Adorable Calvin

Mum

I miss my mum so much , she has sent me today this cute letter stating in so many ways that she misses me loads. Simple sentences, choto mota complaints, huge praises all tell me just one thing, that my mum is right now also thinking about me feel so special.

I guess for me it has taken the visit to US , the only way of realizing how much I am a mommy's girl. I am fathers pet mind you , but I really miss all the silly banter with my mum, her main focus on the restaurant we would eat in when we went shopping, her sincere yet totally false denial that she hated "Kyon saas bhi kabhi ...etc", her cute smile when I would get her some flowers or even a single pastry from the shop below, her yelling at me every Sunday morning to make tea for her. I really miss that stuff and yet never realized its importance for 24 years .

When I call her she would exclaim "Tulsi ko cancer ho gaya " and I would rack my brains thinking which of our relatives this is when I would realize its the eternal "Badi Maa" on "Kyon ki...". There was this one time when she gossiped about all the colony aunties and their siblings and one time when she just cried for some thing which hurt her. There are times when she wants to talk to me in secret and she will check if papa is listening from the other phone and then she will explain "Buddha hamari baatein sun raha hai".

One thing I have realized about our mums is that when they are in some trouble all that they really want is that you just sit down and listen for say just ten minutes. Don't ever try to give a solution because that they can easily figure out themselves, just listen and that's something they love.

Mum I miss you so much, your letter is worth more than a million gifts that you have given me till date.

Suspicions ??

Yes I am doing my research today and yes I am really bored. I had a long day today with its usual ups and downs but with a little extra spice today. I started day with my usual cuppa of tea with the plan of a peaceful stay at home and work. It was interrupted with a request from a friend for a text and that I took gladly because I generally do not refuse such things. So I trotted up to school and my day went totally haywire later. I really do not want to discuss the events, just the thoughts that they generated.

First of all I would like to add here that this coming weekend my friends and me (always put the donkey in the end) are planning this huge event which is really a dream and if it comes true, would make the whole lot of us really happy. This is a fund raiser for a organization called CRY, which helps in educating and providing for poor children across the globe. Now really this is not some kind of advertisement but a necessary introduction to what happens next. So I meet this old and dear friend of mine and well he shocks me by asking "We can donate but where does all this money you collect go"? As if to imply that I would actually be pocketing all that money inspite of having explained a million times before of what we do with the money. This silly event upset me, as I thought if my good friend does not trust me then why I am even bothering knocking on strangers doors who have never seen me before or never even heard of CRY.

I am sitting now, late in the night and this thought is still bugging me, I am thinking why did this friend say something so silly, why did he have to hurt my integrity. I am just wondering why are we so suspicious of the other person's intentions. Its not just this friend , all of us suffer from this problem once in a while. If someone is doing something which involves the word "social activity" remotely then we put the stamp of "show off" or "starving for publicity" or even "money pocketer" on him. If girl talks a little too much with a guy then we say "bitch" or "flirt" or some more generic silly terms. If a professor tries something different I rarely find students appreciating. We would sit hours and crib about the education system but are still happy with no homework and a superficial brush through the syllabus. If a friend compliments us we are thinking what does he or she really want ? If a shopkeeper smiles too much we think that he or she is fooling us, if he does not smile then we think something else sillier.

At the end of day I think its very difficult for us to accept anything at face value, by the time we have finished college and/or doing a job we think we have seen enough shit in the world to start thinking that every person who talks to us is wearing a mask, like the same one we ourselves are wearing. Why can't these silly suspicions at the least cross the barrier of friendship or even a relationship and be rid of forever ?

I don't even feel like completing this blog as I agree its totally one-sided.... But hopefully some day I will have a better experience and add some more to this topic.

A very late review - but worth a thought

I saw this wonderful movie today "RENT" and I have been meaning to watch it from the time it has been released and finally got the chance.

Such an excellent movie, its a musical actually. I am fan of muscles starting from "Sound of Music", "Chicago", "Charlie and the chocolate factory" are a few of my favorites. But these are light movies, but "RENT" is intense, has passion, and makes a statement on so many issues. Poverty, drugs, unemployment, survival, AIDS ... Gosh and best of all "LOVE" too.

So much passion in their voices and so much meaning in their songs ... "Measure of Life by Love" .

Watch it ! Just to see how it feels to be a AIDS patient or a drag queen or even a bar dancer .... How it feels to be a survivor everyday

Sketching ....

