Saving Little Kitten

Once I was casually walking around my home at my native and heard a soft cry; it was a kitten. I was aware that there were three kittens in the back yard and so I ignored the cry. But the cry was becoming louder and with increasing frequency – as if something is wrong or ‘help me out of this trouble’. I glanced around and discovered that a kitten got itself stuck in a broken piece of PVC pipe, with its head and front legs in one end while its hind legs in another. Clearly it got itself trapped inside the pipe and desperately wanted help. By a short distance from the trapped kitten was its mother, who was also meowing.

I wanted to help this kitten out of the trap, but didn’t know how. I being the engineer plus MBA was thinking abut the diameter of the pipe and assumed that if the kitten did not cry and exhaled, its stomach would shrink and then I can probably push it with a long stick. Or may be if it was left starving for some time, its stomach would shrink and then I could help it get out. But all the while I kept an eye on the mother cat, because it might attack me thinking I was troubling its little one.

I also thought of pouring some water mixed with detergent powder on to the kitten so that the pipe might get lubricated and the kitten could get away. All the while the kitten was crying aloud and little did I know that the mother was scared to come near the kitten as it was apparently worried of my presence. I have almost made a plan, but was scared to get near the kitten fearing its scratch. So I decided to wait until it is asleep, buying myself some time to design a method for its rescue.

My son came along and I warned him not to go near the kitten; so he was also beside me and so was my wife. We began discussing how to save the kitten. Unaware of this my grandmother (aged about 94) walked in and asked me what we were discussing. I explained the situation and warned her not to go near the kitten as its mother was close by. Grandma did not listen to me, walked towards the kitten, grabbed the pipe with kitten still in it and gave it a shake.

The next thing we see was the kitten running to its mother. Grandma walked away as if nothing happened.

It took us a while to realize what happened and to close our open jaws.

Just for laughs

Random comments from my 4 year old son

He was assigning characters to all of us from his story book– he was the puppy, his mom was the squirrel and then he turned to me and asked “Achan kozhiyaano?” [Loosely translated : He wanted to ask "And Dad, are you the hen?" but colloquially it meant "Dad, are you a womanizer?"]

Some characters in an animated movie talks about all things that go fast are made in Japan. He liked this thought and connected everything that moves fast were made in Japan. So he used to say ‘Acha, look at that bike, that’s a racing bike and that is made in Japan’, ‘Acha look at that red car, that is moving very fast, That is sure made in Japan”. So once we came across this man who was jogging wearing his sweat-pants. He took a look at this person  who ran past us and commented. “Acha, aa appoppane Japanil undakiyatha” [Dad, that person is made in Japan]

He was staring for long at the calendar hanging on the wall and suddenly exclaimed “Ho  pathu mani aayi, acha” [Oh, it’s ten o’clock, dad!]

PhD by KITA

A research student works in the principle of KITA. KITA is the acronym made famous by the celebrated author on motivation, Herzberg. It simply unfurls as Kick In The Ass.

Oh yeah, that is what we researchers do to get ourselves motivated. Kick in not anyone’s ass, but in ones own and not by anyone else, but by the person alone. That is only how a research can be done. Research can’t be done at gunpoint (data can be collected thus, though). It is to be self motivated and with some amount of eustress. The research supervisor often does not really pay attention to the student because he knows research can’t be done with force. There is a time for it, and it is for sure. Some may have to wait for it and others may have to build it.

There can be days, weeks and months with no progress at all. Nothing to do. And all of a sudden the vault opens and 24 hours seem like few minutes. That is when dejection, disappointment and disengagement makes way for plethora of activities in short notice. Hardly can anything be planned for a research, although veterans strongly recommend having a plan and research diary and stuff. There is virtually no research student who would not have atleast once wondered why has he taken up this task anyway? But the experience and learning is fabulous – not just the subject part, but with regard to the patience required, KITA, reading, writing, reviewing..

I am often asked  - so dong a PhD ah? How long is the course? I say ah well.. this is not a course but research to be done at ones own pace and interest, so it cant be compartmentalized into these many years. Takers are few for this explanation. So now I say 4 years. But what if this gets extended more than 4 years? I’ve an answer : I flunk in few papers and am yet to pass those, hence the delay, I’ld say. I can see those smirks in the faces. 

Time for a  KITA ..

Unflutter by

She was beautiful, or so she seemed in that split second when I could catch her glimpse.

But probably she thought she was ugly.

Well she was, although I would not call ugly, rather ‘not-so-beautiful’. This I realized after a moment, when she came close to me; very close.

It would have been bothering her that she was ugly, unlike her friends. Perhaps that’s why she wanted to end her life. She died; infront of me. In a way I am responsible for her murder. If it were not for me and my vehicle at that moment, at that spot, may be she wouldn’t have lost her life.

Was that intentional or accidental?

I killed her.

