Fish Bait by "The Smoking Mackerel"®

Indian Rail - Toilets

2012-04-05T13:00:00.000+05:30

My passport may have three lions on it, reading Republic of India; my skin tone and facial features may be quintessentially Indian; i may have the built of an Indian; but I’m not very Indian at heart. I have several phobias, and most of them centre around things that the average Indian would take for granted.

I love travelling by train, just so as long as i am not taken ill during the journey and as long as i can keep my use of the train’s lavatories to a bare minimum without giving myself serious kidney diseases. My fear of the toilets that the Indian Railways installs in all their long distance trains stems from their construction, not the foul smells that emanate from within. Believe me, i’ve smelt worse toilets in India, places where the stench of urea is so strong that it reaches up your nostrils like a creeper, trying to block out your supply of oxygen. I’ve seen places that are knee deep in urine, and i’ve even seen places where men and women defecate feet apart, with nothing but God’s blue sky above them. But nothing instills in me that same fear that overcomes me every time i have to make a visit to the loo in the train.

Let me paint that picture for you. Normally a toilet would be white, with a hole at the bottom, where you see a small puddle of water. Some adventurous persons like their sanitary ware in other colours, but that’s purely cosmetic. Now imagine a toilet, in a four foot square cubicle, where, instead of water at the bottom of the hole, you can see the sleepers on the tracks below. That is not a scary thought, but wait; the toilets themselves come in two variants on the train, the Indian and the English. The English is simply a commode, were you can be seated and pick up a generous helping of diseases little known to man. You wouldn’t dare use that unless you were taking a dare or were feeling very foolish. The Indian variant is simply a hole. Yes, it’s simply a hole with two raised, feet like platforms, where, you place your feet so that your poo falls down the hole. And, at the other end of the hole, you see sunlight, reflected from railway sleepers, whizzing by at a hundred kilometres an hour. This hole is in a stainless steel plate that ‘s bolted to the bottom of the cubicle and God alone knows how many bolts are holding that plate up, keeping your bottom from meeting concrete and a hundred kilometres an hour. This is my greatest fear, if those bolts were to come lose, the plate were to fall into oblivion and you were to meet the tracks, would you die?

No, you would not. You’d be dragged along, at great speed, while things from the loos’ in the compartment ahead of you bombard you. Really, if there was a hell worse than this, i wouldn’t like to see it.

Another medium.

2012-01-08T15:41:00.001+05:30

This being my first post from a mobile device, I'm keeping it short.

Hello world!

of India.

2011-10-31T13:02:00.001+05:30

Eight years have passed since i started ‘living’ in India and that’s eight years of invaluable experience with the Indian junta. This may sound like it’s coming from someone who isn’t Indian but the truth of the matter is that though the Republic of India issues my passport, i am hardly the stereotypical Indian in any way at all. In these eight years, i’ve interacted with, lived with, had enlightened discussions with, fought with and had my fair share of disagreements with individuals from various parts of the country. What i’ve seen and see everyday never fails to keep amazing me; the sheer diversity of language, cultures and idiosyncrasies that this country holds within her borders; and the fact that they still manage to be united under the Tiranga.

This is not about the positives; the India that the world sees is largely what the government wants it to see. We proudly proclaim that India is Shining and she is, it’s what’s below the sheen that is disturbing, to say the least. No, this post is about the bad, the ugly, the reasons that Australians and Americans want to attack and maim us as soon as they see one of us; this is about the small mindedness and the ignorance that prevails at large.

I’ve had the chance to interact with people from India’s four largest cities and also from her smallest villages and the difference is both, pronounced and remarkable. I have regular disagreements with a certain individual who typifies the small town mentality, diffidence to those who are from larger cities and towns, and the determination to defend and preserve their values. Though i don’t agree with the majority of this individual’s claims which range from the preposterous such as the entire banking sector being illegal to the utterly ignorant such as newspapers being vile and evil, i can sympathise with his feelings. Being from what he sees as a less privileged background, one where he has no idea about the world, it’s cuisines, it’s people, their languages and ways, he strives to prove that his point of view is correct, his way of doing things is right. I fail to see the point of this as all it leaves him with is a bunch of friends who perceive him to be a village idiot or crackpot, and also with precious little knowledge on how to deal with people from around the world. This person also continually tries to impress upon me, his ideals and habits. To quote an instance, he examined my music collection in Winamp. As you’d expect with a metalhead, there was very little that he could understand and absolutely no artist that he’d heard of. What ensued was a barrage of abuses that i was supposedly betraying the motherland and not being a good Indian. To say the least, he’d be much better off in Russia.

On the flip side, i’ll cite another example of a person who’s grown up in the capital and been to the finest schools, interacted with the best minds and grew to expect that most of the populace would be like that. Sadly, that isn’t how it works; most Indians haven’t even seen an aeroplane in their lives, let alone a tarmac road. Many don’t have access to electricity and basic sanitation. With this state of affairs, this gentleman’s expectations of his fellow Indians are sky high, compared to what the ground realities are.

And what of me? I’m caught somewhere in between the two extremes, expecting better things from Indians and yet resentful of what i see.

All i can do is hope. One day, we will.

Tarmac

2011-08-07T17:30:00.000+05:30

When you apply white shampoo to your hair and see black suds in the drain and still don’t care, you know that the reason for that gunk in your hair is something you love. There are only a few things that i love, rock and roll for instance, heavy metal, country music, The Simpsons, math, electric guitars and so on.

Today, i found another, no actually two more.

Today morning, i failed to keep my promise of waking up in time. In time to get ready to undertake a road trip to the nearest beach, which was supposed to be here. This road trip was to be by a seven seater, four wheeled car, but alas, the need to cleanse my large intestine in the morning hours got the better of me and this four wheeled contraption set off sans moi.

Sans moi and this other gentleman whom i shall call AJ. AJ and me both rose late to greet the day but after cleansing our intestines and filling our bellies, we set off to *you will know where if you click on the link above*. And we did not use a four wheeled contraption, we used one with half that number, half the number of wheels but twice as much fun. Yes, today morning, i finally came to terms with that one thing that any testosterone producing human will live, a chromed up motorbike. The bike in question was a Royal Enfield, a brand that is to India what the Harley is to the USA. Pure passion, nothing else. And along the way, i found that other thing that any petrol head craves, the long, lonely, open road.

We set off for Yanam not having the faintest idea about the road network of Andhra Pradesh and relying solely on the know-it-all Google, which surprisingly worked like a charm, getting us there via the shortest route possible. Once there, and having realised that though you can call Yanam Pondicherry and that all the vehicle license plates read PY, we pushed off, off to where, no one but God almighty and the people who built that road knew. Off we went, a clip below 80, and with the sea breeze in my already filthy hair, i found that one thing that will never desert me, tarmac.

Finally, another quick look at the GPS told us that we were half way to Kakinada, the port town in AP. But along the way, we chanced upon a complex so large and crucial to national security that even Google was forced to take its location down from the map. The map said that we’d be passing through national forest area, with the sea on one side. The sea was indeed on one side but between us and it, stood the receiving station of the output of the Krishna-Godavari D6 block, the gas terminal that supplies the trans-India pipeline with its most valuable commodity, natural gas. The Reliance Industries complex is indeed a sight to behold and the stretch of road leading up to it is one of the best that I’ve driven upon.

I have now resolved that i will own two motor vehicles before i die, one being a Volkswagen Beetle and the other now being a Harley Davidson bike. There’s no purer rush than the open road, and no other better way to experience it that astride a motorbike, with the engine throbbing between your legs. Don’t get the wrong mental image there.

Drive Safe.

Work #1

2011-05-12T13:10:00.000+05:30

From almost two years of work experience in the Indian market, i can safely conclude one fact : The bulk of the Indian workforce is overworked and underpaid. When you’re young, wet behind the years and still to find your feet, most corporate with an ‘established name’ proposition themselves to take advantage of your vulnerability. Most will extract the maximum work possible while paying as little as possible. The folks running such places do not seem to understand the simple fact that no one works in an organisation as an act of charity.

During the time that you lack knowledge and need the company more than the company needs you, it’s ok if the organisation has second thoughts about investing in you. If however, that doubt continues, the employee will have second thoughts about continuing to work in the same place. I can personally vouch for the fact that though the Indian workforce is growing in it’s talent, ability and availability, the human side of the workplace has stagnated.

Many work for almost twelve to fourteen hours in inhuman conditions with the metaphorical equivalent of tissue paper protecting their rights while their employers ‘employ’ all sorts of rigorous and well thought out means to defend themselves in the event of the odd black sheep daring to rear his head and take the matter to court.

