I came I saw I floundered

What is Yoga?

2011-11-18T11:54:00.000+05:30

"Yoga means knowing and experiencing everything as a part of yourself.Modern science has proved beyond a doubt that everything is one energy.Religions are screaming that god is everywhere.Whether you say god is everywhere or everything is one energy, you are saying the same thing from two different contexts.A scientist has mathematically deduced this reality.He has not experienced it.His realization is intellectual and it does not transform his life.A religious person just believes it.A yogi is one who is unwilling to settle for deductions or belief systems.He wants to experience and know it.In that sense,yoga is a technology of taking a person from his individuality to universality, to knowing and experiencing existence as himself."

"Patanjali, who is considered to be the father or assimilator of yoga,said this very beautifully.When he began the Yoga Sutras,he said,And now,yoga.What he meant was that now you have tried everything-tasted money,power,wealth,love,pleasure and you even did the drugs," "and nothing really worked.It was all fine,but it did not bring you any great sense of fulfillment.When you know this,you are ready for yoga."

---Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev ( excerpt taken from the book 'Midnights with the mystic' by Cheryl Simone)

2011-09-21T17:28:00.003+05:30

“Who could be so lucky? Who comes to a lake for water and sees the reflection of moon.”

― Rumi

“Spring comes, and the grass grows by itself.”

― Lao Tzu

“And you? When will you begin that long journey into yourself?”

― Rumi

Breaking through

2011-06-28T22:21:00.013+05:30

Many attempts were made to write this post and all given up because they were becoming too unwieldy to write.I am still holding on to the hope that the regular readers ( if there are any left by now) have not given up on me.It has been a tumultuous first year at B-school,mostly down than up and I have come to loath as well as love MDI in equal measure.It continues to amaze as well as frustrate me at the same time.I have come to discover a lot many things about myself which has been quite an unsettling experience to say the least.

The only significant takeaway is some clarity when it comes to career direction.I have decided after much wrestling with various options and arrangements that writing will be a significant of the future me.I am willing to give it the energy and time it demands.The form,content and methodology will come later but I finally decided that it was about time that I narrowed my options in order to give some much wanted direction to my life.I have been inspired by the following ( celebrated) interview of Faulkner ( pictured above) in The Paris Review:

INTERVIEWER

You mentioned economic freedom. Does the writer need it?

FAULKNER

No. The writer doesn't need economic freedom. All he needs is a pencil and some paper. I've never known anything good in writing to come from having accepted any free gift of money. The good writer never applies to a foundation. He's too busy writing something. If he isn't first rate he fools himself by saying he hasn't got time or economic freedom. Good art can come out of thieves, bootleggers, or horse swipes. People really are afraid to find out just how much hardship and poverty they can stand. They are afraid to find out how tough they are. Nothing can destroy the good writer. The only thing that can alter the good writer is death. Good ones don't have time to bother with success or getting rich.

INTERVIEWER

Can working for the movies hurt your own writing?

FAULKNER

Nothing can injure a man's writing if he's a first-rate writer. If a man is not a first-rate writer, there's not anything can help it much. The problem does not apply if he is not first rate because he has already sold his soul for a swimming pool.

INTERVIEWER

Some people say they can't understand your writing, even after they read it two or three times. What approach would you suggest for them?

FAULKNER

Read it four times.

INTERVIEWER

You mentioned experience, observation, and imagination as being important for the writer. Would you include inspiration?

FAULKNER

I don't know anything about inspiration because I don't know what inspiration is—I've heard about it, but I never saw it.

INTERVIEWER

As a writer you are said to be obsessed with violence.

FAULKNER

That's like saying the carpenter is obsessed with his hammer. Violence is simply one of the carpenter's tools. The writer can no more build with one tool than the carpenter can.

NTERVIEWER

What were the kinds of work you were doing to earn that “little money now and then”?

FAULKNER

Whatever came up. I could do a little of almost anything—run boats, paint houses, fly airplanes. I never needed much money because living was cheap in New Orleans then, and all I wanted was a place to sleep, a little food, tobacco, and whiskey. There were many things I could do for two or three days and earn enough money to live on for the rest of the month. By temperament I'm a vagabond and a tramp. I don't want money badly enough to work for it. In my opinion it's a shame that there is so much work in the world. One of the saddest things is that the only thing a man can do for eight hours a day, day after day, is work. You can't eat eight hours a day nor drink for eight hours a day nor make love for eight hours—all you can do for eight hours is work. Which is the reason why man makes himself and everybody else so miserable and unhappy.

B-school limbo

2010-09-09T09:33:00.008+05:30

No, this blog is not dead and will come out of coma soon.

Books that I've been reading and other news

2010-05-27T12:57:00.011+05:30

1.My Name is Red-unputdownable would be an understatement-We Indians would perhaps like to think that we know all of Islamic* folklore that there is to know like Leyla & Majnun,Alif Laila etc but these are just the tip of the iceberg.This book makes one realize that there are so many other beautiful tales from the Islamic world which we know nothing about, for me it is almost like the discovery of a rich new lode of stories to dive into.Ever heard of Husrev & Shirin ?
2.Where wisdom shall be found-Harold Bloom-discusses the Greeks-Plato,Homer,Socrates then goes on to compare Shakespeare & Cervantes then Montaigne & Bacon in the next chapter(Subsequent chapters deal with Emerson& Nietzsche and finally Freud and Proust)-I have not read any of these writers and will abandon it shortly.
3.The Buddha series-Osuma Tezuka-again rediscovering the Buddhist folk tradition or the Jataka tales-I still need to get used to the sparse black & white style of Tezuka and the in-jokes (Siddhartha the young prince is bored after a day spent watching fire eaters and dancers.So he requests for-"two bulls,a long hemp rope and a barrel of ink" and in the frame in which this happens, a retainer is shown saying-is he going to draw manga?)

Books lined up-Ramesh Menon's Mahabharata-A modern rendering and Roberto Bolano's 2666

PS-I'd be heading over to MDI,Gurgaon for the next two years for my MBA.It was a better end to an MBA season where I plummeted lower and lower as it progressed.The excitement is waning after the initial euphoria but the good part is that I still have another month to go before session starts.Gurgaon looks massive and quite far from Delhi when seen from Google Earth.I've been warned against it's food,air,water,malls,Jats and expats.Lets see what it has in store for me.

*for want of a better word for kingdoms ruled by Islamic monarchs from Asia minor to India in the medieval times

2010-05-10T18:34:00.004+05:30

Into a limbo large and broad, since called The Paradise of Fools, to few unknown.
John Milton,
Paradise Lost
I was writing a post about leaving Bangalore,which got delayed and I had to abandon it.In Jampot now,and it's still not clear which B-school I'll be joining.It has been a week of indecision and inactivity and heat and sudden rains.It is a little weird to realize that office will keep going on as usual and somebody might already have taken up my desk.Have been reading Satanic Verses and Catch-22.There is nothing blasphemous about the controversial chapter concerning Prophet Mohammed in the book,I had assumed there would be some slight innuendo or some such derogatory reference but there is none or perhaps I have not encountered it yet.Catch-22 is a brilliant book with some very well thought out characters and some lines are way too beautiful to be ever forgotten-

"Do you know how long a year takes when it's going away?" Dunbar repeated to Clevinger. "This long." He snapped his fingers. "A second ago you were stepping into college with your lungs full of fresh air. Today you're an old man."

"Old?" asked Clevinger with surprise. "What are you talking about?"

"Old."

"I'm not old."

"You're inches away from death every time you go on a mission. How much older can you be at your age? A half minute before that you were stepping into high school, and an unhooked brassiere was as close as you ever hoped to get to Paradise. Only a fifth of a second before that you were a small kid with a ten-week summer vacation that lasted a hundred thousand years and still ended too soon. Zip! They go rocketing by so fast. How the hell else are you ever going to slow down?" Dunbar was almost angry when he finished.

"Well, maybe it is true," Clevinger conceded unwillingly in a subdued tone. "Maybe a long life does have to be filled with many unpleasant conditions if it's to seem long. But in that event, who wants one?"

"I do," Dunbar told him.

"Why?" Clevinger asked.

"What else is there?"

PS-My garden is in bloom even in summer(Zinnia & Sun plant according to Mom),makes for great photographs-I can't have enough of photographing my garden from my room. and there is a Bulbul pair making a nest in my garden,photos will follow.

2010-03-27T02:02:00.003+05:30

And reality is always without exception, more Bizarre than fiction.Years of double or triple guessing plot twists in books and movies cannot prepare you for the vagaries and the nauseous consolations of life.Destiny is the best bullshit filter out there.

2010-02-06T01:38:00.011+05:30

Hiya folks!
Rambling here after a verrrry long time.Had been busy with B-school entrances and interviews etc(not over yet).Had been to Pune-Mumbai recently.I was visiting a friend in Bombay and I loved the city.The hills and the apartments everywhere (yes I was in Powai-Hirananadani),the cobbled stoned streets,the feeling when you come over from Pune of entering a vast megapolis and when compared to distances in Bangalore,Bombay seemed ten times bigger.Spent a night at the NITIE campus which is beautiful in itself.There is an air of freedom,of nonchalance in Bombay which I have not experienced in any other city.This might also be because of the voluminous reading that I've done about the city but in any case this was a much needed break after the long months of drudgery at work and otherwise.If anthropomorphous traits were to be attached to cities,I often wonder about how Indian cities would shape up.Would Delhi appear smug and competitive and belligerent?Would Bangalore appear laid back but stingy?Would Lucknow appear regal?

Also spent some time strolling along the Bandra Promenade and ogling at the high rises and the swanky houses of superstars and it was quite a surprise to sight Mangroves by the side of the promenade.All in all a great trip and the only disappointing thing was the train journey back.The Bombay-Bangalore route is very dull with vast expanses of sugarcane and cotton fields on both sides stretching out endlessly.Not helping was the fact that I was finding Kafka on the shore quite insipid.

hopefully this post brings me back to samanya prasarann on the blog with regular updates from now on.

The heightened sense of awareness might really just be your numb toe (at 15000 feet)

2009-09-10T21:22:00.013+05:30

Back from a trip to Manali with the folks.They are right when they say that you need to be in the right mood to take a vacation and even though I tried switching off,it was not the most memorable of trips.Though really glad that there is one more state which goes off my list of 'not visited'.I now have 8 states( The Seven sisters and Madhya Pradesh) on my TODO plus throw in a few UTs (Andaman being a major one) :-)

Crossword was having a sale and there was an extra discount for StanChart Creditcard holders so couldn't resist (even though I prefer Landmark over its somewhat inadequate collection) and this:
was the end result of the major splurging which happened.The books are:
1.Pamuk's- Other Colours and Istanbul:memoirs of a city
2.Joseph O'Neill's- Netherland
3.The private Lives of the Mughals of India
4.The history of South India

Pamuk is fast rising up the ranks in the list of my favourite writers.Istanbul is definitely one of his finest works in my opinion. Reading books about cities gives me great pleasure even if it is only just a backdrop for the story ,Istanbul and The Black Book lionize the city to such an extent that now,I dream of walking the streets of that city some day,I dream of standing on The Galata Bridge and gazing at the Bosphorous ferries.
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After reading Cuckold,I have started liking the whole idea of the historical novel,very minimal effort is needed in holding up the plot as the reader is generally aware of the subject at hand, the writer is free to concentrate on certain specific characters and the general style of his writing,he generally doesn't need to bother himself too much with the authenticity of the setting as most of it is 'already out there'.

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It is really surprising but Delhi happens to be the only city where I see Hindi signs(which include traffic signs,building names,municipality signs etc) giving English signs some competition.(Somehow 'Bhoomigut Paarpath' for subway has got a nice ring to it )In Bangalore,the usual practice is to only have the English sign or the English Sign+the Kannada sign in a smaller font.The really frustrating thing is that the normal BMTC buses in Bangalore carry only Kannada signs indicating just the start point and the final destination.In Delhi,the stoppages along the route are mentioned on the sides of the buses which I think is a really prudent thing to do.In Jharkhand,you get to see very few bilingual signs and usually,the Hindi signs outnumber the English ones(though this is changing quite rapidly)

What have you been reading?

Alice in BLunderland

2009-08-25T21:42:00.003+05:30

I want you to take a look at: Arun Shourie slams BJP

What is funny is not that Arun Shourie called Rajnath 'Alice in Blunderland', but the fact that Shourie called Rajnath 'Alice' .This attains a more sinister angle than the usual 'The party is being run like a Akhara' attack if one happens to notice this

But seriously, to understand why Lewis Carroll is being quoted by Shourie,read on:

Humpty appears in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass, where he discusses semantics and pragmatics with Alice.

"I don't know what you mean by 'glory,'" Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't – till I tell you. I meant 'there's a nice knock-down argument for you!'"
"But 'glory' doesn't mean 'a nice knock-down argument,'" Alice objected.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master – that's all."
Alice was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again.
"They've a temper, some of them – particularly verbs, they're the proudest – adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs – however, I can manage the whole lot! Impenetrability! That's what I say!"

Really saddened by the unraveling of the BJP.They are supposed to be our 'major' opposition party aren't they?

2009-06-26T14:02:00.007+05:30

He will always remind me of sitting in my living room in Ranchi, sun-filled and quiet in the afternoon,listening on my music system using my Sony Walkman headphones and going into raptures every time the recorded tape moved on- Remember the Time to Heal the world to Scream and then finally to the one I liked the most-They don't really care about us.He was quite clearly the first western artist I listened to,from a dog eared cassette which had the whole of History-2 on it and which some friend of dad had lent to me.Before there was Metallica and the rest of the Metal lot,there was MJ,entertaining me for hours when I couldn't go out to play or bear watching TV.Before he was 'Wacko Jacko' his Thriller was (and still is) the biggest selling album of all time.Before environmental issues were in Vogue,there was MJ along with a select few speaking out about them through his songs.The one song of his which I like above all else is 'Stranger in Moscow' -a ballad of exemplary beauty. My favourite video of his would be "The way you make me feel" with the dark alleys and the wonderful dance moves and the heart-achingly beautiful Tatiana Thumbtzen giving it that whole 80's feel.Thank you MJ,for the countless hours of entertainment and sheer bliss and 'Magic' that you have provided to millions of fans.You would always be an integral part of all our collective childhood memories and may your soul rest in peace forever.

I leave you with some links.
1.The guardian
2.YouTube
3.'The way you make me feel' video
and finally:
4. Greatbong

2009-06-08T19:42:00.005+05:30

The buzz of the cabinet AC,clickety-clack of muffled keys invigorating tired muscles at the end of the wire,the metallic flickering of a thousand tubelights giving you solace, some even winking.The soft almost soothing droning over late- night, long-distance, inter-cultural conference calls from across the aisle.The clipety-clop of a high heel walking down the hallway. A car backing up, breaking the silence which descends like a fog , evoking some long lost shard of memory glistening in remembrance.Far away sounds of traffic.A sudden gust of wind and the slight rattling of window panes in their grooves.The sudden groan of a chair being relieved of it's burden for the day.
The urgent,almost angry gurgling of the entrails-It is time to go.

2009-05-16T15:21:00.001+05:30

Managed to vote for the first time this time around .I cast my vote in Jamshedpur for the constituency of the same name.It was your typical Jam morning with mercury in the forties but I was excited nevertheless having spent days trawling election websites and watching countless debates on Television.What I particularly like are statistics and the numbers in the exit polls.One thing about statistics such as the number of Lok Sabha constituencies per state is that it makes you starkly aware of the population distribution across states.Do you know that if UP was a country of it's own,it would be the sixth most populous nation on the planet?UP elects 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha.But this is along expected lines.But which is the state with the next biggest contingent of MP's?It is Maharashtra with 48 MPs and then next in line is AP and WB with 42 seats apiece.The polling booth was DBMS school and when we arrived there were very few people with 'stalls' of political parties set up outside to help people find their identification numbers in the copy of the electoral roll.We found our names but there were no photographs against them.We walked into the polling station and there were two classrooms earmarked for voting.Each had a security guard standing outside but the whole set up was anything but intimidating.When my chance came,one officer checked my Electoral ID card and before I could step into the Booth another officer inked my finger but surprisingly no part of the ink touched my nail.I walked into the booth and took a minute to gaze at the EVM and all the candidates and their symbols and then pressed the button against my chosen candidate.There was a loud beep registering my vote and I was done.It was all over in practically ten seconds because the officer was coaxing me to vacate the booth quickly.It was my mom's turn after this and she took some time to put on her glasses,look at the list and then press the button,she did not take more than fifteen seconds but the officer was already mumbling about people taking time which infuriated mom and she turned around and gave him a piece of her mind.

It was as good a voting experience as it gets,quite often people have to wait for long hours sometimes in adverse weather conditions but there is one thing I would like to point out for people who are confused about the procedure of procuring voter's ID card and getting their names on the electoral roll.There is no clear link between getting a voter's ID card and getting your name on the roll.The voter's ID card is to be seen as an Address proof.The reason it is usually insisted upon is because most rural and poor voters have nothing else which can act as a proof of residence.But us Urban voters have a plethora of cads such as driving license,Passport,Ration card or PAN card.The more important thing is to get your name on the electoral roll and technically it is possible for you to vote in more than one constituency if you have names on more than one electoral roll (you can furnish your Election ID card in one and your other card in the other constituency)

PS:This was in draft mode for a long time.

