Best way - Q&A !!

Tagged, Again

under the influence of my love, Aekta, I follow her tag to the 'T'..!

10 years ago: November ’95.
I had missed cracking the JEE and decided not to join any aisa-waisa Engg college. Joined BSc (chem) at Vivekananda College, Chennai and was again preparing for the IITs. Being quite a strict college, within a month, one of the profs pulled me up for bunking so many of the classes and even the lab sessions. I stopped seeing him again ;) Around this time, I was bindaas!! just me and my coaching classes...


5 years ago: November 2000.
Somehow finished with my 4 years of UG in 4 yrs itself ;).. struggling nose-deep with the cream-de-la-cream.. Kinda disillusioned with the IIT (and its girls/whatever you call them ;) and computer science, decided MS(comp) isnt for me :P Wanted to build my management (work experience) muscles before I went to do my MBA. Joined as a software engineer with Philips Software Centre, Bangalore and it was our honeymoon period then! (with the company, i meant :)


1 year ago: November ’04.
Having safely cruised thro' the most my MBA, I was again enjoying the bindaas life... Last shreads in my marital relationship.. and I had more or less come to terms with it.. hence, no qualms on that front either.. Watched atleast one movie a day... With a lot of free time and free high-speed internet at my ready disposal, then started my honeymoon with the blogosphere.


Yesterday:
Reeling under the influence of Murphy's law.. Everything that could go wrong at work, went. Working overtime.. pitching-in for my colleague who was sick and on leave..


5 things I would do if I had a lot of money:
Build my dream house with runway (ala Travolta)
Buy my Skoda Octavia (and then whatever)
Hop onto my jet, in search of paradise island
Woo Perizaad Zorabian
Make sure 1% of my money reaches those who are in need


5 places I escape to:
Friendland
Musicland
Movieland
Blogland
Island

5 things I’d never wear:
(what a question??)
sudarmani jetty
govinda costumes
rupa's banians
janet's brassiere
paris's headbands (she doesnt wear much else, does she?!)

5 favourite TV shows:
Friends
Playboy series (on Russian channel!)/Baywatch
Fullhouse
Entourage
Sun TV Comedy time (a li'l)

5 things I enjoy doing:
Talking
Thinking
Reading
Working
Cuddling
(copied from Aekta!)

5 favourite toys:
(whats that.. kinky? you dont want me to name them, do you?!)

I further tag:
You, yes you!!

God Lives Elsewhere!

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main14.asp?filename=Cr111905do_bigha.asp

A thing of beauty is a joy forever... or so I was joyed to see the Akshardham Temple. But this article made me think... think thrice..

(thanks to Alok and Blog Bang)

God lives elsewhere

So how much space does god need to call it his home? How many crores
does god want us to spend on him so that he can possess a swanky,
sprawling mansion which dominates the skyline? So what will god do in
this huge expanse, move from room to room? Looking for what, inner
peace, outer silence, inner silence, bitter truth? Or will he play golf
or ride a horse and gaze at the distances of the private property he
possesses, till the eye can see, like landlord-princes in old European
paintings? Is god terribly afraid of darkness? Does he suffer from
insomnia? Is he a sleepwalker? If not, why does he need hundreds of
jazzed up lights all night in a city so starkly short of power and in a
nuclear power country where half the population still don't have
electricity (or enough to eat, below that mythical poverty line)? So
why does god need this rolling-in-wealth real estate?

And if he resides in the quietness of our hearts, in every word, bird,
leaf and leaf storm, in every butterfly, ant and inanimate object, in
rippling rivers, evening tides, moon shadows, mountain trees, and if he
lives in the winter wind which we breathe and if he is formless and
infinite, objective and etherised, essence and presence, then why does
he need a lavish palace in concrete as his residence on earth? Whose
god is this god?

Is god terribly afraid of darkness? Does he suffer from insomnia? Is he
a sleepwalker? Why does he need this rolling-in-wealth real estate?
President APJ Kalam, a pro-bomb scientist, inaugurated the opulent
Akshardham temple in east Delhi recently, modelled on the Akshardham
temple in Ahmedabad. Accompanying him was Dr Manmohan Singh, a man of
austerity and scholarship. Also present was the original patron of this
mega religiosity, 'pseudo secularist' LK Advani, who not only fights
elections from Gandhinagar, but compulsively backs Narendra Modi who
presided over the post-Godhra genocide. Find the links: the Akshardham
complex is controlled by the powerful, cash-rich Swaminarayan sect,
mostly based in Gujarat, with strong NRI links among the Friends of
vhp/bjp. And it won't be a misnomer to say that they, like the vhp
NRIs, are orthodox Hindutva loyalists, top-heavy in the caste society.

