Thoughts And Trivia

There is a folk song in Punjabi Language about romance of riding double with your girl-friend on a cycle:

Oh! Lo I see you riding away on the cycle,
but what relationship you have with her,
Oh! whom you carry on the bar in front.
Tell me what fragrance does her hair have?


No double-meanings here please. But let me start chronologically.
Since childhood I was very much fascinated with the Bicycle or cycle to be colloquial. Initially we two brothers were carried to school (5 Km away) by one house-help on his cycle . It used to be fight among us - who will sit on the front - which afforded a view of the traffic - although it was a pain (you know where) to sit on the rod for good 30 mins ride. But sitting in rear was boring. Then it was a triumph to learn to ride the cycle myself - after many falls and bruises. Then finally I got the gift of a used cycle from my father. I rode it myself to school, with friends.
When I was on my first Job, I bought a brand new cycle - green in colour - fitted with fancy bell, saddle, a dynamo and headlight. It was around this time that I got married. And you know what - we used to go for movies riding on this cycle - she on the front bar, nestled to my chest, and I riding the cycle through the crowded streets. The conversation we had during the ride - breath to breath - was romantic. The Punjabi song was very appropriate for such times. I used to hum this song - which caused her to giggle.
Problem is, that for my short height, there are no special sized cycle in India - as is available in Europe. Regular sized cycles are too tall for me. So I had to dismount to stop at the traffic lights.
I used that one for only 1 year and gifted it to a house-help.
I then bought a scooter and used it for 12 years. My son who was born soon, used to like riding on the front foot-board, clutching the handle - making believe that its he who is driving.
Much later at the age of 45 or so, I bought a 10 geared cycle and loved riding it on hills. I was quite regular in using this as an exercise.
Part of my romance with machines is maintaining these. I was most happy with my tools. Taking down the cycle or later scooter to its nuts and bolts. Troubleshooting, repairing and modifying these.
But no longer do I cycle. I just get driven around in a car. How boring!!!

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Warmth of relationships; Most loved people
Are not always sublime,
You realize God sent you alone to this world,
Its such Time - not unlike
The red-hot steel under the forging hammer
Gold assayed in fire,
Clothes through the wringer,
Its not how go through it all,
Screaming, cussing, blaming God
Its how you come out that matters -
Stronger, brighter and cleaner.
Its all in how you look at the world
Without colouring your perception with hurt
Without burdening others with your load,
Without wanton violence,
Without blaming everybody else.
Showering all love & care
On the most important person on Earth
That's you yourself, none other!
Go out treat yourself to -
Ice-cream & chocolate
Fried Chicken and steaming soup
A costly dress, a lovely accessory.
Like everything else it will also come to pass.
This will gift you a fresh new perspective
iron out the erroneous zones in personality
You will be tougher, more lovable
Thats how you will come out of the wringer
(To be refined)

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Rajasthan in India has a Royal and Warrior heritage. Its worth a leisurely tour. Its a place to first hand experience the dusty desert, medieval history, Royal Palaces, complexly structured society - and of course cows on the road.
But Palace on Wheel is a Train of Royal Coaches for a whirlwind conducted group tour in seven days. It does leave you breathless and disoriented - but is best for people who cannot afford to stand and stare.


The tour covers Jaipur, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Sawai Madhopur, Chittorgarh, Udaipur, Bharatpur besides Agra & Delhi on way.It takes you to Forts, Palaces, Havelis, Tiger Reserves & Bird Sanctuaries.
I took the tour starting 17th Sep. You get to ride an elephant and then a camel on the sand dunes of desert. There is lots of shopping opportunities - as Rajasthan has also a tradition in handicrafts, embroidery, leather goods, toys and sculpturing.

I indulged in my hobby of photography and stitching the landscapes. Here are some of the stitchings.