2009-05-08T15:07:00.000+05:30

I was going through my drafts and I found this Tag.I am just incredibly busy these days and so have been unable to post.Went home for a couple of weeks mid-April, bought a new phone(A N73-I am in love again....ah the seductive joys of seamless wireless file sharing! I love Bluetooth(Yes it is a big deal if you consider the fact that my last phone would switch off every time I pressed '9' on it ) , voted for the first time(this would go into another post),managed to finish One hundred years of solitude,The Black Book(which was on the list since last July!) and The Reluctant Fundamentalist(really not up to the hype-a big letdown)Also was gifted the Entire Sandman series on my birthday! :D(I know you guys are sick already with all the gloating but seriously...do you know anyone as lucky ?).This tag is kinda sappy and I still can't remember where I flicked it from but here goes:

1. If your lover betrayed you, what will your first thought be?->Screw Everyone!I hate this world.Then probably go and listen to some Nirvana.

2. If you can have a dream coming true, what would it be?->Spending all my life reading in a room full of books.
3. What is the one thing most hated by you?->The current misuse of the world 'culture' to depict seemingly legal activities in a bad light .E.g. 'Pub Culture','Eating-out Culture' etc.This is being done quite frequently and I am sick of it.

4. What would you do with a billion dollars?-> invest some and spend some to buy a house for myself. will stop working and tour the world.Perhaps start my own firm if I am not too bored.

5. Will you fall in love with your best friend?->I don't think so.It is too complicated and is not fun.

6. Which is more blessed, loving someone or being loved by someone?->loving someone because in this you can improvise.You just have to accept what you get when you are being loved by someone but loving someone can be done in unique and myriad ways.

7. How long do you intend to wait for someone you really love?->I don't have to.I am already in love.

8. If the person you secretly like is already attached, what would you do?->think of someone else.simple.lot of fishes in the sea :D

9. If you like to act with someone, who will it be? Your gf/bf or an actress/actor?-> No one.I would perhaps like to watch Jack Nicholson or Leanardo di Caprio when they shoot for scenes.

10. What takes you down the fastest?-> I don't know what this means but what totally demoralizes me is disinterest esp in people you care, for you.

11. How would you see yourself in ten years time?-> probably a lot more fitter and slimmer and surer of what I want to do.

12. What’s your fear?->The only fear I have is of not being able to live upto my own ideals.

13. What kind of person do you think the person who tagged you is?-> Like I said,I don't even remember where I got this from.

14. Would you rather be single and rich, or married but poor?->married but poor.I think poverty is a lesser curse when compared to loneliness.

15. What’s the first thing you do when you wake up?-> look at my cell phone to see how late it is.

16. Would you give all in a relationship?->I would certainly want to give as much I can but not give up on things which I think makes me what I am.

17. If you fall in love with two people simultaneously, who would you pick?->The one who loves me back more?

18. Would you forgive and forget no matter how horrible a thing that special someone has done?-> No.I hope I won't get into such nasty situations.

19. If you get to go back in time and fall in love all over again , would it still be with the same person?->Yes.I am not allowed to say anything else. :D

20. What will you do about climate crisis?-> try hybrid cars and solar heating and lighting systems.probably convince people to become vegetarians.

25 random things you did not know about me:The facebook tag

2009-03-27T14:20:00.001+05:30

I was tagged on Facebook by The Diva.

I am an early riser.I am happiest if I can be up at 5 before sun rise which doesn't happen too often these days.
I can't understand the whole fuss about "How I met your mother' and don't find it particularly funny.However I am a big fan of Seinfeld and Will&Grace.
I've never read any Shakespeare (if you discount A mid summer night's dream in Sandman)
I love eating a variety of fruits except Watermelon.That's because when I was a kid I ate a whole watermelon and promptly puked my guts out.My favourite fruit is Orange.
My favourite characters in books are angst-y troubled people like Raskolnikov,Ameena Sinai,Gregor Sampsa,Rorschach (can't think any more right now :-) )
I am a big sucker for museums.I try to check out at least one museum in every city that I visit time permitting.Paris was a very difficult city in this regard.
When I was a kid,one of my favourite pastimes was to pore over Atlases.I can still recall a frightfully big number of countries and capitals.At the risk of sounding bombastic,I might just beat you in a geography quiz unless you happen to be a Geography major :-)
Just to clear the air on the confusion created by my various testimonials on Orkut-I support Chelsea very casually.I started supporting The Blues when Crespo used to play for them.Actually I am big Argentina fan so back then,among the major English clubs,it was only Chelsea which had an Argentinian player.Now,it is quite different so you might just catch me celebrating a Tevez or a Messi score for ManU or Barca even against Chelsea. :-)
I prefer Nokia phones(other than for obvious reasons) because they let me drop them from crazy heights.Once back from Goa,I was able to extract a fistful of sand (and I am not fibbing) from my Nokia phone after I disassembled it :-) They are magnificently sturdy.
I am an optimist by nature.
I am a tea drinker.I was once a coffee drinker and would plead with mom to put some drops of decocotion in my milk when I was a kid.When I was a little older,I even tried milky coffee with my Chocos.But now, I prefer the unhurried mellowness of tea.
At precisely this point I was interrupted in office by my manager looking over my shoulder into my screen.Somehow whenever he strolls by he always catches me at some random work unrelated website.This has led him to believe I am an Anarchist and a Satan worshiper.
I am somehow the attractor and retainer of bad genes in my family.The tendency to put on weight and the tendency to lose hair from my father's side.Being hard of hearing at an early age from my mother's side* and random facial injuries-the work of my sis(Its not a genetic thing but I had to mention this :-D )
I think all tongue twisters are just too lame when compared to the baap of all tongue twisters( courtesy Vineet Jain)-"Upper Roller Lower Roller"-try it and I shall treat anyone who can do this continuously five times without faltering
I prefer Facebook over Orkut
I think Obama rocks.The man justifies the hype.I especially like the way he is trying to address the Iran issue.He exemplifies the fact that most great leaders are also great men of words and rhetoric.
I agree with those people who say that 300 the movie was overtly sexist and contrary to expectation,this is what I found out about the Spartans
I find it amusing that Frieda Pinto is suddenly the talk of the town and that people are suddenly going gaga over Slumdog's soundtrack when it is most easily Rehman's worst composition.Just gets to show that the world knows zilch about India.
I prefer Beer,Whiskey the way it is supposed to be had and Scotch.I think Guiness is undrinkable.Not also too big a fan of Fosters.I once tried to convince a friend that VAT 69 is actually a government-made Whiskey and is a brand to promote V.A.T. I don't remember much before or after that.
I would like to have a house with wooden floors.Concrete just doesnt feel right under your feet.
I can eat Pasta anytime of the day.I prefer Penne,Macaroni,Fusili in that order and don't like Spaghetti or Lasagna
Indian states that I have not been to-Himachal Pradesh,the whole of North East,Andman and Lakshadweep,Punjab,Haryana.
I am once a skeptic then a firm believer and now I would call myself agnostic
I turned 24 this 24th of March
ending with a Jim Morrison quote-"I believe in a long, prolonged, derangement of the senses in order to obtain the unknown."

*though my mom still retains her hearing and my dad is not overweight I am referring to thier respective sides of the family

PS:Happy Ugadi to all!

ooo what does this button do or the attack of the :DD's-Dev-D and Delhi-6

2009-02-27T16:16:00.001+05:30

The problem with posting late is that fellow bloggers would have already stolen your thunder when it comes to reviewing Movies or albums.

I recently saw DevD and Delhi-6.I would give DevD a lukewarm rating-not a movie which you should miss but definitely not worth burning-a-hole-in-your-pocket-by-watching-it-in-a-multiplex-in-these-recessionary-times like I did.I was expecting a slightly different plot than that of Devdas and going by the comments of Abhay Deol(He said he wanted to explore the drug 'culture' in urban India) I thought it would be similar to other drug stories that I know of like James Frey's A million little pieces but the impression you get after watching the movie is that the Dev of DevD is basically a drunkard gone awry in a BMW.The audience primarily gets the impression that it was alcohol which caused the problems and not cocaine.Mahi Gill as Paro was simply mind blowing in the way she oozes raw sexuality whether sending her nude pics to her lover or the most amazing scene of all-carrying a gadda on her bicycle riding in the middle of fields of Sarson.I have a vague feeling she is somehow related to actress Priya Gill.(?)I did not like Chanda played by Kalki Koechlin as I was not too impressed by her potrayal of a foreign embassy child turned part-time prostitute cum student.Finally,Abhay Deol as Dev does quite convincingly seem to be the delusional arrogant bade baap ka beta but for someone whose last Abhay Deol movie was "Oye lucky lucky oye" -to escape the similarities in both the movies seems impossible.Both are based in Delhi and both involve a second half in which Abhay Deol rambles around Delhi-in one case drinking and wrecking his life and in the other case carrying out a serious of thefts to prove a point.It seemed like a repeat of the performance in Oye lucky.I definitely like the alternate ending and it finally helped me purge my mind of the horrific run-to-Paro's-gate-and-die-with-bottle-in-hand Shahrukh in SLB's Devdas.I think DevD is a movie which grows on you more the number of times you watch it and I am definitely looking forward to watching it on DVD.

Delhi-6 was a complete and utter letdown.Saw it on the saturday of it's release and I was pretty disappointed.The most frustrating thing about Delhi-6 is that none of the songs are picturized(except Masakalli and Dil Gira) and I kept waiting and waiting but was time and again horrified by hearing all my favourite songs being frittered away as background score.Actually when it comes to ARR's music,it is usually very difficult for filmmakers to picturize them.Ram Gopal Varma has go on record saying that he had quite an headache trying to imagine how to picturize 'Aye rama' in Rangeela.The only Bollywood filmamker who has done justice to Rehman's music is in my opinion Ashutosh Gowarikar esp. in Swades.Most of the characters in Delhi-6 are very well fleshed out but the plot is horribly weak.Nothing much happens in the first half and the second half is one of the most silliest I have seen in recent memory.The only silver lining is Sonam Kapoor who just looks very very yummy :D and this movie proves that she can be a good actress as well.Overall,something which you can definitely avoid if you have not wasted your moolah already.

PS:The movie I am waiting for with utter impatience is Gulaal releasing Mar 13

2009-02-04T19:15:00.000+05:30

It's time to turn out the lights here and prepare for a long hard climb.

even though 8.33% of the year has already gone down the drain (near that pub)

2009-01-31T17:18:00.013+05:30

Better late than never is what they all say-So here I am-back on ICISIF after a hiatus of exactly 40 days-a period spent giving a plethora of MBA entrance exams and getting fatter and not watching movies which people keep recommending.The time was also spent rediscovering my lost love for AOE and A R Rahman's music(thanks to Akhil's awesome car stereo-more precisely time was spent in analysing his songs to figure out each and every instrument used-maybe a post for some other time)

Cannot believe it is 2009!I like January's and usually the half of the year on this side of July.My spirits are the lowest during the rainy season.So my question to all of you is:which is your least and most favourite season of the year? and why?Since this is my first post of the year-I promise that this year I shall post frequently and less about Formula 1 and music and more about the gargantuan pile of books which I have managed to amass and keep wanting to read.So expect to see more posts on books. I wish all of you all the happiness,excitement,love-making and fun which you can expect to eke out for the rest of the year.Thanks for hanging around and commenting every now and then.Your comments mean a lot to me.For the rest of my start-of-the year post go here (This is all I wanted to say anyway too :-) )

and also:
Ghar tera Saloni, Badal Ki Colony, Dikhla de thenga in sabko, jo udna na Jaane

Tujhe kya gum, Tera Rishta Gagan ki bansuri se hai, Pawan ki guftgu se hai, suraj ki roshni se hai,

2008-12-12T16:21:00.013+05:30

The weather in Bangalore is just perfect-blue cloudless skies and glorious glorious sunshine and you can see Jupiter and Venus almost everyday,only a bit farther away each day.The azure afternoons diffuse into golden evenings and then the sky becomes indigo once the sun sets .I just discovered that there are a lot more colors with names out there which I was totally unaware of.There is cream which is like dirty white and there is beige which is the color of very milky coffee and there is scarlet which is like bright red and is almost pink :-) How did these colors escape me? Quite long ago in the middle of a serious discussion- somebody(you know who you are!) talked about Turquoise blue and I was pretty confused.So all you men(women usually don't have problems with such things right?) who have problems with these things Wikipedia comes to your rescue here and here and here.So now you know why all these paints have corny names for shades even though they all look the same to you.Talking about Wikipedia,you can make contributions to the Wikimedia foundation here and cmon all you Wiki-junkies you have credit cards right?Wonder what I would do without Wikipedia.

Anyway,so what I really wanted to talk about was some of the lyrics of The Doors.Some of you might remember a Gtalk status message that I had once-"Mute Nostril Agony-carefully refined and sealed over" and DC had even asked me what it meant and I did not know then,but did a little research of my known.What I found out left me in awe of Jim Morisson's abilities as a poet and just how deep and beautiful his lyrics can get.These lines and the lines below are taken from a Doors song-Horse Latitudes-a spoken word piece from the album Strange days.

When the still sea conspires an armor
And her sullen and aborted
Currents breed tiny monsters
True sailing is dead

Awkward instant
And the first animal is jettisoned
Legs furiously pumping
Their stiff green gallop
And heads bob up
Poise
Delicate
Pause
Consent
In mute nostril agony
Carefully refined
And sealed over

Horse Latitudes are the latitudes on both sides of the Equator close to it where winds drop to a bare minimum and is a geographical term but is a terribly frustrating place to be when you are in sea as there is no wind in the sails to push you forward at a brisk pace.Hence Spanish sailors in the 18th and 19th centuries would have to resort to some very desperate measures to offset the prolonging of the voyage which would include killing and eating the horses on board or throwing horses overboard and this is precisely what is captured in the lyrics above.It just gets to show that most of Morrison's lyrics are still very under-appreciated .Because Horse Latitudes is a spoken piece it was usually included in the middle of an even more mysterious song-'Moonlight Drive' and it was inserted between:

Come on, baby, gonna take a little ride
Goin' down by the ocean side
Get real close
Get real tight
Baby gonna drown tonight
Goin' down, down, down, down
Goin' down
Goin' down, way down
Down, down, down, down, down
Down, baby low
Children of the caves will let the
Secret fires glow

and

Easy, to love you
As i watch you glide
Yeah, we're falling through wet forests
On our moonlight drive
Moonlight drive
Moonlight drive
Moonlight drive

Quite impressive considering the fact that Morrison wrote these lines when he was still in school.

It's been ages since I wrote anything about me self here. The last six months on ICISIF read like a news website.I wouldn't say nothing's been happening but at the same time not a lot :-).I realize that in a fortnight I'd be one and a half years old here in office;that seems like a lot of time only the nagging feeling that you have not learned much.Damn, I did not even want to talk about my work but it just creeps in .I switch off completely once I get home from work.This year has been nice to me(alright,this is not the year end post there is still time for that)So that's that and see you around. :-)

PS:Five points to anyone spotting a small attempt at recursion above ;-)

2008-11-28T11:48:00.004+05:30

The blackest Thirty six hours that we have ever seen in our lives.

Hamilton Wins!

2008-11-03T14:00:00.006+05:30

I am just immensely relieved and ecstatic at the same time* at Hamilton's maiden Championship win after a Brazilian Grand Prix of epic proportions with an absolutely nerve wracking last 30 seconds where all seemed lost at the penultimate corner but thanks to Timo Glock and the irrational Toyota decision not to switch to wet tires,Hamilton snatched victory from the jaws of defeat.It was as dramatic as it can get though you can't help feeling sorry for Massa.All I can think of now was that Hamilton deserved it.It was a season of many ups and downs with fortunes see-sawing like mad but Mc Laren did pull it back in the last few races.The most defining moment award of the season (after the finale of course) would go to: Massa coming out of the pit lane in Singapore with the fuel hose attached :D **. Let's hope we see more and more such Hamilton championship wins and such great entertaining races.
Previous post on F1 here

PS:Nicole Scherzinger of PCD was there to cheer her man on.no wonder he held his nerve :)

*it has been such a great year for sports in general isn't it? First we had India winning the Perth test, then Rafa winning Wimbeldon,then India winning three medals at the Olympics and Phelps single-handedly changing the way we look at swimming and now this.

** Ferrari snarks keep away-I might delete all anon comments on this post

Brahmin's Coffee Bar

2008-10-01T10:38:00.015+05:30

Inspired by Akhil's this post, I have finally decided to come out of the closet and declare my love for Bangalore's variegated South Indian eating joints.Bangalore has this concept of Darshinis-which are small eating joints where one would usually have a quick breakfast or a cup of coffee for very nominal prices.Darshinis are optimized for the morning rush hour crowd and you would usually find everyone from college students to Business execs jostling for a bite of that crisp Vada and a swig of that hot aromatic South Indian coffee.Because of the low cost model of such places,there are usually tables at which people stand and eat.You pay for your order beforehand.I have seen Darshinins only in South Indian cities and this is one 0f the things I would like to see in North Indian cities- a place where you could have breakfast on the fly without spending a lot of moolah and wasting a lot of time.

