prabāt

where the mind is without fear...


Thursday, March 31, 2005

is pain better than death

Terri Schiavo has finally breathed her last. May she rest in peace. At least now!

I was talking of Science and Religion some days back. And the whole story about euthanasia opens the cork on a similar debate, all along mercilessly suppressing the arduous pain that a mid-aged woman has been undergoing for years. Terri collapsed in 1990. What followed since was excruciating physical and mental torture, having been reduced to being no more than a vegetable.

Medicine and science have their limits. It speaks of wonderful philosophy to say 'life is precious' and 'humankind is all about protecting life'
. But with the extent of pain and suffering that Terri underwent for over a decade (and seven of them in legal battles!), she better had found peace in death long back.

I wonder from where do all these religious ascetics creep up with their own philosophical rantings on life and living and protecting living. Her parents felt she would improve with 'better' treatment. But there is only so much medicine can do. And given that the medical chances of her sitting back in normal life was utterly remote as told by most of her physicians over the years, letting her to suffer all the while with a godly hope of a miracle is the height of religious dogmatism prevailing over earthly pragmatism.

Death has its sensations. Perhaps evolution has sensitized the human olfactory system to the scent of approaching death. It's a tussle between conscience and the dogmatic primitive religious instincts that has crippled man trying to come to terms with the inevitable mortality. The case of Terri is more of a conscience issue rather than religious. If this means killing and against what the humans must preach, then ask a soldier to show consideration and think and pray and meditate and praise god before he decides to shoot down his enemy.

Religion and law literally toyed around the inexplicable pain that a body had been enduring. All the trash talk was on who decides – her parents or husband – and what was forgotten was a pathetic soul undergoing what might have been least meant for her.
If what was eventually committed was a sin, the greater sin was forcing a human unto undue pain.

There needs to be a line where conscience rules over narrow minded assertiveness. A medically incurable unbearable pain for years at length in the hope of a miracle is no religious salvation. God is not a magician. But that's what religions seem to be wanting people to believe!


posted by Kishore at 11:34 PM   |   |
Tuesday, March 29, 2005

epistemologically speaking

Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get.

Conventional thinking is all about being contented with what I have. If you don’t get what you like, like what you get. Why the heck?

I don’t want to be contented. I want to do big things. I want to squeeze toothpaste back into the tube. I want to fly at Mach-100. I want to jump from the top of Alps crying out at the top of my voice and record the echo and send it to CERN for acoustic research. Crazy thoughts alright. Trying to do far too much. But as long as I stay within the warps of moral, legal and ethical boundaries, what’s the big deal!

Learning to love whatever you get, is an old fashioned simplistic thinking. The real driver for success is that ever-present vacuum at some corner of the heart constantly impelling the intellect to flood with new postures of cognitive astuteness. It is this vacuum that scales new heights. What do I gain by being contented? It stifles my thought. It makes me lazy. It rusts my mind. It makes me feel sick. It handicaps me. It sucks!

I need that vacuum. Every time I fill it up, I create a new one. I need this coercion to move ahead. I need the drive to think, to pierce through whatever I feel like piercing. And not sit and stare up the seven heavens in a philosophical retrospection displaying a juvenile smile trying to feel good about everything that is already there and making the often abusively misused word ‘contentment’ sound even more philosophical.

Not that I’m unhappy about whatever I’ve got (Oh, I’m happy alright!), but every inch I take thrusts me that much more to take up the next inch. Why would I ever want to stop moving? What’s wrong in baiting for the next inch? If nobody’s hurt, if I’m within the law, if I’m within the casing of morality, if I’m ethical, why should I feel bad about desiring for more? Does desire tantamount to sin? Who says so? Religion? Ascetic? God?

It needs courage. It needs courage to dare. It needs courage to dare to question. It is the present day original sins – Fear, Pride, Lazy – that stand up to the philosophical nonsense of misplaced contentment.


