Life (?), the Universe (??) and Everything Else

Please Stand Up

2012-01-16T00:04:00.000-08:00

My Job, Home, Tests (!) and People

2011-07-09T04:16:00.000-07:00

As I sit in my new home on a random Saturday afternoon and go through my previous post, I can't help but look back at this last one month. From the time I stepped out of the airport, to the guesthouse, to the home, to office, it has been a rollercoaster ride.

Ofcourse a lot has to do with the people here, new and old. The first person I met here apart from Nitesh (hereafter referred to as motka), was my 3rd "apartment-mate", a tall 6'4'' guy with size 15 shoes from IIT Bombay, Vishnu Narayanan Suresh, who we christened Uppu II (in honour of the original Uppu) within 30 minutes of meeting him. Looking for and finding an apartment was an unexpectedly much easier affair to handle than 1st expected... It took us a mere couple of days to finalize on the one we are staying in right now. And within a week motka, Uppu II and I had shifted into our new "penthouse".

The first day of work, the new office, new people, a new environment to adjust to.. all seems to have happened just yesterday, as the days just seemed to fly by and life fell into a routine (sort of :P). One month down the line, with a bank account containing the remnants of my first salary, it all feels a bit unreal. Before I continue, I need to mention a funny Parthiv Patel look-alike from Patiala, Sidharth Dixit, who has been one of the constants in this crazy time in Gurgaon, always helpful and fun to hang out with. Also a shout out to all the guys in office (17 names jot down nahi karna :P). Its been fun, all the training sessions, and the tests... not just the ODCs, but other tests as well (eh motka ?) , and all the plans made sitting peacefully on our terrace after a long day at the office (yeah right :P). I never thought I would have to sit for so many tests once I left Kharagpur (though atleast that gave some sadistic pleasure to a few people :P).

Now obviously, not everything has been hunky dory, because life just loves to throw in a sucker punch or two to mix it up doesn't it ? And so I've had my share of curveballs thrown at me as well, but its something that you need to take in your stride. Its always tough to walk away from something that has been a big part of your life, but there are things that are out of your control and there is only that much you can do. After that, its out of your hands and really depends on factors out of your control.

But moving on from depressing thoughts, its a whole new life that's just begun and there's a whole new world of people out there to encounter, (also a lot of friends to meet up with yet) and a whole lot of planning to do on our rooftop terrace-garden. (Yes we have a rooftop terrace-garden... and yes its awesome to sit out there at nights looking at the Gurgaon skyline, under the stars :D). So here's hoping that this time things keep going smoothly, without hiccups like certain tests and walking away... and a big thank you to all the people who have been here (baniya, THE ankit singh, ek pavitra aatma and all) .

PS Lest I forget, one of the most amazing moments, el toque del espana, para celebracion de una amistad.

My Rollercoaster

2011-05-26T14:28:00.000-07:00

Well what a whirlwind of a month this has been since my last post !! From (the now seemingly) mundane stuff like clearing my dues and walking out of college for good to the really mindnumbing feeling of the possibility of losing a close friend forever, its been a real rollercoaster ride. Atleast we still have our friend !

Such an incident, and its aftermath, makes you stop and think; think about what is important in life, think about what choices should be made, basically just think about life. Is it not too precious to throw away due to the whims and fancies of a perceived "loved one" or due to expectations and burdens that other people put on your shoulders ? Sometimes taking a drastic step makes no sense if the reason of that step is not affected by the outcome... actually it never makes sense, forget that "sometimes". Stuff like this makes you realize that its never prudent to get too carried away by ones emotions. Also to not get so close to any person that you get hurt.

Well you'd think that people would learn... but then again, I guess Darwin was correct and so we continue playing with fire and we keep getting burnt, again and again and again, every time thinking that this time it will be different ! We've all been there. But still such an incident, so close to home, makes you think twice... is it worth playing ? Once you get burnt, it does take time to heal, sometimes a lot of time, but then you need to think... how far away from that fire can you bear to be ? Such an incident makes you question yourself, your beliefs, and most importantly how much of yourself are you willing to expose... and to whom ? We all know that we would not take such extreme steps, but I also know that our friend was not one to take such a step either. So who are we to say what went through his mind, what thoughts were running through him, what emotions had he been fighting ?

So once again you find me pessimistic and utterly cynical about people, relationships, and just life in general. As you would say in poker, after this incident do I have the sack to ante up again for another round ? Or do I walk away from the table, busted ? I believe this time, its not solely upto me, but its upto my friends, people that care for me. It is they who can give me the assurance to ante up again, to buy in to the table for another round again, because this is one poker table that CANNOT be handled alone...

Be that as it may, the days keep going by and I inch closer to my joining date at EXL Services (formerly Inductis), Gurgaon... my first job! Again a whole new beginning, not unlike the first day at college, a new town, a new environment, new people. And you can't help but think, What will my job be like ? What will Gurgaon be like ? What the people I encounter will be like ? etc. etc.

There are a few people I know in Delhi, will I meet them ? Will they remain a part of my life or will they just phase themselves out ? Will a couple of particular friends remain a part of my life ? What about other friends, from school and college ? Will they remain or will they, too, get phased out ? Will I make the same mistakes that I made earlier ? Will I go through on my dream a couple of years from now ? What I can't deny is that the apprehension is far outweighed by the excitement.

The wheels are in motion now... and I have a feeling that this rollercoaster ride is just getting started....

My Small Moments

2011-04-14T09:31:00.000-07:00

With just over a week left for this chapter of my life to close, I cannot help but feel nostalgic about the four years I spent here, at one of the "premier engineering institutes" of this country. I still remember the mixed feelings I had while coming here, not unlike those I'm having now. A sense of accomplishment at having cracked arguably the toughest entrance examination, a sense of apprehension about what awaits me in an "IIT", a whole gamut of emotions too complex to explain.

Four years later, I must say that I have learnt a lot here. Though I do not have much to show regarding my prowess in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, which incidentally was my major here, I leave with something a lot more important.... friends and experiences. From the most random and unplanned trip ever to a scenic Gangtok to a visit to IIT Guwahati on a "debate" that turned out to be much much more for reasons I had never expected, to being able to visit Spain, Italy, France, Singapore... places I had only dreamed about. I made a lot of friends, some close, others closer...while people entered my life and left, some being my fault while others of their own volition. All in all its been one heck of a rollercoaster ride, scary, exhilarating, with a lot of ups and downs, but on the whole a lot of fun.

But you ask what are the memories that I take back from this place ? So which are the memories I cherish the most out of all the myriad of emotions faced...? Because, after all, as said in El Secreto de sus ojos, "Its only memories that you take to your grave" :) . Well, I had initially expected it to be tough to pick out single incidents but surprisingly I find that a few memories stick out the most.

For example, Spring Fest this year was very happening for me. Making new friends, meeting up and hanging out with old ones, going for salsa, hockey et all... but surprisingly its not any of these that stick out in my mind as much as one single moment, one plain and insipid act that didn't even warrant much attention. Now I don't know why that stands out so much for me, but it does. Because when it comes down to the basics, its not the Indian Ocean concerts that I'll remember or even my first and only "EX" in IIT (yes I just put that in there to show that I got one :P). Its the small things that will stay with me, the small moments that I shared with various people, whether it be the time when a friend popped an innocent Melody into my mouth catching me unawares (yes somehow THATS the memory that stands out the most for me this Spring Fest.. weird but true), or the time when you just sat quietly alongside someone special with a beer and a B52 in front of you, the time when you exchanged a knowing glance with a friend across a table in Gangtok, the times when you came out of a viva (always with the same guy and the same marks, Shishir and 0), the times spent sitting in Cheddis and Tikka and Shady's with a cup of tea and no intention of getting up, the time your Jacks and Aces full house got beat by an Aces and Jacks full house, the time when an awkward question (or two) popped up for a friend during a Truth and Dare session, the time when a friend laughed so hard that sauce spurted out the nose, the time when a lunch box was handed over at the train station, the time when a friend and I were forced to practice stopping hockey balls at 5:30 in the morning (still half asleep), the moments are as innumerable as they are innocuous.

As I said before, there have been ups and there have been downs, some moments that hurt a lot and some that didn't, some that made me happy and some that left me nonplussed. But overall I would like to think that all this made me better and stronger for any trials and tribulations that this world has to offer because, and believe you me, I have done almost everything that could be done in my time here. I'd heard that college life would be fun and something to remember, but I never knew it would be this awesome. From the people in my first year, Uppu, Chor, Ledi, Sunil, Chom, Baniya, Majdoor to the people I met later Prateek Agrawal ("jcb anyone?? vs ??"), Thusuda ("wooo"), Bubs ("kyaa"), Urmaliya, the whole poker house, Dubeyda, and a whole lot of people.. the gadhis, the losses and mona... these are the people who made this "trip" memorable.

A lifetime of experiences that I take from this small nondescript place called Kharagpur. Four years that taught me more about life than I could have imagined, four years that taught me (to use a poker analogy) that even if you have a strong hand and suffer a really bad beat, you have got to have the sack to ante up again. Four years that I will cherish forever, for the small moments that made the ride worthwhile, four years that now I will never get back but will always have with me. Four years that taught me more about myself than I could have imagined, four years made up of moments of a lifetime.

My Faults (?) :)

2011-03-28T07:59:00.000-07:00

Every couple or weeks or so, some new thing comes up which inundates your "Walls" and "Status Messages" on the various social networking platforms that are there. There used to be random shit like "Tag your pals" where you could wake up one day to find out which pokemon or which other equally redundant cartoon character your friend thinks you are. Then there was the "tough-questions-about-friends" app and the various manifestations of it, and the list sort of goes on.

And nothings changed. One thing or the other continues to crop up and catch your eyeballs everywhere. Now again, leaving aside the millions... AND THE MILLIONS (the rock reference there :) ) of photoshopped images of the Indian cricket team beating up the Australians and the Pakistanis, its another small webpage that has caught the fancy of people everywhere... a page rather innovatively named "What is wrong with me", which (if you didn't get by the web name) gives people an opportunity to tell you what is wrong with you. Anonymously too, if I may add.

What is this fascination that people have to know what other people think ? I think its everyone has a hidden narcissist inside of them that just WANTS to know... ( yeah thats right I said it, YOU SIR/madam (as the case may be) are a narcissist TOO... I just choose to wear it on my sleeve :P :D ).
Anywho, moving along, I decided to take a pot shot at the thing meself and went ahead and got my very own webpage where YOU can tell ME whats wrong with me.

http://whatiswrongwith.me/protik (Just in case you didn't see it yet...)

So I thought I'd dedicate this post to the wide gamut of, ummm interesting answers that I got.. all anonymous of course.

1. Anonymous says: nothing :)

I say : Brilliant. As we say in the "poker house" :D... "pura love rahega" :)

2. Anonymous says: oh no! you're perfect..

I say : Thank you... I sort of get the feeling that this was supposed to be sarcastic but I'll take it at face value. A certain part of me wants to believe that this answer was written by some pretty girl, say Angelina Jolie or Elisha Cuthbert.. :) :D

3. Anonymous says: you're a bong

I say : Hahahahaha... I don't know how that is my fault but I'll be damned if I say I didn't find that funny. :D

4. Anonymous says: smartass

I say : Ok I know who wrote this so " :P ". Maybe sometimes I am... I'll try to tone it down. Or not :D :P. No seriously I will. Maybe. :)

5. Anonymous says: Your mom was worried you are very Lazy.

I say : So the point that is being made is that I'm lazy, I think. Well actually I am, because you know, if there was a contest to find who the laziest guy in the world was.. I would lose. You know why ? Because I would have been too lazy to even enter. But more seriously, in my defense, I can be quite active while doing something that I like or WANT to do. Plus I like to be cozy and comfortable and preferably asleep.

6. Anonymous says: kyu..kyu..kyun yeh sab kyun...

I say : ainwayi

7. Anonymous says: 1+2=3

I say : Yes, I am a bit weak at maths. For people who don't believe me... just ask any of the guys who play poker or my closer friends. Well its not maths per se.. its basically basic arithmetic that I almost always mess up. Don't like it but its true. Coming to the comment made, "like rahega is answer pe dada.. kaafi innovative way mein bataye ho".

8. Anonymous says: sab peace hai be :)

I say : Thanks rahega dost :)

9. my name is..yes it is says: u r a loss...........pong!

I say : Haa Haa Ekdum.. NOT. LOSS :P (Its an inside joke.. I know who this is :D)

10. Anonymous says: u brag a lot.. act as if u r the most imp person around.. thoda humble ho jaa

I say : I don't know where you are coming from about the brag a lot thing, because I don't. About the other part, yes I do have a bloated ego and maybe it sometimes rubs off wrongly on other people. Sorry about that. But the bragging part is just outright wrong.

And a lot of other similar and some.. lets just say spam comments. Which brings me to the most interesting answer that I got and am dying to address...

Anonymous says:
You are smart, but you lack direction. To add to that, you are extremely narcissistic. Those are things that don't go together. It is probably the bengali in you. Try to think less selfishly, and whatever you do in life, make sure at the end you can look back and say, at the very least, 'Hey, I made a positive change in my environment and the people in it.' I am glad you decided to do this.

