Random Scribble

Wandering Thoughts

2012-01-21T10:23:00.001+05:30

The farther one seems to be from happiness, the more he tends to write (fairly personal observation)
Within my astonishing normalcy, lies the traces of my undeniable insanity.

Keeping a Secret

2012-01-10T21:05:00.002+05:30

Sometimes when you stumble upon a truth which is so secret that it can make or break someone's life (or at least change it for better or for worse), what do you do ? As a social animal your first impulse is to share it with someone in confidence, consoling yourself that you can ask the other person to keep it to himself and not tell it to anyone. In this simple way, we pass on our burden to someone else, though knowing fully well that secret if told to someone else will always reach even further, like water which always finds a way to leak.

Or you can simply choose to ignore it and move on with life as you were going to. Sometimes people deserve to keep their secrets to themselves, and one should respect that. Easier said than done, but it seems to me a nobler choice, and what are we if we don't try to be noble once in while ?

Well, you know the answer.

Stay Beautiful.
Amitabh

Musings

2012-01-04T19:32:00.001+05:30

When you are really sad, you appreciate people who just stay quiet and let you cry your heart out.

Take a bow to Imtiaz Ali

2011-11-13T02:20:00.001+05:30

Somewhere deep within all of us is an innate desire to transcend ourselves, to be more than what we are and what we can be, to grow beyond and merge ourselves into something all pervasive. Sometimes we do realize this wish as well, though rarely and in fleeting moments.In my life, I have had these experiences as well, those sudden bursts of brilliant fecundity (or creativity) which makes you do things which makes you wonder later, if it was only you who did that or felt that. No matter how old I become, I will remember those moments with vivid clarity, like the time when I wrote something or the time when I took that brilliant catch or the time when sang that song or the time when I read that passage.

Despite of my fairly routine existence I cherish and strive for these moments hungarily. But I guess this phase of my life, I am getting used to becoming a bore and cynical. Very few things impress me and even if they do, it fizzles out.

Hence I want to write about the movie Rockstar right away, till I am still in awe, till I am still itching to write something. Once you sleep on such things, you never know if you feel the same way when you wake up in the morning.

Rockstar is basically a love story expectedly from Imtiaz Ali. But more than that it is about an artist's journey to find within himself a part which will transcend him into a realm of his craft which every artist want but seldom reach. He would reach there eventually but through the painful route of a heartbreak. In my opinion, heartbreak is nothing but a plot device, it could have been anything, death of someone, terminal disease of the rockstar (our hero feels doomed for having none of these :) ) but then a love story is a love story. Nothing tugs our heart like love of two good looking people :D.

Nargis Fakhri is all that she needs to be, beautiful and pristine, the unblemished portrait of a woman which can inspire a Janardhan Jakhar to become a Jordan. Ranbir Kapoor is also all that he needs to be and probably much more. In a role of a lifetime, he delivers the goods and proves his worth as the touted 'next big thing'. In my humble opinion, he already is with an enviable body of work in such a short time. His contemporaries are far behind.

Though I will always believe that Swades is A R Rahman's best work, he needs no praise from someone like me. The music is superb and if there ever would be a real life "Jordan" in India, he would have some benchmark to cross. Saada haq is as good a rock track as can be and I have already listened to Kun Faaya Kun and Tum Ho for hours in loop. And then there is "Nadan Parindey". Sample these verse from the song :

कागा रे, कागा रे, मोरी इतनी अरज तोसे

चुन चुन खइयो मांस |

अरे जिया रे,

खइयो ना दो नैना मोरे,

खइयो ना दो नैना मोरे

पिया के मिलन की आस ||

But more than anyone else, this movie belongs to Imtiaz Ali, the director with the vision to create this magnum opus. He deftly moves through a non-linear timeline displaying his control of the craft and the medium. Rockstar works because it has something to say (simply put, it has a story). It may not be entirely new , but every single frame of the movie is immensely watchable and thanks to Imtiaz Ali for that.

To sum it up, I loved the movie and would recommend it very highly to anyone who like watching movies.

If you have read this note so far, put a comment below (I only humbly request), what is it, that makes you feel more ? (apart from when you stand on the weighing machine of course :P).

If you know, you will do alright. Even if you don't, you are alive and will know eventually.

All the best.

Stay Beautiful (Courtsey:Orkut)

Amitabh

Aham Uvacha

2011-10-03T21:39:00.003+05:30

Don't work, play, be hated and many other ordinarily non-sensical things start making sense when a famous celebrity starts giving gyaan on the life. He / She will tell you precisely how your life is going to turn out (no surprises there, we are all going down the drain :P ). Nonetheless, they also know what you need to do so that it doesn't go that way (and you become what they are or achieve what they have).

Of course, they won't say it directly, they would wrap it in nice package (humour preferrably) and then deliver it to you. So , here you are graduating or whatever, when you get the newsflash. Dude (or Dudette) !!! whatever you have been doing so far, just wasn't right, you got it all wrong ( and I am talking about the normal people, who have been worrying to do well in life, for those that aforementioned event actually matters, exceptions are always there).

They will turn everything that you held dear in life so far on its head and tell you to do exactly opposite. This will be done with catchy, attention grabbing phrases (like, stay foolish or Don't work and yeda yeda). You will be intrigued at first, enthused next and confused two days after the ceremony is over. This is typically the time it takes for one get over the hangover of life changing motivational speech.

No, not for a moment I am saying it is wrong for one to chase one's dream, however as a rational being our actions needs to have a ground of sound logic beneath them. Sachin is not Sachin only because he loved to play cricket, he is what he is because of his talent, discipline, perseverance, sheer hard work, suitable guidance and let's admit it, a fair amount of luck as well.

So here is my advice to all of these cool people out there (entitled enough to give cool speeches), yes we need to do something we love doing, yes that would be the best way to succeed, yes it will bring us the true happiness that everyone yearns for and yes it would be the coolest thing to happen in life. But give us some credit, we had thought about it, even tried a little bit. First of all it was difficult to decide on one thing we love enough to sacrifice the ordinary pleasure / stability in our life, for a lot of us, the choice was between a good life or bad life (only in very materialistic terms, never had the luxury of thinking about spritual satisfaction ). Our worries were our parents' aspirations, our own financial stability in life (we don't get unemployment allowance as big as a decent salary in India, Oh..sorry we don't get any at all) and most of all to provide for our families and also have access to things which give us pleasure / satisfaction. Hence given our considerations (numerous as they were), we chose to pick a job / career which will pay enough to ensure that I can buy inspirational books about people who can given cool speeches after I have taken care of our basic needs. We know it is not our calling or destiny or whatever you cool people call it, but it works for us. It gives me time & money to appreciate the music I so love, the hobbies I wanna pursue, to take care of my loved ones and at the same time do something which I love doing. At the end of day, I choose to work because it can help me to do a lot of things I wanna do.

Who said works needs to be the whole and soul of who I am ? I am much more. I always was and I always will be.

Aise Hi

2011-09-03T21:05:00.001+05:30

किसी को दुसरे के दर्द का अहसास नहीं होता,
ग़म होता है मगर कुछ खास नहीं होता
मशरूफ जिंदगी की जद्दोजेहद में
हमें किसी के मरने का भी लिहाज नहीं होता |

A Game of Marble

2011-06-04T12:02:00.002+05:30

"There you go", said Amitabh triumphantly, afterall he has hit the marble and his total marble count stood at 10 now.He was a newbie in this marble business, but he was no rookie. Within a week he has almost mastered the art of hitting a marble by bending his fingers expertly and aim like (or atleast pretend like ) someone who knew his marbles.

"Have you seen Aditya", asked Sukhjeet. "Nah", said Amitabh while trying to gauge the best way to hit the marble so that his marble would end nearest to the pegging hole and help him score the 'goal'. "Abe teen din se school nahin aaya hai (he hasn't come to school since 3 days)", said Sukhjeet.

"I am also playing", said Gautam while walking towards their small marble 'playground" from the classroom. Amitabh sheepishly looked at Sukhjeet. Gautam was a master marble player and letting him play with them would mean loosing some of the marble they have collected so far."We are not playing for real, this is a jhutthi mutthi game between me and Sukhjeet", said Amitabh trying to build a background to avoid playing with Gautam. 'Oh, alright, I will also join you", said Gautam in his flambuoyant way, so typical of someone good at marbles. "But we are not playing for real, you get it right ?", said Sukhjeet, giving his last shot at shooing Gautam away and playing at peace with Amitabh, with whom he had a chance to win some more marbles."I get it, we won't play for real but we can still play for points ...right ? One hit , 10 points" said Gautam. This seemed to be the clicnher, and Amitabh & Sukhjeet (now assured of safety of their marble "wealth") abondened their game to let Gautam joined them.

Gautam stood at the small pegging hole, took 1 marble each from everyone, shook them between his closed palms and threw it away from the whole on the ground. Now the goal of the game was to reach to the pegging hole, while hitting other's marble as many times with your marble as you can. Every time you hit others marble you will have to score the goal with your marble by hitting it inside the pegging hole.

As it turns out, Sukhjeet's marble went the farthest, Amitabh's was second nearest and Gautam's, the closest. Seems like the throw wasn't so random as it seemed at first."Oye haan... Gautam do you know why Aditya hasn't come to school for so many days" , asked Sukhjeet suddenly, continuing his conversation which he started with Amitabh with Gautam now. " This guy is still stuck with Aditya", said an irritated Amitabh, " if he didn't come, he didn't come, must be having fun at home yaar, who cares".

"Nothing yaar, I was asking just like that only", said Sukhjeet, " actually, I am missing the toast he used to bring for his lunch, he told me his mom toast it with something like butter but not butter, and that is why it tastes so different and so good.

"Cheese".

"What ?"

"That thing like butter which is not butter is called cheese, Aditya told me this and you know me, once you tell me something, I don't forget", said Amitabh, cashing on the opportunity to brag about himself. Something which he has started to enjoy since very recently.

"There has been some accident on the bridge, A jeep collided with the truck, Aditya was also there in the Jeep. He is in hospital right now. That is why he is not coming, my elder brother was talking to his frind yesterday, he was talking about Aditya's sister who also in the jeep. But Aditya will not come to school for sometime now." said Gautam, feeling a tad proud of providing a information meant for grown-ups only and quoting his sources as well.

"Yes I know, Aditya & his sister will always go home in their Papa's jeep, I wish my Papa's also had a jeep like that. Once Aditya invited us to his home across the bridge, we went in that jeep to his home during the interval , it was so nice and bumpy" said Amitabh, a little lost reminscing about that glorious visit.

"Did he break any bones ?" asked Sukhjeet out of curiosity.

"I think so, his left arm I guess. But my brother was telling his friend that his head got struk with the jeep's window very badly, his head is all wrapped up in bandages right now. He was unconcious for two days."

"Like the Mummy in Duck Tales ?" asked Amitabh, who was feeling a little left out in this rather serious conversation. He was still remembering the little trip they had. Aditya was always like that, sharing his tiffin with everyone, inviting them to his home and letting us use his new new things, he thought ruefully. Aditya not coming to school was not a good news.

"he he...sort of, I can only imagine, Aditya all wrapped in bandages, running behind us for our marbles making scary mummy noises... ...wwooooooo ...woooooooo ..wooooooooooooooooooo" said Gautam and they all started laughing.

And with that Gautam hit Sukhjeet marble once before hitting the peggin hole. He was, as expected the winner of the game. They started another game but midway someone shouted from the classroom, "Oye, Neppo is here, come back to class if you don't want to be flagged once again". Nappo (aka Napoleon) was the nick name they had given to the Principle of the school who was very strict and very short. How he was named after a French war legend in a school deep down in indian hinterland was a mystery. However, thanks to this, every kid in the school knew who Napoleon Bonaparte was (a really short guy, a detail most relevant at that age). The fact that Neppo always did his inspection with a short stick in his hand like a sword, just helped his notoriety as Neppo.

So they ran back quickly to the classroom, not before collecting & counting their respective "marble wealth".

Boring Hippie that I am

2010-06-12T12:25:00.003+05:30

Hippies were known for their incessant travelling ways. The whole world was their home. They would leave one home and move to another home. I guess, normal people felt a little jealous of their 'free world' policy.

But those were the glorious 70s(an era that I personally identify more with than the one I live in), slowly & gradually, this 'tribe' began to wear out. More and more people joined the mainstream (Some actually became the CEOs of big MNCs :P did someone say Steve Jobs? ). Today hippies are mostly folklore, a nostalgic reminder of the past that was. No more men/women with long hairs, no more people with weird glasses (not really weird, but just tinted, big & round actually is more like it :)), no more drug and marijuana overdoses, and no more unanimous contempt for the 'establishment' without really caring about the reasons for it.

But mind you, 70s or not, long hair or not, dirty filthy stink or not and ‘pot’ or not :P, hippies still do exist, right amidst the normal people, disguised as THE normal (sometimes more normal than the normal people). Now this new "tribe" has two clans, the one who were born that way and the others who had to become that way.

The first clan have learnt the way to masquerade themselves, to 'gel well' into the society. Even though in our modern world, nobody really cares even if someone is really weird, members of this clan take due precautions. They are, from the day they were born, the citizen of the free world. And they love this world, where travelling is so much faster and reaching out to people super easy.

The other clan is just the boring non weird kind junta who has to go the hippie way, because they have been forced to live this life for very long time. Did you ever noticed the ways of a perpetually travelling salesperson, consultant or just a plain person whose job hopping involved moving a lot ?

Being a hippie is not how you look; it is for my utter lack of creativity," the state of mind". They are the people who can never really settle down in a place because who knows when they will have to make a move. They keep most of their essential stuff in the front pockets of their travel bags, so they can access it without ever really 'unpacking' their stuff. In fact, they are good at packing, but really bad (or downright lazy) at unpacking. It just seems too much work, when one has to undo it anytime soon.

This attitude towards unpacking stretches itself to everything. Friends are made but not really. Who knows when one would have to say good bye. The less involved one is, the less it hurts. Relationships are best avoided, especially ones with the strong strings.

This also means that at times one has to fake a lot of things so to avoid being called the 'stoneman', but long term faking, they say, becomes a habit hard to break. Hence when it comes to something real, one doesn't really remember what 'real thing' was like. And before one actually remembers, one is too far away to really do something about it. And then there is the next thing waiting for one to fake. Who's got the time to mull over the water under the bridge?

For those who care, I belong to the second clan; you can choose yours and be glad if you don't belong to the tribe at all. These are tough times for "proselytized" hippies.

Sitting here in a waiting lounge moving from one juncture to another juncture of my life, I hope that I would be able to settle down soon. I still hope to see the world, and yeah the whole of it. But I also hope to find a place where I know I would want to come back to, when I am weather beaten, jet lagged and too tired to travel any further. The place where I would plant some seeds and see them grow into trees, the place I would be able to keep a pet, the place I would lay down knowing deep in my dazed slumber that this five and half feet ( let's add 3 more inches for some 'leg space' here :P) of earth would not mind carrying my weight till the day I would sleep never to wake up again. But then, I have a job to do in a “globalized” world and to an extent I have made my peace with my inescapable mobility. Now I look forward to seeing new places, trying out new things (food, clothes, and habits among other things) . Well, what choice do I have? It’s fun at times and at times plain frustrating. But such is life, utterly oblivious of one’s likes/dislikes. It just loves to have fun at our expenseJ.

