SpaceVibes

Faux-science and spirituality-abuse — is it so easy to get a research paper?

2010-12-25T11:25:00.006+05:30

I am generally very open-minded about stuff related to meditation and spirituality and all this extra-scientific business. This includes my attitude towards God and religion — I am fine with concept of God/religion because people get happiness/peace of mind by believing in God and engaging in religio-spiritual stuff. Pragmatically, this is reason enough to continue doing it, even if it is at the cost of some intellectual dumbing down.

But, every now and then, I find absolute trash which just increases my dislike for this whole school of thought. Is furthering your culture so so important that you resort to specious arguments, fallacious reasoning and just pure drivel to make people believe you? It is really tragic that Sanskrit, a beautiful and fine language that has so much to offer, has to bear being taken apart by idiots with silly reasoning and misbegotten motives.

Case in point: http://paper.ijcsns.org/07_book/200808/20080825.pdf

The paper attempts to modern-scientifically conclude that "steadiness in the mind is achieved by chanting OM, hence proves the mind is calm and peace to the human subject". This is apparently important because "our attentiveness and our concentration are pilfered from us by the proceedings take place around us in the world in recent times".

Even if you were to ignore the terrible English (I am not being pedantic — the sentences are indeed so badly formed that you can't even figure out what they intended to convey), the whole paper is full of baloney:

First of all, the whole paper takes it for granted that OM is like the most awesome thing eva. Its powers are indisputable and unexceptionable. We humble mortals can at most take random frequency transforms. Never once is there an attempt to question the dogmatic beliefs.

The Introduction is full of the typical faux-scientific-religious-spiritual mash that arbitrarily uses vague terms likesteadiness of mind or purification of speech and then tries to bolster the half-baked theories (or just plain assertion) using scientific terms like resonance, energy or thermodynamics.

The second section Concepts and Techniques Utilized in the Proposed Work continues to wax lyrical about the OM mantra and claims that "Those who chant OM will have a powerful, sweet voice" and "Those who do meditation of OM daily will get tremendous power. They will have lustre in their eyes and faces." I swear I am NOT making this shit up!

Finally, one comes to know what the hell they did when we reach the section Steadiness Analysis Of OM Mantra Chanting. They applied a couple of wavelet transforms to the sound file of a person chanting OM, and then showed that once you make him do it a gazillion times (the paper says "a few days or weeks"), two consecutive OM sounds have almost identical wavelets. Cutting the fluff away, this basically means that if people chant OM a few thousand times, their steadiness improves, i.e. all their OMs will star sounding almost exactly the same. This has been considered to be conclusive proof that the OM mantra leads to steadiness of mind and is the proverbial answer to the life, the universe and everything.

The Summary again reiterates the perceived benefits of reciting OM (as if Sections 1, 2 and 3 and parts of Section 4 weren't enough), and the authors have the frigging nerve to end their paper with the line "As a final point, we have confirmed scientifically the accomplishments of OM chanting in reducing the stress from the human mind."

Out of the 16 references, 3 are to papers and 3 are to sites such as Wikipedia and are there to explain meanings of terms that he has used in the paper (Time Frequency analysis etc.) The rest are to random religio-spirituality sites extolling the OM mantra. Wow.

Now, idiots from all around with read such papers, and the media would say "SCIENTISTS PROVE OM MANTRA WORKS". The Sanskrit fanatics would use it to claim "SANSKRIT IS THE MOTHER OF EVERYTHING", and yet another bunch of people would live with misguided notions about a language and culture that deserve much more than these trashy faux-scientific-papers that restate the dogmatic obvious and spread propaganda in the name of Science.

Hindi Rap Lexicon

2010-10-24T08:41:00.005+05:30

This one is a guest post by Anasuya Mandal and Pranjal Bordia, which has been built upon a discussion between Susmit Saraswat, Antariksh (me), Anasuya.

We had claimed that English vocabulary in Hindi rap songs can be distilled to a lexicon of 40 words or less, and here's proof:

1 Feel
2 Fire
3 Higher
4 Desire
5 Floor
6 More
7 Sexy
8 Touch
9 Kiss
10 Hold
11 Heart
12 Break
13 Love
14 Crazy
15 Dance
16 Chance
17 Beat(ing)
18 Heat(/hot)
19 Baby
20 Night
21 Party
22 Burn
23 Disco
24 Darling
25 Pleasure
26 Forever
27 Life
28 Body
29 Shake
30 Move
31 Groove
32 Luck
33 Need
34 Rock
35 Roll

They couldn't reach 40, but we decided we would give the 5 remaining places of honour to Jai Mata Di Let's Rock

New Word - Frand

2010-10-03T17:08:00.010+05:30

In the last few years, social networking has risen to an all new level of ubiquity. With almost everyone having an account on Orkut (and now Facebook), and celebrities keeping in touch with their countless fans by making FB pages, most people have a large pool of online friends – people that are on your friend list, but who you haven't had any actual contact with.

This poses two problems: on one hand, you have the show-off crowd – people who take pride in having big friend lists (ergo, loads of friends) without a modicum of real friendship. Especially when it comes to adding girls, these people take pride in calling XX their friend simply because she was generous (?) enough not to reject their friendship request. Since celebrities often interact with their fans on such portals, it is not uncommon to see people claiming to be friends of a particular movie star or VJ simply because that star replied to their comment on FB/re-shared their tweet, or for similar lame reasons.

On the other hand, there are people like me, who are rather picky about who they call friends (people are actually close), as opposed to acquaintances (people with whom I have interacted in real life but do not consider them close enough to be friends), and feel annoyed that they often have to refer to many non-friends as friends simply because they have them on their FB friend list.

To solve this problem, it is imperative that we disambiguate the two meanings, and I propose a new term - frand. It is to bridge the gap in vocabulary that has been created by the proliferation of online friendship.

frand /frænd/ –noun

A person who the speaker knows only because they are present in the speaker's friend list on a social networking website.

The term has been taken from the unintentional misspelling of the word friend used by many Indian teenagers in phrases like frandship/making frandship/wanting frandship/wanting to be frandzzz/franz who either a) can't spell any better or b) consider this usage cool/hip.

Once frand is a word, people won’t be able to refer to random girls (who don't even know them) as their friends without being blatantly untruthful. Also, guys won't need to feel jealous of other guys who continuously make references to girls who, supposedly, are their friends, but in reality, just frands. Moreover, girls might be less reluctant in accepting frandship requests, because, after all, they are just saying yes to becoming a frand (as opposed to friend), and this will in turn boost the chances of eventually upgrading a girl from frand to friend status.

One major problem that I see is that frand merely sounds like an uneducated pronunciation of friend, instead of a word in itself. This, frankly, is exactly what it originally was, but I intend this coinage to be a sarcastic reference, and therefore, it fits the bill.

References

http://www.lol-land.in/posts/view/12 presents a humorous take on the use of the word frand

http://2basco.com/2008/12/10/can-i-make-frandsheep-to-you-piss-off-freak/ discusses the frandsheep phenomenon.

http://zh-hk.facebook.com/pages/Will-you-be-my-frandsheep/273612054067?v=info and http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2259641070 are FB pages/groups mocking the same.

Your Search Censored!

2010-08-24T12:56:00.003+05:30

We know very well that CC blocks several sites that seem to have content that they consider objectionable, and well we've been living with it. But I just discovered this, courtesy Harish:

Try switching Google SafeSearch OFF (Go to Advanced Search on your Google homepage) and then search for something adult.

I tried - have a look!

Try searching yourself, and you will see that despite your OFF setting, it activates Strict SafeSearch while delivering results. Now, I clicked on the link on the search results page and selected OFF again and I still got censored results. Surprisingly, I got normal results when I repeated this thrice, but Harish tried to do the same, and it's not happening.

This is not restricted to Google. I tried Bing, and while their SafeSearch does not manage to hide much when you use the same term as for Google (something we can attribute to their incompetence rather than CCs benevolence), I went to their settings page and saw this:

Can CC actually implement this? I have no idea, frankly. But, since the Indian Government is certainly not doing this, I have to conclude CC is. In which this is setting a very terrible precedent indeed.

Stupid Industry Giants and their Cool Terminology

2010-08-22T10:54:00.007+05:30

So, all these so called 'hip' and 'happening' joints have an annoying way of making people feel uncomfortable just because they can't speak their retarded lame-ass jargon. What's more, wannabe über-cool dudes will actually become slaves to this weird sort of autocracy, where you pay to be made to look like a fool.

It begins with English. OMG if I go to any half-decent expensive place in Mumbai, I practically can't talk in Hindi or Marathi! It's one thing to train your staff so that they can serve customers who might have only English as the common language of communication. It's another to make it some of firewall that you need to clear before you can order food in your own country! Do people speak in English by default in a subway in Japan! or France? Out here, I have seen employees reply in English even when the customer clearly and visibly wants to talk in Hindi. And it's not as if the employee is uncomfortable with other languages. In most cases he would be as pleased to shed this stupid garb of globalism that only Indians love to put on.

Anyone who goes to a Subway in India for the first time would have to answer the question 'What kind of bread?' without having any frigging clue about what kinds there are. In US/Canada, they at least have a chart which shows you various kinds of breads and veggies and dressings. Here, you have a long line of customers who will start scowling at you in an elitist manner (the sleeveless blouses and oversized T-shirts junta), if you, for the love of your life, can't think of any other answer to "what kind of bread" than "normal". If you ask the guy at the counter what options you have, he will spew out this list of breads in this tone that is generally adopted by those who feel destiny has cast them into the company of ignorant fools. Now, I myself know exactly which dressings Subway serves, and which ones it doesn't, and I can probably tell you the ingredients for many of them, but I still don't think anybody is, becomes or needs to be considered ignorant or uncouth because an Indian does not know what Southwest means in food parlance.

