still-life-with-boredom dept.
We are all vain, fickle animals. How cruelly do we so casually spurn the affections of those that love us, and yet squander our lives over merciless infidels? Surely it must amuse the all-merciful, in his omniscience, to watch us weave our tangled webs of self-deception and deceit. Perhaps, 'Al-Nawaz', in one of his sombre moods, lamenting his lost love, caught a glimpse of the infinite, and trying desperately with his (at the time) limited vocabulary to distill the essence of his experience, wrote down this:
In the courtyard, the flowers bloom, the Indian rose, dispels all gloom
The insects swarm, and plunder it all; and beauty thus, begets its doom
There was a house, in the lane, where I lament my lover's reign
She gave me joy, and infinite pain; sweet pain, alas, taken too soon
All around, the call resounds, the faithfull crouch and bow their heads
For some the crowd is divine; to some, beckons the solitude of their rooms
The priest offers heavenly bliss, yet frowns upon the brimming glass
Peace, sheikh, for we are the anointed ones, who sorrow's dregs consume
Love was not all unkind, 'Nawaz', she offered her right, reassuring hand
Cursed was I, I yearned for all; vain desire led me to my doom
Sunday, October 31, 2004
Saturday, October 30, 2004
loss-for-words dept.
I don't know how I had never come across the Hrishikesh Mukherjee movie Satyakaam, despite having read so much about it. Ah, that statement was so naive! Haven't I often experienced the mysterious arrangements of nature as she, with an amused smile, moulds time, space and causality like a lump of clay?
It should suffice to say, then, that I have seen the movie, and am at a loss for words. Very few movies leverage the cinematic medium to the fullest extent, even fewer transcend it. This is surely one of them.
I shall say no more. This review has said it before me, more eloquently than I could ever have.
I don't know how I had never come across the Hrishikesh Mukherjee movie Satyakaam, despite having read so much about it. Ah, that statement was so naive! Haven't I often experienced the mysterious arrangements of nature as she, with an amused smile, moulds time, space and causality like a lump of clay?
It should suffice to say, then, that I have seen the movie, and am at a loss for words. Very few movies leverage the cinematic medium to the fullest extent, even fewer transcend it. This is surely one of them.
I shall say no more. This review has said it before me, more eloquently than I could ever have.
Tuesday, October 26, 2004
first-of-as-many-parts-as-it-takes dept.
Gelo woke up with a start, in the dead of the night. Only seconds later, the cobwebs of residual sleep had been dusted off. He paused, bemused, at this sudden interruption of his well-ordered regimen. This was a singular experience in the life of a man of power. A man who had been assidiously cared for even before he had been conceived (The idea of him had haunted his father and his grand-mother for the better part of almost a quarter century). For a man of his stature, his magnificence, even the mildest case of insomnia was an issue of the gravest national importance.
He turned his gaze to the table near the wall, where his crown was placed. Even in the faint moonlight, the jewels encrusted in the crest gave off a sinister sparkle. The end result of perhaps three generations of intrigue, murder, and other unspeakable acts of wantonness. Of course, Gelo did not think all of this as he looked at it. He was not trained to think of these things. He was not even expected to think of them. God forbid he had a bout of introspection and pondered the justification of his means before his ends. There would be chaos! Darkness!
He was expected to provide reassurance, bearing, pomp and circumstance. Others would do the thinking for him.
None of this, of course, crossed his mind. As he gazed at his crown, a niggling doubt had just wiggled its way through the neural pathways of his brain, finally triggering a chain of chemical reactions, that in his case would inevitably converge towards a resolve.
Scratching his chin with a lazy satisfication, "Pyrrhos...Archimedes", he yawned.
That done, he closed his eyes, and with a soft moan, sank back into his bed, and snuggled into the sweetly perfumed softness of his concubine.
Gelo woke up with a start, in the dead of the night. Only seconds later, the cobwebs of residual sleep had been dusted off. He paused, bemused, at this sudden interruption of his well-ordered regimen. This was a singular experience in the life of a man of power. A man who had been assidiously cared for even before he had been conceived (The idea of him had haunted his father and his grand-mother for the better part of almost a quarter century). For a man of his stature, his magnificence, even the mildest case of insomnia was an issue of the gravest national importance.
He turned his gaze to the table near the wall, where his crown was placed. Even in the faint moonlight, the jewels encrusted in the crest gave off a sinister sparkle. The end result of perhaps three generations of intrigue, murder, and other unspeakable acts of wantonness. Of course, Gelo did not think all of this as he looked at it. He was not trained to think of these things. He was not even expected to think of them. God forbid he had a bout of introspection and pondered the justification of his means before his ends. There would be chaos! Darkness!
He was expected to provide reassurance, bearing, pomp and circumstance. Others would do the thinking for him.
None of this, of course, crossed his mind. As he gazed at his crown, a niggling doubt had just wiggled its way through the neural pathways of his brain, finally triggering a chain of chemical reactions, that in his case would inevitably converge towards a resolve.
Scratching his chin with a lazy satisfication, "Pyrrhos...Archimedes", he yawned.
That done, he closed his eyes, and with a soft moan, sank back into his bed, and snuggled into the sweetly perfumed softness of his concubine.
Saturday, October 23, 2004
Its been a month since Udayan Shinde finally crossed the threshold into the great unknown. Perhaps the next world shall be kinder to him than the one he so briefly inhabited. I, on the other hand, must resign myself to the fragments he left behind. Perhaps my whole existence was a manifestation of his own imagination, and soon, I shall watch the world I know and hold to be so true, dissolve before my own eyes until I, myself, am slowly erased into nothingness. But for now, I do with the occasional visit to his weary, desolate house. I do with reading the lines in his mother's face, the jadedness in her eyes -- (Oh, heaven, release me from that haunting spectre!); eyes that give away the arbitrary, empty meaninglessness that her life has now become. And sometimes I hear the vulgar laugh of fate echoing in the unkempt recesses of his house, and in vain try to stifle the terrfying thoughts that enter the mind of a condemned man.
