For whom Time stands still

Time! on whose arbitrary wing
The varying hours must flag or fly,
Whose tardy winter, fleeting spring,
But drag or drive us on to die

-Lord Byron

This weekend, as is the case with any other weekend, I was cooling my heels at home. Words can be misleading for Chennai is essentially a hot cauldron for the first few months of the year. It would be rather apt to say “I was burning my heels at home”. Unmindful of the sweltering heat, I chose to sit down and from the heap of books strewn across, picked one and was immersed in it. My reverie was rather abruptly broken by a familiar voice in the streets. Why would I not recognize it? After all it’s been the same distinct loud voice, which I have heard for ages and which mouths the same two lines over and over again.

Paper, Old paper...

Unmindful of my observations, my mother called out to the owner of the voice. She asked him to come over. This was my cue. Over the years I have dedicated myself to making sure that my mother is not made to work hard for every little thing in house. This makes her feel happy and most of the times it is her smile and her silent acknowledgment that matters. I ran over to the other room and immediately began stacking the old pile of newspapers in a jute bag. The door bell rung and I was ready. The man looked at me. The glint in his eyes suggested a trace of faint recognition. A small smile ensued then in his lips. I acknowledged it and we both were into the act of shifting papers in his weighing machine. Just when a little stack remained, he looked at me, and asked me, “Son, what do you do now?”. In a low tone I told him I work. Me naming the company, which most of the educated urban lower, middle and upper class would instantly recognize would not bring the same sense of recognition in his mind. I spared him the name and tried to keep the conversation going on. I asked him how things are going on for him. He looked at me and said, “Son, it’s all the same, I do the same old work, collect papers and try to eke out a living. That has been my life for almost 20 years now”. My heart went out to him. I could not reply back. The words might have stung me. Here I was in my home making rapid strides in my life moving step by step to a place of higher recognition, whereas there was a fellow human being, who in all fairness has struggled more than me but life never has changed for him.

He gave me two soiled fifty rupee notes for the newspapers. I gave back one fifty rupees to him saying he could use it to buy something cool and drink. I guess he was overwhelmed with surprise for there were tears in his eyes. He thanked me profusely, blessed me and carried on with his work. I sat down again with my books. My mom, used to my ways asked me to keep the fifty rupee note. She was apparently happy for the house looked cleaner without the strewn newspapers around. My mind was rather engrossed in the inequalities of our lives. How many times in our lives would we hear elders asking us to work hard, for the fruits of hard work are sweet. Wasn’t that man doing the same thing? Every day he had to shout till his voice grew hoarse. The fury of the Sun will not stop him from venturing out for the pangs of his hunger are a much bigger driving force in his life. Time is a deceptive illusion I realized. For me it was the measuring factor of my achievements and age, whereas for him it was all about counting yet another grey hair while his life always remained the same. I suddenly realized I was sweating and switched on the fan. A cool wave of air spread through the room giving me temporary relief from the Sun’s fury. The voice outside became fainter. I realized he would soon move on to the next street. I wondered if I would see him ten years from now, would he still be the same. I wished he would go to places. I wished somebody would give him Redemption for the hard work he has done all these years. But these I realized were Utopian thoughts of a mind which has some solitude and loneliness. For that man though “Time will always stand still”.

In that journey called life... with those people who are Friends...

The best kind of friend is the one you could sit on a porch swing with, never saying a word, and walk away feeling like that was the best conversation you've ever had.

If there is one word that can summarize my existence on earth then that would be colourful. I tend to view it as an unfinished painting and I think of myself as the expert artist. The artist starts off as a dabbler, blissfully unaware of his skills and as time progresses his strokes get bolder,the melange of colors that he creates acquires another dimension. He realizes that in his hand is the fostered child of silence and slow time. A slice of life that, perhaps would serve as a window to his world in the ages to come. When the strokes of the artist's brush come out of a clarity of thought he is well on course to create his masterpiece.

The bolder strokes in my life would be some of the hardest decisions that I have taken. Yes not all creative ideas are successes and the same reflects in life. We realize that Experience means failing the test first and then learning the lesson. Trust me, nothing can be harder than that. I often hear the adage greatness lies not in falling, but in rising everytime we fall. Many a time getting up requires that extra effort which can only be provided by another set of hands. The set of hands that pull you out. In the artist's world, probably the vivid hues that bring life to his masterpiece.

What is a masterpiece without colors? The vivid hues add another dimension to a piece of canvas. A dimension that perhaps the solid canvas would not have offered had it stayed white. If ever my life is hailed as a masterpiece, then probably it would be because of those beings, whose unwavering support and immense belief served as an elixir to my unquenchable thirst. In times of low self belief it is their belief that holds me through. Words may seem redundant to the supporting shoulders that they offer.
Every other day when the entire world seems against you and starts doubting you. When you yourself cannot decide if what you do is correct, it is then that their belief carries you through.