Today I woke up in the morning with just one aim. I will buy myself a good sketch book, some pencils and yes ofcourse ,not make coloured paper boats but SKETCH.

I will not call myself a very good artist neither a bad one , I do manage to make some good ones but then its not original work. I am not that good to close my eyes and imagine the smooth curves of a women or even the rough curves of a tree. Infact whenever I sketch a tree (out of pure imagination) its genrally this magnanimous structure with a lot of cut of branches (for a long time I consoled my self that the message my tree tries to give is the horrors of stripping trees in forests by humans but then i realized I just dont make anything else) and by the time I am done with the eloborate trunk and cut branches I am to bored to draw the leaves so I just use a scrap paper and spread gray colour as if the little left leaves on the tree are being blown away by a strong gust of wind.

So to be on the safe side I just skecth pictures which appeal to me or those which I know are a piece of rossugulla to be drawn (I refuse to use "cake", India has such rich mouth tempters of sweets so why use the boring cake?) .

Anyway after all the history and two years of dormancy, me shall start sketching today and some of my favourite things to sketch apart from environmental trees are

1) Obleix - I love his big belly , so easy to give him a structure
2) Calvin and Hobbes - his messy hair and hobbes's long body
3) Penguins
4) Broken down huts
5) Roads
6) Fences
7) Fortresses

So keep waiting , Tripti the artist will soon present you with some pictures which maybe from the list above or may not

Whatever appeals to my eye ........

To the moon and Back

This is one of my favourite picuters , took a lot of effort and waiting and with my faltoo kamera it was a great feat ,

enjoy !!

Google and we

Kabhi socha hai, google nahin hota to ham kya karte ?

I am as usual doing my research and well yes its quite boring to run those simulations but guess what I have finally managed to defeat the "red colour", I am not only getting the results but getting the results I need.

So bazically I am in this good mood with no reservations against anyone especially my sadu professor. I am peacefully analyzing the results and completing my presentation and also blogging. Amazing isn't it how we can divide our mind into different channels so easily, oh I forgot I am listening to muzic too.

One of my favorite pass times or timepasses (local desi english) is to look for pictures in our dear old google. I just think of a word and type it the search bar and hit images and there in front of me are the million meanings of that one word I typed. Lets see we type "poles" in google bar and viola we see images of bamboo shoots, electric poles, girl taking bath (wonder why, I guess any word in google will give atleast one picture related remotely to porn), totem poles, map showing north pole, pictures of people who have been adventurous enough to go all the way to south or north pole. Amazing isn't ? I really enjoy that exercise for my brain, association more things with less words.

The next best thing to a book for me is google. Curl up on my sofa, lappy on lap and just have a little peak into the world every once in a while. Its just amazes me , that there is so much information out there and its growing larger with the passing of each second. Each second a million events happen concurrently around the globe, some good some terrible, some you care for some you don't, some where a new discovery has been made or somewhere a mistake has been realized a little too late. So much happens everyday and yet we know so little. I feel like my mind will explode if I grasp so much. I guess sometimes I just resent to know things , I am happy without knowing and leave matters there.

Now I am bored .... I might have not even written what I really started to write but it does not matter. This bloc to me is like the memory store that Dumbledore has in Harry Potter series. With his wand he pulls out a memory to store , to observe and learn later, I do the same , store it to read later, learn and remember and cherish it

Moods ?

Enjoy my Solitude ?

At the top ?

Feel the cold ?

In heaven?

I am lonely?

Which one is yours ? or there are some more messages this picture gives ?

Spring - a festival of colors

Spring -05, this is dilapidated barn which I never really noticed till the day it had rained and spring was in full bloom. The second picture is so symbolic to the way a little color can add a million dimensions to anything. I have always read in so many novels that "the hills or plains burst into colors with the coming of spring" but never really got a chance to see it in India. Logan becomes breathtakingly pretty as spring is in full bloom.

CCP experts

I can never forget the day I got my first job, because in the first place I was not expecting it. It was the day my dad retired and I was sitting at home watching some silly T.V show when my friend called up and gave me the news and exactly at that time the door bell rang and it was my father after his final farewell from his beloved company. I ran out opened the door and gave him the news. He took out the huge garland from his hand and put it on me. It was so amazing ....so clear I can never forget. After that I sat with him for over an hour telling him every detail of the entire day, the day I got into the largest firm which came to our college.

