consortium

The eyes of truth

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 20:06:00 +0000

Being Religious is good! No, I am still an Atheist. The reason why I am saying this is because of a couple of phenomenon that I have observed over the years.

In India, whenever there is a religious festival around the corner, suddenly the followers of that sect become saints. They become vegetarian, they don't drink, heck they don't even abuse. And not just on the day of the main festival, it goes for anywhere around a week before and after. Some people go to the extreme and do a fast, in effect giving their digestive systems and their bile juices a biologically much needed break from constant work.

In the western world, religion has more of a "mainstay" effect. It becomes the raison d'etre for acting good. Non-vegetarianism is not a sin there, so only the other forms of "bad" are abolished, like intoxication and indulgence of the adult kind.

There was a study done which proved that Religious people are healthier and live longer than the non believers.

Religions provide a huge employment base. It has propelled small time people into the handful owners of Ferrarris in India (the surviving family of the late Gulshan Kumar). I don't have the latest data but the last I heard, 11% of all the music sold in India was Devotional music. I am sure it still holds a huge share.
Why just the music industry? Imagine the total number of SMEs it supports. Have you ever visited a large Hindu temple? Flocks of stalls surround it; of flowers, sweets, other offerings; sometimes for kilometers. Imagine the number of publishing houses and workers it feeds. The most published book in the world is the bible. I just cannot begin to fathom the number of copies of the Quran, Geeta and Ramcharitmanas that must have been published and being continued.

Apart from the tangible benefits it offers to the society, there is another important function that Religion serves. It gives strength and support. The strength of mind and the will that drives many people to live, achieve and survive through tough times.

So all you religious people out there, keep up the good work. Just don't get too cocky over your individual beliefs. I believe that any Religion will serve its fundamental purpose only if it is not imposed on anyone. And if you are not in the category, don't fret, just do good for the sake of doing good.

The world

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 08:31:00 +0000

At the risk of sparking an outburst from the feminists and the opinionated section of the society, I am making a statement. It is a woman's world.
Before the boos and the hisses are thrown at the statement, hear this part out.

We are all encased in an all encompassing society that is pro-female. The laws that apply to everyone are somehow either biased towards the fairer gender or are somehow female in origin.

Gillete came up with a campaign recently; indeed to boost their sales. It utilised a powerful tool of women asking their men to shave regularly "or else". Why?
Where did the concept of shaving originate from? What is a beard? It is technically nothing but the side-effect of the male hormone. The same testosterone that is responsible for the elongation of the vocal chords and subsequently the deeper voice. So by removing the signs of testosterone, the society is trying to bring men to the proximity of women, who don't have such side-effects.

How many men will, if left to themselves, in the company of only men, shave? Or apply deodorant? Market Research also categorises the two products in the "Social needs" driven basket.

Another controversial topic that finds a place here is "Monogamy". A man, if left to live on his own terms, would like to be around a dozen supermodels if not a couple of them. Those with the means and the motivation do try to exercise them. Not everyone but quite a few uber rich men do flaunt their "capabillity" this way. Doesn't multiple partners concept apply to the majority of animal species?

Hence the law making polygamy illegal. One of the ways of defining laws is something that regulates the external human behaviour. And of course, monogamy being 'feminine', makes the society more female. Indeed, for the society to work for the benefit of everyone, it should allow a woman the full commitment of one man to raise her child. Let alone the right to live.

Violence is in the genes of men. Men (and males in other species) were born to fight. Fight for food, for territory and for mate. But it leads to problems for others. Hence the need to remove violence to lead to "civilisation". So is it really, on the whole, a man's world?

Fight!

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 20:08:00 +0000

I have been hooked on to this game for the last 4 months or so. No wonder it has more than 7 million players playing it online, and growing. What a journey it has been beginning as a street thug and making my way up. Which still continues. So it is only obvious that I do some justice to a thing that takes up a lot of my daily time, the thing that is the most important reason I log on to facebook.

Mafia Wars Guide by Abhishek Pandey :D

So you have entered the big bad world of virtual mafiosi and are now beginning to make some strides. Wondering how to optimise your game play so that you enjoy the max while moving through the ranks the fastest? Read on....

First things first, I have made a lot of mistakes, hence my guide is all the more "authentic".

The best character is "Maniac". If you have chosen "Mogul" because you had no idea that making money fast has no value in this game and it actually is the weakest character, well, welcome to the boat. A lot of people including me have made that mistake. But you can't change your character mid way. You can't even remove that application and start all over again because Zynga does not delete your character for 90 days after you have removed the application! But Mogul is not all that bad, after me and my friends have achieved a lot in the game with the "weakest" character. It just requires more patience than Maniac.

Right, so what is the game all about?
Doing Jobs. Leveling up. Fighting. Leveling up gives you refills of your health, energy and stamina, which you can use to do even more jobs and achieve greatness.

How to develop your character?

* Start by adding mafia. Tons of them. More mafia means:
1> More attack and defence strength used to win fights.
2> More people to give you gifts, energy packs, help during fights (rallying troops for more experience, taking bullets for less loss, finding loot), boosts and helps for jobs, laundering money (experience and money), chance to benefit while doing jobs/fights if someone adds you to their top mafia, fighting a guy on whom you set a booty (supari in bhaigiri language), even winning wars against your friends.
In short, the chance to get experience and money without spending energy or stamina. Also helps in many achievements.

The gifts and loots that you receive help you complete vault collections as well as increase your attack/defence strength. There is no limit to the number of mafia you can add. The game anyways picks up your top 500 mafia for fights, so you need not worry about stopping there. How to add other people in your mafia? Go to http://forums.zynga.com/forumdisplay.php?f=36 and to the thread "Add me Facebook *one post per thread*". It has hundreds of posts per day by actual players wanting to increase their mafia. You have to add people in your facebook friends list before you can add them to your mafia. And if you add starting from the last page, they will accept your request and add you to your mafia in minutes if not seconds. There is a limit to how many people you can add per day on mafia wars (I think it is 24), but there is no limit on how many you can add on facebook. So add as many as you can, and wait for a couple of days for them to add you. Now whether to keep those friends in your facebook after they are a part of your mafia or not list is your wish, but keeping them in your list has certain advantages. E.g., you can get experience on doing jobs that they post on their walls only if they are in your list, otherwise you just get a token amount in $ (if you help them via your live feed on mafia wars home page). The only bad thing about adding random people is that they clutter your facebook feed with posts. There are people who play 24/7, and their "xyz had just iced abc and is offering you a bonus" message can get irritating after a limit. Alternatively, you can keep them in your friend list and remove such posts using scripts like greasemonkey.
Within a week you can make your mafia grow by 250! So start right NOW.
The benefit you get to attack/defence, war participation and even gifting is available even if you remove them from your facebook friend list.

* Spend skill points wisely:

You have a choice between three types of characters:
1> The energy junkie.
You only spend your skill points to your energy and level up fastest focusing on jobs with highest exp ratio. You don't mind losing all the fights when someone attacks you
2> The fight junkie
You spend your skill points on stamina, Attack and Defence and very few on energy. You fight your way to glory and are more content by pounding people rather than watching the blue exp bar move towards right.
3> The middle man
You wisely balance between energy and Attack/Defence. You do jobs as much as you fight. You don't particularly level up fast like the energy junkie but you don't lose many fights like him.

I chose 3rd for a large portion of my time, but later found that my friend who had a modified version of 2 was much better off. Reason? The experience you get with fights is close to 3 per stamina spent, (averages out with 1,2,3,4, and 6 exp per fight won) while the best exp paying jobs won't give you more than 1.7 exp ratio per energy spent.
My friend had not put any points in attack/defence as well, and still he was winning fights! I discovered that stat points (Attack/Defence) has little bearing on winning fights, (zynga never declares the formula they use to determine who will win the fights, and is subject to a debate involving millions of people), but the size of the mafia matters the most. So if you are level 250 with only 20 attack, but 501 mafia size, you will cream (even) a level 280 guy if his mafia size is 50 or 100 and defence is 200. And there are many such jokers to be found on the fight list whether it is cuba, new york or moscow.
To illustrate, just today I finished 50 stamina on fights and got 150 experience in spite of losing 3-4 fights on the way!

One important thing to be noted is that your mafia attack/defence strength for fights is calculated on your loot items (not on your bought weapons/armor/vehicles except body armor and town cars). Also, gifting your mafia loot items with attack/defence will decrease your strength. So when you read about "equipping your mafia", it is NOT the same as "gifting weapons/armor/vehicles to your mafia", it just means having more loot items or buying items to compensate for not having enough loot.

So NEVER EVER put any points on health. Put it only on energy and stamina. Don't put points in your attack/defence after a certain point. You anyways get a lot of free stat points on vaulting collections (attack/defence/energy/health).

When to use energy packs?
You need to use energy packs wisely, as you can use them only once every 23 hours, and they can make 0 energy to 1.25 of your max energy. The best point to use energy pack sent by someone is when you just finish your entire energy that you get after you have just refilled it by leveling up. That means, you should wait before using energy pack if you are just a few exp away from leveling up. Once you level up, finish the energy, and then click on use energy pack.
With tweaking around, you can develop strategies on leveling up. E.g. I used to do max exp ratio jobs before leveling up. As soon as I leveled up, I used to do least exp ratio jobs, then use energy pack, then again do least exp jobs. By the time I finished that energy, I was already at next level. Then I switched again to max exp ratio jobs. I used to level up twice a day with that strategy. I have modified that strategy to level up thrice a day after getting "Golden Throne" by finishing New York. It involves fighting to get the remaining experience after spending energy. With 100 stamina, you can level up even 7 times a day if you play like a maniac.

Boss Fights:
Do not enter boss fights until you have put your money in the bank. Also, do not enter into boss fights until you have enough shivs/stun guns (there is no need of a getaway driver, I never used one). Don't do boss fights more than once, since their exp payout is pathetic despite their claims.

How to make good money?

New York:
During our times we had properties, and we had to buy more properties for more cashflow. You will most probably have "rackets". I am not aware of how these work, but have heard that they can be more lethal than properties if used correctly. Hunt for guides on rackets on zynga forum. I am sure you will find more than one.
Just keep on building cash flow. Keep banking money. People who win fights against you won't win your money if it is in bank. Once you hit a cash flow of say 1 million $ an hour, you can stop going to bank forever. Since banking will cost you 10% of money, and it becomes much more of a loss losing 1 million dollars on banking 10 million than losing 5-6 fights and 5-600,000 $ before you get iced. Once you are iced (under 20 health), no one can loot money from you until your health recovers over 20.

