the journey, the destination and the fun

1.) the begining (outside san jose)

I recently started on an absolute fun journey from san jose to LA to phoenix to death valley and back to san jose. This photo blog will describe in pictures and not in words the journey that i undertook with my uncles family to lands so beautiful so pristine that words are insufficient to describe them and as they say, a picture says a thousand words:

 3.) sunrise in san bernadino

4.)  morning walk in san beradino. The peaks were awesome!!We went chasing them later in the day

5.) We robbed steve and barrys in san bernadino point blank :P. After we were done for over 5 hours in two shifts there was nothing left there

6.) Glow Golfing: a kids delight and favourite time pass while parents do the boring shopping.

7.) who says sun and snow cannot coexist? we waned to so to some lake ended up going to san bernadino park while chasing snow clad peaks on serpentine roads. Totally awesome experience!!

8.) Our curious attempt at making a snow man

correlation between bidirectional stockholm syndrome and arranged marriages : risk management in indian wedlocks

Stockholm syndrome is a psychological response sometimes seen in an abducted hostage, in which the hostage shows signs of loyalty to the hostage-taker, regardless of the danger (or at least risk) in which they have been placed. The syndrome is named after the Norrmalmstorg robbery of Kreditbanken at Norrmalmstorg, Stockholm, Sweden, in which the bank robbers held bank employees hostage from August 23 to August 28 in 1973. In this case, the victims became emotionally attached to their victimizers, and even defended their captors after they were freed from their six-day ordeal. The term Stockholm Syndrome was coined by the criminologist and psychiatrist Nils Bejerot, who assisted the police during the robbery, and referred to the syndrome in a news broadcast ( from wikipedia) . My view of arranged marriages in a positive sense is that most of them are one form or other of this stockhom syndrome. However it is not a plain stoclkholm syndrome. It is more like a modfified bidrectional configuration. let me be a little more clear about it. 

In arranged marriage, two hitherto unknown strangers, get hooked up. They are hooked up either by their parents, their social circle, shaadi.com, NRI matrimony servies, newspaper ads etc etc. The mode may be anything, but the end result is the same. Two virtual strangers are bounded by lifelong bond of holy matrimony. This bond is governed by a two way stockholm and after the kids are born, they are part of that equation. The husband and wife are both captives and captors in this bond. Another way to at this is that this bond holds husband and wife captive together. They both dont know the true self of the respective partner. In most cases, they dont know each other and they havent met before as well. Thrown together under one roof, they start looking, cooking and cleaning after each other. That when carried on for a period of more than year creates a stockholm like situation. The husband gets to know the wifes wierd notions, the wife gets to know the husbands habits. They both start making mutual adjustments .Dislikes become likes and likes become dislikes. When a child is born of such a wedlock, it further cements such a relation. Both captor and captive now have a common subject which they both like. That common liking further unites them. Their happiness lies in the happiness of that kid. With time, this bidirectionl stockholm mutates into something more concrete, a four lettered word called love and everybody lives happily ever after....

Hold on.. I aint a rajshri banner fan. Theres got to be catch in this tory somewhere. So heres the catch. Even in these so called perfect wedlocks, nothing can turn out to be perfect. The guy may turn out to be a dowry seeking, drunk moron who has this notion that beating his/her spouse whih he got after no effort of his, is the ideal way of exerting his manhood. Such idiots are well left early to minimize any long term physical and emotional trauma. On the other hand, the girl might turn out to be a picture perfect caricature from desperate housewives TV shows who goes around flirting with all the friends of his hubby while he is out earning bread and butter. A well qualified professional wife is an easy solution to this problem.

Coming to risk management in indian/desi wedlocks, I am not any expert in the mixed desi couples. but as far as purely indian couples( both hubby and wife of indian origin), the idea here is to compare the element of risk in romantic relations as opposed to arranged relations and what sort of risk lies in either. 'love' based relationships are almost always based on some sort of farce or the other. As opposed to a solid scientifically proven phenomenon (stockholm syndrome), love marriages are based on abstract concept called 'love' Its an invisible candy very aptly marketed by various film makers so that their multi million dollar movies based on Mr Right finding the Mrs right and vice versa, them falling in love and living happily ever after sell like hot cakes. Various conceptions propogated in these movies include nonsense such as true love transcends life time, true love is infalible, ideal couples dont fight and so forth. Many people take this nonsense to their heart, especially at an early age, when lines between practicality and idealism are as blurred as houses when you look out of the window of a fast moving train. With such notions in their head at this stage, some people begin the quest of true love. In this quest, i am not aware of intentions of the fairer sex but being a guy i know what men want ( I am talking about straight relations here. this is because i am not aware of homosexual relationships). That want, that desire guides them for most part. This is true for all men atleast in their early years. As they grow up, some of them grow up but for most part, many dont and they still want the same them. Their defination of love can be summed up by phrases such 'kiss kiss bang bang' , 'cover the face and f*** the base' , 'game', 'scorecard' , 'list' and so forth. Such men do end up suceeding at what they want to do but for large part they succeed in conveying the shallowness of the term true love. I have known many a women who do the same which much more panache than their male counter parts but their reasoning and motives are unknown to me. When these relations actually manage to reach the point of marriage, then comes the influence of practical issues. All this while either counter part can be putting up apearences, simply because eihter/both of them have invested heavily in a relationship and none of them are willing to let go of the other even if it means lying to other till they are married. Lie being discovered before marriage leaves both parties emotionally scarred. Lie being discovered after marriage bacomes a statistic in raising number of divorce cases.

