Counting down the hours to go before my GRE Subject test, I'm trying to process close to 2 million gigabits of information in between 1 billion neurons in my brain( I use only one percent of my brain and dont ask me how I calculated that ) . The thoughts can be classified into roughly 10,000 different categories. However it seems to me that 70% of those thoughts ought to be categorized (on the basis of relevance to my current situation) as '100% junk'. Why am I writing a blog of all the things in the world then?!
1. To unfocus on the 'junk' and focus on the 30%
2. To tell myself to get my rear end moving!!
One song that can always pacify me to bring me to ground state everytime
"Thunbam nergayil yazhedutthu nee..
Inbam serka maataaya? Emakku inbam serka maattaaya?"
Friday, November 02, 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Cricket, a nation and a half naked fakir
Everyones out with a post on the world cup and India's amazing triumph. A lot of positives and negatives on the win out there on the net. so here is my two cents ( and maybe more ) on that and a related thing that I thought of.
Witnessing the crazy things that people do when we win ( or lose ), the aggression that people show, out on the streets, in the cricket stands, the 'mob phenomenon' is truly a fearful thing. Its sheer potential to get what it wants, the uncontrolled power that it exudes, feeding on everything and everyone on its path, encompassing all and destroying anything that tries to stop or control it. It makes me wonder, if a cause such as cricket can set a nation ablaze, how much emotion would there have been in the fight for freedom? How many millions would have come forward, daggers drawn, ready to put forth their lives so that the country may breathe free again? If a thousand people in a cricket stand can cause such things as stampedes, how much could millions do? How long would it have taken the guns and cannons notwithstanding, to raze down the British, to wipe them clean off the face of our motherland?
If one man, a single human soul, has turned a whole nation from breathing fires of war and revolt to protest in silence for freedom, whatever may his faults be, he is truly a mahatma. It is not so much as the loss of life that he prevented , but his ways that changed the mind, body and soul of a nation from war to peace. I think we owe it to him if the rest of the world sees us today as a country which despite being one of the most populated, is also one of the most peaceful and tolerant in matters of foreign relations.
It may sound strange to link two things so far apart, but on reflecting, there aren't enough superlatives for me to describe the job that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi did. I salute you.
Witnessing the crazy things that people do when we win ( or lose ), the aggression that people show, out on the streets, in the cricket stands, the 'mob phenomenon' is truly a fearful thing. Its sheer potential to get what it wants, the uncontrolled power that it exudes, feeding on everything and everyone on its path, encompassing all and destroying anything that tries to stop or control it. It makes me wonder, if a cause such as cricket can set a nation ablaze, how much emotion would there have been in the fight for freedom? How many millions would have come forward, daggers drawn, ready to put forth their lives so that the country may breathe free again? If a thousand people in a cricket stand can cause such things as stampedes, how much could millions do? How long would it have taken the guns and cannons notwithstanding, to raze down the British, to wipe them clean off the face of our motherland?
If one man, a single human soul, has turned a whole nation from breathing fires of war and revolt to protest in silence for freedom, whatever may his faults be, he is truly a mahatma. It is not so much as the loss of life that he prevented , but his ways that changed the mind, body and soul of a nation from war to peace. I think we owe it to him if the rest of the world sees us today as a country which despite being one of the most populated, is also one of the most peaceful and tolerant in matters of foreign relations.
It may sound strange to link two things so far apart, but on reflecting, there aren't enough superlatives for me to describe the job that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi did. I salute you.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Weathered Lives
Photo details same as the one below except for the absence of any alterations to the image.
This photo was clicked completely by accident. I was moving my mobile camera around, looking for something to shoot when I just placed it against the door and this great shot just showed up! :)
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Multiple emails revelation
The thing about having multiple email accounts - more time to sit at the computer aimlessly at work :)
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Random photo - Commercial Street Bangalore
Where: Commercial Street, BangaloreMods: Watercolor Effect - Microsoft Picture Editor
Camera: Dopod 2MP Mobile Camera
getting older
Shit! Im getting older. Enjoy it while it lasts. Hope to write an optimistic post on youth or the lack of it later.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
Illusions
Painting on the wall... or is it?Where: On the way back from the Esplanade theatre
How: Same camera as prev post.
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Exocytosed thoughts
The organizational level of your hard disk is a direct indicator of the level of confusion in your mind.