Cuba/Moscow:
Here, you need to keep selling your stuff to make money. Here, you need to keep all your money in the bank at all times, because here there is no assured cashflow per hour. Instead, how much you make depends on whether you can sell your goods before they hit the maximum capacity.
One important thing I learnt is that while upgrading your businesses, upgrade only on QUALITY and OUTPUT (Quantity). Upgrade capacity only in the end. Since you can log on once every 9/12 hours to sell your crates anyways. And investing in quality and output gives maximum gains.

There are achievements related to trillion dollars and above for New York. It is impossible to get those with properties. There are guides on zynga forum on how to make trillion dollars, but it involves doing absolutely nothing else for months. So don't bother about them now. But do increase your cash flow as much as possible.

Gifting:

Gifting, as I mentioned before, has many benefits. Now when we start, we all make the mistake of gifting precious collection items (cards, rings etc), consumables (read more about them below), even items with good defence/attack like canonazo/tnt etc. While it is your wish what to gift, you will find that in the long run, you will regret sending an item if you can't vault a collection just because one item is missing, or if you are stuck in a new york job just because you have run out of consumables.
So while gifting, DO NOT give away any consumable, which are:

In New York:
Concealable Camera
Computer Setup
Untraceable cell phone
Blackmail Photos
Illegal Transaction Records

In Cuba:
Politico Corrupto
Untraceable cell phones

In Moscow:
photos of leaders
Concealable Cameras/Untraceable cell phones (based on your choice of vory/mafiya)

Consumables are the most irritating part of New York. I know of many people who have not completed New York just because they ran out of consumables. To put things to perspective:
You will require 368 Blackmail Photos just for Boss tier. And you need to spend energy on first getting concealable cameras, then spend energy AND concealable cameras on getting Blackmail photos. Plus, it is not guaranteed that if you do the specific job to get these drops, that you will get those items. That means, if you do the "obtain compromising photos" job in New York 10 times, you spend 10 concealable cameras, and for all you know, you might get only 3 or 4 blackmail photos!

So NEVER EVER give away consumables.

While gifting, a higher level person might not appreciate all your gifts. So gift prudently. I mean, when some low level guy gifts me brass knuckles or butterfly knife or lucky shamrock medallion, I get irritated a lot. They don't add anything to my attack/defence strength. I have much stronger items. So it is better to give a person what he or she has on his wishlist, as long as it is not a consumable or an item that you haven't vaulted yet. So do not give away any collection item until you have vaulted them at least once!

Also, you can trade gifts. I have used trading to complete a lot of my collections. Exchange with people willing to exchange.

Godfather points:

This is probably the only "revenue center" for Zynga. You can buy them with actual money. Hence it is understandable that these are the hardest to obtain. You get only one for leveling up twice. Sometimes there are promotions where you get free godfather points, like there was one during thanksgiving week (again, clicking on friends' post was required), plus you get 2-3 points if you become a "fan" of the application on facebook.

Where to spend Godfather points?
ONLY and ONLY one of the two:
a) Stat points (4 for 14)
b) Complete energy refill (1 for 10)

DO NOT spend it on anything else. I have wasted points on money before, many of my friends have wasted them on crates/buying consumables (20 points for 10 New York Consumables, 55 points for 3 mysterious crates etc), hence warning you.

General tips:

* Do not do Cuba and Moscow until you finish New York. Big Apple is frustrating but the payouts (especially Private island, Golden Throne) are worth it. My character was generating one energy every 5 minutes when I started out. It is now 2 every 4minutes & 30 seconds. I have used that to finish 5 tiers of Cuba (14 masteries) in 17 days flat.

* Look out for promotional events. There was a Big Apple week which helped many players to complete New York. I am hoping for a moscow week soon. It is tough!

* In case of any problems, do write to Zynga. They do respond, albeit after a long time.

* If you have some close friends playing MW, then ask them to promote you to Either their Mastermind or their Wheelman (only possible if your character is Fearless). The idea is to get maximum experience with least energy spent possible.

I guess this is a very exhaustive guide. But I have still left certain things for you to discover on your own. E.g. Whether to heal yourself at Cuban hospital if you fight in Cuba, is a decision you have to take. Also, I haven't mentioned on how to go about achieving achievements. Those are fun if you discover the best ways to finish them.

Have fun playing! And do forward it to other noobies.

Justified

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 11:52:00 +0000

Happened to sneak a peek on a TV soap on India's no 1 Channel. For the last 4 episodes or so, the prime theme has been the plotting done by a girl to ruin and screw up a marriage that's about to happen. The marriage is of the girl's best friend. Who has been her best friend since her childhood. They have been living under the same roof since childhood for Krishna's sake!

So a logical person should ask "Why then would she even think of such a heinous act of destroying her marriage?" But by now everyone should have guessed that logic has no place in melodrama.
So the reason according to the serial is like this. The guy had originally come to "see" the other girl for arranged marriage but due to some miscommunication (my my, how surprising) ended up picking up her "best friend". This has led to the original girl abandoning all sense, of friendship or of everything human etc etc.

This is the stuff that drives the imaginations of millions of ladies of our country. And it is not just any program, it is one of the most watched program. It is the love of the audience that has made the channel to take the decision of converting it from a 4 days a week show to 5 days a week. So I can make a fair statement (backed by a lot of empirical evidence) that this is what drives a woman's fantasy. Ok, an Indian woman's fantasy. If my mom, who has absolutely nothing to relate to the serial (no big bungalows, no huge joint families, no couple of daughters of marriable age) can also watch it, then I am sure the serial has hit the right spot just like the hundreds of other serials on TV suffering from the same symptoms.

So if this is what women like watching, how can those same women treat the act of their men watching internet porn like criminals? Don't get me wrong, I am not justrifying porn, but I am just correlating the two and deducing that both are equal. Whether equally bad or equally good is for every individual to decide.
After all, the reason given by women of why they absolutely hate, abhor, loathe, despise this sick act of watching porn that men enjoy is that "It is so sick. How can anyone be so sick to enjoy even think of such fantasies. It makes me wanna puke". Then by the very same reasoning, even men can ask the same question to women who watch these soaps. If this is justified, then that is too.

just for the records

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 19:30:00 +0000

Even after I die, my spirit will have the satisfaction that some remote server owned by Google will continue to hold my likings and dislikes. Call this narcissism or some sort of ego massage or another of those offbeat ways to achieve "immortality" but this post will have only my likings and dislikes in the important matters (read matters that I consider important).
Thanks to an application on Facebook that gave me this idea to store it "offline".

Places I want to visit

Machu Picchu, Ladakh, New Zealand, Brazil and Greece

my top 5 favorite books :)

The Dilbert Principle: A Cubicle's-Eye View of Bosses, Meetings, Management Fads & Other Workplace Afflictions, The Lord of the Rings, Eragon and Eldest (Inheritance, Books 1 & 2), Deception Point and The Alchemist

5 best tv shows by Abhishek

SportsCenter, Friends, The Simpsons, Tom and Jerry and Globe Trekker

Albums I can listen to from beginning to end...

Behind the Sun, A State Of Trance 2008, Deep Forest, Enigma - MCMXC a. D. - The Complete Album Dil Se

My top 5 Favorite Songs (At the moment)

Falling in and out of love - Armin Van Buuren featuring Sharon Del Aden, Beauty Hides In the Deep - Doppler effect, Sirens Of The Sea - OceanLab, Please Don't Go - Dobenbeck and sasural genda phool - Delhi 6

All-Time Favorite Athletes

Lionel Messi, Roger Federer, david villa, Lewis Hamilton and Justine Henin

Stars I would love to be stranded with on a deserted Island :)

Ana Beatriz Barros, Ana Ivanovic, Ana Hickman, Giorgia Palmas and Bipasha Basu

5 Things I Want To Learn

Spanish, swimming, Shaolin Kung fu , Become a professional DJ and Skydiving

Favorite movies of all time

Titanic, The Jungle Book, The Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King, The Matrix and Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind

1 athlete, 1 musician, 1 celebrity, 1 actor and 1 actress (hmm maybe the subconscious bengali bias is because of my recent 68 day stay at Kolkata)

Lionel Messi, Armin Van Buuren, Adriana Lima, mithun chakraborty and Bipasha Basu

Even when there is no competition!

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:22:00 +0000

A word for movie producers:

Focus on the script.

"8 X 10 Tasveer" had 2 months without competition, but couldn't do any business
"Kal Kissne Dekha" (original spelling retained) had no competition as it was the first movie released after the multiplex producer saga, but couldn't do any business. So did "Aa dekhe zara".

Core reason?

Yin Yang

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Sun, 17 May 2009 07:59:00 +0000

What is life?
No I am not even attempting to find out the meaning of a subject so complex and so revered. A question that many greats have devoted their lives to answer. But I will touch upon one aspect of it. What the orientals call Yin and Yang, or what the westerners call duality.

Let's start with my favourite, Nature. Nature is beautiful, but comes with its fair share of "ugliness" as well. Complementing the gorgeous mountains are the zillions of creepy crawlies. Coexisting with fruits, grains and nutrition for all are the bacteria, virus and diseases for all.

Another favorite, The Matrix, which has many zen and oriental philosophies embedded in it. Agent Smith continues to exist as long as Neo is in the system. The only way to remove agent Smith from the system is for Neo to die.

Religion has its duality as well. With Gods exist the Devils. With deities, ghosts are present as well.

Similarly, with love comes the feeling of intense pleasure and severe pain.

So when we are afraid of the negative, why leave the entire experience altogether? Just for the fear of experiencing pain, why discard the chance to love? Just for the fear of leeches, why forgo the wonderful experience of trekking through the woods?

So to live life is to experience it in its full glory

Live. Experience. Embrace

The 35 Watt principle

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 21:37:00 +0000

When you want to buy a bulb, out of the two which would you prefer - a 35 W or a 100 W? 35 W obviously. Why?
1) 100 W runs expensively
2) It goes bust very soon

When organisations would like to hire somebody, they would want a 35 W bulb. One that gives a mediocre output, but an output that lasts. They would want you to give sustained output.

"The McKinsey way" tells you to 'take one base at a time rather than trying to hit home runs all the time'. If you hit a home run, everyone's expectations about you are unnecessarily raised. If you can't perform to the standards you have raised, you will get a lot of flak, negative reviews.

When it is about studies, the person that learns the most (not necessarily scores the most) is who studies in short bursts, but regularly. People who clear certifications are those who study regularly rather than those who study intensively at the end.

The reign of ruin

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 21:11:00 +0000

Colors, from the Viacom 18 stable, is all set to overtake Star Plus as the number one channel in India after already displacing sony and zee. What's sad is that the driving force is a serial called "Baalika Vadhu".

