My Sinister Awkwardness Disproved .

"Right-handed people live, on average, 9 years longer than left-handed people."



I was reading the Sunday Paper and a supplement titled 'Amazing Medical Facts ' came along with it. It contained your usual facts you would see on any biology textbook
'Our blood is on a 60,000 mile journey ' and so on..
And reading on I found this.
Right-handed people live, on average, 9 years longer than left-handed people.
Being left handed (Read I'm Left Handed) I felt pretty strongly , you would if you where being told that you are going to 'on average' die 9 years earlier just because of your 'hand' preference. I thought they were bull-shitting me or something so I decided to do a little research. Then things got allot more freaky.
I found this medical paper called
Creation of the Sinister: Biological Contributions to Left-handedness
Which went on to say just because of my lateral preference of the brain is the right, I suffer from a genetical disorder called Geschwind-Behan-Galaburda (GBG) Theory of Left-Handedness
, here�s a excerpt from this paper by Monica Watkins

The GBG Theory holds that genetics is a minor factor in the determination of left-handedness. Influences outside a strict genetic program exert the most control over determination. Studies have shown that injury to the developing brain at specific developmental stages can cause significant changes. It is possible that variations in the chemical environment of the fetus may cause such changes, and lead to a certain cerebral dominance. These chemical variations also influence the development of the immune system. Later in life, the effects of these chemical influences may manifest themselves as immune disorders and abnormal brain structures.

According to the GBG Theory, the chemical variation and its effects account for the following: why left-handedness is more common in men (Oldfield, 1971), why language disorders are more prevalent in men (Heceaen, 1984), why left-handedness is linked with developmental disorders of childhood (Porac and Coren, 1981), and why immune disorders and other diseases are more common in left-handers (Geschwind and Behan, 1982, 1984). In other words, left-handedness is the common thread among problems thought to be unrelated.

After which feeling deprived of the 9 years(50% of my life) I decided to call up my mother and say good-bye.
& Tell her -

Me -Ma I have just been self-diagnosed for a strange genetic disorder that weakens my immune system and I'm going to die 9 years before my right handed counterparts ,life expectancy in India is 61 , therefore doing some quick math I going to die at 51 , may be if I move to Japan where life expectancy is 80.

Ma - (Sounding concerned) Really , Akshay Where did you read this ?

Me - There nothing anybody can do I'm doomed to die young .Can you call the Make A Wish Foundation ,I always wanted a Red Ferrari ,second-hand will do.

Ma - "Don't you have anything to do but to pull your poor mothers' leg long distance. I'm putting down the phone now".

You know what people say about death , once you've accepted that you're going die this strange feeling of happiness overpowers. My friend Sid (a.k.a dabba) wakes up each morning thinking "I'm going to die today" and each day he is disproved (thank god for that he drives me to college).Anyway coming back to my sinister awkwardness. This 'sinister awkwardness' was disproved as easily as it was proved by an article run by the
Associated Press (A/P) titled Study finds left-handers don't die earlier

Here�s a short excerpt ---

LONDON -- Left-handed people don't necessarily die any younger than right-handers, according to new research that disputes the findings suggested by some studies.

In a nine-year study, Dr. Simon Ellis and his colleagues at Keele University in England examined the link between left-handedness and the risk of dying earlier using 6,049 people ranging in age from 15 to 70.

"Handedness did not make a significant contribution to the outcome of death," concluded the study, published Friday in this week's issue of The Lancet, a British medical journal.

The question of whether lefties die younger is controversial. Several studies have suggested a connection, but others have shown no link

Hurray for the English I say.
Thus with my 9 years reinstated I felt like a man saved from the a claws of death a person you was moving into the light but who had been brought back into the realms of the living.

