The Outburst

In this post i would like to again talk about the rape which happened in Delhi. Though no need to specify which one as last i checked another girl was raped. There has been sudden outburst of emotions which can be seen at the protests at India Gate, facebook, twitter and all over the news. People have been demanding "Capital punishment for rapists", "Life imprisonment for rapists", "Chemical castration", "Death by stone pelting" and some have even asked for rapists to be handed over to the public etc. I have a problem with all of this.

Please don't misunderstand me I too like any other human being would like swift justice for Amanat be it capital punishment or life imprisonment to all of the accused. What i have a problem is with mindset of the people which makes me feel as if we are back into the Roman era where the public asks for blood and thus the concept of gladiators. In the current scenario what that equates too people are on the streets asking for the death sentence for the rapists and other forms of torture to the rapists in other words they are asking for blood and since we are relatively civilized compared to our ancestors we are asking for the execution to be done by the law though some have suggested that they should be handed to the public etc which makes me think otherwise. Due to the sudden outburst of emotions people are not able to think rationally. They are just looking at one aspect that is regarding this case and are completely ignoring the bigger picture which is exactly what the government wants.

The above picture may or may not accurately depict the bigger picture but i feel it is a start. Instead of asking just for stricter laws we should also be asking for stricter implementation. If you look in the past accused DGP Rathore was let off with a light sentence, Santosh Singh whose father was the second in command of Delhi Police when the case was being investigated helped his son getting a light sentence and that too after years of pursuing the case and let's not forget the famous Jessica Lall murder case. and there are numerous others like these. To me all these point to the same direction that one of the biggest fallacies of our law and order is that it fails to act and even if it does it is too late. The judiciary and the police try to protect the rich and powerful while the common man is left to the dogs. As pointed by many that there were 646 rapes in Delhi alone in 2012 and there was just 1 conviction till date and that to me is the biggest failure of not only the government, police, judiciary but also of the people of India as we failed to act when there were others like Amanat, Damini etc.

I don't know what lies ahead but I think what will happen is that since people are demanding blood the government will give them blood. Most probably 5 of the 6 accused will get death penalty and depending on the mood of the public they will try to either prove that the 6th accused is not a juvenile or they will either lower the age of being treated as juvenile which is currently 18 thus the government will try to ensure that even the 6th accused gets death penalty. What i would like to ask from all us is that what will make us happy. Is that what we stand for. Think for a second what if some of them had powerful connections, what if they had the political backing do you think police and the government would have acted swiftly. I don't think so since they all come from a poor background it is easy for the government to resolve this case as there are no obstructions from any sides and people like these government will enforce the law but not on people like Suresh Kalmadi, A Raja etc as they are above the law.

Equality and Empowerment

After the horrific incident in Delhi where a girl was gang raped there has been a lot of protests against the government and Delhi Police. And a few hours ago the news came in that the brave girl succumbed to her injuries. All this has forced me to think what role am i playing in this patriarchy society where there is rampant female infanticide and if the girl is allowed to be born she has to live in world like this.

"How did this happen? Who's to blame? Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror." This is what the character V says in the movie V for Vendetta and i think it is exactly true in our case. All of us are here at fault as where were we when a grandmother was crying over the birth of her grand daughter and where were we when woman was burnt alive by her in laws and her husband as the woman's parents were unable to pay the dowry and where were we when a girl was eve-teased on the street and where were we when extremist and fundamentalists were beating up women on valentine's day as they were not following Indian culture and values. We have become such big hypocrites that when people talk about the tradition of dowry we strongly oppose it but when the times comes to get married or get our sisters/daughter married we ready to accept and give dowry respectively.

In our day to day life if we pay close attention we will come to realize that all this talk about women are worshiped in India is a farce. So one time in school a guy was describing an altercation in which his father was involved. His father was driving in Delhi where he was making a turn and this lady driver who was driving a car almost bumped into his car. I don't remember the exact details as to whose fault it was but as usually happens in these cases a verbal battle ensued. And his father came on top by saying "Dum hai toh mardooin ki tarah sadak par moot ke dikha". What it means is that if you have the guts pee on the road just like men do. Instantly all of us started laughing i too laughed as others were laughing but something inside told me that was wrong but i said nothing. I am sure all of us can recount umpteen number of incidents where women were assaulted either physically or verbally. The important question is what did we do about it if we found it wrong.

