Inspiration

Tarun da left us all to go back to India with his wife, of course. That night when we all were recounting our fondest memories of his enthusiasm, optimism and brilliance, I learnt a very important lesson.

Yes, sooner or later we will all part. Not just this time, forever this cycle will go on. Today friends, tomorrow family. If there's any way I can leave an impression of me, it is only in the minds of the people. Of late I have become too aloof, too withdrawn. This way my time with all these beautiful people around me is a waste. I give nothing, I gain nothing.

Too afraid to lose, I have forgotten to win hearts. I must love, must laugh and care. If I do that, there will be less to complain and a lot to appreciate, both within and around.

Hobbling along..

Since my friend's boss told her to "find a hobby" to get over the frustration of a project not going well, I have been looking for one myself. I am quite worried that I cannot come up with any! I mean I like doing a lot of things, but there's no activity that I do regularly in my leisure time for pleasure. I have always been like this, now that I sit down and think about it. Routine bores me.

I started blogging in 2006. Since then, I have had only 26 posts and 3 drafts and countless others drafted only in my head. The good thing about a post is that it sounds extremely well composed in my head. Maybe it is the complacence that prevents me from writing it out :P Or as Chetzy put it, once you have someone to share your life with, it becomes somewhat redundant to blog. I entertained that idea too, for a while. But really, I know I am sheer lazy.

Yes, laziness and workaholism both are the culprits. They together stop me from pursuing a hobby. Then there's enthusiasm that every once in a while raises its head and reminds me of the word "multifaceted". When I watch a good performance e.g. the SASA show or the the Durga Puja song practice, I feel all inspired, but of course it dies away only to make me feel really really old! Yes, that is the conclusion I invariably arrive at these days. It is my alibi for everything!

I have become old. I need to get really serious about my career, finish this Ph.D. If I waste time in such fun and frolic, it will only add days to my Ph.D. I am now someone's fiancee, I have responsibilities. So on and so forth. I have already started painting my future grey with this attitude. Why so? In my mind there's this big dilemma: On the one hand I feel I need to slowly get into my parents shoes, do things the way they do and on the other, my upbringing was so different from their's that I find hard to bend my ways. Besides, my dreams, our dreams have totally different plans for us.

My personal life is great, academics are decent too. Yet, I feel a void I cannot explain. I feel distant from most people, burdened with self-imposed responsibility. I feel under-confident, like never before! It is disconcerting, but true. Having been competitive all my life, I wonder if finding a hobby and excelling at it might be the much need boost.

This leaves me where I started: What's my hobby?

Happy Diwali!

"Happy Diwali!"...This is how that chat had started exactly a year ago! Today as you dug it up, we read and re-read it, analyzing everything...laughing at ourselves! We tried to pin-point the moment, we tried to tell what ran through our heads then. We don't remember it, we cannot figure it out, but that's the beauty of it! It is unlike any other memory I have: it is indivisible. Come to think of it, most of my memories about our "anniversaries" are incomplete! Heart over head indeed!

Of dinners and loners

"Gimme Red!", I smiled my "Everready" smile and matched it with the wink and slight wag of my head that is an essential skill of immense survival value here. I was at my fave local Thai restaurant, Dao, which sits right across the road from the neglected "Indian Garden" which serves crossover food.

As the waiter hurried away with my order for the "Red curry" I smiled, relaxed and felt quite happy. A digression is inevitable here. It's high time, we Indians helped the R&D dept of Thai restaurants come up with more creative names for their curries, no? (I love the way we say 'no' for every expected 'yes'!) I mean after colors, they should move on to monosyllablic names at least, yaar!

So stumbling back upon my thoughts, I smiled a triumphant smile and allowed some pride to peek through my eyes too. A year ago (yes, it's been more than a year,now!) I had either shed tears or fought pangs of loneliness for every single morsel that I ate by myself, stranded on the island of my plush grad housing apartment. Why? I had always been that way; even when eating the cold food that some dear friend had saved for me in the mess, back in my IIT days. Today showed me how far I really had come, because there I was, determined to dispel the gloom that a Friday night spent alone indoors tends to bring on. I went alone shopping on "The Magnificent Mile", a stretch of Michigan Avenue that is a shopper's paradise, looking for a wedding dress to wear at Lori's wedding tomorrow. On my way back, intending to grab a sandwich from Potbelly's, I was trying to cheer myself up from the unknown sadness that had engulfed me since evening, when I passed Dao. Now, Thai food is my weak-point and I quickly entered Dao thinking of carrying out a nice curry and rice. And then, I surprised myself by asking for a table for 1! I have never done this before! It was so refreshing to just sit by myself and eat. While my food came I at first felt awkward sitting there and staring at everyone else. I thought of calling up someone, just to appear all important and busy and 'social'. Resisting that urge I thought, "what the hell do I care about what they think of me or my lack of social circle!" It set me free, I swear!

