Just some Limerick

I was sitting in the class when she moved,

I was looking but no one knew.

My mind raced, and my heart went boom.

I just jumped and ran out of the room.

But she was not to be there,

Now I had no idea what to do.

I thought I’d go back, but she was screaming

On top of her voice and I felt demeaning.

I was about to slap,

But it was not my back.

And I thought I would never do,

It wouldn’t have mattered

But I know you do.

I just made the slip,

It was the easier thing to do.

I should have done better,

But you knew I wouldn’t do.

So it happened all unplanned,

Like a concert going to doom.

It was not a shortcut to hell,

But nowhere was it down bell.

Forever and forever

When I met you for the first time,
There was nothing worth a dime.

But then something I found,
And it just came around and around.

I never thought it would be,
but like it was meant to be.

In no time it has all changed,
And all that is left is just a frame.

Everyday I look for something new,
so that I can be a different few.

But no its always you and you,
just coming back and telling me,
that I had something worth more than one life,
something more than this life,
that would never leave me.

Now that you are a part of me,
How do I lose that part of me?


I hope to have that again,
Just to be that close again
And be that forever and forever.

Future looks gloomy!

I recently read an article which went by the name “It’s over for dollar and euro; get ready for Sensex 60000” in Firstpost.com. Yeah you read it right, it is no typo it is Sixty thousand. The author clearly seemed to me high on a few gallons of Red Bull, if not smoking Marijuana. Before I go forward let’s get the facts straight. The GDP of US is close to around 14.77 trillion USD. And the debt they are holding as on July 31^st 2011 is 14.32 trillion USD. So that puts the sovereign debt at almost 100% of US’s GDP. And going by the US treasury’s website from December 2010 to July 2011, one can see that the debt has been growing at a rate of 5.48 billion USD per day. So that’s about US. I would not go into how it is posed to service its debt, because S&P clearly seems to disagree with Obama on that at least.

With the S&P lowering US’s debt rating has given clear cut signals that now that debt is more risky. And a more risky investment demands more returns hence higher interest rates. Higher interest rate makes it even more difficult for US to service its debt. Whispers if not clear cut speculations have already started about US going bankrupt. If investors panic and start selling treasury bonds, there would be a large supply of US bonds which will far outstrip the demand thus lowering the prices and hence investors might end up getting peanuts for their investments. Now another fear is that due to such factors Dollar will also weaken and that can lead to countries shifting their Forex to commodities such as gold. Now here is bit of a wild assumption, we are all clear about Europe’s position, specially the PIIGS economies and the apprehensions on Euro. So it might happen that Dollar and Euro as the world’s two universal currencies might crash and international trade might start using commodities such as gold in exchange for traded goods.

Another possibility can be the emergence of Chinese Yuan as the accepted currency for trade, but that will surely take its time as it not that wide used today. But here also lies a problem. China is holding 26% of US’s debt, so if the US goes bust and dollar crashes, it will surely have an impact on China and on the Yuan. So even this also looks like a problematic area.

The reason I thought the article was foolish, because the author said the flight of capital will happen from developed economies and investors will invest in developing economies such as India. But he forgot one thing that when US became a superpower it created a lot of wealth and when it crashes, it will diminish a lot of wealth with it too. The investors all will have their wealth mostly in US dollar and when it crashes; their wealth will also be eroded overnight. So from where will the capital come to take the Sensex to 60,000?

Whatever might happen, one thing is for sure, if another recession comes and hits US hard leading to it being bankrupt, its ripples will be felt much more in India than last time and future does look gloomy!

One Last Journey

   

It was time to say goodbye. It was time for that one last journey. I picked up my iPod, made a new playlist from my favourites, mostly old Punjabi songs ranging from Mohammad Sadiq to Kuldeep Manak to ever unforgettable Gurdas Mann.    

It was time to fuel up and I remembered that Autocar Question which used to go by “What would you do with that last litre of petrol?” I thought I was going to have that moment now. Kicked my Bullet start for one last time and it was time for a nostalgic experience. It has been 5 years since I fell in love with it. It has seen it all, all my relationships, all my memories good as well as bad. It even saw the change in me. When everything around was changing it stayed constant with me. It is very hard to forget that last peg of Old Monk that I sipped with my best buddies with the Monk sitting pretty on the rider’s seat or that ride with my first love or that drive back at 2 o’clock  with friends in first year after youth festival of 2006. So many moments which all were running in front of eyes like I was sitting in PVR.

I am being totally honest when I say that it felt very indifferent to part ways with you. Yes I thought I would be sad but I was not. Instead I relived a lot of moments which have become an inseparable of me, moments which can only be lived and not described in words. Finally it reached its destination, I handed the keys over, looked at it one last time smiled and moved on.

18^th July 2006 dad gifted me a Royal Enfield Bullet. 18^th July 2011 he is going to sell it off and life, it will just continue like it always does. As off now the Royal vehicle is gone, but royalty shall continue.  

