musings from tokyo

The first thing that struck me about Tokyo is just how pretty everyone seems to be. From the carefully blown messy hairstyle to the umbrella that seems straight out of a Milanese designer catalog, the average Japanese certainly knows how to present a good first impression. It is, indeed, entirely possible that my observation is biased by the lens of the upscale neighbourhood where I live, but it still wouldn't explain how I've never come across any male on the subway without a suit on. Unless, of course, you count the goth teenager with two piercings and a snarl across his (her?) lips.

This is the thing. In almost every way possible, Japan is a country of remarkable extremes. Places of religion and sex clubs exist freely beside each other, for one. (Of course, some people would argue that they are the same thing. That is a topic for another day). And can any other country lose itself in baseball and sumo wrestling?

We went to Yokohama yesterday, to an amusement park - cum- aquarium. That is because the people I've come here with like amusement parks ( a lot ) and aquariums (a little lesser). One guy declared after riding the rollercoaster that he had just realized one of his greatest dreams. In all fairness, it was his first time on one. As it was, mine. The other "highlight" of the day was being thrown down a very, very, high phallus. (You can see it in the background of the picture) as part of a ride called the 'Blue Fall'. To cut a long story short, I'll say I'll never do such a thing again.



I have nothing against amusement parks, really. It's just that I'd much rather have gone to the Ramen museum or the cherry blossom gardens or even the Chinatown when in Yokohama. I really must find a way to do my own thing.

And they're going to Disneyland next week. God, no.

For relaxing times, make it Suntory time

Nothing quite like Tokyo. So cold, and yet, so so warm. And don't even get me started on the subway. Never have I seen beauty and efficiency married in such harmony.

behavioral economics

Amos Tversky, he of prospect theory fame, writes:

"Probably the most significant and pervasive characteristic of the human pleasure machine is that people are much more sensitive to negative than to positive stimuli ... Think about how well you feel today, and then try to imagine how much better you could feel ... There are a few things that would make you feel better, but the number of things that would make you feel worse is unbounded."

It amazes me how I have discovered so much more truth in sociology and economics than in the pure sciences. Physics was beautiful at times, and mathematics still is, but this is something bigger. This is my calling.

sucker punch

Everytime I try to become a different person, relaxed, happy and even sociable, something comes along to pull me away.

It's no use. I've decided to start hating people again.

forever pale, in
the shadow of the sun
the moon weeps.

combinatorial mathematics

You and your significant other want to juice up your fading sex lives. By a queer act of fate, a close friend of yours is facing similar trouble with her boyfriend. Hence, with a sense of adventure straight out of Nin, the two of you decide that both couples will spend tonight together. Some rules are defined. Each woman has to sleep with each man, for one. Also, only heterosexual trysts. As much as the men may enjoy it, no girl-on-girl. Of course, neither of you are particularly keen to watch the men get it on with each other anyway. And most importantly, you will play safe.

If all the stipulated rules are to be satisfied, what are the minimum number of condoms needed?

(If you are really feeling like it, you could get together with your close friend and set up an entire orgy. Say N couples. Same rules apply. What is the general formula for the minimum number of required condoms then? This is an old chestnut, I'm told. By a man who has greatly inspired me lately.)

***
In other news, guilty pleasures have ruled my life over the last week. Am I the only one who secretly loves Jamelia's 'Superstar'?

Family matters

Mine is a strange family. My father is estranged from all his siblings. My mother has seen one of her brothers die in war. The legend goes that when I - the first grandchild on this side of the tree - was born a few months after his death, family ancients swore that my baby-face was his spitting image, that I was his God-given replacement. My grandfather, a keen astrologer, took one look at my horoscope, and pronounced that I would become a genius to rival my celebrated great-uncle. Under the weight of such expectation, I suppose it's hardly surprising that I've degenerated into a verbose, alcohol-guzzling, even inscrutable MBA student. Maybe I will graduate one day to becoming a poor man's Bukowski. That remains the height of my ambitions. Anyway, I digress.

Yes. As I was telling you, mine is a strange family. For many years, I was under the impression that this strangeness limited itself to a deep affinity for melodrama. What you would call 'filmy', perhaps. Never did I expect the players on stage to be capable of such intrigue as I will now recount.

