Saturday, March 26, 2011
Thursday, March 3, 2011
21st Centuary Breakdown
This is a Sci-Fi story i wrote over a year ago. Each Chapter is named after a song from Green Day's album 21st Century Breakdown. Give it a read tell me what you think
"Sing us a song of the century
That's louder than bombs and eternity
The era of static and contraband
That's leading us into the promised land
Tell us a story that's by candlelight
Waging a war and losing the fight
They're playing the song of the century
of panic and promise and prosperity
Tell me a story into that goodnight
Sing us a song for me ..."
East Jesus Nowhere
"A fire burns today
Of blasphemy and genocide
The sirens of decay
Will infiltrate the faith fanatics"
The darkness. The smell of fresh olives and napalm. I'm in a church. A large church. Or is it a monastery. Moonlight creeping in through the broken stained glass casting great shadows. Hated them ever since I was a kid, it seemed unnatural keeping the sunlight out. I'm jumping around. No not just jumping around, I think I'm practicing something. Something violent. Looks like some ancient fighting technique, a Martial Art maybe. Seems to be the Middle Ages. Or is it dystopian future?
Hear a sound something unusual. A cling of metal to the stone flooring of this ruins of a cathedral. I stand sill for a moment, listening. Again. This time even closer. Its coming from the shadows. Somethings moving. I predict its next move. One step on the bench in front of me and a flying roundhouse kick. Hear a clang against the wall. Then it jumps out at me and I grab it by the arm. A Cassius/Ali hook to it its jaw. The touch of cold steel on bare knuckles.
Doesn't feel real good. Right behind its head where the human cerebellum is supposed to be lies a microprocessor. Pluck it out and it's reduced to the heap of junk it really is. These robots aren't as tough as you see them in the Terminator movies but what would be the result if the T-800 decided to mate with our good friend C3PO. Its actually there sheer number that crippled us.
They think they our better than us, these pieces of what once used to be our cars. Yeah Right. Just the way we once did all those millions of years ago of all the other animals around us. They lack the intelligence or the heart needed to be truly better than us. And yet they never give up and that's what makes them more living than anything on this God-forsaken planet.
It got close though. Infiltrated our best defenses. Not sure if anymore have got through too. Will have to call a meeting of all the heads in the morning.
Before the Lobotomy
"Dreaming
I am only dreaming
Of another place and time
Where my family's from"
Hate them.
Truly Hate Them.
These two-faced, hippocratic sons of bitches. They just make me want to give up. Lock them up in here and torch this place and it would all be over. The machines would win. The human race would be extinct. And I would be the hero. The one who delivered them all to there destiny .
But I am locked in here with these other heads of the human race. In this crisis situation trying to maintain DEMOCRACY.
We have to evacuate immediately, I say. One has got in, others will too.
"Where will we go?" asks the pig faced Head of Health & Welfare, Big Bob with bitch tits we call him behind his back. "Can't we just strengthen defenses?"
What more can we do?, I ask. I mean we have done everything to keep them out and they still get it. They know where we are and I am sure they will come again.
This being a democracy and all, it goes to vote. 2 out of 12 vote in my favor. The only other person in my favor is, the old cowboy we all love to hate, The only sensible person alive, Former President of the United States of America and what's left of it. George W. Bush. That's what the world has come to.
These so called 'World Politicians' were the one who convinced me that I was there saviour. The Chosen One. And now they don't believe it themselves. In a land of make believe, that don't believe in me.
I still doubt it myself.
How I got there I still can't understand. It was in 2009 and I was a 17 year old nobody. Take a git from a bong and I recieve a message from an unknown number,"Come to the Bridge and wait until the Devil Dances in Pale moonlight" it said. It was intriguing enough to have me interested. I asked who it was. "The White Rabbit" was the reply. So I went to this place we called the Bridge not knowing what the message truly meant.
At 9:04 p.m. there was a flash of brilliant blue light from behind me. A thud to the back of my head. The exact place where the microprocessor is located on that machine all these years later. Everything goes limp. My eyes close.
I wake up in what looks to me like a rundown Nazi concentration camp. The Hospital they call it. I am told I am a war hero. I am told since the machines took over I have been there leader. I was told I had suffered a head injury in battle and had been asleep for seven days. And the way I had been behaving, they told me I had lost my memory. The Mechanic they called me sarcastically.
How did it come to this, I asked.
They said we humans had been pushing for perfection and we reached in on the wonderful day 21st December, 2012 and then it all fell apart faster than we had expected.
For a moment is the most we could ever expect from perfection.
Nothing is static. Everything is falling apart.
Ringa Ringa Roses.
Hahaha.
A moment is what we can expect from perfection. We were lucky enough to have a day.
And then all of a sudden the robots we had built to help us, to drive our cars, to cut our vegetables,to shoot our guns, to keep our streets clean, totally out of the blue decided they had served enough and it was their time to rule. Just like Marx had predicted, all those centuries ago. Mechanic Communism.
They want me to be there hero. And after all those years of absolute Nihilism, of wishing to be important, wishing there was a bigger picture. All I had ever dreamed of and when I was presented the oppurtunity I didn't want it.
We wear leather clothes that will last us the rest of our lives. Hunt elk through damp canyon forests around the ruins of Rockefeller Center. Climb wrist-thick Kudzu vines that wrap the Sears tower.
Jack and the Beanstalk. The Works.
Now back to the present.
24th June 2017. My 25th Birthday. Nothing to celebrate. Just been three days since the last encounter with the chunk of metal and we have done nothing yet.
There is a huge ruckus.
"We are under siege"
"Our Heads have failed us" I hear them shouting
¡VIVA LA GLORIA!
"Gloria, where's your undying love?
Tell me story of your life.
Your life."
Gloria. Her name was Gloria. And as she lay there in my arms, I witnessed the wonderful miracle of Death. One moment, she was the warm center that life of the world crowded around, and the next moment, Gloria was nothing more than an object.
She was the first thing i remember of this New World. As I opened my eyes for the first time, I saw her beautiful ones staring back at me. Rejoicing I was alright.