The food seemed even more delicious and spicy. My new found confidence was put to test when a friend called back. I had called him earlier before entering Dao, as a last attempt to seek company for dinner. I answered the questions "You were alone?" and "You ate there or took it away?" with a steady voice, no second thoughts and truthfully!

So far, so good!

Standalone happiness

Many months ago I had read this poem with Chetana, then in one of her posts and today it seems apt here:

Comes the Dawn

After awhile you learn the subtle difference

Between holding a hand and chaining a soul.

And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning

And company doesn't mean security.

And you begin to understand that kisses aren't contracts

And presents aren't promises,

And you begin to accept your defeats

With your head held high and your eyes wide open.

With the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child.

You learn to build your roads

On today because tomorrow's ground

Is too uncertain for plans, and futures have

A way of falling down in midflight.

After awhile you learn that even sunshine

Burns if you get too much.

So you plant your own garden and decorate

Your own soul, instead of waiting

For someone to bring you flowers.

And you learn that you really can endure,

That you really are strong.

And you really do have worth.

And you learn and learn...and you learn

With every goodbye you learn.

-Veronica A. Shoffstal

the excitement of novelty

This has always happened to me. New acquaintances, especially of the opposite sex, always steal much more attention and cause much more excitement than I would like to admit. It's kind of funny how some things never change. From the awkwardness of a teen when talking to a guy to this more matured bold flirting, my approach might have changed, but deep within, I can still feel the typical flutter of excitement every time. I laugh at myself for feeling this way, but sometimes I wonder if everyone else feels the same way too. Why just guys? A new dress, a new friend, a new place, a new project, a new song, a new dish, a new movie, new snow, everything that's new piques interest, doesn't it? Why should it be different with guys?...Well, it's just a power law with a much higher exponent for the guy species! I am helpless you see...I have to obey nature's laws! :P

Joy of giving!

Today I am the happiest ever! :) I have been jumping up and down in my studio and laughing like crazy and talking with my voice brimming with excitement and joy since morning!
It's the first time since I came to the US that I have sent home a package full of gifts for my family and extended family. And since morning as the gifts got distributed, each one of them has been calling me up! They are all sooo happy! But the crowning glory was my mom's description of how she felt: " ....My 50 years of age just vanished as I became a kid and fought with Ruchi (my sis) over which perfume was for whom! Later on I felt quite ashamed of my childish behaviour. .....This is the first time ever that any gift has meant soo much to me ..'coz I know you have poured your heart into it! .............Your Dad left the office early and hunted for the right adapter to charge the electric razor you sent. These gifts have brought out the child in us both!" :)))))

I just cried in happiness! It is my biggest achievement!

The image that has stuck in my mind is Ruchi wearing the sweater on a hot, sultry day in mumbai, just 'coz her didi sent it and then at night falling asleep on the sofa with exhaustion, but still clinging on to that dear sweater!

A thought disturbed my blissful contentment: "....Are these material things the only ways of making them happy? Are these bonds so superficial? " No! Definitely not....when you are far away you can't give a hug or a kiss and these gifts are just a tangible alternative. They all really mean the same..."I love you and care for you, think about you and miss you!"

They know! :D

The song from the heart

I am almost convinced this is a reflex..the most complex one ever! Have you ever just suddenly broken your thoughts and started singing and been surprised at how perfectly the song you spontaneously started singing suits your line of thought or frame of mind?!

This has happened yo me several times now..And it isn't even a song that I had been humming anyway....it sometimes is an old forgotten song, not really my favourites, but very apt in the situation! It is almost uncanny, like an invisible witty friend listening to your thoughts and replying!
And when this happens I can't help but smile at myself...I guess I will never figure out myself...and that's a fun mystery to live with!

Gelling in!

In this frigid cold when the strong gusty winds pin down the already single digit Fahrenheit temperatures to 20-30 below zero I thought I was insane to venture out. But, I am so glad that I went. :)

I just got back from a low-key lazy Sunday hangout at one of my firangi classmates place. And surprisingly, I REALLY had FUN! I had been quite unhappy with myself for not being able to make it to their parties or generally, not hanging out with them ....blaming it on the cultural gap that prevented any sort of normal conversation beyond first 15 minutes or the lack of any motivation, like beer, to stick around after the small-talk had ended. How wrong I was! These guys are not only quite easy-going and fun, but genuinely nice people and very warm and welcoming too! I can just be myself and just be genuinely interested in hanging out with them! It is just the same amount if effort you put in when you go to any new place, even in India, and meet new people.

