Tests and Results

The initial mould:
Our education system plays a very important role in how we perceive the world (and what it does to us). Unfortunately, at a very early stage, we are introduced to the concept of 'test'. This notoriously has two out comes - 'pass' and 'fail'. We are told a 'pass' result makes our teachers, parents and other relatives very happy. While a 'fail' result will bring humiliation, taunts. As a side effect, along with a 'fail' result we learn to lie to avoid social ill effects of being identified with the 'fail' result. This learning to lie is the first step towards systematic erosion of values. But that's another discussion.

As we grow, more differentiation was made in the the 'pass' result to bring about - third, second, first and distinction classes. Agreed - that the system is intended to identify (and there by train differently) the bright students. But the society continues to use this to judge the person in fields other than education too.

Real Life Tests:
After being through all these, we get into this world with the same notion of 'tests' and their 'results'. Real world tests do not have an objective result. They are merely subjective statements of behavior. I will give you an example (risking trivializing the concept): When we touch acidic solution with litmus paper, it turns red. We should not classify the result as 'pass' or 'fail'. The 'pass' or 'fail' depends on what you were looking for. Further, if the result was contrary to our liking, then who failed? Is it the acidic solution or us? That solution, no matter how many times, under how many different conditions we try, will still turn the litmus paper red. It is we who will finally change our 'expected behavior'.

Chemistry lab gives a very new way of looking at the tests. We subject a salt into so many tests. At each stage, we get closer and closer to the truth - knowing the salt better and better. We do not discard the salt itself at any stage. At the end of the whole exercise, we would have known the truth and hence we declare 'us' as pass - not the salt (even though it was the salt that went through the tests).

Life is an endless series of tests?
Contrary to popular belief, the real world is not full of tests. It is wrong to see it that way. Its another mistake to expect a pass/fail kind of result in every imaginary test. That only makes it harder when every moment of life is spent in preparation for the next test or brooding over the result of the previous one. I have known people who take every day commute as a test - happy when they reach office in 30 minutes, sad when it takes 40 minutes. There are others who necessarily believe that year-end appraisal is a true picture of one's performance. The rating (and the subsequent pay revision) gives them a sense of 'pass' or 'fail'. Most of us feel job interviews (both interviewers and interviewees) definitely have a 'pass' or a 'fail' result. An objective look at both cases makes the matter more clear. 1. One's commute time is 90% dependent on other people in traffic and only 10% on his own aggressiveness (not even skill). 2. Rating (and subsequent pay revision) only depends on how hard it is for the firm to live without you. Ask any HR (when they are drunk) and you will know. Either way there is little relation between one's ability and the perceived result. 3. Job interviews is just a compatibility test - open position challenges v/s your strengths, company culture v/s your nature, company vision v/s your ambition and lastly money. None of these have a pass or fail... then why attribute its success or failure to yourself?

If imagining yourself to be in endless series of tests was one end of the spectrum there are other kinds of people as well. At some stage, man's ego will grow to such heights that he starts pushing those around him into useless mind games and keeps score. I will let you imagine the repercussions of such acts.

Bottom Line:
Real life tests are very subjective. They do not have results. They are only meant to lead you closer to truth. Avoid labeling subjects of tests as 'fail' when the truth is inconvenient or as 'pass' if it matches your preconceived expectations. I feel incomplete if I do not quote from the second chapter of the Bhagavadgeeta - "Karmanye vadhiraste..."

Mohandas Gandhi [1869 - eternity]

Any thing that is absolute and complete, never loses its relevance. Gandhi, in reality did not tell anything new. He only reiterated what was proposed by all proponents of absolute peace - Buddha, Yesu. Yes, I do not hesitate a minute to take Gandhi's name in the same breath as the other two. Every once in a while in history, there comes across a person who shows that 'means' are as much important the 'end'. Gandhi was one such person. Every year, around this time I come across people who criticize Gandhi for playing into the hands of the British, of delaying Indian Independence, of begging for Independence rather than snatching it from British, of causing the partition of the country and so on.

Here is how I see the issue. As a person trying to be as Gandhian as possible, I will not force you to accept it. You should reach your own conclusions.

+/ We always compare Gandhi's way of getting independence to something hypothetical. The revolutionary way of Bhagat Singh, Azad, Netaji et al, is equally commendable on the motive front. However, we have not seen any of them reach their conclusion. We can only extrapolate. India was split into pieces of princely states. Each one of them wanted the other to suffer rather than progress for his own state. In this situation, the common man had no way to source a successful revolution. The rich and powerful were never supported any sort of struggle (revolutionary or Gandhian) any way. They were happy maintaining status-quo (Rich grow richer, poor remain poor). That is partly responsible for the failure of Netaji (in spite of he making a deal with Japan and (regrettably) the fascist Germany) and other revolutionaries. In such an environment, 'morality' was the only wealth we had. And Non-Violence is the only way we could preserve it.

+/ A bloody revolution or total Ahimsa: They are 2 different ways of thinking... While the revolutionary way was tried before in other countries and in other times - the non-violent way was being used for the first time in modern history. Neither one of them helped the other. We should not pit one against the other. But if you have to, I can cite examples when revolutionaries played spoil sport - No-cooperation movement would not have to be with drawn if not for Chauri Chaura. Bhagat's case was not compromised by Gandhi. It was compromised by a so called 'revolutionary' - Jai Gopal who squealed after being tortured (?).

+/ Bhagat Singh's execution could not have been stopped by Gandhi. The Gandhi-Irwin pact achieved what it was intended to. Release all political prisoners, no tax on salt and other such immediate issues effecting entire India. It resulted in the release of thousands of political prisoners. The term 'political prisoner's was unequivocally uncompromisingly defined in international treaties. More over, Bhagat (and others) was incriminated for Saunder's murder. If it were only bombing the parliament, then they could have been included as 'political prisoner's. Moreover, knowing the nature of Bhagat, I doubt he would have liked if Gandhi (or anybody else) made a deal with the British for his life. That would greatly compromise Gandhi's high moral ground and also Bhagat's position as the torch bearer of revolutionary arrogance (in a good way). It is a 'what if' scenario in which people do not think the repercussions of 'what if not'.