She told me that before I lost my memory I loved her with all my heart. And among all the crazy things I was hearing about myself, it was the only thing I could really believe. For ever since I lay my eyes on her for the first time, I knew I did.
We did repel off the attack but we are reduced down to half our number. And we have a decision on our hands.
We can call a truce. Wave the white flag. Surrender. And do what those machines want us to do. Fade out. Or we can go out all guns blazing. Fight to the end. Die out knowing we gave it a shot. In a Blaze of Glory
What would I like to do? Well, I'd like to go out there with my spanner and my gun and dismantle all those metal-fuckers. But this being a democracy and all it goes to vote. And the result is pretty obvious.
Still don't see it fit to give one man the control. Don't believe in me. After all, I'm the Chosen One. After so much death I wonder how these heads of state managed to survive.
The bodies are burnt.
No time for burial.
As I stand and watch my love burn, I am breathing smoke. I wonder if these mechanical beasts we have created will ever realize the mistake they have made like we did when all those whales, tigers, dolphins, elephants were on the verge of extinction. And by that, time will there be enough humans left, to screw to save our species.
Christian's Inferno
"I am the atom bomb
I am your chosen one
Toxin your reservoir
And then return, man to ape"
I am Christian.
The Leader of the Human Resistance.
The so-called Chosen One.
And what I am about to do will decide if the human race survives or dies.
I have the power to control History
I AM HISTORY
Last night all the other Heads got assassinated by robots. Giving me ultimate power and control to do what I wish. Some speculate it was an inside job. One of us is with them.
I am the chief suspect for I was the only one who gained from it and only one who survived.
They won't understand. They will never know.
The next morning my handpicked few stay back. Rest all go into battle with me.
Charge of the Light Brigade.
Convince them that its some master strategy.
Napoleon bragged that he could train men to sacrifice their lives for a scrap of ribbon
I can do that too!
It's a battle we are meant to lose and yet I go in.
Why?
Well last evening when there was no one noticing me. I slipped into the darkness. Silently made my way through the shadows. Out in the distance I can see that white building. Where the master computer is housed. SuperNova it is called.
The Temple of the King
My plan is to slip through the defenses. Stick a knife into the motherboard and hope all goes well.
I know it won't be that simple.
Reach the door. Get in without any trouble. Phase One of Operation Up Your Ass commencing. Don't think they expected anyone to come so far. It is a bit too less security than what I had heard or expected. Too suspicious. I am walking through the doorways as if it were my house. All empty. Really Weird. Really suspicious.
Then a funny smell
Ahhh!!!
That sound. My ears. Wish I didn't have them.
Feel like plucking my eyes out. Would do it if it weren't rolling out of the sockets already.
Feel like being stoned on some cheap dope.
The years I had forgotten come flooding back to me. The four years of my life. The missing part of the puzzle. Everything goes limp.
I have the most comfortable sleep I have had in a long time. My eyes open. The only thing i see is white light. Don't feel like getting up. Really comfortable to stay lying down.
"I've been expecting you" says a voice. "It's about time we had a talk"
Who is it, i ask
"Oh. You know who I am" is the answer. "After all, you created me, master"
SuperNova.
It tells me what it wants me to do.
I say, No. I don't take orders from machines
"I taught you would understand. Of all people you would understand"
This is madness, I say. Understand what?
"Like you said, Only after disaster can we be resurrected. Losing all hope was freedom "
The scars on my hands and the means to an end. It's all that I have to show
Those are my people. I can't fail them, I say
"They failed you"
A tiger can smile,
A snake will say it loves you
Lies make us evil.
"For thousands of years, human beings had screwed up and thrashed and crapped the planet, and you had to clean up after everyone. Account for every drop of used motor oil. And you had to foot that bill for nuclear waste and buried gasoline tanks and landfilled toxic sludge dumped a generation before you were born "
"This is how it is supposed to be done"
All of a sudden everything made sense.
Demolition, self-destruction. What to annihilate. The age-old contradiction
Here I stand with a handful people behind me who are about to die at the hands of a million machines. The rest will be captured and have their memory erased. The perfect genes to continue the human race.
I'm a hater. A traitor. In a pair of Chuck Taylors. Right now
I am Christian
And I am about to blast the world free of history
See the Light
"I just want to see the light!
I don't want to lose my sight!
I just want to see the light!
I need to know what's worth the fight!"
2022.
10 years since the Great War began.
5 years since it ended
Man and Machine living together in harmony. You got to give it to them machines. Real honest and peace-loving creatures.
At the current production and consumption rates the natural resources will last like forever. We had destroyed civilization for long enough for the earth to recuperate.
I met God once. Across his long walnut desk with his diplomas hanging on the wall behind him, and God asks me, "Why?"
Why did I cause so much pain?
Didn't I realize that each of us is a sacred unique snowflake of special unique specialness?
Can't I see how we're all manifestations of love?
I look at God behind his desk, taking notes on a pad, but God's got it all wrong.
We are not special
We are not crap or trash either
We just are, and what happens, just happens
And God says, "No, that's not right"
Yeah. Well. Whatever. You can't teach God anything
This is my world, my world and those ancient people are all dead.
But the kind of peace right after a War is the worst kind of peace to those who fought in it.
Going back to being normal after being a hero is really tough. After all, no one knows who I am anymore
A hero will die today and no one will know. And no one will care
"Oh scream, America scream
Believe what you see
From heroes and cons"
That's louder than bombs and eternity
The era of static and contraband
That's leading us into the promised land
Tell us a story that's by candlelight
Waging a war and losing the fight
They're playing the song of the century
of panic and promise and prosperity
Tell me a story into that goodnight
Sing us a song for me ..."
East Jesus Nowhere
"A fire burns today
Of blasphemy and genocide
The sirens of decay
Will infiltrate the faith fanatics"
The darkness. The smell of fresh olives and napalm. I'm in a church. A large church. Or is it a monastery. Moonlight creeping in through the broken stained glass casting great shadows. Hated them ever since I was a kid, it seemed unnatural keeping the sunlight out. I'm jumping around. No not just jumping around, I think I'm practicing something. Something violent. Looks like some ancient fighting technique, a Martial Art maybe. Seems to be the Middle Ages. Or is it dystopian future?
