havent been blogging....but have been reading.....
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Showing posts with label musings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label musings. Show all posts
Monday, July 14, 2008
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Embedded :)
You know when technology has totally embedded itself in your life when -
- after embedding the micro iPod chip in your testicle it can sense when you're having sex and play the right music.
- after embedding the micro iPod chip in your testicle it can sense when you're having sex and play the right music.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
a quarter empty
A quarter of the year is almost over. 3 more quarters left to finish off 007. Its been a busy time, and now the summer is threatening to wipe out all memories of the season past. The north Indian heat will be on us soon. Power outages will be extremely common. Ice will be the most used commodity from the refigerator and the streets will have a deserted look in the day. Dust storms will swirl up and people will get thinner and wearier. We will be praying for the rain and clouds and cursing global warming.
The year started off on a quiet note. The worst seemed over but noone was expecting a very quick upturn in the state of things. The world seemed a mess, with China becoming a capitalist sweatshop capital ( funny how the communists ended up exploiting the workers ), Russia getting scarily organised and authoritarian, America muddling along with George Bush and not really caring anymore, Europe not really looking outwards, Africa suffering from catastrophe overdose, the Muslim world trapped in a hobsons choice or either dictators or religious leaders and Australia having its taps run dry. Still everyone felt that it couldnt possibly get worse and maybe computers, education, internet and globalization would start moving people into more sensible endeavors.
The year started off on a quiet note. The worst seemed over but noone was expecting a very quick upturn in the state of things. The world seemed a mess, with China becoming a capitalist sweatshop capital ( funny how the communists ended up exploiting the workers ), Russia getting scarily organised and authoritarian, America muddling along with George Bush and not really caring anymore, Europe not really looking outwards, Africa suffering from catastrophe overdose, the Muslim world trapped in a hobsons choice or either dictators or religious leaders and Australia having its taps run dry. Still everyone felt that it couldnt possibly get worse and maybe computers, education, internet and globalization would start moving people into more sensible endeavors.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
America
Now that three months have passed since my return from America, I find myself able to look back upon visit there with more perspective. So here goes, " A beginners guide to America - The north eastern part "
Disclaimer - I only saw a few cities and towns. Bits of Boston, Manhattan, Baltimore, DC, Pittsburgh and Buffalo. I saw a lot of Air Tran and also travelled by Greyhound, Amtrak, Chinese Bus Service, Taxicabs, Cars and on foot. I had never visited this country and my first visit was if not an eyeopener, but definitely a fresh experience.
Ever since my return from the US of A I have been trying to put a finger on what exactly it was that struck me as different. What was the character of the place that I visited. How did it make me feel.
As always when I cant think of a one word answer, I settle for 10. So there goes - 10 words that describe what I felt -
1. Scale - I felt everything was a bit out of scale, or atleast in a different scale than poor old india. The cars were bigger and so were the people. The buildings were bigger and so were the styrofoam cups. It seemed like everything had 10% extra, to make it bigger and better. Coming from a place where a lot of people share less resources and can't really afford to waste anything, the feeling of being in a place of plenty was exhilarating. It however did feel out of place, and not in sync with its users. The scale was not really so firmly linked to the Human Scale and sometimes one felt out of place in some settings, as if we were preparing all of this for some super being who would come and occupy the world we were creating.
2. Rumble - This was the soundtrack of America. The deep rumble of rubber on tarmac. No horns honking, no whistles blowing, no voices arguing, no brakes screeching, no birds twittering. Just the steady sound of rubber purring over the roads. Wherever one went, one was followed by this steady buzz and hiss. The roads were smooth, the cars in good shape. So no creaking sounds, no bumping sounds. Just a smooth steady rumble all day and all night, everyday and everynight, everywhere.
3. Sugar - This was the taste of america. Specially corn based fructose. Sweeteners. Additives. Sweet stuff everywhere. On donuts, in milkshakes, in fizzy drinks, sweets, candy and desserts. Some cold drinks had so much sugar, that if you let them stand for a while and then take a sip you felt like you were drinking syrup.
got tired...will continue later.
back...
4. Alchohol - Alchohol was everywhere. Socializing means drinking alchohol. Having a good time means drinking lots of liquor. Amazing variety of wine, beer, whiskey, rum, vodka, tequila in the stores where one would almost get giddy drunk just browsing through the displays. Favourites- Sam Adams, Guinness, Jim Beam, all varieties of tequila. Put on lots of weight and developed a curious dependency on the divine spirit. Gradually returning to normal and drying out.
5. Sterile and Fertile - These two words kept popping up in my head when i roamed around america. Sometimes it seemed so cut and dried. So antiseptic and so squeaky clean. Sterile means
Not producing or incapable of producing offspring. Not producing or incapable of producing seed, fruit spores, or other reproductive structures. Used of plants or their parts. Producing little or no vegetation; unfruitful: sterile land.
Free from live bacteria or other microorganisms: a sterile operating area; sterile instruments. Lacking imagination, creativity, or vitality. Lacking the power to function; not productive or effective; fruitless: a sterile discussion.
It did seem like the last generation. There didnt seem to be anything new springing up, any new directions, new movements, fresh growths. America seemed stuck in the mould of itself. To grow is to change. To change one must shed some part of the old. Thats where I felt the society was a bit sterile, since to shed some part of the old now might get called Un-American. There was a bit too much predictability in the experiences one had there.
The land was fertile though. Very fertile. Lush turgid rivers, fat green trees, huge overfed squirrels and enormous quantities of food. The human layer which has been laid over the earth layer seemed incongruous, a sterile icing on a rich nutty cake. I kept hoping to find something organic, something that grew out of the earth and grew according to the constraints of nature. Instead of that, one could feel the heavy machinery and the imposing human will that had leveled mountains, flattened hills and build huge boxes of concretes called malls everywhere.
6. Smile - I never saw so many smiles in a day as I did in America. I felt happy thinking that the sight of me was making people light up with a big smile, but later I came to realise that its the default facial expression. Everyone had great white teeth, perfect dental work and the ability to keep smiling for longer than I would have thought physically possible.
7. Color - Black and White and the shades in between - For the first time I was living somewhere where most of the people didnt look like me, not even in the shades of their skin colors. I ended up sharing a house with a pale gentle commercial artist and a stocky grinning tanned engineer. It was nice feeling to see so much variety around. African origins, Asian origins, European origins, Middle eastern origins and the various other types were all mixed up in the malls and in the streets. DC was pretty nicely mixed up and I missed that when I travelled to Boston. Somehow there was less variety there. I saw a west african pub which was filled with the sound of reggae and shook with energy while besides it was a cafe pub with classic rock playing and white folks sitting around conversing. Parallel worlds which met and separated and met and separated again.
8. Sex
Disclaimer - I only saw a few cities and towns. Bits of Boston, Manhattan, Baltimore, DC, Pittsburgh and Buffalo. I saw a lot of Air Tran and also travelled by Greyhound, Amtrak, Chinese Bus Service, Taxicabs, Cars and on foot. I had never visited this country and my first visit was if not an eyeopener, but definitely a fresh experience.
Ever since my return from the US of A I have been trying to put a finger on what exactly it was that struck me as different. What was the character of the place that I visited. How did it make me feel.
As always when I cant think of a one word answer, I settle for 10. So there goes - 10 words that describe what I felt -
1. Scale - I felt everything was a bit out of scale, or atleast in a different scale than poor old india. The cars were bigger and so were the people. The buildings were bigger and so were the styrofoam cups. It seemed like everything had 10% extra, to make it bigger and better. Coming from a place where a lot of people share less resources and can't really afford to waste anything, the feeling of being in a place of plenty was exhilarating. It however did feel out of place, and not in sync with its users. The scale was not really so firmly linked to the Human Scale and sometimes one felt out of place in some settings, as if we were preparing all of this for some super being who would come and occupy the world we were creating.
