Yay!! I'm in the papers.

I'm famous.
All of you who live in Delhi and get Hindustan Times at home, go get it. Locate the photograph on the top-right quarter of the first page of HT City. If you see a guy in a blue checked shirt in the photo, that's me. If you don't, get your eyesight checked.

Hahaha. I'm famous.

On focus

I had a very interesting and unique conversation yesterday with an acquaintance of mine on the subject of, believe it or not, focus. It was a highly entertaining conversation, and at the same time, it was an exchange that made me think (The wise course of action, and one that I would highly recommend, would be to stop reading this post right now, for when I start thinking, bad things happen, as I am sure all of you who have been kind enough to visit this blog regularly for a reasonably long period of time would know. Go read the archives instead. They'll be funnier). I learnt a lot from the conversation in question. Although I don't really consider myself a focused person, I learnt that I might well be one. Most importantly, the conversation reminded me of an extract from one of the books I had read a very long time back and had immensely enjoyed, and which I read again very recently, and continued to immensely enjoy.

The book, strangely, happens to be Alice in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll. Even more strangely, It happens to be one of my favorite books. Maybe it is one of my favorite books because it suits my intellectual level, for contrary to popular belief, it is not a childish or non-serious book; I think it is one of the deepest and most profound books ever written. Or maybe it is one of my favorite books because every time I read it, I find newer and deeper meanings in the text (most of which are completely baseless; unrelated to the text; illogical; and predominantly, merely figments of my imagination). Or maybe it is one of my favorite books just because, for a book, it happens to be a very funny and entertaining one.

The extract that yesterday's conversation reminded me of is one I particularly like. It is a passage in which a conversation is taking place between Alice and the Cheshire Cat. Although it is, in itself, an extremely simple conversation, the message it conveys is a complex reflection on life and reality. Every single line has a deeper meaning, and if at first you don't see it, don't worry, for for quite some time (Hahaha. Correct grammatical usage of two 'for's together. Take that, Mr. Misra), I couldn't either. The passage goes something like this.

Alice was a little startled on seeing the Cheshire Cat sitting on a bough of a tree a few yards off.
The Cat only grinned when it saw Alice. It looked good-natured, she thought; still it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt it ought to be treated with respect.
"Cheshire Puss," she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. "Come, it's pleased so far," thought Alice, and she went on, "Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to walk from here?"
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
"I don't much care where--" said Alice.
"Then it doesn't really matter which way you walk," said the Cat.

"--so long as I get somewhere," Alice added as an explanation.
"Oh, you're sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."

Nice, wouldn't you say.

I had intended this post to be a lot longer, but I don't really have much else to say. In any case, I have a lot of work to get done before my Rendezvous Marketing meeting tonight.

So back to work, as Master Yoda would have put it, we must get. For otherwise, in deep shit, as he might or might not have continued, depending upon his views on such language, we shall be.

On diverse subjects

The last one week has been boring. Incredibly boring. I hadn't thought that my life could get any duller, but it has. My research, though still being carried out with extreme devotion and great intensity, has gotten a bit monotonous, and a friend of mine, who I was talking to yesterday, pointed out that it wasn't even completely accurate and error-free. My existence has been reduced to a series of mundane activities. I sleep. I eat. I read. I listen to music. Worst of all, I think.

And thinking, at least in my case, usually leads to disastrous consequences. Take, as an example, the last post I posted on this blog. It was entirely a result of my excessive thinking. I won't go into the other, much more disastrous consequences right now, for they project me in an extremely unfavourable light, and make me feel very stupid. I shall say however, that I have received a rather serious threat from my parents. They have threatened to throw me out of the house if I do any more thinking.

Besides that, work has started for Rendezvous 2005. Some of you might be knowing that Rendezvous 2005 is being organized by Jwalamukhi Hostel, which is also, as most of you would be knowing, my hostel. The preliminary preparations for Rendezvous 2005 started about a week back. I had been given a lot of work that was to be finished by sometime yesterday. I shall have to start working on that ASAP, for if I delay it too much, I shall not be looked upon favourably. More so because of the fact that there was a meeting to discuss how the work was coming along last night, which I forgot all about.

I visited Anything Mac, the authorized Apple reseller that is situated somewhere midway between Yusuf Sarai and Green Park a couple of days back. I came back highly impressed. Before I launch into a detailed account of my experiences there, allow me to give you a brief history of what led me to being there in the first place.

