Sunday, 24 April 2016
Spanish Gypsy flamenco song
The best form of communication is music and dance. There is nothing more powerful than these forms that can express what you need to say better....
Friday, 22 April 2016
Experts and Shit...
I was reading an article on how to improve one's reading skills. What was droll is that I found reading it quite a drag.
A major area of concern with the information overload is that human nature has become acclimatized to a load of stuff much before prime . And because of this explosion of information everyone around is considering themselves experts in a lot of areas. For example, there are a load of DJ's around and so is everyone a photographer. Someone went through a set of research papers without no experience whatsoever in real time scenarios feels like researcher of quite a good order. I met a person who has read everything there is to be read about cross cultural communication, over the internet, over books, magazines, you tube videos, academic exposure &c &c &c and she has never ever stepped out of Bangalore and has met people from across India as well as abroad but only at Bangalore. Her exposure to knowing different cultures were these limited meetings on a particular day when they gathered for a conference or a seminar or something of that sorts. But she is an expert in Cross Cultural Communication. She is a PhD in that. And hence an expert.
Then comes the question what exactly constitutes an expert. who is this person who can be called an expert. What defines this individual. Is it the perception that they carry around due to some certifications or is it that the world around defines them as experts due to the ability to blabber away stuff which was written or presented by other people in a manner discernible to a limited audience. Or is it that my construct of such matters differs extremely from the world views. I am no expert in anything. I probably may have met about 10 experts all together in my lifetime. I have been exposed to a few hundred of them in myriad ways due to, again, the explosion of information.
From my point of view, the expert is someone like Mr. Kailash Satyarthi, the Nobel Prize winner from India who is a children's rights and education advocate and an activist against child labour. He founded the Bachpan Bachao Andolan in 1980 and has acted to protect the rights of more than 83,000 children from 144 countries. Say, Mr. Richard Feynman; an American theoretical physicist known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, hence scientist and also a raconteur, musician and teacher, inspiring millions not only with his physics but also his ability to keep it simple and accessible. His book ' You must be Joking' is good enough for us to comprehend his pure approach to life. Or say may be Mother Teresa who does not need many introductions or lines.
Recently I had the privilege of reading about Haldhar Nag, a 66-year-old poet and writer from western Odisha who has been named in the PhD research theses of five scholars. This poet writes in Kosli language, and at this age, he remembers all the poems and his 20 epics that he has written so far. Popularly known as Lok Kabi Ratna in Odisha, the themes of his poems are based on the rural areas and his writing are mainly on religion, nature, society and mythology. He was awarded a Padma Shri by the President of India.
These above are personalities in their fields and highly decorated and also respected. Other than this I know of people who knows good stuff to survive like a cab driver in Mumbai who knows every little path, every little area and the name of the area all in his head; the complete thriving fucking metropolis of Mumbai in his tiny little head.
Another , a friend of mine, from London, a frequent traveler and tourist who has fighting cancer on his own purely because of his will to live and has fought his way through this scourge for the last 10 years, he is weak but he still has not lost his spirit. It is pure inspiring just to meet him for even an hour as the guy just takes you to a journey of stories, places, people, ladies, booze, culture, sports and I dunno what. The energy just permeates out of him, I am his friend and so I can see how he is straining some of those body cells to continue in that vein, but you know what, what the hell, what are those cells for.
My friends mom who won all her battles because of her unrelenting faith in Jesus is an amazing example of faith moving mountains. I have never seen her question her belief with rationality, she goes about her business, does what she can do at the best of her abilities and she makes sure she says her silent thank you's to the good lord and when shit hits the fan, at times as it does, she says well Jesus shall take care and its never trammeled by anything. It is an amazing gift to be so encompassed with conviction and assurance.I have seen it work in all aspects of her life. She does it with such belief that nothing falters.
Aren't these experts, and also great intellectuals. These people are ordinary people who make life look like a piece of cake if you take it in your stride. They have their morals and values and all that other bullshit; that keeps the world afloat according to the so called historians, culture and spiritual aficionados; in place. I have never seen them falter from the primary approach. It is as simple as that.
Get real, keep it simple, and never forget to do it all for every person you love and keep the expectations aside as it all comes together and delivers if you just keep doing what you are supposed to do.