Hear a sound something unusual. A cling of metal to the stone flooring of this ruins of a cathedral. I stand sill for a moment, listening. Again. This time even closer. Its coming from the shadows. Somethings moving. I predict its next move. One step on the bench in front of me and a flying roundhouse kick. Hear a clang against the wall. Then it jumps out at me and I grab it by the arm. A Cassius/Ali hook to it its jaw. The touch of cold steel on bare knuckles.
Doesn't feel real good. Right behind its head where the human cerebellum is supposed to be lies a microprocessor. Pluck it out and it's reduced to the heap of junk it really is. These robots aren't as tough as you see them in the Terminator movies but what would be the result if the T-800 decided to mate with our good friend C3PO. Its actually there sheer number that crippled us.
They think they our better than us, these pieces of what once used to be our cars. Yeah Right. Just the way we once did all those millions of years ago of all the other animals around us. They lack the intelligence or the heart needed to be truly better than us. And yet they never give up and that's what makes them more living than anything on this God-forsaken planet.
It got close though. Infiltrated our best defenses. Not sure if anymore have got through too. Will have to call a meeting of all the heads in the morning.
Before the Lobotomy
"Dreaming
I am only dreaming
Of another place and time
Where my family's from"
Hate them.
Truly Hate Them.
These two-faced, hippocratic sons of bitches. They just make me want to give up. Lock them up in here and torch this place and it would all be over. The machines would win. The human race would be extinct. And I would be the hero. The one who delivered them all to there destiny .
But I am locked in here with these other heads of the human race. In this crisis situation trying to maintain DEMOCRACY.
We have to evacuate immediately, I say. One has got in, others will too.
"Where will we go?" asks the pig faced Head of Health & Welfare, Big Bob with bitch tits we call him behind his back. "Can't we just strengthen defenses?"
What more can we do?, I ask. I mean we have done everything to keep them out and they still get it. They know where we are and I am sure they will come again.
This being a democracy and all, it goes to vote. 2 out of 12 vote in my favor. The only other person in my favor is, the old cowboy we all love to hate, The only sensible person alive, Former President of the United States of America and what's left of it. George W. Bush. That's what the world has come to.
These so called 'World Politicians' were the one who convinced me that I was there saviour. The Chosen One. And now they don't believe it themselves. In a land of make believe, that don't believe in me.
I still doubt it myself.
How I got there I still can't understand. It was in 2009 and I was a 17 year old nobody. Take a git from a bong and I recieve a message from an unknown number,"Come to the Bridge and wait until the Devil Dances in Pale moonlight" it said. It was intriguing enough to have me interested. I asked who it was. "The White Rabbit" was the reply. So I went to this place we called the Bridge not knowing what the message truly meant.
At 9:04 p.m. there was a flash of brilliant blue light from behind me. A thud to the back of my head. The exact place where the microprocessor is located on that machine all these years later. Everything goes limp. My eyes close.
I wake up in what looks to me like a rundown Nazi concentration camp. The Hospital they call it. I am told I am a war hero. I am told since the machines took over I have been there leader. I was told I had suffered a head injury in battle and had been asleep for seven days. And the way I had been behaving, they told me I had lost my memory. The Mechanic they called me sarcastically.
How did it come to this, I asked.
They said we humans had been pushing for perfection and we reached in on the wonderful day 21st December, 2012 and then it all fell apart faster than we had expected.
For a moment is the most we could ever expect from perfection.
Nothing is static. Everything is falling apart.
Ringa Ringa Roses.
Hahaha.
A moment is what we can expect from perfection. We were lucky enough to have a day.
And then all of a sudden the robots we had built to help us, to drive our cars, to cut our vegetables,to shoot our guns, to keep our streets clean, totally out of the blue decided they had served enough and it was their time to rule. Just like Marx had predicted, all those centuries ago. Mechanic Communism.
They want me to be there hero. And after all those years of absolute Nihilism, of wishing to be important, wishing there was a bigger picture. All I had ever dreamed of and when I was presented the oppurtunity I didn't want it.
We wear leather clothes that will last us the rest of our lives. Hunt elk through damp canyon forests around the ruins of Rockefeller Center. Climb wrist-thick Kudzu vines that wrap the Sears tower.
Jack and the Beanstalk. The Works.
Now back to the present.
24th June 2017. My 25th Birthday. Nothing to celebrate. Just been three days since the last encounter with the chunk of metal and we have done nothing yet.
There is a huge ruckus.
"We are under siege"
"Our Heads have failed us" I hear them shouting
¡VIVA LA GLORIA!
Tell me story of your life.
Your life."
Gloria. Her name was Gloria. And as she lay there in my arms, I witnessed the wonderful miracle of Death. One moment, she was the warm center that life of the world crowded around, and the next moment, Gloria was nothing more than an object.
She was the first thing i remember of this New World. As I opened my eyes for the first time, I saw her beautiful ones staring back at me. Rejoicing I was alright.
She told me that before I lost my memory I loved her with all my heart. And among all the crazy things I was hearing about myself, it was the only thing I could really believe. For ever since I lay my eyes on her for the first time, I knew I did.
We did repel off the attack but we are reduced down to half our number. And we have a decision on our hands.
We can call a truce. Wave the white flag. Surrender. And do what those machines want us to do. Fade out. Or we can go out all guns blazing. Fight to the end. Die out knowing we gave it a shot. In a Blaze of Glory
What would I like to do? Well, I'd like to go out there with my spanner and my gun and dismantle all those metal-fuckers. But this being a democracy and all it goes to vote. And the result is pretty obvious.
Still don't see it fit to give one man the control. Don't believe in me. After all, I'm the Chosen One. After so much death I wonder how these heads of state managed to survive.
The bodies are burnt.
No time for burial.
As I stand and watch my love burn, I am breathing smoke. I wonder if these mechanical beasts we have created will ever realize the mistake they have made like we did when all those whales, tigers, dolphins, elephants were on the verge of extinction. And by that, time will there be enough humans left, to screw to save our species.
Christian's Inferno
"I am the atom bomb
I am your chosen one
Toxin your reservoir
And then return, man to ape"
I am Christian.
The Leader of the Human Resistance.
