A fleeting glimpse...

There is an image from my Mumbai visit in June end that has endured in my mind. I was walking with my mom to Shivaji park I think when we passed a boy returning home from school. He wasn’t the cutest kid …but something about him caught my fancy.

It was drizzling and he had a raincoat on with a hood. He was carrying a school bag and had a water bottle around his neck.

What caught my attention was that he had his face turned towards the drizzle. The eyes were tightly shut and there was an innocent joy on his face, looked like he hadn’t a care in the world…I tried to remember when I had done something so simple so spontaneously last. I dearly wished I had a camera with me to capture that moment forever.

The joy on his face was indescribable…I have forgotten what such simple joy is and can’t find the words to describe it.

Maybe this is what PF were hinting at when they sang

When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse

out of the corner of my eyes…

He was having his glimpse of joy, a simple , guileless joy…let’s hope it is not a fleeting one.

R.I.P my friend

I was shaken out of the stupor that studying stochastic processes generates by the loud crying of some girl near my hostel. As I looked out from my balcony it turned out to be someone I knew.
She was mourning the death of one of her batchmates,Ajay, who committed suicide probably in the early hours of the morning of 27th August.
I must have seen this guy in the mess, though I never probably personally met him.
The reasons are as yet unknown (atleast to me), but the general feeling is there was too much pressure in his course.
He was an Integrated PhD student in his 2nd year, he joined IISc with me last year.
He must have been barely 21-22...did he find himself unable to resist the pressure?
It is said "No pressure, no diamonds" but what about the 'corundum' that might just be crushed under the pressure that is meant for only diamonds? Is it not equally precious?
Was there some other reason? We don't know, and we might never know.
Whatever the reasons the question remains:
WAS IT WORTH KILLING HIMSELF OVER IT?

Maybe he found what he longed for:
A little rest and some peace.

The solutions may not necessarily be very forthcoming.
A lot of soul-searching needs to be done...by every one of us.
The course load on the students could be reduced, a student mentor program could be started.
But really was it worth the one, very precious, very promising life that was lost.

And this is not the first time someone in one of India's 'premier' institutions has taken this drastic step.
As Bob Dylan asks :
n' how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?

Maybe this song by REM could tell us something:
EVERYBODY HURTS.
When the day is long and the night, the night is yours alone,
When you're sure you've had enough of this life, well hang on
Don't let yourself go, 'cause everybody cries and everybody hurts sometimes

Sometimes everything is wrong. Now it's time to sing along
When your day is night alone, (hold on, hold on)
If you feel like letting go, (hold on)
When you think you've had too much of this life, well hang on

'Cause everybody hurts. Take comfort in your friends
Everybody hurts. Don't throw your hand. Oh, no. Don't throw your hand
If you feel like you're alone, no, no, no, you are not alone

If you're on your own in this life, the days and nights are long,
When you think you've had too much of this life to hang on.

Friendship Day...

Making a friend is not a miracle.
the miracle is making a friend who will stand by you when a million are against you.


One of the many Friendship Day smses I got.

I had fun too...went to Domino's ...ALONE!!
So much for Friendship Day.

A year

A year ago I flew to bangalore to join IISc.
Full of hope yet pained to leave loved ones and the city I love so much.
A year ago I wrote Goodbye Blue Sky...in tribute to what I was leaving behind.

In this year some of my dreams were fulfilled, some remain yet unfulfilled and some crushed.
A year of growth, of hope, despair, frustration,excitement.

As is my common comment
so much has changed...yet so much remains the same.

Lesson for LIFE

The best way to keep one's word is not to give it.
- Napoleon Bonaparte

Deja vu??

FedEx makes it five in a row at Wimbledon but it was Raphael Nadal who won my heart.

In 1980, Bjorn Borg beat an extremely talented young left-hander in 5 tight sets to win his fifth Wimbledon title.
.I’ve seen the replay of that match and the young lefthander pull off that amazing 18-16 set 4. Today’s lefthander pulled off an equally stunning 6-2 set 4.
That guy had a permanent scowl on his face, and was constantly challenging line calls.
See the parallels? Getting a sense of the déjà vu?
I’m looking forward to this rivalry and sincerely hoping Federer does not pull a Borg with respect to retirement.

