Happy Diwali

This is indeed the second diwali away from home. Away from adi. Away from all the crackers. But then, this is also by far the most memorable diwali. There has never been anyone, who wrote any special poem for me. Until now, that is. Vichika, wrote this small piece as a diwali wish. Boy, and it soo very well sums up what we did all these days.

Thank you Vichika.

Moon light walks,
Google talks.
Cribbing,Mugging,
Teasing,Chatting.
Schlotzsky lunches,
Jitter benches.
Coffee treats,
Balcony seats.
Friday night movies,
Nostalgic stories...
In our own unique ways,
We've had so many memorable days!

So true vichi... so true.....

Take on wars

What is about war? What is it that triggers millions of soldiers lose their lives fighting? What is it about the power of one man to bring a nation to war with another? All these have been cliched questions oft discussed, but never answered satisfactorly to ever since time unknown......

The questions seem to find increasing relevance again, in such a war torn world today. More so in the American context. Since the end of the "great" war, by the end of late 40s, the wars that America has been engaging its soldiers in, has been very different from the conventional reasons that history has known. While its true that every time troops are mobilized to some distant land far from the political boundaries defining this country, threat to national security is cited, its difficult to believe that thousands of fully trained soldiers lose their lives fighting what is actually somebody else's war.Take vietnam, afganisthan(the one that created taliban first), somalia,gulf war 1 then and 2 now.... In all these cases, troops are engaged into mind numbing battles based on the whims and fancies of one individual......

Take an Indian soldier for instance(we are discussing india here, only because thats the only army from a democratically controlled country that I know a little about). The battles that he fights are those where he sees a direct threat to his own country. Its easier to put a group of soldiers into combat, when they are convinced into believing that their motherland is under foreign attack. Further, an Indian soldier is almost always within or at the political boundaries of his country. I do agree that some army units are engaged in UN peace keeping efforts elsewhere, but we are not talking about them here. In case of US, however, the story is different. There has been no attack on the mainland since its formation. Of course, 9/11 did happen, but that is only a single isolated incident by a terrorist who got extremely lucky with his plan.

But the point of the matter is that, how is it that the American policy makers, convince an ordinary soldier into fighting in foreign lands, to sort out someone else's problems? Take the Somalia issue for example.Or even the Vietnam war. America politburo, in each case, see a particular man getting powerful. And this power was orienting towards the other end of the then bi-polar world. So, they try to take rise internal disturbances, and offer military support to restore normalcy (at least this is how its widely perceived in the world, the truth of the matter would however be always under contention). While it maybe possible that military generals are fully aware of the real intentions of sending troops to such war torn places, what about the soldier on the battleground? Wouldnt he be ever wondering who the real enemy is? Under such circumstances, would the soldier consider it respectable to die in such a battle (which in normal circumstances is a moment of glory for him?)

It is interesting to wonder, that in every conflict the US offers support or tries to intervene, what would have happened if it never did, in the first place? Every time, the only answer is that the intervention was necessary to prevent further damage. But, did the damage really stop? Or did it only get worse? Applying the laws of thermodynamics, any system would always tend towards a region of minimum internal energy when left to itself(it may take time, but it is bound to return to a "good" state). An external force would only push it further away from this region. Military support, I believe is just this. In any case, military action can only make matters worse.

It is also interesting to see where the two largest democracies now stand in terms of military might they exert over their regions of political clout. While on one hand, we have had crazy people taking up presidencies (and then subsequently plunging their troops into wars that were not their own), on the other, it has always been an extremely dormant and weak government unable to plug the continuous acts of violence that the country it rules,was being subjected to. Both have their drawbacks. And both need to learn lessons from each other. India, should learn to take strong decisions when the situation calls for. US, for its own good, should stop thrusting so much power on a single individual.

'Left' Out

It has always been this way... Being left hander was never a direct advantage. Never.In school, in college, at work..... Every computer lab,I had a favourite spot... I prefer using one terminal as I could change the mouse orientation.... but when someone decides to take my seat, hes psyched... everything works on the reverse for him/me! Why cant people accept the fact that there do exist left handers... and its normal to be so.... everytime I pick a pen to write... people go " oh.... u r a leftie!!!" ......so??! why does there have to be an exclamation... a comment.... an expression of sneer,mock, shock,surprise(based on how good the friend turns out to be) for something as trivial as to what hand you use...!

On the 13th of August, is the WORLD LEFT HANDERS DAY..... i dont believe in celebrating days.... frindship day... valentines day... mothers day... fathers day..... man.... theres a day for everything... n i dont believe in either of them...... do u really need a day to celebrate something like friendship, love, mom and dad!! LEFT HANDERS DAY... so now the world of right,decide to celebrate us, ppl of the world of left, a day in a year!
I liked this song..... so for all the left handers who have been through everything that i did.. n do..... heres one....!

