Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Ain't No Hero
I went to get some new strings for my guitar after breaking my first one yesterday. A decidedly bourgeois activity. A frivolous expense for an frivolous hobby .
A found a music store on the third floor of a building in Darya Ganj, a small oasis in a sea of sweat and grime that asked me to take off my shoes before I entered it.
A teak floor, an air filtered, conditioned atmosphere, bright lights cast over arrays of beautiful painted instruments. I licked my lips as I cast aside my shitty old acoustic and let my fingers run wild over one of the shining, glistening pieces of woodwork.
After I was done in the store, I walked out with a confident strut, arms tucked into my jacket, a guitar slung over my back, feeling more like a jock than ever before in my life.
I walked past people setting cement into cracks, vendors peddling over-ripe bananas, girls and boys returning from school who looked up at me as I walked past.
I felt like an alien, an aberration in this place. So... fundamentally different.
On the footpath I saw a body... torso hidden under a magenta strip of cloth.
A child hidden in a blanket. There was no movement as I walked past. Flies buzzed past and landed on the child's exposed legs.
No one noticed the child lying in the middle of the crowded pathway.
A chilling thought ran through my mind. The boy could be dead, and they no would would know.
No one would care.
He could be dead right now. He isn't moving at all. Why is he lying in the middle of the footpath?
My mind rationalized. 'He's just sleeping, you'll just disturb him.'
But the simple truth was... that I didn't have the courage to pull off the shroud from his body.
I walked past numbly, still stung by the chill the thought had caused. I walked faster.
Two large and well fed stray dogs darted past me and to the body on the footpath. I followed their movement passively. The larger of the two, a massive tawny mongrel eyed the body hungrily. It thought for a moment before its face contorted in an expression of fury and became an array of fangs.
My heard pounded hard. I was too far. The too dogs were barely a few feet away from the child, and I was at about twenty. There was nothing I could do.
The mongrel lunged.
A third dog exploded from behind the body, howling as if possessed by a demon. This one was lean, red and fierce. Only two thirds the size of the other two dogs, it's ferocity made the two fat mongrels leap back to safe distance. The red dog issued a harsh bark. The first too growled back but didn't want to fight, they ran away- gone as fast as they'd come.
I looked at the red dog, the dog turned around and walked away. In the midst of the commotion, the kid in the magenta blanket had woken up. He looked around, scared, confused and still groggy from his sleep.
A woman rushed over to the boy, I assume she was his mother.
I wondered if he knew the animal that had protected him. If it hadn't been for the third dog... things could have gone immeasurably worse.
And all I'd been able to do was stand there and watch.
I swallowed the disgust I had for myself and walked away.
A found a music store on the third floor of a building in Darya Ganj, a small oasis in a sea of sweat and grime that asked me to take off my shoes before I entered it.
A teak floor, an air filtered, conditioned atmosphere, bright lights cast over arrays of beautiful painted instruments. I licked my lips as I cast aside my shitty old acoustic and let my fingers run wild over one of the shining, glistening pieces of woodwork.
After I was done in the store, I walked out with a confident strut, arms tucked into my jacket, a guitar slung over my back, feeling more like a jock than ever before in my life.
I walked past people setting cement into cracks, vendors peddling over-ripe bananas, girls and boys returning from school who looked up at me as I walked past.
I felt like an alien, an aberration in this place. So... fundamentally different.
On the footpath I saw a body... torso hidden under a magenta strip of cloth.
A child hidden in a blanket. There was no movement as I walked past. Flies buzzed past and landed on the child's exposed legs.
No one noticed the child lying in the middle of the crowded pathway.
A chilling thought ran through my mind. The boy could be dead, and they no would would know.
No one would care.
He could be dead right now. He isn't moving at all. Why is he lying in the middle of the footpath?
My mind rationalized. 'He's just sleeping, you'll just disturb him.'
But the simple truth was... that I didn't have the courage to pull off the shroud from his body.
I walked past numbly, still stung by the chill the thought had caused. I walked faster.
Two large and well fed stray dogs darted past me and to the body on the footpath. I followed their movement passively. The larger of the two, a massive tawny mongrel eyed the body hungrily. It thought for a moment before its face contorted in an expression of fury and became an array of fangs.
My heard pounded hard. I was too far. The too dogs were barely a few feet away from the child, and I was at about twenty. There was nothing I could do.
The mongrel lunged.
A third dog exploded from behind the body, howling as if possessed by a demon. This one was lean, red and fierce. Only two thirds the size of the other two dogs, it's ferocity made the two fat mongrels leap back to safe distance. The red dog issued a harsh bark. The first too growled back but didn't want to fight, they ran away- gone as fast as they'd come.
I looked at the red dog, the dog turned around and walked away. In the midst of the commotion, the kid in the magenta blanket had woken up. He looked around, scared, confused and still groggy from his sleep.
A woman rushed over to the boy, I assume she was his mother.
I wondered if he knew the animal that had protected him. If it hadn't been for the third dog... things could have gone immeasurably worse.
And all I'd been able to do was stand there and watch.
I swallowed the disgust I had for myself and walked away.
Monday, December 13, 2010
The Placement Tamasha
A large fraction of you must've heard about the flurry of articles about engineering placements, ranging from student from XYZ college gets 70LPA/60LPA/40LPA/whatever to 1900/2000 students placed in TCS, woohoo!
It's mostly the IITs that take centrestage in such discussions, and these discussions take place in the media.
I find this a worrying trend, because the media does not present an accurate picture of the placement scenario. For example. a signnificant fraction of students get jobs on their own/go abroad for further studies, these guys are never counted. Salary figures are heavily distorted by the media before publication as well.
Hell, recently a guy with a 90,000 dollar taxable income made headlines 'IITian gets 70 lakh offer'.
Lets ignore the issue of woeful (optimistic?) journalistic mathematics for now.
Why do we need to know this guy's package? Why do we have to covnert it from dollars/euros to rupees? Why do we have to discuss the salary?
There's a slew of posts about this headline on the net- some congratulations, some IIT jingoism and a lot of bitterness ("Congratulations on becoming another corporate slave" "Stop sending our talent abroad")
Lets take a step back here, since when has a good start to one's career become a national headline?
I have no answers and I shan't waste my time pointing out the obvious.
What I do know is the reason these misleading placement 'headlines' have become more frequent.
I blame NSIT.
They had 1 Schlumberger placement a few years ago and they harped on it like someone had won a nobel prize. The college quickly shot into no.1 position in placements and top 10 slots in a slew of rankings.
Here's the kicker though, Schlum had also picked up people from the IITs/BITS etc (since the company doesn't recruit just 1 guy in a year).
However these older colleges didn't count the Schlum placement abroad as part of their respective placement datasets.
So NSIT skyrocketed in value, parents sent their children there, and all sorts of tamasha ensued, all despite relatively unexceptional placements.
The other colleges are a little riled up now, because they realized that gaming the media goes a big way to determine annual rankings. So we have a grand cockfight with all colleges rushing to reach the lowest common denominator now,
BITS - 8 grads with 40 LPA! 12 in Facebook!!! IITKGP- 70LPA in FBook! IIT-D 30 LPA IN INDIA!!! IIIT-H 60 LPA IN FACEBOOK.
Chalo, what do I care. I'm not getting a job till I start studying.
It's mostly the IITs that take centrestage in such discussions, and these discussions take place in the media.
I find this a worrying trend, because the media does not present an accurate picture of the placement scenario. For example. a signnificant fraction of students get jobs on their own/go abroad for further studies, these guys are never counted. Salary figures are heavily distorted by the media before publication as well.
Hell, recently a guy with a 90,000 dollar taxable income made headlines 'IITian gets 70 lakh offer'.
Lets ignore the issue of woeful (optimistic?) journalistic mathematics for now.
Why do we need to know this guy's package? Why do we have to covnert it from dollars/euros to rupees? Why do we have to discuss the salary?
There's a slew of posts about this headline on the net- some congratulations, some IIT jingoism and a lot of bitterness ("Congratulations on becoming another corporate slave" "Stop sending our talent abroad")
Lets take a step back here, since when has a good start to one's career become a national headline?
I have no answers and I shan't waste my time pointing out the obvious.
What I do know is the reason these misleading placement 'headlines' have become more frequent.
I blame NSIT.
They had 1 Schlumberger placement a few years ago and they harped on it like someone had won a nobel prize. The college quickly shot into no.1 position in placements and top 10 slots in a slew of rankings.
Here's the kicker though, Schlum had also picked up people from the IITs/BITS etc (since the company doesn't recruit just 1 guy in a year).
However these older colleges didn't count the Schlum placement abroad as part of their respective placement datasets.
So NSIT skyrocketed in value, parents sent their children there, and all sorts of tamasha ensued, all despite relatively unexceptional placements.
The other colleges are a little riled up now, because they realized that gaming the media goes a big way to determine annual rankings. So we have a grand cockfight with all colleges rushing to reach the lowest common denominator now,
BITS - 8 grads with 40 LPA! 12 in Facebook!!! IITKGP- 70LPA in FBook! IIT-D 30 LPA IN INDIA!!! IIIT-H 60 LPA IN FACEBOOK.
Chalo, what do I care. I'm not getting a job till I start studying.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Arindham Chaudhari
I didn't expect Arindham Chaudhary to write in defence of Radia Dutt et al,
(http://arindamchaudhuri.blogspot.com/)
but in retrospect its only logical. He does hold (several) important stakes in media (which he uses to legitimize himself), He is a fairly uncomplicated kind of attention whore.
It takes balls for this man to come out and comment on other people's ethical standards, he has no fear of glass houses whatsoever.
I don’t quite hate Arindham Chaudhary… I believe he is scum, of course, but also an entrepreneur par excellence, he makes a tidy profit out of flimsy credentials (a gold medal from the college his dad owned), mediocre intelligence and somewhat bland writing skills.
He makes millions out of a ‘university’ that isn’t recognized in India, that prospers by duping its students to pay several lakhs for a piece of paper- a "college" that lies through its teeth about itself in every forum imaginable, boasting of some of the least qualified graduates in the country, and whose staff has alienated recruiters everywhere, earning the hallowed title of 'worst brand name in Indian education' in HR circles.
And he's a multimillionaire 'expert'.
It's amazing.
No one can monetize mediocracy as well as this guy can.
I salute this man for his spirit, a man of conviction, he knows exactly what he wants and goes out to get it.
I can only stand in awe of his unstoppable desire to drag this nation through the mud, as long as he can get a buck out of it.
It's pains me greatly to be forced to undermine you in every little way I can, Sir.
Sorry sir, I just don't like your ponytail.
Saturday, November 13, 2010
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
More reading material: The Pakistani Propaganda Machine
http://www.sdpi.org/whats_new/reporton/State%20of%20Curr&TextBooks.pdf
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Where are my desires?
Where is that book I've needed to write for a year?
My writing ability is deteriorating with every passing day. Soon I'll be unable to write at all.
Where is the success that I am told that I have achieved?
In some abstract corner? An imaginary variable.
Where is the freedom I long for most?
With every passing day- it is further from me than the last.
Where is my art?
All I see is lazy bastardization and cliche... my lack of technical skill infuriates me- yet I do not have the time to practice.
Where is my science?
I did not think that this would be something I'd lose... but... where am I. Lost in a confusion of equations and evaluations, I no longer thirst for knowledge in the same way. Blame coaching, perhaps.
Where is my body?
I've lost it already- and to the least interesting desire of the flesh.
Where is my Mind?
I used to like thinking of myself as a deep, mysterious personality- Yet all I find is blank space and an empty soul. Maybe I just don't want to think any more... it's too painful, self-destructive.