About a week back, when I had gone to Reliance Web World to meet some of my friends (I would like to add here, that I had gone only to meet my friends, and did not spend a single paisa on gaming, keeping in mind the promise I had made to myself of not spending a single paisa at Reliance Web World on gaming.), I had been unfortunate enough to break my iPod case. I was comfortably seated on an armchair, but as I was getting up, the case got caught against the arm of the armchair, and detached itself from the belt-clip that was originally attached to it, but was now not. The case, as a result, was reduced to a state of uselessness, for I could not use it to attach the iPod to my belt, and I do not like carrying the iPod around in my pocket. I asked people who were a lot more experienced than I was at such stuff, and finally came to know that if there was any hope that my iPod case could be repaired, it was at Anything Mac.

It was under these circumstances that I walked into Anything Mac. It didn't look a very big establishment from the outside, and once inside, it continued to not look a very big establishment. But the moment I was inside, I was completely convinced that it was, indeed, the best place I could have brought my case. "Here," I said to myself, "is a place where my case shall be in good hands."

The scene inside was appropriate for a store associated with Apple. There were iMacs, and iBooks, and PowerMacs, and PowerBooks, and iPods, and assorted accessories lying around in delightful disarray. The walls were plastered with Apple posters, all of them colourful and informative and brilliantly catchy and humourous at the same time. People were working here and there on brightly coloured workstations. And the moment I walked in, I got everybody's undivided attention. They asked me my problem. They understood exactly what was wrong. Then, one of them took the case from me, and, cradling it delicately in his arms, made his way somewhere towards the inside of the shop. A couple more people followed him inside, all the while heatedly discussing what would be the best course of action that one could follow to repair my case. People ushered me to seats, and asked me to sit down. Other people offered me water. Still other people came to me at periodic intervals of time and gave me updates on the latest condition of my case and how it was being taken care of. About 5-7 minutes later, the man who had taken my case inside with him reemerged. He handed me the case, and I could see he had done a good job on it. My case was, although not as quite as good as new, once again capable of carrying out the work it had been designed to do. And the best part is, I did not have to spend any money. They did all the repair-work for free. Before I left, they even apologized for the case breaking, and implored me to come back if I ever, in the future, felt something was wrong with my iPod or my iPod case. Never before have I seen such attitude from people running shops in India. I came back with tears in my eyes, ear-phones in my ears, my iPod nestled cozily in its case, and the case firmly attached to my belt through its belt-clip. It was an almost spiritual experience.

On an unrelated note, I have had the fortune of watching some very good movies in the past few days. I shall now briefly review one of them.

I watched Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of The Sith four days back. I absolutely loved it. Although I had not seen a couple of movies from the original trilogy, and did not remember much from the Star Wars movies I had seen, I had a rough idea of the plot, thanks mainly to Mr. Rohan Trivedi. He was kind enough to give me the gist of the entire original trilogy, and I was, I believe, more or less successful in understanding what was happening during Episode III: Revenge of The Sith. The movie is brilliantly made, and Anakin's gradual transformation from a Jedi Knight to the much known and much feared Darth Vader is very well documented. The action scenes are, as expected, breathtakingly wonderful, and the story moves along at an easy and comfortable pace. A few scenes here and there, especially the ones concerning Anakin and his wife, the Amidala female (she's a looker), do tend to drag a bit, but fortunately, there are not too many of them. Most of the performances are convincing. Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan Kenobi), Hayden Christensen (Anakin Skywalker), and Ian McDirmaid (Supreme Chancellor Palpatine) have played their respective parts very well. The duration of the movie is perfect, and the special effects are, without question, the best that I have seen as yet.

Overall, it is, most undoubtedly, a mast-watch.

Just a Dream

I thought that I heard you laughing.
I thought that I heard you sing.
I think I thought I saw you try.

But that was just a dream.
Just a dream. Just a dream.
Dream.

'The Blue Dart', and other stories

It has been about 4 days since I last posted. I intended to post yesterday, but immediately before I was about to compose this particular post, I came across a very very scary blog. After going through this partiular scary blog, it took me about 24 hours to recover from the trauma it caused me. Those 24 hours have just concluded, as a result of which I am now nearing a state somewhat fit to compose another post.