Friday, March 30, 2007
Shutterbug Update
1
2
3When: 29/30th March 2006
Where: Aloha Changi, Singapore
Why: Was there for a lab retreat
What: Views from the beach / boardwalks
How: Sony DSC-T9 , Windows Picture Manager for change in Colour/Hue/Saturation
Note: I havent been able to think of suitable titles for these images... Do comment of you come up with something. :) Will be grateful.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Friday, March 23, 2007
Cricket 101 it is...
Thankfully, I did not watch India being slaughtered by Murali. Hats off the Lankan team.
Its kind of hard to imagine Bermuda beating Bangladesh at this point, but then unpredictability is what cricket is all about. I sincerely feel Bangladesh deserve to go to the Super 8's. And after their forgettable performance yesterday, India deserve to get back home to the nets and practice. Or maybe not. Maybe they need to get back home and take their minds off the game for a few months. Wait till the ghosts that will haunt them disappear. They probably should stop appearing in commercials for a while, for it will only fuel the burning bellies of the Indian cricket fan and may cause broken television sets. As for the billions of dollars lost by commercial sponsors, don't you know that putting all your eggs in one basket is dangerous?
Hard luck boys. You tried, but failed. But tomorrow is a new day , and brings new hope!
And oh, boys, don't worry about effigies being burnt, but worry if your family will be safe. Because this country is such. Anything can happen. Get some extra security. Maybe the government will extend the NSG Commando force provided to them for the world cup. Keep your windows closed. Venture out incognito only. Better yet, take off to Switzerland.
More importantly, this is not the end of the road.. Well maybe for some, but the game will go on. Chalta hai. 2011 is not too far off.
Its kind of hard to imagine Bermuda beating Bangladesh at this point, but then unpredictability is what cricket is all about. I sincerely feel Bangladesh deserve to go to the Super 8's. And after their forgettable performance yesterday, India deserve to get back home to the nets and practice. Or maybe not. Maybe they need to get back home and take their minds off the game for a few months. Wait till the ghosts that will haunt them disappear. They probably should stop appearing in commercials for a while, for it will only fuel the burning bellies of the Indian cricket fan and may cause broken television sets. As for the billions of dollars lost by commercial sponsors, don't you know that putting all your eggs in one basket is dangerous?
Hard luck boys. You tried, but failed. But tomorrow is a new day , and brings new hope!
And oh, boys, don't worry about effigies being burnt, but worry if your family will be safe. Because this country is such. Anything can happen. Get some extra security. Maybe the government will extend the NSG Commando force provided to them for the world cup. Keep your windows closed. Venture out incognito only. Better yet, take off to Switzerland.
More importantly, this is not the end of the road.. Well maybe for some, but the game will go on. Chalta hai. 2011 is not too far off.
For God's sakes, its just a game!!
I couldn't bear to watch anymore. We were going down. Digging our own grave. Getting ready to pack our bags. And still why do I hope? Well, because I'm an Indian of course!
What am I writing about something that is happening thousands of miles away at 3AM? Well what else could it be? The cricket match between India and Sri Lanka .... That I am not a cricket fanatic who has Sachin's statistics or the Indian cricket team's history on my fingertips could seem a little out of the ordinary. But like every other Indian I would want the Indians to win the World cup... It seems a distant dream as of now, and with every passing wicket, a dream fading into thin air...
Cricket has been hyped by the media to crazy heights. That a national news channel makes the match its headline news seems really nuts.... to me at least. All it does it put more pressure on the players. Being disappointed when your team loses is one thing. Expressing it in words is okay... But burning effigies and attacking homes is quite another thing. Whats with the people of this country? Dont we have better jobs to do? I think its a vicious circle and the media has a big part to play in it . ( Some may say I'm just attacking the media for the heck of it. But staying outside India, the media is your only connection to what's happening at home and you tend to become more of a news junkie that you were. I check the websites of CNN-IBN, Times Now, NDTV and The Hindu at least thrice a day! ) But the fact is that these channels turn their limelight on whatever they can grab for the moment. That's the only way they can keep their viewers and their ratings. So it conveniently becomes a way to become famous on national television to sell kidneys to attend the world cup. This in turn galvanizes the channels into another frenzy of coverage... And the circle is never broken.
I think whats really needed at this point is to realise that cricket is just a game. Its meant to be enjoyed . Not politicised, commercialised, raped on national television for its failures. Its definitely not worth losing lives over.
