A shot in the air

It has been a while since I’ve penned down a proper article. There is so much happening on campus, one might think it would be hard to pick something to report on. Rather, an entire year on this happening campus has ensured that anything which isn’t miraculous is merely monotonous. Here is another one of those articles of mine, a blind shot in the air, hoping I shoot down an orbiting , err well… an orbiting something.
This month, I have somehow got inspired by Jug Suriaya. His articles that are based on nothing miraculous yet make perfect sense. It is a wonder how he manages to come up his pieces of work every week, without a visible drop in the quality of his work. Perhaps it’s the money that keeps him going. Lucky him, I say. For one, I am squeezed every edition until an article is extracted from me. Yet, not a penny in return; while the above-mentioned pens down stories about himself and Bunny, and the moolah flows in like it had nothing better to do.
For a typical engineering student (and that includes me), 12 hours in a day pass trying to figure out what to do next. I guess it is in the genes or something. It seems totally beyond any of us to arrive at ‘penning down an article’ as the perfect time-pass. All or more than all of us hesitate in writing something for the magazine. Either we have nothing to write about, or we are just not interested. For the former, we can always do a Suriaya (which, by the way, seems like what I am doing). Or if writing fails to generate interest, I could say, do a Suriaya again (Now, perhaps ‘Suriaya’ ought to be added to dictionaries as another one of those volatile words). Who says you need to show an interest in writing if you can force yourself to write? When the sky comes crashing down, are you going to stand there and complain that you don’t have your running shoes?
Our last edition had a number of hits that was greater than four times the strength of my batch. Well, one would raise an eyebrow now. If those many people read the magazine (or at least have a look at it), then it means we have a fair number of literates. What it also means is that, there is a fair number of people interested in the kind of articles us Suriayas come up with. Then according to logic, there ought to be a decent crowd willing to contribute as well.
Now, here is the part where we engineers can stick our tongues out at the practitioners of the ‘logical system’. We defy all logic, and go beyond that by sticking our tongues out at it. I remember a statement that said, ‘To be an engineer, you first have to be lazy’. We, the students of this mighty engineering college can hold our heads high in pride – we are one step closer to being engineers. As a result of this effort of ours, only a handful of us (who call ourselves the ‘Press club’) are keeping this magazine running. Ever seen an elephant balancing on four toothpicks? You haven’t? Well anyway, you get the picture.
Ah, yes. At the end of the day, we get something to write in our resumes. We can be proud of our grit, that we endured mockery at our sense of responsibility (You won’t hear of this anywhere outside engineering colleges). But hey, as good a writer as Jug Suriaya may be, he can’t run the newspaper by himself. His column is a weekly matter, and the rest of the paper never comes in empty. What the magazine needs is many more Suriayas, who can find their ‘Bunnys’ and come up with quality articles, even if it is once in a week.

Ending up on the shores

O human!

It is your own doing,

Now you stand upon these lonely shores,

Regretting your faults,

The mistakes you made before

Now, you stand on clumsy feet,

Still, the earth supports your burden

Still conserves those signs of your existence,

The winding roads on which you had trodden

Since your birth the earth nurtured you,

Fondled you with all her care,

What have you left behind? [O wretched human]

Death, destruction and despair.

Dying of shame, you whimper,

Your face buried in your hands,

And it hits you, all that had gone wrong,

When you ruled the great oceans, the lands.

You should have seen it long ago,

When your fate hadn’t been carved,

Into the stones of history, all you can do,

Now is pick up the broken pieces, the shards.

Boot polish

boot polish!
i heard a cry,
tore my eyes away from the landscape,
my eyes rivoted onto a little boy,
he looked of four but may have been three,

a dirty shirt wrapped around his body,
he knelt upon the carriage floor,
pointing at my boots he looked up with inquiring eyes,
boot polish! he said again

giving a slight nod i handed my boots to him,
with a torn rag and a dollop of polish,he set to work
in a while, the boots shone as good as new
i handed him his'char rupiayah',he tucked them into his shirt

getting down at the next stop,
i saw the little boy get down as well,
swiflty he ran to another boy,
together they marched up to a stall,

handing over the pay, they shared a 'samosa'
he couldnt hide his glee, as he tucked into his meal for the day,
the whistle sounded,he ran into the train,
i heard the same cry again,
boot polish!