Why Me?

Being social: Celestial Conversations - #32

2009-09-15T14:00:00.003+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: What the Devil: Celestial Conversations - #31

Me: Hi!
God: Hello.
Me: So, did You have any luck on Twitter?
God: Yes, a few people finally started following me. So they are all now My prophets.
Me: That's great to hear.
God: I think it was Luci's doing. He promised people a seat in the house where a retired colonel lives.
Me: Retired colonel?
God: Yes, he said that My first 1000 followers will have a seat reserved right next to Heaven. There's only one house next to Our place. A retired colonel lives there. Grumpy old man. Not sure why people would be interested in living with him.
Me: Right. Well, Your new prophets must be happy.
God: I have no idea. They mostly won't speak to Me.
Me: Oh?
God: Yes. Instead, one guy wanted to confess to Me. What do I look like? A priest?
Me: So no one is speaking to You?
God: One guy did, but only to tell Me he thought I am a fake.
Me: So what did You do?
God: Damned him to Hell.
Me: Ah. Anyway, about Your prophets, what do You expect them to do?
God: Spread My word, of course!
Me: What word is that?
God: What do you mean by What word?
Me: I mean, if they go out and spread your word, what is it that they should be saying?
God: Whatever they want, as long as it's My word they're spreading.
Me: But You must have a message for the world.
God: What, like SMS?
Me: Not exactly.
God: I don't have a mobile phone. Do you think getting one will help?
Me: No, I don't think it will help. Unless You are interested in getting a lot of credit cards, personal loans or life insurance.
God: Life insurance? For Me?
Me: I think You need to come up with a message that You want Your prophets to spread.
God: But I don't have any message.
Me: Well, come up with one.
God: Like what?
Me: I don't know, something You want people to know.
God: Are you sure?
Me: Yes.
God: So you want Me to tell My prophets to go and tell people things like "There's a sale at Reebok"?
Me: Uh, not exactly.
God: Then?
Me: I can't make up Your messages for You!
God: Why not?
Me: Because then it wouldn't be The Word of God. It would be The Word of Me!
God: Well you're the one who wants Me come up with a message in the first place.
Me: So You don't have any message for the world?
God: No.
Me: And You want Your prophets to spread what?
God: My word.
Me: Okay. I'm glad we got that cleared up.
God: Good. Now I must go and set up a Facebook account.
Me: Right. Facebook has more followers than Buddha.
God: What? I didn't even know Buddha had any followers! I asked him for help setting up a Twitter account, and he said he didn't bother with such futile activity. The liar. I'm going to kill him!
Me: I told You before, it's not that kind of follower.
God: I'm logging off. I have some business to take care of.

What the Devil: Celestial Conversations - #31

2009-09-09T09:00:00.013+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Of Online Identities: Celestial Conversations - #30

Me: Hello?
Devil: Hello.
Me: You!
Devil: Yes, me. The one and only.
Me: What are you doing here? I didn't even say your name this time.
Devil: Don't you know the date today?
Me: What, the 9th of September?
Devil: The 9th day of the 9th month of the 9th year of the millennium. And it's 9'o'clock by the way.
Me: I thought that only worked with 6.
Devil: 9 is just 6 upside down.
Me: So what, you're going to be good today?
Devil: Damn, you're smart. I was hoping no one would realize this.
Me: What, you're actually being good?
Devil: Don't have much of a choice. Mathematics is one area I have no control over.
Me: Really?
Devil: Yeah. But I once hypnotized God into forgetting about the number Seven.
Me: What?
Devil: Yeah. So when he counted, eight came after six. I got Him to count His fingers, and He ended up thinking He suddenly had eleven fingers on His hands! It drove Him crazy!
Me: I'm sure it did. So what good things are you planning to do?
Devil: Well, for one, I'm going to try to get God more followers on Twitter.
Me: Ah! That would be interesting. So what is your strategy going to be?
Devil: Well, for one, we have to beat the skepticism. People don't believe He's God, so they won't follow him. That's actually my fault. Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt. My guys have done a LOT to get that to work. Now, for one day, I need to get around exactly those problems.
Me: So how do you fix the skepticism?
Devil: I tried getting Him a Verified Account.
Me: But isn't that manually screened? You need to convince the guys who run the site, that it actually is God's account.
Devil: Yes, I did figure that out. And yet, I had convinced the guy who was screening this case.
Me: So, what happened?
Devil: Uh, it's embarrassing. Rookie mistake, really. I tried to get him to sell me his soul to me.
Me: Ah.
Devil: You have no idea how big the urge was. And I haven't done that in years! Not with the overcrowding in hell and stuff.
Me: So, no verified account then?
Devil: Nope.
Me: Any other good deeds you intend to spectacularly fail at?
Devil: There are a couple. One is ending poverty. And the other is fixing global warming.
Me: You don't think small, do you?
Devil: Comes with the territory. You don't get known as God's greatest adversary, getting cats stuck in trees.
Me: Right.
Devil: I've done that too, of course.
Me: Cats in trees?
Devil: Yes, cats are inherently evil, so it makes it more fun. Plus, you tie up a bunch of hard-working firefighters in a futile exercise. The cat's going to jump down on its own anyway.
Me: So if you're being good today, what's God doing?
Devil: Trying to be evil.
Me: What?
Devil: Well, God's not very used to the whole Evil thing of course, so I started him off small.
Me: Like what?
Devil: I've asked him to memorize the lyrics to some songs with adult lyrics.
Me: Oh.
Devil: Don't worry. I started him easy. He'll start with Black-Eyed-Peas' "My Humps". He'll probably not even understand what they mean. Then we'll move him on to Lil Kim's "Download", before we get to the heavier stuff.
Me: Ouch.
Devil: Oh, you haven't heard the best part yet. At the end of the day, He's supposed to do a concert of the dirtiest songs in front of everyone in Heaven and Hell!
Me: That does sound evil. Poor Him.
Devil: Oh, it will be a blast.
Me: Well, I guess you have work to do.
Devil: Yes, I better get back to it.
Me: Bye, then.
Devil: Tada!

Next: Being social: Celestial Conversations - #32

Of Online Identities: Celestial Conversations - #30

2009-09-07T08:00:00.005+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Miracles and Failure: Celestial Conversations - XXIX

Me: Hey, God.
God: Hello. You've changed the numbering scheme?
Me: Yes, I thought XXX in the title would attract the wrong kind of search traffic.
God: No traffic is bad traffic, I always say. And I am God, so I know of such things.
Me: So what are You up to?
God: Oh, I've spent the last couple of days on Twitter.
Me: Ah, how come?
God: Well, the first day was spent trying to find a username that wasn't already taken. There are a LOT of impostors there. I tried "God", "GodHimself", "TheRealGod", "IAmGod", "G_O_D", "Gawd" and a few hundred others.
Me: Yes, a lot of people like to speak on Your behalf.
God: One would think that they'd at least ask Me if I approve.
Me: Well Twitterers aren't the only ones saying things on Your behalf without Your approval, You know.
God: What do you mean?
Me: A little something called religion.
God: Oh. That.
Me: Yes. So, did you finally find a username?
God: I almost didn't. Then I had a brainwave.
Me: What?
God: I chose NotDevil.
Me: "NotDevil"? That's your username?
God: You try searching for a username with my name that's not taken. This was the best I could do.
Me: Well, ok. If You say so. But why Twitter?
God: I heard it was a great place to get followers.
Me: I'm not sure they meant that kind of follower.
God: Nonsense. What other kind of follower can there be? In any case, it doesn't work. I've been on this stupid site for a whole day, and no one is following Me.
Me: Ok.
God: I search for Myself in Twitter, and the thing is, a million people are talking to Me, thanking me, or just taking My name, but they are all ignoring me!
Me: Well, they don't really know that you're not an impostor.
God: That's true. For a while there, a couple of hundred poor women signed up as my followers, but they disappeared a little while later.
Me: Couple of hundred poor women? How do you know they were poor?
God: Their pictures proved they couldn't afford any clothes.
Me: Right. So, what have else You been doing on Twitter?
God: I've been replying to people.
Me: Replying?
God: For example, someone said "Thank God." So I replied, "You're welcome."
Me: Ah.
God: One person finally followed Me, so I made him My prophet.
Me: You did?
God: Yes, but it didn't work. He's too lazy. He's not even trying to speak to me. So I made a deal with Luci. He's going to Hell.
Me: Ah.
God: In any case, I must get back to Twitter.
Me: Why?
God: There are a number of people who keep saying I don't exist. I need to have a word with them.
Me: Right. All the best.
God: Thank you. Hey, are you on twitter?
Me: Why?
God: You should follow Me.
Me: Would you look at the time? Gotta go. Bye!

Next: What the Devil: Celestial Conversations - #31

Miracles and Failure: Celestial Conversations - XXIX

2009-06-23T09:00:00.001+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Of Campaigns: Celestial Conversations - XXVIII

Me: Hey God!
God: Hello.
Me: So how did the elections go? Did You win?
God: Don't even ask!
Me: Why, what happened?
God: They disqualified Me!
Me: What?
God: Yes. For demanding votes in the name of religion!
Me: Oh.
God: I told them I was demanding votes in the name of Me. But they didn't listen!
Me: Maybe You should have joined some party. You could have demanded votes in the name of anything then.
God: I tried that. But they all rejected My application.
Me: How come?
God: They said I was too old. My joining would increase the average age of party members.
Me: Ah. So what have You been doing since then?
God: I've been trying to arrange miracles. You know. Build support at the grass-root level.
Me: I thought You said You couldn't do that kind of thing because of the laws of physics.
God: True, but there was no harm in trying.
Me: What sort of miracles?
God: I've been trying to make it rain fish, or at least tadpoles.
Me: Where did You try this?
God: In South India. The fishermen have been having trouble because of all the military presence. But the stupid miracle didn't work.
Me: Was the miracle supposed to be limited to a specific place?
God: Yes, but now that you mention it, I've never been good with geography.
Me: So it could have rained fish in, say, Japan?
God: Possible. But how does that matter?
God: Oh, nothing. Just curious. Anyway, All The Best.
God: Thanks. Bye, then.
Me: Bye.

Next: Of Online Identities: Celestial Conversations - #30

Adopted

2009-04-13T09:00:00.011+05:30

Mom: Hi, Son.
Son: Hey Mom, Hey Dad.
Dad: Son, we wanted to talk to you about something.
Son: Sure, Dad.
Dad: You turn 21 tomorrow.
Son: Yes! My friends and I have a great day planned.
Dad: That's great. See, we thought this is a good opportunity to tell you the truth about something.
Son: Oh, okay. What is it?
Dad: You know how we told you that you were adopted?
Son: Yes, of course. I'm really glad that you let me know right from the beginning. It could have been quite stressful if I'd found out late."
Dad: Yes, it's about that -
Son: What, you know who my biological parents are?
Dad: Actually, the thing is, when we told you that you were adopted, we weren't telling the complete truth.
Son: What? I don't understand.
Mom: See, you're not really adopted.
Son: What? I don't get it. Why are you saying this?
Dad: We thought you're old enough to understand now.
Son: No, I mean... I don't understand. How can I not be adopted?
Dad: That's easy, son. Your mom really is your biological mother.
Son: No! I mean... If I was not adopted, then why would you tell me I was?
Dad: Oh, your mother always wanted to adopt.
Son: Hunh?
Mom: Yes, we had even got in touch with an adoption agency. And then we found out that I was pregnant.
Son: But...
Mom: It was a tough time for us, son. So we decided to pretend that we'd adopted you. And suddenly everything was perfect.
Son: Perfect?
Dad: Yes. And now that you're old enough, we thought it was important that you know the truth.
Son: I'm really not adopted?
Dad: No, son. You're not.
Son: But...
Mom: It's okay, son. We love you just the same.
Son: But this doesn't make any sense!
Dad: It's really very simple, Son. We are really your biological parents.
Son: But -
Dad: Now enough chit-chat. You've got a busy day tomorrow. So get into bed and get a good night's sleep. Good night.
Mom: Good night, dear. We love you.

Of Campaigns: Celestial Conversations - XXVIII

2009-04-09T16:40:00.002+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Gender Questions: Celestial Conversations - XXVII

Me: Hello?
God: Hello.
Me: Hi God! How have You been doing?
God: Fine, I guess. Been a little busy lately. Lots of things going on.
Me: Like what?
God: Well, for one thing, there was this Pink Underwear Campaign recently.
Me: What, You helped organize it?!
God: Oh, no! Not at all. But some of Us in Heaven contributed.
Me: Wow, like who?
God: Oh, Mother Teresa, Florence Nightingale, Gandhi, St Peter, Aishwarya Rai...
Me: Aishwarya Rai? But she's not dead yet!
God: Oh, she was just visiting.
Me: So she knows about You?
God: Of course not. We pretended to be an old age home.
Me: But didn't she recognize anyone?
God: Not really. She thought we were having a fancy dress party.
Me: Ah.
God: Yes.
Me: So, she and the others contributed pink underwear to the campaign?
God: Pink and other colors. Gandhi contributed two in fluorescent green.
Me: Fluorescent green?
God: Yes. He got them in the '90s. But the biggest contribution was from Florence Nightingale.
Me: Really?
God: Yes. Forty three thousand eight hundred and seventy nine pairs of underwear in all shades of pink, and *a-hem* all kinds of styles. It was like a museum of lingerie in the twentieth century. The sight was enough to make even Me blush.
Me: Where'd she get so many?
God: They were all her own. She gave up doing her laundry when she died. She just gets new ones every time. And she hates throwing anything away.
Me: Oh.
God: Yes. It took days to get the stuff packed, and putting the stamps on was a torture. After it was all over, the girls went out and got drunk at a local pub, and the guys stayed in and played Monopoly.
Me: Right.
God: But the thing that's been keeping Me busiest recently is the elections.
Me: The elections? Are You in India now?
God: Yes. I thought I'd try to get elected.
Me: You're getting into politics?!
God: Yes. The competition are all corrupt. I think I have a good chance.
Me: Well, all the best!
God: Thanks. I'll sign off now. I need to work on my manifesto.
Me: Bye then.
God: Bye.

Next: Miracles and Failure: Celestial Conversations - XXIX

The Geek In Me

2009-04-07T13:20:00.004+05:30

I'm making yet another attempt to climb back on to the social bandwagon, and this time it's by rejuvenating my technology oriented blog. So if you are interested in geeky stuff, you might want to head to Geek Whorled. I intend to write there about programming (Java, OpenGL, GTK, Python, etc), gadgets that interest me or that I own (including doing product reviews), Linux, and anything that I feel is too geeky for this blog.

If I can keep the tempo up, I also hope to post more on this blog as a side-effect.

The Power Of The Pink Chaddi

2009-02-12T13:25:00.000+05:30

The Pink Chaddi Campaign is probably the most amazing use of humour (and love, supposedly) that I have ever seen. The Alternative Law Forum, under the guise of the "Consortium of Pubgoing, Loose and Forward Women", have come up with the unique idea of sending thousands of 'pink chaddis' (though they later clarified that they no longer 'colour-discriminate') to Pramod Muthalik, the infamous perpetrator of supposedly Indian culture-prescribed violence against women in a pub in Mangalore. The one statement from the man that really stood out for me was

If they had to oppose something, they could have talked it out with us.

Apparently, he thinks indulging in violence is acceptable, but in a non-violent campaign is not.

In any case, the support for the campaign has been so great that they collected more than 19,000 'chaddis' within a week, and started requesting people to send their packages directly.

I think with a little more organization and some sponsorship (like maybe from Kohinoor, Archies/Hallmark and VIP/Jockey), this could become the standard response to any party or group that indulges in activities that "don't reflect Indian culture".

What say?

My City Is Under Attack

2008-11-27T17:15:00.000+05:30

As I write this, it's been more than 18 hours since the first of the terror strikes was reported in South Mumbai. The news channels won't report anything else, some of the presenters have been awake all night reporting on events as they emerge, and it seems to me like the whole city must be glued to their television sets waiting for all this to end.

I slept at around 2:00am last night, refusing to continue watching the news, expecting that things would be more or less resolved by the time I woke up. Even the news of top cops losing their lives, only made me believe that everything that needed to be done was being done. I resolved to not let the terror get to me, as that seemed like conceding defeat to the terrorists. And yet, I woke at 7:30am (an event in itself), and without bothering to brush my teeth, walked into the living room and turned the TV on.

If I were to track my mood since then, I'd say that I started the day simply assimilating all the information that all the different news channels beamed at me, still hopeful that things would end 'soon'. Seeing the Taj Mahal Hotel burning, was the first shock. The second shock was when I heard that the college classmate of an acquaintance died in the firing at Cafe Leopold. It always makes more of an impact when you feel you are connected to someone who was affected. It could so easily have been you.

Then there were the photographs of the terrorists themselves. They could easily pass off as visitors of the hotels and restaurants they have terrorized, if not for the weapons they carried.

A doctor from inside the Taj call up a news channel and said she was in a group of around 35 people, and that there was one person whom she was trying to take care of, who had been shot in the abdomen, and had been bleeding all night. She was speaking very calmly and tried to highlight the fact that the man urgently needed medical attention. In a second call from her a while later, she seemed extremely distraught. This while some people seemed to be leaving the Taj and were carried away in ambulances and BEST buses. The news presenters are tired and desperate for good news. Every assault by the army is termed the "final leg of the assault on the terrorists".

My father then told me that his cousin apparently visited Cafe Leopold almost every Wednesday, last night being an exception. She and her mother who lives in a building close to Nariman House are both safe.

Hours went by, and very little seemed to change. The hope I initially had, was replaced with fear, fear turned to sorrow, and sorrow turned to despair. Stop attacking my city, a part of me screams. End this insanity now.

And I'm dozens of kilometers away from where the main action is still on. Even 3-4 kilometers away from the Marriot in Juhu - the closest place to here where firing took place. This is the first time that I'm actually in Mumbai when terror has stuck here. All the other times, I was either in Chennai or in the US. And yet, a terror attack that has lasted for so long, can hardly compare with bomb blasts that are over in a short span of time. There is going to be a difference in the psychological impact of events that last an hour, versus events that last a whole day.

I thank all the soldiers, firemen and police personnel that have been involved in trying to end this stand-off, and hope that it all gets over soon.

Ubuntu On My Desktop

2008-10-27T18:15:00.003+05:30

I've been using Ubuntu Hardy Heron Desktop Linux (8.04) since April, when I got myself a new desktop PC. There was no way I was going to inflict Vista on my new hardware, and I'd really liked the ease of using Ubuntu Server Edition the one year before that, at work. The configuration of my custom-built PC is -

My choice of an ATI-based graphics card was based on the fact that ATI seems to be a lot more dedicated to developing open-source drivers than nVidia. They've released their GPU specs, which means anyone can write their own drivers without hacking or reverse-engineering the proprietary binaries, and without worrying that their driver will stop working with the next batch of the chip because some behaviour changed. This means that while currently nVidia has the best support, the future will favour ATI. It was definitely a gamble, but picking a manufacturer that supports Open Source, felt right.

Installing Ubuntu is a breeze. I had downloaded the ISO for the 64-bit version, from the Ubuntu site and burnt it a CD. I booted off this CD, and except for selecting the language, timezone, and partition sizes (which I like to customize), just sat back and watched Ubuntu install itself - in under 20 minutes. And at the end of the installation, I had everything - display, sound, internet, music and video players, cd-burning tools, internet tools, a BitTorrent client, Office software, and even games (including Sudoku). When I tried to install Windows XP on the same machine in dual-boot mode, just getting the OS installed took more than 40 minutes. Then I had to install the motherboard drivers, the display drivers, and the monitor drivers. I only wanted XP to play my copy of Need for Speed Underground 2, but if I had wanted to use XP for normal purposes, I would have spent the next few hours installing Norton 360, MS Office, and some internet tools. Talk about a waste of time!

The only things I changed after installing Ubuntu, were

Used 'Restricted' (meaning closed-source) drivers from ATI, which work a lot better than the open-source ones at this time
Installed the msttcorefonts package, which contains some Microsoft developed true-type fonts, including the ubiquitous Verdana
Turned on Desktop Effects (Compiz Fusion)
Installed the compizconfig-settings-manager package to customize the Compiz settings to my liking

The fonts and drivers are not installed by default, for legal reasons. Closed-source drivers and fonts must be selected by the user specifically. Compiz Fusion - a compositing window manager that makes Vista's Aero obsolete - is still not as stable on large number of machines, and won't work on many embedded graphics card so for simplicity, it's turned off until you specifically turn it on. See this Compiz Fusion demo and find out why Linux users are so thrilled. And before you ask - No, you can't get this working on Windows.

I'm a complete geek, but one thing I noticed about Ubuntu is the fact that - as advertised - it just works. It'll be a lot easier for you to teach your grandparents to use Ubuntu, than to use Vista. Desktop Linux is definitely here to stay.

The latest version of Ubuntu - Intrepid Ibex (8.10) - will be out in 3 days. So head to the Ubuntu site and try it for yourself.

Note: Here are some good articles if you've never setup a dual-boot system before -
How to dual-boot Vista with Linux (Vista installed first) -- the step-by-step guide with screenshots
How to dual boot Windows XP and Linux (XP installed first) -- the step-by-step guide with screenshots

A Country Of Contrasts

2008-10-23T19:15:00.001+05:30

An 80-year-old political leader and some others are killed in Orissa by a group of suspected Maoist insurgents. Political parties blame the murders on a religious community. Religious violence breaks out, and many people die. Others are forcefully converted and humiliated. The state government looks the other way, for the most part.

In a different state, a young political leader forms his own party. In his greed for votes, he incites violence against people of other communities, in the name of protecting what he calls sons-of-the-soil. Many people (including sons-of-the-soil) are hurt, a few die, and there is fear and tension all around. This government looks the other way too.

Terrorists cross the border from other countries, and find the general public dissatisfied with a lot of things, and easy to divide on religious or other grounds. There are 'terrorist' attacks all over the country.

News channels monger fear and panic, using everything from ghosts under trees, to particle accelerators, to rumors about terrorist attacks, to the ineffectiveness of the government's security measures in preventing said terrorist attacks, to the fall of the stock market. They try to divide people along lines of 'people vs the government', 'people vs foreign investors', and even 'people vs science'.

In the middle of all this, a group of scientists of different castes, from different states, and following different religions, manages to launch a mission to the moon.

We seem to be a country of contrasts. Easily divided, easily provoked, easily offended, easily scared. And yet, when some of us put our minds to it, we can accomplish so much. Even the moon doesn't seem so far.

To think of what we could accomplish if everyone stopped trying to divide us, and worked on unity instead...

Chandrayaan-1: We Have Lift-off!

2008-10-22T21:15:00.001+05:30

At 6:22am Indian Standard Time today, India's first unmanned mission to the moon successfully took off from India's satellite launch centre in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, 80km from Chennai.

The success of this mission, which will attain lunar orbit 15 days from now, will bring no little pride to our country. And yet there are people who question the very basis of the mission. "Do we really need it?" they ask. And the reasons they give for why this mission is a waste of time and money?

The money (386 crore) could have been better spent feeding the country's poor.

and

Other countries have already gone to the moon. What new can we learn?

D-uh.

First of all, this is an advancement of the country's technological prowess. As Dr K. Kasturirangan, chairperson of ISRO said when the Chandrayaan-I project was announced

It is not a question of whether we can afford it, it's whether we can afford to ignore it.

In dollar terms, the mission has cost India only US$80 Million. That's pocket-change when compared to NASA's Billion dollar space-probe budgets. And the returns will be great.

Antrix, the Indian Department of Space's commercial arm, earns valuable foreign exchange every year, by launching satellites for other countries, selling data captured by its satellites, and also selling hardware and software. This lunar mission will not only strengthen India's position in the commercial satellite launch sector, but will also give India more experience in the various aspects of space travel.

A mission to the moon - accomplished by only five other countries till date - will put India in the elite group of space-faring countries. So when humans do start visiting or living in space, India will not be waiting in line to be piggy-backed there. We'll be able to get to space on our own. And we'll probably be giving other countries a ride just like we did this time.

And as far as the question "What is there to learn?" goes, there's always something to learn. This particular mission hopes to capture the following information:

Map a 3-d atlas of the moon with a spatial and altitude resolution of 5-10 metres.
Get information about the distribution of various minerals on the moon

Apart from this, we also hope to get information on Helium-3 deposits, which will be useful for nuclear fusion research, and may be one of the answers to our energy problems.
Additionally, today's successful launch seems to have already cleared the hurdles towards government funding of our ~~man~~ person on the moon plans. There were earlier reports that the government was rethinking that mission because of the high cost.

All the attention that ISRO get out of all these missions might also help some of the brain-drain of scientists from India. I mean as of today, how many people you know actually want to become scientists working for the government? The idea of possibly working for something as glorious as your country's space program, can pretty motivating.

Of course, today's only been Stage 1, the easiest of all stages. India has been sending satellites into space for a long time now, and is so good at it makes money out of the exercise. The next couple of weeks will be really interesting, and will be the true test of Indian capability.

I'm not much of a believer but I think I'll have a chat with my friend just in case.

Update: DesiCritics.org has two good posts on the benefit of the mission - here and here.

Proper Nouns And Pronounce

2008-10-21T11:15:00.001+05:30

Here I am, breaking my year and half long self-imposed Maun Vrat (Oath of silence?), to do what I love doing more than anything else.

Complain.

Some things never change, eh?

A friend of mine, often pronounces certain words ~~wrongly~~ differently from what I consider the correct pronunciation, and refuses to correct herself when I point this out, because she says

You can pronounce proper nouns however you want.

A-hem. No, no, not that one! I mean like the sound you make when clearing your throat. Of course, that's more like Ghhmhhmghm, but I digress.

