Emergent Noise

It’s stuck in my head, this catchy and pleasant tune from “Malaika, nakupenda Malaika”. It should bring back some memories for Roodge at least. In case you haven’t heard it, you should…It’s a beautiful melody in Swahili, and you may want to take a look at it’s lyrics.

Malaika – By Harry Belafonte and Miriam Makeba

Speaking of in-my-head songs, if your taste is in a mellow but fast song, you could listen to
In My Head – Queens of the Stonage. This song featured in the EA Sports Game Title , Need for Speed – Underground 2. The NFS series was a great way to pass time, until Underground 2. It had great music and very tedious gameplay.

For those who like to stick to books and stories, I found a really great website called Online Literature that has the full works of a large number of great authors. Currently I am reading Indiscretions of Archie by P.G Wodehouse and the subtle humor is refreshing…especially after accidently stumbling upon one of those silly “comedy” serials that air on TV these days.

It’s stuck in my head, this catchy and pleasant tune from “Malaika, nakupenda Malaika”. It should bring back some memories for Roodge at least. In case you haven’t heard it, you should…It’s a beautiful melody in Swahili, and you may want to take a look at it’s lyrics.

Malaika – By Harry Belafonte and Miriam Makeba

Speaking of in-my-head songs, if your taste is in a mellow but fast song, you could listen to
In My Head – Queens of the Stonage. This song featured in the EA Sports Game Title , Need for Speed – Underground 2. The NFS series was a great way to pass time, until Underground 2. It had great music and very tedious gameplay.

For those who like to stick to books and stories, I found a really great website called Online Literature that has the full works of a large number of great authors. Currently I am reading Indiscretions of Archie by P.G Wodehouse and the subtle humor is refreshing…especially after accidently stumbling upon one of those silly “comedy” serials that air on TV these days.

Another Day has passed by, and the only thing on my mind is that things are getting hot. The weather, and the deadlines too. I managed to do some work isolating the PDB files I need to download. Hopefully by tomorrow morning, I will be done with it. Today was Gudi Padva, that is the Hindu New Year…but over the years, it has less and less celebration associated with it. Most of the time, it comes and goes in the middle of the routine. I guess that is because the entire year’s schedule is Gregorian.

Today in the morning when I read the paper, there was an article about Lata Mangeshkar holding people to ransom. Apparently, she would leave Mumbai if the built a fly-over at Mumbai. I don’t get it. You can hold people to ransom only if you have leverage. How will Lata Mangeshkar not being in the city affect the millions of Mumbaikars who will benefit from the fly-over ? The Chief Minister is going to meet her now. Er, for what? If she doesn’t like to stay with a fly-over, she can move to Kolhapur or wherever she wants to go. Who cares ? Its not like Mumbaikars have to take her darshan everyday to get their work done.

Really, I don’t even get how she is holding the people to ransom. And I don’t know why her leaving Mumbai would be such a catastrophe, that the CM has to go meet her to avoid it. Am I missing something here, or are the reporters gone crazy?

Another Day has passed by, and the only thing on my mind is that things are getting hot. The weather, and the deadlines too. I managed to do some work isolating the PDB files I need to download. Hopefully by tomorrow morning, I will be done with it. Today was Gudi Padva, that is the Hindu New Year…but over the years, it has less and less celebration associated with it. Most of the time, it comes and goes in the middle of the routine. I guess that is because the entire year’s schedule is Gregorian.

Today in the morning when I read the paper, there was an article about Lata Mangeshkar holding people to ransom. Apparently, she would leave Mumbai if the built a fly-over at Mumbai. I don’t get it. You can hold people to ransom only if you have leverage. How will Lata Mangeshkar not being in the city affect the millions of Mumbaikars who will benefit from the fly-over ? The Chief Minister is going to meet her now. Er, for what? If she doesn’t like to stay with a fly-over, she can move to Kolhapur or wherever she wants to go. Who cares ? Its not like Mumbaikars have to take her darshan everyday to get their work done.