I say : Thank you. Now I know that there is someone out there who actually took the time to write down all this for me.. which means a lot. And most of the points hit home. I don't know who wrote it, but its evident that you know me really well and I would love to know who wrote it so I can thank him/her personally, though that would beat the whole point of it being anonymous ! But then its really eyeopening if someone does not mince his/her words and speaks the truth, and I know its meant for my good only. So thank you and I shall keep what you said in mind.

When I made the page, I thought of it as just a lark and evidently so did all other people who answered except for the last one above. I was actually quite touched by that one answer.

Anywho, be that as it may, it was good hearing from people what they think :). And if you still want to tell me a few uncomfortable truths.. go ahead and maybe I'll answer them here... :P :)

Peace.

India Shining or The Not so Secret Seven events of 2010

2011-01-01T12:49:00.001-08:00

Taking a look back at 2010...seven points :
1. Ruchika case - The man (SPS Rathore) still walks free.
2. Arushi Talwar case - CBI closes case. Will there be any answer for the inhumane Narco tests on the innocent servants ? Where is that SC judge who claimed to know the criminal's identity now ? Will the wrongdoers EVER be brought to book ?
3. Suresh Kalmadi - Still not even questioned !!! While minions are languishing in jail. Where are your Narco tests now CBI ???
4. Nira Radia - .....ok...
5. A. Raja - What ?! *cough*Narco test*cough*
6. Arundhati Roy - Sedition charges ?! Are you f$#@#! kidding me ?? Doesn't democracy mean freedom of speech and opinion ?!
7. Binayak Sen - Life sentence ? REALLY ??

So basically, if I have money and clout, then I can get away with murder, rape, embezzlement, bringing shame to the country, .... Or if I am Nira Radia, I basically run the country.

And these are only a handful of cases that jump out at you. There are innumerably many more cases that can be read about each day where the gross miscarriage of justice is apparent. Which begs me to ask...where is that India Shining ? Who cares about the bloody GDP when you can't assure the common man justice ? Who cares about the bloody economic shenanigans when you can't let a person air his/her opinion ? For every superficial step that India takes forward it seems that out society and our judicial and political system yanks us five steps back... to which I just want to ask...

WHAT THE PHAAACK INDIA ??????????? WHAT THE PHAAAAACK ?????????????

Main Hawa Hoon Kahaan Watan Mera - Ghazal

2010-11-24T10:55:00.000-08:00

Well to say that I have come a long way would be mildly understating the fact that a couple of years ago the only songs you would find playing on my laptop would have been classified under the heading "Metal". But nowadays a different genre of songs can be found on my laptop too. As my previous post would have pointed out, this genre is "Ghazal".
So in keeping with my new found admiration for ghazals, I stumbled across this gem of a song by Ahmed and Mohammed Hussain, called Main Hawa Hoon Kahan Watan Mera (which basically means "I am the wind, where is my country?"). Well to say that I stumbled across it would be wildly inaccurate as the credit should go to Ranjeet Rajwada and his rendition of the same song on an episode of SaReGaMaPa Singing Superstars.

Even after searching for the lyrics on the internet I could not find any... which is a sort of injustice to this beautiful song. So here are the lyrics, as I understood it. (Do feel free to correct them if I am wrong)

Main Hawa Hoon Kahan Watan Mera

ab kahaan hoon.. kahaan nahi hoon main
ab kahaan hoon.. kahaan nahi hoon main
jis jagah hoon wahaan nahi hoon main

kaun awaz de raha hai mujhe
koi keh de yahaan nahi hoon main

main hawa hoon kahaan watan mera
dasht mera na ye chaman mera

mai ke har chand ek khaana nashin
anjuman anjuman suhan mera
dasht mera na ye chaman mera
main hawa hoon kahaan watan mera

barg-e-gul par charag sa kya hai
choo gaya tha use dahan mera
dasht mera na ye chaman mera
main hawa hoon kahaan watan mera

mai ke toota hua sitara hoon
kya bigaregi anjuman mera
dasht mera na ye chaman mera
main hawa hoon kahaan watan mera

har ghadi ek naya takaza hai
dard sar ban gaya badan mera
dasht mera na ye chaman mera
main hawa hoon kahaan watan mera
main hawa hoon kahaan watan mera

The original song can be heard here.

Awaargi - Ghulam Ali

2010-10-27T09:36:00.000-07:00

First of all, I'd like to start off by saying that may Octopus Paul rest in peace. Rumor has it that he tried to predict Rajanikant's death when everyone knows that Rajanikant died 10 years ago but Yamraaj still does not have the courage to tell him. Anyway, may he rest in peace, not that I (or the Germans) liked him much.

Anyway,coming to the title of my post today, Awargi, it is a song by Ghulam Ali.. well one of his very best in my opinion. Somehow, this song struck me when I first heard it and I could not get it out of my mind at all. And like good wine, it just keeps getting better every time you hear it. So I thought I'd dedicate this post to this amazing ghazal by Mohsin Naqvi and sung by Ghulam Ali about Awaargi (wandering from place to place).

Lyrics :

ye dil ye paagal dil mera, kyun bujh gayaa awaargi
is dasht mein ek sheher tha, woh kya hua awaargi

(awaargi : wandering; dasht : wilderness)

kal shab mujhe beshakl ki awaaz ne chaunka diya
main ne kaha tu kaun hai, usne kaha awaargi

(beshakl : with no face)

ek ajnabi jhaunke ne jab poocha mere gam ka sabab
sehera ki bheegi ret per, maine likha awaargi

(sehera : desert , jhaunke : gust of wind)

ab main samjha tere ruksar pe til ka matlab
daulat-e-husn pe darbar bitha rakha hai

(ruksar : face)

ye dard ki tanhaiyaan, ye dasht kaa viraan safar
hum log to ukta gaye apni suna, aavargii

(tanhai : loneliness; viraan : empty)

logon bhala us sheher mein kaise jiyenge hum jahaan
ho jurm tanhaa sochnaa, lekin sazaa awaargi

(tanhaa : alone; sazaa : punishment)

kal raat tanha chaand ko dekha tha maine khwaab mein
“Mohsin” mujhe raas aayegii shaayad sada awaargi

(raas aayegi : will like; sada : always)

I hope I did justice to the lyrics. A few words I had to google to find out while different versions of the song have different "shairs", so a certain discrepancy is to be expected. Still, I would like you to tell me if I went wrong anywhere since I'm poor at Urdu. Here's to a gem of a song.. and yes I've come a long way from listening only to metal :P

Ayodhya Verdict

2010-09-30T04:38:00.000-07:00

So today is the day that the High Court Allahabad gives its verdict on the Ayodhya case. The whole country is kept on alert fearful of riots and all news channels are full of the same news.
What I want to ask is... whats the big deal ? The way I see it, whatever be the verdict, the case will be taken to the Supreme Court where it will drag on for another 10 years.. or more. So its really a bit redundant at this point.

As to the actual verdict, it can be read here http://www.allahabadhighcourt.in/ayodhyabench.html

And now, since I am the smart ass that I am, I shall tell you what should have been the best verdict. Something that would have been useful for all humanity and India in general. Something that should have been thought of a long time ago.
Give the land to the municipality and build a big sewage treatment plant there. There cant be less of those anyway... the more the better, plus the hot steaming pile of bullcrap that is the Waqf board and the hindu radicals can also have a place they can call "home".

Hmm now that I think of it, I should be given the ultimate decision making power in this country.

Signing off with the immortal words of Dr. Harivansh Rai Bachchan

Musalman aur hindu hai do, ek magar unka pyala.
Ek magar unka madiralaya, ek magar unki haala.
Dono rehte ek na jab tak mandir mandir masjid me jate.
Bair badhate mandir masjid, mel karati madhushala...

Dabangg ...and other random stuff

2010-09-16T10:15:00.000-07:00

Ok before I begin, though it pains me to say it, I'd like to say it seems Everton can't.

Since I have nothing better to do (I could be studying for my exam but, meh..) ,I thought I'd get in a random ramble on my blog.
So I just watched Dabangg, and let me tell you.. Salman Khan is THE MAN. There is awesomeness in everything that he does. Be it delivering dialogues, beating up the bad guys or doing a ridiculous dance... there is no one who can pull it off better than him and still come out on top :D . Full on entertainment, with bad jokes and bad acting, both so bad that its funny. Awesome though it was, Dabangg in my opinion isn't a scratch on the pure awesomeness that was WANTED (again the salman khan one, not the angelina jolie one). Now, taking nothing away from the intellectual shite that other people make, these are two movies that you would pay to watch, and I feel thats how it should be. Go out, have fun, laugh your butts off.

Anyway, deviating a bit from movies, most of you know that I have a weird set of things, a ritual if I may, that must take place before any exam... otherwise I don't do well in it. I've gotten a lot of shit about it... but hey, its always worked and you never mess with what ain't broken ! Plus when you don't really prepare well, and are staring into the deep dark tunnel of no hope, superstition is THE way to go. :D
Seriously.
Which brings me to something else.
"Ok.. just message me when I have to call next" ...is a seemingly innocuous statement. Maybe a helpful friend, you may assume. But then when someone who never EVER calls says this, then you can't help but wonder... is this person calling me as if its being forced onto him/her ? Because if thats the case, then there is something wrong somewhere. Shouldn't a friend just call you as a friend.. no strings attached ? Maybe the person did not mean it that way. Maybe that person called just because I said so. I don't know. What I do know is that there is one person who I am NOT messaging before my next exam.
What a difference just a line makes, doesn't it ? Well, often its a line that makes or comes to define a book or a movie.. isn't it ? Be that as it may...
Until the next post.

I'll be back. :)

PS A shout out to my chaddy-buddy for calling :D

Everton FC : Will they or Won't they ?

2010-08-19T09:42:00.000-07:00

Maybe the most appropriate question is "Can they ?". Arguably for the first time since David Moyes took charge of the blue side of Liverpool, Everton have, at least on paper, a squad that seems to be the strongest in recent memory. While all the hype this season has been around the rise of Tottenham and Manchester City, and rightly so, Everton have gone about their business in a quiet manner. The acquisitions of forwards Jermaine Beckford, Joao Silva and Magaye Gueye for almost no money may raise questions about the ability to challenge the hegemony at the top of the table, but let us not forget that in David Moyes they have a man who unearthed the likes of Joleon Lescott, Phil Jagielka, Tim Cahill, Mikel Arteta and Marouane Fellaini. Not to mention the grooming of talents like Wayne Rooney, Jack Rodwell and Leighton Baines to name a few.
While Manchester City have splashed the cash and Tottenham have made noises about big name acquisitions, Everton has quietly secured the services of Jagielka, Rodwell and Arteta on five year deals. In Yakubu and Saha, they have a potent strike force and no one can doubt the aerial and goalscoring threat that Cahill presents. The three new signings along with Victor Anichebe and James Vaughan add much needed depth in the final third. In midfield, Moyes is spoilt for choices as Mikel Arteta, Steven Pienaar, Dimitar Bilyaletdinov, Rodwell, Fellaini and Leon Osman all fight for a starting berth. At the back Moyes has the assurance of Joseph Yobo, Phil Jagielka, Sylvain Distin, Leighton Baines, Tony Hibbert, Phil Neville, world cup finalist Johnny Heitinga, and the highly rated youngster Seamus Coleman. The signing of Slovak keeper Jan Mucha gives a much needed back up for the ever present Tim Howard. This is arguably the best squad David Moyes has had at his disposal, and lets not forget that Everton were the only team to "break the top four" before Tottenham did it last year. With a better team, maybe it is not much to dream of a challenge for a top four finish, with qualification for Europe a minimum expectation.
Last season was blighted by injuries to a big part of the squad which resulted in players being played out of position and sometimes even being not match fit. Once the injured players started returning, Everton made an amazing surge up the table (which included victories over Chelsea and Manchester United at Stamford Bridge and Old Trafford and a dominating draw against Arsenal at home) to finish just one place adrift of their local rivals, Liverpool. If Everton can maintain the run of form, and keep a fully fit squad for the major part of the season, they might just be the surprise package of the season. Lets not forget that Manchester City may need time to gel and Liverpool are in a process of rebuilding. Martin O'Neill leaving Aston Villa and the departure of James Milner leaves them in a tight spot. Tottenham may have over achieved last season and they arguably do not have the squad to compete both domestically and in Europe simultaneously as the season progresses. Taking all this into account, this just might be the year that David Moyes and his men in blue finally come good. But they cannot afford to drop points like they did at Blackburn in the opening game of the season. The Toffees have the squad to bounce back from the defeat and mount a serious campaign... and if the squad list and the pre season results are anything to go by, they might just be the value for money bet that you are looking for this season.

How To Know When...

2010-07-27T08:13:00.000-07:00

How to know when you are a guy studying in an IIT...

When, at any given point of time, you open your chat list to always find around 50 people online but only 3 or 4 of them are girls.

