The most inspiring words I have ever heard....
Damn i just broke my vow, not to put anything external, in here, but this lecture was so amazing and inspiring, that it had to figure out here, in my archive of great memories... :-)
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Saturday, May 28, 2011
The perfect imperfection
Sometimes in life, bad things happen, but sometimes in life, things start off badly, but end up good!! A similar thing happened with me few days back. The first day at my intern, I was given a pair of gum boots, and an overcoat. I was asked to wear them everyday. But as luck would have it, I had left my overcoat at home one day, and realized it just before reaching the place. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't dare to go tell a Japanese that I wanted to break one of his rules, I couldn't think of going back 72 km to get it from home, daring 9 o'clock Delhi traffic either. So going in was absolutely not possible that day. I was really disappointed on my act of carelessness and irresponsibility. Probably seeing me sad or I don't know what, Bittu bhaiya offered me to show me what he did all day long after leaving me at the place. He promised it would be really great. I didn't had anything better to do either. So I said fine.
He then took me to a place just behind the plant, a small peak of sorts, which had a small temple on it and it could be seen from quite a far away. And when we reached there, I couldn't believe my eyes. It was nothing like I could have ever imagined in a place like Delhi. It was a really beautiful place. A cute little temple shrining the epitome of love of that of Radha and Krishna. Peacocks dancing in their full glory, and peahens admiring them as was I. The cool breeze that could heal any kind of heat due to the summer, and the peace of mind that came absolutely free along with it, felt heavenly. The greenery all around felt like I was back in IIT-M. I had probably done something absolutely right, that I was getting all this instead of the artificial jungle in the plant with inanimate humanoids and an air filled with the smell of grease and sounds of engines revvying around, perfect ingredients to cook you a headache and hence drive you crazy.
The place was great but with the place also came a realization. A realization as to where we are taking our home, our planet earth to. I found myself facing the ugly truth head on. I was amidst a perfect contrast that our world is facing currently. On one side there was the lovely backdrop of a green terrrain, the seamlessly flowing air, filled with the smell of sand just moistened due to the fresh showers, and incense emanating from the temple. The sounds of birds chirping and the jingling bell echoing around. Peacocks doing their mujra and I seriously do not have any more words to explain the setting. Here are some photographs if they could help me explain:
And on the other side there was the booming metropolis, the hustling bustling city life, and all its mallices. I was awefully gazing at the tens of thousands of newly assembled cars that would hit the Indian and European roads within the next 15 days. Then there was the concrete jungle, with no tinge of green seen anywhere around, fire guzzling chimneys and the dark smoke coming out of them adorning the blue sky.
Is this how we want our future to be? Is this what we want our future generations to inherit from us?? Food for thought!!
Here is a song (the NDTV GREENATHON anthem) a true anthem for the cause.
You can click here for all the photos I took that day. I don't know whether it was the "awesome mausum" or the quaint little place that I saw, I was just in the mood and went on clicking and clicking and clicking.....
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Eat Eat Eat
Mothers, they don't need introduction, do they?? Everything about them is just perfect, except probably one aspect. Their mission(s) in life when it comes to their children, which generally are the following: first: eat; second: eat; and third: EAT!!!
They see you after some days, even if its a week, the first thing that they observe (by default I guess) is how thin you have become. They would prabably say the same, even if you had doubled your size!! They seem to have a myth that the more someone eats (and the more precisely includes the vegetables and fruits you hate the most), the healthier they become. I do not know how one gets to this generalization?!! There has to be some other alternative... and I seriously hate the guy who delivers vegetables to our house... bloddy, is there anything left that cannot be home-delivered??
And when you complain, either they get into their "emotional atyachaar " mode, at the end of which you just have to shut up and eat whatever they give or to the "extremely innovative" mode!! I do not know how they can be this innovative?? More dry fruits find their way into my Matar Paneer than matar and paneer put together. Apples find their way into my mango shake!! and the killer of it all, Karela find their way into Dalma (a typical oriya mixed veg curry, which never had karela!!). Imagine karela in your mixed veg curry perfectly camouflaged, and you find it out later, geez!!! And this is just the beginning, I do not know Dal aur kitna kala hai?? quite literally....
Saturday, April 30, 2011
My Summer Wishlist
MANGOES!!!
Beware all you delicious mangoes, cause Ankit is going to chop you, shake you up, sandwich you, and search all possible ways to gobble you into his stomach....
First and foremost PUT PEACE!!!