My mother has another brother. One that I was quite fond of, growing up. My earliest memories involve playing chess against him, learning its tricks from an obscure east European book that he had lended to me. As I recall, he was pretty good at chess, even if that only means he used to roundly thrash a little boy, all of six. He was also the nicest, gentlest man that I had ever known, so much so that when I saw him write a suicide note that concluded with "I have no option but to kill myself" in full caps, I told myself he was writing a story.

Incidentally, he didn't kill himself. Maybe he really was writing a story.

Soon, I grew up, and we drifted apart. The few times I visited him and my grandparents (he lived with them), I beat him at chess. He was deadly decent about it, telling me that I was a much improved player. I can imagine that if I were in his place, how I'd have moaned. He was married now (to a real vixen, family chroniclers contend), and had twins. Despite the kids' difficulties - they were both, when I think of it now, definitely dyslexic - his nature remained the same. Kind and doting.

This was about six, seven years ago. I went away to college, imagining, in my naivete, that things would always remain the same. And as people of that age are wont to do, I lost touch with the family.

A few weeks back, my mother revealed that she wasn't on talking terms with him anymore. Why, what happened, I ask. He cut us out of your grandfather's will, she said. After the funeral, when we met to slice our shares, he said that he didn't want to share the fortune (and I really do mean fortune) with us. He said that the will was missing. Lost. Destroyed? The will that my grandmother had so carefully drawn up, before her death, so that her two "girl children" wouldn't have to suffer. My mother and her younger sister.

No one knew who the witnesses were, or who the lawyer was, he said. No one. So I keep the money, he said. And then when she came home, shell-shocked, she received a terse one line email. Let us not be in touch anymore, it said. The mother's sister wanted to drag him to court. The bastard, he's robbing us, she said. The mother let it rest. He's family, she said.

One day, I will return to what is now his house. And across the chess board, I will congratulate him on what was his most unexpected move, brilliant in foresight and devastating in implication.

Then, I will proceed to beat him. And leave.

no country for stupid men

They expelled a guy a couple of days ago. The head of the committee that did the honours was good enough to mail the entire batch a narrative describing in full the cold and calculating nature of the criminal's misdeeds. With its noir undertones and the starkness of its prose, it could well have been Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon putting pen to paper. Telling us that on the night of the 21st of January, the accused did this. On the 22nd, he did that. On the 21st of February, when he realized the game was up, he confessed. But of course, the mail made clear, the confession was in "close confirmation with the conjecture on the sequence of events made by the committee from available documentary evidence even before his confession." Yeah. Great going, Sherlocks. What a complete disgrace.

The poor boy had fudged answers on to his graded answer script, and submitted it for re-evaluation. He had gotten away with it (along with an impressive 50 point increase) during the mid-terms, and was stupid enough to try it again. Got caught, and got expelled. Deserves as much for being a one trick pony.

Of course, the way I see it, a post graduate institution really has no business awarding grades in the first place. Harvard doesn't. Nor does Wharton or Kellogg. This place is already super-competitive as it is when it comes to landing those plum job offers from companies who don't even pay that much attention to your GPA. The last thing that we need is a diabolical grading system that takes the joy away from learning in this short interval between self-righteous penury and corporate harlotry. But no, the committees that matter like playing cops and robbers, you see.

Lone Star

In the truest spirit of Jessica Hagy, who was another one of your seemingly endless gifts. Happy birthday, darling.

Jesus etc.

We sat around the fire. Memories flickered like fireflies in the night, and then died, as is their wont on days like this. We made our confessions, with the thousand yard stares of soldiers who have seen too much, and told our Canterbury tales, full of the intrigue and deceit that so described our lives. Then, we jumped into the fire, sizzling, and then fizzling out when the little boys on the shore broke their little castles of sand all over our Walpurgisnacht-before-time.

We woke up the next morning, and we went to work and we went to college, full of ourselves and our lovers' Valentine messages. For once, we were truly happy, because in the clarity of the morning, we truly understood sunshine, and the warmth it brought with it. Lives that are long suffering in the darkness are thankful for the small mercies, and the big miracles. Here's to you, lover, for walking on water.

the economics of college relationships

It's fascinating watching people hook up in business school. I am already quite certain that half my class will be married to each other in a few years. When you think about it, this makes good economic sense, especially for the guys. As a disclaimer, I really don't mean for all that follows to sound horribly sexist. This is just the way economists talk.

