Yo Baayce, I no Soup Boy, I playBoy!

Back in 1973, 10 years before India won the first World Cup, you would be forgiven if you didnt know what Mark Grannoveter first said. In a seminar paper, Grannoveter challenged the world to publish in the American Journal of Sociology that its through weak links that important decisions like jobs, marriage decisions are made. And boy, he made some solid arguments in his defence. So said he, folks within our inner circle are exposed to similar kind of information and are interested in similar things. Its only through 'others' that new inventions flow in.

Neither are my shoe's size big enough to challenge him,nor my tiny brains smart enough to do it. But for a past few days, I have this vague thought running through my mind. Who makes you *happy*? Your parents? Siblings? Best Friends? Probably, you might think in the affirmative.But,i beleive these are the people for whom you exist. These are the people who make life meaningful. But its the new crushes,the new friends make life happy,more exciting than the previous night.

Infact, I find the dearth of literature on the impact of new friends or rather newer people in our life appalling. While we have spent reams of paper, glorifying, celebrating, reminiscing and singing peans about the beautfy of the best friend, often undeservedly, wonder why we have not had the time to acknowledge the time to the new friend! Infact, more often than not, best friends always have tears associated with them, either by joy or through tears of seperation.

In fact, I beleive a teenager's life is not made interesting by the numerous girl friends that he professes to 'maintain' but because of that new crush. That crush who just recently smiled at you in the canteen, on whose sight your heart misses a beat. About whom you can bitch about without being scared of being caught. That period when you get to know her, when you have all the topics in the world to talk about. When “whatelse?” never entered our conversation. When you only ask for a treat, knowing fully well that it was not going to come any soon. When you start the lightest flirting without knowing her reaction?When you have to impress her to garner attention! When you have to put on your smiling cloak to mask the tears inside. To impress her. Those are the times.

With a best friend, i find it strange when they miss them. We know them too well to evenr miss them. We know exactly their reaction in certian situations. But its in the uncertainity lies the thrill. Its in these moments when you do not expect anything from anyone, that you are really on your toes. Being new, sometimes, you find their jokes absolutely pathetic. Sometimes absolutely brilliant. Its infact, this uncertainity which makes it so romantic. So beautiful.

So, the next time you say a hi! To me, Be careful, here is a guy who knows your importance.

Noteplease: The writer of the blog is a handsome young man of 23. :P

When I was a duffer....

I hail from a lower middle class family in India. And am, proudly kanjoos. But,am even more proud of the fact that I have always returned back people's debts. She gave me love. I gave her my life. She made me her close friend. I made her a part of me.

But, Ive never done something that she has done for me. Writing a blog post for me! Never wrote it for the fear of our friendship of becoming jinxed. I have heard a lot about people saying that the enormity of a friendship is percieved only when it becomes a memory. Perhaps, I wish it were this way. I knew, how much she meant even when we were the thickest of friends. And that enduring fear of losing someone close finally drove to losing her, atleast I guess so. Would'nt I love if God had other plans?;)

Today, I am not scared of losing her. And this is not an obituary piece to our friendship. When people say, someone has become a part of you,its probably because its just 'cho chweet' to say so! I mean it. Listen to my questions, “tired eh?” That eh, comes from her. The next time, I say uh huh, you know whom to blame for. A part of her is living in me. And I will probably, keep it till my receding hairline becomes grey.

Do i miss her? No, I do not. Have I 'got over' her? I do not know what that ever meant. Friendships are never made to be forgotten. The next time,I meet somebody with her name, I shall not fail to mention , I once had a best friend with your name. I miss her not, because I am not going to talk to her. I would miss her, if i knew, if all this was only a void in time and she would one day come and tell me, “Everything will be fine dude!”.

Never have I met a person, so honest.So brutally honest. That was the thread on which our frienship was built. A thread which resembled a rope in full gait. Sometimes, we were like puppies. Cute and sweet. Sometimes, I was chalk and she was cheese. Sometimes, I was rude and she was sweet.Most times, she was rude and I sweet..;) (After all, I am writing it.). Sometimes I felt, she should have been called Meenakshi, for those beautiful fish like eyes. Yes, to sum it all. When she was the fish, I loved to be the water.

Is it ego that I do not apologize for 'something'?(something,because there is nothing to apologize for!)Nope, and she knows it better than most of you who will read this. Do I hate her? Nope, you never hate your best friends. You only hate the times that made us apart! Am I scared to talk to her? Perhaps.

People say,rather she says this a lot. Whatever, happens, happens for good. True, these days I no more fight. Infact, the guys in my college are frustrated after all their rudimentary attempts to infuriate me. I have good friends now too. They have always existed. A mistake,I made then.

Yet, there is nobody to call me a duffer now....

To love or to not to.

