Reviewing the hiatus

Incomplete posts , unrelenting thoughts, borrowed phrases, crazy titles, and finally this. After a much longer typical hiatus though !
At least am not running away this time. Not eschewing what is destined. I tried not to be cliched this time but then that's why they call it cliched ;), because you end up sounding terminally verbose without your own knowledge, and gloating it like a piece of modern art.

Last few weekends, were not so obliquely different when it came to candidly pass them doing nothing just like Calvin would have loved to. However, with some futile violations of doing something in bits and pieces can be completely ignored. Like - reading Dan Brown's - Angel & Demons, and watching completely avoidable serials and movies.

Whatever it be I have decided to start up certain things on a war footing. Yes war footing. The first in the list - to build if not everything then only the UI of my web page on the domain I bought last summer for some very mystic reasons ( I fear not to tell them). And it's more cumbersome than writing this blog. With plethora of new web technologies available at your disposal the phrase - 'More is less' in fact actualized for me. Am still confused what to use - GWT (Google Web tookkit), YUI (Yahoo User Interface), Adobe's FlexBuilder, Ruby on Rails or perhaps something more obscure. Not that I have mastered all of them, but yes I have chalked out the options.
What remains is to find someone who can maybe help me in arguing/coding/discussing how to go about putting the thing in place.

Next in the pipeline is to gobble up the Dan Brown's novel series. For the first time I can recall, in my life I have read any novel as voraciously as this one. And I cannot be more eager to catch up with the rest of them. There's something about him, his writing , or perhaps with the subject itself which can leave you craving for more and with so much to contemplate. Simple and realistic fiction which can be addictive. I hope to get some time to finish up the series without any self-made inhibitions.

The last one is most probably the most crucial one - How to get 'there' from 'here'? That's a bit of abstraction though. Am just waiting for something to turn up. Never ever have relied on probabilities but this time, looks like I have to. No other option. Somethings have to be learned in a harder way.

Currently listening -~~~ "aa khushi se khud kushi kar le" ;) ~~~

Investment it is after all.

Shakespeare's eternal quote would befit all the time to come -
"All the world's a stage and all the men and women are but actors",
but the quote would perhaps take upon a strikingly different form in different eras- such as this, which I feel befits the capitalized and globalized world we live in today -
"All the world's a stock market and all the men and women are but brokers."

Investment is all what we do everyday. Isn't it?

At the end of the fag day, what we might look back and see is our investment in all manners, big and small to earn what we need to live. To live is to invest - not only money but time, effort, brain, goodwill, talent and beliefs. But then why should I be calling it an out and out 'investment' and not merely a normal way to live or carrying out our responsibilities disguised as jobs, hobbies, obligations etc etc. After all that is how we have been living ever since the day we know. Yes. But then somewhere down the line as our brains evolved , our dispositions switched towards making investments and see whatever we do not as the natural way of living but as a priced future option. Something I have both repented and enjoyed - often.

Our tendency has grounded to visualize and measure out everything ( and i mean everything) in terms of its potential to give back the desired outcome. We study hard to earn good marks then jobs and then salary. We work hard to climb up the ladder of our corporate hierarchy. We spend time reading to improve our language skills. We socialize and make friends to broader our network of acquaintances. And the only thing I can compare all this to - Our investment in stocks to make more money out of it.

Everything suddenly looks so motivated and intentional. Nothing remains natural and without a reason.

Nothing wrong till now. After all we need motivations and goals to move forward and reach out higher.

It's just that our learning have become a by-product of what we study.(Do a reality check on how many thing we voluntarily learn everyday without any future motivation or looking at its potential use).
Our proficiency and accomplishments have become a side-product of our struggle to be the root of the corporate hierarchy.(Figure out how much of your work is oriented in completing the targets set in the last appraisal cycle.)
Our feelings of content and surprise while reading have become ephemeral against our quest to be more skilled in language and to increase the book count.(The last book you felt close to you heart and which was finished seamlessly. Remember??)
Our best friends and confidants are just a result of the random probability of colliding with someone being worthy of from our friends list.(Check your orkut list and find out how many ppl you really have talked to in the last one year).

Nothing wrong even now. After all its just a shift of priority and that's a subjective human right everyone has in a democracy.

Maybe this transformation, is the characteristic of our times. Maybe there's nothing wrong in this shift. Maybe I am wrong.

I am not the understand the English :(.

Egzactly....!!

To someone like me whose inhibitions towards bollywood movies are more or less governed by the opportunity to watch them, what I have written above would definitely make (non)sense and unveil the context. For others there is this post. To begin with, this is yet again the same time of the year when India witnesses an educational turmoil in form of an examination which perhaps would be and remain an imagination for the rest of the world. I Imagine a satellite picture of more than two hundred thousand peoples giving a test at various corners of the country . Yes am talking about the CAT which was back last weekend and just like the festival of Diwali it left the smoke and thundering sounds as its aftermath. The only difference between the two - the proportion of those encashing happiness and those left somewhat burned and blistered. And the bomb which ripped apart everyone was the legacy of our 200 years of freedom struggle - The English language. or more technically the 'verbal' section in the jargon of MBA blues.

I have had an interesting rapport with 'English' ever since the first day of my school. That of unnerving each other. I wasn't built to learn it. If there is something of which I have remained paranoiac all through my life, the answer would come out in a jiffy - English. Somehow I have never been able to make it up to the required levels of English. I hated English as a child. I hated learning the words which looked alien to my mind. I hated making a separate notebook for grammar all through my school days. I somehow remained disjoint from the whole class when it came to English. My second lowest marks would be in English subject (the lowest being in the social science - I luv to hate this subject till this very day ). My library book would travel along in my bag to home, remain untouched for the whole week and then back again to library on the day of the return. The only time I managed to lead in English for a quarter of year, I was almost about to flunk in one or the other subjects. In short English never became my cup of tea.

And in turn English would put me in the background of activities. Devoid me of any deserving limelight. Give me a taste of my incompetency and make me hate it more and more. Nevertheless in recent past ( i.e. the last two years) I have to my surprise been attracted towards English. I have pulled up my self to appreciate the beauty and potency of this language. I have learned to how to take a stand like a connoisseur when it comes to English in all its various forms ( except for the poetry which I still feel is something highly subjective and the subtlety of which can be understood by its writer, and sometime even he/she cannot). The rivalry however still continues to this day. :((

I have invested quantum of time contemplating why is it that English plays a vital role in all my setbacks, and then like a spark of nirvana it occurred to me that perhaps I am here to redefine (???? OK...refine) the standards of English, and be known more as a legendary figure of English language rather than of any programming language. But that may take all together a new incarnation to accomplish. And untill then perhaps the powers that be - would make me struggle again for this new independence I seek from the paranoia of not being an 'anglo-indian'.

Quote me not !........never..........ever

I like reading quotes. I have been particularly interested in them for quite some time now. I have read the worst and the best of them. I have also believed in the fact that no matter how exhaustive I become in my reading of the quotes, there would still be some under the graves, which are better than the 'best' and worse than the 'worst'. Not unless I hit upon this one today. which perhaps I think is the worst and the biggest loser quote of all times.

"All success begins with spreading your W.I.N.G.S - believing in your Worth, trusting your Insight, Nurturing yourself, having a Goal, and devising a personal Strategy. nd then, even impossible dreams become real."

To a normal eye - this outshines as one of those inspirational quotes which can push people to die for their success. For me this is nothing more than- BULL****. A made up crap. Something written for the sake of writing. Something you can honestly forget the moment your swing your eye balls. Something which can work only for those who don't really want to work. Miles away from the reality and into the futile core world of hyper-philosophical or gyan-darshan. Who's a** can benefit out of such verbose and useless quotes, glamored and enamored like those fugacious Chinese products, which are good for nothing other than creating a mass infatuation.

