Thursday, December 25, 2008

Illini Union

A part of this piece was by Vikram. This is so purely fictional...

As I woke up that morning, I still could feel the pain in my back. It was chronic I thought. After a darkness of 25 years it could have been refreshing, especially when the morning was white outside. But I could not know that it was long 25 years. She looked extremely happy as she gave me some yellow pills. Apparently she knows me since ever and she was 25. Her mother also worked in Elizabeth Health Centre. I tried to say something to her, but she gave me look as if to shut up and went outside the room. There was really old piece of paper, which was lying beside my bed, a 2008 old driving licence of Illinois and some credit cards. All of them said the same, my name was or is Amit. The cellphone lying was really old Samsung model and I thought I owned it at some point of time. May be I should call somebody or anybody, who I could. But it was broken!


That piece of paper read somethign like this...

"A regular hot chocolate and a muffin please", I said to the man, who looked like a part time student, working in the store at the first floor of the union. He didnt get me and gave a questioning look followed by a delayed "sorry". I repeated myself, though this time in a more crappy and faulty english. Thankfully he got me and responded with the ever popular "mm hmm". Actually I had come, leaving my work at the office, to eat some crap at McD. But the damn shop was closed and so were others in the food court down in the basement. As result, I was standing in the middle with a pineapple orange muffin in one hand and a hot C in the other looking for a better place to sit. My eyes took me to the back hall where cosy big sofas and royal comfortable chairs welcomed my ass. I walked and chose a chair in front of the 2 meter high window hoping that hot drinks and chicks would go along.
It was nice warm weather outside. The grass was greener than last time. But there werent many 'people' around and for sure my hot C was unhappy about that. From the position where I was, one couldnt miss a pair of oldies sitting in the open under the shed. But eyes dont see what they optically should, instead they choose to be slaves of your heart. I turned my head zero-one-eighty many a time to spot a chicky, only to find my blue jeans discolour themselves with the brown hot C spilled in the process. I was tired and before I could start thinking random, eyes were allowed the freedom to look at. The old man and woman. Sitting next to each other right in front of me oblivious to the presence of a black bearded, curious guy in blue jeans sipping hot C. They looked happy, I realised they were coupled and its a real long life they must have seen together. The lady had a bag on her lap to which she held tightly with one hand as if she feared it would fall. She wore sunglasses and bright pink coloured clothes. Every time she completed a thought she would gesture with the free hand hinting everything is just fine. The man was more mundane. Wearing a blue t-shirt and a blue jeans, a combo I never tried, he had his hands rest on the armrest and held his head high looking at the cement stripped green fields of the quad. Often he would notice people and their actions and speak to himself. They were both silent. Infact it didnt occur to me till then that there hasnt been a spoken word between them.
Sometimes the old man would point at things he found funny and nostalgic and the lady would confirm his thoughts with a smile. And again they would look together at the sky or may be at the tall foellinger, the taj of the campus, and share memories, good and bad. Perhaps, he was a professor and might have taught...I couldnt complete this thought as I caught myself eating the paper glass. The hot C is no more and I had no clue who drank it but me. So that was a dollar and 45 cents blown in air, though a frac of it still felt liquid in my blue jeans. I unwrapped the muffin and with the first bite decided to eat it slowly with full gratification.
Both were still silent. She took out a book from her bag and started reading, looking up every two seconds to appreciate the sunny day. He added to his set of discretised movements a every now and then smile at the various coloured faces which entered and exited the back door to the union. He was the more expressive of the two as he would make her smile very often with his frequent gestures at the happenings in the rich quad. Or is it not the question of expressing, if what you live for is a smile of your lady love. Sometimes he would take his hands to the back of his head and would allow himself a sigh of relief and sometimes he will try to see what she is reading. I dont know but I felt that they dont seem to be disturbed by the time which passed them invisible. Or at least they didnt care. And I think how much they loved silence was how much they loved each....I discovered that muffin met with the same fate as hot C and the sweet pineapple orange flavour was displaced with the need of tasteless water. As I stood up, the work at the office kicked my brain and for a moment I forgot why I stood up. Next instant I look out and see the couple and then for some 'blessed' reasons known best to God I decided I need a sleep.
Often the undergrads, who really are under pressure, are found snatching sleep at the Illini unoin from their busy schedules. And seriously I had no reasons and very important works behind me to sleep there. But very soon I found a nice long sofa and in a flash jumped on to it with my ass facing the roof. I usually sleep in a minute or so, but the story is different if you just had a regular hot C. It took me around ten minutes to fall asleep and that was only after my mind got sick and tired of the fast, random, out of the deepest blue thoughts which I thought for this to work. I thought of spiderman 2 which we had planned to watch the day after, about the extravagant shots I hit the other day, how easy it is to waste time, conversations I had with two other vagabonds, front cover of sports illustrated 2004 ohh...veronica, front cover of Griffiths I was just reading, snaps of messy work I have done...
It was a dreamless sleep. But what a sleep it was. I slept for 2 hours but it felt I havent slept like this for ages. I was fresh and clean. I knew clearly I have some work to do and I should be going now. With my new found synergy I stretched myself and started walking. I exited through the back door and the evening view welcomed me with a pleasent temperature. I was walking fast and as I turned around to see the people in the open, I saw them. An acute deceleration followed, the couple were still there. They didnt look at me. I thanked them. I felt that I will never see them again, how often do you see people second time in your life! I said byes and started walking. As I increased my pace going away from them I heard them saying silently to themselves: No byes Vikram kyonki yeh zindagi bahut lambi hai aur humare paas waqt bahut kam. I took the short cut through grass and smiled.

