Wednesday, June 14, 2006

A tale of two cities

This would probably be my last post from Delhi as I would be moving to Mumbai this week. Before coming to Delhi, 4 years back, I had spent most of my life at Mumbai. So, throughout the 4 years one question that people kept asking me was to do a comparison of the two cities and maybe give them my choice amongst the two. The answer kept on varying with time spent in Delhi but the conclusion has remained the same till now.

I will enlist the points I had been stressing in my answers.

The public transportation system in Mumbai is better (at least the part I had been in contact). You have local trains in Mumbai plying at the frequency of 3 minutes. I did not had the opportunity to take the benefits of the new Delhi Metro, so I cannot comment much; but I feel that its utility is being overestimated and making the decision (of who is better) solely on the basis of it is rather presumptuous.

Also, though the crime rate may be comparable in both cities or maybe higher in Mumbai, yet the crime in Mumbai is of the “larger” kind. So, there are more murders in Mumbai but less of pick pocketing etc. (the part which generally affects the common man, like me). The fact that Delhi is more unsafe for women is pretty widely known.

Delhi, or in general the north of India, has a lot of variety when it comes to foodstuffs of practically all kinds.

Mumbai has the added advantage that my immediate family has chosen it for their stay. But it is not that Delhi does not have anything on that front. Most of my relatives are in Delhi or in the NCR region.

So, I have been concluding ever since, that my choice would be Mumbai. However, after having lived in Delhi for some time, the gap between the cities has lessened (in my heart). I learned and developed so many things here. I developed my habit of reading; got acquainted with the better of my friends; did my engineering; got closer to my relatives (whom before I could meet only once a year). Finally, the city witnessed my personal growth and it had a major role to play in it.

Disclaimer: You may not find much relation between the picture and the text that follows.

P.S: One other not-so-related stuff. The city of Calcutta or Kolkata has gone from riches to rags. The communists, who in theory are the well wishers of the labour class, have (in their 30+ years rule) exploited this very class in West Bengal. However, this is still not apparent to most of them. They have become poorer due to the government policies but are made to believe that only the communist government is their last hope. To me, the irony is unbelievable. Bengal, which was the most happening place in the British time, has become a place where almost nobody likes to start a new venture.

Recently, we were in the middle of our campus placements. So, we had people from outside the country visiting. There was one chap, who was visiting India for the first time. On his trip, he went to Kolkata and then came to our campus in Delhi. He wanted to setup his base in India. In the middle of his presentation, he asked the audience regarding the place they would like to work at within India. He gave us options and asked us to raise our hands if we would like to work at that place. When the option of Kolkata was given, no one seemed to raise their hand. At this, he said that even he would not like to set his base there. At this, I pitied the state of the city. Even a stranger, on his first visit to the country, decides on not dealing with the city in the future.

Monday, June 12, 2006

'Independence'

I wrote about the Google spreadsheet invitation becoming easy in my last post. Some people seemed interested. Well at least I am interested in a lot of these new innovations in technology. Mr. SA, one of those interested, asked me about my comments about the innovation. Well, the concept is worthwhile and for a lot of people it actually makes sense. Simultaneous editing and viewing of spreadsheets, and for that matter, other applications like the word program can go a long way. I would like to say that it would be helpful to me, but I am not that much sure, as the field I am going into involves a lot of secrecy in its work. So, though we would be working with spreadsheets for the entire time, it is quite probable that people in the field would not be enthusiastic about making content available on the web, inspite of the privacy being promised. As of now, the features are also only basic but good enough for bloggers to get excited.

Sometime back (precisely 4 years, when I just started my undergraduate studies), I started listening about the concept of independence and freedom. This was the first time I was out of my home (and into the world, so to say). At that time, I could not relate to it. But now I can and am enjoying it a bit. I was not sure why anybody would like to have it, but now I feel that how can anybody live without it. It is not to say that complete freedom is the way to go; but upto a certain level it is necessary for the very existence. A recent example was when I along with my friends had to go on a hunger strike. None of us asked about the same but after committing, the information was sent via our cellphones.

