Please call me a cloud

The business of disclaimers: Is a figment of imagination

Every time in my head, when I have imagined coming face to face with you, suddenly, dressed in patched, colorful, layered clothes against what I can see when I close my eyes every morning as blinking neon lights in the night, the mood is that of past betrayal and a fresh scab of longing. There is music, chaos, people are dancing, most are generally happy because they haven't worked so hard for a chance reunion. Things come easier to those who let go quicker. But, it's only you, or something about how the idea of you settled in a corner of my heart so comfortably that it refuses to leave me. Or maybe I like being haunted. I like repeating what you have said and what you would have said to myself often in the silent gaps between two happy days.  

Further in our chance encounter I also, almost always, imagine or actually feel in my imagination a sudden rush of guilt, want, need and sobriety - like something about me is so rickety it can break any moment, but it hasn't for the longest time, I've held it together such. My holding it together is what lends your eyes the cocky confidence in me and you, and lets you have your way. Maybe we decided in an impassioned moment to let you have your way for life. I secretly suspect it was done when we started exchanging books.

I have thus decided to change my name. Please call me a cloud. I feel like a ravenous cloud and my sound is rumbling. The only time that rumble changes is when I break into torrential rains. I am very hungry, my sounds deepening in dissent like the last note of Bhairav and you will only hear me weep in floods, drench you in some strange mix of anger and love. You, be the stone and enhance the pathos of our tragic tale. 

Pop9 photography

I realized I hadn't uploaded the photos I took with my (new/old) Pop9, a lomo camera that gives you 9 images per frame. It's a toy camera and is now available in a bunch of shops in India. It uses standard 35mm film so processing should not be an issue. I lost quite a few images, not sure why. Am yet to process the second roll. Posting a few images from the first. More on Pop9 here: http://shop.lomography.com/us/pop-9-1122

PS. It's really fun if you are into textures.

Leaky Eyes

Of late, I've been working hard at changing the state of everything in life. Since it isn't enough to keep saying I am (re)employable, I did actually test the hypothesis. I still am, employable that is (but I only like the idea of employment, not the actual act). Similarly, a revamp is never finished until one really, truly feels like a new person and completely forgets about the recent past heartbreaks or rejections in general. It's amazing how films can help with that transition so well. It's like films and books are the gymnasium of the hypothalamus. You really have to put yourself through someone else's journey to see the light of the day. I know friends can help with that but again, of late, most friends around have been in crises worse than mine. You don't have to curate these books and films. They happen to you and they may not even be saying things but you may be seeing them. If you are waiting for me to list the books and movies, I'll do it at the end of the post.
I watched the 'Ship of Theseus' yesterday. The first story is of a girl who regains her eyesight though donation and experiences a change in her photography practice. The film is about larger things and I've heard this plot before where someone even starts hating their newly gained vision because they aren't able to handle it but I was set to churning by something else.The film portrays it beautifully. After I went home, I kept thinking if the loss and gain of any other sense would be so paradigm changing as that of vision. With limited vision, she relies on texture, ambient sounds, software instruction, light readings, description of colors and shapes and takes an educated guess/click. If you think about it, that's not how we (with full vision) click. We get overwhelmed by the visual cues so much that most of what "seeing" people can produce seems the same. That is probably why the fatigue and a lot of us stop clicking. She does too, and then goes to Chhitkul (where I was two months ago!), and fails miserably to get inspired (deja vu). The point isn't the newness of vision, it is the amount of distraction that it brings to life, my life.

The girl wasn't looking into the mirror, or at pretty young things, delicious food, watching her own body change shape. She radiated a strange kind of stubborn confidence which only came with opaque eyes. It's like things of her, in her, started to leak the moment she could see. The whole order and method of her photography wasn't working anymore. She even tried wearing a blindfold to experiment. You know how there is nothing left to educated guesses? I was so overtaken by how deliberate everything became for her, as if she/I was orchestrating it because she could see. To be able to see is also the ability to look - at someone. I hate it.

When you look at someone, cruelly, kindly, expectant, hurt, welcome or civilly, it's part of what you mean to give away and part of what they should get from you. I've really been training at looking to look indifferently. There's something about 'alive' eyes, the ones with a sparkle/twinkle. I have those. And, there are deadbeat eyes for poker players. I've been practising the look. I doubt I'll get it any soon. To add some wizard wisdom, remember when Snape taught Harry how to close his mind to the Dark Lord? Yes, Occlumency.

The books and movies. I read: The Fault in Our Stars, Hitchhiker's Guide..., High Fidelity and I saw: Lola versus, The Nanny Diaries, Liberal Arts, Submarine, Ship of Theseus.

Adacamp and OSB: Of Women and Technology

This post comes in between my journey to Adacamp (finally!) and Open Source Bridge 2013. For those wanting to know more about Adacamp, it is an unconference (this was the second one) run by the Ada Initiative which comprises a bunch of really awesome women who work in the field of technology. Although the camp focuses on women in tech, it isn't exclusively for programmers or those with a science background. It is also a space for social scientists, artists, educators and more. Since I missed out on the first one, I wasn't quite sure if the conference was planned to discuss women-pertinent topics or give women a space to discuss what they would like to. Turns out, it had both. The reason I am writing this post is because I am at the intersection of the "women group" and technology. I hope that this post is read by women in tech, especially in countries outside the U.S and does the job of cross pollinating the wonderful possibilities that can emerge out of women centric spaces.

