The Madras Mail

The four of us, Sundeep, George, SJ and me, went to Pondicherry.

We drank, a lot.

I’ve uploaded some pictures on orkut and on facebook, the links are in the ‘About’ section.

I’ve slept for 4 hours in the past 36. I’ve spent 10 hours of that on a train, ran into 20 beggars, 4 eunuchs, 5 blind singers, and a whole lot of interesting people. I spent about 3 hours trying to make my American born cousins understand Tamil and its intricacies, and all I got for that trouble was a whack with a wooden ladle, and a scream that could wake the Gods. I’m in a Kerala for a few days, probably the last vacation I have before I head to business school, and I’m planning to make the best of it. Sleep like a log, eat like a pig and drink like a horse. That’s what best vacations are made of, the memories of doing nothing, but enjoying every single moment of it. And after this, I plan to go to Chennai and get wasted for 2 days.

I just finished a book by Khushwant Singh, The Company of Women; it’s a story about a very horny man written by a very horny, old man. Bad book, don’t read it.

I’m going to spend the rest of the evening watching ‘There will be Blood’ and reading Maximum City by Suketu Mehta.

On a whole other note, I’ll be turning 21 in a few months, which means I can legally start drinking then. I don’t know whether to be happy or to be sad.

I found this during a daily trawl of blogs on the web. A masterpiece.

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2008/04/28/080428sh_shouts_borowitz

Andy Borowitz writes a column in The New Yorker. (http://www.borowitzreport.com/)

You live by the blog. You have a way with words that hold people captive. And you don’t shy away from being in the public eye. Then we want you. Give your two cents worth, and we’ll give you a handsome salary and other bright perks. Your name and blogs will be seen by many around the world. Others have 365 days, you have 365 entries in a year. You get to work with Beck’s and a congenial creative team in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You might even relocate to a greener pasture. Sounds too good to be true?

Beck’s wants to pay people to blog on beer. What wouldn’t I give to be blogging about beer, with a ‘congenial, creative team’ in Amsterdam, and with the option of relocating to ‘greener pastures’.

For people who’re interested, check out http://www.becks.com for further details.

I found this on http://www.attuworld.com, a website recommended to me by a very good friend.

Disclaimer: Attuworld may/will contain articles that are offensive to women, people below the age of 18, et cetera. It will mostly appeal to gentlemen who have a strong sense of humor and ‘finer’ tastes in life.

Life is always about moving on and hoping that things turn out better than they are presently, at least that is what most of us hope life is. It’s quite easy to do the math, as we get older, we ‘supposedly’ get more mature, and things that were precious to us before seem childish, and we have new wants, the need to be more intelligent, more powerful, and more happy. I’ve spent the last 6 years doing crazy, crazy things, and I still miss doing almost all of them.

In less than a month, am leaving Chennai, possibly for good, to Jamshedpur and then the world. And now I have very complex feelings in me. I’m leaving behind my family, my friends, who I’ve known for the most part of my life and am leaving behind Chennai, where I had my first vodka shot at ECR, my first smoke at the beach, and so many first’s in life. I’ve sort of grown to like my chicken at Sea Shell, my beer at Bronx, my 9:30 smoking session at Bhai, the extremely vetti conversations, my late night coffee at CCD (that’s Cafe Coffee & Dum), the neighbourhood dog that gets kicks out of chasing me, endless days spent talking about the future, and so many more things. I’ll probably never get to do any of these things again, and knowing that is a kick in the balls. When I come back after 2 years, the bespectacled, baby-faced, not-so-Brahmin boy will be a bespectacled, baby-faced, not-so-Brahmin MBA graduate with a job; someone who wouldn’t do shots at the back of a car, who wouldn’t pass out at a party, and who definitely wouldn’t drink at Besant Nagar TASMAC.

Am sure the next two years will be a lot of fun, albeit with a completely different set of people, it’s something I wholly look forward to and as Mrs. Rowling said, ‘…, let us step out into the night and pursue that flighty temptress, adventure.’

Dear XXXX,

(Here XXXX refers to God/the Supreme ruler of the Universe/Morgan Freeman/…)

I kinda like my life, with all the things that are fucked up about it, I still like it. I would prefer it stays the same way. So I have just one thing to ask of you.

Please give me money to open VG Inc.

Yours

For the uninitiated, VG Inc. refers to a business venture that has varied interests. The idea was born at a seedy bar in who-knows-where land, and the names VG, Lion, Singam, et cetera refer to a certain person who has been a source of inspiration to millions.

Today was a bad day from the start. I woke up at 10, that is bad.

I usually wake up at 12 or 1, after listening to music, surfing the internet, worry about Afro dude and White bitch who apparently have a ‘primary’ conflict, eat, do the poopoo and other equally distasteful activities, it’s already 5. Knowing the fact that sunset is around the corner, I spend a couple of hours, reading the newspaper, feeding mango pickle to the fish in my brother’s aquarium, I get ready to face the night. So around 7:30, I get my second bath of the day, discuss the finer points of my brother’s undecided career, basically includes, ‘… No man, you are too young to make the correct decisions, big brother knows best‘, with a very smug expression, ‘… Appa, he should totally go to 17 tuition classes and make sure that his entire day is spent in the company of the Accounts, Statistics and other equally boring subjects‘. At 9:30 sharp, everyday, Sundeep calls me to give him company to Xerox the textbooks, pick up dvds, meet a Nobel laureate, et cetera if his parents happen to be near the phone, or just dum if they aren’t. It’s already around 10:30 ~ 11 when am back home and next few hours are spent in watching sitcoms, movies, TV, and anything random till 2 or 3, and finally sleep.

Today was supposed to be spent ‘high’. That did not happen.

We, me and George, were pulled over by a cop at Mylapore. The only good thing was, we planned to do some vodka shots and then get some ice cream, somehow surprisingly, we decided to eat ice cream and not do the shots today, which is probably why we got pulled over. The ‘sergeant‘, the name is because he was wearing cleaner clothes and was resting his sorry butt on a bike, was very ‘honest’ with us and wrote out a ticket and charged us a spot fine of Rs.100, which is somehow supposed to make George drive safely from then on, quite pointless really.

The ticket was written out to a Nlikh Tholole Goone. George, in utter remorse for having broken the law, attested to the fact that he had indeed committed a grave travesty by taking a U-turn along with 10 other vehicles, after the other policeman asked us to take the turn, and having been the only idiot to have stopped, while everyone else took off leaving the sergeant muttering, ‘…kandippa case thaan …‘.

But in the end, there was in fact one offense which seemed very relevant to us,

I’ve decided to rename my blog, the previous name was not very symbolic of the content, it was just an expression of exasperation with the world and a very good motto to live by.

I’m purandhu & valarndhu in a not-so-orthodox Tambram family in Chennai, and since my opinions are heavily influenced by the vettha kuzhambu, the mangaa at the beach, the corner dum shop, the not-so-sophisticated Old Monk at the Besant Nagar TASMAC, and the maamans of Chennai, ‘The Madras Mail‘ seems rather apt.