Call me names for putting it all like this, but I just can't help despising this one. For there are reasons which are quite in parallel to why I hate those stinking K-serials on the idiot box. For first, it looks like something straight out of an evil mind. Someone wanting to confuse people and alluring them with yet another stupid excuse for not working their ways out towards success.


Some people would contemplate after reading - Aaah..am most probably not trying to believe in myself (come on even bush would have believed in himself for all what he has done so far) or I better nurture myself (with what and how only god knows !!), and do I have a goal as yet, I think I better search out(read as waste time) for yet another one....and what not.

So grossly hollow that you can't get a quark of wisdom in them after closely analyzing them and that is why I hate these category of unquotable quotes, meant to be deleted for ever from everywhere - net, books and most importantly from our minds..!

"I hate quotations. Tell me what you know." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Little 'Bloggers'

I am sure Nobody would not have heard/read/listened this -

"While Capitalism is screwing the Working Class, Government is sound asleep, the People are being completely ignored and the Future is full of Shit."

Though it's part of something more trickier and more johhnier ;) , than what it looks here, it says it all and if not read it down.

I know it's one of those things someone puts on the blog, when he/she is suffering wildly from writer's block. Not that am a writer, but yeah sometimes I feel like one,but quite unlike the the ones who feel complete and ingenuous in their writing, tracing every filth they get on board of various tabloids across the net just in order to make yellow journalism more yellower.

Yes am pointing my finger......ok..my fist, on all those bloggers who are complacent in being the next blatantly screaming 'read-me-please---for-god-sake' portal owner, through their blogs. They will regularly post the wild and wackiest of news picked up from the plethora of pathetic news sites and google out fact and figures to somehow make the whole news look like the event of the century. I have seen a sudden surge in the no. of bloggers posting news items picked up seemingly from the last result page of google search, and contrive a mind candy for their regulars, like yet another potboiler story of a soap, as if those sucking K-serials were already not causing enough pain, of every kind.

The question being does that serve purpose? Does that not violate the original idea and concept of blogging?

Well yes and no.
No, because this is the age of remixes and remakes. So these bloggers are no less than their show-biz counterparts in deriving their 'inspiration' from what is happening in the world today. I think blogging has indeed picked up a new show-biz culture paralleled by enormous fan following and the desperateness of the readers waiting for their super-writers to release a new post. Huh !! as if they had choices. ( I think the proverb should be changed to - 'Readers are not choosers')

And Yes because we know it all, the blogging was just a modern approach of maintaining personal diaries only differing in their access to the public as against a method of generating revenues (thanks to google's non-sense adsense), archiving remakes of sensational news, or of showcasing discoveries of obscure facts which essentially only goes to tell the readers about the writing abilities of the associated authors and nothing else.

Ok I know, if that starter on the top of the page still looks alien to this whole post and has been consistently troubling, let me give an explanation. (Just and extempore attempt ... [;)])

"While the bloggers are screwing the idea and concept of blogging, the blogspot is sound asleep, the reader's choices are being completely ignored and the future of blogs is full of shit."

Sounds convincing ? isn't it ... :D

ready for a beating....anyone??

The last post will continue in the next post ;)......Procrastination redefined...:P. OK it's just that I don't feel like writing, I feel like avenging someone for something...and that someone can be anyone...;). This is perhaps due in the wake of incidents such as these :

The 9/11 being repeated in not it's whole entirety but on a much lesser scale only goes to show that Osama has now his competitors within the US. He's offloaded of the burdens of downsizing the high skyscraper in the states. Pun intended -Of Course !!, and I wholeheartedly extend my condolences for those who died in this mishap. Longing to see this world as a safe place to live in...

The more bolder and more armed media of India, capsizes the Orkut community - I hate India. Now can someone explain if it's not paranoia but something else that makes our media in general to run amok and be instigated by a handful members of a community of eternal Indian haters i.e. Pakistanis - Ggod, bless them, their country and our media.

And the Star-struck pune-ites were no less fanatic in chasing Angelina Jolie's all-black tinted glass Innova, than poor farmers of drought-struck areas chasing relief helicopters for food packets. The result : a chaser getting knocked down by the cab containing jolie-pitt, the couple being pulled in a for a case in court and new channels coudn't have asked for more. But who's to be blamed really? The so called 'roads' of pune, the driver of the cab, the chaser or more interestingly jolie herself. And what does this showcase : desperateness, indecency, frustration, or simply our innate instinct of getting wild.?
Can't help feeling for those two poor souls... :(

as always praying .............\_/

Lost in Transportation... - I

How many different modes of public transport have you used in a single day? 2, maybe 3, or a max of four. But my trip last weekend to Goa via Bombay ( yep, i still prefer 'Bombay' over 'mumbai'..in some contexts ) was more than a myriad of transport switches. The whole thing went something like this...I biked from my office back to the flat, picked up an auto from there to airport, boarded the flight off to bombay, caught a 'mumbai' local train to churchgate, took a yellow-black taxi to go to my friend's office, and finally got up on a bus off to Goa. Huh..!! so much for a day isn't it. Though the list is not exhaustive, but it still covers almost all of the feasible conveyances which anyone would take during a trip, only that it was a bit uncommon in a time span of a single day journey.

The rides look simple when i say, "i picked, boarded, got up etc etc on different modes"...but each of them has its own story behind the the groovy scenes...so I would start with my bike..
The most important thing i feel for a biker is to ensure that he doesn't run out of fuel and be stranded in an place without a pump ;). It turned out as I was returning from a place in the outer of the city that the bike had run out of fuel...I was already under the impression that the bike was running on reserve fuel, so those jerks from my bike's fuel starved engine gave a 'jor ka jhatka' to me, and only when I pulled out my hand for the reserve knob I happily realised that I was wrong and there was enough reserve to take me back home.

Searching for the auto next, to hop to airport was torturous. I was amazed as I came out of the flat with a 8Kg bag on my shoulders, at the scorching sunny daylight at 2 in the afternoon. The whole morning it was lightly clouded with no anticipated signs of a ray of sun for the whole day. But as luck would have it, the conspiracy was mid-way, and the drivers of the very few autos which were there, refused to earn in lieu of the relishing siesta they were having. Eventually had to walkdown almost half-a-kilometer to catch one of the empty moving autos. :((

At the airport, I was there well before the departure time of my flight. With a single bag as cabin luggage you can be more than comfortable in hanging around at the airport without bothering to keep an eye on your heavy luggage pieces. Certainly being there well before time, saved me from the serpentine queue for the boarding pass and I proceeded for the security check-in. There a CISF security in-charge put me on hold at the check point for I don't know why, becaue I dont think I was looking so pathetic to be put on hold for an informal interrogation. The in-charge asked me where did i work, how much did i earn and all sort of impertinent questions. Having answered them with a broad smile on my face he asked me to move on. As I moved to pick up my bag, the bag scanner pointed out a small bottle of scent I had packed in my bag which eventually I had to throw away in the dustbin kept there. And thus came the end of one of my longest kept bottles of perfume and of course one of the most cherished ones. :((

I took my bag and rushed to the wating lounge. After a boring half-hour wait, the boarding was announced. Seeing the length of the line, I decided to hold on and wait till the line gets shorter. You can do this except for an Air Deccan Flight which is a free seater, and wherein people would not mind even running on the taxi-way to get their coveted seats. Any how, seeing the last few passengers in the line I moved and waited in line for my turn for the last security check. When I reached at the check point, the guard pointed out the missing security check stamp on the tag attached to my baggage. This probably happened as I collected my bag unaware of the missing stamp, because of the perfume bottle. I kept cussing myself for making a fool of myself, as I moved to get that stamp on the tag.

