I am directly picking this title off the Sony Handycam's Ad. Today, we (our family) had been out on Deepavali shopping spree. Bro and SIL bought a new Sony Handycam to gift ourselves on the occasion and to treasure moments with yet-to-be-born my nephew/niece :) Never to miss the moment of all his/her first's in life... be it first touch, first smile, first words spoken, first step, first masterpiece, first rock show, first make up and most important of all those first words calling me "mama" ;) and so on... :)
At the Sony world/center, There was showcase of a lot of electronics. Above the display of Handycams, there was an large LCD TV which was looping through this advertisement below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBohbQB-55o
It is all about a father reliving the moments of his daughter from childhood to her marriage. A lovely cute ad indeed! This took me back to an incident of which I was a witness a couple of weeks back. I had been to Malleshwaram,Bangalore to pick up my mom from her evening class of psychology. I was waiting outside in car for the class to get over and was just watching strangers around to see their actions, reactions, instincts and do a micro level sociology study of people and myself. That's my favorite pass-time! :D
As I tuned in some soft FM music in car stereo, I noticed an auto-rickshaw stopping next to car on the other side of the road under a street light. A pretty girl in her mid 20's stepped out with a lot of luggage to find her residence. I couldn't help watching her. I was a little safe as I had hid behind the tinted glasses ;). No sooner her father came to place and talked to her giving her a good tight hug and helped her with her luggage home. There was so much joy in his face on seeing his little kid come back home after a long time and all the expressions on his face told how badly he had missed her - Life is just fleeting moments of joy worth waiting for and the uncertainty is what makes life more beautiful. :)
Cheers! and Happy Deepavali.
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Monday, October 11, 2010
Lineage, Lifestyle and Learnings
We as students read history right from our school days to get to know of all the irrelevant facts about who did what, when and where and how! I am not a historian but I believe in saying that "history repeats" because anything and everything I am currently experiencing in this world has been experienced by a lots of others somewhere in the time-line. We study to learn from past mistakes, gather data for prediction of life events, know about cultures but the history itself looks and probably is so much biased if we go only by the available writings.
Coming to a very small scale of geological time frame, If you ask me a simple question of what my great grandfather did for a living and his story of life. I have no clue! We do not know much more than our grandparents in our lineage. As a parent, does one really give knowledge of how social and financial life earlier was to his/her child? We are afraid that the youngster might develop some kind of impression over the family, relatives and hide some of the facts as we bury them deep down within ourselves. We are afraid to expose our problems in front of our children and make them understand the reality of life.
Today, we live in the era of technology, booming shopping malls, hyper-markets and multi-national business enterprises. The lifestyle of people, a generation earlier, were lot different from what we are going through now. Even the morals and values are not remaining the same. The attitude and pace over which we are leading life is changing very fast.
A simple instance: Nowadays, If a grandfather tells his grandson that he didn't have something called TV at his time to watch the kid shouts back to him saying that you are cooking-this-story-up for making me not watch the TV! Having the company of upper class society friends in junior school, the kid even comes and asks the parent if we are poor in just owning a Maruti Alto while his friends travel around in Honda city.
I have several open questions on my mind on my above bizarre random thoughts:
Why is society failing to learn from past and teach next generation? Is it the high rate of inflation over decades? Ever increase in economical gap between upper and middle class? Is it that we have lost the habit of reading Indian novels which expose rural side of our country to relate to our ancestor's life? Is it that we are losing something in over protecting our kids so that he never sees what actual suffering is? Are we shedding moral values down the drain in our pace of earning money and make a grand living?
Coming to a very small scale of geological time frame, If you ask me a simple question of what my great grandfather did for a living and his story of life. I have no clue! We do not know much more than our grandparents in our lineage. As a parent, does one really give knowledge of how social and financial life earlier was to his/her child? We are afraid that the youngster might develop some kind of impression over the family, relatives and hide some of the facts as we bury them deep down within ourselves. We are afraid to expose our problems in front of our children and make them understand the reality of life.
Today, we live in the era of technology, booming shopping malls, hyper-markets and multi-national business enterprises. The lifestyle of people, a generation earlier, were lot different from what we are going through now. Even the morals and values are not remaining the same. The attitude and pace over which we are leading life is changing very fast.