One time i was staying at my dad's first cousin(who is approx 15 to 18 years elder to me). So when dinner was ready to be served i joined them on the dinner table and saw bhabhi was serving dinner. After the dinner i saw bhaiya took all the dirty utensils and put them in the dish washer. I offered to help and he said no you are guest so no need and he further said that bhabhi and him take turns in the sense that one cooks the other cleans the dishes. Somehow that has stuck with me till date. I mean what else is in-equality just like husband, wife comes home from office and she is expected to take care of kids and start preparing for dinner. Doesn't she have a right to relax and take break, shouldn't the husband too help in these tasks. Here we are talking about gender inequality while in our day to day lives we see women getting exploited in these small and unknown ways and we don't even blink an eye.

I am no expert as to how solve this problem of inequality but i do know that part of the solution is definitely empowering women. We need to be proactive in our day to day lives to ensure that we are not part of any injustice happening against women. Which might mean that as a brother stand for your sister's right when your parents say that she should choose a particular field as the one she likes is male dominated, as a father please ensure that your daughter gets the best of education you can get for her, as a mother please do not belittle her, inspire her, help her develop wings so that she can fly and as a husband understand that marriage is a union of 2 human beings, your wife is not your servant, give her the utmost respect and be proud of her. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
― Margaret Mead

I would like to end it by posting Rabindranath Tagore's poem "Where the mind is without fear":

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

The Drunk Guy

A few weeks back I was in San Francisco with my friends. They took me to a club called Vertigo there. We had to wait half an hour to get in and within 20 minutes of entering in I got bored. Unfortunately i dont enjoy places where the music is too loud. I just wanted to enter club once to experience it and i must say everyone must once go to a club in their lifetime just to understand why people go to clubs. The idea to go there can simply be to understand other people's perspective as to why they go to clubs. Anyways since i was feeling hungry i came out and went to a Subway nearby to grab a sub.

I ordered a sub and since it was pretty late only a part of Subway was open for people to sit. A guy walks in who at first sight seemed Indian to me but then again i thought he could be an American born Indian. I was sitting and having my dinner when he asks me if he can sit at the other end of the table. I said yes and once he sat down we started chit-chatting. We didnt really exchange names. He asked me where i lived. And then he mentioned why he was living in san francisco as it was tough for him to commute to sf just to party here. Topics of our conversation ranged from is education really beneficial to about education loans to cars and what not.

I would only like to mention the interesting tidbits of the conversation. He mentioned that he did his undergraduation from Harvard and he was working in sf in the field of private equity. He told me he was making around 2 million a year. And he asked me whether i liked my job. And even before i could answer the question he said do i like to wake up every morning to go to office. And i said no sometimes i hate the fact that every morning i have to wake up and go to office. He said then i dont like my job. He asked me whether i would like to work for him and i said no since i am really not interested in the area he works in. He asked me how much i make in a year. I politely said that i wouldnt like to answer that. He said that he usually pays around 150 grand to 180 grand annually to the people who work under him. He said that he is not happy with the money he is making and he wants more.

He mentioned that if i make more money than i too can get an expensive car and have a happy life. I asked him why is he not happy since he is making lot of money. He said he wants more money so that even if he has an accident while driving a Maserati he can walk from it right away without giving a damn about the condition of the car and just buy a new one. He asked me which car did i wanted to buy and i mentioned a few brands to which he said bro those cars really wont help you with the girls. He asked me what would i like to spend my money on, something which i enjoy. So i said i am a foodie. I like to try different cuisines thus i do tend to spend extra money on food just to try different delicacies.

He told me that he took his girlfriend to some restaurant(in the bay area) because his girlfriend was nagging about that place for dinner. And just for the two of them they ended up spending around 7000$. He said the food was pretty ordinary. So he asked me if my girlfriend asked me to take her to that place would i take her? I said i would try to reason with her and tell her that i cant afford that place. He said then i will have a pissed off girlfriend. I said if she cant understand this fact that i cant afford to take her to a particular restaurant then i do not see any point of continuing my relationship with her. For him it was difficult to digest the concept that i would not take my girl friend to that restaurant and why i would let her get pissed off. He concluded by saying that i was a hypocrite and he was trying to provide a non-indian perspective to life and he hoped that i did not take any of this discussion personally. We both then left amicably.

During our conversation following song was playing in my mind:Society by Eddie Vedder. I was just reminded of my greed and how there was no end to what i wanted. The other point which i learnt was that earning more money will not make you happy beyond a certain point. I hope someday i am able to overcome my greed and hypocrisy.

Elite Education

Hey Blog how you doing? My post has been long overdue so here i am writing the post.