2. Rumble - This was the soundtrack of America. The deep rumble of rubber on tarmac. No horns honking, no whistles blowing, no voices arguing, no brakes screeching, no birds twittering. Just the steady sound of rubber purring over the roads. Wherever one went, one was followed by this steady buzz and hiss. The roads were smooth, the cars in good shape. So no creaking sounds, no bumping sounds. Just a smooth steady rumble all day and all night, everyday and everynight, everywhere.
3. Sugar - This was the taste of america. Specially corn based fructose. Sweeteners. Additives. Sweet stuff everywhere. On donuts, in milkshakes, in fizzy drinks, sweets, candy and desserts. Some cold drinks had so much sugar, that if you let them stand for a while and then take a sip you felt like you were drinking syrup.
got tired...will continue later.
back...
4. Alchohol - Alchohol was everywhere. Socializing means drinking alchohol. Having a good time means drinking lots of liquor. Amazing variety of wine, beer, whiskey, rum, vodka, tequila in the stores where one would almost get giddy drunk just browsing through the displays. Favourites- Sam Adams, Guinness, Jim Beam, all varieties of tequila. Put on lots of weight and developed a curious dependency on the divine spirit. Gradually returning to normal and drying out.
5. Sterile and Fertile - These two words kept popping up in my head when i roamed around america. Sometimes it seemed so cut and dried. So antiseptic and so squeaky clean. Sterile means
Not producing or incapable of producing offspring. Not producing or incapable of producing seed, fruit spores, or other reproductive structures. Used of plants or their parts. Producing little or no vegetation; unfruitful: sterile land.
Free from live bacteria or other microorganisms: a sterile operating area; sterile instruments. Lacking imagination, creativity, or vitality. Lacking the power to function; not productive or effective; fruitless: a sterile discussion.
It did seem like the last generation. There didnt seem to be anything new springing up, any new directions, new movements, fresh growths. America seemed stuck in the mould of itself. To grow is to change. To change one must shed some part of the old. Thats where I felt the society was a bit sterile, since to shed some part of the old now might get called Un-American. There was a bit too much predictability in the experiences one had there.
The land was fertile though. Very fertile. Lush turgid rivers, fat green trees, huge overfed squirrels and enormous quantities of food. The human layer which has been laid over the earth layer seemed incongruous, a sterile icing on a rich nutty cake. I kept hoping to find something organic, something that grew out of the earth and grew according to the constraints of nature. Instead of that, one could feel the heavy machinery and the imposing human will that had leveled mountains, flattened hills and build huge boxes of concretes called malls everywhere.
6. Smile - I never saw so many smiles in a day as I did in America. I felt happy thinking that the sight of me was making people light up with a big smile, but later I came to realise that its the default facial expression. Everyone had great white teeth, perfect dental work and the ability to keep smiling for longer than I would have thought physically possible.
7. Color - Black and White and the shades in between - For the first time I was living somewhere where most of the people didnt look like me, not even in the shades of their skin colors. I ended up sharing a house with a pale gentle commercial artist and a stocky grinning tanned engineer. It was nice feeling to see so much variety around. African origins, Asian origins, European origins, Middle eastern origins and the various other types were all mixed up in the malls and in the streets. DC was pretty nicely mixed up and I missed that when I travelled to Boston. Somehow there was less variety there. I saw a west african pub which was filled with the sound of reggae and shook with energy while besides it was a cafe pub with classic rock playing and white folks sitting around conversing. Parallel worlds which met and separated and met and separated again.
8. Sex
Friday, January 19, 2007
new post #2 of the new year.
2006 was not such a bad year after all. It was also a very interesting year. It marked the peak of the neo-conservative, american imperialist ideology and the latter part of the year saw the climbdown from the lofty peaks of righteous rhetoric.
As Nostradamus predicted, it was a man in a blue turban who rose in the middle east and threw down the newest challenge to the rather confused american war machine. In fact there were many men, and lots of differently coloured turbans which flickered on and off CNN throughout the year. Muqtada Al Sadr managed to become an increasingly important figure, while Nasrullah came from behind to capture the hearts and minds of a fractured middle east like no one had done before.
Sometimes the west forgets that the east is not different. Just like the pioneers in the west preferred to die in glory than live in slavery, so does the Arab. Nasrullah and hezbollah gave some pride back to the Arab world, and the arab world was ready to forgive the destruction of beirut and the loss of homes and infrastructure, just to be able to see someone at least stand up to the war machine. With the kidnapping of a few israeli soldiers, the destruction of an Israeli ship and the grim dogfight to the end with patched together katyusha rockets, Hezbollah at least managed to keep the hope alive in the hearts of ordinary arabs and served as an inspiration for others struggling to assert their independence.
In personal terms it was an interesting year too. I roamed around the country a bit and also started to throw my weight around work and home. After years of living in silence, exile and cunning, the combined effect of a months vacation and two months regular swimming made me sit up and demand more. So off I went to the US of A to see for myself what god and mammon hath wrought. The three months I spent there were very interesting. I didnt see much except the north eastern corner, but what I saw was fascinating. I still havent been able to figure out how to write what I felt and observed about the land of the native american, and maybe I will attempt something in the next post. I saw the summer and fall in the area between washington DC to Boston. I saw halloween weekend in manhattan and drove to the canada border to see the niagara fall. It was a lot of fun, but I couldnt wait to get back home :)
As Nostradamus predicted, it was a man in a blue turban who rose in the middle east and threw down the newest challenge to the rather confused american war machine. In fact there were many men, and lots of differently coloured turbans which flickered on and off CNN throughout the year. Muqtada Al Sadr managed to become an increasingly important figure, while Nasrullah came from behind to capture the hearts and minds of a fractured middle east like no one had done before.
Sometimes the west forgets that the east is not different. Just like the pioneers in the west preferred to die in glory than live in slavery, so does the Arab. Nasrullah and hezbollah gave some pride back to the Arab world, and the arab world was ready to forgive the destruction of beirut and the loss of homes and infrastructure, just to be able to see someone at least stand up to the war machine. With the kidnapping of a few israeli soldiers, the destruction of an Israeli ship and the grim dogfight to the end with patched together katyusha rockets, Hezbollah at least managed to keep the hope alive in the hearts of ordinary arabs and served as an inspiration for others struggling to assert their independence.
In personal terms it was an interesting year too. I roamed around the country a bit and also started to throw my weight around work and home. After years of living in silence, exile and cunning, the combined effect of a months vacation and two months regular swimming made me sit up and demand more. So off I went to the US of A to see for myself what god and mammon hath wrought. The three months I spent there were very interesting. I didnt see much except the north eastern corner, but what I saw was fascinating. I still havent been able to figure out how to write what I felt and observed about the land of the native american, and maybe I will attempt something in the next post. I saw the summer and fall in the area between washington DC to Boston. I saw halloween weekend in manhattan and drove to the canada border to see the niagara fall. It was a lot of fun, but I couldnt wait to get back home :)
Saturday, January 13, 2007
a new year..a new post...a new beginning or a new direction
hi there.... hope you read this..because this is written for you. Hope you are having a great start to the new year and hope everythings going fine. I never thought when I started to write this blog a year ago that I would actually have any readers. I put links to it everywhere, in my emails, on my IM status messages and on my profiles in orkut, linkedin, ryze etc etc. Some time ago I started to monitor my site traffic statistics and found that there were actually a lot of people who landed up here while searching for the hundreds of little things that google is so useful for. There also were some regular readers who even came back to read this blog when there were no new posts. I would have stopped writing and lost interest soon enough if it was not for your constant encouragement... thank you!!!!!!
Now that I finally kicked the holiday rust off my typing fingers, I wonder what I should post about. So many things have been happening in this world. Technology has hooked us in its electric embrace and we are all connected, but now we come to the next question.....what do we do after we connect?
The last year was quite eventful. I had just moved into a new house, was about to complete a year in a job ( a first ) and was just starting out this blog. Looking back at the posts I find that the original purpose of the blog, that of a diary for myself got left behind somewhere and it ended up being more of a scrapbook of odds and ends which somehow got stuck in my head. I found I wasnt too comfortable writing personal entries like - I bought a new toothbrush and X didnt like it. She told me to get an electric one, but I went and bought a shaver instead.
