Mostly Harmless

My journey from Amsterdam to New Delhi was nothing short of a huge trauma of the worst kind. Never make the horrible mistake of travelling by Aeroflot airlines, dont tell me I didnt warn you. Even the airhostesses, most of them overweight, which could have been the only consolation turned out to be as cold as the shoddy services they had to offer.

And lately i've had a couple of encounters with typical Indian aunties which has only deteriorated my sadistic fantasies involving them.
The first of these encounter happened at the Moscow airport. There was this stunningly beautiful girl who looked really modern by all Indian standards with piercings and tattoes at rather wierd places but strangely with a very Indian look. I had been eying her for some time and as it turned out she was taking the same plane as me. As I entered the boarding lounge I found her sitting on the floor which made me nearly certain that she was not an Indian. Indian girls would rather stand the exertion than sit on the floor. Since there were no vacant seats which was good for me, I went and sat beside her. Well, she was an Italian as she told me during the course of our conversation and was studying in Delhi. As we got up to board the plane, I was just behing her in the line when this auntyji came out of nowhere, shoved her suitcase between us and claimed that it was her place and she had been there all the time. She went like-"Pappu (or whatever) beta tum bhi aa jao". I wanted to tell her to get the fuck out of there but all I could manage to mumble was-"yes aunty of course". Then she would stop at regular intervals for feeding the boy - "Pappu beta ye kha lo pappu beta wo kha lo" holding the entire line and exterminating any chances I had to talk to the girl who was far ahead of me by now. I was frustated, the sort of frustration which could make you could kill someone. It was only later that I realised that she was just being a mother.

The second one was at the Mc-Donalds where again this aunty did the same thing, only this time I was not following a girl, so it was relatively easy to succumb. And anyway you dont want to mess with an Indian aunty, God bless you if you do. She would leave no stone unturned to prove that you are a perfectly spoilt brat with no etiquttes and manners, gather a large crowd till the ignominy becomes too much to bear. Of course the onlookers will sympathise with her and all your protests will be drowned in the ensuing clamour. That would be an easy escape, she might even pronounce you an eve-teaser and then theres no escape from the ever frustrated Indian junta.

So then what do we do in such situations. Would any of you like to venture a solution to this menace?

Heres saying a good bye to The Netherlands.
There was a thanksgiving party for me here in the company today, for all I did (dont ask me!! I have no clue). As far as I can remember, all I did was write and read blogs, read newspapers, surf the internet, chat with friends and basically did all that I could to squander away the precious time. If despite all my most sincere efforts, there was still some left then I would for the rest of the time contemplate the possibility of working before rejecting it as being worthless. The head of the department was all praises for me, after all I was the last to leave the office, only if the poor fellow knew the reason for my staying late. And theres another farewell party for me at a discotheque tonight. Lets hope for the best, after all when you are drunk, anything can go wrong. Of course nothing has gone wrong despite all my hopes and prayers for the last 22 years (hope and pray it seems is all I'm capable of doing, apart from trying my best to aggravate the love life of others, more on that sometime later), but then that was India. Anyway I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

I enjoy it when life kicks and screams in all directions but life here has been going on a straight line and that my friends is extremely boring. Going to the office everyday from 9 to 5 for browsing internet and then going to parties and pubs, sightseeing on weekends is not exactly my idea of an interesting life. Its fine for a week or two but not for 10 complete weeks, it sucks. So I'm as excited about going back to India and getting back to the college as I was about coming here.

Its been a long time I watched a hindi movie in theater. So heres the list of movies I plan to catch in a theater as soon as I get back- Paheli, Sarkar and Dus.

Dude, from now on its me who is in the drivers seat and you sit back, relax if you like and enjoy the show. From now on we are going to live life very objectively, emotions are going to take a back seat (they have not played any major role in your life and well lets just say thats the one thing I've decided not to change as of now). You have run the show for a year now and on retrospection the show has been a flop at best and a disaster at worst.
The lessons of life are always learnt the hard way it seems. And anyway you have nothing to complain, I'm giving your indolent ass more time to relax. I put it down here just in case you forget.
As I said, enjoy MY show.

Here's to my 2 months in The Netherlands.
First things first, my friends tell me that i've been obsessed with that three letter word which they like to call sex, I on my part would rather call it shecksh, just to bring out the enthusiasm in me which still holds it in respect and awe (that can't in any way be called obsession, right?). And just to show them that my obsession with shecksh is over and i've transcended these petty boundaries, i've decided not to post about anything remotely related to sex unless of course anything as dramatic happens to me as happened recently, which prompted me to write the previous post.