Not only to those folks who provide support in terms of spite, but also those folks who stay on with you every day, listening to your irate ramblings, to your quixotic ideas and to your promises that would stay on unfulfilled. I see them everywhere. My life would not have been colourful without you folks. The masterpiece is not yet complete. Yeah it's not yet reached crossed even Quarter of what it has to be. But the vivid hues inked have surely been etched for ages :-).

*Phew atlast finished it..was contemplating for too long I guess*

PS : A thank you to Prazy, Harsha, HRH Anu(I'd be killed for this), Deepti, Shanky, Mayuraa , Sanz and of course a late thank you to Gody, Avi and Janani :D. Many a time I just felt energized after just speaking to you folks. Of course my heart is beating funeral marches to the grave but thanks to you folks I still think there is space in this world for my footprints to be etched :-).

Indian 'Hypocrite' Media

So a few days ago in Tirunelveli,Tamil Nadu, a police officer lay battling for life after being hacked by certain bad elements of the society. It was played out on all Indian Media channels and most of you would have come across it. To sum it up. Vetrivel the police officer was knifed,bombed and hacked by certain unlawful elements and he was lying down in a pool of his own blood. The dear Dravidian Party ministers and their cahoots arrived at the spot just in time. The dear ministers were just plain afraid to even get out because there was a bomb threat? (What a joke!!). Ok the others like the secretary were also afraid. The cop begs for water, pleads for help. Not even one single person is ready to take the dying man and give him treatment. Instead the ministers call the Ambulance and by the time the ambulance arrives, the hero has bled to death. Now the questions raised by the media were very accurate. Let me put it up for you :

1)Could the ministers allow such a thing to happen? If the situation was reversed wouldn't the cop be helping the ministers out without any fear to his own life?

2) When somebody begs for water what would you do? In particular if the person in need of the elixir is actually dying. The disgusting scene of the secretary pouring the water on Vetrivel's head was shown. How untouchable is that man? Aren't the elected members from the same Dravidian party movement that years ago fought for eradication of that evil?.

Ok now for the pertinent point. The entire thing was captured on Television!! So what was the media doing? Can't the politician ask back? If the politician could not help the person, why not the Media in particular the cameraman, instead of filming the event go and help the dying person? Where were the morals of the great Indian Media? They were happy to point fingers on the politicians, whereas they weren't ready to clean their own mess. Ohh all the news channels played it again and again. Disgusting to say the least. In all a life was lost. That life would be insignificant in the World's Grand scheme of things, but would remain a lamp that just faded away instead of lighting up the house it was required to. I for one hate the so called Indian Media Boom.

(500) Days of Summer - A movie review

This is a story of boy meets girl. But you should know up front, this is not a love story


What would you do if you were in a failed romance? Are you searching for something that would get you out of the unpleasant past? Then you must surely talk to Scott Neustadter, co-writer of this brilliant movie. The story is based on his true experiences with a girl in the London School of Economics. Ok now back to the review.

When was the last time that a romantic-comedy-drama movie really fleshed out characters as if they were just you and me. The so called romance movies usually have a story line, where a desperate or a loser kind of guy falls in love with an absolute beauty or probably where a guy is ditched by somebody and he meets this warm person and grows on eventually to love her. Add a bit of comedy and variations and you get a love story. My problem with these movies is that, though they are enjoyable, don't connect to the audience. The audience are not fools. We know the things portrayed on screen cannot happen.

(Before the breakup)
Tom:[Montage of Summer] I love her smile. I love her hair. I love her knees. I love how she licks her lips before she talks. I love her heart-shaped birthmark on her neck. I love it when she sleeps.

So where was I? Yeah now Tom played by Joseph Gordon Levitt falls for a girl Summer played by Zooey Deschanel. The story is presented in a non linear fashion for us. The narrator every now and then pops up with annotations. The movie starts reverse from the 500th day. The beginning of each day is highlighted in the movie. So Tom works in a greeting card company and Summer is the new assistant to his boss. During a party, his drunk friend blurts out to Summer that Tom has fallen for her. From the word go she makes it clear that she is not looking for a boy friend but she is ready to have all other things that comes with love :D(Seems hard to believe eh?). Tom obviously being a guy falls madly in love with her. The two date, go around as a couple, shout in parks, frolic around in each others houses. Tom and Summer really seem such a cute couple together. In spite of the different perspectives in which each of them views the relationship, Tom thinks she is the girl of his dreams and Summer believing that there's no such thing as true love, they carry on. We get to know that Tom is actually a talented architect who probably landed up in the wrong job. They have a breakup after watching the great Dustin Hoffman movie "The Graduate". Tom is unable to cope up with this and life goes on in a downward spiral. Summer drops in and out of his life and the scene they have towards the end of the movie is perhaps the defining moment. Tom has quit his job and he goes pursuing his dream. The last scene is perhaps the most memorable for me :-). He meets this really hot girl and when he later asks her name, she replies Hi, My name is Autumn and so the story continues.

