Crossroads

Trying to cross a street at 10 pm at Madiwala Bangalore to catch my ride home..
But first I need to cross the street to get to the stand -
Here is the "Blair Witch" type video on my brave and perilous journey.
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BTW Happy New Year :

Which Pulp Fiction Character are you?

I turned out to be the big bad Mutha Marcellus F Wallace..
The F stands for ST F Up or else I will eat your children!

Here is the link : http://www.pyrrha.org/pulp/

Your name alone strikes fear into others; but maybe, just maybe, there's a little vulnerability and weakness beneath that stoic, fierce exterior of yours. Take the What Pulp Fiction Character Are You? quiz.

Me & Sea Biskit

I was at the Embassy Riding School in Devanhalli, on the way to the new Bangalore Airport. It's spread over close to 250 acres of pristine real-estate, far away from the din and hum drum of the Eastern Silicon Valley. All my apprehensions of riding a giant spitting, kicking and insolent animal with a twitchy instinct was well laid to rest at the end of the day.

Mounting a horse isn't as simpile as it looks - especially if you or the horse carry a few spare tyres below the mid-riff area.
Holding the reins is an obvious key part of learning to make a horse go. You kind of clasp the reins in your middle 3 fingers while the thumb holds it over and the pinkie supports it under. A little foot-tap to the left or right along-with a tug of the taut reins push the stallion left or right. Its kind of key to not let the reins lurch over.



Adjusting the stirrup

The moment I mounted Slim, he went about munching the turf - a couple of kicks later, he decided to lurch forward. Honestly, if you thought riding a horse was bad, you should try a camel. I don't know how you keep your wits about, 10 feet off the ground, half suffering from vertigo, and half nauseated with all that swooning.
There was the handler hanging around my horse, and for some reason thought he neede to adjust the straps underneath the saddle - my horse absolutely didn't like it - now my handler had told me to keep my feet up front, to you know be able to kick the horse - now when the horse got pissed, it turned around and the first thing it would find is my juicy calf muscle - I had to check if this particular horse was a vegetarian.. Sometime later Slim settled down.
A few rounds around the paddock later, we did a quick trot, just about once, for about 50 metres, and I can assure anyone - the family jewels take a serious serious pounding, along with the lower back..



Riding the BEAST [His name : Slim Shady :-)]

Dismounting a horse requires a little bit of athleticism, and common sense. The first part I have, the second part is sometimes questionable - you need to get your feet out the stirrups - check - getting 7 feet off the ground in one action - hmmmm not quite sure - so I bent over forward and slid off the saddle. Phew, embaressment avoided!


Walking off, Veni Vidi Vici...

The 2nd half was to corral the ponies, my pony was called Muffin - and he was a docile chap - the others were little monsters running around - so I had an easy time - just pulling the chap over to the fence, tying in a reef-knot, and asking him to just settle down - after which we settled in to brush the little bugger, and what came out looked like horse-dandruff- not exactly highlight of the day!


Yeee-haawwww : Cowboy tackling the trouble-makers [note who leads who!]

The Hidden Power of Rhetoric

Oft times, we find ourselves tongue tied in situations. Situations where you plumb the depths of your vocabulary, situations where you attempt to find the best riposte and situations where you try to overwhelm your opposition with just the right words.
Certain other situations lend themselves to allow you the speaks to have an element of preparation to woo and wow the audience.
In this day and age of progress, financial turmoil, violent religious fervor and unprecedented overall greed and selfishness unseen in humanity of the past, it is important to dwell on what motivates us. How are we any different from being forced into action by a hate speech, or one of religious calling from say the time of Adolf Hitler or Nero? I doubt if very little has changed, except for the verbosity of speeches which may be contemporary, but the speech in itself would be so mired in bombast, rhetoric and pithy platitudes that we've in essence been listening to the same record, year after year, century after century and have somehow unwittingly not been able to assess the underlying driver behind all of them - to me the driver is Rhetoric

So what is Rhetoric?

Rhetoric in itself is a branch in politics and distance from logic. Not alarmingly it finds its best proponents in politicians, leaders and various religious rabble rousers over time. It is not far removed from political debate, courtroom arguments, and the typical lets-tighten-our-belts kind of speech given by hopeless CEO's in times of crises. While there are many branches to rhetoric, depending on which end of the chain it gets applied - we often as a humand race find solace in lofty words, false promises, and hope for a better dawn. How else do you explain time after time when people go out to exercise their franchise to listen to the bijli-sadak-paani nonsense time after time - bewitched by the utopian promises by spineless politicians and yet end up voting option 1 or option 2 back in power on a flip-flop. It really doesn't - we know what we like to hear, and our leadership panders to such cravings. Rhetoric is a key essence of motivation, however it loses its place in actual problem solving - If I, as an engineer, listened to a bombastic routine from any of my top management and if they could actually see the smirk and smug look on my face they would immediately stop - certain problems call for immediate and quick resolution. All others which require healing over time, can have the woollen gauze of rhetoric applied over them...

"Chronos" - ne pas abuser

In Greek mythology Chronos is THE personification of time.
In the modern day and age, I, the author, upholds Chronos with the dignity he truly deserves.
One of the primary principles, my pet peeves, and something that I find more insulting than someone calling me a "curd-rice eating whore" is when people don't keep appointments.
Have you heard the : "I shall have it done by 5pm" at 6:30 pm?
Have you heard the : "I shall be there in 5 minutes" an hour later?
In this day and age, when people carry watches, have cellphones with alarms, it is basically disrespectful when you propose to have something or commit to something and not deliver it by that time. In fact I am even willing to go out on a limb and allow for some latitude in when you cannot finish that task, its only because you are human - what is not acceptable is that you take your own sweet time in telling me that you will be late.
Following are the rules
1. Make a time-related commitment with me, if and only if you can adhere to it. Or else tell me you will be done before I die of old age..
2. Do not let me know you wont be done after the deadline has passed. That is strictly unprofessional. Also not when the deadline is about to pass.
Two things tell me about a person who would call me if he/she isnt able to make it to an appointment well in advance. It tells me the persons cares about my time - if you don't respect my time, I don't have the slightest iota of respect for you as a person - I don't care if you are Warren F-ing Buffet.
And time management has nothing to do with if you are the giver or the taker in that particular relationship - self-respect above everything else. Business is secondary.
So if you plan to meet me, let me know when - and show up at that time. There has been no appointment - either personal or professional where I havent showed up 10 minutes of before it - It is a habit I cherish a lot, and it tells a lot to people about me as a person - it says "I care" in louder words and makes an excellent impression. I have my flaws, of which there aren't many ;-) , but if you matter to me in the slightest possible way you will have my respect, and you will have my time - Question is, do you respect my time, ergo do you respect me?

Of "Nice" sugar-biscuits and "Monaco" salt-biscuits

I was in Nice .. I still am at the time of writing this.. There are no big biscuit factories as I was lead to believe by the Parle biscuit manufacturers! In fact all "Nice" biscuits come from - hold your breath - Vile Parle!! Oh my God - I was duped as a kid!!
And while I was just settling in from the shock I went over to Monaco - expecting a nice salty treat - the ocean breeze from the Mediterranean blew into my face - aaaah mining the ocean to make biscuits - brilliant - even the Tata's couldn't have thought of this brilliant business idea, me thought! Just when I stepped in and out of a few stores to find out if I could get a tasty salty treat - unamused French shopkeepers shoo-ed me away - my despair grew into a saddened acceptance that Parle manufactures Monaco in, of all places, in Vile Parle! Oh, the duplicity of the Indians.. I was seething with rage.
Meanwhile I snapped a few pictures of the place - It wasn't too bad as one might think [;-)]

Nizza!

Imagine working in an office atop a mountain which overlooks the azure blue mediterranean sea..
Been there, done that..
Here I am in Nice [Nizza], France - and the picture is of me atop one of the mountains in a place called Villeneuve-Loubet.




Yes that is a HELIPAD! SWEET innit?