+/ The Partition stigma: There are two kinds of attacks done often done on Gandhi:
1. Why partition? First of all, the effectiveness of hypothetical dream of undivided India is yet to be proven. The erstwhile USSR and other eastern European (erstwhile) countries show us that it is not a good idea for people with vastly different ideologies to live as one nation. Chechnya, Serbia, the LTTE in Srilanka, East Timor - all have taught us that once the seed of separatism is sown, its not easy to contain the daemon. Have you even considered what if the idea did backfire? A civil war is not what a newly born country with limited resources can afford. Don't believe me, ask any body in Afghanistan or Iraq. The other alternative to partition would have been the use of force - which would go against all that we stood for over a century. Partition unfortunately seemed to be THE only viable solution.

Side note:
At the same time, separatism is not an answer to all problems and partition is not the solution in every case. In today's context, the north-eastern part of our country is brewing with separatist movements. The reason this time is not religion. Its purely development. It is not the Central Government to blame. There have been 16 parliaments since independence and that region has had fair representation. They have to accept part of the blame for consistently sending corrupt representatives. On the other hand, force is not the option. We are now a sizable economic power. We can and should take splurge some money on the North East and make them feel that we care. Economic sustenance will shield them against brainwash and hence

2.Why did he not stop the killing of hindhus in Sindh? The counter question is 'why is it his responsibility?' Partition happened. Inevitable and till day, assumed to be irreversible. From that point of time, Gandhi lost his control over Pakistan. What happened there was to be treated as internal matters of a neighboring country and rightly so. It was a noble and holy decision to let people in India decide their own fate. Scores of Hindus (unfortunately brain washed by fanatics) believe that was a horrible decision and attribute all the source of violence in India to the Muslims left behind. Any Hindu worth his salt should question that decision because it was consistent with Hindu belief of non-violence, tolerance and 'love thy neighbor' philosophy. Gandhi advocated restraint and peace from both sides. As they say "An Idea is not responsible for actions of its believers". How can you blame Gandhi for people *NOT* following what he said? Or following his preachings conditionally? Once the killings happened in Punjab, you lose the moral right to question what happened in Sindh or Bengal. Revenge is an ugly human emotion... and knows not to be in proportion to what caused it.

Those Hindus who cry foul at letting Muslims stay here are the ones who never saw their livers change after partition. Those Hindus who came from Pakistan (thousands of Delhites) do not want anyone else (even muslims) go through the pains again. Its one thing to discuss partition at a coffee place after 60 years, and totally different to be part of it.

+/ You can always take individual statements made by Gandhi and misquote him. We have not lived in that era. Our knowledge about historical events, circumstances, things at stake while those 'statement's are made are limited. This weakness is often mis-used by fascists, fanatics to shed ugly light on Gandhi. I urge people to dig deeper to see where the opinion comes from and do their own research using neutral citations. No great man in history has ever escaped criticism (Yesu and Buddha inclusive). Why should I expect Gandhi to be any different? But criticism must be self researched, neutral and never argumentative. Sampling always dilutes the essence of the absolute. See Gandhi as a whole and not individual quotes - especially when you do not know the complete story.

+/ Finally a word about Ahimsa and Satyagraha are not signs of weakness. They are pillars of strength by themselves. Just imagine, a lanky Indian gentleman in his late seventies clad in 2 piece dhoti - taking on the greatest International power of the time, the British Empire. He did not hide behind a fort of body guards, neither did he ever hurl insults at his opponents. He did not raise his voice to be heard and yet reached out to an entire nation. The strength comes from the moral high ground that Gandhi achieved in the past 50 years of clean polity. That is the strength of purity. People tried to rob this asset from him by trying malign him - while he was alive and after that too. Gandhi did not concede an inch. Those who can not achieve that level of purity can only envy it. Satyagraha is simple. It is a firm belief that truth shall prevail and I shall not relent until it does. The strength of being on the side of truth that can only be experienced and not described in words. Also, the strength of Satyagraha is again its absoluteness.

Here's something I read about people finding faults

Gandhi preached Love and purity of thought. This enough to over come any adversary. When you go away from these principles (when you embrace hate, dishonesty and treachery), you give ammunition to your opponents. They may come in handy as short term ego satisfying solutions. But in the long run, Ahimsa, truth and love has never failed.

I shall up date more points when I get hate comments on this blog. I expect the objections to be on the following lines:

1. Misquoting Gandhi to show that he was pro Muslim.
2. Hypothetical alternative solutions to the grave problems of that time.
3. Gandhi should not have tried to influence politics in the country post independence.

If you have anything new, please let me know and give me time to respond. I have intentionally left out his contributions/stand to social and economical reform since they are not disputed even by the staunchest anti-Gandhi propagandists.

The Perpetual Beta

This is the best description of the city of 'Bangalore'. We entered this mode (earlier we were in "why can't it be like this forever?" mode) approximately 7-8 years ago when construction of the first fly-overs of the city were taken up. Since then, you can not go from one point to another point in the city without having to take a 'detour' because of something being 'under-construction'. Then there is the never ending digging... along the road, across the road, some times criss-crossing too. Once the digging is done, we dig again.

Our city is famous for its 'one-way's. The 'one-way'ness is not new to civilizations elsewhere. Its a definite way to stream line traffic. But, our innovation is a paradigm shift by making them dynamic. Mark some streets as one-way only in peak hours. What constitutes as peak hour depends on the location - there is a office peak hour, school peak hour, cinema peak hour, night club peak hour... and so on. Then the next level of innovation is when let it be a 2-way street for only certain class of vehicles. How many time have we seen such boards - "Right Turn only for BMTC buses", "Cars and 2-Wheelers only", "No Entry for Auto-rickshaws"... Has any body stopped and wondered "Why?". We do not stop at that, 6 months into the one-way scheme, you realize that the road should be running the other way... and so reverse the one-way. Perhaps, we are the only city in the world to have a criss-cross junction on top of fly-over. To top that, we manage it without traffic lights. All in all, it must be said that driving in Bangalore expects (if not ensures) an above normal intelligence.

