Irony of life...Beauty in the beast

Isn't it strange that we all live in the world which faces irony in each of its facet. We can observe the diversity of life and the myraid opinions people have about its creations - living and non-living. I listened to this song "Gin Soaked Boy" by Divine Comedy in 1994 when I was a small school going lad, I fell in love with it for times to come. Though in those days I couldn't comprehend much of the sense it said or the meaning it conveyed, the music and the B&W picturisation appealed. The last line "Who am I?" left a lingering mystery to the lyrics and began to add lines to it...It was never a difficult song by the way as I could always add few made up lines which were ironical. The rediscovery of the song happened a few years back with all credits to the man who invented the necessity of Youtube. Here are the lyrics that I hope would ensure some self reflection to every person who reads/listens to them:


Im the gin in the gin-soaked boy
Im the ghost in the machine...Im the genius in the gene...
Im the beauty in the beast..Im the sunset in the east...
Im the ruby in the dust...Im the trust in the mistrust...
Im the trojan horse in troy...Im the gin in the gin-soaked boy...

Im the tigers empty cage...Im the mysterys final page...
Im the strangers lonely glance...Im the heros only chance...
Im the undiscovered land...Im the single grain of sand.....
Im the christmas morning toy...Im the gin in the gin-soaked boy...

Im the world youll never see...Im the slave youll never free...
Im the truth youll never know...Im the place youll never go....
Im the sound youll never hear...Im the course youll never steer....
Im the will youll not destroy...Im the gin in the gin-soaked boy...

Im the half-truth in the lie...Im the why not in the why...
Im the last roll of the die...Im the old school in the tie...
Im the spirit in the sky...Im the catcher in the rye...
Im the twinkle in her eye...Im the jeff goldblum in the fly..

Who am i?


for the benefit of all, here's the link to the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXP1oLtPyDA

My first day......at IBS Hyderabad

Following is what I wrote last year after spending my first day at IBS...a lot has changed and a lot will never change....I relentlessly pursue my destiny and as they say its written "Makhtub" ...

Having given up all desires to pursue a corporate life without a management degree, abdicating from the royal throne of a research analyst in the world finest consultancy firm, my walk to Hyderabad began….more so only to discover it as a modest Dontanpally village. The rubric sands determining the campus could only make me feel more docile, having been separated from all familiar civilization. Standing on the giant doorway to the IBS campus, far from appreciating the beauty and silence of the surroundings, I went about probing myself if I had been too much an optimist. My senses came back with the loud appearance of the taxi driver who asked if I wanted to left inside to the hostel, I mumbled the obvious answer while keeping an eye on the gigantic suitcases that undermined my herculean powers. The campus looked like a morose construction site, years after having buried the desire to be an architect I felt as if I was here for it. Realizing my qualification as a B.Sc., I shrugged cursing the factors of judgment in life. I had wanted to be a Bus conductor collecting cash, a pilot soaring skies, an armyman and the more realistic engineer. None became of the above choices when I ceded to fate and pursued statistics in degree. My mind went back to the board that I read in the cantonment while on way “ There are no better judges in the world than guns”, I felt I could have made far better decisions had a brigadier installed a 0.33 mm bore rifle fully loaded on my temple.

Signing heaps of sheets of instructions that provided me against destroying any minutest detail of this hostel, I walked towards my room pondering over such possibilities but the strong smell of the veneer coating constricted my nose and thoughts. My parents always said that often our pleasure is derieved from the most insignificant of things in life; I could feel overjoyed noticing the paint color in the hostel room was the same as at home, probably it sparked a nostalgia that made me feel humble. The room had a metal chair, study table and a cot and the USP of the hostel “a balcony”, surprisingly all 2000 rooms had one. Didn’t I tell my father there were great prospects for an architect! but he felt that the initial struggle as a draftsman wasn’t worth it. I felt lethargic and dizzy having spent 26 hours in a sleeper compartment of the train and 2 hours in the rickety autorickshaw, except for a couple of hours of suburban viewings more the time was spent watching the rural India – diversity at its best. Not to forget the road to Dontanpally, which took me back to physics class learning the crests and troughs in a frequency curve, the subtle relation was crazy as there could be no way Thompson or Hertz could have designed the contours of this village. Unbundling the mattress drained of all possible glycogen storage and I retired to sleep dreaming of consuming Idli, Vada and Rasam all square meals but the thought made me feel overdosed. For an evening walk I decided to explore a cent of the 100 acre, over to the academic block where the only population could be found in the IT room trying to find the opportunity to connect with friends and family. I went over the “White House” (No goras no Bush only phone connections and cold drinks) to purchase a local sim finding a gecko on the mango tree gazing at me..I sped away to my room now to find a couple of crickets bordering and guarding my balcony, I muttered and squashed the mortals under the seemingly divine powers of my new rubber slippers. I was reminded of a cousin who had a nightmare of a cockroach crawling up his nose, bah!!

A day was over …but the journey had just begun and this time it was to be for a huge 700 days. I had read a hindi novel “Jungle me who do din” and much did I want to christen the memoirs of my stay in IBS on the same lines, I felt the difference was a little too much. My discoveries were to progress with knowledge expansion, I was here to be an MBA those words did sound big and going by the reputation IBS enjoyed I felt much greater. With many plans, dreams, desires and visions the fairy godmother put me to sleep till dusk….