......

Vikram.. I thought my name was Amit. I could not tell if the handwriting was mine. If something like this happened with Vikram.. I thought I would wait and ask Melissa.

(to be continued..)

Saturday, October 02, 2004

We, the people


Now this is the latest pics of Swades from Indiafm.dom.I must say that the way this Ashutosh guy is handling thepublicity of the movie is awesome. The trailors are a must watch. And also I liked the casting of the movie. If anyone remembers this Markand Despande ; he is too in the movie and also has a song picturized on him. And for him, it is sung by Kailash Kher, which sounds so exotic. One more similiarity I have found in Swades and Lagaan that here is also a YOGI in the movie. Thats this Markand Deshpande. Anyway, enough of this movie trivias, I must go back to solve the ME677 assignment no 3 ; else I am doomed.

Monday, September 27, 2004

New Adobe

Today, in fact, one hour ago, I registered the domain http://www.amitmohanty.com. Finally I am having a net room and I feel elated. Maybe, after 8-9 hours they will actiave it. Lets see where I go from there.

A Deserving Night Out

Not that I never tried; not that I never get motivation; not that I don't try to make mine like any other myriads of blogs (No pun intended. There are good ones like that of Vikram !! ) who publish poems; but I simply can't. The words, the clean web of thoughts and the intensity never comes to me. I mean, its strange, really it is. When I try, at times I become miserably romantic , sometimes I am astoundingly arrogant and rest of the time I am sleeping. I try my hands at story writing, but I just don't have the patience to begin the end. So, probably you will find many adhuri kahanis in my cupboard, in my bath room and on my desktop. There is no end to the end of my stories. Yet, every day I craft one and every day, I regret not to complete. Recently, I am reading some books on "13498 Methods of Killing " by anonymous, so that I can enough knowledge about how to write a Sherlock Homes. My problem is that I never really read a fiction. Recently, when I am 23; I finished all the volumes of Harry Potter; before that..hmm..Well let me remember. By the way, the stuff like Playboy and Penthouse belong to the class of fiction, isn't it? Well, well, well, I never read those. Anyway, so writing is just not my cup of tea.

I can only write blogs. May be I can write few self-glorifying phrases on my website. I had a whole sleepless night to modify my blog and my webpage as I plan to host my website on a personalized cyberspace. And I have started looking for a cheap place, where I don't need to flow much of my dollars and yet service should be good. Any suggestion is always welcome. I have been trying to hear the music of Swades, but Ragga does not connect for that movie. Seems that a lot of of people are listening to the streaming audio. But, sometime I will have my share of luck.

Tuesday, September 21, 2004

Did this guy inspire SWADES?

I am an avid Shahrukh Khan fan, for many reasons. So, when I saw blog of BD regarding the release of his new film SWADES, in which he plays a role of a NASA scientist who returns to India, for he has left something which he can't find at NASA, I was thrilled. The promos of the movie is really impressive, atleast the first one. While wandering in thoughts about the movie, I just thought about this guy. Is he the inspiration for the movie?

A simple looking guy, with an attire that would resemble any college-goer, a deep bespectacled pair of eyes, the smile that would tell you that he is too content with his life. Goes to his boss and says:

"I want to resign."
"What?....Why?"
"I want to go back to my own country."
" Why you want to go to your country? We are paying you the best in the world and you are one of the finest computer scientist in our whole company."
"Yet! I want to go?"
"What would it take our company to make you stay?"
"Adobe India!!!"

