Happy New Year

Another year goes by and time to catalogue the happenings in this year.

The year started fine with 7 of us working to make Chaos: The Gaming Carnival as one of the first cross country gaming event of its kind. This pursuit took the first quarter of my year as there was work to be done ranging from arranging of the sponsorships to getting the infrastructure in place. Fortunately, everything fell in place and the event became a huge success with 1200+ participants from across the country. In course of the event, we contacted Raptor Entertainment, a game development major in B'lore where I ended up doing my summer internship and started blogging. Chaos was certainly the highlight of this year for me.

After this, I have been blogging regularly. Hence, nothing new to put up.

10 of us decided to spend the new year camping at Shivpuri, Rishikesh. The place was awesome. The camp was at the banks of river Ganges,serene and peaceful but extremely cold. Played beach soccer and I am still tired. Lit a bonfire at night and had a blast singing at the top of our voices. In the morning, got out of there, came back and slept for 5 hrs flat.

Time to make new year resolutions (and this yr I intend to keep them like every yr)
1. Learn a foreign language (French/German)
2. Lose some weight (I know its a cliche but can't help it)
3. Get to know abt working of stock markets
4. Miscellaneous Resolutions like sleep well, eat healthy, do meaningful reading etc

PS: I forgot to mention that I got placed with Manhattan Associates, Bangalore.

Somewhere I Belong

Time to go back to Roorkee after a memorable stay in Indore and Ahmedabad. Meeting ones family and friends after a long interval made the holidays a worhwhile experience. However, now most of my friends have left Indore for either PG or jobs resulting in me being confined to home for most of the time. Hence, was able to do a lot of reading like Interpreter of Maladies, The Godfather Returns, Elephants can Remember etc.
Now back to Roorkee for the placements. God knows where I'll end up. For the past few years, I have been in Kota, Roorkee, Bangalore with roots in Ahmedabad and Indore. Somehow I feel that each of these places have made their own contributions making me the person I am today. Let's see what'll be the next city in this list.

Signing Off from Indore. However for the bibliophiles, the review blog Literature & Movies is back online with a review on The Godfather Returns. Keeping my fingers crossed that I'll be able to keep it updated throughout the semester too.

There & Back Again

The title is inspired from LOTR and from the fact that I just came back from a one day trip to Delhi and will be going back again this Friday. Once again I have to endure the morning cold of Delhi.
2day I was flipping through the channels and came across a couple of odd things on Aaj Tak:
1. Aaj Tak was asking public opinion on changing the name of Bangalore to some weird South Indian name which I don't even remember. What's more, many ppl answered in affirmative to the change. I haven't got used to Mumbai or Kolkata and I might have to remember one more name.
2. Some time later, Aaj Tak praising Pathan's exploits in 2day's match followed by his rise from rags to riches. I agree that Pathan is probably find of the past few years and has the potential to be a very good allrounder but to remind us of his beginnings after every good performance, every man of the match is a bit too much
3. Finally, the breaking news thing that Aaj Tak does. Every day, Aaj Tak finds some trivial incident, blows it up into something huge as if 9/11 has happened. It bugs me but I guess to run a 24 hr news channel needs to do this kind of thing.
While going to Delhi, I saw a book titled The Godfather Returns. Being a huge Godfather fan, I had to read it at all costs. I have completed 3/4th of the book and surprisingly the book is good. Will discuss more abt it later.
Finally, I saw a trailor for a Sohail Khan produced movie named Fight Club. Now Bollywood has shed even the pretext of changing the name.Now we won't have to try and remember the name of the original movie on seeing the copy.
Real Madrid seems to be the key runner in signing Keane. Perez hasn't learnt from his mistakes. God help Madrid

Home Sweet Home

Back from Ahmedabad and in Indore for the past few days. What have I been doing ? Eating, Sleeping and Reading. I must have gained quite a few kgs but no worries. The mess food will take care of it when I m back in rke.

Let me tell u something abt Ahmedabad. Ahmedabad is my birthplace and most of my relatives stay there. Its a heaven for veggies. Anything u want - South Indian, Punjabi, Continental, Vada Pav and ice-creams. All available at economical prices. Infact I came across an offer that I havent seen newhere in India.

There's a pizza joint named US Pizza in Ahmedabad (franchisee of some US pizza joint). They have an unlimited offer going on. For 99 bucks, u get - soup, salad (from the salad bar with macroni, pasta etc. abt 20 choices), garlic bread, choice of three pizzas and dessert (vanilla with brownie). Stunned ? The best part is now. U can have unlimited quantities of all the above except dessert i.e. unlimited pizza, garlic bread, salad etc. I dont think I have eaten so much at a time. A single meal there sustained me throughout my day.

At first, I thought this was an anamoly. Then I discovered a place offering unlimited lunch package for 70 bucks. Replace above food stuff with curries, rice etc. This offer is fast becoming a norm there.

Back to the usual stuff. Almost everyone has been asking me abt CAT. This yr, CAT decided to go in with a paper tougher than usual with only 90 questions. I haven't yet calculated my score but my instincts say that I could have performed better. So lets wait and watch.

I also saw a show named Games Bond on Star One 2day. Its a television show where two Counter-Strike Clans come and play. For the uninitiated, Counter-Strike (or CS) is a First Person Shooter game with two teams - Terrorist and Counter-Terrorists. Terrorists have to bomb a target by planting explosives and Counter-Terrorists have to stop them. Amazingly realistic physics, weapons (Its the closest u can get to fire an AK 47, a carbine or be the sniper u always want to be) and team co-ordination. IMO, its the best game ever created. Being a CS player myself, I had heard abt the show and decided to c the episode. Incidentally, the episode was the annual finals. The show was crap. The teams indulged in mindless rhetoric like "We r gonna massacre u", "We're too good for u" etc. To top it all, their gameplay wasn't all that impressive. I guess the serial was made by someone who hasn't played CS. Its a bad implementation of a good concept.

Was going to write a lot 2day but had to attend a marriage 2day and am very tired. So going to sleep now. Will post more stuff later.

I'll end with the usual. I read Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies which is a Pulitzer price winner. Its a collection of short stories. Mental Note- I have to upload its review on my other blog. Currently reading Agatha Christie's Elephants Can Remember and Joseph Heller's Catch 22.

Sports - Madrid going thru another crisis. They have sacked another manager, their Sports Director has resigned and team is in disarray. They finished second in their grp meaning they r looking at facing Chelsea/Arsenal/Juventus/AC Milan/Inter Milan in the second round. Guess another trophyless season is looming.

Have to go to Delhi for a day 2morrow. The city is freezing and my train reaches at 6 am. But three and a half years in rke have prepared me well for this. Next post after coming from Delhi.

It has been a long time since my last post. A lot has happened over this month like CAT, Semester Exams, B.Tech Final Yr Presentations etc. I remember redefining rock bottom in one of my previous posts. CAT and Semester Exams kept redefining it repeatedly. Most of my friends also faced similar situation and 2gether we were able to laugh and forget out problems. Everything got even worse with RM performing atrociously at home (they lost 3-0 to Barca). I guess I should prepare for another trophyless season.
Finally everything was over and our VII semester ended.Only one more semester to go. I remember that when I was in XII, our teachers told us repeatedly that we were going to face the world after XII. I was never able to comprehend the meaning of these words. Now with only 5 more months b4 we face the world (this time, it seems for real), it scares me whenever I think abt it.
Currently, in Ahmedabad to meet my cousins and get some good food. I guess the next post will be from Indore after abt a week.