The journey continued in the part - II

A Reflection

When a lucid and limpid voice, with and elegant yet vivid tone, hits your ear, you are bound to stop, to find out and to hear what that voice has to say....and add to that when the subject of that voice is even more philosophically alluring, you just can't afford to evade.

Well, this is what a friend of mine, infact today confronted me with. Something which I would have missed otherwise. Though it's a mere excerpt from one of the scenes of 'Lageraho Munnabhai' - one of the founding movies of the new age bollywood cinema I should say, it is in essence a gross reflection of the kind of lives we live today.

Will all due acknowledgement to the dialogue writer of the movie and many thanks to my friend for typing the voice back into text, which I have quoted below, here it goes -


/*--
Un sab ke liye jo daude ja rahe hai shaher main
shaher ki daud me daud ke kerna kya hai
ager yahi jeena hai dosto, to fir merna kya hai?

pehli baarish me train late hone ki fikra hai..bhul gaye bhigate hue tehalna kya hai

serial ke kirdaaro ka sara haal hai malum aur ma ka haal poochane ki fursat kaha hai

ab ret pe nange paon tahalte q nahi..ye to aap hi jaane per dil dahalta q hai?

internet se dunia se to touch me hai lekin pados me kaun rehta hai jaate tak nahi

mobile landline sab ki bhermaar hai lekin jigri dost tak pahuche aise wo taar kaha hai

kab dubate hue suraj ko dekha tha..yaad hai

kab jaana tha ki shaam ka gujarna kya hai

saher ki daud me daud ke kerna kya hai

ager yahi jeena hai dosto to fir merna kya hai?

--*/

Sumptuous, food for thought,isn't it. [:)]

Taking out time for 'time out'

I always wondered how can anyone become so busy as to not be able to even update his/her blog, reply to emails, chat with his friends, make calls or perhaps even realize what the time is in his/her watch. I know, this somehow projects me as a slug or jobless person, but no I always did my work, always had something or the other to engage myself with, but strangely it never happened that deadlines constrained me so much as to live on the edge. I believed that taking a 'time out' was always so easy if you know how to manage your time, because I never explicitly had to do manage my time. Time was always there, for anything and everything. I was never so hard pressed that I could not squeeze in or make space for other activities.

But well, this was true uptill some time back, when I somehow managed to see that it is not only possible but very often that one needs to push in him or herself for so many things simultaneously. And now I have to curse myself especially after getting attuned to take a easy sail in the sea of time all this while, for not being to able to do all that stuff, such as update blog, chat with friends, make calls etc etc. Am not apt to multitasking, but I have made it a point that by the end of it, I learn how not to let things go out of the hand when there's just no end to the tasks pouring in.

'Time is at a premium', has always been the motto, and surely will continue to be, the only change however is this sudden surge in the amount of premium, my time is worth, and the speed of time itself from 1 second per second to surprisingly a few hundred milliseconds less per second for me, and to calculate which I seriously don't have a grain of time with me.

Time up :( .....so long...........

And the answer is

To the question put up in the last post :- 'C', and you've got to believe me for it's the most precise and best answer among the choices. Yes, there's a logic and rationale behind it, which is too subtle for all our ingenious and ingenuous minds, so as to promptly strike of C as the most plausible wrong answer to that question. However, the explanation goes something like this:

--
Choi's statement is a comparison among individuals: If my parents have earned doctorate and your's didn't, then Chod says that the odds are better that I will earn a doctorate than you will. Choi's claim goes no further. He doesn't claim that children of doctors are guranteed to earn doctorates, and he doesn't even claim that they are likely to earn doctorates. He merely claims that these children are more likely to earn doctorates than their counterparts who do not have a parent that earned a doctorate. So even if only 5 percent of doctor's children earn doctorates themselves, Choi's claim is still correct as long as fewer than 5 percent of children whose parents didn't earn a doctorate went to earn a doctorate themselves.

Thus the irrelevancy of Hart's 70 percent figure, which gives us information on a different goup -- those who already earned their doctoral degree.


Because she has shifted the scope, the data Hart presents can be true and still have no bearing on Choi's claim. An example :Suppose that there are 10 people in the world with doctorates. Choi merely claims that children of these people are more likely to get doctorates than children of other people. Hart comes along and says that of the 10 people, say , 8 of then(70%) come from doctorate-less parents. Does that alter Choi's claim in any way? No. All other factors being equal, the children of those doctors could still be more likely to earn doctorates, even if most doctorate holders don't have that particular heritage. Because of this, Hart's considration doesn't contradict Choi's claim in any way, and we can therefore say that Hart's statement is consistent with it.


--

Choi & Hart

Dodge this ;) !!!


Choi: All other factors being equal, children whose parents earned doctorates are more likely to earn a doctorate than children whose parents did not earn doctorates.

Hart: But consider this: Over 70 percent of all doctorate holders do not have a parent that also holds a doctorate.

Which of the following is the most accurate evaluation of Hart's reply?

(A) It establishes that Choi's claim is an exaggeration.
(B) If true, it effectively demostrates that Choi's claim cannot be accurate.
(C) It is consistent with Choi's claim.
(D) It provides alternative reasons for accepting Choi's claim.
(E) It mistakes what is necessary for an event with what is sufficient to determine that the event will occur.

WHY DID THE CHICKEN CROSS THE ROAD?

Here are some wise answers ;)
----------------------------------


Plato: For the greater good.

Karl Marx: It was a historical inevitability.

Machiavelli: So that its subjects will view it with admiration,
as a chicken which has the daring and courage to
boldly cross the road, but also with fear, for whom
among them has the strength to contend with such a
paragon of avian virtue? In such a manner is the
princely chicken's dominion maintained.

Hippocrates: Because of an excess of light pink gooey stuff in its
pancreas.

Jacques Derrida: Any number of contending discourses may be discovered
within the act of the chicken crossing the road, and
each interpretation is equally valid as the authorial
intent can never be discerned, because structuralism
is DEAD, DAMMIT, DEAD!

Thomas de Torquemada: Give me ten minutes with the chicken and I'll find out.

Timothy Leary: Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment
would let it take.

Douglas Adams: Forty-two.

Nietzsche: Because if you gaze too long across the Road, the Road
gazes also across you.

Oliver North: National Security was at stake.

B.F. Skinner: Because the external influences which had pervaded its
sensorium from birth had caused it to develop in such a
fashion that it would tend to cross roads, even while
believing these actions to be of its own free will.

Carl Jung: The confluence of events in the cultural gestalt
necessitated that individual chickens cross roads at
this historical juncture, and therefore
synchronicitously brought such occurrences into being.

Jean-Paul Sartre: In order to act in good faith and be true to itself,
the chicken found it necessary to cross the road.

Ludwig Wittgenstein: The possibility of "crossing" was encoded into the
objects "chicken" and "road", and circumstances came
into being which caused the actualization of this
potential occurrence.

Albert Einstein: Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed
the chicken depends upon your frame of reference.

Aristotle: To actualize its potential.

Buddha: If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken-
nature.

Howard Cosell: It may very well have been one of the most astonishing
events to grace the annals of history. An historic,
unprecedented avian biped with the temerity to attempt
such an herculean achievement formerly relegated to
homo sapien pedestrians is truly a remarkable occurence.

Salvador Dali: The Fish.

Darwin: It was the logical next step after coming down from
the trees.

Emily Dickinson: Because it could not stop for death.

Epicurus: For fun.

Ralph Waldo Emerson: It didn't cross the road; it transcended it.

Johann von Goethe: The eternal hen-principle made it do it.

