After the Circa

Things I do, I do to try and get a strong reaction from people. Nobody has anything to say about my ice skating post, when I went to have sushi or the movie. Most of my dream or death posts. So I have failed with those topics.. I think I am starting to realize what gets certain people to react... Anyways, totally disregarding that for this post, here's something I've been meaning to write for a while now.

Let me explain what got me to impose this IM and social networking fast upon myself.

It was a week ago from now, I was in Toronto for the 'christmas' party at the Circa club on John street. It was 22nd of december. I was there with Sachin, Rajat and Franziska. (Franziska is the swiss chick.) After a beer, a shot of tequila and a shot of whiskey, plus a lot of dancing, we were all kinda tired and were just chilling out on the couch on the side. I was missing Sujata a lot and tried to give her a call. The phone rang and then I got the message that her number is busy. Disappointed and definitely not in a better mood, I went back inside.

After a little while more, we decided to jump that place, and head towards the go station or go someplace quiet where we could rest or maybe sleep till the morning when the train starts running again. So we were at a Tim Horton's. I quietly walked away and called up Sujata again. I didn't have much to say. was just missing her and wanted to hear her voice. But as the conversation progressed, I started speaking, in english, with the canadian accent that's second nature to me and just pops up without even me being aware of it. And suju snapped: "don't talk to me in that accent!" I tried to stick to hindi for the next few minutes and then my calling card ran out of balance.

That was straw one.

We had been sitting there so bored for so long that we guys were just going on and on about whatever topic we could find. And sometimes the conversations bordered on the retarded. I was enjoying meing stupid. Consciously stupid. I wasn't drunk. I was the one who had had the least to drink, and NOBODY was drunk. Then Sachin started to talk about his grandmother cursing him in punjabi. This conversation was straw two. (or maybe the part where Rajat went "Your surname is Gupta? Oh, so you're a Baniya!") I wasn't a part of it, because I barely remember what my grandmother used to say. But Sachin and Rajat went on.. joking about how there was no way I would have heard all that... I don't remember mch because I had retreated into my shell and was thinking...

I remembered meeting Sujata's grandparents, Abhinav's Grandparents, Hearing about Pranav's grandfather, and went through a flashback of my own interaction with my grandparents. I was really sad. But I didn't want to show or talk about any of it. I remembered things like when I was talking to Sujata and Mickey the other day. The quote 'Nobody feels sorry for you' came to mind. I think people just feel sory they have to listen to some stupid 'kid' whine. (Although talking to Sujata about my 'grudge' did seem to help me) And decided I don't want to talk to anybody at all.

And that was the last straw. I decided I won't be on IM for people to contact me. I wasn't going to recharge my India calling card. I planned on spending Christmas alone. (But Sachin called up and came to my place and we ended up making some food, watching kungfu panda together. It was great!)

The reaction that I got when I was not talking to Pranav for the first few days was that he would go around asking my other friends 'where is yash' but if I don't speak to any of those people either, what's he gonna do then? That's stupid, right? What can I say? I'm just a baby.

One of my dreams came true. What next?

How many here have seen 'South Park'? Well, to those who haven't I have two things to say:

1. Go watch South Park!
2. Come back and tell me how awesome you thing South Park is.

Well, in the mean time, for the premise of this blog post, I would just like to start by talking about Eric Cartman. The fat annoying character that nobody in his school likes. The kids are always mean to him but still, he thrives on it. So one day, the kids decide, they are not even going to acknowledge him. Just ignore him. (in the episode Death of Eric Cartman) And the audience, will either love him or hate him, or maybe even love to hate him, or hate to love him... but they cannot ignore him. There can't be an episode of South Park without Eric cartman.

I guess the first person to get where I am going with this would be Abhinav. I have a eric cartman in my life, who I can love or hate or love to hate, maybe even ignore him for one episode but the show will just not go on without him popping in here and there. And Abhinav, as the reader/viewer, might occasionaly (actually, always!) hate him. But What can I say, He gives me stuff to write about. If you want, I could make a feed that excludes all the posts related to him, but then you'd be missing out on SO MUCH!

Okay, getting to the topic.. I should have mentioned earlier that Sachin came over to my place on Christmas Day. And I happened to show him something I had noticed a while ago. Remember the part where I drink beer and get drunk in this blog post that I posted in August? It's so weird how I could have forseen that I will come to canada and drink and get drunk when I was back in India! So dreams really can tell the future? Sachin found it pretty amusing too. It was on his birthday party on the 19th October that I got drunk for the first time ever. And the 7th august blog post seems like I wrote it on that day at the very moment I started feeling tipsy.

Now, lets skip to the dream I had two nights ago. I didn't think much of it and didn't bother to blog it. Except now. The dream was, that I was back in Akola. You know how sometimes the place is undisclosed in the dream, this time, it was my house in my hometown back in India. And I was meeting and talking up with a lot of people. And from the corner of my eye, I notice Pranav sitting on the dining table with somebody. But I don't bother to go talk to him. A while later, I remember I'm sitting on the dining table, but Pranav isn't there. Pranav definitely wasn't the highlight of this dream.

You see, I remember when I was about to leave for Canada the first time, I was feeling really happy and confident. I remember myself suddenly being able to talk to my distant relatives, elders, strangers about...something. I hadn't been able to do that before. I was a very quiet little introvert. I figured it was just because I'm 'growing up' heh. But next time around I was in India, I didn't feel the same way. I had lost my confidence and I had retreated back into my shell. And thus I wasn't able to converse with people. I still feel the same way. So the fact that I was talking to people close to me, happily and comfortably means that things had turned around for me. I was not a sad, miserable little loser anymore.

But now, we're getting closer to why I started writing this blog. I was lying on my bed, thinking... this is the second time Pranav was in akola, Right? The first time was a dream a few months, maybe more than a year ago.. And the details in that dream suggested that he was coming to my house at the time of a wedding. At that time, there was no wedding scheduled so I didn't give it much thought. But someone in my family got engaged recently. My cousin Amol's wedding is in a few months. And there are lots of people at wedding.. who I was talking to in my latest dream. So if I consider the drinking in canada dream that came true a few months later.. maybe I could predict when the sum of both those pranav in akola dreams could come true.

Just because I am really looking forward to coming to India and attending my cousin's wedding. I hope I don't miss out on that because of my college.

Another Oakville Transit Adventure

Previously, on this blog... We had just left Fernanda's apartment, and gotten into the elevator. Doni started making weird faces... Upon inquiring, he told me that his stomach is feeling a little upset. He wanted to go back up and take a dump. Which would mean we'd end up missing our bus. I convinced him to hold it back and 'power through it'. And suddenly I realized that left my ipod touch on the dining table. So we go back up again.

I enter the apartment again, saying hi to everybody there, only 4 other friends of Fernanda's who drove here. Unfortunately they only had room for one more so they couldn't have given us a ride. Yeah, they've never even heard of the concept of sitting on somebody's lap to stuff more than 5 people in a car. That's something only us Indians do. Actually, no wait.. The other day, when we were returning from Renata's house after a party, Scott drove us to the college and we were kinda piled up on top of one another just like back in India. Anyways, coming back to the point, Doni didn't go to the bathroom and we got down again.

After walking a few hundred meters from the apartment, Doni slowed down again. I realized he wasn't doing so well, so I offered to go back. But he said it keeps going on and off.. so maybe he'll be fine if we just caught the bus back asap. As we're walking over the bridge, we spotted a bus going past us.. We went Fuck no! And I started flailing my hands to try and signal the driver to stop. Honestly, I wasn't hoping for a miracle, but a miracle is what we got. The bus driver slowed down and we started running to the other side of the road to catch the bus.

I was SO HAPPY! The bus driver greeted us nicely, we boarded the bus and saw that there was absolutely nobody else in the bus except for us. I told him what happened with us earlier that day. Then we told him where we needed to go, and he said he'll directly take us there. AWESOME! We got a cab ride for the price of a bus ticket.I was really amazed by what that bus driver did for us. I thanked him and wished him merry christmas as I got down in front of rabbas. 

We started walking and Doni wasn't feeling too great. So I offered him to come to my apartment to use the bathroom as it was closer. "And if you are going through the woods and feel like taking a dump, you can just do it like they used to do it in the old days. LOL." 

I did end up going to that Christmas Party

I really enjoy using the 24 inch iMacs in the college. Somehow, the workflow is much faster on these. I go through my reading much faster on these, I get down to the stuff I really want to do, and rarely get distracted or interrupted. However, one thing I refrain from doing in the college is updating my blog. Because I don't want other people to eavesdrop on my writing.

But today, I can totally do that because I am the only one sitting in the huge learning commons room. Since the college is not officially open today, there aren't even any staff members or people who work at the ITSC. I came to the college with the intent of playing squash but found out the gymnasium is closed as well. Tough luck huh? Anyways, I guess it's a good thing and I can catch up on bringing you guys up to speed on what's been going on.

Firstly, I should mention that I did end up going to the party I mentioned in my previous blog post. After I wrote that, I sat down and watched some more American dad. four hours later, I was hungry and wasn't feeling like cooking. I thought Doni had already left but no, he called me up from the bus stop to ask me again if I really wanted to go. And I finally said yes. I left my apartment wearing the same sweater and light hoodie. Big mistake. Because the wind outside had really picked up and it started feeling much cooler than 4 hours earlier.