Life it seems, will fade away.....

The starting lines of my favourite Metallica song Fade to Black. This song is about the mental state of a person about to commit suicide. I am reminded 2day of this song more than ever, the reason being that a III yr student of my department committed suicide. I should mention that I didn't know the junior personally but incidents like this are shocking. Another disturbing fact is that this is a second such incident in the same semester with both students being from III yr and of the same department. Rumors going around say that the cause was that they had back papers in one or more papers but this seems like an extremely flimsy reason to me. Can't think of the mental state of a person who can even contemplate such a drastic step. I guess no reason is good enough for this.
Another thing that I am reminded of is a scene from the movie Saransh. Anupam Kher tries to take his own life but is saved. His wife tells him that Taking one's own life is the final act of a coward to which he replies that Who can be more brave than the person who decides to take this step. I don't know who I would agree with.

Life it seems, will fade away

Drifting further every day

Getting lost within myself

Nothing matters no one else

I have lost the will to live

Simply nothing more to give

There is nothing more for me

Need the end to set me free

Things are not what they used to be

Missing one inside of me

Deathly lost, this can’t be real

Cannot stand this hell I feel

Emptiness is filling me

To the point of agony

Growing darkness taking dawn

I was me, but now he’s gone

No one but me can save myself,

but it’s too late

Now I can’t think, think why I should even try

Yesterday seems as though it never existed

Death greets me warm, now I will just say good-bye

Sachin shines, Madrid disappoint

Sachin's back ! This should be the headline of the week. Everything is well if Sachin plays well. Nobody curses the system, Govt. policies etc. Everywhere, cricket & Sachin are being discussed.

However, I m not a big cricket fan. I used to be cricket fanatic in school but not now, I just can't stand 10 hours of cricket in a day. Although I can see a good test series like the Ashes, India-Pakistan, India-Australia (in India) etc but ODIs are a strict no. Test cricket is the true test of a player's skill. I loved to see Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis operating in tandem and destroying the opposition. I hope Sachin continues this form into the test series as well.

The void left by cricket has been filled by soccer and F1. It was a miserable week as Real Madrid suffered two defeats in 3 days. I was unlucky enough to see one of them Madrid v/s Valencia.

Madrid has already lost Ronaldo & Baptista to injuries (I m still cursing Rosenberg for that). With Zidane missing a penalty (his first for Madrid) and being uninspirational throughout, it was a poor overall performance. However, there were two positives from the match :

1. Sergio Ramos is a pretty good defender. He made a few mistakes but as he becomes mature and adepts to the team, he should improve and become invaluable

2. Robinho. In this case, comparisons to Pele seem justified. Robinho is a gr8 dribbler and dribbled pass 4 Valencia defenders on two or three occasions. Although, he needs to work on his finish but that will come in time.

Now Barca is a point ahead of Madrid. Madrid has already lost an astounding 4 matches in La Liga already. Hope we are not looking at another trophyless season here.

One month to CAT

Signs that an examination is just around the corner (atleast in IITR)

1. The weather will become just the ideal weather. Moderate temperature and maybe rainfall

2. Someone will get a book or a movie that u were looking for the past few yrs. Worst case- Someone will get a TV show, a sitcom like Friends or a Soap like Orange County which u cannot stop watching before completing

3. There will be no electricity at night when u start studying.

After a long absence, I m back. Many factors contibuted to this absence and time is not one of them. As I had holidays, I had lots of time but as IITR doesn't have internet in the rooms, blogging means coming 2 floors down to the bhawan CC and waiting for ur turn. This is too much work for a lazy guy in festive spirits and holiday mood.

Just next day after holidays, we had our mid-sems. 5 papers in 2 days. Sheer torture. It never ceases to amaze me that after every exam, I have to redefine rock-bottom. I mean rock-bottom should be an absolute term but I discovered that it isn't.

The question after mid-sems is what to do to get over them. I took one night off playing Counter Strike with a bunch of friends from 9 pm to 7.30 am. That was gr8 fun.

I remember promising that this post will not be a depressing one with the festive season going on. Hence, no further discussions regarding TS, CAT and studies.

I used the 10 days holidays to re-read Lord of The Rings. Over 1000 pages but certainly the book of the century. There is a law that Books are always better than the movies based upon them. So if u think that LOTR the movie was superb, read the book. Although there are many differences in between the book and the movies, I would like to point out a major one. In the book, Gandalf is the lead character with Aragorn being lost without him. The character of Aragorn acquires king like qualities as the book progresses. In the movie, the character of Gandalf is a bit overshadowed by that of Aragorn. Maybe because its risky to have an old wizard as the lead as compared to a young king.

On the movie front, saw Raging Bull *ing Robert De Niro in an oscar winning role. The movie is intense but a bit slow. I guess biopics are like this only. However, I prefer Al Pacino over Robert De Niro. Robert De Niro is good as a cold, calculating character like Vito Corleone in Godfather II. Al Pacino rules in roles requiring passion and communicating through eyes. I can't forget this dialogue at the end of the movie The Recruit when he looks at Colin Farrell and says You gotta give me one thing. I am a scary judge of talent.

2day there was a lively discussion between two of my friends abt why ppl pretend or why ppl fake throughout their life. The discussion started at the lunch table and continued after that too. I was a spectator throughout as I hate talking while eating. The inference was that usually ppl are so bound by the social system that they are unable to do what they really want to do. They have to keep delaying working on their passions till its too late. Hope I don't end up like this.

I just remembered that I mentioned an interview in my last post. The interview was for the post of Co-convener in our Techfest - Cognizance. When I got to the interview board, they politely informed me that the post was taken (I didn't get the logic behind it) and they would interview me for the post of Event Manager. The interview was a farce lasting only 2 mins. This might sound like a loser lamenting that he lost out because of a conspiracy.But as I am not doing nething for ne event next semester, maybe I could find time to do something which I wanter to do for a long time like Learn French/German or Guitar.

PS: Just tried posting comments on few blogs. Blogspot has started this thing of word verification. It is such a problem as sometimes the words are clustered 2gether making it difficult to distinguish the letters. Its almost like a Psychology Test in which u see what u want to see. One day I got lm with l and m so close that I couldn't decide whether it was l & m or h & n. Not to say that I failed the word verification. Made me think that am I some kind of online bot.

Can't Think of a Title for this one

How would you feel if u see 5 months of ur patient work being destroyed inch by inch within 15 minutes in front of ur own eyes. It would tear you apart from within. I had the misfortune to have this terrible experience.5 months of hardwork, toil and satirical remarks from friends all coming to nought. Before you run away with ur imagination, let me specify the incident I m talking about. The incident being discussed is me getting a haircut.

About six months ago, I decided that I'll try a long haired look. After getting a haircut on April 16 (I remember the date because it was my bro's birthday next day and he asked me to get a haircut), I started this quest. Month by month, inch by inch I could see my quest becoming a success. There were many detractors with the usual statement being - This doesn't suit u or Dude! Get a haircut. But I liked the feel of having the long haired look even though it meant regular baths, combing hair every time u leave hostel and continuous barbs.

Then disaster struck. I had to appear for an interview. Firstly, I thought that I'll go without pretending and being who I am (that's what you are supposed to do in an interview) but then realized that the long hair might be a hurdle in clearing the interview. Hence, I had to go for a haircut and see six months of my hard work come apart in front of my eyes.