I have the consolation of knowing that he died quickly, painlessly. Also of knowing that both the police report and the autopsy have exonerated him of the vile charge of trying to end his tangled, confused life himself. Its a gamble really, every day, when we so casually try to drive those brutish machines on our roads. All that remains for me to do, then, is to chronicle my own perpective of this tangled web he wove (oh! but such a fine pattern it was!); to leave it to posterity to judge him and understand him.
I confess that I saw him only as any other man. We all have aspirations, loves, hates, talents and flaws. Udayan had his. But it was his constant struggle to understand, to rein the wild steed that fate had so cruelly forced under a man of such delicate sensitivity that to me, separated him from other men I have known.
In the final email I received from him before the end, he wrote:
I think I have finally discovered my place here :). There is nothing more traumatic than estrangement, nothing that gnaws away at one's soul like the curse of alienation. But I think I'm learning to deal with both of them. I once wrote to you that I thought life had no pattern, that it was only a bunch of random occurences to which no motive could possibly be ascribed. Perhaps I was a bit harsh in my judgement, definitely more than a little hasty.
Yesterday, on Bajirao Road, looking for food, I entered an obscure khanaaval, and ordered some Usal-paav. The Usal, steaming hot with a generous side-helpuing of rassa, almost made the hair on my skin stand on end. And the paav, dipped in this divine concontion, simply melted away in my mouth. Random, life may be, but it is extraordinary how beautiful in its simplicity it can be too, *sometimes*. On the very same day, I found myself in IBH looking for a lucid explanation of queuing theory, when I smelt the whiff of an intoxicating perfume. Who the wearer had been, whether a man or a woman, I do not know. But I felt humbled that nature should so conspire to reserve for me this singular, delicate moment of sensory delight.
You must think I'm going crazy. Sometimes I don't know myself why I write such things to you ;) -- perhaps I'm not helping my cause. But even If I were really only a raving lunatic, I can assure you of the sincerity of my convictions :).
BTW, I think i've finally figured out how to write poetry. The form comes easily, with practise, but the content is harder to work on. In my opinion (and there's a strong caveat on that ;)), intuitive writing is somewhat shallow, deliberate, false. Most of the poems I like have consistent themes and develop them using innovative metaphors. I intend to try this out (easier said than done, right? ;)) -- may require some discipline and patience and *lots* of time, but hey, time is all I've really got, right?
cheers,
US...
Tuesday, October 19, 2004
Veerappan-est-mort!-Vive-Veerappan!!! dept.
According to all the news channels, infamous sandalwood smuggler and kidnapper Veerappan is now no more. The official version says that the joint Special Task Force created by the Karnataka and Tamil Nadu police departments finally hunted him down after years of sustained intelligence gathering operations in the sandalwood forests.
Yeah, right!
What we have not been told, however, is that the man responsible for ridding the world of this notorious anti-social ruffian was none other than S.K.Gowda, sarpanch of Ramangiri village on the outskirts of the sandalwood forests, and on the fringes of the territories that Veerappan called his own.
Here is the truth behind the veil of lies that officialdom has so elaborately constructed around the entire episode...
Blessed with matinee idol looks even in his fifties, with thick eyebrows, and a stack of pristine, glossy hair with streaks of silver running through them (almost as if painted by the creator himself with his divine 15 no. brush), S.K.Gowda is part of the task force in better times. Responsible for the group's intial successes, he incurs the terrible anger of the forest brigand.
Violence and death are now so mundane that even the most horrific of deeds do not move us anymore. Populations are wiped out by famine; rioteers indiscriminately loot, pillage and ransack neighbourhoods. Women and children suffer unthinkable abuse at the hands of psychopathic chauvinists and perverts. It should be no surprise then, that Veerappan's ruthless mass-murder of Gowda's own family should go unnoticed by the national media. Neither is the blatant arrogance with which the government disowns him after both of his arms have to be amputated when an impetuous, unauthorised reprisal goes horribly wrong.
Reduced to farming his dying fields, and, dressed in a spotless white kurta and pashmima shawl that hides his discomfiture, stalking the dark galleries of his ancestral home like a sulking ghost, Gowda confronts the terrible meaninglessness and emptiness that is his life. And then, discovers reserves of strength in his mind. A strength he has no idea ever existed.
Like the Count of Monte Cristo, he finds vengeance his only aim, and he channelizes his terrible hatred to one end -- the destruction of Veerappan and his cohorts. Stealthily he assembles a village militia to counter the barbaric forest men. In Javagal and Veerangal, two ex-convicts, he finds able lieutenants. One-by-one they pick off Veerapan's men until they force a final confrontation.
In a finale as bloody and viscious as the worst in the annals of human warfare, Veerappan's band is wiped out. Not without heavy casualties. Javagal, in an unprecedented act of bravery, or maybe stupidity, blows himself to pieces when he misjudges the timer on some explosives that have been strategically placed in Veerappan's path.
It is only hours later that the task force is notified, and police officers and Karnataka Pradesh Congress Commitee members rush to Ramangiri to claim all the credit for the destruction of the century's most elusive criminal.
But Gowda still lives. Alone in that massive edifice erected by his ancestors which he has made his labyrinth. And here he waits patiently for the end, when he shall be summoned again by his creator in his next life -- there again to confront his nemesis. Again to play the part that fate, that harsh mistress, has decreed he play...
According to all the news channels, infamous sandalwood smuggler and kidnapper Veerappan is now no more. The official version says that the joint Special Task Force created by the Karnataka and Tamil Nadu police departments finally hunted him down after years of sustained intelligence gathering operations in the sandalwood forests.
Yeah, right!