We had to change two busses. But the second bus did not show up in time because the driver had gotten sick and somebody else had to substitute for him. And while we were waiting at the go station, another tragedy struck! The wine bottle fell and broke as the polybag that doni was playing with ripped open from the bottom. Doni put forth his theory that tragedies strike in threes. And I remembered the sunday where nothing went right. 

Once on the bus, Doni realized that he wanted to remind me to bring my camera with me. Damn! Even I didn't remember that. But I suppose it was a good thing, in case it started to rain again. Downtown Oakville, we got off the bus and started walking to her apartment. None of us had been to her house before, so Doni used his iPhone to look up google maps and figure out the way. The wind was unbearable. I didn't even have my gloves with me. Stupid!

But once we got to her place, everything was amazing. The view out the window of her apartment was simply amazing. Another slap on the back of my head for not bringing the camera. The crackers with tuna salad on them were delicious. But I didn't particularly like the chicken. Spring rolls were good tho and there were lots of drinks. No alcohol in case you were wondering. I had some eggnog and lemonade and pepsi. Damn this is making me hungry! There was some chocolate with Brandy in it. I remember having something like that... a chocolate with liqueur in it at Ameya's place in pune back in 11th or 12th grade. I don't think I ever talked much about those years of my life with anybody...

We couldn't stay for long as we had to catch the last bus back. So Fernanda put the dessert in a box for us that we took home with us. But even the return trip wasn't without it's own adventure. Maybe I'll post that in a mini-blog after this. And that will be the happy ending of this Christmas party. yeah, if you want to read the happy ending, leave a comment or remind me if I forget.

Oakville Transit sucks and यश गुप्ता is a Grinch

Or maybe you'd call me a Scrooge for not having enough Christmas spirit. I do not really hate Christmas. Until a few hours ago, I was feeling really cheery but right now, the christmas spirit can go fuck itself. Let's rewind.

I was in my room quietly reading my emails, one of which was a feed of this article. He's a comedian who writes hilarious posts and they always make me laugh. Then I switched to watching the Christmas special of American Dad 'The Most Adequate Christmas Ever'. Then Doni messaged me to ask if I wanted to go shopping. I did need some food so I said "okay, I'll go".

I got ready and went outside, only wearing my light hoodie since it was only 5 degrees today. The pleasant weather got me perked up. However, the weather forecast said it was going to rain later. And that's exactly what happened. We walked to the Superstore from McDonalds in the rain. At the checkout, I said the last nicest thing I was going to say to anybody all day. 'Thanks and Merry christmas'.

Doni was picking up some wine for Fernanda's Party. (Fernanda's a Brazillian friend of Renata.) I hadn't heard about it since it was announced on facebook, and I had decided I won't be on IM or any social networking sites for next couple of days.. He asked me if I was going, and I said "I wasn't even invited." Probably because I haven't added Fernanda to my friends list on facebook. He said I could go with him but I couldn't care less. I realized I didn't want to do anything this Christmas. Nick had invited me to his place in Toronto too, his parents were gonna be there, and probably gonna have a nice christmas dinner, but I didn't want to go. Lets just say it's because of the rain.

I was listening to the song 'The beginning is the end is the beginning' by Smashing Pumpkins.

Pushing the cart through the rain water and melting snow I reached the bus stop. The three of us were waiting in there for bus number 29. It comes, passes us by, stope in front of the sign that says 29 and drops off two people and runs away just as we were walking towards it. How the hell can they do that?! I was furious. I called up the Oakville Transit number to leave a complaint against the bus driver. He could have waited for just 30 more seconds for us to get there from the shelter we were standing under to protect ourselves from the rain. I wasn't liking this at all! My jacket was totally wet, and I could feel it two layers under.

Finally, we caught the #20 bus. On the way, Doni started a conversation about the bus going round and round (He was watching the blue dot on his iphone in google maps) and I bluntly replied, "well, yeah. Can't you tell I'm pissed?" to which he said, "you look in a very nice mood."
"I'm going to assume that was sarcasm" I said and put my earphones back in my ears. Even after we got off, he asked if I was going to come, and I said I'm not sure about it. He said to let him know in about half an hour and I just texted him saying that I'm not going. I'll probably not be doing anything tomorrow either. And I'm fine with that. Because I'm angry. Angry at...well.. the weather, the bus driver, the guy at the Superstore(oh, didn't I mention he put my apples in with Doni's stuff?) I want my freaking APPLES!

A story to tell for every bruise

There was this thing that Pranav and I made up when we were in alibag.. It was kinda based on the movie Hancock. It went as follows: By ourselves, we are safe from and impervious to any kind of physical harm or damage. But... whenever Pranav and I get together, we become susceptible and very vulnerable to all kinds of cuts, bruises, scratches or any other kind of injury.

There was this period of over 3 months since I had landed in Canada during which I was pretty much unharmed. I played squash, never seriously injured myself. I walked on icy sidewalks like crazy and never fell. But this week, it all changed... I guess after I talked to Pranav on the phone the other day..

First, I had, what I would call my worst squash accident yet. I was running towards the wall to hit the ball and my shoe which is always very slippery, got stuck on something, and instead of sliding to a stop, I was swung hard against the wall. And I wasn't even able to break the impact with my hands, so I hurt my cheek bone and my elbow. My glasses almost broke as they flung off my face. I was lucky to not get a black eye that day.

The next was last night when I was going over to Rajat's house. I had safely crossed 99% of the route from my apartment to his basement. But right before the stairs, there was a patch of slippery ice which I didn't see in the dark. I slipped and fell on the cold snow, my fall broken by my right hand which was holding a bag of chips and the rice I had cooked. I stood up and proceeded down the stairs to his room. And once I was inside, I realize that blood is dripping down my right hand. I wasn't wearing any gloves and my hand was so cold, and numb, I didn't feel a thing...

That's what made me write this entry. I look back at all the times I would go do some crazy thing because of Pranav and end up getting hurt. Same for him, I would egge him on to do something (which was his idea in the first place) resulting in.. what else? a disaster. But a pretty fun disaster at that. Because at the end of it, both of us would have another new story to tell.

Tonights Dream

Last nights dream has to be one of the top 5 really... well, 'interesting' dreams I've had. It begs a lot of questions. And I can't stop thinking how or why I would subconsciously think of such a thing.

I had talked to Pranav before I went to bed feeling like I had just jumped into the rabbit hole. I mean I was doing just fine not talking to him for almost 4 months. And my system was all clean. But i thought because I was clean, I could go ahead and take one more hit without getting addicted once again.

Sorry.. Deviated a little from the topic. In the dream, I was back in India. What looked like a really small and rural place. Could be Seoni or akola. So, apparently, I'm studying business or economics and I need tutoring for a math subject.. maybe economics. Damn.. Could I have been trying out for C.A.?

So anyways, I am out in the town looking for a tutor. Not going around asking people on the street, "will you tutor me?" haha. I seem to have someone's address in my head. And I navigate small 'gallis' (narrow roads) to reach a house. Made it seem like I had been here before. Hmm when was the last time someone got lost in a dream? Everyone always seems to get where they're going.

I ask the lady in the house about the tutor. She says no or denies. But suddenly the guy I've been looking for appears from behind, slowly coming into the brighter part of the room where I can see his face. He looks very familiar. He kinda looked like my 9th standard math tuition teacher in Akola, Khan sir.

He agreed to teach me. We had regular sessions, and I seemed to be keeping up. Which is just to say that I'm not a complete retard.

My dream was interrupted by the alarm going off. I have the debate in about 15 minutes so I run to the college constantly thinking about the dream so I don't forget it.



Geolocate this post

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I don't want to 'live to Die another day'

The other day, with Natansh, I had a really amazing one and a half hour of playing squash. And this is what I thought up then. Just didn't get around to posting it earlier.

I had won 4 of the 6 games that we played. I was on fire that day! Although the fact that Natansh's a fairly new player, does contribute to my victories. Anyways, the exercise was good and I was very tired. We walked back, and I thought to myself, I would happily die playing squash. And it stuck. Eventually, like I always do, I end up overthinking such things in my daydreaming mode. And thus openeth the Pandora's box.

The key here, is I would readily die, if I do so, 'happily'. I would happily die drawing. I would happily die eating. I would happily die cycling. I would happily die out in the cold. See, the concept of dying seems really appealing to me right now. Just for debate's sake, lets think if my grandfather's passing away had anything to do with it. I mean, I definitely wasn't super sad about him passing away or anything. So passing away isn't a big deal. I'm definitely no suicidal. Right after this, and before the picture here, I decided I couldn't die unhappy and sad.
by yashrg

But there's nothing I'm looking forward to the next day. Therefore if there Was no tomorrow for me, I wouldn't mind it at all. That's what I have always been like.. living in the moment. Thinking of immediate gains before long term benefits. Rather 'acting' with immediate as opposed to long term benefits in mind. And my next act would now be, to go to sleep. Couldn't care less for tomorrow.