Damn! And I thought I was a loner and goner! :P

Just for sake of completion, here's what we did:
Laura, Charlie's wife picked me up from the el station. I really appreciate her coming out in this cold. We chatted about advertisements, comedy shows and cartoons over drinks. When it was time for dinner, by popular vote we decided on Thai. Among the really good ones were the smoky tasting drunken noodles, the glass noodles and the green curry. The spring rolls were the first ever that I have eaten cold and with zucchini, but they were yum! The topic of grave discussion at the table, as people struggled with their chopsticks, literally to make 2 ends meet, was about the sex separation in Hyenas! Can you believe that! :) Well, it looks like you can't just look and distinguish a male hyena from a female! And there's more to it, but I will leave that to your wikiing skills. Also, we deliberated on why there aren't as many people with extra digits even though it is a dominant trait! We had home-made ladoos that Aai had sent for dessert and they totally loved those "little, dough cookies!" :) Then it was videogame time! And they had a Wii! So I virtually snowboarded and lost all the times! :( And they we cabbed back home!

It was "a nice...a very nice" evening!

Probability, Uncertainity and the tumbling die

Probability: It is very unfortunate, perhaps, that this theory didn't get its fair share of glamour and awe as did the theory of relativity. coz everything depends on probability and even if it doesnt it can at least be explained by it.

Right from most basic interactions in a living cell, eg protein-RNA or DNA all phenomena are governed by probablility over and above other guiding principles.

What are coincidences in life? Just an event with a small probablity, that has occurred..I think it is a very powerful idea..it is a nice way of defining the undefinable..of stating the unknown, incomprehensible in a maths form: an equation. A sort of psychological security?

Then, are accidents, serendipities, coincidences, surprises just a naive person's perceptions of this divine(?!) law? i should think so. coz if there really was a discerning God, would taking Ketan and Neeru's lives...and risking Anushree's make sense in his larger 'Plan of things' or was just His mistake ...or least accusatory of all...just a random chance?

Just a small mistake can be fatal in one situation and a grave one be excused in another....are effects also a conditional probability ...conditioned by time and space?
Then that means there isn't any destiny? This is better..'coz i m not comfortable with living a life, one over which i know I have no control.......but on the other hand the first qn that flashed in my mind wen i heard of the ghastly incident was: Did he deserve this? Of course not, Rashmi, but probability is heartless, mindless, unjust!

heard of Bayesian probability? or posterior probability? given the final outcome, predicting the possible prior probabilities of that happening. ...What i am doing now is that...sadly this is utterly useless in real life...will it get them back...will it steer the rolling car or the tumbling die ...back on to the road, the gameboard?....NO, we lost, completely...absolutely . Game over!

The Feedback loop!

Ahem! Having written the title for this post, I wonder if it makes any sense :-P ('coz if there's a feedback there has to be a loop?..not necessarily, I argue and if there is one, is it feedback or feedforward?) Whatever the semantics, the fact is that this loop feeds on itself. It could, at times, be positive and sometimes even negative. I am talking about the way we perceive ourselves-our work and our lives, in general.

Let me elaborate. In a previous post I had said something to the effect, 'life is like a sine wave'. A little brooding over this has led me to the root of this problem and it looks like this:



The blue circles are our lows and the red ones are highs. Disclaimer: These refer to states of the awake and conscious mind, only! :-)
Hmm...When I am unhappy with the way my life( life, in today's lingo, means anything much less than your actual lifespan and is, actually, used as a vague term when we can't exactly pinpoint a particular aspect of our life!) is shaping up, I end up in a perpetually bad mood which in turn leads to a propagation of the dull phase! Now if this negative feedback is clear the red, periods of positive feedback can be similarly explained. The highs are generally a little short lasting and we tend to magnify our woes, hence the difference in size. Now comes the interesting part; how to escape from the vicious circle and reach the red circle?

I figured out today that for this we require to just withdraw from the cycle and look at ourselves from a different reference frame. During one such pause to introspect, I realized that currently I am not able to work efficiently or be enthu and energetic and do a lot of extra-curriculars 'coz I am just too lethargic and lazy! I have arrived at the 'all important solution to all of mankind's miseries', as Dipa would call it, and that is A JOG and EXERCISES in the morning! Tomorrow onwards (at least for two days :-P) I am going to see if these help me to regain my agility and leap to the red circle.

