English: "Driven to nuts in the gym"
I quite enjoy translating such idioms from Hindi to English and vice-versa for two reasons.
1) I enjoy being able to. It gives me immense relief to know that I am proficient in atleast two languages.
2) It always amazes me that even though word for word, the meanings are so different, still analogues always exist.
If you know of a better translation (either way), please enlighten me.
This post, however, is not about random linguistic facts. This post is a true story of how a poor soul, whose only intention was to exercise honestly in the gym for an hour or so, was bothered, nay tormented by a crackpot in the true sense of the word.
It so occured that I was jogging on the treadmill, panting and heaving, huffing and puffing, and trying to complete my daily target. In came the defending champion and three times runner up of Grasim Mr. India contest (or so it seemed from the airs he had, not from his physique, mind you). Unfortunately the treadmill next to me was unoccupied and he happily jumped on to it (literally). Now, it would not have been such a tragedy had he been a harmless stranger. That was not to be. The clown was an acquaintance of mine. He smiled at me and I returned it in good measure, quite unaware of the fact that that particular gentelman was not going to let me have any peace for the next hour or so.
Within half a minute of ascending the treadmill, this bufoon sped up to an unmaintainable speed. Now I had been jogging for about 25 minutes and hence was merely trundling forth at a speed which can neither be called walking nor running. It was then that the bird brain blurted - "Yaar...huff..puff..if you run so slowly then whats the use?". More huffs and puffs followed alongwith a sudden decrease in speed. I was surprised by such an attack on my method of exercising and naturally tried to defend myself - "I have to run for longer, so naturally I will have to be slower". The master of unintelligent repartee was ready - "You should not run for so long. 8 - 10 minutes is sufficient. Otherwise all the energy will be sapped and you will not be left with any for other work outs." Now it so happened that I was following instructions from the trainer while he was quite obviously self taught. I merely nodded and faced the other way.
By the by, I went on to the next exercise - "Push ups". I have only recently started doing this exercise and am far from proficient at it. I donot however, like being reminded of the fact with every single descent of my expansive derierre. And ofcourse, this was exactly what Superman thought I needed to hear. "Yaar chest should touch the floor tangentially", "yaar your hands are too far apart", "try sitting on your knees and doing it for some days" and who knows what else. After some time I gave up and asked him to give a demonstration. This request did not elicit the enthusiastic response that I was expecting but a pitiful - "Arrey I have come to the gym after many days, let me get into shape and I will show you in a few days...hehehehe".
I was just standing and getting a breather before the next exercise when a strikingly beautiful maiden happened to grace the gym with her illuminating presence. What bussiness she had in the abode of ugly misshapen humans, I could not fathom and nor was I allowed to ruminate on this subject for long. A sound for which my ears had started forming a distinct hatred by now fell upon their drums and I was woken up from my reverie by who else - Sunny Deol fan no. 1.
"You should start doing weights!" he spoke with gusto. "Huh?", was my passionless reply. It did not dampen his spirits in the least. "Weights!", he lifted his left arm and displayed a dumbbell. I laughed in my heart, no wonder he liked a dumbbell. "No thanks...", I muttered and went on for some abs exercises. He was adamant. Sitting beside me in a kneeling position while I went back and forth, exhaling air from my lungs with my hands behind my back, he carried on, unmindful of my utter disregard for his suggestions. "Arrey all these are foolish totkaas. Whats the big deal in becoming thin? Just don't eat for a month or so. Real exercise is pumping iron". "Yeah, I will think about it once I lose some of my body fat", I said a bit irritatedly. His eyes lit up. "Lets start from today itself."
I was on the point of shouting "What have I done dude? Why are you so hell bent on trying out all your ideas on me?". But as you might know, the polite soul that I am, I gave in and followed him. Soon I realized what his idea of "doing weights" together was. He lay down on a bench and asked me to hand him the barbell which was supported by a rod directly above his head. Then he would go on to lift it 3-4 times before turning a deep shade of blue and frantically signalling me to help him place the barbell back on the support rod. This I enjoyed thourougly for a few minutes. :)
Then seeing that there was no chance of getting in even a couple of sets of any exercise, I decided to get the hell out of there. To this he said, "What leaving already? Abhi to warmup shuru hua hai!". "Yeah, sorry got some work to do yaar", I half shouted as I almost ran out of the gym. He followed me to the door and shouted back, "Ok see you same time tomorrow hehehe"
And now I'll have to change my gym timings. What rotten luck I say.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Monday, December 8, 2008
For a long time I have been neglecting this blog. I have been itching to write something but the great ideas just don't come. So I have decided (not for the first time but yet again) that just like batsmen need to spend some time in the middle when they are out of form, I need to spend some time writing before the ideas arrive. We will neglect the small detail that batsmen who have never shown promise don't get any time in the middle. Since this is my blog its like that street match in which I am the kid with the bat and ball. I get as many innings as I want :)
So as the ideation engine is just outputting garbage, there is only just one way to go. Write about a cliched topic, which every tom,dick and harry has written about (and Sarang is about to be added to that list).
26/11, India was attacked yet again by terrorists. More importantly Mumbai was attacked yet again. Between the rains, the Raj and the ruffians, it looks like the city is soon going to be declared a UNESCO World Heritage site.
The terrorists are bad and yes, it is a shameful thing to do and all that. The thing that comes most to my notice is that the sense of outrage is so much more because they attacked the centers of elite prodigality. When I see all those theatre personalities and socialites sitting on the news channels talking about taking radical measures, I only see their mouths opening and closing but not really the words they emit. What I hear instead is, "How the hell did they dare attack the Taj Hotel? See we are all peace-loving Gandhi followers as far as you bomb those ruddy local trains and create havoc in murky back lanes of Pan Bazaar in faroff Guwahati or even in the parliament. But attack 5star hotels, disturb our cozy repasts with foreign businessmen and you have crossed a line. Lets just bloddy carpet bomb Pakistan."
Seriously, all this talk about waking up of the middle class angers and frustrates me more than the attack itself. The news channels are in it just for the moolah. Why are Simi Garewaal and Kunal Kohli talking about what India's strategy should be now. And who in hell is listening to them anyways. Much ado about nothing.
What is even more exasperating is the venom venting that some people start after such incidents.
E.g -:
1) Lets just kill all their families. They are not afraid themselves but the only thing that scares them is potential harm to their families.
Yeah sure! Great Idea. But who exactly are they here? If we had any clue of that it would be a better option to catch them in the first place. And yeah, in case you don't remeber, some have already tried this option. Remember Gujarat?? Yeah that helped a lot, thanx.
Now you might ask, what do you have to offer in way of a solution??
I might not have some big plans like carpet bombing Pakistan or declaring war, but I know two things. The motives of the terrorists are two-fold -:
1) To disrupt our lives, and scare us away from venturing out of our homes and also maybe scaring away potential foreign businesses from coming here ultimately denting our economy.
2) Divide us up, make us do foolish things and gain legitimacy for their actions.
I think that as individuals we donot have the power to bring about a sudden change. What we are capable of is, a) A slight bravery - Instead of being afraid of the next attack and playing into their hands we need to be defiant. I think most of us are. Its natural to be scared but not cowardly. And b) Not listen to the devil's advocates and be united.
It is such simple acts which will help us not only recover but make their jobs more difficult.
The setting up of a dedicated Intelligence department and carrying out of covert ops behind enemy lines should be left to the experts. If you want to contribute, then choose your leaders wisely, instead of just blindly going forward and choosing someone who is a co-religionist, speaks your language or is a champion of your caste. If more then become a leader yourself. Appearing on television and talking seriously, as if you are the director, CIA doesn't help.
So as the ideation engine is just outputting garbage, there is only just one way to go. Write about a cliched topic, which every tom,dick and harry has written about (and Sarang is about to be added to that list).
26/11, India was attacked yet again by terrorists. More importantly Mumbai was attacked yet again. Between the rains, the Raj and the ruffians, it looks like the city is soon going to be declared a UNESCO World Heritage site.
The terrorists are bad and yes, it is a shameful thing to do and all that. The thing that comes most to my notice is that the sense of outrage is so much more because they attacked the centers of elite prodigality. When I see all those theatre personalities and socialites sitting on the news channels talking about taking radical measures, I only see their mouths opening and closing but not really the words they emit. What I hear instead is, "How the hell did they dare attack the Taj Hotel? See we are all peace-loving Gandhi followers as far as you bomb those ruddy local trains and create havoc in murky back lanes of Pan Bazaar in faroff Guwahati or even in the parliament. But attack 5star hotels, disturb our cozy repasts with foreign businessmen and you have crossed a line. Lets just bloddy carpet bomb Pakistan."
