Knocking on Forbidden Doors

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Bypasses are devices that allow some people to dash from point A to point B very fast while other people dash from point B to point A very fast. People living at point C, being a point directly in between, are often given to wonder what’s so great about point A that so many people from point B are so keen to get there and what’s so great about point B that so many people from point A are so keen to get *there*. They often wish that people would just once and for all work out where the hell they wanted to be. – Douglas Adams

Iron(y) Man

For some unfathomable reasons, Google rejected my application for an ad-sense account for this blog. I want my blog to display relevant advertisements and thus help me earn some extra allowance. However, the people at Google think otherwise. What is the problem if an average ordinary guy wants to earn money by penning down his thoughts? …that too without using any profanities or talking about pre-marital affairs. I’m sure Chetan Bhagat never had any problems for finding sponsors for his website. There’s irony hidden in it somewhere but you’d rather find it for yourself.

Shifting our focus to international matters, Hillary Rodham Clinton praised India for acting maturely after the Mumbai Terror attacks. It was commendable that we did not take up arms and launch a full-fledged attack on Pakistan just because a few terrorists attacked our commercial centre. We should have praised US of A for also acting maturely and not launching military attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq just because a few terrorists crashed their planes on two tall buildings. Something tickled my irony bone (next to my funny bone) here, too!

In other news, Mrs. Rita Bahuguna Joshi came back home…or whatever was left of it. Mayawati’s supporters (apparently) had burned her house down in an attempt to renovate it with gasoline. Mayawati claims Mrs. Joshi bad-mouthed the Dalits so she deserves to be punished under a SC/ST Law that bans any discrimination against the so-called backward classes. Mrs. Joshi has been booked under several non-bailable offenses besides the “inciting violence” infraction. She awaits trial, while those who literally brought down her house go scot-free. Mayawati said that she will make sure Mrs. Joshi is punished severely. No action has been (or, can be) taken against Maya Memsaab. Some idiots with a misplaced sense of patriotism will consider it greatly ironic. They will burn with anger at the mockery that is being made of the Indian judicial system. They will fire self-righteous remarks about ideologies and other such expletives. But…they will do NOTHING.

Why do you think Mayawati is the CM of UP? Why did the Liberhan Commission require Rs 8 Crores to tell us what the media was screaming for 16 years? Why do you think politicians are corrupt? What makes them think they can get away with murder? (I’m serious, quite a lot of them have). The answer to all of the above questions is THE COMMON MAN’S STUPIDITY.

Nobody dares to rise up against evil. Yeah, Gandhiji proposed non-violence but he never said that one should always grin and bear oppression. In fact, He did say, “It is a greater sin to be oppressed than to oppress.” I’ll translate it for you. He said that one should stand up for what is right. The scum of the Earth mock us because we let them. After all, since the advent of RTI (Right To Information), a lot of corrupt officials had to face the music (Jailhouse Rock, I believe).

The most obvious question in your mind, “What gives this jerk the right to tell us to do something? Why doesn’t he get up and do something himself.” Well, if you ever go to Mullana ask the final year students (that means my immediate junior batch) about Anurag Saxena. They may not have all good things to say but they will agree on one thing…the guy tried to bring about a change. And that’s far better than complaining.

If you ever come up with a plan that will reform our country, count me in. I may not lead from the front but I guarantee you will have a loyal ally. Just come out of this ennui and think of something that will change this world…for the better. If you have problems thinking big, think simple…how to improve your locality (that does not mean shifting to a posh area). If you are ready to rebel, you’ll always find me by your side. I hope you don’t see irony here because none is intended.

Be the change you want to see in the world. – Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Complicated

Have you noticed something. All my posts have very strange names: Love Bites, Gotta be somebody, Take a Bow, Disturbia, Turn the Page…notice a pattern? Some sort of a hidden symbol? What is it?

Welcome to my life

Are you a software engineer?

Are you tired of sitting and working in a cubicle?


Do you find that the management guys have nothing better to do except use complex jargon and create silly acronyms?

Are you stuck in an organization whose every decision seems stupid and sometimes downright absurd?

Do you cringe at thought of understanding the dialect of managers?


And well, your boss is a loon?

Well, you are not alone.

Dilbert is exactly like you. You can find him on the web at this location: www.dilbert.com

A masterpiece of cartoonist Scott Adams, Dilbert provides you with insight that is necessary for a nerd/geek to survive and grow in the highly competitive world of software.

Why am I praising it? Because I love the cartoon strip and want to share it with you.

Of course, if you are bored with software projects and now want to move on to management, help is on the way. Read “The Dilbert Principle” by by management guru Scott Adams. Its the only management book you’ll ever need. There’s even an Indian flavour in one of Dilbert’s co-workers called Asok.