Right or Wrong

Raj Thackeray beating up Biharis - WRONG
Biharis/UP-ites flooding Mumbai - WRONG
Shooting of Rahul Raj in a BEST BUS - RIGHT
Home Minister RR Patil's defence of the same - RIGHT
MNS Activists beating up Bihari candidates - WRONG
Ban demanded on MNS - Right
Murder of UP laborer on a Khopoli train - WRONG
Obama is the premier US Presidential candidate - by a long shot - WRONG
McCain, if in office, will carry out Bush policies - WRONG
Obama will be friendly towards India - WRONG
McCain will ruin the world like BUSH - WRONG
Republicans are bad, Democrats are good - WRONG
Palin is a nobody - WRONG
Malegaon blasts lead by Hindu Terror outfits - ??? No evidence thus far ???
Money collected in TamilNadu goes to Tamil relief - WRONG
India won't suffer on account of the global meltdown - WRONG
Shivraj Patil is useless, incompetent, and highly impotent - RIGHT

Only the good die young

Some of the greatest composers, writers and poets have died in penury.
Some of India's greatest mathematicians and poets have died unsung.
It is only in posterity that history grudgingly recognizes the brilliance of these men and then questions the manner in which they passed on.
Ramanujam was barely 32 or so when he died of tuberculosis. To think of the amazing things the man could have done if someone had seen him for a brilliant mathematician and not some poor brahmin. How many in India actually study what his contributions are to mathematics. I knew about him in school because he was a tamil brahmin, and because he died a young man. I think we had like a chapter on him in school.
The poet/writer Subramaniya Bharathi was barely 39 when he died - A dozen people showed up at his funeral.
I quoted one of his poetries, albeit translated into english, at one of the poetry competitions in school - the rhetoric, the heart-felt need for social change, and the burning pride of nationalism were amongst the foremost messages that come from the man.
Needless to say, I only won first prize but only because I quoted his vision. He was a champion for change and strove to break down the caste barrier. People prefer EVR Naicker's idol breaking ways to Bharathi's peaceful methods. So much for the dravidian gratitude.

It is heart wrenching to see such souls not know what they could have been had they lived their fullest lives. And even so with the marginalization of the tamil brahmin community in dravidian south India with the Periyar effect and what not.

Outside India as well, it must be admitted the best and brightest came when their childhood was filled with poverty, and they had to fight their way to the top based on pure genius. And true genius finds a way, and has many takers in today's world. A lot of today's "geniuses" are products of schools that tend to push them out the door like production lines. Solving problems are a banal task - The best and brightest are the ones who conjure up the problems - and then find a way to resolve them. The latter in my mind isn't as important as the former. That is the difference between a guy who does research and the guy who has a job at the office - some luxuries are to be afforded to research on account of the nature of the job. The research culture is non-existent in India. We are all glorified IT coolies.

Creativity finds its outlets when people are pushed to corners - to think differently and to come up with solutions. I don't think Einstein ever did anything without the love for it.

Identify, appreciate and nurture talent. But don't let people get over their heads because of it. The worth of the individual is only as long as he/she contributes significantly in any domain. And look through the rocks - you will find the diamonds you oh-so-badly need. And appreciate if for what they can do for you, not for who they are or where they come from.

The Palin McCain campaign

Those were Sarah Palin's exact words - not the McCain-Palin campaign but the Palin-McCain campaign. Okay so she has more testosterone than the flagellating septugenarian - okay, we understand that she comes from a state so RED [read republican], that it makes the texas chainsaw massacre look like a garden of yellow tulips.
Wait - so what was Palin's qualification again - Wait what was George Bush's qualification again? He went to Yale - phhbbttt - "Is our children learning" - yeah right. Who cares?

The elections to the highest posts are not made on degrees - this isn't a job interview at Microsoft. Its an administrative position. Emotions are involved rather than issues - topics get discusses but not issues. Slander is the order of the day, political nitpicking, mud-slinging, its all cool.
Politicians don't make laws - Congressmen and their lobbyists make laws - who reads them all - only the lawyers on the payrolls or parties, and bureaucrats do. Politicians are the pretty faces of the bureaucrats - at the end of the day Red or Blue a bunch of lawyers with connections to big business houses enact laws. Period. All else is just an eyewash. You could roll a dice and choose Obama/Biden over McCain/Palin - it really doesn't matter. When push comes to shove America is never known to hold its punches - Democrat or Republican they will come at you like a tonne or bricks.

So Palin's claim to fame may not be something more than a few paragraphs long. But then this was never about the issues - it was about a public face to push for an agenda to continue the Iraqi war and push the economy, although unknowingly, into a quicksand of self destruction - hey, more power to see them go - with them so will China, the sweatshop of the world. Good riddance to both. God bless India!

Dancing with the Engineers

Dancing with the Engineers :
Contestant 1 : He wrote the Linux kernel and now he is here to do the Salsa...
Contestant 2: He designed the chip with a complete optical interconnect, and he is here to do the Cha-Cha.

Now that's what I call a show!
Okay so quick background check.

Engineers - people who can fix-er-up your satellite dish to your toaster, so you could cook breakfast while you watch re-runs of the Starship Enterprise. Aaah, the breed of nerds, haunched over their laptops, pummelling their keyboards. Give us a bag of Lays, a nice soda [preferably diet, we want to watch that figure, as much as the next seat does ;-)] and a C compiler, and we will bring the world to you!

I digress.
This was meant to be a blog post on us engineers; of us our "moves" on the dance floor. I mean while we can co-ordinate those cruddy semaphores and mutexes in perfect binary unison, we find it difficult to do the two-step on the dance floor. But fear not - on my current trip to Finland I've found the perfect recipe to produce dancing engineers - Its called an on-site in October.
Or as I see it pictorially: o| o
And those are the exact components in the male anatomy which freeze over first in the weather. There I was life going along swimmingly in rustic Bangalore - aah the smell of fresh garbage and IT coolie sweat wafting through the early morning vortex of traffic at Bellandur junction. How I miss that! But here I am finding my penchant for all those dance moves.

In class 4, Mrs. Fernandes taught me as part of a dance routine for the annual day function. She called it the gypsy dance - I have no idea how I got into it - teachers would pick volunteers - I call them conscripts. This was worse than the army - I mean here you are a pre-pubescent 10 year old with a 40 year old woman screaming in your face to get your damn steps right. Since I was the tallest kid in the entire dancing troupe I got pushed to the end of the dance routine - or perhaps I was the worst and hence got send there, but I never really cared to find out. I came out with flying colors!

So here's to finding novel ways to keeping warm and keeping fit. Head to Scandinavia for the winter. I am sure you will find the right moves to compete in the next edition of "Dancing with the engineers"!

Don't forget to unpack your woolies!
My shoulders are haunched in the picture because my folks wanted to see me in something other than my crummy pull-over. Here Ma, I stand before thee - a frozen popsicle :-(
Oh and I call that the Robot-Dance.

Tampere - September 2008

Its been a pretty hectic trip - I was in 4 cities over a 5 day period and the daily travel was demanding but I didn't feel the physical strain of it thanks to awesome Finnair, and VR for making all those rides feel comfy.


Tampere is the 3rd largest city in Finland.
Its not exceedingly pretty or a world class city by any stretch of imagination. The entire city has the pulse of say - Kormangala in Bangalore [okay maybe just 1st block].
I love walking around the place though - with its well manicured roads, walkways and greenery all around even in September.
The temperature is down to 8 degrees even on most days, but its bearable without the chilly nippy wind, and ice-cold rain.




Its about that time of year - Fall Colors as they used to call it back in North Carolina - leaves are a-changing, to brilliant hues of yellow, and violet. I heard the Laplands are a must-visit at this time of the year to witness the beautiful color changes, but alas I am a little pressed for time on this trip - Perhaps some other time?



I sit across the embankment - to the left of this picture - there are a few trees and park benches - to just sit and watch the water fall across a 20-foot cascade. The wild life consists of a bunch of ducks swimming around. There are a few kids who fish too - although I haven't seen anyone catch anything.


Shopping has been a dissapointment though - I head to the local flea-markets, supermarkets, malls - with an open mind to buy anything which would be considered a souvenir to take back home - I haven't been rewarded yet - today is my last weekend in this place, so let me see if I can scope something out to take back home. All I have left is my memories [ and there aren't a lot of them ;-) ]

Blast in

So another day another blast.
A kid got killed, twenty-odd people injured.
The government's reaction - boo-fuc#ing-hoo.
The opposition's reaction - screw the government over
The people's reaction - am I okay? Now let's move the fuc% on
Terrorists reaction - soft targets, they are worse than pussies....

Time to reflect on what is and what has been, the Indian government's policy on security and value for human life - ZILCH.
The following institutions in my mind are responsible for the security of the country
1. Police
2. Armed Forces
3. Intelligence

The less said about cops the better - they are not equipped to handle a house break-in, what will they do deciphering emails and cryptic messages. Fat pouty corrupt bastards all of them, if they ever get time from lining their obese pockets and making out with the political top brass, they would get off their fat asses and do something about it.
The armed forces are devoid of motivation - the top brass is a piece of crap without the balls for surgical strikes and are stifled with myopic vision. The junior cadres are more interested in raping the locals after being away from family for just 2-3 months [heck there are millions of IT professionals who do this, you don't see them raping americans while they are onsite!], and the officers are busy pushing into more lucrative careers prospects in the public sector and who can blame them?
The intelligence setup in india is set up from cops, and well, the iterative venom I spewed on cops basically applies here too.