So to make peace with the life that I had, here is to all the places I have been to, to all the dirt I washed off my feet and body, to all people who came by, stood by me and then wished me farewell, to all who loved me, liked me and hated me to all the joys, to all the sorrows, to all the heartburns and to all the pleasant surprises,. And finally to all the years that have gone by, not for being golden or anything, but for being the years of my own life, the parts of my very own story. They are my most precious possession.

Here is to having some more of them :)

Cheers!!!

Stay Beautiful

Growing up.

2009-11-08T02:39:00.000+05:30

Freedom also means taking decisions which are not easy. At times we need to parent ourselves and do what is best for us even when it is boring, entirely unimaginative. When we start taking responsibility for everything that we do, that's when we truly become an adult.

Questions

2009-10-17T18:25:00.003+05:30

Love is a strange thing ? When can one say that one is in love ? Like a disease it has phases too and hence every phase has different symptoms.

Is it when you just want to look at someone endlessly losing yourselves in her big deep eyes ? or is it worrying about her just a little more than you do about others ? Is it the flutter in your heart when she smiles everytime ? or is it when you exactly know what she is going to do or say when something happens ?

Is it your heart skipping a beat when you touch her unintentionally for the first time ? or is the peace and comfort you feel when you hold her hand? Is it the stage when your eyes are too full of her to see something negative in her? or is it the stage when you are aware that she is just like you, flawed and fragmented?

Is it the initial hopefulness(may foolhadiness too) when world seems to be endless with possibilities and everything around you seems to be pleasant but irrelevant? or is it the time when you know that world may not nice, future may not be perfect, yet present is peaceful enough for you to be with her and thank god for that ?

Is it the time when there is nothing in this world which you wouldn't do to make her happy ? or Is it the time when you know it may not always be possible, but you take solace in fact that you wouldn't do anything to make her unhappy,knowingly.

Is it when it always feels like springs, colours seem bright, birds chirp happily, sky is just the bluest of the blue and looking out of a window is a cheer up ? Or is it when air around you seem damp, blue of the sky is not blue enough, nevertheless life is bearable because she is in your arms ?

Good Luck Dear Friend

2009-10-06T09:53:00.002+05:30

At times one gets too busy in one's own life that we completely lose track of people around us, and if you are in a b-school this might happen quite a lot. In fact it takes a while before you realize who you have lost along the way. Not to say that life here is very busy, it is just that we form a very small circle of people and tend to lose ourselves in that circle only. People out of this immediate circle get lost in the background. You see them once in a while, say Hi and move on with your life.

A week ago, while surfing orkut (which indicates the abundance of time available) a friend's name flashed in my friend list and it struck me, that I haven't seen her for quite a while, inspite of fact that she is in same campus. Then it also struck me that she was dropped from the college due to poor academic performance. When it happened, I was also one of the many people who felt upset to hear the news. But soon enough, we got immersed into our lives and soon enough it was 3 months after that fateful day when we got the news.

Conveniently I forgot that a person existed around us and she was a friend. I am not sure why I am writing this but I felt bad for forgetting a friend so quickly, don't know why.

Anyways, all the best my dear friend, may you do well wherever you go.

Quarter Life Crisis

2009-08-09T13:24:00.002+05:30

Something I found somewhere and felt like sharing.

BEING IN TWENTIES - SOMETHING... :)

It is when you stop going along with the crowd and start realizing that there are many things about yourself that you didn't know and may not like.You start feeling insecure and wonder where you will be in a year or two, but then get scared because you barely know where you are now.

You start realizing that people are selfish and that, maybe, those friends that you thought you were so close to aren't exactly the
greatest people you have ever met, and the people you have lost touch with are some of the most important ones. What you don't recognize is that they are realizing that too, and aren't really cold, catty, mean or insincere, but that they are as confused as you.

You look at your job... and it is not even close to what you thought you would be doing, or maybe you are looking for a job and realizing that you are going to have to start at the bottom and that scares you.

Your opinions have gotten stronger. You see what others are doing and find yourself judging more than usual because suddenly you realize that you have certain boundaries in your life and are constantly adding things to your list of what is acceptable and what isn't. One minute, you are insecure and then the next, secure.

You laugh and cry with the greatest force of your life. You feel alone and scared and confused. Suddenly, change is the enemy and you try and cling on to the past with dear life, but soon realize that the past is drifting further and further away, and there is nothing to do but stay where you are or move forward.

You get your heart broken and wonder how someone you loved could do such damage to you. Or you lie in bed and wonder why you can't meet anyone decent enough that you want to get to know better. Or maybe you love someone but love someone else too and cannot figure out why you're doing this because you know that you aren't a bad person. You want to settle down for good because now all of a sudden that becomes top priority. Getting wasted and acting like an idiot starts to look pathetic.You begin to think a companion for life is better than a hundred in the shack and for once you would not mind standing tall for that special someone which otherwise you had never thought of until now.You go through the same emotions and questions over and over, and talk with your friends about the same topics because you cannot seem to make a decision. You worry about loans, money, the future and making a life for yourself... and while winning the race would be great, right now you'd just like to be a contender!

What you may not realize is that every one reading this relates to it.We are in our best of times and our worst of times, trying as hard as we can to figure this whole thing out. Send this to your twenty-something friends.... maybe it will help someone feel like they aren't alone in their state of confusion...

We call it the "Quarter-life Crisis"

GoBaldyLook

2009-07-16T20:46:00.004+05:30

So finally after such a long time, I took the plunge & went "full monty" with my head.Translated, I shaved my head :). My hairs were coarse, full of dandruff (ewww..), falling & turning grey, and that's when I realized, it is time for "a new beginning". Apart from that I wanted to do it at least once till it is in my hand (or on my head :P ), just another tick on my 'bucket list' :).

What I really found interesting were some of the responses (though I must admit, not completely unexpected :P ) :

Here are some of them ( in no particular order ) :

Inability to recognize me from 2 feets away when they saw me for the first time. One of my friend called me 'Chotu' and almost asked me to bring him some chaai.

Why ? Why ? Why ? ( with supressed laughter juxstaposed with shock... I would interpret it as awe ,courtesey my glorious GoBaldyLook :P ). Supressed laughter later turned into uncontrollable hoo..hoo..haa..haa...with the clutching of the stomach and a pointed finger at me.

What happened ? (almost a shreik !!! ), Gum got stuck in your hair ?

Everything alright at home (Owing to a Hindu tradition ), I quickly reassured them that nothing of the sort has happened and then can go ahead, laugh and make fun of me. Everyone obliged :)

The priceless open mouth with popping eyes.

The rhetorical question, "Dude .. what the F*&^$ ?"

The mean and loud laugh (It hurts.. man :( , coming from the person who knows how to do it)

there were some others, but I'll save them for a sequel ( I can very well write a book :) )

Stay Beautiful
Amitabh

P.S. : I am not going to post a pick of my own, enough people made fun of me already ...boo hoo hoo :D

The year gone by

2009-06-16T12:07:00.004+05:30

"Sir, my name is Amitabh Singh Yadav and I am waitlisted 18 for the PMIR course.
waitlist 18 ?
Yes Sir.
PMIR ?
Yes Sir.
Amitabh ..Singh Yadav.
Yes Sir.

Your waitlist has been cleared and we will send you the formal admission letter in 3-4 days.

Are you sure sir ?

Yes .. now be patient and wait for your offer letter .... and the person on the other side of the phone call hung up. "

It took a while for this news to sink in me. When it did .. I did an impromptu Salsa step (which I was learning those days) and my colleague who was with me for breakfast was amused to see it.

Then I told her, "I am going to XLRI Jamshedpur" with the widest possible grin on my face.

Recently I completed a year after that fateful day and the journey so far has been a roller coaster ride to say the least.

This is my attempt to look behind past my shoulders to reminisce about what has happened in one of the most eventful year of my life.

This was the year :

When I again started to believe in dreams and possibility of impossible dreams coming true. What happens after they come true is altogether a different story.

When I made 3 friends, and if I were a corporation and friends were my profits, I am not only beating recession, I am making a killing of it.

When my dear Sister found the love of her life and decided to get married.She has became a Mumbaikar now.

When I hurt someone because of being nice to me.

When I read too much, understood a lot but learnt very little.

When the time went by faster than it ever could.

When I saw the rich people (too rich for their own good) and the poor people( too poor to get hold of their next meal) and my sense of justice took almost a U-turn.

When I saw 14 interview shortlists without my name before seeing the one with my name for the Summer Internship Process. As it turned out, that was enough :)

When I again tried to fight prejudices of many, failing often and succeeding rarely.I plan to continue doing the same.

When old age caught up with me for the first time. The sign ? It is not the grey hairs(though I have few of them head) and I am yet to grow a fully blown beard or moustache. Rather it is the year where emotions got the better of me, I have become rather more sentimental and emotional than I ever was. I just hope it is a temporary phase.

When even after going through this ... I am not any wiser. :)

Stay Beautiful
Amitabh

Courage of Compromise

2009-02-18T17:49:00.006+05:30

I am a restless person. I cannot stay at a place for long. I have to move and go someplace else. I cannot stay still for long, and then I also cannot stay silent for long. I don't know if it is a good thing or bad but the fact that I have survived so far indicates that it's not a real cause for worry.

But I wonder what it means .. and why is it so ? Over the time I have realized that my inability to make peace with my present is one of reasons I am this way. I HAVE to move away, I HAVE to find something better, I HAVE to be something else and then I see other people.

I see kind that is like me, which I must say is in plenty and confirm my belief in my disappointing commonality. I also see the kind which is different and is in rarity, the kind that has made peace with what they have and make the best of it. Their life is not the endless struggle of haves and have nots but rather a poignant conduct with which they live every second of their lives, keeping the remains of their once cherished dreams, hidden from the world and deep down the depths of their hearts. It is not very difficult to identify such a person, their eyes tells you their stories. The calmness past the days of juvenile excitement in those eyes is sometime soothing and sometime mocking; telling us where we stand and where we could have been. The relief of being past the chase that once haunted them is apparent in those eyes.

If I have confused you(which I am sure I have), just think of a female relative who was far too educated to be the wife of your dork uncle but still chose to make the best of her home, her kids. Think of an uncle who is too good for the place or his job but still chose to give his job the best he can and still love that God forsaken place. Fools might believe that these people were not in love with their dreams enough to pursue them. Actually, I believe nothing can be farther from the truth. Dreams are always cherished, by one and by all. Some of us had to let go of them mostly because of things that are beyond our control. In fact, sometimes it is easier to fight than to give up and move on because it requires a certain amount of emotional maturity to do so.

What most of us don't understand that life probably is not about pursuing a better future; it sometimes can also mean simply living and cherishing our present. They say something about "counting your blessings" ..right ? That is what I am talking about. No matter what they say about the will and its way, the truth we all know deep down in our hearts is that there are dreams which won't come true. So what do we do ? Some people turn bitter, for their whole lives. They refuse to accept the truth. But, some people do accept this reality and move on and make the best of what they have. Fighting is sometimes easier than giving up or what we know as compromise. This rare ability of people to accept the their fate is what I call the courage of compromise.

To know is to Be.

2009-01-17T21:35:00.004+05:30

In Buddhist religion, there is a term called "Karuna", compassion being its closest synonym in English.When we understand the true meaning of this word, we move closer to the very key to understand people.

A person can not be understood by staying where we are.To understand a person, we will need to reach out,offer a helping hand, put yourself in his shoes and try to feel his sorrows & experience his happiness.

When we do that, the answer to the question(which we all have asked at one point or the other), "How could he do it ? " suddenly becomes clear.

Needless to say, practicing "Karuna" is very difficult.When we are kids, we are not mature enough to understand it.When we grow up & are young, there are too many people around us to understand and we are always in a unexplainable hurry. Who has the time to be compassionate to so many people ? We pick some and we leave some, whoever is convenient to keep around is kept.Those who are difficult, are left behind.

As we grow old and are left with fewer people, then it becomes a lot easier to understand the meaning of "Karuna". But then only a few of us understand it since age and wisdom rarely go hand in hand.Nevertheless those who do become wiser with age, become more forgiving, and experience a rare sense of calm and peace.

Understanding people is a slow and painful process. We can not gain trust without trusting, we can't avoid being judged without being non-judgmental ourselves. We must be ready to make allowances, ready to become a little vulnerable.When we raise big walls around us, neither we see anyone nor anyone sees us.We take this risk of getting hurt with the people we love.They in turn do the same, believing that we will never hurt them, and when we do hurt each other, we have the belief that it was not what we meant to do. Faith is the key to any successful relationship.If we lose it, we lose each other.

If you haven't realized by now, we all can be accused of (at one point or the other) of hurting most the people we love the most. Maybe the assurance that they would not leave us has something to do with it. Mostly they suffer in silence, sometimes they tell us.But still they stay because when you love someone, you ought to accept the worst along with the best. There is no selection, only a peaceful acceptance of the person the way he is. You are aware of your own frailty and hence you accept their imperfections. We practice Karuna with people we care about, every single day, every single moment, because we know and we understand.. we understand.

Just My Anger !!!

2008-11-27T20:09:00.008+05:30

इस मातम-ऐ-दुनिया में अमन-ऐ-जहाँ भी नहीं, अमन-ऐ-दिल भी नहीं |

अमन के कातिलों से कह दो उनका यह जहां भी नहीं, वो जहाँ भी नहीं ||

मजहबी नहीं काफिर ही सहीं मैं,

यह जो हैं वो तो इंसान भी नहीं, हैवान भी नहीं ||

Where is your home ?

2008-11-13T12:07:00.006+05:30

Home not necessarily needs to be a place or location, it can be a person, idea or anything for that matter.It is that to what one would like to go back to.

It is this constant awareness at the back of your mind,that we need to go back to it, constitutes the idea of home.

So here is a question for all of you, seemingly the simplest yet one of the most profound.(as Richard Bach pointed out in "Illusion")

"Where is your home ?"

Stay Beautiful,
Amitabh

Life in Short !!!

2008-08-18T23:27:00.005+05:30

That's a piece I wrote sometime back as part of my application for a PG admission process.(Believe it or not :P ).

Enjoy Madi :)

Adieu Amitabh (A eulogy)

Born on the 18^th Nov, named after a living legend, Son of a homemaker & a teacher, Amitabh was an exciting prospect. He was good at studies, followed Cricket and Bollywood religiously (Name does have its effects, doesn’t it?).He duly pursued Engineering where he discovered Public Speaking, Table tennis, English literature, SPIC MACAY, guitar and not to mention his major Information Technology too.

A two year stint with TCS took him from Trivandrum to Cochin, Cochin to Bangalore and finally to Gurgaon. He made some interesting friends & despite all his dislike for food cooked in Coconut Oil, he swore by the Fried Fish till the very end. He liked to claim that he had found enough stories from Cochin and Bangalore for his Grandkids to last 20 years.

His love for printed words was a legacy of his father who was a librarian himself. Starting with Champak, Nandan, ChandaMama, Paraag, not to mention a fanatic following of Cricket Samraat he then moved on to read English Literature, reading classics, fiction-nonfiction with equal gusto. In particular he was fond of Indian Authors Vikram Seth & Arundhati Roy being his favourites.

He was confident, contemplative and had a sense of humour. He was afraid of stagnation, disliked hypocrisy (mostly his) and liked people. An atheist, he respected other’s belief but hated Religious fundamentalists.

