Never Regretted

Well, it's been a little more than six months now since I had my first heartbreak. I guess I survived half a year and I think I will need all the courage and the will power to survive many more months that will eventually turn into years and perhaps decades until I heal completely.

Thinking back about the days I spent being with her for a brief few moments, I will never forget them and will never regret proposing to her. It did hurt being rejected right away, but I guess I needed it. It was lust, infatuation, and not really love that I had for her as I later began to think about it. Well, I guess I knew it was coming but I was never expecting to be hit so hard. I was pinned on my back. It was like being hit by a powerful heavy weight boxer who just delivered his best ever right hook punch on my face and I couldn't get up.

Recently, I was pouring out my tale of woes to a friend of mine who was patient enough to lend me his ear. Guess, having several round of drinks worked, as I talked a lot and I still happened to remember them all. He asked me a few questions and I thought a bit over it to realise what he was arriving at.

Did I ever feel any positives vibes or any positive energy radiating when I was with her? Call this vibes as a force, like Luke felt it in Star Wars. - No!

Did I feel that she encouraged me to do better and be a better person? - Well, somewhat but not really.

Did she come looking for me and felt lost when I wasn't around? - No!

Did she seem happy being with me and I being with her? - No to former and Yes to latter.

Did she do anything very simple for me that made me feel special? Be it anything like sharing a meal or a beverage from the same cup even it was a small sip? - No, never! (And he knows I don't like anyone dipping their used cutlery or even hands into my plate or sipping together from a cup, unless I really really dig that person be it a girl or a guy!)

Did she ever share anything about herself, maybe her past or what she feels right now or what she wants to do later? - No, never!

Was she always smiling and felt happy seeing me after a long while? - No!

Did she ever ask you how you day went at work or shared her day at work without you asking her? No! Well, I used to but I think she hardly listened. 

There you have it! What's wrong with you? Read the signals or signs and they are pretty clear, you fatheaded, moron, twat, idiot! If any or some of the answers were a Yes from the person's side, then there was some spark, a positive one to keep the flame going strong. Here there were none! It was all cold vibes and that was bringing you down and you were not aware of it at all.

I realised that it was all true. There was absolutely no spark between us. I was being selfish and was only thinking about me and being with her. Wasn't bothered about what she thought about me or liked me or even cared about me. Guess, he was right about it after all.

A few pegs downed and then he took control, in charge of the entire thing and I being more drunk than him, found it hard to keep quiet but I had to listen for I realised there was some drunk wisdom from one drunkard to another more drunkard.

He said (from what I remember vaguely after being extremely high on several rounds of beers, whisky, vodka, Jagerbombs, Tequillas, a few imported Cuban cigars) - 

Fall in love with that girl and give all you have to her when you feel that strong positive vibes between the two of you. It is these vibes and energy that will keep you both going stronger together. As you are Star Wars freak, and a big Darth Vader fan, but consider these vibes or energy as the good one that Master Kenobi, Luke Skywalker and Yoda talk about. Not the dark side of the force but the good one. You getting it? Good! It may take a while but eventually it will turn out well. Before you pop that question to her, ask yourself these questions I've asked you. If you feel there are more Yeses as you use your hunch, that is when you ought to pop the question. She may have had a bad experience in her past relationships and is a bit hesitant to take that step forward. This is where you should take that control and assure her that you are always there for her. You may not be able to make her forget her past, but make sure you'll never make her visit that past again. Accept her and her past wholly, embrace it, and never remind her of it, even when you have your share of fights with her however bad it may be. Give her a future she wanted but make it a good one and give her something more she never expected. That's how it should be. Say, you have proposed to her now. If the reply is a quick No, then you have felt the force in a wrong way. Is she is silent when you proposed to her? She is trying to use some time to reply? Just remember she is trying to figure out how to reply. If she is already seeing someone and hasn't told you about it, maybe she is feeling a bit insecure with him and is not certain if it will be him at the end. If this is the case, do not to break that relationship she has with that person for she may lose trust in you or anyone in fact and will forever be insecure. Talk to her, assure you're there for her, remain in touch but don't be a creep and don't be lecherous too. That will psyche her out and all that positive vibes will turn negative and if there was any chance you ever had, you will lose out completely and you will be back to square one. And the main thing is, you don't be an option to her. You should be her priority just as she is yours. That's the way relationships work. 

