Ramble on

India Pakistan: Two sides of the same Coin

2012-01-31T02:38:00.000-08:00

No matter how much both governments try to dissociate themselves from each other, India & Pakistan will always be two sides of the same coin.

My grandparents are older than the divided countries of India-Pakistan which are now only 64 years old.

And the more i read, the more i realise that we Indians & Pakistanis are not so different at all.

We share the same history, same language(Hindi-Urdu), same food, same costumes, same passion for cricket & bollywood and so on.

We are essentially the same people, albeit, now we just live on different sides of an imaginary line.

Ask an Indian if he's Pakistani and you'll hear a couple of cuss words in the very least for mistaking him for the 'other side'. Its the same if you ask a Pakistani if he's Indian, There's this strong sense of hopeful dissociation.

On probing deeper, we see that our national languages 'Hindi' & 'Urdu' both derive from Khairiboli, which was the official language under the Mughal rule since about 1800, which derives from a fusion of the mughal languages - Persian & Arabic and North Indian languages like Punjabi & Haryanvi.

The language was given many names through the ages like - Hindawi, Dehlavi "of Delhi"; Hindustani, and so forth before finally settling on Hindi & Urdu.

Hindi was only standardized to distinguish it from Urdu, which is essentially the same language but with written with arabic characters rather than the Devanagari text.

I cant help but wonder as to what the undivided India would be like. The serenenity of the Hunza valley, the cultural richness of cities like Lahore & Karachi, the amazing food from the North-west Frontier provinces.

Can you imagine the Pakistan & Indian cricket teams of the 90's playing as one? Wasim, Waqar, Sachin, Ganguly, Imran all playing on the same side...

This newfound alienation can only do harm to both sides, because we share way too much common ground between us, to be able to completely break-away from the other side.

My Cool New CV

2011-12-26T12:48:00.000-08:00

Spent a whole day making this.

Im pretty excited to share it with prospective employers.

Any thoughts?

What i am/ was reading lately:

2011-12-16T08:19:00.000-08:00

I Finished reading - Secret of the Nagas, by Amish, follow up to the hugely successful, but terribly written first book, the immortals of meluha.

Well, i dont know how he did it, but the second book was even worse than the first. And unfortunately for the author, i wont be buying anymore of his books.

Im currently reading:

1. Paulo Coelho - Aleph, which is looking like a phenomenal read. I actually dont think ive read a bad paulo coelho book, and ive read a few.

2. Jack Kerouac - On the Road. The book that inspires every reader to alteast once make that crazy roadtrip, and experience life on the road

3. Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - After almost a year, im finally almost done with this, what an unbelievable book, and its added so much value to my life.
I would recommend it to every human being alive.

4. City of Joy - Dominique Lapierre , Ive just started reading this one, the title belies the fact that its about a really big slum in calcutta, and despite all odds the author finds this place to be the city of joy.

Cheerio.

I Wish i knew

2011-11-15T11:57:00.000-08:00

(C)
Wish that I can take you someplace
(F)
Where you can find yourself, Where you can find your self.

(C)
But i wish i knew
(G)
Wish i knew where

(C)
Wish that i can take you through this
(Am)
Without causing too much pain, without causing too much pain.

(C)
But i wish i knew
(G)
Wish i knew where

(C)
I know that i can take through through this
(F)
To the place you want to go

(C)
I just wish i knew
(G)
Wish i knew where.....

Reminiscing: Studying languages in school

2011-11-14T06:53:00.000-08:00

Firstly, i have been wondering since a while, as to how much a person really change through a lifetime?

In extreme cases i mean, from 0 to 10-15% maybe ?

I mean, maybe you might look completely different from the outside, dress differently, talk differently, but who we are deep down inside remains the same, the values, the attitudes, the core.

I, in school like most students liked / disliked certain subjects.

My favourite was French, which i excelled at, throughout school and junior college.

And my most hated were Hindi & Marathi.

ALL LANGUAGES.

The way i looked at it then, and still do is :-

I already spoke Hindi when i was learning it. BORING. It did nothing for me practically speaking.

Marathi - On the other hand, was just beyond comprehension, from reading, to writing and i did miserably at it, almost failing a couple of times.

HNowever, today i can confidently say, i speak it better than most people i know, just by interaction with people (mostly cops and rickshaw drivers in rural maharashtra) and hearing the language.

After spending 6 months in japan this year, i faced a similar dilemma, japanese to write it unbelievably hard, and i had no interest in learning to write whatsoever.

Learning to speak, with its vast practical application, not to forget 'coolness quotient' for a foreigner to be speaking the language... made it an incredibly exciting proposition, and again i lapped it up, with childlike enthusiasm.

I wonder wonder sometimes if its a bit lame to still approach things the same way i did 10years ago.................

Shake that Thang - The Buddy T Project

2011-08-18T20:04:00.001-07:00

Composed this song couple of days ago....

Are we ready for change?

2011-08-18T19:34:00.000-07:00

India`s society in its steadfast backwardness, conservatism and vast segregation into rich and poor is in pressing need of an overhaul.

All that`s lacking is some intelligent fresh perspectives and the desire to clean out the plumbing, so the system can function smoothly and grow from there.

The current political harbinger of betterment – Anna Hazare might provide the inspiration to the people to follow him in his quest for an accountable society and make them stand up against the system.

But the chances of that happening right now are bleak.

Its amazing how much China`s society has evolved recently, spurred on by the economic growth.

India`s economy has been rising quite resiliently as well but this being India, the sluggishness in the coming of change is quite expected.

Globally it can be seen from many other examples that economic growth is usually followed by social reforms.

We have intelligent well educated leaders running our corporations with success, but semi-illiterate conficted felons are running our country.

Ridiculous.
Only in India...

Indians: Ignorance & indifference

2011-08-17T00:24:00.000-07:00

I officially come across like a hater now, with all the bitching, whining and ranting about India and Indians ive been doing offlate.

I even started writing a book about this, which i hope to god i finish... unlike my last 3 book efforts.

So the deal is, Indians are hypocrites right. Look at examples like Sex, Racism, and other issues.

But after living in an ultra modern metropolis for 6 months (Tokyo) with virtually no poverty and pretty awesome standards of living, I realised how bad the scene in India really is.

Ive always cribbed about how small the music scene in India is, and how there are so few options for world cuisine, and why theres only one awesome nightclub in Mumbai, but the answer to this never struck me while i was in India for like 22years. And my friends have been like `Yeah i know, its fucked up`.
But I never thought about WHY.

But now i understand,
WE ARE A FUCKING POOR COUNTRY, thats why!!

Well, if your reading this, your probably one of the lucky few like me who have access to these `luxuries` like computers. Ha!

Lets face it. As of 2005, 45% of our humungous population lived below the poverty line. Source: World Bank

Another 30% probably just scraped through, and have access to only basic amenities like food, clothing and shelter.
Thats 75% of our population!

There are slums about 20metres from my house, and ive seen slums even in the most exclusive parts of the city – Colaba, Malabar Hill, Pedder Road, Lokhandwala, etc.
And i live about 7kms from Dharavi, where Slumdog Millionaire was shot, and the whole world went Gaga watching.

Ps – I was unaffected by the movie, and found it to be quite `normal`.

Getting back to the point, i never paid much heed to these slums, because i knew enough people who were living good lives, driving cars, going to night clubs, living a life as per international standards who also lived in the patches intertwined with these slums.
And we lived a happy life completely disconnected from their plight.
While they slept on the streets in the same blocks as us.

Ive probably seen the same faces for the last 22years and don’t know a single name.
Westerners come to India to find a soul, to search for spirituality and love and blaah blaah, but i don’t see it anywhere around me.

The truth is, we are COLD people, who rather than use our wealth to help the poor all around us, we complain to the authorities to destroy their huts and get them off our streets.

Infact, the rich, entrepreneurs of the country, only see this vast poor population through their greedy eyes and hope to milk dry some more.

Brands like Reliance and others targetting the masses are an example.

We are all living in our own little bubble.

Indifferent and ignorant to whats going on around us.

These things are right in front of us, but we never think about them, i have no idea why.
Everyday newspapers tell us that India is growing, at 8% a year, and now we are in the top 5 richest countries in the world.. and some other bullshit.
I would like to ask these newspapers, which India is growing? The India in the light. Or the India in the dark. (Thank you Aravind Adiga, for this fine analogy)

Universities preach slavery, not knowledge

2011-08-13T21:28:00.000-07:00

Lets be honest here, in today`s world what you study in your university doesn’t matter nearly as much as which university you went to.

Noone gives a shit what you learnt in your 3 years in Harvard/ IIT, etc as long as you got INTO Harvard/ IIT.

From then on, you`ll make lots of money, get good job offers, and work like a donkey.

You have been reduced.

Reduced from a human being to a resource. Someone else`s resource.

Most universities teach us faffy bullshit that will make us into well trained slaves.

But not one will teach you how to be the master.
That you`ve got to learn outside the SYSTEM.

Thats the sad reality of the current education system.

My travel wishlist:-

2011-07-26T22:42:00.000-07:00

In order of Awesomeness:-

1. Kingston, Jamaica – Probably the coolest, most laid back people in the world. Some fine `erb, sun and sand. Ahhhh. Awesomeness

2. Amsterdam – Probably the most liberal of places in the world. Gotta love a city where absolutely anything goes!

3. Brazil – Because Brazil is awesome. And so are Brazilians. And they know how to party.

4. Columbia – No, its not what your thinking. Its a beautiful beautiful country, and since the drug cartels migrated north in the early 90`s, pretty safe too. And them south Americans are really nice people.

5. Barbados, St Lucia and the Turks and Caicos Islands – I read the entire Lonely Planet Carribean page by page like a story book couple of years ago. Awesomeness. Untouched natural beauty.

6. Malana village – If you don’t know why, it doesn’t matter.

7. New York – At the of the spectrum from every other destination in this list. But thats why makes New York awesome. As metropolitan as metropolitan as gets!

8. Central Africa – Just kidding. Lol

Knowledge & Experience

2011-07-25T00:35:00.000-07:00

Knowledge exists purely at the intellectual level.

Thats where its stored. Thats where it collects.

Experience exists at the real or experiential level and is felt and then it is gone.

The medium for Knowledge is thoughts and exists only in the mind.

The medium for experience is feelings.

On an internal level, knowledge and experience are contradictory and opposite to each other.

Infact MORE knowledge may even be detrimental to your experiences.
When you have some theoretical knowledge, you begin to impose it on yourself. You begin to visualize things to be the way you that you have learnt, but they may not correspond to your individual situation. Then much confusion is created.

When you become aware of your feelings, you might actually understand YOUR reality, not the reality that has been imposed on you.

Sexuality and The Indian Censor Board

2011-07-18T01:38:00.000-07:00

Firstly what the fuck does this term even mean.

In a country with a population of 1.3billion and people having unprotected sex left right and center (Pun intended) and producing 5 or more children this is ridiculous!

Bollywood Movies launched with even as much as a hint of sexuality and the masses go crazy to watch it and the kissing scenes/ suggested sexuality become the USP.

Something definitely sounds wrong and creepy and depraved about all this.

And theres a reason for all this creepiness that i want to point out.

Recently a Bengali film called `Gandu` was produced which made waves internationally and won awards in New York, etc

But thanks to the hypocritical mother fuckers at the Indian Censor Board the film is struggling to be approved for launch in theatres or DVD.

As a result, this rare gem of indian alternative cinema will never reach its audience, nor make any money and in all likelyhood the talented director will be forced to eschew his art and become a banker so he can feed his family.

I want to ask these hypocrites at the censor board, if someone is old enough to have sex (18+) what stops you from letting him watch sexual content in a movie in the privacy of his own home on DVD?

The fact that the Kama Sutra was an important part of Indian literature seems to have been forgotten.

So basically because of all this hypocrisy in Indian society, what has happened is sex has been made out to be a taboo, a scarce commodity that is not to be seen, heard or talked about.

Which explains why an absurdly large number of hits on pornographic sites are coming from India.

Because a large number of Indian sexually supressed youth have nowhere else to vent their sexual energies.

This suppression leads to all the leching, raping, molesting, wife beating and related debauchery that India is known for.

Time to get your heads out of your asses people!

The seed is Underground, We only see the Tree.

2011-06-24T20:51:00.000-07:00

How many people reading this post have watched videos of Jimmy Hendrix playing the guitar with his teeth, and behind his head, etc ?

And how many here know that Hendrix was blown away back in `65 when he watched Buddy Guy play with his teeth and do all sorts of other ridiculous stuff (Qouting Jeff Beck talking about Buddy Guy:- He was playing behind his head long before Hendrix. I once saw him throw the guitar up in the air and catch it in the same chord) and then Hendrix taught himself to do the same, inspired by Buddy?

This post is about the geniuses that gave birth to ideas and concepts which were then absorbed by others and given to the world.

The original Seeds.

Most of these Seeds did not achieve much fame for two simple reasons:
Seeds grow below the ground, hidden from plain sight of most except the adventurous few who are curious enough to look below the surface.
It takes years for seeds to sprout and germinate before the tree is born and ready to bloom.

