CAGD Project

Our CAGD project this semester was quite a pleasant exercise. While I shall not bitch about the other course projects, this one took us back to appreciating the aesthetics (something we would have otherwise abstracted out) and designing a simple everyday object in a 3D modeller.
While I shall be strutting around after getting some good marks in that project; I enjoyed doing something totally novel and creative after a long time. Hats off to Sohoni Sir for injecting so much life into things we otherwise take for granted.

Here are a few snap shots of my mobile - that I promised a few people.
Guess which cell-phone model I was aiming to ape in the comments .. First 3 correct entries get a treat (assuming that you didn't know of it before hand)!

Apparently, its not like all my 21 years have been wasted ...
While she was sure I was no where close to 21, my mom did wonder which of the two I resembled more - a 2 yr. old or a 1 yr. old!!

I might not have done much in my nearly 21 yrs. of existence;
but I take joy in the fact that I am / was often regarded as a capable friend or a worthy adversary by those who have!

My good deed of the day :-)

I donated 4000 grains of rice at www.freerice.com . Now I have no idea where the rice comes from & where it goes, but was a pleasant post-GRE exercise nonetheless. Have been swinging between a low of 31 & a high of 43!

1 साल बाद!

Its been an year, since my Goa trip;
& just like Goa, the memories are ageless; as are the wounds! Ouch!

Another year, when the "Har saal .. " resolution has failed.

The globe turns a full circle ..

as a 10 year old boy (circa 1995), I distinctly remember hearing time and again, why globalisation is bad for India, its economy, its people & more dramatically, for the survival of the country at large.
12 years later, things have come a full circle - Americans / Europeans are dreading the same globalisation.

Many Europeans, like many Americans, feel threatened by globalization. But the challenge cannot be met with Mr. Sarkozy’s misconceived ideas, including designating threatened European companies as nationally backed contenders, and giving them special legal and economic privileges. That approach will see sheltered European firms fall even further behind newer and more efficient competitors from India, China and elsewhere.

While much more can be said - it was amply felt during our time in France and reading articles otherwise. Indians are riding the wave, better than the Chinese apparently. Pepsi / Coke which were often the target of anti-economic-imperialism screams, finds an Indian lady at the helm. Ditto with Adobe.
Too inexperienced to comment more -- but :-)

You are in CSE, IIT Bombay when ...

... the following exchange pleasantly lands in your inbox!!

Dear Ram,

Your leadership in piloting this bold initiative through Tata Sons is finally paying off - and how superbly! My congratulations and compliments. I am glad that IIT Bombay has contributed in the effort, not only via its past students (who are also past faculty), but also a little through our on-going research collaboration.

With best regards,
Sincerely,
- Deepak

and just when you wonder who Ram is --

Thanks Deepak. You have been a great supporter and a source of strength. Warm regards

S Ramadorai
Tata Consultancy Services
Mailto: s.ramadorai@tcs.com
Website: http://www.tcs.com

"आरे!! हमारे ज़माने में ..."

Anti, Calvin and the above line are intricately linked.
However, if there was one thing I would say was truly unique to people of my age, it would have to be the taking down messages for others, for the calls they miss.
If you aren't figuring what I am talking about, remember the times, when a phone number had a one-to-one correspondence with a particular address (or worse, there was the funda of 'शेजार्यांचा फ़ोन नम्बर'). As a result, we answered phones (which were seldom for us) and we were supposed to take down hurriedly pronounced names / numbers & remember them for delivery to the correct person. I particularly sucked at this art & was sufficiently chided for the same!!

Anyway, since our parents never had phones in their childhood & the concept of a घरचा phone number is fast on the decline - it truly qualifies for a "आरे!! हमारे ज़माने में ..."
Aah! Those were the times ;-)
A Calvin to spread the cheer ...

A few times over ...

Some years ago, statisticians predicted that by the time He retired, Sachin would hold every batting record - well, they were only partially right.
He has records, by a decent margin as well.
A list of his Batting records :-
1. Most Runs (15800s) in Career (yeah.. yeah -- we all knew that)[Next best 12200s]
2. 5^th highest innings score.
3. 2^nd highest runs in a series.
4. 1^st (4^th and few more) highest runs in a calendar year.
5. More than 1000 runs in a calendar year - 7 times
6. 2^nd highest batting average among batsmen with 7000 runs or more.
7. Most hundreds in Career. (41 + 5 times this yr. that he has been out in 90s :-|) [Next Best :- 25]
8. Most hundreds in a calendar year. (Also, the 4th spot.)
9. Most 100's by a batsman against Australia, Srilanka, Zimbabwe, Pakistan, West Indies, South Africa & Kenya.
10. Most (14) 90s scores .. arrgh!! [Next best:- 9]
11. Most (3) dismissals at 99. [Pulling my hair.]
12. Most 50+ scores in career.
12a. Most 50-99 scores in career.
13. 50s in 5 successive matches [Highest by an Indian.]
14. 4^th highest number of career sixes.
15. Highest number of 4s. [1720 to 2nd best 1348]

Anyway, He has set the stage for a decent onslaught. So back to the match.

Mornings !

Mornings in IITB are little appreciated,
because like many other things here (read: lectures, labs, ...) people sleep through them!
However, once in the rising sun, when I happen to chance upon them --I do miss not meeting them more often.

Quoting Sushant :-

To Kanpur ...

I shall not harp again on the (un)justifiable reasons for my long absence. Some updates:

1. Leaving early morning tomorrow for ACM regionals at IITK. Have never been to kanpur, it might also be my east-most indian city since i am self-aware :)
It should be a nice experience, this time being the best in the year to visit kanpur. Their cultural festival is also scheduled on this weekend. We should have a gala time, an inviting break from the semester.
I guess quite a few expectations rest on us but I am quite pessimistic this time around, we have not practiced at all :(

2. Met Tejas and Sonal after a long time yesterday, had dinner together. Good fun.

So long

Won't bother to add much - have been to Hyderabad, so the eastern city and a few other things might not hold, but what the heck saved me a lot of typing :-)

Universe, Solar System ..

.. & life have been reasonably good to me, over the past month upto last weekend !
Quick Notes :-
1. GRE went w/o major calamity!
1'. Back to Nightouts
2. Midsems weren't as terrible as I thought they would be.
3. Ranade Sir didn't appear as angry as my laziness called for.
4. Ganapati Rocks !!
4.1 : Ameya, Anish, Pallavi Tai, Anand Dada were the icing on a real hectic but enjoyable day 1
4.2 : Delhi trip beckoned.
5. Delhi Trip -- Priya will finally rest in peace. Short trip, sweet girls ;-), sweeter memories. Nightout with Aman & co. Meeting Teemish after 3.5 long yrs. Exchanging notes on IITB / IITD Elections, MI / Rendezvous, Insti. Poltu., life, girls, photography etc.. Spoke to Eesha at length after quite a while. India Gate, RajPath walk, Delhi Metro :-), Delhi Traffic :-|, Richshaw fares :-(, Airport, and oops!! coming 2nd <:-P!
6. Google CA!
7. Qualified for IITK Onsite :D
8. Entering knee deep into the Arabian Sea, and feeling responsible for the 18' idol.
9. Biding Sept. adios
9'. Trek to Naneghat, again.
10. Thinking lots about the Pune trip - HawkEye is brainy stuff :-P
11. Going to Pune - 15.4 sec., a paper presentation & lotsa chicken!!

Burp .. Content.

When you think you have run out of time,
prolly its time to turn the clock on its head!

Corny!

