Life..or something like it...

A Thousand Words

2009-03-08T23:17:00.006+05:30

The second in the series (which unfortunately seems like the first)

Life In Technicolour

2009-03-08T22:38:00.008+05:30

A friend of mine recently invited to a photo exibition, and so this post i thought i'd post some photos that i had taken. I thought i'd divide this post into two, this post 'Life in Technicolour' which has a small collection of coloured photos and the next 'A Thousand Words' that consists of a black and white set. Have fun and let me know what you think.

If music be the food …maybe this one is stale

2009-03-05T19:58:00.004+05:30

A Nokia advertisement says, ‘Its music that connects us’, truer words have not been spoken. In my life music is everywhere, from the moment I wake till the time I go to sleep, and sometimes even sometimes when I’m asleep. It’s a love affair that started very early life, I still remember the ‘Simon and Garfunkle live in central park’ tape that dad used to listen to when I was a kid. I still have that tape in fact, and still do listen to it. It’s very odd that in the day of CD’s and DVD’s someone would still listen to a tape, but there you have it. There’s a certain charm that you get from listening to a tape, the timeless ‘crackle’ as the tape gets old, the fact that you can’t simply skip to ‘the good bit’ of a song, or listen to songs in a random order. That you have to listen to one entire side before you can even see what’s on the other side.

I was talking to a few friends the other day about music and how much things have changed, even from our teenage years (which wasn’t too long ago I might add, contrary to what some people say!) . Today music is a manufactured product. There was a time when a bunch of guys got together and started playing and that was a band. Today everything is thought and analysed. Record companies putting out audition notices to ‘form’ a new band, where a whole panel will judge primarily how you look, and incidentally if you can sing. No worries if you can’t write a single line of lyric, do you look good, can I sell you. Somewhere along the assembly line that produces these so called musicians, creativity is lost. People prefer sticking to a success formula. This is evident everywhere and is creeping into Hindi mainstream music too case in point Aatif Aslam who sticks to his Minor, Major, Major chord formula in every single song. The point that I’m getting at is that every aspect of the process is controlled by faceless organizations that decide what we should, and should not hear, and thereby restricting the creativity.

I was watching a documentary on TV the other day, called ‘Gods of Guitar’, that each week covers a different band. That week it was Pink Floyd. It’s phenomenal the kind of thought process that was put into a single track. The feel of the song was as important as the song itself. Each track had a different story to tell, a different purpose for its existence. Songs like Echoes (Floyd) or Change of Seasons (Dream Theatre) were more than 25 minutes long, because they needed to be. The song would change the bar count and shift from an 8-8 to a 7 and then back again, just like that. This is why there was so much variety in the album. These days a track is just 3-4 minutes that you need to fill on a CD. It’s the money epidemic! Every form of music that ever stood for something has now been infected. We no longer live in an era that produces superstars, like the Floyds, Dylans, Hendrixs, Knopflers or the Cobains. Instead we have the mediocres, who shine for the moment, a decade down the line will be forgotten. This is true for all sorts of music; No longer does Rap produce stars like Tu Pac Shakur, Biggie Smalls, and Public Enemy. There are exceptions of course and I think Marshall Mathers aka Eminem is one of those. His tracks always have a purpose and a story to tell, and don’t have absurd lyrics like ‘I got (w)ho(r)es in different area codes’. I think that kind of music is simply put, inexcusable. Its sad, I feel cause Rap, Rock, Grunge types of music always stood for something, and to see that mellow down, sell out or just lose focus is... well I just don’t have the words.

Hindi music is, well something that I was never too fond of anyway, for the mere fact that most of the music that came out when we were kids was, for lack of a better word crap. The songs from my mom’s era are still pretty damn good, and I still do listen to Kishore and Rafi, fairly regularly. The songs that came out in the middle were pretty terrible, and if they weren’t they were copies. Off late there has been a change of sorts and it’s been getting better. The filmy music is still crap but artists like the talented Rabbi Shergill seem to be changing that. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of talented singers out there, it’s just the money virus again.

The one genre of music that seems to be immune to this virus is Trance/Club music. It’s a genre that never listened to much, primarily because I didn’t understand it. It all sounded the same to me. But now that is not the case. Each track is different, and creates a different mood. The good thing is that the creativity is still alive in this genre. I was watching a DJ Tiesto concert a while back. And he invited a Violin player on stage, and recorded a segment live, and then mixed it live on stage, while jamming (if you can call it that) with the violin player, all LIVE! To watch someone create music then and there in front of you is a phenomenal feeling that I cannot describe. It’s still about the music, hope the other genres follow suit.

