The Invictus

My New Avtaar..Turn the volume on

2007-07-24T23:13:00.000-07:00

It's Official - Am a Genius!

2007-05-14T00:27:00.000-07:00

Your IQ score is:

You scored 142 on Tickle's IQ test. This means that based on your answers, your IQ score is between 132 and 142. Most people's IQs are between 70 and 130.

In fact, 95% of all people have IQs within that range. 68% of people score between 80 and 120. The following chart to your right, shows these percentages and where your IQ score is on that scale.

There's more to intelligence than a single number, a single score or a single label. Tickle uses four distinguishable Intelligence Scales in the Ultimate IQ Test. By analyzing your individual scores on those four scales, we are able to look beyond the raw IQ score into how you process information and thereby determine your Intellectual Type.

How do you relate to other IQ test takers?

Your Intellectual Type Is: Visionary Philosopher

Your mind's strengths allow you to think ahead of the game — to imagine or anticipate what should come next in just about any situation. Because you're equally skilled in the numerical and verbal universes of the brain, you can draw from multiple sources of information to come up with great ideas. The timelessness of your vision and the balance between your various skills are what make you a Visionary Philosopher.

In addition to your strengths in math and linguistics, you have a knack for matching and anticipating patterns. These skills and your uncanny ability to detect the underlying blueprint of most of life's situations add to your Visionary Philosopher mind.

Two philosophers who share the same combination of skills you possess are Plato and Benedict Spinoza. Spinoza had insight into how things worked in the world. He could envision a future based on the patterns he saw in life, and used mathematical logic as a structure within which to present his philosophical arguments. With that base he was able to use logic to formulate his theories. Borrowing from his linguistic strengths he wrote eloquent texts and, therefore, was able to bring his philosophical ideas and structure to the rest of the world. His story exemplifies the talents that are present in the Visionary Philosopher intellectual type.

Whatever you decide to do in life, you've got a powerful mix of skills and insight that can be applied in a wide variety of ways. You can expand your mind to understand a situation. Your strong balance of math and verbal skills will help you explain things to others. For example, if you were on an archaeological dig and discovered an object, you could probably use your deductive powers to figure out not only what the object was but also how it was used. Given your ability to put things together, you are more than capable of inventing a life plan that is in synch with your perspective on how things were, how they are, and how they might be one day.

Great Jobs For You

Because of the way you process information, these are just some of the many careers in which you could excel:

Archaeologist
Detective
Psychologist
Sculptor
Architect
City planner
Chief executive

Some of Your Greatest Talents

You've got tons of strengths. It wouldn't surprise us if you:

Think of the "big picture"
Can anticipate and predict patterns
Are good at context clues
Can see similarities in seemingly disparate things

Your 4 Intelligence Scales:

Now let's look at the factors that contribute to you being a Visionary Philosopher with a 142 IQ score.

Based on the results of your test, Tickle divided your scores into four distinguishable dimensions — mathematical intelligence, visual-spatial intelligence, linguistic intelligence and logic intelligence.

Here's how each of your intelligence scores break down:

Mathematical Intelligence

Your Mathematical Percentile

You scored in the 100th percentile on the mathematical intelligence scale.This means that you scored higher than 90% - 100% of people who took the test and that 0% - 10% scored higher than you did. The scale above illustrates this visually.

Your mathematical intelligence score represents your combined ability to reason and calculate. You scored relatively high, which means you're probably the one your friends look to when splitting the lunch bill or calculating your waitresses' tip. You may or may not be known as a math whiz, but number crunching might come a little easier to you than it does others.

Visual-Spatial Intelligence

Your Visual-Spatial Percentile

You scored in the 100th percentile on the visual-spatial intelligence scale.

This means that you scored higher than 90% - 100% of people who took the test and that 0% - 10% scored higher than you did. The scale above illustrates this visually.

The visual-spatial component of intelligence measures your ability to extract a visual pattern and from that envision what should come next in a sequence. Your score was relatively high, which could mean that you're the one navigating the map when you're on an outing with friends. You have, in some capacity, an ability to think in pictures. Maybe this strength comes out in subtle ways, like how you play chess or form metaphors.

Linguistic Intelligence

Your Linguistic Percentile

You scored in the 100th percentile on the linguistic intelligence scale.
This means that you scored higher than 90% - 100% of people who took the test and that 0% - 10% scored higher than you did. The scale above illustrates this visually.

Linguistic abilities include reading, writing and communicating with words. Tickle's test measures knowledge of vocabulary, ease in completing word analogies and the ability to think critically about a statement based on its semantic structure. Your score was relatively high, which could mean you know your way around a bookstore and maybe like to bandy about the occasional 25-cent word to impress friends.

Logical Intelligence

Your Logical Percentile

You scored in the 100th percentile on the logical intelligence scale.
This means that you scored higher than 90% - 100% of people who took the test and that 0% - 10% scored higher than you did. The scale above illustrates this visually.

Tickle's logical intelligence questions assess your ability to think things through. The questions determine the extent to which you use reasoning and logic to determine the best solution to a problem. Your logic score was relatively high, which could mean that when the car breaks down, your friends look to you to help figure out not only what's wrong, but how to fix it and how you're going to get to the next gas station.

Arushi drinking tea from her Dad's cup

2007-03-26T22:57:00.000-07:00

Arushi Dances to her Dad's beats

2007-03-26T22:56:00.000-07:00

What kind of a world traveller am I?

2006-09-19T22:53:00.000-07:00

Get your traveller profile
Not sure where to go next? Amsterdam, Tokyo or hiking the Darien Gap? Take our travel test and find out what kind of traveler you are and where you should go - and where you shouldn't...


	Your travel type: Travel Yup The Travel Yup likes exotic and adventurous travel, but prefers big cities with fast paced life. He has a keen interest in other cultures and always brings home a few souvenirs. Shopping in Bangkok, getting a tailor made suite in Kuala Lumpur, that's the kind of thing the Travel Yup is into. Even though he likes to get away, he prefers his travels to be comfortable.
	top destinations: Tahiti Alice Springs Las Vegas	stay away from: Hampi Tokyo Cairo

get your own travel profile

My Travel Map..One year progress report

2006-09-19T22:46:00.000-07:00

I last put up my travel map about a year ago. You can see it here. In the last one year since, I have planted just one new flag, and this is the new travel map.

create your own visited country map

The legend passes on...

2006-04-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

Dr. Raj Kumar, the doyen of Kannada cinema, passed away today.
My first idol, the man whose mannerisms every kid in the neighborhood would aspire to copy when we were growing up (early 1980s), is no more today. And i find it very very hard to believe.

When the news first came in this afternoon, i was so engrossed in work that I kinda brushed it off as just another thing. I guess i never accepted that such a thing could happen. But when the full force of this hit me late in the evening, it was quite shattering. Shocking. Saddening. A quiet cry went up.

I was most certainly not one of his most vocal or die-hard fans. Come to think of it, I haven't even watched his last few movies - atleast in the last decade and a half or so. But, how can you completely divorce the memories of a man you grew up watching? Just not possible. The fact that parents would agree to let their young sons and daughters watch movies as long as it was Dr. Raj's movies explains the kind of respect his work commanded. I especially loved his movies in which he portrayed societal issues with great sensitivity. "Sakshatkara", "Kasturi Nivasa", "Gandhi nagara", "Bangarada Manushya", "Gandhada Gudi". Those are the memories that i will carry on with.

The greatness of "Annavru", as he was fondly known, was his humbleness and his genuineness. His essential love for people and that genuine innocence is something that you can only associate with a bygone generation. You would believe him when he said he had a vision of God in his dreams. His humility and good naturedness would make even the most hardened sceptic want to believe him. Such was Dr. Raj's effect on people.

I was fortunate enough to have had a small, but face to face, interaction with the man. And i still remember his one quality that struck me that day - his respect and love for people - young or old. His eyes exuded that strange and peaceful kindness. The kindness that bestowed two others with eye sight when he donated his eyes. Even in death, the man lives on.

The man who strode Kannada cinema for five decades, will live on in the minds and hearts of millions of people. We will all carry different memories of the great man. All of which are tinged with a large amount of fondness for the man.

And then we were blessed!

2005-12-31T06:40:00.000-08:00

Date: Dec 13th 2005, Time: 17:10

A day that will forever remain very very special to me..the day this angel came into my life..A bundle of joy, the physical manifestation of the love in our life, and the very embodiment of everything that's so dear to me, she shall remain my very special one - the one that will respond to me with a "yes, Daddy", when i say "Chinnu"..

Me, my movie, and my personality icon!

2005-11-06T22:43:00.000-08:00

Firstly, apologies are due from me for not showing up around this place for this long. Would love to say I was too busy with things to post, but that wouldn't really be true. Simply not interested, or too bored to post would be better descriptions. Having said that, here's something that I came across while reading through my daily fill of people's blogs (oh yes, I still continue to do that, fret not!).

According to this test, I am this classic movie:

What Classic Movie Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

I think I am pleased with this (atleast, am not "Konan the barbarian", or one of the "Confessions" series movies:-))

A further test - this time on the iconic personality that closely matches my own personality - confirms that I am..hold your breath, this icon:

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Now, am not sure if I should believe this or not..but, the movie test result seems to tally with the personality icon test, guess it's consistently true (or consistently false)!

And Justice for some...

2005-08-06T11:25:00.000-07:00

On Thursday, India acquitted 2 people (while serving a minor sentence to the third) in the Parliament attack case. They had advance knowledge of the terrorist attack, but kept quiet about it. They were found not guilty despite withholding such critical information. Information that could have saved many lives.

On Friday, Britain held 3 people guilty for the 7/7 London bombings. Their crime: they had advance knowledge about the bombings, but they kept quiet about it. They were found guilty BECAUSE they withheld such critical information. Yes, information that could have saved many lives.

Who's right?

PS: And if you were to hear one of the accused-and-acquitted's lawyers - which i did on TV - you will hear from this pseudo-lady what a pious and innocent man her client is! Shame is all I feel...

Most Amazing Movie!

2005-08-02T03:27:00.000-07:00

No posts last week - was out on some training.

Yesterday, I saw the most amazing movie ever! Shot in Black & White, the print was not too good either - lots of grainy stuff, couldn't even make out whether it was an actor or an actress. No audio as well. Really had to strain myself to make out what was happening. Script was not too well written. There was just one actor/actress doing some rather complex motions. At one point, i even got the idea that maybe the actor was a bit too shy to be on camera, with all the attempts to cover his/her face from the audience. Technically bad. But emotionally very rich. For, as the actor flashed the thumbs up sign signalling the end of the movie, this reviewer could only smile and do his own thumbs up at the performance. For, not withstanding all these, it was without any doubt the best-est movie I ever watched - or hope to watch. Yesterday, I saw the ultrasound scan of my baby. :-)

This happens only in Bangalore...and oh so often too!

2005-07-22T04:24:00.000-07:00

This bozo in Qualis (not the poor 2-wheeler) broke the rule (see the prominent "No Right Turn" sign? Yes, am sure, so did the Qualis idiot, but then heyy, he's a bozo ain't he?)- wish he and his ilk get "One tight slap" each time they show their rotten colors...

I am more inclined than ever to capture all such senseless idiots on camera - along with their registration numbers - and post it here (or maybe i'll start a Bangalore traffic offenders blog)...and hope somebody in authority sees it and does something about it sooner than later.

A Grandiose Nation

2005-07-19T06:32:00.000-07:00

I have a theory. And 'cos you came here, you will get to hear all about it. I call it The Grandiose Nation Theory, and its' somewhat similar to the Escapist theory (by the end of the post you will know that too!).

I think we Indians, as a nation, are more focussed on doing BIG, grandiose things which have a smaller chance of ever becoming reality, as opposed to working on smaller, equally effective ones that have a REAL chance to happening. We have a traffic problem, we clamour and conspire for huge, awe-inspiring flyovers. We watch a poorly performing Indian Cricket / Hockey team, we want them to not just improve on their performances, but go and bring "home" the World cup. We have a water scarcity, we go ahead and plan for huge dams that wipe out several hundred villages.

And as it usually happens in India, these grandiose plans rarely make the jump from drawing boards to reality. And when they do, they get stuck as half-baked projects, ala Flyovers in Bangalore.

All this when we could have very easily achieved the intended objective through simpler, less drastic but more effective means. Means that would not only deliver, but do so at a fraction of the cost.

Let me take an example here - The worsening traffic situation in Bangalore's roads and the remedies that have been bandied about. We seem to prefer

1. Flyovers - more of them, bigger, more complex structures, of course all of these built in super-fast time.

2. 4-lane roads with no potholes

3. Cutting down thousands of trees that line Bangalore's roads, all so that a few hundred more vehicles can continue to violate traffic rules.

All these solutions appear to be unnecessary drastic actions - ones that you normally do not take recourse to without first exhausting all possible simple measures. And believe me, in Bangalore (could be true of anywhere in India), we just haven't tried these simpler options.

You see, Bangalore is a city that is mostly laid out in a grid-like arrangement. You have "Main Roads" and "Cross Roads" that run perpendicular directions (similar to the Avenues and Streets in the US). One of the advantages of this kind of an arrangement is that you will always have more than one way or route to take you from point A to point B. If there is a traffic jam on the shortest and most obvious route, you can always take the next "Main" or the "Cross". Elementary, so far. But the problem is the myopic view that our urban planners take. They would rather focus on ONE single road (say for example Bannerghatta Main Road) and then pour money and effort trying to build a flyover / 4-lane road / underpass etc etc in order to decongest the traffic situation. When all they need to do is ensure that the parallel roads are properly asphalted so that they can act as diversions and take the load off the congested road. But they will not do that - they will let the alternative roads lie in dirt,stones and potholes - while they focus on one more grand vision.

On a connected note, I think this is rooted in our penchant for escapism. Of course, we all want to believe that a messiah will come and deliver us from all our troubles one fine day. Till then we will crib and crib, but not do anything to change it. We crib about hopeless traffic situation, but continue to contribute to it with our utter lack of road sense; We sure hope that the BIG flyover will solve all our traffic woes, of course. We crib about corruption in society, but don't do anything about it. We hope that someday, some big guy will come and cleanse it all for us, of course. We just are not capable of taking small but meaningful steps OURSELVES.

No wonder till then, we will have planned flyovers and leftover flyovers. And traffic jams. Mera Bharat Mahan!

My Travels so far...

2005-07-15T04:26:00.000-07:00

I have travelled to these places in the last 1-year or so...

create your own visited country map

Music from my past....

2005-07-15T00:46:00.000-07:00

For a change, my blog moves away from its recently acquired quasi-serious, opinionated state of being, to talk about more lighter things. About the music that I grew up listening to, songs that I used to be mad about, music that I don't get to listen to these days, but that I could listen to anytime anyday.

Here's a list of my 12 fave songs - not exhaustive obviously, but of top-of-mind recall value.

1. Wish you were here (Pink Floyd)

This one never fails to give me the bumps each time i hear it, even after all these years. Simple verse, powerful emotions, absolutely brilliant.

2. Comfortably Numb (Pink Floyd)

Dark in composition, music nevertheless. A good lesson for the wannabe punksters and thrash-ers who think loudness is a proxy for dark angst, maybe?

3. More than words (Extreme)

A very non-Extreme kind of a song. Brilliant verse, simple accompaniment on a single acoustic guitar. Perfect! (you have heard this song, haven't you?)

4. November Rain (Guns N Roses)

Slash on a roll! If you are looking for instances of great orchestration in a Rock number, you need to hear this! Quintessential Pub favorite - best heard with a pitcher of chill beer:-)

5. Love will keep us alive (The Eagles)

A mushy number, no less! But so much better and mature than today's nonsense churned out by such luminaries as Ms. Spears and all those whose name I don't even know or bother to know.

6. Unchained Melody (The Righteous Brothers, Air Supply)

I love the Righteous Brothers version, as seen in the movie "The Ghost" (yes, the Demi Moore starrer)...It has a distinct old worldly feel to it which clearly stands out in today's bubble-gummy times.

7. Bohemian Rhapsody (Queen)

Wierd, unconventional and brilliant orchestration! No wonder this is - last heard - the most popular single in the UK.

8. Nothing compares to you (Sinead O'Connor)

WOW! A good composition made great by its rendition!! One of the most difficult compositions to perform to, this number showcased Sinead's vocals to the extent that she could never - alas - ever repeat.

9. Heaven (Bryan Adams)

College favorite! Along with "Summer of '69", Bryan Adams sure made many of us rock!

10. Imagine (John Lennon)

John Lennon at his best! One of my firm favorites too!

11. Piano Man (Billy Joel)

Billy Joel simply rocks in this number! Have forgotten the no. of times we have requested for this number in a Pub..Best enjoyed with friends, beer and while singing aloud in a loud pub!!

12. It might be you (Stephen Bishop)

One of the first English songs I heard to, and remains a firm favorite! A good number to end this nostalgic trip with.

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PS: The inspiration for this post is a little conversation I had with DC the other day. I was complaining to her how all music channels on TV seem to have gone bereft of good English music; Almost all the channels (MTV, V) seem to have Bollywood-focused content to an extent that it's rather difficult, neigh impossible, to differentiate between the individual channels. The only non-bollywood music that they manage happens to be some kind of grossed-out remix or Bhangra, or Ms. Spears and her ilk who share names of vegetables, peas, and petty currency. The only good that comes out of these is the 2 dozen scantily clad women in pink dancing to these numbers:-)
That's when I chanced upon VH1 on its late night classic show. And what a throw-back to the good times it proved to be!

PPS: I am resisting the strong temptation to add more songs to this favorites list...the list can get really long, and it's not a easy choice here!

Parineeta and the punjabisation of India...

2005-07-11T22:28:00.000-07:00

Saw the movie "Parineeta" finally..after 2 weeks of futile attempts..I must say that the wait was worth it, 'cos the movie is brilliant in its simplicity...easy narration, crisp editing for a old worldly story, decent performances from the cast, in all a beautiful movie..

But the one thing that irritated me no end was the punjabisation of the wedding sequence..Garish punjabi-style costumes, "dolak", song and dance..hell, what's all this? we have seen this kind of a thing in almost all the movies, but why in Parineeta, set as it is in Bengal, derived from Bengali literature, steeped in Kolkata's "Bhadralok" culture?? The story is bengali, the families involved are bengali, hell, the bride and the groom are bengali, yet the marriage is punjabi?? Why???

This punjabisation - wrapping a diverse and rich Indian culture in Punjabi garb - is actually something that I find is increasingly taking over most media. You can't switch on a music channel without being subjected to some kind of a "Bhangra" remix; You can't walk into a pub / Disco without being forced to hear / dance to a bhangra..Almost all movies - esp. the wedding sequences, or the patriotic sequences - are invariably force fit into a punjabi milieu...be it in DDLJ or Kal Ho Na Ho or Maine Pyar Kiya or any one of the countless movies that Bollywood churns out...For variety, you can get a Gujarathi wedding, but that's about it...These movie makers would make you believe that India is only Punjab (or with some concession, Gujarat)..

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Punjabis or their culture, I quite enjoy (atleast used to enjoy earlier) punjabi beats..but when it is taken to extreme limits, so much so that it starts appearing that India is Punjab - Punjab is India, it becomes irritating..Don't we have anything else to offer - is this country bereft of any other cultural form? Or are you saying that people do not prefer any other culture?

London Blasts

2005-07-07T04:59:00.000-07:00

Scene from London blasts

Scene from Mumbai blasts

Blasts in London. Blasts in Mumbai. Both tragic, and such a waste of human life. Both supposedly for some divine cause. A cause so divine that it demands so many human lives. Of course other human lives, never the perpetrators'. *Sad*

Sad that a terrorist can cause so much pain all in the name of God. So much and so sudden that he doesn't even give his victim a chance to call out his own God's name one last time in prayer.

I watch this news. As I watched the Mumbai blast news. And wonder if it is any different. I wonder if the guilty will ever be caught and punished. As I wonder why the guilty who were caught were never punished (Mumbai). Even after 12 memory-scarred years. Will London see justice, where Mumbai didn't? I wonder. And I hope.

I wonder who they were
those who lost life and more
their dreams snatched,bodies strewn all over
can we ever get over
this hatred they call their holy war
in London, as in Mumbai.

Sarkar - the movie

2005-07-05T22:55:00.000-07:00

Watched the movie "Sarkar" last Saturday, and was completely bowled over by what I saw! Amitabh Bachchan proves once again that he is GOD..and for a change, the mortals around the GOD also stand out with some brilliant performances..btw, this is NOT a movie review - you can check the above link for a review..these are just my immediate thoughts coming out of the cinema hall..

