Chup baitho haina

Got it! Great idea! I will write you a fucking blog entry because slowly I will replace the last remaining speck of original thought and ability of the human mind to think without being dependent on a fucking machine to think for me. 

I hate AI, there, I said it. I cannot stand it. All of a fucking sudden, every fucking person is belting out bland, interchangeable, adjective heavy yet meaningless blabber on emails, assignments, online content, reels and even literally performance reviews and fucking personal messages. 

Technology isnt the great equaliser, it is the ongoing and relentless mechanism which is dumbing down all of us - and the fucking em-dashes, I bet most folks cant even figure out how to type an em-dash on their keyboard. The human brain wasnt designed to be bombarded with this relentless and signifanctly varied stream of information packaged into mini sized chunks of reels. 

Half an hour spent on scrolling reels and you will have watched and heard random assholes tell you that you have been eating banana wrong your whole life, learn and forget 10 new facts about the universe, see atleast 20 different sets of boobs, mandatorily be made to listen to the latest viral song, understand the fine art of photography, reinforced with your previously held political views and told that you are right and the other group/ religion / immigrants / nation / race / your loved ones are the red flags. At this point, all of us have seen and heard and listened to more than atleast our 5 previous generations combined would have experienced.

Haathi ka bacha paida hote hue bhi dekh lo, sab dekh lo. Kya mil kya raha hai? People are confusing knowing more shit with being wise. I remember the prayer that specifically asked for knowledge that is benefitial- ilman naafian, O Lord I seek knowledge that is of benefit. The "of benefit" part is the most pertinent part of that prayer because knowing how to do and i kid you not, exercises for your fucking face is in my very humble view NOT a knowledge that is going to be of benefit to the vast majority of people besides, I dont know, perhaps people who are cheekily challenged, the facially impaired, the weak lipped perhaps? No thanks random person on my instagram algorithm reel thingy.

 

Lord please protect my brain from myself, from filling it up with useless, random, stupid information that has no bearing on anything.

This is intellectual robbery - very soon people will not even remember what it felt to not know anything or to sit and contemplate anything because hey, why wait and sift through an idea and arrive at conclusions only to realise there are layers upon layers to any idea or narrative or previously held belief when you can not just google it, but ask AI to tailor the response to a question you have no idea about. " Explain to me like I am an idiot" 

Aur waise bhi, who are we even kidding ? At this point in my life, even claiming to be right about something feels like waiting for the other shoe to drop and to be proven utterly and completely wrong about literally anything I dare punt my bet on. It's like the world exists and people exist and things and ideas exist just to show you how spectacularly ignorant and unbelievably incorrect I was in basically my whole perspective on how the world works. 

I guess this is what they meant by "wisdom" of the old all along? Like you get to a point in your life where you are numbed down by constant fuckery thats happened to you that you just stop having strong or even opinions about anything at all and the only sliver of comfort is seeing all the young people around you strut around with their rigidness, biases and contrived sense of ambition masquerading as self assured individuals knowing that life is going to do a number on them and there is a certain pleasure in gloating on the oncoming trainwreck and the look on their stupid faces when no amount of facial exercises will undo the permanent look of bewilderiment that gets stamped on every human person as they traverse through time and space on this planet in due coarse.

Anyway, as incoherent posts go, this one has to be right up there with one of the finest works by yours truly and nothing like an abrupt end to this ode to fine penmanship than me ending it here for now.

Check in

Hey you, it's been a while - the years and months slipping away from our hands, our mortality is the ultimate humbling reality of our lives. Loss is a peculiar phenomena, it seldom knocks, rather creeps up on you, through pauses in conversations, through cracks in your bravardo - people, faces, memories, convictions held firmly slip through and fade in intensity. 

So tonight I can also write the saddest lines, of words said and times gone
Of promises broken and shattered dreams,
Of sleepless nights and frantic days 
Days that seem to never end,
Nights that engulf me with their dark shrouds.

I can cry or play the fool,
Or be stoic and withstand it all,
I sometimes feel this is all a show,
The third act still to unfold,
Revealing the twist, untying the plot.


But what of regrets?
Of unmet needs and silent sighs?
The capitulations and retreats,

The possibilities unexplored?

