Over a cup of tea

They say a lot can happen over a cup of coffee. A lot can be discussed over a cup of tea, too. We all do it and all did it. Mostly starting in our college canteen and then moving on into professional life. Every tea break becomes a hot bed for discussions and debates. But there is something different about the tea breaks with me present team. Specially with Deep da.

The discussions are no more bound to the small events in day to day life or local and at best national political events. The options are varied and spread into a wider region of philosophy, economy and socio-political conditions of the entire human civilization as a whole. The debates are much more open ended and topics are much more global. And dear me! this is fun!

Just yesterday our discussions began with a normal topic of inflation and rise in price, leading to discuss the actual interest and reason behind growth in various economy and what drives this growth. Soon Energy was the major topic on the board and by energy we all now mean petroleum. Thus the philosophical aspects came into play over what the whole economy of the world is being governed and contradicting each other. Finally the global position of the super powers and whether there would be a third world war, if any, and for what reason!

 A conclusion was drawn that the limitation of petroleum not being infinite and estimating it will finish over some 10-15 years at this massive rate of consumption, if there is not any new source of energy that can replace petroleum, very soon the world will see a move towards a war of resources. And here comes the position of US to occupy the gulf (petrol bunkers), to counter Russia on the equation of who has the oil when it's needed. Finally, we all unanimously agreed to the fact that a decline of petroleum will not really result into a war as we need to petroleum to fight a war, too! That means with the end of the petroleum era we might see a new global cooperative economy or utter distraction of humankind.

So it was deduced that we have around 10 year to enjoy fully before we might start having those changes, safely speaking. We might not even see the changes in our life time, too!

So, it's your decision now on how you spend those 10 years :P

Facebook, Google Plus, Orkut, Twitter, Linkedin?

Yes, what? What are we gonna do with so many social networking sites? There was Facebook from a long time and twitter. Even before that we had MSN, Rediff and Yahoo chat rooms. Then came Orkut, and gained instant popularity almost killing the chat rooms, especially with Google talk. In fact Orkut was more used in India with FB and twitter only being used by a small population. Slowly we moved to Facebook and rest is history. We all know this. Now one after another social networking sites are entering the market. Everyday my mailbox has at least a couple of requests for joining some sites. The list is endless (By the way, here is the complete list of all social networking site) I never tried out most of them. In fact I only tried out Orkut, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn seriously. And now that Google+ enters my life, I'm divided over which should become my primary social networking site?

got this picture on the web, thanks to the source, whoever you may be :)

There are many who don't have this dilemma, as they are continuously here or there, but there are people like me who can't tolerate a massive reconstruction. I used to do Orkut in college just for fun. Later I just registered in Facebook to play the games they had (Mafia Wars and Farm Ville), for time pass in office. Soon the shift was complete as all my friends in Orkut followed suit. I hardly open Orkut now!!! I thought LinkedIn would help my professional growth, but alas I never could fully use it's features. Twitter at first seemed fun, but soon it got boring, since hardly a 20 people follow you! And now with Google+ I'm so confused.

It's true I love Google like a little more than my life!! I use everything of Google, Gmail, Google docs, Google Notebook (an obsolete product of Google labs), Blogger, Google Maps, igoogle, and so on and so on. But what good am I getting from Google+??? I know it's a lot like FB so problem in using it. A good amount of my friends seem to have joined it, (but hardly anyone is using it). So when it comes to Google plus versus Facebook, I'd tilt to FB. Just realized that no matter how good a social networking site may be, it of no use without a sizable amount of regular users. For now it seems Google+ has lost its purpose in India. Facebook thrives and I'm loving it. But the one question lingers in my mind, "Isn't Facebook too crowded with midless apps?" That may be the drowning factor for FB, if Google cashes on it.

Time to go to bed now. Thanks to whoever is reading this line for your patience with me :P
Good night :) 

A dozen guys and a dozen chicken

This is a story that I tell everyone I meet while eating grilled chicken. About 11 others already know what I'm going to tell now. But I can't stop myself. I know this is not really funny, but each time I remember that evening I have a hearty lough at the ingenuity of the event.

Some of us might remember the exact date, though I don't. What I remember is the year was 2008, it was late autumn or winter in India, though in Bangalore it all feels the same. We were a dozen guys gone for an outing in the Bannerghatta National Park. It was late afternoon and a memorable trip for me solely due to the bears dancing around our safari bus. But that is a different story.

It was pretty late when we returned. We had walked a lot and that build an awesome appetite for us. The awesomeness of the appetite was realized in the next 3 hours in a restaurant "The MMA Kebabs". This was our "The Grand" for eating out - cheap and best, as the saying goes (and I mean it. Also there are a dozen others who will support me if you contradict this view). As usual, we ordered a few plates of grilled chicken as starters. Now the play started with one guy saying, "I want to eat a whole chicken alone, I'm so hungry!!"