There is no respite for you, the common indian from this - there are good chances, that you the reader is one of the victims some time in the future. As for your fight/effort to get rid of the scourge of terrorism, look no further - the people who are supposed to be doing their jobs are out screwing the country. Take a good look around, there is no one to save soft targets like you - you and this country are fuc$ed.

Poverty is terrorism

I saw a beemer go on the road yesterday while I was driving my "fuel efficient" Suzuki around. The inside of me just threw up a little bit. How dare, would one on account of his shameless display of capitalist leanings drive around in a vehicle so expensive and so unique, whilst I, the white collared pseudo-IT coolie be so harshly delegated to the banal annals of auto-uncool-dom?
Then I went home and switched on NDTV - a channel so red with its dazzling display-color and political hue, that I got hooked on to it like Fardeen Khan on smack. They had a variety of people on it - but mostly Human Rights activists with a penchant for barking - Infact I named one female the "Rottweiler", and the other minority loving fur-bucket as "Bulldog". So Rottie and Bulldog seem to be saying India's collective failure in providing for its citizens meant home-grown terrorism would come and bite the nation in its proverbial-ass. We are a poor country, they whined at high frequency, so high that only other dogs could hear. We are poor, and hence we cannot provide for our citizens. I see, so if somehow with the flick of a switch we were as rich as the Luxemborg-ians, we wouldn't have this problem, me thinks. But the time was not for a practical solution. Rottie and Bulldog were on song, one of those loud long howls which canines let out when they look at the moon - oooooh this as must watch TV. These folks had been saying what I was thinking all along - if you don't get what you want, its not just because you didn't try - it was becasue THE MAN wouldn't let you have it - free market capitalism without government intervention not bringing you out of poverty? Blame the Government! But India isn't a socialist economy you croak? WRONG! Thou shalst not turn away from your Nehruvian socialist roots, lest thou be banished to the dark recesses of political oblivion.
So I reflected back on that middle aged man with the beemer the other day - I don't have what he has not because I wasn't trying to get rich. And I knew how to get there - Terrorism. For when all else fails, taking lives of other people for money helps get you up the class ladder. Thank you NDTV, I am towards getting myself a 7 series.

The Dark-ened Knight

Sometimes when you come out of a movie theater you have a satisfied feeling. You feel riveted through the time you sat through the movie.
Hats off to Heath Ledger for making one of my favorite villains into my "Favorite Villain". I mean there are enough tributes paid to his role as the Joker in the Dark Knight, and I say he deserves each and every one of it. Its only tragic his life had to be cut short. All for what?
Well he did what is a quoted in the movie : You either die a hero, or you live long enough to become the villain. He quit when he was at the top - and what a top is has been. We will remember you for this one - R.I.P Heath Ledger, R.I.P

Kung Fu-ntastique

Kung-Fu Panda is easily the best animation movie to come out of Hollywood for some time now. Its been so long I forgot what was the last good pure animation movie I've seen in the last decade.
So Americans love the perpetual under-dog story. Little guy shackled in a boring life, suddenly gets thrust into the limelight, and a few montages later is ready to heed his call. Been there, done that a million times, and its not so much with the story line. After all its an animation movie. The animation is fast paced typical of kung-fu movie genre. Double takes, great dialogues, and great characters make this a good watch.
The only sad part was the movie was pretty short - 1:25 runtime is normal for movies of this nature, but I was just sad it all had to end. Some of the animators and story tellers had some amazing imagination because the fight scenes - especially Tailang's escape from prison, and the fight scene across the rope bridge were really amazing.
And the characters are all based on typical chinese good luck fortunes or cultural references, without any fake heavy accents - very neutral, very normal - without being caricatures. Its a feel good movie to go have a look at, and it sure has made my weekend.
I feel like a dragon warrior.

This lady is hilarious - She is a SW engineer [bleh, who isn't] but she breaks the monotony with her kavita in chaste Hindi - with a touch of American tadka.

I liked it a lot, so I'm paying her a little tribute.

Just posted a link to her youtube video on my blog.

Good take on matrimony in the Silicon Valley.

Funny Man - 1

Tell us a joke oh funny man
Tell us a joke tonight,
`Coz we are all in a mood for laughter,
And you've got us feeling all right..
La.. la .. la dee dee daa.. La dee dee daa...

[Shamelessly ripped from Billy Joel's album and song by the same name : Piano Man]

Watch for post 2 on this topic.
I plan a taxonomy of jokes. Something Darwinian. Like separating into different categories. Just not that exhaustive. Probably try a structured attempt at humor.

The Perpetual Fountain

Well before I post the remainder of the blog, let me put up a disclaimer.
It AINT possible. Nyet! You are not going to have a perpetual motion machine at least on planet earth.
The perpetual machine works on a simple concept. Well - just that isn't possible, but its a different matter. It states that the a perpetual motion machine works on the principle that it produces more energy output than its input energy. Now in the IT industry, we know people are over-paid slobs. But that's another matter. It is not possible for any machine, your mechanics text-books would tell you for you to build a machine which is > 100% efficient.
The main problem behind a perpetual motion machine obviously lies in the conversion losses. All reactions lead to losses in terms of either resistance or friction.
In the following picture, the classic case of the perpetual motion machine shows how friction on the shaft actually slows down the movement of the ball bearings.


There is a fountain in front of the place that I work - it has two simple levels across which water cascades as shown below.
My aim was to build an energyless [yea I know it sounds stupid - since I know what happens with perpetual machines], but I came up with this idea nevertheless.
Somehow I thought this was a panacea - although I kind of knew this wouldn't work, and it would be apparent to a high school student, I wasn't quite convinced otherwise. It took me a good 30 minutes before I figured out why.
Imagine the gardener who decided to build this perpetual fountain. The moment he drops water into the bigger tank it would start filling up the other tank as well. So what if I close the inlet valve between the two tanks you ask? Well the moment you open up the inlet valve, it is in the nature of water, and characterized by Bernoulli's principle that water will find its level, provided no external forces are acting upon it [energy input = 0 in my case], and so the tanks would try to level off. If the level in one isn't enough it will spill out of the shorter tank until it so reaches a volume [max height of small tank] where the two levels would reconcile and the fountain would stop. This has to do with the forces of gravity trying to ensure that the pressure exerted by one column of water downwards is the same as that by the other provided no other forces act upon it, and the redistribution of water levels ensure this parity.
Oh well, another day gone, and another lesson learnt.

Man's most brilliant creation

Of all the things that man has made, and he has made many, I am of the belief that music is the most abstract yet pleasurable creations ever. I am not one to willingly accept God, religion. I am a man of science who moves electrons without thinking twice, but there is poetry in the way the notes move on an instrument, or off the lips of a young female singer.
I was watching a movie last night - something I had seen back in 1998, its called Mr. Holland's Opus with the lead role played by Richard Dreyfus. It is a beautiful movie about one man's love for music, and why and how it mattered to him to make others love it as much as he did. But he struggles to teach his own son, who is deaf from birth, to love something which has been his life. What started out as a part-time job for him to make some money enough to get into composing for his own, turned on to become his life mission. To teach music to kids. To make them love it as much as he did. Not just reading notes, but to feel it through them.
In the end he gets a tribute for his 30 years of selfless devotion that brings tears to the eyes of those who watch as much as it did to Mr. Holland. What more could you ask for fulfillment in life?
The other movie that I liked, but was on a very different scale, was School of Rock - Jack Black is really amazing in his role as the fake substitute teacher. He made me love AC-DC again - he made hard rock cool, without the profanities. While a lot of the plot is suspended disbelief, he makes me love the way he loves to play.
Its a shame we in India never teach our children music in schools, except perhaps for the most priciest private schools. I learnt to play a little bit of the violin as a kid, and I learnt it more because I played by ear rather than learn music. I tried getting hooked on to the guitar but I never really caught on - and its sad. I love the beauty of music composition more than any other thing, and its the pleasure of hearing people create those melodies, which makes it all worthwhile.

Down at Fraggle Rock

When I was a kid, a couple of decades ago [sniffle, sniffle], I would watch this muppet series on TV on Saturday evenings. It was called Fraggle Rock.

