i had chanced upon a spectacular bbc documentary, which gave a thorough analysis and a stunning expose of the present times. i however lack the vocabulary to describe this to the fullest so please bear with me.
nation and religion stand to be the only two reasons that are known to cause demarcation amongst people. yet, it is religion ( read : moral stand / morality) that assumes a bigger picture and dictates our lives, because we want to go to heaven. we all believe in freedom, but it is the very definition of freedom that is so distorted.
we go around doing deeds with a notion of doing good. but even this notion of doing good is very askewed. take for example a liberal society. you can do anything you please. to a conservationist this is a nightmare. he construes this as a society with flimsy morals and selfish interests. with people like him in power, they will ensure that people "cleanse" themselves. they believe that they are doing with "good" intentions and they techniques that they use to materialize their intentions are very questionable if not preposterous . they have nightmares of the society gone awry and hence use their power to weed out their nightmares.
this is exactly what u.s.a. and islam went through. i have deliberately used islam because sadly it has been now misconstrued as a religion of hatred and violence rather than peace. the nature of the present situation today can be cornered down to 2 individuals. one leo strauss and the other sayid qutb.
leo strauss was an american professor who postulated that liberalism is a cancer for the state, which affects people in the long run. sayid qutb, an egyptian sent to america to study the system and implement it back in egpyt, too held the same views. he believed that such liberalism gave way to loose morals and this he attributed as the quality of not being a muslim and stated that he didnt deserve to live any more. it is funny how he distorted religion and the right to take life.
their motive was to create a sense of fear and insecurity amongst the fellow men and in that hour of "darkness" they would look to their all-mighty God and thereby putting an end to the flimsy morals (egypt then was imitating the west).
disciples of leo strauss came into power and did the damage in the u.s. they were paul wolfowitz, donald rumsfeld to name a few. i will leave the whole description aside and will only say that, they were the ones responsible for cold wars, al - qaida etc.
sayid qutb also started working towards an organization to achieve the same. sadly he used violence to prove his point. he was executed but the seeds he had sown, began to sprout into saplings and one such sapling was aymaan al zawahiri. convinced of sayid qutb's beliefs, he worked steadfastly towards materializing it. he is a very educated man. and he is now the left hand man of 0sama. violence is never a key to prove a point.
i have painted a very nebulous picture of the situation today as an off-shoot of their beliefs. but little thinking will give you the exact picture i was trying paint all the while.
so what have we got here? a bevy of paranoia ridden people in power, trying to allay the unfound fears of masses by introducing their paranoia to them and swearing to stand by them and fend off the non-existing axis of evil. a new political propoganda? no comments, but if it is, seems like it worked out all to well.
and the funny part is we elected these leaders who will take us into the glorious future that awaits us.
cheers
kyos
p.s.: all the information was taken from the documentary
Friday, May 04, 2007
Friday, April 27, 2007
hey chum, gimme that and make it snappy
knowledge is power - so goes the adage. i really have not come across an instance where this was proved wrong.
anyway arguing about it is not the motive behind this post. what i want to talk about is the cost behind accessing the knowledge. we live in a materialistic world where everything is up for sale. money will do your talking.
people put a price on knowledge today and earn a buck out of it. legitimate or not is for the recipient to decide but if the same or higher quality of knowledge is dispensed for free, no one or very few care, just because (i think) the general masses may think it doesn't have proper credentials etc. etc. i still realize that i am not making any sense. i shall give you an actual example that i have experienced myself. and throughout the example, i want you to know that i am certainly not boasting, i am just recounting what i experienced and what i know, however if you think otherwise, i don't care!
i believe knowledge should be free. price tag on knowledge is absurd for me and i know scores of people who will concur. i had chanced upon a certain entity that helped you to enhance your skills in a particular area. intrigued i tried to absorb the information to my capacity and tried to devote time to it. i think i have learned quite something from it. with this, i wish to fulfill my part of spreading this knowledge that with capacitate people for sift information from dirt and for free. even the entity offered its services for free. more importantly, the topic isn't esoteric and will prove helpful in your everyday life!
hence, whenever people came to me to solve a query relating to the above mentioned area, i first helped them and they were amazed by the outcome. i then suggested the entity from where they could learn it. i also offered to put in my thoughts and opinions, with the intention that they would be able to fend for themselves and have no dependence whatsoever. but i was wrong. and time and time again, i was proven wrong. people are just not interested in it. the knowledge that the entity has to offer is available nowhere, and a price tag on it would be too dear. but it is for free. they are far too materialistic. materialistic meaning they want snappy results without putting effort into it. alas, this is a bane. this is not how things are supposed to be, at least in my notion.