For the interview, I had to dress up in formals. With short hair and in formals, I was almost unrecognizable from my look of a day ago. The remark that stung me the most after that was a friend saying : Now you look human.

Now head banging to GnR, Maiden, Metallica etc no longer has the same fun as it used to be. Head banging reminds me that finally our campus has its own rock band "Drop Dead". Just last week we had their two performances with gr8 numbers like Alive (Pearl Jam), Fear of The Dark (Iron Maiden), Megalomaniac (Incubus), Boulevard of Broken Dreams (Green Day) etc. Head banging was so much fun then with shoulder length hair.

Now I have 10 days of Dussehra holidays. I can't go home as I have CAT prep and the institute authorities have very kindly decided to schedule our exams the next day after holidays. But with most of my friends staying back with the same reasons, it shouldn't be that bad. Seems I won't be able to have home-cooked food before Dec.

Coming to food, the student's council for mess decided not to serve bread in the mess for one month to break the monopoly of bread vendors (some price hike or something). To add to it, we are being served daliya three days a week. I don't get this. Starving students to break the monopoly of bread vendors seems to be some modern day version of Satyagrah

It has been a long post but the coming to the most integral part. Movies. I say Hazaaron Khwahishen Aisi. I found it to be an abstract movie with interpretation of conduct of characters varying from person to person based on his/her perception. But it is a good movie.

With Real Madrid making a strong comeback, the next week should be a perfect one.

Just One Last Thing : My neighbour, Bong has become a zombie since his eons old computer (having the processing power of a modern day calculator) has finally stopped working. Now he roams the corridor on our floor and enters the first open room. Once he enters a room, the room occupant is sure to lose atleast half an hour of whatever he is doing. With me being his neighbour, I suffer the most. But being a good guy (don't smile), I don't mind his habbit.

Calvin & Hobbes

Convocation Day

Finally, the day most ppl dream of since entering an institute was here. The fifth annual convocation of IIT Roorkee. Time to see the seniors I haven't seen for the past semester and some I might not be able to meet for a long time. The nostalgic stories of fun, pranks etc and time to move on and leave this place for one final time.

Some juniors and friends asked me whether I will come back to attend my convocation. This question made me think. I agree that Roorkee as a place hasn't been good. Horrible weather, long classes, lots of bureaucracy, no social life etc. But are these the most important factors in deciding abt a place ? In Rke, I met lots of the ppl who changed me for better or for worse. I had the most fun I think I could have had with friends. I remember a quote I read somewhere "Experiences can be good or bad but memories are always sweet". The summary being, I would love to come back for my convocation if possible and meet once again those ppl.

I was celebrating as Convocation meant one extra day of holiday or so I thought. The classes of Wednesday have been shifted to this Saturday. This means a single day weekend. This is pure torture.

I just received a story forwarded to me by one of my friends. Its a long one but very good one at that. Hope u like it as much as I did.

In Brooklyn, New York, Chush is a school that caters to learning disabled children. Some children remain in Chush for their entire school career, while others can be main-streamed into regular schools. At a Chush fund-raising dinner, the father of a Chush child delivered a speech that would never be forgotten by all who attended. After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he cried out, "Where is the Perfection in my son Shaya? Everything God does is done with perfection. But my child cannot understand things as other children do. My child cannot remember facts and figures as other children do. Where is God's perfection?" The audience was shocked by the question, pained by the father's anguish and stilled by the piercing query. "I believe," the father answered, that when God brings a child like this into the world, the perfection that he seeks is in the way people react to this child." He then told the following story about his son, Shaya:

One afternoon, Shaya and his father walked past a park where some boys Shaya knew were playing baseball. Shaya asked, "Do you think they will let me play?"

Shaya's father knew that his son was not at all athletic and that most boys would not want him on their team. But Shaya father understood that if his son was chosen to play it would give him a comfortable sense of belonging.

Shaya's father approached one of the boys in the field and asked if Shaya could play. The boy looked around for guidance from his teammates. Getting none, he took matters into his own hands and said "We are losing by six runs and the game is in the eighth inning. I guess he can be on our team and we'll try to put him up to bat in the ninth inning."

Shaya's father was ecstatic as Shaya smiled broadly. Shaya was told to put on a glove and go out to play short center field. In the bottom of the eighth inning, Shaya's team scored a few runs but was still behind by three. In the bottom of the ninth inning, Shaya's team scored again and now with two outs and the bases loaded with the potential winning run on base, Shaya was scheduled to be up. Would the team actually let Shaya bat at this juncture and give away their chance to win the game?

Surprisingly, Shaya was given the bat. Everyone knew that it was all but impossible because Shaya didn't even know how to hold the bat properly, let alone hit with it. However, as Shaya stepped up to the plate, the pitcher moved a few steps to lob the ball in softly so Shaya should atleast be able to make contact.The first pitch came and Shaya swung clumsily and missed. One of Shaya's teammates came up to Shaya and together they held the bat and faced the pitcher waiting for the next pitch.

The pitcher again took a few steps forward to toss the ball softly toward Shaya. As the pitch came in, Shaya and his teammate swung at the ball and together they hit a slow ground ball to the pitcher. The pitcher picked up the soft grounder and could easily have thrown the ball to the first baseman. Shaya would have been out and that would have ended the game.

Shaya ran towards second base as the runners ahead of him deliriously circled the bases towards home. As Shaya reached second base, the opposing short stop ran to him, turned him in the direction of third base and shouted,"Run to third." As Shaya rounded third, the boys from both teams ran behind him screaming, "Shaya, run home." Shaya ran home, stepped on home plate and all 18 boys lifted him on their shoulders and made him the hero, as he had just hit a "grand slam" and won the game for his team.

"That day," said the father softly with tears now rolling down his face, "those 18 boys reached their level of God's perfection."

Funny how simple it is for people to trash different ways of living and believing and then wonder why the world is going to hell.

Funny how I can be more worried about what others think of me than what I think of me

Murphy's Law

Murphy's Law states that

"If anything has to go wrong, it will go wrong at the worst possible time and in the worst possible sequence"

I suppose everyone can identify with this statement atleast once in his/her lifetime. The past two weeks have proved me that this is the most applicable law in day-to-day life.

Firstly, exams. Somehow profs are always able to find the portion I am not so good at and ask questions from it. The second part of the statement also cames true with 5 papers in 2 days. All the tough papers are on the first day and the easier ones on the second day.

The exams ended on Thursday. Thoughts of relaxing and watching some soccer crossed my mind but ESPN/Star Sports have stopped live telecast of La Liga (Spanish Football). With Real Madrid losing three matches in a week, my friends are not losing any opportunity to make fun of the Galacticos.

Continuing with sports, tennis has gathered many new supporters here with Sania fever spreading around. Federer was invincible as ever even when he played below par. Hewitt and Agassi both could take only one set each off him. Can't wait for Australian Open to start.

On the positive side, I watched the complete Lord of The Rings again. Somehow, we got an uncut version with one and a half hour of extra footage. Enough reason to watch the trilogy again. More than 10 hours later, I realized that LOTR is one of those rare movies in which eveything is perfect from casting, dialogues, cinematography,story, direction etc. Now I am back to reading LOTR again.

CAT preparations are going on at a decent pace. Quantitative Abilities is proving to be my nemesis in Mock CATs and I am working on it.

Time to go back and mug up some Quants and listen to some music.