Compare any Indian workplace to one of international standards and it will clearly emerge that the ‘international standards’ we follow belong to the international community of some planet that is closer to hell than to planet earth.

Clearly, only one conclusion can be drawn from the contents of this post: That i’m frustrated with the work place and need a break, or rather, i need a career change; or a change of employer.

Review Series #3 - Singers (Part 1 : 10 to 6)

2011-02-14T23:45:00.000+05:30

2010 is over and everyone is done going through others’ ‘Best of…’ lists. Looking to fill the gap till all you list-lovers will have to wait out till the end of 2011, I’ve started bringing out my own lists. Lists of lists, list upon lists, and then some. Yeah, you get the point, but this has to start somewhere, and here’s that ‘somewhere’.

This is a list of the ten best singing voices that I’ve listened to in my twenty three trips round the sun. (please be aware that this list is subjective, you may or may not agree with my choices here. This is also not based on the number of octaves that a singer can sing in, this is based on the power that a singer has in his or her voice. This list is also subject to the presence or absence of a singer/band on my playlist. If you have any comment about the order or the presence or absence of someone that you like, please do drop me a line)

10. Natalie Merchant – 10,000 Maniacs. Yes, that may be the weirdest name for a band that anyone has come up since the ‘Sex Pistols’ but this woman has a voice that’s hauntingly memorable. You Must Listen to : Because the Nights and These are Days, both available in two versions, the original and the MTV Unplugged one. You Must Listen because: of the Irish connection, both her parents are half Irish and that gives her one hell of a cool accent. I personally think that the sexiest accent that any woman can have is the Irish brogue.

9. Alison Sudol (a.k.a A Fine Frenzy) This is a woman who plays the piano and also sings and I think that the combination is very cool indeed. She’s been on the charts in at least six countries and for someone dubbed as an ‘alternative’ artist, that is commendable. Her songs have been featured on the film ‘Sleepwalking’ and also in the sitcom How I Met Your Mother. Considering that her moniker draws from Shakespeare and that she’s been featured as one of VH1’s ‘You Oughta Know’ artists, this is one woman whose voice you should allow to sing you to sleep. Highly recommended listening. You Must Listen to: Almost Lover & Think of You. You Must Listen Because: of the piano bit and also because of the ethereal feel of most of her songs, and did I mention the depth of her voice?

8. Brian Johnson – AC/DC – Yeah, this man is the English frontman of an Australian band and he’s electrifying. The lead singer of the favourite band of any electrician and also a Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame inductee, sent his first record as replacement singer for Bon Scott, to second in the list of all time bestselling albums; such was his impact. His voice is acerbic and yet melodramatic, bitter yet understandable. The perfect voice to Angus Young’s tone, and at 60+ the man has enough energy to hang from a bell during a live concert. Yes, you’d have to be crazy to not have listened to at least one of AC\DC’s simply constructed yet effective songs. You must listen because: This is the perfect heavy metal voice, distorted yet legible enough to be understood. You Must Listen to : Hells Bells, Highway to Hell, War Machine and You Shook Me all Night Long.

7. Tom Araya & James Hetfield– Slayer & Metallica resply. – Need I say anything more about the two front men of two bands out of the Big Four of Thrash metal? One’s a nut and the other’s a nut who lost his voice some years ago. Yes, there’s nothing more to be said about them other than you’ve missed a lot if you’ve never listened to either. Both rarely use rhyme in their singing but you hardly ever notice that, all that hits you is the power, the raw power almost like eloquent cavemen. You Must Listen Because : Hell yeah they’re cool and they both play guitar. And they are wild enough to raise hell wherever they go. And one of them is part of a band that’s credited with putting out one of the heaviest records of all time. You Must Listen to: Angel of Death (Slayer), Reign in Blood (Slayer), Jihad (Slayer), Master of Puppets, The Day That Never Comes, The Judas Kiss, My Apocalypse, Enter Sandman, Fade to Black, Nothing Else Matters… I could go on…

6. Elvis Presley – Solo Artist – The King of Rock ‘n Roll needs no introduction. With a voice that could make female hearts turn to pudding and a name to match, he was nothing better than the king, but sadly not king enough to make it to number one on this list. His eyes, his hair and his dancing, they were all great and even greater were his songs The man served in the arms, met Nixon and though he died in August 1977, sightings of ‘The King’ are not uncommon to this day. You Must Listen Because: The voice, is simply that of a king, deep and rich, like dark chocolate. You Must Listen to: I won’t help you here. Ask your parents of grandparents, if you’re young enough.

Site Rules: One to Six

2011-01-26T14:53:00.003+05:30

The Rules

The following are not commandments of any sort, nor are they meant to make any sense to the majority of the junta. They’re just general occurrences at the work place, more the norm than the exception.

1. Periodically, you will be asked to comment on the progress of work which you know nothing about. A simple analogy would be asking a member of the UN Peacekeeping force in Darfur about the present activities of Hamas. The comments you make, of course, will become legally binding on you and you can and, inevitably, will be held responsible in the event of you making a mistake.

2. The concept of the site ‘Dog’ is very interesting. Every construction site has a resident group of canines that look after the security of material at their site and also keep out invaders. It is the job of these dogs to piss on everything and everyone in a gesture of marking their territory. Site dogs can also be people who scavenge at nearby sites for material that can be used at theirs.

3. You know that you’ve been ‘site-ed’ when:

a. You look at piles of stones on the street and think “Damn civil work”.

b. You look at a stray cable drum and think “Damn, I could use that cable”.

c. You see a metal plate on the road and the first thing that comes to mind is ‘shims’.

d. You see a large pipe and you think “ I’d like to live in that”.

4. In the beginning there was the word, and the word was God, and the word was with God. Now at site, that becomes: In the beginning was the Word, and the word was with Cat and the word was Cat.

5. You tell your boss that you were holding the last pair of hooters in your hands and that there were none left. And you do so with a straight face.

6. The following acronyms make sense to you: FPR, FQP, QAP,GCB, HRSG, GTG, STG, MRM, DPR, PCC, RCC and C-Off. No, the last one is not an expletive, it actually makes sense to those who are site-ed and is like elixir at site.

If you are completely confused by the above, you are normal.

If, on the other hand, all of that made sense, you have been site-ed.

Go see a shrink.

ER.

Review - Tees Maar Khan

2010-12-26T00:49:00.000+05:30

The following is not meant to be remembered as an action that I did, or as something I want people to remember about me. What I did is akin to visiting a brothel, drinking in front of your boss, or talking about someone behind their back.

I did none of these things but I did agree to tag along with a group of friends who were going to see a new Hindi movie. I agreed to watch a Bollywood production; and that is like asking a doctor to inject your baby with the polio virus, or walking into a room filled with Ebola infected monkeys, right after taking your marital vows.

Yes, anything that comes out of Bollywood is vile, disgusting, and only fit for consumption by swine, simians, village idiots and all multicellular organisms, barring humans. For the discerning art critic, Bollywood is a sham, an industry woven around people’s ignorance and their willingness to buy into anything that someone on a screen tells them. In short, barring a few films, I hate anything and anyone that has anything to do with Bollywood.

The torture sequence in question, Tees Maar Khan, started off interestingly enough, with the opening credits being displayed in creatively placed locations on a cityscape, on the road signs, on the backs of trucks and so on. Only at the end of the opening sequence do you realise that it’s actually a mini cityscape with toy trains and tracks snaking around gyrating women.

The cast of the movie is impressive, to the informed that is –

· Akshay Khanna – A name I associate with one of the few Bollywood movies that I remember – Dil Chahta Hai

· Akshay Kumar – Retard

· Katrina Kaif – Accented Bimbo

· Salman Khan - Muscled Bandra resident

· Anil Kapoor – (Guest) – Ok, not a bad actor

· Vishal Dadlani (Music) – Ex. Pentagram, severely degraded now

With names like that, you would be impressed and would look forward to something worth watching, especially with all the hype around the much played Sheela ki Jawani number.

But you would be wrong.

And how.

The movie is a waste of whatever amount you pay to watch it.

Tees Maar Khan (TMK) is a big time thief who masquerades as a film producer. Akshay Khanna is a star burning with jealousy at the fact that Anil Kapoor has an Oscar to his credit. Katrina Kaif is the slutty, starry eyed fiancée of TMK who does little more that throw star tantrums. The rest of the cast are more or less non existent, and do not deserve a mention.

The only things I do remember are the mention of a director Manoj ‘Day’ Ramkumar, an obvious dig at M Night Shyamalan. Poor joke as not many people know the man.

And one more thing, the town of Dhulia, which apparently has a bank called ‘Bloody Angreez Bank’ and a dark forest haunted by a headless knight riding a live horse.

