Friendship isn’t how you forget, but how you forgive.
Not how you listen, but how you understand.
Not how you see, but how you feel.
Not how you let go, but how you hold on!
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Hold On To Friendship!!
Friendship isn’t how you forget, but how you forgive.
Not how you listen, but how you understand.
Not how you see, but how you feel.
Not how you let go, but how you hold on!
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
A Toast to the Jams in Bangalore!!
Over these last few years of living in Bangalore, I have slowly grown to like the jams, which this city provides in abundance.
These jams do build your patience and character. Is it a coincidence that India's most patient cricketers, Dravid and Kumble, hail from this city of jams? (Dravid is even nicknamed "Jammy"). Does it tell you something? Sri Sri Ravishankar…does he get his daily dose of spiritual inspiration while in a jam?? And will I also get a halo after a few more years of this "character building"?? There are, I am sure, thousands of future Anands stuck in the Adugodis and Anand Rao circles, who are plotting their moves against future Kramniks… those poor little Kramniks stand no chance. And if you see a professor-like guy prancing around the Palace road jam, you can deduce that a postulate in Physics has just been proved.
A few days back, I had a thought - If we can have reviews of movies, which occupy only a few hours of our life in a month, why not reviews of traffic jams, which takes up significant hours of our day?? So here is my review of some of Bangalore's famous and not-so-famous jams(in no particular order).
But before that, a general comment - As they say, the taste of food in a restaurant is dependent on the ambience ; similarly, the way I see jams, cozy inside the office shuttle or public transport, is different from the way the owner of the swank new SUV sees it. (btw, if you are the owner of the swank new SUV, don't run me down).
1. The Hosur Road Jam - Unarguably, the mother of all jams. We (ex-) HP'ians are proud of being (once) associated with a great company. We are equally proud of contributing in no small extent to this jam. This jam gives a great glimpse of the Other India - colorful music-blaring interstate buses, garment factory workers, highway trucks, smoke spewing lorries and such. Provides ample food for thought for socialist minds. (Rating: ***1/2)
2. The jams around K'mangala/Forum mall - Definitely the best jams in town. PYTs (Pretty young things), fancy cars, and fancy restaurants; this has it all. But you can't afford any of those. Never mind!! Your sadistic brain can take pleasure in the fact that the guy in the fancy car next to you is cruising around for a parking space, feasting his eyes on the PYTs , while his family is having dinner in one of the fancy restaurants. (Rating: ****1/2)
3. The KG Road jam - To be experienced in the evenings before a long weekend. Every auto/taxi in town seems to be stuck while going towards the City railway station - your hair stands on end, you start sweating, the heart beats faster, and you get the rush that a Michael Schumachaer gets on his last lap. And just as the auto moves, a movie show ends and a few hundred more vehicles pour out… Which was the train that hooted just now?? (Rating: ***1/2)
4. The Jayanagar jam - The puzzle-lovers jam; Jayanagar is maze of bylanes, one-way streets, no right-turns, no left-turns, traffic signals and whatnot. It is an establised fact that Point A to point B, in Jayanagar, can be reached in 6436 distinct ways. But whichever way you take, you are left with a hollow feeling that another route had a better and bigger jam? (Rating: **1/2)
5. The jams around Marathahalli/Whitefield - The IT professional's dream jam; As she sits in the office shuttle looking at other office buses, she can make her career plans. A typical evening in this jam goes thus:
Voice from Company A bus : "Any J2EE developers in your bus?". Three guys from Company B bus respond "Yeah" and get down. By the time, the bus crosses the Marathahalli bridge, the first guy is hired as a J2EE developer. The second guy, who didn't know what J2EE meant, is hired as a project manager and the third guy is rejected as he realised late that he has already worked for Company A last year.
(Rating: ****)
6. The Airport Road jam - Similar in taste and character like the Koramangala jam but has socialist twist. This jam treats the rich businessman, who will later travel business class on Jet, the same as a poor programmer, who had unusually come to office early in the morning, 3 months back, to buy one of those cheap airline tickets. (Rating ***)
7. The BTM 7th Main x 7 Cross jam - Close to my home, so close to my heart. But alas, the spoilsports at BDA finished the flyover at the Jayadeva circle and brought an end to this jam. But for a couple of years, this jam used to give me pure joy as vehicles of all types created a tangle in the small bylanes of BTM layout. The BDA is now planning a new flyover at the Udupi Garden junction; so there is still hope (Rating ***1/2).