Therefore this Sunday I lost 9 years of my life in a quarter of an hour and got them back in 5 minutes. Strange

HIGH NOON OF SILENCE

At noon the sun is always at its meridian. When the mornings are cloudy, though it is not dark, the sun is not visible. When it is cloudy at night, the darkness is more. Suppose it is cloudy until a quarter to twelve noon, and suddenly the clouds disappear at midday. When the sun shines, it will be the usual, bright midday sun. But there is a difference in the atmosphere. The sudden appearance of the sun after the clouds will prove pleasing and cheerful. But if clouds remain for a month, it will give rise to disgust, which would increase every day. When the clouds finally disappear, the disgust will also disappear. Everything will then look cheerful and fine, and the effect of the sun on the mind, heart and health will be very good.

Thus is the case with me. The clouds may disperse even at one minute to high noon, but in that one minute I feel greater disgust. Just as with a pregnant woman having birth pangs and feeling fed up until she delivers the child, I too feel greater disgust at the time clouds are dispersing. The woman knows that the child will be born in five minutes and she will be free of her troubles; still, at the moment she feels it is better to die. Just see the limits of disgust in these five minutes. My disgust is now nearing that pitch! How ridiculous it would be to ask the woman in labor to take a walk in the fresh air. She would reply that she knows all about what is going to happen to her, since she has already given birth to ten children. So he who has had experience of this sort of disgust knows it only too well
- Merwan Sheriar Irani

God must have written that.

The Big Vada

Imagine yourself walking into a fast food reasturant and order yourself a
"Vada-Pav" and a large coke.This day my freinds is not far behind Mumbai's favourite cheap snack would be reaching a mall near you as we speak.
For those who have never not been enlightened enough to have eaten one ,a Vada Pav(batter-fried mashed potato with bread & chutney) is the daily fast-food staple of millions of Maharashtrians and particular denizens of Bombay.
Back to the post on hand a company in Bombay is selling vada-paav(TM) under the brand of JumboKing , through seven stores all over Mumbai.Now it has been branded and TQMed to compete with McDonald's and is all set to take over the world. This is true reverse globalization-Here comes India!


Vada Pav Trivial

Mumbai?s favourite snack was born 35 years ago, when Ashok Vaidya, a snack seller outside Dadar station, decided to experiment. The combination of batata vada and split pav continues to be the city?s sledgehammer answer to the burger.

Just hoping the Vada Pav at your canteen, Chandralok Gardens improves from, tastless to edible.
Chandralok which if you translate into English means Moon People.Strange name don't you think. ?

 

Being my usual trigger happy japanese photo-tourist self

Pardon my photography, but you've read it right the sign reads.

PLEASE DON'T FEED THE MONKEYS .THEY BREAK OUR TILES

I took this picture ,this year in Sri Lanka with the sole reason of publishing it in my blog.I found it pretty hilarious ,the first time I read it so I thought I'll be my usual trigger happy japanese photo-tourist self and take a picture. AND yes the monkeys do break their tiles I found that out at 2am in the morning (Yawn!!).

Sid if you're reading this I'm in Bombay, back on tues.
Yes you've heard right I'm in Bombay/Mumbai therefore my next post will have some Bombay masala or may be some of my Bombay dreams (bad pun I know).

Can you believe Bollywood (Indian film industry) ripped off an Adam Sandler movie.
Yes there's a Hindi version of Anger Management running around , I bet Mr. Sandler will see the humor in that. I'm not a connoisseur of Hindi movies I do see them (I don't how this related but I must tell you Quentin Tarintino Rocks).
I was forced into seeing it on the bus (read Neeta Volvo) with dolby surround sound and all(Picture of a Monkey(me) with hands on his ears).
Anyway it's called
Mujse Shaade Karoge (if you're don't know Hindi heres a fun exercise ,use it on the next person you know who knows Hindi).
Goodnight .

Awake , Awake Akshay Awake.

Eyes open, to the sound of tangling clocks, bells, and buzzers chimes, courtesy Pink Floyd's Time. This is my wake up play list that my computer randomly spits out at exactly 9am.
Yes I'm a late riser and I need my beauty sleep (which I need allot of, refer to profile picture to know why.).