they seek to be dependent and feel comfortable with that idea. i, however; fail to reason, how is this going to be good. if i add a price tag to my services, they are still going to come to me and others like me because they have nobody else who can do it.they could have had it for free with a lot of time and energy saved.
the world moves fast enough for anyone to stand and cogitate. but once one does, he can get things to work for him.
i have altruistically tried to help them, but they just aren't interested and so i stop telling them. they will come when they really want to know .
i take this moment to pay my respect to the those people who have strived not to make knowledge a commodity. in no particular order:
+fravia, zero, woodman to name a few amongst the scores who couldn't be named here.
pz out
kyos
knowledge should be free.
anyway arguing about it is not the motive behind this post. what i want to talk about is the cost behind accessing the knowledge. we live in a materialistic world where everything is up for sale. money will do your talking.
people put a price on knowledge today and earn a buck out of it. legitimate or not is for the recipient to decide but if the same or higher quality of knowledge is dispensed for free, no one or very few care, just because (i think) the general masses may think it doesn't have proper credentials etc. etc. i still realize that i am not making any sense. i shall give you an actual example that i have experienced myself. and throughout the example, i want you to know that i am certainly not boasting, i am just recounting what i experienced and what i know, however if you think otherwise, i don't care!
i believe knowledge should be free. price tag on knowledge is absurd for me and i know scores of people who will concur. i had chanced upon a certain entity that helped you to enhance your skills in a particular area. intrigued i tried to absorb the information to my capacity and tried to devote time to it. i think i have learned quite something from it. with this, i wish to fulfill my part of spreading this knowledge that with capacitate people for sift information from dirt and for free. even the entity offered its services for free. more importantly, the topic isn't esoteric and will prove helpful in your everyday life!
hence, whenever people came to me to solve a query relating to the above mentioned area, i first helped them and they were amazed by the outcome. i then suggested the entity from where they could learn it. i also offered to put in my thoughts and opinions, with the intention that they would be able to fend for themselves and have no dependence whatsoever. but i was wrong. and time and time again, i was proven wrong. people are just not interested in it. the knowledge that the entity has to offer is available nowhere, and a price tag on it would be too dear. but it is for free. they are far too materialistic. materialistic meaning they want snappy results without putting effort into it. alas, this is a bane. this is not how things are supposed to be, at least in my notion.
they seek to be dependent and feel comfortable with that idea. i, however; fail to reason, how is this going to be good. if i add a price tag to my services, they are still going to come to me and others like me because they have nobody else who can do it.they could have had it for free with a lot of time and energy saved.
the world moves fast enough for anyone to stand and cogitate. but once one does, he can get things to work for him.
i have altruistically tried to help them, but they just aren't interested and so i stop telling them. they will come when they really want to know .
i take this moment to pay my respect to the those people who have strived not to make knowledge a commodity. in no particular order:
+fravia, zero, woodman to name a few amongst the scores who couldn't be named here.
pz out
kyos
knowledge should be free.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
where is india going to?
well, what is india coming to? the recent developments in india surely give out the message that india isn't a democracy anymore. i may have gone a bit far in saying that but, democracy in its true sense has lost its meaning in india.
we are a developing nation and we have tons of issues to address to, yet what do our politicians go around doing? well working tooth and nail towards materializing their vested interests. their lack of interest on issues , that were promised to be taken of and the reason why they are where they are now, is pretty evident from the current developments.
we are a proud nation which has so much diversity. i dont think a lot many people realise this. i do because i have experienced it. yet what we do about it? demand a reservation of seats based on caste and creed. while i sincerely abhor this to its very core, i do support the need for supporting those people who have the calibre but not the financial support. due to the gold mine of votes in the reserved section, officialdoms are rooting and tooting for passing this bill . and how? based on a 1931 census. surely any half witted moron could figure out that it needed a more credible need.
that narayana murthy said something objectional , that should not have been said, spread like a forest fire. he apologized for it and i guess think that should be end of matter. instead he is being charged for his comments by politicians . surely they would have better things to do!
