The Holiday of Scholarship Begins

18.05.2024

Today it was my last working day for a whole week and a half. Now I am going to be studying full time, reading and writing for one and a half weeks. The aim, as is always the case with me, is to be the best. The best scholar in this instance. It is a prize I have claimed throughout secondary school, sixth form and university. I am used to it. And the reason I am the best is not just because I have good genes. Not just because I am creative, original and have a brilliant memory. Not just because I can put things together in a way that no one else on the planet can. But because I also work hard. That is the key ingredient. Nobody has as much passion and motivation as me.

I have some thoughts in my head that I want to work on as writing pieces to share on social media. How many people actually read this stuff? It is not many. But that has never stopped me writing. Whether tens of thousands of people read my stuff like for the Japanese art gallery, whether thousands read, like at the Plant art place I volunteer at, whether hundreds read, like with my academic work, or whether just a few read, like on my personal blog, it is all the same to me. I have at least one special reader. Helen. Because Helen reads my personal diary, that is enough. I only need her. Even if she doesn’t love me. Just knowing that she is thinking about me. Who knows why? Maybe just to check to see what I have written about her.

I am pretty sure that I will finish the essay in just a few days. I only have one more thing to read – a book. I have met the author at a conference on poetry which she presented. As a mere PhD student, I presented my work alongside professors from Oxford. Do you know what she told me? That she had studied that poetry for decades, but the things that I saw in it, she had never heard anyone talk about. She told me that I was very very clever. That is what it is like for me – things that people have studied their whole life, I can see something in it which they can’t. Everyone in academia knows that I am super clever when they talk to me. Every single one of the people that knew anything about my work told me that. And yet, where is my job as a university professor? Why not? Because of the racism in this country. What else could be the explanation? When you are looking at something, it is the most obvious answer that is is the solution, not some contrived bullshit.

It is the same with love. The reason I am not in a relationship is because of racism. It is as simple as that. It is not me. If I was white and exactly the same as I am now, I would have what I wanted – a family and kids. I am 100% sure. I’m not going to let anyone gaslight my experience and the reality of oppression in Western society.

I wore a green blazer I bought today. It is my favourite colour. It is the colour of my family. Green was the colour of my blazer at school as well.

A lot of people were super happy to see me back at a certain context after a while today. Except for ______ but that is what __________ is like sometimes. But you don’t know with ________ Sometimes, they pretend to be low key when that is not actually what they are thinking or feeling. And, what can I do about it? Either you are liked. Or you are not. Either you are special to someone and they think about you. Or they don’t. I can’t change my personality for anyone. And I am not going to change from being an Indian man to a wannabe white person for anything or anyone. They have never let you forget that you are Indian. So fuck everyone. I am going to insist on being Indian. Once upon a time, I used to call myself British. Now, I call myself Indian. If that is my recognition in the world, and they will accept no other, than that is what I have become.

The Holiday Begins: Teasing; Investment; Absence and Reunion; Reader Surprise; What I Read Today

25.04.2024

when

through the window

my mind connects with yours

when

you read my words

about how I think of you

and when you think of me

when our two looks

collide

in this moon of electronic paper

what do you feel inside

if it is not love?

Just now, at about this time that I am writing, someone – probably Helen (I assume) – checked if there was a new diary entry. Whoever it is that is reading almost without fail every night is so used to reading this diary. It has become a habit with them. Has this person ever asked themselves why they are so interested in me and my thoughts? Maybe, if it is Helen, she wants to know what I am writing about her every night. It has been seven months. Every night, I think of something new to say about Helen. Every night. I love her. It is like the Arabian Nights in real life. But the storyteller is not a woman that is about to have her head cut off. It is a man that has had his heart ripped out. The one that is holding it in her hand is the one that is most likely reading every night. Maybe, one day, she will give that beating heart back. But you wonder, what is she waiting for? If it is her. Who knows? In this relationship, like with all things with Helen, everything is unequal. She has anonymity. I don’t. I am the one that invests the time into writing, which takes much longer than reading. I am the one that loves at a cost. She receives the love for free. She has to do nothing for it.

My holiday has begun after work finished at 6pm. I rushed down to the Wellcome Collection for the Cult of Beauty Exhibition. With comic predictability, it rained. With comic predictability, the Collection was shut down because the toilets and the water weren’t working. The trains were messed up when I tried to get there too. This is what happens when I have a holiday. I am unlucky. It affects every aspect of my personal life and my relationships.

I went to Waterstone’s on Gower Street instead. Amazing haul of books today. One of my favourite places in the whole world.

Everyone that is close to me at one of the places I am at teases me. Especially the young women. They all pretend to be mean to me. It is so much so that other people comment on it. As I always say, what have I done to deserve this treatment? I am a nice person. But it is all in jest. But when I tease someone? The last time I did it, I got told off for it – in serious trouble. I am still in the bad books for it. That is the difference between different contexts and if it is a man that is doing the teasing or a woman.