If the soap that has had the last 6-7 episodes of every character weeping and wailing because of a tragic death is what is captivating the imaginations of the Indian viewer, then there is something seriously wrong with us. This is the serial that skyrocketed to fame by showing a 10-11 year kid being locked up in a filthy basement and howling throughout the night at the torture (which I am told took a neat 3 episodes). How can it represent the "Entertainment" and "Variety" positioning that the channel did when it launched itself? Colors had shows like "Khatron ke Khiladi" and "Big Boss". It then moved on to the 'universally Indian' likes of "Jai Shri Krishna". But where does "Baalika Vadhu" fit in this image?

Viacom has always been associated with MTV; youthful, vibrant, crazy, uncontemporary. I am afraid even they have taken the Balaji route to the depressing fantasies of the Indian housewife. How can something so depressing with so much negative focus be called entertainment? To make things worse, the serial is making people stay inside their homes till 8:30 pm, so the business of malls, restaurants etc is also effected (just like the KBC effect we saw around 8 years back).

It is high time that Indian women move on from wasting their time with this non sense called "soap" churned out in dozens by dozen channels every day. If the fantasy of an average Indian 'domestic engineer' includes multiple affairs, illegitimate children, squabbling family members all living and plotting against each other in the same house, handling a 500 rs crore "business" without any prior experience whatsover, then it is nothing short of an epidemic. If they get "entertainment" by listening to the preaching lectures full of Indian mythology delivered by sari clad "pavitra" women (who are later known to have done everything "apavitra") with full make up on even when they are cooking food or waking up, then I am afraid it is a mental sickness of the scale of an endemic epidemic.

Jaago India Jaago!

Resonance

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 11:30:00 +0000

....and as the three wheeler; that I was riding alone; sped at the maximum permissible speed allowed by traffic; my mind was in a world other than this one. Surrounded in an epic rhythm and an acoustic melody; enchanted by a mesmerising soul captivating voice. As her last words rang my ears; I realised that there was but one thread connecting me to this world. Those words were, "Follow me yeah let's go"

The epic was ending and the male metallic voice was booming the familiar countdown. As he began "5.....4....." I saw that the traffic signal was also counting down in the exact order....5.....4.....3.....

Which is when I got the message. Loud and Clear. The world inside my bloodrushed head is not different from the "outside" world. There is resonance.

Mumbaiite

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 08:31:00 +0000

The oldest history we have is that of the Magadh empire around 3rd century BC. The now NalaSopara was an established trade port of King Ashoka. It seems they left the islands to Fishermen and Buddhist monks.

(Reference)Bombay changed hands many times. The islands belonged to the Silhara dynasty till the middle of the 13th century. The oldest structures in the archipelago--- the caves at Elephanta, and part of the Walkeshwar temple complex probably date from this time. Modern sources identify a 13th century Raja Bhimdev who had his capital in Mahikawati-- present-day Mahim, and Prabhadevi. Presumably the first merchants and agriculturists settled in Mumbai at this time. In 1343 the island of Salsette, and eventually the whole archipelago, passed to the Sultan of Gujarat. The mosque in Mahim dates from this period.

Then it all started with jealousy. Spaniards were having an upper hand over the Portuguese. Christopher Columbus had accidentally discovered the new world when he had begun to discover India. Their hard rivals, the Portuguese imperatively had to discover the (route to) real India. With Vasco Da Gama, the first Portuguese arrived in India. The Indians discarded what they had brought in their ships (we had better quality materials anyways). The Original wanderers reported back to Portugal Royal elites that India w big. "They had big markets, so many people, long roads, big buildings. Everyone was so rich". But with other better goods carrying trips (Vasco Da Gama came thrice to India during his lifetime, dying here in his last trip), they slowly spread their wings in India.

(Reference)In 1508 Francis Almeida sailed into the deep natural harbour of the island his countrymen came to call Bom Bahia (the Good Bay). Bahadur Shah of Gujarat was forced to cede the main islands to the Portuguese in 1534, before he was murdered by the proselytizing invaders. The Portuguese built a fort in Bassein. They were not interested in the islands, although some fortifications and a few chapels were built for the converted fishermen. The St. Andrew's church in Bandra dates from this period. For years, the Dutch and the British tried to get information on the sea route to India--- often by spying. Eventually, in 1661, Catherine of Braganza brought these islands to Charles II of England as part of her marriage dowry. The British East India Company received it from the crown in 1668, founded the modern city, and shortly thereafter moved their main holdings from Surat to Bombay. George Oxenden was the first governor of a Bombay whose place in history was finally secure.

The web of commerce which had supported the civilisation of the Indian Ocean littoral had died with the coming of the Europeans. The Mughal empire in Delhi was not interested in navies-- despising the Portuguese and the British as ``merchant princes''. The second governor of Bombay, Gerald Aungier, saw the opportunity to develop the islands into a centre of commerce to rival other ports still in the hands of local kingdoms. He offered various inducement to skilled workers and traders to move to this British holding. The opportunities for business attracted many Gujarati communities--- the Parsis, the Bohras, Jews and banias from Surat and Diu. The population of Bombay was estimated to have risen from 10,000 in 1661 to 60,000 in 1675.

Slowly the Portugese had captured much of the southern ports of India (The current Kozhikode (Calicut) and Pondicherry still carries the remnants of their "culture"). The britishers had to find a landing place in India. Their ships circumvented the Portugese ships and beachheads across the western southern coast and went a little north. To establish a small port. They picked Surat.

(Reference)With increasing prosperity and growing political power following the 1817 victory over the Marathas, the British embarked upon reclamations and large scale engineering works in Bombay. The sixty years between the completion of the vellard at Breach Candy (1784) and the construction of the Mahim Causeway (1845) are the heroic period in which the seven islands were merged into one landmass. These immense works, in turn, attracted construction workers, like the Kamathis from Andhra, who began to come to Bombay from 1757 on. A regular civil administration was put in place during this period. In 1853 a 35-km long railway line between Thana and Bombay was inaugurated-- the first in India. Four years later, in 1854, the first cotton mill was founded in Bombay. With the cotton mills came large scale migrations of Marathi workers, and the chawls which accommodated them. The city had found its shape.

That is how the 7 islands came upon being. It began existing. Slowly, with more and more trade, more infrastructure was required. People were required. The Marwari community began traveling humongous distances to sell their stuff. It began breathing. Nothing to take away from Kolkata, as it was the Britishers' original start up port. But the point is, that is how Mumbai began its life.

With more Gujrati people coming here armed with their business skills and community supportive work culture, it slowly established itself as a business destination. It follows logically that with the business culture and performance orientation, the skills and ability of a person would take the center stage. They would become more important than the origin of the person, or to which community or region the person belongs to. Without introducing any kind of bias on association of a person's community with her/his ability, people from different parts of the country began coming to the land of opportunity. With more favourable conditions, the place transformed itself, step by step, from a port to a residential place to a business hub to a (additionally) film city.

(reference)The name Mumbai is derived from Mumba Devi, the patron goddess of the Kolis. The Kolis called her ' Mumba Aai' (Mother Mumba). From this word came Mumbai. The British, however, preferred to call the islands as Bombay. The name remained in practice till recent years. The temple of goddess Mumba Devi is still exists in Mumbai and the area around the temple is popularly known as Mumba Devi area

Given this background, I want to ask a question to everyone even remotely concerned with this city. Whose Mumbai is it? The Britishers? The Portuguese? The Gujrati Bohras/Parsis/Banias? The Marwari community? The Kamathis? The marathas? The kolis? The north Indian migrants?

Of a trance-doper

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:36:00 +0000

My top ten greatest artist groups with the songs that drive me, that are huge reasons for me to live.

EPIC, Progressive, Euro, breakdowns, lift; the terminologies that keep me kicking.

Influencers. Transformers. Spiritually rich and enriching. Mood uplifters. Gods.....

10. Daft punk

Their name is credited by them to a UK based magazine, indirectly. The critic called their music 'daft (crazy) punk'. They picked up well with the single 'Da Funk'. Another amazing album of theirs came out with Japanese animations of alien worlds, named "Discovery". It had tracks like 'One more time', 'Aerodynamic' and 'Digital love'

Funky:

Da Funk
Around the world

Twisty:

Aerodynamic
Harder Better Faster Stronger

9. Delerium

Why did the two member band split after they made the album"Karma"? They produced such amazing tracks like "Silence".... I wonder...

Crowd Mesmeriser:

Silence (featuring Sarah McLachlan)

8. Linkin Park

I won't write much about them, as they are a well known rock band. I wish to attend a live concert of Linkin Park at least once in my life (Are you listening Chester/Shinoda? When are you coming to Mumbai? India at least!).
I have heard most of 'Hybrid Theory' and a couple from 'Meteora'. I don't like "crawling", it is too negative for my taste.

Ramblers:

Papercut
In the end
One step closer
A place for my head
A cure for the itch! (freaking awesome fusion of scratchy R&B with Bass)

7. Eminem

Once again, there have been enough dwellings on this artist all over the media and the internet. He has lead-starred in a large scale Hollywood movie for F***'s sake (his style :P ).
That doesn't take away the fact that I truly respect him. His early life is a great example of resilience (fight from going almost bankrupt and losing his wife due to poverty) and devotion (his love for his daughter Hailie).

Rappers:

Stan
Loose yourself
The Real Slim Shady
Sing for the moment

6. BT

Considered by almost everyone to be the pioneer of Trance music. This guy is old skool in the field of trance music. His album ESCM (1997) had the smash hit "Flaming June". I recommend this track to everyone who want to find out how to seriously dance!

He is known for his stutter technique. He introduced me to the out of this world vocal singer Sarah McLachlan.

'Mercury and solace' had a creepy yet beautifully picturised video of a child apparently hurt by a car crash. He is found by a group of kids in the lush fields nearby and they dance and play around. They seem to be attracted by a shiny object at a distant hill, which seems like metal reflecting sun's light. All this time a model (who's actually the singer, Jan Johnston) wearing coat over a wrapped evening gown(??!!!??) is screaming "reach out for me". I think the kids (or are they time backs of their adult being? Who knows?) are dead and it is a sort of an after-life activity happening.

His other tracks include 'Dreaming' (mixed by Tiesto also I suppose), which is considered to be a classic trance track, in the league of 'Godspeed'. One more was 'Never gonna come back down' which was the epitome of Energy in performance, especially by the Ghetto singer.

Crushes:

Mercury and Solace
Flaming June
Godspeed

5. PVD

This world leading DJ from Germany is a one man army. He has traveled the world, and I was lucky to catch his second coming to Mumbai, live.
His hits include "For an Angel" and "We are alive" which had a video of a huge black trampoline cum couch traveling in city roads (I guess in Germany) and people of all ages/sects enjoying bouncing around. I somehow don't like these songs.

Thumpers:

Crush mix ('The politics of Dancing') from the Energy 2003 live performance
Times of our lives
Autumn
Rapture mix (originally by the group Iio - who derived their name from Sony Vaio!)

