Monday, October 30, 2006

Censure

To add to the list of people whom I have decided to censure: people who describe themselves as ‘funloving’. This is the beginning of another rant. But let me be true to certain ideals.

A long time ago, I remember telling this person that the ‘aam junta’ (the ‘people’, the hoi polloi) should not, indeed must not be despised, for it is this junta from which greatness arises. Without the matrix around you, greatness would wither away in isolation. Note, at this point the condescension with which these words were said. As if the speaker himself stands head and shoulders above people around him. Quite far from it, in fact. This, I had said to one who, if anything happens to believe quite strongly that she stands head, shoulders and most of her quite delightful torso above the rest. Passing lightly over the aforementioned delightful torso (a delight, in itself), this person needed, and needs to this day a gentle reminder that greatness is indeed by comparison, and if it appears too easily within the grasp, then that is a tragedy, because the world is a simpler and less beautiful place than it could and should be.

At second glance, this rant is not a rant. Maybe I am too old to rant. Thinking that I am past the age where I should protest means that I have stopped breathing. And I am not even past my first quarter century! The mediocre must exist! Because without the contrast, achievement is not achievement. But must the mediocre be so mediocre? That is the question. Asimov, and Clarke, actually more Clarke than Asimov have dreamt of, and written of a time and a people where understanding was more than a pipe dream, where thought sat on the its rightful throne. But it appears to me that every such societal structure where thought rules and action lies subservient, must, by its very nature, be doomed to paralysis of the body, and by inevitable extension, paralysis of the soul. And that means extinction. And by the same coin, every race and people ruled by the men of strength teeters on the brink of destruction. The price we must pay for a cold and unemotional demise is a beautifully colourful and violent one. Choose! This is the dilemma we are presented with.

And of course, in our magnificently sheltered way, we may have already chosen. By throwing away our minds to the gurus of advertisement agencies, by swallowing wholesale lies traded back and forth by governments and multinationals, we have sold our souls and futures of generations still to come. And all we have to show for it are bigger SUVs and music systems.

And so, for each person who describes himself or herself as fun loving without telling us what fun is to him or her, we die a little. For every person who likes ‘music and reading’ without mentioning a single outstanding song or book, the collective brain of humanity suffers a tiny stroke and begins to switch off. For every person out there without an opinion, for every person with a fully belly and in reasonable health (do note, that I make an important distinction between people in distress, who do not have the luxury of thought and people in decent circumstances who just cannot be bothered), who chooses the path of least intellectual resistance, humanity begins its perhaps irreversible slide into oblivion.

Saturday, October 28, 2006

NY Roadtrip VI - Coming Home









That was pretty much it. We legged and trained back to Jersey and somehow managed to leave on time the next morning. We made it to AA late at night.

I will be going back, though.

There is a very important lesson to be learnt here: Image Stabilising lenses do not compensate for shaky hands and car motion!

Friday, October 27, 2006

My, my look what I've done

stealing from other people's blogs is not a good thing.. but then, it is excusable when what you steal is worth it... hmm.. that is a lame excuse.. but lets drop that..

I have long been a fan of Rajnikanth... who said he can't? (ok, sorry!) and this video is awesome

and about Johnny Sokko and his flying robot were the stuff of which dreams were made of when i was a kid

I know this is evil but....

Ijust had to steal this from Loren's blog...

read on.

NY Roadtrip V - Being Touristy







And then I called my friend S. Who was kind enough to tell us where to drive. Which we did, met aforementioned S, and adjourned to a mall. Now why a mall? Because they have these hideous American monstrosities called ‘Food Courts’ . Of late, I have observed an outbreak of these things in Indian cities. Nothing depresses me more than sitting amidst a crowd of self delusional idiots eating generic crappy food and thinking that they are having a good time. But in the time honoured tradition of all self respecting Indian people stuffing our noses up the arse of US ‘culture’, we continue to go to such places instead of seeking out and making better alternatives. Anway, let me cut the scream short. So we got to the food court, found some generic Mexican food and were happy. It was still raining… please note.. hencerendering all attempts at normal tourist stuff impossible. Which was just fine for all of us. C loves window-shopping. K loves hanging out with C. I had a decade worth of catching up to do.

