Tayzwi

The usual. Its been this "usual" mood for a few years now. What happened to other moods, I wonder. Looks like its time for the next level of introspection, coupled with some retrospection.

Today for the first time, I got bored at a Bookshop (Landmark). I went around a mall (Forum) and the boredom got worse. McDonald's was crowded like crazy, and so were other places, with a urbane, boisterous, "family" crowd and all were going through the motions of shopping, eating, drinking, hoping, loafing, and whatever else people do in malls. While writing this, I am now thinking about what I was doing there...will that be the last time I go to malls? I don't think so. I am changing; and I don't like this change.

Mourning for all those who took the brunt of nature on sunday. And sighing at the thought of all those who are talking about how Tamil Nadu is now paying the price for its mistreatment of the Shankaracharya

I mean, RSS - Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, not RSS - RDF Site Summary (feed). On my way back from Soraba, I met a very interesting relative of mine who works full-time with RSS and has the somewhat lengthy title of "Akila Bharata Saha Boudhika Pramukh", which translates to "Head: RSS Think-Tank". As we had a couple of hours to kill on the bus till we reached Shimoga, it was talk-time for the idealogically confused Tejaswi Nadahalli and the passionate RSS leader/idealogue Dattatreya HosabaLe. We covered some organizational behavior, leadership, Indic-culture, (Neo-)Colonialism, India, Indian-ness, Nehru, Partition, and a whole load of other similar topics. For the very first time in my life, I met a true leader of people; someone who knows the complications of implementing policies, logistics, people, Indian History, is very well read, ideologically driven, unmarried, devoted, and a lot more. Very impressive person, eye-opening conversation....I even checked out the RSS website and a few columns there. Vitriolic as usual, and also extreme in places; but still, after pondering for a while, I am not sure I am as liberal as I think I am.

I will end this with a few quotes that he used, that I still remember.

"If you are below 25 and not a communist, you dont have a heart; If you are over 35 and still a communist, you dont have a brain"

"Gandhi chose the wrong man; and so did God" - (think Nehru and Patel)

Labels: india

I am off to my village for 3 days starting tomorrow. Some people to catch up with, a wedding to attend, and a few more sleepless nights are in the pipeline...

Visited IISc today to catch up with both the Dattas, and two others, one from TW, and one from Yahoo!, things are going good at IISc...Christos Papadimitriou is in Bangalore these days at HIPC2004 I heard...thats academics for now....

Will get back to you folks after 3 days......till then, adios.....

I have read many SOPs, esp during the days when I was applying to those PhD programmes in the US, and rarely have I seen anything like Samba's SOP. Mail him and ask for your own copy to read a pretty well done SOP with the right amount of calculated arrogance, cheeky humor, judicious amount of self confidence, and of course, a great flow of thought. I liked his SOP. After working for a year after writing my first SOP, and after going back to academia, my ideas have kinda changed and now, I find that I dont like my old SOP at all. WhoTF cares about SOPs now eh? lets get to more interesting stuff.

I have postponed my Bombay journey to the afternoon of 3rd Jan 2005. I will be taking a Jet Airways flight out of Bangalore at 1400 hrs, landing in Bombay at around 1530 hrs. Three cheers for my first flight.

Kumara? when is the Tyagarajanagar Oota?

Am already into my second week right now. And the first week has been hectic, very hectic. Am done with most of my to-do stuff. Minor Major, Vidyarthi, BCB; have paid first visits to most friends; am having filter coffee everyday; having mosranna and other normal food at home; catching up with relatives and cousins.....and other usual after 6 months kinda stuff. Nothing out of ordinary.

Now that I am back for a week, things seem normal; people are the same, Sudeep still gives disclaimers, Sumanth hasn't lost his staccato accent, Kumar looks the same, Sainath is as geeky as ever, More of my software engineer friends have bought digital cameras, adding to the YASETP count of Bangalore (Yet Another Software Engineer Turned Photographer). Saw power cuts, corporation dog-squads, cable TV failures, traffic jams, roadside masale puri, churmuri, auto rickshaws, radio city 91FM, Gandhi Bazaar tarkari market and all the usual stuff that makes regular life here. It was great fun back then, it still is. Love this place.