So, enjoy the humour in our miserable cubiclized lives!

Love Bites

Love. One word with a thousand definitions. A word that is present in every culture, every civilization and every heart. So, it should be easy to define it. But unfortunately that is not so. The fact is, love is the most complicated implication of Life. Booorrrriiiinnnnggg! Why the heck am I rambling about something everybody knows?

Maybe because I’m fascinated by it. Not by being in love but by the concept itself. An emotion that forces people to make as many irrational decisions as possible before they come back to their senses and realize the folly of their ways. Anybody who has ever been in love knows what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the unnecessary sleepless nights, the endless chats, the countless SMSes and never-ending conversations. Boy, don’t they feel good.

And then… I’ve seen people grow out of their love. It’s as if the love went its own way and left two wandering souls behind. Unfortunately, nobody realizes what happens. People are emotional fools. They are so dominated by their emotions that they don’t realize when their thoughts change with their moods. I would love to name the person who left me in the lurch (see: Love Story and Love Story II) but of course, I won’t. Its simply because I learnt so much from my own stupidity. I would love to thank her someday for lifting the veil of illusion in front of my eyes. It helped me a lot in understanding human psychology in a better light. After all, I’d been there, done that…I knew what it felt to have loved…and lost.

People are idiots. The Great Scott Adams has a great insight on the fact. According to him, every person on this planet is a moron everyday for atleast 5 minutes. And there are no exceptions. I have studied a lot of characters and know for a fact that the theory is true. If someone says that he did nothing stupid in the last hours, he probably did nothing at all. Which itself is quite stupid, wasting time just to prove a theory wrong. In case you are wondering who Scott Adams is, he is the creator of Dilbert. In case you are wondering who Dilbert is, you probably are not associated with life in cubicles.

Coming back to the topic, I think I should elaborate the connection between love and stupidity. Love is all about two way communication. Unless there is response from the other side, the relation is bound to fail. For the average layman, If the girl isn’t interested in you, there is no force on the planet that can make her fall in love with you. Its that simple. In college, I never had a girl-friend. Okay, there was a silly love story but that was too pathetic to mention. Its not as if I was shunned by girls. I just did not have the time or money. I used to get sideways glances, slight facial gestures of recognition…those tiny signals that girls give out. You just have to pay attention to the details…like when a girl says “I’m fine” means that she is boiling with rage inside. It all in the details. Anyways, I could easily pick up the signals. No problem. Here is where stupidity comes in. A girl used to give me such signals, I could read it in her eyes. The thing was, I was too glad to have someone swooning over me. So glad that I ignored them. There would be plenty of time later. Later turned out to be eternity. She moved on. Thanks to my own stupidity, I missed out on Ms. Right. Lets just say she is no longer interested in me. I don’t know whether she has found someone else.

The sad part is the guilt. I never got a chance to say that I loved her as well. Well, I did say it. But it was so late that no self respecting lady would have accepted. So, she did the obvious. Gave me the “Just Friends” routine. I think that she wanted to give me another chance but I did not deserve it.

So, I’m stuck with what could have been. I’ll not say whether this girl was the same as the one in my previous love story entries. Better to create confusion in the minds of the readers (if any).

In any case, I came to realize something. Love stories are more beautiful if they have a sad ending. I don’t know why, maybe its because humans are a sadist race (just look at the violence in everyone’s favourite Tom and Jerry) or maybe because we love pain and cruelty. Yes, I said the same thing in two different ways. After all, take the best love stories our generation grew up on:
Romeo & Juliet
Laila & Majnu
Heer & Ranjha
etc etc etc

I guess we enjoy the pain. I just don’t understand why.

The most romantic fantasies are the ones that remain unfulfilled. - Anurag

(If you happen to read this post, please do leave a comment. I would love to know what you think, even if its quite opposite of what I believe)

Disturbia

A word that has made the entire world shudder and bow down on its knees – Recession.

Recession is everywhere, prices are rising like the beanstalk in Jack’s backyard, there’s no job security let alone job satisfaction. People are annnoyed, confused and scared. Anyone who dares to dream about the future finds this poltergeist hiding in the shadows. But is that it? Is everyone a victim or are there people who are making most of this appehensive mood of the masses?

Nowadays, everything can be blamed on recession. Lay-offs in big organizations, bankruptcy petitions, higher prices, fall in stock market have been associated with it for a long time. But there are others. Noida Police attributed the suicide of a young woman to…well…recession. Colleges are hiking their fees due to…greed…no….recession. It is omnipresent. Everyone wants this nightmare to end.

