Haiku Post - Painful pedestrians

How many times have you had to slam on the brakes just because someone crossed the road like an idiot, in the middle of heavy-traffic...more often then not  - it's a lady -  too embarassed to run in public, but thick-skinned enough to want to cross whereever.

And the worst bit is that unlike men who will scowl or even shout back if you curse them, women will break into a smile(!!!) when they hear the squeal of brakes and still continue to walk, without even lifting their eyes to see how close they actually came to being hit.

This haiku is dedicated to these multitudes of 2 legged speed-bumps:

"Woman giving embarassed smile,
If i didn't brake for you,
you would smile less."

Technorati Tags: haiku, humour, india, traffic, accident

from :mrMark:

Postcard To Shri Mutalik

A little something i came up with as a mark of solidarity with the Pink Chaddi campaign (visit)

Why?
Since men can't contribute pink panties.... at least, not me anyway...

...and since there are no pink Frenchies being manufactured...

...and since any undergarment contributed by me would require, previous clearance from BARC before being mailed...

...and since i do not believe in Ted Kaczynski's methods, lol...

...and since i do believe that my "Primum non nocere" oath means something, no matter how bad the Bajrangi's get...

Ergo;

To do my bit, and chip in my share to this andholan, i thought i'd create my personal token of resistance.

With a little postcard - "To Sir, with love" :-)

Big Moon Rising

I'm pleased as punch with myself today!

While driving my bike yesterday evening, i was passing through the lonely stretch on the way home that has no buildings around, and has greenery on both sides of the road.

It was an empty road, and it must have been around 545~6pm... so the brightness of the afternoon-sun was still around, but without any of the harshness.

When i looked to my side i saw a fantastically large moon! Awesome moment then. A full moon too, and really bright, considering the time - I was immediately reminded of the 'Bruce Almighty'-scene where Jim Carrey uses his divine powers to "pull in" the moon, to set the mood for a romantic evening.

Anyway, i drove on past and didn't think to check out the moon again in the night.

Skip to today and i read this headline from a NASA site:

"Biggest Full Moon of the Year: Take 2"

There's a picture in the article that's very similar to the what i saw yesterday, to give you a better idea. Apparently, the moon was at it's Perigee yesterday.

I feel like patting myself on the head for being so "aware of my surroundings", and get lucky enough to notice a rare, beautiful moonrise. (I don't do that so often, so it's nice!)  I guess, a Zen-moment...on a well maintained motorbike. (LOLz!)
image from deansouglass

The New Year spirit

The New Year is here! It's time to share the holiday spirit!



...Happy New Year! Hope 2009 turns out absolutely peachy for you! :)
Cheers!!!

(Luckily, i took this snap in time...a little later and it would've been empty!)

Haiku Post - Paan chewing boy

Cud-chewing, though biologically an exclusive preserve of ruminants (=moo!), has been electively adopted by man who engages in the practice with great enthusiasm. This "biologic-mimicry" is particularly prevalent in avver-India - and it's very apparent too - one only needs to look at the nearest corner in the urban-milieu to see indelible proof of its popularity. Our environs are tainted by the expectorations of the orally-fixated urban painters of India.

This haiku is dedicated to these saliva-spouting gents:

"Paan-chewing lout,
know there is a God above,
he gifts you OSMF"

(OSMF or Oral Sub-mucous Fibrosis is a slowly-progressing disease that results in the hardening of the tissues of the mouth, eventually progressing to a stage where mouth-opening is so severely restricted that even eating solid-food is an accomplishment. It usually affects paan-chewers and users of areca-nut products, and is a forerunner of cancer. The irony here being that the very substance being chewed/spewed ultimately locks the jaws shut)

image from Manjeet Bawa, Sanjay
Technorati Tags: haiku, humour, india

Noise Cancellation Technology... In Church

If you have ever had the misfortune of having to enter a church when a Tamil-mass was in progress, or have had to suffer though the Tamil-hymns you know how universally bad the Tamil-choirs sound. And there is remarkable similiarity in the sound. =universally screechy.

The choir-members themselves are usually either, um... "ceruminously-occluded" or "acoustically-impaired", and so are unaffected by the sonic-torture they let loose on the congregation - amplified manyfold by "high-definition speakers". What this means is that the speakers are placed high enough that no sufferer can jump up and rip out the wires.

The congregation, in an attempt to save their auditory-apparatus frantically employ Noise-Cancellation-Technology by producing identical waveforms of an equal intensity. By singing along.

No doubt the serious audiophile will know that this same technology finds use in special-audio devices such as in the earphones of Military jet-pilots and Astronauts. This is a cunning use of wave-physics in Church!!!