Yes, ideas function with the same analogy, they need to sit for a while, germinate, and it takes long before they have grown into a plant, bloomed and spread their flowers to the world.

How many people here know Bob Marley ?
How many know Lee `Scratch` Perry ? An eccentric record producer from Jamaica who pioneered a new genre of music with Marley and many other musicians from the Caribbean called in the early 60`s called..... Reggae!

Movies like the Lords of Dogtown(About the birth of the skateboarding scene) tell stories of some of these people, who are not famous per se, but planted the seeds that would inspire completely new ways of life.

When a farmer plants seeds in his garden, how long does he bother about the seeds for ? - Till the time the plant has grown... After that the seed is all but forgotten, by everyone except the plant !

List of 10 musicians i`d kill to meet (Dead and Alive)

2011-06-19T23:20:00.001-07:00

LEAD BELLY

1. Bob Marley - The prophet of the 3rd world. The bringer of hope and inspiration for many, even today, many years after his death.

2. Bob Dylan - The voice of a generation, with a scary ability to convert words into visual imagery.

3. John Lennon - What more is there to be said about the man thats not been said already.

4. Anyone from Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones -

5. Ry Cooder - The Alan Lomax of the modern world. The amount of world music he has cataloged and shared with the world is staggering. And a true blues man at heart.

6. Frank Sinatra - Frankie said `I did it my way` and he wasnt lying.

7. Leadbelly - One of the least known dudes on the list, mostly made his music in the 20`s and 30`s, pioneered the blues scene back then. Lived in a time when racial segregation was massive. Im sure he`d have some interesting stories to tell.

8. Eddie Vedder - In today`s times of pop and bullshit well packaged/marketed musicians he brings so much soul, feel and REALITY to his music, its truly a blessing to music lovers from around the world.

9. Bunny Wailer & Lee Scratch Perry - Ive put these guys together because they pretty much pioneered reggae back in the 60`s and spearheaded its journey in much part to where it is today. Restepka boys! Big up to you guys.

10. RajaRam - I had to add atleast one electronic musician to the list. From psy trance to psy bient to psychedelic mantra chants from the Quintessence days, hes created a large impact on trippy music lovers across the world. Definitely an interesting guy worth meeting.

The key to Brand Building

2011-06-03T07:16:00.000-07:00

This blog post is for everyone involved in brand building - PR executives, Advertising professionals, Event Management professionals, Marketing and branding executives.

Firstly, let me clarify, im no Philip Kotler, Im just an average guy fortunate enough to have some fairly interesting life experiences. Also ive been lucky to have worked with some really brilliant minds in the past - Sandeep Chhabria and Shyam Chhabria.

Some of the finest brand consultants ive met in my life.

And these are just brilliant concepts ive learnt from them that i`d like to share.

Firstly Brand building is not all fun and games and playing with different media.

It involves ALOT of research.

As much as possible about the brand, and its journey from its inception till present, track of its growth curve, its core values, its target audience, its image in the market. You get the drift.. pretty much everything about the brand.

Why ? - Because you cannot convince a brand where they should be headed, unless you kn ow where they`ve come from.

Next once you have understood everything there is to know about the brand, You are now ready to conceptualise your brand strategy.

Once you`ve done your homework, this part is really not that hard.

Next: THE PITCH

Show the client in all honesty all what you`ve studied about his brand. I remember going for a pitch to Vertu mobile, where some of the global vice-presidents were present, and apparently they told us they were understanding their brand really well through our presentation! Big Up to the Chhabria Brothers! Sandeep wrote that presentation!

Once you have the client convinced that you have understood his brand really well, and that you have a fairly solid brand strategy in place for its future, he should feel in really safe hands handing over the reins to you.

Disclaimer :- The process is nowhere near as simple as i make it sound. It still involves a lot of hard work, and a small amount of luck!

Life Experience & Motorcycle Engines

2011-06-01T23:34:00.001-07:00

There is a popular saying amongst Auto Enthusiasts :- `There is no replacement for displacement'

Displacement here means the engine capacity:- 600cc, 1000cc, 2000cc, etc

What they mean is if you have a 2000cc engine your way better off in terms of power than someone with lets say 750cc.

Lets equate the CC of the engine with life experience here.

So if you have 20 years of life experience, you probably smarter than someone with only 12.

Probably when you apply for a job, thats why the first thing they want to know is how much work experience you have.

Therefore by this analogy, someone with 10years work experience is probably better at his job than someone with only two.

But theres another factor thats a part of the picture, its state of tune. ie- how high a state of tune your engine or mind is.

For example - some 600cc engines produce more power than 1500cc engines because they are in a higher state of tune.

And some people in a `high state of tune' learn the same thing in 3years as opposed to someone else in a `low state of tune' who`d learn the same in 10.

But theres a downside here, engines in a high state of tune, wear out much faster. Or in simpler words, their engine life is much lower as compared to engines in a low state of tune.

Could this be why so many brilliant minds have left this plane at such a young age?

Genius dies young?

Indian classical music

2011-06-01T05:54:00.000-07:00

Is one of the most technically complex music in the world.

And has its origins in the 4000 year old ancient Indian scriptures of the Vedas.

Since it is so complex, there is usually a very strong bond between master and apprentice, Shishya and Guru, and this has ensured passing down of the knowledge of classical music since atleast 2000 years (thats when the Sitar dates back to, i think)

It is said that God himself manifested through music.

This quote by a one of India:s leading classical musicians is testament to that belief.

"If you practice for ten years, you may begin
to please yourself, after twenty years you
may become a performer and please an audience,
after thirty years you may please even your
guru, but you must practice for many more years
before you finally become a true artist -- then
you may please even God. "
-Ali Akbar Khan

Morning Star

2011-05-26T03:53:00.000-07:00

Lead solo:- intro (D.AGAG. ACBA D.AGAG.ADCB G hammeron to A)

Verse 1
(C)
Waking from the darkness
(G)
Waking from the night
(C)
Wish that i could find someone
(F)
To take me to the light

(Chorus)
(F) (G)
Shes my morning

My morning
My morninggggggggggggggggggggg
(F)
Star

(Lead solo)

Verse 2

(C)
Running from the Wilderness
(G)
Running out of fright
(C)
Wish that i could find some one
(F)
To help me to the light

(Chorus)
(F) (G)
Shes my morning
My morning
My morning
(F)
Star
(Lead solo)

Final Verse/ Outro
(C)
I can see it now in front of me.
(G)
Right before my eyes
(C)
Waking up too early
(F)
For the Sunrise

Chorus Again

There's my morning
my morning
my morning
star

-------------

Radical Idea of the Day #1

2011-05-24T01:14:00.000-07:00

Make the informal Recycling Sector in India Formal

The seed for this idea was planted by this article http://www.ecologycenter.org/iptf/Ragpickers/indexragpicker.html - talking about the plight of ragpickers in India.

And these are people who clean up our country for us.

Start a company and hire all these rag pickers.
Pay them proper wages. Give them a real job.
Make them accountable for their work.
Give them incentives to work better.
Provide them with knowledge and technology to make their work easier and more productive.

There's approx 100,000 of them in Delhi. And most are being exploited by the middlemen (KabariWalas)and being paid peanuts for their recycleable collection.

There's probably another 100,000 in Mumbai and atleast a million in India.

These recyclables can be collected and sold to recycling factories directly, just like the Kabariwalas do.

Look at the business opportunity in this!

What makes the Japanese successful ?

2011-05-22T22:13:00.000-07:00

Well, the Japanese are not that different from other Asians. They are conservative, they are awed by white people, and white people things, especially American.
And like most other Asian countries, they have their own cultural values and beliefs that they stand by and follow.

And they do not come across as exceptionally intelligent either.

However, economically the story is completely different. They have been the world's 2nd largest economy for the past 30 odd years after America(currently 3rd after China by a whisker of a margin).

The standard of living is tremendously high and has been so since decades, poverty is low, and infrastructure is probably the best in the world.

So what makes these guys so succesful ?
The answer is what your parents have been telling you since you were a child.
WORK HARD.

These guys work really hard. I mean their list of priorities is probably in the order of - Work, Family, Everything else.

The respect their employers, and understand the importance to getting along with colleagues to ensure professional harmony, because eventual growth of the company will result in their financial growth as well.

They are also known to work at the same organisation for years and years. So no job hopping for a better paycheck here.

They have mastered the arts of being loyal, hardworking servants to their organisation, and the results are for all to see.

As a result of this attitude of employees, the organisations/ employers here have also learnt to respect the attitudes and contribution of the employees.

Hence the overt humility in business language here amongst people of all positions.
They truly respect each other, and their contributions.

The organisation is more important than the individual working in it.

Its like a well oiled machine, with each individual part complementing the others, and working like clockwork. Unlike other cultures where people work selfishly and aim to be lone stars.

Sushi in Japan

2011-05-17T21:54:00.000-07:00

I have been in Japan for a month and a half and Ive never been to a Sushi shop before today!

Well, to be honest, the pathetic Sushi back home may have played a part in this.

Sushi in India is very bad, and completely demotivated me from trying it here.
That was before today though.

Mr. Takiguchi, my boss asked if i’d like to try some Sushi, and being in the mood to try something new, I agreed.

We ordered a platter each of Nigiri Sushi, with some Eel (Unagi) and waited...

Once the Sushi made its way to our table, my hopes weren’t very high and I wasn’t expecting something to radically change my mind.

However, after the first one, exactly that happened.

I love Sushi! Atleast real Sushi! It was delicious and the Unagi Sushi!!
Woah! Oishi, Oishi!!!

Maybe Sushi again tomorrow..

Ps - This blog was written about 4 days ago and i'd forgotten to post. Since then i've been to the Sushi Shop 3 times and the Sushi chef now knows me quite well.

Yesterday he asked me what i was doing in his restaurant so often when there was a curry shop on the floor above...

Japanese Nuances

2011-05-08T21:00:00.000-07:00

Every train station in Tokyo has bands playing outside on the weekends. Even the ones with very few people around.
Beautiful!!

These guys love their green tea so much....

The door to my traditional japanese apartment. The white stuff is NOT glass. Its sheet paper.
Thank god for Japan's low crime rates.

Yakiuken - A 'Traditional' Japanese game which involves rock paper scissors, some martial arts moves and well... stripping. lol....
Best played in public places - like my friends have demonstrated here.

The loser whos lost all his clothes, eventually moons everyone present, and this is met with great applause and laughter.

Dessert with Gram (Chick pea) and Soy bean Ice-Cream anyone ?

Materialism > Pleasure. Happiness?

2011-05-05T00:00:00.000-07:00

This perennial question has been on my mind since years now.
Living in a big city/ big cities, every now and then, I tend to get caught up in the materialistic – pleasure hungry way of life, and then after hours of pondering over why im unhappy despite having pretty much everything i want, this thought comes back to me.
Materialism = Money, Television, Internet, Fancy Cars, Nightclubs, Booze, Worldly gain, and so on... You get the drift... Pretty much everything in this world that is classified as having a GOOD lifestyle.

These things provide entertainment – Pleasure. And they are by nature habit forming, and you tend to want more and more, and eventually get stuck in the cycle where all you really want is pleasure.
Where does all this pleasure lead one to? I’d be grateful if someone can share some deep knowledge here.
What other place does it lead to other than greed, selfishness and need for constant stimulation of the senses?
This is a distraction from your real life, where there are things that need to be thought about, positive changes that need to be made within yourself, directions that need to be taken, ideas that need to be cultivated, passions that can be cultivated, emotions that need to be sorted out. So eventually you can be at peace with yourself > Happy.
Instead, today, with so many pleasures at our beck and call constantly, we’ve forgotten what real happiness is. Or we distort and tell ourselves its the same as pleasure.
Pleasure is fine to an extent though, don’t get me wrong, im not saying turn into an anti-materialistic, reclusive, deep thinking outcast.

But it needs to be controlled and in balance with our real life.
Anyone whos been to the Vipassana Meditation Center, or has spent days without any materialistic pleasures what so ever will know what im talking about here.

The Awakened Day

2011-03-29T03:47:00.000-07:00

The shining light
Brings the lovers delight
The ignorant man fright,
The swinish king plight,
makes the commoners spirits ignite.
The awakened day is here.

Into the darkness

2011-03-16T03:16:00.001-07:00

The beast that lurches somewhere within,
somewhere without,
In the deep dark realms of the abyss beneath,
Far beyond what you may see ,
Inside the force that makes you comprehend.
Swift, he allures all peeking eyes,
You know not whence cometh he,
His roots, his mother, his blood
Mystery, he remains, for the last days blink.
He is everywhere, He is nowhere,
He is the alive, he is the dead.

You know he’s there, not whence or where,
in the darkest of nights,
In the ignorance of light,
in fool’s delight,
his rage ignites.
He’s coming for you.
He’s coming for you.
He’s coming for you.

In the shade beneath the tree,
in dreams of lust & greed,
he will make you bleed.
With strokes swift, he’ll do his deed.
And vanish out of sight.

The Creative Function

2011-02-17T04:13:00.000-08:00

The creative function comprises of two equally important aspects.