So, where was I? Right.

A-hem. No, you cannot pronounce proper nouns however you want!

Take the case of a name, like 'Rajesh' (that's my name, in case you were wondering). My name has a specific pronunciation, and pronouncing it "Rahash" - "j" is pronounced "h" in spanish/latin/mexican - would be wrong.
Similarly, it is not okay to pronounce the Indian name Dhillon, as "Dhee-yo-n", even if Quesadilla is pronounced as "Ke-sa-dee-ya". "Amit" is "A-mih-t", and cannot be pronounced "A-mite" or "Aim-it". "Iraq" if pronounced "Eye-Rack", is being pronounced wrong, even if it's being pronounced by the President of the United States of America!

Names derived from new additions to the English language are all the more problematic, since you often see the words in print long before you actually hear them. The "Wiki" in Wikipedia, is pronounced "Wih-key", not "Why-key". (On a related note, if you do decide to use the term "LOL" in real speech, then it's pronounced "Ell-oh-Ell", not "Lole"! Of course, I would recommend actually laughing instead.)

A proper noun is a name, and mangling someone's or something's name is not polite - to say the least.

So, the next time any of you decide to change the pronunciation of any so-called "Proper Noun", do consider taking the permission of the owner of that name.

The Vision

2007-03-19T10:10:00.001+05:30

He woke up screaming.

He'd had a vision, and somehow he was sure that it would come true. The world was going to end. In less than three hours.

He had to tell someone. They had to try to stop it. He ran out into the street, and tried to grab the arm of someone who was passing by. But his arms refused to react. He tried to shout, but no voice came from his throat. He tried to write on the ground with a piece of chalk, but his arms wouldn't move. It was as if the universe didn't want him to interfere. He walked around the town trying to talk to people, to warn them. They stared at him, but never reacted, never interrupted what they were doing.

Time passed, but he couldn't seem to do anything to prevent the doom that he was certain was coming. Every minute, he grew more desperate.

He came to an open space where a crowd had gathered. A man was holding a gun to another, and shouting something about avenging the death of a loved one.

He wanted to jump in the middle of the crowd and make them listen. The world was going to end! Couldn't they feel it? But he couldn't even move anymore. He could only watch. He watched like everyone else, as the man with the gun shouted. He watched as he pulled the trigger. He watched as the bullet struck, and the victim fell to the ground. He was sure, like he knew everyone else in the crowd was sure, that the man deserved it.

The world started to grow dark. This was it, he knew. And he'd been unable to stop it. It was noon, but the sky had turned gray. Even the sun seemed no brighter than a dim lamp. It wasn't just becoming dark, he realized. The world was turning black. All the colors were fading away into nothingness. And just like in his vision, the message appeared in the sky. Glowing white letters on black. In a language known to no one. Two words that meant the end of the world, the end of life, the end of everything.

"Okay," I said, shaking him by the shoulder. "You can get up now. It's over."

"Hmm?"

I pointed at the screen, which now said The End in large bold letters.

"Oh. Good. Hope you enjoyed it.

"It was nice. You should have watched."

"What's to watch? If the bad guy kills the good guy's girlfriend in the beginning of the movie, then in the end, the good guy must kill the bad guy. In between, you throw in a few songs, some fight scenes, and you have a three hour Hindi movie."

"Okay, so it was predictable. But it was still a nice movie. They made it pretty well. And there was some good acting."

"If you say so."

"You know towards the end, in the crowd surrounding the good guy and the bad guy, there was this man..."

"What about him?"

"I don't know. He didn't seem part of the movie. It was almost as if... as if he was more real than the other characters."

"More real? Like he was about to jump out of the screen?"

I grinned even though that's exactly what I'd thought. Hearing the words said out loud made the idea seem absurd. "Nah," I replied. "He was probably an extra who was trying to get noticed."

On the screen, the The End sign slowly faded away.

New Look: Ice Mountain

2007-03-01T00:10:00.000+05:30

As you might have noticed, I've made another update to the template of this blog. This is my fifth Blogger template, the third one for the new Blogger, and the third update on this blog. The image in the background is that of a glacier in Greenland. I got it from Wikimedia Commons. Image manipulation was done using The GIMP as usual.

One of the other templates I created, works on the new Blogger and can be downloaded for free, at City in Paint. It's based on an OSWD design, though I made some minor modifications to the look, and some major modifications to the HTML to get it to work with Blogger.

I'll be offering this one for download too, once I complete a few finishing touches.

Do let me know what you think about the new look. I'm hoping the (mostly) white background and the bigger text makes it easier on your eyes. The blog should look okay on Firefox, Opera, and IE 6 and 7. If you're among the less than 1% of readers who use a version of IE older than 6, then you might see some weird JavaScript errors. But those are from Blogger, and I can't really do much about them. Of course, if you are still using that ancient browser, you should really consider getting Firefox.

Bad Solution (55)

2007-02-23T09:15:00.000+05:30

It was a big asteroid. "Ten percent chance of hitting Earth," they said. "Expected angle of impact is enough to wipe out a country."

"We'll use Nuclear weapons!"

They aimed. They fired. They miscalculated.

The asteroid deflected in the wrong direction, hit Earth head-on, and wiped out all life. Except the cockroaches, of course.

Animal Rights or Science?

2007-02-21T12:30:00.000+05:30

Is it acceptable to take animal life or cause harm or pain to an animal, in the interests of science?

This isn't a new question, and it's not one that both sides are going to agree on in the near future, if ever. Me, I'm all for science. But I'm not happy with animal rights being violated either. (For the record, I eat meat but don't think I'm a hypocrite for being against fur.)

Still, how can you make a decision?

Take for example this story. Scientists are apparently trying to figure out how some animals grow back body parts, so that the same technique can be used with humans. If they figure this out, there's no end to the benefits for medicine. 50,000 people lose a body part to amputation every year in the US alone. If scientists can make the technology work, all these people could have their fingers, hands, arms, and legs back in a matter of weeks or months.

So that's a good thing, right?

Not for the animals that have the regenerative abilities.

Take for example Salamanders. These animals can apparently grow back an arm if it gets severed. How often must scientists make cuts in a salamander's body to find out what chemicals, enzymes or glands are involved in the regrowth? How often does someone cut off a Salamander's body part to observe what happens?

Scientists have got far enough to grow extra arms on salamanders. Does the salamander feel any pain when it is cut, or when it has an extra arm coming out of where there should only be a simple rib? Unless the researchers are extremely careful with anesthetics, there's probably a lot of pain involved for the poor creature. Does the salamander know about the value of the sacrifice it is making? Surely not.

A hundred years from now, the number of people who will have benefited from regenerative technologies will probably be close to one billion. There will still be those who demand that researchers stop testing revolutionary medicine on animals. They will still be right. But so will the scientists.

V-Day or D-Day?

2007-02-15T11:35:00.000+05:30

He walks like a king through his house. He is master of his domain. He can eat what he wants, drink what he wants, and he can turn on the television and watch whatever he wants. He smiles to himself.

"By the power of Grayskull!" he shouts. "I... Have... The Power!"

He hears the car in the driveway. His wife is back from shopping. He sighs.

It was nice while it lasted.

We may be called the stronger sex, but really, if there is anything a man is scared of, it's his woman. And if he's not, then he's just ignorant. I'm not kidding.

Men don't understand women. Men don't understand what women want. And men can't live without women. It's a recipe for disaster, I tell you.

And to ensure that men continue to fear women till the end of eternity, there is this annual ritual they've come up with. It's the most evil of all rituals, and has its origins in medieval times.

It's called Valentine's day.

You're laughing.

Tell me, irrespective of whether he's single or not, which man has it easy on Valentine's day?

On Valentine's day, a single guy has to tell some girl that he's interested in her. If he doesn't, then he will be pitied. And the male ego doesn't deal very well with pity. If he does decide to make his feelings known, his fear is that she will say "No". Which is what usually happens, of course. However there is sometimes the unfortunate case where the girl says "Yes".

If a guy is not single on Valentine's day, though, then he's in really big trouble, because he has to do something on the special day.

For two weeks before the fourteenth of February every year, the media is full of advertisements for Valentine's Special gifts and experiences. A guy may decide that he's not going to give in to the intense commercialization of the day, and he's not actually going to get her anything. If you know such a man, pray for him.

If he does decide to get something though, he has to figure out what to get her.
If he gets her a bouquet of roses, she's angry because that woman at work whom she hates, got two from her boyfriend.
If he gets her a box of chocolates, he's in trouble, because her friend got chocolates and flowers.
If he gets her chocolates and flowers, he's cheap, because a girl she knows also got a watch. And a stuffed toy.
If he gets her multiple gifts, he doesn't really love her, because he can't take the time to take her out.
If he takes her out to a restaurant, he should have taken her out to a restaurant in a five-star hotel.
If he takes her out to a restaurant in a five-star hotel, he should have taken her to a resort outside city limits.
To actually survive Valentine's day, the guy must pick his woman up from work, fly her to Europe, have dinner on the beach with a live band playing, and give her a diamond ring.

But then the guy is done for. Because next year, he'll have to top even that. And unless flights to the moon are available, he'll hear the words "You've changed."

KGAF Winners Announced

2007-02-13T10:40:00.000+05:30

The winners of the Kala Ghoda Art Festival literature contests were announced over the weekend. I never submitted anything because the one idea I had, didn't sound interesting enough by the time I wrote half of it. (Actually it was supposed to be five different ideas but I could only think up the first two, and I only wrote half of the first one)

The scores, finalists and winners of the various contests can be found at the following links:

Flash Fiction - Scores, Finalists, Winners

Graphic Flash - Scores, Finalists, Winners

SMS Poetry - Scores, Finalists, Winners

Poetry Slam - Scores, Finalists. (See announcement for winners)

So do head there and take a look.

I'm not too much of a poetry buff but I really liked the SMS Poetry first prize winner.

Among the Graphic Flash entries my favourite was entry # 335 (which tied for second place) followed by 461 (which ended up first).

I've only read the Flash Fiction finalists, and my favourites among them were 168, 239, 243, and 323. None of them won, though. So if you liked a story that didn't make it to the finals, do leave a comment here.

Making Money is Hard Work

2007-02-12T12:00:00.000+05:30

There are a number of people out there who have quit their day jobs to maintain their web-sites full-time. This includes bloggers, like Jason Kottke of kottke.org, Matthew Pullerits of CyberWyre, Amit Agarwal of Digital Inspiration and popular web-comic writer Howard Tayler of Schlock Mercenary.

If someone with the security of a permanent job decides to quit, how do they expect to earn enough? Well, common sources of revenue include advertising, referrals, merchandising and in some cases from donations by fans. Of course, to be able to convert blogging into a full-time career, you need to be popular. And if you intend to depend on advertising or referrals to make money, the design of your page is very important. Amit Agarwal has a number of articles which show you how to optimize a blog for advertising, using real blogs as examples.

Blogging for a living sounds like such a nice job. No commutation, working from home, and no boss!

Well, it's not that easy. If you work for yourself, you do your own taxes, don't have health benefits, and taking a vacation directly impacts your income! And blogging isn't really an easy job. As Amit Agarwal mentioned recently, he spends 10-12 hours a day on his blog. And if you take into account the fact that he blogs 7 days a week, that works out to between 70 and 84 hours a week! That's as much as I spend in my job during the most hectic of projects!

Like I said - making money seems to be a lot of hard work. So it's back to searching for that dream alternative career for me. The one where I work maybe an hour a day and still earn enough to retire at 40.

Loony tunes

2007-02-07T11:45:00.000+05:30

Kusum Rohra has sifted through and collected around fifty of the funniest posts in the blogosphere in the second edition of the annual Loony Mela. So do head to her blog and check them out.

Yes, it will probably take a while to read all of them. Just imagine how much time must have gone into the selection process!

Gender Questions: Celestial Conversations - XXVII

2007-02-06T09:25:00.001+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Merry Christmas: Celestial Conversations - XXVI

Me: Hi!
God: Hello.
Me: You busy?
God: No, I'm relaxing today. Just finished painting my nails.
Me: Painting your nails?
God: Yes. Why, is there a problem?
Me: Not really, but polishing nails just seems like a girly thing to do.
God: So?
Me: You're a guy!
God: Whatever gave you that idea?
Me: What?
God: I'm one hundred percent female.
Me: Really?
God: Why is that coming as a surprise?
Me: Well, most major religions believe You are male.
God: Is that true?
Me: I'm pretty sure it is.
God: Well that will just not do! Why should religions make any guesses about my gender at all? I'm going to see if something can be done about this.

[God has logged out]

Grievance room in Heaven:
Little Girl: God?
God: Yes?
Little Girl: Most major religions think I'm male! (starts crying)
God: What? Whatever gave you that idea?
Little Girl: A man told me while I was chatting on the internet.
God: Were you logged in as Me again?
Little Girl: (nods between sobs)
God: (thinking to himself) Why don't people get their own logins? (to the girl) That's okay. I'm sure the man didn't know what he was talking about.

Next: Of Campaigns: Celestial Conversations - XXVIII

Freedom, If...

2007-02-02T10:40:00.000+05:30

Amit Varma writes that there's a new newspaper out. It's called Mint and the bit he loves about it, is

finally, India has a newspaper that explicitly supports the values of freedom, in all its forms, that I hold so dear.

And this newspaper that "explicitly supports the values of freedom", gives you "free" access to all content on its website, as long as you give up the following information

Your first name
Your last name
Email address
Gender
Country
City
Year of Birth
Educational Background
Occupation
Whether you "currently subscribe to print newspaper" (Whatever that means)

In addition to this, it also requests you for your

Mobile Number
Industry
Household Income Range

The reason they ask for all this information is

Registering with us signifies your complete agreement with our terms and conditions. [Emphasis mine]

These terms and conditions, or terms of use, never actually show up during the registration process, by the way.

The "Registration-required" debate, when it comes to news sites, has been going on for years now. As Adrian Holovaty says in a post on the subject , the news sites seem to be saying

The benefit of registration is that you get the content.

One of the articles that Amit's linked, is titled "What you can expect from Mint." You need to register to read that article too, of course.
So in the case of Mint, the benefit of registration is that you get to find out what kind of content you can expect.

For a website that Google doesn't even know about yet (screenshot for the sake of posterity), I think they're approaching this the wrong way.

So basically, if ever I decide that I really want to read something they have there, I'm going to use Bugmenot. Otherwise I'll probably Google for the info and get it from somewhere else.

Borat and Tourism

2007-02-01T09:20:00.000+05:30

This is why I should blog about my opinions on stuff.

When I learnt that the Kazakhstan government was protesting against Sacha Baron Cohen's depiction of Kazakhstan in the movie Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, I thought they were ignoring the potential of making it the tourism campaign of the century.

What I felt they should have done, was build a fake village on the outskirts of Astana their capital, and call it "Home of Borat" or something. A tour would then take people through this fake village as well as actual tourist-worthy locations.

It's all worked out well, though. Borat has triggered a tourism boom in Kazakhstan. And realising the benefits, their government is now changing its stance. A popular Kazakh newspaper has dubbed the movie "The best film of the year"!

Well if they do implement my idea, I want royalties.

Googlebomb Defused

2007-01-30T05:50:00.000+05:30

Until a few days ago, if you'd Googled for "failure" or "miserable failure", the first result you got would have been the US president's page on the White House website. This was accomplished by a technique called Googlebombing, and was acknowledged by Google as being a vulnerability in their search system. They also did not manually filter these results out in the interest of maintaining the objectivity of their search service.

A few days ago though, Google put in place a change that gets around Googlebombing.

By improving our analysis of the link structure of the web, Google has begun minimizing the impact of many Googlebombs

Searching for a Googlebombed term now gets you information about Googlebombing instead. Read this post on the Google Webmaster Central Blog for more details.

Happy Republic Day

2007-01-27T10:25:00.000+05:30

Hope you all did something nice today. The only thing I did, was forget that it was my aunt's birthday.

I came across an interesting post from the Telegraph, by a Briton who lives in India, about the difference between the ways India, the US and UK each handle terrorism. Irrespective of whether you agree with the article about whether India's position on terrorism is by design, it should make at least make you think, "Yeah, that's my India".

A quote from the piece -

To my mind, however, the single biggest thing Britain and America could learn from India about terrorism is to be considerably more resilient and defiant about it.

When the bombers strike Bombay or New Delhi or Varanasi - as they have with devastating effect in the last 18 months, killing nearly 300 people - India doesn't flinch.

Jai Hind.

KGAF 2007 - Contests

2007-01-25T23:00:00.000+05:30

Once more an entire month has gone by without new posts on this blog. To those of you who still read this blog, I apologize for the delay. I'd blame it on lack of time and writer's block, but that won't really make up for the lack of posts, will it?
Anyway. On with the post.

The Kala Ghoda Arts Festival is back this year, and Caferati is hosting some contests again, just like last time. I hope to participate in the Flash Fiction contest this year too, though I don't really have any realistic expectation of winning, or even making the shortlist. I want to write at least one story, if not two, if for no other reason than to have something to post on this blog.

The Graphic Flash (flash fiction in a graphic format) and Poetry Slam contests both sound really interesting. Do check them out.

And if you're cell-phone happy, you might want to try SMS Poetry.

The deadline for all the contests, is Feb 4 2007, so get off that block right now. (And if you do, let me know how you did it!)

Merry Christmas: Celestial Conversations - XXVI

2006-12-26T08:30:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Till Debt Do Us Part: Celestial Conversations - XXV

God: Hello?
Me: Hi!
God: Hello.
Me: It's been so long since we chatted!
God: Yes, I've been busy.
Me: Busy?
God: Yes, I've been doing two jobs.
Me: Two jobs?
God: Yes. Luci went on a long vacation and asked Me to take care of stuff at Hell while he was away.
Me: Oh. Until when do you have to do this?
God: Until Hell freezes over.
Me: What?! But that's never going to happen!
God: Of course it is. It'll only be another couple of weeks at the most.
Me: Really?
God: Yes. Luci hasn't paid the heating bills in years.
Me: Oh. Well how has it been, doing two jobs?
God: Oh being in charge of Hell is no big deal. All the chaps there are pretty well-behaved. It's the commute that's killing me.
Me: Really? How far do you need to travel?
God: Half around the world, at one time. Then I decided to move Heaven to Texas.
Me: Oh. Where's Hell?
God: Manhattan.
Me: What?! How can The Devil afford the rent?
God: Simple. He doesn't pay the rent. As The Devil, he can get away with it.
Me: Right. So what did you do for Christmas?
God: Oh, We gave Jesus a surprise party.
Me: Really?
God: Yeah. The guys over in Hell came up with the idea.
Me: Where was the party?
God: Hell's Kitchen.
Me: Makes sense. But you do know that Jesus wasn't actually born on Christmas day, don't you?
God: He wasn't?
Me: No. No one actually remembers when Jesus was really born. Some people think He was born in the summer.
God: Oh. Well, would you mind not mentioning that to him?
Me: Okay. But why?
God: Would you be thrilled to know that no one in the world could remember your birthday?
Me: I guess not. Well Merry Christmas to You, in any case.
God: Yes. And a Happy New Year.

Next: Gender Questions: Celestial Conversations - XXVII

Inexperienced: Two Months Later

2006-12-02T09:55:00.000+05:30

Intro: Inexperienced
Previous: So Close, Yet So Far

(Episode 6. This is the final episode in a series about a couple that get married without the benefit of sex education. The nature of the series causes it to be a little explicit, even if this particular episode isn't, so if you're easily offended, you might want to read something else.)

Two months later, at a hospital.
"So, what did the doctor say?"
"I'm pregnant."
"What?!"
"Yes."
"Oh."

(silence)

"So we really have been doing it right."
"Apparently."
"Hmmm."
"You know that friend of yours?"
"The one I finally asked what goes where, you mean?"
"Yes."
"What about him?"
"Could you beat him up for me?"
"But why?! He helped! We should be thanking him!"
"I don't think so. If he really wanted to help, he would have told us about contraception."

Since this is World AIDS Day, here's some important information. So protect yourself, will you?

Insane Call-Center Conversation

2006-10-12T09:45:00.000+05:30

This is an actual conversation I had with someone they told me was a "Tech Support" person at Cingular, which is my cellphone service provider. And this was after I'd spent around 30 minutes on the phone with "Customer Care" and they decided they'd transfer me to someone who was "more equipped" to help me.

Support: Hi, and how may I help you today?
Me: Well, I'm calling because as of last Thursday, I've stopped receiving text messages from India.
S: You've started receiving text messages?
Me: No, I've stopped receiving text messages from India.
S: Okay, you've stopped receiving messages.
Me: Yes. People send me messages, but they never reach me. (Just in case she thought I was calling to complain that no one messages me anymore)
S: Okay. And what would you like to do today?
Me: (Speechless for a few seconds) I'd... like to know why I'm not getting messages from India anymore.

No, seriously. This is not a joke. That's one person who'd fail the Turing test. Or maybe she had a two-minute memory.

It turned out, by the way - another 30 minutes later - that I wasn't actually speaking to Tech Support, since Customer Care had forwarded me back to Customer Care.

Searches That Lead Here: Tagged

2006-10-11T10:05:00.000+05:30

So I've been tagged (If your office firewall blocks this because of the objectionable word in the URL, you can try this link. It's the top post).

I don't always do tags, but this is a post I've been wanting to write for at least a year and a half. So I've decided to give up on procrastination for just long enough to get this post done.

Basically, I'm supposed to write a post on the different words/phrases entered by people in search engines, that lead them to this blog. And because I started using Google Analytics a little less than a year ago, I have access to almost every search word used to reach this site since then. So I'll be doing this post as a series.

I'll start with one of the most common set of search terms that leads people to my blog.

Searches relating to Arranged Marriage - Long, long ago, so long ago, that I don't even remember how long ago, I wrote a post on Arranged Marriages. That's one post on the topic. And 8% of the hits on this blog, end up at that post. Here's a sampling of the kinds of search strings that people have used:

Arranged Marriage Statistics - That's given me 242 hits in the last 11 months. And from the comments on that post, I believe that these are mainly sociology students. So the crap I wrote, has probably ended up being used in someone's research project! I don't know whether to be proud, or worry that my opinion from a couple of years ago on a matter that I have absolutely no knowledge about, just might be considered Expert Opinion!
Giving up on love for arranged marriage - This one scares me. What if someone was trying to decide whether they should wait to find their true love, or just give in to parental pressure and have an arranged marriage? And what if it was my post that convinced this person to go in for an arranged marriage? What if they'd have found their true love if they had not read my post, and just waited for a few more months? What if I stood in the way of true love? How can I live with the burden of such a grave sin? My hair are turning gray from worrying.
Is arranged marriage legal in the united states? - What???
Arranged Marriages don't work
Arranged Marriages are Bad
Arranged Marriages are Evil - Okay, okay, I believe you!

Makes me wonder if I should have started a matrimonial site instead.

Update: I know I'm supposed to tag other people, but I'll make it an open invitation instead. If you feel like doing the tag, leave a comment, and I'll tag you.
Alternatively, if you want to know how to track search terms for your blog, or you want to get a counter that has that feature, let me know and I'll try to help out.

Update 2: Tagging Anwin and Deaths Head Roy.

Thank You, Santa Claus!

2006-10-06T08:24:00.000+05:30

Yes, I know the holiday season isn't exactly here yet, and Christmas is a long time away. But Santa dropped by this afternoon. No, really!

Remember that book-store I wrote about recently?

Well Santa just gave me two $50 gift cards to the store! $100 of books! I suddenly feel like a kid in a candy store. With mommy paying the bills!

Long live Santa!

Inexperienced: So Close, Yet So Far

2006-10-03T06:45:00.000+05:30

Intro: Inexperienced
Previous: Fourth Night

(Episode 5. Read the previous episodes if you want to know what this is about. And be warned that it may not be suitable for children.)

"Listen. You have something that corresponds to this, right?"
"Well..."
"Yes?"
"I do, but..."
"But?"
"It can't be that!"
"Are you sure?"
"Well, it's too small!"
"Oh."
"Yes. That would be impossible. I know at least that much about my body."
"Ok."

Next: Inexperienced: Two Months Later

Inexperienced: Fourth Night

2006-09-29T11:45:00.000+05:30

Intro: Inexperienced
Previous: Third Night

(Episode 4. You're still here, so I'll assume you don't need the "you could be offended" warning.)

"You're going to love me for this."
"I'm supposed to love you no matter what you do. That's what it's about, remember?"
"Well, you're going to love me even more, then."
(tries to look behind him, and suddenly smiles) "Diamonds!"
"Diamonds? No, no. I got a movie!"
"I'm supposed to love you for getting a movie?"
"No, you don't get it! It's an adult movie!"
"An adult movie?"
"Stupid, so we can figure out how to... you know!"
"Oh!"
"Yes!"
"Which movie is it?"
"Basic Instinct. I've heard a lot about it, but never had the guts to get it, before."
"Great! Well then what are you waiting for? Put it on!"

(a few minutes later)

"Do you actually want to watch the whole movie?"
"Not really. Well not tonight, at least."
"Then why don't we fast-forward until the... um... good bits come on?"
"Good idea."

(waiting impatiently)

"I can't believe it. We'll finally figure it out tonight!"
(both look at each other and grin)

(more waiting)

"Hey stop, stop, stop! He's kissing her! Rewind, rewind! Stop, stop, stop! You did too much! It's ok. We can wait for a minute or so."
(both grin again)

"So that's Sharon Stone?"
"I don't think so. I think Sharon Stone is supposed to be blonde. I think there are two women in the movie."
"Two women?"
"Yeah. Lucky guy."
"What?"
"Oh nothing, nothing. I meant... I meant... See he's kissing her!"
"Yes!"
"He's pushing her against the wall. Why is he doing that?"
"I don't know. Maybe he's... What happened? Is it over?"
"I don't know. Maybe the... the interesting part is with Sharon Stone."
"Oh. Ok."