Here is the intro song to every episode : The song is so friggin' timeless that even now 20 years later I recollect every word along with the funky claps in between the words as fillers, its just brings tears to my eyes...



So the fraggles are these tiny creatures without any leaders. And they love radish. They tend to steal the radishes from the garden of these 22 foot tall creatures called the Gorgs. The Gorgs are not the total evil neither good-natured idiots, and the Gorgs have never seen any civilization beyond their own family, and speak with a pronounced Southern [South as in America] accent. Which probably explains their almost trailer trash kind of existance.
Lots of interesting facts and features, include the talking garbage can/trash which spouts out worldly wisdom and advice. One of the characters had an uncle who travelled around the world, and made it a point to send postcards to his fraggle nephew. The nephew would risk life and limb everytime to go collect the postcard, as he had to negotiate a human [this was easy] and his eager to please gigantic furry dog.
I loved the fraggles, and looks like a few of their seasons are out on DVD. Would make a nice present though - and if I ever have kids, or if you have kids, I say this is highly recommended and clean viewing as compared to the Japanese nonsense conquering the screens of today. Its not highly moralistic, and has good entertainment value. And its nice to watch something that you grew up with, with your own kid, as it opens the nostalgia box.

Revenge of the Washing Machine

I threw in a load of my clothes to wash today into my Whirlpool top loader. She is not a very quiet machine especially when it comes to the final tumble cycle - but mostly she is a very good and spotless cleaner. I have had her for over a year now, and she has done an excellent job so far.
So as I said, I threw in a load today and was watching the telly. It was down to the last 7 minutes of the final rinse when my machine decided to tumble dry, but not where she stood. She had decided to take a little stroll around and explore other household items in the process. Needless to say the machine had jumped off its stand and was now ducking and weaving around like Muhammed Ali vs Joe Frazer. I had to come and tried to yank the electricity off, but she was cutting into my hand with those tubes and wires. Finally I managed to stop her.
I later found out the external stand she stands on was the culprit. A little weaker and out of shape after over a 100 washes in the past year. But it was quite disconcerting but funny nevertheless to see the machine go for a little stroll like that. It sure made my day!

Forgive me Lord..

For I have sinned.

Oh God, why have ye blessed me
with a tongue so sharp
And a wit so quick

I can't help but
Extricate myself out of situations
Where my mouth works
Faster than my brain

Lest I end up making fun of
That pretty little lady I meet
Can you please make something
Come out of me that sounds sweet?

Soaring the Skies

The thunderbird shall roar again..
She shall soar again,
Taking me underneath her wings
The chug of the engine,
The sound of the exhaust
The thump under the fuel tank,
Navigating the bends on the road
We shall visit places heard of
Once again..
The thunderbird shall soar again!

Problems in life? Get in the line, Dr. Freud will see you!

Often people pour their hearts out in emotional outbursts. They spill out their problems in life, in a manner befitting an Oscar. Very often, people love playing the wronged victim at the slightest hint of opposition or difficulty in their lives.
I have a lot or respect for people who are what they are despite all that. It shows true character. Anyone can notch up something good, when the going is good. But very often to get to a stage where the going is good, you need to make the right choices. A lot of times our choices result in unintended consequences, however it just seems logical that the paths we take influence the outcome more often than not.
There are times when the tide is against you, but that shouldn't stop you from swimming against it. I've seen the struggles and sacrifices I've had to make, and when I climbed that first peak, and then the second and so on, it was nothing but breathtaking to just cast a glance back and just exclaim : Wow, I did all that! And its the view from the top to the bottom that is the most breathtaking.

Buckle up Sally - for the ride is going to be rough. People who coast through life are very few in number. Remember when you rise to the top you can always weather any storm. For adversity is absolutely the truest test of one's abilities and character. For push comes to shove, you will be dancing around fate in the ring like Muhammad Ali.

My first IPL game

Delhi Daredevils took on the Chennai Super Kings last evening and I was there to catch all the action at the Chepauk Stadium.
Entertainment is the buzz-word for the T20 matches, and even as we setlled in at 5:45 pm well before the 8 pm scheduled start time, the singing from AS, and drumming from Sivamani kept people going through in the stifling heat.
The match, atleast the Chennai innings wasn't something to write home about. I suspected a good dismantling from Viru, and I got what I paid for - lusty hitting, great batting from the DD's. The last match I saw live was where Viru had taken on McGrath on day 4 of that cursed test where the last day got washed out. Watching his eye-hand coordination, his ability to pick up gaps was just pretty amazing. Even a couple of wickets in the kitty of the CSK team didn't do much to upset the DD applecart, but overall it was a one-sided and low scoring match which was expected given the departure of the CSK's Ozzy/Kiwi imports.
Overall, the IPL matches are a fun place to be in, where no matter who you cheer for, its an Indian team which wins the match.. Parochial sentiments set aside, the crowd in small measures enjoyed the brutal execution of Viru-Gauti.

Ill Effects of Alcohol

A study by some white folks, I won't even bother to look up to quote, reveals that "Alcohol impairs judgement."
Oh yea, you really think so? I mean wow, you people in the fake science community put your research grants to fantastic use. I mean seriously, who in the blazes doesn't know drinking alcohol makes your tongues wag, and basically gets you into bar brawls you'd normally eschew while sober?
India is trying to do two things here 1. Bring in "Stricter" laws to combat drunk driving. I think if you kill someone while you are drunk, its called "negligence", and 2. Bring down Vijay Mallya's surrogate (if you can call it that, I call it brazen) advertising via the IPL for his hooch factory called United Breweries. The health minister should have better things to do, as in providing basic health care - or atleast aiming to get a fatter budget for his department to aid in better health care for India's poor. Instead he is worried that 500 Rs. a bottle hooch is going to affect the livers of the 50-something diabetic/hypertensive old man running 10 factories, and who'd most likely head to the US/UK/Alps to get his next heart-bypass/gastric-bypass done. Long story short, people who can't afford Mr. Mallya's booze are not his target customers. And rich educated people know the choices they make before setting off on their bacchnalian orgies. Mis-placed priorities is what has screwed India's polity so far, and this Ramadoss character is one awfully good example of this. "Shut up and make a difference, Mr. Minister!"

An Inconvenient Trith - Global Warming, Myth or Myth?

I was watching Al Gore, not as a politician, but as a man of science, walk his way through genuine scientific-data, asking his audience to connect the dots on the problem that stares and slaps the world in its collective face. The one on global warming.
An inconvenient truth is a wonderful documentary. Pithy without being preachy, insightful without being alarmist, and crisp without being an overblown science lecture. Al Gore walks us through a series of informative data slides, peppered with some minor snapshots into his life, and how he has come to champion the cause of global warming, on his way to winning the Nobel prize in 2007-08.
While I am still a little skeptical on the effects of how human civilization has the scale to completely overwhelm the planet, it is not a bad idea to go with the statistics and try to rein in our respective carbon footprints. A lot of the initiative has to come from developed countries, and developing countries need to do their bit by dutifully acting upon suggestions and alternatives suggested by them. Countries like America have the wherwithal to perform research on renewable energy sources, which India and China need to take the lead in implementing such technologies.

Empathy for the aggressor

The Sree vs Bhajji case is a classic case of one where the abuser gets away because the victim retracts his/her word at the last moment fearing that any punishment to the aggressor would ruin the victim's relations with them. This is especially typical in lower income Indian families where women rely on their husbands as sole income providers. In any which case, there is no justification for violence of this or any other kind, the worst kind of abuse is that of people who you are supposed to care for and protect. And yes the BCCI is right in saying that this is not an open and shut case, to be resolved between the parties, because it totally ends up sending the wrong signal - that it is okay to beat up your teammate as long as you apologize for it, and make the other person feel stupid for feeling like a victim.
Bhajji deserves the ban that he gets, and while a life ban is completely out of place in a situation like this, a 10 match ban would send the right message across. This is a non-contact sport, and we prefer to keep the decency in the Indian dressing room. Now its almost like we are going the lawless Pakistan way. And the obnoxious little weed needs to learn its lesson. And maybe this could be used as an excuse to tell Sreesanth to clean up his act as well. Too much of that staring, chortling at batsmen, and brushing past shoulders is not very cute. Give it only when someone else dishes it out. I can almost see the Oz media thrilles to bits with what has happened. Shame on us..

Spicy Bhajji brings tears to Sree's eyes..