Dialogues – My ass farting would come up with better things to say than the scriptwriters.

Yes the Jawani number is there to be witnessed in it’s full glory, with the Kaif woman shaking everything she’s got.

Lame.

If it were possible to give a movie a negative rating, this would deserve a MINUS TEN.

And if not, I’d like to click the ‘Dislike’ button whenever anyone mentions this.

Watch only if you are completely misinformed, narrow minded retard who has never watched anything better, or if you’ve been living under a medium sized rock.

- Childer Robelle.

The 214th Merseyside Derby

2010-10-17T20:02:00.000+05:30

17^th August, 2010, 6:54 PM IST

The 214^th Merseyside Derby at Goodison Park has seen its first half end and Liverpool, considered one of the top four of English Premier League football, find themselves trailing by a single goal. Liverpool, going into this match placed at 18^th in the league, well inside the relegation zone, are in their first game under their new owners. And what a poor performance by the Reds in the first 45, with a powerful, 33^rd minute strike into the top of Reina’s net by the man from down under, Tim Cahill, being the worst of their worries. None of the passion that you’d normally associate with a Merseyside derby was on display from the Liverpool players with manager Hodgson choosing to play Torres as the lone man in front of goal, and was he lonely up there. Barring a lone header off a Joe Cole cross, the Spaniard had precious little to do with no one from the midfield providing him service. In stark contrast, the blue side of the Merseyside had plenty of passion and aggression, with crisp and quick passing that tested the Liverpool defence at several occasions. Chief among the Everton performers was Yukubu, the muscles from Africa, elbowing his way past almost everyone in the Reds’ back four. The first half was marked by an initial burst of aggression from both teams, with referee Howard handing out two yellow cards, one each to the two teams. His spirit of play, however was commendable, allowing play to go on for quite some time before pulling out his cards.

The second half started with Liverpool pressing for the equaliser before the tempo slowed down and Everton were back on top, dominating the midfield. Everton, then went two up through an Arteta strike into the Liverpool net from outside the penalty box. A rare position of luxury for Everton, as it now looked less and less likely that the Scousers would claw back into the match. Hodgson’s formation was clearly not working, as players like Maxi Rodrigues had an off day. Liverpool’s goal difference was now worse than Wolves, and they looked like finishing the day bottom of the table, their worst start to a season in 37 years. Surprisingly, no changes were made by the Liverpool manager till well after the hour mark when Ngog came on for Lucas. Still, the Everton defence was tight enough to reduce Liverpool to long range shots, most of which were blocked by defenders in Blue. The two Liverpool substitutes, Babel and Ngog failed to make any real impact on the match but they did inject some much needed aggression into the Liverpool attack, well into the late stages of the game. In the end, it finished Everton 2 – 0 Liverpool; a fierce and competitive game, with most of the better football coming from Everton, a tactical and technical victory for them and much introspection required for the Reds’, one off the bottom in the premier league.

Songs, Site and Sleaze.

2010-10-16T17:40:00.001+05:30

We are all bathroom singers, even the most astute and reclusive diplomats always have a song playing in their minds as they purge the day’s dirt from their bodies. I tend to think that the song you sing as you bathe is somehow reflective of your current state of mind. Though this argument has no rational or scientific basis, I somehow knew that something was going wrong with my mind, when I found myself singing ‘We wish you a merry Christmas’ followed by ‘Jack & Jill’ in the bath. Disturbing indeed, because this would be indicative of a shrinking mind, or rather, a shrunken mind able to shrink no more.

Those around me, presumably with more mental faculties, find themselves singing the songs from Robot, a rather stupidly titled, stupid film by a stupid actor. Yes, I said all that because I cannot see any reason why any sane director would allow a blur to pass off as a man running on the side of a train. A sage once told me that I’d be able to find camels in the arctic sooner that I’d be able to make sense of a Rajnikanth flick. I need all the luck I can get as far as that goes, unless, the Camel he was referring to is the cigarette brand.

Back to the subject of mental sanity, I’d like to introduce everyone to the concept of ‘site’. Site is a place, as you must have concluded, and you would be right. Just as all the laws of physics are broken in the space surrounding a black hole, all laws of logic and sense are broken at site. Site, is the beautiful term used by those in the engineering and construction business to describe that oasis of noise, their very own Garden of Eden, the place where you can do as you please, as long as nothing falls on you; it is nirvana for those who desire it and a mind numbingly boring place for those who do not. See, most construction sites are not in an already established urban agglomeration, they tend to be in places that have no facilities, what so ever. Like sub Saharan Africa, or the Malawi desert, or the Antarctic plains for instance. You are the warriors of the Empire, only now you do not salute Queen Elizabeth; you salute the CEO/CMD of your respective organisation. Yes, the sun never sets on Corporate-ania.

Site, is where time slows down for you, just as for man in a spaceship nearing a black hole, it moves as half the speed it normally does. The pyramids of Giza slow down time due to their immense mass and by extending that logic to the construction site, with the immense amount of concrete and other material that is being amassed at one place, you can begin to see my point. Site is where normal men, with normal orientations, suddenly start looking at dogs and animals in lecherous ways. It is where others take to talking to motors and transformers. The more mentally unstable start claiming mosquito infested rooms as their personal fiefs, and occasionally refuse to leave their confines for fear of an invasion in their absence.

It is also rumoured that when at site, you can see aliens in the sky, if you stare at a certain part of the sky long enough.

But site is also where people hope, where dreams are born, where that germ of an idea is allowed the thinking it needs to grow in to something bigger, site is where friendships are made and toes broken, it is where things move and where machinery meets man. Site is where it’s ok to be the mental age of a toddler and to suck your thumb as you hear machinery roar into life. Site, therefore is all things to all men.

Like the Volkswagen Golf.

It is not for the faint hearted and I would not recommend it to people who have spent their entire lives living in the confines of civilization. It’s a jungle out there, and the office is where the snakes are. Yet, the real Steve Irwins are not in an office, they’re at site, bringing urbanisation to the less fortunate and less economically capable.

Cheers from site!

All we know is... #1 (Pilot)

2010-09-21T20:01:00.002+05:30

Everyone, every band, every TV show worth its salt has a strange, masked, often unreal, character that they use as a pseudo-mascot of some sort. McDonald’s has Ronald, the 2004 Olympics had Athena Phevos, Iron Maiden has Eddie, Disturbed has the rather unimaginatively named ‘The Guy’, British motoring show Top Gear has The Stig and so on till you run out of storage space in your head for all of them. Basically, anything famous or that has to be seen by a lot of people and then forgotten (aka the Olympics) must have a mascot. And that mascot must be made to say witty things, like ‘Saturn is not as shapely as your bottom’ or ‘I’m Supporting Brazil. Are you?’. Cue drunken fist fight featuring the Albiceleste clad Argentines and the mascot along with a spattering of Englishmen and Dutch supporters, all wanting a piece of the action.

So, in the true Indian spirit of copying all things great (or buying them, AKA Ambani, Tata), I too have come up with my own mascot to mark anything and everything that happens in my life. I must say here, that not all the credit can be swallowed up by me. A fair proportion must me accredited to the South Indian Bengali, the man from Tamil Nadu who for some reason supports the Communist movement in Bengal. That last bit is my addition and I intend no harm to South Indians, the Tamils or Bengalis.

So without further adieu, I bring to you:

Some say that he can catch fish with his tongue;

And that he twitches his eyelids when bored.

All we know is, he’s called the Cat.

(I lifted that style from Top Gear, Clarkson in particular)

Yes, I give to you the Cat! The cat is short, pot bellied and can just vanish from sight when he pleases! The Cat is the coolest customer this side of an active volcano!

The Cat fears no one and nothing…

Except…

The lion! See it works like this. The Cat is duty bound to ‘Cat’ you at every opportunity he gets but you cannot lay a finger on the Cat; no he’s infallible. The only person who can ‘cat’ the ‘Cat’ is the lion.

If you are confused at the use of a word that can function solely as a noun according to the Queen’s dictionary, as a verb, in that last paragraph, let me put forward some definitions:

Cat – Proper noun – A real life person who can ‘cat’ you, usually senior to you in terms of knowledge and experience, worldly and otherwise. Usually an extreme irritant.

Cat – verb – To annoy with unreasonable demands whose very completion would invite a US led military attack, Apocalypse or at the very least, the ire of a lot of people. To be ‘catted’ is to have unreasonable demands placed before you for completion.

Disclaimer – Any resemblance to any people who are connected to me in some way is intentional. I do not mean harm but rather intend to make this an interesting look at life at a place i frequent daily.

