Art for the sake of art

Splattered all across the internet are numerous hosts of opportunities, each one varying from the most inconsequential of tasks to the most momentous. Each user is met with a barrage of questions and answers when a web-page is opened or a website explored, all of which prompt us to think, ideate and perform. Today, with everyone being brought in to assist, perform and lead, all subjects of the arts and sciences have at least one disciple. However, in this plethora of half-opened windows, the very fundamental art of communication is itself partially ignored when I see that there don’t seem to be any coordinated efforts to keep the writer writing and the editor editing. In all that is considered fun, writing has lost its place amongst the people; even though there are enough readers, there are not, in sufficient numbers, those who wish to satiate them by writing anything of quality unless it is for the sake of money. I don’t know if I should blame it wholly on the lack of encouragement or on the saddening inherent disinterest that today’s youngsters seem to be bred with. I am sure that the question of personal motivation, for no other reason than self-satisfaction alone, can be extended to many other fields of study and, of course, business, but I want to concentrate on the writer but it is the one topic I feel most strongly on. Moving on, I would like to bring in the topic of arts. As the name suggests, the arts encompasses everything that is human by nature – everything that bears a bit of us in it, everything that defies uniformity by bearing aloft the torch of hope that is personality and creativity. The moment we permit an individual to exchange it for money, the creation becomes a commodity. Although I am not here to battle materialism through commoditisation, I believe that such a piece of art that has solely been created to make money out of is not a piece of art any more. I say that if you want to call yourself an artist, you must do so only if you have performed for the sake of art itself. If you want to call yourself a writer, then you will be a true one only if you write for the sake of writing itself. If you have not done so, you are but a businessman, and there will definitely dawn a day when you will lay down your pen and shelve all your paper because you are now rich enough; does that possibility speak anything of creativity at all, or does it speak of riches? Our creativity is for ours to wield, yes, but it must be considered worthy enough if it has been utilised solely to deliver unto mankind the meaning of uniqueness and nothing else. Everything that we think of, every word that we write, every mood that we dictate, is an expression of ourselves. Our presence will then no longer be ripples on water, destined to fade, but markings set in stone. People around us will know that we existed, and they will know not in the remembrance of how rich or poor we were, but in the memory of our deeds. If we were to leave ourselves behind when we pass away, we should know now that we are capable of doing so unblemished; we should understand that there are more ways to show that we helped than in the creations of our desires.

The Choices Of The West

Globalisation has done many things besides open up markets and cause the collapse of local industries. But of course, the other effects have resulted from the opening up of markets. A part of Chennai, where I live from time to time, which I used to frequent was a very conservative area of the city. There is a school there wherein the adopted uniforms consist of a crisp white shirt and a white veshti – a very pleasing sight for a south Indian. The area also has a very active kovil (temple) where bhajans and discourses are held everyday without fail. Apart from the fact that one of my good friends lives here, I like visiting the place for what it is: a live and breathing preservatorium of our essential culture and traditions. The area is West Mambalam. But today, with the nearby Ranganathan street being filled to the brim with shops selling t-shirts with the words like “Armani”, “Billabong” and “Versace” branded right across the torso, all the young men and women on the streets can no longer be discerned as being south Indians apart from careful study of their skin colour. And this is uneasiness is not only restricted to garb. Perhaps I am maturing faster than most people of my age, or perhaps it is my upbringing, but the opinions I have of the people based on the places they frequent is growing to be very judgmental at times. I myself used to enjoy the occasional trips to Silicon Oasis and International City here in Dubai, but the charm per se is lost once I realise what I miss if I could have been elsewhere at the same time. 

