Valar Morghulis ... Valar Dohaeris

"Are you going?" You had asked.
"Where?" , my response, to which you had replied..
"Under the chair to cut the hair..."
Lameness, from the very first day I met you, till now, you are full of lameness and sadness. "syed"
But today as you bid your final adios to Quick Heal, I ask you "you going?" and I wish the answer would be so lame. But you are really going, for greener pastures, and I sit here feeling the exact same thing- like how i felt when Luis Suarez Left Liverpool for Barcelona.

Today is your last day and NO , this post is not to tell you how good you are because you are not. Nobody is. the world is not a perfect place, people are full of imperfections, but somehow over the last 2 years we gelled so well, our friendship connected to the whole different level.  * Okay okay. no more philosophical shit. not today*

Now that you are leaving, I am having a stark realization about the things I will miss about you. and whoa! the list is endless.
So, this blog post is about me, like they always are. I am selfish you see...:P

Ok, before you go all emotional and sentimental I want to clarify few things.

A) No,  I did not shed any tears, but you ought to cry today.
B) Ofcourse you are still in Pune, and we will meet often for Live screening of Liverpool -Manutd game and Euros.
C) Skype is life saver these days. But 9 x 5 , that's roughly 45 hours of our life we are in office and it sucks to the core that you are not going to be there for larger chunk of it. Hence, the whole emotional missing drama.
D) Now that I have finally written a blog post and done my part, you gotta give me a quilled caricature of Tyler Durden.

13 things I will miss about you 

1) Pao calls.

Who will call me pao now?

and most importantly, whom will I call pao now?

Not everyone will understand the significance of having at least one "paon" colleague , but Goans certainly understand it. 

I will miss being called pao.

2) GOT references.

Thank you for forcing me, literally begging me to watch this series. and thank you for keeping me intrigued throughout with striking information from the Book. 

I will miss our Valerian talks.

Valar Morghulis.   You know nothing Chloe.

3) Tyler Durden.

First rule of Being Tyler, don't talk about him, 

Second rule of being Tyler, you don't talk about him.

Only you know the Tyler in me. Tyler in me is not diplomatic as you say. he ain't. Thank you for recognizing the Tyler Durden in me and accepting him, Tyler is going to miss you. *inverted smile*

4) Goan Snacks

Thank you for stuffing me with so much of cashews, dodols , bebincas , coconut cookies every time i missed my home. I remember you used to keep even a smallest bite saved for me. How will my craving for Goan snacks in office be fulfilled? :(

5) Football 

Discussing football with you was so much fun, and teasing you when man utd lost, even better. ofcourse that was very often .. :P   Shahh , Manchester United is going to lose hell lot of games from now on and I will miss the sadistic pleasure I get in teasing you.

6)  your tantrums

Your tantrums about calling me sad/gay (sometimes both) and what not.

asking me "have u seen "this" /"that" ?  when "this and that" were some serials / movies which 90 percent people haven't even heard of, and then when I say no, calling me sad, it was so unfair you know, but still, i'm going to miss it, it was fun,

About me coming late to office (which is very rare :P) and about me being insomniac.  

who is going to tease me now ?  

7) Movies.. (ENGLISH movies)

Discussing movies other than bollywood, I should put it as this. Seriously. Who is going to ask me about all the superhero movies now? and how will I get evil grin when i lie that i saw "cute kaminey" instead of Superman vs Batman.  Speaking english, walking english , talking english and discussing english, you are taking away a hell lot of English out of me, I hope you know that  ;).

8) Gifts , gifts and more gifts.

The amount of gifts we  have shared, i think not even my all ex girlfriends combined have given me so many things. :D   Out of every thing, Mella remains my favourite, my quilled mellisandre. Night is dark n full of terrors. And jurgen klopp.  

Yes yes, I will water the fortune plant daily. I wont forget, promise :D 

9) HIMYM references.

