Rediscovering me!

Wow, what a fabulous 30 years I have lived.  No regrets whatsoever.  There is something in me that started asking a lot of questions, not that I never asked to myself before.  In the last few years, I have been chasing a new target for life, a new reason, a new beginning.  It is always disputable as to what the heck have I done so far, if I have to begin something today.  I am going to keep it simple, no past, only today and futuristic visions from now on.

I have been a person, living the moment, all along and I will continue to be.  It was initial days in college (Vellore engineering college 2002 pass-out batch). We used to have students segregated in batches irrespective of their course they have opted.  I belonged to the "F batch"; there were totally seven batches named A to F, all valid for the first year only.  The batch concept was good, getting to know more friends than your course-mates; in fact most turned out to be long term.  Also, in the first year, it was all common subjects ranging from Physics, Maths, Chemistry, English, etc.,.

It was one of the English sessions.  Folks were called randomly to talk on the stage; the classroom was setup in such a way that the professor's desk was placed in an elevated platform (like a stage) primarily for visibility of the whole classroom.  I volunteered and started talking; topic being general stuff (anything).  I do not remember a whole lot of crap of what I had talked, but I do remember one thing.  I jumped into social consciousness and talked about how each individual should live only until 30 years and should prove worthy within that time frame; my vivid picture was to kill oneself beyond that time to let others live.  The thought still lingers in my mind; when I crossed my birthday, the plot thickened.  I have not realized myself the deepness in the thought I had glimpsed at that time, until recently.

The motive of that thought was to let everyone live.  The deep philosophy behind that was to give food, clothing and shelter to the next generation and move-on (die).  Why should one do that?  Because there is scarcity of all those basic items and humans were exploiting them already.  So what is the rediscovery? It merely cannot be attributed to life and death; it is about increasing efficiency for the duration of an individual's life.  This thought is the soul of "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand.  But objectivism is not all true, only the reason is powerful in it, is my thought.

So what next?  Frankly, the rediscovery is going to happen all my life.  To where I stand, I am equipping myself for better learning by learning basic stuff like driving, flying, diving so I can travel to learn what I want to and to do stuff.  Do what stuff?  I find my interests in rectifying social calamities such as water, food and electricity - so a need for "Energy".  Renewable or more efficient, either way, should get it done.  One of the things I have learnt hard is self-dependency and trying to work that logic into everything that I need to run my day to day life.  What is my day to day life?  All I need for survival is water, food (for body), shelter, clothing and food for thought (software development).  It is plain selfishness, one might say, but I am pretty confident that only when my needs are satisfied, can I stretch it to others.  By the way, by being a software architect, I feel when I search for my needs, I will find them in a way that sets an example for others as well, to find on their own.

For instance, when you have your own farm, you can have your own vegetables, rice and spices.  Grow cotton for clothes. You can dig up for water or take it from rain or ocean, purify and use it.  Set up a solar panel on top of your house for power.  Does any of this need any help from anyone once they are setup, I do not think so.  This was the most primitive way a human was living (self-sustained).  I do not need fashionable articles from Paris, rather I will make it myself when I need it.  I will trade for an item but only when it is in my reach, only when my basics are right. Just expand this thought to a village, we have a self-sustaining village. Expand this thought to a country, we have a "sustaining economy".  I think, it is the need of the hour in every place, for every person.  As Michael Jackson sung it, lets make this world a better place!

A punch on the face!

Friday nights are always party nights; the crowd, the crazy talks, the enthusiasm, the brightness, the grandeur and of course the fun.  They always arouse you.  All through February though, it was quiet - might be because of the void created by the just ended super bowl, or of the crazy Valentine's day celebrations, or probably I lost interest generally.  Los Angeles always carries party nights, just not Fridays or Saturdays; but any other day of the week too.  It was  a fine Thursday night, 16th February 2012, my roommate and I were bored after office and chose the night off at our regular bar - the Sharkys @ Hemosa beach.  It was also to celebrate my roommate's first anniversary; and to have a ball before he could take his wife on an anniversary vacation out of town (who was living in a different town and was supposed to come down the next day).  As usual, the crowd was fantastic and live.  I left my roomie dance and caught up with extreme sports on the grand TV in the bar.  It was all a fine night, no complaints on the fun.

As it so happens, this night turned out to be very special and an unforgettable one for me.  We were out of the bar during the closure time and were decently drunk.  Neither too low nor too high, just the state you want to be to have a mini beach drive, catch a movie and a good night sleep.  I caught up with a smoke and was surrounded by a decent college crowd.  After being all quiet all through this time, I started conversing with a bunch of fellows around me, just exchanging a 'hi'.  Just then a girl passed by us and gave a broad sigh on us.  I know it was not targeted towards me and I noticed the guy next to me go all silent.  I thought the girl had just ditched him and all  I could tell him was 'bad luck'.  Well the guy turned towards me and gave a nice long stare.  After a while, he uttered a 'wassup'!  The tone was easy to judge for me and I was ready to take this guy, well atleast I thought so.  And so we both started moving around the corner of the street; a little away from the crowd.

