A gust of Wind!

So yesterday I was up earlier than usual, so decided to take a stroll outside and go to the barbers shop for a hair cut. It was a beautiful day yesterday with a strong cold breeze blowing and the city still walking up to the morning.

I just love this kind of weather. There are always gusts of cold breeze which refreshes you completely. These winds have a peculiar calming effect on me, the sound that the leaves make when the wind passes through them has a settling effect , one can feel the same settling effect in the sound of falling water. Yes I am a complete nature man.

So as I stand in the balcony outside the barber shop and feel this lovely morning , a chain of thoughts is triggered in my mind and I see a sitcom style flashback of my life right in front of me. From the many thoughts that came to my mind at that time. I want to write about one thought in particular , the way I have changed as a person and the contributions of my surroundings to this change. When we talk of change it can loosely be classified in 2 ways for me . One is the change in the personality , this change includes the things which are immediately visible like change in dressing sense , communication style etc But I wish to write about the other change , one which is more subtle the change in my thought process because this is the chage which is at the base of all the other visible changes . I want to take a cross section of my life and think over how the layer of each year and each experience has changed me. I want to stay away from trying to categorize this change as good or bad . I just wish to write about it . And thats what I will do in the next few posts. I have selfish reasons for writings about this change, and listing these change is an apt pretext for what is to follow later

• For a long time now my life has been driven by the ticking of clocks. The 9.30 tick of the clock before which I have to reach office. The tick of clock on the 31st of the month and subsequent deposits in my salary account. The ticking of project deadline clocks. These ticks tend to overwhelm you and wash away any other thought process from your mind. I guess its time to take off the battery from these clocks for a while.


• Its about time I take what we refer to in Software industry as " 30,000 feet view" or my favourite " View of the elephant from the outside".


• There is a stage in every persons life where the youthful person inside him , the one who came out of college , and wanted to conquer the world is starting to run out of Adrenalin. This is the time either you need to take a decision or life takes a decision for you. A decision which will usually define at least the next 5 to 8 years of your life. I wish to take that decision myself instead of letting life take it for me.
• I already feel light having written all the things above , I wish to lighten my load a bit more , the lesser the load the faster you move.

I guess this provides enough pretext for what is to come and I hope I can write with the same sincerity as I have done in this post.

~ And Nothing else matters!

Of Life and Sports.

So I have become much of a sports buff these days watching each and every type of sport the idiot box has to offer. May it be F1 , Tennis , Badminton , Football ,Moto GP,Tour de France . I even watched Something Lu beat something Le in a Ping Pong match. It is not a deliberate attempt from my end but Cricket seems to have slipped from my Radar these days and am loosing interest in watching that sport.
Watched a valiant effort from Andy Roddick at the Wimbledon in a marathon 5 setter , seriously man my heart goes out for him. That day I really wanted him to win. Then again on another day I was supporting Lance Armstrong the come back man at the Tour de France.
Believe me Tour De France is one of the most Amazing sport I have ever seen. In fact it takes you a lot of time to actually believe that it is a sport.

• For starters it is a race based on podium position for individual cyclist , so as such the glory goes to the individual. but still they compete as a team.
• Cycle race has a concept of Domestique's , there are the cyclist who have no job apart from acting as a shield to the wind for the rider in the team whom they think has a chance of winning the Tour , and burning themselves out so this lone rider can conserve his energy and win. I mean thats one heck of a commitment to give considering that at the end of 23 days the winner is separated only by a few minutes from the others .
  
• Then there are lead out men , men who will lead there rider within 300 meter's of the finishing line and then let him go ahead and win the race. Again one heck of a commitment to let go in the last 300 mts considering some stages are as long as 300 km.
  

But there is a reason to all this , the one and only reason , it is the toughest sporting event on earth. The sport is very demanding. Its the true testament to the theory of "Survival of the Fittest" . 350o km , 23 days straight on the road , temperature ranging from 35 degree Celsius to less than 0 degrees. Average speed of 40 km/hr for the entire race with highest speed reaching around 80 km/hr and that too with a tyre which is as slim as a scale. It is a true test and only the fittest can survive. No wonder the cyclist have a camaraderie and often help each other out.
This years tour was another special one. It marked the return of Lance Armstrong the 7 time champion . He returned after 4 years of retirement. His story is one of the most amazing story I have ever seen. Diagnosed of cancer at the age of 25 , he came back from a near death experience. And while most people would have been happy to be alive he came back , and boy it was a comeback winning 7 straight tours on the trot. This year he raced again and at 37 he might have been one of the oldest riders , but he left many of them behind to get third position.
Its a good watch this sport. My recommendation read the books by Lance Armstrong "Its not about bikes" and "Every second counts" they are really worth it.

