Insanity Personified

Round 1 - Google Vs Me

2009-08-24T00:09:00.005+05:30

Today, during the course of random browsing i stumbled across this small piece of interesting information.
(Produced Verbatim below from the source)
{ The Google Natural Number Game

Google employee Neil Fraser asks:

What is the smallest natural number which when Googled produces no results?

e.g. 155253458363

}
Now since this has been posted all over the net, the actual answer changed. And it has been changing rapidly since then. Last i checked it was 155253458367
and moments later it is 155253458368.
So now i have decided to take on Google search and keep updating this blog by changing the answer till google indexes it. I know I would be fighting against a machine and it might be even futile but what the heck I would atleast know how fast google crawls web (and ofcourse my blog). I am also thinking what if i end up upsetting some top brass in Google who decide to ban this blog (am using their blogging service after all.) Or I might end up having friends who think I am completely jobless (most already think so). Whatever happens, I think, is worth the risk :)
Update - They are really really fast. My blog has been indexed. The answer now is 155253458369.
155253458370 :)
One of my readers (ilango) pinged me and pointed out that the new answer is 155253458371.
Strange Things Happening...
I suddenly have noticed that the index has started moving backwards. The answer changed back to 155253458370. I was like "Did Google remove my index?".. Next day the answer was 155253458369.. And now it is 155253458368. Did i win?

Why Google Still Owns the Web

2009-07-30T09:52:00.001+05:30

What if there were ...

2009-07-16T23:39:00.004+05:30

Virgin

Radhika

One Radhika = reports to Ankit

Two Radhika = Bang into each other while laughing

Three Radhika = Poor Himanshu

Four Radhika = Poor VMI

Ankit

One Ankit = Cheap bastard

Two Ankit = change the way VMI works

Three Ankit = report to one ankit

Four Ankit = World does not have enough space

Ankur

One Ankur = Equals entire People Team

Two Ankur = Are u nuts?

Sahil

One Sahil = Is on phone

Two Sahil = Is on phone

Three Sahil = Is on phone

Four Sahil = Network Congestion

Arun

One Arun = Is cribbing about carom board

Two Arun = is cribbing about tv

Three Arun = is cribbing about two arun

Four Arun = I change my planet

... More to follow

My First Night

2009-06-30T12:00:00.010+05:30

(It’s just a pure coincidence that title of my previous post and this one have word "Night" in common. You might be wondering is this some Nighty blog (watever that means). No it's not.)

The title was just to catch your attention. In our communication classes we called it hook. And now since you are hooked (of course you are), “The first Night” was the first night at our new House. Big deal, you may ask. But when people are updating the world about them cleaning their desktop (that was me btw) through the facebooks and twitters of the world, the first night at a new home definitely warrants a full blog entry of its own.

I kept my right foot first (because am right handed) and then my left foot (because I have two legs). The house was burning hot and Sahil flung into action, immediately. He was out of his shirts before me, Arun or the house could realize it. I actually wondered if he had walked like this all the way from office. Arun was grunting something. I was SURE he had walked like this all the way from office.

The house has one large room, one larger hall and not so large terrace (but then we have three of them… no not the houses but terraces). I can see Qutub Minar from two of it. Arun retired early. Sahil put the phone on his ear and also went off to sleep. I kept roaming around in the large hall and not so large terrace. Had switched off all the lights in the house but a few yellow lights from the street lamps were still stealing their way through the windows. An hour passed by and Arun was still grunting. Concerned I went into the room only to find that it was just the fan. He had slept long back.

Me still not sleepy, came out again. Suddenly saw something moving in a corner. I froze. So did it. I moved. So did it. Genius me, realized that it was just a glass. It reminded me of Anthony from that AB movie. Bored as I was, I actually started talking to Anthony. I wasn’t drunk!

I came back to my room at about 2:30 . Heard some noises. No it wasn’t fan this time. Not even Arun. It was Sahil still on the phone. The lights were switched off, he was lying on the bed forming a triangle with his elbows, shoulders and ears being the three vertices. Absolutely no movement, just the voice. When I went close I realized he didn’t even have a phone. The guy was talking in his sleep.

All of sudden Anthony appeared from nowhere, looked at me and said, “Welcome to the house!”

P.S 1 – I confess that it was the most content less blog entry ever written but I had to do it. It’s one of those block breaker entries and I promise lots of enriching post after this.

P.S 2 – I totally seem to be addicted to Facebook. The other day I was actually wondering if my life was a facebook newfeed, whether I would have “Like”d it. There are times when I look at people and feel like writing comments on their face. And when I was house hunting I had to convince myself that 4 facebook walls would not make a house.