Funny how I can't seem to reconcile the roles of actor and observer.
Where is my Love?
Fucking some guy quite regularly, no doubt.
Seriously though... even doing things is getting boring.
For now, I'll bury these doubts under the badly formed strumming of my guitar.
Where is that book I've needed to write for a year?
My writing ability is deteriorating with every passing day. Soon I'll be unable to write at all.
Where is the success that I am told that I have achieved?
In some abstract corner? An imaginary variable.
Where is the freedom I long for most?
With every passing day- it is further from me than the last.
Where is my art?
All I see is lazy bastardization and cliche... my lack of technical skill infuriates me- yet I do not have the time to practice.
Where is my science?
I did not think that this would be something I'd lose... but... where am I. Lost in a confusion of equations and evaluations, I no longer thirst for knowledge in the same way. Blame coaching, perhaps.
Where is my body?
I've lost it already- and to the least interesting desire of the flesh.
Where is my Mind?
I used to like thinking of myself as a deep, mysterious personality- Yet all I find is blank space and an empty soul. Maybe I just don't want to think any more... it's too painful, self-destructive.
Funny how I can't seem to reconcile the roles of actor and observer.
Where is my Love?
Fucking some guy quite regularly, no doubt.
Seriously though... even doing things is getting boring.
For now, I'll bury these doubts under the badly formed strumming of my guitar.
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Guitarpost
Here I will list my repertoire of tunes. Hope it becomes pretty big some day.
(S)= Simplified only notes version
Kryptonite- 3 Doors Down
Johnny Cash- Hurt
Dropkick Murphys - Shipping Up To Boston
Alter Bridge - BlackBird
Van Halen - Feelin'
Jurassic Park Theme
Star Wars Theme
The Devil May Cry Theme
The Godfather Theme
Laura's Theme Silent Hill
Metallica Fade To Black (Intro-Solo)
Metallica Nothing Else Matters (Intro)
Poets of the Fall Carnival of Rust
Creed One (Intro)
WildTheme/Local Hero/Going Nowhere by Mark Knopfler
RHCP Californication (main riffs)
Requiem for a Dream Main Part
Late Goodbye
Sail on Soothsayer
RHCP Snow
Alter Bridge Blackbird
Blackest Eyes, Porcupine Tree
blah blah blah
I know lots! :D
Pipeline-
Silversun Pickups- Future Foe Scenarios
The Unforgiven 2
maybe some Zero 7
(S)= Simplified only notes version
Done-
Scarborough Fair
House of the Rising Sun (S)
Beethoven's Ninth- Ode to Joy (S)
Linkin Park- In the End
America- Horse with No Name
Dido- White Flag
Nirvana- Come as You Are (Intro)
Nirvana- Smells like Teen Spirit
7 Nation Army (White Stripes)
Smoke on the Water (Intro)
Thesis of the Cruel Angel (Evangelion)
L's Theme Yoshihisa Hirano
Greensleeves (that old medieval tune we've all heard)
Mad World Tears for Fears
Eon Blue Apocalypse- Tool
Soothsayer - Buckethead (Intro)
Behind Blue Eyes
Scarborough Fair
House of the Rising Sun (S)
Beethoven's Ninth- Ode to Joy (S)
Linkin Park- In the End
America- Horse with No Name
Dido- White Flag
Nirvana- Come as You Are (Intro)
Nirvana- Smells like Teen Spirit
7 Nation Army (White Stripes)
Smoke on the Water (Intro)
Thesis of the Cruel Angel (Evangelion)
L's Theme Yoshihisa Hirano
Greensleeves (that old medieval tune we've all heard)
Mad World Tears for Fears
Eon Blue Apocalypse- Tool
Soothsayer - Buckethead (Intro)
Behind Blue Eyes
Death Note - Yoshihisa Hirano
Wild Thing
Numb - Linkin Park
Numb - Linkin Park
Sweet Child O' Mine (intro)
In The End Linkin Park
Asylum of Glass Buckethead (Lots of parts...)
Unforgiven- Metallica
The Day that Never Comes - Metallica
Opeth- End CreditsThe Day that Never Comes - Metallica
Kryptonite- 3 Doors Down
Johnny Cash- Hurt
Dropkick Murphys - Shipping Up To Boston
Alter Bridge - BlackBird
Van Halen - Feelin'
Jurassic Park Theme
Star Wars Theme
The Devil May Cry Theme
The Godfather Theme
Laura's Theme Silent Hill
Stairway to Heaven Led Zep
Metallica ONE (intro)Metallica Fade To Black (Intro-Solo)
Metallica Nothing Else Matters (Intro)
Poets of the Fall Carnival of Rust
Creed One (Intro)
WildTheme/Local Hero/Going Nowhere by Mark Knopfler
RHCP Californication (main riffs)
Requiem for a Dream Main Part
Creed One Last Breath
Ramble On Jimmy PageLate Goodbye
Sail on Soothsayer
RHCP Snow
Alter Bridge Blackbird
Blackest Eyes, Porcupine Tree
blah blah blah
I know lots! :D
Pipeline-
The Unforgiven 2
maybe some Zero 7
Friday, September 3, 2010
Flirting with a Pakistani
When presented with a long list of enriching life experiences, one tends to forget most of them, it seems.
This particular, short-lived scenario occurred when I was a wee (nay, chubby) lad of twelve or so and living in Coolangatta Australia.
Her name was Sameera, she was in my class. I could tell that she was an Asian immigrant, Lebanese, Iranian. Something like that.
It wasn't until she called me out of class one day and asked me about my Indian-ness that I realized that she was a Pakistani.
"Can you speak the language properly?" She asked me.
"Kya, tum nahi bol sakti? (What, you don't speak it?)" I replied playfully in Hindi, which is more or less identical to Urdu.
"No I can. I just don't like to do it."
"Uh. Ok." Thats weird.
And so the conversation lasted for a few minutes. Having a pretty girl call me over to talk to her was a big deal then. Correction- It is a big deal.
Oh did I mention she had brothers in school?
Four of them?
All older than me? The oldest being about twice my size?
I had assumed that our conversation would be kept more or less private... until the next day,when her eldest brother picked me out of a crowd and held me in a terrifying bear hug as he marched me through the school.
Point one. That guy, eight years ago, was probably bigger than I am now.
Point two. All of Sameera's brothers were delinquents (relatively speaking), and I'd actually been mistaken for one of them at one point...
("DAMN YOU ANWAR!!! HOW DARE YOU THROW A WATER BALLOON AT MRS MOPPET!!"
"Whats an An-Wah?"
"DON'T ACT DUMB WITH ME ANWAAR!!!!"
"I'm not Anwaar. My name in Anjishnu. I'm your school's Science topper. (aka I'm A Nerd)."
"GAAAAH YOU LIE!!!"
I'm not too sure how this situation ended. Maybe someone vouched for my identity. Maybe I walked off with a dismissive sigh at the teacher's ignorant racism. )
Point Three. I was damn scared of them.
Sure, we Indians are never taught to 'hate' Pakistanis. Our history texts mostly refer to Partition as a tragedy marred with meaningless violence that all humane people should have tried to avoid- which shattered homes and split families and turned brother against brother.
But with the Kargil War and a plethora of Pakistani terrorist attacks happening every year, one couldn't help be scared.
Sameera's brother gave a long talk about how us South Asians need to stick up for each other and shyt and not take crap from the teachers.
I was quivering throughout the ordeal.
I don't think I ever spoke to her outside of class again.
This particular, short-lived scenario occurred when I was a wee (nay, chubby) lad of twelve or so and living in Coolangatta Australia.
Her name was Sameera, she was in my class. I could tell that she was an Asian immigrant, Lebanese, Iranian. Something like that.
It wasn't until she called me out of class one day and asked me about my Indian-ness that I realized that she was a Pakistani.
"Can you speak the language properly?" She asked me.
"Kya, tum nahi bol sakti? (What, you don't speak it?)" I replied playfully in Hindi, which is more or less identical to Urdu.
"No I can. I just don't like to do it."
"Uh. Ok." Thats weird.
And so the conversation lasted for a few minutes. Having a pretty girl call me over to talk to her was a big deal then. Correction- It is a big deal.
Oh did I mention she had brothers in school?
Four of them?
All older than me? The oldest being about twice my size?
I had assumed that our conversation would be kept more or less private... until the next day,when her eldest brother picked me out of a crowd and held me in a terrifying bear hug as he marched me through the school.
Point one. That guy, eight years ago, was probably bigger than I am now.
Point two. All of Sameera's brothers were delinquents (relatively speaking), and I'd actually been mistaken for one of them at one point...
("DAMN YOU ANWAR!!! HOW DARE YOU THROW A WATER BALLOON AT MRS MOPPET!!"
"Whats an An-Wah?"
"DON'T ACT DUMB WITH ME ANWAAR!!!!"
"I'm not Anwaar. My name in Anjishnu. I'm your school's Science topper. (aka I'm A Nerd)."
"GAAAAH YOU LIE!!!"
I'm not too sure how this situation ended. Maybe someone vouched for my identity. Maybe I walked off with a dismissive sigh at the teacher's ignorant racism. )
Point Three. I was damn scared of them.
Sure, we Indians are never taught to 'hate' Pakistanis. Our history texts mostly refer to Partition as a tragedy marred with meaningless violence that all humane people should have tried to avoid- which shattered homes and split families and turned brother against brother.
But with the Kargil War and a plethora of Pakistani terrorist attacks happening every year, one couldn't help be scared.
Sameera's brother gave a long talk about how us South Asians need to stick up for each other and shyt and not take crap from the teachers.
I was quivering throughout the ordeal.
I don't think I ever spoke to her outside of class again.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Ugh
The guy in the room adjacent to mine is strangely clingy. He barges into my a moment ago while I'm playing CStrike with headphones on- and asks 'What is normality?"
"It's molarity into N-factor. Where the n-factor is usually the number of hydrogen atoms the acid dissociates into."Somewhat distracted from killing my opponent.
"But do you divide or multiply it? because... *blah blah blah*"
"Look it up online." And then proceeded to zone out of the rest of the conversation.
Yesterday he asked me to resize photographs for him and was fairly insistent that I do so. I told him that it was simple and that I could teach him to do it on Microsoft Paint. He ignored it and sent the pics to my email so I could resize them.
The sad thing here is that he's a 9.5 pointer and I'm a 7.5 pointer.
"It's molarity into N-factor. Where the n-factor is usually the number of hydrogen atoms the acid dissociates into."Somewhat distracted from killing my opponent.
"But do you divide or multiply it? because... *blah blah blah*"
"Look it up online." And then proceeded to zone out of the rest of the conversation.
Yesterday he asked me to resize photographs for him and was fairly insistent that I do so. I told him that it was simple and that I could teach him to do it on Microsoft Paint. He ignored it and sent the pics to my email so I could resize them.
The sad thing here is that he's a 9.5 pointer and I'm a 7.5 pointer.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
Sunday, August 22, 2010
A mood-dampening realization.
I wanted to be surrounded by interesting people. Intelligent people. Incredible people.
I got my wish.
I guess I never really thought about what that entailed for my own identity. I used to be quite different from the people around me, fairly intelligent, moderately talented, good at learning new things, critically evaluative, aloof to the point of being considered enigmatic or eccentric, well-read and ambitious, in an unfocused sort of way.
The people around me now share many, if not most of these qualities, and I appreciate it.
What it means though, is that I can no longer use these qualities to try to define what I am.
As if it wasn't hard enough already- I can barely understand my own actions most of the time. I used to solve the problem of 'who' by describing 'what' I am, and that used to work. Now I'm just a big blank space.