I walked into my erstwhile tuition teacher’s house in Nungambakkam for an afternoon’s chat earlier this year, in January to be precise. She is dressed in a churidhar – a traditional Indian costume. The sight is calming to the eyes. For someone like me, who very much likes being at home for more than the obvious reasons, walking into a room wherein everything is Indian gives me the feeling of being in familiar company even though all the people in the room could have been strangers. Anyway, as I whipped up an interesting and bristling conversation with my teacher, one by one her students for the evening began to walk in. The first girl to enter was wearing a pink shirt and shin-length jeans (or whatever they are called). The girl following her didn’t have much of a variation to boast about, except that her shirt was blue. It felt, for some reason again, as though the American industries threatening to encroach into foreign territories had actually opened up a store in my teacher’s living room. I hold very deep opinions about such things as choices, and the assurance I derive from seeing a boy in a veshti or a girl in a pavadai dhavani is indescribably satiating. Perhaps it is the comfort in wearing such clothes, or perhaps it is the ease, and so I forgave them – in my narrow little mind, of course! But these are the kind of people who detest those who do don traditional clothes; it is next to impossible, if not impossible itself, to see them wearing “such things” even during festival days. It is this choice that finds disapproval with them. I concede that I wear a casual t-shirt and a pair of jeans at all times, but when it comes to a special day, I actually find it exciting to walk around in a veshti. That feeling of being “a tall and proud man who has nothing to fear and believes in himself if not in anything else” – that sensation – I always have when being seen by anyone in traditional clothing.

(It is for these same reasons that I appreciate Deve Gowda, our ex-PM. I don’t know which political ideologies he represented, but I do know that I like the fact that he wore a veshti to every country he made diplomatic trips to! When people say he’s someone from the countryside and probably doesn’t know what to wear while meeting people from elsewhere, I just think the people who say such things have never really given thought to the fact that he might actually be upholding the same beliefs as I have at the moment.)

As much as I blame the West for what they’ve done to erode the quality of preferences in my country, I know I will also have to consider what my country has done to them in return. The West being the fountain of capitalism, globalisation was a commercial inevitability for their industries. As the shades of power shifted from the labour unions toward the bourgeois, so did the opinions and the decisions. Cultural blankets became curtains waiting to be parted. When the window of the East was exposed to the aspirations of the West, the opportunities of those behind the window doubled when they saw what was in the world out there. We took their jobs, they took ours. We took their means to earn money, they took ours. We adopted their preferences, they gave us new ones to look out for in case we were still interested. We became the instruments for their success, they became the instruments for ours. It is only expectable that one day, we will become them and they will become us. Identity will be lost, just as it is being nibbled away by the minute today, and individuality will tenderly float on still water. The solution lies not in permanently embracing your roots, but in being able to preserve them at least in mind and thought. Globalisation can be handed the blame of opening up markets, but that is all there is to it. We have let our apparently justified choices encroach on the markets of our mind. All that the man in the West is doing is giving us more options. The more we think about deciding which one to pick, the more we are giving in to losing hope. When as many things as charity and politics begin in the comfort of the home, so does our identity. It is our first face.    

Demystifying Cool

Being cool has come a long way. I can’t really place my finger on when, but I’d like to knight the psychedelic ’70s with the origin. No one really knows what it means, and the word, rather the term, assumes a meaning only in context and again, only when it is part of the utterance of a worthy speaker. If a bespectacled village idiot says it, the inherent dignity that it seems to bear vanishes in a flash, and you don’t have anyone speaking of it in a 50-mile radius for a week. But, say, if Basshunter uses it in one of his songs, it undergoes rapid evolution into a catchphrase which you will find being spoken about in the whole country. I guess it’s one of those things that happen on YouTube: a video is posted, the number of views skyrockets, and it becomes what is called an ‘internet phenomenon’ and the centre of cyber-tourism. Anyway, the young men and women crowding in parties – supplemented, of course, with bulging wallets and bosoms – are cool, but those sitting home by the utopic fireplace and smoking a pipe aren’t. Driving a car that makes a lot of noise and farts even more smoke is cool, while driving a truck (which does the same things) isn’t. Wearing a shirt that has a design resembling a mutated eagle with matching denim pants is cool, but wearing  casual shirt and pants while the heat shoots past sweltering isn’t. However, once a formerly cool guy is spotted by a wannabe, the trends catch on with ‘being cool’. Cotton clothing? Cool! Trucks? Cool! Fireplace and pipe? Cool! 