Also I found that I read more and discovered more about the internet since I started blogging. Its so easy to research something on the internet and you can do your writing, communicating and research on the same machine, so really theres no excuse for not getting your facts right. Just a quick google search, a peek through wikipedia, some copying and pasting and there you are , with all the information at your fingertips.
The last year also saw me return to the pattern of my yearly vacation. I used to take a months vacation every year ( usually after quitting my job ), but had stopped doing so for the last couple of years. This year I did it in style, taking advantage of the low cost airlines launched in India, to spend three weeks roaming around south and east India. From the ridge of Bangalore to the coast of Pondycherry, to the delta of Kolkata to the valley of Guwahati to the hills of Shillong, it was a lovely mad swing with just a backpack and it was great fun.
This was also the first year after quite some time that I found a convenient and big enough swimming pool in the neighbourhood and I spend the summer happily splashing away. It helped clear the head, tone the body and get rid of the toxins and cut down on smoking. The lungs opened up, the complexion cleared, energy returned and life was fun again.
Now that I finally kicked the holiday rust off my typing fingers, I wonder what I should post about. So many things have been happening in this world. Technology has hooked us in its electric embrace and we are all connected, but now we come to the next question.....what do we do after we connect?
The last year was quite eventful. I had just moved into a new house, was about to complete a year in a job ( a first ) and was just starting out this blog. Looking back at the posts I find that the original purpose of the blog, that of a diary for myself got left behind somewhere and it ended up being more of a scrapbook of odds and ends which somehow got stuck in my head. I found I wasnt too comfortable writing personal entries like - I bought a new toothbrush and X didnt like it. She told me to get an electric one, but I went and bought a shaver instead.
Also I found that I read more and discovered more about the internet since I started blogging. Its so easy to research something on the internet and you can do your writing, communicating and research on the same machine, so really theres no excuse for not getting your facts right. Just a quick google search, a peek through wikipedia, some copying and pasting and there you are , with all the information at your fingertips.
The last year also saw me return to the pattern of my yearly vacation. I used to take a months vacation every year ( usually after quitting my job ), but had stopped doing so for the last couple of years. This year I did it in style, taking advantage of the low cost airlines launched in India, to spend three weeks roaming around south and east India. From the ridge of Bangalore to the coast of Pondycherry, to the delta of Kolkata to the valley of Guwahati to the hills of Shillong, it was a lovely mad swing with just a backpack and it was great fun.
This was also the first year after quite some time that I found a convenient and big enough swimming pool in the neighbourhood and I spend the summer happily splashing away. It helped clear the head, tone the body and get rid of the toxins and cut down on smoking. The lungs opened up, the complexion cleared, energy returned and life was fun again.
Sunday, November 05, 2006
been a long time
been a long time since i up and wrote...its been a rather busy time at work...lots of stuff to wrap up...and have to see as much of americana as i can before its time to head back home....hope to get a little unbusy soon and then sit back and ponder over the last 3 months and pour out my impressions of the land of the car.
Monday, October 23, 2006
batli more
been busy drinking...was my birthday..then diwali, the festival of lights and then just happened to stop by an irish pub at midnight on sunday, when better sense should have prevailed. Been playing catch up ever since. Suffice to say that I roamed the area from Boston or Bastun to Batlimore or Bawlmer during these three days, and my chariots were winged, rubbertyred, steelwheeled and laced. I ate pizza and drank beer, ate a full indian wedding meal and drank whiskey, met a new born baby and drank whiskey, slept on the floor of an apartment without any furniture whatsoever and drank whiskey, played tennis, drank beer in the airport and in the irish pub and still had enough time left over to sing devotional hymns and the latest chartbusting hindi songs.... one wonders where all that time comes from. All this in one weekend and there was lots of time left over. Even got through 400 pages of a book called 1491 which is awesome and I shall be reviewing here shortly, if I can digest it. Right now its gotten inside my head and I suddenly feel like an expert in pre-columbus history of the Americas, but lets see what happens once i finish reading it.
Found a nice description of Baltimore, where i just spent 3 idyllic months wallowing in americana. This was in Salon.com, heres an excerpt -
To understand Baltimore, it's helpful to get a grip on its geography. Baltimore is one of those odd American cities that lies in no county; instead, it dangles in the water, surrounded by a ragged blob of land. It has been said that Baltimore County looks like a monkey wrench hanging from the Mason-Dixon Line, which makes Baltimore City the bolt -- one that has been tightened a hair too much. Incapable of expanding, the city has been losing population and political clout since the 1960s, when white residents began to flee for the suburbs. Fittingly, all quintessentially Baltimore stories have a "Wizard of Oz" quality: Characters dream of escaping to someplace new, only to yearn for home. Or, as we say in Bawlmer: Hooooooohme.
read the full article here, after watching the mandatory advert :)
Found a nice description of Baltimore, where i just spent 3 idyllic months wallowing in americana. This was in Salon.com, heres an excerpt -
To understand Baltimore, it's helpful to get a grip on its geography. Baltimore is one of those odd American cities that lies in no county; instead, it dangles in the water, surrounded by a ragged blob of land. It has been said that Baltimore County looks like a monkey wrench hanging from the Mason-Dixon Line, which makes Baltimore City the bolt -- one that has been tightened a hair too much. Incapable of expanding, the city has been losing population and political clout since the 1960s, when white residents began to flee for the suburbs. Fittingly, all quintessentially Baltimore stories have a "Wizard of Oz" quality: Characters dream of escaping to someplace new, only to yearn for home. Or, as we say in Bawlmer: Hooooooohme.
read the full article here, after watching the mandatory advert :)
Thursday, October 12, 2006
The America Diaries
but baby you should see new york....its the most amazing place....theres so much energy there...everyone is busy and working hard...and the streets are full...and lights and music and noises...and people in cafes on the street...and small markets besides the streets...and all kinds of dresses....and all kinds of people...all types of languages being spoken.....its wonderful....
From the first bartender in an underground pub in penn station, to the cleaning woman at mcdonalds, to the concierge of the building, to the artist in the streets, to the cab driver from brazil, to the singer in the classic rock bar, to the poets in the campuses, to the bankers on wall streeet, to the kids skateboarding on concrete, to the pretty women puking in the darkened doorways, to the old man striding across the park puffing a pipe, to the guys reading about afghanistan while sipping a latte, to the girls doing their homework in cafes, to the dancers on the streets and the homeless covered in styrofoam.....this is my salute to you. New York, I had heard a lot about it, and I am happy to report that it rocks!!!!!
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
the america diaries
Less than a month left of my american trip. 3 months is probably not adequate to see this country properly. I concentrated this trip on trying to see the north east corner and meet as many people as i could. Somehow never got around to seeing the touristy things. When I realised that the water of the niagara falls is used for electricity generation and is released for a few hours when the tourists visit, I decided not to get into any tourist type activity again. More important for me was to visit as many old friends as I could. After we left college almost a decade ago, everyone scattered all over the globe, and one way or the other ended up in the US of A. Its been nice to catch up with them and revisit the reasons that we became friends those many years ago.
I thought I would sort of group the people I met so I could make sense of it all. So here goes. First let me start with the Indians.
The various categories of Indians are -
1. Old Old friends - This was the main reason that I accepted the assignment to come to US. I missed my friends, and I am glad I got to meet most of them. Arshad, if you are reading this, get your act together, and meet me asap. Mostly they are all the same as I knew them, but have just grown a bit more. They no longer have unkempt hair ( if they have any left), the social skills are more developed, less goofy, more complex, busier and smarter, richer and fatter :) etc etc. Whenever I met someone whom I used to be friends with many years ago, it just took a little while to get through the interference and get a clear signal, and then we were back in sync and happily chutiyaoing along.