How do you know that you know what you know? Discover the art of questioning. Discover the art of reasoning. Discover the world. Discover yourself. Learning never ends. Don’t bring it to a screeching halt! Let philosophy be a guide, not a surrogate stand-in for common-sense and rationality.

posted by Kishore at 9:55 PM   |   |

Life's like that - 5

He and Me over the office IM.
He is listening to Pink Floyd.

He: when I was a child, I had fever
He: now I have that feeling once again
Me: when I was a child, the cute girl next door loved me

Me: now I want her to love me once again

posted by Kishore at 2:55 AM   |   |
Monday, March 28, 2005

Meet the Fockers

Had been to this movie past Saturday evening with my cousin. There were two very good things about this movie. One, PVR. Two, a regular-size cup masala corn and Pepsi during the interval.

Meet the Fockers. The movie could rather have been named Meet the Fuckers. Believe me, it would still have made perfect sense! Greg Focker (Ben Stiller) is engaged to his girlfriend, Pam Byrnes (Teri Polo). Before they could plan anything about wedding Pam’s father, Jack (Robert De Niro) would meet Greg’s parents (Dustin Hoffman and Barbara Streisand) who lead a laid back Florida Keys lifestyle.

The movie opens with a characteristic mocking of Greg, delivering a baby for a woman. Greg is a registered nurse. The Fockers isle is more of an island off the coast of Pluto rather than something on the earth for Jack, a retired CIA Officer and a tech-savvy, modernized technocratic grandpa. Jack and his wife (Blythe Danner) move in their caravan along with Greg and Pam to spend a weekend with the Fockers, an amateur martial arts expert father and a sex therapist mother who helps old people rediscover their charm of sex life. And all hell breaks lose!

But original humor is what makes for good comedy, not the secondhand gags that this movie pulls. A lot of stuff is borrowed from the prequel Parents. Amid all the confusion that ensues Pam says she’s pregnant but would not reveal it to her obsessive father until after their marriage. The movie proceeds with a painful streak of forced comedy with the Fockers showing off their stuff, kissing and cuddling their 34 year old son as though he were just born and seem like having an orgasm every moment they touch each other. Much to the irritation of Jack, who is hell-bent in knocking the stuff out of this rubbish. The eccentric mannerisms and the dire lack of etiquette of the Fockers makes him turn against the marriage of his daughter. Then, Greg reveals Pam is pregnant.

The movie ends with an inevitable happy ending, with Jack giving in to the marriage and also ending up to the lures of the sex therapist, rediscovering his own lost passions with his wife.


Not the kind of comedy that will remain in memory for longer than the duration of the movie, but nevertheless a reasonable object to kill time in the weekend.

posted by Kishore at 9:28 PM   |   |
Sunday, March 27, 2005

i'm already playing..

I came to office in a pretty cheerful mood, after a good weekend. And as I flipped through the pages of the blogs I regularly read, I just had to pull back a bit on my cheer.

There is only one thing that really affects the laid-back take-it-all-as-it-comes person in me. The loss of a dear one! Be it by death or otherwise! Having experienced both I could feel the pain that
Arunima was expressing in her blog. That sent me tumbling down my memory lane to those episodes of my past that drew parallel to what she had written. Life is a complex maze of happiness and distress. No one, I bet no one, can help it! And words may not always soothe. It’s all a question of time before the best of today might become a liability tomorrow or the nastiest of today becomes an asset tomorrow.
It’s all part of this game.

Life is a playground.
We play different games at different times
Some days we win, some days we lose
Some days we lose pathetically
Some days we are hurt
Some days we hurt
But that stops us not from playing
neither from getting hurt
neither hurting
Its always a noble game in the playground.
Every loss teaching a lesson in winning
Every win anointing our injuries
Promising a better game tomorrow
And so we come back again.
Despite the many wounds

Despite the many losses..
Looking forward to a better game
Looking forward to win.. to help win

To team-up.. to share.. to cry.. to laugh..
To hug.. to love.. to pat.. to caress..
And then go back..
To sleep with the smile of a bliss!

posted by Kishore at 8:11 PM   |   |
Wednesday, March 23, 2005

a tale of a day

My hands lift up from its stiffened angle in a move to relax flow of blood through my nerves and ends up wiping the little moisture stuck to the periphery of that sensitive connection between the shoulder and my head, called the neck. A sense of lack of air cuts across my senses and this sensation is game enough to half-heartedly open my hitherto closed eyes.