In my 5 years in Bangalore,I have been to numerous such places but my favourite would always be-Brahmin's Coffee Bar in Shankarapuram.This easily beats other also-rans in this category by a mile.BCB is basically a garage converted in to a kitchen at the back and an open area at the front with a counter just in front of the kitchen.It was started by two bored engineers in the 70's who realized that they could make a profitable business out of this sort of an enterprise.BCB opens at 7AM and closes at 12PM.It then again opens at 4PM and closes by 7PM.These are the timings from Monday to Saturday and BCB is ( very famously) closed on Sundays.So either you make BCB a part of your daily routine or you make time for it on Saturday evenings.BCB's menu consists of six items:
1.Idli
2.Vade/Vada
3.Kharabath
4.Kesaribath
5.Coffee
6.Tea
7.Butter(optional with your idlis)

Because it is usually very crowded,you have to make sure that you have made up your mind when you go up to the guy sitting just outside who hands out the tokens.Then you step inside the shop which would usually be choc-a-bloc with(if its in the morning)joggers,people carrying large bags for parcels,college students(usually NHS and Jain college students-who have deserted Food street in droves and chow down here these days) and lots of people in safari suits.I have seen many a swanky car parked near BCB-just gets to prove that BCB is popular not only among us lesser mortals but also among moneyed folks.When you reach the counter,you are supposed to state clearly what your order is when handing over the token to the guy over the counter.This is to make sure that the order is dispatched as quickly as possible and no time is wasted in reading and interpreting the order.As soon as you get your order,you trudge out carefully,trying not to spill the contents of your plate and go outside and set your plate on one of the tables or hold it in your hand.If you run out of chutney,you don't have to go back all the way to the counter again as there is 'uncle' with cups of chutney waiting for you under the tree near the shop.Once you are done with the mouth-watering idlis or whatever you are having,you go inside once again to get the coffee.The coffee is brewed from a copper decocotion filter which looks pretty antique but serves the purpose and you usually ask for two glasses as the glass is too hot to be held.You can have all kinds of combinations depending upon the number of people for whom the order is meant including the ubiquitous By-2(which literally means one standard size coffee in two glasses).I have heard pretty complicated orders like 4 by 7 and have never seen the coffee guy bat an eyelid!The only caveat is that BCB is priced a bit on the higher side,with one coffee costing Rs. 8 but in the end the taste just makes up for the assault on the pocket.I vouch that nobody can make Vadas like BCB.

I discovered BCB when I was in final year and the moment I tasted the idli,I was hooked.Usually BCB would be the first stop in the long rambling walks that I would take in college days.I would head out from college on KR Road and walk pass the BAC(Basvangudi Aquatic Centre) and reach BCB where I would have a leisurely coffee and finaces permitting,a plate of idli vada.Then I would take a walk around the shop lined with opulent houses and quiet streets that makes Shankarapuram one my favourite places in Bangalore.I would walk for about an hour and muse about a lot of things and many happy memories of college times are tied with these walks.Always used to give me a lot of solace.

So now you people know what you are missing if you are in Bangalore and what to look out for when you are next here.Here is a pic of the place on a very crowded Saturday morning.

Every once in a while a tag salvages the blog from utter obscurity

2008-09-18T09:45:00.005+05:30

WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE?
No one.My parents wanted a small and a simple name and they wanted a name which would start with an 'R' like my sister
WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED?
About a year and half ago
DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING?
I hate it.People have problems understanding it.I have trouble reading it sometimes.
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT?
Do not have meat for lunch or for any other meal.Strict Vegetarian.
DO YOU HAVE KIDS?
No
IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU?
Definitely, though I would have problems breaking the ice.
DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT?
Not a lot but a little.I usually hate sarcastic people.Sarcasm is good for British Sitcoms and nothing more.
DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS?
Yes,I do and I also retain all of my vestigial organs/parts most notable my Appendix
WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP?
Yes,I'd love to.
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL?
Have not had much other than Kellog's corn flakes,Chocos and oats.Like Kellog's Banana flavored CFs
DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF?
No. I untie them when I have to wear them again :D
DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG?
strong-headed but not strong particularly otherwise
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM?
Choc-a-Mocha of Corner House.I like Coffee flavored ice creams
WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE?
The first thing that I notice about women is usually their hair.The first thing about men that I notice would usually be shoes or watches if they are wearing any.
RED OR PINK?
Red,I abhor pink.Pink is my least favorite color
WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF?
My tendency to pack in the pounds :D
WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST?
I miss my friend Dipayan and the long rambling discussions we used to have about music
WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING?
Denim trousers and white shoes
WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE?
A Pizza (I am still at work and it is pretty late) :D
WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW?
Light My Fire-The Doors-a song which I think is ethereally beautiful(as DC would put it)
IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE?
I would be blue.
FAVORITE SMELLS?
Any aftershave,the smell of freshly grounded coffee,banana
WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE?
Ankita
DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON WHO TAGGED YOU?
Yes
FAVORITE SPORT TO WATCH?
Tennis
HAIR COLOR?
Black
EYE COLOR?
Hazel Brown
DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS?
No
FAVORITE FOOD?
Mom's Rajma :-)
SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS?
Scary movies though I have watched very few.
LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED?
Rock On
WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING?
Red&White
SUMMER OR WINTER?
Winter
HUGS OR KISSES?
Hugs
FAVORITE DESSERT?
Apple Pie
WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW?
The Black Book- Orhan Pamuk
WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD?
I have got David Villa and Michael Ballack(It is a Euro 2008 promotional mouse pad)
WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON T.V. LAST NIGHT?
Don't watch TV at all these days
FAVORITE SOUND?
I absolutely love drum solos and Tabla solos
ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES?
Beatles
WHAT IS THE FURTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME?
Paris
DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT?
Yes, I can hold my breath for over two minutes :-)
WHERE WERE YOU BORN?
Hyderabad,India
PS:I know this blog has been flagging off a bit these days.I,as usual, blame work.I guess the rest of 2008 would be like this.

RAGA:mixed up and indistiguishable

2008-07-29T21:48:00.005+05:30

feeling sleepy and nursing bruises and feeling exhausted after the ordeal.Lilith has generally been very aggressive leaving me copies of extremely suggestive books which include Paradise Lost.old moulds crumble leaving behind more sinisterly seductive sensations. :-)

2008-07-27T20:33:00.004+05:30

You don't think about it till it happens to you.All the pain and suffering seem distant-till you face it yourself.The first blast spot,the bus shelter is barely 300m from my house.I have walked past it hundreds of time.While driving through,I have seen friends standing there waiting for a bus and it sends a chill down my spine whenever I think what would have happened if the blasts were to happen in the morning.When the messages and the mails started coming in,it was unreal-the first reaction being that of denial-this couldn't be happening to us-in Bangalore-we are away from the epicenters of danger-and then it was frustration and anger at the ease with which the bombs were planted and the ease with which they could rattle us.The phone networks got jammed almost instantly after the first messages came through.Thank god for the internet.The feeling that it could have been any one of us instead of that unfortunate lady is very very disconcerting.It has been a depressing weekend.I hope that whoever is behind this and the Ahmedabad blasts is dealt with very severely.

2008-07-07T21:46:00.006+05:30

It will probably never happen again.After seeing half a decade of Domination,seeing countless champions bite the dust ,two nerve wracking finals and four hours forty eight minutes later it was finally redemption.

It was unreal and just very indescribable*.I came back from Jam after a whole day of traveling and was resigned to the fact that the final would probably be over and was scared to even check when Debu turned on the TV but the match was still being played with the score on 6-6 4th set.The tie break that followed was just amazing tennis.Every time Nadal got a breakthrough Federer clawed back.It was won by Federer 10-8 and the rallies were just beautiful with Federer hitting a backhand winner down the line which just had genius stamped all over it.The match see-sawed so many times that it became difficult to sit still and the crowd at center court couldn't keep mum either with oohs and aahs at each and every point.

Finally it was big big relief to see Rafa win.I think all through out the match one could see that Federer was not his usually benign monk-face self and there was just this slight hint of a worry on his face whereas Nadal has become more and more composed as the years have gone by.then there were major changes in his game most noticeably the heavy top-spin on the forehand.He wasn't hitting flat out at all.I have never seen anyone play that shot for every point in a rally but Rafa really did.Another thing which I saw him do quite effectively is alternatively switching between the baseline and the volley game which would be pretty unnerving for anyone. He also combined this with some very acute angles and power hitting and sometimes-deep in a point you could almost feel Federer's helplessness though in the very next moment Fed would come up with one of those magically surreal shots which would sometimes even leave the linesmen gasping.But in the end it was Rafa's mental toughness more than any other factor which finally saw him through.After four and a half hours it was just too much for the 'inhuman' Fedex. For all those people who keep waxing eloquent on Fed and keep saying how perfect he is -all I have to say is that most people don't realize that Nadal was very very close to beating Fed last year.He was broken only in the 5th set last time around and this time not at all.so even though Federer had some twenty six aces to Nadal's six;Rafa still managed to not concede a service game.amen.***Hamilton winning the Silverstone being an added bonus.
**This is not say that I do not regard Fed as a great player but that maybe-just maybe his best days are behind him.

PS:Actually I checked and Federer did break Nadal once in the second set.The error is regretted.

UPDATE: so it was Gwen-the first lady of Rock and her hubby Gavin Rossdale beside Mirka-Fed's girlfriend at the final and even though I was suspicious I assumed it was some dumb Swedish blonde.I hope the final was not too agitating for dear Gwen in her current state:

2008-07-01T00:34:00.001+05:30

At home now and technically 'chilling' out though it is quite muggy here in Jam.People tell me that it is pretty cool now but all I know is that I start sweating if I don't sit under a fan.You really appreciate ACs here.Maybe I have become the extremely sensitive to weather asinine Bangalorean.I was wondering why we don't have power cuts here in Jam,then the power went off yesterday and it dawned on me-its impossible to breath without a fan or an AC here.At the steel plant here during most of the summer,all work is stopped between 11AM to 4PM because even the sheltered portions of the plant become as hot as 50 deg Celsius or more.

So all that can be done is done in the evening and the rest of the time is spent reading or sleeping indoors.I have been reading Moby Dick,Gravity's Rainbow and Beyond Belief in turns so that I don't get bored of any one book.I somehow always end up concurrently reading two or more books and this might seem strange to people who swear by one book at a time but somehow I end up finishing books faster this way.I am also very desperate to read Paradise Lost but unfortunately all these fancy bookshops in Bangalore do not bother to stock it.All I could locate was a massive 'collection of Milton's works' or something of that sort which was anyway beyond the price range.So,whoever you are,please mail me a copy.

Spain won in style and quite decisively.They broke their jinx of not having any silverware for the past 44 years.For me the find of the tournament would be Fabregas-his passing is beautiful and elegant and he created that vital space on which the likes of Villa and Torres thrived.The penalty taken against Italy was very clinical too.With this win I broke a personal jinx too.It would so happen that every team I supported lost in the football world cups or Euro championships.in '94, the first I remember seeing; I was supporting Germany being a fan of Klinsmann.They lost in the quarterfinals.Then in '98,it was again Germany and they lost again. in '02,I switched to Argentina being now a big fan of Batistuta,they were in some 'group of death' and didn't even make it to the second round.That was enough for people to start saying that I am jinxed and that whichever team I support is gonna lose. With Argentina out of the way,I supported Spain and they lost to South Korea in the second round.Then Italy collapsed in the quarterfinals.I started getting taunting calls from all my friends.(you know who you are) They supporting the safe bet- Brazil.Then in '06,it was Argentina again and they were playing some amazing football right throughout the tournament.This time,watching the world cup in the hostel common room was amazing.Unlike cricket in which there would be a collective mourning after an Indian loss,hostel had this different groups of people supporting different teams-the German supporters,the Brazilian supporters,the Argentinian supporters and that would spice things up.The '06 world cup ended in July coinciding with the exams and it was pretty tough concentrating in that almost carnival atmosphere.It seemed as though the jinx would break when 80 mins into the Germany-Argentina Quarterfinal Klose headed in a winner and all was lost. Consequently I bungled up my Digital Communications paper.Yesterday was weirdly familiar with Klose still at the helm of the German attack but thankfully there was no equalizer and I could finally after a 14 year wait see my team win :-)

PS:the only thing better than tennis under lights is probably swimming under lights

In which we do asinine* tags for wont of better things to do ..

2008-05-29T23:05:00.005+05:30

The tag goes like this:
1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.

and so:
1.Python Cookbook**-Martelli,Ravenscroft&Ascher(O'Reilly) -which contrary to all expectations is not about exquisite cuisine or fear of snakes.
2.Done- a book of 800 pages no less
3.The fifth sentence-
def workdays(start,end,holidays=,days_off=None)
4. The next three sentences-
if days_off is None:
days_off =5,6 #default to saturdays and sundays
workdays=[x for x in range(7) if x not in days_off]

5.Found this tag on Space Bar's blog and I tag Ankita,Dreamcatcher(who is pretty jobless anyway),Deepika,Solitary Reaper and Indira.

*isn't asinine such a cool word?Roll it over in your mouth and say it slowly.So deliciously condescending.***
** Accusations of being a geek/IT type will not be entertained.
***I sound more and more like my favorite bloggers.****
****welcome to the labyrinth of recursive footnotes :-)

2008-05-27T22:57:00.003+05:30

What do you do when you are on the edge?When the world seems too cruel and unfair and exasperating?I write-whether it be this blog or my journal or office memos .I write and listen to the 9th and hope that the mad feeling passes.People say writing tinged with extreme feeling is never good but you write when you have to write and then it is just a flurry of words.I can't do calm,composed writing.I wish I could write like Falstaff churning out post after post of such intensity which leaves you spellbound. I would rather be insanely passionate than coolly efficient.I'd rather be Cobain than Chris Martin.I'd rather be Maverick than Iceman.

2008-05-25T22:39:00.003+05:30

An extremely hectic May it has been .First of all there is work which has been quite challenging lately with truckloads of responsibilities and endless sprints*.I want to go home so badly that my head aches every time I think of Jam and my trip is still a month away.Bangalore is unpleasantly cool this summer.It is extremely bright in the mornings with fuzzy sunlight around lunchtime and then around 3 in the afternoon,the light fades away-replaced by dark thunderous clouds and then inevitably-rain just when you have to leave office.innumerable bedraggled evenings-the most agonizing thing being standing at a traffic light with the rain slowly soaking through to your bones-drop by drop.I have always been a person who hates getting wet in the rain.What joy do people get out of dancing in the rain is something that I have not been able to fathom.Also there is this exam to be given and preparing for exams while working is so difficult-you only have the second rate hours of the day at hand not that any studying gets done on weekends.

Traffic in Bangalore is a funny thing.I wonder if it is the same in other places but there seem to be certain windows of time in which there is a lot of traffic on the roads and then there are lull periods in between.For e.g if I leave home at 8:30 then I am often caught in a mild rush on the road-these are mostly people trying to make it to work by 9 sharp but then unusually there is a lull in the traffic around 8:45-8:50 as most of these people would already be close to their respective destinations.but there is no 9:15-9:20 lull as people who have to reach work at 9:30 and also those wanting to reach by 10:00 are already out on the roads with the latter group out by this time in anticipation of heavy traffic!!

Now with Internet at home,blogging would be easier and more frequent(I hope).I am in the midst of a downloading frenzy but hardly have time to watch the movies I have already downloaded.I have a backlog of unfinished books too.There seem to be pending to-do lists everywhere.Work really squeezes the juice out of you.

* After singing paeans for Agile I sometimes do think that it might get difficult if you are the only one in a story point

2008-04-11T15:03:00.004+05:30

There is something surreal about War Pigs .The wail of the sirens at the start and the totally stripped down sound with only the faint drumming when Ozzy sings those immortal lines and the guitar lick at the end of each line.The bass being totally not subdued.There is a certain Naiveté to the lyrics even though its an anti-war song.Its got a definite sadness and a finality to it but yet in an eerie way its an all is not lost song.Its got an ambiguity which I can't describe. Bill Ward's drumming is excellent.It's a song that gives me hope.always.It is a song which restores sanity and alleviates pain.

Faith in humanity has gone down a few notches and don't know when I will get it back again.I am tired of playing games all the time.I have a sudden craving for simplistic quick solutions.

Pari' -day 1

2008-04-01T08:10:00.001+05:30

Paris takes your breath away - at every corner and at every turn- it meets whatever expectation you have and more and surprises you when least expected.It beats any other city that I have seen by a mile.Here is a brief account of the I spent in Paris.Subsequent days would have their own posts.

I arrive at CDG airport around 10 in the morning.It is a bit chilly but not really cold.The train journey from the airport to Chatlet Les Halles metro station bang in the middle of Paris is quite agreeable to the eyes.You get to see Stade de France and the Sacre Cour rising up from the urban sprawl.A little bit of a perspective about the geography of Paris.It is basically a city with very little variation in elevation which is divided by The river Seine into two almost identical halves.The center of the city being ile de la cite - the natural island on the Seine which is a point of reference .I take some time to locate my hotel which is actually a youth hostel -The BVJ Louvre(which was just a stone throws away from the Louvre as you doubtless would have guessed).I am told on arriving that I would only be able to get inside my room after 2.So I keep my luggage in a locker and head out with a smaller bag to see the Notre dame.I don't have batteries for my camera (having stupidly left my batteries in Helsinki in my hotel room) and am desperate as all shops are closed (it being a Sunday) .I head out towards the Notre dame and I reach Pont Neuf- a bridge on the Seine leading to the ile de la cite and
am just completely spell bound by the breathtaking beauty that is the banks of the Seine.I am also utterly frustrated by the fact that I am not able to take pictures.But then there is this roadside stall which sells miscellaneous trinkets where I finally locate a couple of batteries in a remote corner.I am mightily relieved and click away crazily.I reach the ile de la cite and reach a pavement where I see a long queue and assume that it is for the famed cathedral.I am led through a security check and get inside but the cathedral strangely does not seem to be anything like the Notre dame that I imagined.I can see Gargoyles but then I am told that I cannot go to the top of the spires.

This is the insides of what I then find out is the St.Chapelle(which is exquisite in its own right and quite overshadowed on the island by Notre Dame.The glass work especially is of a fine quality)and not the St.Michel Notre Dame.

St.Chapelle is just adjacent to Préfecture de Police and that explains the stringent policing at the entrance.

Next I headed straight towards what many consider the finest example of French Gothic Architecture.The church of 'our lady'-Notre Dame de Paris.My first impression on seeing it was to wonder how anything could be more beautiful and I was so excited that I did not take a decent photograph of it and none of my front-on pics do any justice to it.This is a pic I took slightly later in the night.

