But that sounds so counter intuitive, doesn’t it? Our brains have been trained over the years to believe that choice is always a good thing. It needn’t be. Choice has a dark side too. Think about it. Having to choose something over something else adds an additional responsibility on you. You suddenly think about stuff like ‘Did I choose right? What if what I chose ends up bad? What if I haven’t explored all possibilities?’. It just adds so much more pressure. Don’t take me wrong. I’m not here to say that we shouldn’t have options to select from. But too much of it usually ends up bad.

So eventually, I started looking around on the Internet on the topic; and happily found out that I wasn’t the only with this thought. Relief – I am not that weird as I thought I was. There are people way smarter than me who feel the same. I found this very interesting book by Barry Schwartz titled The Paradox of Choice. Do read it, it is very well researched and explains the concept quite beautifully. The book is available on a lot of places on the web (:grin); but I’ll make your life easier – Flipkart or Amazon.

PS: I do have a copy of the book with me; so if you know me in person; you know you just need to ask for it :)

The site more or less conforms to the HTML5 spec and I have tested it across most browsers I have access to. It works best on any standard compliant browser – read Chrome (visitor share of 24.4%) , Firefox (23.5%), Safari (1.9%), Opera (4.3%), IE 9.0+ (1%). On the mobile, it works good in iOS (0.2%), on Android (0.2%) and also (almost perfect) on the Opera Mini (0.1%). IE versions less than 9.0 are a bit rough on the edges – IE6 (5.3%) is the worst but still readable enough. IE 7 (8%) & IE 8 (7%) are more or less ok. I don’t plan to spend too much time on that though as long as more than 3/4th of my visitors see what I intend them to see :)

The site is still powered by WordPress. All the extra HTML, CSS, JS and PHP were coded on gVim on Ubuntu and the logo on top was my first experiment with the excellent vector drawing tool Inkscape. So the new avatar is a 100% pure open source product! Yeah design is possible without spending a penny.

I have also moved the site on to a dedicated new account at A small orange. A big thanks to Anand Bhai for hosting me for free all these years. I finally moved out to my own home :D

I hope you do like the new version. Comments, criticisms and suggestions are most welcome!

First of all, I give it to Anna for clamouring this much support. It’s no mean feat to rally around so many people for a cause. Have to appreciate that. But is the cause good though? Giving it a naive glance it would seem so. But things are not so simple in the real world. The real world doesn’t comprise of writing blogs, tweeting tweets and liking posts. The real world is a lot different. The real world is a lot more complicated. And I don’t think Anna’s cause is going to have desired effects. Let me try to explain why.

Indians, you and I, have a culture of corruption inbuilt in our genes. It’s not just the politician who’s corrupt – that bracket includes the common average Indian. A simple example. You are caught at a traffic signal violating the red light. The policeman who catches you red handed gives you two options – pay Rs 100 to him and you walk free or he gives you a ticket that needs to paid in court. What would you choose? I bet 90% of you who are reading this would go for option 1. We are inherently corrupt and are willing to sacrifice our principles to cut some corners. That’s the only practical way we know of dealing with such a situation. I myself remember just 2 instances in my life where I have given a bribe. I did have plenty of oppurtunities where I could have bribed.. when I got my passport, when I got my DL, when I built my house – but I never paid a penny. I feel strongly about that; but then again I believe I was just lucky. I never was challenged enough in such situations. If I would have been; when I think about it; I might have paid. Even with so many ‘set’ principles in my head – I admit I’ll be corrupt if the situation demands it.

There is a general misunderstanding that only the person who accepts a bribe is corrupt. The person who gives the bribe is equally responsible. Corruption in India therefore needs to be solved from the bottom levels before we go into tackling it among the highest authorities. Frankly, I don’t see it making any difference at all. I read posts saying that the day Lokpal is passed; India’s going to be transformed overnight into Singapore. Bullshit. In fact, from the way I see it, it’s just going to be the opposite. An Indian does stuff only if he sees an incentive for himself in it. Very very few people are selfless or are keen to be professional in what they do. Applies to politicians, applies to government servants, applies to you, applies to me. Sadly, I think the whole motivation behind a lot of development activities in India is because the people responsible for it see an opportunity for grabbing something for themselves. If they think they’ll be caught; they’ll not take a bribe; they’ll just not do the project also. That’s where India is going to lose. There I said it! – India has actually benefited from high level political corruption. Sad, but true. Corruption is what drives development in India.