Discussion with someone about types of investment. Some make financial investments. Some, like me, make an investment into education. I was told that my education was an investment into myself. But it is actually an investment into our people. There is a reason I have had one of the best educations in the entire world. It is for us as a people. For the Dalits, the Untouchables, the community of the oppressed. We who were denied education to keep us down. They prayed for a mind like mine to come into this world. For us. To be our voice. To be The Tiger. The Tiger has come into this world. The Tiger has become an author. Someone who writes our values. Our way of life. Our hopes and our desires. For us. By us. As myself, I am no one and nobody. As The Tiger, I am Us.

I saw someone after a while. I missed her. Everyone missed her. She is like Helen and Girl 3. She is one of the darlings of the place. Everyone wants to talk to her, be around her. Life is a popularity contest and some people win in it. When they go, there is a vacuum which can’t be filled.

Someone at the place saw me as they were walking past and told me that they read my blog entry on an exhibition. And that it was really good. I was caught by absolute surprise. You never know who is reading what you have written. And why. It was the same when I was doing my PhD. I used to share stuff on the Whatsapp group for PhD students. And, believe it or not, these busy busy people, who I didn’t even talk to, all used to read my blog. It is incredible.

The long-awaited holiday has come. So today I was able to relax and read on the tube. And what did I read? An introduction to some travel memoirs and the history of the Indus river which flows through the Subcontinent. And then, an introduction to plants, their lives and how they have impacted the human imagination.

Why I am the Lone Man in this Country; The Indian View of Marathons, the Olympics and Alexander the Great

21.04.2024

As is the case every year, the marathon came back to London causing the usual chaos and aggravation. I remember we were in a lecture theatre at university and some seedy politician was claiming that the United Kingdom is based on Ancient Greek principles and therefore the Elgin marbles rightfully belonged to us. Everyone laughed. It was a rare occasion when even the sheep in this country could see the bullshit that the politicians spout for what it actually is.

However, that politician was indicating something in this culture. It mindlessly celebrates Ancient Greek institutions which are (I would say obviously) wrong and of dubious pedigree. Democracy? The Ancient Greeks didn’t include women or immigrants or the slaves that did all the work. And how can something be right just because the majority want it to be that way, at the expense of the (thinking) minority? The Democratic leaders were all douche bags that had no principles and just pandered to the sheep.

It is the same with the celebration of Greek sports and athletics. The Marathon (now if not originally) is a competition. The Olympics is a competition. But how arrogant were these ancient Greeks to make someone a winner and everyone else a loser in their ruthlessly and recklessly and destructively competitive collection of city states? How arrogant and ego serving are their games which we are still playing now? It is the mark of an arrogant culture.

It is the same thing with Alexander the Great. How corrupt, greedy and how much of a douche bag do you have to be to go and conquer other countries in the name of arrogance, egotism and pride? And yet this Western culture looks up to this asshole because ‘he conquered the world’. But as we all know, he conquered the known world but he couldn’t conquer India. India killed him. Because India kills arrogance and pride. It is the foundation of our culture and our thinking. We worship Kali because she is the killer of ego: that is what her insatiable blood thirst targets.

But what do you expect people to celebrate in this egotistical culture of neo-imperialists? That aren’t yet properly ashamed of and divorced from British Imperialism and its racism?

And this is how we come to it, why I am the lone man in this country. Because I don’t bow down to the government, laws, the crown or the political institutions of this racist and neo-imperialist country. I keep my head held up high for myself and my community. I don’t lick their feet and run my life by their rules and standards. I don’t let them devalue me. I would topple them in a moment if I had the opportunity for intruding in my area and in my life and trying to destroy us and our culture. In the name of justice, honour and truth, which this country does not have, whatever it says. I acknowledge no one above myself, least of all the white supremacists who have dishonoured my mother and my people. I only bow down to my mother. Out of love. No one and nothing else. Only love rules in my world. Not the hate of the western world. That’s why I am the lone man in this country. I am not a fucking slave with no self respect or individual conscience. I write my own laws for myself and follow them.

At work, I had the opportunity to give a tour to a mother with her daughter that had just qualified as a medical doctor. I felt the pride of the mother when she told me about her daughter’s achievement. I like achievers. I am an achiever myself. It is what we respect. I felt fond of them both.

I talked to one of my new friends at work who I like a lot and have liked since the first time I have seen her. She is a very charming and loveable person.

Not much else happened in life. Except for the fact that I thought I saw Helen come in with a man. It wasn’t her, it was someone that looked like her. It was just a moment of surprise.