We call the speed breakers are 'humps'. These can be come in various sizes and shapes. Some of them are intentional, while most of them are badly covered up digging jobs [refer above to know about our favorite passion - digging]. The rule of thumb is that, if the road is devoid and pot holes for about 100 meters, then cars can reach dangerous killer break-neck speeds of 40 Kmph. Hence, we need humps (I challenge you to read the previous sentence without laughing). Oh, humps are a status symbol too. Every politician wants one outside his house - bigger the better. The latest innovation is when humps double up as pedestrian crossing. If the hump does not slow you down, may be knocking a few pedestrians will. There is a process we follow to ensure road safety. First we make the road. And then, we measure the danger of speeding (~50Kmph). If a person is brought to ER during a week's traffic, then there is enough danger to warrant a speed breaker. We immediately deploy one. The next day, 3 more will be admitted since there was absolutely no warning about it. Then a week later, we paint it in white stripes. From then, our road becomes totally safe for travel (~30Kmph). Lovely, aint it?

The latest buzz word is 'encroachment'. This is the seen by the establishment as root cause of all problems - traffic, sewage, crime, corruption, bureaucratic inefficiencies and what not. In reality, 'encroachment' is a process where the establishment lets a person have its share of bread. When the person makes a sandwich out of it, the all powerful establishment snatches it away. Its fighting immorality with immorality, hoping that two wrongs make it right... I could go on and on... Bottom line - you are never safe when you make the deal with the devil, for it is in its nature to double cross. In another totally unrelated development, the city has come forward to 'legalize' all 'illegal constructions' at a 'nominal' fee. All the words in quotes scare me. A slight extrapolation on any of those fronts - the results are horrendous.

Next set of complexity of living in Bangalore is that places and roads go by more than one name. Most Bangaloreans would not not be able to tell you where is Gen Thimmiah Road, Field Marshall Cariappa Road, Devaraj Urs Road. But they will be more than happy to tell you how to reach Richmond Road, Residency Road or Race Course Road which are the widely known names of the same roads. There is a building by name "Multi-Storey Building". And at least 5 roads that go by the name "Double Road", 2 junctions that are called "Bhashyam Circle". We have a 80ft and a 100ft road (yes, really they are the names). We have Kasturba (wife of Gandhi) Road that joins Mahatma Gandhi Road and Vittal Mallya (liquor baron) Road. Needless to point out that Mahatma Gandhi Road is has the most number of liquor joints. At the end of the day, amidst all confusions, our friendly neighborhood auto drivers will take you to your destinations any where in the city. No hazzles.

All this makes me feel as if we are guinea pigs. The establishment trying new the beta features to see if it works. They want us to be in a perpetual dream of an Utopian city. Well, however screwed up the present it, I am happy that the dream is still on.

The ABC of Decision Making

I am not talking about the mundane "Should I fill gas today?" kind of decisions. I am talking about the big ones - "Nine months of labor or adoption?" kind of ones. There are scores of self help books (isn't it an oxymoron - if the book helps, then how is it self help?) written to help you make the right decision. Believe me - they are all useless. But they all exist because the problem with decision making is very real. I am reminded of this little sanskrit shloka (translation attached).
Everyone has to have his own formula to arrive at a comfortable decision. There is no 'one size fits all' formula... Here is what I think works for most of us. Shoot back with rebuttals and alternative paths.

A: Gather inputs/opinions from *all* directions.
Opinions come dime a dozen. Everyone has one. It is the one thing people are ready to give away for free. But who knows, one of them could open your mind into a whole new dimension of thinking. So listen carefully and deeply to everyone. To quote Jason Bourne - "Forget Nothing".

When I say 'all directions', *all* include family, friends, forums, strangers, your alter ego, supernatural powers and so on. For example: Taxi drivers can give excellent feed back on the handling of different makes of cars in city traffic. Your alter ego could stop you from doing anything immoral (according to standards set by your own sub-conscious). Listen to it sometimes.

The *all* excludes anybody who can use the situation against you ;-) duh. Never ask a policeman if it is a good idea to bury the murder weapon beneath the apple tree.

At the end of this phase, you will be more confused than when you began. That is good. It only means that you have found more options than you initially thought was possible. True stroke of genius always takes shape amongst chaos. So don't be afraid.

B: Scrutinize the above collected opinions/options/suggestions/advice
The data collection phase is now over. Its time to churn it to make sense. Now scrutinize every opinion you got. The key questions you have to ask are:

How credible is the source?
Unless you have extra-ordinary reasons to prove otherwise, your alter-ego and all supernatural powers fail this test. Promptly discard their suggestions. Its noise.
Secondly, if a person shies away from accountability and keeps saying 'ultimately its up to you', then you should see though him. On the other hand, if somebody gives you insight into their way of seeing the problem, and hence their way of arriving at the solution, he is more credible. People who can take criticism are generally more credible than those who can not. Stay away from believing a person if he makes blanket statements. We know that world is not in Black and White. Any solution based on such assumption, (in spite of being ideal) is bound to be impractical. Some comments need to be taken with a grain of salt. Some with pinch, and some with bag loads of them.

Relevance of the advice: Your father may give the best relationship advice. He is very credible and can be trusted to be your best well-wisher. Perhaps, not the best person to ask which college to join or which course to take. In all fairness, it is wrong to ask people for comments on subjects way out of time and interest.

Does the source have vested interest? This is a very key question we often fail to ask ourselves. You should never listen to a insurance agent who gives investment advice. He stands to gain or lose (a lot) when you decide one way or the other. Never ask for marital advice from your father in law ;-). You do not ask a salesman whether to go for 21" TV or a 42" one. It is usually the second layer of friends who can give the most objective suggestions. They are the ones who are emotionally involved, general well-wishers, frank enough to say "I don't know".

Weigh each opinion. Those suggestions that come from 'been there, done that' kind of people should carry more weight than hypothetical (guys who discuss global warming) answers. Obviously, your opinion carries the maximum weight - closely followed by other people whose lives are touched by your decision. Surprisingly, next in my list are that of total strangers. 1. They have no reason to hurt you. 2. Opinions given in a open forum are subject to extensive peer review and hence carry the credibility tag. 3. very helpful in getting a radically different approaches.

Hopefully at the end of these steps, you will be left with a handful of options that can be dealt in a definite order of priority. If they are still too many, you may have to dig deep into each one of them questioning/re-examining every statement.