Like all institutions I have been to, the men here greatly outnumber of women, or to put it very crudely, the supply of women is much lower than the demand for them. Thus, their price increases. This was markedly true during my undergraduate days, where the sex ratio was about 11 to 1. What essentially happened was that a lot of women graduated with an inflated opinion of themselves, simply because they were given so much more attention than they would normally have been accorded. Thus, for no real fault of their own, they became overpriced assets whose values dropped sharply as soon they graduated and entered the "real world". In other words, their bubbles burst, and the fall from Helen to Plain Jane was swift.

In B school, on the other hand, the ratio is far better, at about 5 to 1. A lot of people come here after working for a couple of years, having experienced the "real world". Thus they are a lot more mature, and tend to evaluate a potential mate on a more wholesome basis than merely their looks. The market, however, remains the same: highly differentiated "products" that are moderately substitutable, especially for those lacking even a modicum of brand loyalty, or those still trying to discover their tastes. In other words, this may be broadly termed a monopolistic competition (I know that's an oxymoron, but hey, I didn't coin it), much like the market for toothpaste.

Sooner, or later, supply and demand reach a dynamic equilibrium. This is hastened by the fact that business school is a lot more permissive than undergrad - men can stay over in women's hostel rooms, for instance. Thus, relationships get consummated and gradually, couples are formed who drop out of the market. If the hook-up (merger or acquisition? do i dare say private equity takeover?) does become long term, you may safely say that the guy has landed a highly valued asset, which through of its education at a premier institution, is guaranteed excellent cash flows in the future by way of salary.

From the women's point of view, things are a bit different. Men abound in elite undergrad schools, without much demand for them. Their price plummets. Which is why you'll see so many depressed post-adolescent boys saddled with inferiority complexes. Much like me, in my time. Further, the women have to deal with a real-life variant of the classic "lemons problem". As they begin dating, they quickly realize that a lot of the guys are weird nerds they want nothing to do with. However, rather than evaluate each date on a case-by-case basis, they automatically lower their valuations of all men in the batch. Which is why there were hardly any relationships (or equilibria) in my undergrad school in my first two years. No equilibrium can be reached, as the women have a poor opinion of even the "good guys", by way of the generalization they've made from a cursory glance at the market. In business school, however, the added maturity of the individuals involved acts as something of a market externality. The old rules simply can't be used anymore.

When it comes to me, personally, on-campus relationships are not my thing anymore. They are much too distracting, valuations are difficult and the proximity can be nauseating. I've realized that it's always advisable to keep business and pleasure as far away as possible. I'm glad my girlfriend is outside campus borders. As any treatise on economics will tell you, foreign trade is super-efficient, and often grants the maximum consumer utility (satisfaction). God, how I agree.

Why I am a fucking drunkard

I enjoy it, okay? I like sitting quitely by the side with my drink as they gyrate on the dance floor. I positively revel in the cheap thrill of turning down women who want to dance with me. I do it because what they really want is to mock me the morning after, mock me for my two left feet. I am a painfully self-conscious bastard and they are the reason. Watching them make their Victorian-era moves on the floor kills me. Nothing escapes me when I'm drunk, especially irony. Heightened sensitivity is a beautiful thing.

When I'm drinking, I feel good about myself, about who I am. I don't need to get noticed, or be well loved. I can actually talk to people, and say the things I really want to say. Over the last two months, while carrying out my vow of sobriety, I've missed my alcohol. I've missed waiting and watching. I've missed talking, and connecting with people I'd otherwise never chat with. I hate myself for being a drunkard, but that's who I am. A drunkard and a bloody artist, and that's more than they'll ever be. Them with their faux airs and fancy dresses. I really shouldn't bad-mouth them, because deep down, I quite like a few of them. But, as I've come to discover over the years, exaggeration is the bastard child of intoxication. And I'm as stone drunk as I've ever been.