I feel a swelling over my eye, but that’s just a feeling - a feeling of excuse fooling myself into continuing to keep my eyes closed. But it’s not meant to be that way. With the weariness of the solemn soldier resting after a lifelong battlefield crusade, I finally send tingles through my sensory nerves with orders to keep my eyelids floating above its surface level.

My eyeballs begin to show some movement, as just in a flash of a fraction second I wonder if E=MC2 applies to the velocity of my moving eyeballs as well. I get a pitch dark silence as an answer to my question. With a constant velocity much lesser than the value of C, I turn my eyeballs to its right-most possible corner to look out of that rectangular opening on the wall opening me to the expanse of a vast outside world.

I see an infinite grayscale being transformed into a tinge of color assorted with orange streaks between blocks of blue. My eyeballs become stationary for once and gaze at this unfolding cosmic beauty. I don’t smile, but feel the same hormonal upshots of a wide smile. The fragrance of a sweetened air flows in to sever the choking down my gut.

The grayscale continues to give way to the assorted colors, setting off a mystifying beauty harmonizing the work of a divine intervention. As the sky begins to cleanse itself, an aura of persistently serene momentary solitude comes upon my lethargic physique. The enlightenment reminds me of the subject I am composed of and turns pages to disclose my next chapter. As I lay my sights to read the revealed first lines of that chapter, there’s a jostle of docile vigor. And I push aside the blanket over me.


Its morning. I need to wake up now.

posted by Kishore at 9:11 PM   |   |
Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Marketing manholes

“Good morning, sir. We are calling from name-censored bank and we have a special free offer on credit cards just for all-my-company-guys”.
God Save me! The day begins and moves this way for most people around me. Telemarketing as an advent of technology is all wonderful to see, but most banks seem to be over-enthusiastic to get on top of the technology, going overboard in their effort to stay ahead of competition. Much to the nuisance of the people, there are calls to the personal extensions and many times even to their mobile phones.

Wonder if such banks are maintaining a large database of prospective nincompoops, who can be lured with promises of life long free credit cards, a night stay at the costliest hotel in the country with the spouse and a trip to the edge of the Alps for his next 4 generations provided he returns back alive the first time. It’s a highly despisable act of foolhardy strategies that many banks follow to earn new customers.

This is a difficult age in marketing and customer is the king. All right. All right. But that doesn’t mean earning 1 new customer irritating 100 on the way, on the commercial justification of roping in more revenue with that 1 customer than what was spent on suffocating 100 more with hapless calls to their office desks throughout working hours.

It’s the strangest mystery of the century to unmystify if such banks actually have all the numbers (which means there is something terribly wrong with the privacy thing) or they just dial some company’s number and any 4 or 5 digit number they like, reaching some extension and wait and watch the fun of baiting an unsuspecting scapegoat.

These days I (and people in other companies too!) continue to get these calls from many major banks, retorted with the patient response “Thank you, not interested”, and down goes the receiver. May be, defense is the only possible form of offence in this case, unless some kind hearted nobleman decides to imbibe some common-sense into this goddamn marketing strategy.

posted by Kishore at 7:01 PM   |   |
Sunday, March 20, 2005

i am intellectually challenged

I don't admire nature, but admire those who admire nature.
I never experienced sibling love, but I love my friends as much.

