bangalore airport

I never had an oppurtunity to be at the new bangalore Airport but would constantly hear from my brother Aditya about it being too far away from the city ( He is doing his engineering in Bangalore ) .It became so incessant, his bickering , that it plunged me into giving a thought as to why the decision makers chose this place as their site !

Though he has always admitted that it is far ahead of the present state-of-the-art his complain is completely to do with its location .He always says that nobody seems to know just how far it is from the heart of the city , but everybody thinks it is very far .Now he has a valid point to make when he says that due to the far-ness it becomes a subject of higher math to calculate when you should be leaving to catch the flight ( It involves the concept of space-time relativity :)) , especially keeping in mind the traffic snarl-ups bangalore is diseased with , and , it being just one of the un-control-ables .He suggests the use of lunar calendars based on some vedic system of calibration :) or maybe astrologers .

He has his constant Hows ? Whys ? .I did find some answers to it , if i may suggest so ( though i would say they are generic suggestions and would not be logical always , do not try being cynics :) ) :

1. REAL ESTATE : The farther the airport away from the city the more the connecting land between the city and the airport .Now people in the know-how of the scheme of things could buy the land in advance at dirt cheap rates and then rake in the moolah later on .Simply said " The farther the airport -> the more the connecting land -> the more the prospective real estate -> the more the money to be made by insiders ( no brownie points for guessing who the insiders could be ! :) )

2. CARBON-FOOTPRINT: Now each flight that takes off from any airport of any city does leave a carbon footprint that depends directly on the (A) sheer number of flights and (B) their duration .
(A) Farther the airport -> More the avoidance in people towards flying
(B) Farther the airport -> Shorter the flight duration between airports

Now an interesting point to be made is , ( though might be comical to you ) assume airports start being so far from the city that they are almost mid-way the flight route , what we could do is then start sharing an airport for 2 cities .Similarly other cities could follow suit and eventually we land up with something very interesting and that is 1 Airport for the whole of the country , thus obviating forever the need to fly and thereby creating carbon-footprints ( though the Pachauris could lecture the whole world on it , travelling on planes , resulting hence in creating more of it :) ) .

ULTIMATE MOTION CONTROL IN AIR !!

INCOMPLETE :


genre:poignant , metric : uniform



In the solitude , germinates this cathartic mind of mine

Here everything looks so just incomplete ;

Almost whispering ,kissing & toying in the void ..

But the valiant efforts all go in vain .




There is this incessant fight within elements

The flow of the waters want to breakthrough to the gravel ;

The tall palms amost droop to their destruction ..

To absorb the juices that help them grow .




The fast moving symbols of urbanisation

Want to break into this sanctum sanctorium ;

The vast skyscrapers & its inhabitants peep their blood out ..

But cometh what , they fail to sense anything animate .




And I .....

Want to plunge into the waters

Against the flow of water and against gravity

To kiss that goldfish ..

That has eluded me and failed to sway in the air ...


How so incomplete ?!

Paryushan-festival of forgiveness :

The days that just went by rekindled in me the desire to truly respect the religion i was born with and people who are interested in knowing what jainism has to offer can read this post .
1.It acknowledges the self as atman .It is based on self-realistion ( atmadarshan)
2. It professes Vitraag-detachment as the key to moksha.It amounts to complete renunciation of all possesions and aversions.
3. The basic principles on which it stands are - ahimsa( non-violence),aparigrah(non-possesion),anekant(nonabsolutism).These are the primordial principles.
4. The path to moksha are the 3 jewels( ratna-traya) - right conduct,faith and knowledge.
5. Jinas have elucidated Daslakshan dharma ( 10 nobel virtues ) of the soul-forgiveness,humility,sincerity,purity,truthfulness,self-restraint,charity,celibacy,penance and non-possesion.
6.Paryushan-the festival of forgiveness ,reflection,meditation,adoration and self-purgation is celebrated from the 5th day of the bright fortnight of bhadrapad till anant chaturdashi for 10 days with fervour and devotion.Devotees absorb themselves in praying,studying scriptures,eulogising,attending sermons of sadhus( vyaakhyaana),fasting for days together(apavaas) and exercising severe austerity for spiritual enlightment.

"SANDALWOOD PERFUMES EVEN THE AXE WHICH HEWS IT DOWN, ITS PERFUME WAFTS ALL AROUND WHEN IT IS ITSELF BURNING-THAT IS FORGIVENESS "

Educational dream

I had this dream the other day : I am taking a class in what hardly seems to be a school .Under the plastic canopied shed , rain water gettin in through all pores and kids -tattered,bruised,dirty ,grimy , Oh god the shed is brimming with kids !!

Unsure of how to start - overwhelmed with emotions - i get this rare oppurtunity to feel the kids one by one - I play with their dishevelled hair .The " navo chokro " is soon taken over by this " good uncle " - all beaming and confident .I take the class with panache and end it with a resounding goodbye they had to offer .

They had a promise to make :

" WE WOULD WAIT FOR YOU THE NEXT WEEK " :)

match day : Gambhir, McGrath shine in Daredevils' win,Royal Challengers beaten for the fourth time in five matches: A VERY EXCITING DAY INDEED

It all started and ended so fittingly , with bouts of tension stuffed in so fittingly that it was almost a smooth but long day .The excitement started with that call my friend gave me at 6:15 informing me about the schedule and that we had got tickets within the range we wanted it in for the same day 8 PM match , wow !! At the time my friend called me i was well into my work and would take 3/4ths of an hour to wrap it all up .Imagine.On top of that home was about 35 minutes away from me at that time .Rush home .Freshen Up very very fast .Rush to the stadium which would be choc-a - bloc by the time i reach i was sure .I ask my driver to keep the machines in the office while i get ready and then pick me up from home .Generally i do not trust anybody on this machines part and i prefer doin it all by myself , but i was helpless .I keep him waitin for 20 mts and then rush to the metro station.The 20 mts went in dressin up , gettin minorly , geared up for the match , seeing the delhi map and tryin to figure out what would be the most optimal way to reach the stadium .I leave for the stadium at 7 : 15 for a 8 PM match , when i know the stadium is 45 mts away from me via the metro ( tube ) route.Grossly laggin in time right at the inception .The tickets were with my friend and i was suppose to meet him outside the stadium at 7:30 , no idea about which gate .I leave home and forget my phone , i do not remember his number since i generally dial his number with the help of the phonebook.On the way i luckily meet a company colleague and borrow his phone for the call .3 ifferent combinations tried , all 3 wrong numbers .He needs to get down in the next stop , i am still far from reachin my friend at the stadium .I try callin someone else who is in a way 2 steps away from my friend waitin at the stadium.He would give me number , from where i would get my frnds number .I get throught the first level , but fail to reach the 2nd level before he needs to get down and take his phone back from me .Reach the stadium and ask for the gates for the ticket denomination we were going for .Ahoy ! , 3 gates for that combination , throbbing crowds , swellin like a hot air balloon at all places .I almost scrutinised a 1000 faces so that i could get a look of my friend and hence could enter with the tickets .No , that was not happening .( came to know later he waited till 7:55 and i reachd at 8:05 ).No tickets , completely tired and out of sorts .Calm down , compose myself and start searchin frantically for people selling those tickets they dont need .Get one guy , who sells me those tickets very cheap .The 500 ticket at 250 jut because his son couldnt make it due to a sore foot !!!.Watch the match from calliper to grave from then on , though miss those initial blasts by sehwag.By this time i am so dehydrated that i cannot bear the dry whiff of air anymore ,Get a lime juice and settle on a longish square leg position , with the screen on my immediate left for instant catch-ups of stuff missed.

Reach home , safe and hearty at 00:40 hrs , so tired , the bones almost dis-owning my body !Nothin much to eat except dried cashew nuts and pistachios , but nevertheless a very satisfying and tiring day .What a fittin end to it : sid is smokin the " montecristo mini cigars to glory " - wow !!!" "sos el mejor del -mundo"-it does make me feel like that !

SELF COMPOSED POEM : "LA KALYUG MEGHDOOT TRAIL:

SOURCE: SELF IAMGINATED DARK SIDE OF AN INDIAN MONSOON
GENRE: SARCASM & EUPHEMISM
STRUCTURE : CANTO FORMAT WITH ALLITERATION
METRIC : VARIABLE
WORDS: 400 ( APPROX.)



