Cynic's Window to the World

House Rules : Gambler's Ruin Part Deux

2009-08-23T22:46:00.000-07:00

Independent Events and Chance :
Each roll of the dice on the casino floor, every time you want to throw snake eyes in Vegas, you are hit by a little thing in probability called : Independent Events.
Independent Events refers to the fact that every time you attempt to gamble in a game of chance [i.e. chance based games as opposed to poker etc.] your chances with every attempt remain the same - the probabilistic return on a coin toss is 1/2 for a fair coin, 1/37 of 1/38 for a game of roulette and so on and so forth. Hence the word "hot-streak" is a misnomer.
Games which have no memory are the ones which cannot be beaten without an element or elements of unfair play. That's why black-jack is so different, and that's why to an extent "counting cards" in black-jack actually works - because its a memory based game.

Engineers with background in DSP : Digital Signal processing would know that signals processing is a memory based system : i.e there is an element of causality because of the interference of a signal with a channel during transmission. This memory is required to be extracted to nullify the effects of the channel : i.e. for inter-symbol interference and noise reduction.
But games of chance are just that - once a dice rolls, it rolls without caring about the past - its only statistically after rolling the dice a few hundred thousand or a million times, we can determine the actual distribution of each event and the standard deviation for the same.
Even after this, if you play craps, you have as good a chance to win on the next roll. There is still the element of "house advantage" that causes the dreaded Gambler ruin. The house advantage is not simply based on statistics of winning alone. That is, its not just the odds against the gambler at the casino. The main factor is the payout factor.
Take the two-column roulette example. Bet $13 per column, $26 total. A win nets you $12. But the odds were 26-to-12, so a bet with no house advantage would pay $12. The casino's profit comes by grabbing the $26 when you lose but forking over a lousy $12 when you win.

Casinos make money in the following ways:
1. EDGE : It's the fraction of the overall amount bet that the casino would earn if every set of decisions fell precisely into statistical line. So theoretically, they could do worse or better in a short period of time, but remember, this is a statistical average, not an intstantaneous prop!
Consider the two-column roulette bet again. In 38 spins, the house expects to win 12 rounds at $26 each for $312 in all, and to lose 26 rounds at $10 each for a total of $260. The total bet would be $26 x 38 or $988 while theoretical "take" is $312 - $260 or $52. The edge is $52 divided by $988 or 5.26 percent. A particular series of 38 rounds may not give the casino 24 wins and 14 losses. But, over 1000's of such throws and the house can haul their 5.26 percent to the bank in humvee-limos :-) : Do the math!

2. Return % : It is the very opposite of EDGE, and relates to the amount that the owner is going to get back on his investement in a % term of course. Here to you could weigh in how much you would make over 10's or 100's of pulls of the slot machine lever. This is for the casinos to figure out the money thats going to be drained out of their enormous pockets.

US Government stipulation ensures that the machines that people muck around with actually have a chance of giving a return on their hard earned quarters. But that's a pittance compared to what the casino stiffs you for.

Beating Las Vegas : The Gambler's ruin & Winning Strategy

2009-08-23T01:06:00.000-07:00

People head out to Vegas with often elaborate schemes to beat the house at a game of black-jack or roulette. Other card games like poker involve a certain degree of understanding of the game's nuances and are not a pure guessing game.

The Gambler's ruin is a true and hard fact buttressed by probabilistic evidence.

Let two players each have a finite number of coins (say, n_1 for player one and n_2 for player two). Now, flip one of the coins (from either player), with each player having 50% probability of winning, and transfer a coin from the loser to the winner. Now repeat the process until one player has all the pennies.

If the process is repeated indefinitely, the probability that one of the two player will eventually lose all his pennies must be 100%. In fact, the chances P_1 and P_2 that players one and two, respectively, will be rendered bankrupt are
P_1 = (n_2)/(n_1+n_2)
(1)
P_2 = (n_1)/(n_1+n_2),
(2)

i.e., your chances of going bankrupt are equal to the ratio of coins your opponent starts out to the total number of pennies.

Therefore, the player starting out with the smallest number of coins has the greatest chance of going bankrupt. Even with equal odds, the longer you gamble, the greater the chance that the player starting out with the most coins wins. Since casinos have more coins than the gamblers, this principle allows casinos to always come out ahead in the long run. And the common practice of playing games with odds skewed in favor of the house makes this outcome just that much quicker.

Its an interesting argument. Your lucky streak is a terminal short-run phase. The longer you stay in a winning streak the less likely you are to cash out. Hence the moment you hit a jackpot, make for the cash counters, because its not going to last.

The analysis above however states that there are games which are "skewed in favor of the house". If they aren't of course, the casino doesn't make much money now does it - but the question is how does any advantage truly convert itself into "house advantage" - as with two players who have no prior knowledge a priori on the true outcome of every event, and with the expectation that the game itself is player in a fair and unbiased manner how could the house hold the upper hand in a game?

The only way then for a Gambler to beat the house without cheating is to
1. Have some sort of advantage in the game, with the game having an inbuilt bias towards the gambler
2. Have more money bankrolled than the casino and expect that in a truly unbiased and fair contest the casino gets bankrupt in the longest run. This of course does not consider the fact that casinos can close the table if they are losing a lot of money, to protect their own interests, since the gambler too is given a chance to walk away with his profit/loss.

In games where the possible set of sample points are large - even if the payout is unimaginably large, the playing field truly screws the gambler for all his money. This is because his chance of hitting it are speciously low, while the payout for the house is a zero sum game. In 38 holes in roulette for example, its possible that the house pays out 34 to 35 times the original amount, while is still a little less than what the house would make whenever it wins - and it would wild 37/38 times.

Very simply put - if you are consistent in your choice each time - your chance of winning is 1 - (37/38)^n - the longer you stay in the better your chances, and depending on how much money you stake, and when the roulette wheel averages out, your payout will cause you that much ruin.

If the house sets a minimum and maximum bet limit, statistically it can never lose money. For the gambler the odds are always 1/38. For house its always 1/38. This is because each spin is a new spin.

One interesting betting system is the Martingale betting system :
The simplest of these strategies was designed for a game in which the gambler wins his stake if a coin comes up heads and loses it if the coin comes up tails. The strategy had the gambler double his bet after every loss, so that the first win would recover all previous losses plus win a profit equal to the original stake. Since a gambler with infinite wealth will with probability 1 eventually flip heads, the Martingale betting strategy was seen as a sure thing by those who practised it. Of course, none of these practitioners in fact possessed infinite wealth, and the exponential growth of the bets would eventually bankrupt those who choose to use the Martingale.

Hence if you bet x to win >= x, this strategy doesn't seem bad, if the probability of you winning atleast x is a good shot - i.e. you are not unduly biased in losing with respect to the house. Else the Martingale, in my opinion, just doesn't work, when you don't have much of a shot. Since your betting amount doubles each time, it doesn't take too long until you go bankrupt - since your losses mount like crazy. Also the payout amount isn't anything special, you only end up with x at the end of your Martingale run.

Beating the house seems a plausible option iff the game gives the house no more than a 50% chance at winning - and the gambler has a decent enough bankroll, and house doesn't set too high of a limit to wager a bet. The payout is obviously proportional to the amount dropped in, but the odds act solely a multiplier of the initial wager. Winning against the house is never a foolproof strategy, and that's why you have so many people at the slot machines in casinos in Vegas. You might as well lose your $ in quarters than risk it all at the blackjack dealer.

Discontinuing the Cynic's Window Temporarily

2009-07-26T08:20:00.000-07:00

This blog is getting a little too hot for me to handle with my current commitments.

I am temporarily pulling the shutters down on "Cynics Window to the World".

I will resume posting on this blog probably sometime around Christmas or early next decade.

At this moment all I can say is :

India's Giant step into R&D

2009-07-25T00:36:00.000-07:00

There are over a million articles written over Outsourcing and still a million more which exhort developing economies in Asia to move away from what in the West is perceived as low-cost labor to more exhausting and lucrative R&D work. William Gates Junior exhorted Indian companies to do the same during a recent interview.

Seeds of R&D in India
To give an example Texas Instruments started a development centre back in the mid-80's when India couldn't tell silicon chips from potato chips, and even as we are stuck in 2009, in the cusp of ever man, woman, and child owning a cellular phone, India does not have a silicon fabricating facility, period. The fact of the matter is the quality and quantity of work that has been outsourced is multi-pronged. To say there is no R&D work done in India would be a complete fallacy. However, it is a fact that we talk about MNCs setting up R&D facilities in India to hire fresh graduates out of the IITs and NITs in a bid to both get them to work on developmental projects rather than research in the word R&D - if you are looking for outputs from pure academic research as well, India is probably a few centuries behind America, where the Academic-Industry partnership is very strong. Some of the major funders of science and technological innovation in that country are the NSF, and the Armed Forces, alongwith NASA and of course the IBM's and the GE's.

Crossing the chasm
India has on account of grinding poverty and being young as a nation skipped several crucial steps into building itself in the way the US has. What has happened is, we've skipped the stage of landline phones and moved into cellular phones, we've skipped an entire generation of desktops and moved into laptops and netbooks, we've moved away from wireline services and moved into the digital internet. India definitely has good institutions partly thanks to the initial planning comissions and their utopian goals to solve India's problems, so atleast on paper we could emulate our Western counterparts.

IP enforcement
Westerners who understand the concept of Intellectual Property find it extremely painful to explain such concepts to their poorer counterparts in Asia. At least in India IP protection has in some form both help and infringement-related enforcement, mostly due to pressure from companies that want them enforced. Most of these companies are not Indian. Thankfully we don't have the RIAA and its draconian lawyers, knocking down our doors for illegally downloading music. Piracy bites India in a big way, but unfortunately if you are going to charge exorbitant amounts for music it will probably never sell, and neither will the movie, atleast in India. Promoters and movie producers would be a little kinder with music piracy than they would with movie piracy. We don't have movies run more than a month anymore, and the money they make from the multiplexes in those 30 days can make or break a production house. It needs the protection of the Indian Government. Chinese IP protection on the other hand is horrendous. You get snazzed up i-phones which are cheaper and better than the OEM's, you get phones without IMEI numbers lining up streets in Connaught Place to Chor Bazaar, its an unhealthy and dangerous trend for the world to put up with. Plus Chinese authorities do not or will not understand and enforce intellectual property infringement regulation, of which I am to understand there aren't many.

Why R&D isn't too bad for India
India as an R&D hub would suit Indian mentalities as well - we are a nation which likes to have our food simmered rather than straight off the microwave. However I see some large bottlenecks in the emergence of India as an R&D hub on its own two feet. We have companies which race each other to the bottom in competing for crummy projects. There is no onus to develop a solution, but to provide one for a problem at hand. And this is generally done with the help of 20-somethings fresh out of college, and the projects are again manned by 20-somethings who went through the same grind. There is no scope for excellence, but the onus is on getting the job done, and adding a little sliver to the company bottom line in $-to-Rupee terms.

Pure research works involves a large degree of risk taking and the ability to bounce back if there are no large tangible rewards. In the product development arena, the money that you can get back in return is enormous.
Indian companies primarily are not cut out to work as R&D organizations in the current forms. This is because of the purported hierarchical structures, and massive egos which come into play while executing work of this sort. Homegrown governmental organizations like the HAL, DRDO, ISRO have done well but the number of failures not in public domain would be quite appalling. Indian companies would need a massive organizational thinking to be able to execute a product development initiative. However, its not so much in the execution but also in the marketing and salesmanship of such a product that would affect its future. Brand India is not as big as a 2nd grade East European name, on account of the constant compromise Indian companies makes on the quality of its products made for domestic and foreign consumption - you can even see this in the IT sector with companies very often having problems in their requirements not being met, and this doesn't reflect too well on us. There is no brand equity in brand India for any potential buyers to buy into, but of course things are changing as more and more companies - albiet not Indian - set up R&D facilities in India.
But the basic issues need to be addressed for Indian companies to take a leaf out of. We need to be more serious about time management and quality, and try to pick up these things from the Japanese for their impeccable professional behavior in this regard. If we wish to be taken seriously for what we do, we need to pay serious respect to who we sell our goods to.

Hand on Cheek

2009-07-05T22:20:00.000-07:00

The MP tours his constituency
Surrounded by sycophantic drones
Was pissed by a bank manager
Who wasn't dispersing friendly loans

Quoth he:
"They press my arms and legs
They bring me my tea
How come you don't dispense loans
To folks who are SC and ST?"

Upon which the manager [supposedly]
Opened up his canteena flask
"Bugger off MP" he sipped & said,
"Welfarism just ain't my task!"

Furious was the MP,
Whose writ had been ditched
So he went ballistic on the manager
And slapped him like a bitch

But when the public demanded answers
The MP went meek
"All I ever wanted" claimed the MP
"Was to caress his soft cheek"

Somehow it seemed all-right
Since the repeal of article 377
That the MP would tug another's cheek
And send him straight to gay heaven!

Other arguments by the MP to make a press statement but were weeded out :
1. I just wanted to say : Coochie Coo!
2. I just wanted to tug his cheeks and say : Chooo Chweeeeet!
3. His cheek repeatedly hit my outstretched hand! He hit me! I am the victim!
4. I have split personality disorder. My alter-ego is Harbhajan Singh.
5. What do you mean he is not Ramalinga Raju?
6. I just wanted to show that the man has a lot of cheek!

The six blind men of Hindustan

2009-06-29T02:02:00.000-07:00

Perecption and points of view vary from individual to individual.
We had a poem about this topic in my school English text-book.
I am reproducing this poem, of course, I claim no credit for it - and I hope to have credited the person correctly at the end of his/her poem...

Here goes :

The Blind Men and the Elephant

Key Ideas: Hindu, respecting difference

It was six men of Hindostan,

To learning much inclined,

Who went to see the elephant

(Though all of them were blind);

That each by observation

Might satisfy his mind.

