I'd been wanting to take a break for a long time. A break from freelance writing, from blogging, from the kind of writing I'd do because I was compelled to do it. Money was the factor behind the compulsion to write freelance, while the expectations of my readers and their prompts kept me blogging regularly. But now, I've decided enough is enough. Yes, I still need money very badly. Yes, I still want people to read my blog. But all that can wait. There is a much greater purpose in my life now, and to accomplish it, I must focus on it. What that thing is, I won't reveal right now. But rest assured, my absence from the freelance writing world and the blogosphere will be temporary, and the reason for it should hopefully become apparent in about two years' time.
Till then, let suspense rule...

P.S. I'll still be updating my Twitter account on a fairly regular basis. Writing a mini-blog of 140 characters is far easier than writing full posts on Blogger.
You can follow me at http://www.twitter.com/aparajitab
I'll also continue as the Administrator of The ABC Club, occasionally posting about books I read.

Be yourself

“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him...”
Genesis 1:27
If that is true, then God, or Gods (because in Hinduism you have crores of gods) must be very much like humans. That is the basis for the following write-up, which is totally intended to be interpreted with a sense of humour. It is in no way blasphemous, nor is it intended to hurt the feelings of any community.
For more information about Durga Puja, click here.

Durga was sitting in her dressing room, getting ready for her journey to her father's home. She was humming to herself as she lined her beautiful eyes with a black eyeliner. Having finished it, she opened her bottle of mascara and applied it to her long eyelashes. She was just coating the lower eyelid of her third eye when Lakshmi came in.
“Ma,” she said, “can I borrow your mascara if you have finished with it? Yours is by Sabyasachi, mine's by Tarun Tahiliani, and I so love Sabyasachi's creations...I so wish we had a designer like that in Kailash...”
“You can take it,” said Durga airily. “But don't call me Ma. I hate being called Ma. It makes me feel...”, she searched around for a word, “...feel...so old! And all these humans. Ma, ma, all the time. Even those seventy-year olds have to call me their mother. They don't know how to treat a woman.”
“What's your age, Ma?”, Ganesh asked as he peeped into the room.
Durga flared up, but when she saw who it was, she softened a bit. Her youngest son was her darling. “Ganu, darling, you should know better than to ask a woman her age.”
“You can't be very young, Ma,” Ganesh contended. “You have four grown-up children.”
“That's true”, lamented Durga. “Look at you four. Grown up in no time...”
“They even call me 'Ma',” sniffed Lakshmi.
“And me too,” piped in Saraswati as she entered the room. “Ma, I'd like to borrow your nail polish.”
“Take it,” Durga said, “And don't call me Ma.”

The sisters Lakshmi and Saraswati were in the room they shared. Lakshmi was trying on her new sari. She turned and twisted in front of the mirror.
“Does this make me look fat?”, she asked her sister.
Saraswati didn't even look up. She was playing her veena for one last time before it was to be packed into its case for their journey to their grandfather's home. “No,” she said in a bored voice. Momentarily she looked up.
“EEK!”
“What?” Lakshmi spun around.
“Black nailpolish? Black?”
“Oh,” Lakshmi said. “Oh that. I was just...erm...trying out a new style. You know, trying to go Gothic.”
“Gothic!”
“What's so strange about that?”
“Lakshmi, I play classical music! And punk rock...O God!...Wait a minute, I'm a god. But then...Gothic...”, she shook her head miserably.
“And I wish they give me some good saris down there this time,” Lakshmi continued happily. “It's always the rich embroidered ones, and always the heavy gold jewellery...platinum would be cool, don't you think?”
She turned around to face her sister and saw that Saraswati looked about to cry.


Munching on his fifteenth laddoo that day, Ganesh walked into the Kailash gym. Kartik was exercising hard with the weights.
“Hi, bro”, Ganesh said.
Kartik put down his weights and turned around. He was sweating profusely.
“Eating laddoos again, huh, Ganesh?”, he said.
“Lifting weights again, huh, Kartik?”, Ganesh said in the same way.
“I have to,” Kartik said seriously. “Six-pack abs are a fad with the humans now. They would want to see my well-toned body...”
“Aha! You want to impress the girls!”
Kartik flushed a little. “Well, you already have Kalavati, in any case. And fighters must always be fit, girls or no girls,” he added.
He watched Ganesh savour his laddoo and said, “You should go on a diet, Ganesh. That belly of yours is showing worse than ever. Your rat wouldn't be able to take your weight this time”, he said, and laughed out loud.
“Watching you and Lakshmi on your diets is bad enough,” Ganesh commented.
Kartik was still laughing. “You'll need a more sturdy form of transport soon.”