This semester has been a hell of sorts. All of my weekdays in class, well, most of it, Saturdays in labs, and Sundays, Ummm ummm umm I need to refer to the dictionary, does anyone remember what a Sunday is/was??? Well, let me define Peace for myself. As soon as I reach home, my schedule is going to be a simple four step process, wake up at 11, have lunch, go back to sleep, wake up at 6pm, have dinner and sleep by 9, oh that was just two steps wasn't it?? (In case you are thinking, why do I need to wake up for lunch and dinner as well, well, that's one of the core reasons, why I would be in home, besides, my mother won't let me do that, I hope she doesn't know about my eating patterns here in insti...)
MOVIES!!
This summer is seriously going to be freakin awesome in this regard. Sequels to some of my favourites, and some of the most anticipated movies ever are coming up this summer. Here's my list of musts:
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (May 20th)
Kung Fu Panda 2 (May 26th) (First day show for sure)
Awesome as expected. The furious five and the dragon warrior save Kung Fu. And I love pandas.. :D
Ready (June 3rd)
Hilarious, action, filled with Salman's crazy stuff.
Cars 2 (June 24th)
Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (June 24th)
Teaches you life man! One of the best movies I have ever seen. And I am seriously going to follow it. I am going to forget all my worries, fears and live my life. The thoda kaam, thoda discipline and lots of masti, happy life I used to. After all, Zindegi definitely nahin milegi dobara so what's the point carrying all those worries on your head! Just forget them and say cheers to life.
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (July 1st)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II (July 15th)
A fitting end to the biggest saga of our generation. What more, Harry potter and Ronald Weasley have kids now.
Ice Age 4: Continental Drift (July)
Any other Friday left?? oh yes there are vacancies... help me fill them as well :D
Any more suggestions??
Go Fish
No seriously. I want to go fishing!!, well, literally, fishing. Fishing used to be my favourite past time at my grandfathers place, back in Orissa (oh no no we are not fishermen by the way, we have a small lake, and it has fishes in them). But its been more than five long years since i have done that last!! This time around, I am determined to stay a bit longer than the usual 2 day trip in the past few years... lets see if I can get this done...
IPL:
It's the fourth season already and I haven't watched a single live!!! This time at least I hope to watch one..
Now for some serious stuff:
Internship:
I hope I can make my internship a learning expedition of sorts, and make it a great fun filled experience. I hope to learn the real world applications of all the stuff I have done in theory as yet, and try and innovate something by myself...!!! pretty high hopes... but you never know... This is going to occupy my first 50 days of summer.
Shaastra Circuit Design Challenge (SCDC):
The very fact that I am the first 3rd year coordinator ever for this event (previous coords were all 4th years, since this event has begun), straight away hangs a sword over my head, to try and maintain its standards, if not better. Its one of the trademark events of Shaastra and the flagship event of Dept. of Electrical Engineering at Shaastra, with cash prize worth 40K!! (I am sorry if I am sounding like publicizing my event already...) Stay put for the problem statements...
Projects:
The last month of summer, I ll be back here in Chennai, fulfilling my commitments to all my current projects. I hope to do a lot of progress during this interval and step closer to the final goal. True that this means I ll be all alone on my 20th birthday something that has never happened to me before..., but when at profession, personal errands come later.
Beware all you delicious mangoes, cause Ankit is going to chop you, shake you up, sandwich you, and search all possible ways to gobble you into his stomach....
First and foremost PUT PEACE!!!
This semester has been a hell of sorts. All of my weekdays in class, well, most of it, Saturdays in labs, and Sundays, Ummm ummm umm I need to refer to the dictionary, does anyone remember what a Sunday is/was??? Well, let me define Peace for myself. As soon as I reach home, my schedule is going to be a simple four step process, wake up at 11, have lunch, go back to sleep, wake up at 6pm, have dinner and sleep by 9, oh that was just two steps wasn't it?? (In case you are thinking, why do I need to wake up for lunch and dinner as well, well, that's one of the core reasons, why I would be in home, besides, my mother won't let me do that, I hope she doesn't know about my eating patterns here in insti...)
MOVIES!!
This summer is seriously going to be freakin awesome in this regard. Sequels to some of my favourites, and some of the most anticipated movies ever are coming up this summer. Here's my list of musts:
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (May 20th)
Kung Fu Panda 2 (May 26th) (First day show for sure)
Awesome as expected. The furious five and the dragon warrior save Kung Fu. And I love pandas.. :D
Ready (June 3rd)
Hilarious, action, filled with Salman's crazy stuff.
Cars 2 (June 24th)
Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (June 24th)
Teaches you life man! One of the best movies I have ever seen. And I am seriously going to follow it. I am going to forget all my worries, fears and live my life. The thoda kaam, thoda discipline and lots of masti, happy life I used to. After all, Zindegi definitely nahin milegi dobara so what's the point carrying all those worries on your head! Just forget them and say cheers to life.
