DRUGS...

When you hear of drugs, the words that come to your mind are cocaine, hash and maybe brown sugar. And of course, the most common and popularized in the fashion industry by the film ‘Fashion’, HEROIN. The images that flash in front of your eyes are of people dying and getting addicts, end up on the streets; and if you watch a lot of movies, in a ‘Rehab Centre’. But what I think of are two things, umm… three, MARIJUANA, CRYSTAL METH and HEROIN (the local favorite). I think of MARIJUANA and I think of people like Bob Marley, I think of the songs they made. To quote a few, “I smoke two Joints”, “Don’t worry, be happy” and my personal favorite, “Buffalo soldier”. I think of the great scientists, I think of the great musicians, I think of Heath Ledger, the legendary actor, who redefined his role in the movie by setting new ‘Acting Standards’. I agree, you would say that he died of a drug overdose, but think of what he could have done if he had controlled (yet maintained) his habit of ‘DOPE’? Think of ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ series, Johnny Depp, made billions, and what was his theme of acting throughout the series? ‘Drunk’. Makes you wonder, you enjoy hearing ‘Dope Songs’, you like watching ‘Drunk Movies’ and yet you despise SMOKE.

I have no agenda for this article; I am not-biased, neither in support of DRUGS nor against. I just wish to compare. You look on the internet and you get a zillion pages quoting the history of MARIJUANA, its good effects and its medicinal value; yet it is banned throughout the world. You will find tremendous history of WEED filled with famous people and huge discoveries; and yet there is only one place in the world which not only “Openly serves it”, but also holds a world cup in its honor. I am not sure if you have heard about it, ‘The cannabis Cup’, Google it. BTW, I intentionally kept the ‘C’ in cannabis small, ‘cuz that’s how you see it everywhere, it’s mostly small. J

People are protesting 24 hours a day at least somewhere in the world to legalize MARIJUANA. Ever thought why? What makes them so fond of it? Are they all addicts? If yes then why are they running on the streets shouting slogans when they should be doping in some corner of a dull and ill-managed apartment? It is because, they have realized, ‘Man made Cocaine/Heroin/Crystal Meth, but God made GRASS”. So they protest, they see and hear the words of DOPE, they listen to trance and Nirvana and they THINK…

Now against, I know, people have lost their lives, their families and their entire world because of their addiction to drugs. I am a huge fan of ‘Requiem for a Dream’. I completely agree on its meaning, I would also go to the lengths of saying that it has a message, a teaching. All the people, who are reading this blog, and who speak English (I have Russian readers too, J), please do watch that movie. I could discuss every scene of it. I have integrated its dialogues in my daily life, and my close friends know it. Definitely worth a watch, I have personally watched it for over a hundred times. All the stuff shown in that movie happens. The governments throughout the world have banned these drugs in almost every form, spare a few; but they continue to sell all around at night. I mean everywhere. Name one place where you would not find DRUGS in some form selling on the street with a guy in pajamas and a hood? It’s still present everywhere, world-wide.

People use them, mostly during college life, I would even say that you may not have done WEED in college, but I bet you know someone who did, maybe a friend of a friend, but you knew he was doing it. It is that prevalent. Let’s take one of my favorite TV Series ever, ‘How I met your Mother’. You know it, the ‘Sandwiches’. Form an integral part of many of the episodes, and they were great episodes.

If you’re looking DRUGS up on the internet, or planning to do so after reading this article- Please do look up ‘The cannabis Cup’, I will post a link for a nice video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPcOUuWhLgc&feature=related. Have a look, now try to look up for the uses of marijuana, I am not sure, but think that I read somewhere that long ago, paper was made out of Marijuana.