In the case of arranged marriages, this bidirectional stolkholm like situation actually assuages the situation and statistically it has been shown in various studies that arranged marriages are more successful then love marriages; the only yardstick of success being divorce rates. In my opinion it is this stolkholm like situation which minimizes the risk of such marriages failing. In these relations, you do not fall in love but if everything goes well, you grown in love and this growth actually strongly roots such relationships in firm grounds thus minimizing the chance of their failing unless some specific circumstances occur.  

of completed projects, colliding realities and truth that is stranger than fiction

completed projects:
I am done with another semester at graduate school. It looks like a race half left rather than race half completed. It is not because i am pessimist but from the looks of it, i have more work to do from now than i have done until now in the same time period. Of all the projects that i intended to complete, I have come good on most of them. I now have a full flavor of grad school and truth be told i like it here professionally. My life here from office to ghar and ghar to office is peaceful with no obstructions. I do what i need to do and things happen accordingly. Personally however, there are somethings i dislike and some i really really dislike. But then again, the whole deal with the devil when i signed on this venture was that "against my personal life ( and lack/dislike of thereof) and a menial stipend, i agree to donate the next five years of my life to grad school." back then doing my own thing was so important to me that everything else looked meaningless. Now my own thing is about as important but other things are slowly becoming more and more important.

colliding realities:
I know its not very original but my way of seeing life is numbers and equations, Balance. I am a big fan of balance. I believe when new variables get introduced in the equation of life, they need to be balanced with newer variables still. Being an uncomplicated person, I am not a very big fan of adding new variables. Of late I have however learn that balance itself is not very intuitive. Life equation is not like equations i work with or atleast as simple. The thing with new variables is that they best be left alone. attempts to balance realities of life, however meager they may be are futile. all they end up doing is changing the equation itself.

truth that is stranger than fiction:

truth indeed is stranger than fiction. I always thought of this dialog as a rambling of a half ass old dude who has nothing to do but come up with random quotes of the day (no offense). Turns out this right here is one of the the most important take home message of life itself. Take home message in sense that assuming you get a second chance at life, this statement probably should be your guiding light. Truth is strange, very strange. Fiction you can predict. but truth is an unpredictable and unmeasurable reality that governs your everyday existence.

things to chew on

1. Choices are simple consequence are not.
2. God sees the truth but waits, until the truth becomes a sick joke
3. It takes a lot more than a hot air balloon to write something meaningful
4.Speculations are like doors that open both ways.
5. between the rock and the hard place, the choice is never simple

6. never judge a book by its cover. and once the judgement

has been passed dont change it for the cover.

7. understanding is not related to intelligence or IQ. It is simply related

to an individuals will to identify and accept the truth.

8. your name holds no meaning, your existence insignificant

9. there is no shame in loosing to neediness

10.loss in life can be equated to things not gained substrated from things gained

11. shortcuts are meant to be taken when you are willing to
pay the price for them

12. for some puzzles, gathering the pieces is not the toughest part, putting them together is

13 Marriages are about pretending: the bride pretending to be a virgin, the groom pretending that he has found the one

and the in laws pretending that they like each other.

14 .) mere liye insaan ek aina hai

yahi mera vardaan aur yahi mera shrap hai

Emotional Atyachaar: my predictions on DEV D

Its been a while since i have visited my blog pages with an intention to write something. I have been hard pressed for time and am short changed even now. but there is something that is growing on me so rapidly that perhaps writing about it is the only way i can get it out of my system and concentrate on tasks at hand.  It something like taking a dump so that you can move on with the rest of your day. But rest assured what i am writing here is hardly distasteful. It is just that i have other things to I want to write about but this possibly is the only thing i can write about in 20 minutes and then get on with my life.

Anurag kashyap is a maverick genius.  He is all that i like about indian cinema. Full of new ideas viz a viz sript writing,  has great cinematic sense, is a visionary director, works with new faces and untested talent and brings out the best in them. 

He made his start along with irfaan khan in a star plus serial called Darr. 'Darr' was a psychopathic thriller where irfaan khan played a serial killer by the name of 'desi jallad' who used to vent out his hatred for his wife on whores by brutally killing them. If my memory serves me, that was in the later half of 1990s that this serial was telecast on star. It was clearly ahead of its time and soon got relegated to 10 clock slot when all the traditional indian families had had their stomachs full and have other things to do than watch a killer kill whores and act on his sexual perversions. It soon faded away as star got its 'KK' ticket to famedon and high TRPs.

But that was a masterpiece no doubt. Pretty soon there after, he came out with 'Paanch' and 'Black Friday'. Paanch was never allowed to be released commercially. It was again a film ahead of its time. With charaters having names like pondi, murgi, luke, shuili and joy in circa 2000 when the urban india at best was a closet case as far as expressing sexuality and wanton desires went,  a film like this was perhaps the biggest challenge to the fragile social fabric of that time and hence was never allowed to be seen by the masses. A casual look throug blogoshere tells me that the recently released 'Rock on' is a toned down version of Paanch by about a factor of 1000. The amount of impact paanch would have on indian cinema even if it is made to release now would be tremendous.

I am not saying this on a whim. Another timeless classic called 'Black Friday' by the same director which released recently after the verdict on 1993 bombay bomb blasts came out proves my point. It was a great hit which proved the visinory filmaking skills of anurag kashyap. Then came his 'No smoking' about which i will write another time. Right now i am really eager to talk about  his take on 'Devdas' titled DEV D. Slated to be release on 19th december, this movie already looks to be a masterpiece in the making.