LA KALYUG MEGHDOOT TRAIL:

Light changing radically
Relentless flat tropical yellow ;all flowy
Gives way to an ashes-of -peach colour
So psychedelic , so blur

This light we can see only when
The SUN GOD manages to , after the cloud battle
A few straggling rays down the lane
Those too , refracted by dust motes & rain drops rattle

The bunch of moving water bodies
Scuddling white clouds in the proscenium of the human eye
All milky , eye-pouring toddy
In the never-before-never-after sky

It poured like a farcical comedy
Leaving the rich car struck
Next , they in hotel rooms -" MARGARITA TOO SALTY "
This monsoon is a moronic muck

It poured as if raining donkeys
The "lesser rich " -got bus & train struck
Mobile phones , mint boxes & tiffins get exchanged
They are no more junk-ies
The strings of their soul-ly guitar
Are all playing a philharmonic chord
All voices get overlapped
But no one feels the cacaphonic herd
The gentlemen stand up
Just before the pregnancy struck mother sits down
On the seats of heavy sighs
She wants to avoid the swollen legs.


It actually completely poured
The " lesser-than-lesser rich"
Feel their blood getting sucked
By the AARDVARKY LEACH
The belongings are piled
Children all perched
The granny under a blue sheet
Is plasticly waterproofed & CURSED
school children hoisted on backs
Human chains lead all from stranded buses
All the way into the water get pushed the planks
So that a stray cat gets uncursed


The fisher folk dress galore
Get into the sea away from the shore
Their ANNADAATA & ANNAPURNA
Offer coconuts in SADBHAVANA
But it is INDRA WHO HAS TO DECIDE
who would live & KISE HAI MARNA
The same fisher folk all gay and showy
Still dance -the leaves & flowers brightly holy,
A schism in their heads
Still abuse weather gods- as duds
The real criminals par excellence
Still sipping MARGARITAS with no pretence
The weather gods so un-equanimous
Distributing joy & sorrow with a bias


The true spectre of penury haunts the month
All fortitude gets a brunt
The darkness & deprivation not only corporeal
The hollow also breaks through into the soul

Once upon a time it was known
When in a world washed with innocence
Equine wishes got fish drown
We waited for the monsoon incense .


JHIRR....JHIRR....-its raining
GUDU..GUDU..GUDU..-INDRA'S wheels turning
Out come the palm tree umbrellas
From the side of the agrarian fellow
What fun shore hopping in a row
With no umbrella over you , so mellow
But wait , OH!!-The song of the peacock
Has lost it's way, is so shallow .....


---------------END----********--------END---*******____________________

the island snap in fiji ignites the ' go green ' signal in me :

The recent past has seen a great metamorphosis in me , courtesy the image i saw of some place in fiji , submerged in water .An immediate repercussion of environmental degradation experts say .It has rung in alarm bells within me .A similar jolt was struck on me when mumbai had those life-stopping rains some time back, which at that point in time had forced me to dedicate an allegorical poem on it(http://sidbhai.blogspot.com/2008/04/self-composed-poem-la-kalyug-meghdoot.html) , also posted .

On a personal note i have started to walk to office , have asked my folks at home to run washing machines only at full load , buy clothes only when it is required and not get lured by the attraction that the shopping mall offers.( only visit it when i am in dire need of clothes ),have also manipulated my flush knob to save some water.

I remember my days in calcutta when in bengal i saw those sooty fume-emitting sugar industries .Those bunch of irresponsible idiots burnt the rejected bagasse as fuel for further use .It was simply out of convenience that they did that .I also have started to hate aluminium just because the whole process of aluminium manufacturing is extremely detrimental to the ecology.The bauxite is converted to alumina ( Al2O3) , and then after the smelting process made into aluminium ingots, before finally turning up as aluminium.The smelting process emits a huge ball of those obnoxious GHG which contribute to the warming .I was kind of flabbergasted by the very thought of how the 3rd world countries are left with doing all the dirty jobs and the 1st world countries , just because of monetary might do only the final real value-addition jobs that are clean as cheese.And now after the ' carbon credits ' concept , the 1st world nations have a real medium to replace their moral guilt with money , by buying CCs for anything and everything .It is like spitting on the roads and then paying for it at leisure and will .

And after that article i read regarding green food , i would go on to suggest that friends there is every reason in the book that suggests " stop indulging in hogging meat of any kind" .Obviously there is the physical aspect to it ( in hindi sthool) , which says it causes hypertension and high BP , but beyond that i had just read that the whole process of butchering them is too darn brutal , it does leave a lasting impression of horror on the animal , to be consumed as meat later .The horror, when it is being butchered, brings in a set of chemical changes within the animal body which might not be good for meat eating .Thats the meta-physical aspect of it all .( in hindi sookshma ).

Even my company has taken a huge leap forward in terms of going green .It has already planted a photovoltaic array for in house power consumtion , planned to install solar heaters for heating up all the rooms in the company hostel , getting a complete overhaul done of the drainage system to align it to a proper rain water harvesting system, procuring only amorphous transformers that help in reducing core losses ( iron and hysterisis losses ) , selling CFLs and Electronic chokes at subsidised rates and going to schools with well laid plans of energy conservation across the whole of north & NW delhi .

I would just wanna say at this point in time that atleast the start is good when we have accepted the magnanimity of the problem in its true amplitude and have given due credit to the world rhetoric regarding going green .

nurture the juvenile mind :

There is always this identity theft of most of the children in the country .The 'child ' is soon replaced by the tag 'student '.And just as this happens the trauma and the struggle begins for all .Would it be a success story or one which ends in disappointment and blame ?

Where does the story of the struggle begin? It begins with the metamorphosis of a child into a student that seems to happen like any natural occurrence although this transformation is laden with innumerable and very serious ramifications. When does a child actually assume the form and colours of a student? This could well be termed as the moment of transition .

It starts with " how the child would look like " , " whether he resembles anyone in the family ".Oh sorry , before that very importantly " whether he would be a naughty boy or a sweet girl ".The child is first appreciated for its physical appearance , then because he distantly resembles someone in the family he gets brownie points .How silly ! In due course of time he is lauded for his grasp of speech and walk , his play .The child's antics and tantrums are then the focus of all attention and are constantly compared , benchmarked .All the family members see some of their characteristics in the child .Oh great god , u do satisfy all and all !

Then starts the tedious admission process : play school , primary school and then higher school, all accompanied by trials and tribulations for the child and the parents alike .And then, almost overnight, the change of status happens in the psyche of the parent. From the word go, the child is viewed as a student, and the ability of the child to fit into the school system and its demands becomes the yardstick or measure of success.How heavy and overbearing for the child indeed , does anyone understnd !The biological circadian clock should match the school timings , the aptitude to the curriculum and the strength of the back the load of books !The child who is student first and child only next wears the hat for the whole of childhood and the greater part of adolescence.And tragicly the mood of the parents and family also swing high and low as go the scores on the report card.

Questions and questions all lined up in succession : Which are the best careers in today’s scenario? Which are most coveted, that carry the promise of booming opportunities? Which schools and colleges are the best of the pick? And what scores will take students there? Such are the questions that cloud parents’ minds.The neck of the student is clenched by pressures of a high paying job .The colourful butterfly of childhood dreams has long back flown out of the window into the wilds !

The child is trampled and torn between parental expectation and personal ambition and joys.Who is caring for the child's natural endowments and propensities ? NONE , Is the uniqueness in the child being nourished and cherished ? NO No no .

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE :
- Child first , student next
- differentiated teaching and testing by teachers
- the child needs to be nurtured thoroughly

I am helpless and I have to recall the memorable lines of the Persian poet Kahlil Gibran in The Prophet:


Your children are not your children.


They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself;


They come through you but not from you.


You may give them your love but not your thoughts,


For, they have their own thoughts.


You may house their bodies but not their souls,


For their souls lie in the house of tomorrow,


Which you cannot visit,


Not even in your dreams!

my audip clip

http://www.soundupload.com/audio/42dkafoe3su4sel

I'm Sorry-john denver

I'm Sorry


It's cold here in the city
It always seems that way
And I've been thinking about you almost everyday
Thinking about the good times
Thinking about the rain
Thinking about how bad it feels alone again

I'm sorry for the way things are in China
I'm sorry things ain't what they used to be
But more than anything else
I'm sorry for myself
'Cause you're not here with me

Our friends all ask about you
I say you're doing fine
And I expect to hear from you almost anytime
But they all know I'm crying
And I can't sleep at night
They all know I'm dying down deep inside

I'm sorry for all the lies I told you
I'm sorry for the things I didn't say
But more than anything else
I'm sorry for myself
I can't believe you went away

[break]

I'm sorry if I took some things for granted
I'm sorry for the chains I put on you
But more than anything else
I'm sorry for myself
For living without you

It's cold here in the city
It always seems that way
And I've been thinking about you almost everyday

This song means complete intimacy to me .I constantly relate to it , it is from the " leavin on a jet plane " and " back home again " triumvirate of songs in a way .