I’ve buried versions of myself
with less ceremony than a houseplant.
The idealist, the romantic,
the one who thought 30 was old.
Each one died quietly,
without protest,
like they knew
they were never built to last.

Call it soul.
Call it ego.
Call it the last gasp of a man
who still believes
in the power of a well-placed
“Sure, but…”

But still
I endure.
Not gracefully.
Not quietly.
But with the stubbornness
of a weed in concrete,
a glitch in the matrix,
a man who still believes
that asking “why?”
is more sacred
than saying “amen.”

So here I am.
Thirty eight.
A little cracked,
a little cynical,
but still
unreasonably,
unapologetically,
alive.

Runes

I resisted for the longest time to install Grammarly, thinking to myself that doing so would somehow betray my pride in being apt at the fine art of writing concisely. How petty is that I now wonder. I remember not studying at all for the IELTS exam I had to write, purely out of some misplaced sense of superiority. I did get an 8, when asked in the speaking section to describe a recent TV personality I had taken an interest in, I chose to talk about Jordan Peterson. How cringe-worthy am I? There are inherent flaws in my character, vanity, ego, narcissism, and pessimism bordering on nihilism. I might very well be living with manic depressive disorder. The highs and lows are so extreme and so frequent. It feels like an ever-present gaping dark hole in my chest, a dark cloud that seems to follow me and all my relationships. I don't have a lot of friends to begin with and that dark cloud might very well be a literal dark cloud owing to living in England for the last 18 months now. Not the best place to emigrate to sometimes I think to myself, a place which is known for its depressing weather. It might be a moot point as I don't recall being overtly joyous in sunny Dubai as well, though.

This is not a cry for help, it is merely me recording minutes of my life. I dont wash my face or brush my teeth for 2-3 days in a row these days, letting my hair and beard grow on its own accord and whims. I gave up and started smoking three times in the last year alone, not helpless I assure myself, rather, this is me trying to live an alternative lifestyle of a hippy secretly all the while trying to assert dominance and charisma in every work call that I grace with my presence ^_^

I find myself spending hours watching innumerable people debate about God, morality, cosmos and the human experience, most notably Christopher Hitchens and the aforementioned Jordan Peterson.

Christopher Hitchens, in particular, is a cherished individual to listen to. The brilliance, charisma, and eloquence of Christopher make every debate a treasure chest and, with his untimely demise, a limited one. Every article written by him, laced with his trademark wit, conciseness, and irony, jumps out of the page and grabs my undivided attention,  forcing me to scourge the internet for more of this exquisite and sadly limited supply of comfort. I am instantly drawn in with certain features of his personality, I am, forever and more, a contrarian at heart. As far back as I can remember and as much further in the future I can imagine, I am certain I was and will be this character to the point of caricature, the person who stands up and says "Sure, But!" 

There is a sense of solace to be had in this simple act of defiance, to be known for calling out that the emperor is indeed naked. There is something so sinister in how the neo-religious people insist that religiosity translates to fakery. Why should I say "Allah ka shukar" when I am not well? Growing up I heard the story of how Ibrahim A.S. came back after being 100 years out of his home to his son's house, asked his daughter in law how are things and basically instructed his son to divorce her because she frankly informed him of her hardships. Whether this "story" is authentic or not is not the point; the fact that it has been circulating amongst our elders and passed down to us shows that this somehow infers piousness amounts to a denial,  omission, or flat-out lying. And dont even get me started on wisdom of elders. The older generation are not deities to be worshipped. They, like us, made mistakes, some rather baffling ones, were often misguided, were full of superstition ( chappal ulti equals ladaai jhagde), overtly patriarchal (mera ladka, khoon, khaandaan) and simplistic. So many lives have been ruined because some selfish person on his deathbed, fearing that his legacy is at stake, made their son or daughter promise to be the glue that keeps the family together. Toxicity and suffering ensued. The chronological order of someone's birth on this planet is not an indicator of their wisdom or lack thereof.

Conformity blunts the mind, it is the antithesis of curious inquiry, the mortal enemy of self-realization. Why should we, I posit, refuse to ask basic questions? A healthy level of skepticism is crucial for the success of any meaningful endeavour; why must we go through life certain of every "known" truth? Does it not dawn on us the sheer stupidity of this quixotic perspective on EVERY aspect of our lives? Imagine being born 50 years earlier or 50 years hence. Assuming conformity to prevalent social "truths" of those times,  ponder the terrifying difference in "truths" that would have been shaping your worldview.