Or rather, she committed suicide.

I don’t know her name.

And I don’t want to name her, just for this obituary. Let that be a mystery. Just like her life.

Life in her cocoon must have been a bliss, and she might have seen hell in this world.

Rest in peace, dear butterfly.

Assorted quaestiō

What makes a person commit suicide?

Is it extreme self-love or self-hate?

I would like to believe it is the extreme self-love, because death is the ultimate bliss one could offer oneself.

Do suicides have a sadistic element attached to it? Or is it orgasmic? Or is it sadistically orgasmic?

How I wish I could speak to Nandanar or Rajalakshmi or Nanditha or Virginia Woolf or van Gogh or all of them.

What is easier – putting up a façade of pleasantness and feeling sad inwards or exhibiting a sad demeanor and feeling happy inside? May be equally difficult.

If people were all their true natural way, what would have happened? May be human race would have been extinct long back.

Is life a journey of procuring and securing materials to meet our metabolic and carnal demands?

What happens after one reaches the top most triangle of Maslow?

Does a person who has died by age of 30, suffer from a mid-life crisis at the age of 15?

Why is logic so much over rated?

Is magic, the opposite of logic?

Asking questions is a pleasure, although there are no answers.

Okay now, back to business.

Head Eastward

Assume you’re in a new place and need help with directions. Whom do you ask for? What do you look for in a person who could potentially help you with directions, distances, buses and street names? How do you choose a person who you think could help you, and not misguide you?

Because this happens to me all the time. Not the asking end, but the replying end. I wonder what do people find in me, which prompts them to stop by me and ask for help with directions. This is true even when I am in a strange city. I can sense it when people are about to approach me seeking guidance. I’ve answered questions like “Excuse me, how do I reach CDS, Ulloor from here”? or “Hey, which way to Mekhri circle?” or “Would this bus take me to Besant Nagar?”. On the other hand I am very reluctant to ask for directions if I am alone and if I am not in a hurry. I always have this feeling that “let me go this way, I can always take a U-turn and come back to my origin, incase I get lost”. I have discovered a lot of new pocket roads, especially when taking a walk rather than on a vehicle. Strange thing is I might find myself explaining this new route to a fellow direction-seeker, which I would have discovered only minutes before.

All said and done, I get immense satisfaction when I could help them, and I feel terrible when I say that I am helpless. But no, I have not misguided anyone.

On a lighter note: Once when traveling with my family in a village during night, we lost the way. There was a lone person, seemingly a farmer, beside whom I stopped to ask for direction. He answered hurriedly saying “Head eastward” and sped away. !

Out of body experience

What would it be like to get into the skin of another person and think and act like he is, for a short period of time. Yes people, I am talking about impersonating, harmless though.

I have once done it. It was something like I have to lie more to sustain the previous lies – like a Fibonacci series.

The plot : circa 2006. I was traveling from Trivandrum Central to Kuzhithurai West on a sleepy Saturday early morning passenger train. The compartment was almost free as always, and I wanted to read for sometime and may be catch up on my lost sleep too. I wish. I started to take out a magazine and a person occupied a seat opposite me. I ignored him, and opened the magazine to read. I obviously didn’t want to be distrurbed, but this fellow wanted to strike a conversation with me. Some small talks – like no rain this year, very hot, trains are full in evenings and free in the mornings  - I nodded in agreement and went back to reading after every nod, but the fellow was probably not a good body-language reader, and he came back with his blah blahs.

I understood that my trip was ruined and thought to play along. He wanted to know about me – my name, my job etc. I said my name was ‘Prakash’ and I am a security guard working with an agency at Technopark. He seemed to be more comfortable probably because he felt that I was one like him. He asked more questions about what money I make, if I am married, what other avenues of income I had etc. Now I had to link all the statements I said earlier and then connect it to my next reply. That was fun and a challenge as well. I pulled along and enjoyed this mental exercise.

He then narrated his story – that he was in some section of Indian Army and after voluntary retirement he was a security guard himself and how he earns very little etc. He spoke about how dangerous these jobs were; the rifles the robbers possess, compared to a guard with a lathi or a heavy double barreled shot gun, which is often no more than a show piece. He also explained how his biological clock went haywire, on account of his roster. More importantly he sounded out his mental agony when he has no one to talk to during his duty. He then asked me not to count ‘my’ security guard job as a means of living; he advised me to get a degree, amidst my ‘difficulties’ and try for a government job.

I felt a pang of regret, but I did not want to reveal my actual identity. I felt happy because he could talk to me and atleast for few minutes he could be his true self.

He could be anywhere – the one who guards the entrance, the one at the ATM door or the one at the parking lot.

Alas! I do not remember his face. May be if ever I meet and recognize him, I would tell him that, yes I earned a degree and that now I got a good job. I just want to see him smile when he hears that.

I wish.