A honk and its ramifications

“You could flash your headlights instead?” I casually said, looking up to her, when she honked in an obvious situation where everyone was aware of her approaching. It was around 6PM, still visible but darkness is embracing the place.

However, my remarks on her honking didn’t go well. She got furious, as if I called her an asshole, or even worse! I was speaking in a tone which cannot be considered to be abusive in any manner. She changed her tone, raised her voice - "I learned driving in Delhi, ..." I don't remember the rest. I understand that abusing each other is apiece of cake for delhiites and it comes naturally to them. And all I could remember about the situation is, she wasn't fair in her behavior. It was a verbal abuse, which I didn't expect at all.

All this took place after a running event - her first running event and sure was an exciting event. We had some nice sandwiches after the run. And a beer! I clicked her photos with medals which she wanted to share with her parents.

After having her abusing me, I went blank for a moment. It was a shocker. Consequently, as she drove further, I couldn't give her proper direction – my fault, again. Unfortunately, a sorry couldn’t solve the trouble there. I sank in deep thoughts - and lost there, as usual. But, she went on driving talking to her colleagues on phone telling them what to do. Although she was a good driver, it wasn't that cool! The traffic wasn't heavy until we got on the national highway.

And then there was grave silence in the car!

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I love to see you cry

After a long time, she called me today!!!! Still expects me to talk to her on phone. You know what, this girl managed to get 2000 bucks out of me. To cite the stupidity in that, let me tell you the whole story.

I knew nothing about her, she asked me some bucks and I transferred it to an account that she said her sister's. She never realized I consider myself as a learner -- to be precise, a psychology student with herself as subject. And I was, indeed, learning a lot! Wasn't sure she will return it, nor did I believe that she won't. But I knew later that all she wanted was bucks! Only bucks. It wasn't a pleasant surprise! No surprise at all.

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Salutation to the Dawn - wake up with morning Sun!

Morning is the most beautiful moment of my everyday life. So, sometimes, I wake up with Sun, go to my roof top, and held my thin body against the morning Sun and stand still for some time!

Sometimes, even in the winter, I go up there topless! Fortunately, there's nobody in the apartment I live in, who enjoys the beauty of the dawn! The entire flora and fauna in the world can feel it, I wonder why people around me don't.

When I open my eyes and realize it's early morning and it's so damn cold outside, and naturally inclined to curl up under the blanket, then I think - hang on, what should I do now? Sleep again, or go to the roof top and feel the most beautiful moment of the day? This is the thought, that made those of my days! In the winter, wind sweeps from East and I held myself against the Sun and the wind! Shivering in cold. I shut my mouth tight, drawn inward, clench my fist tight and try to stand firmly on the floor... and to feel the beauty of the Nature.. Out of all sort of nuisance and especially, society's prejudiced offspring... I'm addicted to this Nature.

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Some Random Blurts

How to effectively blurt?  Read on.

A sane can point his finger at someone insane, while the insane, as per the self-proclaimed sane, is occupied with his duties, so obediently, so proactively and committed to it... and he has no time, nor willingness to worry about the sane, or to worry about his own fate.

Well, here I am, wishing for the insanity to find solace and eternal happiness, and to make sense of my life and deeds. 

*Sigh*

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That make me feel great! I mean, the idea of ultimate freedom is, indeed, ultimate. It takes a lot of courage... I haven't heard of many people like Alexander 'supertramp' who went for Ultimate Freedom and celebrated it! But still... I don't understand, why people around me set aside their intellectual abilities, and even their freedom... and rely on Duty which only exists in society... so called civilized society, which leaves us as slaves.

Both of them - duty and obligation, are the ruins of some beliefs that can be only created on top of an assumption that 'they all are idiots.' Oh... I don't mind if you think so... I may be an idiot, but you - society, can't take away my freedom... And they, duty and obligation, want to act as a substitute for my logic, hence to destroy my freedom of expression... and want me to be a puppet... Damn you society...

Aren't you folks afraid of the society? One of my friends once said, life is very simple, we make it a lot more complicated by adding all those dos and don'ts, defined by Society... Perhaps, the reason why many of the creative artists lived their lives away from society is - freedom... a need for freedom... a thirst for freedom... for ultimate freedom.

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Steve Jobs Vs Richard Stallman

I am sure this is not the first time you are reading about Richard Stallman’s remarks on Steve Jobs – “I’m not glad he’s dead, but I’m glad he’s gone.” But that's not why I am posting this. I have seen and heard a lot of buzz comparing Jobs with Edison and even with Einstein! I'd say Stallman is a philosopher, who often talk about his beliefs, as he did before and most of the societal, euphemistic people -- who are more to myths than facts, may call this remark rubbish. It may be, or may be not. But I am glad he spoke out.