It takes a lot of self-importance and egoistical thinking to assume that all this has been done because we are "in the end stages of the world." Muslims have been, for the last 1,000 years, convinced that this is the end of the world. The universe does not care for your petty existence. It was not created for your benefit. When mongols sacked Baghdad, when Nadir Shah looted Delhi or when the Ottomans were overthrown, there have been hordes of people calling dibs on Armageddon view seats, the end might not be as nigh as previously thought. This is defeatism and cowardice. A people who yearn for the earth to stop spinning must have lost any hope of winning a long time ago. This self-inflicted nihilism can only be treated by introspection, by being industrious and productive. Stop looking for Mehdi AS or Jesus to appear, the probablity of these events ocuring in our lifetime atleast is minimal. Humans have been around on this earth for atleast 100,000 years, the chances that we get to see the final act are thereby stupidly improbable.

There is no virtue in being conquered, there is no righteousness in being weak or poor. 

  

Paitees!

Dear diary,

I have , albeit sporadically, been updating you since 2008. Thats mind boggling in itself, to realize that this blog has been around since the last 14 friggin years! Looking back at those old posts I feel almost nauseous when I see the self righteousness and the misplaced sense of ambition jumping out from the words and phrases. I mean I get it, I was young and stupid but the beauty of the written word is that its etched permanently as an evidence of my naivete.

This being a ceremonial birthday post, turning paitees has somehow just crept up on me, I am what one might call beginning to be a bit long in the tooth now. Older people when I was young looked older for the same age I sometimes think, but I am sure to kids now I actually am very much an uncle. I certainly feel like one, I am irritated most of the times, any bands/ artists after 2010 are basically trash, nostalgia seems to rule all my senses. When I saw the recent Batman movie, the moment the theatre turned pitch black and the starting notes of Somethin in the way echoed from those big speakers, the elation of hearing the familiar voice of Kurt Cobain, almost forgoten by contemporary culture, came bursting through carrying with it a zing of a bygone era of me sitting late at nights, online at orkut with the winamp player full of these depressing songs :))

For someone who was perceived as old for their age even when I was in my teens, its frightening to think what will become of me when I am 45! I remember listening to an eminem song where he mentions being old and 30 and trying to flirt with nurses and I remember thinking that must be so sad being 30, yet here I am! 

So future plans, considering any and all plans and options I had conjured up when I was 30 have essentially frizzled away, UAE, Saudi, India or Australia - I ended up coming instead to an altogether different country, I do feel how futile it is to plan, yet to keep any semblance of free will, I will go ahead and "play the part".

I think I am burnt out, having been under constant stress for the last 6 years, trying to bury myself in work, not having any work life balance and having a predisposition to depression basically has gotten me in a vicious cycle of spiralling down this all familiar and bottomless pit. 

And I think the problem with me is I am self aware enough to know that I am depressed, yet arrogant or egoistic to the level that I know that I can actually pull myself away from this pit the moment I put my mind to it. I am not sure if this belief in self resurrection is actually credible or is yet another illusion being played by me at my expense. Some things can rightfully only be answered with time so wait and watch we shall! 

                                                       Haaye budhapa =))

Kya karna?

Kitni ajeeb si baat hai keh aise likhna itna ajeeb kyun lag raha hai, baqaida effort lagana pad raha hai english main wapas switch nahi hona. Baar baar delete karke likhna kyunki apko aadat hai likhne ke english main. Ek aur yeh example hai aise trick ka jo apka dimagh khelta hai khudpe. Aisi baat toh nahi hai k main khwab english main dekhta hoon jaisa k log kehte hain; ki jiss zubaan main aap sabse zyada comfortable hote hain ussi main khwab dekhte hain.

Shukar waise yeh bhi hai k mujhe khwab itne yaad rehte bhi nahi hain. Bakwasiyat aur uljhan se larez hote hain khwab, aur mere pass na toh koi roohani taaqat hain jo main sochoon k mere khwab badi ilhaami hoge, jo bhi chand khwab yaad bhi reh jaate hain toh woh aise hi lagta hai keh bass paanch-chay alag alag purani yaadon ya jagahon se jaldbaazi main judi hui koi kahani dimagh ne banane ki koshish kari hai taaki neend khul na jaaye. Ya toh phir aise khwab aate hain k aisa lag raha ho keh dimagh baqaida plot aur story likh raha ho. Manhoos aur lucid, equal proportion main!