Things I discovered in 2008

Things I discovered in the last year!

• Internet is the Software engineer’s drug … and I am one of the biggest addicts … if not getting enough of it I show symptoms like Shaking hands … sudden bursts of technical jargon.
• Hindsight has the power to make a lot of your decision look fantabulous (and visa versa)
• Hollywood has the same talent as Bollywood when it comes to making crap movies.
• There is no time as college time and one is ready to give anything to go back in it.
• The pressure of getting married is inversely proportional to the distance from home.
• That a trek (big 8 day one) a year is must for me to retain my senses.
• That people are resistant to change in untrue. At least I am not … how else can u explain the many changes that I have in my mood.
• I didn’t want to be a software engineer. ( this one keeps repeating quite consistently in my year end lists..)
• That there is nothing more damning than not having work to do… ( I am bloody scared by Bench)
• That I drank too much milk in my childhood making my bones heavier and myself fatter … I told u it wasn’t the Samosas/Wada Paos/Pizzas/Bread Pakodas/……..
• That the number of movies I have in my hard disk right now is more than what my dad and mom combined have ever seen in there life.
• That I can be described as a guy who has Archie like hair! :) :)

Resiliance - Bull shit

As Shobha De very rightly put it .. Dont utter that word resilient in front of me again !
Yes Mumbai is resilient , Mumbai will come back to its feet , but we are sick of politicians using this excuse to cover up there inefficiencies , time and time again they have failed and now its time they became accountable .. its time we demand more .. its time that we say .. enough is enough ! stop this !

Here are some more incredible things that our politician did today!

• Narendra Modi offered a compensation cheque to the wife of Hemant Karkare .. Good for her she refused to take it and tell him that his gestures were not required and not appretiated!
• Raj Thakre landed up at Karaker's residence to pay his condolences .. he was told he is not invited !
  
• Mr R R Patil said that "Itne bade sheharo me chote mote hadse hote rehte hai " good on you sir , this was a very small incident wasn't it ... oh yes and his explanation for this ! the terrorist had planned to kill 5k people but could kill only 200 ... Bravo Mr Patil .. u deserver a Nobel price for this!

On the other end of this spectrum were NSG commandos who came out of a 60 hrs combat operation from the Taj and to there credit the humble nature of them they say "It is our job to protect the country " , or should we talk about the general manager of Taj who lost his wife and kids but is still working to make sure all his guests are safe. Or should we talk about the South African personal security guard who were on a holiday in India and were in the restaurant on the roof of the Taj .. who not only secured the roof top restaurant but bought down about 100 people to safety from the fire exit !
These are the real heroes of hour. And no praise is big enough for them , they are the true representation of India!

This is not done

• I feel hopeless today , the same metro cinema in which I have watched many movies with my friends was surrounded by sounds of gun shots , not that we haven't heard gunshot in Metro before , but the only difference this time was that they were real , its as if the reel rolling inside the cinema had come out and now it was actually happening. I felt hopeless when the same CST local station was in the hands of terrorist and they were firing automatic guns at the crowd , It sends a shiver down ones spine when we try to imagine the situation of people jam packed in the trains and bullets being fired on them , its nothing less than another Jaliawala bagh. I feel desperate as to how "The Taj" whose beauty we admired sitting at the gateway of India is flames.
  

• I felt happy when the opposition said that this is the time to unite and fight terrorism and stand together for the common Indian I felt proud of the fact that we were together in times of difficulty , and the very next day even when the battle still raged in Mumbai , papers in Delhi carried this add , now I am no one to comment on the morality of such things but how cheap is this ? and how desperate is this ? Have we lost our complete morality ? I am ashamed of the fact that our politics has come down to such dirty levels.
• With each tick of the clock there is another gun shot another death all our so called leaders want to do is to visit the spots and make press statements or complain about them not being allowed into the state , 1 lac for the dead and 50 k for the seriously injured , wow Mr chief minister its a good price you are giving for the lives of people , and oh and what about the guy who just lost a leg , he isn't seriously injured , so the leg doesn't have any value is it ? Is that all you could pull up nothing more ? How about an apology that you failed in your duties ? Don't we deserve that ?