Let’s talk about religion and faith. Picture something about religion in a second, what came to my mind is ‘Incense sticks’ and ‘Sadhus’. You think Sadhus, and you think people with long beards, and orange dresses. For those of you (readers) who have heard about them, would know that they frequently smoke MARIJUANA. Hinduism clearly says that Lord Shiva used hash in some form (I forget the name). Look up OSHO on Google, you will read about the ‘OSHO Ashram’ located in Pune, India; and people all flocking from all over the world to visit it. He preached that love making is necessary for attaining bliss; and I have been in Pune for 4 years during my graduation and I know, they have DRUGS in there. They grow the GRASS in a separate way, if you know what I mean.

If they are so prevalent, so common and so medicinally useful, why are... err, ‘is’ (Marijuana) banned? What is that the governments, after hearing processions and witnessing rallies all over the globe from decades, still choose to ignore and still ban WEED? Ever hear of a person fighting after smoking GRASS? They are always happy. Millions of people die every year in road accidents due to drunk driving, people who DOPE, do not drive, they sit at home and look out the window; and yet, drinking is open after 24 years of age (in India). I wonder if we can file an ‘RTI’ (Right to Information Act, here in India) for the DOPE related section and question of no amendments ever?

I know I have much exceeded my word limit for a ‘Read-able’ article, but I could talk on about HASH forever, but I am sure that my readers have understood my point. I request all the readers of this article to once, ‘re-think’ their ‘Prejudice’ against WEED. Think about it for five minutes with an ‘un-biased’ mind with facts from the Internet, and during the time you are looking up the facts, do listen to a song by ‘John Lennon’, ‘Imagine’, link : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b7qaSxuZUg

People who like Nickelback, listen to ‘If everyone cared’. Link here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IUSZyjiYuY&ob=av3e

           

     Both these songs do not say or support drugs, but you listen to them, and you would know they were inspired (the artists) by JOINTS.

Jumpa lagi…

RIP... you know WHO...

Buenas readers,

It has been a while since I have been thinking about writing this article. I wanted to write a short article for Steve Jobs on the day he passed away (‘died’ avoided intentionally), but then decided to hold on for a while as all the blogs and the whole of the internet would be flooded with articles about him.

                Steve Jobs, a name anyone tech savvy would know, has (‘had’ avoided intentionally) become an icon of entrepreneurship and innovation. Much like ‘Dell’, Apple too started in a small garage making computers; or rather ‘assembling’ computers. I am aware all the readers of this article would have read lot of stuff about Apple, so I would not venture into those grounds. I wish to write about my feelings and my interpretation of Steve Jobs’ life and working methodologies.

                As seen on Wikipedia, and any other source, Steve can be described as a ‘perfectionist’, ‘temperamental’ and ‘erratic’. I would say, all the great minds of the world would comply with these three descriptions. This is how great minds think. Steve Jobs as a kid was inspired by Edwin H Land, a person I have no idea about, nor have I tried to find out about, most of the kids have Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, Salman Khan or Slash as their icons. (By the names mentioned, I refer to their genres) What I mean to say is, you go in any direction looking for a person to follow or to learn from, you will definitely find him to have the three features, or rather, characteristics as used for Steve. I wonder if he would ever become some kid’s icon…

                I appreciate the products of Apple a lot, I am a hardcore fan. I personally own an iPod and an iPhone only (Plan to buy a Macbook soon), but what pulls me to Apple is that Apple never came down to selling cheap products. Even during the critical years when the sales of Apple were low and pink slips were distributed like candy, the products did not come to dirt cheap price selling like many others in the market did. When Steve was fired (or resigned) from Apple, and when he formed another computer company (NeXT-in the same year) with an initial investment of about 7Million USD, he targeted only the research based and educational market to provide a high quality product with a high price tag. NeXt suffered 8 lossy years before making the first profit, but Steve did not compromise on quality or on aesthetics, be it apple or NeXT. This is, probably, the most important factor which makes me an Apple fan. 