What we have not been told, however, is that the man responsible for ridding the world of this notorious anti-social ruffian was none other than S.K.Gowda, sarpanch of Ramangiri village on the outskirts of the sandalwood forests, and on the fringes of the territories that Veerappan called his own.
Here is the truth behind the veil of lies that officialdom has so elaborately constructed around the entire episode...
Blessed with matinee idol looks even in his fifties, with thick eyebrows, and a stack of pristine, glossy hair with streaks of silver running through them (almost as if painted by the creator himself with his divine 15 no. brush), S.K.Gowda is part of the task force in better times. Responsible for the group's intial successes, he incurs the terrible anger of the forest brigand.
Violence and death are now so mundane that even the most horrific of deeds do not move us anymore. Populations are wiped out by famine; rioteers indiscriminately loot, pillage and ransack neighbourhoods. Women and children suffer unthinkable abuse at the hands of psychopathic chauvinists and perverts. It should be no surprise then, that Veerappan's ruthless mass-murder of Gowda's own family should go unnoticed by the national media. Neither is the blatant arrogance with which the government disowns him after both of his arms have to be amputated when an impetuous, unauthorised reprisal goes horribly wrong.
Reduced to farming his dying fields, and, dressed in a spotless white kurta and pashmima shawl that hides his discomfiture, stalking the dark galleries of his ancestral home like a sulking ghost, Gowda confronts the terrible meaninglessness and emptiness that is his life. And then, discovers reserves of strength in his mind. A strength he has no idea ever existed.
Like the Count of Monte Cristo, he finds vengeance his only aim, and he channelizes his terrible hatred to one end -- the destruction of Veerappan and his cohorts. Stealthily he assembles a village militia to counter the barbaric forest men. In Javagal and Veerangal, two ex-convicts, he finds able lieutenants. One-by-one they pick off Veerapan's men until they force a final confrontation.
In a finale as bloody and viscious as the worst in the annals of human warfare, Veerappan's band is wiped out. Not without heavy casualties. Javagal, in an unprecedented act of bravery, or maybe stupidity, blows himself to pieces when he misjudges the timer on some explosives that have been strategically placed in Veerappan's path.
It is only hours later that the task force is notified, and police officers and Karnataka Pradesh Congress Commitee members rush to Ramangiri to claim all the credit for the destruction of the century's most elusive criminal.
But Gowda still lives. Alone in that massive edifice erected by his ancestors which he has made his labyrinth. And here he waits patiently for the end, when he shall be summoned again by his creator in his next life -- there again to confront his nemesis. Again to play the part that fate, that harsh mistress, has decreed he play...
Sunday, October 17, 2004
the-play's-the-thing dept.
"So I hear you are leaving for the US tomorrow?"
"Yes. uhhh...My flight..uhhh..leaves on Tuesday."
"What is it you do exactly, again?"
"Well, uhhh...My company...uhhh...provides software consultancy services to American software companies. I'm ...uhhh... going onsite for ummm...an upcoming release, where..ummm..."
"Oh, so basically, you're going to go there and tell them why this button doesn't appear on this window, and where to point the mouse and click...hyuk, hyuk, hyuk...."
"ahhh...ha..ha...something like that..."
"Where do you normally go then, (sneer) New York, Chicago?"
"No...actually, San Jose, usually...ummm...California. That's where most software companies are."
"So what do you do in your company? How many (sneer) people do you have working under you?"
"I ... uhh... don't think of them as working under me, but yeah...ahhh...that depends..."
"Arre, these software companies usually pay really well , you must be senior now right, arre they must be paying you well, na?"
"Uhhh...ok, I guess."
"'ok......(sneer)hmmm..."
"So, did you go anywhere when you were in the US? कुठे-कुठे गेला होतास?"
" I.Well,.uhhh..once...I... we...uhh... went to LA..."
"Oh, I'm sorry, you (sneer) wanted to say something?"
"No..ummm..I...uhhh...no, please, go ahead..."
"Ahem, so I went to LA with my advisor, with some friends from the eFF-dEE-aYYY."
"FDA?"
"Food...FOOD And DRUG ADMINISTRATION...they approve all the drugs in the US, our work falls under their jurisdiction. So we went to this restaurant which is owned by Spielberg's parents. You know, the film director. His parents are really old, and they actually run the restaurant. We met his mother...Spielberg's mother. She is a really nice old lady. Amazing people, the Spielbergs."
"So why don't you (sneer) do your post-graduation?"
"I...uhhh...there was a time I thought of doing that...but..uhhh...ummm...Well, I guess I..uhhh..wasn't up to it..."
"Hey, (sneer) you should really consider it, its really great. So let's go then? Oh no, please, let me..."
"So I hear you are leaving for the US tomorrow?"
"Yes. uhhh...My flight..uhhh..leaves on Tuesday."
"What is it you do exactly, again?"
"Well, uhhh...My company...uhhh...provides software consultancy services to American software companies. I'm ...uhhh... going onsite for ummm...an upcoming release, where..ummm..."
"Oh, so basically, you're going to go there and tell them why this button doesn't appear on this window, and where to point the mouse and click...hyuk, hyuk, hyuk...."
"ahhh...ha..ha...something like that..."
"Where do you normally go then, (sneer)
"No...actually, San Jose, usually...ummm...California. That's where most software companies are."
"So what do you do in your company? How many
"I ... uhh... don't think of them as working under me, but yeah...ahhh...that depends..."
"Arre, these software companies usually pay really well , you must be senior now right, arre they must be paying you well, na?"
"Uhhh...ok, I guess
"'ok...
"So, did you go anywhere when you were in the US? कुठे-कुठे गेला होतास?"
"
"Oh, I'm sorry, you (sneer) wanted to say something?"
"No..ummm..I...uhhh...no, please, go ahead..."
"Ahem, so I went to LA with my advisor, with some friends from the eFF-dEE-aYYY."
"FDA?"