More importantly, I don't want to live to see another day, another moment of misery. I don't know why or how, but I will often suddenly get really depressed. In class on a particular monday, I thought about my age for merely a second and I felt this deep remorse for my life thus far. And I am more afraid to see me in that state than to see myself dead. My life was happy, I didn't regret my decisions, and I believed something good is just around the corner. I just don't see that anymore.

BTW, This is not the first time I've discussed dying. Follow the tag 'death'...

The Test

So many things I can't see. So many things I can't feel. So many things I refuse to acknowledge. Pretending the cold doesn't really affect me. Acting like I'm warm enough. Not realizing that there's a tear rolling down my cheek.

Huh? What is this cold feeling? Are my eyes wet? Hmm I guess it's really windy today. And I'm already in front of the college building? How long have I been walking? When did I leave my home behind?

Now the doors in front invite me to the warmth inside. Even though I'd much rather be back home, I know I must give this test. With heavier feet I tread to my destination which I do not want anymore.

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Ice Skating Part 1

On December 5th, while I was chatting with Abhinav, he said, "your tweets always do give an impression of you having a lot more fun there" And I started thinking about it. Its just because there are a lot more people following me on twitter, and because its a more active place, that I refrain from posting my dark sad little feelings. This blog however, is more like my secluded, lonely world. It's quiet in here, can you hear the echo?

But well, yesterday, I decided this could change. So here is an entry about the awesome fun I had in Toronto on Saturday.

Natansh had asked me to go to Toronto with him as he wanted to do some shopping. Earlier I wasn't so gung-ho about it. I was worried about the cold weather in Toronto. But I talked to Donnie about maybe catching a movie in Toronto and I decided that I'll go anyways. So I showered, and just as I was putting on my clothes, I got a call from Donnie saying that he was already on the bus and that I had missed it. I hurried and ran out the apartment without drying or combing my hair. I realized that the same bus passes by from behind my apartment after it leaves sheridan college. So I called up Natansh and told him to be there ASAP. Fortunately, this time, he made it.

We met up with Donnie on the bus and went to Toronto together. On the Go train, Natansh was constantly dozing off to sleep. I told Donnie we could quietly move from those seats to the seats on the top floor. And when Natansh wakes up, he'll be surprised to find us gone. As soon as I was walking away, Donnie accidentally woke him up.. or maybe Natansh just woke up by himself. But the whole prank was ruined. It still made for a good laugh. In Toronto, Donnie left for his friend's place to pick up his letter. We decided to walk through the underground PATH. I believe this was my 4th time going through there, and still I was as lost as could be! To make matters worse, a part of it was closed for renovation/repairs of an escalator. In the end, we ended up walking to the Eaton center in the cold.

I took some photos along the way using Natansh's phone. I transferred them to my phone, and tweeted them when I got a wifi connection at the Apple store. The mall was really crowded. Which is not entirely unexpected or surprising thanks to it being a weekend and christmas just 2 weeks away. All that I had seen in hollywood movies about the Christmas shopping season, was proved right. People had gone crazy buying stuff. How could the economy be in a slump with all this money exchanging hands?!

Shopping with Natansh was fun. specially since I could totally egg him on to buy stuff, and he would do it. He wasn't worried about money at all. At Aeropostale, there was this white t-shirt that I would have liked to buy for myself. But Natansh liked it too, and he picked it for himself so I can't buy that t-shirt for myself too. Because then if we both end up wearing the same t-shirt to college on the same day.. we'll be the butt of all kinds of jokes. And with his purchase, he got a teddy bear free. I should have snapped a picture of that too.. but I was looking out for Donnie. He came to Eaton center to meet up with us.

We went to the Apple store, I wanted to check if they had the in-ear headphones in stock. But they weren't available in store yet so I was a little disappointed. Natansh has been thinking of buying an Apple notebook and he was wondering which model he should go for. So I showed him the difference between the MacBook and MacBook Pro models. Donnie wanted to go to Futureshop too, so we headed out that way.

On the street, there was a performer who was dressed as a cowboy and had face paint applied to make him look like a dummy. He stood absolutely still in -17 degree temperature, only moving suddenly at random intervals. There was a Huge crowd gathered there. Firstly, he had me fooled.. I was wondering why are there so many people watching a cowboy mannequin. But as I looked on, he suddenly moved and that's when it hit me. I took a picture of him with Natansh's phone camera.

..wow.. look at the length of this post. I don't think anyone will even read this.. if someone does, and wants to read the rest of my really fun weekend in Toronto, ask me. Till then..

Me playing with vicky?

I have a test tomorrow in philosophy class. I haven't even reviewed any of my notes yet. But I am already too tired and sleepy to bother.I've put on some music on my laptop and just want to update my blog.

This morning, I dreamt that I was back in Akola.. I think. Because I don't really remember any surroundings or environment, objects I interacted with. Only thing that stood out and that I remember is that Vicky and Arjun my nephews were with me. I was playing with them. I don't know what this is supposed to signify or indicate. I didn't even have time to ponder over it as I had to get ready to go to the college. Manish needed his newsprint pad. I got showered, and had a glass of chocolate milk and a banana. Put a muffin in a box and took it to college.

Printmaking class was really interesting and also equally tiring today. I was on my feet for about 4 hours! But I got some really good prints I am really happy with. I think I will put them up soon. Also, the process this class was really interesting since we dealt with color. I wish I had my camera to take pictures of all the activity going on around. It was really a sight to see.

It's harsh's birthday on 4th december, so I wished him at about 8:30 IST. Aso talked to Suraj for a bit. He told me some really funny incident that happened with Harsh. I don't know if I'm at a liberty to disclose that so I guess I will just end this post for now. I will get some shut eye. In the next post, I might add more about what happened today.

Pranav quits smoking

In my blog post, Cycle Dream, I wondered why I had stopped dreaming about friends. It was just a musing, not necessarily a wish for more. But it did remind me of the dream I had after Sachin's birthday party. We got back to Sachin's house slightly less drunk than we were at the party. It was already past 3 am on 19th October I believe. And I slept on the couch if I remember correctly. And I know some of you are going to be curious about this, so lets just get it out of the way first.. no, dreams don't feel any different when you are drunk. LOL

So, first one, was with me and sujata, at a kind of outdoor residential location, which now, I am thinking could have been her farmhouse in the future. LOL. There was some kind of shooting going on in there.. not guns, killing, shooting. but film, cameras, movie, shooting. I was outside, and I could see the crew and everyone through a large opening that could have been a garage door. Anyways, don't want to get into too much detail here, as I have very vague memory of a already very vague dream. Just the way it made me feel, that I was outdoors, in the greenery, with someone was a pleasant thing to remember.

Photo by yashrg
(Yes, the house is above the store.)
The second one was a little more grey. It isn't even about friends, but about my nanaji and the family that lives in Seoni. I dreamt that their house, pictured here, had been remodeled and renovated to something much bigger and more lavish and rich! But the sad part was, Nanaji and Naniji were moved from their room on the 1st floor to a higher floor. Made me really sad. Because in the old age, people shouldn't be made to do a lot of physical work. And they should be closer to the outside world. I wish I could have some say in it. Put my foot down for my grandparents... Anyways. Lets go to the last dream. The one that's the most brief and specific...


I was walking down the street. And I meet Pranav. And by the looks of it, we're meetin after a really long time. Sure we're both excited. But still, not the same spark. But then Pranav tells me some good news. He says "I've finally quit smoking!" I couldn't be happier for him! I really think it's an achievement. And I think we both move on. Or maybe I woke up at the point.


Later that day, I briefly talked to Pranav. This is the chat transcript from that day.. I guess I could have just left it out and had you guess what happened.. it would have been a nice surprise..

pranav: hey

me: hey

pranav: ka haal chaal babua

me: wtf? staying with biharis a lot lately?

pranav: abe teri nahi be ab to teri yaad main jitni ho sake nayi language sikh raha hu, kya pata agli baar yash se baat ho to kis bhasha main bole

me: LOL. you high?

pranav: oye kya bolraha hai

me: why are you not making any sense?

wait.. you never made any sense to me

so this is not ner

*new

pranav: he bhagwan kya hua, itne din mujhse baat nahi ki to main kya bol raha hu tujhe samajh nahi aa raha kya

dhat teri ki

aree tu kaha hai bhai

acha suju se baat kar raha hai kya

me: yes

pranav: wt

me: stop making me switch windows

pranav: ok

Rant

Saturday, I had my friend Bilal send me a photo that I clicked in the college. This the painting I blogged about here, and is now hung in the hallway of Sheridan college. When I go to painting class next week, I will make it a point to ask why he decided to put up my painting when there were clearly a lot of other paintings, much superior in the quality of the rendering. Anyways, the photo, I then attached to an email and sent it to the person who inspired it, Pranav.

On Sunday, at 1:56 pm, Pranav sends a reply. Hmm.. that was really prompt. Pardon the caps, BUT JUST WHEN I DON'T EXPECT HIM TO READ AND RESPOND, HE DOES SO, IN RECORD TIME! I didn't even bother reading through it. Ah.. who am I kidding.. I did glance over it once. And like everything else he says, I don't bother to try to make sense of it. All I want is for him to hate me. And I am not going to bother responding to him. My life is awesome without him. Such that now I am looking for ways to never go back to India. Even if I did, I'd never meet him.