In another part of Kailash, Durga was arguing with her husband.
“I don't see the point in tagging along Mahishasur's body every time”, Durga whined.
“It's a show of power, sweetheart,” Shiv said.
“And all those weapons. My arms ache so much holding them all for four long days. The humans have no compassion!”
“But you are the form of Shakti, honey. You must carry them. The humans will expect to see them in your hands, and when they see you holding them, they will gain strength from you, darling,” Shiv smiled.
Just at that moment, Durga's lion roared.
“Time to go,” Durga sighed. “I wish you were coming with us, darling,” she said to her husband.
“I'm always watching over you all, you know that,” Shiv said consolingly. He added, “But why are you so morose? You used to enjoy going to your father's home...”
“I'm not morose about going to Baba's,” Durga said. “It's just the humans. Their expectations of us. Their worship of us. It tires me. I'm always so tense. I'm always worried that we'll not be able to live up to their expectations.”
“Don't worry, Durga,” Shiv said. “Just be yourself. Or as much as you can be, with Mahishasur's body at your feet and all those weapons in your hands”, he added. "But cheer up, please, Durga."
Durga's lion roared a second time and her four children came traipsing into view. Lakshmi and her white owl, Saraswati and her white swan, Kartik and his peacock, and Ganesh and his little rat.
“Well, time to go, children,” Shiv said. “Come here, give Baba a hug.”
They all walked into his arms and hugged him.
“See you in four days, all of you,” Shiv called as they all mounted their respective animals. “And be yourself, all of you. Just because you're gods doesn't mean you have to pretend to be so much stronger and better than the humans...be yourself!”, he called as they rode out of view.

And so began the journey of Durga and her children into the land of humans. And this time, they will not pretend to be something they are not. Watch out, humans, for a Pujo with a difference.

Personal Agenda

Every Sunday, you get a magazine called Brunch with the Hindustan Times. The last page of the magazine features an interview with a celebrity, titled 'Personal Agenda' and there are some fixed questions that are asked. Just for fun, I decided to solve the questionnaire today and put it up on my blog. So here goes....

Fun to you is...
Shopping at my favourite bookstore at my favourite mall.

If you were invisble for a day, you would...
Bug all the people who usually bug me.

The one invention you're really waiting for...
Something that can read the minds of babies. I'd really like to know what babies think.

Would you like to be young forever?
Definitely not. With age comes wisdom. And boy, do I need that! It really embarrasses me when I think of all those stupid things I did just because I was young and had no wisdom.

What are you reading at the moment?
Um...nothing, I guess. Do textbooks qualify?

Who is your favourite cartoon character?
There are two, actually. Calvin and Hobbes.

The place you really want to visit and why?
Paris, and because I really want to see all the “endroits célébres” of that city.

Which film's hero/heroine do you most identify with?
Matthew Macfadyen's Mr Darcy in the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. I can feel my heart beating with that character when I watch that film. I can feel every emotion he feels.

Your idea of a perfect meal?
Nothing, because I don't like eating.

Weekend at a wellness spa or weekend at a luxury beach resort?
Well, at present, I don't have the money to be at either.

Lean or brawny?
Lean, definitely.

Three people from history you'd like to meet?
Jane Austen, who is my idol; Mahatma Gandhi, whom I admire a lot; and R K Narayan, who will probably always be the best Indian writer in English.

Your worst date ever?
Aha! Nice question. I haven't ever been on a date. And yes, that's true, and you may raise your eyebrows.

Ethnic wear or Western wear?
Generally Western wear, sometimes ethnic, and sometimes a combination of both- like kurtis with jeans.

Morning person or night person?
Most definitely a night person. I'm an insomniac. I sleep in the mornings.

What are you addicted to?
Writing.

The naughtiest thing you've ever done?
Was way back when I was a kid. I did many naughty things, like pouring water over quilts, stealing butter from the refrigerator, stealing the nakuldana that was offered to the gods...don't know which qualifies as the naughtiest.

What's your retirement dream?
As long as I live, I'll be writing. So there's no retirement for me.

Five personal care products you can't do without?
Toothpaste, toothbrush, shampoo, soap, and deodorant body spray/perfume. Is that five? ~Counts. Yes, that's five.

Who do you think your partner has a crush on?
I don't have a partner.

Your favourite drink?
Cold water.

The one food you can never say no to?
Chocolate.

Rate in order of importance: fame, money, power.
Power, money, fame.

Your next move?
Publishing this.