After receiving my Masters degree i must admit that i do feel happy and in some sense proud that i have a graduate degree. So now i belong to the small section of population of the world who possess a graduate degree. One way of looking at this could be that now i am smarter, sharper and wiser etc. Other way of looking at this might be that now i should consider this as a gift and should share it by maybe adopting the motto "Each one Teach one".

I am more concerned about the first point. I do admit that I am very happy with my masters experience at USC. As i ended up studying under world renowned professors. I studied with some of the brightest students. And last but not the least i made some friends which i hope will last for a long time to come. But inspite of all the big promises which are made by lot of graduate schools as to how this or that degree will open a doors to new and better opportunities they fail to mention that it also closes down doors to certain other opportunities. I cant really say that the opportunities you will end up losing are better than the ones currently open to you but they are still opportunities. For example after spending a lot of money on your graduation you might not be interested in less lucrative options like becoming a teacher etc etc

Secondly you tend to lose touch with common people. I mean that i might not have very much common to talk with the handy man, or the guy working at the grocery store etc. The point which i am trying to make here is that studying in a diverse environment might give you the ability to initiate a conversation with people who are from different countries but you might not be able to do small talk lets say with your barber. The problem i feel is that the higher education boasts of how it will set you on a path for success by ensuring you stay in group of people who are elite but it ends up taking you away from the common man or the average person whom you have to interact with or for whom you make products for so as to make his life easier.

Well there is a lot i have been thinking about this issue and till date i havent come up with conclusive proofs as to how it has affected me or as to how this will affect me. But i feel it is always better to be aware of such scenarios even if you dont experience them. I will keep updating this if i get a better understanding about the downside of an elite education.

The Loser

As usual, hey blog how are you? I am really sorry for not being posting regularly but i guess its time to accept the fact that i will never be regular blogger :-|

I am sure we tend to hear the word "loser" on a daily basis in some form of conversation or other. I am sure some of you will be like there is no loser in life as you lose some battles in life but there is always a war to be won. While some may say loser is the one who loses a battle or who quits. I am sure everyone have their own interpretations of the word "loser". And i am not here to debate over which is a better definition. The reason why i am writing this post is to give you an idea what this so called "loser" has to offer.

I am sure almost all of us take advice or read about people whom we consider "successful". We don't like to take advice or read about people whom we consider losers. But i have a different take on this have you ever for a moment considered the so called loser too might have some advice which can be worthwhile your time. So for example lets says you are an athlete who is going to take part in Olympics where you will run a 100m. I feel, most of us will like to take advice from the person who won the gold medal in 100m last Olympics. I am sure the guy who came first will definitely offer some invaluable advice but what about the guy who came in fourth. Have you ever considered what he might have to offer?

The guy who came in fourth will tell you what all you should NOT do if you want to win. Don't you think this also worthy of being called good advice? Sometimes i feel we don't give enough credit to people who fight till the end but still don't end up on the winning side. Even if they don't end up winning i feel their advice doesn't become any less credible. At the end of the day its all about not giving up. Some of the times these losers, they learn from their mistakes and become winners. Till the time they make the transition do give them a bit more attention and do hear what they have to say who knows what you will learn from their pearls of wisdom.

PS: This post is from a so called "loser" according to some people or from a "nobody" according to some people to a "somebody" according to some people but what is constant is the fact that it is from someone who believes in Thomas Edison's saying "I have not failed. I have just found 10000 ways which won't work".

The Journey till now: Fall 2009 to Fall 2010

Hi Blog how are you? I am doing good. As usual sorry for not updating you as regularly as i would like to but still here i am trying to make an effort. All said and done it feels great to update my Blog.

I landed here in LA on aug 5, 2009. Its been 1 year and 17days the ride till now has been full of both joys and sorrows, happy and bitter memories. But at the end of the day all of these were experiences which were part of the journey. As the saying goes what doesnt kill you only makes you stronger so i guess all of these experiences have made me stronger in their own way. One of the good things about the journey up till now was the people with whom i shared the journey. So this post is dedicated to all those people who have made my journey more eventful in their own way:

Initially when we came last year while we were settling down in our apartment we met lot of Indians living in the same building. Since we couldnt remember the names of all the people living in each apartment we used to call them by their native place for eg right across the hall lived guys from mumbai so we called them bombay guys(sorry to bal thackeray) and opposite to them lived banglore guys. All this was done for the purpose of convenience and not for being a regionalistic bastard.

