Anxiety and Pain

If only two words have to be used to describe in whatever length that I would like to express the state of my mind, then anxiety and pain would be just enough for it. But, why do these two words, (or feelings) best describe my mind at presnt? Why is that my mind even prevents me from enjoying the music played in front of a huge saturday evening crowd at a wine festival? The effect of such an intense feeling can only be overcome with the help of some deeper understanding about what causes them. Where is it, what is it and how is it that one can look for the true understanding? Does not understanding, by itslef mean something which is experienced with the help of our sensory receptors? The seonsory perception? Now what does that mean to someone other than a Psychologist? But still, we all live to experience so many different feelings that criss cross in our minds with velocities even fater than that of light. Now after so much of delibration, it is all the more obvious that there is utter confusion about even what the problem is about? The problem is just about the upcoming medical examination to decide the future course of action about the huge metallic presence inside my body? Steel like resolve, metallic voice etc., are commonly used to describe certain person's skills but by going a step further, if I have to describe my arm, I should call it the titanium arm. Funny, is it not? Stop, the fun ends there and the anxiety about what will happen next with these plates, screws and wires is a puzzle only the fortune teller, or in this case a doctor who specialises in shoulders, can answer. The result of this examination might relieve me of the two dreaded feelings that continue to control me, or may be that it only adds to further additional feelings. Time alone can answer this question but the proper realisation what causes these emotions can actually lead to the deletion of the question itself rather than provide answers to it.

The concept : ICE

ICE stands for InterCityExpress, the super fast trains thats cruise along the rails across Germany and nearby European nations. So Express in real sense should mean something very fast and ICE doesnot just read as Express but true to their names are really fast. They clock around 250 kmph at certain stretches but the fascinating part is the relatively very little sense of the speed that you get when inside one. It travels really smooth so that a cup of coffee would never spill over or reading a novel with all those tiny letters will not be a difficult affair. More so when the train brakes, it stops without making you fall to the front. Fast is not the only trait of an ICE, the interiors are indeed a concept in themselves. Sleek doors and illuminated displayboards, lack of any sharp edges near the seats or arm rest or overhead make it a kindergarden safe place even for naughty kids. If there is a train which lets you see through the entire view upto a meter across a glass window, then it should go slower. For, it gets difficlut to really observe something on the move. With on board restaurant and bar like service it is indeed a concept in train travelling. Toilets are in the middle of everywhere but still one likes to visit this part just to see what is new overthere in the endless list of comforts. Looking under the seat, one finds an electrical plugging device, a headphone socket and a clean matted floor. Visible attractions, if only are far and few, the invisible technical details which go in to making this sleek white giant in motion, are much more in number. How to summarize this all???? Shall I call it a SCIENCE FICTION in Real life!!!

The Grey Monk

Put in another way, the island of the grey monks translates to Schiermonnikoog, in Dutch. May be I should have put it the other way round. This small piece of island with sand, beach and water around lies to the north of the Groningen province of the Netherlands. So, what is so fascinating about this island, well the very fact that I made a visit to this island does not necessarily make it so special. There are other reasons to it like the kind of things that you can get to feel with your physical senses. There are other things that you can only feel when you are in the midst of the open vastness that the island can offer to you. My travel to this island was by a very fortunate coincidence on my birthday. I thanked all those who wished me a wonderful birthday, that I got a great experience as a gift. The ferry service from the main land took us nearly three quarters of an hour to reach the island jetty. In fact it was very cold out there as anybody would guess in the month of december in this part of the world. May be that my excitement level was a bit elevated, helped me fight the cold temperature a bit. That in turn allowed me to reach the open deck of the ferry where I could get a glimpse of the Wadden sea. Sea gulls were all around us and the shifting sands (as they are called) were very close to the ferry. There, as the birds made their their fly and land sorties at the same time, I made my pictures and looked around like a child throw open the doors to the candy shop. I did not, for a moment know, what to see and where to look at. Then I realized that I was no different from a mind possessed by the devil, for a change here it was an angel called Nature.

The trip to Wonderland:

The pictures in this particular blog speak more than what you could hear from the words. Yes, the following write up is about the visit I made to one of the fairy tale castles nesled in the southerrn sate of BAVARIA, WHERE once Kings and Queens ruled. Bavaria is even today the most popular tourist destination in Germany. On a boring evening of a friday, I statred to converse with my collegue about the weekend getaways near stuttgart. One of the getaways was this Neuschwanstein Castle from which Disney drew inspiration to design its logo. The picture was so impressive that despite the bad whether forecast for the weekend we decided to head straight to this spot next morning in the car of my collegue.

The last Chapter or more aptly the last day of my Hamburg trip:

Last day of the experimental period is always the best part of the entire trip. Thoughts of going back home to just stretch your legs in the home couch, eating the age old dish of Curd rice with mango pickle and what else not. Any modern Italian pasta Napoli or Rissetto could not stand in front of my love for curd rice with pickles. So with all these thoughts in mind and with a sense of sucess with the aim of the trip (research measurements of course), it was time to look around the Hamburg city. For all its glory as a trading hub and a victim of terrible war which almost razed it down to rubble, Hamburg remains astonishingly Hamburgish. Oh, by Hamburgish I mean the life of Hamburg, its Elbe river. The tunnel which runs for close to a km I guess, under the river could be easily found in wikipedia search but what fascinates me is the size of the container ships that pass over the tunnel. On that particular evening, it was just cold enough to warrant a jacket. I was upto it and reached closer and closer to the harbour( of course this one is in the river and not a sea) against the cold wind and the sea gulls that love the wind to move like air acrobats. Hunger strikes when wind hits hard aginst you, and the remedy was just a few steps away, Creps with choco cream was just the right calorie filled diet that could keep me going. But the unexpected turn of the evening was nothing other than the grand sight of a Titanic like Cruise Ship, the second largest in the world, docked in the harbour. Though at a distance away from me, it reminded me the lavish interiors that I saw in the Nat geo channel. After watching the ship, with of course wide open mouths, it was time to utilise the reamaining sunlight to walk to a neighbourhood river side to have a look at the U-boat used by the German navy. It was quite a distance away but the sheer surprise that was awaiting me kept me on my foot as fast as I could. Also the sweet creps kept my apetite, down for food and high for new experience. At a distance in the fading light of the evening( 7:45 p.m) there was this imposing black figure of U- boat with its periscope and luft (air vent) popping out of the silent water. The torpedos that these U-boats carried were as immense as these so called small submarines. So with that the evening said good bye to the sun and I decided to test the night life of the Harbour City. Any Harbour city has its rich villas and of course filthy back lanes. But on my way back to the main city center I walked passed old structures which were once used to store tea and I was quite convinced that some of these storage houses would have certainly had some Indian Tea in them. So with a U Bahn- trip ( the trams have this name) it was already the Spring exhibition site at the St. Paulis Hamburg Dom. The same old giant wheels that we all know were entertaining but these were really the giant of the giants. With a long look from a distance the glitter, shine and glamour of the most envied part of the city, the so called red light area of Hamburg, was visible. Just it doesnot sink into my head why so many people flock here just to have a pass time, and see things from a distance and do nothing really. I was one of them but the huge sign boards and the open bars and table dance pubs only made me feel a bit of adult and temporarily forget that I was still a, so called new adult. The grand restaurants and the long and wide streets were real paradise for money filled pockets because the immense scope for spending in this area is real. Now and then came those dance girls from inside their secret enclosures to show them to people outside, not of course for a long time. Then with a slow walk down the street took me to a huge building which had 5 green cars in front with a POLIZEI label. The Police station is as imposing as the once old street used for drying up huge navigation ropes from the ships. Reeper Bahn I guess is its correct spelling, Bahn means street or road. And then as in any such area, there were clients waiting for customers and customers looking for good place to hang out. I was there among all of them looking like a child lost in a new world and being loooked upon as an outsider feeling a bit uncomfortable. It all melted away soon as a few rain drops touched down on my cheeks and I started to feel hungry and thirsty again. So the next stop was a huge Pizza Cafe and only with a Gross Apfelschrole (Apple juice with mineral water) my thirst and with an Italian Spagetti my hunger were both quenched. It was already 11:30 in the night and to find the way back to the research center with the last available connecting train, I rushed to the nearby train station and this time again I had to cross the street and I did so with a feeling that " may be next time, some more time".

So I would not call this anything other than my ADVENTURE TRAIL.

The dinner at the Italian Restaurant : Buon Appetito !

16.04.06

As usual, after a long day time sleep to compensate for the tiring night shift, I returned to the beamline. It was Eric's idea to have dinner at the Italian restaurant which he came to know from the beamline scientist Adam. We drove quite some distance to reach the resaturant and finally we saw the Vagabond, Italian Restaurant. The decision was already made to visit this restaurant but when I saw an Indian retaurant just across the street, my mind was longing for Indian food. But to change the plan now, I was not interested. With the hope that the food at the Italian would be as good or to say as thrilling as any other new taste would be for me, we sat at the restaurant. First came the waitress and I had to get it across her to ask for a big Bitter Lemon. Then I was presented with not a menu card but a menu board. All I read in it was more Italian and German, where to start and what to ask for !!! Seems like I was at the middle of an alien land, finding it difficult to even ask what I want to eat. Money is in the wallet but the difficulty to find something good to eat when you hungry seemed to me like a punishment. Punishment was it, in the real sense as well after the food arrived.

The cold waiter who took the order for the menu could not even explain what Risseto was, afterall all, not everyone knows what it means at a first glance. "Risseto is Risseto" came the answer. O.K, now the choice has been made, all I could do was to hope that the dish is managable with a bit of salt and pepper. I had such a low expectation for it that when the dish arrived I was not disappointed at all. More salt and pepper made it edible for me, at the same time my hunger helped me finish the dish as well. But the price of the dish and the hunger of the moment coupled with the cold waiter made the start of the dinner a bit harsh. With time and more food in the stomach, disappointment gave way to " Life is like this, come on" attitude. One more dinner, one more day past by and the lessons keep coming. I am proud that I crossed this situation, but hope that I do it better when confronted with a similar situation.

So, I would call this post as my Cold Italian Connection in Hamburg.

Life with Research:

Confession : I write my blog like I write an email to my friend. I have no habit of preparing a post.

12.04.06 - 18.04.06 - Beamtime at Hasylab X1 Beamline, Hamburg

Tonight, I am here at Hamburg, the synchrotron radiation source DESY to perform some measurements in order to continue my research. Leaded walls and security signs litter the area and in the middle of the night I am surrounded by coils over coils of wire and equipments.

All looks fine because I am lucky to have gained entry to such an research institution and to use the state of the art infrastructure. But with all this comes the responsibility to use the facility to the maximum extent possible. For quite some time now I have a starnge didorder where I am with low confidence and motivation. I was not lke this before and I guess that this has something to do with my health as well.

New friends and new places and always a new information at every turn. Be it the Mag Pie Robbin which sleeps in the branch of the tree at night or the new up coming buds from the barren trees of the last winter. Also It makes me feel strange that I use the fork and knief every night in the restaurant and find not even a single dish with rice.

All this is fine and I am still carrying on with an open mind and a sense of thrill and expedition. I seek help in myself to find the way through the dark. I hope that is the secret of me writing this blog as well.

So, what title could sum up this blog? I found it. Yes, it is exactly the ? mark.