"Food...FOOD And DRUG ADMINISTRATION...they approve all the drugs in the US, our work falls under their jurisdiction. So we went to this restaurant which is owned by Spielberg's parents. You know, the film director. His parents are really old, and they actually run the restaurant. We met his mother...Spielberg's mother. She is a really nice old lady. Amazing people, the Spielbergs."
"So why don't you (sneer) do your post-graduation?"
"I...uhhh...there was a time I thought of doing that...but..uhhh...ummm...Well, I guess I..uhhh..wasn't up to it..."
"Hey, (sneer) you should really consider it, its really great. So let's go then? Oh no, please, let me..."
Thursday, September 30, 2004
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
crazy-li'l-thing dept.
The poetry of Persian poet Al-Nawaz can still be heard at street corners in the towns of Khorasan. A new English translation by Engelbart Fitzwater of his lovelorn poetry can now be found in the neighbourhood Crossword's. Al-Nawaz lived almost four centuries ago in the dusty and disease ridden neighbourhoods of the cities of Khorasan, but his desires and unrequited passion still resonate today. One of the earliest known master of what was to become the 'ghazal', his keen insight sometimes is overshadowed by the unmitigated intensity of his unconnsummated love.
The target of his lustful affections, unfortunately, is lost to us in the mists of history. But the intensity of his feelings still live on in these ghazals, even though we can only speculate as to the identity of his muse.
It is my intention to serialize some extracts from the book here, to trace the growth of his poetry from the transparently obvious to the deep mysticism and unforced, unpretentious maturity of his later work.
So, to begin with, a simple offering:
The poetry of Persian poet Al-Nawaz can still be heard at street corners in the towns of Khorasan. A new English translation by Engelbart Fitzwater of his lovelorn poetry can now be found in the neighbourhood Crossword's. Al-Nawaz lived almost four centuries ago in the dusty and disease ridden neighbourhoods of the cities of Khorasan, but his desires and unrequited passion still resonate today. One of the earliest known master of what was to become the 'ghazal', his keen insight sometimes is overshadowed by the unmitigated intensity of his unconnsummated love.
The target of his lustful affections, unfortunately, is lost to us in the mists of history. But the intensity of his feelings still live on in these ghazals, even though we can only speculate as to the identity of his muse.
It is my intention to serialize some extracts from the book here, to trace the growth of his poetry from the transparently obvious to the deep mysticism and unforced, unpretentious maturity of his later work.
So, to begin with, a simple offering:
Like an earnest field, I waited for a mass of grey
When only a twinkling of a drop would wash me away
The dull night and the silence, dear friend
Only your heartbeat keeps oblivion at bay
'Tis verse for the heart we recite, not holy writ
Things yet unwritten, one still has to say
Some things are born and crawl, others perish
You are the one that willingly lost his way
Gaze at the moon, 'Al-Nawaz', savour its contours
For she must set, night too gives in to day
Friday, September 24, 2004
holding-my-breath dept.
Most of the national channels are reporting (only in text) that the film I mentioned in my last post -- श्वास -- has been nominated for the Oscars. Now I can't find anything on the web, and it seems too early for Oscar nominations to be announced. Most likely its been selected as India's entry for the Oscars.
Anyways, great day for Marathi films, literature, culture. Every Marathi should be proud!
Most of the national channels are reporting (only in text) that the film I mentioned in my last post -- श्वास -- has been nominated for the Oscars. Now I can't find anything on the web, and it seems too early for Oscar nominations to be announced. Most likely its been selected as India's entry for the Oscars.
Anyways, great day for Marathi films, literature, culture. Every Marathi should be proud!
Wednesday, September 22, 2004
rotten-fish dept.
Just had a glance through N.P.Gogate's wonderful novella भाऊचा धक्का. It was a revelation to see that Marathi literature, even after the recent loss of the erstwhile masters, still manages to throw up a few gems now and then.
Gogate writes sparse, knife-sharp prose that pierces like a rapier to the heart of the matter. But in spite of his terseness he has a great sense of atmosphere, and especially notable are his wonderful descriptions of the fish markets in and around Mumbai. They almost bring out the sultry odour of pomfret and zhinga selling in the open stalls.
Marathi literature and cinema seem to specialize in the analysis of childhood and the preservation of childish innocence (Sane Guruji's श्यामची आई being a case in point, so is the recently released, National-Award-winning movie श्वास). Gogate does not dare stray from the formula in his debut, but even inside the strict matrix of his formula, he establishes himself as a thinker of great originality and freshness (can't say that about the Mumbai fishmongers' wares that permeate the goings-on in the book though).
So Gogate's novella brings us Shailesh Kolvandkar, an intense, rootless young adult trying to explore his own past. His search leads him to a small fishing village (one of the many now being slowly consumed by that relentless narwhal of a city -- Mumbai) on the Malabar coast, and there he plants himself expectantly, waiting for his past to catch up with him.
What Shailesh sees instead is a dynamic, rapidly changing world, with the giant city closing in, and old ways of life being permanently obliterated. After spending many pages trying to save an old Kolin from losing her shop to the 'big fish', Shailesh comes to realise the inevitability of change, and more importantly, the fruitlessness of clinging on to the past.
Part of his search is consumed by an obsession for the pomfret with the perfect smell to match his childhood memories. In his torrid affair with a bright young Koli girl, yearning to leave the dying community, he finds the odor of his dreams (don't ask me where or how!!!), and that is essentially the beginning of the end.
Just had a glance through N.P.Gogate's wonderful novella भाऊचा धक्का. It was a revelation to see that Marathi literature, even after the recent loss of the erstwhile masters, still manages to throw up a few gems now and then.
Gogate writes sparse, knife-sharp prose that pierces like a rapier to the heart of the matter. But in spite of his terseness he has a great sense of atmosphere, and especially notable are his wonderful descriptions of the fish markets in and around Mumbai. They almost bring out the sultry odour of pomfret and zhinga selling in the open stalls.