Left-Handers Lament by Ian Radburn

Now here's the story of my life,
I've had fun but lots of strife,
For I was born left-handed, but I'm proud
To be one of the elite, right-handers we can beat
We're the 10% that stand out from the crowd!

But as a little lad, oh the problems that I had
Winding clockwork toys was just a mystery
Tying laces was a pain, couldn't get it in my brain
Everything was back-to-front it seemed to me

Chorus
We're the Cack-Handed Kings, we're the LEFTIES
You right-handers just haven't got a clue
'Cos if you'd been through what we've been through
Then maybe you would feel superior too!

At 5 I started school where I was treated like a fool
Being left-handed I stood out from the pack
And learning how to write was not a struggle - more a fight
For I had my left hand tied behind my back

"Now get it in your head" the sympathetic teacher said
"You use the right and not the Devil's side"
Those supposed men of vision caused me pain and such derision
Is it any wonder often times I cried?

We're the Gibble Fisted Friends, we're the LEFTIES (repeat chorus)

Time then came when my voice dropped
And my face was one big spot
But I was glad to see my teenage years arrive,
Because I use my left, I was different from the rest
And the girls saw me as something of a prize!

I learned some handy tricks in the back row of the flicks
It used to drive my girlfriends all berserk
For their eyes would keep apace of my right hand - just in case
And they never saw my left one go to work!

We're the Southpawed Princes, we're the LEFTIES (repeat chorus)

Well I'm married now, worst luck
But my wife has given up
Asking me to help with chores like peeling spuds,
Or trying to cut the bread, I'll get a 4 x 2" wedge
Lose three fingertips and half a pint of blood

I would love to be a dad, but we've hit a little snag
If you can help please tell us what to do
The problem simply said, is that I'm a left-hand thread
But my wife you see, now she's a right-hand .....OH, YES WE'RE THE

Scrummy-Handed Heroes, we're the LEFTIES (repeat chorus)

Now we reach today, where you stand and watch me play
And yes, I play right-handed it is true
For the very simple fact is that I've had to adapt
Something all we southpaws have to try and do

We have trouble tying ties, writing cheques out, using knives
and scissors made for use in your right hand
And when it comes to sport once again we are left short
In hockey and in polo we are banned

We're the Cuddy Wifter Winners, we're the LEFTIES (repeat chorus)

Now I've finished off my song and as you move along
Please bear in mind the things I've had to say
And please show some respect for your friends who use the left
Thanks for listening to me this Left-Handers Day.

Copyright: Ian Radburn, 2004

Mind Without Fear

I just loved this poem..... Usually i dont read poetry... but this one... was just brilliant.....

Mind Without Fear

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;

Where knowledge is free;

Where the world has not been broken up

into fragments by narrow domestic walls;

Where words come out from the depth of truth;

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;

Where the clear stream of reason

has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;

Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action---

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

---- Rabindranath Tagore

Cordless? Strings Attached !!

Please use left ear while using cell (mobile), because if you use the right one it will affect brain directly. This is a true fact from Apollo medical team. Please forward to all your well wishers

My roomie, Hari, had forwarded this article with the following mail. The mail read,

Dear Kaushik and Suhani,

I did not understand the physiology as I forgot everything....All I know is you both might remember a bit....Kaushik, I would appreciate if you can explain the logic behind this and Suhani, because of you only T-mobile is still running ....Plesae do not use cell phone this much....and Kaushik, this is a good excuse for us not to buy a cell phone. After all, we took 5 credits of physiology....we shall explain to people, the physiological reasons that stop us from buying one...Take care. Happy studies!!!

Love Hari.


Apparently, blood was out of syllabus... so we didnt have to really feel bad if we didnt know the answer! :)

But then, this got me into writing the following 'explanation' :

I still have my doubts about what is being said in the article. Because, if the damage is really being done (which is acceptable), then it should be done equally when placed on both the ears.

The blood-brain barrier (BBB) is the specialized system of capillary endothelial cells that protects the brain from harmful substances in the blood stream, while supplying the brain with the required nutrients for proper function. Unlike peripheral capillaries that allow relatively free exchange of substance across / between cells, the BBB strictly limits transport into the brain through both physical (tight junctions) and metabolic (enzymes) barriers.
And this fellow, can be damaged by :

Hypertension (high blood pressure): high blood pressure opens the BBB
Development: the BBB is not fully formed at birth.
Hyperosmolitity: a high concentration of a substance in the blood can open the BBB.
Microwaves: exposure to microwaves can open the BBB.
Radiation: exposure to radiation can open the BBB.
Infection: exposure to infectious agents can open the BBB.
Trauma, Ischemia, Inflammation, Pressure: injury to the brain can open the BBB

So, this article's focus is on how microwave damages the BBB. This, instead of clearing up the question, gave raise to two more questions.