Quoting this article,

V. Raghunathan writes about a farmer whose corn won top awards year after year. When a reporter asked about the secret of his success, the farmer attributed it to the fact that he shared his corn with his neighbors. Why, the reporter wondered, would the farmer want to share his seed when those neighbors also competed with him for the prize? The farmer's reply was, "The wind picks up pollen from the ripening corn and swirls it from field to field. If my neighbors grew inferior corn, cross-pollination would steadily degrade the quality of my corn. If I am to grow good corn, I must help my neighbors do the same."

That Indians often fail to act like this farmer is the principal theme of Raghunathan's book.

V. Raghunathan concludes "Indians are privately smart and publicly dumb".

:-ss

GRE Tomo.
Nothing more to say :-|

---
Edit:-
I 1430'd :-|

Watched Rang de Basanti again, today! & much like my other posts, I am confused :)
India, celebrated 60 yrs. of Independence, earlier this week!
My earliest memories of Independence Day, were those of painting Flag Hoisting every August - in the painting class - year after year, an incremental number being the only change. Clearly, as a 6 yr. old, the country as an entity didn't mean much to me, other than - it inspired a lot of fervor.
Over the years, it tickled something... but no sooner had I stopped drawing tricolors (about the time when the number touched the golden 50), than the cynicism largely set in. The past years, have meant an additional holiday, mandatory school parades, additional JEE / Agarwals' classes, or possibly a Malhar - as the case may be. I got perturbed this Wednesday, as I went on some errand to a slum in Thane. Lying in the only square feet - those kids would call a playground - the faith persisted. Some kids had put their ingenuity to test, and had laid out a rangoli in the shape of India - on an extremely uneven ground.
Why was it, that I felt the strongest for my land, when it gave me nothing more than air to breathe (in the years '89-'94, which were among the bleakest in nationalistic history), yet when the country spends a great deal on educating me - I take the midweek break to sneak in a few extra word-lists [& :P] , so that I GRE well!

Earlier today, we watched 3 laborers cut their way through the LT lawns, with an almost medieval lawnmower. It was then, that Sangram brought up the topic of relevance of IITs, Engineers, IITian Engineers to India and so on.
Till before Paris, I was of the opinion that any great innovation made by NRIs in USA would eventually tickle down to Indians & make their life more comfortable. Clearly, I was wrong.
India - has her own set of problems. And, obviously grant commissions in Firang Lands, wouldn't pay to find solutions to our problems. With the case at hand - probably a good automated lawnmower is not an answer, we are looking for in India. Where would the 2, who fed themselves and their families, from their daily wages go? - if we replaced them with a mower than needed just 1 man to man. While, it would clearly be in vogue to have ultramodern devices all over IIT, just like in INRIA, in aping western countries we have missed the point. As sangram pointed out, unfortunately many corporate houses, probably have already purged their payrolls - in order to keep up with 'global' standards.
In the same vein, CTARA (at IITB) is probably the most relevant center / department of IIT Bombay.

And at 60, (coincidentally the age at which Government employees retire) India needs a fresh look at the problems facing us. & A generation needs to reawaken! I have no idea, where the winds of change will flow from (or for that matter - if they will). The easy way out seems like the very easy way out! Just forget that the problem exists, and its existence will stop paining you.
But I guess, things have to change.

Koi bhi desh perfect nahin hota, use perfect banana hota hai.

I have no idea, whether I will have the guts to be a young gun of India or whether

Yahaan pe system ko badal ne ki koshish karo, to system khud tumhe badalta hai.

But, among the best part of the movie, was its touch of realism - each of the hero dies a non-heroic death. Revolutions apparently make no promises & the Satyandra Dubey's die .... but they give no arrival notices either.

But then, political revolution (which might be around the corner) might not come just yet. Yet, the technological needs need addressing as well. The generation can come up with solutions - that address real problems. With thrice as many people per area as France, India's problems are plenty & I don't even know where to start!

Its almost become an annual trend now!
Another student, committed suicide on IITB Campus, sometime yesterday, making it the 2nd suicide in about 7 months and 4th on Campus, in as many years.

While, suicides are an extreme step altogether & a problem in its own right, only a few students end up taking that extreme step. What is a more prevalent problem in the institute, is the desire to quit the system!
In excess, of half the students are in the mood to quit the system & things surrounding them - at the halfway mark! The desire manifests itself, in many ways. Those who actually, quit the system, earlier than stipulated - by leaving the institute dead or otherwise, are a few.

But most, unfortunately, a larger number just wait for time to pass-by and them to honorably graduate from IITB. In the mean time, they sleep through courses, take up easy courses, and so on, so forth.
The general discontent, with the system - is something that has to be addressed at some level.

'Matrimonial websites losing out to dating websites'

Its interesting to note what the country is coming to, when you read a news item, as above.
Its a perfect reflection, of the mindset of people all around, where the generation - taking a definite break from marriage-centric view. While, breakdown of the current structure - is not what I am betting on - the thought process has set in.

Keyword Hunting and web Mining!

Trust Soumen to come up (well - webmine to be frank), with

Claiming "IIT=Cornell+MIT+..." is like demanding that Mumbai local trains are superior to the Paris subway because it's much harder to get into a Mumbai local train.

While, it would be wholly disrespectful and way out of my aukaat to refer to Prof. Soumen Chakrabarti, as a plain Soumen, since it is how he is referred to in student circles, I shall do so & pray that he doesn't come across this.
On an academic note, I am mostly taking the Statistical Foundations of Machine Learning course by him this semester.
Soumen as a person, prof., researcher is an enigma alrite. While, I have always been an ardent fan of his newsgroup postings, never did I realise the extensive amount of general writings that he has come up with in the past few years. Most of them are linked here. He speaks of pollution, lawlessness, and more general topics, in such a simple language and persuasive logic, that it leaves you wondering where has all the common sense gone.
His witty one-liners or clever anagraming, I recently realised is just a part of the story. Clearly, people better equipped at humoring english are abundantly distributed (priori hypothesis) all over the web.
What I believe is unmatched is the through professionalism! He was as good as an IIT student can get. A President's Gold Medalist during his IITKgp days, he went on to UCB and so on...
As a researcher, I guess he is good, because a list of people in DataMining, throws up his name in the same league as Sergey Brin and others.
But what is truly fascinating is the amount of professionalism he brings to class. He has a clear handwriting, even more clear ways of sketching out complex fundaes and diagrams. He overloads you with information and expects you to imbibe it at that rate. You are mentally exhausted and bamboozled after attending his class, yet you know that you want to come back for more.
& if all this, made you picturise a jet-setting Capitalist, he says a lot for cycles, environment, making IITs relevant in the larger picture, and the other India - in general.

Still in the meantime, for those who aren't attending his classes - enjoy his sharings and posts. Watching him, have a go at IITB MB egg heads and Can't read but will applys, is something definitely not to be missed.

Water

Watched the movie, Water, last night.
Its one of the Deepa Mehta, element n-ologies, that was nominated for an Oscar for the best foreign film, as a Canadian Entry.
While I had specifically decided to enjoy the movie, as it unfolded and not be critical of it, a few themes got me thinking over and over again.
So, I shall attempt to pass this off as a GRE practice essay, since I am desperate to pen down my thoughts, lest they get lost in the jungles of IIT thoughts.

The movie deals with, the widows of Benaras and their oppression, in the late 1930s. The whole setting is wonderfully reconstructed, though I didn't really figure out what Water had to do with it.
It no doubt had a commanding screen presence and makes an appearance in many scenes. It probably also symbolises, the Hindu religion, that although expansive and well-defined in its flow, can be skillfully shaped up, to the needs of those who read the scriptures - the Brahmins.
It might represent the time-frame of a widow's life from the instant, her husband's ashes meet the waters till the time she (or her ashes) drown themselves.
It could stand for innumerous tears that are suppressed.
Or it could be something different altogether.

