God! They say Friday the 13th is bad... well the last 24 hours have been incredulous in terms how how people drive. It's not like prior to this there has been perfect road sense displayed by people on the road, but the recent hours have just taken the cake!
I was out yesterday for a Lion's Club function. Since I was extremely bored considering the utter lack of company and NO ONE remotely close to my age group, I decided to go out for a drive. So i'm driving and there's this junction at which I wanted to turn around and go back. The traffic police have blocked a U-turn with barricades and you have to take another road going around the barricades to go back. So I do that. As I am about to go around, there come these smart asses on the bike who decide that going all the way around is a waste of time and hence cut across the barricades thus putting themselves right by my side. Above this they expect me to give them way. When I didn't they started cursing and shouting. I used to pride myself on my patience. NOT ANY MORE. Stop car. Roll down window. Give them a good dose of verbal abuse right back and then give them the choice of calling the cops if they wish to make a complaint against me. Yeah right. And they would explain what?
I drive on. There's a Maruti 800 ahead of me and there's a road connecting the main road from the right. Our man puts the right indicator and begins to turn right. So I dip the lights and overtake. No problemo right? Naah! Our champ has a change of mind and swerves left onto the main road with the right indicator still on. Brakes screech and both vehicles come to a halt. No impact, thankfully. Like I said earlier, lack of patience on my side. So I roll down my window to ask him if he's drunk driving like a maniac around. Guess what? He starts yelling at me!!?? I seriously have got minimal patience given the circumstances. Completely blew up on him Verbally, of course. His right indicator was still on. Fired him inside out and finally he shut up. Sheesh!
I mean, seriously, who wouldn't get mad when you're on a bike going down the right way in a one way street and midway you get a car coming the wrong way with him telling you to go to the side to let him through. Well HELL NO! Do what you want. I ain't moving aside buster. You reverse out of here and let me through. If he refuses, well you can always threaten to call the cops and then what would he do?
But the worst part is when we have places of religious worship just by the side of the road and people park their vehicles on the road to go pay their respects. Well, the road is just about the required width to allow two trucks to pass side by side. Park vehicles on the road? Hell, we got ourselves a one way lane!
It's plain civic sense people! How difficult can that be to understand!
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Sunday, July 08, 2007
Voting Farce...
A couple of days back when I was in mumbai, one of my buddies asked me if I had voted for the Taj Mahal in the new 7 wonders of the world list. When I replied in the negative, he exhorted me to exercise my 'right' to vote for the Taj and went on about how we needed to have it on the '7 Wonders of the World' list.
Weird. All this time no one was even bothered about giving the Taj Mahal a second glance and all of a sudden we're being pummelled into exercising our franchise so as to make sure the world knows about the 'Monument of Love'.
Well, i refuse to get into it. Primary reason being that UNESCO has not even recognised this 'new' list. It is a private organisation which just pops out of the blue deciding the world needs a 'new' list of the 'Wonders of the world'. And anyway, who decides on whether a monument is a 'Wonder of the world' just based on people voting via sms and the internet? I mean, the sms's literally mean a whopping windfall of cash flow for the telecom operators. And then we have the government amd the celebrities exhorting the people to make sure the Taj gets into the new list. Well, if the government wants it that bad i'm sure they could just pump in government money into the voting seeing how the money ain't showing any improvement in basic facilities this monsoon across the country.
I mean, how can you even decide on such a list just on the face value of votes?
And above all, if people really love the Taj Mahal so much we wouldn't even need to try to get the Taj Mahal onto the list. It would find it's own way there.
Weird. All this time no one was even bothered about giving the Taj Mahal a second glance and all of a sudden we're being pummelled into exercising our franchise so as to make sure the world knows about the 'Monument of Love'.
Well, i refuse to get into it. Primary reason being that UNESCO has not even recognised this 'new' list. It is a private organisation which just pops out of the blue deciding the world needs a 'new' list of the 'Wonders of the world'. And anyway, who decides on whether a monument is a 'Wonder of the world' just based on people voting via sms and the internet? I mean, the sms's literally mean a whopping windfall of cash flow for the telecom operators. And then we have the government amd the celebrities exhorting the people to make sure the Taj gets into the new list. Well, if the government wants it that bad i'm sure they could just pump in government money into the voting seeing how the money ain't showing any improvement in basic facilities this monsoon across the country.
I mean, how can you even decide on such a list just on the face value of votes?
And above all, if people really love the Taj Mahal so much we wouldn't even need to try to get the Taj Mahal onto the list. It would find it's own way there.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Today, 10th June 2007
Boy! A lot has been happening the last couple of days and even today for that matter!
Mumbai police seem to have found the perfect solution to prevent people (netizens) from spreading hatred through anti-shivaji and anti-thakeray communities online.
Suggestion : BAN ORKUT
Wow! talk about a quick-fix solution! You trying to tell me there's no other way to continue these communities if you ban Orkut??? While we're on the discussion of Orkut by the way, the option of 'anonymous' comments on Orkut should be done away with. I mean, if you ain't brave enough to stand up and say that this is what you feel and this is what you believe in, well... shut up!
