On a cloudy evening, with the smell of rain still in the air, i ventured out to the top of my apartment for a photo session. Here is the best of the lot.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Thursday, October 6, 2011
'I' to 'i' - an icon - RIP Steve
The man who changed I to i is no more. RIP Steve Jobs.
My first look of an apple product was a screenshot of Macintosh's desktop about 16 years back. I used to work in a windows for workgroup. Then someone told me that Mac had all this and more and also that it was released a few years ago.
Over the next few years, while windows caught the craze of the world, mac restricted to the apple PC could not gain market share but had its own followers. Things changed, Time moved on and Steve was forced to move out of apple.
On his return, he changed apple from just being a computer company to a new age computer-consumer-communication giant. He changed the way people used to work at their computers. The way people listened to music. It was a revolution. Jogging became a pleasure with iPod. playlists, albums, rotarty controls became the norm. The once popular walkman was forgotten. Watching videos was changed.. videos became podcasts, to be downloaded and viewed. There were thousands of developers creating hundreds of new apps for iPod. Apple became an industry by itself. While industry and people were settling into iMac and iPod, Steve rewrote history. Enter the iPhone. Another revolution in communication. iPhone raised the bar on the mobile industry. While we were still in awe of the iPhone, apple introduced iPad. The tablet has had several starts and stops and could not create any impact. But iPad changed it all. These were the times that i used to wonder if apple was bringing in the right products at the right time or was Steve an inspirational leader able to sell more products to people. But then I realised it was a combination of several things but the main reason was the inspirational genius behind this.
The man changed the way we live.. from iMac, iPod, iPhone, IPad to iCloud. An iNSPIRATION to an entire industry.
Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish. RIP Steve. the world will miss your inspiration.
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Mobile Phones and ...
The explosion mobile phone usage has brought in a lot of convenience. But there are people (including yours truly) who subscribe to the view that a lot of times it is more of a nuisance rather than a convenience.
People who have been disturbed rudely during their saturday afternoon nap by the ringing of the mobiles, then jumping up to attend to the call only to find it is a sales call for a credit card or insurance policy will more than agree to the nuisance value (wow.. what an oxymoron) the mobile has turned out to be. Almost every saturday afternoon (when i leave my phone on ringing mode, expecting a call), the call definitely comes, except for the one that i was expecting. I tell the caller that i am not interested and not to disturb me, and what happens, i promptly get called in 15 minutes when I am just dozing back from the same caller and I explain that I just told no to the credit card. These are the times i have abused the invention of the mobile telephone and have cursed all the technology gurus who followed a different paths and put us in trouble several years later.
The other impact of the mobile phone is more in terms of a personal behavioural pattern in people. Several times when i travel by public transport, i have found people talking loudly on the phone. The entire bus will hear the conversation starting from something simple as they are already on the way to something complex as discussing a piece of java code or a real estate transaction. The entire crowd will know of the conversation while the person on the phone is oblivious to the surroundings.
I happened to overhear or rather hear a lot of such private conversations on the mobile in a public transport. During one of the journeys, a guy a couple of seats in front of me started by asking some simple questions and in a short while i understood that he was trying to a fix a bug in java code. As the time went, he was exasperated that the person on the other end was not able to debug a simple issue, make a small change and compile the code. The tempers were rising and thankfully for everyone in the bus, he got down at the next stop.
These are the times i used to think if the mobile phone makes people think that they will go invisible and cannot be heard or transported to another world or a shell the moment they pick up an incoming call.
The other behavioural change is the increase in white lies. While all of us are habitual offenders when it comes to telling white lies, the mobile has made it a profession.
As recently as last week, I was travelling in a bus from Guindy to Tambaram. While we were in Meenambakkam, one of the guy received a call and instantly responded that he is in Chrompet and will be in tambaram soon. Some time later, when we were nearing chrompet, the same person received a call and responded saying that he is caught in traffic near MEPZ and will soon come to Tambaram. This type of conversations happen atleast 2 to 3 times in my journey of about 45 minutes, and it happens almost everytime i travel by bus.