Enter Starbucks, and it's another story. Common sense would have you imagine that a "tall" glass would be one that is, erm, "tall", and is likely to have "normal" or "small" counterparts, especially so when it's being used to serve coffee. But no, asking for a "Tall" coffee in Starbucks will get you what they consider "Small" coffee, and if you want what you consider a "Medium" coffee, "Grande" is what you should order. Never mind the fact that "grande" is just Spanish for "Large", so they have successfully made speakers of two languages look like asses for wanting a humble coffee. What if you want a "large" coffee? You say "Venti", which is the one word out of these three that has nothing to do with largeness or tallness. Venti is Italian for 20, and is supposed to refer to the fact that the large (sorry, "venti") cup contains 20 ounces of fluid. How do you expect even a speaker of Italian to figure that out? At least McDonalds has names like "Quarter Pounder with Cheese" which tell you that there is probably a quarter pound of meat and it comes with some cheese on it.

Most Starbucks employees won't give you the damn large coffee unless you succumb and utter the word "venti". Have a look: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wic5Mf06SJ0

Here's a news item about how this stupid dictatorship drew a customer up the wall (N.Y. Post 8/16/2010).

Lynne Rosenthal, a college English professor from Manhattan, said three cops forcibly ejected her from an Upper West Side Starbucks yesterday morning after she got into a dispute with a counterperson — make that barista — for refusing to place her order by the coffee chain's rules.
Rosenthal, who is in her early 60s, asked for a toasted multigrain bagel — and became enraged when the barista at the franchise, on Columbus Avenue at 86th Street, followed up by inquiring, "Do you want butter or cheese?"
"I just wanted a multigrain bagel," Rosenthal told The Post. "I refused to say 'without butter or cheese.' When you go to Burger King, you don't have to list the six things you don't want.
"Linguistically, it's stupid, and I'm a stickler for correct English."

It's a different issue that the issue is not really linguistic, and has nothing to do with Correct English, but you get the point.

Why fuss over terminology? Isn't SB free to call its drinks whatever it wants? Because it is retarded and it makes perfectly sane and normal people and possibly cool people feel queasy because they can't seem to stand up to modern definitions of coolness. It's like bad grammar advice. People who make perfectly correct and well constructed sentences and start them with conjunctions like and/but walk warily in dark alleyways lest they be mugged by prescriptive grammarians.

And it's not even so that the cool crowd has all its cool fundae right. A few months ago, there was this guy who was telling me how ashamed and mortified he felt in the company of a friend who did not know what a Mojito (while narrating the incident, the guy pronounced it with a gee sound, as in giraffe) was, that too when he was sitting in a more-than-200-rupeej-per-head restaurant. 19 years of existence on this Earth, he reasoned, was sufficient time for one to know what a Mojito was. Now, I don't think not knowing what Mojito is makes anyone any more or less uncool than someone from a non-Maharashtrian family not knowing what Jhunka is. But, if I were to act snooty and pompous myself, I would claim that the fact that he knew what Mojito was, and still mispronounced it, deserved far more ridicule, considering it was he who was judging people based on their knowledge of cocktail terminology. 6-7 years of knowing what Mojito is, and being in supposedly cool circles, I would reason, should be good enough to know how you pronounce it.

Give it a rest people, and stop following stupid industry giants like stupid sheep. At least, stop judging people based on standards that have been practically set in stone by these giants and have been sub-consciously internalized by all of us.

Edit: Just remembered this stuff, so adding that too:

Show of hands please. How many of you have felt extremely annoyed at the way waiters at Pizza Hut talk? It's like they have this long English script that they have been instructed to recite with no regard to whether the customer can get even one goddamned word. Back in freshie year when I went there with my parents, this waiter who had some weirdo name came and started reciting her customary script, and my parents were like, huh? Is that even English? To top it, you are actually supposed to give meaningful replies to the questions that are hidden in the 30 second mumbo-jumbo, which means that a first timer is bound to end up feeling terribly flustered.

Congratulations on successfully speaking in a way that no speaker of any accent of English can understand.

And of course, you pay a 10% service charge on top of the 12% VAT on top of the already inflated prices for progressively reducing portion sizes for this wonderful experience.

Symbols and Faux-Patriotism

2010-07-21T01:41:00.007+05:30

So, I went to PVR today to watch Inception, and they played the national anthem before starting the movie. This is something I have never been able to figure out. I mean, why the hell do you need to play the National Anthem before the start of a movie?!

Countries usually have two kinds of approaches towards their national symbols. For some countries, using the nation's flag's colours or emblem everywhere is a way of showing love for their country. The maple leaf of Canada can be found everywhere there, including McD Canads's logo. In Mauritius, official files are tied with a ribbon that has the four colours of the Mauritian flag. People take pride in associating themselves with the symbols, and wearing an underwear with your flag's motif may as well be a sign of patriotism, not of insult. The national anthem's tune, or parts thereof, may be used in movies, for example. Pink Panther 1 had a small portion of La Marseillaise (French National Anthem), played when Jacques Clouseau makes the press statement about being confident of catching the diamond thief.

The second approach is of course, where you raise national symbols to a sacred level, so sacrosanct that they can't be treated as normal. India is a perfect example of this category. There is an elaborate Flag Code that is law-enforced and there are rules about how, when and where to sing or not sing the National Anthem. Using the colours of the flag for design will be frowned upon (and perhaps even punished, depending on the use) and people will tell you off for even humming the national anthem if you do so without being Petrificus Totallus-ed. Individuals weren't even allowed to display the flag on homes and other buildings until 2001 when Navin Jindal won a court case giving us all that right. All in all, it's a strict world here, and we pride ourselves at being excellent watchdogs of our national symbols. And of course, alleged abuses of the same are excellent political masala, especially if they involve kewl mass media (MTV tricolor logo case) or mass theism (Sachin Tendulkar case).

Now, a country might choose whatever approach it wants regarding its symbols, and though I prefer the first one slightly, I respect India's stance and shall abide by it. This brings me to the simple question - Of all places, why does one want to randomly play the National Anthem at the movie hall? Not standing erect while singing it is an insult, but sandwiching it between random movie trailers, advertisements, dhoomrapaan mana hai notices and a movie apparently isn't, and only serves to infuse patriotic sentiments into wayward teens.

I mean, I absolutely don't mind it, and I wish I could sit on my chair and play the National Anthem in the peaceful, dignified, serene setting of my room (yes, my room's very clean, thank you very much) without having neighbours scowling and frowning and calling me unpatriotic or rude. But it seems to me very weird that a country that has a special amendment to explicitly forbid use of the national flag in any clothing below the waist does not find it insulting if the national anthem is played in a movie setting, possibly even an Adult-movie. So much so that we even had a politician fighting to make it compulsory for movie theatres to play the national anthem.

Does anyone see any sensible reason why?

Also, why does no one take offence to this excellent composition, in which people are not standing in attention, not even the vocalists (the instrumentalists can be given leverage as they need to play their stuff)?

Of Sounds and Smells

2010-06-09T21:11:00.011+05:30

Wow, this blog's gotten old now, and it's been a long time I actually wrote for this blog. For one, the extreme freshie-ness of the blog's URL was embarrassing me, but I didn't want to change it. Secondly, stuff like Buzz and FB have ended up nipping most blog ideas in the bud, but this was one thing I always wanted to write about and I am finally doing it now! I announced this post back in April 2008, and it is finally seeing the light of the day after more than 2 years.

It has of course been established that sensory inputs like sounds and smells are very potent in triggering memories, but never have I experienced it so strongly as in the past few years. I will talk mostly about songs in this one - there isn't a lot to talk about in the smells department.

I wasn't too much into songs when I was in school, and although we did play music at home and in the car, they never had lasting impressions. In the past 5-6 years, however, I have come to associate songs very strongly with memories, and it is amazing how quickly and effortlessly you are transported to a particular mood simply by listening to the song you have associated it with.

Quite a few of the songs on this list are actually very random ones - songs that I might not ordinarily like. When I look back, I smile at myself for having gotten into them in the first place, but well, such are the ways of life. These songs matter because I have amazing memory associations with them, and those people who were part of these memories will be able to truly appreciate this post. It's my way of reliving the past few years, a sort of quick review - and of course, hindsight is 20-20.