And that’s why I think the need to be cool should exist. If you don’t understand, here’s why: as long as people fear individuality, as long as people accentuate their external loci of identity, they go farther away from being who they really are. Only by touching the flames of a fire can you know, in the future, why you shouldn’t do it. Only when the time comes that ‘not being themselves’ is no longer a feasible solution will they understand the importance of being oneself. Being cool is being individual. Being cool is being unafraid. Being cool is believing in oneself. The cool guy on the street is who he is because he doesn’t, for a single moment, care about what others think of him; you admire that quality in him, but through a mask that filters out the cause of that. You see only the effect, and you don the garb of the effect. Thereon, what ever you do will be fake because your actions don’t stem from an inborn cause. It’s just like trying to make the external shell of a car run – you didn’t bother about the engine. All you can do now is frame it in a cubicle and make it a show-piece. People will ogle at it, but when the real car runs by, your time will run out. 

‘Being cool’ is not a stereotypification of any sort. Like I said before, it has to be the nucleus of a worthy utterance from a worthy utterer. It can be understood only when the contextual meaning is understood. It’s not something you would use as you would ‘Fuck!’. That’s a word that everyone knows and understands, but ‘cool’ demystified is… fluorescent? Yes, that’s the word! 

Freesoul

You should know the world is a big bad and dirty little place to be, although people keep saying it’s the good earth – that’s only because they’ve got nowhere else to go. This world is full of people like you and me, and that’s important to know. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to be home by the fireplace, a cup of hot chocolate in you hand, and watching ‘Lion King’ – some quality time with yourself. There’s somethings in life you’ll always feel good doing, and one of them’s being home and in the company of those you love. That’s what’s gonna make you feel comfortable and not have too many issues with the world. If you’re YOU all the time, then there’s nothing in this world to be worried about. It’s only when you start living the lives of others do you feel alone, but that’s some place wherein you don’t belong.

There are so many things in this world. Wow, so many things indeed! 7,000,000,000 personalities and 7,000,000,000 perceptions. Do you think each one of them sees the world a different way? I think so. There’s so much more to this world than the politics, the economics, the wars, the diplomacies, the logistics, the transportation, the sciences, the religions, the philosophies, so much more. First of all, there’s the beauty. Now, there’s two kinds of beauty. The one that we see straight away. This kind of beauty is everywhere, form the poems we write to the stories we read to the people we meet. The other beauty is not so naked. You see, there are only a few people who know where that beauty lies, and I count myself one of the blessed. That beauty lies hidden away in the folds of the seconds of time. You’ll have to stop whatever you’re doing, and wait for a moment for that rush to subside. And then, you’ll see the world as it is. You’ll see it’s very purpose unclothed, and you’ll feel so humble. It’s a mighty universe out there, and when it’s done so much with the suns and the stars, do you think it’s gonna leave the earth alone? Do you think it’s gonna leave you alone?

You’ll see the people around you a different way.

Some of these people are those who wanna stick to a routine. These are the ones afraid of boredom. When they have nothing to do, they don’t know what to do at all. It’s because these are the people who have spent most of their lives taking orders from others. These people are scared of facing the truth as you and I see it. They’re afraid of themselves.

And there are the people who fake their personalities. They do it not because they’re afraid of themselves. In fact, these some of the people who know who they really are, but are unhappy about it. They wanna change who they are, and they take up different personalities. But that’s where these people fail, and that’s where I pity them. One of them just picks up a personality he sees on the street and sheds his own. What he doesn’t realise is that he’s now leading the life of the other person: he’s giving that person a second chance to live his life. What I’m confused about is whether these fake people wanna live their lives even once at all.