Now, settling down to write this post was also a part of this 'leap before you weep' strategy! ;-)
It often happens that I have an entire post ready in my mind, but being a lazy bum that I am, I don't get down to posting it. Putting it in green and yellow seems to be therapeutic; I feel a fresh surge of adrenalin after publishing one.

Everyone is special in their own way. And I am for my fart(for benefit of all non-IITians: fart=poor, here) jokes and I love rebuses. So here's the deal: I will post my terri(fic/ble) 'Joke of the day' and as an incentive for u guys to visit my blog again, I'll also post new rebuses as antidotes to preserve your sanity! I am so considerate!

So, are you ready? Here goes today's FJ :-P

This sem we have a course in genetics and we are learning about the galactose regulon in that. There are genes that have names gal1, gal2 ...gal10 and so on. So now, what would gal10 mean in hindi and hindu mythology?
Sahi Jawab: Ravan's left cheeks!! (for the really slow learners: gaal 10 is the clue) LOL! :D:-)))

For those of you who have the guts to plod on:

A simple rebus to begin with:


answer: overdrive. Simple, isn't it?...A better one next time, promise!

Ciao!

Fatte! :P

After this most hectic sem of my life, I reflect on what I have learnt. This-

All that happens is for a purpose.
I am lazy, very!
As deadlines approach, things will get done, but if I want perfection, they can't wait till the eleventh hour to be done.
Discipline is a must!
Depression arises from underperfomance (in my own eyes).
Praying helps to organise my thoughts, so does light exercise.
Justice happens!
Life's always going to speed ahead...time will always be short....Nothing can be postponed for long enough- work, family, socialising, relaxation -all must be balanced in every day life ...irrespective of work schedule.
Time management is the key and STOP CRIBBING!!
out of whatever free time I get, spending a huge chunk in cribbing abt how I dnt get time or what went wrong in the lab is stupidity!
Writing down deadlines and priorities helps...So that explains the new makeshift soft board (read a thermocol sheet pasted on the wall! :P) in my room!
Yeah, and most importantly, I shouldn't study in my room unless it is cleaned. :P
And when nothing seems to go right...just get up and go home! :)


Wow! what a boring post this has turned out to be! :D Sorry guys, u had to survive this, but this is so that I wont forget all this later...like real life notes! Dayaaaa! I must shut up!

Feynman rocks!

I liked him even when I when I had jus gone through the first chapter of "Surely u're jokin .." By the time I finished it I was in love with this man...and this quote is THE BEST!

Science is a lot like sex.
Sometimes something useful comes of it, but that's not the reason we're doing it.

-Richard Feynman


More of Feynman's pearls of wisdom next time.

Lucky, very lucky!

In retrospect, time seems to fly by....these past couple of months are just a blur now...my gaze briefly pausing at a few milestones...probably those that are to have a great impact on me- me, the person. GRE.......shaku aji passed away.............poo n me........ruta n me......ganpati .......the fotos......blogosphere connects...phones ......WE...everything just clicks...........mild, innocuous crushes........barriers dissolve.......chaos...confusion!!.........life luks complicated ......or have I complicated it?.........of course.........why compare with ppl around..why not?....after all we are well trained in relative grading.....nothing's absolute....atleast I thought so, till then....where is the mind and where the heart?.........the boundaries became indistinct.........i realised ....courage is what i lack.....i gave up hope in me......this was not for me......or so I resolved .......'it happens when u least expect it'........and it sure did...........I knew only love.......the tumult vanished....i was suddenly at peace.......it was omnipotent....i cudn't question it.......it had to be right......'coz I somehow just knew!.....My, was I scared!...It was a new language..I seem to be born knowing it.......yet, never discovered it.......seem to be born to speak it....It is certainly how Heaven must feel !!.......To think of all that cud have obeyed Murphy's law..I only have this to say, "..we are lucky, very lucky!"

Bliss is This!

Back at home! Don't know what magic there is ...but being at home is certainly a divine experience....It's worth evrything. I sound like I have been gone for 20 years..can't help it.

The only flipside is that the internet at home has decided to give me the ditch...even now the connection threatens to drop anytime...I will make this post brief.