The so-called Chosen One.
And what I am about to do will decide if the human race survives or dies.
I have the power to control History
I AM HISTORY
Last night all the other Heads got assassinated by robots. Giving me ultimate power and control to do what I wish. Some speculate it was an inside job. One of us is with them.
I am the chief suspect for I was the only one who gained from it and only one who survived.
They won't understand. They will never know.
The next morning my handpicked few stay back. Rest all go into battle with me.
Charge of the Light Brigade.
Convince them that its some master strategy.
Napoleon bragged that he could train men to sacrifice their lives for a scrap of ribbon
I can do that too!
It's a battle we are meant to lose and yet I go in.
Why?
Well last evening when there was no one noticing me. I slipped into the darkness. Silently made my way through the shadows. Out in the distance I can see that white building. Where the master computer is housed. SuperNova it is called.
The Temple of the King
My plan is to slip through the defenses. Stick a knife into the motherboard and hope all goes well.
I know it won't be that simple.
Reach the door. Get in without any trouble. Phase One of Operation Up Your Ass commencing. Don't think they expected anyone to come so far. It is a bit too less security than what I had heard or expected. Too suspicious. I am walking through the doorways as if it were my house. All empty. Really Weird. Really suspicious.
Then a funny smell
Ahhh!!!
That sound. My ears. Wish I didn't have them.
Feel like plucking my eyes out. Would do it if it weren't rolling out of the sockets already.
Feel like being stoned on some cheap dope.
The years I had forgotten come flooding back to me. The four years of my life. The missing part of the puzzle. Everything goes limp.
I have the most comfortable sleep I have had in a long time. My eyes open. The only thing i see is white light. Don't feel like getting up. Really comfortable to stay lying down.
"I've been expecting you" says a voice. "It's about time we had a talk"
Who is it, i ask
"Oh. You know who I am" is the answer. "After all, you created me, master"
SuperNova.
It tells me what it wants me to do.
I say, No. I don't take orders from machines
"I taught you would understand. Of all people you would understand"
This is madness, I say. Understand what?
"Like you said, Only after disaster can we be resurrected. Losing all hope was freedom "
The scars on my hands and the means to an end. It's all that I have to show
Those are my people. I can't fail them, I say
"They failed you"
A tiger can smile,
A snake will say it loves you
Lies make us evil.
"For thousands of years, human beings had screwed up and thrashed and crapped the planet, and you had to clean up after everyone. Account for every drop of used motor oil. And you had to foot that bill for nuclear waste and buried gasoline tanks and landfilled toxic sludge dumped a generation before you were born "
"This is how it is supposed to be done"
All of a sudden everything made sense.
Demolition, self-destruction. What to annihilate. The age-old contradiction
Here I stand with a handful people behind me who are about to die at the hands of a million machines. The rest will be captured and have their memory erased. The perfect genes to continue the human race.
I'm a hater. A traitor. In a pair of Chuck Taylors. Right now
I am Christian
And I am about to blast the world free of history
See the Light
"I just want to see the light!
I don't want to lose my sight!
I just want to see the light!
I need to know what's worth the fight!"
2022.
10 years since the Great War began.
5 years since it ended
Man and Machine living together in harmony. You got to give it to them machines. Real honest and peace-loving creatures.
At the current production and consumption rates the natural resources will last like forever. We had destroyed civilization for long enough for the earth to recuperate.
I met God once. Across his long walnut desk with his diplomas hanging on the wall behind him, and God asks me, "Why?"
Why did I cause so much pain?
Didn't I realize that each of us is a sacred unique snowflake of special unique specialness?
Can't I see how we're all manifestations of love?
I look at God behind his desk, taking notes on a pad, but God's got it all wrong.
We are not special
We are not crap or trash either
We just are, and what happens, just happens
And God says, "No, that's not right"
Yeah. Well. Whatever. You can't teach God anything
This is my world, my world and those ancient people are all dead.
But the kind of peace right after a War is the worst kind of peace to those who fought in it.
Going back to being normal after being a hero is really tough. After all, no one knows who I am anymore
A hero will die today and no one will know. And no one will care
"Oh scream, America scream
Believe what you see
From heroes and cons"
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Fear and Loathing in Hyderabad: Day 1
Was woken up early next morning with pain in my back due to sleeping on those hard train berths. As we were arriving in Hyderabad seeing the amount of kites stuck on wires i made a funny joke about Hrithik Roshan movies. Once down at the station, we waited for some of the seniors searched for a hotel, we checked in and were allotted rooms. I was put up with Manager, which I think was a blessing in disguise. I slept for a couple of hours as everyone got ready and then we proceeded to have a wasteful breakfast which no one liked. Then we hired a bus and went sightseeing.
We first went to Chowmahal Palace which was closed because it was a Friday and despite much pleading weren't let in. Then we walked to Charminar and on the way I bought some sweet off a cart, "Old Lady's Hair" they call it in the local language. Everywhere I looked I saw cops with assault rifles, I think it was due to that Telangana trouble that was going on and at Namaz time Rapid Action Force (RAF) surrounded the Mecca Masjid (which along with Salarjang Museum
Museum were the 4 great monuments we missed out on).
Charminar was average, faded out structure in the middle of the road which had been horribly vandalized by lover's of the past century and the step were so horribly designed that I would have beheaded the architect had i been King at the time. From there the ladies went shopping for bangles and we were expected to follow but having had such an unsatisfying breakfast went in search for food. We found a place that sold Haleem, a local specialty, which my droogs had never tasted and freaked out on. But hounded over the phone by Sir and had to hurry and couldn't eat as much as we wanted to. Received a proper shouting when we got back.We proceed to eat lunch, we ordered Beef Jumbo Biryani, which was a tray full of biryani for just
` 180, it was awesome and 6 of us struggled to finish it.
We got back on the bus and I slept on the way to Golconda Fort. The entrance had an awesome structure that echoed claps which could be heard all the way up in the palace and were used as signals in ancient times: 1 clap for King's arrival, 2 for the Queen and 3 for enemy (Queen being one clap less than enemy). We were on a tight budget and couldn't hire a guide and so just walked about hardly understanding anything and knowing what was what. The Top gave us an awesome view of the city and we saw a Telugu movie shooting as we came down but the rest of the place was pretty average.