Marathi literature and cinema seem to specialize in the analysis of childhood and the preservation of childish innocence (Sane Guruji's श्यामची आई being a case in point, so is the recently released, National-Award-winning movie श्वास). Gogate does not dare stray from the formula in his debut, but even inside the strict matrix of his formula, he establishes himself as a thinker of great originality and freshness (can't say that about the Mumbai fishmongers' wares that permeate the goings-on in the book though).
So Gogate's novella brings us Shailesh Kolvandkar, an intense, rootless young adult trying to explore his own past. His search leads him to a small fishing village (one of the many now being slowly consumed by that relentless narwhal of a city -- Mumbai) on the Malabar coast, and there he plants himself expectantly, waiting for his past to catch up with him.
What Shailesh sees instead is a dynamic, rapidly changing world, with the giant city closing in, and old ways of life being permanently obliterated. After spending many pages trying to save an old Kolin from losing her shop to the 'big fish', Shailesh comes to realise the inevitability of change, and more importantly, the fruitlessness of clinging on to the past.
Part of his search is consumed by an obsession for the pomfret with the perfect smell to match his childhood memories. In his torrid affair with a bright young Koli girl, yearning to leave the dying community, he finds the odor of his dreams (don't ask me where or how!!!), and that is essentially the beginning of the end.
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
dozing-at-work dept.
Why are some things inherently soporific? Telecom, for instance. Can't seem to stay awake through any lecture on Telco infrastructure technology. Maybe its the gentle, rocking beat of acronyms flying thick and fast. But my eyelids begin to droop, and the speakers voice fades gradually until it becomes a distant echo on some static-ridden, ancient PSTN line.
Have to read this article posted on /. to cure my inexcusable ignorance.
Also, got to get through this interesting CPU performance analysis up at AnandTech.
Google may be working on a new browser. Why, in heavens name, I do not know. Maybe they're only brow(ser)-beating a certain other company into upgrading its own.
Why are some things inherently soporific? Telecom, for instance. Can't seem to stay awake through any lecture on Telco infrastructure technology. Maybe its the gentle, rocking beat of acronyms flying thick and fast. But my eyelids begin to droop, and the speakers voice fades gradually until it becomes a distant echo on some static-ridden, ancient PSTN line.
Have to read this article posted on /. to cure my inexcusable ignorance.
Also, got to get through this interesting CPU performance analysis up at AnandTech.
Google may be working on a new browser. Why, in heavens name, I do not know. Maybe they're only brow(ser)-beating a certain other company into upgrading its own.
Monday, September 20, 2004
The Economist has an interesting piece in its technology quarterly this fortnight, which talks about “cognitive enhancers”, or drugs that sharpen mental responses and enhance mental acuity.
According to the article drugs are currently in clinical trials and are only a few years away from hitting the market.
According to the article drugs are currently in clinical trials and are only a few years away from hitting the market.
Saturday, September 18, 2004
polish-sausage dept.
Hmmm....I saw this awesome Polish film recently (one of the lesser known films of the famous communist-era director Kitti Fektowski) which begs to be remade with an Indian locale. I only vaguely remember details of the plot, but here's a brief summary:
A poor farmer is beset with problems -- his crops fail for two successive years, and he finds himself neck-deep in debt with the local money-lenders. In the midst of all this turmoil (he is beaten up by goons hired by the loan sharks, and the threat of losing his fields is very real), his son picks up a stray dog and brings it home.
The poor man doesn't need another mouth to feed, and ignores the poor mongrel until, as is the way with most of our childhood infatuations, his boy loses interest in this new-found plaything.
One drunken night, when he is alone under a lustrous full moon casting a clear ethereal light on his dying fields (captured brilliantly by the cinematographer using some sort of diffusing filter), and on the verge of a grisly suicide by guzzling down a vat of pesticide, the farmer notices the dog (now out of canine adolescence and entering adulthood) beside him. There is a look of sneering contempt on the dog's face (I don't know how they managed to capture that).
The recalcitrant farmer stands down, and possibly to make amends, makes the dog his 'pet' project . He takes him everywhere he goes, and where the dog goes, he follows. His family is distressed, horrified at his blatant neglect of his fields.
Then one day, the man has an epiphany that changes him forever. On a plain, arid piece of god-forsaken land, he and his dog are confronted by a pack of voracious wild dogs. The farmer's dog brilliantly counterattacks and sends them 'pack'ing. This scene was particularly hair raising -- looked as if they used a bunch of steadycams, whirling around at canine perpective level. The fight was brilliantly choreographed (some shades of John Woo there?).
Anyway, the farmer sees the error of his ways -- sees that history is forged by those who take, not by meek submissive fools (like the one he has been). The scene fades out with a long-shot of him hysterically laughing and rolling about on the ground while the dog watches on with a perplexed look (although there is perhaps a hint of a knowing wink in that look.)
Then the predictable climax follows -- the farmer hatches diabolically cunning, fiendish schemes to pick off his enemies one by one, until he is left the undisputed master of his fields, and more. The film ends with the man reconciled with his family (his wife, full of disdain and a distant coldness before, now warms up to him after he rapes her in a pig-sty in a particularly steamy scene.). The final scene has him glaring down at the expanse of his dominion, with a monster harvest in the offing, watching his dog tearing down like the wind through the waving stalks of wheat (or barley or maize or what-have-you). I laughed and cried and basically had a ball watching it. Forget the name of the flick though. Maybe imdb has some stuff on it...
Hmmm....I saw this awesome Polish film recently (one of the lesser known films of the famous communist-era director Kitti Fektowski) which begs to be remade with an Indian locale. I only vaguely remember details of the plot, but here's a brief summary:
A poor farmer is beset with problems -- his crops fail for two successive years, and he finds himself neck-deep in debt with the local money-lenders. In the midst of all this turmoil (he is beaten up by goons hired by the loan sharks, and the threat of losing his fields is very real), his son picks up a stray dog and brings it home.