garlanding a the statue of a man conveys respect for him. regardless if the one garlanding it wears footwear or not! na... the bjp criticizes the congress for "committing such a heinous act".
the man charged with the murder of jessica lal is contesting for the assembly polls. and his mother is going around gathering votes for him. but murderers and politicians go hand in hand atleast in india. the constituition has time and time again been sneered at by politicians with a shady past in commanding positions . the supreme court has though wisely rejected his plea to contest.
these are just the few instances that are notified to the public. there are numerous incidents that arent reported. with this awful scenario do you think it is wise to invest time, effort and money in activities that yield no fruits when we arent able to provide 3 square meals a day to the population of india? while this post has largely been critical about the politicians, it is also our (citizens) lack of interest in matters of the state. we have been promised of facilities during the elections and we know they arent going to be fulfilled and yet we decide to remain mum and complain. fews the reasons that make it into the politician's speech are the failure of the party in power to do anything better and how he will be the change they so sorely need. and next time around he will be the brunt of his rival though the situation wouldnt have changed much. they promise a better lifestyle everytime but dont you think they have gone too far with their lies and we with our hibernation?
it is time to change.
india prevails,
k
we are a developing nation and we have tons of issues to address to, yet what do our politicians go around doing? well working tooth and nail towards materializing their vested interests. their lack of interest on issues , that were promised to be taken of and the reason why they are where they are now, is pretty evident from the current developments.
we are a proud nation which has so much diversity. i dont think a lot many people realise this. i do because i have experienced it. yet what we do about it? demand a reservation of seats based on caste and creed. while i sincerely abhor this to its very core, i do support the need for supporting those people who have the calibre but not the financial support. due to the gold mine of votes in the reserved section, officialdoms are rooting and tooting for passing this bill . and how? based on a 1931 census. surely any half witted moron could figure out that it needed a more credible need.
that narayana murthy said something objectional , that should not have been said, spread like a forest fire. he apologized for it and i guess think that should be end of matter. instead he is being charged for his comments by politicians . surely they would have better things to do!
garlanding a the statue of a man conveys respect for him. regardless if the one garlanding it wears footwear or not! na... the bjp criticizes the congress for "committing such a heinous act".
the man charged with the murder of jessica lal is contesting for the assembly polls. and his mother is going around gathering votes for him. but murderers and politicians go hand in hand atleast in india. the constituition has time and time again been sneered at by politicians with a shady past in commanding positions . the supreme court has though wisely rejected his plea to contest.
these are just the few instances that are notified to the public. there are numerous incidents that arent reported. with this awful scenario do you think it is wise to invest time, effort and money in activities that yield no fruits when we arent able to provide 3 square meals a day to the population of india? while this post has largely been critical about the politicians, it is also our (citizens) lack of interest in matters of the state. we have been promised of facilities during the elections and we know they arent going to be fulfilled and yet we decide to remain mum and complain. fews the reasons that make it into the politician's speech are the failure of the party in power to do anything better and how he will be the change they so sorely need. and next time around he will be the brunt of his rival though the situation wouldnt have changed much. they promise a better lifestyle everytime but dont you think they have gone too far with their lies and we with our hibernation?
it is time to change.
india prevails,
k
Friday, April 06, 2007
the story of search engines
once upon a time, not too in the distant past, there was a world that was plagued with unsorted files over the internet and was waiting for a messiah who would aid his believers in accessing the files from the utter chaos that was rampant or so goes the prophecy.
then came 1994 and with it the calling of the messiah! two students graduated and paved path for millions to help them access any files they chose to, with relative ease and the believers revelled in glory basking in the splendor of what became to be known as the father of all search engines - Yahoo!
five years went by and yet again another messiah answered the calling of his people. but? the world already had its messiah and who was this brat to hog up the spotlight. it so happened that the former had indexed the forbidden site and with that ensued all the commercial crap of the e-world. ensnared in its grip, Yahoo! tried to escape but in vain. no more could it cater its people with search results they desired but hiding them beneath the bloated commercial garbage.
and so the world needed another savior and then came Google and things have been pretty much the Google way. a folklore suggests it is the Yahweh of search engines.
so what was the silver bullet that Google possessed and Yahoo! didnt? before beginning, i would like you all to know that i am writing this from a totally my point of view ( which happens to be not so broad considering i am unaware of the events during 1994, so cut me some slack!)
coming back, what did Google have? from my point of view Google kept it simple. the motive of Google was that of a search engine and that it sought to provide with exemplary standards. and it did. but wait a minute wasnt/isnt Yahoo! also a search engine with more experience than Google? yes, but i think there were couple of mistakes that Yahoo! made which cost it.