Ernest Hemingway: To die. In the rain.

Werner Heisenberg: We are not sure which side of the road the chicken
was on, but it was moving very fast.

David Hume: Out of custom and habit.

Jack Nicholson: 'Cause it (censored) wanted to. That's the (censored)
reason.

Pyrrho the Skeptic: What road?

Ronald Reagan: I forget.

John Sununu: The Air Force was only too happy to provide the
transportation, so quite understandably the chicken
availed himself of the opportunity.

The Sphinx: You tell me.

Mr. T: If you saw me coming you'd cross the road too!

Henry David Thoreau: To live deliberately ... and suck all the marrow
out of life.

Mark Twain: The news of its crossing has been greatly exaggerated.

Molly Yard: It was a hen!

Zeno of Elea: To prove it could never reach the other side.

Chaucer: So priketh hem nature in hir corages.

Wordsworth: To wander lonely as a cloud.

The Godfather: I didn't want its mother to see it like that.

Keats: Philosophy will clip a chicken's wings.

Blake: To see heaven in a wild fowl.

Othello: Jealousy.

Dr Johnson: Sir, had you known the Chicken for as long as I have,
you would not so readily enquire, but feel rather the
Need to resist such a public Display of your own
lamentable and incorrigible Ignorance.

Mrs Thatcher: This chicken's not for turning.

Supreme Soviet: There has never been a chicken in this photograph.

Oscar Wilde: Why, indeed? One's social engagements whilst in
town ought never expose one to such barbarous
inconvenience - although, perhaps, if one must cross a
road, one may do far worse than to cross it as the
chicken in question.

Kafka: Hardly the most urgent enquiry to make of a low-grade
insurance clerk who woke up that morning as a hen.

Swift: It is, of course, inevitable that such a loathsome,
filth-ridden and degraded creature as Man should assume
to question the actions of one in all respects his
superior.

Macbeth: To have turned back were as tedious as to go o'er.

Whitehead: Clearly, having fallen victim to the fallacy of
misplaced concreteness.

Freud: An die andere Seite zu kommen. (Much laughter)

Hamlet: That is not the question.

Donne: It crosseth for thee.

Pope: It was mimicking my Lord Hervey.


Constable: To get a better view.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Picked up from here.

Imagine

By John Lenon :-

Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...



Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...



?You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one



Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...




You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one


Peace ...

Italy takes it all...

I am not going to write about yesterday's world cup final, because I am fed up, both, hearing and reading about it almost everywhere now and thereby increase the redundant informational content of the universe.

I am not going to write about yesterday's world cup final because, France, my intuitive selection for rank 1, lost [:(].

I am not going to write about yesterday's world cup final, because zizou's capricious last minute act of headbutt (keeping all the logical and rationales behind), was an uncalled death of sportsman ship and in my friends language 'game ki haar'.


I am not going to write about yesterday's world cup final also because,
for the second time in the history of FIFA world cup finals, penalty shootouts had to be used, which I believe, perhaps relegates the glory of a 'team game' such as soccer, relinquishing the fate of two nations and hundreds other in their support, on the potentiality of two mans men and a ball.


And I am not going to write about yesterday's world cup final, because there were other great finals happening which need to get the limelight.



But yes, I am going to write about world cup 2006 because, it bids farewell and extends warm welcome to some great legends of world football.

I am going to write about the world cup 2006, because even though only 10% of the total world's population could manage to watch the Italians toasting with the golden cup, it united the whole world beyond nationalism, racism, like nothing else could.

And I guess I have written about the world cup of 2006, because never before in all those 25 years of my life, I have followed a sporting event in such a religious manner (except for the cliched cricket world cups).

And not for the least, I guess I have wriiten all this because the unremmitting memoirs of these last 30 days, will remain forever with me....

(Brazil & Superman) Returns....

They are in to the hearts of billion around the world. They both are the supernatural heroes in the mind of people - one in reality and one in fantasy.They both have the formidable capability to twist 'n' twirl, and jump to reach their 'goal' in time. But, despite this parallelism, the return of these two, last weekend, had sent contrasting vibes flowing across the population of the planet - that of joy and of rue. One returned back to its homeland, with moist eyes, the other to the Daily Planet office, with yesteryear memories. Superman returned with a much awaited applause and Brazil with a much awaited defeat following the 12 successive wins in world cup finals after the last FIFA world cup.

To the dismay of half the world and my exultation( coz i ranked France no. 1 in a sweepstake), Brazil gave up on the 'effeminate' French team, fighting tooth and nail, to preserve its dignity and defending championship, only to return home empty handed this time. Like the inevitable rise and fall of a civilization, Brazil had to descend some time from the apex they've occupied for a period now, and is simply following a natural path of observing the rules set in nature - that which rises, has to fall. I am not asserting this loss against France as the pre-cursor to the downfall of sambian supremacy, but only that it may just be the right omen for the Brazil to analyse that indeed its for real.

Superman on the other hand did return with a grace, and charm,maintaining its valor and bridging those 28 years of hangover it spelled way back in 1978 with the release of original Superman. Brandon Routh dressed in simple skin tight attire, as was 28 years back, and with a drooping serpentine mane on the forehead, was stunning and equally enchanting for the adults who liked him in the first place, as he actualised on silver screen, the punch line of Adidas that indeed - 'Impossible is Nothing'. Far from the reality in the fantasy world, this invincible legend has not lost to its adversaries such as Spiderman, Batman, Neo, or even our local Indianized superhero Krissh, because the rules of nature I guess don't apply to the fancy land.

Two legends, two stories, and two different returns. Lets hope this world cup has more of this sort in store for us as the hollywood I am sure would have.

Zidane VS Ronaldinho

Can't beat'em...never..

My Game is Fair Play

Football world cup fever is on the surge and so is the enthusiasm of the ubiquitous soccer cult. People all over the world are supporting their nations except for the people here in India, who like me have no other choice but to rejoice on the winning jubilation of other countries. People here are content dribbling the larger look alike of football with their mahindra jeeps as a gesture to symbolise their passion for this sport. Stores in Bangalore even managed to put up a gigantic football imported from Thailand for display. Yet again to show how much love, a population of billion can spare for a sport, wherein its hard to find a team of handfuls out of those who would qualify to play from their side in world cup.

The last time ever an Indian team was noticeable in the world cup league was in the year of 1950. Then too the team had to withdraw from the matches because FIFA did not allow the Indian footballers to play bare feet against the rules. Since then it seems that Indian team has boycotted playing under the auspices of FIFA in world cup for continuously 14 times. And only time has to tell , if ever our team returns on the ground of a world cup league match after qualifying from the asian sub-group team of 4 countries namely (INDIA, OMAN, JAPAN and SINGAPORE).

Indianfootball.com proudly hosts a page on India's qualification matches (tagged as 'India's passage to Germany' ) with these countries. To disprove off the miserable and pathetic show put up in the qualifying matches by the Indian team, the page mentions that :

>> India finished third in a though group, which was won by Asian gigants Japan.

Gigant Japan, sounds hilarious. A strength of hundred million is gigantic for a strength of billion. That definitely is not a fair play on part of the indianfootball.com. With each kick targeted on the goal post, my wish to see indian team doing the same on that field has only risen, and risen to a point where I cannot withstand seeing India not play in the next world cup. But the efforts in that directions are still fruitless as greatbong puts it here. So, all in all for India the game is a far cry and not a fair play for a longer time.

NUMBER 10

The King of Football- The legendary 'Black Pearl' in action. The background score is definitely not to be ignored.