Flashback : Mumbai Indians lose to Punjab by one of the largest margins in the tournament. Harbhajan falls plumb LBW to Irfan off ball number 1.
Harbhajan, as Punjabi as Saag & Makki di Roti is in the Mumbai team, has to play against his home side. And he has to lead a bunch of no-hopers in the form of the Indians into yet another match without Sachin. Leadership weight heavy on his shoulders. As they teach you in Management school, even a bad boss can be made to look good so long as the employees slog, and are paid well. Which is where the Kolkata Knight Riders' captain Sourav Ganguly is lucky so far, and Harby has had to take a hit.
Post - match...
"Hard Luck, Mate" says Sreesanth smilingly to Harby.
"What the F is this guy smiling at?" thought Harby? "My ass is on fire here, and all he can say is Hard Luck. Let me slap his smug ass!"
THWACK! goes a right hand across Sreesanth's face...
"Ayappa!" went Sreesanth wilting under the ferocious inexplicable assault.
Once Sreesanth took a few moments to realize the folly of his smugness - all thoughts came back to his mind - maybe it was because he had dropped a few catches off of him? Or that his break dancing ways in the land of the bhangda annoyed him?
But the best reaction came from the two Aussies, Symmo and Hayders, who were last seen rolling around in their respective hotel rooms, wishing they could do the same and get away with it!
Oh, and by the way, as a side note, Bhajji needs to be disciplined in more than one way - We all have problems at our respective work places but getting physical is a big NO NO. There needs to be repurcussions.

The REAL Cricket Carnival Begins..

The 50-50 world cup ain't got shit on this form of the game. Who said the 20-over format doesn't showcase skill? Can you launch a 158 run plunder in 70-odd balls in any format of the game? Yes - then why doesn't anyone do it then? Really, I don't see an excuse why not!?
The inaugural desi-T20 tournament has begun. For a country which shunned T20, and then went on to beat all but one team to lift its first World Cup, this is remarkable progress. Indians have gotten a smack of the real-deal with the WC win, and that was the shot in the arm the game needed. It was a script Lalit Modi or the ICC couldn't have written any better. We are easily the best team in the format of the game, with the sloppy game at the MCG being the only blip on the radar of the 10 odd matches India has played so far.
And to think we spoilt our appetite leading up to the IPL with that horrible test-series against South Africa. I can't even name 5 members of the Proteas' squad without a long pause. The only reason I can re-call Graeme Smith's heroics was for his super-hot model girlfriend, "Slinky" Minky (Ok that and his fantastic 90 off 55 at the Wanderers in that massive 430+ run chase against the Aussies).
Some khadi wearing leftists, those ugly toads - warts and all - touted the T20 as being about Money, and not about the game? Hello? When we grew up back in the 80's nobody even considered sport as a career, because we knew how India treated its sportsmen. No diet, no training facilities, and worst of it all, no money to show for all your efforts. Decades of socialist rot has messed up the minds of the generations past, but the current crop of youngsters in a crude way believe in the youngistan philospophy "Chaho to sab kuch hai asaan!". And so they should!
The IPL has had a teriffic start with the Royal Challengers being Royally F-ed. To have Jaffer and Dravid open the innings is a joke I haven't quite stopped laughing at. By now, Vijay Mallya (Dr.) needs to realize that Dravid is a spent force in each and every form of the game - for a man who ditched the Indian captaincy the way he did, he went a few notches down in my view. I mean the guy chews off his fingernails as a captain when opposition players built any semblance of a partnership. With Zaks, Knoffe and Cameron White being creamed at 18+ an over, the man must have had a damn hernia!! For the Royal Challengers Dale Steyn and Kumble were definitely missed. In all, the only worry with the IPL is the overdose of cricket. My feeling is that it should get a separate 3 month slot on the International calender. Preferably in winter. April, May and June are the worst times to play cricket in India - period - we can reserve these months for tours to the Southern Hemisphere or England.
Meanwhile somewhere in the ICL studios, Kapil Dev is still harping "Am I doing something wrong?" Yes, my man, you are! you bet on the wrong horse.

Colorful Emotions

Black is not a color. The absence of color is defined as black.
White is not a color but the amalgamation of all colors in the visible spectrum.
Two of the things which are visibly, and emotionally different can elicit responses which are diametrically opposite.
And yet there is a strange similarity between them.
Such is the curiosity of color. Such is the beauty that each lends to completely different situations. And yet curiously similar - is it just that the feeling of extremes should be avoided, for they are nothing but the manifestation of the one and whole same truth?
Possibly the presence of one greater truth, which when one feels very strongly either manifests itself as something very breathtakingly beautiful, or something extremely alien, hostile, dark or depressing.

Intimidation

How does one get intimidated by anyone?
a) The person in front of them is BIG
b) The person in front is menacing/threatening in demeanour
c) The person in front of them is Powerful/Omnipotent
So anyway, some folks, who shall remain un-named said "Harish" is intimidating. I do a lot of talking to possible candidates and I've rarely, if ever, I admit, have ever lost my cool. In any case if someone causes me to lose my cool, its a definite no-no. I'm a man of infinite patience with people who come to me and say "I don't know how to do this, I have an inclination to learn, but I need some hand-holding". I've not had any god-fathers, and I've learnt a lot of things the hard way, or through providence (don't ask me how!!) - and I'm eager to share it with anyone who genuinely wants to know how, and has the patience and inclination to learn.
And for all the folks I know out there, have always known me as extremely confident person. Am I cocky? I would like to think not. Cockiness is something that you can't miss - people misunderstand forthrightness and confidence for someone who comes on too strongly. I am not going to apologize for backing myself. As an engineer its a tough world out there, there is a lot of areas in which one's contribution can be measured, and I want to be there when someone decides to sit up and take notice. But I won't sacrfice my confidence, or my humility.

Great Expectations

How does it feel to be at the butt end of someone's beat-me-with-your-expectations stick?
What is the length, size, shape and color of said stick were arbitrarily different?
And what if you don't know when you would get beaten with it?

A little place called home

Hope weighs heavy on his heart

As the silent soldier walks home,

His hands aren't bloodied by battles

And the scars aren't on for show

Many battles he may have won

Still many more he has lost

Fighting on for a losing cause

For deeper still lies the cost


Fighting on without know why

He lay his life on the line

While his world around him burned

He thought all at home was fine


As he returned home to a burnt nothing

His silently held in his tears

[Finally] His hope had given up on him,

And his heart lay bare all his fears

"For what have I fought for?" cried he,

As he cradled his dead infant in his arm

When I was out saving your hopes and dreams

You couldn't even save my family from harm


The silent soldier drew on his gun

And plunged his life into an eternal abyss

While an ungreatful country couldn't save his home

For his unborn son he couldn't even kiss...

Deflating corpulence

If you know me, you'd know how much I love jogging. And if you didn't know me, then I am a fitness freak. And if you've never met me, I am Brad Pitt's long-lost identical brother, Chad Pittanathan.
Hitting the gym was never a problem for me. But I am a misanthrope. Everything and everyone should be atleast in a radius of 3 feet away from me. I scrape against the wall as wafer-thin people walk past me in narrow corridors. The only thing I like touching me are my security blanket, when it provides me with warmth in the cool Bangalore nights.
So back to the gym - I used to be a regular jogger - @ 6 mins to a km, its not bad. Did that for about 7 months straight, sometimes even hitting the gym twice a day. Combined with a great common sense diet, it really helped me get into shape, and look better than ever before.

Suggested regimen - 25 mins of tough jogging - speed of your choice. Upper body exercises with free weights, situps, squats etc.
Morning diet : cornflakes, 6 almonds/walnuts (skimmed milk, half a spoon of sugar - no more)
Afternoon - 2 rotis, sabzis like chole, rajma, a bit of rice and curd
Night - salads, lots of veggies cut into a bowl, add salt and pepper and some lowfat dressing to taste. Some fruits - remember to fill in enough, else you will have a nagging feeling and fall into binge eating.
Last and the most important - control control control. Once your body reaches a certain metabolic state, it will automatically process junk food, provided you also exercise regularly.
And reward yourself once/twice a week, once you get results.
Happy running!

Top 5 things you don't want to hear...

COMING out of the airplane cockpit

5. I just got my commercial license today. I feel like a 16-year old again!!

4. Relax, so what if the engines are out. Today these babies practically fly themselves!!

3. Hey Herb, lookout the window. I need to find a place to park this thing before happy hour.

2. Hey Bob, look out for a gas station nearby, I think we're on fumes here!

1. Hey Osama, buddy, long time no see : So nice of you to drop into the cockpit, Say what's that? A box-cutter? GAwwwwkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk...

Jeehad, Lhasa Style..

