bullshit guaranteed!!!

Changing Constantly

2008-05-28T08:40:00.000-07:00

Scene 1
Act 1
2008
He walked into his house. Mom noticed he wasn't listening to music. 'Must have been a long day', she thought. He was the never kind who brought his work troubles back home. He had quite wonderfully managed to divorce himself from all the work-related stress. At home, he was a very good son and just that. Mom was expecting big things off him. She wasn't ever wrong.
But today something was wrong. He was not eating. And that was a sure indicator that things were out of kilter. She was getting antsy. He had his fair share of mood swings but never had he looked so forlorn. She wanted to ask but din't know what to ask.
Things were getting out of hand. He hadn't talked even a word the whole evening. She decided to take it up with him. She approached him apprehensively. 'Is it work?' she asked in a whisper. 'No', he lied. 'Stop lying and tell me what it is', she said. He decided he had to tell someone and now that someone was asking, he decided to go ahead and tell her. 'Mom', he droned on in that plaintive tone that comes on when we are sad (somehow melodrama never creeps into your voice when you are sad) 'I love a girl. She loves me too, but her parents don't approve of this...' All else was lost on Mom. 'I love a girl.' She heard nothing else. Blanked out. Nothing else mattered. This was not happening.
How could my dear son have done to this me? How could he have selected someone without my approval or his father's approval? Did he think that we might not find a good enough girl for him? What about the girl? Would she be appropriate for our family? Things are never going to be the same from hereon. She was breathing heavily now. Tears were rolling down. And He had only just started..

Scene 1
Act 2
2028 or any year sufficiently into the future

Something was terribly wrong. He had walked into the house, all singing and dancing. He was never so overt with his emotions. He was someone who kept everything to himself, be it the good times or the not-so-good ones. But Mom was happy for him. If he was this happy, something really good must have happened. Maybe, he found a girl! Oh! that must be it! I, of all the people, can recognise someone in love, she thought. But i'll wait till he spills the beans himself. Maybe he will blush too!!
Now a song was running on her lips too. Songs (even bad ones) and Smiles can be contagious. She wanted to know very badly now. So, she just casually started, 'Aren't we happy today'. A huge smile plastered across his face - 'Ya mom, i'm on top of the world, looking down on creations, and the only explanation..', She was quivering with joy now. 'Is this guy in college Mom. I proposed to him today and he accepted! I'm in love mom!'
Her innards just turned to stone and fell into her stomach. Why is this happening to her. Her son, smartest in school and college, charming, chivalrous, the perfect guy for a GIRL had fallen for a guy. This is not true. Did he think of the consequences. Will they get married?!?!

To the many of you who went yewwwwww, there isn't a lot of difference between act 1 and act 2. The scene is the same. We are all resistant to change. We have our comfort zones. We hate coming out of it. Change is always treated as abnormal. Gen X, Gen Y doesn't matter. We, as humans, are not very appreciative of change. We need to appreciate that fact first.
So, next time your parents get shocked when you tell them you are in love, just give them time. Nothing else works better.

P.S.: I'm happily heterosexual, for those of you worried about my orientation.

The finer aspect

2008-03-23T09:13:00.000-07:00

These are fast times. As i like to call it, its the era of instant gratification. Everyone wants to achieve something. we look for shorter routes everywhere. I saw a piece of news recently which told me not everyone is the same, and there's still hope for someone as conservative as me.

This is the one i'm talking about.

In this day and age, its refreshing to see someone honest and who has his head on his shoulders, instead of being stuck on the clouds (or worse, up someone's ass). Here's a man who is ready to give up his lucrative career, loads of money and fame for something as noble as saving his father's life. In fact, there's no guarantee that he will be of help, but the fact that he is ready to give up so many things for his career just makes me speechless. Can we do something like this? Are we ready to do that? Most of us will ask 'Why should i?'. I do not have an answer.

There's also the case of Kim Clijsters, that awesome tennis player, but without the good looks of Maria or the killer backhand of Justine. She was on top of her game when she retired. She retired because she thought she had enough. She wanted a quite life. She wanted to enjoy the simple pleasures of life.

Its very easy to call a person a quitter. But are we having more quitters these days? My awareness of sports is restricted to only cricket, so i'll talk only of that. We have so many cricketers saying they have had a lot of stress and they need to think about their game and their life. The stress seems to be getting to them. Marcus Trescothick, Shaun Tait, Lou Vincent being cases in point. Have we had so many players taking a 'break' from the game before? Mocking a person already down is very easy. Stepping into their shoes isn't.

We so often forget to enjoy the simple pleasures of life. They have a purpose. They slow down your life. Rather bring some normalcy into your life. I'm old school all over. I enjoy the imperfection of a black and white movie, i adore the corniness of a simple PJ, struggling to wake up only to find you have a full hour more before you need to start to work, realising that your best friend is also your soul mate..

Things have changed in my life, and this is one of my most random post. But the most stable among them too. Oh, the times they are a-changing!

Oh My Word!

2008-03-02T07:35:00.000-08:00

There is way too much cricket happening these days. And obviously there are way too many people talking about it. Commentary has become a long forgotten art, simply because of the fact that the wrong people are talking. People who could still be playing are talking and people who should be talking are playing. Sigh.

But one of the worst commentators of recent times has to be Wasim Akram. He wins with an overwhelming majority. Yes, even Ranjit Fernando doesn’t stand a chance. Wasim Akram stands apart in the over-crowded group of mediocre yappers.

