Last blog..

This is gonna be my last blog in a while.
Am in the process of shifting and re-orienting , and have a busy schedule ahead of me :)
Wish me luck !

Left wing with BBQ sauce

The Great Gatsby
Not a mean break to comment on F.Scott Fitzgerald's take on the "American Dream" and its "destruction". Just another dollar chaser's dream crashing and burning. A journey through the seven seas, to get to a land diametrically opposite, to find something, while trying to lose all that is your own. Bequeathed by generations, destroyed by us. There is irony here. India is a mini-america now. You are never too far away from it. I'm preparing for a reverse cultural shock. Something I love to brag about, something I am going to go through soon, when I land, I hope.

Moored
Am looking at Micheal Moore's take on America. Branded left-wing, anti-American, anti-capitalist, socialist, his vitriolic style and method of getting his point across has won acclaim among the foreign press (French poster boy). It's all boiled down to name calling : traitor or not, rather than have a healthy debate on the points he has raised. But to be fair, if I were an American I'd be baying for his blood too. Its interesting to see a rabid left-winger trying hard, to push for a paradigm shift in politics in America today from popular right-extreme-right convictions. In fact Moore has a parallel in indian intellectual circles, in the form of a frail woman, Arundhati Roy, who wields the pen, and talks about her books and convictions from time to time. Her take on the genocidal tendencies of successive Indian governments, using "terror" as an instrument of subjugation and putting down civil rights, may seem to be the case of unbridled vitriol and paranoia, to us seated in the middle class, but you cannot dismiss her lightly. We tend to gloss over gross rights violations, partly due to impunity on the part of the police and the failure of the judiciary in convicting just about anyone guitly beyond reasonable doubt. It's ironical to call America the land of the free with just under 1% of its population in jails, and sharing 25% of the world's inmate population. Which begs the question : Is crime rampant in the more poor countries , or is it worse in the country which has and controls 3/4th's of resources available to mankind?

Euro Furo

Aye Caramba !
Portugal trump Dutch and Greece wallop Czechs.. my my , I'd have bet 100$ the other way on both those matches. Sheesh.. Bad guessing I guess :)

Growing Pains

Kids are inherently silly and are prone to easy manipulation. Its fun to toy with them, and keep them hanging from a thing rope from time to time. They are almost like people but so much easier to fool, unless they are retarded already. I mean , who hasn't grown up with their parents telling them the most atrocious lies. You don't come to realizing you have been duped until you are out of your teens and staring down possible family commitments. You think about the false promises, the campaign of disinformation and the constant threat in case you tried to call their bluff : You might think you were living under the George Bush administration!
It's fun to see them try though, their efforts are honest. Sometimes I feel growing up is a part of undoing education. You may learn new things, but you lose something most important that kids have : impulse. Kids say and do the darndest things and put their politically and morally correct grown ups to shame. I headed to a friends place some months ago, he showed me a tire strung very high to a tree and asked me if I wanted to take a swing. I said no : Was thinking , fall, health insurance and recovery period. As a kid I had my elbows and knees scratched so bad my mom thought my skin would never grow back in those places.
It doesn't take much to entertain a kid. Growing up is such a bitch.

Shakespeare's Foible

I think Shakespeare's play "Merchant of Venice" is one obscenely racist piece of work. Have that today , and you will hear from left wing groups , blacks, Jews, and everyone. The tone is explicit in the hatred towards Jews. Its possible, for the mood in those days to have been anti-Semetic , and that Shakespeare did nothing but reflect those views rather than present his own, it just doesn't seem right. In today's context its stereotypical and bigoted. Also Portia's arguments in court *where she gets to be a lawyer through deception* to save Antonio's ass, seems like she needs a little Law 101.
Anyway, its too anachronistic to have such stories to be played out in this day and age. Was just watching an episode of "The Family Guy" Where Peter Griffin , the dope, bastardizes "The king and I" to such an extent its more like a 30th century porno flick, and is loved by the audience. Isn't that what it's all about, selling smut to the audience , because the audience wants smut? Does the audience affect the paint brush on the canvas of an artiste or does art influence and shape public perceptions? Never can tell, the audience will always be protective , cover their ears and run off when they see or hear someting contrary to their belief. Farenhrit 9-11 seems to be one of those left-wing conspiracy theory documentaries, I'd love to go watch it. Screw you "White Chicks" .

Movie Time..

I love horror movies. Sadly they don't make too much of it and most of them end up in the comedy section. I was scared out of my wits as a 6 yr old watching evil dead , now when i see it i start laughing! Exorcist is still a creepy movie , i cant wait to see the beginning of the exorcist :)
Am watching stephen king's "pet sematary", love his books, takes a little imagination and his words to make the spine tingle. good works in the pipeline i hope !