Anand Vasu of cricinfo points out here that what the team needs to understand that its not about what others think of them , but what they do on the field that matters. And that for while, they should think of it as just a game between bat and ball and do what they do best and do it for the country and more importantly, enjoy doing it. The players seem to be appearing on TV more on commercials than on the field. To me it seems that they have stopped loving their game . That they have begun seeing it as a stressful job to just play in the team. With a billion expectations resting on their shoulders, its not hard to imagine why.
I cant bear to watch the match. Even on cricinfo it seems painful...
But me being an optimist , I believe in taking away the best from any situation...
Situation 1 : India Wins : Well and good.. we progress, holding on to the thin threads of hope that we have and maybe even make it to the semis ( Lets go one step at a time fellas. Semis first and then maybe, just maybe the finals..)
Situation 2: India Loses ( ouch!! even typing that out sounds bad! ):
The Nation : The media goes beserk again. India's loss becomes front page news, ousting our most favourite pastime of politics. Speculations run amok. People lose faith in the team ( for a while. And then another victory against Bermuda and were back to hoping that we will win the next ten world cups in the current form )
The 'boys' : Pack the bags. Head back home. Let the losses to sink in. Get back to their homes and families and take some time off live the non-cricketing lives. And then do what every army does. Rebuild. Cricket 101. Back to the basics. Most of what went wrong is in the mind. They should get back to the basics and begin to enjoy what they do. Complacency can be a cruel teacher.
What am I writing about something that is happening thousands of miles away at 3AM? Well what else could it be? The cricket match between India and Sri Lanka .... That I am not a cricket fanatic who has Sachin's statistics or the Indian cricket team's history on my fingertips could seem a little out of the ordinary. But like every other Indian I would want the Indians to win the World cup... It seems a distant dream as of now, and with every passing wicket, a dream fading into thin air...
Cricket has been hyped by the media to crazy heights. That a national news channel makes the match its headline news seems really nuts.... to me at least. All it does it put more pressure on the players. Being disappointed when your team loses is one thing. Expressing it in words is okay... But burning effigies and attacking homes is quite another thing. Whats with the people of this country? Dont we have better jobs to do? I think its a vicious circle and the media has a big part to play in it . ( Some may say I'm just attacking the media for the heck of it. But staying outside India, the media is your only connection to what's happening at home and you tend to become more of a news junkie that you were. I check the websites of CNN-IBN, Times Now, NDTV and The Hindu at least thrice a day! ) But the fact is that these channels turn their limelight on whatever they can grab for the moment. That's the only way they can keep their viewers and their ratings. So it conveniently becomes a way to become famous on national television to sell kidneys to attend the world cup. This in turn galvanizes the channels into another frenzy of coverage... And the circle is never broken.
I think whats really needed at this point is to realise that cricket is just a game. Its meant to be enjoyed . Not politicised, commercialised, raped on national television for its failures. Its definitely not worth losing lives over.
Anand Vasu of cricinfo points out here that what the team needs to understand that its not about what others think of them , but what they do on the field that matters. And that for while, they should think of it as just a game between bat and ball and do what they do best and do it for the country and more importantly, enjoy doing it. The players seem to be appearing on TV more on commercials than on the field. To me it seems that they have stopped loving their game . That they have begun seeing it as a stressful job to just play in the team. With a billion expectations resting on their shoulders, its not hard to imagine why.
I cant bear to watch the match. Even on cricinfo it seems painful...
But me being an optimist , I believe in taking away the best from any situation...
Situation 1 : India Wins : Well and good.. we progress, holding on to the thin threads of hope that we have and maybe even make it to the semis ( Lets go one step at a time fellas. Semis first and then maybe, just maybe the finals..)
Situation 2: India Loses ( ouch!! even typing that out sounds bad! ):
The Nation : The media goes beserk again. India's loss becomes front page news, ousting our most favourite pastime of politics. Speculations run amok. People lose faith in the team ( for a while. And then another victory against Bermuda and were back to hoping that we will win the next ten world cups in the current form )
The 'boys' : Pack the bags. Head back home. Let the losses to sink in. Get back to their homes and families and take some time off live the non-cricketing lives. And then do what every army does. Rebuild. Cricket 101. Back to the basics. Most of what went wrong is in the mind. They should get back to the basics and begin to enjoy what they do. Complacency can be a cruel teacher.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
All it takes....
Dear Diary,
Sometimes, all it takes for a drastic change in a life is a single event, a single conversation, a single positive result in an experiment that has been failing for months, a single brilliant idea .....