What you see here is a dart. It is a dart I own. I, for certain obvious reasons, call it 'The Blue Dart'. It might look like other darts, but it is not. It is no ordinary dart. For it is a blue dart. It is also a magnetic dart. Which means instead of having a pointed tip, it has a magnetic one.

"So why has he posted a picture of a blue, magnetic dart on his blog?", you may be inclined to ask. And I would only be too pleased to give you the answer. 'The Blue Dart' that you see in the picture helps me do my research. What my research is all about, and how I got involved in it, you will soon learn.

It all started a couple of days back, which was about four or five days into my summer vacations. The first four or five days of my summer break had been fun. I enjoyed the new-found freedom. The freedom from studies. The freedom from following a set schedule. In short, I enjoyed my first five days very much. But as time went by, I started getting bored, and by the end of the sixth day, I was absolutely fed up with the absence of things to do. "Manu," I said to myself, "you need to get yourself some work." And so I decided to do some research. Nothing heavy or intellectual. Just some simple things that will make my days seem less wasted than Mr. Suri's.

The next thing I needed to do was to find out something to do research on. Being an imaginative guy, that problem didn't trouble me long, and I soon found a ready solution to it. This is how I do my research.
1. I take my blue, magnetic dart, a notebook, and a pencil.
2. I close my eyes.
3. I throw the dart in a random direction.
4. I see if it sticks.
5. I write down in my notebook whether the dart stuck or not.
6. If necessary, I maro fraudy.
7. I move to another room
8. I repeat steps 1 through 7.

I usually take about 60-70 readings in a day. The algorithm I follow, which you see above, is simple and linear, and needs minimal thinking. It is, therefore, stuck to strictly. I try to do my work with intense concentration and dedication. According to the rate I am currently moving at, I should have about 1000 readings, taken all over the house, by the end of a couple of weeks. Once that is done, I plan to do the same at some of my friends' houses, and by the time the vacations are complete, I shall, and I say this with much confidence, have a nice thick report ready on the average incidence of magnetic materials in South-Delhi homes.

On an unrelated note, I saw an absolutely amazing and extremely entertaining music video yesterday. It was by a group of two full-grown surdarjis who call themselves the Balle Balle Boyz (inspite of them being full-grown surdarjis) and the name of the song was 'Chak De Saturday'. I say it was a very interesting song because throughout the video, the two surdarjis were running around large halls and into doors marked with the days of the week, wearing long, black trench-coats and recreating stunts from 'The Matrix' series. Between running and recreating stunts, they were also repeatedly saying stuff like, "I love only Saturrr-day!", and I, to be frank, found their multi-tasking abilities quite impressive. My friend Mr. Aseem Suri, who has been talked about earlier in this post, and who has great knowledge and expertise on such subjects, says that the video is typical of the Balle Balle Boyz, and that some of their other songs are even better. He even named a couple of them which he thought were worth a look, and which I am currently downloading.

Besides that, not much has been happening. I recently met Ms. Tara Kaul, Mr. Maanick Nangia, and Ms. Smita Misra over lunch. Tara, I do believe, has already been introduced on this blog. Maanick (which I, for a long time, spelt as manic, but now spell as babboo) is a precious gemstone/beast of burden depending on personal preference. To know more about Smita, click on her name.

I also met Mr. Karan Misra and Mr. Manav Kapur a couple of evenings back. As is bound to happen when such people get together, the conversation veered to weird topics. Somehow we got talking about the absolutely atrocious songs that have, over the past few years, found themselves a way into Bollywood movies, and which one was the worst of the lot. Inspite of the extent of competition present in this particular field, we were, by the end of the conversation, able to reach consensus on a clear winner, although after much deliberation and arguement. I shall, for the moment, exhibiting uncharacteristic good taste, refrain from naming the song.

Till next time, may the force be with you.

Still eight point someone

I got to know my grades on all the courses I took this semester a little while back. And like at the end of the first semester, I am pleased. Considering the amount of preparation I had put in, and the way my tests had gone, an SGPA (Semester Grade-Point Average) of 7 seemed most improbable. But the grades are in, and I am, once again, well above 8. This inspite of the fact that this was one of IIT's reputed even semesters (Traditionally, even semesters at IIT are supposed to be a bit tougher than the odd ones). If I was happy with the results at the end of the last semester, I am absolutely ecstatic about them at the end of this one.

