Spams

These spammers sure have become quite innovative, what with super cool spam filters employed by Google, Yahoo etc. There hasn't been any spam mail in my gmail inbox since ages. But all this changed today. A teeny tiny spam mail managed to fool the formidable gmail spam filters which usually work quite well and very rarely spell out false positives. The GMail team at google sure has some talented people but then I guess, these spammers too sometimes think out of the box.

So how did this celebrity spam mail, if you like, manage to outwit the carefully coded filter ? Ah it was simple, the actual "spam stuff" wherein the senders usually advertise viagra and stuff was shown using an image and the body of the mail was quite harmless as if written by a teenager to his buddy. Not trying to sell anything, not having any "keywords" etc. However the meat was in the image which clearly listed out prices of various aphrodisiacs and also had the name of website selling this stuff. All the information conveyed and the police (the spam filter) was caught napping.

Some creative rogue eh..!

Here's to the crazy ones..

Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes.

The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo.

You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them.

Because they change things. They push the human race forward.
While some see them as the crazy ones,
we see genius.
Because the people who are crazy enough to think
they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Mail to batch, from EPFL, Nearing the coming football tourney

It is a matter of deep concern that in our 4 year history at IIIT, we guys have come close to winning plenty of tourneys but have never actually won any single sporting cup. As must be known to all by now, The Football tourney of this semester has been announced. I know many of us are not at college right now, some of us are abroad, while others are in various cities of India doing their respective internships. However, we still have a sizeable presence in college and some of the key players of old times are still at the place where all the action is going to be.

A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a batch, long suppressed, finds utterance. This moment is here, now. We might be famous amongst our juniors as people who did the max. "bakar" in campus but this is our chance to show them, We can play Ball too. I call upon all concerned in campus to give it your max. Sleep,Movies, Comp Games, Chatting etc would go on forever but the Inter Semester football tourney is now, only once and then it'll never return, atleast for us. When we will be fighing together against a common adversary for a common goal. We take pride in the unity and spirit of our B2K3, what good is this spirit if we cannot muster enough courage to fight together when the odds are stacked up against us.

All this may seem to be bantering of a fool who sits on his desk and asks others to sweat it out, but trust me, Never in history of our batch Was So Much Owed By So Many To So Few. I myself would love to come and play with you, but that is impossible, however I don't think that, that really matters. You guys, in campus, are there and now. Forget your small number, forget your past skills. The moment is in your hand. The moment to embed your names in the annals of glory of B2K3. Grasp it. Practice and Practice hard. No adversary is strong enough to beat B2K3 if you have practiced enough, as a team.

Let other batches know, that B2K3 will not go down without a fight. We shall fight on the 25 yard line, we shall fight in the mid field, we shall fight in the flanks and in the centre, we shall fight in the goalpost; we shall never surrender. Make them jump through hoops to earn every single point against B2K3 and let them wonder how when a batch, reduced to just quarter of its actual size can still fight on, like a Giant. Let them marvel at our spirit and let them look at our batch with admiration. Only then, the true glory would be ours.

Batchmates in college, I have nothing to offer you now but blood, toil, tears and sweat.Practice and Practice hard..

Only then will eternal glory be yours.

All the best..The Best wishes of our entire batch are with you always..
-
Vikram

P.S : Parts of this mail are borrowed from famous sources but these were the best words I could find to convey my feelings right now.

Holi Party

Holi has surely never been a big deal. I mean sure it is one of the very well known festivals but somehow its Winter friend, Diwali beat it always in terms of the attention I (and most people I know) decide to bestow upon it.

However when you are abroad the love of "anything Indian" naturally is very high. The Holi festival and the way we celebrate it, has certainly not much parallel in the rest of the world. Also when you are abroad, the enthusiasm to do your "Indian thing" is all the much more. Thus was formed our fellowship of "Holi Celebrations" here at Lausanne. The fellowship consisted of :

and also Trivedi. Just that I couldn't find any pic with all of us in it. Also as all he did was sit around (:p) so no much qualms on excluding him..!