Now that I am done with the bragging and the special part of the story let me begin why I really began writing this blog. I was updating my blog today and was reminded of my first project in my first company and that's where this little piece sprung up in my mind.

I remember the day clearly when IBM came for recruitment, we were the bekaar ECE guys who had no scope of getting into a pure ECE firm and were also anxious to get into any good firm. I remember all of us hopeful and waiting patiently for the results of the written test. About twenty of us, the ECE guys, got selected for the final interview. Once we saw our names there panic button was pressed. Being a software solutions firm they would expect us to know atleast C / C++ or even Java and vague stuff like that. Well being ECE guys the only things we know or atleast pretend to know is a little hardware circuits or some ECE related language. We ran to the library got some books we had never seen before and starting brushing up our rusty and deeply buried concepts of printing "hello world" in the above mentioned languages.

I remember it clearly, there were about forty odd CS students and my gang of four people waiting for an interview. We suddenly saw this these huge books on data structures , pointers and some more unrecognizable stuff in their hands busy preparing for interview. They looked so tense and worried. After sometime a few people who were done with their interviews came out and looking at their faces it appeared that a tornado of software related questions had hit them.

We poor ignorant ECE guys decided that we should not waste time on "Hello world" because judging by the flavor of the interviews we practically stood no chance of ever getting beyond the "H" of the hello world. So we called it quits, got some tea from canteen and took out a small joke book and had the time of our life cracking jokes on ECE and CS subjects. I still remember this CS girl staring at us, like we are those bigdi hui aulaad who dont care for anything.

Anyway as you can imagine I walked into my interview with this very light head and a song in my heart and skip in my steps. The guy - "Mr interviewer" was middle aged, looked bored and asked me to talk about my family. Well that was it, for almost ten minutes I just kept talking about each of my family members and how inspiring they are and so much more faltoo stuff than usual. He finally requested me to stop and then asked about my final year project. Again I started a long yarn as I am best at it and again was requested to stop. It was hilarious, I was cracking jokes and was totally at peace with myself because I knew ki yeh job to nahin milne waala, to kaye mein impress karne ki koshish karoon. He asked me to write a code involving pointers, so me the "Hello world" expert scribbled something on the paper and tried to convince him that I was on the right track and if given more time (I was thinking 6 months, but said few hours) would give him the exact solution. He said nothing asked me some more questions about how flexible I can be about learning new technology and stuff like that. All answers were given with complete positive attitude as if I am waiting to be their slave because I had no fear. Interview done I went home, took a good meal and was off to sleep. And suddenly at 6.30 my life changed forever.

Initially the feeling was awesome, I was thrilled to be hired by such a prestigious firm and also the fact that I will be earning so much. There were many dreams of learning hi-fi software solutions, wearing formal clothes and strutting about and just generally feeling very grown up and matured and all the crap associated with it. I would never say that I was disappointed because I got much more than I had ever asked for, some of the best friends were made in IBM, some of the most cherished memories of jokes and laughter are buried in that one year I was there.

But when I look back from a career point of view, I doubt if it did much addition. Being the ECE guys we were trained for mainframes testing for which believe me you dont need a engineering degree . Some work was really good but rare, else it was overall unsatisfying. I still remember the first project I was on, we had to convert a firm's intranet website to internet and all that we generally did was to publish a webpage very much like what we do when we write a blog. So what we did was either Cut or Copy the html text and paste into a software which took care of the publishing. So we did this for almost ten hours a day and then we began get bored and you know stuff like that. We used to call ourselves the Cut/Copy/Paste (CCP) experts. We got good money, food and company but then such activities rust your mind. The next project was also not amazing but I got be a pseudo team leader and working under me were five men. It was hell as they all were senior and hated the very sight of me or the work I had to assign. Anyway after facing a lot male chauvinism I learnt to survive there too. Life has its own sweet ways of making you flexible, you should never miss the opportunity or crib, just learn.

My one year at IBM was amazing like I said earlier, in terms of making friends, khaana peena, project deadlines, free food (which generally made our tummy sick), some miscellaneous activities like sports or picnics. I ran away from all that to do a masters here in US and I do miss that life of aisho aaraam, but I struggle here and love it too.

So the reason I wrote this blog is because I suddenly remembered that I am CCP expert....

Cut ....Copy .... Paste