Anything and Talk

Just the other day, I was done with my gym and was on my way back home. There is this narrow street just before my house. I saw a lady coming in the opposite direction. Her head was tilted 65 degrees to her right and she appeared to be shouting something. I was just wondering why she would shout at me because neither did I know her nor was I attempting to hurt her in any way. Suddenly she started waving, like she was showing her disapproval of something. I was dumbstruck at this moment due to this strange behaviour. Then a thought of intelligence appeared in my mind...ah off course, the lady must be a little bit mentally challenged. One finds many of them roaming the roads. That thought seemed to explain the behaviour , but !!!!! What sent that theory for a toss was that for a mentally retarded person, she was too well dressed and was holding a costly purse in her hands.

Not till she walked real close to me and straight past me, continuing her shouting and waving, that I discovered the truth. She was talkin on a mobile phone !!!!!! She was pulling out some documents from the purse that's why the mobile handset was placed between her neck and shoulder causing the tilt of the head !!! But off course, I should have known that before. I mean it's such a common sight nowadays to "grip" the handset that way and talk, especially when one is driving a vehicle and talking at the same time.Another such weird incident of this kind happened in a washrooom of a mall....here from behind a closed toilet, i could hear not just the sound of flushing but actual details of a business proposal !!!!! what a place and time for a business proposal !!!!

One mobile company preaches the idea of "Walk and Talk" to improve your health and fitness (while still increasing their revenue while you do that !!!). Well people have already taken this idea to heart long back and even extended it. The "Talk" part remains constant while the "Walk" is inter-changeable with "Drive","Drink","Eat" and what not....Most common being the "Drive and Talk". I guess when you are driving then it gives the "mobile" phone the real mobility factor !! I have seen people suddenly start shouting at traffic signals , frightening the mortals surrounding them. People are startled till they find out it's only a phone call that is being attended. You get to know about what relatives of people are doing OR when are people's friends planning a party OR how much someone owes somebody. You just need to be close to this "XXX and Talk" person to know this.

Then their are people who are talking hands-free with their blue tooth ear-pieces/headsets. Well these people atleast look more normal than the ones who cramp the handset between neck and shoulder !! Observe these people closely. They always seem to be looking into the oblivion, totally lost in their "mobile" worlds. The emotions on the face nearly always suggests that they are attending the most important call in the world. The hand waving also takes place many a time adding to the drama. All this looks very funny particularly when you are unaware and somebody suddenly starts the "Talk".

Moral of the story being you can talk on a mobile at almost any place , any time and most importantly while doing absolutely anything...."Anything and Talk" !!!

Panicdemic

It came, it spread and it conquered....well not conquered but definitely captured the imagination of the people big time. This is the second of it's kind in 2 to 3 years. Looks like the hunted animals/birds are giving back their own to us humans.

It became a national issue in some countries, powerful enough to shut down an entire nation for a week..well not even recession dared to go that far i guess !!! What was unfortunate to see was the deaths it caused, and must say, in most cases due to utter mishandling of the suffering person. Humans don't have an answer to it right now, till an answer is obtained, hope it won't be a case of trying to defend after the war is over. The good part of it all is that it is not life threatening in most cases, and the cure too, though a bit cumbersome, can be achieved through simple means.

More than the health, it has affected the psyche of the masses. Most noticeably, the MASK !! Many experts have laid bare the uselessness of the mask. Still the mask is seen by the masses as being their messiah of sorts. Many people see it as the sole simple solution to the problem. Masks of all shapes, sizes, colors, thickness are visible giving an impression of an ongoing chemical war !! Makes me feel that i would have gone from rags to royalty if i had anything to do with mask production/distribution in these days.

Recession has been looming large over the world, sickening economies world-wide and now here comes the real "sick"ener, if i can call it that. People are now really extra cautious and careful about the impending threat of an infection and have woken up to the virtues of cleanliness and prevention. It spread a feeling of apprehension and defensiveness in the air. Kids seemed to catch it the quickest , resulting in the closure of the schools, colleges and playgrounds, effectively even keeping the naughtiest kid confined to the four walls of his/her house. And how about people resorting to herbs and traditional medicines and curative oils !! Bottles of oils and herbal medicines vanished from the chemist's shelves faster than a running squirrel.

All and all, it definitely managed to have the masses panicked. The panic was such that I pity the poor staff at the screening hospitals, they must have had to work twice or thrice the workload of a normal day, as scores of people flocked in wanting to confirm their well-being after even a small sneeze or a bit of coughing. Suddenly having cough, cold or normal fever felt like crime with the suspecting eyes of the people around on you. IT was the one and the only sickness in the world at that time it seemed....as slowly everything began to be suspected as being it's symptom..