The last 2 days at lab-12 saw me working 24/2 :D ...something I always wanted to do for the last 2 months. Anyways, my experiments worked! that was a really happy ending and I managed to get some statistical sigificance too....this took care of the report...the Talk with Shona was nothing like I wud hav loved it to be...but nt bad too...he saw my results,...and I mustered the courage to tell him abt the new statistic I had tested...he thought it was a gud idea...Hurray! ...I get scared of people in authority for no reason at all. I remember what Vanda's dad had told me, " Never hesitate to go and talk directly to the person in the topmost chair...they are generally the most approachable." The lab liked me ice-cream treat too...felt nice.

The return flight was adventurous...He cudn't fulfil my wish of gud company and just left the seat next to me blank. :( Anyways, the bbay runway was closed due to waterlogging and we had return to bangy 'coz we cudn't land! After refuelling we flew back ...thankfully able to land this time! Though I was just bored....at home evry1 was very tensed.

Back at home, I am doing nothing ...devouring every dish that mom makes... and catching up on all the sleep i missed in the last 2 mnths....and if time permits..doing a little of the word-lists...I am going to royally screw my GRE! Oh no! bad thoughts to be banished from the mind! ;)

A gud news is that Shona had mailed me..felt nice...I have got to learn a lot from this man! lucky!

Finally the football fever did catch up with me....glad that Italy won....my support counts!
I have given up on Sudoku....very trivial, u see! :P
GOT TO STUDY, GOT TO STUDY AND GOT TO STUDY A LOT!!
Will write when my frustration reaches the zenith!

miles to go before I leave...

Hey it has come, finally!....Day after tomorrow I will be gone back home!! My excitement is soo gr8 it drove me out of the bed early on a sunday morning! And this is my 1st post in the morning. The last 2 days are goin to be a blur with soooooooo many things to be done....report to be written..talk to Shona...complete the expt....treat labmates..buy some gifts...do packing!.....and meet some people!..yeah...and not to 4get basky on mon evening! ......wow!........ today again Ramannna refused me breakfast 'coz i was 7 mins late! I wonder if the prime minister even is required to be so punctual. All in all, a lot depends on these 2days. Especially the talk wid Shona...it will determine if i go back a satisfied me or not....I gtg..else I'll miss the tea too...Wish me luck!

mantra

Though i don't like to admit it often, I am superstitious. On second thoughts, not really. :-P Like I have always felt that all the days are alternately bad and gud for me. So wen in the morning today I got up late, findng that the solar heated water was not hot as the sun had taken leave, my immediate reaction was "Oh @#$*, this is one of those bad days!...why, today is my expt!..... Doomed" .....but next moment I did something very unusual...I regained my calm and decided that I would boil water in the electric kettle that dear mom had sent me, against my protestations, and patiently iterate this till i had atleast half a bucket of warm water. Btw, giving my ablution a bunk wasn't on the agenda as i had played a lot the previous day. Despite the fact that I was going to be very late for my expt I sat there patiently boiling water in this kutty (c I know tam now! ...thanx to my labmates!) kettle....and like a gud gal, i did not fret over the whole ordeal but spent the wait revising my GRE words! I was a new me! eventually i had a nice bath and though i was a little late I managed my expt fine.....at the start of which I did start blundering but soon the newfound calm overwhelmed me ...and to my ultimate surprise I got a very gud result! so much so that I have earned another expt for myself b4 i leave from here! .......The moral of the story is staying calm can change a prospective 'bad day' to a 'gud' one! Long live my superstitions!

Hmm another notable occurrence was ..I got a perfect dissection today! ....I don't think this will make any sense to anybody else..but it makes to me......... in 2 blows "swoosh, swoosh" the skull is opened....and no blood anywhere on the guillotine...and the pulse still there while i was at it....and the jaw twitched, alright..and no gooshing of any tissue..and and the olfactory bulb, the cortex-mid brain, and the cerebellum all intact! Result- jubilant Rashmi praises dead rat.

These days i am a regular on the court....3 days is very regular. Though i am one of the weakest players here i know that i really love basky. The 'stay calm' principle if applied here can help me a lot. It doesn't seem to strike me to think once i get the ball in my hand...all haste. Anyway the best part was it was not a rowdy game but a very fierce one...collisions were happening like we see in fifa! ....I temporarily paralysed one side...but was soon bk ...no way i can miss the action. I felt so liberated...It felt like school days!

Thought : No use thinking about wat's going wrong wid this, think is there a righter way. This doesn't work in su doku.

Ephemeral

Today I was leafing through Shona's PhD thesis and saw that its pages had marks of some spilled liquid. They had become crumbly.....and a thought came to my mind - Once what was so precious has now lost its charm, but what remains is the experiences and memories.....it is not the notes but what we have learnt in our minds that's very important and long-lasting.