• Oh and I shouldn't even talk about the great politician from another state , he has offered 1 crore to all the injured , how kind of you sir . And yes he wanted to meet the widow of Hemant Karkare who lost his life in the mission to kill the terrorist. The same Hemant Karkare whose integrity was questioned by you and your party , the same guy whom you accused of leading a politically motivated case in the Malegaon blasts? " Ye kismat bhi na sir ajeeb hoti hai , agar aap ko pata hota ki wo marne wala hai to aap aisa kyo kehte! Bure phas gaye aap"
• And if all these guys weren't enough , another one of our gr8 politicians come on National television in the backdrop of gunshots and grenades being thrown at Taj contemplating weather 1st DEC would be a good day to call a bandh to protest this attack. Excuse me , but whom is this bandh for ? Is it to tell the terrorist that we don't appreciate such kind of attacks cos I am not sure if they care ! Or is it your attempt to wake up the government ? oh but sir if the gunshot and the grenades didn't wake them up then how will your bandh awaken them ?
• And yes .. I got to ask this .. where is the MNS ? Dont they see that some terrorists have entered Mumbai and are killing there own beloved Marathi manoos ? Ohh they aren't even objecting to the NSG commandos hailing from different parts of India coming to Mumbai! What happened to there charismatic leader who spoke so much that he had to be held behind bars ! not even a single word from him ? . "Aaho saheb kuthe laple ho tumhi ?"

Ridiculous thats all I can say ! Throw these people out of here ! These aren't the representation of India ! They are a pack of jokers ! They are spine less bunch of crooks !
And as I close of this post , after 48 hours of intense battle finally the ordeal is coming to an end. If it wasn't for the brave soldiers like "Hemant Karkare" and the national security guard(NSG) we would have never made it .. Hats of to them!

You Want to Know how I did it Anton , I never saved anything for the Swim back

So I had a free evening after a long time , with nothing much to do I sat in front of the laptop to see a movie .. The one which I saw today is called "Gattaca".

The movie is based on something called as "Liberal eugenics" which propogates use of science and genetics to create a perfectly born test tube baby who has the best genetic qualities of both his parents. They refer to such a genetically perfect human as "Valid" and other human's who are born by natural birth are called "Invalids".

Its a story of how an "Invalid" whome the world doesnt even give a chance of living life properly fulfils his dream. Its a story of a boy names Vincent who immediately after being born by natural birth is diagonised with severe health problems and it is predicted that he wont live to be more than 30 , a boy with low IQ , low fitness level , myopic eye.

Its a story about a fight between him and his genetically superior brother who is said to be born a winner and who always does much better than Vincent in all activities.

The story revolves around how Vincent goes all out to realise his childhood dream of going into space , he uses fake personality to get into a space research organization called "GATTACA" where he does excedingly well and is given an opportunity to go into space , but as the date of departure arrives , the story startes to get complicated. There is a murder of one of the directors in the organization and in the murder area the detectives find DNA of Vincent , the detective investigation are a threat and are very near to blowing up Vincents cover , but the detectives find out that the murdurer is someone else and Vincent succeds in going to space.

The movie is much more than just the fulfillment of a persons dream , it is about the power of will , it shows the struggle between the ones who are gifted and ones who have to struggle to make things work for them. It shows that with determination you can achieve beyond your capabilities , you can stretch yourself to higer levels.
Its funny the movie reminds me of one of the incident during our college days and I got into this paper presentation contest , I and my partner were supposed to give a small presentation on our topic in front of a small audience. I still remeber studiying for the presentation day in and day out. Then when it finally came to the point to deliver I got on the stage and freaked out , I had stage fear , I forgot everything . Every word that I had prepared , in fact the situation got so worse that I couldnt even read from the note which was in my hand , it was as if I had forgotten reading.
Well a month later I made another attempt at public speaking , this time in front of a bigger audience and potentially more embarassment as this event was in my college, that day I did well , in fact I even got complimented. That was 4 years ago , today I stand a changed man , and in fact anyone who meets me today will never be able to tell that I was the same guy who couldnt talk. It wasnt as if after the sucess that day the fear never came back to me , it did everytime I spoke in front of the gathering , everytime I was in the spotlight , I just handle it well now , in fact I got my sweet revenge just a few months ago when I won the best speaker award in a debate competition at our office. Sweet it was !
Before I sign off there is one scene from Gattaca which I liked very much and want to reproduce here. Its about the hero Vincent and his gentically superior brother(Anton) , they always have a competition where they swim in the ocean and the go as far as they can , and the one who quits first looses.
In the movie they always play this game and Anton always wins , but one day Vincent wins the competition and his brother challanges him to prove it again , so in the middle of the night both of them start to swim inside the ocean. Seeing his genetically degenerate brother (whome no one in the world gave a chance) winning Anton asks him :
Anton: "Vincent! How are you doing this, Vincent? How have you done any of this? We have to go back!"
Vincent: "It's too late for that, we're closer to the other side."
Anton: "What other side? Do you want to drown us both‽"
Vincent: "You want to know how I did it? This is how I did it, Anton. I never saved anything for the swim back."
~I dream of fire
Those dreams are tied to a horse that will never tire