Now that it has subsided, it has suddenly gone out of the public eye !!! Columns and columns of newspaper space dedicated to it is now being occupied by normal news stuff, while the TV channels have also taken it suddenly and drastically off their agenda. Anyways but the care needs to be taken, without the panic element, to keep it subsided and not cause any more "MASK" invasions !!!!

Corbettiger

I just visited the Jim Corbett Park near Nainital in India....and needless to say , like my first visit, the whole experience was just amazing. Zooming around the jungle paths in open top gypsies watching all sorts of animals was simply mind-blowing. The best part is the air of expectancy , the minute you enter the park everyone is on the look out for any animal sightings. And when they do actually see some animal, there is immense joy as if they finally discovered the alien :)

But no animal takes the cake like does the TIGER...the elephant comes in a distant second , but you ask everyone what they came to see , I guess more often than not the answer wud be that big majestic cat. And quite logical too coz it's one of the bigger Tiger reserves in India. On it's part the tiger is not so kind to everybody :) ..sighting a tiger is no less than winning a bumper prize on a lottery ticket. Those who actually do manage to see it are absolutely over the moon , yet I met some others who have been trying to spot the elusive animal for years together.

On that part , i think i was super-lucky..i must have been doing some good things for the tiger species in my past life. Coz within 15 minutes of the start of my Jungle Safari , there I was , staring eye to eye at a tiger some distance away. I will never ever forget that look and the stare the tiger gave. The eyes and the whole demeanour was conveying to me that it did not appreciate the intrusion i had carried out in what was essentially his kingdom.I thank my stars that it did not want to get rid of the intruder altogether. It could have done that very easily if you consider it's huge size and the fact that an open-top gypsy hardly provides you any protection at all. Again my deeds in the past life must have come to my aid :)

Things that catch your eye instantly about the tiger are the royal prowling style, the tiger stripes and the sheer strength. Just an awesome combination to watch. And add to that the fact that this was more like a natural habitat and surroundings for these animals , unlike the zoo, which makes them come out in their true colours and grandeur. I just wondered what the remaining 160 odd tigers were doing at that moment. Apparently the one we I saw was stalking a spotted deer so that the barking of the deer gave us a clue as to where the tiger would be. I was thrilled to bits as I initially saw it cutting through the forest bushes after it's prey. Only the stripes and the tail were visible at that point. But later on as we approached a dry river bed , there it was !!!!!! Standing in the middle of the road , looking ready to pounce anytime , flustered at the same time seeing human beings where thjey should not be , in it's jungle !!! Then soon the people watching became insignificant to it and it resumed it's prey-hunt disappearing in the distant trees . The whole tiger sighting scenario lasted about 2 minutes but it was an experience worth preserving for the rest of our lives.
Well after this experience one thing for sure , Tiger preservation is one of the more important considerations of my life now !!!

Was it really a ghost !!!

The other day i logged on to GTalk as usual and found an interesting status message of one of the friends - whom i'll refer to as "Prince". It read - "I saw a ghost for the first time in my life". I was as surprised and intrigued to read this line as he must have been when he saw this supposed(or real who knows !!) ghost.

I got damn curious and called him up that very moment.He told me that he saw somebody fast asleep besides him when he woke up at 5 o'clock in the morning (5:13 to be precise). Thinking that it was his brother , Prince went back to sleep. When he woke up in the morning , he found himself all alone in the flat.It was when he called up his brother that he discovered that his brother had left at 3:15 in the morning itself !!!!!!!!!!

Thus he concluded that it could only have been a ghost that was keeping him company since his brother's departure as he lives alone in his flat. He also managed to come up with a description of the "ghost" saying it was very dark colored , had a big round tummy and was asleep at the time he looked at it. He has been a little ill ever since !!!

Hearing this i just did not know how to react - my brain was saying it could not have been a ghost but then he had seen it and one had to believe his narration.I would have loved to convince him that there was no ghost but i did not try hard since everybody has their own perception of the Supernatural. What leads people to believe in ghosts and witches and souls ?? Maybe they are just too fearful in some situations for e.g when somebody is alone in the dark you are never quite sure of your surroundings or what's happening around you. This possibly leads to a vulnerability of mind and the fear converts itself to an ugly supernatural form in front of your eyes. Add to that the numerous "horror" stories you have heard from almost all quarters which add to one's belief of such ghosts. Even every little sound heard at such times feels like a ghost whisper.

I am a firm believer in Science and there's nothin there that proves the existence of any such thing. There can always be a proper explaination of any "ghostly" activity if one just dares to investigate what the cause of the activity is. In the case of Prince, i feel that firstly he was still half asleep when he got up at 5:13 and secondly he was expecting to see a human figure (and by that i mean his brother) besides him that time. The combination of these two things made his eyes believe there was some human there at that time, which he could not explain when he was completely awake and so he conveniently labeled the whole incident as a Ghost sighting. What cannot be explained is by no way "Supernatural" but it's just something that has not been investigated or discovered as yet by the great scientists of this world. It's a challenge for human intelligence to raise the bar to unearth the yet-unexplained secrets. One should not fear the Supernatural but just try and convert it to "natural" :)

The point should be re-stressed that it's fear most of the times as also the insufficient knowledge about an incident that is the creator of horror creatures. Somehow in the ancient times when science was at it's infancy or even virtually non-existent, people just could not explain what they perceived as unnatural happenings and they have created these ever-lasting myths like witches and ghosts. Even solar and lunar eclipses were termed as acts of the demon but see how they have been proven to be something very natural occurence far far away from any "Evil act".