I don't even know if I have a personality- apart from in the broadest definition of the word. It can't be very interesting.
After all that study and turmoil and hard work, I'm back where I was 5 years ago.
Above average student in a decent institution. Whoop tee dee.
It's been interesting- I've learnt a lot that I wouldn't otherwise... but at the same time it seems like I've grown complacent.
I still have nothing to live for- no goal, no real passion. My grades are forgettable, and I've no real motivation to study... I'm not devoting time to my hobbies, watching random movies instead... I don't want to drink, I don't want to lose myself to some kind of chemical 'happiness', I don't dream, I don't have a career plan- nothing tangible that I want to achieve. I'm counting days till the next exam, that's all.
Speaking of counting days... how long has it been? I haven't even had a pitiable shadow of a love life for 18 months... nothing's gonna change till the 2 year mark, it seems. Not even a crush to keep me distracted, how sad is that?
I still don't have it in me to ask a girl out only to have her reject me outright, and I'm still not interested in the kind of girls that are interested in me.
I really can understand now how it's easier to care less... you minimize your recovery time and maximize trial frequency, how a bastard like me came to believe in the importance of this psychosexual disorder called 'love' is a mystery that really, I've no chance of figuring out. Maybe it's a genetic predisposition.
I think less. I write less. I draw less.
I AM less.
I create less, I consume more.
How am I supposed to impress people when I don't impress myself... it's an exercise in futility right?
I guess that's where I've decided to start. Baby steps.
I wanted to be surrounded by interesting people. Intelligent people. Incredible people.
I got my wish.
I guess I never really thought about what that entailed for my own identity. I used to be quite different from the people around me, fairly intelligent, moderately talented, good at learning new things, critically evaluative, aloof to the point of being considered enigmatic or eccentric, well-read and ambitious, in an unfocused sort of way.
The people around me now share many, if not most of these qualities, and I appreciate it.
What it means though, is that I can no longer use these qualities to try to define what I am.
As if it wasn't hard enough already- I can barely understand my own actions most of the time. I used to solve the problem of 'who' by describing 'what' I am, and that used to work. Now I'm just a big blank space.
I don't even know if I have a personality- apart from in the broadest definition of the word. It can't be very interesting.
After all that study and turmoil and hard work, I'm back where I was 5 years ago.
Above average student in a decent institution. Whoop tee dee.
It's been interesting- I've learnt a lot that I wouldn't otherwise... but at the same time it seems like I've grown complacent.
I still have nothing to live for- no goal, no real passion. My grades are forgettable, and I've no real motivation to study... I'm not devoting time to my hobbies, watching random movies instead... I don't want to drink, I don't want to lose myself to some kind of chemical 'happiness', I don't dream, I don't have a career plan- nothing tangible that I want to achieve. I'm counting days till the next exam, that's all.
Speaking of counting days... how long has it been? I haven't even had a pitiable shadow of a love life for 18 months... nothing's gonna change till the 2 year mark, it seems. Not even a crush to keep me distracted, how sad is that?
I still don't have it in me to ask a girl out only to have her reject me outright, and I'm still not interested in the kind of girls that are interested in me.
I really can understand now how it's easier to care less... you minimize your recovery time and maximize trial frequency, how a bastard like me came to believe in the importance of this psychosexual disorder called 'love' is a mystery that really, I've no chance of figuring out. Maybe it's a genetic predisposition.
I think less. I write less. I draw less.
I AM less.
I create less, I consume more.
How am I supposed to impress people when I don't impress myself... it's an exercise in futility right?
I guess that's where I've decided to start. Baby steps.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
The sins of the father shall be visited upon the son
As with most things, it was DragonballZ that inspired this article. A vague reference by a character in a video game led me to yet another example of the inherent hypocrisy of religion.
"The sins of the father shall be visited upon the son."
I will analyze a bit of biblical text using only one logical tool- Ockham's Razor. The simplest explanation that logically explains phenomenon is usually the correct one and in the absence of proof to the contrary- is to be treated as such.
The text I shall analyse is-
"You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me,"
What's the direct interpretation? Well, the God in the Bible is vicious prick who punishes people for being alive. Remember killing the egyptian children for their parents' transgressions?
But the interpretation used by many christians is that-
A father's sin will be passed onto his children because of the way he raises them. Because the child will learn to sin from the father... and thus the father can lead a family astray for many generations. Without proper guidance, the sin will only multiply as the children come into contact with more bad influences.
Oh, puhleez.
"The sins of the father shall be visited upon the son."
I will analyze a bit of biblical text using only one logical tool- Ockham's Razor. The simplest explanation that logically explains phenomenon is usually the correct one and in the absence of proof to the contrary- is to be treated as such.
The text I shall analyse is-
"You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me,"
What's the direct interpretation? Well, the God in the Bible is vicious prick who punishes people for being alive. Remember killing the egyptian children for their parents' transgressions?
But the interpretation used by many christians is that-
A father's sin will be passed onto his children because of the way he raises them. Because the child will learn to sin from the father... and thus the father can lead a family astray for many generations. Without proper guidance, the sin will only multiply as the children come into contact with more bad influences.
Oh, puhleez.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Mr. Approachable.
Walking down the street in connaught place with two friends, I was approached for directions.
It wasn't the first time it'd happened. It wasn't the last. It isn't even rare.
It's fairly common.
Perhaps the only reason it'd even be worth mentioning is because the approachee, in this case, was a hot girl, rather than the usual 40 year old parent.
I only caught her face from the corner of my eye as I gave out directions to the nearest McDonalds. I regretted it immediately, of course, when I hot girl speaks to you you damn well look at her face. Instincts take over though... I'm still shy at the most basic level of functioning.
It's no longer coincidence. Even if I'm in a group of people... the one asked for directions, advice, help, is me. Some 85% of the time. Hell, the rest of the time I assume they're talking to me and answer instinctively.
The same thing happened at IIT Delhi, when I tagged as my sister was getting admitted. It happened again in Nehru Place when one guy assumed I knew all the bus routes in Delhi.
Because I'm a generally under employed human being who thinks about six times as much as he needs to, I have spent a bit of time pondering over this.
Can I form I hypothesis to explain this phenomenon, my apparent approachability, in a logical manner?
More importantly.
Can I exploit it for personal gain?
Anyone who knows me, knows that I'm a cold person when it comes to interacting with new people, a not so well hidden mean streak for stupidity, and a master at finding out how to piss people off with minimal effort. So it's not that my personality traits that are somehow apparent in my demeanor.
So switch to physical appearance. This makes more sense. Analyzing my body is a lot less interesting than analyzing my wills, skills, motivations and deviations. My body is pretty unexceptional in comparison.
Which is precisely the answer.
What makes me approachable is probably that I seem non-threatening, but also without displaying any undesirable qualities.
Not tall, not too short either. Not fat, not thin either. Not handsome, not ugly. Not dark skinned, not fair. Not intimidating, not pitiful.
Average.
I generally look like a tramp. Walking with head down and looking at my surroundings rather than at people.
Maybe it looks like I know where I'm going... or maybe I'm just loitering around so I'm easy to approach.
Initial Assessment: This will not help me in any way.
It wasn't the first time it'd happened. It wasn't the last. It isn't even rare.
It's fairly common.
Perhaps the only reason it'd even be worth mentioning is because the approachee, in this case, was a hot girl, rather than the usual 40 year old parent.
I only caught her face from the corner of my eye as I gave out directions to the nearest McDonalds. I regretted it immediately, of course, when I hot girl speaks to you you damn well look at her face. Instincts take over though... I'm still shy at the most basic level of functioning.
It's no longer coincidence. Even if I'm in a group of people... the one asked for directions, advice, help, is me. Some 85% of the time. Hell, the rest of the time I assume they're talking to me and answer instinctively.
The same thing happened at IIT Delhi, when I tagged as my sister was getting admitted. It happened again in Nehru Place when one guy assumed I knew all the bus routes in Delhi.
Because I'm a generally under employed human being who thinks about six times as much as he needs to, I have spent a bit of time pondering over this.
Can I form I hypothesis to explain this phenomenon, my apparent approachability, in a logical manner?
More importantly.
Can I exploit it for personal gain?
Anyone who knows me, knows that I'm a cold person when it comes to interacting with new people, a not so well hidden mean streak for stupidity, and a master at finding out how to piss people off with minimal effort. So it's not that my personality traits that are somehow apparent in my demeanor.
So switch to physical appearance. This makes more sense. Analyzing my body is a lot less interesting than analyzing my wills, skills, motivations and deviations. My body is pretty unexceptional in comparison.
Which is precisely the answer.
What makes me approachable is probably that I seem non-threatening, but also without displaying any undesirable qualities.
Not tall, not too short either. Not fat, not thin either. Not handsome, not ugly. Not dark skinned, not fair. Not intimidating, not pitiful.
Average.
I generally look like a tramp. Walking with head down and looking at my surroundings rather than at people.
Maybe it looks like I know where I'm going... or maybe I'm just loitering around so I'm easy to approach.
Initial Assessment: This will not help me in any way.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
MIT's shitty laptop
To be honest, the 100 dollar laptop is a joke.
Lashing out at the indian gov for not buying into MIT media labs' Negroponte is great and all, but lets see what our alternatives are shall we?
Lets start at the outset.
Families are NOT going to buy a shitty, useless laptop for their kids, they simply don't have that kind of spare cash. It goes into food, education, cell phones (I'll get to this)
How did OLPC plan to make money?
BY MAKING THE GOVT SPEND MILLIONS ON THESE LAPTOPS
then leaving the govt to market them to a public that does not give a shit.
The creators will be lauded as geniuses trying to help the poor, and the govt as incompetents who failed to market the killer product (hey! it's cheap!) to the public.
If the govt tries to say that product quality wasn't up to the mark, or that the pricing was uncompetitive- the media will have a fucking field day with the govt insulting MIT.
First
The PC. PCs are always cheaper than laptops- the MIT model ignored this in favour of mobility. Guess what, a 250 dollar, fully functional PC used by 5 or more children is actually much more economical than a 100 dollar laptop.
Second.
The second hand market.
I had a PC. It cost my parents a bomb when they bought it. I played warcraft on it for many years, learnt a lot. But it was just faar to outdated after 6 years. These days, the son of the man who used to do our gardening might be playing warcraft on it.
The HP Laptop I'm writing on right now is 7 years old. On the market it would fetch me 3-4-5k (60-100 dollars) max. It's ancient. I refuse to sell it though, partially because of nostalgia I feel it is worth much more than the price It'd fetch in the market- even after 7 years of purchase. Someday I'll buy a new laptop, but I will pass this on to some child somewhere who can learn from it- it'd only net me 60 dollars on the market... and it's infinitely better than this 100 dollar OLPC crap. Imagine if there was a mechanism to start this kind of a secondhand business on a huge scale.
Imagine.
Thirdly.
Why would anyone by a 100 dollar laptop when they can get a (relatively) HIGHLY functional phone for 50-60 dollars. The phone translates into communication and tangible benefits rapidly, all without a strong need for literacy- while the 100 dollar laptop without an internet subscription is simply a document/picture viewer with a calculator.
There are fairly functional 30 dollar phones in the market, connecting indians to the world like a 100 (actually almost 200) dollar laptop can't dream of.
This is a wasted effort, according to me. And mixed with the second-hand market- phone prices crash even lower. We just need to use this to get quality tech to the poor instead of throwing it in the bin or smashing it or something.