We jam lovers - currently this club consists of only me - have petitioned the government to protect and preserve traffic jams as a cultural asset of Bangalore. Just so that traffic jams are not endangered in the future, we have these suggestions:
1. Build more flyovers - Flyovers do not reduce jams. They just transfer it to the next junction. And in the 2 years that it takes to build them, you are assured of some joyous jams. I am drooling...
2. No public buses - If everybody goes by buses, where will our culture go?
3. Make Tata's 1-Lakh car cheaper by making it tax free - Imagine every two wheeler replaced by a car...The prospects are mouth-watering.
These jams do build your patience and character. Is it a coincidence that India's most patient cricketers, Dravid and Kumble, hail from this city of jams? (Dravid is even nicknamed "Jammy"). Does it tell you something? Sri Sri Ravishankar…does he get his daily dose of spiritual inspiration while in a jam?? And will I also get a halo after a few more years of this "character building"?? There are, I am sure, thousands of future Anands stuck in the Adugodis and Anand Rao circles, who are plotting their moves against future Kramniks… those poor little Kramniks stand no chance. And if you see a professor-like guy prancing around the Palace road jam, you can deduce that a postulate in Physics has just been proved.
A few days back, I had a thought - If we can have reviews of movies, which occupy only a few hours of our life in a month, why not reviews of traffic jams, which takes up significant hours of our day?? So here is my review of some of Bangalore's famous and not-so-famous jams(in no particular order).
But before that, a general comment - As they say, the taste of food in a restaurant is dependent on the ambience ; similarly, the way I see jams, cozy inside the office shuttle or public transport, is different from the way the owner of the swank new SUV sees it. (btw, if you are the owner of the swank new SUV, don't run me down).
1. The Hosur Road Jam - Unarguably, the mother of all jams. We (ex-) HP'ians are proud of being (once) associated with a great company. We are equally proud of contributing in no small extent to this jam. This jam gives a great glimpse of the Other India - colorful music-blaring interstate buses, garment factory workers, highway trucks, smoke spewing lorries and such. Provides ample food for thought for socialist minds. (Rating: ***1/2)
2. The jams around K'mangala/Forum mall - Definitely the best jams in town. PYTs (Pretty young things), fancy cars, and fancy restaurants; this has it all. But you can't afford any of those. Never mind!! Your sadistic brain can take pleasure in the fact that the guy in the fancy car next to you is cruising around for a parking space, feasting his eyes on the PYTs , while his family is having dinner in one of the fancy restaurants. (Rating: ****1/2)
3. The KG Road jam - To be experienced in the evenings before a long weekend. Every auto/taxi in town seems to be stuck while going towards the City railway station - your hair stands on end, you start sweating, the heart beats faster, and you get the rush that a Michael Schumachaer gets on his last lap. And just as the auto moves, a movie show ends and a few hundred more vehicles pour out… Which was the train that hooted just now?? (Rating: ***1/2)
4. The Jayanagar jam - The puzzle-lovers jam; Jayanagar is maze of bylanes, one-way streets, no right-turns, no left-turns, traffic signals and whatnot. It is an establised fact that Point A to point B, in Jayanagar, can be reached in 6436 distinct ways. But whichever way you take, you are left with a hollow feeling that another route had a better and bigger jam? (Rating: **1/2)
5. The jams around Marathahalli/Whitefield - The IT professional's dream jam; As she sits in the office shuttle looking at other office buses, she can make her career plans. A typical evening in this jam goes thus:
Voice from Company A bus : "Any J2EE developers in your bus?". Three guys from Company B bus respond "Yeah" and get down. By the time, the bus crosses the Marathahalli bridge, the first guy is hired as a J2EE developer. The second guy, who didn't know what J2EE meant, is hired as a project manager and the third guy is rejected as he realised late that he has already worked for Company A last year.