Rafa is the King of Clay and might well add grass to his repertoire.

As he pulled off shot after amazing shot,

Alan Wilkins said “This is grass not clay.This is not his surface.”

Well given the improvement he is showing, it very well may become HIS surface.

How many think that its unfair that its Federer and not Sampras who equals the IceBorg’s record? Would have been such fun to see those two go at each other.

Home, home again ...

I go back to Bangalore today.
Last year I put the lyrics of Goodbye Blue Sky.
This year its the Breathe reprise.

Home, home again
I like to be here when I can
And when I come home cold and tired
Its good to warm my bones beside the fire
Far away across the field
The tolling of the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spells.

Breathe (reprise) Pink Floyd

Nothing better than the BEST...

an unbelievable change in the BEST buses I saw this time...
not only can you pay your Hutch bills in the BEST bus but u can even make calls from

A MOBILE PCO!!!!

Here's photo proof.

Words are beautiful things, perhaps the tongue is not the best way of using them.
- Ankur's first blog.

Walk the Talk

This quote on GMail got me started thinking about this

Bobby Knight - "Most people have the will to win, few have the will to prepare to win."

So many people I see or hear from can Talk the Talk but can't Walk the Walk.

Maybe that's why Morpheus tells Neo in the Matrix:

"One day you will realize just this one fact,

There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path"

F.R.I.E.N.D.S

Recent events have made me wonder what this "friendship" thingie is all about.
It's not what you feel about classmates/batchmates in engineering that wears out the moment you step out of college.
It's what makes you spend a reasonable amount of money and a lot of effort to spend a few hours with a select few friends. Of course exceptions exist.(I couldn't meet everyone I wanted to meet the last, short trip).
I will still be friendly with my classmates, but with most of them I am not and was never "FRIENDS"
This quote I got on iGoogle summed it up for me wrt most of my 'friends'.

Contrary to general belief, I do not believe that friends are necessarily the people you like best, they are merely the people who got there first. - Peter Ustinov

Ankur said "Friends are the people you don't have to impress anymore."
friends are the people who have accepted your shortcomings and love you nonetheless.

These lines from the FRIENDS theme or whatever would sum up how I feel:

No one could ever know me
No one could ever see me
Seems you're the only one who knows
What it's like to be me

Someone to face the day with
Make it through all the rest with
Someone I'll always laugh with
Even at my worst I'm best with you

To tell the truth, there's very few such people in my life...and if anything I am thankful for them.

And he talks to the river of lost love and dedication
And silent replies that swirl invitation
Flow dark and troubled to an oily sea
A grim intimation of what is to be

There's an unceasing wind that blows through this night
And there's dust in my eyes, that blinds my sight
And silence that speaks so much louder that words,
Of promises broken

Sorrow ,Pink Floyd

Bittersweet Symphony

Love this song by the Verve. A part of it was used in Bluffmaster.

The whole song

Cause it's a bittersweet symphony, this life
Trying to make ends meet
You're a slave to the money then you die.(True, very true)
I'll take you down the only road I've ever been down
You know the one that takes you to the places
where all the veins meet yeah

No change, I can't change
I can't change, I can't change
But I'm here in my mould
I am here in my mould
But I'm a million different people
from one day to the next
I can't change my mould
No, no, no, no, no, no, no,no,no,no,no,no(fading away)

Well I never pray
But tonight I'm on my knees yeah (not really)
I need to hear some sounds that recognize the pain in me, yeah
I let the melody shine, let it cleanse my mind, I feel free now
But the airways are clean and there's nobody singing to me now

'Cause it's a bittersweet symphony, this life
Trying to make ends meet
Trying to find some money (somebody) then you die
I'll take you down the only road I've ever been down
You know the one that takes you to the places
where all the veins meet yeah.