A major area of concern with the information overload is that human nature has become acclimatized to a load of stuff much before prime . And because of this explosion of information everyone around is considering themselves experts in a lot of areas. For example, there are a load of DJ's around and so is everyone a photographer. Someone went through a set of research papers without no experience whatsoever in real time scenarios feels like researcher of quite a good order. I met a person who has read everything there is to be read about cross cultural communication, over the internet, over books, magazines, you tube videos, academic exposure &c &c &c and she has never ever stepped out of Bangalore and has met people from across India as well as abroad but only at Bangalore. Her exposure to knowing different cultures were these limited meetings on a particular day when they gathered for a conference or a seminar or something of that sorts. But she is an expert in Cross Cultural Communication. She is a PhD in that. And hence an expert.
Then comes the question what exactly constitutes an expert. who is this person who can be called an expert. What defines this individual. Is it the perception that they carry around due to some certifications or is it that the world around defines them as experts due to the ability to blabber away stuff which was written or presented by other people in a manner discernible to a limited audience. Or is it that my construct of such matters differs extremely from the world views. I am no expert in anything. I probably may have met about 10 experts all together in my lifetime. I have been exposed to a few hundred of them in myriad ways due to, again, the explosion of information.
From my point of view, the expert is someone like Mr. Kailash Satyarthi, the Nobel Prize winner from India who is a children's rights and education advocate and an activist against child labour. He founded the Bachpan Bachao Andolan in 1980 and has acted to protect the rights of more than 83,000 children from 144 countries. Say, Mr. Richard Feynman; an American theoretical physicist known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, hence scientist and also a raconteur, musician and teacher, inspiring millions not only with his physics but also his ability to keep it simple and accessible. His book ' You must be Joking' is good enough for us to comprehend his pure approach to life. Or say may be Mother Teresa who does not need many introductions or lines.
Recently I had the privilege of reading about Haldhar Nag, a 66-year-old poet and writer from western Odisha who has been named in the PhD research theses of five scholars. This poet writes in Kosli language, and at this age, he remembers all the poems and his 20 epics that he has written so far. Popularly known as Lok Kabi Ratna in Odisha, the themes of his poems are based on the rural areas and his writing are mainly on religion, nature, society and mythology. He was awarded a Padma Shri by the President of India.
These above are personalities in their fields and highly decorated and also respected. Other than this I know of people who knows good stuff to survive like a cab driver in Mumbai who knows every little path, every little area and the name of the area all in his head; the complete thriving fucking metropolis of Mumbai in his tiny little head.
Another , a friend of mine, from London, a frequent traveler and tourist who has fighting cancer on his own purely because of his will to live and has fought his way through this scourge for the last 10 years, he is weak but he still has not lost his spirit. It is pure inspiring just to meet him for even an hour as the guy just takes you to a journey of stories, places, people, ladies, booze, culture, sports and I dunno what. The energy just permeates out of him, I am his friend and so I can see how he is straining some of those body cells to continue in that vein, but you know what, what the hell, what are those cells for.
My friends mom who won all her battles because of her unrelenting faith in Jesus is an amazing example of faith moving mountains. I have never seen her question her belief with rationality, she goes about her business, does what she can do at the best of her abilities and she makes sure she says her silent thank you's to the good lord and when shit hits the fan, at times as it does, she says well Jesus shall take care and its never trammeled by anything. It is an amazing gift to be so encompassed with conviction and assurance.I have seen it work in all aspects of her life. She does it with such belief that nothing falters.
Aren't these experts, and also great intellectuals. These people are ordinary people who make life look like a piece of cake if you take it in your stride. They have their morals and values and all that other bullshit; that keeps the world afloat according to the so called historians, culture and spiritual aficionados; in place. I have never seen them falter from the primary approach. It is as simple as that.
Get real, keep it simple, and never forget to do it all for every person you love and keep the expectations aside as it all comes together and delivers if you just keep doing what you are supposed to do.
Thursday, 21 April 2016
RIP - Prince
It rains purple today and the Kiss is lost
The stars shall gather together and
and carry his dust and songs to the Gods ....
The Kiss Rendering
The stars shall gather together and
and carry his dust and songs to the Gods ....
The Kiss Rendering
Wednesday, 20 April 2016
On Word Porn
'13 courses that could help you get rich'
'12 self -awareness exercises that fuel happiness and success'
'Become a digital entrepreneur with just these 7 courses'
'10 ways to agile up your productivity'
'13 tough interview questions heard at Apple, Google.....'