Worm-e-culture

Autobiography of the worm.

The metamorphosis took place some 50 days back when it happened to crawl into lab-12. World is very different if u don't have eyes......it took the worm a long time to get to know the eg0-system. The identity crisis - UG or PG reared its ugly head once more. Everyone had happily assigned it the lowest rank; and a worm has no choice. This worm thought that wriggling slowly upwards it cud find it's way..it kept bumping into little dunes of sand ...sometimes natural hurdles, sometimes carved out by the footprints of the mighty. When the poor worm wud get tired, it would try to raise a cry...but worms don't speak or they make infrasonic sounds. Sometimes frustrations would lead the worm to attempt to jump...sometimes the mighty in their gud mood wud grant it a favour. Whatever it was, kept the worm going......Then came the saviour, He who sits at the zenith of the pyramid.....You-Know-Who! The worm craned its neck to catch a glimpse and what sweet surprise!!......it received a nice little pat and a whole bunch of carrots!! My my! ...But worm's can't eat carrots! Alas, the worm realised, it wud soon be time to change habitat. In its last fervent attempt to carve a niche for itself it discovered- a computer is a worm's best friend.......NEURON is what they call it .......and so decided the worm that wud be its niche, it wud toil hard for what was left of its stay....Nevermind the delay, it knew it had come a long way .....Now it realises why it was made a worm....However deep in soil they are, they never get buried..they can always surface through all odds! Long live worm-e-culture!

A stranger!

Is this real? I wonder. My self keeps surprising me, many times! Sometimes I can look at myself and wonder why am I acting this way? No, this is not split-personality...and by the way I just got to know that schizophrenia is misused interchangeably in this context.

The most recent and most annoying example is my weird disposition since I have come here. If these guys were too describe me it wud be : introvert, shy, somewhat hedonistic! This is so unlike me yet, I just maintain the impression, invariably and then I feel so bad. Thinking about this I felt that it has to do with how things progressed since I came here.....even after the initial period of getting to know people I naintained the facade....in a way, I think, my frustrations about my work manifested in my aloofness towards the people here. I realise I was wrong but I have come too far to correct, is it? No, it's not that bad, I think it's not too late but the fact that I have very less time now..it's probabaly that,hmmmm...so I just wud leave things at what they are....hopefully not worsening them. Not that I didn't take any efforts though, .....am I justifying myself? ....let's give it a fair chance...hmm, ok, whenever I have tried to show people that I care ..like for example, when you enquire about their health, if they weren't well the previous day or if I wait for someone to go for meals or something...it is not always reciprocated. These are trivial matters, I know, but they go a long way in showing how much you are a part of their group. And I am just not used to being treated as a 'worm'. Yes, tht's another story..it must wait for a while. Initially I started with a lot of patience ....but obviously the work environment here was soo different, so americanised, it took me a while to get acclimatised and it was aggravated by their indifference.....if it weren't for Debarati, I am sure I wud have got no formal intro with everyone on the first day. It might be expecting too much from people around me but, I am sure that if roles were reversed I wud surely be more amicable........well, that doesn't mean I shud not be able to cope with people of the other genre.

All I can say is that this whole experience has taught me an important funda.......what not to do when I finally go for my PhD. Too bad I cudn't touch these people's lives ....but sure mine has been enriched...I have learnt a lot from everyone here.....more of it later when I am gone from here. And yes, next time it's about the worm!

Growing up!

I have always felt life goes like a sine wave - highs 'n' lows, a period of lots of work and then loads of lukkha time....these last few days have been very busy...not due to work but a lot of things happening in my life! Last week I was cribbing 'coz I had nothing to do to while away time......until I decided to go to Kochi ..to my aunt's place. Even after 4 years of staying away from home these pangs of homesickness haven't stopped hitting me!