The poor man doesn't need another mouth to feed, and ignores the poor mongrel until, as is the way with most of our childhood infatuations, his boy loses interest in this new-found plaything.
One drunken night, when he is alone under a lustrous full moon casting a clear ethereal light on his dying fields (captured brilliantly by the cinematographer using some sort of diffusing filter), and on the verge of a grisly suicide by guzzling down a vat of pesticide, the farmer notices the dog (now out of canine adolescence and entering adulthood) beside him. There is a look of sneering contempt on the dog's face (I don't know how they managed to capture that).
The recalcitrant farmer stands down, and possibly to make amends, makes the dog his 'pet' project . He takes him everywhere he goes, and where the dog goes, he follows. His family is distressed, horrified at his blatant neglect of his fields.
Then one day, the man has an epiphany that changes him forever. On a plain, arid piece of god-forsaken land, he and his dog are confronted by a pack of voracious wild dogs. The farmer's dog brilliantly counterattacks and sends them 'pack'ing. This scene was particularly hair raising -- looked as if they used a bunch of steadycams, whirling around at canine perpective level. The fight was brilliantly choreographed (some shades of John Woo there?).
Anyway, the farmer sees the error of his ways -- sees that history is forged by those who take, not by meek submissive fools (like the one he has been). The scene fades out with a long-shot of him hysterically laughing and rolling about on the ground while the dog watches on with a perplexed look (although there is perhaps a hint of a knowing wink in that look.)
Then the predictable climax follows -- the farmer hatches diabolically cunning, fiendish schemes to pick off his enemies one by one, until he is left the undisputed master of his fields, and more. The film ends with the man reconciled with his family (his wife, full of disdain and a distant coldness before, now warms up to him after he rapes her in a pig-sty in a particularly steamy scene.). The final scene has him glaring down at the expanse of his dominion, with a monster harvest in the offing, watching his dog tearing down like the wind through the waving stalks of wheat (or barley or maize or what-have-you). I laughed and cried and basically had a ball watching it. Forget the name of the flick though. Maybe imdb has some stuff on it...
Friday, September 17, 2004
classy-at-the-theatre dept.
I managed to watch three films during the just concluded Asian Film Festival, right across the street from my house. The Chinese film Postmen in the Mountains left an indelible impression on my mind, not so the other movies, with the possible exception of one other film, newcomer Samyak Sandipani's My friend Saleem.
The film documents the friendship between two undergraduate engineering students who come together in one of Maharashtra's private engineering colleges. This is a pathbreaking film (maybe I use that qualification too freely) possibly the first to take a candid, realistic look at higher education and student life in our colleges.
Rahul is from the countryside from a typical small-town middle class family (the kind that budgets for buying soap). Akhilesh is the son of NRI parents living somewhere in the Middle East or in Souteast Asia. By a strange quirk of fate, these disparate creatures are thrown together in the same dorm room, and the film builds its narrative from there.
A montage of small, poignant sequences during the titles introduces us to both of these characters as they embark on their journey to the college. Once there, predictably enough, the film follows the inevitable clash of cultures between the determined, bookish and overly pragmatic Rahul and the free-spirited, sensitive, na‹ive Akhilesh as they both come to grips with new surroundings.
After this, the film splits into two narrative threads that are occasionally intertwined and then unify into a single logical whole as the film climaxes.
Akhilesh falls for a girl quite obviously not meant for him, and gets his heart broken, trying to compete with his 'localite' competitor.
This is a brave attempt to analyse adolescent social groupings in modern India. A spate of 80's American 'high-school' movies (The Breakfast Club, Breaking Away, or the more recent Mean Girls) have superficially dealt with this issue, but Sandipani opts for a more profound look at the underlying socio-economic and cultural factors that decide how young people of today factor in peer pressure and media images into their decision making. He seems to make the interesting hypothesis, for instance, that economic awareness greatly affect individual maturity. In a male-dominated culture like India, women very rarely are allowed to fend for themselves, and this causes their world view to become skewed -- they see the world only through the eyes of men around them. Akhilesh's experiences somehow seem to reinforce this hypothesis, and he finds himself unable to surmount the social barriers erected against him (through innuendo, deceit and misrepresentation) by his competitors.
A much more fascinating and profound narrative thread, however, revolves around the serious, academically inclined Rahul. He ends up being cruelly manipulated by one of his professors who publishes some of Rahul's work as his own. Shaken and disillusioned by what he considers to be a betrayal of the scientific spirit, more than anything else, he quickly descends into a vortex of ruthlessness and cynicism.
He only manages to rediscover his humanity when he helps Akhilesh deal with his heartbreak, and manages to recover his 'soul' from the brink of infamy.
Along the way we see interesting exchanges between Akhilesh and Rahul, as their relationship evolves from a wary mistrust (often descending into irritability) to mutual respect and acknowledgement.
The end finds them, if a little chastened, looking ahead to life as independent, free-thinking individuals, assured of their own place and identity and yet sensitive to the environment around them.
I managed to watch three films during the just concluded Asian Film Festival, right across the street from my house. The Chinese film Postmen in the Mountains left an indelible impression on my mind, not so the other movies, with the possible exception of one other film, newcomer Samyak Sandipani's My friend Saleem.
The film documents the friendship between two undergraduate engineering students who come together in one of Maharashtra's private engineering colleges. This is a pathbreaking film (maybe I use that qualification too freely) possibly the first to take a candid, realistic look at higher education and student life in our colleges.
Rahul is from the countryside from a typical small-town middle class family (the kind that budgets for buying soap). Akhilesh is the son of NRI parents living somewhere in the Middle East or in Souteast Asia. By a strange quirk of fate, these disparate creatures are thrown together in the same dorm room, and the film builds its narrative from there.
