My sketches of actors

My Sketch of Emraan Hashmi

Thin line between silent acquiescence and protest

Imagine the scenario where a person is being unfairly treated in the office. What are the options open to him. A. He can silently suffer or protest. In both cases there are pros and cons to be considered. If he keeps silent the same treatment may be meted out to him time and again. If he protests then his superiors will always have some excuse to justify their actions. So a thin tightrope walk is necessary to avoid the minefield of office politics. In other cases too there is a tradeoff in every decision we take and the credit lies in choosing one path and sincerely sticking to it no matter what. I believe that sincere actions only help in the long run and there is a gut feeling which one has to go by and not depend on sycophancy or convenience of the moment to choose an action.

Durga Puja 2013

Durga Puja 2013 has arrived. Yesterday I had my first accident (hopefully last) with my new Wagon R car, when I was coming out of the society. I had just come out of the blind turn when a young girl driving a maruti who was also turning to go out, dashed into my car. She should have stopped as I was already ahead of her and going in first gear, but she was driving at a high speed and I was horrified to see that she did not stop at all and DASH! This is what happens when you expect others to break and you don't. She denied that it was her fault at first but people collected there said it was her mistake and then she agreed to pay for the damage to my car. I took down her name and number but now I have to go through the headache of getting the car repaired/insurance etc. Every puja this sort of calamity is happening. Last year before puja, I fractured my toe, and had to suffer for 3 months before it healed. Today I took D for bhog at the pujas and driving in a sari & parking my car and then extricating it was really hassling. But I hope I am getting a grip on my driving now. But my poor car, sob sob..... I am watching two serials on TV - One is Big Boss 7 and the other is Jee Le Zara. I like DV's acting a lot in the serial. He looks very cute when he smiles, not so much when he frowns. I think orange must be his favourite colour, he wears it a lot in the serial. Sanchi's acting is also good, she was looking really pretty in the pearl set in the wedding episode. The pace of the serial is good, not like the awful ekta kapoor saas bahu serials, where they pause the story at every conflict and show the shocked expressions on the actors faces, turn by turn for about five minutes, repeating the same frame a couple of times. Boring! In Big Boss the most hateful character is Armaan Kohli and no doubt he will manage to stik around till the last. The goodies like Ratan , Apurva etc will all be eliminated. Andy is good - funny and open. Among the girls - Kamya is strong, Gauhar is too loud. I can imagine she will be a milder version of Dolly Bindra when she is older.

Mindset of bestselling authors

I often try to imagine how bestselling/famous authors mindset when they set out to write their famous books. Imagine Jane Austen, who wrote the famous novels which practically set the trend and benchmark for romantic novels, setting out to write her famous novel, say Persuasion. Do they have the skeleton of their entire plot and characters, sketched out in advance, how do they plan their chapters, insert the dialogue's and plan the situations. Because as is very evident in a great authors books everything comes together so beautifully in space and time as to make the book everlasting in the minds of most readers. I rather think it is a kind of instinctive talent, not only for words and turn of phrase, but to actually mesh the plot, to give the story a rythym and tempo, to actually be able to visualise the characters in the mind's eye which truly makes some of the books so great.

Facebook Effect

I was wondering on the effect facebook posts have on our lives. Of course it is a wonderful technology which allows us to connect with long past, long forgotton acquaintances/ friends and classmates, but also, I sometimes wonder at the jealousy and envy the posts of these long forgotten people have on our psyche. Here I was quite happy of my mundane existance, average looks and drab clothes, when I see my classmate, the same age as I am, post a totally gorgeous photograph where she looks about thirty, in a five star resort, surrounded by family too. It's enough to make me turn green with envy and take a loong doleful look at my paunchline. Did I really need this, or was I happy enough in my 'ignorance is bliss' world. I catch up with the class dunce and find out that they are far richer than I am and at higher posts. Talk of tables being turned. A thing which I find most amusing is that there is a perspective I have now of life, which was absent back then. When I was giving my class ten or twelfth exams, it was dinned in my head by my parents and by peer pressure that I had to perform well in studies, get good ranks, get into an engineering college, almost as if my life depended on it. I did have to put in 7-8 hours of study every day. I did get into engg, got a job, but hey, those that didn't did as well or more, as is evident by their facebook posts. I thought at that time that those that didn't get good grades would probably have to beg on the streets, such was our fear psychosis. But it's all cool now. Like the famous film 3 Idiots message - the importance should not be given on marks, but on real knowledge, and on self knowledge. That should be what is important.

Someone controls everything

I saw mishti , from our building, with her mother near the school van. I was coming home at lunchtime and i hoped that i would go up to my flat , in the lift, alone. It was not to be, as when i came near the lift i saw that someone was just going up in it. Third floor, fourth floor and on and on went the lift right up to eleventh. By now i could hear the voices of the children talking to each other, coming nearer as i waited patiently by the lift. Soon they appeared, two little girls in school uniforms, shepharded by their mother and the other by her maid. I smiled and spoke to them. The lift arrived at last and all of us trooped in. I wondered at coincidences what if the man had gone only to the second floor. The lift would have arrived and i could have escaped into it without meeting my neighbours , enclosed , insulated in my own cocooned , comfortable existance, but someone had decreed otherwise, someone had decided that i would have to meet my neighbours and appraise them about my existance.

Pollution in Puri Beach

This summer I visited Puri  - Jagannathdham after a gap of 2 years. I was really appalled to see the filth and pollution all around. It's a shame  that better care is not taken of one of the really fantastic beaches anywhere. The waves at Puri beach come with so much momentum as is unmatched at any other place I've been to. The beach is really one of the wonders of nature which is getting spoiled by excessive garbage, filth and animals like ox, camels and dogs being allowed to roam around freely on the beach premises. The innumerable tourists coming here also have very little concern for the litter they leave everywhere around them from plastic packets to cola cans and bottles.
There are fierce fights between bulls roaming on the beach freely and one can really be injured if the bulls come charging helter skelter. The innumerable tourists who throng to Puri also dirty the beaches with plastic , cans and bottles. In fact the situation is become worse as time passes. The open drains by the beach emanate a foul smell. Better care needs to be taken of this priceless place.