Ok, so that was my rant. What is my solution sitting in an armchair? Forget about the guys at the top level. Eliminate the root causes of corruption at the lower levels. Increase the salary of the policeman, the teacher, the clerk, the secretary and every single government servant. So that they don’t feel the need to be bribed to do their job. Atleast some of us would be converted – I’m sure. This may still be naive; but not as naive as telling me that having an additional bureaucratic engine would solve the problems of corruption in India. That would eventually just become another set of officials that need to be bribed. One more obstacle.

Corruption is not a problem that we can afford to solve at this moment in my humble opinion. We as a nation are not at that stage. There are a lot of other pressing problems like poverty, infrastructure and education to solve. Corruption is too big a challenge and too expensive to monitor and eliminate at this point. We’ll someday reach that stage. But we are nowhere near that now.

And like it or not; India is a democracy. Arm twisting the government isn’t the way to get things done in a democracy. Having no politicians is worse than having bad politicians. Think about it.

Let’s be civil. Let’s think of a practical solution to our problem and not indulge in foolishness.

This year was an year of changes. I have relocated to a new place, a new home, a new job and even a new career to an extent. And I am happy that I made all those switches. I have a job that I love, I am doing stuff that matters more. That’s upside #1, and somehow that has floated this year really high in terms of endearment. I miss a lot of things too though. I miss Bangalore, I miss Bosch, I miss the evenings with friends there. But to gain you have to loose some. And eventually I guess the balance tips in favour of the new life. So not a bad decision in the end. Pat on the back.

2010 was also seems like a season for weddings. Two of my dear cousins, umpteen number of close friends – everybody seems to have chosen this year to get married. And as the year ends, the bachelor count in my friend circle is being heavily battered. I am wondering if I’ll end up being the last man standing, the next year I write the post. Watch this space.

Travel wise too the year was good. I finally got to see a lot more of India. Mumbai, Gurgaon, Delhi, Kolkata, Sikkim, Bihar, UP – all first time visits, all happened this year. So yeah, I traveled to my hearts content.

Material gain was also quite high. I’m obviously getting paid more, and with that spending a lot more too! I bought a new car, my new house is nearing completion and I got a new camera. So some of my dreams are finally coming through. Life’s become more extravagant, but I don’t mind that. Whatever the philosophers say, materialism is still important to some degree, atleast for me. Thanks to 2010 for that.

On the flip side, I bid goodbye to a few close friends, whom I might never see again. Having a life built around friends, that needs some adjustments from my side too. But yeah, things won’t remain the same forever can it? I’ll consider that a small blemish amidst all the positives. And yeah, atleast there’s Facebook – which is why I don’t care about the privacy stuff.

All in all – 2010, you were a super-duper-awesome year for me. And I can quite safely say that it was definitely one of the best years in my life so far. 2011′s peeping by the door – welcome, but you do have a tough act to follow!

Photo by Deepak Gupta

Catching an auto for a ride in Kochi, compares well to buying a ticket for a block-buster movie on its opening day. Its a major circus act. The supposed auto-stands here rarely have an auto on stand-by. And by chance if there is one parked, the usual conversation goes like this – “ചേട്ടാ, സൌത്ത് റെയില്‍വേ സ്റ്റേഷനില്‍ പോകുവോ?” (Brother, can you give me a ride to the railway station?). The guy gives you a blank stare as if I have abused his ancestors. No other response, so I ask again. He grunts rudely – ‘ഇല്ല!’ (No!). And that’s it. No reason. He just doesn’t want to go. I doubt if I have seen any city with auto drivers like this. Compare that to the multitude of drivers, jumping at you when you get out of Volvo in Bangalore. I hated paying exorbitant amounts there, but this is much much worse. Atleast you got home quicker!

And then there is competition. No the participants are not the autos, but the poor wannabe passengers. 10 different people located at strategic spots on either side of the road, hoping to be the first to wave down an auto that’ll privilege them with a ride. I could almost spot a smirky grin on the lucky winner – ‘You losers!’. Oh then there is a thing, all autos here have electronic meters. But well, of the hundreds of rides I’ve already taken in this city, I haven’t yet had the privilege of seeing one of them turned on. Its just a fancy item attached to the vehicle, with no apparent purpose at all. I wonder how many rickshaw-wallahs here actually know how to operate one!

