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.
Friday, October 03, 2008
Thursday, October 02, 2008
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!
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.
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.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