2. Work Gang - This is mostly people in my office. All of them have been in the states for a long time and pretty well settled in. All drive Honda's and work on laptops. They gave me a crash course in "how to live here when you get here" and then were always around to help me get settled in. Its amazing how theres no insecurity, office politics, pushing and shoving at all, as compared to any similar setup in India. Its a reflection of the American work ethic perhaps. I have been very impressed with how professional and punctual most american office workers are. Theres a matter-of-fact attitude and a unhurried but efficient way of working thats really fun to see. From a secretary, to a waitress, to an airline pilot, to a senior executive, the pride of "just doing my job" is great to see.
3. The software engineering gang everywhere in the cafes, in the indian store, in the restaurants, in the housing blocks, on the aeroplanes. They are ubiquitous, ( hope i got it right, i think it means - present everywhere ) and are easily spotted. They know their way around america, having spent years here on many trips, on projects in many cities and they know the exchange rate down to the last cent. They know which is the best place to buy anything, the best way to cook indian food in a hotel room, the cheapest option of travelling anywhere. They can live without air or water, but if you shut the wi-fi off, there will be a croaking noise and they start dropping like flies.
4. The waiters, the cooks, the cleaners, the cabbies, the motel workers and the bums - I put that last one in in the hope that there would be one Indian bum in this country. For the future of this race, there must be a few square pegs in round holes, a few misfits, someone who didnt study his ass off and instead grew long hair and became a bum. Havent spotted one yet, maybe the species hasnt arrived yet. Still I am hopeful.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
hi there....
just changed the layout of this page...wanted to try the dark look....let me know if you like it.....
I had to make these changes to move from html based pages to the XHTML format, and so i started to fool around and ended up changing pretty much everything... leave a comment if you like it or dislike it or didnt really notice anything...
apart from this its been a quiet month of september which got over. Didnt do much, didnt go out much..didnt think much, didnt really worry too much. I think September is that kind of month. Its just there in between, and you dont notice it since you remember summer and look ahead to fall and winter.
Planning to go to new yawk this weekend. people tell me that the city has to be seen to be believed. Somehow, after the disappointment of niagara, i am taking claims of the local attractions with a large dose of salt. I havent seen any gunfights, no cowboys, no kukluxers, no children with AK47s, no people tried to sell me crack, no blonde came and asked me if i was alone, no gay men kissing in the streets, no cars roaring at high speeds with drunked kids inside, no muggers...... i tell you, america has just one more month to show me its better face, or i am going to be rather unimpressed.
I had to make these changes to move from html based pages to the XHTML format, and so i started to fool around and ended up changing pretty much everything... leave a comment if you like it or dislike it or didnt really notice anything...
apart from this its been a quiet month of september which got over. Didnt do much, didnt go out much..didnt think much, didnt really worry too much. I think September is that kind of month. Its just there in between, and you dont notice it since you remember summer and look ahead to fall and winter.
Planning to go to new yawk this weekend. people tell me that the city has to be seen to be believed. Somehow, after the disappointment of niagara, i am taking claims of the local attractions with a large dose of salt. I havent seen any gunfights, no cowboys, no kukluxers, no children with AK47s, no people tried to sell me crack, no blonde came and asked me if i was alone, no gay men kissing in the streets, no cars roaring at high speeds with drunked kids inside, no muggers...... i tell you, america has just one more month to show me its better face, or i am going to be rather unimpressed.
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
musharraf on the daily show
just saw pervez musharraf talking to jon stewart on the daily show. Talking about his book and about the taliban etc. He seemed less cocky and more weary. The sophistication and the suaveness were less noticeable than say in Agra. He gave a portrayal of a man caught in an indefensible position...viz ..a rock and a hard place.
To his credit he still talks sense and is a good comunicator. It did seem however that he doesnt wield any real power, but is rather a frontpiece doing a tough job for a long time and getting rather weary of it.
To his credit he still talks sense and is a good comunicator. It did seem however that he doesnt wield any real power, but is rather a frontpiece doing a tough job for a long time and getting rather weary of it.
why not write in hindi
I was introduced to hindi literature at the age of 27, by that time already having read tonnes of books in english. I always felt that english writing coming out of india was somehow lacking in that something which gives a book its soul...it sounded a little strained....and I wished it was more relevant to my life. Amitav Ghosh and Upamanyu Chatterjee were exceptions to the rule I felt but still some of their later books let me down. I used to wonder why noone wrote about the indian experience and why there was no true indian voice yet.
When I read Manohar Shyam Joshi, or Nirmal Verma or some newer Hindi authors I realised that what I was searching for was right under my nose. The evocations of delhi or lucknow or mumbai or even the small towns in their books was so masterly and true, it struck home immediately. I explored a bit and found that there was a vast sea of hindi literature which was vibrant, relevant, brutally honest and amazingly talented. It spoke to me and spoke for me.
So if anyone is thinking of writing in Hindi and wondering what will the morrow bring. Will he be living in the chawls of mumbai and ekeing out a miserable existence, I think that is a fallacy. A writer must find his voice first, not worry about which language will have better readers. Speak the tongue that comes naturally to you. There is no dearth of opportunity. The movies, the serials, the magazines, the websites, the tv channels all are hungry for content. If you create good content, it will sell. To create good content though you must find your voice.
I, being as my flatmate once charmingly observed, "very compromising" had tried to figure a way which combined the best of both worlds. So you can write like this too -
itni saari debate faaltu mein ho rahi hai. jo man mein aata hai usko keh daalo. Dont worry ki usko kaise chhaapenge. Arrey yaar, aajkal to chhaapne ki zaroorat bhi nahi rahi....hum ko dekh lo...kitna likhte hai aur ek drop ink use nahi kya abtak :)
When I read Manohar Shyam Joshi, or Nirmal Verma or some newer Hindi authors I realised that what I was searching for was right under my nose. The evocations of delhi or lucknow or mumbai or even the small towns in their books was so masterly and true, it struck home immediately. I explored a bit and found that there was a vast sea of hindi literature which was vibrant, relevant, brutally honest and amazingly talented. It spoke to me and spoke for me.
So if anyone is thinking of writing in Hindi and wondering what will the morrow bring. Will he be living in the chawls of mumbai and ekeing out a miserable existence, I think that is a fallacy. A writer must find his voice first, not worry about which language will have better readers. Speak the tongue that comes naturally to you. There is no dearth of opportunity. The movies, the serials, the magazines, the websites, the tv channels all are hungry for content. If you create good content, it will sell. To create good content though you must find your voice.
I, being as my flatmate once charmingly observed, "very compromising" had tried to figure a way which combined the best of both worlds. So you can write like this too -
itni saari debate faaltu mein ho rahi hai. jo man mein aata hai usko keh daalo. Dont worry ki usko kaise chhaapenge. Arrey yaar, aajkal to chhaapne ki zaroorat bhi nahi rahi....hum ko dekh lo...kitna likhte hai aur ek drop ink use nahi kya abtak :)
Sunday, September 24, 2006
love hurts
In life sometimes things happen that take a long time to get over. It doesnt always help to have a good memory. Its sometimes so much easier on yourself to be able to forget and move on. The memory of what we had, what we lost, what we let slip through our fingers is a tough thing to live with. Sometimes we wish we didnt have to go through this.
Maybe and then again maybe not. Even in act of losing, we do gain something. We have passed through a celebration of life and that is something worth remembering. That little magical mysterious funny giggly aching crazy feeling. It was there once, we cant kid ourselves anymore that it wasnt there, that it doesnt exist, because we saw it, we felt it take birth in us and grow till it suffused our entire personality. It really was there, bringing silly grins or loud sighs involuntarily at inopportune moments. It wasnt an illusion or a delusion or dream of something. It was the real thing, the true shining simple bare thing, the connectedness with another heart, the astonishing knowledge of another heart.
