the future

"This is the old American Dream, cosmetically made over but with its foundation still in the idea of super abundance. How is global humanity, already starving by the millions, to emulate this lifestyle? Will all the world's people drive energy efficient cars? Will the entire planet, then, be paved to accommodate them? Where are the resources to build large houses, swimming pools, and air conditioners for the planet's growing billions?

It is absurd, of course, to propose the American standard of living, no matter how efficiently managed, as a global model. How then can Americans set themselves apart morally from the rest of the world, in terms of how they live and use the planet's resources?"

- Trevor Burrowes, Does The Third World Point To The Future?

Read the whole article at
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC26/Burrowes.htm

a wonderful something

[Where and how to begin?
just so much there to say
And as declared, in my last confession
Its rather difficult these days, to hold it together
Yet, I must make an effort, I must…
Cause this,…this…’thing’… its…
Well its driving me…
Heck! That’s no good. I’ll start afresh,…
Don’t know where to begin
There’s so much I want to say]

Its not a mad passion burning up the soul
Or a craving of the flesh
Or a timid plea for love, Its not!
Its something more…subtle.
Something that actually spreads
When the alcohol wears off
Its something quite unlike I’ve ever known.

‘Love’ and ‘Lust’ and ‘Passion’
- these words I now dread
For they now stand in my way
Conspiring against me
Not letting me speak my heart!
They want to creep into my mind,
Tie the tongue into a knot,
And make it spit out foolish, meaningless words
(as they have done on so many occasions in the past)
But this time, I wont let ‘em!

For now its sanity I seek,
clarity I crave,
a cold hard slap I want
to snap back to reality
to clean up the cobwebs in my mind
to take the load off of my chest
And to untie my tongue
So that it can ease into the truth
And the truth, my dear, is quite simple…

I’m having trouble accepting
That its done
That I wont ever really know u
And accept the fate of strangers,
passing each other by on a supermarket isle
- one quick glance, and then moving on.
In all fairness, why should it not be so?
After all, what is there to expect?
A couple of more chance encounters?
Exchange of polite greetings?
And ‘friendly’ smiles?
(O how I hate that word!)

And that’s just it! I expect nothing!
I want nothing!
None of those dreaded words
(and of course not the silly one I so regret!)
But it still bothers me
More than it should
That I wont ever really know u.

Cause u see, I’ve seen but very little
(and understood even less when I did)
But now that I’m sober,
and am thinkin it over
Its all so clear to me!
(Never thought I’d say that!)

I see myself for what I’ve been
A fake!
A poser and a loser
A clever vender of catch phrases and clichés
While you’ve been true all along!

You held your wine well
And anybody could tell
You’re as sharp as u r pretty
As modest as you’re witty
But kind to a fault!
(While you endured all my BS and let it slide!)

But even so, I cant but hope
That those bright, deep eyes
(despite the influence of wine and martini)
saw something in there too
something that your perhaps recognized,
something that you knew
from a story in your book,
the pictures on your wall
the dreams you’d chased
or the demons you’d called
I don’t know, what it is…
And it sucks that I never will

Pro(baash) Jibon(?)

Aneek
ami friday sondha thke vabi der sahate boisha gibot kora suru korbo

Adit
Baal!
ekhono korish nai?
baicha asos kamne?

Aneek
ses hobe sunday sondhay
amar sara bochor er routine boli....

mon- friday bikal porjonto fataiya kamla dei
friday sondha- sunday bikal bengali gibot
ere 52 dia guun de

Adit
lol
valoi to
maal e boshar lok pas nai?

Aneek
ei khan e aisha notun exp. hoise... biatta gula irretating... bachelor gula aro beshi

Adit
bura bachelor na changra bachelor?

Aneek
sobai

Adit
lol
valo

Aneek
bachelor gula khali koy tk kamay, rate koto eigula nia kotha koy

Adit
mejaj beshi kharap joile hal maal khaya dekhte parish
majhe moidhdhe
mood valo thake

Aneek
sei try obosso kori nai.... but asar por deshi gular upor birokto hoya ausiee howar chesta korsilsm

Adit
ki hoilo?