Yahoo! had started out as a search engine and later on progressed to various other activities to keep its customers on its pages as much as possible and thereby earning more revenue. cool,but what happened was, it also invited a lot of commercialization. with commercialization comes degradation in quality if not watched over carefully. this is exactly what happened. it crowded its page with varieties to lure and this went on fine as long as there was no competitor. and then suddenly providing meaningful search results wasnt a priority anymore.
stating that Google didnt vie on commercialization would be wrong, but Google had its priorities straight. it started out as a search engine and maintains its image as a search engine. if one would glance at the interface that Google has provided, it hasnt changed much. the main essence remains the same. a text box to type your query in and a search button. cant get simpler than that.
where Yahoo! failed Google succeeded. i guess it understood the thinking of the common man. rather than dumping him with a plethora of meaningless options, it thought of keeping things simple and direct.when it announced of a 1 gb mailbox, all Yahoo! could reply to it was with an increase of 100 mbs.
Yahoo! revolutionized chatting (started with AOL). it mandated the download of the client to enable chatting. Google went one step further. it embedded the chat feature in the inbox. hence if you want to chat and though you dont have the client, you will still be able to accomplish your work.
Google's approach to mail- GMail is lightening fast and a clutter free interface. Yahoo! tried to give a fitting reply by sprucing up its looks but the time taken for loading, where it mattered the most, was too long.
then GMail came up with online text/document editing. this helped the user not to make any assumptions of the system he was sitting on. he would have his tools everywhere. Yahoo! was nowhere near this scene. GMail isnt commercial free either! rather than images that distract our attention as in Yahoo!, it resorted to using text that didnt divert our attention. but placed strategically enough to catch our attention.
one of the things that Google became instantly rich was because of its AdBots. these were scripts crawling through the cyber space either collecting information or displaying an advertisement pertaining to the subject of the site (if you would notice there are adwords in Gmail when a mail is read, and they are close to the words / content in the mail. and also if the mail happened to contain the number through which checking the status of an activity was possible, it would on its own provide a link to the site with the results corresponding to our number. no hassles.
these are some of the many examples that point to only one fact: Google was far adept in its social engineering skills than Yahoo!. it had the correct notion of the common man's needs and sought to it that they are catered yet keeping its focus on producing refined search results all the time. this translated as more "quality" time spent on Google's pages.
so there wasnt much to think over, quality wins over quantity.
i guess i am pretty much done now. Google seems to be the messiah and lets hope it is here to stay.
cheers,
kyos
P.S.: the post might have sounded pro-Google and anti-Yahoo! but i assure you that i have given an impartial observation of what i have experienced and have not placed either in bad light.
then came 1994 and with it the calling of the messiah! two students graduated and paved path for millions to help them access any files they chose to, with relative ease and the believers revelled in glory basking in the splendor of what became to be known as the father of all search engines - Yahoo!
five years went by and yet again another messiah answered the calling of his people. but? the world already had its messiah and who was this brat to hog up the spotlight. it so happened that the former had indexed the forbidden site and with that ensued all the commercial crap of the e-world. ensnared in its grip, Yahoo! tried to escape but in vain. no more could it cater its people with search results they desired but hiding them beneath the bloated commercial garbage.
and so the world needed another savior and then came Google and things have been pretty much the Google way. a folklore suggests it is the Yahweh of search engines.
so what was the silver bullet that Google possessed and Yahoo! didnt? before beginning, i would like you all to know that i am writing this from a totally my point of view ( which happens to be not so broad considering i am unaware of the events during 1994, so cut me some slack!)
coming back, what did Google have? from my point of view Google kept it simple. the motive of Google was that of a search engine and that it sought to provide with exemplary standards. and it did. but wait a minute wasnt/isnt Yahoo! also a search engine with more experience than Google? yes, but i think there were couple of mistakes that Yahoo! made which cost it.
