A Politician of Note

The world’s reeking of them and most of them are fat to the extent that if you gathered them altogether on one side of the planet and made them all jump at the same time it would make a difference to the orbit of the Earth. Many think of them as filthy or creepy, or self-serving. Many think of them as rather smart to be able to get around strict political laws and regulations and counter-corruption. Me, I don’t care.

I’ve given up hope in politicians and national welfare and the whole handy-dandy ‘All for one, one for all’ thing. This is in fact a fitting place to add that ‘They don’t make ‘em like they used to.’. The politicians of the past, a mere 40 years back, a nothingth of the planet’s age, were men of honor. Men of dignity. Men of Courage. But most of all, they were men. Not self-serving and violent animals. Abraham Lincoln, Charles DeGaule and the like. But the one person who has affected me the most, more than any of the other great politicians and more than his peers is the man who fought a long, long war of independence and lived to become the first Prime minister of India.

What awes me the most out of his many, many fascinating traits was the vastness of his mental horizon, the infinite nature of his wisdom, his limitless hunger for knowledge. What made me his fan and gave me much insight on his life is a series of letters he wrote to his daughter while he was in prison. Hundreds of letters about the history of the world and life in general. While most of us stop and curse history after learning the superficial attributes of our respective nations’ pasts, his writings have shown me that he knew about more worlds than one would care to acquire knowledge about. He studied because he loved it and I consider that to be one of his most beautiful teachings. A lesson taught through action.

Spider Engineers

While I was still young and naive, somewhere in the third grade - What can I say? I blossomed late. - and had the beginnings of one weird and rampant imagination, I thought excessively of what the internet was, is. Not that I new much about it, or indeed had even seen any of it. We had dial up connection and paid a fortune on the hour. All I did was hear and play the preschool games I came to love so dearly when I was in preschool. Often the two happened simultaneously. The playing and the hearing when I was too busy playing to actually imagine. But on the rare occasion when I heard while doing my homework (incorrectly), I let my mind fly away to happier places.

So one day while I was busy doing my math homework, multiplication I think, someone mentioned a website on the computer, might have been my father, might have been the uncle who never visited, whatever. And WHAZZAM. My unsteady head flew to websites, or rather web-sites. Figuratively, of course. I thought of webs, nasty white pieces of string featured in a wonderfully gruesome illustration somewhere in between the covers of my environmental sciences text book. Then I thought of spiders, nasty creatures who somehow found immense pleasure in hanging themselves vertically on a thoroughly complicated array of strings that they manufactured out of things that came out of their bottom, while covered in things that came out of their bottom. Then I remember shuddering at the thought of being covered in things that came out of my bottom. Then I went to the toilet, where I continued my line of thought. Sites, I had learned in school that they build buildings on sites and judging by my IQ at the time, I probably also thought that engineers build buildings. Because I found a deep correlation between engineers and sites. I flushed.

I therefore concluded that spiders were planning on building a web, for which my computer monitor would be the site. I was horrified. Not so much of the fact that there were spiders in proximity, but of the idea that they were engineers too! Engineers are poisonous right? And spiders are smart?? Or something like that. So I scoured the house for Spider Engineers, or as I had coined them in a brief moment of personal victory, Spingeneers. But there were none to be found.

Strangely disappointed, I washed my hands.

A Contemplation Upon Nature

Just walking on the streets of Calcutta and then lying on the terrace of my house:


As the sun shines down on me through the trees,
I thank nature
For all she has done to protect her creation
For shielding me from that wonderful monster's full intensity
Even in this metropolis who thinks he does the same
With his towers and hoardings and 'Eco-construction'
But fails to see in his vanity the intricacy of her work,
So serene, so effortless, so pleasing
Which he cannot hope to replicate with rocks
Even those cut.

Now the night is upon me, humid not hot.
Again nature awes me with pleasant winds,
The clouds arranged in a magnificent arc
Moving with the might and velocity of a Pegasus
Like the creator trying to sooth from this weather he created
By waving his beard over Earth.
I sit up but this time the city lights in their full glare,
Hurt my eyes to sooth me from humidity
And I realize I have a question.
'Why does the moonlight not strain the eye?'.
She knows her ways. Again, I thank her.