The first job of this fellowship was to orgainse holi celebrations and then a dinner or snacks maybe. But it looked like Sauron had his messengers far and wide. We visisted a variety of Indian, Sri Lankan and Bangladeshi shops but could not find our beloved holi colours, or gulaal to make it clearer to my Indian audiences. After this initial debacle the fellowship was quite disheartened and the "enthu" had abated more or less. However a series of events led to yours truly letting his spanish flatmate know about Holi and her highness confused my "enlightening session about Indian festivals" into some kind of an invitation to some kind of a holi dinner party. Whats more she was gracious enough to rattle of the exact details of hers "conjured-up" party to everyone in the neighbouhood. More importantly she did mention about this to Rishi's flatmate and he in turn asked Rishi about it. Now, Rishi being a member of the holy holi fellowship was well aware that after the initial losses, the fellowship was just doing what it did best (yes sit on its bottoms) and there was no party. Now, this was heading towards disaster..!

Like in the famous LOTR, seeing the need of the hour, the fellowship swung right back into action. The rest as they say is history. Also as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, I'll allow some JPGs to do the talking now. You can find the pics here :

http://picasaweb.google.com/suchit.agarwal/HoliDinnerAtVikrams
Please note that, all this was cooked by the holy holi fellowship from scratch.

Work Like..

Work like you don't need the money.
Love like you've never been hurt.
Dance like nobody's watching.
Sing like nobody's listening.
Live like it's Heaven on Earth.

First Week in Switzerland

Bonjour..

So its been my first week here. And this week has seen a plenty of firsts of my life.

1.Firsts in the Restroom.
2.Firsts in the kitchen. (I haven't cooked previously, if grabbing the stirrer whenever my mum wasn't looking doesn't count).
3.Firsts of staying with people from completely different lands.
4.Firsts of staying in a "co-ed" student house.
5.Firsts of learning Spanish, French, Romanian and hearing a little of Italian.
6.Firsts of teaching Hindi to others.
7.Firsts of running through an "awe-inspiring" Swiss meadow. (At a "Not so great" personal risk).
8.First of sitting in a "double-decker" train (In which the TT(a woman..!) comes and says Merci (Thank you) when you show her the ticket..!)
9.First of cooking awesome "Rajma-Rice" which in enough for an entire day for two people (Lucky Rishi Kapoor).
10. First of eating Spanish "Taratia" and "Ham+Cheese" and 4 different kinds of Pasta.
11. First of people thanking me with delight when I offer them my "Parathas".
12. First of Discussing Boxing and Karate with my professor.

There are loads more, but I guess I'll save them for some later date. Switzerland till now has been a very new experience. The beauty and order of this place is surprising but I am sure you already knew that.

Merci..
Vikram

Is Saddam really dead ?

All right so a week back or so Saddam Hussein was "put to death" . Justice, as Bush said, had been delivered. Even phone-cam videos of his hanging and mortal corpse were circulated on the Internet. Everyone seems to be quite convinced that once feared by many and admired by some dictator is gone.

Well if you ask me, not quite. There are many unconvincing details about this whole Saddam getting arrested and then finally executed thing. Here goes :

1. Arrest.

Now we all know Saddam was this proud fella who had pledged the invaders would never find him, alive that is. He was a person who had ruled over a nation for around three decades and had fought long conflicts with strong adversaries(Iran and the USA). Does he seem like a man who would be found in a hole, helpless ? The special circumstances and landscape around his arrest seem to be customized to convey a definite message : The once feared man had finally been defeated and trapped like a coward.The footage of him being inspected by a dentist after his "arrest" also conveyed a similar meaning : The lion had been tamed. The arrest is too specially tailored to suit west's interests to be true.

2.Will the real Saddam please stand up ?

