So here I am again with your latest dose of torture. :)

Cigarette smoking

The dreamy-eyed Piscean at IIIT Hyd would be proud -- proud to hear -- as soon as he does -- that I can now properly smoke. Take a cigg in between the two fingers and sans any noise or huff-puff, fill my lungs with the smoke, hold it there, and exhale.

I went to this room -- a hostel room ie -- and the twenty four hour air conditioning notwithstanding -- it was soaked in cigg smoke. We were together for the day coz we had an exam in the eve and this NRI dude lit a Goldflake every twenty minutes. It was nauseating and toxic. He is a pretty interesting guy; has a passion for history and had books on Middle East history -- Egyptian in particluar and is also into documentary movies -- the conspiracy theories ones!

My room partner smokes around two, three cigarette every night. The first one I consume more than half -- I even light it. BTW, FTR, let me tell you that I am as of now a "cigarette-virgin". Let me qualify that. I get a kick in the head in exactly the fourth or fifth drag. Also, I take long drags. In fact I wish to remain a cigarette-virgin for ever. I do not smoke everyday but only say on two consecutive days and then would not smoke for four, five days. The bottom line is that my body hasn't yet developed that craving for cigarette as is there in every cigarette smoker. And it has been like this since ever. In the Diwali holidays last yr too, I smoked with my cousins over vodka and cards, and got a pretty strong kick in the fourth drag. But this is like playing with fire -- it can consume me before I realize. As for the smoking in some of my poems -- that's just for the glamour effect.

Football

I have a passion for playing football. I just returned from playing football. I am still wearing the studds (the special spiked football shoes). I can play good football and so that makes it beautiful. There is a wholesomeness to the game of football which makes you love the game. After I have played football and thoroughly exhausted myself, tranquility naturally sets in my bosom, my mind becomes totally blank, and my conscience becomes clear as the sky.

I have come to think over time that football is like life, and I am sure that every footballer the world over knows this and understands this, perhaps better than me. Let me try and explain that to you:

It is with a clear, simple and constant joy, the kind that is unaware of itself because it so deep-seated in your being, that you play this beautiful game. It is with that joy that you take the pre-emptive runs in the game, dribble, tackle, play the game... And every one has his own defined role -- his own individuality -- and is still but part of the team. I think that Life and Football can sit together and Football can coach Life how to play well.

***

I still get dreams of my school days when I was sixteen/seventeen and played football with my school mates. All my football dreams feature my school football ground. I wish to return one day to the smell of wet grass and beaten leather, fill my lungs with the cool winter air, and play football with my school mates with whom I grew up.