Spotted some kids playing a game in the playground nearby. Reminded me of the games I played growing up. Yeah...I played all sorts of them growing up. This one's similar to what we used to call Andhra Patta. You basically hit one stone with another one. Sounds easier than it is.

The rains have been wary of Hyderabad. The only clouds that we get here are the empty ones loitering around in the sky, doing nothing. Well, at least they block the sun for a while.

We struggle to find peace amidst chaos. Would we have valued peace as much if not for all the chaos? I guess not. We are suckers for what we don't have and take for granted what we have.

Lyrics for the moment

When your world's crashing down
Like you've lost every round
Stand your ground
And ring the bells of freedom - Jon Bon Jovi, Bells of Freedom

The Raj Atithi Guest House was a fourteen-storey building crawling with low life. A five-foot-high wall separated its compound from the world's largest garbage dump. Atop the wall stretched four rows of barbed wire, from the various points of which sagged torn polythene bags of diverse colours. These contained human shit in different stages of decomposition. They'd been flung, of course, at the dump and had't made it across the wall. They in fact looked pathetic, like POWs in a Hollywood movie ensnared in a vain attempt to escape from a concentration camp.

Yummy, you say? Now, hold that urge to shout 'gross!'?

This ones from Upamanyu Chatterjee's Mammaries of the Welfare State which I had picked up about three months back from Crosswords. The protagonist is a government employee who has just been tranferred to a new city and is supposed to live a government guest house for ten days. As the name might have suggested to you, it's a satire on the Indian bureaucracy. And as the paragraph above might have suggested, it's witty, funny and hilarious (and I have only read fifteen pages). There's a healthy sprinkling of the the four-letter word and a lot of not-to-be-mentioned-in-civilised-company words as well. In short, lotsa fun in store.

Lyrics for the moment

But we're never gonna survive unless
We get a little crazy
No we're never gonna survive unless
We got a little... - Crazy, Alanis Morissette Seal

On my long time ago entry, I had talked about our cat named Dimitiri.  Now, I have his real picture. The scratches and cut on his face was the result of his sleepless nights looking for some chicklets. :D

But why writing? Expressing oneself is something we indulge in all the time. The better we are at it, the more easier it is for people to understand. We might choose to express ourselves in written or spoken words, or with actions. Writing is my way of saying it. What's yours?

Moral of the whole thing: Be curious. Know yourself. Curiosity did kill the cat, but it might help you live a better life.

Lyrics for the moment

Do you think that I know something you don't know?
If I don't promise you the answers would you go? - What do you want from me - Pink Floyd

yet I have a good reason to believe I am delusional

Have a nice week ahead of you :D

The software has been renamed to Pidgin (not a user friendly name). I installed it and started playing around, the nice thing about it, is that it works with all chat applications that are there, MSN, Yahoo, Gtalk, AIM, etc. and what is even nicer is that once you set up your accounts, they are all logged in at the same time in the same application, it is really impressive. The setup of an account is not hard at all just as if you are logging on the messenger itself, input the user name and password and that's it. Contrary to the idea that Linux things are not user friendly or are tough to work with the software is very easy, here is a snapshot of my window showing msn, yahoo and gtalk contacts all together, even the ones logged on with their mobiles.

I think there isn't the option to have voice chat, but who cares, for that thing I use another invention called the mobile :D the thing is very nice, I have tried to chat using it with MSN, Yahoo and Gtalk contacts and it worked great, and the other thing is that you have all the chats as tabs in the same window :D i'm loving this new tool.

P.S. this a windows software

Love u all beautiful ppl.. who make my so called sweet life more beautiful.. Now I am off to call sweet maa.. Who BTW came over the weekend just to meet her two daughters.. Lovely isn't it.. I love my parents.. I care about them ( rather worry about them a looooooooooooot ) .. GOD BLESS THEM...

And that’s the most I can do in Spanish, congratulations for Spain, I’m only happy because they kicked Germany out!

The place is beautiful and the weather happened to be great too. What's more, it rained! Unfortunately, the rain interrupted the Karnatak Vocals recital by an elderly artist. I was just happy that I was there with the camera.

The little girl in the last pic is Aamani, daughter of one of the HPC members.