First
The PC. PCs are always cheaper than laptops- the MIT model ignored this in favour of mobility. Guess what, a 250 dollar, fully functional PC used by 5 or more children is actually much more economical than a 100 dollar laptop.
Second.
The second hand market.
I had a PC. It cost my parents a bomb when they bought it. I played warcraft on it for many years, learnt a lot. But it was just faar to outdated after 6 years. These days, the son of the man who used to do our gardening might be playing warcraft on it.
The HP Laptop I'm writing on right now is 7 years old. On the market it would fetch me 3-4-5k (60-100 dollars) max. It's ancient. I refuse to sell it though, partially because of nostalgia I feel it is worth much more than the price It'd fetch in the market- even after 7 years of purchase. Someday I'll buy a new laptop, but I will pass this on to some child somewhere who can learn from it- it'd only net me 60 dollars on the market... and it's infinitely better than this 100 dollar OLPC crap. Imagine if there was a mechanism to start this kind of a secondhand business on a huge scale.
Imagine.
Thirdly.
Why would anyone by a 100 dollar laptop when they can get a (relatively) HIGHLY functional phone for 50-60 dollars. The phone translates into communication and tangible benefits rapidly, all without a strong need for literacy- while the 100 dollar laptop without an internet subscription is simply a document/picture viewer with a calculator.
There are fairly functional 30 dollar phones in the market, connecting indians to the world like a 100 (actually almost 200) dollar laptop can't dream of.
This is a wasted effort, according to me. And mixed with the second-hand market- phone prices crash even lower. We just need to use this to get quality tech to the poor instead of throwing it in the bin or smashing it or something.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Friday, June 18, 2010
Ranchi
Dichotomy.
The hotel room I’m in is a contradiction. Clean, modern, and almost certainly designed as a tribute to perhaps the only artist I’ve referred to in my blog (and with a fair amount of derision I might add.)
The main windows in the lobbies of different floors are designed in the shapes of Pierre Mondrian’s works. The entire hotel has a remarkable abstract-cubical aesthetic.
My room is great, tables with rounded edges that remind me of my signature designs in photoshop. A window makes up most of one wall- eight feet high, over 15 feet across.
Majestic, really. When the curtains part, furious light floods the room, and from my pristine hotel room, sipping on bottled water, I can see hovels, a mosque under construction, and the tumours of India’s burgeoning middle class spread all throughout the city.
It is a contradiction, to be in a high-class hotel room in Ranchi, Jharkhand. It is a contradiction to walk into a bar in this hotel and watch a football world cup match.
A seething mass of bicycles, scooters and hatchbacks at noon, the city is almost empty in the early morning and at night. There is plenty of greenery, and I pass several semi-artificial lakes as I travel between the hotel and my relatives’ home. The mountains in the city are an unusual feature- tumours on the landscape, once again. Every second signboard, of which there are millions, advertises for school tuitions, coaching classes, preparation for entrance exams- IITJEE, AIEEE, AIPMT, AIIMS, for colleges- mostly small institutions willing to admit anyone- I see several massive billboards advertising the Birsa Institute of Technology- which surprisingly offers BBAs and MBAs but no engineering degrees. Perhaps more surprising are the billboards offering coaching for the NTSE scholarship- and as far as I’m aware, that didn’t help me one damn bit with anything in life.
Any ‘coaching’ you undergo for the scholarship will end up being more expensive than the money you can expect to get.
This is the face of an aspirant nation. It unnerves me to see the mindless desperation- but every coin has two sides. The proliferation of tuitions and coaching classes is only in reaction to the desire of the small town student to rise above his or her circumstance- but to be completely honest, it sometimes brings a small smile to the side of my face.
Yes, it’s partially because the mad rush to academic glory ascribes great value to my not-completely-insubstantial achievements in the past, it stokes my ego- and it reminds me of those little things that don’t really matter in the long run that I thought mattered then. But it’s also because of the contrast between the small town and the big city- rife with decadence and the justifications of men and women who gave up before they ever tried, who may perhaps never reach their full potential. They are willing to mock those who take part in the rat race, all the while unwilling to put their own necks on the line to achieve something tangible- instead hiding behind a veil of materialism or pseudo-nihilism, depending on where you’re looking.
There are many who are more than willing to exploit the gullible gumption that proliferates the slightly lower middle class of India.
I met my cousins in Ranchi, I had come here to attend a somewhat distant cousin’s Janeo, the sacred thread ceremony of the brahmins.
One of them had been staying in Patna for the last two years after moving from Delhi, he transferred from Delhi Public School, Noida, to Delhi Public School, in Patna (Oh the irony) which was considered to be the best school for boys in the city.
What happened next was odd. Soon after arrival, he was interviewed by the school principal and deemed a delinquent, simply because he was from Delhi- despite being a moderate mix of nerd and jock. He was told to leave behind his Delhi Attitude, which I assume implies decadence and westernization, but also confidence and flexibility. Other teachers were nice to him, until they asked him where he was from, and he replied ‘Delhi’, at which point he was subjected to the same extreme prejudice.
I found this hard to believe, but the story continued with his younger brother, aged nine, being sent to the same school. First of all, my nine year old brother was not allowed to bring bread to school, for whatever twisted reason the authorities could think of.
On his bus rides to and from school, the nine year olds weren’t allowed to sleep.
They also weren’t allowed to talk.
The Orwellian nightmare continues- my nine year old cousin, tired after a long, hot day of school, fell asleep on the bus, only to find a teacher grabbing his ears and pulling him to his feet.
When I heard this, I felt rage. The same kind of rage that everyone has at times but inevitably fails to act on. This isn’t discipline. This is torture. I am a human being. This is my brother. I am angered.
And the story isn’t over- the elder cousin was witness to the occasion of a friend of his beaten mercilessly by his principal- on account of being a prime suspect for some ‘crime’ or the other, on account of being from Delhi.
The laws of the Republic of India can be Damned.
He asked the other students why they tolerate this man, even though he clearly breaks the laws of the Indian nation. With some resignation they told him that they were in no position to get into trouble, lest it leave a lasting mark on their future.
He’s moving back to Delhi now, and looking forward to returning to some kind of sanity.
Many of my cousins are entering the phase where they need to do things greater than they ever have before… to secure a future for themselves… I hope they manage it. I can do little else. I fear that might make the same mistakes I made, but if I try too hard to warn them, I might scare them off entirely. Let us see.
In the mean while, I haven’t done something stupid for a long time. It’s time to make a big mistake.
P.S: I now sport a large festering slash/welt on the thigh from my first attempt to play football after over a year. 4 goals bitch!
PPS: One of my bihari GRANDMOTHERS asked me if I had a 'female-friend' in college. I said 'No'.
FML.
Monday, June 14, 2010
45
One. Two. Three. Four.
The first pass inconsequentially. I listen only to the beating of my own heart.
Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.
There is a pull. A smothering. The water drives against my hair. Discomfort.
Eleven. Twelve.
I don't think. Thinking consumed energy, the reactions that drive electricity through my brain use up oxygen. The less I think the longer I breathe.
Even so. My heartbeat is too fast.
Seventeen. Eighteen.
Relax. Calm down. Reduce yourself to nothing.
Twenty one. Twenty two.
It's hard now. My mouth wants to open, but there is no air to breathe. The heart beats faster then slows.
Twenty five.
Time itself is broken into pieces of five seconds each. At the end of each- I beg for five more.
Already, a numb despair is beginning to sink in.
Don't panic. Here is a situation where losing your cool can actually make a difference between life and death.
Thirty.
Burning, horrible.
breathe...
Give me FIVE MORE!
Thirty four, Thirty five.
Panic taking over.
breathe!
Aargh.
Thirty eight.
The senses begin to decay. Hope, confidence, decays. This is a fight now.
Thirty nine.
Forty.
I am aware of what it must feel like, to be face to face with death.
Breathe!
Forty one.
The despair soaks through the soul. Black fire burns within my chest.
Forty two.
Everything gives way.
BREATHE!
Forty three.
Peace. Resignation.
Forty four.
There is Nothing.
Forty five.
BREATHE!
My head explodes out of the water and into air, every cell in the body burns for breath.
Halogen lights pierce into my skull as my lungs devour the wind.
I am resurrected.
No one else in the pool notices.
breathe
The first pass inconsequentially. I listen only to the beating of my own heart.
Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.
There is a pull. A smothering. The water drives against my hair. Discomfort.
Eleven. Twelve.
I don't think. Thinking consumed energy, the reactions that drive electricity through my brain use up oxygen. The less I think the longer I breathe.
Even so. My heartbeat is too fast.
Seventeen. Eighteen.
Relax. Calm down. Reduce yourself to nothing.
Twenty one. Twenty two.
It's hard now. My mouth wants to open, but there is no air to breathe. The heart beats faster then slows.
Twenty five.
Time itself is broken into pieces of five seconds each. At the end of each- I beg for five more.
Already, a numb despair is beginning to sink in.
Don't panic. Here is a situation where losing your cool can actually make a difference between life and death.
Thirty.
Burning, horrible.
breathe...
Give me FIVE MORE!
Thirty four, Thirty five.
Panic taking over.
breathe!
Aargh.
Thirty eight.
The senses begin to decay. Hope, confidence, decays. This is a fight now.
Thirty nine.
Forty.
I am aware of what it must feel like, to be face to face with death.
Breathe!
Forty one.
The despair soaks through the soul. Black fire burns within my chest.
Forty two.
Everything gives way.
BREATHE!
Forty three.
Peace. Resignation.
Forty four.
There is Nothing.
Forty five.
BREATHE!
My head explodes out of the water and into air, every cell in the body burns for breath.
Halogen lights pierce into my skull as my lungs devour the wind.
I am resurrected.
No one else in the pool notices.
breathe
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Kalki Chapter One: The Debutant (Part 1)
The man wore a light pair of metal rimmed glasses over a stern, strong face. The grey eyes behind those glasses looked … angry, but intelligent- they hungrily swallowed everything that came before them- but not without having fiercely evaluated every aspect of it. He was in his mid fifties, looked healthy and like he’d only recently slipped out of athleticism, with hair graying at the temples and a well preened moustache.
He went through the documents that he held in his hands exuding an aura that emanated an emotion bordering fury. He put the papers down on the desk before him and looked up at the well dressed young man seated across the table from him.
“Why?” He demanded.
The other man did not respond. A flicker of annoyance flashed across his face. “I don’t quite understand what you mean, sir.” He replied politely.
The younger man wore an immaculate black suit and creaseless white shirt, had perfectly combed black hair and a complexion paled by having been out of the sun too long. He was handsome, in a slightly feminine way, but physically unimpressive. He too evaluated the other man.
"No matter how long I go through these pieces of paper..." The older man continued. "I can't make sense of it. There's no reason you should be here."
If the statement evoked an emotional reaction, it didn't show on the younger man's face. "I'm here because I want to, sir." He said, simply.
The other man's eyes flashed back to the pieces of paper on the desk.
"... Degrees in computer science, biology... with your academic record, you should be doing an MBA and minting money... but... psychology?"
"I believe it's absolutely necessary in this line of work."
"Why someone would come back to India after a stint abroad, to join the FIA, is something that goes over my head. Even with the 'specialist' allowance, you can't expect to earn even a fraction of what you would in a multinational."
"I'm not doing it for the money, sir." Still cold, expressionless.
"You don't have any of the powers and privileges of a traditional bureaucrat either."
"Perhaps, Sir," He paused, flicking a stray hair out of his forehead. "I will be better able answer questions pertaining to my qualifications and contributions rather than conjecture on other career options."
"Yes." The middle-aged man said, without breaking eye contact, "Just as soon as I know why you want to be a detective."