Seriously, all this talk about waking up of the middle class angers and frustrates me more than the attack itself. The news channels are in it just for the moolah. Why are Simi Garewaal and Kunal Kohli talking about what India's strategy should be now. And who in hell is listening to them anyways. Much ado about nothing.
What is even more exasperating is the venom venting that some people start after such incidents.
E.g -:
1) Lets just kill all their families. They are not afraid themselves but the only thing that scares them is potential harm to their families.
Yeah sure! Great Idea. But who exactly are they here? If we had any clue of that it would be a better option to catch them in the first place. And yeah, in case you don't remeber, some have already tried this option. Remember Gujarat?? Yeah that helped a lot, thanx.
Now you might ask, what do you have to offer in way of a solution??
I might not have some big plans like carpet bombing Pakistan or declaring war, but I know two things. The motives of the terrorists are two-fold -:
1) To disrupt our lives, and scare us away from venturing out of our homes and also maybe scaring away potential foreign businesses from coming here ultimately denting our economy.
2) Divide us up, make us do foolish things and gain legitimacy for their actions.
I think that as individuals we donot have the power to bring about a sudden change. What we are capable of is, a) A slight bravery - Instead of being afraid of the next attack and playing into their hands we need to be defiant. I think most of us are. Its natural to be scared but not cowardly. And b) Not listen to the devil's advocates and be united.
It is such simple acts which will help us not only recover but make their jobs more difficult.
The setting up of a dedicated Intelligence department and carrying out of covert ops behind enemy lines should be left to the experts. If you want to contribute, then choose your leaders wisely, instead of just blindly going forward and choosing someone who is a co-religionist, speaks your language or is a champion of your caste. If more then become a leader yourself. Appearing on television and talking seriously, as if you are the director, CIA doesn't help.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Recent Developments ...
I guess we are all aware of the recent upheavel in the financial world. There was a lot of media coverage and a lot of people got scared as hunted rabbits. Banks and other financial institutions either started falling like nine pins or were badly shaken up. Personally however I don't know a soul who has been badly affected. It could be plain coincidence or I just don't know enough people.
Now you must be thinking, "Ok! whats the point wise guy?". Well I donot really have a point. Or I should say that whatever I have will probably not be considered much of a point.
Well immediately after the meltdown there were news reports of people who had been badly affected commiting suicide or worse, killing off their families and then themselves. These were people who were just like us. Middle class employees of reputable firms which had ceased to exist. Ofcourse such news shocked us badly.
I will cut to the chase now. Enough beating around the proverbial bush. In India, we have a lot of farmers who are extremely poor. It is not my aim to highlight their plight nor am I any champion of the oppressed. I just wish to juxtapose two similar situations here.
So where were we, right the poor farmers. Now for many years poor and highly debt ridden farmers of India have been resorting to taking their and their family's lives. There are random news articles about these events and some NGOs try and bring their misery to the front pages. Also several times the politicians announce loan waver schemes to the tune of hundreds of crores of rupees. It does little to help the farmer's cause as obiliterating previous debt does not imply that the reason for that debt is removed as well. However everytime such a waver is announced there is a lot of hue and cry against it in the corporate world. Its bad economics they claim.
Cut to the recent "meltdown" and we see many airlines asking the governement for financial aid. And ofcourse everybody is quite ready to admit that what else is the governement for if not to aid in troubled times. In the US, the government already has given massive aid to several ailing banks.
However if you reflect a little, all these loan waivers and aids to airlines are actually indirectly funded by us - the taxpayers. And its us, the middle class, who pay most of the taxes. So I think we need to reflect what is more important - agriculture or aviation.
The finance minister has come up with a brilliant idea - creating a soverign state sponsored fund of $20 billion for shoring up the stock market. What this means in lay man terms is that taxpayers money is going to be used to increase share prices, bringing the sensex back to a rosy red figure.
So millions of poor farmers die, if you provide for them its bad economics and if you spend money so corporate shares rocket thats good economics.
I don't know about you but to me this economics subject looks a bit dicey.
Now you must be thinking, "Ok! whats the point wise guy?". Well I donot really have a point. Or I should say that whatever I have will probably not be considered much of a point.
Well immediately after the meltdown there were news reports of people who had been badly affected commiting suicide or worse, killing off their families and then themselves. These were people who were just like us. Middle class employees of reputable firms which had ceased to exist. Ofcourse such news shocked us badly.
I will cut to the chase now. Enough beating around the proverbial bush. In India, we have a lot of farmers who are extremely poor. It is not my aim to highlight their plight nor am I any champion of the oppressed. I just wish to juxtapose two similar situations here.
So where were we, right the poor farmers. Now for many years poor and highly debt ridden farmers of India have been resorting to taking their and their family's lives. There are random news articles about these events and some NGOs try and bring their misery to the front pages. Also several times the politicians announce loan waver schemes to the tune of hundreds of crores of rupees. It does little to help the farmer's cause as obiliterating previous debt does not imply that the reason for that debt is removed as well. However everytime such a waver is announced there is a lot of hue and cry against it in the corporate world. Its bad economics they claim.
Cut to the recent "meltdown" and we see many airlines asking the governement for financial aid. And ofcourse everybody is quite ready to admit that what else is the governement for if not to aid in troubled times. In the US, the government already has given massive aid to several ailing banks.
However if you reflect a little, all these loan waivers and aids to airlines are actually indirectly funded by us - the taxpayers. And its us, the middle class, who pay most of the taxes. So I think we need to reflect what is more important - agriculture or aviation.
The finance minister has come up with a brilliant idea - creating a soverign state sponsored fund of $20 billion for shoring up the stock market. What this means in lay man terms is that taxpayers money is going to be used to increase share prices, bringing the sensex back to a rosy red figure.
So millions of poor farmers die, if you provide for them its bad economics and if you spend money so corporate shares rocket thats good economics.
I don't know about you but to me this economics subject looks a bit dicey.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
अंकित का आतंक
मेरे कॉलेज आई आई टी गौहाटी की मेस सेवा से अक्सर लोग खफ़ा ही पाये जाते हैं| वही घिसी पिटी पुरानी आलू की सब्ज़ी या वही साम्भर चावल| लेकिन मेरे दोस्त अंकित को सब्ज़ियों से कोई गिला शिकवा नही| उसे परेशानी है तो सिर्फ़ रोटियों से| आम तौर पर शांत रहने वाला यह बालक रोटियों के मामले में कोई समझौता पसंद नही करता| और सामनाय्तः सबसे प्यार से बात करने वाला यह लड़का मेस कर्मचारियों पर बरसने में किसी किस्म का तकल्लुफ़ भी नही करता| "क्या भैय्या यह रोटी है की आटा? अच्छे से सिक्वा के लाओ" जैसे आदेश तो अब पुराने हो चुके हैं| आज तो हद ही हो गई - मेस कर्मचारी अन्दर से दो बार रोटी ले कर आया और तब भी अंकित ने उन्हें ठुकरा दिया| तीसरी बार ख़ास अंकित के लिए फूली हुई रोटियाँ आयीं तब जाके अंकित ने स्वीकारी|
अंकित के यह बड़े हुए नखरे देख मैं सोचने लगा की क्या अंकित की बीवी उसके यह सब नखरे सहेगी! जब मैंने उससे यह बात पूछी तोह उसने कहा - " कैसे नही सहेगी! और वैसे भी यह कोई नखरे नही हैं, इंसान को और कुछ मिले या न मिले, ढंग की रोटी तो नसीब होनी ही चाहिए!!" इसपर मैंने कहा - " यार मुझे लग रहा है की अगर तू अपनी बीवी को ऐसे नखरे दिखायेगा तो वोह रोटी तेरे मुहँ पे मार के कहेगी की "खानी है तो खाओ नही तो भाड़ में जाओ!", और फिर तुझे ढाबे पर खाना खाना होगा..." अंकित ने इसका जवाब दिया - " तो छोड़ दूँगा ऐसी औरत को मैं जो ठीक से रोटी भी न बना पाये!!"
तब मैंने सोचना शुरू किया की फिर अंकित अख़बार में शादी के इश्तेहार कैसे देगा -:
"चाहिए एक नर्म, फूली हुई और सिकी हुई लड़की ...... नहीं, रोटी बनाना जानने वाली लड़की..." , या फिर " चाहिए एक ऐसी सुकन्या जो पहचानती हो आटे और रोटी में फ़र्क!"