Steve Jobs was great and remain great for centuries to come. As far as the computing, technology and it’s adaptability are concerned (from within my circle of concern), I do not think Steve Jobs has done much. I do not use any of the apple products, they're beyond the dream of an average third world country fellow. On the other hand, Richard Stallman helped poor nations adopt to technology and enhanced them and improved their education, science, technology, health care, etc which in turn contribute to development of the nation with GNU project. I am a great dreamer of equality, and not much in to business and money-making.

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How Annie Sullivan taught Helen Keller as Ayn Rand sees it

Try to remember the incommunicable horror of that child[Helen Keller]'s state, communicated by Patty Duke[Actress]: a creature who is neither human nor animal, with all the power of a human potential, but reduced to a sub-animal helplessness; a savage, violent, hostile creature fighting desperately, for self-preservation in an unknowable world, fighting to live somehow with a chronic state of terror and hopeless bewilderment; a human mind (proved later to be an unusually intelligent mind) struggling frantically, in total darkness and silence, to perceive, to grasp, to understand, but unable to understand its own need, goal, or struggle.

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How I was fooled by TCS as a job candidate

One fine day in March 2011, I got a call from TCS - Bangalore. Caller introduced herself as Purva Bhalerao, asked me if I'd be interested in TCS. Being the No.1 Indian IT services company, I didn't have specific reasons to say 'No'. After a few calls and mails, I was asked to appear at white-field office on 16th April at 9AM.

With all documents I was asked to carry, I reached there by 9AM and realized that there are more like me. They gave me a form to fill up all previous employment details. Then I had to call a '1-800' number for my 'ep' number. I queued up in front of the Subhash building at EP-IP. There were about 50 people for all the skills. Once we hit the hall, we had to write our name in a paper based on the skill sets. The process began. I waited for my turn along with one of my colleagues - the only familiar face I found there.

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Two HR recruiters in my life

I had spoken with many recruiters and had some interesting conversations with some of them. It's always interesting for me to talk to a stranger. Let me post two of them here.

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One HR executive, soft-spoken and sweet,  asked me lots of information and hung up. As I turned around, my cell was ringing again.
"Yup," I said answering the call.
"Hey, it's me again, pMan. I need one more information from you." she said, the same HR recruiter.
"Sure," I said.
"Hmmm, are you married?" I was surprised about that question and was well aware of what she really wanted to know.
"Oh No, are you?" I asked her.
"Hmm.. no... alright.. thanks pMan. I will process your resume and let you know." She was in a hurry. It was a nice experience and lesson learnt. It's all about how, and not what, you ask someone when you ask for something. Needless to say, I didn't get another call from her.

She should have asked me 'pMan, I want to know your marital status to process your candidature?' I am sure, I wouldn't have replied anything more than 'single' and no more questions. There are reasons why should we act formal at times. And, never act friendly with strangers. :-)

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Stuck in the box in chop shops

I had a good conversation with some foreign guys about technology, outsourcing etc. Interestingly they never had something great to talk about India. But, more interestingly, whatever they said did make sense. Mediocrity rocks everywhere. The delay in processing anything. To get anything done by officials, it's a tough job.

An American senator called Infosys chopshop. There must be something why he said like that. We must understand he is a senator and was talking to a crowd. He wanted more jobs in US and never want us to grab it. Whatever it is, he wouldn't say the same about IBM, which was a great engineering firm some years ago, now just consultants. Only money matters, everywhere.

What most of the the IT folks are doing here in India is some mediocre tasks. As long as vast numbers of mediocre companies hire mediocre engineers for mediocre jobs, everyone in the system is thrilled - from here. Engineering is the discipline, art and profession of acquiring and applying technical, scientific, and mathematical knowledge to design and implement materials, structures... - this is Wikipedia's definition of Engineering. If it doesn't involve R&D, its not progressive. Mediocrity start to rock in college where we are supposed to acquire skills. We call somebody's source code our project. Awesome!

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Few of my years old sketches found in the bin!

It's a good idea to create a profile on flickr for sketches. Well, I did that y'day. And I was surprised to see the error message flickr showed to me that says I already have an account, I must either change my email id or delete the other account and some blah!

I had no clue of my other account and so, thought to log in just to see if anything is in. I had to reset my password after few unsuccessful attempts. When I logged in, I found some of my old sketches that is uploaded by myself, apparently.

These sketches are drawn several years ago, before 2005 for sure. I have almost forgotten all these sketches. Thanks Flickr!

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Rijesh is my friend

This is sort of what I'd love to do, I'm satisfied with the sketch and how it looks. And, miserably, it could have been better. :(

The whole sketch is done with a single graphite HB pencil - only one. I tried out all my pencils one by one, most of the faber-castells, nothing worked up to my expectations.

Also, this image is the first one I ever used with GIMP, as a beginner I'd say GIMP is awesome! Thanks to F-Spot too, for the final round of touch-ups.

Finally, thank you, for your stay on this page!