I'm not self-motivated, but I motivate whoever needs.
I've never gone abroad, but enjoy seeing friends' snaps from abroad.
I never shone in any sport, but cheer those who shine.
I never get birthday gifts, but have given so many gifts.
I never learnt music, but learnt to love music.
I never learnt any instrument, but learnt to leap to its rhythm.
I never learnt to dance, but learnt to tap to the steps.
I never stood 1st in class, but was the 1st to shake hands with the topper.
I never won any medals, but clap when someone wins.
I never was the best, but always somewhere behind it.
I never won, but never lost.

God created me acutely talentless
But for the talent to make others happy.. and feel happy! Always!!


posted by Kishore at 8:53 PM   |   |

A well deserved slap

It’s not a news anymore. The Gujarat Chief Minister has been denied entry into US. And it wasn’t all that surprising to watch the political histrionics unfolding across the country in retaliation to the “shame” that seem to have befallen the nation. I would have been mighty pleased if, even half these political stunts were in display when the country was in a literal shame during the Godhra and aftermath.

One could read the press reporting the wily diplomat saying “…[the US action] has put the Indian Constitution to shame” and “lack of courtesy and sensitivity”. This is coming from the very mouth of a person who has taken every possible effort to put the Indian constitution to shame and lacked every possible bit of sensitivity to the victimized masses in the name of religious prepositor and fanning religious fanatism.

Though the predominantly less-educated voting mass of India may continue to elect him at the helm of affairs, it is no denying the fact that his composedly outrageous behavior does not deserve any page of glory in the history books. Blame the masses, for he gets away every time unhurled.

But at least this action from the US Embassy (which is based on factual notes from the NHRC), would have opened an eyelid or two to the atrocious pugnacity of the diplomat hidden all the while behind the veils of religious fervor. The Chief Minister may still continue to hold his office and might continue his heavenly stature in front of the masses, but this slap in his face by the internationalizing of his delinquent office, would remain in history as five fingers scarred deeply through his wearing beard.

What if the Embassy gives in to the pressure from the Indian Govt and revokes the denial of entry? Well, that would be insanity at its hilarious best!


posted by Kishore at 8:09 PM   |   |
Thursday, March 17, 2005

Life's like that - 4

Him: Look, I know you are afraid, and I’m afraid too. But…
Her: I’m not afraid.
Him: Me neither!

posted by Kishore at 5:19 AM   |   |
Wednesday, March 16, 2005

The modern Sphynx riddle?

Angels and Demons is still reverberating. My mind is pacing Mach-15. Too many thoughts hanging deliriously, plucking neurons out of my only brain.

Science and Religion. Are they two sides of the same coin? Or, a classic Oxymoron? Cynicism and demand for proof has become enlightened thought. Is a demand for proof and reasoning unjustified? Where is the line of demarcation between reasoning and faith? What do I live by? Reasoning? Or, Faith handed over to me by my generation?

There could be many a proverbial reasoning, for reasoning is but a line of thought. Thought is only a reflection of one's experience. Experience stems from facts observed as it is, in conjugation with our myths and beliefs (and beliefs in myths). Beliefs, hacked and moldered through generations, are as distinct as the persons possessing them. The siblings of the same family are distinct from their parents and between them too. Truth of one is not verity of the other.

The human psyche is incomprehensibly divergent. We do need to consider every reason, for every reason is as respectable as its host, but there is a sea of difference between considering and convincing. If I convince myself of his reasoning without due consideration, let me at my own peril. If I consider his reasoning and extrapolate my own experience and observe the facts in the lights of my experience, that’s when I could do justice to my existence.

Proof of Reason? If God has to prove Himself, what could He ever do? If He revealed Himself as God Almighty, King of Heaven and Earth, and moved mountains to prove it, there are those who would reason out to say, “It must have been Satan”. Nobody believes the official spokesman, but everybody trusts an unidentified source.

Science may never get to prove the presence or the absence of God. God is just in the minds. The belief that lights up a direction – lends purpose to the living... a trust in some supreme power, that guides the masses through the treacheries of living. Call this power God or Science.. that’s just a human discretion!!