इस ही दौरान अंकित फिर चिल्लाया " भैय्या रोटी!", और उसकी पुकार सुनकर सभी मेस कर्मचारी तिथर बिथर हो गये!
अंकित के यह बड़े हुए नखरे देख मैं सोचने लगा की क्या अंकित की बीवी उसके यह सब नखरे सहेगी! जब मैंने उससे यह बात पूछी तोह उसने कहा - " कैसे नही सहेगी! और वैसे भी यह कोई नखरे नही हैं, इंसान को और कुछ मिले या न मिले, ढंग की रोटी तो नसीब होनी ही चाहिए!!" इसपर मैंने कहा - " यार मुझे लग रहा है की अगर तू अपनी बीवी को ऐसे नखरे दिखायेगा तो वोह रोटी तेरे मुहँ पे मार के कहेगी की "खानी है तो खाओ नही तो भाड़ में जाओ!", और फिर तुझे ढाबे पर खाना खाना होगा..." अंकित ने इसका जवाब दिया - " तो छोड़ दूँगा ऐसी औरत को मैं जो ठीक से रोटी भी न बना पाये!!"
तब मैंने सोचना शुरू किया की फिर अंकित अख़बार में शादी के इश्तेहार कैसे देगा -:
"चाहिए एक नर्म, फूली हुई और सिकी हुई लड़की ...... नहीं, रोटी बनाना जानने वाली लड़की..." , या फिर " चाहिए एक ऐसी सुकन्या जो पहचानती हो आटे और रोटी में फ़र्क!"
इस ही दौरान अंकित फिर चिल्लाया " भैय्या रोटी!", और उसकी पुकार सुनकर सभी मेस कर्मचारी तिथर बिथर हो गये!
Telephonophobia
I have always believed that in the course of our daily lives we accomplish many tasks which before we have accomplished them, look insurmountable. These tasks could be taking a bath (for some) or attending labs and lectures (for most) but for me it is talking on the telephone. I do not find every call a grueling experience but some I positively abhor. I am not afraid of talking on the phone but of running out of things to talk about. Now some people can talk about anything and everything on the phone but I am always scared to death of boring the poor guy on the other side. I do not understand how some people can talk about the latest way they have found of tying their shoe laces or the latest litter of the bitch “just” three houses away. They jump from one “exhilarating” experience to another without giving a damn about the worth of the other poor guy’s time.
Take for example the call I recently made to an old friend of mine. It took us about 3 minutes to exchange the latest in our lives and then we had practically run out of any sensible comments. On occasions such as these the last resort left to us non believers in the art of telephony is to come up with a drab statement like “So, what else is new?”. I regard this sentence to be a sort of signal which means that it is time for the conversation to end. My friend however belonged to an opposite school of thought. From the rest of his speech I could only gather that he understood my “signal” to mean that he had my full attention and I was ready to hear all about his daily rigmarole. He proceeded to tell me in great detail about how he had forgotten his bus pass at home and had had to pay for his ticket, how his girl friend had soundly lambasted him for such forgetfulness and how she was always nagging him about something or the other. By the end of it all I was flabbergasted. He went on and on for 12 minutes at least. Now it was my turn to speak, but I had already exhausted my quota of topics. I was tongue tied and on the phone one’s tongue is pretty much all one has so I was rather embarrassed. After such a long diatribe I could not even go back to my standard question and anyways it had produced highly unsatisfactory results. With great caution I began to recount a small incident about my encounter with a certain professor. Though I knew that the incident was hardly what one terms amusing, I had at least hoped that its simplicity would help conclude the discussion. The outcome was however most bewildering. My friend laughed at all the wrong points in my story and at the end of it started describing a similar encounter of his own. In the end I just managed to get rid of him by saying that I had to go for dinner otherwise who knows how long he would have gone on for.
One of my close friends at IITG has suddenly switched from my camp to the other one. He was like me a simpleton and an amateur in this stupid art. In fact he was even worse than I am. A telephone call from a childhood sweetheart and three months later he has now become a pro. In the initial stages his girlfriend was always complaining that he hardly said anything and now he regularly talks for four and a half hours on the trot and his monthly bill is always four figured. God knows what he talks about daily for so long but he was once heard describing how he fancied ripping someone’s finger nails off and that too in gory detail!!!
Take for example the call I recently made to an old friend of mine. It took us about 3 minutes to exchange the latest in our lives and then we had practically run out of any sensible comments. On occasions such as these the last resort left to us non believers in the art of telephony is to come up with a drab statement like “So, what else is new?”. I regard this sentence to be a sort of signal which means that it is time for the conversation to end. My friend however belonged to an opposite school of thought. From the rest of his speech I could only gather that he understood my “signal” to mean that he had my full attention and I was ready to hear all about his daily rigmarole. He proceeded to tell me in great detail about how he had forgotten his bus pass at home and had had to pay for his ticket, how his girl friend had soundly lambasted him for such forgetfulness and how she was always nagging him about something or the other. By the end of it all I was flabbergasted. He went on and on for 12 minutes at least. Now it was my turn to speak, but I had already exhausted my quota of topics. I was tongue tied and on the phone one’s tongue is pretty much all one has so I was rather embarrassed. After such a long diatribe I could not even go back to my standard question and anyways it had produced highly unsatisfactory results. With great caution I began to recount a small incident about my encounter with a certain professor. Though I knew that the incident was hardly what one terms amusing, I had at least hoped that its simplicity would help conclude the discussion. The outcome was however most bewildering. My friend laughed at all the wrong points in my story and at the end of it started describing a similar encounter of his own. In the end I just managed to get rid of him by saying that I had to go for dinner otherwise who knows how long he would have gone on for.
One of my close friends at IITG has suddenly switched from my camp to the other one. He was like me a simpleton and an amateur in this stupid art. In fact he was even worse than I am. A telephone call from a childhood sweetheart and three months later he has now become a pro. In the initial stages his girlfriend was always complaining that he hardly said anything and now he regularly talks for four and a half hours on the trot and his monthly bill is always four figured. God knows what he talks about daily for so long but he was once heard describing how he fancied ripping someone’s finger nails off and that too in gory detail!!!
Face you Fears...
I am an extremely infrequent blogger. I suffer from the complex that what I write is just my opinion and why the hell should anyone be interested in it. So I need topics about which I can write from scratch. I mean topics about which you have probably read nothing. This turns out to be a difficult pursuit and so I write rarely. From today onwards, however, I have decided to try and get out of this habit. What am I going to do about it? Well I am going to write about something which I do pretty frequently. I am going to write movie reviews. There are two reasons for this. The first one is pretty obvious I guess, because I will be able to write frequently. The second one is called “facing your fears”. As I fear that people wouldn’t read an article by me if it is not about something new, a film review is hardly what people would be expected to have not heard or read about. So, I am going to acquire a “devil may care attitude”. I will write because I love writing and not because I want people to read what I write. Who knows someday I might just write something worthwhile. The first movie I am going to write about is “Jab we met”. It is this movie that has actually inspired me to do this. Read on to know how (well actually, technically I should not be writing Read on as I don’t care if any one is reading or not but still this is one phrase that I like to use very much, so ….)
Jab we met
I have always considered love stories as balderdash. Apart from DDLJ and Hum Tum, I have never been moved by any love story (happy ones I mean). They are all full of clichés and they are always totally predictable. Love stories suffer from the very big problem that you know the end even before the film has begun. So the story teller can not rely on suspense. It is his narration which must be strong. Fortunately after about 3 years (Hum Tum released in 2004), we have a love story which scores well in this test.
Not once in the 2 hours and 23 minutes does director Imtiaz Ali lose hold of his story. His comic timing is perfect and he knows where to leave one thread of the story and begin another. Anyways the threads are few and the story is very simple. But that is a huge plus point of this film. It does not intend to confuse you but amuse you.
The story is roughly this – Aditya (Shahid Kapur) is a dejected man. His girlfriend is marrying another guy and his company is in doldrums. He doesn’t know what to do and feels completely defeated in life, you know the type. Quite absent mindedly he boards a train going from Bombay to Delhi. On that train he meets Geet (Kareena Kapoor), a full of energy, vivacious chirpy and chatty small town girl who is returning to Bhatinda after completing her education in Bombay. Here begins a tale of unexpected adventures that befall the duo as they do pretty much everything that’s possible – miss trains, evacuate hotels after police raids (the police are trying to bust a prostitution racket), jump into lakes etc. They finally reach Bhatinda, where the girl’s Punjabi family play the perfect hosts to Aditya. Now Geet loves a boy who lives in Manali and is hell bent on marrying him and hence has to run away from home. Aditya runs away with her (he can hardly stay in her house when she has run away) and the family thinks they have eloped together. Aditya then leaves Geet in Manali and goes off to build his life back again. He has learnt a lot from the peppy punjaban (and has actually fallen in love with her) and he goes on to successfully re-establish his business.