Food for Thought !

The election time is over and we have a new General Secy (Fortunately from our floor). Once again ten days of promises, permutations & combinations and double crossing comes to end. Just hope that the new team can put aside their differences and work for the good of the institute & the students.
I read a post on freedom on my friend's blog (http://comingback2life.blogspot.com). He has raised some questions abt the current generation taking freedom for granted and abt patriotism. Maybe the current generation doesn't feel abt it because we never had to fight for it and hence, we take freedom for granted.
Still continuing with the agenda of seeing good, meaningful Hindi movies. Saw Mr & Mrs Iyer. Its a very nice movie abt how humanity in people comes to the fore in face of communalism with both Rahul Bose and Konkana Sen being perfect in their roles.
Another movie that I saw again was Swades, certainly one of my favourite Hindi movies of recent times and the best performance by Shahrukh Khan till date. The movie always makes me think abt lots of stuff. Let me explain it by an example.
When I was a child, I used to watch BQC regularly. In one of the episodes, the guest personality was Mr Mani shankar Aiyar, current Petroleum Minister of India. Derek asked Mr Aiyar that in India, parents tell children that politics is a bad profession and tell them never to become a politician. To this Mr Aiyar calmly replied that this is the problem. If good men don't go for politics and bad ppl do, u can't expect politics to be good.
Isn't this quotation aptly applicable even now. Many of my friends are appearing for GRE and going abroad for further studies with an excuse that India doesn't have good enough facilities. But if the best people turn away from their responsibilities, how can anyone expect India to become great ?
This is a problem which is visible all around us. For example, Thomso IIT Roorkee's cultural fest. The current team for Thomso is easily the second best because the best people didn't go for any posts. It seems that Cognizance, our techfest will also suffer a similar fate. Do we still have the right to criticize ppl who work for these events ?
Neways, enuff of heavy stuff for now. Hope next post will be a light one.

Books, Movies & Poli

I decided to see some critically acclaimed movies that I had put on the backburner in the last sem because of their duration or because I wasn't in a mood for the heavy stuff. The list also includes two Hindi movies, so here is what I thought of them

The Godfather II

I loved The Godfather but its not the best movie I have ever seen. The reason maybe that the novel was much much better than the movie and comparisons were inevitable. Godfather II has Robert De Niro playing younger Marlon Brando (the part from the book) and Al Pacino as Michael Corleone trying to cement his place. Robert De Niro won an oscar for his performance. The nasal, reasoning voice of Marlon Brando has been portrayed flawlessly by him. I still can't fathom why Al Pacino missed out on an oscar as I couldn't find nething to separate the two. The last scene where he is seen brooding & remembering the family dinner when he didn't want to become involved in the family business is just superb

Black

A long time since I sw an Indian movie like this. B4 this, I thought that Amitabh had given his best performance till date in Deewar (the old one) but I think this performance rates right with it. The role of a mentor for a mentally-challenged girl makes you realize that how much difference in one's life a mentor can make. I don't think that anybody else can come even close to challenging Rani & Amitabh for the awards this yr.

Masoom

I read the novel - Man, Women & Child by Eric Segal in the summers and decided to see Shekar Kapur's movie. Absolutely gr8 songs, presentation and performances. I guess its the only movie in which I liked Jugal Hansraj.

Next up is Muqbool, as soon as I can get it. In terms of books, still reading A Beautiful Mind.

Its time for politics in IITR as Students' Affair Council is to be formed. I see people involved in politics and can't help by wonder. Quite a few of these ppl, criticize Indian politicians accusing them of being two-faced, profit minded etc. But when it comes to them, they do the same double-crossing, buying votes etc. Another thing that comes to my mind from this. I know that ppl involved in various events bamboozle money. Same ppl are the most vocal in GDs abt politicians being corrupt. Can't understand this hypocrisy. I guess, somewhere I am thankful that Indian politicians are illiterate because a corrupt, illiterate politician is always better than a corrupt, literate one.

I think I am getting too senti abt this but this is what I feel. Neways, its raining 2day and I have a three day weekend. What else could I ask for ?

What's In The Name ?

I m back after a long lay off. I hope I shall be able to be more regular in my posts now onwards.

Since the day that I can remember, my name has been one of the unique ones. I mean how many of you have ever heard of a guy named Supriy? Since my school days, ppl have been making unnecessary additions & deletions from my name. The most common variations have been Supriya and Supriyo. There have been some weird combos in which even I failed to recognize that I m the person being referred to like Supbix Shakh, Surya and the latest one in the voters' list of my hostel Suopriy. The last straw was when I googled for Supriy Shah and google asked me "Do you mean Supriya Shah"

In my school days, this used to annoy me a lot with my classmates making fun of me. Slowly, slowly I came to terms with my name and stopped being annoyed.

Some of you might be wondering, why I am blabbering so much abt my name. The most weird case happened on our journey from Indore to Roorkee. There were 4 of us and tkts had been reserved by Kaddy. The ticket attendant came, checked the tkt and asked where is the girl Supriya. We assumed that it was the usual mistake that ppl make but he refused to believe us. On closer scrutiny, we found that the tkt itself had name of Supriy as Supriya mentioned as 21 yr old female. The tkt attendant refused to believe the truth and I would have been penalised for impersonating myself. However, we showed him my insti id and he accepted the error. I wanted to kill Kaddy at that point of time.

I guess that was not the last incident of its type and there will be many more to come. But hey, uniqueness has a price to pay.

In the meantime, I was able to read HP VI on the day of its release and also To Kill A Mockingbird. There have been many more interesting cases too but that for the next time.

Friends, Cards and Kasper

I realized one fact of life about a year ago. I feel closer to my friends from school days than most of my friends from either Kota or Roorkee. Let me clarify this statement in the subsequent paragraphs

I spent my whole school life in the same school. That means I spent 14 yrs in the same institution. In my school days, I was a lot different from what I am now in almost all things e.g my thinking, my hobbies, my perceptions to name a few. Things started to change when I went to Kota to prepare for JEE leaving the security of home. After that, I ended up in Roorkee for my studies. Throughout the course of my studies, I made friends and continue to do this even now.

Most of my friends from school remained in Indore and developed a different kind of personality. This resulted in a difference of attitude towards things, different interests, different perceptions etc. For example, most of my friends are not soccer or F1 fans, almost none of them listen to rock music, read a lot or surf the net. However, my friends from Roorkee and Kota share my interests, perceptions etc. Logically speaking, my comfort level with my friends from Roorkee & Kota should be higher than the one I share with my friends from school.

However, as I mentioned I still feel more comfortable around friends from school. The peculiar thing is that I don't differentiate between friends i.e. all my friends mean the same to me.
I don't know abt opinion of other ppl on this matter. Plz share ur opinion on this & also the reason behind it.

About the second part of the title. On Tues night, eight of us decided to meet at a friend's place for 3 or 4 hrs. The get together started a bit late at 10 pm. What is the best way to pass time when friends are 2gether ? Cards. We brought out the cards and started to play Flash

At 1:30 AM, we packed up and decided to leave. But my family forbid me to travel at so late an hour and so did families of most the friends too. Hence, we ended up playing cards for the whole night :D. It ended at 7:30 AM in the morning. To sum it up, it was a gr8 way to get to meet the friends and spend time with them (Although, I am pretty much sure that my family shall disagree with me)

Finally, to all the fans of our Kaspers. Now that I am in Indore, I get to surf the net late at night and my FG, Kaddy does that in the daytime. We don't get to chat enough to prepare a Kasper. Sensing ur disappointment, we decided to meet in person to compose the next masterpiece. However, we found that its not possible to compose a Kasper in person. We couldn't do it inspite of our best efforts ! Guess Chat Poetry can be done only thru messenger.

