#foolishworld

I want to write about the need of appearances. I have written about it superficially some time back, and yet another incident today, has triggered off the need to write about it all over again, from a slightly different perspective. Once in my good old days (why are only the old days good ?) a senior brother in my hostel told me ’you not only have to be good , you have to show good as well.’ It sounded like a cliché, or a proverb, or a one liner and my cynical mind immediately went to correct the apparent grammatical error in it. But I reined it in and swirled the words within me again. And gulped it in. Sadly, in the world I am living in (out of compulsion), this piece of insulting advice is true.

 Show good . I like an old-timer, I like the word, I like what it implies. I like old school too. Just like old times. I like the rules, the ones I understand or can rationalize. I hate ‘new fangled’. I hate peppy and chirpy and cute and SO FUCKING FULL OF SHIT!!! Ok maybe hate is a strong word.

 Using an example to illustrate (hypothetical): I stay in a hostel, and I have a single roommate. Now as a rule I don’t like the smell of closed ill-ventilated rooms, similarly I don’t like the smell of unwashed (or for that matter washed) undergarments, either strewn around or carefully adorned on the clothesline. And thus, obviously, I don’t like unwashed-just-used sweaty socks as well. So, I invested in a basic room freshener. I come back to room, I divest myself of my clothes, I freshen up and then I use the room freshener. Some people thought I was being snobbish even a bit gay ( the new Indian male fetish)