1. Ideation - The creation of kick ass, innovative ideas that will blow the prospective target audience away.

2. Communication - The idea is of not much use unless it is communicated as clearly as possible. This may sound easy but with constraints like - limited words, limited space,etc, and shortening attention spans, it rarely is.

Also communicating a big idea is rarely simple through mass media, unless you have an opportunity to physically explain it to the prospect.

This is why almost all top ad agencies across the world tell their copywriters top keep it simple.

The ideal pitch, ad, script or wtv else creative ppl write must be a perfect blend of these two factors.

Open

2010-09-14T04:27:00.000-07:00

Break down the barriers,
Swing open the doors,
Let there be free passage,
Through all these corridors.

This is a shrine,
For all who chance;
‘pon the effulgent path,
To find their momentary radiance.

Judge not here the traveller,
Judge not here the clothes,
For genius mostly hides,
In haggard worn down robes.

Open your mind.
Open your mind.
Open your mind.

Glory, Greatness

2010-09-06T23:35:00.000-07:00

Glory and Greatness are like pleasure and happiness, one fades, like a flare in the starry sky, the other lingers on through the times...

Greatness is born,

but only whence others see,

you know not otherwise,

where it hides;

within whom it resides.

Greatness is tempered,

in fires hellish,

you know not otherwise,

the torture it can take;

nor its threshold to break,

Greatness can only be found,

in log-wood burnt to ground,

so the fires may take,

whatever's there to break.

And the residue left,

shall thus endure the best.

But death still takes us all.

Under the moonlight the dead raise their heads

2010-08-13T00:59:00.000-07:00

"There s love hidden under all that hate. There is anger beneath all that pain. There is fire in the eye. Of the beholder of the grave. I closed my eyes and then he said. Kiss my lips or go to bed. He said. Fire Fire. "

Fly now

2010-07-26T04:04:00.000-07:00

I don’t care about the seasons,
I don’t care about the times,
I don’t want to know what the people say,
All I want to do is
Fly now now now now now now now….
Flyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy now now now…
I wanna Flyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy nowwwwwwwwwwwwwww
The seasons keep astounding,
The people, they keep on scrounging,
The colours keep fading,
The times keep changing,
What is today will be fucking gone tomorrow..
So All I wanna do is fly now now now now now.
I just wanna fly now now now now now.
Im at the mercy of tomorrow,
Im a slave of yesterday,
I don’t know whats really mine..
All I know is-
I wanna fly now now now now now.
I wanna fly now.

Disha

2010-07-24T11:45:00.000-07:00

Itne Raaste tune diye..

Kaunsa wala chonoon?
Dil ki awaaz sunoon ?
Ya yahi baithe sochta rahoon?

aasan to koi bhi nahin.
Raaste saare khaddon se bhare,

Kitni derr aur dhoondta rahoon?

Itne raaste tune diye...

Kaunsa wala chunoon?
Dil ki awaaz sunoon?
Ya yahi beithe sochta rahoon ?

Sahi disha dikha de mujhe, parmatma,
Sahi disha dikha de..

The Spiritual Dilemma

2010-07-07T03:00:00.000-07:00

Warning: Deadly Sarcasm/Cynicism. Read at your own risk. If you’re Pseudo-spiritual, Don’t read it.

Yes, I know, I Know. It’s the new fad, everyone’s doing it, it gives you a‘faux’ moral highground while making conversations with people you’ve just met when you mention you’re a Buddhist or a kabbalah follower, thinking that by doing so you can talk some retard philosophical mumbo jumbo for lack of having anything else to talk about and still get taken seriously.

Problem 1.

These days every third dude who’s read the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita is becoming a Baba, pretending they want to share their immense knowledge of the world with people (Listen to what some of these guys talk, and you’ll realise they are all quoting the same stuff, some of them admit that everything they discuss and know is mentioned in the Upanishads, but most them sake of fame and money pass it off as their own)

Problem 2.

Anyone whos interested in getting into spirituality is getting into it for one of two reasons:- a. They are miserable. Why else would you want to ‘improve your life’ if its already pretty good ?
AND
b. Because it’s the new cool thing to do.

NOTE:- We shall not discuss in detail category b. because what people with single digit IQ points do is irrelevant to most of our lives. Unless you have a single digit IQ in which case you shouldn’t read this article because your going to start crying and kill yourself by the end of it.

Problem 3.

The reason most miserable people get into the practice, is because they think it would improve their lives, they set an expectation in their minds, and practice or meditate expecting happiness and joy and bliss.

However spirituality is about having no expectations from life, and giving and doing things without expectations and being happy with what you have and what you get, and getting rid of wants and material desires.
So the whole practice is of no point what so ever since its done with expectation in the mind. And happiness will never be gained.

Problem 4.

Once these miserable people practice spirituality for a while, they realise that they are not getting the happiness they were expecting, and then start getting frustrated. They then feel that they are hopeless people and the fault is in them, and they will never be happy. They still however continue the practice of spirituality because it’s the right thing to do and discuss philosophical/ spiritual mumbo jumbo like mentioned in the top of the article.

Bob Dylan is Dead!!

2010-06-24T00:59:00.000-07:00

But whos this new guy who looks like an hes jumped out of an old western classic? And why is he using Bob's name and songs to play boring out of pitch concerts??

The vibe is definitely gone....

The Thought Level of Consciousness

2010-06-13T22:56:00.000-07:00

This is the state of consciousness where the person is of the belief that he or she is the same as their mind. And live their life by embracing their minds, and living life and taking all decisions consciously or sub consciously by logical, calculative or mental analysis.
The mind is constantly at work, and instincts are not followed, instead logic and rational thinking is used to solve all of lives problems or make all decisions.
If the person is not conscious of this, too much of living in the thought state of consciousness will lead to sysmptoms like boredom, dullness, lack of energy/ motivation, lethargy, apathy and a constant noise/ jibberjabber going on in the head.
In Cognitive Psychology, a similar distinction has been made between deliberative and intuitive thinking. Deliberative thinking, which is self-aware and controlled, includes logical thinking. Intuitive thinking, which is opaque and automatic, extends perceptual processing to subconscious levels of thought. Cognitive Psychologists have proposed various dual process models of human thinking in which the two kinds of thinking interact.
A report was published recently by the Journal of Consumer Research titled ‘Trust your gut: Too much thinking leads to bad choices’. In five separate studies, the researchers found that better judgments can often be made without deliberation and the more complex the decision, the less useful deliberation became.

Bound in captivity

2010-05-18T05:04:00.000-07:00

Indians since thousands of years have been leaving cities to live the remainder of their lives in forests- SAMADHI. Also Yogis living of their own accord in the mountains of the Himalayas. Samanas is what they were called many thousand years ago- Spiritual Seekers. They have been disassociating themselves from society all together, preferring to live their lives in solitude.
We are all animals, ones much smarter than any other species on our planet, and our intellect has evolved over the many millennia and today one could conclude that we are a fairly smart species.
Today we live in what is called a modern society, with modern values, with a fixed set of behaviour that we are all taught as we grow up in this society. How to behave with others, how to eat, how to dance. Everything we do, our every action is in accord with the society we live in.
When Bob Marley said “No chains around my feet, but Im not free. I know I am bounded in captivity”, he wasn’t just some very stoned guy rambling random words. He was making sense, alot of it.
Now, this is of no significance to someone whos life is fully aligned with society at large, and is happy with his life. Someone whos happy living in captivity.
The problem arises when someone ignores these invisible barriers and does what he feels like, or wishes to. These people are termed as anything between ‘mad’ & ‘psychotic/schizophrenic’ depending on how far their actions are from what mainstream society accepts. Society even calls them sick or disturbed for doing these actions.
Not only is there a perimeter within which you need to behave, but there is also a legal system in place telling you what you can or cannot do, a moral behaviour code, etiquette, office behaviour code, dating rules, relationship behaviour code, the BRO code(which many humans find really exciting and enjoy conforming to) and many many many more.
So with so many said and unsaid rules, laws, codes, etc. Where does that leave room for freedom ?
Well, I wouldn’t say we have no freedom at all, our society is constantly changing, some of the crazy people living in our society create ideas and practices everyday which mainstream society accepts for some reason and becomes a part of what it is ‘okay’ to do. Some of these activities may include ‘head banging’ to metal, which looks quite retarded otherwise, and bungee jumping and so on.
So it would be fair to say that we do have a small measure of freedom in society IF society decides for some reason to accept our actions.
Otherwise, for those seeking further or complete freedom. I believe the forest is the way to go.

High

2009-11-25T05:48:00.000-08:00

I hath been there before,
I thought, on my own,
where white lights shone & peace reigned.

The colours were bright,
the focus was right,
and magic seemed all around.

But I never did think,
That in a blink,
I would be back on the ground far away.

The light went away,
the fire on its way,
To the next seeker who could find it.

The Ironies of Indian culture

2009-06-06T02:41:00.000-07:00

India has probably one of the most diverse cultures in the world with hundreds and thousands of subcultures from state to state, province to province, village to village. With over 360,000 gods and individual mother tongues in India numbering a whopping 700, you can only get an idea as to how many different collective fields of thought to expect in this country.
And culturally speaking, what Gandhi said just before independence, “This is not one India that we are fighting for, but thousands of India’s living side by side” holds true.

Through travel and curiosity of mind I have come to realizations which I think will be agreeable to most who have been able to see these distinct differences.

The reason for this would be that the whole of India has never been ruled by the same monarchy. The North had the Mughals which most of us know about, the south had the rulers of mysore, golconda and the rest had hundreds of smaller princely states that were ruled independently.

In cold North India, Delhi, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, the people are hot blooded, proud, righteous, passionate, aggressive, warm, proactive and willing to take initiative for anything that they feel strongly about.

In the hot south, people are cool, lazy, sleepy, laid back and have a take it as it comes attitude. Many have a very poor Business sense because of this attitude and are simply too naïve. Yet, they are also very very intellectual.

In the higher mountains and villages where people have relatively little, they are most willing to share with those they may not even know, hospitable and friendly.

In Mumbai, where people have relatively much more, people everywhere are looking for something MORE, to enhance their lives, their possessions, and are competitive with regard to everything, are extremely professional and much less human than the smaller cities, and everything happens extremely fast. This is because of the commercial nature of the city and is common to most big metros the world over I think.

People living in hostile environments like the Nepal / Tibet border, Kashmir are some of the nicest people I have met and even in such a hostile external environment they are friendly, curious and kind and willing to offer any little help they can freely to strangers and friend alike.

Good, Bad and the Ugly

2009-06-06T02:38:00.000-07:00

One cannot describe the good unless he knows what the bad is.
Because without there being any bad, noone would know what was any good.
It is like two sides of the same coin, where one cannot exist without the other. They are co dependant and relative only to each other.

Therefore if bad and good can be said to be relative, then neither is absolute and is of variable nature depending on the state of the other in the current reality. ( This analogy is highly relevant to right now, because good and bad is in a state of constant flux)
So therefore lets say hypothetically at some date in the future, man starts behaving in a never before seen way of seen of bad( Lets call this the ugly). And takes bad to a completely new dimension of bad, here, would you say that some of the old bad things are now okay or good. Lets take an example here –

Earlier war was fought in the name of god, for land, for riches, for the prosperity of the nation, for SOMETHING. So those waging war looting and plundering was bad. But now the bad has become so bad that they want nothing to gain out of waging war, only causing harm to the enemy( Terrorists) with no real benefit to them.
So hence , waging war against these terrorists(To accomplish something) has become good.

Ok a better example, in the 18th century, Alcohol was the destroyer of society and was looked at as a menace, but now that we have worse things like drugs and so on , alcohol is not a bad thing anymore and one can say drinking alcohol is okay or not bad therefore good? (Lets keep it simple as of now assuming what is not bad is good, rather than get into a third grey area of in between the two)

Also if the existence of good depends solely upon the existence of bad, like we earlier discussed, two sides of the same coin, how can the good conquor the bad ? without giving rise to a new bad , which can be better or worse than the old bad.

Lets take an example – America invades Afghanistan/ Vietnam/ Iraq/ Its America you never know whats next, and treats the locals there badly, rapes the women, kills the children, hence exposing the bad to more bad.( we have deducted that bad cannot be erased but only made better or worse.by looking at it from a single perspective of just RIGHT NOW that is always constant,and does not change constantly or evolve.) Will this make the bad worse than the old bad, or will this make the bad better.

If you add more salt to salty food, it only get more salty, and if you add more sugar to sugary milk it only get more sugary, therefore by being bad towards the bad, how is that going to make things good for anybody?
Whats up with the Americans man ? Is this so hard to figure out ?

Does the answer lying in being good to the bad ? I think so.

Gautam Buddha said the same thing in his teachings too. Love towards all life was the way to go ( Basics of spirituality)

What really belongs to me ?

2009-04-19T00:44:00.000-07:00

Today im happy, tomorrow im sad

Today im rich, tomorrow im poor

Today im here, tomorrow im there

Today im big, tomorrow im small

Today im climbing the ladder, tomorrow im diving back down

Today was great, tomorrow might not be so

Today im everything, tomorrow im everything

Today im nothing, tomorrow im nothing.