After S figured out that we had come to NY without a “plan”.. she freaked.. albeit mildly. Now I tried getting the point across that I am not really a ‘touristy’ tourist. That didn’t go down to well with her. So she plotted out an itinerary for us for Sunday. On that note, we left to that gawd-awful hostel. I could give you gory details of that place, but why make your day worse?

Sunday dawned. A beautiful day, the clouds having taken leave for a while. With a merry song on our lips we drove off. And ended up taking the wrong turn and into Holland tunnel. Which took us, after a 6$ toll.. to Manhattan…. That came as something of a surprise…. So we turned back and drove to Jersey City. Had breakfast at S’ place.. which is on the 27th floor, and hence afforded a very enjoyable view to us village people. Then hopped on the train to NY. Walked to Battery Park. Took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis island.

There was a really long line for the ferry at Battery Park. This bloke was playing the trumpet… and playing ‘what a wonderful world’ sooooo well. And this other bloke turned up and started playing the Indian national anthem when he saw us. He knows the national anthems of fifty countries.. and makes good use of it where he likely to have quite an international audience.

When we made it back after the ferry trip, S wanted to leave, so we said our emotional farewells and headed off to see the bull. This unusual sculpture greets visitors to the financial district. People tend to line up and take pics of each other grabbing the bull’s .. um family jewels. This brings luck, it says. I got a pic; which was somewhat different.

We spent a while walking downtown. The underground system is really rather complex.. and slightly intimidating. But it works, and this maxim holds true for what little of the city we saw. This is something I realized that I had been missing at AA, the pulse of a great city. AA is beautiful and has a very pretty downtown.. but the whole city has a population of 150000! Which, in my book makes it a.. neighbourhood.

We spent the evening loitering and being vaguely touristy around Times Square. K asked why Times Square was called the ‘centre of the Universe’. (Came from a huge advertisement hoarding). I told him that astrophysicists had calculated that based on the value of the Hubble constant and the Doppler shift of receding galaxies, the Big Bang had occurred at the exact spatial location of Times Square. Making it, of course, the centre of the Universe. He bought it, for a few minutes, at least.

The NY Police Dept. have these tiny three wheelers for negotiating heavy traffic. Reminds me of the autorickshaws back home. Also saw the Bubba Gump restaurant, one of the chain inspired by Forrest Gump. Yadda, yadda, yadda, but this is getting monotonous. And then we went to Madam Tussaud’s. Of course, we did the usual stuff of getting weird pics with all the celebs. The high point was when I got a pic with a statue of Woody Allen. K wanted the same, so I clicked him. And then he asked me, ‘so who was that person?

Thursday, October 26, 2006

NY Roadtrip IV - Jersey City

Started driving the next day. Made it to Jersey City around.. noon. And then panicked. This is why. We live in a small college town. Very pretty. People here bitch about the government and everything else. But they obey traffic rules!! Drivers at AA are great!! Jersey City (JC) is full of jackarses who believe that they are driving 500 hp cars at the Le Mans tracks. All these losers who think that they make up for their pathetic lives by almost-roadkill every day. And the pedestrians…. They have no regard for inconsequential things like … cross walks. Crossing the street at random points is second nature to these suicidal bastards. Do the math! A 1500 kilo car coming at you at… 50 kph has a bloody lot of momentum! Which is somewhat difficult to bring to a complete halt.. in 2 metres. That is why traffic lights were invented idiot! Oh, and the traffic lights. They make no sense. I swear that I stood at a cross walk for ten minutes watching traffic go in every which direction without the pedestrian walk sign ever come on. And when it did, the lights also let the cars come through. Its as if JC has simply taken a vacation from coherent traffic. Its like its… India! Yes, that was what really hit me… if I had come to the US and stayed at some place like NY or JC, this wouldn’t have happened to me… the one year at AA has spoiled me. And of course, it was raining. Not like the proverbial cats and dogs, but the steady persistent rain which comes down with a fierce and terrible determination.. to utterly destroy your day. I keep expressing my views on rain in almost every other blog, but one of these days I am going to write the definitive treatise on rain. Until then…