Disclaimer 1: Sahil and Arun are for real.

Disclaimer 2: I copied this style from a friend's blog and took due permission before doing so. Here is a copy of the "right of use".

me: i am stealing your ps1 and ps2 idea for my next (and probably from now on all entry) in my blogs

5:15 PM and no due credit would be given

you are free to call me a chor in the comments part

i wont delete it

5:19 PM gokul.archer@gmail.com: okie

am busy right now

so here you go.. CHOR!!

me: ok

One night in a train

2008-06-11T10:39:00.004+05:30

As usual i opened my laptop to catch up with those must watch but pending-since-long movies, on the train from Calcutta..... ok Kolkata to Darbhanga. Few minutes later, I was cursing Vijaya Mallaya for providing those cheap kingfisher headphones in their flight which would invariably fail when you would need them the most. I am sure there must be better ways to recoup your billions you so thoughtfully invested in your Test 20 (pardon the pun) team. Anyways, the movie by now, almost oblivious of me, was already into its 3rd minute as if to suggest it does not care about anything that happens outside the laptop.

I ruefully informed them (the movies) their time has not come yet and then moved on to look at my co passengers. By now every passenger in the train had settled down and knew where everyone else was going. This question aap-kahan- jaaoge (where are u going) could arguably be termed as the best ice breaker of the world, invented by some unknown Indian traveler in 18th century. If Indian railways carries 80 lakh passengers every day then this questions gets thrown in at least 50 lakh times a day. However, when somebody tosses up that question to you in a Mumbai bound flight you can’t help but just wonder how people have taken this idea a little too far. Though I did reply to him, “Mumbai, and You?” with the most inquisitive looks mixed with feelings of astonishment. He too replied, in fact very earnestly, “Mumbai”. I now thank Vijaya Mallaya for putting up those glasses in the windows of their aircraft or I would have jumped straight out of it in that moment of haplessness.

There were two more people and a family in my compartment. It was badly lit, thanks to the yellow light inside and dark clouds outside. There was this person lying on the seat right in front of me, completely bald, resting his head on a small black pouch. I wondered why he needed that when there were two pillows lying just next to him. After few moments, when he woke up and sat upright i noticed that small black pouch had risen up with him sticking to his head on the back. I concentrated a little hard to figure out how it happened and then cursing the bad light i realized it was actually not a pouch but a huge bushy bunch of hair covering the back of his head and spreading wide on both ends. So he was only half bald. If you were to look at his head from the top, it would look like some round spherical heavenly body which had a slippery shining northern hemisphere while southern hemisphere had dark dense tropical forests. He didn’t speak a single word in the entire journey and would soon go back to sleep along with his black pouch, still sticking to his head.

Then there was this interesting chap, who according to him had met almost every famous person in this world. He never named any, he just called them “bade-bade log”. He runs this huge chain of factories and keeps buying 3-4 of them every year. He even showed a few of them from the window of the moving train. :O . He also warned us not to mistake him by his clothes or his appearance because he believed in simple life and hated people who showed off. Understandably people had a hard time controlling their sheepish grins. This person indeed was a man of “Big talks” and he did carry them with élan. He recently met GM of RBI (whatever it is supposed to mean) who had actually come to meet him at his factory. RBI is the place where crores and crores of rupees and coins are minted, he added candidly for the ignorant souls. He described his conversation with the GM.
GM – You are one sample
The big talk guy – Yeah I am sample, just like you
I banged my head three times onto the walls of compartment, and then i realized he actually meant simple, and both of them coincidentally believed in simplicity-is-the-best-policy.

And finally there was this family, husband and wife and their poor little kid who had to perform all his school rhymes to the train audience which included the occasional passer bys and chai wallahs. The parents kept on proving to everybody that they had indeed produced a whizkid. Meanwhile the whizkid singed, danced, taught us alphabets and mathematics tables relentlessly, much to the pride of their beaming parents. By end of the journey I could remember kid’s resume by heart which included his name, class, school name, name of mam and age (no not of mam).

By now i had overcome the tragedy of conked out headphones. I was thinking how Indian railways could be the perfect epitome of colourful Indian diversity which we all fondly love to talk about. I got on my berth to catch up with some sleep; meanwhile nobody in the train seemed to get tired. The train kept on moving, the half baldy kept snoring, the big talks kept becoming bigger and the kid was already on his way to become a prodigy.