Some people say that love doesnt exist, and you smile at them. They still havent got it, but we had it. We dont need any proof or any argument on that. Too bad it didnt last, but theres no doubt it was there. I dont say that its anything special, but its not something trivial either. Its like finding faith or committing to a cause. Theres a line that has been crossed and though only the traces, the wreckage and the heartache remain, still theres no going back. When the heartaches get less frequent, when the memories fade a little more on the edges, when life brings us to the next stop and we get on with it, we still will have this in us.
This memory, this unknowable, magical thing that will always belong to me.
And I look around and catch a little kids eye and grin and stick my tongue out.
Maybe and then again maybe not. Even in act of losing, we do gain something. We have passed through a celebration of life and that is something worth remembering. That little magical mysterious funny giggly aching crazy feeling. It was there once, we cant kid ourselves anymore that it wasnt there, that it doesnt exist, because we saw it, we felt it take birth in us and grow till it suffused our entire personality. It really was there, bringing silly grins or loud sighs involuntarily at inopportune moments. It wasnt an illusion or a delusion or dream of something. It was the real thing, the true shining simple bare thing, the connectedness with another heart, the astonishing knowledge of another heart.
Some people say that love doesnt exist, and you smile at them. They still havent got it, but we had it. We dont need any proof or any argument on that. Too bad it didnt last, but theres no doubt it was there. I dont say that its anything special, but its not something trivial either. Its like finding faith or committing to a cause. Theres a line that has been crossed and though only the traces, the wreckage and the heartache remain, still theres no going back. When the heartaches get less frequent, when the memories fade a little more on the edges, when life brings us to the next stop and we get on with it, we still will have this in us.
This memory, this unknowable, magical thing that will always belong to me.
And I look around and catch a little kids eye and grin and stick my tongue out.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
The weeks that were and the world that was
The last few weeks have seen us cross the anniversary of the defining moment of the decade, the fall of the twin towers. Five years ago I was in a cycle rickshaw on my way to a bar, when my sister called me with the news. I immediately ran up to the bar and grabbing a fistful of salted peanuts and a cold beer, settled down to watch the second plane hit the towers. It seemed so unreal but not unexpected. What used to be surprising to us was that how did america escape for so long. We had seen the rage of the terrorists. The people who were drunk on easy money, easy guns, easy narcotics and easy glory. We knew they burnt and destroyed and killed so many of us indians. We also knew that they considered us small fry and what they really hated was the other culture. The culture of the west, with its blue jeans, its rock music, its movies where everyone had sex all the time, its free environment which worked without the hand of god. It was tough for them to invoke religous beliefs and the religious way, when on the other side of the world, america seemed to be having one endless party without any need to include god in the debate.
Soon we will not even remember that world that passed away on 9/11. For a few years there was hope for everyone. Extremists, terrorists, rightists, leftists, militarists, fundamentalists, industrialists, economists all had been rendered trivial. The world had realised that we didnt need a bunch of fancy jargon, we just needed to connect and work together and everything could work just fine. We didnt need a president who was bold and courageous and a shrewd military tactician, we just needed someone sensible who would put in 8 hours in the office and do his job.
In 98 I had moved to Lucknow, the capital of one of the provinces that Vishal Bharadwaj calls "states of abject lawlessness". I had a degree from india's best college, a 98 percentile test score in americas favourite graduate test and fairly well-off parents who were only to willing to see their son go to harvard or something. Yet, inspite of all these options, I went to Lucknow and lived there for two years. Those were the years of the dot com boom. 1998 -2000. I understood what was happening, albeit only as far as a guy just out of college could understand it. So I went to Lucknow and lived among the bhaisabs and the bhaiyas, the good citizens of lucknow for two years. All I did was make sure I checked my email everyday. That was my only rule. At first i would get one message a week. Still I checked it. I wrote to friends, sent emails to magazines, surfed the web, chatted online, made a website, preached the power of the coming webolution to anyone who would listen.
Those were good times and I would experience first hand the power of the new digital revolution. Sitting in Lucknow I stayed close to my friends in the US. I even made some new friends all over the world online, some of whom are still close to me today. I wrote articles for a magazine based out of bombay and was invited down there to spend some time at their office. I researched on the internet and was able to do cutting edge graphic design and 3D work which still amazes me, I met girls in chatrooms and went to other cities on weekends to meet them and date them, I consulted for IT companies in Lucknow and helped traditional manufacturers get new techniques from the internet, I helped people make their webpages and I helped businesses computerize their operations. Oh, and I build buildings too. And I drank a lot and roamed far and afield on my trusty kawasaki. I made friends in the inner city, in the muslim areas and spent many happy evenings drinking tea and discussing life. It was so much fun.
That world that I knew didnt last long. In 2001, the planes crashed into the towers. The towers fell. The elections in Florida earlier had given a lot of us a sinking feeling in our stomachs. We knew the leadership of the free world was in the hands of the USA, and when something wierd like the florida elections/the bush-gore chaos happened, we felt uneasy. The freedoms we took for granted no longer seemed secure. If democracy and transparency and decency and legality could be in doubt in the USA, then what hope for the rest of the world. That had made us uneasy, but we hoped the momentum of the clinton years would carry on and be difficult to turn back. It was not to be. There were a series of crashes. The nasdaq crashed, the dot com boom crashed and suddenly it seemed the 80's were back.
An Indian airliner was hijacked and flown to Kandahar, Afghanistan. The government in Afghanistan was a friend of the government in Pakistan. The government in Pakistan was a friend of the government in the USA. Our plane was standing in Afghanistan and we were watching it on television. We believed that the community of nations would not let us down. The United Nations would condemn the acts of the Afghan Government, the Taliban. The US would lean on Pakistan and Taliban, and our plane would be set free. It was only when the hijackers took a knife and stabbed Rupen Katiyal in the chest several times, that we understood that we were on our own and this was serious.
Masood Azhar, Omar Sheikh and Mushtaq Ahmed Zarga were taken out of indian jails and sent to Afghanistan along with oodles of cash. We got our people and our plane back, except for Rupen, who I think was on his honeymoon when the hijack happened. We felt uneasy because it foretold something. It foretold that the world was not the free and fair place that we thought. The world allowed places like Afghanistan to exist, where the government was in cahoots with hijackers and terrorists. They were madmen and they were friends of pakistan who was a friend of america. That was wierd. We knew they were madmen for sure when they broke down 2000 year old statues of Buddha which had existed peacefully and werent really doing anything to threaten them.
This wasnt the world I knew in Lucknow. It had changed.
Omar Sheikh whom we had to release, went on to plan and carry out the killing of Daniel Pearl, a young wall street journal reporter and then released the video of how they cut his throat for the world to see. This raised him so high in the estimation of the taliban leadership that he became a right hand man to Osama Bin Laden. This London School of Economics trained, urbane british muslim, became the financial mastermind for the Al Qaeda. Legend has it that he betted on airline stocks by shorting them before 9-11 and made more than enough money on this single transaction on Dubai stock exchange to finance the entire operation. He has been cited as the key financier of Mohammed Atta.
This man, whom we had in our jails and were forced to let go. This man who pioneered the art of making video films of murders. This man who financed the key hijacker in 9-11. This man is in a jail in Pakistan, still awaiting his sentence to be carried out, still waiting for his appeals to be heard and still meeting and talking to would be terrorists. The world has changed a lot since he was an arm wrestling champion and master debater at the London School of Economics. He is still around to influence events and so are his leaders in the taliban and al-qaeda. It is a strange world. It would seem that in 5 years something would have been done. America would have meted out justice, but no, theres something else happening. Theres a war in Iraq to take care of first. The world really has changed.
What really has changed?
The Internet still chugs along, witness this blog.
The world gets closer and closer together, witness the global supply chain and outsourcing.
but no, there are some things that have changed.
Chevron is back as the largest corporation. The new economy pretenders have been pushed back and the old barons are back in the saddle.
The pope makes speeches where he shows a serious lack of concern for the feelings of other religions.
Israel feels free to destroy a neighbour from the air. It bombs bridges, roads, power stations. Its like trying to starve someone to death to cure them. The world watches.