Rebello's Axioms

2010-09-19T21:07:00.001+05:30

I’ve been working for a year and eight days as I write this and in the course of that one year, I’ve learnt quite a few things, the most meaningless of which are listed below. If you feel that you are somehow responsible for the inclusion of any of them, please do drop me a line.

1. If you are a connoisseur of fine dark chocolate and find that your serving of chocolate and wine at your neighbourhood bistro is late, send one of your men to Ghana or Bordeaux, depending on the urgency of your requirements, to expedite the growth of the cocoa beans and the grapes. Apparently, sitting next to the cocoa tree or the wine creeper will make them grow faster.

2. It is usually assumed that women make unreasonable demands. I’ve seen men do worse, grown men for God’s sake.

3. Tell an Indian that a book is beautifully written and he won’t bother to buy it. Tell him that he can learn something from it and he will.

4. When you’re taking a dump in the morning and you hear the phone ring, it will be someone from work. This is Rebello’s theorem. The corollary is that you will not be able to actually take the calls you want to.

5. Rock, metal, rap, pop (notice the progressive degradation in quality) are genres that the average Indian has not heard of; this can be attributed to the fact that most songs have lyrics in one language. If you were to include an English sentence, however inane, in a Hindi song, its cool (case in point – On the roof, in the rain, is a Hindi song. *bah*). If you swap the two languages in that previous sentence, it’s still true. (Case in point – Jay Sean, any song).

6. I was once told by the son of two fine doctors that surgeons are allowed to play any music they like while they are performing surgery. I’d recommend an album titled ‘Eaten Back to Life’ by Cannibal Corpse to be played during open heart surgery.

7. If you plan to live in a new city with someone that you know and are comfortable with, it will so happen that both of you will never be in the same city at the same time. You will, however, meet in the city you first met. This is a special case of Murphy’s Law.

8. People will hit on your friends. All your friends will have better halves. You will continue to remain just a half.

9. The probability of a dimension or detail being omitted from a drawing is directly proportional to its importance. This will also be the one thing that your customer will demand to know immediately.

10. Late at night, when you’re bored, have work to do and when there’s no one around in office, you will have an urge to go to the loo. It will be at this time that you walk into the women’s loo.

Several people are responsible for the above, including but not limited to The Cat, The South Indian Bengali, Socks, God, Gopal, K and the Mirror Guy among others.

-Eldrich

Review - Music - Lamb of God - Sacrament - Track #1

2010-09-08T22:43:00.002+05:30

Sacrament - Track #1 - Walk With Me in Hell

I’ve never done a ‘song’ review before nor have I done much work in the album review front, my only effort being a rather lame, or so I think, review of Megadeth’s ’09 album United Abominations. Here, I’ll be giving you my take on a rather controversial sounding song by a controversially named American band from Virginia. Rather deceptive, that name, if you take it apart.

I’ll be saying dirty things about –

a) Walk With Me in Hell – from Sacrament (track no. 1, 2006 – Epic Records)

This track is from the Grammy nominated ’06 release by the Richmond boys, Sacrament, their fifth studio album. ‘Redneck’ from Sacrament was nominated for the Grammy awards on 2007 only to lose to ‘Eyes of the Insane’ by Slayer.

Lamb of God, i must mention here, were initially considering calling themselves Burn the Priest. The constant references to doing bad things to the church or in the darker sides of Christianity is disturbing to say the least, but i will ignore these issues for the purposes of this review.

Walk with Me in Hell, though, diabolically titled, features surprisingly few satanic references in the lyrics. According to the band, the lyrics refer to the fall of co-dependency with slight references to Dante’s Inferno. The song opens with a melancholic yet crushing riff juxtaposed with drummer Chris Adler’s machine gun style double bass and continually pounding cymbals. Blythe keeps chanting something about breathe as the song opens up just before the first verse. Blythe, I must mention sounds like he just regurgitated a whole pile of rusted nails and razor blades.

The myth of a meaning, so lost and forgotten

The guitar riffs are acidic enough to dissolve titanium, yet not good enough to mark the diamonds of the guitar world.

The solos too are spot on with the overall theme of the song, dark and effusive yet somehow the squeals remind me of Pantera. Not too long, tight but the palm muting could have been better in spots. Typical powerful LoG, but nothing that will separate the song from the crowd of metalcore acts out there.

Over all, a very likeable song that grows on you after a few listens; loud enough to bring those who have died under a month ago yet not heavy enough to raise Hitler.

Homo Cellphone-ictus

2010-09-07T00:46:00.000+05:30

If you were to be a two pronged alien or a twin antennae-ed cockroach, you would be dumbfounded by some of the choices the average human has to make; that is if aliens and roaches can feel dumbfounded. The average human has to decide which brand of toothpaste to use, what car to drive, whether or not to supercharge his car, what shirt to wear, what water to drink and so on. If, on the other hand, you happen to be an alien, or a cockroach or a monkey on a tree in India, you simply do what your body tells you to and go forage for another planet to invade, or a kitchen sink to infect or find another balcony to take a dump in. It really is that simple when your brain can see no further than your next meal. You couldn’t be bothered with where you’d find the next intergalactic fuel station to top up your uranium or be bothered with where you’d be taking your next dump. You just do these things.

Take another human activity, buying a cell phone, for instance. It has become insanely complicated. Go to the average store and you’re bombarded with a smorgasbord of clam shells, candy bars, flip phones, sliders, touch screens, smart phones dumb phones, cat phones, Androids, iPhones, YouPhones, MePhones, hell, you’d confuse Einstein! There’s enough strange-sounding variety out there to keep the average Frenchman satiated.

Pardon, monsieur, Would you like that clam shell flipped with a grating of a candy bar or a hint of smart?

This dilemma came to light when rather recently, I decided to go hunting for a phone that would suit my needs, and not the needs of some hypothetical consumer that the phone companies have in mind. My needs were simple, small phone, thin phone, few keys, colour screen, GPS for the big bad Indian countryside and an internet browser; Standard issue on most phones these days except for the issue that most phone manufacturers also add a lot of other rubbish to the package, just to raise the price. For the love of God in heaven, why would I want a million megapixel camera in my phone, or why would I want a phone in my camera? The argument of most is ‘convenience’, one device, two functions. This is my answer.

Would I like dinner with breakfast or my breakfast with dinner? Neither, they’re two completely separate things, best enjoyed apart.

Can you imagine the following going through the head of someone like Atul Kasbekar, the renowned fashion photographer?

I’ve just taken a rather nice picture of that banayan tree, what shall I do with the image?

I know, I’ll just upload the 90 MB RAW image on Facebook and let all my mates know.

(for the uninitiated, a RAW image is what the average SLR, a decent camera, would produce instead of the compressed JPEG’s that most point and shoot cameras do)

That would be akin to killing a phone with a Nikon and a shaky hand, or killing a Nikon with a Sony-Erricson and a hand that belonged to an Eskimo. It’s killing two birds with one camera, or phone, depending on how you see it.

Again, why would I want a 32’ AMOLED screen to fit in my pocket? I’d just go and buy a television and mount it on my wall if I wanted to watch movies or be entertained.

If I wanted PS3 like graphics, I’d go get a PS3, not a Nokia X3 or whatever it’s called. If I had enough of those, I could build an igloo. Imagine that, an igloo that kept out the rain, allowed me to talk to thirty different people at the same time, and also came with a bunch of little screens that allowed me to watch the telly. Cool, eh, the things you can do with the average phone these days.

But, no, being me, I had to have what I wanted. I wanted a small phone that dids a few tricks, like a daschund that jumps through the letter hole in my door, not a lion that gets its paws burnt trying to jump through a flaming hoop. Sadly, the days of simple phones that look like the letter E with the middle line missing are over. No one wants a phone just to be a phone anymore. They want it to do magic tricks too but sadly the problem with that is like magic’s most famous trick, the disappearing act, the Houdini. Your phone is also a Houdini, it comes factory made with a sliver of the great escape artists soul embedded inside. Go to a railway station or bend over too far and Hey Presto! Your little device is gone until you find out what the magic words are or are able to get it back with a sleight of hand.

Coming back to the subject at hand, or rather in hand, phones have become so complicated that for the average man, deciding on which one to buy takes about as long as it does the phone companies to churn out a new model. By which time the one you want will become obsolete and will have been buried in a grave yard in a remote church and you will have to start the process all over again.

Which would make you tear your hair out in frustration which will then result in raw material for faster and stronger communication channels for the newer models which will enable them to survive the flinging at walls and stomping-ons that you will subject them to when they don’t work.

