Googled

Somewhere midway through a routine and needless to say boring day at the office; As I was aimlessly glaring at the code on the screen, something popped at the bottom right corner of the screen. As I shifted my sight from the IDE to checkout as to who felt like spamming my mailbox, it was yet another forward from an OB friend of mine who had religiously taken up the task of filling my inbox to the bream. I had even contemplated setting a outlook-rule to re-direct her mails into the thrash bin but then held myself from it because they were the only good things that happened to me in the long and strenoous day at office. So as I involuntarily clicked on the pop-up to glance(not read) at it before moving it to its final resting place, I was pleasantly surprised to see a nice pic of a person performing pooja. Pooja of God. No, you got it wrong, I didn't mean to indicate any deity worship but GOD stands for Google Oriented Development. "Yet another forward"? naah, it wasn't just another forward anymore and how it could be? After all, it had to do with Google and more importantly it was about glorification of google.

Google, has been the MAAI-BAAP of vast humanity of IT geeks. Well, I wont be very wrong if I go a step further and say the entire Indian IT industry is based on two pillars. One being 'google' and the other being "copy-paste". Googling the keyword, and copy-pasting the code has been the mantra for the IT nerds across companies and hierarchies. It shouldn't be surprising to see parody of the motto of an India IT giant read as "Powered by Google, Driven by copy-paste".

Take a second off and ask yourself "When was the last time you use the word 'Web-Search' in your life?". Chances are there that even rewinding through years wont fetch you the answer. So much so that Google has been the synonym for web-search, it has been a synonym for source-code for us. Needless to say, it has created a own brand for itself in this pursuit.

Google has been an integral part of the lives of Software Engineers. So much has been the impact, that the day (god forbid) Google site is down, many among us will have to leave for a vacation. I openly acknowledge the value of Google in my life and even further add to it that my survival in this world of IT depends on my access to it. For that matter, even the companies that recruit us involuntarily acknowledges this fact. Otherwise, wonder why Google site is never blocked in the most stringent of the workplaces? What else can justify the fact that 'Google' is the site which is set as browser homepage by majority who access the "mayagaal" of web?

Google, as a company too has been worthy of accolades. What started as a university level project venture and transformed into a name to reckon with in matter of not many years. Their business model has been reaping huge gains for Google and with its innovative and more so free software, it has been giving the other big-wigs a run for their money. Not only it has been hawking for more share of IT pie, it has promoted itself up the ladder of 'best-employer' list.

So, everybody say "Om jai google hare, swami jai google hare!" ...

P.S: I reccomend you use www.blackle.com. This site is a Google custom search and claims to save on energy usage. The claims on energy saving need to be cross-verified though the search-results are the same as that google.

With great powers come great responsibilities

Was flipping through channels on a laidback Sunday evening, just when the familiar Peter Parker caught my eye and I paused to watch it for yet another time. The friendly neighbourhood Spiderman was just evolving in his heroic self when Uncle Ben advises him, which just like any other teen, Peter shrugs off. The words of wisdom being “With great powers come great responsibilities”.

As these words echoed in my mind, came to my mind the thought and probable title of my next post. And, here it is.

Not very far back in the past and a friend of mine just happen to casually quote one thing. He said and I quote “To test a man’s character, give him power”. (There happen to be a second half to this quote but I choose to ignore it at this juncture). This quote by him seems to strike me like a bolt from the blue. ‘How true?’ I asked myself. Because the only common thing that one can relate all the famous and notorious men the world has seen till date is the five lettered word called POWER. I consciously and deliberately mentioned about the fame and notoriety part of these powerful leaders because it was the use or sometimes abuse that tilted the scale of popularity in their favour or against them. Those who used it for larger good of the masses climbed the scale of popularity, while those who abused their power must have been certainly hovering in the negative regions on this scale.

Power to many is brute force, but in reality it’s not just that. The father of our nation was seemingly a very powerful leader who played an instrumental role in setting the sun over the British Empire. He neither had the muscle power in his arms nor was backed up with heavy armoury. His power came from his way of thinking and probably his concept of Non-violence. He was able to create and mobilise an enormous pool of humanity who seemed to follow his way of living and these unified mass in turn proved to his power.