Yes, I have had a few good experiences with auto drivers even in the small time I have been in the city. But the other side of the coin heavily outweighs those good deeds.

Maybe they are actually doing me a favor without them knowing. Those long walks… definitely healthier. Ha! I win!

A few weeks back, there was big fanfare orchestrated by a lot of Indian media outlets regarding a homegrown web browser called as Epic. I was a bit skeptical already, but after downloading and using Epic, I outrightly recommend reading those reports as a case study in technology sensationalism. I’m not putting down the Epic packaging, as a one click browser suite it has quite done its job. But what puts me off are the claims that this is India’s answer to Mozilla! But hey, the browser IS Mozilla’s, just that they have packaged a few utilities, plug-ins and wallpapers into one single pack. It is not a new browser, and it definitely is not the hallmark moment marking the maturity of Indian software.

This is not the only example. After this came the $35 palmtop. This time it wasn’t just the Indian media that jumped into the bandwagon, I saw such reports even on foreign news outlets like BBC News and The Guardian. I don’t really know how this $35 laptop is going to work out, especially since we import most of the hardware from China. Haven’t these journalist had the sense to look up the status of some of the other low cost appliances the Indian government announced a few years ago? I’m talking about the Simputer (to be fair, it was atleast insignificantly successful), the under $100 computer and the numerous other projects. They are all paper tigers that didn’t seem to have seen the light of day. I sincerely do hope that I am wrong and our Government actually builds this. But I’ll believe it when I see it.

And does anyone remember Bhuvan? Touted as the Google Earth killer. I haven’t even been able to get it working so far. After all the media hype surrounding this, I don’t even find a mention of that now in any of the newspapers or by the government.

What we need to do is to encourage the REAL projects that came out from India and Indians. Like Zoho or Varamozhi or Quillpad or MashiThantu or Posterous (atleast in part). Why don’t these awesome products never get a mention anywhere in the media? Sad!

After so much fanfare the movie ended up being a disappointment. As the movie started I had this feeling (which I seem to get regularly while watching Hindi movies nowadays) that I have seen all this somewhere before. After some hard thinking, it turned out that the starting plot of the movie was eerily similar to Woody Allen’s ‘Match Point’. But somewhere on the way it started deviating from that plot and merged into the plot of Quentin Tarantino’s ‘True Romance’. Bollywood script writers are getting smart these days. Blending and mixing. If only they knew how to do it better! The last 15 minutes were the worst! It was slower than watching paint dry. You knew what was going to happen, and the director seemed to be bent on killing you softly while unveiling his masala melodrama. Ouch!

Outside after the show, it was raining heavily. And that ended up making me totally over the moon with nostalgia. That regular routine we had almost every other evening after college – dropping off my friends at their homes, the lonely 10km drive to my house, the sound of the rain drops and the perfect old mallu songs on the radio. Atleast the movie gave me a chance to do all that once again. The saving grace!

So I was greeted on the door by a very serious looking, but by no means intimidating, old man. First thing he asked me was ‘ഈശ്വരനില്‍ വിശ്വാസമുണ്ടോ?’.. ‘Do you believe in God?’. Hmm. Great question. I told him ‘Kind of’. Uh oh! Wrong answer. He went on into a lengthy discussion into that subject. He started off with the exact same argument that I use to convince people about some of my controversial stand points – “I was like you once, I didn’t believe too much in that either. But then…”. That usually works, but not to me ;). Anyway this got me thinking – where do I exactly stand? Do I really believe in God? Off course I do. I can neither prove God’s existence, nor can anyone prove otherwise. To me there God is something that I probably will not be able to truly understand, but I firmly believe in the existence of a power beyond our thoughts and beyond our science. As an engineer, yes I would have been very happy to find proof or some tangible evidence. But being an engineer also makes it easier for me to understand that not everything can be explained by science.