This is the point in the story where things take a dramatic turn. Geet’s boyfriend Anshuman refuses to marry her and she can’t return to her family. Aditya takes her back and you know what and how of the story henceforward but mercifully not much is left. Anshuman comes back to claim Geet and provides some fun moments in the story or what is left of it.
All in all it is an extremely enjoyable film with all its jokes being of the highest standard (which is quite difficult to find in these days of excessive toilet humour). Kareena Kapoor excels in the film and Shahid is strangely bearable. In fact he is good most of the times, but just fails to pull off some of the more difficult scenes (These are the scenes least relevant to the film but necessary for continuity so it doesn’t matter much). But that is ok I guess, nothing is perfect. The supporting cast doesn’t get much to do (with Shahid Kapur’s mother not even getting a dialogue, she has to be content with making obscure faces all the time) but still they do what is required of them well (The guy Anshuman looks as anserine as he is supposed to look.)
The songs are however a disappointment. Most of them are not well placed. Still they are not lacking in melody and if you watch the film in a cinema hall I daresay that you will like them. Though not exactly in the same league as the other two films I have mentioned it is still all in all a very good effort and a refreshing change from all sorts of strange stuff being churned out in the name of creativity these days. In true film critic style I will give the film 3.5 stars (out of 5 of course).
P.S -: Most of the readers of my blog have seen the film with me today so I am not expecting many people to read this but still if you do, then I would be extremely happy to hear out what you have got to say. And yes, how this film inspired me to face my fears, just simply by recreating what we all have seen so many times – A love story, and doing that successfully.
Jab we met
I have always considered love stories as balderdash. Apart from DDLJ and Hum Tum, I have never been moved by any love story (happy ones I mean). They are all full of clichés and they are always totally predictable. Love stories suffer from the very big problem that you know the end even before the film has begun. So the story teller can not rely on suspense. It is his narration which must be strong. Fortunately after about 3 years (Hum Tum released in 2004), we have a love story which scores well in this test.
Not once in the 2 hours and 23 minutes does director Imtiaz Ali lose hold of his story. His comic timing is perfect and he knows where to leave one thread of the story and begin another. Anyways the threads are few and the story is very simple. But that is a huge plus point of this film. It does not intend to confuse you but amuse you.
The story is roughly this – Aditya (Shahid Kapur) is a dejected man. His girlfriend is marrying another guy and his company is in doldrums. He doesn’t know what to do and feels completely defeated in life, you know the type. Quite absent mindedly he boards a train going from Bombay to Delhi. On that train he meets Geet (Kareena Kapoor), a full of energy, vivacious chirpy and chatty small town girl who is returning to Bhatinda after completing her education in Bombay. Here begins a tale of unexpected adventures that befall the duo as they do pretty much everything that’s possible – miss trains, evacuate hotels after police raids (the police are trying to bust a prostitution racket), jump into lakes etc. They finally reach Bhatinda, where the girl’s Punjabi family play the perfect hosts to Aditya. Now Geet loves a boy who lives in Manali and is hell bent on marrying him and hence has to run away from home. Aditya runs away with her (he can hardly stay in her house when she has run away) and the family thinks they have eloped together. Aditya then leaves Geet in Manali and goes off to build his life back again. He has learnt a lot from the peppy punjaban (and has actually fallen in love with her) and he goes on to successfully re-establish his business.
This is the point in the story where things take a dramatic turn. Geet’s boyfriend Anshuman refuses to marry her and she can’t return to her family. Aditya takes her back and you know what and how of the story henceforward but mercifully not much is left. Anshuman comes back to claim Geet and provides some fun moments in the story or what is left of it.
All in all it is an extremely enjoyable film with all its jokes being of the highest standard (which is quite difficult to find in these days of excessive toilet humour). Kareena Kapoor excels in the film and Shahid is strangely bearable. In fact he is good most of the times, but just fails to pull off some of the more difficult scenes (These are the scenes least relevant to the film but necessary for continuity so it doesn’t matter much). But that is ok I guess, nothing is perfect. The supporting cast doesn’t get much to do (with Shahid Kapur’s mother not even getting a dialogue, she has to be content with making obscure faces all the time) but still they do what is required of them well (The guy Anshuman looks as anserine as he is supposed to look.)
The songs are however a disappointment. Most of them are not well placed. Still they are not lacking in melody and if you watch the film in a cinema hall I daresay that you will like them. Though not exactly in the same league as the other two films I have mentioned it is still all in all a very good effort and a refreshing change from all sorts of strange stuff being churned out in the name of creativity these days. In true film critic style I will give the film 3.5 stars (out of 5 of course).
P.S -: Most of the readers of my blog have seen the film with me today so I am not expecting many people to read this but still if you do, then I would be extremely happy to hear out what you have got to say. And yes, how this film inspired me to face my fears, just simply by recreating what we all have seen so many times – A love story, and doing that successfully.
FACTs
What is ‘fact’? A naïve dictionary (Word web) lookup returned four definitions, each shorter in length than the previous, but also more profound, and left me bewildered and perplexed as to the meaning of this abstract concept. Hardly the thing you expect after reading a dictionary, is it not?
“FACT!!!” you say. “Surely this guy’s mad” you think. “What’s in a fact? It’s one of the easiest words around. Every dumbass knows the meaning of fact. No need to consult a dictionary, just ask someone from primary school…”. However before elapsing into guffaws of laughter, please be polite enough to read through the article and then you may see your folly.
I am preparing for an accursed examination called the CAT. I know you have heard all about it so I don’t fancy describing it here is of any use. Even if you are ignorant of this exam (and believe me, in this case ignorance IS bliss!!), it is not the details of the how and why that consult us here. This exam frequently features 3-5 questions of a type we like to call FIJ (short for Fact-Inference-Judgment) questions. About 4 sentences are given to us and we have to guess (I don’t have any other word for what I do) if they are facts, inferences or judgments. Pretty easy, you reckon. Yes, that was exactly what I reckoned when I first saw these questions. Turns out that these are some of the most feared questions (at least among people I know). After trying to learn the method or trick or whatever psychic powers are needed to solve these questions, at long last, I just gave up. And so I decided to embark upon the voyage of discovery, to discover the meaning of the word ‘FACT’.
So then what is fact? Let’s sample this one -: “A statement or assertion of verified information about something that is the case or has happened”. Now what I don’t understand is whether the lexicographers have been purposefully naughty? First of all who verifies the information? Who decides whether something is the case or not? Pretty fishy don’t you think? To me it seems as if the compilers of this particular dictionary wanted to label as many statements as possible as facts. What about this one – “A concept whose truth can be proved”. On the face of it this definition is clear enough. However the intention is ambiguous. Sample this – John has a white house. Is this statement a fact? Of course it is. Now it can be a wrong fact, but it is certainly provable either way. Ok check out this one – Morality is one of those basic aspects of humanity that can’t fit into one or two academic fields. Experts say this is. Baffled?? If not then you have got to contact me and teach me. But if yes, then don’t worry – so was I. How do you verify that??
There were two more meanings of ‘fact’ as I said earlier but they seemed to me nothing more than different permutations of the two listed above. They definitely shed no new light on the matter. But what gobbledygook you say. You are happy with your own definition of what can be considered fact and what can’t be. “Exactly” – that is my point. That brings us to another problem. Is fact at all different from judgment?
Recently the Archaeological Survey of India proclaimed that the Adam’s Bridge is a purely natural structure and has not been made by any living being –dead or alive, man or monkey. Those of you who know the”history” of this bridge can comprehend the significance of this statement. Obviously a lot of people, for different reasons, took offense and created a clamorous hue and cry over the issue and got this “fact” repealed. Why? Was it not verifiable? No, that was certainly not the case. Indeed it had been scientifically ascertained that the physical feature in question was not man made. The problem with this particular fact was that it went against popular sentiment (did it?). So can we conclude that the “verification” part of the definition includes acknowledgment of belief (maybe popular, possibly despotic) 1? “The sun is at the center of the solar system and all the planets, including earth, revolve around It.” is a fact taught to kids in school. Not long ago2 this was not the case.
Wikipedia says that fact is “something that can be verified according to an established standard of evaluation”. The important point here has been highlighted. So who comes up with standards of evaluation? You and me (not literally of course), and people like us. People with all their biases and preconceived notions and beliefs etc. 500 years ago it was the church who decided standards of evaluation, today others who have replaced the church in authority. In my case it is my coaching institute which decides what is fact and what judgment (no doubt in a most moronic fashion).
