Jan 1, 2009

Awesome

Imagining

Life is complex;
handle the real and the imaginary parts separately!!
(Dont mess up the real and the imaginary parts!!)

Intermittent Thoughts

People said I was hopeless.. Then I became romantic..
Now I am a hopeless romantic!!

dard-e-dil pe aisa namak pada,
ki saari bimaari duur ho gayi!!

Sry for that :P
Let the music begin..

Roads

"A bend in the road is not the end of the road, unless you fail to make the turn"

Life Cycle Simplified

'Birth->Pain->Suffering->Struggle->Achievement->Pleasure->Death'
and they say - "All the world's a stage"

Thoughts Part 3

In imagination you are bound by your knowledge, but knowledge knows no bounds.
Know More :)

All you dreamt was just a dream.

No experience can let you experience eternity but for eternity itself.

Blood

Good people should not taste blood.
But the fact is that only good people can appreciate the taste.

.....

Tonite I write the happiest of all lines.

PS - Thank you Mr. Pablo Neruda

Alternative Answer

42

Giano Trulli

Thinking of the things I have lost, I have really lost a lot, physically.

Answer

The issue with God's language is that God speaks in silence.
Hence to understand that u need to be silent, hence patient, hence me.
yeah :(
:)

Enjoy the contradictions.
Let there be light :)

Emotions

Emotions, pls dont come my way.
You know I cant handle you.

Questions

Why should I strive for greatness..
Why should I be a pioneer..
Why should I make this world a better place..
Why be myself?

Why should I not talk..
Why should I have no emotions..
Why should I not get what I want..
Why should I not be sad..
Why be myself?

Why should I loose my focus..
Why should I care for the person I care so much..
Why should I not express myself..
Why be myself?

Looking for my guide. Looking for my light.

X, Y

X: Do you believe in God?
Y: I believe in believing in God until we realise that there is no God.

What does this mean?

4 of the 5 blogs that I visited just now had a recent post on cancer, Including mine.
yeh kya ho raha hai?

Sharing

I have lots to share. But I wont. Not that I dont want to.
But I guess its better I dont.

Thoughts again..

The second edition of Thoughts, the first one of which had got me blogging after a long hiatus.. So, here goes the post again:

It all started with my birth and will end in my rebirth.

Whole of my life has been a flashback.
(Hope this becomes my epitaph!!)

Most of the times you get what you want, from the things you dont do. But for that you got to be persisitantly doing the things you are supposed to do.

You dont know whats in store for you until you go out shopping.

Ppl ought to know this:

Goodbye Randy Pausch
Randy Pausch - The Last Lecture
Randy Pausch speaks at CMU commencement

How to start?

Itna kuch karna hai
aur mai kuch nahi kar raha :( :(

Maroon Day

Jahan dekho same color..
Never felt so 'common' before.

Indian Democracy

Who are we fighting against?

Seeker

Seeking eternity in transience and
transience in eternity.

A common man, i guess.

God

Weird

I have been keeping myself from writing this for quite sometime now. But I guess I cant keep it anymore. Preparing to leave the place was painful and whole of the last week was just overwhelming. Having met so many wonderful ppl and recieving their love and affection in abundance was simply overwhelming. In order to not expose my vulnerable side ( which is a janmon janmon ka issue with me as mentioned in A new me) I might have been weird in my behavior here most of the times. Sorry to anyone if that had hurt!

Weirder are things back here I guess. If only the politicos could realise the harm they are doing to their own progeny, at the least. CPM and BJP coming together should be the worst thing to sheve off the nuke deal. The kind of forces that have formed the opposition are really threatening. The fundamentals of their existence are being shattered. The sad part is that they know that we the people will choose to ignore this (atleast thats what they are hoping and unless we wake up this is gonna continue) and vote them back in the next election. Because afterall they are over own Hindu saviours and workers' messiah against the Italian watchdog.

Enough damage has been done now to wake up. We have been ignorant in the guise of being 'tolerant' and in the process have lost the shine of our past. I pity those who still believe that India is a super power and that it is the light for the world. The chidiya has long deserted us not because they stole it but because we in our ignorance guised as tolerance has allowed that to happen. The ignorance today is to not understand that without adopting to technology we cant feed over ever increasing population. Do they aspire to feed this population on the basis of a hand plough? Or are they hoping for some Devata to come down and help us cross the bridge?