Saluting when the word "major" comes up. Or you calling me Ted and me explaining you Barney's graphs about everything. It was fun, nobody else got how I met your mother jokes better than you do.

"Major missing" 

10) Linux commands.

Thank god you were there to save my ass everytime my lizard brain kept forgetting Linux commands. Our grand hacking plan is still ON , very much. But i will have to google every Linux command now. When you were around, everything was so simple, even the toughest of linux related query was just a phone call away, from taking the remote of my machine and turning off my Kali's firewall, to installing vine, everything will be sorely missed.  My beloved Kali is going to miss you. 

11) Telling you stories. 

Oh yes, you were always an ear to me blurting out about all my women-escapades, ex's , crushes, and all the time i failed/passed , all the time i screwed up, won over. Reading my emails and giving me advice about all that was wrong/right in it. i will miss sharing all my stories with you, (mostly girl(s) related.:P)  but still, other stories as well, about global warming etc :D

12) Hearing stories

Damn, this is the worst thing. getting to know so many theories, (ice cream theory, rings the bell? ;) )  hearing out all the gossips and happening in office. who is after whom and who proposed her, all this girly talks , shaah, i am going to miss this the most tbh :P   you were like my inside agent in QH.  Plus, also, which girl gave me compliment and what was the compliment, detailed information provider you were. I am never going to know all these stories now, I feel like an outsider without a trusted insider already :(

13) 13 theory.

Oh ya!! like I always say , everything in my life finally boils down to 13. this number 13 is everywhere, even this list i am unknowingly ending on 13th point. you were the only one who believed in my 13 theory, its hard to explain it to anyone else you know, people call me mad :P

See, the list is not even half done, but i am ending it on 13. (just to prove my point maybe)  and having said all this i genuinely want to wish you all the best in future and you will be missed badly. stay intelligent, smart, like you always are and lame and sad like you always are.  

You understood me like nobody else, the time i was sad in Feb and prior, the time I was happy, the time I am Tyler, the time I am Cornelius, the time i am Jaqan haguar to the time i am Daisy , you just knew who i was and what i am. you were there for me in the happy times and sad. We started as Goan colleagues in this company and friendship connected to the level of brotherly-sisterly affection, where you understood me, accepted me and saw me for who i am, confided in me and told me i am not as weird as i come across.

Okay, i know you would want to kill me for making this dramatic post even more dramatic and only thing you want is the poem on your weird theory, and i am getting to it. you will get it soon., :)

This post though , is just to let you know that within the numbered days we had so much joy and laughter and memories, and for that I will always be grateful.. :-)

We all gonna miss you a lot!

Take care, adios!!

And have a wonderful Life ahead scripting Linux.

All the very best :)

H@ppY N3w Y3@R

New year; this is one time of the year all the narcissist, pessimist, optimists, misogynists along with every other misfits of the society join together and do/act what they call as a “celebration”, it differs from people to people; parties to parties, but most of the time, it revolves around drinks, booze and sometimes, if you are lucky, a midnight kiss. 

So cliched and regular;

It’s a morning after the great 31^st, people somehow assume that you have a hangover, and yet, you are expected to turn up in your office, wearing your best formal attire in a meeting and deliver a presentation.

My manager looks at me with somewhat disjointed look, it’s hard to figure out his looks sometimes, he is wearing blue jeans, so this must be Friday.

I sit there in the conference full of mangers and bosses, all suited up, their bald head shining, their face beaming with confidence, a fake confidence; a mask which they have learned to put on their faces so well, parker pen in their pockets, iphone 5, 5s, 6 ,6s, buzzing, with the same irritating ringtone, yes, they are all busy and they are all waiting for me to deliver this presentation about the new vulnerabilities discovered in our product.

