My latest jigsaw!

I have always been allured by jigsaw puzzles. I just cannot stand seeing an unfinished jigsaw puzzle. In my office in the cafeteria they have a jigsaw puzzle placed right in the center which people try to finish when waiting for orders.Once the puzzle is finished they put in a new one. Its normally a 1000/2000 piece jigsaw puzzle and even though i dont buy anything in the cafeteria I sometimes just go in and spend about 5-10 minutes of my time trying to fit in the pieces.

I relate life to a jigsaw puzzle. You try to figure what life is all about like a jigsaw puzzle but with no picture as reference.You try to fit in all the pieces of information you have to get a complete meaning and understand it. With each piece you put in you think this is what the final picture is going to turn out as. Different people may get different pieces.But the irony and beauty in life is you wont know how many pieces are there totally .So finally in the end you wont know whether you completed the puzzle or not .You just hope you did. :) :) Just a very vague analogy and random thinking. :)

Anyways, I happened to finish this jigsaw puzzle quite sometime back and i had to break it back down to pieces after finishing it.I intially thought of framing it but i know i will never take it back ,so no point.Before I broke it down I took a snap of the completed one. Rajendra,Prahsanth and myself finished most of it,though once in a while whoever came to the house also pitched in .Being a movie buff,i chose this jigsaw with Humphrey bogart,marlyn monroe,Elvis presley and James dean.It looked gorgeous when it was finished.Pity ,we had to break it down!

DIGNITY!

Today I saw two contrasting scenes in life which reminded me of the word called 'Dignity'. My mother always used to stress on living life with dignity. Now that's vague,I never used to understand what it meant. You obviously tend to ask what is dignity?Who defines dignity? and many other unanswered questions.

I think its left to an observer/individual how he wants to interpret the word and wants to relate to it.Now coming back ..

I was travelling to office in the bus today and at a busy street junction there was a lone man standing holding a board 'Am hungry and homeless,Please help me'. He was an able looking guy with no physical deformities and in tattered clothes. He was doing nothing he just stood there on the busy junction with vacant tired eyes holding the board. When i looked at him I had a series of questions popping 'He is able,cant he find some sort of work instead of holding a board like that?' 'Can no-one offer this man anything or is he not trying?' 'Can i ever stand holding a board like that in a busy street' 'How painful would it be to leave all your dignity(I used this word deliberately here) and stand like that with no hope and waiting for someone to bail you out?'...
I pass the scene ..


I normally go to a sandwich shop called 'Pot Belly' in the afternoons to have my lunch.There is a sort of small attic there where some singer will be strumming a guitar and singing a song.Its very much like Phoebe in the friends serial singing in 'The perk' cafe.They keep changing almost every other day,some are good,some are bad,but i think this potbelly joint provides employment/entertainment/encourages talent with this job position. Today I happened to be a bit early and there was no singer,so i sit eating my sandwich watching the people passing by.In the crowd of people I see an old blind man feeling his way through the crowd using his stick, I don't know for some reason I have always pitied the blind people the most in my life,being a photographer/traveller/admirer of art/movies/nature I have always felt the most for blind people in my life,I hope to open/sponsor a foundation for blind people someday in my life.Not digressing .. I follow the path of the blind guy who feels his way around and gets on to the escalator and comes to the floor wing in which I am sitting and he slowly makes his away across to the potbelly joint I am sitting. He stops very near to the entrance of the pot belly and keeps looking straight as if waitng for somebody! Suddenly a guy inside the joint spots him and goes out and takes him by the hand and leads him in. He directs the old guy to the small ladder which takes one to the attic,this old guy has a guitar hanging by his shoulder,he feels his hands and legs around the ladder and slowly climbs up and gets on the top and feels the chair and mike and positions himself. He starts strumming the guitar and starts singing. He was not the greatest singer but I was completely moved by the entire scene and felt a deep respect for this old blind man.

I just happen to co-relate the scene i saw in the morning to this one and somehow a meaning seems to dawn upon the word 'Dignity' ...

D300 ..

I have finally ordered my Nikon D300! It will show up on my doorstep on thursday! I just cannot wait and i am all excited, Since the time i have made this order I have been moving around with a halo over my head, i feel as if I am walking on air, I have this small thumping in my heart, and have this small smirk on my face and that light headedness of having won a million dollar lottery. ;) I feel like a kid who has been just granted his favourite candy in the candystore.

I have ordered a Nikkor 18-200 mm VR lens and a Nikkor 50mm prime lens with it.All this has cost me a small fortune,people raise their eyebrows when i quote the figures,might think I am a damn fool or nut!But damn who cares - Its my money! This is what I always wanted and if you dont go and get what you want in life then probably life is not worth living.

So I am just waiting for Thursday!! With my 70-300 mm lens its going to look like a bazooka! I just cant wait to try out all the different things with it.

Song listening: The importance of being idle - Oasis
Book reading - The Motorcycle diaries - Ernesto Che Guevera

Nostalgia!

Nostalgia is a strange emotion,you go through a range of emotions at the same time,its like sadness,happiness combined together.You feel happy,yet at the same time you feel sad.

I am in the balcony right now sitting on a high stool with a backrest with feet swung over the balcony railings.The night sky is clear with stars twinkling.There is a three fourth moon at an angle of 45 degrees in the sky.There is a cool breeze blowing which kisses my exposed feet extended over the railings which makes me twitch my toes.I have my laptop on my ..where else, my lap and have the habit of shaking my legs as if I am restless.I have my ipod playing with the sennhiesers clung over my ears.I have put the ipod on random.

