Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Tonight We Sleep In Hell


Diary Entry – 44

At two in the morning I woke up and cried out fu*k Jayalalitha. Jayalalitha is the chief minister of the state that I live in. A state with no electricity.

When you have a power cut at two in the morning, it will tick anybody off. In my state people blame Jayalalitha for their troubles the same way we blamed the dean of student affairs (aka dosa) in our college. We blamed him for the lack of water and the pathetic food. I blamed him more for the food than the water. Our mess + electricity fee + water fee per day is 75 rupees. It was a miracle that we even got food. My college is a management miracle that should be a case study in Harvard Business School. For the obese, joining my college is like joining a weight loss program. What could the poor old DOSA, do if he is expected to serve a full day meal for seventy five rupees apart from providing water and electricity. So whenever I seem to miss college, I think about the food, the water and the electricity and say to myself, “Home Sweet Home.” But home is turning out to be an even bigger nightmare. Nights like these where you spend swimming in the pool of your own sweat makes you miss hostel.

Some people from other states will now empathize with our problem saying that they don’t have electricity either. When this empathy comes from places like Kerala, it really pisses me off. The monsoon rains there makes the entire state feel like it is being air conditioned where as we people here in Chennai feel like we are living in a furnace. Empathy from such people is not wanted here. Chennai is hot as it is and the other day this is what my mom had to say:

Amma: Eda Kathri is coming to Chennai in another few days and will be here for the entire month. So don’t go out too much.

Me: Kathri? Is it one of our relatives? Why the hell does she want to stay here for an entire month? I cant entertain relatives, who decide to vacation in the hottest place in the world.

Amma: Ayo Kathri is not our relative. It is the name of hottest season in Chennai. It is going to get more hot from now on.

Me: What? That is worse. I wish Kathri was one of our relatives now. *sigh*

The power cut at two in the morning lasted for two hours. I couldn’t bear it and so I decided to take a bath. As I found my way to the bathroom in the dark, I saw a shadowy figure lurking around the bathroom. Times like that you wish you saw the reruns of the Karate Kid in Sony Pix. It is not usual to have power cuts at 2 A.M and I thought the thief’s played with the power lines. I was ready to ambush what I thought was a thief. It turned out to be a lady and the lady turned out to be my mother. I was glad that I hesitated with the punch. My mother was in the bathroom for the same reason as I was. She couldn’t bear the heat and wanted to wash her face and hands to cool down.


We don’t have an inverter in the house because of rationalization that we do in the house for any purchase we make other than food. When it comes to food, the people in my house will spend their entire fortunes on it. Sometimes I get the feeling we are buying too many sweets and ice creams. When I tell mother we should be saving she says, we don’t spend our money on any other unwanted things so we shouldn’t worry. She couldn’t be more right. We don’t spend money on anything at all. That includes the inverter. Whenever I tell her that an inverter is something we need in our house, I am asked the question on how our ancestors who had no electricity hundreds of years ago lived in this country. Then I am asked, how the British not only lived in the exact same place we are living in now, but also made a big city during a time when even a ceiling fan was a luxury. *face palms* is the only reaction I can give.

One good thing came out of this early morning nightmare though. Current came back at 4 A.M and we went back to sleep. When I woke up, mom comes up to me and tells me, I made some calls. We will have an inverter with 5 hours back up in our house in another few days. In my head I shouted, “Thank you God.”

I know my blog was about to face extinction. I have been very busy doing several things at once in life. A lot of good things came out of this blog and I will never let it die that easy.


61 Comments for this post:

  1. Lol...can I empathise if I've spent my life in Delhi without an inverter?!

    Try sleeping on the terrace when you're perpetually scared of the Monkeyman...scarred me for life I tell you!!

    Lol..nice post!! :)

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  2. You obviously haven't experienced the Delhi heat.Chennai is MUCH better.

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    1. Delhi has power cuts? :O I am starting to think that our country is poor.

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    2. We do have power cuts but not like Chennai.
      But the air conditioner does not help much.

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    3. Lol u cant say that. How can an ac not help? :D It must be broken ;)

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    4. Yes well, can't stay inside forever.And with the college admissions and stuff I'm barely home.At least Chennai has a beach :( Dayum.

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  3. Hyderabad is so hot now, I want to weep. I sit up in bed in the middle of the night, clothes (or whatever little of it I wear in summer) drenched in sweat, praying "Please God please! Let me sleep for at least an hour!" And this is even without the powercut. :/

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    1. Lol dont u have the monsoons in hyderbad? My geography is a little weak :D

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  4. Mumbai is crazy ass hot too. And the humidity makes it worse. Thank God there are no powercuts around my area yet *touches wood*
    Yaaay for the inverter :D
    Also, I hope you get time soon and you tell us all about what you have been doing!
    BTW I love the new layout or maybe I just saw it abhi, whatever,I love it! =P

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    1. I thought the entire city is flooded during the monsoon :O.