'12 new business ideas you can start now'
'5 tips for better images on DSLR'
'20 books every marketer should read'
'50 documentaries that are a must see'
Every person who browses the internet or the reading apps should have gone through this horrendous lists that keep forming every day, may be every hour. Humans love lists. Inducing someone to open up the article is the primary idea behind throwing a list at your face. The list looks fascinating only in the its current state - 'THE HEADING'.
What is inside is pure hogwash. Almost incorrigible. The first time you read something like this you feel okay those are things I have thought about but never placed on paper or committed myself to but good, the guy / gal got the idea well enough for a read. But everyday! every fucking day! I mean C'mon!
This whole world of content marketing or the generation of content on the internet over places like the one I am using or on 'Wordpress' or whatever else place, means that people take to blowing it all out across the virtual universe and some nincompoop like laps it up and things everything is hunky dory, there is a lot of action happening. This is just going beyond incomprehensible. Okay; I give them this that they did not ask me to read these and I haven't in the last few years but before that I used to do so and I was okay the stuff being strewn across. But now it is almost looking obsession like. Every magazine, business, entertainment, spiritual; every Tom, Dick and Harry is vomiting out stuff on how to fucking take care of my life and what I should read, and what I should wear and how much should I spent and how I can take the help of apps on the phone to help me with the reading, wearing and spending and how these apps would wake you up in the morning, tell you to walk, then write, have coffee, take a dunk, brush teeth, fuck, take bath, go to office, tell you how much time it would take you to reach office and then after reaching office remind you that the first mail you are supposed to send is to someone totally unimportant but you should do it. After that you should get into the project that you are working on and send updates over another app about where you stand so that everyone in the team is in the loop and guess what you do not need to send an email (woohoo, happy time, no email) the person knows that you have updated because the person also has the same app and he has already got the notifications. In between all this brouhaha make sure you change your profile picture as well as Facebook wall page as you did not do that for the last 2 days and what would the world think of you. They may think that you are completely out of touch, You are supposed to whats App a few people about a few completely unrelated things because else the whole world is thinking; what the fuck happened are you out of the groove and the very same people would pick up a totally avoidable video and pass it on and you shall give a thumbs up emoji and the other person guesses you have watched the video and enjoyed it. Another notification pops up from Twitter that Mr. Trump in the United States of America a few thousand miles away said that he hates Mexicans and on the other side some photographs of Bernie Sanders has popped from the year 1910 and that Ted Cruz does not seem to be the kind of guy who would ever win the American presidential elections. Very important for me as without these notifications I would have been totally out of touch with the world and I may have failed to be aware in a general manner about such important historic events that happen half way across the world.
All this and more continues unabated day in and day out, everyone around is oblivious of this serpentine twirl they are all in the middle of and they do not even realize that its a web and in its perceptions we are bound, feeling secure of the constant inundations and within these they forget to live real lives.
But all this is because of words, everything around us become words. Below these headlines, there are words in the article. Words, catch phrases, positive connotations, motivators, it just goes on. The singular concentration to get the mind to look at the world in one manner, in one way, the bloody positive way and it conjures up images of exaltation and delight and sets forth into the path devised and forgets as the next round of lists and words pop up from all over caressing our souls and making us feel good.
A lot of people who read this stuff say that they are in the habit of reading. and that they read good stuff and that it is food for thought. Funnily they carry these to the meetings, the interviews and even to the dates that they encounter and it all falls flat because these are places were reality meets these supposedly-almost-divine-interventions. Word porn is good in the way that it creates that sudden sense of satisfaction of having read something and also of positive intent and energy but exactly like the way the porn world functions it is all about instant gratification. The gratification of having seen, played, worked upon and no pressures of the real thing. There is no pains and tribulations of love, longing, empathy, desperation, performance, outlook, anxiety.. nothing; just enjoy and move on.. The words take you up in a crescendo and make you feel free and devoid of tensions and then you feel that a deed is done. Reading has been a much publicized, oft repeated angle of the intellectual elite for centuries and when that deed seems so ridiculously easy to commit to and get done with, there is an elation of the senses that peaks at these random intervals. It is masturbation of the worst kind.