On the other hand there are others who have abused power. I know these leaders whom I call notorious might be considered as gods in certain pockets of the globe but my branding them so is based more wide accepted norm of popularity. Take for e.g. the biggest fugitive of our times, Osama Bin Laden. He too undoubtedly is a powerful leader, otherwise how would he have been able to elude the might of the US marines till date. But, the million dollar question is, ‘Is he a popular leader’? I am quiet confident the nays will outweigh the yeas by zillions. No wonder such a verdict reveals that he abused the powers he had, to ruin the demography of the world. His powers were mainly because the Kalashnikov he wielded and the fortress of brainwashed fundamentalist maniacs he had build around him by misguiding them in the garb of religion.

Not just these big names, even you and me can be powerful leaders fuelled by the power of strong will. If you have the fire in the belly, then that can very well serve as the powerhouse for you. A notable personality and someone we could relate ourselves with is that of RTI activist. His power was empowerment of the general public with the tool of “Right to Information”. His struggle was undoubtedly not restricted to his self interest, but stretched beyond for serving the mankind. These examples speak for themselves, for the power we might carry should serve the larger interest of the public. Only then one could be identified as a truly powerful being.

In our pursuit of raw power we seem to forget the true essence of it. A powerful leader need not be a popular leader; but a popular leader is definitely a powerful leader because he will be having a might of his fans and followers backing him up. Thus the golden verses of Uncle Ben should never be forgotten.

An untitled poem of my life

Tell me, what I am? A creature with a name plate?
My designation eludes me beyond the company gate.

Techie nerd? Naah, I am an average joe;
How, where, why? I just don’t know.

Feels like an obnoxious dog, looking at the neck strap;
Money is myth, that’s holding me in this career trap.

What I am is not what I wanted to be;
I gonna make it to the top, for others to see.

All my heart craves for, is a long sabbatical;
No worries, professional nor economical.

Things are gonna get better, Life is gonna change;
Shots are gonna hit target, only at the firing range.

The need of the hour is to make the move;
Somehow get going, get over the glue.

The other perspective...

“Every coin has two faces” they say and indeed it does. A couple of days rewind, and I got to see a positive side of the 2 inches long tobacco stuffed stick a.k.a cigarette. The statuary warning that come along had kept me away from it till date and will continue to do so; but I was pleased to see what a bonding a cig can enforce between two individuals. These two puff buddies seemed to have entwined their lives into one another’s; and their bonhomie pushed me to this next blog of mine, if not pushing me into joining them to smoke my life out.

As a child we have always been chanted to look at things in a positive way and as we clock more miles on our age track the chanting haven’t ceased.

But often do I think, do all things that look good are indeed noble? And for those matters are all things that are projected to us in negatives shades equally evil? For the things we take on face value need not be the same that they depict they are. A right hand as seen in the mirror is the left one; and equally true is the other way round.

What better example to take then our own epics. Thanks to the evangelism of Mr. Ramanand sagar and latter Mr. Sanjay Khan; and even more thanks to the non-advent of remote control and cable television that prevented me from flipping between frequencies, my adolescence years were sprayed with constant and daily doses of the mythological sagas. Be it the “Maryada-purshottam”ism of Lord Rama in the Ramayana or be the “Kaurav-Pandav” duel in the Mahabharat. Ofcourse, then there were “The sword of Tipu-Sultan”, “Prithviraj Chauvan”, “Jesus”, “Jai Hanuman”, “Gautam Buddha” and finitely numerous many.

I might be charged of blasphemy but still I prefer to stick to the Hindu mythics involving the Rama, the Kauravs and the pandavas.

So, one could briefly summarize the Ramayan as the story of lord Rama, an incarnation of the lord Vishnu, known for his portrayal of a idealistic man and his victory over the ten headed devil Ravana. No one will challenge my brief summary above, but as it’s said the devil lies in the details. Let’s start with the villain in the story, the devil as it might be doubly reinforced by the possession of 10 heads. But this devil Ravana, a son of a sage, was a devout Shiv worshipper and had performed ages of worship and the very not so human trait of possession of ten heads was a result of his offering of head that many number of times to please the almighty lord Shiva. Finally blessed by Shiva, he was gifted by the eternal source of power the “Lingam” which was snatched from Ravana in not so very fair manner by the rest of the gods anticipating abuse of it by him. Moving from the villain to the hero of the mythological saga, The lord Rama. Was it right on his part to seek “agni-pariksha” to verify the sanctity of his better half; the very lady who readily boarded on a 15 years exile in wilderness resigning to all the cosy comforts of the flourishing kingdom? Was this act befitting to the tag of Maryada-purshottam?