4. Deep Forest

Thanks to the creativity of this french duo. Creative because they combined Pygmy chants with Digital (revolutionary back then, in 1992) sounds. Creative because they moved on to Hungarian and Gypsy chants for further projects. Their first album was titled "Deep Forest". If you have heard the title song from the movie "Gupt", look no further for its "inspiration".
Creative as they were considered forerunners in the world of world music.
Creative as they have Australian native lyrics (not Swahili) in their smash song (sweet lullaby)

Makes you wanna groove:

Deep Forest (title track)
Hunting
Savana Dance
White whisper (have you heard the background music of Salman Khan's presence in "Judwa"?)

Heavily uplifts the mood:

Night Bird
The first twilight

3. Planet Funk

Mental patients exhibiting all signs of catatonism (a kind of madness for all you lazy bums) locked in a room. This forms the base video of "Chase the sun". The secret to the wooden radio is revealed in the next released video "Inside all the people", where there is no radio equipment inside the hollow box at all! Perhaps suggesting that the patients are listening to something out of their imagination.
"Inside all the people" goes on to show the chemistry that happens between a man and woman. A simple collision in the crowd is showed 3 times with 3 different results.

Rated 5, automatically ;) (windows media player style):

Chase the sun
Inside all the people

Hip turners:

Who said (stuck in the UK)

2. Enigma

Who could possibly think of a positive out of a 12 year old child dropping out of school to pursue a career in music? I am glad Mr. Cretu did.
Gregorian chants, Sexual noises, Thumping dance track, Shakuhachi flutes, can anybody possibly imagine a fusion out of these? I am glad Mr. Michael Cretu did.
Who would get inspired out of falling asleep in a London underground train? I am glad Mr....Yep, you got it.

Welcome to the world of Enigma. The world of mysteries. The world of treasures in terms of musical riches. No wonder the list of bollywood movies that got 'inspired' are countless. From the background music of Tridev to the songs of Akshay - Mamta Kulkarni (mang meri bharo....straight lift from mea culpa), everyone has tried to rake in the success story of this phenomenon.

After 'the cross of changes', their third album was a fusion of these Gregorian chants as well as tribal songs.

Reinventing itself in "The screen behind the mirror" and "Voyageur" proved that the artists have no dearth of soul.

Favourite tracks: Too many to list but will post a few 'toppers'

Mood Transformers/Transporters to different worlds:

Callas went away (I have written a poem on the visions I get when I hear this song)
Knocking on forbidden doors (Another vision that I get is of a guy running across narrow paths in the night on high dark barren plateaus, with deep gorges on both sides, to save someone locked in a dark castle...scary?)
Shadows in silence
In the shadow in the light
Push the limits.....It has lyrics having statistics about the MOON! Then linking it with the famous 'Oh fortuna' (remember the background score of the old old spice ads?) chant, possibly implying a connection with the moon and velut luna (like the moon, fortune is very moody and erratic)
Smell of Desire

Groovies:

The eyes of truth
I love you I'll kill you
Age of loneliness (Carly's song)
Return to innocence (The reverse video)
TNT for the brain (Listen to the Table, and listen to the sanskrit chants in this album)
Voyageur
Page of cups
The piano
The gravity of love
Modern crusaders
Traces (Light and Weight). This is the song captured in Sony Ericsson mobile handsets' "greetings" alarm/ring tone. Apart from Enigma, I think only AR Rehman can put the sounds of dripping water and match stick lighting to create the effect.
Silence must be heard
Turn Around (techno focus, and lyrics straightaway mention titles of previous hits of Enigma)
Ancient person of my heart

Some of the best songs are produced by Enigma collaborating with Deep forest. Two of my favourite artists combining to give awesome music! What more can I ask for? Notable ones are: 'Into Morocco' and 'New Dawn'

1. Chicane

Trivia: All you Bryan Adams fans, read this. Have you heard the song "Cloud no 9"? If you have, then the chances are that you have heard the remixed version of this song, not the original one. Because the original one was so bad, it never took off. It was Chicane's remix that did the trick and the song became popular. Bryan Adams sang for their biggest hit so far (Don't give up) as a gesture for his help.

Their music is described as relaxed, ambient, mood shifting and influenced by Ibiza!!

Anthems, my version of "Bhajan":

Saltwater (my all time favourite song across all categories of music, to date)
Don't give up
Sunstroke (remix)
Offshore
Autumn tactics

Phew!
What a ride this has been for me. If you have read this far, thank you very much for walking through this with me!

Forget the bulls and bears, JB students chase leopards

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 04:36:00 +0000

Thanks to Kunal for the title. Disclaimer: This article is purely a spoof

POWAI, MUMBAI (9 pm):
It was a usual routine game of Volleyball at the annual sports festival of a rival school in Powai, when the students of JBIMS turned it into a nature related activity. Joining the spectator list of students from SIMSR, JBIMS, NITIE and SPJIMR was a yellow, 4 foot long leopard. It is widely believed that the leopard was attracted at the sight of the best planners of India gathered together so close to his home.

As a token of respect for the leopard the students of JBIMS engaged into a case based discussion on 'Ways to spread awareness about leopards among Mumbaiites'. Among the various suggestions provided, a few innovative ones were using campus radios and visiting thejijamata udyan (zoo) while visiting the Ganpati of Lalbaug. The closing statement of the discussion "We look forward to hosting you on this campus again" was substantiated just 30 minutes later as the Leopard gave a second appearance in the same ground.

"The value of conserving nature is ingrained in us in the very first year through courses like CSR" says Neerav Makwana, a first year student of JBIMS. "Being at Churchgate, the closest we get to animal sightings in nature are those of the dolphins near marine drive. So we thought that the current situation presents to us a wonderful opportunity to practice what we learn".

When asked about the number of prizes that JBIMS won at the sports festival, he replied "Most B schools take part in these events to win, but Bajaj is different. We come here with the primary purpose of enjoying, and we have successfully ensured that the enjoyment quotient is achieved at the end of the day. We also provided a value addition in terms of leveraging upon the existing resources of our rival institute. Also, when it comes to maintaining a consistency, we have proved ourselves yet again as we reached in the semi finals of all the events we took part in".

Ramblings of the connected kind

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:40:00 +0000

1>We are a part of the Universe. We are one with the Universe. We are no different.

The Hydrogen present between the stars and in the Nebulae and the Carbon present in the Sun is the same that is present in our bodies.

2>The Universe has a plan for all of us. The world is a stage and all the men and women merely players.

If we discover the plan that the Universe has aligned for us, it will do everything in its power to help us start it. To complete it takes a little effort from our side. The Universe doesn't make plans and assign it to those who don't have the capability to complete it.

3>The Universe is intelligent. If it can create an intelligent mind that can ask questions, it is more intelligent than us.

Instead of questioning or doubting life, God, the world, it is our duty to search the plan that is the purpose of our life. Then to work to finish it.

Our planet is teeming with life. All living beings are living and working for the higher purpose, aligned with the one soul. Hence it is imperative to have respect for life.

*On Revolution (Terrorism):
How can the purpose of one's existence be abruptly ending the purpose of living of one hundred others?

The return to innocence

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 23:03:00 +0000

Then: You felt elated just because your parent looked at you sideways and gave you a short chase over the flight of stairs. You were in sheer ecstasy when you were finally caught and tickled on your tummy.
Now: You have been on the couch cycling through 104 channels for the third time in the last 10 minutes but still haven't found "anything" worthwhile. You put a potato chip in your mouth thinking about your "growing" tummy and how "Jerry" used to have one and still outrun "Tom".

Then: Any gift you received gave you double excitement. One was the pride of showing off the gift itself, no matter how common or simple or cheap it was. The other was the plethora of things you could do with the boxes/covers. Like building triangular tunnels for your toy train, makeshift rain houses for "Jackie" your puppy, cutouts in the shape of stars.
Now: The USB stick you got just 6 months ago doesn't seem interesting enough. Yes it still serves the "function" but you could have got one with FM/MP3/MPEG4 playback with a 30 GB storage. Is there an exchange offer for gadgets nearby?

Then: It's a birthday! There will be cakes, wafers, samosas, comic hero masks, cone caps, big balloons, toffees inside, coloured papers, agarbattis to burst them, games like 'hide and seek' and 'dog and the bone'. You hope that the friendly game of "Uno" cards you have brought as a gift will be used for entertainment in your friend circle in your summer holiday nights. You also hope that you get some comics as a return gift. Even a "Billoo" or a "Kar Bura to ho Bhala"-Bankelal will do.
Now: Sigh. Another senior member of the project is getting released. There goes a string of long speeches, especially by our Project Leader. Achievements, legacy, dependency, motivation, blah blah blah. My legs are aching. Hey that team member lady is wearing a nice pair of shoes. Wonder if there is a rum cake at the end of this.

Then: It is 5 pm. You hear your surname being shouted in a very crude way in the street below. Your sleeping father moans and gets irritated. You think "How many times do I have to tell my friends to use my first name? How hard is it for them to call me 'Ravi' instead of 'Singh'? At least they are not doing 'Kaalu' anymore. I'd rather put on my canvas shoes and take my bat or else this shouting will continue like everyday".
Now: The idea of a physical workout involves walking. From house to the bus stop, from platform no 6 to 1, inside a shopping mall, and if lucky, a garden or a sea face.

Then: The term "Adrenaline" meant a visit to the nearby mountain temple during monsoon. Who is interested to go for a Darshan? We go inside the premises only because of the laddoos we get for prasad. We are more interested in exploring the muddy and shrubby mountain and if lucky spotting a snake and running for our lives.
Now: I can feel the testosterone in me. Let me flash the message on DC++ : Anyone interested in a 2 hour game of Counter Strike 1.6? No? What about Halo? Thankfully I paid for LAN in this connection as well.

Then: Finally! 3 months of saving pocket money. Finally got my hands on the new "Savage Garden"/"Kaho na Pyar hai"/''Jagjeet Singh" cassette. I will listen to it at least 5 times a day on my walkman. Would my crush Pooja/Sumit like to listen to it with me?
Now: Who is this Amy Winehouse who has been on page 3 all the time? Lemme see what youtube search sputters? "Rehab"? Sounds more like her addiction problem than a video to me. Anyways, let's see how the first 30 seconds are. Or else it's back to "Race" for me.

After the journey of "Then"s from your 2 year old phase to being a teen: When was the last time when the words "simple" and "pleasure" seemed synonymous? Was it your last visit to the sea beach? Was it the friendly game of ball you played with the 3 year old in your society? Was it the melting of chocolate on your tongue? Was it the head oil massage you gave to your mom/grandma? Yes we have moved far ahead with the times. Is it time to return to innocence again?