Ticking away the moments
that make up the dull day
You fritter and waste the
hours in an off hand way

Sometimes time fails to wake me up, and I lie there on my bed dreaming I'm awake.
This happens 50% of the time therefore I rely on my fail-safe wake up protocol.
This song has the sole aim of waking you up.
Wake Up, THE DOORS.

Wake up!
You can’t remember where it was.
Had this dream stopped?
The snake was pale gold
Glazed & shrunken.
We were afraid to touch it.
The sheets were hot dead prisons.

After waking up I show signs of sleepiness by yawning and outstretching my hands above my head. There is theory going around that I'm never really awake, that and I'm perennially high. The second one is true.
I therefore walk to the bathroom, brush my teeth after which I continue towards the toilet pot to relieve myself; I’m suddenly woken up with a jerk and a tickle in my heart. It’s like kick starting a motorcycle.
I then stand in front of the mirror and this is how the mirror will describe me -

He's got, a slight cold and his nose is blocked so you can hear him sniffle his way through life. His face has turned a shade of greenish brown and his eyes are red and watery and his face has been chiseled in to a permanent frown.


Then my day takes a u-turn towards hell. I go to college and spend the day sleeping through a galaxy of lectures.
But sometimes I don't go college then I spend my time calculating the rpm of my ceiling fan which is so fun or I count the specks on my wall or I have a ball doubling 2s.

Doubling 2s is fun exercise you should try it.

You start with 2 and that becomes 4 8 16 32 64 128 .... you get the picture
on day a particularly uninspiring day I reached 524288.
You add 0 to that number you get a number of one my "great friends" please call that number , tell him I sent you.

Anyways enough rambling for the day.
It's raining again.
I don't like September RAIN.

A room with a view

if you were sitting where I'm sitting right now and you turn your head a 90 degrees to the right this is what you will see.In a few hours darkness will fall the light ,dissappear but most likely I'll still be here and this picture will never come back. The dry palms you see on the side are the home of my bat friends they make quiet a racket in the night.I won't be lying if I tell you I don't open my windows in the night.But know since the window is open ,might as well keep it open. 

My life in a nutshell

My life in a nutshell, going to college.Morning 10:30 traffic Law College Road listining to my ipod .
Boy ! I really love this picture .Notice the on coming motocycles that's signature Pune nightmare traffic. BTW for those who don't know this mode of public traffic this the internal view of a yellow and black Bajaj RE autorickshaw (read Rickety Rickshaw )
 

Winds of Change . 

Caveat Reader

Caveat Reader, Readers Beware!!
Ok I'm not a Latin scholar or anything, the only Latin I leant during my schooling was

Perseverantia Et Fide Et Deo.

I know to most Indians it sounds like a spell out of Harry Potter.But it stands to mean simply "Try, Try till you succeed". I tried to live by that in school but look where it got me. Moving on.

Lingua franca

a medium of communication between peoples of different languages.

India has no one lingua franca . It's hard to home on to one language in a country where the people speak near a million. Unlike other in India the language spoken changes every 100 km and the dialect of the language spoken changes every 20Km.
Thus where such a large variation of language and dialect a "common language" a lingua franca is important. As there is diversity in ethnicity the first barrier for communication is one of 'people' to 'people’. Here there is a need for national language the "Rashtriya Bhasha" (national language). That is 'Hindi'.
Many atime when I have been on foreign soil people have asked me strange questions like -

Speaker - So you are Indian.
Akshay - Yes, It's appears so.
Speakers - Do you know how to speak Indian?

Let me interject here see there is no language called Indian. Thus no one can speak Indian.
Even though Hindi is the official national language, English is India's second lingua franca and then there are the others

Comming back to me my language skills which are appallingly bad and thus I gained profiency in only one.
I speak English.
Apalling Hindi.
Even more Apalling Marathi.
Can't Speak French (even after studying it for 2 years).
Can't Speak Punjabi which supposedly is my mother tongue.