The violence is completely understated in a very subtle manner..you can feel the strong undercurrent of violence that is about to erupt, but nothing very obvious or in-your-face..You end up fearing that a massive bloodbath is about to erupt any moment, thus building up the suspense and thrill..Ram Gopal Varma gets full credit for crafting a movie that keeps its audience by the edge of their seats...

The only negative I found in the movie was its soundtrack that came across as being too loud and unnecessary...While the characters themselves have done a fine job of "silent acting" - with each facial expression conveying more than a hundred lines of dialogue - the background score, esp. the overused "Govinda Govinda" bit stands out of character..But, in all, a tremendous movie...It's amazing - and a sign of maturity on the part of Bollywood - that scripts are being written for a 60+ year old Amitabh Bachchan. Kudos!

A Frantic Finale for Cities Vying for 2012 Games

2005-07-04T03:02:00.000-07:00

The frantic world of Olympic bidding has descended on Singapore, and a vote by I.O.C. members Wednesday will decide what many consider the most hotly contested Olympics ever - with New York, Paris, London, Madrid and Moscow vying to win the 2012 Games.

I did some deep dive into the history of modern Olympic games venues, and was surprised at what I found. Let's start with the choice of venues since the advent of the modern olympic games. We will limit our observations only to the Summer games, since the options of venues for the winter games - human will and behind-the-scene-politicking not withstanding - are largely decisions of mother nature (climatic conditions to be more precise).

Olympic Summer Games:

Athens 1896, Paris 1900, St. Louis 1904, London 1908, Stockholm 1912, Antwerp 1920, Paris 1924, Amsterdam 1928, Los Angeles 1932, Berlin 1936, London 1948, Helsinki 1952, Melbourne 1956, Rome 1960, Tokyo 1964, Mexico City 1968, Munich 1972, Montreal 1976, Moscow 1980, Los Angeles 1984, Seoul 1988, Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996, Sydney 2000, Athens 2004, Beijing 2008.

Notice something strange?

1. The first half of the 20th Century - all but one (1932 Los angeles) olympics were based in Europe. This coincides with Europe's golden period so to say.

2. In the not-so-old history of the modern games, USA has staged 3 games; In fact, USA got 2 games in the last 20 years (1984-2004)! And New York is a hot candidate for the 2012 games!!

3. Out of 26 games (including 2008 Beijing - venue for which is already decided),
14 - NATO Europe;
02 - "Iron Curtain" Europe, of which 1 (Moscow 1980) was boycotted by USA and allies.
05 - Americas (of which 3 were in USA)
05 - Rest of the big wide world.

See how the olympic movement has been effectively close-held by certain blocs? A token distribution here and there (Tokyo, Seoul, Beijing) notwithstanding, it really comes across as the Olympic games of the western Europe & USA, i.e. NATO.

And the latest debate on candidates for 2012 does not change any equation. It's again a battle between Paris and New York (the frontrunners), with London, Madrid and Moscow filling up the rest of the list. If economic status and prosperity is an indicator of olympics venues, then why Europe? After all the predictions of how this would be the Asian century, sadly, there is no Asian candidate. Presumably because, Beijing, an asian city, gets to host the previous edition, and the logic goes that you cannot have 2 successive olympics in the same continent (huh? care to explain this logic with regard to historical precendents please?)

Anyways, given this short-sighted list of 5 candidate cities, am yet again surprised to hear that Paris and New York are the frontrunners. And not Moscow. The same city which got to host the games once in 1980, but was robbed of participation from the western bloc. You will recollect that 1980 games were really a no show, thanks to the diktats from the NATO allied countries barring their sportspeople from participating. Isn't this a wonderful chance to redeem the past by hosting the games in Moscow?

H-1Bs behind women's decline in IT

2005-07-01T02:53:00.000-07:00

Want to know why women's share of tech jobs is shrinking? Look at the temporary guest workers entering the country, most of whom are male.

That's the case being made by a group that advocates on behalf of U.S. software programmers and opposes H-1B visas. The Programmers Guild plans to release a report this week that re-examines data from a workforce diversity study published last week by the Information Technology Association of America industry group. Among the guild's arguments: the use of H-1B visas contributes to low shares of information technology jobs held by women and some racial minorities.

You can read the full news article here.

I am not sure what to make of this news!! except that some analyst is busy peeling too many onions:-) This could - allow me to have some fun here while indulging in some loose predictions - imply the following scenarios:

1. The report gets thrashed.

Pro: Most realistic scenario.

Con: Too boring - why would anyone be interested in this news?

2. US passes a new legislation - women IT workers can be replaced only by women H-1Bs .

Pro: This would "retain" the sex ratio in the industry.

Con: How the rest of the world is going to come out with as many women IT H-1Bs is a mystery.

3. President Bush makes a statement "Replacing women with women H-1Bs is important, but not enough; racial diversity is also important. Therefore, racially diverse women "is" as important as women and racial diversity to address america's security concerns. We will strive to "displace" all hispanics, asians, arabs and women in American businesses. We will bring in new hispanics, asians, arabs and women who will ensure that our great nation remains as "divorced" as ever. Because racially diverse women "is" more important today than women and racial diveristy was before 9/11".

Pro: Proves that racially diverse women are more/less/equally important (or something to that effect).

Con: of course, that's what it is!

Black Friday, the movie

2005-06-27T01:53:00.000-07:00

What a hard-hitting movie! Certainly, the most "non-movie-ish" movie in recent times..enough sting to give you a rude jolt and wake you up from your comfort zone..Powerful and realistic dialogues to transport you back into the trying times...the movie truly lands a sucker punch, whilst telling you the story of the Bombay blasts of 1993...it describes the plot-making behind the blasts, the strategising - both in Dubai and in Bombay - and the way this ghastly deed was enacted on Bombay's lifeline *shocking*. The characters we meet are compelling: the terrorists, the corrupt law enforcement agents who abetted the plot, the investigators who would stop at nothing, and above all, the people of Bombay of whose resilient spirit this movie is a celebration. Today, as terrorist attacks on Indian cities become more frequent, this heroism is something we might all be called upon to emulate.

You can read a synopsis of the story here.

For those who cannot wait for the movie's release - the movie is based on the book by S Hussain Zaidi, "Black Friday: The True Story of the Bombay Bomb Blasts"

It is sad - and a telling commentary on India's Judicial system - that even after 12 years, conviction (and justice) is nowhere in sight. The movie release has been held up on the basis of a complaint from one of the accused.

41 Years Later, Ex-Klansman Gets 60 Years in Civil Rights Deaths

2005-06-23T23:15:00.000-07:00

"Edgar Ray Killen, an 80-year-old former Klansman in a wheelchair, was sentenced Thursday to 60 years in prison for his role in the deaths of three civil rights workers in 1964".

This makes the headlines in today's The New York Times.

For the families of victims that Edgar Ray killed, it's sweet justice. For the Judicial system, it is a proud moment. Everything about this ruling seems to make sense. You kill a man - 3 men in this case - you pay for it. Simple. Or is it?

I welcome this ruling completely. I subscribe to the idea that the law of the land MUST be upheld - each time and every time, unfailingly & unflinchingly. But something about this case also sets me thinking - can we apply the above idiom of justice in each case, ie. go by the rule book consistently forever? Do we acknowledge the fact that the rule book itself - or its interpretation by the Jury system of justice - can change over time? Consider the below extract from the article,

"Prosecutors said that a sheriff's deputy pulled over the three men on June 21, 1964, and jailed them long enough for Mr. Killen to organize a death trap. Jurors said they rejected murder charges because the evidence, much of it transcripts of testimony from a 1967 federal trial, did not prove that Mr. Killen knew that the men would be killed.

In 1967 the federal government tried 18 men for conspiring to deprive the victims of their civil rights. Seven were convicted; none served more than six years in prison. That jury deadlocked 11 to one in favor of convicting Mr. Killen; the holdout said she could not convict a preacher. The state had not brought charges in the deaths until Mr. Killen was prosecuted this year".

This crime was committed in 1964 - 41 years ago. You will note that the '60s in America was a time when public opinion was divided between "For Civil rights / liberty" and "For discrimination against african americans"..Crimes such as the one described above were not isolated instances, but were related to a larger trend (am NOT justifying the trend, neither am i saying it was right). Times have changed in these 41 years. If such an incident were to occur today, it would certainly make more noise and shock more people than when it did 41 years ago. What this means is that the public - and the Jury that is, but, a subset of the larger public - reaction to such crimes would certainly be different in 2005 than what it was in 1964. Values can change; Ideas of "right" and "wrong" can change in 41 years. Can you apply today's values to yesteryear's crimes? Here's an example from the above extract itself: The Jury of 1967 trial didn't convict this man, whereas today's Jury did! This despite the fact that in 1967, the jury had access to more evidence and witnesses than what today's jury did! And there have NOT been any new evidence that has come up in these 41 years that gave the current jury fresh ammunition to go by, that the earlier jury didn't have. It appears that it's a case of changing societal values that came into play in influencing the current jury decision.

This begs the question: Can we reopen old cases and try them against today's sense of morality and ethos? Pardon my exaggeration, but allow me to illustrate this conundrum. In the 1930's - '40s, as part of the Indian freedom struggle, several Indian freedom fighters went on strike against the government of the day (British) refusing to co-operate (Non co-operation movement). We hail them as great heroes (deservedly so). But such acts are considered to be evil, non-progressive and subversive activities today. So do we repaint the acts of freedom movement against today's canvas? Sounds silly, I agree. But isn't that what has happened in the above case?

Each act - good or bad - needs to be evaluated against the ethos and values of that day and age, taking into consideration the prevailing circumstances that make for the order of the day; Shifting lenses of time to view earlier acts is dangerous and neverending.

The mess called Bangalore

2005-06-21T22:02:00.001-07:00

Bangalore has been called as "The Garden City" in the past, and more recently, it has earned the grand sobriquet of "The Silicon City of India". While am not going to comment on either, i think it should more aptly be called "The most apathetic city in India". Please do not get me wrong - especially all ye faithful Bangaloreans - am a true blue Bangalorean myself, having grown up in this once wonderful city. But instead of beating our chests and taking offense at anything negative said about our city, let's be honest. Let's just look around us - the chaotic roads, complete lack of urban infrastructure, City police who can't decide whether they are more ineffective or insensitive, utter lack of civic sense, complete disregard to basic discipline and an even more shocking lack of a willingness to change any of it. Is this what we are so proud of?

First rains, and the already hopeless and "just-can't-get-any-worse" traffic situation still manages to beat itself by turning even worse. Not only is one expected to look out for idiots driving contraptions called Auto Rickshaws and their big bully cousins driving City Buses, but one is also expected to stay clear of live wires dangling dangerously, fallen trees, and of course the potholes that seem to seamlessly extend from one to another. And all this in complete darkness, since the Electricity board seems to say "Let there be darkness" with the same alacrity as God saying "Let there be light".

Driving in bangalore traffic is just as pleasurable as getting squeezed between 300 sumo wrestlers. If you are driving in Bangalore, you are doing all of these:

1. Anticipating the mood of the vehicle in front, so that you don't bang into his back.
2. Anticipate the mood of the vehicle behind you, so that he doesn't bang into you.
3. Anticipate the mood of the 2-wheelers alongside you, so that they don't catch you unawares when they pull a "XXX" type stunt on you.
4. Anticipate the mood of the herd of people who might just decide to surprise you by suddenly crossing your path in the middle of the road.
5. Carefully plot the locations of bus stops which are in any case always at the corners of turns or start of half-constructed flyovers.
6. Show a fist while screaming obscenities at the many Indicas & Sumos that ply the call-centre employees.

Of course, you sare expected to do all of these at the same time. Clearly, this requires a tremendous amount of driving skills. Unfortunately, the good folks at the RTO(Regional Transport Office) who issue driving licenses to potential assassins don't seem to think so.

And then there's the infamous cowboy of "namma bengaluru" - the Bangalore City Police. First cloud, and the desi Marlboro man is the first to disappear. But not before he carefully switches OFF all the traffic signal lights! His ineffectiveness is of course so legendary that I am told he is in great demand to train his counterpart in Bihar. But what he certainly cannot train anybody on, is his extraordinary insensitivity. You really need to soak in the bangalore environment to become a zen master of insensitivity. Here's some real life examples:

A week ago, at one of the traffic junctions, one stupid Auto driver crashed into my brother's car (Maruti Zen) and simply took-off without even as much as looking back (You expected an apology, huh?). But not before he took with him the car's bumper and grill. Of course, like most law-abiding persons do, my bro noted down the Auto rickshaw's registration number, and went to the cops with it. The cop asked him to return the next day, since he was nearing the end of his duty and didnt want any "trouble". Of course, with the car being what it was, my bro got the bumper and grill fixed - cost quite a bit naturally. Then the next day, when he went back to the cops, the cops reprimanded him for having his car fixed ("You look like an educated person, is this what you do? You people should be blamed first") and asked him to go back and get the car back to its damaged state before they can do anything about it!! Not to end there, they said the car will then have to be left at the police station for 3 days, during which time, of course, nobody was responsible if anything happened to the car (like geting stolen, for instance). Of course, my bro had to grumble, and then shut up and come back wiser.

Today morning, one jerk on a 2-wheeler crashed into my car from behind. And without as much as an apology, he just took off. The car is damaged and am sure is gonna cost me a few grands to get it repaired. But do you expect me to go to the cops? You know the answer.

This begs the question: Whose side are these cops on? Certainly not the victim, it appears.

Then again, take public activism. or the utter lack of it in Bangalore. A city can only be as good as the strength of it's public activism. You don't need to look further than Mumbai to see how an effective and vocal public can make a difference. Recently, a girl was molested by a police constable in Mumbai. You have heard about it. You have also heard and seen on TV, the kind of public protests that followed it.
Now around the same time, 3 such instances happened in Bangalore. Did anything happen? Not more than a passing mention in one of the inside pages of a newspaper.

And you still think you should be proud of Bangalore?

Rape in China: A 3-Month-Long Nightmare for 26 Schoolgirls

2005-06-20T23:06:00.000-07:00

"The teacher always sent a girl to buy his cigarettes. He left the class unsupervised and waited in his office. When the girl returned to class with flushed cheeks and tousled hair, the other students said nothing".

"For nearly three months the teacher, Li Guang, raped 26 fourth- and fifth-grade girls in this rural village, parents and court officials say. Some girls were raped more than once as Mr. Li attacked them in a daily rotation. He was found out when a 14year-old refused to go to school for fear that the next morning would be her "turn." She did not want to be raped a third time".

This got reported in The New York Times today.

What do i say to this? Shocking? Apalling? or plain surprised - that this news ever came out?? The rapid force of modernisation in China has brought with it all kinds of complexities - chief amongst which is the breakdown of traditional societal models and support structures. Yet, even as the conventions of Chinese society are being shaken by the tumult of modernization, the Confucian reverence of teachers remains strong, particularly in isolated areas like this farming village in Gansu Province in western China. Parents grant teachers carte blanche, some even condoning beatings, while students are trained to honor and obey teachers, never challenge them. No wonder this carnage from a pathetically demented man went unnoticed for so long - and would have continued if not for that one poor brave girl.

I would not be surprised if hundreds of such incidents are happening in China - only one of which - somehow, accidentally - got reported in China's tightly controlled and censored media environment. In a society which believes teachers can do no harm, the responsibility of media becomes paramount. It becomes the media's job to go out there and highlight these issues and bring them into the open. Sadly, that's not what the central machinery wants.

Happy Birthday Gal!

2005-06-20T22:53:00.000-07:00

Happy birthday, dear sis-in-law!! As you grow one more year older, there's no denying u r old!:-) But then, u'll always be the youngest one in the family and that's not going to change anytime; And as the youngest old kid, you shall continue to get from us lotsa attention, lotsa affection, and a little bit of painful interference too!

God bless, and all the best in ur videsi venture!

Abhijit Sawant and his orchestra

2005-06-19T22:06:00.000-07:00

Did you watch "India Session - Abhijit Sawant and his friends" on MTV last evening? Lucky if you didn't. I did. And that gave rise to this post.

Well, when I say I did, I meant I watched portions of it. Of course, I just couldn't bear to hear "Aapka Abhijit" sing his entire "classics". It was amazing to see him choose the best of the good ol' hindi numbers. It says a lot about his refined taste in music. But sadly, i cannot say the same about his singing tho'. He sang so bad that it looked like he would drive away the thick monsoon clouds from the Bangalore skies to a safe distance. To maybe Somalia where MTV is not broadcast, and where rain is really needed. It actually did drive away the clouds & rain from Bangalore - awaiting confirmation from Somalia whether it managed to reach them however.

Aapka Abhijit went on murdering song after song after song - he could most certainly put Jack, the ripper, to shame. After watching "Sur" (movie) in the afternoon, it was like watching "Be-sur" in the evening! This guy, i believe, was a singer in one of the orchestras in Mumbai. The guys who sing in Ganesh mandals. It really shows. He should go back to it and spare us. Not that am against people who sing in orchestras, just that i haven't heard of any Kishore Kumar / Lata who came out of any orchestra, you know. The least i expect from a guy who comes through from a field of thousands of aspirants to emerge as the "Indian Idol" is that he has some decent singing potential. Not kill numbers which are classics lodged in our collective memory. Would it remain so after Abhijit Sawant has had a go at them?

Cabinet nod for dual citizenship

2005-06-16T22:00:00.000-07:00

The Union Cabinet on Thursday gave its approval for amending the Citizenship Act 1955 to enable all persons of Indian origin who migrated to other countries after January 26, 1950 to acquire overseas citizenship of India.

The cabinet meeting, chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, also gave its approval to amend the Allocation of Business Rules and to allow Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs to issue notifications under Section 7B (1) of the Citizenship Act and issue smart cards to registered Overseas Citizens of India.

However, the amendment would not be applicable to all persons of Indian origin, their children and grand children, who migrated to Pakistan and Bangladesh after January 26, 1950.

It will benefit people who were eligible to become citizens on this date or belonged to the territories, which became part of India after August 15, 1947 to acquire overseas citizenship "as long as their home countries allow dual citizenship in some form or the other".

These were among the various proposals approved by the cabinet, Information and Broadcasting Minister Jaipal Reddy told reporters after the meeting.

AC: So do we expect the next Prime Minister / President who is a foreigner, yet not foreigner?? The news article does not specify if there will be any distinction in the rights that get conferred on such "dual" citizens..For example, will such people be allowed to vote? Will they be able to contest elections?? More importantly, if the answers to the first two are "yes", then can we - who are not "dual" citizens - expect them to bring about the right kind of understanding about India and her ground realities to be able to truly represent the people? Or would this amount to - now am treading exaggerated ground here - outsourcing of governance to across the border?

Questions and more questions! But, to my mind - not that i claim to know a great deal about this matter - it appears to be an exercise that is aimed at gratifying (red carpet to rashtrapati bhavan?) the NRI / PIO populace, with no real need or rationale for doing so.

I think a better alternative of integrating the Indian diaspora - the real objective i think - would be to strengthen the concept of PIO (apart from simply labelling it as so and issuing PIO cards), giving them certain privileges while at the same time making a clear distinction between PIOs and normal citizens of this great country. You see, there's also a matter of paying tax, which I as a normal "Single" citizen do!
What do you think?

Smoking banned in movies.....

2005-06-15T21:43:00.000-07:00

...but allowed in real life!

This stinks of hypocracy all the way from New Delhi to Bangalore (where I am)...You are allowed to smoke in real life, while guzzling on Beer/Whisky or whatever is your preferred poison, but you are NOT supposed to show smoking in movies, or advertise alcohol on TV. The explanation, presumably, is that you cannot allow media to promote these evils. Well intentioned, Maybe. Stupid, Yes. Double-standards, Most certainly!

Why not simply ban the production and sale of Cigarettes and Alocohol?

Of course, the govt will not do that, considering that it derives huge revenues from the cigarettes & liquor manufacturers as Excise duty and Sales tax. In fact, in some of the states, these two sectors account for the highest revenue from excise duty. Not to mention, the large amounts that grease the palms of many political big wigs. Therefore, the govt can not & will not even think of banning them. But then what's a govt that doesnt want to get reelected? And how can it get reelected without showing that they care, and are the moral guardians of the society? So, they go banning advertising of these products.