[ For people who are not familiar of chennai topography, Tambaram is a suburb in chennai and about 20 kms from Guindy, with Meenambakkam, Chrompet and MEPZ being intermediate stops].
The third change is that mobile is making "Man the social animal and a conversationlist" to 'Man the secluded but connected and a shrt txtng prsn'. During the days before the mobile, the train or bus journey is one place where you will find a lot of discusison happening. It can be sports, politics, movies or general affairs. There used to be a lot of heated debates with known or unknown people on Gavaskar vs Kapil Dev or a Kamal vs Rajini. Now, unfortunately, that has gone into the oblivion. People get onto the bus, and start listeining to music or start texting or get onto a call.
These behavioural pattern change can make a vast change in the generations to come and we may lose the habit of making a conversation. The same way when email changed the way of writing letters or sending greeting cards....
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Rest In Peace, Tiger
Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi
A great cricketer, an excellent captain and a man who changed the Indian cricket. These were the first things that came to my mind when I read that he passed away. Later that night, when I was watching the news channels, i remembered my father recalling some of the stories about Pataudi when i was a school going, cricket crazy kid. My father fondly recollected "Tiger's" cricketing acumen.
To him Pataudi was a genius. He was one of the earliest people in Indian team who changed the way how fielding was looked at in the team. Prior to him, fielding was always the last priority, and the fielders used to do a lot of chasing rather then intercept the ball based on the speed and direction. Tiger brought his excellent anticipation to be at the right place when the ball was hit. He was also one of the best fielders in his time and brought this aspect to the team.
Pataudi was an inspirational captain as well. Under him, the spin quartet blossommed. He was instrumental in making our bowling a strong point in our several overseas wins in the years to come. He had the instinct to back the right players and give the confidence to the players. His batting was a delight to watch. My father used to quote several innings of Pataudi which were real gems. He recalled how stylish a player the Tiger was and especially his ability to come back to top level cricket despite his accident when he lost an eye. With just one eye, it becomes very difficult to get the depth of an object. But here was the guy who had to get adjusted to this difference in the normal life and then went on to excel in the field which does not spare anyone with a weakness.
He was a gentleman on and off the field. An aristrocratic behaviour did not put him off with his team. Post his cricketing days, I always felt that the Indian cricket could have utilised his cricketing brilliance better. But unfortunately it was not so.
Goodbye Tiger, RIP.
A great cricketer, an excellent captain and a man who changed the Indian cricket. These were the first things that came to my mind when I read that he passed away. Later that night, when I was watching the news channels, i remembered my father recalling some of the stories about Pataudi when i was a school going, cricket crazy kid. My father fondly recollected "Tiger's" cricketing acumen.
To him Pataudi was a genius. He was one of the earliest people in Indian team who changed the way how fielding was looked at in the team. Prior to him, fielding was always the last priority, and the fielders used to do a lot of chasing rather then intercept the ball based on the speed and direction. Tiger brought his excellent anticipation to be at the right place when the ball was hit. He was also one of the best fielders in his time and brought this aspect to the team.
Pataudi was an inspirational captain as well. Under him, the spin quartet blossommed. He was instrumental in making our bowling a strong point in our several overseas wins in the years to come. He had the instinct to back the right players and give the confidence to the players. His batting was a delight to watch. My father used to quote several innings of Pataudi which were real gems. He recalled how stylish a player the Tiger was and especially his ability to come back to top level cricket despite his accident when he lost an eye. With just one eye, it becomes very difficult to get the depth of an object. But here was the guy who had to get adjusted to this difference in the normal life and then went on to excel in the field which does not spare anyone with a weakness.
He was a gentleman on and off the field. An aristrocratic behaviour did not put him off with his team. Post his cricketing days, I always felt that the Indian cricket could have utilised his cricketing brilliance better. But unfortunately it was not so.