If Poets can enjoy their poetry, Painters their paintings, why can’t rich their money?

I was really confused last month when Ratan Tata threw some jabs at Mukesh Ambani for him enjoying his wealth. I don’t want to go in the discussion that he has not earned his wealth, rather inherited it. But my focus here is on someone who has earned his wealth. To be fair to the elder Ambani, he should be given credit for some of his wealth if not all.

He has been praised, criticised, ridiculed for his house Billion dollar Antilla. But what I fail to understand is why? I have met a lot of people in my life, who believe that spending more than necessities is wrong and they don’t take it in a good manner, sometimes even frowning on it. The so called society has always taught me not to show off my wealth as wealth is not good. Rich people are evil and certainly sometimes a public display of wealth can leave a bad taste in many mouths.

But my question is, is earning money a science or art? I certainly consider it an art. If it is a science please tell me where they teach it, I would be the first in queue to learn. There are people from different backgrounds, different kind of upbringings who have made it into the wealthiest list. There are people from different backgrounds, different upbringing who have become great painters and great poets. They all show it and we all love it but when a man steps out of a Mercedes or a BMW in an Armani suit and Gucci suits, a certain reaction goes which is nowhere near praise.

I find it hard to digest why some still detest wealth, wealth creators. Why fingers are pointed at them. If we look up and appreciate art, I would say we need to appreciate wealth creators also. I’m not at all going for others reasons such as the amount of people found employment when Antilla was built or when a Buggati sold. My point is limited to the mindset and how differently we see, perceive and react to money. I just ask the question why different reactions, just because its money and accumulating money is considered as greed, while writing 10 poems in a day not. Perhaps we still need to broaden our mindset and see things in a different way to understand them better.

Beer! 10 reasons why I love you.

1. You were always there for me.
2. You always gave me what I wanted, never demanding anything back like those Girlfriends.
3. Your friends Whiskey and Vodka are super cool too!
4. You were a constant company when I had the greatest time with my friends.
5. You were even there why I was alone, down and dejected.

6. You were not boring after those initial months of our relationship

7. You come in so many varieties and options and none of them are jealous of each other.

8. You make a perfect companion for a Saturday night EPL game or a Sunday IPL.

9. Wherever I go you follow me.

10. Because I know you’ll love it too!

  

Did Baba really get 55 Lakh missed calls?

Amid all the drama and hoopla of past 3 days, one number struck me as very odd. As I've a tendency to take numbers too seriously I decided to do some analysis of the news that Baba Ramdev got 55 lakh missed calls. I used a simple technique. A day has 24 hours, each hour has 60 minutes and each minute has 60 seconds. So multiplying all we get 86400 seconds. Now the next step was crucial, I took an assumption here and you can question me on that. I assumed that a person calling Baba will at least busy his phone for 5 seconds (Note- I'm not saying that the phone will ring for 5 seconds). So dividing 5 by 86400 seconds will gives us 17280, exactly the number of calls possible in a day if the above assumption is taken.

The next part was to calculate how many days are required to reach the magical figure of 55 lakhs. Just another calculation away. I divided 55,00,000 by 17280 and I get roughly 319 days. That leaves a question. To get so many calls has Baba been planning this for more than year?

How to add the Google +1 button to your Blog or post

Folks this is undoubtedly one of the most exciting thing to happen to my blog. Google as we all love has given us bloggers a boon. Now we can add the famed +1 button to our blog and to our posts just as I recently did to my blog. Its very simple and straight forward. You just need to copy and paste some lines and you'll be done. Just go to your Blog dashboard and then to design. In design click on edit HTML.

There search for head> tag. The easiest way to do it to hit the ctrl+F button and type it and you'll find the tag. After you have located the tag just copy paste the following code above or before the head> tag

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js">

After you're done with this, it's time to get the button. For that click here and it will redirect you to the official Google +1 site. From there get the code for the website and paste it in the html where you want to have the button. After that have fun and collect a lot of +1. And don't forget to click on that button below. Happy Blogging :)

For more click on the following links

Link 1 Link 2 Link 3

Harsh lessons learnt for life from my first year of MBA

Well folks I've almost completed my first year of MBA. The journey was not easy and had lots of tweets and status updates. I could not have done this without the support of my Friends, Family, Teachers (yeah both of them ;) ), all chicken corners and fast food joints in Greater Noida. Oops I forgot this was not end of second year, sorry wrong speech. So coming back to point the year bygone has told me many lessons which I swear I’ll never forget in my life. As I've a habit of forgetting things, I decided to write a blog about the 10 most valuable lessons I learnt.

1. It is always hard to stay awake in a class but easier to stay awake through a late night movie. Even after having a bucket at KFC. If you don’t believe me, aa forget it I know most of you are already saying “Been there, done that”

2. On the first day of the month you’ll be having Butter chicken with 100 pipers. On the last of the month you’ll be having Dal Roti with hostel ka paani. (This I have a feeling will stay ever after my MBA)

3. You’ll always remember the latest song and sing it even while sleeping, but you’ll never remember that economics theory even when the teacher demands from you in the class.