                When I heard about the passing of Steve jobs, and read the following articles on the internet and elsewhere; a thought that erupted and stuck in my head was, “Legends are born after their Death”. Look around, all the people we call ‘Great’ or ‘Geniuses’ were acclaimed to be so after they died. Whilst they were alive, they led difficult and suppressed lives. Also this has made me wonder if this is how the world is; we condemn revolutionary thinkers or innovators by using the terms like ‘impractical’, ‘non-profitable’, ‘too-futuristic’ and the worst of all ‘Impossible’. What comes to my mind while writing this article is the typical life story of a genius:

1. A genius is born.

2. He tries to show the world his ways.

3. He is condemned with the above mentioned words.

4. He fights/ or works alone and proves himself right.

5. He dies an unknown man, and after his death, he is acclaimed as god of his field and people suddenly love him and respect his work.

This makes me wonder, whether the people who hold the topmost positions in companies are jerks (highly unlikely) or that’s how we are, we don’t want to change anything unless we know that its hugely better than what we do now. We resist change. These 5 steps that I have mentioned may not be true to every word for all the intellectual ‘Legends’ that you know, but if you look closely, I am sure you will definitely find resemblance of this life story to the one of your ‘Legend’'s.

Any-hoo, I do not wish to take much of your time as now I am typing in word and I am on the 2^nd page, which would make a very long article on my blog. J So, I will check out now with these words:

“O’ people of the world, occupying the high positions in the intellectual and commercial world, please be open and help young minds. We see your ‘Young/Smart mind/champ/etc. development programs’, and we also know they’re all a lie. Be true, be futuristic.”

Also I would like to quote one of Steve Jobs’ quotes which was quoted originally by ‘Wayne Gretzky’ (A hit Ice hockey player):

“'I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.’ 

And we've always tried to do that at Apple. Since the very very beginning. And we always will.”

Learn something world, look beyond the horizon, that’s where the new stuff is; getting where others are is no big deal, set new standards. Don’t follow others, make followers.

Namaste.

Writing Styles

Ola amigos,

                So any new happenings in the stereotypic life? Well, I just got the news that my Favourite author has finished written yet another book. If you haven’t guessed it yet, I am talking about, ‘The Aleph’, by Paulo Coelho. I just came across this article which mentioned the Aleph and I clicked on some hyperlinks, jumping from one page to the other and reading about this new book that Paulo has written. Just as an FYI, I am a very huge fan of Paulo’s and also try to read his blog whenever I am in a pondering mode. I want you guys to have a look at it too. So the link to his blog is: http://paulocoelhoblog.com. Do drop by.

So while reading some of the reviews of the book, and some of the interviews that Paulo has given about the book, I came to a place, where Paulo was asked whether his book has anything to do with the one written by Jorge Luis Borges, as Borges had written a book titled, ‘The Aleph’ a long time ago. Paulo’s reply to this question is what made me research this guy. Paulo replied, “No this book has nothing to do with Borges’ The Aleph, however he is surely the icon of my times”. Reading this, I thought, whoa, Jorge Luis Borges, is Paulo Coelho’s Icon? I surely have to read this guy’s work. Anyhoo,  you would be amazed to know what I found out about him. Borges is a man who wrote legendary (Yes, this is in reference to Barney using this word in How I Met Your Mother) essays and short stories. He did not write novels, but he wrote essays which would shake you to the core. One of his essays titled ‘A new Refutation of Time’, took me by surprise. It had a sense of physics in it which, I’m sure you guys know is something which I cannot resist. So I read about him on Wikipedia, and download an English translation of this essay (He originally wrote in Spanish).

Reading that article shook me, I was amazed, I mean it is like impossible to understand, it was 3 pages printed, and I can say this confidently, it would take you over a week of insight, intricate reading and several hour long thinking sessions for it to make any sense at all. At the end of which you would definitely spend another hour admiring this guy’s writing style.