I believe that any product thats gets manufactured & sold, has a right to get advertised. That's quite fundamental, right? The above action of the govt seems to remind me of one of the popular lines of "Loin" Ajit: "Isko Liquid Oxygen mein dhal do. Liquid isse jeene nahin dega, aur oxygen isse marne nahin dega" ("Throw this fellow in Liquid Oxygen; Liquid will not let him live, and Oxygen will not let him die")

Titbit from a not-so-distant memory

2005-06-15T01:24:00.000-07:00

What do you say to a headstrong lady Professor who gives you a solid "A" in all her subjects, even after you tell her - on her face and in front of the entire class - "Your class is an insult to my intelligence, as well as my common sense", and then walk out of her class never to attend any again?

Birth of another Spiderman?

2005-06-14T23:27:00.000-07:00

Spider bites man in supermarket

"..a 65-year-old man has been treated in hospital after being bitten by a venomous spider as he reached for a bunch of bananas at a supermarket..."

So do we see the advent of a 65 year old Spiderman? Jokes aside, it is quite shocking to see the response from Sainsbury, which is where it happened. Here's what Sainsbury had to say:

In a statement, Sainsbury's said they take "all possible precautions to prevent events such as this from happening". Yeah, right!

"We sell millions of bananas every week and it is an extremely rare occurrence." Tell that to the poor old man who faced this "rare occurrence".

"The customer has not been harmed from the bite, and we believe he is now fine". Of course, the old man was just faking it, or maybe trying to morph into Spiderman.

"We arranged for his shopping to be dropped at home after the incident, and are extremely sorry that this may have caused him distress." Wow! How considerate I say!!

The entire statement from Sainsbury seems to be directed at washing its hands off the incident. First they say they take all possible measures, and hence if something like this does happen, its your bad luck. And then, they go on to underplay the incident, and claim the old man was indeed alright, nothing happened - so what if he had to be hospitalised for 17 hours, he was simply faking it.

A non-finance person's view of IPO evaluation

2005-06-14T07:10:00.000-07:00

The last few months have seen an increased activity in the IPO markets with many IPOs hitting the market (including several mid-cap MFs); and in the last couple of days, the mercury levels have really shot up, what with Provogue coming out with its IPO. As it usually happens, renewed activity in the capital markets only act as a boost of viagra for the old men who call themselves analysts. Predictably, you must have been forced to read atleast one analyst's take on how good or bad the provogue IPO really is.

And to support their views, naturally, all kinds of numbers are thrown at you (EPS, PE multiple, DE ratio etc etc). Numbers which, to financial ignoramuses like you and I, look more out of algebra text books that we left behind in high school.

This isn't one more "analyst's" analysis. As i said earlier, am no warren buffet. This isn't even a pitch to promote Provogue - Provogue is just an example I am using to explain my point. The purpose of this post is to help you look beyond plain financial numbers, and understand the worth of an IPO from a retail investor's POV.

Here's what one analyst wrote about Provogue IPO:
"...a price band of 130 to 150 against an EPS of 6.67 looks pretty expensive..."

From a pure finance angle, yes, he's right. But he's wrong. And possibly myopic.

EPS = Earnings (ie. Net Profit) / No. of Shares.

This ratio is expected to be high, to be considered as good. In other words, you earn more for every share you own. right? simple. So far so good.

But the problem with using EPS as the sole measure to value an IPO (or a firm) becomes apparent when you realise that EPS is a backward looking measure - it tells you how good or bad the firm has performed in the past. It doesn't tell you how it will perform in the future!

One of the most important deficiencies in using EPS as a sole measure is the fact that the brand value gets discounted. Let me explain this. Suppose the brand 'Provogue' were to be sold, how much would it earn?. Let us divide this number (Brand Value) by the no. of shares..For a powerful brand like Provogue, this ratio (Brand value per share) would be far higher than its EPS...this difference is really the Brand premium, which most financial analysts conveniently ignore.

"How is this capital utilized?" - very few analysts would ask this paramount question. The fresh capital from the IPO can be used in either of the 2 ways:

(a)to build capacity - in other words ploughed back into the business so that business can grow, Or

(b)to bail out the promoters stake from the business - in other words, the promoters can chose to sell their stake, take their money and wash their hands off the business.

Interestingly, using EPS would not differentiate between the two! Neither do most analysts. Sadly.

Disclaimer: This post is only meant to present the author's views on the general topic of assessing IPOs without making any specific reference to Provogue or any other IPO; the author shall not be held responsible for any loss caused to any person whatsoever who accesses or uses or is supplied with the content (consisting of articles and information). Readers are advised to cross-verify the information and to also seek professional and expert advice before taking any decision based on the content provided above or acting on any recommendations made herein. The information or opinions provided herein are not a substitute for professional advice.

RFID tags for prisoners coming to Asia

2005-06-13T23:24:00.000-07:00

Anywhere you go in Tokyo, Seoul or Singapore, the proliferation of personal technology is hard to miss.

And now convicts in these countries won't feel left out. NEC has signed a letter of intent to resell RFID identification and tracking system for prisons from Alanco in Asia. The agreement is non-exclusive in Japan but exclusive in other, unidentified, Asian markets. A definitive agreement, worth several million, will be signed in the next thirty days, said Alanco.

With the Alanco system, prisoners, or "uncooperative users" in Alanco parlance, wear RFID bracelets surrounded by a multitude of readers. As a result, their movements can be tracked. In U.S. prisons where it's been installed, Alanco TSI Prism system has reduced inmate violence. What Yakuza member could object?

"Inmates know they are being monitored and know they will get caught. The word spreads very quickly," said Alanco exec Greg Oester last year.

AC: More on RFID, and how it is going to change our lives,er i mean our prisoner's lives..Can you imagine this happening in Tihar Jail or one of those hard core jails in Bihar? I say, why limit this to only jails, why not have it in all of Bihar? It's the same ain't it?

How about embedding these RFID chips in captured militants and then when our distinguished Govt sets them free (ala Kandahar), you will atleast be able to prove their cross-border connection???

GPS-enabled school uniforms hit Japan

2005-06-13T05:17:00.000-07:00

With GPS-enabled school uniforms on the way in Japan, the timeless parental refrain "don't forget your jacket" is about to assume new significance.

According to gizmo hub Engadget, the jackets, in addition to letting parents track their kids, sport a panic button that children can push in an emergency, immediately summoning a security agent to their exact location. The GPS-enabled blazers are made by school uniform maker Ogo-Sangyo, with GPS technology provided by Secom, which previously teamed up on a kids' backpack with built-in GPS.

RFID tags have been used to track kids in Japan before, and they've been considered elsewhere, including the United States.

But the notion of electronic IDs in schools has proven more than a little controversial, with some calling them a cutting-edge way to monitor attendance and keep kids safe and others assailing them as an assault on the youngsters' right to privacy.

The student tags employ the same technology used in building access badges commonly issued to employees for security purposes.

Drivers who sign up for quick-pay toll programs use similar devices to cruise by toll booths. And RFID technology has recently been found in chain stories, libraries and casinos.

AC: What this means? Imagine the possibilities!
1. You can NOT bunk classes without getting fired for it
2. No more 'proxy' attendance! (Boy, are we glad this technology didn't exist when we were in college)
3. More problems for the dilettante casanovas from DPS, RK Puram; And parents, no need to wait for the infamous MMS to know what "they" did last summer!
4. Guys, no more two-timing your ugly girl friends.

And naturally, this had to come out of Japan "wonly"!

The Big Blue!

2005-04-11T07:31:00.000-07:00

Another view!

This is Real!

2005-04-11T07:22:00.000-07:00

Am back on one of my peek-a-boos, this time to post a photograph i took when we drove down to Coorg...must admit that this pic has gone through the Picasa image editor to come out the way it has...

Apologies for the long hiatus!

2005-01-28T22:06:00.000-08:00

My apologies for the unexplained break from this place...a lot has happened since my last post -which i see was a long time ago.

For starters, i have answered the conundrum that was mentioned in my previous post ("Old loyalties vs new avenues"). I opted for the latter. And that option - rather the process of deciding on that option - has not been an easy one. Taking a sangfroid decision to leave behind a workplace full of emotional attachments is never easy, you see.

But, i have moved on to a new job, in a new place. Bangalore is where my calling is these days. Couldn't wait to get out of Mumbai all the time I was there. Now that I have, a part of me misses Mumbai. Life, I tell you!

The new job is well, what can I say, different. Too early to comment on whether its good or bad, but surely long enough to say that its very different. Being an APAC resource working out of India office is lending credence to the "Na Ghar ka, na ghat ka" dictum! Bangalore is full of these self-service restaurants called "Darshinis"...I think my new job is an experiment in Corporate "Darshini"..Just about everything is self-service..people interaction is minimum - you know people by their e-mail ids rather than their face. What a change from my past!

But, as they say (who, am not sure!), we learn and we grow. Amen!

Old loyalties vs new avenues

2004-09-13T20:46:00.000-07:00

How does one decide between old friends and new acquaintances? How does one decide between old comforts and new opportunities? How does one decide between old devils and new unknowns?

How does one decide between a job that one has grown fond of (and become an acknowledged champ in) and a job that demands charting unknown waters?

SOS!!

Tell me why series...

2004-09-11T01:41:00.000-07:00

Why is it that my nose always twitches and cries out for a nice long itch / scratch just when the barber puts the towel around my arms, and asks me not to move? silly only....

Ghost blog

2004-09-08T03:00:00.000-07:00

Blog waalon, mein vaapis aagaya hoon..bachcha log taali bajao........hic hic!

After that rather flattering self-reinstatement of this blog - aka a rising of the dead ghost (now, their cant never be a "non-dead" ghost, righto?) - let me give a desperate push to this blog.

A lot has happened since my last post. Actually not so much - that was me n my exaggerating self. On the other hand, maybe some. But too boring to get into the inconsequential details.

In front me stands a placard that reads "I have not failed 700 times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work".

Very inspiring, am sure. Most long sentences are invariably so. Just as they are lost on me. Now that brings me to the topic of my attention span that doesnt seem to span anything longer than a matchstick these days....am getting bored too easily...am told its got to do with one's belly size. Rubbish i say. How does someone else's belly size affect my attention span (tho' my own ever increasing girth might)?

Familiarity breeds contempt. Bullshit again. (Familiarity breeds. Period.) Uh oh...got sidetracked yet again. I was thinking of the powai roads that I take every day...Familiarity in this case is a necessity if you have to avoid those humongous potholes - u need to know where they are and how much to yank ur sterring wheel.

Why do they call them "Pot Holes"???? Maybe long back - and even now in Mumbai - folks deposit their burdens in them? Maybe. Just like cats and dogs who dig holes, do the deed and cover them up. Except that cats and dogs cover them up.

Ok now, enuff. enuff of my blabbering. Tho' i must admit, if u have so far, u must be one helluva wastrel! he he he.....

All in a day's work!

2004-08-09T01:33:00.000-07:00

A "?" and a "!"

2004-07-15T22:46:00.000-07:00

"?": Is it the end of the road for me and my blog? Why am I not as enthused as before? why do I suffer from a blogger's block thats more than a few blocks long? Will I bounce back from here - I know not. But I wish I do. Soon.

"!": On a more exciting front, Im gonna be a proud owner of a Mitsubishi Lancer - loaded till the ears - in a day or two! Fell in love with the sexy baby the moment i started the powermill and heard the purr....

Far away...right here....

2004-06-29T21:56:00.000-07:00

Have not posted for more than 15 days now...have not even gone thru my daily reads...whats happening?
Apologies first....Been around, yet not been around...no enthu to post anything new...had more than ample subjects to write about, but just couldn't motivate myself to put it down on post. Simple.

In a silly (futile?)attempt at capturing all that that transpired in these 2 boring weeks, here are some not-so-good nuggets:

1. Sometime in these 2 weeks, I went and saw "Lakshya" in a non-descript, decrepit theatre in Thane...Came away with a not-so-good feeling about the movie..Don't know how much of it was to be blamed on the Theatre itself, and how much on the movie. Thought it was a tad too slow for my liking, with a mess of characterisation. Anyways, enough said about the movie.

2. Went to one of the Tata Motors showrooms planning to check out, and maybe buy, Indigo. As luck would have it, the one available sales person to show us around happened to be a girl. Now, why, oh-so-why, do they have women in automobile showrooms (no offense, no sexist remark here...plain honest truth)..Its the Mars and Venus thing you know...Apparently they dont have Automobiles in Venus..

Now coming back to this woman in the showroom, I asked her if I could take a test drive..And I get this amazing answer "sir, anyway you are planning to buy the Petrol version sir, Petrol car is anyways verrry smooooth...Why do you need a test drive, you can buy it 'no'"!!!!!
Waah!! That did it, she just "unsold" the car to me..Wanted to shout at her and ask her how many times she goes to the trial room to try out the fit everytime she has to buy a Rs.300 shirt/top/pant/whatever....

After successfully un-selling the car to me, she proceeded to explain the finance option to me..Damn! I didnt even ask her for that!! I wonder what these Automobile showrooms are selling these days - the Autombile or the "EMI"...They seem to spend more time talking about the finance scheme / EMI, than about the main product itself!!!

3. Oh shit, I forgot point 3..I swear on you, I had a point 3 (and even 4 & 5)..but this stupid car saleswoman made me forget...so much for the car!

So see you...soon I hope!

Movies and me!

2004-06-16T05:00:00.000-07:00

Before I subject you to the subject topic, allow me the devious pleasure of deviating to apologise for being inactive on this blog for the last week or so...been caught up with work up to my thinning pate....

Ok, with that being said and done with, lets come to the one issue that seems to happen - always - with me, making my "relationship" with movies and movie theatres so much more strong:-)

The guy sitting next to me in the movie hall.

I have had - by some cosmic supernatural design or plain default - to endure some amazingly, err lets just call "entertaining" people sitting next to me in almost every movie that I go to...And this phenomenon is spread across cities / theatres / movies...

1. Movie: Chalte Chalte; Location: Bangalore

The guy sitting next to me was a typical "tapori" reformed into ala Shah Rukh...With a bandanna - a very colorful one at that - firmly in place on the head that wasn't, this guy insisted that he not only got to sing all the songs that Shah Rukh sang in the movie, but also the ones that Rani Mukherjee sang for Shah Rukh!!!

2. Movie: Hum Tum; Location: Mulund

There were 2 middle-aged guys sitting next to me...and the guy actually sitting next to me was so excited everytime the cartoon "Hum Tum" characters came along, that I actually felt pity for his friend..Not only did this guy make it clear in no uncertain terms how much he loved the movie / movie stars / cartoons / songs etc, he insisted that his friend "MUST" like the movie/movie stars/cartoons/songs etc, as much as he himself did!!!!!

3. Movie: Dev; Location: Thane

The guy sitting next to me - didnt have a bandanna, no - seemed quite decent and all that...atleast decent enuff to give me the impression that this movie would be a different..but alas, it wasn't to be...once the lights went off, and the dialogues started flowing in "The" Bachchan's classy baritone, this guy could not be restrained...He started to sort of jump all over, shake his head, move to the edge of the seat, cross uncross his legs and all that....(Disclaimer: all this at a safe physical distance from me)...At one point in the movie, after a particularly powerful dialogue from AB, this guy actually removed the cap from his head...talk of being moved, this guy was really moving, u know what i mean!

I guess thats the fun of actually paying up and going to the movies!:-)

Random note #1

2004-06-10T01:33:00.000-07:00

Have decided that all posts that don't seem to have any idea or sense behind them - or I can't think of one - shall henceforth be classified as "Random note #xxx"...and no, "xxx" stands for numerals (*chee dirty minds*)..So thats the introduction to this meaningless rambling...

Im having some trouble with my throat for the last 2 days...no, nobody's been at it, though i suppose some would give their left leg to do that (obviously they can't give their left/right arm...they would need both to strangle a roughneck like me)...
So as I was saying, I have this terrible feeling that Im coming down with a viral fever or something...so far its only been the something part...feels as if there's a gillette mach 3 razor stuck between my throat, and *ouch* hurt it does..(all ye ladies who havent had the use of gillette mach 3, rest assured that it REALLY can hurt)...So am carry myself through meetings, presentations and wot not with this ache..unless my hearing also has been affected (which I dont suppose), i must be sounding like Mukesh singing one of those very very "dard bhari geet" on Binaca geet mala on AIR...

Incidentally, my boss also is on leave today. Seems he's not well too. Sore throat or something. Of course, its pure coincidence.

On the blog front, my blog seems to be becoming like an "over-the-hill-and-then-another" bollywood heroine..bereft of ideas to write on, or roles to talk about, "The Invictus" is resorting to rambling on and on...anything to get the crowd in...

Happened to read in today's Sleaze times of India that there was some sorta blogger's meet in Colaba on Sunday...peered hard enough at the fotu to see if there was anyone I could make out...Of course, no one....

Finally, am currently reading "The Da Vinci Code"..and man, what a thriller!! Can't make out where fact stops and fiction begins...am having a sorta subtle fight with my wife on who gets to read it first..If she sneaked it off to office yesterday, I have managed to do the same today...

Ok, now if you are reading this now, then you must be as jobless as I am...So why dont you do what I am about to do? Go home, instead of reading stranger's blogs.:-)

Wish you were here...

2004-06-08T02:29:00.000-07:00

So, so you think you can tell
Heaven from Hell,
Blue skys from pain.
Can you tell a green field
From a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?

And did they get you to trade
Your heros for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange
A walk on part in the war
For a lead role in a cage?

How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls
Swimming in a fish bowl,
Year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found?
The same old fears.
Wish you were here.

Love thy neighbour, but not so much!

2004-06-04T02:27:00.000-07:00

This one was narrated to me by my wife (DC) during her update to me on the happenings...

In my absence from India, DC had moved into her parents' house in Mumbai. Now any Mumbai-ite will tell you how it is to live in Mumbai's apartment blocks. Neighbours take the term "Co-operative housing Society" to its literal nadir, esp. if you have stayed in that society for long years! Here's some proof:

1. Seeing that DC has "come back" to her "maaike", one old-couple-neighbours promptly assumed that our family was either "enlarging" (which i assure you it isnt...not at the moment atleast) or , worse, disintegrating (which i assure you it isnt..now or ever). So as good neighbours, they strut their good selves - part curious at the first possibility, & part indignant at the latter - and demand to know what is happening in the society.

Of course, they were completely disappointed to know that the reason was simpler than they thought, and there was really no masala in the story:-)

2. Again recently, DC's folks decided to paint their house after many years.
And that was enough reason for yet another friendly neighbourhood old-couple to assume that DC's younger sister R (who is currently based in UK) was getting engaged! So, out they come enquiring about the "Boy"..whether he's from India or UK, whether err..."We chose the boy, or R herself did the chosing" and such questions!

Whoever wrote of loving thy neighbours, didnt have "Co-operative housing Societies" in mind, I'm sure!

Travel travails!

2004-06-03T05:02:00.000-07:00

One of the most eventful jouneys AC has ever undertaken - flight back home!

1. Uncharacteristical of AC, he ended up tagging along excess baggage...oh no, not "a few dolla...err kilos more"...all of 22.3 Kgs in excess!! So AC decides that only his non-existent charm can see him through this very existential problem..He chooses - of all the check-in counters available to him - one that's "manned" by a woman. A glorious PYT. An amazing looking bimbo. A dose of sentimental story-telling, and then some more convincing ensures that AC walks off with a paltry baggage fee:-)

2. Luck being what it is, AC couldn't get into business class, and had to travel economy...Anybody who travels economy will tell you that the best part of the journey will be the co-passenger. He / she will also tell you that the worst part of the journey also will be the co-passenger. I suppose, it was the latter in AC's case.

A Mallu with a fake Brit-Aussie-Yankee accent decides to be all three at the same time..Rest is amazing irritation.

3. Immigration queue in Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport (why can't somebody just name it as Bombay airport...atleast Mumbai airport?)...In front of AC is a guy in a suit, chatting to the guy behind AC, also in suit. Suit#1 says "oh so frustatedly" that India can never shine with this kinda infrastructure...Suit#2 follows suit and agrees, and shares with the rest of the queue how much he misses the "infrastructure" in Malaysia...Suit#1 talks of how he is so tired after nearly 2 months of world travel...

AC - wideeyed more out of irritation than wonder - checks these 2 "pseudo suits"...Suit#1 has only one book of passport (obviously he couldn't have been to half the places he mentioned..right from japan to jhumritalaiya to "JFK")..AC looks around and sees that suit#2 is no different.

AC decides to show-off his passport and thence, silence the 2 pardesi babus..