Goodbye Tiger, RIP.
Saturday, August 6, 2011
After writing my previous article, i was interested to read some of the thoughts on happiness.
I came across an ariticle on "Man's search for meaning" a book by Viktor E Frankl published in 1946. One of the quote from this book " Happiness cannot be pursued but must ensue, as the unintended side-effect of one's personal dedication to a course greater than oneself. Happiness must happen and you need to let it happen by not caring for it". Profound thoughts from a Dr from Austria. A point to expand on the statement - you cannot pursue happiness but must become a consequence, a consequence of our thoughts, deeds and actions. A lot of times, i feel this very true. There is no silver bullet to find happiness. But is this not something our indian philosophy has told us? Going back to our roots, we can find the path to pursue which will lead us to experience happiness.
So, I went back to the Hindu scriptures and found several reference to being happy. Happiness does not come out of possessing enormous quantity of welath, being surrounded by the best things life, having no problems in life etc, but it comes out of realisation on our purpose in this life. We have seen someone like Dasaratha a very learned man and a great king suffer from the pangs of being separated from his son. On the other hand, King Janaka was a great man who was not affected by any of the wordly happenings. He was a person who followed the ideal path of "nishkamya karma" and was a "stithapragyna". While nishkamya karma is all about doing your duty without the attachment to it, stithapragyna is about not being affected but any emotions. One of the best examples of nishkamya karma is Lord Krishna. In the Gita, He tells Arjuna that despite being the God of the Universe, he still continues his duty. Our best bet to the path of happiness is to be detached to our actions and be not bothered about the results of our actions. This can help us in keeping our minds free.
I came across an ariticle on "Man's search for meaning" a book by Viktor E Frankl published in 1946. One of the quote from this book " Happiness cannot be pursued but must ensue, as the unintended side-effect of one's personal dedication to a course greater than oneself. Happiness must happen and you need to let it happen by not caring for it". Profound thoughts from a Dr from Austria. A point to expand on the statement - you cannot pursue happiness but must become a consequence, a consequence of our thoughts, deeds and actions. A lot of times, i feel this very true. There is no silver bullet to find happiness. But is this not something our indian philosophy has told us? Going back to our roots, we can find the path to pursue which will lead us to experience happiness.
So, I went back to the Hindu scriptures and found several reference to being happy. Happiness does not come out of possessing enormous quantity of welath, being surrounded by the best things life, having no problems in life etc, but it comes out of realisation on our purpose in this life. We have seen someone like Dasaratha a very learned man and a great king suffer from the pangs of being separated from his son. On the other hand, King Janaka was a great man who was not affected by any of the wordly happenings. He was a person who followed the ideal path of "nishkamya karma" and was a "stithapragyna". While nishkamya karma is all about doing your duty without the attachment to it, stithapragyna is about not being affected but any emotions. One of the best examples of nishkamya karma is Lord Krishna. In the Gita, He tells Arjuna that despite being the God of the Universe, he still continues his duty. Our best bet to the path of happiness is to be detached to our actions and be not bothered about the results of our actions. This can help us in keeping our minds free.
These were great principles for us to follow but have become very difficult in our present day lives. We tend to think too much on what we want to do, what we did rather than focussing on the present. Living for the present without attachment to our actions with clean thoughts and deeds can lead us on the path to happiness.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Pursuit of happiness
In the recent few week, I saw the movie "The puruit of happyness" twice. As a movie, it was well made - good screenplan & editing, Will Smith in a good performance and his own son Jaden acting as his movie son did a fantastic job.
But the movie made me to think, going beyond the boundary of the script. As a continuation of my previous blog "happiness is a state of mind", I wanted to explore more of my thoughts.