(Rating: ****)
6. The Airport Road jam - Similar in taste and character like the Koramangala jam but has socialist twist. This jam treats the rich businessman, who will later travel business class on Jet, the same as a poor programmer, who had unusually come to office early in the morning, 3 months back, to buy one of those cheap airline tickets. (Rating ***)
7. The BTM 7th Main x 7 Cross jam - Close to my home, so close to my heart. But alas, the spoilsports at BDA finished the flyover at the Jayadeva circle and brought an end to this jam. But for a couple of years, this jam used to give me pure joy as vehicles of all types created a tangle in the small bylanes of BTM layout. The BDA is now planning a new flyover at the Udupi Garden junction; so there is still hope (Rating ***1/2).
We jam lovers - currently this club consists of only me - have petitioned the government to protect and preserve traffic jams as a cultural asset of Bangalore. Just so that traffic jams are not endangered in the future, we have these suggestions:
1. Build more flyovers - Flyovers do not reduce jams. They just transfer it to the next junction. And in the 2 years that it takes to build them, you are assured of some joyous jams. I am drooling...
2. No public buses - If everybody goes by buses, where will our culture go?
3. Make Tata's 1-Lakh car cheaper by making it tax free - Imagine every two wheeler replaced by a car...The prospects are mouth-watering.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
About Me!!
Well there is nothing much to be said about me. M quite a straight forward guy with big ambitions and some things which i strongly believe in are
" One LIFE - Live It To The Fullest"
"After the game,
the king and the pawn go into the same box"
"Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly"
"Try not to become a man of success but a man of value"
"The world is round and the place which may seem like the END may also be the beginning"
......To Quote a few [:)]
Sufism - Tale of Love and Mysticism!!
For long Sufism has been viewed as a mystic culture. Word 'Sufi', though debatable, means ‘one who is pure’. It epitomizes purity of soul and unending quest for the divine; realization of truth by following the path of love and devotion. Basic tenet of Sufi doctrine is that God is all-pervasive. He resides in all of us. It is the communion of self with the beloved(God), which is the eternal source of bliss and enlightenment.
This school of thought found large-scale acceptance among the common man. During the medieval period Bhakti Movement was articulated by Hindu Saints and Sufism by Muslim Saints.
Simple and sublime verses of Sant Kabir Das, a disciple of Bhakti movement and a philosopher, echoed Sufi sentiments.
Do not go to the garden of flowers!
O Friend! Go not there;
In your body is the garden of flowers.
Take your seat on the thousand petals of the lotus,
and there gaze on the Infinite Beauty.
(Translation by Tagore)
One of the most revered Sufi saints of his time was Mowlana Jalaluddin Rumi. His work professed infinite Love for the divine.
At every instant and from every side, resounds the call of Love:
We are going to sky, who wants to come with us?
We have gone to heaven, we have been the friends of the angels,
And now we will go back there, for there is our country.
We are higher than heaven, more noble than the angels:
Why not go beyond them? Our goal is the Supreme Majesty.
What has the fine pearl to do with the world of dust?
Why have you come down here? Take your baggage back. What is this place?
Luck is with us, to us is the sacrifice!...
Like the birds of the sea, men come from the ocean--the ocean of the soul.
Like the birds of the sea, men come from the ocean--the ocean of the soul.
How could this bird, born from that sea, make his dwelling here?
No, we are the pearls from the bosom of the sea, it is there that we dwell:
Otherwise how could the wave succeed to the wave that comes from the soul?
The wave named 'Am I not your Lord' has come, it has broken the vessel of the body;
And when the vessel is broken, the vision comes back, and the union with Him.
(Translation by Simone Fattal)
Some other Sufi saints, who had great influence on the masses, were Nizamuddin Awliyah, Amir Khusrau, Baba Farid, Bulla Shah…
Even today, sparks of Sufism can be seen in the musical renditions of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Abida Parveeen….
It’s a manifestation of confluence of traditions and cultures- breaking all the barriers- to spread the message of love.This is so beautifully expressed in this hindi couplet of Amir Khusro
Khusrau darya prem ka, ulti wa ki dhaar,
Jo utra so doob gaya, jo dooba so paar.
Khusro says the river of love
Has a strange flow
One who jumps into it drowns,
And one who drowns, gets across.
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