There's this stupid little virtual world game that I play, called Second Life. I have talked about it quite a few times in my blog. This is not a game but a virtual world as in you are free to do what you want once you are in it. There are no aliens to shoot at no points to collect or stuff of that sort that makes up a video game. There are games "in" the game but SL itself is fully free-form. It has its own economy and many types of businesses. People meet, chat, have relationships, marriage and everything.
It is quite an engrossing thing, this game and so addictive that some people have this text on their profiles, "Remember, it's just a game!". I don't agree with them. It's a game, technically and for the purposes of establishing that I am a sane person, I'll concede that it's a game. But it's not completely a game. In a game when you shoot at the alients, or the villain's henchmen or the enemy army, they don't hurt, they don't bleed, they do bleed on the screen, but not in real. Just pixels. Lighted dots on the screen. But in SL, behind the pixels there is always a human being. He may not be as ruggedly handsome, or she may not be such a ravishing beauty but they are human, with a mind that thinks and a heart that feels. Some people, not necessarily the people who claim that it's a game, but some people do not fully realize that they are interacting with humans. Humans with feelings. These people can be really mindless jerks at times.
On my friend list are some people I have not talked to in a long time, but I still can't bring myself to delete them off my list. It's not much different from the way I always call my friend Harry, my real world friend Harry, on 9th Feb without fail, even if I have not talked to him the rest of the year. And there are some people I talk to almost every day on Sl. Just like in RL, I will call my real friend Fazil at least once a week no matter what corner of the world I have taken refuge in.
In this world we form friendships. Do they matter any less than the "real" friendships because the medium of communication is different? I don't think so. The joy of new connections is the same. The partings have the same kind of sting and the feeling of loss. The partings are quite real and painful they are depends on depth of the relationship not the medium they were made in. Well, I am feeling the pang of such a virtual parting today so I just thought it might help if I rant about it.
Monday, March 03, 2008
Sunday, March 02, 2008
Back like a bad penny!
Recently I have been neglecting my blog lately. So this short and sweet entry to just let you know that I am back from my vacation in India (like you care), and things have been happening at quite a fast and exciting pace. So, I am back in England, enjoyed a long break in England after the holidays in India and now back to work. Different work, different city, new hassles. I'd like you to believe that my neglect of my blog is because life has been busy, hectic and full of new hassles but it's not. It's my usual, well-known and oft-celebrated laziness behind this long silence.
Most of time, spare time, has been spent in a), looking for an accomodation in the new city, b), reading thrilling, fantastic, old-is-gold type American fiction and rest on my laptop, watching The Great Indian Laughter Challenge videos or playing Second Life.
Well, let's see how soon I can write a meaningful, (and interesting) post again. Not that there is any shortage of topics or ideas in my mind.
Most of time, spare time, has been spent in a), looking for an accomodation in the new city, b), reading thrilling, fantastic, old-is-gold type American fiction and rest on my laptop, watching The Great Indian Laughter Challenge videos or playing Second Life.
Well, let's see how soon I can write a meaningful, (and interesting) post again. Not that there is any shortage of topics or ideas in my mind.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
More Comedy
Okay here's another clip from the Indian comedy show I am addicted to. This guy Kuldeep Dubey, he's young, but he awfully talented. In this clip he's presenting a mimicry style account of the much talked about Abhishek-Aishwarya wedding. Simply hilarious
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Flattery
Don't they say "imitation is the highest form of admiration" or something like that? Well, I'll tell you what it's all about.
I have some bad habits and some very bad habits. Among my bad habits is blogging and among my very habits is that I sometimes indulge is writing poetry, Hindi or English or even Urdu sometimes. Nothing that's worth anything, just to amuse myself and to try and create the illusion that I am more than just a blot in the vast universe.
Anyway, this one time I had a dull toothache that lasted several days and one of my friends, it was MJ I remember, suggested why don't I use that pain as inspiration to write something. It's a common (mis)conception that pain inspires great creativity and a poet is worthless until he has felt real pain in his life. So, be that as it may, I decided to write on it and came up with a Hindi poem (kavita) "Zikr Us Dard Ka" that talked about this toothache in a humorous way. My friend liked the poem very much so I got encouraged and posted it on a forum called www.ebazm.com which I used to frequent. Here's a link if you are curious - Zikr Us Dard Ka It's a great forum for creative people or the ones who like to read poetry. Some people on that forum who read that said good things about my poem and I felt like a million dollars.
