Random Ramblings

I have often seen people confusing individualism and selfishness, and using both synonymously. They may usually not accept it directly, but it is often clear from their attitude and mannerisms.The moment you drop a hint that you are an individualist, eyebrows are raised as if looking at a selfish person! Yeah, both emphasize upon living for yourself, putting yourself first and all such stuff. But I believe that there is a fundamental difference between the two. While individualism is about living for yourself without causing harm to or belittling others, selfishness is essentially living for yourself often at the cost of others. It is somewhat like an analogy of making one line bigger (given two lines of equal length, drawn using a chalk) . You can either make one bigger by extending it using a chalk ... or you can rub the end of one line to make the other bigger! What say? Ayn Rand would probably agree!

An organized communal riots, gaining the proportions of a pogrom ... but the popularity of the person in command (Mr. M) increased and he got a landslide victory in elections! 5 years later - Mr M walks away (rather runs ...!) from a popular TV show when quizzed about his role in that pogrom. A (somewhat questionable!) TV sting showing Mr M's role in that riots Mr M banning TV channels which are about to telecast that! and Mr M and his aides refusing to come out clean ... Still he continues to be at the helm of affairs. He ruled the roost for a long time despite his highly questionable conduct (... without giving any defense, but rather perpetrating hatred which makes us believe more in his role!) Still, he rules the roost (at least as on Friday 26th October, 2007) ... rather he is allowed to ... Without taking any sides, I am just tempted to ask are we living in a civilized society, where we are driven more by hatred than anything else? If yes, what kind of civilized society is

What if I suddenly realized that my life is going as per the script pre-decided by some novelist, and I actually don't have any control over it? What if my life is nothing but a non-stop uninterrupted TV show, running for 25th consecutive year with me unaware? Wat if I am actually living a century before, and am actually on my journey to know the future of the world? What if in reality ghosts are the only things that exist, and humans are merely an illusion ? What if time was actually not moving in forward direction? What if on one fine day I find that they are about to demolish the earth to build the inter-galactic superhighway? What if trees and animals suddenly interchange their roles and vegetarian plants eating only animals, while non vegetarian plants eating both plants and animals? What if I am suddenly arrested just for imagining these all as I am committing a thoughtcrime ? Seems like an overdose of fiction and movies! Am I getting, rather sinking deeper and deeper into th

That lady was probably in her early 30s, seemed like a resident of a well off locality, probably wife of some well off businessman in the town. (SEC A type, in marketing jargon!) . She seemed to be coming after a shopping spree, although calling it a 'spree' would be an exaggeration, as all he had was a small bag. It seemed that she could not get a car that day and hence decided to take a rickshaw to her way back home. "Ae rickshaw" , she blurted After some negotiations, the elderly rickshaw-waalah obliged, and she kept calling that person as "rickshaw" ! I was just reminded of a sequence from movie Lage Raho Munnabhai where Gandhiji says - "If you want to judge a person, observe how he behaves with a person having a lower standing than him" !!! I smiled, nodded my head once and went ahead !

Recently I read about the New Zealand cricketer Craig McMillan announcing his retirement at an age of 31, the age when players are often in their prime. Although he wasn't anywhere close to being a great player, he was certainly a good one, having played some good knocks in recent times. There was not much hue and dry, or fanfare and all, though there were some usual courtesies exchanged and all. I was just wondering what if he had been an Indian player and done he same ? In fact, first of all would he have taken a similar decision here, considering various stakeholders! Maybe, there would probably have been tons of news channel smelling something fishy, many fingers raised here and there and few extreme public reactions, and maybe politicians coming in to plead him to consider his retirement once again and return to game. Rest assured, the player who has retired might probably not have been let to live in peace ... at least for few days! And the decision to retire might have an el

1 holiday, 6 movies! 8 movies in a span of last 32 hours! Huh … That was too much … A mixture of good cinema and utter crap … of hardcore realism to escapism … of typical and offbeat … of some popular to some watched by a handful … a mixture of many differents actually! Just writing a purposeless random review of all of these – 1. 1. City of god – Excellent! Brazilian movie, at best understood with help of subtitles and visuals. An excellent depiction of a Brazilian slum, where kids having guns is not an uncommon site; where crime is a way of life. 2. 2. Love actually – Beautiful! A mushy love story … rather many mushy love stories …Karan Johar types, if some parallel has to be drawn to our desi phillum industry … with everyone from a school kid to Britain’s prime minister is falling in love. A good watch nevertheless! 3. 3. Jhom Barabar Jhoom – Crap Only good things are nice songs … but not that interesting with random jhoom baraabar

Ever wondered how many opposites coexist within you, within me ... probably within all of us? I live in present. Yet that present coexists with memories of pasts and dreams of future. I face life as it comes. Yet there are times that I become an escapist. I am often practical and rational. Yet there are moments when actions seem to have only one explanation, and that is irrationality! I may look at the problems and issues in hand, while I wander in the dreamland in the same very moment. At times, I am concerned about many things happening across he globe, and the very next moment I become completely oblivious to my very surroundings We may be attached to a million things. Yet we long for moments where we can break all these shackles and wish to break free. There are moments when one feels that the world is beautiful. Yet there are other moments when all surrounding us is just a big bad world. There are moments which seem like hours, yet there are many hours that seem like a fraction of

He waited for almost 2 hours. The Captain was about to come. He was about to be given a hero's welcome in his home town, a not so big city. And why not ? After all he had won the world championship after beating arch rivals in a nail-biting final, when people had almost written them off at the beginning of the tournament. They were now the world champions in that format of game. This was a shorter version of the game. But things were never the same. He was among many people who burnt the captain's effigy few months ago. They were protesting against him. They even tried to attack his house and car. Reason - Extremely poor performance in the World cup tournament., which was another version of the same game. The captain was then just an ordinary player, who performed miserably in the tournament. Back then, he was even referred by someone as a disgrace to the team by few people. But now it was a different situation. The noise was becoming louder by each passing moment. The captain

This is just another incoherent random collection of arbit thoughts ... rather questions, one of the posts of "direct dil say ..." kind of posts. Some of these are within some corner of my heart occasionally venturing to the surface and often close to the outer word but are once again sent to the same obscure corner of the heart where it was before. What motivates us to do things we do? I think more often than not we are guided by the fact that everyone else is doing it. There maybe a small element of "we wish to do it" ... but again after some probing it comes to XYZ is doing so OR others are doing it kind of things. Maybe it is too deep rooted. Why do people expect us to be different ... yet be like "everyone else" ? Maybe, it is due to a kind of peer pressure, or due to a fear of 'rejection', Or is there any other reason? Why are many people not even open minded enough to realize the need of being open minded. And how can we make them realize t

Dictionary meaning Hospitality - 1. the friendly reception and treatment of guests or strangers. 2. the quality or disposition of receiving and treating guests and strangers in a warm, friendly, generous way. Indians are believed to be one of the most hospitable people. It may be true to quite an extent, but there are some elements which seem strange. Say the obsession with eating, or to put it in some other way, guest eating well being a surrogate of a good, hospitable treatment. This may be more visible in interior or 'traditional' parts of country where ofter the person who is 'guest' is supposed to be 'following' or 'eating' thing served by the host. Plus there are some unwritten rules like you need to be always smiling, you need to get along well with everyone irrespective of age, believe with XYZ rules and all and blah blah. To hell with what you believe in, to hell with what you like or dislike, to hell with what you are as a person! It all rem