Another strange and confusing interpretation I found (yet again on Wikipedia) that resolves no doubts is - Facts may be understood as that which makes a true sentence true. For example, the statement "Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system" is made true by the fact that Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. The problem is that this definition resolves fact but transfers its ambiguities to the word true (truth is another pandora's box altogether).
And in the end I will leave you with some more food for thought. Take any one definition of “fact”. E.g. take the visibly simple one - “A fact is any statement or concept whose truth can be proved”. Is this statement in itself a fact or is it a mere opinion? So with all its defects is fact prone to recursion as well!?!
1Due to this debacle some ministers have now decided to endorse the fact that Lord Ram definitely existed once upon a time, a fact that is quite unverifiable as of now. What an irony?
2Considering that the age of the solar system itself is of the order of billions of years, 500 can be said to be not long ago!!
“FACT!!!” you say. “Surely this guy’s mad” you think. “What’s in a fact? It’s one of the easiest words around. Every dumbass knows the meaning of fact. No need to consult a dictionary, just ask someone from primary school…”. However before elapsing into guffaws of laughter, please be polite enough to read through the article and then you may see your folly.
I am preparing for an accursed examination called the CAT. I know you have heard all about it so I don’t fancy describing it here is of any use. Even if you are ignorant of this exam (and believe me, in this case ignorance IS bliss!!), it is not the details of the how and why that consult us here. This exam frequently features 3-5 questions of a type we like to call FIJ (short for Fact-Inference-Judgment) questions. About 4 sentences are given to us and we have to guess (I don’t have any other word for what I do) if they are facts, inferences or judgments. Pretty easy, you reckon. Yes, that was exactly what I reckoned when I first saw these questions. Turns out that these are some of the most feared questions (at least among people I know). After trying to learn the method or trick or whatever psychic powers are needed to solve these questions, at long last, I just gave up. And so I decided to embark upon the voyage of discovery, to discover the meaning of the word ‘FACT’.
So then what is fact? Let’s sample this one -: “A statement or assertion of verified information about something that is the case or has happened”. Now what I don’t understand is whether the lexicographers have been purposefully naughty? First of all who verifies the information? Who decides whether something is the case or not? Pretty fishy don’t you think? To me it seems as if the compilers of this particular dictionary wanted to label as many statements as possible as facts. What about this one – “A concept whose truth can be proved”. On the face of it this definition is clear enough. However the intention is ambiguous. Sample this – John has a white house. Is this statement a fact? Of course it is. Now it can be a wrong fact, but it is certainly provable either way. Ok check out this one – Morality is one of those basic aspects of humanity that can’t fit into one or two academic fields. Experts say this is. Baffled?? If not then you have got to contact me and teach me. But if yes, then don’t worry – so was I. How do you verify that??
There were two more meanings of ‘fact’ as I said earlier but they seemed to me nothing more than different permutations of the two listed above. They definitely shed no new light on the matter. But what gobbledygook you say. You are happy with your own definition of what can be considered fact and what can’t be. “Exactly” – that is my point. That brings us to another problem. Is fact at all different from judgment?
Recently the Archaeological Survey of India proclaimed that the Adam’s Bridge is a purely natural structure and has not been made by any living being –dead or alive, man or monkey. Those of you who know the”history” of this bridge can comprehend the significance of this statement. Obviously a lot of people, for different reasons, took offense and created a clamorous hue and cry over the issue and got this “fact” repealed. Why? Was it not verifiable? No, that was certainly not the case. Indeed it had been scientifically ascertained that the physical feature in question was not man made. The problem with this particular fact was that it went against popular sentiment (did it?). So can we conclude that the “verification” part of the definition includes acknowledgment of belief (maybe popular, possibly despotic) 1? “The sun is at the center of the solar system and all the planets, including earth, revolve around It.” is a fact taught to kids in school. Not long ago2 this was not the case.
Wikipedia says that fact is “something that can be verified according to an established standard of evaluation”. The important point here has been highlighted. So who comes up with standards of evaluation? You and me (not literally of course), and people like us. People with all their biases and preconceived notions and beliefs etc. 500 years ago it was the church who decided standards of evaluation, today others who have replaced the church in authority. In my case it is my coaching institute which decides what is fact and what judgment (no doubt in a most moronic fashion).
Another strange and confusing interpretation I found (yet again on Wikipedia) that resolves no doubts is - Facts may be understood as that which makes a true sentence true. For example, the statement "Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system" is made true by the fact that Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. The problem is that this definition resolves fact but transfers its ambiguities to the word true (truth is another pandora's box altogether).
And in the end I will leave you with some more food for thought. Take any one definition of “fact”. E.g. take the visibly simple one - “A fact is any statement or concept whose truth can be proved”. Is this statement in itself a fact or is it a mere opinion? So with all its defects is fact prone to recursion as well!?!
1Due to this debacle some ministers have now decided to endorse the fact that Lord Ram definitely existed once upon a time, a fact that is quite unverifiable as of now. What an irony?
2Considering that the age of the solar system itself is of the order of billions of years, 500 can be said to be not long ago!!
Twenty20
India and Pakistan have reached the finals of the first ever Twenty20 cricket world cup and the mood in the subcontinent is nothing short of ecstatic. India beat Australia yesterday in yet another nail biting finish of the tournament. I however found myself sitting in my room, editing an article on the Hindi Wikipedia occasionally checking cricinfo to find out if things were all right. There is no denying the popularity of this new bundled up version of Cricket, but Twenty20 has also attracted criticism from many quarters. I am one such cynic.
I have been following cricket since I was a toddler. For many years cricket was the only important thing in my life. I had memorized all the record statistics and could list the batting averages of many a players on my finger tips. Those who think that this behaviour is a bit extreme they have never felt the excitement of cricket first hand. This behaviour is deemed more than appropriate in this part of the world. I was mesmerized by both forms of the game - Test and one day . Test cricket is aptly named as it is a grueling test of the nerves. The fielding side tries to play on the nerves of the batsman, surrounding him from every side, and the batsman on his part tries to stay put at the crease defying all their efforts. This goes on for five days with the teams alternately batting and bowling twice. The one-day version is usually played as a 50 overs per innings game and though shorter, it is in no way inferior to the longer version. This version tests not patience of the players but their resourcefulness and energy while leaving sufficient scope for the both the bowlers and the batsmen to showcase their talents.
Why is an ardent follower of the gentleman’s game like me not excited by it's new avataar? For the basic reason that in it's new incarnation it ceases to remain exactly that - "A gentleman's game".
Apart from Cricket, I am also an avid football fan. I generally keep myself informed of the latest happenings in the European leagues and also enjoy watching all the big fixtures. What attracts me to football is the raw energy and sheer pace of the game. Small though it is (just 90 minutes), it keeps changing rapidly and is one of the most dynamic sports today. Imagine what would happen if suddenly FIFA starts organizing test matches of football, which would be played over 5 days. It is quite simply unfathomable. Twenty20 in my opinion is analogous to a five day football match.
Cricket is not just a contest between bat and ball, but between the minds of the batsmen and the fielding side. Reducing it to a quick mockery which gets finished before it has begun is nothing short of blasphemy. True, twenty20 offers much in the form of excitement to those who just enjoy batsmen pelting the ball to all corners of the park, but it leaves the fans of that tussle of wits which is the hallmark of cricket, sadly disappointed.
I am not a purist. Neither will I deny that I was shouting "sixer! sixer!", before the last bowl of that historic Broad over in which Yuvraj Singh struck six sixes, along with all my hostel mates. My problem is that these matches just do not leave the appetites of seasoned fans like me satiated. The bowlers are reduced to mere jumping jacks, stripping the game of all the traditional flavours of Cricket. This is no equal contest between bat and ball, but a macabre mass murder of the most feared species of cricketers, the wicket-takers. The whole game is massively stacked against the poor guys and leaves them with no chance of salvaging their dignity.
I am not against Twenty20 as a form of entertainment. I will certainly watch the Indo-Pak final. What I am against is Twenty20 being developed as a form of sport. With the IPL vs. ICL war hotting up, the capitalist pressures may hold sway, and the day may not be far when domestic cricket would get fully Twenty20-ized and then the quality of international cricket would get degraded into an abyss.