A simple instance: Nowadays, If a grandfather tells his grandson that he didn't have something called TV at his time to watch the kid shouts back to him saying that you are cooking-this-story-up for making me not watch the TV! Having the company of upper class society friends in junior school, the kid even comes and asks the parent if we are poor in just owning a Maruti Alto while his friends travel around in Honda city.
I have several open questions on my mind on my above bizarre random thoughts:
Why is society failing to learn from past and teach next generation? Is it the high rate of inflation over decades? Ever increase in economical gap between upper and middle class? Is it that we have lost the habit of reading Indian novels which expose rural side of our country to relate to our ancestor's life? Is it that we are losing something in over protecting our kids so that he never sees what actual suffering is? Are we shedding moral values down the drain in our pace of earning money and make a grand living?
Thursday, September 16, 2010
"Mute" spectator
I dropped at nearby shell service station for refueling my Enfield Bullet. After top up of fuel tank, I reached out to get a filling of the tires with Nitrogen gas. There was a guy, station worker at that Shell petroleum outlet, who was busy doing his work of setting the PSI units to prescribed values and filling up the front and rear tires as fast as he can. He waved at us and called upon all two wheelers in the queue as he was working parallel on all front tires of all bikes at once and then setting the pressure to a higher value for the rear tires to work smarter. (A nice efficient scheduling algorithm indeed!) But there was a man with his scooter who was in need to break this algorithm and wanted to be FCFS! (First-come-first-served). He was very upset of the way he was waved and asked to wait for filling up of every other bike's front tires to get his rear tire done. He went to manager with a complaint that this worker is showing hands at him and asking others to move ahead of him and break priority. Manager rushed to the place as the guy was still continuing doing his work of filling air. Manager revealed that the guy is deaf and dumb and does show only hand signals to communicate. I said to the man in scooter that he was doing his work in parallel so that it saves a lot of time. But the man left grumbling over the petty issue making a big fuss. The manager who stood next to me said that even though god has given him everything, he shouts over this poor guy who is deaf-mute. At least this guy isn't begging or stealing but doing a service at station for earning some money. The man was already long gone with his two-wheeler to even lend an ear to those words. I stood a "mute" spectator after listening to what manager said as my thoughts lingered around the same but the guy was busy filling up gas for the next car in queue without knowing what all had happened until now.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Fear of God
For everyone God is a divine spiritual power. We all see him in different walks of our daily life. We associate everything happening to our lives which we don't have control upon as god's act of testing our strength and will. Sometimes we are guilty and we know it. We fear of that something wrong we committed and feel that some punishment awaits us! So strange are our customs and rituals but it is the way humans have created god from eons ago which has helped to maintain a good harmony in the society we live in.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Lost forever
We didn’t even mean to hurt each other
‘Cause I heard those words come out of fear.
Now we aren’t fighting anymore
But screaming inside broken;
Regretting for all the words been spoken.
Never did you call me to say that you’re sorry
Neither did I make a true attempt to tell,
The ego within us had made all our feelings expel.
Can you forgive me and be my true friend again?
All I asked you was some more time as I wasn’t ready yet,
To build the friendship stronger since the day we first met.
But since then we both have gone apart way-too-far
Not accepting the way we really are
In saying that you aren’t the person I was looking for.
-------------------------------------------------------------(September 9th 2010 1:00am)
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Exploration devanahalli - NH7 ride
This Sunday I was pretty bored as I was alone at home. Everyone at home had left to marriage of a distant relative before i got up :P I was as usual stuck to my bed till 11am in the morning. Had a slow paced day till noon and then I realized that there no nothing cooked at home to eat. I had to prepare something or go to a nearby restaurant for lunch. As I had very late breakfast, I planned to go for a drive and eat somewhere I had not tried before. It was almost 2pm when I left towards the New Airport at Devanahalli. A beautiful Sunday afternoon - cloudy, cold and cozy - I was driving on NH7 towards Air force station near Yelahanka.
There is a hillock to the left at the junction of Devanahalli-Shidlaghatta soon after the Airport. I saw a Jain temple under construction over the hillock and just visited that silent place.
It was windy in the afternoon and not many people around, I was enjoying the silence. There were some couple of architects sculpting the marbles intricately marking designs with pencil. It was beautiful to see those white soft stones to get shapes of bells, pillars and idols.