Why am I saying this? Well, I am waiting for that single event. It may not mean much for anybody else. But to me , it means moving away from a long period of low motivation levels and seeing some positivity... Maybe its within me and I only have to see it. Maybe it is already happening...
Well, tomorrow is a new day and brings new hope! :)
Sometimes, all it takes for a drastic change in a life is a single event, a single conversation, a single positive result in an experiment that has been failing for months, a single brilliant idea .....
Why am I saying this? Well, I am waiting for that single event. It may not mean much for anybody else. But to me , it means moving away from a long period of low motivation levels and seeing some positivity... Maybe its within me and I only have to see it. Maybe it is already happening...
Well, tomorrow is a new day and brings new hope! :)
Monday, March 19, 2007
Waiting....
Waiting for freedom... 1947
Still waiting for freedom... 2007These pictures were taken sometime in February 2007 in Singapore when I was waiting for the bus to return home
Camera: Sony DSC T9
Note on the Camera: Doesn't usually take a great shot, and I had to make several tries before I got these two. I feel something needs to be improved in this picture. But still, its the only one I have now, and so I love it for all its flaws . :)
Saturday, March 17, 2007
Friday, March 16, 2007
A poem I wrote...
I wrote this poem when I was kind of in a depressed state.. well im out of it now and actually thought it was worth putting up.. as i always say, extremes of emotion bring out your creativity better than anything else!!
Frozen
Frozen in time I remain, Confined in nothingness
Getting slowly consumed by the vaccum of deceit,
Into a void, which has a cloak of
Truth and Purity on the outside and
Decadence and Self-indulgence on the inside.
The choices to a different world
Lay in front of me, and yet I cannot choose
For your first love is always hard to let go,
It pains me to speak of her thus,
But she once promised to emancipate me
from this world of chicanery,
Alas, I realised
her world is made of people too.
Written on 15th March
Frozen
Frozen in time I remain, Confined in nothingness
Getting slowly consumed by the vaccum of deceit,
Into a void, which has a cloak of
Truth and Purity on the outside and
Decadence and Self-indulgence on the inside.
The choices to a different world
Lay in front of me, and yet I cannot choose
For your first love is always hard to let go,
It pains me to speak of her thus,
But she once promised to emancipate me
from this world of chicanery,
Alas, I realised
her world is made of people too.
Written on 15th March
Thursday, March 15, 2007
The things I want to do
Ive created a kind of a wishlist for the things I want to do right at this moment. Here it goes.
- Play strategy games for hours on end
- Go running until i fall over
- Stand at the tip of a cliff and shout until my voice goes hoarse
- Take a decision
- Go back to college and sit in class one more time
- Go back home and hug my mom
- Get a hug from my dad
- Eat loads of french fries and waffles and yet not grow fat
- Take a long drive on a lonely road
- Go to a lonely tea shop on a mountain and enjoi a garam chai
- Drive a ferrari on the autobahn
- Learn to play the guitar like santana in one minute
Saturday, January 27, 2007
All good things reduce in size...
Today, after quite a long time, I had the opportunity to eat Pringles. For the unfamiliar, Pringles is a brand of potato chips which tastes absolutely out of the world...And horror of horrors! The diameter ( if you could call it that , because the chip is oval in shape and slightly curved) has actually reduced since I had eaten it last, which was quite some time ago... The texture of the chip had also changed, being much smoother when compared to the earlier one which had quite a rough terrain ... Of the two, the sadder issue is that the size has reduced... why do all my favourite stuff reduce in size?
What other stuff has had this fate condemned to it , you may ask...quite a few actually! take the once quintessential part of a middle class chennaite's life , the Saravana Bhavan idli or dosa for example.. Im sure all chennaites ( and people all around the world where HSB branches are) will agree with me... The size of these items has been steadily decreasing while the price has been increasing ... even counting for India's present inflation rate... it became completely unacceptable to me to eat a dosa which was a few years back, priced at 10 Rs to eat it at 18 now! and when your dosa actually arrives, its about the size of the average chapatti!
