License to kill?

I think it is way too easy to get hold of a driver’s license in India. I think the criteria should be more stringent. I guess it is the only way to keep a check on (as eradicating would be impossible) the madness on the roads. Here is a suggestion.

There should be a psychological test as part of the regular written (can crack them with both the eyes and the mind shut) and the drawing-patterns-on-the-ground tests. This test should be contrived in such a way that the following questions would be answered about a person’s character and ability after the results are processed.

a)Does the person have the ability to spot, identify and decipher a one-way signboard? Will he be able to understand that the vehicle coming head on in the opposite direction is not the latest model of a car with headlights at the back?

b)Are there chances that the man/woman is a prospective spree killer, a fan of Charles Starkweather knowingly or unknowingly? As in, whether he/she is likely to mow down people with his Tata Sumo at the same ease with which one cuts through soft idlis?

c)Will he dim his headlights hence not blinding drivers within one kilometer radius? Does he/she realize that lampposts emit light and not vision-impairing gases?

d)Will he come to terms with the concept that cabs have numbers on them not because they are on a run after a jailbreak and hence are not criminal by manufacture?

e)Will he/she be able to realize the fact that the guy on the road in camouflage trousers is a college kid who went shopping the day before and not an infiltrating enemy soldier, and hence refrain from running him over?

f)Does he have enough understanding of the Geography to understand that all roads in India are in fact in India? And on all roads, however American their names might sound, one has to keep to the left while driving?

g)…

Happy driving!

Alcohol - the ultimate solvent

Mrs. Geeta Ramachandran, my chemistry teacher, taught me that alcohol is one of the best existing solvents. For people like me who did not pay much attention in school, it is a liquid substance capable of dissolving other substances. Due to its acidic or basic (could be either like water) properties, it reacts with almost everything resulting in the dissolution of the item in contact. The element that comes in contact is most tangible, with the exception of gases. This, I thought, was the ultimate truth until I discovered the wonderful properties of ethanol - the most commonly used form of alcohol and not surprisingly, an industrial solvent.

Well, here is one thing they don’t teach in chemistry classes. Reactions you don’t find amidst racks of chemicals and test tubes in well-equipped laboratories. Apart from all things tangible and intangible, there is one more thing that dissolves in alcohol and disappears without a trace. It is called sorrow. And this is one dissolution that produces a pleasant reaction. Not because of the production of nitrous oxide a.k.a. laughing gas. Not simply because it eradicates sorrow. But because you know there is a way around. Even if it’s an eventual killer. Even if just for a while. There is a way around.

Confused?

To dreams I wake up screaming while to nightmares I smile,
lions graze in my backyard and lambs roar in the wild.
Beginnings await my arrival while destinations I leave behind,
honey burns in my veins while poison feels surprisingly kind.

Their songs my eyes see while my ears listen to them paint,
the murderer I embrace, but mercilessly scythe down the saint.
The moon lights my noon while the sun warms my night,
darkness opens my vision but I am blinded by the light.

For captivity I fight while from freedom I flee,
wounds give me pleasure but with pampering I bleed.
With pens my words vanish while erasers ink them to life,
I pray to lord for war while peace I put to knife.

I slice through the maze while I get lost on the streets,
am I just confused or am I just confused?

Advertising. WTF?

Unlike in the metros, advertising still works in mysterious ways for my folks and the likes back in Kerala. My dad hates it when I introduce myself as a copywriter to his friends. He prefers ‘advertising executive’. Like that sounds any better. But can’t blame him completely, can I? I remember telling one of my friends, a science graduate, about me being a copywriter. “That must involve a lot of reading. Considering the amount of law books you have to mug up.” said he, almost breaking into tears. A small ‘copyrighting’ versus ‘copywriting’ crisis.

The hilarious case of Smiju T K, a fellow art director, is even funnier. He was at an aunt’s place, an old lady, to bid farewell before boarding the bus to Bangalore. As the answer to a query about the nature of his job, poor Smiju avoided the term art director conveniently. He was well aware of the layers of explanation and an in-depth seminar on advertising he would have had to conduct to explain the term. Instead, he translated advertising into its Malayalam counterpart. The lady held his hand. Her eye wrestled back a tear drop. “Be careful while painting those hoardings. Those ladders can be real tricky you know.” To everyone else who wanted to know his profession since then, he was a carpenter. By the virtue of lesser risk involved I suppose.

Redundance!

Beep, beep! My friend sitting across the table at the bar picks up his phone. It’s an SMS. His eyes bulge and are on the verge of falling down from their sockets as his eyes take in line after line. Without a word, he passes the phone to me. It read, “Brother’s engagement over. Wedding on the 16th. Luv sis.” Before you WTF(use as a verb) the aforesaid, you have to realize that the brother mentioned in the text message, is his brother. Not a co-brother, but his own in every sense of the word. Born of the same mother, and arguably the same father. The sender of the message, 'sis', is his own sister. Under the same conditions as the brother. Have marriages become a thing of trivial importance? Or is it the relationships? I do not know.