Thursday, January 17, 2008

The Internet

Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life. Well, not small, but valuable. And sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it, or because I haven't been brave? So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book, when shouldn't it be the other way around? I don't really want an answer. I just want to send this cosmic question out into the void. So good night, dear void.
- Kathleen Kelly,You've Got Mail

Its 12:24 am here now and more than 10 days since I last updated the blog. And as long as I intend to continue updating, I find no compulsion to give a reason why I should write paragraphs on what kept me from updating. It always makes me feel powerful whenever I say that I am not going to give any explanations for what I have done or perhaps for what I haven't done. It is presumably because nobody will ask me after reading such a thing; and it gives additional length to the post!

In this mean while I saw some good movies - 'Serendipity', 'You've Got Mail', 'When Harry Met Sally', 'Notting Hill' and 'National Treasure 2'. I still have a big list before I can get more space on my computer's hard-drive. Before I saw the first four of the movies I have mentioned above, I only used to like action flicks on some serious and fast ones like 'Da Vinci Code'. But after watching these, especially 'Serendipity' and 'Notting Hill', my whole perspective of romantic ones changed into apparently what I can term as 'sensible'! In fact my perception of this country called United States has also changed - the people there to be specific.

Saturday I experienced a totally new form of time - I had to select curtains for home. To start with my mother liked one which I couldn't like. I asked her to go ahead with it telling that it she, my father and brother who are going to live in the house! Then I liked one which she didn't like because it had black in it. Even till now I couldn't figure out what "not-so-good" the color black has in it. The final selection of course was my choice!

That Saturday I had also visited my paternal uncle's house in the morning. He keeps himself so busy that I literally had to take a kind of appointment from him before he could spend two hours with me discussing about our family and my further education. It started with a question I asked him about why my eldest uncle never visits India. There were reasons - starting from his nature from childhood, moving around his education in India, then his aeronautical engineering in France that costed him 90,000 franks in the early 1970's, the his job in a company named Thompson that dealt with radar systems, his marriage there, his two children, then his divorce, then his lonely life fully dependent on pension. It didn't make me feel good but the conclusion cleared me why my uncle would never come to India.

Then of course was a discussion about my father's maternal aunt who is a Saudi national and how she had been funding and sponsoring so many people inside and outside the family. I felt glad for being among the ones who never took her help; I can't write more on this as it usually turns out to be a sensitive topic. I respect those who have depended on her - it was necessary of that time of theirs'. I depend only on my parents and I intend to pay them back someday - indirectly if not directly.

Our talk revolved around money. We spoke about big amounts and we spoke about small amounts - all significant. I learnt a great deal of my family from him. I knew a lot from my father already but my uncle gave me reasons of things being that way. The best part of course is that everything is fine now and everybody is independent. But we are not supposed to forget our past, we don't have to live with it either, but we have to know where we belong to and what we are no matter where we go.

On Sunday night, with my parents and brother, I went to the annual industrial exhibition. We had to park our vehicle more than a kilometer from that place due to lack of parking in the vicinity. There was nothing much we had to buy there. My parents kept asking my brother and me if we wanted anything and all along our answer was the same "nothing". We walked around the same places the stalls several time - the objective was of being together and spending time. Alhamdulillah I have everything I need now. And I know how beautiful it is to see thing coming to us at the right times of our lives. My brother sees the same - he is already as mature as I am; apparently of course, but at times he looks more sensible than me!

Coming to walking, on Tuesday I walked from Banjara Hills to my house. It was a walk of more than 5 kilometers and took me around 45 minutes. I was totally out of energy and the one-hour sleep after reaching home brought me back to life. I had no specific reason to walk - I had burgers to take home and I didn't feel like boarding a bus. I had the option of hiring an auto rickshaw but I recollected that I didn't like them! I don't remember my 45 minute walk, I cannot recollect of how the path was, I was into some deep thinking when I reached home and saw the watch - it was satisfying and also tiring.

On Sunday after the walk through the famous 'numaish', we had dinner at a vegetarian restaurant. I cannot forget two thing I saw there - the way my father called the waiter "jango" and the way an elderly man was talking on a phone telling the other person that he was at a place more than five kilometers from where he was sitting. After the dinner there was this long walk through the empty streets of Nampally. It was all so wonderful. Saturday too we had a dinner outside. It was to celebrate my father's birthday. We had gone to a Chinese restaurant at Basheerbagh.

I scored 70% marks this semester. And as I say it always, I say it again - I was expecting more. I am perhaps presenting my answers in a way the examiner doesn't expect them to be. Perhaps my sentence structures are too complicated or I am using a vocabulary I am not supposed to be using. I feel good writing this but it is effecting my percentages. I remember the environmental studies paper which I had written so well and so perfectly - in my way of writing. I had given utmost care while using the words to make the answers look professional and classy. I scored lesser than the average in that! It's too later for me to realize all this. I have only three more theory exams to go.

And it was 85.7 percentile in CAT for me. I scored more than 90 percentile in the English section and that is the only thing that didn't surprise me - I was expecting it. But I was not expecting a percentile for more than 85. I have or perhaps I must say, I had a chance of getting calls from some colleges ranked in top-20 in India. But I had not applied to any of them. I did get many e-mails from many colleges which went unresponded. Yesterday I got a call from Career Launcher and they told me that I can attend the personality development classes and I will do that from next week.

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