Guti Haz. - A Tribute

2010-07-26T06:41:00.000-07:00

Roughly about a month ago, I was in Madrid and as any football fan would, I found myself roaming around the Mecca of football, Santiago Bernabeu. Love them or hate them, you cannot deny that Real Madrid F.C. is the place where every footballer worth his salt dreams to be. They are what Led Zeppelin was to rock n roll, what the Lakers are to the NBA, what arguably Austin was to WWE... they are in short, THE Franchise. So there I was, in the Bernabeu, and I happened to walk into the player's section of the museum where all the kits and details of the players are archived. Everyone was taking pictures of the kits of their favorite players and I immediately looked around for mine fearing that there may be a lot of people there. After all this player, along with a cetain Raul Gonzales, has been here for more than two decades and is arguably synonymous with the club. Then I realized... the crowd was somewhere else.

Now the thing that struck me most was not the fact that all people were crowded around Cristiano Ronaldo's or Kaka's boots and kit, but the fact that this person's kit stood alone, and almost to a certain extent, neglected. Was I merely lucky or was it a sign of the times ?

Jose Maria Gutierrez Hernandez, or Guti to all Real Madrid fans, joined the club at the age of 9 and came through all the youth structures till he broke into the first team at the age of 19. With his amazing skill and talent, he could have been one of the best players ever.. but he was always overshadowed. Anyone who has seen his backheel pass to Zidane against Sevilla will have that piece of play forever etched in memory... and more recently his blind pass to Benzema at the Riazor, which helped Madrid break a two decade duck against Deportivo La Coruna, flatteringly called "the Heel of God". Maybe words cannot do justice to the amazing piece of brilliance.. as Goal.com put it..

"No one saw it coming... no one. When Enzo Maresca cleared the ball away from the penalty area, he must have thought that the danger was over for Sevilla. Cicinho had put in a cross that Zinedine Zidane had failed to control and the Sevilla midfielder hoofed the ball away, but only as far as Guti. 25 yards out, with a host of bodies blocking his view and with his back to goal, surely Guti couldn't do anything except spread it wide?

Wrong. Guti did a 'taconazo', the outrageous back-heel split the Sevilla defence, Zidane was at the end of it and Real Madrid were on their way to bagging all three points. Guti conjured up the unimaginable, that one moment of genius that etched itself forever in an observer's memory. That pass, and that pass alone, defines Guti, the temperamental genius who could never fulfill his gift, the "eternal promise".

One of the best final passers that the game has seen, maybe he was always destined to be overshadowed by names like Figo, Zidane , Beckham and more recently Ronaldo, Kaka et all. Today after 20 years at the club to which he gave his all, he is deemed surplus to requirements, his kit stands alone... not appreciated by the younger fans, the neo-galactico supporters. But this is a man about whom Zidane and Ronaldo (the Brazilian legend) had nothing but praise. Maybe he represents a dying breed of players, those that believe that, in the words of Danny Blanchflower, ‎"the game is about doing things in style and with a flourish, about going out and beating the other lot, not waiting for them to die of boredom"..for whom its as much an art as a sport. Maybe he is too old for the fast paced game that is championed today. Maybe. Maybe not. As he moves on to Besiktas for his swan-song, it is heartening to see that atleast he gets recognition while leaving... the eternal curse of the genius. Till then I'm happy I got the time to take a good pic... :)

From the amazing solo goal against Bilbao or the delightful volley cum lob against Villareal to coming on as a substitute and single handedly beating Sevilla to that amazing night against Valladolid where he scored 2 and created 4 in a 7-0 mauling...you can't help but wonder what he could have accomplished had he the same dedication and determination as Raul, another legend. Xavi, Iniesta, Sneijder who ? But sometimes its just not meant to be...

Here's to one of the most talented players of his generation. Take a bow Jose Maria Gutierrez Hernandez !

5 Reasons why I did not want Spain to win the World Cup

2010-07-13T09:19:00.000-07:00

Let me start by saying that even on paper, I believe Spain were the only team really deserving to win the World Cup. Uruguay, Germany, Ghana all lit up the World Cup with their play but in the end they either over achieved or were stars in the making who will rule in he coming years. But for now, the superior team won. Still that does not stop me from putting forward my 5 reasons why I did not support Spain a.k.a. THE 5 (or more.. its just that 5 is a good number. I like it.) REASONS WHY I DID NOT WANT SPAIN TO WIN.

1. Sergio Busquets. Dont like him. Nor should you.

2. Iniesta is a very good player. He dives a lot. How can you criticize Robben and not Iniesta ? And to say that Iniesta dives less is wrong on two fronts. Firstly, he dives more. Secondly, you dive once or you dive ten times doesn't matter. Bottomline is that you dive. He is a horrible little cheat who is constantly rewarded with free kick after free kick for his diving and playacting, not to mention the fact that he can get away with his petulant little kicks on the opposition when a match official has the gall to not make the call you want. Again Iniesta is a really skillful player and really good with the ball at his feet but maybe sportsmanship doesn't come naturally to many. Holland were disgraceful yes but so were Spain with this man leading the way. And just because he is Spanish doesn't put him above reproach, sorry. (P.S. before someone brings up Ronaldo's name, this does not concern Ronaldo at all. Yes he dives. He did not dive in this WC. The only reason that he gets criticized *more* than others is because he scores 40 goals a season and has a magnificent right foot, very good left foot, power, pace, bags of skill and brilliant timing in the air... in short he is better than you can ever dream to be.)

3. Italy are criticized all the time for their catenaccio system. What Spain play is just a form of anti-catenaccio. The only difference being that Italy defend while Spain retain possession. Oh, and by the way, retaining possession does not equal attacking football. Before pseudo-intellectuals come up with the technically beautiful and tactically superior argument let me just say the Italian catenaccio system's success is based on two things : being technically and tactically superior. If you appreciate one and not the other then you are a stupid poser. If someone gave me a penny for everytime Xavi passes sideways to Busquets and vice versa, Bill Gates would have had a competitor.

4. Just because its become a fashionable thing to say that you support Spain even when you have no idea what position Javi Martinez plays in or who he is for that matter. (He played in THIS woorld cup for heaven's sake). I am willing to ignore the fact that 90% of them can't even name 5 players from FIFA WC 2006.

5. Did I mention Sergio Busquets ?

6. Barcelona. The football club (apart from Messi) has no class. I have said it for a long long time and now atleast the Arsenal fans (if no one else) will agree with me. Loudmouths like Pique and Xavi make it worse. (Before someone starts about Real Madrid... yes they are bad in this department too but they don't claim otherwise. Barcelona, on the other hand, are two faced.)

7. Their opponents, Holland. If you noticed by now that my dislike has very little to do with the footballing aspect but more with other things, I would like to ask one question... what has Spain ever given you ? Let me say two words that should make you pledge eternal support to Holland... Amsterdam. And Heineken.

8. I did mention Busquets right ?

Dedicated to facebook.

2010-07-09T03:43:00.001-07:00

everyday someone pokes me. i poke them back. repeat cycle in 2 days. wtf is this "poke" thing anyway ? in the meantime.. i poke you again. its like night of the living dead. just with pokes and no brain eatings. thats disgusting. not the pokes. the brain eating i mean. or is it the poke ? i have too little work. POKE.

R.I.P. Octopus Paul

2010-07-07T14:11:00.000-07:00

It perhaps needs no explaining that Octopus Paul has overnight become a huge celebrity but as a German supporter (yes I hate Sergio Busquets that much), theres nothing better that I'd like right now than octopus soup. Not just any octopus soup, but Octopus Paul soup and I daresay every other German supporter on the day would agree. But then again, did we really need an octopus (yes an OCTOPUS) to tell us that Spain were the superior team ? If we did, then the world needs a major reality check ! For me Germany had lost the match with the suspension of Muller and no matter how important Ozil and Schweinsteiger are to the German team, Muller is the man who does it. Without him, the counter attacks just lacked that pace and focus. Be that as it may, come this weekend, we shall crown a first time champion in either Netherlands or Spain... which brings me to the point that I have a problem with. Read the next line carefully (I shall even highlight it for you) :::

On the 11th of July, either Khalid Boulahrouz or Sergio Busquets will be crowned the champion of the World !

Please, read that again. Let it sink in. Now say those 3 words... WTF ??!!

ADD : Attention Deficit Disorder (?)

2010-07-02T06:37:00.000-07:00

First of all... A NEW LOOK ! WOOHOO ! Instant like :D.

Anyway, I was just randomly surfing the internet when I came across a list of things that are supposed to be 'indicative' of whether or not you have ADD or attention deficit disorder. So I think to myself, I have no work as of now, nothing to do, well lets see if I qualify or not. So here's what I found out....

Predominantly inattentive type symptoms may include:

Be easily distracted ..check

Miss details, forget things, and frequently switch from one activity to another ..check

Have difficulty focusing on one thing ..not really

Become bored with a task after only a few minutes, unless they are doing something enjoyable ..always, check

Have difficulty focusing attention on organizing and completing a task or learning something new ..not really

Have trouble completing or turning in homework assignments ..Check

Often losing things (e.g., pencils, toys, assignments) needed to complete tasks or activities ..Check

Not seem to listen when spoken to ..check

Daydream ...Check

Become easily confused, and move slowly ...not really, the move slowly is more out of being lazy

Be very impatient ..absolutely check

Blurt out inappropriate comments, show their emotions without restraint, and act without regard for consequences ...check

Have difficulty waiting for things they want or waiting their turns in games ..check

So that's a solid 10/13 for me. Wait a minute... does that mean that I have ADD !!!?? No way.. that can't be true because I know that I do not have.. hey what's that ? ooohhh shiny...

SHIT Happens.. but why ?

2010-06-09T07:47:00.000-07:00

What the hell is wrong with the world ? Yesterday was like a whirlwind for me... I got to know that when misfortune falls upon a really nice person, it doesn't matter how well you know him, you get affected.

A guy you couldn't talk to because you spoke different languages and knew only for 3 -4 days, one day has to pick up his bags and just leave for Barcelona looking for a job since he couldn't find one in Valencia. He has no place to go to in Barcelona, no idea where he will get work and no money. And he doesn't have the answers to this even when he is on the bus. The last thing I remember is a forced smile on his face and him claiming that "Allah will do something" before praying and leaving Valencia.... forever (?). But behind that assuring smile I see the doubt, the fear, the hopelessness and try as I might, I cannot stop feeling gutted. All for a guy I barely knew. Was it him, or was it his situation, or the false pretense of everything being ok.. i don't know, but I could not stop my eyes from welling up. And I am NOT the kind of guy to get emotional at stuff. Come to think of it, its the second time my eyes have welled up since I can remember. Again, all for a guy I barely knew.

Then I wish a friend of mine "Happy Birthday" and I get to know that her dad died a week ago from a cardiac arrest. Right-o. Great. Now I felt even worse. And sitting on gtalk on a different continent, theres not much I can say or do about it.

So I think to myself, put on some metal and try to forget it, because like it or not, when things are not going your way, there is nothing better than metal... maybe bashing some stuff with a baseball bat but then thats just going too far. So I start my iTunes and put it on shuffle and am browsing the web just for passing the time and I come across this article in the TIME magazine about the recent oil spill and the Bhopal Gas Tragedy (read it please)... and I think.. what is the world coming to ?? Okay so I knew that the government was a bunch of inept goons, but even our judiciary is inept ?? Wtf is wrong here ?? I know it is an old story but hey, coming on top of what had just happened, it just filled me with outrage and unbridled anger. Oh and to top it off, guess which song happened to play when I was reading the article ? Creeping Death - by Metallica. Appropriate.

Which brings me to what a lot of people keep telling me... SHIT Happens. Really ?? And why ?? Why can't shit not happen ??? Even if it does happen, why does it happen to the good folk ? Why cant shit happen to fucktards like Warren Anderson and Union Carbide ? Why cant shit happen to Lalu Yadav and Pappu Yadav and Raj Thackeray ?

There is something seriously wrong with this world that we have been given.

P.S. Apparently its the great circle of life.

Viva La Espana !

2010-06-04T06:26:00.000-07:00

Hola mi amigos !

Uno semana en Espana y estoy tratando de aprender este idoma.

Ok so I got a little help from Google translate in that. Basically its been a week since I've arrived in Spain and the moment I got here I realised how important it is to know Spanish if you have to live in this place. No one and I mean NO ONE speaks a word of English in Burjassot, Valencia (where I am) and that just makes everything a wee but more tough for communication. Dos mesas left !! I have to learn spanish !

Since my work at the university has not really started, I have a horde of time left on my hands to do absolutely nothing and let me tell you, its TOUGH. Not doing shit day in and day out while sitting behind a desk for 10 hours a day is the toughest job in the world... the only light at the end of the tunnel is that A.) I'm in Spain :P ...and B.) I'm probably getting paid for it (not that I like it though.. i think for the first time in my life, I am actually dying for some work.. which will probably be the other way around once I do start working but whatever..).