The first approached the elephant,

And happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side,

At once began to bawl,

"Bless me, it seems the elephant

Is very like a wall."

The second, feeling of his tusk,

Cried, "Ho! What have we here

So very round and smooth and sharp?

To me, 'tis mighty clear

This wonder of an elephant

Is very like a spear."

The third approached the animal

And happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands

Then boldly up and spake:

"I see," quoth he, "the elephant

Is very like a snake."

The fourth stretched out his eager hand

And felt about the knee,

"What most this mighty beast is like

Is mighty plain," quoth he;

" 'Tis clear enough the elephant

Is very like a tree."

He fifth who chanced to touch the ear

Said, "Even the blindest man

Can tell what this resembles most;

Deny the fact who can,

This marvel of an elephant

Is very like a fan."

The sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope

Than, seizing on the swinging tail

That fell within his scope,

"I see," cried he, "the elephant

Is very like a rope."

And so these men of Hindostan

Disputed loud and long,

Each of his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right,

And all were in the wrong!

John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887)

RIP MJ & Thank you for the Music!

2009-06-27T08:44:00.000-07:00

Three generations swung to his music.

Three generations saw a dancer like nobody else.

He crooned with energy that a 100 strong men could not have mustered. Yes, he was not just just a once in a generation performer, he was also the performer of the past century. Some people might throw in names like the Beatles, or even Elvis - no disrespect - none of them had $%^t of this guy.
He left them all behind with his cool moves, and a singing style that made it hard to decipher words, but you know what - people never really cared about what he was really singing about : It could have been about ghosts ghouls and goblins [as in Thriller] or it was about something touching [I'll be there] or it could be the raunchy seductive. His amazing singing skills were on display primarily as a child artiste. But if you want to know a man who was born to rule the mother of all stages of the world, then it was MJ.
Whaddaman, the ultimate performer.
Hhe could sing in that amazing voice, he could moon walk, and then stand on his toes.
His live shows could only be described at 2 hours of continuous adrenaline pumping through his veins. This man cut across so many geographical borders, that I wont have any trouble believing that even people in far flung North Korea, Ulan-Bator, Swaziland or Peru would have trouble connecting with this man - his music and his novel dance moves. Heck even my dad knows a few of his songs, so universal is his appeal!

The man leaves behind a personal void for me as well. I spent some of my early years in NY before I came back to India - Michael's Thriller on LP is one of my most prized posessions [although I honestly don't know if it is still around - the cover with him lying done, and on the inside is a picture of him and a tiger. MJ's music videos were trailblazing and way ahead of his time : Even when I see some of his videos [thriller, black or white, smooth criminal, scream], I can honestly tell that modern day music-videos are flaky and made more by studio honchos and less by imaginative people.

The man screamed and "Shamon-ed" his way into our hearts and minds. His controversies may have dimished MJ the man - but MJ the artiste truly lives on. And for once a supposed child molestoer actually has my sympathies because quite frankly his father treated him and his brothers like a bunch of performing poodles.

I hope history is kind to you MJ and you've meant so much to me - as a child of the 80's. I swear : 50 years from now we can look back and say - there has since been no other and there probably never will.
I see no harm in letting my guard down and shedding a tear for you.
Since the days leading to your tragic end, I hope you've find peace at last...

Trust

2009-06-23T10:21:00.000-07:00

Bonds of trust
Lay cruelly mangled
In your web of lies and deceit
Whither is loyalty
When all you do is cheat

Bonds of trust
Of an Unholy alliance
What was between
Just me and you
Is now lain out for all to see

Bonds of trust
Easier broken than mended
For my wounds so deep
Are not easily forgotten
To your own you've tended

If I were a Transformer Auto Bot

2009-06-20T08:38:00.003-07:00

This is perhaps what I would look like
P.S the eyes are actually from a photograph of mine :-)

Pontificatory Purgatory

2009-06-19T06:52:00.000-07:00

Sadness fills this stoic heart
Heavier it grows with every blow
Beseeching ye of soft currents
Calming, as o'er me she flows

What wounds dost thou carry
And scars of everyday
Why hurt are you by every human?
What saddens you in every way?

No more a facade of stoicness
Weathered by humbling disgrace
Wallowing bowels of self-pity
Shames ye in to your filthy place!

Now under you ye truly carry [they say]
Catharsis for thine soul
Just reach down - [a heart asundered]
No your heart won't really know

Why [does this heart] cry in sleepless nights
Whats makes thee go insane
Is this life so sad you wonder?
Is it worth living with this shame?

Turned around out of living hardship
Ye be fallen by the wayside
If living isn't living what be it be?
Anything but surviving suicide?

AUTUMN : where art thou?

2009-06-17T08:14:00.000-07:00

The slightest breeze,
Coaxing dew-eyed buds
Out of their sleepy slumber

Dancing tulips swaying
The cool autumn zephyr
The rhythm of birds & bees

The nippy wind, the cool accent
As I walk down streets of cobblestone
Gazing into the river deep
As I stand by the bank
The autumn wind lulls me to sleep...

Brave Kitty

2009-06-05T11:42:00.000-07:00

I was headed out for lunch to Chenab - its at Whitefield. Not much for the food. It was what happened when I was driving to get there. Saw a little grey kitty - leap ferociously across my car in less than a bound - and I am talking little kitty no more than 8 inches long from head to butt.
It crossed over the median and then hopped over to the other side. It dodged a bus, and a car, but somehow managed to bang its cranium into a lousy-ass slow two wheeler - it misjudged the speed of the lame-o Uncle driving it. I thought Little Kitty was done. But lo and behold in less than a second - kitty woke up, dusted itself off and was off to the other side - probably something worth Kitty risking one of its precious 9 lives to get across. Kitty surely expended 3 of its get-out-of-jail cards with that run.. Amazing... I wish I had a video of it..

The Girl at the Diner

2009-06-05T10:12:00.000-07:00

I gazed into her lonesome eyes
Hazel worlds of sad mystery
I gazed into her open wound
Of trust betrayed
And a heart forlorn

I gazed into her lonesome eyes
Expecting a world of anger or hate
Maybe retribution for a broken heart
Or consigned to loneliness as
Her Fate

I reached out in the way I could
Promising to help her wounds to heal
She smiled gingerly as my hand she held
"What of the wounds that are concealed?"

Down that dusty diner, one day, It was
an evening of spring, Sometime in May
She cried as I put the ring on her hand
As we left with out footprints of love
On the grains of sand

Years have passed since I met her then
And now she lays buried - deep in rest,
I weep clutching her photo to my chest,
Never thinking the blow life had dealt
for that fateful night I had met,
That heavenly girl is the diner

Inspiration : Go for Glory

2009-05-28T21:43:00.000-07:00

Movie dialogues can hardly be construed as inspiration, but during stressful times, when things aren't looking your way, its a good piece of advice to have..
The following lines are from The Pursuit of Happyness, where Will Smith's character and his son [real son = reel son] discuss about wanting to be a basketball player..

Don't ever let somebody tell you... You can't do something. Not even me. All right?

You got a dream... You gotta protect it. People can't do somethin' themselves, they wanna tell you you can't do it. If you want somethin', go get it. Period.

There are people in the world who are out to judge you - to tell you how good you are - they tout around as experts in your field. Most of them are charlatans. The true mentor you can have is someone who can give you a realistic heads up on how to go about achieving your goals. You can learn a lot from such people. Then there are the people who judge - those who have never done anything worthwhile in their lives, but have somehow risen through the bureaucracy and deign to tell you that you will never make it or you are no good. Side-step such ignoramuses and follow your path to Glory. And don't forget the words of Will Smith/Chris Gardener :-)

Holier Than Thou

2009-05-27T10:50:00.000-07:00

He who chants the Vedas the Loudest
Gets moksha from the Endless cycle
of Life and Death and Life again...

He who pays through his nose
To get a darshana of the Lord
Is truly blessed,
And promised a place in Heaven

He who truly wishes to gaze,
Upon the radiant face of the Lord,
Shall have to push fellow believers,
And such a one is truly blessed in afterlife

From : The Fake Bhagwad Gita, not the spoken word of Lord Krishna.
Hinduism, and in essnce followers and believers of the Hindu Holy Trinity, often realize that their "salvation" or "moksha" lies not in mass communal gatherings and prayer. It is an individualistic path one must tread in order to attain the Bhramana.
This is both a vital, as well a selfish [selfish, not in the bad sense] way or attaining spirituality, but thats the way it is ordained in Hinduism. Now with a population of 800 million of the faithful, it is a tough job giving your fellow Hindus a leg up on attaining moksha.
That simply ends up in the madness that is seen in Hindu temples all over India and especially south India. People run all over each other in an attempt to gaze at the Lord, and more over if its a special festive occassion or a special occassion based on the phase of the moon it gets doubly worse. More people have died in their attempt to break the damned cycle than ever before.
Prayer chanting at temples is supposed to be either done by the priests. What ticks me off is when people sit down in areas clearly earmarked "Dhyanam" they get their little cellular phones - which arent exactly allowed inside temples - and start playing off spiritual music. And also, keep the mantra chanting to yourself, or in the vicinity of your home. Rigorous vedic chanting once in a few months in the temple is not going to give you and vimochana - except it might add to your bad karma from all the curses you'd get from the people around you. Please leave your Holier than thou attitude at home. We are all here to pray, some a little, some a little more - lets not rub it in to each other's faces!
Hinduism's curious case of leaving each to his own creates a spiritual rat race we see in temples all over India. The amount of money these temples make is unbelievable, and the followers are utterly oblivious as to who lines their pockets with the gold and money - the amount if put directly to charity can do a lot of good. Temples do function as charitable trusts, but the question of accountability still remains. Seeing the conditions in which most temples are kept, it is pretty clear absolutely nothing goes into their maintenance.
Clearly these people want you to attain spirituality, by giving away all your worldly posessions to them. Sounds like a scam!

The Wonder Years

2009-05-22T03:12:00.000-07:00

I was watching one of the umpteen re-runs of the Wonder Years one evening. And I thought to myself - if as a kid growing up in the halycon socialist days of yesteryear India, I were to make a movie/tele-serial on my life how would it pan out to be?

Aaah, the 80's - the decade in which I was born into - the decade that had Cyndi Lauper's she-bopping minus Hanson's umm-bopping - what a decade of cultural upheavel - a decade that bridged the divide between the uber cool swinging' 70's and the uber-modern 90's [we had cable TV for chrissakes!]. The decade where if you wanted the answer to a question you turned up to your dad or mom and asked : Where do babies come from? or When was the International Labor Organization founded? Sadly you parents weren't exactly wise to answer either question, and after some humming and hawing they bought you one of those "General Knowledge 1987" books - books on current issues and event? Don't we call that a www.cnn.com ticker these days?

Those days growing up were tough. No TV and definitely no internet. The TV was a queer thing - we had a TV which had 16 channels - 15 actually, and one earmarked for the VCR. The remote control used to weigh a brick and very often my brother or I have used it to give each other concussions during our numerous fights. My VCR had a remote too - except instead of working on Infra-red, it was actually a wire connected to a VCR port - wow! That was really lame.

In the 80's all technology was smuggled and/or purchased from "Foreign" - which was code word for Dubai or Singapore or the US of A. Customs officers had all the time on their slovenly hands to emasculate anyone who brought in a piece of technology : it didn't even matter if it were a 2-ex-or gate or a North Korean missile muncher. As a country our govenment was socialist by profession, capitalist by confession and Stalinist by obsession. Buying anything good in those days always attracted a penalty from the Government - but that was only because nobody in India ever really paid Income Tax in those days.

So in the 80's we were Socialist [spread the poverty], and hence we had two Government authorized channels : DD1 and DD2. DD1 was more of the heavy duty stuff, usually meant for adults - occassionally if a leader died you'd know : because some nondescript Sarangi player biled his guts out on the telly. Which meant no entertainment programming for a few hours - you were forced to mourn the death of the guy! How dare you otherwise! DD2 was the yuppier of the two, and typically carried more entertainment programming - like 1 hour of ramayana per week or one hindi movie every Saturday evening - something which brought the whole nation's kitchens to a standstill, and then mahabharatha. I still re-call waiting 7 whole days for 30 mins of HE-MAN every Sunday evening. Or for that 30 mins of "Jonny Sokko and his Flying Robot" every Tuesday evening - which was a Japanese dubbed sci-fi from the late 50's and early 60's : Eastman color in all its GLORY!
DD had all the trappings of Nazi-like indoctrination when it came to programming. Usually it was under the guise of the National Film Center for Kids or some other government gobble-de-gook department whose clear mission was to teach us the virtues of sharing, and that posession of material property was evil. We had such great imports as Hungarian cartoons, Romanian puppetry, East German slapstick and other Soviet Bloc imports - if the Kremlin Politburo didn't approve of it, we couldn't see it.
I recall spending my summer holidays literally doing nothing most days except play in the mornings and evenings. The afternoons were mostly spent trying to do pansy things - like draw or paint or read comics. Sometimes my mom would pop in an old cartoon in the VCR. If I got bored, I'd swing my bat around and play pretend cricket. But the best entertainment was if my brother was around we'd fight. And then my Dad would come and beat the crap out of us for ruining his afternoon siesta. But mostly that. We weren't burdened by tuitions or coaching classes or learning or doing something that kids these days are forced into.
My life panning out as a tele-serial would suck - so would any kid who'd grown up with me in the miserable and god-awful decade called the 80's.
Well, all it does it makes me appreciate what I have today.

Good Jokes

2009-05-16T01:10:00.000-07:00

Here are some good ones I picked off the web :
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HOW JEWS GOT TEN COMMANDMENTS

God went to the Arabs and said, "I have Commandments for you that will make your lives better."

The Arabs asked, " What are Commandments? Can you give us an example?"

God said, " For example ............ . Thou shall not kill."