I was reading the column in the Metro newspaper when people talk about people they like on the Tube but they do absolutely fucking nothing about it. Because they are cowards and dumb. I have actually talked to someone on the Tube that I found really attractive. It was a few years ago. It was a Japanese woman that got on with her friend. I liked her. I gave her my seat. She bowed to me. I started talking to her when we got off. If it wasn’t for the fact that she couldn’t speak English properly. She was super cute and super friendly. I could tell she was attracted to me because she kept on looking at me and smiling at me. That is life. So when I read the Metro, I look at these people around me and wonder how the human race even continued with people like this around.

Paris’s Love for Helen

20.04.2024

husn tera hai nangi talvar

your beauty is like a naked sword

jido haath lagein

when I put my hand upon it

to ghayal ho javein

then I am wounded

aankhein teri

your eyes

ekh aag

a fire

jis mein hum raakh ho javein

in which I become ash

aag he aag

only fire only fire

jis me hum choor

in which I scatter myself

baatein mein jaddoo

in your words a magic

har baat qayamat

every word a calamity

humein manzoor

i accept

gum-e-dil-e-mohabbat

the sadness of the heart of love

ae mere huzoor

my mistress

jo rehte hai humsein itna door

that stays far away from me

20.04.2024

Do you know what Paris’s love for Helen is? Paris can’t sleep because he is sick of love for Helen. Paris can’t get out of bed in the mornings because he is sick of love for Helen. When he sees other men following Helen around, Paris trembles all over. Someone is going to take Helen away from him. When he sees other men following Helen around, it feels like Paris’s stomach is falling apart. He feels like he is going to faint. And when he is sick like that, he has to talk to people and smile and nod at them when the only thing he can think about is Helen in someone else’s arms, Helen not being his, Helen gone away forever.

When Helen is there, he can’t look at her because he loves her so much. She is the only thing he can think about.

Paris hates himself for loving Helen because he knows that she is never going to be his. Paris hates being sick in love.

Paris hates the fact that Helen isn’t in his arms. That he is not stroking her cheek. That he is not caressing her hair.

Paris hates the fact that Helen knows he loves her and she doesn’t care about it.

What does it mean to be Paris? Paris went into Greece and he took Helen from the king in front of everyone. It didn’t matter how many people were there. Somehow, he took her for himself.

What does it mean to be Paris? To keep Helen as his, Paris fought against the whole of Greece. To stop someone taking her away, to defend her, he fought against everyone.

How lucky Paris was that he could have Helen. And die when he wasn’t going to have her any more.

I talked to a woman that had a puppet in her hand today. She was using the puppet to talk to me. It wasn’t a performance. It was a real conversation. She carried that puppet around to the evening. She had that puppet with her as her friend. So many people tell me that I am handsome all the time. And today, for the first time, a woman said it to me through the puppet. I said that the puppet looked cute. The woman made the puppet say that it looked cute from all angles and that I was cute as well, dashing. Was she trying to flirt with me through the puppet? Or was she just being nice and playful? I was interested in an exhibit at the gallery that she is at and I mentioned when I was going – should I have done that? I was just making conversation and I wasn’t thinking about what I was saying because I was distracted by today.

I made someone’s day by pointing out that the brooch she was wearing was a Paisley design. She really needed that information and by chance I provided it to her. She kept on thanking me over and over again. That is what it means to have and to share knowledge.

I went to a chocolate tasting event. At first I could follow it, but then the thoughts took over.

Someone told me I looked tired today. What can I say? I can’t sleep properly. This is the biggest disappointment in my life. In a life filled with so many disappointments and betrayals.

let me clasp at the snake

and suck at its venom

let me be one with the hurt

and death

give me the paper and the pen

that I might maul it with my

blood

the cross with its cruel nails is the shelter

the thorns adorn the crown

for the man that is god

that loves the unloving other

Day Off: The Flow of Research; One Happy Memory; Supporting my Friend, etc.

16.04.2024

Pretty depressing day. Such is life. When you think about your problems.

I spent the whole morning and into the afternoon doing my art history assignment. I just need to write it up now. That is going to be the hardest part because I am losing motivation in doing things and I am distracted nowadays. It has got to the stage where even the important things are pointless now.

But there is one thing about research and contemplating artworks and fitting them into your stories – you are lost in the flow. You forget about everything and everyone else. Because that is when your mind truly focuses on things.

When I was volunteering to teach English to refugees and migrants and give them the extra help that they needed, I used to have conversations with them at the end of the lessons as a group. They used to look forward to that part. It gave them a chance to talk and listen to each other’s stories. One day, I asked them to share a happy memory from their childhood. Do you want to know something peculiar? None of them could share a happy memory. Whether they blotted out any memory of happiness from their childhoods, or they literally couldn’t remember anything, they all came out with sad stories of unhappiness. That’s human nature for you.