Rule of Dumbs

2008-05-07T12:29:00.009+05:30

Today i am going to unveil some very interesting facts and lessons which I have amassed in my 24 years of existence while dealing with.... ahem the fairer sex ( I might have lied about my age in the previous statement ). The girls/women/naari/stree (hereafter called they/them) have been incomprehensible to me and in general to the humanity. It has taken mankind a million years to know them as they are and it is going to take another million years to know them as they really are. But whatever iota of information you have about them, trust me it does help. Hence it is our duty to spread the information for larger benefit of human kind. So here goes my two cents.

Tun Tnnn Taaaaaaaaanaaa Tun Tnnn... Dhigdhig Dhigdhig .. Tanaaaaaaaaaaaaa Tun DHIG.
(That was 20th century fox opening music)

1. Aliens, Ghosts and intelligent girls are alike. Everyone has heard about them, nobody has ever seen them.

2. There are always two interpretations to what they say. None of them is what you understood.

3. The most dangerous question they could ever ask you is how do i look. Play safe. Do not go overboard with statements like "you look beautiful today" . You might be quizzed to death for "they not looking beautiful other days".

4. The 10 top most things you would find in their purse.
i) Comb - Because that one of the million strand of hair gets dislocated every minute
ii) Hair Clips - Because everybody else has it, silly
iii) Deo/Perfume - World would not be a livable place without them for us
iv) Innumerable ATM receipts - Because they have never heard about account statements
v) An I card with the most horrible photo of their life - Just in case
vi) You-know-what to keep them free - Because zamana badal gaya hai
viii) Ok i have run out of things before i could reach the magical figure of 10, but just imagine how would it look if I had written the top 7 or 8 things. These numbers just don't go with top.

5. All of them have two friends. The best friend and the boy friend. Both of them are invariably two different person. The best friend's sole purpose of existence is the transformation to the boy friend someday, probability of which taking place is equal to Ashish Nehra hitting a backfoot cover drive for four.

This list is not exhaustive and I plan to update it regularly, as and when the secluded insights dawn on me. Request you also to share your insights by way of comments/mails/chitthi/sandesh . Remember ( Next few words were written in high pitch. I simulated that effect by hitting my keyboards really really hard with both hands) Together we can and we have to crack the key to co-existence and if we fail to do so, the Charles Darwin evolution theory says we'll go extinct, only "them" will survive. Scary, isn't it !!!

Tashan and Tamasha

2008-04-26T22:55:00.016+05:30

“The Akshay Kumar”, casting of the movie reads so and they could not have got it righter. And they could not have got it wronger, by prefixing the "The" for rest of star cast as well. Nobody belongs there yet, except for Akshay. His charisma and stature has been burgeoning by day. Wherever he makes an appearance, he simply loots the show. Be it his little cameo in OSO, his brief performances in zee-sony-star (wonder if aastha is also there) award ceremonies, the latest thumps up ad, the daredevil stunt at IPL or the strings of hits he has been throwing .. one after another. Tashan is the latest one in his kitty (ok not a hit one) and how he delivers in otherwise a comparatively lack luster movie from the famed production house.
Tashan is all about Akshay and his tashan. The first half of the movie is a narration with Saif suddenly coming out of the frames and talking to the camera, an innovative (not so quite) story telling which does look stylish. The movie picks up pace on a red scooter with Akshay Kumar and his 10 heads zooming past you. Thereafter you just want to see more and more of him. Even if it is his counter-strike-got-real fights scene with hanuman chalisa like bachchan pandey mixed with rap howling in the background. Kareena thankfully is not just a gimcrack though the director has tried his level best to prove her one, when she is thrown in song and dance sequences thrown in at most unlikely places. The songs, (though some of them being good) serve as road breakers giving the already waffer thin script a run for the money (pun intended).

Anil Kapoor, the lesser said about him, the better it is. He is plain boorish and irritating to the hell. His incomprehensible hinglish is hilarious, but only to the writer, because only that can explain the logic of using the same situational jokes again and again to the point where they (the jokes) are beaten, squeezed, ambushed, bruised and flattened beyond and worth recognition.

The pace of the movie takes a beating with all those flashbacks (which are weird to say the least) but the “tashan” keeps coming back in tits and bits (though you can't help thinking that you have had enough of it). The movie ends at least thrice with whispers of not-yet-over oomph every time. (I do realize that i have started using lot of dashes which result in words-like-this).
Despite all this and other extremely bad word of mouth reviews it’s still worth a dekko simply because Akshay is just too good to give this a skip.