They also asked me to follow up on the poem and write about the next part - the visit to the dentist. I picked up on that and wrote another poem called - Ek Anokhi Mulakaat Obviously this was not as good at the first but still people liked it and parts of it I do like.
Now, today, my sister emailed suddenly talking about couple of my poems (English) that I had sent her before and I decided to send her these poems. I decided I would like her to read people's comments as well about my poem and did a search in Google for "Zikr Us Dard Ka". The results surprised me.
My poem is available in places where I had posted it, but also where I had not posted it. At least 2 people are using my poems as their own. LOL. I was surprised and of course enraged, but now I am not sure if I should make a whole lot of noise about my copyrights or consider this a flattering situation and just enjoy it.
I have some bad habits and some very bad habits. Among my bad habits is blogging and among my very habits is that I sometimes indulge is writing poetry, Hindi or English or even Urdu sometimes. Nothing that's worth anything, just to amuse myself and to try and create the illusion that I am more than just a blot in the vast universe.
Anyway, this one time I had a dull toothache that lasted several days and one of my friends, it was MJ I remember, suggested why don't I use that pain as inspiration to write something. It's a common (mis)conception that pain inspires great creativity and a poet is worthless until he has felt real pain in his life. So, be that as it may, I decided to write on it and came up with a Hindi poem (kavita) "Zikr Us Dard Ka" that talked about this toothache in a humorous way. My friend liked the poem very much so I got encouraged and posted it on a forum called www.ebazm.com which I used to frequent. Here's a link if you are curious - Zikr Us Dard Ka It's a great forum for creative people or the ones who like to read poetry. Some people on that forum who read that said good things about my poem and I felt like a million dollars.
They also asked me to follow up on the poem and write about the next part - the visit to the dentist. I picked up on that and wrote another poem called - Ek Anokhi Mulakaat Obviously this was not as good at the first but still people liked it and parts of it I do like.
Now, today, my sister emailed suddenly talking about couple of my poems (English) that I had sent her before and I decided to send her these poems. I decided I would like her to read people's comments as well about my poem and did a search in Google for "Zikr Us Dard Ka". The results surprised me.
My poem is available in places where I had posted it, but also where I had not posted it. At least 2 people are using my poems as their own. LOL. I was surprised and of course enraged, but now I am not sure if I should make a whole lot of noise about my copyrights or consider this a flattering situation and just enjoy it.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Thought of the day - 16th Jan 2008
"The three great essentials to achieve anything worth while are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense."
- Thomas A Edison
This might be my last thought of the day for a while. I am going on hoilday and might not get time to do this for two weeks! :-)
- Thomas A Edison
This might be my last thought of the day for a while. I am going on hoilday and might not get time to do this for two weeks! :-)
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Thought of the day - 15th Jan 2008
I was in the mood for a Latin quote today so here it is. Notice the confidence of the author!
aut viam inveniam aut faciam
[I'll either find a way or make one]
aut viam inveniam aut faciam
[I'll either find a way or make one]
Monday, January 14, 2008
Thought of the day - 14th Jan 2008
When written in Chinese the word "crisis" is composed of two characters - one represents danger and the other represents opportunity.
-John F. Kennedy, address, 12 April 1959
-John F. Kennedy, address, 12 April 1959
Friday, January 11, 2008
Thought of the day - 11th Jan 2008
“What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?”
- Vincent van Gogh (Dutch Painter, one of the greatest of the Post-Impressionists, 1853-1890)
- Vincent van Gogh (Dutch Painter, one of the greatest of the Post-Impressionists, 1853-1890)
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Thought of the day - 10th Jan 2008
Only when we are no longer afraid do we begin to live.
-Dorothy Thompson
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
Thought of the day - 9th January 2008
"The best time to plant a seed and grow a tree was 20 years ago; the second best time is now."
- Chinese Proverb
- Chinese Proverb
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Thought of the day - 8th Jan 2008
He who deliberates fully before taking a step will spend his entire life on one leg.
- Chinese proverb
- Chinese proverb
Monday, January 07, 2008
Cooking up something new
Would you believe I never learned to cook? Culture being what it is in India, boys are not obliged to learn to cook, and believe you me, I had no interest in learning to cook in the time I could go out and play in the street! :-)
So, long story short, when I got a chance to go work in the US, I took it, but soon found out that the US of A is not very kind to strange foreigners who have chosen to be, stupidly it seems, vegetarian. Since I was working for an Indian company, hence getting money enough to buy food but not 30 days in a month in a restaurant (Indian restaurants are really pricey, it seems all over the world.), the next option was ...you guessed it, cook!