4. It is easier to wake up early in the morning to watch a cricket match, but impossible for completing a left over assignment.

5. You can always motivate a group for a sip of Royal Challenge, but never for that Marketing group assignment. (I bet Vijay Mallaya loves that, hope he gives me a job when it comes to placements)

6. Text messages are still the way for it, when you know you have your faculty over at Facebook too.

7. That mentos thing (late for class wali) never works in real life. Teachers are way too smart to fall for that trick and you just freeze when they shout or throw some sarcasm at you.

8. Do break rules but don’t get caught not only applies at the traffic lights but also in B-School life.

9. Never think weekends are supposed to be fun, you’ll only be disappointed.

10. Trust me. It was far easier to write this blog than a 500 words project report.

So there they are, if you also have some do share it with me at the bottom. For moment let the feeling that we are seniors now sink in.

Social media over a cup of coffee

As always last Saturday I’d nothing useful to do, and some said weekends are meant to be fun. Well quite simply no if you’re single, 22 and coming to a new place, knowing not many and having no bike. But I simply refused my usual self to exist and woke up at 9. Yes on a weekend I woke up at 9, when was the last time that happened?

But because of my kind friend Mudassir, it was not going to be the same tale again. He had emailed me earlier about a certain OCC (no it is not an abbreviation for Over a Cup of Coffee but Open Coffee Club) having a discussion about Social Media. Well after that it was just what I was missing for the past few weeks “A high octane discussion by people mostly young from different companies and some even from different countries”.

We were past the clichés pretty soon, and went onto some serious discussion. It was really exciting to meet few entrepreneurs and specially some who were in the social media space. Social media is such a space where every fifth person on Facebook and every second on twitter feels like an expert. Not that I’m questioning anyone’s expertise as I feel no expert, but there were really some good takeaways from the discussion.

One that really has stuck me is that Facebook was designed as a platform where people will stay and will be reluctant to leave. Well this thought had never crossed my mind. We all think of leveraging what this new Facebook revolution has given us. But in the process we all try to bring prospective customers to our website, so instead of that we are better off by keeping them hooked on the platform itself and engaging them as much as possible by discussions and debates. The idea that nobody likes to be sold to forcefully also add to this and makes the point that content is the king hygiene today.

Another important point was how much of a truth was behind what Facebook might tell me the profile of my TG. To be honest I know most of the links I’ve liked in the past few months were either obligations or were due to my conscience forcing me so that I keep my Facebook friends engaged. So if Facebook come up with some analysis of that data constructing an image of me, I won’t be surprised if I fail to recognize myself. And then is this article on Facebook which talks about some more things that have crossed my mind more than once in the previous few months. Perhaps that’s the reason I’ve shifted more to Twitter.

Ah Twitter. Then there was one of the most significant things I remember. Someone pointed out that instead of shoving our products down the throat of a follower on Twitter, one should try to collect information about what they tweet and perhaps make better products or even innovation, who knows what all is possible. I remember another person mentioning that he had written a book on Sanskrit. He had a Facebook page which had not many followers. But a simple comment on some forum discussing about Sanskrit brought 6000 followers to his page. Moral of the story, it’s not only about sharing on your own page but also at other places also.

I think Social media is in a nascent stage now, where not many can predict which way it will go and what consequences it will bring with it. A thing called Orkut was hip a few years ago and today it is as good as Gautam Gambhir’s facial expressions DEAD. But one thing is for sure, along with all the changes, it will definitely bring along new opportunities, open new business horizons and much more.

P.S-I would like to apologize to have not mentioned any names above. For the people who were present there and are reading, I had to rush as I had no breakfast that morning and can’t survive on a hungry stomach on a weekend so it was not possible for me to know some better. But there is one person I do remember. It’s Amarinder and Amarinder thanks for everything, for moderating and for arranging it all. I would love to attend more OCC meets till the time I’m here.

Comments are welcomed J

That’s how you hit two targets with one shot says Congress

Today an LTTE Leader made a sensational appearance hinting that DMK might have been indirectly responsible for Rajiv Gandhi’s death. But that’s not the crucial. The crucial thing is the timing. If we look back at most of the incidents around DMK and Congress one can easily sense what’s going on.

Before going on let’s have a look at some of the facts. DMK is the third largest party in the UPA coalition behind Congress and Trinamool Congress with a substantial 18 seats. The last two years of the government has seen more scams and allegations of corruption than bills passed, with DMK seen as the centre of it most of it. The media has mostly shown DMK as a corrupted party which has nepotism grounded in it. The DMK lost badly in the recent assembly elections in Tamil Nadu and the by the looks of it, it doesn’t seem that they will gain the lost ground soon and easily. And then the most important fact of them all, two DMK MP’s, one of them being DMK supreme’s daughter is behind bars for one of the largest corruption cases India has seen.