Fully Faltoo

What does MTV do to fill up its horde of void air-time? Perhaps the same thing I intend to do right now. Something completely 'Faltoo' or 'Futile' to say in english. Though these two words cannot be technically termed as homonyms, yet somehow both of them can qualify as a slangish translation of the other in their own native languages. That is to say, each is the originator of the other. Somehow we as hindi-tongue metamorphosed the word 'Futile' over a period of time, bounded by our immature penchant to include english words in our daily talks, in to what MTV proudly broadcasts as a full fledged package of so called fabricated 'inter-tainment'.

Or maybe, Brits as english-toungue during their era of Indian oppression, realized that they have been missing a word, whose meaning they would have never grasped by heart, only because of their belief that the sun never sets in the english empire and that they have never done anything, during the whole course of their civilization, which in essence qualified as pointless or fruitless. So they embezzled the word 'Faltoo', transposed the letters 'l' and 't', polished it with some english ascent and ahhaaa...got a whole new word - 'Futile'.

OK, whatever be the background of these words, the reason as I made clear in the beginning, is to spend time writing something 'Fully Faltoo', something without heads or tails, something which has no literary value, or which can be read mechanically like a verbose paragraph but makes no sense at all. And its indeed a tough task- to not make sense. Give a shot on writing something gibbrish, keeping the grammar intact with the proper use of words, and I bet you end up writing something useful for someone.

But is that the case always, and with everyone, becasueI seriously doubt what I opined above. Thanks, to a white paper which I am fighting to convert for the past two weeks, into a more meaningful,informative and purposive document. I think white papers, are more loyal towards their name, by being 'White', in a holistic sense, with not an iota of information to disperse to its readers. And in this fight I have been compelled to believe that 'lingerie' alone is not the only manifestation of brevity, but 'white papers' too are in the same league.

Anyhow, the goal seems to have been defeated here, because the post is not substantially 'Futile' in a satisfactory sense, or may be it is, who knows, except for the one who can make sense out of it. Besides, sleep is one thing , that can make a genius, think not with his head, but tail, and that's what am doing I guess. I'll better cull this down here and get some 'fruitful' sleep.

Despise-List

Most people are alive because its illegal to shoot them.Someone had said. And that's true to the last of its word in my opinion. To be honest I was a bit apprehensive at first to write a post on the demeanour of others, but after 4(+3) days of futile procrastination, I finally decided to let go it.

Well to put it straight - Man is a social animal. And I just can't stop laughing because that phrase holds a very special and cliched status in my local friend circle. But its pertinent here for the kind of double meaning it circulates, one which implies that Man is unlike Animal because Man is social, and the second that Man is after all an animal. Carrying this foundation forward to the the point I intend to bring in - That its natural for us as 'residual animals' to not like certain individuals, or group of people around us because of their demeanor. So that 'despise list' of ours, consisting of those, whom we despise for one or the other reasons( and at times without reason also), automatically becomes a natural product owned by each of us.

Speaking of which, I would like to present with some quintessential of the very like, who in one or the other manifestations would be present in the despise list of everybody. So the first place in my hit list is occupied by the - The Uncle Jacks' ( basically the jack of all trades..and masters of none..) -
Though you may at first instance not be able to relate them as any distant relative of Uncle Sam, but it takes a few minutes of chinwag, that you start disliking them (like you do Uncle Sam) for the reasons,you cant even dare to tell them. They know more than you about the profession you are in. So, obviously you just cant undermine the complex of self-ignorance by discussing theirs with them. They would not mind giving you advice on anything ranging from a cure for common cold to whether your computer needs a DDR-I or II RAM. They are the best possible local ( and moving) britanica's available around you, without any guarantee on the veracity of their informational content. Personally, I just hate to even see such people around me, but that they unfortunately keep popping somewhere among my relatives, gives me a bad bad time on social occasions.

Next in the list are those who can be straight away classified as despicable for no reason at all except for their mirror cracking,ugly and unwelcome faces that you have to encounter everyday in your workplace because like the lyrics of Enrique's song goes - You can run, You can hide, but you cannot escape - their faces. That's the case, there are faces in your office which make you delighted, which give you a pleasant feeling, and then there are the faces of these second kind - which will keep hitting you, for you dont like to see them. Don't know what's with these faces after all. I agree that an ugly face doesn't qualify as a demeanor at a person's level, but tell you what, most of the times an ugly face entails an equally forbidding demeanor which can piss you off.

And yes, the third kind - Hypocrites. Can be found in abundance everywhere. Maybe you can count yourself as one among them. Infact I have tried many a times during self inspection not to relinquish myself as yet another brick in the wall of hypocrites, but I think its just not possible. Hypocrites in themselves are not bummers, its the preposterous act of boasting the hypocrisy which can make you kill them. They can talk about the impotency of government one minute and in the next flaunt their ingenuity by telling you the ways of tax evasion. They can argue on cons of prostitution if legalised in India, and beg you the same hour for the next MMS clip. They can proudly speak of their agnosticism and pray in the temple next day for the exams. Such are they , that you woudn't feel bad to have them executed for being what they are.

But Off all the reasons one can have for despising others, I feel its this despise list which keeps you from following or doing or behaving in a manner you dont like in others. Thus its as necessary and vile as a list to have one.

Frizza

Well, that's what you call a pizza, when it comes for free - a Frizza (Free pizza) !. For us however the word fits more cleverly as our weekend luncheon on a more or less regular basis. Hold it dont start clicking for your dictionaries. Oxford is still to give recognition to this word, but only after they recieve a letter of requisition for the same. Any volunteers for that? - do contact me (shouldn't be hard !).

The etymology of this word can be easily understood in the context of Pizzas, because the only thing you can get for free in this world and that too delivered at your door steps is a Pizza(* conditions apply). Thanks to those MNC's and their global objective capitalistic philosophies prevailing in the world today which enunciates - 'Customer is our God'. And damn sure I am, that after a frizza you'll certainly 'feel like a god'.

So, we have devised an almost unfailing and pragmatic plan (the average succes rate stands somewhere at 3 out of 5 times) for anyone to obtain a free pizza, but you will have to read this whole post till the end to get to that. No no, don't start scrolling coz its not even at the end. Because you must always remember - There are no free lunches in this world ;).

Frizza as I would put it in the marketing language, is more of a corporate retaliation of Do-mi-noes against the Freshizzaa of Pizza Hut (Dominoes does not like to promote the same for unknown reasons even I dont know). But somehow I have a definite penchant for the former and an equally strong dislike for the latter. There are blatant differences between the two. We know it all. But what most of us will not know is how to get one i.e. a frizza. Most certainly any voracious pizza eater would some or the other time have had a pizza feast when the delivery man gets late and by the company policy of '30 minutes or free' s/he would be more than happy for not paying for it.

But how about gettting the same at the success rate of 3 out of 5 times. Sounds, interesting, isn't it. So here are some tips -

1.) Always order a pizza at the peak hour. Peak hours include the rush traffic hours when ppl retrun from their offices in the evening.

2.) If you never read the weather section of your newspaper, take up the habit of reading it today itself. Because if your city is going to witness an unwelcome rain or a storm in the evening, you got to make the best of it by ordering a pizza after the sunset.

3.) On weekends, for the lazybones and breakfast skippers like me who would not like to step out of their home or even their room, their lunch orders suddenly start to weigh heavily on nearest pizza shop. So for an afternoon frizza meal, check if your clock shows post 1230 hours, its the best time to order the pizza.

4.) Always start your stop watch the second you put down your phone after ordering your frizza. For a frizza you ought to be on your toes. Counting each second that passes, ready to show the delivery boy his ineptness of missing that 30 minute deadline by a 'second'.

5.) Most of the pizza shops keep a database of number, addresses and the associated person and the name of delivery boy who last delivered a pizza there. So always try to place your order with different numbers of your friends in turn to order a pizza.