Ring Ring..

If I go to the movies, spend 8$, and I hear you sit behind me with a cellphone with a ringtone set to Hillary Duff's latest, I will have your balls along with my pop- corn. I bloody swear I will. If it says cellphones off , there is no reason you need to take that call. You are not important , and please don't spoil my movie going experience.
And grandma who can't understand what the fuck is going on in LOTR 3 because you haven't seen parts 1 or 2, take a fucking hike, read the book or watch the movies. Please STFU and stop asking : Ooooh who is he.. oh the guy you already told me about 5 mins ago and 5 mins before that.
It isn't too much to ask for you to keep your mouth shout, or chew some popcorn or stick a soda in your mouth. I recommend an adult pacifier for the itchy inquisitive movie goer who cant comprehend something as simple as the Hollywood movie. It aint rocket science.

You've got mail!

It's amazing how the internet has changed the way we meet new peoplle. I've known quite a few friends with a penchant for chatting endless hours on end , in brainless chatrooms, who have actually hooked up with another person. Although I can't vouch whether they form the perfect match, it seems a swell idea. You can have a life spending endless hours on the net instead of going out to socialize. Turns closet freaks into amiable party animals? Maybe , maybe not.
I remember subscribing to some kid magazines, back in the olde days. There was a large 2 page section in this magazine called Target, devoted entirely for kids who wanted to make "pen-pals". Eager kids would put up their name and address and anyone could reply stating their interests. If they found you cool, they'd write back. It was 15 years ago but long distance phone calls were out of the question. It force you to sit down and devote a ream to writing about things. Did'nt matter what. Whatever was on your 10-year old mind. I wrote to someone. He never wrote back. That was the end of it. But I would read about these kids who'd write in and say how they had made new friends. I gave up after that one effort. Maybe the kid died, or maybe he hated my guts, whatever. No idea. Just some village kid, after all.
The internet is a nice way for shy people to start out making new friends. You need to sift through a lot of coal and rock to find a diamond. Be safe, and use good judgement. Everything isn't black and white.

Garfield the movie : Recipe for failure

Some comic strips never make good movies. Garfield is definitely one of them. Cartoons have been stagnant for over 40 years thanks to lack of tools for better animation. Better tools have definitely driven animators towards easier and faster creation of their favorite charachters. Garfield is so 80's and somehow doesn't fit into the type of humor one expects these days . South Park is the benchmark for satirical humor today. Real crappy animation doesn't stop it from making a point. Garfield has all the animation but its a conecpt gone as stale as the Disco era. Yawn . The concept and execution suck so much I will never ever go to watch it . Ever. Not if my life depended on it. It sucks , it fucking sucks , that's the end of it. No garfield you are not funny any more , may be 20 years back when we had nothing else to read on the Sunday comic page we laughed at your antics. But when you do the same thing over and over and over again for 20 years , people get tired and bored. Reinvent or perish.
I implore people not to watch the movie. The end of the world is nigh.

Land of the dweebs

Was watching an ad on TV : Oral B - Brush Up. It's a product you slip on your finger to brush your teeth.
It's ironic with the Atkins craze, Americans don't find time to brush their teeth. If its something of a convenient way to clean your teeth after meals, I wonder why nobody thought of a way all these years.
hmmmmmm ..
Its called a toothbrush

The flame dies here!

Interesting news byte

"PT Usha declines last-minute invite"

The IOC *Indian Olympic Committe* 's gaffe. A committee whose primary aim is to send more accompanying members than sportsmen to the Olympics. A shining example of all the Olympic gold's that India has ever won (Just 3 medals in over 70 years of participation and none of them gold!). A very interesting statistic. And the only member who came ever so close to making it in the top 3 , has been snubbed in a manner that can only happen in a country like India. The only athletic achiever in a nation of 1 billion had almost been given the cold shoulder in a bizzare act of ungratefulness by the IOC. The last minute invite didn't go down too well with the former athelete and she declined the invitation.

It's very easy to fix blame when it comes to the lack of genuine athletic talent in India. The lack of infrastructure, no money, lack of proper diet, lack of decent playground parks or recreational areas and the genuine attitude of people towards sporting activity in general. It's quite ironical, with fewer people having a genuine interest in any athletic sporting activity , the field is quite open (Forgive the pun, I assure you I do not have the Times of India syndrome).