That reminds me... the best thing about Spain are the people here and the roads. Why roads you ask ? Well, its sorta a little bit similar to Kharagpur in the fact that the pedestrians have power. In Kharagpur, people walking and on cycles are the Kings and cars always have to play second fiddle.. while everyone walks down the middle of the road. Its not exactly the same here but its awesome when you want to cross the street and all cars just come to a complete halt for you, unlike in India where you will probably get run over if you don't keep your eyes open and reflexes sharp :P !! Here you can walk across a zebra crossing without looking either left or right, safe in the knowledge that if there are cars there, they WILL STOP. Also trams by the way. Everyone stops. Its quite enthralling and call me juvenile or childish or just plain sadistic, I love crossing streets for no reason apart from this !!

About the people, never have I met more friendly and helpful people. In India, if you ask a random person on the street for directions and the person doesn't know, he'll just shrug and move on but not in Spain, atleast that has never happened with me. I get lost sometimes, well actually almost every other time I'm outside I get lost but then I don't know the place or speak the damn language so what do you expect ? Anyway, all the times I've asked someone on the street to help me out, basically by repeating the address a hundred times, I have ended up with a street full of people eager to not just point out the direction, but actually lead me there !! One guy in Madrid actually took me to the Metro, came with me to the train station AND bought me a ticket to Valencia, all because my bus to Valencia had got cancelled and I'd asked him how to get to Valencia !! Now that was amazing since I'd just arrived in Spain and the guy spoke NO ENGLISH AT ALL... I couldn't even thank him properly. So Antonio and Fran, wherever you guys are.. MUCHAS GRACIAS ! Then the people at the Residencia where I stayed the last week... well what can I say ? They totally made me feel at home, albeit in a different language and I met a lot of amazing people. Not least Christina, the person incharge at the Residencia who charged me only 15 euros a night when I was leaving when the actual price for a room is 25 euros per night, and thats just for the heck of it !! And all the Pakistani and Indian shop owners, Kebab and fruits and vegetable, for the numerous mind boggling discounts they gave me just because I was from India again making me feel that all these wars between our two nations is to what end ? Even earlier whenever I've met people from Pakistan, educated or not, they have always been of the same opinion, "India - Pakistan ek hi hai" , which makes me wonder if all people feel that way, then who are the one's fighting ? Of course I admit that the older generation (of Hindus from my perspective) has an inexplicable distrust of Muslims, but then aren't we the generation that is actually incharge here ?

Anyway moving on from these matters, I visited a place called the Oceanographic here, which is the largest aquarium in Europe. Now, aquarium is actually a misnomer but man was it insanely amazing !! Whales to great whites to more mundane beings like manta rays and jellyfish to creepy ass shit like giant spider crabs (they are fricking 12 ft !! TWELVE ...!), all within an inch of your face just behind that glass... it was awesome !

Having no work though ensures that I spend an insane amount of time on facebook (and I am quite sure its not healthy) , which made me realize today that I have 453 "friends" on facebook !! FOUR HUNDRED FIFTY THREE ! Do I even know that many people ???! And not only that, when you have time on your hands like I do now, you want to talk to people (no not hand gestures and broken Spanish, actually TALK)... and then you realize that out of all those 453 there are just a handful that you really want to talk to anyway. And they are usually not online at that moment... x-( . So if by any chance they are and they are busy or something, it just makes you madder.

Anyway, tengo hambre... and its off to lunch for me. Hasta luego !

The Return of the Jedi, well not Jedi ..but sounds more dramatic anyway.

2010-04-04T07:46:00.000-07:00

So I have not blogged in quite a while but when one of prettiest girls you know tells you to resume writing, then you damn sure resume writing ! Even if you have absolutely no idea what the heck you're going to write about.

Anyway, something I realized as I near the end of my 3rd year of college is that at Kgp, as time goes on, I keep getting proportionally lazy and basically developing a lackadaisical attitude towards most things. Which is not necessarily a good thing to happen. But I guess that encompasses what most Kgpians call "peace". And "peace maarna" has sort of become a way of life for a lot of us. So while I've been "maaroing peace", time has gone on and suddenly I see myself entering my final year of college or rather, nearing Placement !! Looking at the current scenario of placements, well, let's just say that for Metallurgy, the best placement opportunity is at Jindal Steel... and I do not want to go to Jindal Steel !! So what's left you say ?? As I see it, there are two roads available to me then... CAT and GRE. So I think to myself... "what am I good at ?" , "what work am I cut out for ?". Due to the fact that those questions draw a blank, I decide to not bother about either of them now and open facebook to see the latest updates and spend the rest of the day doing nothing or rather, "maaroing peace".

And maybe, just maybe, the fact that I've recently been going on various trips on weekends is to escape thinking about this. But you know what ? Peace maar.... we'll ponder on that later. Talking about trips, this last weekend a few of my friends and I went to this beach some distance away from Digha at a place called Mandarmoni. Its an awesome place, almost like a backwater with no tourism and stuff. Oh, and before I forget, we went by truck. Yeah you got that right, we hopped on the back of a truck and went to Mandarmoni. I've seen it in the movies and let me tell you upfront that yes, it is that much fun.... but... it is DAMN uncomfortable. The movies don't show you that ! Its bloody uncomfortable and especially when the mercury is pushing the 40s, then its unbearable and we probably have a watermelon vendor on the highway to thank for getting back alive..well thats an overstatement but hey, as long as you get the point. But you know what, it was fun. And it may have been hot and uncomfortable, I'm ready to go it again.. it was that fun.

On a more serious note, I probably need to decide what I want to do. Any ideas ?

P.S. This is in memory of Bhaichung, the rabbit we had. He was an idiot, but a likeable one. Only two months old, it was definitely not his time. If only the idiot had know better than to run towards a stray dog. May he rest in peace. :(

Without Me... ?!

2009-09-27T14:32:00.000-07:00

Guess who's back
Back again
<>'s back
Tell a friend

Guess who's back, guess who's back.....

Its the season for comebacks.. or so it may seem. First it was Kim Clijsters who, having given up tennis a few years back, suddenly decided that she had the fire in her to have another go at the existing bunch and came storming back to win a US Open and complete a fairytale comeback. And lets not forget that legend of a man, Lance Armstrong. His legacy aside, coming back from retirement and finishing 3rd in the Tour de France is no mean feat, even if you are Lance Armstrong. Then you have the lesser known Dara Torres. Who ? Yes, Dara Torres. A 41-year old mother, she returned to the pool after EIGHT YEARS away to win a silver in the 50m freestyle event in the Olympics. These are not just isolated cases. Remember Michael Jordan and his numerous comebacks ? Then you had George Foreman, Nikki Lauda, Henrik Larsson... the list goes on.

And so, coming back to where I started.. Guess who's back ?? JUSTINE HENIN... yes you read that right, Justine Henin is BACK !!! After months in the wilderness, my favourite player has decided to stage a comeback a la her compatriot Clijsters. Finally in an era of power-dominated tennis, there will be that elegance and grace of Henin. I'd said it once and I'll say it again... Justine Henin's single handed topspin backhand is absolute poetry... right up there with Federer's passing shot and Zidane's double drag-back. Now the question remains, will she be successful ? I really hope she is ;) .

That brings the question, why do all the champions try to comeback ? What is it that makes all these people want to go at it all over again ? I think its the competition. All champions relish competition. When you've retired from a sport, suddenly you no longer have to work hard, push yourself that extra bit to be better. Come to think of it, ordinary life is rather mundane and you don't really need to sweat it out a lot. You miss that adrenaline rush, that rush of blood that makes you perform out of your skin. You even miss the crowds. But all comebacks do not have a fairytale ending. Sugar Ray Leonard, Mike Tyson...there are atleast 10 failed comeback attempts for every successful one.

So heres to Justine Henin. May her comeback be successful...since as Eminem put it in his song

No matter how many fish in the sea

It'll be so empty, without me ....

India's heroes

2009-09-19T09:27:00.000-07:00

So the other day I have this wallpaper on my desktop, a pic of Bhaichung Bhutia and Sunil Chettri with the Indian tricolour after the Nehru Cup victory, when a friend of mine comes along and asks.. "Which team is this ?". After berating him for the next 20 minutes, I realised that its not just him but a lot of people who don't know most of the country's sportsmen. People know totally arbitrary players in the EPL but they don't know more than a couple of players from our own national team! Now that, in my opinion, is a disgrace. Which brings us to this post...

So maybe you don't know the country's sportsmen (/women).. but there are a few people about whom you SHOULD know. People who are making the country proud on a regular basis in the international arena... The following is a list of people who, in my opinion, have excelled for India in the past few years.

1. Vijender Singh - Boxing

2. Saina Nehwal - Badminton

3. M.C. Mary Kom - Boxing

4. Pankaj Advani - Billiards and Snooker

5. Narain Karthikeyan - F1, now A1GP

6. Abhinav Bindra - shooting

7. Sushil Kumar - Wrestling

8. Saurav Ghosal - Squash

9. Leander Paes - Tennis

10. Mahesh Bhupathi - Tennis

11. Vishwanathan Anand - Chess

12. Bhaichung Bhutia (actually the entire team) - Football

The amazing thing about the list above is that, if you notice, the last four names would have been on the list even if it were made 10 years ago ! Now that is consistency and and if that does not warrant attention and praise then I do not know what does. The list is not exhaustive and I may have left out a few people by mistake.. comments on the list are welcome. If you notice, a certain sport (played by *9* countries in the world) has not been included.

The House of Wine - MADHUSHALA

2009-08-20T09:58:00.000-07:00

एक बरस में, एक बार ही जगती होली की ज्वाला,

एक बार ही लगती बाज़ी, जलती दीपों की माला,

दुनियावालों, किन्तु, किसी दिन आ मदिरालय में देखो,

दिन को होली, रात दिवाली, रोज़ मनाती मधुशाला।।२६।

So before any of you start to wonder why I'm starting off on such a "high" note, let me clarify that the four lines above are an excerpt from the much acclaimed poem, MADHUSHALA by Harivansh Rai Bachchan. The first thing most people asked me when they saw me reading Madhushala was "Dude, are you all right ?"... which if you notice says a lot about how today's generation looks upon reading in Hindi, our national language. When I say generation... I mean the 'educated' people from towns and cities. What a shame !!

Ok enough of that crap... seriously. Even I have a lot, and I mean A LOT, of trouble reading in Hindi and the only reason I started to read Madhushala was because a friend of mine said it was quite entertaining... and fresh off from reading two back to back comics of Nagraaj (with Super Commando Dhruv), I was feeling quite adventurous and good about myself.

So back to Madhushala... As I started reading, I found myself totally immersed in the poem and the reading in Hindi ceased to remain a problem. Now on face value anyone can see why it is so entertaining to college students and others.. but if you re read the stanzas, you realise that the poet is not actually promoting alcoholism (though its quite easy to imagine why people would think so) , but the Madhushala (tavern/ house of wine) is used as a metaphor for this world and the poet is actually writing about life using wine as an allegory.

Madhushala is one of those rare works that achieved both critical acclaim and popularity.. no raised eyebrows there !!! Funnily enough, a lot of people originally frowned upon the poem since it was perceived to be a celebration of liquor.

Bachchan uses the goblet, the wine, the bar-maid and the tavern regularly in almost each quatrain, each more beautiful than the previous one. Such is the beauty of his composition that today, even after nearly more than three quarters of a century, Madhushala has lost none of its charm and meaningfulness. The beauty of Madhushala in part lies in the fact that you can interpret the lines whichever way you want... If you look at the bare surface and read it as a tribute to alcoholism, well you'll still find it to be a magnificent and entertaining journey... either way its a beautiful and amazing composition that will leave you spellbound.

If you have heard Madhushala or read it before, you have been as lucky as I have been. And if you have not, please do get hold of a copy of the album. Listening to the composition in the voice of Manna De creates an unbelievable atmosphere. The level of Hindi is slightly higher than Std X levels as you would have guessed by now. But do give yourself up to the joys of this work, the meaning will follow itself!

Go ahead, enjoy this vigorous- and loving- tribute to the goodness of life! (or to alcohol..as you would have it) ;)

P.S.

Harivansh Rai Bachchan mentions in his autobiography that he gained so much notoriety as someone who promotes drinking that he was once summoned to give his side of the explanation to Mahatma Gandhi. Incidentally, he was a teetotaller.

Wimbledon 2009 - The emotions

2009-07-05T10:47:00.000-07:00

What is it about Wimbledon that produces such classics year after year after year ? If last year was about breath taking rallies and ground strokes, this year it was all about the power of the serve. Another epic match which kept everyone on the edge of their seats. Before the match, I almost expected Federer to cruise through... after all, the record suggested that. Roddick has won only 2 of their 20 meetings and none of them ever went to five sets, but sport usually has this way of making a complete mockery of any statistics. Well it was one of those affairs which make you so nervous that you just want to switch over to a different channel just for some relief from the tension but you just can't get your hands to operate the remote control. So you are just sitting there, on the edge of your seat, watching as these two men.. no, more like gladiators... slug it out on that battleground, the cauldron that is the Centre Court in front of Messrs Sampras, Rod Laver, Illi Nastase ..people who have been there, done that.. and you can't help but wonder what drives these two guys on. More than an hour into the fifth set and they still chase down the balls as if their lives depended on it.