And there are the I-am-who-I-am people. They’re really nice, but so rare, to come by. They know who they are, and they embrace the fact without any regrets. These are the people who will inherit the earth, not the meek, not the humble, not the anyone-else. These are the people who will want to and continue to belong. These are the people worth meeting people for. But since they’re so damn hard these days to come by, I’d rather sit home and watch ‘Lion King’.

You’ll see the nature around you a different way.

You think the tree in the distance sways because it’s windy? Why shouldn’t it be possible at all that it’s trying to say something to you, to me, or to some other tree? Just because you can’t reason it out scientifically doesn’t mean it can’t happen. When we say our knowledge of the universe is limited, we mustn’t just say it. We must believe in it and apply it. I believe that the tree is trying to say something to me. (Why ME is a long and different story!) And when I see a tree swaying, I think. And that’s who I am and I’m not afraid of it. George Bernard Shaw once said “you all see things as they are and ask why; I dream of things that are not and ask why not”. Isn’t that a nice way of putting it? Acceptance seems to be so hard in this world. But I’m not complaining: there’re enough quacks out there to ruin the whole thing, and I know people are just being careful. Like I said, I’m not complaining, I’m just worried and sympathising.

When you stop for a second like that and think of things as they are and not what you’ve made them to be, it’ll all dawn on you. What you need to do next, who you actually are, and what you’re purpose in life actually is. There’s little more to living than enjoying the beauty and being a part of it. What some of these people around me do is too surreal. But hey, what would you rather be, painfully aware or blissfully ignorant? 🙂

What it all calls for is a release from the body we occupy, for in all that we happens around us, the mind is at work and the body only makes the difference. If we shed our bodies, we’d all be peaceful and carefree souls floating through the timeless universe. There would be no keyboards, mouses, chairs tables, rooms, doors, windows, corridors, buildings, walls, fences, prisons, schools, roads, streets, cars, planes, hotels, brothels, guns, tanks, jets, bombs, bullets, wars, battles, bloodshed, boundaries, no reason to be unhappy. There would be little smiles floating in the air. So that’s what I thought. Just because I can’t shed my body doesn’t mean I can’t imagine it, does it? And so, I did it. I shed my body. I only think because I have to. That’s a wonderful way of living you know, without having to be worried about the next moment, only concerned about the present. In fact, think of this: the present really doesn’t exist. The history does because it’s the only innate knowledge we possess, and the future does because it’s the only unknown that we prophecise about. In the fleeting moment that the future consumes us, we fall into its trap and let it become history. What if the present had been forever? What if you could do anything you wanted to, without having to worry about the consequence? When there’s no history, there’s no consequence.

Have you seen the flaw yet? The only flaw is that we’ve all already been created. And since we’re created, it only means there is a history, and since we’ve all jumped in suddenly from nowhere into the universe, there will also be a future. But again, that is all there is to it. The solution to everything in this world is being happy with yourself. And to be happy with yourself, you need to see the beauty around you: that, as far as I can see, is the only redemption this earth has to offer. Think not of those around you, and for a small moment in there, think not of your closes ones. See where you really lie. Forget science, forget religion, forget God. Just you, alone in a wide universe, but not so alone when you think you’re one of a kind, because you are. There’s nothing that can stop you from being happy.

Tell me now, what can? 🙂

Care For A Poem?

Hello. I am a writer, or at least aspire to be one. I wear glasses, I think I am very verbose, use big words and dream of sitting lakeside, somewhere in Spain one day, with a Remington typewriter in front of me and a Lucky Strike burning away a few centimetres from my teeth. I day dream about winning the Nobel Prize in Literature, although I never see that happening with the way I am going.