Some riddles cannot be solved. But riddles need not be solved to be enjoyed.

posted by Kishore at 2:23 AM   |   |
Monday, March 14, 2005

my mind is a bit hyperactive today

Angels and Demons with its Antimatter theme has made an enormous vent in me. I belong to an R&D team in my company, but never has anyone spoken in such proportions. So here I am...

Imagine a program that can learn from itself getting hacked - the more attempts to hack the more secure it becomes. What point does computer science come fact-to-face with the other sciences, particularly physics?
Can antimatter power the new generation of supercomputers?
Can bits and bytes be replaced by antielectrons (positron) and antiprotons?
If software can sit in chips, can it sit in a molecule. Molecular computing would say a big Yes.
If it can sit in a molecule, then can it sit in an atom. If it can, then it could sit on ether!
Software becomes just another particle, an intelligent particle – another matter – an intelligent matter. Imagine, every particle around you is actually an atom of software (I call them Softons, as in protons), intelligent in its own ways. Softons, for example, could be programmed to detect microbes in the air.. a new avenue opens in medical research. Internet will be breathed in.

Softon becomes a piece of intelligent matter. Just like any other matter, an antimatter can be formed, by accelerating the particles using the
LHC (Large Hadron Collider) and all major applications of antimatter begin to ensue - but this time, in an intelligent way. All laws of physics become applicable to softons as well. Including E=mc2. And that opens a new field of Physics that deals with matter that knows how it is supposed to behave and adapt to environment. Softons.

If you could convert all of the energy contained in 1 kg of sugar you could drive a car for about 100,000 years without stopping because,
E=mc2. Imagine something similar happening with the intelligent matter – softons.
Future is astounding... Future is amazing... Future is staggering...

I want to talk with someone at CERN...!!!!

Helllllloooo..... Anybody listening....???????


posted by Kishore at 4:34 AM   |   |
Sunday, March 13, 2005

Monday morning...

Whats up... my presentations at the thursday/friday sessions
Whats on my ears... I want to spend my lifetime loving you (Mask of Zorro)
Whats on my mind... antimatter, CERN, Vittoria Vetra, Angels and Demons, Dan Brown
Whats on my computer... powerpoint, word, winamp, IE
Whats on my IE... CERN, history of antimatter, blog
Whats on my desk... a cuppa Nestle
Whats bugging me... cache loaders, identifiers, expirators, fragment caching
Whats pleasing me... good 3 days still to go for my session
Whats eating me... only 3 days to go

posted by Kishore at 9:14 PM   |   |

Me and my cerebrum

7AM. A fresh morning. The fragrance in the air was elating. I stepped into my office bus and took my usual 3rd left-side seat. I closed my eyes to let the little rubbles of sleep tingling on the sides of my eyes engulf my yet-to-wake-up-completely body. A few moments of singing silent undertones and I was awaken by the jerk of the bus moving. I opened my eyes to realize I was still within planet earth. And with that exhilarating revelation retreated back to my posture.

“Hey Hi”. It seemed like a loud thud very adjacent to my eyes. I startled up from my sleep to shoot that alien flying machine down. It was my long last batchmate (from my training days in Mangalore – 2.5 years ago). “Still sleeping eh?” she pipped taking her seat next to me and I gave out a huge sigh of surprise meeting her after so long. “Yeeeaahhh, long time.. no see...”.

As the bus moved trampling upon the uncared streets puffing every second minute past numerous traffic signals, braving its way through the eternally hazardous Hosur Road on way to my daily abode, we spoke of equally interesting things. The days at Mangalore, her adventures with her project team, how she escaped that rain last summer, that tussle with her boy friend and how she won. And yeah, a wee-bit about me too.

After a stretching bit of chat, delight writ large on our faces and both of us yet to recover from that smile we opened after her “Hey Hi” 40 mins ago, we finally stood up to make our turns out of the bus which was now within the prudent auspices of our office campus. She turned to me and grinned wide, enough for me to count all her teeth at one go and said “Bye Kishore”. I was no less in my energy “Bye mmph..er..brrr..uff..mmpphhh..errr…ehh…mmm”.