What makes Wasim bhai unique in this is the fact he remains, to this day, the greatest bowler ever to have adorned the game of cricket. He wove magic with the ball, make no mistakes. My memory of Wasim is that of him, screaming down the pitch at a dropped catch, screaming down the pitch after cleaning up the batsman, screaming down the pitch after the batsman gets beaten off a peach of a delivery. But, alas, this was to change. And how!

The first instance where my image of a screaming Wasim was to change was with the Shaz and Waz show. Here was the greatest bowler discussing girls in the crowd. And trying to flirt with them. Overkill, Wasim bhai.

Mention must be made of his prowess with the words. His vocabulary would make a third grader go “Mom, I can be a commentator too!!”. He gives you numbers – “This is the third over for XXX. He has seven overs left. The score is 125 for 2. The man on your screen is yyyy. He is great batsman. One of greatest. My favourite. He plays awesome straight drive. Required rate is 3.45. Current rate is 2.34.” And then some commentator will save us from further misery by cutting in. Notice the complete absence of articles. Fair enough, he was playing cricket from the age of 5, so he missed all the classes.

But these days its not just Wasim bhai. The whole standard of commentary is going down a lot. There’s Arun Lal ( he says “I have never seen anything quite like this” in every match), there’s Laxman Sivaramakrishnan (would jump out of his chair with excitement everytime someone hits a boundary), there’s Navjot Singh Sidhu ( I won’t say anything here ). And then of course, there’s the legendary Ranjit Fernando ( this crikat is being played on a good wikaat ). Goeffrey boycott, please come back!

Commentary as an art should be minimal. Words should serve a purpose. They should create an image. Richie benaud managed that. No one to my memory has been able to quite do that these days. My experiences are obviously only restricted to TV and i haven’t really touched upon radio commentators because i simply don’t know. But still i feel there is a huge scope for improvement among the present lot.

And finally i’ll leave you with an amazing piece of commentary by Wasim bhai in today’s CB final. Have a good laugh.

Rohit Sharma plays an expansive drive and gets beaten. Wasim goes – “Now, Sachin should use his experience. He should go to rohit and say “ok guy (sic), you played well so far. Now don’t play anything. Just make runs.”

Long live wasim bhai!

SOJOURN

2007-11-30T03:17:00.000-08:00

One of the most irritating things about working in a software company is not the work profile, the mediocre salary, artificial people. It's the fact that ALL companies are situated so far away from the city! One wonders if there is a hidden agenda to it. Sure, it is difficult to find a place inside the city but 40km from the city? Why, god, Why??

But fortunately mine is situated only 25km from the city and yet the journey becomes unbearable for a lot of reasons. First of all, since the place is so CLOSE to the city, my employers did not think it necessary to have a full fledged travel arrangement. So, they provided us with these safe mini-buses with extremely unsafe drivers. I shrug my shoulders and tell my co-passenger, "Occupational hazards". I can see a faint nod but that could be for the music.

And now the music! One has to really see these mini buses to understand how small they actually are. Claustrophobics please excuse. And the driver in my particular vehicle has gone to great measures to install a wonderful sound system with woofer et al. The works!, you understand. Scene satham na, like he so aptly put it. But the trouble comes later.

You see by the way my driver described the sound system i imagine you would have gotten a fair picture of the kind of music he listens to. Not Pink floyd for sure. Metallica is out of the question too. But he surprised me by listening to ilaiyaraja. I didn't think he was that kind. But i was in for more surprise. He had such a huge collection of ilaiyaraja's music that he could have done a dissertation on raja's music and he would have aced through it, although his english would have to be strictly monitored.

Naturally i also warmed up to Raja's genius. But after the usual gems I was getting a little uncomfortable. No, it wasn't the bus or the junk food from the previous day. It was, quite amazingly, Raja's music. It had a sameness that made me squirm. Same arrangements, same voices and sometimes even similar lyrics. There is no doubting Raja's genius. He remains one of the greatest composers imho. So, what then? It was the kind of movies coming out then. And also the number of movies.

Go back to the 90s and you will see a disgusting similarity in all the movies. Same hackneyed plot, horrible editing, mediocre setting. Sometimes even the milieu is the same. Strove very hard to create a sense of Deja vu, they did. And so Raja got stuck in this cess pool, one is forced to conclude. Probably the producers wanted the very same songs that managed to top the charts back then.

That leaves me with no other option but to get to my collection on the phone. Sadly the sound in the bus is so loud that, that option presented itself no more. So, i listen, still squirming. As if the journey wasn't bad enough till now, someone up there who hates me, decides to make it worse. The coup-de-grace.

My office looms large to my right. But what is the smell? The stench is getting stronger. I turn left and see only huge mountains of land with streams of paper coming out from them, strangely. Something is definitely wrong now, the smell is unbearably inhuman. I take a closer look at the mountain of land and find out it is not land after all. These were mountains of garbage. Yes, you heard it. Garbage. Huge mounds of them. For hundreds of metres. "Cruel trick" i tell that person who hates me up there.

Celebrating Mediocrity

2007-10-05T23:57:00.000-07:00

The past few weeks have been mediocre to say the least. After suffering from a horrible writer's block (How is that for an excuse for not writing for so long???), aggravated by the fact that i joined a software company known for mediocre vegetable products(You see,i dont give names) ,the past few weeks have been frustratingly (no points for guessing) mediocre.