By the way, I chose Yale. Never was in doubt, I don't think. Once a crazed academician, always a crazed academician. Europe will have to wait. Maybe I'll live to regret that particular decision. This is the point where I would quote the great Buddhist Avalokiteswara, but I forget what he had to say about the matter. The matter being the true nature of our lives. This is why I wanted to quit drinking. I have no self-control. I'm throwing it all away. As I write this, tiny brain cells are probably being destroyed. But what the hell. It's not like I plan to do anything significant with them anyway.

Conundrum

I am not sure I enjoy being spoilt for choice. I bid for exchange universities tomorrow. The GPA based bidding order has put me in a position from where I can either go to Yale, or to some random German university. The dilemma arises because Random German University will also offer me a scholarship of 3000 Euros over the exchange period of three months, which provides enough monetary fuel to finance my travels across all of Europe Yale, on the other hand, will cost me a bomb, and I will in all probability be stuck in Connecticut all winter long.

I suspect that at the heart of the matter is an altogether more philosophical issue. I think it comes down to who I really am, deep down. The academician is me is desperately yearning for Yale, with its lengthy list of Nobel Laureates and its place in the American Ivy League pantheon. On the other hand, Germany, and the money that its government will so graciously provide me, will give me the opportunity to travel across the continent in true troubadour fashion. Backpacks. Eurorail passes. The works. The guy who went to Leipzig last year on the scholarship visited 16 countries. S-i-x-t-e-e-n.

But then again, it's Yale! Yale, which has produced Murray Gell-mann, and Sinclair Lewis, and Jodie Foster, and Camille Paglia, and Tom Wolfe, and Nick Carraway in the Great Gatsby ! (Lets pretend for now that George Bush didn't go there). The sheer weight of its history bears down on my soul. I simply can't turn down an opportunity to go there, can I ?

Sigh.

Watching Juno

Much in the tradition of Lost in Translation, Sideways and Little Miss Sunshine, Juno will, in all probability, not win the Oscar for Best Picture. Strange as it is, that is perhaps the strongest vindication of its beauty.

I really can't say much more now. I'm quite speechless. Nothing like a comedy that brings you to tears.

what i feel like, these days

to convey one's mood
in seventeen syllables
is very diffic-

-- John Cooper Clark,

who is the second greatest man I know from Salford, after one Mr. Scholes. And no, that's not Myron. Though he's a bit special too.

clueless

Something's not right with this year. There is a sneaky feeling that Something Bad is just waiting to happen. A feeling that I'm unable to banish by watching movies that cover the entire spectrum of Hollywood's high school film offerings from the thoughtful, and sometimes even profound Rushmore(1994) to the inane yet strangely enjoyable Superbad(2007). Perking up, in true Phobe Cates fashion, next in this particular line is the Big Daddy of the genre, Fast Times at Ridgemont High(1982), which I will proceed to watch sometime today.

I have something of a penchant for digression. I can't really focus on anything, without letting my mind wander. Perhaps that explains why I cannot drive very well. The instructor tore his hair out trying to get me keep the damn thing going straight on an empty highway. Evidently, watching me 'play around' (and I mean this quite literally) with the steering wheel is not his idea of a good instructional session.

Anyway, I was trying to tell you about That Sinking Feeling that has accompanied the advent of the year. It's a bit like a dirty spot on your clothes that refuses to go away. No one else can see it, but it drives you nuts. And there's nothing you can do about it, except wait for it to go away, the way it came. Perhaps this feeling is borne from the fact that I spent New Year's day throwing up. Don't they say you spend the entire year doing what you were on New Year's? Ouch.

And by the way, apart from a glass of wine on Christmas Day and New Year's eve, I've kept to my word. I don't particularly feel de-toxed, or anything, though. In truth, my hitherto well-functioning digestive system, which has been entirely free of Intoxicant Substances for a month, has been killing me the last few days. I suppose this is what irony feels like, when it kicks you in the guts.