Notre dame is one of the sights which defines Paris.It is so intricately built and the sculpture on it so exquisite that it can rival any Indian temple like Belur-Halebid or Hampi.Its architecture is beautiful with the two towers at the front,the spire in the middle and and huge stain-glass circular windows on the sides.The best part of the architecture are the Flying Buttresses which are basically rib-like support pillars to prevent the roof from falling in because the side walls have been weakened by carving huge holes in them for windows.you can see them in this pic just behind the clump of trees though again, not a clear view.

The insides are a bit unlike the other churches which I visited as Notre Dame served as a major focal point for religious movements in France.(thats about as informative as I can get without committing a factual error!).There was a lot of Christian symbolism and imagery which I didn't 'get'.However I did see a statue of Joan of arc and the plaque said that after she was burned alive by being falsely accused of being a witch by her enemies,the decision to restore her image to that of a heroine was taken in Notre Dame. The insides:

I spent quite some time there and wanted to go up the stairs to the spire where you get quite a view of Paris but was dissuaded by the pain in my legs and the long queue.It was the first Sunday of the month and the entry was free.Apparently you can get really close to the Gargoyle there.

Next I headed towards the Eiffel Tower.The most visited sight in Paris-what the Parisians affectionately call -'The metal asparagus'.I wanted to get over it pretty fast and I wanted to save time for the other sights.The tower was all lit up when I arrived and looked really-like the tower you see in photographs:

There are a certain few minutes in the evening when the lights on the tower go all shimmering and flickering and it is a really beautiful sight.(which you can see in the above pic).The area surrounding the Tower is very picturesque with great sweeping lawns on one side and the Seine on the other side.This idyllic tourist setting is complimented by hordes of people of all nationalities-Spaniards,Brits,Aussies,Sub-Saharan Africans all standing for at least a couple of hours in the queue putting on their best behaviors.The icing on the cake is the generous sprinkling of very well behaved and meek African and Indian(Punjabi) youth selling the eternal have-been-to-Paris symbol.The showpiece which has to be a part of your show-case back home-The Mini Eiffel Tower replica.

Already it was dark by then.It was a pleasant evening with lots of people.I didn't go up the tower to avoid the tremendous rush and instead took a stroll along the Seine eating a huge bag of fries and clicking snaps. I was very tired after the 4 AM flight and the running around and traveling.So I went back to the hotel.My dorm room had 4 beds and there were two Australians and one Japanese.The Aussies were backpacking across Europe having given themselves a 2 month break between school and college.The Japanese didn't say much and was very apologetic and polite.so much for day 1.Day 2 - The Louvre.will continue.....

Sick :(

2008-03-27T20:09:00.005+05:30

I am not back as yet but have been terribly sick all this week ...in fact from last Friday.I was sick on my birthday too as many of you doubtless know.I still managed to cut a cake and my roommates managed to polish it off for me.It is a subtle kind of fever....my skin is not actually burning hot but the fever is there underneath...every time I think it is gone,it comes right back.I am depressed and tired.I sweat underneath my bedclothes and it goes away and then I start shivering because of the sweat.I have been taking antibiotics and have been thinking not so rosy thoughts.Not going to office for 5 days means I have lesser number of days of leave to go home which is again depressing.I will probably get a blood test done once the dosage of pills is exhausted.really depressing stuff.Everybody is sick in Bangalore.We almost had an epidemic in our team in office.On the friday of the Megadeth concert only 10 out of 23 turned up for work.Hi Denzyl if you are reading this :-) Leave a comment sometime to cheer me up.
I feel a bit like Rodya in Crime & Punishment not to say that I feel murderous but delirious.Rodya of part 1 and 2.The Wikipedia article on C&P is excellent by the way.I owe replies to some emails from some of you and this is my excuse for the delay.Till I am hale n' hearty again.

I have a sudden urge to eat Singhada with sauce.Not Samosas.Singhadas in all their crispy glory.

Will be back.....

2008-02-19T19:07:00.002+05:30

Taking a small break from this blog to pay attention to more pressing issues( not that anybody would've noticed).I am tired of doing infrequent small posts which absolutely suck content wise and is usually a personal rant.When I started out ,this was not supposed to be a personal sort of blog but here I am.As blogging is difficult from office, I shall post when I have a net connection at home.I can't really say when I will be back but it won't be long.So long everyone.Be good when I am away :-) and keep those blues away.

2008-01-31T02:26:00.000+05:30

You Should Be a Science Fiction Writer

Your ideas are very strange, and people often wonder what planet you're from.
And while you may have some problems being "normal," you'll have no problems writing sci-fi.
Whether it's epic films, important novels, or vivid comics...
Your own little universe could leave an important mark on the world!

What Type of Writer Should You Be?

The trip so far...

2008-01-30T22:16:00.000+05:30

Right now in Finland and loving it so far.Its been almost four weeks and I will be here till next Sunday.Since this is my first time in a foreign country (having not been to Nepal even)...I was expectedly very very elated when I first got to hear about my trip from my manager.The whole of December was spent in frenzied preparations right from the clothes to the shoes to anything that would help me get through this 'trial by ice'(as one colleague put it ) and I thought of putting up a short post about my plans but could not get around to do it.But it is not as cold as I thought it would be(Apparently Finland is having its warmest winter ever recorded) but its beautiful when it snows!:

I would be doing a travelogue kinda post in some time as Falstaff says:
'the whole point of all this travel is to blog about it afterwards'. :-)
I would also be visiting Paris for some days.So till then....... Au revoir

PS:
It has been a month packed with some pleasant , strange and truly bizarre experiences.Today I made this:

That's Spaghetti for you ,with chopped onions and crushed tortilla chips(not visible) and the sauce is (hold your breath) Rasam! - made from MTR Rasam mix!!
Ah! the travails of Single South Indian Vegetarian men abroad or why do we lose so much weight there.

Zeppelin

2008-01-16T02:29:00.000+05:30

I just love.adore.worship.idolize these guys.Nobody else comes close-and would ever come close.

Do you remember, mama, when I knocked upon your door?
I said you had the nerve to tell me
You didnt want me no more,
I open my front door hearing my back door slam,
You must have one of them new fangled,
New fangled back door man
Since Ive been loving you,
Im about to lose my worried mind

2008-01-05T23:34:00.000+05:30

I got tagged by DC so here goes.

Ten things I miss in my life (in no exact order)
1. The British Library in Ranchi and the smell of the books there.
2. Playing Tennis under lights!/playing tennis
3. Sis - who is on another continent now.
4. My house in Jam esp the garden in winter in the afternoon.
5. sitting in the last bench in college with Akhil, laughing for no reason and at practically everything.
6. A very old and a dear friend of mine called Vaibhav - not able to locate him on Orkut either
7.Brahmin's coffee bar's idly/vada/coffee
8.Kaveri restaurant in Ranchi
9.A who moved to Delhi recently
10. quizzing with fellow Freud's nightmares (that was my team)

Ten things I want to achieve within a decade from now.
1. Backpack across South America with friends. Live there for two years, maybe.(similar to DC)
2. write a book
3. complete Ulysses :-)
4. Go to Kailash Mansarovar
5. try Sky diving.
6. contribute to an open source project.

7.Learn how to play the drums (very highly there)

8.learn decent cooking

9.start building my own house

10.vote in all the elctions I am eligible for.

this was fun!

The ear yend post

2007-12-29T19:11:00.000+05:30

Things have been so chaotic and crazy and I have been so insanely busy that I feel like screaming(almost)..Lots of things to do and err....forms to fill.Last( Xmas) weekend went river rafting/trekking in Dandeli.River rafting is certainly something that even the most faint-hearted should try out as it is unbelievable fun.Also a lot of friends are leaving Bangalore and going elsewhere. A left for Delhi,Mazum is going to the States and my college roommate would be going to Chennai.So ended up running all over the place trying to synchronize farewell schedules. It is kinda sad that people whom you know so well and whom you always assumed would be a part of your life are suddenly moving away - doing their own thing and all that would be left would be random impersonal scraps on Orkut. Anyway so this time I decided to do an year end post.Blogging wise this was a better year with more posts than last year and few more people in the comments section (A grand total of 6 people -yay!) but as compared to other bloggers I have too few posts.Its not the lack of ideas but sloth which is to blame.Also add to this spending 8 hours a day in front of the computer and you have the perfect excuse to avoid blogging. Anyway 2007 was an eventful year and lots of things happened.

had a crummy internship-a heartbreak- went on an amazing trip to Goa-two trips to Jam- had a great B.E project experience-read quite a lot-left college-started work-moved into a new house-went on some more trips-fell sick repeatedly-realized quite a few things about myself.It was an amazing year in short and though not always pleasant it was a kind of year I would want to live again.It was pretty roller-coasterish.and yeah some resolutions for 2008:

1. Blog more often
2. Lose weight
3.Learn French & Tamil (don't ask!)
4.Start playing tennis
5.Learn cooking
6.Be 'kind' to people
7.Read more
8.Stick to your beliefs and have 'simple' goals in life.*

The Jains have a very interesting festival of forgiveness called Paryushana in which people ask forgiveness for their misdeeds of the past year.I think its a great concept.So in the same vein- Micchami Dukkadam to all of you readers of the blog. May you have a fun filled 2008! here's wishing all of you a very Happy New Year!!

*sounds very BT-ish I know :-)

Recently....

2007-11-28T19:25:00.000+05:30

Its been a crazy post Diwali November.Getting adjusted to the new house.Falling sick repeatedly due to diarrhea.Planning for January.Work getting a little hectic.This weekend I was completely engrossed in traveling and attending Grihapravesh-es.Have been listening to a lot of classic stuff-The Doors and Sabbath and esp Led Zep (OK what do call a Hippie's and a carpenter's ideal date?--- tripping on Doors ( apologies to Saanjh :-) ) ) .Also I am mostly dead on Orkut but pretty much there on Facebook ( due to company intranet filtering and 'coz I hate Powerscrap) with all its myriad applications which ask you to characterize people , poke your friends, put up your fav comic on your profile and do thousand more fun things.Really you should check it out.*

I have been buying books left right and center since the last five months and lately I have been able to catch up on reading instead of just admiring the bookshelf.

Books bought recently:

1.The diaries of Franz Kafka
2.Gravity's Rainbow
3.Madame Flaubert
4.A clockwork orange
5.Brave new World
6.Nirvana's Biography
7.Step across this line
8.The ground beneath her feet
9.A father and son
10.The code book
11.Dubliners
12.Above average

Among these I have only managed to read A father and son,Above average and Brave new world.All the rest are in unread or half-read stages.I was impressed by Brave new world and I would say it pretty much beats all other Dystopian themes by quite a margin.I like the irony and the grey ending of the book and they way that issues like purpose of life are explored without firmly sticking to one.Another post I did on Dystopia some time back here
Hopefully I would have something interesting to say next time around.Most probably I would be putting up some older posts which are in draft just 'coz I have put enough effort into them to delete them.

*I think that lately, all I have been doing is pimping various sites.I know people come to my blog just to navigate to other cooler pages but what to do, hardly anything interesting happens in my life. I have been told that everything that I do has an air of recklessness to it-including this blog.

The Diwali post

2007-11-09T19:41:00.000+05:30

My first Diwali post in the three Novembers on Blogspot.Diwali being the most favourite festival of mine.Diwalis in Ranchi were always special.There would be that special chill in the air with the coming of winter and the days and the afternoons would be marvelously sunny and blue-skied.Invariably we would have a four day mini-vacation from school.I remember a lot of Diwalis-some pretty routine,some out of the ordinary.There was this Diwali when we went to wish a family friend of ours and came back to see that all of our diyas had disappeared.This being a house on the ground floor.Me and my sis had an argument whether the diyas were carried off when lighted on lots and lots of steel trays or the thieves had a well laid out plan of extinguishing the diyas,emptying the oil in a can,collecting the wicks together and then stuffing all the diyas in a huge boraa, this latter suggestion being from my sister.Then when we were living in Satellite colony,we had a gang of boys going from block to block blowing up all the letterboxes(made of wood).Their modus operandi was to go in two groups of two to blocks facing each other and blow up the boxes simultaneously using two aloo-bombs stringed together.This was to cause simultaneous pandemonium.Apparently they also gutted the insides of a post-box made of steel (as they could not blow it up-if they had succeeded,then they would have sent scraps of hot metal flying everywhere - a la Flak Cannon in Unreal Tournament 2000).

Then there was the usual pre-Diwali notorious cracker bursting in school.It was always a ritual in school eagerly anticipated by everyone.Whoever attended Shyamali in the 90's would surely remember the sudden sound of a bomb going off in some corner or toilet and the roar that would rise instantly-the roar of the students cheering.There were special fireworks when we were in class 9th.The Secondary building students had just assembled for the morning prayers and there was an ear-shattering explosion and smoke was visible from the corridor of 10th std(Some people recall that this was at exactly the moment the Princi had started pleading for the cause of a cracker free school-but that I think is just melodramatic trickery of memory) .The Princi was furious and ordered for an immediate round up of the 'culprits' which resulted in Modi lining up some random ppl(which included some hapless victims from the late line) and pushing them on to the podium.Then the Princi in an attempt to act 'tough' started roughing up the slimmest guy of the lot,shaking his collar in front of the whole secondary section.It was the most pathetic display of arrogance by the teachers I have ever seen.There was also the Diwali in which Aashu had burnt his hands and there was collective universal mourning in school what with all his Bhakt log falling over each other to convey their sorrow and all the teachers hearing out his tepid tale of woe with the utmost seriousness.(There is this interesting tale about of a follower of Aashu*- Bhakt Pandey) but pardon me I am slipping into Shyamali folklore again.

What was once fun turned into a boring ritual once I came to Bangalore.Routine trips to relatives place and bursting crackers with cousins much younger than you is no great fun.Also in the Hostel there were a lot of crackers burst but that satisfaction was not there.Today for the first time-I lit diyas and found it pretty enjoyable .This time I am down with food poisoning(yes, again) so can't gorge on the usual sweets and delicacies as I used to.Hope your Diwali was fun.

*Aashutosh-Aashu for short(yes the two a's are there to appear at the top of any list alphabetically) is a friend who was the 'star' of Shyamali and the apple of every teacher's eyes.The Maryada Purushottam Ram of the batch.

Yeah, back at the roadhouse they got some bungalows

2007-10-26T18:43:00.000+05:30

"All right,all right,all right.Hey listen ,listen,listen man.I don't know how many you people believe in astrology.(to a woman in the crowd)Yeah that's right baby.I am a Sagittarius.The most philosophical of all the signs......But anyway I don't believe in it.I think it's a bunch of bullshit ma self. But I tell you this man.I tell you this-I don't know whats gonna happen man but I am gonna have my kicks before the whole shit-house goes up in flames!!"

--live in Boston '70

A life of unrestrained hedonism.The dream that was always there and now will see fruition.

When I woke up this morning, I got myself a beer
Well, I woke up this morning, and I got myself a beer
The future's uncertain, and the end is always near

Let it roll, baby, roll
Let it roll, baby, roll
Let it roll, baby, roll
Let it roll, all night long

Yeah, I am gonna have my kicks before the whole shit-house goes up in flames.

and we go to Brazil......

2007-10-07T22:16:00.000+05:30

THE BAD GUYS

It was frustrating to watch Lewis get stuck in the pit-lane-gravel and even more frustrating to see Kimi win.I was kinda hoping Hamilton will seal it today but that was not to happen.If only McLaren had called him into the pit lane one lap before.However this leads us to an absolutely gripping Brazilian Grand Prix and the championship again being decided in the last race.The points tally reads as follows:
1. Lewis Hamilton 107
2.Fernando Alonso 103
3.Kimi Raikonnen 100
(10 points for 1st place,8-for 2nd and 6 for 3rd)

so Lewis can win the Driver's Championship if he comes 1st or 2nd.However if he comes 3rd and Alonso 1st then it is an absolutely delicious case of a tie-which I do not know how FIA resolves.Kimi can only win if comes 1st or 2nd and that too if the other two do not make it to the podium.So it is really only about Alonso vs Hamilton.Keeping fingers crossed for the 21st.

update:Yeah all you comment trolls-Kimi won. and the most F-ed up part was I couldn't watch the race.couldn't watch bcoz i don't have a TV or a radio and almost puked in the morning when I saw the papers.and yeah-NO MORE ANONYMOUS COMMENTS.I am putting an end to the guessing game that I play every time I see a new comment.so there.

A post a day.....

2007-09-26T22:13:00.000+05:30

The folks at the office say that Agile is really the way to go but me being a newbie don't know really.We (the torch-bearers of hardware) never really had an exposure to Waterfall anyway,so can't really judge which is better.Life is increasingly spent at meetings,trainings and presentations which is fine as long as you can sit somewhere where you can become invisible and snatch a wink or two.My strategy is to go for a little behind the middle seat so that I can still be at the back if the back-benchers ( seaters?) get called to the front.I am slowly getting addicted to Excel and Confluence-the wiki they use in our place.Life's little achievements consist of avoiding the maximum number of traffic lights by choosing bizzare driving routes,buying novels from shady second-hand books stores and by trying to eke out the most tax benefits by investing (planning to invest rather) in schemes which make you feel like that masterji in some old Doordarshan era ad-"Samay samay par LIC ka premium bharna jaroori hai".I am really thinking of writing book reviews to make this mundane blog a little more exciting by posting scandalous ideas and in general antagonizing everyone.Yeah and book reviews are very subjective things(that's what writerscafe.org says about Book review guidelines)-so everything is an opinion and not fact.

If you think that you have a tech(or a science) bone in your body,
check out boiledbeans
A visual quiz a day complete with a scorecard .What fun! this is the first thing that I do in the morning at the office.