Algorithms

Scared yet?

Disclaimer:

You probably should be if you're not 9 yet. Quite simply because the word has more letters than the number of times you've been around the sun all your life. This belief is precisely the reason for me not opting to be a Biologist or a Geologist because I'm not supposed to know what the word 'Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis' means until I'm 45 or a Hippie for that matter considering 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious' although it would make a viable career option once I turn 34. However if you're not yet 9 or traumatized and know what 'traumatized' means, read on.

Now that we're done with that, an Algorithm is simply a series of steps that you can repeat several times or less in order to solve a problem. It has massive application In the fields of Computer Sciences, Engineering, Mathematics, basically in order to solve any logical problem and several illogical ones.

I like to classify them into 3 types:

Infinite

Repetitive

Processes

Note: Mathematics does not classify Algorithms.

Infinite Algorithms are ones that give a different result every time you undergo the series of steps. Basic mathematical operations can be examples of infinite algorithms. Suppose you have 2 integers a and b. To add the algorithm is to add 1 to a which becomes the new a. And to repeat this b times. Similarly to multiply add a to itself which becomes the new a and to repeat that b times. Similar algorithms can be created for Subtraction and Division.

Repetitive Algorithms are ones which eventually on repeating again and again do return to the initial configuration of the problem but the problem often gets solved somewhere therein if the algorithm is right. If I were to form a circle of a certain arc, my objective is to smoothly transition from one arc to another until I form the circle I return to the point from where I start. Though not to the original condition. Some cases where I do reach the initial conditions come, maybe when I solve the Rubik's cube.

Lastly, the Process. It's a series of steps that you design in order to achieve an objective but this time, there's a procedure. An array of yes or no questions and each choice has a different step you have to follow. Like designing a flow chart. Eg:

Algorithms have several uses especially in fields of Computer Sciences, Logistics. But you can basically use them for anything else. They can be broad and narrow and basically however you want them to.

I'm bored now. Best of luck.

A Secret Place

Thank you 'The Little Prince' for the idea. I was reading it and this little composition popped into my head:


And then a drop will slide by,
Heading steadily away from the eye,
But with one swift motion your emotion you will spread,
Punishing it for the path it tred,
It gave you away, your courage is now shame,
But how much longer could your sentiment remain tame?

Your oculus - blood red you cannot conceal,
While the occasional glance you unstealthily steal,
With a smile on your face and a fire on the inside,
Desperately, carelessly looking for someplace to hide,
You let flow a stream, You pray nobody hears,
A secret place, The land of tears.

Stuck in 2009?

11:55 had me all excited, I wanted to be the one to initiate the countdown. So whenever any one asked me "What time is it??" I replied "It's not time yet." and tried to appear eerily inconspicuous. At 11:58 I everyone appeared eerily inconspicuous, so I called the local talking clock to get the exact time to the second, my watch was right to the second, quite understandably so too because I'd spent an hour and 6 bucks the previous day making that orientation. For the first time in 16 years I was going to be the one to say "10..." with exactly 10 seconds left. The first 13 I didn't really care, on the 14th I started late, on the 15th I started early. This would be the only perfect chance I'd ever have to redeem myself for 3 reasons:

Firstly, the new-year's eve for 2010 was a blue moon new years eve. Literally. 31st December 2009 was the first blue moon of my life and basic probability states that such an event come ONCE in 12 blue moons,
Second, It's my second last chance to do the countdown if the world really will be ending in 2012,
Lastly, 'Two Thousand and Ten' just sounds frackin' awesome and I wanted to end the countdown with "WELCOME TO TWO THOUSAND AND TEN!!!!!!".