There. My rant is over. This was typed at 12:16 am on technically, 3rd of december. I am not going to publish it right away.. I'm going to 'put a pin in it' and let it hang. (You'll get that reference if you have seen Bolt)

Hmm.. coming back to this post, I should first tell you that I did ask the painting teacher about the painting. And he said he thought that painting fit the criteria of the assignment really well. And he had given the people who were putting up the display a couple different paintings and mine is the one that finally got put up. The other day, I was in the kitchen looking outside in the balcony, at my old suitcase that I painted and thought to myself.. hmm.. a rubik's cube is somehow a recurring theme in my artwork.

Also, more words for Pranav. I have now read his stupid email 3 times and have interpreted it in my own way and have a response I'd like to personally drop at him some day. It goes something like this.."Pranav, wake up and realize that I am not what your life is. I am a lost soul, a damaged good, a worthless piece of shit. Your real life is something great. How many times have I told you yo're right? well, You were right... about me. Think back to that conversation we had. And then well... stop saying things like you just said in that email."

Anoher weekend post

Just one blog post ago, I had blogged about my weekend. And its already time for my second weekend post. Just goes to remind me how infrequently I blog these days. But with the addition of a new follower, Archana, I hope I get more motivation to blog regularly.

Well, this weekend, I planned to go watch the movie, Bolt. It stars John Travolta, Mylie Cyrus, Susie Esman and Mark Walton. If you haven't already seen the trailer, (Like certain friends from India who haven't even heard about the movie before..) go check them out. My favorite characters from the movie, are Bolt, (obviously) and Rhino. The part where Bolt is a little pup is one of my favorite parts of the movie.

But wait, I think we're getting ahead of ourselves. How I actually got around to watch the movie is also a story in itself. Donnie and I had talked about the idea of going to watch the movie on Saturday. But when I called him up on Saturday, by the time we made up our mind and the plan was laid out, it was already too late. you see, we also wanted to have sushi but if we had food first, then movie, we'd not get a bus back. Okaville Transit stops running early on the weekends. So we decided to do it sunday afternoon.

I was feeling pretty tired that day, so I fell asleep after talking to Donnie. I woke up at about 11 pm. I sent a text message to Natansh telling him that we're going to go watch the movie. He said he'll come. I spent next few hours tidying things around the house, killing time with my ipod touch. And at 2:30 am, went back to bed. Sunday, I woke up early enough. Internet was still not working. So I decided to shower, and make myself something to eat. Nicole's mom was in the house, cleaning up the kitchen. I kept my cutting an apple act as mess-less as I could. Even then, the bitch had to come yell at me 'clean up your apple after you're done, yash' And as usual, I just ignored her. I say all these things about her, but its actually kinda nice having her as a roommate for certain reasons.

I called up Sumit and then sujata as I was having my banana, apple in strawberry yoghurt. Good thing I had something to eat at home because we ended up missing our bus and had to wait for nother hour for the next bus. And I would have gotten really hungry by the time we got to the sushi restaurant. Sushi was delicious as always. We got to try out some new dishes. Like Salmon rose. It looked so beautiful. Orange salmon wrapped around the filling in the shape of a rose bud. I wish I could have snapped a picture. And this time, I made sure we tipped so that they don't spit in our food the next time we go.

We got to the theater just in time to comfortably buy our theater-snacks and find ourselves good seats. While the theater showed promos of movies I'd already seen trailers for on the apple.com/trailers site, I played with my ipod touch. There's this really cool game called tangram pro which involves placing/arranging triangular shapes to form a particular pattern shown on your screen. I'm sure you've played that kind of puzzles when you were little. Indeed I put it away as soon as the movie started. Just like a good citizen must. :P

After the movie, we walked back to the bus stop, in freezing rain. We could hear little ice droplets hitting the ground, the cars in the parking lot, etc. and making a really unusual and loud noise. It felt like -9 outside and to make matters worse, I wasn't wearing my gloves. And since we had gotten wet, the Strong wind made it much, much worse. Waiting for the bus was an ordeal in itself. But I was super glad to be back home again!

The cycle dream.

This morning I woke up with the most amazing feeling in a while! Thanks to the second dream I had tonight. But I'll be going chronologically, and will tell you guys the first dream I had.

I was in a clothing store looking at jackets. Not any ordinary store, this one looked like a pretty high end expensive clothing store. Now I had bought my American Eagle jacket a few weeks ago on a Monday. (I don't remember the date) but in the dream, I didn't have that one on me. And I looked at one jacket which looked like the synthetic material ones that a lot of sports brands like Nike and Adidas have. I didn't like it. So the salesman showed me denim jackets, which I really liked. This was kind of like the Ralph Lauren denim jacket Aniruddh Bhaiya had brought from canada A few years ago. But that jacket was too big for me. And even now, it probably is.. haha. But I still loved that jacket. Arjun Bhaiya used to wear it a lot.

Well, I don't remember if I ended up buying that jacket in the dream. Lets just move on to the second more exciting dream of the night. It seemed like I was in some exotic location, vacationing with certain people, who seemed to be some kind of celebrities, or actors even. In the dream, they were my acquaintances, maybe even friends.. but it was not someone from real life. (Makes me wonder where have all my friends gone? Why don't I dream about them anymore? ) We could have just been tourists, but I feel there is also a possibility it was all in a movie. Hah! Like I would be an actor! /sarcasm.

Everyone except me, had a bicycle we would use to commute. So I walk into a cycle store that is very close by. I didn't look around or ask people.. I just knew the cycle shop. And as I walk into the store, I know the person who works there. It's like we've recently met. I tell him I need a cycle, and he just lets me take one. I head out with my cycle, but my friends have already gone without me. So I jump on the cycle to try and catch up with them. But I can't seem to be able to ride the bike really well. Like I've forgotten how to ride a bibycle. I wobble and almost run into things, still picking up more speed. Now the surroundings have started looking like a dirt village road in India...as opposed to the developed country urban intersection where the dream started... This dirt road looks like seoni or Akola and I am riding on the left side... when I finally hit a little mud hill and crash and fall.

That's when I woke up, and I really wanted to go ride a bike! I figured I'd ge around to it, but I didn't. I did other things that did relate to the first dream, but the post is already too long. And I still want to tak about what the cycle incident alludes to, in real life.

For the last couple of days, I've had a google chat archive open in a firefox window. evey time I exit the browser, it saves the open pages and reloads them next time. One of the pages is the chat I had with Pranav, about the bike that got stolen from sheridan college last year. And I was responsible for loosing it because I hadn't locked it. And funny thing is, instead of really talking about anything, I go on and on describing bicycles...hihi..Cool expensive bikes I've seen... their features... heh.. I talk about how brake pads loose efectiveness on steel rims during rainy season.. well... that's just how I am I guess..

boring weekend

People when they meet you after the weekend, they generally ask how it went, what did you do, yada yada... They always want to hear something exciting, maybe you went to a crazy party, saw a new movie, or whatever.. My weekend however, was rather dull. Except for the one little thing that happened Sunday morning-afternoon ish.

I was talking to my mom, which almost always gets me really irritated and in a short tempered mood. I was also simultaneously talking to sujata. Ah, I wish abhinav was online right now.. I could have told him this incident much more comfortably. And also gotten some kind of response... which is almost never the case with blog posts. Anyways, so I was frustrated and had lost all will to do anything. Just the previous night, I was working till way past 3 am. I thought I could get up and do the same today. But 'mom' happened.

She was going through my flickr library and asking me all kinds of questions.. about the places I was, people I was with, etc. Mom also asked me about the stupid locket I was supposed to keep wearing at all times.. I had to put it on in front of her... but then I realized the camera had stopped streaming video for some reason... LOL. Suju was telling me about her friend Ashwin. Then divya navigated to the photo of Sachin's birthday party. And mom asked me about Vodka..which by the way, Divya seemed more worried about than mom. God Div! stop mothering me! And as I told this to Suju, she asks me,

sujata bhagwat: are u closer to your mom or dad?
yash_unique: don't know
sujata bhagwat: or both or none?
yash_unique: none?
sujata bhagwat: as in not both
yash_unique: yep
sujata bhagwat: ok
yash_unique: why?
sujata bhagwat: who do u open up to?
yash_unique: don't make me say it...
sujata bhagwat: ?!
sujata bhagwat: ok chhod
yash_unique: phew! I didn't think I'd get off the hook so soon
sujata bhagwat: are we playing DA soon?
yash_unique: doesn't look like it
sujata bhagwat: great then i shud sleep
sujata bhagwat: i dont want a designer face 2moro morning
yash_unique: lol
sujata bhagwat: seriously man
yash_unique: are yaar ab papa bhi aa gaye pooch taach karne ke liye
sujata bhagwat: they are obviously concerned
yash_unique: lets drop that topic!