Besides that, not much has been happening. I have been getting very bored on some days, and having a lot of fun on some other days. I went to Daryaganj yesterday with a few friends. I had heard much about the Road-Side Sunday Bazaar there, so I decided to go and check it out myself. I also wanted to buy some books (fiction, mostly) to keep myself occupied for the coming few days. I went at about 1:30 PM, intending to spend the afternoon scouting for books. It was an intensely hot and tiring afternoon, an afternoon spent walking long distances in the sun and haggling with road-side book-vendors. But in the end, it was all well worth it. In the evening, I returned home tired, but satisfied. In a little over 4 hours, I had managed to acquire 1 Alistair MacLean, 1 Jeffrey Archer, 1 thick collection of Contemporary Short Stories, The Life of Pi by Yann Martel, and 3 Wodehouses. And all that for a neat sum of Rs. 250 (Rs. 264, if I include conveyance). An extremely productive afternoon, I think.

Later on, after a nice evening spent playing Badminton, I borrowed another Jeffrey Archer from Karan. I also, as a result, had to borrow a movie, which Karan insisted I take if I wanted the book. He flatly refused to lend me the book unless I agreed to take the movie as well. As a result, and in the absence of anything better to do, I was compelled to watch Khooni Dracula last night. Click on the link to read a review. I shall not write much about the movie here. I shall suffice by saying that the movie made me feel almost good about watching Kya Kool Hain Hum.

I shall now stop writing, for it is getting late, and I am extraordinarily tired, not having slept much in the last two days.

P.S. - Nobody is more awake to the fact than I, that the last few posts on this blog have failed to soar to the great heights of eloquence and witty humour that one has, over time, begun to expect from the entries posted here. The problem, though grave, is, I assure you, temporary. I am, if I may so add, working on it. So start expecting a nice and funny entry on this blog. You shall, hopefully, see one very soon.

On scribbled-on shirts

The picture you can see here shows my Scribblers' Day Shirt. On the shirt, you can see my school blue tie.

All those of you who were with me in class XII can try to find your messages on the shirt.

All those who weren't, can't.

I'm freeeeeeeee!!

My Major Tests are over. They all went terribly, but they are over. No more studying and chasing deadlines for the next two and a half months. Yay!!

My Major yesterday went quite terribly, but I'm not going to talk about that. I'm going to talk about what I did after the majors.

After the majors, I saw a couple of South Park episodes. Good stuff that, if you've just finished your exams and have nothing much to do. Adequately obscene and entertaining.

I also saw an episode of The Wonder Years. After about 6 or 7 years. It was amazing. The episode, as such, wasn't an exceptionally good one, but seeing something that I hadn't seen in such a long time was an awesome experience. Watching Kevin, Wayne, Paul and Winnie again after such a long time brought back memories from when I used to watch the show, before Star Plus was overrun by Saas-Bahu sagas (Is that the correct plural?). I didn't remember much from the show, but as I was watching it, I began to recall stuff I never knew I still had stored in my brain. I wonder if this is what people call nostalgia.

Before I go, I must review the movies I have watched (completely or partially) since yesterday.
Pulp Fiction : Saw the first half hour. Didn't get most of it. Seems interesting. Must watch the rest of it some time soon.
The Godfather Part III : Good, but not as good as the first two. I personally feel that the first was the best one. Many people do like the second as well. However, the third one is, I think, although a good watch, a bit of a let-down after the first two.
Kya Kool Hain Hum : Don't ask me why I went to see this movie. More importantly, learn from my mistake. Don't.

Till next time.

Three down, two to go.

I am a little more than halfway into my Major Tests. I took my Computer Science major test on Wednesday, followed by Mathematics on Thursday, and finally Manufacturing Processes today (or rather, yesterday). The Computer Science and Manufacturing Processes Majors were, predictably, unmitigated disasters. The Mathematics one was, surprisingly, as I had prepared the least for it, a somewhat mitigated one. It was, however, a disaster nonetheless.

My next two majors are on Monday (Physics), and Tuesday (Thermodynamics), which means I can take it a bit easy today (or rather, yesterday), which is probably why I am posting. After Tuesday, I will be, hopefully, posting a lot more frequently.

Besides that, not much has happened. I got a haircut on Tuesday. Well, technically, I finished getting a haircut on Tuesday. I started getting it (the haircut) on Sunday. Why I get my hair cut in installments is a topic I don't feel much like writing about right now. Maybe I'll write about it in the comments.
Feel free, therefore, to ask me about it.