Aneek
posay nai..... ami deshi gavi... din ses e ghas na khaile pet kharap kore

When people speak of great men

"When people speak of great men, they think of men like Napoleon - men of violence. Rarely do they think of peaceful men. But contrast the reception they will receive when they return home from their battles. Napoleon will arrive in pomp and in power, a man who's achieved the very summit of earthly ambition. And yet his dreams will be haunted by the oppressions of war. William Wilberforce, however, will return to his family, lay his head on his pillow and remember: the slave trade is no more."

- from the movie Amazing Grace

a lucky mistake

Ended up watching Outlanders (2007) instead of Outlander (2008). Wish I'd make more mistakes like these.

And oh, did I mention I managed to fall in love (again) in the process? She is Alexis Raben, the actress playing Anna in the movie. She is absolutely brilliant and extremely beautiful (sigh...) and has a double major in Film studies and Psychology! I'm sorry Naomi, but I would have to take you down from the desktop. I love you too, but there is just not enough room there. I'm sure u'll understand. :)

Signs?

Just finished watching the 3rd season of Dexter. (No I don’t have anything better to do in the summer.) It’s a popular show about a serial killer who kills other serial killers. Like all shows of this kind, its strangely addictive. I mean…u get to watch a guy slicing other guys and get away with it, without feeling any guilt whatsoever! And if even that doesn’t float your boat, there’s the sex scenes with ample nudity. TV’s never been better!

I mean…its simply brilliant! It takes a lot to cut it with the viewers these days. Violence has to be taken to this whole new level. And the hero here is freaking amazing! He just doesn’t kill people, he cuts them up into pieces, wraps them in bundles and feeds the fishes. And today’s viewers cant be too naive…I mean…nothing is black and white u know…its all gray and today’s viewers are kool enough to handle it. I mean…after all, he is just killing the bad people, and not like he can help it…he is putting his need to kill to good use, to clean up the streets! And not like the show says he’s okay…it makes it clear that he’s a monster and not all can handle it. Bull shit!

No matter how nice the monologues may sound…its all bull! The thing here is pretty simple…all of it is sick. The idea of the show, they way it can attract us and the fact that we have gotten to a stage where this can be openly dished out says a lot about how we r evolving as a race. Heck its not just the killing bit…the show is dishing out some other fantastic ideas too. For example, it’s a ‘scientific fact’ (?) that serial killers are born to be serial killers. Cause they have a specific type of brains! (Yep, that’s right, it’s apparently a gene thing, so, yeah, a serial killer’s relatives are also likely to be serial killers!). And oh yes, we should understand that serial killers are just…different u know…may be even better…like they are supreme predators...like the Lion! Fucking fantastic!

Wonder what else we can expect on TV? How about a little incest? Nothing like a li’l guilty pleasure to make your day. U know…it doesn’t have to be all bad…after all, it was quite okay in ancient times…it keeps the blood pure. Any may be it would be something that’s absolutely necessary for the survival of the species after a messy war or global disaster or something like that. Heh…there could really be a show like that one of these days…and we’d be watching that too. Wonder if these signs mean something...

Anna Karenina

I finally read Anna Karenina. And I'm very glad that I ignored a good friend's warning in doing so (he told me its nothing more than a soap opera and I'll be sure to ignore his comments on literature in the future). Anyhow, I don't want to write a book review. (I don't think I would be able to even if I wanted to.) Its an amazing book and I liked it and thats that. What I wanted to write about is that films that were made based on this. The 1st was in 1938 starring Greta Garbo, then there was one in 1948 and finally, the one released in 1997 starring Sophie Marceau. And they are all terribly bad!

I understand its difficult to make a 1000 page classic into a movie. The directors would obviously have to have some liberty with the screen play and the charecters but that hardly means they have the right to murder a work of art they way they did - all of them! They have been rather callous with the whole thing - the casting, screen play writing and of course, the acting. None of the leading ladies did justice to Anna. Almost all of the films ignored the strength, simplicity and spirituality of Levin. They also ignored the sincerity and innocense of the lovely Kitty and the rightousness of Karenin. This is especially true for the 38 version that made all the charecters look like complete idiots! If someone tried to watch this movies to get an idea of what the book is all about - oo boy!

Anyhow, like I said, its probably not the easiest book to make into a movie. However, I'd hope someday, someone would do a better job of it.