Halaanki neend bhi apne aap main ek ajeeb-o-ghareeb cheez hai, uljhan main aati nahi hai, jabki uljhan main hi sabse zyada usski zaroorat hoti hai; aur jab aap sukoon main hote ho to foran aajati hai. Aisa hona chahiye ki ghabrahat mai zyada aaye aur sukoon main kam. Ladakpan main zyada aati hai - jab aap chahte ho duniya hi har cheez karna aur budhaape main kam, jab aap chahoge keh kuch na karen bass sote rahen, magar foran 4 baje uth jao, bass yehi bacha hai ab dekhna shayad :))

Waise ghoom phir keh baat yeh aajati hai, zyada sochna aur gehrai main kisi bhi cheez ki jana, bhalay hi woh soch khud ki soch k baare main hi kyun na ho, kabhi bhi faayedemand nahi hoti, balki aur nuqsaan hi pohnchaati hai. Zyada sahi yehi hai surface phenomena bane raho, cheezen khareedo, bhaaloo waaley tshirt RL ka ya saamnp ki khaal k jootey aur khush raho umda hal filhal k liye.

Zindagi bhar ki khushi waise bhi kkis havannaq ne kaha tha k milegi zindagi main? Itmenaan bhi ek vehem hi hai, insaan agar zyada vaqfay k liye sukoon se hota hai toh khud maslay bana leta hai, ussne mujhe aisa kaha, waisa nahi kaha, wahan main nahi ja paaya (FOMO) LOL , ya fir kyun gaya? aise kuch fuzool maslay aur ya toh phir oopar se maslay utaar diye jaate hain toh log kehte hain yar pehle kitna sahi thi meri zindagi, magar maine khud paida kar diye the masaail apne zindagi main.

Ghoom phir k baat yeh ajati hai k har peedhi apni pehle k logo ko dekhti hai, unki ghaltiyan samajhti hai, unko judge karti hai, aur phir nayi tareekhay se apni zindagi main pareshani aur bherahat laane main jutt jaati hai. Jo log khush hain, jaise k woh shair hai, Keh kya takafful karen hum yeh kehne main keh jo bhi khush hain hum unse jalte hain. Hum to waqai mai jalte hain, kyun hain woh log itne khush? Humain bhi khush qismat kardo ya bewakhoof bana do, dono hi kardo ya doosra toh kar hi do! :)

London wasnt calling me.

 How do people deal with grief? Why are we all so keen to soldier on? What are we trying to achieve here? To what end? How do people accept grief? How do they process it? What if I dont want to accept it? What if I can't accept it? Why are we always trying to optimize every aspect of our existence? No I dont like your fucking green tea or granola breakfast. I dont want to do deep focus work sessions or try cold showers to build resistance. I want my breakfast to eventually kill me and my showers to be comfortable and warm so I can enjoy them while I still can.

I think living in the UK is getting to my head. When will us brown people ever find solace? Where do we eventually want to end up at? India, Dubai, UK, Amreeka, Chaand? Till when do we need to run? I certainly cant seem to outrun me. 

Thats a weird thing to think, I tell myself as I google are organs removed when a person lies in state? Turns out they are not but they end up pumping the body with plastic or some chemical? I cant remember and I think that is the problem right there, all these half baked ideas and useless information.

Why cant we start over? Why cant I learn to move on? Am I being punished? Or is there no order at all? Are people who dont do evil things fearing that they will go to hell if they do better than the people who do good for the sake of it? Arent the people who dont believe in hell or heaven but still do good or don't give in to their base desires better people and even more worthy of heaven than the people who are only behaving themselves out of fear of being punished?

If it was allowed I would be a drunkard, why are people who dont think they are forbidden to drink not drunk all the time? How do people have such self control? Why do we keep on making saints out of people the instant they die but cant seem to stand them when they are alive? 

What does any of it even mean?