If you think the mediocrity ends there, read the title of the blog again. A self-confessed CRICKET-fanatic( not indian cricket-fanatic mind you), i shouted the loudest when india won the T20 world cup,the mother of all mediocre sports. But that shouting was borne out of the built up frustration owing to reasons totally unrelated to mediocrity or cricket.

Ok, now i can imagine you thinking 'why am i even reading this?' I'll get there. My point is that we have become a generation that celebrates mediocrity. It is quite wonderfully complemented by the era of instant-gratification. We all want everything to be done in a jiffy and in the hurry to get things done our way we don't wait to think if it was the right way or if we actually achieved what we wanted. We can also be called the almost-there generation. Examples follow.

Cricket being the only sport i follow as passionately as i follow the count of the latest boob-job that Pam gets, T20 perfectly exemplifies what i'm taking about. 20 overs a side. No chance to think. The horrible-'hit-out or get-out' theory. Bowlers who?. This is what cricket has become. Where are the grafters? Where are those sublime cricketers who could bat all day and yet manage to score not more than 10 runs(probably turning in their graves or commenting on star sports). Where are the bowlers who sent shivers down the timbers. The very fact that someone like Rahul Dravid wqould probably not have been picked if he had made himself available tells you how things stand.

The other level of mediocrity comes from my very own life. The place i work. Software company. Definitely not challenging work,agreed, but atleast it should be WORK!. We are being trained now on a particular software and we'll be assessed on that. The more marks we get, the more salary we get. How professional?!?!. Side-effects of campus-corporate interaction,i say. What's next? Ask us to pay fine for flunking tests? I didn't do that even in school!!

This again is connected to mediocrity. Because you see, mediocrity breeds itself rapidly. The pressure to make money right after your graduation pushes you into a job just for the sake of it and you end up in a mediocre job. But your parents are happy. You are making 20k a month, why should you be complaining. What if its just a little matter of not enjoying what you do and having to stare at blue,black lines for hours together. Get a move on. Money is what is important. Typical middle class insecurity helps too.

So, those were the ravings of a middle-class boy living in a space big enough to be Paris Hilton's trash can in a city where most people don't even speak their local language but beat you up if u speak any other language. Life could be better. Hoping for better times.,

OPEN SOURCE

2007-02-22T04:58:00.000-08:00

Robin Williams in one of his usual explosive stand up routines enacted a sequence, in his own inimitable style,involving Bill Gates and a reporter.The reporter asks "Mr.Gates, Are you not trying to create a monopoly?" to which Gates replies "Monopoly is a stupid game,my friend,I'm trying to control the world"(read with liberal expletives).I laughed along with everyone who saw that. But it isn't very far from the truth is it?

I am writing this blog using Microsoft's word processor obviously running on the Windows platform and in all probability you are going to read this on the browser provided along with Windows.I shall be damned if i say Gates isn't controlling my virtual life. His organisation has made an almost scary pervasion into our computers banking mainly on the workings on the human psyche. Let me explain a little here. We all know how wonderful Windows is. We all started working on computers only because it was easy to work with Windows. It made things simple for us. Who would not like a gift neatly wrapped. The catch here is that you cannot really open the gift. Its all yours as long as you don't open the gift box. If you think about it,this story has all the makings of a blockbuster hollywood movie. A machiavellian businessman who has a potential life changing tool with him and seeks to control the world. He is almost successful but for a bourgeois saviour who wakes people up from their trance and makes them realize.

Only in our true life story we do not have a single saviour but a bunch of nerds and geeks doing it for us. Stalwarts like Richard Stallman and Linux Torvalds ushered in a new era.They came up with a tool which was astonishingly simple. Its not so much a tool as it is a system because it redefines our way of approaching computers. I'm talking about OPEN SOURCE. One of the basic complaints about Windows was that it was not transparent. What do you do if you are affected by a virus for which Microsoft has not released the patch yet? What do you when you see a feature in Internet explorer that makes it vulnerable to attacks? You just squat and pray that the geniuses at Microsoft will eventually solve the problem.Why can't you solve the problem? Simple. You don't have the source code of any of these programs.

Open source changes all these. This term actually applies to the source code of a software. This is made available to the general public along with the software. So next time that software poses a problem the tweaker in you does not need to die a silent death. OPEN SOURCE seeks to shatter every convention established by Mr.Bill Gates and Co. They want to straitjacket you and open source breaks all the shackles. Anyone who has used the UNIX operating system, I'm sure, will agree with me. It offers a seemingly endless array of features the most noticeable being the multi-user capability. One classic example of the utility of Open source is the evolution of LINUX OS which seamlessly combines the capabilities of UNIX with the interactivity of windows not compromising on transparency. LINUX is a collection more often called a distribution available for download.

As is most often the case, Open source has these days come to refer to a lot more than just softwares. It has become a cult. Nowadays, it exemplifies transparency and openness. Cola companies are being urged to give out their secret recipes.This is seen as a sign of Open source going beyond the realm of computers. One other example could be the use of open source in medicine which calls for open-source pharmaceutical development.

All said and done, we ( yes, we) still have a very long way to go before we can get anywhere close to challenging the Gates' hegemony but i daresay we are on the right path. So, next time your pc freezes or gives the dreaded "blue screen of death", you know what to do. UNIX has been called the greatest operating system you may never use. Let us break the myth.

Fiery fifty

2007-02-11T05:21:00.000-08:00

I have been tagged for the second time! What an achievement,because i thought no one would ever read my blog beyond the first post! This time its not

to my liking but i have to keep up the tag and honour my blogging obligations(rotfl). So here goes..