All's well that ends. Period.

PS: As promised, have got some Toblerones for the MBM on 5th June!:-)

The Great Singapore sale!

2004-05-28T01:15:00.000-07:00

The great Singapore sale starts today..The annual affair attracts thpousands of tourists who flock to the shopping districts of Singapore buying everything from DVDs to err...hmmm Bulgaris (well, cudnt find something that sounded well with DVD:-))...

Anything you want from here?

PS: Countdown for my return has started...4 days to go...

My new blog

2004-05-27T01:56:00.000-07:00

I know I've rubbed some people the wrong way (now now, you dont have to take everything I say literally!) by writing about ..err.."unconventional" and maybe for some, unpalatable issues. I agree this blog is not really the place for me to go writing long thesis on Indian history and stuff.

I have decided to spare you!

I have started a new & separate blog "Matrix of the mind" which will solely deal with my serious side. All my "unpalatable-to-some" stuff shall henceforth go into this new blog. This hopefully will help you to know what to expect, and then get what you expected:-)

So see you at the dark side of the moon...oops, shucks thats the wrong quote (Pink Floyd's influence, you see)..I meant, see you at the serious side of mine:-)

Fact or fiction?

2004-05-25T23:18:00.000-07:00

I received this as an email..Now what do you make of this?! Dunno whether its true or not, and will not comment on it either. But sure makes for interesting reading - fact or fiction. Read on!

In 1705, Guru Gobind Singh was chased out of Anantpur Sahib after a long siege by a force comprising Rajputs from Bilaspur (now drowned under Bhakra's Gobind Sagar Lake ) and Mughals from Sirhind. At a place now called Parivar Bicchora on the banks of a river, the Guru was separated from his two youngest sons and his elderly mother due to the river being in spate and the young/old being incapable of crossing.

He entrusted these members of his family into the care of a trusted servant called Gangaram Kaul, a Kashmir Pandit (part of the crew who came to beg Guru Tegh Bahadur for help against Aurangzeb) who promptly sold them out to the governor of Sirhind.

The Governor (one Wazir Khan if memory doesn't fail me) then tortured the two young sons to death in Sirhind and Mata Gujri (wife of Guru Tegh Bahadur and mother of Gobind ) died of grief as she was forced to witness this. (this happened in what is now Gurdwara Thand Burj Sahib and Mata Gujri Sahib, Sirhind).

Gangaram Kaul received a jagir in gratitude from the governor of Sirhind for delivering such "high-value" prisoners. The Jagir was on the bank of a lake ("Nehr") and the Kauls changed their names to Nehru as a result. Eventually Gangaram was put to death along with Wazir Khan (if that was his name) when Gobind's follower Banda stormed Sirhind in 1708.

Nehru confirmed the origin of the name change from Kaul to Nehru in "Discovery of India". Indira Gandhi eventually completed the cycle of vengeance when she avenged the death of her ancestor at the hands of the Khalsa by Operation Bluestar.

At the very beginning of his book, "The Nehru Dynasty", astrologer K. N.Rao mentions the names of Jawahar Lal's father and grandfather. JawaharLal's father was believed to be Moti Lal and Moti Lal's father was one Gangadhar Nehru. And we all know that Jawahar Lal's only daughter was Indira Priyadarshini Nehru; Kamala Nehru was her mother, who died in Switzerland of tuberculosis. She was totally against Indira's proposed marriage with Feroze. Why? No one tells us that !

Now, who is this Feroze? We are told by many that he was the son of the family grocer. The grocer supplied wines, etc. to Anand Bhavan, previously known as Ishrat Manzil, which once belonged to a Muslim lawyer named Mobarak Ali. Moti Lal was earlier an employee of Mobarak Ali. What was the family grocer's name? One frequently hears that Rajiv Gandhi's grandfather was Pandit Nehru. But then we all know that everyone has two grandfathers, the paternal and the maternal grandfathers. In fact, the paternal grandfather is deemed to be the more important grandfather in most societies. Why is it then no where we find Rajiv Gandhi's paternal grandfather's name? It appears that the reason is simply this. Rajiv Gandhi's paternal grandfather was a Muslim gentleman from the Junagadh area of Gujarat.

This Muslim grocer by the name of Nawab Khan, had married a Parsi woman after converting her to Islam. This is the source where from the myth of Rajiv being a Parsi was derived. Rajiv's father Feroze was Feroze Khan before he married Indira, against Kamala Nehru's wishes. Feroze's mother's family name was Ghandy, often associated with Parsis and this was changed to Gandhi, sometime before his wedding with Indira, by an affidavit.

The fact of the matter is that (and this fact can be found in many writings) Indira was very lonely. Chased out of the Shantiniketan University by Guru Dev Rabindranath himself for misdemeanor, the lonely girl was all by herself, while father Jawahar was busy with politics, pretty women and illicit sex; the mother was in hospital.

Feroze Khan, the grocer's son was then in England and he was quite sympathetic to Indira and soon enough she changed her religion, became a Muslim woman and married Feroze Khan in a London mosque. Nehru was not happy; Kamala was dead already or dying. The news of this marriage eventually reached Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Gandhi urgently called Nehru and practically ordered him to ask the young man to change his name from Khan to Gandhi. It had nothing to do with change of religion, from Islam to Hinduism for instance. It was just a case of a change of name by an affidavit. And so Feroze Khan became Feroze Gandhi.The surprising thing is that the apostle of truth, the old man soon to be declared India's Mahatma and the 'Father of the Nation' didn't mention this game of his in the famous book, 'My Experiments with Truth'. Why?

When they returned to India, a mock 'Vedic marriage' was instituted for public consumption. On this subject, writes M. O. Mathai (a longtime private secretary of Nehru) in his renowned (but now suppressed by the GOI) 'Reminiscences of the Nehru Age' on page 94, second paragraph: "For some inexplicable reason, Nehru allowed the marriage to be performed according to Vedic rites in 1942. An inter-religious and inter-caste marriage under Vedic rites at that time was not valid in law. To be legal, it had to be a civil marriage. It's a known fact that after Rajiv's birth Indira and Feroze lived separately, but they were not divorced. Feroze used to harass Nehru frequently for money and also interfere in Nehru's political activities. Nehru got fed up and left instructions not to allow him into the Prime Minister's residence Trimurthi Bhavan. Mathai writes that the death of Feroze came as a relief to Nehru and Indira. The death of Feroze in 1960 before he could consolidate his own political forces, is itself a mystery.

Feroze had even planned to remarry. Those who try to keep tabs on our leaders in spite of all the suppressions and deliberate misinformation, are aware of the fact that the second son of Indira (or Mrs. Feroze Khan) known as Sanjay Gandhi was not the son of Feroze. He was the son of another Moslem gentleman, Mohammad Yunus.

Here, in passing, we might mention that the second son was originally named Sanjiv. It rhymed with Rajiv, the elder brother's name. It was changed to Sanjay when he was arrested by the British police in England and his passport impounded, for having stolen a car. Krishna Menon was then India's High Commissioner in London. He offered to issue another passport to the felon who changed his name to Sanjay.

Incidentally, Sanjay's marriage with the Sikh girl Menaka (now they call her Maneka for Indira Gandhi found the name of Lord Indra's court dancer rather offensive!) took place quite surprisingly in Mohammad Yunus' house in New Delhi. And the marriage with Menaka who was a model (She had modeled for Bombay Dyeing wearing just a towel) was not so ordinary either. Sanjay was notorious in getting unwed young women pregnant. Menaka too was rendered pregnant by Sanjay. It was then that her father, Colonel Anand, threatened Sanjay with dire consequences if he did not marry her daughter. And that did the trick. Sanjay married Menaka.

It was widely reported in Delhi at the time that Mohammad Yunus was unhappy at the marriage of Sanjay with Menaka; apparently he had wanted to get him married with a Muslim girl of his choice. It was Mohammad Yunus who cried the most when Sanjay died in the plane accident. In Yunus' book, 'Persons, Passions & Politics' one discovers that baby Sanjay had been circumcised following Islamic custom, although the reason stated was phimosis. It was always believed that Sanjay used to blackmail Indira Gandhi and due to this she used to turn a blind eye when Sanjay Gandhi started to run the country as though it were his personal fiefdom. Was he black mailing her with the secret of who his real father was? When the news of Sanjay's death reached Indira Gandhi, the first thing she wanted to know was about the bunch of keys which Sanjay had with him.

Nehru was no less a player in producing bastards. At least one case is very graphically described by M. O. Mathai in his "Reminiscences of the Nehru Age", page 206. Mathai writes: "In the autumn of 1948 (India became free in 1947 and a great deal of work needed to be done) a young woman from Benares arrived in New Delhi as a sanyasin named Shraddha Mata (an assumed and not a real name). She was a Sanskrit scholar well versed in the ancient Indian scriptures and mythology. People, including MPs, thronged to her to hear her discourses.

One day S. D. Upadhyaya, Nehru's old employee, brought a letter in Hindi from Shraddha Mata. Nehru gave her an interview in the PM's house. As she departed, I noticed (Mathai is speaking here) that she was young, shapely and beautiful. Meetings with her became rather frequent, mostly after Nehru finished his work at night. During one of Nehru's visits to Lucknow, Shraddha Mata turned up there, and Upadhyaya brought a letter from her as usual. Nehru sent her the reply; and she visited Nehru at midnight...

"Suddenly Shraddha Mata disappeared. In November 1949 a convent in Bangalore sent a decent looking person to Delhi with a bundle of letters. He said that a young woman from northern India arrived at the convent a few months ago and gave birth to a baby boy. She refused to divulge her name or give any particulars about herself. She left the convent as soon as she was well enough to move out but left the child behind. She however forgot to take with her a small cloth bundle in which, among other things, several letters in Hindi were found. The Mother Superior, who was a foreigner, had the letters examined and was told they were from the Prime Minister. The person who brought the letters surrendered them...

"I (Mathai) made discreet inquiries repeatedly about the boy but failed to get a clue about his whereabouts. Convents in such matters are extremely tightlipped and secretive. Had I succeeded in locating the boy, I would have adopted him. He must have grown up as a Catholic Christian blissfully ignorant of who his father was."

Coming back to Rajiv Gandhi, we all know now that he changed his so called Parsi religion to become a Catholic to marry Sania Maino of Turin, Italy. Rajiv became Roberto. His daughter's name is Bianca and son's name is Raul. Quite cleverly the same names are presented to the people of India as Priyanka and Rahul. What is amazing is the extent of our people's ignorance in such matters.

The press conference that Rajiv Gandhi gave in London after taking over as prime minister of India was very informative. In this press conference, Rajiv boasted that he was NOT a Hindu but a Parsi. Mind you, speaking of the Parsi religion, he had no Parsi ancestor at all. His grandmother (father's mother) had turned Muslim after having abandoned the Parsi religion to marry Nawab Khan.

It is the western press that waged a blitz of misinformation on behalf of Rajiv. From the New York Times to the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post, the big guns raised Rajiv to heaven. The children's encyclopedias recorded that Rajiv was a qualified Mechanical Engineer from the revered University of Cambridge. No doubt US kids are among the most misinformed in the world today! The reality is that in all three years of his tenure at that University Rajiv had not passed a single examination. He had therefore to leave Cambridge without a certificate.

Sonia too had the same benevolent treatment. She was stated to be a student in Cambridge. Such a description is calculated to mislead Indians. She was a student in Cambridge all right but not of the University of Cambridge but of one of those fly by night language schools where foreign students come to learn English. Sonia was working as an 'au pair' girl in Cambridge and trying to learn English at the same time.

And surprise of surprises, Rajiv was even cremated as per vedic rites in full view of India's public.

This is the Nehru dynasty that India worships and now an Italian leads a prestigious national party because of just one qualification - being married into the Nehru family. Maneka Gandhi itself is being accepted by the non-Congress parties not because she was a former model or an animal lover, but for her links to the Nehru family. Saying that an Italian should not lead India will amount to narrow mindedness, but if Sania Maino (Sonia) had served India like say Mother Teresa or Annie Besant, i.e. in anyway on her own rights, then all Indians should be proud of her just as how proud we are of Mother Teresa.

My final Opera in Oz-land

2004-05-24T08:22:00.000-07:00

My assignment will come to an end soon..and with that my globe-trotting days end too (well, for some time atleast)...but am I sad? Hell, NO! I'm going home, am going back to Mumbai!

Sydney was my last stop before I head back home...Here's a snap from Sydney: My last Opera at, where else but the Sydney Opera House!

Twinkle twinkle Big Star!

2004-05-23T19:47:00.000-07:00

Date: 20th May, 2004
Venue: Departure area, Changi Airport, Singapore

I pass through Immigration, and enter the world of duty free shopping..Have about an hour for my flight to Sydney..And I hear some loud music in the airport..follow my ears, and end up in front of a mini-stage which reads "IIFA Awards 2004, Meet the Stars of Indian Films".

As i listen to the pretty young thing tell me and the 20+ crowd how our day is going to be made: We would be meeting the biggest stars of Bollywood as they arrive in Singapore for the IIFA awards..Im, well, excited, i guess...esp since Im right in front of the stage!

As we wait for the stars to come out in the day, we are told that they have just landed, and should be at the stage in all of 5 minutes..and so they do!!

Sunjay Dutt.....wearing a white-shirt, and black trousers..

AC: (Shouting) "heyy Munna!!!"

SD: "Kaun hain be?"
AC: "Tera baap hain be!"

SD: (taken aback) "heyy hi, please come up...so, whats your name? and so what did you like so much about "Munna Bhain MBBS"?"

AC: (getting on to the stage, and taking the mike from him) "Mike Testing...1, 2, 3.."

Ha ha ha....

OK, that was what didn't happen.

What did happen however was....

A tall dashing man in a peppered french beard, in a deep baritone: "Hi, Its always wonderful to be back in Singapore..." (and then, turning towards me) "Hello" (waves at me).

I had met the biggest star of them all, even before I had taken to the sky:-)
I had met Amitabh, THE Bachchan!

PS: Well, The "didn't happen" portion didn't happen since I had to rush off to board my flight...

Off to the land of Oz...

2004-05-19T03:59:00.000-07:00

Off to Sydney tomorrow...be back next week!

Kill Bills...

2004-05-18T20:17:00.000-07:00

This is a story i am writing even as I conjure up the plot...This is meant to be a movie that I have half a mind to make (uggh, only a half-mind would want to make this)...not any other movie, but a real arty sharty types....So, if you are rich, have some money to throw around AND also read this story, feel free to finance this movie for me!

You need to imagine this not as a story but as a corny movie script (and if my financier insists, please note there is more than enuff scope to add porn too)...Ok, here it goes...

************
Scene 1: [Dark background, no images, only sound]

Tak tak tak tak tak...(knocking on the door)
"Bhai saab", a sweet feminine voice.

(silence)

Tak tak tak tak tak...(few more knocks)

"Bhai saab....koi hain?"

creeekiyooon....(Creeking sound of a chair, someone getting up)

he he he...evil chuckles...followed by sounds of footsteps...

(silence)

"aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...........aaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

(Blood curdling screams)

*************
[Titles & credits come up]

[Disclaimer: Not all characters described in this story are fictional, and any resemblance to any man/woman/others, living, dead or otherwise, is mostly unintentional]

************
Scene 2: [cut to a shot of a house - not an apartment, but an out-house in a chawl]

I am sitting in my one-room house..yes its nothing more than a house...its not my home..strange, considering I have lived here in this very room for the last 5 years...hmmm...last 5 years...now that I think of it, it was 1985 June when we moved in..Did I say "We"? Yes, we were a recently married couple - Kamala & I..

Kamalanayani Jumanji (or KJ, in short) came from a rather rich family of zamindars..I was their Munshi's son..and our love had not known the great divide that existed between us, and on her 22nd birthday, KJ and I had eloped...and had come to Bombay..to this house, that we wanted to make our home...

The first few days of marriage was as usual bliss...I had managed to find a job as an accountant in ashi-yana textiles at a salary of Rs.500. we were more concerned about warding off all traces or evidence of our new existence from the angry eyes of my father-in-law (Badasaheb Jumanji, and nothing in short)..For 3 months and 13 days, I used to be scared, every single day, of coming back home from work, dreading the prospect of having BJ at home...

It was september 24th...I remember that evening very clearly...

******************
Scene 3: FLASHBACK [Black & White shot, rain lashing out as if to prove monsoon is still not dead]

It is 8:30PM and am returning home..and the rains, oh, when will these rains ever stop...look, my trousers are totally wet, and am holding a plastic cover over my head, while simulataneously trying to cover my shirt pocket...I bought that Gold ring that Kamala has been fighting with me for..Yes, we have been fighting for sometime now...Today, I finally managed to take a loan from the broker for this ring...I know this will surely be the last time anybody would lend me any money. Not before I repay their earlier loans..But today, I will also end our fights...I will give Kamala her ring...

[Flashes of lightening, and claps of thunder]

Door to the house is open, and there's no Kamala anywhere...wait, there's a note..

"I have decided to put an end to our agony. We both have not been happy with this marriage. And we both know it. I have lived in a life of comforts, and today I find my situation deplorable..I know you work hard and all that, but, I dont wanna burden you any further. I am leaving.

Goodbye forever.

Kamala

PS: I met the man of my dreams, your friend Atmaram Chandramouli (AC)."

[Camera zooms to a shot from above....open door, rain and wind lashing outside, curtains flying all over..and the hero in the centre of the room...letter slips from his hand, and flies away, carried away by the wind]

[END OF FLASHBACK]

*************
Scene 3 / Act 1: [cut back to the room, to the present, to color, minus the rain]

I am sitting by the window. And watching the world go by. Maybe I am still looking out for Kamala, hoping she would somehow pass by this same window...not because i miss her...because I can ask her why she did this to me...yes! I want to put this knife to her throat and ask her...and then have the pleasure of slowly slicing her throat...Wouldn't that be a joyful sight!!!:-)))

**************
Scene 3 / Act 2:

Tak tak tak tak tak (Knocking on the door)

"Post", the postman shouts out...

Tak tak tak tak tak...(few more knocks)

"Bhai saab....koi hain?"

creeekiyooon....(Creeking sound of a chair, someone getting up)

he he he...evil chuckles...followed by sounds of footsteps...

(silence)

"aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...........aaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

(Blood curdling screams)

**************
Scene 3 / Act 3:

I hate people. I hate people who knock on my door..And it almost always Postmen bringing me some bills or the other...its always one bill or the other..maybe i expect a letter from my kamala...maybe i expect an explanation to the questions that echo in my head...but no, its always the bills. And always the postman...No matter how many I kill, a new one always shows up..And this one was my 5th...and like the 3 other postmen like him, he had to die..What could I do? I had to kill him...Do i enjoy killing them? No, but it was their fault! They know i hate bills, yet....I think they are all sent by my evil father-in-law, BJ....Yes, its him! and sometimes he sends not only postmen, but also people in disguises...like the other day, when I had to open the door to that wretched woman who pretended to want some Sugar or tea-powder...Of course, i had to kill her too..All of them, a clean slice of their throat!!!but not before i enjoyed severing them - piece by piece..I first cut their feet...and when they start screaming, i shove the feet in their mouth....and then i slowly and deliberately slice off their left arm...and slap their face with it...and then i make them beg me for mercy...oh! I love the look of helplessness in their eyes!!but not for long, cos soon those helpless eyes will become helpless when I gouge them out...aaahhhh! the smell of blood as it sprays forth from those hollows of the eyes!!!!.and then after 3 minutes, 13 seconds of bleeding, I will finally start to slice their throat......

ha ha ha...

**************
Scene 4 / Act 1:

Tak tak tak tak tak (Knocking on the door)

"Post", the postman shouts out...

Tak tak tak tak tak...(few more knocks)

"Bhai saab....koi hain?"

creeekiyooon....(Creeking sound of a chair, someone getting up)

he he he...evil chuckles...followed by sounds of footsteps...

(silence)

"aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...........aaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

(Blood curdling screams)

**************
Scene 4 / Act 2:

Damn, bills and bills..always those bills....Kill Bills!

**************
Scene 5:

Tak tak tak tak tak...(knocking on the door)

"Bhai saab", a sweet feminine voice.

(silence)

Tak tak tak tak tak...(few more knocks)

"Bhai saab....koi hain?"

creeekiyooon....(Creeking sound of a chair, someone getting up)

he he he...evil chuckles...followed by sounds of footsteps...