Yahoo! had started out as a search engine and later on progressed to various other activities to keep its customers on its pages as much as possible and thereby earning more revenue. cool,but what happened was, it also invited a lot of commercialization. with commercialization comes degradation in quality if not watched over carefully. this is exactly what happened. it crowded its page with varieties to lure and this went on fine as long as there was no competitor. and then suddenly providing meaningful search results wasnt a priority anymore.
stating that Google didnt vie on commercialization would be wrong, but Google had its priorities straight. it started out as a search engine and maintains its image as a search engine. if one would glance at the interface that Google has provided, it hasnt changed much. the main essence remains the same. a text box to type your query in and a search button. cant get simpler than that.
where Yahoo! failed Google succeeded. i guess it understood the thinking of the common man. rather than dumping him with a plethora of meaningless options, it thought of keeping things simple and direct.when it announced of a 1 gb mailbox, all Yahoo! could reply to it was with an increase of 100 mbs.
Yahoo! revolutionized chatting (started with AOL). it mandated the download of the client to enable chatting. Google went one step further. it embedded the chat feature in the inbox. hence if you want to chat and though you dont have the client, you will still be able to accomplish your work.
Google's approach to mail- GMail is lightening fast and a clutter free interface. Yahoo! tried to give a fitting reply by sprucing up its looks but the time taken for loading, where it mattered the most, was too long.
then GMail came up with online text/document editing. this helped the user not to make any assumptions of the system he was sitting on. he would have his tools everywhere. Yahoo! was nowhere near this scene. GMail isnt commercial free either! rather than images that distract our attention as in Yahoo!, it resorted to using text that didnt divert our attention. but placed strategically enough to catch our attention.
one of the things that Google became instantly rich was because of its AdBots. these were scripts crawling through the cyber space either collecting information or displaying an advertisement pertaining to the subject of the site (if you would notice there are adwords in Gmail when a mail is read, and they are close to the words / content in the mail. and also if the mail happened to contain the number through which checking the status of an activity was possible, it would on its own provide a link to the site with the results corresponding to our number. no hassles.
these are some of the many examples that point to only one fact: Google was far adept in its social engineering skills than Yahoo!. it had the correct notion of the common man's needs and sought to it that they are catered yet keeping its focus on producing refined search results all the time. this translated as more "quality" time spent on Google's pages.
so there wasnt much to think over, quality wins over quantity.
i guess i am pretty much done now. Google seems to be the messiah and lets hope it is here to stay.
cheers,
kyos
P.S.: the post might have sounded pro-Google and anti-Yahoo! but i assure you that i have given an impartial observation of what i have experienced and have not placed either in bad light.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
imagine- john lennon
i had this wonderful opportunity to see the documentary on the life on John Lennon. and who better could be relating it than John himself!
i guess divorce, troubled childhood and drugs are something that a successful musician must have gone through. i have yet to come across a musician who is successful and hasn't gone through any of the above!
as the world remembers gandhi for his stand with non violence, john lennon is remembered for his effort to spread world peace.
having girls go la la over you at a youthful age of 20s or even in the teens, can fill an individual with arrogance and reckless disregard for anything. but there was something different about john. simplicity pervaded through him and his stardom didn't seem affect his thoughts / motives. he tried to live like a normal man, pursue his interests.
but then things weren't so simple for him. he was caught up in the mania that was "The Beatles". a tumultuous world in a way. with the fame that he achieved anything that he said was something sort of a dogma. often misconstrued, his statements provoked widespread discontent, yet that didn't seem to affect even a little bit of his position in the hearts of his people.
he had this down to earth disposition which you would fail to see in other celebrities, to the extent that he suggested one of his followers to get a real life rather than following him as he meticulously explained that it wasn't doing any good to him. strange eh? who would turn down a fan?
after the beatles split up, he concentrated his life in spreading the message of peace. sadly though he was assassinated, just because there was a consensus that he was responsible for "splitting up" the beatles by introducing yoko ono.
an defiant spirit who was his own master.
his song imagine still resonates in many a people.
imagine- its easy if you try...