For the uninitiated, devdas is a character based on the Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyay novella Devdas. 

Devdas is an idealist, someone like howard roark. Somone who is good in concept but difficult to realize.  He loves paro, his childhood sweetheart but the circumstances prevent him from marrying her. He turns alchoholic after losing both the love of his life and his family and permanently gets into a platonic relationship with a whore named chandramukhi and makes her brothel his permanent quarters. He eventually dies alone, devoid of love and away from his family due to alchohol abuse.

Now this is hardly something you make a movie about in my opinion. The guy is basically a loser who for the lack of some 'quality' action  falls hook line and sinker for this one chick and basically wastes away his life wanting her and only her. common dude get some life!! anyhow three movies have already been made on this topic and basically they are sugar coated distortions of this concept which would give a 21 year old chronic diabeties. 

Enter anurag kashyap and you get Dev D out of Devdas. Dev D looks to a pot smoking pill popping guy whose single point agenda in life is to get some 'action'. Love for him is not singing songs or getting drunk on cheap country liquor. He looks like a guy who would pop a pill and 'F***'. Now i dont have the slightest idea how the whole script is going to unfold but from the looks of it its gonna be a ball. Kashyap has casted a by the book pristine panju beauty for the role of paro who in this movie is not a virgin(in the original devdas paro being a virign throughout the novel was a very big deal. She was 'saving' herself for her devdas. what crap!! i doubt if anyone even talks like this anymore) Chandramukhi is renamed chanda in this movie and she redfines slut. I have always maintained that chameli in my books was a big flop simply because kareena kapooor cannot look like a slut no matter how hard she tries. Kalika playing the role of chanda looks like someone who means business and that would mean pure unadulterated entertainment when this movie comes out 

The only face recognizible in this movie is abhay deol which grapevine suggests came up with the concept of this. For once i believe the rumors appear to be true. abhay deol seems to be in his element as a pill pooping hyppocrite whose one point agenda is to get some action with his sweetheart 'paro'.  He looks to be at ease in his character and diplays an array of emotions from' tharki', to high to angered to simply bored with panche even in the two minute traler of the movie recent released. 

The music of DEV D is by amit trivedi, the guy who gave us the haunting track of Aamir and if 'emotional atyachaar' is anything to go this, he will surpaas his work in Aamir

To close my praise of this movie to be released, I wish to see more of anurag kashyap and less of rajshri productions or the like in this future. People like anurag kashyap hold promise for the future of indian cinema for they bring with them fresh talent, freash ideas, fresh script and fresh music. They are the ones who make bollywood bollywood and not some'RAJ' recycle bin with trains in the closing and opening sequences.    

Hell-Heaven

I would like to assume that the person reading this would have read The unaccustomed earth by jhumpa lahiri. Though this fragment of writing has no direct relation to that masterpiece collection of short stories by the much acclaimed writer, nor do these two or so paragraphs have the poise and the strength of prose that is possessed by the author of that novel.
This piece however draws parallels from Hell and Heaven, a story belonging to that collection. Hell and Heaven describes the experience of Indian diaspora in USA. The story spans three generations beginning in 1970s and culminating in the present time. It shows how people who came to America from India in 1970s were much attached to their roots . For them finding an Indian family and that too belonging to their hometown is sometimes a catalyst that enables them stay to on as for them, beyond the realms of intellectual and monetary pursuits, a thread that connects them to their roots gives them a much stronger sense of being at home than going to home itself. In contrast the progeny of such individuals who are born and raised in America are much closer to American culture. They adopt the American way of life, are educated in american ways and embrace the american culture in more ways than their parents have or ever will. They cannot eat the home cooked indian food for it is too spicy, bu they will gorge all day on the chemical mac and cheese and other such foods, smoking joints, booze etc is all so cool and so is 'hanging out' and 'making out'; terms that were unheard of when their parents were students.
But there is something more to it. Something more ominous as pointed out by the author in ever so scuttle manner that is so characteristic of her. The fact that the first generation diaspora that came here back then deserted their parents in their old age even though the indian system of values taught them otherwise, they now face a clear and present danger of being relegated to old age homes in an alien country when their end days come. For their children who are alien to indian value system cannot be expected to take care of their parents. This i believe is life's way of coming full circle. What the first generation indians did to their parents back then will happen to them in their old age. And it is worse for them for their parents at least died in the motherland; they face dying alone in a country not theirs.

After reading that short story, i have come to realize that Hell and heaven as described in the context of that story have blurred out in the present time. The present generation of students who move to US to pursue higher studies are a different breed all together than the previous generations. Quite a sizable percentage of them are from affluent families with private school English medium education and hence a set of values with a more occidental hue. The concept of dating isn't alien to them and so isn't drinking or smoking. Quite a few of them have had close encounters of 'that' kind and some of them are very open about their boyfriends/ girlfriends even with their parents. For such individuals, the culture shock is not as rude as it used be for their previous generations. America on its part has also changed since 1970s. There are a lot many Indian restaurants than there used to be back then and thus food is no more a concern as it was for the protagonist of that story. The non existent social life in college and university campuses back then as described in that work has also translated into something very colorful. Many American universities have hundreds of indian students. Coming from different parts of India, they are neatly organized into into indian student associations across various universities. These organizations give a vibrant and family like atmosphere to thousands of students coming from India. These groups enable fostering of strong bonds among people sharing same homeland in an alien land. Some of these bonds even last a lifetime.
So have heaven and hell merged into one singular state? Is the American experience mostly trouble free now as apposed to what it was back then? The answer is no. While Jhumpa lahiri focussed on issues that were more prominent back then, at this point from where i see, issues are different. For all the education and forward thinking, modern india is more divided on the lines of region now than it was then. This chasm is seen in a new light in indian diaspora in american campuses and beyond. People tend to flock with people of their own region. With a mass exodus of indians to american universities as students, being an indian is not enough. you have to belong to the same university of same city or same state at least if you are going to hang out together. The balancing of indian side and american side by the current lot is also shaky. While on one hand i have met people who say that 'Indians are not the best people to hang out with' to people who would have a strong opinion about democrats and republicans and dirty Indians within one year of being here and on the other hand there are those who still don't touch meat or liquor clinging on to their age old beliefs. So in this scenario what is heaven or what is hell? In the times when occident is learning a trick or two from orient and orient is adopting things that occident is slowly phasing out from its way of life there is no hell or heaven.