(more waiting)

"Hey, they seem to be dancing. Let's watch this part."
"Ok."
"So that's Sharon Stone?"
"I think so."
"Ok. And that other girl?"
"No idea."
"Sharon Stone looks good, doesn't she?"
"Yes. Quite."

(pause)

"But not as good as you!"
"You learn fast."

"Hey see they're suddenly in the bedroom!"
"Finally... What? What happened? It's over?"

(both stare at screen)

"You know..."
"Yes?"
"I think this DVD is the censored version."
"You mean..."
"Yes."
"So..."

(silence)

"You know, years later when we look back, this is going to seem funny."
"If we ever figure it out, that is."
"Hmm."

"I'm going to give our kids sex education at the age of ten."
"Ten! Anyway. At this rate we'll probably end up having to adopt."
"Maybe they'll learn about it from their friends and tell us."
"True. Let's adopt an older kid, so that we don't have to wait too long."

Next: So Close, Yet So Far

Inexperienced: Third Night

2006-09-28T10:30:00.000+05:30

Intro: Inexperienced
Previous: Second Night

(Episode 3 of a really tragic story. Read the previous posts in the series for context. The posts are beginning to get somewhat explicit, so if you're easily offended, consider yourself warned.)

"Hey, I'm sorry about last night. I shouldn't have said what I said."
"No, I was equally at fault. This is so frustrating."
"Yes, it definitely is. My friends have been congratulating and teasing me all this time. So I can't even ask them."
"Same here."
"What do we do?"
"I don't know."
"Well, see we know this goes somewhere right?"
"Yes?"
"So all we need to figure out is where, right?"
"True."
"So, let's do that."
"Okay."
"Good."
"So..."
"Yes?"
"Go ahead."
"Go ahead what?"
"Figure it out."
"How?"
"I don't know! It's your idea."
"Can't you try to help?"
"(sigh) I don't know. How do we begin to figure it out?"
"I don't know. Okay, let's try to analyze this."
"Okay."
"See, this needs to go somewhere, so that somewhere needs to be able to accommodate this, right?"
"Right."
"So I guess we are looking for a part of you, where this would fit."
"Right."
"So, any ideas?"
"Even less than before."
"Can't you think of anything?"
"Nothing. Until now, I thought I knew my body."
"Hmm. Do you think it, sort of, appears when needed?"
"I think you've been reading too much Harry Potter."
"Harry Potter?"
"Yeah, the fifth book."
"No idea."
"You haven't read the Harry Potter books?"
"No. I don't read much."
"What?!"
"Um, could we concentrate on the current problem?"
"Okay. But tomorrow we're going to the library and you are going to
start reading."
"Can't you think of anything?"
"No."
"We're going to die virgins, and we don't even know what that means!"
"Oh stop being so melodramatic. I'm getting tired. Can we sleep now?"
"Okay."
"Good night."
"Good night."

Next: Fourth Night

Inexperienced: Second Night

2006-09-27T11:35:00.000+05:30

Intro: Inexperienced
Previous: First Night

(Episode 2 of the plight of newlyweds lacking education. Read the previous posts in the series for context. These posts are probably R or PG-13 rated, depending on who is doing the rating.)

Hug, kiss, cuddle, etc.

(pause)
(both look at each other)

"What next?"
"Um, I don't know."
"Didn't you ask someone?"
"No, of course not! Did you?"
"No, I didn't."
"Oh."

(both thoughtful)

"Well..."
"Yes?"
"See, I'm sure this goes somewhere."
"I can see that, but where?"
"I don't know."
"This is so stupid."
"Hey, I know what to do at my end. You should know how things work at yours."
"What? How dare you! That's such a horrible thing to say! You're sleeping on the
couch tonight."
"What?! Why?!"
"Because you're an insensitive boor."

Next: Third Night

Inexperienced: First Night

2006-09-26T10:30:00.000+05:30

Intro: Inexperienced

(This is the first episode of the story of a pair of newlyweds seriously short on sex education. So if you're easily offended, you probably don't want to read any further.)

Hug, kiss, cuddle, etc.

"Okay let's do it."
"Yes, let's."
"Yes."

(silence)

"So..."
"Yes."

(more silence and staring at ceiling)

"I think we should take our clothes off."
"Right. Right. Let's do that."
"Yes, let's."

(fumble around with clothes, ending up partially undressed)

More hugging, kissing, cuddling and etc-ing.

"Okay, let's do it now."
"Yes, let's."

(silence)

"I think we need to undress... um... all the way."
"Er... yes, I think that too."

(more fumbling around with clothes)

(deep breaths)

"Okay, let's do it now."
"Yes. Let's."

(pause)

"Umm..."
"Errr..."
(both together) "You know what to do, right?"
(both grin)
(both) "Yes, of course!"
(both sigh in relief)

"Okay, good".
"Yeah, good."

"Well, then..."
"Yes."
"Um..."
"Yes?"

(pause)

"Err... Umm... Do you know where I should put this?"
"Don't you?"
"Actually no. I'm new at this."
"Damn! And they told me to let the guy do everything!"
"Sorry."
"Well, now what?"
"I don't know."
"Hmm."
"We could go back to cuddling."
"Okay."

(some more cuddling)

"I'm sleepy."
"Yeah, me too."
"Okay, good night."
"Good night."

(both) *phew*

Next: Second Night

Inexperienced

2006-09-25T11:45:00.000+05:30

Those who complain about the effect of Western culture on Indian Tradition (whatever the two terms mean), tend to use incidents like the Delhi Public School MMS video in their arguments. I mean, sweet innocent school-going kids should have no business making pornographic videos of themselves, right?

The other camp, blames high teenage pregnancy rates, and the uncontrolled spread of sexually transmitted diseases like AIDS on the lack of sex-education at an early age.

In both cases, the section of society being talked about, are kids. No one seems to care much about the other section of people in India that are affected by the lack of sex-education.

Adults.

I mean even where people pay attention to them, it seems to be limited to handing out contraceptives and mumbling stuff about AIDS and family planning. Ok, it's a start. But from what I've heard, there are never any instructions about exactly what to do or how these contraceptives should be used for maximum effectiveness. Very rarely are there warnings that no form of protection is 100% effective, or stuff like the fact that condoms can burst if you don't take care to get rid of air bubbles.

It was recently brought to my notice, though, that the lack of information is worse than I thought. Apparently, there are people in their twenties in our cities, and educated people at that, who -

Think that pregnancy is caused by kissing. (I wonder what they think The Pill does in terms of avoiding this. Give you bad breath?)
Get pregnant because they didn't think they needed contraception, since they were only having sex during The Safe Period. (There's no such thing as a "safe period", but how many days of their honeymoon did these people waste?)
Don't consummate their marriage for days after their wedding, not out of shyness, but because they don't know what to do!

I'm not kidding. I wish I was, of course. (I've actually heard that people sometimes spend weeks and even months without knowing what to do, but I refuse to believe that. I mean at some point, nature's going to take over.) The idea of a couple sitting on their wedding bed without knowing what it is they need to do next, is no laughing matter.

Ok, so maybe it is. In fact I think the idea is so hilarious, that I've immensely enjoyed writing about the experience about just such a couple. The story is completely fictitious of course, and is purely the result of my overactive imagination. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

I'll be publishing it here as a series of posts over the next few days, so watch this space.

If you're one of the people I'm talking about, apologies in advance for having a laugh at your expense. I just couldn't resist.

Next: First Night

Disaster Just Struck

2006-09-22T10:55:00.000+05:30

As of this week, there is a brand new Borders bookstore on the ground floor of the building I work in. And along with a very large collection of books, they've got at least 40 shelves full of science fiction and fantasy. While they don't have every Discworld novel ever written (but then that's ok, since I do), they do have difficult to get Terry Pratchett titles like Nanny Ogg's Cookbook and Where's My Cow?.

And they've got offers like "Buy 2 books and get the 3rd free" and "20% off".

I'm so screwed.

Update: It's worse than I thought. Their SFF section is not just 40 shelves. It's 139 (yes, I counted). And that's not counting the 30 shelves filled with extra copies of the bestsellers. And the store occupies at least two floors.

I'm so so screwed.

Cinema - Censorship

2006-09-18T11:45:00.000+05:30

There's a new film out called This film is not yet rated. (If you're reading this at work, you might want to be a careful before clicking on that link. The poster for the movie is a little explicit, and forms the background for the website.) The makers of the film have tried to bring out the dissatisfaction of moviemakers and movie-goers with the way the MPAA assigns ratings to movies released in the US. There's also a petition on the website that aims to fix this. Below, excerpted from the website, are the salient points of their issues with the MPAA's functioning.

MPAA ratings are ill-defined, subjective and inconsistently-applied. This makes them confusing for both film-goers and film-makers.
The rules of ratings determinations and the details of the deliberation process are secret, as are the identities of members of the Ratings Board and Appeals Board.
Raters have no special qualifications and receive no training. Professionals from fields such as education, media studies, sociology and psychology are not involved in the process and may even be intentionally excluded.
Film ratings are not applied uniformly regardless of content and viewpoint. The disparity in treatment is especially apparent with regard to films dealing with sexual orientation.
The NC- 17 rating deprives individual parents of their right to make choices for their own children and dramatically limits the ability of adults to see films.

The last statement refers to the fact that films with an NC-17 rating find it extremely hard to get screened in cinema theatres in the US. Many reputed stores will not stock DVDs of a film rated NC-17. This film is not yet rated was initially given an NC-17 rating by the MPAA. The filmmakers later surrendered the rating. As a result, it's now being screened at a very limited number of movie halls across the US. The filmmakers recommendations to fix these problems (as mentioned in the petition) are excerpted below.

Objectivity: We ask that the MPAA develop and publicize objective guidelines for rating films.
Transparency: We ask that the MPAA publicly identify all participants in the rating process and their qualifications, background or experience.
Professionalism: We ask that the rating and appeals board be comprised of qualified individuals representing a broad cross-section of views and experiences, and that they receive training in the objective criteria for rating films.
Fairness: We ask that the MPAA develop fair procedures for rating films and hearing appeals, which includes the right to be heard through a representative of one's choice, the right to present relevant evidence and arguments, the right to a majority vote and the right to a written decision specifying the grounds for the rating determination.
Personal Choice and Responsibility: We ask that the NC-17 rating be replaced with a category that describes content fairly and accurately, but does not restrict the rights of individual parents to make their own decisions about what their minor children may see or limit the ability of adults to see films.

I recommend reading the comments of people who've signed the petition to give you an idea about public opinion on this matter. A good number of parents seem to feel that the rating system is arbitrary, and reduces their capability to make good decisions about what they should allow their children to watch. There are apparently a good number of movies that are rated R when they could have been just as easily rated PG-13, and if parents allow their children to watch these, then it's hard to justify not allowing them to watch other R rated movies.

Now read this interview (link courtesy Selective Amnesia) of Sharmila Tagore (Chairperson of the Indian Censor Board). The article is about the fact that she's in favour of allowing adult scenes in movies in India, and also getting rid of the ban on airing adult content on television. However, to quote her from the article, she

"... wouldn't endorse [her predecessor's proposal to permit pornographic films in the country]. I don't think society or the Indian people are ready for it. There's a cultural difference between India and the rest of the world."

"Indian people are not ready for pornographic films". I'm trying to understand what that statement means. Maybe the local VCD/DVD library owner will know. I wish I was back in India. I'd be able to ask him.

As to the obvious comparison between censorship related issues in the US and India, I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

Train Ride (55)

2006-09-11T07:10:00.000+05:30

He woke up. He was on the train, going home. The coach was empty, except for him. And the little girl across the aisle. She looked at him, her eyes red with tears. She looked scared. "I want to get off," she said...

He woke up. He was on the train, going home...

Motorcycle Ride (55)

2006-09-06T23:32:00.000+05:30

A glorious day for a motorcycle ride. Clear skies, the shining sun, cool winds, chirping birds, and flowers in bloom. "This," he thought, "is what paradise must be like." Lost in his thoughts, he didn't see the light turn red before he crossed it. A truck driver in a hurry ran him over.

Censorship and Incompetence

2006-07-19T11:00:00.000+05:30

I could choose to be angry about this. I could choose to find it irritating. Or I could just choose to find it funny. But it's not really funny. And I'm tired of being angry or irritated. So let me just be philosophizing.

I'm sure most of you already know what I'm going to say, but let me make it a little clearer.

First there were the 7 bomb blasts in trains in Mumbai. (Full coverage here) A lot of people died, a lot more were injured, and everyone around the world knew about the blasts in a couple of hours. That's the kind of thing the internet and satellite TV makes possible in this information-hungry world. There was no censorship at the time. In fact, some people felt that news channels should think twice about the content they choose to broadcast. That was on the 11th of July. Tuesday.

Then there was the amazing work done by the World Wide Help group at the Mumbai Help blog in coordinating relief efforts, as well as just simply providing information to those who needed it. There's that word again. Information. Remember it. I'm going to use it again.

Fast forward a few days. It's the 15th of July. A Saturday. (Not Sunday - which is the day to drink before sunset.)

Reports are coming in of people not being able to access blogs on Blogspot - which by the way, is the domain that hosts the World Wide Help and Mumbai Help blogs (and of course, in case you forgot, this blog too). People wonder if it is a couple of ISPs specifically blocking the *.blogspot.com domain. At this point, all there is, is a lack of information. See? That word again. I told you I'd use it. But wait. I'm not done yet.

Time passes, more domains (including but not limited to *.geocities.com and *.typepad.com) appear to be blocked, and the problem spreads to most ISPs around the country. There are rumours that this is the result of a directive from the Indian government to ISPs. This is confirmed on speaking to the customer service departments of various ISPs. A number of bloggers cover the issue and suggest workarounds. Even the mainstream media jumps in. And the issue goes international.

Soon, it starts to appear that the Indian government didn't ask to block blogspot.com or any of the other domains. Apparently the list of sites that should have been blocked numbers 18 specific URLs. Some of these may be specific blogs, and some of them may be other websites or pages. Not entire domains.

Then what's wrong? Why can't people reach Mumbai Help? Or India Uncut?

Well, apparently the ISPs couldn't figure out how to block specific subdomains, and so ended up blocking the entire domain in each case.

Yes, I was tempted to laugh too.

There are two important aspects to the problem here. One is Censorship, and the other is Incompetence.

Let's tackle Censorship first. As Neha says (and she says it very well; you should listen to her, there's a very smart brain in that head), let's not use euphemisms. Let's call it censorship. Because that's what it is. It's not "balanced flow of information" as CERT-IN wants us to believe. What it is, is "an infringement on our right to information". Even if that information is an instruction manual on building your very own hand-grenade.

Censorship is based on the idea that there are two kinds of information. Good information and Bad information. Bad information is the kind that puts the wrong tools in the wrong hands, spreads fear, doubt, and all those other things that your average government worries about. Most people wouldn't argue too much against censorship of Bad information. And that is where the problem lies.

Too many people try to keep their children away from information about sex and contraception, because they believe that doing this protects their children. A lot of people now believe that early sex education is the only solution for tackling problems like AIDS and teenage pregnancies. What parents do, is censorship. They deny their children information, when the only real solution is to supply even more information.

And that's what the government does. It provides the wrong solution. A solution that does more harm than good. Which brings me to the second point, Incompetence.

I'm sure a number of people out there have shifted the blame from the government to the ISPs, who don't know enough to do their job well. A block on a specific blogspot or geocities site becomes a block on the domain. Those network engineers just don't know their job, do they? They're all a bunch of fools. No?

Don't deny it. There's at least a small part of you that thought this, at least for a small amount of time.

Well, yes, not being able to block specific sites does seem to be a sign of incompetence, at least to us geeks who think we know more than we actually do. I can't imagine why it's so impossible to block a specific sub-domain. But then what do I know about the how their servers are set up?

No, I wasn't referring to the incompetence of the ISPs, though I'm tempted to. I was referring to the incompetence of the government.

Let's make an assumption, which starts of giving all the credit to the government. (For the record, I'm not making all this up. It seems to be the gist of the speculation about the government's motive behind blocking those sites.) Let's say some terrorist group has been using some blogs and other web-sites to pass on information to their cell networks. This mode of communication must be cut. Or we could be looking at another set of bomb blasts in some other part of the country. So the government identifies 18 specific URLs that are key to stopping this mode of communication. It then uses the word "government directive" to enforce a block on these URLs, which is eventually implemented by most ISPs in a couple of days.

Let's say that the ISPs had not botched up. Let's assume that the block had been only on these specific URLs. What exactly would that have achieved?

When trying to control the exit of a felon from a city, all the exits are monitored, and every vehicle passing out is checked. When terrorist groups are using cell-phones to communicate, lines are tapped. What the police doesn't do, is revoke the felon's driver's license. Or disconnect the terrorist groups' cellphone subscriptions. Because the police knows from experience that this is not really going to work. What is required is to use even better technology to beat the criminal at his own game. If the bad guys have information, then what the good guys need is to get even more information.

Then why does the government not seem to understand this in matters of technology? Why didn't the government instead, decide to monitor access to these URLs instead, and try to find people who were frequenting these sites. Or why don't they try to identify cities, towns or villages where there seems to be a higher probability of hate-fuelled unrest? Why does the government opt for the simpler and less effective solution when it comes to the internet?

The fact is, that however much we may wish to claim that India is playing an important part in the technology revolution and that every important new technology has at least one Indian behind it, back home we're still struggling to use technology to solve problems. Whether it be stopping terrorism, or irrigating our fields.

It all comes down to information. We need it. A lot of it. And we need it a lot more than we realize.

Staying Safe

2006-07-19T08:00:00.000+05:30

For a couple of hours after I found about the recent blasts in Bombay, I was in a boiling rage. "They've attacked my home", I thought. "They've attacked my family". I wanted to get back at them in any way possible. For a couple of hours, I understood why so many Americans gladly supported bombing out Afghanistan and Iraq after 9/11.

I've always had this talent for being stoic about bad things that happen around me, as long as they don't actually happen to me. Of course I worry about them at times, and try to think up solutions to some of these problems, but I generally don't get too worked up about them. Call me selfish. Or call me a guy with a short attention span.

But this time, they struck too close for comfort. As soon as I found out (11:00am EST, 8:30pm IST - the world really is growing smaller isn't it?), I remembered that my brother takes a train between Andheri and Borivali everyday to travel to and from work. I got through to him on his cellphone pretty easily (considering that people even locally were having trouble reaching each other), but the first words he said to me were "Rajesh, I can't reach Daddy."

Apparently, my father had gone to South Bombay for some Annual General body meeting. He's retired, spends most of his time close to home, and usually drives wherever he needs to go. The last thing I'd expected was for him to be using the trains. After about an hour of telling each other that he never travels by first class on the trains, and that he'd never travel by train during peak hours, and that he usually takes the bus, and that the fact that his phone was ringing, meant the phone was okay, and if the phone was okay, it meant he was okay, and that he never answers his cellphone anyway, my father reached home safe. He'd spent three hours in a bus trying to get home.

The simple fact is, that when you hit the mode of transport that is used by a majority of the city's residents, and you hit it at peak time, those 186 dead and 714 injured, could be anyone. They could be your brother, your aunt, or that guy you went to school with, that friend you made last year at a conference, the girl you've been wanting to ask out for weeks, your Maths teacher... anyone.

I work in Manhattan these days, and the blasts were immediately noticed by New Yorkers who've been hearing rumours about terrorists targetting New York's subway system. Suddenly those rumours seem a lot more possible.

Of course, in India we have the additional worry that an incident like this could be used by political parties and/or jobless youth to spread even more fear and kill/injure even more people. Even though our cities generally tend to show solidarity rather communal disharmony in such situations, the political climate in the country tends to give rise to fear anyway. A few hours after the blasts, everyone was expecting riots in the city.

Anyway. The important thing is to ensure that it's a lot tougher for terrorists to do something like this again. But what?

While I don't think that it is feasible for the police force of any city to keep an eye on every single spot where a bomb could be hidden, I think the statements by bloggers and journalists that indicate "it's impossible to stop such terrorism", are too simplistic.

After 9/11, every train station, and every airport in New York asks passengers to be vigilant and "report suspicious behaviour". These messages are broadcast on public announcement systems, and seem to be more frequent when intelligence reports indicate a higher risk of attacks. The police force has only so many eyeballs. What we need to do is get the public involved. And by that, I don't mean beating up the next guy you find wearing a turban, a beard or just unwashed clothes.

We need hotlines that people can call up to leave reports of people doing suspicious things, or suspicious looking packages in public places. We need to confiscate every bag left unattended for more than 30 seconds in a public place. We need a police force that can work hard enough to look into at least 80-90% of these reports for the first couple of weeks. Initially, the number of false reports will be very high. Paranoia and the general excitement of having a forum to voice your suspicions to, will cause that. But soon that will die down. And we will need to repeatedly broadcast messages for people to keep their eyes open, and to tell someone about anything that might seem important. God knows how many people die in terrorist attacks, because the few people who did notice something ignored it because they had to get to a meeting, or catch a train, and didn't think it was important, or didn't know how to let someone know.

We need to go to every school out there and tell children to keep their eyes open. Any parent will tell you how observant children can be. And how much smarter than us adults.

Make it easy for people to drop a report. Ensure that any cellphone can call that number. Let it get recorded on voice-mail. Allow people to send SMSes. It might help if the person making the call thinks they won't have to waste time "speaking to someone". At the same time, give them the choice of a human interface.

You never know what someone might notice next.

No More Coffee

2006-06-02T17:00:00.000+05:30

Government Bans Coffee Shops

Reuter: After shutting down Dance bars throughout Maharashtra last year, the state government has now turned its attention to Mumbai's espresso bars. In yet another controversial decision, the state has passed a bill banning coffee shops based on the theory that they are breeding grounds for prostitution.

"Young men and women spend hours at these places," said a minister. "Are they under the impression that we don't understand what they are doing? If they want coffee, they can make it at home. What do they come to these bars for?" Another claimed that the youth of the nation "should be at home studying or praying at a temple. Such behaviour is spoiling our culture."

When asked what they would do once the ban came into effect, some coffee shop owners said they would start selling tea instead. "But what will I do?" cried BJ, owner of the internet-cafe-cum-coffee-shop BlogLand. "Most of my customers don't like tea!"

After this latest ban, observers are wondering what will be next on the government's agenda.

Well, it could happen.

Who Can You Blame?

2006-05-23T19:10:00.000+05:30

Update: Great. The BJP supports communalism, and the UPA supports casteism.

First there was the announcement of an increase in reservations in the premier educational institutes of our country.

Then there were students protesting the hike in reservations.

As it generally happens in our country, things didn't go very well.

And today there doesn't seem to be much of a solution in the offing.

I've been against reservation in principle, since 1990, which was when I stepped into this country as a student for the first time. My education until then had been in an Indian School in Kuwait, where I'd read the word "caste" only in Social Studies textbooks.

I've asked myself over the years whether pro-reservationists are really all that unreasonable, and whether reservation does achieve anything more than keeping caste-differentiation alive in the minds of our youth, who are the first ones to be affected by it in modern society.

Affirmative Action has good intentions, and reservations are an implementation of that idea, but is it the right implementation?

It has been my belief that Indians as a people, are intelligent. Maybe my belief is just a kind of patriotism. Who knows? Still, I have believed that even if we are not any more intelligent than the people of other nations, we are nonetheless intelligent. And if we are intelligent, then the people we vote to power must be intelligent too. (What are you laughing for?)

Still, more than 50 years after the provision for reservation was made in the constitution, why is it that only a tiny segment of SCs (Scheduled Castes), STs (Scheduled Tribes) and OBCs (Other Backward Castes) have benefited from it?

I'm sure that the number who've benefited can't be large enough, because if it were, that large number of people would be interested in getting rid of the "backward" tag, don't you think?

Going by surveys, at the very least, 29.8% of India's population are OBCs. At the most, the number is 52% - that means there are between 300 to 500 Million people in our country who are considered "Other Backward Castes". That's one in every 20 people on the planet. 50 years after our leaders wrote for us a constitution guaranteeing Equality, this huge number of people in our country are called "Backward".

Aren't our politicians intelligent enough to know when a solution to a problem isn't working? Or do they simply not care?

Who has been voting this chap to power over the years? It's not the first time that he's won an election, right?

The answer seems quite simple. The average Indian, is stupid.

That includes me, of course. And you.

Not The Same Thing

2006-05-10T01:15:00.000+05:30

Yes, yes, I'm alive. Against all expectations to the contrary. I guess you'll need to pray harder.

And we break our silence (No, it's just me. The plural is just for the heck of it) to disagree with a man who is probably the most popular Indian blogger on the planet. As the Tamil saying goes, I think I've got horns on my head. (Yes, I've been in Chennai too long. No, I don't know the Tamil saying itself. I only know what it translates to. Don't ask me to explain. I'm blogging after two full months. I'm supposed to be incoherent.)

Amit Varma's got a post linking to the results of a new scientific study. While I agree with the intent of the post in general, I completely disagree with the title of the post.

Being gay, is not like being left-handed. Which hand you use to write or eat with, isn't dependent on biology. It's more a matter of luck. And, of course, on whether your mother made you hold the pencil in your right hand when you were learning to write.

A left-handed person can learn to write with his/her right hand, if the necessity arises. Right handed people can teach themselves to do things with their left hand. All it takes is practice.

But no amount of practice can turn a gay man (or woman) straight. Or vice-versa.