2007-09-24T22:52:00.001+05:30

Happy birthday to the Dutta twins(1st and 3rd from right).Even after so many years,I still cannot let go off the excitement that is your company.Right from the tennis matches to your music system, the double ride on your cycles to the insane laughing bouts.The Vietnamese hat in your living room to the frenzied accounts of your various escapades in school.The cynicism and the constant chatter about Cobain and Axl to the rides towards HEC.From talk about Noir films to Marijuana to the pandal hopping - I know it is not coming out well and I don't know how to put it but all I want to say is that you(including the Black field gang) are the only people around whom I am completely uninhibitedly at home.You are the very few people who have seen the real me.I don't say this often enough but I am grateful that I met you guys and even when I grow old and weak in the bones I will still cherish the memory of the time spent.Thanks for everything(and for a change I really mean it) and stay the same.peace.

2007-09-02T09:43:00.000+05:30

Copy-paste from Dreamcatcher's blog.

If I were a beginning, I would be: The dawn
If I were a month, I would be: December
If I were a day of the week, I would be:Saturday
If I were a time of day, I would be:Three am
If I were a planet, I would be: Uranus(A planet which rotates with its axis on the side-Punster's keep away)
If I were a season, I would be:summer
If I were a sea animal, I would be: a Great White Shark
If I were a direction, I would be: East
If I were a piece of furniture, I would be: a couch
If I were a sin, I would be: lust
If I were a liquid, I would be: Petrol
If I were a fraud/scare, I would be: making headlines by now
If I were a gem, I would be: a Lapis-Lazuli
If I were a tree, I would be: a Banyan
If I were a tool, I would be: a Swiss Knife.
If I were a flower/plant, I would be: an Aloe Vera
If I were a kind of weather, I would be: a bright blue sky on a winter morning.
If I were a musical instrument, I would be: a tabla
If I were an animal, I would be: a tiger
If I were an emotion, I would be: joy
If I were a vegetable, I would be: spinach
If I were a sound, I would be: the sound of a didgeridoo
If I were an element, I would be: Calcium
If I were a car, I would be: a Ferarri
If I were a song, I would be: The end by The Doors
If I were a food, I would be: apple pie
If I were a place, I would be: Goa
If I were a material, I would be: Velcro
If I were a taste, I would be: sweet-sour
If I were a scent, I would be: scent of Pulao
If I were a religion, I would be: Hinduism
If I were a sentence, I would be: All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players
If I were a body part, I would be: the shoulders
If I were a facial expression, I would be: a grin
If I were a subject in college, I would be: Algorithm design and analysis
If I were a shape, I would be: a spiral
If I were a quantity, I would be: a carat
If I were a colour, I would be: black
If I were a thing, I would be: a garden
If I were a landmass, I would be: a mountain
If I were a book, I would be: Ulysses
If I were a monument, I would be: The Colosseum
If I were an artist, I would be: Dali
If I were a landscape, I would be: a valley
If I were a watch, I would be: showing EST
If I were God, I would be: laughing
If I were a vowel, I would be: u
If I were a consonant, I would be: r
If I were a formula, I would be: The Fourier-series expansion formula
If I were a Science, I would be: Organic Chemistry
If I were a theory, I would be: Post-modernism
If I were a famous person, I would be: Salman Rushdie
If I were an electronic equipment, I would be: a super-computer
If I were sport, I would be: tennis
If I were a movie, I would be:the Casino
If I were a cartoon, I would be: The Simpsons
If I were an explorer, I would be: Magellan
If I were a scientist, I would be: Alan Turing
If I were a relation, I would be: elder brother
If I were a river, I would be: The Amazon
If I were intoxication, I would be: marijuana
If I were alone, I would be: content
If I were a question, then I would be: why don't I have enough time?
If I were a hobby, I would be: reading
If I were a habit, I would be: being generous
If I were in an atom, I would be: U-235
If I were an end, I would be: the end of the solar system.
If I were you, I would be: laughing by now.

2007-08-28T22:19:00.000+05:30

A random conversation at work:

Female 1:but the J2EE trainer was good.
Male1:No,was bad.I did not understand much.
Me: Me neither!
Female1:but he was very helpful.
Me:You have been afflicted by the Stockholm syndrome.
Male1:but thats when........
Me:Yeah but it's similar to that.analogous.
Female1:what's what syndrome?
Male1 and Me:you wouldn't understand-you need level for that! bwahahahahaha!!
*Female1 grimaces*

And this featured in our conversations too. Wikipedia fascinates always.

Also innumerable Homer Simpson conversations......... with Male1 being a Springfield resident-almost but Male1 has been sufficently irradiated.(I will have names for my co-workers soon)

D'oh!!!!-just look at his expression here!!.LMAO :D

I love my job.

2007-08-21T22:10:00.000+05:30

Feeling fidgety.revolted with myself.lost.lonely.bored.fatigued.nerves on edge.blue-black vs turquoise blue,in an eternal dance of wits.

Has been a while

2007-08-10T23:22:00.000+05:30

Its has been a while since I did a decent post.Life's been pretty busy,hectic would not be the apt word.Wake up-go to work-come back and sleep and then wake up on Saturday around 7 and think-oh, no going to work today- and then promptly dozing off for a couple of more hours.It is a strange feeling,I never actually imagined how life would be working and so far this life has been good to me.My routine in the office usually involves-reaching there by 9:30,coffee break of 10-15 min around 11:00,lunch around 12:45,loitering in the campus for about three quarters of an hour,another coffee/tea break around 3:15 and the office crowd starts thinning around 5:45-6 and everything is quiet around 6:45-and yeah around 6 ,some head to the cafeteria for snacks while some go to the gym-I head back home,cursing and breaking furiously in the maddening MG Road traffic and in between I also do some coding desperately trying to come to grips with unfamiliar programming concepts/vocab "requirements"-"analysis"-"design" all mean different things in different contexts and the most scariest word of them all-static............
I dream of red lines and yellow lines and light bulbs and red crosses and cntrl-x,cntrl-v,cntrl-c all running in wild maniacal circles around me- taunting me to confront them till I hear the sweet purring of the CPU acknowledging my almost perfect resizeable-resistant -pesky user defying-UI.

it's almost Asok-in-Dilbert ian this love for my workplace is but I cant help it if my manager is a very co-operative man and that my team members do not actually suck but the honeymoon is gonna end soon- I have a vague premonition.Sometimes I do have that instinctive urge to bunk-to run away form work and cool my heels but then as a friend of mine pointed out-'you get paid to do this' so I curb the desire and get along with the job at hand.Finally read HP-7 and the last duel between Voldermort and Harry is almost anti-climactic- Expelliarmus?against the most feared wizard?The last chapter is such BS but it was unavoidable 'coz this would be the only way of ending the saga.I couldn't help feeling a bit sad at the end of it all-no more waiting for the next book ,no more Hogwarts ,no more Hagrid's creatures or Hogsmeade....

In other shocking news,Carlos Tevez moved to ManU(was hoping he would move to Chelsea-the presence of Crespo in the Blues starting line up two years ago being my sole reason for supporting them) on a two year loan from WestHam and Alonso continues to behave like a spoilt child.Kumble scored a century(I just love Test cricket!).Amidst all the sporting upheavals ,I decide to start another blog.So I present before you Bourgeoisie Armchair Philosophy- a blog solely dedicated to discussing things other than my personal life,sports,music, random musings -in short everything that I do not talk about on ICISIF.I am co-hosting this blog with Niksworth. No, I could not think of a better name and it just came to me. Bourgeoisie 'coz of my earlier Communist leanings,Armchair 'coz I am not the kind of person who actually does something about what he says and Philosophy is just to validate any post that I might do under the garb of that word though Niksworth might disagree.happy reading.

2007-07-21T01:14:00.000+05:30

October, 2001-Life was uncomplicated and a thousand cupids were at work.The Patronus shone across the lake and I was moved by the firebolt of a gift from Sirius to Harry.

June,2003-school came to an end and college was still a few months away:Sirius died and James was cruel to Severus in a pensieve.

July 2005-gave the dreadful C.O. paper and was relieved to have managed to write enough to scrape through.To celebrate me,Akhi and A walked into Crosswords and were offended by the high prices but still managed to learn in the ensuing holidays that Ginny and Harry were no longer a couple and Gwrap didn't prove to be so important after all.

July 2007-Life's pretty smooth sailing right now and hope that Hagrid,Hermoine and Harry are still alive.

good things have always happened to me when ever a book has released.keeping my fingers crossed this time around.

2007-07-15T18:42:00.000+05:30

I got tagged by Deepika here.The rules.
1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged, write a blog post about their own 8 random things, and post these rules.
3. At the end of your post you need to tag 8 people and include their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment and tell them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.
4. If you fail to do this within eight hours, you will not reach Third Series or attain your most precious goals for at least two more lifetimes.

OK don't the 1. and 2. points mean the same thing?since the people I wanted to tag have already been tagged,If you are reading this consider yourself tagged.

Eight random things about me:

1.One of the greatest pleasures that I indulge in is laughing at my own jokes.I laugh in such a way that the audience laughs at my laughter rather than the actual joke.So I get away with the most inane PJ's.

2.I get claustrophobic in the AC compartment of trains and have difficulty sleeping in that climate controlled rickety thing.

3.I prefer eating salads,soups and all things 'healthy'.If you want to torture me,just get me a meal of fries,cola and burger.You would rather see me at a SUBWAY than a McDonalds.In spite of this I am not really in good shape.

4.My idea of heaven is a place where you could play tennis to your heart's content and never get tired.preferably clay and under the lights.Also one of my childhood dreams was to win the French Open.

5.oh! and I have a very short attention span.I have only seen about 100 movies in my 22 years of existence.even when I do watch ,I see it in sittings.I saw Bheja Fry in 3 sittings and saw the two seasons of Prison Break over a period of 1.5 months.

6.I like girls with beautiful hair,long hair,coloured hair,highlighted hair-really in love with the Gothic look :D ;I hate girls who gossip,the 'I have to be home before dark' types,the unread/dumb/bimbo types,the typical Bangalore engineering female.

7.I am very immune to weather and my mood does not depend on whether its cold,hot,rainy,windy etc. and I usually can brave it all.One of the reasons why Bangalore's much vaulted great weather has not made any impression on me.

8.I usually do not complain at all and can be a very adjusting person and get along with almost anyone.In case this is sounding like an entry in a matrimonial website,let me tell you that I suffer from multiple Dr.Jekyl and Mr.Hyde syndrome and am different things to different people.That's why all my Orkut testimonials are very different from each other.

PS:have not been able to blog much even though there is no dearth of topics.There have been tectonic shifts in life.College got over and have started work-which is proving to be a strange experience,more about it later I promise.

2007-06-18T00:48:00.000+05:30

Thats school:DAV,Jawahar Vidya Mandir,Ranchi.its a bad photograph I know.Well the point is these are the 'hallowed portals'(as my senior in college so often used to say to refer to our dept. corridor and has made this phrase sound so horribly cliched) through which I first entered school life.This used to be the primary section's gate and there was just that door on the right(just beside the right shutter) which used to lead to it.Now instead of the staid and simple entrance we have this giant Greek acropolis-esque thing hanging above the gate.Not that I am complaining,makes the entrance seem imposing but most of my kindergarten playground and the swings and all are gone.The reason for this is that the three storey building we see here was not there before.The classrooms whose windows we see on the left now house the senior section(11th-12th).I wanted to go inside and have a look around and meet my teachers but the school was closed 'coz it had not yet re-opened after the summer hols.

OK all this was just to put the photo of my school up on my blog.bear with it. :P

general joblessness

2007-06-16T11:30:00.000+05:30

At home and horribly jobless.Somehow the whole anticipation of holidays is the only thing worth experiencing.I have learned in this period of 1 week that it is very important to plan your fun too otherwise you end up regretting what all you could have done but didn't end up doing.So yesterday I made up a list of all the things I wanted to do and could cover almost 90% of the list.Since I have been sleeping late into the day....I get these nightmares....of having an exam and having not studied anything.....I mean five times in a row...is that a sign?Today I had the weirdest dream.I boarded a bus which was mostly empty except for my grandpa's brother and who else on the wheel but my grandma...who is not even five feet in height (she would have to stand to get to the foot pedals) and I see her expertly maneuvering the bus in narrow Market area by lanes (Bangalore) and then I end up in class where everyone is preparing for the OR paper and I am dazed as I have not studied a word.So I try to read through what everybody else is reading and then I wake up.Thank god.I have a very fishy feeling about the OR paper though.

Last weekend was fun,saw the Nadal-Federer French open final and it was great.The top-spin on the forehand just destroyed Federer and there was no way he would have triumphed even after he won the second set.Now I am pretty sure Federer is just another Sampras and there is nothing special about him :P.This was followed immediately by the Canadian Grand Prix which was thoroughly enjoying what with Hamilton pulling off a clinical win.The guy to cheer for.As I was telling a friend of mine,its no use supporting teams as you just don't have any control on who is going to drive your cars,so its better to support drivers and now with Alonso and Hamilton,Mc Laren is the team .The gap between Alonso+Hamilton and Massa+Kimi is widening with each race and it just gets to show that all of Ferrari's Dominance was just because of Schumi's brilliance as a driver and not because Ferrari was ahead of the field in terms of superiority of the car.As I write this,Hamilton has already taken pole in the Indianapolis race.yay!

The absolutely best show on TV is Scrips National Spelling Bee championship-ESPN,where 10-14 year kids spell words like Videlicet and Coryx and Ferresine. Its a very prestigious competition in the US and the surprising thing is the presence of so many Indian-American and Asian origin among the finalists.It is really tougher than what I initially expected it to be.These kids have to know how each syllable is spelt in each of the the countless languages that English borrows words from like French,Latin,German,Greek,Polish,Scandinavian languages to really make some headway. website here.

I am very sleepy and have nothing else to say.so ciao.

2007-05-31T22:32:00.000+05:30

The pelting rain made it extremely hard to see out the window.She was already half an hour late and the weather made it even more depressing.Slowly sipping his tea,he reached out to wipe the frost so that he could look into the street more clearly.For some reason all he could hear at that moment was Beethoven's 9th,it kept going in his head in cycles,like a river flooding,overflowing and then..... dying down into a trickle.He kept going into the past....but strangely grimaced at the futility of looking for things to cheer about there, not because it was painful but because he did not trust the past.The past with its tinkling laughter and the rosy sheen and the joys which seemed so hollow from afar.He loathed the way his memory twisted the past making it more cheerful than it really was,obliterating the little niggling discomforts and the background of chaotic cacophony and just presenting him with the visual, no sounds nor smells.

He was always more of a nose-person.He had his phases in which he indulged in a variety of smells.....gasoline,varnish,coffee,freshly ironed clothes.for weeks on end he would confide in these smells and escape from the reality of the situation.His current weird favorite was the smell of metal, iron especially with the sharpness of its reach.

His musings were interrupted by a sharp rap at the door telling him that the lawyer had finally arrived.Moving steadily to the door he opened it and let the grim looking woman of around thirty-five in, accepting her apologies with a nod.The lawyer opened her briefcase and took out the required papers.
'All the papers are in order and only some issues need to be dealt with.'
'Yes,We shall do the needful.'

Three quarters of an hour later,the sheets were in his hands and everything was indeed in order.The lawyer had left some ten minutes ago .The old Mahagony bookshelf was to go to his son who had shown a great inclination in caring for his book-collection,replacing the covers of many dog-eared classics and carefully dusting the shelf with his faithful duster.His space age retro furniture was to go to Sam,what with him pestering him repeatedly to turn it in as it had long outlived its practicality and aesthetic value.He had already had his confidential and classified material shipped to the department of defense.Better keep things uncontroversial.A major portion of his savings would go to ICBL-International Society to Ban Landmines.He was not one of those ungrateful types.

He woke up with a start with the loud buzzing of the door bell.Quickly he stuffed the papers under the couch and felt his robe to make sure everything was in proper order.He grabbed his crutches and made it to the door.it was still pouring heavily outside.
'hi honey,how was your day' he heard her say.
'great'
'well,I am pretty tired today...so am gonna grab a bite and going straight to bed.You had your dinner I hope.'
'Well yes I did.How was your day?'
She turned around caught unaware at the sudden unexpected question.The only conversation that they really ever had was monosyllabic grunts.
'Well...same old...had to take the overseas call today y'know'
He could almost smell the fear in the air.Also the very faint smell of Chrome,a cologne he hated for the tangy citrus smell that made him sick.He did not think it was masculine at all.Before this it was Davidoff.

'I am fixing myself a sandwich... you want something?'
'No I am fine'.

He saw her enter the kitchen and listened to the clatter.He thanked his rubber soled crutches and for a brief moment remembered the good 'ol days when his fellow officers called him 'The cat'.

He moved stealthily towards the kitchen and positioned himself in the dark corner.He could feel the sweat at the back of his neck accumulate around the tiny vial on the locket.At once he could feel his entire being, even the cold metallic outline underneath his robe and he shivered in the coolness of his sweat.but then he smiled, he knew he will be rewarded with smell of sharp tangy hemoglobin.Warm iron on hard iron.The rain had stopped.