Found the hostel. Found a suitable place to park.. am I kidding? There are NO suitable places to park in the city unless you consign the fate of your car to the gods above and the kindness of the people below. The latter does not show much of itself anyway. And found the hostel. So there are hostels, and then there are ultra shady places which somehow have linked to the website and are passing off as a place to stay. We were scalped, ripped off, taken for a ride, and then some by the shady people who run a shady hostel in a shady neighbourhood. At some length, and pain we negotiated a sum with the hostel lady, which allowed to us to more or less keep the clothes on our backs. Then food. This was another nightmare. There are no decent places to eat in the city. As in: none! We found this strange, dodgy Chinese place which said ‘dine in, or take out’. I am not a big fan of Chinese food when options are available… but for this once, I suggested we make it there. The joint was a take out only.. with people who either understood no English (or pretended no to.. its difficult to spend twenty seconds in Jersey City without becoming slightly paranoid). And it looked like some kind of mafia place where there are all these martial arts experts hiding behind the counter and all hell might just break loose while you are asking for a chicken hakka chow mein. So we left. And I called my friend.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Ny Roadtrip III - the raine in spaine is mostly where the sun doesn't shine



We started the drive around noon the next day. Drove throughout day without incident (that is actually a mark of good driving…) until late at night.. nineish… when we got splattered by Hurricane Ernesto. The US has an endearing habit of giving its weather names. As if calling a bloody thunderstorm by its first name… ‘hey Ernesto, whatsup man?’.. makes you less wet. Anyway, Ernesto… our good friend made the I80 freeway a lousy place to be.. visibility down to a few feet do not make for good driving conditions. We took an exit and made it to a gas station. Another thing about driving in the US. When one wishes to get gas/eat/take a leak, one finds a suitable exit and then a gas station. The whole concept of pulling the car over and spraying the bushes by the roadside does not exist here. Anyway, this gas station… for some reason had the loo a good fifty feet away from the main station. And the door was jammed so tight that I could not open it. Just could not. Main force did not work… like there was an evil angel hanging around who wanted me do die of a bladder explosion and acidosis. Think I am kidding? Go google these terms above.

And then we wanted to crash for the night. The attendant gave us directions to a motel which took us through a really dark one lane road flanked on both sides by huge trees .. and seemed to go on for ever and ever and ever…. No houses on either side… just this silent road. Not the kind of place one would like to be lost in.. (although, to be accurate, I would not like to be lost at all..).. that was what it was like. Just at the point we were ready to give up and call 911 for help.. we turned onto a larger road and the first thing I saw was a MacDonald’s. Yeah!! Long live generic shitty tastes-like-fertilizer junk food!! And found a motel to crash for the night.

K wanted to check mail. This guy is really into his email accounts (he has more of them than, say, the Secretary of State.) If he is ever about to be hanged/shot/otherwise executed and they ask him what is his last request.. he will want to check email!

Started driving the next day. Made it to Jersey City around.. noon. And then panicked. This is why. We live in a small college town. Very pretty. People here bitch about the government and everything else. But they obey traffic rules!! Drivers at AA are great!! Jersey City (JC) is full of jackarses who believe that they are driving 500 hp cars at the Le Mans tracks. All these losers who think that they make up for their pathetic lives by almost-roadkill every day. And the pedestrians…. They have no regard for inconsequential things like … cross walks. Crossing the street at random points is second nature to these suicidal bastards. Do the math! A 1500 kilo car coming at you at… 50 kph has a bloody lot of momentum! Which is somewhat difficult to bring to a complete halt.. in 2 metres. That is why traffic lights were invented idiot! Oh, and the traffic lights. They make no sense. I swear that I stood at a cross walk for ten minutes watching traffic go in every which direction without the pedestrian walk sign ever come on. And when it did, the lights also let the cars come through. Its as if JC has simply taken a vacation from coherent traffic. Its like its… India! Yes, that was what really hit me… if I had come to the US and stayed at some place like NY or JC, this wouldn’t have happened to me… the one year at AA has spoiled me. And of course, it was raining. Not like the proverbial cats and dogs, but the steady persistent rain which comes down with a fierce and terrible determination.. to utterly destroy your day. I keep expressing my views on rain in almost every other blog, but one of these days I am going to write the definitive treatise on rain. Until then…