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We have two hemispheres in our Brain, Right & Left. Both are quite separate with a minimal shared bandwidth between them. Both are quite different. Right one is a parallel processing computer hooked to various energy sensors in our body, simultaneously gathering millions of streams of data. It connects to the world outside. Its very chaotic, it cannot make sense of what it gathers, because it cannot distinguish self from the universe, present from the past and future.
Its the left brain which is a serially, logically processing machine, which has enormous wealth of past records. It also has a sense of "SELF". Its this brain which makes sense of Right Brain inputs and its effect on our selves.
Right brain is what gives us a sense of being connected to the rest of living beings and with the rest of the grand universe. It gets the sense of being permeating the whole universe and vice-versa. Its raw, fleeting, slippery and transient and present moment in time - that has no past no future.
The left brain is what brings us down to earth, controls our actions and makes us a calculating, methodical entity, separate from the rest of living beings and we-and-they feeling regarding the rest of the universe. Its past and future with the present moment missing.
One can understand this when we just come to conscious from anaesthesia generated unconscious. I wrote about my experience of this 80 Fathoms below conscious. As I regained consciousness, the right brain kicked in with gibberish data. Immediately left brain came back, failed to resolve the inputs but alive enough to say that "you are ok, I cannot make sense of it but its enjoyable even in raw form. Do not let others shake you out of it, enjoy while it lasts".
Without the left brain (as can happen in a left brain stroke) you feel the feeling of becoming one with the universe, but you become non-functional - cannot process language, cannot understand numbers or remember who you are. The feeling is not unpleasant - as told by people who have gone through it. The feeling is of "Nirvana" or "Moksha" of release from the limited life to unlimited peacefulness. Here is the talk by Jill Bolte Taylor: My stroke of insight about her such experience. If the video doesn't work go to the site.

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(<-A modern Japanese Pagoda on the banks of Coronation Tank of Vaishali)
On my recent visit to the archaeological remains of the ancient city of Vaishali, I tried to feel how it must hae been to live in those times. Its a sobering experience and makes you respect people who lived then.
Vaishali, a city in North Bihar, India is known to have existed since at least 6th century B.C. It was very large, very populous and rich. It was also the capital of the state of Vaishali. The legend has it that one of the earlier king, "Nabhaga" abdicated the throne due to an accusation about Human Rights violation and is believed to have declared: "I am now a free tiller of the soil, king over my acre". The city then declared itself a democratic Republic - the first democracy of the world - much earlier than the ones in Greece.

(<-The earliest of Ashokan Lion pillars. Unlike later ones it has no religious edict engraved on it. On right is an irreverent look at the butt of the lion. The lion's facial expression is pathetic not majestic or ferocious - where have you strung me up?)
The place is also linked with the lives of Mahatma Buddha and Mahavira (the 24th incarnation of Jain Religion). Buddha spent most of his last years here. During this time, the place was famous for its courtesan - Amrapali. She is the focus of many legends and stories of that time for her beauty and wealth. Modern day Hindi Novel - "Vaishali Ki Nagar Vadhu" (Vaishali's City Bride) is also about her. Buddha's influence (or is it vice-versa) converted her to a female-monk, for which Buddha broke his rule of allowing only men-folk as monks. This change almost broke the Buddhist community into two warring sides (shades of "Helen of Troy").
There are now many archaeological remains in the area. Most of these show layers of construction in various periods of the history - from 6th century B.C. till 7th century AD.

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Of the bewildering and encyclopedic events in our life, some memories stick to the brain and some do not. The selection of remembered event is based on the intensity of interest that we had in the event at the time of occurrence.
But this interest changes as we grow older. As a child the level of curiosity is so intense that large percentage of memories of our lives from age of 3/4 years to 17/20 yrs get remembered. Later on this percentage goes on reducing. This makes interesting study when you compare the memories of life spent together with your children or parents.

Recently my son suddenly recalled, that once I had fainted due to vaso-vagus syncope. This nothing but a metabolically programmed, shut down of brain due to intense pain, to reduce the damage to the body. I learnt that I was more prone to it as a trait. About 25 years back, my wife, me and my son (then only 5 years) were sleeping and I woke up due to some stomach pain. I sat up on the edge of the bed slightly leaning forward due to intense colic pain. I had vaso-vagus syncope and I fainted, just keeled over, and hit the wall in front like a sack of potatoes. The sound of my head hitting a ledge must have woken them up. I do remember this event, but the detailed imagery that my son recalled, was very vivid. He could create a complete visual scene, although very small kid at that time. The boom of the tree, the exact place I was lying. The sounds , the colour of the floor etc. I did not have that much detail in my mind.
Being at the center of the three generations, I recalled my and my father's relative memories of shared events- and found it to be true in reverse order.
I think that is good as well! Otherwise our minds would have been clogged with too many memories of more busy portions of our life.