This blog has completely gone off on a different tangent. I wanted to talk about how music affects us, in terms of the lifestyle that we have, and the company we keep etc. guess that will have to wait till later.

Pointless III

2009-02-23T11:20:00.002+05:30

Someone i know recently said..
"If winners never Quit and Quitters never Win, then which fool came up with Quit while you are ahead!!"
Profound i think :p

Unfair Life??

2008-05-05T09:54:00.002+05:30

Here is something that my roommate said the other day, something that he had read, and its absolutely brilliant. Here it is

"Life is unfair,
but then, its unfair to everyone,
that makes life fair!!"

Absolutely brilliant!!! =)

Making A Bed

2008-05-05T09:12:00.003+05:30

Seeing people sleeping on the streets is something that I've seen most my life, its nothing new to me. Its something that never struck me as anything out of the ordinary, taken for granted i guess.

Living in Bombay i frequent Pune every weekend, and two days ago while in the bus, as it had stopped to let some people off, I saw a man on the footpath making his bed. It was a sight that had me transfixed. I could not pull my gaze away no matter how hard I tried. Making a bed is something that I do everyday, the man was doing exactly the same things that I do, pulling the corners, straightening out the wrinkles, tucking in the sheets, but the fact that he was doing this on the street is something that hit me like a storm. 'This is home for him, if it rains, if its cold or hot, this is home!' It really does strike a chord in you, possibly an Am or an Em, or one of the more melancholy chords, sorry an insider joke for those musically inclined, and more importantly a pathetic attempt a humour :p Jokes apart its really a sad sight so see, and made me want to try to help, don't know how or when yet, but i do want to.

Thats the thing with life, it'll show you the most ordinary, or regular sight in a different light and change your whole point of view in an instant.

Its Been a While II

2008-03-01T09:53:00.000+05:30

It seems i'm regularly irregular at this thing. It took someone to point out that the last post that i made here was almost a year ago, so i thought i'd come down and pay a little visit, plus its always fun to try and remember what password you had used while creating the account :p hehe; but now that the blog's been integrated with google i was automatically signed in. Bit of a shame i thought, robbed me of my fun.
Anyway like i was saying such a long time has passed since i posted anything that i doubt that i'll get round to trying to recollect the details ever. Some major events are however worth mentioning. Firstly that i successfully completed my Masters, did fairly well too, came second in college still didn't manage to beat Akshaya. If there ever was an example of healthy competition this surely wasn't it. I mean it was mostly just my obsession with trying to beat her really.. thats it.. she didn't even care. It never mattered how well or badly i did, but did i do better than her. Never happened!! VERY frustrating , hehe still it was all in good fun.
Secondly i got a job. I'm working for a company called Tata Technologies. I joined then in July of 2007 and have since then moved to Bombay. I'm currently working as a functional analyst dealing with database management, primarily working on UNIX, Oracle and Siebel.
The third and perhaps most important thing is that i've moved out of my house. 23 years of my life i've spent living with family, but now i live in Bombay in a dingy appartment with 2 other roommates. Its an entirely different type of exprience to live out of home, but that i'll leave for later cause i'm sure that there ae going to be a few posts on that soon :)
Apart from that everything has been regular, just like life... it happens

Without a destination

2007-04-15T18:20:00.000+05:30

Well its been a busy few days, weeks i guess... had a lot of work that had piled up and i need to get it done, but i finally got my project printed and submitted; On time that too! :D Sure there are a bunch of silly mistakes in it but then, perfection is so boring doesn't leave any room for creativity :P hehe
With all this work piled up you feel bogged down living in your own little world, its at times like these i wish that i could just get away from it all. There's this thing that i do at times like these that i find calming, and unfortunately i haven't been able to do that for a while, i guess its time now :) ... the simple solution that i have is to walk the streets, no purpose, no reason and most of all no destination... Just wander the streets and take in the life around me.I don't know why it calms me down, i guess its because it gives me a sense of detachment from all that's around me... you truly get to observe how life works and truly how diverse the people around you are. We spend all our time living in out own little world and that for us is the universe, moving along like mindless drones doing what is needed of us and then back to our little world. I guess the only analogy that i can see is looking at humans as blood cells doing everything with a purpose, do your job and nothing more, to truly understand the nervous system you need to lift yourself above the microscopic level, then and only then will you see the delicate, intricate and beautiful world that you exist in, the subtle similarities and the stark differences, the diversity!
i remember this one time when i was speaking to a rickshaw driver, an old chap and he was telling me all about his life, how his family has been living in the same house for over 150 years, about his kids.. another guy was telling me how he used to work in UAE and had to leave the country in fear of his life, this shoeshine who despite being well educated ended up on the streets for lack of a job. It really is a good reality check and makes you wonder if your life is really that bad... and it also makes you thankful for what you have. I guess that's why i find the experience calming. The words "Kindness of a Stranger " comes to mind makes you believe that people are inherently good :) a bit philosophical i know .. but still
and the best part bout whole thing is the irony that in order to get away from it all i end up being more connected to life :) a nice little side effect that! :)
I guess its time that i wander off without a destination again :)

......