C: What if analysis
Do a thorough 'what if' analysis on each of your options. Actually if you bother to think about 20 years ahead, it does not matter one bit if you chose this way or that. However, for the peace of mind during those 20 years its better to have some semblance of analysis to backup your decisions. The distance you have to account for in this phase depends on the gravity of the problem. A question like "To run the Mumbai marathon or not?" needs only 3 months of future to consider. A question like "Mainframe job in US or Research at IISc?" could have a 5 year horizon. If you think beyond that, you analysis runs the risk of invalidated by a geo-political event - a war or a deep recession or a unholy treaty ;-)

After all these, you decision *has* to pass through the final test of morality. The standards of morality has never been absolute. It varies from times to time, generation to generation, place to place and even person to person. Nevertheless, it is always better to live with regret of staying moral than the guilt of immorality.

Act. This is as important as coming to a decision. Once you have committed yourself to decision, you must see it through. If in doubt, then do a rerun of ABC without widening the scope. Remember, Not acting is a decision in itself. Hence there is no meaning in coming to a real decision and not acting.

The three 'R's: In sanskrit they say "kAlAya tasmai namaha" (salutations to the all powerful time). Only time can completely determine the fallouts of your decision. Year later, you will usually recall your decision in one of the following ways
Rejoice: You still think it was the best decision and your life is much more happier since then. This is the ideal place to be... Hopefully ABC should lead us there.
Regret: You are happy with the present scenario. But, feel you made a rash decision. Another option could have landed you in a better situation. This is the place where half the humanity currently exists. Everybody feels, they could have done better 'if only...'. However, the luxury of this hindsight is not there at the decision point. People must understand that it is OK to err, as long as they take the best decision possible with the information available at that instant. That is when they will move from Regret to Rejoice.
Repent: The decision has back-fired. Clearly one of A, B or C was overlooked. But that's not the end of the world. There is always another 'R' - Retry. Countries

We are sooo small...

(click to enlarge)

Every now and then man needs to remind himself of his real place in the grand scheme of nature.

On a lighter note, can you spot the cyclist passing under the tree? This tree is really huge!!!

When was the last time you saw a movie and became silent....

There are some movies that leave you spell bound. Very few. "Grave of the Fireflies" is definitely one among them. As one of the reviews on imdb said "It is the best movie you will never see again". The effect the movie has on the viewer is that strong.

It is the story of a brother (Seita) and a sister (Setsuko). Father is serving in Japanese Navy. They just lost their mother in an air-raid. No news about the whereabouts of the father yet. There are no surprises in the movie at all... Its just one boy's struggle to keep his sister and himself alive through the war.

I liked the movie at multiple levels:
It is a movie centered around the human cost of any war. Countries may win the war... But people always lose. For every Seita and Setsuko in Japan, there will be an Ann Frank in Europe. No matter who wins the war, people on both sides lose. This is unambiguous message from this movie.

In Setsuko, I saw a sister that I never had. She is such a lovable character. I would have done all (perhaps exactly all) that Seita did to keep her safe. Whether you have a sister or not, the love between Seita and Setsuko will touch any body.

Setsuko is oblivious to the war surrounding her, changing the course of her life... She shows how much love a child can offer when she inquires about Seita's well being after being beaten up. In fact, at that moment she needed the doctor more than Seita. She is an outstanding example of the collateral damage of the war. No matter how pure at heart you are, the hatred purported by warmongers can burn you down.

The animation - You may wonder why did they not do the movie with real people. The answer can be got in parts when you look at the expressions of Setsuko. Children can not act. You just have to create an environment where they would say the dialogs naturally... And it would bring tears to anyone to create an environment to get Setsuko's reactions.

Its a period movie. War movie. Set in Japan (Axes forces). Still it does not have any gruesome details of the war. The director is fully focused on the message of the movie and has not dramatized any where.

Must watch. At least once.

PS: There is one more war movie by the name "No man's Land". It also depicts that nobody "wins" against a war. But that was a movie about people who were involved in the war with (brainwashed) hatred towards the others.

Lessons with a twist in Sanskrit

When people talk about Sanskrit, they usually attach a sense of grave seriousness to it. True, composition in Sanskrit is no child's play... you have take care all the meters, alankaras and what not!! Amidst all that poets have found way to get the lesson through with clever remarks to let it stay in your mind for long. Just look at the following verse from the beginning of Neeti Shataka from Bhartruhari.

As the story goes, Bhartruhari was a very wise king. One day a yogi came to his court and presented him with a fruit. He said whoever eats this, will become immortal. Perhaps, the real goal of the yogi was to enlighten the king about the realities of this mortal life. Bhartruhari, being a noble person thought - there is no use of me living for ever, if my wife is not going to be with me. So let her have the fruit. He gave it to the queen. The queen was secretly in love with some one else. She also thought on the same lines of the King and gave the fruit to her lover. He, on the other hand gave it to some other lady... finally it came back to Bhartruhari himself. That is when he seems to have composed this. He renounced his kingdom and became a yogi himself.

Bhartruhari could have explained the futility of the eternal cycles of desires and disappointments in plain words. However, when he gives such a twist, the lesson lasts longer in the minds of the reader.

=========
Update: references to humor removed... on second thoughts there is less humor and more grief in this.

amma (ಅಮ್ಮ)

Mother. In Kannada we call her 'Amma'. There are tons and tons of literature on this topic on the INTERNET spreading across all genres (fiction, faction, fantasy, even science fiction), all eras, all languages, all religions, all civilizations... all what-not. All of them concur on one thing - there is no form of pure love other than that of a mother towards her child.

Usually I don't state the obvious. But in this regard, I shall make an exception. Here's my story.

I was about ten years old. Fifth standard. I used to take final exams really seriously those days. Coming second would cause unbearable grief. (At least I assumed it was unbearable at that time). My amma knew about this (in some ways she was the cause for such a belief). As luck would have it, days before the final exams, the viral bug caught me. I was running serious fever and a leaky nose. Some how, disease gets you into a heightened awareness of your conscience. I still don't know what came over me - because I insisted on studying harder. Reciting poems with my eyes closed. and so on... My mother would stay by my side always - rubbing my chest every time I coughed. One evening, I was lying with my head on her lap. She must have thought I was asleep. I clearly heard her pray that if God wanted, he could give her the fever... in exchange to my well-being.