Transformers: Dark of the Moon (July 1st)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II (July 15th)
A fitting end to the biggest saga of our generation. What more, Harry potter and Ronald Weasley have kids now.
Ice Age 4: Continental Drift (July)
Any other Friday left?? oh yes there are vacancies... help me fill them as well :D
Any more suggestions??
Go Fish
No seriously. I want to go fishing!!, well, literally, fishing. Fishing used to be my favourite past time at my grandfathers place, back in Orissa (oh no no we are not fishermen by the way, we have a small lake, and it has fishes in them). But its been more than five long years since i have done that last!! This time around, I am determined to stay a bit longer than the usual 2 day trip in the past few years... lets see if I can get this done...
IPL:
It's the fourth season already and I haven't watched a single live!!! This time at least I hope to watch one..
Now for some serious stuff:
Internship:
I hope I can make my internship a learning expedition of sorts, and make it a great fun filled experience. I hope to learn the real world applications of all the stuff I have done in theory as yet, and try and innovate something by myself...!!! pretty high hopes... but you never know... This is going to occupy my first 50 days of summer.
Shaastra Circuit Design Challenge (SCDC):
The very fact that I am the first 3rd year coordinator ever for this event (previous coords were all 4th years, since this event has begun), straight away hangs a sword over my head, to try and maintain its standards, if not better. Its one of the trademark events of Shaastra and the flagship event of Dept. of Electrical Engineering at Shaastra, with cash prize worth 40K!! (I am sorry if I am sounding like publicizing my event already...) Stay put for the problem statements...
Projects:
The last month of summer, I ll be back here in Chennai, fulfilling my commitments to all my current projects. I hope to do a lot of progress during this interval and step closer to the final goal. True that this means I ll be all alone on my 20th birthday something that has never happened to me before..., but when at profession, personal errands come later.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Heat Index
The other day, after 6 hours of continuous work on an insane project, I was absolutely drained. I was working in CFI, cursing for the first time that Sunday was a holiday, cause if it weren't, labs in my department would have been open, and I would have been working at 21*C, <10% humid environment instead of 37*C and somewhere around 90% humidity!! After I came back to room, I had a bath, a 500ml of Grapo fizz, and 1L of glucose, and yet was feeling bad, dehydrated, and sort of feverish. This made me wonder, was it really 37*C, cause 37*C on any other day, I could have taken it with pleasure, oh not really but still wouldn't have been this bad, afterall its my body temperature on any normal day. A little googling gave me the answers.
And the answer is the Heat Index. As I am writing, Chennai's thermometric temperature is 86*F or 30*C but the apparent temperature is 99*F or 37.222*C. So why is it so??!! Here's the answer:
Our body loses excess heat in three ways — radiation, convection and evaporation. If the blood circulating just beneath the skin is at a higher temperature than the surrounding air, heat is lost through the first two ways. When the outside temperature is higher than the body temperature, evaporation is the body's way of losing heat. We start sweating and the evaporation from the skin keeps us cool. The problem is that the capacity of air to hold water vapour is not finite; it can only hold a particular amount at a particular temperature. The term used to indicate how much of that capacity has been used up is relative humidity — the ratio of vapour contained to the maximum the air can hold, expressed as a percentage. So, the higher the relative humidity, the lower will be the capacity of air to hold any more water vapour. That means evaporation slows down and hence its cooling effect too is slowed down, making us feel hotter.
Fig: A screen shot from Weatther underground. Click on pic to expand.
Courtesy: Google, Times of India & Weather Underground
And the answer is the Heat Index. As I am writing, Chennai's thermometric temperature is 86*F or 30*C but the apparent temperature is 99*F or 37.222*C. So why is it so??!! Here's the answer:
Our body loses excess heat in three ways — radiation, convection and evaporation. If the blood circulating just beneath the skin is at a higher temperature than the surrounding air, heat is lost through the first two ways. When the outside temperature is higher than the body temperature, evaporation is the body's way of losing heat. We start sweating and the evaporation from the skin keeps us cool. The problem is that the capacity of air to hold water vapour is not finite; it can only hold a particular amount at a particular temperature. The term used to indicate how much of that capacity has been used up is relative humidity — the ratio of vapour contained to the maximum the air can hold, expressed as a percentage. So, the higher the relative humidity, the lower will be the capacity of air to hold any more water vapour. That means evaporation slows down and hence its cooling effect too is slowed down, making us feel hotter.
Fig: A screen shot from Weatther underground. Click on pic to expand.