2007-03-25T22:17:00.000+05:30

There are days when you have so much to say but cant get a word out...days when you just feel so helpless...

Pointlessness II

2007-03-23T21:58:00.000+05:30

Define a consumer.

According to the Indian consumer protection act (1986) a consumer is...

i) any person who buys any goods for a consideration which has been paid or promised or partly promised, or under any system of deferred payment and includes any user of such goods other than the person who buys such goods for consideration paid or promised or partly paid or partly promised, or under any system of deferred payment when such use is made with the approval of such person, but does not include a person who obtains such goods for resale or for any commercial purposes

OR

ii) hires or avails of any service for a consideration which has been paid or promised or partly promised, or under any system of deferred payment and includes any beneficiary of such services other than the person who hires or avails of the service for a consideration which has been paid or promised or partly promised, or under any system of deferred payment, when such services are availed of the approval of the first mentioned person!

WHAT??!!!

Pointlessness!!!!

2007-03-23T21:18:00.000+05:30

AHHHHH!! This shit is so frustrating! Ever tried filling out a bloody web form... you know the ones with the "submit" button... and usually right next to that is some button called "clear" or "cancel"!! That's just horse shit!! Nobody and i mean NOBODY!! takes pains to fill out the whole bloody form and then think "oh! darn it i've filled the whole thing wrong. Well thank god for this nifty clear button right here"... what inevitably will happen is that for some stupid ass reason you'll click that button ... cause the button that destroys ALL your work of hours is right next to the submit button!!...case in point...

Project Internal Deadline Up!!

2007-03-22T01:27:00.000+05:30

Well the title kinda gives it away doesn't it! Anyway...its really late now so i'll keep this short. I went to college today after ages and was greeted with the good news that we have our internal Project Vivas on friday.. THAT cheered me up at 7 bloody 15 in the morning!! hehe :D I've not seen so many people in college for a while now... nor have i seen such wide spread panic, you'd think they were on the sinking Titanic!! hehehehe! Everybody , and i mean everybody was busy today, doing this, making that, looking at books, looking for faculty, some running around like headless chickens not knowing what to do.
Its funny really, i think i was the only one today not doing anything(but more on that later). The notice for the presentation was put up weeks ago, just the date was missing. and yesterday the date was filled in! Its only then that all of us actually bothered to even read the notice to see what we need to do! hehe seems like no matter how much of a heads up you give a student , the only time he'll even start work is when he's neck deep in water and sinking fast!
I think i annoyed the hell out of most people today cause i was doing absolutely nothing! Just sitting around looking at other people doing there work, occasionally just randomly annoying them. The reason for that oddly enough was that for some weird reason i'd already finished most of what was required of me! :o!! I read that notice 3 times just to be sure! hehehe. The thing was that in Jan i'd got this thing in my head that i have not yet started my project(which i hadent), so for like a week and a half thats all I did, got a whole lotta work done, n then i used to do a little a day, n that effectively meant that i got most of it done. haha who would have thought that a stitch in time really does save nine!! :D The one odd thing however was that while i was in the lab annoying the hell out of people this one guy said to me..."dude youre lucky that your work is done"... n i just looked at him!... i mean what does luck have to do with it? Lady luck didnt come down and do my work, nor did anyone else... i did it... people definitely did help out no doubt about that and a big thanks to those who did, but at the end of the day i was the one who put it down on paper (or rather powerpoint), just because i did my work and that person didnt that makes me lucky?... :-?
I've been sitting online for a while now going through websites gathering matereal for the paperwork . Its the most boring thing that i have done in a while... its just read, edit, type!!!...I HATE IT! =D hehehe! still glad that thats all i gotta do!

heres a pic of the login screen! click to make it larger... =)

