The Art of Lying – Honestly

Don’t get me wrong – this article does not advise you to change into a dishonest deceitful turncoat, nor does it proclaim that lying is the way out of any difficult situation. I believe honesty is still the best policy – though in a different way than our forefathers (and mothers) probably thought.

In today’s world, there can be 2 variations of the truth – the ‘whole’ truth and the ‘hole’ truth.

The ‘whole’ truth – this means just what it is supposed to mean – giving your version of the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Useful only when you are morally upright, innocent, fearless, and are dating the Hulk.

The ‘hole’ truth – this means, well, the truth with a hole. This aspect marks a slight digression from the ‘whole’ truth. Though not strictly a lie, it does represent a butchered form of the real thing. Useful while trying to wiggle out of unpleasant skirmishes, or avoiding unpleasant people. Requirements include wit, quick thinking and as always, fearlessness.

Being the ideal person includes having a tendency to maintain a balance between the mentioned kinds of truth. The examples that follow make it evident that different circumstances require the application of different tactics.

Scene 1. After finals, you bump into the class nerd, who has won every scholarship under the Sun, has a 4.5/4.0 GPA, is going to MIT for graduate school (because they begged him to), and will save the world with his Nobel prizes, Oscars, Pulitzers etc.

Nerd: “Hey – how’d you do in that class?”

Your response:
The Hole Truth – “Superb – made an A”
The Whole Truth– Well, at least in one the subjects in pre-school you did.

Comment – notice how, by leaving out some details, thus disguising the truth, you can actually ingratiate yourself. Isn’t that better than revealing that you flunked the rest of the tests, never turned in your homework, and actually had to fight with the professor to get a C?

Scene 2: Your friends are insisting to go karaoke.

The Whole Truth: You’re in no mood to go because (a) you’d rather watch the movie you recently borrowed from a friend or (b) you don’t want them to discover your abysmal knowledge of songs or (c) you suck at singing. Period.

The Hole truth: (Also known as excuses)

1) Say you’re actually more than 5000 miles away (without saying away from WHAT – you are technically more than 5000 miles away from the Moon or Antarctica etc) – and that you’d really love to join them but can’t)

2) Take a bubble bath. Then call your friends and tell them you’re somewhere in the Pacific (after all, at least one molecule from the 20 gallons of water you’re in has probably been in the Pacific at some point – thanks to the water cycle).

3) Microwave a date (the dry fruit). Then tell your friends you’d go, but you have a hot date.

Scene 3: Your parents are getting on your nerves to get married and settle down (since you have a job now).

The Whole Truth: You don’t want to. Because you’re lazy, and don’t want to look after another hapless individual. Also, you’d rather sleep in every morning, go clubbing obsessively, flirt outrageously, drink boundlessly…etc.

The Hole Truth: Cheerfully, tell them you’re gay. (The word, after all, has more than one dictionary meaning). Recommended if you revel in family scandals.

Ode to an Umbrella

This one's real - I wrote it after a friend broke my umbrella and then never replaced it. Apparently this wasn't effective enough, because he still hasn't.... on the bright side, I have something to always yell at him about.

Ode to a Broken Umbrella
(2007)

Oh, how I miss thee!
Thy colorful shade,
Thy tawny haze,
That offered protection against the elements,
Burning heat, icy sleet,
Those rare snowstorms as well.

Though most may not have appreciated thy blinding beauty,
Nor admired thy serviceability,
But when I held thee in my hand,
I felt like a long lost ship that had reached land.

My foul-weather friend thee was,
When all had walked out on me,
Through dreary days, and watery ways,
Thee kept me as dry as I could be.

That fateful day,
When that fated hand swung you to and fro,
And I watched in horror as thy torso snapped,
And I mourned your demise with woe.
Thee lies buried in my corner drawer,

While I dream of happier times,
And when the clouds burst, and I am forced to,
Cower under an ugly black trash bag,
I think to myself…someday…
Someday...I will have my revenge.

My life...

...as a stupid, rebellious teenager :)

IT’S MY LIFE
(2004)

The wise old woman sat back in her chair,
The sun glittered lightly on her snow-white hair.
‘It’s a big bad world,’ she said to me, ‘so remember what you’re told,
Humour the young and listen to the old.
Follow the rules, not your heart.
It maybe hard, but it’s a start.
Let your future lie in the hands of others,
They’re all your friends, or sisters and brothers.
Happiness is living in society,
So push aside thoughts of freedom and liberty.’

Lost in this labyrinth of old - world wisdom,
Rambling in the darkness under this blanket of dogmatism,
I seek my way out, out of this cage,
And walk into the waiting world’s enigmatic haze.
If living means breaking the rules, then I’m a rebel.
If society is heaven, then I’d rather live in hell.
I have my desires and my goals,
That I want to pursue, without any holds.
Choices are on my side, Time is not.
I want to reach infinity, where my destiny was forged.

I want to chase the receding horizons and rise above the clouds,
To conquer the skies and make my country proud.
To live and love and fight and die,
To surge ahead before the world goes by.
To watch the beauty, not the strife,
To fulfill my dreams, because it’s my life.

Eye-bags and MIA dogs

Finals week.
Glazed eyes.
Day-dreams of sleep.

I found this poem while cleaning out my desktop (because my computer decided it had had enough after 3 years and secretly entered into a competition with a fellow computer from the stone age to see which could be slower) that I wrote spontaneously while talking to a friend a couple of summers ago during finals week. (That, by the way, is an example of the worst kind of run-on sentence, in case you're a a literary freak - like me).

...
my bed is always made,
my pillow lies alone,
i walk past it daily,
and my comforter's woe-begone

caffeine has taken over my fridge,
and orange juice is a dream,
and it's a daily excercise,
to keep the whites of my eyes clean

my eyes are always wide shut,
and every day is such a drag,
people tell me i could go grocery shopping,
with my built-in eyebags.

...

One of my dogs decided to be stupid and went missing recently. It's terrible when people (or animals) disappear like that - and you don't know if they'll ever be back, or if they moved on to another universe/time/life. It's like a movie that conks out 15 minutes before the end. And all you're left with is hope, or despair, and absolutely no clue about what to believe in.



I hope she's safe wherever she is.

The Last Day - Again

And all of a sudden, ('ekdum se', as Medha would say) it's the last day of classes again - and another semester comes to an end.

In hindsight, nothing really bad happened this semester - but this period in life is one of the suckiest ever - and I think hormones should be given the boot...we'd be so much better off without them. But then if we did, who (or what) would we blame for all the troubles in life?

And thus end the seemingly endless controls-strucD-systems-compressibles homework cycles, late-nights of unstoppable laughter, stinky fencing equipment days, the reapeated-blue-screens-of-death, AerOnion madness, Nazar procrastination, the completely random outings like San Antonio, the chocolate festival, holi, penn masala, choir recitals, architechtural engineering showcases, engineering talent shows, balls, awesome pie-fests, climbing, bent-polishing, etc etc.

This semester was really really long. I'm almost glad it's over - so I can say the hardest goodbyes and get it over with.

Life's really really long. Which means it has infinite time to screw up in every possible way.