If one cannot apply this defense, and are forced to sit silently- as a result of one's ignorance of Tamil, then nothing can save one's ossicles - the notes will be so high and nasal that soon one's ears will start to bleed. But the songs will go on. And on.

...Compelling reason to start learning decent-Tamil saving for BOSE Headphones!!!


Read more: Noise-cancelling, BOSE® Patented Technology
Technorati Tags: humour, religion, tamil, church, choir, BOSE, technology, headphones

Back From THINK INDIA

(Retrospective Post)

I had a pretty good time at the Think India convention.... we were a total of 19 from our College- 9 guys, all my classmates save two. (On the whole there were apparently 800 delegates, though i think the organizers fibbed.)

It was a 3-day event held at The Art of Living International Centre, AoL's massive Bangalore Ashram, around 25kms from the city. The campus is HugE, and growing, and has the very impressive Vishalakshi Mandir as it's focal point. (see photos)

I was expecting Dorms, but we were assigned rooms in the Ashram's big accomodation facility. There was a hitch in the accomodation the very 1st night - we were given the wrong combination for the lock to our room, and it was 1030pm by the time we got in.

Thankfully, the rooms were pretty nice. (read: clean!)


There's a 11pm curfew in the Ashram, but get this, they don't shut the gates! (that's "freedom" for ya!) We all walked down to the closest village, a kilometer away at 1130, bought some liquor and happily walked back to the room. We didn't exactly abide by Ashram rules after that.

Neither did we pay much attention to the instructions from the Think India guys...

That's the good thing about having friends who have the same attention-span as you ....

...you all get bored at the approximately the same time!

We attended only the interesting lectures...mostly only on the 3rd day. Rest of time, we were generally lolling about through the ashram. The girls, on the other hand, i think, attended almost every lecture... they even attended the Yoga sessions faithfully!!...waking up at 530am!!! Hehehe..

( Vishalakshi Mandir at the heart of the Ashram )

The convention was largely all talks discourses.... Guruji's, Professional's, Scientists, Doctors, Social Workers... a whole mixed bag. Some of the speakers were mind-blowing...i mean, really really really good! But most of the others were just plain boring, coz they just kept repeating on a common theme.

Ancient-scriptures were linked to Scientific advances.
The relevant Shlokas were quoted to prove that the New ideas of today can be found in millenia old texts.
Everything from Business Theory to Rocket Science to General Relativity were ascribed to the Vedas.
By the end of it, many speakers went beyond just linking the old and the new, and were directly attributing ancient-knowledge as the seed for today's developments.

Every time one of these speakers would start off, we'd get up, all 9 of us, and walk out! LOL!!!


Like i mentioned before, a few guys were really fantastic... they were crystal clear about what they wanted to convey. It was awe-inspiring and really an absolute pleasure to sit and listen to these guys talk. That they were true masters of their subject came across to everyone, just by the words they spoke. You could actually see that these guys were going to succeed, just because of the way they thought about life and things. T'was really a treat for my cortex!!!

There was an interactive session at the end of the 3rd day...a kind of closing session. I didn't make it to the session (as usual!), but i later heard that the ABVP-guys, who acted as moderators for each group, kinda hijacked the (every) discussions to voice out their political agenda.

I had been pleasantly surprised at the lack of overt-propaganda in the entire 3 day, but i guess this was it. (read my apprehensions: previous blogpost)
We finally got back into Bangalore at night, in a crowded bus. (3rd day)


It wasn't my usual idea of a 'break'...but we had some very 'different' fun. Besides, college authorities were giving us 3-days-attendance ...and i think we made full use of that.

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Pune Trip

So i got back from my Pune-trip a few days back.





I had a really "wholesome"-holiday there!





a photo of Parwati Lake...what is now the Parwati Darshan area


There is a distinctly different vibe to the city....totally unlike Bangalore. Or maybe like the Bangalore of old- when Banagalore WAS still a 'Pensioners Paradise'.

Anyway Pune has its own sobriquet- 'Oxford of the East'. And its a moniker thats completely valid... coz it a SUCH a YOUNG-CITY! I mean it...It's like a Lord Of The Flies scene!

Whereever you look there's young-people.... And i dont mean chunnu-munnu's and age-29-not-old-by-oldies-standards-but-not-young-by-teen-standards crowd.... i mean College-going, Midriff-baring, Goatee-sporting 20-somethings.

The place is full of them...i mean...full of us!

(A few more praise posts on Pune coming up....)










pune university uilding










st.pauls church..still stands today shaniwarwada...peshwa dynasty