3 letters

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 22:12:00 +0000

You are now over one year into the software "industry". You have crossed over from being "enthusiastic" to "complaining" around 4 months back. The words that describe your job now are "boring" and "monotonous". You are still here because you earn a little more than your "core engineer" friend, there is a possibility of you going "onsite" and the IT sector is hot right now. Most of your friends are already stamping their visas for US for their MS degree. But you think that it is just a passport for earning in dollars doing pretty much what you would have done in India anyways. Now the situation is of a "saturation point". You now want to "get out of it". Suddenly working as a boss rather than a subordinate fills your fantasies. You have been hearing about the 3 letter entrance examinations that test only high school level aptitude since college. You have also been hearing about the 7 digit annual salary figures that the passouts from these 3 letter "institutes" are paid, from your colleagues. So you decide, it is time to enter the race. Welcome to the world of lakhs of aspiring MBAs across India.

Now even though the beginning of the paragraph starts with my story, the motivation does not quite relate to me completely. But I can claim it as a fact that it is the story of 3/4th of the candidates fighting for a seat in a good B school in India. I have already validated it during the "personality development" sessions of my class, where blatant honesty of the entire class comes in. I have also experienced it while interacting with fellow aspirants during my "calls" so far. Among the 8 of my group mates in SCMHRD, 6 were from Software industry, where 4 were from my last company. My purpose here is not to beat around the bush. My purpose here is to share with you a few observations and trends gathered over 1.5 years of my "endeavour". Not only for the "aspiring candidates'" benefits, but also as an opportunity for the "already aspired" candidates to reflect. Let me begin with a few stats through a visual element. The figures are rough but collected from very reliable sources.

Name of the test	No of applicants (2006)	No of applicants (2007)	Percentage increase
CAT	1,91,000	2,30,000	20.4
SNAP	97,000	1,39,000	43.3
MH-CET	52,211	74,622	42.9
JMET	21,000	28,000	33.3
IIFT	42,500	47,500	11.8
NMAT	32,000	37,000	15.6

(The figures for XAT and FMS were around 70,000 and 52,000 last year (january 2007). I still haven't found a reliable source for the 2008 figures of these exams)

Observations:
1) The success story of India Inc is inspiring more and more educated/employed youth to take up the B path.
2) People are not shy of taking an exam multiple times. "Creme-de-la-creme" prize motivates even the highest paid "labour". The concept of one exam, one path, one job career has long gone now.
3) Tests that offer multiple application opportunity (more than one college) grew far more rapidly than single college tests. Everyone wants to pick and choose rather than relying on only one aim.
4) The seat to applicant ratio for well known colleges will keep on decreasing insanely as long as there is no upper limit for the age/attempts. We saw a fall in the no of applicants of JEE last year only after the IITs established a "maximum 2 attempts" limit.
Advice:
If you are waiting for 1 or 2 years to start the race, I suggest you to jump in right away. The selection ratios of colleges like FMS, JB, SIBM are already in the 1:500 mark. So out of the 500 people applying, only one makes the cut.

Observation of exam and entrance trends:
1) GK is a thing of the past
No not all tests have done away with GK. But almost all tests seem to follow suit. FMS did it away after 2003, XAT in 2006, and it was NM's turn to do it this year. Reason? Colleges don't want the GK section to skew results. They can test the general awareness of a candidate during further rounds, GD, PI. Besides, the ultimate focus of a B school is its placement, and lately the role of GK as a deciding factor for the companies has gone down.
Advice:
Read newspapers regularly. But don't waste your time mugging up the who's who of orgns/govt bodies that you are not even remotely interested in.
2)Reasoning is the "in" thing
It is an open secret. B schools don't want philosophers or mathematicians, they want candidates who can think effectively under pressure. So all the traditionally compartmentalised sections have got mixed profusely with reasoning. Verbal has shifted from knowing the meanings of a word and knowing where to apply them to critical reasoning. Quant has moved to caselets (cat, jmet, xat), an effective way for "integration" of a problem.
Advice:
Instead of preparing for specific type of questions focus on the "why" everywhere possible. Even during the interviews the "whys" are the most frequent and the most impostant ones.
3) B schools want half made managers
Thanks to the RTI and the curiousity of a challenged lady candidate, IIM B has opened its weightage for selection to the public. Is it a surprise that a CA gets 5% more marks than a candidate from another stream (She/he has already done many subjects that form a part of the curriculum)? Again, is it a surprise that most B schools give more preference to the work-ex people (They already know the "corporate culture" and the nuances of how to make a mickey out of people for the benefit of the orgn, at least they know what their bosses did)? How can the B schools make their exams, the so called "Aptitude tests" separate the half baked "managers" from the rest? By introducing Business decision making in their paper of course. IIFT did it in 2007, XAT followed suit in 2008. Actually XAT just increased those "subjective" type of questions introduced in 2007 from a set to half a section.
The group discussions are moving from the "creative/abstract" to general and Case studies. All 3 of SIBM, SCMHRD and SIIB used case studies for group discussions this time as opposed to "creative topics" and "visual presentation" based GDs last time around. They are utilising their priveleges to separate out the potential manager material from the bookish candidates.
Advice:
Now even the non-elite B schools have 60,000 to 85,000 students to choose from (for their 120-180 seats) instead of the 4,000 they had before. E.g., SIMC received 67,000 applications this year. To make their training job easier, to increase their placement figures, they want people who are coming with a pre-wired mind ready to transform to a manager. So right from the beginning of preparing for these tests, keep a "managerial" attitude. As the cliche goes, try to see the "bigger picture" instead of preparing for tests. Be sure of your goals, problem solving methodology etc even while preparing for your mocks. Read up simple case studies with the point of view of an organisation even before exams.
4) It is becoming more and more "open"
Just 3 years back it was only the CAT paper (among all MBA tests) that was open for scrutiny, analysis and post mortem. I am talking about the right to take the question paper home. They threw it open to the public. Almost as a challenge. They have twisted and modified the paper beyond recognition every year since then. So even if it is open, no one can actually use it to ensure success in the following year.
IIFT and JMET went public in 2006. XAT followed step in 2008. I think that the dynamics of the game are changing so much that the paper setters are sending out a clear message. "We want people who are prepared for any surprise. We will change the paper next year. You can analyze our paper as much as you want, but you will get in only if you have it in you".
Advice:
Don't make your mindset fixed on a "pattern" of an exam. Try to practice as many variations as possible. Try to maximise your score in an exam instead of speculating about the cut offs.A score of 60 in JMET 2006 resulted in rank 1300, the same score got one a rank 300 in 2007. I have personally seen all the papers change from 2006 to 2007; in terms of no of questions (SNAP, NMAT, XAT), difficulty (CAT-enough said, JMET, XAT, IIFT), sections (XAT-always stumps the junta, FMS, IIFT), type of questions (CET, XAT, IIFT, FMS)

Enough gyaan for now. Awaiting comments and your 2 cents

How to make 9.5 million dollars in one stroke

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 12:40:00 +0000

Woohoo!! My dream has finally come true! U know, the dream that I had since childhood, the dream that we all share. To inherit a huge amount of money by the way of an untimely (timely for us) demise of a rich, anonymous, generous relative.

Not in my wildest dream had I imagined that such a huge sum would come to me in this form. That too, from some other country altogether. That too, without any hassle involved, especially the tax part.

This moment is so special that I want to share it with you all. So here lies what made today an unforgettable one.

FROM MR ABDUL SAMAD. AUDITING AND ACCOUNTING UNIT. FOREIGN OPERATIONS DEPARTMENT. UNION TOGOLAISE DE BANQUE,(U.T.B) LOME- TOGO.

Togo? All that I knew about Togo till today was that it is a small footballing Nation in Africa. Arsenal's in form striker Manu Adebayor hails from Togo, and is apparently unsatisfied with their handling of the sports. That it qualified for the world cup last year but failed to do it for this year's ongoing African Cup of Nations. Hmm, interesting that I have acquaintances there.

Dear Abhishek,

I am Mr Abdul Samad,Auditing And Accounting Unit,Foreign Operation Department Union Togolaise De Banque Lome Togo. With due respect and regard.I have decided to contact you on a business transaction that will be very beneficial to both of us at the end of the transaction

Woah!!! Somebody pinch me. Not only does my benefactor from Togo know me, he is a big man there! Auditing and Accounting Unit? Foreign Operation Department Union Togolaise De Banque? And here I am, a measly commoner in this country of 1.13 billion, who has to waste 5 hours just to get someone from the Govt to attest his admit card of an entrance test, only to prove that it is indeed him in that photograph. Moreover, he has kept my interests (unknown to him till 2003) in his mind while taking such an important decision!! My days have surely changed!!

During our investigation and auditing in this bank, my department came across a very huge sum of money belonging to a deceased person Mr G.C Badran who died on the 26th of December 2003 with his wife and their only daughter.They travelled to IRAN on holiday and unfotunantely, they were involved in an Earthquake which occoured in Bam on the 26th of December 2003 in IRAN which claim about 25 thausand lives in the Earthquake . Since then I have made several enquiries to their embassy here to locate any of his extended family relatives, but all efforts proved abortive.

Mr. G.C. Badran... let me check my family tree... Oh heck, who cares, as long as he was rich and generous... R.I.P. Mr. Badran. May you get salvation. How ironic that you died on the day that a new India was born. Maybe this is a sign, an omen (remember the Alchemist?). That a person from India should get his hands on the riches. How lucky that it was me!! I am still blinking in disbelief!!

After these several unsuccessful attempts, I decided to track his last name over the business directory in our chamber of commerce, trade and tourism, to locate any member of his family hence my contacting you. I contact you to assist in repatriating the fund valued at US$9.5 million left behind before it gets confiscated or declared unclaimed by our Bank where this huge amount was deposited.

I can understand how frustrating it must have been Mr. Samad. Searching for his relative among the hundreds of billions of Togolese. Perhaps that explains why you shifted your gaze to this country of a few dozens, and picked me!! I am so thankful to you. I am so thankful to the universe! For conspiring for my desire!!
I am still in a shock. Can you imagine? US $ 9.5 million?
Yes you are right Mr. Samad. I should hurry up and get that money and convert it into my country's currency as soon as possible. Or else the rupee might rise and make those dollars a little less. I wish that you had been a little early in sending that mail. Just a few months ago I would have converted that amount at 48 rs per dollar instead of 32....never mind....I will make do with those 9.5 million.

Our Bank has issued a notice to provide his next of kin and Since I have been unsuccessful in locating the relatives for over one year , I seek the consent to present you as the next of kin to the deceased deposited sum in our Bank so that the proceeds of this account can be paid to you.