Jaa sanam mujhko hai - Class VIII school trip to Manali. I had just joined DPS Jodhpur back then, and this Na tum jaano na hum had been released that time. Keeping with tradition, I had not watched this one either, but this song somehow stuck on. It singularly encompasses the anxiety of being in a new school, the sweet group of 20 we had on the trip, the first time I was staying away from home, taking pictures with the point and shoot film Kodak Kroma - everything.
Meri zindagi mein aaye - Two weeks at Mauritius - start of Class IX. This song used to be played on their radio, like, 5 times a day, and it has such a firm imprint in my memory that I am instantly transported to that beautiful country. 14 amazing days. Hotel Gold Crest. Rainbow in front of the hills. First time I flew alone, and it was an international flight!
School Chale Hum - This one's magical. Going to the School Bus pick-up point in winters at 6 in the morning, when it would still be pretty dark. This song made me loyal to the NDA government. I was totally heartbroken when UPA came to power!
Bulla ki jaana & Kaisi Hai Yeh Rut - Class XII songs. When I entered 12th standard, a sudden fear, not unlike one experienced by many fourthies, seemed to overpower me - the fear of losing it all - the fear of entering a completely different world. The comfort I felt in my school was soon going to be over and there was this whole anxiety of doing well in all the exams made in hell. One of those you've gotta prove yourself to yourself periods, and these songs take me there.
Main Jahaan Rahoon & Veeraaniyaan - JEE! It's funny that a Reshamiyya song should make its way into this list, but we just had to go watch a movie on the day of the JEE. We went to Provoked and realized that we were the only four people who had turned up. Realizing that a good but depressing movie was not really what we wanted to watch after giving JEE, we went to Namaste London. The feeling of relief mixed with anxiety - I had not yet calculated my expected score.
Smack That & Belly Dancer & Maula Mere Maula Mere - Some of my strongest song associations. Before I left for the Astronomy Olympiad Camp (after class XII), I got a CD with MP3s, and just transferred a few songs to my cellphone. I lived those 18 days listening to the two Akon songs several times daily - enjoying everything I did but wanting desperately to go back home. And then the 12th Board result on the 23rd of May - the feeling of relief more than anything else, followed by elation and phone calls. I heard Maula Mere Maula for the first time on Ralph's iPod. It's this beautiful cocktail of sentiments that I am immersed into whenever I listen to any these songs.
Alvida & Un jour en france & Wo Ajnabi & Les Mistrals Gagnants & J'ai demandé à la lune - Freshie year, first sem! I had heard Alvida a few times before coming to IIT, but it registered for the first time when it was sung in the Freshie Music Orientation. Thanks to Red FMs chaar gaane chipak ke and Malishka, the only good RJ I've ever heard, this song and Wo Ajnabi have left strong impressions - walking from the main gate to H3 in a downpour that completely drenched me - the freshie naïvety of assuming that the Harry Potter quiz that I had wanted to go to must have been canceled due to the rains (!) - the irritation of the transition from a place where everyone knew you (and where you could get work done in a snap) to a place where you were a non-entity (and had to run around in the Acad Office to get a simple document signed) - and the occasionally damp walls of my room. Un Jour en France was when I got assigned NCC instead of NSS because of some SAC office goof up. Those tense days as I ran around everywhere I could to get it changed - MA105 Quiz - Coming to terms with the fact that scoring 6/10 is a totally accepted thing - telling your parents that above average marks are good enough - downloading French songs from ESnips using Pranjal's ancient laptop - 100 ml of orange juice - society tea -attending French classes in the institute - Les Mistrals Gagnants was in fact given to me by Delphine.
The Wall - Aditya Birla Scholarship - I heard snatches of this song in the Taj Ballroom, and tried to find out what song it was, but didn't succeed for 6 whole months! It was when this song suddenly played as the ringtone on Arpit Agal's cellphone during a Bridge Workshop in H3 that I was finally able to put my finger on it. And it took me back to that memorable evening.
Kabhi Kabhi Aditi & L'hymne de nos campagnes & Une belle histoire & Nasha hi Nasha hai & Lambi Judai - Summer after freshie year. The joy of a single room. BJC. The sound of rain splattering on the window. The smell of wet grass and the freshness in the air that only monsoon can bring. Going for meals to the H13 Mess. And listening to Nasha hi Nasha hai played at 3 a.m. (at a volume so high that the whole wing could have heard it) by some random college guys staying in the room next to mine while I was down with cold and desperate for sleep - going to Mayank's room to burn Windows Vista onto a DVD (first time we met) - a weird collection of memories, all bursting out the moment I play any of these songs.
The masochism tango & Un coup d'oeil dans le metro & Hasta la vista mi amor - 2nd year is when I started listening to songs while studying, and The Masochism Tango somehow stuck on in my 3rd sem. Harish had told me about this song. The lyrics is hilarious! Don't miss this one. This was also the time I started listening to French rap artist MC Solaar, again courtesy Harish, who introduced me to Hasta la visa, mi amor, a rap in Spanish and French.
Dream On - SciTech Quiz at TechFest in Sophie Year. At school level I had won lots of quizzes, but freshie and sophie year didn't go that well on that front. SciTech was therefore a pretty big thing for me; we had not expected that we would make it to the finals, and this song, which was on repeat while we stood next to the OAT for like one hour before they actually began the quiz show, got branded into my memory. Every time I hear it, I am taken back to that OAT stage.
La tribu de dana - I discovered this on Harish' laptop, and it is probably my most played song. I have recommended it to lots of people and there has rarely been someone who did not like it. With rich folk music in the chorus and lyrics rich rap style singing, this is also one of the few songs I played in my French sessions. I don't know what they meant to others, but for me, they were high points of the entire week. It was also the time when I was suddenly bored of acads and all courses seemed very dreary. In those days, I literally used to count days down, awaiting those two hour sessions that mattered so much to me.
99 Luftballons & Le tourbillon de la vie - I heard 99 Luftballons for the first time at a Karaoke at Madame Tussaud's wax museum at Amsterdam with Amil. I sat there for half an hour just listening to this song which seemed to have ensnared me. Apart from having great lyrics, this German song has probably been heard more often in the world than all of Rammstein combined (well, that's what a comment on YouTube claims, but I seem to agree :D). I made Sangram listen to this song last month, and he tells me that song will also always remind him of that nature trail we did along the river. Le tourbillon de la vie is a microcosm of the summer of 2009. I chanced upon this one while I was randomly hunting for French songs on YouTube and it instantly reminds me of the best summer of my life. Everything - Cooking, Travelling and even the Hostel room allocation mess I came back to. The lyrics of this song and its simplistic music are etched deep in my memory.
Hallelujah and Ironic - I think it was Nikunj that told me about this song. There are lots of versions, but I love only the Rufus Wainwright one. Lots of 5th sem memories with this one. Ironic - the song that brings back all the awesome memories of the Reading Literature course we did - Ankur's diligently made summary document - complaining about how much fluff there was in Copan - Travels with a donkey.
Jos sä tahdot niin - I can never thank Harsh(vardhan) enough for introducing me to this song - one of the best foreign language songs I have heard, and boy I have heard many! Don't miss this one. The video is simply divine and the voices amazing. Susmit (and I think Mayank too) would remember me making him hear this song, like, 10 times in a row before he conked out. And whoever I recommended this too, I would make a fuss, makign them promise that they will watch it on full screen and use headphones.
La forêt des mal-aimés - Whenever I went to Claire's place, we almost always ended up playing this song. Cooking at Claire's would always be associated with Pierre Lapointe's songs.
La corrida - Teaching French at KV IIT with Claire - I had this song in my laptop for more than a year, but it was when I heard it being performed for the school kids by the French group led by Baptiste Daleman that I really developed a liking for it. Also, Ankur accompanying me one day to the school - teaching the kids animal names.
Halo & Time Flies & Fireflies - The Porcupine Tree concert @ MI '09 - coming back from the concert with Mayank and Susmit dead tired and then listening to Speed of Sound - Flight journey to Delhi with Anasuya for the Honda YES Award - learning Hiragana in two flights - sitting at the Delhi airport and making a list of friends we wanted to treat - realizing how I had very few good friends but that they were very valued ones.
Edit: I can't believe I forgot Fireflies! I often ask Kovid to suggest songs to me, and generally, our tastes match. He told me about Fireflies in January, and I have heard this song hundreds of times. It's one of those songs that you like a lot but can't explain why. Lots of 6th sem memories with Fireflies. Thanks Kovid!
Lovelinesse & Jimmy - I couldn't attend the Moriarty concert during MI, and a couple of people gave me very terrible reviews after that, so I didn't bother listening to the songs. It was when I read Ms Jaya Joshi's review of the concert and her experience of staying with the artists for a few days (or rather, the artists staying at her place for a few days), I was struck by how deeply she seemed to have been impressed by the group. Quoting her, when you listen to these songs, you get the impression that these guys are just singing for themselves and are having a great time. It's as if they don't care if anyone's listening; they are having too much fun already. It was late in the 6th semester (endsem time) that I heard these songs and instantly fell in love with them. They seem so effortless, and the girl's voice sort of haunts you. And there's ths beautiful use of the harmonica. These songs, along with La Corrida were on permanent repeat all through the endsems.

So, well, here was a quick flash-back. This was one of those posts that you write more for yourself than for anyone else... and I am sure that, a few years down the lane, I will enjoy reading it even more than I enjoyed writing it today.

Demystifying Time Travel

2009-10-05T17:17:00.005+05:30

Raunak and Neel (http://talesofiit.blogspot.com/2009/10/time-travel-x-02-pure-time-travel.html) recently wrote an article about Time –Travel. That reminded me of a very detailed piece I had written about Time-Travel (with respect to the Harry Potter series) when I was in Class IX. Frankly, I do not believe TT is possible, and if yes, it does lead to zillions of paradoxes, but I still liked the way it was treated in the series, and it was certainly better than most Sci-Fi treatments.

It included a pictorial representation too, and I admit I was rather proud of it. I managed to unearth it and am putting it up here. Do read and comment. Sorry if the language feels a bit immature. It was written around 5-6 years ago!

Most of the HP fans are very fascinated by time-travel (henceforth referred to it as TT), but after reading a few articles by fans about Time-Travel, and some questions put up by HP fans about TT, I noticed that most of them have too many misconceptions about the whole thing.

Many of us, including myself, overlooked the concept of Time-Travel when we read PoA for the first time. But, after a lot of reflection over the whole thing, I noticed that it is not that easy as it seems on the first instance. But, at the same time, it is not difficult to understand if we give it a thought.

What is Time-Travel?

TT is the action of going back (or ahead, though it is not mentioned in the books) in time.

What is so special about it?

What makes TT special is the fact that after Time-Traveling, the actions of the Time Travelled person directly affects his past form. The other thing is that it results in two copies of the same person.

What makes it dangerous?

Well, TT is dangerous because your actions affect the past. In other words, what you do after time travelling will affect your past selves. Time travelling is extremely easy if you know you are going to TT in advance.

Also, keep in mind, the following question is meaningless – "What if this had happened instead of that? What if Harry had taken Buckbeak without letting MoM members see it?" The reason you can't ask such questions is because whatever happened in the book was because characters did things that led to it. It is difficult to digest this but it will ultimately sink in.

OK, I will elaborate everything with an example:

Let's imagine a person X. He is living an ordinary life. He has not yet time-traveled, but, plans to do it after an hour. The time now is 9:15 AM. He plans to go back 1 hour in time at 11 AM. At exactly 10 AM, one more X is added to the scenario. One X was already present and the other X has now come.