“Get those glares off will you?” my manager whispers to me in his irritable voice. I have worn a crumpled white shirt, and faded dark blue jeans, yeah, I am the Steve jobs type; except I didn’t invent an iphone and neither I own one. I don’t want to use the shitty product made by children in China. Plus, it’s the easiest to crack, I have always preferred blackberry over any other phone, their sophisticated software keeps me and all my hacks/emails safe.

“you wouldn’t want to see me without them” I shoot back without looking at his face, yet another face beaming with confidence, a fake one at that.

“Allright, as long as you sell them with the security discoveries we have made..” he scoffs with a resigned voice and I flash my teeth at him. I haven’t brushed; I smell my own bad breath.

“Gentlemen, anything to eat?” asks the senior manager.

After gulping three cups of strong coffee, you don’t feel any hunger, neither, you feel less sleepy. Coffee was meant to provide you a kick, I suppose, to charge your motor neurons and get you “charged up” for the outside world in a better way. Or maybe that was just a marketing trick they used.

After gulping three cups of strong coffee, I still don’t feel any difference, my eyes still bloodshot red, the pupils dilating, eyelids constantly in a state of coming down like a shutter waiting to close down, and I am the owner of it, pulling it up against the force and inertia and gravity, what the hell is gravity, you don’t know gravity when you are an insomniac.

New year; people get excited for no reason, I just want to tell them.. “hold on, relax, nothing has changed, you have the same shitty job, the same shitty spouse ,same shitty car and same shitty routine, nothing changes, what is there to get excited about? Only the calendar has changed”

It’s the same world we live in, filled with corruption and mis use of power, of religious politics and dowries and farmers committing suicide. This is not a fresh start for all those vices, if it is, then yes, it’s a new year for me, but its not, it’s the same old year for me, New year; just like the old one.

I explain my part of the slides, and its well appreciated by everyone involved, some silly questions asked, non technical mostly, which I answer with ease. And then they discuss how our product has so many security loopholes? “ya right” I smirk inside my mind, If at all I go public or even private with the number of security defects I discover every time I use this product, this company will come to a stall.

But, that’s not my job and not something which I want to do, I want to stay an introvert, as long as I am leaking a few at times, it keeps me safe, gives me a low profile. It’s important for any hacker to stay low, not over do anything, or they portray you the genius of the world, give you more and more work and that’s not what we aspire for. We at FTW have been asked not to escalate our selves.

New year, finally the topic is back again in the conference, the sweets have arrived and all the seniors are eating those with a smile on their faces, again, a fake smile, fake beaming smile, fakers, all are fakers , nothing is real in corporate world, we are all meant to wipe our clients asses, US clients, UK clients. What has this country come to? Where is this country heading?

It’s been a while since I have slept. Must have been around 3-4 days or maybe more, I don’t even remember. That’s the thing about insomnia, it’s not a disease, it’s an illusion, a tangent of a circle of a tangent, attached ninety degree to its base and revolving anti clockwise with a centrifugal force applied. Or is it centripetal ? it’s a perpetual dilemma inside an already camouflaged dilemma.

Last night, I heard people outside wooing, cheering, wishing, dancing, kissing and doing everything other than what I was into.

I stood in my balcony with a coffee mug in my hand, watching the city lights glow further away and I laughed hysterically; slowly and then all at once. I laughed at their idiosyncrasy; their delusion, their fake hopes and their fake promises, their fake resolutions, fakers, everyone around, faker.

The city lights kept glowing and my monitor screen kept blinking as the Gh0stRat made entry into every machine that was ON, every laptop that was connected to all those mobile internet providers.

People; normal people, feel that the congestion they are experiencing in their network, the slow internet is down to the fact that there is too much “traffic”; I laughed at the very same thought of theirs. Traffic, that’s what normal people call it, traffic; it’s not something which you experience in the internet, it’s never traffic, traffic is such a physical word, it applies to things, cars, trains, air traffic. Fine; you have it, but internet traffic? Bullshit.