Enough facts now let’s see the ground situation. Congress suffering from bad public image is trying to put all corruption image on the face of DMK and even distancing itself from DMK sometimes. They cannot afford to leave DMK’s hand as if DMK pulls out, the government can collapse. So what they are doing is putting one foot in the door. Sonia Gandhi showing some closeness to J. Jaylalitha and reminding DMK they are just an option. I won’t be surprised if they leave DMK and join hands with AIADMK in the next general elections.

This was the Congress’s situation. Now let’s have a look at DMK’s state of affairs. DMK has hit an all time low. They have a very low public acceptance with them at the moment. So if they decide to pull out leading to a collapse of the government, they won’t be too confident while going for the assembly elections at such a moment. So they are in a situation where they can’t demand anything and can only sit and wait for things to turn better.

So it’s more of an alliance where nobody can do anything but to stay together. But Kanimozhi has been made a scapegoat by Congress to show DMK what they are capable of. Also this has shown how helpless a father can be in the wake of Indian politics.

Social Networking +1

I was going through my twitter Newsfeed when an idea struck me to relieve me of my boredom so I got down writing

Facebook ask me what I'm thinking, Twitter asks what I’m doing, Foursquare asks where I am and Orkut....aaaa. Ok forget Orkut I can’t remember, anyways it’s dead. I decided to create some fictional Social Networking website with some catchy status update asking lines.

1. Food&me.com

Yeah it had to start with food.

What’s hitting that belly?

2. IPLHooked.com

Who is getting the next curse?

3. PoliticiansToTihar.com

Oh this one is one of my favourites.

Who’s coming next?

4. YeahImfat.com

What’s the next excuse to console?

5. GeeksAreGod.com

For some of my geek friends

How many lines of code today?

6. OneSidedLovers.com

Who is the hot chick that just moved to office/college/school/colony blab blab............

7. DepressedExLovers.com

When are the next happy hours and what’s on your mind Devdas?

8. PoliticiansInTihar.com

Yeah one more

How much?

9. RajniRulez.com

Any Joke will do sire.

10. Bored4mOffice.com

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Eureka........Eureka!

Don’t worry, I was not having a bath when I said the above words nor have I discovered anything new. I was in my usual place in the office doing nothing but some reading and mind thrashing. But during the course of my meditation (of course mind thrashing) I came upon the news of LinkedIn IPO and I could feel the fears of some sceptics and laughs of some lunatics. For the past 6 months or so I been hearing a lot of talk of another bubble in the making from the bubble obsessed people, our now beloved friends Americans. To be more precise another dot com bubble.

The recent events like the takeover of Skype by Microsoft and the LinkedIn IPO helped a lot by giving a lot to talk and write. I couldn’t help but feel that the only reason many of the American watch News is to find another bubble or to create one. So obsessed are they with the idea of a bubble that even after having disastrous consequences twice in a decade they still want another one.

It seems like God has definitely blessed America or Americans as to say by once again listening to them. I have been hearing stories of people driving across States with posters on their cars saying “God give us another bubble”. But this definitely is not a dot com bubble, even if it turns out to be a bubble in the end. This time it’s all about social networking. Be it Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Zygna or Skype. The buzz word is social networking. There are people saying this is not a bubble as all these have sustainable business models generating good revenue year after year. But so were the companies that started the last dot com bubble like Ebay, Amazon and its revenue not profits people.

But this is not where the things go wrong. I read someplace there are three kinds of entrepreneurs. The first are the innovators, the second are the ones who tweak and take it to masses and third are the cheap imitators. The third ones are the one which are most dangerous. It seems that most of the people who run to the markets to invest have either not read or forgotten that “All that glitters is not gold”. The LinkedIn IPO showed how eagerly people wanted an IPO from the social networking breed. With some shares going at double or more the initial price of $45, its valuation went straight away to $8 billion in the trading market from the $2.5 billion it had earlier.

And the Curious Case of Microsoft buying Skype has not helped, but add more fuel to the fire. By no means this looks like a bubble. It when every Tom, Dick and Harry is making social networking sites to make those millions (which I guess is already going on) and the rest of Tom, Dick and Harries think that they can rank in the moolah by investing is when things go wrong. Both things have started, but not risen to alarming propositions. The next year is going to be very interesting to watch whether Facebook or Twitter comes out with IPO and how big of a response come from people (it sure is going to be big). It’s after that, the people who would think that they missed the bus will be interesting to watch. As these will be the gullible ones to burn their hands by investing in the third category of ventures. So let’s wait and watch the movie. From the looks of the initial trailer or teaser or whatever you call, it looks to be an interesting one. I have already bought the popcorns and a nice comfy seat. For the moment GOD BLESS AMERICA!

Wars…..Wars: We Want Wars

Before you even think about judging me, I’m a peace loving person, although not a follower of Gandhi, but still I do shun violence. So you must be thinking why am I supporting Wars?