Its a well known fact that Saddam Hussein employed many "decoys". As in, due to security concerns many of his speeches were delivered by people who were made to look and sound exactly like him. It is very much possible that the person arrested and executed could be a decoy. One didn't hear about any DNA tests being performed on the convict. And in any case did the US Army have any samples of DNA of "the real" Saddam ?

3. The Trial.

Saddam Hussein was reportedly very vocal during his trial. Once again, any of his so called decoys could have been there and sounded exactly like him.

4.Footage of execution and the corpse.

There has been an angry reaction all over the world about Phone camera videos which have been shot illegally. The US government has registered its protest with the interim Iraqi government which his initiated an inquiry. Now doesn't all this seem a little too convenient ? Having seen the clippings of Saddam being hung(without a mask, mind you) and then of his dead body, the entire world would be convinced of his death. After all we all believe our own eyes don't we ? Well it is quite improbable that phone-cameras would be allowed inside the execution room when in most of the high-security zones it is forbidden to bring them along. Also one wonders what would trigger the lazy guards to shoot this event and post it on the internet the same evening. Some net-savvy guards we have in Iraq.

All this surely hints at some foul play which is underway in this entire episode. However truth is like running water, it finds its way.

Viva Bombay..Viva India..

Great Post.. (Published in Guardian UK)

When the Reader's Digest earlier this month published a survey ranking cities in order of the politeness and courtesy of their people, Bombay, the city where I grew up (and which nationalists have renamed Mumbai) came last. The surveyors obviously understood neither the city nor its citizens.

For if you want to get a flavour of what Bombay's people are really like, witness the astonishing humanity and generosity with which they have poured out their hearts and supported those among them who were maimed by synchronised bomb blasts. People flocked to hospitals to donate blood, and thousands offered strangers bed to sleep in. The state will respond slowly, trying to figure out the extent of the blasts and organise its emergency services; but the city's enterprising people will not wait for that helping hand.

Recall the fury of the monsoon on July 26 last year, when Bombay experienced 37 inches of rain within 24 hours. While the urban administration could barely cope with the crisis, individual citizens ensured that the city did not collapse into anarchy, offering guidance to public policy advocates on how to manage a crisis. Bloggers were at it then, and they are at it now, disseminating information, connecting individuals and families, and offering resources.

For enterprise, not rudeness, is the other name of Bombay, a city where few want to depend on someone else for help. But there is always a helping hand for those who need, as Suketu Mehta points out in his book Maximum City, which was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.

In that book, Mr. Mehta writes:

In the crowded suburban trains, you can run up to the packed compartments and find many hands stretching out to grab you on board, unfolding outwards from the train like petals ... And at the moment of contact, they do not know if the hand that is reaching for theirs belongs to a Hindu or Muslim or Christian or Brahmin or untouchable, or whether you were born in this city or arrived only this morning. All they know is that you're trying to get to the city of gold, and that's enough. Come on board, they say. We'll adjust.

And adjust they do, always, all the time. The roads of Bombay today are filled with people walking home, offered water and food by people living in the neighbourhood. Slum dwellers have jumped into the fray, offering help to the stranded people walking home. Rides are offered and accepted, and nobody asks anyone what their faith, language or caste may be. Only the blood group matters, and there are queues of people at hospitals waiting to donate. And according to some blogs, the Western Railway will resume service tonight, running trains through the night. The show goes on in Bombay, always.

The people of Bombay don't want you to get in their way as they try to cross the road, cling to railway compartments or hang out of double-decker buses as they try to make that appointment, secure that deal and attain that reward that would take them one step closer to realising their Bombay dream (No, not that one!)

There is pluck and resilience in Bombay. Salman Rushdie, the city's finest chronicler, wrote in The Moor's Last Sigh: "Those who hated India, those who sought to ruin it, would need to ruin Bombay."

Bombay is a city without a dominant regional culture, language or religion, and it is quintessentially modern. There are few ancient monuments, and the Taj Mahal is a five-star hotel. This practical, no-nonsense efficiency makes Bombay the preferred choice of multinationals setting up their Indian headquarters, in spite of obscenely expensive real estate.