Courtesy: Google, Times of India & Weather Underground
Saturday, April 2, 2011
The force that unifies India
Well, what else can it be, It's Cricket!! Whenever I see the whole India celebrating, on TV, after a huge triumph on field, I get reminded of two particular lines from 'Madhushala';
मंदिर मस्स्जिद बैर कराती
एक करती मधुशाला
How true!! And it very well applies to cricket as well. It sees no religion, no caste, no status, no regionalism... It's all the same for everyone, the emotions, the sudden rush of patriotism, the sense of pride, and of course the warm blood getting warmer.
It's really great watching Delhi going to one of those mini Diwali modes, Kolkata getting drowned in the syrup of the sweet Rasogullas, Chennai getting frenzy in one of those Rajnikant styles, and Mumbai well, celebrating with all the Tare Zameen Par. You see images of Bhangra pouring in from Chandigarh, all the folk singers, with their tweaked versions of the ever romantic Rajasthani folk songs, to fit to the occasion, from Jaipur, the actual heros of the nation, enjoying themselves in the most weird fashion ever from Srinagar, or may be even from the most dreaded sectors of Drass, Kargil and Batallic. If the images from the rest of the country are mind boggling, the images from just outside the venue of the game are even more so. You see people dancing in a form called, well I don't know, may be a mixture of Kathak, kuchipudi, and Odissi!! ; with the tricolor proudly clutched in their hands.
Now that India is in the finals, and playing Sri Lanka today, I just hope that these celebrations continue even after 11 O'Clock tonight. I just hope, I get to see all these, ummm!! get to hear all these through all your pings on to my g-talk. I just hope.........
Go India!!! 1.21 Billion (1,21,01,93,422 to be precise) people will be there cheering for you tonight....
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Time Machine
Well, not exactly, I am referring to my alarm clock, yes the very clock which is responsible for destroying my wonderful and sweet dreams every morning, fortunately went mad, and started clocking in the opposite direction. Wise clock went anti clockwise!!!
I wish it could actually take me back in time to those lighter and brighter days of school, or may be even a little before I was born...
I wish it could actually take me back in time to those lighter and brighter days of school, or may be even a little before I was born...
Sunday, March 13, 2011
3G., an experiment that went absolutely awry...
<This is what I wrote before realising what had happened to me>
" 3G, the next big thing in India, is finally here. I was so excited, when I saw the full page ad. of Vodafone 3G in TOI, today, and obviously, as I love to try out new things, went ahead and activated it on my phone. And believe me, as the ad. says, its "faster, smarter and better", it actually is.... The biggest difference, you would straight away find is the speed of the Internet, loading gmail, which would take around 7-8 seconds on 2G, loaded within 3 seconds in 3G. Now that's a huge difference!!!
Then I checked out all the other services available, and the only other services available as of now were Live TV and video calling. Looking forward to try out video calling, but tried out the Live TV, and whats more... it costs just Rs.7 a day, to view any channel you would like. Love it!!! Watched ESPN live (no buffering after the initial one), Cartoon Network !!(In case you are giggling at me, com'on, there is a child hidden in every person..), NDTV, Times Now, Discovery, Animal Planet, UTV Movies, to name a few. Now who would be more proud than me, after-all even I am going to be one of those "Communication Engineers"......(whats wrong in bragging a bit...:-D)"
Everything was great and I was loving it and showering praises on it, when I suddenly realised that I had been robbed off of nearly half a K!!! My balance was at a deficit of Rs 431 !!!.. Damn it!!! this one went absolutely haywire....money, nearly 24 hours of absolutely no connectivity.... huh!!! Seemed like I had developed an uncanny knack of creating trouble for myself, out of nowhere...sigh!!! But what's the fun in life if everything goes as you wish...!!! What say??!!
" 3G, the next big thing in India, is finally here. I was so excited, when I saw the full page ad. of Vodafone 3G in TOI, today, and obviously, as I love to try out new things, went ahead and activated it on my phone. And believe me, as the ad. says, its "faster, smarter and better", it actually is.... The biggest difference, you would straight away find is the speed of the Internet, loading gmail, which would take around 7-8 seconds on 2G, loaded within 3 seconds in 3G. Now that's a huge difference!!!
