Oneplus oNe - definitely UNSETTLING!

And I mean it in the best of ways! OnePlus with its 'never settle' motto have really managed to disrupt the market in all possible ways. The web is flooded with reviews of the phone that range from mind-blowing to over rated, so here comes another pebble along the shore.



My interest in the phone got sparked by the unique marketing style it adopted in India, invite-only. It pressed the right chords of the new-age, e-consumers and created a lot of waves with the way it engaged with potentials. I, however, got it once the phone became available on open amazon market.

I bought this phone after considerable research and I am sure the reader has also googled this enough to be well aware of its technical genius. So I shall refrain from quoting any tech specs in this post but rather my own personal views after a week's use.



What charmed me the most even as I was unboxing it was the attention to detail in the package design section. Everything's sleek, has amazing placeholders and is in a stark red&white theme. The consistency is with flanker products like the screen guard, etc. Frankly speaking, I got the screen-guard a couple of days earlier and my eagerness went through the roof having never seen such an intricate and elegant package for something as simple as a screen-guard.





The joy continues as you take the phone out and start tinkering with it. The phone is a looker, beating its competition hands down with a sleek unibody design and a unique sandstone finish back panel. The phone feels just great and I have often found myself caressing it's back to enjoy the matte-ish feel without even realizing!

CyanogenMod is its custom ROM that gives an interesting twist to the lollipop most android-ers are happily sucking on these days. Its my first android experience and its very, very satisfying so far. I have noted stark improvements over stock lollipop (running on Moto G2) and ZenUI (of Asus Zenfone fame) in the settings menu and custom animations. Not that they would matter to the average user, but then one who wants to be mediocre would probably not even consider this phone!



Performance remains true to the flashy specs, in succinct, I am running almost 25 apps and 3 games in parallel for a week now without a single reboot and the phone has not slowed once. Multitasking is even more fun once I updated to the latest 12s version of the CyanogenMod due to a sexier transition animation.



The battery is almost as good as my previous Windows Phone even though I am definitely doing a LOT more. That's something which keeps me grinning for a full day on superheavyduty use and more than 1.5 days if I alternate between the powersaver mode and performance mode, take the pain to switch the data off every now and then and use the WiFi in between!

I read a lot of people cribbing about its camera while researching and have decided that while in this aspect OnePlus oNe may not be a flagship killer, it's not something to
written off easily. In fact I kept 0 expectations from it and am pretty content with both of its shooters. If you're going for this, I'd recommend the same. Lower the expectations, happier you shall be. Nonetheless, some samples below.













Oh and like a good storyteller, the phone has some nifty tricks up its sleeve that you discover in due course. For starters, gestures work like a charm and are equal parts useful as well as fun to tinker with. I shall leave the others for you to discover on your own otherwise what would be the fun?

The Darkness Beckons...

Your bad is my good. Your crimes are my refuge. Your evil is my self. I am, YOU!  not quite, I am a part of you. The one augmented and demonic facet of you that you keep hidden from the prying eyes of the world. 

I am darkness.  Absolute. Pristine. Complete. 

You are in denial if you think I do not reside within your heart! I do. It has been my abode since the first time someone bullied you or teased or insulted you and you could do nothing about it. Remember the surge of fury that raged you? Remember the frustration and anger at your inability to take revenge? It was me, whispering softy to you to fight back.

But you pushed me aside, shunned me away as life’s brighter shades enchanted you. I watched, patiently, as the colors went out and then even the stark black and white gave way to a muddy hue of gray.

I looked on as you battled the intricacies of life, baffled and hurt at your inability again. Inability to drive things the way you see fit. I was there when your bubble of confidence burst. And only when you had to accept that sometimes, no matter what you do, you cant have your way did you remember me again!

I was the shoulder you cried on. The pillar of strength that you rebuilt yourself on. I was the one who gave you focus. I was the one who made you appreciate the clarity within chaos. Every time you hated the past, every tear you shed, every wrong you did, every penance that you paid for made you stronger. All this while it was me who pushed you in the corner, I kept pushing till finally you started pushing back. And while I saw a phoenix rise from the ashes, I leaned back to watch over you again. 

I am darkness. Incessant. Omnipresent. Pure.

All I ask for is acceptance!

But…

He smiled. She frowned. He did all to bring back her smile. Acted cute, made up jokes, prophesied his love for her in a dozen ways, and wrote her love songs amongst other endless frivolities. Alas, all in vain. Her mind seemed to be made up. She seemed to have something against him that was creating a gigantic rift between them in front of which even his titanic efforts were dwarfed but…

He didn’t give up. Trudged on steadily, undeterred. She left. Once again. She left in a huff swearing never to see his face again. He waited for her return. His patience gave way after a week and he started looking for her. In vain. She had disappeared off the very face of the earth, or so it seemed. Her phone was switched off and none of her friends knew of her whereabouts. She was at none of her favorite haunts. He was worried. He wasn’t even aware of the reasons of her rage. He had been a pillar of hope, but…

After that long his faith was waning. What, where, how, who? So many questions without any answers. He was terrified of what the future held. The uncertainty of it all flummoxed him. As he entered his house after the seemingly endless and fruitless search his every iota screamed at him for being such a blunt tool and for his obiter dictums but…