One, so how come the left ear talk is relatively safer?

From what I know, supply of blood to the brain takes place from both ends.

Second, why only mobile phones?

Considering the fact that mobile phones operate at a frequency of 880-915 MHz, and that cordless phones work at 900-2 GHz range, the damage that both make must be the same.

I mean the time that a person spends on a mobile phone, if he/she is going to spend the same time on cordless, the damage should be the same right?

Doctors, engineers, anyone with any possible explanations, please write back. Will be really happy to get these inputs.

In the mean time. get back to those corded days if you want to last till someone can come up with a research backed explanation! :)

I Herd that!

Another of the crazy thought that was roaming around in the vast vacuums of space between the 2 ears of my head! An outcome of listening too keenly to a mathematical modeling class!

Dr.Walton (a famous professor in TAMU known for his skills with tensor analysis, continuum mechanics and biological pattern formations) was explaining about pattern formations and how to model them mathematically in his class. As an example, he also mentioned that populations of species can be modeled and patterns of a population spread in a region can be estimated and quantified. To prove this, he modeled the behaviour of E.Coli bacteria and ran a simulation to show how they spread about in a particular region for a given set of conditions. He further showed, that experimentally, when the same situation was replicated, the bacteria behaved exactly the same way as was predicted in the simulations. Now since it is a bacteria, and has no mind of its own, we could "control" their behaviour and migration patterns by controlling the conditions that influence their decision.

Would the same theory hold good for humans too? Can we predict human migration patterns the same way we did for a bacteria? Not withstanding the lunacity of the thought, I shot off a mail to Dr.Walton. Surprisingly, he did bother to take time off and respond to my mail. Heres a reproduction of the mails that were exchanged.


My mail to him:

Dr.Walton,

From the past few classes, where you have been teaching pattern
formations, I gain an impression that we can actually formulate
mathematical equations that can predict the migration of populations of
species across a geographical space. So, this also means, we can
"predict" human migration patterns? Why then, do the big cities get
choked up, saturated with this rush of people from the smaller
settlements?

My point is, if there are models that can be built which identify and
show a likely route that population of humans are going to take over the
future, can't the planners, use this, and try and negate the effect? Or
are the city planners already using these systems to build the cities of
future?

Kaushik

For which he said:

Kaushik,


Your impressions are quite correct. These and many other
mathematical models are being applied to modeling human migration
patterns, in general, and to the design and evolution of urban
population distribution patterns in particular.


J. Walton


:) So humans are indeed treated as herds! Imagine this. A capitalist decides to use this model to his advantage. He buys land for cheap in a god forsaken place, and then plugs in values into the model that can shoot up human migration towards this area. What would happen? Unimaginable profit margins? In short, the population is being herded around?

Now for another dimension. Imagine the government uses this model to predict and plan the population rise in a particular region. And it sees that a particular area which is not so developed now, is going to be a commercial hub in the years to come. That is if the social patterns are left to themselves. Now, if it decides to publish these results and let people know, what would happen? Wouldnt there be an exponential rise, what with everyone trying to move to the "to be" happening place? For instance, if the model predicts a linear dependance of the population rise and real estate value on a particular factor, suddenly with this announcement, wouldnt there be a quadratic or exponential dependance stepping in? In short, the very equations that were used to model a particular trend are getting altered because of the equations itself?!!!

In a quest to quantify everything known and unknown, in an attempt to take control of everything that governs our lives arent we entering into chaos? Just another scary thought. As these new revelations are made in every field of science, and with every new parameter entering into "humanly controllable" regions, isnt it possible that we are after all a part of larger schema of things already being controlled by something collosally big that is uncomprehendable by the intellectual capabilities of the human brain? And is collosal governing factor god? Or is something else? Only "time" will tell.

Nuclear deal? Whats the big deal huh?

Heres the big deal...... i was feeling so nice with the way things were going on between India n USA... what with the nuclear deal..... n the legitimity associated with india being a nuclear state n all that....
what was "actually" happening , was that i was drinking away happily what the indian media was feeding me :).... old habits die hard u see.. i still read only ndtv n rediff!

i did sometime think about how the world looks at india n tried reading some other country news sites... n whats more interesting that to read pakistani newspapers n how they portray india :) but thats a different story.....

coming to what happened today..... i chanced to read this article today... i visited this site for a totally different reason..... u see, my roomie ( n i mentioned this elsewhere, but he's almost like a role model to me now.....) soma, is now actively into dramatics.. hes the part of a play thats running successfully here in TAMU, and naturally any article about the play, about their performance, i was watching closely.....so we have this college newspaper called the BATALLION, where theres an article once in two days about how truly this play is a miss not n all that....

now its only today that observed this, but theres also a world section in the paper... n clicked it to see if the paper was covering the nuclear deal.... n naturally it did..... now comes the horror...... can u imagine this is what the article said!