Having said that my God is not really the same as your God or the astrologers God. What the old guy told me was that God is someone to be feared. Feared? Why? Respected – yes. Feared – no. I see God as a friend, like those imaginary friends that all kids in Hollywood movies seem to have. Someone I can talk to in my mind, someone I can talk to anytime, anywhere, anyplace. I don’t believe you need to go to a temple, a church, a mosque or a synagogue to see God. So what does that make me? I’m sure I’m not an atheist, neither am I am agnostic, but as I once replied to my ex-roommate Bachu – maybe I am a non-religious devotee. And ironically that still makes me a Hindu – even an atheist is a Hindu and I am at least one degree above that, I do believe in God. In that sense I am proud to be a Hindu then. I don’t see the need for religion in my life, but I can understand why it makes sense for a lot of people. And maybe it is needed, a blueprint for life, maybe. But I just fail to understand why religion makes some people fanatic.

Coming back to the astrologer, the main purpose my parents took this unusual step was probably to give hints to me that I’m slowly getting into the ‘wedding years’ bracket. But ironically that didn’t help, because the astrologer told us that it’s best that I get married only after 28. I suddenly love astrology ;)

PS: Disconnected thoughts, but I just felt like writing this :)

What I like most about the city is that it is really close to the sea. That scores a big plus in my books. There are plenty of places were you can stroll along the sea-shore or enjoy the sea breeze or just sit there – I can watch the sea for endless eternity. These are things I really missed in Bangalore and Plochingen. This doesn’t score a point above Trivandrum though – plenty of places there too to do the same things.

Plus there are plenty of shopping areas around here. That’s not high on my list of priorities, but it does help. It presents itself as a very bubbly city, which is great for me. It may not be a Bangalore in this respect, but definitely good enough. Both Trivandrum and Plochingen are laid back cities, which also works, but at this point of my life.. hmm.. I prefer ‘bubbly’ over ‘laid-back’ :).

What I really don’t like is the traffic here. Horrible. I survived Bangalore and I thought that was worst I would see. Ernakulam beats all that – with 1/5th of the vehicles of Bangalore – now that’s an achievement! And the driving culture here is even worse. I don’t think I’ve seen it this bad in any other place I’ve been to. I am now even more scared crossing roads – nobody ever stops here!

Another bad thing is that I find a lot of people here imitating cosmopolitanism (if there’s a word like that); despite the city not really being what you would describe as cosmopolitan. It all ends up looking very artificial. I don’t know – KFC-s, Baristas and multiplexes seem like a mismatch here. Maybe that’s just a feeling that’ll go away.

Overall I think the city will grow on me, just like the other new places did. It’s just as good as the other places I’ve stayed in. What makes a city unforgettable are the number of friends you have there and I had a few in all those special places I’ve stayed in before. I guess I’ve already started that process here. So maybe, it’s just a matter of time, before I fall in love with this place too!.

It had rained non-stop for 4 hours; that was ample time for the entire area around the railway station to get flooded, again. There wasn’t a way out with water everywhere. My dad had come to pick me, but there was no way that he could drive up to the station, unless our Maruthi could instantly transform itself into a hovercraft. So he parked up 1 km away on higher ground and waited. I was getting restless so I decided to wade through the water and walk to the place. So laptop on one hand and a heavy bag of clothes in the other, I started the painful journey. I soon realized that it was such a stupid thing to do, but by then I had already passed the point of no-return. One broken slab somewhere, and I would have atleast fractured a leg. Thankfully nothing happened and I found our car after half an hour of swimming in the city center.

Driving back, I now had no doubt about what Mr. Luce had said about our government. It really is a mystery how our country runs. The ‘water’ problem of Thampanoor (the railway station and surrounding areas) is legendary. I’ve been hearing about this since I learnt to put 2 and 2 together. With all this technology around and Trivandrum even trying to be twinned up with Barcelona (ha!) its just amazing that our administration is not able to solve this pre-historic problem. I have read about many a project trying to fix this problem, spending millions of rupees, but to what end? 15 minutes of rain (no, I am not exaggerating) and Thampanoor becomes a lake.

I’ve always been of the opinion that its not right to keep blaming the system for every flaw and doing nothing ourselves as citizens. But there are somethings that the system has to work out by itself. This is just a prime example. It’s so sad, so much public money went to the drain (pun intended) for no use. Maybe its true, as Luce implies and as one of my colleagues quipped, if the problem is solved, how will the government ‘servants’ fill their pockets? No more flooding = no more projects = no more money to steal.

For the love of my city, someone with power please do something. I feel powerless, except to shout. :(