Effects of 12 days of questioning

2009-04-19T00:38:00.000-07:00

I am big, I am small

I am happiness, I am sadness

I am alive, I am asleep

I am power, i am submission

I am spirit, I am creator

I am absolute, I am relative

I am strength, I am weakness

I am the change, I am the non-change

Everything ive ever thought about,
I am.

Dormant, awake, resting, ressurecting,
I am everything.

I am nothing

i am mine.

How commercialization is breeding mediocrity.

2009-03-18T06:10:00.000-07:00

Today if an artist wants to sell his art, even an amateur, the route is very simple, go to a few galleries, look up some art stores, visit google.com to see what the scope is for your art style/ talent etc and you know exactly what sells and what you can do just to make some moolah. Or even if you’re below average painter, with so much commercialization in todays times, theres demand for everything even really poorly done Rs.200 paintings till probably as far up as you can count.

Same goes with poetry and literature, getting your work published has never been so easy, and with the globalisation and marketing practices, not that hard to make a nice fat chunk of money either, with far less effort put in as compared to in the days gone by.

This practice I think is breeding mediocrity. The whole concept of money being involved from the very start of one’s career dilutes the ‘striving for excellence’ attitude. Also when everything today in the world revolves around what the market is looking for, what the people want, there is very little room to think out of the box and be revolutionary and making money becomes the only priority for everyone involved in the process.

To name a few examples, William Blake one of the greatest poets of all time, with magic flowing through his letters was relatively unknown in his time, probably he was ahead of the curve, people didn’t get him and he lived his life without any fame or riches.

There was an African American rock musician in the 1980’s who was first heard by U2’s manager and some other top bands like the Rolling Stones, when they came across his demo tape and they were blown away by how good he was, he was recommended to record labels by the top guns of the industry and launched his album which did very poorly. Apparently he was ahead of the curve too. People didn’t get him.

So moral of the story – Music / Books / Art, etc you come across today which make the highest money or sell for the highest amount are not the best. They are just the most marketable and hence command that much. So don’t go by money as a barrier as to how good things are. You can either do your own thing, follow in your own creative energies, dwell inside and come out with some ground breaking content, or you can sell out, make what people want you to make and get rich.
A very large number of people today choose the latter.

Today, when you know at every stage of your life where exactly you stand and what is needed to reach ‘somewhere’ and make a mark for yourself, you tend to not use your own creative talents and skills as much and focus not much on what you want to write, but instead focus on what there is a higher demand for.

Earlier to be a good artist/poet/ writer you had to be able to dazzle people with your brilliance, there was no scope for mediocrity or the mediocre. Thus people pushed themselves to their limits and beyond, there was no fixed road that was known, no fixed path that they needed to walk down, thus they looked within themselves, used their own brains for better ways and came out with dazzling results.

And the results are clearly evident. Creativity is keeps going down as we move forward.

Poetry is dead. ( A fact globally agreed upon, it peaked in the 18th 19th century and in on a downward spiral ever since)
Philosophy is dead ( Same story as Poetry. Science has taken up the void created by it)
Art is dying ( Some of you might not agree here, Art still commands high prices, you’re right! but the era of dazzling art/ artists has ended and everyone would agree art today is nowhere close to as GOOD(quality wise) as it used to be in the period till the end of the 20th century.)

(Root Cause) The Whole Squared.

2009-02-24T03:25:00.000-08:00

This is an idea I have had in my mind for a long long time, even though I’d always been opposed to excess materialism, commercialization, and so on. This is not something id ever looked at directly. I ve always asked myself this from time to time, and I always found myself replying No.

Until offlate, I came across a few facts.

A survey was done in Canada, which in the 90’s had one of the highest standards of living in the world was found to show that the ratio of mental ailments, and patients suffering from psychological problems also to be the highest, in the WORLD!
How can that be right ? Something’s gotta be wrong, the better the standard of living the happier im supposed to get right! Its obvious, Everyone knows this! Well WRONG!

The United States of America, probably the most commercially, materialistically forward, most developed economy in the world, also has an extremely high case of mental ailments, but not only that, also have the most number of prisons as compared to any other country in the world!
The most recurring reason why crimes are commited anywhere = Money!

I have a theory as to why this may be the case, Most people are brought up thinking that by having a lot of money and all the materialistic pleasures they can imagine, they will be happy. But this is not really the case always, infact there’s much more to real happiness than just these material pleasures. Then some of these people become desperate, and start making wrong decisions hoping to find happiness and the downward spiral begins leading to trauma. While those in the smaller towns and villages with lesser means are not expecting that much from life, and are content with what they have.. and are hence generally happier.

This is just a point of view and I would really like to know what you have to say about this.

Little Flakes of Silver

2009-02-24T02:59:00.000-08:00

I must be privileged,
I really am, for from dusk to dawn,
From eve to morn, the heavens shower upon us,
From aeons and eras away,
Milky shiny spots of silver
Shapes and colours and even numbers.

Which come closer and closer,
From the now dancing skies
And float lightly on the breeze
And land exactly where they looketh best,
Little flakes of silver.

The hypocrisy of being Indian.

2009-01-28T01:44:00.000-08:00

I was just reading today’s newspaper and now another bunch of ‘Hoodlums’ from another political party called the ‘Rashtriya Hindu Sena’ (yes you’ve figured it out! In the name of religion everything is justified) a previously unheard of political group, attacked a pub in Mangalore and assaulted the youth there while previously set up cameras recorded all their antics, particularly women, in the name of going against Indian values. Their credo – to serve society and prevent bad behaviour.

Something which would change very soon once the party came into power. And then all would be forgotten.

And which Indian society is he trying to serve ? The same society that speaks absurdities about a widow who’s getting married, the same society where youth partying with friends and drinking some beer is wrong while beating your wife, stoned, drunk at home is absolutely fine because then she’s your wife and the same society where you treat people differently based on what caste they belong to, Hindus have a problem with Muslims, North Indians with South Indians,Maharashtrians with North and south Indians both, and so on and so forth. And yet we hear so much about the unity in diversity here.

What about individual freedoms ? freedom of speech, freedom of expression and all that bullshit ? Or simply put, are we even free to do what we want, in this jungle where those in power have no interest what so ever to use it, even in times of chaos(India’s home minister I think it was who said after the terrorist attacks that no big deal let me continue filling my coffers),And Those not in power are doing what ever they can to exert it.

We blame the west for being racist when we don’t realize that what is it that we are doing amongst ourselves here if not racism ? casteism ?!

The pacifier

2009-01-21T01:11:00.000-08:00

He the pacifier, comes out at night,
and scavenges through the dark,

The streets of oxford town,
He searches, homes & cars & parks.

Under the murky shade of gloom,
city scum draw out,

the filth, the dirt, the underclass
come pass their snide remarks.

Lo, the pacifier,

Searching for the slightest sign,
To quell the war of thought,

The initial first sign,
Of mistrust, unclarity, a spark!

The pacifier wields control,
Over the night stark!

With one wave, one sleight of hand,
He calls the dogs’ last barks.

But one thing the pacifier knows,
You cannot kill the pain.

but only the fire put out,
And wait, its flame regains.

Needing space

2009-01-08T22:37:00.000-08:00

Everywhere in the world, you see people using this statement, professionally personally. Its almost a cliché in relationships when either partner needs some time out, football players use the term freely saying all they need is a little space on the field, so do race car drivers on the track, so do cricketers on the pitch. So what is this all about.

I think it is more to do with, in the middle of all the doing, the action, just getting a relaxed moment to calm down and gather our thoughts, and plan our next move.

Living life today in the fast lane, there is need almost a non stop need for dynamic action, to meet all our personal goals, work targets, and so on.

Hence, in the middle of say a football game, where players are constantly following instinct and have pretty much no time to think at all, all they look for on the field is a light moment where they aren’t under much pressure so they can think and assess the overall situation at hand.

Also it could be because we like having our options open, so some ‘space’ gives us the few moments we need to asses our options and rationalize, and calculate and assess are chances and look into our future a little.

Been there. Done that.

2009-01-06T01:17:00.000-08:00

A lot of people reach this point at some point in their lives(sometime after their youth has some to an end) where pretty much everything in the world that excited them they’ve pretty much done, and consciously or subconsciously their enthusiasm for life begins to diminish, passivity replaces the zest, excitement and energy and they start to sober up, and they surrender and devote their now unenthusiastic lives to a single cause. In most cases it’s their job, earning the moolah, the first biggest priority in today’s materialistic world.

There is hardly any feeling of happiness and the excitement is replaced by a feeling of emptiness. Life becomes monotonous and they sink into their daily everyday routine. Here they start doing things that they think would make them feel better like be nice to people, good things towards society, social causes, and tell themselves how grateful they are for everything they have, but in reality this doesn’t help their cause at all, only the thought brings happiness, not the action in itself.
Quoting a popular self help website, “The problem is that without a positive emotion the best intentions in the world won’t get you anywhere. Why? Because we are sentient, that is, feeling beings. Our feelings move us. In order to get out of our comfort zones we must feel some excitement for the thing that isn’t comfortable.”

Quoting Britney Spears, citing reasons for her problems in her life, ““There’s no excitement, there’s no passion. I have really good days, and then I have bad days. Even when you go to jail, y’know, there’s the time when you’re gonna get out. But in this situation, it’s never ending. It’s just like Groundhog Day every day.”
In this collection of thoughts it’s apparent Britney needs the craziness and excitement in order to feel satisfied.
Also this state of mind seriously hampers personal growth, creativity, and a host of other related issues.

How to get rid of the passivity:- The first and most important thing to do is get out of your comfort zone. Start doing things that you wouldn’t normally do. Or help you get out of your shell/ comfort zone.
Do some crazy things. Things that are funny, wild, scary, wacky, outrageous, or well , just weird. It can be anything.
Awaken the curiosity of your childhood. There are whole new worlds to discover.
Also as much as you may feel like relaxing and doing nothing, activity is what you need so get off that chair and go get out and start something.

You need a serious change in your activities. But not superficial or meaningless changes, such as switching from one bar to another.

Refresh your body by taking a walk or exercising. Boredom can simply be a sign that your body needs reinvigorating.

Spirituality:- Living life in the present moment, taking life one moment at a time, keeping aside all prejudices,thoughts and completely following and relying on instinct and impulse.

This works best because when thoughts are put aside,the mind in the present realises every situation/ scenario is distinctively different from the other and life ceases to be dull.
One reason why thoughts can lead to this problem is that, when you are thinking you are in either in the past or the future and not living the present moment fully, thinking of what next and what happened. Give the present moment a full chance, open your mind, break out of the chain of thoughts and see the change in your life.

Get your life back.

Spirit of the City ? You’re joking right.

2009-01-06T00:28:00.000-08:00

This is a statement that I have just had too much of reading, it made some sense in the earlier perspective, with regard to the 26/7 flooding where everyone supported each other, strangers even, in the commotion of the time, but then things went on, and I don’t know how much the BMC or the people responsible, or in authoritative positions learnt from the incident to make sure it didn’t happen again. And very soon it was all forgotten about and noone cared.

Again with regard to the train blasts that happened over several destinations over the city, untrained civilians helped out tremendously those who needed immediate help and attention, but again very soon, it was all forgotten and no serious measures were taken to make sure the problem can be tackled in future.( one local newspaper even sent a newspaper reporter to do a real test by leaving behind a large parcel on a local, demonstrating how easy it really was to plant a bomb on a local).

But in current context, and in hind sight when I look back at the last couple of years in the city, I don’t really see much spirit. And reading the term everywhere, just makes me wonder am I too thick to see spirit or where is it really ?

What I see is a city, that’s moving way too fast, and where people have hardly enough time for their own things/issues/problems/work to sort out, leave aside changes in the city, where one cant help looking away from so many things in our public life, simply because there is so much else lined up already for people. And even the thought of making change/ or even ponder over serious issues of the day their CITY is facing can be an extremely far fetched, distressing thought.
This extremely fast paced life, coupled with complete apathy of the politicians and civil authority, lead to what we face today with half measures, on the spur of the moment quick decisions/ plans for the city(at the moment of the tragedy) and a load of other bullshit from our bunch of politicians trying to get their votes in place, as soon as the tragedy takes place, but soon after, out of compulsion, to make ends meet, people are busy with their own hectic lives again and its all forgotten.

Looking at the big picture here, I don’t really see much spirit, what I see is a city full of people so busy, involved in their own lives and problems that there really isn’t much time left to think about the city, its present and future state, and till this point that even complete disregard for their own personal safety just to get to their respective jobs on time.

Some who are not familiar with Mumbai might even call this selfishness to an extent where people are only concerned about their own lives and stuff to do and turn a completely blind eye to problems the city is facing over and over again, the city that they see, smell, hear and feel every single day and still don’t hold authority responsible for the many changes promised/ desperately needed, but having lived in Mumbai all my life, I know its not. I wish the days were longer hereJ

Something I belong to

2008-10-26T02:49:00.000-07:00

Running, running, running, running,
running, running, running.......
looking for my holy grail,
my wonderland, my place to call a home,

swimming through deep ocean,
ploughing through dense jungle,
fighting through the waves of subsaharan gold,
just to reach my tribe, my people, my place.