1. Were you named after anyone?
The sun.

2. Do you wish on stars?
Nope..Im not astrologically inclined..thank heavens for that!

3. When did you last cry?
Can't remember.

4. Do you like your handwriting?
Nope.

5. What is your favourite meat?
How dare you ask that question to a vegetarian..im going to sue you,you know!

6. What is your most embarrassing CD on your shelf?
There's not one CD that embarasses me.. every little baby in there is "MY PRECIOUS"

7. If you were another person, would YOU be friends with you?
Nope..i belong to the woody allen kind.."I WOULDN'T BE PART OF A CLUB THAT HAS ME AS A MEMBER".

8.Are you a daredevil?
Nope..me is a coward and the most insecure person on this earth.

9. How do you release anger?
Venting it out on people who wouldn't mind(or atleast i think they wont)

10. Where is your second home?
My college..

11. Do you trust others easily?
Yup.

12. What was your favourite toy as a child?
Don't remember

13. What class in school/college do you think is totally useless?
Those management classes that engineers have to do..Dont see the point of those.

14. Do you use sarcasm a lot?
Sarcasm makes my day.. Optimism is so boring!!

15. Have you ever been in a mosh pit?
Nope.

16.What do you look for in a gal(/guy)?
If she is committed or not.

17. Would you bungee jump?
Yap..sure thing..just give me the money and the next thing you know,ill be jumping off a cliff..

18. Do you untie your shoes when you take them off?
Yup

19.what's your favourite ice cream?
My money=vanilla, Friends' money=honey fudge soaked with raisins and strawberry topping.

20. What are your favourite colours?
Black.

21. What are your least favourite things?
The list keeps changing..time dependent..right now,having to wait for daily soaps to get over.

22. How many people do you have a crush on right now?
Do crushes on celebrities count?..then the number is 22321.

23. Who do you miss most right now?
Nobody.

24. What are you listening to right now?
Wish you were here-pink floyd!

25. If you were a crayon, what colour would you be?
Black.

26. What is the weather like right now?
Humid.

27. Last person you talked to on the phone?
Vydhieswaran.

28. The "first" thing you notice about the opposite sex?
The way their hair is dressed.

29. Do you like the person who sent you this?
Of course.. In fact i admire him.

30. How are you today?
Feeling strangely indifferent about india's loss to srilanka.

31. Favourite non alcoholic drink?
Coffee.

32. Favourite alcoholic drink?
Considering the fact that the only ever alcoholic drink i tasted was vodka,my answer would have to be beer i suppose..

33. Natural hair colour?
Black.

34. Eye colour?
Black.

35. Wear contacts?
Used to..too messy for my liking.

36. Siblings?
elder bro.

37. Favourite month?
Jan.

38.Favourite food?
Thayir sadam with potato chips.

39. Favourite day of the year?
Jan 1st.

40. Have you ever been too shy to ask someone out?
I dont really know,having never really asked anyone out..should try it out sometime.

41. Scary movies or happy endings?
Neither.

42. Summer or winter?
Chennai winter.

43. Holi or Diwali?
Diwali.

44. Do you like your name?
Who wouldn't!

45. What book/magazine are you reading?
India Today

46. What's on your mouse pad?
I dont have a mouse pad..

47. What did you watch on TV last night?
Recap of some match that india won.

48. Favourite Smell?
Masala.

49. Have you ever regretted breaking up with someone?
Nope.

50. Most tiresome thing you’ve ever experienced/done?
Trekking in Mudumalai..when i was in school.

Now that im done,(phew!) i tag Vijay(since everyone else i know is tagged)

Back to the future!

2006-12-19T00:47:00.000-08:00

On a lazy Sunday afternoon, trying to get the examination horrors off my mind and get into the vacation mode,i chanced upon a magazine(I shall not name it here,but for the curious ones,I'll give you a clue-It has the country's name.I'm not exactly a cruciverbalist you see). My eyes lit up when i read the cover page. It was a special new year edition which read 30 years hence in glorious glittery font.My imagination started going berserk and seeing the list of writers which boasted of some of the most influential politicians of the century i thought this magazine would be a wonderful to spend some quality time.

The format was a little unexpected.Every thorny present day issue was put to relevant personalities and they were asked to answer the one question that would change the course in the next thirty years.Interesting,but after a point of time my mind started playing games with me. What would i have written on this,if i were given a chance.Nothing extremely intellectual or something that would make you look at things with a different perspective,but i thought it should have my trademark(?!) cynicism and hopelessness. I decided ot make it a short story of sorts and please do pardon the melodrama.

so here it goes..

2040 A.D.

Beneath that navy blue visor and unruly mop of hair,Samit Dravid had a very vibrant and technical mind.His passion was cricket just like his father. And now on the cricketing field,representing India for the first time ever in his life, there were a million images floating through that mind of his.He remembered how he had been thrust into the international cricketing scene. His father had a dramatic farewell from the game. He had threatened
that he would retire if the board does not hike the salaries of the players which was the same since he had started playing. And since the board did not seem to flinch, he retired from cricket. Rahul Dravid had been a legend and his career was a lesson for any upcoming cricketer. He had played a full 40 years thanks to the life enhancing drugs and also thanks to the absence of any good talent in Indian cricket.

The board wanted to seek revenge on Dravid for having retired so early and they thrust his son into the foray at the ripe young age of 40.Samit knew it was going to be tough. But he was ready to fight it out. He had been there ,done that. At 40, even he had led a full life.