The Arabs were shocked, "What? Not kill? No way! Killing and massacaring innocent people is our birth-right and the only reason for our existence.. No, we are not interested. "

So God went to the Africans and said, " I have Commandments. "

The Africans wanted an example.

God said, "For example ........... Honor thy Father and Mother."

The Africans were dismayed. They said, " Father? Yo maan! Can't tell for sure who our fathers are, maan!"

So God went to the Mexicans and said, "I have Commandments. "

The Mexicans wanted an example.

God said, " For example ........... Thou shall not steal."

The Mexicans were flabbergasted. They said, " No steal? No steal?? Hey Senor, we no steal then how we live, huh? Gracias, but no! "

So God went to the French and said, "I have Commandments. "

The French wanted an example.

God said, "For example ............ . Thou shall not commit adultery."

The French were stunned. They said, "What? Not commit ze adultery ....... ? Non, non, non. Non Monsieur. Pardonnez nous. We, ze French, must have ze romance. "

So God went to the Jews and said, "I have Commandments. "

The Jews asked, "Commandments? How much do they cost?"

God replied, "Nothing. They are free."

The Jews answered, "Good. We shall take Ten! "

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In the city of New York, a pet but vicious Rottweiler dog attacks small child. A brave soul pounces on the Rottweiler and saves the child. Soon the media and the Press are at the site and are busy interviewing this brave lad.

“See the newspaper tomorrow“ says a Press Reporter. “You will see yourself in the headlines as The Brave New Yorker saves a child from a vicious dog”

“But” says our young man “I am not a New Yorker”

“Don’t worry “ says another Press Reporter “But you will be in tomorrow’s headlines as The American saves a child from a vicious dog”

“But” says our young man “I am not an American, I am a Pakistani”

The headlines next day read

The Vicious Pakistani Attacks A Pet Dog

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yeh hai Chennai, Chennai Soober Kings!

2009-05-09T00:00:00.000-07:00

Chennai - is a wretched city. And I use the word wretched with all the love and reverence that the word doesn't deign to carry. Chennai evokes mixed emotions almost as much as Mumbai does, but I guess a few degrees less on the passion scale. No other Metropolitan city in India comes close when it comes to defining character. Kolkattans outshout but that hardly changes the truth. Delhi has few takers. Bangalore is a mosh pit. Hyderabad is like a blunt blade with the pulse of a 90 year old.
Chennai evokes hatred as much as it does appreciation - simply because no one deigns to humor the occasional north Indian who has stumbled across this weird city with as much as a schmidgen or Hindi. Athu Sellathu.. The Lingua France is Tamil, rest be damned . I just read a quote from 1959 in the Deccan yesterday which had Nedunchuzhian of the DMK saying : English should be made the language of operation all over India. 50 years later we've regressed into a Mulayam Singh wanting the abolishment of computers. Bravo Democratic India!
The CSK team seems to reflect the laid back intensity of the city. There are no people running behind buses, waiting for trains or simply in a hurry to go someplace. Everyone seems to have time to stare at the odd traffic accident, provide advice to total and complete strangers, and sometimes go forth and help people in need - it has all the essential qualities of a quaint town just with better roads and richer people. Of course there is a huge degree of indiscipline and it just frustrates you so much you could be bald with the callousness of people.
The IPL team reflects the attitude of the city. Filmy stylish, flashy but mostly chilled without a hint of pumped up intentsity and aggro. Trying to coast on hard work rather than brilliance. Watching L Balaji's run up is next only to hearing a Mercedes Engine crank up :-). And commentators and player after player acknowledge the sportsmanship of the Chennai crowd as opposed to the extremely partisan crowds elsewhere in India.
Chennai is no Mumbai - it clicks for those who want life in a little slow mo. Give me idli-vadai over zunka-bhakar anyday.

CSK Update

2009-05-07T11:10:00.000-07:00

Today is CSK vs the Kings XI . The Kings XI is leading an awesome fightback as I write.
I am among the legion of "fans" of the CSK team.
Today their walloping of the Punjab bowlers was a sight to behold. The more I see Suresh Raina, the more I think this kid has one awesome future and holds the key to Indian cricket in the next decade. "Stylish left-hander" is an oxymoron but just watching him pull the ball is an absolute treat [next only to watching Yuvi belt a long hop]. Matthew Hayden to me, remains the most under-rated player of the past decade. This man strikes the fear of God into bowlers, and this IPL is all about him - he has almost never failed, and it was sad seeing him get caught for 89. Sreesanth is a coward and a moron, and someone should just ban him from ever playing any competitive cricket - his send-off of Haydos who thrashed him for 20+ in that over was childish and boorish. Can we have some Match Referee intervention here?
Dhoni who has had a terrible IPL2 until the match before last, suddenly finds the best time to hit form. To me Mahi is one of those players who don't really have the god given talent of other "higher" players like Yuvraj or Sachin, but he is a one in a generation act. History is going to be kind to him in a decade from now, where he trades in the lack of pure talent for a cricketing brain that none of his gifted peers can ever come close to possessing. Which is what makes him a clear headed leader. Somehow the best leaders have been the ones lower on cricketing talent than their team mates but have the ability to gauge the game a lot better - Allan Border is one such example - not only did he inspire the great Aussie resurgance of the 90's he did so by going about his job very quitely. How is it that no one remembers him as the highest run getter in test matches, and everyone fawns over Sunil Gavaskar? Why is it that Tendulkar failed to inspire despite his fans screaming and drowning out any nay-sayers?
It just takes a little more than mere talent to lead men. Talent itself cannot inspire. True leaders are made of something else.

2009-05-02T21:45:00.000-07:00

So the following items were of significant consequnce for the week ending 2nd May 2009

1. DK followers stone Army convoys allegedly carrying supplies for the Lankan army
MY question - who pays for the damage? The quarry was nothing but supplies and tents and chairs. Why did the drivers/jawans go on a rampage beating up both media and innocent bystanders. If criminal proceedings are in order against DK/PDK then a court marshall is in order against the jawans for not showing restraint. Or the ones who were in command of such hooliganists army personnel.

2. Ajmal Amir Muhammid Kasab/Kasav is not a minor, makes demands!
At the end of this trial, Pakistan gets a new insight into how the famed Indian justic system works. The next bunch of attacked will be brought in a few days shy of their 18th birthday, and will have certified copies of their birth certificates from
Pakistani hospitals pinned on their lapels in case, non-Inshallah one comes out alive. Then he goes straight to juvi - and comes out when he is like what 21? Oh and according to NHRC he will also get a right to vote. And mostly vote for the secular parties. And possibly contest the elections as he turns 25. Since that is necessary to reform people who have strayed from the path of Indian righteousness. Bakwaas. Someone can give ajmal some H2S04 or poison ivy in an attar bottle - let him spray himself with it.

3. Manmohan Singh says "Q" harassed enough, let him [and the Gandhi's] live in peace
Manmohan pleading on behalf of his Masterni - please leave her alone, and hence Mr. Q as well - nobody is going to do anything about this 30 year old case. The CBI has received funding for such period to work on a project and has fuelled the subsidized lives of 1000's of investigating officers, CBI heads, press-wallahs, typists and so on. Justice delayed is justic won - for the delayers.

4. Voting in Mumbai shocks propah newspapers and psephologists.
Heat isnt the cause of the Mumbai voter not coming out. Surprisingly a large part of Mumbai is slum. 70% slum. Nothing the poor ever wants gets done. The middle class would probably have voted on the same number patterns as 2004. Which just goes to show it won't take anything short of an act of God to make Indians vote int his farcical democracy.

5. Swine Flu as elusive as KKR Victory
Where is this Swine Flu? People, poultry, animals have been harassed enough. People call the flu H1N1 and not swine flu anymore. And its an over exaggerated hype coming in from WHO. It is not a pandemic if 100 people die from it - More people probably die across the world from sneezing and cracking their ribs. And according to some Indian docs, Tamiflu/Relenza are not effective in combating this strain. Makes sense to stop Americans/ Mexicans/ other affected countries from sending their crap over here. All passengers to be screened at both port of embarkment and destination. If you are sick dont travel or prepare to be deported.
Fake IPL player is more interesting than KKR combined. McCullum shows the power of binary in his scores. Ganguly shows that if he can't lead he wont bother as an individual contributor - he is taking a leaf out of MSD's book : MSD's batting is now getting on my nerves.
And CSK needs to get rid of Jacob Oram, he sucks.

Swine Flu

2009-04-27T08:29:00.000-07:00

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Have a look at this picture below. Do you think this cute little fella could ever harm you?

Did you say cull him? As Homer once said [Homer as in Simpson, not the poet] : You can't kill him if he is wearing people clothes.. And then Spider Pig, Spider Pig, but I digress.

So I asked my girlfriend when she would put out - last she said "When Pigs fly". Well its "Swine Flew" - close enough for me - I am going to go ask her for some lovin'.
Arrivederci!!!!

Accidentally...

2009-04-26T07:58:00.000-07:00

I was on my way to grab some spirituality and a meal on my way back.
Right about on the road that leads to purple haze and a clutch of seemingly half drunk drivers ducking and weaving, and a toyota corolla in front of me slams the brakes - too late for the thunderbird which stops like the Queen Mary - My bike skidded and slipped under the corolla's boot. So while I am extricating myself, a mild mannered guy steps out of the car and quips : "He braked too hard" - I said what can I do - then without a thought to whether I was okay or not, proceeds to check underneath the boot of his precious fu#@ing vehicle. I told him - don't fuc@#ing panic - its okay, and of course it was. My fender caught a bit of the paint, and looks like the fork has taken a slight beating in the mangled mess - and my foot and back dont feel very good either. All this for a traffic incident at 20 km/hr. I need to sleep this off, and the bike needs a visit to the shop to check for any damages. Not a great start to the week, I'd say!

ICC World T20 2013 : SWAT

2009-04-26T02:15:00.000-07:00

Greetings and Salutaitons from Mingora, capital of the SWAT valley, lying on the western border of lovely and safe Pakistan.

Khidmat Hussain, Governer of the valley of SWAT said : "Our lovely state has offered to the ICC to host the 2013 ICC World T20 Championship. We expect this move to help justify the universal understanding of the SWAT area as the most peaceful place on earth. Our denizens are lover of the game of cricket and appreciate a good game between the Muslims and the Kafirs."

Meanwhile ICC Chariman Shri Sharad Pawar, who besides holding onto positions as BCCI Chief, and Prime Minister of India [in that freak election in 2009 where the Jaago Re campaign cause such frivolous voting from confused youngsters, it led to a three way tie, and all the pseudo secular parties decided to shove the biggest blackmailer into the position of power, aka Shir Sharad Pawar], recently agreed to tour SWAT in a cursory move to review the security situation in the area. However, what he said was not very clear to the media since his lips now dangle from left to right - a lot more han before, because of which no body but no body knows what India's official stance is on any position since 2009.

The Australians earlier were up in arms over the move from moving the ICC World T20 championship from Australia to SWAT. Cricket Australia chairman Andrew Symonds threatened to blow up the ICC office in Kilinochi, while CA chief spokesperson Matthew Hayden called Sharad Pawar an "obnoxious little weed". Also ex-captain Ricky Ponting called this a "cheap shot by the big bloke" in apparently a response to Sharad Pawar being shoved off the victory podium during the Aussie victory of an ICC Champions Trophy back in 2007.
This was in response to the ICC fact-finding team's assessment on the security situation in Australia as "very grim". Australian Prime Minister Loud Howard cursed the 2009 American induced re-settlement plan of the Taliban in the Western Australian desert as "biggest bloody mistake" in the "great history of Australia". When questioned about the "felony past" of Australians Prime Minister Howard called it a "racist sub-continental concoction".
Meanwhile SWAT valley is scheduled to host the biggest gala event of the cricket millenium. With the resettlement of the Taliban in Western Australia, Pashtun women are now free to compete for positions as cheer-leaders for various teams. Some teams have vowed to carry their own cheer-leading squad, especially the Afghanistan team which has teamed up with the Dallas Cowboys. Meanwhile the Indian contingent has refused to send their cheer leading squad after Pramod Muthalik, now Indian MOS for Culture and Vice Prevention deemed such activities as Un-Indian.
So the stage is all set for an amazing game of cricket during the SWAT summer. American President Sarah Palin has herself vowed to come down and have a look at the "hot diggity dog its just like baseball" and inaugurate the great sporting event. Meanwhile women from Buner's PIM [Pakistan Institute of Manamgement for Women] are looking at ways at making this event a commercial success as part of their finaly year project study. All in all the T20 showcases the logistical ability of SWAT to conduct this event with no untoward incidents whatsoever, and gives a chance for the people of war-torn countries like Australia and England to have their hearts opened to the hospitable people of SWAT.

Dagger through the Heart

2009-04-25T10:09:00.000-07:00

Scars of your angry words
A schism in my heart
Turned my world upside-down
And tore my life apart

Where were you in my misfortune?
Where were you in my pain?
Dithered to stand beside me
Was this love all in vain?

If all you ever wanted
Was what I never had
O'why did we have this drama
Of a love we nev'er had?

As you walk out that door
Into the world, cold and dark
I feel the seething pain
Of that dagger thru' my heart

SWAT Cats

2009-04-25T09:25:00.000-07:00

Does anyone recall the SWAT Kats? Or was it SWAT Cats? It used to play around on TV during the late 90's - and I always recall watching it eating an tomato-onion uthappam delciously lobbed by my dear loving mother. Was it after I came back from college? Oh, I don't know - it was the cable age, but there still weren't reality shows like MTV Hero Honda Roadies around, so I guess SWAT Kats [or was it SWAT Katz now, I am really confused] would have to make do.
I only recall T-Bone and Razr [or was it Razor - is that what inspired the Moto Phone?], and a hardassed cop whose city was policed with loads of choppers. The Kats had a combat aircraft which pretty much bordered on the looking like F-14 Tomcat but flies like a Britsh Navy Harrier and flight dynamics of a F-35 with the computing power of the internet stashed away somewhere. Very impressive.