John why did u leave us and go so early and so fast , we miss u ....

my " love -visual DNA "

http://youniverse.com/love/results/bcb80da3539cfae1f0a3bdd349cff742#

The Seven Words on the Cross- Eagle christians :sermons

1stly : “Father forgive them; for they know not what they do.” In other words forgiveness is the hallmark of a Christian.
2ndly : “Verily I say unto thee, Today thou shalt be with me in Paradise.” -> repentant sinner .A Christian will never exclude a sinner from the possibility of being integrated into the society of God if he or she truly repents..
3rdly : “Woman behold thy son.” Jesus showed that the Christian’s core concern should be the welfare of others as illustrated in the Parable of the Good Samaritan...
4thly : “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” -human cry of despair from the downtrodden and oppressed for god's recognition ....
5thly : “I thirst.”-a christian should be ready for any kind of physical suffering symbolised by the crucification of Jesus as part of the redemptive plan of God .....
6thly : “at-one-ment” (atonement)-God accomplishes his task by ending all suffering of humankind ......
7thly : “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.” -implicit obedience and surrender to the will of God.......

And hence The Seven Words on the Cross are a condensation of the Sermons .......

water crisis :dry delhi summers

This is one interesting incident that i have gone through in recent times . It is a generally accepted fact that the harbinger of delhi summers brings with it an acute water crisis.This past week was almost desert-like in my house with not a drop of water to drink or bathe.Due to the same old prejudice in my mind - i said to myself -sid guy , the days have begun where you have to dig deep for each drop of water .So for drinking i had water cans or the community water outlet and each time i had to go down 3 floors and get some water and for bathing i had to go to a friend's house nearby - now u could imagine how irritating it was .

But then i was a fool to not take any cue from nature and the surroundings .Realisation should have dawned that it was a bit too early for such acute water shortage and i should have asked my neighbours at the same floor ( floor matters because my motor is placed on the 2nd floor and it could be that the natural flow did not get the water to this height for the motor to pump and maybe the guys having a motor placed on the ground floor would be having water just because the pump was accessing it), but i never did any of this and just assumed that because it was summer on our heads that there was not water and was complying with it . On top of that the newspapers continually said that the whole of delhi was facing the water crisis, so everything just seemed to be even more normal and expected.

Then one fine day , my motor co-sharer came by as a godsend and stimulated my biased brain .Let me just explain to you the whole situation: we have a common overhead tank which is on my terrace and both off us share that tank , and the motor has 2 energisation points : one with him and the other with me , so on manual changeover we can control the running of the motor. It so happens that the chap has such job timings that at both times of the day he cannot somehow get the supply water for his use and so has to bear with the tank stored water .At my place i run the motor at both times , but these days since my conductor going in to the motor was open i was not being able to access the motor and about which i did not come to know because the motor was in his house , and hence i concluded that there was no water inflow from the water board's side , but i was grossly wrong .Today i happened to go to his house and serendpitously discover that the motor was not running through my switch , so i came home straightaway and checked the continuity of my conductor and saw that either both wires ( P and N ) were glowing on a line tester or both were not glowing ,the other chap said that " bhai there is a short circuit" , i said cmon how can it be a short circuit , if it is a short circuit both would glow on any combination you apply .Is is a open on the N wire and i was exactly right - for an open circuit if the open N is connected to the supply side P both would not glow and if open N was connected to supply N both would glow : because the whole of the P voltage would come over to the N wire because of no voltage drop.So after about 15 mts of haggling with the wires we discovered that there was an open right next to the plug point in my house and we then cleard that fault .

And AHOY!!!! we could get abundant water from tomorrow onwards.

MORAL : MURPHY'S law is ubiquitous and is always working , here in india systems are always on the verge of instabilty and hence there are many possible ways of it going wrong , though for it to be all picture perfect there is only one way , so rather than thinking and assuming too much , it is always better to start checking your immediate surroundings for the looming MURPHY resultant .

FARM LOAN WAIVER -A SHALLOW RESPONSE , A CRITICAL ANALYSIS :

STATEMENT : All agricultural loans disbursed by scheduled [commercial banks, regional rural banks and cooperative credit institutions] (A) up to March 31, 2007 and overdue as on December 31, 2007 will be covered under the scheme

For marginal farmers (i.e., holding upto 1 hectare) and small farmers (1-2 hectare),
there will be a complete waiver of all loans that were overdue(A) on December 31, 2007 and which remained unpaid(A) until February 29, 2008. In respect of other farmers, there will be a one time settlement (OTS) scheme for all loans that were overdue on December 31, 2007 and which remained unpaid until February 29, 2008. Under the OTS, a rebate of 25 per cent will be given against payment of the balance of 75 %.

Government estimates that about three crore small(B) and marginal farmers (B)and about one crore other farmers will benefit from the scheme. The total value of overdue loans being waived is estimated at Rs.50,000(C) crore and the OTS relief on the overdue loans is estimated at Rs.10,000 crore.(C)

ANALYSIS:
-> which institutions, loan categories, and class of borrowers will be covered by the scheme -far from clear ..
-> (A)-Scheme applies to only those farmers who have outstanding loans .Majority of rural and farm households declare they have no outstanding loans or debt.And those who admit they have debt may not have instituional debt at all .Thus majority of the farmer community not applicable .
->(B)-Access to institutional debt and proportion of outstanding debts are skewed to larger farms ie. >> 2 hectares of arable land.
-> (A)WITHIN : What constitutes institutional loans : they include both direct(production and consumption needs) and indirect (trading,transport,distribution,processing of farm produce) lending .These indirct loans acoount for half of all loans on an average.Any justification on waiver of indirect loans ??
-> (C)-INR 60,000 Cr, thats bizarre and hideous , this estimate is far from clear and very very vague to say the least. There is good reason to believe that a generalised waiver of all overdues will benefit non-rural borrowers to a considerable extent; that the large majority of rural households, including those in the below 2 hectares(small and marginal) category will not benefit; and that the magnitude of benefit accruing to them will be considerably less than INR 60,000 Cr.

REPERCUSSIONS:This scheme would not address the current agrarian crisis in the way it is intended to .It would create a huge backlash in terms of attitude shifts in the farming community.Waivers would encourage borrowers to presume that they can sooner or later get away without repaying loans as corroborated by history.The culture of default by default would make a home in the farmer mindspace.There is statewide massive rural reform process going on and this waiver comes right at the wrong time : an irony of sorts.

WHAT HAD TO BE DONE INSTEAD:Faster pace of growth in the rural economy and an improved quality of education and health services was rather the call of the hour .Addressing deeper problems rooted in the overexploitation and degradation of land and water; government policies that encourage wasteful use of resources; the inefficiency of public systems responsible for implementing programmes, regulating the use of common service facilities, and ensuring quality infrastructural and support services would have done the job.

This was my experience and conversation with a small town factory worker in his tiny factory making those plastic bottles to hold chuna ( edible lime product ) .The conversation was insightful in more ways than one .The machine was a low-end one though thoughtfully crafted . It was nothing but a moulding machine with variously shaped moulds to cater to many end products . On the top was a cuppish slot to hold the plastic raw material and that was fed into the heating chamber with the help of a spindle . The heating chamber was nothing but a coil which was fed by the ac supply and which heated the raw material ( plastic balls) beyond their melting point .This viscous,molten plastic was then fed into a chamber where it was blown out into bottles by the help of pressurised air from a compressor .The finished product came out of a 4-legged termination point .The efficiency of the machine as stated by the worker was a mere 50% but still reaped in huge profits for his employer .