But I have many happy memories from my childhood. Reading books and living in the adventures – we went to the library regularly although we didn’t have many books at home. Visiting my grandparents and then sleeping in the bed with my grandfather while he told us stories into the night time. My grandmother who made the most delicious chicken curry when we were visiting and fed us snacks that she made like fried bread and gulab jamun. Sometimes, they would buy us cream cakes. Holding my mother’s scarf while she cooked and talked to me in the kitchen. When my father bought me a top of the line Sony Walkman with a radio in it when he was working abroad because it was the thing I most wanted in the whole world to listen to my music on. Eating ice cream on the beach with my family. Going to the shops with my parents for the groceries. Going to school and being around my friends. It is an endless list. I had a very happy childhood.

Afterwards, I went to visit my friend. She has suffered a lot. But for me, she is always positive. I gave her a bouquet of white roses. I always bring her flowers when I visit her at home. I kept my little troubles to myself because she has big ones in her life and in her family at the moment. It was my job to listen so that she could unload and feel a little better and to say things to support her. I have started saying goodbye to her about ten minutes before I have to leave because she never wants me to go and will start talking about other things.

Next, I went down to the shops at the big mall in Stratford. It is a depressing place. The sales assistants don’t interact with you in any way when you are buying anything, the ‘book shop’ didn’t have any non-fiction books in it and the smallest range of books I have ever seen in a book shop, everything and everyone looks so cheap and mean. And that area is more up market than the area that I actually live in. That’s what it is like to live in a type of ghetto. I went to the Marks and Spencer’s clothing store and bought myself some nice white T-shirts because summer is coming up. I have never actually bought a white T-shirt that costs more than five pounds in my entire life. As a result, they look cheap. But, in summer, white is one of my favourite colours. So, for the first time in my life, I have spent twenty pounds on a nice, white T-shirt that I actually like and looks good on me. I bought two of them. After all, in my life, there is just me to spend that money on. No family of my own. Where else is it going to be spent? Was it a case of retail therapy? Women are going to look at my muscles in those T-shirts in the summer. I am still ripped. I’ve attracted women with my body before. If you have to get superficial, you have to get superficial.

Motivation is so low that I can’t be bothered scraping off the beard off my face. I don’t like beards. They are not a good look and they add age onto your face.

Now that the diary is over, I have to do some remote overtime for work. Just work. Nothing else. For nothing.

Birthday Meal; Being a Stranger

07.04.2024

god drowns in the water
he puts out his hand
the element is endless
he fights for escape
god drowns in the water
light flushing into the depths
boils the heart in the water
asking for caress
god drowns in the water
he puts out his hand
to feel the smooth palm
and to clutch at the fingers
to join with the woman
that is out of his grasp
love drowns in the water
he puts out his hand

07.04.2024

Ironically, given the situation, this perfect white rose has grown where I thought this rose bush – which symbolised my love for Helen – was dead.

Sitting at the diary after a birthday meal. This diary is the only place I talk about my personal life and my most private thoughts and feelings. Over time, because I don’t share the links, the readership has dwindled. People come out of our lives. People move on. The people you were once close with, you are no longer close with.

There is one person that reads every night. Is it Helen? You never know in this life. Maybe it is not even her. So all this time writing and reflecting, trying to communicate with her, it might all be useless. Who knows in life what impact our words and thoughts will have on someone.

Helen and I are strangers to each other. She called me a stranger. She wanted me to be a stranger to her. And I am. She did not even recognise my voice. Even people that I have known for a few months have told me that my voice is unmistakable. That is Helen for you. It just confirms the situation in life – she is never where I am. We never talk with each other. The only thing left is my memory of the past. There is no present and no future.

One of the roughest weeks this week. Constant pain everywhere. Motivation is at a record low. Things are happening that I don’t want to be happening. The allure of the new and a change is becoming greater and greater. It is the two year mark in this museums and art gallery occupation. This is the time that is the worst for restlessness.

Looking back and counting the true friendships I have made, the people you can trust and you get on the best with. There are some. But what about the special friendship? Every woman I meet that I get on with is much younger than me. I am not completely stupid. I know that they prefer people their same age or just a little older. I am out of the running even before I begin. Added to the cultural differences.

But where is there to go aside from where I am now? What is there to be done?

What does it feel like to be a stranger with the person in life that you most didn’t want to be a stranger with? You feel the separation. The body moves through space. The space that I am moving in is relentless. Endless. Heavy. Choking. The desire for connection, the hunger for joining mentally and physically. It unfolds in space without satisfaction. Complete frustration. Complete loneliness. Separation from life itself.

Disappointing news today. What was there to expect? Everything is breaking all around me.

People have eaten up my time. The trains are always late or there is always an issue. So the commute time has increased. There are other issues. People just eating my time. Depriving me of my time. When I don’t have time. They have nothing to do. I have everything to do.

Do you know what compensation is? There is no one special in my life (I cannot say Helen, even though I love her. She is not with me). So the only thing to do is work. All of the pent up energy from the massive libido and power and energy of The Tiger is going into work. What else is there? A few meetings with friends. And the rest is just work. Complete sublimation. The desire to be considered valuable in at least one area in life, if you are not going to get it in personal life.