amidst everything... this is what the article said:

"President Bush ushered India into the world's exclusive nuclear club Thursday with a landmark agreement to share nuclear reactors, fuel and expertise with this energy-starved nation"

if u want the complete article, here it is:
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BUSH?SITE
=TXCOL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2006-03-02-23-05-33

!!!!! now i know i m not supposed to take a word out of the article n blow it up like this... but what the heck?!!!! this is how the US sees india? ENERGY STARVED NATION?!

n to think of it, the indian media puts it like, "US now understands that India is a formidable power to reckon with, and it cant help ignore us anymore.... yank... yank... yank....."

while it certainly might be true the way American politicians and policy makers see it that way....... the people of america are still happily fed the image of a third world india that needs all the help that america can offer.....

typical over enthu that i m , i was about to shoot off a mail to the editor complaining the article paints India in a bad light... blah... blah... blah...... n that person who wrote the article must be careful of the tone of language and all that, when i went back to see who wrote it.... n guess what? its a terence hunt with none other than, AP!!!! n this person is a White House Correspondent.......


so disappointing!

Amrika!

now... we all know americans screw up spellings... n we know desis try hard to copy americans... what with all the fake accents.... westernization n all that....

in telugu theres a saying " puli ni choosi nakka vaatha pettukundi ta"... meaning.... seeing a tiger with stripes.. a fox tried to do the same.... using some hot iron... :) i guess u know... its difficult to translate such things.... but hope u get the meaning! my friend vichika got this classic piece from a desi store here..... cudnt believe it..... :)

mobile phone virus

This is one of the craziest ideas that has hit me in a loong time. Actually, this is the outcome of too much of 'mechanical regulations of cell transport systems' class assignments and a crazy conversation that I had with Ankur sometime back.
So what happened was, ankur was talking about taking over the entire world by inventing a mobile phone virus that will make humans (or whoever is using a mobile phone :) ) his slaves. He wanted to build a mobile phone application that will penetrate the human brain . So, being a mobile networks expert, he said he could device applications that will download itself into any phone that is on the network. He said, it was upto me to take over from there to penetrate the brain. :)

So, I was thinking. And this thought suddenly struck me when I was having my coffee with guru n vichika... (in case I didnt mention this before, I will very soon go bankrupt paying for this cuppa coffee at this 'potti' kade (baddi kottu) called java jitters near my lab! :)
Ok... coming back to the idea , technically speaking, there exists a transduction principle called mechanotransduction, where signals(information) are passed onto a cell system using mechanical forces. Now, in this class, I have also learnt that gene expressions are controlled with these mechanical forces. That is, if the system believes that certain proteins need to change form or shape due to some change in the body, a force is applied to the cell, which alters the gene expression. This change in the gene expression in turn will affect the protein synthesis.
Now, suppose, we can come up with a mechanical force that will affect a gene expression such that it takes the same effect as some deadly virus. Suppose we can build a mobile phone application that will produce these mechanical waves. Now, when the human actually places the phone near his ear, these forces could penetrate through the human ear cells (hair cells, gated spring model actually shows that this is possible) and the changed gene could now start multiplying as the cell starts replicating. Now, to ensure that the entire body is affected, we could take in a gene that sends signals to the brain through some other protein or signalling systems. Mission accomplished!!!
What a destructive thought! :)
When I was narrating this to vichika... another thought came up :)..... for the genome project to completely decode the human gene seqeunce, it might take another 10-15 years... by which the mobile phone technology itself might get redundant.... she said... maybe there could be 'telepathy' instead of mobile phone.... so I came up with another rubbish idea that could actually make telepathy possible ! :D next blog dedicated to that nonsense ! :)

Hill Station? Nah... College Station

This was made when I first came into TAMU, and my opinions have since changed, 'facts' have been corrected and in general the picture I will be cutting now is entirely different.. Neverthless, I reproduce it here without editing any text, just to show how does a fresher look at things....Things that I have changed views on, are now in colour :)) ... n the rest black n white ;). The narrative is like, the 'fresher' Kaushik talks and the 'senior' Kaushik records his comments in colour for a fair picture to the audience ! ;)

The morning of 31^st July 2005, was my first in the small village of College Station. And, I don’t know how many more mornings do I have to see here. But believe me, the experience is not too rosey as it seemed from back home.

The village of College Station (which the Texans call a “CITY”) is built around the Texas A&M University. With around 6,000 acres campus(the third biggest in the US after Stanford ,I forgot the second!) you can imagine how big the town will seem to be. TAMU(that’s how everyone calls Texas A&M University) takes about 47,000 students at per semester. And most of them are not housed in the college. So, majorly, the town consists of leased accommodations. Small, two floored apartments. The tallest structure here seems to be the town water tower!