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius --- and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction." - Albert Einstein

If Noah Webster could browse the blogosphere today, the tubes in his thought machine would have probably suggested him to erase words, whose meanings have been thoroughly abused by the folks who sound English when their lips move and the fingers press. And probably, he would have had to stress himself to love love. Infinite reams of paper later, thousands of routers away, cultures which have heard of others only through the idiot speak, love is still spoken by all, understood by none.

Neither am I going to try to define love,even if you let me do it. Yet, love to me is belief. A belief which transcends the boundaries of logic and rationality, a belief more powerful than the mersmising words which teach you love. And belief in a human is a curve which wants to hug the ground every passing day.

I am a cricket fan. Long ago, when the only thoughts that disturbed the dance of cricket in my mind was the stick of my Hindi maam, when girls were “other” students in class, I loved cricket. Back then, when I didnt know what was form or class, I believed Srinath would hit a century every match. I loved Sachin off course, but that was not due to the majestic cover drive or the other worldly pulls. A reason for which I did not know the answer.Never, felt why I had to justify why i loved Sachin.

Sometimes, when we are drowning in the sea of pessimism, which we so easily mistake it to be the river of statistics, logic and common sense, to see the day is refreshing. Makes you feel, there is life outside the sea too, where you can mistakes and still live. One such day was 72 hours ago. Down under, dusted, obituaries written, the bodies of the once revered Indian superstars were waiting to be recieved in the Indira Gandhi National airport New Delhi. To say,they rose like the phoenix from the ashes would be cliched. It was something else. I had to bribe myself to believe that this was the same team which was so pathetic.

While, the logicians and experts will formulate a theory to confine the Indian victory to their words, I am happy to believe. Love, i thought is similar. It was as simple as the game played on Hobart soil. Sometimes, its good to grow young. Throw a tantrum. Love someone. Tell her the same. Its a new sun that rises everyday. Forget the dark moon which engulfed you yesterday night.

To live, you have to love, to beleive.

Sher Da Punjab

In those days, there was no flash mob. Or probably, even if it had existed I was blissfully unaware of them. Six days after my 12^th birthday, on the 13^th July 2011, at around 12 o clock in the midnight, there were a lot of people on the road. Some smiles. These were the ones who didnt follow cricket. But that day was different. It was not the sense of joy or relief one experiences after winning a match.

It was revenge. Genuine revenge. The pent up anger took the form of fanatic chats of “Bharath Mata Ki Jai!”.That was the first time, I had seen a flash mob. Those days when cable tv could be found only in the hotel at the end of the street provided the catalyst. Two young men had made the day for a million men, memories for a million days and bedtime stories for million kids yet to be born. One of them was Yuvraj Yograj Singh, who would later be known as The Prince of Punjab. Sher Da Punjab had finally arrived.

He not only lived our dream, created dreams for us and many a nightmares for the bowlers spread across the seven oceans. Stuart Broad for one will like to forget his name soon. Even on that day, I did not bite my nails. Today, I am. That day, he fought for me. Today, its a battle he is fighting alone. A battle against cancer. An innings where he does not have Kaif for company.

It is in moments like these, we tend to realize how hollow our life is. An India-Pakistan match is finally just a jugalbandi between the bat and the ball. A match lost only makes you stronger to defeat. They say, form is temporary. What in life was ever permanent? Class, OK.

It also tells us so much about men who are deemed succesful in life. Perhaps, its never so cliched to say it often takes a moment to lose it all.

But Yuvraj, has a chance once again to epitomize the rising of a pheonix from Ashes. We lost the Natwest to England. Yuvi won it for us. We dumped him for poor form. He came back. Won the World Cup for us. Now, he needs us. No, he does not need blogposts like this. But, this he can do. But those exasperating reports in news channels covering every hair of the injury he surely can do without. He also can surely do without his parents being peppered with questions like “Kya aapka beta vapas khel payega?” The audacity that the newsmakers exhibit is sure something to behold and wonder on.

Perhaps, for the fighter that he is, the comebacks that he has orchastrated all fell into the realm of mere mortals. Yuvraj was made for something bigger. He had always this sense of occassion. One more comeback, yuvraj for your fan.

Our hearts are bleeding red. It needs you to wear the blue jersey back for it to bleed blue again. Till then, my nails are getting shorter....

Equations betrayed, emotions empowerd

Sometimes sitting alone in the room helps. The eerie calm around. The locks in all the rooms where your eyes can survey. The mental picture of all smiles and the lines of code in college. Feels like a man lost.

Perhaps, in moments of solitude such as these is when a lot of floss is seperated and better conclusions emerge. But when you are lost and your hands are stamped by hundreds of others as they stamp it and make their forward, you probably think wrong. True, there are friends to whom you can always pour your heart out. But words are far too rare now.