At the end, even if it doesn't work out, remember you gave it all you had and you could.  You're a good, generous, well mannered, big hearted, a very decent chap who means no harm. You're an amazing guy and we all are lucky to have known you. You have those rare qualities and it takes time for any girl to see through these and realise it. You have that love in you and I'm sure it will never be empty even if it's for the wrong ones. Just be yourself and don't ever change for anyone. You're honest and open and don't hold back any secrets once you really like that person and that's good. But too much of it is too bad as well. Just be yourself, never hide who you are in any relationship and knowing you, I don't think you should have this problem. Just be yourself and let things be and go as they are. Be confident, be positive and that will take you in the right direction for girls like these qualities in any guy. Girls feel safe and confident with you for they know you'll treat them nice and like a queen or a princess and they like that. Treat them as your best friend and not as just your girlfriend. Never treat them as a trophy or a prize you've just won. They don't like that either. Love starts between friends especially when they are best friends who share everything, their secrets, their thoughts, their past, their hopes, and so on. Be their best friend, their confidant, someone who can be trusted upon, and never break that trust and confidence. Build that trust and that will gain you a lot of love and respect from her. You are a very humourous person and you love to make others laugh. Use that skill with her and watch her falling in love with you. I know you are at times shy with girls, but I'm confident that it will work out well if you try hard enough.

This is my two pence of thought for you. Think about it and decide on your next steps. It will take time to find that right girl but I know you'll end up with someone who will be proud to have you. Be calm and be patient. And lastly, never regret loving someone, even if it's the wrong one. You have a good heart and keep that spirit going always. 

PS: the above delivery is only what I understood and remembered and is not exactly what he said. There are a few things I may have added or deleted but it is a gist of what he told me. 

Phew! I sat and listened to him slurring at times but I never interrupted him. At the end of that discourse he fell asleep and I was awake wondering what to do next. It was well past 4 am and I was thinking whether to sleep or to pour myself another tissue restorer and drag a puff of those tempting cigars until I drop dead. 

Will remember what he said and until then will close my heart to all and never allow anyone to enter. It will take time to heal and I know I'll heal soon. It was a miracle from Baba that I'm now in the UK on a one year assignment and this is helping me forget her. Although there are occasions I remember her as I see couples here cozying up and cuddling but  those feelings are lesser now. She is slowly becoming a memory and I hope she fades out soon. 

Like he said, I never regretted loving her very strongly. Tomorrow even if I meet some one with whom I shall share those strong vibes, and if it doesn't work out again, I shall still never regret loving her to, telling her that I am in love with her. Will try and apply whatever I heard from him and see how it goes. I know it requires patience and time. This is all I have and I can do for now.

Until then I guess I will wait for those strong vibes or that force to feel me, to search for me. And I know it will be soon and a powerful one too. She may be her normal self, but it is her strong vibes that will attract me and she may or may not be aware of it. But I'm sure she will understand me eventually and using that strong force we will be happy together. Until then, I'll just......

Vinay 

29-Oct-2011

02:45 GMT (London)

INDIANISMS!

Was tagged to this very interesting article. Thought of putting this on my blog page for perhaps people to see.

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Do one thing. . . just take a piece of chalk... and a duster... and write... and
We are a unique species, aren't we? Not humans. Indians, I mean. No other race speaks or spells like we do. Take greetings for example. A friendly clerk asking me for my name is apt to start a conversation with, "What is your good name?" As if I hold that sort of information close to my heart and only divulge my evil pseudonym. Bizarre.
I call these Indianisms.

Which got me thinking about a compilation, a greatest hits of the 10 most hilarious Indianisms out there. And here they are. The most common ones, and my favorites among them.