Bombay is also the home of the sassy and cheeky Bollywood, whose hundreds of forgettable films may not win awards at international film festivals but do make lots of money. Strike at Bombay's bindaas (cocky) nature, and you rock India's confidence.

Consider this sentiment: "It takes more than Semtex to shake Sensex, stockbrokers in Bombay said after those blasts, which killed nearly 300 people and which targeted Bombay's premier buildings, the stock exchange tower, the Air India Building, the passport office and a Sheraton hotel, as well as buses, in what many think was a dress rehearsal for the kind of simultaneous attacks that hit London, New York Washington, Madrid and London nearly a decade later.

Bombay is India's face to the world; the star of the east with her face to the west; an energetic port where people come from all over to seek their fortune. It is India's Manhattan: if you can make it in Bombay, you can make it anywhere. It has been bruised and battered, but it has the strength of being the only truly cosmopolitan city in south Asia.

Such cities live on trust. Bombay is used to welcoming outsiders and strangers. Tourists travel in its motor launches to the Elephanta islands; traders deal in shares, bonds, gold, diamonds and commodities; tycoons set up businesses; shoeshine boys work hard and strike it rich; and starry-eyed girls come from the hinterland to make it in its tinseltown.

But despite the blow, Bombay will not tear apart. Great trading cities cannot be exclusionary; they mix everything. Bombay is the tawa (a flat iron wok) where pao bhaji (a popular dish of buttered fried bread and curried vegetables) is cooked, the ingredients blending together to create a sizzling, spicy meal.

Mr Rushdie went on to write:

Bombay, a relatively new city in an immense, ancient land is not interested in yesterdays. In Bombay, all Indias met and merged. Bombay was central; all rivers flowed into its human sea. It was an ocean of stories, we were all its narrators, and everybody talked at once. What magic was stirred into that insaan-soup (the soup of humanity), what harmony emerged from that cacophony!"

This absence of a majority and the celebration of plurality, are what make Bombay unique: the city belongs to nobody and to everyone. In 1993, Bombay erupted in riots - a blot on the city's fair name; in 2003, people marched in silence; in 2006, they are offering their blood.

It takes a lot more than a few bombs to break the city's spirit. Salaam, Bombay!

Football..

Found this somewhere ..very true :

Why is football so popular?

No one knows for sure but there are some theories:

• it is a game that is not affected by social barriers: the required gear is inexpensive and the playing field is natural grass, so it can be played both by the riches clubs and the poorest localities.
• it is a game in which intelligence is more important than brute force: good footballers are not necessarily the strongest, but the ones with more body flexibility and quicker of mind.
• it is a game in which the final score is not easily predictable: surprises do occur (like Greece beating Portugal in the last Euro).
• it is a game that values talent above anything else: if you are a good player, it doesn't matter if you are ugly, illiterate or plain stupid; you will earn a lot of money and become famous. Football is known to be one of the paths that can lead a poor boy to stardom (read about Pelé, for instance).
• it is easy to understand: for every goal scored, one point. Goals are scored when the ball enters the goal. Foals are when a player hit another player instead of the ball. Fouls inside the main area become penalty kicks. The ball must be controlled with any part of the body but the arm. Onlye the goalie can touch the ball. When the ball is kicked off the field it reverts to the other team. Violent or unfair players are warned (yellow card) and eventually sent out (red card). There's not TV aid, no measuring tape, no computer-generated statistics, no need for an electronic score keeper. The only thing about the game that is a bit obscure is the offside rule, but people seem to have taken it for granted for decades.

The Same Plate.

How on earth do they do it ? I for one could never ever do any such thing. Its so gross. And whats more they are doing it all the time. Also this is not just specific to say a one or two. All of them do it. Not that there are many of them here. Its an Engineering college after all. That too at Allahabad. But whatever their number is, the entire bunch of them do it. Is it something like, you are not in a relationship if you dont do it ? Or comeon we are in a relationship we should be doing this..Or Or lets show the world that we are in a relationship. Lets do this.