      The layout? You mean my blogs template? :) It has been like this for a very long time :)

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    2. Erm, monsoon starts in like July-August no?

      Template no, that is same. But I hadn't noticed some of the things on your blog. :]

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    3. Oh it is already raining in Kerala. I thought you guys must get the rain too. By the way, what is different in my blog from before?

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    4. Oh :o Wow!
      Well it's humid-er than usual here, thanks to the rainfall in Pune/other parts of Mah and what not, but monsoon though technically starts around mid-June, usually starts to rain during Ganesh Chaturthi,so July/August/September. :]
      I hadn't noticed the button, the pages also. :D That is new, or else I just wasn't paying attention =$

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    5. LOL I am leaving to Kerala in a another week so I can enjoy the rain there. LOL I havent tweaked this blog for a year now :P Didnt you notice the cob webs? ;)

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  5. I think its to do with today's concrete buildings as well...I remember my visits to Kancheepuram to my uncle's place...At the center of the house there would be a place for storing water and it would be open to the sunlight...and there would be trees around...And even in the worst of the heats the house would remain cool...Alas! Gone are those days!

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    Replies
    1. Our house is surrounded by trees too but it doesnt help much. :(

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  6. I thought Kerala had the best house construction methods. I love the design of the houses there. Being from Kerala, you can think of building one house in Chennai in Kerala style. Let the apartment dwelling people of Chennai learn from it.

    Destination Infinity

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    1. LOL i dont think the kerala style house is going to help the heat hehe and also the it is a lot more expensive to build such houses like that in the present that ever before. I have to be super rich :D

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  7. Dude, that first line had me in stitches! But I was hoping for more 300 references as the title so slyly suggested.
    Xerxes peon: Our arrows will block out the sun.
    Me: Appidyaa?? Super, when can you get started?

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    1. LOL now that is one three hundred reference I could never have thought of haha

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  8. Call me once Kudankulam is up and running, I cannot even fathom stepping into Kathri compounded with a 2 hour power cut.

    I guess its worse in the rural districts where there are power cuts for 16 hours a day.

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    1. LOL i think there is some new wind energy that is being supplied to the power cut is around 6 to 8 hours in the rural districts. Where are you by the way?

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    2. I`m happily perched in continental Europe where summer to the locals means 25 C. :P

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    3. Lol i am moving to UK next year. Where in europe are u? are u doing your masters or something? I am gonna miss the chennai heat once I leave this place I guess.

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    4. Yup, I stay in Germany at the moment where I`m doing my masters in Mechanical Engg and yes, you are most definitely going to long for the Chennai heat when you move.

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  9. Enjoyed the read....I can imagine. Only good thing about mumbai is there is not power cuts.

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    1. LOL at least there is hope of the monsoon coming soon :)

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  10. (Kund)'amma's reign is quite toppling yet no one knows why any one in power has to always do something that people would not like. "Give someone power and you will know who they truly are" goes a saying and as far as the other power-electricity is concerned, if given, we would have been sleeping, if not, find alternative current-the inverter, to sleep again... just like our nation which snores as it sleeps amidst all this thamaasha... helplessly.

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    1. We elected her because that was the only other alternative to Karunanidhi government wasnt it? lol we did not have a choice.

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  11. at least somethings still wakes all us in middle of the night :)..nice post

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  12. I hear Coimbatore is equally bad, if not worse. I remember the electricity used to go off, at the prescribed time, right on the dot! If only the same punctuality applied to other things.
    At least you don't have mosquitoes for company! :P

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    1. Well that is the case everywhere in Tamil Nadu. It goes off on the dot here in chennai too. Mosquitoes are very much here, though in lesser number. I dont think there is much water here for them to breed lol. :D

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  13. ahhh talk about it. I think this problem is pretty much everywhere in India. For electricity, Mumbaiakars are better off though.

    great post btw :)

    http://styledestino.blogspot.com/

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  14. I have felt the furnace like temperature in chennai, during my two years of life there.
    Good that you held back your punch :)

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    1. Apart from the heat, chennai is an awesome place you know? :)

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    2. No doubt. I totally agree. I have very much enjoyed my stay in chennai.

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  15. Ancestors lived in mud houses without mosquitoes to plague them. There was breeze swaying the trees those days.
    Now concrete palms have firewalled everything.

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    1. Yeah these are the pains of living in a modern world :)

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  16. Great thoughts you got there, believe I may possibly try just some of it throughout my daily life.

    Gift to Chennai

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  17. Now I feel so lucky to have automatic power backup in my building!

    BTW, nicely written post with subtle yet entertaining humor! :)

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  18. haha..read ur blog after a long time..even i haven't been writing for a while..yeah, I know hw it feels ..my parents also spend their entire fortune on food :D

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    1. lol i am sorry i keep bothering you with emails which are not meant for you. I live in constant fear of what i might send u by accident :D I made it a point to blog ONCE a month :D no pressure or regrets this way :D

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  19. That is why I escaped to kerala :P

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