I hope I haven't given too much of details into the movie's plot. Probably not the best reviewer in town. You definitely should watch this movie. I would rate it as high as The Graduate,Annie Hall, Serendipity, As good as it gets. The characters are so adorable in spite of their obvious flaws. It's been nominated for all major awards this year. Both the actors are amazing. Zooey Deschanel is just so natural. What do I say about Joseph Gordon Levitt. He's surely one the best actors I have seen in a long time. He just gets into the part with ease. So I'll end it now. Go watch the movie folks. You won't be disappointed.

(After the breakup)
Tom::[Montage of Summer] I hate her crooked teeth. I hate the way she smacks her lips. I hate her knooby knees. I hate that cockroach shape splotch on her neck.

PS: Special Thanks to my friend Silky ;-) who made me watch this movie and to Karadi who gave me his copy :-).

Ressurecting myself from the Rubble of that Past...

Finally I got a new PC. My third machine and yeah this time my kid bro assembled it himself. Specs are not important. It just made me realize the value of my lovely Flinstone aged P4 PC. My kind bro did not delete anything from that PC and so one of the first things I did was to take a backup of all my resources. Well of course a 1TB external hard disk comes in handy :D. So going through the ruins of that PC I found a curious text note called links and I was momentarily stunned!!!. It brought back fond memories of a day when I never knew how to operate a machine and how to grapple up terms like C/C++ and Java. Looking back in retrospect I feel that I had a greater sense of direction then than I ever had in my entire life. Life had a purpose then. The goal of learning for learning's sake and not for achievement was imbibed in my veins. Each and every vein responded in sync to that single desire of learning something new. Achievements never mattered. Hell who cares whether I win or not? Is it not the fact that I learnt that I could use pointers to traverse arrays today when I was using subscripts yesterday more gratifying?.

Thank goodness I found that out. Waking to life is the most important thing that was required for me. From a stress filled day to think about what I achieved!!!,is it not better if I start piecing the links and go ahead. At least I shall cover some ground instead of sitting tight :-). Thank you my dear old PC, you have truly woken me up :-). It was then I realized that in pursuit of something called success I truly forgot what was more important. Self realization dawns and Longfellow comes to my rescue.

Not for enjoyment,Not for sorrow
Is our destined end or way
But to act that each tomorrow
Finds us farther than today..

Yeah he was right :-). Life is not always about that success. It is about that experience. It is about living for the right things, for living without hurting others and for helping when they need your hands and not regretting it later. It is about going forward as a underachieved human being than a successful monster. It is about cherishing those wonderful moments from which we learn and piece together an entirely new puzzle in this amazing world. And finally it is about the joy that comes out of Learning for learning's sake.

Landmark Quiz at Bangalore (Nov 2009) Prelims

Ohh yes, The Noob has been loitering in and around quizzing competitions for ages now. So the day was the Rajyotsava and as goes tradition, The Landmark Quiz 2009 Bangalore edition was held at St.John's Auditorium in Koramangala. We had Dr.Navin Jayakumar as our host. The enthusiasm was palpable. The entire crowd was brimming in confidence. Me and my team mates also saw the usual QFI and the KQA folks and then we realized that definitely we are not going to make it any big there. Of course that doesn't stop us from learning new things or trying out our luck in these quizzes. I'll just post the questions from the Quiz for a lot of folks who did not attend them. These were the prelims questions. Mind you, some questions are not in order. For the nth consecutive time I forgot to bring my quiz notebook and yeah I did feel bad. Of course two tissue papers came to my rescue :P. Thanks to Transit at The Forum ;-). Hmm without further ado, here are the first fifteen questions from the prelims. I'll post the remaining in some time from now.

1) The question was about a treaty that formally came to effect on November 1st 1993 by some European Countries. Treaty of European Union as it is known officially. Also some details were given. My team mate cracked it the moment he saw November 1st. I took some time to decipher that. But we both got the answers right :-).

Ans) MAASTRICHT Treaty

2)After Taj Mahal this monument is the second most visited place in our country and has the second largest number of tourists visiting it. Name this monument.

We got confused by the 'word' monument in the question. The answer was so obvious.

Ans)The Mysore Palace

3)This American sitcom has an ongoing narrative revolves around four children—Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormick—and their bizarre adventures in and around the fictional and titular Colorado town.

The name Eric Cartman was enough here :D

Ans) South Park

4)The question was about a variety of grain which could be stored for decades and was made famous by the Arabians and the Mediterranean Muslims. Some more lines describing the trivia of the grain was also given.

