chronicles of a wannabe gymmer

what is it about guys and gyms? this esoteric relationship that witnesses more love and hate twists than a saas-bahu serial courtesy e. kapoor?

i recently joined a gym. by recently i mean about 3 months ago. now typically, if you've seen me, i'm not quite the hulk hogan. but despite my slightly below average weight, i do like to describe myself as being somewhat athletic. while i may not have the right bulges, i do have the right lines and cuts which indicate potential for bulges. and this potential is exactly what i hoped to exploit upon signing up

right....so coming to this curious matter of guys and gyms. i see a lot of things when i go to the gym. not that i go very often. that's problem one. if i go two days in succession, i feel as if i've won the nobel prize or something. kudos to aman!! lets sit back and relax a day. or two. or three. who even thinks about the undoing of 2 days of backbreaking toil? not when there's xbox to be played, beer to be drunk, people to be met. that's all more important than keeping fit.

keeping fit. that's number two. i joined initially just to stay fit. thought i'd do cardios, keep my paunch reined in, develop some stamina. now here's the weird thing. there's something about a gym that makes you feel like you are capable of being a greek god. after a few days of cardio, i felt good about myself. i even went to the bathroom after one or two workouts to check myself out in the mirror. things were on track. yes!!! and then....you see the others. those hardcore gymmers, who come into the gym for about 2 hours a day, and do only weights. and you...you're trying so hard to put them down, saying they have no life and spend all their time sweating with other guys. that they have no brains, only brawn. sighhh...you fail to convince yourself. what can one do when next to him is a guy (call him X) lifting weights 4 times as heavy as this guy, whose biceps are twice as thick as one's body, and who looks like slapping bison dead with his right hand while skinning crocodiles with his left is his pastime hobby?

and yet, at the other end of the spectrum, you have what i will call the type 2 male. so round he tries to call himself aerodynamic. so hairy he says his skin is dark. and so sweaty, you have to wait after he's used a machine for it to dry. and he comes to the gym, this type two, wearing tight shorts (the sight of which makes my eyes bleed when he squats) and tiny tees that crawl up 8 inches when he stretches, revealing a forest of hair thick enough to camp in (ugh...what a thought!!!). and of course, he's bitten by the greek god syndrome, working out like it's his duty to reveal the pleasures of his self to the world.

so what is it that draws me to the gym? a typical person X, i'm always afraid, will start laughing when he sees the relatively puny weights i struggle along with. the average type 2 male is a burden on the eyes, his sweat is rancid enough to kill dead meat all over again, and his sweat (god have mercy) could pass for the black sea. so y do i go??

one answer could be females. but there's a flaw in this reasoning. the only females who come to a gym are the ones who need the gym. that is to say, those who look like beached walruses, but are in fact much bigger but lesser likely to breed. in the off chance that some slim attractive woman does turn up, hot figure and all, she drones like a bee drawn to the hive that is Mr X, he whose shadow could probably knock me over. so much for brain triumphing over brawn.

so here we are. wrong girls, huge guys, right girls going to huge guys, and huge guys. yet i still go, unfailingly, unwaveringly, unfalteringly, consistently, 2-3 days of our 7 day weeks. after dragging myself home tired from office. despite no visible effect on my physique. it really is a puzzle. go figure.....

Seeds of Hate

bombay
the city of dreams. i associate this city with the song 'laree choote' from the movie 'ek chaalis ki last local'. i heard it when i was about to leave delhi for bombay in may. it seemed to me to be full of sadness and hope. i could imagine bobby deol sitting at the door of a moving local, staring wistfully out at parallel tracks awash with orange glow from overhead streetlights. of course, the actual video was shitty, a group of people dancing like ducks running from a hunter. but this is my mind, my blog, my connotation. deal with it. anyway, as i was saying, the city of dreams.

but in the last month, so many people have had their dreams broken. many more have fled the city, in a rare instance of mass exodus. all these poor people have one thing in common. they're north indians. more specifically, up-ites and biharis. castigated and condemned for coming to the city of opportunities and stealing away jobs from the 'sons of the soil', they can't find support from any quarter coz the perpetrators have the people, the police and the government eating out of their hands.

i was in office one fine day, when i got a text from my mausi in hyderabad, hoping i was ok. i wasn't really, since i was in office against my will. but these are small matters. when i asked her why she sent this message, that's when i heard about the tension in dadar, and i was like 'hoo boy, here we go again!!' tension in dadar occurs more regularly than the weatherman's forecasts come true. anyway, i'm quite immune to them. i've walked at 11pm along streets so deserted with tension, one could easily mistake it for a curfew. the only inconvenience being that cabs become a precious commodity. those pricks have ruined my life here, making me beg to them.
but what of those who aren't immune? the economically weaker? the downtrodden? who's to save them from the hound-like packs of goons wandering the streets with bats and clubs in their hands, out for a kill? a kill at the bidding of a deluded son of a power hungry tyrant....

but there's a solution. north indian, you want to be safe from these people? come, stand with me. raise you voice. all together now. say it loud. 1-2-3.
"JAI MAHARASHTRA!"

come on guys....we have enough problems in india without regional politics slowing us enough to send us back into the dark ages. forget the states, we're Indians!