Bombay - the dead city

Just a day after my last post, Bala Saheb Thackeray passed away. I was in South Bombay then, and I live in suburbs. The moment we got the news, everybody panicked. Everyone was scared, and the sole aim was to reach home safely. People took whatever transport they could find and rushed. Within fifteen odd minutes, cabs started refusing to take passengers. Within one hour, each and every shop was shut. It looked as if the city was dead and not a person.

I would have really appreciated this if this bandh was not out of fear. Even I panicked. I left town the moment I heard the news. From Colaba to home on a bike, we took longer routes and avoided Sena areas. Thankfully we were on a bike as it was easy to navigate through traffic. By the time we reached Bandra, it was almost dark. We decided to take the link road route as we know quite a few people there. Thus if there was any problem anywhere, we could have gone and stayed there. 

Now, I have never ever seen Bombay THIS dead. It was more than an hour since they declared that he was dead and almost all the autos and taxis were off the roads. There was little traffic on the roads. In some areas, even the street lights were turned off. The worst thing was when even medical stores were asked to shut down. I saw a few people asking petrol pump guys to shut down too. 

Bombay has been dead since last evening. Not a single shop is open anywhere. Rather, let me put it this way - not a single shop is open anywhere officially. If you go in the market, everything is available, at a higher rate and at the back gate. What's the point of such a bandh? Bala Saheb Thackeray always aimed at the welfare of middle class marathi manus and today the same marathi manus is paying double the price for basic necessities.

Bala Saheb loved Mumbai. And the same city is being terrorised by his followers on his death day. We had to pay a higher rate for milk as my niece is young and she needs it. That too it was of pathetic quality. Thankfully nobody is ill. I don't know how we would have managed that situation, for mom falls ill frequently. Niece is allergic to smoke and dust, she is recovering too post Diwali.

Yes it's a bandh day. No restaurants are open, no theatres are open, even cable TV has been forced to shut down. Thankfully internet is working. And I hope it keeps working even after I publish this post. There are rumours of Bombay being bandh tomorrow too. Which I doubt will happen, but you may never know. And I hope my 15 day bandh prediction in the previous post doesn't come true either. I hate to see Bombay dead. It's good busy and shining, in traffic and crowded. It's dead when it's dull. And I don't like it. 

Hope to see the normal Bombay soon enough.

White collar terrorists

Can you ever imagine a standstill Bombay? If not then visit this city when something happens in the Thackeray family. Bala Saheb Thackeray has not been keeping too well. He was on life support system. When the news channel flashed that he was critical, riots started in various parts of Bombay. In my area, most of the shops were shut down yesterday, only the medical stores were open (thankfully), there were fewer vehicles on the road, not much traffic.

That was not all, Shiv Sainiks visited restaurants and theatres and asked people to vacate those places as their leader was fighting for his life. How could people enjoy normally? How could they smile when Bala Saheb was struggling for each breath? Thankfully he is out of danger now and stable. I dread the day he dies. Looking at Bombay's state when he was critical, I won't be surprised if they declare a Bombay Bandh for 15 days when he dies.

What I fail to see is, why should others stop celebrating when one leader is ill? Shouldn't it be a personal choice? Some people have a problem when younger generation celebrates Valentine's day, they have a problem when you are out on Diwali day, enjoying a quiet dinner with family. How should Bombay people function then? We are more scared of our political leaders than the terrorists. I make my plans after watching the news, and I am sure most of the Bombayites do the same.

It's a sad state that we live under fear all the time - fear of life, fear of death, fear of attack, fear of natural calamity, fear of humans and gods. And we still step out of home and call it spirit of Mumbai or whatever it is called these days. Because we have to survive. Just to get beaten up by one of those nutters who is hitting people as they stepped out on the day their leader was hospitalized, or their auto was stopped and autowala was fined as that leader sneezed thrice! And we live in a democracy.

I have always been proud of my city. Even post terror attack, or train bomb blasts, people resumed their normal lives in no time. Yes there was anger even then, but how pathetic and sad it is when you feel terrorised by your own people. It's not just sad or pathetic, it's suffocating. It makes you hate the best city you have lived in so far. There is no hope for improvement. One mafia goes, another one comes to rule. Children, nephews, grandchildren - everyone knows and wants to enter politics. And spread terror. They are white collar terrorists. They terrorise people and are still respected and followed. And they still get elected, again and again.

I hope they remain immortal and healthy forever. That's the only way we can live peacefully.

PS: Hope they don't kill me because I called them white collar terrorists and not saffron collar terrorists.

Strange people!

I do not remember the last time I opened "New Post" page, and that's saying something. As usual, busy times, crazy work and party schedule all the time, and I have been helping a few people start a blog. Thus, I have not been finding any time to blog. Talking about irony!

A lot has been happening on personal and professional front, but nothing significantly new that requires blogging. Nor have I felt like writing anything even though so many things happened which could have been blog worthy, but since they were not happening in my life, I didn't bother to write about them.

Every now and then I am reading about more and more cases of Domestic Violence. A little known fact is that most of the people think that it is limited to husband beating up his wife, but it also includes any physical harm by anyone who is family.

With digital media evolving, way too many social networking sites are around. And most of the people who have internet access are on almost all these sites. And once you are there, you kind of get an idea about what's happening around you even before others get to know. People share news and views from around the world, post interesting links and exchange information. But the same platform is abused too.

