Change is the only permanent thing in nature ..

Okay Okay .. I wont be philosopher .. I just wanted to tell everyone that this site is now moved to a new and better place ... Now waiting to see everyone there ...
So please update your bookmarks .. :) ..

I nabbed Al Qaeda ..!!

Hmm... Come summer and its the season of mangoes everywhere .. Now you will be thinking what Al Qaeda has to do with mangoes ..? Yup ... they have something indeed... Well .. this boring Sunday noon reminds me of an incident that took place two years ago ..

      My Dad ... always wanting to have lots of greenaries in our garden, has grown so much plants and shrubs and whatnots in our yard .. Among them is a big tree of mango .. I suspect that was planted all because of his sheer liking of the fruit but thats another story ... It was planted when we moved to this place .. thats some 14 years ago .. and now its a big tree and it produce fruit every year .. And with every crop of unripe mangoes comes a lot of children - all having lots of stones in their hands ... Trying to get their hands to mangoes .. they stone the poor tree whole day ..They run when I yell at them .. I say heck .. that stone just landed near my solar panel ... And these children .. they hide when they hear the door opening .. they just vanish as the sky was raining the stones .. Its all because of their gurilla tactics we named them Al Qaeda ... Afghanistan invasion was a hot news topic those days so Al Qaeda was a buzzword .. So there were these Al Qaeda people .. attacking the tree ... and vanishing when I try to catch any of them ..

      Usually they didnt came on holidays as they knew I was around and didnt wanted to caught .. But some desperate guys dared to attack on Sundays too .. This anacdote is about one of them .. It was a Sunday noon like this .. I was getting bored with watching news so decided to check the surroundings from the terrace .. When I reached the terrace I heard small whispers in our backyard (The mango tree is in backyard) .. Hehe . ... Al Qaeda guys .. I grinned .. Time to catch them .. So I decided to have a peek .. I saw through the branches .. there were two of them .. Hiding against the neighbor's wall ... They threw the stones and waited for any response . .. And they collected the mangoes when they saw nobody is watching them .. Grr .. I have to catch them ... So I descended and walked out of my house and take a long turn to reach the backside of our neighbours .. The kids were busy collecting stones for their next attack .. I slowly advanced towards them and when I was real close one of them saw me .. "Bhaagoo ..!!" He yelled .. and both of them started running in different directions .. "You can't ..!!" I heard myself yelling ...
 
     I decided to chase the bigger kid ... He was running fast and was trying to get into our playground from where he can jump the wall on the other side of colony .. He ran fast but he was no match for my running skills .. Damn .. I play cricket regularly .. This kiddo cant run from me .. And when he was just about to jump to the wall I caught him .. I think I served him a slap or two .. but I dont remember .. The kid started crying as soon as I caught him ... "It wasnt me bhai ..!! I was just collecting the fruit..!!" but I wasnt in the mood to leave him .. You were stealing fruits from my garden .. I will give you to the police . .. I told him ... Hearing Police's name the kid's crying got louder .. I caught his arm and start pulling him towards our house so that Dad can decide about his punishment .. The kid continued his cryinng and protests .. I met one of my friends Shafi when I was halfway .. He asked "Al Qaeda guy ..?" pointing to the boy .. I said "Yes .. Now I am gonna hand over him to Allied forces .." We both laughed at it ... Shafi also started scaring the kid about the hardships that police gave to thiefs ...

      So we reached our home within a minute .. three of us ... Dad was in the frontyard reading newspaper .. .. I told him that I caught this boy stealing mangoes from our garden .. ( Dad also knew we called these boys Al Qaeda ) . . . Okay .. He also started scaring the boy telling him that we will hand him over to the police .. I asked "Who was with you ..??" ( A faint image of bollywood pictures emerged in my mind but I snubbed it ) .. "Nobody was with me .. I wasnt throwing stones .. I was just passing by ... and when I saw fruits I just started to pick them ..." said the boy .. "Where do you live .. whats your father's name .." .. The boy didnt replied to this .. "Okay .. your father will pickup you from lock up.." .. "Whats your name .." asked Shafi .. the boy was now on top of his cries .. said .."Osama ..!" ... Osama ..? We both looked at each other ... ... "Bin Laden ..? " asked Shafi ... now trying hard to control his laugh ... The boy had evidently never heard of Bin Laden as he just stared blankly and kept crying ... About then .. I couldnt control my laughter and all of us burst into laugh ... The boy stared at us astoshingly as to gather what happened .. "Okay .. Now I will leave you but you'll have to clean all those stones from our backyard .." .. The boy wanted to buy anything for his freedom .. He said .."Okay sir ..I'll do it .." ... "And what is the name of the one with you ..?" Asked Shafi .. The kiddo didnt replied again .... Anyways ..he picked all the stones from our backyard and then I let him go ... He promised he'll never steal fruits from our garden again ...