He had tried his hands at movies at the age of 24.He acted in 17 movies in that year,of which 12 were on familial relationships,4 were on love & action and one of his home production,the one which he was hoping would be a hit,did not find the light of the day due to censor cuts which amounted to 100 minutes of the 120 minute movie(One particular incident which had the environmental activists crying foul was having the heroine run around trees.They had said the tree got bored of it and its feelings ought to be respected. The censor had relented to that claim.) Acting was his thing and he decided to stick to it. He quit acting when turned 27 because he felt a gaping hole in his creativity. He had acted in 74 films with 2 mega hits,3 super hits,5 hits,7 luke warm hits,10 below average hits,12 way below average hits.

After having conquered the movie kingdom,the next obvious step for him seemed to be to enter politics. He had seen so many people do that ,he was even tempted to think that people would not consider him a whimp if he didn't enter politics. After floating his own party which added to the present tally of 1723 parties(The number recently crossed the number of dialects in the country which was celebrated with a lot of fanfare and pomp). He knew the tricks of the trade. He knew it didn't help if you make lofty promises like what a long forgotten president had done a few decades back.Name was Abdul Kalam. He had something called Vision 2020 which people remembered even now for its preposterousness and downright sillyness. There was also a
day celebrated on his behalf. He didn't remember the day exactly,there were too many.

But now on this day, he wanted to get rid of all these images and concentrate on his cricket,the basics of which he had learnt from Greg Chappell Jr. Jr. He was a coach in great demand because of his no-nonsense attitude and ability to show the finger to the general public in front of the media. If he could prove himself on this stage with a century or two,he could stay with this team for a long time and make a lot of money through sponsorships. And after getting done with playing cricket,he could become a selector and screw the lives of those who screw with him. Sweet revenge it would be for him.

And if all else fails,he could always start a restaurant, or have his own ridiculously exorbitant fashion line, or worst comes he could become a social activist and get a lot of media time.

Samit just loved the possibilities that life promised at the moment.

BOLE TO GANDHIGIRI MAST HAI!

2006-10-07T09:10:00.000-07:00

Im sure by this time every movie buff would have seen Lage Raho munnabhai and written loads about and have spoken even more about it.Sure,sometimes one gets the feeling the media is
overdoing the hype,but believe me if the media is doing anything right for the first time its this.When they have time to say that Angelina jolie was sighted at some pune lounge and make that a flash news they sure can spend some time popularising this fantastic work of celluloid.

Its fantastic because it has got a message and not to mention its commercial.There are a plethora of movies with a "message-with-a-difference" tag but most of them are horse shit cause they are preachy.To those who say this movie is preachy,I do accept there are some dialogues in the movie which could have been avoided but im not here to critique the movie.I leave that to better minds.

The most refreshing part about the movie for me is the fact they were able to make a movie that made gandhi cool and never once did they bring up the "videshi" lifestyle funda.I mean this movie had the potential to turn out into one of those that could have gone horribly wrong getting too high in desi sentiments but kudos to the director on having avoided that.

There is a general opinion that Ahimsa does not have a place in such an uncivilsed society.The movie answers them quite hittingly.You cheer for that old guy when he strips to get his pension.Thats the power of Ahimsa.Bravo! for bringing Bapu into the limelight.Its about time.

And lastly i would to draw a parallel with a very similar yet starkly contrasting movie,Rang De basanthi.The theme of both the movies was the same-Bringing about a change.Only that the methods adopted were different.Sure,both were noteworthy attempts,Infact RDB scores in screenplay and plot-delineation over Lage Raho,but to me,stripping in front of ann officer,on any day, scores over killing a minister.

So,those of you who havent seen the movie,please do.Cos,its not always that bollywood serves you clean unadulterated fun yet leaves you thinking at the end of it all.

GREY MATTERZ?!?!?!

2006-09-11T06:55:00.000-07:00

A convivial meeting for drinking, music, and intellectual discussion among the ancient Greeks.Guess the word.No,not friday nights.For,discussions about size of yasmine bleeth's skirt(if she ever wears one) in BAYWATCH is not intellectual.the word im looking for is SYMPOSIUM!!!! Yes Ladies and gentlemen! That is exactly what a symposium means.How i wish my symposium was like that!!

Any disinterested final year engineering student(which is pretty much everybody) can tell you that the most exciting part of the final year college involves organising the symposium,not just because we have usually homely looking females serenading in sarees wearing loud make
up but also because of the fact that at the start of the fourth year it dawns on you that you have done nothing worth mentioning in your three completed years of college(getting laid does not count) and this is probably your last chance to do something that will make your juniors look up to you.

It was precisely with this notion that i started working on my symposium with the "expertise" gained from the previous year's symposium.Little did i know that it involved more than just flirting with classmates.Sometimes you even have to flirt with staffs.It gets worse,sometimes it could be even male staffs.But,seriously,there was a lot more work than i thought there would be.I was incharge of the quiz and inspite of having an efficient team at my disposal it was tough going.

The tough part of the quiz is not in setting the questions.You have to deal with a lot of self doubt.Whether the questions will be tough enough?Will the quiz be enterprising enough?What if the participants start throwing rotten tomatoes?How do you deal with such situations?

After being literally forced to get rid of my self doubt we set about the data mining part.The team basically comprised of three people who formed the crux with some generous contributions from quite a few people.Since i have decided to refrain from naming people i shall give them nicks.The team comprised of me,Mr.IN-YOUR-FACE,Ms.FAULT-FINDER.Both did their works to perfection(statutory warning:this line is only intended to make those two people feel good).