Well, go ahead, who is stopping you. But that's no reason for another couple of guys copying him and saying we think we are also hungry enough for one chicken each. Aha! so you guys are gonna get a whole chicken for yourself, why should I be left behind. So I joined the party. And very soon the train followed. As the waiter stood by taking orders, 11 out of 12 guys opted for a whole grilled chicken as "starter"!!! (Whoever is reading this is thinking us to be "Rakshas" now).

Naturally, we ended up with 12 whole grilled chicken. Actually we didn't bother to order half a plate for the poor friend of ours (the only seemingly human in a group of Food Demons). So he opted to be rich and joined the full chicken club. Here is a point to note. Baring one guy in the group, if you see the rest, none ever, by their physical appearance, looked like a foodie. But that's no point to stop you from eating good food and drinking good liquor, isn't it?

So, 12 empty plates were served and then 12 grilled chicken were cut and served on those plates. And leaving a few crushed and whole bones, the plates were empty when we finished. I still remember the bewildered eyes focused to our table, specially those who didn't get grilled chicken because of us. That was a great meal and I never looked back from then on. Rightly, I gained 50 pounds while in Bangalore.

I'm never gonna try that again. I still feel a whole chicken sitting in my stomach when I think of that evening :P

A party and a few songs

I had a party few hours back. No doubt it was fun - singing, dancing, food and drink, also some smoke (no joints only tobacco). But that happens in almost all the evening parties, right? So why am I writing about this one?

Yes, the DJ played some beats that everyone enjoyed, the food was good, drinks were unlimited and you could hear a lot of tall tales. But that's not what will make me remember this night. It's only a few songs. Towards the end of the party those were played on request. In fact those songs are not party songs or songs that DJs usually rock the dance floor with. Those were classic rocks of the golden period. You may be guessing by now and needless to say that you are right. There was Pink Floyd, Eric Clapton, the Scorpions, Eagles, Bon Jovi and Brian Adams.

Last time I played air guitar (also the real guitar at times) to those songs were in college three years back. Life changed much since then. No more grasses, no more getting drunk (I mean really drunk so that you mostly don't remember what you did). No more crazy head banging and no more the free spirit.

Yes, many things may be lost but the spirit is never lost. That's why I could see people at 40+ dancing like college kids lost in the tune and forgetting where they are. That's blissful. My spirit was revived once again and hope I'll not lose him now for a long long while. Kudos to rock music.

A side note: But surprisingly, I never feel like listening to those songs anymore after leaving college. I think they make me too nostalgic. And of-course they feel far better when in a crowd, that holds the spirit of rock.

The feeling of Max Payne

This post is for all those who are familiar with the character known as Max Payne. And for all those are not so fortunate enough to come closer to this person (!!) please click here to know more. Though I guarantee you that you will never know the truth until you have played the game as if you the Max Payne.

I first heard of him when I was in school. It was an award winning game. My primitive PC was hardly able to run it. But yet we played. We became the NYPD detective, searching through the dark alleys of New York City for someone unknown, with revenge in our heart. Each chapter took us forward to becoming more like him. Getting more share of the pain in his heart. Getting relief with every shot of the gun in my hand and dying every second.

The music that stills lets a chill run through my spine. I played the second part in College. By then I could feel him more in me. With every stage a pack of cigarette would burn out. With every passing hour of the night I would move deeper in him, until I become the Max Payne.

And how could I forget Mona. The story is so incomplete without her. The lady who kept the hopes alive and set a fire of burning desire in our hearts.

The feeling still lingers deep in my heart. Hope to hear from those that loved this game at least once in their life.

A naked man

As usual in the evening for me, I am just standing outside DLF Towers near New Town, to catch a bus home. It's around 8:00 PM in the evening and the place is pretty crowded. Buses and shuttles (shared cabs) are passing by and stopping to pick up passengers. I left two buses because of the crowd. I could see a streaming flow of headlights of speeding vehicles descending from the over-bridge far ahead. Then in the midst of all those lights I noticed something odd.

At first it looked like a man walking with a long stick in his hand for support. The man seemed to be wearing dark clothes. Soon as he came closer I felt the man to be scantly clothed. But when he reached within 50 feet or so I realized he was naked and very old, probably mentally disabled, too. Barely able to walk without the help of the thin, long branch that he was using for support. On the other hand he held on to something that looked like a white loin cloth.

It was a pathetic sight to watch him pass by through the crowd of all well dressed men and women. Does the people of this country not deserve their minimum basic needs? The question in my mind is what the rich do with so much money stashed away at the swish banks (which of course remains vastly unused!) when they need only a piece of cloth and 6 feet land at the end of life?

And what sin did this poor man commit that he will not even have a single piece of cloth on him even as he is alive??