Err, you were searching his relatives only for an year? But that means that the bank must have made a huge amount of money by investing his 9.5 million dollars (that rightfully belong to me) for 4 years before you started your search. Never mind Mr. Samad, I am ready to forgive and forget, just get to the part where I get this money. The suspense is too much for me to handle.

Therefore, on receipt of your positive response, we shall then discuss the sharing ratio and modalities for the transfer. I have all necessary information and legal documents needed to back you up for the claim which i payed greatly to acquire.All I require from you is your honest cooperation to enable us see this transaction through.I guarantee that this attract no risk at all for it will be executed under legitimate arrangement that will protect you from any breach of the law.

Like we say in India, "Neki aur poochh poochh?". There you are waiting for my response and here I am, raring to come to Togo. I have already booked a discounted Air India ticket to Dammam. Because I couldn't get a direct flight to Lome. I guess I will have to hitch a ride from there. Can you please tell me the preferred mode of transport? We don't have that kind of information in India. I am sure Mr. Badran would have been so ashamed of my ignorance if he were alive today.
Regarding your share, I am ready to shell out a huge sum for your cooperation (you have already made all the legal documents for me, after all). So in return for your huge favour, I will part with a magnanimous sum of $2 and 39 cents. I am so happy with you that I will also remit to you the charges for the documents that you "payed greatly to acquire" or 47 cents, whichever is lower. What's more, I will even give you a discount for your payment of my air tickets.
Regarding your concern about the law, don't worry Mr. Samad. We are all corrupt here. Even if you can't get me out of the trouble, I'll ensure that with my newfound riches, I will get myself out.

On the receipt of your response via the above email address ,I will furnish you with a detailed clarification .

Sincerely,

Abdul Samad.

So that's how my life changed and I went on the path to riches!! As a gesture of sharing my happiness with all of you, I have decided to give all of my friends a grand treat, in the finest hotel in Lome, Togo. So be there, I will truely appreciate it.

P.S.
1>The credit for the idea for this entry goes to a blog I read today.
2>I did mark the mail as spam. I hope none of the receivers falls for it.

Respite

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 15:32:00 +0000

It was a little after 7 pm. I was going back home. I had to change trains as usual. I was lucky enough to get a (relatively) less crowded train for the first leg; so it couldn't have been stress. It is Mumbai; so it couldn't have been the weather either. My flu has also been cured, so it wasn't the fever. Yet, while waiting for my connecting train, on that crowded platform, in the absence of any wind, I shivered.

I was one with my sub-conscious a moment before that. My mind was doing what it's best at; when it is left to wander by itself. It was revelling in my near-past experiences. It reached an intense incidence that happened less than two weeks ago. The incidence that had left my ego hurt and years of trust broken. It triggered a chain reaction that was over in a few, but vehement seconds. A pain, that subsided in a matter of seconds, probably because it had been experienced before, more than once. A surge of confused anger towards the one who caused it, which again died, because something inside me said that it wasn't anybody's fault. It probably wasn't. An overwhelming sense of awareness, of losing my equanimity. A strong guilt, for losing my peaceful balance, which was why I shivered...... Finally, peaceful empathy.

It was in this state of peace that I was sub consciously searching for a familiar face, to share my compassion. In that sea of bodies. Somebody who could understand me. Somebody who was not closed inside his or her mind. Who could take a little time out of his or her busy schedule. Somebody who could converse with me. Not necessarily talk or listen, but somebody who could just share..... Somebody.... Anybody.....
Then I saw her.

The purest being in that place. The living example of selfless love. Innocent. Candid. Shy.
I had met her before, once, at that very place. I hoped that she would recognise me. She did. She acknowledged my presence and responded to me reaching out to her. She greeted me. The affection was definitely growing. Then I did something that I normally don't do to others. I ruffled her shiny hair. I went ahead and stroked her fair cheek and neck. I was hoping that she won't mind that, after all, she was too young to be self conscious of such public displays of affection. Her body language said that she liked it. That in this lonely world full of stress, she found that simple touch soothing. Her eyes closed in a kind of acceptance.

Her actions were the only means by which I could gather her thoughts, for she didn't speak my language. In fact, she couldn't speak at all. She was born with this impairment. Her kins here have the same "disability". But time and again she and her kins have taught me that words are not required to communicate the essential. That the most meaningful of all feelings can be conveyed by a simple touch. Sometimes a nudge. That is what she and her kins have used with me as a communication tool all these years. That is what I have used to befriend her. To strengthen my bonds with as many four legged "man's best friend"s as I can.

They always end up giving more affection than getting. Today was no different. Today a street dog feeding off leftovers at a platform of Kurla station gave me pure, expectationless love. Much more of it than what the sea of people could give me, even if I were a celebrity.

They experience many complex emotions that the "superior" humans do. They have their own way of expressing them. Whether it is a twist in the neck combined with raised eyebrows showing surprise at the comfort that we humans show at the presence of a new guest; or it is the grabbing of a human's arm with their teeth, lightly, and putting it across their belly, to announce their acceptance of friendship; it is all there.

Thank you

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 20:04:00 +0000

I wept because I had no shoes, until I saw a man who had no feet

When I see people around me cribbing, complaining, making noises about the things/people/situations that they don't have by their side, or as they would want them to be, that they, according to them, so righfully deserve, I feel a sense of gratitude filling up inside of me. No, I am not (that) crazy to experience a wildly off the track emotion as a reaction, neither am I a saint, I have my share of complains as well, though I try to minimise them. But I feel grateful for everything that defines me, for everyone who has made me, who is responsible, in some way or the other for me being alive and enjoying life. Why? Because I think I have learnt a little respect along the way.

Big words? Let me bring some facts down to earth by the way of a simple example for everyone's benefit. Just work with me.
Do you drink a cup of tea or coffee every morning? Well most of us would say yes, after all tea is the world's second most popular beverage, right after water. Now, have you paused for a moment and pondered what goes into bringing that cup of tea to your table/bed? I am sure that not many would go beyond the person who is making/serving the tea at this point. That's exactly where I want to expand the horizons, the views. Here's what goes into your daily cup of tea:

1>Water:
Thousands of Kilometers of well planned, working, monitored pipelines passing water from Vaitarna lake around 50 kms from a western Mumbai suburb to your home. The water passing through probably 7 stages of filtering, chlorination, reverse osmosis, more filtering. Your household filter that uses even more technology like activated carbon and electricity to make it even more pure. I haven't even started thanking your builder, your plumber, your society watchman (who starts the tap at 7 am daily, religiously)
2>Sugar (optional of course):
Months of preparation of soil, hard work from farmers; tractors, bulls, ploughing the fields relentlessly. Fertilizer industry and chemical industry being invovled. Ground water drilling pipes for irrigation. Loads of trucks to carry those fertilizers and other tools required for producing Sugar cane. Sugar mill separating those unwanted impurities and converting it into sugar. Yet another fleet of trucks to carry those sacks of Sugar from those farms to the APMC market, then from there to your grocery store. Let's also not forget the labourers working under the municipal contractors who maintain those roads, the motor industry that provides such utilities like trucks, the rubber industry that makes their tyres.
3>Milk:
Let's talk about the huge dairies that hold hundreds of cows, buffaloes, the fodder that feeds them, the labour required for their upkeep and milking them. The packaging industry that works overnight so that it gets distributed along the proper channel to your doorstep at sharp 6 am.
4>Gas (or Electricity for the electric stove)
Do you really want me to write about the huge process by which Crude oil is drilled from ocean beds, refined, then transported to your homes; or do you get the idea? Or do you want me now to write about how Uranium is mined in an eastern-central state in India and then processed to be sent to Tarapore to be fissioned to produce energy for electricity?

I should stop here. There is no limit to this thinking. But the point is, there is a huge clockwork of processes running around us to provide the things that we think of nothing more than "basic". And we need to be grateful to all the people, all the machinery that works just so that we can fulfil our "basic" needs. If just one cog fails to work properly in this machinery, the whole machinery will grind to a halt.

To sum it up, at the risk of it sounding like an award speech, I am thankful to:
1>My parents. For bringing me into this wonderful and amazing world that never ceases to amaze me. For teaching me how to walk, to talk. For patiently answering my really stupid queries. For making me stand on my own feets. For being my friends, my confidantes.
2>My teachers. For not just teaching me the whats, the hows, the whys, the wheres, the whos and the whens, but also for instilling the values that make me a human. For making me a part of the society, the country. For showing me the way, for selflessly working so that I can progress.
3>My friends. For developing me as a person. For sharing and letting me share my passions, secrets, desires, loathings and love. For providing me with different point of views. For talking to me, for listening me. For helping me throughout. For removing the unnecessary fear and shame from my head. For playing with me. For pointing out my shortcomings. For helping me discover my sexuality (I am not kidding, it is an integral part of growth).
4>Mother nature. I am sure that those who know me closely, will associate this line as my line: "My mother nature is a babe. She is a hottie, she is that beautiful"
For unconditionally providing me with all the resources that I use, sometimes squander, but I require just so that I can live. For the air, the water, the food, the beauty, the inspiration. You are the reason for me to live. The more I explore you, the more I fall in love with you. I really am indebted to you. No one can justify the statement "The best things in life are for free" better than you.
5>Evolution. For giving every living thing a purpose to live. For starting this magical phenomenon called life. For giving us the power to learn, to understand, to question, to deal with the worldly phenomenas, to change things for good.
6>The society. I am thankful to the roadside cobbler who mends my slippers so that I can walk again, freely. To my doctor who gives me the medicines so that I can get back to enjoying life. To my vegetable vendor. To my daily newspaper supplier, my cable wala, my mobile service provider. The railway clerk who parts with the change for a 100 rs note because I don't have the exact change. The traffic policeman who helps me find a landmark. The exam invigilator who ensures that my answer sheet goes to the correct person. The 3 year old kid who lives on the second floor, for teaching me the power of simplicity, the miracle of an innocent smile, the excitement of an untainted mind. The buddhist monk who explains to me the rituals that they perform to please the God at Enchey monastery. The temple priest who conveys the ideas that first evolved in the minds of my forefathers thousands of years ago. The forest rangers who fight poachers from getting the better of helpless big cats just so that the balance can be maintained. The news readers who mouth the latest happenings in this world. The people who don't agree with me, for adding a whole new dimension.

I want to conclude with the most important part of it all. My gratitude doesn't end here. I feel that if I am alive, if I am doing what I want to do, it is possible only because of everyone and everything that I mentioned above. Hence, in a way, I am answerable to them for my deeds. That if I say or do something, it shouldn't be something that brings shame upon them, that lets them down. That I should not just take everything I can get, but carry their good work forward. That I should be able to return a part to them. It is this same thought that motivates me to donate my blood multiple times. The same thought that makes me part with a small amount of my earnings to make the life of at least one child in rural India better. That makes me buy a gift for my parents. That makes me call my PC dealer to pursue him to give a good deal for the Rickshaw driver, who lives nearby and wants to add more value to his Son's education. That makes me carry heavy weights for the neighbourhood aunty. I hope I get more opportunities to return something in life.