Then i asked him how they were paid . On hour basis ? Or on number of bottles made ( in that case they were dependent on the machine as they did not completely have a direct hand in the number of bottles finally turning up ).He said " bhaisaab , maalik jo hai na bada ginti ka pakka hai , 5 gm main 50 bottle nikalti hai , toh ham karib 3 kilo maal din main nikalte hain aur tab jaake prati 1000 bootle ke hisaab se 20000 bottle ke paise lete hain ( wink wink !!! ratio and proportion redifined !! wink !) , tabhi kuch bachta hai khaandaan ko khilane ko kyonki aane jaane ka bhaada bhi toh lagta hai , aur phir sahab ( whispering) hame toh is wajan waale machine pe bhi bharosa nahi ( actual weight of their output would be in the tune of 4 Kgs) hai aur na uspe , lagta hai maalik ne ise bhi golmaal kar rakha hai tabhi toh hame kabhi nahi dikhata wajan kya hai !!!! bas yehi majboori hai ki andhere mein naukri kar rahe hain kyonki aur hame kaun rakhega bina jaan pehechaan ke delhi jaise shahar mein !aur phir gaon mein kya karen , kheti bhi toh bahut mehengi pad rahi hai gentor(generator) ki bijli mein !

Now that is how the trickle down theory works in india !! with falsified calculations , dishonesty , utter disregard for the poor and bull shitty weighing machines !

Solar house: A Solar Home, can u add solar panels to your house ?

The house includes a fully integrated solar roof that is interconnected with the local utility grid. The solar electric system uses an inverter which regulates the energy produced by the solar panels on the roof making the system completely compatible with the home's local utility provider.

This solar home, replete with solar panels, harvests energy from the sun to generate electricity and heat. On sunny days, the roof collects enough sun energy to produce more electricity than the home actually requires. Since the home-owner has a net metering agreement with the local utility, the electrical meter on such days will run backward, selling energy back to the utility company. At night, the residents of this solar home consume electricity from the utility as regular consumer.

The home is also equipped with a solar thermal array that provides all of the pool heating and a good part of the domestic hot water. The family's swim season is extended by two months, as well as paying a much lower overall cost for pool heating.

As well, part of the home's space heating requirements is covered by solar thermal heating. This also reduces their monthly gas bill.

In addition to all these features, the home is constructed using passive solar design principles. These features include the use of natural daylighting, natural cooling, superior insulation and windows as well as other energy conservation techniques.

invictus-" unconquerable "

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever Gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of Circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of Chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

This is one hell of a poem by William Ernest Henley, it is my eternal guide when i am down and out in life , it inspires me to bounce back from any damn shit surrounding me . Its greatness lies in the way it tells us to take responsibilty of our own destiny .It is the same poem which Timothy McVeigh ( oklahama bomber ) recited as his final statement before death .( though in no way does he influence my admiration for it )

tamil movie: criticality

Recently i had the (mis)fortune of getting to see an old tamil movie named vaali- directed by s.j. surya ,it is a plain and simple plot of a desperado having desire pangs for his brother's beautiful wife played by the sensuous simran ( maybe inspired by " Vanilla Series - My Brother's Wife- DEBTS OF DESIRE he he !!). The brothers have been played by ajith in a double role .

Now what is it about the movie that makes me write a dedicated blog on it - it is the spoon-feeding done to the characters by the director , cmon mr. surya you cant give the characters a flat- not thought about -all made ready recipe - let them think for themselves for god sake !!!!

There are some very obvious scenes when the plot just unfolds as you would expect it to being a lay-viewer ( total lack of creativity):

• the sikh driver just comes at the right moment and hence the antagonist is informed of where the couple is put up for their long-delayed first night ( bad dude , bad !)
• the lady trips over the carpet and finds blood- signifying that her husband is in danger -just in time
• the mundane " it had to happen scene " where simran by mistake mixes sleeping pills in the protagonist's glass of milk - i was dumbstruck MR. surya
• towards the end simran realises that the guy in the house is not his husband only after she gets no replies to almost a 1000 questions ( antagonist is deaf and dumb FYI) , pathetic
• the phone receiver had to be pulled off for no 2nd call from the husband's end when there was no other way of communicating ( they literally were bearing the proverbial brunt of the telephone monopoly)
• the tranfer of the gun-holding jacket onto the actress' shoulder-that had to happen - the villain should die in the hands of the victim bhai ...though eventually both get to share the delight of killing the villain-the last nail on the coffin is struck by the husband ...

Though i just could not take the credit away from simran for deftly handling glycerine throughout the movie for scenes filled with lachrymose .....

But goddammit ! MR. SURYA the next time round please make the characters think for themselves - gift them a sense of inductive logic so that the thriller remains just that and not a mere" predicatable state of affairs " ...

till then .. chao

Exporters look for more sops :pre-budget rhetoric

I had this chat to an exporter friend of mine some days back over the omnipresent G-TALK and we were mulling over the insecurities that the exporters are facing post the rupee appreciation .(the rupee has appreciated by 15 per cent against the dollar in the past 16 months ) It has not only impacted the profit levels of export-oriented units (EOUs), but also foreign buyers who are now looking for other cheaper options, pressing a panic button in Indian industry .If the ambitious export target of $200 billion has to be achieved by the end of the next fiscal, some measures are needed to provide a cushion for the sector.Now that exporter friend of mine had to say some things which were repeated in one of the articles in a leading newspaper and i could see that the pulse of the exporters is beating at a uniform rate and they are a bunch of anxious people waiting for magic to happen in the hands of the magician - FM p. chidbrm .They cite these needs :

• concessions in taxes and duties and formation of some kind of cash reserve to tackle the present crisis, posed by stronger rupee.
• concessions for the export sector, particularly for the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and the worst-hit labour intensive sectors like textiles, handicrafts and leather.( my friend belongs to this group)
• tax incentives for the manufacturing export sector for movement up the value chain
• waiver of the Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT) so that the impact of the appreciating rupee could be minimised
• extension of income-tax benefits to all exporting units
• basic customs duty exemption on capital goods imported under the Export Promotion Capital Goods (EPCG) scheme
• rebate on duty paid on exported material
• exporters want ambiguities removed while giving service tax refunds and its benefits be given to all those contributing to India’s exports
• Small manufacturers, who are either in the non-excisable sector or in the exempted category, have to bear the incidence of service tax paid during the course of exports. Exporters say levy of service tax affects competitiveness of exporting units and want that they be exempted from paying the same

AHOY! Is chidambaram anna listening , anna pananga , idi ella pananga , please saaar ....

Stop the world, I want to get off!

Let us face it, the world today is an agglomeration of events and impressions, most of which are “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” The word “most” is deliberate there, because interspersed in these inconsequentially gauche episodes are pixels of quintessential significance. Those who walk through with a perfunctory glance will miss them, but the pragmatic observer pales at their intrinsic importance.
Another year of nebulous delights has sped by. It was the purveyor of both the mundane and the magnificent. The senseless killing of hundreds of innocents went unnoticed in Iraq, in Chad, in Kenya, in Afghanistan. Superpowers gloating over obscenely fat (and mainly undeserved) pay cheques, turned a deaf ear to the pleas of the poor, the dispossessed, the starving, the dying.
While ineffectual statesmen, deified by the press, made exponential speeches in totally ersatz parables, cities burnt, and hopes crumbled. The statesmen rode back in the plush comfort of stretch limos, while the common man shook his head in untenable despair.Indiscriminate greed
It took a brave person like Gore to stand up to the established lobbies in the hallowed precincts of power. Every second some gigantic tree that took ages to reach its splendid proportions is felled. Indiscriminate greed and implausible superstitions propel the slaughter of animals to slake the demand for parts believed to rejuvenate vitality.
The blood of cobras is collected to be served to men with pouches of indulgence hanging from their jowls; sharks are caught, their fins cut off, and then tossed mercilessly back into the waters. The majestic whale is hunted and killed, so are the bear, and the rhino. The senseless killing of wildlife is equalled only by the facetious attitude towards the destruction of the environment. We are the ingenuous inheritors of this presumptuous folly.
Similar shenanigans are not missing from the other facets of life. Religion, politics and even the sacred corridors of learning are rife with corrupt practices and insensitive machinations. Impoverished citizens hide in the hills of Orissa, fearing persecution. Mosques are burnt, temples desecrated, churches destroyed, synagogues defiled. Hatred and intolerance are nurtured by lack of communication. It is ignorance that breeds insensitivity.
Caught between two worlds — “one dead, and the other powerless to be born” — is the common man. To him goes the questionable delights of this unctuous struggle. He trusts in political statements shrouded in arcane promises, but tastes the bitterness too late. His dream of democracy is cloaked in terse sobriety. He no longer recognises democracy in the travesty of the ideology that he sees around him. The mantle is borne by worthless men who have no calling, except that of unrestrained avarice.
Imprisoned in the milieu of unbridled progress is also the optimist. He counters the argument of enervating pessimism by pointing out the achievements of a Muhammad Yunus, a Jimmy Carter, an Orhan Pamuk, a Doris Lessing, a Roger Kornberg. We are mulling ideas in an age of tremendous possibilities, and it is up to us to bear with grace and dignity the responsibilities of a “brave new world.”
We need to wake up to the loss of tremulous hopes before we are engulfed by the rampage of festinate greed. Do I want to get off now? This is the only world I know, and I believe that we are capable of rising above all these to a level of refined purity. So, let me just wait and see what’s around the bend.