//o-o\\
i guess divorce, troubled childhood and drugs are something that a successful musician must have gone through. i have yet to come across a musician who is successful and hasn't gone through any of the above!
as the world remembers gandhi for his stand with non violence, john lennon is remembered for his effort to spread world peace.
having girls go la la over you at a youthful age of 20s or even in the teens, can fill an individual with arrogance and reckless disregard for anything. but there was something different about john. simplicity pervaded through him and his stardom didn't seem affect his thoughts / motives. he tried to live like a normal man, pursue his interests.
but then things weren't so simple for him. he was caught up in the mania that was "The Beatles". a tumultuous world in a way. with the fame that he achieved anything that he said was something sort of a dogma. often misconstrued, his statements provoked widespread discontent, yet that didn't seem to affect even a little bit of his position in the hearts of his people.
he had this down to earth disposition which you would fail to see in other celebrities, to the extent that he suggested one of his followers to get a real life rather than following him as he meticulously explained that it wasn't doing any good to him. strange eh? who would turn down a fan?
after the beatles split up, he concentrated his life in spreading the message of peace. sadly though he was assassinated, just because there was a consensus that he was responsible for "splitting up" the beatles by introducing yoko ono.
an defiant spirit who was his own master.
his song imagine still resonates in many a people.
imagine- its easy if you try...
//o-o\\
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Monday, January 22, 2007
let the adventures begin
well tis was when i moved into my new rented apartment. it happens to be bigger than my house.
right on the first day we had goof-ups if you may call them. we all had a good laugh at the moments and what's in store for us.
now everywhere in america you have the smoke alarms installed in the house, in every room! and this is quite new to us( me and my room mates) as we never had such a feature in our homes. there is a smoke detector in our kitchen. there is also an exhaust fan available for us to use when we cook. but since it is new to us, we didnt bother to switch on the exhaust fan. and in moments we realised the presence of the smoke alarm. it went out *beep*,*beep*,*beep*.
our memories of a smoke detector going off was only in the movies where the scene was of a burning building. but in this case, the big question was, where is the fire? panic stricken we looked for means to turn it off.
one thing that we also noticed in l.a. was that the fire department is proactive. our house has a window that looked onto the road where we could listen and see the fire truck wailing its siren away almost every 2 hours or so. now we were wondering if they would be heading for us? so we opened up the windows, furled up the blinds and still the alarm wouldn't go off.
this was very similar to a protagonist trying to rescue a baby from a burning building, the only difference was we didnt know what to do. there was this button on the smoke alarm. and some how we figured that upon depressing the button again, the alarm would calm. :P
then i yanked out the stick that supported the hangers from the closet and tried it at the alarm. then another roommate of mine draws a chair underneath the alarm and depresses the alarm button and it goes back to its mute state.
if you think that was all for a day, it isn't.
now the concept of heaters is also new to us naive youngsters. ours works on the concept of gas. the land lady had told us to put the heater in a "pilot" mode when not in use. i asked for its significance she didnt have a reply. in the "pilot" mode however it was still on, on a lower flame though.
things started heating up in sometime though it was on a pilot mode and we couldnt take it anymore. so thats when we shut the gas supply off thereby turning the heater off completely. that worked out all fine and dandy.
that night though we felt the need of the heater, which is when we turned it on and we ready to enjoy the warmth it gave. but it didnt give out anything. and then we looked around and thats when we realised that there wasnt any flame to burn the gas which is when we realised the significance of the pilot mode.
anyway, we needed to strike a flame in that encasement. we neither had a long match stick or any such means light the flame. we took a newspaper. wound it tight so as to form a stick and lit it with a match stick. this is pretty much how the primitive man who invented fire would have done after some point of time minus the newspaper. now we started poking at the gas outlet in the encasement. nothing! again and nothing! then again and zilch! this was demoralizing and puzzling for us because we were engineers by profession and would not accept anything without a proper reasoning.what arrogance!
then we let the gas flow freely and lit. and i was the one hold that torch and *bhoop * came the noise and the flame came right at me and there is was, burning in all its splendor.
oh i forgot to mention that in case something went wrong i had one of my room mates with a cooker filled with water.
then again we had a good laugh.
playing with fire right on the day of signing the lease for the apartment! some fun eh?
i guess i have rambled on for quite some time now. i shall give you some breathing space.
till we meet again
k for kyos
right on the first day we had goof-ups if you may call them. we all had a good laugh at the moments and what's in store for us.
now everywhere in america you have the smoke alarms installed in the house, in every room! and this is quite new to us( me and my room mates) as we never had such a feature in our homes. there is a smoke detector in our kitchen. there is also an exhaust fan available for us to use when we cook. but since it is new to us, we didnt bother to switch on the exhaust fan. and in moments we realised the presence of the smoke alarm. it went out *beep*,*beep*,*beep*.
our memories of a smoke detector going off was only in the movies where the scene was of a burning building. but in this case, the big question was, where is the fire? panic stricken we looked for means to turn it off.