rochester to baltimore: a mini travelogue

I have been in US for two years now. And for some unknown reason havent had any proclivity whatsoever to venture on my own outside the confines of the quaint hamlet called Rochester. It wasnt my inability to do so that limited me but it was my lack of desire to leave the safe confines of Rochester and the fear of facing the unknown beyond it alone shackled me. Couple that with the becalming influence of 6-9 month long frosty winters and rainy season of Rochester and that for me had been a killer dosage to suppress any urges of venturing out.
So this summers when my brother go an internship at John Hopkins, something in me stirred and against all my instincts(or lack of thereof) i offered to drive him down to baltimore. If you look up Rochester and Baltimore on google maps, they are roughly 350 miles apart . The fact that i had never driven alone for more than 20 miles(beyond the confines of rochester) had me both excited and worried. Excited because under the guise of dropping off my brother, this was the perfect chance for me to break those invisible shackles that bound me and live life like it should be lived and worried for obvious reasons.
At the beginning of the journey i was pretty wired for obvious reasons. But the 70 mile stretch on I 390 outside state of new calmed my nerves and soon I began to savor the
pristine landscape of the state of Pennsylvania. What I saw on this journey can perhaps be called the most pristine landscape I have ever seen( the fact that I havent seen much shouldnt take away anything from the beauty of this landscape) . With small gas stations selling cheap gas nested in the lap of the hills to pristine rivers, I saw all in this journey to which I could feel in my bones, a sense of belonging. A feeling that i was close to my roots. The chimps on the trees, the birds on the wire and the men in their steel beasts all seemed together in perfect harmony as if they belong to each other, as if this is how it has been since the beginning of time and this is how it should be till a meteor strikes the earth again wiping out everything only for everything to be rebuilt as it was then. There is not much to describe about the journey as such. I took two stops. On at a subway for lunch and another at a starbucks for coffee. I had my underage brother with me so a trip to wineyards was out question although their charm was irresistible. So all in all driving at 60 miles an hour, i captured as much as i could with my eyes; the beauty, the serenity and the unison of everything.
Someday when i become a better photographer, i will start cataloging memories in digital format. But as far as my first road trip goes, the memories will remain fresh for a very long time.

The Swadesh Syndrome

We are a tribe, we graduate students in US. We are entirely different from our sister tribe in Europe, our cousins in Australia, Singapore and New Zealand and other smaller fragments scattered all across the globe. Without going into a detailed analysis of why we are different, I am going to go straight to the one focal difference. We are all here to elevate the pedestal we stand on or to occupy a higher pedestal as human beings. USA is a land of opportunities, both academic and entrepreneurial. Since we Indians are entrepreneurs by nature, more entrepreneurs (and slightly lesser academicians) throng this country every year to make more money, to build their own house, their own personal space.

Let’s face it, there are a multitude of reasons for each of us to be here be it to earn money, to rise above the billion strong crowds, to carve a niche, to buy an AUDI, to become an American citizen, to marry a gori and so forth. You can rationalize your reason for being here with whatever reasoning you wish or all of the above or some other personal reason you have conjured up to suit yourself. the reality however is that before coming here we are all allured by the promise this place holds for us. But at the core of it all we crave for our roots. According to a recent news input, India was the top receiver of migrant remittance with remittance from US being the single largest component of that. That is a good enough proof of existence of the Swadesh Syndrome. It was first aptly portrayed by Shah Rukh khan in the movie Swadesh. Gainfully employed at NASA and accepted as a US citizen, he played this dude who chose to go back to India to assuage himself of some nagging pangs he felt and ended up staying there forever.

This is the worst manifestation of this syndrome. And since this is a movie and far removed from reality, we will discuss some more real manifestations of this syndrome.

When some of us come here, we are barely out of our teens, having some weird notions of academic grandeur or of the colorful life here. Some of the latest rajshree production movies will have you believe that white chicks big time dig brown skin dudes. Other allures include strip clubs, all night bars, dollars, fast cars and other delusions of utopia. So two year paid slogging or five year on peanut salary slogging looks a small sacrifice in the large scheme of things. When we get here however we acquire a sense of reality. White chicks don’t exactly overtly dig brown dudes and since actuality you are a little below on the food chain, you have to work more hard on that front. Rest whatever money can buy you will end up buying if you can get your H1B which is getting exceeding difficult as the years pass by. Your friends on the other hand who stayed back in India are living the dreams you had envisioned. They might just have the hyundai santro or pink zen estillo but with a stable job they are right up on the food chain to score a chick for both long term/short term purposes. This is when you get the first manifestation of Swadesh Syndrome. You suddenly start noticing Indian girls on campus and they suddenly start looking more ‘attractive’. You start slipping one or two hours beyond the allotted 20 so that you can spend those extra $$$ trying to woo that new found ‘love’ of yours. The fact that she has some cool software consultant lined up for her right after her graduation becomes painfully clear to you at a very late stage and then you look ‘homeward’.