10 years on and this is the only picture I can get of the SWAT Kats : Grrrrrrrrrrrr!!!

So here is my song, an ode, a tribute to the gentle people of SWAT valley, the true radical squadron...

I get up in the morning
To the sound of the azaan
Every morning is Allah's blessing
For my day is really really fun

I am part of the virtue squadron
We have duty everyday
We pick up men with moustaches
And shaven freaks along the way

We impose the law of Sharia
In the valley of lovely SWAT
For that is the word of Muhammed
I know the Qu'ran by heart

Beating up defensless women
Who in public they'd be seen
With men who aren't relatives
Or showing off a bit of skin

Allah praise SWAT valley
We are imposing His holy word
Soon inshallah we will rule
With the letter of the sword

Who cares about education
Schools for women are a waste
Get caught with a book in SWAT
And lashes turn you into paste

Don't hate us for it
Allah wishes and we do
Just look at your family member
Who is holding you down too

So Allah Praise SWAT
The Switzerland of the East
And down with democracy
Coz its such a fu!@ing Beast !!!!

IPL, Part Deux

2009-04-25T09:08:00.000-07:00

What would make the IPL even more interesting
1. Absence of Bimbettes and Male Bimbos on Sony's Set MAX hosting shows, half-time intervals and tactical breaks. If I want glamor I am anyway watching the white skinned South African Blondes shake their stuff.
2. NDTV stops shouting why IPL2 is all the rage in south africa by force feeding Indian cricket down a tube in every "indian origin" south african. "Oh, we love Indian culture" coos on dreadlocked brown girl "Aishwayrya, Amitabh Bachchan" - yes we all are proud of our 35 years of civilization thank you very much descendant of coolies.

IPL is an IPL - no matter where the carnival goes. Trouble is how the BCCI and the team owners recover their cost. Come to think of it, I don't understand beyond the cost of the winning team's cheque what else does a team lying say 7th or 8th lose over the guys who come in first? More airtime perhaps? It seems to me that this is a place where Shah Rukh always trumps India Cement Chairman for sheer popularity [or poor taste of the desi crowd, but hey I don't have a six-pack, who am I to begrudge him that!?].
My pick for the year as was last year was the Chennai Super Kings simply because captain cool Dhoni is in chage. However, Dhoni has turned out to be like one of those project leads in IT Companies - he wants to be a team lead, but doesn't want to do any hands on work. He will tell the fielders where to stand, bring on the right bowlers and shuffle the batting order, but will not do anything by himself with the bat. Heck that is sad for a guy who cracks over a million dont you think? And what has Andrew Freddie Flintoff done for CSK so far - he has looked the worse player - perhaps Morkel has something to say about that, but atleast he isnt overpaid - and now he is heading home with an injury. People were right - he is a tremendously overrated player. Pity though, buying him still isnt the worst decision made.
Meanwhile the Deccan Chargers seem to get better with each outing, and that is good to see - especially since the Indian talent over there is doing its job too.
Who wants the elections anyway? Its the same thing - either the crook or the thief lords over you - just get over this democratic farce and give us folks some good entertainment. I was keen on watching atleast one or two of the CSK home matches this year - but stupid P Chidambaram had to throw it all away.
Side note : Tennis Australia has refused to send a team to placid chennai citing security concerns for which they will get docked both money and playing rights for a year. Hahahah - talk about shooting yourself in the foot. Good riddance, we dont want your convicts setting our stadium on fire.

God save India if Mulayam becomes PM...

2009-04-11T08:19:00.000-07:00

Was reading this article :

Mulayam Singh, aka man with the personality of a cardboard-box that just downed a liter of Castor Oil, has "claimed" that "Computers cause unemployment". Wow - did we not have the Reds say this 25 years ago when the likes of Sam Pitroda and Rajiv Gandhi were shoving the "unholy conecpt" of Software and Hardware, and have created a 15 billion $ outsourcing industry on which more than millions of people have been indirectly or directly employed?
What a fuc$ing moron - With people like these who needs enemies? The snake in the house is about to go beserk and invenomate all of us with their regressive thinking - I am not sure if I will be out of a job, maybe cellphones can be replaced with this :

Ragging : Myths and Myths

2009-04-11T03:24:00.000-07:00

A kid from Kerala studying at Coimbatore's PSG college is almost blinded. His injured eyes are a pain to look at. I really feel for the poor kid.
His "seniors" asked him to lick their boots and part with Rs.3000/-. IS this ragging? Or is this extortion, hooliganism and attempted murder?
There are quite a few folks who extol the "virtues of ragging".

Myth 1. Ragging makes you a man/woman. You become independent and can fend for yourself
Where is the fu#@ing bravery when 10 oversized seniors pounce on a kid who can't even find his way around campus? You tell me what ritual such as undressing, or being brutally beaten up, or even doing a song or a dance have to do with making a man out of someone. And if they aren't then who the f#$k are these seniors to turn them into men/women - is this some form of social service we are unaware of in society?

Myth 2. Ragging brings seniors and juniors closer : I got to know my senior better after he made love to me.
At the end of the day leveraging power to abuse someone does not bring people closer. It simply creates a dependency between two people and you can get eternal subservience from the other person. If you have to go through a hazing ritual to be friends, such friends are not worth having at all.

Myth 3. Ragging is ragging.
Ragging is a polite term for sexual, mental, verbal and physical abuse. This is a harsher crime that actually crosses multiple boundaries of illegality, and hence should have the harshest punishment, including the death penalty to be applied depending on the circumstances. Can you imagine the pain Mr. Kachroo's father has to go through to light the funeral pyre of his son, and fight in the Supreme court, just to get the management kick out the useless Principal of the college. Its another matter how he has to deal with the murderers of his son.

Myth 4. There are varying degrees of ragging.
Who the heck are you to decide it? Stay away from the juniors when they join college. Let them find their own way around. If you have been boned by your seniors, it doesnt give you the right to go about raising hell in the lives of poor kids who've come to the college.

Myth 5. Ragging prevents students from "mixing" together
If you are bent of boning new kids, you better not be allowed to get close to them. IF your intentions are indeed noble, time will allow for you to be respected and to engage in some fruitful friendships with the newbies.

Student who are involved in ragging are like vultures - you could see them hang around campus and attempt to harangue anyone and everyone who passes their way in the initial days of college. Law enforcement should be allowed inside colleges to curb with this menace. When kids know someone is watching their back, they can go ahead with the task of getting used to college life. Because ragging sure as hell isn't going to help them.

Election 2009 : who will mis-rule India?

2009-04-10T23:02:00.001-07:00

Governance, if such an oxymoron exists in the Indian context, is not guaranteed in Election 2009. This is and will always be India's most media-debated elections. But whichever channel I switch over to, there is no discussion of issues. There is only discussion of who ties up with whom, if Pawar is flirting with the 3rd front, or is Amar Singh going to shack up with Laloo or the Congress. Atleast the great impotent Manmohan Singh came up on the telly, with the strings of 10 Janpath, and the AICC Working Committee moving his mouth, hands, and what not to the tune of
"I Hate Advani,
The Communal Fool,
Who gives a F@!#,
If I just can't rule,
Why do you care,
That I shack up with DMK,
As long as Madam Soniaji,
That Italian Widow is okay,
With the thought of terrorist sympathizers,
Being in my Cabinet,
As long as I get in through the Rajya Sabha,
My masterni shall not fret!!"

He says he doesnt want to legitimize Advani as a PM candidate by debating with him. That smacks of atrocious arrogance and disgusting behavior in a supposed democracy. How dare a person, not elected by the people talk of a candidate who has been elected to the LS so many times? MS is not a man of the people - he is the rat who gets through the vermin's entrance, and then lords over the house. Why is it MS, are you afraid to debate the issues? Why does you party claim public sentiment to be the reason behind dropping Tytler and Sajjan? Why do you care when it is Bishops in Kerala who decide who contests on Congress tickets? Any answers? I guess not!
I am not voting for either Advani or MS - as long as they are the primary candidates from their parties.
The day Narendrabhai Modi stands up and says he is interested in the top-post, he has my vote, simply based on his reaction to winding up post-Godhra, and bringing development to the great state of Gujarat. In an interview with CNN IBN yesterday, he had Suhasini Haider blush like a first-time bride [this part was hilarious!!], when she threw the question at him : Did you attack the Prime Minister personally? He retorted : I said the man wasn't able to meet people for 2 months, and it didn't feel like the country didn't have a PM while he was away, you tell me where is the "below the belt" in it?
Fantastic. Modi is like Nero, you media-whores - provided you can limit the discussion to his great oratory skills in Hindi - and stomping on the holier than thou English media. The cool manner in which he takes questions up, most of which are personal slander, is a little leaf that other rabid political opponents should take from his belt. Check out ibnlive dot com for the full interview.
In other news:
Chiranjeevi said he wants to distance himself from the BJP to show his secular credentials, but is open to a tie-up with the Italian party. I have a picture which I can't post [which is gross fraud by the way] showing Chiru standing next to Obama and his party's flag. Did Obama endorse you Sir? Did he ask the voters of Tirupati : We want change! Rubbish... To see the gullible voters fall for this crap is just reinforcement of the poor IQ and stupidity of the Indian voter. Secularism : yeah right : Perhaps people should ask why Chiru moved heaven and earth to get someone bumped when his daughter married an upper caste boy - do as I say not as I do, isn't it?
Jaago re is a waste of my time. First time voters don't mean squat to this country with the swell of slumdogs outnumber you 10 to 1 [just like a cricket field!]. I have my voter ID card [for a while]. But I choose not to exercise my right, as enshrined in this constitution. That is my legal right. Do you have a right to complain if you vote, but the guy in office is not your candidate - of course you do! As a tax-payer I still have every right to complain, regardless of who is in office, because whether I vote or not, whether my candidate wins or not, two things are for sure for me and you - death and taxes... Meanwhile parties sleeping around gives political promiscuity a whole new meaning.

Anatomy of the 21st Century Indian Male

2009-04-03T21:51:00.001-07:00

Respect Women - No Questions Asked...

2009-04-03T20:55:00.000-07:00

In Michael Moore's Sicko - and very often in life they say the true character of a country can be judged by how it treats its weakest. To me it applies to how it treats its women as well. The more I find the oxymoron of Indians worshipping women dieities true, the more ugliness I find in the behavior of its men towards women. It's been a terribly sickening Saturday morning when I open a newspaper and all I find is violence against women, of such depravity, it nearly made me throw up.
Unfortunately, the way in which Indian men and women themselves treat the women of this country is downright disgusting. I find that this is not just systemic bias, but just like its caste system, its some sort of latent hatred towards women - which pours out in each and every activity men do - and each and everything they say to them - its down right patronizing tone and revolting undercurrents. I do not understand how you cannot do any value judgement of your significant others in life! This creeps through all strata of society - women with no economic independence and no say in the role of planning their family fall prey to the debauchery of men all over.
Its an endemic plague afflicting society, and I find this abuse is very strongly tied to the absence of economic and sexual freedom for women - The moment this happens and women have greater say in choosing who their partners are and when they are interested in family, it would lead to lesser of this abuse - but the scope for exploitation still exists - as long as we have a nation full of pimps - either in the family or outside of them.
There is no new reason I need to give for asking the men of this country to stop this brazen and disgusting violence and repression of women - What the Taliban did to the woman in SWAT is just a mirror of what happens in our country as well - there is real good scope to give women the freedom they deserve in making decisions and of course they will make mistakes - but then who doesn't. We need special laws against this subjugation of 1/2 of our country, and unless we do, forget super power status - we won't respect ourselves as a nation.
It needs a serious change of attitude of the lot. Easier said than done!

Goody Two Shoes

2009-03-22T07:34:00.000-07:00

Well.. after a fairly short and not-so-protracted battle against cervical cancer, Jade Goody, aka racist foul-mouth white-trash wench, has finally kicked the bucket at the ripe age of 27, and leaves behind two little sons. Sad part that..
Jade's cruel twist of fate, and Shilpa Shetty's rising stars are so in the opposite worlds that any one who believes in astrology cannot but wonder how two totally different people from separate continents, have such reversals of fortune, that its sickening.
Of course both are camera-grabbing, sound-byte giving, over-the-top acting attention whores, and their apparent lack of talents are overshadowed by the fact that people are willing to give in to any sloppy fight between two grown women on the telly.
Jade's wedding a month before her death, serves us to remind that gold diggers reside on both side of the gender fence. She made over a million pounds in selling the rights to her wedding, and the rights from all her interviews, her two books [two books by age 27? I can't even write a single chapter!] had made her rich.. And a newly wedded grieving widower who is most likely going to hit the dating circuit in the coming days. Watch out english women! Here come the husband of the english patient..
God knows what is Jade's gift to this planet - she lead a life in below average surroundings, held mediocre jobs, and the Big Brother riff gave her the status of a rockstar. Even suburban middle class Indian men know "Jade Gooooody", if only her claim to fame were a supposed "racist rant" against "poppadum Shetty" - who the fu$# uses the work "Poppadum" anyway - I always thought it was "Lijjat Paapad" or the more tamil-ized "Appalaam" mmmm tasty.
Jade didn't die soon enough - her fight laster almost 6 days more than what was expected. That gave TV channels 6 more days of banal reporting. Bye-bye Miss Not-so-Goody Two Shoes.. RIP..

Jago re Jago re Jago re... Jago re..