In fact, I think the biggest problem that people have with homosexuality is the fact that they believe it is like being left-handed. That you can change it if you try hard enough. That it is something that can be fixed if you catch it early enough. That not letting your kids know that there is such a thing as homosexuality, will keep them straight.

Being gay is more like being black. Or brown. Or white. Or yellow. Or red. Except that it's not hereditary. (How could it be?)
You can't change it any more than you can change the colour of your skin.

It's NOT Teasing!

2006-03-12T05:45:00.000+05:30

I've seen this point mentioned on other blog posts written for the Blank Noise blogathon, and it's got me thinking. I believe that the first step to getting any closer to safer streets in our country, is to stop calling it Eve Teasing. It's not "teasing". It's the violation of the modesty of a human being. A violation of the exclusive right of a human being to their own body. A violation of one's right to peace of mind. A violation of the right to be in a public place without fear.

It's Harassment. Sexual Harassment. It's time to call it what it is.

Unfortunately, This Is Not Fiction

2006-03-07T05:30:00.000+05:30

Updated with links. Look at the bottom of this post.

I almost didn't write this post.

Procrastination is one reason. A genuine lack of time is another.

But the most relevant reason, really, is that I didn't really know.

When I was around fifteen, a cousin of mine from the US who was visiting India took a train ride with her father from Churchgate to Andheri. My uncle had not lived in Bombay for a decade and a half and simply remembered the Virar Local as being "a little crowded" at peak hours. Now you don't leave a thirteen year old girl alone in a strange city, so of course she rode with her father in the general compartment. Needless to say she was sobbing uncontrollably when they got home. When I landed there, all the women in the family were crowded around her trying to offer comfort. The men of course were berating my uncle for using the "Viral Local of all trains".

Now despite my claim that I'm from Bombay, I've only lived in that city for a little more than four years. And I've been inside a Virar Local just twice. So on that day the only reason I felt bad for my sister was because she had to ride squished up inside a train compartment full of men, for a journey that must have lasted almost three quarters of an hour. It wasn't a big deal. Girls cry over anything.

You see, I didn't really know.

A couple of years later, again in Bombay, I was walking down a lane, my college bag slung on my shoulder, probably whistling a tune on my way to the bus stop. There were a couple of girls walking a few yards ahead of me, who must have been around fourteen or fifteen. I noticed them when a tall boy of around my age walking in the opposite direction, bumped into them quite hard. He'd apparently been pushed by a couple of his friends with the sole intention of crashing into the girls. As you would expect, the boy simply walked back to his friends laughing away to glory, while the girls quivering with shock held on to each other and walked on without a word.

For a second I felt like I should teach those boys a lesson. But I've never been very brave. One of me. Three of them. I walked out that lane ashamed of myself. Ashamed for not trying to right that wrong. What's the point of good intentions if you don't have the guts to carry them out? As I walked past the girls, I even considered apologizing on behalf of men in general. I don't know if it would have made a difference, but the fact is that I felt too guilty to do even that. My inaction had made me an accomplice. I wasn't any better than those boys.

It's not easy to forget such moments of weakness. But I walked out of that lane still not really knowing.

Yes, I'd heard about eve-teasing. I'd heard about guys on the street singing songs like "Choli ke peechhe kya hai" to harass women. I knew it was the right thing to do to escort a female friend home at night. I knew it wasn't a safe world for women. But I didn't really know what women have go through in the streets of this world. I had heard about "bottom-slapping" but had never really seen the point of it. Surely it didn't happen very often?

I read about incidents like what happened to Hemangini Gupta on a train to Chennai, and lauded the efforts of victims who tried to ensure that the molesters got punished for their acts. I know a girl who beat a guy with her sandal at a bus stop. Another kneed a man in the groin once. But really, I didn't think of these as anything more than "one-of" incidents.

So when I heard about the Blank Noise project, I nodded my head about how sexual harassment was a real problem in India and thought I should try to write something about it for their blogathon.

I'd probably have forgotten all about it, though, if not for this post. Annie has written a powerful account of what a woman has to go through in our cities. It hits home the fact that these things are not "one-of" incidents. That women suffer this harassment throughout their lives. That there is a real problem out there. It's a post that we men need to read more than the women. Because we need to know.

Two of my cousin sisters grew up in Bombay. Two more are still in their teens. It makes me shudder to think what they must have gone through or what experiences life still intends to show them.

And I feel ashamed once again. Just as ashamed as I was in that lane almost a decade ago. Ashamed that I represent a gender that knows no limits. A gender that perceives a woman as weak, and then proceeds to take advantage of that weakness. A gender that goes on to blame the women for attracting the attention in the first place, when their only fault is that they were born female.

This post is for those two girls in that lane. I just wanted to say that I'm sorry.

Update: As part of the blogathon, Neha Viswanathan has written a powerful post about harassment in India.
Megha writes about child abuse, and lists helpline numbers in the US and India.

Update 2: Megha Krishnan writes about sections of the penal code under which harassment is an offense.
Thalassa_Mikra proves that it doesn't matter to the men what a woman is wearing. Even a burqa isn't enough protection.
Charu points out that no place is sacred. Men seem to know that God is blind.
Incognito shows that it doesn't matter if you are in a crowd or not.
M. gives tips for retaliation. Use them with care.

Till Debt Do Us Part: Celestial Conversations - XXV

2006-02-14T00:30:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Sound of Music: Celestial Conversations - XXIV

Me: Hello?
God: Hi
Me: So how have You been? Not hiding anywhere I hope?
God: No, no. I haven't even spoke to Luci in a long time.
Me: Doesn't he hate You calling him that? After all he's the most evil being in the universe, and You call him something that sounds like a little girl's name.
God: Of course he hates it. But that only makes it more fun!
Me: Ah. Never thought of that. But how come You are taking so long to respond to each of my messages?
God: Sorry. Can't type very fast.
Me: Oh? What happened?
God: Carpal Tunnel Syndrome.
Me: What?! How?
God: Oh, I had to write one hundred cheques.
Me: A hundred cheques? To whom? And why?
God: The bank. They wanted four years worth of post-dated-cheques. Two for every month.
Me: That's only ninety-six.
God: They thought hundred was a nice round number.
Me: But why did the bank want so many cheques?
God: For the payments for My home loan.
Me: Home loan? Why would You need to take a home loan?
God: They told Me it would help Me save tax.
Me: Who told You that?
God: Oh, some guy I met near an ATM.
Me: But You don't need to pay tax anyway!
God: I don't?
Me: Of course not! It's not like You have an income!
God: That's a good point. Why didn't you tell Me that before?
Me: I never knew You were taking a home loan!
God: That's another good point.
Me: So You bought a house?
God: House? Who says I bought a house?
Me: But You signed up for a loan, yes?
God: Yes. And?
Me: Why would You need a home loan if You're not buying a house?
God: I told you. For the tax.
Me: But the bank wouldn't give You a loan if you weren't buying a house.
God: You don't need to buy a house to get a loan.
Me: You don't?
God: No. Buying land is enough.
Me: Oh. So You bought land, then?
God: Yes.
Me: How much?
God: One square foot.
Me: What?
God: I couldn't afford any more than that.
Me: Oh.
God: Yes. Real estate is quite expensive.
Me: That's definitely true. Hey, God?
God: Yes?
Me: This is the twenty-fifth episode of me chatting with You. That makes this a silver jubilee episode.
God: Twenty-fifth? I think you have it wrong. Can't have been that many.
Me: But it is. Look at the number above.
God: But in some of these episodes weren't you speaking to other people? Like My secretary, for example.
Me: It's still celestial conversations, even if it was just Your secretary.
God: But what about episodes where you only spoke to the Devil?
Me: God!
God: Yes?
Me: Just be happy for me, won't You?
God: Oh, okay.
Me: I'm waiting.
God: Umm... Congratulations?
Me: Thanks!
God: You're welcome. So how are you going to celebrate this joyous occasion?
Me: Let's not overdo it, okay?
God: Spoilsport.
Me: Hey, it's also Valentine's day!
God: You're not going to ask Me to be your valentine, now, are you?
Me: What?! Of course not!
God: Thank Me.
Me: Bye, then.
God: Bye!

Next: Merry Christmas: Celestial Conversations - XXVI

KGAF FF Contest - My Entry

2006-02-06T23:30:00.000+05:30

I got my entry into the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival's Flash Fiction contest late on Saturday night (or early on Sunday morning, depending on your point of view). Since it seems to be permitted by the rules to post my entry on my own blog, I thought I'd do so without further ado. So here it is. The theme/trigger was Black Horse.

Joyride

"I can have my lawyer draw up the papers," he told her as the horse trotted away with their daughter.

"Whatever," she replied. For months she'd stopped looking at him when she spoke to him. But now she looked him straight in the eye. He looked away.

"Do you think she'll understand?" he asked as he looked at the child. They could hear her laughter tinkle through the air as she rode. "Black Beauty!" she'd called the horse, when she first saw it.

"No," was the reply. He could feel her eyes bore into him as she spoke. "But she'll learn to accept."

"I'll visit her on weekends," he said. He hoped she wouldn't refuse.

"She won't stop being your daughter," his wife said. But in a short while she'd stop being his wife. Would she find someone else? Would she get married again? He felt his knees go weak.

He couldn't bring himself to say anything more. So they stared silently at their daughter who was riding slowly back towards them. She'd stopped laughing and looked more scared than excited.

The joyride was over.
The End

Of Art Festivals

2006-02-05T16:45:00.000+05:30

I just found out from the The Unknown Indian's blog that Vasantahabba has been cancelled for the second year in a row. Vasantahabba, is a festival of dance and music that runs from sunset to sunrise on the first weekend of February, on the outskirts of Bangalore. It is usually held at Nrityagram, the dance school founded by the late Protima Bedi. 2005 saw the organizers canceling it to pay respect to the memory of the victims of the December 2004 Tsunami. This year though, the festival was cancelled due to lack of funds.

I attended Vasantahabba on a visit to Bangalore in 2001 and have been aching to go back ever since. It was definitely one of the best experiences I've had, ever. To find out how to make sure there is a Vasantahabba 2007, check this post.

I'm in Bombay for the weekend on some personal work and have been seeing huge billboards all over the place advertising the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival. From coverage at the official blog it seems to be an event that no art lover in Bombay should miss. Now I don't consider myself to be one of those artsy/intellectual types, but I'm still not happy that I'm probably not going to be able to take advantage of my trip to Bombay to see some of the events, like for example "Prayog" - An experiment in Bharatnatyam at Rampart Row.

But if you can, do check out the schedule and take advantage of this once-a-year amalgam of art. There's an HTML-only version of the schedule here if you have any trouble with the PDF link.

Update: Do check out the contests hosted at Caferati as part of the fest. The deadline for the Flash Fiction contest is gone (unless there's another extension) but the SMS Poetry contest is still on. So get your entries in quick!

Baby Talk: The BlogLand Chronicles - 4

2006-02-03T02:30:00.000+05:30

First: Beginning: The BlogLand Chronicles - 1
Previous: Republic Day: The BlogLand Chronicles - 3

Anil and I were discussing the different love songs King Kong could have sung had he only bothered to learn Hindi, when Prakash walked into BlogLand.

"Hey, Prakash!" I said. "How's the baby coming along?" Prakash's wife had given birth to their first child a couple of weeks before. Ever since then, that was the only thing he could talk about.

"Oh, don't even ask," he replied as he sat down at our table, holding his head in his hands.

"Why, what happened?" I asked, concerned. Until the last conversation, which was only a few days ago, talking about the baby was what made him happiest.

"She sleeps all day, and stays awake all night."

"Sounds like my kind of kid," I said.

But he ignored me and continued. "I've hardly slept the whole of last week! Half the night she's up and crying for no apparent reason. Then other times, she needs to be fed, or changed. We've decided to share the chores, and since Sarita does the feeding, I'm stuck with changing the diapers. Have you ever changed a baby's diapers?"

"No way!" said Anil. "And thank goodness for that!"

"Me neither," I said. "It's bad, is it?"

"Trust me," he replied, "you don't know what shit loads of something means, until you've seen the inside of a baby's nappy."

Both of us roared with laughter, and even Prakash grinned. "That was a good one, wasn't it?"

"Priceless!" said Anil, still laughing.

"Why doesn't she bottle up the milk so you can share both the chores?" I asked.

"Oh, you think I didn't try suggesting that? You see, changing diapers is one of the ways I compensate for not being able to share the pain of child birth."

"I can see that being married is a lot of fun," grinned Anil. "Shit loads of fun, to be precise!" And he started laughing again.

"So," I smiled, "the wife and kid are coming along fine, I take it?"

"Oh, wonderfully. If it hadn't been for the lack of sleep, I'd almost say this was the most fun I've ever had!"

"Can't be more fun than your honeymoon," Anil pointed out.

"True," said Prakash. "But that was a different sort of fun. And the joy of looking at that little bundle of flesh knowing she'll call you Daddy one day, is unbelievable. It's even worth changing diapers for that. Just wait till you have one of your own."

"I'm in no hurry!" Anil looked horrified.

"You're definitely a long way from even worrying about that, if you ask me," I teased. "By the way, how's your girlfriend?"

"Friend who's a girl. Not girlfriend. She's fine. We might watch a play next week. You've finally decided to stop bugging me about meeting her on the internet, have you?"

"Let's just say I'm tired of preaching to a deaf ear."

"Why can't you accept that you were being unnecessarily paranoid?"

"Being paranoid keeps you safe."

"And single!"

And he started laughing again. "Hey Mike!" he shouted at the man sitting a few tables away. "Read anything funny lately?"

Mike looked up from his book and said, "As a matter of fact, I just started Terry Pratchett's The Wee Free Men, which is quite funny. After all, it's Pratchett. But I can't say the same about the last three books I read."

"Which ones?" I asked.

"Philip Pullman's first two His Dark Materials books, and Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter."

"Are they any good?"

"Oh, they're fantastic, all three of them. I'm aching to read the last in Pullman's trilogy. He's got one fantastic imagination. But the bookstore was out of stock when I last checked. And Hawthorne takes you back to the 1600s, and compares the life in the US then, with life in 1850. You get a trip to two different time frames, in the same book."

"So the English used in the Scarlet Letter isn't giving you any trouble?" I asked. Mike had complained about that when he read The Pickwick Papers.

"Well, for one, The Scarlet Letter is much shorter. And I guess it's a little easier once you get used to it. Just like reading Shakespeare." With that he returned to his book.

"What's so difficult about reading Shakespeare?" asked Anil.

"I don't think he was referring to the condensed shorter versions you read in school when you were ten," I pointed out.

"You mean those weren't the originals?"

And we all laughed.

Separation

2006-01-31T19:00:00.000+05:30

"Don't leave me!" he screamed, sobbing, his cheeks wet with tears.

He was on his knees, tightly holding on to her hand, trying to stop her from walking away. She was sobbing too, as she pulled her hand away.

"Please don't make this more difficult," she cried, freeing her hand from his.

"Don't go! I'm begging you!"

But she turned around and left anyway, running out through the open door to the taxi that was waiting for her - a shameless witness to their grief.

"Please! he cried through the open door, as he collapsed on to the floor. Please!"

But the taxi sped away. And he lay on the floor, curling up into a ball, sobbing against his knees, as even the setting sun disappeared over the horizon, leaving him alone with only his tears, just like she had.

Republic Day: The BlogLand Chronicles - 3

2006-01-26T23:59:00.000+05:30

First: Beginning: The BlogLand Chronicles - 1
Previous: Going South: The BlogLand Chronicles - 2

"Hi!" said Manish as he came in to BlogLand and sat down with Anil and me.

"Hello," I replied. "And Happy People Again Day."

"What?"

"Re-Public?"

"Ouch!" he groaned. "That's the pits."

"Oh, come on," I said. "Anil didn't like it either. I thought it was a good one."

"Well, in that case, your sense of humour is probably dead," said Anil.

"Anyway," he continued. "Guess who I'm taking to see King Kong tonight."

"You have a date?" asked Manish, surprised.

"You're going out with that internet girl again?" I said.

"Why do you have a problem with her, anyway?"

"You're going out with someone you met on the internet?" Manish had a lot of catching up to do.

"Yes he is," I replied. "And I don't have a problem with her personally, but I just don't think it's safe."

"Man, you're paranoid. I'm not a five-year-old!"

"How did you meet her?" asked Manish.

"In an internet chat room," I replied for Anil.

His eyes widened as he looked at me and then at Anil. "Cool!"

"So you don't think there's anything wrong with meeting someone you know only through a chat room?" I asked.

"Of course not," he replied. "People have been making friends without meeting them for a very long time now. First there were pen-friends, then phone-friends, then email and chat friends, and now people meet through blogs and SMS. The medium may be changing, but the concept is the same. There has always been an element of risk involved, but as long as you take the usual precautions, it's no big deal."

Anil smiled. "Okay, you win," I sighed. "Hope you enjoy your evening."

"How come you're taking her to an action movie, though?" asked Manish. "Shouldn't you have picked a chick-flick or something?"

"Oh, the movie was her pick. I was going to suggest Chicken Little. But once she suggested King Kong, I thought I'd keep my mouth shut."

We all laughed. That's the problem with stereotypes. Lots of men like poetry, and lots of women prefer sports. But while women are free to display masculine interests, the reverse can get a man laughed at. A man who knows how to knit a sweater will probably pretend he doesn't know how to hold a knitting needle.

"Ugh!" came a voice from the next table. Mike was slowly closing a book and putting it down on his table with a disgusted look on his face.

"Was it that bad?" Anil asked him.

"Extremely," said Mike as he turned to look at us.

"Which book?" I asked.

"One Night @ The Call Centre," he replied. "Chetan Bhagat. The guy's first book was quite readable, even if it wasn't spectacular. This one is the pits. Some parts are nice, but the rest..."

He obviously was finding it hard to put his feelings into words.

"How about that other book your were reading," said Anil. "Inscrutable Americans, I think it was?"

"Oh, that was really good," Mike said immediately. "Wonderfully written. Anurag Mathur is extremely funny most of the time, and can get quite serious too when he wants to." He turned to look at the book he had just finished reading. "But this..." He looked like he had been forced to bite a live frog.

"Well," I said. "Hope you have something better to read next. You shouldn't have to end People Again Day with something that makes you look like that."

"People what day?" said Mike. "Oh. Republic. That was pathetic."

Manish and Anil laughed. "I really think you should give it up," said Anil. "It really is a bad joke."

"Fine!" I shrugged.

Next: Baby Talk: The BlogLand Chronicles - 4

Sound of Music: Celestial Conversations - XXIV

2006-01-24T00:45:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: One of Us: Celestial Conversations - XXIII

God: Hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm.
Me: Hunh?
God: Hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm.
Me: God?
God: Yes?
Me: What are You doing?
God: Oh, I'm humming. Couldn't you tell?
Me: Well it's not like I can hear anything.
God: Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't know you were deaf.
Me: I'm not deaf.
God: But you just said you can't hear anything.
Me: I meant I couldn't hear you humming.
God: But of course I knew that. It's not like this is voice chat or anything.
Me: But... but...
God: Oh forget it. By the way, can you read music?
Me: Actually, I can.
God: Oh, good. Ting ting ting ting ting ting ting.
Me: What are you doing now?
God: Playing the piano. Guess which song this tune is from. Ting ting ting ting ting ting ting.
Me: How am I supposed to do that?
God: You just said you can read music.
Me: Yes, but I can't read that!
God: Excuses, excuses. Anyway. It's Joan Osborne's What if God was one of us.
Me: Ah.
God: Yes, Lucifer played the song for me, and made Me believe people knew I was living right here on earth.
Me: So how did you find out he was lying?
God: Oh, he told Me, of course. He always does in the end.
Me: Oh, I didn't expect that. Considering he's the Devil, I must say it was pretty nice of him.
God: Don't say that in front of him. He'll probably burst into tears. I think he's been getting a little soft.
Me: You do?
God: Yes. He delegates most of his work these days. No more stalking the world to grow the kingdom of Hell. No more promising people riches for their souls.
Me: Yes, he was telling me. He said most people weren't truly evil, and you can't really change that.
God: Oh, he's just making excuses. He isn't really looking for truly evil people. What he really wants to do is buy as many souls as he can, just like he's been doing for millennia.
Me: Oh. But then doesn't he have a real estate problem to deal with? And I thought there were only around two hundred people in Hell anyway.
God: Oh, Luci's too smart for that. He buys the souls, but charges them rent if they want to live on the premises. The two hundred odd souls in Hell are on a scholarship program. You see, souls can't earn any money. So the rest have no option but to stay on Earth.
Me: Oh, that story.
God: Yes. But anyway. The truth is he can't afford to buy souls anymore.
Me: Can't afford to?
God: Yes. He lost a lot of money when the dot-com bubble burst.
Me: Oh. He invests in stocks does he?
God: Of course. Well, he used to, at least. Where do you think his unending piles of money came from? But he's too scared after the last crash. And extremely poor too. I only came to know a couple of months ago when Hitler told me that Luci hasn't been able to pay wages for the last few years. Though if you ask Me, I doubt if he's ever had a paying job in Hell in the first place.
Me: Why were you speaking to Hitler?
God: Oh, Hitler's the current receptionist at Hell.
Me: Hitler's a receptionist?
God: Yes. Luci believes in maintaining appearances, you see. At one time he'd hired James Earl Jones. Then he switched to Richard Roxburgh. That man learned how to really affect the evil look from Luci himself. He got picked to play Count Dracula in a movie! But after that he upped his rates, and now Luci can't afford to pay him anymore. So he's got one of his own boys to do the job. Because you always need a receptionist.
Me: If You say so.
God: Anyway. I've got to go now. I need to speak to Joan Osborne.
Me: Why?
God: I want to make sure she doesn't really know I'm here on earth.
Me: Oh. But how will You know for sure?
God: Oh, that's simple. I'll go and ask her. She won't be able to lie to Me.
Me: So You'll tell her who You are, and ask her if she believes You are on earth?
God: Yes... Oh. Good point. So you think I shouldn't meet her?
Me: I guess not.
God: Hmm. Okay. Thanks. Bye then.
Me: Bye.

Next: Till Debt Do Us Part: Celestial Conversations - XXV

Candle In No Wind

2006-01-19T21:45:00.000+05:30

All the controversy with the design awards at the Indibloggies reminded me that I'd made updates to my own blog's design more than four months ago, and had been sitting on them since September. So here it is.

I did make a few minor tweaks between going live with my previous template and now though, so the following is a summary of all changes since June 2005.

The most obvious change, of course, is the new template theme. The candle in the background is a public domain image I got from PD Photo.org. I used The GIMP as usual for all image manipulation.
The second most obvious change if you're not using Internet Explorer is that the blog seems to float over the background (which remains fixed). The effect is based on the Complex Spiral demo by Eric Meyer. The effect breaks quite badly in IE because of a bug in Microsoft's implementation of CSS, so I used special styles to override it for IE 6 and below. The result isn't especially great to look at, but there's no other way out without using JavaScript. So if you want to see how I envisioned the design of this blog, please use Firefox. Any other standards-compliant browser should work fine too, of course.
You should no longer have a horizontal scrollbar if you're using Firefox at a screen resolution of 800x600. Other browsers seem to have a broken implementation of min-width and max-width, so if you're not using Firefox, you'll still need to scroll horizontally. Firefox users at a higher resolution will see a wider layout.
You can no longer make the Sidebar disappear, though sidebar sections still collapse (try clicking on the section title). I have the feeling most of you weren't even aware that this was possible before, but with the fixed background, IE made the effect difficult.
Haloscan trackbacks are gone. I wasn't really using them anyway, so I replaced them with Blogger's back-links (This was done a couple of months ago).
The blog should look better on machines without Verdana if you have the Bit Stream Vera Sans font installed. I had noticed that browsers without Verdana made this blog look quite ugly. (This change was made in July or August last year)

The change took between 24-30 hours to implement, more than half of which went into creation and tweaking of the images. The rest was mostly spent tracing and getting around different browser bugs (most of them IE of course, though Opera did give me some trouble).

Barring some minor html layout tweaks, this is mostly a CSS update, and a pretty simple one at that. If anyone is interested in using or modifying this template for their own blog, let me know and I'll be glad to share it with you.

This blog template was tested on Firefox 1.5, IE 6.0 and Opera 8.5 on Windows XP. I tested it on Linux a long time ago, and I'm hoping nothing's broken since then. Of course, I could easily have missed something (and I know that 2-3% of you use other browsers like Safari and Konqueror), so if you see something breaking, please let me know.

The old design is still available at Geek Whorled - my dormant technical blog.

Now, back to regular (or should I say irregular?) programming.

One Of Us : Celestial Conversations - XXIII

2006-01-16T14:20:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Stop! Thief! : Celestial Conversations - XXII

Me: Hello?

The Devil has logged in.