'12 self -awareness exercises that fuel happiness and success'
'Become a digital entrepreneur with just these 7 courses'
'10 ways to agile up your productivity'
'13 tough interview questions heard at Apple, Google.....'
'12 new business ideas you can start now'
'5 tips for better images on DSLR'
'20 books every marketer should read'
'50 documentaries that are a must see'
Every person who browses the internet or the reading apps should have gone through this horrendous lists that keep forming every day, may be every hour. Humans love lists. Inducing someone to open up the article is the primary idea behind throwing a list at your face. The list looks fascinating only in the its current state - 'THE HEADING'.
What is inside is pure hogwash. Almost incorrigible. The first time you read something like this you feel okay those are things I have thought about but never placed on paper or committed myself to but good, the guy / gal got the idea well enough for a read. But everyday! every fucking day! I mean C'mon!
This whole world of content marketing or the generation of content on the internet over places like the one I am using or on 'Wordpress' or whatever else place, means that people take to blowing it all out across the virtual universe and some nincompoop like laps it up and things everything is hunky dory, there is a lot of action happening. This is just going beyond incomprehensible. Okay; I give them this that they did not ask me to read these and I haven't in the last few years but before that I used to do so and I was okay the stuff being strewn across. But now it is almost looking obsession like. Every magazine, business, entertainment, spiritual; every Tom, Dick and Harry is vomiting out stuff on how to fucking take care of my life and what I should read, and what I should wear and how much should I spent and how I can take the help of apps on the phone to help me with the reading, wearing and spending and how these apps would wake you up in the morning, tell you to walk, then write, have coffee, take a dunk, brush teeth, fuck, take bath, go to office, tell you how much time it would take you to reach office and then after reaching office remind you that the first mail you are supposed to send is to someone totally unimportant but you should do it. After that you should get into the project that you are working on and send updates over another app about where you stand so that everyone in the team is in the loop and guess what you do not need to send an email (woohoo, happy time, no email) the person knows that you have updated because the person also has the same app and he has already got the notifications. In between all this brouhaha make sure you change your profile picture as well as Facebook wall page as you did not do that for the last 2 days and what would the world think of you. They may think that you are completely out of touch, You are supposed to whats App a few people about a few completely unrelated things because else the whole world is thinking; what the fuck happened are you out of the groove and the very same people would pick up a totally avoidable video and pass it on and you shall give a thumbs up emoji and the other person guesses you have watched the video and enjoyed it. Another notification pops up from Twitter that Mr. Trump in the United States of America a few thousand miles away said that he hates Mexicans and on the other side some photographs of Bernie Sanders has popped from the year 1910 and that Ted Cruz does not seem to be the kind of guy who would ever win the American presidential elections. Very important for me as without these notifications I would have been totally out of touch with the world and I may have failed to be aware in a general manner about such important historic events that happen half way across the world.
All this and more continues unabated day in and day out, everyone around is oblivious of this serpentine twirl they are all in the middle of and they do not even realize that its a web and in its perceptions we are bound, feeling secure of the constant inundations and within these they forget to live real lives.
But all this is because of words, everything around us become words. Below these headlines, there are words in the article. Words, catch phrases, positive connotations, motivators, it just goes on. The singular concentration to get the mind to look at the world in one manner, in one way, the bloody positive way and it conjures up images of exaltation and delight and sets forth into the path devised and forgets as the next round of lists and words pop up from all over caressing our souls and making us feel good.
A lot of people who read this stuff say that they are in the habit of reading. and that they read good stuff and that it is food for thought. Funnily they carry these to the meetings, the interviews and even to the dates that they encounter and it all falls flat because these are places were reality meets these supposedly-almost-divine-interventions. Word porn is good in the way that it creates that sudden sense of satisfaction of having read something and also of positive intent and energy but exactly like the way the porn world functions it is all about instant gratification. The gratification of having seen, played, worked upon and no pressures of the real thing. There is no pains and tribulations of love, longing, empathy, desperation, performance, outlook, anxiety.. nothing; just enjoy and move on.. The words take you up in a crescendo and make you feel free and devoid of tensions and then you feel that a deed is done. Reading has been a much publicized, oft repeated angle of the intellectual elite for centuries and when that deed seems so ridiculously easy to commit to and get done with, there is an elation of the senses that peaks at these random intervals. It is masturbation of the worst kind.