1. 'Passing out'
When you complete your studies at an educational institution, you graduate from that institution.
You do not "pass out" from that institution.
To "pass out" refers to losing consciousness, like after you get too drunk, though I’m not sure how we managed to connect graduating and intoxication. Oh wait … of course, poor grades throughout the year could lead to a sudden elation on hearing you've passed all of your exams, which could lead to you actually "passing out" - but this is rare at best.

2. 'Kindly revert'
One common mistake we make is using the word revert to mean reply or respond. Revert means "to return to a former state."
I can't help thinking of a sarcastic answer every time this comes up.
"Please revert at the earliest."
"Sure, I’ll set my biological clock to regress evolutionarily to my original primitive hydrocarbon state at 1 p.m. today."

3. 'Years back'
If it happened in the past, it happened years ago, not "years back."
Given how common this phrase is, I’m guessing the first person who switched "ago" for "back" probably did it years back. See what I mean?
And speaking of "back," asking someone to use the backside entrance sounds so wrong like the autorickshaws in Bangalore asking if you want to go to the
railway station backside...when they mean the rear gate or entrance?
"So when did you buy this car?"
"Oh, years back."
"Cool, can you open the backside? I’d like to get a load in."

4. 'Doing the needful'
Try to avoid using the phrase "do the needful." It went out of style decades ago, about the time the British left. Using it today indicates you are a dinosaur, a dinosaur with bad grammar. You may use the phrase humorously, to poke fun at such archaic speech, or other dinosaurs.
“Will you do the needful?”
"Of course, and I’ll send you a telegram to let you know it's done too."

5. 'Discuss about'
"What shall we discuss about today?"
"Let’s discuss about politics. We need a fault-ridden topic to mirror our bad grammar."
You don't "discuss about" something; you just discuss things. The word "discuss" means to "talk about". There is no reason to insert the word "about" after "discuss." That would be like saying "talk about about." Which "brings about" me to my next peeve.

6. 'Order for'
"Hey, let’s order for a pizza."
Sure, and why not raid a library while we’re about it. When you order something, you "order" it, you do not "order for" it.
Who knows when or why we began placing random prepositions after verbs? Perhaps somewhere in our history someone lost a little faith in the "doing" word and added "for" to make sure their order would reach them. They must have been pretty hungry.

7. 'Do one thing'
When someone approaches you with a query, and your reply begins with the phrase "do one thing," you're doing it wrong. "Do one thing" is a phrase that does not make sense. It is an Indianism. It is only understood in India. It is not proper English. It is irritating.
There are better ways to begin a reply. And worst of all, any person who starts a sentence with "do one thing" invariably ends up giving you at least five things to do.
“My computer keeps getting hung.”
"Do one thing. Clear your history. Delete your cookies. Defrag your hard drive. Run a virus check. Restart your computer... ."

8. 'Out of station'
"Sorry I can't talk right now, I’m out of station."
"What a coincidence, Vijay, I’m in a station right now."
Another blast from the past, this one, and also, extremely outdated.
What's wrong with "out of town" or "not in Bombay" or my favorite - "I'm not here"?

9. The big sleep
"I’m going to bed now, sleep is coming."
"OK, say hi to it for me."
While a fan of anthropomorphism, I do have my limits. "Sleep is coming" is taking things a bit too far. Your life isn't a poem. You don't have to give body cycles their own personalities.

10. 'Prepone'
“Let’s prepone the meeting from 11 a.m. to 10 a.m.”
Because the opposite of postpone just has to be prepone, right?
"Prepone" is probably the most famous Indianism of all time; one that I’m proud of, and that I actually support as a new entry to all English dictionaries. Because it makes sense. Because it fills a gap. Because we need it. We’re Indians, damn it. Students of chaos theory.
We don't have the time to say silly things like "could you please bring the meeting forward."
Prepone it is.

There are many more pure grammatical "gems" in what we call Indian English. Perhaps in time I’ll list some more. And perhaps in the near future, we'll get better at English.
Till then, kindly adjust

Author Unknown

Love Is Blind

I always believed,
that love was blind.
But that theory was relieved,
since I was the one that was blind.