The younger man's expression hardened for a moment.
"Because I'm perfect for the job. I thought that’s what you’d be looking for."
Something shifted in the older man's face, some might have detected a half-smile, others- nothing at all. "Fair enough. The interview is over, follow me." He got up.
The younger man- up till that point a paragon of stoic calm- was unable to stop his mouth from opening a little as his face distorted in confusion. "Wha- Certainly sir."
The older man motioned the younger to follow as he opened the door to the small corner office he had been conducting the interview in and out into the main hall.
The hall was a large area with little furniture- a few desks, chairs and computers were in the process of being unpacked. One wall was made entirely of glass, giving the officers in the hall a clear view of the sun beginning to rise over the city skyline.
It was 8:25 am.
Overlooking the hall was a curious emblem mounted on a small rift in the ceiling- a plain black circle emblazoned with the words 'Federal Investigative Agency'.
The older man saw the younger looking at the emblem. He answered as soon as he saw the black haired youth open his mouth to ask the question.
"The top brass hasn't decided on a logo yet. We're keeping the space blank till they come up with something."
He began to walk, the younger man followed.
"Did you know that the Research and Analysis Wing had a logo privately commissioned for them for fifteen lakh rupees?"
"No."
"It could never be used. Security risk."
"But... what?"
The older man never broke pace as they reached the elevator and he hit the button.
"This kind of functioning was what facilitated the formation of this organization. I intend to make sure it is not repeated here. This is why we're hiring people like you...specialists...Not sure how much that'll help..." He said. "What was your name again?"
They entered the elevator, leaving the bare-boned office behind.
"Akash. Akash Agnihotri… Er, Sir, where are we going?”
“I’m going to see just how useful you are in the field. We’re heading for a crime scene.”
“Ok.”
The elevator doors parted and the men walked into the main lobby of the ground floor, within seconds they had reached the entrance and emerged out the building into the street.
“I’ll try to brief you on our way there.” The officer.
A car was parked near the entrance to the building. A white Honda City- the driver, a heavily tanned, somewhat tired looking man in his late thirties dressed in a simple white shirt and dark pants, waved to the older of the two men. The car was meant for them.
“Mr. Sharma, where are we going?” He asked.
“Rajender, throw me the keys.” The middle aged officer, Viraat Sharma, replied. The driver seemed bemused as he threw the keys to officer Sharma, the younger man noticed, but not particularly surprised by the unconventional order, he made a note of it in his head.
Sharma thrust the keys into the younger man’s hand, who almost recoiled at the touch of the metal. “What kind of law enforcement officer is afraid to drive?” Sharma smiled sardonically.
Agnihotri clenched his teeth, grabbed the keys and pulled open the door into the vehicle.
“That’s more like it.”
***
The skyscraper was fairly ugly by modern standards. A crude, block of grey with no adornments- every shape on it was either rectangular or cuboidal, nothing like the glistening havens of glass, metal and air conditioning like that came up these days on the outskirts of the city.
It must have been thirty years odd years old, and in a state of pathetic disrepair. Almost half the windows were without panes, paint had peeled off almost everywhere- they wouldn’t be able to tell if it had ever been any colour other than grey. Seepages and corrosion could be seen from a distance. It looked like it had been abandoned for years.
Akash Agnihotri was sweating, even though the air-conditioner was on, the weather outside was cloudy with a slight drizzle and it was thirty minutes past eight in the morning and most of the city was still asleep.
He brought the car into a halt next to a couple of officers standing next to the street and herding people away from the building. He opened the door and stared straight at the dark clouds above him, letting pinpricks of the cold rain pepper his face.
“The tip off came over an hour ago, the details coming in have been erratic. That’s part of the reason I didn’t have time to interview you properly- but since you’d taken the early flight into the city, I thought you’d like to get on the job as soon as possible.” Sharma explained as the two walked up to the nearest uniformed constables.
“Yes of course sir.” Agnihotri still seemed a little rattled by his drive through the Indian financial capital.
Sharma started talking to a constable. Agnihotri looked past them- behind them were more khaki clad police officers walking in and out of the building, along with two ambulances buzzing with activity as white-uniformed medics sprinted to and fro, a fire-truck waited on standby, but some of the firemen were also getting ready to enter the building.
What the hell happened here?
“Sir you can’t go in-” One of the constables was speaking.
“I’m I.P.S. you ignorant lout!” Sharma exploded. “Take me to the man in charge here!”
The constable gave a little squeal and nodded his head. “Sorry sir, mein bas le jata hoon”- I’ll take you there immediately.
Sharma followed the constable, putting his temper back under his control. Agnihotri followed Sharma.
The head officer was a lean, shrewd looking man in his fifties- wearing full khaki unform- the name on his tag was Rakesh Sinha, Agnihotri observed, he was talking to the constabulary until he saw Sharma and seemed to recognise him.
“Viraat!” He exclaimed. “You’re with the FIA now right?”
Viraat Sharma grunted a positive. “What in god’s name happened here, Rakesh?”
Officer Sinha’s expression soured a little at Sharma’s direct question and his dismissal of official pleasantries.
“It isn’t like anything we’ve ever seen. We have found seventeen casualties in the building, nine fatalities as of now, and we’ve recovered over two dozen firearms from the premises.”
Sharma frowned. “Extrapolation from your faint cheerfulness, you think this was a gang war.”
“Er, we don’t think it’s a gang war.”
“Why?”
Agnihotri caught something out of the corner of his eye.
“It’s because of the manner of the deaths- suffocation, knife wounds, blunt traima, snapped necks and just one death because of gunshot wounds.”
“What?!”
Agnihotri had moved away from the two government officers. His eyes settled on a spot on concrete that was heavily stained by an ugly red, the stones of the sidewalk were cleanly split and cracked around the centre of the pool.
Both the older officers followed the younger man’s gaze.
“A man fell there.” Sinha supplied helpfully.
“Oh.” Said Agnihotri.
“We estimate from the twentieth floor.”
“How come, did you get a crash or ballistics expert or something?” Sharma inquired.
“Er, no, but you’ll see why.” Sinha replied.
The three of them looked at the bloodied, shattered depression in the sidewalk. Viraat Sharma ran his hand through his hair and frowned. His voice was almost a growl “Do you have any idea who’s responsible for this?”
“Not a damn clue.” Said Sinha.
“Any evidence that might tell us more about what happened?” Agnihotri asked cautiously.
“Er... well you could say that.”
***
In the dim light of early morn, the room was ominous. The door shrieked as it opened fully.
The first things he noticed were the pictures.
They were littered all over the floor of the dark room. The upturned ones showed happy, sometimes tired looking, men, women, families posing to have their photographs taken. Most of them were smiling. Some of them were sprayed with blood.
The second thing he saw was the chair and the body of the man tied to it. The chair was tightly secured with rope on top of a bed. The man in it ‘sat’ with his head down. He wore a night-gown, and his mouth remained trapped in a dumb gape.
Blood dripped into the bed-sheets at his feet from three bullet holes in his chest.
Agnihotri scrutinized them immediately. The three holes formed an equilateral triangle on the man’s chest. Did it mean something? Or was it simply some result of taking advantage of the accuracy offered by point blank range.
Along with him, there were four other men in the room. Officers Sharma, Sinha, a ballistics expert and a blood splatter specialist.
After a few seconds of being deep in thought, the ballistics man announced loudly. “This man was shot from extreme close range.” --which educed everyone else in the room to give him a long, hard, cold, stare. He closed his mouth.
It was a small room, the furthest anyone could be from the man without leaving the room was about eight feet.
“I’ve seen this man’s face before...” Agnihotri mused. “...A businessman?”
Both Sharma and Sinha snorted simultaneously.
“More like a crime-lord. That’s Prasad, the leader of the biggest gang in the city.” It was Officer Sharma who spoke. “That bastard’s weaselled his way out of a dozen cases of extortion and kidnapping. He disappeared from India about ten years ago and fled to Dubai.”
Rakesh Sinha nodded. “Back in the day, his name used to come often- but he was never directly involved in anything- there was never any evidence... and someone else always took the fall- and his name was interspersed with many others. We didn’t realize how important he was until he moved to Dubai and set up a business enterprise with drug money and declared himself CEO- that’s when we realized that he’d been the mastermind behind the whole operation. Now- he was invited back to Bombay with open arms by the chief minister for being a Valuable Conduit of Foreign Investment.”
Sharma muttered a few obscenities under his breath and then picked up one of the photographs from the ground, a brightly beaming young woman posing near the Gateway to India monument next to the Arabian Sea. The blood splatter expert opened his mouth to protest- but the protestation never came.
“I’m willing to bet two legs and an arm that these are the pictures of the victims of crimes he was never convicted for.”
Sinha frowned. “Yes, that seems... but surely that can’t explain the whole...” The sentence faded into silence before it got anywhere.
Agnihotri used the silence to clear his throat.
“The revenge motive should be looked at very carefully here. This setting, it’s very personal. All the other men have been ambushed and disposed of immediately. This man was executed. He’s bound, but there’s no cloth in his mouth- he wasn’t gagged. He was allowed to talk- to beg, to scream. He was shot- when no one else was shot. If you look at the swellings on his arms- he was conscious for at least ten minutes and tried fiercely to struggle against the ropes.”
Sinha interrupted-“Viru, who is this guy? IPS?”
Sharma sighed. “No. He’s an FIA Specialist.”
Sinha- “What does he specialize in?”
Sharma- “He... is, just, er... generally specialized.”
Agnihotri ignored the interlude.
“Look at the photographs meticulously scattered around the room. The killers might have done this before executing the man. We can be pretty sure that this room was originally intended for Prasad to stay in.”
He paused for a moment to consider the room. Then walked to the nearest work-desk and shuffled through a few papers.
“We can be pretty sure that this room was specially prepared for Prasad. It’s the only liveable room in the building- air conditioning, newspapers and financial reports... and the victim is dressed in his nightgown- he was probably trying to sleep on this very bed. It seems like the killers spent a lot of time in this room- the time taken to do this elaborate rope binding would imply that Prasad was either incapacitated or being controlled by force as it was set up. It would be much easier to simply kill him than to make a show of it like this. In that sense- the revenge motive makes sense.”
“Or it might just be an elaborate ruse to divert our attention.” Said Sinha. Officer Sharma’s cellphone rang and he answered discreetly.
Sinha continued. “Prasad’s gang is definitely the biggest in the city- but he’s got some stiff competition, as many as three other gangs are fighting to take over his drug running turf. Some say he was coming back to India to intimidate the other gangs- they might have seen it as an opportunity to assassinate him. It makes sense- a surgical strike like this might be enough to break down the structure of the Company.”
He stopped to mull it over in his head.
The young man drifted along the desk, examining each object- just like the killer had- hours ago. His hand fell on a diary, instinctively he pulled it open and flipped through the pages. All blank.
Except...
The last page had a small block of text written in small cursive script.
I wonder if anyone will read this. He’s already confessed. It means nothing of course; it must feel good to not have to pretend to be human anymore, right? It’s sick that monsters can don human skin with such ease.
And Then-
He closed the book.
Who wrote that?! He inhaled sharply, and started looking for anything else that might give him a clue.
Sinha had finished thinking. He spoke out loud, though no-one was listening. “If it was a gangland killing, we needn’t worry- one of the gangs will know about the hit- the others won’t. We’ll keep this out of the media, suppress news of his death- most people just know him as a legitimate businessman anyway- and see which gang shows the most aggressive activity in following days”
Sharma had returned from his call, white faced.