I then left the place to follow the "anjaane raasta" :) I saw the signboard saying Nandi Hills 28Kms at a junction and so I took that deviation and drove for a couple of kms; no sooner the fuel came to reserve. :(
My bad, I should have had a look earlier before starting. I asked nearby rurals and oncoming cars about fuel station ahead/nearby or above Nandi hills. Answer was a NO! Everyone asked to go back to Devanahalli for refueling. Consoling myself that I wouldn't land up in any problems since I have 2+ litres in reserve and would definitely make it another 55+ kms. I started to drive till the base of Nandi Hills. Roads are very good - lengthy, straight and non bumpy. I found a silkworm rearing farm on the way and wanted to take some snaps of cocoons. I got into one of the farms with my camera and the owner came running to me as to see what I am doing standing next to chandrike (A bamboo tray used for sericulture). As I was photographing cocoons he was more interested to show me the whole of his farm. I was more eager to ask him about everything that I saw around. A 5th grade boy from neighborhood also started explaining me about procedures they follow. I visited the Mulberry plantation next to the farm which is used to feed the growing silkworms. Within the few minutes of our meeting the owner had explained the whole of silkworms life-cycle! When I went inside the room I saw lots of cocoons ready for harvest. He said that he would make a total of Rs.40000/- in one harvest and a single harvest would take a period of 28 days. He asked me of my profession and told that his son too is an engineer working at Bangalore. People in rural places are very happy to see someone coming from city to see what the agriculturists are really working on. I have experienced this a lot many times during my visits like this on biking and trekking. We as engineers, doctors and lawyers often neglect the backbone of our country. If you ask a urban lad of this generation as to where the grains, fruits and vegetables actually come from, they would answer either Namdhari's or Reliance fresh or some other supermarket!!
After bidding bye to the silkfarm owner Prakash and the neighborhood boy Manu, I left with a cocoon in my pocket for the memory of visiting this silkfarm. My bullet had already started showing symptoms of getting cold as she had drenched in rain and electricals of bike had gone to a toss! There was a electrical short in headlight switch which forced me to come back before sunset. On the way back I visited the Devanahalli fort and Tippu sultan's birth place which is on the way. It is a monument still standing. There was nothing much to see here. You can see an old venugopal swamy temple as soon as you enter the gates of fort. Driving back home I had Idli-Vada at some hotel around 6pm, a very late lunch indeed! :P
Above are some wonderful snaps taken from my camera.
Cheers!
Karthi
There is a hillock to the left at the junction of Devanahalli-Shidlaghatta soon after the Airport. I saw a Jain temple under construction over the hillock and just visited that silent place.
It was windy in the afternoon and not many people around, I was enjoying the silence. There were some couple of architects sculpting the marbles intricately marking designs with pencil. It was beautiful to see those white soft stones to get shapes of bells, pillars and idols.
I then left the place to follow the "anjaane raasta" :) I saw the signboard saying Nandi Hills 28Kms at a junction and so I took that deviation and drove for a couple of kms; no sooner the fuel came to reserve. :(
My bad, I should have had a look earlier before starting. I asked nearby rurals and oncoming cars about fuel station ahead/nearby or above Nandi hills. Answer was a NO! Everyone asked to go back to Devanahalli for refueling. Consoling myself that I wouldn't land up in any problems since I have 2+ litres in reserve and would definitely make it another 55+ kms. I started to drive till the base of Nandi Hills. Roads are very good - lengthy, straight and non bumpy. I found a silkworm rearing farm on the way and wanted to take some snaps of cocoons. I got into one of the farms with my camera and the owner came running to me as to see what I am doing standing next to chandrike (A bamboo tray used for sericulture). As I was photographing cocoons he was more interested to show me the whole of his farm. I was more eager to ask him about everything that I saw around. A 5th grade boy from neighborhood also started explaining me about procedures they follow. I visited the Mulberry plantation next to the farm which is used to feed the growing silkworms. Within the few minutes of our meeting the owner had explained the whole of silkworms life-cycle! When I went inside the room I saw lots of cocoons ready for harvest. He said that he would make a total of Rs.40000/- in one harvest and a single harvest would take a period of 28 days. He asked me of my profession and told that his son too is an engineer working at Bangalore. People in rural places are very happy to see someone coming from city to see what the agriculturists are really working on. I have experienced this a lot many times during my visits like this on biking and trekking. We as engineers, doctors and lawyers often neglect the backbone of our country. If you ask a urban lad of this generation as to where the grains, fruits and vegetables actually come from, they would answer either Namdhari's or Reliance fresh or some other supermarket!!