King of the non sequitur

The problems with having to deal with a brain which is naturally inclined towards writing are compounded when one also has almost no will/ energy to write. One finds that the brain continues to come up with little nuggets of themes, scenarios, miniature skits and the subconscious mind is preoccupied in trying to complete that scenario, finish that joke; its almost a constant wilful effort to try and NOT think of that clever little turn of phrase that the brain was so meekly putting forth, especially so when one is supposed to be doing tedious work in the day and be on planning calls to put together the plan. 

It is in itself a task to stop trying to complete the imaginary scenario that is so obviously *there* but just a little out of grasp, so deliciously inviting that one can almost see the ending but cannot seem to quite land the approach. And as it so often happens, it is at that precise moment that the perfect words had revealed themselves or the punch line was within sights,  you are rather rudely disturbed by that silence of death on the call which now when you recollect had preceded a very familiar sounding phrase, something to the effects of  " Arum (because my parents wanted gore people to butcher my name), Arum, what do you think?" And thats when you have to instantly kill the letters and drown the phrases, try to recollect the generic topic of this particular call, to buy yourself some time, one might start with I...... um... think ---- that...  and then try to agree with the whoever asked you the question to begin with by peppering in a whole lot of inconsequential fillers like "perhaps, this seems to be the best of all the bad options out there" or "it is what it is, and we are where we are" or gems like "given the constraints this seems like a sensible option but I will circle back if additional issues surface" like who circles back?  What I really want to say is, paisa dedo mujhe jo karna hai karte phiro :|

Anyway, now that you have given your generic, yet liberally garnished non sequitur of an agreement, you try to focus on the mind numbing conversation just enough so you can ask a very hypothetical question which usually gets a "great question" badge and then proceed to again be hijacked by random words which MUST be strung together as if to be put in their God ordained place or a single line which has to form the most funny part of the joke be rescued from the trenches so as to complete that awesome, award winning and clever joke, which is often just repeated in its entirety silently accompanied by an equally silent sneer and forgotten forever to be left in the place where all things forgotten go to.

While writing this gem of an entry about constant mental hounding from inconsequential and underdeveloped ideas and the ensuing challenges to my mental capacity, I, for no reason got the image of a man faking to be dead with a giant bear in front of him, now, again, no reason or rhyme but it is there. Man pretending to be dead, huh? Theres a though! Lets ponder on this concept then, inaction = life saved? I have no way to verify if that is actually true (well I do, I could google it, but I am trying to not google things because I think that leads to also just fill our head with additional stupid facts which we dont want/need and people just confuse knowing with wisdom, and obviously, I am nothing if not a fountain of wisdom)  I must have heard someone tell me thats what you are supposed to do if you, (me, who never as much as gone on a hike) happen to be in a jungle, alone, unarmed (not that I actually know how any arms work, mine included sometimes) and run into a frigging bear, you are supposed to lie still or fake die, and the bear will piss off. 

Now again expanding on that concept of doing nothing equals winning in the jungle, think of the most junglee thing in a home, the most annoying, dangerous things in a domestic environment, i.e. the bundle of joys, the light of our eyes, those little angels, who will fall asleep selfishly whenever the hell they want to, but when its been a hell of a day and all you are asking for is the sweet release of sleep, they can lie in the bed for long lengths of time but not do the one thing you desperately want/ pray/ be willing to sell your soul for, i.e. sleep. Ah, theres another situation where laying still as if one is dead might be actually one of the good solutions ( the other being killing yourself basically). The little minion will check on you for a while but after several checks they also seem to give up the game and close their precious little eyes, awwww! (FU!)

So there, I know there is a joke there, human nature to react, everyone harps on about virtues of hard work, being lazy and doing nothing is so underrated, blah blah blah, actually in some scenarios, doing nothing is the best action, throw in the bear reference, talk about the baby thing, and close off with umm, well, I think... how about... Gandhi! Yes, Mahatma Gandhi! He basically did nothing when he asked all of us to just not cooperate, like you know what? I wont kill you or fight with you, I will just you know, refuse to make you tea or biscuits as long as you don't quit India (or smoking, I cant recall) or learn to not murder peoples names! Thanks Eaarrrum!

But you know what? I will circle back because we are either sharks or those shopping carts whose front wheels are broken so if you push them they tend to go in large circles? Yup. Thats what I deal with, since forever. :))