There are phones for women, for businessmen, for executives, for grocers, for farmers, for accountants, for kids, for the YouTube generation, for old people, for nuts; heck there might even be a phone for God! But sadly, there are no phones for the simple mobile phone users who want their phones to work, and do what they want, when they want it.

You might eat your candy bar if you’re hungry, your clam shell might contain some oil slick from the Exxon Valdez, your slider might just slide off into another dimension and your flip phone may slam shut and bite your ear off. Hell, it’s scary.

Only one phone met my criteria for ‘my’ phone and a friend is now considering buying it because he’s become disillusioned by all the iPhone clones out there and also because he needs it, or so he claims. If you want an iPhone, save enough money and buy one. Don’t buy a HTCPhone or a SamPhone, they’re rubbish. If you’ve ever used an Apple made touch interface, you’ll agree with me; if you haven’t, try rubbing your finger against your eyeball. Did your eyelid slam shut instantly? Now, imagine if you had to press your eyeball to within millimetres of causing blindness for your eyelid to shoo your finger away. That’s the difference between Apple and pretty much everything out there.

My solution to this problem : Buy an old Alcatel or Erricson phone. They’re only phones and not much else. Nothing else, no other problems.

Cheers!

BlackGovernment.

2010-08-29T16:51:00.003+05:30

I do not normally comment on government decisions or any of the ruckus that normally happens when the house is in session, I mean come on, one MP throwing a chair at another doesn’t harm me, does it? But this issue seems to be going too far.

The Saudi’s, Indonesia, the UAE government and now us, all while the Lebanese are thinking about going down that road. What could have got my attention?

As soon as you step into the technology space, you get my attention. The Government of India has , of late, been stirring up quite a ruckus with RIM (Research in Motion) the Canadian makers of the ubiquitous BlackBerry, the one device that you will see in any corporate board room. RIM were the pioneers of mobile email services with their push mail feature that allowed even the busiest executives stay in touch with their inboxes.

The government cannot get access to the corporate messages that BB users send across the cellular network in India because the server is located in another country. Our solution, move the servers here or give us the decryption algorithms. That’s like tying to moon to the earth so some people can always see it. Think about that for a second, enterprise emails and messenger would be the most widely used services by any corporate user. Would banning both these because the powers that be cannot access their encrypted contents be a solution?

Strangely, most telecom operators have backed the government in its stance and that seems to have riled the top brass as RIM, with co-CEO Michael Lazaridis launching into a tirade at India. RIM are facing a ban on services to almost a million Indian users and they concern is understandable.

The Chinese and Russian agencies, it seems, can already access BlackBerry’s heavily encrypted corporate email services, and therefore can read any email that they deem to be detrimental to national security. India wants the same level of access to the BlackBerry service in India, because of a ‘fear’ of misuse by militants. Oh come on, for the love of God, which gun toting militant would have a BlackBerry in the other?

Dude with gun, into his BlackBerry: ‘Dude, one a clock, let’s take down Parliament. In Toronto.’

Other Dude: ‘Yeah, I’m locked and loaded. Just a pint of beer and let’s take it down’.

Believe me, there is a bar called ‘Parliament’ in Toronto. Google it.

That would constitute a threat to Janpath only if terrorists now refer to Delhi as Toronto. And if pigs could wield knives and cook their own stew.

OK, if encryption is disturbing the governments, we might as well send letters without envelopes, send SMS messages on building walls and print newspapers on the streets. Heck , if you use a piece of paper with holes in the right places, you can read all sorts of messages in the average newspaper. Aliens? Are you going to put the blame on them?

Considering the issues that this country is facing, raising concern over issues like BlackBerry’s encryption seems farcical at best.

If you want secure communication, and are a terrorist, would you really use a BlackBerry? Or does the government want to know what the Birlas, Ambani’s and Hiranandani’s are thinking behind those closed doors? Are their press releases not enough for the tax authorities? Is that really it?

Or is this a cleverly timed act to draw public attention away from the Commonwealth Games debacle-in-waiting?

We can wait and watch at best. Or Encrypt our thought. Unless Delhi want the code to that too.

ER. The serious version.

It's out in the open.

2010-08-16T22:53:00.002+05:30

Dear Diary,

This is a very confusing time for me. I live under the impression that I have no one to confide in because deem no one that I know, worthy of being confided in. The fact that I know that I live under this ‘impression’ reeks of narcissism and also speaks volumes about my present mental state. I know that I want to talk to people but self restraint and my overall lack of trust in the human race stops me from making any progress. At best, the only thing that increases in my world is the distance between me and the people I call my friends.

I also know that I’m capable of doing a lot of things, new things and things that I already do, but can do better. Other people also recognise this and the fact that so many of them speak out about it just drives me up the wall. There was once a time when I loved large gatherings of people, it became a place to swap tales and learn about new things; now I despise crowds and parties. Anything new and not tested before scares me. I know that I take music seriously but something keeps my finger on the ‘next’ button whenever an unfamiliar song comes up on my iPod.

I love people but I refuse to acknowledge that. For some twisted reason that even I cannot understand, I am unable to answer that question. I seek more, but of what I know not. I see myself as an amalgamation of people whose qualities I secretly admire, but on the sly and whose presence I will not acknowledge. I want, but do not know why. I want to proofread this post before I post it but I know that I’ll do that later, after it’s up on my blog and will then be too lazy to make any changes.

The monsoon is on, it was my favourite season until this year when, again, for a reason I do knot know, I despise the rain.

Meeting people just leaves me more confused any cynical than I was before. Maybe I need a change of season or a change of scene.

Or maybe I just need to worry less and get on with things more.

Che. We’ll see.

PS – Heard on the phone: ‘Architecture is manipulation of man’s surroundings’.

Disturbing Similies

2010-08-02T22:54:00.000+05:30

Assorted Similes:

Definition: A figure of speech that expresses a resemblance between things of different kinds (usually formed with 'like' or 'as')

I will now proceed to say very disturbing things about some of my favourite bands:

1. Dave Mustaine (Megadeth) sounds like a cockroach being strangled.

2. James Hetfield sounds like a dinosaur on cocaine.

3. When you listen to Mick Thompson’s guitar tone, what comes to mind is the blades of a jet engine gnashing against the front teeth of a snake.

4. James Shaffer’s (Korn) guitar makes a sound very similar to a huge Parle-G biscuit being broken above a trampoline.

Now because I’m not in the mood, I cannot come up with anything better. Wait for more.

Review Series #2 – Products The Nokia C5-00

2010-08-02T21:25:00.001+05:30

Review Series #2 – Products

The Nokia C5-00

In this new review series, I shall be reviewing some of the gadgets and other things that I use as I chug along the line of life. To begin with, I’ll be reviewing my latest acquisition, a mobile phone, the Nokia C5-00.

The C5 is part of Nokia’s new C series of cellphones targeted at the price conscious consumer. Here, I am assuming that the C stands for cheap, or crummy, or cheesy or another such word that starts with the third letter of the English alphabet. The phone is pretty basic in appearance, it’s a candy-bar design, with no million megapixel camera to boot. Nokia were obviously working hard on the price when they were designing this phone. The camera itself is pretty basic, at 3.2 MP with no autofocus, a simple LED flash and basic image capture capabilities, it will suffice for daily use. The cameras location is also not prominent though clearly visible. The overall finish of the phone itself is very classy and both colour options available exude quality with the metal rim running along the edge looking very nice indeed. The phone feels very good in the hand, and though its bulk is substantial, its dimensions make up for that. It actually feels like an expensive paperweight. The screen is large though it won’t be giving the 60’ LG plasma screen a run for its money any time soon. It’s readable and gets the job done on the whole though visibility in sunlight is a bit of a problem. The keys are nice and big and comfortable to use, specially for people who tend to be sloppy in their key presses. A relief, compared to some other phones that I was looking at. Note that the microphone is embedded in the keypad and the person you are calling may not hear you if you are a Sumo wrestler or have very fleshy cheeks. A front facing camera is also provided, so you can comb your hair when you’re stuck in a place away from civilization.

What it’s like to live with:

Surprisingly good, due in large part to the dimensions and weight but the features also go a long way in helping to make your life easier. The call quality is excellent, even in some of the worst network conditions available to the average human, it hardly dropped a call. It feels very nice in your pocket, when you can feel it, that is. As far as the applications go, the integration with the social networking world is great. Once you connect to Facebook or Friendster or MySpace (the default apps), display images of your contacts are integrated with the phonebook on your phone. Would you believe that? As far as the internet applications go, the browser works great, though there are minor page issues with loading and rendering. Flash, Acrobat and MobileOffice are pre-installed, so you’re good to go with most attachments. The Gmail app also works great, loading messages in a jiffy. There’s even a feed reader! On the whole, it seems that there’s pretty much nothing left out with little more that the average person would need for daily use.