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Flame of an oil lamp, flares up, one last moment, before it runs out of oil and it just starts spewing black soot.
Evolution of societies also follow this route to oblivion. The dying society flares into megalomaniac creations just before being snuffed out. Is the present 21st Century also the last for the Human Race? From the megalomaniac creations - it just looks to be the case of burst of the dying flame.
There is a web-game about what it would be like for the human race to die in year 2100, if do not wake-up.
But look at the megalomania. We have created a Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Europe to just smash two protons (travelling at almost the speed of light) together, just to prove whether two mathematically elegant theories could actually govern the sub-particle universe.

LHC has been built in a circular tunnel 27 km in circumference. The tunnel is buried around 50 to 175 m. underground. It straddles the Swiss and French borders on the outskirts of Geneva.
The statistics and Money spent is nothing Human Race has ever seen. For example:

1. The combined strands of the superconducting cable being produced for the LHC would go around the equator 6.8 times. If you added all the filaments of the strands together they would stretch to the sun and back 5 times with enough left over for a few trips to the moon.


2. Part of the LHC will be the world's largest fridge. It could hold 150 000 fridge full of sausages at a temperature colder than deep outer space.
3. The cost of the accelerator only (without experiments and computing) but including manpower and material is 4.7 Billion CHF (that's around 3.03 billion euros)

There is more on the web, officially.
...and unofficially
I think there could be a simpler way to do science.
This is not all. The type of buildings that we are now making in the Middle East is super-megalomania.
Mahatma Gandhi used to say: "There is enough on earth for our needs, but not enough for our greed."
We are going to kill the Human Race if we do not temper our use of Earth's resources.
What Do You think? Please leave comments!!!

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We do face people with whom we find it difficult to deal. May be we are ourselves difficult person to deal with! ;-)
How to deal with persons we are having difficulties in social/business interactions:- here is the cheat-sheet:
1. Have an inner dialogue (I-D). The attempt by him/her is to put you in a non-rational frame of mind - to numb you with high-emotions so that you are not able to think. Therefore deliberately think and have an internal dialogue - give yourself a pep-talk - "I am not going to get cowed down here!". What is he saying? What are the issues involved?
2 Keep to basics (B's). Do not get drawn into tangential supplementary issues. Point out the basic issues. Insist on not getting into peripheral issues. Point out this is not appropriate to discuss "Always" - stick to the immediate provocation. (e.g. You are 'always' late for appointments! Let him/her state are you late this time? Other past instances are not being discussed.) Step 1 above, Inner Dialogue should help you think what is the basics here.
If he/she comes down to basics and if you are at mistake accept it! You need not explain in detail how this happened, instead promise that you will not commit such mistakes in future. Express (with self-respect) regret at the inconvenience caused.
3 State feelings , opinions, beliefs (F-O-B). You have right to express how you are feeling in this transaction (I am feeling being unfairly treated.). State your opinions freely. Express what you believe is involved. BUT BUT please stick to basics, do not fly into tangential - do not step up emotional temperature.
4 Be not a party to dis-assertiveness, state your needs and wants (D-N-W). Resolve during the internal dialogue that you are not going to be a party to dis-assertiveness. I will not accept unfairness towards me!. State your Needs and wants clearly: (I need to be given time to work on this report. I need to be given such & such resources if this result is required. I want that I may not be please treated discourteously.)

Well this needs to be practiced. Practice the opposite party role also. Get unfairly tough on somebody and see how he handles it ;-). Explain it off after its over. Keep a printed slip with following in your purse:
1 (I-D) Have an inner dialogue
2 (B's) Keep to basics
3 (F-O-B) State feelings , opinions, beliefs
4 (D-N-W) Be not a party to dis-assertiveness, state needs, wants

Did you find it useful! Do you have better strategies? Please leave comments!!!

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Even as a child my favourite time-pass was sitting on the window which had a wide ledge. The window looked out on a public ground. Munching on peanuts, I could ask my mother:
Who is That Man? Where is he going?
Why does he not play a game? Will his mother be angry if he is late?
What could be in his bag - that he is carrying? etc.
I got fairly plausible and patient answers. She I now recall used to be amused and pleased at such questions.
Is it Genes? My son also asked similar questions. I also loved such sessions and answered him patiently and with humour.
I treasure both sets of remembrances as moments dripping with pure love.
But now as an adult (as you see in my profile "About Me"), I look at the world and ask myself those same questions again. Sometimes I look inwards and ask myself about myself!
What do you get from writing such Blogs? Will your wife be not angry for spending too much time on computer?
Who reads them and why do they?
You could play the role of my mother and try answering that ;-)