Next morning, I was all OK... jumping up and down getting ready for the kannada exam - singing 'BArisu kannada dim-dimava'. While my amma had a very tired look on her face. She could still come till the end of our road, and send me off to school with a smile. She clearly had the fever.

I know... I know its just all a coincidence that my fever had done its time and her fever was just beginning. But I still like to believe that my amma brought it on herself because of the deal with GOD.

Anybody else doing it for me is simply unimaginable.

Why do I remember this now?
Earlier this week, I was sick. Down with fever and cold. This combination medically has to last for 7 days. Medicine can only help you counter the side-effects. But the virus itself can not be conquered. But, I was up and running in 2 days itself - fresh as a daisy. I wonder if my amma has again offered the deal to the almighty. I will be damned if the all powerful cruel GOD takes the deal and goes through with it.

Rickshaw poetry

Is it just me or do you also find the auto-rickshaw drivers being more romantic now a days?

Below is what I can recollect from a couplet behind KA-01 A-9551... The driver would not tell me his name... I guess he wants to remain anonymous.

Hazrath hi bus tujhe paane ki, tumhe muskurate dekhne ki
Aur koi khwaish nahi hi is deewane ki
Gila tujh se nahi hi, Gila to hi us khuda se hi...
Kya zaroorat thi tumhe itna khoobsoorat banane ki...

MCP: Missed Call Protocol

I was not in Bangalore yesterday. I was surrounded by strangers (far-off relatives) and was exchanging pleasantries in far off Mangalore. Every now and then my mobile would buzz me just for one ring. When it happened quite frequently, an uncle of mine asked me what was the matter... I evaded his intriguing question by dismissing it as pranks perpetrated by my colleagues. But, I very well knew that they were "Missed Calls" from her, my FGF ;-) This method of telling "I am missing you" started about an year ago... Back then, she used to call me and often, I used to be eager to hear her voice... So I used to pick the call and wait. Only then, would both of us realize that there was nothing to speak. Any thing she would tell me, I already knew - and vice-versa. Silence was perfectly OK too... Now-a-days, I let the phone ring for at least three rings before picking up. If she meant to tell me that she missed me, she would realize that I already knew that and cut it before three rings. That's how, silent wordless calls got converted to 'missed calls'.

It was all fine until a couple of months ago, when she made a startling discovery that while my mobile was flooded with 20-30 missed calls a day, her mobile got none. One fine evening half way through her Frappe Hazzlenut, she asked me Don't I ever miss her? There is no right answer to such a question... and 99% of them are definitely wrong. I tried my luck. I explained:

"Every moment dear. Every moment you are not with me I miss you. Watching you walk away is the hardest thing for me to do every day. But I don't believe in technology to tell you I miss you. Do I even have to tell? When ever I think about you, I pray to God to make you smile :-) Look, like right now!! There it is - the smile (She practically smiles all the time ;-). Next time, you smile and not know why... its me just thinking about you. If you feel ticklish and want to giggle, go ahead... that's when you know I am missing you like hell."

I think she bought it. She sat there thinking about what I had just said for twenty minutes without speaking any word (the usual). She finished the cold coffee, and took a Rick home. I continued on my cappuccino and "Its not about the bike" for some more time. That book is simply a 'Must Read'.

Yesterday night, by the time I came home, I had four SMSs filled with smileys... Evidently, I am missing her much more than I had thought.

Dear O' Dear

Its hard to find words that do justice to my feelings... Apparently a 16th century English poet from Warwickshire, England has come close.

To my dearest FGF :

O, learn to read what silent love hath writ:
To hear with eyes belongs to love's fine wit.

respectfully copied from my friend's blog who in turn copied from some where...

BTW, trivia:
Shakespeare died while he was negotiating the deal to get his life time of works printed. The printers were ready to give him 10 pounds... and he was asking for more. After he died, the publishers sent a note to his widow at Stratford-upon-Avon that under those circumstances, even though they were not obligated to give them anything - they would send her five pounds. Yes, thats what William Shakespeare got for selling the publishing rights of all his works. Centuries later, Britain brought in its copy right laws. China is still in the process.

Nevertheless, now concentrate hard and listen to my silence through your eyes...

Five Minutes

There was a slight drizzle. The roads were bustling with late evening traffic. Its amazing how a slight drizzle drives people crazy. Half of them want to stop their two-wheelers below the first tree on their way... and the other half believe that it is not raining at the other end of the road and so want to get there in the next second if possible. Lanes, lights, indicators, cows, dogs - just simply does not matter. Such was the condition yesterday night. Hold the picture in your mind.

I am a fitness fanatic. So, I cycle to office some days. I enjoy it while it rains. It washes away the perspiration... or so I think. Rain comes with its downside too... the chances of the chain slipping is more. It has become usual for me to get my hands soiled a couple times a day. It only a matter of where it happens, and how tired I am at that point. When it happens, I have get off the road and spend about 5 minutes working my magic on the gears. Hold this picture in your mind.

Spare a thought for people who work on the streets for their lively hood. Rain disrupts their business. They may have to go home empty handed; perhaps some loss on their capital too. Damn the government for not providing social security for the unorganized labor pool. One such labor pool flourishes at the corner of Cubbon Road and Dickenson Road. Their work time starts around 9 in the night (I guess) and goes on till wee hours of the next morning (again, I guess). Well, its a 9-to-6 job nevertheless. The ignorant get shocked at their industry. The gentlemen (the hypocrite lot) avoid them all together here. The shy and still curious adolescent gang steal glances at them pretending to be innocently ignorant. The pragmatic lot (like me) will use the road simply because traffic is always free flowing here. Now you know the who, the where and the when. Hold this picture also in your mind.

Now put all the three together. A slight drizzle, crazy traffic, a cycle needing my attention, and me surrounded by a dozen 'commercial sex workers' and their aides. When I realized that the chain had slipped, I began thinking... 'Oh God!! Why here?'. You know its too hard to concentrate on the teeth of the gears when you are conscious of the kind of people watching you. Those were 5 long minutes. All sorts of hypothetical scenarios crossed my mind. What if pretending to repair the cycle was one of their cue to approach? What if a customer approached me with request to broker a deal? What if one of the retailers took objection on me blocking her enterprise? What if my numb fingers (from the cold rain) not able to put the chain back on to the gears quickly? What if there was a police raid at that very moment... my argument that the cycle broke down at that exact place, at that time would look really flimsy. Oh!! there were many more 'What if ?' permutations.