Don't know you Mother Tongue ? ... Crime against Humanity ?

Most people India think it Pleasant conversation to dig deep into your personal life and history .
Most people ask you your name and surname then by looking at your name and surname they decipher what geographic corner of India you hail from and then logically decipher your age , education background , bank balance , caste and all this my asking you a series of very tough questions.
Most of the time , one thing leads to another and converstion leads to the following.

Person - Ok , you're Punjabi (person from the state of Punjab ,NW India).
Akshay - Yes I'm .
Person - Do you know Punjabi.
Akshay(dreading that question) - No actually I don't know punjabi.
Person (in disbelief) - But, it's your mother tongue !!!!
Akshay(getting pissed)- I know.
Person - You're parents never taught you ???
Akshay - NO

You get the picture. Not knowing your mother tongue is a serious crime.
As for of you my now thorougly bored by my rambling don't forget I warned you.
Caveat Reader.

Gmail For Free

As the Gmail debate rages on,privacy or no privacy , 1Gb of no 1Gb most will agree gmail is still in fashion , it's like the mail equivalent of the ipod.
Yes ,gmail give it you 1Gb but even rediff gives you same ,then what makes gmail click.
I think it is exclusivity that Gmail holds that makes the G capital.I found that gmail's "invitation only" enrollment process is the key to the attraction it still holds.It works like a pyramid scheme where only blogger members (owned by google) and those you are "invited" get their id @gmail.com and now there entire sites which cater to people who want gmail or those who want to barter a gmail invite for something ( read gmailswap.com).
I too bartered an invite for a postcard from Mexico City.
Anyway this being my 101st entry .. I thought I'll give away my 3 remaining gmail invites.

Thus for the first three lucky people who mail me at akshaym@gmail.com get the invites.

In other trends looks like amazon's A9.com is giving google a run for it's money.

Striker's Anonymous 1
Part 1
Monday the 6th of September.
Bombay , India.

Akshay is sitting at home and being the couch potato that he is ,is watching television . He is clicking away at the remote as if it where a game console of some type , channel surfing.
[A cellphone "rings" and "vibrates" on the wooden side table making an even stranger noise]
Akshay outstretches his hands and picks up the phone and talks into it like people usually do.
If you where present there you would have heard the following :

Akshay - Hello, Was sup in college?
Akshay - What!! MIT is on strike. You're joking right ?[in disbelief]
Akshay - No way ,All of Second Year Engineering !![in disbelief again]
Akshay - Police and all came , God this is simply unbelievable !
Akshay - Their demanding 34 grand back!! awesome !!![come on this is too good to be true]
Akshay - How come I always miss out on the fun?
Akshay - Yes I'm coming back to Poona tomorrow. See you in College. Ciao!

The next day...
Tuesday,7th of September.
Mumbai-Pune Expressway,India.


Times of India , Pune
- page 3 -
[Reads]
MIT students boycott class in protest against fee

PUNE: Close on the heels of engineering students from the Maharashtra Academy of Engineering, Alandi protesting against the "steep" fee structure, their counterparts at the Maharashtra Institute of Technology (MIT) at the Kothrud campus on Monday boycotted classes demanding an immediate refund of excess fees collected by the college management.
Over 300 students from the second year, who gathered in the college campus early ,Monday morning, said they will continue with their agitation till the management agrees to comply with the fee structure determined by the Shikshan Shulka Samiti headed by retired high court judge RA Jahagirdar, and refunds the excess amount already charged from them.

Clouds overcast,a blue Neeta Volvo bus yonder ,passes by you in a flash.
Little does our protagonist know that you are watching him as he sits on seat number 22 reading The Da Vinci Legacy (a da vinci code clone) which by the way for your information he is still reading.
As the bus moves closer to it's destination we switch locations to the Campus of Maharashtra Institute of Engineering , where the strike is entering it's second day .The Management has agreed to refund Rs.20,000 of the Rs.34,000 demanded by the students .The students refuse and the strike continues with sloganeering in high pitch.