I was talking to a little girl with her father at work. As always, they are the best conversations, even if they last for less than a minute. Because these little children are unfeigned. Honest. They don’t hide anything. You know where you are. You see the world through their innocent eyes. You understand them. They are not boring and disappointing like adults.

The whole day just talking to people. And then you go home and talk to more people. And then, finally, you can sit at your diary and talk to yourself. Finally, you can stop pretending. You can suck at the sourness of the lemon. But what about Helen? She spends all day talking to those other people. Even in her breaks you see her talking with her other people. And then? In the night? She comes and reads this diary when I am talking to her. Why? There is no meaning to it. But it happens. If it is her. Perhaps it is not her. And if I found out it was not her, I would stop writing this diary.

Blaming the One You Love; When Your Body Remembers; Calling My Friend Every Day; Thanking Someone

20.03.2024

I am managing to wake up earlier in the morning but not enough to work on anything. Only to exercise. I have to change my habits. I have to look forward to getting out of bed. I have to achieve again.

The last chapter in the book about relationships my friend gave me was about how we blame the person that we love for everything in our lives. It is a form of love. It shows that you love them. It is irrational. But it is a form of flattery. Because they are that important and central to your universe. Am I not blaming Helen for this society and the way it is? Is that unfair? The fact is that this is the biggest missing piece in my life. And I am suffering because she wouldn’t be the missing piece so that everything was complete. But it is not because of Helen. It is because of all the women that I have been in love with that would not return the love. She is just another link in the chain connecting them all.

Incident today. When the body remembers, everything comes back. Today it was the nausea. I should stay away from women. But I can’t. I can’t let fear rule. I can’t be a coward. I should stay away from the ones like Helen. They don’t know that they will kill you with their kindness. First, they are friendly. Then, over time, you start to develop feelings for them. Then, they can hurt you. But, every time, you think what is the harm?

Why do they call it falling in love? Because love is dangerous and leaves you exposed. Wikipedia:

Falling in love is the development of strong feelings of attachment and love, usually towards another person. The term is metaphorical, emphasizing that the process, like the physical act of falling, is sudden, uncontrollable and leaves the lover in a vulnerable state, similar to “fall ill” or “fall into a trap”.

I have called my friend every day this week because she is not feeling well and she needs support. I am her friend. It is my duty. And I never shirk from my duty. Plus, I like talking to her. I mentioned something to her. She told me what she tells me every time: just wait and don’t give up. You are special. Because you are special and you think deeply, it is harder for you. She told me some really personal stuff about herself to help me.

When I went to visit her the other day, my recovering friend, I read out the story my friend in museums and art galleries told me about the folk tale about love (the one where the man kills the woman because he can’t understand that she tells him that she loves him beautifully). She was enraptured by the story which I read out from my version of the blog and asked me to give it to her to keep. So today, I thanked the friend in museums and art galleries that told me the story and her grandmother that told it to her. We want people to share our stories. We want them to have an impact upon people. It is a beautiful story, so meaningful and knowledgeable. I will remember my friend telling me that story forever. And I will remember telling it to my other friend and sharing it forever. It came from a woman to a woman. And then to me. And then to a woman again. It is a woman’s knowledge mediated by a man’s knowledge. Both the perspectives have been combined in it.

Holiday: Seeing My Friend; Darkness and the Shadow; Arianna Grande’s Separation; Violence in Films; The Young Couple

19.03.2024

It was a holiday today and as usual, I did some overtime on my holiday instead of having the whole day off. But the overtime and getting there and back only took up four hours of the day. So I have basically finished my Art History assignment. I will polish it off tomorrow. I spent about four hours today writing the assignment.

In the morning, I went and saw my friend, the one that is recovering. I bought her a beautiful bouquet of flowers – the most beautiful one in the shop. They have wonderful arrangements there. Very stylish. Hearing her charming voice and looking at her kind, friendly face is such a gift.

We talked about so many things. But one of the topics of the conversation was the darkness inside each of us and the shadow. Carl Jung said we each have a shadow self which can destroy everything. We are scared of it. It is against society. We deny that we have these aspects. People keep on saying I am really nice. That’s probably one of the reasons I get friend zoned, aside from the obvious reason that I am Indian and act like an Indian person. But I know that I have a shadow side. I have had anger management problems since I was a little child. The only one in the family. I’m the only one in the family that is The Tiger. It has come down to me. I control myself nowadays for the most part. But what anger asks for is release. Around almost all of the people I know, I keep my mouth closed and I keep myself chilled out. I let them get away with stuff that I wouldn’t tolerate for one second on the street or in other situations. That doesn’t mean that I don’t get very, very angry sometimes. And that anger in those situations is needed for those situations – to give you strength and to make you dominant and to be feared. People look at me and don’t realise who they are messing with. They assume I’m a pushover. I’m not. Outside of my personal life, I don’t care that much to make it an issue. Unless you seriously step over the line. Then there will be repercussions.