While, female oppression, is something I have already blogged on, in this movie, its much more potent. Unlike, Dor where, the widow did love her husband & missed him, Water speaks of girls, not even in their teens, widowed before they met their husbands, for whom they could have no possible affection. Also, while we feel sad for Meera, what happens to the playful Chuhiya, only about 7 yrs. old, is graphicaly brutal. The setting of the ashram, with the same grief multiplied in each inmate, is gripping. (That Chuhiya constantly reminded me of a niece, I absolutely adore, didn't make it any easier.)
But, I shall give my feminist rantings a rest.
A smaller but visible undercurrent, is the Gandhi effect. Gandhiji is still remembered largely, as a leader who catalysed Indian independence. With, independence being a 2 generation old thing, and Gandhiji's relevance in present day India, almost forgotten (except, for the rib-tickling Lage Raho...Munnabhai), Water atleast reminds us, of the kind of impact Gandhiji made in a social context, then. With a miniscule screen time for the person himself, the director still manages to talk about Gandhi as a harbinger for change. All along, we are reminded, that a messiah will alleviate the pain, that we see the lead actors suffer.
One of the lines, that the character actually delivers is

For long, I thought that God is the ultimate truth. But now I know, Truth is the ultimate God.

While, one may routinely pass the above as another of Gandhi sayings, it is in the context of the movie, (with Holy Texts being used as tools for discrimination) that you realise the substance. The movie, with a central character searching for herself, as she is lost in the crowds milling for a look at Gandhi, is the most realistic picturisation of his mass popularity. Seema Biswas's acting in the closing minutes is amazing. Her confusion, desperation, will, yet uncertainty are beautifully potrayed.

Eventhough, the above themes, hurt me, for the discrimination was brutal, it never got personal. Thankfully, my family and I, have been fairly modern in their viewpoint. Widow oppression, is wholly detested. 1 UP! My both maternal grandparents, have been Gandhian in their thoughts and actions, for their whole life. My grandmother, continues to stick to his principles till today, and we have imbibed some of the easier ones from her. 2 UP!
But, what bothered me most, was the Brahminical angle to it. While, I am a non-practising Hindu and have at best vague ideas, as to what it means to be one, I have always been proud to be one. I prided my brahminical roots, for their intelligence and awareness. I dismissed anti-Brahminical movements as mere jealousy, that was mostly based on medivial happenings. This movie shook, some of them to the core.
Water, starts with a quote from Manusmriti, that screams of discrimination. The movie ends with stats, that refer to him. The movie is littered with things, he has setup! While, each refers to some distinction, a look beneath the surface, doesn't paint as bad a picture.
Lets take, a case in point. We learn, during the course of the movie, that Manu allows, a widow only 3 forms of life. A Sati (death in the pyre of her husband), or a life devoid of earthly pleasures, or (subject to consent of the family) a marriage to the younger brother of the dead husband. While it seemingly, subjects the widow to the mercy of others, it also ensures that she is not left uncared for. In a male-hounding society, it gave the widow a slight immunity against being subject to humiliation. So in principle, the laws of Manu, seem considerate, if not fair.
What has over the years, (and repeatedly so) gone wrong, is the interpretation of the laws. I never thought, that the learned men (read - Brahmins) would skew the vedas to mean things diametrically opposite, of the original intentions. As one of them says, in the movie "It is a blessing for the widow, that she gets to sleep with a brahmin. A Brahmin can sleep with any woman." This is clearly, not what Manu had in mind, while setting down the basic rules that govern Hinduism.
Over centuries, such traditions would have amounted to the most blatant and widespread misuse of power, that ever has been.
And as per Hinduism, there is no action that ever goes unaccounted for. Each action has to be redeemed and its fruits (bitter or sweet) to be consumed. Hence, in light of such atrocities, the overwhelming anti-brahminical sentiments that are running amok all over the country start to appear just. Suddenly, I feel the collective guilt weighing me down and a black smear spread all across my ancestry. The current domestic situation, doesn't really allow me to talk about this to my parents :P and clearly, its not something that my extended family will take kindly to. But, as my senses open to an outside world, I realize that the quiet manner in which all brahmin bashing is endured, doesn't reflect a strength of character but rather an attempt to passively accept the conviction for ancestral deeds.
In an ever-shrinking world, where you require every possible support to make you stand up for what you are, and carve a niche for yourself, a fundamental constituent gone rotten, is very disturbing.

To Book or Not too Book ...

is the Million Dollar (well, atleast 15$) Question, hounding me for the last month or so!
Well, the book in question is (the only book, being talked about) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows & the book in the title, refers to the verb - 'To book'!
The Harry Potter frenzy has whipped up to such a cresendo, that not buying the book on the first day, or not racing your friends to its end, is not an option. To all the true fans, it will just be a matter of shielding yourself, from the effects of a spilled out suspence - which hits you from all possible media. While I have already accepted, that some nasty (who shall thereafter not continue to be my) friend, will message me the ending, I wouldn't surprise me if some tabloid or Times of India (same difference, really) screams out "XYZ dead", to sell a few more sunday editions.
As bad luck would have it, the book releases, about 6 hours before I am due at the Airport. As worse luck, would have it, these are 01h00 to 07h00, on a Saturday Morning. (For, Paris on a Saturday Morning, read my posting about Amsterdam .) Also, stuck in an Economy Class seatee, is not how I wanted to be glued to the book, as such. Hence, I am forced to read the book, after landing in India. This puts me at a major disadvantage compared, to others, who will have a clear day's 'work' behind them, by the time I land.
Now, comes the critical evaluation of either sides of the above question :-
Even if I manage to lay my hands on the book, the instant I land & start ploughing through it, that very instant (which, will clearly annoy my parents no end. It isn't a pretty site, when you emerge from the terminals and jump into the arms of Harry & Hermione, instead of Mom & Dad), I shall have known the suspence latest by Sunday night. I shall, be left with the glory of reading through the climax, as others are chewing through every detail of it, in a indefinite loop. By the time, I climb out of the Deathly Hallows, my mom will wanna send me to the Gallows & no one will want to hear anything, I wanna say about the book either. It will be a Catch 22July, alrite.
If I manage to calm my excited self and restrain it from preplacing an order for the book, I shall manage to get one for myself, a few days late. While the person who lends me the book, shall have his/her sadism by forcing me to ingest every detail of the suspence, before I can start, I get the book alrite. As I predict, once the initial cheer surrouding the Hallows, dies down, the book prices shall dive. Good Chance, that I can buy the same book in a proper shop, for as less as 300Bucks or better buy the entire 7 book set, for something like 1500 bucks.
How much, am I willing to pay to live through the Hallows, a day after everyone else & thereafter look at annoyed parents and no cheer?
How many loud suspences and intended hints, am I going to ignore, willing to endure and for how long, till I finally manage to read the book a week or so, late?

... is the question?