Of course, it may not make much of a difference considering that fake profiles are mushrooming all over the place, but then again... it may just be one less option to make blind accusations.
And if you feel a community or profile is offensive, flag it. Like Google said, flag it and they will look into it. Maybe a certain number of people may be required to flag it before they look into it, but then again, you've voiced your opinion.
And lets see... what else do we have? Oh yeah! Lewis Hamilton takes pole position in the Canadian Grand Prix! Damn this guy is fast! Alonso follows and so, McLaren one-two for the start of the race!
Rafael Nadal wins the French Open 2007! He took the 4 set match 6-3, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4. His dominating streak over Roger Federer on the slow surface now gives him a 6-1 record in the 7 times they're played on clay. Nadal has become the first man since Bjorn Borg in 1980 to win three successive Roland Garros finals.
In the women's finals Justine Henin beat Ana Ivanovic 6-1, 6-2 to become just the second woman in the post-1968 Open era to win three in a row after Monica Seles in 1990-92.
And last but not the least, the embarrassing Afro-Asia Cup 2007 finally came to an end today with the Asia XI making a clean sweep of the series 3-0.
Mumbai police seem to have found the perfect solution to prevent people (netizens) from spreading hatred through anti-shivaji and anti-thakeray communities online.
Suggestion : BAN ORKUT
Wow! talk about a quick-fix solution! You trying to tell me there's no other way to continue these communities if you ban Orkut??? While we're on the discussion of Orkut by the way, the option of 'anonymous' comments on Orkut should be done away with. I mean, if you ain't brave enough to stand up and say that this is what you feel and this is what you believe in, well... shut up!
Of course, it may not make much of a difference considering that fake profiles are mushrooming all over the place, but then again... it may just be one less option to make blind accusations.
And if you feel a community or profile is offensive, flag it. Like Google said, flag it and they will look into it. Maybe a certain number of people may be required to flag it before they look into it, but then again, you've voiced your opinion.
And lets see... what else do we have? Oh yeah! Lewis Hamilton takes pole position in the Canadian Grand Prix! Damn this guy is fast! Alonso follows and so, McLaren one-two for the start of the race!
Rafael Nadal wins the French Open 2007! He took the 4 set match 6-3, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4. His dominating streak over Roger Federer on the slow surface now gives him a 6-1 record in the 7 times they're played on clay. Nadal has become the first man since Bjorn Borg in 1980 to win three successive Roland Garros finals.
In the women's finals Justine Henin beat Ana Ivanovic 6-1, 6-2 to become just the second woman in the post-1968 Open era to win three in a row after Monica Seles in 1990-92.
And last but not the least, the embarrassing Afro-Asia Cup 2007 finally came to an end today with the Asia XI making a clean sweep of the series 3-0.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Just another day in India...
I'd just posted a day ago on the Gujjar bandh and how it was detrimental to public life, and guess what? Now we've got newspaper reports about Shiv Sena activists attacking 2 cyber cafes because in Orkut there are groups or rather communities denouncing and bad-mouthing Shivaji and their supremo Bal Thakeray.
Firstly, I couldn't be bothered if someone denounced Bal Thakeray. Him and his self-proclaimed moral police, the Shiv Sena, have created more trouble than good. Seriously, you ask me... I think they're responsible for most of the troubles.
Secondly, isn't it fair that if you claim the right to criticise, you should also perform the duty of listening? Like they used to say in our civics class back in std. 8th, 'Rights and Duties are the two sides of the same coin'.
They say freedom of speech is available to all. Is it? As long as you criticise their opponents, it's freedom of speech. Once you get to them, it's slander and against public morality.
And for crying out loud! The 'slander' they are upset about? It's on Orkut!!! Not inside those cybercafes!!!
And just when we started to think that our news channels are devoted to bringing the general public news and information about the state of our nation, WHAM! You have a WHOLE DAY dedicated to understanding public opinion about what effect the change (oh! sorry, isn't it death?) of Smriti Irani a.k.a. Tulsi in Ekta Kapoor's KSBKBT will have.
JEEZ!
IT'S A FREAKING T.V. SERIAL!
Firstly, I couldn't be bothered if someone denounced Bal Thakeray. Him and his self-proclaimed moral police, the Shiv Sena, have created more trouble than good. Seriously, you ask me... I think they're responsible for most of the troubles.
Secondly, isn't it fair that if you claim the right to criticise, you should also perform the duty of listening? Like they used to say in our civics class back in std. 8th, 'Rights and Duties are the two sides of the same coin'.
They say freedom of speech is available to all. Is it? As long as you criticise their opponents, it's freedom of speech. Once you get to them, it's slander and against public morality.
And for crying out loud! The 'slander' they are upset about? It's on Orkut!!! Not inside those cybercafes!!!
And just when we started to think that our news channels are devoted to bringing the general public news and information about the state of our nation, WHAM! You have a WHOLE DAY dedicated to understanding public opinion about what effect the change (oh! sorry, isn't it death?) of Smriti Irani a.k.a. Tulsi in Ekta Kapoor's KSBKBT will have.
JEEZ!
IT'S A FREAKING T.V. SERIAL!
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