Iraq is what it is. Too many dead bodies. Too many atrocities. Too many feuds. Too many guns.
India loses its voice. It now meekly echoes whatever the US tells it.
Strong leaders, Religious leaders, Military leaders are now much in demand. Moderates all over the world who were just doing a quiet job of governing are being pushed aside by the need of the hour. The need of the hour seems to be very confrontationist. The one world - one mission - one voice - one internet - one idea days seem so long ago.
5 years ago the towers fell. Now on my first visit to America, I see the changes and the ones that will come. The voices on TV are shrill, the Flag waving is grimfaced, the hole in the ground in ground zero is still a hole in the ground. Somewhere someone is not doing a regular 8 hour a day job of running things. There is less hope. There is less freedom. There are more checks. There are more warnings. We have now started to look over our shoulder more and less at the stars above.
the world is truly changing...welcome to the brave new world.
Soon we will not even remember that world that passed away on 9/11. For a few years there was hope for everyone. Extremists, terrorists, rightists, leftists, militarists, fundamentalists, industrialists, economists all had been rendered trivial. The world had realised that we didnt need a bunch of fancy jargon, we just needed to connect and work together and everything could work just fine. We didnt need a president who was bold and courageous and a shrewd military tactician, we just needed someone sensible who would put in 8 hours in the office and do his job.
In 98 I had moved to Lucknow, the capital of one of the provinces that Vishal Bharadwaj calls "states of abject lawlessness". I had a degree from india's best college, a 98 percentile test score in americas favourite graduate test and fairly well-off parents who were only to willing to see their son go to harvard or something. Yet, inspite of all these options, I went to Lucknow and lived there for two years. Those were the years of the dot com boom. 1998 -2000. I understood what was happening, albeit only as far as a guy just out of college could understand it. So I went to Lucknow and lived among the bhaisabs and the bhaiyas, the good citizens of lucknow for two years. All I did was make sure I checked my email everyday. That was my only rule. At first i would get one message a week. Still I checked it. I wrote to friends, sent emails to magazines, surfed the web, chatted online, made a website, preached the power of the coming webolution to anyone who would listen.
Those were good times and I would experience first hand the power of the new digital revolution. Sitting in Lucknow I stayed close to my friends in the US. I even made some new friends all over the world online, some of whom are still close to me today. I wrote articles for a magazine based out of bombay and was invited down there to spend some time at their office. I researched on the internet and was able to do cutting edge graphic design and 3D work which still amazes me, I met girls in chatrooms and went to other cities on weekends to meet them and date them, I consulted for IT companies in Lucknow and helped traditional manufacturers get new techniques from the internet, I helped people make their webpages and I helped businesses computerize their operations. Oh, and I build buildings too. And I drank a lot and roamed far and afield on my trusty kawasaki. I made friends in the inner city, in the muslim areas and spent many happy evenings drinking tea and discussing life. It was so much fun.
That world that I knew didnt last long. In 2001, the planes crashed into the towers. The towers fell. The elections in Florida earlier had given a lot of us a sinking feeling in our stomachs. We knew the leadership of the free world was in the hands of the USA, and when something wierd like the florida elections/the bush-gore chaos happened, we felt uneasy. The freedoms we took for granted no longer seemed secure. If democracy and transparency and decency and legality could be in doubt in the USA, then what hope for the rest of the world. That had made us uneasy, but we hoped the momentum of the clinton years would carry on and be difficult to turn back. It was not to be. There were a series of crashes. The nasdaq crashed, the dot com boom crashed and suddenly it seemed the 80's were back.
An Indian airliner was hijacked and flown to Kandahar, Afghanistan. The government in Afghanistan was a friend of the government in Pakistan. The government in Pakistan was a friend of the government in the USA. Our plane was standing in Afghanistan and we were watching it on television. We believed that the community of nations would not let us down. The United Nations would condemn the acts of the Afghan Government, the Taliban. The US would lean on Pakistan and Taliban, and our plane would be set free. It was only when the hijackers took a knife and stabbed Rupen Katiyal in the chest several times, that we understood that we were on our own and this was serious.
Masood Azhar, Omar Sheikh and Mushtaq Ahmed Zarga were taken out of indian jails and sent to Afghanistan along with oodles of cash. We got our people and our plane back, except for Rupen, who I think was on his honeymoon when the hijack happened. We felt uneasy because it foretold something. It foretold that the world was not the free and fair place that we thought. The world allowed places like Afghanistan to exist, where the government was in cahoots with hijackers and terrorists. They were madmen and they were friends of pakistan who was a friend of america. That was wierd. We knew they were madmen for sure when they broke down 2000 year old statues of Buddha which had existed peacefully and werent really doing anything to threaten them.
This wasnt the world I knew in Lucknow. It had changed.
Omar Sheikh whom we had to release, went on to plan and carry out the killing of Daniel Pearl, a young wall street journal reporter and then released the video of how they cut his throat for the world to see. This raised him so high in the estimation of the taliban leadership that he became a right hand man to Osama Bin Laden. This London School of Economics trained, urbane british muslim, became the financial mastermind for the Al Qaeda. Legend has it that he betted on airline stocks by shorting them before 9-11 and made more than enough money on this single transaction on Dubai stock exchange to finance the entire operation. He has been cited as the key financier of Mohammed Atta.
This man, whom we had in our jails and were forced to let go. This man who pioneered the art of making video films of murders. This man who financed the key hijacker in 9-11. This man is in a jail in Pakistan, still awaiting his sentence to be carried out, still waiting for his appeals to be heard and still meeting and talking to would be terrorists. The world has changed a lot since he was an arm wrestling champion and master debater at the London School of Economics. He is still around to influence events and so are his leaders in the taliban and al-qaeda. It is a strange world. It would seem that in 5 years something would have been done. America would have meted out justice, but no, theres something else happening. Theres a war in Iraq to take care of first. The world really has changed.
What really has changed?
The Internet still chugs along, witness this blog.
The world gets closer and closer together, witness the global supply chain and outsourcing.
but no, there are some things that have changed.
Chevron is back as the largest corporation. The new economy pretenders have been pushed back and the old barons are back in the saddle.
The pope makes speeches where he shows a serious lack of concern for the feelings of other religions.
Israel feels free to destroy a neighbour from the air. It bombs bridges, roads, power stations. Its like trying to starve someone to death to cure them. The world watches.
Iraq is what it is. Too many dead bodies. Too many atrocities. Too many feuds. Too many guns.
India loses its voice. It now meekly echoes whatever the US tells it.
Strong leaders, Religious leaders, Military leaders are now much in demand. Moderates all over the world who were just doing a quiet job of governing are being pushed aside by the need of the hour. The need of the hour seems to be very confrontationist. The one world - one mission - one voice - one internet - one idea days seem so long ago.
5 years ago the towers fell. Now on my first visit to America, I see the changes and the ones that will come. The voices on TV are shrill, the Flag waving is grimfaced, the hole in the ground in ground zero is still a hole in the ground. Somewhere someone is not doing a regular 8 hour a day job of running things. There is less hope. There is less freedom. There are more checks. There are more warnings. We have now started to look over our shoulder more and less at the stars above.
the world is truly changing...welcome to the brave new world.
5 things to do in noida
That was kind of fun, writing down 5 things to do in Delhi. It brought back many a happy memory. Memories of rushing towards a government wine shop with one eye on the clock, trying to burrow your way through the mass of humanity thronging the counter and getting your arms around a bunch of bottles before the "theka" or liquor store, closed at 9 pm. Now I think I shall refine it a bit...and go for 5 things to do in Noida. Its been a while since I lived in Noida, and maybe some of the places I remember do not exist anymore or have fallen into disrepute, superceded by newer attractions. Still, for what its worth, I give you - 5 things to do in Noida
1. Have an iced tea with a cheese tomato sandwich. Or if its winter, then a warm cup of almond kahwah. The lal market, just besides sector 30 and 36 is a great place to hang out, and not just for the young army daughters. Theres a little Tea Shoppe, just next to the Lal Market. Run by a gentleman who retired after running a tea estate, its a great place to enjoy a cuppa. Sit down on the cane chairs, warm your hands on the little coal fires and have long conversations with friends while sipping endless varieties of tea. A must-do if you are in noida.