The included GPS receiver is what really made my buy this phone, having chanced upon it while using the features filter on the Nokia site. It is simply brilliant with a lifetime subscription for turn by turn navigation and preloaded maps of all major cities of India. If you get lost now, you’ve either left your phone at home, happen to be on another planet or are a pillock.

The phone is very useable and not something that’ll frustrate the hell out of you. One of the main reasons that I picked this phone was the price. At 8000/-, you couldn’t ask for much more. It is miles ahead of the bricks that Nokia pass off as cell phones, and way classier too. I had a long, hard look at some of the other touch screen phone in the market like the Nokia 5235 and some other XpressMusic phones but the sheer frustration of having to live with something that you have to continually bang to make work put me off. As someone once said, ‘Once you’ve used the iPod Touch’s interface, you expect everything to be like that’. Nokia’s touchscreen phones are irritating and are much too thick and large to be called phones. And in the 8K price band, all you’d get would be the screen of the iPhone. That was definitely not on my radar. Samsung and LG do have some cheap touch screen phones but really, they’d be more like the kind of things that you’d give to a kid who hadn’t ever used a phone. Literally, resistive touch technology sucks che. Note here, that the only phones I’ve ever used have been Nokia models. I cannot use anything else.

The Verdict:

If you’re on a budget, don’t have a rich uncle who’ll buy you an iPhone, don’t like touchable tackiness and want the reliability of a Nokia, buy it.

It’s worth every rupee.

Please Don't Kill Me.

2010-07-20T22:53:00.003+05:30

Today’s headlines in the Times of India, Bombay (yes, I’m stubborn):

Sena warns banks to write names in Marathi

Why? What is Marathi signage going to achieve? Scare away more potential investors from what is supposed to be India’s financial capital and undoubtedly one of its best cities?

Probably, yes.

What does a show of your culture really get you? It’s a matter of pride being from Maharashtra and I take legitimate pride in that but I do not enforce my culture and thinking on a guest in my city, and I must make a point here, this city you speak of, Urbs Primis, Maximim City, Bombay, belongs more to me than to anyone in the Sens. I may get flocked for pointing this out, but I’m East Indian, a descendant of the initial inhabitants of Bombay. I have no concrete figures or data but it’d be reasonably safe to assume that few or none of the people in the Sena are EI’s. This city is mine, yes it belongs to me by virtue of inheritance. It does not belong to anyone from outside the municipal limits of Greater Bombay. People from Akola have Akola to call home though they consider Bombay their residence for now. Same goes for people from Jalgaon, Vidarbha, Nasik, Pune or anywhere in Marathwada. What about me? Where is home for me? A flat in a distant suburb? Really? In the city that I call my own, it is sad to think that ‘outsiders’ have taken it over while my entire community sits as mute spectators.

Will getting banks to put up Marathi signage help anyone?

Will Marathi directions help anyone except those who can speak the language?

Will this really benefit anyone?

I leave that to you to answer.

South Trip

2010-07-13T17:15:00.002+05:30

The Trip Down South

Part Two of Ten – The Bangalore Bang

Forward Journey Log 2.b. (About the City)- Sunday – 4^th January ‘09

The next morning had quite a lot of promise in store for people with nothing better to do. But before getting to the morning of any day, you have to pass through the previous night. And boy, did things happen during that night. Certain member of our troupe don’t care much about sleeping and really make fourty winks seem like a couple of decades, these were the nocturnal, those who do their bidding by night. These chaps found a way to dial into adjacent rooms using the hotel’s phone network and used that as a means to put a stop to whatever we were doing in dreamland. I, too had my dream of prancing horses interjected by the ringing of the phone, which I happened to be sleeping next to. I heard something about someone, and when presented with the choice of listening on or returning to my prancing horse, I chose the latter. Other things too transpired during that night, from people jumping out from behind the hotel sofas and scaring the wrong persons to the hotel manager being woken by other guests who were bugged by the incessant racket that we were creating.

The morning, being a Sunday, I headed off to find a Roman Catholic Church and not finding one, I settled for a ‘church’ where I had no idea what was going on. None the less, I said my prayers and left. I was also supposed to go visit a temple, as part of my Indianisation course, but that did not come to pass. Besides that, i also got to hear a story about a little girl who wrote letters to God, from a little girl and that was entertaining, if not anything else. Oh yes, then came the part that set a lot of tongues wagging, and just to put a leash on them, I’ll narrate what happened bus skip the details.

Most people here, decided to take a tour of the city on this bus but since I like to explore the city at my own pace, I opted not to go. The tour covered the Bangalore Palace, the ISKON temple and other landmarks. Only four people decided not to go – Parth, Archana, Pranav and me (South Indian, South Indian, Maharashtrian, Maharashtrian). Parth was visiting family and Pranav was doing likewise. You can now figure for yourself why tongues were wagging.

This is what happened. Me and Ms Muffet first went to get food into our stomachs, a very small one and a substantially larger one, at the same dosa joint next to our hotel. That done with, we walked along MG Road, towards, some place, I don’t know where. The first stop was the Cottage and Village Industries store which, sadly, closed at 2 PM, which meant that we would have to leave before then. That store I liked, no I loved, because I have this ‘thing’ for artefacts and collectibles. Ms Muffet went along on her own, looking at things I did not care for, like earrings, earrings, earrings, sarees, sarees, earrings, shoes, shoes, earrings, sarees and well, you get the drift. Then came the best part; earrings. I have never gone shopping with anyone who spends an hour staring at a mirror reflection of their face with a little something dangling from the ear lobe. Now I know why the attendants of jewellery shops are usually women with mirrors. Vanity. I’m not saying anything here, it’s just a conclusion that I’ve drawn.

I didn’t have much else to do besides sit on the stool and stare at rocks set in metal with loops meant to pierce the flesh on the top. Painful, the lacerations required to dangle rocks from your ears, me thinks. I also now know why the section that had the earrings was enclosed and soundproofed. No, it’s not to prevent theft, it, in fact, is to drown out the cries of anguish of men losing their minds and falling to the floor in frustration. These noises must not reach the ears of other shoppers who would then proceed to leave the shop.

I did buy something, but only because the colour reminded me of a parrot. Parrots can talk for hours without anyone around or anyone asking them to. See where this is going?

After that, there were free drinks, milk drinks, just so you know, free snacks and a free walk down a very picturesque road in Bangalore. Then came the killer. Parth joined us together, we took on the assault of women, saree shopping. We went to this store, called Nandini where the staff are smart. The seats there are meant for the men who are served complimentary drinks like tea, coffee and orange juice. If the trip wears on, you might even be given a free meal, while someone nearby asks questions like ‘Is this colour ok?’ or ‘Do I look good in this?’, to which the men pay scant attention. This is exactly what happened and after an hour and a half of absent minded conversation, I looked up and saw five sales girls standing under the halogen lights, glowing smiles on, sarees on their shoulders and one woman staring at them alternately. This went on for some time till me and Parth decided to go check out the ‘toy’ section where there were small cars and more entertainment. When the woman in concern saw this, she left the shop and we did likewise, only to repeat the whole fiasco at another store that did NOT have a ‘toy’ section!

What were we to do besides use each other for company? I decided to take a break and sit outside the nearest bank in the hope that salvation would reach me. It did not.

At the end of this, two men were loaded with shopping bags like beasts of burden being led on by their master, who had just been had by one of her own kind. See the pictures below for before and after shots.

(at left, Before, she'd been had)

(at right, After, Still had)

Then came the best part of the evening – FREE FOOD! Yes, I took free food from a woman, yet again. How cool is that? And it’s not very hard; I can assure you of that. And even though the food wasn’t that great, the company and the telly more than made up for it. All this was transpiring while the rest of the crowd was at some disco, doing the disco.

And that was the point where we bid adieu to Mallya-Land; the coolest place this side of the Godavari.

Cheers!

That was day two in Bangalore. The next day was not in Bangalore, it was someplace else.

Football, controversial things and Music.

2010-07-11T17:25:00.001+05:30

The following post may ruffle your feathers if you are :

a) A die hard football freak

b) A nationalist

c) A hardliner

d) A staunch religious

I have been watching the 2010 Fifa World Cup in South Africa, since the first match of the Round of 16 between Uruguay and South Korea and the only reason I was kept watching was because Argentina were still playing. Once they were bludgeoned out by the nation that makes the BMW, I started saying very disturbing things about the remaining nations. Like the following:

1) Germany is a nation of Devil worshippers. You can deduce this from the colours on their jerseys. Incidentally, the only person to have noticed this was me. Germany also turned the English into a nation who believed that the goal line behaved such that any time the ball was put into the net by an Englishman, the goal line moved behind the net and the goal was discounted. The conclusion of all this is that I do not like the Germans.