courtesy: CHOTY-ANNE THOMAS (Open Page)

intersexuality

what are various ways in which culture-bearing humans have interpreted and lived with this natural ambiguity? and why?

a) cultures have accommodated the ambiguity
hermaphrodite (hermes + Aphrodite)
1) hijra in India— not so much a ‘natural category’ of person, but a role that can
subsume a range of sex/gender nonconformists
including intersexuals but also what in west would call eunuchs (castrati),
homosexuals, transsexuals, transgendered persons

2) guevedoche (‘penis at 12’) Dominican Republic
= the hereditary genetic mutation that Cal has in Middlesex, which in US has no popular name and is treated as a medical condition — 5 alpha-reductase — "treatable"


We have learned from listening to individuals and families dealing with intersex that:
* Intersexuality is primarily a problem of stigma and trauma, not gender.
* Parents' distress must not be treated by surgery on the child.
* Professional mental health care is essential.
* Honest, complete disclosure is good medicine.
* All children should be assigned as boy or girl, without early surgery."

" TrAp dOoRs " interviews : what are they ?

Once in a while we are all victims of these " trap door " interviews, some of us realise it and some of us are so puzzled we do not even realise it , imagine . These interviews are littered with landmines intermittently , throwing us out of gear , steamless, gaping in amazement like a deer frozen by the headlights of a car in the middle of a forest.

We all follow cardinal rules of an interview process when we go for it ( job and company research,composing brilliant answers for common questions ,preparing intelligent lists of questions ,dressing well ,being punctual , smiling away to glory ), but there is one trap door question and you are all haywhire .The most experienced interviewees get skewered.
SOLUTIONS AND ANALYSIS :
THE DEAD SILENCE :
Just after an answer the interviewer maintains a deliberate silence and stares at you as if you just asked for his kidneys.Now thats the psychological trick he is playing..He wants to test your compusure under stress ,now most of us unwary people jump headlond and boom !!!, the void is filled with utter nonsense .What we should have done here is be patient, confident , waiting out the prolonged silence with deliberate ease and then posing a smart question of your own and thus reversing the psychological tennis ball.

SOME DISCONCERTING QUERIES :

• Tell us about yourself ( the most common but the most flagellating )
• What made you leave the last job ( the trap is being laid for you to fall into -careful-slow down-think )
• What are your weaknesses( no sentimental crap here , mind you)
• Something you did you are ashamed of
• How would you respond to an atrocious idea by your boss
• Where do you see urself 5 years from now
• How would you define success in your job

Now such open-ended questions are intimidating , DO NOT narrate juvenile inhibitions or try baring your soul.Take this as an oppurtunity and not a threat and discuss your employability by discussing your work ethos and history . Stuff like " i am very hard working " or my friends describe me as a perfectionist " might work if supported by facts .But if you are totally flustered , avoid the question with a genuine " I am sorry but nothing comes to my mind "

ODDBALL QUESTIONS:

• In a dinner party which 3 famous personalities would you invite
• The last book you read
• What were your childhood aspirations
• What classes or subjects generated interest in your mind in high school
• What would your refrigerator be stuffed with most of the times .
• If you were born a fruit what would it be

These are crazy questions which have no bearing with your ability quotient but they speak volumes for your persona , they get you stripped bare in front of the panel .They reveal your thought process, personality, creativity, interests and your fittingness to a team culture .If thrown out of balance , regain your compusure , collect your thoughts and formulate short and sincere answers. There could be an inclusion of light-hearted humour to break the proverbial ice .Do not loose the thread of conversation ( continuity) at any point in the interview .

Don't let Economics override Technology for god sake !!!spectrum allocation fiasco , is it ?

Don't let Economics override Technology
Middle path may be good for spiritual sake (heard of Raja-rishi model?), but when it comes to regulatory policies, it is not just frivolous but dangerous too. One such policy now is the government decision to have a combo of entry fee-revenue share model for 3G spectrum allocation. The rationale seems to be having an entry fee small enough for encouraging competition but high enough to avoid small inefficient players throwing their hats.The underlying premise for entry fee is this- spectrum is scarce resource, so the government should give a strong dis-incentive for inefficient usage. So far so good, but something seems amiss- economics seems to have overridden technology.Technology is fast making spectrum a scarce to an increasingly abundant resource. You may think that radio signals kind of bump into each other, so the electromagnetic spectrum has limits. Actually, it’s not the transmission that poses problems (though signals get weakened with distance), but the receivers aren’t sophisticated enough to differentiate one signal from other. This problem is getting fixed.Wide band spectrum and spread spectrum (used in CDMA) is just one way of circumventing it- instead of confining the signal to a narrow band, spread the signal over broadband so that it mimics a guassian random signal, and have sophisticated error correcting receivers to decode them.One of the emerging technologies is mesh networks. In this, the signal is passed through a network of receivers which receives the signal and passes them to adjacent receiver, giving the counter-intuitive result that the channel capacity increases with the number of receivers.One more technology involves having cognitive ‘smart ‘radios having super-computing chips to receive the signals, which dramatically increases the signal capacity, as it decodes spectrally-close signals.These and more are evolving, which will make the existing technologies obsolete. An entry fee may bring small fortune for the government, but decreases the Indian companies’ ability to adopt newer technologies when they arise. Revenue share model, where companies pay as they use would have been more appropriate. Long live the middle path!

Why do you wish a person "many happy returns of the day" on their birthday?

The happy returns on your birthday refer to solar returns - the moment when the sun returns to the zodiac sign and degree it occupied at your birth. A horoscope is drawn up for the precise moment of your solar return, in order to predict your year ahead - hopefully a happy one!

or mayb...

This phrase came into use when people revolved around their families (before the days of confuddling and befusing technological contraptions) and they would, when it came to their birthdays, go home to their families to celebrate with the family. When they said "many happy returns" it meant "We hope you have many more happy days like that returning to your family..."

or mayb...
You are wishing them that their birthday will "return" again - many times i.e. that they will have a long life.as simple as that !!!
god would know better, but i celebrate mine on the 17th of the 3rd month and i want all of u to wish me " happy returns " on that day each year...

Is " extrovert-introvert " siblings a myth?

We read stories which portray diametrically opposite siblings. Is it a cliché which was invented to base a juicy story? Studies have confirmed that this is the norm.
The phenomenon is called sibling de-identification, popularized by American psychologist Feinberg, he says this occurs predominantly in siblings of same sex, have limited age differences and those who are immediate ones (the first and third sibling tend to be similar than first and second, say). The second one tries to pursue different courses, enjoys different genre of movies, have different hobbies, which is acceptable. But what is surprising is that they have a very different personality traits even though brought in exactly the same environment- the second one is reserved if the first is enterprising, short tempered if first is warm, takes quick decisions if first is contemplative etc. Research shows the second girl of the family tends to be tomboyish and lacks feminine interests like dance, reading romantic novels .....
Why does this happen? Siblings compete for parents’ share of attention and love all the time, which leads to friction (prominent cause of sibling rivalry). Over time, they (mainly the second one) try to differentiate themselves from the each other. (In marketing terms, they tend to carve out and operate in separate niches so that they don’t have to compete for the customer (in this case the parents) directly.) So, by having different personality, they unconsciously establish they are unique in their parents’ eyes.

We are all victims of sibling-de-identification at some point in time ; arent we ???

pirsig

You see things vacationing on a motorcycle in a way that is completely different from any other. In a car you're always in a compartment, and because you're used to it you don't realize that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You're a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame.

On a cycle the frame is gone. You're completely in contact with it all. You're in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming. That concrete whizzing by five inches below your foot is the real thing, the same stuff you walk on, it's right there, so blurred you can't focus on it, yet you can put your foot down and touch it anytime, and the whole thing, the whole experience, is never removed from immediate consciousness.

my visual DNa

http://friends.imagini.net/sidintense/widget/9

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

Art as a disclosure of the deeper reality of things is a form of knowledge.
It is imitation not of outward nature but of inner reality.The mind of the artist is always at work, aiming at a definite purpose. He discerns within the visible world something more real than its outward appearance, some idea or form of the true, the good or the beautiful, which is more akin to the spirit itself than to the visible things. This idea or form, this meaning or value is not an added grace or refinement, but the very heart of the object itself.