Another Teen Movie

[The following has been written with a viewpoint of someone who has read the book -- For the rest, its a college adventure movie :D]
While making a movie out of a massively successful storyline & compressing the largest Harry Potter novel so far, into 2 Hours and 17 minutes, is no mean task but (inspite of knowing all this,) I am more than mildly disappointed.
In case, you wondered, I watched Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix, 1^stDay Last Show in Paris. A big Yeah to that!
To those, who think HP is abra-ca-dabra go take a hike!
To those, I promised to see the movie with, apologies, but will see it again with you anyway.
Also, incidentally, after giving Goblet a skip in the theaters, I have watched each of the others in different city - Pune, Bangalore, Bombay & now, Paris :D
I can't stop gloating :)
So basically, in an effort of squishing 800 pages of the book - the director ends up practically nowhere. One thing that the movie stands out for, is the measure of growth that the Daniel Radcliffe, as Harry & Emma Watson, as you-know-who ;) , have shown. Unlike, Goblet, where Miss Watson, had everyone from Krum to Me to many others floored, she is much more subdued. Except for a scene, where she applies a bit too much of lipstick, she's back into the mould of a best friend, who looks averagely good & not the school beauty, who sits besides you in class, but is being asked out by International Quidditch Heroes. I miss her bushy hair, though (No Pun intended - its how JKR describes her).
Among the other cast, Uncle Vernon looks hugely comical, Gwarp is fitting, Bellatrix is unnaturally loud ...
... & is part of a bigger problem, that I think the movie suffers from. All characters in the movie, have gone overboard to fit exactly into the mould JKR designed. Dumbledore, as I saw him in the movie, wasn't the same as I had mentally pictured him to be while reading, but that was OK!
This movie, has Umbridge having all the associated imagery to recreate the toad visualisation that JKR creates in the book. In a movie hard pressed for time, panning her obscenely pink office a couple of times, is a huge waste. While she might have exactly imitated the book, the added visualisations with her toadiness overdoes it. While her characteristic, 'Hem, hem' is perfectly timed and astutely executed, its an irritant as the movie progresses. Among the most frequent complaints about HP5, has been her time-consuming character. The movie doesn't help itself, by coping this part.
Similarly, with Bellatrix! It is necessary to speak of her evil laughter a few times over to get the message across, it is sufficient to display her laugh just once or twice.
While, the reason Order, as a book is vastly different from its predecessors (also, among the reasons it is complicated), is that it speaks of the Gray areas between the Dark and the Light. It shows James, in a nasty light. It speaks of Umbridge as a misguided but loyal follower. It speaks of Aunt Petunia, doing more than just feeding Harry on leftovers.
The movie blunders each time.
We are never given a chance to like Umbridge. James' arrogance as a 15 yr. old is portrayed as Harry's strength in repelling Snape. The Howler sent to Petunia is still an unexplained element. In case, JKR resolves it in Hallows, the movie HP7 will have a null pointer.
In the concluding minutes, Harry's anguish at learning the prophecy was done with, in a snap. It speaks, of Dark Lord marking him as an equal & neither surviving while the other lives. While, picturising it would no way have been an easy task, Harry's contemplations by the Great Lake, bring out the man in the boy.
What the movie succeeds in doing, however is capture the difficult scenes, well. Fudge's tinkering with the Daily Prophet uses nice techniques. The Department of Mysteries creates an aura of the unknown. Characters of Lupin, Sirius, Tonks, McGonnagal, Ron and Hagrid are self-assured. Voldemort is unnecessarily disfigured. We hear that Tom was a pretty handsome boy. Luna Lovegood, is a revelation as McDreamy. Ginny isn't positioned to be Harry's love interest in the next. Quidditch is sorely missed. But the lack of too many outdoor scenes, create a nice Dark tinge to the whole movie.
What we are left with, is our jock, with a couple of great pals, in a school with an evil teacher imposed on them. They decide, that something secret is cool and rebellious, since they have a point to prove to the world. He manages to snog a girl, in the meantime. They goof up and land in a soup. But our friendly neighbourhood jock, has to star in subsequent movies & with a little help, saves the world alrite. The evil teacher was wrong, all throughout & is duly punished. Another Teen Movie - a few JKR details, don't hurt!

s-Pam

Almost everyone who has a email id receives an email as below

Hello! I am tired this evening. I am nice girl that would like to chat with you. Email me at pam@docmaildirect.info only. If you would like to see some of my pictures.

If she is 'tired', 'nice' and would just want to 'chat', why would I want anything to do with her #-o. I have more than enough pictures to see >:P

Allo !

MapLoco, says someone from:

La Celle-Saint-Cloud, France Mon, 02 Jul 2007 18:39:18 -0500

visited this blog.
Now La Celle-Saint Cloud, is a pretty nearby place, infact just a few kms from INRIA. But there is noone, from that area whom I know. In case, you happen to be a person, I am talking of or similar, kindly leave a message :D

DubyaMan

Either George W. Bush has no ideas, how HUGE poodles are,
or, he thinks that (like the supposed WMD) the rest of the world, doesnt know the truth about them.

For an unflinching ally, Tony Blair, he remarked the following to The Sun

I’ve heard he’s been called Bush’s poodle. He’s bigger than that.

As Tony Blair, leaves office, I feel for him for unknown reasons, but then like everything else, Bushisms steal the limelight.

Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish

I am neither the 1^st person, nor will I be the last person, talking about it - but Steve Jobs' commencement address at Stanford titled - Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish, inspires me everytime.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

Heres the video :

Advice

Never hand out, unsolicited advice. Doesnt work :D

Calvin - again!

Extremely interested in seeing where this goes tomorrow ;)








--
Edit :- Dated 19.06.07
Nothing related to this, the following day.

S'il Vous Pee

This post of mine, is another of my attempts at elongating a weekend, fast coming to a close. Anyway, the following mail forwarded by Sudeep, caused a genuine chuckle. Read on...

Seems God was just about done creating the universe, had a couple of left-over things left in his bag of creations, so he stopped by to visit Adam and Eve in the Garden. He told the couple that one of the things he had to give away was the ability to stand up and pee. "It's a very handy thing," God told the couple who he found hanging around under an apple tree. "I was wondering if either one of you wanted that ability." Adam popped a cork!! He jumped up and begged,

"Oh, give that to me! I'd love to be able to do that! It seems the sort of thing a Man should do. Oh please, oh please, oh please, let me have that ability. I'd be so great! When I'm working in the garden or naming the animals, I could just let it rip, I'd be sooooo cool. Oh please, God, let it be me who you give that gift to, let me stand and pee, oh please."

On and on he went like an excited little boy (who had to pee ).
Eve just smiled and shook her head at the display. She told God that if Adam really wanted it so badly, and it sure seemed to be the sort of thing that would make him happy, she really wouldn't mind if Adam were the one given the ability to stand up and pee. And so it was. And it was...........well, good.
"Fine," God said, looking back into his bag of left-over gifts.
"What's left here? Oh yes, multiple orgasms..."

Basically, while the recent tell-it-all streak, shall not extend to multiple orgasms, I shall contain myself well within the 1st 85% of the mail, of which I have experience, and in spite of the sting in the tail (read: kick in the balls) of the mail, I found the 1st Adam part of it pretty hilarious.
The mail made me pretty vividly imagine, a excited Adam all gung-pee about his new powers that he could spray about. Think about a 5 year old, jumping with joy at a new water-gun gifted to him & you know what I exactly mean.
The mail also brings out, Eve's reticent nature and her ability to grin in joy (or helplessness) at how relieved (pun intended) Adam is at the power to stand up for himself and express himself. Everyone has experience, at their moms/sisters/daughters sitting tight in the car while we merrily pop out of the car and pop back in minutes later.

On a lateral note, the following picture sums up how evil I feel, each time I can use my Adam-inherited powers. Can you possibly, imagine Susie in place of Calvin, doing the same? Hell NO!
Calvin might not be able to hit Susie with a single snowball, but when it comes to matters that matter, he is bang on target!
Similarly, I was intrigued & interested at the public urinals, I found at street crossings in Amsterdam (seen below). So simple, minimalistic yet efficient and complete, they exactly sum what standing up and peeing is!
While, I hadn't seen something like this before, Deepak D. aka DudDa, interjected saying they can be found in Bihar - Surely! DudDa, we had no idea Bihar had open urinals :P

Thought for the day!