In hindsight, there has to be a winner and there has to be a loser. So, ok the Swiss maestro, that artist with the racket, Roger Federer finally won.. his 15th Grand Slam, finally (?) cementing his place as the greatest to grace the sport. But you have to stand back and think... was it fair ? Well, sport, like life is usually unfair.. and thats the bottomline. You have to feel for Andy Roddick, you really do. There is this guy... the massive underdog who comes out and plays the best tennis of his life, whose hard work, detemination and passion put in throughout the past year really shows in the overall improvement in his game. So this guy comes out all guns blazing and takes the first set and has 3 set points in the second which, due credit to Federer, he doesn't take advantage of. You think he is down and out as Federer takes the 3rd set in a tiebreak again but he stands up. Just like all the other times he's been defeated and he has come back, stronger than before. He bounces back again and breaks the Federer serve to take the 4th !! So the better player on the day breaks his opponent twice and outplays his opponent thoughout the majority of the match. You would expect that he'd win... but hey.. life is just not fair is it ? I came across this quotation a few days back :: "Man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated."

Like it or not, Andy Roddick personifies this statement. You cannot help but admire Roddick's guts, his courage. Lesser people would have given up much earlier and many still do give up without much of a fight but here is a man who has always come back stronger than before, has always strived to better himself everytime he comes on to court. So here's to Andy Roddick. Hopefully he'll come back stronger next year and finally add a Wimbledon crown to his cabinet.

Congratulations to Roger Federer on his 15th... but Roger, you've been lucky. Nadal got injured and then you were outplayed in the finals... but you won. Maybe thats what champions do, they win no matter what. But the heart belongs to Roddick, for his grit, his tenacity... Andy, you were the better player on the day, you outplayed Roger Federer of all people !! But hey, sometimes thats life... you end up on the short end.

Another epic, another final to be remembered through the ages. I cried today when Roddick lost... but I'm not ashamed of it. It seemed ironical... is there a lesson to be learnt here ? Does luck always triumph ? Maybe sometimes it does... but when you sacrifice a lot to get to something and you fall just short even when you've given your best, you start to question.. is your best not good enough ? We all face this question sometime in our lives. I've had a lot of tough times, i've felt a lot of pain... but hardly ever have I been moved to tears, but there was something about that moment when I saw the look on Andy Roddick's face when I could not hold back. I've laughed at people crying at the movies, but today it all seemed so desolate.

Anyway... a great match. Hats off to both of the players, tennis is richer because of the epic that they carved into history today.

Another shitty day

2009-05-09T09:19:00.000-07:00

Getting up at 5am
Catching the 6 am train to college
Running from door to door, department to department in the sweltering sun
Taking the evening train back home

Why you ask ? Well if you are pretty sure that you've done well in a certain subject and you expect a good enough grade, then its quite a shock when the grades come out and you realize that every other guy who can hold a damn pen has got a better grade than you have. So off I go to Kgp in the hope that the man who taught me will be good enough to let me see my endsemester marks. I figure that since I'd got 32 in my midsemesters and ended up with a grade B while guys who got 15, 17, 20 etc ended up two grades better than me, then the only way they could have done so was by getting atleast 25-30 marks more than me, which means they got atleast 50-60 marks more in the endsemesters. Assuming they got 100, I must have got atmot 40 for this travesty to take place, right? But I was expecting 80+ !!

So there I am, on the train to Kgp... confident that my plight will be heard, and after a consolatory pat on the back, I'd be shown my endsem marks after which hopefully, all will be fine. Everything is fine with the world when I reach the damn place...and to give a better wrap of what took place, here's an excerpt of the conversation that took place between me and the guy entrusted with teaching us basic electronics (yes I got a B in Basic Ec...) ::

me :: Sir can I please see my endsem marks ?

Man :: NO.

me :: But why ?

Man :: Because there are 300 of you students in this course and I won't search for each and every person's paper.

Me :: Not everyone, sir, only mine...Sir I'll search myself.

Man :: NO.

Me :: But Sir its important. I got 32 in my midsem !!

Man :: SO ?

Me :: Sir people who got 15, 17 have got EX, how could I have...

Man :: JUST ACCEPT YOUR GRADE AND GET LOST.

Me :: But...

Man :: What do you want to say?

Me :: Sir...

Man :: NO. You just see your grade and go.

Me :: ...

Man :: GET OUT.

So what I realize is that I'm not going to get to see my marks either because

The idiot doesn't want to search for my paper.. (That doesn't sound right, does it? Not the sort of thing you would expect from a teacher, esp one at a premier institution like IIT)
Or there is some other reason that he won't tell me about. (Which again sounds too wierd)

Anyway, so there I am, standing without a clue as to what to do next, and I think to myself," as long as I'm here, why don't I check out my marks in Materials Processing. afterall that grade will be good, I got 47/60 in my midems !!" Off I prance to my department to know my grade, which shall, I hope, give me a lift.... the Prof checks an excel sheet, and he announces my grade..its a ..wait for it...a C !!!! Awesome... just awesome.... went with the flow of the day. Apparently I did so badly in my endsems that I got a C. Now, I'm stuck with a cg just below 8.. and I feel like I've been robbed.

As a friend of mine said, "abey iit mein aake kya hua hai abhi tak achcha ?? hamesha luck kharab hi hua hai...exam hum achcha dete ahin, grade koi aur le aata hai.. " Now I realize what he meant.. poor guy.

Anyway, well thats the way things are... and heres to the great institution that is IIT and its even greater teachers... CHEERS !!!

Either about grahic novels or about sitcoms or another totally arbitrary post

2009-05-01T12:11:00.000-07:00

When almost all of your friends have taken up blogging and are now quite regular at it whereas you, the person who started before them all, have for most part almost abandoned it all, there seems an innate desire to go out there and post something or the other... just for the heck of it... just to show the world that you are still there... Well that's just what brought me to this post.
I look around and think what can I write about ? One guy's already written about girls.. one's written about life in kgp... one's written about all his crushes/flings... one guy has also written about graphic novels !! I ask you, what does that leave me to write about ?
Ok, so am I the only person who get's this psuedo writer's block with more regularity than air strikes in Afghanistan ?? I say pseudo because... well we all know that if I qualify to be called a writer then India qualifies as a football superpower... but then keeping that aside, I mean, whats with me and these totally random topics ?? Why the hell can't I get atleast one, just one decent topic to write about...??
Anyway have you ever wondered how many TV series are just different spin offs from F.R.I.E.N.D.S. ..? Presently watching Scrubs, I can't seem to overlook the similarity between JD and Elliot 's on again off again relationship and Ross and Rachael. And I admit that JD and Turk make a great pair.. so did Jeff and Steve in Coupling... ditto for Ted Barney Marshall from How I Met Your Mother.... but none of them, and I repeat, none of them are even a scratch on Joey and Chandler. I mean these two had AMAZING chemistry.. and even though Jeff and Barney make their shows much better than the rest.. Chandler with his ready sarcasm and Joey with his endearing stupidity are a notch and some more above the rest.
But I digress. Where was I ? Oh thats right.. I was searching for a good topic. Coming to the graphic novels, I must admit that it was the hype surrounding the realease of the movie Watchmen that led me to read the graphic novel.. and let me tell you I never expected it to be half as good as it was. Maybe because I thought it was a comic and didn't expect much but it BLEW ME AWAY. Then I read another, then another and before you know it I was deep into the world of graphic novels and let me tell you, if you think that graphic novels are just mere comics and for kids only, then you cannot be more wrong. I personally found most of the graphic novels that I read to be deep, and many layered... unlike the tripe in paperbacks nowadays served as bestsellers. No disrespect to Messrs Tom Clancy, Jackie Collins and other bestsellers and total disrespect to absolute rubbish like Mills and Boon... I would read graphic novels anyday given the opinion that I formed by reading a select few. It is with a new found respect that I now consider Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman to be amongst my favourite authors right up alongside the likes of PG Wodehouse, Douglas Adams, JRR Tolkien, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie etc. Yes that's the amount of respect I have and I bet you will too if you read the graphic novels that I have read (and really liked) and present below ::

V for Vendetta (possibly my favourite, way way way better than the movie)
Watchmen (people claim its overhyped.. NO ITS NOT. The movie ending is more plausible than the one in the graphic novel though)
Sandman (Some episodes are better than the others but overall awesome)
Sin City
From Hell
Batman : The Dark Knight (Sooo dark and Sooo awesome)
The Dark Knight Returns (once you've read the dark knight)
Persepolis (just beacuse I saw the film first and maybe that's why I liked it more)

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Iron Man, 300 are a few others which inspired movies, but the 8 listed above are my choices for anyone... and I guarantee that anyone who reads the 8 listed above will see graphic novels in a whole new light.. unless ofcourse that person has never read anything beyond Tinkle, in which case, this probably wasn't for you... :D.

The One After the Previous Random One (Not necessarily less random though)

2009-04-10T06:11:00.001-07:00

Have you ever felt that annoying feeling when you know that there is something absolutely necessary and important that you just have to do... but just cannot for the life of you remember what it is ?? If you have then you know what I'm talking about. That's the exact same feeling I've been experiencing for the past three to four days. The only problem is that I know exactly what all i have to do... :(

There's the term paper i have to write by next week on a topic that I have no idea about. Come on, Molecular Modelling in Slag Design !! What do you think I am ?? Anywho, then there's the two lab reports and the extreeemely important class test on a subject that I am in danger of not passing because i have no clue what the guy teaches in class... Why can't they dumb it down for us a little ?? So thats a lot of work.. and here I am not doing anything about it. You know, its like a evil circle that you can't get out of. I feel so bad and gutted about the fact that I've done nothing yet that I go ahead and sulk for some more time and hence end up doing... guess what ..NOTHING !!! And now that I've rambled on for some time, I realize I have no idea what I want to write anyway...

Anyways, I've always wondered what possesses people to keep blogs ?? If you need to write and express yourself through it, then why not keep a diary ? If you just want to tell people your views on certain stuff, why not tell the guy next to you or a friend or someone.. why write it online?? Why do I keep posting sh!te sporadically ?? Theres this friend of mine who started to blog after I did but is now head and shouldrs above me in terms of frequency of posting and general advertising his blog... which I give him credit for but still makes me feel almost compelled to post something or the other. Guys help me out on this one.. why blog at all ??

By the way... today our mess was closed so we had to have dinner outside. Now why do I bring this up, you may ask... well a friend and I went to have dinner at a small restaurant called MidTown. When we returned with our wallets considerably empty, we came across two guys.. one of whom had dinner at our hostel's canteen and another who had dinner in MS canteen... and guess how much it cost them ?? Rs 60 something in our canteen and Rs 100 something in MS !!!! My friend and I had BETTER food at a BETTER place and it cost us only Rs 55 per head !!! HAHA.. Dan, prusty, and others who had food there... IN YOUR FACE !!! IN YOUR FACE !!!

Totally random thoughts... or maybe not

2009-04-06T11:49:00.000-07:00

Well, its been 4 months since i last posted anything so this one is probably more out of guilt than anything else. You know, a lot can happen in 4 months... A lot...

Anyway i was wondering what pain actually is... is it the knee you bruised or the hand you broke or is it something totally different ?? I've broken various bones in my body and even had to have an operation once just to set the bones correctly... and I can vividly recall the numbing pain that I experienced when the doctor removed the clamp from my bones without even giving anaesthesia (I've still not forgiven him, x( ... ). But no pain.. no physical pain, in my opinion, can compare to the wierd heavy feeling that persists inside of you when you feel, let's just say, betrayed by someone you trust.

You know, its funny how a single incident or event can totally change a person and his/her behaviour. How a person can change almost overnight from being friendly and open to all to being cautious about who he considers to be a friend and whom he does not. Supposedly a friend will stand by you through thick and thin... through all the rough stuff, when you need support...

And when that person fails to be there, thats when you feel betrayed. But then Time, the great healer, is the best medicine and slowly you forget and possibly forgive... actually you dont forget or forgive... you remember... :) and you feel angry...not at that person but at yourself for presuming too much... for letting that person close... for depending on that person...

Thats when you start to evaluate... who is a good friend ? who is a TRUE friend ? who is the person you can depend on to be there for you ? And suddenly you realize that you can't be sure of anyone or anything anymore... You re-evaluate your attitude and become more wary of people that you let in to your inner circle...

Maybe, in hindsight, such a setback (if i may call it that) is sometimes required... that sometimes you need to put a blade in fire to make it stronger... but hey whatever...

I need to see the next episode of scrubs... two and a half men is the best comedy series thats going on now... blah blah blah... I don't really know what to write anymore... blah blah blah more pseudo intellectual crap....