The logic that I once mastered and could convince others cannot convince me today. Probably, now I understand I never had convince that somebody. They just gave that smile to convince me about my effort.

Words are shunted deep inside the throat and goes deeper with every time the saliva is swallowed. And when it comes, it comes out in a burst. I am in neither of these stages. The incomprehensive lines probably tell my state. I am trying to vomit out grief before it assumes epedemic propositions.

However, you have friends, these are those days you want to be left alone, confined to the four walls. And for a change, Murphy's law does not strike me today. As always, loneliness is calling me for a walk.

Probably, I should allow emotions to capture me. Probably, I should sleep. Probably, I should talk to someone. Probably, I should my work.

But for now, I am going for dinner.

The Professor's Coffee, The Burger from My Benchmate And My Sister's sweetness!

An irrational decision. Work Thrift. Futile Time. The apprehension of staring into the kingdom which you thought you owned to be conquered by younger shoes. The fear of the smiling face who know you, but you forgot his name.

The joy of reminiscing the time troubling the keyboard, frustrating the teachers, teasing the friends. My decision was made. So many reasons and people to tell me to spend another day tapping the keyboard,copying the code and cursing the lecturer. Logic into the dustbin, the smile back on face, the best clothes in the wardrobe back to where it belongs, i muttered,”Alma mater beckons!”.

48 hours little did i know, I would be spending a day in the far corners of Yelahanka, the lakes away from the din of the corporate world. Away from all the code who continue to bug with you although people still say the bug is in the program! And yeah, those TV ads which show your alma mater covered with leaves, black and white, broken desks, those walls where you wrote your name and that place where you used to chat with your crush do not come rushing back. On the contrary, its so much good to be coming back as an alumni.

The same teachers who scolded you,slapped you suddenly wear an adoring smile. The “submit your blue book ” replaced by a sweeter “What you doing?”. But the icing on the cake has to be a lecturer buying me coffee. The same hands which once fined me now buys me a coffee. The coffee did taste a lot better. Yeah, the old caterer was finally replaced.

Buildings change, teachers change, your college changes, you change. But these bloody friends. They still pull your leg the same way they pulled your leg when your waist size was a couple of inches lesser, when your head were not weighed by the past 3 year's experience. Never mind, the odd quip about our secret 'adda's that we had in our not so big college, the talks still remain same.

But if there is something that has really changed are the juniors. Yeah, my juniors. Rather, our juniors. Six months is a long time in engineering life. Although, only 2 lines of resume is what you add in that period, so many chapters in life are written during those four years. Hearing their stories of increasing projects and assignments does invoke that little sarcastic pleasure in us! After all, didnt we too go through the same phase where we cursed our teacher every hour? Yeah, the same teacher whom I came all the way to meet. A few genuine problems, too which all we could was give an elder brother's shoulder. A few words, which did sound wise. Although, their young faces gave the same reaction that we used to when our elders advised us. I had become the boring fellow, that I had warned myself against. To their credit, the juniors did try to hear with intent whatever nonsense we spoke!

A small regret of not being able to meet someone special. Nevertheless, the end of the day, sweet! My sister had brought me a chocolate. But the sweeter gift was she accompanied me in bus till home. Sheer sweetness.

The Social Kolaveri!

Last seen, 15 million and counting! The number of hits that Kolaveri garnering smashing all records gathered hitherto by any Tamil song or for that matter, ANY hindi song. Add to this the millions of hits on the duplicated ones and the thousand Kolaveri remakes!! Indeed, Kolaveri this!

But a more interesting number that I came across was the 1 million hits that Ra.One gathered! One million numbers is no speck in the dust but one million after the umpteen times we had to change our TV channels just to force SRK's advertising blitz out of our living rooms meant million numbers isnt all that an Himalayan number.

Enough data and stats for me to rattle some keys on my laptop and waste some of your productive time. The small computer science brain inside tells me this could quite be an epoch in the history of advertising's chequered history. What started in olden Egypt in the form of papyrus rolls, today is a multi million industry and so often a bad 'branding' and reputation could spell the death knell for any company. So often, we have to come to remember a brand not because of the product that it is, but because of an inspired piece of brilliance that an ad film maker would have come up with.

But today, like never before, all the traditional advertisement mediums like print and television are in grave danger of losing their relevance. From a computer science perspective, these mediums represent a one level tree with the second level being constructed only through word of mouth which has a much lower probability compared to the social networks like twitter and facebook.

No doubt, the future of advertising lies in social advertising. But, it would be interesting to know if its really quality material that spreads viral through the social network. Or would we be pushed into a dark world where only the popular rules the roost? Can the social network be hijacked by the marketing gurus to feed us their content?

Personally, I beleive the the viral growth of social networks has led to quality products being given a fillip because of word of the mouth.Or is it really? Or will only the materials which pleases the mass be audible to us?

An exciting period in advertising surely this!