When i see you the whole world stops
the music rise, the temperature drops
I feel you...
And i hope you feel me too.

Im just running, running, running, running,
running, running, running .....
looking for my holy grail
my place to call a home.

i want to dwell in you,
And i want you to dwell in me too
I want to rise with you
through you, until.....
I have you.

Perception

2008-10-21T00:56:00.000-07:00

When the doors of PERCEPTION are cleansed, man will see things as they truly are. - William Blake, Aldous Huxley.

Perception - As perception begins to grow, widen, expand, biases start to decline in corresponding result. (This is through understanding that WE, each of us are just a speck in this wide ocean. )

Until the perception has expanded to such extent, ie - state of enlightenment draws nearer, so does the universal truth. and we start to realise that our individual perceptions matter only in our singlemindedness and not in universality.
Truth becomes clearer, and understanding more evolved and correspondingly continues to rise till THAT stage has been reached where the one universal truth can be seen to stand only.

HOW/ WHEN and in What order - When the individual starts to understand that the self is like a droplet of water in the whole, and like many droplets that have come down and evaporated and come down again, by giving too much emphasis to the single droplet, and not seeing the whole whole, would be like seeing only one part of a maze, the first step, the whole however, (relatively speaking) depending on level of perception, would only give the hitchhiker, the man making his way through the maze, a better picture he is about to embark upon, wanting to embark upon.

This maze cannot be understood fully or to the highest possible level by only understanding worldly aspects nor through books and reading alone.

Deep meditation, mind altering phenomenon, drugs, ie - complete detachment from the outworld only is a tool to the higher light.

The maze maybe outside, but the road, route, is inside.
-----------------------------------------------

These concepts of detachment, and perception, and the light, individual man being a speck, insignificant entity in the universe, and concepts spoken about in most forms of spirituality given different names .. and can be easily found through google, etc for deeper understanding ;-)

The rolling stone

2008-10-02T02:26:00.000-07:00

As the rock breaks aprt,
from the river bed,
it flexes its strong arms,
and raises its young, curious head,

flowing along the river,
seeing, understanding, feeling, grasping much,
the sights on offer

enthusiastic, excited, playful,
with,around, the fish and fawn

then,
it slowly starts to harden,
for the sun is always shining;
bright, far far away
hardens, slowly becdomes heavy,
from the inside, resisting,
contemplating, moving slower,
seeing lesser, feeling lesser,
comtemplating deep, its road to take.

The better part of its journey was over.
But then again, the stone didnt have any say in it.
He was just along for the ride.

I hope you can get what this really is about ...

Consumerism, Materialism and the West

2008-09-11T01:49:00.000-07:00

What is happening:- Quoting an article from the Hindu, “The problem in the West, however, is too much choice. It is far too easy to bring out the plastic and go shopping. For some, retail therapy is an almost addictive way of filling the inner emptiness of a dreary and lonely metropolitan life. For example, the British are spending more with their credit cards than the rest of Europe put together, an amazing statistic reported in an article in the Intelligent Life section of The Economist Web site. With 64 million pieces of plastic in circulation, more than one for every man, woman and child, the British alone spent more than £120 billion ($215 billion) last year on credit card purchases. The increase across Europe has been 76 per cent since 1998, while real economic growth numbers have been barely in positive territory.”

The description of a better life in today’s capitalist, materialistic world is simply one where you can have a lot of money with which in turn you can do a lot of stereotypical ‘expensive’ things. But are you really going to be happier with your ‘so called’ better life ?

Is there another road to a better well, happier life? Hell yes! Ofcourse there is! The East has known it since pretty much as far back as 6000 years, to the times of Gautama Siddhartha, who has been a rage the other side of the globe, and Buddhism and other spiritual practices have only been on the rise in the Concrete Jungle West in recent years.

Everyone is after that elusive tag of dressing the best, looking the best, having the coolest things, and so on, which directly leads to many social disorders, depression, substance abuse. Simply because it is not possible to be king of the hill forever.

This extreme dependence on materialistic things, and not looking for much else for happiness, are completely opposite to the basics of spirituality(which says, live in the now, and that’s when you’d feel most bliss, not in thoughts of yesterday , tomorrow, or a few hours ago, because every moment is beautiful in the ‘now’ and live/feel every moment for its bliss. Materialism says, you are not that happy now, but you need something to make you happier, doing spiritual harm) – harmony and balance of the spirit.

Quoting John Berger,who’s written extensively about social movements, changes through the 60’s and 70’s,and booker prize winner in 1972 for his book ‘G’, “Publicity is not merely an assembly of competing messages, it is a language in itself which is always being used to make the same general proposal…it proposes to each of us that we transform our lives, by buying something more…Publicity, situated in a future continually deferred, excludes the present and so eliminates all becoming, all development. Experience is impossible within it.

Though written with spiritual overtones, the problem of consumerism spreads over to more realistic, graver issues also.

Quoting consumericide.com, “Though each person has to decide for themselves what is important in life it is helpful to see that many people’s choices have been programmed into them by television, marketing companies, and by society itself. If consumerism really is not the highest truth or best organizing principle of life it will fall in on itself and create a collapse in civilization that will make the great depression look like a mild economic/social bump. As Argentina, and the drug lord war in Rio de Janeiro are only now beginning to suggest, as well as the continuing devastating conflict in Palestine, the world divided into those who have and others who have not is not sustainable in any kind of civilized way.

The years ahead will give us plenty of time to reflect on what is really important in life and what makes life pleasant, harmonious and sustainable over the long run. When it comes to thinking about others, about the future, our children, it is the long run that matters. It’s only been the last three decades where this lesson, for example, has come home to cigarette smokers. Yes, pleasant in the short term, it kills in the long. Is this what we have done by basing our economies on consumerism? And this question has to be seen in the context that consumerism is something that only about a billion people get to enjoy with special emphasis on the top 500 million. The topic of consumerism take us directly into distribution of wealth issues and the very nasty trend these past decades for wealth to become more and more concentrated in few and more wealthy hands.

The topic of consumerism take us directly into distribution of wealth issues and the very nasty trend these past decades for wealth to become more and more concentrated in few and more wealthy hands.

My top 20 album recommendations

2008-08-30T23:41:00.000-07:00

In no particular order

Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band - The Beatles. The beatles were on LSD and it was starting to show in the music. Psychedelic tunes made the music really trippy ..

Magical Mystery tour -Beatles. Psychedelia had full on kicked in, and they sound completely different... no more dancing grooves, and upbeat tempo.

Kill Em' All - Metallica. Though a faggot band overall .. the first album, with Dave mustaine(now megadeth) is phenomenal. music is a clear blend between influences of both bands. Ass kicking, head banging, loud music.

R.E.M Unplugged - Awesome. Really soothing, relaxing music. In my opinion, they were doing a way better job, at the kind of music coldplay is making now.

Nevermind the bollocks - Sex pistols. They made one album, and then all of them O.Ded and died, but the album kicks ass,arguably some of the best punk rock ever made.

The freewheelin' Bob Dylan- bob Dylan. A must listen for anybody interested in fantastically good lyrics, some of the tracks from the album became anthems for the civil rights, anti war movements in the 60's. The peak of dylan speaking out for causes.

Natural Mystic - Bob Marley. A kickass album with a kickass title track( also from exodus) beautifully done grooves. Happy music.

One Love (The very best of Bob marley and the wailers) - Bob marley. Best of the best. Phenomenal, hard to find something bad about anything in the album. Fantastic stuff.

Buddha bar 2 by vale - A kind of mix between what you will hear in goa at the shacks, and spiritual world music. I like the combination .. and it makes for a fresh interesting listen.

Voyageur - Enigma. Some really really peaceful tunes, yes sounds similar to most other enigma, maybe slightly slower and more serene, but something about this album, makes it great relaxing/ feel good music.

British Steel- Judas Priest. Makes for great old school hard rock / heavy metal. With some nice solos and really peaky high vocals,these guys definitely had the heavy metal spirit in them

The essential-Neil Diamond. Blues, Old school, happy blues.

Best of- The doors.

18-Moby. Some really nice electronica music, moby definitely had his own thing going on as compared to a lot of electronica/ commercial artists, with slightly trippy,slightly feelgood electronica.

The Wall-Pink Floyd. the wall pt1 and pt 3 are some of the best solos ive ever heard. mother is one of my favourite tracks of all time. and put together with hey you, run like hell, young lust and so on, makes for one mind blowing album.

RamoneMania- The Ramones. Definitely one of the outstanding/ more original aritists ive heard, putting punk beats together with other wise soft music, they put together an outstanding concoction of music, which even today stands out as really good and really original.

Youth-Matisyahu. Some of the more original reggae artists, no offence towards the other reggae bands ( im a huge reggae fan) but most sound really similar and especially similar to Bob marley. Surprisingly refreshing, with some great grooves.

Humanity Hour 1 - Scorpions. The usual norm of most old school rockers launching fuckall albums in this decade was broken was with this masterpeice. with some really really melodious music, scorpions have stuck to what they do best, not tried to hard to have the same sound or wtv and put together one awesome album.

Snow Flower- Ananda Shankar. Pandit Ravishankar's nephew, who pioneered the east meets west, puts together some originals and a couple of western tracks on sitar. He's done a phenomenal job on the cover of light my fire and jumpin' jack flash, staying true to both eastern and western styles.

Synchronicity - The police. A great mix of pop/ rock/ jazz/ reggae, the police had a great thing going on, with some really groovy / beach happy / gonna tap your feet music. Incredibly original, and a must listen.

Best of- Sting and the Police- A great mixed bag of genres with some fantastic tunes, especially 'Englishman in new york'

The very best of MTV unplugged - Various. A great compilation of unplugged music, do not miss the page&plant battle of evermore unplugged with the indian chick on vocals hitting the high notes, shes almost... orgasmic. also some nice stuff by sheryl crow, paul simon and so on ..

Bollywood Blues

2008-08-29T00:48:00.000-07:00

Gham ko hatao
jindagi ka kuch banao
Bas ek hi jai jandagi

Cycle par savari
vodka, whisky, dosti yaari
yahi to hai jindagi

sweet ladki dikhi to
mere dil mein hui bimari
usse dikha dunnggaaaa
apna pyaaaaar

Jawani jindgaani
simple si hai kahani
sun lo baas dil ki baat

mazeee karenge saath saath
sun lo bas apne dil ki baat

-
random ghat trip.
haha .. anu malik inspired ;-)
tune is ripped off from one of the tracks from the new movie rock on.

Shorts

2008-08-19T10:04:00.000-07:00

Phoenix from the flames

The burning fire, now but a faint of its true life,
hinting its shining glory from from its heyday glow,
slowly but steadily fading,
and from the dust, ashes, fading burn,
emerges......... a phoenix,
surreal in all its glory, shining,
its beauty enormous, yet humble, pure, true, innocent,
beauty's epitome.

-------------------------------------------------------

Morning Dew/ Awakening

The mountains enormous part, split, open up,
like volcano fire erupting, beauty of such mysticism,
its sight could so easily be gone ungazed, but to the gazing eyes,
beholding a sight of the bright molten heat erupting,
from the dark night, birth, is a bliss so true, so surreal, so ... enriching
so ....... awakening

----------------------------------------------------------

Beauty

Colours, sights, sounds, feelings, emotions, vibes,
in harmony come, and awaken, bring into colour, a picture, so invisible,
inexplainable, indescribable, so difficult to paint , that the feeling, unreasoned, alighting sense... seems almost ......... magical.

Black jokes, one for the black chappies

2008-08-18T10:41:00.000-07:00

Citius Altius Fortius

Faster,High err Heavier , Stronger

3 Reasons why you don’t mess with a coloured dude.

Ps- yes we know your feeling confident with 100IQ pt or so advantage.

Blacks,being direct descendants of apes, may be lacking in one aspect which came from the human chain of evolution, Brains!

Well but that doesn’t mean you don’t take the black chappies seriously, for what hes lacking in brains, hes compensating in brawn (Yes my friends, you can go out and test one for yourself, if you aren’t ready to take my word for it)

Facts of evolution:-

All black dudes aren’t blessed with the ability to earn a living, thus no matter, atleast they can resort to stealing/ shoplifting/ and so on, which for him are as effortless as it is for you to solve a basic calculus problem. (Yes its true)

Research has shown, that complicated physical activity like handling guns, knives, swords, large stones/ most other known forms of weaponry come instinctively towards blacks.

The Citius Altius Fortius Advantage :-

3 reasons why a black would do a better job at stealing the local grocery store than you.

· Citius – The black has a 98.4563% chance (accounting for the percentage of athletes and known shoplifters) of being faster than you. So don’t bother running if your watch has been pulled off your hand, you are only going to feel worse trying to catch him.

Ps - Blacks who have discovered Mcdonalds don’t count( They belong to the next category.

· Eat ius – The black , if not stronger or faster than you is definitely bigger than you… errr whole family. Try being wise and going straight for the nuts will not help you, for it will be a few tries before you’ve found them, by which time the black dude has sat on you and your bones have been crushed to a fine dust.