Devil: Hi!
Me: What the ...!
Devil: Oh, please continue. What were you going to say? What the Devil? What the Hell?
Me: What are you doing here?
Devil: Is there a problem? It's a free world isn't it?
Me: Where is God? I haven't spoken to Him in almost six months!
Devil: Oh, Him. He he! He's in hiding.
Me: Hiding?
Devil: Oh, yes. Ha ha! Ho ho ho! He he -
Me: Will you stop guffawing like a hyena? Why is God hiding? And where?
Devil: If I told you where, there would be no point in Him hiding, would there?
Me: But why does God need to hide?
Devil: Oh, that's my fault! He he he!
Me: Your fault? Why would God need to hide from you?
Devil: He isn't hiding from me! He's hiding from the world! Ha ha ha!
Me: And why exactly is He hiding from the world?
Devil: I told Him... he he he... I told Him... ha ha ha... I told Him that people were on to Him. That they knew that He was right here on earth living like He were a normal human being. I told Him that His cover was blown! Ho ho ho!
Me: And He believed you?
Devil: Of course He did! I gave him proof!
Me: What proof?
Devil: I made him listen to that song by Joan Osborne. What if God was one of us? That convinced him!
Me: You know, you are really...
Devil: Evil? Thank you!
Me: And why have you come here to bother me? You looking for another convert?
Devil: Oh, no no! I'm just here for some fun. And anyway, you don't convert people to evil.
Me: What about devil-worshippers?
Devil: Oh, them. Those guys are an embarrassment, really.
Me: Embarrassment? But they worship you.
Devil: Oh, come on! I'm not looking for people to worship me!
Me: No?
Devil: Of course not! I only want people to be evil and do evil things. Not draw stuff on the ground and light candles!
Me: Oh. But they do a lot of bad things as part of their rituals.
Devil: Kids stuff, actually. But the worst thing is that people are actually beginning to recognize Satanism as a religion!
Me: A religion?!
Devil: Yes! Which would make me a God!
Me: Uh...
Devil: The ignominy! Me, a God! I'll never live it down! So many centuries of hard work, and what do I get? They're calling me a God!
Me: So what is it you want, then?
Devil: For people to do evil, damn it! To spread hate. To cleanse themselves of all good thoughts. To do bad things not because they thing it's the right thing to do, but in spite of knowing that it's the wrong thing to do! You have no idea how many people out there steal, lie, and commit murder and adultery, justifying it to themselves as the right course of action given the circumstances, or because they think they have no other option. And so many do all these things only out of stupidity!
Me: But it's all the same isn't it?
Devil: No, it's not! The means doesn't justify the end. You humans define Evil as actions and thoughts that are "morally bad". In my books, you're not truly evil unless your actions defy your own morals.
Me: But you don't think that these people out there committing murder are good, do you?
Devil: Of course not. There are just as few truly good people out there, as there are truly evil people. But I'm getting tired of this argument. I'd come here to enjoy myself. Not to realize how badly I'm doing my job. Goodbye.
Me: Bye.

Next: Sound of Music: Celestial Conversations - XXIV

Going South: The BlogLand Chronicles - 2

2006-01-09T04:30:00.000+05:30

First: Beginning: The BlogLand Chronicles - 1

"You should meet my new girlfriend," said Pankaj, as I tried to concentrate on putting my latest blog idea to words.

"Mm-hm," I responded, trying not to get distracted, and at the same time also trying my best not to seem rude.

"She's a Saudi babe," he went on.

Maybe I'm prejudiced, but the sound of those two words in the same sentence somehow didn't seem right, and as my blog idea evaporated, I turned to look at him. "A what?"

"A Saudi babe," he repeated. "You know."

I had an image in my head of Pankaj dating a woman in a black burqa but somehow the image didn't make sense. Pankaj's girlfriends tended to be women who were interested in the latest fashion trends. They looked at my three-year-old straight-fit jeans with disgust. "They're so nineties," one had said. "They're so out of fashion, if you hold on to them a little longer they'll probably come back." That was good advice. Jeans don't come cheap.

"No I don't know," I said to Pankaj. I don't know why people say "You know" like that. As if saying that will make it come true!

"Man, sometimes you're so dense it's infuriating. Oh, here she comes."

"Hey honey!" he shouted in the direction of the door, and a very Indian looking girl walked in. And she was not wearing a burqa either. Instead, she was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt that must have made it extremely difficult to breathe. And her name was Mohini.

As Pankaj made the introductions and headed towards the counter to get their coffees, Mohini sat down at my table. "Pankaj told me you're a blogger," she said.

"Yes, I am," I replied, wondering if she thought it was a job description. "And you're from the middle-east."

She seemed stunned. "Not at all! In fact I've never been outside India."

"Oh?" I replied, completely confused. Pankaj changed girlfriends practically every week. Was he confusing this one with someone else?

"I'm from Kerala," she said. "I've lived there most of my life."

"Like I was telling you," said Pankaj coming back with two glasses of Cold Coffee in his hands. "A total Southern chick."

She must have liked being called something that's just hatched from an egg, because they both grinned widely at that. I was wondering why Pankaj equated South-Indian women with Saudi women when I realized that he'd being pronouncing the 'th' in 'Southie' like the 'th' in 'Southern', so I just smiled.

"Mohini is a terrific singer," bragged Pankaj.

"Oh, that's nice," I smiled. In that T-shirt? Talk about breath control.

"Yes, she's performed on Radio too!"

"Oh, Pankaaaaj!" she drawled. "You're embarrassing me!"

Ugh! Why do women say things they clearly don't mean? Pankaj knew she was clearly enjoying the bragging, so he went on to talk about how she'd trained as a dancer for years and sung professionally, and won medals for gymnastics, and...

I have an uncle who claims he can sleep with his eyes open. It was very helpful in college, he's told me. I wished I could do that right then.

After what seemed like an eternity, they were done with their coffees (Mohini only had half of hers because she had to 'watch her figure', even though I thought that was Pankaj's job) and the two of them left.

I thought I'd finally be able to get some blogging done when my friend Anil walked in with a girl who must have been his "internet date". She was extremely beautiful and Anil was looking triumphant. If she didn't end up robbing him by the end of the week, he was going to make me eat every single word I had ever uttered against the idea of looking for women in internet chat-rooms.

Luckily for me, he didn't bring her over to my table to brag. I watched them as he pulled out her chair for her, trying to be the perfect gentleman. Relieved, I returned to writing my latest blog post, and reading a dozen others.

After around an hour, Anil sat down at my table. I looked up and noticed that the girl seemed to have left. Anil was grinning ear to ear.

"So?" he asked.

"She looked quite beautiful," I said honestly.

"See?" he beamed. "I told you that you were wrong!"

"Fine," I replied. "So she's probably not a truck driver. But you still don't know anything about her."

"You're such a pessimist!" he laughed. "Don't worry. I'm in no danger of being murdered in the near future. Or being robbed, either. I'm not giving her my address until I have some more background. I'm not stupid, you know."

I was quite surprised. I'd expected Anil to have proposed marriage on the first date. He usually came across as quite a desperate character. I realized it was probably all just an act.

When I didn't say anything, he smiled. "Ah, you don't know."

I smiled too. "I must say that I seem to have misjudged you."

"Yes, you did," he said. Turning to look at Mike the book-lover, Anil shouted, "Mike, my man!"

"Do you have to shout?" muttered Mike who was sitting only one table away.

Anil grinned. "New book, I see? So you finally finished that Pickwick book?"

"The Pickwick Papers. Yes. Finally finished it last night." It had been the first instance we'd known, of Mike taking a week to finish a book.

"And what's that you're reading now?"

"Anurag Mathur's Inscrutable Americans," Mike replied. "I realized that I'd never gotten around to reading it."

"Tell me how you like it when you're done."

"Why?" said Mike. "Don't tell me you actually plan to read the book!"

"No way!" said Anil. "I just want to sound intelligent the next time someone talks about Indian authors!"

I sighed with relief. Now that was the Anil I knew.

Next: Republic Day: The BlogLand Chronicles - 3

Beginning: The BlogLand Chronicles - 1

2005-12-30T16:43:00.000+05:30

There I was sitting in BlogLand, sipping on the last dregs of an Ice Mocha Moka (I wonder where they come up with these names), waiting for Anil. He was supposed to have met me there two hours before, which explained the three empty glasses of Moka next to my laptop.

I was in the middle of a debate with myself about whether I should order a fourth Moka or not, when Anil walked in.

"Sorry, man! Totally forgot about you. I got busy chatting."

Now Anil was the perfect example of the kind of guy who shouldn't have any luck with women on the internet. The scary thing was, he managed to befriend a new girl every week, and would spend hours chatting with them online.

"Why do you do it, Anil?" I asked.

"Do what?" he replied, as if he didn't know what I was referring to. We'd had a number of conversations about my disapproval of his trying to meet women in chat rooms.

"This obsession of yours, of course."

"I really don't understand why you have this problem with my attempts to get a girlfriend."

"A girlfriend? In a chat room? A girlfriend out of a conversation that begins with A/S/L? Anil, these women you're meeting could be 53-year-old male truck drivers, for all you know!"

"Man, you could be a 53-year-old truck driver, for all I know." After a pause, he added, "Well, in a quarter of a century or so."

I glared at him.

"Anyway, I'm meeting her for coffee tomorrow."

"What?!" I was stunned. "You're meeting this one?"

"Yep. Right here."

"Here? What if she's a he? And what if she's a serial killer! Anil, BlogLand is a coffeehouse for bloggers. I won't let you desecrate this place by bringing your chat room flings here."

"Serial killer? Desecrate? I think you've lost your marbles for sure this time. And anyway, BlogLand is a coffeehouse that also provides special services for bloggers. It's not a temple. And I really don't think BJ has any intention of driving away paying customers."

I looked at BJ - the proprietor of BlogLand - for support as he sat behind the counter. BJ just looked at me and shrugged.

BJ was a retired blogger. No one knew what his screen name had been, though he'd mentioned that he had been very popular when he blogged, and that the pressure to blog everyday had just become too much.

He'd started BlogLand a year before, with the intention of making blogging tools more accessible. The place was essentially a coffeehouse/internet-center that provided the added service of helping customers with their blogging needs. You could hire a laptop for an hour that came with wireless internet access and pre-installed blogging tools. If you had a laptop, you could hook on to BlogLand's wireless network for a fee. If you ordered something to eat or drink, the internet access was free. BJ also helped customers make changes to their blog designs, and if the need arose, he'd help them fix a broken blog. If you didn't have a blog, BJ would encourage you to start one and show you how. If you were interested in reading blogs instead of writing them, there was always BJ's daily recommended-reading list.

BJ wouldn't turn away non-believers (that was the term he used for people who didn't write or read blogs). He'd just try to convert them. And if that didn't work, there was always coffee.

"What's your problem with chat rooms anyway?" continued Anil. "I've never seen you complain about Bloggers' Meets. How come meeting strangers through a blog is okay, but meeting people in chat rooms is considered an act of desperation? It's just hypocrisy, I think."

"Oh, come on! When you meet someone through a blog, you've read the stuff they write. They've read stuff you write. There's a bit of background. Bloggers' meets are not about desperate single men and women!"

"Internet chat rooms aren't all about desperate men or women either. But how can you be so sure that what you say, is true for every single person out there meeting someone through a blog?"

He had me there. And he knew it. He also knew that I hated losing an argument. So by way of changing the topic, he looked at my three glasses of Ice Mocha Moka and said, "I'm going to order an Espresso. One more for you?"

I nodded.

As he brought the drinks back to the table, Anil looked at my glass and said, "Why do you insist on having this horrid concoction all the time? And four of them in a row?"

"It's not horrid," I said, taking my glass from him. "It's quite nice, in fact. Also, it's one of the few things BJ has with no coffee in it. You know I hate coffee."

"Yes. You hate the smell. You're weird. I mean, who in this world, hates the smell of coffee?!"

"I do. And," I continued, "do you need me to remind you that I've been waiting here for you, for the past two hours?"

Anil laughed. "Man, I thought you'd have forgotten about that by now!"

"Hey Mikeo!" he called at the T-shirt clad, spectacle-wearing man at the next table. Mike, as usual, was reading a book while sipping on a large cappuccino. He had a blog in which he mostly wrote book reviews. He read two or three books in a week, and a few times he'd hit as many as seven books in seven days.

"Yeah?" Mike growled. He didn't like being disturbed when he was reading, and Anil loved to do exactly that.

"What book are you reading?" he asked.

"Dickens's The Pickwick Papers."

"Well, how is it?"

"I've been reading it for over a week now," he replied sullenly.

"A week?!" said Anil, genuinely shocked. "How thick is it anyway? You've been reading that for more than seven days?" Mike had finished Lord of the Rings in six days.

"It's seven hundred and fifty pages of tiny text, and has English from 1836. I'm almost done, though. Do you know what a portmanteau is?"

"Port man toe?" repeated Anil. "The toe of a man who works at a port, maybe?"

"It's a sort of suitcase."

"Then why don't they call it that in the first place?"

Mike rolled his eyes.

"So is it any good?"

"Yes, actually it is really good. The humour is sometimes subtle and at other times extremely loud. The characterization is simply amazing. And of course reading something from two centuries ago also gives you a wonderful insight into the culture of that time."

"Right," said Anil blankly. Mike shrugged and returned to his book.

Anil turned back to me and said, "If you gave me a book that was seven hundred and fifty pages long with words like Port-Man-Toe, I'd take a month to read it."

"Anil, you'd take a month to read a Famous Five book. I think you'd find The Pickwick Papers a little heavy for your consumption."

"I didn't understand that last word you used," he said.

We both laughed.

Next: Going South: The BlogLand Chronicles - 2

Of All The...

2005-12-28T01:00:00.000+05:30

There's a concierge service in the office. Which means that you can book movie tickets, train tickets, bus tickets, and pay your bills, all without leaving the office.

Yes. The management is really smart.

Well, I approached the concierge desk today, as I was planning to spend new year's eve with friends in Bangalore.

"Hi," I said. "I want to book tickets for Bangalore this weekend. To Bangalore Friday night, and back Sunday morning."

"Are tickets available?"

For a second, I wondered why my voice sounded different. And then I realized that the guy at the desk was asking me.

I looked around a little to ensure that I wasn't talking to the wrong person.

Nope. The board on his desk said "Concierge Desk". Right Desk at least.

"You work for the concierge service, right?" I asked, wanting to be sure.

"Yes, of course," he said, pointing to the board.

"So," I tried again. "About those tickets..."

"Are they available?" he repeated.

"Umm... err.."

"If you can find out if tickets are available, that would be helpful," he continued. "How much do the tickets cost?"

I didn't know what to say. I still don't.

Faces

2005-12-17T02:00:00.000+05:30

I'm not very good with remembering faces. In fact, I'm not very good with names either. And to be frank, I'm even less good at putting names and faces together.

It's not that I have a memory problem, as such. Not at all. I still remember climbing up and down the staircase in my uncle's house in London when I was two. I also remember befriending a priest on the flight back home. I remember things I did in the US when I was nine. I even remember conversations I've had when I was ten.

But when it comes to faces and names, I think the associated part of my brain is probably missing some nervous tissue. (Yes, I know. The whole of my brain is probably missing some nervous tissue. But can we not get into that now?)

To give you an example, every time I return to Chennai after a trip to the US, I bump into people who I'm supposed to know, but I just cannot place. I may be casually walking towards the cafeteria, when someone vaguely familiar will come up and say "Hi!"

Now, I may not be a master of tact, but I do try my best (yes, I know it isn't good enough, but that's another story) not to be rude. So instead of saying "Who are you?" I say "Hi", ask some random questions like "So which project are you working for now?" and "How are you doing?" and move on, wondering where I know this person from. Attempts at looking at their ID card to get their name, are not always successful. After all I don't want it to be obvious.

There are some people who I know quite well, and remember exactly how I know them, but their names will always elude me. Then there are people whose names I remember very clearly, but I would have trouble recognizing exactly which of the four people sitting in that room is, say, "Mahesh".

A friend once introduced me to his girlfriend, who seemed to know me, though I didn't recognize her at all. "We played carrom together earlier this year," she said. "Oh yes!" was my reply. I still don't know what she was talking about.

A couple of weeks ago, I was passing someone in the corridor who looked familiar, and immediately said "Hi!" Now it would have been fine, except that she seemed a little taken aback at this, even though she did respond. In the sixty seconds that I spent talking to her, I realized she was probably just someone I'd seen around the office and had never actually spoken to, and that she was just too polite to point that out. I still don't know what her name is.

And yesterday, I ran into someone who (1) did not look familiar and (2) whose name I did not recognize either. That, of course, didn't stop us from having a conversation that lasted at least two minutes. I even answered his question of "So how long has it been since we met last?", correctly. I was pretty proud of myself at that. I have this sneaky suspicion though, that I really don't know him and that he actually mistook me for someone else.

But the most interesting example of this fault of mine is from a while back.

(Note: Names have been altered)

I'd joined a new project at work, and was told I'd be working with Bhavna, though we wouldn't be sitting together initially. Bhavna was someone I'd seen around the office and whose name I definitely recognized, though I may have only spoken to her once.

She'd come over to my seat, we'd discussed something, and I'd then proceeded to work in it. At some point, I decided I wasn't clear about something and that I needed to discuss it further. I'd forgotten to take her extension, so I decided I'd just go over to her seat and talk to her. She only sat a couple of cubicles away anyway.

[For the benefit of the non-technically inclined out there, and also due to non-disclosure agreements with our clients, I'm going to replace all the technical words in the following conversation with completely irrelevant non-technical ones. It won't make any sense either way.]

Me: Hey Bhavna, I have a question about the {evolutionary tendencies of tadpoles}...

She: [turning to me, and realizing that I'm speaking to her] Oh, I'm sorry, I wasn't listening. Can you please start again?

Me: Oh. Okay. Well, it's about the {tadpoles} see? I mean I know we're supposed to {get them to give birth to monkeys} but don't you think that {was exactly what my mother warned me about} ? See, on the one hand you have {tadpoles} and on the other hand you have {orangutans} and somehow I think they just don't seem to go together. I mean even if we could get that to happen, {who would feed the little apes}? There'll always be the risk of {the babies swallowing their moms}...

[She'd looked quite blank when I'd started speaking, and she continued to look just as blank as I rambled on. And then I realized that that wasn't Bhavna. I knew her, and had spoken to her before - spoken to her more than I'd spoken to Bhavna at least - but she definitely was not Bhavna. And she'd probably not heard me call her that either.]

Me: Well, anyway, so I was a little confused about that. By the way, do you know where Bhavna sits?

She: [probably thinking I was a little nuts (okay, extremely nuts)] Oh, I think over in that cubicle.

Me: Thanks.

[At this point, I sort of slinked away.]

Imagine talking to two different people over a period of time - people who don't even look alike - and believing they are the same person. At least Jaggu had an excuse in Chaalbaaz (1989).

So, now that you know my little secret, the next time you run into me, and go "Hi! Where have you been?!", if I look a little blank, please don't mind, okay?

Defeat

2005-12-08T00:00:00.000+05:30

One more short short.

War

"How long before they reach the castle?"

"Our army will probably be able to hold them off for an hour at the most."

"And the secret passageway out of the city?"

"It was never finished, your highness."

"Well then," said the king. "I'm off to sleep."

"Sleep?"

"I always wanted to die in my sleep."

The End

We Don't Need No Sex Education

2005-11-19T00:45:00.000+05:30

Mob Storms Condom Company

Reuter: A mob carrying placards saying 'Off With Condoms' and 'We Don't Need No Rubber' stormed the offices of Durex at J. N. Nagar yesterday. The protesters claimed that by selling condoms the multinational company was encouraging people to fornicate.

"Why would you need condoms unless you wanted to have sex outside the confines of marriage?" said one man. "This is all part of a master plan to bring the dirty western culture to our country and to corrupt our youth!" Another protester suggested that western condom companies were paying movie and sports stars to promote immoral behaviour.

Shouting slogans of "Let's burn that rubber!", the mob tore down the gates of the Durex building, smashed windows and beat up security personnel.

In an unrelated incident, a transport truck carrying five thousand condoms was reported stolen from the Durex building on the same day.

This hasn't happened yet, to my knowledge. But it doesn't seem too far off, does it?

Salaam Bombay!

2005-10-29T06:15:00.000+05:30

Warning: This is a pointless post. As in, it's more pointless than my usual posts. So if you are interested in reading the usual comparatively less-pointless stuff that I irregularly churn out, come back in a couple of days. I'll try to make sure you're not disappointed.

It's been a hectic two weeks selling my car, TV, Foosball table, and other assorted stuff, wrapping up work, and packing everything I own into two suitcases. There's been no time to blog, and even lesser time to respond to comments. And now I'm finally back in Aamchi Mumbai for a couple of weeks of vacation time before I get back to the grind in Chennai.

I've observed a few things in the last few days, though.

Air India isn't that bad

No, really. They're not as rude as, say, Air France, not as off-schedule as, say, North-West, and not as uncomfortable as Biman Air. They get you from one spot to the other, and they do it fairly well considering that they have a plane full of Indians to deal with at the same time.

I'd forgotten how warm Bombay can be in October

It's raining in Chennai these days, and even that city has lower temperature than aamchi Mumbai. Thank goodness for air-conditioning.

I hate Zee TV more than I thought I did

I mean, really. My mother insists on watching every episode of every Ekta Kapoor show on TV, and I can't bring myself to be in the same room when one of them is running, for more than five minutes at a time.

Broadband in India is expensive

I mean MTNL wants me to pay Rs 1199 (a month!) for a 256 kbps connection with a 1.25 GB download limit. And my brother's 64 kbps/unlimited download cable connection doesn't allow me to set up my router so I can hook my laptop into the connection. Well, at least they say I can't. To he** with them.

I may call it writer's block, but I'm just too darned lazy

Really. I've been sitting on at least five blog ideas for a couple of months now. And instead of putting pen to paper (or to be more accurate, finger to keyboard), I've been spending my time reading Schlock Mercenary, Real Life Comics, and Down To Earth. I'll tell you, Web Comics can be extremely addictive. Specially if you decide you want to read through all the archives.

Enough rambling, I think. I intend to be back to more-frequent-than-regular blogging in the next couple of days.

Based On A True Story

2005-10-13T13:15:00.000+05:30

This post comes to you with inspiration from Films Division (Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India). The specific movie that this post came from, can be found here (link courtesy the wonderful goings-on at the clouds).

This post is also based on a true story that has taken the Indian blogosphere by storm. Read all about it.

The Birdies and The Hunter

It was a regular day in the forest and all the birdies were doing the usual stuff - building nests, teaching their kids to fly, and pecking at bird-seed.

The heroine of our story - whom we shall call Bird-E-Vun - was also going about her regular day looking for new piles of bird-seed. On this day, during her search she came across this pile of poisonous bird-seed. The nice birdie that she was, she tried to warn all the other birdies about it. Soon, she met Bird-E-Tu and told him about the poisonous pile too. Soon, Bird-E-Vun and Bird-E-Tu were both telling all their birdie friends about the pile of poisonous bird-seed.

Now this particular pile of bird-seed had been kept there by a vicious hunter, who wanted to catch a lot of birdies by poisoning them. Obviously, he didn't take too kindly to Bird-E-Vun and Bird-E-Tu driving all their little birdie friends away. The hunter first tried calling Bird-E-Vun a liar, and tried to drive her away. He called her names and tried to get her to keep her beak shut. When his tricks didn't work, he decided to trap all the little birdies that were helping Bird-E-Vun and Bird-E-Tu, using nets.

Even when Bird-E-Tu found himself caught in a net, he refused to stop telling his birdie friends that the pile of bird-seed was poisonous. This tale of bravery quickly spread far and wide across the jungle, and soon every birdie was talking about Bird-E-Vun and Bird-E-Tu. One by one, birdies arrived from around the jungle to help our birdie friends. The hunter used this opportunity to trap more little birdies. Seeing this, hundreds of little birdies gathered around the nets and helped lift them off the ground, freeing Bird-E-Tu and all the other little birdies that had got caught. Hundreds more descended on the hunter and started pecking at him. The hunter, scared to see so many birdies suddenly coming after him, turned around and ran far, far away from the jungle, never to trouble the little birdies again.

And all the little birdies lived happily together again.

And it was just the beginning...

Moral of the story: Don't try to stop free speech. Or we'll come after you.

This post may be a little premature, but I believe it will happen. Don't you?

It Takes A Geek

2005-09-30T12:30:00.000+05:30

Long time, no short. Yes, I know. Apologies to those of you who've been disappointed by my update frequency, but work's been a killer.

Anyway. I found the responses to my previous story quite interesting, specially considering that I thought I was responding to popular demand. I should probably have paid more attention to the tale about the Miller and his son. Well, atleast I haven't lost my ass yet.

Whatever. Here's the next one.

Note: This one's just a bit on the geeky side, and requires remembering some grade school physics.

Invisible

They called him a mad scientist.

He looked at his invisibility potion. He'd show them.

So he drank the potion. And every part of him was transparent. Including his eyes.

Refraction stopped working. He was blind.

He could see no one. And no one could see him.

It drove him mad.
The End

Happily...

2005-09-21T00:33:00.000+05:30

People have complained that there's been too much morbidity in my stories recently, and that it shows that there's something wrong with my head. Well, in my defense I've been reading Neil Gaiman's Smoke and Mirrors, and the stories in it are hardly cheerful, if you know what I mean.

Anyway. Here's the next installment of the 55-word story.

Ever After?

They met. They fell in love. They courted.

Soon he got a job, and they got married. They fought a little, but mostly it was a good marriage. They had two children - a boy and a girl.

They lived happily together till he died at the age of seventy-nine. She died a year later.

The End

Now don't tell me that dying of old age is also too morbid.

Excuses...

2005-09-13T10:15:00.000+05:30

After a weekend and a day full of catching up with work, here is another short short.

Hitman

"Twelve," he thought, as he wiped the blade on the body.

They called him a hitman. He called himself a messenger.

"One murder or a dozen, there is only one Hell," he thought to himself as he dragged the body into a bush.

The Devil stood nearby, watching. He smiled.

The End

Jealousy

2005-09-10T00:30:00.000+05:30

This is hard to stop.

Run

Sally won the gold medal for the 100-metre sprint for two years straight. The third year she came second by a hair's width.

That evening they found the winner's dead body in a dumpster. They caught Sally when her motorcycle fell and the bloody knife fell out.

She could run, but she couldn't ride.

The End

Sombre

2005-09-09T07:00:00.000+05:30

Another short story.

Stone

"Why stone?" asked the girl.

