In deep waters..trying to stay afloat.

Its very difficult to be happy these days. I can't afford a genuine smile amid what is going on around me.Yet another day has passed, and the wait goes on.A wait for my future employer. Few weeks back i used to laugh at the apprehensions shown by a friend of mine, over whether he will be able to stay at the company or not, with job cuts in IT market showing up regularly nowadays. Now, being engulfed by the economic downturn all around, i do really have started to reciprocate his feelings slowly. Forget about being fired, i am now bothered if any chance of such a situation will arise afterall. I atleast did not have any thoughts about it anyway.But when even some IIT students get regret letters from their prospective employers even before joining, then its certainly something fearful to think about.The news about this , carried by TOI on their front page today have really shaken me up a bit.
Anyway, my changed attitude towards life over the years is helping me to keep myself unfazed by all this. I am trying to live in the present and not crying over what is not in my hands. Preparing for the D-day on Nov 16 th is the foremost passion which is keeping me busy , alongwith a recently developed interest over politics. I feel utterly shameful about the fact that I didn't bother to care about the political scenario of my country in the past.Whatever it is, i do intend to make amends for that from now on. Anyway, i don't know how to interpret the drama we just visualized until now over the reinstatement of 1900 odd sacked employees of jet airways.It looks to be a good reason to celebrate for those people.But certainly the picture is not without some inside politics.Well ,Mr. Goyal says he had a 'conscience call'.He couldn't apparently face the trauma of his sacked employees. Well,he means to say that a businessman of his stature acts practically one day and resorts to his emotions the very next day.But of course we people are not going to buy into it. As very logically pointed out by a friend of mine, may be some aviation fuel subsidy has been offered to him. Although it looks highly unlikely after i read today that fuel companies haven't agreed to his demands so far as he has defaulted thousands of crores on them till date.
May be the govt have come out internally with a bail out plan ,who knows.
But whatever be the reason, i have been extremely disturbed by the way the MNS party chief Mr. Raj thackrey has gained political mileage from this whole fiasco.The way this man is carrying out his ideology of regionalism in Maharashtra has left me seething with anger over why this man is still roaming free! He doesn't advocate for the common masses, instead he tries to use the regional boundaries in his favour and threatens to widen them even more with his vested interests. His recent outrage against Mrs jaya bacchan for his alleged UP attachments were beyond any level of comprehension. As far as this recent jet crisis is concerned what role did he and his party workers played will become very clear if you read this small article below:
http://www.rediff.com/money/2008/oct/17air2.htm
Seems so childish, isn't it? but Mr. Thackrey have accomplished his job.He have already received the accolades from the re-employed employees.He has become a 'saviour' to them.
I have always visualized myself as a Indian citizen 1st , a Bengali next, for which I have received quite a bit of flak from the people i am close to. But i don't care.Because i know that the true development of a nation is only possible when we estrange ourselves from all our regional boundaries and become ONE as a nation.But this self-centered man is oblivious to all such ideologies.
I have many more ideas to share about this Regionalism vs Nationalism issue which i will surely do very soon.
With all these misery around,the only solace i could find was from our very own Sachin's achievement today. He stands on top now! The great actor Tom alter, signed off with a beautiful statement that 'when Sachin is in full flow,watching him feels like nothing can go wrong in your own life!' Truly speaking, i have never felt the same kind of thrill in watching a masterful innings from any other batsman in the world , the way i feel watching Sachin play, even today! way to go Sir!!
And last but not the least, the week has ended and the weekend is here again. With my previous mock score having helped me regain my self-confidence just in time, I prayed for Saturday to come at the earliest, to try my hands on yet another mock! lets hope that i can again push myself up for the final phase leading to the most important test of character of my life so far! :)

End of Pujas..