      So that ended a small episode of fun ... Shafi and I wondered if the other boy was Saddam Hussein .. We never knew cauz he didnt returned again .. Atleast I didnt saw him again ..

       Now the mangoes are on again .. and so are the boys ... This year they have introduced a new trick .. All of them have catties ..They shoot stones from the catty ... it dont make much sound ..so they collect the fruit and leave silently .. I have caught many of them but havnt got a hand to the top brass of Al Qaeda again ...

I am not a Bachelor Anymore !!!

Whoops ..!! I did it .. My friends are eyeing me with jealousy ... I am the first in the group now who isn't a Bachelor anymore ..Now I have an elite position :) ..

So how are you feeling now ..? My friend asked .. I said "Whooops .. On the top of the world !" ... It wasn't an easy task .. I really worked hard for it .. And when success touches you after your toil it just tastes something .. What a bliss ...

So ... What are my plans for the future ..? Umm.. Plenty !!.. With my new status I will have an advantage over others .. :-p .. After all I am a Master now .. :-p .. Finally I have completed my Masters degree in Computer Applications .. !! The results just declared today .. I got an aggregate of 65 % .. Somewhat less that what I expected but still I am happy now .. :)

Internet : A Solitary Refuge ..?

Owing to the pitiable conditions of our electricity board, we are not getting power in daytime.. That's why I keep getting less time to work on my blogs .. :( .. Hopefully the conditions will improve soon ...

Recently, me and my friend were having a discussion over hobbies and areas of interest .. He asked me what I quote as my hobbies .. I said .. Surfing the Net .. Reading ..Listening to music .. Playing Cricket whenever my old chaps assemble... My friend told me not to include Surfing as a hobby in my Resume .. I asked why ..? He said surfing looks like a lonely act .. It gives the impression that you seek refuge in the Internet and turn your face from the "more social" things.. I did agreed to some of the points but later thought over it .. These are points that came to my mind .. Btw .. I had to bring "addiction to the Net" in discussion to elaborate my points ..

[Flashback]

I still remember when I first used the Internet in my life .. It was in a new Cyber Cafe that had opened near my college ..As my friends were busy playing Pool, I was trying to cope with the discoveries that were appearing .. I had used Email on my college LAN earlier but this new technology (WWW) was so much new for me .. I instantly felt the fondness for the Net ... I still remember the first website that I opened was Zeenext ( I think its closed now :-p ) .. I created my first email address on that site .. Then I learned that there is far more to the Net than just emails .. I found out Yahoo! which was emerging as the leader in Search technology those days .. I searched and downloaded a Cobol compiler for my studies... which later turned out of no use to me as it didn't worked on Netware and it wasn't a freeware .. .. But still .. I searched and prepared my study notes on the Net .. Soon my friends too started finding about the new "fashion' .. Their favorite websites ..? Of course porn ..:-p .. ( Honestly I didn't surfed porn cauz it was an expensive deal .. It was 60 Rs. an hour and I could see newest film for Rs 10 at my home comfort :-p .. ) .. My friends too realised it soon and then we started chatting ... We used to search girlish IDs in the chat rooms and then chatted with them for soo long .. Soon I realised I can create multiple IDs on Yahoo! and started fooling my friends with girls IDs ... It was fun ... Then when we were working on our project, I referred to many programming websites for my work .. It really helped me ...Then I joined many forums and communities .. (fortunately most of them are extinct now :-p .. ) .. I made many friends and met some of them too ... Later I got Internet at home and I started to use it for my studies and chatting ....

