There is a lot of things I want to write about today, but all of them are so different that I cannot think of a title to fit them all. This actually should be two or three blogs, but anyways I am putting them all down here under different sub headings.
"They had a name"
The other day I and my friend were talking about what crap people write in papers (research papers). There was a paper she read in which there were some experiments done on monkeys and apart from mentioning the monkey's vital statistics and history, they also mentioned its name. We had a good laugh. What's in a name? A monkey by any other name would be a monkey, and in this case a just a poor experimental animal. But, well my friend pointed out unlike us, the monkey has its name in print. There was another story she told me in which a professor does research on grad students, and people say, "grad students, monkeys, same difference"!! No wonder we have names too. Anyways these stories reminded me of some other 'things' that had names. The building I work in used to be the Hospital in days of yore. The other day I discovered a corridor (I am still playing Columbus-Columbus, trying to discover America) on the fifth floor, where there were arrays of human organs , or slices of human organs displayed in glass cases. My first reaction was "Wowwww!!" and then with an almost morbid fascination I saw brains of different sizes, diseased, deformed, kidneys, lungs, empty skull (Ok Ok I will stop now :D). It looked just like the arrays of packaged meat in grocery stores. Well not quite, they look much cleaner, almost like vegetables. But anyways. Then I looked closely and to my horror I found that they had a name. Typed in very clear fonts, were the names of the people who owned them, and their ages. They all had names.
"Growing up"
Well that is a difficult thing to write about. A few years back when I was an undergrad, I used to think, every one is happy, everyone else apart from me, is so incredibly lucky. And now starting off at the very beginning of my grown up life, I see myself and all those incredibly lucky people having completely messed up lives. I used to be jealous then, now I feel sad. I wish I knew someone who I could see and say, wow, they really are happy. But then again, I only wish, I don't notice them, because I feel afraid if I will notice some pain below the surface. And now there is so much over dose of pain, in my life and the lives of people around me, I really feel that, was it worth growing up for? I had once seen a great BBC documentary series, about the development of the human body right from birth to death. Talking about the development of auditory sense, they said that the tiny hairs that tranmit sound in the ear start degrading from the moment you are born. So kind of its always a down hill journey, this life. I know I am probably talking of widely unrelated stuff, but.. And then each time I say 'but' now, I remember something that another friend told me, "We keep adding up constraints, without realizing their redundancies". Deep, eh? Would be deeper if followed :).
"Borrowed Friends"
I went to a halloween party with my undergrad roommate and her friends. They all knew each other, and I was the only grad there. Before going I had started feeling weird. I had started doing my usual stuff, wallowing in self-pity and mopping, that I don't have friends of my own and I need borrowed friends to keep me company. I did not want to go, I thought I will be so out of place there, I am not like them, I am so so so so .....
I did go. I did not know anyone. I was the odd one out, I thought they are all kids, and I did not exactly had a great time, because that is not my idea of having a great time. But still, I am happy I went. At least there will be more people I can smile at on the streets, and at least a few are great friend material for my kind of a person. And then I remembered, most friends I ever had are 'borrowed friends', friends of my friends, and then they become my friends.
I am not too optimistic now, but yes when you are lonely, then its is easy to start from 'borrowed friends'
"Easy Banking"
Today I had an amazing banking experience. I had to apply for my credit card, I had to get statement mailed to me, I had to deposit and I had to withdraw. And I did all this sitting on a chair with a guy clicking away on his mouse in front of me. His name was Mark, written on a badge he wore. Nice, isn't it? He has a name too. He is not just a frust man sitting behing a glass counter in SBI and cursing the long queque. He smiles, he jokes, he makes small talk, and he makes you feel you are God. Well he gets paid for all this too, so it makes sense. I have nothing against indian banks, or Indian ways of doing business, with our population it is difficult. But it will be nice if they all have names. I have been wondering, that most of us back in India, do not know the name of our paperwala, milkman, cable man, bank guys and the little boy who serves tea, prefering to call him "Chotu". Why are most people, including ourselves so nameless ? Is it too difficult to know their names ? Well I guess that is because we consider it inappropriate to call people by name, in many cases. Like we call elders as Uncle, Aunty, children as beta beti, very old people as dada dadi, etc. And that is kind of nice. So maybe not having a name is not too bad. But anyways that was not the point of this article. This should have probably gone in the first topic. What was interesting in my banking experience was the chat I had with the guy. The guy asked me what I am doing, and I said I am a grad student. He went on to tell me that is wife was a grad student too. I was surprised at first, and thought wow, what a coincidence ! But on second thoughts I realised, probably that is why this guy is here in the first place. He has come here because his wife has to go to grad school. I am just speculating, but that is very very likely. I wondered, how many Indian guys would do that ? I may be wrong in my assessment of Indian guys, but somehow Indian men are raised making them feel that if they compromise for a woman, they go to hell. In a similar situation back in India, the girl would probably never go to grad school. The other day, when I was reading the e-copy of the IIT,Kgp newspaper, I saw that people are discussing on minekey, "The society, even in IIT Kgp, cannot completely accept women as engineers." Well for that matter our society cannot accept women as drivers, bankers, shopkeepers etc etc. There are just so many forbidden professions for women in our country. Talking of work, well I see almost everyone here works, without inhibition, without mental blocks, of some jobs being 'below standard'. With the entire nation working, it is not hard to guess why they are what they are. Compare it with the number of idle people in our country, the number of idle youth who feed on their father's money and chase girls, and partly they are the reason why most jobs become out of bounds for women. There are certain things we should learn from America, but for some reason we only learn all the wrong ones.
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