Don't be silly, if I can't afford to eat out how can I afford to employ a cook? I meant cook not as in noun but as in verb..cook for myself. So, that's how I started to learn to cook, willy-nilly as one would say, cook or starve kind of situation. Still being the lazyass I am and a computeraddict on top of that, I spent over a year in US, cooking, on an average, about 3 times a week. Rest of time there were other options like microwaveable pizza or french fries.
Cut to 2006. I moved to UK. And immediately found out the brand names for readymade, microwaveable pizza. I spent about 6 months, on that pizza, rarely making pulao when the mood struck me but otherwise spending more time in front of the computer than the stove.
But then, I made a trip home, (you know about that right, last March?), and Indians express their love and affection through food. So, not only my mom was making my favorite dishes but cousin sisters, friend's wives trying to fill the void for Indian food created in 6 months, in 10 days.
The result was that as soon as I got back and tasted the readymade pizza again, I was like, "Wha...! You must be kidding me?! This is horrible!!". Well, I simply had to start cooking and I did, courtesy of the British stores that carry quite a good variety of Indian spices, cooking sauces, pickles and even real Basmati rice.
Cut to now. Recently I have started "enjoying" the cooking. No, I never had that attitude that cooking is women's job, but I did consider it something akin to magic that they could make such delicious food and seemingly so easily. I had started to learn by trying to make aloo-paranthas (hmmm, how to explain that, well, round items, like roti, but stuffed with mashed potatoes that have spices also mashed in. Does that help?). They used to be my favorite item, (ate a lot in Frankfurt) and I could make them even before I left India. But even if it was man's job or woman's job, it was not my job. I was mystified by how can someone cook. I know it doesn't stand to logic, maybe like a person who can ride a bicycle can never understand why someone else can't. Believe me I burnt rice so many times in US, I had a name for it.
From magic it turned to work, a chore to performed in order to eat.
But now, with the help of the British stores and their wonderful Indian-imported cooking sauces, I can make food that makes at least my mouth water. And I can eat it without having to stretch a point that it's my own work of art so I have to eat it. Now, I have started experimenting a bit, no, not to invent new dishes, just to try and make the dishes I have not tried yet. Nothing fancy, or even difficult, even a housewife will sniff at me calling that an experiment, but things that used to mystify me. Like recently I made peas n' potatoes, another one of my favorite dishes.
Moral of the story is that I have come to the conclusion that everybody, and by that I mean every boy, should learn how to cook. It is a wonderful ...sport? activity? skill? pastime?..??...and being able to feed yourself, adds a very important part in your personality. I am a little sorry, very little because I don't believe in wasting time being sorry about things that have already happened, that I did not start learning to cook before, but I am also very happy that I have started! My next plan is to make 'kheer', a dessert made of milk. Not difficult, but very delicious! Why is it a target? Because I am still a lazyass and making that will mean cooking another item on top of the usual dinner that I cook every day now! :-)
So, long story short, when I got a chance to go work in the US, I took it, but soon found out that the US of A is not very kind to strange foreigners who have chosen to be, stupidly it seems, vegetarian. Since I was working for an Indian company, hence getting money enough to buy food but not 30 days in a month in a restaurant (Indian restaurants are really pricey, it seems all over the world.), the next option was ...you guessed it, cook!
Don't be silly, if I can't afford to eat out how can I afford to employ a cook? I meant cook not as in noun but as in verb..cook for myself. So, that's how I started to learn to cook, willy-nilly as one would say, cook or starve kind of situation. Still being the lazyass I am and a computeraddict on top of that, I spent over a year in US, cooking, on an average, about 3 times a week. Rest of time there were other options like microwaveable pizza or french fries.
Cut to 2006. I moved to UK. And immediately found out the brand names for readymade, microwaveable pizza. I spent about 6 months, on that pizza, rarely making pulao when the mood struck me but otherwise spending more time in front of the computer than the stove.
But then, I made a trip home, (you know about that right, last March?), and Indians express their love and affection through food. So, not only my mom was making my favorite dishes but cousin sisters, friend's wives trying to fill the void for Indian food created in 6 months, in 10 days.