It was a well planned, well timed DDOS attack initiated by us, and the enormity of it was so much this time, the targets were 99 percent achieved, the success rate made me beam with confidence and smile with confidence, not the fake smile which we see everywhere, it was a real smile on my face, and I was so lost into tracking the nodes of it, flushing the .dat file from every machine using the script that I almost lost track of time and then, just like that it was morning, the day after, first day of new year, the night these people polluted our environment, the air that we breath, we polluted their computers, tit for tat;

As the clock struck 12, they shouted happy New year; fireworks, a lots of those went in the air, bursting polluting the air, already 90 percent polluted air in this megacity, noise pollution wasn’t even considered. People do this to themselves; pollute everything and everyone they belong to, the environment, and then they complain, get weird formulas, odd number of cars on the roads , even number of cars on the road, cars with odd number plates, cars with even number plates. There is so no such thing as odd and even, the entire world comprises of binary. Zero and one. You initiate ‘one’ somewhere then you can’t undo it, unless everything shuts down. And then initiated again, applying zero.

That’s exactly where M@dR1 is spot on, he is spot on about a lot of things, about how we should erase everything and start over, how, when evil grows, there must be a shut down and a restart. We buy his philosophies, every one of us believed into him and his ideas, his vision. 

A not so while ago, even I were amongst these celebrity kids, hanging around everyone and everywhere, being a faker, roaming on the streets celebrating new year. Firing crackers, shouting at the top of my voice, drinking, vomiting and then drinking again, an act of socializing what they used to call, now I see it as an act of faking.

But eventually, every one changes, and everyone has to change, everything has to change.

I clearly remember the day it all changed for me, the day I changed, the faker in me died and I became a part of this revolution.

It was 13^th of December 2013, a Friday.

I lay there listening to the humming sound of tap slowly transforms into whooshing sound of water followed by hissing and dripping, I felt the hard hitting noise of water falling on the tiles; tethering.

It wasn’t my turn that day. It was Rogers. I watched him sleep with his shorts slid on his fat ass showing his bum-cleavage.

A cockroach was strolling joyously on the half eaten pizza lying on the small table, its antennae vying for signals in all direction probably blessing the original owner of that pizza.

In a half asleep state I lay there, half dead, half hung over, like a lifeless body; lazy.

The Liverpool and Manchester flags waved their own sweet glory at the side of the a 29 inches television set with Liverpool flag fluttering ferociously owing to its victory the previous night.

Three beer bottles were fallen lifelessly on the smudged floor, smudged with butter chicken gravy. Next to it ,a newspaper spread on the floor containing other left-over food items, cashew beans and a half full beer bottle, the owner of it, Viresh, lay further ahead, with wide open mouth snoring ever so loudly.

I watched it all; I didn’t know how long I was watching it with smeary eyes until the bell rang.

 Once, twice and then continuously for few more times, my eyes were wide open now.

Again, nobody got up. “bastard, get that” I shouted, but nobody responded. Viresh hushed in his sleep, stopped snoring for a while and got back to his sleep again, needless to say his snore frequency returned again.

I heard the footsteps recede as the tranquil calmness inside and outside the flat returned.

I woke up cursing both my flat mates, blanket, unwashed for many days, wrapped around my shoulders. I looked into the mirror. I looked like a drug addict. Or maybe I had become one. Our flat looked like a typical bachelors flat. With things thrown around everywhere, it was like mini chaos in our foreign style open hall combined kitchen flat. The bedroom was occupied by Rohan and shayana, I didn’t want to disturb their only night in Pune in our furnished yet pathetic flat. The only people I could curse and I had a right to curse were both sleeping shamelessly.

I put on the sleepers, in left mine, in right viresh’s and walked towards the door with groggy eyes.

The door made creaky noise as I opened it slowly, a delirious wave of cold wind struck my face sending chills down my spine. There was no one as expected, I turned around and checked the letter box in which I found one letter.

While walking back towards my bed with a letter in my hand, I kicked Rogers bum with my leg like a football half expecting him to swear at me which he did as he went to sleep again, his bum-cleavage even more visible.