Rest is probably a story told many times all over the news media. He started the Adobe India from scratch and bang bang !!! Now, it accounts for the 20% of the whole business of Adobe. And, those still could not identify the guy, he is Naresh GOD Gupta, IITK Comp Sc. , President Gold Medalist. And is he the inspiration of SWADES? May be or may be not !!! May be, this is not his life being told on the screen. But, who cares? This would not make him less of a hero.This story is probably a history, someday the history would be legend and legend would be myth (!!!). But, this inspiring tale would never cease to exist.
http://www.expressitpeople.com/20040816/people1.shtml

Friday, September 17, 2004

The tale of sine and cosine

"He never believed in the theroy of time, atleast as proposed by Einstein. His watch sometime showed the time which people back there in India followed and then sometimes, it showed the Eastern Time. He tried to make things as time invariant as possible. The assignments and the proposal defense winked and disappeared as the smoke in the air. Then the time to reconsile. Sometimes pretty soon and sometimes pretty fast."
"Knock ..Knock..."
After so much of pain and patience and determination and perseverance and what not, I was just trying to write a blog after such a long time and trying to sound as cool as possible; sometimes as if I am having an I-Don't-Care attitude and sometimes feigning as if I really care and then throughly confusing myself what to write next. And this knock on the door. I really did not knwo what I felt . The pleasure of being escaped from a state of utter confusion or the indignation of being disturbed.
"Hey, Aaameet ! Whats ye doin? May I come in?"
"You are already inside dick." Well, the guy is Dick Morgan. (Name changed to hide identification.)
"He He. Listen Man, didya do that freakin assignment . I am snail slow at doin it , Man. And this
James guy, he wants it on Monday."
"Hmm.. Go ahead." The assumption that James guy is the professor will fetch you ten outta ten.
"Can you help me out , Man? See, I did it as told, not gettin the mu****#$%$ answer ,Man."
"Hmm...Oho..Okay." A moment of silence and moments were longening into seconds and seconds into minutes and he was really getting worried as the quata of nothignness reached his two sensory organs, which were initially dangling from his head and now , they were up like a pair of antenna with pigments of red.

"I think you took the cosine vaule of 60 degree instead of sine of the same. See.."
"How do you know that freaking number 0.5 or whatever is the value of sine of 60.."
Interupting.." Thats cosine of 60."
"Whatever.. You never told me, Man. You know, if I know this trick this will help me a lot. "
Arbitarily and out of context. " Dick, tell me do you look into you state ID when I ask your name?"
"Haaaannn..?????"
"Nothign. Actually its not that difficult. You diffentiate the sine and you get the cosine. So, if you
know the cosine , you know the sine."
"Thats cool. But, how do you know what is cosine?"
"Well, integrate sine."
"Hmm. pretty cool. Now, I know your secret."
"Right, so you may be lost in some island and sitting on the shore thinking about some yatch and thinking what your girl friend doing last friday when you were lost in the sea, yet you can know the sine and cosine."
"Wow...Hey, did you do your assignment ?"
"No, I am yet to lost in some island. I will see you tomorrow. I have this work to do, update my blog and all. A hell lot of work."
"Okay. You take care, Aaameet. See you tomorrow in the class."
"Yeah......(slowly).......EXPECTO PATRONUM....."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

P.S. I watched the movie "Kyuin Ho Gaya Naa?". Ash was at her natural grace and the guy was looking cool. Once again they wasted Bachhan Sr. The only moment of respite is in the climax when you have got see Diya Mirza smiling and the movie ends.

Tuesday, September 14, 2004

The Computer

I have been not bloggig since long and excuse me for that those ardent fans of seeing something meaningless and crappy on the net. Finding an excuse is never hard for me. Escaping from the routine massacre is not that difficult for me. If I have to hearken the prophecy, then the nemesis is out, out to massacre the procrastinating tryst with my graduate life. The thesis work is taking unusually long time. I have been having difficult time getting them written, I mean properly written in the format as specified by the graduate school. Thank God, there is something better than Microsoft Word. Not a word to be spoken about it. I find it simply disgustign at this stage.


Now, that I have got a new Dell Dimention 3000 at my apartment and also the high speed (yeah, note the word high speed!!) net connection, I can scribe somthing in my blogger. (Ironically I am writing this from my lab.) And , someday I will...............