After reading this specific essay for like a dozen times, I sat to wonder, I mean out of the tiniest experience have with books, I have seen some very different writing styles. I mean there is Paulo Coelho, who talks, simple like in Eleven minutes to thought provoking, like in the Alchemist. There is Dan Brown, who writes to show that he has finished his homework. I mean, he is thorough with the facts before he starts writing, be it the ‘Masonry Museum’, or the secrets of the hidden cults of Catholic Church. I have seen Ayn Rand, which you must know from my last post, but this guy, Borges, he would make you wonder. I find his writing style too impeccable to be imitated by myself and so I shall not quote or paraphrase anything from the essay. I would however be deeply joyous if anyone would like to have a read. Just like the last post, leave your email id and I shall email you the English translation of his essay.

Sziasztok,

Avid Reader.

Just Thoughts

Hey folks, hello there...

I think about writing of various things that I encounter in life. There are so many moments in life when I’m there, I say, “That’s something I should mention in my blog”. Out of ten times, I write down one incident in a pad on my iPhone or on my Blackberry. Sometimes I even observe the happenings in more detail so that I have more facts to write about. But it so happens that slowly the list grows and the older of those incidents fade out of my memory, so when I sit down or open that list again later, I say, “Hey, I don’t even remember this completely, I am never going to be able to write about this, let’s just remove it from the list”. And there goes a nice incident which I thought was worth sharing.

As you all know, I have a liking to reading books. I read many types of books, I wouldn’t go to the limits of saying that I read ‘All sorts of books’, ‘cuz I don’t. Novels I like, my original genres were Sci-Fi and Philosophy. Lately, however, I have dared venture into other areas as well. I have, for the first time in my life, bought a drama or I don’t even know where it fits, type of a book, which I am sure most of you would have heard about called, ‘The Fountainhead’. I have started reading the same, and it is not like the books which I read usually which make a huge revelation after every couple of lines, but it’s one, which shows you new styles of writing and when there is a nice scene, you can only wonder of the writing skills of the writer and how she has used random and even contradictory terms together to make the sentences even more interesting, more strange, more out-of-the-blue.

You see there, I tried to imitate the writing style of Ayn Rand, not that I can or I am in any way comparable, but what’s there In trying? She often does this; end sentences in a way like I did, “more interesting, more strange, more out-of-the-blue”, you see, I used ‘Interesting’ and ‘Strange’, kinda makes you wanna wonder, how would it be exactly. In the first couple of hundred pages that I have managed to finish as yet, I found this style of writing very evident, very subtle, and very enticing. J

So, apart from wanting to share this specific, mystifying and enthralling writing style of Any Rand- OK I know I am over doing it, but it’s fun ;), I had a couple of more things I wanted to put of on my blog.

Firstly, I have been watching that lately, the history and hidden truths about Sonia/ Rahul Gandhi have been a common shared thing on Facebook. Suddenly, all the youth have started hating Rahul Gandhi, which Is apparently supposed to be the youth icon of politics. I have never found myself to be in any way related or interested, or let see, a better word.. ‘Bothered’, about Indian politics. Like most of the youth out there, I just hate the Indian Government. Especially since I am a working individual and I know, that the Indian government takes 30% i.e. literally one third of my salary as taxes; and does not give me anything back worth even a dime. I mean, not that I do not know the problems and other shit that the government has to deal with, it’s just that I do not find it to be efficient or properly motivated for that matter.

So coming back to the original track of things, I know many of you must have already seen this letter by a person (specifically not mentioning the details, as the IITians are already highly over hyped), has written as a reply to one of Rahul Gandhi’s statements on TV.

I was planning to put it up as a continuation of this post, but I see that no one actually reads long articles, so I am just gonna leave it at that, and anyone who wishes to read that letter, can leave a comment on this post with your email Id and I shall mail it to you. Don’t worry, you shall not be spammed as this is a real blog, and let’s face it, we all are busy people and have no time for sending out spam.

So just leave a comment and I shall share that letter with you. It’s a good read.

Phir Milenge,

Leisure Writer.