The result was that as soon as I got back and tasted the readymade pizza again, I was like, "Wha...! You must be kidding me?! This is horrible!!". Well, I simply had to start cooking and I did, courtesy of the British stores that carry quite a good variety of Indian spices, cooking sauces, pickles and even real Basmati rice.
Cut to now. Recently I have started "enjoying" the cooking. No, I never had that attitude that cooking is women's job, but I did consider it something akin to magic that they could make such delicious food and seemingly so easily. I had started to learn by trying to make aloo-paranthas (hmmm, how to explain that, well, round items, like roti, but stuffed with mashed potatoes that have spices also mashed in. Does that help?). They used to be my favorite item, (ate a lot in Frankfurt) and I could make them even before I left India. But even if it was man's job or woman's job, it was not my job. I was mystified by how can someone cook. I know it doesn't stand to logic, maybe like a person who can ride a bicycle can never understand why someone else can't. Believe me I burnt rice so many times in US, I had a name for it.
From magic it turned to work, a chore to performed in order to eat.
But now, with the help of the British stores and their wonderful Indian-imported cooking sauces, I can make food that makes at least my mouth water. And I can eat it without having to stretch a point that it's my own work of art so I have to eat it. Now, I have started experimenting a bit, no, not to invent new dishes, just to try and make the dishes I have not tried yet. Nothing fancy, or even difficult, even a housewife will sniff at me calling that an experiment, but things that used to mystify me. Like recently I made peas n' potatoes, another one of my favorite dishes.
Moral of the story is that I have come to the conclusion that everybody, and by that I mean every boy, should learn how to cook. It is a wonderful ...sport? activity? skill? pastime?..??...and being able to feed yourself, adds a very important part in your personality. I am a little sorry, very little because I don't believe in wasting time being sorry about things that have already happened, that I did not start learning to cook before, but I am also very happy that I have started! My next plan is to make 'kheer', a dessert made of milk. Not difficult, but very delicious! Why is it a target? Because I am still a lazyass and making that will mean cooking another item on top of the usual dinner that I cook every day now! :-)
Thought of the day - 7th Jan 2008
“Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game.”
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German Playwright, Poet, Novelist and Dramatist. 1749-1832)
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German Playwright, Poet, Novelist and Dramatist. 1749-1832)
Friday, January 04, 2008
Thought of the day - 4th Jan 2008
“Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in.”
- Napoleon Bonaparte
- Napoleon Bonaparte
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Thought of the day - 3rd Jan 2008
I can give you a six-word formula for success: Think things through, then follow through.
- Captain Edward V. Rickenbacker
- Captain Edward V. Rickenbacker
Laughter Challenge
This is one thing I miss about India - the superhit TV show Laughter Challenge, kind of like the same concept as Last Comic Standing in UK, hmmm, maybe they stole it from India. LOL.
Anyway, if you understand Hindi, watch the video, it's damn funny.
Anyway, if you understand Hindi, watch the video, it's damn funny.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Thought of the day - 2nd Jan 2008
“The ladder of success must be set upon something solid before you can start to climb”
- Anonymous
- Anonymous
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Another Frasier Quote
I don't know if the writers come up with these fantastic one-liners or they quote extensively from other sources but they do have some very impressive quotable lines. Take this one, said by Frasier to his brother Niles -
"Life is not to be taken in baby steps."
Monday, December 31, 2007
A madman's dream - khawaab deewane ka
Happy New Year! Happy New Year!! Happy New Year!!!
Is it? Really? Why?
What's so wonderful and unique about a year change? It's just a unit of time, isn't it? Seconds, minutes, days, weeks, months, and years. So? What's so bloody fantastic about changing a year that you have to go all out and spend a lot of money, drink like crazy and wish each other like idiots, "Happy New Year, Bill!", "Happy New Year, James!".
This world is a funny place. Not funny as in "ha, ha", but funny as in weird! Very weird! There are people who go crazy celebrating the change of a year, and there are people who wouldn't know what bird you mean if you say "Near Year's Eve". There are places where a man may be killed for a 100 dollars and there are places where it wouldn't buy a cup of coffee. There are people who devote all their lives saving the rain forests and there are people who pride themselves on buying genuine crocodile purses and suitcases. There are children who don't have a regular source of food and there are people who need to take pills to digest all that they eat...
You know as well as I do that I can go on and on, there is no limit of such contradictions in this world. You don't even have to look hard.
The question is how to make sense out of this madhouse? And more importantly, what is my place in all this shambles? Am I being callous when I ignore the sad pleadings of the tragic, miserable, needy situations in the world? Or I am being stupid by thinking about such things and wasting my chance, one chance, at living? There must be a balance somewhere, there must be some method to this madness? Is there?