2. Score some pot. Noida is liberally sprinkled with good old fashioned pot sellers. All you need to do is ask. You dont need to smoke it, but just for the fun of scoring it, its a must do activity. You would be taken into bylanes, into slums, into wierd clearings in slums where frightening statues of the mother goddess look over a bunch of hash devotees, to crowded marketplaces where the stuff is sold in sealed plastic bags so professional looking that you almost expect to see a bar code on them. If in case you shrink from this activity, have no fear, just walk around to the naya bans market in sector 15, ask for the government hemp shop and provided that you have a ten rupee note, walk away with a government approved and distributed bag of indian pot leaves that you might be able to finish in a month, if you smoked really fast.
3. Grab a camera and a motorcycle and go out at midnight to the noida expressway. Driving along it in the middle of the night as it snakes its way over the Yamuna river is a real fun thing to do. Stopping at various points to take photographs and communicate with the river goddess is highly recommended. Round this off with a drive down towards Kalindi, when you get in from the expressway, head towards Mayur Vihar and take a left in front of the aiims apartments, on a small nondescript road. This little road snakes its way along the Kalindi reservoir and is a beautiful drive. A great expanse of water stretches out as far as the eye can see. There are various birds and stuff to entertain you. The moon shines down on a lonely fisherman rowing his boat across it and casting its net. Dont stop too long unless you know your way around, for the police have a habit of being rather inquisitive and butting in without being introduced. A good story is that of being a staff photographer for a newspaper and showing them your camera. They are a little wary of fleecing journalists and so usually will let you alone.
4. Food at Laxmi's. Down at Brahmaputra market in sector 29 theres a little udipi joint called Laxmi which has the best coconut chutney ever known to man. The food is cheap, hot, fresh and mouthwateringly delicious. Try the rasam as a start, then the days special and then keep eating as long as you can. Make sure to round it off with a filter coffee. The surrounding areas are great for bird watching. Also if you walk down a bit you come to ganga shopping complex which is like the underbelly of noida. All night cybercafes, bars, restaurants, a lovely parantha shop, liquor stores and sundry offices make up this shopping complex. Everything is cheap, but watch out for the drunks.
5. Sector 18. Still the coolest place to hang out. Sit outside on the corner of Barista and watch the human parade. Best to have hot drinks and keep watching till you feel a sense of contentment. Good place to meet new people too. Then toddle down to the nearby theka, buy a beer and drink it in a shady corner keeping an eye out for cops. Have some food off the streets and top it off with an icecream from mcdonalds. For further entertainment, theres always elevate.
1. Have an iced tea with a cheese tomato sandwich. Or if its winter, then a warm cup of almond kahwah. The lal market, just besides sector 30 and 36 is a great place to hang out, and not just for the young army daughters. Theres a little Tea Shoppe, just next to the Lal Market. Run by a gentleman who retired after running a tea estate, its a great place to enjoy a cuppa. Sit down on the cane chairs, warm your hands on the little coal fires and have long conversations with friends while sipping endless varieties of tea. A must-do if you are in noida.
2. Score some pot. Noida is liberally sprinkled with good old fashioned pot sellers. All you need to do is ask. You dont need to smoke it, but just for the fun of scoring it, its a must do activity. You would be taken into bylanes, into slums, into wierd clearings in slums where frightening statues of the mother goddess look over a bunch of hash devotees, to crowded marketplaces where the stuff is sold in sealed plastic bags so professional looking that you almost expect to see a bar code on them. If in case you shrink from this activity, have no fear, just walk around to the naya bans market in sector 15, ask for the government hemp shop and provided that you have a ten rupee note, walk away with a government approved and distributed bag of indian pot leaves that you might be able to finish in a month, if you smoked really fast.
3. Grab a camera and a motorcycle and go out at midnight to the noida expressway. Driving along it in the middle of the night as it snakes its way over the Yamuna river is a real fun thing to do. Stopping at various points to take photographs and communicate with the river goddess is highly recommended. Round this off with a drive down towards Kalindi, when you get in from the expressway, head towards Mayur Vihar and take a left in front of the aiims apartments, on a small nondescript road. This little road snakes its way along the Kalindi reservoir and is a beautiful drive. A great expanse of water stretches out as far as the eye can see. There are various birds and stuff to entertain you. The moon shines down on a lonely fisherman rowing his boat across it and casting its net. Dont stop too long unless you know your way around, for the police have a habit of being rather inquisitive and butting in without being introduced. A good story is that of being a staff photographer for a newspaper and showing them your camera. They are a little wary of fleecing journalists and so usually will let you alone.
4. Food at Laxmi's. Down at Brahmaputra market in sector 29 theres a little udipi joint called Laxmi which has the best coconut chutney ever known to man. The food is cheap, hot, fresh and mouthwateringly delicious. Try the rasam as a start, then the days special and then keep eating as long as you can. Make sure to round it off with a filter coffee. The surrounding areas are great for bird watching. Also if you walk down a bit you come to ganga shopping complex which is like the underbelly of noida. All night cybercafes, bars, restaurants, a lovely parantha shop, liquor stores and sundry offices make up this shopping complex. Everything is cheap, but watch out for the drunks.
5. Sector 18. Still the coolest place to hang out. Sit outside on the corner of Barista and watch the human parade. Best to have hot drinks and keep watching till you feel a sense of contentment. Good place to meet new people too. Then toddle down to the nearby theka, buy a beer and drink it in a shady corner keeping an eye out for cops. Have some food off the streets and top it off with an icecream from mcdonalds. For further entertainment, theres always elevate.
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
5 things to do in Delhi
Got a little homesick..and when erimentha ( that sounds like a cough lozenge )tagged me.. Now I gotta tag 5 people too who will do something similar..thats the hard part..let me do the easy part first.
.I started to think about Delhi and what were the things I loved to do there.. so here goes the 5 point action programme for Delhi.
1. Get drunk in the afternoon in Rodeos ( its amazingly cheap in happy hour )in CP, then have a milkshake at Keventers, then take a walk around the inner circle to get your brain cleared out..then walk towards Paharganj, watch a bar dance, talk to the drug pushers, chat up the hippie tourist types, get drunk again and then either rent a room and crash there ( again amazingly cheap ) or catch a bus or train out of there.
2. Pack up all your computer junk and raid your neighbours,relatives for other computer junk that they no longer use ( or wont notice that its gone ). Go down to Nehru place and sell all the stuff. After that buy some wierd CD's, new gizmos, second hand books and a working class meal. Then head to the bar in the Park Royale and get drunk or check the disc out. After all, theres a great feeling of spending money thats earned from waste.
3. Get drunk along with a friend, get a motorbike, start out at 12 midnight and do a full circle of the ring road. Stop on the way at AIIMS for snacks, Moolchand for parathas, ISBT for cigarettes and in west delhi for some booze. Repeat till tired or arrested.
4. Go to Shakuntalam in Pragati maidan, for a cheap movie show. Then toddle down to Kamani Auditorium and catch a musical recital or a play and end it with a walk down Janpath shopping for clothes.
5. Go to Gurgaon and keep trying to get into either Buzz, Mojo, Buddha Lounge, Saffire, Odyssey, Peppers etc. Try doing this on Saturday night without being accompanied by a girl. If nothing works, get into Last Chance in Sahara Mall and keep drinking beer and dancing like crazy till the sun comes out.
cheeerssshhhh
.I started to think about Delhi and what were the things I loved to do there.. so here goes the 5 point action programme for Delhi.