Music for the moment

There's so many different worlds
So many different suns
And we have just one world
But we live in different ones - Brothers in Arms, Dire Straits

There was another surprise in store. The letter said that I could pay the amount online. So, I logged on to the eseva website. The website has all the qualities of being a government (read sloppy) website. Bad english ("Enter answer minimum four charecters" for answer to security question), unnecessary fields in forms (though Pre-filled, what's the state name doing in the registration form?), no authentication of the data entered and so on. Anyway, I somehow managed to pay the amount thus sparing myself the effort of going to the Commissioner's office.

In the end though, I was just glad that I had used a government serivice that works!

We then headed for the park, in cars. The walk began at around 7.00. We were allowed inside the park since we were accompanying the members of Birdwatchers Society of Andhra Pradesh. It was quite scary. There we were, photography enthusiasts out to have some fun, being forced to remain calm and quiet. Them birdwatchers have some patience. We managed to spot a few birds...the oohs and aahs from the birdwatchers were quite amusing. After sticking around with them for a while, we promptly got lost. And, as a result, had quite a bit of fun.

Photography-wise though, it was not a very fruitful outing. Ended up taking macro pics of plants, shrubs, leaves and stones. We felt that the birds had gone to the city for some 'humanwatching' and the Deers were lazying around somewhere out of bounds. The only deer that did turn up was the one below. Posed very nicely for me...must be used to being photographed.

Dear Creator,

Hope you are having a good time. I write to you in a rather disturbed state. The cause of my concern is my lack of understanding of your reasoning behind my creation. I know most of your creations have similar queries and must be keeping you busy with letters like these.

Assuming that their queries would be more or less similar, I'll come down to that one grouse which I feel is unique to me. You created me to drive the body in which I reside. I hold the basic code of day-to-day activities and the ability to create intelligence. I work non-stop on the job. I relax for a second and the body would collapse like a broken toy.

To be very frank with you, I hate my existence. All the time I keep absorbing all sorts of data around me. Instead of looking at it as I see it though, I keep asking all sorts of questions. What was said? What was heard? What was seen? What was not seen? What was supposed to be said? Why was it said? What should be done next? Darn, the whats, whys, why nots and their likes keep torturing me. Yet, I am only too happy to do as they like. Self-control is something you did not think was needed by me.

And to top it all, you've created so many of the same kind--at last count we were about six billion of us. And we keep adding the number. We divided the one world you gave us into several tiny proportions. Nearly 200 of them. Me and my replicas are busy devising ways to benefit our own groups. That benefit mostly revolves around one of our most important inventions: money. We want more and more of it. And if making more money involves taking it away from someone else, we do so gladly. Selfishness comes naturally to us. We try all the tricks that we can create. Treachery, deceit, sweet talk, lies, theft and what not. The end matters. Not the means. And when so many of us try to do the same thing, you can only imagine what kind of a chaos would ensue. The world is now a mess. Thanks to your...err...mindless creativity.

We've also created our own ways of worshiping you. And the ones following the popular ways make sure that they take every chance they get to prove their way to be the best. You might say it's just too many of us that's causing the trouble. Not true. Even in tasks involving a maximum of two of us, we are perfectly capable of screwing up. Making friends, making enemies, finding love...you ask and it we can screw it. That said, there are some of us who indulge in the good deeds too. Helping others out, understanding and problems, education...so on and so forth. Unfortunately, the rotten ones far outnumber the good ones. And for this, the blame lies squarely on you. You devised no way of controlling the quality. The bad ones ought to go. But they stay...and flourish.

I hope sense dawns on you sooner than later and you do something about this situation which has already gone way out of control.

Till then, I hope to stay as calm as I possibly can.