I don't know!
That's my honest answer. I simply don't know. But then that gives rise to the next question - I don't know but what should I do about it? One extreme path leads to the mountains in search of "the Truth" and the other extreme leads to the concrete jungles made by humanity to enjoy this life in the pursuit of happiness in endless cocktail parties and meaningless festivals. Again, is there a balance, a middle path somewhere?
I don't know!
I'd like to quote from Faani Badauni's ghazal once again:
एक मुअम्मा है, समझने का ना समझाने का,
ज़ीन्दगी काहे को है, ख्वाब है दीवाने का.
Ek mu_amma hai, samajh_ne ka naa sam_jhaane ka,
zindagi kaahe ko hai, khwaab hai deewane.
[It is a riddle, neither to be understood nor to be explained.
Don't call it life, it is the dream of a madman!]
My interpretation, (not very insightful), is that a dream has no logical or rational flow, nor any basis for things that happen there. And a mad person's thoughts are also like that, with no logic, no rationale, no sense. So when you combine the two and talk about the dream dreamt by a madman, you are talking about something that'd defy the "sensible" completely, something impossible to understand, something beyond our powers of comprehension and imagination.
I'll continue to try and find my place in this infinite madness...in the meantime I'd love to hear from you. Please feel free to add your own questions, comments, answers, opinions. I'd really welcome a chance to discuss this.
P.S. Wishing you all a Very Happy New Year! :-)
Is it? Really? Why?
What's so wonderful and unique about a year change? It's just a unit of time, isn't it? Seconds, minutes, days, weeks, months, and years. So? What's so bloody fantastic about changing a year that you have to go all out and spend a lot of money, drink like crazy and wish each other like idiots, "Happy New Year, Bill!", "Happy New Year, James!".
This world is a funny place. Not funny as in "ha, ha", but funny as in weird! Very weird! There are people who go crazy celebrating the change of a year, and there are people who wouldn't know what bird you mean if you say "Near Year's Eve". There are places where a man may be killed for a 100 dollars and there are places where it wouldn't buy a cup of coffee. There are people who devote all their lives saving the rain forests and there are people who pride themselves on buying genuine crocodile purses and suitcases. There are children who don't have a regular source of food and there are people who need to take pills to digest all that they eat...
You know as well as I do that I can go on and on, there is no limit of such contradictions in this world. You don't even have to look hard.
The question is how to make sense out of this madhouse? And more importantly, what is my place in all this shambles? Am I being callous when I ignore the sad pleadings of the tragic, miserable, needy situations in the world? Or I am being stupid by thinking about such things and wasting my chance, one chance, at living? There must be a balance somewhere, there must be some method to this madness? Is there?
I don't know!
That's my honest answer. I simply don't know. But then that gives rise to the next question - I don't know but what should I do about it? One extreme path leads to the mountains in search of "the Truth" and the other extreme leads to the concrete jungles made by humanity to enjoy this life in the pursuit of happiness in endless cocktail parties and meaningless festivals. Again, is there a balance, a middle path somewhere?
I don't know!
I'd like to quote from Faani Badauni's ghazal once again:
एक मुअम्मा है, समझने का ना समझाने का,
ज़ीन्दगी काहे को है, ख्वाब है दीवाने का.
Ek mu_amma hai, samajh_ne ka naa sam_jhaane ka,
zindagi kaahe ko hai, khwaab hai deewane.
[It is a riddle, neither to be understood nor to be explained.
Don't call it life, it is the dream of a madman!]
My interpretation, (not very insightful), is that a dream has no logical or rational flow, nor any basis for things that happen there. And a mad person's thoughts are also like that, with no logic, no rationale, no sense. So when you combine the two and talk about the dream dreamt by a madman, you are talking about something that'd defy the "sensible" completely, something impossible to understand, something beyond our powers of comprehension and imagination.
I'll continue to try and find my place in this infinite madness...in the meantime I'd love to hear from you. Please feel free to add your own questions, comments, answers, opinions. I'd really welcome a chance to discuss this.
P.S. Wishing you all a Very Happy New Year! :-)
Thought of the day - 31st Dec 2007
Rise above the storm and you will find the sunshine.
- Mario Fernandez
A Very Happy New Year to everybody!
- Mario Fernandez
A Very Happy New Year to everybody!
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