Friday, October 20, 2006

NY Roadtrip II - Snafued before starting.

The Prius is this really cool car, which gives amazing mileage due to its hybrid petrol-electric drive. We then drove back to AA. Or so we thought. We got lost so many times that it stopped being funny after a while. And each time we pulled into an exit and asked for directions it looked like we had stepped through a time warp and into someplace where everyone speaks like a character from a 1960s slasher movie. You know… slow music and the shop counter clerk with shifty eyes….

We finally got home around midnight. D called around then. To say that K should not come to NY cos of some absolutely lame XYZ reason. Which basically boils down to this: something was very fishy. Very fishy the way one might describe the North Atlantic. In fact the only thing which is less fishy than this is probably the Sahara. Now there have been precious few people I have REALLY despised. D went from being of zero consequence to me and my life to right up there in the list of ten people I hate the most in maybe three days. That much be a record. So I am a harmless very peaceable nonviolent bloke. But I wish no good at all to the aforementioned D. There is an ancient curse, which goes, ‘may you live in interesting times’. Need I say the rest?

That put a damper on things. The kind of huge, massive damper that needs summer and a huge electric fan to dehumidify. Ok, that metaphor was carried too far. But, we sat around looking like characters in a British murder mystery. Until someone suggested that we book a youth hostel. Which we promptly did.. in Jersey City. And crashed for what was left of the night.

Thursday, October 19, 2006

NY Roadtrip I

We went to NY. This was on Labour Day. Why exactly? Cos its NY! The Big Apple! Any other reason needed? Ok, so I had a friend there whom I had not met in .. a decade! That is enough of a good reason. So if that thing on top of my shoulders actually had a brain in it, I would have flown up sometime in June when Mil was in NY, apparently being romanced by the recruiters of the firm where she was interned. Mil is my cousin, has strong views on many topics and is smart. That is enuf of an intro. But then, I didn’t! That was me being stupid and enjoying.. I don’t really know what; at AA. Ann Arbor is actually beautiful at that time of the year.. but what did I know? I was in lab!!

Anyway, enough of the rant. So after I came back from the Desh, fully rested and batteries recharged, C and K spring it on me that we are going to NY. As in going. Not as in, ‘dude, dyu wanna go to NY?’. Ok, that is not bad. So the plan was to rent a car and drive up. Looking at the beauties of the countryside along the way. Like motels, assembly line manufactured coffee shops.. you get the picture. R was invited. R is one of the more indecisive people I know. In fact, I know quite a few indecisive people and R takes the cake quite thoroughly. So after vacillating for a while, she finally opted out. Meanwhile, things were happening at the planning end. We were supposed to be bivouacked at D’s place. D is doing a PhD somewhere in NY and happens to be K’s batchmate from the days of yore.

About a week before the trip, D started this vague line about having to go somewhere on the weekend in question. At this moment, D and C had spent some time bonding via the net. All kinds of touristy plans had been hatched. Me, I stayed pretty much out of that. Things began looking really shady to me.

And then, C’s friendly rep at the Toyota dealer called and said that the Prius she had asked for was not around yet, but a black one with a slightly higher trim was available. This was just before the weekend. C cancelled the rental car and we drove to the dealer. K drove us. Apart from the one time when he steered straight into oncoming traffic and my life well and truly flashed in front of my eyes, this was quite uneventful. K’s brilliant excuse for pulling that stunt was that the other smartypants in the backseat, K2 was giving him contradictory directions. Contradictory to whom, one asks? Me. The navigator.