So the next time you want to complain about the quality of food that you get in your college/office canteen, just try to remember the photos that were circulating in an e-mail first. You know, the one that showed a starving child trying to make it to a nearby food camp, and a vulture waiting for it to die. Or if you feel that you don't have enough friends in your vicinity/work, just remember the female colleague who has left her home town/village, her friends, her family, to adjust everything possible in another city, only so that she can earn a living.

Why?

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 15:47:00 +0000

There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
-Douglas Adams

And came adolescence. From that hormone filled roller coaster ride onwards, almost all of our actions have been directed towards fulfilling the singular purpose: to pass our genes in the pool. Men are drawn to women with waist to hip ratio of 0.7; like moths are drawn to light. Evolution programmed men's brains to calculate that without the aid of any external tool. Women are inevitably drawn to "providers"; you know, the ones with dollops of moolah, or the ones with a potential to earn bucks, in the form of inheritance/intelligence. Women are born with the concept of "commitment" and "long term" - which is mostly foreign to men. After all, their provider should be willing to help them out with the entire process of raising the offspring, which is the sole purpose of their existence. Oops, did I just answer the question asked by men all over the world: "Why do women want marriage, then children, as soon as possible?"

I think not, I think I just asked the question to the supreme creator; 'God' for the believers, 'Evolution' for the atheists like me.

I am nobody to ask this question. I am only a part of the 6 X 10^18 kgs of the mass on this earth that is different than the rest of it by a factor of 4 letters, "life". Yet, today, I dare ask the question, "Why are we here?" "Where are you headed?"

We have all been fascinated by the question of our origins. We have dug deep for million year old bones for answers. We have sent giant telescopes out of atmospheric disturbance to look at the darkest corners of our Universe to give us a clue of the big-bang, the supposed beginning of "time". But I think the correct thing to ask right now is "Why is God/Evolution making us do what we are doing?" Why is every species spending all the effort to procreate (All the fight/amongst males for "dominance") then protect the young ones (The supernatural urge to protect "children" first; in case of an emergency; and the attention that these "cute" ones draw from all adults)

How many times have we heard that a proportionate face represents a lineage of sexual health? (And hence, the feature that attracts one first). That 'Love' is nothing but a trick that nature plays on us so that we procreate? It is a poor explanation, in my opinion , to explain why you can't get that "special one" out of your head for the first 4-12 months. But what the chemical reactions don't explain is the purpose. Why are we fighting to get the 'perfect' partner? Why do we (animals/plants included in 'we') die after our purpose is served? In some cases the male of the species dies as soon as the purpose is served.

So we are all refining the pool, increasing its quality with every generation, and multiplying relentlessly. Evolution is throwing new designs, testing permutations every now and then. It started with 16/18 basic designs in prehistoric oceans. It killed off the ones it didn't think appropriate. It killed off the mighty dinosaurs too. It reduced the size of the bodies of animals whose area of roaming reduced. It introduced - balance, food-chain/web, diseases. For what? What is it trying to achieve?

There are many theories that suggest what will happen in the end. The most wiely accepted one, it seems, is this one. The universe is in the expansion stage, and will reach the limit eventually. It will shrink once it hits the bounds. All the rules regarding entropy, enthalpy will be reversed. Imagine keeping a cup of cold coffee on your desk to find it heating up by itself to boiling point. But if one exists in that stage, it will be difficult for her to imagine what happens "normally" for us. What will evolution do then? Move back to unicellular life?

When we look around ourselves, we find that things are changing. We carry remnants of our own species that suggest presence of Evolution. Our Vestigial organs like ear muscles and appendix are enough to prompt us to think. I just hope that sometime in future we are able to answer this question, like we have answered so many. What are your views?

Shaken......and Stirred......and Dizzy

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 22:22:00 +0000

When the stakes are high, when the money involved is a lot, when the competition is tough, and when the goal to be achieved is heavily desired, by many, the very basics of principles and ethics are severely compromised with. It was proved, much to my disgust, once again in the ongoing "spy row". Being an ardent fan of Motorsport, and Formula one (till now) I feel a moral obligation on the behalf of everyone who is remotely interested with sports to clear the closet of the skeletons that have been piling up heavily in the recent days.

I am feeling shaken to the core, my basic trust has been broken. The sickening feeling is awefully similar to the feeling I got in my childhood when I learnt that the "sport" we call as a "religion" is nothing but a farce. Yes, I am referring to the match fixing scandal in cricket that left me broken. No, it was not only the Indian team that was tainted. The likes of Late Hansie Cronje proved the depth to which the sickness was spread. Similarly, it is not just McLaren that is tainted (as i will put forth later).

What the match fixing scandal did to every Indian was possibly nothing more than to give an ugly scar on the face of its history, which is, visible, but it doesn't bother the eye much and we can happily go back to watch the Twenty20 world cup. But what it did to me was to shake the very foundations of my beliefs. That the sport is about prestige, national pride, and the players are out there to prove their worth in the sport. That they are playing to win. That they are principled. Hence my passion in cricket was gone forever. Yes I have watched a few matches off on occassionaly since then, but with zero emotion. It has never retained me long enough to be glued to the screen for the entire length of the match. It is just not the same knowing that a few mobile phone calls from a bookie can change the very outcome of a match.

It is like being a child believing all through that Santa Claus exists and climbs through the chimney of its house to give it gifts. The child is rudely awakened to the fact that there is, in fact, no santa claus and the friendly ho ho ho that it hears every christmas indeed comes from the father. The future efforts of the father to dress up like a santa claus with the fake pot belly will not instill the same passion and the excitement in the child anymore.

The spy scandal has proved the ugliness of the situation. It has rudely awakened all of us Die hard Formula one fans that how individual interests and ambitions can snatch the beauty of the sport and leave it at being called a farce. Yes, a few individuals at McLaren were guilty. Even the Ferrarri mechanic was guilty. Yes, there was an exchange of information between them all in the interest of the coveted top spot. The funny thing is, that how this is not the first time that it has happened in the so called "sport". Let me remind you of the 2005 Honda incidence.

How they manipulated their Fuel tanks to carry that little bit of extra that was outside the regulation. If you are a Ferrarri fan beaming with a grin that how "justice" was done to your favourite "clean" team, let me remind you that Ferrarri is equally guilty in this case. You don't even need to look that far back to come up with an incidence that proves you in the wrong. The Melbourne fiasco earlier this year proved that even the "best" team can resort to cheap tactics like movable floors to gain the advantage. If you are a Renault fan laughing at the hapless Ferrarri McLaren and Honda fans, let me also remind you of the accusation (yet to be proved)that an engineer by the name of Phil took with him 3 CDs carrying confidential data about the cooling system and what not from the McLaren garage when he joined your favourite team earlier this season. If for some unfathomable reason you are a fan of any other team, then your happiness is short lived, as it is just a matter of time when it will be proved that your team also resorted to something beyond the legal boundaries to gain the edge.

The feeling of disgust is so gripping that many fans have simply resigned from the sport altogether. It has definitely played with my passion in such a cheap way that I will no longer have the passion or the rigor with which i used to watch this dear sport. I will watch a few races, yes, I will watch a few completely also, yes (as the race doesn't take more than 1 hour 45 minutes). But it will take a full one and a half season before I can even begin to imagine that it is a "fair" sport. Even if I become a full fledged fan then, i will never believe in the sport completely. Coming to the favourite team aspect. It will continue to be McLaren, because of the
basic reasons I started supporting it initially (Equal driver policy, drive to improve performance, balance in all the aspects, not a blind focus on speed or acceleration, consistency, independent thinking and behaviour). I will start watching A1 from now on (For those who don't know, everyone is given an equal car there, and drivers represent their country, and India has been an integral part of that sport). If a parallel series comes up challenging F1, yes, I will watch it also.

There is only one truely pure sport left for me now, and it is football. I can find solace in the fact that any tweaking in the performance is clearly visible (as proven by the Serie A controversy 2 seasons ago) and it is the most transparent sport available. I hope this trust doesn't get shattered so easily.

As for the general Indian Public blissfuly unaware of the details of Formula one, you will know what it is next year, when the liquor baron from India (Vijay Mallya) starts applying his business strategy to Spyker team that he bought out recently. The average indian's knowledge about the sport will grow more than the presence of a certain Karthikeyan not so long ago.

Hope for the best for all sports and all competitions in life. I vow that I will not play aroundwith core values in whatever i do in life. I hope to give integrity more preference than success.

The adjective

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 19:13:00 +0000

Pre Script:
1) Blog entries are not supposed to follow any rule. I have many other areas in life where I have to follow "formats" and rules, and I don't come here to apply or extend those rules.
2) Everyone has her/his own opinion, that's what makes us "individuals". I am presenting some of mine in my blogs, I am not forcing anyone to accept them. If you like them, you would probably read the blog longer than someone who hates them. I can accept both trains of thoughts as it is not my goal to dictate one's thoughts.

Coming back to the intended subject.......