The second manifestation of this is seen in those who quit India as they did not want to do any software job and after doing their masters/PhD they want to do ‘real’ technical job with cool job profile and even cooler paycheck. Quantum mechanically there may be a parallel universe where everything is perfect and all pieces fit nicely in the puzzle of life. But this isn’t that universe. There isn’t a cure for this manifestation. The huge education loan you took means that you will have to do some job. Drinking bear on Sundays with friends on same boat and eventually getting married are the most recommended frustration assuaging practices.

The third manifestation is of the other kind. It is seen in people with very strong ties to their home who want to go do their higher studies in the US so that they can go back home and cure the system of all the ills that plague it. Decent folks these, ironically they are the ones who end of finding the love of their lives here and rationalize their staying back here by saying that home is where heart is. They do go back but that’s mostly post retirement/ after getting their children married

These are all the manifestations I am aware of based on a broad spectrum of people I have come across. I will be lying if I don’t admit to having any of the above described manifestations. After all we all do. There is no shame in it. We are humans and are eternally in the quest of greener pastures but the 'browner' ones cannot be forgotten altogether.

delhi college of disarray

Its been a while since i wrote something here, but this particular item on hindustan times newspaper was too good an opportunity to pass up on. The cat is finally out of the bag!! Six years after i joined that place, i can now say to a common man that dce sucks and not have those kind of looks from him which are usually given by a normal man to a mad man. The article was well and truly short and does not fully justify the state of affairs at dce. Let me just add on to the content and mention things hindustan times forgot to mention..

1. The syllybus hasnt been revised for 16 years and not ten as claimed by the newspaper. 10 was in my days. Its 16 now. Last syllabus revision came in the 1992. this of course excludes those deptts that were set up after this year

2. Results aside, the convocation is held two years after a particular year graduates. My 2006 batch had its convocation in 2008 and on the banners and degrees it was shamelessly splashed convocation 2007 held in 2008. In what convoluted universe does this make any sense?? Honourable chief minister of delhi was present on the occasion which makes the matters worse

3. water tank: The one water which does work is bee infested. There used to be a hornet nest behind it and till i graduated no effort was ever made to clear it up. There used to be a talk of putting up a RO(reverse Osmosis) tower inside dce at my time. IT is very required as water at dce is high in flourine content and drinking it for four years is inviting a dangerous condition called fluorosis. It never materialized.

4. computer center is defunct and grossly inadequate.

5. the 20 faculty members that professor bhattacharya is talking about have been coming since my first year. trust me, they havent come and they arent gonna come

6.Somebody should have fed the reporter the food at the mess. That warranted a sperate article altogether

7. However all said and done, i dont agree with the students if they say they havent been introduced autocad or any other advanced software. Since it is not syllabus which they can procure the copy of before they join, it is then left to them to this stuff on their own

8. DCE was barely able to handle 500 students in our time. You keep on swelling the number of seats and the situation is going to worsen.

All said and done, the rot runs deeper than the article says. So take stalk before you decide on dce as your career option. The thing with DCE is that it is no better than a private college.following are why DCE is still preferred by many:

1 The fact that there are almost no classes held in dce means ample opportunity for people to prepare for MBA/MS/PhD/IAS. People do a lot of internships outside college to learn what is not taught inside college. People join MBA coaching classes as early as second/ third year and spend all their time preparing for IIM which is good which in turn means that a lot of people at DCE end up getting into IIMs eventually. Also there exist some opportunity within campus to do some research projects and if not within campus, permanent faculty is generous enough to help you get an internship outside campus. That helps with your MS/ PhD aspirations

2 DCE still has some brand name because of it alma mater . At all functions/special occations all the principals past present and future have had and will mention shri vinod dham, i would like to ask them what happens to the other 23,999 (B.E. program only) people approximately that have graduated out of dce till date?? they dont care and they dont know for most part. Till recently administration was in zero contact with the alma mater of the college. Of late some attempt has been made to tap them which has resulted in improvement in the placement scenarios. If these attempts continue to be made atleast people wont be jobless post a degree from DCE.

3. Some things in life circumstances teach you. Something positive you can learn from dce is how to make maximum out of minimum at your disposal. four years in dce teach you that. That and team spirit friendship and other notions that are totallly unrelated to the college and its curriculum.

That about sums up what you can learn from DCE. I remember doing my Bipolar MOS lab on a c computer software as BiMOS ICs were very expensive we were told and students burn them. Research yielded that for most experiments we did it costs rs 175-800 per IC and they are pretty robust and unless you want to burn them, they dont. With this thought i believe i have berated my alma mater enough. This and the hindustan times article shown here http://justbeingmyselfmyway.blogspot.com/2008/05/delhi-college-of-disarray.html

about sum up my feelings........