Well, fortunately all the scenarios remained only hypothetical. I got out of there in just as much time.

Autorickshaw - KA-04 B-5824

No, this is not a hit-and-run case. This is the only information I could gather about the auto-rickshaw that amazed me with sheer volume and nature of messages scripted on its back. Truly amazing...

A SMILE can end a war

Smile a lot, it does not cost anything (B, sounds familiar??)

Life is like an ice-cream. Enjoy it before it melts down.

Beg, borrow but never steal.

My favorite:
Life is like a lock, and mind is the key. You turn it one way, and it locks. You turn it the other way and it unlocks.

There were couple more. Something about life being short and love being beautiful... but these are all that I could memorize in 30 seconds I got to be in reading distance behind him. God! I miss my camera.

I became an 'Ajji KoLi' (ಅಜ್ಜಿ ಕೋಳಿ)

In our child-hood we are taught a lot of fables... Most of them are forgotten by us as quickly as we learn them. But life has its own way of reminding us of them every now and then. One such story....

[Those who know the story, skip to the last paragraph...]
Once up on a time, in a small village there lived an old lady (the ajji ಅಜ್ಜಿ , in Kannada). She had a hen (koLi ಕೋಳಿ, in Kannada) (or a rooster). Both of them had only each others for friends. Every day, the hen would wake up early and let out a loud crow just before dawn. The old lady also would get up early and make fire. Every body in the village would get up a little late after sunrise and borrow the day's fire form the old lady. This was a normal routine.

Gradually, the old lady and the hen both felt that the whole village was dependent on them and they could boss around any body. The hen thought that unless it woke up early and called for it, the sun would never rise. The old lady thought no food would be cooked in any body's house unless she started the fire (and everybody else borrowed from her).

One day, she got into a fight with a young lad who talked dis-respectfully about her ability to start fire. Irked by such lack of respect, she was determined to show the village what it is to live without fire for a day... and to show them what would happen if the sun did not rise for a day. That night, stealthily she took her rooster and a days supply of food and headed out of the village. She planned to spent a day in the forest away from the villagers.

The next day, the rooster crowed - the sun rose and the old lady made fire. She thought it would still be night at the village since the rooster was with her... In the afternoon, when she was eating what she cooked, she was imagining that everybody at the village would be frantically searching her to borrow the fire... everybody, especially the young lad, would be sorry that he spoke so harshly to her... She thought this day would be a lesson for all of the villagers.

After sunset, she returned back to the village. To her dismay - everything is normal there. Kids are happily playing, the shops are all glowing in the light of wicks lit up, there is smoke on top of every chimney. How did everybody get the fire? Nobody is talking about the missing sun. It did not even seem as though any body missed the old lady and her rooster.

At this moment, it dawned on her that all her pride in starting fire for the entire village was self made. The importance that she gave to her own rooster for the sun rising was all a mere hype. From that day, she continued to make fire for everybody - but never bossed over anybody.

Moral of the story: No body is indispensable. We should help others, but never bind them to obligations.

Ha ha... at this point you must be wondering how did I come to learn this so late in life? Well, It happens. I am a pretty out-spoken person. I almost speak to everybody at my office. I consider all of them were my friends (albeit of varying degrees). Last week, I went on a 5 day vacation... I was surprised to see that not one of varying degree of friends did remember me. There was no reason to (glad about that). But, isn't friendship all about calling a friend without a reason... just to keep in touch... make someone happy... just to find out 'whats up?' and so on. This also reflects on how I have been treating people... After all, all relationships in life (barring a few divine ones) are of quid-pro-quo nature. Aren't they?

Totally confused...

May be life is this... We learn various things at different times and under different circumstances. We keep accumulating knowledge... Intelligence is in choosing the right knowledge to apply for the right problem at appropriate circumstances.

Today morning, actions of a very dear friend of mine troubled me very much. The actions themselves could be totally unintentional (hopefully) and hence don't mean much. But, how am I to know? Nevertheless, I had to deal with it... Lot of reading and thinking in the past few weeks gave me the problem of plenty... too many solutions which one to apply?

Lesson No 1: (learnt from "A Poison Tree" by William Blake)

http://www.newi.ac.uk/RDOVER/blake/a_poison.htm

excerpt:
I was angry with my friend:
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.

I should have confronted the friend and settled matters then and there.

Did not apply this one... since I was not even sure of what I was thinking. More over, there is lot to lose in this approach (unless the level of friendship is like Karna-Duryodhana or Lewis-Clark or Rohit-Jaadu) if the basis of the wrath is absurd :-)). Closest friends Brutus and Caesar did not get this - how could I ?. More over, I have a history of jumping into wrong conclusions based on my extremely fast CPU - totally unreliable.

Lesson No 2: (learnt from kannada proverbs)

ಕಣ್ಣಾರೆ ಕಂಡರೂ ಪರಾಂಬರಿಸಿ ನೋಡು (kaNNAre kaNDarU parAmbarisi nOdu)
Even when you see it, you should examine more. Because, when you see only the present you may not the context. My dear friend Anand once elucidated that any sample of the infinite is bound to be incomplete and hence inaccurate. How true?

ಕೋಪದಲ್ಲಿ ಕೊಯ್ದ ಮೂಗು ಶಾಂತವಾದಾಗ ಬಂದೀತೆ? (kopadalli koydaa mUgu shaanthavAdaga bandIte?)
If you cut your nose in anger, it will not come back when you cool down. This has reference in Ramayana when Shurpanaka got her nose cut from Lakshmana due to her anger (haste) and hence was disfigured for ever. Very wise. So, I decided to apply due diligence before taking action... or even talking about it. Again, very wise.

Lesson No 3: (learnt from some one... some day)
If you derive your feelings (joy, sorrow, anger or frustration) from any body else... sooner or later you are bound to be disappointed. True feelings, what ever they are must be from within in. That way you will have complete freedom (as well as complete responsibility) in what you feel. No body can take that away from you.