If your feet stink, you are forewarned before a Foot in Mouth experience!

Don't know why I came up with this one!

Sold Out!

Falling in line, with Deja News (Google Groups), Blogger, Picasa, del.icio.us, Orkut and some more, I have sold my Blog and hence my Soul to the coffers of Google!
Henceforth, a couple of Google Ads will feature on this blog, and Google promises to pay me some loose change, in case people click on them.
So its an earnest request, that you view the sites that Google thinks are relevant to my blog, links of which appear on the top banner of this blog.
While I had made a deliberate attempt to veer clear of Google running my life, at every instant from GMail to GTalk to Orkut to Picasa to Blogspot ... Sangram told me how lucrative the whole thing is. And since Google is privy to all my mail, [orkut] Crushes ;), and so on, I might as well, get paid for it.

Pata nahi - Frankly it was a very tough mental choice, though trivial.

On a hand, this Blog although publicly readable, is something that I regard as a pretty personal notepad. I often take pains, to change the template of the blog to suit my taste. As a result, granting the machines at Google, the access to decide what goes on my blog, was like splattering fliers for Dog Biscuits, on a lovingly designed kennel (France effect - Dogs abound).
On similar lines, I never ask someone to explicitly visit my blog, don't publicize it (other than a 1 line mention on my homepage & Orkut profile), don't send out new post notifications. Everyone who comes here, does so with free will and implicitly asking them to visit the Google Ads, seems worse than doing the above things, which I don't.

Anyway, very humanly, the greed for supplementing my Intern Income ;) got over me at that instant and hence, if you may, please visit the advertisements linked above and help share Google's wealth among the less fortunate, who religiously practice the religion called Googling and more so, turn more people faithful, everyday.
If Jesus can provide for the Bread and Wine, so can Larry Page and Sergey Brin. Cheers to it!

New Age Information Sharing!

Technology hasn’t eliminated the desire for rules about who tells what, when and how. You don’t want your wife or girlfriend to tell you she’s pregnant by sending an e-mail message. A close friend could be miffed if he found about your hot date on Friday not from you, but from a casual acquaintance who had already seen pictures of it on your Facebook page.

I fail to find time to actually write something on this blog, though there are tons of thoughts about France, India, Life etc. running through my head.
Till then, sharing another interesting article from NYTimes :- about information and grapevines in new age!

ahh..

Even if you are 'Lakhon mein Ek' there are still 60,000 of you. That I think, is the major problem in this world :-< !

Take it with a pinch of Turmeric©

Knowledge in ancient India was protected by ... not legal or economic ones. The term “intellectual property” was an oxymoron: the intellect could not be anybody’s property. ... Perhaps it is for this reason that Indians do not feel obligated to pay for knowledge. Pirated copies of my book are openly sold on the Bombay streets, for a fourth of its official price.

-Suketu Mehta

On patent laws and heritage wisdom, this makes a good read.

Afghan Girl

Some images live with us, forever.


Google for 'Afghan Girl' to know more, in case you don't.

Summer Migration

While I intended to post about my French internship - on this blog itself, following Sudeep's cue (Its always a good idea, to do that), I shall now be writing on another blog - http://jenepeuxpasparlerfrancais.blogspot.com/ . So please check out that as well.

Adios!

Blame the Stars !

This is what Peter Vidal had to say about Sagittarius, today :

This is an ambitious period but, first of all, you must satisfy your emotional goals. It’s time to mend fences if there have been any arguments. Romantic hopes may call you away from home before long. The people you’re attracted to at the moment may be from very different backgrounds.

Of all the things - Sangram had to read this out to me, 1^st thing today morning!
Thankfully, I don't believe in Inter Planetary misalignments ruining my week - I am more than capable of doing it myself.

I have noticed that as(s)trologers - have 4 prime areas of concern : Romance, Career, Health, Financial Health. They choose one of the 16 subsets generated by permuting the success / failure in each of these and assign a zodiac sign to it. Good chance that every man thinks - that Bingo! his week had been well-predicted.

& coming to "The people you’re attracted to at the moment may be from very different backgrounds." .. I think I might just start eyeing French Chicks ;)

Seminar Elections Networks Eurotrip Love orkut Eurail Embassy Friendship Scrubs rsl-34 Presentation Compilers Relationships Senti Visa Kile Career Manifesto AI kpdf Cell-phone HIMYM Endsem Coffee Frankie Finger Schengen Term-Paper Elixir INRIA Campaigning StaffC Report Sweat Nat-Comp Sleep nsl-31 Yahoo Ranade Bike ISIC Break Life Google LAN Vivas Thunderbird Syllabus Porn Fuzzy-Logic Slippers Tears Latex Carte-Orange RyanAir mplayer CheatSheets

Stopping in the Labs on a Shady Night

Stopping in the Labs on a Shady Night
                                     --Shantanu Gangal ;)
Whose labs this is, I think I know.
He lives with his LAN, though;
He will not see me stopping here
As his wards squirm around in fear.

All my wingmates think it queer
As they miss my effervescent cheer
Between the courses and labs around
My room PC, is rarely working found.

I take a break from a dull screen
As I recall my passed away teen.
I think of them Miss; I miss,
All for a bright careers' sheen.
The labs are hot, humid, and bleak,
But I have deadlines to meet,
And loads to code before I sleep,
And loads to code before I sleep.

For best results, hum it to the tune of Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening .[If It wasnt obvious yet!]

Seminar

For all those, who wondered what was keeping me busy these days [I know that isnt a large number - but still I like to smart around a bit :P], its the final stages of the Seminar, with report and all.

While I dont have any time to delve into more details, at the moment - you can check out my seminar report - as complete as it till now .

--
Edit :- dated 10.4.2007
Seminar report done. submitted.

--
Edit :- dated 19.4.2007
Seminar presentation slides -- here.

Yay !

Hot on the heels of completing an year on the blog - it has recorded over 1000 hits in less than 6 months :D
Noticed this : Just now. Yay !

Not all those who Wander are lost !

All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost;

The old that is strong does not wither, deep roots are not reached by the frost.

From the ashes a fire shall be woken, a light from the shadows shall spring;

Renenwed shall be blade that was broken, the crownless again shall be king.

: J.R.R. Tolkien

Needless to say - I derive the title of my blog from this poem!
Stumbled on this, today.
Since its a great poem, might as well share it :)

Why I left the LT at 44/3 ...

Over the years, I have come to realise that India cant win when Sachin doesnt play.

Obviously, like any fan of Sachin, I have heard a lot of things about how, no longer can he win matches, how he hasnt played any inning of importance for long. how he is a ghost of what he was and is highly over-rated and tons of other things you had to say to me!

But I knew the instant that Tendulkar was out - this was to be script that i had often seen in the past.
Indian cricket team- other than one lucky Lords' evening - cant win a match [especially while chasing] when Sachin doesnt play atleast a supporting role.
My heart breaks for this man , if this turns out to be his last match in a World Cup!

Thus I knew it the instant, that he was out, India isnt winning this match & the irony of the situation will be that Sachin will be blamed for non-performance and the team's failure.

Hate the 10 other woMen in Blue !

11 mein se 15 bekaar,
fir bhi mera Bharaat mahaan!


The anguish doesnt stop at 1 blog post !

Americans on Cricket :D

“You mean people actually pay to watch this?” exclaimed one American I tried to interest in the game. “It’s about as exciting as measuring global warming.”

“And just as vital to the rest of the planet,” I retorted.
: Shashi Tharoor

In an editorial to NY Times - Shashi Tharoor, whom I long suspected to be as Indian as say, V S Naipaul, actually makes a good stand for cricket !