Then, as she didn't respond for a long time... I had to say something.. even though I didn't want to.. because this is one of the really depressing things I could talk about.. I went on.. "ok, wait, I open up to abhinav. and I used to talk to Pranav.. Parent's are asking about my friends...Why aren't you saying anything...?" Finally I figured she'd slept and I said, "nice talking to you. good night." and I got one last message.. "I might be wrong, but right now u need a tight hug and a tight slap, both to bring u to your senses!"

hmm... I decided to call her up. Finally got through on my third try. I started slowly.. trying to lead up to the conversation where we had left off.. I wish I was recording that conversation.. there were some really trong things said. And I was in tears, laughing out loud so Sujata wouldn't realize. The tears were just indicative of the sad realization that it was true I did need a hug and maybe a slap. I had changed, and I didn't like how things are one bit. Don't like them at all, but have to live with it.

But gradually conversation moved to something more pleasant and I actually started feeling better. And I casually asked how's pranav doing. And Sujata tries to read into it.. and asked if I really wanted to know. Great! I tried so hard to make it sound like I cared, and now she puts me in the spot. A long pause later, she proceeded... And our conversation proceeded. Which unfortunately was cut short because of a network glitch. I didn't call her back as it was already pretty late. But I hope she's not upset about it.

Friday classes

In today's (21st november) Painting class, we critiqued the 20 paintings project. This is like the 3rd critique we've done this semester. The students were asked to lay down their paintings on the floor and present them to the students. A set of questionnaire was written on the blackboard.

• Which is your first one?
• Point out your most recent one.
• How long did each take you?
• Which one did you find most difficult?
• Which one were you most interested in?

This was going to make talking about the paintings a little easier. I thought it was a valid starting point.

We went through a bunch of people, among whom were some who had completed their paintings just the night before. That's when David Joron realized he should have told us to hand in 5 every week instead of leaving all for the last day. LOL. Even though Mark hadn't finished all 20, there were some I really liked. These lemon paintings for instance.. I asked mark if it was ok for me to use it here, and he said yes. So these photos are property of Mark Finnigan. (Just to save my ass)

Just before we were about to talk about my paintings, it was break time. Sigh.. anyway. Just then, David Joron comes up to me and says, "I'm honoured to be quoted on your blog." This took me by surprise, although it shouldn't have, because such stuff has happened in the past. But not regarding any teacher as far as I remember. So, he said he was googling his name because he wanted to see if people are talking about his show, and he stumbled across my blog. God! I had totally forgotten about his show! My previous teacher Sybil was also in that show. Oh well, I was too swamped with stuff to do this week.

Ahem.. so, when we talked about my paintings, I think I talked a great deal and was taking up much more time than anyone else. But I was happy to get all the feedback I was getting. Specially when its about work I think I didn't do well with. Like my chair painting. I said it was a disappointment, but the teacher said it was well done. I like to delve deeper into why I was so disappointed with it now, when I know there was a point when I liked that painting... I had done that painting a couple of weeks ago. And I remember how the chair looked in front of me. I was really struggling with trying to get the right colors for the reflection because again, the room wasn't very well lit. So I guess when I finished it, I felt a sense of achievement and felt happy with it. But later, when I had done some more advanced stuff and improved, I didn't think that painting was any good..weird?

Well, after painting, we went to photography where we watched a documentary called 'manufactured landscapes' It's a documentary about a canadian photographer who takes photos of mines and such man made landscapes. I didn't find it too interesting for the first 4-5 minutes. But then the idea gripped me. That's when I decided to do the photoraphy portfolio on pictures from India. Not terribly poor india, not terribly rich and glamorous side of india, regilar middle class stuff I've done, places I've been etc. I took out a bunch of photos from my hometown Akola, Seoni, Pune and Mumbai. I asked people to go through them and help me shortlist 15 photos max. I guess I got a decent response and I will be able to pick out photos much easier.

Baby sock

I don't think any of you are aware of this, probably because I've never talked about it before. But our classrooms, with the kinds of kids that inhabit them are the perfect kind of place for really weird, awkward and funny conversations. One of today's topics happened to be pregnency and babies. I don't know how they got there, but they were talking about The chick who had an operation and became a man, but still got pregnant and was on Oprah.. LOL.

Loren talked about women having a higher resistance to pain, in respect of giving birth. And some other kid made a joke, "I feel bad for the woman who has to bear my child, I have such a huge head!" I laughed at it out loud. I shouldn't have to worry, because I don't want to have kids, right? And thought about yesterday..

Wait, before I tell you what happened on the bus yesterday, I should tell you what happens in How I met your mother Season 4 episode 7 "Not A Father's Day". It's called that because Barney after a recent incident, starts a new holiday for guys who don't want to be dads. But the side story is that Marshall and Lilly want to have a baby but lilly starts having second thoughts. So she invites Ted and Robin over to help make up her mind. Ted is strongly pro baby and Robin hates kids. But after all their argument, Lilly sees a little sock of the neighbour's kid. And goes I WANT a baby. Ridiculous as it may sound, later in that episode, Ted busts Robin with the same sock. And all Robin says is, "Look at it... its so cute!" So a little baby sock can even make people who hate kids like the idea of having a baby.

I promise there's a point and a very good relation to the story. As I was going to the superstore, on the bus, there was a man with his baby in the pram. Since it's really cold outside these days, the baby was tucked in a little baby sleeping bag type thing. And he was looking at me for a while as I walked into the bus. A while later, he got restless and started kicking his legs inside his bag. He pulled out his sock and the dad took it from the baby and put it in his jacket pocket. ahem... how many of you figured out where this story is going?

So, yeah, I for a brief moment thought about me being in that position. As if I'm actually going to have a kid, and I'll be in canada at that age, on a bus, in Oakville... hmmph. How pointless... Isn't it?

Blog update- Wooooo!

I woke up this morning and I felt something. I wasn't hurting anymore. My throat was feeling fine. The cold's as good as gone. I could enjoy my day off! But I was determined to have things done. Certain things that I've been putting off for far too long. I felt I couldn't do those things on my own, I needed someone to help me, make me do it. I had been trying to get Abhinav to help me. I mentioned "I need your help" about 4 different times to him, but he didn't respond "with what?" or "Just name it bro."

If I may go off on a tangent here, it reminds me of the story our painting teacher David Joron told us last Friday's painting class.

Last night, I went back to my studio to touch up a painting for my upcoming show that was almost done. The painting was basically finished. All I had to do was a quick coat of transparency. I called my wife, said I'll be home in an hour. Fourteen hours later, as I finished painting on it, it was already next morning. I didn't even realize it had been that long. And I didn't even get to sleep as I had to be places, do things.. so I didn't get my sleep and was a zombie for two whole days. Why am I telling you this story? To tell you that nobody feels sorry for you. No one!

Yeah, Back to my story now. Well, last night, after thinking a lot, I popped the same question to Sujata. And in the brief moment when her internet got disconnected, I came to my senses. I realized, she can't do anything to help me, I'm going to have to pick up the pieces myself. I should pull my shit together. But when she asked, I didn't want to disappoint her, so I sent her those messages she had missed. I thought to myself, lets give it a chance and see if she really can do something.

Today, I went and bought groceries. I finally have fresh food in the house. I made myself fried rice for dinner. And ate a lot more than I thought I could have.. I guess I was just super hungry! Maybe next time I'll cook even more. I am SO gonna need a bigger skillet for that LOL. The point is to make a meal I can store and eat again later. I am supposed to be having like 4 meals a day. And today I had just 2. Then again, I am just so lazy that I won't even walk out and get myself another helping of food if its not within arm's reach. Yeah, first thing I had this morning was Doritos (jalapeno and cheddar if you must know) because it was sitting on my table.

Hah! Anyways, I have other news to announce. I bought my own domain names for a year. yashrg.co.in and yashrg.com The first one redirects to my blog and the second one to my mobileme web presence for now. I might end up using the latter for my website that we are making in webdesign class. Let me know your views or opinions on the URLs.

Well, Time for me to sign off now. I'm so glad I got this off my chest.

Sports Injuries

This Friday, (Umm.. that would be 7th of november. This post has been sitting in he drafts for quite some time!) I was waiting in the learning commons for Sachin and Andrew to go play squash with. But both of them were busy with their class presentation project. And I ran into Donnie, the Indonesian. I would insert a photo here, but its just so hard to get a good photo of him. Anyways, He said he's interested in playing squash. I didn't mind, it would be fun to see how well he could play. And for once it would be nice to play against a weaker opponent.

We went to the squash court and started playing. Donnie was used to playing lawn tennis, so he'd wait for the ball to bounce off the ground first, and would anticipate it to bounce higher. As expected, he'd miss the ball almost all the time. There are some reflexes that one develops after having played a game for long. And expecting the ball to bounce a particular way, sqing or spin a particular way is one of them. That's why, I was kinda glad I hadn't played tennis a lot. I wonder if Suraj would be able to get a hang of squash very easily either.

I think the first injury was on the very first day, Donnie tripped and fell on his knee as he was running to hit the ball. The next day, There was a big red bruise on his knee... Oooh!

Still, Donnie and I kept meeting up for squash more often. Then I think this was thursday the 13th that we were playing squash, and I happened to hit Donnie really haard with the ball. I believe I was the one who served first, and Donnie returned and stopped paying attention to where the ball or I was. And he ended up standing right in front of me. I didn't realize that either, untill I had hit the ball really hard and it smacked against Donnie's Lower back. Damn!