The truths of poetry cannot be set out in elaborate arguments but are conveyed more subtly.The artist gives a new meaning to our experience and organizes it in a different way due to his perception of subtler qualities in reality.


Artists send us their eyes and we see through them

indian paradoxes -perspective

the sense of nationhood that india provides to all of us in india is not very deeply insighted , the singular and simple thing about india is that you can only speak of it in the plural .

if america is the melting pot of cultures , india is a thali , a grand combination of sumptuous dishes in different compartmentalised bowls .Each taste's different , and does not always mix with the next , but they all belong together on the plate and complement each others' identities and make the meal a very satisfying one .

and lets further on go about exploring the subtle differences and the major ones between 'hindutva ' and 'hinduism '.Lets delve deeper into the etymologies of these two.

pronounciation

these are some common words some of us mis-pronounce :

" extempore " -3 syllables ( ex as in expect + 2nd e as in test + o as the a in china + final e like the i in pit , so the pronounciation is like " extemperi "

" sojourn" - ( in so the o is like the o in hot , j as in jam, ourn like the urn in burn) .stress on the 1st syllable 'so'. finally we get - " sojurn "

departure: the empty enclosure:,,genre : poignant,,narration: mixed

comes over me a shudder
With silence and tears i quiver
we are parted
i care for u
u know it but do not show it you had once caught me by your latching fingers
now u say u would faintly be touching it
am i that bad
or my destiny has that written all over it
your words " can i go "
"i would not be there when you come next"
did u loose your soul when u asked all this
how hollow , how empty i felt u do not know
how could i have ever said i mind
i was still living the nightmare
dont we need your caress when we are down and out
dont we need your touch when we fall down bruising ourselves
dont we need your hands of gold
to weed out all that is unwanted



And there is nothing left to do
But to kiss once again, and part,
One world was not enough for two
Like me and you.
you let me off your protective womb
to be all unprotected and by myself
was that not a contradiction


she left with not much of a warning
but just a bright voice and pain-filled eyes
the embrace was so heavy, i could feel my heart falling out lacerating
was there enough justification
i drank all the " anguish of the schism "
how do u expect that i seek that empty world ?
i dare not indulge in the memory's soul rupturing curl



i hug for the last time in debility
seeking to gather the whole bag of emotions
keeps rushing to me my frailty
i cannot douse the flame of the candle
that is quenching my motion



the moon rose that night
all murky, white and shapely mass
u have gone to that world
where distances would feed on the appetite of remebrances
My lost delights, now clean from sight of land,
Have left me all alone in unknown ways;


my cries cannot be heard outside
they need a medium to be vented through
but it is all a vacuum
a pain filled vacuity


the walls still shout
with ever increasing intensity
" can i go ", "i would not see you here again" ,
my truth filtered acknowledgement
mixed with the noice of the brick layers jab me for that


i still see you dancing
no sooner did the day start
that u danced a step
in the middle of the kitchen
you jigged all hep

यह जानकार आपको हैरंयत होगी की सारे धर्मों ने शराब का विरोध किया है . और यह साधारण , बिलकुल ना समझने वाले नेतागण जो दुनिया को समझाते हैं की शराब का इसलिए विरोध किया है की उससे चरित्र नष्ट हो जाता है, की उससे घर की सम्पंती नष्ट हो जाती है ,की आदमी लड़ने झगड़ने लगता है , यह सब बेवकूफी की बातें हैं . धर्मों ने शराब का विरोध सिर्फ इसलिए किया है क्योंकि जो आदमी शराब पीता है , वोह अपने को भुलाने का उपाय कर रहा है ,वोह अपनी आत्मा से कभी भी परिचित नहीं हो सकता ,क्योंकि आत्मा से परिचित होने के लिए अपने को जानने की इच्छा होनी चाहिए .इसलिए शराब और समाधि दो विरोधी चीज़ बन गयी .जितनी अकड़ शर्ब न पीने वाले मैं देखि जाती है उतनी शर्ब पीने वाले में नहीं देखि जाती. पर फिर शर्ब क्यों ख़राब मानी जाती है ??? यह इसलिए की अगर हम शर्ब पीते हैं तोह हम अपने आप को भूल जाते है , अपने स्वरुप को भूल जाते है , अपना परिचय अपने आप से नहीं करवा पाते , तोह हम अपने इस जन्म को भूलने की फिक्र में लग जाते हैं अगर शराब पीते हैं , तोह होता यह है की हम पिछले जन्मों को भी याद नहीं कर सकते , और अगर हम पिछले जन्मों को याद कर नहीं सकते तोह इस जनम को कैसे सुधर लेंगे !!!!!!!

the osho way

You just have to be alert enough and you will find the whole nature is full of wisdom, and the whole existence is crying out truth from different sources.

You just need open eyes, receptivity, sensitivity, awareness, and this whole existence becomes your home.

Zen is concerned absolutely with your relaxation because only in relaxation does one sink deep enough into the original sources of life.

The whole existence becomes a totally different phenomenon the moment you disappear. Hence, you are the only problem. If you can dissolve your problem…it means you have to dissolve yourself. So there is no salvation for you, there is only dissolving yourself into the ultimate. And there is nothing greater, nothing more majestic, nothing more miraculous.

the monkey -jumping on keyboards and managing to type the works of shakespeare scenario-demystified

The grittiest detail in this problem is that the answer is only yes if we are talking about an infinite number of trials; that is, having an infinite number of monkeys or letting one monkey pound away for an infinite amount of time. If we are restricted to a finite number of monkeys and a finite amount of time, then the answer is no. It is entirely possible that in a finite amount of time a finite number of monkeys may type out nothing but pages upon pages of meaningless drivel. It's also possible (although unlikely) that one monkey may get it right the first time.



A typical digitized picture on your computer screen is 640 pixels long by 480 pixels wide, for a total of 307200 pixels. Using only 256 different colors, you can get decent resolution. Now if you take 256^307200 (256 times itself 307200 times) you get... well, a pretty big number, but a finite number nonetheless. That's the number of different images you can have of that particular size. Any picture you would scan into a computer at that size and resolution will necessarily be one of those images. Therefore, contained in those images are the images of the faces of every human being who ever lived along with the images of the faces of every person yet to be born. Deep stuff, eh? I'll leave you with that thought. Thanks for reading this

EfIl-dats life backwards

I want to live my next life backwards: >You start out dead and get that out of the way.>Then you wake up in an old age home feeling better every day.>Then you get kicked out for being too healthy.>Enjoy your retirement and collect your pension. >Then when you start work, you buy a mansion on your first day.>You work 40 years until you're too young to work.>You get ready for High School: drink alcohol, party and you're generally>promiscuous. >Then you go to primary school, you become a kid, you play, and you have no>responsibilities.>Then you become a baby, and then...>You spend your last 9 months floating peacefully in luxury, in spa-like>conditions – central heating, room service on tap>>And then... you finish off as an orgasm.>>What a way to go!

life-the ubiquitous convergence

See our life is like a picture having 2 rail lines , on either sides the 2 rail lines tend to merge into a point, and as we walk further on any of the sides the point moves further too, leaving us trailing behind it at all the times ,back and forth we try going , but hell with it the past and future, it is all but one , life does not change with time , like the 2 points of convergence of the tracks on either sides , we cannot reach the point but we still have to travel along the tracks till infinity, we have to live our lives even if we think we are not gettin the desired end and have not got the wanted start to it .