After getting considerable amount data,we set about the unenviable task of framing the questions again,i might add,with some considerable help(unwanted as well).Deciding the rules and the rounds for the quiz was yet another painful task.But thankfully the other gentleman in my team took care of that(If you are wondering what exactly was my work in the team,im getting to it).

With only a few days left we were almost done.Nothing untoward happened till the D-Day of course.The day arrived and the crowd started trickling in.The quiz registration started and after 15 minutes there were only 3 registered teams and it looked like my nightmare of empty halls
might just become a reality.But as time passed by more teams started pouring in and we actually had a difficult time controlling the crowd.Close to 100 teams turned up.The evaluation did not take up much time since most teams did not cross 5.With the finalists decided i was getting to do the hosting on-stage.(Yup,that was the only thing i did in the quiz).

If lady luck smiled at us in the preliminaries,she was clutching her stomach and laughing her ass off in the finals.Because things went horribly wrong.Participants from some of the most prestigious institutes drew a blank to most of the questions.With time running out,i decided to
scrap the last round and end the quiz and give out the names of the "winners".The scorers (Ms.FAULT-FINDER,i might add,along with Mr.I-DONT-KNOW-WHAT-IM-DOING-HERE) throw yet another bomb.We have one team with 20 points and all the other three teams have 10 each.So i needed to arrange for a tie-break between three teams.Simple,you might say.Yes,I might add,if only i had three buzzers.I had only 2 buzzers with me and when i announced on stage that two teams will first fight it out and then the winner with the other team.The teams protested.I decided it was time to shed the cloak of professionalism.I went close to the teams and said "Macha,We dont have three buzzers(big grin emoticon)".They grudgingly agreed and so the show ended with a "thrilling tie-breaker" where one team did not know how to use the buzzer.

Thus ended a "spectacular" quiz(im getting tired of these quotes).But everything said and done,we all had an amazing time working on the quiz.The endless hours spent looking for questions,the non-stop bickering over the rules,the abysmal ignorance of some of those i
worked with...all memories,that shall stay with me forever.I would not be doing justice if i dont mention the other parts of my symposium but that requires a separate post....so for now ciao.

Buzz off,Cheapo!!!

2006-07-22T11:15:00.000-07:00

Scene 1:

Artists:Ravi Kiran,Some guy in a brown shirt

Place of Action:Fabindia,Besant nagar

Time:2:30 PM

(Ravi kiran is browsing through some shirts which might impress his imaginary girlfriend)

Some guy in brown shirt:Could you tell me where i could find kurthas..

Ravikiran:Oh...I dont work here..im a customer...

(Both smile sheepishly and walk away)

Scene 2:

Artists:Ravikiran,Some guy in a brown shirt

Place of Action:Globus,T.Nagar

Time:5:30

(Ravikiran is sifting through some lingerie for his imaginary girlfriend and this time he is holding his all new Nokia mobile and working with it)

Some guy in a brown shirt:Excuse me,Where is the Ladies salwar section?

Ravikiran(Turns and proudly flaunts his mobile):Why do u think i would know that?

SGBS:Oh..dont u work here,im sorry...

Ravikiran:Hey..Wait a minute...

(but before he can ask him anything he gets lost in the crowd)

Back home after a long shopping spree in which he buys a brown coloured vest,he thinks...What was common between the two scenes above

NO IT WASN'T THE GUY IN A BROWN SHIRT!!!!

It was the fact that people thought i was an "attender" at the respective shops.Now,What is so fundamentally cheap about me???I start an intensive introspection...My hair-Its a lil rugged alright but there is nothing unkempt abt it that smacks of stupidity or cheapness..in fact i(alone) think there is something elegant abt my hair,raising hairline notwithstanding.
My dressing sense-Okay,I like to experiment with colours and not exactly a fan of big labels,but that doesn't mean my dresses are ersatz.So what if i wear Orange coloured jeans,i atleast draw attention.My Mobile-Nokia does not produce Eau-de-cologne,it produces perfume of the highest order.

So to sum up,(Huh?),there is nothing "CHEAP" about me.Its only that i was having a bad day and on that particular day things got a little out of hand..That is all.

Boy!!What a waste of cyberspace this post is!!!They sure are right in banning blogs..such an insult to one's intelligence.

Anyway,
bye for now,
Do Return(YA RIGHT!!!)

ONE LOVE!!

2006-06-12T09:04:00.000-07:00

I knew it...She was dying on me!!!..for the past few days she had been acting strange,but she would never tell me anything.She had always been a loner.I was the only one who had managed to break through her hard exterior..but she was so sweet..Give and Ye Shall receive from her...but now i seemed to be losing her.There was no mistaking it.Initially i thought she must be just sick or something but as time went by,i found out that there was something seriously wrong about her.Having left her to the pros,i now decided it was time for some introspection.
Well,it all started almost an year back.Wish i had remembered the exact day.That was it.Maybe i had never bothered to do more abt our relationship.i never bothered to know more about her.She was there for me to see,and i had ignored her..Stupid me..If only i had worked more on our relationship..If i could just have a time turner..Oh!!How i wish..
She was such a great person to be with.She was always ready for any movie..just about ANY goddamn movie.no preferences.She actually watched some utter crap with me and told me she liked them just because i was around...HECK!!!She was even game for porn movies..She was the best!!!
She was absolutely brilliant with everyone..A true social animal..The way she used to flirt with my bro used to make me jealous,but she always knew how to make me feel good...She is making me feel pathetic with every passing second..
But Wait a minute..the pro to whom i had entrusted her is telling me that she might make a recovery and whats more it could well be a full recovery..my joy knows no bounds..Im on cloud nine..im just not losing to him anymore..She will be all mine and i swear ill take great care of her next time around..
Just then he gives me a word of caution.."dont over work her..all night long is fine but do give her some rest..afterall you invested 50,000 on her and u dont want to spend more on her..right?"..but im not listening..my love,my only love,my COMPUTER is back and roaring and this time there is gonna be no overworking her...you will have your share of rest baby..and she roars back in approval by booting properly after a long time!!!!