I would be the last one to believe the necessity of one particular thing as the sole saviour. But the ground reality is that India badly needs infrasturucture to support its growth. We all know this. Power is one major issue and this deal is one good step in that direction. If you dont like it please suggest an alternative. Ignoring the problem is the worst way of 'solving' it.

Let there be light :)

Good Morning India!!

Am back home..
flight on time.. no jetlag ;) thoda sa sir dard but after a gud sleep last nite. Everything's fine.
but iit still has few more days b4 it sees me.

btw started writing this in the morning. but with a powercut and snail pace net at home.. finally am publishing it in d afternoon :P
Lagta hai mere saath India ko bhi sudharna hoga.

tab tak ke liye.. Good Morning India!! and
enjoy :)

Aankhari Raat

Gud nite.

Does this need a title?

While trying to prove something wrong, quite often you end up doing the wrong thing.

Some Recent Trips

Lives of great men all remind us,

that we can also make our lives sublime,

and leaving back footprints,

on the sands of time.

- Henry Longfellow (1807-1882)

[visited his house]

Woods are lovely...

...

...

... and miles to go before I sleep.

- Robert Frost (1874-1963)

[visited his house too..  :)]

Interestingly these were close Arians too.

That means I m going to mars too..

yuhooo :)

Sorry

But 50th one for 2008.

Stop it!!

Stop

Shayad I have to stop now otherwise u wud need someone to compile my stuff and I would be hanged too :(

Let there be light :)

Lo(ve)ok

Seek and ye shall find.

- shayad Jesus ne kabhi bola tha.

Total Chill

2nd last official day..

no work all play :)

knowledge

The knowledge that you have today was learnt yesterday and would be unlearnt tomorrow.

zindagi

Kuch pal aur jeena hai, e maut

tujhe thoda sa intezaar aur karna hoga..

- dont remember the exact words and the source.

My feelings during the last 5 days of this great experience called US of A.

Adventurous, Hectic, Emotional :)

July 4, 2008

Break the Silence

Hey

X: If u get up u will be awake.

Y: But the train goes to Mars.

X: Do you  like mango?

Y: I prefer football.

X: Its cold outside.

Y: Ohh the children have the umbrella.

X: But its hot.

Y: Good so the train is late now.

X: Are u awake?

Y: Goodnight.

California?

Aise hi

World

The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible.

-Einstein

WALL.E

bolna zaroori hai kya?

If Only

If only I could be on time,

I would be god.

A gr8 Sundae!

Had a wonderful Sunday afternoon..

Having food, reading newspaper on the chair outside the restaurant out on the streets.. in this amazing weather (20 deg C) in the company of cool breeze.. Ohh, I'm lovin it.

Moreover observing ppl moving on the Boylston Market Street brought up 2 major feelings in me..

1) Felt as if it was the 8th century India when ppl used to move in complete oblivion of their worries enjoying the company of their mates.. and yet here I am in the 21st century US.

2) Observing the way the couples of various age groups held each others hand, I did see a pattern.

A pattern in the way they felt in each others company.

...clicked a few pics..but won't share them for free :P

Let there be light :)

Belief

When u know something's gonna happen.. is that expectation?

Or is it belief?? ;)

Kya karein kuch logon ke funde hi clear nahi hai :P

Can You Believe It?

Yuhoooooo.. I did it :)

thank u :)

God

Do Or Die

Date

Had a date with the Father of my field :)

1000 papers..

500 patents..

200 companies..

One Man.

Mazaak hai kya?

There is plenty of room at the bottom!

These days everybody seems to be so busy.

Mac D : I'm lovin it..too :)

Lab Discussions

Topic of the discussion: If you can't avoid it, enjoy it.

I came up with the following:

Agar chor khidki se ghus raha ho toh.. darwaza khol do.. bhag jayega.

Glass half full?

No matter how hard you try.. seeing glass half full will only quench ur thurst :)

[phoenix] Ascetic Me??