1300hrs :
Akshay reaches the campuss greated by the shouts of a hundred of his fellow students.
They shout -
"Refund!!! Refund!!!"[as if it where a football chant]
followed by
"Ganapati Bapa Mooriya amche paise vaapas diya [Marathi]" (Give are money back)
In all the excitement and the adrenaline of the mob ,Akshay joins in the festivities,only to recieve a hundred missed calls form his mother asking him not to get involved.But Akshay being the stubborn buffoon that he is dives right in , you know what they say once you're wet might as well get drenched.


{to be contd}

I felt like Alice in Wonderland on Magic Mushrooms.


Went back to school today, it’s been three years .The feeling was strange to say the least .It was like meeting a old friend who you where once very accustomed to but now don't meet anymore .You remember all the good and bad times you shared and that nostalgia leaves you into a surreal place .

Today, 6th September is celebrated in India as Teachers day, a day where students everywhere pay tribute to their gurus and being in Bombay I decided to visit school for old times sake. I thought it would be nice to share some of my thoughts and feelings on the visit.
Firstly as I mentioned it was kind of surreal . On the drive there I had this feeling at the bottom of my stomach , the kind of feeling you get in a school bus or when you don’t know anything in your applied mechanics paper.

nostalgia.

A bittersweet longing for things, persons, or situations of the past.

Walking through the countless corridors ,the opens halls and emptily filled classrooms it was like sleep walking into the past .My first observation was that everything looked smaller .It was like someone had drawn a box around place with their mouse and did a 2x zoom-out .Was it that everything had grown smaller or was it that I had grown bigger or was it a little of both ?
For any reason beyond my microscopic intellect I felt like Alice in Wonderland on Magic Mushrooms.
Moving on

The question was why where all the girls who where also visiting dressed in the summer prep line?
All of them flaunting it in their “Mango Addict:” T-shirts. Consumer Nation I tell you.
Not that I’m complaining .
Bohemian Rhapsody playing in my head followed my radiohead’s There There .


Things Change

The More things change ,the more they stay the same. Things have changed so much but in my head there just the same . Same old same old.
It’s typical isn’t it.

Ending where I began ,I went back to school but I came back.

For all those people who don't know Fiat 118 Ne looks like here's a picture.
This is in relation to the post Cobras in small outdated Italian Cars with Schumacher at the wheel

BitTorrent taking P2P by Storm

Hello ,from a bruised and battered me.
Had to stay home today and miss out on college and the quiz at Ferguson because of my swollen leg.
So I'm stranded at home all alone as usual,
this really sucks.

I found this awesomely new P2P client called BitTorrent .
Kazaa's days are numbered ,this software is simply to great to be true and did I mention fast.
BitTorrent a brain child of Bram Cohen , better known for CodeVille .
Bittorrent has a very efficient mechanism which gives its edge over Kazaa and it's also very simple to use.
It's works on a process called Swarming where a file is broken up into several parts for easy circulation.
To start sharing a certain file , a .torrent file is created by a user which is spread by the usual method.
Anyway it's just such a great client .
I use the one called Bitspirit.
which can be download at www.lanspirit.com

Note --- I'm so sorry for all these typos

Cobras in small outdated Italian Cars with Schumacher at the wheel??.


On a personal note , I nearly died today.
This the second or so time in these many weeks.
I was Caught from behind by a Fiat 118 Ne and then was dragged across the gravelly road with my skin run through a sort of paper shredder.
A very FUN experience.
On a happier note I'm alive with no bones broken .
I bet this is a CIA / ISI / KGB / Mossad name the agency ,
sponsored conspiracy against me.
First cobras, then small outdated Italian Cars
What next Cobra's in small outdated Italian Cars with Schumacher at the wheel??.
Actually thats a little two Kill Billish.
I live to survive another day!!