Stumble Upon

2007-03-14T21:27:00.000+05:30

I came across a wonderful new add-on for my internet browser today! its called "stumble upon" for mozilla! all you gotta do is specify your interests and it takes you to random websites that you may like! ITS BRILLIANT! I've seen sites that i never would have thought of even looking for! like this one where it asks whats in your fridge and cupboards and suggests recipes!! :D HOW COOL IS THAT!! I feel like a kid in a candy store today! The internet is truly as amazing place!

if interested you can download firefox at:
Get Firefox2 Here

and stumble upon at:
Get Stumble Upon Here

I Want be a Little boy

2007-03-12T20:23:00.000+05:30

Joseph Heller said "When I grow up i want to be a little boy". Today i wish that i could; i haven't laughed so much in a while. It was a lazy Sunday today and we decided to go bowling, decided not to and went to sheesha instead, sheet, abhi, pia, veena n i. sheet n i in the front, others in the back, they were haven't their little conversation, and sheet was just rambling. He was in what i like to call his 2/10th mood! hehe but that's a separate story. For some reason he was extremely frustrated and everything just kept annoying him. It all started when this guy on a bicycle cut in front of the car, so sheet honked, and that guy just gave him a dirty stare!! sheet's like "damn! what an asshole! i should just go and kick his hut down n that guy will be fucked! I just hate poor people. they all should just drop dead!" hehehe! funny to see such extreme frustration!

Sheesha was a chilled out affair. Just lazed around on the deewan with a hookah. some beer and eats and jazz playing. they had rolled back part of the roof at the end we were sitting at, it gave the whole place a Caribbean feeling.

After that we all went to the regular hangout ...Bliss. Met up with Vikram and a friend of his there. Sheet ,Vikram and I were in the same school, they were a year junior to me and we were just discussing all the stupid thing that we did in school, from being suspended for hanging n the basketball hoop, making our English teacher cry EVERY day! giving out physics teacher a nervous breakdown till she left school, locking the other physics teacher out of class, spraying ink on Tommy our vice principal, putting her obituary in the paper!! co-ordinating 10 alarm clocks and hiding then all around class to ring at 2 min intervals, skipping class by jumping out of windows as the teacher came in, putting wax in the principals office lock, firecrackers in the toilets till they broke! randomly clapping in the assembly till the whole school started clapping! All this was just to the teachers! what was done to the student was an entirely different story, kicking people as they were peeing, randomly giving people birthday bums, kicking all new students as they walked the corridor to their class, hide kanwars scooty in the bushes!..soooo much more! :D

i cant believe it! as kids you just cant wait to grow up, and when you do you wish you were a kid again, no worries, no responsibilities... no nothing! we grow up too fast! i wish i was a little boy again! =(

It's Been a While

2007-03-10T20:15:00.000+05:30

WOW!! Its been absolutely ages since i posted anything here...i kinda forgot the password and then today while cleaning out the old documents from the computer found this old file with the password in it :), so i thought that i'd post something here. The last time i posted anything here was when my results were out for the second semester..its almost to the end of the fourth semester now... so its definitely been a while... lots has happened which i'll post later, for now just some photos that i took, since i was feeling nostalgic =) here they are (yes.. you can click them to see the full image...)

1)The first one, kinda obvious that, hehe the pyramids and the sphinx silhouetted against the setting sun. The sheer size of it all! It makes you realize what man is capable of if he puts his mind to it!

2)This was taken at Lang lake in Ontario, Canada, my second vacation of 1998!!! :D We were out camping on this lake, it was breathtaking. This photo was taken from the restaurant that we ate at regularly, overlooking the lake and the island in the middle. In the summers people come in on sea planes, have a meal by the lake and fly away to where ever they came from, in the winter when the whole lake is frozen you can see people coming in on snowmobiles

3) A cold gloomy day in England. This for some reason is one of my favourite photos. Its looks so typically English =) The palace in the back is Blenheim Palace, where Winston Churchill spent his childhood

4) This photo was taken from the top of Edinburgh Castle, showing a view of the city.

RESULTS R OUT! :)

2006-07-11T23:11:00.000+05:30

Well this may seem wierd but i've been looking forward to the results from the day the exams got over...not cause i expected to do spectacularly well, i just wanted to know how it was. Well now that its here, it turns out i did a lot better than i expected.. I CAME THIRD IN MY COLLG!!! :D. Really surprised by this, especially since i wasted all my prep leave sitting on orkut complaining bout how the exams were commin up n how I should study to anyone who would care to listen...and most who didnt want to. A special thanx must go to Harsh n Divesh for being instrumental in the collosal waste of time that was my prep leave... oh n not to forget Ms. Megha. so i ended up studying only like 6 days..n now that its out all i'm hearing from people is that if you studied you would have come first... i mean that is so typically indian... its always 'if you had put in a little work you would have come first but any way congrats'..NEVER the other way round... says a lot about us as a people; that attitude!! BUT I DONT CARE!!! I CAME THIRD n i'm happy !!! :D

The Beautiful Game Comes To An End...

