Saturday, June 25, 2016
New religion "Real Gods" complete with puja room, holy books, holidays
How about a new religion, "Real Gods", wherein the gods are the foremost achievers in their respective fields in the recent times? Think back to the classic "puja" shelf at home- for the Hindu ones amongst you the memory should be quite clear- with framed photos of different gods. These photos are to be replaced by framed photos of Mohammad Ali, Steve Jobs, Sachin Tendulkar, Nikolas Tesla, Mahatma Gandhi, Mary Curie, Warren Buffet, Florence Nightingale and the likes. This "puja room" is a critical ingredient of this religion- mandatory in the houses of a believer of "Real Gods". Apart from a place of workship, what are the other key aspects of religion? Holy books. Holy books are the best biographies or autobiographies of such people. And the other key aspect is religious holidays. Holidays in Real Gods are on key days of Gods' lives- for example October 30th is celebrated is a "Aliday" (even sounds like holiday) as the day of the "Rumble in the jungle" bout. Birthdays are not celebrated as anyone can just be born, but what is celebrated is the key days in this persons life related to their godliness, as in the Aliday example.
And all through reading this article, please do remember that I am only half-joking. I really-truly think this religion can make the world a better place. By idolizing the practices of the best of us, we can only get better, as a race.
Real gods are fallible, though, and the god-list keeps getting updated. For example, Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods, Oscar Pistorious could have been gods but after their indiscretions were exposed, they get removed. Removal is performed by the "Council of Real gods" - an elected body. And Gods don't get removed for just resorting to Machiavellian tricks like the whole Winklevoss episode surrounding Zuckerberg (this is purely for argument' sake coz I don't think Zuck would anyway be a cinch for a God) - because remember Krishna? He was quite the Machiavellian. It's only downright violations like those of Armstrong, Woods, Pistorious that lead to removal from the Pantheon. It's a grey area, of course, but that's why the qualified Council is there. The god-list would also be refreshed to ensure that the current god-list stays relevant to the current times. Once a god, always a god, of course, but official celebrations (holidays, mainly) would cease once the god is removed from the official list from the Council.
This is inline with standard Hindu pantheon philosophy, btw, of multiple gods for different vocations. Such as Goddess Saraswati for education and Goddess Lakshmi for wealth. There could be a Steve Jobs - God of creativity in business, Tendulkar - god of performance despite humongous expectations, Tesla - god of invention (300 patents!), and so on. I like the concept of many gods of Hinduism, and that is replicated in Real Gods. For example, there is a God of Coaching, say Brian Clough (whose coaching achievements are gloriously depicted in the movie "Damned United"). These facets of godliness get highlighted, for gods, and other routine life details may be left out. For example, we really don't know about other about the wealth of Goddess Saraswathi or the literary pursuits of Goddess Lakshmi. Since its a pantheon, everyone can has their favorite gods, of course. to whom one can choose to be most devout towards.
What happens on religious holidays? Full multimedia experience to ensure you understand and imbibe some of the godliness that made this person a god. You read extracts from the biographies that morning, and indulge in an activity relevant to that god. For example, on "Jobs days", (Jan- 9, 2007, the day when the iPhone was launched) you read extracts such as the below:
"Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That's because they were able to connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things. And they reason they were able to do that was that they've had more experiences or they have thought more abut their experiences than other people. "
Reading all this will give you a true sense of the godliness of this person (Jobs being Creativity in business). It would be a multimedia and interactive puja. You would listen to Jobs' Stanford commencement speech, watch the best of Jobs' speeches. You would go buy, and wear, the famous black Turtleneck sweatshirts. And you would do an activity, such as design your own new technology product, which would be submitted to the Council a week before. The winner would be announced on Jobs' day.
So what say, are you sold? Accepting donations starting today.
Note: It so happens that this also resonates with standard IIT-B lingo. Whenever someone does something truly spectacular, then they are venerated with the term "Tu god hain".
And all through reading this article, please do remember that I am only half-joking. I really-truly think this religion can make the world a better place. By idolizing the practices of the best of us, we can only get better, as a race.
Real gods are fallible, though, and the god-list keeps getting updated. For example, Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods, Oscar Pistorious could have been gods but after their indiscretions were exposed, they get removed. Removal is performed by the "Council of Real gods" - an elected body. And Gods don't get removed for just resorting to Machiavellian tricks like the whole Winklevoss episode surrounding Zuckerberg (this is purely for argument' sake coz I don't think Zuck would anyway be a cinch for a God) - because remember Krishna? He was quite the Machiavellian. It's only downright violations like those of Armstrong, Woods, Pistorious that lead to removal from the Pantheon. It's a grey area, of course, but that's why the qualified Council is there. The god-list would also be refreshed to ensure that the current god-list stays relevant to the current times. Once a god, always a god, of course, but official celebrations (holidays, mainly) would cease once the god is removed from the official list from the Council.