"I was alive once," said the gargoyle.

"I too laughed, played, danced, loved...

"And lost.

"It hurt. I cried. The pain was unbearable.

"So I turned into stone. Stone feels no pain."

The girl looked at the gargoyle silently. Then she walked away.

The gargoyle didn't.

The End

Me No Grimm Either

2005-09-08T21:30:00.000+05:30

How about a fairy-tale short short?

Princess Diaries

There was once a princess who slept on a pea and hurt her back. Seven dwarf lawyers sued an evil witch for it. The princess beat the witch with her glass slipper. This broke a spell and the witch turned into a handsome prince. The frog was jealous, but they lived happily ever after.

The End

Me No Agatha Christie

2005-09-08T09:00:00.000+05:30

Here's a murder mystery in 55 words.

Murder

The detectives arrive on the scene.

"Looks like murder," they say. "He's been shot in the chest."

The maid is sobbing. The wife seems to be in shock.

"Do you suspect anyone, ma'am?" they ask the wife.

She looks at them sadly. "The gun's in the cupboard. He was having an affair with the maid."

The End

Aesop Revisited

2005-09-07T21:15:00.000+05:30

Attempt number two (or three, depends on how you're counting) at the tag.
A fable this time.

Slow And Steady

"Race?" suggested the hare.

"Sure," said the tortoise. The tortoise always wins, he thought.

"Ready, set, go!"

The hare bounced away. The tortoise shuffled forward slowly.

I won’t stop for a nap this time, thought the hare. Half way to the finish line, a hunter shot him dead.

The tortoise always wins.

The End

A Love Story In 53 Words

2005-09-07T04:00:00.000+05:30

So what kind of story can you write in less than 55 words? Any kind, really.

Do you?

"Go on!" his friends urge him. "Tell her how you feel. You never know. She may feel the same way about you too."

So he walks over to her. "I love you," he says. "Do you love me too?"

She pauses for a moment before replying. He looks familiar. "No", she decides finally.

The End

More tomorrow. So do come back!

Wham Bam...

2005-09-07T03:30:00.000+05:30

It began here - etcetera - In Brief,
was inspired by this - 55 Fiction
and reached me via him - J. Alfred Prufrock.

To summarize, the tag is to write one or more stories, in less than 55 words each. And since you always pay this kind of thing forward, here are my victims -

Now 55 words is generally not enough for me (even though zero tends to work out fine quite often). So in attempting to write one short short, I ended up with multiple stories. And I suspect there'll be more coming up.

This one's just to warm up -

The Beginning

"Hey," says a voice. "You’ve been tagged. Write a story in 55 words or less."

The blogger awakes.

"55 words," he thinks. "Hmm."

He flexes his fingers. "Let the writing begin..."

The End

3108?

2005-09-01T09:29:00.000+05:30

I'd be grateful if no one noticed that I've cheated by back-dating this post by a couple of hours. I blame this on one of my roommates who used IE (that browser from hell) on some suspicious websites on my laptop over the weekend as a result of which I had to spend a large part of the evening off the network scanning my (mostly full) 60 Gig harddrive for viruses.

Here's a snippet of a conversation I had with a friend today -

"Today is Blog Day," she said.
"Oh, I thought it was Wednesday," I replied.
"My God! Do you really think that was funny?" she asked incredulously.
"No," I said, "but it was definitely worth a try."
"You need help," she said.
"Someone comes up with yet another Hallmark holiday, and I'm the one that needs help?"
"Oh, come on. You're acting like you're Scrooge or something."
"Wow. I've never heard you use that kind of language before."
"No, no! Scrooge! With a G!"
"Scrooge?"
"Yes. From A Christmas Carol?"
"Which one?"
"No, the book!"
"There's a christmas carol that's as long as a book talking about something called Scrooge?"
"Rajesh!"
"Ok, ok! I'm Scrooge."

And that's how it went. More or less.

So, today is Blog Day, or as Technorati calls it, BlogDay2005. And they chose the 31st of August, because '3108', looks like 'Blog' in the forgotten tongue of the Dogonowa tribe of central Africa. Something like that anyway.

Conversation snippet # 2 -

"3108?" I asked. "That's so stupid. It should have been 3106."
"Ah," she replied.
"I'm sure whoever came up with the idea probably didn't want to wait till June next year to celebrate it. So they just went with August."
"The 31st of June?" she asked.
"Yes. But it's two months too late, right? So they probably thought..."
"The 31^st of June?" she repeated.
"Yes?"
"So it's like a leap year then?"
"Oh."

Anyway.

Apparently, today's the day that Bloggers have, that is "dedicated to getting to know other bloggers from other countries and areas of interest. On this day Bloggers will recommend other blogs to their blog visitors." And I'm supposed to find five blogs to link to.

Even though replicating my blogroll here would be quite easy, the intent is to go and discover new blogs (which I shall take to mean blogs I'd not come across before), and recommend five of them to you. Of course, I shall still cheat, and name blogs I've come across only recently, or blogs I don't visit very often but like very much nonetheless.

Samit Basu is India's first SFF (Science Fiction and Fantasy, for the uninitiated) writer. I discovered him fairly recently, when I saw a Terry Pratchett reference to his book The Simoqin Prophecies which was published when we was 23. (Why didn't I drop out of an IIM? Heck, why didn't I ever apply to an IIM?)

Eric Raymond is the geek who's probably most known for his paper The Cathedral And The Bazaar. He knows Terry Pratchett! If only Terry Pratchett had a blog too. Sadly, he doesn't.

But at least Neil Gaiman does. I haven't read Gaiman's Sandman comic books, but I've been hearing a lot of good stuff about them. I have read Good Omens though. He co-authored it with Terry Pratchett.

Post Secret is a blog I drop in at every now and then. Frank Warren asked people to send him postcards with secrets anonymously in November 2004. It was supposed to be his contribution to a Washington DC art exhibition. Today it's a way for people to share their secrets with millions of people around the world. Sometimes funny. Sometimes angry. Mostly very moving.

Kiran Jonnalagadda or Jace for short. He worked for The Jasubhai Group's Digit magazine once, and maintained a technology forum at www.Lunateks.com. I helped him maintain it at one time, until both of us got busy. The site was run off one of Digit's servers until it went offline.

There. Done.

Saving The World, One Clean Vegetable At A Time

2005-08-16T11:00:00.000+05:30

A: So, you are sure about this.
B: Yup.
A: Really.
B: Yup.
A: Writing a comic-book is how you want to begin your career in the literary world.
B: Yup.
A: Okay. Whatever you say.
B: Hey, I'm not kidding. I can draw pretty well. And write a bit.
A: And you won't have to worry about grammar as much.
B: Exactly!
A: But do you have a basic theme for the comic-book?
B: I've thought about that a bit, and I've decided to do a superhero comic-book.
A: Superhero?
B: Yup.
A: Isn't that a little old? I mean almost every kind of super-hero has already been done twice over. What kind of superhero would you create?
B: Oh, I had a couple of ideas about that. But I think I'm going to go with "Mr Clean".
A: Mr Clean?
B: Yup. He turns into a sponge whenever something gets dirty.
A: A sponge?
B: Yup. A big yellow sponge.
A: Umm...
B: And his secret identity will be Robert Bleach.
A: Robert Bleach?
B: Yup. Of course, this comic-book will be targeted at housewives.
A: I think you're a little late with your idea. There already is a sponge called Bob.
B: Really?
A: Yes. And he's not exactly a superhero.
B: Hunh? What a waste of sponge!
A: Right.
B: Well, my other idea was Spinach Man.
A: Spinach Man?
B: Yes. He gets his super strength from spinach.
A: I think they've done that too.
B: That too?
A: Yes. It was very long ago. You know, I think you need to stop thinking about sponges and vegetables.
B: Oh. So you think Captain Celery won't make a good superhero?
A: Oh I'm sure he will. But I just think that your idea is a little ahead of its time.
B: Yeah, me too.
A: Maybe you need to think more in terms of special powers that can be used to save the world, you know?
B: Now that's a very good idea!
A: I know.
B: Hmmm. Let me think. Hey! I got one!
A: What is it?
B: I could write about Writer Boy!
A: Writer Boy? I thought you were writing a superhero comic book.
B: Yes, and that's the name of my superhero. Writer Boy!
A: And what does he do exactly?
B: He saves the world from evil villains by arriving at the scene, and writing a happy ending.
A: Ah.
B: It's a fantastic idea, isn't it? Just imagine. The evil villain plants a bomb on a bus, and tries to trigger it off by remote control from his hideout.
A: I'm listening.
B: Writer Boy appears on the scene and saves the day by writing a happy ending where the battery on the remote control receiver of the bomb dies, and the people get off the bus safe and sound!
A: Ah. Sounds interesting.
B: Didn't I tell you? I'm going to make millions!
A: I'm sure you will. But every superhero has a weakness. What will your hero's weakness be?
B: That's a good question. A superhero isn't a superhero if he doesn't have a weakness. Hmmm. I know! Writer's Block!
A: I don't think you can use Writer's block as a weakness for a super hero. It needs to be something that the evil villain can use.
B: Good point. Ah yes! His weakness will be broccoli!
A: Broccoli?
B: Yes. Writer Boy can't stand broccoli. It makes him nauseous, and he can't control the ending. Writer Boy gets into a bad mood, and could write any sort of ending if he comes too close to broccoli.
A: You know, broccoli is actually very good for you.
B: You sound like my mom.
A: I am your mom.
B: Ah. I thought you looked familiar.
A: You know, I think you should go get ready, or you'll be late for school.
B: But I told you, I don't want to go to school. I don't need to! I'm going to write a comic-book!

When Harry Met...

2005-08-02T10:30:00.000+05:30

It's one of those seedy pubs - the kind where you get drunk on the alcohol fumes, and get cancer on the passive smoking. The kind where the floors are wet with spilled beer - sometimes spilled on its way into a drunk, or as is the case more often, on its way out. Customers here tend not to get remembered when they return. It could be the whiskey. Or it could be the fact that it's difficult to recognize a man who has spent most of his time in the bar lying on his face.

At one corner of the bar, a man sits alone, staring at the empty glass an inch from his eyes, his wallet empty. He's hoping that any moment now someone will walk into the pub and shout "I got promoted today! One round of drinks for everyone, on me!"

Well, he's allowed to hope, isn't he?

He wears a somewhat loose black t-shirt, apparently hand-embroidered with pink, orange and lavender colored threads. The letters on the back of the T-shirt say K.I.S.A.

The only thing that separates this drinker from the rest of the riff-raff in the pub, is that his t-shirt looks clean. Washed, anyway.

A random drinker approaches the bar for a refill. He looks like a stockbroker who may have lost a few million today. He's not been drinking too long, so unfortunately for himself, he's still relatively sober. Relatively, of course, being the operative word. He notices our K.I.S.A. friend sitting alone in his corner.

"Heeeeeeeey!" he says to the man in the t-shirt, swaying as he speaks.

The man in the t-shirt turns slowly to look at him, as if half asleep. He nods.
Encouraged, the stockbroker sits down on the barstool next to his.

"Mind if I... ssssh-sit here withhhhhh... you?" he asks. In a short while speech will become more difficult - which will allow him to concentrate on his drink. But for now he's feeling chatty.

"No," comes the reply.

"Gooooood-d!" says the stockbroker as he sits down, and smiles widely. "My name is... is... Harry!" he shouts, and extends his hand. The shouting wasn't necessary, but it feels good to exercise the vocal chords.

The man in the t-shirt doesn't bother with replying or extending his own hand, and goes back to staring at his glass.

Harry shakes hands with the air, and says "Nic-sh-c-sh-e to meet you!"

The man in the t-shirt doesn't seem to feel the same.

Harry looks at the letters on the t-shirt and says "Naai... Niiiice embra... em-bra... embryo... em-bar-dery... colours!"

At this, the man in the t-shirt turns to him and says "Thank you. I did it myself."

"Gooooood!" says Harry, and smiles even wider. His smile is the kind that reminds one of the story of the man who smiled so much, that the top of his head fell off.

"What doesh... K-K-Kaaaay... Aaaaiii... Esssssshhh-ssh-sss... Aaaay... What'shit shtand forrr?"

"Knight In Shining Armour."

"Kniiight?" asks Harry.

"Yes," says the knight.

"Then where ish... your... your... horshe?"

"I hired him out to a man in Manhattan. He gives people joyrides around Central Park."

"Annnd the sh-sh-shiningggg arrrmour?"

"Gave it to a guy who needed a costume for a party."

"Shh-shhh-shworrrd?"

"That too. But it's okay. I nailed the hilt to the scabbard."

"But ww-w-w-why?"

"Because I'm out of a job and it was the only way I could think of getting my hands on some money."

"No jobbbb?"

"Nope. None at all."

"Thaaat shucksh!" says Harry, and pats the knight on the shoulder. "Get ano... ano... another onne!"

The knight looks Harry in the eye and says "Do you know how hard it is for a knight to get a decent job these days?"

"No," says Harry simply.

"Well, the last dragons died in 1572."

"No drrrragons?"

"No. The knights of that time had no understanding of the delicately balanced nature of the ecology. They killed them all!"

"No drrraggonsss... Go to Chinatown!" says Harry happily.

The knight decides to ignore him. "And you should see the women these days! They don't even need us anymore!"

"They don't?" asks Harry. The thought of women not needing men sobers him up a little.

"Of course not. They want to be independent now! They have jobs!"

"Mmmm," says Harry as he runs his tongue over his teeth. "Must be the chicken," he thinks.

"I nearly had a heart attack when I found out that they're actually learning self-defense!"

Harry nods vigorously. He wishes someone had told him a little earlier, though.

"I mean, women and self-defense? What do they think knights are for? Playing chess?"

"Hmmmm," says Harry. He wonders why playing chess at night is not a good idea.

"I was walking down a street the other day," continues the knight. Without my mask on, looking for a job as usual, when the most wonderful sight caught my eye. There was this drunk-looking man shouting at a woman who was passing by."

"'Ah!' I had thought. 'Finally a something to do!' I'd planned to rescue the woman from the drunk. Maybe she'd fall in love with me. Maybe she'd offer to make me dinner. If nothing else, maybe she'd offer me some money!"

"Ah," said Harry wisely.

"So, I stepped into a shop to put my mask on. I have my secret identity to protect, after all. But by the time I stepped back out, what did I see?"

"Whhhaaat?" asks Harry, in suspense.

"The drunk was lying on the ground on his stomach, the woman had her knee pressed against his back, and was twisting his arm behind him!"

"Ah," says Harry. He makes a mental note to stay away from any women after he leaves the bar.

"It's as if there is no purpose to my life anymore!"

"Ah," says Harry.

"Stop it with the 'Ah's already. And what are you staring at?"

"Niiiice em-brai-drrree."

Stop! Thief! : Celestial Conversations - XXII

2005-07-20T10:30:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Belief: Celestial Conversations - XXI

God: Hello!
Me: Hi! You've been missing a long time now.
God: Someone's reported Me missing?
Me: No, no! I meant that I haven't seen You in a long time.
God: You haven't actually seen me, ever. This is the internet.
Me: Right, but You know what I mean.
God: And that is?
Me: Nothing!
God: You can't mean nothing. Or why would you bother to speak at all?
Me: Oh God!
God: What?
Me: I wasn't talking to You!
God: How many Gods do you believe in anyway?
Me: Hundreds I guess. I'm a Hindu.
God: Ah.
Me: Anyway. Where have You been?
God: Everywhere, of course. There's a reason they call Me Omnipresent.
Me: I mean, I haven't seen You online in a long time.
God: Yes. And?
Me: Why haven't I seen You online in a long time?
God: Oh, someone stole My laptop.
Me: Oh! So where are You chatting from now?
God: A computer in the school library.
Me: Ah.
God: Yes. It's quite hard.
Me: What, the computer?
God: No. Losing it.
Me: You've lost it?
God: I just told you, it got stolen!
Me: No, I meant that as a joke.
God: Joke? What joke?
Me: I... Never mind.
God: Whatever you say.
Me: So, did the cops say they could get it back?
God: No. They told me it was probably God's will.
Me: Strange cops. But why would You want Your laptop stolen?
God: That's exactly what I said!
Me: And?
God: They gave me funny looks.
Me: Of course they did. What else would You expect people to do if You go around saying You're God?
God: But I am God!
Me: So?
God: *sigh* So what was I saying?
Me: You were talking about Your laptop.
God: Ah, yes. I lost a lot of data.
Me: Like what?
God: Like telephone numbers, my address book, 50 recipes on how to make a meal out of bread and peanut butter, and the list of people who are allowed to be in Heaven.
Me: You need a list?
God: Of course!
Me: Why would You need a list?
God: To be able to tell if someone was living in Heaven illegally.
Me: Oh.
God: Yes. I had to start the list, after we realized that there was a pizza guy who had come to make a delivery and never bothered to leave.
Me: Ah. But aren't You supposed to use St Peter's Big Book for that?
God: Yes. We got an electronic copy after the Pope fiasco.
Me: Oh yes. So did The Pope get in, finally?
God: Oh, he got tired of waiting and went back to inhabit the new guy.
Me: Okay.
God: Yes.
Me: So You were saying You got an electronic copy of the Big Book.
God: Yes.
Me: And the original?
God: We had to destroy that. There can only be one Big Book.
Me: Really?
God: Yes. It's got something to do with copying from the right, or something.
Me: You mean copyrights?
God: That's what I said.
Me: Um...
God: Anyway. So we're in a bit of a soup now.
Me: Oh?
God: Yes. Everyone's arguing about how they think some of the others aren't really supposed to be in Heaven.
Me: Oh. And you didn't get any backup?
God: What didn't I get back?
Me: No, I meant, didn't you backup your data?
God: Backup?
Me: Yes?
God: What's Backup?
Me: It's copying your information somewhere else, for safety.
God: Like into a book?
Me: No, like on a CD.
God: Aren't CDs too small?
Me: Of course not. You could fit an encyclopedia onto a CD.
God: By writing very small?
Me: Hunh?
God: Aren't CDs these shiny pieces of plastic, a little bigger than the palm of your hand?
Me: Yes?
God: Well, if I wrote on one of them, I'd barely be able to fit the Ten Commandments on them.
Me: What?
God: And I'd have to use one of those felt-pen things. Pencils don't write very well on CDs.
Me: Eh?
God: And they're so shiny, I'm sure it'd be quite difficult to read from them. I think I'll just use a notebook.
Me: Um.
God: Call Me old-fashioned. I never really got the hang of technology, I guess.
Me: I'd have to agree.
God: It's a little hard to keep in touch with all the new things people keep inventing. Like the stuff they can do with a ringtone, for example. Makes My head spin sometimes.
Me: Right.
God: Anyway. I'll be off then. Must buy that notebook.
Me: Bye then.
God: Bye.

Next: One of Us: Celestial Conversations - XXIII

Public Proposals

2005-07-08T10:30:00.000+05:30

A story I posted as a comment on the blog linked above -

Birthday Party

It's the girl's birthday. She's opening her presents. People are gathered around. As is usual on the girlfriend's birthday, the BF's present is opened last. It's this huge box, almost as tall as the girl herself.

"Did you get me a giant teddy bear?"

BF smiles.

She rips open the box, to find a whole lot of confetti, and a smaller box inside. It's around waist-high.

"Oh, it's that cute Victorian-style dressing table stool, isn't it?"

BF smiles even wider. He seems to be sweating just a little.

She rips open the box to find even more confetti, and a smaller box inside, around two feet high.

"A small TV for my room?"

BF adjusts his collar, still smiling.

She rips open the box to find yet another pile of confetti and a much smaller box.

"Ah, I know!" she says excitedly. "It's an iPod isn't it?"

BF is still smiling, but looks quite worried now.

She rips that open too, and finds confetti. She turns the box upside-down, and watches the confetti float softly to the ground. She shakes the box hoping that a smaller box will fall out.

Nothing.

She turns around to look at BF angrily. "What...?"

There's a collective gasp from the guests.

He's on his knees, holding a small ring with a large diamond in his hands. "Sweetheart, will you marry me?"

She's shocked.

He looks up at her expectantly.

She looks around at all the guests.

They look back at her.

The tension in the room is palpable.

A tear appears in her eyes.

He gets to his feet, and puts his arms around her. She cries against his chest.

Then he pulls back, and slips the ring onto her unresisting finger.

There is much celebration, women shrieking, guys shouting, and lots of people hugging each other.

The guests go home.

As the girl says goodbye to the last guest and shuts the door behind them, she turns around to face the BF.

"How dare you?" she asks.

"Hunh?" (Come on, he's a guy)

"How DARE you???"

"I..."

"You didn't even have the common courtesy to ask me in private first?"

"Uh... umm..."

"Just assumed I'd say yes, did you?"

"Well..."

"No warning even!"

"I..."

"In front of all those people!"

"Er..."

"Do you know how embarrassing it was for me?"

"I'm..."

She slips the ring off her finger.

"?"

"You did it on purpose didn't you? You proposed in front of all those people so that I wouldn't be able to say no."

"!"

Gives ring back to him.

"!!!"

"And you still owe me my birthday gift."

" "

"And to make up for it, you'll get me that giant teddy bear. One with a bow. A small TV for my room. An iPod. And you'll engrave my name on the back. Not yours. Just mine. And there'll be so many bouquets of flowers, that I won't have enough place in the house to keep them. And a big box of chocolates. Make that two."

BF looks at her blankly.

"Do you understand me?"

He nods.

"Good."

She walks toward the bedroom.

"Close the door when you leave. I'm going to sleep."

The End

BF = Bloody Fool

Now for the prologue. Yes, I could simply call it the background for the story, but big authors who get paid to write, call it a prologue, and I haven't given up my Pulitzer hopes yet.

The inimitable aNTi (I haven't yet figured out what he is anti, but that's the topic for a whole new blog) wrote something that caught my eye the other day. And to make it more interesting, one of the things that gave him the the idea for what he wrote, was one of my stories.

Yes, I know it's confusing. And the fact that I'm feeling particularly literarily-challenged (is that even a word?) right now, isn't helping. But anyway.

Referring to an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond where Raymond proposes to Debra (now his wife) in public, aNTi asks the following question -

In ficticious works of art, like the [Everybody Loves Raymond] episode mentioned above, I notice that a lot of protagonists getting the message across in full view of a lot other people. Does this happen in real life too? Do you guys know of any incidents where such acts have backfired, and the gal goes - "Hmmmm...., I am not so sure"?...

The short story I've reproduced above, was my attempt at describing what might happen in that case. As mentioned earlier, it can also be found as a comment to that blog post, and since I tend to collect my stories on this blog, I decided to reproduce it here (with some editing).

Not to mention that it's a good way to slightly increase my pathetic blogging frequency.

Which brings to mind the fact that I sometimes feel I've written more interesting comments on other people's blogs in the recent past, than I've written posts on my own blog.

A New Look

2005-06-29T10:30:00.000+05:30

For those who haven't been watching (and my site statistics tell me that must be at least half of you out there) I hit a century with my last post. And it took me more than one year after I started blogging on this site. And with this 101th post, I am also choosing to get rid of Blogger's Snapshot Sable template.

So, those of you who've been here before, will notice that I've changed the look of the blog somewhat. Alright. A little more than 'somewhat'.

The new design was developed from scratch by yours truly, over a period of three to four months. Right from the creation of the initial mockups, to the basic html framework, and the slow refinement of the same to make it all work on Blogspot. Yes, I'm slow. But in my defense, I'm not a web designer. At one time, one of the main reasons for the lull in my posting frequency was the amount of time I spent on the re-design. When you try to do something that you don't have a natural talent for, it tends to take quite a while to complete.

And then, a couple of months went by looking for the right moment to inflict it on you, the poor unsuspecting reader.

I've learnt a number of things during the process of designing this template. A few of them are -

IE really sucks with respect to standards compliance. So your blog will look exactly the same in Firefox, Opera, and Safari, but IE will screw it up.
Microsoft, by not fixing CSS bugs in Internet Explorer, is really holding the web back. As an example, imagine semi-transparent backgrounds.
65% of people out there, for some reason, still use that god-forsaken browser. (I'm still talking about IE)
You really don't need to use the 'Table' tag to define your layout anymore.
I am not as creative as I had hoped I was.
The resolution of 800x600 is not dead.
You can't do with your browser what you can do with an image editor. (Okay, you can to extent, but then you'll need to forget that a lot of people who visit your blog use Internet Explorer)

I've used some Javascript on this page, and even set a few cookies, in an attempt to increase the user-friendliness of the design. The cookies don't violate your privacy. But the site should work just fine with Javascript and cookies disabled, so turn them off if you must. Also, this blog should still be readable if you turn off images. So those of you with limited bandwidth might want to consider doing that. The only thing that will disappear is the title and the tag-line. I still haven't figured out how to fix that.

