Electricity Cut

The recent electricity cuts in Hyderabad has been creating quite a havoc in many people's lives. I am a victim too. With a lot of expectations, I switch on my laptop which has almost zero battery backup, put on my favorite playlist and start getting ready for the day, except that after few minutes, i.e., at 10 AM, there is no electricity and my laptop is on a standby mode. I sigh, shut the lid and play those songs in my head instead!
Worse happens when electricity cut happens at night, especially during sleep hours. The swarm of mosquitoes, somehow seem to be waiting at some corner of the room, waiting for electricity cut to leave me vulnerable without the Good Knight! They seem to attack even more mercilessly than before. And they force me to fight back too and spill blood, most of it being my blood, from their bodies.
But all is not lost. Because it is the absence that makes us realize the importance of that thing. Besides, these electricity cuts can really boost health of our people, especially kids who won't be able to play X-box type games or computer games, or watch TV, not for very long anyways! Moreover, being in the dark, using torch or candlelights to resume one's daily work can be quite exciting, an unexpected uninvited change from the same monotonous life with blinking tubelights and boring bulb lights.
In my childhood, my friends and I used to play Dark Room where the seeker has to find everybody else in the dark room. This game can now be played as Dark House or Dark Building in case of electricity cuts.
If you haven't tried Dialogue in the Dark, I'm sure you must have got enough experience of it by now as you might have sat and eaten your dinner in darkness. But if you haven't, do try. Its quite an interesting experience and you may enjoy using our other senses to fill in for your visual sense. One of my friends shared her experience and reading that I'm definitely trying it out during next electricity cut.

Monday Blues

Do you suffer from Monday Blues? This is perhaps one of those things that separates me from the "crowd". I look forward to Mondays.

During my school days, I looked forward to saturdays like every other kid but times were different then, during those days I used to live at home. Now, I live away from home, with some friends. Taking forward the lethargic and laid back attitude of college life, I lose every weekend morning to sleep, and then laze around in the afternoons only to have the night time left which I spend watching some TV shows or chatting on facebook. The point I'm trying to make here is, a good, early start of the day is essential! And I get that on weekdays when I have to wake up by 9 AM to go to office. I sip a cup of coffee and get by the day. That way I also end up sleeping pretty early, by around 1ish AM at night.
Another reason I look forward to mondays is because I get to meet people at office. My colleagues and seniors are really cool and we have great working environment. On weekends I only get to meet people during regular Madhapur Toastmasters meeting or other toastmaster's clubs meeting. Other than that, I'm pretty much with myself only. Although I do enjoy watching TV shows at my flatmate's PC which has really cool LCD screen while at the apartment, its watching the TV shows that I've been trying to give up for quite sometime now. And when alone, well, if I have electricity and access to the internet, facebook and online streaming of TV shows becomes the obvious choice. Else, I get lost in my thoughts, make stories in my mind that later I feel too lazy to type out.
I love mondays, it gets me back to office where I learn many new things about SQL server and database systems, and it gives me a sense of purpose in my life. Although the AC sometimes blocks my nose, I think its a small price to pay for all the returns everyday and at the end of every month.

Happy Diwali everyone

Diwali, the festival of lights, the symbol of good over evil. Diwali has always been my favorite festival among all the festivals I know. The house gets cleaned and one wears good/new clothes. The house, the colony, the whole country lights up! I used to eagerly but patiently wait for the Diwali Pooja to get over so that I could start the ceremony of bursting crackers! Within an hour, some guests might come over, and it was even better if they had kids and even more better if they were my friends. But crackers bursting was the most fun. The adult males sometimes smiled, sometimes laughed as we attempted the rockets and bigger bombs! We were Army kids and so Diwali crackers should be kid's play, even for us.

My Diwali crackers bursting days started early in my childhood. I started with sparkles, and dreaded holding a lighted phuljhadi. The sparks just jumped out of it and fell on my arm, freaking me out! I got used to it and I knew that if I can handle phuljhadi, I can handle any firecracker! So I lighted/bursted them all, except the rockets because I heard all kinds of bad stories about it, especially the one that the bottle used to launch the rocket might get tilted and rocket might land in someone neighbor's house! But lighting a bomb and throwing it away, using a candle or agarbatti, I was slowly becoming a pro! And then the inevitable happened... the 10th standard Board Exams. Since 10th Standard, I didn't burst crackers. I somehow lost interest and even today I don't. I'm not being environment friendly, its just that it doesn't make sense to me anymore!

Fast forward to the present. I am typing this post on my laptop. I lit two candles at God's corner, at a corner of our apartment, and prayed (i.e., wished for many things). I also lit few candles in the verandah. My Diwali preparations done! Also, I cleaned my room! And as I sit here I hear some crackers bursting. But the intensity has reduced. Have the crackers reduced or people actually celebrating the festival have reduced? I'd like to believe the former is true. We already light up the whole country with diyas and candles, as for the sound effects, lets use modern technology to simulate cracker's noise and have a pollution free Diwali!

Happy Diwali Everyone. :)

My career plan: Be a superhero

After watching Captain America (2011) movie, I finally understood what I want to be. I want to be a superhero! In fact I do have some skillsets required to be a superhero. I am short in height, like Peter Parker (Spiderman), or Logan (Wolverine) or Steve Rogers (Captain America). I like helping people but only when they ask for help. I am good at keeping a low profile and making excuses about my sudden absence at the most critical times (Superman, Batman, Spiderman). And I love watching superhero movies and reading their comic books.

So I spent my whole Sunday (i.e., yesterday) and devised a detailed set of steps I need to follow to embrace my destiny (career) as a full time superhero!