Today is ekadashi. All the hoopla surrounding the Pujas is slowly coming to end, yet again. Maa is returning to her abode and will come down again next year to enlighten us.At times I have wondered,whats so much of this excitement all about? Months before the festivities begin, people flock around the market for new cloths, accessories for only these 4-5 days (actually it varies!) of madness. Do we really need a reason to buy clothes? Of course we don't throw away the clothes after the Pujas end, but neither do many don the clothes before the pujas! When I used to stay at kharagpur ,the Pujas used to end as soon as they had started, because the real enthusiasm used to begin from Saptami onwards as most of the pandals remained unprepared till Shasti.That used to feel horrible at times for the lack of commitment on the part of the people who used to delay the construction till the last moment. My local Puja pandal itself looked a skeleton before Shasti with only its framework standing.They used to work that night and day after to finish it off in a hurry.The end product looked beautiful though I have to say. But nevertheless most of us are carrying forward the same tradition of last minute preparations!
Anyway, coming to the topic, I first realized the elation generated for these small pleasures of life from an incident apparently irrevelant from the present point of view.That was probably during the 2nd year of our college.Our dept. cricket team seemed to be losing by a heavy margin.Loads of runs were required from the final few overs.I for once had left all hopes and was just waiting for the inevitable.But what i was watching looked remarkably foolish.Most of my classmates were still cheering like the most optimistic fools god has ever made! We needed sixes and fours from virtually every ball. How the hell were we gonna make it from here?? Ok,the batsman was trying his best to do the necessary and hitting the runs at regular intervals to keep us in the match.But for how long? God himself has to descend down to earth and take the matters in his own hands.That was'nt going to happen obviously...but it happened! Though instead of himself , I think the god had sent down the devil on his behalf who I think , entered into one of their bowlers soul! Every ball he throwed down the pitch seemed headed for the slip fielders.They were wides, the widest wides i hav ever seen! In minutes , we had got an extra run generator and there came the required run rate , going down and down with each ball. Suddenly it seemed very much possible , and there I went , going berserk with my apparently foolish classmates and cheering my team every single second. I am sorry to say that our team did lose the match finally but not the way I had expected.It seemed mathematically possible till the very last over. But what I had won for myself was a valuable lesson-a hard yet simple fact, that in the small moments of happiness , are sown the seeds of eternal bliss! Whatever seems to be the fate in our immediate future , going down the ways of gloominess will never lead to anything consequential. I wonder why people pray to god in fear on the day of any result being announced.The result has already been prepared, printed on paper.Its not gonna change no matter how much we beg to god! Its not in our hands anymore, bcoz that opportunity has already passed during exam days.
All said and done,that vital lesson leads me to the answer for the craze surrounding the Pujas. Its about coming out of the hectic pattern of life ,although for a few days.but these few days uncover so much energy before and thereafter that you can spent days in anticipation for it without any a hint of tiredness. I realized this to the fullest these few days where the mental strength seemed to stretch me beyond my physical limits.It seems god does descend on earth atleast for we bengalis, during these few days, in an invisible yet illuminating form of energy!

Finally,I am in!

So finally I have entered this new atmosphere,the blogosphere. What made me indulge myself suddenly in such seemingly 'useless' passion when i have lots of other things to do? Well, i really don't know if i have the urge to do anything 'useful' at this moment. About 5 months has gone down the drain since the final days of college ended. Living a mundane lifestyle, doing nothing except munching, idling away hrs and hrs before the PC, solving those intelligent but apparently foolish sums again and again, and last but not the least waiting for the big brother Wipro to come and invite us to do bonded labour, has made me bored to the core! Is this why i have chosen another one to add to the ever-increasing list ofpass time activities? ummm, partly yes,mostly no.
The passion for owning a personal blog stems from the very early days.The primary objective was although different-to create a personal web page.This was when i was developing interests in programming and the concept of originality(i still believe in it though).But over time, the motivation and urge to go deeper into the technicality of doing the necessary began to recede slowly.Somewhere down the line it vanished one day. Although a bit of passion was reinvigorated during the hey days of the HPL but it was not enough to fuel the fire. That thirst was not going to die down so easily.
I was a very emotional person from the very beginning .I try to remember every positive as well as negative points in my life. I try to give the due attention to few little memories or thoughts i have, in my so far relatively insignificant life. But i have never been able to do so in a systematic manner.In fact my life has been almost fully unsystematic till date. So in order to bring some order into it I have rested my hopes on this blog. Besides, being a broad-minded individual, I think I will be able to rediscover different attributes of myself while expressing my thoughts here in paper.Being a voracious reader of anything meaningful and an intense lover of the beautiful language called English,will no doubt help me in this quest. Quite a few times I have backtracked due to this inherent laziness of mine, contemplating whether I would be able to maintain the same interest throughout.But not anymore! I have decided do justice to my cause.Come whatever in the way,be it the hectic ways of life with its numerous problems, I hereby vow to commit myself to this small passion of my life and take care of it with pleasure.