The Five

2007-05-01T22:57:00.000+05:30

I saw it in Debu's room once.The writing on the wall(apparently a senior's tribute to our Very Terrifying University(VTU)):'18 horrific Labs-62 subjects-168 internals-768 hours in lab,this isn't a f****n' B.E ,this is War and only the bravest make it'..Throughout this 4 year period we are bombarded with so much informtion and are kept so insanely occupied with exam prep that it is difficult to actually appreciate the subtlety and the profoundness of some of these absolutely brilliant subjects.Concepts which can make you go 'eureka' in the middle of the night and lead to frantic smses to friends of the :read pg139, Roth....amazing! kind. Appreciating engineering subjects is a very difficult thing as it is mostly concerned with mundane- how to do X or how to obtain Y from Z or with- this is how such and such a thing happens. But some of these subjects have such creativity in the way they arrive at results that you tend to wish fervently that you could be coffee wielding, bearded jeans-and-T-shirt grad student changing the way the world uses technology a La Bob Metcalfe /Jack Kilby/Richard Stallman/Kekule(OK Kekule is not quite engineering...we shall let it pass shaking the head silently at the demise of a once good Organic chemistry semi-expert) I have been waiting for a long time to do this post.I know my list doesn't contain the standard ECE gems-Digital Signal Processing,Electronic Circuits even Logic design....but the subjects that I have mentioned are the ones which I had most fun studying irrespective of their importance in the bigger scheme of things.Here in countdown format are my five most fav subjects :

5. Telecommunication&Switching-This subject mainly deals with the whole of the telephone network dealing right from the set at home to trunk offices and switching stations.It also deals with telecommunication traffic which ultimately leads to the usage of queuing theory.A very interesting thing to learn for people who want to go :you know.. this telephone network that you are so dependent on actually consists of twisted pairs connected to big Strowgers and sophisticated exchanges.....basically boast about their knowledge in front of their hapless non-engineering friends(never mind the fact that most electrical/electronics engineers are absolutely at sea when it comes to normal households appliances). I came across this in fifth sem and according to many this is a very strange/vague subject, the fact being that the textbook by J.E Flood is very cryptic ,brief and leaves much to imagination. My interest was especially piqued after seeing The History of Hacking documentary which deals also with 'phone phreaking' or hacking phones.

4.Microprocessors-8085.
Absolutely the only subject which I can safely say that I know in its entirety.The subject which,if you are an electronics engineer will never ever forget.The subject which changed the way I looked at technology in many many ways and exposed me to the sheer genius of this small little chip which runs each and every electronic device ever invented.microprocessors in layman terms are the very hearts of computers.It is the component in your computer which understands the 1's and 0's which everybody keeps talking about.I studied this in 4th sem and suddenly a lot of gaps in the knowledge of how things work in a computer were cleared.The invention of the microprocessor must surely go down as one of the most original and stunning creations of the 20th century.The prescribed textbook-RS Gaonkar is an absolute gem when it comes to lucid explanations,especially the parts about interfacing.really enjoyed reading it.

3.VHDL-It stands for VHSIC Hardware Description Language.VHSIC-Very High Speed Integrated Circuits.A programming language which describes hardware.It was a 6th sem subject and one of the only subjects that sem which were palatable (what with such heavyweights such as Microwave communication and Antenna & wave theory....subjects which merit a post all of their own) VHDL was an eye-opener of sorts 'coz it is one of those subjects which actually lets you think in terms of components such as Multiplexers,buffers,registers etc.So that you can actually envision a hardware design.I fondly remember cracking the logic of signed binary divider and some other tough-ies while solving some of the most beautiful design problems.bliss.

2.Computer Organization-A subject which is close to heart.One of the most diciest subjects in all of four years just because of the sheer amount of syllabus to be covered for the exam.The subject deals with the innards of a computer system...everything from memory,I/O,processor architecture,computer arithmetic.This was the defining turning point for me in engineering-opened doors of insights and I was truly a electronics engineering student after this.Loved reading about microcoded instructions,cache replacement algorithms and certain gate delays in carry-lookahead adders.*droooooooooool*.The textbook is one of the best I have ever come across...Hamacher,Vranesic,Zaky...apparently the cover of the book is a doodle by Vranesic's son.

and finally the Numero Uno:

1.Computer networks- The book-Tanenbaum.What do you call a book which is untouchable in terms of technical brilliance,has the capability of staying informal in tone always and is side -splittingly funny? I would call it:The Bible of computer engineering.You are seriously missing out on life if you are a CS/ECE/EEE student and have not come across this book.I suggest you shoot yourself in the head.Twice.Our university has this tendency to prescribe some amazingly boring and drab textbooks which suck the life out of you but strangely, we were prescribed Tanenbaum when it came to networks in 7th sem.I had a torrid affair with this book,who wouldn't... considering the fact that almost every page is filled with anecdotes of technical gaffes and Tanenbaum actually goes on to discuss the politics of technology and the serious problems that internet faces or is going to face in the future.The tone is always tongue in cheek.How can I ever forget...The apocalypse of two elephants,the history of the internet...countless stories about how people came up with ideas to make a world wide communication network,about the many versions of the Ethernet and the various internal squabbling between the various 802. IEEE groups.I especially admire the way he goes about talking about the various collision avoidance algorithms in local networks,also the politics of the ISO/OSI vs TCP/IP.Did you know that the person who invented frequency hopping spread spectrum is none other than -Hedy Lamarr-the first woman to appear nude in a motion picture(the 1933 Czech film-Extase)?People in my class had such fun reading the book that many of them read more than what was expected and on the day of the exam,were pretty relaxed.I leave you with the unforgettable Tanenbaum quote:
'never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway!!'

Reload

2007-04-17T20:31:00.000+05:30

Its been long ...almost a month and a lot has happened....A somewhat memorable b'day followed by an amazing trip to Goa and a hectic period of seminars and back-breaking project work(my project-mates will most probably say that all I did was recite inane stories,take 'power' naps and generally fiddle around with the laptop).A lot of trips to CCD's and random restaurants happened.The sem so far has been pretty roller-coaster.Also finally began reading Ulysses and am absolutely loving it.

Also, thanks to Uatu I finally could lay my hands on Sandman.Most amazing stuff and I am already head over heels in love with Death :-D.What a character!Actually I would place Death along with Dagny Taggart as my favorite female characters in any form of literature(for clarification, I hate Ayn Rand's philosophy but love her characters,Hank Rearden being my fav).My Orkut profile pic has dream and death sitting together and gives my profile a slick look me thinks.My roomie is worried 'coz just today I listened to Beethoven's 9th some 7 times...somehow I am finally coming to terms with some of the addictions that I have: currently Beethoven's 9th,coffee, Orkut...the most dangerous being Orkut.I am on auto-pilot most of the times on Orkut and would have scrapped people without knowing and have joined communities without actually being interested in that particular topic.I am seriously addicted,suggestions for de-addiction anyone?

College has almost come to an end and I might just have attended my last classes without realizing it......and can't help feeling extremely nostalgic about our dept. who have been extremely sweet this sem without harassing us too much about attendance and internals and stuff...compared to CSE,we have teachers who 'understand' our 'problems' and give us extensions on deadlines.Just in case somebody from any other branch is reading this...my friend Avinash has attended only about 10% classes in all of engineering..thats like he has attended only about a semester out of eight.So there... that I guess would put all arguments about superiority of branches to an end.I would follow this post with a few posts on the various characters that inhabit our dept. and college in general and another one on my fav subjects throughout engineering...so geeky technical post alert on subsequent posts. Maybe I will do a Goa post too.....

PS:The pic-Miramir beach,Goa...the greatest holiday destination in India and if you have not been there yet, you are seriously seriously missing out on something.

Playlist

2007-03-22T00:09:00.000+05:30

Iris-Goo Goo Dolls
Free fallin' -Tom Petty and the heartbreakers
The reason-Hoobastank
Wonderwall-Oasis
The warning sign-Coldplay
Desert Rose-Sting

I keep trippin' on Iris...been listening to it continuously from the past 4 days, it just gets to you...feel happy/sad,hopeful.... listening to it
and I want to run away and never come back......

PS: went to the Iron Maiden concert this Sunday and it was crazzzzzzzzzzy....will post about it sometime in a few days....

Food

2007-03-06T02:37:00.000+05:30

Motivated by Saanjh's this post I am going to talk about food or the lack of it in my life right now.Ravaged by chicken pox at an unheard age of 21,I have drastically curtailed the mischievous excursions of my tongue into spicy excesses.Coconut water,milk,sugar,small quantities of tea,coffee,curd rice,chapaties with dal...basically anything without a even a trace of chilly.Bland-distasteful mundane stuff.Under the influence of inadequate spice in life,the tongue has become loose.I had two foot-in-mouth moments in a single day.Serious gaffes.People who have tried eating four plain idlies(without chutney without sambhar) can raise their hands.Nightmares of drowning in a pool of hot scalding, boiling rasam keep happening to me.

Food has meant different things to me in different ages.school was about tiffin-share.Home was about tomato-phobia and puris and aaloo parathas and fruit/vegetable salads on sunday afternoons(to name a few?).I have tried my own combinations too.Honey in tea,Kellogg's Chocos with cut banana and coffee instead of milk(try it....absolute gastronomic heaven).Best thing about food is the anticipation of a fancy meal and the Pavlov's dog like reactions induced by the aroma wafting into your room from the kitchen.Eating great food is like an intense orgasmic experience for me.If I like whats on the plate,I don't usually remember anything after I pick up the spoon.....its all a daze.... but the strange thing is that I don't think about food all the time or even most of the time.Whenever I lay my hands on some good grub,I am thankful to god but if not, then I will eat whatever is available and not regret it and I eat surprisingly small amounts of food. For me,nostalgia is nosy and particular smells trigger particular memories....always happens with deodorants but I am digressing now......

Hostel food is....well...edible and strange.It cannot be put down as downright bad.....but somehow I always get the impression that I am partaking of someone's anger and bitterness.The food is angst-y,usually very spicy and not very conducive to hmmmm...gulping without chewing.The rotis are leathery...how can they not be...its hostel-protocol followed by cooks all over India using telepathic-mind communication.'thy shall struggle with our rotis puling with both hands until your jaws or teeth give away'-they conclude in unison.The warden writes absolute gems when it comes to bringing out the lurking fear of food-poisoning in the student's minds.sample this:
Dear hostel students
mes will be function from tomo i.e on 23/2/07 pooja will be arranged in kitchen at 7 AM on 23/2/07.all students are cordially invited.all the best to all of you.**

Did I happen to mention I am a vegetarian?I have these discussions with my non-vegetarian friends about which is a better lifestyle and I enjoy the anguish on their faces when I pull out my 'animal-cruelty' argument or 'non-veggie-lifestyle-leads-to -quicker-deaths' one but frankly I don't give a damn what people eat and even my not eating non-veg food will not prevent the zillions who eat like they are Eskimos of the far-north .so I am not really very hot on the 'prevention of animal cruelty' thing.There are actually a lot of genuine reasons why people should stop eating meat and I don't want to list them here.If you are wondering why there are so many incomplete loose ends in each one of my posts.... well its because I am a lazy bum and procrastinator supreme so you have to do with what you get........see I am too lazy to even think of a decent ending(I know its not something new ...one does not realize how many lazy people are out there until one gets onto Orkut.)

**this part of the post was in draft for quite some time

2007-02-28T01:13:00.000+05:30

I see faith in your eyes
Never you hear the discouraging lies
I hear faith in your cries
Broken is the promise, betrayal
The healing hand held back by the deepened nail

Follow the God that failed.......

lyrics from METALLICA's landmark Black album .The song was inspired by the death of James Hetfield's (the lead singer) mother from cancer; she was a member of the Church of Christ,Scientist and therefore refused treatment.It speaks of his anguish in seeing his mother die without seeking medical help of any kind and it brings out very poignantly the eternal battle between religion and science.Though I do not approve of this particular branch of Christianity,I am a believer.....of Hindu philosophies.'belief' is more of a word which I use out of force of habit,my 'belief' is more of a logical conclusion and my religious beliefs do not conflict with my scientific knowledge.I know I should really do a detailed post about all of this...but my mind is totally numbed by a whole day of Perl programming and SQL querying.The reason I have been thinking about this is that in the space of 2 days I have had two people tell me that they would rather agree to disagree with me than have me speak on length about religion/spirituality.It so happens that most of my closest friends are atheists or agnostic.There is Sam,Deb,my roommate(though he wouldn't admit it),Ankita and of course K. Nikhil if you are reading this....I have never asked you dude...what beliefs do you have?and yes let me make it clear that I am perfectly at ease with what people believe and what they do not.I am not out to convert people to my school of thought.But it sometimes makes me think,why is 'belief' as in religion always equated with 'illogical' thinking and 'stupidity'?

Right now I am thinking about a lot of things at the same time...like how Metallica lyrics so damn always nail the point that they are trying to make,how my life is so freaking turbulent right now, how this sem god has kept me occupied to the hilt,how Bangalore is such a strange place that I can feel neither disgust nor love for it....

P.S:I am a big-big sucker for music lyrics ok?this is the only form of poetry I enjoy.peace.

The post he did for someone else.

2007-02-17T22:53:00.000+05:30

Asterix-modernism-Darjeeling-Tsangu lake-morning three roses tea-77E-60's earrings-Sophie's choice?-Steinbeck-Makkalakoota-1st year fest-agony-depression-zany haircuts-the wasted 3.5 years of engineering-emails-post-modernism-suduko-regret-Kannada kali-Zidane-margaritas-milk-Karl Marx's beard-French-ESI bus stop-Queen's-42/8-Chord road walks-Yahoo messenger-Hari Sarvottama-To kill a mockingbird-can I be anonymous?-rose garden road(Nanda road)-accidents-cappuccino-stalker bitches/fatsos-black-Alphonso mangoes-old Hindi songs-Grey's anatomy-Goa-Southpark-agnosticism-Vedanta-giving up on 1st kriya-by the window-'don't send me forwards'-somewhere between two layouts-Midnight's children. and whatever happens...........that sums up about everything.

Visual DNA

2007-02-10T19:40:00.000+05:30

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

2007-02-09T23:55:00.000+05:30

There is this incredible radio station on Yahoo Launchcast...a new one called Guitar Gods and words are not enough to describe its brilliance... Metallica,Sabbath,Satriani,Aerosmith,Deep Purple,Van Halen one after the other ...mesmeric.The sad thing about Yahoo Radio is that it does not run in Firefox..only IE.I read The Catcher in The Rye in the hols and was not too impressed.it is a nice book,the New-York lingo of the '50s is really appealing and I really liked Holden's idea of 'phoniness'...and how inadvertently he himself morphs into one...but was not ground-breaking in any way I thought.Guess I have a weakness for longer works of literature...small works don't leave much of an impression on me for some reason...

missing hostel and the ensuing hullabaloo and really miss laughing my guts out...haven't done that for quite a looooong time.feel like racking my head on a really hard quiz or a crossword.college is going to end in about 3 months...and it is ending in a very chaotic and hateful way....like a downward spiral ....anti-nostalgic with a bitter after-taste...and strangely I feel like a spectator in my own life...and don't feel sad about this...watching it unfold almost like a book.

My blog is not heading in any well defined direction...ends up being a rant post after post,so from now I vow to stick by coherence and humor....cross my heart etc

Jaded

2007-02-05T00:26:00.000+05:30

The world has changed.My world....and can no longer claim the immunity of an innocuous whippersnapper.........and feel depressed.'bcoz of the chicken pox---the bland diet to be followed---the inseparable boredom--the lack of meaningful conversations----and not being good enough for anything...for quizzing ,for love, for acads....life should only be uphill from here...surely

In other news.....

2007-01-15T00:25:00.000+05:30

From the last 72 hours I have been eating and sleeping non-stop...12 hours of sleep almost everyday followed by eating...and having those amazing hot-showers for long periods of time(tired of the bucket-and-mug routine in the hostel) ah! time stands still in the steam and the serenity of the hot shower...have been planning to do a lot of stuff but end up doing nothing....TV is surprisingly boring with both Zee Cafe and Star World having become pretty much lifeless...I pick up the TV listings everyday to scout of interesting stuff but end up finding some obscure movie or the Nth re-run of Friends....I am sick of it.....except Roadies-4 on MTv which I think is a pretty cool show....gets to show that its not only ability but also politics which is the key to success on these reality shows....have been reading Crime&Punishment and I must say that its seeming to be a major force as far as my reading experiences are concerned.......I would reserve my opinions about it as I have not read it whole but I would recommend it to one and all...

The thing I like about Jam is that its not really a town in which I grew up(as my folks moved here after I joined engineering and was away from home) and it allows me to take an outsider's perspective when it comes to weighing its pros and cons over Ranchi...Its a fabulous city...neat..well planned and so so peaceful......tree-lined broad avenues and the house that we have here is just absolutely amazing!My room overlooks the garden at the back of my house and for all the complaining that my mom does about my lack of interest in the natural world...its just great waking up and looking at the lush green grass and the trees and the birds!!whereas Ranchi is the city of memories...of childhood..of the innumerable special things...there can't be any comparison really.Ranchi wins hands down...notwithstanding the beauty of Jam.

**have been fiddling with the digi-cam at home and though I am not much of a foodie....couldn't resist taking this: PIC OF THE PICKLES

Hols!

2007-01-09T08:58:00.000+05:30

Exams almost over save for a stupid Constitution of India paper and I can already smell the food at home and the silent,tree-lined avenues of Jam enticing me into taking a long, solitary, peaceful walk to places I am yet to explore...maybe an early morning walk upto The River's Meet and down the Marine drive.....I look forward to catching up on reading,TV(Austrailan Open here I come!) and probably tennis and swimming....lazing around in the afternoon sun in the garden...and meeting up with old friends........after a month long ordeal ....I hope to make the most if the 19 day respite that I have been given... happy hols to all!