I’d forgotten her name! 2.5 years!

posted by Kishore at 7:19 PM   |   |
Friday, March 11, 2005

Life's like that - 3

The world is changing...
People must always be on their toes...
But then, people fall down when they stand on their toes...
(Try it and see for yourself!)

posted by Kishore at 4:17 AM   |   |
Wednesday, March 09, 2005

Aaah... Ouch...

Ohh… Ouch… Aaaahh… Phmm… Am still searching for words to describe my pain. Somebody get me some…

Whenever I used to see those binge brawns undertake a solid toning at the mecca of muscles (popularly known as the Gym) in my office campus, little did I ever think I would finally give in to the temptation of working myself out. And finally it happened. The day was today. For the first ever time in all my guess-my-age years, I dragged myself into the hitherto unseen unknown unexplored unexperienced arena called Working-out-in-a-Gym!

I had CB with me for a moral and physical (just in case) support as I walked into the amphitheatre. I could see those huge dinosaur like tread mills waiting to get a tasty (yuck!) bite. I finally chose one “All right chum, this is your lucky day, you’re gonna be all mine”. CB handed me a dumbbell to keep myself sweating until I could climb the dinosaur. 1-2-3-...-10 and that was that. My biceps got the better of me. My hands were already floating aloof beside my body. An outstanding scene for a 3-D movie.

Finally the dinosaur was there. All mine. I climbed up and felt like a 6 month old child trying to compete with Maurice Greene for the 100mts at the Sydney Olympics. The Gym instructor, a Chinese looking little lady with a French accent saved the blues as she slowed the pace down suitable enough for the 6 month old kiddie. Ga..ga..goo..goo… But the child grew up fast and was atleast able to complete the race, even if not compete!

Then there was the Tyrannosaurus-Rex (whatever it is actually called). Pulling the string forward and backward in ununiform irregegular motion, trying to keep up to my increasing palpitation and the almost breathless breathing. When I did decide to spare the T-Rex, I was feeling worse than a worn out rag. I could realize that my body is composed of some cranky stuff called muscles. One more round, and I could actually have counted them.

A gush of lukewarm bath was the most peaceful relaxation for all the David and Goliath games of the previous hour. Right now, I’m feeling like a new species of homo sapien that rediscovered its way back to the earth, escaping the clutches of the all-brawn-no-brain martians.

May David triumph!

posted by Kishore at 7:00 AM   |   |
Tuesday, March 08, 2005

A question of time

Its only a question of time. Everything around me is just passing. Another extrapolated illusion!
Its only a question of time. World’s just a little stage. I share my part with him and her.
Its only a question of time. This scene soon gives way to the next and I already look to my next player.
Its only a question of time. Companion today is stranger tomorrow and stranger today is companion tomorrow.
Its only a question of time. Passion today is indifference tomorrow, weakness today is strength tomorrow.
Its only a question of time. Love today is angst tomorrow, worry today is glee tomorrow.
Its only a question of time. Leisure today is duty tomorrow, endeavor today is reminiscence tomorrow.
Its only a question of time. Pleasures today is pain tomorrow, tears today is smile tomorrow.
Its only a question of time. Chatters today is reflection tomorrow, exploits today is retrospection tomorrow.
Its only a question of time. Life would keep moving, memories lingering.
Its only a question of time. A hurdle or two, a stutter or two, a stumble or two.. the race would go on.

Its only a question of time. Time is the healer.
Wait! And let Her heal!
I’m waiting…

posted by Kishore at 11:29 PM   |   |
Monday, March 07, 2005

Happy Women’s day

Its women’s day! A day in honor of those noble species that gives meaning to the living. A tribute to the tenacity of the so-called weaker sex.