Well parallel to all the Wars we all know (Mostly involving US) there has been another kind of violence going on, mostly silently, sometimes roaring. It stays hidden for most of the time, never makes for front page headlines or for that matter to Prime time Debates on 24 hour News. But these Wars are something who as much influential as all the other Wars you’ve been thinking about. But one thing about them is after the War is over winner is you the reader.

Ok enough suspense, let me raise the curtain and show the magic (no magic actually that just sounded good). I’m talking about Wars such as Cola Wars 80’s, Browser Wars of the 90’s and more recently Cell Phone OS war.

So let’s start with the Cola Wars. I was fortunate enough to read a case study about Cola Wars in my first year of MBA, but I can swear on Gita, Kuran or Bible that I hardly remember a thing. All I can gather is that the War left has us with beautiful commercials, lovely jingles and a handful of products, the taste of which we are still savouring. Not to mention it also gave us lot of MBA material to study and lots of strategies also and one big case to do with. Although I know the last part won’t make many happy especially my esteemed classmates who are dreadful and weary of reading 20+ pages of a Case. I shall not say more about that, because I know I’m riding on a very thin rope and I’m yet to complete my second year. Nevertheless the Cola Wars gave us a lot of things which till date we remember and so much was its influence that it went to the outer space as well.

The second war and one I’m more close to is Browser Wars. We all love to open up Google Chrome or FireFox or even Internet Explorer (You lazy idiots stop using this crap and download a worthwhile browser) but few of us might be familiar about something called Mosaic. It was the first known web browser, which later gave birth to Netscape Navigator, which later was the reason for development of Internet Explorer, which later….ok that’s enough, go figure it out yourself. It was also one of the reasons of now famous Microsoft’s antitrust litigation. Although the rest didn’t go too sweet for Netscape, but see what has that left us. It gave numerous web browsers, made a couple of Nerds millionaires (as if I give a damn, they didn’t give a dime to me). And it also played a big role in the massive Dot com bubble.

Recently though we saw another such War among Mobile Phones OS, precisely between Android and iOS. And I have to say I love all the cartoons these people make. They also love to take a dig at each other once in a while. And then we do have the Joker also in Steve Balmer who has a habit of giving us reasons to mock him. Saying that this War is nothing in proportion to the earlier ones will be an understatement. But still if you think so, just go and search the amount of lawsuits they have on each other.

As I draw to a close, I would like to point out to another War in making, a war which can have an even bigger impact. It’s the Tablets people. The thing we all want to own and because we can’t (apparently because of money) we say it’s useless and crap and full of shit and blahhh….

As you can see even in these Wars, the biggest participant has been the US. So therefore I urge the US Department of Defence and also President Obama to increase their budget, so that they can speed up more on such Wars and give us something to cheer about.

Find your Singur-An Open letter to Mr. Rahul Gandhi

, cFirst of all congratulations Mr. Gandhi for the victories Congress garnered in the recent assembly elections across different states. A special mention of Mamata Banerjee who has proved that True Grit, Resilience with Patience can help achieve anything, may people take lessons from her struggle and implement them in other places.

Now let’s come back to you. A few days ago you were making headlines for something. Something you did in villages near Greater Noida. You were there supporting the farmers agitation against the state government for the way it acquired land. Well at least that’s what the media was telling me. Now Mr. Gandhi let me familiarize you with one of the cruellest yet most useful word of today. It’s called RESULTS.

You can ask any school going child, or an investor how big is that word’s importance today. So let’s have a look at the results you generated from your so called agitation.

1. Gained a lot of Political mileages and newspaper coverage

2. Checked another point from the To-do list (Going to jail)

Did anything else happen that made significance?

Now those were the results you gave. Let’s have a look at what could also have been achieved. If the land was really acquired illegally or at lower prices, you could have continued your agitation and deliver something like what Mamata did in Singur. You could have done a lot more, that would show up on your report card, telling people that you are serious about things.

Uttar Pradesh is a state which has literally slept through the last two decades of India’s growth. It has always been seen as a drag on the nation, pulling back the growth shown by other states. It has been notoriously famous for its population, having one of the lowest literacy rates in the country. You were the one who termed it as you “Karambhoomi”. Mr. Gandhi it’s not words that matter, it’s the actions, remember.

With UP assembly elections not too far away and then the next General elections in 2014, all eyes will be on you and the results you are capable to produce. Mr. Gandhi “Find your Singur” and make it clear you mean business or we won’t take too long to forget you.

Today you are not only talking to the Aam admi, you are talking to the Common man as well. And common man lives in the age of Twitter, Facebook, and Blogs etc. Common man makes an effort to look beyond the obvious, search and not just believe what he is shown. Mr Gandhi common man is not just educated, he is enlightened also. He can see what India is capable of and where it is lying because of the leaders who are in charge of the ship.