The Good:
- The Akshay Kumar
- The first half
- Background Track
- Kareena in you-know-what
- The visual eye candy cinematography

The bad:
- Anil Kapoor and his irritating perennial unfathomable English
- The never ending one-against-hundred fight scenes
- The pyar-kabhi-marta-nahi and main-inteqaam-lungi flashbacks

The verdict:
- Watch it for him, The Akshay Kumar

Unveiling the IRIS logo

2008-04-23T15:04:00.010+05:30

For the uninitiated, IRIS is the annual B-School Fest at IIM Indore. The theme this time around is "Break Free" ( The Krazzy 4 song came later). Break free signifies a lot of things and is open to interpretations (like all creative arts in the world :p). IRIS has been known for its innovative contests which (like all other good things) has been copied, tried, used and overused (by others, ofcourse) till the dust. IRIS 2008 promises to be different from all its previous editions. We have added new verticals (cultural and corporate) to add more fizz to it.
Now after the shameless promotion, here is a sneak preview (only to privileged few who read this blog) to the newly created IRIS logo.
You can see my other designs here (The shameless promotion continues)

Insanity 2.0

2008-04-16T22:03:00.014+05:30

No there is no Insanity 1.0 . Did you ever called KBC as "KBC 1" before the second version came out.

It's been Three hundred forty two days since i last posted something on this blog which actually seems like a life time. (I wrote it as Three hundred forty two and not 342 because the former looks some really large number and no, I didn't count it, it is just an approximation with the assumption that it bothers no body.) After getting into IIM, I never had any time to keep this blog updated (it is an exaggeration, which is ok) and now when I am doing my Summer Internship I have run out of excuses to not update it. If you have noticed (ofcourse you have noticed) that the look and feel of this website has also got a face lift keeping in line with the spirit of Insanity 2.0

Summary: Insanity personified is name of my blog. It has been dead for long and when I restarted it I chose to call it Insanity 2.0 because of no good reason (Brevity is a virtue which I fail to realize ... time and again)

I was thinking if I had kept this blog updated what stuffs would have gone here. Umm perhaps some of these ...... My first few days at IIM, victory at talent night and elections, some nonsense, Klueless and after, T20 victory, more nonsense, my new graphic designs and still more nonsense. However, I would try to catch up with some of those in next few days but it's a promise which i'll try not to break.

I just now realized that the first post to Insanity 2.0 is a pure crap but then I also realized someday I had to do it.

How the drIIM came true!!!!!

2007-05-09T17:22:00.005+05:30

All i wanted to say about CAT

It was the summers of 2004, final year of college, when appearing for CAT crossed my mind for the first time. I remember attending a free session on CAT by TIME for newbies. The guy giving the lecture was trying to explain how difficult it is to make it to an IIM. There were 160 odd of us sitting in that conference room and he said "In a typical CAT scenario only one out of you will make it to an IIM". At that point of time i was like "Dude, are you nuts" (I said that to myself). I tried calculating the probability of me making in decimals and i fumbled after the first zero. While the guy at that point was saying "Typical IIMer finish long calculation in less than a minute, for which we mortal beings require calc. (For that calc effect blame it to my 2 years of dumb IT job).

We were doing our summer internship/design projects (read doing absolutely nothing) at that time so joined TIME classes along with a dozen of batch mates. We used to go to the class early morning after a typical engineering night out (ah, how badly i miss those night outs now).

My first impression about CAT:
Quant: Now this is what is gonna be my forte. Being a 100/100 marker many times in school and being an engineer, quant is gonna be a cake walk for me.
DI/LR: My logical abilities are great. But these calculations in DI, gosh!!! i missed my calc so badly.
Verbal: Being a Bihar boarder, studying in hindi till 10th, this sure is gonna be a tough nut to crack.

CAT's first impression about me:
Quant: Oh this guy thinks he is very smart. Lets give him back. He will struggle to clear the cut offs, constantly.
DI/LR: This guy can not be more right.
Verbal: So what if you are a Bihar boarder, your grammar is all right, your reading speed is great, just finish off the Norman lewis soon.

Within a month, i had stopped attending the classes, i found them useless. I had suddenly found a new interest - "Movie Making" :) . Was spending hours with camera and editing the movie clips.
After the summer were over, i had finished 3 chapters of Norman lewis, a few mock cats and 6 short movies. Come October, the big news arrived. Our (team of 3) movie had been nominated to Berlin short film festival in micromovie categories. And expectedly was followed by 15 days of fame (yeah, we were on newspapers, tv, internet). In November we were to go to Berlin to attend the festival. Did somebody ask what happened to the CAT 2004.

CAT 2004: 87 percentile (dont remember the subject wise break up, never bothered to).

Come 2005, Joined HP along with dozen of batch mates. Nothing much to say here. Not much of enthusiasm. Joined CL for test series. Mock scores were again like previous year, varying from 80 to 98 percentiles. Never ever bothered to look back into the mock papers once i gave them. How bad it cost me :( .