I have been following cricket since I was a toddler. For many years cricket was the only important thing in my life. I had memorized all the record statistics and could list the batting averages of many a players on my finger tips. Those who think that this behaviour is a bit extreme they have never felt the excitement of cricket first hand. This behaviour is deemed more than appropriate in this part of the world. I was mesmerized by both forms of the game - Test and one day . Test cricket is aptly named as it is a grueling test of the nerves. The fielding side tries to play on the nerves of the batsman, surrounding him from every side, and the batsman on his part tries to stay put at the crease defying all their efforts. This goes on for five days with the teams alternately batting and bowling twice. The one-day version is usually played as a 50 overs per innings game and though shorter, it is in no way inferior to the longer version. This version tests not patience of the players but their resourcefulness and energy while leaving sufficient scope for the both the bowlers and the batsmen to showcase their talents.
Why is an ardent follower of the gentleman’s game like me not excited by it's new avataar? For the basic reason that in it's new incarnation it ceases to remain exactly that - "A gentleman's game".
Apart from Cricket, I am also an avid football fan. I generally keep myself informed of the latest happenings in the European leagues and also enjoy watching all the big fixtures. What attracts me to football is the raw energy and sheer pace of the game. Small though it is (just 90 minutes), it keeps changing rapidly and is one of the most dynamic sports today. Imagine what would happen if suddenly FIFA starts organizing test matches of football, which would be played over 5 days. It is quite simply unfathomable. Twenty20 in my opinion is analogous to a five day football match.
Cricket is not just a contest between bat and ball, but between the minds of the batsmen and the fielding side. Reducing it to a quick mockery which gets finished before it has begun is nothing short of blasphemy. True, twenty20 offers much in the form of excitement to those who just enjoy batsmen pelting the ball to all corners of the park, but it leaves the fans of that tussle of wits which is the hallmark of cricket, sadly disappointed.
I am not a purist. Neither will I deny that I was shouting "sixer! sixer!", before the last bowl of that historic Broad over in which Yuvraj Singh struck six sixes, along with all my hostel mates. My problem is that these matches just do not leave the appetites of seasoned fans like me satiated. The bowlers are reduced to mere jumping jacks, stripping the game of all the traditional flavours of Cricket. This is no equal contest between bat and ball, but a macabre mass murder of the most feared species of cricketers, the wicket-takers. The whole game is massively stacked against the poor guys and leaves them with no chance of salvaging their dignity.
I am not against Twenty20 as a form of entertainment. I will certainly watch the Indo-Pak final. What I am against is Twenty20 being developed as a form of sport. With the IPL vs. ICL war hotting up, the capitalist pressures may hold sway, and the day may not be far when domestic cricket would get fully Twenty20-ized and then the quality of international cricket would get degraded into an abyss.
Me
A small poem I wrote about myself -:
a little generous , a little greedy
a little satisfied, a little needy
a little practical, a little idealistic
a little stable, a little apocalyptic
sometimes different, sometimes same
sometimes familiar, sometimes strange
sometimes free, sometimes bound
like a spring my life is wound
but I guess your life is the same
still you read the poem...what a shame!!
a little satisfied, a little needy
a little practical, a little idealistic
a little stable, a little apocalyptic
sometimes different, sometimes same
sometimes familiar, sometimes strange
sometimes free, sometimes bound
like a spring my life is wound
but I guess your life is the same
still you read the poem...what a shame!!
Sarang Sharma
The Distric Towers!!
This is a short essay-story kind of a thing I wrote slashing out against the concepts, the very foundations upon which modern society is built.However it also depicts certain gains of modern ideology.It is not totally critical, nor is it overly praiseful.It is merely reflective of my confused state of mind regarding the pros and cons of the contemporary world.
The District Towers
The gargantuan white complex had been standing abandoned for over a decade, before the Delhi Metro project became the reason for it’s metempsychosis. The latest sensation to hit the nation’s capital was going to streak right across the complex’s leaden face. The announcement of the route was enough to set in motion a sequence of events that were to culminate in my enthralling tryst on a frigid December evening. All the assorted brand names filled in tenders for
shops and showrooms in what was going to be the new youngster’s hub of West Delhi. Adidas, Nike and Reebok for footwear; Lacoste and Lee for clothing and McDonalds, Pizza Hut and Domino’s for fast food; in short all the exclusive and most “in” brands of the day set up shop to create another place for what the young casually called ‘hanging around’ or ‘just chilling’. In actuality these were euphemisms for getting “drop dead drunk” and “smoking your lung’s
off”, designed especially to conceal the truth from their ever trusting parents who were drowned in the sea of liberalism. Within two years the once dilapidated structure stood reincarnated in a more glorious form. The high rise towers now housed the showrooms of the hottest
selling products throughout the lower floors, while the upper floors were offices for multinational banks and insurance companies.
I parked my light weight scooter (yes yes the one which only the sissies are supposed to drive), in the parking lot just outside the plaza. A parking assistant promptly turned up, issued a coupon and demanded ten bucks. He was loaded with fake accessories, a T-Shirt which screamed Adidas from so many places and in such varied fonts so as to confirm that it was not original and sunglasses which might have been all the fashion at the time of independence but seemed definitely awkward in the present settings. Only a few years back the lot was an ill used, stench ridden and rodent infested public toilet of sorts. Now it had metamorphosed into a spic and span compound for the latest in Italian and Japanese cars and bikes. My scooter looked like an embarrassed washer man’s ass between the finest steeds. I paid the fee in a huff and made my way towards the multiplex which had recently come up in the premises of the tower complex.
The purpose of my visit was to book two tickets for the night show of the latest Hollywood potboiler. However unlike most youngsters I was not going to ask for the corner seats. Me and my younger brother were going to watch the film sitting right in the middle of the balcony. The special effects charged comic-action-suspense flick had generated much more interest than it genuinely deserved, but then who really cares for such mundane issues like story, plot and screenplay when you are getting to watch people combating in Kung-Fu while simultaneously being airborne like eagles, in the dark depths of the cosmos far from the Solar System. The queue was long and winding and the chilly wind struck the face with a wrath that illjustified the arduous wait. I was disillusioned with the movie and had no interest in spending 200 bucks on such otiose rubbish, but my brother's constant bickering and peer pressure made me stand firm and resolute.
I looked around at the once ramshackle buildings turned exhibitionist haven of the mighty and rich’s adolescent progeny. Flashy and multicoloured neon lights attracted and appealed, almost seduced, the onlookers to have a look and consequently buy expensive up market foreign goods. People drove towards the shops under these lights like moths towards fire. Boys and girls, and even men and women between the ages of 15 and 35 hurried out of the crowded stores laden with heavy plastic bags and gratified expressions. “How many days would they enjoy their new acquisitions before growing weary of them?”, I asked myself. How much time before they will throng these places again, in search of yet more items to give them a more permanent satisfaction? Not many if the crowd inside and current trends were any indication.
The line moved forward. So did I. A huge sardarji stood in front of me. He was regularly mouthing gentel obscenities, the type you get to hear everyday travelling by local buses. No one minds them very much and everybody uses them generously. However the written world is definitely not ready yet to see them in print. I hence refrain from qouting them. Anyways, this Sardarji's name was Yug Bahadur Singh. Loosely translated the name means this era's bravest guy. I knew his name because he made no secret of it. Whenever he hurled an abuse at someone or the other he told them who was doing so. "Yug Bahadur is not scared of you *********s" and "Yug Bahadur gives shit to you ******s" were the general form his expletives took. But why ,you may ask,have I suddenly started writing the vulgar Sardar's biography. Read on to find out.
The queue finally reached a stage at which, after 40 minutes of waiting I finally found myself just one place from getting the tickets booked. And in front of me was, no prizes for guessing, Yug Bahadur Singh. "9 tickets, center row", said the sardar. "Sorry sir, we don't have so many seats together anywhere", came back the nervous reply. Suddenly a hush swept over the whole place, though I think it was purely coincidental, but the effect was dramatic.... just like the movies. Standing behind I looked up at the Sardar's turban and tried to see through and find out what must be going on in his mind. The silence got a little prolonged. The almost sweating ticket guy asked sheepishly, "Sir??". The Sardar replied, a lot less unsure of himself, "What do you mean no seats?I have been standing in the sun for an hour... and no seats". And then as suddenly as any thing he started crying. No, not the ticket guy but the Sardar. He cried like anything, as if he was 5 years old and had been denied the ice cream which he had been promised for doing his homework. He started beating the ticket window, voice growing hoarse from all the crying. Horrified onlookers stopped in their tracks to take a look at the spectacle and some even asked me what had happened. I was as amazed as anybody and could not bring myself to tell everybody the strange tale. This went on for a while and then a little boldly I ventured to ask,"Sardarji what happened?"