It all comes down to self-control. You can control yourself for a long time. A very long time. Then, one day, you can’t control yourself any more. You have to have some kind of release. That’s why I do weights and exercise when I can get up in the mornings – for the pain and to let the aggression and anger out. I have been controlling certain aspects of my self and body for a long time now without a proper release. This is a man’s body. A warrior’s body. This body was built for the Three ‘F’s – Feeding, Fighting and the other one.

When the release comes and all self-control breaks down, which has taken up so much energy and resource, all of the aspects of the shadow self come out. In the myth, when Paris’s love and desire for Helen awakes and he cannot control himself in the face of marriage, the law and the political accords which protect Helen and the King, there is absolute carnage. Violence breaks out all across the world. In the modern period, when war breaks out, the soldiers start raping the women. They torture the prisoners of war. They kill children. They go on a rampage. There is no longer any self control or any vestige of human decency left. The shadow begins to rule. You have to fight the shadow. It is dangerous. It is inhumane. It thirsts for blood and pain, domination. But you also have to be aware that the shadow is in you. Because you sometimes need it. Sometimes, you have to fight. And then, when you have to fight, you have to be strong, capable of winning and ferocious. You have to become The Tiger. But the point is not to get carried away and to know that the shadow has to pass. Do not maim or kill. With actions or words. When Kali the Dark Mother Goddess is filled with blood lust, in the myth, the only thing that can stop her is that her husband Shiva contained her wrath by lying down on the floor and having her dance the dance of war upon his body. It is control that preserves the whole world from absolute destruction, as we know in the nuclear age. You have to be aware of the consequences of your actions.

I read the newspaper for once on the Tube and I heard about Arianna Grande’s separation. And then I thought about some of the lyrics on her new album. Love is not an easy thing. Getting love is not easy. Keeping love is not easy. Loving someone is not easy. Why is it not easy? Because there is a sad lack of acceptance of others in this society. In Indian culture, you accept who you have in an arranged marriage. They are bonded to you for life. They say that you are reincarnated again and again in different lifetimes to be with your partner. So you have to compromise. You don’t know them. You learn them. You don’t love them at first. You learn to love them. You appreciate that no one is perfect. You appreciate that there will be differences between men and women and you allow each their own sphere. What about Western culture? Marriage is no longer for life for most people. Any sign of a problem and they give up. If you are in any way different and not a clone of the other person, they don’t value you as a partner. People look for the one – in Indian culture, many people can be ‘the one’. Because the West emphasises individuality and uniqueness in love, whereas traditional Indian philosophy is that feminine and masculine are two separate energies that combine in recurring ways across history and time to create the whole. So there is no uniqueness, only the reiteration of what what has always been. You are supposed to think the same, do the same things, if someone is not perfect, they are expendable. Western romance is super demanding and unrealistic. Indian romance accepts compromise and is realistic.

And what about me and Helen? I know that Helen is not the same as me. She wants to be individualistic, whether she actually is or not. I am in the community and see myself as part of the community. She wants to be completely independent. I rely on my family. We don’t agree on a lot of things. I am cynical and pessimistic. She has criticised me for it. But do you have to have exactly the same thoughts in life to love someone? Do you want to be trapped in a bubble your whole life where everyone just thinks the same things? What about union in society? What about compromise and agreement? What about the strength of combining different perspectives? Moot points. Who knows what is happening in Helen’s life and what she thinks. Who she might be with. Who she might love. Who she is looking for. Do you know what my friend said about her to me privately? She will never think that anyone is good enough for her. Forget about her. I don’t know why they said that, but that was their impression of her.

The British public is worried about violence in films. While the world burns around us in hate and pain, apparently the problem is violence in films. The British public is ignorant and ridiculous and I wouldn’t even trust them to carry my piss down to the sewers, let alone rely on their opinion in a referendum or in a public vote. Democracy is the rule of the stupid. The very idea that the majority of people must be right is stupid. The minority cannot accept that idea. I am in the minority. Why would I follow a philosophy that disfavours me? I am not stupid. I am a realist. Whatever anyone thinks about me. I want a happy ending. I don’t believe it is going to happen. I want to believe. I don’t believe.

I saw a young couple when I was eating in the night after work. They were sitting right next to me so I could hear everything they were saying. This was annoying as I don’t want to be with a couple while I am in my free time eating my food. First I saw the young man’s face and I took an instinctive dislike to him. Then I saw that his girlfriend actually looked alright. So I said to myself, that’s pretty typical. They all seem to go out with absolute tools, people I think are morons and that I would never go out with in a million years. Then, you know what he did? He started shouting out in an obnoxious way to her not to touch him so that everyone in the whole place could hear. That’s the kind of weird and dysfunctional relationships that go on around you with these people. How can they put up with each other and be attracted to each other in the first place? This is why I avoid being around other young couples. I don’t want to hear or see their mess. It affects me negatively. I hope I never find out who Helen has chosen or will choose over me.