Sincerely yours,

Human Mind

Lyrics for the moment

Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
'relax,' said the night man,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
But you can never leave! - Eagels, Hotel California

ek hunar hai jo kar gayaa huuN maiN
sab ke dil se utar gayaa huuN maiN

(hunar : skill)

kaise apnii haNsii ko zabt karuuN
sun rahaa huuN ke ghar gayaa huuN maiN

(zabt : control)

kyaa bataauuN ke mar nahiiN paataa
jiite ji jab se mar gayaa huuN maiN

ab hai bus apna saamnaa darpesh
har kisii se guzar gayaa huuN maiN

(darpesh : to confront)

voh hii naaz-o-adaa, voh hii Ghamze
sar-ba-sar aap par gayaa huuN maiN

(naaz-o-adaa : playfulness; Ghamze : amorous glances; sar-ba-sar : from top to bottom)

ajab ilzaam huuN zamaane kaa
ke yahaaN sab ke sar gayaa huuN maiN

kabhii Khud tak pahunch nahiiN paayaa
jab keh vaaN umr bhar gayaa huuN maiN

tum se jaanaaN milaa huuN jis din se
be-tarah, Khud se dar gayaa huuN maiN

kuu–e–jaanaaN meN sog barpaa hai
ke achaanak, sudhar gayaa huuN maiN

(kuu–e–jaanaaN : house of the beloved)

Ghazal by Jaun Elia ( Link via Aligarians)

Sigh! These are the times I wish this man was not sitting so far away. He recites poetry really well, you know!

Each one perfectly  "rising up" to the occaision ( sorry for the bad pun)! 

Aah the sweet taste of success after months a few days of disastrous mildly dissapointing results!

Those who know me well, would know it as proof that I, out of all people, actually didn't eat any rice and was happy with just eating phulkas! ( For the uninitiated, I am a total Rice person. I can live without rotis for months and not miss them, but I have to have rice at least once in a day...actually make that all meals)

If there is a cookery heaven, this is it. Phulkas that are nice and soft, and round and fluffy...

PS: Lest you think its another one of my cooking - obsessed achievements....it was 50% me and 50% The Boy.

 I think we totally rock.

No, really. Now you can actually come for dinner.

Woah~ I had a very interesting day yesterday. I hung out with these bunch of "kids" hehehe, just joking but partly true (no offence there :p especially to Beelaphant) I was supposed to hang out with this friends of mine but end up, hanging out with the ones in the picture above. I know one of them well, Hanee-san because yeah, we've been good friends for quite some time now. The rest of them in the pictures are Hanee's friends, the ladies are her bestfriends except Nazeeng whom happen to be Nabeelah's Lil Sis and the guys are just friends, i suppose :p The names of ladies up there : Zeelah, Nazeeng (inwhich I still think its a very cool nickname cause its unique), Nabeelah, Iraz, Adeq and Hanee..as for the guys, I only know Azeez and Wafiee, the rest didn't intro themselves so I have no idea at all :p Well, to cut the story short (because if I were to tell the longer version of it, I'll be one who's tired of typing instead you reading the whole thing :p) Hanee texted me and asked for a favour of helping her, since I was free earlier so I don't mind helping her out. She wanted to throw one of her friends a surprise birthday party (Nabeel a.k.a Miss Labu) I got to know everyone of them bit by bit and I find them quite a funny group.

Here are my first impressions on them ; Zeelah - she was quiet and the mysterious one but until she opened up, I find that she'll only talk much with the people she is comfortable with. Nazeeng - a very shy kid but willing to mingle around with the adults. Nabeelah - she may looked innocent and all, but she is very wild person. Iraz - a very Hanee look alike, but character is very different yaw. Adeq - I knew her before when I hung out with Hanee the first time, I think, but hey, she is quiet and at the same time, not that quiet, weird explaination but I can't explain any other way :p Hanee - Haha, no need for her la because I've known her for quite some time now, so for now, all I can say is she has the same taste in music, colours, numbers and etc because she has the same horroscope as I am, Arienz yawwwww~~ Hehe ;) And finally, Azeez - I didnt get the chance to talk tohim when we were upclose and personal but chatted with him and he's a cool kid, very religious but at the same time, being a rebel as well, haha.

Actually Im too tired to continue here so overall, I'm just glad that I joined them cause I had loads of fun :D Do hope I can just hang out with them again soon enough :) I'll stop my blogging now cause I'm having a terrible migraine and its killing my creativity so I'm outta hereeeee~~ Till next time :p

Cheers~

On the download day site they have a map showing the countries of the world and how many of that country pledged to download the software on the download day which is June 17^th (i.e. today), only 360 in Jordan have pledged to download.

So if you like Firefox go pledge to download the latest version of it; #3.