2007

2007-01-05T14:47:00.000+05:30

2007...already!! the last six months of college life stares at me and I feel so old!I will graduate in six months...the thought gives me a strange kind of chill down the back....I just got outta school and now I am almost...expected to be responsible and behave as an adult .... 2007 was always somewhere out in the distance...somewhere in grown-up time...the millennium just seems a short while ago...its not as if time flew by or something...but its just that as a kid 10 years back seems all hazy and you hardly remember anything ....but now 10 years back or 7 years back is so clear in the memory....4 years in Bangalore...its not a long time...its an era! and I have an eerie feeling I have not done anything worthwhile all these years...allow me to go out there and get a life..........

meanwhile why is it that Aerosmith have this uncanny ability to mirror just what you are thinking?...... leaving you a sample(lyrics) of one my favorite Aerosmith tracks,Hole in my soul:

I'm down a one way street
With a one night stand
With a one track mind
Out in no mans land
(the punishment sometimes don't seem to fit the crime)

Yeah there's a hole in my soul
But one thing Ive learned
For every love letter written
There is another one burned
(so tell me how its gonna be this time)

Is it over
Is it over
Is it over
cause I'm blowing out the flame

Take a walk outside your mind
Tell me how it feels to be
The one who turns the knife inside of me
Take a look and you will find there is nothing there girl
Yeah I swear, I'm telling you girl yeah cause
There is a hole in my soul that's been killing me forever
Its a place where a garden never grows
There's a hole in my soul, yeah I should have known better
cause your loves like a thorn without a rose

I'm as dry as a seven year drought
I got dust for tears
Yeah I'm all tapped out
(sometimes I feel broken and cant get fixed)

I know there's been all kinds of shoes underneath your bed
Now I sleep with my boots on but you are still in my head
(and something tells me this time I'm down to my last licks)
cause if its over
Then its over
And its driving me insane

Is it over
Yeah its over
And I'm blowing out the flame

Take a walk outside your mind
Tell me how it feels to be
The one who turns the knife inside of me
Take a look and you will find
There is nothing there girl, yeah, I swear
I'm telling you girl yeah cause there is a hole in my soul
That's been killing me forever
Its a place where a garden never grows there is a hole in my soul,
Yeah I should have known better
cause your loves like a thorn
Without a rose

December blues.

2006-12-30T22:27:00.000+05:30

*This is basically a nostalgic kind of post....so it will be of interest to a few.Feel free to skip*

Another December and another boring end to the year,from the past 3 years December has been spent slogging hard for odd sem final exams which usually are held in the last week of December and 1st week of January in our god-damned university..this timing is beyond my comprehension,when I go back home, I just stare at my bedroom ceiling lying in bed all day 'coz all my friends are back in college having had their hols in Dec. 3 Decembers spent doing last minute lab experiments,then doing the lab exams and then finally theory exams....the whole 3 months of the sem squeezed into a matter of hours and last-minute-mugging orgies...........

But it was not always like this.Back in school December was the month of chilling out.We use to have our annual day in the end of December(like every other school I know) and the whole month would be spent doing various kinds of drills and exercises in the brilliant winter sun for a grand show on that day.That meant no classes for an entire month,trips to the school stadium and cardboard cricket in the corridors and inside classes..on reaching home,there never used to be too much stress on studying as all tests and exams were far away,so many evenings were spent reading all kinds of books from Glimpses of world history to numerous Enid Blyton's,even Nat-Geo mags!The best part of the month used to be the last week when the school used to close for about 10 days after the annual day.Mornings would be lazily spent watching TV and then around 11, all of us friends would gather for a round of tennis...I tell you.... nothing beats tennis in the winter or tennis under lights in summers or tennis......basically.This would be followed by reading just the most unimaginable stuff (now that i come to think of it) like hardy boys or illustrative books on Egyptian mythology......at various points of my life I wanted to be an engine driver,an Egyptologist,an astronomer,a writer,a mathematician,a drummer!!(more on that someday).In the evenings..cricket in the black field and mindless meaningless gupshup walking around the colony or sitting on the ledges around the tennis court .In the nights...I don't actually remember what I used to do...except just before sleeping I would be laying down inside my mosquito net...again reading under my table lamp.Oh and later when I was in 9th or 10th grade...most of the afternoons would be spent listening to Guns N' Roses and Def Leppard...everyday...the same songs and the same albums over and over again.I must have heard that GN'R Live Era cassette at least a 1000 times if not more.....an yeah how can I forget watching those Australian tours of various visiting teams on ESPN...even test matches...especially the Boxing Day test....It used to start around 5 in the morning and carry on till about noon.........
Looking back these winter holidays and December in schools are the things I miss most about my childhood.Summers would be spent at grandparent s's houses and Durga Puja hols was fun too but there used to be more stuff to do during those times...and less of simple lazing away those beautiful winter mornings and in general goofing around.......Ah! I shall stop here.Enough you navel-gazing depressive nostalgic ,mathematical function!thy shall not bore!(*grimaces at the misguided attempt to liven things up*)

A very very happy New year to one and all.May all your wishes and dreams come true!!!.

P.S:gave my Computer Networks paper today...so this has to be done:I bury you-you stupid acronyms you ATM,TCP/IP,UDP...you freakish IEEE standards with all your crazy numbering and most importantly you Data link layer protocols...I hate you!! Tannenbaum R.I.P muhahahahaha :-)

Dystopian themes.....

2006-12-23T01:40:00.000+05:30

I somehow have a great liking for Dystopian themes......I like it better than any mystery/detective stuff as this whole chaos in the future thing is strangely spine-chilling.The dark 'what-can-be' side of the future gives the author a canvass which he can enliven with any shade of gray and gives us a perspective of what can be wrong with the present world...My favorites being V for vendetta
,Ayn Rand's Anthem and Issac Asimov's The Foundation series though the last one cannot be called strictly dystopian.I am not a great fan of Ayn Rand's Objectivism shit but I like Anthem for its non-pretentious, threadbare story-line.I read The Foundation Series when i was a kid and was spell-bound by the wondrous theme of a galactic empire and its collapse...I also remember reading a story back in school in my CBSE English textbook about a time-travel back into the past for a strange kind of Dinosaur Safari and how these bunch of hunters end up trampling a innocuous butterfly which causes a Domino's effect through time causing a very drastic change in the present...... and oh.. I so want to read George Orwell's 1984 but somehow have never managed to lay my hands on it.

P.S :Its 2 in the night and i have no idea why I am doing this...I have got exams 5 days from now and really should be getting back to my books...the rest of the day being spent in watching Southpark on you-tube and Will &Grace on DVD.....god bless all of us toiling away under the tyranny of VTU exams.Best of luck to everyone.

2006-12-08T21:55:00.000+05:30

Actually speaking I am much more freer now....the conscience is liberated and I can be as aloof/critical/sarcastic as I want to be.Happy Birthday sis!.....a nice return gift of a day I received

Somebody give me a shovel...I have got memories to bury......

hand in glove

2006-12-04T01:23:00.000+05:30

the silent war of words
caught between lines never spoken
the gaping holes,left after three years
of avoiding the inevitable.
they work hand in glove.

the eclecticism of the superficial conversation
and the purity of the baser undercurrent
intertwine and confuse.
they work hand in glove

years of small talk and running in circles
frustration- depression- rage
turn me into a recluse
they work hand in glove

scarred memories of a smile and the fragrance
of the wind blowing through the hair
of memorable bus rides and loopy earrings
sadden and bemuse
they work hand in glove

the finality of the unspoken verdict
for the frivolities entertained in the mind
of the unfaltering optimism and the desire
to give it your all -one last time
already my muse
with destiny;
she works hand in glove.

The Travails of Single South Indian men of conservative upbringing" or "Why we don't get any..."

2006-10-19T17:18:00.000+05:30

I have gathered many insights into the endless monotony that is the love life of south Indian men. What I have unearthed is most disheartening. Disheartening because comprehension of these truths will not change our status anytime soon. However there is also cause for joy. We never stood a chance anyway. What loads the dice against virile, gallant, well educated, good looking, sincere mallus and tams? (Kandus were once among us, but Bangalore has changed all that.)

Our futures are shot to hell as soon as our parents bestow upon us names that are anything but alluring. I cannot imagine a more foolproof way of making sure the child remains single till classified advertisements or that maternal uncle in San Francisco thinks otherwise. Name him "Parthasarathy Venkatachalapthy" and his inherent capability to combat celibacy is obliterated before he could even talk. He will grow to be known as Partha. Before he knows, his smart, seductively named northy classmates start calling him Paratha. No woman in their right minds will go anyway near poor Parthasarathy. His investment banking job doesn't help either. His employer loves him though. He has no personal life you see. By this time the Sanjay Singhs and Bobby Khans from his class have small businesses of their own and spend 60% of their lives in discos and pubs. The remaining 40% is spent coochicooing with leather and denim clad muses in their penthouse flats on Nepean Sea Road. Business is safely in the hands of the Mallu manager. After all with a name like Blossom Babykutty he cant use his 30000 salary anywhere. Blossom gave up on society when in school they automatically enrolled him for Cookery Classes. Along with all the girls.

Yes my dear reader, nomenclature is the first nail in a coffin of neglect and hormonal pandemonium. In a kinder world they would just name the poor Southern male child and throw him off the balcony. "Yes appa we have named him Goundamani..." THUD. Life would have been less kinder to him anyway. If all the women the Upadhyays, Kumars, Pintos and, god forbid, the Sens and Roys in the world have met were distributed amongst the Arunkumars, Vadukuts and Chandramogans we would all be merry casanovas with 3 to 4 pretty things at each arm. But alas it is not to be. Of course the south Indian women have no such issues. They have names which are like sweet poetry to the ravenous northie hormone tanks. Picture this: "Welcome, and this is my family. This is my daughter Poorni (what a sweet name!!) and my son Ponnalagusamy (er.. hello..).." Cyanide would not be fast enough for poor Samy. Nothing Samy does will help him. He can pump iron, drive fast cars and wear snazzy clothes, but against a braindead dude called Arjun Singhania he has as much chance of getting any as a Benedictine Monk in a Saharan Seminary. '

Couple this with the other failures that have plagued our existence. Any attempt at spiking hair with gel fails miserably. In an hour I have a crown of greasy, smelly fibrous mush. My night ends there. However the northy just has to scream "Wakaw!!!" and you have to peel the women off him to let him breathe. In a disco while we can manage the medium hip shake with neck curls, once the Bhangra starts pumping we are as fluid as cement and gravel in a mixer. Karan Kapoor or Jatin Thapar in the low cut jeans with chhaddi strap showing and see through shirt throws his elbows perfectly, the cynosure of all attention. The women love a man who digs pasta and fondue. But why do they not see the simple pleasures of curd rice and coconut chutney? When poor Senthilnathan opens his tiffin box in the office lunch room his female coworkers just dissappear when they see the tamarind rice and poppadums. The have all rematerialised around Bobby Singh who has ordered in Pizza and Garlic bread. (And they have the gall to talk of foreign origin). How can a man like me brought up in roomy lungis and oversized polyester shirts ever walk the walk in painted on jeans (that makes a big impression) and neon yellow rib hugging t shirts?

Sociologically too the tam or mallu man is severely sidelined. An average tam stud stays in a house with, on average, three grandparents, three sets of uncles and aunts, and over 10 children. Not the ideal atmosphere for some intimacy and some full throated "WHOSE YOUR DADDY!!!" at the 3 in the morning. The mallu guy of course is almost always in the gulf working alone on some onshore oil rig in the desert. Rheumatic elbows me thinks. Alas dear friends we are not just meant to set the nights on fire. We are just not built to be "The Ladies Man". The black man has hip hop, the white man has rock, the southie guy only has idlis and tomato rasam or an NRI account in South Indian Bank Ernakulam Branch. Alas as our destiny was determined in one fell swoop by our nomenclature, so will our future be. A nice arranged little love story. But the agony of course does not end there. On the first night, as the stud sits on his bed finally within touching distance and whispers his sweet desires into her delectable ear, she blushes, turns around and whispers back "But amma has said only on second saturdays..."

-------sourced from Siddin Vadukut

Self tagging.....and the joys of asymmetric posts..

2006-09-20T21:33:00.000+05:30

These long breaks from blogging have almost become a habit now...somehow I find it extremely hard to come up with sane topics to post on...what do I talk about?the most exciting that happens to me is a mass bunk in college(some might think it IS excting....for effective mass bunk latch the classroom door so that the cowardly student crowd hesitates to open it and the teachers are stuck by the finality of the act ;)) and life just rolls on from day to day.......

As i am shameful and desperately short of topics...I shall do the unthinkable and tag myself(claps and the WWF eh?).... it is a tag on books....here goes...
1. One book that changed your life?
Midnight's Children by Rushdie it shook me up and turned me around..read it during the hols after my first year..what incredible word play! what convoluted twists and turns! and the endearing part is the humaness of the characters and the one of the most brilliant endings I have ever read....seriously. go grab a copy and read it right now.even the Gold edition from your local Crosswords will do...
2. One book you have read more than once?
The House of Mr. Biswas by V.S Naipaul
brilliant.funny.moving.
3.One book you would want on a desert island?
How to kill and eat rodents the Maori way? naah...
4.One book that made you cry?
Microwave Engineering by Das&Das it not only made me cry but also grovel in the dust thrashing my fists to the ground.They should have a huge bonfire to burn unpalatable engineering textbooks and also kidnap the authors and push them down a cliff.

5.One book that made you laugh?
All of P.G wodehouse's work and also The Dilbert Principle by Scott Adams
6.One book you wish had been written?
How to deal with corrupt Indian govt. offcials with your ethical framework intact :-)
7.One book you wish had never been written?
none actually....maybe all those Dan Brown books which cause unecessary ruckus and turn out to be untruthful in the end....
8. One book you are currently reading?
Godel,Escher,Bach:An eternal golden braid...actually been reading/trying to read this for the past 3 or so months....
9.One book you have been meaning to read?
Ulysses--- James Joyce ;-)
10.Tag five people.
anyone reading this can consider themselves tagged.....

the real me(coy?)

2006-08-13T02:28:00.000+05:30

ok.1 year on blogger and still no clue to the general public about what kinda fellow i am.well....here goes..

quizzer--filter coffee lover--extremely curious--role play gaming enthusiast--orkut addict--accident prone--unreal optimist--lover of books--fetish hater--teetolar--outwardly humble--inwardly arrogant--early morning riser--wannabe CS theorist and algorithmist--rain hater--admirer of bono,turing and ab lincoln--travel loving tramp-creative--illogical--ex-vedantist--sri-lankan tea freak--sitcom fanatic--pseudo bihari--pseudo kannadiga--bangalore jaded--jolie/keira knightly/rani fan--humorous--hater of metrosexual men--big big literature-phile--anxiety prone--admirer of women with long hair--rushdie/naipaul/asimov fan--loser of keys--never angry--minor claustrophobic--dreamer--setter of unachiveable daily goals--hindu mythology steeped--metalhead--PJ king--ear pain sensitive--humongously flat nosed--loner--horribly attention deficient--expert puddle jumper--very sensitive to smells--nature ignorant--decent tennis player--restless--hydrophile--impervious to weather changes--dilbert/tintin/asterix freak---dust allergic--lover of 2nd class train travelling--people watcher---sarcastic..........and the list will go on.

The picking up of old threads

2006-07-16T22:14:00.000+05:30

Blogging after a really long time feels great...feel like a free bird after the dreaded exam 'season'...no more anxious gut wrenching agony of 1.5 day gap between monstrous and obscure papers....had a dream this afternoon....I see vast unexplored expanses of a fat engg. textbook.. everything looks unfamiliar and the exam is just next day and suddenly i wake up....relief floods in...no more exams for atleast 4months....its over.... its over...

the reason why Mr. Psmith features on this post is coz i am smitten (if that is the appropiate word) by this guy's mannerisms/speech/wit...i had not sampled this character of Wodehouse ever before until yesterday when casually browsing through in a book store I decided to indulge in my 'dessert' of a literary meal...Wodehouse.. but didnt want to read Jeeves coz i have already have had too much of him...Psmith was a nice surprise in the sense that this story(Psmith in the city) is not your usual jump-into-mahyem-instantaneously Wodehouse novel but takes the more luxurious winding hill road to the point.its such a great feeling reading P.G.Wodehouse after nearly a gap of 3 years...3 years in which i was exposed to more variety than ever before but came across only a few novels which could make me feel gidily happy inside............ leaving you with a sample of a Psmithism.....

Psmith describing a fight which broke out in a certain meeting:
"By this time the meeting had begun to take sides to some extent .What I might call my party,the earnest investigators,were whistling between thier fingers ,stamping on the floor and shouting 'chestnuts!!' while the opposing party,the bravoes,seemed to be trying,as i say,to do jui-jitsu tricks with me.It was a painful situation.I know the cultivated man of affairs should have passed the thing off with a short careless laugh;but, owning to the above mentioned alcohol expert having got both hands under my collar,short ,careless laughs were off.I was compelled,very reluctantly,to conclude the interview by tapping the bright boy on the jaw.he took the hint,and sat down on the floor.I thought no more of the matter and was making my way thoughtfully to the exit,when a second man of wrath put the above on my forehead.You can't ignore a thing like that.I collected some of his waistcoat and one of his legs ,and hove him with some vim into the middle distance.By this time a good many of the earnest investigators were beginning to join in;and it is just there that the affair began to have certain points of resembelance to a pantomime rally.Everybody seemed to be shouting a good deal and hitting everybody else.Itwas no place for a man of delicate nature, so I edged towards the door,and drifted out.There was a cab in the offing.I boarded it.And having kicked a vigorous politician in the stomach,as he was endeavouring to climb it too,I drove off home" :) :)

mistaken identity??

2006-05-21T00:07:00.000+05:30

this happened to me in the ART OF LIVING silver jubilee celebrations in bangalore....

me: look at that guy doesnt he look like..prakash padukone(the ace badminton
player)
ak: no...cant be..what would could he be doing in such a crowd...you must be
mistaken.
me: i am sure its him...
ak: ok lets see

and then ak follows the guy in question....goes a little to his left and then looks at him from the side...the guy gets flustered...looks at ak then turns back and stares at me.....by this time ak walks back to me.....

ak: no he aint padukone....lived in bangalore all my life...i can tell.
me: i recognize a face when i see one....
ak: there is only one way to find out...
me: whats that??
cups his mouth and shouts-"prakash!!"

the guy turns back....... annoyed this time....

me thinks-"where is deepika then??" :P :P

I am on a high!