The Sardarji trying to control himself, sobbing, then wiping his eyes on his shirt sleeves said, "My master he will kill me. He won't feed me for days." I couldn't understand. The idea that this huge sardar who had for so long been abusing everyone as if he was some bigshot was actually somebody's servant was too fantastic to imagine. "No one can beat you for such a silly thing. It's none of your fault that the hall ran out of tickets.", I tried to reason with him. "Oh you don't know my master, he is a beast... a true beast.",he said now a little more in control of himself, but still not able to stifle the occasional sob. "Oh come on, no one's like that, who is this master of your's?", I asked. Taking out a dirty hankerchief he wiped his eyes. The Delhi Metro streaked past by the towers with it's characterstic sound. Then he looked left and right in a conspirative fashion and then whispered , his voice drowning in the commotion caused by the train's arrival, ..... "Yug Bahadur Singh".
The District Towers
The gargantuan white complex had been standing abandoned for over a decade, before the Delhi Metro project became the reason for it’s metempsychosis. The latest sensation to hit the nation’s capital was going to streak right across the complex’s leaden face. The announcement of the route was enough to set in motion a sequence of events that were to culminate in my enthralling tryst on a frigid December evening. All the assorted brand names filled in tenders for
shops and showrooms in what was going to be the new youngster’s hub of West Delhi. Adidas, Nike and Reebok for footwear; Lacoste and Lee for clothing and McDonalds, Pizza Hut and Domino’s for fast food; in short all the exclusive and most “in” brands of the day set up shop to create another place for what the young casually called ‘hanging around’ or ‘just chilling’. In actuality these were euphemisms for getting “drop dead drunk” and “smoking your lung’s
off”, designed especially to conceal the truth from their ever trusting parents who were drowned in the sea of liberalism. Within two years the once dilapidated structure stood reincarnated in a more glorious form. The high rise towers now housed the showrooms of the hottest
selling products throughout the lower floors, while the upper floors were offices for multinational banks and insurance companies.
I parked my light weight scooter (yes yes the one which only the sissies are supposed to drive), in the parking lot just outside the plaza. A parking assistant promptly turned up, issued a coupon and demanded ten bucks. He was loaded with fake accessories, a T-Shirt which screamed Adidas from so many places and in such varied fonts so as to confirm that it was not original and sunglasses which might have been all the fashion at the time of independence but seemed definitely awkward in the present settings. Only a few years back the lot was an ill used, stench ridden and rodent infested public toilet of sorts. Now it had metamorphosed into a spic and span compound for the latest in Italian and Japanese cars and bikes. My scooter looked like an embarrassed washer man’s ass between the finest steeds. I paid the fee in a huff and made my way towards the multiplex which had recently come up in the premises of the tower complex.
The purpose of my visit was to book two tickets for the night show of the latest Hollywood potboiler. However unlike most youngsters I was not going to ask for the corner seats. Me and my younger brother were going to watch the film sitting right in the middle of the balcony. The special effects charged comic-action-suspense flick had generated much more interest than it genuinely deserved, but then who really cares for such mundane issues like story, plot and screenplay when you are getting to watch people combating in Kung-Fu while simultaneously being airborne like eagles, in the dark depths of the cosmos far from the Solar System. The queue was long and winding and the chilly wind struck the face with a wrath that illjustified the arduous wait. I was disillusioned with the movie and had no interest in spending 200 bucks on such otiose rubbish, but my brother's constant bickering and peer pressure made me stand firm and resolute.
I looked around at the once ramshackle buildings turned exhibitionist haven of the mighty and rich’s adolescent progeny. Flashy and multicoloured neon lights attracted and appealed, almost seduced, the onlookers to have a look and consequently buy expensive up market foreign goods. People drove towards the shops under these lights like moths towards fire. Boys and girls, and even men and women between the ages of 15 and 35 hurried out of the crowded stores laden with heavy plastic bags and gratified expressions. “How many days would they enjoy their new acquisitions before growing weary of them?”, I asked myself. How much time before they will throng these places again, in search of yet more items to give them a more permanent satisfaction? Not many if the crowd inside and current trends were any indication.
The line moved forward. So did I. A huge sardarji stood in front of me. He was regularly mouthing gentel obscenities, the type you get to hear everyday travelling by local buses. No one minds them very much and everybody uses them generously. However the written world is definitely not ready yet to see them in print. I hence refrain from qouting them. Anyways, this Sardarji's name was Yug Bahadur Singh. Loosely translated the name means this era's bravest guy. I knew his name because he made no secret of it. Whenever he hurled an abuse at someone or the other he told them who was doing so. "Yug Bahadur is not scared of you *********s" and "Yug Bahadur gives shit to you ******s" were the general form his expletives took. But why ,you may ask,have I suddenly started writing the vulgar Sardar's biography. Read on to find out.
The queue finally reached a stage at which, after 40 minutes of waiting I finally found myself just one place from getting the tickets booked. And in front of me was, no prizes for guessing, Yug Bahadur Singh. "9 tickets, center row", said the sardar. "Sorry sir, we don't have so many seats together anywhere", came back the nervous reply. Suddenly a hush swept over the whole place, though I think it was purely coincidental, but the effect was dramatic.... just like the movies. Standing behind I looked up at the Sardar's turban and tried to see through and find out what must be going on in his mind. The silence got a little prolonged. The almost sweating ticket guy asked sheepishly, "Sir??". The Sardar replied, a lot less unsure of himself, "What do you mean no seats?I have been standing in the sun for an hour... and no seats". And then as suddenly as any thing he started crying. No, not the ticket guy but the Sardar. He cried like anything, as if he was 5 years old and had been denied the ice cream which he had been promised for doing his homework. He started beating the ticket window, voice growing hoarse from all the crying. Horrified onlookers stopped in their tracks to take a look at the spectacle and some even asked me what had happened. I was as amazed as anybody and could not bring myself to tell everybody the strange tale. This went on for a while and then a little boldly I ventured to ask,"Sardarji what happened?"
The Sardarji trying to control himself, sobbing, then wiping his eyes on his shirt sleeves said, "My master he will kill me. He won't feed me for days." I couldn't understand. The idea that this huge sardar who had for so long been abusing everyone as if he was some bigshot was actually somebody's servant was too fantastic to imagine. "No one can beat you for such a silly thing. It's none of your fault that the hall ran out of tickets.", I tried to reason with him. "Oh you don't know my master, he is a beast... a true beast.",he said now a little more in control of himself, but still not able to stifle the occasional sob. "Oh come on, no one's like that, who is this master of your's?", I asked. Taking out a dirty hankerchief he wiped his eyes. The Delhi Metro streaked past by the towers with it's characterstic sound. Then he looked left and right in a conspirative fashion and then whispered , his voice drowning in the commotion caused by the train's arrival, ..... "Yug Bahadur Singh".
Sunday, April 13, 2008
My experiments with iiTruths
I feel that this is one topic which comes foremost to my mind. The reason is that I am in the IIT phase of my life. Before we I describe IIT life in detail, let me flashback to the Target:IIT phase of my life.
Year 2002 A.D, Month April
I had just given my Xth board exams and was feeling at peace with the world. However in today's world it is almost a sin to relax. And so it came to happen that the society demanded a decision of me. What way would my career go from here onwards. Now secretly I wanted to be an author. You must be smiling knowingly upon reading this fact, because my writings are amateur at best. Well all I have to say in my justification is that wait till you have seen my C codes!
For a "bright" middle class student in India there are really only two choices - Medical and NonMedical (read Engineering). Now there was a history of engineering in my family. And I hated Biology. So these 2 facts coupled together led me into the wild race of getting into an Engineering college. Much can be said about those 2 horrific years of my life. However I do not wish to suffer (or cause you to suffer) by recalling those hideous days in any great detail. Let us just say that there was hardly a weekend that I did not pass in coaching classes or hardly a week without extra classes.
Finally after much perseverance I did attain the ultimate dream of every guy like me. I was in IIT and had the branch of "my choice".
Present Day
After spending over 30 months in IIT, I have made some startling observations and come to some rather controversial conclusions. The whole of the IIT system is a farce. The society subjects the qualifying students to an unjust deification, in effect causing an apotheosis that all other wish to emulate. IITs, however have not kept the promises they made and have been utterly unsuccessful in what they set out to achieve.
The image of IIT that is projected to the outside world is one of a Gurukul. Centers of excellence where there is extreme discipline, where ideas germinate in an academically stimulating environment and where the most brilliant young minds of our nation strive hard to gain knowledge and expertise in various technical fields so that they can apply novel methods for the progress of India. This was the aim with which IITs were setup.
The actual situation is however, an absolute negative inversion of this resplendent picture.