“So Viru, any bets on who it will be- which rival, I mean? Your only real contenders are of course Tanveer Qayoom, Khalid Mortaza, and Bhimsinha Sharma.”
“It isn’t any of them.” He spoke sharply.
“What? Why?” Sinha asked. Agnihotri put down whatever he was fiddling with to look at Viraat Sharma.
“They’re all Dead.”
He went through the documents that he held in his hands exuding an aura that emanated an emotion bordering fury. He put the papers down on the desk before him and looked up at the well dressed young man seated across the table from him.
“Why?” He demanded.
The other man did not respond. A flicker of annoyance flashed across his face. “I don’t quite understand what you mean, sir.” He replied politely.
The younger man wore an immaculate black suit and creaseless white shirt, had perfectly combed black hair and a complexion paled by having been out of the sun too long. He was handsome, in a slightly feminine way, but physically unimpressive. He too evaluated the other man.
"No matter how long I go through these pieces of paper..." The older man continued. "I can't make sense of it. There's no reason you should be here."
If the statement evoked an emotional reaction, it didn't show on the younger man's face. "I'm here because I want to, sir." He said, simply.
The other man's eyes flashed back to the pieces of paper on the desk.
"... Degrees in computer science, biology... with your academic record, you should be doing an MBA and minting money... but... psychology?"
"I believe it's absolutely necessary in this line of work."
"Why someone would come back to India after a stint abroad, to join the FIA, is something that goes over my head. Even with the 'specialist' allowance, you can't expect to earn even a fraction of what you would in a multinational."
"I'm not doing it for the money, sir." Still cold, expressionless.
"You don't have any of the powers and privileges of a traditional bureaucrat either."
"Perhaps, Sir," He paused, flicking a stray hair out of his forehead. "I will be better able answer questions pertaining to my qualifications and contributions rather than conjecture on other career options."
"Yes." The middle-aged man said, without breaking eye contact, "Just as soon as I know why you want to be a detective."
The younger man's expression hardened for a moment.
"Because I'm perfect for the job. I thought that’s what you’d be looking for."
Something shifted in the older man's face, some might have detected a half-smile, others- nothing at all. "Fair enough. The interview is over, follow me." He got up.
The younger man- up till that point a paragon of stoic calm- was unable to stop his mouth from opening a little as his face distorted in confusion. "Wha- Certainly sir."
The older man motioned the younger to follow as he opened the door to the small corner office he had been conducting the interview in and out into the main hall.
The hall was a large area with little furniture- a few desks, chairs and computers were in the process of being unpacked. One wall was made entirely of glass, giving the officers in the hall a clear view of the sun beginning to rise over the city skyline.
It was 8:25 am.
Overlooking the hall was a curious emblem mounted on a small rift in the ceiling- a plain black circle emblazoned with the words 'Federal Investigative Agency'.
The older man saw the younger looking at the emblem. He answered as soon as he saw the black haired youth open his mouth to ask the question.
"The top brass hasn't decided on a logo yet. We're keeping the space blank till they come up with something."
He began to walk, the younger man followed.
"Did you know that the Research and Analysis Wing had a logo privately commissioned for them for fifteen lakh rupees?"
"No."
"It could never be used. Security risk."
"But... what?"
The older man never broke pace as they reached the elevator and he hit the button.
"This kind of functioning was what facilitated the formation of this organization. I intend to make sure it is not repeated here. This is why we're hiring people like you...specialists...Not sure how much that'll help..." He said. "What was your name again?"
They entered the elevator, leaving the bare-boned office behind.
"Akash. Akash Agnihotri… Er, Sir, where are we going?”
“I’m going to see just how useful you are in the field. We’re heading for a crime scene.”
“Ok.”
The elevator doors parted and the men walked into the main lobby of the ground floor, within seconds they had reached the entrance and emerged out the building into the street.
“I’ll try to brief you on our way there.” The officer.
A car was parked near the entrance to the building. A white Honda City- the driver, a heavily tanned, somewhat tired looking man in his late thirties dressed in a simple white shirt and dark pants, waved to the older of the two men. The car was meant for them.
“Mr. Sharma, where are we going?” He asked.
“Rajender, throw me the keys.” The middle aged officer, Viraat Sharma, replied. The driver seemed bemused as he threw the keys to officer Sharma, the younger man noticed, but not particularly surprised by the unconventional order, he made a note of it in his head.
Sharma thrust the keys into the younger man’s hand, who almost recoiled at the touch of the metal. “What kind of law enforcement officer is afraid to drive?” Sharma smiled sardonically.
Agnihotri clenched his teeth, grabbed the keys and pulled open the door into the vehicle.
“That’s more like it.”
***
The skyscraper was fairly ugly by modern standards. A crude, block of grey with no adornments- every shape on it was either rectangular or cuboidal, nothing like the glistening havens of glass, metal and air conditioning like that came up these days on the outskirts of the city.
It must have been thirty years odd years old, and in a state of pathetic disrepair. Almost half the windows were without panes, paint had peeled off almost everywhere- they wouldn’t be able to tell if it had ever been any colour other than grey. Seepages and corrosion could be seen from a distance. It looked like it had been abandoned for years.
Akash Agnihotri was sweating, even though the air-conditioner was on, the weather outside was cloudy with a slight drizzle and it was thirty minutes past eight in the morning and most of the city was still asleep.
He brought the car into a halt next to a couple of officers standing next to the street and herding people away from the building. He opened the door and stared straight at the dark clouds above him, letting pinpricks of the cold rain pepper his face.
“The tip off came over an hour ago, the details coming in have been erratic. That’s part of the reason I didn’t have time to interview you properly- but since you’d taken the early flight into the city, I thought you’d like to get on the job as soon as possible.” Sharma explained as the two walked up to the nearest uniformed constables.
“Yes of course sir.” Agnihotri still seemed a little rattled by his drive through the Indian financial capital.
Sharma started talking to a constable. Agnihotri looked past them- behind them were more khaki clad police officers walking in and out of the building, along with two ambulances buzzing with activity as white-uniformed medics sprinted to and fro, a fire-truck waited on standby, but some of the firemen were also getting ready to enter the building.
What the hell happened here?
“Sir you can’t go in-” One of the constables was speaking.
“I’m I.P.S. you ignorant lout!” Sharma exploded. “Take me to the man in charge here!”
The constable gave a little squeal and nodded his head. “Sorry sir, mein bas le jata hoon”- I’ll take you there immediately.
Sharma followed the constable, putting his temper back under his control. Agnihotri followed Sharma.
The head officer was a lean, shrewd looking man in his fifties- wearing full khaki unform- the name on his tag was Rakesh Sinha, Agnihotri observed, he was talking to the constabulary until he saw Sharma and seemed to recognise him.
“Viraat!” He exclaimed. “You’re with the FIA now right?”
Viraat Sharma grunted a positive. “What in god’s name happened here, Rakesh?”
Officer Sinha’s expression soured a little at Sharma’s direct question and his dismissal of official pleasantries.
“It isn’t like anything we’ve ever seen. We have found seventeen casualties in the building, nine fatalities as of now, and we’ve recovered over two dozen firearms from the premises.”
Sharma frowned. “Extrapolation from your faint cheerfulness, you think this was a gang war.”
“Er, we don’t think it’s a gang war.”
“Why?”
Agnihotri caught something out of the corner of his eye.
“It’s because of the manner of the deaths- suffocation, knife wounds, blunt traima, snapped necks and just one death because of gunshot wounds.”
“What?!”
Agnihotri had moved away from the two government officers. His eyes settled on a spot on concrete that was heavily stained by an ugly red, the stones of the sidewalk were cleanly split and cracked around the centre of the pool.
Both the older officers followed the younger man’s gaze.
“A man fell there.” Sinha supplied helpfully.
“Oh.” Said Agnihotri.
“We estimate from the twentieth floor.”
“How come, did you get a crash or ballistics expert or something?” Sharma inquired.
“Er, no, but you’ll see why.” Sinha replied.
The three of them looked at the bloodied, shattered depression in the sidewalk. Viraat Sharma ran his hand through his hair and frowned. His voice was almost a growl “Do you have any idea who’s responsible for this?”
“Not a damn clue.” Said Sinha.
“Any evidence that might tell us more about what happened?” Agnihotri asked cautiously.
“Er... well you could say that.”
***
In the dim light of early morn, the room was ominous. The door shrieked as it opened fully.
The first things he noticed were the pictures.
They were littered all over the floor of the dark room. The upturned ones showed happy, sometimes tired looking, men, women, families posing to have their photographs taken. Most of them were smiling. Some of them were sprayed with blood.
The second thing he saw was the chair and the body of the man tied to it. The chair was tightly secured with rope on top of a bed. The man in it ‘sat’ with his head down. He wore a night-gown, and his mouth remained trapped in a dumb gape.
Blood dripped into the bed-sheets at his feet from three bullet holes in his chest.
Agnihotri scrutinized them immediately. The three holes formed an equilateral triangle on the man’s chest. Did it mean something? Or was it simply some result of taking advantage of the accuracy offered by point blank range.
Along with him, there were four other men in the room. Officers Sharma, Sinha, a ballistics expert and a blood splatter specialist.
After a few seconds of being deep in thought, the ballistics man announced loudly. “This man was shot from extreme close range.” --which educed everyone else in the room to give him a long, hard, cold, stare. He closed his mouth.
It was a small room, the furthest anyone could be from the man without leaving the room was about eight feet.
“I’ve seen this man’s face before...” Agnihotri mused. “...A businessman?”
Both Sharma and Sinha snorted simultaneously.
“More like a crime-lord. That’s Prasad, the leader of the biggest gang in the city.” It was Officer Sharma who spoke. “That bastard’s weaselled his way out of a dozen cases of extortion and kidnapping. He disappeared from India about ten years ago and fled to Dubai.”
Rakesh Sinha nodded. “Back in the day, his name used to come often- but he was never directly involved in anything- there was never any evidence... and someone else always took the fall- and his name was interspersed with many others. We didn’t realize how important he was until he moved to Dubai and set up a business enterprise with drug money and declared himself CEO- that’s when we realized that he’d been the mastermind behind the whole operation. Now- he was invited back to Bombay with open arms by the chief minister for being a Valuable Conduit of Foreign Investment.”
Sharma muttered a few obscenities under his breath and then picked up one of the photographs from the ground, a brightly beaming young woman posing near the Gateway to India monument next to the Arabian Sea. The blood splatter expert opened his mouth to protest- but the protestation never came.
“I’m willing to bet two legs and an arm that these are the pictures of the victims of crimes he was never convicted for.”
Sinha frowned. “Yes, that seems... but surely that can’t explain the whole...” The sentence faded into silence before it got anywhere.
Agnihotri used the silence to clear his throat.
“The revenge motive should be looked at very carefully here. This setting, it’s very personal. All the other men have been ambushed and disposed of immediately. This man was executed. He’s bound, but there’s no cloth in his mouth- he wasn’t gagged. He was allowed to talk- to beg, to scream. He was shot- when no one else was shot. If you look at the swellings on his arms- he was conscious for at least ten minutes and tried fiercely to struggle against the ropes.”
Sinha interrupted-“Viru, who is this guy? IPS?”
Sharma sighed. “No. He’s an FIA Specialist.”
Sinha- “What does he specialize in?”
Sharma- “He... is, just, er... generally specialized.”
Agnihotri ignored the interlude.
“Look at the photographs meticulously scattered around the room. The killers might have done this before executing the man. We can be pretty sure that this room was originally intended for Prasad to stay in.”
He paused for a moment to consider the room. Then walked to the nearest work-desk and shuffled through a few papers.