CAT 2005: 94 percentile (dont remember the subject wise break up, yet again)

Year 2006, Frustration grows. Still at HP. Joined TIME classes this time but hardly ever attended it. Was there only for Mock CATs and also didn't miss any free opportunities by IMS and CL as well. We were group of 6 friends slogging it out together. We were also doing mock cats at home other than those on Sundays. I relied on the strategy of postmortem of mock cats. Will always miss cut offs in one of the sections with over all being pretty descent. As the C day was coming near, scores were increasing but so was the nervousness. How badly i wanted this year to count. Could not have afforded another year.

Had taken a week break from the work just before CAT. Didn't have the stamina to study in last 2-3 days. The C day finally arrived. Could hardly sleep in the night. Nervous like hell. Tried not to pay any heed to "all the best" messages, but those messages and phone calls were making me believe that the occasion was much more larger than i had initially thought. I was burdened with all those best wishes and pressure to perform. Was trying all those "tips to cool yourself". Taking deep breaths, drinking glasses of water.

Was kinda convincing myself, "Let it just start once, you'll forget everything else". And it indeed did. I started with Verbal (had followed the strategy of giving 40 minutes to it, and 55 minutes each to DI and Quant all through mocks). Since the going was tough, gave full 50 minutes and attempted almost all. DI seemed walk through and so looked Quant, untill disaster struck. (It all seems so funny now :P) Never ever in my life i had such an urge to go out and have a pee. I in fact checked out the possibility of it during the CAT paper but expectedly wasn't allowed. Last 15 minutes were unbearable, left the paper with my heads down, was trembling, almost tears in my eyes. 15 minutes in a CAT paper are too much to be wasted, was going to realize it later. After the paper i rushed out for the nearest loo only to find a long queue there. Next to it was ladies toilet without any queue, didnt even had a second thought. Just rushed in with my heads down. I could feel many surprised eyes staring at me. Was least bothered. Had the relief of my life in next minute :) (Ok, i know i am getting too much in details)

..... forward to January 2nd, 2007.....

CAT 2006: 99.46 (DI: 97.04, VA: 99.96, QA: 90.70)
The scores looked pretty descent, with doubts over the quant score. IIMA comes out with the calls. Rejected. C Rejected. B Rejected. L Rejected. Quant score had me in big time. Finally Indore gives me a call (i still remember the sigh of relief i had). K Rejected (Couldn't believe). Does not end here. XAT scores: 99.67 (DI: 99+, VA:87+, QA:98+) but no call from XLRI either. To top it all when MDI declared its GD PI call list, my name didn't figure even there. Though after repeated phone calls and mail exchange they finally gave me a call. And in JMET at rank 429 calls from IIT B and D would have been a miracle only.

..... Time for final results.....
NITIE (PGDISEM) : WL 4
SPJAIN: WL 4 (finally converted)
Few days back i booked a railways ticket to my home town: WL4
IIFT: WL
And after painfully agonizing wait IIMs came out with their results.
I remember i was literally hitting F5 every second on the IIM result page the day it was out. And probably i was the first one to see the result as well. (Opened the result thread at PG ;). Was trembling while keying in my registration number, hit the RESULT button.

Name	:	VISHAL KUMAR JALAN
Registration No.	:	5150531

You have been selected for admission to PGP (2007-2009) of IIM Indore.

And there it was. A mix of shock, excitement and dont know what. I just punched my fist in the air and everything after that was a blur. Was unable to think or speak anything. I had made it to the one of the most coveted institute of India. My drIIM had come true!!!!!!!

Coorg - The Scotland of India

2007-04-13T15:30:00.001+05:30

Coorg

Cricket Without Its Federer

2007-02-20T18:53:00.003+05:30

Sample this. Headlines taken from Cricinfo in last 10 days.

Stunning McMillan seals whitewash.

Australia must find answers quickly.

Australia crash to 10-wicket defeat.

England snatch upset series win.

Superb Collingwood seals tense win.

The common link? Australia on the losing side!!!
Mate, you must be kidding. No i am not.
Welcome to the new age Cricket. It is exciting, suddenly!! Australians are being plummeted. Gone are the days when you started reading the ranking table from rank 2. I wonder if Sunita Williams has access to news out there in space or else she might report a malfunction of landing on the wrong planet.

Schumachers, Tigerwoods, Federers and Australians come once in a millennium. They redefine sports, they awe people and then they make it boring. Wasn't winning and losing supposed to be integral to any sport. But these people defy the later aspect of it, arrogantly. So it is always heartening to see rise of Alonsos, Singhs, Roddicks and Kiwis. They redefine sports, they awe people and then they make it interesting.