freakonomics

crime rate fell not because of good policing, better gun control laws or better job scenario but because abortion was made legal, as the unwanted children were not born.
obstetricians in areas with declining birth rates are much more likely to perform cesarean-section deliveries than obstetricians in growing areas—suggesting that, when business is tough, doctors try to ring up more expensive procedures.
most disease-ridden province in his empire was also the province with the most doctors. His solution? He promptly ordered all the doctors shot dead.
that the amount of money spent on campaign finance is obscenely huge? In a typical election period that includes campaigns for the presidency, the Senate, and the House of Representatives, about $1 billion is spentper year—which sounds like a lot of money, unless you care to measure it against something seemingly less important than democratic elections.It is the same amount, for instance, that citizens spend every year on chewing gum
here they imposd fine for parents coming late to pick their children from a day care centre.But there was another problem with the day-care center fine. It substituted an economicincentive (the $3 penalty) for a moral incentive (the guilt that parents were supposed tofeel when they came late). For just a few dollars each day, parents could buy off theirguilt. Furthermore, the small size of the fine sent a signal to the parents that late pickupsweren’t such a big problem. If the day-care center suffers only $3 worth of pain for eachlate pickup, why bother to cut short the tennis game? Indeed, when the economistseliminated the $3 fine in the seventeenth week of their study, the number of late-arrivingparents didn’t change. Now they could arrive late, pay no fine, and feel no guilt.
economic incentive vs moral incentive :they wanted to learn about the motivation behind blood donations. Their discovery: when people are given a smallstipend for donating blood rather than simply being praised for their altruism, they tend todonate less blood. The stipend turned a noble act of charity into a painful way to make afew dollars, and it wasn’t worth it.What if the blood donors had been offered an incentive of $50, or $500, or $5,000?Surely the number of donors would have changed dramatically.But something else would have changed dramatically as well, for every incentive has itsdark side. If a pint of blood were suddenly worth $5,000, you can be sure that plenty ofpeople would take note. They might literally steal blood at knifepoint. They might pass off pig blood as their own. They might circumvent donation limits by using fake IDs.Whatever the incentive, whatever the situation, dishonest people will try to gain anadvantage by whatever means necessary.
For every clever person who goes to the trouble of creating an incentive scheme, there isan army of people, clever and otherwise, who will inevitably spend even more time tryingto beat it. Cheating may or may not be human nature, but it is certainly a prominentfeature in just about every human endeavor. Cheating is a primordial economic act:getting more for less. So it isn’t just the boldface names—inside-trading CEOs and pillpoppingballplayers and perk-abusing politicians—who cheat. It is the waitress whopockets her tips instead of pooling them. It is the Wal-Mart payroll manager who goesinto the computer and shaves his employees’ hours to make his own performance lookbetter. It is the third grader who, worried about not making it to the fourth grade, copiestest answers from the kid sitting next to him
The incentive scheme that rules sumo is intricate and extraordinarily powerful. Eachwrestler maintains a ranking that affects every slice of his life: how much money hemakes, how large an entourage he carries, how much he gets to eat, sleep, and otherwisetake advantage of his success. The sixty-six highest-ranked wrestlers in Japan,comprising the makuuchi and juryo divisions, make up the sumo elite. A wrestler near thetop of this elite pyramid may earn millions and is treated like royalty. Any wrestler in thetop forty earns at least $170,000 a year. The seventieth-ranked wrestler in Japan,meanwhile, earns only $15,000 a year. Life isn’t very sweet outside the elite. Low-rankedwrestlers must tend to their superiors, preparing their meals and cleaning their quartersand even soaping up their hardest-to-reach body parts. So ranking is everything
Kennedy balked at the various fees, pretending to play hard to get, but agreed to join. Notlong after, he took the Klan oath in a nighttime mass initiation atop Stone Mountain.Kennedy began attending weekly Klan meetings, hurrying home afterward to write notesin a cryptic shorthand he invented. He learned the identities of the Klan’s local andregional leaders and deciphered the Klan’s hierarchy, rituals, and language. It was Klancustom to affix a Kl to many words; thus would two Klansmen hold a Klonversation inthe local Klavern. Many of the customs struck Kennedy as almost laughably childish.The secret Klan handshake, for instance, was a left-handed, limp-wristed fish wiggle.When a traveling Klansman wanted to locate brethren in a strange town, he would ask fora “Mr. Ayak”—“Ayak” being code for “Are You a Klansman?” He would hope to hear,“Yes, and I also know a Mr. Akai”—code for “A Klansman Am I.”
The day that a car is driven off the lot is the worst day in its life, for it instantly loses asmuch as a quarter of its value. This might seem absurd, but we know it to be true. A newcar that was bought for $20,000 cannot be resold for more than perhaps $15,000. Why?Because the only person who might logically want to resell a brand-new car is someonewho found the car to be a lemon. So even if the car isn’t a lemon, a potential buyerassumes that it is. He assumes that the seller has some information about the car that he,the buyer, does not have—and the seller is punished for this assumed information.
Most impressively, fully 70 percent of the women claimed “above average” looks,including 24 percent claiming “very good looks.” The online men too were gorgeous: 67percent called themselves “above average,” including 21 percent with “very good looks.”This leaves only about 30 percent of the users with “average” looks, including a paltry 1percent with “less than average” looks—which suggests that the typical online dater iseither a fabulist, a narcissist, or simply resistant to the meaning of “average.” (Or perhapsthey are all just realists: as any real-estate agent knows, the typical house isn’t“charming” or “fantastic,” but unless you say it is, no one will even bother to take alook.) Twenty-eight percent of the women on the site said they were blond, a number farbeyond the national average, which indicates a lot of dyeing, or lying, or both.
The richer a man is, the more e-mails he receives. But a woman’sincome appeal is a bell-shaped curve: men do not want to date low-earning women, butonce a woman starts earning too much, they seem to be scared off. Men want to datestudents, artists, musicians, veterinarians, and celebrities (while avoiding secretaries,retirees, and women in the military and law enforcement). Women do want to datemilitary men, policemen, and firemen (possibly the result of a 9/11 Effect, like the higherpayments to Paul Feldman’s bagel business), along with lawyers and financialexecutives. Women avoid laborers, actors, students, and men who work in food servicesor hospitality. For men, being short is a big disadvantage (which is probably why somany lie about it), but weight doesn’t much matter. For women, being overweight isdeadly (which is probably why they lie). For a man, having red hair or curly hair is adowner, as is baldness—but a shaved head is okay. For a woman, salt-and-pepper hair isbad, while blond hair is very good. In the world of online dating, a headful of blond hairon a woman is worth about the same as having a college degree—and, with a $100 dyejob versus a $100,000 tuition bill, an awful lot cheaper.