2006-07-11T16:27:00.000+05:30

It finally had to happen...the world cup 2006 had to come to an end and so it did. Italy won the cup against all expectations...and every team that I supported lost!... I mean not a single team won...how does something like that happen :) good thing I’m not a betting man...still it was a month of entertainment. But I think it was a bitter sweet experience in a way, although I really wanted to see who would win now that its over a lot of the great players will retire from international football. No more zizou, nedved, henry, ballack, ronaldo, beckham ....the list is endless.
The first world cup that I saw was when it was held in France in 98' when the French won with many of the same players that they had this time round in the finals...that time they were just starting their career...full of young blood this time round it was no longer the young blood but rather the experience that counted ..the playmakers no longer capable of doing what they did 8 years back...I guess sentimentally I wanted them to wrap up their careers the way they began...complete the full circle. Sadly it was not to be...
We had made plans to watch the finals at a local club - Zinc - on the big screen that they had put up such things are always better in a crowd of people I feel where the atmosphere becomes electric and the event no longer remains an event but rather become an experience...but all those plans were laid to rest when it turned out that the state was shut down by a political party because some idiots did some stupid shit in Mumbai...there were riots in the state capital n sporadic acts of violence in Pune, but that was enough for all the shops, restaurants and every form of business to shut down shop! things did look normal by early night n the game was to begin at 2330 so we did still think of going out but decided against it just in case...in the end nothing happened but the threat was enough to ruin our evening n those of I don’t know how many others...it was strange to watch these images of people from around having a ball while we sat huddled around a TV watching the biggest event of the year...hehehe well I exaggerate a lil' it wasn’t that bad we did kinda have a mini party of our own so it wasn’t all bad :) but it was a rude reminder of the fact that even though we live in a free country we really don’t have control over our lives...someone far away who sits in a position of power will be able to influence it ..for the good if they want but mostly its for the worse...
The entire month life revolved around the football n now that its over there is going to be a void in life for the next few days but at least I’ll have my life back :)

This is me..

2006-07-09T11:19:00.000+05:30

Well its been a while since I created this blog but I haven’t really posted anything here...i was thinking bout writing this in the 'About Me' section but then decided to post it here..

How many times has it happened to u that someone asks you tell me about yourself n u freeze like a deer in the headlights rambling on about the most insignificant things...I’ll try not to do that this time LOL so here goes...

Born in a small town of Amravati near Nagpur in Maharashtra on Sep 13th 82’ I’ve just been there twice...having mostly a nomadic existence because of a dad who is in the army...the silver lining of that is that I’ve had the opportunity to travel the world…but the inevitable dark cloud is that I get bored of a place really fast...a trait which I have not yet been able to overcome

I know many people but have few friends and even those are compartmentalized…a typical Virgo trait I’m told. The phrase that describes me the best I guess would be ' a contradiction in terms '...I’ve been called honest and a liar, diplomatic as well as tactless, nice and mean, funny n Mr Grim. etc etc…u get the idea...but the one thing that everyone agrees with is that I’m level headed… so at least I got that going for me …:)

I completed my graduation in Microbiology from Pune University but right now am pursuing my masters in computer management...but I hope to get back to 'my roots' so to speak in the future...the biological world truly fascinates me...its intricate and delicate and at the same time simple n sturdy...it leaves me speechless..!!

There are 2 things so far that I really care about in life...music and science, science probably winning by a whisker...i know that may make me sound nerd-ish but I truly love to learn (not study ..Learn) and mostly I’m thinking about some weird question...a trait which when it spills into my social life annoys the hell out of people...when I ask the dreaded question "WHY??”...LOL. When I’m not doing that its usually music that occupies my mind...i wake up with a song in my head, and go to bed with one in my head...and am usually humming a tune...a lot of the times at very inappropriate moments...like exams, or when people are talking to me...but people who truly know me accept it... :) I play the guitar a bit and it has a calming effect on me so play it as often as I can :)…oh and one final thing I still cant tuck my shirt in!!! LOL ….

Well that’s enough for the intro I guess, for the rest… watch this space :)

Well Here Goes...

2006-06-23T01:42:00.000+05:30

Hey guys...never really done this before. but it seems like an intresting concept ...lets see how it goes... this is my life ...watch this space :)