Luckily for me all the people whom i met here at USC either in my apartment or in my courses from India were not the kind of people who used to discriminate on the basis of region, religion etc etc. I have had the privilege of not only knowing but also being friends with people who belong to different parts of india. During the 1 week i still remember how we started sharing food with Karthik, Sushant and Manjeet who are from down south. I dont remember what we exactly we cooked and shared with them but what i do remember is that they gave us Tandoori Chicken which was awesome. It was at their place where i cooked chicken for the first time. And then it became like a daily affair in Fall every friday. These guys have been good friends as they used to let me invade their fridge when we were out of stuff. It was thanks to these guys that i got hooked onto sitcoms like 2 and half men etc etc :P. Plus they were nice company to be around especially when i used to be locked out of my place.

Similarly day by day interaction with bombay guys increased ie with Nisarg, Sagar and Souranshu especially the daily Counter Strike sessions at night during spring semester. Thanks to them I was able to experience food like Toastada, Sheer and other mumbai food which i had never tasted before. They are nice company to have especially for going out for walks or for discussing things about philosophy and life.

Then comes Vairavan and i must say i am lucky to meet a guy like him. He is a gem of a guy. He has been a friend and more of a guide. Thanks to him my journey here at USC has been easier and more enjoyable. He is a guy who enjoys a good meal and a good laugh. He is 1 guy whom you can rely on. I am also lucky to have met his ex roomate Arjun who too is a nice guy. Arjun is a good friend and a guide who keeps on advising on what to do and what not to. He is an awesome cook and i love eating the various dishes he cooks though i am yet to eat anything he cooked since spring semester ended. Both of them have been very nice to me. And thanks to them i have learnt a lot about life and more.

At USC i have met 2 more people who have had made a positive impact on me they are Venkat Raman and Venkat Balaji(VB). I met VB in the latter half of spring semester and i must say i havent interacted with him too much but whatever i did it made me realize we had a lot of things in common. He was very helpful to me and i would like to wish him best of luck for the future. Venkat Raman is also an interesting chap a nice guy who is nice company to have especially if you wanna go and have a meal together or if you wanna talk about girls in general. I would like to to mention about Anushree as she has also been helpful to me not only for helping me out with the content for interviews but also for providing me with food when i was hungry. I would also like to thank her for giving my roomates and me home cooked food which was delicious. But i guess i need to remind her that she has 1 of our containers and we would really appreciate it if she returns it containing some awesome dish :D

Last but not the least my roomates Anu, Sumit and Devesh. They too have been nice and helpful to me. Sumit is a nice chap who was willing to give me a helping hand right at the start when i wanted to collect my phone from Fedex. He was the one who went with me to pick it up but unfortunately i wasnt able to get it but that wasnt the point. He cooks well but doesnt do it very often. Anu is not only the guy who is tall, dark and handsome but also a guy with a big heart. He was the guy who literally took care of me when i was unwell. Just to add he makes awesome sweets. Devesh aka Vito Corleone is a good guy who not only cooks good food but also is awesome at playing Counter Strike. He is good guy if you wanna discuss history, politics, religion etc. Also we have 1 more roomate this fall his name is Abhinav up till now my interaction has been limited but whatever it is he seems to be a nice chap. Lets see how things go with him.

Anyways enough talk time to hit the bed..

Blunt Honesty

Hi there blog how have you been doing? As for me i am doing good met new people this semester they have been nice to me. I have a learnt a lot from them plus i am enjoying this semester 3 new courses learning a lot all in all its nice feeling. Are you kidding me is that the truth who will say that you are still without a proper campus job you kind of screwed 1 midterm. Plus you have been struggling to keep up this semester and last but not the least you are still technically unemployed.

Hmm which would be a nice introduction the first one where i am talking generally about my life this semester or the second one where i am explicitly telling the truth. I guess most of you would say the first one and to be honest i too would agree. I mean who the hell likes to meet a guy who is cribbing about his problems in general. Even if he or she is not the cribbing types but on a general basis if that person is cribbing you wouldnt like it if he or she is a close friend else you will be like why the hell is he or she cribbing in front of me.

I will tell you about my experiments blunt honesty and to be honest results were not surprising. And as usual i will try to add a funny tinge to the whole thing so as not to make it a serious debate so please bear with me(This line was just written to please myself as you see i too cant be blunt honest with myself and say who cares about your blog its not as if many people are going to read it.)