FYI.. with all humility.. this ascetic is learning ballroom dance in amrika..and making good progress at it :)
I want to be the most ascetic materialist this mankind has ever produced :P

Enjoying the contradictions..
Awareness is everything :)

Expectation

I read it somewhere:

Everybody is self-centred. Its only the radius that matters.

Understanding it now :)

Life and Death

Why do we fear death?

Fear of failure is reasonable as we can work hard to avert it. But death is not a failure. It is as inevitable and as natural as life.

About Me

I don't prefer talking unless it is needed..

...Am i changing?

I don't know.. but thank u.

... i guess, thats it :) 

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

This was my first visit to a museum of this kind. Not exactly the first visit to a museum as I had visited one back in Bombay when I was a child. But the previous experience had left me feeling much apprehensive for this one. Moreover the word 'Art' in the name ranged alarm bells in my ears. As even though I appreciate art I have no technical sense as one of my friend who is a great painter. So I feared I would be easily spotted out as a naive amongst the 'elite class'. Par fiter toh mai hu hi.. So I mustered all the courage (The little Technical Art Wisdom I have, in case I end up in an artistic conversation with fellow visitors) and entered the museum ...lekar prabhu ka naam.

To my astonishment it was not the 'Modern Art on paper' that I had envisaged. It was truly a holistic art museum if one may say so. The 'art' comprising vivid expressions of human society and thus was obviously out of the bounds of 2-dimensional sheets. Though there were some canvases as well but even they seemed to bring alive multiple dimensions in their portrayal. Thus I was now on a comfortable pasture but the ground to be covered was even more stupendous task. So I decided to take free guided tours with the museum personnel to the various galleries in the museum each lasting about an hour and half ish.

It started with the 'Art of the Asia' tour. The firang lady guide first took us to the Indian section. Showed us a Ganesha statue procured from a place dating to 13th century A.D. Madhya Pradesh. Now this was amazing.. Imagine hearing the story of Ganesha from a firang. And she told us the story about the birth of Ganesha. It sounded wonderful coming from her. After this, how could mostlybhu remain silent? So, I told her and the fellow visitors another story of Ganesha which everyone seemed to enjoy :) Then came other deities, coins, stone engravings all belonging to various dates back in various points in time of the Indian civilisation. There were some early Indian paintings too.. mostly on tree bark kind of stuff. Next came the Buddha section and the Chinese gallery. This I must say was one of the most humbling experience for me. We all know that though Buddhism started in India but its true growth actually took place in China. The museum's effort in creating a 'real' Buddhist temple of the 8-10th century A.D. was simply awesome. There were a huge wonderful collection of statues of various Buddhas. Yes for the uninitiated like me, there are actually believed to be different Buddhas with different characteristics in Buddhism. And this was the advantage of a guide that we were provided key inputs from the civilisation during those times. It helped as it came from rigorous program that each guide has to go and was certainly more than what we have read from our history books.

Next was the Chinese section that raised a few deep thoughts in my mind. May be we Indians have a grudge against the modern day China mostly because of our experiences, competition, oppressive communist policies of China or whatever. But there really existed a profound exchange of ideas between the early Indian and Chinese civilisation and that was clearly evident in the galleries. Also after seeing the Chinese culture in their architecture (that was displayed through a 8th century A.D. Chinese house), paintings and other symbols I am totally convinced about the proximity of both cultures. Moreover, seeing the progression it was quite apparent that we seemed to have forgotten our roots (may be because of the Mughal invasion, the British Colonalisation or whatver) while the Chinese through their diligence have built upon their base (may be by resisting all invasions??) to achieve what they have achieved so far. Thus, now I am not as frustrated on seeing a Chinese in US as I am on seeing an Indian in US. The only reason being the difference in their attitude. Hope the future generation including me realise our potential as has been documented in the vedas and the Upanishadas. We have a way to go before even thinking of 'calling Bombay the Shanghai of India' or even 'blaming the Chinese Communism for the failure of Nuclear Deal'. There is a severe need for introspection.

Finally came the Japanese section which was more of an influence of Chinese culture. The only different aspects being the vividly coloured Kimonos on display and the Samurai culture. As I was wondering over the Chinese section didn't get to absorb much of the Japanese section.