2009-03-14T04:13:00.000-07:00

Well I consider voting, and democracy, a waste of people's time.
And by people I mean the genuine people who actually make a difference - i.e. the tax payers. As opposed to the mass of humanity which suck at the teats of government induced doleouts, that lactate like a cow on hormones before every election.
Why do I the hard-working tax payer subsidize the living of my well-off brethern in the slums? So that they may have a better chance at life? Why would they? Why leave the gutters of mediocrity and slumdoggedness when all I need to do is attend political rallies of Mulayam Singh, Govinda, and MK Stalin and have money distributed to me like they were paper fliers? I don't need to - no siree.
IF over 50% of this wretched Indian population wallow in the slums of poverty, lets finance their bailout, in no uncertain terms using loans. Pay my later, but pay me - there are no freebies. When I do you a favor, and I expect you to get better, I expect you to pay me back - I am not even asking you for interest, I am asking for the principal amount back so I may be able to bail out more of your oppressed brethern. I do not see any voice lent to my words if for every decent civilized and hard-working white collared coolie like me, gets overshadowed by a bunch of 10 such brute, uncivilized, paan-chewing, woman-beating, working-woman molesting, cricket-team-size procreating slumdog of this country. My voice will then have no reason it will have no reason. Please stop preaching to me about change - I am a learned man - I can do the math. I know who registers to vote. Those brutes have more knowledge about their ration cards and voting rights than I do - If I have to get a ration card done, I have to grease the palms of a dozen bureaucrats and cough up over 2000 Rs. for privileges I will NEVER EVER USE - doleouts.
For true democracy to make some sense, the folks who've been to jail, and the folks who don't pay taxes shouldn't have a say in how things get done. You will get your financed bailouts, but just stay out of the voting process. This way we can bring in more corporate style changes, and the middle class can have its good roads and 24-hr electricity it deserves more than the polio drops of some 10th kid of some slumdog human wastrel out on the street.
Voting for tax payers is my naara, everything else is just a sham - Jaago re can knock on my door if they pass this law in the Indian Parliament. Or else, don't wake me up - I don't want change in the system, I don't care for corruption, and I certainly don't care for public expenditure on health-care. Give me a good road to my work, and ensure my electricity doesn't get snapped a dozen times a day your filthy elected mongrels....

What makes me Angry...

2009-03-13T10:38:00.000-07:00

I picked an extremely hard topic to post on. Yet one that very much defines my character, and makes me the adorable and charming douce that I really am.. I could write reams on what pisses me off and yet not hit adequate self purgatory. The chasms of pissed-offedness, a perennial and now eternal state of not just mind, but also being, leaps from within the bowels of my bosom. Anarchy rules in optimism and happiness. Angst gets things done - pronto. Angst helps the mind focus and channelizes your energies to the one thing you want the most - and it is what pushes you towards innovative necessity more than any warm fuzzy fuddy duddy feeling ever could.
The nature of angst has driven away poets, philosophers, lovers, do-gooders, candle light vigil holders and a major mass of humanity, yet inexplicibly, yet binds them in a quixotic ironic yet crueely obvious twist of fate. Mankind's history is replete with experiences of love amounting to jealousy, philosophy being villified, science being demonized and yet the very thing that drives us towards angst, is from what people often incorrectly surmize as "wanting to do good" - the essence is to channelize angst in the right manner to get what you want done, and yes I can assure you you can. We face resistance on a daily basis, we either choose to submit, or overrun - people pay the consequences for overrunning only in the short term - submissive people do this in the long term. Being aggressive and taking what you want without asking isn't bad or evil, it is about marking your territory, and showing dominance. Dominance rules, submissiveness loses in nature and human society. Co-operation blows, competition wins - flip through TV for your answers. Anger without direction is pointless, anger at people who have nothing to do with the problem at hand is useless, and anger without passion is worthless. Go feel the angst, go feel the adrenaline rush, go tell people what is on your mind - if you can't win friends, try to overcome enemies. You will have your very own fan club...

Womens' Day

2009-03-07T21:34:00.000-08:00

Another western concept tries to find its niche here in India. First it was hallmark's Valentine's day, then it was what - Father's day, Mother's day - ever wonder why the American's don't have children's day or teacher's day celebrated - it is because of the American value system which places selfishness above knowledge, which is in line with the Judeo Christian philosophy of "save they souls or go to hell" dogma. This has very little to do with the hooliganism unleashed by the Sri Ram Sene, because irrespective of their professed religious ideology, I simply treat their behavior as a law and order problem, and little or nothing to do with scoring political brownie points and should be deal with as such. Child-brides, dowry deaths, human trafficking, no access to health-care might be problems their urban sisters are blithely unaware of while they hit the pubs, and party the night away.
What ever happened to women helping women? That is utterly and sorely missing. The greatest impediment to the success of women is not just their male counterparts - but women themselves. Men by very nature are competitive and will attempt to out do each other, while it is in the nature of women to be more co-operative. The discrimination against the gender filters through all class barriers, as indicated by the sex ratio in the state of Chandigarh/Punjab stands to be among the lowest.
Women don't need pink chaddis and pub bharo andolans - you can drink to it once you are done emancipating your sisters. Cheap gimmickry gets you media attention and more molestors, not the respect of your uncouth opponents.

American Idol 2009

2009-02-07T05:19:00.000-08:00

American Idol has a reasonable fan following with me. English music, and the American dream and the American fakeness is all too alluring for me. There is a desi contestant too, and boy I think he can sing : Anoop Desai, I want to see your brown skin go through to the top 24 atleast and take it from there.
I did hear some good voices this year, but the years that caught my ears the most were in 2008 and 2006. I didn't like the year 2007 where Jordin Sparks came up trumps, I didn't see any really good voices. Not a lot of folks remember the also-rans from earlier rans as they did from 2006 and 2008, and it was painful to see some of them get kicked out.
Here's to Anoop Dogg, and to see some real competitors emerge from the 9th season.

Expert Commentary my ass..

2009-01-31T09:27:00.000-08:00

The current India-SL series is a big yawwwnnn.. Any series with Sri-Lanka evokes as much excitement as seeing Hillary Clinton in her birthday suit. Honestly, what was the BCCI thinking - SL is easily the most boring side in the world to watch, Ajantha Mendis apart their brand of cricket can be described as gully cricket at best. Jayasuriya has been playing since I was in my diapers, when the hell is he going to retire?
Oh wait, I digress.. Has anyone seen an ass disguise himself as an expert commentator - called Dilip Vengsarkar - the man cant string two lines in English - if you can't just say it in Marathi you idiot. His glib quotes were : "we took wickets and they lost wickets and... we won.. which is a good result for us" I was goot Woooooot the FuC#@@#$#@@$#!!!! This guy was writing in TOI probably a decade or so ago, I recall him write in Mid-Day when I was in Mumbai. Fricking moron. Javagal Srinath is no better. These cliche toting dumbasses who had the privelege of playing for India just because there was no other talent simply meant that we are now saddled with such cliche ridden idiots on the telly..
Meanwhile I just see Ishant outfox the Lankan Ravan sena - and its now 7 in a row - Looking forward to the New Zealand tour though. Time to get roll over the Lankans 5-0 and demoralize their ass - getting all cocky after beating the LTTE are we?

Muthalik se Muttaliq

2009-01-28T07:21:00.000-08:00

Who is Muthalik? India doesn't want to know who he is. India wants to know what he and his ilk in the Bandar Sena - oops - Ravan Sena - oops - Ram Sena want.
Women drinking in pubs upset Mr. Muthalik and his cooped up misogynist comrades. They are not fascists. They are sexually obsessed voyeurs who never get a slice of the pie, a jump on the action, so they will take it away from every one else who does. The Ram Sena and fellow idealogues need a day job - joblessness is what causes most of these low-class people to indulge in wanton destruction. Anyone who earns knows the value of money, and the consequences of their action. You take it away from an individual who doesnt earn, and lives off handouts, he basically has nothing to lose.
Ideology grows in empty minds, frictious vaccum - it is an opiate for the dull, and slow - just like religion. People don't need a hand of God to get them out of their problems - they need elbow grease and some gumption. We are not entitled to anything we have - our lives, our family and certainly not our money - which is why we need to stay away from false ideologies such as the ones perpetrated by fascists such as Muthalik and do our job. That's what India needs. People who do their jobs - a good work ethic - and mutual respect. That is what is hard to find - Another joker called Ashok Gehlot finds malls repulsive. Go tell that to your builder developer friend who financed your election Mr. Gehlot.
Jesus, we are a regressive society. Hopefully when this older generation dies and passes on, we can bequeath an India which is averse to such revulsive ideologies. And hopefully future generations do not become a torch bearer for it!

Wings of an angel

2009-01-16T06:11:00.000-08:00

Responsibility - its more than a word

2009-01-12T08:50:00.000-08:00

The Satyam ex-CFO Vada-curry Vadalamani professed ignorance with the book doctoring charges and claimed he "blindly signed" what he was given by the brother Messers Chor and Lutera Raju.
Wow - that is the world's worst defense. People kill to get to the CFO position, I know I would - and all you can coolly tell us, after a few Enrons, Worltels that you never saw an excel sheet? Sir, you are get paid for what, may I ask? Sit on your black ass and play Solitaire, while your employees work 25 hr days, while you bill client like World Bank for 26? Tsk tsk, "responsibility" isn't just an non-andhra word, Mr-ex-CFO, it means you take charge for what you do, and you say - It happened under my watch, and what I did was unpardonable, now punish me.
If your employees used that defense you wouldn't get any of your projects done - "I dont know who wrote this code, I just compile it". You and your andhra-money-grabbing ilk make me sick. Go to hell, all 3 of you, you brought all of Indian IT down with your money grabbing filthy hands... I hope you feel the pain of every investor each night you try to sleep you filthy animals...

The best damn cookie...PERIOD

2009-01-10T23:55:00.000-08:00

American cookies are shit - I hate Oreos and the store cookies - European cookies are too bland, expect for the French ones I haven't bothered trying - But of all the biscuits I've tasted my favoritest is : Britannia Pure Magic Vanilla :

It was launched back in the 90's.
They stopped this somewhere down the ages, and relaunched it again some time ago - the vanilla filling and the cookie exterior blend in this awesome goodness... I can't wait to get up each morning and dunk a handful of them into my coffee.. MMmm mmmm mmm delish!!

Wings of the Bird..

2009-01-10T06:48:00.000-08:00

Haven't taken the bird out on a long ride in a long while. Planning something for the following weekend, once my document comes back from insurance renewal. In 4 years she has done almost 20,000 kms mostly in moribund city traffic. Have kept her safe so far, and have been no accident save one bit of lunacy from an oncoming auto rickshaw driver way back when the bike was 8 months young.
The little dot on the front of the petrol was the indent when the front of the handle jammed against it and I skidded.

I want to get my hands on a good Lightning 535 in Bangalore, so in any case any one is interested in selling one, they can get in touch with me through this blog.

Slumdog for the Oscars? Hold on...

2009-01-09T06:18:00.000-08:00

How would you feel if a rape offender surfaced a few years down the line to pursue a victim for her beauty, but ended up castigating her for being "used-good"? Not only is that highly offensive but you'd probably say what the hell is the rapist doing out in the open anyway? Lock him up and throw away the key - and of course the victim is entitled to some form of restitution.
Slumdog Millionaire is one of the movies I was curious to read about in review before I spent my well-earned 200 Rs at one of the shameless extortionists called PVR cinemas. I've read enough, and I don't care 2 hoots for cinematography as some of the erudite white-skinned readers of CNN etc. have professed. Especially when you film human excrement covered all over a little boy. And pass it off as a patently Indian thing to do.
Britain's love affair for India started almost 500 years ago when a band of the white skinned brigands set shore up on the shores of our native country. To trade, and then to enslave. The enslavement part came partly because the armies were of predominantly Muslim Mughal conquerers who sat on their fat-asses watching Mujras while certain Englishmen on boats were piling up on the western shores. To anyone who thinks Britain did a favor on us to bestow the Queen's lingua france, think again - nobody robs a piss-poor country, so the counter argument and the argumentee both get thrown out the window. And the Brits didnt' simply put all the goodies on a boat on the midnight of August 14th 1947. They did so over 300 years, since the set up of the East India company.
For the same bunch of ragged ugly Brits to come to India, and film - nay - exploit India's "ugly underbelly" for commercial purposes of the white-west who lap it up like a starving dog - with the samy pithy quotes - "moving", "human spirit", "rags to riches" - its just inane I tell you - Yes there is poverty in India, yes there are people who take a dump on the Western Express Highway, but that is the prerogative of the people who take the dump, and the folks who keep populating the slums with kids who take a dump in the open.
I don't intend to watch the movie, and I call up on all self respecting Indians to refrain from doing the same - in fact I support pulling down the movie from Indian theatres as well [violence would be morally justified] - If I wanted to see poverty, I'd just take a little walksie outside of my apartment complex, and watch the kids relieve themselves.
Coming back to my argument earlier - rapists of the native land, coming back to exploit the ugly side of their victim - doesn't sound appealing, it is nauseating.
As with every thing western, take an angle, blow it out of proportion - especially with anything eastern - By the same yardstick if America were Micheal Jackson, Marilyn Manson, and George Bush, that would collectively be the dumbest nation on planet earth - okay just one notch above Pakistan.

A few things India is not:

1. Amitabh Bachchan fans - I find him annoying at times and an over actor..

2. Live in squalor and poverty - Take a trip down to the Bronx - London was the largest slum until the turn of the 19th century.

3. All Indians do not work in BPO's - the few that do annoy the rest of us.

Self-respect is not in the purvey of left-liberals - which is why they will sell their mothers to go watch this movie and get a "new insight into India" while yapping over their iPhone and avoiding the kid scratching the window of their petrol-guzzling luxury sedan.