6.) In continuation to the above tip, keep atleast 3-4 different formats of your home address handy. For e.g. an address of the sort - Flat No. -1 , ABC Apt, XYZ Street can be provided as

a) 1st Floor, 1st Flat, ABC Apt on XYZ Street.
b) ABC Apt, Near (some landmark) , Flat No-1, XYZ Street.
c) Flat No-1 , ABC Apt, Near (some landmark) , PIN-xxxxxx.

This would ensure that it takes some time for them to figure out that its the same location where they have already shipped the pizza.

7.) And last but not the least - Ingrain yourself of the fact that a free pizza is your birth right. So dont feel shy or ashamed while demanding a free pizza when your delivery runs out of time even by a margin of a second. Because unless you contain that obduracy and shamelessness to do that, you dont really deserve to eat a frizza.

Ok, I guess those should be enough, unless you have your customized versions in addition to all the above tips which you can add on to the list as your comments. I just recalled a (poor) joke in context to my frizza delivery shop - Dominoes, which goes something like this -
What is the opposite of Domi-noes?
-Domi-does-not-know.(select the white part with mouse if you give up)

And it rightly goes along in here, because Dominoes really does not know that there are people like us who will not forgo a single chance to keep the Dominoes profit short of their share.

A Century - Zipped in a song !

I spent my most part of today's sedentary work schedule listening to this one song which as the title aptly puts has compressed almost all of the major 'should-know-about' events/legends/wars/inventions and from anything to everything that ever came in news headlines during the last century. And if your guesses are in place it shouldn't be hard ( atleast for those who take the lyrics of 'angrezi' songs a bit seriously and not try to chew the undecipherable ascent of the english singers at times) to hit the bull's eye.

Yes its one of the Billy Joels' selfcomposed (both lyrics and music)song from the 1989 album Storm Front. - We didn't Start the Fire. The song is composed of names and phrases which made history of the 20th century as we know it today. It can be so intriguing to see that each and every single word (except ofcourse the chorus part) hides in itself a news-making story of its time and I am not exaggerating this fact. Take a look here and see for yourself. So much so that one of the sites promotes the song as an excellent education tool for teachers and students and I cannot agree more to that although history has never been my cup of tea at school.

Still I feel that this song is indeed a one stop shop for many of us like me to know and learn those wrapped in time realities, which are so completely different from each other in all aspects, yet have been cornered down at one place and called upon one by one like the siblings of a large family. How much great, fullfilled and accomplished it may seem in its purpose, the song I feel misses that one name from the Songwriter's hall of fame, of that one legend who introduced Piano rock - that of Billy Joel himself.

Success is relative.

Nearly a decade back a quite popular advertisement took rounds on TV, which sought an answer to this question - "Hum kamate kyon hain (Why do we earn?) " And then precariously assuming that nobody could answer that question, the lead in the ad , with a mouth full of delicacies presented the obvious answer - "Khane ke liye ( To eat )". I bought that answer easily ten years back like any other high-school student for whom working and earning are two big words in themselves. But ten years down the line that answer seems to have lost its convincing touch.

I have never not even once I guess given a thought to why and what for am I working. Definitely my work pays for my bread and butter but unlike the prominence it had in that advertisement, earning my livelihood is not the prime and sole objective of working for me and likewise for others. Because today we don't work and earn only to eat, today we work and earn - to earn more than others, to get an edge over others in terms of financial security. For us pay packages now weigh more than the kind and quality of work they associate to. One has to work hard enough to maintain what s/he continues to earn and strive to look for better opportunities which pay more so that others are behind them in that rat race of eating more than what they can chew.

So, What amount should qualify as a limiting, respectable, good and complacent earning for anyone? Well the answer to this correlates somewhat to the definition of limit of functions and might look something like this with very slight modifications :

For every δ > 0 there should exist ε > 0 such that f (x) − L > ε
whenever x E D and 0 < |x − c| < δ.

Where ε and δ are as always real numbers, x defines your skill set, f(x) defines your expectant salary (which evidently is a function of your skill set). However very interesting are the numbers defined by L and c. L is the salary which others are getting and c represents their skill set. So what I've written above can be rephrased in simpler words as - The difference between the expectant package or cash one thinks one should get and what others are getting should always remain positive even though the difference between one's skill set and that of others can be negative at times.( If you remember the exact defintion of limits you can notice that the modulus has been removed from the first inequality in view of that.)

I guess what Eliot meant in his quote 'Success is relative' - that you are not successful unless you are more successful than others is a much simpler version of exactly the same idea what I am trying to put across here. But should that not be seen as a perptual and eternal effort on one's part. Because there's always someone ahead of you and someone behind you, which although projects a linear view instigating one to incessantly invest their efforts to reach the front end of it , only to realize that it is essentially behaving as a vicious circle.

~ Untill next time happy circular running !!

Obituary: Death of development

If at all I created an unrest amongst those money worshippers through my last post which proclaimed 500 bucks as not a torrential sum, I would like to present them with this and vindicate myself. I read this article today morning as I picked up TOI with due reluctance after a substantial time gap, only to find a budding parallelism between us (me and TOI) along with a surprise (ahh not again !!) of seeing others who think like me. But unlike me, their thinking has a very mammoth structure( kahan 500 aur kahan 1Cr !! ). Big difference isn't it.

As you might have read by now and even if not, the article says that its not surprising since
after all the Indian economy is booming. Most definitely. Because I can very proudly boast myself being somewhere at the center of the testimony to this statement. Who else if not for India's youth(and that too in IT industry) can be a proper witness to this boom. And for those who still disapprove of this - I would tell them that a Crore is now a middle class term, that even the service class people can now think of buying Mercedes, that luxury cars have kicked off Maruti 800 to the sub-urban roads, that people are prosperous even without worshipping Laxmi and yes that the sensex is moving under the pull of anti-gravity.

But does this all even make sense to those who will disapprove, to those who are completely untouched by this rapidly changing face of urban India, to those who are committing suicide
because of lack of money in a 'booming economy' - because for them a crore is something like a room full of currency notes, for them Mercedes is a car from another planet and Maruti 800 still qualifies as a 'Car' - some thing that runs on four wheels, for them money is just another manifestation of 'Laxmi' and sensex for them is maybe an abbreviation of sensual-sex.

I might be sounding pessimist, in trying to paste this all-groovy face of new India with an ugly and scraped one. But it remains an equally important yet ignored facet which we cannot override or run away from. Not disparaging the overall growth and development that India has achieved in a sudden burst of industrialization over a short period of time, but this evolution has segregated the population in a concerning manner. Rich have become more richer, poor more poorer that too to an extent of ending their lives because of poverty.

This disjoint set of people who have not been benefitted but rather infact exploited for the sake of development of another set is the one which actually needs to see the daylight of the enthusiastic achievements of India. 'Incomplete knowledge is dangerous' goes a popular saying, but I would say an incomplete and broken development which is not all round and that does not benefits all is perhaps more dangerous instead 'fatal'.

500+ and counting....

I could only imagine. Until I saw the page views of my blog crossing the 500 mark, today. Not as if I was waiting for it to write this post but the complacent feeling it has brought along is definitely no less than that of Kumble cracking his 500th Test wicket or that brokers watching the BSE index cutting-across the five-figure mark. Although unlike the hard earned joy of Kumble, mine has been earned relatively easier and sweat free.
And that kills my exultation.
It took him 16 long and patient years to achieve it. For me it took less than 90 days.
And that inhibits my triumph.
He earned millions on his way towards his 500th wicket. I earned zilch.
Someone I know, would be thinking at this point about this absurd analogy here.... so fine no more comparison of oranges and apples. I rest my case.