Thus the tour ended and came the realisation that yours truly was infact out of the lab on the pretext of attending a technical conference (which had actually finished before I entered the museum ;) ) and thus needed to get back to the lab ASAP. Fortunately, I could revisit the museum on my ticket. So I decided to cover up 'The Egyptian and the Ancient Greek and Roman World' in my next trip. As I am not used to writing long posts, I would cover up the other tour, which was equally enlightening, some other time.

Happy

Had been restless for the last few days and was unrestful when the day began. and was until late afternoon when some discussion with a lab mate brought up the song chura lo na dil mera.. to my mind from the movie Kareeb. Posting the video below. 

Now seem to have got the vibe back :)

Orkut

Today's fortune: You are very expressive and positive in words, act and feeling.

kya baat kar raha hai?

Gud nite.

Zindagi

Itna mat socho..

jo achcha lagta hai karo..

zindagi mein aaye ho..

khao, piyo, aish karo aur mar jao...

prakash ko rehne do ;)

The Aries Effect

...

.... I guess it is only in silence that we can better comprehend the Aries Effect like any other effect in life.

Know Thyself.

Strength

God, like all the moments in the past and all the moments to come in the future please give me the strength this one last time to carry out the task I am here to do.

Fate

You don't know what's in store for you until you go out shopping.

When you do what you have to do then you get what you have to get, which almost always is more than what you want to get.

21 years of my life

I can't believe that I am 21 yrs old. Not that I ain't mature enough.. On that front I guess I am more mature than a 40-50 yr old (or atleast equal coz after that I guess the reverse trend begins) and I am sure the ppl who know me would agree on that.
But just the feeling that I have spent 21 long earth years on this great planet makes it unbelievable.

Let there be light :)

Believing is Everything.

Leisure & Me

One of my biggest problem is that I take leisure too seriously.
Mujhe sudharna hoga :)

Existence

Unless there is no existance, I exist.

Simplicity

Simplicity of complexity is what makes up a holistic viewpoint.

Enjoy

Enjoy what you get and get what you want.

Love and Loss

Its about one of the pleasant experience I had last week...

To begin with, my stay here in US of A is turning out to be a really good one. The interestingly weird part being that my 'Todays Fortune' in Orkut is coming out at the appropriate time everyday... I guess, this may be because of the time difference between India and US and the time at which Orkut updates its server! What implications does it have??! I don't know... But this post is not about that.
I have been fortunate (as usual :)) to have met all the wonderful people out here. I am really thankful to everyone to have provided me a new perspective on life :)..... But this post is not about that too.
Its about the way the events shaped up before and after the loss of my cell phone.... and its about the realisation I had during the whole process that has made me to come up with this post.
So, here goes the story...

I was on this beach called 'The Revere Beach' in Boston when I lost my phone. I admit that it was completely my fault to begin with... But as I have mentioned in one of my previous posts... you can never be choosy about the experiences you have, but you definitely have the choice to decide the way you want to feel about it. In my case, I think thats what was in store for me. As even after identifying the guys who stole my phone, I didnt approach them... I know what you must be thinking about me right now :) But thats the way I am. And the reason I am writing about this incident is that strangely I did not feel like loosing anything after the incident... To cut the long story short... when I called to my phone, a guy picked it up and demanded 100$ to get the phone back. Moreover he asked me to come to a secluded place in Boston to collect the phone. When I narrated this to a friend at the fraternity where I am staying, he suggested me to call the police and seek their help. Now here in starts the most interesting part...
The police department transferred me from one office to another. Finally, one of the officer asked me to visit him in person to lodge the complaint :) After going there, this is what I had to hear from the Massachussets State Police official, "We are short of personnel to accompany you and better you dont go there as you may get shot down. This is a bad bad world, dude." Imagine this coming from a police officer in the US of A :) I guess you are getting to what I am trying to point out. It does not matter if we are Americans, Europeans, Asians or Africans. At the end of the day we are all the same...HUMANS... the way we function, the way we think.