I know... but have not reached a stage where I can insulate myself from being effected by others... Long way to go.

Lesson No 4: (observed while throwing stones at a serene lake)
Mind is like the surface of a calm lake. As long as the lake is calm, the reflection that we see on it is beautiful, some times more beautiful than the real world above. Any body who has spent a moon lit night by a lake will definitely agree with me on this. But how easy is it to disturb the tranquility by just dropping a stone... It causes ripples immediately... these ripples reach the bank... and as if getting a new purpose in life, they multiply... Even before the stone reaches the bottom of the lake, the ripples have already taken over the surface... the reflection of the same world you just admired looks horrible, twisted and distorted.

However, the lake is resilient. It swallows the stone (the trouble maker), accepts it as its own... and finally brings back the tranquility at the surface.

It took only fraction of a second for the stone to disturb the peace at the surface... It takes hours for the lake to fight the turmoil within to bring back the peace.

Well.... does this even apply here?? Any way the Lake, the stone, long time to restore tranquility... good connection.

Lesson No 5: (learnt from the story of the Zen guru)

http://www.chennaionline.com/society/zen.asp

excerpt:
Once upon a time a big monk and a little monk were travelling together. They came to the bank of a river and found the bridge was damaged. They had to wade across the river. There was a pretty lady who was stuck at the damaged bridge and couldn't cross the river. The big monk offered to carry the pretty lady across the river on his back. The lady accepted. The little monk was shocked by the move of the big monk. "How can big brother carry a lady when we are supposed to avoid all intimacy with females?" thought the little monk. But he kept quiet. The big monk carried the lady across the river and the small monk followed unhappily. When they crossed the river, the big monk let the lady down and they parted ways with her. All along the way for several miles, the little monk was very unhappy with the act of the big monk. He was making up all kinds of accusations about the big monk in his head. This got him madder and madder. But he still kept quiet. And the big monk had no inclination to explain his situation. Finally, at a rest point many hours later, the little monk could not stand it any further, he burst out angrily at the big monk. "How can you claim yourself a devout monk, when you seize the first opportunity to touch a female, especially when she is very pretty? All your teachings to me make you a big hypocrite." The big monk looked surprised and said, "I had put down the pretty lady at the river bank many hours ago, how come you are still carrying her along?"

You get the point....

Finally something that I like, and I want to accept. I have carried my worries all the way till the middle of the night. I should at least drop them here. Tomorrow, is another day - another start.

Random Lesson:
There were more learnings that I saw while walking back home. I saw the most beautiful evening clouds... huge foolish clouds trying to block out the brightness of the Sun... and the Sun was still imparting a splendid silver lining around them. Today I *saw* the real meaning of "Every cloud has a silver lining"... Too bad, that does not solve my problem. Hopefully its true.

As the name of the blog and this post, it is getting too random and too confusing.

Relax dear!

Often when we lose all hope and think this is the end, God smiles and says :
"Relax dear, its just a bend! Not the end."

Some SM's just make your day!!

Why do we name things?

Have you ever thought... Why do we have such a strong urge to name things? We are not contend by naming humans... we also name all our pets - that too with human names. We can not eat a fruit without calling it by a name. We can not climbdown a mountain without calling it Mt so and so. We name cyclones, waves, stars, volcanoes, waterfalls, rivers, deserts, islands... There are millions of species of animals apart from us on this planet and all of them carry out their business without having to name any thing.

I understand that we started out naming people to be distinctive and unique. Fine and fair argument... But some where down the line, we missed the very point and started naming children after some body else... clearly defeating the uniqueness objective. As if to bring order to chaos, we started having two parts to a name "person" and "family". World was peaceful until some body thought it was just not enough and came up with a "middle" name. Now we have "prefixes" and "suffixes"... This would be Bill Gates if he were knighted.... Sir William Henry Gates III. In the midst of all these, our dear friends from Andhra Pradesh created a rival system of naming... the only logic seems to be 'longer the better'. Try this Rajasekhara Srinivasulu Laxminarayana Siva Venkata Sai - Yes, it is one person's name and people call him Sai.

People of royal birth seems to have got the entire naming funda wrong... they rotate the same name every 2-3 generations. In Thailand, the king is always known as Rama.

On the other hand, you christen a person with a beautiful and well thought out name. But actually call him by his nickname. Fine, you did not like the real name. So you called him by nickname. But some cultures have rules in nicknaming a person too. Robert has to be nicknamed Bob, John-Jack, William-Bill, Elizabeth-Liz... So you are not actually *choosing* the nickname.

There is another peculiar thing that comes to notice about we referring to people:

We do not use names to refer to people if they are many of them. "There were many people at the function". We also do not use names if we do not care about the person. "The new finance guy is a moron".

Once we are a little more familiar with a person not referring to him by name may sound disrespectful. I can not keep referring to people at office as "the receptionist", or "the tech support guy", or "the MD" - although there are only one of each kind at my office. Familiarity makes me use their names. We also use names when there are less of them... "Mayank and Keshava are good friends of mine".

Again, if a person becomes too close to you... you stop referring to them by name. An Oscar acceptance speech would go like "I would like to thank my *Mother* for all that she has done...". Some times a "her" or a "him" in a sentence carries all the meaning it has to...

Does it not seem strange when we choose to refer a person/thing by its name?

When we talk about names, its hard to ignore Mr Shakespeare. He said "A Rose By Any Other Name Would Be a Rose"... But I ask why name it at all?

PS: We even name blogs... even when the best one came up with is "random"

Lofty ideals - words of an auto driver

So what if the English is broken? So what if they just rhyme? Auto drivers are as creative as any body else when it comes to spreading social messages...

Here is one of them:

Help ever...
If not hurt never.

Seen at the back of a truck

Save rain water.. One child is best.

Very noble thought(s)... but what's the connection?

Savanadurga - A Labour day outing

Bangalore is basically made up of rocky ground. If you go out of Bangalore just 50-60 Kms, you will find many many rocky hills. On top of many of these hills, a king (paalyegaara) of 16th century by name of 'Kempe Gowda' had constructed forts to protect the people from enemy invasion. Don't pin me down on dates and other facts... things are very much in grey area when we come to Bangalore's real history. Date lines don't match... Things are not taught in school... rotten politics is every where.