Singing in the Rain (1952)

Not into musicals that much. But sure wouldn't much watching more like these. Pity,...they just don't make 'em like they used to.

LISA NOVA

I dig this chick! She's like the modern day Monty Python. Her videos happen to be one of the most viewed stuff on YouTube (7 mil hits in 6 months in the beginning of 2007). Never mind all that. Check her out yourself.

Heres some of the stuff I liked:

TWITTER WHORE
sxephil and HotForWords
Behind the Scenes-Pirates of the Caribbean
WILD DREAM!!!

World builder

Happy a hundredfold...

"Happy a hundredfold, whoever
can lean on faith, who can dismiss
cold reason, sleep in sensual welter
like a drunk traveller in a shelter,
or, sweeter, like a butterfly
in flowers of spring it's drinking dry:
but piteous he, the all-foreseeing,
the sober head, detesting each
human reaction, every speech
in the expression of its being,
whose heart experience has cooled
and saved from being charmed or fooled!"

- Pushkin, Eugene Onegin (tr.Ch.Johnston)

"No, sirs, the ode's the thing..."

``oh, quit your stale, your tedious quacking,
and your alas-ing and alack-ing
about what's buried in the past:
sing about something else at last!''
All right, you want the resurrection
of trumpet, dagger, mask and sword,
and dead ideas from that old hoard,
all brought to life at your direction.
Not so? ``No, sirs, the ode's the thing,
that's the refrain that you should sing,

- A.S.Pushkin. Eugene Onegin (tr.Ch.Johnston)

idle again...

“Idle again by dedication,
oppressed by emptiness of soul,
he strove to achieve the appropriation
of other’s thought – a splendid goal;
with shelves of books deployed for action,
he read, and read – no satisfaction:
here’s boredom, madness or pretence,
here there’s no conscience, here no sense;
they’re all chained up in different fetters,
the ancients have gone stiff and cold,
the moderns rage against the old.
He’d given up girls – now gave up letters”

Pushkin, Eugene Onegin and Other Poems

Got internet, finally

This is why I want to live in NY for a couple of years...

2009

What do you expect on a new year’s eve? Well, I guess you don’t really expect much. A year has gone by, things have happened and you managed to get by okay and now, you just want to spend a few fun hours with your friends, enjoying a few drinks and laughs. And when the countdown is on, and the new year finally arrives, all you really hope for is a good start.

Didn’t have a great start this time. My fault entirely. Bluntly put, I was a mess. Drank a bit too much and things got a little hazy around the end. Somewhere in between I met a guy from Belgium, a French couple (they were just friends and the guy was obviously head over in hills in love with the chick) and a couple of American chicks I tried to fix up with Christopher (the Belgian guy). Doesn’t sound too bad. Ha? Well it wasn’t too good. If it hadn’t been for Mohsen, my corridor buddy, it woulda been a hell lot worse. If he didn’t stay on, and bring me back to home, I woulda been lying cold on the streets or get picked up by the police or something.

I threw up on myself several times on the night bus. (I tried to “do it with dignity” in that I tried to be silent and retreated to a dark corner and made sure its all on my own cloths but who am I kiddin anyway!) It’s a good thing I almost passed out so I didn’t really see if anybody took notice. The walk was dreadful. Especially so cause I twisted my ankle and lost my scarf and it was freaking cold out there. I somehow got home and threw my cloths into the washing machine and hit the bed.

I woke up a couple of hours later but couldn’t get up. I was still very dizzy and felt very weak. Had a bad headache and when I tried to stand up, my ankle hurt like hell. I hadn’t eaten well in a long while and I didn’t feel like cooking. I looked, smelt and felt like shit.

So how was my start? Its weird but now that I think about it, I think it was pretty good. Luck favored me in more than one way last night. In the morning I found my new bus card and cigarettes lying on the cleaning room floor. Its lucky that I just lost one scarf and not the bus card; that would have been terrible. A twisted ankle is much better than a broken one and last but not the least, I was damned lucky to have Mohsen baby sitting me. I am not used to being taken care of this way. Yep! The way I see it, I’ve made an ass out of myself and was lucky enough to get away with it and now a days, I ought to be thankful for all the luck I can get. Good start. Happy new year!