A gentle sight
that cleansed my eyes
A gracious word
that freshened my lips
A humble thought
that enriched my intellect
A noble deed
that healed my actions

May mother earth be blessed
With more such of your kind!

Happy Women’s day…!!


As I write these lines, I'm listening to the theme from Chariots of fire, probably the noblest piece of music I've ever heard! And I dedicate this to the entire womanhood!

posted by Kishore at 7:05 PM   |   |

The Man.. The Machine...

My computer blew! Well, not literally, but it's as good as blown away. That exquisite piece of technology that runs on my machine fiddling with which makes me earn my livelihood no more works on my machine. I broke into every folder and ran every bit of component I could lay my hands on, but it took late afternoon to realize it was all over. May its soul rest in piece er.. peace.

It’s been such a loyal servant to me all these days and parting it is painful. But, I have to move forward. Technically that translates to formatting my machine and zapping all the stuff. My Winamp, Yahoo, internal IM, RSS Reader, Qucktime. And this also means cloning all the loads of stuff that I have got, including my colossal collection of music. Now, I only hope there is enough space in our server to hold everyone. I couldn’t after all render my children homeless. I took a note of all the RSS feeds, so that I can make a quick work of it tomorrow, when my formatted machine finally gets going.

It’s a stinky redundant work to do all the stuff over again. But it also means, this is all going to result in something new. It means my machine will run faster, better. It means I can manage my junk better. It means having a new picture on my desktop. It means a new screen saver. It means a new customization to my IE may be a google toolbar (but for some reason, I don’t like that thing hanging out of the top of my IE, it looks like a running nose).

A change for the good of it. A new wine in old bottle. And tomorrow will be the d-day!

(and tomorrow, be sure to catch up with the India v Pak cricket test too.)

posted by Kishore at 6:19 AM   |   |
Sunday, March 06, 2005

Sunday evening...

A brutal massacre! Merciless to the core! I was walking down MG Road yesterday evening and that's how I killed time. It was an inevitable bit of shopping I had to do and my chums had gone to native. So that left me alone in the lurch.

I boarded the bus and thoughts began to cramp my brain. I want to talk. I tried calling LS, but her line kept me in waiting. I SMS'ed AV. No reply. Man!! This is Sunday evening and I seriously want to do some talking or I am going mad! With the ill-fated braincramp I reached MG Road. And there I was.. walking all alone amid a crowded road which looked deserted to my cramped eyes and got to do my bit of the shopping thing.

Roaming around haplessly for a while (which was worth a bhel puri and a softee ice cream) I then settled for killing time at Higginbothams and then listening to some strange remix at Planet M. LS called me and that gave a momentary relief to my braincramp. But a couple of minutes of call is no match for all my Sunday evening jabber.

Sunday evening, I could have done nothing better.. but shopping all alone sucks! And killing time is an art!

posted by Kishore at 7:22 PM   |   |
Thursday, March 03, 2005

Life's like that - 2

He and Me over the office IM...

He: As an outsider, what do you think of the human race?
Me: It looks just like me..!!
He: Are you always so stupid or is today a special occasion?
Me: Today is the "make others stupid" day..
He: Don't think, it may sprain your brain!
Me: I'll moov it..
He: I like you. People say I've no taste, but I like you.
Me: Did u lick me?
He: A fool with a tool is still a fool
Me: A genius without tool, is still an infertile.
He: Don't get insulted, but is your job devoted to spreading
ignorance?
Me: Pardon my ignorance, but what is ignorance?

posted by Kishore at 7:18 PM   |   |
Wednesday, March 02, 2005

My Wish Comes True

A beaut of a lyric from Kisna...
    I am looking for a reason
    To smile once again
    Through every changing season
    The pain I can't explain
    I see the magic all around
    Shining down on me
    With you my life would be so right
    If only it could be

    May be this world is a mystery to me
    But if you could be here for eternity

    A moment is all I am searching for
    Just a moment in love with you
    A moment so special so beautiful
    In a moment my wish comes true

Music: AR Rahman
Sung by: Sunitha Sarathy

posted by Kishore at 7:17 PM   |   |

The world loves me

Want to know if the world cares for you? Want to know how many remembered to remember you? Want peace? Want quiet? Want bliss?