I clearly remember this all, what if I had not woken up and got that letter; letter with no name, only an Indian flag printed on it. what if?

I doubt M@dR1 would have tried approaching me again would he?

I remember it all.

Fast forward to present day and this meeting is still ON, half the things I can’t hear, half the things I don’t want to hear. A vote of thanks, followed by more sweets and coffee, I drink another cup of coffee and my eyes have finally stopped revolting , given up sort of, and just when I am planning on going home and catching a much needed sleep, my blackberry buzzes, there is a text from M@dR1.

“It’s #0n3ym00n tim3”.

Hampi: History revised :)

Have you ever wondered if film sites like Sholay really exist? Have you ever found yourself in a place so dramatic in its natural form; you can’t help wondering what sort of people and what sort of life it has seen? In England, they have stonehenge , in India, we have a village full of stonehenge.

Oh yes, I am talking about Hampi, the place where ruins of lost kingdom of Vijayanagar rest.

We spent a very little time exploring fraction of what is there to see, but still, I will go on to say, I had a wonderful time, maybe it was down to having my closest friends around, or the sheer beauty and magical wave of Hampi.

And for the first time in my life, I am not being forced to write a blog, I am writing this out of my own sheer enthusiasm, just documenting the collection of our memories. 

 
Let me warn you, this post isn't about the actual "Things to do in Hampi" from a traveler's perspective , it isn't a monotonous boring description of what all to cover there, its just a point-pictorial description of things we did (&we didn't) in Hampi.

10 things we did in Hampi. 

1) Blend Yourself amongst the ruins.

The trip to Hampi isn't worth it if you cant be a part of the lost kingdom of Vijayanagara empire. 

You need to blend in, and at least try and imagine the life they lived. we did just that. well, by clicking pictures in front of those ruins ofcourse.

2) Explore things on your own.

Exploring things on your own, we have heard that term before haven't we? in college, in office, our managers telling us to "explore", but the real exploring comes when you are at some unknown place, you need to take a walk through the unknown to find the unknown, and I must say walking through the ruins was the best part of this trip.

3) Take a Coracle boat ride adventure.

Coracle, also known as Dongi, is a bowl-shaped boat made of reed, saplings and hide. For one of the most thrilling boat rides complete with whirlpools, high currents and crocodiles, go for a fun filled coracle ride on Tungabhadra river. Riding in a coracle on the Tungabhadra was a thrilling experience.

4) Learn some history.

While at some historical place, its always advisable to take a guide and get to know some facts (also fiction) about that place, we did just that. Special thanks to our guides Krishna and Basaraja.

5) And teach some.

Every group needs a philosopher who carries out his profound philosophies, every group needs a Ted Mosby. We obviously had one *you know who*.

6) Eat well.

What you get when a group of foodies are put together in south India? well, a lot of idlis and dosas and puri bhajis. we visited two top rated eating hangouts in Hampi - Mango Tree and Laughing Buddha. Look at Erika, trying to eat that masala dosa. needless to say who ended up finishing it, Vivek and Russel ofcourse.

7) Click a lot of selfies. 

Okay, this isn't something to do about being at some historical place. its just a fad, I'm talking about selfies, and we did manage to click a lot of selfies (we are not abnormal after all).

8) Climb the hills and relax atop.

Walking 600 steps to reach the top of Anjanedri hills ( the birth place of monkey-god hanuman) was one experience, jumping further and walking towards the dead end was another. the wind was so strong there, the air was so fresh there. it was almost as if we were in heaven. I did some meditation and gained some more profound knowledge to share on the next trip ;)

9) Do a lot of madness.

A trip /travel isn't worth it if there is no craziness/madness in it. when we all meet up, the craziness erupts to the level of uncertainty.

