A dangerous face lurking in the dark...

These days almost every other person you meet has a mail-id. Some people muse that internet gave addresses to millions who do not have a proper snail-mail address. Most of the mail-id owners these days have a networking site profile that says something about themselves, their hobbies, their likes and many more. The idea behind these personalized profiles is to help like minded people network. These profiles also aid in knowing more about the individual/owner but behold: there is always a dangerous face (an ugly face perhaps) that lurks behind these profiles.

Sakshi was pursuing her masters in industrial relations when she got a marriage proposal from a well known family. The guy held a masters degree in engineering and was working for a small firmware company abroad. Sakshi had a fine liking to arts and was adept in painting and playing the keyboard. She saw the guy’s profile and gathered that he played the flute and many more. While meeting in person, he too accepted that he played flute occasionally. Few months after marriage what Sakshi experienced was hell; I mean she experienced the truth. The guy actually had an opportunity to attend flute classes for three weeks when he was ten years old! Sakshi also found that each line item in his profile was wrong. His real face was ugly than what his profile conveyed. His hobby included reading, but he had never read a whole novel in his life. The ugly face posed a more dangerous face, a threatening one perhaps when she had to politely apply for divorce and put an end to the relation. But will the Indian society accept?

The incident happened a few years ago and this intrigued me to probe into profiles of few people whom I have met in office or elsewhere and found that an alarming number of profiles contain information that do not match with the real face of them. The irony is that almost 95% percent of Indians do not have a hobby or a past-time activity and their ego forces them to fill one in the profile. The one filled is probably the activity that their parents thrust upon them in their childhood.

(Name are obviously changed, but the incident mentioned is real)

Not only on web-profiles, many fake their real identity as well...

Last Sunday I met Mr.Vel at a fair in Chennai. I had known this person earlier through a web group. Slowly the talk went into hobbies and he exclaimed that he was a great fan of Tamil language and his pastime was to update his blog. I commented back saying that his blog was last updated way back in 2008. He paused for a moment and weaved a story that all his writings were in paper and before I could ask further questions, he said he had lost all papers while shifting his house and left the place for a moment.

This reminded me of Sri, who joined with me in my previous company on the same day. He claimed that he was an expert in net technology, business, art, and many more. He also started bullying other guys in net-tech group and had a pleasure making him feel greater at the expense of others feelings.

(Name are obviously changed, but the incident mentioned is real)

Michael Crichton...!!!???

It is 5 months already and I am getting the news now!!!

A mail from a community within the company linked to a presentation on global warming by 'LATE' Michael Crichton...I was taken aback by this news. Is Michael Crichton dead? and now I googled it to confirm it. A smoker, he battled throat cancer and died at 66.
If the news is true, then why was I not aware of it? I may very well say that I was busy with my project work...and all other odd reasons for why I did not get the news. I do have a single reason why I should have known it... the author, whose 'Disclosure' made me lost into its storyline; the same author whose 'Airframe' was in line with my own interesting subject; the same author whose 'Prey' made me its prey for a week... Anyways I feel sad by the news of the demise, so late...almost five months and now I am thinking how linked I am with the world and its happenings.

Verbal voyeurism...

'Don't you watch MTV roadies?' questioned my friend as if I had committed a crime... Got to know from him that the TV series aired in MTV channel has to do something with adventure...Some colleagues of mine said they like the program because it has something to do with reality.

I forgot all of these conversations amidst my daily work…months passed by before I first witnessed this program. 

Returning back from office early, I saw my roommate watching the program. It was a selection for the ‘Roadies’ as they call. It was something like ragging and ripping apart a person. That was ok…

Last week I saw the roadies in action and found the participants verbally assaulting each other. Found that it has nothing to do neither with adventure nor with reality and what people relish seeing is just a vulgar pleasure in hearing something that is voyeuristic.

I just got up, felt the air engulfing my thoughts and went out for dinner mulling over my thoughts on what people really want as enjoyment.  

We are ready with our next mission, Are you game?

A fortnight ago, Friday evening I and my friend KK planned for a long trip to Goa, then shortened it to Mangalore, further shortened it to Nandi hills followed by Hosur... and shortened it further: we spent Saturday at the office... Saturday evening, suddenly an idea flashed while returning home and we got down much ahead of our place...
We dropped into our senior colleague Y's place without any notice. We rang the doorbell and hid ourselves near the stairs and just gave him a surprise when he opened the door. We felt some 10 years younger doing this act...
We still felt younger by forming a trio: I, KK and Y's daughter Ria opposing Y. Munching on the ready-cook popcorn prepared by Ria, the trio strengthened by the tea that Y had prepared.
We helped Ria to finish off some school maths and here began the real action...
We forced Y to join our trio for dinner, and to take his car out on a Saturday evening, made him to eat pizza which he hates to the core. It was all fun that evening...

We are ready for another storming action and creating a trinity with Ria...but when it will happen? Any suggestions Y?

Is piracy no more surreptitious!..?

A small handout slipped out of today’s newspaper as I was flipping the pages. I was really amused by the handout as it was about availability of pirated CDs ranging from latest engineering tools to kid’s games. The handout also mentioned their web-site, e-mail id, address and contact numbers. Usually the pirated CD business is against law and surreptitious and this handout left me wondering about the boldness of the person behind this and the sad state of law and order in the state, Googling the issue, I landed on a relevant article published in ‘The Hindu’ newspaper (Click Here).
People are also encouraging piracy as they get the required software for peanuts. Now who is to be blamed…the people or the police or the clandestine business people?

The wrestler...

I come across this sight at least once in a week and more than once during exam season. This is common among engineering students in Bangalore. Two college kids on a bike, one busy wrestling the traffic and the other wrestling with a set of equations and diagrams scribbled on a sheet of paper. Occasionally the guy at the handle meddles into the equations and then goes back to the road… Always the equation wrestler seems to run at full MIPS (As we indicate a micro-processor performance in Millions of Instructions Per Second), storing the unprocessed RAW data. In most cases the traffic wrestler is a boy and the equation wrestler is a girl. The current trend in India is that you need to and will get into IT industry irrespective of your engineering major. The real wrestling starts if they go in for a job breaking this trend and this is rare.

Right ecosystem nurtures…

My mom gave a plant to me 18 months ago saying ‘Let this plant divert you from the ever bright computer screen and work pressure to the reality of life’. The plant came all the way from Coimbatore to Bangalore adorned with only five leaves. Now the plant has around two dozen leaves! One more lemon seed found its way from my grandma’s backyard three months ago… Just after a cuppa lemon tea, I put the seeds in the pot and it got buried under the thick layer of humus on the top layer. We were closed for the weekend following May-1 for a span of four days. I sprinkled some water and bid good bye to my plant family comprising this indoor plant and a money-plant plus a croton. Post long weekend, yesterday, I noticed a centimeter long shoot from the edge of the pot. The lemon seeds have germinated. I like the way they have grown; straight pointing to the sky…
My plant family has one more member to its group… :)

Kudos Srikanth.D.N...

There are people who do things differently...One such person is D.N.Srikanth about whom, I read in yesterday's newspaper. Financial situations forced him to take up the job of a bus driver in Bangalore City bus corporation (BMTC). Now he makes sure that his six trips a day from the city bus stand to Peenya Industrial Area is an intellectual experience for his passengers. He does so by having a small library in the bus, which comprises daily newspapers and some books. Also he makes sure that the water dispenser is filled every trip, so that his passengers need not worry about thirst parching their throats. I am really out of words in praise of him...All the best Srikanth for your future...