Eek S/W enginner ki pratha

Hum panchi unmukt gagan ke,
Pinjad bandh na gaa paayenge,
Kanak teeliyon se takrakar,
Pulkit pankh toot jaayenge

Hum behta jal peene waale,
Mar jaayenge bhooke pyaase,
Kahin bhali hai katuk nimbori,
Kanak katori ki maida se

Svarn Shrinkhla ke bandhan mein,
Apni gati udaan sab bhoole,
Bas sapno mein dekh rahe hain,
Taru ki phungi, par ke jhoole

Aise the armaan ki udte,
Neel gagan ki seema paane,
Laal kiran si chonch khol,
Chugte taarak, anaar ke daane

Hoti seema heen shitij se,
In pankho ki hoda hodi,
Ya to shitij milan ban jaata,
Ya tanti saanso ki dori

Need na do, chaahe tehni ka,
Aashray chhinn-bhhinn kar daalo,
lekin pankh diye hain to,
Aakul udaan mein vighn na daalo

- Sumitranandan Panth

Last week in Chicago

This time around, the US was an interesting experience. Went to loads of places, tried a bunch of cuisines...a decent experience all in all. But I'm not all that sad to go back to अपना देस (I couldn't help using the cool feature that blogger has provided :))

Anyways back to the main topic...looking back at the 3 months, life was fun filled with no work...3 months wasted i would say on professional front...didn't learn much from the entire experience except for the fact that i know y Scott Adams loves to hate consultants so much :) The other thing that I have realized is that there are lots of not so smart people around to be milked by the smart people...guess that's what this world is all about.

So long US...till the next time.

Personality test

I saw this interesting link - another one of the personality tests...and it came up with the things that i knew about myself all along...It was still an interesting experience though:
The link is: http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/whatamilike/index.shtml

and this is the result: http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/whatamilike/index_5.shtml?personality_type=idealist

reconfirming the obvious. :)

Note that the article says that idealists are more likely to say that they are vegetarians...coincidence? I think not. :D

Bad writings

When I look back and read the posts that i had in this blog. i feel that i have reached new lows as time is passing by.
guess i should just concentrate on relevant topics on which i can write fluidly without thinking too much....talk about spontaneity (or rather the lack of it.)

A cynical point of view.

There was a time when there was peace in the world and no bloodshed.
Or was it all in my mind?

Right from the beginning of human civilization, there has been bloodshed all the time...the savage in the humans was there always to be seen throughout the pages of history...Human life is akin to an animal's...initially all the humans are nice and cute and innocent...but then as they come of age...they become more intelligent, savage and cunning...Where does all this lead us to? is there any difference between a primate and a homo sapien at all except for maybe his intelligence which might be used for more savagery across human mankind?

A slight detour to one of the ideas in the movie Matrix -- one of the first Matrix created was a perfect one - where all were happy. It failed miserably. I'm just thinking, could there be any shred of truth in it? Is this what the real world is all about too? Should there always be someone sad for someone else to be happy?

And does this mean that a world of peace and harmony is just a fools dream that most are chasing - a mirage that everyone is chasing? Does that mean that all the wars that are happening in this world has no solution? If yes, then why the effort to go through the motions of trying to make things work? Isn't this stupidity on part of the superpowers that they are striving to do something that they might think is never going to work somewhere deep down in their mind?

I know that nothing is going to happen unless one keeps trying, but then I'm just thinking. If the Al Quida is eliminated, wouldn't there be some other organization to take its place? Isn't this going to be a cycle that will never end? I guess the only thing that could happen is that an individual might come up with a solution that would be temporary to say the least. He would get all the Nobel prizes and accolades and finally die, leaving the world in the same situation as it was before he was born.

This sets me to another thought - what could be the aim of a person in life then? Exist? Try to be happy, try to make a mark in this world before one ceases to exist? The word "Life" has never been so meaningless. I guess, its better for one to look at the micro picture, feeling happy about the small things that life offers and forget the big picture because its never going to change.