But, looking in depth to this crossing of 500 mark revealed no such great achievement on my part. Since a very significant percentage of total views came from the nano-audience of my blog which comprises of very specific two or three or maybe four regular visitors ( including me !). However, the diversity of people from about ten politically separated geographical boundaries who contributed in whatever way to take this count where it is today, is something truly pacifying for me. Sadly, though none of them were regular.

Out of these 500 hits on my blog, I guess even half of them cannot qualify as proper visits because people came looking for the new posts day after day while I wasn't even near to any thought of updating my blog, resulting in an uncalled increase in the hit count of my page. For the very same reason in fact I personally avoid hustling around on the blogs and in the process invoke the site meter attached to them. Instead I subscribe to the XML/RSS feeds from the blog sites which I like to visit again for the new updates. This way I stave off from visiting the site unnecessarily and also remain informed about any new posts on them automatically.

In the very first place when I started writing, there was no intention of mine to trace my visitors and keep count of how many of them walked through my blog page. Slowly yet quite fast I realized that most of the blog owners have used one or the other way to do so, compelling me to abide by that unsaid and unwritten code of conduct. But seriously it goes beyond my comprehension to visualize those bloggers as neo-narcissists who on one hand try to convince themselves of their popularity by looking at their visitor stats and on the other - talk altruism. Quintessential Hypocrites !.

Whatever it be, as a no-earner, 500 bucks used to be a big figure not long back - it still is but has lost its grandeur. I think its just a matter of clock hands before I make myself more accustomed once and for all to this hit count business and not be intrigued by any such 'breaking-news'.

The uptown girl , The downtown train.

I have been hearing something called as ' Opportunity Cost', quite frequently these days. My flat mate recounted the incident of an interview session at IIMB wherein a girl candidate was thoroughly convinced by her interview panel that she's better off not joining any IIM becuase her cost of opportunity if she enters into an IIM will be far more than what she would otherwise be able to generate if at all shes does not enter into the same. Obviously that was a simple number game played by the interviewers as part of their usual soft beating they do around with candidates . But yes, there's an element of truth, and a hard-headed fact somewhere in that game - That is, MBA is the way to 'fancy money'.

So if the question is 'Why MBA?' , the most common and grounded answer one hears is - ' For Money' and only few would give you an answer such as ' I want to learn', ' Marketing,Finance, Banking are my passions' or ' I need a value addition in my profile'. No wonder with a surge in foreign placements from top B-Schools, and an ever increasing thickness of pay packages, who the hell after all will be concerned with learning and value-addition.

And that's where I think is a thick line of difference between those entering IIT's and those entering IIM's or take it even one level higher - between aspirants of engineering and aspirants of management. For the former, money is not a direct motivation for gettting into their dream institution but for the latter perhaps that's the only one. Money or job is not an issue in the minds of students entering the IITs or mayb other engg institutions also, because aspirations are different. People there enter with a different philosophy, with a different craze and with an insanity of doing and learning the only thing for which they have toiled so hard to get into. But I am seriously skeptical if the same holds with those entering B-Schools.And because money comes easy( now that's something contentious here ) after an MBA, is why every other graduate in this country is bidding on doing MBA.

The other time 'Opportunity Cost' made its appearance, suddenly erupting in the middle of my discussion with someone, I knew that this word is going rounds these days, adding more hep to everyone's post-modernist jargon and that too completely cost free. The issue in discussion was the exorbitantly high fees of ISB, that is providing at least an inhibition towards my inclination to apply in there. And pat came out this word as he tried to explain me that one should think like a businessman even when one is not and see that return of investment one year down the line in terms of saving my whole one year ( the MBA curriculum at ISB is of one year. ) and the package I would earn in that saved on year will eventually pay me back the cost of that opportunity, obviously ignoring the facts of any kind of value addition, or learning or even my interest in doing that at personal level.

Far away from all these real-world implication of the word 'opporunity cost', its business value, economic aspects and what not, I kept wondering is that all left in this world to calculate, to even before grabbing an opportunity see the costs involved and leave it if its exceptionally high but hold it if its not much and meanwhile the TV kept playing an unknown video song on a channel, in which a guy jumps off, of a moving downtown train, beholded by the amazing beauty of a downtown girl walking in the opposite direction of train he saw across its windowpane. I rejoiced at the thought that at least somethings still need not be weighed on the balance of 'oppotunity cost'.

Bloganalysis

With no Bush around, no political uproars, no new releases and no
substantial turnarounds, it's been difficult for me to write. So
reading loads of blogs in search of content and topics (read as
'masala' in local terms !) has been a gud pass time in last few days.
And except for few definitely good posts I came across, most of them
stood as dead as mine, with no new posts of late. In one such post by
Youth Curry, a complete statistical analysis of the blog world is
beautifully presented.

I will quote some lines from it, and not provide the direct link (Yes,
I want to take credit and also fatten up this post, without thinking
hard ;D). Just kidding, with due acknowledgement to the original
author, here are some startling, some boring and some plain facts
about the blogdom along with some of my own researched ones.

- 98% of India is still unaware of what a blog is.

- In the blogosphere's superpower(who else but the US), most Internet
users - 62 per cent according to a survey by the Pew Internet and
American Life Project - aren't exactly sure what a blog is.

- The Google for blogger is www.technorati.com, a search engine that
tracks blogs.

- A scant 9 percent of net users read blogs frequently.

- Out of the thirteen activities on net Gallup measured in its poll,
reading blogs finished dead last.

- The number of blogs which are 'active in some way' is just 20% of
the 'total'.

- At the close of 2002, there were some 15,000 blogs compare it to the
'total' figure today which stands at somewhere around 28 million.

- More than 56 new blogs start every minute.

- Those updated in the last 30 days account for a mere 13%.

- Only two blogs get more than 1 million visitors a day and the
numbers drop quickly after that: the 10th ranked blog for traffic
gets around 120,000 visits; the 50th around 28,000; the 100th around
9,700; the 500th only 1,400 and the 1000th under 600.

- IBN is the first Indian media company to start 'official' blogs'.

Well, those were some pacifying facts for me, as the figures reflect a
not so intimidating plethora of bloggers and I can count myself as one
of those early birds, who's not in search of any prey. The blogger
community is as varied and diverse as the global citizenry itself. And
so are the posts - from politics to humour to sarcasm, to critcism to
a complete movement, its all there on blogs. Bloggers have realized
the inherent power and reach of this medium that they are overjoyed in
having such a means at their disposal. BlankNoiseProject

is one such social movement which appalls the profanity of eve-teasing in a very silent and organized way. With IIPM issue already handled in a surprisingly unified way
by this community more and more people are using blogs as a perfect
non-violent tool for expressing their outrage.

But its not only about contriving protests, expressing against or in
favor of different causes. There are people who've gained limelight
and popularity as bloggers, by the very style of their writing and
humorous yet sensitive content. With competitions in place for best
bloggers in various categories and readers voting with far more sense
of responsibility than they have for general elections, blogging has
kind of become a serious business. Those like me who don't consider it
any more significant than a bathing exercise cater only to a
nano-audience - which comprises of and is limited to one's friends and
family circles, or ocassionally of few more regular readers, adding up
to not more than 20 or something visitors daily.

Where as the big bullies of blogdom attract a torrential number of
regular readers to their posts. With almost a million daily hits on
the most popular one ( and that's close to the average of 1.7 million
visitors per weekday which the online edition of The New York Times
receives) blogging is catching up pretty fast with the other media in
place.

Certainly neither aiming at such a popularity chart or coming even
close to these types is the idea behind my blogging, but what
certainly intrigues me is how far and to what extent will this
powerful form of tech-media expression go in future.