We get 4 channels with an antenna. And believe me, seeing them is a huge pain. There is no proper reception anywhere. We have to keep adjusting our TV antenna per channel!(can u imagine that?! In India itself, it was only in my mom’s home town, I had to do it last when I was in my 6^th standard!!).Apart from Fox and KAMU(TAMU's own station) no other channel has a proper reception. Of course there is cable television, but that costs 30$ per month. Hey, I forgot to mention this, we got our TV for free. And guess from where? TRASH BIN! Here desis get most of their things from the trash bin.(Should have been unfunded fresher desis actually :D) Mostly, Amrus trash their stuff which work perfectly fine but are too old for them at the trash, and we can pick it up from there. So, we got our sofa set and TV from the trash bin. Another roomie got his mattress (typically it costs around 40 $) from there too. Radio however is a different story. There are more than half dozen FM channels blaring the same loud English music all through! And for a guy with taste of Indian music???? Man, the plight is worst. Here, they still live prehistorically. People still watch home videos in cassettes!!! VCD players are still expensive. Most audio players don’t play MP3s.(Err.. I have since seen that it is only OUR player that dosent :D) And guess what? I brought my entire collection in MP3 cds!!! So, I guess its going to take quite sometime for me before I can start listening to my music!( The situation is still the same... only I now play my music in my computer at the office)
Texans are hugely patriotic. Wherever you go, you will find Texas and US flags hanging around, and slogans such as “Don’t Mess with Texas” !! Guess what, Texas is one of the few states where pedestrians are the kings.(Again, since I knew only about Texas then, its like Texas is US for me..... I now realize that Texas IS NOT US... its a whole diferent world out there)Come what may, pedestrians are treated with utmost respect. Even if the signal turns green, and someone is walking on the zebra corssing, all the cars wait for us to get to the foot path!

About the town?! Well, we do have Wal Mart, HEB, Target… n other giant supermarkets…(all pale in comparison with the big towns :) )And one more thing. In case I didn’t mention this before, College Station is a twin city with another town called Bryan. So, its more like Hyderabad, Secundrabad style. I mean its like postal address says it’s a different town, but for all practial purposes they are the same. So, like the malls are 2 each. Wal mart for instance has 2 stores for College Station and Bryan!!!

Believe me man, this store called Wal Mart is huge!!!! (hehehehhe..... this guy is crazy!)If this is what he could build for this village, I was wondering how big it must have been in proper cities like Houston, Chicago and all of them. Desis, have a car pool system. Public transport here sucks big time. In fact, here at College Station, I would say its next to zero. For instance, I cannot get to Houston (which is 90 miles from here) without begging for a lift. Of course there is a bus that runs once a day! So, getting to Wal Mart which is on the other end of the town is also ruled out. The first thing that funded PhD students buy is a car! And immediately, they become friends for everyone!!! People from 4-5 apartments squeeze into the single car and buy stuff sufficient for a month….

About the campus. Man its so spread about. Unlike IIT which has lots of trees between its buildings, here, the space between the two buildings is made into a garden! So, this adds to the heat. I mean, we don’t have a nice shelter where you can rest.We have a golf course, an airport and a nuclear reactor within the campus! The reactor though is used only for experiments! George Bush Sr. has a huge Presidential Library here. It is said that 36% of the Texas Tax Payer’s money is brought into this University alone. An interesting fact is that TAMU’s first citizen is a bitch. No, seriously, it is a female dog! Legend has it that when the TAMU football team was getting back from Arlington after losing its 10^th match consecutively, and their truck broke down, they found this dog and it seems it protected them or something like that. Since then, it had become the TAMU team’s lucky mascot. They have never lost a match after that, and now millions is spent on that dog. It travels only in airplanes! Guess what? It is free to roam around the campus, and if it enters a class and barks, then that class is left for the day!!!! Crazy people isn’t it?!

'Pot'ty Lucked

On the afternoon of 30^th August 2005, i got locked up in my home's bathroom for as long as 3 hours.... might sound a not too long time...but folks....try it out... n u will know how long a time it is...

first, an introduction of my bathroom! it is small.... fcourse it has a tub n a shower...but certainly small... its got yellow walls!(stop thinking!)... n ya.... like every american house bathroom it has carpets... n like conventional desis we like to keep our bathrooms wet....so in the process the carpets r screwed up! n they stink.. we tried dryin it once outside....but it started stinking differently again once it came back inside.. there is a ac duct into the bathroom....but the old home that mine is....it is faced upwards.... n unlike desi bathrooms... there aint no ventilation windows.....