· Fortius - Unless you have bones like wolverine that heal instantly, do not be brave when in an argument with a black dude. Risking the above can cause anything from death to living the rest of your life as a cripple ( you pick which is worse)

Moral of the story – don’t mess with a black, give him what ever he wants, and then let the cops come and deal with him .

Love your life, don’t risk it unnecessarily. Amen.

In memory of ram, the best darn black chappie I ve met .. hahaha

Why are we here ?

2008-08-14T04:42:00.000-07:00

This is something that most of us have,at some point or another, in our reflective moods asked ourselves.

And one thing that most of us(atleast the sane ones) agree upon is that we are here for a reason.

The enthusiast says we are here to make a difference.

The Holy man says we are here to serve God. ( However unclear and indirect that may sound)

The Radical says that we are here to remove the bad and make it good.

The activist says we are here to keep everything in perfect harmony as it was before we got here.

And so on …

Where most people look towards the answer is in the bible.

From what the bible says – God created us. Beginning in Genesis Chapter 1, we read that after each phase of creation, God "saw that it was good." According to Scripture, once He completed creating the heavens and the earth, the plant life and all the animals, He created man:

So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them (Genesis 1:27).

This tells us what God did, but still doesn't explain exactly why He did it. We read on and discover that He spoke well of the male and female and showed His pleasure by entrusting them with His creation:

And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth,

As part of His blessing, He gave us stewardship over the earth and its other life forms:

and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so (Genesis 1:28-30).

At the end of Genesis Chapter 1, we read how He felt about his completed creation:

And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day (Genesis 1:31).

Why Are We Here? The Logical Conclusion
Why are we here? God created us because it pleased Him to do so. This message is consistent throughout the pages of Scripture, and nowhere said more succinctly than by the Apostle John in Revelation 4:11, where he has a vision of Heaven and witnesses the four elders prostrate before the Lord of all Creation, saying:

Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

We are created for His pleasure. From the first page of Scripture to the last, that message is clear. We are created for His pleasure. Further, the Apostle Paul wrote in Colossians 1:16: For by Him were all things created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers: all things were created by Him and for Him.

If we accept that all this is true, and that any other answer is both illogical and devoid of hope, then the next question to ask is - what do we do about it? Or more to the point, what do you and I do about it?

However illogical it may sound, this is what the bible says.

Also the bible says, none of us is here by accident and we were planned and wanted by our Heavenly Father from before the beginning of time (Psalm 139).

From what science says – We didn’t just get here. First came water, then micro organisms, then slightly bigger animals, then apes, then fire and so on. And then man evolved and adapted, and evolved and adapted and then just a little bit more evolution and adaptations, and well, that’s pretty much how we got here.

So scientifically speaking this is how we got here, and this is how evolution works, God knows ( ha!) 1000 years from now, evolution might have taken man onto a different path.

So from what I make, by looking at facts, completely opposed to the bible, we are here by accident, by flook, nooone knew we’d be here, noone thought( well apart from nostradamus and a couple of looneys) that we’d be here.

So then, again getting biased here,if we are here by chance, rather than look for an answer elsewhere as to what our purpose is, why don’t we look inside ourselves, find our purpose(or simply put just do what feels good/ right to us since each one of us are built differently). And do that! And that when reflected back upon 50 years from now, that’s what we were here to do. Why we were here!

If all of us were here for the same reason, then there wouldn’t be much difference in our behaviours, attitudes, or thinking and probably we wouldn’t need the one thing that distinguishes us from animals, our consciousness, our ability to think for ourselves!

So since we have the ability to think, we should use it to figure out what our purpose is and follow that road! Rather than look else where/ ask else where for the answer. And that probably is why we are here :-)

SELECT THE BLANK PART TO SEE WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS.

Tavish Bhasin’s 10 tips to a kickass holiday!

2008-08-14T04:12:00.000-07:00

I thank this student organization(AIESEC) that provides internships for students , mainly to provide to people the cultural experience, of travel/ living/ working in a foreign environment, to introduce me to the world of travel almost 2 years ago.

Since then the equation has been pretty simple, everytime im feeling low/ down/ down and out / down and out and low(you get the picture) the solution is very simple.

Plan a vacation and get out of the city ASAP.

Halfway through the journey to the holiday, fun and frolic begins, beer begins to flow.. and there, you are feeling great already.

1.) When ever life gets a little boring, a change in your daily life, however small can only be refreshing.

2.) One very simple equation that you can follow is great vacation = distance(in kms)/money at hand. Though the latter has always been a relatively smaller number in my case, the higher your value, the better your vacation will be.

3.) Don’t be a tourist, and go around with your conman/ guide.(how ever you may look at him) Explore the place yourself, follow your heart, see what you find interesting in the place, ask around, make random conversation with the locals, you might be mistaken as a enthu traveler and ripped off a small amount of money, but its worth hearing what the locals have to say.

4.) Do things you would never do in the city, however funny/ absurd they may seem. Its these things that you will remember and enjoy, and take back home with you, not things you do all the time. Its all about refreshment J

5.) Keep your activity to leisure time ratio at 2:1 (on average) depending on how lazy you are… then you can tweak the ratio accordingly.. if the ratio gets too high on either side, you will either be too bored, or too stressed out. Remember you are out to enjoy yourself.

6.) Spend your money well, don’t squander it away on a good hotel room, and then compensate for it with less beer. Budget as low as possible for accommodation , and as high as possible for beer, food, miscellaneous.

7.) Always budget before your trip! This may seem unnecessary but its incredibly important to budget well to make sure there are no hiccups in your kick ass vacation.

8.) The number of people you travel with. I have a theory here where--- The more people you travel with, the more fun you are going to have without really bothering to explore/look around much from the place. Whereas , the lesser people you are, the more you are going to be able to enjoy the place. So plan accordingly, depending on where you are going.

9.) Leave your city worries at home with you when you travel. And keep your mind on relaxing rather than worry about what the boss is going to have to say once your back.

10.) If you are lacking in basic maturity and understanding and none of the above tips work for you and/or you are a cutlet and still cannot make the most of your vacation..Then do not worry there is one foolproof way with which your vacation cannot possibly go wrong. Be drunk all day and create a ruckus. 20 pints of beers should do this for you.

Cheers,

and have a kickass holiday.

The hand

2008-07-21T02:44:00.000-07:00

Through forests, deep, dense,
thin, sparse, clear land,
and through the water,
I pass, work through, fight across.

Some part i enjoy, some i despise,
some i ignore, some i cherish,
memory, thought, becomes a weapon,
that can hurt deep & scar ,
the beholders.

something inside happens as,
the water calms, slows,
the tide has recedeed,
the wind blowin it has eased.

peace, calm, serene, beautiful,
the forest thins as i travel,
into its depths,
the road is not important, (in context)
the destination,

i hold onto the hand
and let the forest lead,
and lead it does, for when
the wind stops, the waves
are at peace,one, with itself.

The hand leads furthur,
into the dark night,
with fear, yet with faith,
I trust in the hand,

Fighting the shivers, hope leads, paves
the way.
To a beautiful glow,
Light, burning bright, the shining
sun.

The journey is over,
and replaced by another,
a new day,
the next real challenge,

for the hand has kept me away from the devil,
which lies in the detail.

the hand of a clear mind, intuition,
with faith and belief , shall take you
through the dark night & as if by magic
the road will appear shimmering before you
into the crystalline reality ,
of tomorrow.

A Hard rain's a-gonna fall

2008-07-21T02:23:00.000-07:00

The land erupts,
into fire and flames,
as birds from the sky,
play demolition games,

in the heat of turmoil,
for his country's glory
he puts on the line,
his life's a-story.

the media blessed him,
made a great news story

through forest and sand,
he pushes through,
in search of someone, something,
hes been ordered to do,

He gets out his tools,
bullets and bombs,
hoping tomorrow he can hear the homecoming songs,
but thats not something you can bet on,
for a hard rains a-gonna fall.

He's hit, hes hungry,
in agony he falls,
into a pit alone
with noone heeding calls

"Do i swallow my pride,
Suicide?!
I have much to do,
they must know im a patriot"

He lost a limb,
needed machines to reach the pedals,
he lost his peace, forever a good night's sleep
heck cmon we gave him the Goddamn medal!

We

2008-07-14T05:39:00.000-07:00

Just saw one of the Bob marley biographies.

In memory of the great man ...
The prophet who prophesied peace .
Bob marley, who symbolizes happiness, oneness and unity through times of struggle. and ofcourse Jamaica ;-)

The ultimate superstar of the third world.
-----------------------------------------

We faught the system,
side by side,
one brother one side,
the other the other side
challenge the governments and this and that
we was a we but now are a i and i

we played in the gardens
as children as friends
as enemies and rebels
as brothers as friends

we had the beautiful days
when the sun and jah
both shone light on the yellow sand
On the people ( the people! the people! )
and the Ska and reggae bought us the ticket
for the night (ait! ait! ait!)

we shared the vibrations
the positive and the opposite
and even the angry vibration sometime (sometime ... )

we were born through love
and lived through war
which is which and what is what
who are we to say
or they ?

It is for everybody to see
For everybody can see the see the love
if only they open their eyes
or even their heart

And believe

the good ... and forget the bad
for we are one
aint not one on one

we painted the town red,
through war,
and today we be painting it red
with love and peace

for
We are the children
of love
we are the children
of jah
we are ... i and i

Let us have a look at your hand.

2008-06-16T03:18:00.000-07:00

Another song i wrote, this song writing is catching on for some reason .

All you takers of lives,
you that pull on your triggers,
you that act without mercy,
you that want to make your own justice,
you that want to play God.

Fighting away for yourself,
you who's fighting his own war,
you who's disrespecting life,
you who's venting his own pain,
you who's taken away their children,

What about those children,
would they play your dirty game,
if it wasnt for the atacks,
which you refuse to take the blame

Why are you hiding,
If what you're seeking is so plain,
why dont you reason justice,
why dont you tell us your name.

You that use your muscle,
to cause the innocent pain,
what face d'you see every morning,
To still believe your sane.

You must see a doctor,
who'd give some pills,
who'd take away your money,
who'd sedate all your thrill

though im younger than you,
i know, let me tell you something
that when your done with your time,
Even Allah would never forgive what you do.

Totally Masters of War(Bob Dylan) inspired- Even jesus would never forgive what you do.

Peace :-)

What about the Bomb

2008-06-12T03:49:00.000-07:00

Of stories, dictations

United nations

Tales of hypocrisy

Made of stories and lies

what do you want

What do you see

What is it

That you want to be

It a mystery, to those without eyes

All the others can see the burning light

Why are you hiding

Whos time are you biding

Is the day gone

Of the time of the bomb

I saw it a-yesterday

In the waters of the east

Do I see it tomorrow again ?

Now or then ?

Your Playing a game,

a dangerous game, of players and pawns

But all I wanna know is

What about the bomb

You may be the Master

You maybe the Pawn

But all im asking is

What about the bomb

A folk song a wrote yesterday .. too much Bob Dylan, John Lennon influence i think ...
At times like these i wish i knew my chords well...

All i wanna know is what about the Bomb!

Anxiety Induced Stress- The Problem behind the problem !

2008-06-05T01:56:00.000-07:00

Facing some problems in your life(pretty much everybody does!)? That have got you thinking so much about getting over them that just the process of thinking about your porblems is causing more stress to you than the problems you are actually facing!

Yes its True!

Welcome to anxiety related Stress.

Anxiety related stress is a behind the scenes problem, where your anxious, thinking too hard about something , and that infact is what is getting you more stressed than the problem you are facing in the first place!

Anxiety related stress is what alot of us face, and yet its something that a lot of us are not aware of even.

For example, You are facing problem A , that has you on the edge of your seat thinking about how to solve, but just thinking about solving problem A is causing you more stress(subconsciously) and discomfort than Problem A itself! Get it ?

Quoting Thesite.org.uk, "It is quite normal to feel anxious when you are facing something dangerous or difficult, but it is not usual to feel anxious all the time or to feel that anxiety is ruling your life. Extreme anxiety is manifested as phobias, panic attacks or obsessive compulsive disorder.( a problem faced by an increasing number of people in today's fast paced world)

When anxiety has gone too far...

Severe anxiety is similar to a 'false alarm'. Our bodies over-react, and respond with anxiety to something that is not threatening. It can happen if we exaggerate the danger in our minds; if we are under stress; or when we start thinking about past difficulties.

Severe anxiety doesn't just fade away; it can be so unpleasant that you begin to find ways of avoiding the situation or event that makes you feel so bad. Every time you succeed in avoiding the event your anxiety level drops and so in the short term you feel better. However long term you can become a recluse, avoiding any situation that may evoke anxiety and never knowing whether that danger was all in your mind. "

As clearly evident, if anxiety is not nipped at the grassroot, it can manifest into must more serious problems.

The 21st Century is called the Century of Anxiety and Stress with almost 7-10% of adult population suffering from anxiety induced problems, expecially the youth, school and college students.