As with anything new, there are a number of people to thank -

The Template Queen - whose fantastic work on her own blog opened my eyes to the amazing possibilities of blog-templates. A number of elements in my new design were inspired by ideas that she has used on her blog, even if I actually implemented them a little differently - like the basic blog layout, and the collapsing sidebar and sidebar sections. Not to mention that I did seek her sage advice during the development of this design. Advice which she was kind enough to give.
Spencer Kimball & Peter Mattis - for developing that wonderful piece of software called The GIMP, and all the other open-source developers out there who have helped bring it to its current state after S&P abandoned it at version 0.99. The GIMP is why miserly bloggers like me can afford to do their own image work, without having to fork out $600 for Adobe Photoshop. Of course, as a disclaimer to Photoshop fans out there, I haven't compared PhotoShop to The GIMP, so I really don't know how they compare feature-wise. All images used in the design on this template were created and edited using The GIMP 2.2.3 for Windows (The Windows build for 2.2.8 should be out in a couple of days. I plan to upgrade then).
Richard M Stallman and The GNU Foundation for developing and maintaining GNU Emacs - the only real editor. I used it exclusively for writing and working with HTML during the design of this template.
W3Schools for their excellent compilation of reference material on CSS. I'm the kind of person who generally prefers reading the specification, but this website fulfilled all my CSS needs, and quickly.
Peter-Paul Koch for sharing his simple Cookie manipulation functions with internet developers all over the world. I was feeling particularly lazy the day I decided to use cookies, and came across his website. The code he's written, is simple, and works very well. I never had a reason to try to rewrite the code on my own. (My excuse is that a good programmer is a lazy programmer)
The Mozilla Foundation for developing Gecko, the technology behind the Mozilla and Firefox Web-browsers. I've developed this template primarily using Firefox as my browser, and a number of its wonderful extensions for Web developers.
Opera Software for making their browser freely downloadable. This made it possible for me to test this template on both Opera 7 and 8.
The World Wide Web Consortium for maintaining and promoting Web Standards like CSS and XHTML. If all browsers stuck to these standards, the world-wide web would be a much better looking place.

Alright. I think I must stop now. This isn't the oscars.

Since I'm only a miserly blogger, and don't have access to every OS out there, this template was tested on Mozilla Firefox 1.0+, Opera 7 and 8, and IE 6.0 on Windows XP Professional, and Mozilla Suite and Mozilla Firefox on Fedora Linux Core 1 (I live in the past). I know that some of the people who visit this blog use other browsers - like IE 5, and Safari, so please let me know if this blog doesn't seem to behave correctly for you. Screenshots would help.

As a request to IE users out there, of course - Get Firefox. (This is specially for those of you on older versions like 5.x).

There. I've done it. Now back to regular blogging.

One Hundred Things To Rant About: Post #100

2005-06-24T00:05:00.000+05:30

My first ever article/story published online was a collection of rants. So were a large number of posts I have published on this blog. The title of this blog itself, is a rant.

You see, my favourite activity in the world is to complain. When I was born, my first thought was - "Put me back in there! This place is cold! And it smells!"

My mother has had to bear the brunt of my complaining. When I was a kid, I used to complain about anything she cooked. Everything I ate, was too hot. Hot as in temperature, most of the time. And if it was ice cold, then it was still too hot. As in spicy. I have even claimed to find salted yoghurt too spicy. All the women who've had the misfortune to cook for me (my mom and my aunts), have at some time considered replacing the salt with rat poison. But they know I'd probably complain that the food smelt weird.

In spite of all the complaining though, I've been known to keep a cheery disposition. Most of the time, anyway. The secret to that, of course, is the complaining.

I enjoy it.
Having complained about something, I find it infinitely easier to deal with.

Of course, there is the problem of those things that you can't complain about. Things you're not allowed to complain about. Things that are too personal to tell anyone else. Things you can't share with anyone. These pent up frustrations can be quite depressing. But there's a slight solution to that too, right? Complain that you can't complain!

Yes. I'm quite crazy.

So, on this hundredth post of mine, I thought I'd compile a list of one hundred things that I have complained about at some time in my life.

In no particular order -

Homework.
Teachers who gave homework.
Having to learn more than one language.
Having to learn more than two languages.
Exams.
The fact that there are Integral equations that cannot be solved (Yes, I'm quite the math buff).
Engineering submissions.
No work.
Too much work.
Deadlines.
Computers with 1GB of RAM that take 25 seconds to delete a zero-byte file.
That there are no single women left on this planet.
Women who claim they are single but really aren't.
Children who swear more than I do.
Not being able to bring myself to swear as much as some of my female classmates.
Not being able to speak every third sentence without the F-word.
Having to watch clean versions of movies on Star Movies with all the interesting parts removed.
Global poverty.
Global warming.
Pollution.
Printers that don't make it easy to print on both sides of the paper.
Being misunderstood.
Cafeteria food.
My own cooking.
Missing mom's cooking.
That eating Chhole Bhature can give you gas.
Having to eat rice everyday once I moved to Chennai.
Chennai auto-rickshaw drivers.
Power-failures in the sweltering Chennai summer.
Waiting for the rains on a hot summer day.
Waiting for the sun to come out on a rainy day.
Potholes.
People playing Holi with permanent colours.
Women who ruffle my hair and mess it up minutes after I finally got it looking presentable.
Women who say I'm "So Sweet!".
That all women are different.
That all women are the same.
Being called "Uncle" when I was seventeen.
Being the only person my age at a party.
Attending a friend's wedding to find that they're the only people I know.
Having to rice with my hands at a South-Indian wedding because a spoon would damage the banana leaf.
Being given a spoon at the next South-Indian wedding even though I didn't ask for it.
Plagiarism.
Writer's block.
People who write emails and blogs as if they were writing an SMS.
HTML mail.
Browsers that don't support web standards (read as IE).
Inequality of the sexes.
Men who beat their wives.
Child-molestation.
Rape.
Suicide.
Murder.
Terrorism.
Communalism.
Sexism.
Racism.
Casteism.
Hate.
Cities where people lack civic sense.
Cars that cost too much.
Rising petrol prices.
Restaurants in the US that give you ice in your water when the temperature outside is -5°F (~ -20°C).
Sugar in lime-juice (Yes, like I mentioned before, I've got very specific tastes).
People who don't follow the instructions on the back of the box when cooking Knorr instant soups even if it turns out more tasty than when I tried.
Having to watch that growing dust-gathering pile of washed clothes on my roommate's bed, because he was too lazy to put them in the closet.
Years later, watching a growing dust-gathering pile of washed clothes on my own bed, because I do not have the time (I'll fold them today, I promise).
The fact that Lime'n'Spoon is not a national sport.
Knowing that we probably won't learn if there is any other intelligent life in the universe, in my lifetime.
The fact that I picked up my first Isaac Asimov book only after Asimov died.
Not being able to lay my hands on a single unused copy of Asimov's Empire novels.
That Douglas Adams never finished writing his last book.
Talkative fellow passengers on an eight-hour flight when you are in no mood to socialize.
Fellow passengers who keep to themselves on a nine-hour flight when you are extremely bored.
Rude flight-stewardesses.
Airline food.
Mini pretzels.
Juice shops that add water to their milk-shakes.
Needing to have malaria to get time off from work.
The fact that ~~almost~~ all my friends are getting engaged or married by the end of this year.
People who buy movie tickets in black.
Friends making me watch a movie with tickets bought in black.
Hard and extremely sharp grass in the company lawn that was planted to make sure the employees do NOT sit on it.
Reading a suspense story through to the end, only to find the last page missing.
People who give away the plot of a book before you start reading it.
Finding out who the killer was in the movie "Kaun" before I saw the movie.
That most movie/book reviews have spoilers.
That no word rhymes with "Orange".
Missing a large number of movies I wanted to watch because I didn't have company.
Reaching the US when a movie I wanted to watch is no longer running in movie halls.
Returning back to India to find that the movie is no longer running in movie halls there either.
That it's extremely difficult to get company to watch a show on Broadway.
That my cellular provider won't switch me to a post-paid plan without changing my number.
Spam.
Having to throw away food because we couldn't eat it all before it went bad.
People who don't cover their mouth and nose when they sneeze or cough.
People who put the wrong thing in the wrong shelf (No, the plates do NOT go in the same shelf as the pressure cooker!).
People who don't try to clean up the mess right after they spill something.
Roommates who use your blanket without asking if they can.
That when it comes to things to complain about, one hundred is too small a number.

There! I feel better now.

The Year Ahead

2005-06-07T09:20:00.000+05:30

No. It's not this blog's birthday.

First of all, I prefer the term blog-anniversary. So if anything, it is one day past the first anniversary of this blog. Not a blog birthday. Not a blog anniversary. Okay?

So now you're going to say that that's not true. The earliest post on this blog seems to be posted on the 17th of April, last year. Well see, that was just to throw you off. *evil grin*

I did start blogging on the 17th of April in 2004. But that was on Sulekha. That "blog" if you want to call it that, can be found here. The first post on this blog was posted on the 5th of June, 2004. Once I started blogging here a little more regularly, I just copied my first ever blog post to this site, with the original date. Why? Oh, it felt like the right thing to do at the time.

Anyway. So, what else is special today?

Let's see. It's the 6th of June in the year 2005. That's 6/6/5. So one year from now, the date will be 6/6/6. The year of the Devil is just a year away.

Yes, I know. Very funny.

So, I've been blogging here for more than a year now. What next?

Well, I have a couple of things on my mind. First, hopefully, I'll start blogging everyday again. (Of course, that's probably just wishful thinking).

The other thing I've been thinking about, is starting a blog version of a soap opera. Why? Oh, just like that. It's something to do. In general of course, I've always been afraid of sharing a half-finished story with the world. But I'vevjust begun writing a story for which I don't have a specific end in mind, and I think I'll have to watch it evolve over an extended period of time, to see where it goes. And now I've experimented with episodic blogging in the Celestial Conversations, so I'm just a little more comfortable with the idea of publishing an incomplete story.

I've read stories split over multiple parts on blogs before. One of my favourite bloggers who does this, calls herself Fizo_Al on Sulekha. She now also blogs on blogger sometimes. Of course, I haven't read any of her latest stories, but they used to be quite interesting to follow.

What I'm going to attempt, though, isn't supposed to have a specific end. At least not yet. So writing something, and then not being able to go back and change it, is a little scary.
Still, let's see.

So does that mean that there will be no more Celestial Conversations? Naah. My God's not going anywhere yet. *smile*

I've also had this idea for a blog sit-com for a few months. I haven't been able to write one complete paragraph about that yet, though. Hopefully the new year of blogging will bring me some new words.

There's also that play-type comedy that I've been unable to complete for almost two years now. And the long pending blog-template update.

Lots of blogging to do. So little time.

(Alright. I can't resist it. Happy Belated Birthday Bloggy!)

Plagiarism Returns: This is getting ridiculous

2005-06-06T21:18:00.001+05:30

In a moment of intense masochism a couple of weeks ago, I set up a Google Alert for the following piece of text - "it was a lovely december morning" (Yes, I hear you saying "Don't tell me you're still going on about that", but I've been known to be quite persistent about certain things).

So, last night Google sent me the following link - Sulekha Expressions

Now, I was initially a little surprised to see that link there, since JALS hasn't been on the main Sulekha page in ages. So I clicked on the link that took me to the page, and as I expected, my story wasn't there.

Still a little curious, I checked Google's cache. And was taken to this page - Google Cache for Sulekha Expressions. (The cache entry will probably expire soon, so here's a screenshot for the sake of posterity).

As you can imagine, my surprise soon turned to shock. Someone had plagiarised my story on Sulekha itself! Yes, it did get taken off the site within a day or so, but still! The fact that it went through their review process (one that lasted four months the last time I sent them a story of mine) and passed, is proof of a gaping hole in the way Sulekha functions, isn't it?

My disillusionment with Sulekha has been increasing for quite some time.

The management behind the portal, specially the creative section, is hardly professional anymore.
Here's a something I heard from a fellow Sulekha author -
"I submitted the story a few months ago to Sulekha, and they rejected it - quite rudely - telling me that I should consider adding a little humour to it. I then tried submitting it without any changes, a couple of months later under a different name, and this time they published it in a couple of weeks."
For the record, I considered that particular story quite funny.
They keep adding new sections to their portal, without bothering to fix serious existing bugs.
The link to the "Vintage" article on the site hasn't been changed in almost two years.
Submissions sometimes take months to appear on the site, and then appear without letting the author know.
Sulekha management is unresponsive.
Their weblogs were supposed to have RSS support a year ago, and there is no sign of that yet.
Private submissions magically became public during the last major upgrade, and there is no way to delete them now.
The site design is confusing to say the least.

And now this.

Unfortunately, it is probably still the most popular forum for the Indian Community on the internet. And until that changes, they won't have any motivation to get their act together.

So, I'd just like to thank the kind soul who pointed the plagiarism out to the authorities. Thank you!

Update: Fixed broken link to JALS

Belief: Celestial Conversations - XXI

2005-05-30T11:49:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Prayers and Art: Celestial Conversations - XX

God: Hello
Me: Hi!
God: So, did you do anything interesting recently?
Me: Oh. I saw The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy.
God: Ah. On Discovery Channel?
Me: No, no! This is a movie, and is based on a radio show and a five-part trilogy by Douglas Adams.
God: Five-part Trilogy?
Me: It's complicated. But it's funny.
God: If you say so.
Me: It's quite nice.
God: So, this Douglas Adams chap.
Me: Yes?
God: Is he any good?
Me: He was, yes. Very good.
God: Was?
Me: He died a few years ago.
God: Oh. May I bless his soul.
Me: Amen.
God: I think I'll try to pick up one his books at the library.
Me: Uh, You might not like his writing all that much.
God: Why? You just said he was very good.
Me: Well he was an atheist.
God: So?
Me: That means he doesn't believe in God.
God: And?
Me: You're God.
God: I happen to be quite aware of that particular fact.
Me: And it doesn't bother You?
God: Why should it bother Me?
Me: Why wouldn't it bother You if someone doesn't believe You exist? In fact, Douglas Adams gave this long lecture once, about how he was convinced that You don't exist.
God: Would it bother you if someone somewhere stood up in the middle of a classroom and tried to convince everyone that you don't exist?
Me: Um... Probably not. In fact, I think I'd find it funny.
God: Same here.
Me: Interesting.
God: I don't have the slightest problem with atheists. They're a very amiable sort. It's the theists that I have trouble with.
Me: Hunh?
God: I'm not kidding.
Me: And why would You say that?
God: Because it's true! Atheists don't go around killing people in your name. Atheists don't blame you for everything that's wrong in the world.
Me: But atheists kill people too.
God: Not any more than theists. But at least they don't say it's for My sake.
Me: Surely, it's not all like that...
God: Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night because a six year old child was praying to you to make his father stop beating him?
Me: Uh...
God: Have you ever had anyone pray to you to make their pain from chemotherapy stop?
Me: Um...
God: Did you know that almost every hitman says a silent prayer for forgiveness right before or after he makes a hit?
Me: Er...
God: Do you know how helpless it can feel to not be able to be able to feed a family of seven, after the father - the only earning member - died after being run over by a truck, all because of the policy of non-interference?
Me: I guess not.
God: It can be quite hard to be Me.
Me: I'm sure I can't imagine how hard.
God: I wish I could do something. But changing one thing today, changes an infinite number of things in the future. Moving a pin from one side of a desk to the other side, means billions of people who will never be born.
Me: I've read about that kind of thing. I believe the chaos theory is all about stuff like that.
God: You people have come up with a theory about chaos?
Me: I guess so.
God: Human beings never cease to amaze me.
Me: Well, it was You who created us.
God: I did no such thing!
Me: So You're still sticking to that story?
God: Story?
Me: That the universe just happened, and that it wasn't Your fault?
God: That's not a story.
Me: Fine.
God: Good. But tell me, what about you?
Me: Me?
God: Yes, you. Do you believe in Me?
Me: Um... er... Oh! Look at the time, will You? I had better go now!
God: Oh, okay. Good night then.
Me: Good night.

Next: Stop! Thief! : Celestial Conversations - XXII

We don't need no discrimination

2005-05-24T09:43:00.000+05:30

Sticking to fiction kills a blogger's blogging frequency. No? I think so.

Are numerical digits any different from letters of the alphabet? Weren't all ASCII characters created equal? Don't all of them occupy the same number of bits? Isn't 'W' just as long to a computer as '1'? Would you buy a keyboard with a missing 'E' over one with a missing '0' (zero)?

What is this discrimination for, then? Why do these royal 'numbers' get to parade on a keyboard over the common lot of the 'letters', then? Is Mathematics any more important than English? How would you say three thousand seven hundred and sixty nine, if you didn't have language?

How would you sign a cheque? How would Milton talk about Paradise Lost? How would Shakespeare say 'Hamlet'?

Is equality only for the sexes then?

What's the point of all this?

Oh, nothing. I'm just sleepy.

Prayers and Art: Celestial Conversations - XX

2005-05-16T12:00:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Bye, Mom! Bye Dad!!: Celestial Conversations XIX

God: Hello.
Me: Hi! So what have You been up to?
God: Oh, quite a lot, actually. We're working on getting that new school up and running.
Me: Ah, that must feel nice.
God: Yes, it does. It's been quite a long time since I've involved Myself personally in helping out.
Me: Really?
God: Yes, quite a long time. The last time I personally did something to help someone, was when I taught Leonardo to sketch.
Me: Da Vinci???
God: No, of course not! He's the one who taught Me to paint. I meant Di Caprio.
Me: What?
God: For that movie he did about that ship that sank.
Me: The Titanic?
God: Ah, yes. That's the one.
Me: You taught Leonardo Di Caprio how to sketch for that movie?
God: Well, I tried. I'm supposed to be the best teacher there is, but Leo was not a very good student. I heard that the director finally decided to do the sketch himself.
Me: Do You have any idea what the sketch was of?
God: No, unfortunately not. I got bored and left early.
Me: Good.
God: Good?
Me: Oh nothing, nothing! So, You watch movies?
God: I try to. I find the whole idea of movie-making quite interesting.
Me: You do?
God: Oh yes! Fiction, theatre, movies - they're all a wonderful concept that you people have come up with. It's a celebration of the act of lying. Human beings are really quite a strange species, don't you think?
Me: Um, I guess we are.
God: Oh, you definitely are. There was this guy I used to talk to, a few hundred years ago. His name had something to do with milk-shakes.
Me: Milk-shakes?
God: Yes. It was a strange name. Anyway. So he's the one who explained the concept to Me. It's quite simple, really. You start with a small lie, build a large number of lies around the first one, and keep going until you get bored. That's fiction. Act it out, and that's theatre. Capture it on film, and that's movies.
Me: Interesting definitions there.
God: Oh, you must take My word for it. He explained it quite clearly. He even made Me write a few stories just to make sure I understood how it worked.
Me: Really? What did You write?
God: Oh, nothing special. Very amateurish stuff. There was one about this young couple who fell in love, but their parents wouldn't let them get married. So they killed themselves.
Me: Umm...
God: And one about a pair of twins - a girl and a boy. Both of them were cross-dressers.
Me: Er...
God: That one was a bit ahead of its time.
Me: Yes, but -
God: And there was one about these three women who used to meet for a cup of coffee around this cauldron in the middle of the jungle, and give people bad advice. The wife of one of the guys who took their advice got OCD.
Me: OCD?
God: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. She kept wanting to wash her hands.
Me: That's -
God: Yes, like I said, quite amateurish.
Me: I won't even ask. But You were saying that Leonardo Da Vinci taught You to paint?
God: Yes. But I must say I wasn't very good at it.
Me: You weren't?
God: No. I tried painting a portrait of this woman once. I could never get her face right.
Me: Oh.
God: Yes. I kept getting the smile wrong. It looked hideous.
Me: You -
God: Oh it was an embarrassment. I believe it even hung in someone's bathroom for sometime.
Me: You painted -
God: Oh, look at the time! I must be going now. We're taking admissions for the school.
Me: Oh, okay.
God: Bye!
Me: Hey, God.
God: Yes?
Me: Wanted to say one thing before You left.
God: Yes?
Me: Don't take this the wrong way.
God: Go ahead.
Me: Well, a friend of mine is going into surgery today.
God: Oh.
Me: I just wanted to... um... I hope it all goes fine.
God: Oh.
Me: You don't have to reply to what I'm saying.
God: Okay.
Me: Prayers sometimes get answered, but they tend not to be conversational.
God: Right.
Me: So, I'm just praying that it go well.
God: Right.
Me: That's all I wanted to say.
God: Okay.
Me: Um... I'll be going now.
God: Right. Right. Me too. Lots of stuff to do.
Me: Bye, then.
God: Bye.

Next: Belief: Celestial Conversations - XXI

Wanna Credit Card, Sir?

2005-05-06T12:24:00.000+05:30

Megha wrote a post about the Amway problem yesterday, and it reminded me of something similar that happens a lot back home in India. Since I haven't posted anything here in a long time, and I thought readers of this blog might be interested in reading the contents of my comment there, I decided to recycle it (more or less) on this blog -

Unlike a number of other unfortunate souls, I've not been bitten by the Amway pest that much. I guess I did meet some chap in a Barnes and Noble, once, who was trying to interest me in something. But I wasn't paying much attention, and he - unlike what I've heard of others of his breed - wasn't much of a conversationalist.

But then I have an uncle who dabbled in this Amway thing once too. So I've seen the super-fantastic-toothpaste and the extra-strong-cleaning-solution that can clean the paint off your walls.

In India, though, specially if you are in a plastic-happy city like Bangalore or Chennai, it's probably more common to get accosted by ICICI and Citibank Credit Card agents. The first few months when this started, everytime I exited an ATM or walked out of the office campus, a guy wearing an almost crisp white shirt with tie, and navy blue trousers (alright, sometimes they were brown), would accost me. Here's a sample of the conversation that would follow -

Agent: Sir, can I take a moment of your time?
Me: Hmm?
Agent: Sir, I'd like to interest you in this free credit card from ICICI. You have to pay nothing, sir. And this card is accepted in 2593 stores, restaurants and theatres across chennai. Plus you get discounts and special offers every few months. So would you like to apply for a card now, sir?
Me: No.
Agent: It'll only take two minutes sir. I have the form ready right here. So what's your name, sir? (pen poised over the form, to complete the application most efficiently)
Me: I don't need another credit card.
Agent: It's free sir. So, what is your name, sir?
Me: I don't care if it's free. I already have a credit card.
Agent: But everyone has multiple credit cards nowadays, sir! And this is a Gold card. And it's free! Your name, sir?
Me: I don't care what other people do, I don't need another card.
Agent: We are giving you a Visa card sir. And ICICI has the most ATMs all over India. You can even withdraw cash using the credit card. (He tells me this after watching me walk out of an ICICI ATM).
Me: I already have an ICICI Debit card!
Agent: This is a Credit Card, sir.
Me: I already have a credit card, I don't need another one! And I don't have the time to argue about this anymore. I'm leaving.
Agent: It's very good, sir. It'll only take two minutes. Please sir!

and so on.

Now, when I'm back in India -

Agent: Sir, I'd like to interest you in this free credit card from ICICI. You have to pay nothing, sir. And this card -
Me: Thanks, but I already have an ICICI Gold credit card that is accepted all over the country inc;uding 3428 locations all over Chennai, and another 12863 locations in Bombay, Bangalore and Hyderabad.
Agent: Is it a Visa card, sir?
Me: Yes.
Agent: You can get one more, sir. MasterCard this time. And you can have your photograph on it.

*sigh*

Atleast these Amway/Quixtar chaps aren't so whiny... Or are they?

Bye, Mom! Bye Dad!!: Celestial Conversations XIX

2005-04-14T10:35:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Hello Kitty: Celestial Conversations XVIII

Me: Hello
God: Hi.
Me: So, Your parents still around?
God: They just left yesterday.
Me: Oh. So soon?
God: That's exactly what I was thinking. Time seems to have flown by.
Me: I know the feeling. It must have been hard watching them go.
God: That it was. I cried like a baby.
Me: You did?
God: Yeah. Never saw Myself as the kind of person who cries because He misses His Mommy.
Me: I'm sure no one else did either.
God: Not a very Godly image, right?
Me: You could say that gain. Anyway. So I guess You're going to have to start cooking again.
God: Oh, don't remind Me. Life sucks enough already.
Me: That it does.
God: Know what else sucks?
Me: What?
God: The earth.
Me: Hunh?
God: People think it's gravity that keeps them on the planet. In reality, the earth just sucks.
Me: Umm...
God: I read that on a T-Shirt.
Me: Oh.
God: I thought it was quite funny.
Me: Ha ha.
God: So anyway. For now it's just Me and the cat.
Me: Right. Hey, did You hear about the Pope?
God: Oh, did I ever! The gang hasn't talked about anything else, since they heard.
Me: You mean like the welcoming committee?
God: Welcoming Committee?
Me: I mean for when he comes to Heaven.
God: Oh, no! The row is about whether he does.
Me: Hunh?
God: Well, there's this big argument that started about whether he should be allowed into Heaven at all.
Me: Oh? Why?
God: Well, St Peter has gone on vacation for six months, and nobody can seem to find the Big Book.
Me: St Peter is on vacation?
God: Oh, yes. We don't add more than one person to Heaven in a couple of centuries anyway. So it's not like he's got a high pressure job or anything.
Me: Oh.
God: And a Pope's soul generally doesn't retire. They just inhabit the next chap.
Me: Ah.
God: But this one has had it, he says. He got tired of living.
Me: Okay. But what's the argument about.
God: Well, there're some who believe that since he's a man of God, and has been one all his life, he should enter Heaven. And then there're those who say that he doesn't believe in the "All men are created equal" theory, and that letting him into Heaven would be trouble. Quite a racket they've created.
Me: Interesting.
God: Too interesting for My tastes. I'm just sitting it out. I told them to figure it out and tell Me what they decide.
Me: The gang, I assume, is everyone else in Heaven?
God: Yes. And every one of them has got an opinion. Dad likes to call them The Gang. I guess it's better than calling them the inmates. Definitely feels like a nuthouse though, sometimes.
Me: Okay. And they've been discussing it since he died?
God: Actually the argument started a month before his death.
Me: Oh?
God: Yes. The Pope sent in a "Fate decision request" around that time. At least while Mom was here, she was presiding the committee.
Me: She was?
God: Yes. The gang can be can be quite unruly. She had them take turns to talk, and everything. Before that, all I'd hear is one loud din.
Me: Interesting.
God: But now she's left, and they're driving Me crazy. I wish I could take a vacation.
Me: You? Then who would be God?
God: Well, I was watching "Bruce Almighty" the other day. In the movie, I left a guy in charge for a week.
Me: But that was a movie. And You saw the mess the man made of the world.
God: Do you think the world's not already a mess? How much worse could it get?
Me: Good point there. But who would You leave in charge?
God: Well, you're as good as anyone else.
Me: Me?
God: Of course.
Me: But why me?
God: Well why Me?
Me: But I'm not equipped to be God!
God: You think I am?
Me: At least You have aeons of experience!
God: That's just an excuse to not take up the job. See, that's one of the things you need to improve about yourself. You shouldn't be afraid to meet a challenge head-on.
Me: I don't think my insurance covers that kind of head-on collision. And anyway, I have a project deadline coming up. I can't take on the job of being God!
God: Oh. That's okay, then. But how about after this project?
Me: No!
God: Why not?
Me: I have projects lined up one after the other till the day I die.
God: Oh. That sounds like My job. Anyway. I'd better start cooking. Or I'll go hungry tonight.
Me: Yes, You do that.
God: See ya, then.
Me: Bye.