ichirin no hana-a single flower

a beautiful thoght worth sharing

original source : http://www.animelyrics.com/anime/bleach/ichirinhana.htm

You are the only "you"
There is no such thing as your replacement
Don't wilt away, single flower
You are like a flower
That bloomed in a dark shadow
Even though you're in a place you didn't wish to be,
You can't move because of your roots
Just spit out your closed-up feelings
I'll accept all of your pain and suffering
So please don't cry
I wanted to see your innocent figure
That looked as if it were about to wilt, one more time
I want to become your strength
Even if there comes a time
When the whole world becomes our enemy
YOU SHOULD NOTCIE THAT THERE IS NO OTHER
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO NEXT TIME
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO OTHER
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO NEXT...
TIME NOTICE THAT YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT
You are the only "you"
Till now and from now on
Even if there comes a time
When the whole world becomes our enemy
I'll protect you
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO OTHER
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO NEXT TIME
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO OTHER
YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT THERE IS NO NEXT...
TIME NOTICE THAT YOU SHOULD NOTICE THAT
NOTICE THAT THERE'S NO OTHER
So don't give up, single flower
NOTICE THAT THERE'S NO OTHER
I'll protect you
That looked as if it were about to wilt, one more time
Please smile, single flower

dreams and fantasies- an ode to life

everybody dreams. Dreaming is the first thing you learn after you are born. your first three years when you have no school to worry about, no worry about where your next meal will come from, why E=mc2 and so forth, you learn to dream. However, the worst part is that you forget your dreams, those dreams that you had in the very first few years of existence, as you grow up.
From three to seven you become aware of the world around you. More subtle nuances of your existence dawn upon you. Your parents, your birthday, your gender, existence of another gender,school, importance of learning and working and so forth. These are more general things one gets exposed to in these four years. Depending on your parents circumstances, you may end up being exposed to a smaller subset of it in a more rigorous detail or all of it or you learn a very pleasant thing called 'choosing' at a very young age but more or less this is what happens. In these formative years your dreams are a reflection of your parents. you want to be good like your dad or pretty like your mom but you end up losing those precious dreams which you had in your first three years;dreams that were your own.
From seven to fourteen, you develop a lot of things. Thinking, personality, attitude, awareness of your sexuality,fancy for girls, fancy for things that throw smoke in air and accumulate soot in your lungs among various other things. Your brain is very receptive in these years. Your dreams become more alive and vivid and end up being fantasies. You fantasize about the wonderland alice lives in and if you may end up living in there at some point, you believe in unicorns, in toads that become princesses and so forth. Your parents are very happy with you and in fact encourage you to get allured to these fantasies. They tell stories each one more wilder and fantastic than the last one so that you have your 'sweet dreams'
Between fourteen to nineteen your parents crush virtually every fantasy you have ever had which ironically they fed you gracious portions of when you were a child. There is no alice, no wonderland, no He man, no Superman, no Batman hell even WWF is not real. If you dont study and become something in life you will not be able to survive, you will not have a morsel in your stomach they say. Suddenly food and shelter are not taken for granted any more. Your air castles shattered, your dream turned to dust you suddenly become painfully aware of the fact that life isnt a house of chocolate eternally pleasing to all five senses, it is in fact a grain grinder and you are the grain. Of course not all is gloomy in these years. You learn about friends and friendships. That is perhaps the best thing that can ever happen to you. You get attracted towards opposite sex, your body changes and so does your mind. Reality closes its circle around you and rather than it being a part you you become a part of it.
From 20 to present, where i am right now, you study to become a professional and learn to earn your livelihood. Some succeed at it and by some arbitrary yardstick are termed as successful and others are branded losers. And with the way things are these commendations stay with you for the rest of your lives. But wait, in all this what happened to your dreams?? to what you desired to be??
At this crossroad of my life, i am cursed with having a total recollection of all the dreams and aspirations i had beyond the age of four. If you have read this essay till this point, i urge you to take moment and reflect at your inner self. I am sure all those dreams will come back to you. But why would you want to have this realization that what you are doing now is something which at no point in your life you ever wanted to do?? Even if you get that realization would you give up all you have worked for till now and chase your dreams, those wild fantasies you had as a kid or as an adolescent??
I don't know about you but as far as i am concerned all i can hope to do as a human being is to bring what i am doing now to its logical conclusion. If it takes this lifetime fine maybe in the next lifetime, if my dreams don't die with me I will live them; one lifetime after another.

chemical chai in lalu raj

So this year we had a hog wash of a railway budget from the stables of our very own lalu prasad yadav ji. Railways is 25000 crore richer, more garibraths, fare 'cuts' in off peak seasons in shatabdi and rajdhani blah blah blah i dont even want to know.
What catches my attention is that people in his very own state(in aurangabad district) admitting that they make tea or chai as this extremely popular hot indian beverage is known as from fevicryl. for the uninitiated, fevicryl is no milk. Its a harmful paint based chemical having pearly white color so it resembles milk.
The perpetrators of this egregious crime plead helplessness and say that making milk based tea costs them Rs 150 per unit which they sell at 200Rs per unit. But the overages in terms of bribes mean that their costs double and combine it with relatively short lifespan of milk based tea means that they cannot earn their livelihood from these means. A fevicryl based tea on the other hand costs rs 50 a unit, lasts upto six days while still staying drinkable upon reheating and brings them the same profit with the bribes.
This may have been reported only in aurangabad but who knows where else its happening. Millions of people travel everyday on these trains. They drink tea, eat snacks during their long arduous journeys. while the very cost of their journey has now been reduced, i guess people should be mindful of the fact that it comes at a price and that the next cup of chai that you have may not be refreshing but be killing instead

