All ye Facebook junkies,

look this up.

and have a happier New Year.

Teacher, salaam

Being the kind of teacher I am, it always interests me to see teachers being talked about with understanding, appreciation and respect. So it was good to hear Amitabh Bachchan saying in Arakshan, and Saswata Chatterjee reiterating in C/o. Sir that there's no such thing as a 'great' school, and a good educational institution is not made by airconditioned classrooms with wi-fi internet connection: all it needs is a good teacher and a blackboard (funny, I myself have never needed even a blackboard, and it's been a lifetime!)

The girl in the latter movie also made a telling point: the same school and the same teacher's best efforts can still produce scoundrels... it will be a long time yet before something as incredibly difficult as teaching (and I am not talking about mere 'instruction', be it in plumbing or surgery) can be reduced to running pat algorithms with totally predictable results, assembly-line fashion.

Science, or plumb craziness?

Interested in reading some really bizarre stuff of the science fiction/fantasy variety? Try this.

I was fascinated by this sort of thing as a youngster. Wonder why it doesn't thrill me half as much any more, though I keep in touch...

New 'revolution' in Dragon country

Does history really go round in circles, then?

They have just finished the Third Plenum of the Chinese Communist Party.

A century ago, countries like Russia and China were planning to take the 'revolutionary' step of getting rid of capitalism and building a socialist paradise.

Today, they are taking the 'revolutionary' step of going back the whole hog.

What price a century of mind-numbing arguments, quarrels, riots, wars, pogroms and general mayhem?

Anybody who wants a peek at what was going on in Beijing may read this.

There really are civilized nations on earth!

I wish I had been born in Iceland. See why.

It's a country where most 'educated' people read and write and don't spend all their time telling their kids to become engineers so they can shop mindlessly all their lives! 

Thanks, Saikat, for sending me the link.

Without comment again

This is a news story in today's edition of a national daily.

Whither proletarian revolution?

Toilets and primary schools

This is to my mind one of the most important articles carried by my newspaper in recent times, and it tells succinctly why I shall never call India a developed or civilized country, even if the roads become chock full of BMWs, every urban middle class male has become an IT engineer and every young rich female has become some sort of classical artiste.

As for the reasons cited by the author for why these two shames never go away, I just don't know...

matrimonials

Subhadip Dutta sent me the following. I hope the advertisers eventually have satisfactory married lives.

These are actual profiles from 
shaadi.com, hilarious they are 

Disclaimer: I am not responsible if you forget your basic grammar after reading this mail 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
I want very simple boy. from brahmin educated family from Orissa state she is also know about RAMAYAN, GEETA BHAGABATA, and other homework. 
(Can smbdy plz explain What 
Homework???) 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
I want a boy with no drinks. If he 
wants he can wear jeans in house but while steping out of house he should give recpect to our cast. 
(by not wearing his jeans? What the 
hell...! )  
~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ 
HYE I AM A GOOD LOKING GIRL,WHO HAS THE CAPABILITY TO MAKE ANY BODY TO LOUGH. 
I BELIEVE IN GOD AND ACCORDING TO ME FRIENDS ARE THE REAL MESSENGER OF GOD. 
THE 3 THINGS I AM LOOKING FROM A BOY THEY ARE, 
1. THEY MUST BELIEVE IN GOD. 
2. THEY HAVE TO LIKE MY PROFFESION 
3. THEY SHOULD NOT GET BORED WITH ME WHEN I WILL TRY TO MAKE THEM LOUGH. 
(I am loughing {laughing}) 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
whatever he may be but he should feel that he is going to be someone groom, 
and he must think of the future life if 
he is too like this he would be called the man of the lamp. 
(I am clueless, I feel so lost. Can anyone tell me what this girl wants A 
LAMP ? ?) 
~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ 
I love my patner i marriage the patner ok i search my patner and I love the patner ok thik hai the patner has a graduate ok? 
(the 'Ok-syndrome' K K) 
~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ 
I am pranati my family histoy my two 
brother two sister and father & Mother. 
sister completely married 
(somebody please explain how to get married ‘completely'?) 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
My name is farhanbegum, and i am 
unmarried. 
pleaes you marrige me pleaes pleaes pleaes pleaes pleaes pleaes pleaes 
(Heights of desperation! ) 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
i am kanandevi. i do own businas. one sistar. he was marred. 
(“1 sistar…he was marred”. I’m dead…) 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
I am Sharmila my colour is black, but 
my heart is white. i like social service. 
(Is she a Zebra..???) 

Splendour of colours

Thank you, God, for all Your blessings.

Click on the following link for a sumptuous visual treat. Then pass it on to all you love.

http://www.greatdanepro.com/Just%20Colors/index.htm

genius... or, the trouble with being carelessly bilingual

A 15 year old in my class said two days ago, quite unabashedly, 'My dada (elder brother) is three months older than me.' When I observed that that is biologically highly improbable, she looked blank, and was demystified only when a few friends who had caught on faster explained it to her over giggles. She had meant her cousin, of course... most Bengalis refer to cousins like that, rarely pausing to think about complications it can cause.