“We can be pretty sure that this room was specially prepared for Prasad. It’s the only liveable room in the building- air conditioning, newspapers and financial reports... and the victim is dressed in his nightgown- he was probably trying to sleep on this very bed. It seems like the killers spent a lot of time in this room- the time taken to do this elaborate rope binding would imply that Prasad was either incapacitated or being controlled by force as it was set up. It would be much easier to simply kill him than to make a show of it like this. In that sense- the revenge motive makes sense.”
“Or it might just be an elaborate ruse to divert our attention.” Said Sinha. Officer Sharma’s cellphone rang and he answered discreetly.
Sinha continued. “Prasad’s gang is definitely the biggest in the city- but he’s got some stiff competition, as many as three other gangs are fighting to take over his drug running turf. Some say he was coming back to India to intimidate the other gangs- they might have seen it as an opportunity to assassinate him. It makes sense- a surgical strike like this might be enough to break down the structure of the Company.”
He stopped to mull it over in his head.
The young man drifted along the desk, examining each object- just like the killer had- hours ago. His hand fell on a diary, instinctively he pulled it open and flipped through the pages. All blank.
Except...
The last page had a small block of text written in small cursive script.
I wonder if anyone will read this. He’s already confessed. It means nothing of course; it must feel good to not have to pretend to be human anymore, right? It’s sick that monsters can don human skin with such ease.
And Then-
I Will Destroy Them All
He closed the book.
Who wrote that?! He inhaled sharply, and started looking for anything else that might give him a clue.
Sinha had finished thinking. He spoke out loud, though no-one was listening. “If it was a gangland killing, we needn’t worry- one of the gangs will know about the hit- the others won’t. We’ll keep this out of the media, suppress news of his death- most people just know him as a legitimate businessman anyway- and see which gang shows the most aggressive activity in following days”
Sharma had returned from his call, white faced.
“So Viru, any bets on who it will be- which rival, I mean? Your only real contenders are of course Tanveer Qayoom, Khalid Mortaza, and Bhimsinha Sharma.”
“It isn’t any of them.” He spoke sharply.
“What? Why?” Sinha asked. Agnihotri put down whatever he was fiddling with to look at Viraat Sharma.
“They’re all Dead.”
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
A few choice morsels from Nietzsche's Apophthegms
"The devil has the most extensive perspectives for God; on that account he keeps so far away from him:—the devil, in effect, as the oldest friend of knowledge."
"What a person IS begins to betray itself when his talent decreases,—when he ceases to show what he CAN do. Talent is also an adornment; an adornment is also a concealment."
"One is punished best for one’s virtues."
"He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee."
"Love brings to light the noble and hidden qualities of a lover—his rare and exceptional traits: it is thus liable to be deceptive as to his normal character."
"One does not hate as long as one disesteems, but only when one esteems equal or superior."
“I am affected, not because you have deceived me, but because I can no longer believe in you.”
THE DISAPPOINTED ONE SPEAKS—"I listened for the echo and I heard only praise”.
"A soul which knows that it is loved, but does not itself love, betrays its sediment: its dregs come up."
"What? A great man? I always see merely the play-actor of his own ideal."
The maturity of man—that means, to have reacquired the seriousness that one had as a child at play.
"What a person IS begins to betray itself when his talent decreases,—when he ceases to show what he CAN do. Talent is also an adornment; an adornment is also a concealment."
"One is punished best for one’s virtues."
"He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee."
"Love brings to light the noble and hidden qualities of a lover—his rare and exceptional traits: it is thus liable to be deceptive as to his normal character."
"One does not hate as long as one disesteems, but only when one esteems equal or superior."
“I am affected, not because you have deceived me, but because I can no longer believe in you.”
THE DISAPPOINTED ONE SPEAKS—"I listened for the echo and I heard only praise”.
"A soul which knows that it is loved, but does not itself love, betrays its sediment: its dregs come up."
"What? A great man? I always see merely the play-actor of his own ideal."
The maturity of man—that means, to have reacquired the seriousness that one had as a child at play.
Friday, June 4, 2010
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Judging a Book By Its Cover
Mostly I'm all for old quotations. Lots of wisdom to be had there. The old adage 'Never Judge a Book By It's Cover' is something that's close to my heart. I always remember it when I form opinions... especially about people. Although it applies to cars and software and graphic novels too.
Who would have known that the fancy-pants Fiat Punto runs a trashy engine half a decade older than the humble Maruti Swift? But there's still one field where I find that I just can't agree with that old saying.
That's when I'm trying to judge...
...er...
... well...
Books.
These are all good books.
Can you recognize a common thread to them all? No? Yes? I assume no.
Maybe it'll help to have some comparative pictures of great and not so great books from the same author :)
Good. ...................................................Meh.
Like reading an awesome action movie.
Like reading a B-grade
action sequel.
I think most of you would have gotten the very simple distinction between the covers of the good books and the not so good books. That's right... the good books place the emphasis on the name of the book, the bad ones place emphasis on the name of the author.
Somehow I never liked reading authors names in large characters. I didn't put my finger on 'why?' until much later. Having your name in massive characters is an ego exercise, and takes away from the work itself. If the work is good enough to stand on its own, it does not need the crutch of it's author. On the other hand... if the work is weak, the author, the publisher is insecure, he tries to bank on past glory... either that or he has the ego the size of a mountainside.
Is it too ridiculous a thing to base your entire understanding of book selection on?
Maybe.
I've followed this simple algorithm for years, and with ridiculously high levels of success in detecting trash.
Sometimes I look for good art too, as an indicator that the publisher has confidence in the book- but this isn't nearly as trustworthy a mechanism as the first one.
Judgemental? Hell yes.
Accurate-? Oh yes, about 80+% accurate.
There are some grave miscalculations, of course- Endymion Spring made me want to puke while reading it, but I liked the cover when I saw it.
Of course, many books have several different covers, experimenting with both styles of presentation... but eventually the 'equilibrium' shifts in the direction of one or the other experiencing better sales- so the company moves into mass producing the more successful cover... and you will find... perhaps in the four most common covers for a good book, that the name of the book takes prime position in three out of four, and just the opposite for a bad one.
Sometimes good and bad books are released in a 'series' so they need to have the same cover styles... Newer authors are less likely to have planet sized names on the cover...
Er, maybe I'm writing too much. I don't really think too much when picking up a book.
I guess I can't resist the irony of the fact that I always DO end up judging a book by its cover.
And It's pretty damn effective.
Who would have known that the fancy-pants Fiat Punto runs a trashy engine half a decade older than the humble Maruti Swift? But there's still one field where I find that I just can't agree with that old saying.
That's when I'm trying to judge...
...er...
... well...
Books.
These are all good books.
Can you recognize a common thread to them all? No? Yes? I assume no.
Maybe it'll help to have some comparative pictures of great and not so great books from the same author :)
Good. ...................................................Meh.
Like reading an awesome action movie.
Like reading a B-grade
action sequel.
I think most of you would have gotten the very simple distinction between the covers of the good books and the not so good books. That's right... the good books place the emphasis on the name of the book, the bad ones place emphasis on the name of the author.
Somehow I never liked reading authors names in large characters. I didn't put my finger on 'why?' until much later. Having your name in massive characters is an ego exercise, and takes away from the work itself. If the work is good enough to stand on its own, it does not need the crutch of it's author. On the other hand... if the work is weak, the author, the publisher is insecure, he tries to bank on past glory... either that or he has the ego the size of a mountainside.
Is it too ridiculous a thing to base your entire understanding of book selection on?
Maybe.
I've followed this simple algorithm for years, and with ridiculously high levels of success in detecting trash.
Sometimes I look for good art too, as an indicator that the publisher has confidence in the book- but this isn't nearly as trustworthy a mechanism as the first one.
Judgemental? Hell yes.
Accurate-? Oh yes, about 80+% accurate.
There are some grave miscalculations, of course- Endymion Spring made me want to puke while reading it, but I liked the cover when I saw it.
Of course, many books have several different covers, experimenting with both styles of presentation... but eventually the 'equilibrium' shifts in the direction of one or the other experiencing better sales- so the company moves into mass producing the more successful cover... and you will find... perhaps in the four most common covers for a good book, that the name of the book takes prime position in three out of four, and just the opposite for a bad one.
Sometimes good and bad books are released in a 'series' so they need to have the same cover styles... Newer authors are less likely to have planet sized names on the cover...
Er, maybe I'm writing too much. I don't really think too much when picking up a book.
I guess I can't resist the irony of the fact that I always DO end up judging a book by its cover.
And It's pretty damn effective.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
A nice fun letter based on the literal reading of Leviticus (not by me)
In her radio show, Dr Laura Schlesinger said that, as an observant Orthodox Jew, homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22, and cannot be condoned under any circumstance. The following response is an open letter to Dr. Laura, penned by a US resident, which was posted on the Internet. It's funny, as well as informative:
Dear Dr. Laura:
Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination ... End of debate.
I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some other elements of God's Laws and how to follow them.
1. Leviticus 25:44 states that I may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?
2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?
3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of Menstrual uncleanliness - Lev.15: 19-24. The problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.
4. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?
5. I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself, or should I ask the police to do it?
6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination, Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this? Are there 'degrees' of abomination?
7. Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle-room here?
8. Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?
9. I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?
10. My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev.19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair, like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)
I know you have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy considerable expertise in such matters, so I'm confident you can help.
Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.
Your adoring fan,
James M. Kauffman, Ed.D. Professor Emeritus, Dept. Of Curriculum, Instruction, and Special Education University of Virginia
(It would be a damn shame if we couldn't own a Canadian :)
Dear Dr. Laura:
Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination ... End of debate.
I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some other elements of God's Laws and how to follow them.
1. Leviticus 25:44 states that I may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?
2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?
3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of Menstrual uncleanliness - Lev.15: 19-24. The problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.
4. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?
5. I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself, or should I ask the police to do it?
6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination, Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this? Are there 'degrees' of abomination?
7. Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle-room here?
8. Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?
9. I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?
10. My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev.19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair, like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)
I know you have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy considerable expertise in such matters, so I'm confident you can help.
Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.
Your adoring fan,
James M. Kauffman, Ed.D. Professor Emeritus, Dept. Of Curriculum, Instruction, and Special Education University of Virginia
(It would be a damn shame if we couldn't own a Canadian :)
Sunday, May 16, 2010
The Placebo Effect
The placebo effect and some of it's related results are some of the most mysterious phenomena in medicine, biology and psychology.
The gist of it is quite simple. Make people think that they should feel something- and they do. The far too classic humans-behaving-as-cattle mentality.
You've probably heard the story in one form or the other- the one from my college goes- two guys walk into a room-party expecting to find drinks, the host hands them glasses of pepsi mixed with mountain-dew and tells them it contains alcohol just to shut them up.
Three glasses later they end up kissing themselves, claiming they were too drunk to know otherwise.
But of course, the drink contained no alcohol- so biologically- they couldn't have been drunk. It's easy to just call guys like this wannabe morons and continue on with life like nothing's happened- but you've just been witness to something poorly understood even today- even after vast amounts of research in many fields.
Imagine the same effect mentioned above, applied to the field of medicine.
For many years it's been responsible for the spread of crackpot science- Homeopathy, Ayurveda (though many parts of this have scientific support), 'Vitamins' as cures for infectious disease. They prescribed their remedies- sold them with confidence- and the patients reported results.
A clear cut case- the patients report improvements! All of these 'alternative' medicines must therefore be effective.