Come to think of it, does everyone actually want it to end? Organizations are making a killing. Before recession, it was 3 employees doing the work of 4 for a good salary. After recession, its 1 person doing the same amount of work for almost no salary. He is happy just because he still has a job. Employees will work overtime without thinking about bonus pay. Do you think the companies will want the situation to change quickly?

In the market, the prices can be adjusted without counting the demand factor. Hoard goods, tell everyone its recession, hike the prices and enjoy the festive season.

Then there’s the eternal excuse of having something to blame for your own failure. Humans like to have a scapegoat whenever they make a blooper. Recession’s the panacea. Did not score well in exams, its the economy’s fault. India lost a cricket match, recession affected the team’s morale. Can’t present your girlfriend with that romantic teddy. Ahhh, recession. Do you think we can let go of such a beautiful fabrication.

And they say, no good comes from a recessive economy!

When your neighbour loses his job, it is called an economic slowdown. When you lose your job, it is a recession. But when an economist loses his job, it becomes a depression.

Losing my religion

Cricket is the gulli-danda of the elite – Laloo Prasad Yadav

India crashed out of the ICC T20 World Cup yesterday. The newspapers and channels are busy bashing Dhoni and his men for the defeat. But, is Dhoni the real villain?

Cricket, in India, is a religion. People live and breathe cricket. Cricketers like Sachin Tendulkar have temples dedicated to them. In a nation of over 1 billion fans, cricketers are demi-gods. The fans idolize them. And then, there are expectations.

Cricket has become such a competitive sport in the country that the few who do make it to the top are objects of adulation. However, the hopes of an entire nation are riding on their shoulders. So, what happens… India loses one match in a competition…the captain’s house is ransacked, effigies of the players are burnt. And these shenanigans are not restricted to any particular city or region. The entire nation suffers from the mood swings.

This time around, the Men in Blue had a lot to live up to. They had won the first edition of the T20 World Cup and the entire country wanted them to retain the title. But, they did not make it. So, what went wrong?

If you have been watching the news lately, you would say, there was a drift in the team. You are absolutely wrong. Cricket has such a huge following in India that cricketers compete with film celebrities in the gossip columns. And gossip, by its very nature, is untrue.

This time the team was prepared well and there was not much on the publicity front. If the team is out of the news for some time, it means that the players are actually focussing on their game. But what the Great Indian Media had everyone believe was that there was infighting among the Men In Blue. As usual, Dhoni had to shift focus from his game to dispel the rumours. But the media latched on to his every word. Literally. His every move under scrutiny just to prove that all was not well within the team.

Now, Dhoni is a flamboyant personality. He likes being in the spotlight, but not for wrong reasons. So, he had to fight with the media when when he should have been concentrating on his team. The media further went on a killing spree and destroyed any chances of a good night’s sleep for Captain Cool.

And then, the inevitable happens. The players, who were forced to shut up the media with a show of strength had been distracted from their goal. The media had been successful in destroying the peace and quiet in the Indian camp. They said the players performed below par. If you have ever been told that 1 billion people expected you to win against the top cricketing nations in the world, would you or would you not feel the pressure? The players did not show it, but they were under a lot of pressure. The news channels are having a field day cursing Dhoni for a lacklustre performance.

And they say that a rift between Sehwag and Dhoni cost us the title.

Oh please, cut the crap!!

Gotta Be Somebody

What are we but some of our experiences – Anonymous

Who is this Anurag anyway?

During school, Anurag was regarded as a dark horse. He was someone who would not give up even when all the chips were down.
He is attracted to mystery. Any puzzles/problems given to him would surely be solved, even if it means endless hours of effort.

Some of his friends regard him as an Encyclopedia. His unquenchable thirst for knowledge has helped him learn a little about everything. He is always ready to help anyone who approaches him.

Recently, Anurag was the President of ISTE, Student Chapter in his college. ISTE is responsible for organizing events like aptitude tests, group discussions etc. which are aimed at the overall development of the students. President means a bloated ego, right? Wrong!

Anurag would rather be ‘near’ the proverbial spotlight than be in it. There’s an adventurous side to him too. He’d like to grow old without having any regrets about things he could’ve done. He’d rather do them!

Ethics and principles are very important to him. Although he doesn’t sow it, he cares a lot about honesty and scruples. Conscience is a small voice in your head that says, “Dude, we could get caught. Better not do it.” That puny voice utilizes a million amplifiers in his head. So, he stays away from things that might pluck at his conscience.

In case you thought that this character sketch was a wee bit… sketchy, here’s a list of adjectives that Anurag thinks apply to him:

Audacious, amiable, bold, caring, calm, daring, friendly, frank, inquisitive, methodical, polite, sincere and understanding.

Note: The list is by no means exhaustive!

