The seemingly random chaos of the roads, streets and corners of this city all falls into place now. After 2 years I have finally deciphered the order in the chaos. I understand its pulse. I don’t feel a stranger anymore. Yes, Kochi too is now my home. And I’m loving it.

One of my favourite thought exercise is to romanticize about the chaos theory. So this other day, I was having a conversation with one of my dear friends regarding the multiple ‘what-if’s in our life line. Isn’t it incredible that random actions by random actors cause incredible repercussions to your future?

Sometime in 2002. I was attending the centralized allotment process for admission into an engineering college. For those who are unfamiliar with the process – people are called in order of the rank they get in an entrance test and they choose which college they want to study in. People with the higher rank therefore have more choice and usually have higher chances of getting into the college they want. I was chatting to this girl who had a rank just above me and she wanted to get into college X. We could see the live updates of the seats remaining in all colleges right in front of us. With 5 people to go; there were still 2 seats left for her preferred college. She was quite hopeful. But just as her turn came in; the board suddenly showed 0. She was quite disappointed and had to settle with some other college; lets say college Y. I came to know later that there was actually still 1 seat left when she had gone in for the allotment. What had happened was a clerical error and eventually I got allotted that seat. She could have gone ahead and given a complaint and this would have probably been sorted out in her favour; because I myself didn’t have an objection. But she and her parents waved it off and said they didn’t want the hassles. We became friends and after a few years I was still in touch with her. She studied for 4 years in college Y, she met a guy there, she fell in love with him, she got married to him recently and is now expecting a child – all because of a clerical error by a government employee. You might say it was all meant to be; it was fate yada yada – but isn’t it just so damn interesting that someone totally external to her world has affected her destiny and the destiny of generations to come?

Now what would have happened if the girl went and complained? That brings back to the discussion I had with my friend. How would that have changed my life? Would I have the same friends that I have? Would I have taken the same career path as what I have? Would we two have ever met? Questions and more questions. Life is an incredible collage of choices and coincidences.

There is this short story ‘A Sound of Thunder’ by Ray Bradbury written in the 1950s which discusses this theme in-depth. The protagonist goes on a time travel adventure to hunt Dinosaurs. The catch is that the Dino can be killed only at the moment when their natural death would have occurred anyway and you are not allowed to veer off from a precise predefined pathway. But the guy steps out of the path momentarily squashing a bug, whose effects change a lot of things in the future that he goes back to. It is a really good read and I would suggest you have a look at this whether or not you have are fanatical about the Chaos theory. You can read it online here.

Consider this – The 5 minutes you took reading this blog post; if you had spent those 5 minutes doing something else (probably more interesting) what would have changed in your life? You never know.. That’s the beauty of the butterfly effect!

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 :)

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!

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!

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 :)

I come from a sleepy suburb of the small city of Trivandrum, with all its old world charm. Compared to Bangalore, the hustle-bustle, the traffic and the noise is almost non-existent there. So I was brought up, being used to a bit of peace and quiet. The transition to the metro life of Bangalore was quick, and it wasn’t a very easy one. It was like you had gone fishing beside a serene lake and then suddenly getting kicked into a Metallica concert.

One thing Bangalore gave to me (and a lot of us) is freedom – financially and otherwise. Used and misused it, and in the meanwhile enjoyed it a lot. It gave me new meanings to life and allowed me to see things in other dimensions. I appreciated all that but still it never felt like home. I could never imagine a settled life here. There was always a feeling that I was a stranger in a strange place.

But that was some time ago, and time changes perspectives. I spent last week in my dear own Trivandrum celebrating Onam with my family. It was good, but strangely for the first time really, I started badly missing Bangalore – the congestion, the traffic, the crowds and everything associated with it. That was when the realization came that I had indeed accepted Bangalore as my new home. Bangalore has now become the routine, and Trivandrum the (welcome) aberration. They say home is where the heart is… I guess I have learnt to give some part of my heart to Bangalore… 3 years down the line.

Surprising myself; I actually managed to more or less follow the diet up until the sixth day with minor altercations. And I did loose 2 kgs (though the claim from Anu was atleast 4kgs). But the thing that interested me the most was why would General Motors; the car manufacturing company in dire straits; come up with a diet plan? With the “Internets” at my disposal; I went searching. And as I suspected; GM had nothing to do with their namesake diet plan. That too from the reputed New York Times. So why did I still follow it? I saw no harm at that point of time and the article writer himself said that he too had lost a few pounds.

After the whole experience though; I would suggest not to do it. It’s not worth loosing 4kgs in a week only to gain it back in half that time. Though I’m not an expert in the way the human body works; I suspect such rapid cycles of weight-loss and weight-gain would not do any good for your body. The best thing to come out of it though was a no non-veg week after a long time (I took the vegetarian diet). I don’t feel any rejuvenation of the mind, the soul or the body after undergoing it, like various sources on the net claim it to do.

Lesson? Nothing beats exercise. If only GM had come up with a plan to cure laziness! :(

This is a season of changes for me. Friends getting married; people going off far far away; my parents almost into retirement. And me? Well; I am just going where the wind takes me; rudderless. I suppose that’s not how it should be once you are 25. You need to have a sense of direction I suppose; but even as I write that; it is extremely difficult for my mind to consider that reality. My friends tell me I still act like a teenager sometimes and some others say I act like a 50 year old. Maybe they are right. But what’s a 25 year old supposed to act like? Well – I am even more confused.

The easy-go attitude seems to be very difficult to shake off for me. Nothing affects me profoundly; despite my outer mask suggesting otherwise. You call me; I always pick up. There’s no bad moment to talk to me. I have seen many people tell; this is a bad time to talk. But honestly I don’t remember a moment (ok one; but that’s it!) when I’ve said that. Others of my age have already started tackling life’s difficult tasks and they already have had that turning point but I am somehow stuck. I started building a house on my own (“my own” is relative) and I thought such a huge responsibility would mean that would make my life change. But it didn’t. Even that for me seems to be a snippet for conversation with my friends and nothing more. It doesn’t give me the tension I wanted it to give me. But no. Not even that. Some people say that’s a good thing; but no; not for me. I am bored; I need some stress to cure it I suppose and to feel like not being an alien in a strange planet.

I have a job I like (despite peer pressure to not; hating your job seems to be in-fashion); I have a steady income; I am surrounded by friends; I have a supportive family and my problems are miniscule compared to others’. Even then I feel incomplete. Every single day; even the productive ones; even the entertaining ones; seems to be one more day wasted. But “wasted” vs what? I am unable to define that.

Is this my quarter life crisis? I think so… and I have no clue as to what the remedy is. Here’s going back to where the wind takes me… see you at the next place I crash into.