In comparison the Chinese whip (literally) their atheletes into shape. I have seen videos of a four year old chinese girl who was unable to stay upside down while was beaten with a cane, while she was still in that position. The poor kid cried her guts out. What, you may ask is the penalty one has to pay for Olympic glory ? Pretty high I guess, to be the best in the world and to be settle for nothing less. It's often a matter of national pride, and none of that seems to be evident the way the IOC bears itself. I bet that Suresh Kalmadi doesn't know the first things about sports. Its a vicious cycle of putting dinasours in positions where vision, forthrightness and youth are important to drive people. I don't envisage any hope , direction or improvement with politicians at the helm. He did set a goal of 10 golds in 2000, well surprise, surprise it fell through. Even hockey doesn't seem to be a sure bet for a medal these days. The only other country which is consistently as bad or worse than India is Pakistan. Let's just not go there, terrorism isn't an Olympic sport yet folks.

If it weren't for cricket, Indians wouldn't be playing any sport at all. Alas, cricket isn't an Olympic sport.. yet :)

Pun Intended..

So my friend showed me there was more to the Times of India website (www.timesofindia.com) (than the sorry excuse of a website they have, and I'm just referring to the content). I was browsing through the ePaper version, which took a while to load, even on my cable modem and 802.11g home network. So finally when the page did load, I got to read the actual Indian newspaper, a nice touch I thought. But my eyes kind of skipped the whole TOI crap on top and I skimmed to some neat pictures and color photographs of gyrating Bollywood Stars, for a moment I though I was on page 3 of the rather infamous Bombay Times. To me the whole facade seemed like some cosmo-vanity fair hybrid. And all this from a newspaper which claims maximum circulation , although they always seem to be at loggerheads with Hindustan Times every year after the "results" are out.
To me, the day the newpaper group got into Entertainment and promotion for movies, it sounded the death-knell of good journalism. I have been reading this newspaper since I was a kid, what we have now is nothing but a pale shadow of the past. Changes are obvious and forseeable , but what peeves me is the abysmal quality of news reporting. Somehow the seriousness has all been squeezed out of the news , and all that is left is a cheap thrill tabloid report. What really baked my noodle were the "eye-catching" headlines I read :

"Anastasia is Mys Paris" // Sports
"Married Sehwag turns Bachelor, of Arts" // Sports
"In the house , now for the party" // Politics

Oh, my god, this is awful awful pun. This is just a sample of an endless bevy of bad rhymes, something you'd see upfront on the TOI website as well. Most of them are childish and some of them don't even make good puns. It just seems like a bad punch line taken out of the Sitcom "Friends". Does TOI consciously make an effort at producing such terrible headlines? You know what I think ? That they actually have a "Pun Department" , which takes in all the blase headlines and news reports from the reporters and the editor, and make an effort to see the pun in every situation. Haven't got a pun ? Improvise . Still not working ? Jam a few terrible non-sensical words .. Still doesn't work ? Use Hindi too yaar.. Amazing, you just gave a bunch of college hippies from South Bombay some brilliant work to do. Thank you for ruining journalism. Thank you for ruining a good newspaper and making my mornin coffee taste bad. Thank you for making reading in the Bathroom a whole shitload of pain. Get the pun , eh Times of India ?

QOS : A Case for Air-India

Air-India is India's flagship carrier for destinations in India and abroad. It has been providing civilian transport and disaster relief for nearly 70 years. What started off initially as Tata Airlines, has now rooted itself, as a loss making Public Sector Unit (PSU), with a diproportionately large number of employees on its pay-roll to ever make profits.
Indians who have ever travelled abroad and who have ever travelled Air-India would talk about the uniqueness of Air-India as opposed to other airlines. What normally gets them talking, is how every one of them has been ill-treated by the cabin crew and dismiss it as a junk airliner running on onygen provided by the federal government. What is not unique is the innumerable number of complaints the passengers seem to encounter whenever they set foot on the airliner.
It takes a lot of guts to be the devil's advocate, I must admit. I also would ask you to not call my client (in this case Air-India) the devil. Lets just call it the alleged devil . Most of your charges will not stick by the end of my blog.
A lot of sympathy that is generated within me for the airline may be partially attributed to the fact that my fathe ever worked there. What you see as blatant partiality, I like to call insight. I have heard my father talk about his work, and the people he ever worked with and it tells me a lot about the charachter of the organization.
For anyone who has ever come down to India and went back, was asked this one question : "how would you, if you could, summarize India in a nutshell?". The reply is swift :"Are you crazy, there is no way you can summarize India in a page, or a book". There is a word though :"multi-dimensional". To me this little aside captures the essence of Air-India the bloated organization. Its a company trying to find its feet in the myriad of people manning it. To me, its the heart and soul of being an Indian, in a way. We find India, too, in a very similar way. There is little understanding of the effort to push India forward, but the effort does come from various quarters.
As I talk to people, and I recount their experiences which have almost always been in the negative, it just seems to be plain hyperbolic extensions of "He said, She said" and making that apply to their experiences. Self-deprecation is a wonderful thing, and it is very common among Indians. What is also common is to bring anything and everything, Indian, down with the person. I have heard absolutely ridiculous comments from people : " The cabin crew attendant refused to give me head phones and instead asked me to sleep and not disturb him ", to " they refused to serve me food without onions in them". Most of these people also harp on the wonderful services provided by British Airways and such in comparison. I have travelled by these airlines, and as a guy who speaks French as the only other International Language, I find it very alien in these airlines, have had problems aplenty with lost luggage and not too friendly people at the check in counters either. I ask these people how do they measure QOS on airliners; they can not reply. To people who find it difficult to even eke out the 1400$ for the return fare from the US, expecting amazing service, the Queen's banquet as cuisine and having the cabin crew be your personal slave, means QOS , I'm sorry you are grossly mistaken. If you do expect that kind of service bump yourself upto club class or First class. But please be reasonable.
For old-timer Indians, Air-India is a very comfortable environ to travel , since they do not have language barriers. There is a certain degree of compassion toward a fellow Indian you can only expect from another. That is something even a courteous German or a British cabin crew member may not be able to provide.