Mr Gandhi, common man puts a price tag on his vote and that vote is not for sale. You will have to earn our votes to get them. You will have to prove, that you are worthy of being considered as a leader, who can lead us in the future. Mr. Gandhi you will have to rise above things like petty politics, easy political mileage and show us some real results. I know it will be a very difficult War, but then Wars are not won in a day. Wars are decided on the fate of small Battles. Battles like Mamata Banerjee fought in Singur, in Nandigram and ultimately won the thirty plus year long War against left. And as caution my dear friend once said; you cannot win every Battle, you’ll have to pick your Battles to win. Pick your Battles today and leave behind petty skirmishes and the big War is coming soon, but its fate is already being built upon. And if you fail to take notice of all these things, that cruel word RESULTS will not be a happy reading for you.

Android killed my Laptop

My roomie won’t be too happy reading this post as he’s an Apple fan bigtime, who worships Steve Jobs. And he is sitting beside me when I’m writing this, probably thinking about coding some rival application. But that’s how the world is today. It’s no longer Mac vs. Windows or Linux. It’s the cell phones that have taken the world by storm now. I could hardly remember the day when I started becoming so heavily dependent on cell phones. Was it when I got my hands on N-series or iPhone?

Back in 2005 when in school, it started using Linux mostly openSUSE and the Ubuntu. And with my geeky friends who all are now engineers used to argue Mac or Linux, yeah Windows was never in discussion. Fast forward to 2011, I landed in Bangalore sharing a room with another geek working for an IT company and for the past one week all we have been discussing has been Android, MeeGo, Symbian or iOS. And as I love arguing, the debate is still on.

But it’s not that PC OS are out of our debates. It’s out from daily chores as well, starting from checking my email, Facebook, Twitter and many other things. I actually prefer using my Cell phone to complete these tasks, and of course for music, although that is shared by my iPod also. And beyond these usual suspects, I read News, play Solitaire (love the game), of course Angry birds and so many more things. Those who know me know what those so many things mean.

So one would ask the obvious question why Android, all these things were even accomplished by cell phones that came before it. Well I say the same reason, they (Nokia...coughs) are not selling and Droids are. But as my Boss says “Nothing is obvious in life”, so let’s dig a little more.

I bought my current droid (x10i) last year and now I’m planning to buy Galaxy SII (Let those bucks once). The reason I would say it was Android and not even Apple, is because even my friend from school who once asked how to unmute his laptop (yes he did) is posting updates on Facebook underneath which is written via Facebook for Android. It came to masses and with a UI that was simple with apps which were too many and free.

With features such as the Swype keyboard and some real fancy pyrotechnics (No I am not wrong I used that word intentionally) they give it gives me a rich and a way better experience than my Crap (Windows) loaded laptop. That’s the reason I would say “Android killed my laptop”

I do use my laptop sometimes and although I agree it will never cease to exist, but nowadays it’s more like Sourav Ganguly in there, can deliver a lot and useful sometimes but who requires it all the time.

P.S- I posted this from my phone. And special thanks to my friend @kachuaChap from twitter who tweeted the title I used.

Will the same brand of justice ever be served in India?

I just couldn’t ignore the coincidence. In US, Rajaratnam was held guilty on all 14 counts of insider trading and back here in India we got the free for all access to Amar Prem Katha. And for the icing on top, I read a lot more about Niira Radia too. So as Rajaratnam is staring at 20 years in a federal prison, my question is will the same kind of justice ever be served in India?

Rajaratnam was no ordinary person, no. 236 on Forbes list of wealthiest people in US, richest Sri Lankan alive he rubbed shoulders with who’s who of Wall Street. He hired a team of one of the most expensive attorneys but contrary to what his peers in the hedge fund industry thought, he couldn’t escape conviction.

Back to India, how many big Corporates have we indicted? How many seen the inside of a jail and remained there? None expect for Raju (R another strange coincidence, Holy crap my name also begins with R) as far as I can remember. But what about other big shots who have been known to committing corporate crimes like Anil Ambani, Praful Patel etc.

The Niira Radia and Amar Singh tapes clearly reveals the nexus that is going on between corporate, politicians and even media now. These low life people are destroying and killing the Indian Dream when it is still in its infancy. All I have been seeing throughout the day has been mockery and cheap humour of both these tapes. But I am yet to see any action. I know many more like me think we can rise up the others and get noticed, but with tapes like this coming out don’t be ashamed of the route these people might take.

The last ray of hope we had was a unbiased media and a honest judiciary which has been literally stripped and is laughing back at us make me feel like a fool, a donkey. We dream of catching up with the West and all I can say is we are living in a fool’s paradise. We are bound to stay behind and will always be looked upon as the underprivileged, downtrodden ones unless we stand up, take notice, leave IPL for a moment and do something. I don’t know what that something can be or will be, but we will have to or let’s kill our dreams right now. I just ask one thing.

Will there ever be same justice irrespective of Caste, Creed, Domicile, Wealth or Political connections?