For one hour, two X's exist in the scenario. At exactly 11 AM, the original X time travels. Now we jump back to the past again. For the original X, it is PRESENT, but for the TT one, it is PAST. If they were to meet, the TT one would know what happened between 10 and 11 AM as he has already seen it, but the original X has not yet seen it. Actually, both are the same persons. A look at the diagram will make everything clear. You can see a timeline. The red line indicates the original X at 9:45 AM. Now, at 10 AM, the new X arrives. This is the blue line. At 11 AM, the original X (red) TTs and goes back to 10 AM whereas the new X (blue) continues the life. So, in the period of 10 AM to 11 AM, two X exist. I call this time-zone as the dual-existence zone.

Here, I come to a very very important part of TT. This is also a question that is asked by many.

Does Time-Travel mean that a TT person will be trapped in an infinite loop?

There it is… The most popular question. It was especially for this question that I drew the diagram of the timeline. It is clearly visible that there is only one loop. See, the red line goes on till 11 AM, and then the black line joins the red with the blue line that starts at 10 AM. Keep in mind that there is only one X. It is just that there are two copies of X between 10 AM and 11 AM. At 11 AM, the blue line continues forward. It DOESN'T loop. To understand it, take a rope and make a loop in it as shown in the figure. So, the red line goes on, turns around, becomes the blue line and then the blue goes on. So, there is no chance of being trapped in time forever like some Sci-Fi story or movie (not a very pleasant thought anyway!). There is only one loop. I think I couldn't explain it better.

I think I have answered most of the questions directly related to Time-Travel. I will now attempt to answer the two most burning topics about TT in GoF and OotP.

Is it possible that Fred and George TT'ed during the World Cup and thus told Bagman about the outcome about the match?

I will answer the technical portion of the thing (related to TT). I have imagined what might have happened.

After seeing the match Fred and George TT'ed and went back to the time a little before Bagman asking them for a bet. The original Fred and George new they will TT in the future so they went away to make the coast clear for their future selves. So, it was the TT'ed F and G who betted with Bagman. Later, the TT'ed ones either hid somewhere or stayed there. The original F and G either came back after ensuring that their future selves were away. I will quote my earlier lines - Time travelling is extremely easy if you know you are going to TT. See, how smoothly the plan worked.

P.S.: It is mentioned in GoF that Fred and George went away for a while during the cup.

Now, the most asked question:

Couldn't Harry TT and rescue Sirius?

The first mistake – Do not use Couldn't.
I will explain why you can't use it later.

I wished it were possible, but unfortunately, it is not.

If you refer to Mugglenet's Time Travel section, you would see that Harry couldn't have prevented Sirius's Death. Remember this:

You can prevent a thing from happening. You can't undo it once it has happened. (^Z won't work here!)

In PoA, Sirius was NEVER kissed by the Dementors. NEVER. Buckbeak was NEVER killed. NEVER. The reason Sirius was not kissed and Buckbeak didn't die was because Harry and Hermy-Own (OK, kidding! Harry and Herm-own-ninny, OK! OK! Harry and Hermione) time travelled and DIDN'T let it happen.

If Sirius had been kissed by the Dementors, nothing could have prevented it.

The main thing to understand if one wants to fathom the mystery of Time Travel is that Whatever is happening is happening because we did things that led to it.

This is the reason why I told you not to ask the WHAT IF THIS HAD HAPPENED INSTEAD OF THAT questions.

TT is possible every time. What makes the difference is that we don't do it. That is because we don't know when we need to TT. TT is running parallel to the normal time (this is to be understood). Harry and Hermione knew Sirius was going to be kissed. So they could prevent it from happening. If they had not TT'ed to save Sirius and Buckbeak, Beaky would have been dead and Sirius would have been kissed. Afterwards you couldn't have asked WHY DIDN'T HARRY AND HERMIONE TIME-TRAVEL TO SAVE SIRIUS AND BUCKBEAK? That is because, they DID TT and so Sirius and Beak are alive.

The reason why I forbade you to use couldn't is because nobody had stopped Harry from TT. He could have TT'ed if he wanted. But the fact again is that he didn't.

If Harry really had Time-Traveled to save his Godfather, Sirius would NEVER have died. The fact that Sirius has died shows that either Harry didn't TT or did but was unsuccessful in saving Sirius. Therefore, Harry couldn't have time-traveled. But, just to prove you that it was impossible for him to have time-traveled, I will change the story line a bit:

> Harry saw Sirius fighting with Bellatrix. Bellatrix launches the killing curse. Harry closes his eyes with fear. He hears footsteps and explosion. When he opens his eyes, he finds, to his surprise, that Sirius is not present in the room and Bellatrix has just gone to the other room.

> thinks Sirius died and fell through the veil. He runs towards the veil but Lupin comes from behind and says, "Harry, nothing to worry, Sirius is safe."

> Harry doesn't understand what's up but keeps quiet. After sometime, Lupin explains to him that Harry has to time-travel and save Sirius. Harry goes back in time (how he does it is no concern of ours). Now the story is from this Harry's point of view (the one who time-travelled). I will use "Potter" for the original Harry and "Harry" for the time-travelled one.

> Harry runs and hides himself. He sees Sirius and Bellatrix fighting and sees Bellatrix launching the curse and Potter closing his eyes. Harry runs and pulls Sirius out of harm's way. Bellatrix goes to the other room and Potter opens his eyes to see nobody but him.

Thus, the time-travelled Harry rescued Sirius.

> Potter goes to Lupin who tell Potter that he has to TT. Potter TT's and goes back and hides, and when the time comes, jumps and rescues Sirius.

What I have presented is a very crude description. I want to impress upon the fact that Sirius has DIED and Harry cannot undo his death by TT'ing. He could have prevented it. So, Sirius fans should not be hopeful.

Re-painted!

2009-04-30T00:49:00.004+05:30

After a year with the progressively fading abstract Sun, I desperately wanted a new design on my Laptop. What with the professional services of Hakuna Matata Inc. and one whole day at our disposal, we finally worked out a design, but unlike the previous one, this one was intended to ring deeper.

Have a look.

[And yeah, the array index is using Base 1 :D]

(1,1) & (3,3) - The same sentence One language is never enough written in four languages. English, Korean, Spanish and Greek. www.omniglot.com is an excellent website for all Language Geeks, do visit it! The thought of having only one universal language scares me.

(1,2) - The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci. Saluting not only the Science and Technology of the past, but also the infinite symmetry, beauty and organisation of nature and mathematics. The Divine Proportion; The Golden Ratio; Nature's Building Block. Ping me if you don't find that grand!

(1,3) - These are lines from Sangam Poetry (a poem by Kanniyan Poongundran), purpotedly the oldest Tamil literature we know of, dating to 100 BC. The words யாதும் ஊரே - யாவரும் கேளீர் - (Yaadhum oore, yaavarum kelir) roughly translate to any town is my town and any man is my kinsman. Boy, do we need these sentiments now!

(2,2) - If you, like me, spent your schooldays watching the Oh-so-awesome shows on Discovery Channel, you might have caught this on TV. The OneEarth campaign. We have but one earth. And it's in our hands. Totally. And we aren't behaving exactly nicely with it.

(2,3) - The Parthenon in Acropolis. Was a temple to the Greek Goddess Athena. Features on my laptop for many reasons, one being my profound liking for Greek Mythology. Also, it is a beautiful architectural specimen too, built in the Doric and Ionic style. The smart guys figured that if you make the columns straight, an optical illusion makes them look thinner in the middle, so they made their columns a little thicker in the middle, so the columns would appear to be straight (Source). And of course, the building is virtually a tribute to the Golden Ratio.

The German text reads Die Luft der Freiheit weht, which is actually Stanford's motto and translates to The wind of liberty blows. Since the general theme is global peace, unity and cultural diversity, the wind of liberty signifies to me, not only education but also freedom from the shackles of narrow thinking the world is suffering from.

(3,1) - The colours of the French flag - Blue, White and Red. There due to my love for the French language. Also, the Eiffel Tower, an engineering marvel, a wonder of the world. The text reads, Vouloir, c'est pouvoir, which literally translates to To want is to be able to ~ Where there's a will, there's a way.

If we want to do it, we can.

(3,2) - I am sure these are pretty familiar lines. वसुधैव कुटुम्बकम्. The Earth is a family. If only we could get rid of the stupid blame game and just embrace each other as one big extended family (LitCon :P). The text which reads a bit like LOLFUN is my name in a code which I myself am unaware of. Hakuna's asked me to figure it out. You guys are welcome to give it a shot.

So, that pretty much covers it all. Wrapping it up, the message I wanted to convey, while portraying the cultural diversity of the world, is that if we wish, we will be able to let the wind of liberty blow and free ourselves from all these shackles, into a world where the whole Earth's a family, every village my home, and every citizen of the world my kinsman.

Of course, these are big words, and such stuff is easier said than done, but the one thing my exploration into languages and cultures has done to me it is to help me appreciate that golden thread that weaves the sheer diversity in the world together into one seemless, multi-coloured fabric.

What do you think?

P.S. @Hakuna. Couldn't thank you enough. You're a genius.

Commented-Demented

2008-12-06T22:54:00.030+05:30

Warning: Occasional mature content. Reader Discretion Advised.

YouTube's been a revolution. Yes, in ways more than one. The videos are of course fantastic, but a whole new world lies (!) below them. In many cases, the comments on videos provide more entertainment than the videos themselves. Most of these follow steady patterns and can roughly be grouped into 7 types. Have a look. Can think of more? The comments section is open!

Brainy Buggers
They can’t wait to show the world their mental prowess or their detailed knowledge of everything under the sun. They explain things with panache, and make you feel you have wasted all your life in useless activities when you should have devoted it to the pursuit of knowledge which you could then have eloquently passed on through the comments section. Their knowledge is absolute, and cannot be contested.