Howdy! I am a blogger. I have more than one blog, but choose to publicise just one because the others didn’t turn out well, and let’s face it, this one’s not that good either. But even though I know that, I wear a mask of indifference and think what I write is the new shit – and that keeps me wondering as to why my name doesn’t appear on the “Top Posts from around WordPress” list. I spend half of my day ogling at the stats page, and jump around in my lonely room when there is a jump in the number of viewers.

Hey! I’m a software programmer, although I’ve never sold anything. I have my name in the market by word of mouth, and if do land an order, I never meet the deadlines. My room has a computer, a fully equipped Alienware system with oil-cooled processors! I also have an X-Box, some old newspapers, a picture of my ex-girlfriend, and some porno videotapes. I get paid on an order-basis, and that’s usually between $1,500 to $2,000. Most of this goes away on food and rent, and other miscellaneous expenses. Oh, and I get together with my other friends on week  ends and have some beer while watching a ‘Star Wars’ marathon for entertainment. Yes, always the same movie. Why do you ask?

Hey! I’m a stock broker, and my job is to make money. But of course, with the recent recession and everything, I’ve lost a lot. I couldn’t even afford rent and my kids’ schooling. The wife left, of course. What could she do? I’m happy the kids are fine at her parents’ place. Oh, it was my birthday yesterday! Yeah! Me, Ronnie and Chuck spent some time together in the evening, they threw me a party at the local, and then we headed for some fun at Missy Margaret’s. I hope the wife doesn’t find out, though. But what can I do? I’m fifty, for God’s sakes! Sometimes, you know, I have these moments in the evenings when I’m bored… I just feel like pulling my hair out – if I had any! Life sucks!

Who’s yo daddy?! Yo man, I’m a rapper for the Numb Nuts. We fire up the gangster scene, yo! Me? I live with my mom. How the **** is that funny?! Get outta ma sight before I thump ya, ya ******f****r! What did you say?! So what if I’m white?! Yo man, you gettin’ on ma nerves now, you racist ***-**-*-*****! Get outta ma sight!

Hee! I work at Wal Mart’s; I’m a counter clerk. Yeah, I know the work’s a little too much, but I enjoy it. You know what I do after work? I go that gasoline station right over there, yeah that’s the one, and me and my boy hook up for some fun! And then we go and have some ice cream together. He knows my favourite flavour, oh he does! He’s so sweet, you know? He gets me all kinds of toys, you know! Oh! He’s so sweet. But now he wants to leave me! Can you believe that?! But I’m gonna wait for him right here. I know he’ll come back one of these days. Maybe you should come over to my place some time! We can have some coffee and then some ice creams! What do you think? Wait! Where are you going?!

Hello there! I’m the Chief Statistician here! You can call me Whiney around here, you can call me that! Weird name right, ‘Whiney’? They always laugh when I ask them what it means! See, they all know I’m funny! I always knew I was funny, you know! <Giggle> My mom used to always stifle me when I was a kid, and I never really had the chance to open up when I felt like it. So I went to my friends and told them all about my problems at home… it all seemed so trivial then that I laughed about them. They used to call me Whiney’ too, you know! Argh! I love being funny! <Giggle> Oh, please, yes, sit down! What? I’ve been served?! But today’s Christmas! What?!

(My greatest fears in life.)

Love Lost In A Paradox?

Note: This post is intended for the guys. And “they” consists of the girls.

As long as I know that they do fall for me, I don’t need a girlfriend! After a circumstantial break-up with my previous (and first :P) girlfriend, I realised I was worth more than I could imagine. I was apparently good material for you-know-what, and this nicotinic blood shot straight to my head to deliver me to a new world. I went crazy; all of a sudden, I was born anew. But in spite of all this, I would like to stay within that paradox, if possible for the rest of my life. Knowing that there’s someone out there who will like you for who you are is a beautiful feeling, if not ego-inducing, but that can’t be helped. It makes you believe in yourself if you already don’t, and that’s always a welcome addition to your persona’s arsenal. It reinforces your other beliefs, it fortifies the truth that is your perception of the world, and it eliminates the need to always ask for a second opinion on matters – after all, there’s another person out there who takes your word for it! Let me tell you, they’re of all kinds. You may not know this, or you may have chosen to ignore it, but you will come to realise this at some point of time.