Dull routine. Monotonous schedule. Hard work. Tough job. Steep learning. Higher goals. Improvement intent. Financial Independence. Compromise of personal Independence. Mental Adjustment. Physical adjustment. People skills. Polite exterior. Restless interior. MP3 Distractions. Caffeine Distractions. Grapevine Distractions. Lack of satisfaction. Getaway dreams. Paradise dreams. Getaway suggestions. Relevant Research. Irrelevant Research. Striking gold. Constraint checking. Narrowing down. Peer Convincing. Pal convincing. Family convincing. Anticipation. Excitement. Apprehension. Rumour mongering. Dusty closet. Dirty bag. Easy goods. Difficult takeaways. Accessible market. Full Debit card. Reserved tickets. Misty Dawn. Dank dawn. Cold dawn. Mobile alarm. Hot antioxidant. Caffeine rush. Adrenaline rush. Weekend rush. Holiday rush. Brief conversation. Brief meeting. Satisfaction. New batteries. Old gadgets. Double check. Almost missed transportation. Comfortable seats. Long roads. Winding roads. Long iron tracks. Passing-by greenery. Decreasing population. Decreasing density. Decreasing housing. Satisfaction. Black sky. Navy blue sky. brown sky. Hazy sky. Beige sky. Orange spurt. Orange splash. Grey clouds. Golden break open. Scattered Chirping. Solitary Roosting. Forgotten gadgets. Remembered gadgets. Fond memories. Fond melody. Narrow road. Winding road. Climbing road. Steep slope. 22 Hairpins. Active check post. Inactive parking lot. Bright shoes. Heavy bag. Fast snack. Lush meadow. Lush valley. Olive green vegetation. Bright green leaves. Dewy leaves. Foggy path. Scattered chirping. Solitary roosting. Cracked path. Transparent Waterfalls. Wet shoes. Dark shoes. Crackling branches. Rising smoke. Distant smoke. Melodious folk song. Distant civilisation. Realisation. Distant hustle bustle. Distant din. Forgotten din. Forgotten concrete. Realisation. Satisfaction. Fresh day. Foggy day. Cold Drizzle. Wet eyebrows. Heavy eyebrows. Realisation. Ancient structure. Ancient faith. Crumbling structure. Stable structure. Stable faith. Old rituals. Pure prayer. Purity. Good will. Green grass. Flowing grass. Wind. Cold wind. Breezy day. Flowing water. Gushing Stream. Pure stream. Rocky stream. Black waterhole. 6 legged creatures. Colourful creatures. White rock. Round rock. Wet rock. Black rock. Black dent. Black rock. Black cave. Narrow water source. Adrenaline rush. Adventure. Realisation. Huge surge. Thrilling Discovery. Offbeat track. No track. New track. Black wall. Non-uniform wall. Green grass. Slit grass. Lashing wind. Wet wind. Foggy view. Large tree. Branches-into-the-roots tree. Ancient tree. Unwanted graffiti. Higher ground. Lush meadow. Flowing grass. Unspoilt nature. Virgin nature. New Promise. Newfound Determination. High Cliff. Wet cliff. Steep Edge. Panoramic view. Breathtaking view. High place. Wide place. Distant civilisation. Realisation. New Surge. Impulse Activity. Rising temperature. Sweet fatigue. Relaxation. Binge lunch. Forgotten Survival. Forgotten Lineage. Forgotten Philosophy. Intense discussion. Realisation. Worthy feeling. Alive feeling. Energetic feeling. Half-hearted goodbye. Acknowledged Reality. Realisation. Rephrased truth. Necessary Soliloquy. The universe is one. We are one with nature.

In God we trust; all others must pay cash

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 20:29:00 +0000

A promise is a promise, and, well, a few, are meant to be kept!!
The credit for the topic goes to my full time friend Prashant aka Kaalu aka Hritik.

A challenge is a challenge, and sometimes it comes in the form of writing about something that one has not thought of. Fathom a topic that is not dear to my heart (I am only saying this because I didn't give birth to it, not because it doesn't have enough fuel). And trying to do justice with it. Well not everything is supposed to make downright sense.

OK, let's go.

What is the difference between a prayer that is offered in a church and a casino? Well, the one that comes from the casino is for real!!
So it's not about the highest chance of winning (0.5%) on a 21-blackjack game that we trust. We trust in God!!

We do not trust your intentions when you say you are coming from your island city of India's financial capital and saying that you just want to visit a friend who has been living in new Mumbai. But we do trust that 25-er you are giving to us everytime you cross this 2 km bridge!! Therefore it becomes mandatory for you to trust us back!! Trust that we are going to religiously account for all the passing vehicles every hour of the day and put all that we collect to the development of 8 new projects throughout new Mumbai. Oh what did you say mr.? You are a superstar movie director who wants to see the locale of a waterfall in khopoli for a potential shoot-spot and might actually promote tourism for our city? Umm....well.....see we don't trust words and promises. We believe in now. That translates into.....that's right.....money.

What happens when we combine the two concepts of God and trust? Better still, throw in the third one of cash too. We put the words (that more people will approve of) to be in charge of the moolah. Yes, the "temple trust". The "trust" manages the cash that believers readily give in for the (hope of) return of trust from God. Which brings me to this piece narrated very well by my childhood teacher. This is about God, even when he taught us science back then.
"Once upon a time an avid devotee goes to the temple to get the darshan of his beloved God. Of course, being the temple-law abiding citizen, he leaves his shoes back outside, un-monitored and dangerously prone to theft. When God sees the level of devotion in him, he decides to give him the luxury of a private prakatikaran (appearance). God gives him a modest worldly ichchha poorti (granting of a wish). But there is a catch. The ichchha poorti can take place but it will take time and in the meantime the devotee's shoes would have been surely gone. The devotee thinks about it and decides to ask God for his expensive shoes back, giving the ichchha poorti back to God."

Isn't it an amazing story? Why? What's so special? You might ask. The speciality of this story can be summed up as: "And they live happily ever after". Just be with me if you haven't wandered off already.
1>The devotee is not trapped in the viles of greed. He learns ultimately that whatever he has already got is indeed something worth being content with. (What can be more important than keeping the possession of expensive earthly possessions while being here on earth).
2>God does not have to cleanse the morale of anyone on this earth. (Why him God? What's wrong with my devotion? Don't I listen to enough T-series tapes singing your praises?).
3>The devotee does not have to explain the tax department/gossipy relatives/suspicious wife that this "gift" was indeed a gift and does not form the part of an undeclared income/undeclared love.

This story also has a deeper meaning. That somewhere in the realms of the world we live in, the concepts of God, trust and money are all intertwined.

Perhaps we should be looking for more. No, not more cash, but more things that we can trust upon, that don't require the stamp of association with God. Loans require guarantees. Book Issues require entries. Recruitment of full time housekeepers require police registration. Apples require "imported from amreeka" sign. Hmmmm come to think of it, haven't these "things" originated in the presence of, that's right, God?

The 80-20 principle

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Fri, 25 May 2007 18:08:00 +0000

Howdy peeps,

This is my second attempt to dissect some topic and to create something out of perhaps nothing too important.

So here goes.
For those who don't know, I am referring to the pareto principle. According to this article at wikipedia, Italian economist Pareto observed that 80% of Italy's wealth was owned by 20% of the population. In less nerdy terms, this principle can be put in a nutshell as "80% of the consequences stem from 20% of the causes"

Ya...um...ok...this sounds so boring, what does it have for me?

Well the practical applications this will unfold will make you think how relevant this thing is, and I am sure you will think of your own experiences after this.
Consider this,

*80% of your sales come from 20% of your clients
*80% of the resources are typically used by 20% of the operations

No these are all big words......Not convinced??
Ok, now look at this:

*we wear our 20% most favoured clothes about 80% of the time
*we spend 80% of the time with 20% of our acquaintances

And now for the confused philosopher to go to work :P

*80% of the guys have the hots only for 20% of the chicks (n 80% of the chicks have the hots for 20% of the guys; on a parallel note, it's very much possible that the majority of these 20% guys are the guys that are also in the top 20% of the wealthy junta :D )
*80% of fresh graduates want to get in 20% of the MNCs in the market to begin their careers with (Yes that friend of yours who wanted to start at a relatively unknown company forms a part of the remaining 20%)
*80% of all candidates taking an entrance exam apply to the top 20% colleges
*80% of people taking up studies choose 20% of the courses/fields available
*80% of the sports watching junta watch 20% of the matches being broadcast
*80% of the aware people are aware of 20% of the news happenings
*80% of the talks of gossip mongers are about 20% celebrities/neighbours
*80% of your nostalgic memories are occupied by 20% of what happened during school/college/work
*80% of your thoughts are occupied by 20% of your near n dear ones
*80% tourists visit 20% places??

now since the wheel is set in motion......

philosophy is for geeks - provoke factor

noreply@blogger.com (The Junkie) — Mon, 21 May 2007 20:58:00 +0000

"The only thing a philosopher is good at is contradicting other philosophers"

Why this mundane topic as my first one?
Simply because every one has been a philosopher at least once in their tiny existence on this cradle of life called earth. As there are stimuli for every sense, there is a stimuli for this otherwise dormant part of our minds too.

Consider this:
What provokes a swear word from you?
-The chappal clad office goer who steps on to your boot-polished shoes when you are travelling in the bus/train?
-The great indian legendary batsman defining "duck" for dummies?
-Watching cruelty against some living being you are passionate about?

What makes your heart melt?
-A romantic-tragic scene a la "titanic"?
-Watching your 4 legged companion feed her little ones?

And What invokes the philosopher in you?
-Post match post mortem shown on the tv?
"yaar mujhe samajh me nahi aata aakhir saurav ko team me wapas kyu bulaya"
"hoo haa india....the team with the maximum passion wins and not the team with a billion fans"
"if only i could get a char-aana everytime i feel the match was fixed"

-T-shirt quotes?
->10 reasons why beer is better than a woman
"reason one is good......hahaha on reason 2......hmmmm...never thought of reason 3 before" by no. 5 the original "reason" pops up from inside of you
->Come to india, one billion people can't be wrong
"sau me se nabbe beimaan, fir bhi mera bharat mahaan"
->God first created man, then the woman, after all, the rough draft comes before the masterpiece
"Damn, what was the reason no 8 why beer is better than a woman?? I'll figure it out after I have one foster's"
->Filthy stinking rich......Well two out of three ain't bad
"Hic, I have been drinking too much beer.......heck...it only adds to the two 'qualities' i have according to that t-shirt quote over there.....burp....there goes the first one......beware supermodels.....here i come....hic"

-Thought provoking movies?
"I love jaane bhi do yaaro, it is so funny and so sarcastic at the same time"
"Rang de basanti has made me believe that if everyone decides to do something for our country, she can be a much better place to live"
"Life in a metro has made me think ki sab ko apni gaadi bahar nikalni chahiye"

-The occassional book that your friend gave to you
->Who moved my cheese?
"Wow yaar, before i read this book i didn't know i can be such a rat running after those pesky materialistic possessions called cheese"
->The Dilbert principle
"Man, how did the author know? Even at my workplace i have trolls for accountants and the red prime evil as my boss"
->The Alchemist
"My poor grades this semester/rejected promotion is but an omen that this universe is sending me. I need to choose a different major/switch companies. As I am still young and the universe is conspiring for me to get me the 9 point something/Junior manager post I so deserve. Look, a coaching class advertisement/new job opening in the newspaper, another omen"

-A song you heard before getting out of home today?
->Ab ke saavan, jam ke barse, bheege tan man.....
"Hmmm....I wonder if this was the song that was playing on vividh bharti on 26/05 (the day it rained so much in mumbai that people died from the floods)"
->Meri awaaz suno.....mujhe azaad karo....
"Insaaf do.....Insaaf do..... I wonder if my principal/boss ever sang this in front of his/her superior (Do they even have a superior??)"
->Kitni haseen zindagi hai ye.....hoto pe jaise kahani hai
"Yea sure, you son of a star, you rich spoilt singer, you have the privelege of roaming around in a '47 convertible chevy in the streets of brazil for the song and the guts to leave your first wife for a bombshell.....sure your life is 'haseen'"

-Something I haven't mentioned here? :D
happy commenting!!