--

Beating around the 'Bush'

Bush was...sorry...he's still very much alive and here in India. Infact today's he's unintentionally letting Hyderabad's traffic go haywire. But I didn't let him see me[as if he cared ;)]. You see I have my own priorities to manage . But yes a whole cult of people out there from all parts of the country are more than obsessed to greet him with anything black they can lay their hands on.

So, what is it all about telling Uncle Sam, that he's a persona-non-grata (obviously not officially) in India?. I dont recall Bush's government putting any sanctions, or reclaiming all those jobs which have been outsourced here, or even for that matter doing anything to disturb the childhood of any young Indian. Still the coverage of protests on various news channels against Bush's visit is rivaling the coverage of his own entourage. I doubt even if half of those dissenting, know about the acts of Bush for which he should be despised. I confront, even I dont know with clarity what is the percentage of truth in his dark side which makes him a subject of worldwide reproach, but then am not going to become a part of that black balloon campaign against him. Instead I would rather prefer to sit here on my desk - unprejudiced and unbiased about his actions, and try to decide which side I should take.

The fact that Clinton during his presidential visit did not witness his effigies burning on mid-roads, rules out that certainly the protest this time is not against the American government, or the nuke-deal, or Laura Bush exacting herself as a 'desperate housewife' ( which might have provoked those pro-indian shiv sainiks), but solely and only against that one man - who unfortunately still lags behind, in the process of evolution of human species.

People, I think need a reason to protest, if not all of them, atleast the members of 'Left' certainly do. I have never ever heard 'Left' not being a part of protest of any kind. Looks like they are born 'Protesters'. From hike in oil prices, to privatization, to breach of the protocol by the government (incidentally this time they are part of the coalition) , to any god damn thing on earth - they will protest against. Being a leftist is demanding it seems. Whatever it be ( I don't give a damn to these protests), Bush's visit has certainly raised eyebrows - some in contempt and some in hope. But being an optimist I definitely don't like to look at the negative aspects when there are other seemingly hopeful and positive turnarounds. The all hyped Indo-US Nuclear deal is just one of those aspiring things which I somehow have been able to appreciate out of all the crap - whether it materializes ( that depends if bush goes back to convince congress) or not is a different issue.

However, for that 70% population comprising of common and general mass, it's a matter of minutest significance whether India gets an uninterrupted supply of Uranium for civilian nuclear reactors or not, the more important thing is whether at the end of the day, all this chaos and gala affair will eventually help to make a better difference in their lives. Sadly No. He came, He saw, He left - is all what Bush's visit to India would mean to a silent citizen who will remain flashed amidst all the limelight thrown over at Mr . President by media. Press would continue to analyze the joint statements and minutes of those high-level diplomatic meetings for few days, untill another sting operation or a new scam would finally take over the front pages and 'exclusive' reports on all news channels.

As I write this, US choppers hovering above in the city sky, giving an impression no less than that of a global emergency similar to the ones depicted in sci-fi movies of alien attacks, have finally touched ground to let president board on any one of the three Air Force One's, randomly decided at the last minute ( That's my guess, for what other than this purpose those 2 extra boeings accompanied Bush's caravan) .

I was just wondering if US could possibly have faked this whole Presidential visit by sending a look-alike of Bush to India (If people can doubt US mission to Moon as being faked, I dont think their is any exaggeration in my thinking the same about Bush's visit to India) because of their exorbitant concerns related to Presidents security that even the food for Bush was flown down from US itself. I guess packaging and shipping of the atmosphere along with the climate and air is still an ongoing research in Pentagon, that left Mr. President with no other choice but to breathe in Indian air.

All's not well that ends well - Bush will head for Pakistan where preparations for giving a warm (rather burning) welcome to him are in progress. A bomb blast ceremony in front of a US consulate took place yesterday in view of this. This guy has his admirers all over the world I must say [;)].

However, my wishes as a fellow human are always with him. ( Whopes !! did I say human.)

This biography of Bush is a good read , I found while researching for the content of this blog.

Avertible Inevitables.

This off late reticence of mine is no sign of my busy schedule ( It's more than 7 days since my last post !!) or even of my ineptitude to write without having anything in my mind - like those top-of-head posts which I had already attempted to write once, sadly without any voyeuristic satisfaction.
Besides no one was really bothered this time so as to bother me out of their craving to read me. But believe me that wouldn't have helped anyways. I will disclose why, but later.

I guess writing without even having a vague idea of what one is writing is fun both for the reader and the author unless the structure and language control are completely incongruous with that vague top-of-head idea. Not to panic, this one's definitely not from that league. It has all the sense I can possibly put into it.

The past few days, I have spent more time on net than before, yet it comes as no surprise to me, that my blog did not play host to any new post all that while. Not that I completely forgot about it, or that there were other hard pressed issues which digressed me but because of an experiment I was trying upon my own self. The experiment to try to avert all those inevitables I have been living with - Inevitable both in terms of events and objects.

The events which have coup over to govern my life. The objects which have insidiously became an indispensable part of my earlier 'have-lived-without-them' life. These such as the cell phone which has evolved more or less like an organ of my body, its address book which is like my own identity proof (even though it does not have my own contact details), the bike which has rented me that insecure freedom of movement, that debit card in my wallet which lets me wander disembarrassed from hassles of paper money, those email accounts which make me feel my presence and last but not the least- this blog which gives a sense of possession to me, are the quintessentials of those objects.

I dread these seemingly superficial indispensables which have kind of over occupied me and left me gasping for that little volume of fresh air, to which I have the right. I found that the things which I thought I could not forgo or dispense with, can actually be made dispensable and I have decided to stave off from them in turn. Its just that my blog happened to be the first subject of my experiment but nevertheless it does not disparages or lowers it in any manner. The idea of this experiment came about involuntarily when I switched to a new mobile which did not had my address book. It was more than a realization for me, that I could easily manage to live without my address book. It was not something for which I need to be unnecessarily careful about or be apprehensive of loosing just in case it actually got lost.

A similar record which an instructor during my time-management course narrated pertaining to his life abetted this belief of mine. He said that he has practiced to keep his mobile switched off whenever he's in a session. Though at the start of this practice he did feel uncomfortable and concerned about missing any important/urgent calls and of possibly breaking the hell upon him if he did not recieve those calls. However, when he looked back at those 10-15 years of his professional life he had lived normally without the facility of being contacted in any emergency hours by anyone because mobiles were not in use in those days, that he recognized the fact that he still can manage to forgo the use of it, if not at all times then at least for the time he's in session. And since then, he says that he has never felt either the guilt or been vexed because of this practice.

So, the idea is clear, our disposition to make every little, unimportant, and avoidable event or thing, an indispensable part of our lifestyle, is what is killing and torturing. Clearly its not easy to either filter out necessary from unnecessary or discern all of our actions but a little practice would certainly help. Trying to spend one day without a mobile in the pocket, without that urge to check your favorite news site or the email account, without rushing back to watch that episode of your favorite soap, without the notion of that insecure freedom of movement your bike renders, without that sense of security of having the debit card in your wallet and then see the color of the new freedom, the thrust of its wings, which we have unintentionally kept ourselves devoid of.

I know it all sounds puritanical and prudish but I know that I would be the last person on this planet to become a puritan so its not something out of my philosophical inclination but rather out of my experience. The crux to all this crap is - do/use/believe/maintain/produce something only to the extent that if it comes, one can easily manage to live without it and have one's freedom and dependency completely disjoint from it. It's a commonly felt notion that desires drives the necessities of our times which eventually make us our own hostage and bondage to their dependencies.

Thus, Passion->Obsession->Obligation was one series, and Desire->Nescessity->Bondage is the next one I have discovered for my own rejoice.