(silence)

"aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...........aaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

(Blood curdling screams)

************

Scene 6: [cut to a shot of a house - not an apartment, but an out-house in a chawl]

Wiping the blood off the knife and the hands, I come out of the kitchen...happy, smiling...for the man who never let me or my husband live in peace...even after we had moved out of his house, even after we were no more his tenants...the hounding, the fear...no more..cos today, the fear is no more...

[Title appears]

Mrs. Kamala Mouli.

Gurumurthy's article on Sonia..

2004-05-17T19:34:00.000-07:00

Been following the brouhaha created by some in Ashi's comment box in response to a simple forward that she happened to post. Thought this particular article below would be a good answer to some of them. As the title mentions, this is an article written by Gurumurthy (Swadeshi Jagaran Manch) published in the TOI..Naturally, I don't wish to comment either for or against what has been written (my views on this are exactly that: my own, and wouldn't want to add them here).

It is certainly not a matter of pride to have Sonia as the Prime Minister.You cannot be electing a person as Prime Minister and not feel proud of having elected her. When someone wants to lead this country, it must be a matter of pride for its people to have that person as their leader. Imagine the depths to which this issue has descended.

"What is wrong if she is the Prime Minister," is an argument that comes not from the ordinary people of India, but from the educated Indian. This comes from the Chidambarams and from the Rajdeeep Sardesais of this country; this comes from editorial writers sitting in cities. So let us analyse this issue with all its implications for a country like India, which has an unbroken civilisational continuity.

India is indeed a civilisation behind the facade of a nation. It is now facing the might of the nation-state, which has evolved in the west. The nation-state mechanism in the west is basically aggressive, violent, conquering, invasive, dominating, imperialistic. It is a concept which the Indian mind cannot internalise, understand, or exhibit in its attitude. So, now we are conceding that foreigners can become prime ministers and presidents of India, provided they hold a citizenship certificate.

Odious comparisons are being made by a few who are bent on justifying Sonia as the prime minister. Look at Sister Nivedita, they say. She rebelled against the British for India. And her name was Margaret. Swami Vivekananda called her Nivedita because she had surrendered herself to this country. Where then is the comparison?

Compare Nivedita with Sonia Maino. She came to India marrying a very good-looking man. When she came to India in 1968, she was wedded to an Indian who was the son of that country's Prime Minister.

People say it is our tradition that when a woman enters her husband's home, she becomes part of that family, and so Sonia too is an Indian. It is a sentimental attitude. Look at the acts. Sonia did not apply for Indian citizenship in 1968 when she married Rajiv and came to India. It is what any good Indian wife would have done.

She filled an application in 1968 for permission to stay as a foreigner in India for five years. She said, "I am married, I am married into the Indian Prime Minister but I would still like to remain a foreigner." So she was given a certificate in 1968 to reside in India as a foreigner for five years. In 1973, after the first five-year period expired, she again applied for the permit to stay on in India for another five years as a foreigner. And this is the person who is going to live and die for us. My friend Cho Ramaswamy told me not to believe what she says, There is not only a
complete divorce between what she says and what she does; there is also a clue that she will do precisely the opposite of what she says. I will come to it later; there are instances and instances.

So, she again applied for a foreigner's permit. You know why? Between 1968 and 1973, there were indications of war with Pakistan over East Pakistan. And sure enough there was the Bangladesh war. During that conflict, when all commercial pilots were asked to forego their leave and enter service, she asked Rajiv to go on long leave. He was given special permission and they left the country. Throughout the period of the war, they were in Rome. Why? Because the American Seventh Fleet was moving towards India, and Sonia Gandhi probably had serious doubts about India's survival!

So she deserted the country with her husband. She returned only after peace was restored, and after India had won the war because of Indira Gandhi. This is where the stark contrast between Sonia Gandhi and Atal Bihari Vajpayee is most glaring. Look at their conduct after the two wars.

After the creation of Bangladesh in 1971, Vajpayee, who was the Leader of the Opposition, stood up in Parliament and congratulated Indira Gandhi for her courage and vision and praised her as Durga. He was a patriot. At that important moment, he never thought that acknowledging the achievement of his political adversary will cost him votes. Yes, he and his party lost votes in both Partiament and Assembly polls, but not because Vajpayee stood tall in his praise oflndira Gandi. After the Kargil war, Sonia Gandhi told the NDA Government, "Please do not ask for any credit." This is meanness, pettiness, smallness, and foreignmindedness.

Sonia Gandhi played politics even with the self-esteem of this country by choosing the wrong moment to demand an explanation from the government, to raise issues of corruption in defence deals. Her praise of our armed forces came after she realised that the people of this country were not taking her criticism very well. That she was a foreigner and had no business asking for explanations came across very clearly. Every intelligent lndian knew there were problems, including corruption associated with some sections of the army and that it was these problems that resulted in the Kargil invasion.

Should it be used as an occasion to expose a small number of people and defame the entire army in the process? The army today represents the core of Indian nationalism. This was the occasion for the nation to rise above everything and pat the army for its heroism, courage and sacrifice.

But only a nationalist will think like this. However, Sonia Gandhi, who was after votes and political power, could not think like this. Now let us come to the period between 1973-1978. In 1977, when Indira Gandhi was defeated, Sonia sensed the mood of the nation, took refuge in the Italian Embassy and refused to come out of it. She said she was going back to Italy. Sanjay Gandhi had to go and plead with her to return.

Is this is the person who is going to live and die for India? To live in India is very different from living for India. And to live in India in such glory, with such protection and resources, is very different from dying for India. Nationalism will not come by merely wearing saris. It is as much a fancy dress today as any other dress can be. But some Indians are very happy to see Sonia in a sari, and regard her stay in India as their good fortune. Why? I am going to say something which many of you may not like.

Some of you may even say I am a racist. I was discussing this issue with Cho Ramaswamy. He told me something he may not write but I will share this with you. Cho said, and I quote, "If Sonia Gandhi had been black, had been a person of African origin, this problem would never have arisen."

Do you understand what this means, unpalatable though it may be to some of you? It is this fascination for the white skin and it is we, the English educated Indians, who are responsible for this. Tamil patriot and poet Bharathi said, " Ayiram undingu jathi, enil anniyar vanthu pugal enna neethi. " Yes, we may have hundreds of castes but that is no reason for an alien to fish in our troubled waters and play arbiter here. That is what Tilak mean by Swaraj first. We may fight among ourselves, we may even kill each other, but we don't want a foreign arbiter.

I know of several political leaders saying that the Indian English Press will stand against us. Only because the Indian English Press is bound to take a hostile attitude towards those who consider Sonia as a foreigner and a reluctant citizen, many political parties are unwilling to make this a national issue. This is the terrorising influence that the English educated Indian intellectuals have on the political class. Another argument is that this is not an issue in the rural areas. If you do not make it an issue, how will it become an issue there?

The Emergency was imposed in India. The national TV, the Press, everything was controlled by the government. The cities revolted against the Emergency; in six months it spread and percolated, and then the villages revolted, too. Ideas always percolate, but if they are edited at the top, the nation remains confused. Never in the history of the world has a foreigner ruled another country except by invasion.

But what is abnormal here is that we are in danger of electing a foreigner to rule this country. Some Indians do not want to be seen as being narrow-minded or less liberal. What is this liberalism? One-sixth of humanity living together is in itself the greatest symbol of liberalism. We are one-sixth of humanity and we live together and live well together.

Let us now recap what Sonia did in 1978, after Indira Gandhi lost the elections in 1977. Sonia again applied to stay on in India as a foreigner. In 1968, 1973, 1978- for three five-year terms - Sonia applied for a resident's permit to stay in India. On April 30, 1983, her third five-year permit expired. By that time it was certain that Rajiv was to become the heir to Indira Gandhi.

And so, even on April 27, three days before the permit expired, she had still not opted for Indian citizenship. She wanted to be a foreigner till the last day the permit allowed her to be so. And this is precisely what Sharad Pawar asked her in the Congress Working Committee (CWC), in May 1999 It all happened suddenly. Pawar described to me how it happened. On that day, the CWC was to discuss the Goa election and Pawar was supposed to present his analysis of the situation in Goa. The lady came with a prepared speech (please note, even in the 20-member working committee, she comes with a prepared speech).

She began reading her speech. Everybody was surprised at what she had to say. She said that the Sangh Parivar, against which her mother- in-law carried on a campaign to finish communalism, against whom her husband did this and that, had now decided to destroy her.

"They are branding me a foreigner. I will fight them to the last drop of my blood. But, I don't want this issue to drag on till the elections. I want it decided today because if it is decided now, we can fight it out at the time of the election, and it will be no issue at all. So, I want to know first whether any of you have any objection to my becoming the Prime Minister,"she said.

All these fellows remained silent. And then Madhav Rao Scindia spoke, "Madam, you do not have to fight the Sangh Parivar propaganda, I will fight it. This is not your battle, this is my battle:' This set the tone for the rest of the discussion and soon most members began to ask, who are these RSS people to dub Sonia a foreigner?

Soon it was Sangma's turn to speak. Sangma said, "Madam, I have very different views on this issue. I don't know anything about you; There are people who are saying that for 17 years you lived as a foreigner in India. If the voters ask me, how will I explain? Please tell me why you did not opt for Indian citizenship in 1968? I cannot convince the people of my own state, my own constituency on this." And then it was Pawar's turn.

He told me he was sitting immediately to her right. He was the last to speak. He was the first one to organise a public meeting for her, a massive rally in Maharastra. He told Sonia, and I quote, "In that rally, you said I am an ordinary humble Congress worker. You said I don't want any position, I don't want power, and I am associated with the Congress family. You also said I don't even want to become a Congress member. I can't bear to see a party with which my mother-in-law, her father, her grandfather, and my husband were all associated, decaying like this. So, I want to strengthen this party. This is what you said on that day." Then Pawar told the rally, "If she is willing to do such a generous job for a nationalist party, there should be no objection. She does not want to be the president of the party, she does not want to be in any position and she doesn't want to be an MP."

Pawar told me that he had recounted the statements made at that rally to Bal Thackeray in defence of Sonia Gandhi. "But the day she ran to the President of India and told him that she had the support of 272 MPs to become the Prime Minister of India, which was a lie, all of us changed and I changed, too;" Pawar told me.

Sonia said she was not interested in politics, and that she would never enter politics. She said she would not become a Congress member but will only help the party as a person belonging to the Congress fami1y. She said and I quote, "I am just a four anna member, I will not occupy any position." But what happened thereafter? She physically threw out Sitaram Kesri from the office. The poor fellow was in the toilet. His chair was empty. And do you know what happened? The Congress goons bolted the toilet door from outside and made Sonia occupy' his chair, The elderly man wept. This is how she became the president of the Congress Party.

In the same way the western armies in the past invaded other civilisations and seized power, she seized power in a 'coup d'toilette'. This is the disconnect between her word and her action. Her conduct was the very reverse of her profession. she said she had no ambition to be the Prime Minister. But who ran from pillar to post to bring down the Vajpayee government?

Again, when the media probed her about the money paid by Bofors to her friend Quattrocchi, she said, "Yes, the CBI is saying he is a suspect, but they have not produced any papers; and unless you produce papers to prove that somebody is guilty, you cannot say he is guilty."

But what is the truth about Quattrocchi ? In the Bofors deal, the quality of the gun was not the issue. It was always rated as a good gun, but there was a better gun called Sofma. In 17 meetings, the negotiating committee kept the Sofma gun ahead of the Bofors gun from 1984 June to early February 1986. For two years, in 17 meetings, the army brass involved in the decision making had preferred Sofma to Bofors. But everything changed on February 17 that year. Please mark the dates. The competition among arms manufacturers to sell guns to India was on from 1980.

On November 15, 1985, a company called AE Services entered into an agreement with Bofors. It said, "Gentlemen, I will get you the Government of India order for Bofors guns. And I will get this order by March 31,1986. And if I get it by March 31, you will give me three per cent commission, which is $36.5 million or Rs 160 crore at the current rates of exchange. So, if I get you this order by March 31, you will give me this commission and if I don't get it you need not give me anything. You owe no obligation to me."

Who can enter into this kind of a contract except the person who can get it? Fina11y, the cat was out of the bag. The person who signed the contract filed an affidavit in the Swiss Court saying it was Quattrocchi who advised him to enter into this contract.

The sequence was as fo11ows: On February 17, 1986, the Bofors gun was nowhere in the picture. However, on March 15 and 16, Rajiv told the Swedish Government ( on a State visit to Sweden) that he will give Sweden the order for supply of Bofors guns. On March 17, the negotiating committee cleared the deal in 48 hours. Eleven officials and Rajiv Gandhi signed the deal and on March 21, 1986, 10 days ahead of the deadline to which Quattrocchi had committed himself, the contract was signed.

The bribe agreement between this shady company AE Services, and Bofors said: "Bofors will pay AE Services proportionate to the amount the Government of India pays to Bofors." The Government of India paid 20 per cent of the money to Bofors and exactly three per cent of 20 per cent was released in September 1986 to AE Services.

Within 13 days, that money was transferred to an investment company and two years later, after The Hindu and The Indian Express came out with exposes on the deal, with documents as proof, it was transferred to another company and the Swiss Police unearthed the fact that the persons behind all the three companies into which these monies had gone was Quattrocchi and his wife.

Only they had the authority to sign the secret accounts. When this was found out and the bank documents were being transmitted, Quattrocchi filed an appeal against the transmission of documents in the Swiss Court but the court said he was a dishonest man and overruled the objection saying Quattrocchi was involved in the deal. He has taken bribes and he is related to the Indian administration at the highest level, the Swiss Court said.

The Swiss Court order came in July 1993 when Narasimha Rao was the Prime Minister and the Interpol told the Government of India that Quattrocchi 's appeal in the Swiss Court had been dismissed, which meant "Arrest him." The powers-that-be gave Quattrocchi one week's time to escape. Just like Win Chadha has been allowed to escape an year earlier. And this man too flew out of India. When the CBI raided his home and found his diary notes,. these revealed Quattrocchi had been having dinner meetings with Rajiv and Sonia Gandhi. They found photographs and letters that had been exchanged, and everything was seized. Thereafter, the Delhi High Court issued an
arrest warrant against Quattrocchi. He appealed to the Interpol which was dismissed.

The Delhi High Court also dismissed it saying his presence was needed and he had to be arrested. These are all judicial orders printed, published, and available in the public domain. Thereafter the matter went to the Supreme Court. Quattrocchi told the Supreme Court through his advocates that he would come and present himself, and that he should not be arrested. The Supreme Court said, since the man says he will come and present himself and be available for interrogation, why should he be arrested?

However, Quattrocchi defied the orders of the Supreme Court and did not turn up. He filed an affidavit in the Swiss Court saying that India was a brute nation and he cannot get justice in the judicial system of India. And Sonia Gandhi is defending this fellow Italian. It is, therefore, a blatant lie to say there are no documents to prove Quattrocchi's guilt.

It is also a lie that Sonia did not know his plans to abscond from the country. It is impossible that somebody who resided in Delhi for 20 years, who shared weekly evenings with Rajiv and Sonia, would have suddenly left Delhi , without even telephoning to her. She must have been privy to all these things and she has the audacity to ask where is the proof?

So, truth has nothing to do with Sonia Gandhi. There is an absolute disconnect between her words and deeds. Now the issue is whether Sonia in politics is a national shame.

Whether it is a national shame or not, it is certainly a danger to national security. Why do we have rules in the army which prohibit a foreigner, a foreign born person, even though he is a citizen, from occupying certain high-ranking offices in the army? Why do we say that our IPS officers should not be of foreign origin? Why do we say that our IPS officers cannot marry foreigners? Now, herein comes the idea of the modern nation-state.

A modern nation-state has a built-in insecurity and that is the reason why it has to secure itself. But can the Prime Minister have a foreign wife? Can the Prime Minister's son have a foreign wife? Sitting in the Prime Minister's Office, in the Prime Minister's home, a foreign wife for 15 years; who ran away with her husband when the nation was at war, breaching the discipline of commercial pilots is now a well, established fact. In India, the MLAs, MPs, and ministers are not subject to any rule or discipline. Even today whether an MLA or MP is a public servant is a matter that is being debated in courts.

So, can an MP have a foreign wife.? Can a minister have a foreign wife? This distortion has crept into the system. And what are the consequences of foreigners penetrating our polity?

When George Fernandes spoke on this issue on the national television, it was chilling. He spoke of a particular file whlch contained all the secrets of the government. Where are the nuclear weapons, where are the missiles, who can press the button, which missile points in which direction, who are our spy links in different countries? This single file contains all this information.

That file is not handled by anybody other than the Prime Minister of India. If Vajpayee ceases to be the Prime Minister and Sonia becomes the Prime Minister, he will have to hand over this file to her. It will have every nationa1 security secret. If it falls into wrong hands, it will strip India naked before inimical forces.

`Can we afford to hand over these secrets to her?` Fernandes said even the Defence Minister cannot do anything; he cannot look at that file. Even the services chiefs know only their part of the secret. The combined, collective national secret is in the hands of one man that will be handed over to this foreigner, should she achieve her political ambition.

Whether somebody can speak tolerable Hindi or not is not the issue; it is far more serious. It goes to the root of the existence of the nation, its security and its survival. Sonia's loyalty to India will always be in doubt. If there is even a millionth of a chance that her loyalty to, this country is in question, it should be enough to disqualify her from prime ministership. The issue is not whether Sonia will succeed in becoming the Prime Minister, but the very idea that somebody like her can nurse such an ambition.

If the intellectuals of India, whose duty it is to preserve the mind of India have failed, I am certain that at least the ordinary people of India will succeed in protecting national interest as they did in 1977.

Gawd promise...

2004-05-17T04:36:00.000-07:00

I shall stay away from any more serious stuff...below is an aberration...

History's biggest Hoax - The Aryan Invasion Theory!

2004-05-17T01:12:00.000-07:00

THE ARYAN INVASION THEORY

The main idea used to interpret the ancient history of India, which we still find in history books today, is the theory of the Aryan invasion. According to this theory, northern India was invaded and conquered by nomadic, light-skinned RACE of a people called 'ARYANS' who descended from Central Asia around 1500 BC, and destroyed an earlier and more advanced civilization of the people habitated in the Indus Valley and imposed upon them their culture & language. These Indus Valley people were supposed to be either Dravidian, or AUSTRICS or now-days' Shudra class etc.

Basis of the Aryan Invasion Theory

We should first note that the Aryan invasion theory is totally foreign to the history of India, whether north or south, which has no literary or historical record of any such event. Prior to the invention of the idea by 19th century European scholars, there was no tradition of an Aryan invasion anywhere in India, in either contemporary or ancient records.

The Aryan invasion theory is based upon the idea that Aryan represents a particular group of people. In the classical view of the Aryan invasion the Aryans are a particular ethnic group, speaking a particular language. However in Vedic literature Aryan is not the name of the Vedic people and their descendants. It is a title of honor and respect given to certain groups for good or noble behavior. In this regard even the Buddha calls his teaching Aryan, Arya Dharma; the Jains also call themselves Aryans, as did the ancient Persians. For this reason one should call the Vedic people simply the "Vedic people" and not the Aryans. If one takes Aryan in the Vedic sense it would not be like talking of the invasion of good people, as if goodness were a racial or linguistic quality!

The Development of the Aryan Invasion Idea

European scholars following Max Muller in the 19th century decided that the Vedic people whom they called the Aryans after a misinterpretation of that Vedic term - invaded India around 1500 BC. They were said to have overthrown the primitive and aboriginal culture of the time, which was thought to be Dravidian in nature, and brought a more advanced civilization to the land (though they themselves were still regarded as barbarians). The indigenous aborigines were identified as the Dasyus or inimical people mentioned in the Vedas.

The rationale behind the late date for the Vedic culture given by Muller was totally speculative. Max Muller, like many of the Christian scholars of his era, believed in Biblical chronology. This placed the beginning of the world at 400 BC and the flood around 2500 BC. Assuming to those two dates, it became difficult to get the Aryans in India before 1500 BC!

It is important to examine the social and political implications of the Aryan invasion idea:

1. It served to divide India into a northern Aryan and southern Dravidian culture which were made hostile to each other.

2. It gave the British an excuse in their conquest of India. They could claim to be doing only what the Aryan ancestors of the Hindus had previously done millennia ago.

3. It served to make Vedic culture later than and possibly derived from Middle Eastern cultures. With the proximity and relationship of the latter with the Bible and Christianity, this kept the Hindu religion as a sidelight to the development of religion and civilization to the West.