I contantly believed
that one day she would love me,
but I solely deceived
my heart's hope to be free.

Emotions faded away
below her mixed messages.
All that I had to say
was directly written on bleeding pages.

Love is something
this heart will never get.
My heart will lonely sing
poems filled with regret.

It is always the same story
but now I won't glimpse at the past.
Because my fate i can now foresee
forever i will be love's outcast.

Vinay
24-Jul-2011
Time : 1325 IST

An Introduction

Wierd!!!

Generally an introduction is written at the very begining. But, here its somewhere in the begining/middle/end. View it however you want it to.

Been thinking what to blog about these days for I rarely find anything interesting these days. Then an idea struck, why not write a little about myself. After all, I rarely get the time to talk about myself to others, for I find other stories are more interesting than mine.

Anyway here it goes, my personal bio

Given Name : Vinay Gokula
DOB: 16 May 1982
Place of Birth : Jamshedpur in Jharkhand. (Earlier it was a part of Bihar)

Interests : Now this can be fun.
Most of my interests are always short lived for reasons unknown.

Life's Harshest Lesson

Recently I learnt a few thing that i thought of sharing. These are something really painful and they have changed me forever. Rather than typing some shite story and lengthy passages, that runs into books, let me summerise in a few plain simple words.

1. When you are going through tough times, you then know who your real friends are. People will only inquire about it, but do they really care? The only ones who are concerned will try and help you out of it, not by just talking some shite stuff (all those useless philosophical stuff found all over the internet), but being with you all the time. Real friends will be with you and tolerate you even, if you say and do something bad, for they know that you really did not mean any of those stuff. I HAVE YET TO FIND ANY.

2. Never trust anyone in your life more than yourself. However close you feel they are to you, never do that. You never know, when they break that trust. When the trust is broken, everything else is on the loose. Things are never the same even if you attempt to repair it. Recently, this has happened to me. Trusted some who I thought were my dearest and closest. At the end, I lost someone whom I shall never forget in this life. Today, as I think abut it, I feel foolish for what I did.

3. Never ever express anything to anyone. When you do so, you never know the consequences. I once did it, and today, I realised, I should have shut my gob then. Things would have not got messed up so badly as it is today. However strong these expressions are, keep them yourself, even if it kills you. Its better that way than live with the aftermath that occurs.

4. Never ever do something playful like teasing, a prank etc to some people, however close the relations might be. You never know when it can tick them off. I once did it and its been a while since I heard anything from them.

5. Never expect anything in this bleeding life. The minute you set expectations and they do not happen the way its suppose to happen, it can mess up your life. How often has this happened to me? Sometimes I expect a lot of thing for a few people and situations. When these do not happen, they can be disastrous.

These are some of the things that I can remember off the top of my head. If there are more, will add them to the list.

These things have changes me and the way I think and live. People did comment that I've changed a lot, in the recent . But do they really know why I have changed or what caused me to change. They find you have changed because, you have stopped living the way they want you to live. Sometimes you ought to live for yourselves however hard it might be. Even if it means being lonely, so be it. At the end of the day, you need to live for yourselves and not for others. We were not born to be slaves and serve others.

Vinay
01-May-2011
Time : 2150 IST

Who Am I???

How oft am I asked this question?

"Where are you from? I don't think you are a South Indian. Are you a North Indian? Your Hindi is quite good!"

I'm then quite perplexed to answer. I then go on to explain who am I?

I guess there are a few of them who still do not know who am I. So here it goes for those who did not know me.

Well, I'm a Mangalorean Konkani with my ancestors hailing from Mangalore and nearby places (like Udupi, Kundapur, Cholpadi etc) commonly called as South Kanara. So I speak Konkani at home. (My mother tongue, Konkani, is atrocious at times. Only me mum can understand me at times, not always!) My family name is PAI. So ideally I should be named as Vinay Pai and not Vinay Gokula. I think even Vinay Gokula Pai sounds quite good. I was named Vinay Gokula by my father, Gokula B V. My mum wanted me to be named Vinay Pai, but dad had his way.