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Child is the father of Man. If we want to understand hows and why of behaviour of early Humans, lets look at what is relevant to an infant.
Understanding Physics by early humans is not surprising - since even a child learns of laws of nature by an intuitive interaction with the world. But I wonder, how and why did humankind learn to understand numbers and then on to mathematics? For numbers do not have that direct a day to day relevance for an infant - except for that acquisitive instinct to possess more of what it likes. But why numbers to mathematics and then application of mathematics to Physics. It does not make evolutionary sense.
Only explanation could be that numbers, mathematics and physics in mathematical language is hard-wired in human mind. BUT WHY?
Will a community isolated from learned mankind arrive at the same mathematics and physics? If we are hard-wired - it should and if we are not then the Human knowledge is only a soft skill passed on and extended from generation to generation.
In Andaman Island there are two tribes (The Jarawaks and ?) in some islands, who have shunned contact with rest of humans - except at a distance. They are known to understand numbers and arithmetic. They are so averse to human contact - that we cannot find if they have knowledge of any rudimentary mathematics or physics. But their mere knowledge of arithmetic supports the hard-wired conjecture.

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I am afraid of the Lightning since childhood. I read a lot about lightning as a child out of curiosity. This has instilled a sense of panic in me when the clouds are angry - specially in the dark.
What I recall learning is:

1. The bolt of the lightning travels at a speed of 60,000 m/s ; temperature of 30,000^oC (five times hotter than surface of Sun)and carries a current of 40-120 kilo-amperes. A normal strike travels a distance of approx 1.3 Kms. Target is struck actually by 3-4 strikes 30-40 ms apart, due to repeated discharge of the charge in the cloud. The discharge channel in air is only 1 cm dia.


2. Lightning strikes the highest or the electrically the least resistive path to the earth. Be away from these high sites. Do not stand under a tree in an open space.


3. Its its search of least resistive paths that causes the cracking sound due to sudden changes in its paths. The thundering sound is due to the shock wave created by air in contact being suddenly heated to 10,000^oC.


4. In a structure it strikes the corners. Stay away from corner rooms or a corner in a room.


5. If standing in a row, it strikes the extremities. Stand in the middle of a line.


6. On striking or even before it may divide into a large number of splinter paths. If you are slightly afar from a target, even then you are vulnerable. People even 25 metres away may be vulnerable.


7. Rarely its has been seen to come as a balloon of bright light. Though lots of eye-witness reports are there, but there has never been a scientific confimtion of this.


8. More lightning is seen in rains after a particularly dry spell.


9. Mostly the lightning is negative charged. But rarely it is positively charged - which is more damaging - travels larger distances before striking. So even area not having clouds may get struck - really bolts from blue!


10. Lightning is the deadliest weather phenomenon, 24,000 people get killed and 2,40,000 are injured by it each year


11. Safest place is to be inside a strong house, but stay away from anything that can conduct electricity - phones, TV, Computer, plumbing, Metal doors/windows.


12. Car's tyres are ineffective as insulation. Its metal body of car that conducts away the charge that saves the ocuupants - if they are not touching any metallic part at that time.

No! No! I didn't want to infect you with my panic. Honest. Being forewarned isn't being forearmed always.

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The hit counter on this blog is entering into that range of figures - about which I feel very nostalgic. In 1953 I was 3 years old. Chubby, naughty, playful - 4th child out of five. I was very greedy about food and used to steal goodies from kitchen. I had started going to Nursery School at that age - which I hated. I remember feeling very lost and crying on the first day - when a very pretty classmate came, hugged, kissed and consoled me. I can recall even the pillar against which I leaned to cry. Thereafter I think I must have stopped crying and started playing with her. Its not a love story, the girl left school after 2/3 years - I don't know her. I graduated from the same school at 17 years of age. Its a rosy feeling to recall that act of kindness. Oh! no! Let me not cry again.
Originally published in my blog Nothing That Matters, where you can see the comments.

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After a long time, I returned to the site, and did what I had been hoping to do for a long time.....
I found out ways to make a better layout for this blog. I came across the blogbuster site. It has downloadable template for magazine style - three column layout with widgets.
So, here it is. It was lot of slogging. Not easy. I was familiar with HTML. I had been tinckering a lot with earlier template - with lots of customization. But XTML or widgets, I had not tried.
I lost lots of earlier customizations and had to bring it in again.
I still not through, but yes its up and running for the time being.
Thanks to my wife for her patience with me - while I worked on it for hours.
What do you think of the changes??

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