4. It discredited not only the 'Vedas' but the genealogies of the 'Puranas' and their long list of the kings before Buddha like Rama and Krishna were left without any historical basis. The 'Mahabharata', instead of the great war, became a folk lore. In short, it discredited the most of the Hindu tradition and almost all its ancient literature. It turned its scriptures and sages into fantacies and exaggerations.

5. It served a social, political and economical purpose of domination, proving the superiority of Western culture and religion.

However today, after nearly all the reasons for its supposed validity have been refuted, even major Western scholars are at last beginning to call it in question. I am highlighting some of the more important evidence that have come through in the recent past that clearly refutes and negates the Aryan Invasion theory.

1. New excavations - Harappan Civilization:

After the formulation of the Aryan invasion theory, archeology did not stop. New finds continued. These however have gradually undermined the invasion theory.

Harappan civilization (3100-1900 BC) was the largest in the world up to its time. Harappan sites have now been found as far west as to the coast of modern Iran, as far north as Turkestan on the Amu Darya river (a region usually identified with the Aryans), as far northeast as the Ganges, and south to the Godavari river. A site has even been found on the coast of Arabia. Thousands of sites have been found with several cities, like Ganweriwala on the Sarasvati river and Dholavira near the ocean in Kutch, as large as the first two major cities found, Harappa and Mohenjodaro. Most sites remain unexcavated and new explorations are likely to push the boundaries of this civilization yet further. A civilization of this size could not have been quickly or easily overrun by either migration or invasion.

Further, given the facts that there was no destruction of Harappa and no evidence of any large scale migrations of people, the latest form of "the Aryans coming from the outside" (as for example, represented by Romila Thapar, who is a well-known Marxist historian generally opposed to Vedic culture) is of a gradual migration of small groups pastoral peoples during the same period of the second millennium BC.
It is now generally agreed that the decline of Harappan urbanism was due to environmental changes of various kinds, to political pressures and possible break in trading activities, and not to any invasion. Nor does the archaeological evidence register the likelihood of a massive migration from Iran into north-western India on such a scale as to overwhelm the existing cultures

2. The Rediscovery of the Sarasvati River:

The retreat of the Aryan invasion theory has been accompanied by the rediscovery of the Sarasvati river of Vedic fame (by the American satellite, Landsat). Recent excavation has shown that the great majority of Harappan settlements were east, not west of Indus. The largest concentration of sites appears in an area of Punjab and Rajasthan along the dry banks of the Sarasvati (now called the Ghaggar) in the Thar desert. Hundreds of sites dot this river, which appears to have been the breadbasket of the culture. Mohenjodaro and Harappa, the first large Indus sites found, appear to be peripheral cities, mere gateways to the central Sarasvati region. Infact, it has been suggested that the Indus Valley civilization be renamed as the "Sarasvati vedic Civilization" in view of these findings.

It is well known that in the Rig Veda, the honor of the greatest and the holiest of rivers was not bestowed upon the Ganga, but upon Sarasvati, now a dry river, but once a mighty flowing river all the way from the Himalayas to the ocean across the Rajasthan desert. The Ganga is mentioned only once while the Sarasvati is mentioned at least 60 times. Extensive research has shown that the Sarasvati changed her course several times, going completely dry around 1900 BC. However, as per the the Aryan Invasion Theory, the so-called Aryan invasion took place in 1500 BC.
If so, how could the Vedic Aryans know of this river and establish their culture on its banks if it dried up before they arrived?
This clearly establishes that Rig Veda must have been in existence long before the the supposed-aryan invasion.

3. Indus seal:

The Vedic culture was thus said to be that of primitive nomads who came out of Central Asia with their horse-drawn chariots and iron weapons and overthrew the cities of the more advanced Indus valley culture, with their superior battle tactics. It was pointed out that no horses, chariots or iron was discovered in Indus valley sites.

This was how the Aryan invasion theory formed and has remained since then. Though little has been discovered that confirms this theory, there has been much hesitancy to question it, much less to give it up.

However,further excavations have discovered horses not only in Indus Valley sites but also in pre-Indus sites. The use of the horse has thus been proven for the whole range of ancient Indian history. Evidence of the wheel, and an Indus seal showing a spoked wheel as used in chariots, has also been found, suggesting the usage of chariots.

Moreover, the whole idea of nomads with chariots has been challenged. Chariots are not the vehicles of nomads. Their usage occured only in ancient urban cultures with much flat land, of which the river plain of north India was the most suitable. Chariots are totally unsuitable for crossing mountains and deserts, as the so-called Aryan invasion required.

Ancient History Revised

We have examined the Aryan invasion theory and seen how it has continually failed to prove itself. Therefore we must look at the history of India and the world in the light of the collapse of the invasion theory. The acceptance of a Vedic nature to Harappan and pre-Harappan civilization creates a revolution in our view of history, not just of India but of the entire world.

Now, based on what has been presented above, following facts about an ancient and glorious period of India clearly emerge:

1. The Aryan Invasion and Racial theories, and Aryan-Dravidian conflicts are a 19th century fabrication by some European scholar. They are being exploited even now for political reasons.

2. The hymns of Rigveda had been composed and completed by 3700BC, this can be scientifically proved.

3. The language of the Indus script is related to Sanskrit, the language of Vedas.

4. The Indus valley civilization should be aptly called as Sarasvati Vedic civilization, as the new evidences and right interpretation of the archaeological findings indicate.

5. There is now strong evidence that the movement of the ancient Aryan people was from east to west (and not the other way), and this is how the European languages have strong association and origin in the Vedic Sanskrit language.

6. The ending of Indus Valley and the Sarasvati civilization was due to the constant floods and drought in the Indus area and the drying up of the Sarasvati river. This had caused a massive emigration of the habitants to safer and interior areas of the Indian subcontinent and even towards the west (East to West movement).

7. There was no destruction of the civilization in the Indus valley due to any invasion of any barbaric hordes.

8. The Vedic literature has no mention of any invasion or destruction of a civilization.

9. There is no evidence in any of the literature which indicate any Aryan-Dravidian or North-South divide, they were never culturally hostile to each other.

10.The population living in the Indus valley and surrounding the dried up Saraswati river practiced the Vedic culture and religion.

The above, clearly, establishes the need for re-writing our history textbooks - which has been majorly influenced by Nehru's "History of India" (that subscribes to the Euro-centric view of Indian history), and severly twisted by the post-independence Socialists / Marxists.

Biting the ballot....

2004-05-13T20:10:00.000-07:00

The most recent figures show a significant economic recovery in the current fiscal year.

* GDP growth rate is set to break-out of the "hindu growth rate" mould (4-5%) and settle into a 6 - 6.5% range.

* Industrial growth is now into the second consecutive year.

* Inflation rates are on the downward curve.

* Stock markets rally has continued for the most part of the year.

* Exports continue to grow at double-digit levels.

* Foreign investments have been boosted by the steady portfolio flows.
And the foreign exchange reserves are enough to cover imports for as much as sixteen months.

* Relationships with Pakistan are seen to be improving; China has for the very first time recognised Sikkim as an integral part of India, rather than as an independent country.

* There is a sense of "practical reality" that has been brought into the Indian foreign policy - today, India does not shy away from evaluating global developments or bilateral relationships from a point of view that, for the first time again, puts India's interests in front and asks "What's in it for India?" (even if it means taking a less than "high ground", as has been defined in the decaying minds of half-baked nehruvian "secularists").

This is seen from the way how India continues to engage both Israel and Palestine, US & the former Iraq. Before you slam this as a dichotomy of sorts, let it be understood that political diplomacy is indeed based on such dichotomies! A good foreign policy in always one that benefits the country framing that policy, and not the other way round..There are no "wholes" or "absolutes" in foreign policy; A defence co-operation with Israel doesn't automatically imply a co-operation across all areas; A country is entitled to talk to Israel while talking defence, and talk to Palestine while talking International peace. It's perfectly natural. It isn't a zero-sum game either.

And for the first time, India's foreign policy has started to acknowledge this universal fact.

* On the vexed issue of "Hindu fundamentalism", I thought the fact that the supposedly "right-wing" ("non-secular" is yet another commonly used description - you may suit yourself with any of these) NDA was in power actually helped keep the real fringe elements at bay..Surprised? well, ask yourself when did Dec 06th 1992 happen? Despite being in power, has there been any major or further disruption on this issue? While conceding that Gujarat was indeed a blot (about which I am deeply ashamed of), I might also want to ask if what happened in Gujarat could have been prevented by any other non-NDA government...Well, we saw the "mother" of all communal disruptions - the babri masjid demolition - happen under the Congress government (and why didnt PVN dismiss Kalyan Singh's BJP government in the state?).

Now try asking yourself if a non-NDA government could have been succesful in reining-in these fringe elements?

Importantly, ask yourself, will the non-NDA government that will soon be hoisted on us be able to rein-in the vindicated fringe elements.

* On the "corruption" front, it is clear that for the first time in Indian politics we got to see a "less-corrupt" governance - not withstanding Tehelka (the top-layer of government still came out unscathed by Tehelka...Unlike, Harshad Mehta & his "suitcase" or Lakhubai Pathak or his "suitcase" gifts to PVN)

* Again for the first time, somebody bothered to talk about development, giving us a break from caste / religion / reservation and such other highly flammable issues.

* For all the criticism, one cannot escape acknowledging the fact that there was some amount of attention - if not progress - towards basic infrastructure.

So, does all this mean India did Shine? I don't know and I cannot comment. I cannot comment, coz I refuse to be yet another arm-chair intellectual who sits in his air-conditioned office and comments on the vast - and mostly drought-affected - population of India. But I can indeed comment on the 250m odd Indian middle-class, and how the last few years have seen the middle-class explode in size, and income levels.

So, why did "iNDiA not shine" at the hustles?

1. The India that shined - that's us, You and I - are too big to be bothered about elections or voting. So did you vote? Neither did I.

2. The India that did not shine - the rural mass - as always ensured that they voted. And they voted against the government(s) that stopped distributing free power, that reduced subsidies.

Thats not really surprising; thats human nature. Remember Herzberg and his "Hygiene vs Motivators"??

If you are happy with a product, do you talk about it? on the contrary, if you are NOT happy with the product - you are disgusted and angry about it - what do you do? You go and make yourself heard. That's exactly what they did. They made themselves heard - in Italian, I sincerely hope, for their own good.

Now thanks for hearing me out...Signing out, disgusted.

PS #1: Can't comment about others, but for me, I am disgusted at the prospect of being ruled by an Italian. Yes, I consider her an Italian, and not an Indian. If you have doubts about that, please ask her why she chose NOT to be an Indian herself for 15 years - yes, she applied for Indian citizenship in 1983 after 15 years of being in India. Wasn't that her disgust?

PS #2: The constitution created this monster called Election Commission, and gave it such far-reaching powers with absolutely no accountability to anyone, that every election time, this monster decides to rear its head - albeit in all TV channels, print media and what-have-you. Now, can they be held accountable on grounds of "Dereliction of duty" for excluding nearly 30% of the eligible voters from the electoral rolls? Isn't that denial of fundamental right? The way I look at the issue is that in a country as diverse in geography, in culture, in language, in social status etc etc, the fundamental right to exercise my vote is my ONLY national identity. And the EC just denied me that identity.

Can I ask why I should pay my taxes then?

I hope, the EC realises that its destiny lies not in the TV channels, but in that less-glamorous job called "fair and free elections".

Facts of Life..

2004-05-11T06:51:00.000-07:00

This one is from DC....
----------------------------------------------
The father smiled to see his child
Come running to his side.
"Please tell me, Daddy, what is meant
By that word 'sex'", she cried.

He looked aghast at this sweet girl -
She was but eight years old;
Too young, he thought and innocent
To break this childhood mould.

She should be playing with her dolls
Or other toys she had
Instead of asking questions such
As this one of her Dad.

With openness and honesty
An inborn family trait,
This Dad explained the facts of life
Quite candidly and straight.

His discourse finished, thankfully,
He kissed her on the cheek;
No word she'd uttered all the while,
But now began to speak:

"I didn't think my question was
A matter so complex,
For Mum just said to tell you lunch
Is ready in two secs".

The near-martyr...

2004-05-10T04:47:00.000-07:00

I'm just about coming out of a blogger's block. Or so I would love to convince myself..Note here that I don't call it writer's block. That one is for people who write write. Not for semantically challenged or symbolically-handicapped people like me. (Side note: There is one other block I just came out of recently: 9th Block. But thats a different kinda block - the kind you reside in, and the kind you write in a different post).

Some time back, I wrote about my "missile man days" in an earlier post. Since it didnt seem to attract too many negative responses (hmmmpphh, it didnt attract any response, Positive or Negative, but on Monday's I chose to ignore such facts), I am emboldened enough to write about yet another of my...errr, exploits..Its not too much of a brainer to suppose that this incident too happened during my engineering days..

One fine year, on a not-so-fine day, our college principal decided to fine us by closing down the college canteen. It was a shocker for most of us who were suddenly faced with the prospect of going back home after classes. I suppose though it was a bigger shock to the bravehearts who were more used to giving their exams in the canteen, sipping a "chai" and discussing the page number / paragraph no. where the answer was available in the text book. But then these were stronger souls who had survived many such minor irritants, and could survive this too. And they did. They shifted their examination hall to the restaurant just outside the college gates.

And caught in this muddle were us! Where were we to go after class hours? actually, where were we to go during class hours? surely not to the class rooms!*horror* Damn, something had to be done.

Something desperate for desperate times.

I had a friend called M.

Characterisation: M had a figure most women would die for (actually kill for)..a petite, svelte figure that boasted not a single extra ounce of lard. At 32-26-32, M was as thin as a reed...A male reed, that is.

Story continued: M was a real sport, and we made sure we told him about it. We would praise him about his "Ultra slim athletic" figure that was the envy of many girls (including the one he fancied), and in turn buy his loyalty (Kameena tha main!)..So it was M then, that we turned to for help during "slender" times like this.

A cuppa free chai, a full Gold Flake King (imagine being treated with a full king-size cigarette during college days, trust me, it's BIG), and some counselling on what we planned to do - with his help of course - finally managed to win his consent and lead support to the devious plan we had.

This is what happened that hot summer day....

13:00 M "collapses" on the football ground. As true friends, we naturally rush him to a friendly-neighborhood hospital, where he is "admitted".

13:30 A group of students raid the principal's chambers to inform him of the great misfortune. And just so that he does not fail to see the link, I clearly tell him that M collapsed because he was hungry. And under-nourished. And in the hot sun. Empty stomach. No Canteen. In hospital. On drips.

14:30 Principal rushes to the hospital with fruits - Mangoes, Bananas, and some more. He is concerned about M's "condition"..M, of course, getting a chance to play the hero for once, plays out the tragic scene so well that even Dilip Kumar would have been proud of..

"Sir, I..I come from far away sir..and and because I attend ALL the early morning classes, I leave home so early...I don't have breakfast...I also come from a poor family sirr.....no money for hotel...what to do sir...ooooohhhh, aaiyyooo ammmmaaaa", M makes us proud with.

The principal is clearly concerned now. He promises to do something. He wishes M well, offers the fruits (which as M's attendant, I take), and leaves.

Of course, I could not afford to give those fruits to M, and risk spoiling the drama. I believed in the "Real" thing even then. Which meant that I got to eat all the freebies. While M starved - Really starved!

17:00 The canteen was back in action, faster than you could say "one-by-two chai".

And as they say, "All's well that ends well".

PS: Just for good measure, I kept M in the hospital till 10PM in the night. And had more fruits for evening snacks too...

Blogger's Block...

2004-05-10T01:18:00.000-07:00

Post karein kya na karein ye kaisi mushkil hay
Koi to bata de iska hal o mere bhai
Ki ek taraf to ussay post karein hum
Aur usko hi ye kehne se darrein hum

Roz roz hum sochta yehi
Idea humko vo agar mil jaaye kahin
To aisa post-ega saala vaisa post-ega
Khullam khulla uspe dil ka raaz hum kholega
Vo saamne chamakti hai
Mouse bhi atakti hai
Aur ye blog jaati hai fisal

Post karein kya na karein ye kaisi mushkil hay
Koi to bata de iska hal o mere bhai
Ki ek taraf to ussay post karein hum
Aur usko hi ye kehne se darrein hum

Koi badi baat nahin humein post karna tha jo bhi
Vo to hum yoonhi karte magar
Phir bhi kiya nahin vajah iski hai yehi
Bas comments se humko tha darr
Ab karein ya na karein
Ki "Yes" kahein "No" kahein
Soch soch mein hi idea gayi nikal

Post karein kya na karein ye kaisi mushkil hay
Koi to bata de iska hal o mere bhai
Hey bhai mere bhai
O mere bhai
Hey bhai mere bhai
O mere bhai

Triggered thoughts...

2004-05-08T00:55:00.000-07:00

Firstly, congrats to Elysia for making it thru' to IIMB..This post is actually a result of reading thru' her post..Reading her post triggered a series of my own thoughts that transported me a few years back - to the time when I was stepping into b-school myself..the emotions upon being told that I had made it thru' one, the motions of actually getting admitted, and the mindblowing and humbling experience that b-school hits you with, completely turning around your life (as you knew it till then)...Unforgettable...some amazing times, amazing people, some friends for life...truly memorable..

Thanks Elysia, for giving me a chance to slip back in time and relive some of those days!:-)

Chicken soup for the chicken soul.......

2004-05-06T06:47:00.000-07:00

Damn me %$%^^^&&&& and then some more %&^*((&%$##...

I CHICKENED OUT!!!!! I've become my own worst fear....I have lost my identity...Oh yes, I've been thoroughly "domesticated" by marriage...

What else can explain this?

I decided to stay back in Bangkok for an additional day & half (i wrapped up all my work by today afternoon, and planned to take the whole of today, and tomorrow) with the sole intention of exploring the..err ahem..the "more interesting" opportunities that the city has to offer...to cut the bullshit exaggeration short, I wanted to go to one of the many strip-bars / sleaze bars in Patpong, the notoriously sleazy district of Bangkok for a "dekho" (and some beer, of course - nothing more than that, I swear!) tonight...As per plan, I finished whatever little shopping I had to do (won't be allowed inside my house without them, you see!), and kept the entire evening - actually night - free for Patpong...except that my rationalising mind had to do some stupid rationalising..

"Why go all the way to Patpong for beer, when you can get all that on Sukhumvit Road just a few meters away from the hotel i'm staying at?"...So at sharp 8:00 PM, off I went, trudging along the burden of high hopes (of a "dekho", silly). To the friendly neighborhood "Mini-Patpong"..So far so good..*Darn* That's when the chicken soup in my soul started to stir and cluckle (or whatever sound they are supposed to make)...I passed the place a couple of times, bought a pack of Marlboros that I've long stopped smoking (reassuring feeling of a companion from days of cowboy yore) and passed the place a couple of times more...By now, the chicken in me had grown louder..so loud that even Jack Canfield (the guy who served chicken soups for many a soul, and made millions in doing so) would have stopped to admire.

so, as the story went, 8:30PM saw me back inside the comforts of my hotel, sitting in the nice "decent" bar, finishing a beer, and getting out at 9:00 (this is supposedly one of the "hip" bars in town, but all the "hip"ness starts only at 11:00PM)..and like a true chicken that lost out on a chick, I went to the in-house Thai restaurant, had some vegetarian food (i'm not a veggie, but i guess the ironical / cynical side of me had taken over), and was back in my room posting this at 9:45PM...

And calling up DC in India, and telling her about it...Only to be laughed at.

And as DC says, "AC, you have been domesticated completely by marriage". Like most chickens are.

Cluck Cluck. Eggs anyone?

PS: Since writing this, I realised that my intention to visit Patpong could be grossly misconstrued by people not familiar with Patpong..To clarify, I was refering to the many beer-bars that also double-up as strip-clubs...So the intention was to consume the former, while "just having a detached look" at the latter (and NOT the other way round, please!)...

Gone again....

2004-05-03T05:07:00.000-07:00

Am off again....to Manila & Bangkok....
will be back only on Saturday....*grrrrrrrr*am starting to hate travel that doesn't let up...

"Vasudeva Kutumbakam"......