Sexy Dress

What is not revealed is sexier than what is!

Primary Particles

Picture from internet Do electron proton and neutron really look like this? Shape, colour and size?

Categories of People

I have recently realised that there are some fixed categories of types in which most people fall, and that their behaviour can be predicted from the category they fall in. So I the great will try to create the categories broadly to try and categorize my acquaintances and more importantly MYSELF and try to deduce in which categories they and most importantly I fall, with a view to predicting their & MY behaviour under different circumstances.

Category 1 : Egoistic and selfish, high self esteem. Good talkers with average intelligence, with little morals or emotional empathy : They can motivate people and sway them rather for their own benefit than for others. Unfortunately most people I meet fall under this category with shades in between. When this category of people do something which appears unselfish it should be examined rather carefully for traps and pitfalls.

Category 2 : Egoistic with high self esteem but unselfish and principled, good talkers. They are the friends I want to make, those who will stand by one when the rats desert the sinking ship.

Category 3 : Meek, low self esteem with poor verbal skills and assertivity, What they think or do or morals are does not really matter as they don't often sway people's opinion or get into positions of real power. Such people are easily influenced by others more dominating than them. I like to think that I belong to category 2 rather than 3 although my verbal skills are pretty poor and self esteem sometimes lower than it should be. These are the 3 categories of people mainly though they are shades in between.

Failure

It's a well known saying that the real character of a person comes out only when he is faced with failure. So today after the failure it was pretty interesting to see the reactions of the people around me. RoTi is a lucky guy! His system worked just in the nick of time & he got bouquets for it. ASS behaved as if his involvement is minimal. Talk of rats deserting a sinking ship! Even the great Dad himself did not come down to witness the episode after his previous brush with failure he is now wiser and prefers to stay far far away from all these taints in his pretty ivory tower. I felt sorry for Puppy as he had worked the hardest for this and now might be made a scapegoat for the failure. I sometimes feel mad at SOB for being such a cold, polite and emotionless boss. At least sometimes you have got to get strung up about something and at least 'SAY SOMETHING'. But he prefers cold cuts to hot words, which is pretty OK most of the time but how good a leader does that make him. Pretty wimpy I should say, not in the least motivating for the team. Its rather demoralizing than anything. I am not in the know of office gossip but I bet its's discussed pretty threadbare in some circles. I was upset with Ramu for not doing the things as I had directed him to earlier, later I felt I should have let it go, anyway I was feeling rather bitter about it & wanted to vent out some feeling after the event. How beautiful the view was from the terrace of the building! Mole was enjoying it by himself when we all barged into his domain. Being the totally positive guy that he is he ordered tea for us all! This is God's revenge on me for wanting a cold, proper & emotionless boss after Tasi. I don't like Sob at all sometimes due to this, but I guess the scale evens out somewhat when I compare Tasi with Sob.

Wednesday 30th Jan 2013

I started making calculations for the important event scheduled for friday. I wonder what will happen? Will all the hard work go down the drain or if it will be successful or even partially so & what will work & what won't. I went for an eye checkup to a pretty expensive eye clinic for the eye floater problems which I am having for couple of months lately. The did a couple of eye tests- pressure, vision etc and cooly charged six hundred bucks, telling me i needed to come back again for some more tests as the result was not fully conclusive! The receptionist stared at my well worn shoes and looked doubtful if i could pay the fees, and two or three orderlies escorted me every step in the clinic.

Interpersonal politics

I think politics began with the creation of atoms themselves. First there was Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden living a blissful life till the ugly serpent reared its head and cajoled Eve to bite into the sinful apple. So the serpent was the first politician who swayed Eve to do something she had been forbidden. In a friendship between two people there are hardly any misunderstandings, until a third force appears, who for his own motives or even unknowingly distorts the relation between the two, be it ever so slightly. At best it can be a mutually beneficial relation for all, at worst the third person can break the bond between the two prior friends. This is the same thing which happens with molecules. Sodium and Bromine were existing peacefully as sodium bromide till chlorine came along and swept sodium off her feet to form sodium chloride to leave poor bromine standing alone. The forces at the molecular level make for an interesting study at the macro level too. We can characterise people as elements too. Very reactive male- Chlorine, Very reactive female - Sodium, Unreactive person - Noble metal like Helium and so on.

Great characters in fiction

In popular fiction there are a handful of characters who have exceeded their creators in fame and popularity. Two such who easily come to mind are Sherlock Holmes created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Potter by J K Rowling. Sherlock Holmes, the original cerebral detective was created by Sir Arthur CD in 17th century, in an age where there was no visual media, yet he became the benchmark for all later authors of crime fiction. His deductions were so startling and surprising and his mannerisms and physical appearance and gestures so 'singular' that they became iconic. Harry Potter, the beloved boy wizard is so popular that almost every other child knows about him and his adventures. In the visual age, his character has been bought to life on screen very suitably by Daniel Radcliffe. Few characters are there in child fiction who are as popular as Harry. In Enid Blyton's books of course we had characters we all identified with and were interested in like George in Famous Five books or Fatty in the Five find outers and dog. But these books revolved more around the mystery or adventure the characters get into rather than the central character. What makes these characters stand out more than any other. One must be the sheer originality of the character sketch. Sherlock Holmes was THE detective on which Agatha Christie sketched Hercule Poirot's quirks and Miss Marple's character.