After bidding bye to the silkfarm owner Prakash and the neighborhood boy Manu, I left with a cocoon in my pocket for the memory of visiting this silkfarm. My bullet had already started showing symptoms of getting cold as she had drenched in rain and electricals of bike had gone to a toss! There was a electrical short in headlight switch which forced me to come back before sunset. On the way back I visited the Devanahalli fort and Tippu sultan's birth place which is on the way. It is a monument still standing. There was nothing much to see here. You can see an old venugopal swamy temple as soon as you enter the gates of fort. Driving back home I had Idli-Vada at some hotel around 6pm, a very late lunch indeed! :P
Above are some wonderful snaps taken from my camera.
Cheers!
Karthi
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Jai Hind!
Today, Saturday August 14th 2010, Eve of 64th Indian independence day, I saw and experienced this nice feeling of celebration of Indian independence which i would like to share it here.
This happened to me on the road today. I was going to meet a bunch of my colleagues who had called for a weekend fun meet at Amoeba bowling alley, Churchstreet Bangalore. I started from my place at 10:30am in the morning for we were suppose to meet at 11am IST (If you don't know the "real" meaning of it then it could be called Indian "Slip" Time) near Brigade Rd.
Roads were not so crowded up until late afternoon. I was heading to the Brigade Jn via MG Road where I had to stop for the Red signal. I saw few guys at the junction selling a lot of Indian tricolor on the streets of Bangalore.One small kid, around 10 years old, approached me with different variety and flavors of how Indian tricolor could be used - Wristband, Badges, Khadhi, Caps and finally flags. He had a plastic flag which had glue at the bottom to stick it firmly on dashboard of the car. A SUV with a dark tinted glass stopped next to my Bullet. As I said no to everything the boy showed me he had to finally move on. The window of the SUV rolled down and the boy was busy again in selling those to his new customer. To my surprise they were an old foreigner couple (around 45-50 years of age) and they did buy a Indian flag to put it on the dashboard of the car. They gave him some money and asked him to keep the rest of change. The boy was more happy than ever and gave the lady one more Indian flag for her to keep. For that fleeting moment, I saw the feeling of celebration in boy. I smiled at the couple who smiled back at me. The signal had turned green and I left with several thoughts on my mind - Who are really celebrating our Indian independence? - those foreigners! What it means to be real freedom struggle for that boy? - Is it just his daily bread! Why do we now see it just as a national holiday? - to rejoice without office work!
Even I am the victim of globalization of economies, societies and culture, working for software industry in a MNC, I don't have authority to say much about this but feels a kind of guilt that we have lost the real feeling of Indian independence and freedom struggle.
Jai hind!
This happened to me on the road today. I was going to meet a bunch of my colleagues who had called for a weekend fun meet at Amoeba bowling alley, Churchstreet Bangalore. I started from my place at 10:30am in the morning for we were suppose to meet at 11am IST (If you don't know the "real" meaning of it then it could be called Indian "Slip" Time) near Brigade Rd.
Roads were not so crowded up until late afternoon. I was heading to the Brigade Jn via MG Road where I had to stop for the Red signal. I saw few guys at the junction selling a lot of Indian tricolor on the streets of Bangalore.One small kid, around 10 years old, approached me with different variety and flavors of how Indian tricolor could be used - Wristband, Badges, Khadhi, Caps and finally flags. He had a plastic flag which had glue at the bottom to stick it firmly on dashboard of the car. A SUV with a dark tinted glass stopped next to my Bullet. As I said no to everything the boy showed me he had to finally move on. The window of the SUV rolled down and the boy was busy again in selling those to his new customer. To my surprise they were an old foreigner couple (around 45-50 years of age) and they did buy a Indian flag to put it on the dashboard of the car. They gave him some money and asked him to keep the rest of change. The boy was more happy than ever and gave the lady one more Indian flag for her to keep. For that fleeting moment, I saw the feeling of celebration in boy. I smiled at the couple who smiled back at me. The signal had turned green and I left with several thoughts on my mind - Who are really celebrating our Indian independence? - those foreigners! What it means to be real freedom struggle for that boy? - Is it just his daily bread! Why do we now see it just as a national holiday? - to rejoice without office work!
Even I am the victim of globalization of economies, societies and culture, working for software industry in a MNC, I don't have authority to say much about this but feels a kind of guilt that we have lost the real feeling of Indian independence and freedom struggle.
Jai hind!
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