Sadness

Hadn’t it been for the sadness in the world, we wouldn’t have had some beautiful poetry. We wouldn’t have Shakespeare’s tragedies, Homer’s Iliad, Vikram Seth’s A Doctor's Journal Entry. Hadn’t it been for the sadness in the world, we wouldn’t have Happiness...................

That one again

When I was alone,

I feared it.

When you were gone,

I felt it.

But it came with such a pain,

That all went in vain.

I tried to cry,

But with these dry eyes,

How could I cry.

But I went on with the thought,

What upon me had I brought.

I had no answer,

And also none to seek one.

For I once again,

Became that one again.

Osama, Obama and Why a Terrorist?

Last week while going through my timeline on twitter, my brain crashed, went abruptly into a reboot and booting was only possible in safe mode. That meant going offline, disconnecting myself from all sources of media. But was that possible, yeah you all predicted right, it wasn’t. I was soon back online. Going through my timeline, flickering through web pages, looking at some, where it said Obama killed Osama and sometimes in pursuit of being fast, the other way around.

But it was a treat for the media and the twitter world. Both sections went abuzz. For media it was something they dream every day, a spectacle to be given proper coverage. So totally senseless articles such as TOI’s fictitious description of the Navy SEAL also made their way in, once again displaying new lows our Journalism has achieved. But apart from these a bigger question loomed.

I have always been confused, thinking about why people choose the path of becoming a terrorist. Everywhere one sees, it is said that a terrorist has no religion one country etc. But although the former one is very controversial, the latter one seems to have been found. Of late Pakistan has been seen as a country which not only shelters terrorism, but also is now the hub.

But all these things aside, again the same question rises how one can take the dramatic step, how can one be so brutal. Have we ever thought who is a terrorist and who is not or we choose what our media tells us to? I decided to take some help from a professor of ours. Professor Google. As I expected there is no internationally agreed definition. We all think a guy who spread terror is a Terrorist. Well if that is the case I have faced a lot of terrorists in my time at school and college. So as it is goes, it is up to a nation’s discretion or the big daddy controlled UN’s.

They say everyone part of the Al-Qaeda pledged allegiance to Osama himself. A guy who they thought lived in caves, away from the riches that he would have inherited. A guy who was a veteran of a war that saw the Soviets bite the dust. A guy who people thought has only one mission, to see the west go down. But was it that people chose to be a terrorist just because of that one guy. If it was so, then I guess we’ll soon witness the end of Al-Qaeda at least.

I decided to go some years back, some 30 years, when Punjab was under militancy. Another person having credentials of the same magnitude emerged there also. Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale was seen as a charismatic man, a man who revived a movement of extremism in Punjab. Whose only motive in the later part of his life was to have a separate Sikh state known as Khalistan, exactly on the lines of our beloved neighbour Pakistan. But then many horrifying incidents happened including Operation Blue Star, fake encounters killing many innocents and finally normalcy returned. Punjab was peaceful, En route to being prosperous again. What happened later, the politics is a different story although.

So I decided to do some thinking and came up with an answer. The reason a person chooses to be a Terrorist is the same why a person chooses to be a Cricketer or an Actor. They all get influenced by someone in that field. But then as I have a habit of contradicting myself, I couldn’t refrain from saying isn’t it those role models come after one has picked up a trade or is it really the other way around? Well this has one again left me scratching my head. If anyone of you readers have some theory please feel free to comment. For the moment let me scratch my head a bit more, I think I have some itching problem #$@)*%

Robin Hood was a terrorist!

Last week all of us were given topics to speak on, for the last evaluation of our Effective Business Communications sessions. Like the rest I was also given two topics, one being the title of this post and the other one being “The creative artist’s freedom to creativity is a threat to social stability”. The second one was so long that I lost my breath when I read it the first time, so I decided to stick to the first one, which I thought would be easy to prepare, although that was not the case eventually. But nevertheless I went forward and below is what I thought would be the script, which again was not the case.

Honestly speaking I was perplexed when I first looked at this topic. Robin Hood is and has been one of my favourite childhood heroes. I had no answer, not even any idea where to look for them. No clue at all.

But then it reminded me of Krishna sir and I saw a ray of hope with secondary research. I decided to dig deep and read as much as possible about Robin Hood and Terrorism.

I was surprised to find out that there was no fixed, universally accepted, agreed upon definition of terrorism or who is a terrorist. The closest I came was this UN General Secretary report which stated “Terrorism is any act which causes bodily harm with an objective of intimidating a larger population”. And terrorist is anyone

Whose methods are violent in nature,

Whose aims and motives are Political in nature,

Whose actions have a wide psychological effect than the immediate victim,

And who works with an organization with a clear cut chain of command.

After reading this, I was even more confused. I thought how Sherwood’s Prince of Thieves could be one of such.

Yes his methods were Violent in nature. Yes his action had a far wider psychological effect than on the immediate victim, so much so that even King John felt it. And yes he had an organization called the “Merry Men” with him being the leader.