I really hope India wins today - Tendulkar might have another chance at lifting the Cup
I really hope India loses today - I will spend much less time hereforth till 28th April.
Till then - I head out to LT to watch the screening :)

PAF 2007 - Aashayein

Yesterday night - the PAFs for the year 2007 got underway !

Hostels 3, 8 , 10 & Tansa House came together to present the 1st one - Aashayein (Hindi for 'Hopes') on 18th March , ie : yesterday.

[All IITB lingo & usages explained here]
Background:
Hostel 3 wanted to get some guilt and shame washed off - after a forgettable 'Camouflages' . The current 3rdie batch, has over the past 2 years, shown enough promise in Dram, and was raring to go. Mishra, Golu, SMS, etc. were really pitching in. Chaube, Pondy, Nana were there to help out.
Choreo has always found H3 lacking, but with freshie enthu & H10 participation, there didnt seem a likely shortage of dancers. phew !
H 10 - the UG Girls hostel - has finished 2nd both years I have been here. Clearly something that clearly doesnt go too well down with them, given that no one remembers when was the last time they actually won a PAF. Dependable for Choreo and FA work.
H 8 - Mix of good enthu seniors and talent.

OAT :
Though practice had begun much earlier - I will cut short to the hand over of OAT [Open Air Theatre] the venue.
We had OAT for 72 hrs, before performing and handing it over to next hostel pairings. Institute wide student body elections were held that night hence the there was general ruffling about. Even then, most of the prod was moved into the OAT. There were quite a handful of frames [of bamboo] that were ready, yet the major wood frame for the central backdrop was yet to be made [by an external carpenter].
Saw how the PAF was shaping up for the first time - and - it wasnt a pretty site.

Since, most of the students attended classes on a working Friday, rehearsals and work commenced only in the evening. We had the 1st run-through scheduled at night, meant that all departments had to get their act together.
Prod - fata pada tha. The stadium was only vaguely visible.
Dram - major changes were to be made. There were long scenes that werent rehearsed even once. A chopping was on the anvil. The +ve - no ego clashes and people were ready to work around this problem and get things done as well was required.
Music - Heard it for the 1st time & was damn impressive. All was live - which is incredible. To top it off, there were a couple of original scores, which were really coming off well. :)
Choreo - neat. more later.

The run-through that started at 1 pm extended to well past 330 until - it was discontinued because the subsequent scenes were not practiced, and major reshaping of the earlier pieces was required. :D
We might not end up requiring the last scenes, if the IIT crowd doesnt take a great liking to the initial scenes. :P

Work started at around noon on a hot saturday working. Mostly Prod work - since the entire cricket stadium had to be made. A great number of seniors got cracking. We were going to try an idea to use curtains to hide the entire stage while a major prod change happened during the performance. If the curtains, putched during show - it might have been curtains then and there.

We had another run through that night.
The scenes just stretched on and on. Deletions were called for. Redundancy was to be eliminated. The entire character [of numerologist Bejan Daruwalla] was dropped from the script. (Reminded me of the quack in 'Lage Raho! MunnaBhai' who couldnt predict his future successfully at gunpoint. Like wise - Daruwalla was dropped unceremoniously from the script - almost as bad a Ganguly ;) )
There was a palpable tension among the seniors / OCs since it was a distinct possibility that the PAF might , again, not end. Faces were lined with sweat and creased with tension. An emergency meeting was convened to look into what could be done to revive. No one was really hungry to geez the Maddu food, that came along.
As usual, music & dance junta came , performed satisfactorily and left.

'D'ay
18th dawned late - since anyway everyone was around till 7 am with a hangover from the previous nights morale low.

why r we dancing ...yahan pe to kuch bhi prod nahin dikh raha hai ......paf ho bhi raha hai ya nahin ???
- Choreo Team on 18th Morn

kinda sums up the feeling.
Still the prod team was reliably up early - by mid afternoon - things were distinctly looking up on the prod front.
Non-stop dram / voice over practices lent a semblance of completeness with a fresh & slim script to boot.

Another run-through later, we were finally ready to roll at 930 pm.

The 1st boost of confidence was felt after the dream choreo was pretty well received. Though irritated by the excessive and abstract choreos, the choreo was done beautifully to say the least.
I always, knew that there were good dancers in here, but this was so close that - it was almost surreal. Anshu was too good and as graceful as i have seen any dancer [after Madhuri Dixit ;) ].
Mishra was again amazingly elegant and gave a power-packed performance. Among the juniors, Vrinda, Aishwarya and a few others were mind-blowing. The thing that was most appealing was that the dancers were actually enjoying themselves, while dancing under the spotlight and it showed brilliantly. I tried to tape as much as the dance as possible, but since I had a subsequent scene - tried to get back into my elements. Even later, I was just so floored by their dances. If everyone accepts my Orkut friendship requests, I will become a fan instantly. :)

Soon - the PAF was truly underway and inspite of the occasional heckling at lengthy monologues and cliched jokes we were going to finish this thing no matter what!

The FAgiri was visibly brilliant - Haji Ali was never so beautifully captured. Pop Tates was as close to reality as it gets. Classroom walls had realistic graffiti - it said 'Pandey Rocks'!
Kudos to Jango, Shiksha and many others.

Lights held up brilliantly inspite of lack of co-ordination during earlier run throughs.
Prod shifts were quick and swift. Music was captivating and held the audience for a really long time as the curtains were closed and there wasnt any other action to hold the crowd's action. Live singing added to the beauty. Innovative use of flute as well as Mandolin was great :) Guitar was nice as well.
At one hour mark - my initial apprehension was dispelled. After another short acting stint, I was done for the night. :D
Later, the crowd was brilliant and brilliantly reactive. They actually cowered as rains came down on Eden Garden. That wasnt even practised. Their cheers really brought the punch of the match into the PAF. Sidhu is always welcome.
This part of the match, was again - loaded with choreo - yawn - eventhough the dancing was upto standards.

But as the final wicket fell - we knew we had delivered a complete PAF - winnable or not has to wait for the next 10 days, but certainly complete. Vartika's senti ended in quick time - which is important since the audience really doesnt appreciate too long fundaes, especially at the end of 1.5 hours, [which is extremely long by PAF stds.]

Thank you all !
It might not have been a Dastak - but it was far from Camouflages.
Eventhough my contribution to the PAF was at best minimal, I had no feeling of wanting to leave the OAT at the end of it.

Cheers !

--------------------------
Short guide to IIT Lingo

• Lingo : Language frequently used that is not comprehendable by an outsider
• Dram : Dramatics, simple enuf
• Choreo : Choreography , or Dance
• Prod : The sets and related stuff of the production.
  
• FA : Fine Arts - painting and so on.
• enthu : enthusiam.
  
• putch : flaw in the performance.
• senti : sentimental speech

---
Edit :- dated 21.3.2007

Check out PAF pics on http://www.it.iitb.ac.in/[tilde]vikram/PAF-2007/
Photographer's Request - Dont add a link to the above url - in a place - where crawlers can take over
---
Edit :- dated 28.3.2007

We came 2nd in Overall Trophy & 1st in VoiceOver Trophy
Not too good [I believe we could have won] but then...
---

An year gone by ...

On 13th March 2006, in a moment of extreme frustration, mental unrest, self-hate and many other such emotions, I first decided to put hand to keyboard.

A complete solar revolution has happened since, and I am 1 year old on this blogspace.
I know that, what is written here is not of any literary importance & doesnt mean anything to anyone but me, but it means the world to me.