one thing that we also noticed in l.a. was that the fire department is proactive. our house has a window that looked onto the road where we could listen and see the fire truck wailing its siren away almost every 2 hours or so. now we were wondering if they would be heading for us? so we opened up the windows, furled up the blinds and still the alarm wouldn't go off.
this was very similar to a protagonist trying to rescue a baby from a burning building, the only difference was we didnt know what to do. there was this button on the smoke alarm. and some how we figured that upon depressing the button again, the alarm would calm. :P
then i yanked out the stick that supported the hangers from the closet and tried it at the alarm. then another roommate of mine draws a chair underneath the alarm and depresses the alarm button and it goes back to its mute state.
if you think that was all for a day, it isn't.
now the concept of heaters is also new to us naive youngsters. ours works on the concept of gas. the land lady had told us to put the heater in a "pilot" mode when not in use. i asked for its significance she didnt have a reply. in the "pilot" mode however it was still on, on a lower flame though.
things started heating up in sometime though it was on a pilot mode and we couldnt take it anymore. so thats when we shut the gas supply off thereby turning the heater off completely. that worked out all fine and dandy.
that night though we felt the need of the heater, which is when we turned it on and we ready to enjoy the warmth it gave. but it didnt give out anything. and then we looked around and thats when we realised that there wasnt any flame to burn the gas which is when we realised the significance of the pilot mode.
anyway, we needed to strike a flame in that encasement. we neither had a long match stick or any such means light the flame. we took a newspaper. wound it tight so as to form a stick and lit it with a match stick. this is pretty much how the primitive man who invented fire would have done after some point of time minus the newspaper. now we started poking at the gas outlet in the encasement. nothing! again and nothing! then again and zilch! this was demoralizing and puzzling for us because we were engineers by profession and would not accept anything without a proper reasoning.what arrogance!
then we let the gas flow freely and lit. and i was the one hold that torch and *bhoop * came the noise and the flame came right at me and there is was, burning in all its splendor.
oh i forgot to mention that in case something went wrong i had one of my room mates with a cooker filled with water.
then again we had a good laugh.
playing with fire right on the day of signing the lease for the apartment! some fun eh?
i guess i have rambled on for quite some time now. i shall give you some breathing space.
till we meet again
k for kyos
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Saturday, January 06, 2007
bon jour la
well here i am . in l.a. phew! i must say i was excited.
once you are here is when you realise the hardships,the hurdles that lay ahead of you. the very idea of building everything from scratch with nothing is seemingly very detterent for any faint heart.
everyone faces them,anyone who has come here leaving the rosy family thousands of miles behind him. and everyone has a fresh new identity to start out with. i really dont know how to put it in words but i shall try my best.
i was taken in by a senior of mine who i must say was really helpful in all sorts. i was taken aback by the amount of help that he had extended to me. i shall never forget that. all for a one person whom he had met only 2-3 times. then i was taken where a group of students welcomed me and prepared food. we had a jolly of a time. all for a one person whom they had never met in their life! but then in today's world who would be so nice?
the only tool that you have to start out with ,in this brave new world, is trust. hehe, if you dont have that, consider yourself to be a gonner. i sensed this in the past few days. amongst new people all you can offer is trust and that's a BIG thing and do whatever you can so that they dont loose it on you.
i guess i am done saying. pretty much an arbitrary ending.
till we meet again
good bye
once you are here is when you realise the hardships,the hurdles that lay ahead of you. the very idea of building everything from scratch with nothing is seemingly very detterent for any faint heart.
everyone faces them,anyone who has come here leaving the rosy family thousands of miles behind him. and everyone has a fresh new identity to start out with. i really dont know how to put it in words but i shall try my best.
i was taken in by a senior of mine who i must say was really helpful in all sorts. i was taken aback by the amount of help that he had extended to me. i shall never forget that. all for a one person whom he had met only 2-3 times. then i was taken where a group of students welcomed me and prepared food. we had a jolly of a time. all for a one person whom they had never met in their life! but then in today's world who would be so nice?
the only tool that you have to start out with ,in this brave new world, is trust. hehe, if you dont have that, consider yourself to be a gonner. i sensed this in the past few days. amongst new people all you can offer is trust and that's a BIG thing and do whatever you can so that they dont loose it on you.
i guess i am done saying. pretty much an arbitrary ending.
till we meet again
good bye
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