It was a memorable weekend. Never ceases to surprise me how an unplanned weekend can turn out to be so good. There I was at my office, wondering what the hell to do with the day and a half of no work left. I wanted to go to the Pentagram and Parikrama concert desperately, but none of my usual metal-head companions were around. The spirits were down. But one man's grief is another man's inspiration. When I saw Santhosh in an even worse condition, my problem was solved. I dragged him out of the office and we bought the passes to the show. It was still four hours away, so we decided to do some time pass and headed over to Ashoka Metropolitan Mall after a salad at Subway (Corn and Peas Salad is back!).

The stay at the mall involved a 30-minute drooling session in the Apple iStore. I ogled at everything from the iPod shuffle to the Apple TV. Deprivation, thy name is Apple! After a coffee at Barista, we headed over to Rock Heights.

Once there, we waited patiently for the show to begin. We had to udergo a rather boring session by the forced-onto-us anchor, Mehar Bhasin. Things were looking up when Parikrama started their gig. A few initial hiccups occured and we were eager to see them get going. Alas, that never happened. The band has all sorts of problems with the sound systems. Too much bass, reduce the volume on the violin, stage speakers are too loud. And so it went on till the end. Except for a violin solo by Imran Khan and a song cover of LOTR, Parikrama were pale shadow of what I saw of them at the Iron Maiden concert last year.

Fortunately, their gig ended. We were just happy that it ended. No complaints!

And then came Pentagram. Vishal Dadlani and co. delivered a flawless performance. The guitar, the drums, the vocals...they were all mind blowing. The sounds were ringing in my head half-an-hour after the gig was over. I was looking around to their source only to realise they were emanating from the inside of my own head. Anyone could have mistaken me for being high on weed. But that's the effect Pentagram had on me. Truly awesome.

The day next...

Sunday began on a lazy note. I got up at 10 and, without any food, headed over to Indira Park for the weekend photo shoot with the Hyderabad Photography Club. Some experience it was. The weather had been awesome throughout and it continued being that way.

Shot at Indira Park on Sunday, July 15 2008.

The smile just made my day.

More pics at my Flickr page.

No one can decide for everyone. Whether one chooses to be a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian (or a bit of both) is purely a personal choice. Neither a spouse, family, state or religion have the right to impose upon an individual their will in this regard. Unfortunately that's not what happens. But that's a different topic altogether.

It is a well known fact that both Veg and Non-veg food have their benefits for the human health. My question to the supporters of vegetarianism then is, on what basis has it been concluded that Veg food is better than Non-veg?

In India, religion and caste play a key role when it comes to the food one is allowed to eat. Hindus are considered to be largely vegetarian. But there are castes that eat Non-veg. Brahmins have to stay away from meat. The 'lower-castes' need not. Then there are the Bengalis, who, irrespective of their position in the caste-based hierarchy are 'certified' to eat fish. Might one ask on what basis were these rules put in place? May be if a convincing answer came by, one could argue that religion and caste are the right criteria for deciding what food one eats. One will have to curse his / her destiny then for not being able to eat the food of one's choice. Till then, however, individuals should be allowed to choose what they eat.

OK. May be I degressd a bit by bringing in religion, but then I had to make my point. What you say?

Rambunctious Whippersnapper ( For the love of God, couldn't you pick an easier user name?) has sent one across asking us to reveal secrets and that too 10 in number (???)

Hmmm...I don't quite know what all to put in here, given the limitations of my blog but nevertheless, let us come up with stuff that's still secretive or not yet discussed, at least in context of well, the blog!