Dry Days

the last few days have been somewhat dry on the blog. not that i am pretending that there is a hige audience out there waiting with bated breath for every pronouncement issuing... hardly the case. i was somewhat busy with work and other things. mostly work though. went to canada. that will be another blog. in the meantime, i shall start posting a journal of our NY trip about two months ago. yes, this took an extraordinary time to write.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Computer Zindabaad

This computer never stops amazing me. I remember running a 3d script on a PIII a few months ago and it ran for more than an hour. This machine crunched through in some 12 minutes. It happens to run on a 2 GHz dual core and just 512 RAM. And oh, by the way, it also ran a bunch of other stuff including streaming audio all the time and didn’t hurt. Wow! Go OS X.

Pine

I use Pine. Pine is the standard UNIX mail system which people have been using all over for a while. It has a text only interface, and is very simple to use. Everyone around me uses webmail. Webmail is… via the internet. It is, just like Yahoo or Rediff mail. I just realized the following: sometimes I find myself checking mail from computers that do not have SSH/Pine and so I have to use webmail. Except that my Pine address book does not map to webmail!!!!!

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

God and other mathematicians

'and that was negotiated a long time ago between God and other mathematicians'
-Prof. Crippen at the Z-lab meeting, 9th Oct, 2006

Sunday, October 08, 2006

Bangla bands.

Chandribindoo has the most horrible lead singer in the universe. The only reason why people still listen to them is that the aforementioned people haven’t yet figured out whether their lyrics are just plain stupid or making some really subtle point. This is the point at which people are divided. Typically there will always be some smartypants Bong bloke who claims that he and only he sees the deep meaning behind those songs. Such people have never been laid. They eventually marry ugly people and are unhappy for ever; but they never admit it.
Cactus is too intellectual for their own good.
Fossils has great instruments and a great singer. Unfortunately the singer also insists on writing the songs. Which is something of a mistake as no one actually confuses his lyrics with coherent thought. More like ramblings after a suitable dose of booze and/or weed. I am a big fan of Fossils.
Parashpathor. Girls like them.
Bhoomi. Great. Wonder why I don’t hear anything from them anymore… some one told me that the band broke up…. Is that true?

This was the shortest analysis of contemporary Bengali Bands you will find anywhere.

Thursday, October 05, 2006

Chhotu



Chhotu was my cat. She died last week. Almost towards the end of Durga pujo. I use the phrase ‘my cat’ with some caution. No one ever really owns a cat, quite unlike owning a dog. A cat affiliates itself to a household, and gathers around itself a crowd of willing servants. Chhotu was the third cat in the current series. The first, of course was the redoubtable Biplobi Beral Meowzedong Bhattacharya. The second is Motu, a ‘hulo beral’ who displays maturity beyond his years. Indeed, Motu’s favourite companion is 80 year old Mr. Das who lives across the street. And then Chhotu. Chhotu was small, and cautious to the point of being perpetually terrified of everything. How she actually bought it remains something of a mystery. What is true is that she will not be around to bug me when I go home on vacations.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Another guest post about Durga Pujo

I don't have the time and I am in no mood to write. So this guest post taken from the Telegraph about the Durga Pujo will have to substitute.

Warm and very infectious
- A first-timer recounts his introduction to the Durga event
MAX BENITZ
The Kalighat Yuba Maitri Sangha idol. Picture by Pabitra Das

I’m pandal-hopping around Calcutta. It’s midnight and I’ve just stumbled upon a pandal constructed with 24,000 Horlicks bottles. Until this moment, ‘culture shock’ was what other people got.

A month in Calcutta has certainly taught me to expect the unexpected, but a 10-metre-high temple of energy drink was still somewhat hard to stomach.

It’s been interesting to see Calcutta gearing up for the big event. It’s also been a bit confusing, because no matter how many photographs you see and people you speak to, nothing can truly prepare you for your first Puja. Idle hours of anticipation proved wasted once the festival had begun, as nothing in my experience could prepare me for the vibrant variety of Puja.