After a few minutes I was lying on the ground with a pawed eyebrow and a scraped neck, a bleeding knee and mouthful of blood.  Interesting to observe, all happened in a few minutes; but trying to recollect, all I remember is a punch on the face.  The punch though, as I vividly regain my thought, was a violent one.  A closed right fist from a lean-all-bone'y right armed young man came at a lightning speed to hit my left jaw.  The other thing I was able to recollect in that moment was that there were three to five young men involved rather than one single person.  Not sure, if each had planned a part of my body!

It was drama for the next ten minutes.  Cops around, paramedics flying, I have to admit that I had been stubborn on the pain and had rejected medical attention immediately.  So I chose to continue my beach drive, movie and good night sleep - just that none of those happened.  It was such an uncomfortable sleep stretching well into the noon next day.  My roommate had fortunately a good sleep and had taken off to office the morning and came back noon to home for lunch.  All he had to do was to check my face out to see if I was still bleeding.  Well I was not, but was swollen all over the face.  He touched my cheek and I realized I had a severe problem.  We rushed to the hospital.

It was a double fractured broken jaw!

One more step to death!

Travel has become convincingly interesting to life. Feb 17th and 18th were no different. This time the destinations were Lake Tahoe and Yosemite National Park. The plan was crafted neatly and perfectly time bound. Rent the car on Friday and all 6 of us synced up on Saturday early morning at 5:30am. Drove to Boreal mountain for skiing. Although it was second time that we ski, had a tough time practising the turns. End of day drove back to Sacramento through the Lake Tahoe route. The route is a beautiful and picture perfect one. Had a peaceful night at the Good nite Inn in Sacramento.

Lake Tahoe!

Sunday - to trek the whole day in Yosemite. It was about 2.8 miles of trek and about 5 hours round trip. There were two trails that we could take. Studying the maps and weather conditions, we planned to take the John Muir trail. But at the last moment, we chose to go via the Mist trail because my friend knew the trail already. Thus we reached the bottom of Vernal Falls. By this time one of the six decided to retreat. Here is where the Mist trail gets seperated from the John Muir trail. So we headed to the top of Vernal Falls via the Mist trail. Here we had our lunch and three of six decided to retreat. So we were left with only me and my roomie (who knew the trail before) to conquer the trek plan. Our plan is to get to the top of Nevada Falls because further trail to Half Dome requires more time and camping, also due to weather conditions Half Dome was closed.


Thus me and my roomie headed to conquer the Nevada Falls. Trail was quite clear initially until the top of Vernal Falls, but towards the Nevada Falls it becomes quite unclear and rocky. Although there were steps in the latter part of trail to Vernal Falls, they were steep and risky. Further more, I was only wearing leather shoes which were not even close to trek-shoes. The Mist trail although it becomes rockier from top of Vernal to Nevada Falls, the trail leads pretty close edged to a mountain, making it scarier (atleast my friend felt that way). Often I got lost in the trail because atleast in two places it was confusing and unclear. At one point we were retreating the trail to figure out the right way, as if we were attempting to solve the eight-queens problem using backtracking algorithm. The beauty of Mist trail is that it reveals the beauty of Vernal Falls and Nevada Falls through its way whereas the John Muir trail doesnt. Its such a beautiful sight to witness the valley down from the top of Vernal Falls. Both the trails reunite again about 0.2 miles from the top of Nevada Falls. To get to the top of Nevada Falls, we had to reach this unification point and then walk 0.2 miles in the John Muir trail. The top of Nevada Falls is a beautiful one. It should be around 7000 feet above sea-level.


After a photo session, we decided to take the John Muir trail to reach the Yosemite valley / car. Walking for almost half a mile we come across this snow covered path in John Muir trail. The barricade was only about a foot tall and about half-a-foot wide and a wrong step on that would definetely take you to hell. The path was completely in hard snow ice and it was drizzling at that time. Occasionally ice was falling from the top along the path. WorseWe came to a point where we couldnt use the path/trail anymore, instead we had to walk about 25 feet on the barricade. Initially I thought we could do that and my roomie listening to that did walk on that barricade for about 10 feet. After that he could find some low ice where he could stand in the trail. Now it was me to cross that yard, and I couldnt because my shoes became very slippery and I literally sat on that ice. Now we examined the trail more carefully and understood that we were risking a lot. So we decided to retreat via the Mist trail itself. This place was so dangerous that had either of us placed one step wrong, we would have reached the valley the fastest way but dead.

The ice-packed death bed!

The trauma of that incident is still there but my curiosity and adventurous attitude have increased further. After all, the death bed is yet another walk of life...