Words' worth

Had posted this a few months ago...then took it off because it was adding too much entropy to the Universe.

There is a great deal of verbal communication in the world today. Letters,phone calls,emails,chats,blogs(:P)...an infinity of words.

I for one believe that the best communication involves zero or a minimal amount of words.

What a million words of commiseration could not do...a sigh and 6 words did.
It felt like an arm round the shoulder ...and all those wise men and women with their words did not realize that that was what I needed.

A few friends and a completely different topic had me laughing on the worst day of my life.

No amount of words can do what one look into the eyes of a friend trying desperately to hold back her tears did.

I went out for dinner once by myself...a couple sat on the table facing me.
The girl was trying to hold back her tears. The guy sat opposite her,not eating ...just looking into her eyes...almost soothing her...not one word was said.
I smiled.

The Grass was Greener...

Met Ankur, Prasanna and Paresh this last Saturday.
Had a lot of fun...but I must admit I was also a bit sad.
There is something about meeting old friends, exchanging notes on who is doing what, gossiping(if that is what you call it)...it makes you look back at how you were when you were with them.
It was great to meet them because very rarely do you get a group of friends together that can understand precisely what I am going through...undoubtedly my closest friends.
The same jokes were back, the mimicry, the leg pulling over how sincerely I attended 12th std classes while these ppl goofed off.
It reminded me of those days 6-7 years ago...the innocent belief that if you were smart, worked hard then luck would not play a role...that doing beautiful mathematics was the purpose of life, that physics was the highest in intellectual endeavour.
Where is that cheerful belief, that innocent confidence??

It takes old friends to remind you of who you were, who you are and what you are turning into.
Maybe I can prevent the cynicism from creeping into me any further.
Maybe I can find my 'Return to Innocence'

Last September Ankur wrote this.
I can identify with the emotion...Thanks for everything guys!!

An old song that fits the mood ...
"Koi lauta de mere beete hue din".

Time.

This is my life's song right now...wasting one day at a time getting nowhere.

TIME - Pink Floyd

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an off hand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but its sinking
And racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in the relative way, but you're older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the english way
The time is gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say

Coorg tripping...

Kanna planned a trip for us to Coorg with stay at the Club Mahindra resort in Kodagu valley.
Amazing 3 days...LOADS of FUN!!!!!!!

Won't write much since a picture is worth a thousand words...I'll let the photos do the talking.
A few B&W pics for "effect".
For the full album visit my Picasaweb page.

The Rematch

In 2005 two 'not-so-great','undeserving' English teams won the greatest prize their sport had to offer that year against 2 Champion sides:
In May Liverpool beat Milan in the Champions League final in what was called '6 minutes of madness' or something like that.
In July and August of the same year England beat Australia 2-1 in the Ashes with a lot of luck.
It pained me to see Warney and McGrath bowl their hearts out on the last day of the 5th Test as the Englishmen drudged their way to a draw and an Ashes victory.
That day I predicted they would get Whitewashed the next time they went to Australia.
The hunger was visible in the Aussies, in Warne and McGrath, in Lee and Ponting and Hayden and Gilchrist to make up for loss.
I had predicted a whitewash, a whitewash it was, Australia thr"ASHES" England.

Now Milan have a chance to get even...and a 5-0 scoreline would just ROCK!!

FORZA MILAN!!!

But it rained

April 11th 2007.
It rained at night here in Bangalore.
I was reminded of some of my favourite Pink Floyd lines:

Outside the rain fell dark and slow
While I pondered on this dangerous but irresistible pastime
I took a heavenly ride through our silence
I knew the moment had arrived
For killing the past and coming back to life

I took a heavenly ride through our silence
I knew the waiting had begun
And headed straight...into the shining sun

Failure

Used to see this ad when the NBA matches were shown on Star Sports and ESPN.
Amazing ad...by the Greatest.

Might sound familiar.


I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career;
I've lost almost 300 games;
26 times I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot...and MISSED.
I've failed over and over and over again in my life.
That is why...I succeed.

Watch it here:

you-tube

Amazing ad