Mahtoub

Last week ended with two rejections, both international and each at the final stage. If Indian gatekeepers demand revenues or at least projections of billions of dollars in profit, the Europeans probably needed someone younger with a PhD and a series of postdoctoral theses behind their name, maybe a female of colour, with STEM qualifications as a co-founder thrown in… But frankly, I have no idea why we weren't selected. Both were met with nonchalance, and I went back to laying tiles around the “Fountain of Youth,” the replacement of the cracked 50-year-old wash basin in my mother’s bathroom. “The Toilet of Doom” has been completed for a month now, with everything from sewage lines to plumbing, installing the potty and floor tiles, done by own hands, and is since in regular use - thank you!

The only thing these two rejection love letters, as I call them, achieved, was that I am no longer planning to participate in the third European event to which I have been invited. Considering the huge travel expenses along with the ritual humiliation involved in getting the Schengen visa, it may have been worthwhile if participating in all three or at least two events. Attending just one, that too with no foreseeable or tangible benefits, the juice is hardly worth the squeeze. Unless counting the subsequent “I am honoured and humbled” LinkedIn and other social media posts while trying to hoodwink people into believing that I am punching far above my weight. And talking of weight, it will also save me some money and the anguish of joining a gym, or the angst of dieting that I would have had to do in order to squeeze into my business suit.

Though, what truly surprised me, was how relieved I was at not qualifying for these programs. Was it my being hardened from years of rejections, both as a man, romantically and sexually and for my ideas and work, professionally? Stuck in my comfort zone, or finally embracing the essence of “Mahtoub"(Arabic for thus it is written)? Well, it's mostly a combination of the first and the last. Besides, I have a fair idea where to spend the scarce resources to upscale my project next year, which otherwise would have been blown on travel.

Yes, still running very short on funds, but providence provides.

And talking of Mahtoub, I have to thank Paulo Coelho for introducing me to the term, not that it was very mind-altering. Naseeb(fate) and Kismat(luck) serve almost the same meaning in speech, especially while complaining about life. Mahtoub is more impersonal, in the sense that one doesn’t blame it for his or her misfortune.

I must also confess that I ran through The Alchemist like a bulldozer, regarding it more of a psychedelic trip than literature. Whereby it joined the company of other life-view-altering novellas like Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, Ayn Rand’s Anthem, Huxley’s The Doors of Perception and Brave New World, and Sheldon Kopp’s The End of Innocence. And yet, like all trips, real, psychedelic, or literary, just like a river, it's never the same when you revisit them.

Once, hoping to recreate a coming-of-age jaunt (albeit a little late in life, but still with a bang) in Manali, with bikes, snow-peaked mountains, copious smoky substances, and someone to cuddle up with to keep the cold away, I repeated the same journey a couple of years later. Except this time it rained constantly, the place was deserted. A near curfew with cops patrolling the streets, as just a week earlier a bunch of Israelis had been thrashed black and blue by the locals. A regular event there, by the way.

Similarly, completely blown away by Siddhartha during my teens, I tossed it off as an adult, muttering something about the pretentious old German. Nonetheless, I am eyeing Huxley’s tomes to reread for some time now.

If they leave me disappointed, or worse, bored, I guess I would know what to say - Mahtoub!

The Fountain of Youth

Comments

Anonymous said…

Such a fun read with insights to draw nevertheless. The impersonal nature of Mahtoub though saved it from misuse or rather abuse, will remember the term in days to come

December 23, 2025 at 1:13 PM

When a Blind Man Cries - An Ode to Nivedita

Deep Purple’s “When a Blind Man Cries” is arguably one of the saddest rock ballads ever sung. But honestly, I was never a great fan of Purple and only started paying serious attention to the song after hearing a cover version by the German never-grew-old rockers Axel Rudi Pell. They did justice to the song in a way Ian Gillan and the rest of Purple could never dream— powerful, yet plaintive heavy metal vocals, with canyon-deep guitar riffs emerging from the core of the heart only to rip it apart, while tears stream down from empty eye sockets. Listening to this song invariably reminds me of a college senior and good friend, “Raja,” an ethnic Nepali who lived in a small room behind a pharmacy owned by his uncle, not far from my home. Short, stocky, thuggish but effulgent, we shared a love for books and rock music—though he leaned more towards metal. I started appreciating Iron Maiden thanks to him, while he tripped on Floyd...

Russi Topi and other Delusions

Ushanka-The Iconic Russian Hat a.k.a. The Russi Topi Out of the blue, I was contacted by a Russian chap I had once met at a conference. No prior message, no email, just a straight video call from his car. He claimed this was normal for them and immediately looped in a colleague. Nothing about Russia, or Russians, surprises me anymore, especially their business culture, or the apparent lack of it, so I didn’t react. From unscheduled calls to blunt emails and bullying tactics in meetings, it is all part of doing “Bizness wiz Mazeer Russha.” It was evening, I was free, so I let it slide. He had called for the unlikeliest reason, one I could never have guessed. They wanted to discuss sourcing construction workers from India. They began by complaining about how hard it was to get labour import quotas, pitched it as a “great opportunity” for me, and even gave me a glimpse of Lubyanka, former KGB and now FSB headquarters, from the car window. He then went off on a tangent, cursing the “pedera...

SHAME

I first tasted deep shame in 10th standard, delivered personally by a girl’s mother, who kicked me out of their house like some neighbourhood pervert. The irony - I had never touched the girl. We were just friends. Soon afterwards, my friends in her school, some gleefully to cause hurt, others as a word of caution, filled my ears about she was caught with some boy in the school toilet. They faced disciplinary action. While, I inherited the silent disgrace. The second blow came when I confessed to a friend’s girlfriend, who thought I was a Casanova, that I never had a girlfriend, or touched a girl, and that I was completely inexperienced. In contrast, she had been sleeping with her coach since school, followed by a relay race of men, eventually devirginized my friend, then when he left for higher studies, helped his best friend become a man. A few more years and bodies later, she married a gold digger from the back end of nowhere - that's decades before Soci...

Down Diya Brigade

In my class section in high school, there was a group of boys who weren’t particularly good at anything - not academics, sports, music, looks, not even cracking a decent joke or spinning a convincing yarn. Yet, they were united by one habit: Booing anyone and everyone who, in their view, dared to step out of line. Many of them were Boy Scouts as well, though not everyone. Told early on that they are a chip above the rest, with badges to proved it, they had an innate belief that they could lecture anyone. Same with delivering condescending comments to outright insults all in the name of greater good, and playing the victims when the tables turned. A trait many carried into adulthood, and by all evidence it still hasn't eroded for some now in their 50s. Though the two of the worst offenders were not scouts, they just played the role of being too cool to be a part of anything except Booing Cheerleaders. With my outspokenness, sometimes unusual and often outlandish...

Enlightenment

The voice on the phone delivered a phrase most men dread hearing from a woman, “Ravi, I have something important to tell you!” In this case though, despite being completely smitten with her during that period and even entertaining the rose-tinted fantasy that she was the one who got away, I had nothing to worry about. My strict code of not getting involved with married women kept me safe. I was, however, totally unprepared for what followed and even less how to visualise it. “My third eye has opened,” she announced with absolute seriousness, then launched into a ramble about Shiva Lingams, visions, stream of consciousness and pre-Columbian Hinduism as evidenced by how a US state, made famous by fried chicken, was actually named after the Sanskrit word for thorns "Kanthaka". It is usually not very easy to unsettle or surprise me with things spiritual, bottled or otherwise, and her cosmic revelations too barely moved the needle. Well, except f...

Fueling Thoughts

Search This Blog