So I went for booking the bus tickets two days in advance and inspite of my parents protests against me travelling in the heavy rains. Not knowing the place can be very frustrating, especially as I found out that day, after walking 4 kms and spending close to 100bucks just on travelling 'coz I kept losing my way in this jungle of a city. Phew! at long last I reached the booking office and all my previous notions about bangy being a cleaner and nicer city than bombay vanished as I ended up walking down this dirty market road, to reach that place. Somehow I got the reservation done after much haggling as all the buses were full. It was dark by this time and that wasn't a place I wud love to be even during daylight...so, I started to feel even more insecure..and the whole thing made me very suspicious of everyone around me!.....to the extent that I thought that the rickshaw driver, realising well that I am knew to the place, was trying to take me for a ride...and my imagination went to imagine even worse things...so much so that I made him stop in between and asked another man for directions...and also I thought the man at the booking office was trying to keep me there for an unduly long time and so I refused to sit down at his office.....now it seems ridiculous of me to have been standing there for close to an hour that I was there!!! Not only that, I also told him that I from pune when he tried to be friendly with me..I told him some other name...and then thought he was charging me more for the ticket...and on and on.....On my way back I was holding on to my bag tightly 'coz I had just visited the ATM that evening. I am sure that wud have drawn more attention to my bag....I was behaving as if people have xray vision and will come after the meagre 2000 bucks I had in my wallet!! Finally when I reached IISc, i heaved a sigh of relief. I still had an hour to waste before got on to the shuttle so I went to cisit the library...that too without an ID.......Then I did that which was my only way to get in...gave the security guard a sweet smile....and expressed my deep desire to have a look around the library ..of the 'greatest research institute in the country'.....and it worked!! While in the huge leather chair in the lounge with all the top journals lying around me...I reflected on the evening's adventures and had a hearty laugh at my stupidity and distrust and suspicion! ..and of course vowed not to tell this at home..mom would be psyched at the thought of her naive gal travelling alone in an unknown city at night!

Then, after much dilly-dallying I went to Kochi and Vijay Kaka and Kaku were so affectionate, I felt totally at home.....I was completely relaxed ....no worries at all.....at peace! On my way back in the bus there was this gang of rowdy boys......hitting at me.....playing loud music at my ear, sneaking peeks at me...and the horrifying of all..resting his dirty feet on my handrest! When language is a bar.....sign language is all that comes to your rescue ..but not wanting to show off my indecency..I did not gesticulate to him, instead just shot him a fierce, menacing glance......at the next opportunity I got my seat changed.....only to land up at the mercy of 'bus-bugs' the close relatives of the bed-bugs :P, .....with sleep out of the question I coaxed myself into discerning outlines of the trees and landscape in the dark and enjoy the journey! at daybreak my prayers were answered when our bus broke down and we were squeezed into another fully filled bus....minus the bus-bugs so that I could grab an hour of intermittent sleep. After another one hour of journey through all other available modes of local transport in the city, I reached the peace of my room .......my first reflection on the whole experience was "Luxury Buses Ought to have Loos!" :)

God still had many more lessons in mind for me....so just 2 days later when a friend and I weer walking down from my PG place to NCBS, a rogue came and snatched her purse ......and we chased him....and lost him....and then reported it to the police...who kept up their tradition in arriving an hour late. The real fun started after this....for this small an incident there were three van full of officers.....each taking their turns to question us on all peripheral details...Thank heavens they didn't ask me the favourite question 'What is this Biotechnology?' ..apart from that they engaged in all trivial talk.....right from establishing some marathi connection with me! Of little importance, and understandably so, was the description of the snatcher, 'coz my friend had dropped the most important clue...she was leaving the city in a week,.....so the case was shut......My first experience with the police had lived upto my expectations.....I couldn't help laughing out at the farce they put up!

Next day was even more eventful with my friend bent upon filing an FIR.....though the logic was right....the place was wrong...as we had to go 'police-station-hopping' finding out the station under whose purview the patch of land, where the incident had happened, came..no, no...don't take that too lightly,....even a centimetre here and there and they'll direct u to a different police station! After all this we got an FIR receipt....written in pure Kannada! We were jubiliant! I hope this puts an end to this long drawn theft episode!

So as it turns out four lessons later..I m a different person....more scared..more suspicious of people around me and hopefully more careful in the future!

At last!

After a month of lukkhagiri, I finally got to 'do' an experiment myself! I had not expected an EPM (it's a fairly simple maze where u put a rat and see what it does) to bring me so much joy! To say the least, it is not bad for a start in Neuro. After 10 days of 'stressing' my rats I checked them for anxiety and the icing on the cake was I got to dissect out their brains too! Sorry, I don't know whether I am supposed to feel sad for them or glad for being able to do a novel thing.

I was unsure of what my reaction to all these animal experiments would be before I came here. I took myself by surprise when I didn't as much as wince when I saw the sight for the first time. The power of the psychic works wonders sometimes! Today too, I had steeled myself for the ordeal , psychologically as well as by eating less for luch ;) . I don't know what helped me more...but apart from the split second guilt I felt for the rat when I was about to put it in the anaesthesia chamber, and when I had to actually sacrifice it, everything was accomplished with surprising detachment. Inspite of all this, an objective assessment would be gud. I couldn't get the hippocampus (where we form some memories ) out in a piece, and couldn't wield any instrument with required force; which is like crushing some inanimate object; but I managed to get the brain intact.