Not the first time that I have witnessed such an episode, but it surprises me every time I come across it. Girls blog/tweet about how their guys physically abused them. They even mention about how they were beaten up, what did that guy do exactly, how they wanted to file a complaint but couldn't and such things. What I fail to see is what's the need of going public about your sufferings? Before social networking sites too, people faced these problems and dealt with them accordingly; then why the sudden need of going public about the whole issue?

No I am not against going public about it, but do it only after you are over and done with that. After you have taken an action against the person doing so. And if you have not taken any action, then explain/mention why you didn't do so. Come out with the whole truth, mention all the important aspects of the situation instead of posting stuff that will gain you sympathy from others.

It's too easy to sit and enjoy the show, to come across as a victim, to have people around you standing with a box of tissues; but difficult part is to take an action. It requires guts to mention the wrong doer's name (who usually happens to be the husband) in front of the police due to society and family pressure.

And not all men are the same. It's funny to the extent of being utterly foolish when you blame the whole species for an act of one man. Yes, many are losers, but not all of them. 

It's a matter of time before the law officially passes about making social sites content admissible as evidence in the court of Law. Not that they don't consider that right now, but IT Act is yet to incorporate facebook/twitter/linkedin to the list. I won't be surprised if the next amendment has a clause specifically about social networking sites.

So, on the scale of one to Neha, how angry and frustrated are you right now?

PS: Ignore the header. It's there just because I didn't want to have a funny URL for the post.

Faltu Gyaan

Someone recently pointed out that I have been writing a lot of philosophy on blog. The reason is simple - I don't have to think and write when I am writing faltu gyaan on the blog. It just comes naturally. Now isn't this a good term? This better be the header of this post and new label from now. I be a genius.

I have been writing same kind of stuff or taking part in contests. No I don't have any reason for doing so. I write whatever I feel like writing. At times I express what I feel about certain things under contests/reviews hood. But you have got to be smart enough to understand that.

Yes, no philosophy or personal post. This will be a general post. Something I used to write in those early days of blogging. Those times when I travelled, I looked at everything from a blog's subject point of view. People to things to surroundings - everything was worth writing about. I used to blog about whatever I observed. I used to observe to write. 

Then time changed. Blog became more of a personal space. And I started writing about my thoughts. Observations still continued to happen as it had by then become a habit. But this blog became more of a ranting zone. So I decided to write a general post today, which has become a kind of philosophical too. Rather a ranting one.

So the topic is - plagiarism. I have been reading a lot about it everywhere. Blog posts are copied, tweets are copied, photos are used by people without permission or giving credit to the original photographer, designers copy the outfit designs, softwares and movies are pirated and what not.

I have even written about copyright laws in one of my previous posts. I had mentioned the legal provisions regarding that and what protection the author had. But I am surprised about one thing. I know stealing is not a right thing to do, but unless you are going to make money out of it or someone else is making money out of it, making it a life and death issue is foolish. Yes my posts have been copied too and I asked them to give me credit at least or remove them from their site. They removed the posts. That's it.

At times some lines, some status messages get copied too. I have received some things written by me as an sms. And I take that as a compliment. It was anyway a line. I was not going to use it anywhere. Some people copied it, some took the pain of sending them as sms forwards and tada. I am happy even if it doesn't have my name at the end of it.

When I was in school, I had written a poem for school magazine. It later on came on a very popular website then - bluemountain.com. It didn't even have my name, but that was the happiest moment of my life - to see my poem being published on a popular website. Internet was new then, and kind of not too common. So it WAS a huge deal.

Plagiarism is wrong, but you will have to face it. If you are too sentimental about your work, publish it in a private blog and be happy. Neither it will be read nor stolen. Yes I like to give faltu gyaan for free.

Of headaches and heartaches

I guess this is a season of sadness. So many people I know are going through a rough phase in their lives - some have serious health issues, some have family problems, some have financial crisis and some are heartbroken. And some people are not in any of these situation, but are the ones who patiently listen to whatever the other lot has to say. 

No it's not obligatory to listen to rants, but we are one selfish specie. We think about us too. We know that some day or the other we will need people too when we feel low, and we will need them too. Or we will need them when we want to share happiness. We stay around with people for one simple motive - we need them. If not now then some other time.

I guess that's where we want unconditional relationships at times. There are people you need, but you might not be able to give that back when time comes. Or maybe that's just a matter of convenience for us. Who would not like a friendship or relationship with no strings attached? But one does tend to get attached at some point in time and the same unconditional relationship becomes complicated.

Relationships are about understanding more than arrangements. When you don't expect anything from a person, you should ask yourself where you are really attached to him/her or not, for expectations are a part of affection. You want to talk to the person, or you want him/her to leave you alone - well that would be expectations too right?

We have weird ways of showing our misery. Some people cry, some just go underground, some get drunk and talk, some don't talk at all. A friend recently blamed another friend for his break up with a girl two years ago. This girl is getting married to someone else. When he got to know about it, he suddenly realized that he still had feelings for her. I guess it was convenient for him to pass on the blame to someone else, but the other person was really hurt. When we are in pain, we don't realize what we are talking about. We say things without thinking and it may leave an everlasting impact on others.

Anyway, talking about me, I used to get a headache when I was low. That kind of took away all the opportunities to express what I was feeling, for I used to be down with a headache. Even now when I am slightly stressed about work or life, I get a headache. 

And it's good to blame it on age. I am going to be 30 by this year end. I can't believe I have lived for 30 years already. It seems like such a short period. There is so much I have done already and still it's not even 1% of the things I want to do. There is still a lot of time, but if 30 years can pass without my realizing much then I am sure the next 25 30 years will pass too.

I think I should make a to do list.