The blog stemmed out of a long bottled up urge to scream out at the IIT system, at my friends, at the power hierarchies of this college that :: let me be myself and just f*ck off into nothingness. I am not too sure, that the release is complete. I am not too sure whether it mattered, but one thing is sure that - this blog allows me to be myself.
Whether someone reads it or doesnt is immaterial, because this is a place where I am closed to review & criticism. Its an equivalent of biking down Marine Lines at 90Kmph in the dead of the night without a helmet - never thinking twice about any damn thing in the world, be it the signals, the police, the law, the road or its potholes. Its just about feeling the wind through your hair and defiance in your blood. If there are additional rain droplets and/or a girl on the pillion, I couldnt ask for anything else in the world.
Blogging is about a similar personal ecstacy!

As a result, you could say that I am senti about my blog. Sitting comfortably cross-legged on a couch, at home with laptop on my laps and writing a blog at unearthly hours is something I always wanted to do - and coincidentally I am doing this for the first time on this occasion.

With an year gone by, I wonder what all has changed. Nothing at the face of it. I am still as angry, much more confused, as much a lazy-bum & most of my posts are still post-midnight.
But the last year has been a year of great learning and experiences.

I turned 20. I decided that I would first say things about growing up, when the pangs of turning 20 first hit me on Sudeep's Bday. Then again, I was practically shaking when the bike-ride from Eesha's midnight cake-party to IIT allowed me time to think of how much turning 20 means and how little it seems. I ended up scaring her as much.
I have a draft of all that I wanted to say - on my 20th Bday & never could till then. I never got around to publishing that as well.
Each time, i realised that writing about growing up - isnt a night's work.

The year has been marked by endless nightouts discussing friendship, relationships, marriage, parenting, life, career - rather the challenges of each one of them.

It was an year of taking up challenges and failing in them. The spectacular banding of Speakers' Club sophies and as spectacular failure of the idea will haunt me for quite some time. That thing hurt me very deep, because I had put in a real fight to pull that idea off. Just that there werent enough freebies/incentives to be handed out at each point of time. Yet it was an year, when I realised that given a responsibility I can execute it well & that I can be entrusted with things.

Last year, I discovered that the joys of having a hang-out group far outweigh the transience of hopping from one group to another and exchanging pleasantries with them. I really need to write about all my friends one-of-these days and establish the role they play in maintaining my sanity.

Bike was such a crucial cog in the year gone by, that I dedicated a seperate blog to my passion. [Though I cant say, I do justice to it]. Airport, SakiNaka, Juhu Beach, Parel & Pune.

This was the year of THE 5th SEM, of persistent segmentation faults, core-dumps, of reliving the joy of being in CSE, of a week in Bangalore, of MSR, Google, of OSL, of Coffee & Biscuits, of Maddu and Jalebis.

It was of persistence through asking times, cribbing in every blog post.
It was of blogging, when the mind runs out of ideas & of blogging, when the mind is full of them, of blogging, when the mind seeks shelter & blogging, when the mind reports adventure.

It was an year of the Blog My Blog !

I Hate it when ...

Weekends go by without any activity! Sigh ..

Weekends represent a break, rather an escape from the routine of IITB tyranny :P, a chance to meet new people, relax unwind and not-look-forward-to the next week!

And all that I am doing on a Holi weekend is - face a monitor at 330 in the afternoon, with no plans for the next hour, this evening, this night or tomorrow !
& just when the weekend draws to a close, suddenly there are a heap of things to do.

Things that I could have done this weekend :
1. Go on a car-ride to some beach
2. Go to Pune for general timewasting :)
3. Spend a weekend at home and catch up with School friends.
4. Actually, get some quality seminar work done!

Alas ! none of that is happening !

If Men Could Menstruate ...

Found this pretty hilarious :D

Living in India made me understand that a white minority of the world has spent centuries conning us into thinking a white skin makes people superior, even though the only thing it really does is make them more subject to ultraviolet rays and wrinkles.

Reading Freud made me just as skeptical about penis envy. The power of giving birth makes "womb envy" more logical, and an organ as external and unprotected as the penis makes men very vulnerable indeed.

But listening recently to a woman describe the unexpected arrival of her menstrual period (a red stain had spread on her dress as she argued heatedly on the public stage) still made me cringe with embarrassment. That is, until she explained that, when finally informed in whispers of the obvious event, she said to the all-male audience, "and you should be proud to have a menstruating woman on your stage. It's probably the first real thing that's happened to this group in years."

Laughter. Relief. She had turned a negative into a positive. Somehow her story merged with India and Freud to make me finally understand the power of positive thinking. Whatever a "superior" group has will be used to justify its superiority, and whatever and "inferior" group has will be used to justify its plight. Black me were given poorly paid jobs because they were said to be "stronger" than white men, while all women were relegated to poorly paid jobs because they were said to be "weaker." As the little boy said when asked if he wanted to be a lawyer like his mother, "Oh no, that's women's work." Logic has nothing to do with oppression.

So what would happen if suddenly, magically, men could menstruate and women could not?

Clearly, menstruation would become an enviable, worthy, masculine event:

Men would brag about how long and how much.

Young boys would talk about it as the envied beginning of manhood. Gifts, religious ceremonies, family dinners, and stag parties would mark the day.

To prevent monthly work loss among the powerful, Congress would fund a National Institute of Dysmenorrhea. Doctors would research little about heart attacks, from which men would be hormonally protected, but everything about cramps.

Sanitary supplies would be federally funded and free. Of course, some men would still pay for the prestige of such commercial brands as Paul Newman Tampons, Muhammad Ali's Rope-a-Dope Pads, John Wayne Maxi Pads, and Joe Namath Jock Shields- "For Those Light Bachelor Days."

Statistical surveys would show that men did better in sports and won more Olympic medals during their periods.

Generals, right-wing politicians, and religious fundamentalists would cite menstruation ("men-struation") as proof that only men could serve God and country in combat ("You have to give blood to take blood"), occupy high political office ("Can women be properly fierce without a monthly cycle governed by the planet Mars?"), be priests, ministers, God Himself ("He gave this blood for our sins"), or rabbis ("Without a monthly purge of impurities, women are unclean").

Male liberals and radicals, however, would insist that women are equal, just different; and that any woman could join their ranks if only she were willing to recognize the primacy of menstrual rights ("Everything else is a single issue") or self-inflict a major wound every month ("You must give blood for the revolution").

Street guys would invent slang ("He's a three-pad man") and "give fives" on the corner with some exchenge like, "Man you lookin' good!"

"Yeah, man, I'm on the rag!"

TV shows would treat the subject openly. (Happy Days: Richie and Potsie try to convince Fonzie that he is still "The Fonz," though he has missed two periods in a row. Hill Street Blues: The whole precinct hits the same cycle.) So would newspapers. (Summer Shark Scare Threatens Menstruating Men. Judge Cites Monthlies In Pardoning Rapist.) And so would movies. (Newman and Redford in Blood Brothers!)

Men would convince women that sex was more pleasurable at "that time of the month." Lesbians would be said to fear blood and therefore life itself, though all they needed was a good menstruating man.

Medical schools would limit women's entry ("they might faint at the sight of blood").

Of course, intellectuals would offer the most moral and logical arguements. Without the biological gift for measuring the cycles of the moon and planets, how could a woman master any discipline that demanded a sense of time, space, mathematics-- or the ability to measure anything at all? In philosophy and religion, how could women compensate for being disconnected from the rhythm of the universe? Or for their lack of symbolic death and resurrection every month?

Menopause would be celebrated as a positive event, the symbol that men had accumulated enough years of cyclical wisdom to need no more.

Liberal males in every field would try to be kind. The fact that "these people" have no gift for measuring life, the liberals would explain, should be punishment enough.