Coming back to where I left, theres a lot this place has taught me. Like drinking lots of beer, always having wine with your meal, be overtly expressive in showing your love to your girlfriend especially in public places like sticking your hand down her panties, sporting the most outrageously weird clothes or having an extraterrestrial hairdo (like having your hair look like antennaes in all directions) and not giving a damn about it. Of course there are other trivial things also like honesty, commitment, modesty etc. you get the idea? Thats why its one of the least corrupt countries of the world. There are no larger than life celebrities here, no film industry and probably thats why no controversies, no political dramas and no shoddy journalism.

Well its been perfect so far. And just when I was starting to feel nostalgic, its time to return.
Also its time to do something i've been postponing for a long time now. My philosophy in life has been- Dont delay until tomorrow what can be neglected altogather. But neglecting this time might prove fatal. Yes my friends belong to the savage breed of humans (???) who would go to any extent, mind you any extent, if I forget to bring back presents for them. Everybody has been dropping messages to that effect in my mail box, some of them direct explicit threats and others not so direct but implicitly threatening nevertheless, some of them have gone as far as to list the various things i'm supposed to gift them ,of course I'm thankful to them, they have been king enough not to list the brand names as well. And I being the person that I am, find it extremely difficult to say no, for totally different reasons in this case though.

So, to escape the impending doom, I guess i've been left with no option but to go shopping for the suckers. Suckers really suck(no pun intended).

Well, today was an interesting day in my otherwise mundane life.
Got up to some great weather with the sun shining down with great intensity and so I and one of my friend decided to go swimming by the riverside. Well the people of Netherlands dont want to miss any opportunity to show skin at the slightest provocation. Its not that they like to publicly display their well toned bodies (who wouldnt want to) but the thing is here even the folks with not so good bods and even outright atrocious ones are down to the bare minimum whenever the sun is visible. So we had all the more reason to go swimming, we knew we are in for a great visual treat with lots of (female, in case you are under any scepticism as to my sexual orientation) skin to feast our eyes on. We were to find out only later that we had some pleasant shock(surprise would be too mild a term here) in store for us.

So, high on expectations we reached the coast. We couldnt believe what we saw there. My friend was like-"Is that girl over there really topless or she's just wearing a skin coloured bra" and I was like- "When did they start making bras with nipples on them man". And then we saw another one and yet another one. I said "The sun is really shining down on us today. Are we in heaven or what!!". The people there were so blissfully oblivious of the entire situation made me wonder, while we had to make conscious effort to take our eyes off those topless beauties, we entirely forgot about swimming.

Then there was this embarrasing situation I got myself into during the evening, though I am not to blame for the mess. Theres this french chick who is new to the hostel. While I was cooking dinner, she was apparently returning from somewhere. She said hi to which i reciprocated and then she proceeded towards me on collision course which left me bewildered as to her motives. Why does this chick want to pass thtough exactly where I am standing when there's whole lot of space she could use. Anyway, I stepped out of her way to let her pass. Turns out she wanted to greet me which in French style is done by giving a peck on the cheek. She explained to me if I understood now to which I managed to embarrasingly mumble something about the Indian way of greeting and hence my inability to comprehend her motives. Then she told me something about her weekend and I still recovering from the shock, told her something about mine. But then I told myself, no need crying over spilled milk the damage has been done.

And also an apology for the previous post would be in order now that i've regained my sanity.

OK let me begin by saying that i'm under a temporary bout of dementia and so what i'm going to say may not make any sense to you. But if i'm suffering from demetia and I know it means that i'm in my senses. eh fuck it.
Lets analyze the sentense, "sukers suck" (taking into account all the puns, there are four if you would pay attention). So, do they?
Well literal suckers literally suck..yeah right
And metaphorical suckers metaphorically suck also
Now its becoming too complicated fuck you all.

"Whenever in doubt fuck!"
I have no idea who said that but it makes fucking sense to me. Ok ok I didnt mean that literally, but one of my friends once taught me a really powerful stress busting technique which has worked amazingly well for me. Whenever you are down and out, and the world feels like a fucking boring place to live in, when life sucks like it has never sucked before, then my dear friend face the mirror and say fuck as loudly as you possibly can. In case you are in doubt, the fuck is not directed at you or anyone in particular, in fact it is directed at the world in general as a matter of fact thing. It makes you feel powerful and also reminds you to fuck ( literally man,as we all know its one of the best stress busters).
But since i'm sitting in the office, getting terribly bored with nothing to do and I cant exercise my never failing stress buster, I feel wretched. Will write something sensible once I feel better. As of now FUCK!!