That aside, seeing the river of still eerily inconspicuous faces before me and being a Poker freshman I announced "11:59!!!!!". Nobody winked. I decided to count to 50. So I closed my eyes. 1...2...3...and my mind shifted, I thought of her, smiled and forgot where I was, took a fleeting glance at my watch and started counting again: 23...24...25............49...50. I opened my eyes I glanced at my watch "25 seconds left???" , I thought. Counting to 15 then, I closed my eyes 1...2...and then someone shouted "10!!!", then everybody shouted "9!!!", then "8!!!". I took more than a cursory glance, infact an almost entirely frantic and hateful, even deadly glance at my watch. Still 25 seconds to go. "5!!!", "4!!!". I cursed, I breathed, cursed again, breathed again, realized that the only reason I was breathing so hard was so that i could curse more and cursed again. I'd lost. "HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!".



Well, the party's over, Its 3:00 AM. Now I've recovered and I've decided that I'm gonna get my watch fixed and until I see those last 25 seconds go by, my new year will not begin. But to everybody else, Happy New Year! =)

The Absolute Best Day of My Life

Since I told you about my most humiliating moment so far, I thought it was only fair that you know about the best day of my life.
The official best day of my life is 28.3.2009 , that was the day on which absolutely everything i wanted to happen, happened. No exaggerations, not a single lie....everything that happened on that day in detail:

The beginning wasn't anything particularly exciting, I woke up, brushed, bathed, got ready for school(ON A SATURDAY!) and not really school but my science theory exam...the board exams that I told you of earlier, the Crazy BullShit Exam(CBSE...in case you didn't notice the emboldened). 'So?' You might ask 'Whats so freaking awesome about that?'. My reply - Its not, whats awesome is what happened after that. Right from 7:00 AM...my entire day was as good as- but not -a dream(Trust me, I checked. I was pinching myself and getting myself pinched all through.).

Starting with something as mild as the absence of traffic on my way to the examination hall and ending with something as wonderful as a 12 hour sleep (That was the last big exam so it was affordable).

The first good thing that happened to me however, was not the absence of traffic. It was what I recalled before I entered the car that reached the examination hall 45 minutes before the examination started. It was this: the previous night I had practiced all diagrams except one, one I'd forgotten about. Namely-Schematic representation of a biogas plant, something dubbed as vitally important by one of my teachers . A single diagram that I had never considered, useful enough to accomodate in my very choosy brain. But in the car...I forced this one in...every detail.

So, as I said, I reached the examination hall on time, after which I had a couple of uneventful discussions with a few freinds. One of whom informed me about a real cool fact in the text book, from a chapter which I had conveniently decided to skip(Dont look at..well....this page like that! I did the notes).

The third thing was something that happened the moment I received the question paper but I found out only after the exam got over. So, I prefer to make you wait until after the exam before tell you that.

Well, I recd. my paper and it was pretty normal, all I expected. But by the time I saw the 7th question in the bio section I had a smirk on my face and and by the time I finished, my smirk had been transformed into a scarily long smile. The reasons being these: The seventh question in the bio section required me to draw the schematic representation of a biogas plant for 2 marks :-] . Secondly, the last question was one in which I was able to comfortably insert the very interesting fact that my friend had told me of and I quite vividly remembered to formulate the perfect answer :D .

And here's the third lucky thing that happened to me, I got the easiest set. And I'm not lying when I say that I was supposed to get the toughest set, but the invigilator was some weird idiot who changed a pre-decided seating arrangement because he suspected someone of copying! God bless him.Also, something i didn't calculate during the examination, was that because of his change..the person sitting next to me had the same set.But that really didn't matter because I had no intentions of copying on that one paper.

Confession: The day before the science exam while I was looking for some details, it occured to me, while searching for my 10th grade science lab manual that I, strangely enough had lost it. A little worried though I was, I decided to ignore the fact and concentrate on the matter at hand, I felt sure I would be able to figure something out the next day. (Confession ends)

15 minutes after the exam ended, I was sitting comfortably in my car, telling my parents about how cool the paper was. But I couldn't bring myself to tell them about the book. I was well aware that going to the school to get my book from the lab would be stupid because it was a saturday. So looking up to the sky I formulated a plan and promised not to wonder about the outcome, deciding that I would get back to when something happened about it(something that had become quite used to doing, you must have figured out. But it pays, so far as my experience extends, which may not be adequate. Its still in the experimental stage, which makes it a dangerous lifestyle).