Madonna's 'the power of goodbye' comes sailing through.All of a sudden i go nostalgic.This song triggers something. Its like a flurry of random flash backs,my whole life.I remember my childhood friends,raichur krishna river,me,pranav,appa and amma on its banks,random trip moments,harihara,cousins,thatha,malleshwaram railway station,some hiking moments,harihara swing and garden,the fun times during ganesha festival,saibaba darshans with doddappa on sunday mornings,lalbagh jogs... A smile comes to my face,yet at the same time my heart grows heavy. I go through the flurry of deaths Indira atte,ravi doddappa,nagraj doddappa,my friend,thatha...

All this happens in split seconds.My whole life flashes by in bits and pieces.I am amazed at what all i have stored in my brain. So this is what my last 26 years on this planet has been like. My eternal questions of philosophic porportions just crop up.

The songs goes on in the background ..

Your heart is not open so I must go
The spell has been broken, I loved you so
Freedom comes when you learn to let go
Creation comes when you learn to say no

There's nothing left to try
There's no place left to hide
There's no greater power
Than the power of good-bye

...

Somehow all the 'Good-byes' in the song triggered off this line of thought .. LIFE..

Vive le Joker!

I have become a huge huge fan of Joker after watching the new batman flick. Hats off to Christopher nolan for brilliant script and direction.Heath ledger,I dont have any words for how he has portrayed his character.I think Bob kane would have been proud to see such a fantastic portrayal of his character.

The Joker character just hooks you by the collar and lifts you and you just cant be awed by his villainy and insidiousness.His philosophy is stunning.Dialogues are fantastic ..here are a few

Batman: [Whilst the Joker is holding Rachel out of a window] Let her go.
The Joker: Oh, very poor choice of words. [Lets her fall]

The Joker: [standing in front of a burning pile of money] This town deserves a better class of criminal, and I'm gonna give it to 'em. Tell your men they work for me now, this is my city.
Mob boss: They won't work for a freak.
The Joker: [Imitating the mob boss's accent] Freak? [Pulling out a small knife] Why don't we cut you up into little pieces and feed you to your pooches, hmm?[Joker's thugs pulls away the mob boss] And then we'll see how loyal a hungry dog really is!



Joker: It's simple, we uh- kill the Batman.
[Men in the room laugh, once again.]
Salvatore Maroni: If it's so simple, why haven't you done it already?
Joker: One thing I've learned is if you're good at something, never do it for free.

I'm not a monster. I'm just ahead of the curve.

Do I look like I have a plan? I don't have a plan. The mob has plans, the cops have plans. You know what I am, Harvey? I'm a dog chasing cars. I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. I just do things. I'm not a schemer.


Its been really quite a while since i have gotten so excited after seeing a character portrayal,the last was the performance of Javier bardem as 'Anton Chigurh' in 'no country for old men'.

DARK KNIGHT

Its 3:20 AM now. I am just coming from watching the 12 AM 'Dark knight' movie. We could not get any other tickets.Its running house full in America which is unheard of! All i can say is 'Its a mind blowing movie' . If you are a batman fan you will just be taken away. All i can say is when i saw the movie I felt so happy and sad at the same moment to think such a fantabulous actor as heath ledger is no longer there,like someone said he will probably go down in movie history as another James Dean,though i dont think James dean acting came even very close to this guys. I just couldnt contain my excitement all through out the movie.His joker character just digs into you.He might win an oscar like all the people are right now claiming and even if he does posthumously i think its way far off justified. Its a fantastic story line,fantastic effects.

I think i will be the joker tonight in my dreams. Who wants to be batman!!! He he he ha ha ah aha ha ...slurp ...

Boredom ...

I feel that most of the time in a day I am bored .. Bored of the mundaneness,the routine,the bourgeois.I know I am the creator of this emotion but somehow I cannot quell this emotion and come to terms with it.I loathe the feeling so much sometimes.
I sometimes think.. have most of my interests borne out of this without me realising it? Infact I sometimes think this whole world was defined arising out of boredom.Somebody got bored with living thier routine lives and tried something new or got an idea or created something new. Music,Art,science,Literature,religion etc ..


Now what's the panacea for boredom? Change,randomness,arbitness,exploring the unknown.Ironically the human mind resists the very same things to varying degrees.I want to write more ..but i am bored,i have thought about this too many times to put everything into words ..Lucky are those who do not even realise it.

My latest fav song ..

warcraft III - Rammstein Mein Herz Brennt



I just get completely pumped up when i listen to this song. Currently tops in the most played song on my ipod.I listen to it atleast 5 times in a day. Rammstein is a german 'Dance metal' group. So he is singing in german and not some gothic language :)(as described by my friend :) ) The song name translates to 'My heart burns'. This song is used in the Hellboy movie.I just love the guitar sequence that starts at around 3:45.Listen to it in some good music player to appreciate it.My Ipod and Sennheiser creates mind blowing music.

God!

Somebody asked me the other day - Do you believe in God?

I did not know how to answer him. I asked him 'what kind of god do you mean?'.He got confused.He said 'you know..the concept of god'. I said 'That's a better question'.
'Yes' 'I believe in god'. He goes 'So you are religious' . I say 'You got me wrong, I am not a believer in god that way'. He goes 'So what kind are you a believer in?' . I reply 'You can call my belief very close to pantheistic'. He 'uh ..hmm.. what kind is that?'. I don't know how to explain it 'Google it'. I dont know whether he ever found enough interest in my beliefs to go home and google it.

But today I was at a book store and was skimming through different books and i happened to chance upon a book on Einstein by Walter Issacson which seemed very interesting. Funnily enough somebody asked the same question to Einstein and here was his reply and i went on thinking nobody could have put my belief about god in better words than this.

[?] Do you believe in God?

Einstein - “I’m not an atheist. I don’t think I can call myself a pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds.

We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn’t know what it is.

That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God. We see the universe marvelously arranged and obeying certain laws but only dimly understand these laws.”