We apologize for letting you down. Once our colleges start, we won't be able to do so even more. Hence, our next Kasper could be delayed by a year. But we'll be back. We promise. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the programmers of Yahoo Messenger without whom, Kaspers wouldn't have been possible.

Indore Diary

It has been a week since I have been in Indore. If I would have landed up straight at Roorkee from Bangalore, the culture shock might have been a little too much to bear. Indore is serving as a middle ground to ease the shock.
Our last night in Bangalore was the most awesome night of the stay. Office guys took us out for dinner and we had a blast. That was when I found out that 3 ppl from our office belonged to a Rock Band. One was bass guitarist, one vocals and one lead guitarist. I am so glad that we went to Bangalore instead of trying to remain at home.
Life at home has been decent at best. Firstly, my friends had seen all the movies and so I was left with no company for movies. Also, most of my friends have graduated now and were trying for admissions in respective PG courses with no time to spare. Soccer season has not yet started and so no matches.
But all is not that bleak. I get to spend time with my family, I get gr8 food and can fight with my younger bro.
After a week of lethargy, I finally got to see Sarkar. It’s a pretty good movie. In case any of you are interested, I will review it pretty soon on Literature & Movies blog (Link in my blog roll).
I got to see a F1 race 2day after a loooong time. McLaren have truly overtaken Ferrari as the leaders of F1. I know that Renault & Alonso are leading McLaren and Kimi but still I have a feeling that this year is McLaren’s year. Alonso has won 5 races this year. In the past two races, Kimi was punished by 10 positions in qualifying but still finished on the podium. In one race, there was some problem with Kimi’s tyres and he had to retire when he was leading Alonso by a comfortable margin. Add to this the fact that McLaren were favourite to win the US Grand Prix and it is clear that it is fate which is against Kimi.
Anyways, 2day the winner was Montoya. Since I started following F1, I have maintained that Montoya is one of the best drivers on the circuit but has never been able to do justice to his talent. 2day he proved his talent by leading Alonso for most of the race. Hope he continues in the same form.
I know this has been a pretty arbit post with me jumping between topics. Its more of a diary entry than a blog. Hope u ppl don’t mind.

Au Revoir Bangalore

First Impression is the Last Impression

This has never been true in my case. Hence I don't judge people based on first impressions. But I made this mistake with Bangalore
I criticized Bangalore in one of my posts. I was new to place, a bit apprehensive and didn't know neplace to get good North Indian food. Add to this the chronic traffic jams and one ways, I concluded Bangalore was overhyped.
But Bangalore grows on you. Give it time and the only one place in India where u would like to settle permanently is Bangalore.
With time (6 weeks to be precise), I have fallen in love with this city. The positives that this city has far outweighs the negatives.
Firstly,the people.Everyone I met in Bangalore can be described in one word, cool. The office guys (Vidyuth, Sandeep, Jayanth, Ravi, Akshay, Aashray, Keshav, Joel and anybody I might have missed) with whom I could discuss movies, rock music, books,soccer, F1 and computer games (obviously) as easily as with my friends top the list. The young crowd means there is an informal atmosphere everywhere ( Ever worn a GnR/Cobain T-shirt to office ?).
Imagine spending summers under covers with fan turned off. That's Bangalore for you in summers. With temperature hovering around the 25 degree mark in May-June, u always feel fresh and full of enthusiasm & energy.
The only negative that Bangalore has is traffic. Jams are a usual occurance and every other road is a One Way. One ways should be renamed as Bangalores.
So what did I gain from Bangalore. Lots of things, namely
1. Got to know lots of gr8 people
2. Met people I had not met for 2 yrs or more (Rahul, Bhawani, Arun, RK Verma Sir)
3. Made my first e-mail pal
4. Developed the new hobby of Blogging :D
5. Got back in touch with school friends through chatting
6. Bought 35 books (My family is gonna be mad at me)
7. Discovered a FG (Fellow Genius)
8. Me & my FG invented and developed the latest genre of poetry, Kasper (my crowning achievement from this place)
and ofcourse I learnt game development (which was the primary reason for me coming here).
All this Bangalore experience would have been a waste without two people - Joshi & Raghav.
Joshi was with me in all the experiences. I can't thank him enough for that. He also woke me in the morning for office ;) or else... Thanks Joshi for everything
Raghav, well if he wasn't there, me and Joshi might have been the only two ppl and would have gone tired of each other :D.

Time to sign off from Bangalore and go back to IIT R for the last step of that journey. Au Revoir Bangalore. The new title of my Blog is as relevant to IIT R as it is for Bangalore

Book Meme

Meme - an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture

One of my friends on LiveJournal www.livejournal.com/~demonicdiaries tagged me to do this.
So here goes

As far as I can remember, I have always been a voracious reader. When I was a kid, I used to read comics (Nagraj,Dhruv stuff) and some classics. After clearing JEE, I had a month with nothing to do. At that time I discovered English novels and did not look back. I have read anything and everything that came my way ranging from Sidney Sheldon to Ayn Rand. Now I am moving towards more serious reading like GOST, Catch 22, To Kill a Mocking Bird etc and autobiographies.

Total No. of Books I Own: hmm around 35 (my own). Not counting comics & books owned by family members

Last Book I Bought: 27 books from B'lore :)). Last One is Straight From Dell

Last Book I Read: Dude, Where is My Country by Michael Moore

Book Currently Reading: Contact by Carl Sagan

Five Books That Mean A Lot to Me:
The Godfather by Mario Puzo
Without doubt, the best book I've read. Couldn't keep it down. Had to complete it in a single seating. Missed classes but who cares. The lines, the personalities, the incidents. Everything is mindboggling

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
A book about dreaming and believing & following your dreams. Philosophy with a difference

Atlas Shrugged & The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
Books about living for urself and standing up for what u think is right. Unforgettable characters like Howard Roark, Dagny Taggart, Fransisco D' Anaconia, Hank Rearden

Love Story by Erich Segal
130 page book touching u deep inside.

Sherlock Holmes
The series that got me hooked to reading. Still the best detective reads of all times

Harry Potter Series
Preference List - IV, II, III, I, V


Noteworthy mentions :
Harry Potter Series(IV,II,III,I,V)
(Pure fun and enjoyment. Anybody, who won't want to live in that world of magic ? )
7 Habbits of Highly Effective People
Chicken Soup for the soul
Lord of the Rings
Michael Crichton books (Sphere, Timeline,Jurassic Park, The Lost World)
1984, Animal Farm
John Grisham(The Partner, The Rainmaker, The Firm)

Wish List : Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Five People You Meet in Heaven, A Beautiful Mind, Pride and Prejudice

I tag everyone who reads this to put this on their own blog.

Third feather in our cap

Firstly, let me apologize to our fans for the delay in our next composition. Instead of wasting our energies on all kinds of possibilities, we have decided to concentrate on writing 6 line poems. A 14 line poem is referred to as a sonnet and hence we had to find a name for this new genre of poetry. We decided to keep our modesty and humility aside for this one (how many times in ur life do u get to name a work on art on urself ?) and name it on ourselves. So henceforth, we will refer to our creations i.e. 6 line chat poetry as Kasper (Kaddy + Super). here goes our next creation

On a rainy day in June.