Jesus and Mo

2008-12-29T06:25:00.000-08:00

You know, a year ago, had anyone asked me what my favorite comic strip was..... Calvin and Hobbes i would have replied without batting an eyelid. Well, that was before i came across this totally amazing comic strip on the net called "Jesus and Mo"... which for me is as good as, if not better than, c&h any day.

for those who've not seen it as yet... this strip is a tongue in cheek look at two of the most dominant religions today- Islam and Christianity. The USP of the comic are its two spokesmen jesus and mo (yup prophet mohammed himself... as explained in the first comic, its not a depiction of the prophet, as that is not allowed, its just a body double that they are drawing :) )... using whom the cartoonist has a go at most of the contentious issues prevailing today and even those dealt with in the Koran and the bible. Equally important, i feet, are the comments posted by the viewers which will go quite a way in enhancing your knowledge about things written in the so-called holy books... these comments also help in both understanding the deeper meaning in each comic and appreciating the subtle innuendos made. With 'guest stars' like Moses and Ganesha joining in the fray once in a while...the strip makes for quite a pleasant read. Apart from Jesus and mo, the other important character in the strip is the barmaid, an atheist, whose presence adds a different view altogether... that of science whereas jesus and mo argue with her on most of her opinions....

The comic may seem to be a little pro-science and anti-religion, well that's just because it is pro science and anti-religion, ...so one needs to approach it with an open mind, if you are the highly religious sort that is. Take it in the right spirit, since no matter what your beliefs, Jesus and mo is a really funny offering. so have a look at it cuz, imho, its worth it
www.jesusandmo.net

till next time....

Catch 22 ........

2008-12-22T08:57:00.000-08:00

right...what now?

I've been thinking [u do that a lot when u have no other work] lately and i realized that i could possibly just possibly occupy my time constructively... but by doing what? that remains the question... I'm into my umpteenth post now and i still have no idea where im heading... or for that matter where my blog is heading. while i ponder upon this and other important questions plaguing mankind today [like who ate the last MnM from the fridge?] ill just leave u guys with my views on a book i read recently.

catch 22 by joseph heller has been around for quite some time now and i was surprised it had taken me so much time to lay my hands on it. Well frankly, if you think highly of war and heroism in war.... this book will pretty much remove the scales from your eyes. The main character yossarian is caught up at the front while a war is being waged... and his main struggle is not to win the war or to be a hero but something more realistic... his main aim is to stay alive come what may... goddamn his country. As the book begins to grow on the reader so do the characters and i for one started identifying and empathizing with them and their emotions. well i dont want to disclose the story because that wouldnt be fair, but suffice to say that it gives us a glimpse of the lives and the mindsets of the poor guys at the battlefront who have to risk their lives fighting a war that was started by old geezers, farts and friggen politicians who remain safe and cooped up at their homes while young lives are wasted fighting their egotistical wars. personally im not one of ur emotional sissies who wets their handkerchiefs while reading a storybook but catch 22 is one book that really tugged at my heart and made me go through several emotions- anger, sadnees, helplessness etc. as u see the characters suffer one by one and kick the bucket.....

You know.... if im stranded on a deserted island and am allowed to keep only one book with me... this would be it. yeah, you will probably not find a bigger Wodehouse or Douglas Adams or for that matter, LOTR fan than me.... but Catch 22 is way above any of them.

For those who have read it- the part which affected me the most was the part when the poor chaplain is tortured because of the irving washington joke played by yossarian... followed by the part where kid sampson dies at the beach... they all die one by one except orr and yossarian. For those who havent read it... what are u waiting for? get out there and read it... if u cant get ur hands on a copy contact me for the ebook, but please do read it... u wont regret it.

of course if uve never read anything beyond tinkle and archies or for that matter enid blyton.... ummm forget it. others just go and read it and im sure most of u will not regret it.. most of u. This is a book that stays with you for a long long time.

Oh and while you are at it, you might want to see the movie 'A Clockwork Orange'. All I'll say is that its worth the watch. [:)]

TO DO OR NOT TO DO ....

2008-12-20T11:44:00.000-08:00

I recently read The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and I'd definitely recommend everyone to hear his lecture atleast once (its available on youtube). Anyway what struck me most, apart from the optimism and resilience shown by the guy, was the fact that he had a set of goals in mind which he had waned to accomplish and which, by the way, he did. That set me thinking... now what are the things that I absolutely definitely have to do once in my life ?? And guess what... I did come up with a list !!!
Without further ado, here's all the things I want to do in my life atleast once (as on this date that is)... Maybe sometime in the future if I draw a list.. it will be totally different but for now this is it...

Go on a world tour
Go to Wacken
Watch the FIFA World Cup final in person
Bunjee jumping
Paragliding (done)
Zorbing (done)
THE BIG SECRET ONE WHICH I WON'T REVEAL.....

But then on a more immediate basis what I really need to do is get my 500gb Maxtor hard disk replaced. Yeah it crashed.. thanks Maxtor for your reliability... thankfully its in the warranty period. The only regret being that thanks to my hard disk crashing... not only have I lost around 450gb of data but I've also lost a whole season of ATOM ANT, 2 STUPID DOGS, WACKY RACES and ED, EDD AND EDDY and 2 seasons of METALOCALYPSE!!!!!! NOOOO !!!!! Now i'll have to download the whole thing again.. :(
I only wish there were some way in which to recover the data....

Ohh and before I forget, a big thank you to IIT Kharagpur for reopening on the 30th of December and so thoughtfully depriving me of the opportunity of spending the New Year with friends in Jamshedpur.
And to top off a string of bad news... its time for me to miss another kickass concert. This time the lucky band is Opeth , yes OPETH (!!!) , who are coming to Chennai (of all places) just when my college fest will be on... But, on a more optimistic note, ill see them when I go to Wacken anyway so its alright... :)

Death....

2008-11-29T09:41:00.000-08:00

Well what with the terrorist attack on Mumbai and the results of my end semester examination due, it seemed that the world couldn't get any bleaker. But you know what? Fate has a cruel way of dealing with stuff... Just a few hours ago I got the news that an old schoolmate of mine passed away yesterday. Apparently he had a tumor that spread to the lungs... It just feels weird you know.. someone you know is gone.. just like that... I mean what happened to all the advances in medical science ?? Why couldn't they stop the bloody thing from spreading ??
Anyway while I'm cribbing, can someone tell me why oh WHY do our security forces still have to go into battle wearing World War II memorabilia ?? I salute the brave people.. the real heroes of the nation... the NSG, the ATS and the police squads which took the terrorists head on while still wielding 303 rifles and bulletproof vests that date back 1965. We are not a small and impoverished country... and we can definitely arm our troops with the best weapons available. Where was our intelligence when this happened ? How could they not know any of this ? This attack was planned way in advance as is apparent in the way that it was orchestrated... Maybe a revamp is needed of the whole system. Hopefully this will open the eyes of the USA and they'll stop helping Pakistan the way they are doing now. Maybe the Pakistan Govt is not directly linked to these attacks but we all know that vested interests in the ISI, the Pakistani army and the government are responsible for the flourishing of the terrorists camps in that country. Something needs to be done.. and its us, the common people, who need to step up and make sure our voices are heard. Look at all the lives that were lost. Its horrendous how anyone can commit such a dastardly act.. and the worst part is that all the terrorists were aged 18-28 !!
Now the future is in our hands... the youth of this nation... but the most terrifying thing is that these terrorists are of our age too. Agreed that there is a lot of ignorance prevailing in the previous generations but then you would expect our generation to know better wouldn't you? Why cant these people see that no matter what you believe in, no matter why you are angry, no matter what you need to say... killing innocent people is just not the way to go about it.
Anyway
Signing off with a heavy heart

In Memory of all the lives lost in Mumbai
and in memory of Kavan...
May your souls rest in peace....

Rewind >> more than a year ago...

2008-11-20T10:26:00.000-08:00

You know what... a few days ago I remembered that I used to have another blog... so I thought why not check it out, see what i'd written earlier... Well this is what I'd written just after my JEE results were out, school was over (OVER!!) , and I was really really confused about a lot of stuff... seems such a long time ago... [sigh]

well.. its off to college for me. im off to this place called kharagpur..which is really famous for two things.. firstly, the iit and secondly for having the longest platform in the world... in a nutshell, quite a boring place by the looks of it... but hey, who knows? i may come to like it.. havent got much choice though considering ill be spending the next four years of my life there....

anyways this is the time when all ur friends go off to different places and you sorta lose touch with most of them ... so there is this partying and hanging out together sort of thing... (which is why im spending most of my time in the club) who knows what the future holds in store..?? a lot of people tell you a lot of different things about this graduation... guess what you can do is listen to them and then promptly forget most of it... some guys are like "why dont you go to bombay", while others are "kharagpur is the best".. so basically noones of much help.. uve got to form ur own opinions..

this is the time when you are most confused about what awaits you and what decisions you should take.... but the most amazing thing seems to be the way the past two years just flew past.. man...you blink and its over kinda thing. it seems like yesterday when i first went to my coaching class..not to mention school.. hmm a lot of memories persist..gets sorta nostalgic remembering those times..

there was this guy, who along with me bunked every single economics period we had in the eleventh.... we got caught a lot but always managed to wriggle out with a good excuse.. then there was the time when along with two other guys i was pulled up for bunking assembly.... and thats just standard 11..... then quizzes debates and other activities that always provide you the opportunity of not going to class.. god im gonna miss loyola...

u know.. our school gets a lot of adverse publicity but we've always managed to pull through such rough phases and emerge stronger than before and no matter how much people try to malign the reputation of loyola.. no one ever succeeds.. thats what the strength of loyola is... no matter what people say they still want their wards to study in loyola... the fact of the matter is that loyoleans always carve out a place for themselves wherever they go... u can always recognise the loyolean in the crowd... i dunno how that is but thats the way it is...

Well its been almost two more years and reading this stuff made me go back to those days again and you know, those WERE the times I'll never forget... everything we were up to in school...

And then I realised, almost two years have past since I've come to this place, KGP!!! Well I guess thats how time flies... before you know it most of life has just passed you by...

And thats when I realised what the most important part of life is, the thing I've been doing all these years, the thing I plan to do for the forseeable future :: MAARO PEACE... :)

BAD MOVIES .....

2008-10-26T04:02:00.000-07:00

There are two ways to make a bad movie.... one is making it while flipping the finger to the rest of the world and not giving a damn about anything. The second way... well to know what the second way is.. watch KIDNAP. Or rather... don't.
In my opinion the whole cast and crew including the producers distributors and anyone remotely connected in anyway to the movie should be put in a straitjacket and be made to watch KIDNAP.... forever. How could they inflict such a movie upon us unsuspecting humans ?? In my opinion, if you have to make a bad movie.. make it like GUNDA. When GUNDA was made, its makers made no bones about the fact that they had made a pathetic movie... rather the USP of the movie is the fact that it is mindbogglingly bad. Hats off to them for the movie though..!!! Its so bad that its really really funny. Like the part where atleast 50 ambassador cars come up to beat Mithunda (yes the one and only) , and all the cars stop and the doors open... and only 5 guys come out to fight. Or the parts where the character introduce themselves... "Mera naam hai Bulla, aur main rakhta hoon hamesha khullam khulla " !!! Brilliant. When while going to kill his enemies, Mithunda suddenly stops to do an absolutely irrelevant song and dance sequence, you dont clutch your head in frustration... you cheer along with everyone else around you watching the film. THAT is where Kidnap fails.
The makers of Kidnap told the world that they were making a good mainstream film, and thats where they messed it up. When people go to see GUNDA they go with a certain mindset, they go to be entertained... they know that the movie does not need to make sense... rather the fact that it doesnt make sense half the time just adds to the entertainment factor. ( http://www.gunda-faqs.blogspot.com/ ...yes some true fans and disciples of the great director Kanti Shah and Prabhuji Mithunda have endeavoured to answer the questions posed by the holes in the storyline.) Anyways, Kidnap disappoints on each and every level and Imran Khan is AWFUL ...even Upen Patel would have been ashamed of this performance and thats saying something. Minissha Lamba, the girl who mysteriously keeps changing her clothes every time Imran is not around, is equally rotten. Vidya Malvade, who plays her mom, is much much better looking.. and thats about it. The dialogue delivery leaves you wanting to bust open your head by banging it repeatedly against the wall.
"This is a kidnapping. I have kidnapped you." ,says Imran to Minissha... Even the furniture in that room gives more expressions that this duo. I would point out atleast 50 other points in the movie that would make you feel like killikng yourself if you were watching it but I wont as I suspect even the effort of typing them in may leave me brain dead or maybe paralysed for life.
I would just like to implore the people who make movies to please see the film once before you release it. Our people have been tortured enough... we dont need it anymore. Please.. please if you do make a bad movie, there s no harm in owning up to it. I suggest you release it with a advisory sticker proclaiming it to be a bad movie and I swear we will watch it. Just do not catch us unprepared.. let us be ready for what we will face when we come to see your movie. Look at GUNDA.. we made it work... it has become a cult movie... a phenomenal success . Thank you.

P.S.
If you people did not know, GUNDA is rated 8.6 on imdb ... At one point of time, many puritanical devotees of the movie from IIT Kharagpur even managed to get it into the top 10 by repeatedly voting for it (yes on the same list with Shawshank Redemption, Godfather etc). YEAH!!!
A suggestion... if you are free this weekend, dont go to watch crap like Kidnap... go out there and rent a classic, rent GUNDA. I sincerely believe its one of those movies that you should see atleast once before you die... Bulla, Lambu Atta, Chutiya, Ibu Hatela, Prabhuji (Mithunda) and everyone else.. may your legacy live on forever in the minds and hard disks of your devotees !!