I was talking to my friend who is in india and i asked him so was he still single or did he found someone special he said he did and i congratulated him on this. He posed me with the same question and i replied with a very logical answer. I said i am a grad student and i am technically unemployed plus it is not that i have too much money to spend and on top of it i dont even have a campus job and i dont have a car so why would any girl go out with me. He replied by saying dude you are being too pessimistic blah blah. Rest of the conversation is not important. I thought i was being realistic and i was very honest with the reason which i think i was the problem.

For all the people who watch how i met your mother and have seen the episode return of the shirt can relate to this. In this episode when Ted wanted to break up with Natalie he thought that he should tell her the truth by saying she was not the one ie he wanted to too honest and do you remember what happened Ted was beaten up Natalie using Krav Maga. Plus i was just talking to another friend of mine and asked him about his experience about being too honest. I will not go into too much detail as it might be mundane for many of you i will keep it short. He told me while he was working in 1 of the IT companies and was attending a meeting when his boss asked him a question and he replied from his heart ie he spoke too honestly result his boss said to him he was too young , immature, he was hallucinating that is why he was talking rubbish. In short an epic failure.

I think the problem with being blunt honest is that it threatens the very existence of other peoples dream that is why they hate blunt honesty. The thing is you are trying to shatter the dreams which they might have clung on for so long and by being too honest you are demotivating them. Also i feel that we humans have now become accustomed to lies where we truth is slightly modified so that it does not hurt us too much or it makes sure that we are not taken out from our comfort zone. And to be honest its okay i mean come on who likes it when you have cooked for the first time and the person who tastes it says what the hell salt is too much, it is not cooked properly, it is too hard blah blah you will like it if the other person is like ya it is nice try for someone who is new to cooking etc etc. I mean a little bit of flattery doesnt hurt right that way the concerned party is left happy and they also have an idea where they lack but in more subtle way so in a way it makes them feel good about them. In short blunt honesty hmm is not a good option and generally it doesnt work if it has worked for you do tell me about it.

PS: First of all the talk with my friend about gf should not be taken personally by girls i am not accusing them of anything. Its just that this happened with me recently so i used this as an example nothing more nothing less. Plus this whole blunt thing goes with my theory about me being a cold hearted person and all but anyways no big thing. Plus for those who like this post or dont like this post but take it in light hearted manner good for them but for those who took it too personally i will say what naga baba says "**** *** ****** ****" \m/.

Random Ramblings

Hi there a happy and a prosperous new year to you and too your family. Okay thats about it now that we have the salutations out we can get to the business(i dont know why i am saying this it just felt kind of cool at the time of writing this post).

Well one semester down at USC and i can say it was nice and interesting in its own way. I mean whats better than slogging you ass of for 1 semester i mean doing 6 assignments per week and coming back home around 3am to find that you have to do laundary else you wont be able to go college tomorrow ohh man that feeling is awesome.

Just kidding but grad school is different kind of exeperience altogether i mean it is more about time management and it is extended COLLEGE LIFE. It was nice that for the winter break i went to the east coast and visited my mama in Virginia. From there on i went to New Jersey and New York. I had the opportunity to get to know my mama's family so it was fun.

Well New York was my dream city i mean i had always dreamt of visiting New York i dont know maybe it was due to the hype created by the hollywood but after being there i can say it doesnt live up to the hype created. Lets not go into the detail as to why it didnt live up to my expectations all i will say is my next dream place to go is Paris lets see if i will go there or not.

I had an interesting event which happened with me right before the semester ended. It was match between USC v/s UCLA lets just say its A guy walks up and asks the price of a jersey and i say it is 60$ and he says "thats too expensive what if i pay you 50$ and my wife shows you her boobies" His wife who is listening to our conversaton adds that i might have seen a lot of fake boobies but i havent seen real ones like hers i say that doesnt work out. He then offers me another scheme he says "i pay you 45$ for that and my wife gives you a bj" i say that also doesnt work out. Well then she asks me to show her a jersey for her size and i ask what size she says the one that doesnt make her look fat i give her an extra small she says that it so sweet of me but it wouldnt fit her boobies. Well after they left i had an hearty laugh.

And this year i also realized that whenever i go out and meet a girl alone(some people might wanna call that a date but i wouldnt) and if she ends up paying for the meal then we never end up meeting again. Well this happened again this time too dont want to go in details about i will just say this time i will be happy if we dont end up bumping into each other again. And the reason i believe is that we never end up meeting again is that i let them pay or maybe because i have the knack so i have utter social inaptitude. Anyways it really doesnt matter once i find a wingman like Barney Stintson.

PS: I will end up saying girls on the west coast are much hotter than girls on the east coast.