The Three Women; The Nightmare of God; Time Runs Out; Love Runs Out; A Good Day at Work; A Thank You Note; The Rejection of Difference and Repression

18.03.2024

There is a moment when the shine comes off reality. Some people hide from the ugliness of the nuts, bolts and the naked mechanisms. They deny, flee. But then, what about those that lock their eyes on the terrible truths and try to change the fabric of things in this world? Are they heroes or monsters?

When I finish a piece of art, I am always proud of my handiwork. It is a piece of me. So I was pleased with this one. And when I do the work, because it is digital art, I always post it straight away to share it with the world. I make it for the world as a gift. I work quickly. I think of my art as calligraphy – skills learnt to convey expression in a moment, years of refinement to produce spontaneity. The influence is from Chinese and Japanese calligraphy, the beautiful writing.

I was wondering if Helen really wasn’t well or if I had just read that into the situation. She didn’t look well to me and then there are other memories involved. Me and Helen are almost strangers to each other now. We haven’t talked for a very long time because we are never together any more. She knows about me because I want to believe that she reads this diary every night. What do I know about her? What I know of her is based on her behaviour rather than what she has told me. Her behaviour is distinguished by kindness and care. That is her personality. That is the personality of all the women that I am interested in. It is has become the most important thing.

It has been playing on my mind that Helen doesn’t seem well. Am I contributing to that with this diary? Why does she read it? The fact is that Helen suffers, with or without this diary. And then, when I saw her it was after a day in the weekend. Perhaps that is why. But feeling unwell also goes with stress. But all this could be a misunderstanding. Perhaps Helen is not unwell at all. Sometimes, I see her face and it changes from how I remember it. How do I remember it? The flashing brown eyes when she ambushed me – because usually her eyes are dark and black. They changed colour. The time when she changed her hair and I couldn’t recognise her when I looked into her face. The serious look when she is talking about something which she thinks is important, the intensity of her. The frown that goes down sometimes when you say something. The smile, like the smile of the Mona Lisa.

When people around you are unwell – possibly Helen and then my other friends – you wonder if there was a god, does he get nightmares about the way that he makes people suffer on this planet? How does he live with the guilt of what he causes to happen if he were real? Because it is not just them that suffer. It is the people around them that care about them that suffer as well.

In this low period, time has run out. It seems impossible to get anything done before and after work. Life is rushing along. There are so many unfinished things. Because the motivation for everything is going. There is no excitement or goal to work towards. What is the point of everything? When you are never going to get love out of it? That has always been the motivating force for everything.

Today’s workday was amazing. Even though I can’t control anything in my love life or my personal life – because you can’t control the behaviour and choices of other people – I can control what happens at work. Because when I do things, I am dominant and people follow me, whether or not they give me the formal recognition for it. So today, I gave tours in the art gallery which I wrote, including to one of the curators, my favourite. She loved the tour and gave such good feedback. She told me that I had made her see things in these familiar posters which she had never seen before. I don’t go on about it all the time, but I am very clever. And people recognise that when I talk about things. I went to a meeting to improve experiences for visitors within the museum and I think I made what was quite a good suggestion. I also helped a colleague with a problem that she was having. People often come to me for advice there. Because all the people that are close to me know that I make an effort for them and that I will always help them because they are like my family to me. I did some things for some of the people there that I will not mention here but which made me feel good about myself.

But when I got home, no matter how good the day is at work, I have to return to the situation. My personal situation. Your job can’t love you back. You can get satisfaction from it. But you don’t get the most important feeling: the feeling of being loved. Only a woman can give you that love and your children. That’s what these career women in London don’t understand. If you leave your job, you will be replaced within a week. Life will go on. People won’t even miss you that much after a while. But in a family, you are irreplaceable. You rule over everyone’s hearts. But such is the world that people have chosen a career and money over what is most important: love.

Someone sent me a thank you note for something I sent them. It was nice and unexpected. I like looking back at these notes and thinking about how you might have improved someone’s day just a little with what you did for them.

Lately, I have started thinking I should end this diary. This diary was the expression of love and an invitation for love. But where is the love? But now, it has become a habit. What can I write to Helen now? A love poem? She knows I am thinking about her. Should I complain that she does not love me? What else have I been doing? The speculations about Helen, I keep to myself. The jealousies I keep to myself. The darkest thoughts, I keep to myself. If I told the reader some of the darkest moments and the thoughts, the intensity, they would be shocked.