That's enough of the gory stuff, I guess!

Usually in the evenings everyone goes to play some game..today I skipped basky and TT and instead solved some rebuses, and other puzzles....I realised then that I am not bad at them and I enjoy it too! Almost as much as basky!

Hmmm...there's oo much to write about but I will have to pause here for the day as I am feeling nauseatic, prolly from the omlette I had for dinner 'coz that's been my dinner for the last three days now!! :(

Why bother?

First they came for the socialists,
and I did not speak out
because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.

Then came for the Jews,
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak for me.

These stanzas by the Protestant minister in Nazi times..are so relevant to today's fight against reservations.

Rang de Basanti

'Don't criticise, don't even think, if you can't act!'

I came across this quote by Hellen Keller in one of my mails and it stuck in my head ever since. I am otherwise bad at remembering quotes. Never mind. This is exactly what the righteous Rashmi in me always tells me.

When I saw Rang de basanti, I made an important decision of my life. Now, I am usually not the person to take films eriously, but that was the time when the issue I resolved was uppermost in the debating area of my brain. So, it so happens that the gud rashmi (read righteous) and the bad rashmi (read normal) are at conflict. The bad rashmi wants to go abroad pursue an illustrious career in research and settle down with a peaceful family life and of course, not to mention, live in luxury. The gud rashmi argues that I must return to India and after a while enter into politics. I can only make a difference if I am part of the system. There was a time when both Rashmis were averse to politics....but patriotism overruled. But a plunge into politics, at whatever age, entails the end of a peaceful family life. That was the hitch. That was when Rang de basanti came to our rescue and I realise that everyone has conflicting desires and the choices are exclusive but, nevertheless, have to be made ...and that's when the rope crossed over and the gud Rashmi won the tug of war. (Hey, 'War of the Rashmis!!' ;))

The current burning issue of reservations has put me in a fix, again! I am feeling so worthless that I am not doing anything about it and yet I am very skeptical about the efforts of my friends in Bombay making any difference. I soooo want to do something but don't know what. Everyone says that the only option we have is to leave the country and not return. But, that is not what I really want to do, even now. At the same time, I am beginning to feel the frustration and hopelessness with which the common Indian looks at politics. Where has my optimism gone, I wonder! Or is it time for realism? I am so confused, I don't believe it's me!

The solution is to just give myself some time, of which I have lots here :P, and I guess, things will fall into place. Once in a while we really do need time with ourselves, don't we? So writing a blog is all about that!! Eureka!!

Here I am!!
This is me,
Finally on a blogging spree! :)

This is as far as my originality goes! ;) ....and that reminds me of defining my very 'original' blog-title ..if anyone fails to grasp the meaning at a glance or even afterwards it's perfectly ok..'coz I have invented this verb! :D 'sulcing in' refers to delving into (my) brain along the 'sulci', that are the deep grooves that are found on the brain!

All these days i have been waiting to blog for lack of a suitable theme to write my first blog on ......when I came here to bangy I thot, perhaps, frustration in research is a good motivation...but finally, today my inspiration came by in the form of the Nobel laureate, Mr. Torsten Wiesel, who had come here on a visit to NCBS. It was not only the grand old man's hour and half long talk, throughout which he was standing ..versus me struggling to kip my eyes open..(what a shame!) nor his passion for science, his sharp mind and up-to-date knowledge of current science inspite of being out of the lab for soo many years now! I was impressed by all this but, above all, what struck me most was his humility ....absolutely down-to-earth....when he was chatting with us in our lab it was just like an informal talk, like contemporaries were chatting at a coffee shack! (Oh! how I miss those chats back home!)
Not only the big visitor but humility is something tht has caught my attention ever since I came here. All the PIs (tht's the way they call them here ;)) are very friendly, very modest, ....I thought initially, tht this projects lack of respect..but what the heck, the superficial, so-called respectful deeds that we do are actually a mere formality, this culture here is so much more real! No false feelings, no pretentions! And u can spend your energy more on scientific issues! I like it better now and here!!

So moral of the story is that if i ever want to become a Nobel laureate ....first thing i must do is stay deep rooted in the ground ....and just grow up higher n higher! :)

That's all for today...so much for a start.....next one when the appropriate neurons fire again!
so long!
Rashmi.