Brawny Buggers
Remember that big guy from school who weighed 40 pounds more than you and was a head taller? The one who just couldn’t help bullying everyone around just for fun? The one who found it pleasurable to challenge every other scrawny guy to a fight but became a sissy the moment he found a match. The Brawny Bugger is the electronic incarnate of your favourite school bully and the physical version of the Brainy Bugger. He is passionate about challenging people to duels and would not lose an opportunity to punch, kick, beat and crush the life out of you. In this carnal bliss, he has, however, forgotten that you can’t yet throw punches over the Internet.

The WTF Files
Reading these comments makes you begin to contemplate deep questions about the very reason for human existence. These comments don’t last longer than a few words, nor does the poster’s mental prowess. Not only do they not relate to the video in question, they are so brainless you actually begin to pity the poster. By the way, this is the most common category of comments.

It’s fun to see that this stuff is mostly written by scrawny, emaciated guys who probably would not have survived to tell the tale had they shouted this stuff in real life.

Now, now, dear. If my literary talents extended only as far as three words, I would make sure I spelt them meaningfully.

Incoherent Babblers
Be prepared for long lines of text talking about everything in general and nothing in particular. These smarty-pants love writing tons of text which does not, even in the slightest, have anything to do with the actual video posted. In most cases, it is written in horrible English, and the best you can do with them is laugh out loud. Be prepared for a lot of meaningless random ranting. Alternatively, these guys try to answer questions posted by other users, but only end up increasing the general chaos of the comments section.

Automated Appreciation
Be prepared for comments from mike217642kd which wax lyrical about your video and make you feel that at least one guy in cyberspace appreciates your stuff. In your moment of bliss, you realize that the comment goes on further to give you a link to www.anypornsitehere.com and you suddenly wish that the LHC Experiment had just turned the Earth into a black-hole and you had been sucked in. Yes, they multiply faster than rabbits, and they are unbeatable. Welcome to automated bots, who go about placing generic comments on YouTube videos and blogs which just sort of seem to fit well. But then, the comments section was never place for intellectual discussion, was it?

I confess, I was pretty pleased with this one. Until I realized every single person who was on my roll had got the same.

Politically Motivated
These are people in late teens who thought it might just be wise to know some politics. Now, as their only source of information is blog rants written by other deluded individuals or some silly conspiracy theory movies, they are ready to buy that Obama is actually Osama with a clean shave and a hair-cut (Yes, Hakuna!!!). With their half-baked and stir-fried knowledge, they set on the mission to increase global political awareness. They post dire remarks about how the country is going to the dogs and how the president should rather be bound and sent to Antarctica. Funnily though, most of the times, these comments are posted on videos which do not, even remotely, relate to politics.

Skeptically Yours
Welcome to the new age skeptics. They demand proof, absolute proof. According to them, all that is there on the World Wide Web is either morphed, Photoshopped, warped, zoomed or zapped. They know. They don’t need no education. They can see right through you. They feel insulted to see cheap cinematic tricks trying to insult their intelligence, and they don’t take kindly to such acts. The same smart-asses will however, believe that the LHC is just one massive black-hole or that Sun is the largest star in the universe. So much so for the facts.

Khoon Chala

2008-09-24T14:09:00.009+05:30

मी आज रक्तदान केले... ह्याचा अभिमान वाटतो : I donated blood today... It feels great

That's what the shining red and white badge said.

When MoodI organised Khoon Chala, the blood donation campaign, it was something I appreciated whole-heartedly, but something I was equally sure I didn't want to be a part of.

I don't know why I had an inhibition in the first place (which was intensified after hearing stories about people almost fainting and feeling exhausted and the standard Indian construction weakness feel ho rahi hai), but I had pretty much decided I won't go for it (despite it taking place in my hostel lounge). By the time it ended though, I was pretty much regretting having not donated blood.

Anyhow, when, on 23rd, the camp was again set up in H3, I decided to go for it. The kind guys asked me to fill up a form and forwarded me to the Doctor, who enquired about my disease history in the past year, which turned out to be satisfactory for the situation. From there, it was on to the temporary beds they had set up. He asked me to look away, and I felt something piercing my arm (obviously, now), something being stuck, and that was all. He said I could look now. I thought the donation procedure was over, something that was just pure scary. I mean, if that guy could take out 350 ml blood from my body in a matter of 5 seconds, it was something to be horrified about. Thankfully though, the process had just started, and I felt real stupid for thinking otherwise. Anyhow, the entire procedure took about 10 minutes, with blood slowly getting collected in the standard plastic container (it contains anti-coagulant solution and was kept on one of those kitchen balances, to keep track of the weight). I was asked to lie down straight and hold a rubber ball in my hand, which I was supposed to pump, to facilitate blood flow. After chatting with the guy for sometime, I found it best to listen to music while the Khoon chalaa.

All in all, it was pretty copy-book style, and after the bag was full, he asked me to continue lying down with my legs bent close to my body (so that the brain gets sufficient blood). Some blood oozed out from the prick, but after some time, it was all pretty patched up.

It was time for Tea and Biscuits, and I happily munched on a packet of ParleG (God bless this brand). In the meanwhile, I got my certificate and blood donation card (along with the badge I could flaunt), which mentioned that I could donate blood again after three months. That card also enables me to claim blood in case I need it in the future.

The whole thing was done very nicely, and you do get a pleasant feeling of satisfaction and happiness. The folder that they gave talked about how Human blood cannot be synthesized in the Laboratory and how there is a great deficit of blood which leads to many deaths which could have been prevented.

The blood loss is corrected in 24-48 hours (in volume) and the RBC deficit is filled up in about 56 days. Some people believe that donation actually stimulates Bone Marrow to produce new cells, which leads to a cleansing effect, but all concur that Donation does not cause any harm.

Do donate blood if you get the chance.

EDIT: I read on the Internet that blood has a shelf life of about 35 days, something I was quite unaware of. But, the demand for blood is so high that no unit actually reaches expiration date. Puts the whole thing in perspective, doesn't it?

Ta da,
Antariksh

A word in time (TwoPence)

2008-07-28T19:41:00.006+05:30

I had this Reader's Digest booklet titled (if I remember correctly) A word in time, which was a collection of witty replies, repartees and other verbal bullets. It was one interesting read, and the amount of sarcasm that was filled in a few words was purely amazing.

Today, I StumbledUpon (yes) a site which had a similar collection. It's a pity we don't find such brilliant verbal battles anymore. The reasons are simple. The language, as far as arguments are concerned, very quickly degenerates to four-lettered (or more) asterisked words. In the prevalent youth culture that relates Xpletives to X-factor and where vulgarity is de-factoit, arguments requires absolutely no wit, humour or creativity. The one who can degrade himself further in this manner emerges as the winner, and the vanquished has to concede two forms of defeat.

True verbal bullets hit at the perfect spot and render the recipient defenseless. My favourite quotes about profanity are:

Profanity is the common crutch of the conversational cripple

Profanity is the weapon of the witless

I wish we had more people like Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, whose sharp wit did more than any physical assault could...

Dedicated to the masters of wit and sarcasm.

Growing up with Cartoons

2008-07-17T11:27:00.004+05:30

Disclaimer: Nothing really. Oh yeah, all the cartoons and characters mentioned below are the property of their respective owners. May they live/rest in peace.

Just the other day, I, Mehul and Amol were sitting in H-13 mess having dinner when I told them about how I was listening to theme songs of the cartoons I loved watching when I was younger. One thing led to another, and we were soon reminiscing about the cartoon shows we all grew up with (the discussion then turned to lamenting about how K-serials have kompletely kaptured TV channels now, but that won’t make its way into this post).

These cartoons always have a special place in your heart, more so because you grew up with them and they never fail to bring back beautiful memories. The amount of education they impart to young kids is incomparable. Be it the merits of eating spinach or the importance of saving the environment, they do it all, and boy, do they do it well! It takes a mother countless teary and tiresome nights but one ‘Choti choti magar moti batein’ episode is all dear Shaktimaan needs to make kids brush their teeth before going to bed.

The oldest memory I have is of watching Flintstones and Captain Planet. The interesting thing is that the way I saw looked at these shows changed as I grew up but they never seized to be funny and entertaining. When I was 4, I would just enjoy the funny sounds, the Yabaa-dabaa-dooooo (!) and the cozy Flintstones, yeh hain Flintstones title song. As I grew up, I began to be fascinated by how effortlessly they depicted the pre-historic counterpart of almost every modern amenity. The run-along-with-them cars, bird beaks for disc players, dinosaur cranes… the simplicity, and the brilliance.

Captain Planet was a different experience, but equally nice. When I watched it for the first time, I was five/six-ish, and the show used to be in English. I hardly understood a word. They could have been discussing the reasons for the Gulf war for all I knew. But what I used to love was the way the five heroes raised their hands, some super cool light rays came out from their rings and arose Captain Planet with his traditional ‘When your powers combine, I am Caption Planet!’ It wasn’t until I was about ten and Captain Planet started being aired in Hindi that I realized there was some planet saving involved!

Back when our cable operator didn’t oblige us with Cartoon Network, Disney Hour on Sony was the savior. Duck Tales (my all time favourite), Alladin (Yeh hai Araaaaabian Nights), TaleSpin (Baloo, kid and Madam Mahalingam), Chip and Dale, and many more… one hour of pure fun! I have such nice memories about all of these shows... By the way, Disney Hour was also a major break for the anchor Vishal, who has since moved on to bigger and stupider things.

Another thing I now realize is the wonderful dubbing quality (content and expression) of the cartoons, something which Harry Potter translators of Choomantar Gali fame have not been able to achieve. In fact, in many cases, the dubbed Hindi voices are of a much better quality compared to the original ones. Case in point: Mickey mouse. The English guy sounds like he has something permanently stuck in his throat. Of course, with dubbed voices, you might normally hear the same set of four people in both Richie Rich and Pokemon, but they were good, nonetheless.