“The transformation really has to be seen to be believed,” Prof Amitava Roy had told me but after the recent rains, I’d assumed that there was no way some pandals would be finished on time. A pandal near where I live (Gol Park) was still an unclad bamboo structure as recently as Monday but, as everyone had assured me, come Sashthi, it was all painted, finished and packed with revellers, idols in place and ceiling crowded with glittering patterns.

That this turnaround was completed is surely a testament not only to the skill of the artisans but also to their intense pride in the work that they do.

Some of the pandals are truly extraordinary. The 66 Pally Sarbojanin, near the Kalighat temple, really struck me. The dimly-lit, red-walled, terraced pandal is set off by dark, monochrome idols; combined, the colours are reminiscent of ancient Greek pottery. Patient and orderly crowds filed past this abode of Shakti, while incense and bells filled the nightscape.

For every blockbuster puja, there are many neighbourhood pujas. Lacking corporate sponsorship or wealthy donors, they build smaller pandals celebrating the Mother Goddess in a more modest fashion.

“We want to create a very homely atmosphere,” said a committee member of the Brindaban Matri Mandir Puja, Sukeas Street, and such pujas certainly succeed in this. Whether its conch-blowing contests or neighbourhood feasts, the smaller pujas have a friendly atmosphere — like a larger version of the British ‘family Christmas’, which I’ll be missing out on for the first time this year.

While some might accuse certain pandals of gimmickry, the centrality of the idols is indisputable at each and every puja that I’ve seen. “The focus is not the Horlicks bottles,” said the secretary of the Dakshinee Sangha pandal. “It’s all about the Mother Goddess.” The artistry is often astonishing. While I preferred the more traditional, doll-like idols, the sense of violent movement captured in more modern depictions can be searingly effective too.

Calcutta tends to shut down at night, so it was intriguing to see the streets clogged with crowds and cars through the night. The city certainly does nocturnal very well and whether you want to take a spin on a Ferris wheel or grab a bite to eat, all tastes are catered to at any time of the night. Only the pariah dogs seemed confused by the Puja activity, as if we humans had no right to take over the streets that are usually theirs in the small hours.

Although the pandals and idols take centre stage, Durga puja seemed to me to be more about a certain mood throughout the city. This atmosphere builds, whipped up by ubiquitous advertisements for everything, from lip salve to diamonds, and is utterly infectious. It is both warm and welcoming and has made my first Puja an unforgettable experience.
Top

Another opinion

Here.

Sunday, October 01, 2006

Tulasi and stuff that may be quite scary

Update: Tulasi's blog has been added to the Roll. Not that he is regular about updating, the idiot. I found this article about the possible future of Google, which is quite.. interestng.

Maha-Ashtami

Yesterday was Maha-Ashtami, the eighth day of Durga Pujo, the eighth day of Devi Pokhho (literally, the days of the Godess) and usually an excelent reason to spend the entire night out on the streets of Calcutta pandal-hopping and having a whale of a good time. We have an exam looming next week.. and yes, I am going to well and truly splattered in this one. I went out with S and S to a plce near AA, maybe 45 minutes.. P and M followed in their car and got hilariously lost. So hilariously lost that they took a good two and a half hours getting there. 'There' was a small school on a suburb of Detroit where some Bong folks had put together the typical 'probashi' or diaspora pujo. The pujo was actually well orchestrated, if a trifle different; mostly because the purohit/priest was a North Indian, or as we call them, Hindustani bloke. The cultural programme had as its highlight a reasonably well worked out play... it is mostly a matter of luck at such places... the audience can expect to see performances ranging from the absolutely awful to the reasonably good. Very good takes a lot more work. And then again, such plays will typically have as their theme a comedy... very few people seem to want to see good theatre at a Durga Pujo. Again, this is something that Mukhosh, a theatre group I happened to hang around with a long time ago in Bangalore is trying to change. There! My little bit of propaganda done... Adios... All told, a day well spent. Pictures will come later..