My hope for the future is that someone doesn’t have to live through what I have had to live just because they have been raised differently and from another culture. But the reality is that things have actually got worse over time and not better. Things will always be like this in this country. Because it is hate that rules and not love. And these women, they are nice people for the most part. But the way that they are and how they treat you is just as bad as everyone else because they can’t accept or love difference. And they don’t even realise that this is what it is. And on top of that, they are repressed. Repression is even worse now than it was in the past. And I feel it is linked to the rejection of difference. I know it. I can feel it. I always follow my intuitions.

Chocolate; A Kiss; Pride; Helen the Heroine; The Nurturing Instinct; Teasing

15.03.2024

the kiss

15.03.2024

what does a kiss take?

a kiss takes a thought

and makes it into a story

a kiss takes a dream

and makes it into a quest

what does a kiss give?

a kiss gives a moment

which becomes the eternity

of memory

a kiss gives an awareness

which changes your destiny

beware of a kiss

I eat chocolate every day because it simulates the same emotion as love. It makes me feel good. It gives me what is missing out of my life. I have been suffering from love starvation recently. Chocolate is a slight solution. It’s no accident that it relieves depression in the Harry Potter novels and is a cure against the Dementors. The author had a divorce. Like me, she was separated from the one that she loved. I told someone the other day that it is a simulation of love. She told me not to say that. She said it was sad to say that. What do these youngsters know about what it is like when the most important thing in your life is not there?

This morning, I saw a stranger woman. On these dating apps, you look at the photographs and you don’t feel anything. You are numb. This whole day, I thought I wouldn’t see any woman that I would look at. But then she was there. Beautiful, stylishly dressed. My exact type. We locked eyes. And suddenly, I was thinking about kissing her. A long kiss. You know what they say? They say ‘in your dreams’. It’s probably what Helen thinks if she does not say it. What encouragement has she ever given me this whole time? In your mind, it is not a crime to kiss a woman. As long as you don’t stare or make them uncomfortable. And just looking at her and thinking of holding her and kissing her sent a surge of feeling throughout my whole body. I could feel it in my head. The sense of connection and intimacy which you remember from before, which you are missing and craving. Of course, I did not talk to her. You see women every day that you would want to be with. And yet, if you ever tried to talk to them, they would treat you like a serial killer. The ones you know for six months or more do that – so with the ones you don’t know, it would be even worse. And you know something? I am never going to meet that stranger ever again. You never do. Life is not a movie where you coincidentally keep on banging into women again and again until they fall in love with you. And when they are in your lives all the time on a regular basis? Like I said, this is the society of love.

I passed the assessment at the Gardens. I’m officially on the team now. I put in a lot of time and work to do it. Because it was my duty. To save the world and all the plant life in it with my talents. To make a contribution. I have been raised to be a hero. I do the things that a hero does. I commit to education and learning to transform the world and make it a better place. It was my grandfather’s dream, my mother’s dream, so it is my dream. I do my level best to fulfil my duty. And when I do fulfil my duty? Then I am proud of myself. Because what do I get from it? I am in some gardens which I love and around nature. But I lose a whole day’s pay to do it. I travel one and half hours there in the morning and then one and a half hour’s back when I go in every week. But it is all worth it. When someone or something is worth it for you, you do it. Because as I often say, I have to look in the mirror and not see a monster. If other people can’t see you as the hero, that is their prejudice. Because I have done a lot of volunteering – and work that was hard and very involved. I know that I am a hero. Not just in terms of volunteering, not just because I am the first one with a PhD and published work in my family, but in my personal life and on the streets. I am proud of myself for doing what it takes to be a hero.

And in this diary, I am the hero. What about Helen? Is she the heroine? What have I actually said about Helen in this diary? Nothing really. Because this diary is not about Helen. It is about me and my love for Helen and what happens when you can’t get your love in life, when your love can’t die and you are stuck and can’t move on because of this society of love and its ‘diversity’. There is a big question about Helen though. Why can’t she stop reading my diary? Every night. Why was Helen so uncomfortable when I stopped talking to her and avoided her? Considering she told me that she didn’t even know me? Why does Helen even care in the least what I think about her? We never went out together because she is the one that said no. She is not my ex.

And yet, how can Paris stop thinking about his Helen? At any moment in the war, he could have handed her back over. It would have been over. Paris can’t. It doesn’t matter about the cost. Paris is in love with Helen.

I have been calling my friend every day because she is poorly and she is all alone. Everyone that has needed care and attention in my life and I could help them, I have done it. I am good at nurturing people and nursing people. Because I have a lot of patience and I am a caring person. Some people think I am nasty because I make jokes and tease people. That was the humour back in the old days which is what these youngsters fail to appreciate. I went to a boy’s school. That is what it was. Just because the rules of humour have changed whereas we are still the people with the same upbringing and experiences. It is not meant to be nasty – it is a form of friendliness. But the youngsters nowadays can’t laugh at themselves like we could. They are anxious and have issues. They lack our confidence in ourselves. However, times change. I have been taught my lesson. Not around 99.9% of women. With the men, it is still okay, with some of them.