This would of course be incomplete if I didn’t mention our beloved Tom and Jerry. If there were one cartoon show that any person, regardless of age, could watch and enjoy, it would be T&J. The immersive experience, sans dialogues and sans human faces, is simply magical. The toughest thing is to take the clichés and put new life in them, and T&J achieved it beautifully. Of course, later versions like Tom and Jerry Kids were quite annoying; NO. Sir, we do not want to watch a baby cat chasing a baby rat, however adorable they might look.

I don’t know whether it is because we’ve grown up, but the present breed of cartoons just doesn’t seem to have the class and style of its predecessors. You have the same old recycled stuff in both Action and Manga alike. People seem to be running out of ideas. Quality is degrading, and kids are being made to watch crap. Some of the shows are so nauseating, they give me goose bumps. The malady called Shin-Chan tops the list. Lets ignore its content for a while, which could actually be used to good results. It clearly gets the award for the most horribly and childishly drawn cartoon. It looks like the work of a three year old who’s been taught to hold a pencil for the first time. And the voice! Luckily, it borders on the upper end of the Human Auditory range. Sadly, it’s on the inner side, and we humans have to stand this garbage. A few hertz up, and only dogs and bats would be tortured by it. I am seriously considering using it to drive away mosquitoes and insects. As Susmit (of ryubahamut fame) rightly puts it, such shows are the counterparts of the sort of poison adults swallow in the form of soap-operas and reality shows.

I asked some of my friends about their take on the topic, and here are snippets:

Susmit held a strong stand (quite like him!) about theme music. Not a lot of songs do come to mind, but one thing can be said without the shadow of a doubt -- the cartoon theme songs of yore far surpassed their younger siblings that the present cartoon watchers, well, endure. There's no effort done at making things sound good, the music is stale, everything is so unimpressive… However, there are a few songs that strike out as worth mentioning, the Power Rangers theme for instance, which had the craziest sickest guitar solo I'd ever heard in a cartoon theme song, and perhaps a few others like Swat Kats (just music, no lyrics -- the way I like it) and Flintstones. I can't remember any strong contenders from the Disney side, however. (Does being musically challenged from a decade ago cause them to vent frustration by creating abominations like HSM and Hannah Montana? A topic for another evening maybe. It's amazing how most of the 3D animated films have great musical scores!)

Here’s Mehul’s version.

Cartoons... as we shall come to think of them, are not only cute, sweet and adorable but also have a charisma that appeals to children and grown-ups with great effect. Ever since this world of acute imagination and creativity, earlier restricted to print media and comic strips, has extended its reach to television, it has made the phenomena more dynamic in every sense of this word. All those reading this article would almost instantly recall being glued to Cartoon Network or Disney Hour while their mommas were shouting at them. Since then, it has only increased its grip with new cartoons coming from televisions to commercial stores, video games, computer games, flash cards and what not!! From Mickey Mouse to Dragonball Z, all have proved their mettle giving real human-born actors a run for their money. My favourites (and I hope many people will not subtract much from this list although they are free to add) are Tom & Jerry, Chip & Dale, Swat Cats, Talespin, Jhonny Quest and Dexter's Labratory.

Karthik pitched in too: One of the cartoons that really had me engrossed was Beyblade (Antariksh’s note: Thank God I never got intothe whole Digimon and Beyblade stuff). I think I never get enough of anime whatsoever :).The determination of Tyson to be the best and how he managed to do that without harming friendship was fantastic. 'Let it rippp', 'dragoon attack' ... are they ringing any bells in your mind? Above all was the engineering aspect of the blades. With each level/tournament he won/lost, the design of the blades would be improved with different weight distributions which would enhance their spinning and hence the attack. Unfortunately, the series is a short one (compared to the likes of DbZ, Naruto) and truly one of best entertainers in the Anime industry today!

Though I never caught on with the BeyBlade mania, I was quite amused at how ordinary tops could be glorified in such a manner!

Whenever you think of these cartoons, you are reminded of the glorious days when heads were lighter and happier, when the world was smaller but ambitions larger. I salute the stalwarts who excel in this art and bring home such wonderful creations.

For oft when on my couch I lie,

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye,

Which is the bliss of solitude.

William Wordsworth

Thanks to Susmit, Mehul and Karthik for their inputs. What I have written is merely a dip into this wonderful world. Do share your reminiscences… what cartoons you grew up with and which ones, even today, fill your heart with thrill… You can’t deny you loved them! :)

Ta da,

Antariksh

Hard Work Pays

2008-06-13T23:13:00.003+05:30

Clicking on the page title will take you to the NDTV website which tells the story of a village laborer (named Narsimha Rao from Andhra Pradesh who cleared JEE 08 with an AIR of 453.

Of course, the boy deserves kudos for braving it and making it, and NDTV gets the credit for reporting something really meaningful and thought-provoking. But, the post did strike a deeper chord.

Think of houses where a gas stove is a luxury... Contrast, keeping on one side the entire household on full throttle preparing a guy for college, and on the other side, not having enough money to make it to the counseling.

It is this wide economic disparity that is our enemy, and it cannot be filled by mushrooming 6 IITs overnight.

We don't need as many premier institutions as we need equal opportunities to all who want to make it up there.

What do you feel?

If you want to help Narasimha Rao, write to him at the below mentioned address:

Narasimha Rao Magenti
Son of Appaiah
Garikapadu Post and Village
Wyramandal, Khammam District,
Andhra Pradesh Pin-507165

Or you can call him- Mobile No. 9949927498. This number belongs to A Prasad, a resident of the same village.

For online transfer of money - A Prasad, Account No. - 52112028333, SBH Wyra Bank.

House or Home?

2008-06-09T18:56:00.020+05:30

While looking at a forwarded mail which contained samples of badly written (and hence humorous) Matrimonial Ads, I found this one:

i want very simple girl. from brahmin educated family from orissa state she is also know about RAMAYAN, GEETA BHAGABATA, and other homework

Among other things, it mocked the way the author mistook homework with housework. But I suddenly noticed something which my mind had overlooked until this point. Using the word Homework to denote household chores, although wrong from the point of view of Standard English, does seem to be logical. I mean, that's what it is supposed to mean, right? Home-work.

House is associated with the building whereas Home refers to the place with which we have a sense of belonging. Here is what BBC says:

House describes a particular type of building.
Home is the place where you live and feel that you belong to.

That's why we have things like Home-Sweet-Home or There's nothing like home.
Doesn't it seem strange that the language which has two different words to denote these subtle shades of meaning quite ruthlessly swaps them in the popular terminology of Housework and Homework?

The house-hold chores carried out by, say the mother, or the lady of the house, are innately connected with the feeling of attachment and belonging that the word Home conveys, whereas the concept of Homework does not merit such a distinction. In fact, homework needn't necessarily be done at 'Home', per se.

To provide you more samples:

"It takes a heap o' livin' in a house to make it home"- Edgar A. Guest

Or how about this:

A house in which nobody lives is nobody's home.

So here was a little thing I thought of sharing with you guys. Intriguing though these might be, it is too trifle to be associated with some deeper, sinister meaning, so I shall not make an endeavour similar to the distinguished authors of the ToI editorial page, and shall continue to use these words where they are traditional placed, to be intelligible, if nothing else.

What do you think about it?

Fruit Pursuit

2008-05-24T17:40:00.006+05:30

Four kids, one man, Mission Mangoes.
H3 happens to sport lots of Mango trees. What better way to enjoy them than to develop a fail-safe strategy to catch them unhurt?

Success rate - 100%

The strategy

The stash

Clicked outside H3 Main Gate, 17:20 p.m.

Font Fantasy

2008-05-19T15:52:00.022+05:30

There are bad types and good types, and the whole science and art of typography begins after the first category has been set aside.

- Beatrice Warde

Disclaimer: What follows are my personal views on a topic. Curiously enough, they match those of countless people (including many professionals) around the world. You may not be one of them. You have the right to differ. I have the right to not bother myself with it. The comments section is open.

Aha, fonts... They can be executive, formal, casual, magical, informal, comic, transitional, amusing, official, proportional, black-letter, mono-space, ding-bats, serif, sans-serif, ornamental, modern and so on...

NO. This entry is not one which will claim that Fonts have personality or character and thus it will not try to personify them and write a panegyric to that effect. Fonts or Typefaces (sounds better) are sort of acquired tastes and you really get very fond of them. And fonts do speak as loudly, if not louder, than the words they are used to write. There are bad looking fonts, and there are good looking fonts, and there are people who know the difference. Unfortunately, the number of items in the three categories is in descending order.

Global standards in aesthetics got a major blow when Times New Roman (TNR) was made the default font for all MS Office applications. It crawled its way into every single imaginable document and made it worse. Academic notes, OK. Official documents, OK. Letters, fine. Computer Programs, AAARGHHH! It honestly used to give me the creeps when I used to see examination papers with C++ programs written in TNR. But I guess they should not be blamed, because the book we followed set a rather bad example of writing all its programs in Serif fonts. What a disaster!

As important as Serif fonts might be, they just don’t look good when they are used everywhere, and certainly not when this crown of ubiquity is worn by Times New Roman. They used to have grace and a certain executive look (and some do have, I daresay), but I suggest you take a look at some other similar fonts which look much better.

Give Georgia a try. It has a formal look and is pretty graceful. Plus, its lower case characters have the width TNR lacks. It is, in fact, excellent for academic reports and documents.

Sans-serif fonts, though they look good, give the report a sort of informal/casual look which might go against you. What’s more, teachers/examiners are traditionally used to seeing stuff in Serif and so it is better you stick with it. And just in case I am being too harsh with TNR, let me say that it has its uses too, primarily in the upper case. It can manage to look pretty neat in headings/banners, but, as always, not over-using it is the key.

If you want to see the ultimate contrast between what a font looks like in the upper and lower case, Monotype Corsiva steals the show. Being one of the very few Script type fonts shipped by default, it bears (rather unwillingly) the task of filling in for a certain graceful, flowing font, as deemed by many. Its lower case is almost tolerable but it’s when the upper case comes into view that things get out of hand

Now imagine HTML (or for that matter, C++) code being written in Notepad with Monotype Corsiva as the font. Trust me, I have seen it, and it’s any sane developer’s nightmare.