He wasn't angry. It was all part of the game. And there have been so many other incidents like this over time. Once he was running towards the ball, and I didn't have enough time to get out of the way, and he ended up bumping into me so hard that I fell on the ground. This other time, I was running to hit the ball that was very close to the wall, and after returning the ball, hit the wall really hard. I wasn't in a position where I could absorb the impact with my hands, so my right shoulder took most of the force.

Just the other day, I was browsing flickr and stumbled across a squash injury photo. And found out there's a whole group of photos of squash injuries. There's also a broken racquet in there. I hit my racket really hard against the wall and the floor multiple times too. This is something I've learned over time, "You can't be afraid of the wall" Because in squash, many times, the ball is really close to the wall, and if you're scared to take a swing at it, you'll always loose.

Niagra Falls Visit

Sachin had signed me up for it last Friday itself. I hadn't even heard about it and might not have found out if it wasn't for him.

Last night I bought chips and bananas from rabbas to take with me on the bus. But this morning in the rush I forgot to put it in my bag. I didn't however, forget my tripod, extra battery and my new lens. You know what that means! I'm planning to take tons of photos. The weather is overcast, a little windy but not too cold. I walked to the SCAET building in my 'bluenotes' hoodie. I was the first one there.

I met Manish inside scaet building and we started talking about cameras and photography. I remember he had told me he has a D40 too. The bus arrived on time. As i was about to stand up and walk out, the camera strap got caught on the chair and my camera fell! It's like everything went into slow motion. I slowly bent down towards my camera, picked up and checked if the lens was ok. I should get a filter for it. And a hood. Sachin,Rajat and Bhupi were late. I had to do something to stall the bus! So I decided to take some pictures of the bus, instead of just asking Andrew to wait.

Here, I learned another lesson about the 50mm lens on my camera. That trying to take pictures of big objects will involve me having to walk really far away from the subject. I thought I was far enough from the bus but when I looked through the viewfinder, I could still only see half of it. Crap! Just then, the three musketeers showed up and we were ready to go.

I sat alone on the seat, Sachin and Franzi to the left and Rajat in the seat before them. To his right were bhupi and Manish on the seat in front of me. I realized If I wanted to take any photos of people in the bus, I'd have to go wide. So I put on the kit lens on again. I was going to do the lens switch about 3 or 4 times more throughout the day.

As we arrived at our destination, I could sense that it was getting cooler. And actually so, it was much cooler outside here as compared to oakville. Good thing I brought my sweater and cap. As we started walking towards the falls, I got my equipment ready to shoot. Tripod and everything. Shot my first pano from a bridge that was straight ahead on the falls. We could also see the American falls from there. But a better pano was from the higher vantage point.

There, I met a businessman from Germany. I clicked his picture for him and we got talking. He said he came on a business trip to Toronto and you can't come to Toronto and not go to niagra falls. I told him I'm a student here, originally from India. He asked me around Mumbai, I told him yes, a few hours away. He started talking about ACC cement in Mumbai. His company deals with them he said.

And here this blog post comes to an abrupt end because my iPod ran out of battery before I could save the next couple paragraphs I had written. And now I'm getting impatient to get it out there. Besides, there's no motivation to finish it. I mean who cares anyways!

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My Miserable Existance

Let's face it: It's not sudden, this has been a long time coming. I would periodically have these periods of down and lot of times I would even think of blogging it but I wasn't close to a computer. But tonight I can't wait anymore. Leaving two unpublished blog posts behind, I'm just going ahead with this one.

I've been sitting in my messy room for last 3 hours or so. It's 10 pm. Not going to go have dinner. Don't even feel like going to get some water for my parched throat and dry lips. Talked to parents and aunt and uncle over skype for a few minutes. Thank god for skype 'connection lost' errors.

I am lying on my bed, iPod in my hand, laptop barely within arm's reach and I feel.... I feel like I'm drunk without even consuming any alcohol. Somehow I feel it's a really comfortable feeling. I wish I had some booze so that I could heighten this relaxed feeling. Of not knowing what's going on, being completely numb.

Because I know as long as I'm conscious, I will only keep thinking about it over and over again. This one word I don't want to use on this blog.

So I'm just lying here, listening to my playlist..
A moment ago it seemed, it was yesterday you were here with me and everything seems to be OK ..
This wasn't what I wanted to be, a man in misery..
Mita do unhe.. Bhula do unhe..
And she will be loved..
Is it bright where you are, have the people changed..
Goodbye means nothing at all, makes me come back and catch her every time she falls..
For now we stand alone
The world is lost and blown
And I am master of a nothing place
Hate me today Hate me tomorrow..

Well.. It just keeps going.

Geolocate this post

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New feature at blogger.com

I was told that embedded comments feature has now been made available to everyone. The embedded comment form is more convenient for your readers because they can use it to post a comment immediately, without clicking over to a different page. It also looks better, since it matches your blog’s style and colors. But, I am having a little problem implementing it. So I changed my template, and removed a lot of customization.

I apologize if it still isn't working, I guess I'll have to remove EVERYTHING to bring things back to normal again.

Halloween at Sheridan

I brought in the painting I did the previous night but since a lot of other students hadn't finished their paintings, The teacher decided we were going to do the critique next week! Damn! In class we just watched a few videos on youtube. Of people painting objects and portraits, etc.. mainly with oils. I wish I could remember the names of the artists now.. We also saw a lot of work on artists' websites it was very inspirational for the 20 paintings project. And finally, we talked about our 'setups'.

I'm sorry, let me elaborate on that part. Students are divided into three groups and we get to decide what we want to paint for the next three weeks. Each group will discuss and finalize an arrangement to be made in the painting studio. Everything from how the stage is arranged, the props, the overall look of the background and even the models and their costumes is as per our will. That, in a word is the 'setup' that we're going to paint. Our group is doing a kitchen scene with two chefs. Mainly because I suggested it. It will be a nice diversion from what an other group wants to do.. A very colorful Gypsy theme.

There were a lot of people who came to college all dressed up for halloween. I took lots of pictures of people. I think my favourite was the dude who came dressed as facebook. haha yeah, you have to see it to believe it. A guy was dressed up as iPod. And I met two 'jokers' in college. Joker from the batman series!

Photography class was really interesting too. I haven't gotten around to uploading all the product shots we took in the studio, but this is one of them. Photo by yashrg

Just getting to see the kind of lights they use and learning how its all set up when apple is trying to make their macs look oh so sexy or BMW is making those irresistible car wallpapers. Although we were not working at the same scale as BMW. And just for fun, we clicked photos of the people dressed up in a halloween costume. We didn't really delve into portrait photography, I'm sure there's more to it. And now I hope we do get to learn something about portrait photography next week. Here's one of Sean's photos, after a little post processing in Lightroom.
Photo by yashrg

I invited Sean to the party. So instead of going back to Hamilton after class, he waited with me in learning commons. Sachin dropped by and we went to play squash. He also signed me up for the trip to Niagra Falls. I played three sets with Sachin and three sets with Andrew. It was fun. Playing with Andrew, I really learned a lot of new things. Can't wait to go again!

Before Hallowen there was..

30st October 2008: Today, I managed to finish one of my paintings for the painting class. It was the relationship painting based around the portrait painting I did as my last project. I did mention that briefly in my blog post here. That was a painting of Pranav standing in a towel, with socks and shoes on. Having a hard time imagining that? Go here. We were at Suju's farmhouse in alibag and all his clothes got wet at the beach. And they didn't dry till the time we were supposed to leave for pune again. So he had to ride in the car without a shirt or pants. We stopped at the nearest store and bought him a pair right there. It was hilarious.

Now, for the second part of the project, I had to take that person I had painted, and do a mind map of words that signify it. And using those words, I had to create a painting that would have some meaning to it.. How or what I feel when I think of him, should influence what the painting's like. Sounds like a really cool project huh? I think so too. I had originally thought this painting could be completely abstract. There's no objectiveness to what a color or shape means to someone. And even when talking about it to maggie, I said, this painting is going to be a bunch of angry black and red paint splatters or maybe depressing colors.

Mind map for painting
Originally uploaded by yashrg

But here, take a look at my word map. I did this in a couple of minutes, and looking at it, Ideas started flowing. I got so pumped up for this painting, I squeezed the paints out, turned on my laptop to look at reference images and got to work. I decided against doing something abstract and thought of meaningful imagery. After the big Landmark Logo and rubik's cube was done, I paused and realized I don't have anything else to put there. I can't remember how long my first stretch was, but I took several breaks in between and was working till the night. Slowly building up and putting in a photo frame with the remains of a torn picture, a phone with his number on it, a dart board.. But really, the juice had run out.

I was hoping to go to the Halloween pub night at the college. Sachin had expressed interest at first. So I called Rajat up to know what the latest plan was. And as I had imagined, it was off. Oh well, there's always the party Nicole's throwing at the apartment. And I also had to finish the outdoor painting by looking at the reference image from that day. But I was too tired at the end of the first painting to work on that. I would just have to hand in my incomplete outdoor painting.

Diwali in Canada -Diwali what?

Happy Diwali. Its Tuesday in this part of the world. And by now, the celebrations are over in almost all parts of the world. But for me, there were no celebrations. I have to be home and finish painting. Rajat has a test tomorrow so he isn't up for a party. And my digital painting class ends at 10 pm as it is.