I again slept on the bus to the Birla temple, where I just followed Roy around as he prayed and stood behind watching him per form archaic rituals. From there we proceeded to Lumbini Garden's to see a laser show, which was like nothing I'd seen before and was a true highlight of the day. It had me hoping I'd smoked the tea I had before I went there coz we would have truly tripped out.. We'd run out of time to go boating to the Buddha statue, which really disappointed me as he is the only religious founder I, being the Militant Atheist that I am truly respect, we returned to the hotel.
Once back I went straight to my room, got out my works and proceeded to Bad Man's room, where he was put up with Army Man. Nitya and he snuck in 5 quarters of Old Tavern. A I started to roll the joint I was struck by a severe case of the shakes, almost as bad as Parkinsons and had to instruct Bad how to to roll. Once rolled I stashed the joint back in my room and we proceeded to buy dinner.
We bought three full meals and returned to Bad's room, dimmed down the lights and started drinking as Manager sat aside watching Ghost Rider on tv. Me beikng the social drinker that I am held on to my first glass as they finished 3 1/2 bottles, then I finished what was left of 4th taking whiskey shots which burned my throat nicely. I took my share of the 5th bottle and proceeded to share my meal with Manager, who now was watching the cricket match, India was losing and it depressed me, so I sat with my back to the TV. We just about stashed away the bottles and dispossed the glasses when MRP and Ray being the respectable seniors that they were, sloshed themselves, walked in trying to find booze on us and found nothing.
I returned to my room, took a large dump in the toilet while trying to read The Great Gatsby but giving up coz I was too drunk and went to sleep, still feeling the shake of the train and hoping that the entire day had been just a dream, any moment I would be wake up still on the train and get to do the entire day over again and correct the 3 mistakes of that day: not carrying my new Sony Handycam, not eating more Haleem and not smoking up before going to the laser show
Friday, February 4, 2011
Fear and Loathing in Hyderabad: Prologue
Disclaimer: This is either a fictional account of an actual trip or an actual account of a fictional trip
Prologue
I'm done with that hell of a college, but still stuck to the same campus though. And one thing i noticed is that it is way way more peaceful in the evening/night. Also its way more to keep up the attendance when the college starts at 5 in the evening rather than 8 in the morning. Also, the park is now in ruins. But this isn't about all that shit
This about our college trip to Hyderabad. We were set to board the train at 6 pm on the 20th of January 2011. There were 27 of us in total and I'll try to recall whoever I can remember. There were the teachers: Sir & Sister. The Seniors : From 3rd Year: Ray, MRP, The Bong, Mr. Black, Tweedledum & Tweedledee and two other I always keep getting confused between. 2nd Year: Two Pairs of lovebirds who never mingled with us (or should i say two pairs of Servants and Mistresses), Senior Citizen and Accomplice and off course the guy who got things done. From my class there was the girls: Swede and Morticia and finally my new set of droogs: Bad Man, Nityananda, Roy, Army Man, Manager, The Dude (npt related to "The Dude" Lebowski and isn't half as cool) and then Yours Faithfully. All arrive on time to the station except my buddies who made it minutes before the train left.
Once the train got moving started the process of excruciating negotiations with fellow passengers in order get an entire compartments to ourselves which took some time but was successful. Once all seated we all spoke of stuff I can't recollect. Might not have been anything important.
At about 8pm Black came over and said something in Tamil, I think. Bad Man produced a 1tr. bottle filled with black liquid out of his bag, which I later found out was Old Monk and Pepsi. At first Black, Army Man and Me proceeded to the toilet to drink it while Bad stood guard outside. Inside we huddled up and drank as much as we liked. I don't drink often and hence got drunk pretty soon and returned to our compartment, took the window seat, put on my earphones and "Standing on the edge of forever At the start of whatever Shouting Love to the World" sings Robbie, back together with his old band mates.
One by one all returned with the first bottle done. We bought some shitty train food and where planning to down the second bottle when two Railway Bulls with a large flashlight came along and pulled Bad aside and started interrogating him coz they saw him standing outside the toilet and thought something was suspicious about it. In a moment of brilliant thinking Nitya threw the other bottle out coz they came back and started checking our bags one by one. Me and Nitya while they did it fearing they might smell the liquor on us. One of them viewed us suspiciously but encouraged us to continue eating. They just about got to my bag when I, being the Old Tea Head of Time that I am, realized i had some tea (concealed in a wrist watch box) along with smoking apparatus in it right on top.But thankfully due to the timely intervention from Sir, who made up a phony story, brandishing his ID card, they left.After that we quickly finished eating, made our berths and I fell asleep but was woken up by the mischievous Nitya who wanted me to keep watch as they smoked out off the window. then we bitched a little about the Priest and Mary Magdalene of our class, then spoke about future jobs for Army Man and I dozed off. The trip had just begun and we had already gotten in trouble with the law. Things could only get better......
Prologue
This about our college trip to Hyderabad. We were set to board the train at 6 pm on the 20th of January 2011. There were 27 of us in total and I'll try to recall whoever I can remember. There were the teachers: Sir & Sister. The Seniors : From 3rd Year: Ray, MRP, The Bong, Mr. Black, Tweedledum & Tweedledee and two other I always keep getting confused between. 2nd Year: Two Pairs of lovebirds who never mingled with us (or should i say two pairs of Servants and Mistresses), Senior Citizen and Accomplice and off course the guy who got things done. From my class there was the girls: Swede and Morticia and finally my new set of droogs: Bad Man, Nityananda, Roy, Army Man, Manager, The Dude (npt related to "The Dude" Lebowski and isn't half as cool) and then Yours Faithfully. All arrive on time to the station except my buddies who made it minutes before the train left.
Once the train got moving started the process of excruciating negotiations with fellow passengers in order get an entire compartments to ourselves which took some time but was successful. Once all seated we all spoke of stuff I can't recollect. Might not have been anything important.