2) Spain is a nation that flings tomatoes at bulls and risks human lives trying to get tomatoes off the bull, just for fun. When they play football, it’s like their boots all have little bull-horns on the bottom that can cause serious skin lacerations. To the Spanish, the World Cup was in India and they demanded saffron in the Cape of Good Hope. They also scared a lot of salmon on their way there.

3) The Dutch are always high on cocaine or weed or sunflower oil or nitrogen or helium or cat fur or Dettol or silica gel before playing any of their matches. In their minds, there are a million balls on the pitch and deciding which one to kick is a difficult choice to make, which would explain why a certain Mark van Bommell always kicks other players shins and groins and chests and hands. He sees footballs everywhere.

4) Uruguay, well they’re too much like India and since I love India, I won’t say anything about Uruguay except, well done for a nation of four million. Two neighbours, each with populations in excess of a billion each cannot send a team to the world cup.

Now, let’s move on to more interesting things like the music that I’ve been listening to. It starts with Audioslave, now disbanded but hugely popular during their heyday in 02 – 06.

Their last album was Revelations, in 2007, peaking at number 2 on the Billboard 200.

I’ve become strangely hooked to one of their songs; I am the Highway, a typical Soundgarden – RATM type number. I must mention here, that each time I listen to that song, this mental picture forms in my head, of a tomato singing. By saying that, I am alluding, albeit very indirectly, and now rather bluntly, to the fact that I think that Chris Cornell’s voice would sound very good of the visual was one of a ripe, juicy, red tomato singing.

Another band whose music I’ve been exploring of late is that of the LA based Megadeth, one of the Big Four of Thrash Metal. The album that I’ve got is 2007’s United Abominations, a politically influenced compilation of digs at the then Bush administration. United Abominations was well received by critics and I too, loved it, but not initially; most songs were much to vicious or loud for my taste. I started with A Toute le Monde (Set Me Free) a duet featuring Christina Scabbia (of Lacuna Coil fame). The song is a re re cording of the suicide themed nunmber on Youthanasia, and personally, seems much better with Scabbia’s contralto voice. Another track that caught my attention was Washington is Next, both lyrically and technically, the guitar soloing is spot on and the rhythms breathe fire into a song waiting to bite.

Other notable tracks are You’re Dead, Amerikastan and Gears of War, also featured on the game of the same name. All songs, with the exception of Never Walk Alone…a Call to Arms are written by Mustaine alone, with the latter being a collaboration with Gren Drover, the band’s other guitarist.

Overall, an album you must buy, if you can still find it in stores.

-Elda

PS – More music reviews coming up. Also coming up, the end of the South Trip Series, more on the Review Series, and the fiery conculsion to the laptop series! Tying up loose ends!

Review Series #2 - iOS 4

2010-06-28T22:37:00.003+05:30

iOS 4 – The Updated iPod OS – A Travellers Review

I bought a 16 GB second generation iPod touch in late 2009 primarily because I wanted an mp3 player and a snazzy one at that. I didn’t disappoint. The interface was flawlessly cool, the response was like gliding your finger over water in real time and iTunes, well, the less said the better. But the audio quality more than made up for that. Amazing buy, and coming from a miser like me, it must be worth your money. It was.

Then Apple released OS 3, the update for the devices firmware that added some much needed features like the ability to copy and paste text, the software support for the Bluetooth hardware and a couple of other tweaks like the in device search capability. Generally well received but the price, sucked, to keep it short. Apple had us again.

To atone for their sins, Apple released the iOS4 update free of charge for all iPod Touch users, except for the first generation devices. The Apple website declared that the update would include the ability to multi task, changeable home screen wallpapers, and all of the OS3 updates, for free! I took the bait and downloaded it. Here’s the result of three days of living with it

I. The Speed: It sucks. Song changes on the original 2.2.1 OS that I had, were almost instantaneous. Here, there’s a noticeable period where the last portion of the track playing, sort of hangs before the next song comes on. Sometimes, the display doesn’t even update the title of the song playing, sticking to the previous one. And when the device is locked and you bring up the controls, you have no idea whether the key ‘press’ has even been registered. It’s annoying.

II. The Appearance: The icons have been revamped and the transitions for the home screen icons are new. At least for me, they may have been this way on OS3. But what use is any of that? Ok, the folders capability is useful, but when you have a screen full of little boxes with icons that you need a magnifying glass to see, it’s not. The keyboard and the overall font sizes, appear smaller for some reason.

III. The Music: Same quality: good. You can now create playlists: Good. When you bring up the tracks for one particular album, you see a little thumbnail of the album art on top: Good. Song changes: suck. Songs also take appreciable longer to start playing. Sucks, again. Double tapping on the album art, when a song was playing would bring up the album track listing along with the rating pane, where you could assign a rating of one to five stars. Now, doing that same action takes longer to register and you’re left confused whether you did the right thing or not. Sucks. Song seeking now has the variable scrubbing rate feature. Good. Also, now you can load the genius mixes from your computer on to the playlists, and there’s even a separate menu for that. Great.

IV. The Apps: Yes! They all work! And even some that didn’t before now do! Yaay! Great!

V. Overall: It’s free. Download it. Hope the music issues get fixed soon. That’s what the iPod is for.

My Recommendation: if your internet connection is free and unlimited, go for it!

The Real Elda's Playlist

2010-06-21T22:24:00.002+05:30

I’ve been analysing the music I listen to and I’ve done some number crunching with Excel, the results of which were rather surprising. Below are some of the more shocking findings:

Figure 1: Sample of the Top 10 genres in my playlist _{(percentages are
relative to this sample, not the whole list)}

Finding One:

I have fervently maintained that Pop music is only for gay men and people who shave their armpits. Five percent of my playlist consists of pop music. And I have indexed 5015 songs. That’s well over two hundred songs. Multiply that by an average of 4 minutes per song and that comes out to a staggering 16 and half hours of music to shave armpits to. God knows how many could be done in that time.

And from the graph, you can clearly see that I’m not much of a metal head. I’m more of a soft person.

Finding Two:

The average song takes up roughly one megabyte of data storage space for every minute of audio, considering that you’re using MP3 encoding at 128 kbps. That’s 5 MB for a four and a half minute song. If you raise the bit rate to 192 kbps, that size works out to roughly 6 MB for the same song duration.

22.7 % of my music falls into the above category. This is correct, as I’ve given up on downloading any songs encoded at 128 kbps. I’ve been listening for too long to accept anything below 192 kbps, it’s just too painful.

Astonishingly, a rather large chunk of my music is from the old days, when 128 kbps was way too much because we all had dial up.

Figure 2: Breakup of the percentage of artists. Note that Old School Rock includes artists like Pantera, The Beatles, Led Zep et al.

Finding Three:

If you’re not a dirty Napster user or love to steal music, you’d go out to the store and buy an album and support your favourite artist. Now when you buy most music albums, there are one or two songs that you like listening to, the rest are barely bearable, unless you’re getting a ‘Greatest of’ collection or one of the ‘Best of the Year’ compilations. The few tracks you listen to will eventually be released as singles, be downloaded by millions and are usually buried somewhere in between the more mundane tracks.

7.97 per cent of all my tracks are listed as track number ONE on their respective albums. This I really cannot explain.

Finding Four:

I claim to be an Iron Maiden fan. Which means that by virtue of their similar styles, I should also listen to a lot of Judas Priest and maybe Deep Purple; look at the graph below.

Linkin Park, eh, from a Maiden fan. Stunning.

I am not all that I make myself out to be, now can these numbers lie? I think not.

Notes: 1] This playlist data was compiled using iTunes version 9.

2] Data was analysed using Microsoft Excel 2007.

3] Results are by no means conclusive.

4] Any damage or loss that occurs from use of this data cannot be attributed to me. If you decide to marry based on the above data and subsequently find out that none of my claims are true, you have only yourself to blame.

M/S God EPC Ltd.

2010-06-06T14:17:00.001+05:30

What if God was one of us (Joan Osborne)

If God was a Banker (Ravi Subramanian)

What if God were the Sun? (TV series directed by Stephen Tolken)

What if God was a coconut (random post on Yahoo! Answers)

What if God was a Consultant? (Eldrich Rebello, I Googled it)

Seriously, what if God appointed an EPC (Engineering, Procurement & Construction) contractor for the world?

