Infotainment Kaleidoscope

My journey in the world of computers started back in the early 80's when I was about 7 years old. That was the time when an occupation related to computers was considered extremely rare and specialized. Among those few early birds of the time is my father. He used to work in a company called "XLO Machine Tools" and had been selected as a young and bright candidate to learn and adopt the new technology that would one day take the world by storm. I vaguely recall seeing him draw diagrams of boxes and lines on paper, which made me curious because they did not make any sense to me. When I asked him what he was working on, he responded saying that he was learning "programming". It was only several years later that I learnt those diagrams were flowcharts. The first computer I saw was nothing like the PC, latptop, tablet or mobile we see today. The concept of a monitor or display as we see now did not exist. It was a huge machinery instrument that my father was work...

This is an attempt to describe my imagination of what I will do when I am 64 years of age. First let us understand why I have picked up this age for discussion. To put it in simple terms, though the stipulated retirement age in various work sectors differs, it would be safe to consider that by 64 years of age, most people of our generation would retire from whatever professional work they have been chasing as a full time career for their lifetime. In today’s fast paced world, no matter what profession one chooses, life presents itself as a continuous evolving and ongoing race with various stages of the career path. The common milestones in most people’s lives are survival, growth, stability, and finally sustainability in terms of health and wealth as old age approaches. After all the struggle through life, one may actually look forward to that retirement day and start thinking that it will put an end to his worries. Alas! This perception is far from true. While a small break of a...

Like other life forms, we humans depend upon nature for our survival – food, water, clothing, shelter etc. Nature has enriched us with many things, but due to our selfish desires, we have misused nature’s blessings in many ways. Man required energy for fulfilling his basic necessities and ensuring safety from the animal world. Firewood was his first source of energy. Trees and forests remained a long-lasting source of heat and energy. The sea, river and lakes provided constant sources of food and water. Later on, man discovered metals and elements. The discovery of coal and petrol was a big leap in the evolution of human civilization. Over a period of time man used the gifts of nature to develop advanced discoveries and inventions to improve his life style. Some such examples are electricity, railways, ships, aeroplanes, telephones, mobiles, radio, television and computers, all of which have immensely helped mankind. But then, the materialistic desires of man took over. He starte...

Today, I am going to share some of my thoughts about something that every one of us have heard or said at some point in life. Sometimes our parents say “I want you to score more than 95% in your exams, and I don’t want to listen to any If’s and But’s”. At other times, our teacher says “Everyone must complete this project by Friday, and I don’t want to hear any If’s and But’s”. Well, everyone wants to keep the “If’s” and “But’s” out of their earshot when making a demand. And yet, the same people find themselves making up these “If’s” and “But’s” when being accountable to someone else. The other day, I had been to my friend’s house, and her father was scolding her for scoring less in one of the worksheets. He sternly added that he wanted to see her get more than 90+ percentage marks in the next exams – no if’s and but’s would be acceptable. After some time, I unintentionally overheard him discussing work with his boss over a conference call – and it seemed like he was making up his o...

My daughter Vrutti won the 1st prize for this at school… Let’s begin by asking ourselves the question “What does growing up mean to me?”. I am very sure that the answer would differ vastly from person to person present here. For some, growing up may mean ageing, for some it may mean moving from school to college, for some it may mean running a household like their parents do, and yet for some others, it may mean getting more mature than they are now. Each one of us has a different perception of growing up in the future, and nobody seems to be right or wrong. Now let’s look at the other side of the same question. Often, when talking among friends we say “I want to be a small child again.” Why do we say this? It’s because we miss the carefree and fun filled life we enjoyed when we were toddlers. Probably twenty years from now, we would wish we got back our school life that we have today. This behavior, we as humans, exhibit is because we always relate the term “growing up” to pas...

Based on what I have seen, heard and learnt in life, I have always believed in existence of god, though I was not a very temple going person. God had proven his presence to me many times – especially difficult times are the ones when even a slight ray of hope is a god given gift. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing because with hope comes faith and courage to face the most difficult times.  But sometimes, we don’t realize when this faith evolves into superstition. About 18 years ago, I was in the struggling phase of my career. Having recently started a family at the age of 24 with almost nil savings, finance was a challenge all the time. The world seemed to be against us and misery looked like the only future. My wife Dimple had always been more religious than me, and she sometimes used to visit a well known Balaji temple in Dombivli. Once she asked me to accompany her to the temple. It wasn’t very keen to go, since I was wary of how these places of worship are often a well orga...

It is best to plan your visit well in advance. We booked the tickets online 2 days before our visit on 24th May 2015. Although the Sky theatre is 500 seater, only about 130 tickets are available for online booking. When we booked our tickets online, we could only get them for the 12:00 noon show “Invaders of Mars” (Hindi). When we reached the venue. we realized that about 350 tickets are sold over the counter, which is good in a way so the general crowd is not turned away. We therefore also bought tickets for the 3:00 PM show, “Wonders of the Universe” (English). The entry starts about 10-15 minutes before the stated timing, and the immediate attraction is checking how much a person would weigh on the Sun and the remaining planets of the solar system. After a few minutes, the show co-ordinator calls everyone and provides a 10 minute brief explaining the solar system, and a bit about how vast our universe is. This is followed by entering the actual sky theatre where the show starts....

From centuries, we have learnt that man has developed countless inventions at jet speed in the fields of science and technology. Man, who once lived in the forest in the natural state, is now on the cliff of mechanical advancement. The question that arises today is, “Who made whom? Did man make machine or did machine make man?” Man invented machines to save time and energy, but has become increasingly dependent on them. While inventions like dishwasher, washing machine and vacuum cleaner make our lives easy, they deprive our body of the physical exercise required to keep us fit. We depend on the calculator for simple mathematical calculations that our ancestors easily performed manually, which proves the reduced thinking efforts used by our brain. Today, we cannot imagine life without the cellphone, and forgetting it at home for a day makes us uncomfortable. We have attached our lives to television, computers, gaming and social networking; however alienated ourselves from the real ...

Ganpati Bappa Morya!!! This is considered a “Navasacha Ganapati”, meaning that if anyone makes a wish and promises to do something in return to please Lord Ganesha, the wish comes true. Accordingly we paid a visit to Lord Ganesha to fulfill one such promise made 2 years ago. While some may say this is superstition, others consider it as faith. It doesn’t really matter what anyone says, but one thing is for sure – “If you visit Pune, you cannot miss a visit to this temple.” The temple is located in the heart of the city, about 1 KM from the famous Shanivarwada. The interiors of the temple are bright silver, and the idol of Lord Ganesha is simply marvelous. If feels great when you stand inside the temple for the darshan. On the outside, the premises seems to be a bit overcrowed with no space for further expansion, though the temple sees increasing number of visitors every year. Since its in the middle of a crowded place, parking could be a challenge. If you are taking your ow...