P.P.S.
Also on a more serious note watch Shawshank Redemption (if you haven't yet) and Grave of the Fireflies. These are movies that leave an imprint upon your heart... For people who thought animation is just for kids, watch Grave of the Fireflies about a brother and sister orphaned during WWII and their struggle for survival. Who said all animated movies have a feel-good ending ?

Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps ...

2008-10-10T10:04:00.000-07:00

Ok... Now, I know that most of you will vouch for F.R.I.E.N.D.S. , a few of you may go for How I Met Your Mother or maybe lean towards Two and a Half Men, and my buddies in IIT will move towards The Big Bang Theory... and while I'm the first one to admit that all these shows are extremely funny, having seen them all, let me just put past you another show which I know most people haven't seen but I assure you is equally rib ticklingly funny, Coupling.
You know what I've noticed ? Every IITian, well atleast every KGPian, well atleast every normal KGPian, watches atleast one sitcom or the other..!!! I mean, what is it with us and sitcoms? Anyways cant say that I've got anything to complain about..
Now where was I ? Oh yeah, Coupling, right... Well I brought the first four seasons home to watch during the pujas and I found it to be as absorbing as the aforemetioned shows. Do give it a try and I dont think you'll be disappointed.

Anyway, be that as it may, one thing that always bothered me is my apparent inability to remain interested in anything for a sustainably long period of time. I mean, I probably have had more hobbies than a whole army combined but somehow... I start with full enthusiasm and shoot off the starting blocks but, as time goes by, my enthusiasm keeps waning until I just sort of stop doing it. I used to collect matchboxes, then round stones, then keyrings, then coins, then stamps, then playing cards, not counting the times I collected WWE trump cards, tazos (remember those things we used to get in Lay's ?? I had 113 of those) and pokemon jenga cards among others. Then more recently I started googlewhacking and a few days later promptly forgot about it until I chanced upon my post on the same.. (necropaedophilic psychopath.. sometimes I crack myself up :) ...HAHA ) .

Oh and before I forget... guess who is coming to GIR ???
You'll never believe it ....
SATYRICON !!!!!

Why does it have to happen to me ?? WHY ?? First the Megadeth concert, then the Maiden gig and now.. SATYRICON !!! I'll be missing this too !!! Its like Fate was readying me for this, like fattening the pig or rather cushioning the blow...
"So you miss the Megadeth concert, you must be feeling bad".
"OK so you missed the Maiden gig, dont be gutted, you missed Megadeth remember, though this is a little bigger..."
Now its :: "Hey, remember you missed Megadeth and Iron Maiden live ?? Well umm, lets just put it this way, umm, you're going to miss one more, nothing big, just satyricon.. OK" . WHAT??!!!
Anyway I'll just have to resign myself to the fact... theres nothing I can do about it now... but SATYRICON...

\m/ metal rules \m/

P.S. I'd just like to add that Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit, Evanescence, Marilyn Manson, Rammstein, etc. are NOT METAL !!!!! And please do not call them metal bands, thus degrading actual metal bands... Thank You..

P.P.S.
Give Coupling a try. Also the other shows mentioned in the off-chance you haven't even seen those.

P.P.P.S.
When I say that these bands are not metal, I mean that they are not. See, there are bands who would probably get classified as metal though they are now a disgrace mostly like Korn or Slipknot... but the bands mentioned above are not metal.

Block Block Block

2008-09-14T09:08:00.000-07:00

You always keep hearing about authors getting writer's block, and you know its one of those things that you read about and never expect it to happen to you, kind of like being a hurricane victim or a drought victim. I mean you read, you feel sorry for the affected and you move on... Well, though I'm no writer, I must confess I am experiencing something of the sort. For the past few days I've been meaning to post something but for the life of me, i just cant figure out what to write about, or rather what to write.
Leaving that as it may, the past month has been a very hectic one for me. You won't believe how little time I had for myself with being involved in this thing and that in my hall. Oh, and you know what I realized ?? I realized that I have the most awesome time management ability !!! HAHA... Thankfully this week onwards half my work load will be reduced and I can finally concentrate on my studies (my exams are next week and i haven't even started, i got a 0 in one test and in one viva)... ok, so maybe my time management skills do suck, that too big time.
Seriously though what I realised in the past month is that if I'm getting involved in more than one activities, I need to get my priorities right.

By the way, I just got a 500gb external hard disk !!!! and I feel awesome about it... its just what I need for our KGP LAN , the one thing that every KGPian is proud about. Talking about our LAN, guess what I found to be available ?? A full season of Different Strokes !! Now I dont know if you remember that show, but I do and it brought back great memories of the times when I used to come back after playing hide and seek with my friends and my mom used to give me chocos while i sat in front of the tv waching different strokes... ahh those were the days..!!
I just cant wait to get back to kgp and download all of it :) ..and 4 seasons of Jeeves and Wooster YAY!! long live mr. wodehouse...

Of Doctors and Humor

2008-08-15T12:56:00.000-07:00

After all the visits I've made to my dentists, I have realised one thing : to be a doctor, or dentist, you need to be DEVOID OF EMOTIONS. Can you, the normal man, imagine yourself calmly taking a drill (yes A DRILL, the thing you make holes in walls with) and entering into a persons mouth and proceeding to cut off a huge chunk of the gum while blood spurts all over the place ?? Well it makes my stomach churn, and to think I let someone do that to me !! Fricken hurts like hell.

Talking about dentists, one budding dentist refused to let me post the ambigram of his/her name that I made which, in my opinion is one of my best works. Well talk about property rights... I made it, its my blog, but still... anyway you know I bear no hard feelings :).. though I really really wanted to post it. Actually I made a few more so I would have posted those too if I had to, you didnt have to worry. I love messing with you, you know that.

Isn't it amazing how many people have such bad sense of humour ? And by bad I mean really really PATHETIC. Unfortunately I fall into that category. But its not a bad thing you know... well maybe it is how would I know anyway? A guy once pointed out a bunch of wires on the ground in Electrical Lab and said "Taare Zameen Par" and it was enough to keep me in splits for most of the class. You know what I feel? People don't appreciate the sheer brilliance and ingenuity that goes into the making of a PJ... I mean, ask your ordinary person to make up a PJ and I can guarantee you that he'll be dumbfounded. It takes intelligence, wit and above all TALENT. During the intros this year, I found that a lot of guys read books. Well if you want humour and you like to read, then I have just one word :: WODEHOUSE . The greatest comic writer ever, and in my opinion Shakespeare doesn't even come close. I mean if Shakespeare is a pretty nifty tomb, the Wodehouse is most definitely the Taj Mahal. Sample this ::

He wore the look of a man who was searching for the leak in life's gaspipe with a lighted candel .

Simply amazing, sensational and brilliant. How can you come up with such an allegory? Hats off to you, Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse.

IIT ...mindless ramblings....

2008-07-23T23:47:00.000-07:00

So finally i'm back in college . Before going any further id like to inform the people who dont know that Kharagpur is the only city, or more accurately, the only inhabitated area which is famous for everything it contains. Other normal places you see are famous usually for one thing say steel or mica or even mangoes, well thats not the case with THIS place. HAHA. Im proud to inform you that every thing, absolutely everything, that Kharagpur contains is world famous ::

THE RAILWAY PLATFORM
IIT

And thats about it. Thats all. No literally THAT IS ALL.

There is no frickin thing in this godforsaken place other than those mentioned above. But before you get me wrong, let me clarify, Im proud of my institute, just not of its geographical location. Anyway thats neither here nor there.

So I come back after my vacations and Im assigned to a new hostel (YAY!). I go in and am informed that I'll be living in a double-room with some other guy which is absolutely fine by me. But what i'm not informed is that I'll be living with another guy less in a double-bedded room and more in a two-beds-squeezed-into-a-cubicle-such-that-you-dont- even-have-sufficient-place-to-stand room. So here I am, cooped up in this ...umm... room (?) which has only one lan port for the two people resulting in one of us hogging the connection while the other guy has his back turned. Anyways its not IIT whom I blame for this type of crunch but the fatass idiots in our government who already have one foot in their graves but are sadistically bent on making this country a goddamned miserable place for its future citizens before they go.

PS : Did you guys notice how these politicians just never seem to die ? They all seem to linger near their graves and keep haunting us all with their fucked up ideaologies. In my opinion what this country needs is a strong hand which will deliver the decisive shove to these lingering spectres...

An Awkward Attempt

2008-07-18T11:31:00.000-07:00

Ok so this time its Palkush whom I need to thank... Well you know all the times that you just sit idle and have nothing to do and all you do is doodle on some piece of paper ? So why not use it to do something constructive like making an ambigram ? So here is my attempt at it.. well its a hand drawn sketch so its not picture perfect but hey, so what? And since its my sister's birthday, I thought why not make an ambigram of her name... Anyways heres to you didishona...

Belated HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!!

Love Neil

The Tale of Two Movies

2008-07-14T13:44:00.000-07:00

So finally today I saw the pakistani movie "Khuda Ke Liye", after a lot of procrastination and boy am I glad I saw it !! A stirring movie, if a little controversial in its interpretation of Islam but then again anything about Islam does tend to cause a little controversy, it depicts the problems faced by Islam in todays world. Two musicians, brothers, in Pakistan from a progressive well to do family go on different paths as one falls under the influence of a mullah and joins the taliban while the other goes to the US to pursue his music. Meanwhile a British Pakistani man marries off his daughter to the younger brother, her cousin, the one who joined Taliban in a rural part of Pakistan to stop her from marrying a british 'gora' (white guy). The other brother in US marries a girl he meets there but after 9/11 is abducted by the FBI on suspicion of terrorism and is tortured. Will Mary, the British girl married off against her will, be able to escape and return to Britain ? What happens to the guy being tortured in the US, will he get justice ? You have to watch the movie to see for yourself how it pans out. One thing I can assure is that you wont be disappointed. Featuring a special appearance by Naseeruddin Shah, the film is full of memorable moments, and though the cast doesn't do a spectacular job, they are borne out by the script. I mean, the acting is not bad at all, its actually rather good in patches but then the powerful storyline makes up for it. And in my opinion, I dont think any of our Bollywood mainstream heroes could have done justice to the script as much as the present cast did. All in all a beautifully made film and worth watching every minute.
Oh yeah I also saw the much hyped Jaane Tu ..ya Jaane Naa . Well lets just say its not a scratch on the abovementioned film. But then again its not meant to be. It is the cliched boy loves girl but doesnt know it / doesnt have the guts to say it until and unless she decides to go to America, and then chases her to the airport. But this done to death storyline is well handled in this film and it turns out to be thoroughly enjoyable. A good beginning for the actors, and yeah Genelia is cute. You get your moneys worth, I think, though I may be wrong as i saw it in a rundown theater and it didnt cost me much, then again my day was made thanks to Naseeruddin Shah (again) who, in a special appearance as a guy who is dead but for some reason or the other seems to fancy dancing around in his portriat, makes a priceless expression which is a mixture of pride, glee and happiness when his son is arrested by the cops. I almost shit myself laughing at that expression. You know that bears out my theory that its these small things in life that usually gang up to make your day. Then again, an enjoyable watch, but I'd rather watch "Khuda Ke Liye" anyday. Or maybe.. uhh I dont know... well watch both the films. But then Khuda Ke Liye is one of those films, in my opinion, that a person should watch atleast once.

Okay Okay is it just me or does that song "Kabhi Kabhi Aditi Zindagi" (admittedly a very catching song) sound eerily similar to "Appudo Ippudo" telegu song in Bomarillu.

NOTE : I have NOT seen the movie but I HAVE heard the song as have most other people in my college for mostly the geographical diversity of the students.

Googlewhacking ....

2008-07-10T12:17:00.000-07:00

Ok so probably i should thank Arnav for it was his post that made me want to try my hand at it.... then again it was eerie how i got my first "googlewhack" if you can term it that.... i make a typographical error (ie i spell a word wrong) and guess what? only one result !! some idiot had made the same mistake as me ..HAHA!! well thats when i thought : "hey this can be fun... lets try something else" ...
by the way if you spell it correctly... you get multiple results so technically its not a googlewhack but then again that was the FIRST ONE... "brain loboctomy" (YEAH lobotomy doesn't get you a googlewhack, and dont ask me why i was searching that in the first place)....
anyway these are a few more i got ::
metaldude delinquency
metaldude armadillo
necrosadistic greatstone
trinitro armageddon
necropaedophilic vegetables (HAHAHA)

could anyone tell me.. is there a similar term for when you get no results?? because i got lots..and i mean lots of those...

my favourite one being "necropaedophilic psychopath" (how do i think up these things ??) ...you know why i included that in this post ? HAHA.. so now if you search it ..its become a GOOGLEWHACK !! [aside] i AM good.