Tuesday, 19 April 2016
On Blues and Us
"Why did I come here? I am trying to study Differential Equations, but now all I want to do is crack a bottle of
whiskey open & go on a Tom Waits binge. Damn you Tom, for being so fucking good."
This above is a comment on YouTube below the Tom Waits video ' Hope I don't fall in love with you'. I felt it very accurately captures what blues does to people. I love the music. In fact, I love any kind of music. While I am playing with my laptop keyboard on these lines I can hear the soft but brilliantly moving OST from Godfather playing in the background. Makes all the difference in the way my thoughts are moving. It does. One may not know it but it does.
I have not done any experimentation on this but I have seen the way people react to music at all levels. It may have a lot to do with the fact that music expands your soul. It takes you to another realm of existence. Before a speech, before a meeting, before an interview before any of the million rigorous yet not so important tasks that we do if we listen to the music that you love it moots a massive change in behavior, approach as well as attitude.
Every time I listen to John Lee Hooker, any of the Chess record guys - Howlin Wolf, Muddy waters, Chuck Berry, Eta James. I am stuck in this forlorn mood where a beer in hand and pain of past lost loves and the need for a little twinge and loss becomes evident. If I have lost someone recently and then I am listening to blues mostly, I go deeper into the throes of human nature and find solace in the guitar plays and the resonance of the gravel voices. The words cut deep within me and I love the cuts, it aches, it does not pain. It creates this wonderful world where the lowering of the spirits and the senses takes you into a hole with the good lord. Funnily, it is never with the devil it takes you to a place of silent rumination and a sharp, clear vision emerges in front of you that helps you to go back to the very same places that has hurt you a million times but that hurt has only made you a better person and made you understand life beyond all its happy failings and sultry daily monotony.
Tom Waits did that to me the other day. I was having a happy, frolicsome day and I was reading 'On Writing' by Stephen King, of course in the morning I was reading the Coca Cola Story by one Mr. Pendergast, and I was brimming in confidence and enthusiasm and that is what books do to you. And i was just passing through various songs on You Tube and Tom Waits came up on the side list and I was induced to click it. I mean the guy is a genius and the voice, OMG; I mean where does that come from, if the devil has not gifted him that then what does the devil do good. I clicked and guess what Mr. King and Mr. Pendergast kind of left me and in came the hurts of yesteryear rumblings; Mr. Bukowski, Mr. Elliot with his Wasteland, my own thousands of wastelands, the wounds I have caused to my own and also to others, the joys of understanding through suffering and the utter disgust of how life is now in the early part of 21st Century.
What blues says or does is pure human nature with its millions of ups and downs. As you sink into your chair and hear the music bellowing from the room it makes you want to stretch and the animal instincts of what we really are settles in. We want to get free, we want to let go, visit the oceans, get the sun to hit hard on us, meet people talk to them about wondrous journeys and other people, we want to gossip about what is happening in our towns, in our neighborhood, we want to talk about long lost loves and all those things that never happened, we want to share in the beauties of the landscape and terrains and the hills and the valleys of our lives. That blissful journey towards what humans need to be.
The new age fast track, fast paced lets-get-shit-done and tell the world by uploading a photo does not make for great communication, it does not make for any communication. It bestows to the mind the thought that there is communication but in reality, somewhere in the corner the devil whimpers with a snide and laughs bemoaning how the good lords creation has lost the most beautiful of human relations of sharing and enjoying the nature that surrounds and believes he is doing so with his holiday packages, his sun lotions, his cheap tickets, his stationery observance of sedentary places with their ever-photographed monuments and blip-and-you-shall-miss rivers and grandeur and taking images of all of these for the world to envy and feel green and how in among these visions the mind is conjuring up the payments that await when one returns and the work - the daily grind of routinized inelegance- shall set him back to middle ages. He is worried but he has to continue and he has to seek solace in the cold, unsavory delight his eyes has gathered and get back to working on that camera and sharing on Instagram, Pinterest and I dunno where all.
As the comments on my latest updates settle in, I am listening to Magic Sam's boogie... this is taking me further away from my time into a journey of solace and comfort in the Sun, among the stars with the wild unrelenting expanse of the sky... I can feel the wind on my bald pane
Monday, 18 April 2016
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