Today I talked to most of my family in India. I also tried calling up Sam and Rahul but couldn't get through. Stupid reliance India calling card! I called up Abhinav and he was pretty surprised to get a phone call. Well, what can I say, I aim to not disappoint. haha. After all that was done, at around noon, I got ready to go to the college. I was going to play some squash today.

I don't know how or why, but today, I had a very nice grip on the racquet. I could control the ball better and hit it pretty much the way I wanted to. I started by doing some solo practice. Hoping some other player would come along so I can play a match. I listened to a podcast called 'squash cast' and followed along with their suggested regime. First, practicing servicing from both the fore(front?)hand and backhand. I tried to get the ball exactly in the service box on the other side 10 times continuously. After that, I stood close to the front wall, and hit the ball on the wall and returned the volley a little stronger, so that I am now moving away from the wall. Then slowly hitting it softer to come closer to the wall. Helps to get good control over the ball.

A little while later, another guy came in and asked me how long I was going to be. You see, the other squash court had some mats placed on the floor so couldn't be used for squash. So I suggested to him that we rotate playing between him, his friend and me, but I guess they decided not to. I practiced for some more time, just playing against myself. Then it was time to head off to the caf. I needed some food now haha.

At the cafeteria, I ran into Rajat again. Franzi was also with him. We had lunch together. Even after having hoped I wouldn't eat any meat, I ended up eating chicken stir fry with noodles. I can't even keep feeling sorry for that. I hope you understand. I couldn't finish my food so I saved it up for later. Rajat told me about the fight they had with atif over the heating in the house. I am so glad I am warm enough to sleep in my underwear in my room. LOL. I told rajat I'd catch up with him later and headed off to the international center.

They had little tealights (small candles) lit up on the front desk so obviously they knew it was Diwali. But a little email to wish the students a happy diwali wouldn't hurt. huh. I picked up my letter for the work permit application and was about to leave. But how could I leave without eating some sweets? I had a slice of white chocolate and almond cake. Which, even after eating half the slice, I thought was vanilla. WTF is wrong with me? That lady must think I'm so dumb!

Anyways, I went to the learning commons, spent some time on the computer and then went to the library, picked up the october issue of the Animation Magazine. And drew IGOR. If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out their website. After a while, I lost patience and decided to head to my digital painting classroom. On my way there, I stopped at the 'sizzler' at the connexion where Abhishek works. But he wasn't there today. Damn! there goes my chance of a free burger or drink. LOL.

I was in the classroom about an hour early, so I downloaded the latest episode of Heroes and watched it. Digital painting class today was not at all interesting for me because we were working with the pen tool. I already know how to use the pen tool and have done some pretty cool stuff in vectors. Still, I stuck around and followed through. It was a pretty long and convoluted process in photoshop for doing what could have been done very simply in Illustrator. Meh.

I came back home, made some maggi noodles for myself. Nicole, mandy and bradley were awake and we all got talking. It was fun. Nicole said I could invite my friends to the halloween party she's having in our appartment. Oh, hell yeah I will. It's going to be really fun. Sachin is going to bring the house down! Anyways, I did 3 no wait.. two only...paintings before I got distracted and eventually went to bed.

First Lifecast

Let's see how this works.

I can't find the send or post button. Oh I see, I hadn't enabled posting of blog entries. Thats dumb because it should have been on all along. By default.

Geolocate this post

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Grandfather's Mansion

Its been so long since my last blog post that I myself have forgotten what I last talked about. So I'm just going to start with last night's dream.

I dreamt that I was standing in a room that had a lot of its original furnishings removed. I could tell by looking at the size and cleanliness of the room that it was an old style mansion of a rich person. I was talking to an elder lady who could have been my aunt. I was curious about something I saw...On the floor where a bed used to be, there was a trap door.

My grandfather's house, or 'haveli' as I like to call it, the house I was born into, had something similar. There was the staircase outside, that was used by everyone to get upstairs. And then there was the staircase that led from inside of the ground floor to the bedroom upstairs where my parents and I slept. It wasn't a hidden or trap door, it was a pretty well built flight of stairs. But it didn't have any source of light except the door that opened into my room. So as a kid, it was kinda adventurous or even scary to go through. Still, I used to love that route to sneak in and out of parents' sight.

So I believe that's where I was in my dream. Sure the dream doesn't render everything exactly as you remember it, it embellishes a few things. And my Grandfather's house was demolished a few years ago. So in the dream, I must have been there right before that house was about to be demolished. Talking about why the trap doors were made and why you don't see them in new houses... I would love to have trap doors like that or secret passages in my home. They provide a safe/secret exit in case of danger. Kinda like the Batman penthouse in 'The dark Knight'.

I never saw that old house being demolished. I was in pune when I heard from family that the old house is being brought down. Leaves me thinking about why, in my dream, I wanted to go there. I think the significance of this dream is that I am still looking for a way out. I can't let other people know, or I am afraid to admit it, but I want to sneak out. And in a way it's true. I have been wanting to somehow screw up so bad that my parents have no choice but to bring me back.

Addition:
In other relevant news, my grandfather passed away 26th october in his sleep. It was just 5 am IST when I got the news. I loved my grandfather. Much more than my grandma. I had so much fun with him when I was young. He brought me a lot of joy.

I had heard this somewhere, the Egyptians believe when one dies and goes to heaven, the gods ask the person two questions before they let him into heaven. "Did you find joy in your life? and Have you brought joy to others." And I would just like to tell my Grandpa that the answer to the second question is yes!

Finished the painting assignment.

I finally moved to my new place. And while I won't tell you one huge downer about my room, I would just like to go on record saying that I hate these stupid wooden walls! (any guesses on what the pet peeve is?)

Today, right after I showered and got ready to go to college, I felt really exhilarated. I felt I was now confident enough to call up Pranav. But that would have to wait. I was headed off to meet katie. Worse part was, my cellphone was low on battery. I think I figured out what's wrong with it. My phone constantly thinks I have plugged in some attachment to its pop port. And it keeps blinking 'Enhancement not supported'. The light and sound that the alert generates drains the battery much faster.

Anyways, I met up with katie, went and had a slice of pizza for lunch. Then, we played foosball! I'd never played foosball before. It was my first time. And I won the first game! At only 75c per game, we decided to give it another go. This time, Katie won. So the score will have to be settled next time. After that, we hung out in the learning commons for a little while before she had to run for class again. I took some time to rest because my arms were in no condition to paint after he heavy lifting I did moving my suitcases upstairs to my room.

For painting, I decided to just take a friend's photo, view it on my laptop and paint it. I went to the pit, hooked up my laptop and got to work. Montu bhaiya came online for a bit, I talked to him. He doesn't seem annoying anymore. I guess when you are lonely, any company will do.. ;) But even I feel he's much more composed now a days. Gladly, he kept it brief enough. I also took a little break between painting to go for life drawing. The girl next to me was really excellent at drawing. Probably a 3rd or 4th year student. I tried to copy what she was doing. But I failed miserably. How miserably? its upto you to decide.

After the homework piece, I had to work on the painting from last week, before I went home. I wasn't really in a mood to paint last week and was very disappointed with what I came up with. But today, after 'fixing it up' a little, I wasn't feeling too bad about it. Now I could get my much needed sleep and get to class in time tomorrow. I was up till 3 am that night and had missed the morning class. On the way back, I tried calling pranav but he wasn't answering. I was a little disappointed. And to think of it, I wasn't feeling like I'm up for the task anymore. Its hard to explain. I remember the last time I wanted to talk to him, I was on the verge of breaking down. But I couldn't get a hold of him. And I've been holding back ever since.

I made maggi noodles for dinner. Back in my room, I talked to mom and dad. They'll be sending me some money soon. yay! $ca-Ching!$

Sunday Tragedies Part two

Next stop was wal-mart. I didn't really need to buy anything from there. But Sachin and Rajat wanted to get some clothes. There were some winter jackets right in front of the clothes section. I might need to buy a new one this year, but I', just gonna put it off for as long as I can. Rajat piked one up or about 40 dollars and started looking for a pair of trousers. Eventually, I lost track of abhishek and Sachin. After we were all checked out, it was time to head on home. We were gonna go to the Indian grocery store, but cancelled.

After putting away the groceries, we started bringing down my stuff to move to my new apartment. Deciding what to keep and what to take today, was a tough task. I wasn't going to be able to live there as of now, but I would like to move as much of my bigger stuff as possible. I ended up only leaving my bedsheet and blanket and my expensive electronic equipment here. Sachin had a lot of school work to do still helped me move. We loaded up all the stuff in the van and set off.

At 'the Villas' Me and Sachin took the stuff upstairs while Atif waited in the van. The life was so packed with my stuff and Sachin and Nicole it was a sight to remember. And instead of going up, the life first went down! we apologized to the people who were waiting and went upstairs. We quickly unloaded the lift and started running the suitcases to the appartment. The suitcase that I had painted had by now, fully given up. The zipper broke so that it wouldn't close at all from one side. I love all the complements I get from people who say they love the suitcase, but I must throw it away now. So, I was running that suitcase to the apartment, and I stumbled and almost fell.