1. My Superpowers: I'll need something/someone radioactive enough to bite (Spiderman) or hit me (Hulk, DareDevil). So I need to be in US for something like this to happen. That's why I have started preparing to switch job to another company in which I'll get to stay for few months onsite immediately on my joining (I'm ready to settle for less pay for quick onsite opportunity). So if you know of such an opportunity, do let me know. BTW, I'm a software engineer, in case you haven't already figured out.

2. My Love: I'll need to make an exhaustive list of all the girls I've ever had crush on, since school days till today, starting with friends, then acquaintances, then almost strangers. After that I'll have to start meeting them, in the order written in the list because I've observed that once a person becomes a superhero, even if the girl is unaware of it, she'll somehow show more interest in that guy.

3. My Sacrifice: I'll have to lose someone very close to me that should make me swear to eradicate evil and crimes. This will be the hardest of all and quite tricky. But we all make sacrifices for our career. So I've decided, I'll remove one of my closest friends from my facebook friends list. Will pick a chit to decide the name.

4. My uniform: This is what will define me and put me into the character. I love wearing ties (like Doctor Who), so ties are mandatory. I also want to have a cape (Superman, Batman). Rest could be anything but within the limits of decency and should be socially acceptable as I'll be running around and fighting crimes during daytime also.

5. My online presence: Interested volunteers please write your e-mail id in the comments and I may get back to you in case required. This will be voluntary work, no compensation will be given. But c'mon, its the experience that counts! You'd be like my sidekick, a superhero's sidekick! You can include that in your resume and add me as one of your references.

I don't need to tell you where to find me in case you need me... Facebook of course! Just post your request on my wall and I'll get back to you whenever I or my sidekick friend checks Facebook the next time! I shall regularly tweet my activities so that the criminals fear me (sadly only the educated ones with access to internet!) and my friends, the common people feel safe.

So if you find someone running on the streets like a madman wearing a torn shirt and holding his bermudas, then that would be the criminal I'd be chasing.

Price of a human life.

Today when I came back from office, Sushanta told me that Mumbai suffered three blasts today, which killed 8 and injured 70. On facebook I saw some talking about the coincidence of the blasts and Kasab's birthday falling on the same day!

This reminds me of 26/11 attack on Mumbai. Innocent people were massacred. The whole country was caught in a frenzy, a state of shock and fear, anxiety for the well being of people of Mumbai. These incidents pushes me to ask this very basic question: What is the price of a human life? What do these terrorists think is the price of a human life? What do you think it is?

A few times I have tried to imagine myself being shot dead or having a close friend/relative killed by these zombies. And I couldn't imagine it. The fear, the pain is too much to bear! Death of even a single person saddens the heart. And while all this happens, I find myself helpless in this situation, and seriously, there is no worse feeling than feeling desperate yet helpless.

I agree that its not always possible to predict the next bomb blast, the time and the location. But why do these blasts even happen? And why Mumbai, why? And why India suffers from so many terrorists attacks?! Is there a solution?! My head spins yet again as I try to calm myself and make peace with the fact that I have and perhaps will always be a pawn in their game (read: politicians, businessmen, bureaucrats) and if unlucky then may become a victim to one of these meaningless attacks.

Mumbai, you've survived before, you'll survive again. Let us all become invincible and nullify the effect of their attacks by our never say die attitude. But by God how much I feel like slowly sucking life out of that person who pushes these so called "terrorists" to kill innocent people in cold blood.

P.S. - Today I read about the origin of the initiative "Spoorthi" and later learned about the bomb blasts in Mumbai! What a difference in initiatives!

What makes you feel happy

One of my friends gave me this questionnaire one day which had this question: What makes you feel happy?
I replied to him with the filled questionnaire after a week only because I really had to think about this question. I know what makes me laugh, what makes me smile, what delights me, what excites me but I believe happiness is something beyond all this, something grander.

The answer was so simple, being at home makes me happy! But then what if I didn't have a home. Would/Should that take away my happiness? Now a days I live away from home, does that mean I am not or can't be happy? This argument was good enough to compel me to think a little more.

If he had asked me this question few years ago I would probably had said, "dude, if Microsoft hires me I'd be really happy!" Microsoft didn't hire me, so can I never be happy?!

My definition of happiness has been changing over the years but after reading his question, I had to find a way to at least convince myself that there are some things in life that are or which can provide perennial source of happiness. Instead of specific reasons I started searching for general reasons, common things that happen in life. And then it struck me... I always like when someone comes and talks to me, I always enjoy sharing my ideas or opinions with others, I really feel connected with the other person during the face to face conversation. So I replied, "A good conversation". Most of my conversations have been good.

What makes you feel happy?!

Learn to fall

Our karate teacher, Mr. Babji taught some of my friends and me how to fall when someone lifts you on his back and throws you down. He told us that we should try to fall on the back and try to spread the impact across the whole back by rolling a little on the back. He told us that falling on our back causes less harm to the body than trying to break the fall using hands. This simple yet useful suggestion made me realize that in martial arts, as in life, falling is inevitable. That is why there are some techniques, some suggestions to minimize the hurt, the pain when the impact happens.

When someone says, "I got your back buddy", what they really mean can be correlated with the advice Mr. Babji gave us. In fact, isn't it that most of the times when we fall, we fall on our back (metaphorically and in reality) because nobody volunteers to fall, it just happens. While falling on our back, we can't use our hands to break our fall, we can't see how deep we'll find ourselves after its all over, how hard the impact would be, so we basically have no choice. One should just accept this situation but always have someone or something to make it easier for us. Friends, relatives, a pet or some hobbies like movies, music, sports, writing, workout, gardening etc. can be that cushion to make the fall bearable. We must have something to someone to come to, to share our success and seek comfort during disappointments.