All that apart, after the accidental break down of the Mekedaatu plans - we decided to go to Savanadurga which would be a equally nice drive. My driving partner - lets call him Nani - was promptly only 20 minutes late to start. A nice (lengthy) breakfast in of Nani's old hangout's in Basaveshwarnagar further delayed our start by an hour... But who was in a hurry?

Nani is a good driver. We headed out of Bangalore on the Magadi Road... He negotiated the irritating Kamakshipalya traffic with a two-wheeler like agility. Oh BTW, we were driving a year new SWIFT. Half an hour of irritating traffic and more irritating road brought us to some where near Macho Halli. The agony continues... some "Work in progress" situation for the next four kilometers saw us riding over dirt tracks stirring up clouds of dust behind us. All these surprisingly did not seem to effect Nani at all, who was happily smiling away to the tunes of 'Dr Raj's eternal romantic songs'.

Nani had been here before... So, there was no need to ask for directions... although the illusive water-tank that he so clearly remembered never appeared before me. Any way, the winding roads kept him happy... nice music and the cool AC kept me happy. It was a very good combination. I needed to take pictures of anything remotely photo-worthy... and he wanted to take a break ever so often. And more over, time was on our side...

Well, reaching Savanadurga is all about left turns. There are mile-stones counting the number of kilometers (yeah, I see the contradiction too) left to reach Magadi. When it reaches 'one' there is a left turn to be taken... Boards are currently there. Not sure if they last longer... This is called 'Hosapete' circle. Couple of chais shops, bakery, cool-drinks... and nothing more.

Savanadurga is 12 Kms from there. Some distance (have no clue how much) in that road, will lead you to a place called VG Doddi. Gotcha... if you reached here, it means you missed the left turn you were supposed to take. Yes, just before VG Doddi, there is a left turn... there is a decorative entrance (again, not sure how long it will last). This should be good enough hint. After that you have to be really dumb or arrogant to lose your way.

We were at the base of Savanadurga hill by 11:30. There is a temple for Lord Narasimha at the base. Since wait period to consult the deity was too long, we decided to first climb the durga (fort) and then come back to the temple. So be it. We started to ascend... the wrong way. It had to happen. When we found it tough we looked around to see how others were doing it... that is when we realized that there is a easier, albeit round-about way to start. Ten minutes (okay... it was 6 minutes) into the climb, we had our first pit stop. Clearly we were climbing the wrong rock. We had to walk sideways to reach the correct path. Since we were already half way (okay.. 1/4th) up this rock, I thought why not see the top of this one. Nani gladly volunteered to stay back. Climbing was easy. Damn easy - until I reached a point where memories of Kabbaludurga (a mis-adventure of mine 4 years ago. Another day - another story) came back to me. The crevices I could hold on to were becoming less comfortable. Some how I had lost the will to stand upright. All this said - time to climb down. Oops... and then I made the mistake of looking down... Nani was way down some where... and there seemed to be no way I could go there walking on two legs. I wondered whether I should be happy that I climbed so much in just three minutes or start making contingency plans if I end up with the same plight as Chamayya Mestru of Nagara Haavu movie. Well... After 10 gruelling minutes of dorsal (face skywards) crawling I was back where it all began. Both my palms had blisters but I was happy to be walking again... many thanks to my denim trousers.

We started walking sideways to reach the 'actual' path. Until you do it, you would not realize the risk in this. It is very easy to twist your ankle when gravity is tricking your sense (if you have one) of balance. Fine... Once we joined the more trodden path, we were joined by various groups of people... some left us behind and went ahead... and some vice-versa. All kinds of people come to Savanadurga... some as pilgrimage... some for just time pass... some to put a tick on their TODO list... reason could be many - but the pain is all the same.

The terrain, the heat, scarcity of water, Nani's innate urge to give up - I was fighting multiple battles here. Each battle required different strategies... The terrain had to conquered the old fashion way. One step at at time. The heat... there was no escape. The only way out was to surrender and mitigate the damage by taking ample rest when ever we came across shades. They came in various shapes. Under a tree, between two boulders, sometimes even walking in the shadow of Nani helped :-)) The third battle was against water (or the lack of it). I am accustomed to using very less water during my running... So that battle was won fair and square. The last one was a tough ask... the enemy was changing faces at every corner. Nani would find creative reasons to stop at any pit stop. Luckily, I had more creative reasons why we should see the top of this climb. This tug-of-war between the curious and the quitters went on for 2 hours... both physically and in our (Nani's and mine) minds. Finally the curious had it their way.

The fort is no big deal to write about. It must have been a formidable opponent to overpower in its days. However, I think anything that high in that heat would be formidable... The enemy had to first fight the quitter in himself and only then would the fort be accessible. On top of the Fort, there is a Nandi (Bull, the vehicle of Lord Shiva) looking over towards North. There are no inscriptions... no commentary on how it got there, why it has been put there, who put it there. Zilch. Nothing. There were a bunch of other climbers who had their own un-verified versions of history. I did not understand why there was a bull, when the temple below was of Lord Narasimha and not Lord Shiva... any way that is for the historians to ponder about.

At 2:30, we thought it was time to head back... In this more used path, getting down was not that scary... We were safely back at the base in 50 minutes (okay, 1 hour 15 minutes). At the base a nice kind hearted lady offered us drinking water from the well. She would not accept our help in drawing the next pot of water from the well... 'Does urban life kill the humanity in people?' I began to think....

We quickly offered our prayers to Lord Narasimha and headed back to civilization. Near the base of the fort, there is a vendor of tender coconuts. Mr Nani quenched all his thirst here. Nani's promise of getting ragi balls for me for lunch seemed impractical since it was already way past lunch time. Still we tried our luck at Magadi... In vain.

Nani, still could not believe what he had accomplished. The quitter in him had been sedated... albeit temporarily. He definitely felt good about it. But does not want to accept it... for fear that if he gets into this habit of feeling good this way - life may become harder.

Reached Bangalore safely at 7:00 PM. Bought 'Namma Oorina Rasikaru' by GorUru Ramaswamy Iyengar for just ten rupees (Now you know where I picked up this Nani from). Rava Idly at Janata Hotel... The End.

The End.