So it looks like the long awaited, long expected, and extremely overdue conditions in China and the provinces it forcibly controls, has come to a simmer - not yet to a boil. But its only fair in a developing country, if you do not provide sustenance to locals, and religious freedom, there is only so much that even a monk can bear. Then, it doesn't matter if the regime is one of the most shamelessly courted dictatorial, martial and openly capitalist (under the garb of communist) in the world, people will fight back. Its only expected that the intensity of the fight picks up on both sides, since China has declared a "people's war" on the poor people.
India, and its pussilanimous incompetent septugenarian leaders, have issued peeps of "anxiousness", lest the communist cur pet-dogs start yapping at their ankles again. In a day and age of coalition politics, political gimmickery, one-upmanship and laxity (in the name of human rights) has taken over India's foreign policy.
India needs to ask the Dalai Llama to ship out. His presence is a nuisance to the country, and if his presence doesn't help solve the Tibet autonomy issue for the buddhists, there is no point in the expensive cost of hosting him and his followers. He spends most of his time in made-up Shangri-La's spouting unintelligent statements at conferences - he sure does have star value, but sadly little substance. For the man who once said, its good for Tibet to be under Chinese rule so we can suck on their growth and progress, its difficult to bring out any sympathy for him, very well knowing that the very people he lords over have given up decades of their lives in solitary confinement in People's Army concentration camps. Just ask the Falungong members, and you will know what persecution means.

Travails of being a woe-man!

Men - those chauvinistic attitudes, those ritualistic gawkers, those pontificating patriarchs - yes the very cream of the scum of humanity. Yet curiously at the pinnacle of almost all human achievement.
How can men be the cruelest of creatures, yet genteel and the most brilliant two legged product to climb out of nature's bosom of evolution?
Before feminists, christians and the assorted tater-tots of flag wavers and crusaders pick up cudgels questioning my "slant", lets put a few things straight
1. Men are violent - given a chance we'd solve technical discussions at software companies in the mosh pit with our bosses.
2. Men are gawkers - we check out anything in a skirt
3. Men are liars, cheats and snore in bed (and they also steal your covers>
4. They are bad liars, communicators, and anything involving talk, shopping and opera gives us a kidney stone or a brain aneurysm or a McDonald's combo of both!
5. Men are also the most brilliant, and amazing creators of anything and everything from art, science, literature - par excellence is the word I'd use - anyone else is a distant second.

Nature has created men for two things - getting home the proverbial bacon and procreating. Men are absolutely terrible at anything else. Evolution be damned, apart from the gay prissy crowds of fairies and pansies masqerading around with the all-male package and dabble in home decor and fashion, men know how to hunt - There are varied levels of hunting that we've adapted to over the centuries, but the intent and procedure is the same. Which is why men drive and strive to be awesome at work, because for them their work defines their success as a man. Ask any self-respecting man, anyone who is not satisfied with their work would have terrible emo problems, and its only natural for the bacon bringer to feel so, since his work defines him.

Men have been thrown into a complex mix of sensitivity and legal and moral baggage that is at odds with the testosterone laden cocktail that is the masculine brain. While I am apologetic of the majority of gawking eve-teasing cheap talking folks of my sex, we in India have adopted a double-speak policy on sexual liberation and traditionalism. We've progressed on neither, and what these sick eve-teasers are left with is images of skimpily clad bollywood imports, and shy prudes around them. Women obviously deserve more than these sorry excuses or sperm carriers.
Men have suppressed generations of emotionally coming out for fears of being seen as less masculine, not just by women, but by their peers. While women may see this as cleansing and making them feel lighter, men absolutely hate lowering their guard and being seen as weak or too weepy. Men do not have too many options and outlets for emotional outbursts, and since it is in the nature of women to be good talkers and listeners, they should let men come out without being judgemental. I think that helps in building healthy emotional relationships.

What a night of driving..

Had to drop the birthgivers at the airport tonight - hmm bad timing!
Bangalore was in the clutch of just 20 minutes of rain as I started out, but her gutters overfloweth with the love from her guts that looked liked a belching intestine!
Disabled vehicles were aplenty, and the occasional kannadiga walking across outer ring road in the absence of anything even remotely close to street lights all along up until aiport road, meant playing a dangerous game of dare - I wouldn't push the pedal beyond 45kmph, and the people behind me, surprise o surprise gladly obliged, since everyone was as blind as a bat in a cave at midnight.
Oppressively bad roads and impossibly crude waste managament, lack of sewerage contributed to atleast 1-2 feet water stagnating everywhere, and my heart goes out to the brave albiet foolish two wheelers who took to the roads tonight. I salute your spirit, and I hope you get back home to your loved ones, but please don't venture out on nights like these. Hopefully common sense prevailed over the hoi polloi, and we'd see some sane driving in namma Bengaluru.. I can't imagine if this were Devanahalli aiport, I'd not only not be home before mid-night, I'd also have a dislocated spine from all the bending, wiping, hooting, clutching, braking & the like-gripe.
Have a safe night tonight Bengaluru, rise and shine tomorrow!

International Woman's day

Its a day for the propogandists to further their "cause" - what exactly that may be is left open to interpretation - preferential treatment, sops, reservation, freebies. Pile it on, I'm in minority, and I want to make the most of it!
So we have an "International" Woman's Day - as in not national or pan national or SAARC, but "International". When there is a desperate need to highlight the plight of women in backward socio-economic conditions, the agenda get hijacked by non-self made rabid feminists, women who got rich through bequeathing the family crown, socialites, models and a pot pourri of high-flying bimbos.
The greatest victory for men worldwide from the bra-burning "liberated" feminists of yore, proclaiming sexual independence was much more than ages of partiarchy could ever achieve for them. When women screamed the shrillest that they don't want to be judged for having multiple sexual partners, men had hit the proverbial jackpot - every woman who wanted a booty call, could just call on a man, "More power to women" sniggered men.
There are major women issues in this country, which are attributed to rabidly patriarchial backward (emotionally, not just financially) attitudes, that need to be broached, brought out into the open and stomped out
1. Female infanticide, foetecide
2. Lack of financial independence which hurts independent partner selection
3. Trafficking of women
Over-priced bimbos on bollywood silver-screens who charge over 5 million rupees for vulgar dance numbers that serve no purpose than to tittilate audiences are the worst ambassadors for women. Such women cannot claim discrimination, its ironic, since the very demand of the business is something akin to flesh trading, and it would be best that they either do something positively for their backward sisters in the country or just stop paying lip-service.
Attitudes towards women will never change due to socio-biological factors. It is not that a man chooses to be a chauvinist, as much as an independent woman chooses to be a feminist, and no matter the development strides we make as a civilization, we are still slaves to our animal instincts. Animals in nature carry out gender roles, so how are we any different. The solution to the problem lies in accepting and catering to differences, not trying to force stereotypical templates of neutered & sterile manhood on the not-so-fairer sex.

Safety First, s'il vous plait

My gripe with car companies in India, either Indian or foreign is that their approach towards safety goes for a complete toss. I consider an approach towards safety as a two pronged approach
1. Mention of crash-test results from either tests in India or abroad
2. A safety-centric approach during marketing of their product to consumers
Countries like America do not allow cars to get on to their roads unless they pass specific road safety tests to make it crash-worthy. Which is quite optimistic considering most interstates enforce a 70mph (*65 is most states, unlimited with restrictions in some others) speed limit - which is far less than the total absence of control in India selling the camries, accords, and beemers to eager beaver yuppie Indian customers.
Now in India even people forking out 20 lakhs don't know that cars need to be built for safety. And that means a strong chassis, crumple zones, air-bags, ABS
and other things. In fact safety in India is always an "option" and thrown in only in high-end vehicles. And most companies dont seem to be selling those features, because they know the number of cars sold in this category will be few, and paying lip-service to safety may get the occassional US-returned NRI to buy the car.
We can debate the driving habits of Indian cabbies all we want - what is not pardonable is that when you had an option to save yourself, car companies did nothing to push up prices a bit and make these features as standard. Its ironic, that these features are required in India a lot more than they would in a more disciplined driving environment.
Coming back to point 2, I wish to dissect a few car ads
1) Ford Fiesta - guy lights up some torches using his car , shows that he does 120kmph in what seems to me a distance less than 50m - If you use simple kinetics, I am not very sure you can achieve this, but that's another folly of the ad. Ad sends no sense of value of the product and in fact glorifies bad driving, skidding, and near misses
2) Maruti Suzuki Swift - Boss takes the employee's car for a spin without his permission - Ok, that is strike one, I don't care if you are the CEO of my company, but you are not touching my wheels without my permission - A few outrageous spins, and 360 donuts later the boss comes back in one piece.
3) Chevrolet Aveo - Saif and Rani, your brains have been screwed on backwards - why is Saif trying to overtake you, like a Punjabi on testosterone? And then he drives backwards - I get no information on the product, and the ad is definitely a seller for how not to drive to impress chicks (which is also the outcome).
4) Hyundai i10 - When not baring his fabulously GAY 6-pack, Shahrukh eggs on blondes in Kawasakis to race his 66 hp i10 somewhere in Powai, Mumbai. Fallacy exposed. His first question to the bombshell is "Wanna race" - I URGE ALL READERS WITH VEHICLES - Please go through details of your vehicular insurance to read the following lines "Other than willful racing OR Organized speed trials" as a disclaimer for insurance payouts - what you are doing is not only ILLEGAL. but also doesn't get you a single paisa when you crash and burn.
5) Skoda- White skinned man, races against an F-16. Fallacy exposed - lets not go there. Its sickening. Probably not as bad as the others, but still pretty irresponsible from the Czech/Germans.