Obviously I know only how to eat and not to think about the food stuff. Turns out that the answer was actually easy if we had guessed properly.

Ans) Durum Wheat

5)What new words were added to the constitution of India during the 42nd Ammendment by Indira Gandhi?

Yeah we found this out. It is not so dificult

Ans) The words were Socialist,Secular

6)Theatrum Orbis Terrarum was a book published in 1570 and first introduced a word in the English language which perhaps was the best word for what was published in the book. The book was published by Gerard cramer. Some more trivia also was there.

We thought it was Encyclopedia

Ans)Atlas and Gerard Cramer was Mercator

7)How do we celebrate Hockey Legend Dhyan Chand's birthday?

Ans) National Sports Day. Also the Arjuna Awards are announced on the same day.

8)This sweetmeat got the G.I ( Geographical Indicator Tag) for it's uniqueness. I have forgotten the exact wording.

Ha ha ha.. I got this answer right. Thanks to Priyanka. Her quiz at the office had that question and so pat came the answer.

Ans) Tirupati Laddoo :-)

9)In 1883, when a printer in Cheyenne, Wyoming working on a regular telephone directory ran out of white paper. What did he do?

Of course you need not be Einstein to figure this out. :D

Ans) Yellow Pages

10)In nuclear weapons, a ________ occurs when the testing of a nuclear bomb fails to meet its expected yield. The reason(s) for the failure can be linked to improper bomb design, poor construction, or lack of expertise. All countries that have had a nuclear weapons testing program have experienced this. What is the one word used to describe that low yield.

Ans) Fizzle

11)This question was related to mythology about an Avatar of Goddess Earth who actually killed Narakasura when Krishna fell asleep just for a moment.

Ans) Satyabhama

12)The question about a species of Elk which was named after an American President.

Ans) Roosevelt Elk named after Teddy Roosevelt :D.

13) Hmm I forgot what question this was.

14)A question about the Hugo award for 2009 and how it was inspired from "The Jungle book".

Ans) The answer is Neil Gaiman for "The graveyard book"

15)The domino effect suggests that some change, small in itself, will cause a similar change nearby, which then will cause another similar change, and so on in linear sequence, by analogy to a falling row of dominoes standing on end. This was the Domino Theory of the United States referring to the growing Communism in Asia. Where did it all start?

Ans) Vietnam

I'll post the rest of the questions in some time folks. Needless to say I did enjoy the Landmark quiz as always. Yeah waiting eagerly for the Chennai Edition next year :-).

Ah she does it again!! Chronicles of Rakhi Sawant!!!

This one is for all the folks who tuned in to watch the infamous "Rakhi ka Swayamvar" on TV with great eagerness. The show was an absolute facade!!! Ohh yeah the bharatiya naari Rakhi Sawant has managed to pull it off again. This time she has called off her engagement with that Canadian based guy. Guess What?? Thanks to the media boom in our country almost all the news channels will soon have this piece of shit as "Breaking News" and the so called Sabse Tez channels will have 2 hour shows asking questions like "Rakhi ne aisa kyun kiya?", "Kya Elesh aur Rakhi ke beech mein pehle se daraar tha?" etc etc!!!. Yeah right when the whole country is burning with issues like drought and less rains and looming recession our so called educated media has to offer us only this!!. Looking back I reflect on the media boom and the astuteness of Rakhi to use this as a tool to keep her in the limelight. Any publicity is good publicity and with that publicity comes in a load of opportunities to make good money.

Chronicling Rakhi Sawant might be a really good case study in finding out how the Media creates a somebody out of a nobody. A good for nothing Item girl, she starts her tryst with the television in various reality shows. Makes a name for herself by being foolish!! and yet rakes in a lot of money. Aah how she must be rolling on the floor laughing at the poor folks who watched her on television saying,"Ha ha ha,I fooled you" (*South park style dialogue*). This is what she does, selects a set of folks who have enthusiastically applied to become her husband. Makes fun of some of them very badly on Television. Chooses another guy and then happily calls off the marriage. Yes not before making another show with the guy on how they live together!! Wow. I really should learn a lot from this woman. She sure does know how to make money. I really feel bad for the Indian Public. Do the channels feel that the entire Indian public is foolish or do they thrust in shows like these so that we are left with no choice. I am reminded of the movie called Idiocracy which shows a dystopian future where the entire world has become so foolish and a person of average Intelligence tries to help it. It is so prophetic to watch that movie if you see so many people in this country watching Miss.Rakhi.

No offence meant to Rakhi though. She knows how to still be in the limelight and still make fools of people who watch her. Aah will the entire world listen to a minority of sane voices. It never has and so she will still continue. "And that's the way it is". *Signing off in Walter Cronkite style :D :D *.