next, the situation... it was a typical hot afternoon, with everyone runnin between home n classes.... we (me, hari and anand) got back to have our lunch.... i made the lunch... so after eating the food... everybody had to visit the loo.....anand was done first and said he was leavin to the comp lab to send some mails... n said he will be gettin somewhere else from there..... hari was to meet a prof in the dept.... i had to get to the dept too...so i asked him to wait....but he said he is runnin out of time n ran off... this meant i was alone in the home at 2 in the afternoon..... so like any typical loo visit i pick a book n get inside..... guess what is the book? DISCOVER YOUR DESTINY.... :)

not realizing what happened with anand before... happily lost in thoughts i locked the door tight.....so what happened with anand? the inside knob of the bathroom got jammed... so it meant only ppl from outside cud open the door!!!!! once i closed the door i realized it...but the situation demanded i needed to attend some more urgent matters first......! finishing up... i tried all possible techniques....nothing worked.... n worse? the stink from the carpet starting taking over..... using up half the roll of toilet paper i cleaned half the bathroom dry n slept for sometime... i had to get up when it starting gettin suffocating... n i decided this is it.. i m gonna do something... i picked up the bathroom scissors, nail cutter n starting opening the knob... when it opened up, i used the scissors to push the lever to open the door....

situational details: unlike everytime, i decided to leave my pants outside in the room and went in only with my undies! so at the time of pushing open the door.... i was jes in my tshirt n undies...

position? i was kneeling down n trying to open the lock such that i cud see where the lever is.....

what happened? suddenly the big mass of the white door disappear and a giant in blue n brown was standing instead!

anand came to pick up his pack of ciggerrates (god bless his smoking habit!) realized that someone got stuck in the bathroom n decided to help by opening up.....

what did he see? me in my undies.... with a pair of scissors in one hand and nail cutter in the other kneeling down in front of him!!!!!

man... the others had a laugh of their life.... looked like the DCH situation... ppl were rolling down laughing... while i was jes sittin out....enjoyin the new found fresh air!\

WORRRRRRRRRRST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Punch" Deva Yagna

It was a typical boring Sunday Morning of 17th April, 2005. Mom had left for Hyderabad some days back, so that meant, there was nothing to look forward to for the lunch as well. The TV had the same old boring programmes running. Sunday Times as usual did not have any news....only semi nude models and all the gossip associated with them!

Just when I decided to pick up the Dilbert book that was gathering dust on my table, dad called me to the temple nearby. Normally, I would have refused. But this time, there was nothing worth doing, and secondly, he was talking about some PanchaDeva Maha yagna which was going on in the grounds next to it.

So, there I was. At the Manish Grounds. This ground has an interesting story. It remains the only piece of real estate in my area untouched by an builder. This ground is real huge. A little additional space, and I guess it will be as big as a real cricket ground itself! and the people of manish nagar, guard it with their lives! literally! I believe some years back, when a builder bought it to set up a go karting arena there, there were huge protests and rasta rokos to stop the builder. Thankfully, the ground is still there..... intact....
with its own walking track... between huge sky scrapers.

About the yagna, that i went to witness? man.. i was spellbound. There it was. At the middle of the ground. A huge temporary structure of bamboo. The structure is really impressive, what with its fantastic cross ventilation. Considering that it was going to be there only for 9 days, I think a considerable effort went into building it. Inside this bamboo structure was a sight thats really rare to watch. A 100 havan piers were blazing inside. And there were four vedic brahmins per pier who were meticously feeding it with ghee and all the havan samagree. Indeed a fantastic scene. So much of heat was coming out. In fact, 1 minute near this structure, i was sweating profusely. And there they were. Inside it. Offering the pooja. On the background was the divine chants of the Veda. I dont know if you have experienced it, but listen to a well versed vedic brahmin chant the veda, and you are sure to get the goose bumps! So fluid.... so elegant... so
commanding....so authentic.....so.....beuatiful........ n there were a dozen of them chanting in a choir....... man...it was so so good! what was good to observe, was that the people performing the yagna were of

so many age groups..... the youngest was looking not more than 10 years of age(really cute looking with his little pony tail on a bald head!)... n there were the veteran 90 years too... all together... in unison...... performing the yagna.... the entire event made me speechless!

An interesting observation was that, despite mumbai being so "modern" in its approach to life, people here are deeply religious.... you have people wearing minis, coming to temple daily! and there they were....while the brahmins continued to perform the yagna, hundreds were going around the bamboo structure offering their prayers....

One thing that is there with any event in mumbai, is that it is extremely well organized. every possible arrangement will already be made.... these people are so professional in their approach! there can never a situation where things will go wrong... but then I guess....with this kind of population, it is really necessary.........remember the gangai amman koil festivals that keep going on yearly there in chennai? theres so much of chaos everytime.....but here...somehow(at least till what i have seen) that never happened.....i mean... just imagine....... it is just a small temple in a relatively small colony...but still they have arranged it so well.....

Unfortunately, that was the last day... it was synchronised to complete a day before the sri rama navami festival! at the end of the yagna, it seems they was going to be free lunch...unlimited in capacity, and to unlimited people..... humungous task indeed!
The 'punch'deva yagna for sure, made a huge mark!