2004-05-01T07:49:00.000-07:00

Writing this post as I wait for my Flight (to Singapore) at Jakarta Airport..The inspiration for this post is a fellow Indian sitting next to me..(am actually writing this while trying to keep it out of his line of sight!)...A 25-28 year old Indian male (actually that line pretty much conveys a lot, thus helping me avoid an elaborate description of him) talking to some girl in India on his mobile..Seems he's living an exciting life of a Romeo...actually make that "Majnu" (Phir bhi dil hain hindustani, you see!)..So as I was saying, and as he was saying, he seems to be a majnu who will be shortly marrying his sweetheart (which is not the one he is talking to, btw)...and one set of parents - most probably his - are opposed to the idea...So Mr.Majnu is describing his trouble to the girl on the line (i think its possibly his sister)..He is right now saying that he will go visit his parents before the marriage and try to thaw the stand-off..."I am scared this stand-off will become permanent, if I dont do something now", says Mr. Majnu...He also adds, for good measure, that he always knew that the girl-on-the-line was someone he knew would support him, though he was not so confident about "Sumedha" (AC: I should be hating myself for doing this...but i dont)...Anyways, the discussion is continuing on the same lines...but heyy wait, he's leaving now...OK, he's taking the earlier flight to India via Singapore...So that puts an end to this commentary...

Brought to you, Live!, by Radio Mirch Masala...

PS: Why "Vasudeva Kutumbakam"??? Dont you get it? Irrespective of which country he's in, what he does for a living, and such other qualifiers, a 28 year-old Indian male seems to have the same problems when it comes to marriage!!

Away message...

2004-04-29T19:23:00.000-07:00

Im off on yet another one of my sojourns...this time to Jakarta...Wont be back here till Monday...So, I shall flatter myself enough to think that somebody would miss me, and promise to come back and post on Monday!:-)
Tata...birla...

Purani genes, aur sitar....

2004-04-29T06:38:00.000-07:00

Ok, that headline has got almost nothing to do with this post...Its just that I like it, and i get to post what I like, isnt it?:-)

Was reading thru' one of my "many-conveniently-forgotten-promises", and decided i'll turn around (figure of speech), and come good on atleast one of them...the one where I said I'll write about some of my pranks in college...here it goes...

This one is from my engineering days....

A bunch of us had just discovered the joys of basketball, smoking, and wasting away hours in the canteen (not necessarily in that order)...And our sincere commitment towards these pursuits left us with no time to attend to that small matter: classes and education. And so days went by, till one day we realised that we were heading towards serious attendance problems...But then, when has a trivial matter like attendance ever hindered sincere people like us? We decided on a new modus operandi. We would indulge in all of the above, and when its 15minutes left to go for the class to end (classes were of 1 hour duration), we would somehow sneak into the classroom. Just in time for the attendance. Just like that.

We used to have this PYT as our lecturer of Basic Electronics (FY BE)...Dont recall her name, tho' I remember we used to call her "Sharon, the Stone" for some reason. Once, as usual, a group of about 10 guys, that included your truly, sneaked into the class when there was all of 15 minutes more to go. And it didnt stop there..A classmate (N) and I decided we had a future in Aeronautics, and started firing away these match-stick missiles (Agni??)..These "missiles" would fire away (literally and metaphorically)...
To our luck, one such missile decided to make a landing on Sharon's dupatta, which promptly got burnt...the poor PY thing got the shock of her life, and became hysterical...At this stage, the rest of the late-comers made a vanishing act from the class...Sharon started to walk out of the class, duly promising that she would discontinue the course, and complain to the prinicipal etc etc...
That was a scary proposition to yours truly, since, for all the interesting things that I did, there was also that one useless thing called "Distinction" that I would somehow manage, and was needed (family commitments, also a license to indulge in the interesting exploits), and cancelling the course would have hurt the purpose!

That then started the phase-2 of our drama: N & I went to Sharon, made a sorry face and.......hell, we didnt apologise...we told her how because of a few "thugs" who are not interested in studies, "sincere and honest students like us (N & I, of course) would suffer"...So please to be forgiving...and more sob sob sob...After some more sobs, we managed to convince Sharon that "for the sake of sincere students" like us, she had to continue with the course..of course, without penalising anyone....

Now, after that, whether we got "honored" (by the "thugs") or kicked by the silent spectators is a different story...and, i assure you, not half as interesting...

I-Tech Movies!

2004-04-28T18:53:00.000-07:00

What if the I.T. industry starts producing movies? Would it be called "I-tech movies"?

Some Film titles may be like these :

#1. Hang To Hona Hi Tha !!!
#2. Meri Disc Tumhare Paas Hai
#3. Aao Chat Kare
#4. Programmer No.1
#5. Mera Naam Developer
#6. Java Wale Job Le Jayenge
#7. Hum Apke Memory Mein Rehte Hein
#8. Do Processor, Baarah Terminal
#9. Tera Code Chal Gaya
#10.Har Din Jo Mail Karega
#11.Network Ke Us Paar
#12.Debugging Koi Khel Nahi
#13.Jish Desh Mein Bill Gates Rehta Hai
#14.Raju Ban Gaya MCSE ..!
#15.Client Ek Numbari, Programmer Dus Numbari
#16.Login Karo Sajana
#17.Naukar PC Ka
#18.1942 -- A Bug Story
#19.Kaho Na Virus Hai
#20.Crash Se Crash Tak
#21.Haan Maine Bhi Debug Kiya Hai
#22.Shaheed Hacker Singh
#23.Password De Ke Dekho
#24.Terminal Apna, Login Parayi
#25.Mr.Network Lal
#26.Terminal Sajaake Rakhna
#27.Hackers Ka Raja, Debuggers Ki Rani

Chinese wonder...

2004-04-27T23:25:00.000-07:00

Have you seen those Jackie Chan chinese movies? or better still those Non-Jackie Chan Chinese movies? Yes yes, the same ones that have a lot of kung fu, noodles, "eeeyaaaaoow", chopsticks. And "Master" of course. These movies always have a great Kung Fu teacher, and his many students. All of these students always address the great teacher as "Master" (pronounced as "Mastah"). Its also interesting how the best student of the great "Mastah" always ends up marrying the Great Mastah's daughter, who is Not called as "Mistress" *indignant*. Anyways that's not the story here.

Ok, now that brings up a question to my mind (questionable mind, eh?):

If a chinese student were to study in an english school, and the great teacher were to be Prof. Bates, would the chinese student address him as "Master Bates"??

Google mail!

2004-04-26T23:40:00.000-07:00

Hurray, I've been "rewarded" with a GMail (Google mail) account by the fine people who run Google (and Blogger.com)...Apparently some regular users of google services have been selected to receive and test this "revolutionary" new email service...so they say...

That's me folks!!

2004-04-25T23:00:00.000-07:00

This is a "PS".

After reading the 2 posts of today (below), in case you are wondering how I could swing from one extreme mood to the other, I just wanted you to know that "I'm like this only", kindly adjust!:-)

Woke up in the morning feeling all "down" - monday morning blues / missing DC - and wrote what was playing in my head (aaye tum yaad mujhe)...then got down to reading some stuff to lighten up, and, boy, did i start flying or wot?!!

Kids these days.......!!

2004-04-25T20:48:00.000-07:00

A pregnant woman is about to give birth. The doctor has her on the delivery table, legs up in the stirrups. Suddenly, he sees the top of a head push through. Then the baby pops its head out and says to the doctor, "Are you my dad?".

The doctor says, "No, I am your doctor!". With that, the baby pops right back inside.

"Damn!", says the doctor. A short while later he sees the head push through again.

"Are you my dad?", asks the baby.

"No, I am your doctor.", he replies. Once again the baby vanishes back into his mother's womb.

The doctor turns to a nurse and says, "Nurse, get that baby's father in here right away--we may have a situation on our hands!". Moments later the baby's father is in the delivery room, and the baby's head once again pops out. "Are you my dad?", the baby asks of the father.

The father replies, "Yes, little baby, I am your father!"

The baby then reaches up and begins poking his father in the forehead with his index finger--"How do you like that?"

Aaye tum yaad mujhe.....

2004-04-25T20:36:00.000-07:00

Aaye Tum Yaad Mujhe Gaane Lagi Har Dhadkan
Khushboo Laayi Pawan, Mehka Chandan

Jis Pal Naino Mein Sapna Tera Aaye
Us Pal Mausam Par Mehndi Rach Jaaye
Aur Tu Ban Jaaye, Jaise Dulhan
Aaye Tum Yaad Mujhe...

Jab Maein Raaton Ko Taare Ginta Hoon
Aur Tere Kadmon Ki Aahat Sunta Hoon
Lage Mujhe Har Tara, Tera Darpan
Aaye Tum Yaad Mujhe...

Har Pal Man Mera Mujhse Kehta Hai
Jiski Dhun Mein Tu Khoya Rehta Hai
Bhar De Phoolon Se, Uska Daaman
Aaye Tum Yaad Mujhe...

The "Why"s of life....

2004-04-22T18:41:00.000-07:00

There are a lot of questions in my life...a few "What"s, a few more "How"s, and a truck load of "Why"s....Thought i'll tackle the "why"s first....(Sidenote: These are not inspired by any other website..these are what Anu Malik would call "Original"...I swear on you!)

#1. If you "Ride" a bike (2-wheeler) & "drive" a car (4-W), then why do you "ride", and not "drive" a horse?
#2. Before marriage, men "yearn" for a wife; after marriage, the "y" disappears...Why?
#3. Why is a priest called "Father" when he is , you know, celibate and all that?
#4. Why do women marry rich old men, and then spend the rest of their lives looking for a little "change"???
#5. Why is it that if you take out the "Dum" from "Dumpati" (Married Couple), you get a "Pati" (Husband)?
#6. Why do women want only the most-perfect men for husbands, and then spend the rest of their life trying to change them?
#7. Why are they called "Apartments" when they are all stuck together?
#8. Why do Lipton employees take "coffee" breaks?
#9. Why do you need a driver's license to buy liquor when you can't drink and drive?
#10.Why is it that when you transport something by car, it's called a shipment, but when you transport something by ship, it's called cargo?

Get high this weekend.

2004-04-22T18:36:00.000-07:00

Singapore Sling - Singapore's own Cocktail!

Ingredients:

Peel of 1 lime
29.5 ml gin
29.5 ml cherry brandy
29.5 ml benedictine
club soda

Combine gin, cherry brandy, and benedictine in mixing glass with several ice cubes. Stir. (You may also combine ingredients in a shaker and shake.) Strain into a tall glass into which several ice cubes have been placed. Fill with club soda

To garnish, neatly peel the lime in a continuous spiral. Add the entire lime peel and serve with a swizzle stick.

For a delicious variation substitute ginger ale in place of the club soda.

Loose emotion......

2004-04-21T19:19:00.000-07:00

For some reason, I woke up today remembering these scenes from the movies:

1. Movie: Anand
Scene: Cancer-afflicted Anand (Rajesh Khanna) is standing alone on the portico, by the window and allows himself to feel sad for the first time in the movie. This is just before he breaks into the song "Kahin door jab din dhal jaaye..." So much pathos, so much emotion, without having to shed even a single tear...Brilliant! It's almost like Anand has been putting on a happy facade all the while, and for the first time, he lets the mask slip...albeit when he's all alone by himself, far from the eyes of his near and dear ones....

2. Movie: Door gagan ki chchaon mein
Scene: The picturisation of the song "koi lauta de mujhe, beete hue din"...Magic in Black & White....In my opinion, the best movie Kishore ever did..Again the picturisation of the song "Aa chal ke tujhe", with Kishore and his son walking hand-in-hand across the hills, beyond the clouds...to a distant land....after losing their home and belongings...Freedom and liberation from worldly desires....Beautiful imagery..something Color movies can never ever aspire to capture.

3.Movie: Kuch Kuch Hota Hain
Scene: Anjali (Kajol) is about to get married to Aman (Salman). Anjali, decked in all her bridal splendor, is standing by the window of her room, her eyes betraying the pomp and sparkle of the occassion. When Rahul (Shahrukh) walks in searching for his own daughter, Anjali. And the conversation that follows. No tears, no melodrama. Simple emotions. Simple sadness. Simply beautiful!

4.Movie: Kuch Kuch Hota Hain
Scene: Anjali (Kajol) and the kids are singing "Raghupati raghav" song, while Rahul (Shahrukh) comes running across the rope-bridge searching for his Anjali (daughter)...The end of the song coincides with Rahul calling out loudly to his daughter "Anjali", only to see his "other" Anjali (Kajol) turning around to face him. The next minute or so is pure brilliance in acting...The mixture of confusion, surprise, happiness,nostalgia, self-consciousness, awkwardness...is a sheer delight to watch...Shahrukh and Kajol have never been so good together...I guess Kajol could always bring out the best in Shahrukh, without him having to resort to his usual hamming.

5. Movie: The Truman Show
Scene: The entire second-half of the movie.
Especially, the last scene when Truman (Jim Carrey) overcomes his own putrid terror of the sea, and the elements thrown at him by his "creator", driven singly by his desire to break-out of his cocoon....finally hits the wall - a metaphor for his own limitations, the final frontier separating him from his uncertain but exciting future, one that promises him his freedom...The mixture of uncertainty & a growing feeling of excitement at having finally found his freedom couldn't have better expressed. Jim Carrey truly, truly became my fave after this role. Im still sulking from the fact that he lost out on an Oscar for this performance. A performance of a lifetime.

PS: Isn't it ironical that Jim Carrey was, personally in real-life, trying to break-out of his own cocoon as had been defined earlier by "Ace Ventura", "The Mask" etc, and was trying to seriously become a more versatile actor, a more serious actor....?? I guess, where Truman succeeded, Jim failed.

Englihs in Japan

2004-04-21T19:09:00.000-07:00

Ashi, as promised....Snapshots from Japan!

PS: The rest of the snaps were removed on 28th April, for no reason whatsoever.

If opposites indeed attract......

2004-04-20T19:19:00.000-07:00

....the why do people who are attracted to each other start looking alike?? (on a separate discussion, does this mean that they will no more be attracted to each other? Maybe its a karmic cycle of attraction & repulsion, no?)

The "keeda" for this post was planted by KJ in one of her comments to my earlier posts. No, this post is not about how KJ keeps planting "keedas" and affecting the general health of the public. This is far less interesting than that. This is what KJ wrote:

".....it happens when ur fine tuned to another person...and before u know it, u'll even start looking like each other...for the wife's sake, i hope ur good looking :p"

That then set me off on the highroad (sidenote #1: why is it called "Highroad"? Is it becoz its an uphill? Must be, considering that any activity involving any amount of thinking is definitely an uphill task for me:-P).

In my 2 years of knowing my wife (DC), have I started looking like her? Or, worse still (for her, of course), has she started looking like me *shocking*?

Now since DC stays about 5 hours away from me, it is obviously difficult for my 256MB BDD (brain disk drive) to make a fair comparison. (I need her to be here, right in front of me to make any "spot 6 differences" kinda analysis, u see)

Thats when i decided to instead understand and answer a related question:

What would happen if, as KJ says, my wife and I were to start looking like each other?

This, my BDD confirms (without any RAMming, of course) can be done. So it goes on to present its conclusions on the complicated analysis, as below:

#1. Indian women look good with a headfull of thick hair. It is advisable not to change this status. (unlucky me:-()
#2. Indian women don't look good with facial hair. It is advisable not to change this status too.
#3. It has been proven that Gillette Mach3 is harmful to sensitive female skin. And Revlon to sensitive male egos.
#4. While wifey can still wear my T-shirts (which she already does) & trousers, sadly, I cannot wear her blouses and skirts.
#5. A female imitation of a nasal Kumar Sanu song ("yaara o yaara, milna hamara, jaane kya rang laayega...uuhhoo uuhhoo") actually manages to sound worse than the real thing.
#6. The family consumption of make-up, esp. moisturiser / facial creams would go up. I wouldn't know where to stop applying the "facial" cream, and start applying the shampoo instead!
#7. Woman with beer paunch is neither "ale" nor healthy!
#8.................
#9.................

Oh my god, am already thinking like a woman!! I can't seem to go beyond 7 points (8 & 9 are there coz "9 is so lucky ya....") (Sidenote #2: Ashi, you asked me to make this sexist remark, remember?)

Memories and respects

2004-04-20T07:14:00.000-07:00

As i get ready to hit the sack and call it a day, a thought enters my mind and refuses to go away. A thought that makes me sad. A thought that makes me wonder "what if only...?". A thought that takes me back by 10 years.

The thoughts of Ayrton Senna. It will be 10 years to the day on 1st May, since the legend moved on to a different plane, leaving us mortals behind. I still find it difficult to consider him - my first F1 idol, THE Fastest man in the world - as "Late" Ayrton Senna.

RIP.

Why English teachers die young......

2004-04-19T19:29:00.001-07:00

Ashi, expect such english usage in Japan!!!:-)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Reasons why English teachers die young: Actual(!) Analogies and Metaphors found in High School Essays
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
#2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
#3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
#4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
#5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
#6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
#7. He was as tall as a six-foot-three-inch tree.
#8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.
#9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.
#10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.
#11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
#12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
#13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
#14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
#15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.
#16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
#17. He fell for her like his heart wa s a mob informant and she was the East River.
#18. Even in his last years, Grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
#19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
#20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
#21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.
#22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.
#23. The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
#24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
#25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
#26. Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.
#27. She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.
#28. It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.

The Shuttler who shuttled too much....

2004-04-19T19:02:00.000-07:00

This one is inspired by Toinks post on attracting disasters.

I am reminded of one rather funny (to us, not for the pal in question, am sure!) incident that involved a good friend and classmate of mine. NR and I were classmates in school, then in pre-univ (XI & XII), and again in engineering. Further, my mom and his mom were colleagues. So, as you have guessed rightly, we were quite close.

This incident dates back to the time when we both were doing our pre-univ in a college in Bangalore. Every afternoon / early evening, we would go to another of our classmate's (Ishwar) house. Here, we (about 4-5 of us) would play Badminton on the terrace of Ishwar's house. And as yours truly was quite good at the game, NR would insist that I be his doubles partner.

One such evening, we were all playing a hotly contested doubles match on the terrace. NR was, as usual, my partner. During a stage in the game, NR was playing at the back of the court, while I was standing near the net trying to finish-off any loose openings. The shuttle was tossed deep inside our court, and I cried out to NR "Finsh it".....nothing happened. I shouted again "come on smash"....Nothing happened. I turned around to see what had happened, and holy shit, NR was not to be seen!!!!

NR had taken a tumble and was lying face down on the ground. Thankfully, there was a lawn and he had chosen a good green spot to make his landing. We immediately took him to a hospital, where the Doc confirmed that nothing was broken. Not even so much as a bruise. Except that the extremely fair-skinned NR was looking as if all his blood had been drained from one side of his body to the other: He was a mixture of "Indian" and "Red Indian":-D

To complicate matters (for us that is), he started blabbering
"Boss, tho' I fell down, nothing has happened. That means God wants me to live. He has kept me alive so that I can get a Rank in the XII standard exams...."etc etc etc...

Whether God really intended all that is another story. To be told someother day. So keep reading.....

Pati, Patni aur.....Telepathy!

2004-04-19T07:26:00.000-07:00

There is a reason why I am writing this after saying in my earlier post (see below) that I'm feeling too "lazy" to write anything for sometime. No, I'm still lazy and nothing could possibly change that. But then haven't you heard of lazy (idle) mind being the devil's workshop? (not sure of the devil part tho')...And then, of course, interesting things happen when you are lazy enough not to expect any.

I have seen many a movie - of course the bollywood churners - that have enlightened me about the existence of "telepathy" between Husband-wife / mother-son / brother-brother and so on...

I have also read quite a few books on the same - reading which have kept me awake many a late night.

And am sure so have you too.

But, have you ever experienced it yourself?

I have. And have come to believe in it. A sort of an inexplicable but certain link between my wife and me. There have been too many instances supporting this belief - one too many to be brushed-off as "coincidence". The latest one happened about 5 minutes back - and that's the stimulus that set my "lazy" self to put down this post.

It's not coincidence when:

1. everytime she thinks of calling me, she receives a call from me instead. At the very moment.

Uncanny this. It started happening about a year (slightly more than a year) ago. And it continues to this day. Across different countries.

And the vice-versa also happens (she calling me up). But the frequency is lesser. (maybe the signal here in Singapore is not so good?:-D)

2. Everytime - EVERYTIME - we play "20 Questions", we end up guessing each other's answer.

You may say "well, thats what the whole game is, aint it?". True. But then you need to know how different my wife's tastes are from my own. While she is the "sophisticated" one in the family with a fine taste for western classical music (chopin, mozart etc), i'm the "dehati" one who would revel in Govinda's own "symphony no.1" instead. While she would talk comfortably about great philosophical authors (no examples here, dont know any:-D), my list would start at "Robert Ludlum" and end at "John Grisham". You get the picture, right? So the point here is that there's no way she would select a personality that I would be aware of even remotely (my limited brain drive automatically deletes such names to make space for more meaningful ones. Like "Calvin & Hobbes" for example). The reverse too is true. I would also deliberately choose personalities from my own areas of interest that would not be her "top-of-mind" recall.