1. Get drunk in the afternoon in Rodeos ( its amazingly cheap in happy hour )in CP, then have a milkshake at Keventers, then take a walk around the inner circle to get your brain cleared out..then walk towards Paharganj, watch a bar dance, talk to the drug pushers, chat up the hippie tourist types, get drunk again and then either rent a room and crash there ( again amazingly cheap ) or catch a bus or train out of there.
2. Pack up all your computer junk and raid your neighbours,relatives for other computer junk that they no longer use ( or wont notice that its gone ). Go down to Nehru place and sell all the stuff. After that buy some wierd CD's, new gizmos, second hand books and a working class meal. Then head to the bar in the Park Royale and get drunk or check the disc out. After all, theres a great feeling of spending money thats earned from waste.
3. Get drunk along with a friend, get a motorbike, start out at 12 midnight and do a full circle of the ring road. Stop on the way at AIIMS for snacks, Moolchand for parathas, ISBT for cigarettes and in west delhi for some booze. Repeat till tired or arrested.
4. Go to Shakuntalam in Pragati maidan, for a cheap movie show. Then toddle down to Kamani Auditorium and catch a musical recital or a play and end it with a walk down Janpath shopping for clothes.
5. Go to Gurgaon and keep trying to get into either Buzz, Mojo, Buddha Lounge, Saffire, Odyssey, Peppers etc. Try doing this on Saturday night without being accompanied by a girl. If nothing works, get into Last Chance in Sahara Mall and keep drinking beer and dancing like crazy till the sun comes out.
cheeerssshhhh
Friday, September 01, 2006
Ganesha Chaturthi
The much loved elephant god, Ganesha, gets his very own festival. Millions of people all over India celebrate this with much enthusiasm and gusto. Its specially popular in the western state of Maharashtra and even more specifically, in Mumbai or Bombay, the capital city of Maharashtra. Crowds spill out on the streets, carrying clay statues of Ganesha, singing and dancing and banging drums and getting drunk and shouting prayers and what not, till the ferment becomes a fervor and the stream of humanity carrying Ganesha statues aloft, pours into the beaches where the land meets the sea. Wading into the sea, with chants and mantras and the odd curse when someone slips and falls or get pushed, the clay statues are immersed into the sea and they slowly melt away.
* note : all statues are made of baked clay and are totally bio-degradable.
There is a rather silly joke which I always remember when I think of Ganesha Chaturthi.
* note #2 : its not to do with the fact that he is an Elephant God, and yet is carried by a mouse. Thats right, a little mouse is the official carrier of our beloved happy funloving elephant god. That is funny, but also very profound if you look at it differently. Sometimes Ganesha loses his mouse...specially if theres cheese around..and then he doesnt like it a bit... as you can see -
Where were we, ahh yes, the joke. Well it seems once a christian, a hindu, a muslim and a Sikh were on a boat near Mumbai, and it sprung a leak. The christian, prayed to Jesus, who appeared and picked him up and carried him to land. The Muslim prayed to Allah, and was rewarded similarly. The Sikh, prayed to his Guru, who appeared and carried him to land. The Hindu being a follower of Ganesha, prayed to him and Lord Ganesha appeared before him. The hindu was happy and waited for Ganesha to lift him up and save him. To his amazement, Ganesha started to do a little elephant dance singing a lively song and made no move to save him. The boat went under and the Hindu was drowning, and there was lord ganesha, doing the cha cha cha and singing a peppy film song. "Lord why dont u save me" cried the hindu. Lord Ganesha gave a smug smile and said, " You guys make a song and dance and drown me in the water every year dont you..now see what that feels like" ...at which point the Christian, the Sikh and the Muslim standing on the shore, clapped their hands and acknowledged the wisdom of this. The Hindu was going to say something, but swallowed some water and went under, never to resurface.
Monday, August 28, 2006
more later
stats for this week....surprisingly internet explorer is just 55% of the browser share among people visiting this blog.
This was one of my best weekends in a long while.... met some old good friends....visited boston... took in the MIT campus... and even managed to wrap myself around some excellent masala dosa's... will write more...work has suddenly heated up..so getting less time to blog...but its due... dont go away....i have few readers anyway... if you are reading this..you are one of the extremely rare species.. a literate friend.
Friday, August 18, 2006
rambling along
its late at night on thursday...the motel staff are behind bulletproof glass, late night customers drive up in fancy cars with lots of bling. Its been a full working day, part of a busy week and I am tired out.
I had a nice talk with my boss on the way back from work. He was explaining to me how things worked and how important the right environment was. It was a strange situation to be in, because usually I am the one trying to preach this message. I usually talk about thinking big and providing the best possible environment for people to work in and it was nice to be taught a lesson that I thought I knew. Goes to show that one often forgets what one knows.
This set me thinking about events and people that taught me something in this past year and I thought I would list them down...lest i forget.
Rule #1 - This would be the lesson learnt at the new year party. The rule is, if you have a party in the winter, make sure theres lots of firewood. Charu reminded me of this, when he went and sourced a 30 foot long bamboo pole at 2 am from a nearby construction site, which was impossible to cut or chop or burn...still the message was there.
Rule #2 - No matter how pissed off they make you, do not strike back at someone you share a house with. You have to live with it..better to turn the stereo on at full volume and get your message across. Break a few bottles if you have to, but dont break any heads.
Rule #3 - Two dogs are better than one. One dog chews up your trouser legs, two dogs chew each others ears.
Rule #4 - Before attempting any tricky technological undertaking, take a deep breath, read it up on the internet, check out the manuals, talk to someone who knows about it and then sit down with a calm mind and just do it step by step.
Rule #5 - If you have a plan and you realise certain flaws in it and drawbacks to implementing it then do not question the reasons for the plan. This is sometimes tough to remember. Hold on to the original plan and work around the problems. It may be harder than you thought, but you may be stronger than you estimated.
Rule #6 - Give all possible freedom to people, but take a daily report. If you cannot get them to make a report everyday, theres very little chance that you can get them to do anything else. If you dont have the time to read the reports then you probably dont have time to mentor them either.
Rule #7 - If you like someone, dont be afraid to ask them out for dinner. Coffee is fine and beer is nice, but dinner is what counts.
Rule #8 - Its always more lively in a bus than it is in an aeroplane.
I had a nice talk with my boss on the way back from work. He was explaining to me how things worked and how important the right environment was. It was a strange situation to be in, because usually I am the one trying to preach this message. I usually talk about thinking big and providing the best possible environment for people to work in and it was nice to be taught a lesson that I thought I knew. Goes to show that one often forgets what one knows.
This set me thinking about events and people that taught me something in this past year and I thought I would list them down...lest i forget.
Rule #1 - This would be the lesson learnt at the new year party. The rule is, if you have a party in the winter, make sure theres lots of firewood. Charu reminded me of this, when he went and sourced a 30 foot long bamboo pole at 2 am from a nearby construction site, which was impossible to cut or chop or burn...still the message was there.
Rule #2 - No matter how pissed off they make you, do not strike back at someone you share a house with. You have to live with it..better to turn the stereo on at full volume and get your message across. Break a few bottles if you have to, but dont break any heads.
Rule #3 - Two dogs are better than one. One dog chews up your trouser legs, two dogs chew each others ears.
Rule #4 - Before attempting any tricky technological undertaking, take a deep breath, read it up on the internet, check out the manuals, talk to someone who knows about it and then sit down with a calm mind and just do it step by step.
Rule #5 - If you have a plan and you realise certain flaws in it and drawbacks to implementing it then do not question the reasons for the plan. This is sometimes tough to remember. Hold on to the original plan and work around the problems. It may be harder than you thought, but you may be stronger than you estimated.
Rule #6 - Give all possible freedom to people, but take a daily report. If you cannot get them to make a report everyday, theres very little chance that you can get them to do anything else. If you dont have the time to read the reports then you probably dont have time to mentor them either.
Rule #7 - If you like someone, dont be afraid to ask them out for dinner. Coffee is fine and beer is nice, but dinner is what counts.
Rule #8 - Its always more lively in a bus than it is in an aeroplane.
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