Disproportionate Retribution

2009-01-04T04:42:00.000-08:00

So the Israeli troops have made a ground incursion into Gaza to get rid of Hamas. One of the top commanders of Hamas have been taken out in the earlier air-strikes.
This has been Israel's dis-proportionate response to the dozen odd people killed in rocket attacks made by the terrorist organization by the name of Hamas. It is anyone's guess how many more Palestinians are going to be steam-rolled in the new offensive in the name of "defense of Israel".
One of the most unthinkable but doomsday scenario aspects is that Israel's disproportionate response every time to each act of terror is aimed at, according to Israel, aimed at shutting the other side up for a while, but could very easily back-fire in the kind of radicalization and polarization of the non-Arab countries against it. To expect any friends of Israel in the Arab world would be insane. However the over-the-top reaction is not winning it any sympathy in Europe and other countries with minority Islamic populations.
Coming back to the doomsday scenario I was talking about. Its always possible that the only Islamic country with nuclear weapons - Pakistan - would and could support the detonation of a dirty-bomb on Israeli soil. However, if the Pakistanis had anything they would already have forked it out to their jehadi brothers in Palestine. Detonation of a dirty bomb would definitely leave its fingerprints which would be almost impossible to get rid of - However if the same were to be used against a neighboring nation - say India, in the event of a conventional war, it would be justified in the name of self-defense - the same illogical reason used by Israel. For the same reason the detonation of a nuclear dirty bomb would most probably never happen on Indian soil, because that would mean an almost immediate response from India, and if there is mobilization prior to this by Pakistan to save itself, India's ears would be up for a possible act of war.
There is every possibility that nuclear weapons, if at all they are in any sense of maturity level for delivery, would be used against India - in fact they would probably throw everything including the kitchen sink against their neighbor, very well risking complete annihilation. That's their doctrine, its not the no-first-use as purpotedly espoused by Zardari on TV.

Crossroads

2008-12-31T07:18:00.000-08:00

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?

2008-12-30T05:35:00.000-08:00

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.

What's the exchange rate? I want to convert...

2008-12-27T22:23:00.000-08:00

Bring out the prayer mats.. It is azaan time!
The Muezzin has croaked the "Allahu Akbar" out - time for the faithful to face Mecca ASAP!
Seeing as the new-found ambition of Pakistan is to unfurl the Pakistani flag, and in turn, spread the gospel of the Islamic Caliphate - the "chumma" of the "Umma" all over what they call is the fragmented "Indian Federation - and seeing as is our impotent, clueless and utterly useless leadership, police and military is unable to stop, prevent or pro-actively man the borders/waters to the west of the nation, I think its about time that Indians submit to the fact that the sword of forced conversion and Islamic subjugation is pretty much a reality.
While us rice-eating, IT coding, unathletic and un-religious-ferver-dogma-inspired-non-martial Hindus go about such droll lives as earning our pay, and paying taxes to the same eunuch Government, I thought it would be wise and prudent to roll-over and just play dead. Its a lot easier than resisting, since I don't have anything more than my ex-roomie's hard-disk to throw at an assault-rifle wielding/RPG toting Jihadi/Pak Army regular, Allah-willing he crosses the border and traverses 2000 km down south!
So I've started to pick out cool Islamic names : Something that sounds good to the ears, and has a pompous ring to it - Like Fakr Ul-Bade-Lund... That's sure to get those hot-fair-skinned Paki chicks into bed at the introduction part!
But honestly, what is the Indian establishment doing? The most painful part of the 1 month "anniversary" part of the Mumbai attacks has been the eunuch Bollywood types music directors/song-writers/bands which have penned songs to "tide over the grief" rather than trading their guitar axes for battle axes, they go about the typical bangle-wearing Indian non-martial tradition of bending-over. It sickens me, as I arm-chair flip through the channels and curse the Indian muddle-class [not middle-class].
60 years since Independence and if the Indian military cannot guarantee absolute victory with minimal casualties, then it should cease to exist in its present form. More than 2/3rds of the budget of the services go into pay and pension with little left over the fight a f#@king war. The need of the hour is honest, and aggressive decision-making. War-mongering and the macho-bravado aside, we need an honest assessment of how much we can do to break the enemy into pieces, and how we can achieve to do it with minimal damage to the Indian economy. The world will come to us - they have to - we are the 2nd biggest f#$king market in the world? Who would the Western world rather sell to - The Albanians? Prepare - prepare for the worst consequences and take a hit - we can't live this life without self-respect. I hate the Indian middle-class and the f#$king beatniks for changing me from an agnostic-Hindu into a 5-time a day bending over-a-prayer-mat Paki - Now where is that f#@king Haj subsidy, Indian Govt - I want to throw a few grenades at the wall of the Shaitan!

Come sing with me ::
Kashmir ki Azaadi tak..
Hindustan ki Tabaahi tak..
Jihad, Jihad, Jihad...

Me & Sea Biskit

2008-12-19T21:01:00.000-08:00

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!]

Foot in the Mouth

2008-12-18T11:14:00.000-08:00

Pakistani Media now has a new hero - For the coming weeks, there is fodder & fuel for our half-witted cousins from across the border to latch on to the dim-witted, callous and extremely dangerous statement made by an Indian MP, a minister, of a moronic department. Who even knew of a Minorities affairs, until AR Antulay stuck his smelly senile foot into his filthy asinine mouth.
To claim Hindu terrorists co-ordinated their murder of Karkare along-with the Paki strike on the Taj and Trident has made Pakistani conspiracy theories look as true as the cry "OJ did it!".
Would the dis-honorable septugenarian stand down and say he was mentally ill when he said this and resign? Would MM Singh, the spine-less PM step-in and shut the loose cannon in times of a national crisis? So far things don't look good - Antulay doesn't retract but in fact gets more bull-dog-ish on it. Congress(I) has distanced itself from this, for once sensibly, and the party has asked the lunatic to provide an explanation for his lunacy.
Very little is going to come out of it, but the damage in the free media is incalculable. Somehow if the party leadership can step in and place a gag order on its moronic ministers before they make such sensational statements, by using good sense and judgement, by circulating such "finds" or allegations, inside cabinet before making it free for the consumption of vultures in the Paki media, so as to temper idiocy, and not make this nation look like blood thirsty murderer - all meant to please who? Are you pleasing Muslims with this statement? Do they care who killed Karkare or who he was investigating - some one else takes over the case - Just that the person will probably ensure the Malegaon probe is not tainted with the political angle that Hemant Karkare brought to it. And that's when the Congress' cat would be truly out of the bag.

High on MSD!

2008-12-16T08:28:00.000-08:00

MS Dhoni - the dashing young keeper who burst on to the Indian cricket scene with a primal brutal 148 against the Porkis, and now captain of the Indian T20, ODI and test teams has yet another win under his belt. A 4/4 test-win-record is not exactly something to go ga-ga about yet, but he has started on a finer +ve note than any and has probably won more tests than most Indian test captains!
I think I like MS Dhoni overall - he has the stoic face of a braveheart, finds it easy to break into a smile, but can make brilliant decisions that totally bely the cool and calm exterior. He has the hallmark of a good strategist as all the wins under him testify - the opponents have more often than not been massively outplayed, and close finishes have almost always ended up India's way. He finds it possible to get the best out of all of his players - from the senior most to the debutant - and that is the hallmark of a great leader. And that in his short period at the top of 1 year, he has shown he truly belongs.
Sourav Ganguly is the benchmark for future Indian Captains to emulate. He was bold in his own right - but there is definitely something Dhoni can do better - on the win/loss ratio, and push India permanently into the top 2-sides in the world and keep them there.
He is in stark contrast to Dravid who would fumble, foam and show extremely -ve body language when things would not go his way - contrast this to Joginder Sharma's last over and Dhoni's absolute lack of histrionics even when India swept to victory in that amazing T20 finale.
Some claim Dhoni is lucky, he has the Midas touch - you are lucky once, twice or thrice, but to do it consistently means you are made of better stuff. To me, the Indian team looks to be, at the moment, the most naturally gifted and professionally prepared bunch of cricketers out there, with an amazing Aussie aggro - I don't think this Indian team is a bunch of "gentlemen". If the gentlemen tag goes to a bunch of no-gooders who lose on a consistent basis, then off with the tag. We'd rather be a bunch of guys who regularly push the envelope like the Ozzies, and can entertain the crowd with their successful ways than be a bunch of flashy losers.
MS Dhoni has promised a lot in the short time at the helm. There is something about this man - he is not moulding a bunch of losers into a winning team - he is moulding a bunch of very talented bunch of youngsters to believe that they belong - and that winning is their birth-right. We sorely missed that in the days of yore - To quote a cliche, this is the new India - we are not satisfied with Govt jobs, we are children of the capitalist era - yeh dil maange more!
Go forth and win, MSD, India thinks you rock!

Left Media propoganda : NDTV to the fore

2008-12-14T07:28:00.000-08:00

Where does Bark-a Dutt get off with her show on NDTV? I don't believe in the "if you don't like it, don't watch it" philosophy when your program is meant to beam to every nook and corner of this country, and all you dish out in the name of a debate is cheap leftist propaganda. We all know her love for the sound of her own voice - which is why the people on the show are puppets, and she cuts off/grabs their microphone, and would throw in her view on each and every statement - which means in a program of 45 minutes, participants would speak for no more than 15 minutes, and Bark-a barks for about 30 minutes of the show correcting people, berating people who speak their mind, shouting down opponents - heck she reminds me of a leftist version of Bill O'Reilly on the American version of Fox TV.
For those unaware, left-ism is the shoring up of national sorrow by re-distributing land, and laying down arms, and leaving the nation to the good-will of invaders.
This was the gist of the show : "We don't want war, War is lunacy, but as a nation, our collective conscience should be pushed into action, by putting 'pressure on Pakistan' but it is important for us to introscpect" - Can't make sense of what this means, of course not, its the biggest load of bullshit spouted by the barking bitch with 1 hour on prime-time.
Apparently according to her, certain segments of the media she alleged, obviously looking at and pointing at the vernacular media, of playing up nationalist emotions and indulging in jingoism. And the best part is the kind of total butt-heads she manages to get on the show - possibly from the Leftist college campuses with links to the Communist parties, or interning at NDTV for a full-time barking job talking of the "Babri Masjid making me hang my head in shame" - you know what if your head hangs in shame I suggest you move across the border, any border, and just stay there - Please feel your shame vanish when your bullet-ridden carcass with its eyes gouged out are tossed back into this great nation.
Watching Zardari "play down" the "IAF intrusion" sounds like a guy who enjoyed a few rounds of sherry before talking to the media - The man is incoherent incompetent and talks about a joint investigation. Its like calling in Osama to come in and have a look at evidence at Ground Zero. I would bet not less than 250 million Americans would lynch every hair on his body even before he lands in NY.

NDTV's reporting so far has been something I missed - because of my travel - so I am not going to comment on that - but it is very typically irresponsible of them to spout unintelligent and extremely pusillanimous reactions to an act of war. God save such people from framing, or shaping popular opinion, or affecting people in a position to push the button of war. But I don't discount the fact that the Indian middle-class is too much of a coward - they would start panicking the moment a Pakistani warhead goes off in their cities..

An interview with a secular MP

2008-12-14T04:35:00.000-08:00

Recently Porkistan, our heavenly neighbor to the west [ heavenly : because there is a good chance you go to heaven if you ever visit the place , just don't expect 6 dozen virgins ] has decided to ban Jamat-Ud-Dawa [which in Urdu translates in Medicine of the Ass], apparently a "front" organization for the LeT and its charitable activities of blowing people to smithereens. How such an organization can even be allowed to exist has people up in arms from across the border. Actually for some people across the border, how the BJP, a front-organization for such fascist terrorist organizations such as RSS, VHP and the Bajrang Dal [translates into : Multicolored Lentils in Hindi] can still exist is a matter of extreme worry.
A few secularists spoke on the condition of non-anonymity.

We spoke to a Rajya Sabha MP, Ms. Shabuna Azmy,
[US : Inteviewer, SA : Shabuna Azmy]

Us : So what do you have to say about the ban on LeT and its front organization
SA : Actually, our secular neighbor, Pakistan has shown the light of the way to India. With such horrendous Hindu murderers like BJP/RSS/etc we need to take a leaf out of the Pakistan establishment's book and ban the BJP. We should learn from them. See how well they have reacted?

Us : So you have proof that BJP has been involved in terrorist activities?
SA : No, but because they highlight the plight of the Hindus, we do not like them. It makes us look bad - its almost as if we ourselves are responsible for our failures - and that is really ridiculous, how can someone be responsible for their own failures? It has to be someone else.

Us : Errrr, Yea, and did you know the LeT was responsible for the attack on the Parliament - or the place in which you are "supposed to" work?
SA : Look, all this was the handiwork of the Indian agencies - Pakistan has already told us about this - why aren't we listening to them? We should look at the Hindus who died attacking the Parliament

Us : But MP they were'nt Hindus - they were Lashkar operatives from across the border?
SA : As I told you already you are mouthing the official Indian position. The Pakistanis have already had the final word on this matter. You journalist types also na...

Us : Excuse me for asking this, Ms.MP, but which side of the fence do you sit on? Seriously?
SA : The one that pays my bills? If Mr.Advani can send me a fatter cheque than these Saudi oil barons, I'd be all over these Pakis... .

Us : We thought so, stupid b#tch.. Thanks for clarifying that. Now you can go back to splitting this great country in to half.
SA : Are we done here, I have a cocktail party to go to...

Indian Angrezi

2008-12-12T00:31:00.000-08:00

Brownie # 1 : I wanted to be going to my hometown to attend a function...
Brownie # 2 : So when are you going to your native?
Brownie # 1 : That terrorist bombing happened na, so I could not pre-pone my visit ya.
Brownie # 2 : I am also thinking of going re.
And so on and so forth..

[English faux pas in the above sentences are exemplary of brownies speaking Lingus Brittanicus. I have better sense than to speak/write that way]

What the F#$% is a hometown? The Future Group has a shop called HomeTown - is that why a lot of people hang out there when they say they are going there?
And what the flying F@#$ is a native? What are you - and indigenous tribe of the Andamans? I mean give me a break!!