Lakalakalaka in Mumbai

On the 17th of April 2005, was the first time I saw a Rajni movie in Mumbai.Man, what a huge difference it was from Chennai. The last time I saw Padayappa(his another super duper hit) in Chennai, I could
barely manage to hear the dialogues, could hardly here any of the songs and could hardly see the movie too..... such was the mob reaction to his dialogues... to his dance movements.... anything he
did.....had to be appreciated with a shrill whistle.....if it a song.....everyone got up n danced.... if it was a fight..... n someone poor chap managed to touch him... then he gets to hear the most third rated gaalis....n if some character says something demeaning about rajni...then thts it..... chappals fly to the screen.......RAJNI's entrance is marked with rupee notes and lottery tickets flying all over the theater...shrill whistles...huge rounds of applause.Theatres playing his movies always make huge profits... This despite the fact that at the end of two days of playing his movies most of the seats are torn.... (sometimes there were reports of the screens being torn down too!)show timings need to be changed( I have heard that in smaller towns...some scenes r played twice..thrice...depending on the crowd!)...Such a tremendous mob impact this one man has over the people of tamil nadu.....n the latest to join the frenzy....r the ppl of japan(incidentally the same set of ppl who make the most technologically advanced devices for the ppl of the world!).....

wht makes this man enthrall n sway so many millions of ppl....wht is it abt this dark man from maharashtra (who was a bus conductor in his lesser known human days!)throw so many people into a state of frenzy
with his one liners or his gait? is it the looks? is it the style? is it the grace? is it the charm?is it the super stunts(which most of time cross the limit n become ridiculous?).....or is it his ascetic personal life? wht is it? a tough question indeed...... wht surprises me is the fact that he gets all the tribulations in tamilnadu...whereas in his home state he is almost taken for a joker!
Rajni for sure cant be compared to any other movie star..... no SRK fan would be ready to burn himself for SRK....no SRK fan would tear down the screen if something goes wrong....no SRK fan would stone the
houses of the directors, producers and the music directors if the movie does not meet the crowd expectations....... why did i have to choose SRK.... coz in the movie fraternity i believe SRK comes closest
to associate any mania with someone..... fcourse theres a chiranjeevi in andhra...but thts still lesser compared to rajni....(but thts another story)politicians...yes...i have heard....but then... thats a
paid crowd......indeed rajni is unique.....

so there i was..... payin 130 for a ticket that costed 130....! for all the previous rajni movies i either paid twice the ticket amount if it was before 50 days of release....or wait for a ridiculously long 150 days before i could get tickets through the counter...! it was a peaceful sunday evening..... i was nostalgic hearing so much of tamil all around me....so many south indian faces.... so many saree clad women(for a change, the theatre was filled with properly covered women!)...so much of oil dripping hair!(seriously..i yearn for tht
too!).....surprising to see that so many were ready to leave the final one day match between india n pak n came to see rajini bash up the villains! To my surprise, the movie was running a houseful....! the story was a typical rajini story..... of course u must not be readinthis for the story...so i m goin to save the trouble! n in case u r still reading this to know what lakalakalaka is all about.....go n see the movie!!!! lakalakalakalaka!!!!

Lost Inorbit

This was my third visit to the Mumbai's biggest mall. For a place big enough to hold 600 cars, I think Inorbit, by any standard is big. And every visit, the girls' dressing was progressively looking up. As, the days are getting hotter, the collar lines and the waist lines are gettin lower and the skirts are getting shorter. It was for this, that we decided to hit Inorbit. This was one of those malls, that had it all... The ground floor was taken by GIANT the chain of those supermarkets where everything was dirt cheap. In fact, thanks to GIANT, my monthly packet of NUTRAMUL which is 70 Rs at my usual grocery shop, costed me only 69.30 Rs. KOOL......>!!! Thank you GIANT!

Apart from GIANT, there was also SHOPPERS STOP and LIFESTYLE....(of course these shops extended to the second and the third floors as well....)n for a change from their outlets in chennai(when i left it ie) these were swarming with ppl....

What got me to write about INORBIT.....was the range of the shops that were found there... Apart from the conventional Planet Ms and Lee outlets, there were other 'hatke' kinda concepts that I doubt if in any other Indian city, and for that matter any other mall, where these shops could make any business....!

There was an exclusive shop for BARBIE. BOSE had an exclusive outlet too..... With the starting price of 75 k for a simple 4 speaker set, I wondered what kind of clientele was this guy catering to.... N there were others.... Ipod had an exclusive shop.... Of course there a dime n dozen shops all throughout that sell Ipod, but a shop jes for that?!!
There was a shop that called itself Hobby... n it was selling ideas for having HOBBIES!!!! it cant get worser than this... In this fast paced city, u actually goto a shop to buy an idea of what kind of
hobby u want!!!