Once when asked if he had any regrets…he said “I have many…but I won’t mind living to have some more”. We couldn’t agree more. Good Bye ‘O’ Beloved Friend. May you start again from where you left.

Love Ya XL !!!

2008-07-12T23:47:00.006+05:30

This is story of an ordinary college boy. His story is as common as can be till something happens. During the very first few days ...Like you see a girl .. beautiful, smart and so intelligent that everyone seems to be eating out of her hands. You being the ordinary guy .. look at her in once in a while and try to console yourself by concentrating on some other stuff. The time goes by .. she is too good, you don't stand a chance and you remain the invisible guy that you are .. at least to her.

You are so much enamored that .. You feel scruffy when she is around... you feel tongue tied even when you know that you are not going to talk to her and she not to you. You live your life in the self-denial mode and keep it a secret even from your best friend.. Since he might find it funny and you really would not like it. You try talking yourself out of it .. it doesn't work. You try focusing your attention on something which supposedly is more important (study, career and all that crap they talk about), even that doesn't work.

Then as it happens with almost everything in life ... somehow your heart beats a little less faster when you see her. You try to follow the rule of "avoidance leads to forgetfulness". You succeed partially... life seems a little better now ... at least on the surface.

Then out of nowhere.. After 2 years in the college ... on a fateful day, something happens. You are coming back from your college and since you are thinking about the India-Pakistan match that India lost yesterday.. You don't notice her approaching you from the side. Suddenly she is standing in front of you and she asks. "Hi Amit, How are you?" (Let’s assume that’s your name).

You are dumbstruck. Caught between the feeling of shock and euphoria (She KNOWS my name !!!), you mumble something ..which obviously isn't audible enough but essentially meaning that you are good and something like that.

She understands and nods appreciatively.(Why ? ..you wonder ).Then she asks ... a little awkward herself, "Do you like coffee ? "

You being the klutz you are, reply , "Yeah .. kinda.." Looking everywhere but towards her.

"Oh..good", and then there is silence -- the odd kind where nobody would speak for a while and hope that the other would somehow rescue you two from this misery.. ..the sweet misery of those early days.

"Uh... would you mind, If I walk with you for a while", says the sweet one ... the one you waited for all along, the one who descended from heaven and landed right to your heart. Is this really happening, you ask yourself and pinch hard... yeah it is !!! .. And it's not another one of you dreams you have once in a while.

Your mind runs fast, very fast ... thinking things which are unimaginable.. looking for reasons for this sudden stroke of luck .. and finally believing in GOD.

Snapped back to real world and senses, you say " I don't mind" then regret immediately and add quickly " I mean .. sure! I would love to" and sigh with relief... just hoping that she won't change her mind.

And then you start walking .. together.. for a short walk now ... and then towards the future ... where there is bliss and there is heaven... though they might doubt it ...but you do live happily ever after.

Why I wrote this all ... just to tell you what XL means to me. When I started preparing for B-School entrance exams ... XLRI Jamshedpur was such a big name for me .. that I even didn't dare to dream about XLRI Jamshedpur, with my own deficiency in Maths and XAT's reputation for Whacko Quant section. I wrote XAT like a Zombie and the only good thing I remember doing is not attempting a single questions I was not sure of. To my utter surprise and delight, I got a GD/PI call from XLRI and the rest is as they say History.

XLRI PMIR to me is like that girl I mentioned above, so wonderful that I was afraid to admit my love for her even to myself. XLRI PMIR was my dream course and I am while writing this from XL, LIVING MY DREAM.

I am in Love and I don't care who knows it :D.

XL meri jaan .. love ya !!!

First Impressions !!!

2008-06-23T21:53:00.004+05:30

Human mind has a tendency (or rather desire) to simplify things. A first meeting with every person will result in a first impression. Few words which will define the person and make it easy for us to put it somewhere with others, who supposedly are of the same kind. It is always easy to put people in categorical boxes .. some people might say it is demeaning and some might find it an insult to their individuality but the truth is that is how it works ... for you and for me. We categorize people. Period.

In normal situation, we can afford not to form a concrete image of the person based on first impression.With enough time and conversation we start to understand
the person.In fact, if enough time is given, it would be really difficult to find a bad person.To put it in simple words," Every person is nice, when you finally know them".

Nevertheless, this luxury of time is absent in a business scenario where we have limited time and interaction.We need to gauge the other person as quickly as possible to gain an advantage.The rules of body language and reading faces;are probably meant for such situations.These rules provides us a handy way to form a reasonably true first impression of the person.This information can be used(if inferred correctly) for making our decision making process easier.

The caveat with such rules is that they need sufficient expertise and experience before one can apply then effectively.And also one should not feel tempted to use these rules in personal life as they might hinder the way we see people, the way they need to be seen.Without a bias.Period.

The Smart Kids

2008-03-17T00:17:00.005+05:30

As most of the people who read it, I found both of Chetan Bhagat's books (Five Point Someone & One Night@Call Center) very interesting. But then these books are not just any interesting books. These are trend setters. Chetan Bhagat started an interesting trend of similar books. Everyone who was someone(read IITian,IIMian and XYZian) wanted to become a bestselling author and some of them actually did(e.g. Harshdeep Jolly of 'Everything you Desire").Even if they didn't, at least the cover page of their books says so, and I being a firm believer of sanctity of printed words..Believe it.

Now consider some similarities between these budding 'authors'.

They all are bright people, they are market savvy and they all know what to write and for whom to write. They have turned writing into a business plan, and a sound one at that. After all, Kotler was taught for a reason :).

Here is the list of a sample questionnaire cum checklist they all ensure to complete while writing their book.(talk about being methodical :))

Q1.Will I get a publisher?

Ans: Hell yeah!!!, there are enough Rupa Publications in market waiting for another college memoir and did I told you my IIx degree works like a magic wand ?

Q2.Who will read my book?

Ans: Apart from thousands of desperate students hoping to get into these hallowed portals, some of my college mates and few odd alumni ...phew!!! That makes it quite a sizeable customer base :)

Q3: What will I write about ?

Ans: I just finished 'Five Point Someone', So I guess I HAVE to include all the juicy details about campus life. I need to ensure my protagonist is not the very intelligent types(who like 9 graders neways :)).Don't forget to include account of male desperation and female bitchiness(Irrespective of what gender I am and how much I know about it).

And...yes, pay heed to the mushy love story amidst all the chaos I'll create, the more details better it is.I mean there HAS to be a LOVE STORY, all the Eric Segals of the world step aside , lemme show ya !!

And just like that, I have a book and Yes, I am an AUTHOR now. Even a process oriented software company will have to try hard to beat the dead on execution of these plans.

And then there are usual questions of what to wear for the photo on the book cover but then "authors" don't bother about such trivialities.(and let a image consultant do it for them ;-))

Chetan Bhagat(and all the 'inspired authors') belongs to the market savvy new breed of Indian Authors who understands economics better than human emotions. Both of his books filled the void in the Indian Book Market where Mills & Boons and usual Chic-Lit (Opel Mehta type books) is still trying hard to find their grip. He actually started a trend and what we see now is a flurry of books where the author's educational qualification matters more than the quality of what he writes. I have read some really bad books recently owing to this trend. I am sure there are many other authors who deserved to be published and read but they are left in a lurch since they don’t have flashy tag behind them.

Here are some areas of concern with these books: (Great minds think bulletwise…so do I :))

Most of characters are caricatures, with hardly any details and effort visible from the Author.
Juvenile stunts (at times exaggerated) remains the highlights of the book.
Love stories are there for the same reason a Bollywood movie has songs.
No one sincerely tries to tell a story, it HAS to be a light-hearted banter all the time ….why? Because it sells. Period.

Now before you all jump at me and blame me for being too harsh, let me tell you that I completely understand the hard work involved in writing any book. It requires a certain talent to be able to do so and I do not deny it. All those who have finished a book and got it published are achievers in every sense of the world. But I find the shallowness with which a story is told, quite discomforting. The oversimplification of issues and characters is too evident to ignore. It is not difficult to understand why a Vikram Seth, Rohinton Mistry and Arundhati Roy will belong to a different league and why some “mortals”(If I may say so) will remain mortals. Talent cannot be an excuse for mediocrity. The great authors became great authors because they were passionate about what they wrote; so you will have a Vikram Seth rewriting the whole ”The Golden Gate” and Rohinton Mistry leaving his job to turn a full time writer. These were not great milestones of a sound business plan but then writing is no business either. Writing is their métier and the fact that they are able to write what they truly want is enough for them. Money is just a happy co-incidence and the sooner our young ‘Authors’ understand it the better it will be for us readers.

Smart kids as they all are, I am sure they will understand it soon. J

PS: Rupa Publication has been there in low cost publication for quite a while now and has millions of thankful readers across the nation for making reading affordable. Cheers !!!

Philosophy-101

2008-02-09T22:57:00.001+05:30

This is first in the series of the articles I am planning to write about Philosophy. I have read this fascinating book "Sophie's World" by Jostein Gaarder which is a beautiful compendium of all the important philosophical thoughts. 
And I have all the intentions of borrowing heavily from this book :)
Here I go:
What is Philosophy ?
Going by the etymological analysis Philosophy literally means "Love of Wisdom". I would go ahead and daresay that philosophy is the celebration of Mankind's ability to wonder and to ask questions. The basic philosophical questions we have been asking and wondering since time immemorial are:
How was the world created? Is there any reason or meaning behind what happens? How ought we to live?
And the most important (I believe) of them “Who we are & why we are here?" 
It is difficult to find a culture which hasn’t dwelt on these questions in one form or the other. Here is an extract from the book:
"A Greek philosopher who lived more than two thousand years ago believed that philosophy had its origin in man’s sense of wonder. Man thought it was so astonishing to be alive that philosophical questions arose of their own accord." 
In fact, according to the author (and I agree) THE ONLY THING WE REQUIRE TO BE GOOD PHILOSOPHER IS THE FACULTY OF WONDER.
Have you ever seen a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat? It never fails to amaze us. Now try to put yourself in the place of the rabbit. The only difference being that you would be aware of being a part of something magical and rabbit won't. A philosopher knows that this world and this life is actually a magic trick and we are the rabbit in this trick (Some even say that we are actually little insects buried in Rabbit's fur).
Most of us find comfort deep in the Rabbit's fur and few of us (the philosophers) try to get to the tip of the fur to see the magician in the eye.
Enough of rabbit talk, summarizing:
The very sense of wonder and the quenching thirst of answers for some basic questions maketh a man 'the philosopher'.
Many a men had already asked these questions and tried to answer them...some even asked new ones ....we will talk about them later :)
Stay Beautiful :)


Amitabh
 

You are Your Favourite !!

2007-12-26T23:50:00.000+05:30

I seem to remember unusual things, good thing for a small time quizzer :).I remember this particular instance very well; Me and my sister sitting on the backseat of the Rickshaw (when we were small enough to be put there); she casually asked me "who is your favourite hero"(of course, hers being SRK in those heady DDLJ days :)).Though today I have a long list of favourites/likes/dislikes/pet peeves etc etc...believe me, that day that question made me think. Those were the days when I was too busy playing LANGDI,GALLERY, reading Comics(Dhruv, Nagraj et al) and watching cartoons, I never found time to pick a favourite hero. I used to find any Mithun's movie awesome; the more the stunt the better it is, simple enough. But then I was equally fond of Amitabh Bacchan too..(imagine an 11 year old kid watching SHAAN alone on TV till 1in the night...phew...it was me again).But who had the time to classify heroes into favourites ?...you see the movie and then become the hero for a day or two(I became AJOOBA and Shanshah for a whole week once J) and it was over.

With age I learnt that everyone seems to have their favourites in everything. Favourite Hero/Heroine, Ice cream, clothes, shoes, drink, color, book, song, movie, undergarment brand (did anyone just said ..Jockey :) )..you name it and they will have a favourite. It makes our lives a lot easier in this world which is brimming with choices. The more money you have, more choices you can have. Then some people go ahead and start picking their favourite people too ---favourite politician, teacher, painter, uncle, cousin and many others. What could be the reason of someone/something being your favourite? I will not quote any dictionary definition here and will assume that anything that captures our imagination and we find enchanting broadly constitutes our favourites.

We root for our favourites; pay extra for them; relate to them and discover a sense of identity with them. We believe they are the best that can be. We don't like if people criticize them and defend them with determined ferocity. Though we allow concession for other people's doubt; we frankly do not care what they think. My favourite is the best; that's what we say all the time, unabashedly.

Growing up is not easy; one moment you are your Father's little son/daughter and then suddenly you are on your own. One moment your mother combs your hair and the other moment you find yourself stranded alone on island full of stranger. We realize that Life is not a Mithun Da's movie after all; it is like all those Kalaa Movies(art movies) that you never wanted to watch when you were a Kid. People can be mean and friends do not play with you again if you have a fight, even if you say Sorry!! Papa is there no more surprising you with the toy you always wanted. You will have to fight it on your own and earn everything. Nothing comes for free and money is never enough (even when you earn in THOUSANDS !!).

But it wouldn't have been so bad if you felt good about yourself. Though everyone wants you to be positive and have a healthy self-esteem; it all seem so fake to you. You had done things and still are doing things which you are not proud of. But such is life. Sometimes you feel at top of the world, sometimes Abyss is just not deep enough.

I am not trying to paint a gloomy picture of life here; but I think every normal person goes through such phase at least once in his life(and I may be wrong).So let's do what Geet (Kareena Kapoor) said in 'Jab We Met'.....BE YOUR FAVOURITE !!!

Let's root for ourselves, understand the basic fact that every single one of us is a Masterpiece of Legendary Painter named "Destiny". She took every pain to make us what we are today, sometimes added a few brushstrokes here, smudged a few stroke there to give this sterling Masterpiece to this world called 'YOU'. Did you ever found anyone just like you? Don't just go by the Canvas's rectangular shape; look deeper in the paint and brushstrokes.... this is Master's touch. An original piece, exclusive edition forever, only for YOU.

People will doubt you; but you’ll know better, after all you are your favourite :).

They might try to put you down, but you defend with passion of your soul, you are your favourite.

You will not feel good about the things you did and are doing, but you know these are the finishing touches of the painter that made you the masterpiece you are, you are your favourite.

You know future might not be the paradise; but you won't give up hope because you are your favourite.

You will respect everyone around you for the masterpieces they all are, but you will know you are special, you are your favourite.

You know with time everything will change and will go away; you won't because you are your favourite.

Stay Beautiful,

PS: Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all of you :)

Top 5 Bollywood Actors

2007-11-28T22:37:00.000+05:30

Presently:

Amitabh Bacchan
Black,Sarkar, Baghban ...need I say more ?

Pankaj Kapur
See Maqbool, Saher, Dus and Blue Umbrella to know what I mean.

Aamir Khan
Look for Aamir when he cries in DCH and RDB, any questions of anyone being a better actor
than him in his generation will be put to rest forever.

Irfan Khan
See Haasil, Metro and even a ridiculous Aan-men at work to see why all the critics go bonkers over his performance

Ajay Devgan
No one can match his ability to deliver one knock out performance after another with minimum fuss.Every shot in 'Gangajal' speaks volumes about what he is capable of.

All time greats:

Amitabh Bacchan
Since no one else in Bollywood can do what he did in 'Black, Aamir can ..but maybe 10 years from now

Sanjeev Kumar
Simply for the reason that he dared to play characters more than twice his age at the peak of his career and pulled it off

Smita Patil
Just to remind you that 'actor' is a gender neutral word

Aamir Khan
He is well on his way to top of this list by the time he finishes, the best we have seen in decades.