Ye olde days..

Just reminiscing after watching all the sloppy 80's countdowns on VH1. Yes, I was born at the turn of the decade and enjoyed the 80's. A notoriously gay decade though, with all the suspicious dress sense, synth-line based music, bad rapping (white rappers).

I was just thinking about my lil' BMX bike from those days. Right now some other kid is probably riding it, maybe it's lying in some landfill. It was this wonderful white and red BMX bike, something which I was real proud of, since I was the only one among my friends to ever own one. The temptation for a kid not to perform stunts on a bike like that, well, is a little too overwhelming. The bike was all about need for speed and X-treme stunts. My favorite was doing a 360 near the grocery store. I'd rev it all up and head to this slightly dusty patch and hit the brakes real hard and stop in the opposite direction. It always got the requisite attention among my peers, the oohs and the aahs and the self-ego-preservation for any red blooded kid who loved showing off.

Somehow most stunts were improvised, none of them done with any kind of safety equipment, I didn't even have a helmet, far from having one I'd never even heard of helmets for riding bikes. That was sissy, only for girls in their little pink cycles with the confetti hanging out. No sir, no safety for me. I had to attempt this slow dive off this sand dune, near a construction/repair site. All was well until I realised with no velocity at the end of the "ramp" all I was gonna do was head straight down. No time for a physics lesson here Newton, I was 11 and I was gonna nail it, until my bike fell down first, since it weighed more , and my scrawny bony body landed on top of the miserable heap of metal. I swear I had some internal concussion , I could'nt move for 5 minutes or so, but I remember my friends dragging me away , with the occassional tsk-tsk's , as if to say : "We told ya so". Yea right, like that ever stopped me from doing crappy stunts for you.
I do remember this kid , who had a bike similar to mine, but had a lot of frills and a plastic cover on the rear tyre instead of spokes like mine did. It was this instinctive animal behavior, when we faced off for the first time. Like the two of us were on fire breathing horses, circling each other, in a very nature red in tooth and claw statement, the first to back down loses. The bluff was'nt called, neither of us blinked and we rode past each other.

I do remember looking at his rear tyre and going : Whoa that has got to be aerodynamic. There is no chance in hell my ride is going faster than his. Never to be outdone my friends egged me on to a race off. We selected a fairly uneven stretch of turf not too far away from home and lined up. The race was short and furious, but the outcome was foregone. I may have lost the race, but I never cursed my bike. Somehow it was sacred to me. And by then she was old, a little rusted here and there, and gave years of performance and cool action even when I got into tight spots. I may have lost that one face-off with the cheap imitator, but I still haven't lost my respect and love for the old BMX'es. Which is why now I still love riding bikes, albeit well-powered, and my brother rides a Ducati.

I see kids these days on their PS2's and Xboxes and I feel I was lucky to ever know what it meant to ride a bike and do stuff. I'd trade all those scraps, bruises and band-aids for your games. I didn't need anybody to tell me to go out and have some fun. I was always there ...

Starting e-blog..

Welcome to my blog :: Randomly Coherent.
I haven't specified a purpose for the blog as yet, but I should be putting up some short essays.
Most of the essays will focus on human behavior and social-issues, strategic interests, civilian and military technology updates.
As I've said its all randomly coherent , expect a lot more !
I am trying to make a religious effort at trying this out, until I am out of time!

Well read on and I expect feedback on my views at ircdodger at yahoo dot com.

Peace Out
Harish V