Snickers seem to have less nuts than they used to, Lays chips DEFINITELY don't have as many chips in their 'nitrogen sealed' packs as they used to.. now 75% of the pack is nitrogen.. they probably should put 'FREE! 30% more nitrogen inside!' on it.
tsk tsk.. I actually thought of writing to Pringles , to the email id that is usually given on the boxes that say " we have manufactured this product to the best of standards... if you have any complaints please email us at... " , and further proceeded to humor my thought to see how far it would go. I actually thought how nice it would be if my email actually made it to eh top brass and they decided to increase the size of the chip and it would be one of those 'wow that's cool' stories that come on the news :P ! But then the cruelty of reality brought me back on ground, an with another sigh, I popped a small stack of pringles into my mouth, and walked away munching..
PS / Disclaimer: All names of products in this post/blog are purely imaginative and any similarity whatsoever with any product on the market is purely coincidental.
What other stuff has had this fate condemned to it , you may ask...quite a few actually! take the once quintessential part of a middle class chennaite's life , the Saravana Bhavan idli or dosa for example.. Im sure all chennaites ( and people all around the world where HSB branches are) will agree with me... The size of these items has been steadily decreasing while the price has been increasing ... even counting for India's present inflation rate... it became completely unacceptable to me to eat a dosa which was a few years back, priced at 10 Rs to eat it at 18 now! and when your dosa actually arrives, its about the size of the average chapatti!
Snickers seem to have less nuts than they used to, Lays chips DEFINITELY don't have as many chips in their 'nitrogen sealed' packs as they used to.. now 75% of the pack is nitrogen.. they probably should put 'FREE! 30% more nitrogen inside!' on it.
tsk tsk.. I actually thought of writing to Pringles , to the email id that is usually given on the boxes that say " we have manufactured this product to the best of standards... if you have any complaints please email us at... " , and further proceeded to humor my thought to see how far it would go. I actually thought how nice it would be if my email actually made it to eh top brass and they decided to increase the size of the chip and it would be one of those 'wow that's cool' stories that come on the news :P ! But then the cruelty of reality brought me back on ground, an with another sigh, I popped a small stack of pringles into my mouth, and walked away munching..
PS / Disclaimer: All names of products in this post/blog are purely imaginative and any similarity whatsoever with any product on the market is purely coincidental.
Friday, January 26, 2007
Some people told me that extremes of emotion make you want to write... Extremes of anger, sadness, joy, desperation, boredom...
Today was a day of extremes... It started off on a sour note when I went to the lab an hour late... Because I didn't wake up earlier...I started to work again after two days of taking a break ... Because none of my experiments were working and I thought taking some time off might help me think better.. or maybe i just needed to freak out...
so today i went thro with a few changes to my existing protocol after some vigorous searching through the internet...full of hope, optimism and positivity.... but God had other plans for me in store... the experiment failed again... and it has been close to a month... i was fed up.. lost.. desperate.. dejected and downtrodden...
i racked my brains hard to think what the problem could be.. And came up with zilch.. And so as the day dragged on.. Coffee break.. chit chat... lunch.. browse aimlessly... Coffee break again.. browse more aimlessly ( dont ask me what the difference between aimless and more aimless is.. that probably is the most aimless question....)... And then it so happened that Vignesh, my senior had booked tickets for a cultural program by the students of NUS... Frankly, given my state of mind, i wasnt quite looking forward to it...
So thats the bad half of the day...The better half will come tomorrow / in my next post , which hopefully should be sometime soon.. Its 1 AM here and my biological clock hasn't seen this time for quite a while..
adios
Today was a day of extremes... It started off on a sour note when I went to the lab an hour late... Because I didn't wake up earlier...I started to work again after two days of taking a break ... Because none of my experiments were working and I thought taking some time off might help me think better.. or maybe i just needed to freak out...
so today i went thro with a few changes to my existing protocol after some vigorous searching through the internet...full of hope, optimism and positivity.... but God had other plans for me in store... the experiment failed again... and it has been close to a month... i was fed up.. lost.. desperate.. dejected and downtrodden...
i racked my brains hard to think what the problem could be.. And came up with zilch.. And so as the day dragged on.. Coffee break.. chit chat... lunch.. browse aimlessly... Coffee break again.. browse more aimlessly ( dont ask me what the difference between aimless and more aimless is.. that probably is the most aimless question....)... And then it so happened that Vignesh, my senior had booked tickets for a cultural program by the students of NUS... Frankly, given my state of mind, i wasnt quite looking forward to it...
So thats the bad half of the day...The better half will come tomorrow / in my next post , which hopefully should be sometime soon.. Its 1 AM here and my biological clock hasn't seen this time for quite a while..
adios
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