Someone write me a cheque already

If I were to ever get down to actually writing a book, I suspect that it will turn out a little like Marisha Pessl's Special Topics in Calamity Physics. Nice cherry flavoured gum that you really dig into, until all that remains is the tasteless cud that you feel obliged to chew till the twisted end. But that's what I've always been - heavy on the style, and weak on the substance. Some nights, I like to think of myself as the David Lynch of the blogging world (okay, so I flatter myself occasionally), with works that are aesthetic masterpieces (see Mulholland Drive, 2001)but really don't mean anything. Unless you want to talk of psychogenic fugues or something (see The City of Absurdity: David Lynch).

Also, I've been wondering. How does one land a book contract with a six figure advance anyway?(see Viswanathan, Kaavya) I don't have an agent, or any connections in the right places. I haven't studied English Literature in a fancy Ivy League school. I have an undergraduate degree in Engineering Physics, for God's sake. I console myself saying that there has been a Great Writer who also had the same major (see Pynchon, Thomas. Though, admittedly, he dropped out of Cornell before he could graduate). It is also fair to say that I don't have a pretty face that can adorn the back flap (see Lahiri, Jhumpa) or a literary mother who can tell me what not to do so I can win the Booker prize that she couldn't (see Desai, Kiran). Perhaps I also have a serious shortage of Exotic and Adventurous Life Events (see Pierre, DBC or Roberts, Gregory David).

All I have is this blog. Now what do i do? And no, I will not convert this into a sex blog. Though that appears to be the quickest way to get noticed by some publisher type (see Belle de Jour). What's the male equivalent to chick-lit anyway? Metro-lit? Or do I have to invent a whole new genre now?

Oh, man ( As opposed to oh, boy)

I just realized today that I am in the midst of my first serious real-life (read non-online) platonic relationship.

I think I can safely say I've grown up now.

high fidelity

The other day, She asked me why my walls were bare. I'm afraid I didn't know. Every room I've ever inhabited has been distinguished by its distinct lack of personality, and its whole-hearted embrace of the anonymity that I have so craved over the years. The present one is no different. Which makes it quite ideal, in all its unabashed nakedness, for my first megalomaniac pursuit in years.

This hostel room will have a poster. Or a collage of pictures, if you would prefer to call it that. Someone once took the trouble to make me (why me, God only knows) an electronic birthday card which was a montage of all the images that person believed represented my life, and this poster of mine will be similiar in concept, but vastly grander in execution. With pictures of everyone, and everything, that has ever had an infuence on me.

Of course, before I get down to making the poster, I have to, in true Nick Hornby tradition, make a List. Now that I think of it, I really have missed making long meandering Lists, and responding to long inane Tags. Honestly.

Anyway, this is it. I'll append it perpetually, of course.

List of Top Twenty Five Influences on MC's life
(in no particular order)

1. Mom. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I'm momma's boy, and proud it.
2. James Dean. Rebel without a Cause. Plus, he's my lucky wallpaper.
3. Midori. My favourite mistake. And my most well-intentioned apologies, as always.
4. Stone Cold Steve Austin. Don't laugh.
5. Almost Famous. If only for Penny Lane wearing a fur coat and that dazzling smile.
6. Nick Drake. Has there ever been a better to ode to sadness than Pink Moon?
7. The Fountainhead. I was young, and very impressionable.
8. The Lorentz Attractor. Where science meets art. My favourite juxtaposition.
9. The Catcher in the Rye. Just made me so sad.
10. Franny & Zooey. Just made me so happy.
11. Lost in Translation. Could yet turn out to be the story of my life.
12. Nevermind. Soundtrack of my teenage years.
13. Blow-up. Michelangelo Antonioni at his greatest. And the last scene. Oh man.
14. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. More than the film, the concept.
15. The Laughing Buddha. For being a source of solace.
16. Roy Keane. Only one Keano.
17. Piggy. Could have made this list for me. And got most of it right.
18. Speech Processing. Undergraduate thesis. Work of art, if I may say so myself.
19. R.E.M. I would play Automatic for the People as I killed myself too.
20. Snay. Kindness, personified. Never was 'nice' more appropriate. Or 'adorable'.
21. Economics. My biggest eye-opener in a decade.
22. The Shins. What they said in Garden State about New Slang was bang on.
23. Gregory House. I'd give anything for a little of the genius and the acerbic wit
24. Good Will Hunting. Or Elephant. You'd never have thought the same man could make both.
25. The Stone Roses. Enough said.