The whole IIT system has today become a machinery for manufacturing engineers for the US.
Worse these "engineers" are nothing like Nehru envisioned they would be.They are mostly nerds who have suddenly gained freedom and are hell bent on enjoying it to the utmost.
The eternal optimists will say that I am being cynical for no reason at all. I however will prove my hypothesis (forgive me, that's my science background speaking ,not me) through some conclusive examples.
In our batch (all batches for that matter), 1 or 2 guys make most of the assignments and the rest just copy them. Not that the rest of us are in any manner inferior to the others or that we are not capable of making the assignments ourselves. In fact it is pretty difficult to explain to the TA's, what you have not done yourself.Understanding and modifying code made by someone else is no mean feat, but I am never disputing the intelligence of IIT'ians. All I am saying is that we turn into hedonists who will watch movies all day long without a care for our responsibilities. This however is not the situation of all in IIT. There are students who are sincere and donot run from work. However they would definitely make up for less than 5% of IIT's populace.
The majority of students here just study enough to clear their exams with good grades(which is nothing difficult, a good example would be yours truly). Then they get "great" jobs in multinationals or worse they fly off to the "first world countries"! A good proportion also secure admission to IIM's. They delay their departure to the west by 2 years in this way, but the end result remains the same.
The supporters of "going to US for higher studies" will say that a student interested in his/her subject has no scope in India for further development. They would say that there is practically no research going on here, and the faculty is substandard. I would like to ask them, why is it that there is no research going on in India, despite so many research grants?Why is the faculty substandard?It is because intelligent and brilliant IIT undergraduates leave the nation for going to US etc. They carry on their research there, and eventually teach there. This is a vicious cycle and someone has to break it.Otherwise how are we to march forward in this regard?
The purpose of the IIT's was to create a technical man power which would be at par with the best engineers in the world and a state of the art scientific work force which would take India into the future a confident and technically self dependent nation. However I ask how many of us are going to sit for the UPSC exams and join the government engineering services? How many of us are going to pursue our postgraduate and doctoral studies here and then go on to join indigenous research labs?Even those who stay back in India (like me) join multinational companies, thus in effect contributing to someone else's success.Even today our Delhi Metro project is built with Japanese and German help.It is a shame on those countless elite engineers that IITs have produced over the last 5 decades.
Some people are of the opinion that as more and more Indians do well all over the world, our gene pool would spread all over the world and in the future we would be the most superior race.
They also say that currently an intellectual war is being waged between the races of the world and we are on the winning side.
My reply to these people is that they have gotten their battle lines mixed. The war is certainly on but not between Indians and Caucasians or any other such race but between nations. The Indians who are going abroad are fighting for US,UK etc and not for our gene pool or anything. Humans are no longer animals, fighting among breeds for survival of the fittest. It is the fittest nations that shall survive, not the fittest races. Thus currently all the funding our government is giving to these institutions like IITs and IIMs is actually strengthening our opponents.
The detractors of this theory would raise questions against me. Am I any different than the ordinary IIT'ian? Am I not also guilty of the sins I so knowingly list. The answer is yes. I am as much a slave of modern society and what it thinks as others are. But the difference is that I realize my pitiable state and this realization might lead to a conscious effort to free myself sometime in the future. This is the endeavour of this blog. To atleast disillusion some who are enslaved in this MATRIX.
I would like to end this article on a positive note however. Recently an awakening seems to be taking place in well established IIT'ians. A change of thought may take place and we still might be able to save the day. I implore you to read the following news report for further clarification.
Year 2002 A.D, Month April
I had just given my Xth board exams and was feeling at peace with the world. However in today's world it is almost a sin to relax. And so it came to happen that the society demanded a decision of me. What way would my career go from here onwards. Now secretly I wanted to be an author. You must be smiling knowingly upon reading this fact, because my writings are amateur at best. Well all I have to say in my justification is that wait till you have seen my C codes!
For a "bright" middle class student in India there are really only two choices - Medical and NonMedical (read Engineering). Now there was a history of engineering in my family. And I hated Biology. So these 2 facts coupled together led me into the wild race of getting into an Engineering college. Much can be said about those 2 horrific years of my life. However I do not wish to suffer (or cause you to suffer) by recalling those hideous days in any great detail. Let us just say that there was hardly a weekend that I did not pass in coaching classes or hardly a week without extra classes.
Finally after much perseverance I did attain the ultimate dream of every guy like me. I was in IIT and had the branch of "my choice".
Present Day
After spending over 30 months in IIT, I have made some startling observations and come to some rather controversial conclusions. The whole of the IIT system is a farce. The society subjects the qualifying students to an unjust deification, in effect causing an apotheosis that all other wish to emulate. IITs, however have not kept the promises they made and have been utterly unsuccessful in what they set out to achieve.
The image of IIT that is projected to the outside world is one of a Gurukul. Centers of excellence where there is extreme discipline, where ideas germinate in an academically stimulating environment and where the most brilliant young minds of our nation strive hard to gain knowledge and expertise in various technical fields so that they can apply novel methods for the progress of India. This was the aim with which IITs were setup.
The actual situation is however, an absolute negative inversion of this resplendent picture.
The whole IIT system has today become a machinery for manufacturing engineers for the US.
Worse these "engineers" are nothing like Nehru envisioned they would be.They are mostly nerds who have suddenly gained freedom and are hell bent on enjoying it to the utmost.
The eternal optimists will say that I am being cynical for no reason at all. I however will prove my hypothesis (forgive me, that's my science background speaking ,not me) through some conclusive examples.
In our batch (all batches for that matter), 1 or 2 guys make most of the assignments and the rest just copy them. Not that the rest of us are in any manner inferior to the others or that we are not capable of making the assignments ourselves. In fact it is pretty difficult to explain to the TA's, what you have not done yourself.Understanding and modifying code made by someone else is no mean feat, but I am never disputing the intelligence of IIT'ians. All I am saying is that we turn into hedonists who will watch movies all day long without a care for our responsibilities. This however is not the situation of all in IIT. There are students who are sincere and donot run from work. However they would definitely make up for less than 5% of IIT's populace.
The majority of students here just study enough to clear their exams with good grades(which is nothing difficult, a good example would be yours truly). Then they get "great" jobs in multinationals or worse they fly off to the "first world countries"! A good proportion also secure admission to IIM's. They delay their departure to the west by 2 years in this way, but the end result remains the same.
The supporters of "going to US for higher studies" will say that a student interested in his/her subject has no scope in India for further development. They would say that there is practically no research going on here, and the faculty is substandard. I would like to ask them, why is it that there is no research going on in India, despite so many research grants?Why is the faculty substandard?It is because intelligent and brilliant IIT undergraduates leave the nation for going to US etc. They carry on their research there, and eventually teach there. This is a vicious cycle and someone has to break it.Otherwise how are we to march forward in this regard?
The purpose of the IIT's was to create a technical man power which would be at par with the best engineers in the world and a state of the art scientific work force which would take India into the future a confident and technically self dependent nation. However I ask how many of us are going to sit for the UPSC exams and join the government engineering services? How many of us are going to pursue our postgraduate and doctoral studies here and then go on to join indigenous research labs?Even those who stay back in India (like me) join multinational companies, thus in effect contributing to someone else's success.Even today our Delhi Metro project is built with Japanese and German help.It is a shame on those countless elite engineers that IITs have produced over the last 5 decades.
Some people are of the opinion that as more and more Indians do well all over the world, our gene pool would spread all over the world and in the future we would be the most superior race.
They also say that currently an intellectual war is being waged between the races of the world and we are on the winning side.
My reply to these people is that they have gotten their battle lines mixed. The war is certainly on but not between Indians and Caucasians or any other such race but between nations. The Indians who are going abroad are fighting for US,UK etc and not for our gene pool or anything. Humans are no longer animals, fighting among breeds for survival of the fittest. It is the fittest nations that shall survive, not the fittest races. Thus currently all the funding our government is giving to these institutions like IITs and IIMs is actually strengthening our opponents.
The detractors of this theory would raise questions against me. Am I any different than the ordinary IIT'ian? Am I not also guilty of the sins I so knowingly list. The answer is yes. I am as much a slave of modern society and what it thinks as others are. But the difference is that I realize my pitiable state and this realization might lead to a conscious effort to free myself sometime in the future. This is the endeavour of this blog. To atleast disillusion some who are enslaved in this MATRIX.
I would like to end this article on a positive note however. Recently an awakening seems to be taking place in well established IIT'ians. A change of thought may take place and we still might be able to save the day. I implore you to read the following news report for further clarification.
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