Hrithik Roshan
He could be our best export to Hollywood, he has got the face, the body and tell u what ...he can act !!!. He is the face of the future bollywood and that is a major reason why he is on this list.

Where are you ?

2007-11-24T11:18:00.000+05:30

Sometimes I feel that my life is going like as if I am standing on a roadside, doing nothing.People are passing me by, they all see me there..standing; some of them stop by just to chat up a little and then they start walking again, leaving me behind.Few of them stay a little longer and after a while decide to move away but they also stand on the roadside, so that I can see them, wave at them and share a few laughs if I want to.

End of the day, I am alone again waiting for someone who will stop, stand beside me and be there forever.The long lost friend, the companion of my sorrows and my happiness.The one who will listen to my musings amusingly and tell me stories.The one who will be there even when I'll be gone to keep my spot on the roadside, because I'll come there again,walking on that road to complete the circle of life.

Catch Ya Later !!

2007-11-07T18:58:00.000+05:30

Hey there..!!

It's me !! the guy you would be in 10 years from now ..... I am not gonna tell you what am doing for living , that will simply freak you out.

I just called you to give you some pointers(you as well might use'em):

1.Keep playing cricket...these lunchtime matches are something you are going to cherish forever.
2.Goldi & Prakash are indeed your best friends and they will be for a long time to come.
3.The way you read out from english text and do english commentary just for fun, will have a lasting impact on the person you will be 10 years from now.
4.Keep dreaming ...of being the commentator, Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid... philosopher... Remo fernandes .... just dream some more..they will be great help later.
5.You like that Arora girl a lot ... no matter what you believe or say right now :-).
6.Your board exams would be just fine ...but do all the problems Aggarwal Sir gave you.

Catch ya later.

2007-10-17T21:43:00.000+05:30

I did not loved her because it was right, I just loved her.

Knowing is always the easier part, saying it aloud is the tricky one.

-Nicholas Evans in "The Horse Whisperer"

Rendering Renditions

2007-09-27T22:57:00.000+05:30

Rendition is one of my favorite words; It doesn't means copying, it doesn't mean plagiarizing either;It doesn't mean imitating, it doesn't mean stealing either. When we talk of music; rendition is just another way of recreating an existing song from the composer's perspective. Just giving the song a little bit of his/her own soul.

You must have come across a lot of renditions yourself....remember "Leaving on a jet Plane" by John Denver? Who can forget the divine rendition of this song by "Peter, Paul & Mary". In fact because of THIS rendition the original song became famous.

What is it that makes renditions so appealing to us? I guess it is the opportunity of seeing our good old song in a new garb which is what catches our imagination. Apart from that, sometimes these renditions appeals to your own musical affinities. Personally speaking I think that though Bob Dylan's forever young is one of the most beautifully written song, I find the original cover a tad loud for my own taste, but the lyrics somehow more than makes up for itJ. Recently I just stumbled onto Joan Baez's rendition of the same song and Boy o Boy!! Wasn’t I glad to find it? I must have played it for at least 50 times on my laptop since then.

I also feel that renditions have a life and touch of their own. They sometimes make you feel the way which is so hard to explain; when the original songs fail to do so. Though, I must admit that all renditions are not so great. Just take the case of "Knocking on the heaven's door" by Bob Dylan (who BTW seems to be most 'renditioned' music artist).

There are countless renditions of this song; The Grateful Dead, Aerosmith, Bryan Ferry, Mark Knopfler, Wyclef Jean, Roger Waters, Givan Tichy, Eric Clapton, The Sisters of Mercy, Warren Zevon, Seether, Cold Chisel, U2, Television, Guided By Voices, Avril Lavigne, Daniel Lioneye, Bon Jovi, The Lost Dogs, Randy Crawford, Beau Jocques, Chaozz, Zé Ramalho (Brazil)(info courtsey wikipedia) just to name a few. There are bound to be some bad one's in there simply by the law of average.

Particularly I like a rendition when it strips a song of everything that was entirely unnecessary and all I get to listen is the bare essential of the song, its very soul. Well..Isn’t it something to look forward to!!!

Here is a list of renditions I like a lot, there are not many but I will try to append this list in future:

Peter, Paul & Mary (Leaving on a Jet Plane by John Denver)

Sheryl Crow (Sweet Child O' Mine by G'N'R)

Joan Baez (Forever Young by Bob Dylan)

Joan Baez (Blowin' in the Wind by Bob Dylan)

Avril Lavigne (Knokin' on Heaven' Doors by Bob Dylan)

Nirvana (Penneroyal Tea by Nirvana itself)

Time to go...

Stay Beautiful.
Amitabh

Wonder Years !!

2007-09-15T00:19:00.000+05:30

Amidst the hectic life I am living these days, I somehow try to catch an episode or two of Wonder Years which I have downloaded on my laptop. Not surprisingly I have become a huge fan of the show. I had only heard and read about this show earlier, was finally able to catch hold of it now, thanks to broadband internet connection!!

Wonder year seems to have a huge fan following and not undeservingly so. What I liked most about it that the main characters are hardly any heroic sort, you see an episode with a very familiar situation and you expect it to end it a certain way, but it doesn't. Nothing extraordinary happens and I end putting myself in Kevin's or Paul's(and sometime Winnie's too) shoes simply because it is so easy to relate to them. Can I pay a better compliment to the director of the show?

I like Kevin and Paul the most in the show, as their friendship is something which reminds me of my school days, they are just two people living one life, which happens only when one is kid.

Not to mention, Winnie Cooper is the most adorable 12 year old I have seen, so fragile and vulnerable and yet so divine, It's difficult not to fall in love with her. Though when I was in Seventh grade, I hardly thought of girls, I was too busy with my studies, friends and the next episode of Shaktimaan (Just kidding I am not that young ;-)). In fact I thought that this 'thing' is only for IDIOTS. I mean who had money for it. In 9th grade all we cared about is our endless supplies of Samosas & Jalebies and some other things unmentionable in public space. What a fool I was :-)

It’s hard to think about those days and not smile, somehow all the spanking and scolding we got when were kids is all forgotten and all we remember is something we all will cherish throughout our lives.

Running down the boulevards of life, though we hardly find time to catch our breath, we tend to slow down sometime when life permits us and take a look back; what we see at the far end of the road we travelled once is some initial darkness and then we see the growing years, learning years and even formatting years as they have labeled them . We shake ourselves a little and try to see them for what they actually were and it suddenly hits us, though we are all grown up that we always wanted to be and have all the money wads bulging out of our pockets we somehow feel a little pang in our heart for all the years that they were, the innocent, the untouched, the unblemished and peaceful years ;as they aptly call them, they truly were our wonder years. Though we know they will never come back, we’re simply glad that once they were ours and with a wry smile we keep moving on, it’s time to catch the bus to office :-).

When I look back I see many people I’ll always be glad of meeting. Here are some of the protagonists of my "Wonder Years”: (In no particular order)

Suman: My best buddy till 5th grade, he left for Rourkela and since then we never met.He was so fast in writing he always ended up doing my home work too :).

Rana: She was my classmate in Nursery and Kinder Garten, always came first ..a reason good enough for me to remember her and mention her name. By the way I never talked to her (atleast as far I can remember :-)).

Puja: I first got to know her in 2nd grade, remember the girl who will always do her homework in impossibly neat handwriting and also will come first in the class ??....that's her for me.

Ravi Joshi: The small guy who didn't voted for me in 6th grade student council's elections,I never forgave him for that, He was such a dear friend. I stopped talking to him till eternity.(Though we were bickering as usual again after 2 days)

Bharti: He was my friend from 2nd grade and saved me from a bully in 7th grade, I owe him my life for that.

Aashish, Aaditya: The 1st, 2nd rank holders in 6,7,8 . Why are they so important ? I was the only one who came within a striking distance of 10 marks to shake their throne.Gees din't I tried hard for that ?

Aaditya now works in my company and Aashish is currently in Bangalore.

Goldi, Prakash: I had a trio better than DCH(Dil Chahta Hai for the uninitiated) way before it was released.

Goldi is now untraceable and Prakash is in Indian Army these days.

Ekta, Rajni: 2 girls I absolutely adored at school. Why ? They always scored more marks than me. Simple.

There are quite a few notable omissions here, let me keep them inside the warm blankets of my memories.They don't seem to mind.

Stay Beautiful,
Amitabh

IAQs & As

2007-09-08T14:24:00.000+05:30

You must have seen FAQs(Frequently Asked Questions) in one place or the other.You also must have seen the Q&As published in glossy magazines -sort of a mini interview of celebrities.Well ..I thought what would I do if someone asked me such questions, and since I am no celebrity( I mean ..not yet ;-)) these questions would seldom be asked, they would be infrequently asked questions & answers(IAQs & As).

I completely agreee this is as self-indulgent as it gets but as they say ..what the HECK !!

Here I go :

Q1.You salivate when ..... ?

I see Katerina Kaif,Carmen Electra & Authentic Mughlai Food (In no particular order..)

Q2. You drool over .... ?

Intelligence, self-sufficiency and honesty and sometimes over Jessica Alba too ;-)

Q3.Life is....

Pointless

Q4.Friends are ...

neccessay evils

Q5.Love is ...

I am clueless about it.

Q6.War is ...

Occupation of perverts....

Q7.Music is...

To each his own

Q8.Books are...

my favourite escape from the real world.

Q9.Biggest threat to the world ...

Religion, Terrrorism and Global Warming(In that particular order)

Q10.You cringe when...

Someone is denied his freedom of expression by violent means.

People don't know what they are talking about.

I hear of any kind of religious violence, I feel like shooting all who did that.

Q11.You feel happy when...

I am reading a good book

I behave like a gentleman(happens very rarely)

Q12.What you want to be ??

Nothing that I am already not.

Enough of it now , even I am tired ....now it is your turn ..go ahead ...answer these IQAs for yourself.

Signing Off
Amitabh

White Flag-Dido

2007-07-26T11:06:00.000+05:30

Why does it happens that sometimes we listen to a song that we instantly identified with ....all the emotions and the feelings.It seems as if I were a lyricist I would have written exactly something like it.Seems like a leaf out of my own life, wonderful !! Isn't it ?I guess songs/books/poems are written for their own sake but maybe the commanality we all share make them universally appealing.

This is a song I found from a fellow blogger ( http://www.melodycalledlife.blogspot.com/ ).

So beautiful this song is ..I couldn't resist myself posting it.Dido Rocks ?? Indeed :-)

"White Flag"

I know you think that
I shouldn't still love you,
Or tell you that.
But if I didn't say it,
well I'd still have felt it
where's the sense in that?

I promise I'm not trying to make your life harder
Or return to where we were
I will go down with this ship
And I won't put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I'm in love and always will be

I know I left too much mess and destruction
to come back again
And I caused nothing but trouble
I understand if you can't talk to me again
And if you live by the rules of "it's over"
then I'm sure that that makes sense

I will go down with this ship
And I won't put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I'm in love and always will be
And when we meet
Which I'm sure we will
All that was thereWill be there still
I'll let it pass
And hold my tongue
And you will think
That I've moved on....

I will go down with this ship
And I won't put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I'm in love and always will be

I will go down with this ship
And I won't put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I'm in love and always will be...
- Dido

The sad demise of Sachin Tendulkar

2007-06-12T18:41:00.000+05:30

It is with great sorrow and sadness I have to tell you that Sachin Tendukar , Son of Ramesh Tendulkar , the heartthrob of millions, died yeseterday while he was playing with Bangladesh in the 2nd Test Match.Fittingly enough the last innings of the record century maker from India also was a century, though we will try not to deliberate how it was made.

He was not feeling well for quite sometime suffering from should-i-score-centuries-or play-cricket-for-the-team, and not unexpectedly failing on both the fronts.His last healthy appearance on the field was recorded when he was playing against West Indies in Malaysia in slog overs, doing what he does best to a mediocre bowling usually , teaching how not to bowl to him, which pretty much meant not bowling to him at all.

His last days have been thoroughly recorded as a real life case study of the ever interesting theme of "Death of a Genius".His last days was very much notable for the eagerness he showed for scoring centuries, and doing whatever it takes to achieve it which sometimes meant a kid growing up and learning how to say four letter words before Sachin reached to his coveted Hundred from "Nervous Ninties". There are some insane people around who are accusing him of playing a little defensive, now who can make them understand that it all depends upon team needs and the quality of bowling attack one is facing(Did someone just said it was Bangladesh or we had already scored three hundred runs for 1 wicket??).They are plain stupid people who expect him to score on every juicy half-volley or a spinner pitching the ball on half-pitch on a dead pitch.Shut Up you morons !!! If the game was so easy every Brayan Lara would have become Sachin Tendulkar.I mean you don't do easy things, do you ? You do complicated things and then give even more complicated explanation of such complicated doings if somebody bothers to ask.Yeah I know that is not cricket , but Whatever !!

Anyways this is just too much to be addressed in a obituary.Let me go ahead and tell you the cause of death so that we don't have to ask like a stupid in the funeral ...." What the hell happened " when everybody is trying so hard to decide the amount of glycerine to get the desired effect for such a socially important event.According to experts( just take my words for it, they are experts !! ), he died of ECS( Excessive-Caution-Syndrome) which got aggravated by "Make-my-place-secure- anxiety-attack" which normally succeeds an extended " I-have-got-only-5-Crore-worth- -commercial-this-year-complex" .

This world is harsh and harsher is the death of someone we love, but we have to learn to live without them and though we know it is going to be difficult, we all going to try to live wihout you.

Sachin, the one who hit the bowlers all over the park and the one whose batting was the elixir of our cricketing life(if there was such thing),

WE WILL MISS YOU !!

ADIEU !! May you rest in peace , forever.

Musings of a Melancholy Mind

2007-05-18T18:52:00.000+05:30

Life seems fairer in retrospect,than it actually is.

Dreams are there to make life more bearable.

Don't take yourself too seriously,you might become the only one to do so.

Friends let you sing, even if you are not the best singing bird in the woods.

Money is the greatest sedative in history of mankind.

Life becomes a lot easier with a God handy for cursing.

Being human is not an excuse for not being perfect.

Just Like That !

2007-03-06T18:19:00.000+05:30

Destiny (or simply put it, Life’s trajectory) is a strange thing. You never get to know the reasons for many things that happen to you, even when you seek them with intense ferocity. Utterly inappropriate as it is, still you can't help shrieking WHYYYY at such times.

Maybe the simple answer is ...there are no reasons for anything that happens to you, it happens because it has to and you become what you are because you have to. Maybe there is no answer too...leave alone the possibility of there being a simple one. And these questions, sought reasons remain orphans much to agony of the seekers of their answers.

Destiny, kismet, luck and what not is nothing but an idea which help to keep many people sane as they should be for the greater good.(I m not sure of 'should be'....but what the heck ? then I am also not sure of 'greater good' too).

There are other ideas too, Idea of GOD, of divine intervention, of Karma, of afterlife, of heaven, and of hell etc etc. Why do we believe in all of them even when none of them seems to have a tangible existence ? (I know these were not supposed to be tangible..but I ask just for the sake of it ).Nevertheless even intangible things have some kind of tangible or demonstrable proof of existence for example Gravity, Force and many other. Well my aim here is not to question the existence of such things(pardon me for saying so..'things' ? )I m only saying that even if we don't know the truth about GOD and many other ideas ...will the truth be any better ? Will the proof that God is non-existent make life of some people any better?(leaving some idiosyncratic atheists like me aside) Will this world would become any better place to live ?