But before that, did you know - The US Declaration of Independence states the right to 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness'. This is the earliest indication of a nation trying to bring in "happiness" into the purview of the state and this was signed in 4th July 1776. Much later in the mid-1900s, Japan and South Korea amended their constitution to bring in the right to pursue happiness and Vietnam added this in their declaration of independence. Bhutan was one of the other countries which started measuring the "happiness index" of its people in similar terms like GDP.
On reading this, I found it a bit of a surprise. To me, happiness is "a state of mind". It depends on the individual and can country guarantee it as a "right". Also, another interesting point that struck me was the nations did not guarantee the "right" to happiness but the "right" to pursue happiness. To me, even the "right" to pursue happiness solely depends on the individual and the state of his/her mind. As in previous blog, while I had a lot of things going great for me, but still I was not in the right frame of mind to pursue happiness, leave alone being happy. Whereas the people whom i met / saw definitely were in better state of mind to pursue happiness and probably be happy.
Thinking further, if happiness is a state of mind, what makes it easy for some people to be happy or pursue happiness while for others it is a difficult task and for some it is impossible? Is it something to do with what you have and what you do not? I doubt it. If that is the case, then I would have been better off during my bus commute when I saw the two young people (refer to my previous blog). Sometimes, it is simple. If you like what you do, you will feel happy. I have observed that whenever i am travelling to the temples, my mind is very light and i am very happy despite the discomfort of irregular food or sometimes painful journey. But what happens when things are not so simple. That is when the trouble start and the pursuit of happiness becomes difficult.
So, can we the task of being happy easier? Of course yes and our own scriptures show us the path to be happy. (to be concluded...)
But the movie made me to think, going beyond the boundary of the script. As a continuation of my previous blog "happiness is a state of mind", I wanted to explore more of my thoughts.
But before that, did you know - The US Declaration of Independence states the right to 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness'. This is the earliest indication of a nation trying to bring in "happiness" into the purview of the state and this was signed in 4th July 1776. Much later in the mid-1900s, Japan and South Korea amended their constitution to bring in the right to pursue happiness and Vietnam added this in their declaration of independence. Bhutan was one of the other countries which started measuring the "happiness index" of its people in similar terms like GDP.
On reading this, I found it a bit of a surprise. To me, happiness is "a state of mind". It depends on the individual and can country guarantee it as a "right". Also, another interesting point that struck me was the nations did not guarantee the "right" to happiness but the "right" to pursue happiness. To me, even the "right" to pursue happiness solely depends on the individual and the state of his/her mind. As in previous blog, while I had a lot of things going great for me, but still I was not in the right frame of mind to pursue happiness, leave alone being happy. Whereas the people whom i met / saw definitely were in better state of mind to pursue happiness and probably be happy.
Thinking further, if happiness is a state of mind, what makes it easy for some people to be happy or pursue happiness while for others it is a difficult task and for some it is impossible? Is it something to do with what you have and what you do not? I doubt it. If that is the case, then I would have been better off during my bus commute when I saw the two young people (refer to my previous blog). Sometimes, it is simple. If you like what you do, you will feel happy. I have observed that whenever i am travelling to the temples, my mind is very light and i am very happy despite the discomfort of irregular food or sometimes painful journey. But what happens when things are not so simple. That is when the trouble start and the pursuit of happiness becomes difficult.
So, can we the task of being happy easier? Of course yes and our own scriptures show us the path to be happy. (to be concluded...)
Saturday, June 4, 2011
happiness is a state of mind
I always felt that happiness is a state of mind and nothing can give us happiness. This was confirmed to me again last week by an incident.
It was a Monday morning and i was travelling to work by bus. It was already hot and humid ( i live in chennai, india). It was getting uncomfortable as I did not get a seat and had to carry my laptop bag as well. In one of the stops, two young people - a guy and a girl (mid 25s) got into the bus and went past me. From the first look, it was evident to me that they were in the middle strata in the income group and were friends travelling together. The conductor asked for ticket and the guy showed an-all-day ticket. After sometime, i noticed something different. The 2 people were conversing in sign language, it struck me that both of them were hearing and speach impaired.