There she was. He smiled weakly, she looked resolutely. He felt his words tripping over each other. He tried to be more coherent. Failed. The words flew and chose their own course. She listened. But did she understand? He knew not. She called him stubborn yet there she was, closed to any hope, any dream. Letting the fear of striking out not only keeping her from playing the game but enjoying it too. Deep down she knew, joy unbounded waits but…

He closed his eyes, to hide his broken self. He remained little more than an empty shell casing without her. She was the bullet and with her gone, he was but a piece of scrap. He knew she’d win, he always let her. But unlike the other times he wished for things to be different; for her to lose, just this once, so that they could both win but…

Even before the words were out of her mouth, he knew. He could feel them coming. The curse of understanding her mercilessly flayed him before her words had a chance. Yet he tried. He tried hard. He knew he gave it all he could. He realized he was being verbose, but he couldn’t help it. He knew he held nothing back but…

All he could do now was await her decision. She was the slave and he, the master. Without fail. Always. Yet, in that moment the master’s soul was the slave’s toy and that was a piece of inerrant truth.

One more, he ordered. Me too, she chipped in. The barman smiled. They had had quite a few already.

He smiled at her, she looked pleased. He was glad. She had been stoic for a few days. That forebode ominously to him. But the events of that night brought with them a serene calmness. It had not been long, and he was yet to figure her out. But he didn’t care. He was glad for her presence there and the smile on her face.

She smiled back, content. He had parried her disarray till it stopped haunting her dreams. But she knew that the demon of confusion still lay low, waiting to strike. Yet with him, she was happy. Buoyant almost. The future remained shrouded in mist, she cared not. It was this moment that mattered and she was at peace.

Here you go, the barman left the tequila and lemons in front of them. They looked at the salted glasses and at each other. She giggled. Penny for your thoughts, he asked. She raised her glass and looked deep into his eyes, Just giving it a shot!

*a long while later*

Umm-hmmm. He blinked. Why couldn’t he recall the night. *CLINK* The bottle of Jose Cuervo Gold rolled gently over the floor and he smiled. His back felt heavy and he looked back. Her head lay nuzzling the small of his back and her legs dangled over the other side of the bed. Too much tequila’s never too good, he grinned and zonked out again.

Beyond the haze...

Tired of lying languidly,

Bored of the nonchalant daze,

I try and see,

Beyond the haze,

A surreal place,

Of dreams galore,

Where was reality,

I had cared no more,

A world so known,

A sinful variety,

I now let go,

Lost, in a newfound sense of propriety,

Everything is new,

Yet so familiar,

As if I was watching the same previously,

Just with glasses unclear,

I can see way beyond the haze,

The road’s long and the horizon far,

I care not and happily I walk,

With a hearty smile and my guitar.

Uncertainty

Herculean strength, the outer persona,
Barren wasteland, hidden beneath,
Micheal's light, shining freely,
Or Nebuchadnezzar's pit, in sanity's sheath?

Mist around, clouded way,
A dollop of gold for the last ride,
Enough it seems, flimsy delights,
Hell awaits, arms open wide.

The whirlpool beckons, the cracken cackles,
Yet the angel calls, opening the passage free,
To the pearly gates but slippery is the way,
Angel herself's lost or seemingly be.

What shall be lost and what found,
Remains shrouded in the shackles of time,
Hope lingers, will the angel too,
Charred is the end or eden sublime?

Epilogue:

I wish I knew :)

The modern Gospel of Judas- Injunction

Epilogue:

Clad in trinkets hiding wounds,

The silent arm gently swayed,

Watching the blade's brazen glint,

For a clean cut he prayed.

Again, but with a difference. Or perhaps the only difference lay in Mary's  reaction. Perhaps Christ was no longer the pillar of hope and sanity that he thought himself to be. Or perhaps Nazareth's crown of thorns had swayed her away. Restlessly he had battled within for over an hour deliberating the merits and cons of having a conversation that could only go 3 way, each way playing word by word in parallel inside the confines of his highly efficient brain. 

*An hour of dabbling in holy smoke later Christ finally summoned up the wits to have that conversation with Mary*

Mary often observed that the there lies absolute chaos in things well panned out. And the most clarity lies within chaos. What we truly are and what we choose to become depends on choices that lie in the hands of those most ill suited to take them. And yet we allow them to. Christ could relate to that, his entire life had been proving the same! 

But despite his well put words, for he could put them across really well, there seemed no difference in Mary's pattern that always ended up in invoking extreme loathing for the self. But the thing with hate is, you just can't hate specific targets. Once you invoke the demon of hate, it shall trudge its way up from the bloody pit only to swallow one and all in its way.

But what Christ always failed to grasp was the fact that words well meant are most misunderstood and often become the preludes for more saiyances to summon more and more demons from the pit of self wallowing and destruction. Can you imagine the pain of the saintly man who watches a lover writhe and cry before succumbing to a grotesque fate, right at the altar of their love? And then as the cherry on the cake, he is then made to carry the very coffin of his lover, strapped to his chest with the casket open so that nothing is allowed to escape his eyes. And he does so willingly. Such a masochist himself, Jesus effin Christ! 

Prologue:

Cuts, blunt and too many,

Suffering that never seemed enough,

His friend perhaps best,

Tough love or perhaps just rough.

Where reason fails does will survive,

Free will, a burden or a reprise,

The irrelevance of words,

Often lies in the best advice.

LOSS

Last words of an
Obiter dictum
Strangely incomplete yet
Subtly final