The India Hangover

The evening sun in Mumbai

You know that growing sense of badly suppressed excitement before an India trip? Well, I used to know it- what seems like but is not- ages ago. 

It used to start many months before the actual trip- when I decide the trip dates and start looking for flights. Being an obsessive spreadsheet-maker I would narrow down costs and options into a table and finally narrow down on one. You can hear my heart thump slowly, like the sound of feet before a long run. In a few weeks, however, those drums would be drowned by the din of everyday life. Deadlines, weekend plans, grocery lists.

Then, one fine day about a month before the trip, I would suddenly remember "Oh, I am going to India in a month!". Those beats would begin again faintly in the background. Slowly yet steadily growing louder.
About two weeks before the actual trip, I would realize I haven't done the gift shopping yet. And I have only one weekend. I would make a list of things to get, and kill myself running across the city in that one weekend. Sometimes, I would also be ripped off by the Amazon shipping costs. 

The next few days would be a race between me and all my to-do lists. Pending bug fix, check. Collected gift package from leasing office, check. I-20 signature- oh hell, I forgot that... and so on. And in those rare minutes I catch myself thinking, I would feel the impatience. 48 more hours to board the flight. And 26 hours after that. Why can't I be home sooner?

Then D-Day would arrive and I would do all the last minute packing and re-checking that I locked my place and finally reach the airport. Oh hell, forgot my ipod charger. But that would appear minor compared to the prospect of going home. The drums would be audible again. Playing an interesting beat, almost like a folk song. And as I feel the airplane engines rev up and leave the ground I would hear the drums being accompanied by a full blown orchestra- "I am going home." To people I love...

I call this whole process the pre-India-trip-build-up. Sometimes accompanied by the sudden sense of nostalgia, it makes me wonder if Cheran's (of "Autograph" fame) spirit is somehow haunting me..
--

Guess what, I don't know that feeling anymore. This time I went through the charade of spreadsheets and to-do lists and gift buying. But no drums. When I got into my flight in SFO, I fell asleep almost instantaneously.  In fact, during my layover at the London airport I was just bored and counting the minutes before I could sleep on a comfortable bed.

Not to say I was not looking forward to the India trip. With my newfound interest in photography I had huge plans of taking beautiful "bringing-out-the-colors" pictures of bangle stores and smiling old ladies with huge nose-rings. And sunsets on dusty roads and crowded markets. You get the drift. And I WAS looking forward to meeting my family and friends. Maybe the little music director in my head was on a vacation. (This reminds me of the homunculus argument! But I digress... ) But somehow, the excitement I usually have for going home was just a little dim..

(To be continued...)

Tooth fairies, fantasy and dasavatharam

I know I haven't been writing for a while. Blame it on a super hectic month followed by an India trip followed by an even more hectic month and then the holiday season. Anyway, I wrote this post before leaving for India, but couldn't get around to putting it up. So here it is.. Also, hope to write about the India trip soon.. We'll see when I get around to doing that..

I read this post on Hallucinations about a conversation between 2 six year olds about tooth fairies- one girl knows they do not exist and the other doesn't. It made me wonder what I really thought about fairies and stuff when I was a kid. Very early in life, my mom told me Santa Claus was just someone I know dressed up with a fake beard. And my dad told me that the people you watch on TV are just acting (that was because I would get way too depressed seeing characters die or get hurt on TV!). I remember reading way too much Enid Blyton (I think I read everything from the Red story book to the Book of pixies) and trying to imagine that my toys could talk at night. It was fun to imagine, but even then I knew it wasn't true.

The fantastic things I truly believed in then were quite mundane. Like the fact that there is a supernatural power watching your every move and waiting to restore the balance in the world. Or that good begets good. That if you keep hoping, everything will turn out alright. They are nice to believe in as a kid. Sometimes, even as an adult. It is nice to do your part and assume that "there is somebody who made you and cares for you, and who will help you if you do the best of what you can".
But as I grew older, I decided that these ideas were as fantastic as the idea that tooth fairies exist. That the reason to do the right thing is not because you will be rewarded in the end, but because the doing is itself the reward.
Funnily though, I admit that the made up sentences(or ideas) work. Telling yourself not to give up because all that hard work has gotta pay back does give you enough confidence to last the last mile. (You see what I did there? :P) When you have been back-stabbed or are generally cynical, telling yourself that good begets good motivates you to go on doing good. So you see, even though I think these sentences are made up, I use them all the time. 

Then, the truly amazing thing about all this is not the fact that I realized as I grew up that these ideas are made up, but how these conflicting ideas can co-exist in my head (and in the head of the kid about whom that author was writing). I can drown hours in imagination, I can tell myself confidently that it will all work out in the end. And yet I know these are just sentences I am making up. (To some people, this might smell of hypocrisy. But maybe I will write about my justification for it some other time).Anyway, that reminds me of the Tamil movie Dasavatharam. There is this conversation in the end which beautifully sums up all I have to say about the co-existence of rationality and fantasy.
 
The translation goes this way-
Asin: Why do you say there is no God?
Kamal: I am not saying that God does not exist. I am just saying it would be wonderful if he did.

Write your own sensational newspaper article

By now you have probably heard the outrage/mockery about the article in "The Hindu" about a false doctorate claim.

Click here to skip to article generator.