What happened:

Adacamp has a fairly strict content privacy policy (which in retrospect I can totally understand). So, I can tell you about the kind of sessions that were offered. Being an unconference, most of the session proposing and programming happens on the spot. There were at least 5 parallel sessions going on for two days. Ranging from open education to open government, learning python to open hardware, work cultures for women, to women centric maker spaces (the one I really wanted to be a part of); the range was broad and exciting. I proposed two sessions: on angry young women, and on women centric maker spaces. A fun session where I learned things: soft circuits (and e-textile - with no stereotypes attached :P )

Things I loved:

The first day started with a session on "Impostor Syndrome" and had a room full of people nodding away at how they have felt like fake geek girls and similar. That spawned talks on likability as well. I wish the impostor talk was done with a different approach though. The other awesome thing was encountering woman entrepreneurship and how! All the participants were "starting" things or making things happen. Being a catalyst, an enabler and not only a victim or marginal stakeholder - is a great way to inspire fellow women/queer/marginal identities.

Things that I hope will happen:

I hope that Adacamp (and all the other conferences that I have attended so far) evolve into international participation hubs. It is very important to make that happen to truly understand how difficult it is to speak about anything as a group. On my part, something that I really hope to get started is a tiny maker-space where I live. I am yet to decide on whether it will be women centric or it could be broader. But, if you are in New Delhi, India and reading this, write to me and let's get things going! :)

Journey ahead:

My next stop is Open Source Bridge 2013. Equally excited, especially because I hope to see many fellow Wikipedians there! At OSB, I hope to give a small talk on queering Wikipedia. The presentation is basically around a set of case studies (and personal editing experiences) that demonstrate how cultural conflicts, knowledge making and Wikipedia's own policies are constantly in conversation and that for certain content to start coming in on encyclopedias (especially in the digital age and with a focus on diversifying), the encyclopedia project must fail (must change, look different, open/close). If you are going to Open Source Bridge and want to have a conversation around any of these - women, tech, Wikipedia, tech cultures in India, I'd be happy to meet up!

That's not all! My aim behind writing this post is also to tell you fellow women (tech and non-tech) friends that you *should* attend the next Adacamp! Keep watching their website or follow the twitter updates.
All pumped up on girl power and geek schwag, more later!

Making money profane

At some point in life, we all start getting money. And, at some point we become comfortable with spending bits of it without being too afraid. This post is a partly inspired thought experiment after I read the post on Suspended Coffees (Read: 'Suspended coffee' helps those in need) that went viral probably a month or two ago. The idea is that you pay for an extra coffee in a restaurant and that can be given for free to anyone else who might not have the money to buy one. In a time when trust is really a rare commodity in our interactions in public, this phenomenon inspired and moved me a great deal. I was determined to try it out in my own locality (somewhere in India) to see how people react. However, there is another question I have been battling in the past year: how do I make spending money more fulfilling?
So, let me tell you of the three instances where I tweaked this "suspension" experiment and the different things I felt.
Part 1:
First, of course, was a straight replication of this suspension idea. I was visiting a friend in Bombay and told him about suspended coffees. He was also excited. So, while we are at the beach and this kid badgered us to buy a rose, we thought of trying it out there. The way I saw it, was simple. Buying a rose for someone we like at the beach seems so cliched and corny. But, wouldn't it be really amusing if we randomly got a rose that we never paid for (or realize we have an admirer whom we may never meet)? So, we paid for a rose and the kid gave it to a boy clicking pictures of himself at the beach. From what we could make out, the boy was not only astonished but also a little intrigued. He was visibly happy and I'd like to think it made his day.

Part 2:
While I was really happy with the rose incident, I kept asking as to what really happened there which was disruptive. Some possible causes to describe this: unexpected, good faith, personal gesture. So, I wondered if I could buy other things in the same vein but increase the utility part. And, the most obvious things I could think of were: food, travel and education expenses. So, again while in Bombay I found a taxi driver and gave him a hundred rupees. I roughly explained my idea to him - told him to take people where they want and in the end deduct hundred rupees. He seemed baffled but he could see the twinkle in my eyes. (This may already seem a bit hipster to you) I am assuming he actually executed my plan because he nodded in satisfaction, just like the rose boy earlier.

Part 3:
This I did in Delhi. For a year now I have been not-so-broke and I can't recall the days when I used to be down to a hundred bucks for the last week of the month. And then, something came up for photocopying or printing. So, I went and gave three hundred rupees to Sonu, my university's photocopier and told him to use this for a day and offer free copies. My university has a very high moral ground and such so I knew Sonu would do it. I went back to him the next day and he told me that people spread this "offer" and used it wholeheartedly, to copy anything and everything!

I am sure a lot of you already do some form of charity. My mum also feeds X number of needy people on special occasions. But, the purpose of my experiment/exploration was different. I wasn't interested in generosity or personal happiness or equality so much. And, I realized that was my kick was in disrupting routines, seeing if I can momentarily change how we are used to feeling about the world around us. When we don't have the money for that taxi ride or photocopy or tattoo or movie or gift, money seems like a really big deal. When we do have money, many of those things don't seem so special anymore for several reasons.
Can I make money absolutely nothing by inserting it in places where people expect to struggle for it? Money and struggle, the relationship is routine and obvious - one that you can't escape. But, in this routine living is where the jadedness seeps in and thinking for oneself (instrumental reason) sets in. That is why deeds of kindness, honesty, loyalty etc which are the given foundations of our society seem to take us by surprise. At times using money against its own logic can give the maximum satisfaction, at least to me.