What remains now is finding the pictures. And putting them together. This is going to be so much fun.

Where I make my resolutions, before time

Without wanting to sound overtly melodramatic, I think it's appropriate to say that it has been a fairly life-changing weekend. Visiting home has always given me an achingly beautiful, wretchedly artificial perspective on things, the fleeting whiff of bottled perfume that sugar-coats the rottenness beneath. This time was different, though. This was the real McCoy, the metaphorical Big O that would put all Meg Ryan-When-Harry-met-Sally-fakery to head-hanging shame. And it is the most supreme of ironies that my first satori moments in years came as I lay in my bedroom with those two most potent products of man's decadence - television and potato chips.

Leaving Las Vegas and Reality Bites are, as anyone who has seen both films and appreciates my sudden obsession with cliched metaphors will readily testify, chalk and cheese. I remember reading a review a year back that bemoaned how badly Reality Bites had aged since the heady days of 1994, and I couldn't agree more. (Incidentally, has there ever been a better year for quasi-mainsteam cinema? Pulp Fiction, The Shawshank Redemption, Kieselowski's 'Red' . And Forrest Gump wins the Oscar for Best Film. D'oh.) It suddenly occured to me, as I was watching Ben Stiller and Winona Ryder kiss to one of my favourite guilty pleasures, that at this point in time, I am neatly saddled between two stereotypes. I would like to think that I am still more than capable of picking up a ringing phone with Ethan Hawke's "Welcome to the winter of our discontent", but am sadly as likely to be wearing Ben Stiller's nattily tailored suit as I parade my pseudo-intellecutal tendencies.

Oh, by the way, if I forgot to mention, I go to business school these days. You may now mock me and chant 'Judas', 'Et tu, Melon Collie?', or whatever it is that you like to say when you come across a sell-out. In my defence, I really had no choice, and I don't fancy the corporate life very much. Just looking for a smash-and-grab job, so I can finance my real life thereafter. As you can see, there's but a short step from crassness to nobility.

Moving on, it is now a matter of great amusement to me that where all my girlfriends have failed, Nicholas Cage has spectacularly succeeded (No, i don't mean anything dirty. Shame on you). There are several enduring moments in Leaving Las Vegas, and the crucial question posed is an intriguing one. Is drinking a way of killing yourself, or is killing yourself a way of drinking? I have been a drinker for 18 months now, and a heavy one for atleast 6 of those, and I can see myself as the Nic Cage character some 5 years from now, awash with single-malt whisky and burning out gloriously. Only, I don't think I want it anymore.

I miss religion. I miss sitting in the lotus posture, counting from one to ten. I want that back. Thus, an experiment of sorts. No more wild child business. No more sleeping on tower-tops, with women or without. No more anger, and no more retribution. No more marijuana. No more alcohol (and that includes beer). Atleast for 6 months. Let's see.

Also, watch David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises. Film of the year, by far.

To steal what she never could own

Just like that, in one fell swoop, two birds were killed with the proverbial single stone. One supposes vultures and pheasants (for lack of a better bird) make for strange bedfellows. Do excuse the pun. You know what they say about love and war.

***

From my eager perusal of the pop culture of the times, I'm suitably informed that smoking the post-coital cigarette is the single most joyous post-coital event there is. Excuse my simplicity, but I've never quite understood why. Even if I did smoke, and were not entirely disgusted by the sheer inelegance of it all, I'm sure there are several better things you could do when you're lying beside a naked woman you've just pounded.

Like listening to The Stone Roses' "Waterfall", for instance. Only a madhouse like Britain could catapult a band like Oasis to a bigger audience. Admittedly, Wonderwall is something of a tune, and I still occasionally go "..there are many things that I'd like to say to you but I don't know how..', but 'What's the Story (Morning Glory)' versus the debut Stone Roses album is a no-contest. I can't even imagine cleaning up jissom to 'She's Electric', for one. God, no. But give me 'Waterfall' or 'Shoot you down', and I am the Energizer Bunny. At a time when, as most men would testify, I am expected to be down and out. Quite literally.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQUxCQxu9og

****

Much water has passed under the bridge. It's good to be back. And this time. I hope to stay.