Also, he likes to boast a lot. He can sing his own praises day in and day out. Yet, he feels embarrassed if someone else appreciates his talent. Why? There is probably a screw loose somewhere in the enigmatic machine that is his brain.

(This article is written in the third person. I apologize, but I felt it easier to describe myself as seen from the eyes of a third party.)

Leader of Men

After the elections results are finally out, I’ll resist the temptation to say “I told you so”. Not because of any scruples, but because I didn’t. Nobody did!

No one had any idea who would form the government this time around. There were genuine concerns over Mayawati finally fulfilling her dream and plunging this country into a horrendous nightmare.

What with only 44% voter turnout in Mumbai, the nightmare seemed liked becoming a reality. LK Advani, Mayawati, The Left Front…there was no one who was actually close to the public. The Congress itself was a mess trying to put together a non-existent alliance. Those concerned about the future of the country must have spent sleepless nights. I assure you, I wasn’t one of them.

This time the elections were not about selecting the right candidates, it was about selecting those who would do the least damage. Irrespective of its notorious past (Bofors, Emergency etc.), the Congress this time was closer to the public’s heart. Yeah, prices had risen, but they would have anyway. Yeah, there was recession, but it was handled superbly by the government. Although its allies kept threatening to destabilize it, the government stood firm on its ground. I’m talking about the Nuclear Deal. No, I don’t know what it contained but if Manmohan Singh was ready to sacrifice his government for it, I would back it no matter what.

That’s the whole point! Manmohan Singh may be one of the silent types but still he is a great leader. Leading by example. He does not ask anyone to obey his orders. He politely requests them on National TV to lend him their support. Better than Narendra Modi (or even LK Advani) who gain popularity by catering to the peoples’ baser instincts…like xenophobia, religious discrimination etc.

These elections are not a victory for the Congress, they are a victory for democracy. Voter turnout was less. Those who did not vote should keep their mouths shut when the government makes any silly decision. After all, you had a choice, you made the wrong one. GTH!

Cheers to the Great Indian Democracy!

There’s no government like no government! – Anonymous

Take a Bow

I never thought I’d be writing this post. But now, the end is near.

In the week 27th April – 1st May, I organized SYNERGY 2K9. The name was given to the otherwise boorish sounding ISTE WEEK last year. President Aashish Aggarwal and VP Anurag Saxena had come up with a unique name for a mini tech-fest consisting of five events in a span of three days. Mr. Kapil Goyal, a notorious teacher from the Mechanical Department had said it was impossible. “In your face, KKG!” was our triumphant response at the end of three days.

Fast forward to 2009. I had already proved myself with ISTE WEEK (See: Tears in Heaven). The name Synergy was going to become a fixture every year. Planning was in full flow. And then it hit me. My last contribution to college. My last hurrah! After dedicating three years of my life to ISTE, it was finally time to say goodbye. I felt heavy. No more events, just spend some time peacefully as a regular, ordinary student. But the path chosen 3 years ago did not let me return to mediocrity. SYNERGY 2K9 was destined to happen.

This time around, all technical events. The list:

• Tech Yard
• Web Hunt 2.0
• Bravado – The Corporate Quiz
• Bit Fighters
• Gladiator’s Arena

We had an event from every discipline. From Mechanical to Computers. But something was missing. Electronics! There could be no robot making or circuit designing because frankly, ISTE in our college is a cash-strapped society. Our budget did not allow us the luxury of thinking about ICs or bread boards. We all were confused. And then- There was Light!

Tech-Chat was the answer to our prayers. Something that was loved by all…students as well as teachers. All applications duly signed and approved, all material bought. And so began the last dance.

The week preceding the events, I had gone to Ambala to place the order for the prizes. Nothing can be more embarrassing than selecting the trophy you are going to be presented with at the valedictory ceremony. I blushed but placed the order anyway.

In the prize distribution ceremony, I was where I had always wanted to be – on stage as an anchor. One last time!

May 1st 2009, 1545 IST: It was finally over. The name of the new President had been announced. Now was the time to be alone. ISTE had been my everything in college. I ran a lot less behind girls than I ran for events and meetings. It was fun, no doubt!

ISTE helped me salvage some pride. In a desolate middle-of-nowhere college run by a capricious management, it had given me hope. I used to think joining MMEC, Mullana had been the biggest mistake of my life. It wasn’t. Whatever work I did, it benefitted me and my fellow students. I came in contact with talented individuals who were all ready to bring about a change in college.

The winds of change are blowing harder than ever. I just hope that the foundations of the college do not crumble under the pressure.

And now, I’m gone! In July, a new batch of students will arrive. And I’ll be just a memory…fading away into ignominy.

Goodbye ISTE, it was worth every moment!

Be the Change you to see in the world. – MK Gandhi