The Rebelle blog

I started reading The Outsider by Albert Camus last night after a not-so-great reading week. It dawned upon me as I started going further in the book that this was about a man, a young bloke who is seemingly unambitious about his life. I instantly wanted to shut the book and stack it away from my reach. While we all know that Camus's writing is depressing as hell, this book particularly came as a surprise to me. The young man who perhaps mirrors a life most of the people live, subconsciously, mostly to just fill their stomachs, work the grind of eat, sleep, earn money, raise families and then die, here this young man doesn't seem to have a purpose in living. He works at a small office, is unresponsive to work in the manner that when his boss asks him about shifting to and working in Paris to head operations of their office, he declines the opportunity. The woman who he is friends with asks him if he'll marry her and he replies saying if she wants marriage he'll marry...

I recently reread Norman Lowe's phenomenal book on History titled, Mastering Modern World History, as part of my preparations for upcoming exams. The first time I had read it was as a general reader who wished to know the events and timeline of progression of nations post-war and about independent colonies of the British Raj. This time when I read it as a student interpreting and correlating world events that led to wars, formation of UN, the Cold war era and subsequent disintegration of Soviet Union, it brought a methodical analysis to history as we should see and study it in current context. After reading through school textbooks about the French and Russian Revolutions and their fight for securing and protecting the apex human values of liberty and equality, it became even more important to start reading about the history of humanity that also went through two very disturbing and violent world wars that destroyed nations and people. This book was last updated in 1997, henc...

1996- This is the year I most vividly remember from my childhood. I was eight years old and had started acquiring a new taste for literature and visual mediums then. This was the year I remember having seen Thoda sa Aasmaan that starred Deepti Naval. She was a big name then. My parents were huge fans of her cinematic work and TV was generously allowed to be explored by kids like me by parents back then. The end credit shot of a wooden door with a white lattice was permanently etched in my eyes. Years later whenever I saw latticed windows and doors I always thought of Deepti Naval standing in solitude and frozen in time. I also clearly recall watching Swabhimaan and loved Svetlana. Don't know if it was the unusual sound of the name or I was just smitten by Kittu Gidwani! I did not read Russian Literature until I was ten, so, Svetlana charmed me for a long while. I remember watching YUG based on India's Freedom Struggle and its catchy title track ringed in my ears for a long...

I wish there were a way to deal with uncertainty. I know I have reiterated about it a thousand times here, but I haven't exactly figured out a way to deal with it effectively and steadily. All that uncertainty does to me is spirals me into an endless abyss of self-doubt and negativity about my capabilities. Why does this happen so often, is beyond my understanding?! These self-inflicted judgements aren't helping one bit to help me come out of this misery. Worse that happens is I get deviated and disturbed from my path of work. I must find an effective and long-term solution for this problem post in my life. No matter however much I am trying, it sometimes feels that my efforts are way too less and half-hearted. I still have the fear of failure but it doesn't stem from lacking confidence or less preparation; it's more about letting myself and the people who have supreme faith in me down. This has made me so anti-social as well. Of course, I can't go back in time an...

The house feels cold. Bereft of the familiar I sit on the chair, waiting... Wanting to feel the surge of creativity but, everything is a blank canvas. My head hurts even more than the heart aches at this loss of opportunities of things gone by grudgingly, some that make me repent endlessly. The moaning the anger that spits in my throat unable to find a voice. Wrong choices haunt so long, so far the wait turns the dead clock hands into a vintage archive waiting to be discovered by another dreamer and jughead.

My exams begin in about thirty days and this wait is terrifying. As the day approaches closer, my heart starts beating faster in anticipation of my performance. It should be better than the last. All this studying and reading and almost breaking my back over late night writing has to yield good results. My confidence wobbles on some days not because I am afraid but because I am terribly nervous of myself. Even as I am writing this, I feel butterflies in my stomach. A good friend once told me that a little nervousness is good. It ensures that we remain alert and not be too confident of everything. Not sure if it's a good thing to be both nervous and confident at the same time, I would rather be confident. This newness is scary. There are new feelings every time I begin something new and different, oblivious of what it shall lead to. I suppose it happens with everyone. We are all cut from the same cloth. I keep telling myself that every new challenge is to be accepted with a knight...

All writers are a sum of their experiences. Heard this in an independent movie I saw on a dreary rainy morning. It might be a little delusional to write about seeing the starry night before it started raining so hard that it was impossible not to curse the fat raindrops for blocking my glasses. I ate a giant scoop of cold ice-cream that cut harshly through my teeth and sent shivering down my entire body. I walked in the rain, aware of the water gushing through the streets and through my summer sandals. I don't know why I wear them usually in the rains. Something about splashing water around the ankles makes disliking the rains a little bit more acceptable. Last night, I had strange dreams about my friends who are readers. I met them in my dream while they were tying their shoelaces, ready to spring through glass doors with yellow walls. Amusing how I can recollect these little details but not the actual conversation from the dream. One of them was crying over something and I h...

Something that I started a few days ago, well, actually more than a month ago, it no longer makes me happy. My interest has not totally subsided but I can't find the longing for it in the same intensity when I first started. And who can I put the blame for this? Me, of course, no one else. I don't feel like my former self any more. I don't wish to dwell in too much misery either but the drive to get things done and put my energies into it is increasingly missing. I feel like I am losing a substantial part of my persona which controls me and eggs me to do things. Not just do things, but be alive and active. That go-getter attitude is missing. And it is me alone who realises this, because for others my positive spirits are visible and even an inspiration but my inner me knows what is wrong. It's absurd at times when this realisation sets in that perhaps I am troubling myself unnecessarily, that it's all in my mind except it is not. What is happiness after all? I...