And what's the deal with this word pre-pone - We've screwed the language so much that in fact some dictionaries might even give this word credibility!!
And why do indians use the words "na" and "ki" as fillers in between english sentences? Its like the mind thinks in hindi, and an adaptive filter continuously transfers this in to the Queen's English - not the Queen from Buckingham Palace rather the dacoit Queen from MP.

I find this rather amusing piece of wordings in Governmental documents
"I wish to intimate" - It sounds like you are going to get all post-coital with the intended recipient of the memo!

Indians have to dispassionately assess their command over the language - its quite one thing going to an english medium school and totally another to remove the heavy accent and horrendous mothertongue-english translation filter inside their little heads...

Red River

2008-12-11T12:18:00.000-08:00

Tin-pot aristocrat, perched atop his pulpit
Master of all he surveyed
Quoth he : "We shall overcome"
While we knew words wouldn't live up to the deeds

Tin-pot aristocrat, nestled in goose feathers,
When the country he ruled burned to a debris
Evil came in silence
Evil came with hate
And burnt our symbols of prosperity

Tin-pot aristocrat, flipped over in his bed
While its victims clutched their dead
Wretched in apathy
Wretched in sorrow
Of what use are thee? Tin-pot aristocrat

Denizens of this nation, oh be it so great
Fuelled up in anger, not revenge or hate
Asked for some answers
Not of the Evil that stole in,
But of the tin-pot aristocrat
And the government he ruled in

Great denizens of my native land
You fought for justice
When revenge [could have] was at hand
You sought answers to questions
Not stormy talk of repercussions
And sought to straighten out
The leader in the tin can...

For ye, of little mind, cast thy eyes on the river of blood that poured forth that chilly November night...
You look askance when we looked for answers and you pay the price down the line...

I have faith in the strength, fortitude and uprightness of my native people - who have been wronged - and every right to seek justice at a time and manner of their choosing.
Please fix your eyes on the glasses on the person who never made it home that night - drenched in blood and brain matter... Where art justice?

The Hidden Power of Rhetoric

2008-12-10T13:12:00.000-08:00

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

2008-12-10T05:20:00.000-08:00

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

2008-12-06T06:22:00.000-08:00

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!

2008-12-06T01:28:00.000-08:00

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?

Perfect Reaction to the TERRORIST MURDERERS

2008-12-04T11:20:00.000-08:00

Jon Stewart is a man who doesn't mince words - and a man of extreme intelligence...
You have said what every Indian like me wanted to say but couldn't do so on TV..
But thanks for reaching out and understanding our pain at this time - and then putting one across to the cold blooded murderers!

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Mumbai Tragedy

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Mumbai TERRORISTS Identified

2008-11-30T03:07:00.000-08:00

One italian and two indians were held responsible for the terrorist attacks on Mumbai.
They have been identified as top political big-wigs in the Indian establishment. For reasons of safety their names and photographs will be published and released indiscriminately so as to let them feel the same fate as those they've failed to protect.

The blood of thousands of people are on your hands, face and well-pressed khadi - Lady and Gentlemen.
If you have an iota of a soul, if you have an iota of humanity, and an iota of a sense of responsibility you would step down, and let this country be led by better dynamic and sensible leadership.
You will however pay the price for all this - There will be retribution and there will be salvation for those who've perished for no real fault of theirs.

GUILTY..
GUILTY...
GUILTY.....

Shivraj Vishwanath Patil

Sonia Maino Gandhi

Dr. Manmohan Singh

Nation's Gratitude

2008-11-30T02:29:00.000-08:00

The greatness of a nation lies in the respect it pays its founding fathers, its revolutionists, its freedom fighters, and the soldiers who have time and again laid down their lives so that we may live.
The more I think about it, the more it hurts - what drives a man with a family, and with everything to live for, to fight for the sake of a billion people who don't know him. That my friends, is not something poetic conjured up in the hearts of nationalistic, flag-waving arm-chair patriots. It is something you really need to look into yourself - think about it.
I've got this link to a picture on the NDTV site : I do not claim credit for this picture - and if there are claims of copyright I will pull this link down : Here goes :
http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id=NEWEN20080074627
I want you to see the love and gratitude - you can't because all you see are outstretched hands and flowers in the hands of the hoi-polloi of Mumbai. They have no idea what it means to lay down their lives for the country - but I'd be damned to not say that they appreciate each and every sacrifice made by these toughened and elite soldiers of the National Security Guard. Its not a very romantic notion when you are called upon to tackle someone as maniacal as the people who'd stormed the hotels, hospital and Jewish centre.
Just like this one of many pictures - Mumbai stood in unison holding banners, egging on the soldiers as they stood outside the beseiged Taj. They aren't just curious onlookers - they were there to make sure that the vermin, the scum of humanity got exterminated in the worst possible manner. India honors her soldiers - of that there is no doubt. We need to do it time and time again. But what is distressing is when the civilian government takes a complete backstage to armed constabulary, people expressing more faith in military dictatorship rather than civilian authority, it just means India has slipped down the path of impotent and incontinent leadership. In today's India, we have CEOs from Silicon Valley to Osaka in private enterprise, but we don't have a single dynamic leader who can cut across party lines and bind us together. It is in current context - and Obama moment - we need an Obama - if he comes from a disenfranchised background, even better. We as a nation have lost our character. Its time to be tough as nails to evil, while extending our arms of all encompassing love to friendship. The two can definitely co-exist. We don't want to become an Israel, thank you!

We shall overcome, We shall Arrrrrgggghhhhhhhhhh

2008-11-29T08:04:00.000-08:00

Giving peace a chance..
Let us not be driven by revenge. Lets not hold our relations with our neighbors hostage to the developments. India doesn't have evidence! Lets not jump to conclusions. Lets not have knee-jerk reactions. Lets not set the peace process back by years. Lets not paint everyone with the same brush. Pakistan has suffered at the hands of terrorists as much as we have! Lets help each other combat this menace that stares the world in its face! This is not an Indian problem - its a global problem. Any retaliation would lead to more attacks on our soil.

I have one solution to anyone who raises any such "issues":

That gun is a Chinese-made ripoff of a Smith*Wesson revolver.

Why the Mumbai attack is good for India over time..

2008-11-28T12:17:00.000-08:00

Ladies and Gentleman I present to you
Exhibit One..
I give you a man who bathes about half a dozen times a day. He prefers wearing an expensive suit. And he does all this whilst looking the best for a job he is not only ill-qualified to hold, but even at the slightest pretext and disillusion of him being envisaged of being capable of holding the job, is actually so hopelessly bad at it, that you would rather give your kids to the Michael Jackson Neverland night-care center than you would trust the lives of you-yourself and that of your family.
Mr. Shivraj Patil - take a bow - Oh yes you certainly must. Its not your fault that at election time, the rightwing hawks in the Hindutva-wadi BJP and its affiliate curs are baying for your blood. POTA - don't need it - its not bad enforcement that's the problem. Take away all laws with teeth and watch Human Rights violation go down to a minimum. Because torture is the preserve of such inhumane and uncivilized countries such as American, UK and France. Who knows - the terrorists, who have my utmost sympathy [ and that of my fellow writers and great left-wing thinkers such as Kuldip Nayar, Arundathi Roy, Kushwanth Singh, Amartya Sen, Arvind Adiga, Mahesh Butt, the laundry list goes on!] are misguided Indians who are fighting for freedom against the tryanny of the Hindus. Mr. Shivraj Patil has managed to do something that takes the skin of a rhino and the nerve response of a King Tut mummy - has managed to stonewall terrorists. Whatever the message they plan to give us - has failed to reach the ears of the Govt - time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time again. How does a misguided youth ever manage to do anything - violence doesn't seem to get their point across? At some point in time the terrorist will eventually break and give up arms. And then, when about a few hundred million of us are dead, we will have peace. Perhaps we shall live as a minority in our own holy land, but its a small price to pay for no more terrorist attacks any more. Until then its time for us to do a Patil - grow the skin of rhinocerous, and shut off all nerve receptors to our brains.

What's with the interviews given by the socialites who came under attack - one of the women seemed like she powdered her nose before she came on TV. I can almost hear her say - wait CNN before you get this on tape, can you please hand me your eyeliner and mascara - I'd rather be dead under a hail of shrapnel and gunfire than be caught on the telly without a mask of makeup.

I am not cynical. Its not that I don't care. I am kidding - honestly I don't care. I really don't care for those who have died. Some rich people died. Some middle-class folks died. But I guess it was all pretty well deserved. The security agencies in India are a joke - This includes and does not LIMIT with the ARMY, Air Force and the Navy.

Cases in point :

The Indian Army is an army of rape and subjugation - its principally known for fighting insurgencies and molesting women wherever it is stationed. While some of these cases may be fake, a good number would probably be swept under the carpet. Foot soldiers who can't keep their manhood within their pants dont deserve the respect of this country. An ill-trained, and ill-motivated bunch of poorly paid, but overly praised unit. Highly and grossly over-rated.

The Indian Air Force received what is the best compliment from the commander of operations for the joint exercise held recently between the USAF and the IAF - enough said about the metal piece of junk with circa 1950's design and unsophisticated BVR Weaponry without the ability to sustain their poor accident prone-record.

The Indian Navy was busy sinking Thai trawlers off the coast of Somalia like a cheap-lunch-money-stealing-bully while a bunch of misguided innocent youths from across our friendly neighboring country came by hijacking boats/ships off the indian coast. Oh sorry about that - is there a Kenyan fishing raft we could sink with our Russian Klub missiles? Oops sorry those don't work - what if we just threw it on the raft with our seamen? Does that count? Probably...

The NSG commandos went into the operation without any proper floorplan of the hotels - When the MARCOS/NSG commandos were asked why it took them over 40 hours to clear the hotels - he exploded into a fit of rage which so befits the haughty security agencies , before blurting - we don't know the floorplans! Nobody told us! We had no idea - Excuse me Mr. Commando-person-type : The first job is for you to do your background on the flight to Mumbai - it took your over 5-6 bloody hours to get to the site of action - What was the in-flight entertainment - Dostana - for some of your troops who swing the other way from time to time during the "gruelling" training sessions? If you can't get intel do a recee. If that doesn't work you go in blind and not whine like a pussy.

In India incompetence and asophistication in handling your job is quite normal. I would'nt trust my trash, let alone my life with any of these Government Agencies. Everyone supports their own agenda, and have their own axes to grind. Trust no one. Go get a gun - If anybody questions your right to own one - shoot the bastard. Its your god given right to protect yourself. IT doesn't require a great host of training to aim straight to the head. The only thing that is above board is self-preservation.

Don't blame Pakistan for your security problems. They are chipping away at loopholes, of which there are infinite, to rightly and justifiably bleed India. It is to pay for India's misadventure into splitting Pakistan into its other bastard love-child known as Bangladesh. The armpit of a bengali speaking country is more pain to us than a disjointed Pakistan split across west and east. Indira Gandhi's vision haunts us 4 decades since...

The attacks are good - they are purgatory - the only way is the way up. We've not just hit rock bottom, we are defining new plumb depths of mediocrity not as a nation - but as a nation's character. No amount of money can buy you respect - All of the victims of Mumbai's attacks will testify to that. Hold a gun in your hand and hold it against the head of a screaming man/woman/child - and you will know what power means. Its about time to grow some India...

Right or Wrong

2008-11-01T00:06:00.001-07:00

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

2008-10-03T05:12:00.000-07:00

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

2008-10-02T09:56:00.000-07:00

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

2008-10-02T03:08:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-27T11:42:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-27T11:32:00.000-07:00

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

2008-09-02T22:32:00.000-07:00

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

2008-08-09T11:04:00.000-07:00

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

2008-08-08T09:22:00.000-07:00

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.

2008-08-06T04:15:00.000-07:00

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

2008-08-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

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

2008-08-05T06:00:00.000-07:00

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

2008-08-01T07:55:00.000-07:00

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

2008-07-27T03:50:00.000-07:00

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

2008-07-26T06:36:00.000-07:00

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..

2008-07-25T11:19:00.000-07:00

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?

Who wants to be a Terrorist

2008-07-25T10:35:00.000-07:00

The all new reality show

Now on Congress (I) TV

A show hosted by the honorable Home Minister Mr. Shivraj Patil. The language is a little dicey since he doesn't speak coherently but the message is clear. What can we do to help you kill more of the people who don't vote for me?

Okay, so now we have our first contestant.

He has been trained in extreme religious devotion. He hates people who don't pray in the direction in which he prays in. He holds a Masters Degree in Mechanical and Metallurgical engineering which he got in through the Quota system.

We call him Mr. Q

Patil : So Mr. Q, why do you want to be a terrorist

Q : I want to kill people who don't believe in my religion.

Patil : Oh that is a very noble initiative indeed. Okay, so lets play - Who wants to be a terrorist!

Patil : Here are the rules - remember you have to plan and plot to dismember the rule of law in the native land. You must plan to convert the entire country into another religion while screaming death to infidels. Along the way you should pick up as many civilian casualties as possible. You may use the suicide mission option no more than once, for obvious reasons. [laughter] You may use the get out of jail card since I voted for the Congress card once every 5 rounds. You may use the minority card on all occasions as a life saver.

Before we head to our first question we have to take a break for a word from our sponsors.

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How I survived a half-hour Saas-Bahu serial

2008-07-25T09:55:00.000-07:00

I am a man's man.
I love sports.
I love deep fried chicken.
I love things that go fast, I love exuding the rudeness and self-confidence that is oh so "manly" and cocky.
I hate girly stuff that some men take up. Metrosexual is lost on me. I get haircuts if my hair gets long, and I don't give two hoots for a pedicure/manicure/mudbaths.
But that gets me goat a lot, is the saas-bahu serials. I cannot take it, I can't stand it, and I sure as hell can't watch it.
In the name of journalism [no it was not curiosity, I am still straight as an arrow], I had the pleasure of watching something called : Babul chali something something Doli Saja ke

I didn't get the gist of the story except some impostor took the place of a chick called Anu and the actual Anu was lying unconscious some other place.
Its not the story that is important. There is a minute delta change in an episode.

