Overheard on Radio Mirchi this morning: 8.8.08 is supposed to be a lucky day because of the number 8... evidently some people believe it to be true; others may not.
China evidently does: why else would it launch itself at 8 pm on 8th August 2008? The opening ceremony of the Olympic Games is more than just a sports spectacle; it's the coming-out party of an entire nation.
Today could also be the day when people end one life and start another... like the Tibetans, for instance, who protested and hoped they'd make it to centre-stage (and they did for a while, at least).
Ironical then, when one is reminded of the Buddhist saying: "What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly."
Go for Gold...China and Tibet and whoever else is charging off the blocks of life!
On this date, in 2002, I went in for my second surgery to remove a stubborn, ruptured appendix. Not too many people remember this but I was reminded of it yesterday by one who does. It was a surgery that could've killed me but I survived and went on to have some of the best few years of my life after that.
Today, in the mail, I got to know of Randy Pausch. He was a professor of computer science, human-computer interaction and design at Carnegie Mellon. A terminal pancreatic cancer patient, Randy decided on June 26 this year (my birthday, incidentally) that he was stopping all treatment. A month later, yesterday, he died in faraway Virginia, USA.
I hadn't even heard of the man but if you see this recording of his last lecture in September 2007 at Carnegie Mellon, it'll tell you more about life than about death.
We spend a lot of time planning what we should pack and carry when we go on vacations. If only we spent as much time figuring out what to leave behind...
Confessional as it may sound, I've not read a single word churned out by Ms Rowling.
Harry Potter movies I've watched. Glasses I've bought (and worn). His magic has fascinated me and, contradictory as it may seem, I've stayed away from the books only so that I don't become part of the herd that devours every title as soon as it's published.
And the spell is cast... the books must be read, I suppose. even if they're not, this itself is worth every word. Even when it's read over and over again.
Paul Irish is a Bostonian. He's also a geek who digs music and "brings to you an eclectic menagerie of aural pleasures. I scout out music you've never heard and deliver only the finest. Expect music curiously different, yet simply enjoyable."
Check out his brilliantly-named blog and you'll realise why some people get a high by just listening to music. Awesome music, at that!
Thanks to a friend's email... It isn't often that a website comes up with typos like these but when they do, it's worth archiving... the headline in this article on a child of Indian origin winning a spelling bee has a spelling error in its headline! Ironical but comical as well...and even after 24 hours, Rediff hadn't corrected it. By the time you read this, they may have; hence, the screen-grab.
There are days when you'd like the past to be best forgotten, the present rushed through and you wish the future wouldn't really arrive (or, at least, arrive with some clarity).
On days like these, thankfully there are people to look forward to.
I 'd first read this in my college days and while I remember every word, I could never recall who actually wrote it. Googling hasn't helped either. But enjoy it anyway...
The sexual urge of the camel is greater than anyone thinks And can only be gratified fully by going to bed with the Sphinx. But the Sphinx's magnificent orifice Is choked by the sands of the Nile. Hence the hump on the back of the camel And the Sphinx's inscrutable smile!
The question is: will Google ever be able to make these actually-not-so-random connections when you search for 'death' and end up with about 581,000,000' results of which the first is this, according to which I will die in 2019?
Am I over-obsessed with death? Worry not folks 'cause as Donne wrote: '...death, thou shalt die.'
A couple of weeks ago, Delhi (and Gurgaon) was reeling at 42 Celcius. A few duststorms later, the temperature had been reversed to 24.
A while ago, the skies darkened and the rains have come down almost as though the monsoons have arrived. The only problem is that this part of India doesn't really get any rain so the folks here aren't quite sure what they should do with Mummy Nature's bounty. The roads are flooded within a few minutes, cycles and scooters have been abandoned as riders scurry for cover, women on their way to work in autos have been drenched to the bone and are wondering which parts of their otherwise well-covered anatomy are now visible to the unashamedly- staring Jat...
On rare Monday mornings like this, there are only a few things one should indulge in.
Get hold of some brinjal and besan, add a few chillies and some salt; heat up lots of mustard oil and fry enough pakoras to keep you going for the next few hours. Combo this with piping hot masala chai and you have the perfect nibble-sip-nibble rhythm in place.
If that's too much to do, just toast some bread, spread dollops of butter that'll melt through and drip on to your cold fingers... the chai, though, has to be there.
I could spend hours watching the leaves get bathed and turn from dusty brown to glistening green as fat drops come down by the litre; Kishore Kumar would play in the background and I'd do nothing but daydream... nothing, though, will quite make up for the warmth I could get from curling up to someone who's either too far away or too distant to care.
The winds will blow the clouds away and, finally, the traffic jams will ease up enough to let office-goers get to work. The morning will get swallowed by the madness of another Monday and the rain won't quite return. Even if it does, it won't be the same. There is an unforgettable smell of parched earth that floats up when the first showers hit the ground... the second shower will never do the same.
So, for the sake of the sinful stomach, let me too get down to work.
Kolkata Knight Riders played Mumbai Indians in the latter's home-ground last evening. And lost.
I missed Kolkata achieving the dubious distinction of the IPL series' lowest score because I was playing another match in Delhi on a slippery wicket... and not quite winning that either.
On the way back from Delhi to Gurgaon, caught in traffic, the skies suddenly opened up and let loose a shower which, inexplicably, took me back to Amby Valley where I was last year in a conference during the monsoons.
An old college friend, still in Calcutta, sms-ed to invite me to her son's thread ceremony; I called her back and heard her rant about how meaningless the whole affair was in this day and age. I agreed but had to tell her that she needed to do this not for herself or her son but because we often do things to please others... she wasn't quite convinced. And it doesn't look like I'll make it to Calcutta for the feast she's organising :-(
The call reminded me of another classmate, now in Bangalore, whose birthday it also was yesterday... her phone though went unanswered. I had found her after years on a bookshelf at Crosswords in Kemps Corner, Mumbai - but that's another post.
At home, an old friend again from Calcutta - now living in Mumbai and staying over for the night - was waiting.
When I did get home finally, no one wanted to watch Mumbai thrash Kolkata. Were we being parochial or just prioritising the few hours we had to spend catching up on each others' lives?
We finally yakked till midnight with Jack Daniels for company and figured that Saurav, Sachin and Shoaib were just not worth it.
Is there a point to this post? Doesn't look like it but Calcutta's always worth rambling about.
"The problem with beauty is that it's like being born rich and getting poorer" said Joan Collins.
The problem with YouTube, though, is that it allows Madonna at 50 to look like 20; and makes most women wonder why life is so unfair to them!
Of the close-to 17 million ogles this video had got at this time, how many of them would have been envious? How many women's popping eyeballs? How many men clutching theirs?
How does a woman (like Rekha, for instance) reconcile herself to the fact that, no matter what she does, beauty will be lost? Or, that fighting weight-gain may be a losing battle...