2006-05-05T04:15:00.000-07:00

I spent 30 minutes trying to come up with an intro for the most important blog but decided im not that gifted and so i have decided to just hit the nail in the head with a sledgehammer

I AM HALF A POLITICIAN,LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.No i dont mean i have been promising my mom that i would do all the domestic work or promising myself that i would get a girlfriend by this weekend..I just have indeed become a half-politician.

I campaigned for Lok Paritran..the new hope that has been forged by the elite of India.For the uninitiated, this is the party that everyone around you has been talking about,started by IITians.I was intrigued(read clueless) by their ideology but the fact that the very people who have been accused of not giving back anything to the society have decided to take things into their hands with regards to running this country is indeed refreshing.with this thought i decided to give them more than just my vote..

Inspired by a friend,who called me in the evening to ask me if i were interested in campaigning for LP,i decided to give it a go.i joined him in distributing pamphlets around my "constituency".What was interesting was the response of some of the oldies.."evalukkellam vera velaye illa...sayangaalam aana vandhuda vendiyadhu.."(rough translation:what the **** are doing in my place...being a very conservative locality ppl dont swear in your face..they swear at your back).But jokes apart,the response from the general public was very impressive.I got the impression that the people were disillusioned by the current lot of charlatans-calling- themselves-politicians and completely angry that they were being treated like this.

Some of the political parties' manifesto may be mistaken for a list written by a overly
expectant kid on the eve of christmas,But these people had promises that might actually work.Just reading the manifesto you could understand that they know their limitations and are not trying to fool the masses.When we were half way through with the distribution thing,the candidate called my friend that they had arranged a surprise rally kinda stuff and that we could come if we wanted.

It was a bike rally with around 10 people.we went around the place holding placards with the candidate leading the front.It was quite adventurous to see people waving hands at you(yes,indeed!!!people did wave at me!!).The most heartening fact was that whenever we stopped someone would come over,congratulate the candidate,and they were not just students.In fact,a 40-something gentleman actually offered to campaign for LP giving us his phone number and that he would be free after 6 in the evening.Thats when i really got some
semblance of a hope that this party may just work.

They sure have a long way to go and i plainly dont see them taking roots in some rather
important states of the country in the next decade or so,but everything good has to have a beginning and i am definitely happy that they are starting off from my city.

I would just like end this with what my candidate,Aravind seshagiri,replied to one curious
passerby:
You dont really stand a chance in this place.
i know i dont stand a chance here,sir.But the person who is winning here will know that there are people here who are ready to really work for the constituency and that non-performance will definitely not be tolerated.If He/she wants to win the next time, he has to perform.period.that is always a good sign,isn't it?

Bullshit works!!

2006-03-22T06:39:00.000-08:00

A Few months back i decided to test one of my professor's intellect.Although there are some time and tested methods of doing this,i took the safe route...i wrote crap in my paper and was expecting to get blasted.But LO behold!!Not even an admonition.Worse,i scored 3 on 5 marks for that particular question.

Emboldened by her apparent lack of attention while evaluating my papers,i decided to take it to a further level.This time i shall target more questions and atleast get a special mention.Guess what happens??I happen to be the topper this time round!!!As my attempts have been insanely useful and,not to mention,quite popular too,I plan to help some of the poor earthling engineers by giving some valuable advice on how to write those utterly irritating and greek-and-latin tests.

RULE 1:When you plan to write bullshit,make sure the first line is technical.Because the attention span of a pea-brained lecturer is generally abysmally low.Sample this,

What are Ghost images?How can they be overcome?

Ghost images occur due to the lack of synchronisation between the frame and line deflection circuits.(i have absolutely no idea what this means).They have been found to occur while watching utterly scary movies,because your mind starts playing games.You are affected subliminally(note:you can also practice some GRE words here) and you start conjuring up GHOST IMAGES.They can be best overcome by not watching such movies.Or
else you might have to go to a shrink.

RULE 2:It also helps to end your answer with some techie stuff.

What is a turnstile array?

Turnstile array is nothing but an array consisting of a single tile that turns.you can see that it is a misnomer.it should have actually been "turningtile" since there is just one tile,but these engineers have no sense basically.they happily screw around with names making life difficult for those around them(that helped!!!).I guess,it is an antenna.
The last line was supposedly technical.i actually got full marks for that question

RULE 3:Try writing answers that tantalisingly make sense

What is adjacent channel interference?How can it be overcome?

Adjacent channel interference refers to the interference from a neighbouring channel.It is an
eavesdropper's paradise.It can be overcome by keeping the 2 adjacent channels as far apart as possible or else asking nosy people to just let it quit.