1. Women are plotters. Big time. It seems to be their only job. Women do not and can not enjoy the happiness of other women.

2. Its always got to do with either money or sex or both.

3. The good are good. The evil are evil - so evil they eat their own kids for breakfast.

4. For dramatic effect - dialogues are repeated.

5. For dramatic effect - camera pans on the person 3 times

6. India is full of very very fair people - very pretty very handsom families we all are. Not a single visual flaw. Everyone is decked up to the fullest finery.

I've escaped with my life and gonads intact. I can't take it any more. I am going back to watching American cops beating down some redneck/black/latino on the bonnet of their Ford Victoria, while the narrator extols the virtue of professional police training.

SPOT light

2008-07-19T03:44:00.000-07:00

The zing thing is back.
No, not GOLDSPOT drink, but the music band.
Apparently an LA based band with Indian-American members [the brown kind, not the red-one], calls itself Goldspot in what is rumored to be a tribute to the tangy, fizzy orange drink of the 80
s and 90's.
There used to be a Golspot factory which pulled in me and my cousins when we were kids, back in the olden days when we used to visit Chennai. Now that very spot is where a soul-less Ford dealership stands [I like you Ford, you just didn't have to stand on the grave of a much loved drink].

The video is of one of their songs, and I like their open embracement of both India and America, without the violence, hateration and nudity so typical of crass Bollywood.

"SOUL"MATE

2008-07-08T10:26:00.001-07:00

People, some of them, go about a part of their lives searching for the perfect soulmate.
They live in the fantasy world that there is someone out there for everyone. With the rise in female infanticide, and the resulting skewed sex-ratios, I would think not!
Okay, so jokes aside, why do people live in such utopian worlds? Why are people so stubbornly holding on to hooking up with that "SOULMATE" and not settle for someone who kind-of sort-of fits the bill? Well, most people do start off believing that there is a special someone out there for them. Emotionally balanced, financially hot, makes breakfast in bed, and never steals the covers. That is not the definition of a soulmate. It is the definition of hoping to find someone like you, yet with all your flaws corrected.
Quite often people have a quick reality check and realize that marriage is easily one of the most flimsiest relationships. In America today, more than 50% of heterosexual marriages end in divorce, and more than 60% of children are now born out of wedlock. In Mumbai the number stands at 20%, but I guess as a good toady to America, we are going to get there. Atleast on the divorce front. We still frown upon single mothers.
Marriage is in fact the worst decision people make - mostly because people don't think right when they say "I Do". Really, there are so many variables towards maintaining this inherently unstable relationship, yet all of us get into it, and some folks think its the bedrock of society. That it may just be. Its just that people need to be practical about things. People aren't perfect. Heck even your parents aren't perfect. Don't you think 30 years even after marriage they'd know each other better - they still squabble over the most trivial things, and its quite natural and not the reason to bail out of a marriage. But it does tell you, that there is a lot of give and take that makes it tick - more than anything, you need to enter the hallowed halls of matrimony only if you have the right attitude for it.
Else, just back off and don't make someone else life miserable as your own.

Dasavatharam - an unbiased review

2008-07-06T21:06:00.000-07:00

So I watched Dasavatharam, the Tamizh version on the big screen in Bangalore last week. The best places to watch movies are places where they aren't popular, for example non-native states. This rule holds true only for India. In America, I've never had problems getting a 1st day 1st show kind of seat - advance booking be damned. I tried scoping out tickets in Chennai for any and every day of the week at the Inox there, but I might as well have made an attempt at world peace while I was at it. I just couldn't get seats - good seats actually. And never more than 1 of them.
Anyway - here is my take on the movie. It is a good one time watch. Despite what you read towards at the end of the blog. Cheesy is something that flashes across a lot. The only fresh thing about the movie are the funny segments, and Kamal does it the way he has done it before. Quick sharp crisp dialogues and great comic timing by all actors.
The following characters were supercilious and it was just downright arrogance to even conceive putting them in the movie and playing the roles just to go one up on his mentor Sivaji who donned 9 roles - If he wanted them he should'nt be playing them, the makeup was hideous - The Afghan, the Surd (good work here), the Jap (good work but totally useless), the Dalit Christian (good work but useless) .

Okay so here comes my rant about the movie itself. It has nothing to do with Kamal's acting, dialogues or screenplay.
It is with me having to put up with Kamal's extreme Vaishnavite superiority complex.
The word Dasavatharam is the reflection of lord Vishnu's 10 avatars on planet earth.
Act 1 Scene 1 shows Kamal the Iyengar Brahmin battling the Cholar King's minions, who attempt to remove a solid stone idol of Lord Narayana. But Kamal goes ballistic, and in a scene taken from the MATRIX, beats the crap out of the toadies, and warns the King to quit his Shaivite arrogance. He gets captured though and one of the Shiva worshippers removes the Vaishnavite markings over his body. It is sacrilege on show, and Kamal plays the martyr. And in a scene of true Biblical proportions, Kamal is drowned in the deep waters of the Bay of Bengal by the vicious Shaivite King, while all the time looking like Jesus on the cross, except for the nails, we have flesh hooks.
The song that plays in the background all this time is one of true Vaishnavite arrogance and needs some explaining for the non-tamils :

Raaja Lakshmi Naayagan Srinivasanthaan

Srinivasan Sei Intha Vishnuthaasanthaan

Kamal claims to be the slave of Lord Vishnu here - okay that seems about okay.

Naatil Undu Aayiram Rajaraajar Thaan

Rajanukku Raajan Intha Rangaraajan Thaan

Okay, so Rajaraja Cholar was the King who built the amazing temple at Thanjavur. It is a Shiva temple. And the best in South India at that. Easily for over a 1000 years. It is now a UNESCO heritage site as well.

So what the song says here is that there may be a 1000 Rajaraja's in this country, but the king of Rajas is Lord Vishnu.

Neerukullae Mooikhinalum Neethi Saagathu

Nenjukullae Vaazhum Engal Jothi Saagathu

So here comes the hero part - song claims even if you drown me, the light that flickers inside me for Lord Vishnu cannot be extinguished. Sure it doesn't Kamal!

Saivam Endru Paarthaal Theivam Theriyathu

Theivam Endru Paarthaal Samayam Kidaiyathu..

The song says - if you say Shaivism, you won't see God. However what stumps me if you say Vaishnavism would you see God? Oh, yes you do, according to the monotheistic/non-duality preached by the followers of Vaishnavism.

Its ironic actually, for all this love of God to be professed by Kamal Hassan, a self proclaimed God hater, meat-eater and self styled followed of EV Ramasamy Naicker aka Periyaar.

Asin acquits herself pretty well as the chaste, simple yet annoying Iyengar daughter living in the Agraharam at Chidambaram. Her name needs some explaining though - Andaal, the character in the movie, is a Tamilian poetess of note, and she is said to have been in love with Lord Vishnu so much that she actually married him. Or so it goes. And in places in Tamilnadu, she has a stone idol erected and she is worshipped as God. Ohhhh I could go on and on with the references and the overdose of Vishnu and his varied names, but I am just too sickened with the propaganda in the movie.

All this for what is what I ask.

A Black Man's voice..

2008-07-05T08:26:00.000-07:00

Its a cruel part of life,
But I still live on
Patiently
Taken down `coz in
the projects
Its all about
poverty...

Y'all know how hard it is
To live
niggardly
Silently the cops move in
And I get attacked
Fatally..

I am a black man
Walking down these streets of Detroit
Its dark at night
And I blend in
But the wailing of the sirens
Echo from a distance
I was clutching a stash
But I ditch it in the alley
And go "Run nigga nigga Run!"
The cops narrow down

Beating down and hollering
I run with every breath I strain
But the po-po beat my ass into the drain
And with handcuffs they restrain
And I can start to feel the pain
Radiate into my head and as I black out
Fade into the night
I just can't believe I gave up
Without standing up for a fight
Soon there is darkness and no light
And that's the black man's plight...

Mathematical theory of life...

2008-06-30T09:03:00.000-07:00

Life..
Quest-ce-que la mystere?
Okay, so people get all depressed about how good or bad their day was.
I would like people to look at the graph in the picture ye below

We have localized maximas and minimas on a large scale in life.
To find out if we've truly hit peaked or reached a new nadir -

We differentiate function life with respect to time.

d/dt Life(t) which yields Life'(t)

subsitute t with the current date

Life'(date) tells you if you've truly maxed out on luck or have truly hit rock bottom :-)

Life is nothing but the interactions of a random number of variables with varying means and different variances all working in harmony to make up your life.
So when you go out there and live, remember, you are breathing because Mathematics chose you to. It was indeed someone else's turn to die.
The Hindu dharmic texts which talk of karma, could be thought of as a causal relationship of a statistically unterminated process (over several janmas/lives) to determine the fate of your actions. It may only be that we can't even begin to characterize using math, the variables, their interactions and their effect on how we live, that we can't quite fathom what goes on in our own lives. And very well so, if we had it all figured out, would we still be living the way we were?

Marketing BLITZ: Samsung corners unknown demographics

2008-06-29T08:40:00.000-07:00

Phil Kotler take a backseat. The folks at Samsung have taken your books to the cleaners and have cornered all new demographics in their attempt to outpace Nokia.

The story so far .....
Samsung has a new phone. Well its not exactly new - but then almost every week Samsung seems to come up with piece of shit technology to pass as their latest and best. They are still a distant second in sales (beating a floundering Motorola was easy) to the Finns, and still have a long way to go to build a brand image in phone technology. Don't get me wrong, I own a Samsung giant screen, and I love the way it functions, I just think they aren't really quite there yet (or ever will be) with the marketing blitzkerig of Nokia, and of course the products do matter as well.

So the Samsung "GURU" is the phone that has caught my goat. Actually it isn't even the phone that bothers me. It is the advertising company that Samsung has decided to go with on all their ads, and the message they are trying to convey through them.

Through this sequence of videos, I shall categorically prove that Samsung has attempted to hit demographics - Stalkers, creeps, rapists, molestors, eve teasers, peeping toms, flashers and has possibly even succeeded.

Here is the sample...

Advert number 1
http://youtube.com/watch?v=QHx2apK7E2s
Ok. so this was the first in the series of ads. It is creepy.

FOOT NOTE : Hmmm... Every "white skinned" gori-mem does not want to romance an Indian guy for chrissakes. And for Indian guys, white skinned girls are not "Easy Game" for the love of God. There is no "Fine Line" between "love" and "stalking" - I think the line is pretty obvious and out there, and if you can't take a bloody hint then its time to drop the axe on Mr. Winky.

Advert number 2
http://youtube.com/watch?v=3i9GqvXm3TM

Things start to get creepier - Staking now turn to molestation. A tribute to all Indian men out there who can't keep their testosterones in check. All under the nose of her firang boyfriend. Chee chee chee chee.. possibly a good ad for sexual dysfunction. Indian man has access to herbs and what not. Oh, and of course tantrik sex, yeah.

Advert number 3
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Yn1_-f4dd4I&feature=related

She has a good time with our lonely Indian romeo and shutters off to Spain (Hmmm Hazel is the model in this video). Poor Indian man doesn't like being used for sex and then not having a commitment from a woman. It is against our vedas, puranas and sanskriti you see.
Bharatiya naari would never do that! Well technically she wouldn't have a one-night stand either but that's a different matter. Or allow herself to be molested.

Advert number 4

Now I didn't have a link to this. But to sum things up, the same model form the first two ads, goes on clicking pictures of more white skinned goris. And they smile back at him, as if they are Veronica Varekova strutting their stuff for Sports Illustrated. [Okay, I will admit I have a weakness for her, but I can assure your its purely platonic - I think she plays the piano well because she was wearing a tankini and lying on top of one].

But I will give Samsung the benefit of the doubt that they started this ad campaign before Fiona Mckewon's daughter Scarlett Keeling was raped, bruised and then dumped off one of Goa's filthy beaches.
The fact that ad number 4 turned out after all the hullabaloo of the case, just begs the question - What was SAMSUNG thinking?

That Samsung has already cornered the LUNATICS, psychos, pathologically paranoid, demographic was amply demonstrated by my earlier blog, with Aamir Khan doing the honors by looking and acting the part! Kudos, if that was acting, it was as natural as it could be!!!!

The Samsung ad with the R_TARD

2008-06-15T06:49:00.000-07:00

Have you seen the Samsumg mobile phone advert with Aamir Khan in it. He has this hair-cut like the one given by my barber down the street (and its not a compliment).
He swivels all around just because his mobile phone has surround sound. Now I may not be an acoustics expert but that kind of behavior definitely ain't got nothing to do with the fact that Samsung has come up with some amazing piece of technology - but for the fact that Aamir chooses to behave like a retard in the advertisment. Its only fair that their choice of poor ad firms and poorer products makes them a distant second to the Finnish giant and phone maker Nokia.
Ditch the bitch and try making better phones Samsung. I dare you, I double dare you..

Soaring the Skies

2008-06-13T09:47:00.000-07:00

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!

2008-06-12T10:26:00.000-07:00

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

2008-05-02T22:23:00.001-07:00

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

2008-04-30T21:24:00.000-07:00

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?

2008-04-27T06:12:00.000-07:00

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

2008-04-27T05:37:00.000-07:00

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..

2008-04-25T21:40:00.000-07:00

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..

2008-04-18T22:53:00.001-07:00

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

2008-04-16T09:31:00.001-07:00

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

2008-04-10T09:25:00.000-07:00

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

2008-04-02T07:33:00.000-07:00

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

2008-03-27T08:59:00.000-07:00

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...