Strange amounts of intuition

Thursday afternoon, I got a call asking me to come for a job interview on Friday morning. I agreed (pretty obvious I suppose), hung up and went through my mail to see what job the interview was for. Blah blah later, I don't know why but I had an almost certain feeling that I would not just get the job but that it would be good job and that I would get it on my terms. I was so certain about all this that I told 3-4 people about this "good feeling" I had. Sure enough, the next day, it was a breeze. I got along famously with my employers, I got offered a better job than I expected and I got as much money as I asked for. The stranger thing was, even as I was sitting there being interviewed (it was more general conversation than interviews), I had the same certainty all along. Which is why I stuck to my guns when they twice, briefly, tried to offer me lesser money.

About 10 days ago, my friend, whose hospitality I have been (ab)using for the last month and a half, left for Africa for work. When leaving and saying bye, she said she would see me when she gets back on the 2nd July. I told her that she won't see me at her place when she gets back because I would have a job by then and will be getting my own place.

This sense of intuition is something I had in very small measure till recently. But since a couple months, this feeling... no, sense is a better word than feeling for this phenomenon... this sense has been sort of growing. And I admit freely that at times, it tends to be most disconcerting. Suddenly, it becomes difficult to distinguish between intuition and fanciful thinking, and to some extent, also between fact and fiction.

There have been many instances in the last two months or so where my gut feeling has not just been on the target but has totally swamped it, this job business being just the most recent one. It has caused me to wonder about potential links between intuition and high intensity mental/ emotional activities. I have yet to come to any sort of conclusion or hypothesis though.

Anyway, on a more important note, I have yet to see my terms of employment. I hope I even get a contract at all!

Update:

This is 5 minutes after I published above. I called up my future office to ask about my contract etc. The big boss picked up the phone and told me that I and him and everyone else in that office is out of work since the company has just shut down. So much for intuition. :P

Plastic NGOs

While applying for jobs to NGOs, how does one react to an article like this?

http://www.hindu.com/2009/06/10/stories/2009061056832000.htm

A cyclone strikes an ecologically fragile area, and the people living there are in desperate need of food, water, clothing, shelter etc. Right on cue from the cyclone descend NGOs and private donors, doing their bit to help the suffering, distributing packets of food and water, and clothes too. I suppose they construct some make-shift sort of shelters too. Either way, those packets, well, they are actually packets made from plastic which are disposed of as and where. Mind you, this is an ecologically fragile area which is also a world heritage site.

So the cyclone leaves and leaves behind a flood of plastic. Not bad, eh? Who would have thought such things possible except in some weird sci-fi novel like The Garbage Chronicles? (For those of you who haven't read or heard of it, I suggest you start trawling through bookstores, second hand vendors, rare-book shops, websites, your uncle's attic, wherever, and get a copy. It will leave you amazed beyond words and when you turn to me thank me for introducing this master-piece to you, you will have no words left.)

How brilliant are these NGO people anyway? Are they still habitually wearing horse blinds? Is it really that difficult to think of such basic simple things? You know, like don't leave your trash behind? Especially if it happens to be a 'delicate' locale you are in? I wonder if some other NGO is now going to offer help in cleaning up the place. Or maybe the government should force the NGOs who are responsible for the plastic mess to clean it up too. Or maybe that is taking too much risk, lest they clean up the current mess and create a fresh one while they are at it. Nothing is too difficult for such brilliance to achieve.

Demotivating in some ways, as an aspirant to join the industry. But more frustrating than anything else, seeing how some of those arseholes probably earn fat cheques for being retards while my genius goes squandered! Aye, the nobility of intent is rather meaningless then, isn't it?

The power and the glory

I have now been in Delhi for 3 weeks and a few hours, where I am trying to find a means of living. The city was blistering under the heat of May when I arrived, and now it is still burning despite the respite that few brief showers brought. And while I am still as jobless as I was when I arrived, I feel that the downward spiral I was on has been arrested. Apart from a hiccup that might present itself in another week's time, I foresee the blinding glare of the future which makes me think I need to buy another pair of sunglasses. And even that hiccup, if it happens, I have a good idea of how to deal with it.

I have thunk things through, and made decisions about my course of actions based on eventualities that may arise. I have decided yet again that the notion of karma is mostly bullshit, and hence, I am out to craft my own path with little thought and consideration to the "right" way of doing things, to being "nice" or to the feelings of others who may be impacted by my choices. Consequences of actions can take care of themselves, and other such bullshit, you know.

I remember being like that for the most part once upon a time, and I think I also remember being happier then. Less involvement, at the personal passionate level, with most things and most people led me to being less bothered with how the former went and how the latter behaved. A blend of cynicism and carefree-ness was my typical take on life, and I wonder why I ever let that go. Actually, I know the answer to that one. I still don't care much about things, but its those pesky people who pierced my little bubble, came in, danced wildly around while I watched mesmerised, shed my armour and joined in the dance, only to realise too late that it was Siva's dance of destruction.

But that's alright. I have learnt a trick or two from Siva myself, such as the delicate art of balancing poison in my throat, and getting on with the rest of it. And of course, there is the power of herbs that one must never rely on but well, it sometimes helps anyway.

Another three weeks, I would say. It should take about that much time before I have a job offer that also offers to pay the kind of money I am asking for, which honestly, is not too much. And if it takes longer than that, well, I will just have to see when my money starts to run out. But either way, I am sure of it, I will be soon raising a toast to the power and the glory.