Observations

I generally don't post in such quick succession, but I have time on my hands today, and my thoughts are flowing rather erratically, so I decided to channelise them in a post. :-)
I hate social networking sites. I've tried out almost all of them- Myspace, Facebook, Hi5, Orkut...and none of the experiences have been very pleasant. Yet, I maintain my Orkut account for the sole reason that my friends are very keen on using Orkut.
But much as I hate them all, I cannot deny the fact that these networking sites do provide some recreation and food for thought. Today I'm going to share with you a few observations about Orkut.
On Orkut you get all sorts of weirdos. There are of course those people who will send friendship requests out of the blue. I got one such request (before I changed my settings so only people who know my email address can send requests -yes, you can do that in your Settings), and an accompanying scrap: “Please please please make friends with me.” At least the grammar of that one was tolerable. Some will spell friendship as “fraandship” and so on and so forth, but I guess you have all heard a lot about it (and probably also faced it, specially if you're a girl), so I won't harp on that. Instead, let's take a fresh look at new groups of weirdos.
1. There is the kind that doesn't seem to know where they belong. You know, there's this section on your profile that you have to fill up- it's about your location. And some people will go like “Kolkata/Pune”. Okay, we all understand what that means. You're either in Kolkata or in Pune- I suppose one is your home, the other is your workplace or something like that. But do you have to mention both places in that “location”. It asks you where you are located, and nothing more than that. And since you can't be located at two places at the same time (come on, I've never yet met anyone who's ubiquitous, have you?), why do you have to mention the names of both places?
2. Now there is the kind that is so eternally lovesick. They write all sorts of long, long, long essays (yes, essays) in the 'About Me' section, speaking of how someone broke their hearts and so on and so forth. They will join communities like
- “The Problem with Love is...”
- “Love Kills”
- “Why Do I Still Love You?”
- “Nothing Hurts like Love”
- ”Don't hurt me, I'm already dead”
- “Living in Silent Pain”
- “So Much Pain Behind These Eyes”
- “Broken Hearts” (tagline: “god will you let her know that I love her so when there's no one there that she's not alone? just close her eyes and let her know my heart is beating with hers”. No comments.)
Seriously, these communities are all for desperados. I can't imagine anybody sane who'd want to make a public display of their emotions to this horrible extent.
3. And then there are the philosophical weirdos who join communities like
- “What's the Meaning of Life?”
- “Dreams”
- “Blood” (tagline: “for those who love the juice of life”)
- “Tears”
I visited one of these communities to see what they actually do. And there are threads like this on the Forum: “Hi. Want to learn Indian flute?” (1 post); “Torpedo SMS anonimo gratis!” (1 post in God-knows-what-language); “Earn Money through TREKPAY” (16 posts), etc. Almost no thread has more than a hundred posts, and the thread that does have more posts is actually a game totally unrelated to what the community is about.
4. Then there are people who will form stupid communities like this: “This is Not A Community”. Accompanied by a picture that says: “This is Not A Picture”. Community description: “THIS IS NOT A DESCRIPTION. So Let's NOT Get Together, NOT Make Friends, In This
Non-Beautiful, Non-Smart, NON- EXISTING Community. NOT A WARNING : People Who Do Not Spam Will Not Be Banned!!! Please Do Not See: Do Not Read The Community Policies Before Not Posting!!!!!!!” Incidentally, it has 63 270 members.
And this: “I joined too many communities!” (18 516 members). Community description: “The goal of this community is to help Orkut users who joined too much communities.
We are here to discuss about this problem, and possible solutions.
If you can't read all communities you subscribed to, if you can't remember all communities you joined... come here: you'll find help. This community is not intended to spam new communities.
It aims to help people in leaving other communities, or to let them discuss this problem.”
And this: “?”. Community description: 102 question marks. Number of members is 1337.
Then there are communities that promote profanity. “Now WTF” has a strength of 7079. “Bangla Khisti” has a strength of 7209. (If you must know, the word “khisti” in colloquial Bengali means profanity.) “What the Fuck!!!” has 1072 members. I don't see what is so great about using swearwords in every sentence you speak.
5. And lastly, there are morbid people with twisted minds. I've posted something about this earlier. (Click here and here). These people really, really, really need a psychiatrist. They will put up all sorts of gruesome pictures of their hands bleeding where they have slashed their wrists, and so on. There are even communities for them. Pro-suicide groups, I'm tempted to think. One such community is “Die for Love” (it has a picture of a person slashing their wrist) and- would you imagine!- it has 19, 563 members who all need help. The community description goes: “I sit in the park where I dwell for this girl I love so well. She took my heart away from me, now she wants to set me free. I see a boy on her lap she says things to him she never said to me. I ran home to cry on my bed not a word to mother was said father came home late that night. He looked at me from left to right.. he saw me hanging from a rope he took his knife to cut me down and on my dress a note was found: dig my grave dig it deep/ dig my grave from head to feet/ and on the top place a dove/ and remember this, I died for Love.” Pathetic.
I feel so sorry for all these people. Orkut really needs to keep a tab on such communities. And parents need to know which communities their children are joining.

If you have your own observations about social networking sites, you might want to share them in the Comments section.
Till my next post, keep visiting.