King on Grass - Wimbledon final review

2008-07-07T11:44:00.001-07:00

Amazing ... Simply AMAZING .
I stayed up till 2am yesterday night watching Messrs Federer and Nadal slug it out in a most annoyingly rain interrupted final at Wimbledon. Well 'slug it out' is probably the wrong phrase to use when describing these masters at work. What transpired yesterday was a masterpiece of tennis composed by two of the most supremely gifted artists, yes i call them artists because thats what they are, of the present era.Who would win ? Will Federer, that supreme master of his art and the king of grass, be able to surpass Bjorn Borg and win six straight Wimbledon titles, or will it be Nadal, the young upstart with seemingly neverending reserves of energy, who becomes the first man since Borg (again) to win the French and Wimbledon in the same year ?? It had all the indications of a thrilling ride. Would Nadal again prove to be too good for Federer (remember how outclassed Federer was on the red clay of Paris ?) or will Federer finally overcome this man from Mallorca who has consistently been his only stumbling block ?? When the match started I was pro-Federer while my dad was all for Nadal. Well the greatest tribute I can pay them is probably the fact that by the end, it didn't matter to us who won... because it became clear that on the day there was only one clear winner :: TENNIS. It was a tale of three parts :: 1. Before the rain interval in the third set... 2. After the rain interval.. and 3. The Final Set .If anyone had doubts over Nadal's form going into this match, those were quickly put to rest as the Spaniard came out all guns blazing and immediately broke Federer's serve early in the first set. Federer seemed to have got his rhythm back as he raced to a 4-1 lead in the second set but the young Mallorcan came back strongly to win 5 games in a row as he took the second by a similar margin as the first, 6-4. Federer stepped up the ante but Nadal matched him stroke for stroke and it seemed that there was no way back in the match for Federer when the Heavens opened up and play had to be suspended. The break must have been just what federer needed as he came back revitalised and took the next two sets 7-6 each. To be perfectly fair to both the players, the tennis on display was of a very high calibre and any lesser mortal would have wilted in straight sets to either of them, but it was to these masters credit that they matched each other shot for breathtaking shot. Then came THE FINAL SET... Big serves, bigger groundstrokes, sublime volleys, dropshots and inhuman passing shots, the final set had it all and more. It was the tennis you get to see once in a lifetime. Every other shot had me gasping for breath as the players kept finding those angles and openings which seemed impossible to me and I daresay a million other inferior souls. It was 7-7 in the final set and most of my nails were already chewed off when the turning point came....We join the action at 7-7 final set, Federer serving, break point Nadal....what will happen ??? A breathtaking rally in which Federer seems to have the upper hand when.... Nadal breaks for 8-7 with one of the most unbelievable passing shots you will ever see!! Nadal now serves for the match. Will Federer be able to hold on? Match-point Nadal 40-30. AWESOME return of serve by the reigning champion !!!! Deuce... Federer not ready to throw in the towel yet. Big serve by Nadal, and Federer unalble to return it. Advantage to the Spaniard and yet another match-point. Nadal serves for the match, Federer returns, Nadal backhand and.... Federer hits it into the net !!!! NADAL WINS !!!!!! 6-4 6-4 6-7 6-7 9-7 ....Is this the beginning of the Nadal era ??... Is this the end of Federer's dominance ?? Nadal had proven to the world that there is no one in professional tennis who can touch him on clay, and in his third final at Wimbledon.. he finally conquers the grass. But there is no shame for Federer as he did not at all play badly.. though he would do well to minimize his unforced errors.... and we hope he'll be back next year. Well looking back, it must be greatest Wimbledon final ever, well atleast the best game of tennis I have ever seen or probably ever will see, unfortunately there could be only one winner... and all credit to Nadal as he emulates the legendary Bjorn Borg. All in all it was one of those matches that remain with you long after all is reduced to just statistics...

Metal...just that.

2008-07-05T13:13:00.000-07:00

A lot of people say that you should live life in such a way that when you are done and dusted you should have no regrets about the way you went about it in the first place. Well I say thats impossible, because there is no chance in hell that you'll not have regrets. Face it, you WILL have that nagging sensation at the back of your mind for not doing some thing or the other. But the point is :: Why am I writing all this in the first place ?? ... maybe its a way to give vent to my regrets... or maybe its because I have nothing else to write about. Anyway my biggest regret (yeah wiseguy I DO regret certain things already even if im only 19) is missing the Iron Maiden gig in Mumbai a few months ago. Yeah you could say that I can attend some other concert but then again in India metal gigs aren't exactly dime a dozen especially of the calibre of a Maiden gig. Now I can well imagine what you must be feeling... "whats so great about metal ?" ...you know how I know that... well thats the exact question all my family and a lot of my friends ask me... "why metal..? its just noise !!"

Before going any further Id like to say :: NO ITS NOT "JUST NOISE" !!!!!

If you ask me, metal cannot really be explained... you need to feel it, you need to get to know it, you need to let it flow through your body, through your veins, through your blood,... and THAT is what metal is and that is what it stands for. It is music that needs to be not just heard but to be lived, to be understood. As any metal fan, or metalhead, would tell you, there is no feeling equal to the arenaline rush you get when you are headbanging to a good metal song. Metal is something that stays with you, its always there for you, especially when you are sad, depressed or just generally mad at something, it gives you company and makes you belong. It is music that is about YOU, yes you,its about individuality, its about your fears, your desires, your questions, your feelings, rather it BECOMES you. So the next thing you ask is "what about the guy screaming into the mic ?" . Well I ask you, "why dont you listen to him for a change ?". Most metal songs have intense and thought provoking lyrics. As mentioned in the documentary "Metal : A Headbanger's Journey", metal confronts what we would rather ignore, it probes that which we'd rather forget, it challenges things we fear and shy away from and maybe...well, and maybe thats why metal will always have the tag of outsider in the world of music. You know, if you dont get that particular feeling, if you dont feel those goosebumps, that thrill, that exhilaration, when you listen to metal, then probably you will never understand it but... know what? Thats okay.

One point id like to make, before anyone gets started here, is that there are metal songs that are not worth listening to, then again you cant expect it to be all hunky dory, i mean even Shakespeare wrote some quite average stuff. But then its again all about opinion and as a wise man once said, "Opinions are like ass-holes, every person, however dumb, has one"...But even if you dont like metal as a genre, Id suggest you watch the documentary "Metal : A Headbanger's Journey" at least to get to know a bit about this misunderstood and often maligned genre. One more point Id like to raise is that you see news headlines like "Metal fan kills 5", why this discrimination against metal, what about why the guy really flipped ? Maybe that guys favourite computer game was Age of Empires, and favourite food was say, Chocos...so why not "AoE fan kills 5" or "Chocos eater kills 5" ?? Anyway see the documentary, cuz though its not 100% informative or accurate (cuz again its the documentary makers opinion), atleast you get the general idea.
\m/ metal forever \m/

GOD - Do we need Him ?

2008-07-02T11:06:00.001-07:00

The world as we see it today is riddled with problems. Rapes, murders and other atrociuos acts against humanity are all but common. The world is torn apart by war. But is there a common thread that links most of these? Forget Africa or Iraq or Afghanistan, jihad has become an all too common word, there seems to be no end to the Israel and Palestinian conflict, Tibet is reeling under oppression... there just seems to be no end. How can this be stopped? Where is God when you need Him? Where is this 'great omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent' dude and why doesn't He do something? Which brings us to the Epicurean argument ::

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?

A rather telling argument in my opinion.

The fact that most atheists try to put forward is this - There is no need to believe that a big magician living in the sky exists and will put things straight. Why should a person need God to follow a morally correct life? With the scientific data available today, we can accurately explain all that we see and how it all came to be. Documented evolutionary proof rules out any 'intelligent design' theories. What cannot be overlooked is the overwhelming lack of evidence about the existence of god. Even if we assume that god exists, there should be a physical impact on the universe which there isn't. The argument that god or his work has no impact in our universe just reinforces the uselessness of worshipping him.

The main problem that atheists have with religion is that it stops people from asking questions. In today's world, all religion does is hinder progress. (The Roman Catholic Church claims that usage of condoms is a mortal sin.) When the world, especially Africa, is reeling from AIDS, such a proclamation surely is plain stupid and nonsensical. Some countries in Africa have, believe it or not, a 70% AIDS affliction rate. This is nothing but plain preposterous and a shame on all human knowledge. I mean in an age when we pride ourselves to be "intellectuals", how can anyone be so dumb as to not recognise facts ?? Speaking of the Roman Catholic Church, you sometimes cant help but feel the Pope , no offence meant to anyone, could have carved out a very respectable living as a stand up comedian. A man who can call a worldwide press conference in 1989 ( yes NINETEEN EIGHTY NINE) and can unblinkingly proclaim that the world is NOT flat is definitely a force to be reckoned with. Today the only group of people more discriminated against than atheists are homosexuals. You've got to ask why? Every person has the right to choose his or her way of living be it sexual or religious orientations. We should learn to respect the views and opinions of others. In religion answers are not open to question, rather religion thrives on non inquiry. The fact that people need the concept of hell and punishment to be morally correct is an insult to human dignity.

You can disbelieve in the existence of a supernatural magician and still believe in music, still believe in art, and still believe in the sanctity of life.

If you ask "why is there something rather than nothing?" or "what came before the big bang?" and you answer "God", belief in that God makes no difference to your daily life, or to morality and responsibility, nor does it cause people to band into groups, exclude outsiders, commit atrocities or justify wars. Believers frequently claim that rejecting belief in God would lead people to immorality, murder and mayhem. What little research there is so far suggests quite the reverse. A recent study comparing developed nations showed that the more religious nations also had higher rates of murder, suicide, teenage pregnancy and violent crime - precisely those behaviours that most religions prohibit. In an age when science has answers to most questions, the belief in an extremely perfect being to have created us is absolutely irrational because if you think about it who, by the way, created the creator? Because if someone created the creator, then that someone must be greater then the creator. But then someone must have created the guy who created the creator, who has to be, logically, even greater... and this goes on.

Douglas Adams : "Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?"

I feel every person should be allowed to decide upon his religious orientation. As Richard Dawkins has said, we are (atleast 99% of us are) believers of some religion which we did not choose but were born into. To say that I am a Hindu is probably incorrect, what should be said is that I was born to parents who are hindu. Every school asks a child is religion. Well is it not ridiculous to imagine that a kid would have a definite viewpoint on this subject?

My last post was supposedly a bit random, well this one has a clear theme and is not about being funny. I feel this is an issue that must be faced by everyone. What I've regularly observed is that as soon as religion becomes involved we throw logical thinking out of the window, which is the worst thing we can do, for once we let our analyzing power get clouded there is no saying what might come to pass. The views expressed are solely mine and no harm is meant to any persons sensibilities though all comments and views on this issue are welcome.

What ? no seriously.. WHAT??

2008-07-02T03:32:00.000-07:00

THANK YOU GOD (IF YOU EXIST THAT IS) !!!!!
Before anything else, probably an explanation is required for the url of my new (yay!!) blog.
After 20 futile minutes of trying to find a name for my [ahem] blog, i finally get frustrated and hey what do you know... THATS THE ONLY NAME AVAILABLE .. appparently. Well it just adds up to my conclusion that, as Douglas Adams had so aptly said in the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, nothing in life really adds up. Just when you feel you have made some head or tail out of it, life just creeps up behind you and gives you a hearty kick in the backside. Sometimes I wonder if Mr. Adams had really got it right when he gave the answer to the ultimate question, the answer to life, the universe and everything else, to be ... hold your breath.... the ULTIMATE ANSWER TO BE NONE OTHER THAN.... 42 !!!
Yes you got that right, FORTY FRICKIN TWO. It just makes sense that it doesn't make any sense, so it must be correct.
If you are still not convinced, just sit back, relax, take a deep breath and look around you. If the world was as logical a place as you think it to be, how, and I repeat, HOW in the hell does a film like Om Shanti Om become a hit ? Or HOW, just HOW in the hell does a song like Dil Dance Maare even get made ? Now you answer that !!
Anyway, yesterday while browsing through the net I came across two old songs, nay two old evergreen classic Hindi songs by A.R. Rahman. Two lovely melodies from the early nineties, two ...well cutting straight to the chase.. the songs were "Muqabla muqabla" and "Urvashi Urvashi". [ahh those were the days] . The reason i bring it up here is the lyrics of the two songs. Seriously look it up and I swear to God you won't regret it. The 1st song contains the following lines and I swear I'm not joking :::
"Jurassic Park mein sundar si jodi
Jazz music gaye mil ke"
"Picasso ki painting mera peecha pakad le
aur Texas mein naache milke"

Well lets just say that I was lost for words, I was flummoxed, bamboozled, dumbstruck by the awe inspiring design and beauty of the lyrics. As P.G Wodehouse once said, if you put a thousand monkeys at typewriters for a considerable period of time one of them will eventually churn out a script to Hamlet, but I assure you no matter how many monkeys you have and no matter how much time you give them, not one will be capable of churning out gems like these.
So here's to those brilliant geniuses at work in Bollywood, may they conjure up such countless pearls for years and years to come.

Signing off for the very 1st time...
ME. :)