photoshop pun

Mumbai is quite the melting pot of cultures. Well, it's more of a vast, seething morass of peoples who sometimes, without warning, lean out of a BEST bus and regurgitate well-chewed paan (betel leaf) all over your windshield.
Paan badly stains paint goddamit!
But let me not let personal sentiment cloud this column which is supposed to highlight the cultural diversity of this city and how the various political parties attempt to appease the varied multitudes using only a desktop computer and nifty image processing software.
Mumbai has more hoardings per square foot than any other city I have seen in the world. (I have been to four countries you know.) Traditionally, and I am going by instinct here, good hoardings are all about location. Find a place where the ideal consumer gathers in large numbers with enough time to consume your hoarding and you have an ideal spot to erect your publicity signage.
The average person tends to spend vast amounts of time in Mumbai doing nothing. Mostly because you're waiting for something to happen -- your train to start, the signal to turn green, the cop to wave you ahead, the guy at the ATM to finish his withdrawal, the cheque for the column to come.
And these inordinate amounts of waiting tend to make the entire city a healthy breeding ground for thousands upon thousands of hoardings. Most traffic signals abound with them. Yes, there is the occasionally amusing one, of course. The always inventive and amusing Amul hoarding is one that is anticipated eagerly on a weekly basis. Yet, for each one of those, there are a thousand banal ones for television serials.
The TV serials ones sprout up like mushrooms suddenly, when a show is scheduled by some channel, and then bizarrely use the English alphabet to blare out Hindi taglines.
"Ek TV serial, jaisa aap ne kabhi na dekha ho! Kyunki isme Ronit Roy nahi hai!" (A TV serial like no other! One that doesn't star Ronit Roy!)
But of late I have begun to notice a new class of hoardings that brings together the best of political opportunism and the many benefits of information technology.
Like I said, Mumbai is quite the mixed vegetable curry of cultures. Therefore, appeasing and addressing the various cultural and sub-cultural constituents of the city is essential for any political party. Or at least for those that intend to play a role in political proceedings. (The Freelancers Party for Free Liquor is prepared to wait for a people's mandate.)
Now, there are two broad ways to go about warming the cockles, if you will, of the many different societal segments of Mumbai. You could actually do something to uplift these folks by building them better roads, better homes and do the sort of thing that our politicians are currently learning how to do by going on international study tours to countries in Scandinavia.
Or you could make it LOOK like you care deeply about them.
And the latest tool in this PR sleight of hand is the Photoshop-ed hoarding.
Adobe Photoshop is a popular piece of software that is used in image manipulation. The exact function of the software is pretty self-evident from the name of the software itself. 'Photo' stands for photograph and 'Shop' stands for the fact that you can do a lot of shopping with the money you save from buying pirate copies of the software from vendors in South Mumbai.
Practitioners use Photoshop to touch-up and make minor edits to photographs or other images you scan and upload. It is extremely versatile and this is particularly evident on matrimonial sites. With just a few clicks a person who otherwise would describe his complexion as 'silhouette' becomes a much more popularly pleasing 'wheatish'.
Yet the most innovative use of Photoshop I have seen in a while is the way the politicians of Mumbai use it to reach out to the sections of society that they have lost touch with over the prevailing years. That portion of the populace I like to call the voting public.
When some form of election is around the corner, the politician sits up and takes notice. Suddenly he remembers that it's been a long time, approximately a term in office, since he was in touch with the voting masses. And then, after spending a few jealous moments contemplating upon President Musharraf and his productive, democratic ways, the politician decides he needs to connect with the people.
He immediately calls for a festivals calendar and an accomplished Photoshop operator.
And then suddenly the creative political hoardings begin to make their appearance.
Each politician in Mumbai has a photo taken of themselves that they have quite the fancy for. It is probably the one in which they look the youngest and most handsome -- when the smile is at its best and the body language is most imperial. A high-resolution of this photo is handed over to the operator.
The operator then sets out to make hoardings.
Just around a Muslim festival the hoardings come out all over Bandra and the Byculla side with each politico wearing an ethnically suitable fur cap. As is the norm, each hoarding will showcase one important individual in large profile and the rest scattered all over the rest of the hoarding. However the fur cap on each one of them is identically placed, slightly tilted to one side.
Come Gandhi Jayanti and the fur caps are replaced with a neat array of crisp white Gandhi caps Photoshop-ed onto the exact same collection of heads. The operator does not apply even a smite of imagination. The most he will do is resize them to fit the heads. And even that is sometimes missed. Leaving some of the local 'samaj sevaks' looking like they bought the cap before shrinking in an intense sauna. Recently, black tilaks were the norm in a show of unity with the pilgrims who thronged the city for Ambedkar Jayanti.
And the poses! Sonia Gandhi [Images] is always seen leaning forward and waving. Sharad Pawar [Images] is normally grinning widely with his chin tucked into his chest. Balasaheb is pausing, pensively, mid-sentence. Raj Thakeray is always pointing expansively towards the left with his back to you.
But whatever their poses, the Photoshop-ing cannot be missed. Sometimes, in a bizarre show of political unity, you sense that the fur cap is the same across party lines and head sizes. Identical to the vertical crease in front. The same Photoshop guy?
Of course, it's all weird political gesturing. Most people can make out the cold, insincerity of it all. They can easily see beyond the thin veil of make-believe and see them politicians for who they are: vile demigods eager to tap into our own social insecurities and win our valuable votes.
To use a popular Malayali metaphor: that dal is not going to cook in our oven sir! We are not going to fall for this ridiculous opportunism. We will make up our minds on our own!
Well, I think so. I hope so.

a dream of mine @ once a loser always a loser

8:40: i am going to the airport to board a flight on a hand pulled rickshaw , i can c the facade of the airport across a distance of 2.5 kms8:42: rushing , gushing thru the open fields8:50: inside the airport in the baggage check counter8:51:onto the boarding pass counter8:52 security check , the metal scanner detects a scissor ( i dunno y i was carrying it though these security fellows are very particular abt sharp objects )
8:55: flight is suppose to leave at 9, i reach the passenger throughway9:00: still in their vans that carry us to the plane , i c the flight take off thru the window of that vannow it is fun
9:01 : i request the on field attendant to call back the flight ( as if i was queen elizabeth , and my father was her husband )
9:03: flight manoeuvres around and lands back to pick me upimagine how big a dumbo i amnow still not content with that9:04 : my insatiable hunger for cigs drives me to ask for a 1 minute extension so that i can have a puff9:05 : request granted time for next take off extended to 9:06i light up a cig , the puff chain beginsguess what happens next...i go on puffing .... smoke rings in the air ... one puff .... one moreits like when u r answering a tough ques u feel like goin till the end , till u get the answeru go on attemptingi am still puffing......
9:05:59 : jus 1 last one i say to myself 9:06 : rush towards the plane to see it soaring in the air , above the runway , away from me , gone missed it again
7:45: hrs : my lady alarm pushes me off my bed , stilll in somnolence i am " ALARMED " - for 3 reasons - the alarm , the dream , to see the real world not going anywhr.
moral of the dream :
" TO save a soul , sometimes a limb has to be amputated"( as lincoln said in the distant past and as musharraf re-quoted him when he declared the extra-constitutional emergency ) andthe 2nd moral" a pair of scissors can shear u off a lot of money "
if i wud have saved the 3 mts there in the security check i wud have caught the flight in the 1st place and the question of the 2nd place would not have come i analysed itit was such a true dreami am always late , i smoke tilll the butt , i am carelessu knw it shows the real thing.
and i had missd a flight just some days backslept off thinkin i had loads of time and jus got off 2 hrs before the flightand obviously nno human is ever satiable , not me alone
and the best thing is during a security check they had actually taken off a pair of scissorshow true can a dream bethan thathow close can it be to reality

ઐન્જ, ત્યાન્જ :સાથે ને અલગ :ખૂબ સાથે ને ખૂબ અલગ: my gujarati poem

1


Together, apart:


ઐન્જ, ત્યાન્જ :સાથે ને અલગ :ખૂબ સાથે ને ખૂબ અલગ:

ખૂબ સાથે ને ખૂબ અલગ;
આજ છે મનુશ્ય ના મન ની ઉપાધિ ની ઝલક…

આટ્લા બધા દિવસ સાથે ને સાથે;
આટ્લૂ શિખ્યા કઈ કેહેવા ને ચેજ નહિ માથે …
ખૂબ બધિ ચીજો હમો ને ખબર ચે અન્તર્મન્માઅ;
આપરા દર્રોજ ના શબ્દો ખાન્દાનિ કરિબી ના …..

અઈ નથિ તમે ,તમારિ જરૂરત મેહ્સૂસ થાય છે;
અને હૂન જ્યારે ત્યાન હોઉ છુ તોહ ભાગ્વાનિ મજ્બૂરિ હોય ચે ….

“ટિપે ટિપે સોનુ ભેગુ કર્વાનિ જરૂરત હોય છે”

જ્યાન બધૂજ અજિબોગરિબ હોય છે ;
પણ તે છતાએ અન્જાન નથિ હોતુ….

હૂન ત્યારે ઝાડ ના પર્છાવા ના નીચે ;
બેઠો રહૂ છૂ એક્લો ..
પોતા ના અન્દર ઝાકુ છૂ…
તોહ તમારા અડ્તા સાયા ની કમિ મેહ્સૂસ થાય છે….
એ માણા નો સાયો ,જે માણ ઉપર આજ્ની ગલિચ હવ્વાઓ ની પર્છાયિ નથિ પડી…..

હૂન મારા હિસ્સા ની ઇન્સાનિયત ને મેડવ્વા નો પ્રયત્ન કરુ છુ;
પણ સક્ષમ નથિ થતો કારણ કી તમ્ને ખાસ અડી નથિ સક્તો …

સમય એ પન્ખિડો છે ;
જે આખોના ના ખૂડાઓ મા છાપ છોડી જાય છે….
સમય ઘોડા નો તે ચાલક છે ;
જે આપરા માટે સૂર્ય અને ચન્દ્રમા ને દર્શાવે છે આકાશ ના દર્પન મા ……
સમય શ્રિન્ગાર નો એ ચોર છે ;
જે અમોને દયિ જાય છે આસૂ ને તજ્દી….
પણ સત્ય નો સાક્ષાત્કાર એજ છે ;
કે આપરા સમય ને પકડ્વા નો પ્રયત્ન કર્વૂ બેકાર છે!!
એ તો બસ એક પન્ખિદો છે;
જે આપરા થિ ઉડિ જાય છે….


એટ્લેજ દર્રોજ ઉઠ્તા મને થાય છે ;
કિ તમ્ને પક્દિ લઊ એવા કિ છોડાઅજ ના શકાય …
નહિ તોહ સમય ખાઇ જશે;
મારા સપ્નો ના ઘોડા ,તમ્ને પ્રદાન કર્વિ અપાર શક્તિ
આ કોઇ પાર્કા ની મૂડિ નથિ કે ના પચે ;
આ તોહ છે માર અન્તર્મન ની વાતોન……