Maybe in the future we'll be able to make ourselves immune to pain at will, enhance our metabolisms into burning more fat simply by commanding it (imagine losing weight just by wanting to!), some might use the body's dopamine and serotinin as a substitute for well... er... dopamine and serotonin substitutes found in recreational drugs- though it seems unlikely that the body would willingly push dopamine levels so high that it could permanently damage receptors. Maybe we'd be able to fall asleep and wake up on command- there are even muscle delimitors that sometimes allow people access to incredible strength- atheletes might tap into those reserves by conditioning themselves.
I'll end with a piece of advice that's pretty novel for this blog.
The gist of it is quite simple. Make people think that they should feel something- and they do. The far too classic humans-behaving-as-cattle mentality.
You've probably heard the story in one form or the other- the one from my college goes- two guys walk into a room-party expecting to find drinks, the host hands them glasses of pepsi mixed with mountain-dew and tells them it contains alcohol just to shut them up.
Three glasses later they end up kissing themselves, claiming they were too drunk to know otherwise.
But of course, the drink contained no alcohol- so biologically- they couldn't have been drunk. It's easy to just call guys like this wannabe morons and continue on with life like nothing's happened- but you've just been witness to something poorly understood even today- even after vast amounts of research in many fields.
Imagine the same effect mentioned above, applied to the field of medicine.
For many years it's been responsible for the spread of crackpot science- Homeopathy, Ayurveda (though many parts of this have scientific support), 'Vitamins' as cures for infectious disease. They prescribed their remedies- sold them with confidence- and the patients reported results.
A clear cut case- the patients report improvements! All of these 'alternative' medicines must therefore be effective.
Not exactly. Let's take the case of Homeopathy.
Homeopathy's two fundamental laws are -
1) The more diluted a mix is- the more potent it is.
Yes. The more diluted a mix is, the more potent it is.
This is in contrast with 'allopathy'- modern medicine, which works on the general idea that higher concentrations of an ingredient are 'stronger'.
2) An ingredient that causes an ailment at higher concentrations- heals it in lower concentrations.
Surprisingly- this is at least partially true for some cases. Vaccines work on the principle of making anti-bodies develop immunity by exposing them to alien protein strains that must be devoured. Snake anti-venom is made using snake venom. However, these cases are true largely because you need the causative agent to know what to destroy. An ingredient that causes an ailment is needed to figure out how to cure it.
You can't, for example, cure illnesses born of poisoning this way. Exposing a guy to small doses of CO won't make him resistant to carbon monoxide poisoning. Cure arsenic poisoning by drinking water contaminated by arsenic.
And certainly- injecting 'small doses' of small pox without weakening them first is about the most evil thing you can do.
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If you are horrified by what I've written by homeopathy and want to refute it... you're free to google it yourself. There are plenty of corroborative sources online, find them, find flaws in them and we'll have an argument. Be sure to provide raw stats- My recent probability and statistics course should help with the p-values.
If you're horrified by the two laws and wonder how come homeopathy hasn't killed off large swathes of the population already-
It's because the first law negates the harmful effects of the second.
You take 1 drop of an arsenic solution and drop it into 99 drops of water/alcohol. You now have a 1X or 1C solution. The (according to chemistry) strongest and (according to homeopathy) weakest solution.
Mix it up, take a drop from the above hundred and put it in 99 drops of water/alcohol. You now have a '2X' or '2C' solution of 0.01 percent concentration of the original.
Typical homeopathic solutions lie in the 20x to 30X zone. that is for a given sample- they contain ten to the power minus forty or ten to the power minus sixty times the number of molecules in the original drop.
This was all fine and dandy in the 1700s when atoms hadn't been discovered and the molar concept had not yet been established. Today we know that 16g of carbon contains approx 6.022 10^23 molecules of carbon. I'm not sure how much 1 drop weighs- but let us, for an approximation, assume that the drop manages to contain 1 mole of the active ingredient- 6 x 10^23 molecules- (this is a mass effectively greater than 1 gram, and practically greater than 20 grams at least considering that pure elements esp. gases, aren't used as 'active ingredients'.
This means that 6 x 10^23 molecules in that original drop are diluted to a level that is equivalent to them being divided into 10^40 equal vials of the final homeopathic solution. The probability of finding a SINGLE molecule of the original ingredient in a vial of 20x (moderate strength) solution is about 6 x 10^-17. (I.e. substantially less likely than you picking up a single random rock and it being made of pure gold.)
This means that 6 x 10^23 molecules in that original drop are diluted to a level that is equivalent to them being divided into 10^40 equal vials of the final homeopathic solution. The probability of finding a SINGLE molecule of the original ingredient in a vial of 20x (moderate strength) solution is about 6 x 10^-17. (I.e. substantially less likely than you picking up a single random rock and it being made of pure gold.)
That's one atom. One atom can't do much, to be honest.
However it is in practice a few hundred times even less likely- because we originally took a very sweeping approximation- a drop of water solution does not weigh 20 grams.
So if you're taking homeopathic "meds", you're mostly ingesting sugar, water and alcohol- harmless. No need to worry about arsenic poisoning, you'll occasionally find a single molecule of arsenic floating around here or there- shouldn't do too much damage.
Just to be safe- remember to ask for the 'high power' (low concentration) tablets.
Now the question remains- if this quack medicine openly flouts some of the most basic rules of some of the most basic chemistry, how come people that take the sugar pills report an improvement in their condition?
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When homeopathic medicine is tested against no treatment being provided- the homeopathic medicine shows better results.
When homeopathic medicine is tested against tablets made of random harmless-but-not-helpful ingredients. Both show equal results.
So random pills are equally effective as homeopathy. Nice.
The patient, upon receiving the medicine, has a certain 'expectancy', he expects to his situation to improve... and is more likely to believe that he feels better.
However it is in practice a few hundred times even less likely- because we originally took a very sweeping approximation- a drop of water solution does not weigh 20 grams.
So if you're taking homeopathic "meds", you're mostly ingesting sugar, water and alcohol- harmless. No need to worry about arsenic poisoning, you'll occasionally find a single molecule of arsenic floating around here or there- shouldn't do too much damage.
Just to be safe- remember to ask for the 'high power' (low concentration) tablets.
Now the question remains- if this quack medicine openly flouts some of the most basic rules of some of the most basic chemistry, how come people that take the sugar pills report an improvement in their condition?
--------------------------
When homeopathic medicine is tested against no treatment being provided- the homeopathic medicine shows better results.
When homeopathic medicine is tested against tablets made of random harmless-but-not-helpful ingredients. Both show equal results.
So random pills are equally effective as homeopathy. Nice.
The patient, upon receiving the medicine, has a certain 'expectancy', he expects to his situation to improve... and is more likely to believe that he feels better.
If he's given a painkiller placebo, he's more likely to believe that he is in less pain than a guy given no placebo.
It's simple up to right now- right? It's all in the mind- people are easily programmed, duped and coerced into believing things.
I'm sure the early researchers of the placebo effect would have come to the same conclusion.
I certainly wouldn't have thought it prudent to investigate further.
Luckily, there are people a little more insanely logical than even me.
So they actually decided to test to see how similar or different this 'imaginary' painkiller response was to the real deal.
Researchers discovered that Naloxone, a painkiller antagonist, actually stops the effects of a placebo.
Wait.
"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?"
Ah. Let me explain. Most painkillers belong to a certain class of drugs called opioids. Yes, because we live in a sad, sad, world, Opium the recreational drug belongs to this group and is the most popularly known member of it.
An opioid antagonist is a chemical that interferes with the working of the opioids- the painkillers. So this literally means that someone that ingests a placebo with Naloxone (without being told what naloxone does, of course. that wouldn't help with the placebo effect!) will not experience an alleviation of pain. But if it's all in the mind- it should make no difference. Naloxone itself does not 'cause' pain, it simply makes REAL, CHEMICAL painkillers less effective by a mechanism that is scientifically documented.
Why the hell is it working on imaginary painkillers?!
The Placebo effect is not just in the mind it seems.
Patients given placebos have shown tangible, observable differences in recovery! And largely to the positive!
Our brain is a powerful thing. We usually associate it only with control and co-ordination of motor functions- but it's in charge of hormonal release as well.
It's the brain that releases adrenaline when something scares the shit out of you, it's the brain that releases endorphins when you're happy, the brain that drives your body wild when you see the most attractive person you've seen for a while. Conversely, when the serotonin receptors on your nerve endings are overloaded, as any junkie will tell you, the it affects the brain as well.
The naloxone study lead scientists down a path to discover that the 'painkilling' due to a placebo was not in your head (not all of it, at least) but rather because of an opioid manufactured inside the body, by the brain, because of it's expectation parameters.
The brain wanted a painkiller. So the brain MADE a painkiller. Thus the brain got a painkiller.
The brain, overall, oversees the creation of a massive variety of chemicals in the body, some seemingly without conscious input (insulin, testosterone, HGH), while others that most certainly rely on conscious input (adrenaline, noradrenaline, sexual arousal, the entire sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems).
It's entirely plausible that there's a third class as well- a 'semi-conscious' brain that can't be tapped into directly like the parasympathetic/sympathetic systems, not simply by willing it, but by coaxing it in a way most people generally can't do.
'Believing', ridiculously enough, makes your brain produce the right chemicals it needs to sustain that belief... unless you've got naloxone to deactivate those chemicals as well.
I will not delve to the philosophical extrapolations of this... since it's fairly unscientific to do so. But certainly, some will look to this as being in support of the old adage 'believing you can do it' helping you actually 'do it'.
The effects of conditioning are startling and fascinating. From what we can tell, the brain can be trained to make the right chemicals needed for treatment- of pain and disease (for now), evoke the right responses, and with the correct conditioning- actually, substantially help with recovery.
Now researchers are arguing over the extent to which immunity and pain can be influenced from the top down- i.e. physiological changes from psychological changes, and doing experiments on rats.
There's a lot we do not know.
It's like having a latent superpower! And not the only one your body is hiding from you, I might add.
Maybe in the future we'll be able to make ourselves immune to pain at will, enhance our metabolisms into burning more fat simply by commanding it (imagine losing weight just by wanting to!), some might use the body's dopamine and serotinin as a substitute for well... er... dopamine and serotonin substitutes found in recreational drugs- though it seems unlikely that the body would willingly push dopamine levels so high that it could permanently damage receptors. Maybe we'd be able to fall asleep and wake up on command- there are even muscle delimitors that sometimes allow people access to incredible strength- atheletes might tap into those reserves by conditioning themselves.
Will all of it be legal? How much of it is really even possible? I have no idea.
Lots of people are trying to find out just what exactly this body of ours is capable of.
Till then, we will simply have to brainwash ourselves into making our superpowers work.
Please note- there's a Nocebo effect as well. Basically the same thing as the placebo effect but with a 'negative' expectation and a negative result. I suppose the case of the two guys getting drunk on pepsi and dew would be classified as a Nocebo. If people expect pain and suffering, their brains might just decide to oblige them by releasing pain receptor agonists.
So homeopathy helps because people believe it does. If my deconstruction of the two basic homeopathic laws has made you a disbeliever- the placebo effect will no longer help you, sadly.
I'm sorry, if that is the case.
I don't know if it's morally right or wrong to disable a believer's placebo effect simply because my ego pisses me off when homeopaths consider themselves to be equivalent to 'allopaths' despite doing no research, having no scientific models for how their medicines work, going against the basic concepts of chemistry, and yet claiming to be a 'science'.
Another interesting area, I guess, is to experiment on whether 'believing' in the placebo effect itself can actually activate a placebo response... who knows? it might actually be possible.
I'll end with a piece of advice that's pretty novel for this blog.
When in medical treatment... stay positive. It actually helps. We're pretty sure about that.
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