To begin, let’s consider the following:

And God said, Let there be light: 2 Cor. 4.6 and there was light.
4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6 ¶ And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
8 And God called the firmament Heaven. 2 Pet. 3.5 And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9 ¶ And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
10 And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.
11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
13 And the evening and the morning were the third day.
14 ¶ And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
15 and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
18 and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
20 ¶ And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

What is all of that was just the contract document in summary? Let’s think about that for a second:

First, let’s assume that God floated tenders for the ‘Earth’. So what was God really, the owner, the consultant or the EPC contractor?

Now that’s a question that needs to be answered, starting with the EPC contractor, that’s not really possible, because he would have had to win the contract from someone, and that, by virtue of how these things work, would also imply that there was competition, other God like beings out there, which as a man believing in the Holy Trinity, I see as possible. The competition was Jesus and the Holy Ghost. Essentially, very confusing as that involves competing against yourself, you know the others weaknesses and strengths, which makes competing difficult.

About the first assumption there, I don’t see other God like beings wanting to have little planets of their own, you know, where you raise a civilisation and see what it does and what its inhabitants develop. No, God was not awarded the EPC contract; he simply drafted the tender document and invited interested parties. So God was definitely not the contractor. Scratch that off.

~~What if God was an EPC contractor.~~

Option two was God being a consultant. That could be possible, with one assumption, God was consulting himself, after all, since he knew it all, he needed no specialists from outside. So, the contract involved God consulting himself. That’s settles.

God was his own consultant.

Let’s briefly consider possibility one, that God was the owner. Now when you think about it, who owns the Earth? Us? No. We just take it on loan from our future generations. So that’s humans off the list. When you eliminate the being at the top of the food chain from the list of possible owners, that more or less eliminates the lesser endowed fauna. And earth definitely cannot belong to the plants or to hens or pigeons; they just wouldn’t know what to do with it. Can you really imagine Pigeons on the senate of Rome? Our cities would centre around granaries!

Earth, then, definitely does not belong to any of its inhabitants. That leaves us with a few other options: Martians, trees on Venus, advanced civilizations on satellites of Aplha Centarui or of course, God himself. I shall leave it to you to consider just how preposterous all of the options listed, with the exception of the Divine Being, are, and you can then justify to yourself just why the Earth belongs to God Himself.

God, is therefore the customer. His approval is required for all documents to be passed, of course in consultation with his consultant, which is again, himself. God therefore, made the world just as he saw right.

Now, the contract document for the earth would have started something like this.

God’s World – Earth – Third Rock from the Sun – Outer Suburbs of the Milky Way

M/S God Ltd has awarded the contract for the complete design, engineering, procurement of material and construction of the planet Earth (henceforth, the project) to (Name of EPC contractor, we will discuss this later) on this day, 0/0/0000. This contract is awarded on an LSTK basis, unconditionally, except for any deviations mentioned in Annexure – I or any others, raised by the contractor during the execution of the contract, subject to approval of M/S God Ltd, (Henceforth, the Customer) and his consultant, M/S God Ltd. (anything after this just means that if you screw up, you will be unconditionally screwed, and also details of the terms of financial closure, which will confuse you).

---------------------------------------Sections deleted for clarity------------------------------------------

Project Life Cycle: Seven Days, working, subject to holidays as applicable under the regional jurisdiction under which the project site falls. (literally translated, that means that Though Shall Keep Holy The Sabbath).

Now for better execution and proper engineering coordination, God decided to sub contract the entire World to Seven sub contractors. It is just co incidental that we have seven continents. One of them definitely screwed up, and how.

Before we get into the details of the various packages and to whom each was allotted, we shall pause briefly to enlist the major documents that are required for the proper running of the world:

1. Tender document with applicable deviations.

2. Bank Guarantee. (to ensure that the project actually starts)

3. Project Operation and Maintenance Manual (submitted later)

4. Design Criteria Document.

5. Overall Specifications. (Dimensions, generation, output, consumables)

6. Plot (or rather, Globe) plan. (See any atlas)

7. Necessary Clearances from regulating agencies. (Galactic Police, Pollution Control Boards etc)

8. Electrical Single Line Diagram. (how will power flow, America first, Africa last)

9. Heat Balance Diagram. (required for weather)

10. Control and Instrumentation Diagram with control philosophy. (God’s control panel)

If you like the idea, or would like to know how the world actually came to be, drop me an email or let me know.

Alternatively, you can wait a bit and I will come up with more.

Review Series #2 – The Ladies

2010-05-30T22:57:00.000+05:30

Review Series #2 – The Ladies

So I met two chicks recently, two I hadn’t met in a few years, two chicks that I used to spend whole days with, when I was younger. For the purposes of this blog, let’s call them Y and C. recently, in a desperate fit of connect-with-your-past, I hung out with both of them, at separate points of time.

Let’s start with Y. Y is from Maharashtra and is understandably proud of her roots. Though, what beats me is how you can understand or even justify her pride. She can speak Marathi and can go around slapping people silly, from way below them. If you can understand the implication of that last sentence, God bless you. She’s holy, would make a good Nun and thinks that the best way to spend her time is to hang around in the church compound. Not something that I would recommend. She’s a Xavier-ite, (men, note the implications of that) just as I am an Agnel-ite, which unlike me, means that she knows a lot of hot, happening and super attractive and smart Catholic chicks. Which is good news for me, a fact about her that I am still to put to good use. In her tiny little mind, she still thinks that I’m something that fell out of and oven in Bahrain and got deported to India for no apparent reason. She’s right, I was, and another fact about me that she uses incessantly to bug me is the simple fact that can speak and respond to exactly two words in Marathi, in English. Little miss Sunshine, or rather I shall call her, reflected-from-water-sunshine, which I shall not as it’s too long length is not something befitting this woman, ok, back to the woman, she likes movies and actually took a hundred and ten rupees from me to watch a movie about a fat green joke. And then she started feeling cold in the theatre, right next to a man who was half asleep and also feeling very warm indeed. I will not review the movie about the fat green joke because that’s exactly what it was, a fat waste of money, but none lost, I shall soon recover that in a deviously crooked way.

Miss Y Sunshine also likes the good life which involves snorting cocoa from the hot chocolate cups that McDonalds give you. Then she will hang on to the cup like her life depended on it and complain that the chocolate is sub standard, a fact that I knew. Now there’s something that I should suggest during my next review meeting, make better chocolate or just send someone to Ghana to expedite the growth of the cocoa beans. She has a dog and a hammock, that I can once remember sitting in and being very frightened about something; whether it was the dog or her, I don’t remember.

Yes, after the movie came the good life, sitting in the food court and playing food. It’s only logical, you play football on a football pitch, you play tennis on a tennis court. See? Malls thus encourage the sport known to doctors only as food. Ah, food and bad stomachs are not things that go in the same sentence, but I managed to make her size minus ten waist grow to a minus 6 by the time I was done conning her in to eating all that fattening food. Good job, me.

But still at the end of all this, for which I shall receive a good talking to and some choice abuses in Marathi and hindi, half of which I will laugh at due to their inane literal translations, I still like the woman and admire her guts, from up above. :-)

Now, let’s move to C. C is dusky, like Bipasha Basu and likes to colour her evelids blue and other distracting colours. Such colours on your eyes look strange, according to me, but I bet she would want to differ. In her own words, she “can look real pretty if she wants to”. I have no comments on that primarily because I’m more attracted to men according to the vast majority of people who’ve known me and also because I will never comment on the looks of any women, it’s a dangerous sport, like bob sledding; your head could experience huge G forces and come off. C also likes to make big eyes and do things without her parents knowing. She also wishes that she had more happening men in her life, which, sadly, she does not. Like Y, C too lives in a predominantly catholic area of town, which means that she knows a lot of hot, smart and attractive Catholic women, which is good for me. Sadly, I do not know a lot of hot Catholic men to reciprocate any chance meetings with women that I may have due to her. She also has a dog, which, incidentally, she thinks is smarter than most men she knows. I don’t have exact figures of how many men she does know, but I think that the number is dismally low. C also has a thing for bling and all things flashy, like CK, Dior, Armani, Versace, LV and the likes. Did I mention expensive?

C, like Y, does not eat a lot but does drink a lot. Slash, with the a replaced by an O is what she does on quite a regular basis. Fun and slosh, I call it.

And yeah, C is also an EI from Maharashtra. Cool, eh?

That’s about all I can manage to say about these two, I’d love to know them better so I can bitch about them better.

If either of you lovely ladies (see, I’m trying to lessen the impact on me) ever read this, and don’t like anything said about you, please feel free to call me, abuse me and hit me over the head with anything heavy.

Much love and thanks for humouring me,

Your Cousin,

Eldrich.