Piles of paper and bandwidths is going to be devoted (read wasted) in coming days on this changing face of cricket, especially with the world cup around the corner. Who are you going to put your money on? Suddenly the streets are going to be buzzing again with speculations, And no am not talking about only the Indian sub continents streets, they would have been buzzing anyways. We have a reason, and a very good one to start watching cricket again with same kind of anticipation and excitement which we did some three or four or five , grrrrr.... probably million years back.

Having said and done, write off Australians at your own peril. As Rohit Brijnath aptly puts it.

"Will Australia win this World Cup? Of course! It's what they do."

And on a second thought probably we are very harsh when we accuse them of bringing monotony in the sport. They raise the bar for lesser gods. For instance watch this awesome display of ruthlessness by Federer. Did i hear you say Cricket is not that bad with its Federer!!!

The Sorrows and Joys of Digital World

2006-12-21T14:35:00.003+05:30

It was yet another monday morning but not quite.
Logged into office, tried to sign into yahoo messenger (one of the few important things which i do as soon as i come to office) but to my dismay got "incorrect password" error again and again. Tried logging into yahoo mail, no success here either. Fearing the worst logged into my alternate email account, and there it was, the dreaded mail from yahoo "Your password has been changed".
With all kind of negative thoughts tried the "forgot password" option but it would always throw an error "The information you entered does not match with your profile information"...
The hacker was smart enough to change everything!!!

"Cmon this is just a free mail account, you can get another", i said to myself. But then i just could not gulp the fact that i just had lost a 5 year old mail account with over 100 contacts in messenger.

So what's the big deal???. You can get another for free.
If this is what you are asking, wait till it happens to you. The sorrows of digital world are different.

Anyways surrounded by the gloom i resolved of getting it back, no matter what. Going through the help pages i got a link where i could i mail them about my problem. I got a response immediately and as expected it was an automated reply :(. Frustrated i did a Google and my search string was exactly this "Recover hacked yahoo account". Got to read people's experiences where somebody was lucky to get the account back in a month after number of mail and phone communication with yahoo, while for some, yahoo was not as friendly.

What gave me the ray of hope was this post by a guy who said " The key is to get a live person (not a machine) to communicate with you. Make him believe that account is yours and it's really important for you to get it back" . As for this guy he had mailed them saying he had his children's photos in the mail box and it could be some pervert pedophile hacker downloading them. This worked like a miracle and the yahoo helped this guy to even remember his answer to security question by giving him hints. (Yeah, this guy was able to recover the account even without knowing the answer). The yahoo support guys threw hints like "probably you were watching some cartoon shows while creating this account".

This was enough for me to start onto my "recover yahoo" mission. I mailed them giving all possible kind of reasons why i should have my account back. (The mail makes for hilarious reading now, can not post it here coz has some private information). And believe it or not a person (no machine this time) replied back within 48 hours giving me my new password.
Yep i got my account back in just about 48 hours. Talk about the joy i got after seeing the mail in my mail box. Was i plain lucky. just a little creative...... or perhaps both. :)

If you are one of those poor fellas who have lost their yahoo account (or for that matter any other account) or if you ever get into situation like this, do not lose hope, even if you do not remember any damn thing about your account , of course do not forget your user id ;) . In the ages of machines you do have humans somewhere down the line. Use your skills (and sentiaaps) who knows.... you too might get lucky :)

Unwinding in Peaceful Pondicherry

2006-12-18T19:41:00.001+05:30

Peaceful Pondicherry

You have your own advantages and disadvantages of being in a country of more than a billion people. Frustration of finding hordes of people at tourist places (and not so tourist places) is certainly one of the latter. Considering this my weekend trip to Pondicherry came as a pleasant surprise for me. After all at how many beaches can you drive your bikes to the shores and in fact even to almost middle of the sea, of course i mean driving on jetty . (In case you do not what a jetty means (i didn't know before i went to pondicherry) here is the dictionary definition. Jetty - A structure, such as a pier, that projects into a body of water to influence the current or tide or to protect a harbor or shoreline from storms or erosion. )

Pondicherry is certainly peaceful (Oh yes, you certainly have read this on incredible !ndia advertisements.) Be it the paradise beach or the Auro beach you'll always find only a couple of groups (and of course some couples ;)) apart from you. You do not have never ending queues, neither do you have to shell out a fortune to visit those sought after destinations. Yeah Pondicherry is a tax free UT (union territory, i like this acronym ;) ). The best way to enjoy Pondicherry (as we did) is rent a bike (for a meager 150 bucks a day) and roam around at your convenience. Parking is not a problem (It's a big concern for poor souls like me in bangalore) and neither the petrol prices. A full 10 Rs less than that in bangalore, i wonder if we have more effective Mamta Banerejee, here in pondicherry ;)