Then I checked out all the other services available, and the only other services available as of now were Live TV and video calling. Looking forward to try out video calling, but tried out the Live TV, and whats more... it costs just Rs.7 a day, to view any channel you would like. Love it!!! Watched ESPN live (no buffering after the initial one), Cartoon Network !!(In case you are giggling at me, com'on, there is a child hidden in every person..), NDTV, Times Now, Discovery, Animal Planet, UTV Movies, to name a few. Now who would be more proud than me, after-all even I am going to be one of those "Communication Engineers"......(whats wrong in bragging a bit...:-D)"
Everything was great and I was loving it and showering praises on it, when I suddenly realised that I had been robbed off of nearly half a K!!! My balance was at a deficit of Rs 431 !!!.. Damn it!!! this one went absolutely haywire....money, nearly 24 hours of absolutely no connectivity.... huh!!! Seemed like I had developed an uncanny knack of creating trouble for myself, out of nowhere...sigh!!! But what's the fun in life if everything goes as you wish...!!! What say??!!
Sunday, March 6, 2011
When I decided to make a pizza....
probably sun rose from west, probably I had gone mad or probably I was so bored that it drove me to the levels of lunacy one day during my winter vacation of 14 days!! in the second year (Dec. 2010), that I decided to try my hand on a completely unexplored field, cooking!!! It took a lot of effort, and finally (yeah!!!) I convinced the "Master-chef" at home, my mom, to let me try out stuff. With a strict no-no for the use of the gas stove (taking due considerations of my past records), I was limited to the microwave only. I always try finding positives in every situation, and therefore was happy that at-least I was allowed to use that, moreover it was just the previous sem I had learnt how a microwave oven works, so was excited.
Then began the search for the dish, and somehow, the first thing that struck was pizza. I had seen mother doing one of those, so thought wasn't going to be much of a hassle. Asked mother to arrange all the ingredients for me. Then it was the turn of the rookie, I arranged stuff on that gloomy base, the best I could, and it was ready to go into the oven. And then whatever happened in the oven is history !! Don't even dare asking me what happened, else there will be consequences....
I tried my level best to give it a face lift and:
I thought, would better get back to things I was good at, but somehow managed to calm my self and give a second chance. And this time it was pop-corn!! I expected them to pop out white but they came out black!, not again!!!
This was it, I almost decided to drop the word "cooking" out of my dictionary when a brilliant plan came to my mind. I was good at turning things into black ! in the oven, so why not make something that is supposed to be black !! So i made this:
a chocolate cake, and believe it or not, this time I was successful. It was so good that I finished off the whole thingy all by myself within a day. After-all I wasn't that bad, I proved it Yeah!! I did it... :D
Then began the search for the dish, and somehow, the first thing that struck was pizza. I had seen mother doing one of those, so thought wasn't going to be much of a hassle. Asked mother to arrange all the ingredients for me. Then it was the turn of the rookie, I arranged stuff on that gloomy base, the best I could, and it was ready to go into the oven. And then whatever happened in the oven is history !! Don't even dare asking me what happened, else there will be consequences....
I tried my level best to give it a face lift and:
This was it, I almost decided to drop the word "cooking" out of my dictionary when a brilliant plan came to my mind. I was good at turning things into black ! in the oven, so why not make something that is supposed to be black !! So i made this:
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Birthday Blues
Birthday, the day, some years back, which is responsible for ones very presence. Yes its absolutely one of the happiest days in ones life. What would you do typically on your birthday? Go to a temple in the morning, finish your wish-list of gifts and things you would like to do/achieve by your next birthday, most importantly spend a lot of time with your family and friends throughout the evening, and then the rest of the night unfolding all the awesome gifts and wishes you would have received. This is what you would typically do, of-course surprises and exceptions will always be there.
But things are a "little" different when you are in a place like IIT Madras.You better do the following.
Good thing is that I have never experienced it yet, thanks to the timing of my b-day. i still continue to celebrate my b-day the first way (but) minus friends.Yes it does feel a little bad that way, but life is a great mixture of happiness and not so good feelings, accept everything whatever comes positively and be optimistic.
But things are a "little" different when you are in a place like IIT Madras.You better do the following.
- First change or remove your birthday date from your fb account, and hope no one among your college "friends" (you better recognize them as friends or else...) remembers your b-day.
- Keep a good look at your friends throughout the previous day, any suspicious movements/ any unreasonable or sudden visits to ccd by your friends, find a hideout immediately, and get underground before 10 pm the previous day of your b-day.
- Do not attend to any unknown numbers or numbers of your potential bump givers after 10 the previous night..
- If you happen to miss any of these precautions, better get prepared with lots of ice and pain killers, cause you are gonna, well experience it yourself... :P
Good thing is that I have never experienced it yet, thanks to the timing of my b-day. i still continue to celebrate my b-day the first way (but) minus friends.Yes it does feel a little bad that way, but life is a great mixture of happiness and not so good feelings, accept everything whatever comes positively and be optimistic.
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