Tell me how comforting it is for a person who lost his dear ones in Tsunami that it was nothing but a mere consequence of some rumbling at the bottom of the sea thousand miles away ?If you suggest this you might be called a heartless bast*** ,never mind the fact that it IS the truth anyways. But when somebody say that it is Mother nature's way of taking revenge from humans or It all because of God’s wish, the victim despite of his irreplaceable loss finally accept this as his 'FATE'. In the extreme situation(though not very rare) as a penance for something wrong he must have done in the past or some other life.

My understanding of this phenomenon remains at best cursory, but even I understand why people use these anodyne to comfort someone. Knowledge of truth does not necessarily make a person happier. So if that is not the case, these words of comforts are all that one would expect from his fellow human being and doing so is no felony.

Meanwhile LIFE keeps on running sometimes lazily, sometimes hastily and sometimes frantically on the zigzag tracks of its own without a bigger design, without much thought about where to go. Seekers of reasons and ultimate truth, sooner or later feel disillusioned in their hopeless pursuit and give up , those who refuse to give up, DIE.

And life goes on ,JUST LIKE THAT.

Master Pieces of Bollywood -I

2007-02-15T18:55:00.000+05:30

This is my first post in a series of posts I am planning about some hindi movies which are as they say "all the five stars" ...perfect in every way...they were the movies which swayed us beyond senses...these are the immortal classics created by our very own "Dream Merchants"..the Magnum Opuses of the Masters.....

In no particular order, irrespective of their commercial success they are movies to be watched again and again....

without any further ado.....here I go ..hope it includes some of your favourites too :-)

ANAND :
(Rajesh Khanna, Amitabh Bacchan .Directed by Hrishikesh Mukherjee)

If there could be an award for the movie which is a favorite for most number of people Hrishi Da’s Anand will have every chance of winning it. The story of a man suffering from “Lymphosacoma of Intestine” Anand was a tryly a joie de vivre- a celebration of life. Rajesh Khanna delivered in a “role of a lifetime”,never we felt so thankful to be alive as while watching Anand die onscreen. As all other Rishi da’s movies..Anand was a tale of simple people living a simple life of simple values.The surprise package of the movie being “Babu Moshai”(Amitabh Bacchan).Intense and in conflict he gave us an act so stellar we were all mesmerized, maybe he was just intending to hint at what was yet to come.

The Shakespearean conversation about Jindagi(life) being a Rangmanch(Stage) being played from a tape recorder still remain one of the most watchable scenes of Indian Cinema.
Rishikesh Da requested Salil Choudhary to compose music for Anand who at that time had gone back to Calcutta after getting disillusioned from Bollywood.He came and din’t he conquered? One has to really try hard to find a better album than Anand. Every single song went on to become an immortal classic. Manna Dey’s “Jindagi kaisi hai paheli” still haunts me even after listening to it first time around 15 years ago.

RANGEELA

(Aamir Khan,Jakie Shroff,Urmila Mantondkar. Directed by RGV)

Picture this, yellow shirt,yellow pants and shoes of unknown colour Munna wear this “Insignia” to take Mili out for a lunch to five star hotel.
Munna(to waiter):Aye Suit !! Fan on karne ka (turn on the fan)
Waiter(a little perplexed, a little haughty): AC is on Sir.(pointing his Finger towards the AC.
Munna(with the usual swagger) : To idhar ghumaane ka na !! (Turn it towards my side)

Munna the most loveable Tapori of Indian Cinema was a pathbreaking portayel of Mumbai’s Street Smart Species by Aamir Khan and what a memorable character it was.
You can watch this movie umpteen time and will never get bored of it.

Not to mention after Roja Bollywood saw a genius unraveling yet another musical masterpiece..let it be funky “Rangeela re”.or sensuous ‘Hai Rama’ or soulful pyar yeh jaane kaisa hai and the pathbreaking “mangta hai kya”…every single song was a gem and the album still remains a truly collector’s item from AR Rehman.

Urmila the “Maasoom” girl suddenly grew up and captured the imagination of ANYTHING MALE in the country. Ram Gopal Verma proved his versatility again….Aamir Khan never worked with him again.

Only God knows why.

Never Mind(Happy New Year)

2006-12-29T20:31:00.000+05:30

So another year is going to say our good bye to us and what a year it has been for me ,for you and maybe for the whole world(we say this thing every year and miraculously it sounds true every time ..ne' ?).

It was a year when this world saw the final verdict on Saddam Hussein (he is going to be executed soon, at some secret place) ,never mind George Bush & Osama are still alive(even Saddam too for that matter).

Another Booker prize came India's way, never mind me and many other like me still din't felt enthused enough to read the book.

Bollywood went berserk , delivering monster hits one-after another with great stuff like RDB,LRM and Omkara, never mind KANK and FANAA were also among these monster money churners(in fact among the top 4, if i m not wrong).

India Inc. saw a landmark year, with monster Mergers and Acquisitions(with 2007 expected to overshine even this ),never mind our great whole Indian IT story is still only the size of a General Motors Subsidiary or a little more than Warren Buffet gave away this year as charity(a whopping 37 Billion $ !!).

Indian government ,ran as usual, they planned ,left objected, they went with it anyways ,left still supports the government(that is If there is not a breaking news 'breaking' while I am writing it and you are reading it... ah!..I miss those 13 days governments and trust me so do these news channels)

This year we saw, prince’s struggle broadcasted live, Jessica lal got her long due justice, never mind there are still lacs of cases pending in the Indian courts.

On a personal note :

I got 4 haircuts in the whole year, never mind the later half of the year saw just one and that too in August!

I made 4 new friends this year (Isn't that a world record for a single year?),never mind I also lost one very dear one (Don't worry that person is very much alive).

This year I saw 3 new places (Bangalore, Pondicherry and Kodaikanal), never mind I went to home only for 4 days in the whole year!

This was the first year I paid Income Tax(Oh K.... it is my company which did that but on my behalf ),never mind I intend to be jobless very soon(Amen!!).

And this was indeed a long year, I saw many ups , many downs,....downers far outnumbering the cheers but it was the year when I again started seeing dreams(after a long time )....they will take time to realize ..but I know ..they will....they most certainly will !!!

Wishing you all a very happy New Year....
May you all remain healthy and keep increasing my blog hit count… ;-)

Stay Beautiful!!

What is Beauty ?

2006-10-26T20:06:00.000+05:30

When I realize while reading a book the reason why Author chose to write a sentence in this way and not some other.The order and the choice of certain words which he decided upon while writing to convey a certain meaning and not some other,and the fact that I got it; That is beauty.

When I see a guitarist performing on the stage, his head tilted down to see the fretboard ,his fingers moving faster and faster to reach other chord or node, he himself oblivious to the world around him leave alone the audience.When to him the whole world is reduced to his guitar.This picture of a man oblivious of the world,his head tilted, with a slightly bent knee to support the guitar; being in front of our eyes still in some other world.He might be a novice in his PR gimmicks so typical of rockstars, his other worldiness simply makes me gasp for breath.That is beauty.

When I sit on the stones beside the river in my hometown.I hear the sound of the flowing water, looking at the soothing green of the mountain forest in front of me.I can feel the coldness of the stones, an effect of being so near to the river and for so long.I look at the most beautiful blue of the sky and I shudder with my desire for somebody to be sitting beside me there at that very moment.It is neither the blue sky nor the soothing green of the forest, it is neither the clear water flowing beneath me and nor even that 'somebody', It is the plain and simple desire that I had at that moment..that is beauty.

The fact that everytime I try to grasp the meaning of beauty, decide upon something common between all the things beautiful,I fail miserably because I always find something,somebody beautiful in its own way ....that my dear friend is BEAUTY.

Stay Beautiful(I like orkut ;-) )

Munna Meets Mahatma

2006-09-13T19:37:00.000+05:30

"I'm back" says our Desi Arni aka sanju baba aka Munnabhaai & guess what ?? Circuit is there too to take us all on a "journey of a lifetime"(fitting, despite of being such a cliche).
Last Saturday ,I finally watched Lagey Raho Munnabhai (LRM) & I admit I was late in doing so.Reason being no time and no tickets on weekends so typical of Bangalore(in Munnabhai lingo ,"Timeich nahin tha apun ke paas aur uper se Ticket ka much much).Lucky as I always am(no pun intended),I got a ticket for the 10 PM show.I was a little concerned about getting back home at such late hour after the movie..but anything for Munnabhai :-)

Now something abt the movie : wonderful script,brilliant direction,outstanding performances(Circuit still rulz !!) and overall an honest effort to make a good movie.Is it better than Munnabhai MBBS ??..well I guess any such comparisons will be unfair.They both are different movies ..wonderful in their own ways.Nonetheless both are result of dedicated ,genuine and honest hard work.

When you work hard and honest, it shows and when you pay fashion designer and stylists you end up with KANK(Can't hold my disgust over that piece of crap any longer).2006 has been a good year for Bollywood.Both in terms of revenues and in terms of good movies(mind you,there is no correlation between the two).So far we have seen movies like RDB,Omkara,"Krissh"(no eyebrow raising here, please ;-) ).I am not counting FANAA and KANK ,because they were hit more because of the pre-release hoopla they generated and less because of their being any good .Both movies were crappy and dull like a silver fish in an old book.I mean how many times do we have to bear SRK stuttering to say 'Sh**' before we die with frustration ?

Now after leaving all this 'critique'(big word..nahin ?) behind and forgiving me for a digression let me tell you honestly & loudly,I loved LRM.We laughed at Circuit and Munna's evergreen repartee,paid attention to meaningful(beautiful too) words of the old Mahatma, felt morose with the old men's troubles of the old age,felt cheered up with them when Muna came to their rescue and before we knew ..the show was over.It was magic.Magic of simplicity, honesty and of a benevolent desire to tell us something we don't want to know.LRM is a good movie ,but what makes it a great movie is its attempt to reincarnate Gandhian values.Gandhi is 'KOOL' again.Munna is again the Mr.Fix-it-all,but this time no ghoda(gun), no connmanship and no lies, just the good ol' values of love and truth.

All the solutions to our problems are very simple and staight in the face, it is our refusal to see them that makes them so complex.In the words of Rishikesh Mukherjee,"It is so simple to be difficult,but it is so difficult to be simple". Baapu just reiterates this simple truth to us in LRM.LRM doesn't preaches, it just reopens the age old debate of Violence v/s non'violence.It does not passes any verdict rather it tells a sweet story of a gold-hearted goon dabbling with gandhian values. But you learn something along the way, atleast feel that Gandhi wasn't as outdated as we like to think.

So simple are these values, you commit a mistake ,say sorry and MEAN IT.Speak the truth ,it is the real shortcut to whatever you want.Be Honest.Isn't that something we already know.But it is the hardships of growing up that made us oblivious to the goodness(or badness) of these values.Take it easy and sab chalta hai is our attitude.I guess we learnt very fast and unlearn these simple things even faster.

Gandhi is not outdated.It's us who have chosen the seemingly easier and wrong path.It is our inablity to withstand against the corruption that is very in'dated' but it is leading us all to a precarious situation. Even I am feeling a little guilty while writing these lines.Am I any more true to Gandhian values than you ?? Well...my mortified conscience won't be able to answer this embarrasing question.Still the answer is out there ...blowing in the wind.But I suspect if anybody else is in better situation than me .We are all the same and that's such a pity.

Does LRM serves any higher purpose than making money for its producer and tickling some of our funny bones ?? Maybe yes ,maybe no..but if it stimulates you enough to even read or to know more about Gandhi and his ideology....Then I bet it does.

I have seen the movie...and now I m looking forward to read a book called 'My experiments with truth " by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.I am certain now ..it will be worth it.

stay beautiful !! [Orkut.com's signature ..but I guess I can use it without any copyright issues...
:-) ]

PS:
On a lighter note,Vidya Balan looks like a million bucks as always.I couldn't help feeling a little lost when she was onscreen.

Ah ! the same old inexplicable mystique of female beauty (...sigh...)

Sing Song

2006-09-11T18:51:00.000+05:30

Once upon a time, we used to sing a song ,
In the morning assembly, with the sound of a gong.

we hardly knew what it meant,and never did we care,
everybody sang it ,nobody was spared.

'Hail the motherland' it said, all that we knew.
nobody objected ,neither me nor you.

Some of us sang it,some simply stood,
we weren't bothered if it was for bad or for good.

when the assembly broke ,we ran for the game,
and again as usual we became all the same.

Nobody was applauded for the way he sang,
and everybody of us was just one simple gang.

I see it now ,we were such a fool,
That song wasn't a song but it was a tool.

it will tell us who love the country and how much is his love
and care not for a moment ,if it kills the white dove.

Travelling Thru'

2006-08-25T11:20:00.000+05:30

This is a beautiful song written,composed and performed by Dolly Parton as an Original Soundtrack for the Movie "Transamerica".In the movie it symbolizes the journey of a Transsexual going through a Gender change in more than singular ways.But if you keep aside the movie for a while, it won't take much to realize that there is something for everybody in this song.

It befuddles me to see Dolly Parton(An architypal dumb looking blonde..that too with cosmetic surgery done all over her face), and then read this song ,with such depths of meanings.How she managed to write something sooooooooo GOOD ?? Well..Maybe Agent Smith was right when he said "Appearances can be deceiving at times ,Mr.Anderson" in "Matrix Reloaded".Lemme shut up now and just read on....

Travellin' Thru:

Well I can't tell you where I'm going, I'm not sure of where I've been
But I know I must keep travelin' till my road comes to an end
I'm out here on my journey, trying to make the most of it
I'm a puzzle, I must figure out where all my pieces fit
Like a poor wayfaring stranger that they speak about in song
I'm just a weary pilgrim trying to find what feels like home
Where that is no one can tell me, am I doomed to ever roam
I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' on

Questions I have many, answers but a few
But we're here to learn, the spirit burns, to know the greater truth
We've all been crucified and they nailed Jesus to the tree
And when I'm born again, you're gonna see a change in me

God made me for a reason and nothing is in vain
Redemption comes in many shapes with many kinds of pain
Oh sweet Jesus if you're listening, keep me ever close to you
As I'm stumblin', tumblin', wonderin', as I'm travelin' thru

I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru
I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru

Oh sometimes the road is rugged, and it's hard to travel on
But holdin' to each other, we don't have to walk alone
When everything is broken, we can mend it if we try
We can make a world of difference, if we want to we can fly

Goodbye little children, goodnight you handsome men
Farewell to all you ladies and to all who knew me when
And I hope I'll see you down the road, you meant more than I knew
As I was travelin', travelin', travelin', travelin', travelin' thru

I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin'
Drifting like a floating boat and roaming like the wind
Oh give me some direction lord, let me lean on you
As I'm travelin', travelin', travelin', thru

I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru
I'm just travelin', travelin', travelin', I'm just travelin' thru

Like the poor wayfaring stranger that they speak about in song
I'm just a weary pilgrim trying to find my own way home
Oh sweet Jesus if you're out there, keep me ever close to you
As I'm travelin', travelin', travelin', as I'm travelin' thru

Education Ho !!