- a cynic

Windy experiences

Its been some time now since the last blog. I'm still in Chicago. I'm still trying to understand how things work, and how things can work though should not be made to work that way.
Chicago is a beautiful place (i would say that to almost any and every place) with tall (and i really mean tall) buildings. The place where I am staying is smaller than most of the buildings in here and even that has got 25 floors. (just to give you a sense of what do i mean by tall when i say tall)

Now to the list of places where I/we have been to:

1. Millennium park: A nice park which has got a few weird structures (which could pass off as modern art) which always has a group of people who keep wowing at them (though i have this feeling that no-one, not even the creator of the "modern art", knows what it is all about - guess that's human nature, what one doesn't know is regarded highly till you understand it, in which case its not novel enough to be had in high regards.)
2. Devon street: This is a place where all the desi people should go atleast once if in Chicago. Im sure that you would feel closer to apna des than in here. Loads of Indian/Paki stores and this is going to be our choicest place for groceries in the coming days. (There is an interesting incident that happened the first time we were over here - My boss got 3 sugarcane juice glasses after we had a meal that could have fed a heard of elephants. We couldn't drink it, obviously coz we never did look like elephants at any point in our lives, and so it was destined to be on a cardboard case, orphaned and not cared for. Just at that time, there was a Gujji couple who saw the cane juice and exclaimed "Ganne ka ras!!". That could have been me exclaiming when i see 100% in my marks card, or navjot singh sidhu on any stupid joke. We, like true desis gave him the info as to where to get the juice from. In the end, my boss even gave away one of the juices to them too, free of cost. Would have garnered him loads of blessings and a sure shot place in heaven along with getting relieved of the burden of carrying the juice glass all the way back home... back to the places of visit)
   
3. Sears tower: This is as tall as a building can get. (well, almost - there are 2/3 buildings higher than this too, but again, let's not get into the details on that one because a) I dont have any details to give b) I hope you have read the heading of the blog - it doesn't say Malaysian experience) Interestingly, this building's idea was thought of by an Indian (I guess this is a knack of all Indians - Indians in India don't try to do any good/think anything different. As soon as you give them an opportunity to do something good for some other country, they will do everything under their powers to oblige them. I hope this changes for good in the coming years with India on the way to getting into the league of superpower countries. Am I expecting way too much?) The entire Chicago was illuminated with zillions of lights. Right in front of us, there was GMaps for Chicago with lighting effects added to it.
   
4. Navy pier: We have been to place 3 times till now. Each time we have been there, we have done something different. The first time we went on a ferris wheel. The next time we had beer and listening to the live music that a band was playing over there. The third time, we went on a night cruise from where we saw fireworks - I've don't have many words to describe that night - it was amazing and beautiful beyond any word that might have been created to describe such things in the English language.
   
5. Michigan Avenue: I'm not sure if this should be over here or not, but then since this has been mentioned in all the Chicago guide books as a place to walk along, I guess I should add this too...just for the records. Since the day we came over here, we have been walking along this road, and more often that not, there is something different happening - be it the shows that people come up with along the pathways, or the small patches of gardens that keep changing once every couple of weeks

That's it, for now - there are a few notable omissions from the list - theater, movie halls, museums and clubs. I'll try to rectify these aberrations as soon as possible - most notably the last one :)

peace
sid

US experiences - second opinion

After a few shitty days (both emotionally and otherwise) I'm ready to be the same sarky, thoughtless guy that I was all the time. (or so it would appear to the others) I'm back in the US the second time (Most of the blogs that I had written the last time around, was when I was there in the US and I continued the bad work for some more days coming back - but then the effort was huge and daunting. So, I did what I generally do when I'm doing something that I would like to do, but would be so much happy doing without because of the effort involved in it - not do it. *I wish the bloggers have a concept of a postscript for a blog, these brackets generally go tangential to the main topic and it becomes a real pain to actually come back to the main topic. Maybe, I should contact the Google guys.*) and the US does not seem to be a pretty bad place to survive after all!

The plan this time around was to be in Boston for a week and then change bases to Chicago (where the real fun starts *for the people who don't know me, I'm being sarky here, I hate working*)

The Boston part of the trip was good. There were lunches and there were dinners, and there were more lunches and more dinners. Loads of cheese everywhere, lots of iced water (I haven't been able to figure out the obsession that the folks over here have for ice - there is ice in the water in the winters in water, there is ice in the water in the summers here, there is ice in the cola, I'm pretty sure that these guys must have been the ones to start the concept of iced coffee *here I go again.*) and loads of coffee. (this is one thing that I absolutely love in here - enormous cups of hot piping coffee.)


Other than the food and the cuisines that my stomach had to bear everyday, I did meet up with a couple of friends of mine. One was a school friend and another a college mate. Interestingly, I had not met the school friend of mine from the time we left the school and I'm sure that we might mot have met up had we been in India in the same city. I guess that's what happens when one comes in so far away from your emotional bases. :)

That was all about the Boston trip which spanned for a week. The week was good, no real work (the fun is going to start in Chicago, remember?) and the food was good (most of the times, at least) Just waiting and watching what is going to happen in the next few weeks.

Chicago experiences in the next blog. Chow till then.