This pink sandstone dham of godliness, sprawled over 100 acres, as
mushy newspaper reports tell us, cost Rs 200 crore, (some say Rs 400
crore) and it is 141 feet high, with 234 ornate pillars, 20,000 gods,
sculptured flora and fauna, a vedic village, markets etc, the works.
God's own little sacred space. Next to a river which is dead, a dead
Yamuna, killed by urbanity's insatiable insensitivity, now nothing but
a nullah, a dirty repository of sewage and shit, static, with plastic
and polythene bags full of flowers and offerings to god floating in the
quagmire, like a rotten memory which refuses to die.

Across the temple, beyond the high, protective, iron fences, like an
apartheid fortress, live the other children of god. The invisible row
of proles, in sub-human ghettos. On Diwali, outside their thatched
homes, they smeared the courtyard with cow dung, some made alpana with
mashed rice, the little feet of Lakshmi, and lighted a diya with a few
drops of oil. Days after the festival of lights, the diya still burns
in this dark expanse under the Nizamuddin bridge, as if telling the
dazzling Akshardham adorned with hundreds of lights, that yes, god
lives elsewhere. In the ignited minds and wings of fire of democracy's
black irony. God's own democracy.

Shattered..

Dreams shattered...


could be the clearing for a bigger reality.

It is in MY hands, this time, everytime.

first time...

For the first time in my life, somebody has kinda dedicated a post to me. As they say, first time occurences are really sweet!!

Well.. find out!!

Anniversary of Sorts

Its that time of my blogging era and I looked back and read some of my initial posts. I also read some of the current posts of the people who kinda initiated me into blogging with their own writing. Wow! it does seem like a short time.. just about a year into my journey thro' the blogosphere!

Interesting.. and I am sure the future has many more in store of which I dont even an inkling of.

I was also searching for my post on the movie 'Chokher Bali', but couldnt find it. :)
Anyways, it is a fantastic movie and here are some of my thoughts (as I can recollect now). Caution: It will make sense to you only if you have watched the movie.

"it is subtle 'n graceful.... a great movie..

I had a lot of 'why's on my mind at the end of it and was chewing over the movie.. almost a year back. And this is how I think I interpreted the movie..

Binodini was smitten by Behari, but he was unattainable.. or so she felt. Her despair and lust took over her and she gave in to Mahinder. But then, life (thro' Mahinder's wife) starts screaming at you when you are in the wrong lane and with time she realized that she was riding against the traffic of life.

Binodini walks out but still she doesnt know what. And when Behari comes, she offers herself to him. But he refuses (he also says something like 'I am here to get you back for Mahinder', doesnt he?) She realizes many more things and also that she has been short-sighted in her dealings with life. Thats why she walks away when Behari comes back for her, 'cos she didnt want to succumb to his short-sightedness now'.

BTW, did you know.. 'Chokher Bali' in bengali means 'an irritant in the eye' "

Anyways.. Good to meet ya.. Thank you folks!!
Bhaskar

Just to get past 10000 ;)

Just to get past the ten thousand
Here is a post that has no start and no end!

Many milestones would come and many would go
but the webprints that your comments leave make my heart glow!!

why?

What fun?

what fun in writing when you can just experience it?
Indians wrote the KamaSutra and then they stopped writing or talking about it!
'Just Do It'?!
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Its been quite some time since I wrote anything much here.. But then, life has been quite a lot of bumps, hairpin curves, pot holes in between rosy, metallic roads.

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I went trekking in the interiors of Karnataka along with my cousins during the Diwali eve. Yaana was quite a sober affair while Kodachadri was hair-rising!! The leeches, the thick moist forests, the steep slopes, the tall green grass, the scent of a wild animal... whew!! it was just amazing!!

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One of my friends from the US will be here for the weekend and he says 'I owe it to him for the good time I had in NY!'

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Gimme more! Yeah, why waste time writing? ;)

Which Classic Movie are you?

I am the 'Apocalypse Now' it says...
something like ' I am the rogue wanderer searching in the meandering river of life for my shadow self'

check out for yourself!

Dell Champion Road Run: Nov 27

I and atleast two of my cousins are going to run in aid of these children. Your support will be useful too to these kids.


Community Champions of DIS Bangalore:

Are we keeping our commitment to run for the children of Freedom Foundation?

Hurry! Click on the links provided for your segment as below to register you & your family members:

Registration fee: Rs.150 (hand it over to your segment SPOC)


Dell Champion Road Run
For the HIV-afflicted children of Freedom Foundation

Date: November 27 (Sunday)
Time: 8:30 am

Thank you for your commitment!
Watch this space for more details!