10. Play and relax.

Finally, when you are on a vacation , you do need to relax as well, and the lazy Goenkars that we all are, we kept whole sunday for the thing we love the most -to be "susegaad". We played football, played UNO , relaxed in the pool. Sunday is always about being lazy, and we didn't let that tag go away from us. 

P.S. I scored one nutmeg goal and assisted two. Just look at my perfectly weighted header in the picture. B-).

5 things we DID NOT do in Hampi. 

They say for every goody-goody thing, there has to be a bad thing, to maintain universal balance. well, luckily for us, we didn't do any such things. I wouldn't term these things as "bad". but these are few things which you should avoid while on travel and on vacation. I am glad we did just that. Oh don't judge us by the picture, we were just posing. #honest. :)

1) Sleep like lazy bears. ( oh no! they were just dozing for a while )

2) Smoke in the hut behind parking lot. (oh no! they were just taking a shade from the hot sun)

3) Drink whiskey while looking into the mirror ( oh no! that's just water, we are just posing)

4) Snap the animals around (Oh no! we were just trying to click scenery, monkeys just happened to be there)

5) Imitate the spiritual/sculptural figures. (Oh no! I don't know what the hell I was doing there :P)

Confessions of a Hackaholic

I took the hex dump from wireshark and analyzed it.  The magic header “Gh0st” was clearly visible.

I felt the sudden wave of excitement running through my nerves, but it was soon followed by the pang of nervousness and anxiety. Patience; whispered my mind.

My Remote administration Tool, or “rat” as they call it, had successfully penetrated the machine, now all I had to do is -wait. That’s the thing about hacking; you need patience and luck, lots of it actually. 

If it was a piece of cake, and anybody could do it, where the world would be at this stage no-one knows.

Next, It was time for my payload to do the trick, I inserted my USB, and uploaded the carefully pain strikingly crafted payload in the machine. It was a success. I remember how I had found this Payload on some hack forums and how I had edited and modified it for my own gains. Unknowingly I got a smug look on my face. There are people who keep saying, “you need to be a good programmer to be a good hacker”, and here I was, doing all right, without even being an average coder. I believe, you don’t need to be a good coder, just need to have basic understanding of how code works when you come across it and how to modify it for your own use. Let’s face it, everything that is needed has been already coded, thousands of rats, numerous payloads, nobody needs to write the fresh codes, just improvise. And that’s the gift I had, I could improvise on anything I could get my hands on. I already had such a huge collection of tools, commands, etc.

I scanned through my laptop result thoroughly. There was no green text box with “access granted” field like how they show in movies. This was real life and this was happening. I felt sweat forming on my forehead and it fell on the touchpad of my laptop within whiskers. It was that hot in Pune. Humidity with added pain to use root-kits for this hack was adding to my irritation, I have never been a big fan of Root kits or rats, especially when there are so many vulnerabilities to exploit.

It reminds me of a quote from the movie “The fault in our stars” – that’s the thing about love, it demands to be felt.

In my life, there was no love, and this quote was twisted into– “that’s the thing about vulnerability, it demands to be exploited” – Fault in our windows. That was the twisted trajectory of my life these days.

I checked the time, it was almost past 12. I needed sleep. This was the last hack for the month, just one more sleepless night, I assured myself. Did I believe in my assurance? I doubt so, but I had to make sure I stayed all right. These hacks were getting more and more frequent now, there was a mole in our hacking clan, there is always one. And we needed to find and flush him out sooner.

Just few more hours of waiting, and then I will have the hashes, I will start my script for decrypting the paraphrases and sleep, I decided.

I got up, drank the cold coffee from fridge, looked myself in the mirror, I looked like a drug addict, without actually being on a drug.

I started brushing my teeth and concentrated on the sound which followed, It felt synonymous to the sound my decryption script would make while cracking through every hash-code, if it made any. I was going crazy, I was becoming crazy, or maybe I had become one already.