• I can't stand apples, unless in a pie, can't stand bananas unless in a milk shake. I can however, devour copious amounts of litchis, strawberries, cherries and grapes. I have expensive taste, yes?
• I have extremely low tolerance for body odour. I have gone ahead and gifted a deodorant to an acquaintance. I hope he got the point.
• I love a good debate. Just for the sake of argument, I am known to jump on to the other side, irrespective of what my "real" perspective is. And I love being the devil's advocate.
• I am fascinated and love wildlife. And know for a fact that will be actively involved in conservation, especially of the tiger. Dream holidays always include forest reserves and TV watching has a healthy dose of Nat Geo and Animal Planet. I am however, scared of cats, dogs and such.
• I am a soppy romantic who believes in love and good things and friendship and happy endings. I don't however associate romance with wining and dining, flowers, or chocolates.
• Talking of chocolate, I am addicted to it. I can have it just, make a snack out of it and even a full meal.
• And stealing one from the Whippersnapper, I LOVE books. So much so, that I think reading is not necessarily related to buying. I love buying books, while it might be months before I actually pick them up, but really, I can keep buying. In fact, I don't recall the last time I went to a bookshop and just browsed. I always pick up something or other.
• I am scared of pain. Physical pain. I can't handle it, no matter how minor it seems to another person. Think needles, bruises, cuts, aches and pains, I am a total coward!
• I am really good with lyrics. From the best of songs to the worst. I am able to remember them by heart just after listening to them once or twice. The cheesiest of songs find a place in memory. I can't say the same about names though. I am terrible at remembering names, and on many occasions have embarrassed myself, having begun to introduce someone, and promptly forgotten their name.
• This blog scares me sometimes. Especially when people believe they've figured me out completely and take everything on the blog too seriously or at face value. Forgetting that while it is very much a part of who I am, it is not the complete me. And while I write a lot here, there is still much more that I don't.

And with that, we come to the end of another tag! And for the ten bakras that we need to make -

Blue Mist

D

Nevermind

Indian Homemaker

Childwoman

Just Passing By

Lively

Planethalder

Once Again

The Introvert

The location: NTR marg by the Tank Bund (Hussain Sagar).

The scene: Clouds had gathered over the city. The sky went gray. The lake looked so gray and so clear, I've never seen it like that before. The footpath was unusually clean. The other end of the lake was visible quite clearly too. The trees were swinging in the wind. I stopped by at a spot just before the foot-over bridge, with trees on either side of me, just to gaze at the scene created by nature itself. I soaked the scene in and moved on.

The tragedy: I was not carrying my camera. The charger had gone kaput last weekend and is yet to come back from repair.

The positive: Who needs a camera to store such a beautiful scene? It's etched in my mind. Every pixel of it. Something similar had happened back in 2006 when I travelled to Solapur. And that's exactly how I consoled myself.

Sigh...such is life.

I want to live alone. By myself.

I want to be able to play the Guitar. Just like that.

I want to set the world right. The way I want it.

I want to kill the constantly nagging side of me. Get some peace.

I want to write. Each and every thought.

I want to dance my ass off. Drop dead.

I want to go away. Never come back.

Is it so difficult? Really?

There are people who seem to be doing what they were born to do. The businessman, the sports person, the soldier, the actor, the singer. The majority of the people in the world - the ones like me and possibly you -  though, come into the world not knowing what we are meant to do. For us life is all about getting some education so that we can end up with a decent job. At any given moment there are more, by a huge margin, people who don't know why they are doing what they are doing.

Was the guy next door born to write code for a living? He sure is good at it, but is coding the thing for him? The replies to such a question can go to an extent where the guy's education, family, parents' aspiration, government's inability to provide proper education and a lot more things can end up taking the blame. But that's not taking us anywhere. If we really knew what we were born to do, we'd have done it irrespective of the road blocks. At worst, we'd have given it a try, failed and moved along hoping to come back later. Unfortunately, even that happens in very rare cases. Those paint brushes that were left in the corner of the cupboard dry out crying out against the injustice. They were sacrificed because that entrance exam was too important. The Tanpura was covered in a piece of cloth and thrown in the store room because singing was too tough a field to succeed. "You know how many of them wannbee Rafis and Kumars roam the streets of Mumbai looking for that big break? Go do the course that our neighbour's son did, he got a job instantly. May be you'll get lucky too." The death knell. End of story.

I'll end it here, lest I end up writing a short book that no one wants to read. Here's a photograph to cheer you up. I took it at the Mozamjahi Market on Sunday with the HPC. She started laughing when she realised that she was being photographed. I felt jealous. She sells beetle betel nut leaves for a living. God bless.

Lyrics for the moment

And what it all comes down to
Is that I haven't got it all figured out just yet
'cause I've got one hand in my pocket
And the other one is giving the peace sign - One hand, Alanis Morissette