Janmashtami

The ‘most complete avatar’ of God was born today. The street below me is thronged with merry crowds visiting the only local ‘tourist spot’, the Ram-Sita Mandir, and it’s awash with bright many-coloured lights, and the junk food vendors are making hay (mercifully they have spared me the loudspeakers blaring the same old bhajans they have been playing for nearly three decades now).

I have been musing. In the whole vast Hindu pantheon, Krishna is my favourite god. And not just for his balgopal roop, I was not telling the whole truth there (the last lines of that blogpost). I am thinking of Hari, and Janardan, and Ananta, and Gopal, and Jagannath and Keshav and Vishwaroop and Achyuta. But most of all I am thinking of Shyam Muralidhar Purushottam, Lord of Radha, the Ultimate Lover, of whom we mere mortals, despite our most strenuous and earnest efforts, can at best be only pale shadows, and that only for a  fleeting moment in time, to only a few…

Ask if you want to know what I have been thinking.

Without comment again

And some people tell me this is a worldwide phenomenon now...

(many thanks to Subhadip Dutta for sending me the cartoon)

Fish out of water!

A dead shark was found abandoned in a New York train, AP reports via my daily newspaper today; see this. Whatever will they report next?

Perhaps it did rain real cats and dogs somewhere sometime?

Zen and the art of enjoying family bliss

I stood outside my daughter's school for a long time the day before yesterday, wondering how I had passed by the same place so many times in my youth, and never dreamt that I'd be waiting there someday on the sidewalk, amidst the noise and the milling crowd and traffic  with such quiet, glad anticipation in my heart. And this morning I have been pottering around the house with mop and brush and duster and cleaning fluid, sprucing up my Kolkata flat, while my wife was flitting around, talking to me about all sorts of things as she does too rarely, and I can't have enough of. And having long and fun conversations in between with favourite old girls and boys over the phone and face to face about everything from new college experiences to expanding tutorials to movies to the globally famous ongoing quarrel between the old economists Amartya Sen and Jagdish Bhagwati. It's cloudy and windy, the lush green rain-drenched vista from the balcony is as appealing as ever, and I have been having a grand vacation, despite the migraine, despite hardly going out of doors. Rab tussi great ho, as the Punjabis say: You have allowed me to know bliss with so little.

Oh, and playing the fool with the neighbour's dogs. Catching my breath after running around to grab them both together for the ten second photo op...

Helicopter moms

See why I love cartoons? This is one field where I still believe a single picture can be worth a thousand words...

I hear that such moms have become a dime a dozen even in the US of A, which used to be at the vanguard of personal liberty once, and where it was an article of faith that children ought to be allowed to grow up as fast as possible, and left as much as possible to their own devices for best results.

I take pride in thinking that in this all-important sphere, too, I have been able to follow the rule of the Golden Mean while bringing up my own daughter. I have not been an irresponsible and negligent parent, but I have avoided being a dirigiste dad also, I think. My daughter might confirm it.

'The Society of Mediocre Engineers'

This is an essay after my own heart, and Saptarshi has excelled himself. For the sake of comparison, you can look up the post titled 'Engineer or bust' on my bemused blog.

Saptarshi's latest

My young friend Saptarshi Moitra has written a post in the best tradition of whimsical writing. Look it up here. Thanks and congratulations, Saptarshi.

Readers who are really interested may visit my earlier posts titled 'Pretty good doctors' and 'Of noses and other profound things' (the search bar helps). Indeed, it won't hurt if they explore this blog a little more on their own, either...

Oh, and yes, I almost forgot: Happy Birthday, America!

this and that

Three observations for now.

Driving through the old MAMC township the day before yesterday, I saw a young man galloping past on a horse. I kid you not. Too bad I did not have a camera with me...

This blog remains the poor cousin of the other one. Pity. My readers would not have regretted it if they had explored this one a bit more.

There are few men in my town whom I admire, leave alone respect. One of those is a poor cycle-van driver who goes by my house hawking cowdung manure. He alternately yells to tell people about his ware, and breaks loudly and tunelessly into shyamasangeet or some vaishnav padavali number immediately afterwards. Those who cannot figure out why I admire and respect this man will never know anything essential about me.

Oh, a fourth one. I am sick and tired of people laying claim upon my time without bothering to weigh their words and considering how I might feel reading them...they shouldn't mind that I ignore them completely. After very long and careful deliberation, I have decided that is the only sane thing to do. No man either has infinite patience, nor owes it to anyone. But that could be one reason why some might think of me being wantonly whimsical. Which is why I put this here.

Dwarf vying with giant

Chetan Bhagat, who's lately got too big for his boots riding on the admiration of millions of pinhead teenagers, was firmly put in his place recently by a man whose boots he is not fit to lick - see this - and I am happy.

Thank you, Rajdeep, for sending me the link.

A German who loves India

Here's something written by a well-known man, a man even more whimsical than myself. Read, and let him or me know whether, if you are an Indian, you feel sorry for him and sorry about ourselves. The man loves India despite everything! He can be reached by email at m.kaempchen@gmx.de