Really, I don’t even get how she is holding the people to ransom. And I don’t know why her leaving Mumbai would be such a catastrophe, that the CM has to go meet her to avoid it. Am I missing something here, or are the reporters gone crazy?

Blogging is viral. The strongest motivation you can have to write a blog, is if your friend has one. Most of us will soon develop an uncontrollable urge to ramble. The urge, is also periodic; it waxes and wanes depending on time, boredom etc. The latest addition to the blogosphere is Maya (of the Murdeshwars). In case her blog name gives you ideas… No, she doesn’t have any particular passion, addiction for citrus fruits. The blog is not about citrus fruits either. And no, no addiction for small round yellow things either. (I’ll stop now).

Another friend of mine Kate, wrote a post about choosing good titles for your thesis , which is , as it turns out, an art. The reader must realise the thesis is about something, and must be tricked into reading the thesis for the maximum number of pages before realising it’s not the ground breaking work the title suggests. One can actually graph out the efficiency of the title by counting the average number of pages the reader goes through before cursing himself. Like this post, for example. You don’t really know what it is about, do you ?

Like Seinfeld put it once, “This show is about …Nothing!”. Anyhow, 2 years ago, at about this time, I went to Kelshi, which was an amazing time. There is something attractive about visiting your roots. Pristine beaches and absolute quite are some of the advantages. By the way, something to really look out for is to go on a pristine isolated beach in the Konkan strip on a full moon night. Combined with the dark shadows in the Deodar trees that often line the coast, the unreflective sand, cool whistling breeze and the ocean faithfully reflecting the full moon, make up a totally eerie site. Looking at the shadows, you really begin to hope none of the dark shapes are moving towards you. Local belief in ghosts and tantrics doesn’t help much either. Even if you do not find any “spirtual” companions, you are likely to find some crazy fellow playing around with human bones and performing all kinds of rites.

Here is picture of Keshi beach, the green patch you see on the right has the village hidden. Yes, that is the entire village.

I think I will goto Kelshi again, once my term is over…perhaps this time, I will brink back photos of the beach by night…

Blogging is viral. The strongest motivation you can have to write a blog, is if your friend has one. Most of us will soon develop an uncontrollable urge to ramble. The urge, is also periodic; it waxes and wanes depending on time, boredom etc. The latest addition to the blogosphere is Maya (of the Murdeshwars). In case her blog name gives you ideas… No, she doesn’t have any particular passion, addiction for citrus fruits. The blog is not about citrus fruits either. And no, no addiction for small round yellow things either. (I’ll stop now).

Another friend of mine Kate, wrote a post about choosing good titles for your thesis , which is , as it turns out, an art. The reader must realise the thesis is about something, and must be tricked into reading the thesis for the maximum number of pages before realising it’s not the ground breaking work the title suggests. One can actually graph out the efficiency of the title by counting the average number of pages the reader goes through before cursing himself. Like this post, for example. You don’t really know what it is about, do you ?

Like Seinfeld put it once, “This show is about …Nothing!”. Anyhow, 2 years ago, at about this time, I went to Kelshi, which was an amazing time. There is something attractive about visiting your roots. Pristine beaches and absolute quite are some of the advantages. By the way, something to really look out for is to go on a pristine isolated beach in the Konkan strip on a full moon night. Combined with the dark shadows in the Deodar trees that often line the coast, the unreflective sand, cool whistling breeze and the ocean faithfully reflecting the full moon, make up a totally eerie site. Looking at the shadows, you really begin to hope none of the dark shapes are moving towards you. Local belief in ghosts and tantrics doesn’t help much either. Even if you do not find any “spirtual” companions, you are likely to find some crazy fellow playing around with human bones and performing all kinds of rites.

Here is picture of Keshi beach, the green patch you see on the right has the village hidden. Yes, that is the entire village.

I think I will goto Kelshi again, once my term is over…perhaps this time, I will brink back photos of the beach by night…

What I said about entering a new phase of life turned out to be a prophecy of sorts. It is official now. I have been offered admission to the International Max Planck Research School, University of Goettingen in the Molecular Biology program.