Ghosts are just mental images in the minds of a vulnerable and frightened being. All such unreal and unnecesary ideas can be abolished only through proper education mainly in the rural areas and proper enlightenment.

Folks , I can't see the keyboard ......the lights have gone out suddenly and it's dark...and , and OH NO there's a white human figure out here hanging from the ceiling !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! See ya if i am alive tommorow.

IT Industry - The Dark side

If you think to yourself , what's the fastest growing thing in India, you would think of many things. But one such thing which is not obvious is the rapidly expanding IT industry. From just being a fun toy in and before the early 90s , the computer has become your pocket filler today. And the extent of the bucks earned no doubt is attracting huge masses to this industry. At the outset itself let me make it clear that i am not too much of a computer crazy guy , infact i hate it more than i love it when i come to think of it as my buddy in my day to day job.

Why you wud ask , when you cud do so many fascinating things with it. Sure , but i feel except if you are really making a difference to anybody or creating something REALLY happening like Rocket Science/Super Computing , everything else that gets produced in the IT industry is just the same wine in different bottles. However the the most sorry part of it all for me is that the IT industry makes you sit at one place for hours together. I mean why stare at the "new version of the idiot box" and keep tapping your fingers the whole day on that key-bored when you can easily be out of the office somewhere in the arms of nature or arms of your loved ones. I like to be fit and healthy , the IT industry it seems objects to a person being healthy by giving him/her some bad habits which i will discuss later. The computer is in many ways like an adhesive , keeps you firmly routed to your seat and your cubicle . Well talking of cubicles , remember that even the prison has a 4 sided structure to which the prisoner is confined !!!! Difference being a prisoner does not have to bear the computer within his cell like an IT guy... That brings me to the second part of this topic - the guy itself : the IT PROFESSIONAL henceforth referred to in the article as the "IT PRO".

If you wake me up in the middle of the night , place a massive crowd of people before me and ask me to identify the IT PROs among them , I am confident i would be so accurate that it would place me above Einstein in the "Genius" rankings.

Firstly the dress itself gives it away.... tip-top, well ironed formal shirt , formal trouser , shining pair of formal shoes , a mobile pouch , expensive gadgets.... shirt always tucked in with a belt to keep it tucked in around the ever growing tummy. But the biggest characteristic of an IT PRO is his laptop bag..doesn't matter if there is a laptop inside or not, the bag is an inseperable part of an IT PRO's persona. Also the ID card hanging around the neck , for me bears a great resemblence to the garland put around a photoframe :) ... the ID card sits around the neck sometimes even as early as leaving home and comes back intact around the neck till you reach back home late night , midnight whatever time !!!!! For an IT PRO , it's much much and more much valuable than say an Olympic Gold Medal around an athlete's neck. Interestingly whenever i am walking out on those streets, I see a similar thing around the neck of the canines of this world.

A GENUINE hardcore IT PRO MUST MUST always talk about releases, bugs , database , requirements while being not only at his workplace but also at the lunch table, snacks , lifts and even nature call rooms..believe me i have seen people talking only IT related things in places where you would better concentrate on something else:))))

Also if u ever notice real close, most of the IT PROs, specially those who have found their feet in this IT jumboree, always move around with a swagger, like they just conquered Everest or got an affirmative response from a Miss World. They just somehow seem to try to give a feeling that everything about them and around them is so cool , when deep in their minds they also know they are just the prisoners of these computers confined to the limited space of their workplaces. I used to wonder and now I have no doubt , that thru the span of their life , they see their computers more than they see their wife and kids !!!!!

With IT job comes a plethora of bad habits like very little activity thru the day, negligence of health and fitness , drinking "Coffee" innumerable times a day ( a dangerous trait ) , absolute disregard of the eyes and the brain etc etc. A person tends to bog down and become monotonous and routine in his daily life.All and all the IT Industry , as well as it pays , also eats you away mentally and health wise big time.

All i feel is that computer work is no special talent as such , it can be taught and brought out of the most common guys..there's no semblence of a real physical talent as is required in acting , singing , sports etc. Not everyone can become a player , singer , actor but almost all with some guidance and buffer of time can become IT PROs !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

EMBRACE OTHER PROFESSIONS AS WELL.....Leave the IT line to those who wanna spend a stereotypical, routine life doing ..well nothing !!!