2006-08-03T19:13:00.000+05:30

British left us almost 60 years ago.They gave us a lot of things, some good, some bad.The red tape culture of bureaucracy was bad,using meritocracy to select a bureaucrates was good.Giving us a judicial system which will take years to punish the guilty was bad but which will make sure that an innocent is never punished was good.It might be queTheir intentions of giving it to us might be questionable but the benefits that we Indians have reaped out of it are undeniable.

If an organization is an auotomobile, communication is the neccessary lubricant to make the ride smooth.Because of a significant English-speaking population, India has this lubricant in plenty and hence proved as an ideal answer for big organization's ever increasing human resources needs.Here the Macauley's system of education gave Indians a crucial edge over any other developing country.Macauley wanted Indians to learn english so that they can be employed effectively in Indian affairs of British administration.He understood that communication will be a crucial factor in governing India.He never speculated about how this will affect India--after independence, for the simple reason that 'Independent India' was to him an impossibility.

Education is instrumental for an individual to gain wealth and respect in Indian society.This reason made our parents to give education of their children utmost priority(here i am counting only those parents who had the means and enough sense to think about their child's welfare).When most of the world was busy producing managers, artists, fashion designers, musicians etc.Indian were busy teaching their kids Maths, Science and English as they believed it is the only way to get a prosperous and stable future.Getting into an IIT is like a dream coming true to any Indian student even today.

We invested a lot in having many institutes with particular stress on science and engineering colleges .Now every year we see lakhs of engineers coming out in the market.Their quality is not so consistent but what matters is that they all have dreams in their eyes and will do almost anything to make them come true.And what may seem to the world an underpaid job, in India, it still is somebody's dream coming true.

And finally all this investment and plans are paying off in India becoming World Brain mine.Indians are now considered a talent pool that is as smart as their western counterpart, if not better and at the same times, is ridiculously cheap and speaks the language of the world. So if i am business man, it makes a lot of sense to hire and train Indians if it is feasible.

So.. where do go from here ? where lies the future ? My best guess would be to say 'some place nice' but ONLY IF we plan today and face the challenges that need our immediate attention.The picture is still not as rosy as we all would like to believe.The fact that 3/4 th of the professionals we produce every year are coming from only 1/4 of the total population indicates that there is still lot to be desired from the present situation.Until ,unless we work for a better educational infrastructure ,making education accessible to every section of the society, the dream of India Shining will remain only a mirage to us.The good news is that, if we stick to the fundamentals we can do it.They may vary a little here and a little there but following points broadly sums them up( i hope so ) :

1.Invest more in primary and secondary education , providing compulsory education to underprivileged classes should be priority.More participation will only increase quality and quantity of the human reasource.It will also provide the social equality that provides any economy the political stability it requires to bloom.

2.Start paying your teachers more, make teaching a lucrative profession as a teacher may decide finally the fate of hundreds of our children.

3.India's core strength lies in teaching their kids Science and Maths ,stick to it .This world will require far more engineers than we will be able to produce.Quality higher education and enough infrastructure to meet industry demands needs to be the call of the time.

4.Increase the focus and funding for the R&D projects going in industry and educational institutions.It won't be reaping immediate benefits but research projects of today becomes outrageously successful product or technology of tommorow ,so essential for any stable and booming economy.

5.Increase the industry-academia participation, it will be a symbiotic relationship beneficial for both.

I admit it is always easier said than done, but a blog can only help you in putting forth your opinion.Rest is upto the people who read it and who wrote it in the first place.If we want to do something we will always find a way.But BEING AWARE is the first step for any worthy cause and I feel elated to say that we have taken that one CRUCIAL step.

Aufwiedersehen!! ( Until we meet again in german)

Four Wedding and a Funeral

2006-07-26T11:58:00.000+05:30

Funerals are overwhelming affairs.Ironically ,it's at a funeral you are reminded so dearly of a loved one and not when he is alive and kicking.You realize the substantially reduced meaning of your life without him, you are caught off guard.It is at a funeral, you become aware of the fact that their are things in Life you can not control, no matter how badly you want it.You look back at your own life and find that doing something was invariably a better option than doing nothing and just wishing.The pointlessness of your daily life stands right in your face, while you are trying hard to overcome the unbearble grief.

Recently I saw 'Four Wedding and a Funeral'.A spectacular movie without a second thought.Short,sweet,heartfelt and certainly made by person who is an avid observer of people and life.See it and you will understand what I mean by that.The attention paid to little nuisance is clearly a work of a virtuoso.

Here is a scene in the movie, the 'mad old man' is dead and this is his eulolgy.A poem by W H Auden, rarely in a movie you see a sequence so heartfelt, you mourn along with the people on the screen:

Funeral Blues

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever; I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood,
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

W. H. Auden

2006-07-21T14:26:00.000+05:30

Life!!: An Article U shouldn't miss!

I Feel Good !!

2006-06-23T11:51:00.000+05:30

I rarely write anything upbeat on my blog. Most of my posts are either satirical or plain contemptuous commentary on the sad situation of the world and ppl as I see it .Let me break that monotony not just for the sake of it but because recently I came across something that made me optimistic about our future. Insignificant though it may seem to many, it is a crucial and pleasant developement .

I was leafing through the pages of Outlook magazine and I came across an article titled as Sudama’s Children (You may have to register online with OUTLOOK india though ,don't worry it is for free ... :-) )

Since now you are back to my blog after reading the whole article (if you haven’t …finish it first ,it’s worth it ),we can talk about how I felt about it.

Being brought up in Tanakpur (a far fetched place at Nepal Border in Uttaranchal, India), and after studying in government schools till my senior secondary education, I can’t help having a feeling of kinship with these children. After my intermediate examination I went to Delhi to prepare for IIT-JEE and got admission in a prominent coaching institute. So Barely 2 months after passing 12th exams from a small town I was sharing class room with people from country’s most reputed schools, (most of them being from DPS RK Puram and Ranchi,Bokaro and all the St.XYZ in Delhi).It was difficult at first and at the same time confusing .As if preparing for JEE alone wasn’t daunting enough, I suddenly found myself amongst these people having an IQ >200 and talking in a language which I I initially thought as French. Thankfully, only thing that was needed to garner respect in the class was one’s proficiency in Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics which I had in sufficient supply. Still I had felt so many times like an absolute dork whenever I have to clarify a doubt in the class because of my unease with English as a medium of communication.

Somehow I survived through that period of my life and got admission to a decent engineering college (after bidding adieu to all my dreams of being an IITian). And again I found myself pitted against that convent educated junta that I always found so unbearable. This time around, I knew my Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics won’t help me and finally I took refuge in the protection of a language I hated for so long.( That hatred was nothing but my anger at my insufficiency at the language ).I did that only to survive, and now I am glad to tell you that I did.

The problem with Indian mindset is that we still associate English with the elites (after all it was once our rulers’ language). One’s social status (or ‘kool’ ness or ‘hip’ factor) is still largely decided by his proficiency in the language. In fact, without English your chances of success are very limited in conventional professions (engineering, medicine, banking and many more).Even top Hindi movie actors today prefer to speak English most of the time. I am not an anti-English activist and I know that much of Indian economic success owes itself to the large section of English speaking population we have in India. I am only saying that English is a MUST to be successful in India and more so if your father was not exactly a rich man. This is a bitter truth that most people in India are aware of, consciously or unconsciously.

All these elite schools are there to take advantage of this fact. English as a medium of instruction is used to increase one’s ease and proficiency of the language. Speaking in English in mandatory in many schools and use of regional language in most such school is a punishable offence. They have the support of the elite class of the society who believe that the school of their kids determines their social status and hence are willing to pay handsome amount of money to achieve that. Most of these schools charge monthly fee more than the monthly income of a common man. These schools no doubt provide quality education to all their students, only problem being they are out of reach of an ordinary Indian.

Government initiative to make quality education less elitist and more inclusive is welcome in all senses. It’s really difficult not to feel euphoric on seeing little kids splashing in swimming pool and realizing simultaneously that finally we are able to see a classroom without having classes of its own. Had it not been for the Government’s initiative, some of these kids would never have got the chance even to see a swimming pool, leave aside the possibility of being in one.

I know it’s too early to become hopeful, I know it’s too naïve to believe every word of this news item as it is , but I know for sure that this thing is for the good of society and its many less fortunate members. This is the ray of hope at the end of the tunnel and I am sure there is light there. Education is the power of new world order and quality education equips you to fight your own battle against injustice and misfortune.The more access the people will have, the better our future will be.

I also know it won’t be easy to overcome the biases of the elites about the poor, I know it will be difficult for some of these kids to cope and compete, but I also know that a chance of seeing them coming out from the purgatory of poverty is worth it all. They know it or will realize it soon.

This gives me hope of better and more equal society, again I know I am being naive in saying so.Nevertheless I feel this ephemeral naivity with hope is far better than the hopeless cynicism that I normally dwell into.

Hope, they say is a strange thing, it doesn’t cost you anything but worth a fortune. It is not the society with most money that will survive; rather it will be the one with HOPE, however little it may be. Period.

Being Amitabh

2006-06-13T11:41:00.000+05:30

My name evokes seemingly unforeseen but actually very similar responses.Infact i have come to the conclusion that similarity of responses to my name prove the utopian belief that we all are basically the same.The word Amitabh has been imprinted on Indian mind along with the indelible 6 feet image of Mr.Bachchan.So anybody with the same nemesis and barely 5 feet 6 inches tall invariably transalates into disappointment.They all try, very hard to cover it, but end up being more obvious than usual.Unsettled as they are,most of them end up mumbling somthing about Mr Bachchan, as if i m not aware of the STRANGE coincidence !!

Sample this one (a very normal response..47.94 PERCENT !! of the ppl i meet for the first time have said that...yes i make sure to keep a count every time i meet a new person.Didn't I tell u that ? ) :

NEW GUY/GAL :"AMITABH".......bacchan ?? huh !!
Me(saying): "I'd love it to be ..but unfortunately it's YADAV...AMITABH YADAV."
Me (thinking):Darn right !!.Ah..finally somebody recognized the REAL me.You know, it's just that these days i m shooting for Latest RGV production which is psycho-quasi-comic-romantic-horrer thriller where i m playing a character one-third my age and what you are seeing in front is nothing but special effects to make me look like this.Don't you want an Autograph or something ?? huh ?

Sample Another(constitute 23.86 perccent of the total respondants):

NEW GUY(only guys no gals): "Jaya bhabhi kitthe hain ??"(Where is Jaya ?)
Me(Saying):"Kash Hoti"(i only wish)....(with a deep sigh to give it the desired effect).
Me(Thinking):Where else she will go ? Cooking Aloo Paranthas for me at home.Won't u join us for dinner ? Abhishek is dying to meet you.

There are many other reactions but i will spare you and me both from the agony of going through them all.

Until we meet next.

PS:Contrary to the popular perception, I like my name very much.

Why Reservation is Right ?

2006-06-01T17:26:00.000+05:30

Because constitution is a pact which we all agreed upon .It is not a document of convenience as we all may like to believe.Sometimes a section of the society may have to suffer for the greater good of the country.Reservation is a tool of achieving social equality clearly mentioned in the constitution.
Because the idea of utopian society without caste,creed and religion based biases is only wishful thinking.For a complex society like India, caste is a fundamental reality and reservation has been the most effective of the tools to counter inequality in eduaction and employment.Crying out loud about " perpetauating casteism ' may sound appealing but fact is that caste system is an integral part of Indian society like it or not.Just try to tell your mother that you are seeing a SC boy/girl to underastand the basic reality.
Nevertheless, integrating economic status with caste system will make this system more effective.
Because the belief that merit is a monopoly of certain elites is false. It somehow smells the same as Hitler's Aryan's race concept.The fear of diluting the merit or exellence will be alleviated by the example of Tamilnadu state where reservation for OBCs is their in place for some 10-15 yrs.The only dilution seems to be in the upper caste contribution to the toppers in public exams, merit and the average marks obtained by an student has remained very stable so far despite of reservation.
Because the most ridiculous gesture to your own ideology is comparing the anti-reservation movemnt to RDB (Rang De Basanti ) effect.The moment you say it , the seriousness of the issue is tossed to a dustbin.A sensitive issue like this deserves a serious debate which seems to be the only absentee so far.
Because holistic development of any society depends upon its education sytem.An education system becoming more inclusive of all the segments of the society ( because of reservation) will only help and not derail the progress of Indian society as we like to believe.
Because a child obtaining 40-50 % marks without any facilities(like tutions, convent school environment, access to quality education practices ) is atleast as intelligent as a child scoring 80-90 % with all these facilities at his service.Merit in exams alone can never be a true measure of intelligence.A doctor without compassion and will to serve will never be a good doctor even if he is a topper from AIIMS.

7 Things to do to be INDIA SHINING

2006-05-23T11:13:00.001+05:30

Invest more on higher education while making sure that more ppl have the opportunity to do so.
Pay your teachers more ,if right talent is attracted to teaching profession the country will never become short of skilled people.
We have to do more about the abysmal research situation of this country.Economy sustain for a long time only on improved product quality and increased customer satisfaction achieved by focussed R & D.Manufacturing quality product also provide employment to millions of uneducated workers .These employes workers will create a new market when they will spend the money they earned thereby generating more revenue and more jobs.
Do something about the sad situation of infrastructure especially power sector.Try to reduce dependency on middle east countries like Saudi arabia and Iran.For that we need to find alternative resources of energy and fully tap their potential.
Do something abt the basic living condition of the coutry.If half of the population doesn't have access to clean drinking water ,trust me dreaming abt becoming a superpower is nothing but an exercise in futility.
No need for all the communal tension at this time , religion can take a backseat for the moment and that will only do good for the country .
Keep strengthening the family bonds as u will need some support while racing to the top.

India Shining ? You Bet !

2006-05-08T15:43:00.000+05:30

Brothers are shooting brothers......

People are being burnt alive .

Despite of all this Sensex is touching new peaks day after day and as they say India is still shining.I personally feel that sensex has a penchant for heightening the irony of the situation.Last time it was touching new peaks everyday , India was hit with Tsunami --the worst natural disaster that we ever faced.One thing is for sure - sensex has nothing to do with the prsoperity of the country .So those who always make haste in going gung-ho about how a new sensex peak means stronger or wealthier India should come out from their self-created virtual reality .They should try to rub their eyes hard.. and try to realize that this country is not a picture of heaven they believe it is.Let me try to put all these abhorring nonetheless real things in a perspective one by one.

Prominent BJP leader Pramod Mahajan was shot recently by his very own brother.Now his soul is resting in peace after almost a 12 days struggle against death.I refuse to buy the story of his angry brother shooting him only because he used to scold him a lot.And when a person(Pravin Mahajan) have a whole family behind him than it only adds to the increduality of the situation.He must be hallucinating something at the time he shot his brother.Definitely there is more here than what is meeting the eyes.Maybe some uglier facet of politics( how more disgusting will it get from here) which is still uncovered.And now be prepare for all that drama that comes with anybody's death.Now ppl will claim that Pramod Mahajan was the one stalwart of the politics that we all are going to miss.They will also discuss the possibility of him becoming a PM one day ( How ridiculous ! ). But the truth remains that since sometime he was losing his grip in his OWN party BJP let alone Indian politics.But for the time being let the bygones be bygones and may his soul remain in peace.And meanwhile let our India shine....