Over the next 20 minutes or so, they were conversing pretty happily, with several bouts of smiles exchanged, probably sharing a joke or two. During that time it became very evident that despite all their problems, the two young people were happy (they had this minor inconvenience of not getting a seat). They were oblivious to the world around them. Just then it struckme. Here I was sitting in the bus, and was thinking of the troubles that I had in my mind as well as some issues that I would face at work that day. All this did not stand near to what these two people face on a daily basis. But still, they were happy..
As i continued on my commute, i was reminded of a second similar incident. This happened during my divyadesam trips.
I was travelling to the divyadesams around mayavaram. During a visit to one of the temple in a village which apart from the temple, had only a small shop and about 25 houses across 4 streets, we reached after it was closed. We were told that the bhattar (priest) lived in the same street and we can go to his house to get the temple opened. This was around 3 pm in the afternoon. When we went his house, he gave us a warm welcome, offered us something to drink and eat. Since we had completed our lunch, we declined the offer. He then offered us to drink atleast water. The water was pretty hard with a tinge of salt. He explained that this is "well water" and ground water is pretty hard in these areas. He went on to tell us that he generally takes his two wheeler ( an old tvs 50) to the next village about 5 - 6 kms to bring his family's daily quota of water for drinking / cooking and that day there was no supply. We then went to the temple which was not so well maintained and that he had to spend some of his salary for the upkeep. Despite all this, he was extremely happy. He said that the God has taken care of him very well - "Perumal enna divyama paathukurar" is what he said. He added that he was getting about 2000 Rs a month and was more than happy with that.
These two incidents reaffirmed that happiness is a state of mind and cleared some of my own "troubles" by the time i got down from the bus.
It was a Monday morning and i was travelling to work by bus. It was already hot and humid ( i live in chennai, india). It was getting uncomfortable as I did not get a seat and had to carry my laptop bag as well. In one of the stops, two young people - a guy and a girl (mid 25s) got into the bus and went past me. From the first look, it was evident to me that they were in the middle strata in the income group and were friends travelling together. The conductor asked for ticket and the guy showed an-all-day ticket. After sometime, i noticed something different. The 2 people were conversing in sign language, it struck me that both of them were hearing and speach impaired.
Over the next 20 minutes or so, they were conversing pretty happily, with several bouts of smiles exchanged, probably sharing a joke or two. During that time it became very evident that despite all their problems, the two young people were happy (they had this minor inconvenience of not getting a seat). They were oblivious to the world around them. Just then it struckme. Here I was sitting in the bus, and was thinking of the troubles that I had in my mind as well as some issues that I would face at work that day. All this did not stand near to what these two people face on a daily basis. But still, they were happy..
As i continued on my commute, i was reminded of a second similar incident. This happened during my divyadesam trips.
I was travelling to the divyadesams around mayavaram. During a visit to one of the temple in a village which apart from the temple, had only a small shop and about 25 houses across 4 streets, we reached after it was closed. We were told that the bhattar (priest) lived in the same street and we can go to his house to get the temple opened. This was around 3 pm in the afternoon. When we went his house, he gave us a warm welcome, offered us something to drink and eat. Since we had completed our lunch, we declined the offer. He then offered us to drink atleast water. The water was pretty hard with a tinge of salt. He explained that this is "well water" and ground water is pretty hard in these areas. He went on to tell us that he generally takes his two wheeler ( an old tvs 50) to the next village about 5 - 6 kms to bring his family's daily quota of water for drinking / cooking and that day there was no supply. We then went to the temple which was not so well maintained and that he had to spend some of his salary for the upkeep. Despite all this, he was extremely happy. He said that the God has taken care of him very well - "Perumal enna divyama paathukurar" is what he said. He added that he was getting about 2000 Rs a month and was more than happy with that.
These two incidents reaffirmed that happiness is a state of mind and cleared some of my own "troubles" by the time i got down from the bus.
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