Having forgotten the manual. A slow half-smile kind of thing was in the development process on my face as soon as my mouth started watering for something popularly known as Baskin Robins' Ice Cream. So we pulled up at the joint. I was half expecting to return empty handed because the last 3 times I tried, BR didn't have the one flavor that I absolutely CRAVE i.e. Cookies n' Cream and I have this bad(or maybe good, depends on how you perceive it) habit that I dont do anything I dont approve of. But this being my lucky day...you guessed it...IT WAS THERE! All white with lumps of brown...I could taste the air above it(I think you can see pretty clearly that Im obsessed and back then I was desperate). I ate it slowly, drop of cream by drop of cream, block of cookie by block of cookie until I'd licked the cup clean(Im not particularly fond of cones). I remember that as the best ice cream experience I had ever had, in fact I can taste it right now.

At home, the first thing I did was to take my 4X4X4 rubik's cube out of it's package and instantly break it. I recommend people who don't have an understanding pair of parents like mine to look for more productive ways of solving it, rather than getting irritated with the devilish thing and banging it to a wall. Kidding. I was just admiring it, twisting it around and as a result of the cheap quality, it just spontaneously fell apart.(Support to China: The cube that I had was definitely not produced in China because China is well known for making the best Rubik's Cubes on the planet.)

The hours between 2:00PM and 6:00PM weren't very eventful, but the 2 things that happened after that were what compensated for a whole day's worth of the most disgusting luck one could have. They were these:

It rained. The showers were unusually late this year and once they started they were pretty frequent. I was waiting for the boards to end 'cause I love the rain, but when you've got to break your head over CBSE social science you just can't concentrate on anything else. But then just 2 weeks before the end of my papers, the sprinkles ceased and we started getting sunny afternoons. The 28th of March posessed a particularly hot lunchtime, but at 6:15 just before I left to implemet my sort-of masterplan to locate a usable lab manual, the clouds began to conspire and while I was in my cab it began to patter and then it poured, and I was awestruck at the beauty and that cool and fresh feeling of the rain. That day I experienced the rain like I would have had I been sitting in my terrace apartment in my building in Barra Bazaar(Calcutta).

The second awesome thing was that my sort-of masterplan worked(only just). The idea was to go to the house of a science tuition teacher who I'd joined a couple of months before cause my mom had all her faith in my genius but zero faith in my responsibility. And I have to admit that without her help I probably wouldn't rock so much at organic chemistry. Well anyway the idea was to go to class with the pretense that I needed help in the two experiments that CBSE decided to very conveniently insert into the portions 2 months before the exams, thereby giving us no time to actually do them. Anyway, I decided that I would then tell her towards the end that I wanted the lab manual of some other publishing house, just to get that extra bit of exposure and then I'd pray that she had and extra(because her son was giving the boards too). So well, I did this, but what happened next was, disastrous. She said that she dint have an extra. She said she'd check again and went out to honour her commitment, while I in my desperation searched her book drawers frantically and then I saw it, lying there in the second drawer from the left and second drawer from the bottom was the much blessed copy of the book I needed. Surprised at my finding, she let me have it, asking me to return it after the MCQs. The fact that I dint really use that book is very different, but in due thankfulness of all the help that she had bestowed upon me, I broke my age old tradition of not returning borrowed books.

When, after a while I got out of her place, It was raining again. I stepped into it with a strange, almost daring cheerfulness and let the cold strings of water beat upon my forehead, neck, anxiety and books. By the time my father got there, the last two of those were diminished and for the first time in 6 months, I didn't care. It was the feeling one would get were he to escape from a war prison and that was exactly what had happened. After a year of toil, I had escaped, content with the condition I was in, knowing that I had to live for a year in the next 10 days. Knowing that, a peace of mind that would have made the village idiot jealous came over me. I knew that this was something I could achieve, something that I would achieve. I had my dinner, and went to bed thinking that If there really was a God, he'd proved himself to me today.