Right at this moment when i m writing these lines, people in Vadodara,Gujrat are living in the hope that the nightmarish events they are going through, will get over very soon.I read the news of a Muslim youth being burnt alive in his Tata Sierra by a mob of 2000 people. His fault ? well..to start with he wasn't a hindu and at the same time a muslim.He was also foolish enough to believe that no matter what... the city is of Humans.He forgot that religious fanaticism turns humans into a cannibalistic creature which doesn't have a face .He forgot that in the times of riots, 'might is right'.Whenever people's so called 'religious sentiments' got hurt they automatically get a license to kill, to burn, to rape, and to loot.These licenses are issued by some bastards(pardon me for cursing but nothing else was more appropriate) who know that vote banks are built on the blind rage of the mad crowd.And than these same bastards will give a formal statement which is nothing but some politically correct mumbo-jumbo which no body means and nobody believes.But it is recorded on the paper, and it is the only thing that will matter one day, if somebody approaches the courts.You might feel that what i m saying is a little exaggerated only for the purpose of making it more interesting, more readable.Maybe u are right or maybe u are simply wrong.Let's dwell on it some other time.And meanwhile let our India shine.

And did i forgot to tell u that Sensex recently crossed the "historical landmark " at 12000 points ???....great going isn't it ??

Let Peace Prevail !!

2006-05-04T18:07:00.000+05:30

The word 'Taliban' makes me sick to my stomach .How in the hell these barbarians are alive in this modern world ? George Bush should try his hands at acting because that's all he is good at. Running a country is just not his kinda job let alone trying to be a 'crusader of peace'.What he did after 9/11 was a job half-done that had not made much impact on terrorism.And now we are seeing the consequences of a job half-done.

Last week Taliban held Suryakant-an Indian and threatened to kill him if all the indian will not leave Afganistan. They did killed Suryakant and what we did ? I think the latest 'breaking news' i got is that they trying to identify the dead body. pardon me if i m not so updated with the so many 'breaking news' breaking simultaneously.

The problem is why these reckless hooligans are able to do anything they and get away with it. Who funds them ? Who provide them ammunition and all other things they require to execute their plans ? Since they HAVE all these things, they are able to do what they are doing.The truth remains that their are people in this world who seems to be as normal as us are secretley supporting them.Why ? The answers is Religious Fanaticism.

In the coming time this politics of religion will again overtake this world as it has done successfully in the past.I m no prophet but anybody can see that the more somebody try to supress it more it grows.It's a vicious circle. You condemn them ..try to supress them ..they feel they are being unduly supressed because of their religion ...some idiots are always there to fan this fire more..and again they do something as an act of revenge ..and again u try to supress them.Circle complete.

It is never going to end until we see the light and realize that religion is a very personal thing.It is meant for individual's communion with God(though i m an atheist,let me assume i know the basics).All these religious institutions serves no purpose and mean nothing if all they do is nurture hatred for other relgions and their followers.

Education should be our religion and schools our temples( or church,mosque etc).They will give us a better understanding of things and nobody will ever be successful in misguiding us .We all will become our own guide.

But Alas !! It remains nothing but a wishful thinking .People of this world have this great inclination of attaching so much undue importance to something as inconsequential as religion.Hope to see a world as John Lennon imagined before i leave for my heavnely abode [ as i would like to believe ;-) ]:

Imagine there's no countries

It isn't hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion too

Imagine all the people

Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one

I hope someday you'll join us

And the world will be as one .

-John Lennon

Till next post ....just hope that peace will prevail if not today maybe one day.

chao !!!

6 Ways to Improve Hindi Movies :

2006-04-17T16:49:00.000+05:30

1. for chrissake !! read the script atleast once before making a movie.(how else can u justify ,Kyun ki, Saawan, Shaadi se pahle etc etc .)

2. Give Mallika sherawat her due ..on any given day she is a better actor than likes of Kareena and Esha who gets roles because of their MOMS.She definitely deserves better scripts.

3. Some movies are flop from the time u see their promos..don't allow to release them..I hope everybody knew that Saawan-the love season and any aaftab shivdaasani starer is going to get flop anyways.

4. We can always do with minus 2 songs per movie.

5. Amitabh Bachhan is a powerhouse of talent ...use him only for meaningful pupose like Black or Sarkar.Movies like Lakshaya are a disrespect to his talent .

6. Shahraukh Khan should only be directed by karan johar and aaditya chopra and that too only in 'out and out' romatic roles.No more attempts for change of image ..i mean don't u think it is little too late for that ?

2006-04-11T14:03:00.000+05:30

I have often told you stories
About the way
I lived the life of a drifter
Waiting for the day
When I’d take your hand
And sing you songs
Then maybe you would say
Come lay with me love me
And I would surely stay

But I feel I’m growing older
And the songs that I have sung
Echo in the distance
Like the sound
Of a windmill goin’ ’round
I guess I’ll always be
A soldier of fortune

Many times I’ve been a traveller
I looked for something new
In days of old
When nights were cold
I wandered without you
But those days I thougt my eyes
Had seen you standing near
Though blindness is confusing
It shows that you’re not here

Now I feel I’m growing older
And the songs that I have sung
Echo in the distance
Like the sound
Of a windmill goin’ ’round
I guess I’ll always be
A soldier of fortune
Yes, I can hear the sound
Of a windmill goin’ ’round
I guess I’ll always be
A soldier of fortune

-Deep Purple

2006-03-28T17:11:00.000+05:30

It was never about the Candy

Why it happens that most ppl grow old in the manner they never wanted to ? I believe that everybody of us has hated at some point or other,our elders for being so mean or rude or selfish or just strict(reason is inconsequential here) as a little child .We all swore that when we will grow up we will be the one person who will treat everybody nicely and in a just manner.(again what we meant by justice is of no significance).We all believed and did what our moral science teacher taught us .For sure we all tried hard to achieve those noble standards atleast once before most of us failed to do so and stopped trying.We all realized(or believed) while growing up that a good guy rarely wins the race and most of the times its a bad guy who by hook or crook takes the winning cup.These moments of glory for the bad guy were our moments of disillusionment from the moral values of being honest, speaking truth, working hard and wishing well for others.Let me try to explain it in terms of what we all liked once a lot " a candy".

A candy means a lot to a child ,sometimes a world.He likes it a lot and is willing to do almost anything to get it. In my childhood days if you had beahaved yourself there was a fair chance of u getting a candy .So I tried to do good and 'behaved' and if i succeed i get a candy ,simple enough .My best effort was enough to get the candy .The moral lessons and all the 'do right' preaching was important to me as long as i get my candy.

With time this candy is replaced by some other things which becomes important to us through the passage of time.Since these things are not as trivial as a candy therefore sometimes we end up not getting this 'new candy' despite of our best efforts.Frustration follows.. and we can not help feeling that this world is not governed by these simple rules of morality but a little cheating ,manipulation ,deceit ,chicanery ,bootlicking and God knows what, is also required to get our "candy" apart from a little stroke of luck.

Since it was always about the candy, we throw these moral values in a dustbin and set out to get it(the candy) with everything that is required(good or bad) in our bags and fight the battle again to get our candy and sometimes we get what we wanted .But we lose so many things along the way .We don't believe in good anymore .We suspect almost everybody around us of being same culprit that we ourselves are.We lose faith in the innate goodness of human being .We start seeing only the bad things in people and most importantly we forget that life is indeed beautiful.What we see around us is nothing but a mere reflection of ourselves.

Now u say : Hey !! now i have my candy but still i m not happy .Is something wrong ?

Actually there is ,if u haven't realized by now then let me tell you --it was never about candy ,dear !! The candy was there to give u a motivation so that u will do right things.Candy was there to train u to do right same as a ringmaster use meat chunks to train tigers.

Have u ever wondered why it feels so good when we help somebody or speak the truth in face of difficult situation.Our ancestors always knew that the source of any feeling is always there-- up in your head .If u don't have guilty u will always be happy and when we do so called "right things"-- take it or not, u do feel happy. You were supposed to realize the meaninglessness of candy on your own but u didn't .That finally made u the person u never wanted to be in first place when u were a child.

So Dear friend !! Doing right is the right thing because ,It was never about the candy.

2006-02-20T14:34:00.000+05:30

A Suitable Boy : Review

Published in 1993, written by an internationally acclaimed author Vikram Seth, 'A suitable Boy' is unconventional in many ways. First and foremost being its length, it has roughly 1350 pages and nothing short of a tome. Other factors being ,a preface written in verse, verses used for chapter titles in the index, the family trees( given to facilitate understanding for those poor people who can never understand that how a nephew's niece is related to the uncle's cousin, which are quite simple for us Indians) and these are just to quote a few.

The book starts with the marriage of Savita Mehra in 1951 to a English Lecturer Pran Kapoor. Lata is the younger sister of Savita and since Savita is now married, it is high time now to find a suitable boy for Lata. The whole book revolves around this one liner plot. Seems quite unexciting...huh !! wait ! haven’t we overlooked something ? It is 1951, a time when a nation had general election for the first time under its own constitution, a time when the scars of partition were still not completely healed, a time when the rosy dreams of Independent India were withering away and most importantly a time when some Indian felt for the first time that British India was not that Bad. Just like Salman Rushdie's "Midnight Children" the time period in this book is highly significant. Set mainly in the north of India, this book is a definitive guide to the Indian culture and values for anybody who is curious about it. For those who are already aware of them, it is a journey back down the forgotten memory lanes.

Vikram Seth takes you through a pan-Indian journey (as he himself termed it in the book) in the search of a Suitable boy for Lata. On the journey you meet many people, some suitable, some not, but all carved out with such a rare finesse that they almost seem at a touchable distance from you. The amazing storyteller that he is, he also commands a deep understanding of human psychology and emotions. His characters are real, made up of flesh and blood. It seems as if you are reading about your neighbor next door. He strictly adheres to the old rule of storytelling that great stories are simple stories. And with this simplicity he dwells into the minds of his characters, which makes them so special. He is an amazing researcher and you can see that in the amount of detail he provides about a shoe cobbler, lawyer, judges, shoe trader, politician, courtesan, Calcutta socialite, Godman, mathematician and what not. His hard work pays off in the consistency of all of his characters.

This book is about Lata's dreams, her Mother's expectations, Maan's (Pran's brother) escapades, Savita's love for unattractive but understanding Pran, Kabeer and Amit's unfulfilled desires(two 'suitable' boys), Pran's struggles with his disease and college politics , Indian politics and about its perception through a common man’s eye and many other innumerable characters. But most importantly it is about a journey of Lata from being a girl to becoming a woman. She changes partly because of the circumstances around her but mainly because of discovery of her true self along the journey.

This book never preaches anything but teaches you so many other things. It is actually a love story in a very unconventional sense. It rarely talks about the fairy tales; rather it talks about the unpleasant things happening around. We never want to discuss about these things when we are in love but nevertheless they all have their own undeniable significance. It talks about a love that grows slowly and steadily, the one kind which is good enough to be true, the one kind we all wish to have one day in our life. This unusual romanticism gives the book a universal appeal, which is a hallmark of a timeless classic.

Words are only used as a means of storytelling and are not an end in themselves. You keep on reading this book seeing the unread pages thinning away day by day and before you realize, Lata is finally married and leaving for her own home saying farewell to her mother and maybe to you also. You close the book and wonder to yourself "Was it me who just completed this 1350 page book?" and somewhere deep in his subconscious, Mr. Seth smiles and says "thank you my dear. Thank you very much."

2006-02-13T12:31:00.000+05:30

I'd rather be a Cowboy:John Denver

Music is music because of some individuals,those who had been gifted and motivated enough to contribute their genius to give us all a song, that we all can hum whenever we feel like.The simpler the song the better it is.Contrary to the popular belief i have always been of the opinion that good music does not require much except a sweet melody and meaningful lyrics.All these mixing,techno,remix and electronica stuff only makes it more unpleasant(i Admit ,exceptions are always there,no offence to Rahman fans ..i m also one).But if "soothing melody and beautiful lyrics" seems like your idea of music then John Denver's music and you, are made for each other.

"John Denver (December 31, 1943 – October 12, 1997), born Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr., was an American singer-songwriter and musician who was one of the biggest selling artists of the 1970s.
Denver's songs were suffused with a deep and abiding kinship with the natural world. Songs such as "Take Me Home, Country Roads", "Leaving on a Jet Plane", and "Rocky Mountain High" are popular all over the world. His songs are characterised by sweet melodies, elegant guitar-strumming, and his soulful rendition of the lyrics." (source: wikipedia)

His musical journey started when his grandmother gifted him with a 1910 Gibson guitar.Soon he found himself playing in local clubs simultaneously attending Texas Technical University.Here he also adopted the surname "denver" after his favourite city.He dropped out of college in 1964 and went to Los Angeles,California to join a folk group Chad Mitchell trio but didn't stay long with it.He left it in 1969 to pursue a solo career and released his first LP "Rhymes and Reasons".It wasn't a great hit but it had the famous song "leaving on a jet plane", his first claim to fame.His first real big break came with the second album "Poems,Prayers and Promises" which contained the cult song "country roads ,take me home" which made him a household name in America. After that he kept on delivering one bestselling albums after another. At the end of his career his tally was an astonishing 14 gold and 8 platinum albums .According to Sony records he is one of the five top selling artists in the history of the music industry.

John always fought hard for environmentals issues and his natives will always remember him for what he did for them apart from millions other fans.He died in a tragic plane crash in 1997.As he promised "he indeed left us on a jet plane" .

Artist : John Denver
USP: Country Rock artist , guitar based melodious songs with beautiful lyrics.
Some Famous Songs: Leaving on a jet plane,
Take me home ,Country Roads,
Annie's Song,
I'd rather be a cowboy,
Sunshine on my Shoulders,
I'm Sorry,
Thank God I'm a Country Boy,
Rockey Mountain High,
Different Directions (My favourite !!! though not that famous)

2006-01-25T18:30:00.000+05:30

The Great Indian Software Industry Show

A quarter of a cabin, with a personal computer, a ergonomically designed furniture which includes a revolving chair,a table with a cupboard( meant to keep documents in properly arranged fashion ) ,no life and height of boredom, not exactly cubicle in shape ; is how i would describe my office cubicle .

Sitting there i realize how a young, bubbly soul turns gradually into a jombie.A nerdy creature which is known better in societal parlance as software professional.
I understand that by being born in poor country like India, i made myself disadvantaged to people who lived in a rich country.I will do the same and sometimes better work than them but still i'll be paid less since the wretched cost of living index of a country decides my pay packet. I sometimes wonder about my middle class values of hardwork and sincerity.These
are the values that all these software companies thrives upon.As a paid labour ,i m entitled to fair working hours.But since i have been tought right from my childhood that to be successful , i need to work hard ,harder then the most of the ppl arnd me; i work ,work like an idiot,at times like a dog.But what is end result of this taxing endeavour ?? My project leader delievers a project to a company owned by the rich of the world (most likely some MNC) ,within deadlines ,surpassing all the quality standards and the customer is happy.My Project manager pats me on my back,says something complimentary to me (which at times may be accompanied by some meagre monetary appraisals) and hands me over another project.Since by then i m little rejuvenated and little less tired,partly because of rest that i have been bestowed with recently and becasue of PL's pats on my back(Afterall it's not everyday tht ur PL says nice things abt u);i start working with a renewed enthusiam in a hope that all i need to achieve immortality is sincerity and hard work.Needless to say i feel highly disllusioned not before long.