Some of the symtoms of Anxiety related stress are:-

Negative Self-talk
Restlessness
Inability to concentrate

What You Can Do to Reduce Anxiety Induced Stress

A positive attitude(extremely extremely important), a balanced approach and relaxation exercises(meditation, breathing exercises, yoga) and spirituality are just some of the ways you can combat stress.

Other unprofessional ways of dealing with anxiety related stress would be general relaxation, doing something you enjoy, anything you are comfortable with thats going to calm your mind; even if its a game of Uno with a close friend, or a conversation about your problems with someone who just understands.

"A quiet mind cureth all."
—Robert Burton

The Indian Crab

2008-05-23T12:31:00.000-07:00

I like to believe like the average Indian is a lot like a crab ie- The Indian Crab, after someone much older told me about the analogy a few years ago.

Why A Crab ? Because when you put crabs in a bucket, what the crabs do is pull each other down when trying to climb out, rather than help each other get out. I think the average Indian Lives by a similar funda.

The average Indian is an extremely lazy lethargic individual who is thus also very often not in his happiest state of mind and may seem quite Fried(frustrated for no real reason) as I like to use the word. Hence all the beating up the kids and wife at home, drunkenness, ego issues, being unreasonable et all.. but then going out making a straight face and playing cricket on the cricket field( Which is Called The gentlemans game Btw) where so much as showing a sign of being offensive against the opposition can earn you a ban for a few games, where as beating the wife/kids at home doesn’t get you in any harm at all.

The average Indian because of being extremely lazy and lethargic is also not your real go getter. Because of which very very often a lot of people who deserve the credit get comments where frustration is being vented ex – Gandhi is an asshole, all politicians are fucked up, this country is fucked up and so on. Which also lead to lack of patriotism. Because one is never too happy about giving credit where it is due.

He will also try very hard to put you down and show his superiority over you, and try very little to show appreciation towards good things done by someone else. That little sniggering is always there… appreciation isn’t spoken much about, criticism is to be found in everything under the sun.

Rather than going out and getting what he wants himself, he will snigger at you for getting it, but still not see the light and get motivated into going out and doing it himself. (The grapes are sour analogy)

After being caught up in all this mental mess, over ego issues, small everyday frustrations,The entire attitude towards life is too cynical and needs to be more positive, he forgets his larger goal, his happiness, his trip, his road that he needs to walk down. (Pretty much every second family has parents saying do Engineering become an Engineer, Doctor and the children are still really doing this)

Also the average Indian because of being lazy and lethargic, also suffers from a lot of insecurity and inferiority complex. Since he is too lazy to go out and put in what is required, he will either sit Back and snigger at those who do,, and those few with the positive attitudes they come across, they feel insecure and intimidated by, , refusing to change their ways here and learn (because they are also frustrated and stubborn) from someone with a good outlook, they snigger at them, refusing to accept the lacking in them rather than just learning from the other.

Also because of all these things, he also tends to lie to himself about a lot of things, make up excuses for not doing things.

I would like to clarify that I don’t mean these things in a negative way. Im also pretty much the average Indian ;-) and I have a lot of average Indian friends, who I talk to these things about .

Also some of you might think the writing is a bit exaggerated, well I think I would agree with you on that.

Cheers, Have a good day.

The pictures music paints

2008-05-08T01:50:00.000-07:00

The music of today is a direct reaction of the political, cultural and overall state of affairs in the recent past.

The best way to understand the state of affairs anywhere in the world is through the music in that particular region, for example the Rasta music of the poor class in Jamaica, the Jazz and Blues from the racial oppression against the blacks in the mid 30's and , the folk musicians of the late 40's and 50's speaking about political trouble in the world, which was a firey blend of a mix of very new methods which werent very easily being adopted by the peoplefor whatever reasons, situation in those days and problems and from then on...

The general vibe of communism and peacefully getting the message across to the masses through popular medium the mid 20's onwards if not earlier, has stuck on and even now, though not politically charged, the music in general speaks volumes about problems of the world and popular culture...

And going by this analogy, the music of today doesnt paint a very happy picture.

In that respect people in the 60s and 70s were living of the scraps of the table of the 30's and 40's of political upheavel, political and social change, peace and so on ... and today we are living off the scraps off the 60 and 70's with respect to popular culture, music and ideas....

The Power of the Sub-conscious

2008-04-23T00:06:00.001-07:00

The Great Success stories of this century atleast, will be told by those people who have unlocked the power of the subconscious...

Fairly ago, there was a theory that a human being while thinking uses only about 2% of his brain, while the remaining 98% remains unlocked .. and in access only in the subconscious.

Man in sport and theory may have reached the full limit of his conscious, which actually might be a very small part, assuming the above mentioned theory is even partly true.- That there is a very large part of our processing power that remains undiscovered.

There are many sites with theories, techniques and other ways of unlocking the Subconscious.
Quoting Subconscious- secrets.com -

"You may be wondering what's so great about the subconscious mind power, why should we bother to unleash the hidden power of the subconscious mind. If you have such doubt, I have a question for you. Do you know what Tony Robbins, Brian Tracy, Bob Proctor, Robert Kiyosaki and ALL other successful people have in common?

Yes, all of them know how to unleash the hidden power of their subconscious mind power.

If you want to be successful, you must know how to unleash the hidden power of your subconscious mind. Some successful people do it unconsciously, without understanding how it works. But now, you have a chance to understanding how the subconscious mind power works and how to unleash its hidden power.

Awaken the giant within. Where is the giant?

So Where is the Giant, i would quite confidently like to believe that Theories like the Hugely popular "The Secret" that talks about the laws of attraction, and thinking heavily about what you want most, thus drilling it into your subconciousness.

Also alot of form of spirituality may also be ways to connect with the subconscious, the Soul.

Buddhists chanting "NamhYo Ho Renge Kyo", meditation and so on, techniques that are nowadays hugely gaining popularity, unlock a door, it is evident. It however may be right to assume that this is the door to the subconciousness.

Also other techniques like Hypnotism, getting people into a subconscious state and asking them questions which they honestly answer to find out the truth about people, help them find out things, they cant trace in the conscious.

World No.1 motivation guru, Tony Robbins, once said, “All personal changes must take place at the subconscious level.” To have permanent changes in our lives, we must change the thinking of our subconscious mind! Drill it in as i like to call it.
Also since the subconscious is such a large part as compared to the conscious mind, it may also be right to believe that.

"To probe into the deeper levels of the subconscious, unconscious mind, your mantra needs to be kept secret." - Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.

Though, the Subconscious state is a huge treasure trove of knowledge, and access to it is highly essential in today's cut throat times, "Our subconscious minds have no sense of humor, play no jokes and cannot tell the difference between reality and an imagined thought or image. What we continually think about eventually will manifest in our lives.
Robert Collier "

Robert Allen Zimmerman

2008-04-22T03:23:00.000-07:00

A Very New Inspiration ..
Been listening to him for a while now, but happened to watch the concert the other day on television and his charisma for one is something that just catches you offguard.. the conviction in the music and those tales, stories, of songs that he's created.
They arent really just songs, Rolling Stone Magazine(Check out the co-incidence :-) called his lyrics," His lyrics - the first in rock to be seriously regarded as literature - became so well..." and "while whole schools of musicians took up his ideas."

Undoubtedly one of the most influential musicians in history,not that surprising when you figure his last #1 in 2005 was almost 50years after his first, he pioneered his American Version of Rock and Roll and started the whole idea of great music also having great lyrics and great meaning altogther. Many of his tales, musical tales had high influences on modern music Culture, Tracks like 'Like a Rolling Stone', undoubtedly one of his influential pieces of music, 'Mr tambourine Man', and others like 'Blowin in the wind' and 'The times they are a-changin' became athems on the civil rights and anti war movements.

Just happened to pick up his book Chimes of Freedom about him and the 60's :-)

Way to go Mr Dylan..

The Tortoise and the Hare

2008-04-16T00:45:00.000-07:00

Remember the story or rather fable as Aesop called it, about the Tortoise and the Hare? Where the Slow Tortoise beats the faster Hare in a race, and then the famous Moral of the Story:- Slow and Steady wins the Race ?

Though written many years ago, it funda still remains fairly true even In today’s time about climbing the Success Ladder. A small Analogy that ive drawn.

The Rabbit Man, for better understanding sake I shall refer to both as Rabbit man and Hare man, Starts out earlier at a younger age, reaches a Point A rushes to the next opportunity to climb higher, in doing so somewhere along the line he runs into some trouble, or like in the story, takes a little nap to enjoy Point A and rest. In doing so, he looses his position, gets out of the flow and sees a dip in his position. This continues in his cycle and he eventually loses the long race.

The Tortoise Man on the other hand is never in much of a hurry, he doesn’t rush to take the lead, moves at his own pace, is not affected by the final outcome, he knows where he has to reach at the end of it, and enjoys his journey there by moving at his sweet leisurely pace. He doesn’t take nearly as many breaks as his opponent and doesn’t rush ahead and fall back later on.

Slow and steady is the way to go for him.

He takes the opportunity when he gets it to take the lead, and makes the most of it.

Moral of the Story: Slow and Steady wins the race.

The pencil sharpener

2008-03-28T02:01:00.000-07:00

Harold Ross, legendary editor of THE NEW YORKER, was so fanatical about his pencils that he hired an office boy to sharpen them. The pencils had to be of a certain length, with no teeth marks.The points had to be fine, but not too fine. It took the boy weeks to perfect this, but he succeeded. And one memorable afternoon, Mr. Ross said to him, "Son, You're a damn good pencil sharpener."

someone please comment

2008-03-11T06:45:00.001-07:00

this is a dam wierd scene .. someone who was insisting that i post a comment on their blog made me realise that what the fuck ... we as individuals need appreciation man ... like its basic instinct.
Lol ...

How could i not ?

2008-03-10T00:38:00.000-07:00

Bob Marley - I Can See Clearly Now

I can see clearly now, the rain is gone,
I can see all obstacles in my way
Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind
It's gonna be a bright (bright), bright (bright)
Sun-Shiny day
It's gonna be a bright (bright), bright (bright)
Sun-Shiny day

Oh yes I can make it now, the pain is gone
All of the bad feelings have disappeared
Here is the rainbow I've been prayin' for
It's gonna be a bright (bright), bright (bright)
Sun-Shiny day

Look all around, there's nothin' but blue skies
Look straight ahead, nothin' but blue skies
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How could these lyrics possibly NOT make anyone happy.
The lyrics , the bass line , the general feel of the music , just like the people just screams happiness. The super conviction is another thing to watch out for also.

Its incredible to see this bunch of black relatively poor people living by the rastaman positive vibration ;-) screaming happiness.Was watching cool runnings yesterday , and my drag bike is now soon going to have stickers saying "Rastaa Rockett" And watching the movie also just made me incredibly happy.
Maybe its just the spirit and the attitude of these people.

And their music follows in the same spirit with nice happy tunes and tales of the continuous difficulties faced by the people.

Could you be loved and be loved?
Could you be loved and be loved?

Dont let them fool ya,
Or even try to school ya! oh, no!
Weve got a mind of our own,
So go to hell if what youre thinking is not right!
Love would never leave us alone,
A-yin the darkness there must come out to light.

Could you be loved and be loved?
Could you be loved, wo now! - and be loved?

(the road of life is rocky and you may stumble too,
So while you point your fingers someone else is judging you)
Love your brotherman!
(could you be - could you be - could you be loved?
Could you be - could you be loved?
Could you be - could you be - could you be loved?
Could you be - could you be loved? )

Dont let them change ya, oh! -
Or even rearrange ya! oh, no!
Weve got a life to live.
They say: only - only -
Only the fittest of the fittest shall survive -
Stay alive! eh!

Could you be loved and be loved?
Could you be loved, wo now! - and be loved?

Hopefully a short lil trip to Jamaica soon will just sort it.

Mind Over Body.

2008-03-05T23:30:00.000-08:00

Whoever thought when Grace Kelly sang the lyrics ,”One pill makes you larger, and one pill makes you small ,and the ones your mother gives you ..Don’t do anything at all” Refering to psychedelic drugs back then would actually be relevant to medical science today.

The placebo effect-Taking dummy medicine pills with no real healing effects but the psychological effect of the medicine working on your body is enough to make you feel better.Though the placebo effect was discovered many years ago- showing the power and control of the mind over the body.Offlate placebo pills have been gaining popularity in the western countries to soothe headache , flu , and as painkillers.
But, the power of the mind doesn’t only extend till the placebo pill.

A lot of other techniques like positive thinking – thinking positive to have a good outlook towards everything in our life to improve our life by simply controlling the mind , and visualization – where in people visualize circumstances and events they want to see in their life and eventually see results and change.

Athletes are ‘visualizing’ running faster and actually seeing it happen , businessmen are visualizing doing better business and actually seeing it happen.People are visualizing a better life and reaping the benefits.

Does this mark a new change in overall culture of the world where mental training is almost as important as or more, than the physical training and hard work we are accustomed to.

