New Year Musings

I spent a good part of last month away from work. Home seems to be getting sweeter every time I go there. And of course there are tons of things that I wanted to blog about. Here is a summary of the ruminations.. (some might be elaborated in later posts)

End of a nightmare.. beginning of another?: I had the luck of welcoming the new year with a prayer along with my parents (The small peaceful local church seemed a better place than a boisterous party. Watching my niece slip in to sleep as we prayed was a bonus). There is a general feeling that the year 2008 has been one of the worst years for the country : terrorism, recession, scandals and what not (refer to Ramachandra Guha’s articles in outlook if you are more interested in this). Although my family(including me) had a reasonably good year, we could not feel  joyous about the previous year. I fervently wished for a different 2009 and within a week all the wrong omens have come : The blasts in Assam, terror threats  (to IT companies at Bangalore  and the Expat congregation at Chennai)  and Satyam’s downfall only seem to the beginning of another nightmare. I can only hope that the pattern would be different for the rest of the year, but with elections around I do not think it will change course.

Expats, please back your country: As if all that frustration was not enough, that sick egoist b**** Arundhati Roy (I normally do not resort to such words, but read her articles on 26/11 and you will see I am actually being kind) carries out another blatantly illogical attack on the State of India almost justifying the Mumbai attacks. It seems she wants to use this opportunity to become a Chomsky of India. Heard about the fox that tried to become the tiger?  I was a fan of her at the beginning. It would have been so much better had she stuck to her booker-winning fiction novels than torturing us with her wisdom like this. And what’s worse, I found the mails agreeing with her were mostly from Expats.  If these are the views of  our ambassadors to the world (according to Pranab Mukherjee) then God save our country. Look at the way the China and Israel are able to act strongly to protect their interests. This, despite the existence of warped brains like Roy who see every incident through their cynical lens. Its because of the strong backing from their diaspora. Our folks abroad need to learn lot from the way the Jewish Community throws its weight behind Israel. Power and Influence that is never used is no power at all. If not now, when are we going to assert ourselves.

The mess in my homeland: With all the recent talk of extra-ordinary progress and welfare activities of unprecedented magnitude in Andhra Pradesh, I thought I would see a shining state (and of course, an equally shining Telangana). What I came across however was a state with  a corrupt, populist, bankrupt and misguided government, equally corrupt state machinery, caste polarizations (thanks to recent political developments),  corporate scandals, squabbling press that has lost a sense of professionalism, land-grabbings and the traditional problem of farmers. The list is much longer. I will a write a detailed post about this shocking state of affairs later.

Counting the blessings: This is the regular thing… here is the list

i) Got my degree . I was the first to receive both my BTech and MS at the IIIT’s convocation (although I defended in 2007).

ii) Lot of travelling (India Only) : Delhi, Pune, Chenni, Mysore, Ooty and Hampi are the places. Started making business trips .

iii) Kept my job. Learnt a lot at work. Company spun off from the US one. Effectively a start-up now, but thats all the  more interesting.

iv) Ended a relationship. No regrets .

v) Moved to a new and cool home.

vi) Started commuting to office by environment-friendly means (bole to walking/cycling).

vii) Still going strong on that physique thing. Built a six-pack abs (and realized its not worth the effort unless you are into show-biz). Hope recession wont hit my gym budget.

viii) Improved my general knowledge and social consciousness.. thanks to wikipedia and  TED.

ix) Made a habit of praying (just to be safe )… although agnostic tendencies are showing up .

yeah thats it.. just short of double digit!! (hence  switched roman numerals ).