These are just time and tested rules which have been repeated for the convenience of some readers.Hope these help.And as a bonus,i shall also include one other answer that i wrote where "flashes of genius" can be seen.

What is persistence of vision?

When an image exists for one-sixteenth of a second after it is lost,it is called persistence of
vision.Whereas if it lasts for a lifetime,it maybe called a nightmare!!!

BE THE MIRACLE!!!!

2006-03-07T02:06:00.000-08:00

YAY!!!..YIPPEE!!!...Me has been tagged.i have been asked to write on something(its a heady feeling you know).This time the matter is quite serious,RDB inspired.Since i have become a great fan of the movie(i have actually planned to buy the movie,will be the first ever for me!!),I have planned to write.Bravo to Sudhish for starting this thread...your movie reviews rock!!

What do i do to be the change--unconditionally?

I plan to write more generally...

1.I shall no more be a hypocrite.I shall not come up with a patriotic anecdote to my friends about how my blood boiled when someone in the RTO office bribed the brake inspector to get the license and then go to the same inspector with a sheepish grin to get my license..I shall be honest.

2.I shall be much more involved in knowing about the politics of my country.A lesson i learned from RDB.We carp about how the country is going to the dogs,but what are we doing about it?What do we know about our country?How many of us care to know?Well,I plan to know something about the politics of my country everyday...An encouraging sign in this front is the party started by IITians,atlast some of the best minds of the country are trying to take the country forward..way to go!!

Pardon me for sounding so bombastic(I plan to write some dialogues for a CAPTAIN padam),I have always been the Big picture guy...Now onto some smaller things

3.One of the very basic things which im sure everyone who has been tagged would have probably included in his list is to stop littering.At the risk of sounding cliched,cleanliness is next only to godliness(sometimes banality gets the point across better than grandiloquence)

4.I shall be a much more tolerant Human being.I shall not let my heart rule me.This may not sound like its got anything to do with the thread but seeing the kind of riots around the country by zealots in the name of religion,I do feel We can be a little more tolerant,not apathetic,but tolerant.

5.I shall be proud to be an Indian.Not many of us feel that way.Make no mistakes,I dont mean to be a jingoist,just a patriot.

Being a neophyte to the blogosphere,I dont have anyone to tag.

P.S.:It does feel wicked to include some absolutely clueless but pompous words in your writing..thanks to GRE

EXTREME GAMERS VS KOOTHU PATRAI!!!

2006-02-25T08:57:00.000-08:00

After an increasingly long time(about an year to be precise) spent dreaming about winning a cricket match out of my sheer talent and getting frustrated with absolutely inane siddhuisms,I actually got a chance to get some on-field action...Yes!!!I got to play cricket...
Well,there is this rather exciting,albeit stupidly titled,tournament called lagaan cup where a lot of people in my college come up with ridiculous team names(22 balls,Xtreme gamers,koothu patrai and so on so forth..) and some people play great cricket.And what's more,we use tennis ball and not the conventional cricket ball where you live in the constant fear of being a hit by a speeding ball directed towards you by some jealous batsman.This is the place where you can try some of the shots that Dhoni plays at your own physical risk(to be precise,you run the risk of injuring your wrists,arms,legs,head,eyes,knee...)
Coming to the actual match we were pitted against a rather easy team to beat who were best known for their innovative profanities and one particular shahrukh clone(wrong place dude,we need Aamir here).Really mediocre bowling attack and not a great batting line up to talk about,it should have been a routine day in the park for us,but Boy!! did we mess it up!!
We won the toss and as expected elected to bat(I'm used to this expression used by commentators everywhere,no one was expecting us to bat or bowl.The crowd there comprised of 11 members from each team).After a promising start,we lost our way and got to 71 off 10 overs.Good by any standards,but considering the fact that you are playing with a tennis ball and that the ground was about 1/10th the size of the smallest ground in Bangladesh,we knew we were goners.
They started off pretty well,actually,we let them start off well .The first over cost us 16 runs.We knew we were fighting a lost cause.Fielding did not help our cause either.We were not just giving them gifts,we were also giving them our credit card numbers!With everyone having an opinion and every opinion acknowledged,none actually worked and before we knew it was all over.
Well the boys played badly,it was just an off day(I MISS DADA).but the point is it feels good to know that i have some active muscles in my body and they do tend to get flexed every now and then.Good to know that i have aching muscles i never even knew existed..
And btw,yours truly did not make golden duck but got out off the second ball and gave away the winning runs!!!!

taking the plunge

2006-02-23T09:14:00.000-08:00

Hi
I HATE BLOGS!!!..I had to spend a really long time to come up with a name in which i could have plainly done lot more important things,so imagine the time it would have taken for me to write this bullshit!!I HATE THIS!!!..i mean why is it that i feel it absolutely necessary to write a blog even though i have absolutely no idea what im gonna write about.Is it because i wanna flaunt my ignorance?No,i have better ways of doing that like writing my college exams.Why is it that even after 3 fiascos at writing a blog i still feel compelled to write another one?
If you r expecting any answers for these rather pertinent questions,U AINT GONNA GET ANYTHING!!!I am here because half the people i know r writing blogs and i think i can do better than most of them.
I am basically a very pleasant guy you know with the usual tantrums of a very normal guy with mood swings at mega hertz rate(im also a geek).
You can expect a bit of Bill watterson and Ambrose Bierce in my blogs(I am a little ambitious).
keep coming here and do appreciate my blogs.Ill try to keep these updated cos i am as jobless as you are