The PLACEBO Effect(The word placebo is Latin for "I will please". It is in Latin text in the Bible , from where it became familiar to the public via the Office of the Dead church service. From that, a singer of Placebo (at funeral) became associated with someone who falsely claimed a connection to the deceased to get a share of the funeral meal, and hence a flatterer.) - Researchers at Columbia and Michigan University have shown that the brains of volunteers who believed that what they were taking was pain medication were shown to be spontaneously releasing opioids, or natural pain relief.According to that ABC report the Food and Drug Administration contends that as many as 75 percent of patients have had responses to dummy ‘sugar’ pills. It pointed out that all major clinical trials use placebo groups because the effect is significant and to be expected.

This effect has been known since the early 20th century.Harvard’s Herbert Benson says that the placebo effect yields beneficial clinical results in 60–90% of diseases, including angina pectoris, bronchial asthma, herpes simplex, and duodenal ulcers.

THE FAITH OF YESTERDAY AND TOMORROW

2008-02-17T23:52:00.000-08:00

According to Robert Graves, the earliest societies and religions were matriarchal, kings were sacrificed, and the moon was thought to control the sun.
A few thousand years ago many goddess oriented civilisations were destroyed by aggressive Indo-European tribes who worshipped aggressive sky gods, and thus females lost their sacredness. These newer world religions were monotheist, Judaism, Islam and Christianity, with one god who was male, and took shape in the Iron Age when men dominated societies in Europe and the Middle East. Some fathers of the early Christian (qv) church even argued that women had no souls. Goddess cultures tended to be egalitarian, earth-centred and non-violent.

The Great Mother has been around since as far back as most civilizations go.

For the GREEKS man represented order NOMOS, while women and were PHYSIS, wild, threatening and lawless like Bacchae, inversely the CELTS and others believed women were especially close to the sacred landscape, and in many religions the goddesses were zoomorphic. The MORRIGAN to the Celts were triple goddesses but sometimes one goddess; sometimes three of different ages, also appearing in many different cultures as Fates/Moriae/Parcae, Très Matres, Three Marys of the Sea, etc., The idea of a Holy Trinity did not form part of Israelite theology and only became a Christian concept as the gospel spread into the pagan world, where a holy triad or family was a well established device. The Holy Spirit was female in Hebrew texts also.

She has simply manifested herself through different forms over the centuries but the basic idea has idea of love remained the same.

And it isn’t surprising that more and more people are becoming interested in pagan traditions and worship of the Great Mother.why? Because God the Father is associated with the rigour and discipline of worship ,whereas the mother Goddess shows the importance of love above and beyond the usual prohibitions and taboos.

The phenomenon is hardly a new one, Since centuries, a significant number of people break away and go in search of more freedom in their search for spiritual contact.

According to Pagan tradition nature worship is of supreme importance.The goddess is in everything and everything is part of the Goddess.The world is merely an expression of her goodness. The gypsies never believed or understood the concept of borders,they always thought that the Earth, the Goddess was One.

There are many philosophical systems such as Taoism and Buddhism which make no distinction between Creator and creature.People no longer try to decipher the mystery of life,but choose instead to be a part of it.

In the worship of the Great mother, what we call ‘sin’, usually a transgression of certain arbitrary moral codes, ceases to exist.Sex and customs in general are freer because they are a part of nature and cannot be considered to be the fruits of evils.

This liberation is in all probability the reason why people dwell their faith in the Great Mother.

The new paganism shows that man is capable of living without an institutionalized religion, while still continuing the spiritual search in order to justify his existence.

This has been a growing trend over the last few years. We may be witnessing a very important moment in history, when the Spirit finally merges with the Material, and the two are united and transformed.

The general increase in spirituality-The Art of living foundation, Buddhism, Osho, Kaballah and many other mediums that are reviving the older

pagan ways of worship.

The Goddess or the Great Goddess is a type of female deity who is primary. She historically existed in many cultures, though not under the same names and not necessarily with the same traits. If there is a male god, his powers derive from her. (Gottner-Abendroth 1987). These terms are not usually understood to refer a single deity that is identical across cultures but rather a concept common in many ancient cultures, which those in the Goddess movement want to restore. (Christ 1997). When Goddess is spoken of as a personal guardian, as in 'my Goddess' it means 'my worldview in Goddess spirituality.'

Thealogy is a term whose first use in the context of feminist analysis of religion and discussion of Goddess is usually credited to Naomi Goldenberg (1979). It substitutes the Greek feminine prefix "thea" for the supposedly generic use of the Greek masculine prefix "theo." Frequently used to mean analysis of Goddess thought and mysticism, it can also be used more liberally to mean any kind of divine, not just deity divine, as in meditation, ethics, ritual pragmatics.

Relevant bits and pieces gathered from everywhere and the central idea comes from "The witch of portobello"

In Today’s competitive World,”College Life” has not much to do with College anymore.

2008-02-06T23:50:00.000-08:00

Gone are the Days when one would refer to his going to college everyday and attending his lectures everyday and coming back as their college life.In today’s competitive world,those days are long passé.” Going to college is just a formality that I have to go by,but that definitely doesn’t account for all my college life says Anish Menon,vice president of the Corporate Sector of AIESEC,A Students Organisation.

The extreme competition in general with regards to future security

has got to the students and a lot of them are doing a whole bunch of additional extracurricular activities apart from the College.

Other activities students are a part of these days are :-

1. The Rotoract Club,

2. AIESEC

3. Intra College Clubs,

4. Inter College fests with activities like debating,creative writing,dance,etc

5. Work – Internships.

College life isn’t much to do with hanging out, partying meeting friends,etc anymore.Its more to do with preparing yourself for the future and taking part in,working on and building essential skills required.”I take part in a lot of creative writing competitions at the college fests and im also looking for my second internship in writing to find out if this is what I really want to do in life”claims Ram,an enthusiastic student of S.Y.B.Com,HR college.Surprisingly Ram is not alone, there are many many students who take part in college fests, dances, singings,writing, dramatics, the works.

However,it is a known fact that Corporates look for versatility in their employees.And these small factors from their college life does play a role later on in deciding their future.”I went for a job interview once and I had headed the Malhar Marketing Department while in college,and that is all they asked me about for half an hour in the interview”

So has the definition of recreation and fun for today’s youth

changed? Its upto you to decide.

Are we really ready for the Rs1lakh Car(s) ?

2008-02-06T23:43:00.000-08:00

One great promise by a man almost 4years,has turned the Indian Car market completely on its head.The idea of a ‘cheap’ car has been completely revolutionized and one can soon expect a cheap car for nearly 1/3^rd the price of what it currently is.This may seem like a boon for many many people, ,specially in a growing economy like ours,who can now afford to buy a car.

But are we really ready for a Rs1lakh car? Or for that matter,the Rs 1lakh Cars….Following in the footsteps of Tata,Bajaj motors has also promised a Rs1lakh car , so has Hyundai motors.So there may soon be a whole segment of car’s priced between Rs1-2 lakhs.And with that, a very large number of new cars on our streets.

The way things are currently though,when traffic jam’s are no longer only a rush hour story,and with almost standstill traffic during peak hours,people switching to taking taxi’s to work due to lack of parking spots.and with groups of people volunteering together to share a bus rather than take their cars.Are we really at the right time for this revolutionary idea.Or has it come too early ?

First ride of my race 2stroke.(2 years ago..)

2008-02-04T00:50:00.000-08:00

For nostalgic reasons I thought I would write this article since this bike now has been lying parked in my garage since the last speedrun(17^th-18^th Feb’07),and ive pretty much forgotten the feeling of starting it up.

It was sometime around Early Jan 2007,I’d spent pretty much the whole last month at Zubin Ponappa’s garage,who I must give full credit and thanks to for tolerating hyper active,super excited me the whole time and completing the build,working till night,running around getting different parts,waiting for the engine and expansion chamber to arrive from a Chennai(A big thanks to Vivek uncle also, from Tectrac Racing for sending his spectacular fast bore from his ’04 Group C winning bike) and finally putting it all together….

At about 10.30 the previous night,the bike is put together completely and we start the engine for the first time.But because we have no footpegs on the bike and the jetting isn’t dialed in,it is decided that’s its not ready to be ridden as yet.

So we wrap things up for the day,I go home unable to sleep,return as excited as ive ever been early next morning to get things going.In about an hour its time,the footpegs are in place and its time to start the bike up and take it for a spin.I slam the gear lever down,first gear and the bike nudges forward,but before I can get to the empty back road,100mts away,CLUNK! I look down and see a tiny dent on my exhaust! The bike has only 6 inches ground clearance.Too eager to worry about that then,I continue to the empty stretch get to the end of the road,slot into first and give it gas.3000 ,4000,5000rpm and still no power,the bike is cluttering along happily but no real power at all.Im getting restless,im on full throttle now waiting for something to happen,and suddenly about 7000 rpm something happens,im lunging forward at break neck speed,everything has become a blur and im having difficulty holding on,I back off the throttle as soon as I can get a hold of things,I stop, and see my handlebars have been pulled inwards by me in utter panic,and people have gathered all around to see what that deafening sound was..very soon the cops have also arrived.

A warm welcome into the world of race spec 2strokes and a scene which would become very familiar all too soon.

-Tavish Bhasin.

Ps – It would be important to note that I after this incident, for almost 3weeks was scared of riding the bike in the powerband in first gear.

If you’re a nice guy and would like to support/sponsor our racing for the ’08 season ,you can contact me on 9322678422 J

2008, Run for your life All you Uber COOL People.

2008-02-03T01:26:00.001-08:00

Yet another year has gone by, just as always… it felt like just one day … its so amazing how it has flown by blah blah blah.. the usual jazz.

But,incase most people havnt noticed, till last year, drug consumption was increasing , people were starting to drink at a younger a younger age, abuse/rape were on the rise and so on … you get what im saying (things were getting more and more fu*ked up and we were heading for total destruction…)

But this year suddenly the whole story seems to be changing.Drinking and driving which last year was Okay… most of us have done it on numerous occasions so we know for sure,can suddenly get you put behind bars! “1967 odd people busted for drug abuse since December 2007, these are signs put up at a bunch of traffic signals in the city.

Out of a city of 21million(that’s what it was at the last count right?about 7 years ago) 2 girls were taken advantage of on New years Eve, both of which are not interested in filing police complains,yet this news makes headlines stating Mumbai is not a safe city.Clubs abroad have got way stricter with letting underage kids in who are obviously dying to get to the alcohol.Another ridiculous story I heard recently was that London clubs have apparently become smoke free.Instead a smoke smelling deodorant(ya right,like that’s gonna help) is sprayed so the FEEL remains(does the spray also have nicotine?).The whole country of Portugal is becoming smoke free,

Closer to home … the whole city of Chandigarh has become smoke free(which means you cant smoke cigarettes in any public place in the entire city Bah)

Where are we, the Super Cool HappeningYouth to go under times of such extreme Boredom ? Duh …. Amsterdam ofcourse.

Reality TV ?

2008-02-03T01:26:00.000-08:00

This is something that ive been thinking about since a while now and ive never really got it.Well im not that old …almost 20 to be precise.And ive pretty much been watching TV since cable tv came to our city around 1990 or so.And its been amazing to see how television has grown and changed..From Batman to the Simpsons to WWF to Full House,Fresh Prince to Friends to to now Suddenly this new batch of So-called reality Tv shows that have just been all over the place recently.

I think this first started getting to me after this sad excuse of a reality show – Wife Swap in which all sorts of weird families – pirate families,dwarf families, families doing magic,etc are made to swap wives other weird families and every episode has one clash between the new characters and in the end all is well and everyone seems to have changed there behaviour,made a compromise and improved their lifestyle and all is well.

Closer to home,this Mtv ‘reality’ show called ‘Roadies’ has really been a hit with the youth and they are now in their 5^th season and are now apparently holding auditions in other countries also and thousands rush and wait in Queues for the auditions.Well one episode I saw recently featured one guy pretending to be blind,a bunch of drama queens,one small town guy who showed a lot of strength and character yet the crudeness of a small town guy and a few other weird characters.

Which brings me to the point,This isn’t reality man! Look around you,everyone is not weird,everyone is not compromising after being told everything they do is comptetely wrong.And most of all,people are not stupid.Why cant these shows simply be categorized as ‘bits and pieces of reality” Tv,or more honestly drama tv.Its not that bad and im sure people would still watch them.After all drama shows are still big even today.

First Blog post :-)

2008-02-01T05:53:00.000-08:00

You know some of those times,when you just end up thinking about so many shit things involuntarily and it ends up clouding your mind up so much that you become slow in your general behaviour and have difficulty focus on what exactly it is that you are doing .Be it figuring out a complicted movie,making complicated conversation.

Its at times like these when making the simplest of decisions, even the simplest ones so much more difficult.

Well unfortunately today happens to be one of those days.
It so happens that i have just got back from Goa yesterday and some certain things consumed have made my throat/cough so bad its not even funny.

And now there's a plan to go to Kalka (near chandigarh) tomorrow for a AIESEC conference and the simplest of decisions- going for this conference here is making me psycho with confusion.And a little sicker also i think ( Its so much more fun when you dont have to take the blame for things........)

Also i refuse to get how someone can have such a bad throat for so long,im not smoking as much as i want to and when i smoke as much as i want to on one day im coughing like a TB patient for the next two..
Annoying .

I think i bad throat is the most irritating for the common ailments