Thinking since afternoon

Seeing Joshi the baboon

Looks of a cartoon

Beware of this moroon
Has evolution happened too soon ?

Signed

Kaddy & Super

Your invaluable comments on helping us to further improve upon our skills (although as a dialogue in our fav movie goes Perfection is difficult to improve upon) are most welcome.

PS: For those of u who think we misspelled moron, it has been done on purpose to keep the rhyming scheme. Gr8 poets do it all the time. :)

Disclaimer: All characters and names in this work of art are purely fictional. Any resemblance to a person living or dead is fully coincidental. :))

Fate/Luck/Coincidences

Every man has but one destiny - The Godfather

Is the world governed by some supreme power and the everything is predecided with 'luck' being used to enforce its will ? Or actions of a person decide how his life is going to shape up? I guess everyone thinks of these questions sometimes.

People believing in the former hypothesis are sometimes referred to as fatalists i.e. people believing in fate while the believers of the latter hypothesis can be classified as atheists. Some of you might be wondering about the sudden change of mood in my blogs from comic/humor to philosophy. I will tell u the reason behind this

I prepared for JEE in Kota as a student of Bansal Classes. However, I somehow also came in touch with R K Verma Sir and Dr B V Rao, teachers of Physics & Chemistry respectively at Resonance, Bansal's rival class. Both of them are very good teachers (perhaps in the top three of their teaching field) but more importantly they are one of the best people I have met. I did not study much with Verma sir but the little time I spent with me left indelible impressions about his personality especially his modesty and simplicity.

I know this narration is getting a bit lengthy but jsut bear with me for some more time

In my I year at IITR, I came in contact with Arun Sharma. We didn't seem to have anything in common but somehow we just clicked off. We used to spend quite some time 2gether. At the end of I year, he reappeared in JEE and left Roorkee for Kharagpur and we lost contact.

One night, I am just loitering in landmark in Forum (A mall in B'lore) and am stunned to see Verma sir standing just outside the shop. It had been 3 years since I had seen him and I had to be sure. But once I was sure, I had to go up to him and talk to him. Needless to say, he didn't remember me but still it felt good to just be able to talk to him even if for a few minutes.

Yesterday, i.e. Sunday I am just relaxing in my room reading a novel and there is a call from an unknown no. I pick it up (free incoming) and a voice from there says "May I speak with Supriy Shah". I was not used to being talked to like this on phone and replied "Yeah, Supriy here". And the voice says "This is Arun, I m doing my training in IISc Bangalore. Can we meet ?" The feeling cannot be put down in words but we ended up meeting each other and started up right after where we left 2 yrs earlier.

After these two examples,back to the original question. Fatalists will say Makhtub:It's written while atheists will say that all this was just coincidence. This is the real difference between fatalists and atheists other than their beliefs, isn't it ?

So let's have a discussion on this. I am not exactly a fatalist but I trust that there is something beyond normal human understanding that plays a pivotal role in outcome of the events. Some might call it luck, others might call it coincidence but I guess everyone believes that life cannot be defined totally using Mathematical equations or principles of Physics. Let's hear ur side too !

Bond Gets Shock of His Life

For the uninitiated, we at IIT Roorkee have nick names for almost everyone. These nick names might be twisted names, describing certain aspect of the personality or may be just random e.g. Tarun Bansal being named Bond.
Yestrday, Bond tried to act like Bond by coming online on YM but being invisible. I can't imagine the shock he had when I sent him an IM. He started like "How did you know I was here". I told him intution but he didn't buy that. He kept asking and I kept deflecting the question. Finally, I had to tell him, how I did it? The solution was so absurdly simple that he must have been kicking himself as he lost a treat over it. :))
On another note, I completed Veronika decides to Die by Paulo Coelho. Its a very good book and almost as good as The Alchemist. I shall be putting up its review soon. After this, I have started Dude, Where is my country by Michael Moore. Its another of Moore's satire on George Bush's presidency with chapters named like "How to stop Terrorism ? Stop Being a Terrorist".
Bangalore having a very good market of second hand books has spoiled me. I plan to get few CEO books as well as some books I've wanted for as long as I can remember e.g. Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy.

Completion of III weeks at B'lore

Well, another weekend comes up. This weekend, Ankit was going to be in Bangalore and stay with us.
On Saturday (we have a half day)we are working in the office. There is no electricity since morning but the UPS was standing up. We leave for lunch, come back and voila! the UPS backup is out. So no electricity and we ppl in the office start chatting while we wait for electricity. Swapped stories about college life, music interests, movies etc. There was no electricity till 3.30 and we left.
Back home, I continued reading Executive Orders by Tom Clancy. Its the biggest book I've ever read at 1358 pages and I shall be putting up its review on
http://superpassions.blogspot.com
Baveja arrived in the evening and we all went to MG Road to loiter around. There were a total of 5 of us and we had fun. Afterwords we came back and all 5 stayed in our room only. At night, we played cards till 4 am and went to sleep.
Sunday morning, we woke up at 12 noon, got ready by 1.30 and went for lunch. After lunch, went to Raghav's room because he has a TV and DVD player. Watched Munnabhai MBBS before leaving for The Forum to catch Mr & Mrs Smith show at 7.30 pm
Mr & Mrs Smith is easily one of the worst English movies I've seen. Except Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, there is nothing in the movie. Absurd storyline, lame direction and everything against it. So give it a skip unless u are a diehard Brad Pitt/Angelina Jolie fan. Afterwords, ate at Pizza Hut and everyone went back their ways except Ankit & Sumit who stayed with us. Ankit will be with us till Wednesday and Sumit didn't want to go back so late as he lives at another corner of Bangalore. At night, watched Dil Chahta Hai on Ankit's laptop and went to sleep. Unfortunately, I ended up sleeping on the floor for past two days in a row. I managed to get my hands on Dude, Where is my country by Michael Moore. Will post the review of this book as soon as I complete it on the same blog that has been mentioned above.

PS: Bad news. Came to know that Bong was diagnosed with viral fever and typhoid. So he's been hospitalized in Hyderabad. Hope he gets well soon.

Poetry with a Message

Here it comes. After a day of rest, the creative juices are back. With extremely good weather in Indore & Bangalore (cool, rainy) me and Kaddy get back together to pen the second chat poetry of our lives
Our first poem was just an expression of our feelings at that moment of time i.e. it was spontaneous. Now we are writing with a plan. So here goes the starting para of our latest poem

It is raining outside

Let us go for a ride

Or wanna have fun inside

I promise I'll always abide

What u wanna do, u decide

Signed

Super & Kaddy

The poetry is not yet complete. Once we complete it, we'll come out with a title and also what it means and stuff. This is just to satisfy the appetite of our legions of fans, who wait with abated breath for our work.

First Chapo in B'lore

Finally, we managed to get hold of a senior in Bangalore. That too, Mr Amit Aggarwal. The big fish of the batch of 2003-04. We caught him one day in Forum, called him up the next day and party was finalized.

So yesterday, we met at 7 pm in Forum. While waiting for Amit sir to show up, I ran into R K Verma Sir, proprietor Resonance and one of my teachers in Kota while preparing for JEE. He didn't remember me (I expected that) but still it felt nice to meet him and talk to him after so many years. Finally Amit sir showed up and we four (me, Joshi, Raghav and Sir) went to MG Road for dinner.