another movie review-strangers

the movie might sound Hollywoodish but this self stylized whodunnit is from the stables of our very own bollywood. Friday nights for the last cpl of weeks have been potlucks and after potlucks i dont sleep too well. Trying to cut down on my food intake has meant that i am always guilt ridden for not have eaten wayyy beyond my stomach full like i used to.
But this isnt about me. This is about the movie which i watched while drinking about a gallon of orange juice(100% natural one wayy better than pepsi cola) and well it did worsen my insomnia now that i cant sleep without writing about it and quite a few other things i suddenly have on my mind, I am glad that i did watch it.
Strangers starring jimmy shergill,kay kay menon, the doe eyed bengali beauty, daughter of a Nobel laureate who doesnt know how to act nandana deb sen, sonali kulkarni and an acting talent from yester years kitu gidwani in a blink and you miss it role.
Now the thing about a movie like strangers is that it doesnt go well with the sensibilities of indian masses. While adultery is still in closet and walking out of dead relationships still not an option, a movie that shows otherwise is not going to attract too many cinema goers. But if you are looking for a glimpse of powerhouse indian cinema, a good script with oodles of twists and turns and stellar performances, this movie is one of your best bet in the last six months.
The problem with murder mysteries is that you cannot write too much and yet reveal only too little. So without going into too much details, jimmy shergill who has always been a darkhorse in bollywood has come out again with a stellar performance, kay kay menon is as always on the top of his game, nandana deb sen though an extremely pretty sight should stay out of movies and well sonali i miss u :).
I today gained two sentiments from this movie, that writing is like shitting; when you write you vent up all that is accumulated inside of you and that when you hold your breath and think that by doing so everything will come to a standstill, you always end up not holding your breath long enough

enjoy this movie guys, totally worth it!!

type of indian women found in us grad schools courtesy longhorn

this is not mine but hillarious to say the least

so here goes

this is just a summary. for details visit
http://sudiptachatterjee.blogspot.com/2007/11/desi-juliet-guide.html

THE BALLERINA (Julietofus Dansicus)

THE SNOBFACE (Julietofus Pedigree-ius)

MOTHER MARY (Julietofus Matronus)

CATWOMAN (Julietofus Amoramus)

THE CHATTERBOX (Julietofus Blabberifus)

UBER-GIRLY (Julietofus Pansipus)

BASANTI (Julietofus Rusticus)

THE ULTRA FEMINIST (Julietofus Sultanus)

FIRANGI PHASAYA (Julietofus Oversea-us

ULTRA CAUTIOUS (Julietofus Cherry-pickus)

MISS BIRDBRAINS (Julietofus Pinheadus)

THE ROUND ONE (Julietofus Slimmifus)


VEGGIE DELITE (Julietofus herbivorous)

THE TAKEN ONES (Julietofus long-distancus)

for my own reference :P or anybody else for that matter :D

source http://www.ibnlive.com/news/she-wants-our-relationship-to-be-a-secret/59243-19-p1.html

Here are the five things that definitely say another is either not interested in carrying on with the relationship (if you aren’t imagining the relationship in the first place) or are not interested:

1. S/ he does NOT introduce you to friends and keeps you a secret: Unless there is secrecy due to parental disapproval or HR trouble (for office romance cases), most people will introduce their partners to their friend circle. If yours is not doing so, there could be two reasons: You are not ‘important’ enough to be introduced (and are a private convenience or ‘time-pass’) or they don’t consider you good enough and consider you an embarrassment. If s/he talks to you (or meets) you in private but denies even knowing you in public, they are not serious about the relationship and you are about to be history soon.

2. S/ he does not talk to you (as much) anymore: There cannot be a clearer sign of another not being interested than them NOT wanting to talk to you. If you have been talking to the other for some time – whether over coffee or on the phone – and now they don’t want to talk anymore or don’t seem to have much time, they’ve either lost interest or are not interested. Replying in monosyllables, yawning on the phone, ending calls midway or always being busy when you call are clear signs you should back off.

3. S/he is ignoring you: When someone is interested, they SHOW interest. If on the other hand, the other avoids places where you could be, does not tell you where s/he would be (for fear you would land up there), does not take your calls, blocks you on instant-messenger and does not respond to SMS-es (even after five days), they are definitely NOT interested.

4. S/ he hopes you will find someone “better” for yourself: It means they are hoping that you would leave them alone and get on with your life. When you are clearly interested in someone and they are giving you the “find someone better” line, it means they wish you’d rather put your interest and affections elsewhere and not on them. Many times people are not comfortable telling another to buzz-off on their faces and employ this tactic hoping the other would get the message.

5. S/ he wants to be ‘friends’ with you forever…: Wanting to “be friends” is the most classic and perhaps the biggest sign that the other is not interested. ‘Being friends’ here should not be confused with the other person valuing you; instead it means the person definitely does NOT see you as a romantic interest. Wanting to be friends is perhaps their way of telling you that ‘friendship’ is all they want from their association with you and is a polite way of telling you to move on.

Baarish - Indian Rain Song (Original)

dug this song today from youtube and lo and behold before the day ends, everybody has it in their favourite videos list on orkut.
This song for its sheer beauty(and the beauty of the singer) deserves to be blogged.