P.S.: The soundtrack of Alexander is cool like the movie trailors . go to http://www.alexanderthemovie.com

Thursday, August 12, 2004

Voyage of Sindbad

Twenty four hours, three states in US covered, driver lincense one week old, cops caught two times. Well, that sums upto make the voyage. Its no not any Arabian Night story.

6.30 AM -- Purdue, INDIAN. I start off with a crusing speed of 80 miles as the traffic was low and cops were probably still having the hang over of last night just like me, not to catch me. Sometimes, I felt like a ball throw by Akhtar, speed was kissing hundred. I survived to reach my next destination in Champaign.

11.40 AM -- Champaign, ILLINOIS. I rode greyhound (the bus service) to reach Carbondale in 4.30 PM. I rented a car and started off for St Louis, Missouri.

5.00PM-- Mt Vernon. I took the wrong exit and was moving all inside Mt Vernon for fifty minutes. Finally, I got the right path after asking 72 people.

9.40 PM- Still on the route to St. Louis. Got a call from Tarini, BIotech, IITKGP, Batch 2004, that he has arrived at Lambert International Airport. Fcuk !!! OKAY, I said wait for sometime, may be for hour ..How about two hours? I would reach there.

10.10 PM- I missed the exit for Lambert and was inside downtown St. Louis. Four lanes. Speed 70MPH. I was wondering where the hell I was in. A truck passed beside me. I could see in slowly looking towards my right. OK..Truck ..It would pass in quickly. 10 seconds gone. 20 seconds passed by. What the hell it is carrying? KutumMinar or what? Now, another truck on my left and a big, sharp turn. Wow, it must be feelign great to be sandwiched between two slices of trucks. I would exactly feel the way a chicken breast feels when I have that in McChicken. Just that providence wished otherwise and I survived.

10.20 PM-- Some thign flashing on my rear view mirror. What the hell? Why these guys use these colored light flashing all above their head. Hmmmm..Coz they are cops , a lady cop to be specific. My innocence put on my face saved me.

My life is not that expensive, I can probably take it for granted. But, while returning I was a better driver, coz Tarini was with me.

Saturday, July 31, 2004

Graduate : End of the Begining!!!

Its just not another day. I wonder how often this feeling is going to get me over, pick me up the ground and throw me to ectasy, teasing me softly and remaining as elusive as the mirage, telling me that the show must go on and then making me sleepy, making things appear beautiful and then stealing my every time to glance at them. Its just crazy. I can bear all the pain of burning midnight oils, reading someone else's PhD thesis and writing for paper for some journal, whose editor, you feel is an ****ole. Yeah, its happening. In my dreams and in my reality, in my every notion, I think of it. I amliving for that moment and that moment seems to be appearing in the distant horizon of december. I am graduating. I am, indeed, graduating. The underdog is surprising everyone. I will be graduting this december. I applied for graduation this friday and I have started believing that I can do it this december. And if providence is in love with me unlike past, then I may go for a PhD in Purdue. Shreekant and Amar all are all those fine buddies. I can't really wait to be with them.I don't know though, how to celebrate it. If it had been a year ago, I would have grabbed a budwiser, ok may be, more than just one and couple of calls to Vikram, Vineet and all those cell phone no.s lying in my phone book. But, my annual celebration for Teetolism is on, and I really don't want to again start drinking. I am a bad drinker I must admit. Or, rather I was, atleast. But, I made few calls to my friends I guess.

My Father's Name

People, from back West Asia, especially, from India have this problem may be. But, it is really funny to watch some of the activities of them. This guy is there to get a ticket from Champaign to West Lafayette, Purdue and gave his credit card to the Afro-American Girl at the counter.

Girl: What is you father's name?
Guy: Excuse me.
Girl: I asked your father's name?
Guy: (Paused Astonished. With an accented English this time) Why ya need tha?
Girl: To issue the ticket. ( Girl is equally amused and astonished.)
Guy: Why the hell you need my father's name? (Guy thinking...My dad is not single. He is
happily married to my mom.)
Girl: (Angry, annoyed and amazed) I need your first name , Sir. Not your father's name.
Guy: Thats on my credit card.
Girl : Oho...

Witness to this event were Mitrabhanu Sahu and Vikram Jadhao , both doing their PhD in Physics, UIUC. The guy is me. I guess I made a follow up to the blog written by Ankan.