2006-04-26T00:01:00.000+05:30

after 17 years of slogging,it finally happened.I got a job.After waiting for so long and making it a central point of my engineering life,The moment has finally arrived-i got placed-and how do i feel-ecstatic? don't know for sure.........

april 21st: I get up and think,god plz,plz let me get placed today-at the same time keeping in mind that at the end of the day,it might just be a dissapointment-a sinking feeling of having blown it...which i had after company W.

the usual flurry of SMS'S wishing me luck arrive.I read up logic design,hoping to make sense in the interview when I say it is my favourite subject! Go through the usual motions and start feeling pretty confident of clearing the written atleast.Start walking to the coll from the hostel with 'sunrise'-Norah Jones in my head.The company in question:A.the seminar hall is choc-a-bloc with the ppl giving the test and already placed 'package enthusiasts' wanting to take a look at A's package.The PPT(pre-placement talk) is precise and excellent unlike W a few days back clearly detailing the growth of an employee from the Juniour Software Engineer level to the senior exec level .The audience is pleased with the pay-package which is much more than T,I and W before it.I sit beside Aniruddha who asks me to give him my unbiased ,frank opinion about T.

The process begins....first is a written round which is a breeze considering that it is mostly pretty basic stuff.Out of the 200 odd eligible....150 get through written round.Then we are given an employment form to fill and an essay to be written in 10 min.After this we are shunted into a GD-group discussion....a 14 member one and the topic is-"should the private and the public sectors join hands to improve bangalore's infrastructure".The GD is fish-market and only 5 of us make it through the round.along with me Akhila and Ashish make it and I feel sorry for Dinesh,Manvil and Suhel who dont make it despite speaking well.I have a quick lunch and rush back to the seminar hall to wait for my interview call.I try to brush up my microprocessor subjects and logic design but fail bcoz of a jack-hammer headache shaking my system..........

I wait and I wait patiently at first then begin to get anxious.....the tech interview+HR interview takes long....I see gaurav get through and then Beena and then Akhila.....get the news that the team interviewing is not asking tech questions even in the tech interview stage...feel confident about my prospects and keep wishing that this torture,agony and anxiety end soon.everyone who completes his/her interview seems to be getting through.....I wait still and finally they call me for interview at 10PM!........

I am let into the interview room and the interview goes like this:
I(INTERVIEWER):sorry to have kept you waiting up so long.
ME: its fine.
I:tell me about yourself
ME:I did my schooling in.....and i m doing my engg. in....... and I like quizzing and reading
I:(ignoring the hobbies cue) do you have a valid passport?
ME:yes, but i don't remember the number.
I:ever had any visa rejections?
ME:never travelled abroad
I:tell me why A in 3 words
ME:global exposure+growth(should have said high performance.delivered damn!)
I:do you have a driving license?
ME:yes
I:which vehicle do you drive?
ME:Tata Indica
I:what do you think is your greatest achievement and why?
ME:my winning the NTS scholarship coz it is a very prestigious schol and blah blah..
I:why did you take up Electronics&Communication engg?
ME:when i joined engg. ,i was very much into and still am into computer hardware and wanted to know what makes a computer work and blah blah
I:It says in your resume that you are an active member of the art of living foundation.what is the art of living all about?
ME:The Art of Living is all about...................
I:thank you.It was nice meeting you.

after the interview i am informed that i have got through the HR round and that i had to be prepared for the tech round.The mood ion the placement cell is relaxed as everyone seem to be sailing through thier interviews.finally after a 10 min wait i am called for the tech interview.

the interview goes on like this:
I:(after the initial greetings)tell me about yourself.
ME: i did my schooling in .... and ....
I: but you seem to have a very south Indian name?
ME:I am actually a kannadiga brought up in the east.
I:you seem to be from M.S.Dhoni's school did you know him personally?
ME:(sensing my opportunity to steer the interview ;))actually he was my sister's classmate.
I:how was he like in class?
ME: he was a very shy person and never use to talk to the opposite sex ;)

and a few more questions on Dhoni....couldnt believe this was my tech interview.....
I:what programming language are u comfortable with?
ME:C
then she asks me some basic questions on c/c++....
I:any plans of studying further?
ME:absolutely none(lied through the teeth!)
I:any questions?
ME:what is the day to day routine of a s/w engg. in A like
she gives me the details.....

I come out.....and I feel pretty positive...all interviews and rounds over....but unlike others.... she(the interviewer) doesnt tell me on my face whether I am selected or not.I wait outside...tentatively,nervously...though there was no reason for anxiety.I am thinking how bad it would be like to get chucked out at this stage.
I sit in the training hall and wait.....then this guy(a member of the organization which is conducting the interview process) comes and tells me I am selected..................shock!!!!!!

fast forward to 1.5 hours ahead:
I am doing 80 on vast empty stretches of JC road and pass through Hudson circle...its strange as i have never seen this place without traffic...my legend-sans silencer,sans headlight&tailights and sans brakes!! looks like a bullet in the darkness.....I am going to MG road to SAVERA...the only restaurant which is open in the wee hours of the night in the whole of bangalore.....and though it is pretty unbeliveable....its true... and shocking!!('some moron actually offered me a job??'-me thinks)and though i know it is yet to sink and the initial euphoria would lead to satisfaction would lead to boredom.....at this moment i am happy, excited and terribly terribly relived.......this is my hour and nobody can take it away from me...........................................................................................

shit!!

2006-03-12T12:51:00.000+05:30

Taoism: Shit happens.
Confucianism: Confucius say, "Shit happens."
Buddhism: If shit happens, it isn't really shit.
Zen Buddhism: Shit is, and is not.
Zen Buddhism #2: What is the sound of shit happening?
Hinduism: This shit has happened before.
Islam: If shit happens, it is the will of Allah.
Islam #2: If shit happens, kill the person responsible.
Islam #3: If shit happens, blame Israel.
Catholicism: If shit happens, you deserve it.
Protestantism: Let shit happen to someone else.
Presbyterian: This shit was bound to happen.
Episcopalian: It's not so bad if shit happens, as long as you serve the right wine with it.
Methodist: It's not so bad if shit happens, as long as you serve grape juice with it.
Congregationalist: Shit that happens to one person is just as good as shit that happens to another.
Unitarian: Shit that happens to one person is just as bad as shit that happens to another.
Lutheran: If shit happens, don't talk about it.
Fundamentalism: If shit happens, you will go to hell, unless you are born again. (Amen!)
Fundamentalism #2: If shit happens to a televangelist, it's okay.
Fundamentalism #3: Shit must be born again.
Judaism: Why does this shit always happen to us?
Calvinism: Shit happens because you don't work.
Seventh Day Adventism: No shit shall happen on Saturday.
Creationism: God made all shit.
Secular Humanism: Shit evolves.
Christian Science: When shit happens, don't call a doctor - pray!
Christian Science #2: Shit happening is all in your mind.
Unitarianism: Come let us reason together about this shit.
Quakers: Let us not fight over this shit.
Utopianism: This shit does not stink.
Darwinism: This shit was once food.
Capitalism: That's MY shit.
Communism: It's everybody's shit.
Feminism: Men are shit.
Chauvinism: We may be shit, but you can't live without us...
Commercialism: Let's package this shit.
Impressionism: From a distance, shit looks like a garden.
Idolism: Let's bronze this shit.
Existentialism: Shit doesn't happen; shit IS.
Existentialism #2: What is shit, anyway?
Stoicism: This shit is good for me.
Hedonism: There is nothing like a good shit happening!
Mormonism: God sent us this shit.
Mormonism #2: This shit is going to happen again.
Wiccan: An it harm none, let shit happen.
Scientology: If shit happens, see "Dianetics", p.157.
Jehovah's Witnesses: >Knock< >Knock< Shit happens.
Jehovah's Witnesses #2: May we have a moment of your time to show you some of our shit? Jehovah's Witnesses #3: Shit has been prophesied and is imminent; only the righteous shall survive its happening.
Moonies: Only really happy shit happens.
Hare Krishna: Shit happens, rama rama.
Rastafarianism: Let's smoke this shit!
Zoroastrianism: Shit happens half on the time.
Church of SubGenius: BoB shits.
Practical: Deal with shit one day at a time.
Agnostic: Shit might have happened; then again, maybe not.
Agnostic #2: Did someone shit?
Agnostic #3: What is this shit?
Satanism: SNEPPAH TIHS.
Atheism: What shit?
Atheism #2: I can't believe this shit!
Nihilism: No shit.

And of course we must add...Alcoholics Anonymous: Shit happens-one day at a time!

FROM-the jaywalker

2006-02-07T22:32:00.000+05:30

Back home- in the schoolhouse,it was.The big moon sailed off to the westward.An' we walked,him an' me-a little ways.Didn' talk 'cause our throats was choked up.Didn' talk none at all.An' purty soon they was a haycock.Went right to it and laid down there.Seein' the Texas boy an' that girl a-steppin' away into the dark-think nobody seen em' go.Oh god! i wisht i was a-goin' with that Texas boy.Moon'll be up 'fore long.I seen that girl's ol' man move out to stop 'em and then he didn'.He knowed......might as well stop the fall from comin',and might as well stop the sap from movin' in the trees.an' the moon'll be up 'fore long....................

- FROM THE GRAPES OF WRATH

Bengalooru??!!

2005-12-30T14:19:00.000+05:30

to,
Dharam Singh,
chief minister,
karnataka

subj: do something!!
respected sir,

as a concerned citizen of Bangalore...i would like to pull your attention away from petty coalition squabbles and ask you to concentrate on the job of governing Karnataka and Bangalore and not indulge in the game of name change......... there is absolutely no reason why Bangalore has to be known as Bengalooru!!.In Kannada anyways it is pronounced as bengalooru....The only thing that this name change achieves to do is reestablish the importance of english in India today...coz if it was not important then why would you insist on changing the english spelling!!
so in a way you have succedeed in conveying exactly the opposite message that you intended to put forward....... so typical of you politicians i would say.... and not only Bangalore but other towns have also been infested by this name changing disease.....Mysore-Mysooru,Mangalore-Mangalooru,Gulbarga-Kalburgi...... dont know where it will end.... if you really want to make a difference to the state and especially to Bangalore...i would suggest....
1.WIDEN THE ROADS FOR HEAVENS' SAKE!!...roadwise Bangalore is still stuck in the city of the 60's....every goddam galli is full of vechicles...and 2 wheelers everywhere..
2. REGULATE THE NO. OF VEHICLES.....every day 600 new vehicles are added to Bangalore roads...its madness...
3. IMPROVE THE DRAINAGE SYSTEM.... a downpour for a couple of days leaves Bangalore flooded as if it was hit by a tsunami or something..
4.SOLVE THE CET MESS QUICK every year there is a new rule to admission to professional colleges....private colleges seek to make profit and its like different batches of students are paying different fees in the same college
5.ACCELERATE THE METRO PROJ......bangalore desparately needs a mass transport system better than the staid and cumbersome BMTC
6. WE WANT A NIGHT LIFE!.....the rule of closing down all establishments by 11:30 PM must go (yes for you non-Bangaloreans... all pubs and discs in Bangalore close by that time ;) )

so mr. dharam singh......please i hope you are listening and will not dispose of this letter in the dustbins of bureuacratic corridors....

maya-1

2005-09-30T18:47:00.000+05:30

THIS IS THE FIRST PART ........

Lokesh the pure sat at the steps of the temple contemplating.....he was there to oversee the distribution of alms to the everyday temple beggars...but his mind was elsewhere....being the devout temple priest he always knew that just the chanting of mantras mechanically will not lead to any salvation...all it will lead to is a simple life with no frills.....but he really wanted to experience the 'unspeakable bliss' that the books always refer to...the greatest experience that any human can ever have in his life...the point of no return........ where having attained that state...the greatest of thrills of the world appear to be partly child's play....he always knew he wanted that....even when he was a kid it was always the tallest tree,the farthest fruit that appealed to him.......ever since he was initiated to the brahmanic rituals through a ceremony...and was made to shave his head and tie the top-knot...he always knew his place was among the greatest of gurus...the stalwarts of spirituality..............

he was found to be sharp at the 'gurukul' ,the place where brahmins from poor families send their children in the hope that they would live a respectable life of culture and decent income
....had an uncanny ability to remember sanskrit shlokas....and great in interpretation and analysis of vedic scriptures....

but now there was a splinter in his mind...a single word which was giving him sleepless nights...he was amazed at the hold of that word over him...a word which symbolized a concept which was so subtle that if you blink you will miss it.
and Lokesh had blinked........

lokesh the pure set out.....bundled his clothes and a few meagre belongings .
"god bless his soul" said the head priest.
"he has finally realized that he is made for big things...he has finally reached the stage of vairagya- renunciation"
Was he really setting out for renunciation-lokesh didnt know..but he was sure that he could no longer face the daily grind of the temple puja and the day to day monotony of this life.he wanted to seek.he wanted freedom.he wanted peace......and of course there was that word...........

lokesh the pure roamed the forests of god knows which part of india..subsisting on wild berries and alms from the villages.....drinking water only from the rivers and the streams.....sleeping on the bare earth....and meditating under the shade of the trees......even though it was a hard life....it was not at all adventurous but he was satisfied...finally he was living a life he wanted to live...... but whenever he was eating or walking or doing anything other than meditating....the word bothered him.............................................

the definition was no headache really-it meant 'illusion'.what was not real.what was just a sham......but it still puzzled him.how can the world be unreal.how can it be just an illusion..................

it was a hot april afternoon...and his agony over the word reached a frenzy...probably accentuated by the hot lava of the blazing sun......his head started swirling...and he collapsed under a peepal tree...........

musicology.........

2005-09-19T23:34:00.000+05:30

there is something strange about u2.......the more u listen the more giddily happy you feel.....i mean even the war songs and all.....maybe its the guitaring....the strange unique sound of theirs.......i dont know what. the first time i heard them...back in class 9....i was this metal hungry adrenaline-driven teenager...who wanted to hear great riffs....but then mazum gave me 'joshua tree' ...and i was like...what is this sissy music......................................

I still remember....D came upto me on teacher's day and said-'try this thing man they rock!!'.....it was metallica....and that day changed my concept of music......never had i heard such powerful vocals and such mindnumbing guitar.......then there was the GN'R phase...man i must have heard that 'live era' CD about a thousand times....followed by def leppard,van halen,deep purple etc etc and the metalhead was born......my parents never understood why i needed to listen to such 'violent' music...why couldnt i listen to normal hindi stuff...but they never interfered.....in our play group there were 5 of us who used to listen to rock.me,mazum,the twins and coney...mazum's elder bro was this huge metal/rock fan...and he had an amazing collection of cassettes.....it became our base standard...we used to go to mazum's house open that huge drawer under the tv and do a lucky dip kinda of thing to pull out a cassette.i listened to so many obscure bands like this........then we began building our own collections....i had a few aerosmiths,def leppards and scorpions...meanwhile the twins bought a cd player...and that ushered in mp3s........and we began listening to a lot of stuff very quickly .the only band that i can say that i grew up with is linkin park.......in hindsight i feel it was a bit retrograde for us to listen to rock when the flavour of the day was clearly hip-hop...........

but over the years you tend to become mellow.......you start liking different music for different reasons....like i was surprised that i actually liked 'desert rose' when i came to college but i used to hate that song in school......began liking a host of bryan adams and sting and phil collins songs which i never knew could feel like that.
....and then there is u2......it is such an uplifting experience listening to u2 lying on the lawn staring at the sky watching the moon rise up......my favourite is 'pride in the name of love'...from the album the unforgettable fire...there is this strange magnetism about bono's voice in this song...and the video just rocks!! also 'Gloria' from the album 'october'.......a great example of prodigiously brilliant song-writing...........

lately been listening to a bit of indian classical instrumental(!!)...i always liked percussion coz i have a diploma in tabla...and zakir hussain,sivamani and trilok gurtu just take my breath away......there is something about the tabla which no other percussion instrument can emulate....its as if the tabla has a life on its own...rather that just being an accompanying instrument..........

dont know where this musical quest is taking me........lets see....

the nothingness ...................

2005-09-09T18:22:00.000+05:30

well of late i feel empty....not in the gastronomic sense but a void of feelings and emotions...feel as though i dont feel anything anymore......it seems such a drag to go on living like this......the all encompassing black hole of a heart sucking in every drop of............... you know........blood........the eyes which see selfishness everywhere.....even in the teacup where the monster of milk mixed with leaves sublimate the existence of the sugar cubes....sleep is strange......it is when the sane mind rests and when the inner eye is restless....churning up images that you suppress in the day they walk out of you like semi-human zombies and terrorise the neighbourhood................. .the merciless clock ticks life away.....swinging its swords to the noon of armageddon...or is it midnight?it cant be midnight.....for midnight is a misnomer...a sham...a fake fakir numbimg our senses to the passage of time.....fooling us to a false sense of security...that half the night is still there.........but ask the owls and their human morphs....they will tell you how time accelerates after the closed hand namaste of the midnight hour ..................................

suddenly there is light......not the natural but the electric....."rajat you allright? you have been screaming in your sleep....you are always such a peaceful sleeper.....a bad dream??" the human form of my dad speaks as if from far away.....i finally come to my senses...."ummm...ya its ok..." the light is switched off and there is silence once again.....i stare out the window into the shimmering night sky and hear the occasional flutter of wings from the birds in the trees........then i see them........ a pair of shimmering diamonds....in front of me on the window sill......i imagine 2 stars staring me in the face.......i open my mouth to scream and all i hear is deafening silence.......maybe not all zombies-of-the-night go away when you wake up.................................