I like reading autobiographies, and not biographies. The reason being that biography again is like hearing about someone from someone else, which is something we are accustomed to. An autobiography, on the other hand, lets me hear from the person himself. The views expressed may not be 100% authentic, but whatever we can get is worth the reading.

Currently, I am in the middle of the autobiography of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. It is a good embodiment of a life, which anyone interested in the Indian freedom struggle can have a look. It covers, in detail, the period of his life upto 1934, when he was in jail (or gaol) as he like calling it. He wrote the autobiography in jail and so not much is present of after 1934. Only a chapter has been added in 1940 filling in some gap. However, I would have liked more details of the period closer to independence as well as the time he was the Prime Minister of India.

It is a good read; not only because of the fact that Nehruji was good at English, but also because it enabled me to see the other side of the picture, and maybe the person. This generation are filled with those who believe that most of the freedom fighters could have done a lot better. They took a lot of time in “gaining” independence for the country. Some may even believe that it was not even gained and was just a result of the weakening of the British after the second world war. This generation believes in the methods of Bhagat Singh and party to be used as a means to meet their ends.

Reading the autobiography made me think if all of the above was actually true. Whether we were justified in taking the sacrifices as things which were unnecessary and useless? Nehruji has put Bhagat Singh and others in the category of terrorists, which is certainly not something which one would do now; but at that time may be the concept of terrorism was quite different. One thing I have started admiring about Nehruji (important to note, that before the book, all the things I had heard about him or rather believed about him, were not something to be admired) was his persistent demand for Independence (and nothing else). While many others, including Mahatma Gandhi, gave way to things at the cost of Independence, but Nehruji did not.

May be I have started relating to him due to this ‘Independence’.

Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Start contributing

Every time I open this site for a new post, I expect (at least subconsciously) that the other “contributors” might have done something so that they can be called with that name in the future. Nevertheless, I get delighted (surprisingly) when I see that no such thing has happened. Maybe I feel happy about the fact that I am the only one adding to the value of Myself SpeakingÔ (had not used the trademark for a long time now). I do not know why, I keep postponing the idea of writing posts, when the entire day, I think about how to frame the events occurring into words and sentences for the next post. The things, which actually manage to reach the posts, are only a tiny part of those intended.

(I think I have not told you that, every post, I first write it into some word processing application and then transfer it here. This would explain the reason of my posts being free of grammatical and spelling errors).

Everybody has a style of writing. You can many a times guess the author (if given some manageable number of alternatives), just by reading his work. This phenomenon includes the writers of blogs as well. Like, here at Myself SpeakingÔ, though others contribute so less, yet if you see the title of a post with some full stops at the end (i.e. blah blah ….), you know that Mr. AR would have been responsible for those; or if you see more than one exclamation marks sticking together, then Mr. KS has got to be held guilty.

I had talked about various social networking groups before and how they help you to be in contact. Well, the phenomenon is far from dying. Not only is the number of such group increasing, but also the time spent by people on these is phenomenal. I am myself present on Orkut. This particular service has changed some verbs and has created a few new ones. So, if someone asks you whether you have been orkutted, (my word processing application does not recognize it, as of now) do not look puzzled. ‘Getting scraped’ is no longer derogatory and infact people have started measuring the extent to which a person is extrovert, by the number of times he has been scraped. In addition, deleting a scrap is considered as a sin in the religion, Orkutism.

I sometimes feel, I can start a completely new blog on Orkut; and I constantly try to control the temptation. So, get ready for some more of my comments and suggestions and experiences with this new found tool of the world.

Is everybody leaving blogger.com? For, whatever blog I visit at blogger.com, I find the top post giving the address of the newly found home of the writer. May be they have moved on, but I do not have any such plans for the near future. Finally, I would be joining the sole company who has offered me a job in the first week of July. I have heard that will provide us with internet connection; but there would be no accessibility to personal mails. Also, sites like blogger.com and (yes, you guessed it) Orkut would b out of bounds. How will I survive, I am a little skeptical.