Uptil here it was all a learning and I did not feel anything... again that's me :) May be thats because of the experiences I have had in my life till now. And as I have again mentioned in one of my previous posts... I m learning to enjoy the contradictions. But when it was time to buy a new phone did it occur to me the loss I had just suffered. Loosing the phone numbers can always be regained I guess. But with the phone goes all your cherished SMSes... memorable pictures... and videos that you had preserved for so long, managing the memory each time not to delete those special ones even by mistake. But with the loss of this phone everything was just lost for ever... Moreover for me, the phone I had just lost was the last new thing, I had stubbornly demanded from my Dad... :) This experience was a reminder to me and may be for all of us to 'passionately live a dispassionate life'...while enjoying the contradictions of life.

Again I wish this for you as I wish for myself...Let there be awareness. And before it gets too dark...Let there be light!

Thoughts

As mentioned in the Videos post... from now on I also plan to post the multitude of quotations and thoughts that come to my mind daily.... afterall why should I suffer alone? So, here goes the thoughts post:

If your sole mission in life is to find a mission then you are inevitably bound to find one.

knowledge is just an awareness, the point is to understand the need and needs arise out of awareness.

not creating a problem is solving one.

there is nothing about me that you would want to know, except who i am! and that depends on who you are.
so first tell me who you are and then i would tell you who i am.
'know thyself'

"a guaranteed return for your money."
egoist or self-confident?
i am confused.
check out for yourself and let me know.

i spent so much time knowing myself that i forgot who i was.. so right now, i am what i am.

(new knowledge)/(eagerness to know) = 1

god wants us to be atheist so that in learning his greatness we can discover ours.

when u are alone, don't talk to anybody.

The greatness of a theory lies in the simplicity of its practicality.

There is either a right way or the wrong way. The middle path leads nowhere and the previous two leads to the same destination called death.

True knowledge lies in staying ignorant of what you know.

Videos

Its said that a picture speaks more than a thousand words... 

how many equivalent words could you find for a video?

So, in an attempt to express my feelings and my thoughts, I would in this post be putting up video links of the videos that have had an indelible impression on me. I am sure each one of you  would enjoy it as well....

aur haan... from now on I also plan to post the multitude of quotations and thoughts that come to my mind daily.... afterall why should I suffer alone? But that would be in a different post.

and one last thing... recently I read that "The best part of attaining a goal is the journey"... so I guess I would like to share this wonderful journey of mine to have the goal of a meaningful life for one and all.

So, here goes...

1) Subvert the Paradigm

2) Failure

3) Michael Jordan - I believe I can Fly

4) Think Different - Apple

5) Steve Jobs - Stanford 2005

Ashoka

King Ashoka once said: "Give me time and I will conquer the world."
I say: "Give me time and I will conquer myself."

PS: I am not sure about Ashoka's statement.
But history did give him The Battle of Kalinga.

Open up

Samay ke baad aur bade logon ke pehle kisi ko bolne ka mauka nahi milta.

Well the first part is simple. I had the student discount coupon to Domino's and forgot to mention it while placing the order. Thus had to forgo the offer.
Now about the second and also a bit about the first. Had a busy Sunday today. First the GRE class, then a meeting with the meditation group followed by a lunch together. Then the "History in the making" UK-India Entreprenuers Summit. It turned out to be an exhilarating event. But in order to not spoil the image of IIT, as had happened 3 years back when a senior posed a stupid question to the then Chinese Premier, I was sceptical about myself right from the start. Why do I think so much? So I ended up not raising the most pertinent issue and letting it all go unspoken.

May be it was because of the one mistake I made early in my life that is holding me back most of the times to speak out my mind. But then to dissect further, I have been an introvert throughout my life. I distinctly remember not claiming a prize though I was way ahead of the winner back in pre high school. May be its because I tend to be perfect within, before expressing it out to the concerned. In the process not letting the concerned know the whole picture and leaving the subject decieved with the outcome of my stupid conclusions. May be its because of this whole scientfic assumptions and methodical training that I recieved early in my life. I am not blaming it all to it. Coz it has helped me in some of the crucial events. But still there is room for improvement.