My paternal Grandfather (Dr. K Venkatesh Rao) came to Bangalore in late 1930s(?) to pursue his medicine in the reputed Bangalore Medical College (BMC). After graduating, he married my paternal granny (Krishna Bai, fondly called as Kittamma by many of them) and settled down in Bangalore. In early 1950s, my dad was born (third in line) here.

That's one side of my ancestors. Moving to my other side, yep my maternal side. My maternal Grandfather (C Vittal Kamath), moved to Jamshedpur in late 1940's (?) after graduating from Coimabtore where he pursued his Electrical engineering. He worked with TISCO, in Jamshedpur, all his life. After marriage, my maternal granny (Ganga) moved to Jamshedpur, from Udupi. My mother and my uncle, though born in Udupi (60 km from Mangalore), were educated in Jamshedpur. So, this place, is my mother's maika (hindi word for parents place).

After marriage, my parents settled down in Bangalore. I was born on May 16th, 1982, in Jamshedpur. This place is located in North Eastern part of India. So this makes me a North Indian by birth!!! After birth, I moved to Bangalore and was raised, educated and is working in Bangalore.

As I lived in Bangalore all my life (well, almost!), I know the local language, Kannada. Some say, then you must be a Kannadiga. Though, I do admit, my Kannada is also bad. So bad, that I rarely speak in front of my friends, in fear that they ridicule my Kannada speaking inabilities.

Every year, during my school days, all my summer holidays were spent in Jampot (or Jamshedpur), with my dearest Ajju and Mamama. Being in the North-Eastern belt, as Hindi is spoken widely, this is where I perhaps picked up Hindi (with a Bihari accent, perhaps). Hindi, was my second language, in both school (10 years) and college (2 years). Sometimes, I speak in Hindi with my mother.

My mother, as she was raised and educated in Jamshedpur, she speak mostly in Hindi with her brother. Her Konkani speaking was fluent only after her marriage as she had to speak to most of the relatives were Konkani speaking. So like her, my Konkani is atrocious, worse than hers!!!

When I speak to my mum or dad, I start off with Konkani and end the sentence in either English (with dad) or Hindi (with mom). It’s the same case with Kannada, though it ends in English. Its always been the case from childhood. My Kannada or Konkani, has a lot of either English or Hindi words mixed in it. So sometimes, when I speak to some of my friends, it’s a mix of languages. Thankfully, when I speak English, its quite ‘pure’.

That's with the Indian languages (Konkani, Hindi, Kannada and English!). Since childhood, I always wanted to learn German and finally found my way and I now I can speak some German, although its not very good as I have none to converse with! Need to focus once again and learn the language once and complete 3 levels of it. Wanted to try either French or Spanish, but I need to speak German well first rather than mumble something.

So at the end who am I? Some say I’m a Mangalorean for my ancestors were from hereabouts. Some other say, I’m a Bihari, for I was born in Jamshedpur (It was in Bihar then). Other say I’m a Bangalorean for I’ve lived here all my life. So sometimes, I’m puzzled. I do ask myself this question, often. How do I explain it in much simpler ways? Then I found the answer. It doesn’t matter whether I’m a Mangalorean or Bangalorean or a Kannadiga or a Bihari (or a Jharkhandi). I’m an Indian above all and is proud to be one. JAI HIND!!!

So now, WHO AM I? :)

Vinay
23-Apr-2011
Time : 1351 IST

A Cold Dark Corner

There's a cold dark corner in the back of my room,
it speaks to me and says I'm coming for you.

As I lie on my bed in the fetal position,
my eyes are closed hoping and wishing.

Maybe that one day my dreams will come true,
that I don't have to be here so down and blue.

The corner keeps talking about how I'm going to die,
all I can do is lie there and cry.

As the corner gets closer and takes me in,
my soul starts to burn as so does my skin.

My bones shall lie there turning to dust,
my bed surrounding nothing but rust.

Vinay
13-Mar-2011
Time : 00323 IST