A montage of small, poignant sequences during the titles introduces us to both of these characters as they embark on their journey to the college. Once there, predictably enough, the film follows the inevitable clash of cultures between the determined, bookish and overly pragmatic Rahul and the free-spirited, sensitive, na‹ive Akhilesh as they both come to grips with new surroundings.
After this, the film splits into two narrative threads that are occasionally intertwined and then unify into a single logical whole as the film climaxes.
Akhilesh falls for a girl quite obviously not meant for him, and gets his heart broken, trying to compete with his 'localite' competitor.
This is a brave attempt to analyse adolescent social groupings in modern India. A spate of 80's American 'high-school' movies (The Breakfast Club, Breaking Away, or the more recent Mean Girls) have superficially dealt with this issue, but Sandipani opts for a more profound look at the underlying socio-economic and cultural factors that decide how young people of today factor in peer pressure and media images into their decision making. He seems to make the interesting hypothesis, for instance, that economic awareness greatly affect individual maturity. In a male-dominated culture like India, women very rarely are allowed to fend for themselves, and this causes their world view to become skewed -- they see the world only through the eyes of men around them. Akhilesh's experiences somehow seem to reinforce this hypothesis, and he finds himself unable to surmount the social barriers erected against him (through innuendo, deceit and misrepresentation) by his competitors.
A much more fascinating and profound narrative thread, however, revolves around the serious, academically inclined Rahul. He ends up being cruelly manipulated by one of his professors who publishes some of Rahul's work as his own. Shaken and disillusioned by what he considers to be a betrayal of the scientific spirit, more than anything else, he quickly descends into a vortex of ruthlessness and cynicism.
He only manages to rediscover his humanity when he helps Akhilesh deal with his heartbreak, and manages to recover his 'soul' from the brink of infamy.
Along the way we see interesting exchanges between Akhilesh and Rahul, as their relationship evolves from a wary mistrust (often descending into irritability) to mutual respect and acknowledgement.
The end finds them, if a little chastened, looking ahead to life as independent, free-thinking individuals, assured of their own place and identity and yet sensitive to the environment around them.
regarde la pluie dept.
The rains have now left for the North. The days are now stiff and cold with a hint of golden yellow that warms the face in the afternoons, but only a hint.
Only two weeks ago, on a sunny weekend, I would wake up (not later than 10) to the chirping of unknown birds. Outside the kitchen window I could see the shivering leaves of shrubs, bathed in a necklace of dew-drop diamonds.
If I closed my eyes, I could hear the traffic on the road outside, falling at me like tired sea-waves, in crests and troughs.
The rains have now left for the North. The days are now stiff and cold with a hint of golden yellow that warms the face in the afternoons, but only a hint.
Only two weeks ago, on a sunny weekend, I would wake up (not later than 10) to the chirping of unknown birds. Outside the kitchen window I could see the shivering leaves of shrubs, bathed in a necklace of dew-drop diamonds.
If I closed my eyes, I could hear the traffic on the road outside, falling at me like tired sea-waves, in crests and troughs.
Saturday, September 11, 2004
deathly serious dept.
Death lurks at every corner. It is the curse of mortals and possibly their only salvation. Yet we are so oblivious to it, until it strikes sudden like a malicious viper gliding in the grass and takes a living man in its grip.
And yet the venom persists and festers even after the dead are only a figment of our imagination. Because with death, also die memories and words and emotions and a host of other components that make us individual sentient beings. It is only with sudden realisation that you internalise the fact that part of you is dead forever, too.
Death lurks at every corner. It is the curse of mortals and possibly their only salvation. Yet we are so oblivious to it, until it strikes sudden like a malicious viper gliding in the grass and takes a living man in its grip.
And yet the venom persists and festers even after the dead are only a figment of our imagination. Because with death, also die memories and words and emotions and a host of other components that make us individual sentient beings. It is only with sudden realisation that you internalise the fact that part of you is dead forever, too.
Saturday, September 04, 2004
straw-dogs-dept.
Curzon's Books is a really small bookstore I came across this week in one of the by-lanes of Prabhat Road. The shop is run by an old Anglo-Indian lady, claiming direct descent from, of all people, Lord Curzon. It was already considerably disorienting for me to see someone of foreign descent managing to entrench themselves in Pune's Brahmin heartland. Add to that the unthinkable idea of her running a book-store catering to readers of Marathi. That she should claim descent from one of the most hated Viceroys of colonial India, infamous only for his ill-advised partition of Bengal, and later his obstinate opposition to the women's suffrage movement in Britain does not cast any illumination either. Stranger things, however, are known to have happened.
But then again, I digress.
One book in particular caught my eye for the sheer audacity of its title. पुण्याचे कुत्रे आणि त्यांचे साम्राज्य (पुरुषोत्तम प्रका., पुणे) (The Dogs of Pune and Their Empire) by Dr.V.S.Rajpurohit.
Dr. Rajpurohit claims to be a reader in Sociology at the University of Pune. I must confess to not having heard of anyone of that name, and some queries to acquaintances haven't been of much use either. The most obvious hypothesis is that the author is writing under a pseudonym. But that does not explain the need to so brazenly declare oneself a fraud. Surely, a book with as intellectual a tone as this would inevitably fall into the hands of the most ruthless of cynics that this city has to offer (yes, I refer to certain world-famous individuals from one of the equally world-reknowned 'Peths' of the old city).
Perhaps with his brazenness, the author also expresses his amorality -- his disdain for the laws of men and yet an affinity for the canine world that surpasses in its (well, for lack of a better word) dogmatism, the most fanatic of religions.
The book itself begins innocuously enough, by etching out in well-measured words, the geographical lay-out of Pune. Very meticulously, and with the air of a master violinist tuning his instrument, Rajpurohit (I have resigned myself to calling him by that name) catalogs the breeds and social hierarchies of the mongrels that inhabit its streets. Typically, he completely ignores the domesticated variety, preferring to look at them as only passive gene-pools that scatter their seed now and then to the 'real' population outside.