Another badly used (rather, abused) font is Lucida Handwriting. To give text the so-called handwritten look, this font is used left, right and centre. I have seen entire documents and articles submitted specifically with this font (‘coz its soooo cute). Just imagine reading a book like this. I will leave it for you to decide.

Let’s move on to sans-serif (SS) fonts. Preferred over serifs for their readability on-screen, they have enjoyed a nice place on the Web. Slowly, though, they have begun to enter the print world, essentially for their cleaner, no-frills look. Arial and Tahoma ruled this world for quite a long time, and fairly enough. Verdana followed, and Trebuchet MS had a niche for itself. TMS has some really cool features and quickly imparts energy and vitality to web-pages. Plus, its narrow letterforms have their own advantages. For that reason, though, it is not that suited for print applications, which isn’t that bad, because it was created for use on screen. By the way, choose Helvetica over Arial if you have no restrictions. Verdana is the wider cousin of Tahoma so you might want to use the latter for its relative compactness.

Speaking of SS fonts, if there were one font that deserved to be dismembered and buried under the sea bed, it would be Comic Sans MS. Originally designed, not as a general typeface, but for use in Children Software and related merchandise, this font, at one time, crept into places not even remotely connected with kids, and can safely be called one of the most hated fonts by designers around the world. A font is to text what tone is to speech, and with this in mind, CSMS conveys disrespect and naivety. A command or an order is best suited to be written in an imposing font, worthy of the authority it is used to denote. Using CSMS to write, say, a NO SMOKING or a DO NOT ENTER sign will be ridiculous, but irritatingly enough, this usage is common. The way this font has seeped into places it has no business being at has made people around the world start a BAN COMIC SANS campaign. Take a look: http://www.bancomicsans.com. As this site rightly words it, using CSMS for formal messages/instructions/warnings/notices is analogous to showing up for a black tie event in a clown costume. The Anime Ace font is a pretty good choice if want to give your text a comic look rather than a comical look.

So, we’ve had enough about bad fonts, and fonts that need to go. I will mention just one more font that the world would be better without, and then move on to good typefaces. That font is Papyrus, and is another example of a font, suited for a specific purpose, being used everywhere. Just a couple of days ago, I saw it being used in a Certificate. Yes, a certificate. Mind you, neither the organisation who issued it nor the recipients were 2000 years old. The font’s fine for giving that antique look to headings, but it’s nothing less than sinful to use it in normal text. Apart from having very low readability (worsened by the annoying dents in the letters), its letterforms are so thin they look starved. Plus, the excessive height of the upper case letters compared to the tiny middle and lower zones makes it a strict NO-NO. Open any page which talks about fonts designers hate, and you will almost surely find CSMS and Papyrus in the list. Here’s what Chris Costello, the creator of Papyrus, has to say: “Today, it is so overused, I would not use it unless there was some very unique application that called for it.”

The release of Microsoft Office 2007 ended the glorious (?) era of Times New Roman. With it being usurped from the throne it had occupied for many years, and with the development of 6 new font families by Microsoft, all of which make good use of the ClearType™ technology, the time for a great screen and print reading experience has come.

Calibri, the default font in all Office 2007 applications, is the best thing that has happened to Sans-serifs. The subtle rounding of the corners and the correct proportions make it perfect for most applications. It has the warmth and friendliness which Arial, Helvetica or Verdana lacked, plus, has a sufficiently formal look for official documents. What’s more, it looks equally graceful in both small print size and large banner/poster size. What is most amazing that even at a small font size, the letters don't get shriveled as is common with most fonts, but retain their solid nature.

If you like Serifs more, take a look at Cambria and Constantia, in that order. They have power and grace. Candara and Corbel are two more SS fonts in the collection, and though they don’t beat Calibri, they too have scope to be put into good use. For programmers, Consolas is perfect for comfortably reading huge volumes of code and certainly beats Courier New and Lucida Console in the fixed width fonts.

Segoe UI, the SS font that Windows Vista uses for its User Interface (and which has replaced Tahoma for that job) is another neat and friendly looking font, and has good readability at small sizes too.

But, what about the thousands of other fonts out there in town? I have missed many of them here, say Garamond (Edit: My friend Ryubahamut confirms font is very pleasurable to read. Interestingly, the Harry potter series has been set in 11.5/12pt Garamond) or Century Gothic or others. You may try them too, but I can assure you that none of the documents you ever make, none of the presentations you ever create and none of the websites you ever design will require the services of any esoteric font. As for others, well they have their uses, and they are better off being used where they fit best. Honestly, you won’t write your term paper in Blackadder, will you? If you want to create a specific design for a client (or yourself), you might find some particular font from the Web suited for the purpose. But remember, if he/she asks insists that you use Comic Sans MS (’coz it’s so playful and springy and cuute), you are better off working for someone else.

Good luck!

Cheers,
Antariksh

P.S. As always, and as mentioned in the Disclaimer, constructive comments are invited.

Traveler IQ Challenge

2008-05-18T23:38:00.007+05:30

This game, which can be accessed from the Applications section of Orkut, Facebook, MySpace and a few other sites is refreshing and educative. Simple and addictive, all you need to do is to Click on the World Map at the location of the city/monument being flashed on screen. Points are given for Proximity and Speed. There are different Quiz sets and multiple difficulty levels in each. Though it gets very frustrating when you miss going to the next level because you fell just a few points short of the Min. Required Score and have to start all over again, the game is fun to play and will boost up your Geography Knowledge pretty fast! What's more, it calculates your 'Traveler IQ' and gives you a nifty badge to flaunt! I have added the widget at the bottom of the blog, so those who do not have an account on any of the mentioned sites can play it here. You will get your badge, but your score will not be saved.

Try it.

Dilemma

2008-04-18T21:30:00.001+05:30

Just found this somewhere, and was stuck by the sheer truth and beauty of it.
Don't have much time now, so will add my thoughts on it later.

Whenever you're called on to make up your mind,
and you're hampered by not having any,
the best way to solve the dilemma, you'll find,
is simply by spinning a penny.

No - not so that chance shall decide the affair
while you're passively standing there moping;
but the moment the penny is up in the air,
you suddenly know what you're hoping.

Piet Hein, poet and scientist (1905-1996)

Social Networking

2008-04-08T22:15:00.004+05:30

Disclaimer: What follows is just a light-hearted take. Any other interpretation of the same is not what I intended it to be.

God said, Let social networking sites be… and there was chaos.

Welcome to the world of Social Networking. In the rapidly developing world where typing lessons are obtained on chat windows, having an account on an SN site seems to be an important prerequisite for all round development. Statistics say that if you have a sample large enough, you will get something of everything. What better way to see this in practice than Orkut and FaceBook…? The least they do is provide you with your RDA of laughter.

At one end, you have strict Orkut-ians, whose profile is the typical ‘Mujhe mere siddhanton se koi alag nahi kar sakta’. They will make their pictures private (Never mind the fact that their pictures are on dozens of other friends’ albums), their scrapbooks private, their empty profiles will crave for attention, and their usage will be self-monitored with frightening discipline. But, they make the better part of the wonderful world of online identities.

And then, you have the standard ‘Ultra mature’ kid, whose age, let alone the class in which he studies, has barely reached two digits. He is convinced of his flawless looks and charm and has snared his parents into believing that making an account on Orkut will help him bring a change to his studies as he can indulge in constructive discussion with peers. However, having made an account on Orkut before learning that the Earth revolves around the Sun, he is quite incapable of realising that Orkut does NOT send public messages by scrapping them to its users in 5 different colours and font sizes using a random combination of capital and small letters. Equally difficult is the realization that Orkut will not ask its users to post text in the address bar, especially text which runs a Script saved on some third party website. However, all these trivialities do not deserve the attention of Mr SexyGuy4You or Mr R3ady2RockDAParty, who take it as their personal responsibility to make it known to the masses that Orkut has begun ranking profiles and has made a new Matrix style skin. As the number of scraps, number of people in the Friend list, Fan list etc have become the modern equivalents of Number of cows/buffaloes and amount of land owned, many a desperate Profile Holder can be seeing jumping in jubilation on hearing about the latest technique to increase these vital stats to 6 digit figures. (As if any sane person will believe it if your profile showed that you had 999999 fans…)

Occasionally you encounter a guy who has decided to make good use of the garb of anonymity offered by the internet. He will claim to be in Medical College, 2^nd year, and at the same time be seen discussing Social Science homework in his Scrapbook. Subtlety…

But, such sites do much more than increasing your IQ. They are the rallying points of philanthropists. Why waste time doing good deeds everyday to make sure that your scales don’t tip when your daily Goodness quota can be completed by simply forwarding messages and scraps which will help some Unknown Guy in some God-forsaken part of the world with a disease hitherto unheard of? I wonder how the Nobel Peace Prize committee has not yet conferred a title on Orkut. Probably none of its members is on it… With Orkut, all days of the year have been mapped to some or the other thing. We have Rose Day, Exchange a pen with your friend Day, Nothing substantial to celebrate Day, and so on… I wonder if they have No Orkut Days also. Probably, they send belated wishes for that one…

You may have heard the phrase Dumb Americans (no offence meant). I beg to differ. Any person who has been on FaceBook knows that it requires more than average intellectual powers to find your way around it and to understand the countless fun things you can do with FaceBook. With battle cries of ‘Switch to FaceBook, Orkut is now filled with too much junk’, many an excited youngster, after conveniently forgetting that it was people like him who made Orkut a trash pile, makes the confident switch to FaceBook. Aha, nice white interface… surely looks cleaner and better… After looking for the elusive ‘Wall’ in vain (having read in Mumbai Mirror that FB has a Wall), he decides to add a few friends and rest for the evening. The morning has (un)pleasant surprises. Within no time, he is already unable to keep a record of the number of times he has been struck, fed, devoured, smitten, pillaged, plundered, had powers and abilities used on him, challenged on Dog Quiz, Comics Quiz, Logos Quiz, Brands Quiz and a zillion other quizzes, being invited to know which Greek God, Harry Potter character, military position, colour, PlayStation, Sports Car, Body Part, Female Shoe (Hooker boots, pumps, stilettos, or sneakers?), Dance Style (Am I strong & flexible like a Ballet dancer or a hot firecracker like a Cha Cha dancer?) (and a few other things I refrain from mentioning, in order to preserve the G-rating of the blog) he is and, lest I forget, got an invitation to join the elite group of pirates, slayers, zombies, werewolves, angels, devils, multimillionaires that haunt CyberSpace or should I say, FaceSpace. Sample this – ‘X wants to know how spoiled you are. I just found I was spoiled and it was interesting’. And since all this is sufficient to get the head of anybody who God (Greek or otherwise) didn’t shower with excessive intellectual capability, there is a smart feature which lets you compare your invitations with that of your friends and find out if they are equally harassed. And of course, to start from the beginning, as they, say, there is one test to find out whether I am normal in the first place. Well that certainly needs no test to be figured out. Whatever normality I had was surely in pre-FaceBook days!