There are over a 1,00,000 people in this country who die out of avoidable accidents. We need driver discipline on the streets and corporate responsibility in the boardrooms. Only then we can not worry everytime a loved one gets late from work, that they haven't been overrun by some heavy vehicle, or atleast a well-designed vehicle and seatbelts has saved a loved ones' life.

If you meet me..

Some of my favorite quips:
1> Sweet...
2> That's right!
3> Gawd Damnit!!
4> Oh my Gawd, you guys..
5> Well, you know...
6> Sweet Jesus..
In the words of the great Bartholemew Simpson, "Eat my shorts"..

Worshipping False Idols..

Its just been a fantastic season 7 on American Idol so far - 2008 has the hottest - most talented bunch of artists on the stage easily since the show was conceived.
Just didn't like all the african-american artists on display this season though - bad song choices, and bad arrangements definitely.
Its just too close to call for me - and this time the guys are definitely giving the best of the girls a run for their money, with their performances.. Its the only show worth watching every week.
I still think ejecting Alaina Whitaker was a stupid thing to do, and then you start to wonder what ever happens to artists who kind of lose their way to the top 3 or 4.
I thought the man from my home state North Carolina, absolutely rocked with his rockin' Elvis & Jon Bon Jovi. He is now a good recording artiste now, but very few are lucky to scope out a contract..

Pleo your best buddy..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZL1FReoBTA

Now why didn't I think of that - its cute as a button :-)

Obnoxious Little Weed

That spinner with the turban
His action's quite queer
Looks like he's doing the bhangda
Until the crease he'd near

Punter can't tell which way
That jaffa is going to go,
Unless the ball is stopped
And broken down in slo-mo


How do I get that offie
Out of my bleedin' head,
I know I cant out-bat him
So I'll get him in trouble instead!

In the dark Oz dressing room,
The team had hatched up a plan
Symmo got Bhajji all riled up,
So he cursed them like a Punjabi man

Now Hayders calls Bhajji (on air),
An obnoxious little weed,
Trust the gutsy offie to keep on spinnin',
A sticky web indeed..

What games do socialists play?

Not T20 cricket for sure..
Okay, a quick wiki check on what is socialism
"Socialism refers to a broad array of ideologies and political movements with the goal of a socio-economic system in which property and the distribution of wealth are subject to control by the community.[1] This control may be either direct—exercised through popular collectives such as workers' councils—or indirect—exercised on behalf of the people by the state."
Allright - so what this is, is robbing Peter to pay Paul. Now Peter may not necessarily be better off himself, but if he is even "relatively" better off, then Peter is screwed. Never mind the fact that Peter spent all those nights slaving in front of a kerosene lamp, trying to make a better life for himself, and his ageing factory-laborer parents, while Paul was selling kidneys to unscrupulous oil barons and texan worms.
A lot of commentators have first villified the shortened version of the game, an indirect productivity boost, where in a country of 1.5 billion we have people taking days off work just to catch that India-Bangladesh series. Communists, aka work-shrugging parasites, have shown the greatest opposition to the T20 game, asking for it to be banned(!!!!!!), for it viciously violates the communist norms of earning more than their fellow brother on the basis of talent, merit or any other rational word for aptitude.
Mr. Dasgupta, shut up - your annoying utterances and lack of understanding of the world around you is appalling. Why are the you and your ilk crying about the fact that players get paid (auctioned is offensive?) in the millions for (1) their worth on the field (2) their worth off of it. I'd rather you be more offended by the auctions of destitute Bangladeshi/Nepali women from across the border, than those of the country's brightest talents in pursuit of rewards for a liked game.
I don't care if nostalgic oldies without an ounce of talent to rub shoulders with even the likes of noobs Ishant Sharma/Rohit Sharma's squeal from beneath their socialist burqas that they didn't get paid well during their times. Your best efforts can be labelled as 1971 England, 1971 West Indies, and Australia 1985? All this in over 100 years of cricket? That is atrociously bad - no wonder you guys didn't get paid - you never did your job right. It was another fact that the Indian Board didn't have the money to pay you, which they would have, had India not been the socialist communist USSR loving country it was for a good part of 5 decades.
In a day and age where useless IT louts get paid in the lakhs, its only fair that the people who've gambled their careers into a game, where breaking into the national team is 1 in a million , we need to pay the top entertainers the best money. Well deserved lads, now go earn your keep.

No time for sentimental fools..

The net has opened up an amazing plethora of possibilities - with the advent of networking sites like orkut, facebook, myspace et al on the www, its been a whole lot easier to catch up people from the college, high-school and even your kindergarden days.
How much of people you want to re-acquaint yourself with, is something of a personal choice. I've found in a lot of instances that there are so many people I've not been in touch for almost a decade and a half, and obviously its nice to catch up on not just where you are right now, but how the journey was for you all the way along.
Somehow, us guys are not much talkers anyway, so we don't recollect the finer details. A normal conversation would probably include among other things, the schools we went to, and the job(s) we were at, and how we led our lives in general (!). Beyond that the talk kind of withers away, and there isn't much to say to each other anyway.
Kind of ironic, the best buddy, with whom you shared your school lunches with, shared your first crush with, or the awesome fun you've had with during those awful hindi classes, that you need to reconnect all over again - you are worse than strangers - you are two people who have had a history of good friendship a long while ago, and now there is nothing. And neither is trying to make an extension to reacquaint..
I guess a lot of friendship is temporal, that unlike blood ties, we need some level of emotional interconnect for a person to be relevant. Its been tough to let go of people you used to be close with, but I guess its a lot less disconcerting when you try to look back upon the good times you and that person have had, and decide its time to move on. Just like what will happen to the present lot of friends in a good part of a decade.. Touche

Sins of the Father

What blood coarses through these veins
That be'it my own
Or of my progenitors of yore?
What wounds do you carry
Of injustice today,
Or of generations before your own?
Where ends this cycle
Of endless retribution
Why must I pay
For the "sins" of my forefathers?
- Harish

I'm not apologizing for mistakes that are not of my own actions..
I'm not begging plaudits/forgiveness for deeds/mis-deeds of my ancestors
Lets start judging each other by our actions of today,
The hurt may be there, but guilting people into paying reparations based on follies that are not of our own is just plain wrong..
The seeds of dissension in Indian society are far deep-rooted into the psyche of the common Indian. There are so many different categories to slot yourself into, and to further sub-categorize yourself into.
I never knew who I was, until I was forced into a corner. And all for good reason. Mumbai, the city of dreams, where everyone from the crass CEO to the honest daily-wage worker rub shoulders on the ubiquitous mode of transport - the Mumbai local, is home to me, and my innate respect for the other man. We never did judge on where we were from, or what we spake, or what God we worshipped. Life was good..
My tryst with Indians in America changed all that. Most Indians in America are insecure - both mentally and financially, which is quite ironic, considering most Indians migrate to America to make more money. Here you would see people bond only with people from their own state/religion. Its just nauseating. The poor cosmopolitan Mumbaikar is caught in a dilemma, on which side to take. I am not the one to find myself slot into a category, although even if I did, it just wouldn't work out!
People have tried to gauge my personality based on my "TamBram" lineage. Unfortunately this makes for (a) a bad rude surprise (b) a cheap stereotype, neither of which the closed-minded people are ready for.
A peek into my lineage shows I've got a lot to be proud of - but I'm not going to rest on the laurels of the past, and I want Indians in India and abroad to be more judging of people's abilities.
I've tried being someone else, I've given it a shot from time to time, but it just wouldn't work - I am proud to be an individual, without claims to inherit any legacy, good or bad. I'm a child of this free world, and I'd be damned before you insular people hate me for something that I am not!
Give me the tolerance of Mumbai anyday over the narrow-mindedness of the rest of India. MNS be damned. There are 30 million Indians living in this mega-city without hatred, and we are as Maharashtrian as varan-baath. You can challenge that over my dead body...
P.S> This author was born in Mumbai and spent 18 glorious years in that city

Thrilling you swiftly..