And how would women be trained to react? One can imagine right-wing women agreeing to all these arguements with a staunch and smiling masochism. ("The ERA would force housewives to wound themselves every month": Phyllis Schlafly)

In short, we would discover, as we should already, that logic is in the eye of the logician. (For instance, here's an idea for theorists and logicians: if women are supposed to be less rational and more emotional at the beginning of our menstrual cycle when the female hormone is at its lowest level, then why isn't it logical to say that, in those few days, women behave the most like the way men behave all month long? I leave further improvisation up to you.)

The truth is that, if men could menstruate, the power justifications would go on and on.

If we let them.

(c) Gloria Steinem, Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions. NY: NAL, 1986.

Can be found at: http://www.haverford.edu/psych/ddavis/p109g/steinem.menstruate.html

>:) 2

How to recognise a candidate --
A omnipresent Smile - how much so you are bugging the hell out of him
A everringing mobile
A bagpack having a diary full of 'points' & Phone nos.
An unnerving ability to appear stunned and excited at every idea the person in front comes up with, no matter how redundant and impractical it is !


The Election Committee has announced, this time in an email sent to everyone, & officially heralded in the Election Season.
Here you will find what an IITB election notification looks like.
This will be the only piece of election related material that will be as plain and uncomplicated :P

A major change from last time, has been that the notice brought all talk in the open.
In a run-up before the nominations are filed in over the weekend, candidates are being propped up, pulled down and aspirations are being played with.


Here are few of the characteristics of IITB elections:
1. The entire student population is eligible to vote.
2. The entire student populations isnt interested in voting.
3. The entire student population is made to vote.
4. Not every student knows whom to vote.
5. Every student knows that his vote will count.
6. Every student is intelligent [IIT .. u know]
7. Every student is intent on making his vote count, for as much as it can... for HIMself !
8. Every student is told by someone, whom to vote for!

All these things make them a very interesting affair.

Since the General Secretaries (GS) form the top hierarchy of the student body, they are earnestly contested elections. 4 GS mean 4 times the fun :D

On a more serious note, lets have a look at what ails the system:-

In spite of the wide spectrum of the campus populace, the posts are contested by only those belonging to a narrow slice of it. As a result, the elections and subsequent functioning of the gymkhana is largely immaterial to the rest.

Whats this slice like ?
Out of the 6000 odd campus residents, only 3rd / 4th yr. UG students are known to contest. They constitute about 1000 odd. Even among these, less than 20% have ambitions that have anything to do with this annual parade.
These ambitions are varied in nature -
They may spread from actually contesting and winning an election to propping up a familiar face as one to getting ulterior motives fulfilled.
Since the college spectrum has enough posts to satiate everyone [Read this - extremely hilarious and almost true article] only the posts at the top are keenly contested, while the rest are shared with much co-operation.

As a result, its a matter of these 150-200 people [which works out to abt. 12 per hostel or quantified still better - 2 per wing] that a candidate has to 'work' out things with.

That is the phase the elections are in right now!
Its called - Groundwork, Manifesto, suggestions and so on - but boils down to laying the groundwork of present & future networking.

Its to early for deal-making [Have just heard that it happens, donno whether it is true :P] but its early nonetheless ;)
Till then..

V Day Special

Unless there is a twist of fate;
Yet another year I'll end up without a date,
While I wish you a Happy Valentine's Day;
I think I will just turn Gay !

Made this up - in an instant of inspired self-loathing on the eve of another V Day.

[The above rhyme is made with a imaginary individual in mind. No direct reference to the author is intended .. ]

---
Edit :- dated 16.2.2007

Sonal's reply to the above :-|

'Tis sad, I understand mate;
No twist of fate;
got you a date,

But, never you mind;
Someone of your kind;
Is just difficult to find,

Someday,
It would all be very fine;
For today, heres a wish of mine;
O dear - Happy Valentine !

>:)

The institute Poltu. Season has begun. :D
While it actually began some time ago, it has heated up things to such extent that you cant walk past the canteen without people casting 'will-he' looks in you direction & instinctively you end up doing so more than once-in-a-while.

Hope to keep you more updated :P, though I have no idea, what fraction of the things I know can be publicly shared. [While I dont claim to know a significant amount, sharing any fraction of the 0.00001% things I do know, can be risky proposition].

More later ...
The handshaking has just begun, the smiles have just widened & the phone has just started to ring.

The movie - 'Dor' ;

& little More !

While the rhyme up there is on the lighter side, the rest of the post will not necessarily be :)

I am just done watching the movie - 'Dor'.
While I must agree that I had heard positively about the movie, I had no idea what the movie was about.
The movie starts and doesnt take too long to introduce the main cast :-
Gul Panag - I never knew much about her, other than the fact that she landed some pageant crown, some years back. With minimal beauty accessories in the movie, she is still very beautiful. She plays Zeenat, a self willed teacher from Himachal.
Ayesha Takia - I always knew she was ravishing, but she manages to act here & not appear a misfit in a rural setting as a Meera.

Zeenat maries Amir, just as he leaves for Saudi, while in parallel Meera takes a tearful farewell of her husband, as he leaves as well. Meera finding herself, being shoved into the background & behind the veil, as the doting husband leaves, is a perfect foil to Zeenat.

Other characters, like the commanding in-laws of Meera, the stern grand-ma, the effervescent girl and few others are seen around.

Their lives collide when, Amir is indicted for murdering roommate Shankar [Meera's Husband], while in Saudi & the put on the death row. Only a pardon, by Meera can save Amir [according to Saudi laws].
In search of this pardon, Zeenat leaves on a journey to Rajasthan, that is portrayed very beautifully. The interaction between the two leading ladies in the backdrop of a very conservative Rajput family, forms the major of the later part of the movie.

At this point, I will stop from making a movie review and stress slightly on the few things that twanged my heart strings - while watching the movie.
That the happy starting and romancing, between the two couples would end was obvious, the depiction of Meera's stress disturbed me a lot. Call me a sissy or whatever, the scenes following the death rites were brutal to say the least.
Her resignation to her fate and compliance with the traditional norms of the family structure bring about an inherent imbalance in the family structure. Very subtly, the issues of a widow being forced and expected to remain sad - as a mark of loyalty - to the memory of her late husband are brought up.

While clearly, the urban Indian society has come far from this speed breaker, & that contemporary girls cant be granted even a percent of the innocence of Meera, I over the years have come to accept atleast to myself, that certain inequalities still persist. While I have no idea, how my parents would have treated a girl child, I do see many parents [of guy-friends + gal-friends] still making a marked distinction between the two.
I am sure, never was the utmost importance of the academic career of any guy friends, ever questioned. I am pretty positive that wasn't the case, with most of the girls, even those - who mingle and wander amongst us.
Similarly, never was I expected to devote valuable [& justified] academic time to do housework, something that I find out doesn't translate on to girls in equal measure, even now.
I was shocked a few days ago, when I came to hear of, that a professor teaching in IITB still held the view that - 'Beti engineering kar ke kya karegi?' !

Every time, any girl confides in me something about her family - I am like 'Aise bhi hota hai kya?' . Suddenly, I feel so very advantaged that am a guy. Most of the things that have been so very obvious to me over these years, apparently are not equally obvious to some parents, wrt both genders.

The icing on this cake turns out to be - that my classmates are being confronted by their parents about getting married, at regular intervals. YA RITE !!
Just that, there comes a time, when one can no longer laugh it off !

[Disclaimer: This neither explains nor justifies all that actions that contemporary girls are known to indulge in, which are still very deplorable. The above post talks only about the inequality in a family structure. I have not come across, nor do I expect to do so, any such example in college setup.]