There we decided to go for Chinese food and went to Three Quarters Chinese. Once again, B'lore traffic played havoc and it took us half an hour and many rounds of the area to find a place to park our car.Three Quarters Chinese is similar to an ethical Chinese restaurant with Indian staff but the whole menu had weird Chinese names for various dishes e.g. Chap Choi Tobanjan (Combo of Vegetables in Hot Garlic Sauce), Chun Quin (Veg Spring Rolls). Atleast they had given the names/description in English or we all would have been stumped.

The food was good but the bill amount must be astronomical. We all felt a little guilty but there was nothing we could have done at that point of time. Thankfully, Amit Sir is leaving B'lore till 28th so this will give us time to get this over this and be ready for him when he returns.

Our First Chat Poetry

For those, who have been following my blog would have guessed that I belong the category of ppl who like to have their share of fun while working. So 2day in the evening, Kaddy and I were chatting. Firstly we teased Joshi and then Kaddy went for a coffee. After that, we compiled a poem on coffee on YM (Bet this is one use of Yahoo Messenger even the creators won't have thought off) So here it is, Supriy & Kaddy's first chat poem. Hope this is one of many

Free Coffee By My Side

Cannot keep my happiness inside

That coffee machine is my pride

Dreading the arrival of my guide

This addiction is the starting point of my slide

Always wash clothes with detergent Tide, Tide, Tide

Signed

Super & Kaddy

Some of you might think that this is junk or waste of time. But maybe after 20 years this poem will sell as the first poem written by Super & Kaddy, the greatest English poet duo of Modern Era. and certainly the first to herald the coming of a new genre of English Poetry - Chat Poetry

Amen

Mohan's Birthday

Monday, 6 June was Abhishek Mohan's birthday. Me and Joshi called him up in the morning to wish him and he invited us to Pizza Hut (MG Road) for dinner and afterwards to movie, D. We agreed happily to this. We didn't know what we were getting into.

Reached Pizza Hut at 7.45 pm and had to wait for 15 minutes for the Ti ppl to show up (Mohan, Nema, Manu, Shilpaand a guy from IITD whose name I forgot to ask). That with us four - me, Joshi, m/c and Raghav made it 9 ppl. Ppl started to go berserk whild ordering and Mohan clarified that he won't pay more than 600 bucks. We agreed to this (why I don't know) and ordered as if we were starving.

In the end, Mohan ended up paying 700 bucks and each of the other ppl ended up paying, hold ur breath 75 bucks each. This is more than what me and Joshi spend in Pizza Hut if we go there by ourself. To rub salt in the wound, we could not go and see D as we were already delayed.

Moral of the Story :- Never go to Mohan's chapo in Pizza Hut and if u go, try and keep ppl under control while ordering

The Reason Gerrard shud stay at Anfield

This is a post I came across in a Forum on ESPNStar on why Gerrard shud stay. gr8 Post

As a lifetime AC Milan fan, with a Liverpool supporting girlfriend, I would like to give you my view on Steven Gerrard and his future at Liverpool. Steven Gerrard: 24 years old, Liverpool captain, from Merseyside, a homegrown talent. Now, I believe most of you reading have played football when kids (some of you are probably still playing now, like me, in those cold Sunday mornings, in some local amateur league, sorting out the nets, the money for the ref, bringing home muddy boots for the missus' delight...). We all started in the same fashion and so did Mr Gerrard: in the streets and in the school playgrounds, with jumpers for goalposts, spending hours arguing wether the ball was or wasn't gone over a bar that wasn't there to begin with. Preferring a game of football with your mates to anything else that there was in life. And if we weren't playing football... we would be watching it. Whether you were a striker or a defender, whether you were good or bad, whether you were you or you were Steven Gerrard the dream was one for all of us: TO WEAR THE LIVERPOOL SHIRT AND THE CAPTAIN'S ARMBAND AT ANFIELD IN FRONT OF THE KOP You can change that to AC Milan and the San Siro if for me. I am sure every single one of you had that dream of putting on the Red shirt and the armband. Some of you probably still do! Well, so did Steven Gerrard. This is why as a neutral I can not understand nor tolerate the fact that the guy is even thinking of a career outside Liverpool! Can you? Being captain of your own team at the age of 24, playing Champions League football ... is that not enough? If Gerrard was to stay he almost certainly will be Liverpool captain for another 10 years. He will almost certainly win trophies in the next 10 years. He will be Liverpool greatest player during his nearly 20 years with the club's first team. He will be a legend. He will probably be remembered as the best Liverpool player ever. He will be what Franco Baresi has been to Milan. Does anyone know what Baresi did in the early eighties? Here's what has happened: At 14 Baresi joins Milan after Inter (where is older brother was playing) rejected him, how foolish of them! He makes his debut very young and in 1979 wins the title with Milan. A couple of years later Milan gets relegated from Serie A to Serie B. The club is in a mess having being involved in match fixing and the club's owner ran away. The club was in total crisis, seeing the light at the end of the tunnel was impossible. A few weeks later city's rival Inter make an offer for Baresi and Baresi's partner in the middle of the defence Collovati. Straight away Collovati joins Inter. A then very young Baresi (21-22) is made captain of a falling giant. He's regarded by most as the best young talent of his generation and the 1982 World Cup is around the corner. Staying with Milan playing in Serie B would probably jeopardise his chances of going to the World Cup. Joining Inter would mean playing alongside his brother and enjoying the race for title every season at a club flushed with money. Collovati had no doubt in his mind that the right choice was to join Inter. But what did Baresi do? The similarity with the Steven Gerrard's situation was so big I had to write this article. Liverpool are nowhere near as bad as AC Milan was in the early eighties. What should Steven Gerrard do? What did Franco Baresi do? I am sure most of you know what Baresi did but I'll tell you anyway: HE STAYED AT MILAN! He played for them in Serie B. He was so good he was picked for the World Cup squad anyway. Milan won the Serie B league and came straight up only to go down again one season later. More offers came in for Baresi. Did he regret his original choice? Did he join Inter, Juve? Did he? Of course he didn't. He played for Milan in Serie B again. That's what I call a man! In the following years with Milan he won promotion and then went on to win the European Cup three times (now better known as Champions League), he won the Intercontinental Cup twice, the European Super Cup 3 times, the Italian League 5 times (to add to the win in 1979), and played a total of 5 European Cup Finals. He became for every Milan fan 'Il Capitano' (The Captain, capital T and capital C). When he retired from football in 1997 the club not only organised a match for him in the San Siro where 85,000 paying supporters saw him and the Milan players play the likes of Maradona, Romario, Careca, Koeman, Mattheus but also the jersey with the number 6, the number he worn for so many years, was retired as well. No more Milan players will ever wear the number 6 (this week has been announced that the same will happen with Paolo Maldini's number 3 when he retires). Thinking forward should Gerrard commit himself to Liverpool for life? I can not see why he shouldn't be able to experience the same glory and all time legendary status. It all goes back to that one dream we had when we were playing in the streets. The day that dream ends football will end with it. I wish Steven Gerrard will realize this. By the way: how many of you knew who Collovati was? To Milan fans he's a traitor, that's all, who left the club in their hour of need. I have to wash my mouth every time I say his name. Baresi in contrast is an immortal.