But what was it that he really did? He robbed the rich and gave it to the poor. He was what a lot of economists call today a believer of “Equitable Distribution of wealth”. If he would have existed a few centuries down the line, his name would have been taken with the likes of Lenin or even Karl Marx. He championed poor’s cause, a hero of the poor, and a messiah for the oppressed.

He cannot be termed as a terrorist, at best a communist. I believe Robin Hood was a terrorist or hero depends upon from which side of the fence you are looking through.

MBA for a receptionist!

So here comes another Sunday. It’s been a while I rested on a weekend and not go for some partying or shopping. But I have to say as much as I love partying, travelling or shopping, this time I really liked a quiet and alone Sunday. As the first thing on my checklist was to get a good amount of sleep for my sleep deprived body, so I woke up in the afternoon when finally my back started aching. And then as always I had missed my breakfast and lunch at the hostel mess is an option that I never consider. So I decided to take a walk and treat myself to some paranthas. That is how I ended up settling for the nearest market to our hostel which is Kailash. I went there, got my cell phone recharged, another thing I can strike off the checklist and ordered some paranthas. At that point only one thing crossed my mind if only I could have mom’s handmade paranthas. I got my order and started eating. Just as I was engrossed in them, some advertisement struck my eyes. It was one of those kinds where you take out a printout and you go around the town pasting them on the walls. It read

Required-Receptionist

Salary- 6000-8000

UG/Graduates/MBA

I was stunned. It really shook me. I was so taken aback that I forgot I was having food. How can an MBA even think of doing the job of a receptionist, leave alone the salary. You go to a B-school, pay around half a million Rupees at least and then go through the entire rigor to be an MBA. They teach you operations, marketing, finance, HR, strategy and what not. How a person after learning so much, can even think of being hired as a receptionist? I started thinking, my mind now totally diverted from the fact that I had no food for the last 15 something hours and now a plateful of paranthas lied in front of me and only me. I thought, how can that person who gave that advertisement, think of hiring an MBA for the specific job. Well It didn’t require too much of thinking. It takes no Sherlock Holmes to figure out that we are living and studying in a fractured system. A system which has stuck to the old notion of just getting admission in a college and then go through the motions and one thinks he will end up having a job. This has what led to the dilution of what MBBS, MBA or other educations really meant. Many of us study because we think we don’t have enough education to match how much we want to earn. And we forget the fact that it not the education but the capabilities that matter. We forget that in the real world nobody gives a damn what degree you have, they see what you can do. What results you can deliver. I think the person who gave the advertisement, is aware of the same fact. He knows he might hire an MBA for the job of a receptionist but then that’s all he or she might be capable of. Here I am not questioning our education system, what I am questioning is our mindset, how we approach our life at college. Are we one of those who just go through the motions and are desperately waiting for two years to end, so that they can finally earn something, or are we part of the other breed who approach everyday as to learn something new and make a change in them. Are we the same what we were a year ago or there is a fundamental change in how we think, how we act. These all are questions I think all of us who have this huge burden on their shoulders to be dubbed as nation’s future should ask oneself. What am I here for?

AND I THINK REALITY IS UNDERRATED.

What do we live for?

Last few days, something has happened but it has been hard for me to put it in words. I have been unable to figure out what that has been and more precisely why? I have been running here and there for years, reading lots of stuff, questioning it, discussing it with people looking for answers. But it never occurred to me what was the question. But suddenly today it happened. I started thinking about what was the question. But still what really was the question is irking me. And then it struck me, WHAT DO I LIVE FOR? You might think what am I talking about? This is a fundamentally simple question. And that is what really is, a fundamentally simple question and one with a very hard to be answer.

I started thinking. I decided to look around, looking for people close to me and what might they be living for. Is it the family? Or that dream? , Or the money? How could be the answer, to such a simple question be so tough to be answer. I have read numerous books, numerous blogs, many newspapers, magazines etc. But all that looks like going for a toss, when I try to answer this question. I close my eyes and I feel this dark hollow black area where feel I am struck, looking for the way out. I see myself standing and wherever I look it all looks the same and I get no idea which way to go. Am I living for money or to be with the people I love or a dream which is so vague that it makes modern art look meaningful? What is it?

We all come to this world with a blank mind and we all get to know this world and ourselves gradually, taking each step with the help of our parents, friends and others who influence us over a period of time. I don’t know why but somehow after the time this question struck me, I have been unable to find answer to any dilemma that came my way. And this thing is so bothering that it is making me feel as if I am asphyxiating. Well most of us look for answer in the people who have influenced us over a period of time. Our parents, achievers, our friends or might be a big brother. And there is where my confusion even becomes more acute. I really don’t understand where to look for answers. I look at those in Egypt fighting for a cause and many losing their lives for it. Do we live to fulfil a cause? Then I look at people who study day and night to be something, but what something? I know this post is full of questions and I really don’t know what to write more. But if someone is reading this do try to answer this question. “WHAT DO WE LIVE FOR?”