While running back home, we picked up cans of energy drink because we were going to have a blast tonight. Actually, Sachin wanted to do some research on different energy drinks in the market for his assignment. (Did I mention he's studying marketting?) Back home, we found out that the internet had stopped working. Abhishek had assignments to finish and submit. Rajat ws trying to connect as well but nothing worked. I suggested to try the other open networks that are in range. But Atif would have to get our internet fixed in time. Turns out we had exceeded our monthly bandwidth limit.

For dinner, at first, nobody was feeling like making anything. I said I'd bake my garlic bread and chicken wings. Abhishek said he'd have bagels or something and it all sounded ok. Lazy bums! But I was really feeling like making bhurji. So I told them, I'd do everything, just get me the ingredients! I first put in my garlic bread and chicken fingers in the oven. Started chopping up the tomatoes, onions and bell peppers. in 10 minutes, it was time to take the garlic bread out. I removed the baking tray and couldn't find room on the kitchen counter. So I put it on the table. And suddenly, I realized, there was a plastic table cloth on the table which was getting burned. I quickly lifted it off, but it left a scorched hole in the table cloth!

That was tragedy number... umm.. I lost count. Sachin and I looked at each other and assured there were many more to come. LOL. I, no, WE finished cooking the bhurji, with everyone adding their little contribution to the recipe. (Except Abhishek who was busy studying.. or something) We had a nice hearty dinner together. Then, it was time for the energy drinks and the 'comprehensive' review. We picked a can each. Mine was called rockstar. (pictures coming real soon guys!) And we all went outside the house so that our noise doesn't disturb other people. (well, actually because Rajat wanted a smoke)

It was pretty chilly outside. I started getting really really cold. So we came back in the kitchen after a few minutes and Sachin continued jotting down our opinions. Abhishek was kicking around the football. Another tragedy waiting to happen. He did acidentally kick it on the table or kitchen counter a couple times. But thankfully, nothing broke. Lastly, we all sat down to watch the movie 'wanted.' Sachin decided to make popcorn. He put the packet in the busted microwave in the basement that doesn't rotate the food. We told him to keep it in there until the popping sound stopped. And a few minutes later, we smelt something burning. The popcorn in the center had overcooked and were completely charred! How can anyone burn popcorn?!! LOL.

Ah.. That's about it for this sunday. As the clock struck 12.am it was monday. I hate mondays!

The Sunday Tragedies Part one.

Yesterday was one of the most eventful days I've had in a while! First thing I had scheduled for today was to meet the landlord of my new apartment at 12 pm. I went downstairs and woke Sachin up to ask him to come with me. Sachin told me he was awake till 3 am last night! It was going to be a long walk to the bank and back so I just wanted some company, and he readily agreed. We got ready in a few minutes and were out of the house by 10:45 am. We were talking about all kinds of things just like Thursday night. And I was completely oblivious to the disastrous day I had lurking ahead of me.

At the bank, I first used my international traveller's debit card to withdraw money. Then after counting everything, and putting aside enough for the deposit of the new place, I was about to deposit the rest in my checking account. I had inserted the card in the ATM and while I was still counting the money, the machine started beeping and displayed a message, "do you want to continue with the transaction?" (a) Yes or (b) No, eject the card. I pressed yes, and the machine tells me it has retained the card for security reasons. Fuck! I tried calling up customer support but nobody answered for a long time. Eventually, I gave up.

Sachin and I were both confused and bewildered as to how it happened. But I wasn't really worried. Probably because since I didn't have any money to loose even if someone, somehow did get hold of my card and could find out my pin. Yeah, long shot. I'm just going to call up the bank later and tell them to cancel/block my old card and give me a new one. Right now, though, I had my mind on the one other thing- The crazy landlord Teresa. I also met Nicole for the first time, and as I had heard, she's the bossy intimidating type. The second tragedy, which I overlooked at first, was the fact that Marta hadn't moved out yet. All her stuff was still in the room and I wouldn't be able to completely move in today. I signed the lease and took my copy, carelessly put it in my back pocket, half hanging out and walked back home.

On the way back, after we had crossed the sheridan parking lot, I suddenly stopped as I realized that the lease paper wasn't in my pocket anymore. I started backtracking my steps. I noticed something on the ground a little further and I asked Sachin to go check it out while I ran ahead to scout for it. Luckily, I found the paper in the parking lot in a puddle of water. It was all wet, but had it not been for the water, it would have kept on blowing who knows how far away. Relieved to finally have it in my hands, I walked back to Sachin to tell him to stop looking. But he was already sitting on the side laughing at me. He went, "If you had actually lost it, I would be swearing my head off at you right now."

And just to be safe, he decided to carry the paper back home with him. LOL. Back home, Abhishek and Rajat were awake and we decided to make omlette for...uh, Lunch. Well, Sachin was the one who did most of the cooking. After a yummy lunch, I went upstairs to pack my bags up. The guys were going to go to the superstore and walmart for shopping and asked me to come along. I figured, I might as well. We went to the superstore and I picked up some stuff. At the checkout, my credit card got denied! Now how did this happen? Luckily I had some cash on me so I paid for it. But still bewildered about how this could happen, I walked out to the parking lot.

Continued here, in Sunday Tragedies Part two.

Monaghan's Bar

On thursday, I had just finished life drawing at around 8:15 pm. I went to Tim Hortons to see if Sachin was still there. I wasn't feeling like walking home alone and hoped if he was going to be done in a few minutes anyways, I'll just wait for him. I sat down on the side of Tim Hortons and started to sketch on the 'Sheridan Sun' (college newspaper) lying around. The quality of paper wasn't the best but it was fun doing quick rough sketches that noone will ever see. Eventually it even boosted my confidence.

About an hour later, Sachin was done, and he told me he was planning to go to Monaghan's bar. I don't remember whether he asked me or I just invited myself. But since I had nothing better to do, and like I said, I didn't want to walk home alone, I decided I'd go to the bar, hang out, and go back home later, with Sachin. We also called up Abhishek but he refused to come. Sachin kinda had second thoughts about going because he didn't have 'good' clothes. And his whole class was going to be there. But I kept telling him to not worry about it too much.

At last, we ended up at Monaghans and met up with his classmates. I was introduced to people and I sat down at one end of the table. Soon, Sachin and I went to go get ourselves something to drink. We returned with two bottles of Corona. The canadian guys told us we were supposed to put the piece of lemon inside the bottle and let the flavour mix with the beer. I was kinda hungry, I had hoped we'd eat maggi noodles at home.

Singing and dancing on the streets

Lets go back to thursday, 18th september. After the stupid elective class, I was supposed to meet katie at the connexion. I had my cellphone working by now, and I called her up when She didn't show up even after a really long time! She said she was almost there. But even after she got to the college, we couldn't go in because the idiot security guy at the gate wouldn't let her into the pub without an updated sticker on her ID card.

So we decided to hang outside the cafeteria. We weren't terribly hungry and the food at the caf wasn't very interesting either. So we just sat watching 'Rain of madness' on my ipod touch. Its a mocumentary on the making of the film Tropic Thunder. Its pretty hilarious. Then it was time for her class. So we walked towards the E wing. Met another one of her friends outside and talked for a bit. It was fun while it lasted. Now I needed to kill the time before life drawing.

At life drawing, I met Evee and Lauren who I know from Visual and creative arts 2nd year and are in the animation program now. Lauren told me she visits my blog which was kind of a surprise for me. I have a stalker! LOL. But she's really nice. I spent most of last year without talking to her much and I kinda regret that. I was a little put off by all her piercings and just made up my mind that I cannot stand her. That was stupid of me.

After a successful life drawing session, I was walking home very enthusiastically. I was listening to some song from Om Shanti Om and I lifted both my arms and pretended I was holding a partner and swayed like I was doing ballet dance like Shah Rukh Khan. Walking further, I started singing along with 'Jhankaar' imitating sudesh bhosale as best I could. Damn that hurts your throat! I didn't care about what other people were thinking I felt like a little kid. I figured if I could make walking back home a game like this, I wouldn't even realize I've been walking for over 25 minutes!

I was pretty tired that day so I didn't bother typing the blog. But today was monday. And I'm.. not doing so well. What could be the reason? The realization that the webdesign class is pure crap and that I'd put this right between typography and 2d design of 2nd year visual and creative arts. Or was it the feeling that I can't go on spending 4 more years of my life here like this. I want to be back home. But its not an option anymore. The other day I asked my parents if I can come to India for christmas break. And while dad immediately said "no, its too much money", they kept asking me how many days holidays do I have and why did I want to come there. I realized I shouldn't have brought that topic up at all! I hope they're not worrying that I haven't been able to adjust to being here. Worrying them was not my intention. I hope they just think I only want to spend some more fun time with Pranav,Abhinav and Sujata.

Pranav has been online all the time last couple of days. But I didn't bother talking. I don't have anything to say to him. I pretty much said all I had to, in the last email I sent him. Plus, he is so unreliable, I can't let myself get used to talking to him again only to find out he's never online a few days later. You know what I mean? I downloaded the new episode of how I met your Mother. Pranav and I used to watch it together. We watched the whole series together in India...