Overhyped Bangalore

Now that I have been in Bangalore for 10 days, it allows me to have a more objective look at the city. Is bangalore really what it is claimed to be ? Indian silicon valley. The fifth metro etc. The place where everybody wants to work.
I don't agree with these analysis. Yeah Bangalore is fun but there are only so many times you can go to Forum, roam on MG Road or Brigade Road. What else to do ?
Firstly, the plus points. The weather is gr8. Enthusiasm and informal work culture are surely a positive thing and the crowd and eateries too.
But the traffic is pathetic. I mean I have seen more traffic jams here in 10 days than in the last 10 years of my life. To cover 2 kms from office to home at 7 pm takes 45 min. Moreover, electricity problems. Whenerver, it rains electricity is cut off and we are left in the darkness. Is this what an international city is ? I don't think so
My analysis might be wrong. After coming from a place like Roorkee and hearing so much about B'lore, I might have been expecting a lot. But in this case, I got less than I expected

Liverpool - The Kings of Europe

The big day(or night rather) was here. The Champions League Finals with Liverpool taking on the might of AC Milan.With no TV around, we had to go to m/c's place. A foolish auto driver gave us the wrong directions and instead of 10 km, we had to travel 30 kms to get there. Still seeing that final was worth anything.
The match started in a disaster for Liverpool with Maldini scoring in 53 seconds. It went rom bad to worse to worst for Liverpool with them trailing by 3-0 at halftime. Everybody wrote off Liverpool. But they had not accounted for Gerrard, the greatest player on earth 2day
In 54th min, Gerrard took a superb header to start the comeback. In 56th min, Smicer hit a 20 mts shot to fool Dida and the the comeback was complete in 60th min when Gerrard won a penalty and Alonso converted on the rebound. Liverpool had the advantage with Milan looking tired. But none of them could convert their chances and match went into extra time.
30 minutes of extra time followed. Milan dominated those two sessions but could not convert many golden chances the best one being Shevchenko's in second interval. Shevchenko missed out on a chance from a meter and also the rebound. This double save from Dudek showed that Gods were on the side of Liverpool.
Then to the penalties.Milan started them with Serginho going wide and Dudek saving the one from Pirlo. Liverpool scored both. Then Tomasson and Kaka converted for Milan. Riise missed his chance and it was down to Shevchenko, on whom you could bet ur life to convert a penalty
to save Milan. But Dudek saved that one and Liverpool became the Kings of Europe.
Another good news :- Gerrard has pledged his future to Liverpool.

General Life@Bangalore

Someone once told me that Bangalore is called "The Garden City". After being here for a week, I think it is "The Bar City".Each and every street has atleast one bar and the thing is every one of them is full.
Another scene is in the South Indian food joints. All such joints are filled at all times. Seeing these scenes, Joshi remarked "People down here have nothing to do except eat and drink". I didn't remark that he also seems to have only these two things to do as I have to live 6 weeks with him.
Some people warned me that food in B'lore can be expensive. Well that's only if a person is not willing to move to South Indian cuisine.If u r ready to experiment with South Indian cuisine, food in B'lore is as cheap as anywhere. One way to live is save money on weekdays for a blast on the weekend. This is what we are doing.

I Weekend in Bangalore

Saturday:
Had to go to office at 10.30. Left Rahul's place at 9 am and went to find accomodation. Could not find accomodation till 11.30 as commute was between two ends of the city and had to miss office. Found a decent place in BTM Layout, 5 minutes from office and took it.Picked up our stuff from Rahul's place and moved into our new room
Meesam, Raghvendra, Raghav, Lalit and us had decided to meet at Forum at 4.30 pm. So took a bath and went there. Forum is a mall in Bangalore. Unbelievable place with anything under the sun available. By the time we reached there, no tickets for Star Wars Episode III night show were available. So decided to see Kingdom of Heaven directed by Ridley Scott & starring Orlando Bloom. Window shopped in the mall for 8 pm and then went to MG Road for dinner. There went to NASA for dinner and time pass till 10pm. gr8 place with rock music blaring at ful volume.Heard Metallica, GnR, Iron Maiden etc till 9.45 and left for the movie.
The movie was a disaster.If I hadn't paid 130 bucks for it, it would have been the first English movie I would have walked out off. But had to stay put till the end with Ridley Scott out of my good books. It was around 12.30 already so we all went to our place. More misery - No electricity and hence slept in the heat with six people in the room.

Sunday:
Got up in the morning at 10. Me, Joshi & Raghav decided to catch Star Wars in Forum while rest of the guys went back. Unfortunately, only night show tickets left and so, moved over to see the movie in Symphony another hall. After the movie, hanged around Crosswords for some time, had our evening snacks at a Rs 11 street corner and left for MG Road. Covered the length and breadth of MG Road and Brigade Road. Found a few good used books shops but didn't have money so bought only three books. Will go back to check them out later. Nothing more in the night worth telling except that Bhawani got placed in Caritor and owes me a big party and I got scolded for not informing my number at home. But this is usual, isn't it ?

Accomodation Problems

Today was a usual day as Daisy (the dog) was out and Joshi was subdued. Morning was lost in looking at still more PG Accomodations and afternoon in working. The progress till now has been pretty decent. The only event was m/c (Meesam) calling for the weekend program. Planned to see Star Wars III but detailed program has not been finalised. 2morrow office for only 3 hours then again search for accomodation. 2night going to Rahul's flat. Shall see what to do later.

Went to Rahul's flat after Manish Bhaiya and Bhabhi left. Went to Rahul's home at the other end of B'lore. Met him and his three roomies. These four have become more of Joshi's kind of people than my type if u get the hidden meaning. Anyways, night was fun as we had dinner and than went to sleep. Next day, office at 10.30 but before that have to find accomodation.

I Day at Internship

May 19,2005
Morning: Joshi woke me up at 8 am. I tried to kick him but suddenly remembered that this was not Roorkee. So had to stand up grudgingly and get ready. At 9.45,we started for office and Joshi stopped to buy a SIM. One thing led to another and the old man at the counter yelled at "Educated People" in general and Joshi in particular. I was shaking with silent laughter but this was just one of many more such incidents to come. Reached the office at about 10.15 am and met the people. People are really nice with an informal atmosphere. The work is really interesting and we started working within an hour. There is one problem though. These people have a dog who is more of a wolf than a dog and he barks like anything. One of them had to escort us to avoid the dog.

Afternoon: Got up for the lunch break and went for a South Indian Thali. Haven't eaten so much rice in a single meal in my life. Went to work in a drowsy state and Joshi tried to act bold. Tried to run by the dog but couldn't. I once again was left shaking with silent laughter. After trying to run the program for about two hours (without success), Joshi had to call his brother. He went out to call and within seconds, there was barking of dog and shouts of Joshi. I leave the rest to your imagination. Don't worry. Joshi survived. Came back all shaken and shivering with me shaking with silent laughter. This shaking went on for the remaining afternoon.

Evening: Left the office at 6.30 pm and went to purchase a SIM for myself. For this had to get a photo. Went for digital photograph and decided to buy 37 photographs for 60 bucks but after looking at the photo, changed my mind to 5 photos for Rs 40 as no use having 37 copies of that photo. Purchased the SIM and went to see a few PG accomodation with Akshay from office. Here people are giving dungeons and cells for Rs 2500 per "head". Didn't like any PG and went back. Rest of the evening passed off without any incident. Hence, I day was good and filled with much more silent laughs than I would have thought possible