[/Flashback]

What is a society ..? Babylon tells me: human beings and the relations between them .. Loosely, society is everything we interact with in our daily life .. Being social (read not confining to your room for the most of your time) is considered good ( I cant find some other word for it) .. And someone who avoids social meets, parties, get togethers etc. is considered not normal ... ie its the normal behaviour of humans to meet others, interact with them .. And someone who (don't like,) avoids these meetings is considered a lonely fella .. Cauz man is a social animal it is his fundamental activity ... The "lonely ppl" often develop some complexes and tends to fall for darker world .. even commit crimes.. (So what turns out ..? Being lonely will lead you to be suspected of not normal activities ..) Now we move ahead ..

Now .. If people who don't take interest in meeting other people (Refer to them as "Hermits" hereafter) what do they enjoy ..? Usually their interests appears to be watching TV, reading novels, drinking and so on .. Normal people too do these things but the time they spent on it is far less than the hermits...Gradually they confine themselves to a solitary world ... Okay .. I got it .. Don't be a loner .. Now talk about Internet please ..

So what happens when the hermits enter the cyberworld ..? They quickly realise that this is a place where they can express their suppressed desires ... Now the Net is a place where you can interact with a lot of people .. you don't need any public speaking skills to chat (I know many people who are good at cyberchat but cant speak a word in debates or public speaking activities).. you can impersonate others .. You can become whatever you pleasure to be and yet remain anonymous ...
The hermits gets overwhelmed by this sudden freedom .. Now they can do whatever they always wanted to... They starts giving more and more time to the Net .. Some of them (the Geeky ones) joins communities ... Some (more Geeky and more suppressed) joins underground groups .. become virus writers ... the list is endless .. All in all they get addicted to the Net .. .. We will come back to this in a moment

Take another scenario .. What happens when a more social person enters the cyberworld ..? He too get the same experience of freedom .. But he thinks "Hey .. Here is another place I can interact with people .. " .. Now even if he sacrifice some of his time for his online life, he doesn't leave his offline life .. Even if he becomes a net addict too ..

So .. We meet all type of people when we surf the Internet.. The hermits .. and the socials .. How do we differentiate between them ..? I am tempted to say that people who give too much time to Internet can be hermits .. but I know its not correct .. Net has become such freely accessible that a person can be online from his office or mobile too .. So any other idea ..? I guess we cant conclusively determine someone's personality by his online Avatar .. We have to meet him to find what sort of person he is .. But what happened to our original point of discussion ..? Is Internet a refuge ..?

I guess Internet does offer a refuge to a person if he seeks .. I know many ppl who are called spoiled geeks who have no or very less public life but are active online .. But there are people who are active online and still are very social in their offline worlds.. So .. Internet is whatever one wants it to be .. If you come here to seek "solitary refuge" you will find one and if you are here to find more friends, you will find them too ... All depends on your attitude .. your personality ..

So Am I going to include "Surfing the net" in my resume ..? Yes .. I am .. cauz when my employer will see me, he can find out what kind of person I am .. and I am sure I don't look like a hermit ...

But this is nice topic to discuss ... Hmm.. Lets see ..

The F16 Saga ..

I knew this was bound to happen .. This has been an old strategy of the US first to create a problem and then pose a solution to it .. From the start when US spoke of giving F16s to Pakistan, there was a talk about giving the anti missile defence system to India .. (I mean selling) but New Delhi brushed it aside .. Now has come their new offer, the Lockheed Martin has offered India to purchase the Licence to build F16s in India .. And our Defence Ministry is considering this offer favourably ..
      So .. First create a disease and then sell its cure ... and profit from both sides .. When will our politicians start thinking like this ..?

Changes in ethical values ... Or is it ..?

Hmmm .. In accordance with my preparations for the SBI, I have decided to take a topic everyday to discuss and to think about .. So this is the first in the series .. I'll keep posting my less intellectual posts too along with this btw .. :P

Popular TV serial Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahin can be regarded as a metaphor to the current society. The story of a Plain Jane becoming a successful entrepreneur has lots of twists and intrigues...