Whatever be the pretext, I think its completely unhygeinic. Whatsmore it also puts you under so much pressure. The order comes and then you have to share it and then you go i have to eat this fast otherwise there would be nothing left! Why after being in love has one to eat his/her food on a shared plate that too in the college canteen? This is something i would never understand.

Concentration..

Ah that elusive thing ..this concentration . Why oh why dont i seem to have even an ounce of this miraclous elixiir. The most oft repeated cliche in books like "a hundred thousand ways to success" (God are their really so many ways ..i seem to have so much difficulty in finding even one..!!) is ,"concentration is vital for doing well in any given situation".And obviously it is true. But the problem really is, why in the world is it so rare and uncommon and a dodgy little virtue ? They say one can always develop it.Oh really ? and how ?? Ah there are so many techniques . Like ?? Well to mention one look, continuously at a pen( or whatever) for 10 minutes without thinking anything. WHAT ?? without thinking anything ? for 10 whole minutes..!! You kidding me ?? At any given time i have atleast two threads of thought in my head , and that too when i am doing something worthwhile(which is very rare i confess..). At other times my head is filled with all kinds of xyz thoughts.

This is most pronounced when i am actually trying not to think of anything else.Let me give the wary reader an example. Doing TSD (time speed distance..duh..!!) problems . (In brackets are my thoughts) Ram starts to walk towards his office at 6:30 (office hmm..cool wonder why it is called an office..oh comeon back to the question) and reaches 5 minutes late ( the crusades video i saw was so interesting man, wonder why Saladin didnt attack Richard at juffa ? ..aaargh back to the question) If he starts at 6:25 and doubles his speed (that fella jeremy brett is ideal for sherlock holmes not that our dear old dracky cudnt do it ..but accent will be a real problem..ah that wallpaper with Mr Simpson saying No Problemo was such a laugh ..hehe..ooh what was the question again ??) Ram starts to walk towards his ( God i am reading this again now..have to work on my concentration ..wonder why is it so elusive..)office at 6:30 and reaches 5 minutes late (concentarate.. concentrate.. concentrate...) if he starts at 6:25 (concentarate.. concentrate.. concentrate...) and douybles his speed ,(concentarate.. concentrate.. concentrate...) he reaches at 7:10 ( ah not able to conecntrate..tch tch ..furget it..lets go and write a blog) . Finally i close the book and am here blogging.

God save me..

Speed Reading - Day 1

Good Reading speed seems to be , in all most everyone's opinion , the surest way of cracking the VA section in the much talked about CAT exam. After days of procastrination yours truly finally , and this is largely due to the spanking new "CL packet -2" which has just arrived, decided to test waters in this territory. Now here i must tell the amused reader that i always thought myself to be a "decent enough" reader. I have been reading books since maybe the 3rd standard. A self proclaimed authority on enid blyton,sidney sheldon , jeff archer and the likes, i started "How to master the art of Reading Comprehension" with a smug smile. Ah, i thought to myself such books are for the naive souls who havent touched a novel in their wasted lives and enlightened beings such as myself, who have been having books as their best friends since childhood, need only to read them as leisure. Or so i thought. What started as a casual leisurely go at a "diagnostic test" of a given RC became a nightmare.Read the following para in under a minute and answer the questions , it said.Hah..i thought, such a teeny tiny para and a whole minute ..i might get the pop corn as well. Anyways started reading the para , nicely written i wondered, some greek mythology stuff, a lot of unpronouncable names and a few realtions like this guy killed that guy and all. Ok fine , finished reading it, checked the stop watch..shucks 1 min 27 secs. My goodness ..!! thats well past the stipulated time but anyways lets hit the questions i thought.After scratching my head for a whole minute with the questions , i got only 6 out of 10 correct. But the inner "avid reader" tag inside me was refusing to relent. No maybe this was one of those out of the blue, much below the median , unreflecting of your true position, performances .Lets try the next one I said to myself. The next passage was from zoology.Ah finally some science ..science is good. Come on have to reedeem myself in this one. Started reading it ,but whats this ..so many numbers , like x number of species of this and y number of species of that are known. Good God..!! somehow i finish the passage and check the time 1 min 38 seconds. Talk about improvement i had in fact deterioted and that too in one of my interest areas.What the world is coming to ? My poor heart exclaimed.No probs , the optimist in me shouted out ,lets hit the questions.Finally after attempting the 10 odd questions and checking the scores only 7 correct. So RC section is all togther a different ball game then.Atleast i can find solace in fact that i have identified the problem early and the only way to go from here is up..!!Loads of reading coming up for me in the coming weeks and all the fixation ,enlarging eye span ,skimming and so on, techniques are going to find a regular user..any good reads anyone ?