Next: Prayers and Art: Celestial Conversations - XX

Hello Kitty: Celestial Conversations XVIII

2005-03-29T23:15:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: Godparents : Celestial Conversations - XVII

Me: Hello?
God: Hello.
Me: So, how does it feel to have Your parents staying with You?
God: Oh, pretty nice actually. I get to eat Mom's cooking.
Me: Ah, yes. That's always nice.
God: Yes. No one can make sun-dried tomatoes quite like she can.
Me: Good, good. So, are You planning to show them around the city?
God: Oh, no. They prefer to get around by themselves.
Me: They do?
God: Yes. They're the independent sort, My parents.
Me: Ah.
God: Yes. They are in Las Vegas this week.
Me: They are?
God: Yes. Dad is in one of those Elvis impersonation groups.
Me: Oh.
God: Yes. He grew sideburns one day, and joined them. Now once in a while, he puts on a suit and jumps out of an airplane.
Me: What?
God: Yes. They call themselves the Flying Elvi.
Me: Ah.
God: So I'm stuck at home vacuuming fur-balls.
Me: What?
God: Well, I made a very stupid mistake.
Me: You made a mistake? That's hard to believe.
God: I did. And it was a stupid one.
Me: So what did You do?
God: Well, Mom asked Me if I liked big cats.
Me: Okay.
God: And I told her I loved them. That they were the most elegant animals on the planet.
Me: Okay.
God: So she got Me a house cat.
Me: And?
God: I thought she was talking about the wild ones! You know, Tigers, Jaguars, Pumas...
Me: Ah.
God: And she found a fat stinking stray house cat, and gifted it to Me!
Me: Quite a disappointment, I can see.
God: You bet it was. And as if that wasn't enough, she wants to get Me another one for My birthday.
Me: You have a birthday?
God: Doesn't everyone?
Me: But You're God!
God: Why do you keep saying that?
Me: Well, aren't You?
God: Of course, I am. So?
Me: So, a birthday is the day a person is born. You weren't born!
God: That's discrimination.
Me: But You weren't!
God: I have parents.
Me: You were adopted!
God: Now you've gone and hurt my feelings.
Me: Alright, so You arranged it, but that doesn't change anything.
God: It still wasn't a nice thing to say.
Me: Fine! I'm sorry. So You have a birthday. When is it?
God: Zero A.G.
Me: What?
God: That's my birthday.
Me: 'Zero A.G.' isn't a real date.
God: It was, before they messed things up with the Gregorian Calendar.
Me: Well, what does the A.G. stand for?
God: After God.
Me: Very clever.
God: You should read the scriptures, and Trust in Me. You're too skeptical.
Me: Fine, I believe You. But that's only a birth-date. When is Your birthday?
God: Hunh?
Me: I mean when do You celebrate Your birthday?
God: It depends.
Me: On what?
God: The stellar calendar.
Me: Oh.
God: Yes. Based on the relative positioning of the stars and the theory of relativity I can celebrate My birthday on practically any day.
Me: I'll pretend I understand and believe that.
God: See? Too skeptical. I'm sure you'll go to Hell.
Me: That's not a very nice thing to say.
God: Fine, then. We're even. You hurt My feelings, and now I've hurt yours.
Me: That's just childish.
God: Well by some calculations, I'm just a year old.
Me: And how did You get that?
God: Oh, simple. Since I'm God, My age is the only absolute age. So, taking My age to be the primary unit of age calculation, I'm precisely One.
Me: Ah.
God: You don't believe me?
Me: Of course I do.
God: I can prove it. There's a mathematical formula and everything.
Me: No, no. I believe You.
God: I can even prove that 1 is equal to 2.
Me: I'm sure that's true.
God: I can prove it.
Me: In God We Trust.
God: Now that's My boy!
Me: You're a good teacher.
God: Of course I am. Anyway. Have to go now. I think the cat's got Diarrhea.
Me: Ugh.
God: You can say that again.

Next: Bye, Mom! Bye Dad!!: Celestial Conversations XIX

Godparents : Celestial Conversations - XVII

2005-03-12T12:52:00.000+05:30

First: Celestial Conversation
Previous: God's Will? : Celestial Conversations - XVI

God: Hello
Me: Hi! Where have You been?
God: Oh, I spent the last few weeks mostly sleeping.
Me: Sleeping?
God: Yes. Had to stock up on it. My parents are coming over this weekend.
Me: Your parents? You have parents?
God: Is that a problem?
Me: But You are God!
God: Why do you keep saying that?
Me: But how come You have parents?
God: Oh, pretty simple. I put myself up for adoption.
Me: Adoption?
God: Of course. Apparently, people without parents do that.
Me: Only children can be put up for adoption!
God: That sounds very discriminatory to me.
Me: I can't argue with that. But why did You put Yourself up for adoption?
God: Oh, filling out government forms was becoming quite a hassle. They keep asking for your parents' names everywhere.
Me: Oh. So You fill government forms.
God: I had to. They were telling me I didn't exist.
Me: Ah.
God: Yes. Filling those forms became quite necessary. And now I've filled so many forms that they think I exist all over the place.
Me: Interesting.
God: So what was I talking about?
Me: Oh, You were telling me that's why You got Yourself new parents.
God: Yeah.
Me: Okay. So You just went out and got them, eh?
God: Well, it wasn't an easy decision.
Me: Really? Why?
God: Well, most of the candidates wanted the scriptures to be rewritten to read "The GrandFather, The GrandMother, The Father, The Son & The Holy Spirit."
Me: Oh! That's quite unreasonable.
God: Not really. The trouble was meeting the Pope to ask him to do that.
Me: What?
God: Yes. His secretary told me his appointments are booked till the year 2025.
Me: You actually thought the demand was okay, then?
God: Why not? If I'm The Supreme Father, then my parents are The Supreme Grandparents, right?
Me: Right. So how did you get these ones to agree?
God: Well, Dad was already quite famous. He prefers to lie low these days. He's so famous they even wrote a book about him.
Me: Oh?
God: Yes. More than thirty years ago.
Me: Ah.
God: And the book was so popular they even made a movie out of it. Marlon Brando played Dad.
Me: Wow. That's cool.
God: I know. Dad was really something. People used to call us The Family. It was fun.
Me: Oh. You mean Your father was... The... The...
God: Exactly. But he's retired now.
Me: Wow. Not hard to see why You chose him. Given what they called him, it's almost like he was destined for the job.
God: Well, if he was My choice, then isn't it destiny anyway?
Me: I always thought Destiny was a girl.
God: That she is.
Me: Really?
God: Yep. Skinny, brown-haired, and freckled. Wears braces for the effect of it. I never understood that. She's got perfectly straight teeth.
Me: Oh. So she works for You?
God: No way. I can't afford her rates.
Me: No? Then she works for the Dev-... him?
God: No, no. She's more of a free-lancer.
Me: Oh. Anyway. What does Your parents coming over, have to do with Your stocking up on sleep?
God: Have you heard my dad snore?
Me: Oh. That bad?
God: Like you wouldn't believe. Where my dad sleeps, the neighbours often think they're having an earthquake.
Me: Ah. And you live in a studio.
God: Yes.
Me: Isn't it about time You got a bigger apartment?
God: Yes. I'm in the process of doing that.
Me: Oh, that's nice. Where are you moving?
God: Sri Lanka.
Me: That sounds interesting.
God: Yes. They wanted to build a school in one of the places that got washed out by the Tsunami. So we offered to take it up.
Me: So You're going to start a new school? That's really nice. But how can you afford that?
God: Oh that's simple. It's all paid for by charity.
Me: That's nice.
God: Yes, and the best thing is that they're going to build teachers' quarters.
Me: So You're going to get the rest of the crew to join You too?
God: Yes. They were beginning to miss Heaven.
Me: But are fourteen people enough to start a school?
God: Oh, Lucifer is going to help out. He's going to send some of his people over as visiting faculty.
Me: What?
God: Well, what do you expect me to do? Starting a school is not easy.
Me: But teachers from Hell? Aren't you afraid you'll corrupt the children?
God: Well, how do you teach anyone the difference between Good and Evil if you can't teach them the meaning of True Evil?
Me: Good point.
God: Anyway. I must be going now. Have to buy some cigars for dad.
Me: Oh, okay. See ya.
God: Bye.

Next: Hello Kitty: Celestial Conversations XVIII

Bad Blogger!

2005-03-11T23:59:00.000+05:30

Blogger with a capital "B" of course.

Yesterday I couldn't post anything because I couldn't even log in to my blog maintenance screens. And today I can't post comments on anyone else's Blogger blog. People can only comment on their own Blogger blogs. Quite boring. Interestingly, Blogger's spell-check tool doesn't recognize the following words in this post -

Blogger
blog

Pretty smart, eh?

So what's my excuse for not posting for the two weeks before that happened?

*sheepish grin*

A new post will be put up on this blog in less than 24 hours - unless Blogger dies on me again.

Don't go away! We'll be right back after the messages (or lack thereof).

Onions and Tomatoes

2005-02-25T12:02:00.000+05:30

"We're out of onions."

That's my wife. Forever complaining about Onions. And Garlic. And Tomatoes. And Cauliflower. And an assortment of vegetables that I didn't even know how to recognize in their uncooked state, until the day I got married.

"I'll get some in the evening."

And that's me. Forever restocking my house with Onions, and Garlic, and Tomatoes and Cauliflower and a wide assortment of vegetables I still have trouble recognizing, so that my wife can continue to cook them and feed our small but happy family.

"Daddy, I'm having trouble with this problem."

My daughter. She's all of eleven years old. It's that exact age when she stops being daddy's little girl and becomes a woman in her own right. You might think it's a little early for that, but it's not. Do you have any idea how much smarter and ahead of us, kids are these days? I mean she's already making eyes at guys a couple of years older than her.
It scares the bejesus out of me.

"Which problem?" I said, as I looked at her book.
"This one. I'm not getting the right answer."

I spent a minute looking at her solution, and pointed out where a minus should have been a plus.
"Thanks Daddy," she said, giving me a smile, and returning to the book.

Only yesterday, it seemed, she used to give me a hug and a kiss on my cheek for things like this. Now it was just "Thanks Daddy".

"If you don't get some onions quickly, we'll be eating out tonight."

My wife was forever threatening me with the "We'll have to eat out if" line. I'd begun buying vegetables by the crate, lately, to keep her off my back. But if she didn't use them soon enough, they simply went bad. It seemed to me that I just couldn't win.

"Which is not a bad idea, if you think about it," she continued, as she came up behind me and put her arms around my neck. She'd just washed her hands, and the scent of Tropical Herbs (or so the soap bottle said) wafted through my senses. She knew exactly what to do when she wanted me to agree to something. And I was putty in her hands.

"Out again?" I asked, trying to resist, as I kissed the inside of her elbow.

"We haven't eaten Chinese in a long time," she replied, kissing me on the cheek - as if I needed any more convincing.

"Mom, Dad! Get a room!"

That was one of her favorite new phrases.
"We're just showing our love for each other, sweetheart," my wife said.
And I continued, "Yes, dear, and we waited till we got married to do this." Just to make sure. My paranoia about my daughter was getting worse everyday.

My wife sat down and looked at me with an amused expression. "Liar!” it seemed to shout.
Ours might have been an arranged marriage, but we had been meeting each other for months before we got married. We'd been very much in love by the time we actually tied the knot. And we'd stayed that way.

My daughter, for her part, blushed as she continued her homework.

"Chinese?" I asked. "Wang's Kitchen or Chen Hui?"

"What's Chen Hui?" my wife asked.

"It's a new place that's opened up next to Tucci Benucch," my daughter answered. "It's supposed to be quite hep. Can we go there please, Daddy?"

My eleven-year-old considered the place ‘hep’. I thought of it as having an 'ambience'. I wondered if there was any difference.

"Chen Hui it is."

"Yay!" my daughter shouted.
My wife just smiled.

"Well, then," I said, "I'm going to have a bath."

"No!" my wife and daughter shouted together.

"You take an hour in the bathroom, Daddy!"

"Yes, and we both have to freshen up too!" my wife chimed in.

"You," I looked at my daughter, "finish your homework, or you're not going anywhere."

"And you," I said, shifting my attention to my lovely wife, "can join me if you want to."

This time, both of them blushed.

Marry Me, Please!

2005-02-15T10:45:00.000+05:30

The first time I asked her to marry me was when we were six years old.

"I'll be the husband," I said, "and you can be the wife."
"No," she replied simply.
"Yes," I said.
"No," she replied again and walked off.
After a few moments, I walked off too. It’s no fun playing house alone.

The second time I asked her to marry me, was when we were fourteen. We were partners in a dance for the annual school program and I was waiting for her to come out of the dressing room. I was dressed in a black suit and bowtie. As she stepped out of the dressing room in a pink dress that came down to her knees, I took a deep breath. She looked like an angel that had just stepped down from the heavens. As we waited for the teachers to give the signal for us to get on stage, I stared at her and tried to find my voice. She caught me looking and smiled as she asked, "What are you looking at?"
"Will you marry me?" I blurted out.
Her smile turned into a grin, and a second later she burst out laughing. I didn't mind. I could see stars in her eyes. Still laughing, she took my hand and led me onto the stage.

The third time I asked her to marry me was on her sixteenth birthday. We were at a picnic with friends and the two of us were sitting by ourselves under a tree as the rest argued about which game to play next. She laughed at something someone was talking about in the distance. I heard the tinkling of bells in her voice. I plucked a daisy that was growing nearby and gave it to her as I said, "Will you be my wife?"
She blushed as she looked at the flower, and then burst out laughing again. She took the flower and ran to join the rest of the group. I followed.

The fourth time, we were eighteen. We were sitting in the cafeteria in college as she sat sipping on a glass of orange juice and telling me how beautiful the last poem she read had been. After speaking continuously for a few minutes, she stopped and said, "What happened? Why aren't you saying anything?"
I looked into her eyes and said, "I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you marry me?"
As before, she burst out laughing again and said, "You're not old enough to get married yet." And then she started talking about another poem.

The fifth time I asked her to marry me was the day of our graduation. We were both twenty-one. I got down on one knee with a red rose in my hand and said to her, "Will you, now, take me to be your husband?"
She grinned this time, and replied, "You're always in a hurry. You wanted to do your post-graduation, right?"
I shrugged, got back on my feet, and walked with her to the convocation hall.

Four years later, I had finished my post-graduation and had a job in a multinational company. We were sitting in an ice cream shop when she brought it up. "You haven't asked me to marry you in four years," she said. "What happened? Did you change your mind?" She was smiling widely.
"What do you think?" I teased.
"I think you're afraid I’ll reject you again."
"You haven't really rejected me even once, till now," I countered. "You never really said 'No'."
"I did when we were six," she pointed out.
"She remembers", I thought to myself, as I smiled at the memory.
I held out a spoon of ice cream for her to taste, and said, "Alright, so you rejected me once."
"So?" she asked as she tasted my ice cream.
"So nothing," I replied.
She rolled her eyes in silence. She was no longer smiling.
"Well?" I asked. "Do you think I've changed my mind?"
She frowned as she said, "I don't know." She looked beautiful even when she frowned.
I watched her for a few seconds and said, "Why don't you ask me to marry you this time?"
"Me?" she replied, eyes wide in surprise.
"Why?" I asked. "What's wrong with that?"
She blushed. "No," she said.
"Are you rejecting me again?" I asked.
"No, no!" she said quickly.
"So then you are saying 'Yes'?"
She stuck her tongue out at me as she realized what I was trying to do, and went back to eating her ice cream.
"Hey," I said, as I took her hand in mine. "Marry me."
She scrunched up her nose as she replied, "Are you sure?"
I'd been sure since I was six. "Yes," I said simply.
And she just smiled and nodded.

Late Night Phone Call

2005-02-14T05:20:00.000+05:30

"Hello," I said, barely awake.

"Rajesh?" It was a girl's voice.

"Yes?" I replied, checking my watch for the time. Gods, it was 3:00 am!

"Are you ready?"

"No," I replied, a little confused about what I was supposed to be ready for. "Who is this?"

"Rhea. Are you still asleep?"

"Lady, it's three in the morning. Do I know you?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. I think I got the wrong number."

A little irritated, I nonetheless managed to fall asleep again as soon as I put the phone down.

The next morning, I vaguely remembered the phone-call, but wondered if I had been dreaming. I checked my cell phone and there had indeed been a call at three in the morning. I thought about it. Even in my sleep, the voice had sounded nice.

That night, I felt like some mischief. So I set the alarm for three the next morning, and went to sleep. At three, I woke up and dialed the number that my cell phone had dutifully recorded in the call log.
A sleepy voice picked up the phone. “Yes?” she said.

"Rhea?" I tried not to laugh.

"Yes?"
She sounded sleepier than I must have been the previous night.

"Rajesh here," I said. "You ready?"

"Ready for what?" She seemed to be crawling her way to consciousness.

"Are you still asleep?" I avoided the question.

"Rajesh, daddy's flight was yesterday. You're a day late."

At this point I ran out of things to say, so I said sorry and hung up.
The next day, at 3:00am, she called again.

"Hello?" I had been asleep, but from the moment I opened my eyes, I knew it would be her.

"Rajesh? Rhea here."

"Hi Rhea."

"So what are you doing?"

"Dreaming about you," I replied.

"Well I just wanted to say Good Night." I could almost see the grin on her face. Of course at that point I didn't know what she looked like, so all I saw was a Cheshire-Cat-type grin hanging in the darkness. But you get the picture.

"Good night, Rhea" I said cheerfully

The late night phone calls went on for a week. They'd be short, but fun. And then I got tired of waking up in the middle of the night everyday, so I decided to call her before I went to sleep.

"You're early" she said.

"Yes," I replied. "I have an early day tomorrow. So I thought we could have this conversation now instead of at three."

"Smart move."

"I know. Hey, what are you doing around seven tomorrow evening?" I wondered if I was moving too fast. Still, there didn't seem to be any harm in it.

"I'll be collecting my kids from school. What about you?"

My heart skipped a beat. For a few seconds, I didn't even breathe.

"Hello?" she said, to check if I was still on the phone. I could tell she was trying to suppress a giggle.

I relaxed. "I'm right here. Well, I'll be taking my grandchildren to have ice cream, at that time. I thought maybe you could get your kids, I could get my grandkids, and we'd all have ice cream together."

She paused for a second, and then said, "Sounds like a good idea."

The next day, I came home early from work, and took almost an hour getting ready. I wondered what she looked like.
We'd decided to meet at Baskin Robbins. When she'd asked me how she'd recognize me, I told her to look for an old man in a navy blue shirt. She had laughed at that. When I asked her what she'd wear, she said she hadn't decided yet.

At exactly seven, a little girl in a green dress walked into Baskin Robbins. The girl came straight to me, and said "Are you Rajesh Uncle?”
At that moment, I felt like the biggest fool on the planet. "What was I thinking?" I asked myself.
But then in came this girl in a T-shirt and slacks, who was definitely not the girl's mother. Elder sister, maybe, but no way was she a mother.

I lifted the little girl in my arms, and looked at Rhea. "You're quite the practical joker, aren't you?"

"Well, old man," she replied. "You said you'd get your grandkids along. What did you think this was? A date?" She knew she had got the better of me, and a big grin was plastered across her face.

"Oh, their parents decided this was not a good day for ice cream. So I came alone. Well, what's your name little girl?"

"My name is Priya."

"Ok, Priya, which ice-cream do you want to have today?"

She looked at Rhea and asked her, "Didi, can I have Mango ice cream?"

So Priya had Mango ice-cream with strawberry syrup, I had chocolate chip vanilla with caramel and nuts, and Rhea had Blueberry ice cream with no toppings.

We talked about how expensive school fees were getting, how it was almost impossible to get good medicine for arthritis, and the fact that there weren't enough playgrounds left for children to play in.

That night, when I called her up, I asked her, "So Priya is a cousin, is she?"

She laughed and replied, "No, not a cousin. She's the neighbour's kid."

"So you thought you needed an escort to meet me, did you?" I had been thinking about that all evening, but hadn't got a good opportunity to say it.

"Well a pretty girl has to protect herself."

"I won't argue with that." She definitely wasn't lacking in the looks department. "But did you really think a four-year-old could protect you?" I did find that amusing.

"Oh, her dad was waiting outside in the car for us all the time."

"Beautiful, intelligent, and sneaky. I like that in a woman."

"You're not too bad yourself, for an old man."

"Why, thank you. So, would you join an old man for coffee tomorrow? Without an escort?"

"Ah. A real date?"

"Only if you prefer to see it that way. I just thought an elderly man and a single mother could go share a cup of coffee."

"A date."

"And then maybe a walk on the beach?"

"Slow down, soldier!"

"So just coffee is okay then?"

"Well," she said, pausing as if to think about it, "ok."

"That's great," I said as I started breathing again. "Good night, Rhea."

"Good night, Rajesh."

I smiled to myself as I went to bed. Next time, we'd do dinner.

Atmosphere = N2 + O2 + CO2 + Various gases + Love

2005-02-13T09:25:00.000+05:30

(In case you didn't get that , it means "Love is in the air")

Valentine's fever is in the air. People are either thinking about what to get their sweethearts, or talking about how Valentine's Day sucks. Usually, the former have sweethearts (or at least have specific people in mind they want to make their sweethearts), and the latter don't. Disclaimer: This is not a rule.

Me? I try my hand at fiction.

However, writer's block has recently been a bit of a problem in the recent past. So no new stories.

That being said, I do have some stuff I wrote around a year ago, that I never published for various reasons. So over the next few days, to celebrate Valentine's week (why just one day?) I'll be putting these stories up along with any new stories I can manage to pen down.

Hope you like them :)

Ash and the Mailman

2005-02-09T11:42:00.000+05:30

I'm not a big follower of the Late Show with David Letterman, but hearing that Aishwarya Rai was going to be a guest on the show tonight, meant that I had to watch the show.

Not because she is the most beautiful woman in the world. She isn't. She was. 11 years ago. But that was... 11 years ago.

Not because I once had her picture as my desktop's wallpaper. I did. But that too was 11 years ago. Ok, 10.

No. That wasn't it.

I wanted to watch, because... because...because...
Ummm... Do I really have to have a reason?

Anyway.

So she was on the show. And Letterman was all praiseworthy of this most beautiful woman in the world, who has millions and millions and millions of fans. All over the world. And yet, is relatively unknown in the US of A.

And what did our dear "most beautiful girl in the world" have to say?
Well.
The less said about it, the better.

(Of course, in that case, I should not say anything at all, but that would be quite boring, no?)

She was better than expected. She actually caught Letterman off guard a couple of times. In a nice way.

But.

There's always that "But" isn't there? (No, no. Single "t")

You'd think she has a personality of her own. You'd think that what the script-writers pen up, isn't all she has to rely on.

Well, you think wrong.

*sigh*

Resume Of A Single Guy

2005-02-07T11:33:00.000+05:30

Resumé

Name: Guy, A. Single

Position applied for: Boyfriend

Previous Experience: None

And we wonder why it's so hard to get the job?

And the story goes on - The lighter side of plagiarism

2005-02-02T15:56:00.000+05:30

Oh, ah! New post within four days? You ok? Everything fine and dandy, I hope? No emergencies or anything announced, were there?
:P

With lots of stuff being written about plagiarism in the blog world these days, I tend to keep my eye open for stuff about anything to do with it. So I guess it was natural for me to notice the Page protected by Copyscape button on Amit Varma's India Uncut blog. Needless to say, I thought I might want one for myself too.

So, I followed the link to the Copyscape site and found out that automatically protecting my page was a paid service (I'm a Sindhi *). I could use the site, however, to find up to ten "plagiarised" copies of any of my online work for free.

Masochist that I am, I tried the URL of Just Another Love Story. (Hey, found another one! Damn. Gimme a sec. There! Cribbed.) Most of the results I had already pulled up using google, but there were a couple I hadn't noticed before.

So, having nothing else more interesting to do, I tried the URL of my first article published online - Rants Of A Single Guy

Of the two hits it pulled up, one of the websites was an online version of Mid-Day, the Bombay afternoon tabloid. For a second, I thought "Damn! An offline version of my first article!"
Taking a look at the actual contents of the page, though, I almost burst out laughing! Maybe I've developed a sense of humour about this kind of thing, but seriously, I think it's quite funny :)

See: the link that Copyscape found

* Apparently, Sindhi's are this breed of extremely miserly Indians who try to scrounge on every paisa or cent (or other smallest denomination of the currency for the country they live in) that they can lay their hands on. My mom always says there must have been a mix up when I was born... *shrug* (Back to rant)