Anyone who had followed Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahin will be having some food for thought now. As the story unfolds, Jassi is now reconsidering her ethical and moral values. Following the betrayals and setbacks, she has come to the conclusion that world regards honesty and truthfulness as a weakness in one's personality. So now, She has decided that she wont let any weakness stay in her.. So what does it mean ..? Is she going to take the path taken by those who lack conscience ..? Is she going to answer in the same language that everyone was talking to her ..? ..

So what went wrong ..? Is Jassi right now or was she right earlier ..? If she is right now, then are we living in a world which is so called practical in sense but lacking moral values ..? If she is wrong, then what should be done..? Lets try to find out the reasons with my limited knowledge..

I recall a quote here :
Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions..

According to my observations, we like the people who are well mannered, honest and truthfull. We want to become like them .. But if someone having those qualities reaches any distinction, we tend to have suspicions over him. We think somewhere beneath his apparant honesty is deceit... The path to the top needs many sins to be done .. .. We cant generally accept that anyone who reaches top has a clean record..We start getting jealous of him .. And add to this if the person has risen from a lower (be it economic or social) class and is not having a good looking face, our jealousy multiplies... If someone becomes practically what we wanted to become theoretically, we started getting jealous of him...this is what Jassi faced ... But what's Jassi's mistake in it ..? Who needs to change ..? Jassi or the people around her ...?

I feel that a person like Jassi if turned evil will do a good harm to the society, and the people around her cannot and will not change ..So shall we keep living with questions like these unanswered ..? In my opinion, if change is needed anywhere, its in the system ..If the system is changed, then the people will change automatically.. But this cant be done overnight .. So much labour required .. attitudes need to change .. definitions of ethics needs change ... definition of success needs change ...Can such vast changes be brought ..? I am tempted to say Yes ..!! All we need is a initiative .. if I could shed my reservations and If I could overcome my covetousness, I can think about changing others around me .. One should start with himself .. So here I am starting to do actually what I believe and give everyone the credit he deserves ..

The ethics will not change .. the attitude needs a change ..

Some good news !!

Ah .. At last my hard work seems to be paying off now.. All of that day long studying and practising has started giving results.. Hmm.. No more prefaces .. The news is I cleared SBI's written examination ..And now I'lll be attending the Phase II of their selection ie GD and PI which they are conducting at IIM L ...

The news brought both joy and panic for me .. As the paper went well I was assured of my success but there was a rumor that they have decreased the number of posts but still I had faith in my labor .. Panic came because I have now so less time to prepare for the GD and PI where I am sure I will face a stiff competition .. But still I am preparing for it as this has been my dream job and I will work hard to get it ..

That reminds me that the written exam was the toughest paper that I have given in my short career .. None of my batchmates or my Instructors (Yeah ..They too compete ) cleared it so there was nobody with whom I could celebrate but still .. Here I am .. And now I am preparing to face the ultimate challenge .. I have come this far .. I wont let my effort show any scarcity and I really mean it ..

So now .. I have to postpone my ongoing project at STDC (which is already running behind the schedule ) for the preparations .. I hope Majid Bhai will understand ..
Hmmm.. So .. I should get to the job as soon as I can ..

(This was written on 18th of March)

[Edit] As I type the above things, I come to know about two more people who have been selected. . There is one Pankaj Mishra who got his PI on 6th and the other one is his friend who got his date on the 5th of April.. Pankaj is already working in IOB so he's not going for any preparations as he get no time apart from his job .. But still .. I do hope they will too excel in the exam .. Lets cee ..

Edited on 20th of March

I am back ...!!

So after a two month exile from Net, I am back now.. Infact I was accessing the Net occasionally from cybercafes, there is no comparison with late night surfing and conferences.. Checking multiple email account was another trouble .. But this small break has changed a lot in my life .. I realised how much we have become dependent on the Net.. Be it sendig a file through the network or email someone this has become a routine in our lives... Anyways this break forced me to concentrate on other things too which was a sort of positive result ..

Many events happened in between.. I'll post about them in future posts ..

Well .. this post was due for a week and I decided to post it at last today .. Hopefully I will be regular on the Blog now ..

(This post was typed on 12th of March .. But I was damn busy / forgetful to post it )