😛

Like Joey Tribbiani says, “just grab a spoon”! They’re also who me and you are, and they also have the problems as us. If you’re judging them based on some preconception that go like “girls are aliens” (Dexter), “I can’t look them in the eye” (me till a few days back), and so on and so forth, you’re completely mistaken, misled and more prone to blunders. I’m not saying I’m Dr. Love. I’m just saying open your eyes a little more. Radical feminism doesn’t say you have to revere them, nor does it set them apart. It only means they have more problems than you do. Even they wanna bunk class, even they wanna headbang, even they wanna light up, even they wanna drink, even they wanna provocative T-shirts, even they wanna do the things you do. You both are from the same society, most probably the same state, probably the same era, and the same state of mind. Maybe they don’t do those things because they think someone’s looking; if you turn your back to her for a few moments, she could be going mad on ‘The Trooper’. It’s all up to you. Varun Vohra once said, “If you make a decision, stick to it”. It’s up to you to pick the time to live up to it! Take a step forward. Forget the world behind you.

A077513

While on one of my ritualistic excursions through the net, I came across this article on Wiki about the 1999 Columbine High School massacre, listed as America’s deadliest high school tragedy. I went through the whole thing, starting from the strategy of the two kids, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, and their blood stained tour through the school, before they killed themselves. With a whole lot of debates raging from Cassie Bernall’s questioning and Rachel Scott’s Christian martyrdom, psychiatrists blame the megalomaniac nature of the two students for the whole incident. I also went around looking for Harris’ blog page, which seems to have been removed, where he documented all the hatred he bore towards the society in general, the making of the pipe bombs and the propane explosives, and the death threats he issued to his neighbours and family friends. This might all seem like me digging up an issue so known and old to the readers out there, but to me this is something new. I come from a very secular and conservative society, and all children are taught patience as a virtue even before they begin schooling. The need of tolerance is very high in a country in India, and though it seems to restrict our personality developments in the earlier stages of our lives, we come to understand it later on and also appreciate it. But what’s interesting to me here is not the mental structure of Harris or Klebold, but the social phenomena that may have provoked them to commit this crime. I for one believe that not everyone is a fool, and even though foolish decisions exist, there must have been some reason or the other that provoked them to commit this misinformed and misguided act. Looking beyond the role of one’s parents to take responsibility for their child, the role of the society also plays a very important role in one’s upbringing. The friends you make, the relationships you hold on to, the people you turn to in times of crisis, and the people whom look up to or look down on.

The impressions you have in the minds of the people around depends on many social factors. At the same time, one other factor that inhibits a complete assumption and ‘display’ of one’s own personality is bullying. While bullies seek to overshadow some other moment(s) of failure in their lives by picking on younger kids, the effect they have can even be devastating. Bullying exists in the childhood of every child, either as the bully or as the victim. If you had been the bully, you’d have experienced some sort of overwhelming sensation that makes you think that you’re in power at that moment – a compensation for your megalomania. But the victim feels helpless in a world that is supposed to have helped. It blunts the display of your character and makes the issue seem rudimentary and inconsequential in your eyes, further deepening its nails. This will lead to a suppression of emotion on a temporary basis but as the child matures, it will all pour out in one form or the other. The need for a friend and a friendly touch is always necessary for an adolescent youth, and this need is projected in our conformity to a given set of rules and regulations in order to find acceptance and a sense of belonging and, most importantly, identity. A loss of identity is equivalent to having home no go back to at the end of the day, an absence of an ideal reference point for all your decisions. As for the blames on the violent video games and all that, I think those wouldn’t have mattered much as long as the child had in mind the fact that it was a just game, a portrayal of some event as it would have been if it ever happened.