This is inline with standard Hindu pantheon philosophy, btw, of multiple gods for different vocations. Such as Goddess Saraswati for education and Goddess Lakshmi for wealth. There could be a Steve Jobs - God of creativity in business, Tendulkar - god of performance despite humongous expectations, Tesla - god of invention (300 patents!), and so on. I like the concept of many gods of Hinduism, and that is replicated in Real Gods. For example, there is a God of Coaching, say Brian Clough (whose coaching achievements are gloriously depicted in the movie "Damned United"). These facets of godliness get highlighted, for gods, and other routine life details may be left out. For example, we really don't know about other about the wealth of Goddess Saraswathi or the literary pursuits of Goddess Lakshmi. Since its a pantheon, everyone can has their favorite gods, of course. to whom one can choose to be most devout towards.
What happens on religious holidays? Full multimedia experience to ensure you understand and imbibe some of the godliness that made this person a god. You read extracts from the biographies that morning, and indulge in an activity relevant to that god. For example, on "Jobs days", (Jan- 9, 2007, the day when the iPhone was launched) you read extracts such as the below:
"Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That's because they were able to connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things. And they reason they were able to do that was that they've had more experiences or they have thought more abut their experiences than other people. "
Reading all this will give you a true sense of the godliness of this person (Jobs being Creativity in business). It would be a multimedia and interactive puja. You would listen to Jobs' Stanford commencement speech, watch the best of Jobs' speeches. You would go buy, and wear, the famous black Turtleneck sweatshirts. And you would do an activity, such as design your own new technology product, which would be submitted to the Council a week before. The winner would be announced on Jobs' day.
So what say, are you sold? Accepting donations starting today.
Note: It so happens that this also resonates with standard IIT-B lingo. Whenever someone does something truly spectacular, then they are venerated with the term "Tu god hain".
Labels: Musings
Saturday, June 18, 2016
Makarasan undone by the Raunchy ride
Makarasan vs. Road- it's a tie
Now we've started this practice, this team of ours at Jamshedpur, of doing group yoga in the evenings. I'm a regular on Mondays and Tuesdays - they say front-load your work, and whether I'm doing that with work or not, I sure do it with fitness pursuits. Wednesdays and Thursdays I slack off, and Friday I'm on the 120 km car ride from Jameshedpur to Ranchi- the Raunchy ride.
I call it that because it is a hell of a rough ride. While the first and last quarter hours are a 6-lane breeze- kudos to Gadkari and co - the mid section is quite an ordeal - it's a bumpy 2 lane ride.
After the yoga, especially this position called Makarasan, my lower back feels stiff as an oak. However, all the good work is undone by the Raunchy ride, after which the stiff oak is reduced to jelly. I can actually feel the springs in my back doing their cushioning work (and groaning while at it!) when i bounce up and down on the seat. There is a need for a vertical-restrainer seat belt on cars traversing certain roads in India- so that the car springs are able to do their job. At the end of the ride, the back turning to jelly feeling is absolutely real, I tell you. Just as real as the oaky feeling is, after some rounds of Makarasan. By the way, if you take to this road in the night, I suggest to blast on car speakers, as an appropriate theme song and also as a way to ease the pain, AC-DC's Shook me all night long . (That song, such explicit lyrics always makes me smile)
Note: Above ain't me, it's a spiritually-connected gentleman by the name of Jack Cuneo.
Clogged arteries of the economy
As observed in separate discussions with AM and AJ, these are the biggest cities in Jharkhand we are talking about. And add to that- it's the biggest mining belt of the country, and that too by a mile. As evidence, we see trailers upon trailers bouncing along slowly, laden with coal and rolled steel and what not. And so many of these trailers are parked helplessly in a damaged state by the road- undone by its vagaries. This is not a good situation because the coal and the steel these lines of trailers carry are the life giving force of the Indian economy. One's gotto fix the roads here. Just saw an article yesterday that bad roads are costing the Indian economy $21 Bn per year - a staggering 1.3% of GDP! Two sources of damage- the slow movement speed and all the damage to the vehiles. This bad road situation in this heavy freight corridor is akin to an ERP engineer at Infosys Bangalore unable to even chat with the onshore client in the US because Infosys uses a dial up connection - in 2016.