So as the game goes, rest assured, the first 19 questions are sure disasters for both of us. But then the fun starts. When the 20th chance comes around, I / she would focus hard on the answer, and sort of "urge" the other to get it. And in 9 times out of 10, it works!

While initially it used to startle us, we have now accepted it as real. And instead of wasting time on wondering at it with surprise, we try to deliberately use this "telepathic" link to "transmit" the answer to each other:-)

3. Just today, about 5 minutes before i started to write this piece, yet another incident happened.
As some of you know, DC returned to India yesterday after a 11-day holiday here with me in Singapore and had been missing me all day today. She was travelling home from work in her vehicle in Mumbai when she closed her eyes and thought of me. She thought she could be home early today and be in time to take my call. And the next thing she knows - she gets a call on her mobile. Me of course!:-)

Well there have been quite a few instances like this. But at this stage, my laziness has taken over my self again, and prevents me from trying to remember any more of those instances. So it remains fodder for another day and another blog.

Back to bachelorhood...

2004-04-19T01:17:00.000-07:00

Had a terrific time all of last week.
Took 2 days off in the middle of the week (Wednesday & Thursday) to take my wife (DC) out to show around Singapore. Went to Sentosa where DC freaked out on the magical fountain show....went to snow city where we (AC / DC) skied together....Did the visit to Jurong Bird Park where DC couldn't stop laughing during the All star bird show - when the parrots start talking (this particular parrot started crying "Amma Appa":-D)....

But then all good things come to an end. Mine did on Sunday morning. After a brief stint as a loving hubby, I went back to my forced bachelorhood. 11 good days ended with DC's return to India.

I guess i'll take some time to get over boredom & "lows" before i attempt to write again:-(

Fiddling around with the template...

2004-04-13T02:58:00.000-07:00

Taking inspiration from Thullz, I have been fiddling around with the template trying to add features that wud hopefully increase the traffic around here!:-)

Have added the news ticker..will be adding the weather report too....

Any suggestions?

If Dharmendra were to play Spiderman.....

2004-04-11T22:40:00.000-07:00

CR, This is inspired by your post on Spiderman, and how much u want to be like the web guy. What do you know, you seem to have competition from none other than our very own "Garam" Dharam....!!Look at this image and try to imagine Spiderman / Dharam mouthing "Kutte, mein tera Khoon peejaoonga"...

Back from a blissful holiday....!

2004-04-11T22:24:00.001-07:00

Just back from a terrific holiday in one of Malaysia's most beautiful islands - Tioman Island...Tioman Island - "Pulau Tioman" as it is called locally - is off the East Coast of Malaysia. It is quite popular for its virgin beaches & the variety of Sea sport options it provides. Amongst other things, We (My Wife and I) got to Snorkel at various locations in the middle of the South China sea! Its an amazing feeling to just jump into the sea - middle of the sea with no land in sight anywhere - and get to see some brilliant corals, touch some most amazingly colorful fish (including Clown fish "Nemo")...And to top it, I took underwater snaps using a disposable underwater camera!!!!! The pics are yet to come - will post them once they do.

The above snap was taken when I was about to leave the place - when I was waiting for the ferry boat to arrive. This was a small boat out in the distance, so far away that to the naked eye, it was no more than a speck in the horizon (Having a good zoom camera helps!). There's something very...how do u say it? - nostalgic maybe(?), ethereal about this pic that transports me to the land of paintings & fairy tales.....Dont you think so?

Riddler on the roof!

2004-04-08T02:13:00.000-07:00

Q.How can you drop a raw egg onto a concrete floor without cracking it?
A.Concrete floors are very hard to crack(u shud know that)!

Q.If it took eight men ten hours to build a wall,how long would it take four men to build it?
A. No time at all it is already built(think ahead).

Q.If you had three apples and four oranges in one hand and four apples and three oranges in the other hand, what would you have?
A. Very large hands.(Good 1 na?)

Q. How can you lift an elephant with one hand?
A. It is not a problem, since you will never find an elephant with one hand.

Q. How can a man go eight days without sleep?
A. He sleeps at night.

Q. If you throw a red stone into the blue sea what it will become?
A. Wet.(sorry abt this)

Q. What looks like half an apple ?
A : The other half.

Q. What can you never eat for breakfast ?
A : Dinner.

Q. What gets wet with drying ?
A : A towel.

Q. What happened when wheel was invented ?
A : It caused a revolution.

Q. Why is it easy to weigh a fish ?
A : Because it has its own scales.

Q. Bay of Bengal is in which state?
A : Liquid

Q: what is the opposite of Nagpanchmi?
A: Nag did not punch me.

Q:now what is the inverse of Nagpanchmi? Come on..
A: I punched Nag.

Q:Chintu's mom has three sons.What is the name of the other two?
A:Chin-1 & Chin-3

Marriage - a diagnosis...

2004-04-08T01:31:00.000-07:00

Marriages are made in heaven, so they claim. I disagree. I think marriages are made in hospitals - for you become "patient" after marriage (sidenote#1: "Impatient to marry, Patient after marriage"...Heyy a good one-liner ain't it?):-) No wonder my wife tolerates me and my idiosyncrasies. Consider what she has to put up with:

#1. Getting proposed to, of all places, in an Auto-rickshaw during peak hour on a hot and sultry mumbai evening.

#2. My running-off to a different city every few months. And leaving her behind.

And when she finally decides to switch cities & jobs to be with me, I happen to run-away to a different country altogether:-D

#3. Everytime she calls up and asks me to say something nice to her, all she gets to hear from me is "Something nice"!

#4. Everytime she asks me to sing something nice to her, all she gets to listen to is a pathetic, exaggerated, but close imitation of Kumar Sanu singing one of his most pathetic songs.....

The list cud go on....except that I dont want to put all of it on record here...who knows, she might just be reading it and getting ideas!!!!!:-)

Amusing myself...

2004-04-07T20:51:00.000-07:00

With nothing better to do other than reading my own composed mails from the past - and thus look busy during office hours - I came across this mail that i sent out earlier to some of my friendlier colleagues at work. This was a mail i sent out just after my recent trip to Bangkok & Beijing (see my earlier posts..Archived). Thought i could delete the irrelevant portions and post the rest to amuse myself. And then some.

Read on:

Hi all,

There we go again...i just know it when another burst of "serial mail" is about to happen...and this seems like a good time!

What news from my end? well well, lemme see now...

1. was in Bangkok (one word really) & Beijing last week....former being probably more dirty & definitely more slimey than amchi mumbai. Wonder why people go to Bangkok "to enjoy the sun", when its infact quite "Shady"...but as you would have guessed by now (with all the faith u have on my good behaviour), i preferred the sun. Period.

2. Scared the shit out of 2 girls in Beijing. Story goes thus: Went to Tiananman square - which really shud be called Tianan "Men" square from the number of people all around - was "viewed & interviewed" by several young chinese gals who wanted to practise their english skills on me (they really are trying hard to master English - they chat up all & any foreigner who can speak english)...And yours truly casually explained to them that everyone in India ( 1 Billion only) speaks English, infact its the mother tongue these days...Shud have seen their faces - yellow faces turning beetroot red:-)

3. Am playing host to yet another of our colleagues - L - who is staying put at my apartment for the weekend....btw, I went along on his shopping binge, and from the looks of it, he seems to have decided to quit this job.

And open a "kirana" shop in goregaon, selling Fairness creams (why else "Goregaon"?) / Shampoos / conditioners / scrubs and some...things (hell, u dont expect me to know their names, do u?)

4. The TV news channels here are weird. The primetime news has such nuggets as "Old woman slips on the road in Hougang and injures her leg" ...Help!

5. Tried the gym in my apartment once. Am convinced i dont need any more gym-ing ever. End of Gym-ing.

6. Tried Swimming next day. Till everyone else was swept away by the tsunami waves i created. End of Swimming.

re-guards

A

Friendship lasts forever, but some friends don't......

2004-04-07T20:11:00.000-07:00

For some reason, this morning brought back long-lost memories of a friend. Dunno if it was CR's post on friends or something else, but i was overwhelmed by the memory of what happened in 1998...

S was a classmate of mine in first year engineering (i think second year also)...Though not a close friend or anything like that, we got along well...He dropped a year, and thus became my junior in college. However, S continued to hangout with my group of friends.

S came from a rather humble background. He had lost his father quite early in life, and his poor mother had struggled to bring S and his sister(s?) up. S was the eldest, and the only son. His family commitments were, in a way, the reason for his dropping a year in engineering....Later, i learnt that he dropped out of engineering since he had to work to support his family.

Years passed, and I graduated out of the college, got a good job and was pushing a new life.

It was a day in 1998, when another one of my classmates from college called me up......

S had managed to find some odd job or the other, while looking out for that special break that would finally help him get his sisters married, and put a smile back on his defeated mother's lips . He had, finally in 1998, managed to find that dream job that was to be his answer to all his family's problems: he had got a job in the Indian embassy in Washington. Though it was a lowly job, it was enough to help him and his family realise their dreams..S was expected to fly out the next day - Sunday - from Bangalore. But fate had other plans for him...........

On the previous evening (Saturday), S took all his friends out for booze and dinner at one of the dhabas outside the city..I had lost touch with him by then, and hence was not part of that group. Late at night, S was riding back home with his friend on his Yezdi Road King bike when.......

......to say that we would all be meeting up at S's house in an hour's time for one final farewell. Incidentally, S's friend was wearing a helmet & had survived the crash.....

This memory is dedicated to a friend who I didnt really know too well, but wish I did. RIP my friend.

If home is where the heart is......

2004-04-07T01:02:00.000-07:00

......then today I can go back home!:-)

Wifey-dearest has come visiting me here for a few days...A short visit, nevertheless good enough to rejuvenate me and keep me in good spirits for another month or two, before I start missing her again...
For now, I'm going around the office with that silly grin all over again!!!:-)

Don't blame me if you dont see me here for the next few days. Kindly adjust!

Migrated here from Rediff...

2004-04-06T08:41:00.000-07:00

After trying out all kinds of things - and with tons of help from ashi - i realised the futility of the effort..the effort to fix my place under the rediff sun...instead, now i have migrated to blog spot...if u have come so far, then you know my new address!!

Walk down the Memory lane - Part 3

2004-04-06T08:37:00.000-07:00

Since we are all in the mood for nostalgia, i, too, shall deliberate & then elaborate on how good the ol' days were. My best memories, and by logical extension (courtesy CR!) the life that I miss the most, almost always involve the things that i got to do and get away with.

I have always been the "planning-for-the-future" kinds. As a kid too, i had plans for myself - except that they kept changing. Of course, i was not, and am still not, fickle-minded. Each of these change of plans had a good reason and story behind them. Some of my "future professions" included:

1. Superman: At age 6-7, I was fully convinced that I was Superman. Only proving this to normal humans (read: Mom, dad, hapless younger bro) was left to be done. Those were the days when we were in Bangalore, and our house (like most houses in Bangalore at the time) had a large open area in front with some trees. And a long clothesline. One Sunday (or Saturday) afternoon, a towel found itself converted into Superman's cape (guess that was the largest piece of cloth on me at the time - Superman was only wearing his underwear and "baniaan"). And the cape had to fly, of course. So, I started running from one end of the open area to the other. Except that this Superman had a pair of scissors in his hand. Mom's nice silk and "American georgette" sarees were all spread out on the clothesline for a nice sunday (or saturday) afternoon "tan". Rest is history. Superman had to retire that very day to his fortress of solitude.

2. Mechanic: At around the same time as above, we used to have this old-style telephone - the one that didnt have a "redial" button, the one that looked black and like a huge toad that went "trrring trrring". Yes yes, u get it now, thats the one.
Now, both Mom & Dad would go off to work, while my bro (yeah, the same hapless younger bro) & I wud have the house all to ourselves. (Wow! in hindsight)...Now there was something about that telephone that fascinated me (by then i had decided I was not superman, but a Mechanic). I had seen my dad using the screwdriver, clamps and such other interesting gadgets. So, one fine afternoon I decided to expedite my Mechanic-future and started to "repair" the telephone. Off went all the 4 screws, off came the black top, out came the circular dial-pad. And also a whole lot of stuff that i didnt - and still dont - know of. I must admit i learnt a fair deal of how the telephone works (and a great deal of how it doesnt work!)..Having learnt everything there was to learn about "Telephone servicing", i cudn't put it back together tho'! So, i just put back the black-top cover of the telehone and shoved everything else under that. Hmm..it seemed to look ok i thought.

That is, till my dad came back home and had to make a call. He lifted the receiver, and *clang*, *clonk* &*%&&% all came crashing down.....

That day i realised i didn't want to be a mechanic after all. I then decided I was going to be a Scientist!

3. Scientist: I think I was about 7 then. One of my cousins had become a doctor just then, and I was "maha" thrilled with the prospects of becoming a scientist / doctor types myself. One good afternoon (wonder why it all happens in the afternoons? well, that was the time when Mom & dad wud be away or sleeping, you see), i took the thermometer, and decided that I was both the doctor as well as the patient. In my zeal to become a doctor fast, i forgot that i was not supposed to bite into the thermometer:-( Which is what i did.
All hell broke loose when, luckily for me, my parents got to know of it. They rushed me to the hospital immediately. I remember the doctor (not me, the real one) giving me something to drink and all that - to thankfully confirm that I had not ingested any mercury. Then they took the x-rays to check if there were glass-pieces inside of me. The X-rays didnt seem to show any. However - this is the best part, hold tight! - to be sure that there wud be no bleeding inside, the doctor asked my parents to give me a continuous supply of Ice Creams!!!!!! for 3 days!!!! Amazing!! Royal treatment for 3 days!!!

On the 4th day, my parents fully convinced me that it was not worthwhile to be a Scientist / doctor either.

4. Cook / Chef: This was when I was about 11-12 years. I learnt to prepare this sweet dish "Shira / kesaribath"...simple dish really...That convinced me that my destiny lay in the kitchens of the world.:-) I wud make this dish at the drop of a hat. So far so good.

The trouble started when i started insisting that all visitors to our place have some of this shira. As mentioned earlier, my folks wud be away in office. So any relative / visitor who would come home when my mom/dad weren't around simply had to eat the shira i prepare. I guess, this was one profession my mom was keen i take up considering the no. of unwanted visitors i drove away!!!

But Dad stepped in this time - there was no way I would become a cook. I had to be an Engineer or a Doctor (Engineer preferably, considering my earlier experience)...

So folks, that's how i ended up doing my Engineering (and subsequently "B-school"ing)...
The best part is that, today I get to do all the above exploits - and not only get away with it, but also get paid for it!!

Life is beautiful!! Touche'

911 - A Perspective

2004-04-06T08:36:00.000-07:00

I don't normally give in to the practice of Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V straight from the NET....Atleast I wud like to believe that I gave up this habit after life at B-school..But then, once in a while it becomes quite irresistable and I just HAVE to "lift" some article..Here's one such. A Westerner's persepective (from his name, he doesnt appear to be what the North Americans wud term as "They") on the shenanigans surrounding 911...Read on.....

Tired of September 11th - A Canadian View

I think September 11th has been done to death.

Most North Americans still seem mesmerized by what happened on that day. Anyone who tries to talk about how self-centred and hysterical we've become since then is labelled as being soft on terrorism.

But in the past twelve months, more North Americans were murdered by their spouses than by terrorists. Food poisoning killed three times as many of us as terrorists did. Drunk drivers killed more than five times as many. Ten times as many of us committed suicide as were killed by terrorists. The North American death toll from smoking was 100 times the number from terrorism.

If the next ten years are like the past ten, you still are more likely to be struck by lightning than to be killed or injured in a terrorist attack. Am I saying that terrorism is okay with me? No. What I'm saying is that in the sea of human misery, September 11th was little more than a ripple. I want you to hear this. I am not soft on terrorism. I am soft on children. Today, around the globe, something like 30,000 of the world's children will die of hunger and preventable childhood diseases. In the days since we watched 3,000 of 'our kind' die in the World Trade Centre, 3 million of the world's children starved to death. Beautiful, much loved little beings that mothers and fathers and sisters will grieve and weep for. CNN didn't film them, but it happened just the same.

North American governments are now planning to spend more than twenty billion dollars a year to fight terrorism. Twenty billion dollars a year just happens to be the amount the World Health Organization has estimated it would take to end hunger in the world. It's the amount of money we would need to spend to create a world where no child goes to bed hungry. We've heard a lot of talk since September 11th about how the terrorists are callous and heartless cowards. And here we are, blithely preparing to spend a sum of money so huge that with it we could rid the world of the scourge of hunger, and we're not even weighing that possibility.

We're so frantic to save our own skins that we don't want to know that we ARE making choices.

If we continue on our current path, the architect of the 21st Century will be fear. We will have allowed a motley collection of thugs, misfits and bullies to hijack our hopes for the world.

I know that it is still within our power to build a future with love and compassion at the centre. The first step is simple: we must recognize our panic and calm down.

Bruce O'Hara, British Columbia, speaking on CBS

Problem with Rediff - 1

2004-04-05T02:04:00.000-07:00

Thanks ashi for helping me out with the problem...i think it continues to trouble me...now am trying to explore netscape and see if this helps...

APRIL FOOL's DAY!

2004-03-31T21:16:00.000-08:00

Best wishes to all who share this day with me!

Personality - says who?

2004-03-31T21:15:00.000-08:00

well this personality test is really something!! upon my urging, my S-I-L tried it..so far fine, but when the result came out, it suggested that this sweet little girl is actually a tyrant. It also went on to say that she shud positively stay away from learning german (something on the lines of Hitler, i suppose)... now, sadly for her, she speaks german quite fluently.........:-)

My Fave Calvin & Hobbes....

2004-03-29T21:58:00.000-08:00

Personality Test says I have one!

2004-03-28T21:36:00.000-08:00

Personality test...

Thanks to Sri, I took the TheSpark's famous Personality Test and this is what I am..Interesting...

PROBER

(Dominant Introvert Concrete Feeler)

Like just 3% of the population you are a PROBER (DICF)--curious, passionate, driven, and probing. You're the kind of person who can't leave well enough alone. You have a very strong personality and a sense of adventure. And you'd rather go out and experience things for yourself than take someone else's word for it. Some people probably think you're a maniac.

People have a hard time believing you're an intelligent person. Perhaps there's a reason for this? Time will tell.

Walk down the Memory lane - Part 2

2004-03-27T23:16:00.000-08:00

Thullz, thanks for the piece on "Nostalgia"...I myself was contemplating writing on this...reading urs has got me all motivated to do so right away!:-)

Some of my most nostalgic memories (surely most of you people will share them in common):

#1. All-day cricket matches in the Hot summer sun. Cork ball, no less!
#2. Getting the usual reprimand from Mom for #1 above (playing in the sun & getting tanned. Racism anybody?)
#3. Climbing up trees (Note1:Mangoes & Tamarind in particular) (Note2: Always the nasty neighbour's), and stealing mangoes.
#4. Facing the music from mom - after the neighbour's complain and convince, yet again, how much of a menace I was to the neighborhood:-)
#5. Revenge! Leading the pack of friends (Anil, chandru, Seenu, Raju, Raghu, Hari etc) to the terrace of the complaining neighbor's house to change the direction of the TV antenna (remember DD of the yore?). Right in the middle of "Chitrahar" or "Hum Log" or "Barrister Vinod" or the Sunday evening movie (Mithun's "Pyar Juktha Nahin"?)
#6. Summer vacations - visit to my ancestral village. and coming back rich (getting gifts from all relatives!!):-)
#7. Reading every single issue of "The Sportstar" magazine - of course when it was still Rs. 1.50 per copy! Cutting out all color photos of Kapil / Vijay Amritraj...
#8. Big Fun bubble gum!!! Collecting those "runs" or the "puzzles" in the inside wrap of the gum...and of course, trading them with ur friends!
#9. Steam engine trains. And their whistles.
#10. Hating girls! Time when a boy wud be treated as an outcaste or a disgrace if he even so much as speaks to any girl (other than someone's sister, of course).
#11. Eating "Baraf ka golas" in summer!!! And never falling sick!

Hmmmmm...*sigh*...so much gor then. And so much for now. Au revoir!