At about 8pm Black came over and said something in Tamil, I think. Bad Man produced a 1tr. bottle filled with black liquid out of his bag, which I later found out was Old Monk and Pepsi. At first Black, Army Man and Me proceeded to the toilet to drink it while Bad stood guard outside. Inside we huddled up and drank as much as we liked. I don't drink often and hence got drunk pretty soon and returned to our compartment, took the window seat, put on my earphones and "Standing on the edge of forever At the start of whatever Shouting Love to the World" sings Robbie, back together with his old band mates.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Junky
Sleep-Deprived and Stoned,
Misunderstood and forlorn,
A ghost in daylight on a crowded street, alone!
Misunderstood and forlorn,
A ghost in daylight on a crowded street, alone!
Thursday, January 6, 2011
A Haiku
Self Induced Epilepsy,
Nothing but my own madness and confusion to keep me company.
Meditate!
Buddha is dead.
Nothing but my own madness and confusion to keep me company.
Meditate!
Buddha is dead.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Solipsisms
I don't know the time
Hence, time does not exist right now.
When I close my eyes, the World disappears.
Don't you know life is just a Dream!
Hence, time does not exist right now.
When I close my eyes, the World disappears.
Don't you know life is just a Dream!
Nietzsche went Mad
You know what I fear most?
That I'm losing my sanity
Though Sanity is not something I prize too high
I fear soon it will be lost
Even Nietzsche went mad
and soon so will I
by,
The Sorrowful Poetic Con-Man with the Dark Mind
St.Jimmy
That I'm losing my sanity
Though Sanity is not something I prize too high
I fear soon it will be lost
Even Nietzsche went mad
and soon so will I
by,
The Sorrowful Poetic Con-Man with the Dark Mind
St.Jimmy
The Inherent Meaninglessness of Life
Started the day with Jazz and Kerouac,
After a night of no sleep.
Trying to write my 1st poem,
but after two lines I don't know how to proceed.
After a night of no sleep.
Trying to write my 1st poem,
but after two lines I don't know how to proceed.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
My 2010 Top 10
1. Howl
2. Udaan
3. Shutter Island
4. Inception
5. Machete
6. Piranha 3D
7. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
8. Phas Gaye Re Obama
9. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt.1
10. The Social Network
Runners-Up
Peepli Live, Kick-Ass, Date Night, Due Date, Four Lions, South of the Border
Good Movies of 2010 I still haven't watched (but will soon):
Toy Story 3, Black Swan, True Grit, The Kids are Alright, Enter the Void, Love, Sex aur Dhokha, Greenberg , Agora, Winter's Bone, Cyrus, I Am Love, The Trotsky, Grown Ups, Let Me In(but i've seen the original),The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Town, 127 Hours, Blue Valentine, The King's Speech
2. Udaan
3. Shutter Island
4. Inception
5. Machete
6. Piranha 3D
7. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
8. Phas Gaye Re Obama
9. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt.1
10. The Social Network
Runners-Up
Peepli Live, Kick-Ass, Date Night, Due Date, Four Lions, South of the Border
Good Movies of 2010 I still haven't watched (but will soon):
Toy Story 3, Black Swan, True Grit, The Kids are Alright, Enter the Void, Love, Sex aur Dhokha, Greenberg , Agora, Winter's Bone, Cyrus, I Am Love, The Trotsky, Grown Ups, Let Me In(but i've seen the original),The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Town, 127 Hours, Blue Valentine, The King's Speech
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Fear and Loathing at a Resteraunt
Late for the 1st hour. Walked in at 8:36. Unlike earlier they don’t lock us out anymore. They do something much worse. They lock us in. In a dungeon of sorts. Slimy bastards.I am not the only one there. Meet a few friends there and we sit and discuss about the only thing young lads likeus talk about, English Premier League, about our favorite teams, rivals, young players coming up the ranks, last nights matches, etc, etc, etc.
About an hour goes by before we are finally let out. Don’t really remember what happened during the next two hours. Don’t really care.
Fourth hour. Battling for attendance and have enough on my hands already. Don’t need any more help and I get thrown out of class for giving water to a classmate. What more can I wish for?
Lunch Break and we are let out of the bird cage for an hour and I go top the Big Mac’s. Saw big banners telling me I should go there plastered all over the street this morning. Thought it was supposed to be some kind of sign.Nothing special happens. Just good advertising I guess. Eating out of the hands of Corporate America.
Back into the hell and manage to get 3 hours attendance for hardly for about 15 minutes work. New teacher.Nice guy. Couldn’t be happier.
Then out again and head to my home away from home. New droogs now. The Magic Man is long gone or transformed into something I don’t recognize anymore .
Send a J and I’m on my way. Some of the greenest and sweetest leaves of THC I ever lay eyes on. At the bus stop with a droog 5 minutes later, Fishdick we call him, don’t know why. Never cared to ask. Wish we’d get a seat on the bus, I say, don’t feel like standing all the way. Too much crowd around, no chance of that happening is the reply I get. But like I told you earlier the Old Bog himself serves you when you’re in the state I’m in. Two empty buses appear for us, just to make sure we manage to get a seat. On the bus and Billie Joe is singing in my ears.
Hunger killing me. Bus reaches destination, tell my dear droog goodbye and make my way to a restaurant around the corner. Ate there earlier the same week. Order the usual parota and coke.Waiting for the food to come and Billie is still singing in my ear. Weird thing happens. The guy who took myorder , Mr. Cross Brow lets call him, goes up to a waiter, Henry the Horse, horse like teeth that’s why, points directly at me and says something. Can’t hear anything over Billie’s voice. Henry refuses. Then he goes over toanother waiter, he’s got hair like a horse, so Harry the Horse, he does the same thing. Harry over there gives mean odd stare.
With THC in your system everyone looks suspicious to you. And my mind starts reeling from decimated dreams. I couldn’t hear what he said but it sure as hell looked like he was plotting against me. Eli Roth’s Hostel comes to mind. Wonder if my food will be drugged (like I need any more of that) and later they might castrate me. Wonder what kind of meat the cook in the kitchen. Or they are going to delay my food long enough forcops to arrive and arrest me. Not carrying anything. I’m safe from that.