Moving from the one epic to even a more voluminous epic. The epic whose theme was set around the battle of Kurukshetra. Draupadi was mentioned to have taunted Duryodhan about his father’s blindness which angered him and led to her “vastraharan” and the entire Mahabharat followed suit. The shade of grey that characterized the skin tone of Lord Krishna, also seem to have seeped into his character too; for that throughout the entire length of the epic he was involved in some sleight or the other. Even though Pandavas being depicted as the positive characters, didn’t hold them from playing the sleight and tricks that Lord Krishna suggested. Though Kauravas, or the supposedly the evil force, did play the game strictly by the rules; the Pandavas seem to bending the rules time and again. Be it the eclipsing of Sun by Krishna, or be it the Ashwathama incident. Be it the foul Killing of Karn when he was down of his chariot, to the tactful and equally foul killing of duryodhan.

By all this, I don’t intend to malign any of the holy lords neither do I want to indulge into profanation of the holy sages that were scripted by Vyas and others. The whole point of this blog is to inculcate in oneself a viewpoint of looking at things in a totally unpartisan and in an unbiased manner devoid of any sorts of prejudice.

Disclaimer: I am a devout Hindu and proud to be one. I have full faith and belief in the scriptures and the epics that have transcended down through generation. Through my write-up above, I do not intend to malign or belittle in any way the hindu mythological figures as depicted in the mythic. For that matter, I could have picked any other religion/epic to drive my point across. Be it the “Jehad” in Islam or the “Divinity of Jesus” in Christianity; but I choose to cite examples from my very own religion for the sake of not being labelled “communal” by the self-proclaimed “seculars”.

A Man of No Action

Yours truly, is the one I am pointing to. I should be ashamed to say that and very much so I am. But at the same time, I am proud that I realize it and more so am able to ridicule myself. If you have been reading till here, you might have made an opinion about me by now; needless to say it won’t be impressive for a self-proclaimed lazy bump. But No! that’s not what I want to portray me as for the simple fact that I am not lazy, not even anywhere close to it.

Then why do I call myself the way I have? Well, there are reasons for me to be self critical and even more importantly I wonder whether this will serve as enough of impetus for me to ward off my inertia and spring me into action in pursuit of my destination? If it does, then this attempt of self-degradation will do me a ton of good; and I pinning my hopes that it indeed will help in my pursuit. I hope you must have wandered through my previous blog “Ek Akela Is Shehar Mein” and after reading that you must be very much acquainted by the plight I find myself in. Continuing on that, I have planned to break out of the jinx known as "job". Its with no less shame, I have to say that these plans haven't materialized as yet. I guess its gonna take time for these paper giants to transform into actual flesh and blood. Breaking out of these self-imposed restrictions that job (I choose to call it "Slavery") brings alone has ranked very high on my priority list and rightly so. Its a irony though that I choose to execute the tasks in my priority list with a totally screwed up sequence.

I have never been bereft of business plans. Infact, my disliking for my current job profile have been sprouting many plans in my mind. I have been churning my gray matter and coming up with some brilliant ideas (and I say this without the slighest tinge of boasting). I had been looking forward to others whose could identify themselves with me and crank me into motion. My tete-a-tete with the friends sprinkled across the globe help me locate thinkers at same frequencies but they, like me(unfortunately :-( ) seemed to be overpowered by the Newton's first law. Additionally, thanks to my non-dislike to reading, I had read quiet a handful of inspirational books/write-ups which feeds motivational fuel to the fire within. Guess, when these volcano gonna erupt?

But, as slapstick reality beckons me and I still find myself in equally deep(if not deeper) mess, the good old proverb "Action speaks louder than Words" makes its larger than life presence felt. On a positive note, one thing for sure and I seek solace from it for the time being; if at all I don’t know what I want, atleast I know what I don’t want. As a final quote of self assurance, I would like to say... I am just like that little bird who has got enough strength in its wings to set on the flight alone; the apprehension and the fear of fall can hold me back for a while but the flight is inevitable. Ameen!