(If you haven't, it's good for you. You are possibly doing better things in life than reading stupid viral articles. Here is a recap for your benefit: A few days ago, The Hindu published an article about a boy who "has arrears in engineering, but a PhD in physics". The story went on to talk about how this person had to choose engineering because of parental pressure, and how he spends his time doing physics research and was ultimately recognized by a UC-Berkeley professor with an on-the-spot doctorate. Naturally, most people on the internet shared it because "the Indian education system is so lousy".
And then an amazing person wrote a letter to The Hindu saying most of the claims in the article were false and they shouldn't have published it without verifying them, forcing them to actually verify the claims and The Hindu had to publish a retraction. Of course, now other people shared this piece because "the Indian media is so stupid")

Meanwhile, I got inspired by Mr.Gunturi to publish some research of my own. After having read many articles in the Hindu's Education Plus and main paper, I think I can automate the process of writing an education-related piece. I already published this piece in the Brazilian Journalism Research journal and they awarded me with a honorary doctorate in journalism, even though journals do not usually confer doctorates. (It is on its way, I will update the image once I receive it.) I have also submitted some part of my research to the "Case Studies in Strategic Communication" journal of the University of South California. They accepted my paper without review because it was so awesome like that!

Having achieved all this in such a short span of time, I decided to share my knowledge with the mere mortals on the internet who usually have to do actual research before getting their doctorates.

So, here is an excerpt from my paper:

(Yes, I have cleverly not put in the actual body of the paper. Because THAT isn't important for publishing this article in a newspaper or making it viral anyway.)

Oh, and here is a mini version of my algorithm for generating a newspaper article for The Hindu education sections. Use the drop-down menus to generate your own:

Our sensational eye-grabbing title shall be:
Choose sensational title Engineering student has disproved the Tijdeman-Zagier conjecture Student fails second grade, but demonstrates proof for cosmic inflation Student rejected by TCS for placement, but solves the P=NP problem in his backyard Engineering project group invents a robot to shoot viral videos

The student's name (note the scope for diversity or emotional spin-offs here. Also scope for Shah Rukh Khan movies. These options not included in the demo.):
Choose student name Raj Chopra Ishaan Shah Rajasekhara Yarlagadda Venkata Samba Siva Rao Khan. And he is NOT a terrorist.

The student in question studies in the premiere institution called:
Choose premiere institution College of Engineering, Guindy Delhi College of Engineering NIT(REC) Trichy IIT-K

He was forced to pick this field of engineering,
Choose field of engineering ECE Computer Science IT Civil, just for variety

even though he was obviously interested in a different field of research. After the achievement, he was too busy giving interviews to popular newspapers to comment, but the author still decided to claim he said something of this sort :
Choose cliched quote "Was too busy with research to pass exams" "My professors did not realize the value of my work" "Everyone told me to look for an IT job" "Something about rote learning? I am running out of cliches here."

His/Her father who is a
Choose father's occupation bus-driver bank clerk who lost his job poor unskilled laborer who struggled to send his son to school black-ticket seller at Sathyam cinemas

has to say something like this about his achievement (with tears in his eyes):
Choose cliched but emotional quote Proud but waiting for Infosys job Not surprised- he was a prodigy He would scribble equations on his crib India does not encourage people like him

This professor from NIT, Trichy (Yes, it's an insider joke. Sorry but it was too much of a temptation to resist)
Choose name of professor S.Raghavan of ECE S.Raghavan of ECE S.Raghavan of ECE S.Raghavan of ECE

commented something about
Choose quote content Many opportunities in our institute Unlike in international universities ... Profound implications for microwave engineering He must join my unique research group

(Note: If some parts of the article confuse you, you might want to look at this.
Also, this piece was inspired by the Chetan Bhagat Plot generator at Coconut Chutney)

Let them be

(Statutory warning: This is one of the posts that I warned you about on the other page. Long and serious- so if you don't have the stomach for it, go eat a doughnut instead.)

The day I wrote this Today (I actually wrote this post a couple of months ago, but never got around to publishing it), I was reading an article about women and forced parenthood when I came across a line that sums up pretty much 90% of my beliefs. I suddenly realized I have never written about my core philosophy so I thought this is a good time to write it down. I am sorry if it ends up sounding like I am moralizing or advising- by the very nature of this philosophy, I can't be.

The idea is:
"People are different and need different things. Society (and we, as a part of it) should support this premise without judging them on it. But only as long as their 'needs' don't harm other human beings".

To me that much is obvious. But just to explain, think about what you would do in the following scenarios..

The rat race of fun and the meaning of life

Courtesy: http://www.cafepress.com/ironydesigns/923434
You can get this on a T-shirt there.

You know how people say you must live for yourself- live by your own standards, don't worry what people say, stick to your principles blah de blah. By now you probably know I am quite the supporter of that ideology. It's your life and you get only one chance at it etc.

That being said, it is quite hard to actually stick to it. Especially in this day and age. (I am sure millions have said the same thing about their day and age, but anyway.) There are too many things available for us to do, travel is a lot more affordable and convenient, more activities are open to people, and above all information about everything is at your fingertip, quite literally. As an obvious consequence, there is too much of a competition to DO things.

"Oh, you went to Yosemite this weekend, I flew to this obscure mountain village and drank this amazing drink they make out of trees that only grow in that region. It's a once in a lifetime thing. Everyone must totally do it." Gone are the days when I could just watch the Sun TV Top 10 movies on Sunday morning and think that my weekend was done.

The worst part is that I didn't even realize I was caught in it till I read this article. Unknowingly, subconsciously, I had joined the rat race of "fun". Which wasn't half as much about fun as about posting your pictures on Instagram. Unknowingly I began to think of weekends as lists of things to complete and places to visit rather than plain sleeping time.

Anyway, reading that article made me realize that the things I want are really simple- like looking at the stars, taking walks in the morning, and of course, popping bubble wrap. They involve almost no money and yet are priceless. They may mean nothing to most people, but so what.

So, I decided to write this note to self, just so I don't forget: 

Remember bubble wrap. That's all there is to the meaning of life.

(Oh, and now that I have found mine, good luck finding yours! :) )