Indian software companies thrives on their least cost philosophy.They offers such an irresitible prices to their customer that, had size and risk factor of a project won't have to be taken into account they will land up with almost all the software projects under the Sun.The only reason that they can offer such prices is the cheap labour they have at their armlength.The wage differential between indian companies and other companies is a very important factor in tilting the decision in their(indian companies) favour.But the question remains ,who ultimately pays the price for this bargain ? who else but the poor fellow who writes the code.He work under the pressure of ridiculously tight deadlines and as a result ends up working for inhumanely long hours.The plight of the situation is that he rarely gets anything more then peanuts for his
efforts when compared to the profit his company generates because of it.His personal life suffers tremendously and all he can hope from the situation that one day this will change which in the normal course of things rarely happens.

This is the story of almost every software engineer working in India.I can not help but seeing similarities between this system and the old slavery tradition.
Earlier a slave used to work hard in a vain hope that one day when his master will be happy of him ,he will set him free.A slave wanted a happy end to his otherwise tragic story.
These days a programmer works hard in a hope that one day he will stop coding and will be told to take some managerial responsibilities and his gloomy days as a programmer will be put to an end.

Seems like the business has only grown bigger in terms of number of people and amount of moneyinvolved.The basics, however remain the same-- the one who has the money uses the people who don't have it to have some more money in his wallet.Who cares for the penniless afterall !! But since these are the days of democracy ,perks and paypackets are provided, unlike the slaves but just sufficient enough to keep the mouths of people shut.(Money, however little it may be; has been the greatest sedative afterall from the start of human civilization).

And the Great Indian Software Industry show goes on.

2006-01-24T18:12:00.000+05:30

Something Nice

God is crazy about you.

He sends you flowers every spring and a sunrise every morning.

Whenever you want to talk, He'll listen.

He could have lived anywhere in the universe, but He chose your heart.

( and though i m an atheist still i liked the very thought )

2006-01-20T16:53:00.000+05:30

Who will cry for the little boy

This is one of many silver screen moments i truly relished..
It's honest ..at the same time poetic..
How he managed to pull it off .. i still remain clueless..
In the movie Antwone Fisher(based on a true story) directed by Denzel Washington.
Antwone ( who never had any parents) recites a poem to his psychiatrist.
Maybe text doesn't have that effect compared to moving images but still the poem is beautiful and pain striken...

Who will cry for the little boy, lost and all alone
Who will cry for the little boy, abandoned without his own

Who will cry for the little boy, he cried himself to sleep
Who will cry for the little boy, who never had it for keeps

Who will cry for the little boy, who walked on burning sands
Who will cry for the little boy, the boy inside a man

Who will cry for the little boy, who knew well hurt and pain
Who will cry for the little boy, who died and died again

Who will cry for the little boy, a good boy he tried to be
Who will cry for the little boy, who cries inside of me

2006-01-04T13:27:00.000+05:30

Cry of a guitar

when i see skeletons,those who are living;
when i see dead,those who are walking;
when i see people living who do not have soul;
when i see a heart with nothing in it but a hole;

Then my guitar cries.....

people die because they have to;
people live because they are supposed to;
soldiers kill because they have to
innocents die because they are supposed to
but when somebody looks st the sky
with tears in eyes

Then my guitar cries....

but how does it matter
and why should u care..
after all you are what you are ..
and it is nothing but
..........just a cry of a guitar..

2005-11-24T12:45:00.000+05:30

ILP at Trivandrum

Everybody has to agree upon atleast one thing if not many ,that ILP at trivandrum is an experience which is meant to be treasured for life.You meet ppl from almost every part of India and sometimes if u r lucky even ppl from outside India.
I do not know much to comment upon what TCS offers to their employees which is unique from other companies since i m very new to this organization.But i do not think any other organization in India can match the experience that ILP at trivandrum provides to the participants.
ILP TVM teaches u many things apart from the class room teaching.It teaches u that life will always be what u want it to be. If u want to see the lack of resources , lack of metropolitan atmosphere at trivandrum , the feeling of being at the corner of the country and not at the centre etc etc, u will see them all . But if u want to see the beauty ,u will realize that to beat the kovalam beach in its serenity, freshness u will have to go Heaven, u will realize that it is possible to integrate and balance technology with the natural beauty as it has been achieved in the technopark, u will also realize that it's possible to see the Sun coming out of its sleep from the Sea (Daily Visual Hallucination at kanyakumari in the morning or evening.I felt i must be imagining things when i saw the Sun coming out of the Sea in Kanyakumari.The reputation of Kanyakumari' sunset/rise is well earned) and most of all u will realize that everybody in this world has to move in order to build their destiny but they require the right start and attitude and ILP TVM does a lot good in instilling that in every participant bloodveins.

2005-11-24T12:37:00.000+05:30

My only regret in this life is that i have never been able to be intelligent or fashion designer enough to be a gay.I can't help falling only for Women.

2005-11-02T15:57:00.000+05:30

HUMANS, different on the surface, essentially the same.

2005-10-31T17:30:00.000+05:30

CREATIVITY

A mere combination of 7 notes can result in a thing so magnificent and boundless as Music is hard to believe .For ages, people conributed to the overwhelmingly huge collection of various combinations of these 7 notes .Just to realize that all the varieties of music that in the world is nothing but mere arrangement of these 7 notes in different fashion(probably the most iodiotic definition of music in the history of mankind but nonetheless true by logic) will make you understand that creativity is mostly innnovation within constraints.

Creativity is a strange thing . It finds its inspiration in strange places,things,objects and people. A bestseller novel might find its origin in varied places. Some authors write mostly to reflect their own life, some write it from nothing but a figment of imagination.. some find inspiration in people around them , some find the cultural outlook of the people amusing or bemusing enough to write and this list of inspirations that can be called anything but comprehensive .Authors are , afterall strange people(this is very personal opinion of mine).

A painter mostly finds its inspiration in philosophical paradigms, complicity of life, people in real life, depictions of God in litrature and a living being too. At times inspiration can be so idiosyncratic that you may find them weird .You may also find urself unable to find any connection between the inspiration and the piece of art it inspired..but that is absolutely normal.Artists are afterall strange people( this is again a very personal opinion of mine).

It really does not matter which descipline of art i am talking about .. the creation of a piece of art always unfolds itself in such a stupendous manner that you are left only to marvel at the the beauty of it..both the process of creation and the final result.Seeing a real master work on his art is such a treat to anyone's eye.You will realize that once a artist is clear what is to be created..it will be created .. at any cost. It is as if that work is desperately seeking life and it surrenders itself into the hands of master... and as it always happens ....life finds its way.
No constraints can stop that creation of work...money,time,skill,people,effort .. anything.

It is creativity which refuses to look at constraints which makes this world go round.This sheer adamence of acting blind to limitations is the key to creation of a masterpiece.

It is also the key to be the best person you can possibly be.

ADIOS

2005-10-29T15:52:00.000+05:30

Googlewhacking

Am i late to notice this fact? not exactly, it's just that i found the blog phenomenon a little late.
Started by Larry Page & Sargey Brinn, google have singlehandedly chaged the face of the web we see now.It made the search easy and unbelievably effective.

You can find Pamela Anderson as well as the Pope thru the same web page. Infact it gave zillions of web pages the attention they truly deserved. It performed the matching between the user and web pages so effectively that it reminds u of the "made for each other" concept in a very weird context.It infact increased the reach of the web to the millions of users who never knew where they can find information relevant to them.

One interesting game that emerged out of "googling" is called googlewhack . To play this game u need to type in 2 words in google search text box (without any quotes) so that you get only one search result .Pretty easy.. huh!! wait till u try.

Some examples are Francophile namesakes,dork turnspit, unconstructive superegos etc.

If u find one, post it to googlewhack stack at www.googlewhack.com to include your name in the hall of fame of googlewhackers.

happy whacking!!!!!!!!!

2005-10-29T09:05:00.000+05:30

Remember , when in doubt...... FUCK!!!!!!
-Al Pacino in "Scent of Women"

2005-10-28T13:16:00.000+05:30

In afternoon when ur battery is low , u feel all sucked up, what gives u the power to carry on?
Hope that ur passivity will last longer than the day and then u will be able to sleep.Sleep seems to be such an unproductive thing at first sight , but it provides all the rejunivating mechanism of ur body the time to get in action.Or in other words it is the plug point of ur BATTERY!!!!!

2005-10-28T09:38:00.000+05:30

Life is something that happens when you are making plans for future.
- john lenon.

So LIVE IN IT !!!!!!!

2005-10-27T09:05:00.000+05:30

Well. just for beginning i never understood why lucifer's name has always been associated with desire.
The pure simple feeling of longing for something or somebody, how can that be devilish or bad ?? (as they say).To desire nothing is to stop being alive, so i will better be dead.The philosophy of achieving nirvana is a contradiction in itself. You want something so that you will not desire anything anymore !!!! Now how is that possible on the face of the Earth but still i must add, "what a thought".

2005-10-25T15:10:00.000+05:30

it's just gr8 to put ur first feet in the bloggers world.Let's see what happen.

2004-01-11T19:26:00.000+05:30

Thus Spake G B Shaw

A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

A lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth.

A doctor’s reputation is made by the number of eminent men who die under his care.

Alcohol is the anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life.

All great truths begin as blasphemies.

Baseball has the great advantage over cricket of being sooner ended.

Dancing: The vertical expression of a horizontal desire legalized by music.

Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.

Do not try to live for ever. You will not succeed.

England and America are two countries divided by a common language.

Even the youngest of us may be wrong sometimes.

Few people think more than two or three times a year; I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week.

I was always unlawful; I broke the law when I was born because my parents weren't married.

I often quote myself, it adds spice to my conversation.

If all the economists in the world were laid end to end, they wouldn’t reach any conclusion.

It is a woman’s business to get married as soon as possible, and a man’s to keep unmarried as long as he can.

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.

Martyrdom: The only way a man can become famous without ability.

My reputation grows with every failure.

One man that has a mind and knows it can always beat ten men who haven't and don't.

Only Lawyers and mental defectives are automatically exempt for jury duty.

Take the utmost trouble to find the right thing to say, and then say it with the utmost levity.

The golden rule is that there are no golden rules.

The perfect love affair is one which is conducted entirely by post.

The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that’s the essence of inhumanity.

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.

The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech.

There are two tragedies in life. One is not to get your heart’s desire. The other is to get it.

Those who can do, those who can't teach.

To be clever enough to get a great deal of money, one must be stupid enough to want it.

We learn from experience that men never learn anything from experience.

We should all be obliged to appear before a board every five years and justify our existence...on pain of liquidation.

We don't stop playing because we grow old; We grow old because we stop playing !

What really flatters a man is that you think him worth flattery.

When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.

When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.

When a man teaches something he does not know to somebody else who has no aptitude for it, and gives him a certificate of proficiency, the latter has completed the education of a gentleman.

Which painting in the National Gallery would I save if there was a fire? The one nearest the door of course.

You see things; and you say `Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say `Why not?

Youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children.

2004-01-11T18:22:00.000+05:30

Richard Bach : other than 'ILLUSIONS'

The gulls who scorn perfection for the sake of travel go nowhere, slowly.Those who put aside travel for the sake of perfection go anywhere, instantly.
- from "Jonathan Livingston Seagull"

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For most gulls, it is not flying that matters, but eating.For this gull, though, it was not eating that mattered, but flight.
- from "Jonathan Livingston Seagull"

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If our friendship depends on things like space and time, then when we finally overcome space and time, we've destroyed our own brotherhood! But overcome space, and all we have left is Here. Overcome time, and all we have left is Now. And in the middle of Here and Now, don't you think that we might see each other once or twice?
- from "Jonathan Livingston Seagull"

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That's what learning is, after all; not whether we lose the game, but how we lose and how we've changed because of it and what we take away from it that we never had before, to apply to other games. Losing, in a curious way, is winning.
- from "The Bridge Across Forever"

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We're the bridge across forever, arching above the sea, adventuring for our pleasure, living mysteries for the fun of it, choosing disasters triumphs challenges impossible odds, testing ourselves over and again, learning love and love and LOVE!
- from "The Bridge Across Forever"

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If it's never our fault, we can't take responsibility for it. If we can't take responsibility for it, we'll always be its victim.
- from "Running From Safety"

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Can miles truly separate us from friends? If you want to be with Rae, aren't you already there?
- from "There' No Such Place As Far Away"

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You have no birthday because you have always lived; you were never born, and never will die. You are not the child of the people you call mother and father, but their fellow-adventurer on a bright journey to understand the things that are.
- from "There' No Such Place As Far Away"

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Fly free and happy beyond birthdays and across forever, and we'll meet now and then when we wish, in the midst of the one celebration that never can end.
- from "There' No Such Place As Far Away"

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Nothing happens by chance, my friend... No such thing as luck. A meaning behind every little thing, and such a meaning behind this. Part for you, part for me, may not see it all real clear right now, but we will, before long.
- from "Nothing By Chance"

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2004-01-11T13:08:00.000+05:30

Quotations From The Messiah's Handbook
"Reminders for the Advanced Soul"
in "Illusions - The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah"
by Richard Bach - 1977

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Perspective - Use It or Lose It. If you turned to this page, you're forgetting that what is going on around you is not reality. Think about that.

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Remember where you came from, where you're going, and why you created the mess you got yourself into in the first place.

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You are led through your lifetime by the inner learning creature, the playful spiritual being that is your real self. Don't turn away from possible futures before you're certain you don't have anything to learn from them.
You're always free to change your mind and choose a different future, or a different past.

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Learning is finding out what you already know. Doing is demonstrating that you know it. Teaching is reminding others that they know just as well as you. You are all learners, doers, and teachers.

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Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself. Being true to anyone else or anything else is not only impossible, but the mark of a false messiah.

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Your conscience is the measure of the honesty of your selfishness. Listen to it carefully.

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The simplest questions are the most profound.
Where were you born?
Where is your home?
Where are you going?
What are you doing?
Think about these once in awhile, and watch your answers change.

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Your friends will know you better in the first minute you meet than your acquaintances will know you in a thousand years.

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The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other's life.
Rarely do members of one family grow up under the same roof.

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There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts.

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Imagine the universe beautiful and just and perfect.

Then be sure of one thing:
The Is has imagined it quite a bit better than you have.
The original sin is to limit the Is. Don't.

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A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such a speed, it feels an impulsion....this is the place to go now.
But the sky knows the reason and the patterns behind all clouds, and you will know, too, when you lift yourself high enough to see beyond horizons.

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You are never given a wish without being given the power to make it true. You may have to work for it, however.

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Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they're yours.

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If you will practice being fictional for a while, you will understand that fictional characters are sometimes more real than people with bodies and heartbeats.

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The world is your exercise-book, the pages on which you do your sums.
It is not reality, although you can express reality there if you wish. You are also free to write nonsense, or lies, or to tear the pages.

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Every person, all the events of your life, are there because you have drawn them there. What you choose to do with them is up to you.

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In order to live free and happily, you must sacrifice boredom. It is not always an easy sacrifice.

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The best way to avoid responsibility is to say, "I've got responsibilities."

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The truth you speak has no past and no future. It is, and that's all it needs to be.

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Here is a test to find whether your mission on earth is finished: If you're alive, it isn't.

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Don't be dismayed at good-byes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again.
And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends.

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The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly.

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You're going to die a horrible death, remember. It's all good training, and you'll enjoy it more if you keep the facts in mind.
Take your dying with some seriousness, however. Laughing on the way to your execution it not generally understood by less advanced lifeforms, and they'll call you crazy.

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Everything above may be wrong!

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