Its hard time, I start applying the first sentence of this blog which is a fact of life. May be thats what all our pursuits are directed towards. Haves are different from Have Nots because they have got this point strong in their head. We always look for that extra time that extra space to use and if you waste all that time in thinking to perfection, Man you are not gonna make it. Open up.

Lately, I have started observing things that were so obvious to others. Don't know if it was because I had no time before or I was heading in the wrong direction. But its good to be learning the fulfilling lessons of life. And as I have said over and over again: Let there be illumination. Let there be light.

Mai aisa kyun hu?

Mai itna bada alsi hu ki chahta hu, bina aram kare hi aram ho jaye.
Mujhe sudharna hoga.

My Daddy Strongest

You are the wind that nourishes the saplings,
You are the light that provides the warmth,
You are the rain drops that soothes the skin,
You are my Dad and
My Daddy Strongest.

- Happy Birthday Pappa.

So Long And Thanks For All The Fish

No, this post is not a review of the 4th book of THHGTTG series. But one thing a casual reader of this blog would have guessed from my recent posts and the aura around this blog, is that I am a big fan of THHGTTG. Well, that I am.

But this one is even closer to my heart. Here in lies the answer to my life, universe and everything around me. The incidents that have shaped me are the ones I value the most. Its not by choice that I invited them. But I do take the responsibilities of the acts I performed, which I believe were the apt thing for me at that point of time. Obviously, thus I may have been weird, incomprehensible or repulsive at times. But with all your support and goodwill today I am in a position to understand life from a different perspective which would have simply been impossible if none of you were in my life.

Now that I stand on yet another crossraod, a crossroad I have been eying for long, all I feel is hope and zeal instilled by you. Let me have the strength to spread this vibe among the people around me.

Let there be light.

A New Me

I can't believe I am writing this. There had always been a fear in me to express out myself. Not that I never tried it or faced a failure attempting to express myself. But more than that it was due to a belief that one is responsible for his own actions and thus involving someone else in the process would unnecessarily violate the eternal law of universe. Yes, I actually believed in such things and thus created an air of loneliness around me. Trying not to complicate things I ended making things difficult for those who cared for me.

Its not that I have become an extrovert overnite but that I have realised the importance of expressions which are so inherently a fundamental to our existence as a social being. Hope I live up to the expectations of all the people who have stood by me through the rough times. I have always cared for you. But its just that I never told you. And thats what you will see in the new me.

Passion

I passionately hope to be dispassionately passionate about all things in my life. (hope that such a day would materialise someday)

Freedom At Last

I don't think that my life will ever be same again for i have tasted the 'exclusive' and the 'ever elusive' (atleast for me) freedom a two wheeler offers to guys of my age.
This freedom as it goes for any other human endeavour was not a windfall to me. It took me tonnes of pleadings and persuasions before the successful transfer of my TVS Scooty from Tarapur (a small town 100 km from Mumbai and the first nuclear power station of India) to Delhi could materialise.
The story goes like this...

In case you are hoping to know the explicit pleading procedure that I had to go through, I would like to state it at the outset that I have no intentions of disclosing it. Thus for the sake of letting you figure out your own reasons to have a two wheeler, I would instead mention here the aftermaths of the whole process. I believe that this process has been a exciting happening in my life.

Well, so it started with me packing my bags, atleast the thought of it, (as all my packings actually start 45 min prior to the departure time of the train, including in it the 25 min it takes me to reach station. Gosh, I need to change this habit!) a day before I was about to leave and my friends back home started suggesting all steps I should have taken a month in advance. And after braving them all, I embarked on the journey to delhi.

After reaching Delhi and getting my bike out of the station (which is yet another story of the Great Indian Efficiency at work and thus I won't describe it here) I was confronted first of all by all the masked (helmet) men for which I was not equipped. Thus began my race for getting into IIT premises before the patrolling team could get me, which I won ultimately. And this was a experience a God (law) fearing soul like me would cherish forever.

Warning: I know that this is worst anyone could get at describing things and my sympathies are totally with you for having to go through this (:P) Hope I improve sometime.

Aksar

Aksar aisa kyun hota hai
sochte hai joh, sochna unhe hi padta hai
mana ki sochna unhe bhata hai
par kya koi sochkar hi unhe yeh baat sujhata hai.