Life Switch

Hmm ..

Just got back after seeing the movie Jaane Tu .. Ya Janne Na the one with Amir Khan's nephew in it. Good comedy which doesnt bore you not even for a single moment.
Now dont get me wrong , I am not going to do a movie review here, rather just felt about writing something about what the movie made me feel. I have a friend who is totally a movie buff and who thinks that movies are real , and sometime I find this friend of mine wants his/her life to be just like a movie.
Sounds like a perfect proposition doesnt it , a guy liking some girl and not knowing it and then after commiting a few mistakes coming back and getting her and then the Happyes Endings .. Or a Hritik Roshan singing "Lakshya to har hall me pana hai" and then finally getting it , But is it as easy as they show it in the movies ?
Most of the times movies have a switch mode of operation .. what I mean by this is sudden realisation of truth , sudden awakening that you see happening in people...
Switch OFF : I dont know what I want to do in my life!
Swith ON : I want to join the army go on top of hill and kill all dushman ke siphai..

Swithc OFF : I dont know who is the girl I love
Swithc ON : XYZ is the love of my life.
And then the hero probably goes to get his girl who is about to leave the country , but he manages to get to her say sorry and make up and blah blah..
Life is not that simple , simply because life doesnt have just the ON/OFF mode , in fact the majority of people who live in between these states dont they.. I can tell you many cases of people wanting something and not getting it , happened to me so many times .. To be fair to the bollywood industry , they do show stories with tragic endings , like Amir Khan and Juhi Chawla ending up dead in "Qayamat se Qayamat tak" , which I must say is another extreme case , in a way its still a happy ending in the sense that atleast they dont have to see the agony of seeing the loved one in someone else's arms.
Normal life is very different from all this. It is not about winning or losing , but its about fighting hard each day to prove yourself.
Ok fine , so you wanted to be a sucessful businessman with lots of money and you also ended up being on but is that the end of the story no its just the start .. each day when that businessman gets into his car to go to office he thinks how am I going to protect my businessness ? how am i going to get better from my competitors ? How do i get new clients ?
Getting a partner who is caring and understanding .. Piece of Cake !
Try keeping the understanding for 20 years ..
Well its still Fair you say .. If you have something then you have to make an effort to protect it .. I mean if you have a sucessful business its your duty and responsibility to protect it.

But what really hurts is when you fail , life is very harsh on failures , there are no escapes from failures , you have to live with them as long as you live and ironically it is how you accept and live with failures which decided how sucessful you will be.
There is a mysterious way in which failures keep reminding you of themselves , It may be the friends and relatives who try to sympatise with you or associates who murmur about them near the water coolers or the coffee wending machines , or worst case you have to get up each day and face you failure in the form of lady sleeping besides you whome dont like. It is how we deal with these failures which decides what we will become. Failure is like that monstor who sap's you of your energy , who drains you , who breaks you slowly .. and all you can do is keep fighting .. as hard as you can .. I remeber a story which my trainer told me . It goes like this...
In the deep jungles of Africa , every morning when a deer gets up , it says to itself ..
"Today I am going to run faster than the fastest tiger and make sure I live another day"
and in the same jungle the Tiger gets up and says
"Today I am going to run faster than the fastest dear so that I will not go hungry today"
So my friend every day when we get up we need to tell to ourselves
" Today I am going to run faster towards my goal , so what if I may fall hard , so what if I may fail , tomorrow is another day tomorrow I will try again"

~ I get knocked down , but I get up again ,
You are never gonna keep me Down ,
I get knocked down. - Tub Thumbing