Feb 1st 2008

My 1st car, and 2nd vehicle joined my family..

The Arctic Pearl Metallic White 2008 Suzuki Swift just captured my heart completely. It shows signs of sluggishness in its pickup - the 1st gear is kind of short, but it feels at home in 3rd and 4th over the 30-odd kms I've driven so far on day 1.

The steering and EPS is just awesome - exteremely soft and responsive, makes turning real fun!

This is a really bad pic, but at 9pm its just what comes out with the assistance of tubelights.

Bhajji Hullabaloo & Tait's one-way ticket to the cleaners

On the Harbhajan issue it ends with a victory to India.. Lack of evidence? check.. Muscle flexing? check.. Pissed off racist Oz players? check.. CA and BCCI laughing all the way to the bank? check... Players feeling like prostitues for being pimped by their boards rather than being taken care of? check..
Apparently Bhajji, the Punjab da Munda (son of the soil), said the words "Maa ki", and Hayders jumped on the wagon going "I'm gonna tell - you are looking at a champ (drunken monkey boxing?)" apparently referring to Symmo. Anyway Bhajji's disclosure of the "Maa ki" sent the Indian contingent into raptures, and left the Ozzies fuming - "If he insulted my white mother, it has to be racism, ban the brown bastard (this is not a racist word in Australia)!!"
In non-contact sports, there are fewer ways of gamesmanship (i.e. another english word for pissing off the opponent mentally). The best way to outdo an opponent is to get to their minds through your game. If that doesn't work, its quite fair to rattle them with a few choice words.. family? country? race? no holy cows here. How many of us do not play the race card - when we complain about outsourcing to the starving East India slave labor capital Bangalore? Or when an MNC supplants the seemingly nice but naive & eager to please Indian manager with his 'white' counterpart, "He is going to take us to task" sighs the chips and cookie face-stuffing softie.
Sledging is an important aspect of the game. Man for man, most teams are pretty equal on ability. The X-factor often lies in getting under the skin of the opponent. I want concrete example of best-loved winners in team sports - The West Indies? Hogwash - who is the dooce who can't remember them bowling at the heads of batsmen with 4 eccentrically tall and equally hostile quickies? Don't remember Michael Holding kick the stumps out of the ground for getting a bad decision in NZ? A few of their charming exploits are available at cricinfo.com.
Meanwhile, in an act of awesome stamping of superiority, the amazing comeback Indian team just sent Shaun Tait to the looney bin. The almost-170kmph-touching almost-quickie who was dragged through the Perth pitch like a nigger in 1700's Alabama, is going AWOL on cricket for a while citing mental and physical exhaustion. The Indians have put their money where their mouth is... The only thing seen dangling from the fat racist mouth of the Ozzies is their own smelly foot.

Sibling Jealousy

Sibling rivalry - both the Thunderbird and the Swifty compete for my attention...

Don't worry I love you both equally! Both of you are key to my independence.. And both of you guzzle fuel like the arabs are our friends!

A 'swift' decision...

Just made the payment for a 'pearl metallic arctic white' 2008 suzuki swift, VXI.

Should take delivery of the baby sometime in the first week of February.

The color choices I had was white and white (just had 2 vehicles in stock, and any other color takes 2 months to come in) - didn't want to lock in money, and stay put without a vehicle for a long time.

Minus ABS, minus stereo system, minus alloys its still a pretty decent package.

Totally love the cute looking gear knob, and its enjoyable clicking gear shifts. Found it a little heavy to handle in stop and go traffic, on a vehicle that had run over 25k kms. I do not like the band-aid sized rear windscreen, its really annoying while parking, even for someone like me who has been driving for over a decade.

Has a raspy feel to the engine (the same one as that on the esteem with slightly different aspiration, and a different tranny), and I must say I want to rev up the engine over 4500 rpm to unleash each and every one of the 87 ponies underneath the hood.

I still don't quite get the fact that the Suzuki sport package, (the two-door box-car) sells for 11.5k Quid in the UK, and has a really well-put together package altogether while we skimp on the interoirs with really cheap looking plastics, and garish upholstery.

The 2008 swift (costs 7k more) has a modified front and rear bumper, with the tail light stop lamps modified a tad on the outside. On the inside, the cloth upholstery gets a minor makeover, and a digital clock moulded into the facia is a small, albiet welcome addition.

I dropped by Pratham Motors, Sarjapura ORR, Bangalore for not more than 10 minutes to buy the vehicle. I am pretty sure its one of the easiest deals the salesperson has ever made in her life.

Accessories, if you can call them that include a car perfume, mats, mudflaps, leather steering wheel cover, sun film (garware) - can be bumped up for a price.

So more updates on the cute brute later next week. Makes for some good weekend running-in in the backroads of Sarjapura where I live.

Dog in the Manger..

I see a lot of the dog in the manger mentality..
Flashback - in case you didn't read your English books/stories as a kid - the dog in the manger mentality refers to the presence of a dog in a manger, a cow-shed if you will, and while a dog doesn't eat grass, it didn't allow the cows to eat it either. Well, any symbiotic relationship involves a bit of give and take, but the fact that a lot of people love to have a say, without being responsible for their inputs actually pisses me off. Give me responsibility, I relish it, and I absolutely stand by whatever I do, no matter what the outcome. I don't care how outcomes reflects on me, because to me, if I make a conscious decision at a point in time, I think there a pretty darn good reason for doing so.
These days the communists are a very good example of the "dog in the manger" mentality. A role in running the destiny of a billion people, the ability to pull a government down, without having to be directly responsible to the people for their behavior.
I have no respect for someone who tries to weasel his way out of something - be a man, stand up for your actions - often a good justification, serves to highlight that even while hindsight is 20-20 we are often blinded by the absence of providence.

Jellycut Ban

Villagers in Tamilnadu banning the age-old masculine (read vicious) sport of Jallikattu plan to defy the Supreme Court ban on the sport. The reason being, they don't want the bulls to be injured (loss of human life, which may be incidental could be second) :
Villagers in effect telling the SC :
"Hey SC, don't have a cow man!" (i.e. lets have a bull!?)

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Dard-e-dil ke syahi mein dubokar,
Likha hain bewafa tere pyaar ka naam,
Dard-e-dil ke syahi mein dubokar,
Likha hain bewafa tere pyaar ka naam,
Milke-bichadna, Bichadke-phir milna
Kaisi hai tere-mere pyaar ki ajab si ye dastaan?

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Us haseena se mohabbat karne ki jurrat
Kuch humne bhi karne ki taan li is tarah
Us haseena se mohabbat karne ki jurrat
Kuch humne bhi karne ki taan li is tarah

Lavs agar na nikle in labon se agar
To kaise karti woh is pyaar ka izhaar?

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Shayari - Dil, Dard, aur Wafai...

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27.9967890 and counting...

Birthdays are strange days!

We celebrate the entry of life into this world. We celebrate our addition to the swarming human population.
I don't understand birthdays a lot. There isn't much to understand per se. But the celebration doesn't make sense. Unless you have a lot of friends to hang out with. You would hang out with them on any other day. Just this day, they ensure they bathe themselves in your esteemed company. Some of them are there, to wish you well even though they don't really mean it, some of them are there for the dinner and open bar concomitant with any birthday celebration. And still others are there to make you feel old about yourself, for they just happen to be a few years younger. The good ones don't care for more than a phone call and a wise-crack.

There are major differences between celebrating a birthday as a kid and one (if you still call it worth celebrating) as an adult.
Kids want to grow older because the world doesn't take mental maturity on face value.
Adults, or atleast I, see it as a good time to take stock of my life, maybe analyze a few things in retrospect, and see the birth day as a good problem solving exercise.
So I should have this short list of things which I think I should have/ should be doing by the time I turn 28. I need to set some good goals for the following year and take up on them in right earnest.
Hmm, lets see what I plan to do the next year - Tomorrow is D-day, so I probably could think up of some good ones to put up on my blog tomorrow.
Keep reading "Randomly Coherent".