Then, there was a shop that was selling memorialia.... small signature cars and bikes... there was another called earth....where there were selling freshly made "ANTIQUES"! N there was another shop selling designer name boards!mind u, this isnt the conventional road side name
plate selling shop its got english speaking sales people, tryin to understand your personality to sell u the board that reflects ur true self!!! n the starting range? a kool 2k!!! n there was another
selling only pens!!! have u heard of stationary shops selling only pens before?! it has got pens ranging from 4Rs to around 10k!

I have heard a lot n read about this one before, but this is the first time i was actually seeing one... a shop meant exclusively for lingerie! n surprise....unlike other such shops were men rnt
encouraged to step in.... this one had no such qualms!( its a different matter that i didnt dare to step in!)

The third floor had a multiplex, with 3 screens running 10 movies(with at any given point of time has to have a minimum of 1 SRK movie!oh gawd, these mumbai ppl...when will they ever get rid of their mania for this nut!...but thats for some other time)!!!! god knows how do they manage that!

And the rest of the floor is devoted to the mumbaikars all time favourite-- FOOD!!! a concept that i saw in chennai in a much smaller scale...... all the famous...(n not so famous) eatiries have a shop here... u buy ur food.... find a place to sit...(which u never ever will!) n ENJOI!!!! n of course there was a games arcade too!!

To sum up... the mall reflected perfectly the city it was living in..... NOISY.... SMELLY.....(of perfumes and food together!)...LOUD..... N EXPENSIVE...... !!

MAN... i WAS LOST in ORBIT!!!!

Purply Hazed

In more senses than one, this is the first 'official' blog......

So here we go...

On the evening of 19th March 2005, was the first time i visited a lounge bar. Called, the Purple Haze, it was supposed be the swankiest, coolest and the most happening place to be on a saturday evening in Bandra. I was taken there by my cousin with his three colleagues. After a quick swag of a cold coffee with ice cream at the Cafe coffee day on the Carter Road, we moved to the purple haze. While I should have been warned with the things to come, from what I saw at cafe coffee day, the excitement of hitting the dance floor, with skimpily clad babes dancing around me, detracted me away from the sights of a group teenagers happily smoking away their "worries" with hash.... The girls were all busty, voluptous, and bitchy. The guys were all fat(the kindest i could think of) and snobbish... but thats another story.

The entry into Purple Haze made us poorer by Rs 600 each. Actually, since there was a girl in the group, one guy managed to save a hundred, as entry to couple was lesser. Once inside, I was dumbstruck. Blinded would have been a better word. There was not a single decent lighting anywhere. The whole place was so gloomy. It was surprising to think, that people could actually come here and forget their worries. It was 9:30 in the evening, and the whole place was literally empty. Sans the purple clad waiters around, and a couple(the woman was indeed skimpily dressed with a tatoo on her shoulder to show off), the place looked more like an abandoned dungeon where nobody of a decent upbringing would even think of going.

We were offered a small single stool(which the waiter claimed was a table for six!!) and shown the menu. Frankly, I know I am poor with eating outside, and I do not understand most of the menu cards I look at, but this was a way too much. The puzzled look was on everyone's face...(though the rest wouldnt accept it). After the pages and pages of alcoholic drinks, we could just about manage to see only the starters. Where was the main course? "Sorry sir, where you are sitting, we offer only drinks with starters.... For the food, you will have to go the floor above".... shocked us out. The guys in the group were very clear. We can go without food, but we r here to watch the babes.... n we r not goin anywhere without that. So, we decided to blow up the 2800 on starters and drinks to watch the babes. We were told, that the place would only start getting full by around 11:30.... that was a cool 2 hours away. and with a plate of French fries costing around 150 bucks, we were not sure how long will the 2800 last.

Stretching the single glass of rum, vodka or mocktail(whoever ordered the drinks) became the single point agenda. The music(god knows for whom were they playing it for) became louder and louder as the time passed. By around 10:30, it transcended into noise, and water in my glass was rippling in effect to the bass from the speakers. I was just about to tell everyone this, when I realized, that the rest of the gang, had just then started actually enjoying it!!! Cursing my south indian upbringing, I decided to keep quiet.

Slowly, the guy on the rum, started cracking typical adult jokes. I too pitched in( though I am not too sure, if people around actually even bothered to hear it!).

Everyone was bored. The service was pathetic. The music was shit. And everyone was waiting for that magical moment of 11:30....(as if, by then suddenly the flood gates would open,and all the heavens blessings would be showered on us....! and nude women will spring up from nowhere!)

Just as luck would have it, we blew out the money by 11:20 and the next minute, we were asked to leave to make space for the more "REGULAR" customers! Mouthing the choiciest swears and gaalis, we left the place "PURPLY HAZED"! lookin back, we realized tht indeed the place was getting full with the babes...!

GOD BLESS THE PLACE!