Resolutions.

So that time of the year has come when one reflects back on how swiftly did one break the resolutions one so zealously drafted and swore to abide by on new years.Allthough i had promised myself it'd be different this time along but i think there is some, no i know there is some invisible, all potent, omnipresent force which is hell bent on making us break our resloutions.

Invisible,omnipresent,allpotent werent these adjectives reserved for our old friend up there? Some one with the name of God who has helped us, wretched poor souls on countless occasions.So is our own loving God bent on forcing us not to keep our resolutions..!! NAh..it would be too naive even to think this as even plausible.The adjectives in question may even point to that infamous idiot called "satan" but seriously you didnt think our lives would be so important that these special beings would conspire for such trivial matters.

Ok so its nothing external then.Years come and go and unfailingly most of us break our new year resolutions .Some do it on the evenings these resolutions are made while some are considerate enough to let them live at least as long as the poor mayfly.Did you know mayfly has a lifespan of 24 hrs.God just 24 hrs how does it do all the stuff in just a day.!! and humans say life is too short..bah..anyway thats a different issue.

What leads us to break our resolutions then.Is it our weak will power or now that we are used to breaking them we are actually waiting for taking the leap.Its become such a cliche "Oh my resolutions arent going to last even a week..hehe ".Its become party talk and ,some may even like to believe Page 3 stuff..Why is page 3 so important by the way?

Anyways , let me give myself another chance this year at keeping my resolutions ..Amen.

confusion

Dont we really love user manuals ..!! Guidelines , clear premises on what to do next . How wonderful would our lives be if that was the case for issues in our lives as well. What confusing times , what dilemmas exist in our seemingly mundane world.Doubts , hesitation ,second thoughts clearly human mind was not well programmed for these buggy thoughts.Why then does our mind take the liberty to indulge itself in such luxuries which leaves us rest less to say the least.

People . How diverse do they come.Such interests, such strange likes , such laughter . It leaves one's mind flabbergatsed. One probes , ponders , often thinks one's wits out but again the need for that divine user manual is extreme. Total anarchy prevails in the thinking department of our top storeys.

Age. Is all this just a play of how old one is . One would surely like to think otherwise. But again such times have come before and maybe they will keep coming. So its all our years palying games then . No , its something more.I will figure out what sooner than later.

But coming out of these dilemmas is easy . Like that night. Yes one just needs to "talk to one self" and all the answers come pouring out. Its all within they say , they werent completely lying then.

cheers..!! :)

Coffee, Preity and Saif

God i used to like that show ..!!

and this one especially had such high profile guests coming ..i expected it to be really nice.Not to mention that at one time i really liked the female guest in the show.

But phew..what a waste of time ..Karan Johar must certainly be much better a director than he is a talk show host ..why else would he be so successful. This show was certainly one of the worst i have seen lately on the idiot box. Half the time those three (karan, saif and preity ..duh..!!) were talking about some silly rumours ..c mon ppl who cares ..why not talk some sensible stuff ..and Preity ok so u r tired of being labelled "bubbly" ..eh ..will you stop overacting for God's sake. Dude she was such a turn off..!! Saif was the only one talking some sense but look and behold he dropped the atom bomb .. quoting saif :

" i am very paranoid (karan tries to intervene).. no no ..i am like this only ..i dont like working in any movie, bigger the movie(like KHNH) bigger the nightmare it is for me"

And we talk about enjoying what we do..get a life dude..