Walk into your office early morning before the rest of the mass hurls in, bring in a hot cuppa from the vending machine, sit at your terminal and… check your mails!

Its probably the noblest of all the daily morning rituals. There is nothing in this world more peaceful than a silent early morning office with just a footstep or two tapping beside my ears every now and then, and laying back on my stylish push-back seat with a hot cup of Nescafe from the vending machine spreading out an amazing vapor tickling my smell buds and my fingers double-clicking the ‘Microsoft Outlook’ icon. “Updating inbox…” says the status bar of my Outlook as I open it and gape with my wide open eyes and start watching all my overnight mails pumping in at an extravagant pace, all this accompanied by the blissful exercise of sipping the upper crust off the delicate fluid in my hand.

Look what do I see.. I sure seem to have a lot of admirers all around the world, whom I know nothing about. There are those people with domains that sound like a mix of greekish latin english and love me so much that they provide me ways to enlarge parts of my body to make me look better and offer me unbelievable mortgage and medical discounts, give away the costliest software for nothing and even help me find girls to date. And there are some who just want to let me know they still care even though they have nothing to say, by sending a contentless, subjectless, meaningless mail. And there are also a few mails from those I know.

Meanwhile, my cubicle-mate has just taken his place enacting a morning ritual only slightly different to mine (he sips tea!), and I just walk over to his desk not wanting to miss the “Updating inbox…” phenomenon. Look what do I see.. An almost ditto of my inbox, but for the mails from those known few.

An overwhelming happiness beams upon me as I give out a broad grin. After all, I am not the only privileged victim of Spam!

This post is dedicated to my teammate Chaitanya - the most spammed member of our team!!

posted by Kishore at 4:47 AM   |   |
Tuesday, March 01, 2005

Abroad or perish

Alfred Tennyson once wrote “More things are wrought by prayer…”. With due respects to him, I give a new definition “More things are wrought by lies…”. And its more true, if you are a parent of a guy looking out for a girl for the supposedly holy ritual. More so, if you belonged to a typical South Indian community that I belong.

If I write a book on the kinds of lies that the guy’s house give to impress the prospective girl’s house, the top of my list would be “He’s going abroad soon.” You should be one of those blessed cosmic creatures to actually see how this sparks off a string of light bulbs on the forehead of the prospective girl’s parents. “Oh! Did u hear that! This guy is going abroad. Imagine telling our neighbors and that slimy uncle of yours, that my daughter is settled in the States! Hey make it a 1-up for this boy!”

And if you don’t go abroad, you are just another ol’ swine spending his life marching between the delirious streets of a dusty South Indian suburb, who goes to the Kodaikkanal hills for his honeymoon and wonders how beautiful God’s creation is…

In that far-reaching world, Foreign translates to intelligence. Intelligence in foreign translates to wealth. A wealthy intelligent boy settled in foreign. Who could ever have second thoughts on such a match for their daughter. After all, the neighborhood gossip of their daughter settled in foreign married to a wealthy intelligent boy is more important than the boy being ‘her’ choice of a guy.

As for the boy’s parents, over all the couple of years they were looking for a girl, their son has always been going abroad in a couple of months. When things get to materialize and as they get closer to marriage they pip in, "He is not going because of this marriage stuff coming up". What an unquestionable justification! What a responsible boy! Sacrifices his going abroad for the sake of his would-be wife, though he might always still get to go anytime soon, mind you.

Lies! When would the boy’s parents choose to keep facts straight and simple? And when would the girl’s parents choose to put the daughter’s future ahead of neighborhood gossip?

Having asked that, just as the oracle in The Matrix and the history as we know it would say, not making a choice is also a choice.

posted by Kishore at 3:32 AM   |   |