I usually don't delve into topics such as these which are better left to the self proclaimed advocates of womens liberation movement but here we are talking about womens sexual liberation, yeah well that sounds more funky and yo. Let me explain.

I recently read an article on the sexual liberation of women, that proclaims that women might have become more financially independent but they are far from sexual liberation yet.
Today if a girl proposes to have sex with a guy, he would proclaim that at the top of his voice to all his friends. But equality dictates that the same should be the case with a girl as well, though I'm dubious about that one. For a guy its prestige issue, the more the number of girls he has slept with, the more the respect and awe he commands.
On the other hand if a girl goes around sleeping indiscriminately, she's termed a slut. Sleeping with her is no problem but men would normally develop a cold feet on long term plans. The question then is, is sleeping with random guys or girls right or wrong. Well that is debatable and in any case I frequently use such big words as right or wrong. What is right for one might be wrong for someone else.

In fact I know many people who would want a sati savitri (strictly virgin) for their wife, nothing else would do, even though they go drooling over every other girl they come across and would not miss a single opportunity to indulge in u-know-what. Their hypocrisy amazes me no end but then such is life. Sorry girls the time is still not on your side, screwing around only gets you screwed up. Wait some more.

Well I watched a rather funny advertisement of a telephone company here in The Netherlands. At the end of it if you find yourself unable to appreciate the humour, then either you belong to the fairer sex or you are an asshole or both. Anyway, here goes-

There are these two men one of them is really big and tall and the other is his opposite both named bill. Suddenly you see the big bill starts sucking in the air with full force. He sucks and sucks and sucks till you become irritated while the small bill stands there besides him calm and serene. So whats that got to do with the telephone company? Guess .. Guess...

Moral of the story:
Big bills suck, small bills dont.
The company that brings you small bills.

More on humour later.

I can vividly remember that day when I first watched sexual intercourse on video, I had passed class 12th and was preparing for JEE. Very late you would say, well yes considering the early sexualisation of kids these days. I was shocked to hear a really explicit joke from one of my small neighbours who happens to be around 12 which shocked me no end.

Anyway the programme was to be held at one of my friends home whose parents were out of town. I was considerably excited at the thought of the visual treat that awaited me. Well although we were aware of the basic moves but the other things really took me by surprise (what other things? keep guessing....). Hey man this is supposed to be one of the most beautiful things on earth but I couldnt see any beauty in what I was seeing. This is hideous man, I said and my friends some of whom were first timers like me agreed. We coulnt take the whole thing and soon backed out inspite of protests from others who said it was not in the spirit of things to back out mid-way. They said we should face the realities of life but couldnt cajole me into watching that horror anymore. To hell with the realities of life, anymore of this would make me puke.

And so I went home disappointed thoroughly. All my hopes had been belied. But the worse was yet to come. Those grotesque imaged haunted me for a week after that. They would resurface everytime I tried to eat anything and so I couldnt eat anything properly for nearly 7 days, which made my family really worried about my loss of appetite.

The holiday season is now starting here in The Netherlands and so this weekend was full of activities. There was an Indian style mela in the center of the town and it seemed as if the entire population of the town had gathered there, it was crowded like hell. People with wierd makeups performing spectacular stunts and I also got to see a play by a British group.

Well for me it was a mixed feeling really, with scimpily clad blond girls all around me but non of them single. I've officially given up my search for a single girl after 2 months now. Speaking of girls, well the average beauty here is definitely more than the average beauty of Indian girls, although I dont find the girls here that attractive (grapes are sour, did you say?).

Netherlands is one of the most liberal countries of the world. This is one of the many countries where prostitution is legalised (sounds great?, i know), one of the few countries where euthanasia is also legalise, and as far as I know the only country in the world where drugs are legalised (that sounds greater?, yea i know). In fact people from as far as America come here so they can take drugs without any hassles. A quote I read on one of the T-shirts in Amsterdam comes to my mind as I'm on this- "Warning: Visitors will return" and no doubt they will, in fact they do.

The Government has a very chilled and practical attitude and it doesnt try to act as the godfather of every damn person setting moral standards for them, instead it considers them mature enough to decide their morals for themselves. Well I'm no moralist and whether going to a prostiture or taking drugs is morally and ethically right or wrong is still debatable, but why not let the people decide that for themselves? I'll leave you with that thought.

Apart from that I'm terribly missing Indian food here and I cant wait to get back home and eat the mom cooked food.