Friday, June 02, 2006

Yes, it will rain; No, it won't

After living in Mumbai for about 15 years, one thing I learned was that the weather was far from being predictable, especially the monsoons. You carry your umbrellas the entire day only to bring it drier home. And the day you forget it or consciously avoid taking it (looking at the bright sunshine in the morning), you are up for a couple of showers.

But the Meteorological departments and other institutions dealing with climatology across the world are doing their best to prove me wrong. How much they have succeeded is debatable but at least the majority believes that this is something to be discussed about. The hurricanes, earthquakes, floods and other natural calamities that we hear frequently and the accompanying large damages of life and property keep adding fuel to the above talk.

I do not know what educational qualification is required to get an entry into the Indian Meteorological department; but rumours say that the money (from the entry level itself) is good. Some say that it is comparable to the highest salaries paid in India. One thing I am sure is that a lot of money is going into the department for the equipments required have got to cost a fortune as well as the satellites being flown require advanced technology and huge amounts of money.

But is this spending – in the name of the human quest to know and somehow control nature – justified. I have come across cases where either these people were not able to predict some major happening, climatically speaking or had gone terribly wrong in their predictions. This winter the temperature in Delhi reached 0.2°C when it usually goes to a minimum of 4°C during that time of the year. As usual, there were no indications before hand. There was also news that BBC had given a better prediction about the climate of Delhi than those given in India.

A more recent example – and one which has a lot more effect – was the case of predictions for this year’s monsoon. The predictions were that it would be below normal. This has ruffled some feathers as India – which is a more agriculturally oriented country – had been trying to revive the agricultural industry and such a happening would have spelt doom for the same. Also, the stock markets became a little jittery at the news.

However, the result is again similar. Not only has the monsoon reached the country before schedule, the meteorological department itself has now predicted a normal monsoon for the country. I know that predicting the climate is easier said than done, but what I ask for is some positive progress.

Thursday, June 01, 2006

You have to cross the Threshold

You had always been behaving and acting in a certain way. Then, slowly or sometimes abruptly, you change the method followed and do things in a different way or maybe add and delete items from the things you do. This happened only because, either your threshold changed or the threshold of the thing changed. In short a relative or mutual change in the threshold.

For every thing there is a threshold and may be even a threshold value, if you wish. You had been traveling by train forever and that too in the second class. Suddenly, you feel that in future, if you travel by train that would only be in the air conditioned coaches. After some time, the train journey ceases to be an experience you might wish to experience. You are all for air travel even if that is a little too much for your pocket. That is the time to realize that a threshold has been crossed (or achieved!).

There might be a number of reasons for the same. Like in the previous example, affordability may be an important parameter. The cost of air travel may have decreased or your income might have increased so that it was strong enough to support your new mode of travel. Various other reasons can be searched for, but the thing to notice is that there was a threshold which had to be reached.

You come across these, almost daily. You come across a stranger; talk to him/her for a while; find him to be a nice guy/gal; decide on the next meeting; have a few meetings. The virtual threshold of making him a friend could be crossed at any stage of the above interactions or it may happen that it is never reached at all. Also, you would see that there are a number of points/milestones to be reached and with each one of them, there is a threshold value attached.

Now, the value depends on both the people interacting and the situation or the behaviour involved. Thus, the value varies with the person involved and as such different individuals in a similar situation might have the milestones at different levels in the journey. The value interprets and translates into different variables like time taken, money spent, quantity of work required to be done etc. So, different persons may take different amount of time to become friends with a particular person, or may have to employ distinct amount of labour in similar work profiles.

This threshold value is more dynamic than it seems. So, it is possible that it increases or decreases according to the change in the parameters on which the threshold (and thereby its value) is based. So, when you move out of the comforts of your house for the first time, the value hill is steep; but once the initial phase is over, it kind of becomes a plain and for many, the other way (i.e. moving from the independence in the outside world to the confinements of the home) becomes a mountain.