Will be visiting Yahoo! and ThoughtWorks this week. Am gonna be at Dhimant's play this weekend. And a host of relatives to visit. Will be out of town next week for a wedding, and the last week in Bangalore - will be on call.

And check this out; I am spending my new years eve at Dharmavaram Junction in Andra Padesh, thats right, my ticket to Bombay is at 1800 Hrs, Dec 31st. Thats crazy, but true. Hope to find someone on the train to party into the morning that night :D

me is back home, and it looks a trifle different; mostly due to changed interiors at home, different bed, new tables, cupboards, sheets etc.; but maybe some changed perspective as well, from my side; dont know for sure. hmmmm. cant pinpoint the exact feeling and thought, but just not feeling the same: thats the abstract part of the whole come-back-home experience.

bikes good; so, cruising all over the place. Su Depp is doing fantastic, all exciting about nothing and everything at the same time. Me has a mild bout of fever, so, not really venturing out beyond HosakereHalli on one end and Nagendra Block on the other. Will get out into the thick of things starting this weekend.

My professor has given me some work to finish by this week; so, maybe the next couple of days will be on that. Its been a while since I studied at home, maybe time to call Kumar home and start on with some serious study (tea, Britannia milk bikies etc), can get some quality kathe also; what say Richie Rich? UGH, I have become insanely nerdy; sucks!!

Need to get well quick, cuz lotsa people to visit on the other side of town; Yahoo!, TW, Samba, Dhimant, and quite a few others; people keep telling me that Bangalore traffic has worsened, need to check that side of the story too. And of course, gotta visit Vidyarthi, Brahmin's, UD, dont know if I can make it Janapadaloka, but lets see, gotta whole month to plan.

I want to change a few of my traits.
I want to change that thought too.
I hate recursion.
I am beginning to suspect that there is a big gap between what I want, and what I am willing to do to get there;
I am an unclean fellow, my lab-desk is the messiest in the entire IIT; with zillions of papers, a water jug, couple of bags, three to four used handkerchiefs, a fully chewed/bitten tshirt (that can never be worn again), a ton of books, 40-50 one/two rupee coins stewn around, handiplast covers, tablet covers, medicine covers, unopened bank statements, a pair of shoes, chits, an uncountable number of computer cords, used teabags in a plastic cover, and so on......
I am making a few serious mistakes in life.
Its been a long time since I introspected about some of my core theories.
I have lost the craving for good food.
I seem to subsist in vacuum.
Very few things seem to interest me these days.
Very few things seem to move me these days.
My telephone manners have improved.
My general reading has taken a big beating.
I haven't held a TV remote control in 5 months.
I wonder where I will be this time 2 years from now.
The cynic in me is getting a very big share of my actions.
Life is still beautiful, interesting and fun....

I had been to a cousin's place yesterday, in up-market Bandra, and met my cousin's daughter who is in seventh standard. She studies in the best school, carries a 6610, knows more about Yahoo! messenger than I do. With all this and more, she came out of her room, wished me a very good evening and vanished. After a lot of talk with my cousin regarding how young students in up-market Bombay are getting into smoking, drinking, drugs, casual sex (I have also seen the DPS RK-puram video, and was almost disgusted by it), peer-pressure among early teens, and I ended up feeling like I was talking to some American suburbian mom. Bombay is so damn polarized, the cultures are so different from slums to plush apartments, that it is taken to both extremes. Anyways, I went to check the girl's room and found some very interesting books like Richard Feynman's essays, unabridged versions of some classics, and so forth.......and also a few Mills & Boons (Kummi, ask Richie what these are), and so, to make it a good day for our friendship, and to also encourage her to read the kinda books I read, I presented her a good book that I had purchased earlier that day (for myself, called The Brief History of Everything - Bill Bryson)........ the girl lives in a world thats somewhat different from ours........and very different from her mom's.......

life.

Labels: life