Lifting the gloom
However, seeing the wagons upon wagons of freight trains and all the trailers on the Raunchy road gives one the feelers for the pulsing heart of the Indian economy- the coal that powers and the steel that holds it up. And the road is getting better and better- it took 5 hours earlier, it takes 2.5 hours now. While there may have been Naxal issues earlier, and we can stop and have great masala tea and onion pakodas at Hotel Panchavati on the way.
Now we've started this practice, this team of ours at Jamshedpur, of doing group yoga in the evenings. I'm a regular on Mondays and Tuesdays - they say front-load your work, and whether I'm doing that with work or not, I sure do it with fitness pursuits. Wednesdays and Thursdays I slack off, and Friday I'm on the 120 km car ride from Jameshedpur to Ranchi- the Raunchy ride.
I call it that because it is a hell of a rough ride. While the first and last quarter hours are a 6-lane breeze- kudos to Gadkari and co - the mid section is quite an ordeal - it's a bumpy 2 lane ride.
After the yoga, especially this position called Makarasan, my lower back feels stiff as an oak. However, all the good work is undone by the Raunchy ride, after which the stiff oak is reduced to jelly. I can actually feel the springs in my back doing their cushioning work (and groaning while at it!) when i bounce up and down on the seat. There is a need for a vertical-restrainer seat belt on cars traversing certain roads in India- so that the car springs are able to do their job. At the end of the ride, the back turning to jelly feeling is absolutely real, I tell you. Just as real as the oaky feeling is, after some rounds of Makarasan. By the way, if you take to this road in the night, I suggest to blast on car speakers, as an appropriate theme song and also as a way to ease the pain, AC-DC's Shook me all night long . (That song, such explicit lyrics always makes me smile)
Makarasan vs. Raunchy road (the truck is damaged- see the uplifted front portion- and blocks 50% of the road)
Note: Above ain't me, it's a spiritually-connected gentleman by the name of Jack Cuneo.
Clogged arteries of the economy
As observed in separate discussions with AM and AJ, these are the biggest cities in Jharkhand we are talking about. And add to that- it's the biggest mining belt of the country, and that too by a mile. As evidence, we see trailers upon trailers bouncing along slowly, laden with coal and rolled steel and what not. And so many of these trailers are parked helplessly in a damaged state by the road- undone by its vagaries. This is not a good situation because the coal and the steel these lines of trailers carry are the life giving force of the Indian economy. One's gotto fix the roads here. Just saw an article yesterday that bad roads are costing the Indian economy $21 Bn per year - a staggering 1.3% of GDP! Two sources of damage- the slow movement speed and all the damage to the vehiles. This bad road situation in this heavy freight corridor is akin to an ERP engineer at Infosys Bangalore unable to even chat with the onshore client in the US because Infosys uses a dial up connection - in 2016.
Lifting the gloom
However, seeing the wagons upon wagons of freight trains and all the trailers on the Raunchy road gives one the feelers for the pulsing heart of the Indian economy- the coal that powers and the steel that holds it up. And the road is getting better and better- it took 5 hours earlier, it takes 2.5 hours now. While there may have been Naxal issues earlier, and we can stop and have great masala tea and onion pakodas at Hotel Panchavati on the way.
Labels: Random Ramblings
Sunday, June 05, 2016
Sikkim Haiku
Watcher
Trickle into the Teesta
By it we hop sip stare back
I and the Redstart
A white-headed Redstart (image from Wikipedia)
Barb wire
Light touch the soil across
Wave catch eye get waved back at
Them at Nathu La
Kanchenjunga
'Junga view window
But opaque curtain of fog cloud
Parted by my dream
Evening in the train
Breeze drops rail clatter
Greens blues and games huts whistle by
Pen paper haiku
Always wanted to write Haikus. Saw SS create a wunderbar one for RB's bday, imparting some mental momentum. With fertile mind owing to Sikkim escapade, and idle time owing to train journey, above is the result.
Trickle into the Teesta
By it we hop sip stare back
I and the Redstart
A white-headed Redstart (image from Wikipedia)
Barb wire
Light touch the soil across
Wave catch eye get waved back at
Them at Nathu La
Kanchenjunga
'Junga view window
But opaque curtain of fog cloud
Parted by my dream
Evening in the train
Breeze drops rail clatter
Greens blues and games huts whistle by
Pen paper haiku
Always wanted to write Haikus. Saw SS create a wunderbar one for RB's bday, imparting some mental momentum. With fertile mind owing to Sikkim escapade, and idle time owing to train journey, above is the result.
Labels: Travellog
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