FaceBook confidently informs me that a friend of mine (who I previously trusted) has fed me to a werewolf and that I have been devoured. With equal conviction, it conveys to me the news that another friend of mine has turned into a vampire and is on the prowl. To guard myself in such perilous times, all I need to do is click on the ‘Start Fighting Chumps’ button which will transform me into a Slayer and then I can start beating up on all creatures of the dark with élan and the traditional drum roll. While some friends have graciously extended me offers of citizenship in their tastefully designed cities, others have been so kind as to include me in their circle of trust. I have been offered to adopt a puppy (from a list of breeds) and give it all the love and affection it needs. The proverbial icing being that I get a cuuuute picture to put on my profile (to display my canine affiliation). Being on FaceBook has helped me gain the confidence to Poke, Cuddle, Kiss, Hug, Slap, Kick persons of my choice and also engage in Pillow Fights with them. Pretty character building, eh?

So, those who haven’t made an account yet, why are you missing out on all the fun? After all, it is all about expanding your Social Circle…

Disclaimer: The aforementioned was a light-hearted take supposed to be taken in a light-hearted manner. Any other interpretation of the above is necessarily false.

Coming up next–

Of Sounds and Smells

The Girl Child (Women's Day Special)

2008-03-08T12:17:00.004+05:30

Today being Women's Day, I thought of posting a poem I had written about a year and a half ago when our school was a part of a campaign against female foeticide and infanticide. Before talking big about the emancipation of women, their equal status and the like, let us first ensure to them the fundamental Right to Live. Do share your thoughts on the idea and the poem. Comments invited.

If you click on the title of this post, you will be directed to a BBC News Page quite relevant to the issue.
I am giving the same link here : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4592890.stm

The Girl Child

The Sun rose, a cock was heard,
The leaves rustled, out flew a bird;
A pleasant morning, but the house's filled with dismay,
The reason – A girl was born that day.

When her eyes opened to the world bright,
She found no-one in sight.
She flapped her limbs, a cry she sent,
Outstretched her arms, no hand she was lent.

The mother wept, the father cursed,
The girl was alone, waiting to be nursed.
But all alone, on the cot she lay,
The reason – a girl was born that day.

Why all this, I ask you now,
What was the fault of the poor soul?
She too had dreams, her ambition strong,
Why then was she made to face such wrong?

Treatment, such as no-one deserved,
Children of paupers are better served.

It is a question we must address,
Let us give the girl child her redress.
Let her spread her wings, and let her fly,
Let her reach out high, and touch the sky.

Cheers
Antariksh

Watching the Republic Day Parade...

2008-02-23T21:20:00.004+05:30

(If you are reading this via Orkut, please visit antarikshspeaks.blogspot.com instead. I don't know why but Orkut spoils the formatting.)

It is something like the craze which people have about watching a cricket match from the stadium. There are no action replays, no wide-angle shots, no bird's eye views, no on-screen statistics, and most even don't get to see, from close, the players they revere. BUT, there is that feeling of being there, right at the place where all the action is, and of course, the satisfaction of being at a place where not everyone can easily manage to be.

So, after a long time, I found something that doesn't fit into the categories I have mentioned in the Introduction and so is apt for my blog! Finally, the MidSemester exams are over (Herr Einstein's time dilation demonstrates itself particularly well during such times), and so I have decided to jot some stuff down about my watching the Republic Day (RD) parade this year. As it has been almost a month since I went there, I might have forgotten tiny details, which were anyway of no value and so the essence remains preserved.

When I received the letter from the HRD Ministry inviting me to Watch the RD Parade from Prime Minister's Box nothing seemed more obvious than accepting the invitation and sending the conformation. And I prayed to Murphy the lawgiver that he not dish out unnecessary commitments or impossible to miss quizzes and whatnots in the time when I was planning to be away (He did butt in at the last moment though, making sure I missed a surprise quiz taken because 50 out of the registered 600 students had turned up for the lecture…)

Anyhow, let’s come back to the topic. I took a Taxi from Delhi airport and asked him to take me to Hotel Janpath (which, incidentally is a 4-star hotel near Connaught Place). During the drive, he looked back and asked me in a strong Bihari accent, 'Kahan se aa rahe ho'. When I told him I was coming from Bombay, he continued, 'Kya karte ho'. 'Padhta hoon college main', I replied. Hearing this, he asked, his voice full of skepticism, 'Janpath mein kaise kya?'. It was only after I explained to him that I had been invited and blah blah blah, that he felt satisfied that I was indeed wanting to goto Hotel Janpath. He still added in a last remark, 'Kyonki Janpath to 5 istaar hotel hai na, isliye pooch raha tha'. Finally I reached Hotel Janpath where our accommodation had been arranged for by the HRD Ministry. During High Tea, all the invited students introduced themselves and we had an informal session. We got to know the criterion for the selection for this award (or whatever you wish to call it). Since I didn’t find this in any blog when I tried to search it up before going to Delhi, I am writing it here for whoever is interested. Separately for Class XII and X, the top two students from each region are selected and then a cut-off is fixed so as to select a total of 50 students from the two classes. The other 50 students are University toppers. Their selection is pretty much random because there are lots of universities and so it’s quite tough to have a common yardstick. So, they try to incorporate regional diversity and also try to select students from as many different disciplines as possible.

My roommate was a guy from Jodhpur itself (In fact, we live in the same colony!) We were given instructions about next day’s parade and all the necessary do’s and don’ts (mostly don’ts). We were supposed to leave at 6:30 in the morning from the Hotel when the buses would take us to Raj path. After a hurried breakfast at 6 in the morning, we started off, sleepy but excited, after being handed over the personal invitation cards for the parade. We had already been assured that it would be an experience we would never forget and so our hopes were pretty high. After 5 rounds of showing the invitation card and the proof of identity, getting frisked and passing through the Metal Detector, we were finally taken to the VVIP enclosure. Now, the raised platform where the President, the Chief Guest and other dignitaries sit is flanked by two enclosures which are called as the PMs box, because that is where the PMs invitees sit. It was there that we were seated and so we pretty much got a perfect view of the parade as it was all done almost in front of us. Now you all already know about what normally happens in the Parade so I will skip all that. Rather, I have made a neat list of things which I found most memorable about those three hours there:
1. Sitting in the stands on that beautiful morning wearing a tri-colour rosette and hearing patriotic tunes mingled with the chirping of birds. It sort of plunges you into patriotic mood.
2. The way in which the entire motorcade moves on the Raj path. So, elegant, it almost seems to flow. The co-ordination is perfect, the timing accurate.
3. The national anthem being played to a 21-gun salute. I had heard the pounding sound plenty of times when I watched the parade on TV and always felt it was rather neat. But, the sheer impact of the first cannon shot almost really took me off my feet. The sound resonates for quite some time and each blast is followed by a huge shock wave that stirs you from within.
4. The solemn moment when the names of the people winning the Gallantry Awards were announced along with a detailed citation expounding their bravery in the battlefield; I could feel what a bittersweet moment it must be for the widow/father who had been invited for receiving the prize from the President.
5. The helicopter dropping orange petals over the stands at it flew past. It felt magical when, after about a minute, the tiny petals slowly came floating and fell on us.
6. The sheer precision and poise of the marching columns. The perfect timing and coordination of the groups as they moved in unison with artistic grace and elegance.
7. The orange, white and green coloured balloons as they rose from all around us and slowly made their way up, in a way, taking India to the skies.

Seven being one of my favourite numbers, I will stop the list here! Anyhow, the parade lasted for exactly 2 hours, what with Monsieur Sarkozy needing to rush off to Agra immediately afterwards. We were taken back to the hotel, where, after lunch, we were given certificates and had a small photo-session. A Metro Ride had been organised on 26th Evening and a tour of the city on 27th. I, however, had to go to Gurgaon and so I bid goodbye to my newly made friends on 26th Evening itself. My flight back was on the next day. The return journey was uneventful unless you count the Autowallah at the airport trying to charge me twice of what it takes to go to IIT Powai, and on top of that, acting as if he were doing me a favour. Anyway, in less than two days, I was back to reality! Techfest was on and I attended whatever tiny bit I could.

It’s always tough to come back to normal life once you get a complete, albeit small, respite when you leave all worries and troubles behind for some time and enjoy as much as you can… But, as they say, c’est la vie!

Cheers
Antariksh

P.S. It’s like eating something extremely tasty, hearing something very melodious or smelling something really good… Very rarely can you do justice to the thing by explaining, in words, how it made you feel. Do drop in comments! Constructive Criticism invited.

Just In

2007-11-17T19:03:00.000+05:30

Hi. Although I have started this blog, I am not going to be posting for a week or two, at the least. Anyhow, keep looking...

Cheers
Antariksh