The subsequent portions of the book then set an unrelenting pace for ideas and insights that lasts till the end. This is where Purohit is in full flow, as he paints before us a vivid, evocative picture of the lives of these canine dwellers. Their street-wars, their alliances and betrayals, lust and affection, not to forget their ugly yet unalienable facets -- cannibalism, incest and disease. He shows a remarkable zest and empathy for their stories, and an even more astounding analytical mind when it comes to guaging their territorialism and sense of good and evil. For instance he tells us that the small lane that straddles Raviraj Hotel off Bhandarkar Road is home to a bunch of albino siblings. From certain genetic markers (this scientific discourse was frankly beyond me), Rajpurohit deduces the existence of an "illicit, passionate tryst of unmitigated lust between a pure Dalmatian and a common mongrel of mixed blood". The siblings themselves, claims Rajpurohit, stake their claim on the extent of this lane (not more then a hundred steps long), and exhibit a unique degree of discipline and organization in their pack behaviour. A token based system ensures that the road is constantly watched. Each individual takes turns resting and fornicating. Occasionally they will venture out into the other surrounding bylanes of Bhandarkar Road. On such occasions, the unit displays military precision in their attacks on their fellow canines, and a very well-defined hierarchical system for distributing the spoils of war. The description is almost too surreal to be true.
Refreshingly, unlike other Marathi authors, Rajpurohit does not shy away from classical English references either. "Let loose the dogs of war...", he snarls, spewing forth vitriol in his tirade against the Pune Municipal Corporation's pest control department.
So it is with some bewilderment that I consider the case of Dr.Rajpurohit. He writes in a highly stylized, idiomatic Marathi, and feels completely at home with the lastest forensic techniques in his field as well as classical English literature. One wonders, whether a man of such diverse faces would find the world of men large-hearted enough to accomodate him. It is only inevitable then, that such an excellent man should go to the dogs.
Curzon's Books is a really small bookstore I came across this week in one of the by-lanes of Prabhat Road. The shop is run by an old Anglo-Indian lady, claiming direct descent from, of all people, Lord Curzon. It was already considerably disorienting for me to see someone of foreign descent managing to entrench themselves in Pune's Brahmin heartland. Add to that the unthinkable idea of her running a book-store catering to readers of Marathi. That she should claim descent from one of the most hated Viceroys of colonial India, infamous only for his ill-advised partition of Bengal, and later his obstinate opposition to the women's suffrage movement in Britain does not cast any illumination either. Stranger things, however, are known to have happened.
But then again, I digress.
One book in particular caught my eye for the sheer audacity of its title. पुण्याचे कुत्रे आणि त्यांचे साम्राज्य (पुरुषोत्तम प्रका., पुणे) (The Dogs of Pune and Their Empire) by Dr.V.S.Rajpurohit.
Dr. Rajpurohit claims to be a reader in Sociology at the University of Pune. I must confess to not having heard of anyone of that name, and some queries to acquaintances haven't been of much use either. The most obvious hypothesis is that the author is writing under a pseudonym. But that does not explain the need to so brazenly declare oneself a fraud. Surely, a book with as intellectual a tone as this would inevitably fall into the hands of the most ruthless of cynics that this city has to offer (yes, I refer to certain world-famous individuals from one of the equally world-reknowned 'Peths' of the old city).
Perhaps with his brazenness, the author also expresses his amorality -- his disdain for the laws of men and yet an affinity for the canine world that surpasses in its (well, for lack of a better word) dogmatism, the most fanatic of religions.
The book itself begins innocuously enough, by etching out in well-measured words, the geographical lay-out of Pune. Very meticulously, and with the air of a master violinist tuning his instrument, Rajpurohit (I have resigned myself to calling him by that name) catalogs the breeds and social hierarchies of the mongrels that inhabit its streets. Typically, he completely ignores the domesticated variety, preferring to look at them as only passive gene-pools that scatter their seed now and then to the 'real' population outside.
The subsequent portions of the book then set an unrelenting pace for ideas and insights that lasts till the end. This is where Purohit is in full flow, as he paints before us a vivid, evocative picture of the lives of these canine dwellers. Their street-wars, their alliances and betrayals, lust and affection, not to forget their ugly yet unalienable facets -- cannibalism, incest and disease. He shows a remarkable zest and empathy for their stories, and an even more astounding analytical mind when it comes to guaging their territorialism and sense of good and evil. For instance he tells us that the small lane that straddles Raviraj Hotel off Bhandarkar Road is home to a bunch of albino siblings. From certain genetic markers (this scientific discourse was frankly beyond me), Rajpurohit deduces the existence of an "illicit, passionate tryst of unmitigated lust between a pure Dalmatian and a common mongrel of mixed blood". The siblings themselves, claims Rajpurohit, stake their claim on the extent of this lane (not more then a hundred steps long), and exhibit a unique degree of discipline and organization in their pack behaviour. A token based system ensures that the road is constantly watched. Each individual takes turns resting and fornicating. Occasionally they will venture out into the other surrounding bylanes of Bhandarkar Road. On such occasions, the unit displays military precision in their attacks on their fellow canines, and a very well-defined hierarchical system for distributing the spoils of war. The description is almost too surreal to be true.
Refreshingly, unlike other Marathi authors, Rajpurohit does not shy away from classical English references either. "Let loose the dogs of war...", he snarls, spewing forth vitriol in his tirade against the Pune Municipal Corporation's pest control department.
So it is with some bewilderment that I consider the case of Dr.Rajpurohit. He writes in a highly stylized, idiomatic Marathi, and feels completely at home with the lastest forensic techniques in his field as well as classical English literature. One wonders, whether a man of such diverse faces would find the world of men large-hearted enough to accomodate him. It is only inevitable then, that such an excellent man should go to the dogs.
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