Just Thinking

In India cricket and Bollywood are no less than a religion. If you compare the number of people going to a temple and a theater, there won't be much of a difference. In a temple we praise the lord and in a theater we praise the actors. For some, cinema is just a 2 hour entertainment, where as for some it's life. Cinema, movies, films have become an irreplaceable part of most of our lives. On weekends all of us watch a movie or a part of it, either in a theater or on a laptop or a TV, but we do. The reasons are pretty simple. They take us away from all our worries, sometimes we even relate to the stories. We cry with the character, we laugh with them, we start living their lives. But for 2 hours only. That's the beauty of cinema, you get to live multiple lives without anything to lose.  May be that's what attracts us the most. Everything is an affair of just two to three hours. However, making a movie is not that simple. To depict a complete story in few hours is a

Yesterday was my 26th birthday. So, under the modern social convention a few people wished me. A lot didn't. Some of my friends didn't even cared to call, they just posted it on my facebook wall. As, I was enjoying the least attention on my birthday, a call from a guy in the evening made my day. He just wished me a happy birthday followed by a general conversation and then hung up. I felt really good after that. That call made my not so happening birthday, special. In the month of February this year, me and my brother visited a place in Ahmednagar district of Maharshtra. We visited a residential school ' SNEHALAYA ' operated by an organization of the same name. SNEHALAYA is an organization started by Dr. Girish Kulkarni with purpose of rehabilitation of women working in red light areas(RLA) and their children. Now, SNEHALAYA has 17 active projects under it's name. They work for issues like human trafficking, aids awareness, domestic violence, child abuse, rehabil

One of India's foundation pillar has been knowledge. We had great learned sages who contributed a lot to the world of Science and Philosophy. India also had one of the most ancient Universities. Some of the research that happened in these universites changed the whole world. In our mythology too we had given high importance to science and knowledge, Saraswati, Bramha, Vishwakarma etc. are peculiar examples of our interest in knowledge. But, even after our interest and inclination towards a knowledge based society why have we failed to create an example in the modern world. India today is nowhere when it comes to education standard. We failed terribly in keeping up the reputation of our ancestors. We are not even able to provide proper basic education where most of the other nations are achieving high level of advanced education. There are only a few Universities in India which could compete truly with the global Universities and for a country with hundreds of Universities this i

Live life king size. According to me, one of the most misleading quotes. Rather than living 'the life' we spend it working to become the king. I hope you understand what I want to say here, we have got it all wrong. Dissatisfaction is the biggest enemy of this age. We are not satisfied by anything. We want more of everything and are ready to do anything for it, but we forget that while doing anything we are spending some precious time of our life which could have been the best time of our life. There are two basic parameters to measure anything, quantity and quality. Quantity being the bulk or size of it or rather its physical features and quality being the experience of it, the amount of substance or depth anything has. Life can also be measured on these two parameters. Quantity being the physical appearance of one's life, his/her credentials, status in the society, resources at disposal,etc. and quality being the happiness in one's life, his/her relations, humor, tr

A lot has been said and done about the garbage ( Kachra in Hindi ) problem of India. By garbage I don't just mean the household garbage bin but domestic and public hygiene problem. This blog is about my personal views on the matter and presents the situation as a commoner. I don't think there is any human being alive or dead who likes garbage. Garbage is a problem and most of us run away from it like every other problem, rather than tackling it. Very few try to find a solution to it. The basic reason behind this kind of attitude is the filth that is associated with garbage. Nobody wants to get there hands dirty or wants a foul smell around them. This nature of human is justified but we are only responsible for this filth and smell. How can we just throw away the waste and don't care about what happens next or this affects u. Just throwing away the garbage is not the solution. The aim should be garbage reduction rather than just getting rid of it. You might clean your hous

 "I will hold the rains for you tomorrow", said the old man sitting beside me. I was stunned by his claim, but I definitely wished that his claims come true. I was sitting in the rain, in front of a Gurudwara in Chumthang village of north Sikkim. The old man was the owner of a small grocery shop, and was advising tourists, not to go forward and spend the night in Chumthang.  I was not alone. About 300 tourists were stuck in between two landslides and were spending the night in the Gurudwara with us. A few months ago, my dad called me up and said,"I am retiring this year son, lets go on a tour to Kerala before that." That's it. I began to research about Kerala, the weather, suitable visiting season, must go places there and all those things. It all went into waste when mom called and said,"Kerala is too hot in summer, lets go to Gangtok." Nobody dared to challenge her and so, the research started again. Soon, flight bookings were done, hotel bookings

My plan was to write this blog right after the first part but somehow I wasn't able to deduce what things mattered to me in my life. So, I gave it some time. Tried to find out what more mattered, through observation of lives of  family, friends and even strangers.  I would again say that these are the things that I think matter in life. It is just an opinion. A different view is not at all uncommon and is very much invited. Please feel free to express yourselves in the comment box below. Continuing with the things that matter ... 6. Prioritizing your life Life of a human being is very complex, varying with a lot of parameters. It is very important to understand that we cannot keep everyone happy, we cannot be best at everything, we cannot achieve everything. Thus we will have to decide whom we want to keep happy, what we what want to be best at, what we want to achieve and what not. Prioritizing is more difficult than it seems to be. The hardest part is to let go