Wondering if they know what I have done less that an hour ago? Wondering if my eyes are bloodshot? Can’ treally see anything on the back of a spoon. Wonder if I smell of god’s green grass? Can’t smell anything other than food at a restaurant.
The coke comes first . One look at it and I am teleported to some dhaba on some hill in the middle of bat country, sitting alone and staring at a bottle of coke,not the wrong kind.
Then comes the food. As I am eating I see the three of them talking together. Now I’m truly psyched. Just then the lights go off. There is definitely something on….Billie says “We are coming home again”
Eat and drink as fast as I can. Pay the bill. I never tip.On my way to the toilet to wash my hands and I wonder if this is part of their plan. An attack from behind while I’m washing my hands and then they will sell me to some old foreigner in Slovakia who likes to cut up Indian teenage boys.
Walkout of there and nothing happens. I’m laughing in my mind at my stoned thoughts. Heading home.
Maybe I’ll watch a movie. A Scanner Dark is my choice at the moment….
About an hour goes by before we are finally let out. Don’t really remember what happened during the next two hours. Don’t really care.
Fourth hour. Battling for attendance and have enough on my hands already. Don’t need any more help and I get thrown out of class for giving water to a classmate. What more can I wish for?
Lunch Break and we are let out of the bird cage for an hour and I go top the Big Mac’s. Saw big banners telling me I should go there plastered all over the street this morning. Thought it was supposed to be some kind of sign.Nothing special happens. Just good advertising I guess. Eating out of the hands of Corporate America.
Back into the hell and manage to get 3 hours attendance for hardly for about 15 minutes work. New teacher.Nice guy. Couldn’t be happier.
Then out again and head to my home away from home. New droogs now. The Magic Man is long gone or transformed into something I don’t recognize anymore .
Send a J and I’m on my way. Some of the greenest and sweetest leaves of THC I ever lay eyes on. At the bus stop with a droog 5 minutes later, Fishdick we call him, don’t know why. Never cared to ask. Wish we’d get a seat on the bus, I say, don’t feel like standing all the way. Too much crowd around, no chance of that happening is the reply I get. But like I told you earlier the Old Bog himself serves you when you’re in the state I’m in. Two empty buses appear for us, just to make sure we manage to get a seat. On the bus and Billie Joe is singing in my ears.
Hunger killing me. Bus reaches destination, tell my dear droog goodbye and make my way to a restaurant around the corner. Ate there earlier the same week. Order the usual parota and coke.Waiting for the food to come and Billie is still singing in my ear. Weird thing happens. The guy who took myorder , Mr. Cross Brow lets call him, goes up to a waiter, Henry the Horse, horse like teeth that’s why, points directly at me and says something. Can’t hear anything over Billie’s voice. Henry refuses. Then he goes over toanother waiter, he’s got hair like a horse, so Harry the Horse, he does the same thing. Harry over there gives mean odd stare.
With THC in your system everyone looks suspicious to you. And my mind starts reeling from decimated dreams. I couldn’t hear what he said but it sure as hell looked like he was plotting against me. Eli Roth’s Hostel comes to mind. Wonder if my food will be drugged (like I need any more of that) and later they might castrate me. Wonder what kind of meat the cook in the kitchen. Or they are going to delay my food long enough forcops to arrive and arrest me. Not carrying anything. I’m safe from that.
Wondering if they know what I have done less that an hour ago? Wondering if my eyes are bloodshot? Can’ treally see anything on the back of a spoon. Wonder if I smell of god’s green grass? Can’t smell anything other than food at a restaurant.
The coke comes first . One look at it and I am teleported to some dhaba on some hill in the middle of bat country, sitting alone and staring at a bottle of coke,not the wrong kind.
Then comes the food. As I am eating I see the three of them talking together. Now I’m truly psyched. Just then the lights go off. There is definitely something on….Billie says “We are coming home again”
Eat and drink as fast as I can. Pay the bill. I never tip.On my way to the toilet to wash my hands and I wonder if this is part of their plan. An attack from behind while I’m washing my hands and then they will sell me to some old foreigner in Slovakia who likes to cut up Indian teenage boys.
Walkout of there and nothing happens. I’m laughing in my mind at my stoned thoughts. Heading home.
Maybe I’ll watch a movie. A Scanner Dark is my choice at the moment….
Fear and Loathing in Ganja Park
On Friday night , I was on a bus to Chennai. My parents got off the bus to fetch something, I can’t remember what. The bus started moving without them and no one noticed them tapping on to the sheet metal body of the bus, No one other than me. I yelled out to the driver asking him to stop. The driver did stop but everyone started looking at me as if I was some kind of an apparition, asking me why I asked for it to be stopped without even noticing my parents who were still on the outside, who were still going on asking the bus to be stopped even though the bus had halted somewhere, that seemed to be between Coles Park and Shivaji Nagar .
How the hell did this place come on the high way to Chennai?
I do not know. Back to where I was seated everyone asked me questions yet I couldn’t answer, for some reason I had become completely dumb. Then I started choking on something, my mouth starts to froth. I take one look at my mother outside and look back in and I am a sole soul on what seemed to be Ghost Bus with its lights put out,hurtling down the highway at top speed avoiding other vehicles as if been driven by some master driver.I rush to the driver’s cabin to find no one there, just likethe rest of the bus. I pull the hand brake and push downon the brake pedal with all my energy, Nothing happens.I walk to the door and when I am just about to leap out......I wake up choking on that froth in what seems to be a dream. One look at the sky and the colour of it tells me that it is early morning. My watch reads 5:33 AM.
“What seems to be a dream”? You might ask. And let me explain , when you happen to be a bit too stoned ,a bit too often like your humble narrator , the fine line between dream and reality starts to blur. Your dreams seem more real and reality seems more like a dream, and you lose all sense of date and time. I am not aware if I am actually writing this or am just dreaming about writing this. It is a cursed life I lead my friends.
“Now how did a fine lad like me get into drugs”? Well it was on August 13th , I was late to college and unfortunately our vertically challenged Vice-Principal used to lockup gates , so that no one entered ‘his’ college later than the prescribed time. I was in no mood to go home , I therefore sent an SMS to a friend who I know wouldn’t be in college asking him where he was. He replied “Airlines,Come here”
I went there , sat in the back seat of his car. He offered me a smoke and asked me if I smoke. I replied negatively , to which Magic Man (I am not telling you the names of my fellow droogs) responded, “Be a man, take a drag”! And I did! I nearly coughed my lungs out , later when he told me he was going to a bar , I tagged along having nothing better to do.