Apart from being peaceful and cheap the one thing which sets it apart from other tourist places in India is the surrrounding French aura. The street names (most of them) are all French, and are incredulously clean !!! You have the doodhwala speaking French without attending Alliance Francis classes (no kidding, though am not sure if they also manage the accent). The restaurants serve French and Italian foods (read bland). You see people from more than 30 countries here zipping around in bicycles around the streets of pondy. (no i didn't count them, read it somewhere and moreover they all looked like some Foreigner :P).

Wanna experience Mauritius, France and India (just a touch little far fetched) all in one place Pondicherry is the place to be. Go and pamper yourself.

Photos here http://picasaweb.google.com/vishal.jalan/PeacefulPondicherry

Roti, Kapda aur Cricket !!!!

2006-11-24T15:47:00.002+05:30

The drubbing at Durban didn't come as a surprise to me at all especially when it was the same pitch where we were skittled out twice for a total sum of less than a hundred in 1996. But what astonished me was the debate and subsequents hours wasted in the parliament over it. Come on guys this country has enough graver problems which need your precious time.... literally. (Believe it or not, the cost of running a Parliament is approximately Rs 58 lakh a day, while that of the whole session easily runs into crores.)

No where in the world do you never expect the house of commons fighting over issues like their team losing a soccer match but then where else do you expect people saying with blatant prideness "It happens only in India". I would not be amazed if i read this (members fighting in parliament over cricket) as some fun trivia in an international publication.

And when reaching a conclusion was concerned cricket was no different from other issues (not considering here the reservations, amendment of constitution to provide more power to legislative etc.) Neither had you Peter Roebucks and Gawaskars dissecting the peformance of the team [no
(un)fortunately they are not yet Rajya Sabha or Lok Sabha members]. So the quality of discussion wasn't any better than the ones heard at the "chai ka galla" next door. From chappel bashing to "bring Ganguly back" song, as if reason for current failure lies solely on them.

Just before i sign off (hope this is correct way to use it and if it is not blame it to over exposure of host oriented tv shows ;) ), even if we owe this to very sporty MPs we have then why not a discussion on Indian Hockey debacle (Trivia of the day: Hockey is India's national game. Played with 11 sticks and a ball. The stick looks exactly like those which bad guys carry in hindi movies ;) Save it somewhere, you might well be at loss of words while you explain hockey to your childrens.)

Style YES, Substance NO

2006-11-23T19:36:00.002+05:30

Casino Royale - Movie Review

"I play with guns, girls and gadgets. Who am i?"

"Bond.... James Bond"

We have grown up answering this trivial question in every other quiz shows but after Casino Royale the question (and for that matter answer) becomes dubious. Yes there is Bond .. James Bond but guns ares missing. This James Bond fights with his own hands. He does not come out of fight with his suit and ties intact. He has bruises. He has blood flowing.... like any other mortal being. No gadgets to assist him. Gone are the girls bowled by his charm. (Instead he is bowled by them to the point of leaving the job of agent 007 only to realize later that he is just a pawn in a bigger game.)

And this is precisely why Bond fails to live up to the expectation. The Bond here is not the ultimate hero. He does not come out of blues on his own rather he is plain lucky at most of times.
The character is not marked by smug confidence but a very impatience brat who keeps getting flowed by turn of events.

Alright, they say that this is the first novel and actually it is the making of James Bond but then we do not need the making of a hero after 50 years of seeing the actual hero. Go and watch it only if you are ready to digest it as a normal action movie and not a typical James Bond movie or else disappointment is in store for you.

The battle in chat room

2006-03-28T20:10:00.001+05:30

This is an extract of conversation between me and Sanjay about the much hyped words like "Momentum", "Moral Victory" etc etc..

5:19 PM Sanjay: kitne run se jeeti?

me: 39

Sanjay: abey yaar

shud have been 50

chal anyways

5:20 PM me: kya farq padta hai saley

Sanjay: padta hai yaar

morally more crushing

5:21 PM me: these talks of morally and momentum are all bull shit

Sanjay: wankhede mein india ne harna to tha hi,after sachin's dismissal

me: where did the mumbai momentum go?