I lay there in my bed, looking at the fan and trying to decrypt whether it was rotating or revolving. I couldn’t even decipher what the hell I was doing with my life.

I didn’t realize how and when in the middle of figuring out the unknown, I dozed off.

And then, she came…

Like she always does; silent, soothing, supportive, listening, advising, cute, beautiful and the entire goody –goody adjectives combined.

The only problem is, she only exists in my dreams, appearing only when I am asleep and making me join the puzzling pieces of my dreams together to form morbid and vivid picture of that unpredictable beauty.

Her smile is the most unique one I have ever seen for when she smiles her eyes twinkle. And her eyes, well , what can I say about those eyes, when I look into them, I see a whole new world forming, where there is her and me and butterflies and fairies, where peacocks dance to the tune of our love while the angels are busy writing our love stories..

What I most like about this dream girl of mine is the fact that we are on the same wavelength, we connect so well, and the more I get to know her, the more I sleep that is; the more interesting things I decipher about her. It’s amazing really how one person can get you out of your depression, in my case it’s my dream girl. I wish I get sleep whole day and night, I wish I could get time for the same, if I could I would, I would sleep through the whole day and night just to get the dreamy glimpses of her.

“wake up” she whispered in my ears. I was awake in my dreams of course, but I didn’t want to wake up, I wanted to hear her voice again, I wanted to hear her “Wake up” again.

“Wake up”. She said,  I smiled, she slapped me softly on my cheek, the brush of her fingers; smooth.

“Your RAT has settled down, time to decrypt” she continued whispering. The fact that she knew so much of technical stuff was such a turn on but tonight I didn’t want to hear anything of it. She was well read, could write awesome, and was a brilliant conversationalist, all in all, she was perfect; she is perfect.

But the main reason I fell for her was her ability to get the butterfly in my stomach every time she appeared.

I looked at her with sleepy eyes; her smooth and silky untied hair glistened under the influence of oncoming sun rays through the window.

“Do come in my life soon, I feel empty without you” I gave her one of those “I am your puppy” expression. She chuckled.

“I have already arrived, just open your eyes and look around” she winked.

It took me a while to understand her sarcasm but by the time I did, she was already on her way.

“Good” and “goodbye” she said as she retreated through the window while giving me a flying kiss, her slow retreat was complete as she transformed from the diminutive figure into a tiny bright spot which I tried catching into my right palm unsuccessfully.

Loud buzzing sound of alarm woke me up. The sun rays had started entering my room through the window. It’s almost as if my dream and reality were in sync with each other.

It was 6 am. I had slept for 5 straight hours, which was rare. I needed to complete the decryption before heading to the office.

I started the script, made myself coffee and kept pondering about my abnormal life.

Where every other normal guy in town had love in reality and hacking in their dreams, I had the opposite. Hacking was real for me, but love for me remained an illusion, so much of a transformation since the shift to Pune.

Every once a while, the nostalgia creeps in. where I look back at how I was, and how the things were back in Goa.  I have been single for almost 2 years now, I have been clean for over a year now, I miss the love, I miss the care, I miss the fun, I am missing out on reality, I have become so engulfed in this oblivion of my own where in the life seems so unstable, so encrypted, where the only companionship for me includes, the operating systems, the commands, payloads, viruses , malwares, Trojans, the only friends I have are rats, the only task I do is to intrude into systems. I have become so accustomed to these abnormally sleepless digitized nights, that I have lost the difference between reality and dreams, between bots and people, between zeroes and ones. I have lost the count of time and hours.

The zombie look I have acquired will be questioned in office today; people will ask me all sorts of questions like “Are you depressed?” “Are you on drugs?”, some guys will even go on to say “he is from Goa, he must be under the influence of alcohol, he must be high and having a hangover” and as always I will smile for one thing I can’t be is argumentative. I will nod, they will keep quite. And only I alone will know the real reason for my bad hangover, for believe me when I say so, I am never high on weed or alcohol; I am only high on hacks...