First Cobras


Most people must have heard of Rudyard Kipling and no I would not pretend to be him just to make my blog more readable.
That would kind of be like my freind H.G Wells who is reachable at H.G Wells Represents.
The only reason I'm reminded of Mr. Kipling is a Book he once wrote.
More speciffically a story from The Jungle Book , Rikki Tikki Tavi.
Why Riki Tikki Tavi ??
A good question, dear reader .For the answer we must jump into a stort incident which happened to me a week before yesterday.
I was driving into the cul de sac I call home, parking at my regualar spot ,right at the end of the dead end by the heap of collected dead foliage.A place not blessed with proper lighting in the night but a place blessed with a silence that comes with darkness.The time, being rather late to be coming back from college as it is ,the excuse drama practice.
I rode in with my headlight blazing easing off the corner accellerating steadily and than breaking till I gently glided to a stop at the end.
Getting off my bike , I stand there face to face with a snake .
No ordinary snake I remind you ,a cobra.
He stood there gawking at me with his magical eyes , time stopped ,my nuerons screeming for a response form my now panicing mind.
Looking at the this beauty of a snake , don't get me wrong I don't particularily adore snakes but just looking at this awesome specimen of nature made a strange feeling of awe overcame me.
And then there was fear,
dude this snake could do serious harm to me , I have seen all the documentaries and the collective national geographic/discovery channel in my head was telling me to
back up , nice and simple... Nice Cobra Nice Cobra and a occasional down boy as he was hissing in a calm and somewhat seductive manner.

So I backed off slowly at first and then I ran , I ran till I reached my gate
Happy to live and tell the tail without the help of any anti-vemon..
Anyway the story isn't over .
Then the next day when I decide to park my scooter on a differrent spot guess who I meet ,a mongoose.A rather large rodent like creature with a long bush tapering tail.

I found this very interesting ,
Forgive me I just a city boy a boy who is not used to wildlife around his own sanctuary, forgive the pun.Thing is nothing has changed I still stay in technically a city of 4 million people , Pune but I still share my yard with a Mongoose and a Cobra and many other nocturnal inhabitants I haven't had a pleasure of meeting (these include bats).
Thus to end and draw a connection , I have my very own Ricki Ticki Tavi ..
But I prefer to call him just Ricki.

What I feel about Indo-Pak Reunification


What I think on reunification really doesn't really matter. My microscopic thoughts will never make a difference.
But after listening to the sometimes redundant reasoning to 52 different speakers on the topic I'm bound to have a perspective idea on the matter.
Most will dismiss the idea on it's face value, stating mutual distrust , religion and sometimes even hate..
For example when I told one person in my class that ,I was speaking against Indo-Pak Reunification... He was went on an Anti-Pak spree saying.
"Woh Salle Pakistanis" (Those Pakistanis >> where "Salle" is a derogatory word)
I know he did not mean it's just the media in both the countries spread this mutual mistrust.Thus it's almost cool to bash the other country.Degrade them on each others national television ,it's a sort of entertainment,it the perennial coffee table conversation everyday people have , all segments of society.

The thing is people are fickle minded and their thoughts on subjects change like a compass changes direction.

And there is one thing I can say with certainty that things that seem impossible today will become possibilities tomorrow.

The same is the case with the "India - Pakistan" relationship ,these two countries were one in 1947,before partition (for those who don't know the history here's a link
Partition of India)
and hopefully can become one in the future burying their past differences.

Who would have predicted in 1944 that Europe would stand united as the largest bloc of countries going into the 22nd Century?
It would have been just a dream a dream of a few.
A dream they worked on and brought to reality the same is the case with India Pakistan Reunification .
It is just a dream ,but if we work on it CAN become a reality.

Certum est, quia impossibile est

(It is certain because it is impossible)
-Tertullian (c. 160-c. 230)