“Take a sip ,come on be a man...” he said. “Come on take it , a sip for the new friendship”, the magic Man continued.And again I drank a glassful in his honour.I kicked both of these so called bad habits in a week ortwo..rather easily , but it was the weed that stuck. It stuck because it was my decision to stick to it and we have goodold James Franco to blame.Yes it was his portrayal of Soul Silver in Pineapple Express and the two Harold and Kumar movies which made me want to try it. Even though I strongly disagreed when it was said that movies promoted smoking amongst youngsters. It was a movie that truly changed my life.
Now what had sparked my current episode of madness was a lunch break in GP , you might guess what I was doing there. Walking back to college , there was a feeling pricking just behind my ankle. A feeling I knew a bit too well for the Wednesday of the previous week I had felt for the same. It starts with that prick and very swiftly shifts to feeling that you are walking up a steep surface. Then it hits you, the Vertigo, leaving you disabled to take another step.But luckily a friend who was passing by the park helped me back to it and then he left in 15 minute sas he had a class to attend leaving me seated on that park bench for what seemed like ages seeing the park ahead of me stretch to acres and acres and then hit back and return to its former size. I saw familiar faces with larger jaws and larger noses. But the watch proved me wrong , it was just an hour. My friends returned from class, I was still a bit dazed in the head..but I guess I was okay.
The thoughts that came to my mind when I was stoned were quite dazed themselves. “What if the Matrix wasreal...”? “What if we were just lying in pods imagining all this when in reality we were suspended by a machine that had taken over?” This is what gives reality a more dreamy feel. A kind of self alertness generates like the ones in a First Person Shooter game , only with a lot more to do.Now that’s what a bad trip feels like. You see a good trip is different. It is the most wonderful feeling one can have. On a good trip it seems like the Old Bog himself is working for you and everything seems to go your way and this is what keeps us stoners going.
I do feel a little bit of regret for having smoked up , just alittle bit. And it doesn’t mean I won’t do it again. But I amsure as hell that I would have been damned had I not......
Your Humbled Stoned Narrator
St.Jimmy
How the hell did this place come on the high way to Chennai?
I do not know. Back to where I was seated everyone asked me questions yet I couldn’t answer, for some reason I had become completely dumb. Then I started choking on something, my mouth starts to froth. I take one look at my mother outside and look back in and I am a sole soul on what seemed to be Ghost Bus with its lights put out,hurtling down the highway at top speed avoiding other vehicles as if been driven by some master driver.I rush to the driver’s cabin to find no one there, just likethe rest of the bus. I pull the hand brake and push downon the brake pedal with all my energy, Nothing happens.I walk to the door and when I am just about to leap out......I wake up choking on that froth in what seems to be a dream. One look at the sky and the colour of it tells me that it is early morning. My watch reads 5:33 AM.
“What seems to be a dream”? You might ask. And let me explain , when you happen to be a bit too stoned ,a bit too often like your humble narrator , the fine line between dream and reality starts to blur. Your dreams seem more real and reality seems more like a dream, and you lose all sense of date and time. I am not aware if I am actually writing this or am just dreaming about writing this. It is a cursed life I lead my friends.
“Now how did a fine lad like me get into drugs”? Well it was on August 13th , I was late to college and unfortunately our vertically challenged Vice-Principal used to lockup gates , so that no one entered ‘his’ college later than the prescribed time. I was in no mood to go home , I therefore sent an SMS to a friend who I know wouldn’t be in college asking him where he was. He replied “Airlines,Come here”
I went there , sat in the back seat of his car. He offered me a smoke and asked me if I smoke. I replied negatively , to which Magic Man (I am not telling you the names of my fellow droogs) responded, “Be a man, take a drag”! And I did! I nearly coughed my lungs out , later when he told me he was going to a bar , I tagged along having nothing better to do.
“Take a sip ,come on be a man...” he said. “Come on take it , a sip for the new friendship”, the magic Man continued.And again I drank a glassful in his honour.I kicked both of these so called bad habits in a week ortwo..rather easily , but it was the weed that stuck. It stuck because it was my decision to stick to it and we have goodold James Franco to blame.Yes it was his portrayal of Soul Silver in Pineapple Express and the two Harold and Kumar movies which made me want to try it. Even though I strongly disagreed when it was said that movies promoted smoking amongst youngsters. It was a movie that truly changed my life.
Now what had sparked my current episode of madness was a lunch break in GP , you might guess what I was doing there. Walking back to college , there was a feeling pricking just behind my ankle. A feeling I knew a bit too well for the Wednesday of the previous week I had felt for the same. It starts with that prick and very swiftly shifts to feeling that you are walking up a steep surface. Then it hits you, the Vertigo, leaving you disabled to take another step.But luckily a friend who was passing by the park helped me back to it and then he left in 15 minute sas he had a class to attend leaving me seated on that park bench for what seemed like ages seeing the park ahead of me stretch to acres and acres and then hit back and return to its former size. I saw familiar faces with larger jaws and larger noses. But the watch proved me wrong , it was just an hour. My friends returned from class, I was still a bit dazed in the head..but I guess I was okay.
The thoughts that came to my mind when I was stoned were quite dazed themselves. “What if the Matrix wasreal...”? “What if we were just lying in pods imagining all this when in reality we were suspended by a machine that had taken over?” This is what gives reality a more dreamy feel. A kind of self alertness generates like the ones in a First Person Shooter game , only with a lot more to do.Now that’s what a bad trip feels like. You see a good trip is different. It is the most wonderful feeling one can have. On a good trip it seems like the Old Bog himself is working for you and everything seems to go your way and this is what keeps us stoners going.
I do feel a little bit of regret for having smoked up , just alittle bit. And it doesn’t mean I won’t do it again. But I amsure as hell that I would have been damned had I not......
Your Humbled Stoned Narrator
St.Jimmy
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)