Sanjay: lekin 212 run se with more than a session to go was what was more hurting

me: now papers will talk bout momentum being in india way

Sanjay: abey wo momentum to england had lost day before in jaipur yaar

me: that was so morally crushing

exactly

why did they lose in jaipur at all

Sanjay: warm up match hi haar gaye the saale

5:22 PM me: they were on a high

Sanjay: it matters yaar

me: momentum unke saath tha

they should have won then

Sanjay: you start doubting urself

me: india were morally crushed

Sanjay: india(especially bhajji) was able to pull himself out of it

me: how did then they come back from behind

abey yaar

Sanjay: otherwise india had almost lost this one

me: these stupid terms dont matter i think at all

Sanjay: hota hai yaar

5:23 PM me: kya hota hai

Sanjay: confidence pe bahut farak padta hai

its always there

me: why did england lost in jaipur

Sanjay: abey its not that you cant lose or anything

but you are more confident

thats it

bas confidence aur self-belief ki baat hai

some ppl might be able to have it inspite of not winning matches

but winning matches helps

me: the self-belief of bhajji would be high now

5:24 PM Sanjay: the bigger the margin the more confident you become

yes exactly

me: now wat happens when andrew flintoff comes in next match and smashes him all over the park

according to this logic

flintoff cant do that

5:25 PM Sanjay: abey aisa kuchh nahi hai

me: yaad hai pathan ne pakistan mein (pahli series) mein ** **** di thi

Sanjay: i m not saying that you become invincible

its just taht you will be more confident

its confidence yaar nothing else

me: i agree that these things do matter

Sanjay: achha you tell me

me: but not as much as they r blown out of proportion

Sanjay: why do ppl wear specific bandanas and jersey numbers

5:26 PM and try and go with the same bat if they have performed well with it?

me: one bad over can change everything

Sanjay: its just that you think that it is helping ur performance

<> its not doing anything extraordinary

but you are just more confident wearing that bandana or whatever

5:27 PM me: abey u r not getting the point

i dont say that u dont require confidence at all

Sanjay: you are not getting the point!

me: u do require

u also require the momentum

but one can seize away this iniative in one good over

Sanjay: abey u cant do anything with just confidence

you need to do things rigth also

5:28 PM and it becomes easier with confidence<>

me: after the win south africa had on australia... nothing can be more morally crushing

Sanjay: thats all i am saying

if you are believing in yourself

me: losing after scoring 434

u seriously woudl start doubting ur capabilites

but look wat is happening in test matches

dono innings mila ke bhi sa 434 nahi bana pa rahi hai

Sanjay: ok

now you tell me

how come

5:29 PM <>when some bowler is bowling badly

and he gets a wicket

all of a sudden he starts bowling a fiery spell?

(has happened many times with shoaib and today it happnd with bhajji and in the first match or second test with kumble)

me: yeh bhi hota hai ki after getting a wicket he is hit all over

5:30 PM and yeh bhi hota hai ki (jaisa ki u mentioned) u keep getting hit everywhere and u still start getting wickets

Sanjay: abey maximum time ye hi hota hai ki bowler gets more confident and bowls better

u mean u keep getting wickets(instead of start) right? otherwise that statmenet is confusing

me: there are more cases of bowlere getting hit after getting a wicket than getting more wicketws

5:31 PM <>Sanjay: abey its more abt bowling better rather than getting wickets

if a bowler is hit for a six in the same over as he gets a wicket then the confidence gained is lost

its not just a game of good shots good ball and good fieldings

me: exactly now u r talking

5:32 PM Sanjay: its also a mental game

the balance can keep shifting

me: so that confidence gained could be as short lived as one ball

right??

Sanjay: but if you are strong and resistant enough once you get the "ba;ance" and "momentum" in ur favour you try not to lose it

yes exactly

me: so u think england or india are strong and resistand enough

5:33 PM Sanjay: abey yaaaaaaar

you are not getting my point

you can just resist to it

you cannot just stop it from going to the other side

england did have the "momentum" in todays match too!

they just became overconfident

me: yehi to main point prove karna chah raha hoon ki yeh jo cliches hain " morally crushing" "momentum" etc are not as important as made by media, u and me

Sanjay: flintoff and pieterson threw their wickets when there was no need

5:34 PM <>they could have defended

me: more batsmen from indian side threw their wicket

Sanjay: they are only as important as the player considers it to be

me: than in english side

so wat do u mean by "Team is confident"

Sanjay: just as in the case of superstition

5:35 PM me: if it boils down to individual

Sanjay: *sigh

this argument is a lost cause

its not abt any individual or team at all man

<>me: and if u win this argument u'll have momentum with u for next argument :D

u'll be more confidnet

it would be morally crushing for me

lol

Sanjay: hey bhagwaaaaan!

My First post

2006-03-28T19:57:00.001+05:30

Hello World