The guy who uploaded this video gave the following apt description

"An original song about the emotions stirred in a girl witnessing the first rainfall of the season. Pardon the nowhere-near-perfect guitaring/singing, this was a single take recording...loved the quirky camera angle so I couldn't resist putting this up here"

I go one step ahead and say watching this video was the most beautiful event in my day today


so here goes!! enjoy!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9OWy_JTqbg

kal-yesterday and tomorrow...... a tribute

From the amount of movies i see this blog should be filled with tributes to all kinds of movies. from psych thrillers to horror to comedy(i dont do romance!!). But only once in a while there come movies that are befitting a tribute. Of late there was one 'Taare Zameen Par' and then there was one starring kamal hasan called 'Sadma' and then a few notable ones would be 'Haasil' and 'Seher', both worth their weights in gold.
I believe most of the readers would be familiar with actress chitrangada. This two movie wonder shook bollywood with her performance in 'Hazaroon Khawaishen Aisi' . That is another masterpiece. But today when her third movie has been announced i write a tribute to her second movie which in my opinion is her best work to date and I doubt she will ever be able to surpass it. "Kal-yesterday and tomorrow" is a hallmark in cinematic excellence. It is more than a movie. Its portrayal of life itself. A wise man once remarked to me 'Nobody dies a virgin, life fucks all'. This movie is a life size portrayal of that sentiment
Two years ago when i was about to leave for my graduate studies here, i used to sleep pretty less. Days were spent with family and friends and nights watching TV cause i knew it would be sometime before i could see a real nice hindi movie here. SO on one of those days by chance i stumbled upon this movie at 2 am in the morning and can never forget the next three hours.
Its a haunting tale of four friends played by chitrangada, shiney ahuja , raam kapoor and a very pretty simriti mishra. The four friends have a happy life till life itself happens to them. Writing anymore here would be a dead giveaway of the script.
The tale itself is slow paced with haunting soundtrack a remixed version of which can be found on youtube. So if you are into fast paced racy raunchy masala stuff then dont see this movie. You just wont appreciate it. However if you want to reflect on life itself then go grab a DVD and watch it in the darkness of night. It will give you a perspective on a lot of things atleast thats what it did to me.
The director of this movie is ruchi narain , the assistant director for HKA. She has done a great job but her immaturity can be seen here and there during the movie. But all in all its completely pardonable and a great watch

North Vs South or is it....????????????????

They say birds of a feather flock together. I say the feathers may be different but they belong to the same sky; that all the sky is for them to share. They say north should stay in north and south should stay in south. I say north south east and west are the same. In fact they are an amalgamation. Together they are complete and alone they are just fragments; incomplete carcasses of a mammoth culture.
My insinuations are towards growing crisis being faced by hindi speaking population at their very origin. Branded as lawless, brawling, chaotic and barbaric reminders of the marauders who have plagued our lands since time immemorial, they are being singled out and subjugated to humiliation and alienation in the very country where national language is hindi and whose ex prime minister had the pride to deliver a lecture in hindi on the floors of UN general assembly.
My being from the north has got nothing to do with what I write here today. In fact sitting in US, I should be least bothered about whats happening in India. I have never been beyond madhya pradesh(Once to bombay for three days), before coming to US never met any south indian, never dated any south indian girl(the only one i know is aishwarya rai and boy she is hot!! and ironically now married to a north indian living in bombay) and obviously never watchd a south indian movie. Being a pakka north indian from haryana according to some Lt governer of delhi and a certain political wannabe from bombay, i should have popped off a couple of unsuspecting south indians by now, molested at least 10-12 women before/after getting completely wasted, broken all laws regarding parking, loud speakers building construction, money laundering tax evasion, electricity theft, forgery impersonation and last but the least my personal favourite mowing down people under my car.
To their utmost disappointment if they probe in the life of this pukka diliwalla as i pride in calling myself i have done neither. Pride myself in being a law abiding citizen of india for 21 years and a law abiding non resident alien in united states for two years where ironically laws are stricter with lesser loopholes for both north and south indians to wiggle out of.
The reason i am pouring my heart here today is because fighting over names of states, filling up of personal coffers at the cost of stunted growth and red tape were bad enough we now have these irresponsible netas hell bent on irreversibly widening the north south divide.
Banglore is IT capital of india not of andhra pradesh or karnataka where majority of business is carried out in english which is neither hindi nor marathi nor tamil nor telugu. Mumbai is the home of bollywood which churns out the maximum number of movies in hindi language year after year. Haryana produces the maximum amount of wheat in india which is the staple diet from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, the steel from jamshedpur and bhilai is in homes of north and south indians and tea from darjeeling and beauty of himalayas and salt from gujrat and...... the list goes on and on.
Can we live by beating and alienating each other? The above argument amply illustrates that united we stand and divided we fall. So why this chasm? why these fault lines deepening now? The answer lies in petty cultural differences and differences in upbringing people from north and south have. while people from north believe more in showing off what we have and what we dont have,living beyond what means permit and enjoying life to the hilt. From whatever i have observed in graduate students from south india here, i can say that they are generally reserved, brilliant in their minds, not showy and pretentious and very proud of their heritage. These differences are just my opinion and based on my observations. However these petty differences sometimes lead to petty disputes which are now being blown out of proportions and being used for vested interests.
If I look at a micro sample which would my graduate school here, i see a tendency in people belonging to same regions hang out more together. Nothing wrong with that. It is purely a matter of choice more than anything else. But i also find people who have this notion that since people speaking 'their' language are almost equivalent to hindi speaking language, their language should alo be made national language or a certain super star from south should be made bharat ratna and so on. Again nothing wrong with that. Purely their opinion. I dont agree and dont find it to be socially correct to overtly disagree. There are people on the other side too who would use expressions like 'gult', 'southy' , 'illad', 'sambhar -dosa' and stuff like that to brand segregate and label people according to their convenience. Rather than the stupid politicians, there are these small tendencies in us which they aggravate to a point of conflict between individuals born to one land. I for one after coming here have learnt to judge people on merit rather than their mother tongue. Idiots and bigots can belong to both north and south but so do good people. We must learn to see good in human beings regardless of their caste color and creed or else we who weep for our lost sons and daughters abroad will have to weep for ones killed at home by our own hands.