I am yet to work out details, and have not confirmed anything with them. None the less, like Dr.Balaji put it, at least I am asking different questions now.

Current plans for two weeks include a mad-dash to get representable data for the project and turn it into a thesis. Fortunately, we had to do Phase I some time ago so basically the only extra thing to do is the results and the thinking. The literature survey and so on is already done. With all these things and courses , my pace of working on the project had really slowed down. I am sure that happens to all of us, right ? But today, I finally went one step ahead with my data acquisition.

Sometime in the next three weeks, I have to give two exams, prepare two presentations, and research and understand , a few published papers. Bring it on .

On a personal note, things are going great , everyone is a bit busy this year even though it is vacation time. I guess as you grow older vacation time loses meaning. Pooja is quite absorbed in her studies for her exams next week, and therefore systematically ignoring me ( ), so little time is spent on the phone or online chatting with her.
Most of the time is now diverted into reading a really cool book by Bernard Dixon, Power Unseen : How Microbes rule the world. Yeah yeah, I know what some of you are saying, it sounds like a bad hollywood horror flick you watch only when you’re drunk enough to not realise what is going on on the TV. But seriously, if you took the time out to read the book, your perception of the world would change. You can read a review of the book in the BMJ here

Off late, I have also been Orkutting a lot, thanks to Richa Speaking of which, I actually got in touch with my best friend in school…Amey Nadkarni, through Orkut. In the past 7 years, a lot happened, and we had drifted away. But hey, everything happens for a reason, and we’re still in the process of getting to know each other all over again.

I shall resolve, btw, to post more frequently again. This time it may come through, a lot of things are rolling now…as is clear.

What I said about entering a new phase of life turned out to be a prophecy of sorts. It is official now. I have been offered admission to the International Max Planck Research School, University of Goettingen in the Molecular Biology program.

I am yet to work out details, and have not confirmed anything with them. None the less, like Dr.Balaji put it, at least I am asking different questions now.

Current plans for two weeks include a mad-dash to get representable data for the project and turn it into a thesis. Fortunately, we had to do Phase I some time ago so basically the only extra thing to do is the results and the thinking. The literature survey and so on is already done. With all these things and courses , my pace of working on the project had really slowed down. I am sure that happens to all of us, right ? But today, I finally went one step ahead with my data acquisition.

Sometime in the next three weeks, I have to give two exams, prepare two presentations, and research and understand , a few published papers. Bring it on .

On a personal note, things are going great , everyone is a bit busy this year even though it is vacation time. I guess as you grow older vacation time loses meaning. Pooja is quite absorbed in her studies for her exams next week, and therefore systematically ignoring me ( ), so little time is spent on the phone or online chatting with her.
Most of the time is now diverted into reading a really cool book by Bernard Dixon, Power Unseen : How Microbes rule the world. Yeah yeah, I know what some of you are saying, it sounds like a bad hollywood horror flick you watch only when you’re drunk enough to not realise what is going on on the TV. But seriously, if you took the time out to read the book, your perception of the world would change. You can read a review of the book in the BMJ here

Off late, I have also been Orkutting a lot, thanks to Richa Speaking of which, I actually got in touch with my best friend in school…Amey Nadkarni, through Orkut. In the past 7 years, a lot happened, and we had drifted away. But hey, everything happens for a reason, and we’re still in the process of getting to know each other all over again.

I shall resolve, btw, to post more frequently again. This time it may come through, a lot of things are rolling now…as is clear.

I now have a new (and better) blog at The Daily Nash-on. See you there.

Welcome. The beginning of this new blog is symbolic, I am about to start a new phase in life, and it seemed fitting to catalogue it in a whole new way. The older blog will serve to remind me of college days and things I’ve experienced in the last three years. Three Years, that I’ll never live again. I treasure them for the experiences I had, and things I learnt, and the things that I outgrew.

For those of you who do not realise , The Daily Nash-on is a play on the name of a popular newspaper The Daily Nation , well, Nash is my de facto nickname now. This blog will serve the same purpose as the newspaper, except (this is an ego-trip), I am the reporter, editor, protester etc.