Borsalino

Everyone who's read Shantaram would probably find this redundant, but the Borsalino is this wide-brimmed hat made from very particular furs. Now this piece of art apparently digs quite the hole in your pocket, and there's bound to be fakes. In comes the Borsalino hat test. You roll the hat up into a tube thingy, and make it pass through a wedding ring (for SOME reason). After emerging from the other side, if the hat is not all crumpled and messed up and preferably not broken, bingo, you've gotten yourself a deal. If there's creases, you'd better run back and look for the genius who made some quick bucks outta you.

Now some people happened to realize that this makes for quite a handy metaphor. So "putting someone through a Borsalino test" has come to mean putting someone through quite a bit of mental (and possibly physical) stress and see whether he/she (for all you sexists, I said he/she, inspite of HATING it) "emerges" from it without a sign of being "crumpled" or affected by the stress. Us engineers would like a stress-deformation metaphor, but that would involve talking about "hardness" of the person, and it's best to leave that realm of unending innuendos aside.

So anyway, back to Shantaram. GDR describes himself been put through a Borsalino test by a recent acquaintance, to put it very bluntly. Why all this? I suddenly noticed the constant Borsalino tests we keep pushing each other through, in places more than you'd notice if you give it a little thought.

Of course, the "emerging without being affected" now covers a much wider purview. It all begins with the initial one - to put in a more vernacular fashion - the first impression. It goes on throughout the period of knowing a person, and extends to every human relationship that exists. Barring a few relationships with a teeny amount of people, everyone Borsalinos everyone else. I wish that'd become a valid verb.

I'm not even going to begin about whether it's necessary. I probably would have if halfway through writing that, I wouldn't have lost track of the patterns of the present thought vortex. Just that, right now, I think everyone would be much happier if these tests were slashed a bit.

And, I haven't begun thinking about this in detail. Thankfully, I'm somehow able to control these erstwhile unmanaged thought trains. I'll hold on to this thought for later.

Most will argue that these are a part of life. I just wish they weren't.

Late Night Jazz Ballads

In vaguely browsing through the music I have, I came across a folder in my Jazz collection called "Late Night Jazz Ballads". It was 2:30 AM, and I couldn't see any reason not to play it. Work was a good 6 hours away, and a few soothing progressions couldn't hurt. As I lay propped on my elbow, listening to Jimmy Smith, Dexter Gordon, Ike Quebec and the likes, I had this little memory run-through of all the memorable 2:30 AMs I've had. Owing to my wallpaper being this hard-earned photo of the BITS, Pilani clocktower I'd clicked with the sun setting next to it, the run-through kicked off with memories of Oasis last year. Good times. Expectations shattered. The tones of the tenor sax were more than the perfect catalyst to provoke the memory-walk. I was left wondering why I'd never pulled out this folder before. I imagine all the effort that goes behind a jazz piece. To be technically perfect, to recognize that perfect progression to hit that perfect mood. But I guess in the end, every jazz artist just wants to soothe, just wants to sound good.

As I write this, I realize I don't like getting profound about my music. I would never write a post about any music, overflowing with superlatives, because in my music, the two letter word is the operative (Credit to NT for that very useful phrase). I don't like making an epic out of a piece, I don't like writing about it as if I know every facet of it, because I never will. A true priest will never glamourize God in his writings. A true soccer fan will never write about a particular goal in a rambling fashion. For worship brings with it respect, and when you respect something, you want to attach a humble outlook to it. I might speak more than what is good for my well-being about music, and about particular aspects of it, but when I write it down, I plainly want it to soothe. I just want it to physically light up the senses. I just want it to sound good. Just like a Late Night Jazz Ballad.

One good argument.

As the darkness engulfed him, yet again, he posed one question to life. He challenged life to present one argument to support whatever he'd done in life was worthwhile. One simple argument, one reasoning with logic. Everything he'd taken up, he'd failed. Daniel had no idea where to look. To the Beatles song playing in his room, or his non-existent imaginary friend. The one happy thought he had for all those days had abandoned him. He gradually let the darkness take him down. He just wish he'd had the gall to climb up to the terrace.

Tears

I grieve. I mourn.

Soon, I shall rise back. I will pledge, I will swear by, I will respect, I will revere, I will idolize. I will grow to love more.

But today, I weep.

An hour in the life...

11.24 am.
VJTI, Matunga
Mumbai.

What does a guy do, with an hour to kill, in Mumbai's top-notch engineering college with prestige and all that jazz? Puts pen to paper and hopes the words flow like traffic on an unjammed expressway.



The letters appear shakily on the crackling brand new notebook. Though a prolonged absence from actual, conventional writing is one of the reasons, the main culprit is the resting of my arm outside a third floor window, with my biscep acting as leverage and forearm dangling outside during a midnight conversation, with the wind trying to act more like a tornado. I'd talked about cleavages and bases, among other things.

I have to wait for a long time more. I see the senior students strutting in the canteen with a sense of possissiveness. I hear the loud discussions on Orkut, i hear the somewhat muffled girl-talks about the return of an ex-flame. A black and white cat smiles at me as it walks by. I smile back incredulously. I think a girl somewhere is trying to catch my eye but that's just my imagination.

I've been running around for almost two hours now. Hostel fees, Bio-datas in the office, a random line which turned out to be one for the railway concession form. I glance outside on the basketball court and feel a dead hope of seeing a known face. I've already stalked the college to that effect once. Puneites don't usually come on this of the country. They don't like the climate.

I glance at my watch. The impatience is starting to seep in. I feel my feet rhythmically under the table. I think of the person who slaps my thigh in irritation when i do that. I miss her.

I see friendships being bred here in the canteen. Some will last.

This ain't gonna end man! Another damn half hour to go! I randomly think of Ninitha and her accusations me stealing her bakarwadis. I realise my writing's beginning to smoothen out.

I consider going for another walk around the campus. Feels good walking through an array of emotions. The college is a minimised version of the great city it is in, I feel. I drop the walk idea. Jus cuz I can. I minor commotion is caused when a guy almost steps on the cat.

I put my pen down and look around helplessly. Time seems to crawl and itch it's way across. I begin to play Tabla on the table. A few heads turn. Only for a moment.

I realise I've been stealing looks at a certain girl between sentences. I take a long look at her and turn away an instant after she looked at me. I can feel her inquisitive eyes on me as I write. I try to straighten my posture.

I begin dreaming about good old times. Times on the tekdi, in the university. I think about whether they're gonna come back, ever. Thoughts turn to the future. I start missing a certain person a lot suddenly.

I slow down, realising I can kill more time and write neater that way. I recall a joke about killing two birds with a stone.

I'm whistling Johnny Cash's "I Walk the Line." A guy two tables away hears it and quick turns around in recognition. I go on whistling. I realise how much I adore whistling. I turn to a new vague tune. I think about the new earphones I need to buy for my iPod. I contemplate on whether to go for Philips or Panasonic.

My watch tells me it's 1 minutes to go. It's started raining outside. I think of getting my third cutting chai before i leave. A guy at the next table is narrating a joke. The girls listen intently, the guys seem uninterested. In another corner of the canteen some people start singing. The girl I was looking at goes upto the food counter. I resist the temptation of following her with another chai as an excuse.

I believe it's time I start packing. It's been a fun hour! I put my pen and notebook in my bag, get in my raincoat and head to the auditorium........