During the entire show the three continued friendly banter which was sooo boring to say the least .Does "talk show " just mean you show up wearing fancy clothes( no saif was not even doing this ..he had some ruddy old T -Shirt under his coat) and just talk as if you were gossiping in a restaurant and you think people would like to watch that for an hour..well i know we are very silly..but c mon not all of us are losers who have no lives of their own. And someone tell miss Zinta to stop laughing after every sentence its getting really annoying.

Finally towards the end of show ..the topic veered around to saif's nose and preity's Bum ..wow what a note to end the show on ..keep it up guys ..but do watch david letterman's show for once ..Karan you will certainly see the difference..

maaza

Seriously ..do they mix something in it ?? Is there a heavy but undetected amount of dope which pulls u like alizee ..? God knows one can never have enough of this beverage .Morning ,evening , night ..whatevr time it is ..its never "not" the right time to have a maaza.And if i find one soul who is satisfied by just having one , i ll name him the next Ronaldinho.

Wow, what effect the first gulp has on your personality ! From a wretched soul looking for meaning in life you are transformed suddenly into someone who is at ease, who is happy ,who is comfortable and who is looking into the future with nothing but hope.Just 250 mls of pure ellixir(the spelling may be wrong ..!!) if you ask me.But what makes it different from the plethora of beverages out there? Is it the fact that it contains fruit juice and not carbonated water(like coke etc) which makes it different ..? nah..i would any day trade a litre of real fruit juice for a glass of maaza. Maaza is different , its not fruit juice .Its life.

But like allmost all things this one too has a flip side, yes it finishes off too quickly. You had just started drinking it , realised it tastes like heaven ..took a few gulps and puff..!! its over ..finished ..the end..and you feel devastated ,like a child who has just lost her favorite toy.You feel sad..but
you havent learnt to say die in life have you ? so what do you do ?you cant buy a new one can you ? the 8 bucks spent have already been heavy on your student's pocket ..but offcourse you do something .. you struggle ..try to fish out that last drop of the "ellixir" out of that slim and small bottle ..You try and then try again and when finally convinced that theres nothing left ,you give up.Look at the bottle in despair and play with it for sometime .Dream about the heaven you were in moments ago with your maaza..Then you pull yourself get on with your work ..waiting for the next "Maaza break " and promising yourself that as soon as you get a job , you will finish an years supply in a single day..!! cheers..!!

looking away

all the time ..without fail whenevr i m travelling in train from college to home for vacations , or for any oder reason . they turn up, their eyes full of sorrow. looks envoking mercy , or trying their best to envoke mercy. sometimes alone sometimes carrying a baby, nursing a broken arm ..watevr.

and me trying my best to look away ..!! fighting my concience not to slip out that odd one ruppee coin i have in my pocket . after all i ask myself ..how many ??

to how many beggars will i keep giving these coins for they never seem to stop coming.

dont encourage beggary people say , but does reminding this always to urself when that wide eyed 8 year old having a tear or two (fake ..? ) says " bhiayya ek rupya de do.." helps u keep a clean conscience.even if u curb temporarily the urge to slip out "the coin" dusnt it make u feel sick to the stomach ?

okay , so wats the solution ..how can we the future of india ..help to eradicate this evil called beggary and extreme poverty ..after all what exactly can we do ?

first

Foraying into the world of blogging .I am happy for making a start.

Its a pretty cool thing to do , as i have never been able to push myself into writing a diary and am in front of my comp for almost the entire day ,maybe this'll help me to "self-reflect" , which i intended to do while writing a diary.

i dont know many of my frnds to be avid bloggers whoich i hope to be , so its going to be lonely at first i m sure , but sooner than later , it'll be ok.