Super(hu)man

We love superhero movies, don't we? Feels nice to be sleeping in peace when there's a Batman or Superman guarding the city. All these years, we've been living, watching fantasy, hoping it would come true. When there are so many fictitious characters, why can't there be a real-life superhero to keep this world safe? The condition around now, seems to be leading to that very question. But can a Superman, who obviously has to come from a Kryptonite, really keep the human race intact beyond Nature's plans?

Dinos were given the license to exist, and they were eliminated after that, for whatever reason! Now it's the time for Humans, and we don't know how long the Earth will hold us. Maybe a day will come when Nature says, "Goodbye Humans, I am making way for more advanced creatures to rule". At such a time, can we save ourselves? We assume we are intelligent enough to avert any major disaster. We even have arrangements to divert meteorites away, just in case. But when Nature decides the time has come, can anyone, leave alone stopping, can anyone delay whatever could be coming at us? Are we trying to beat the Universe in its own game? Will the technology we have today help us live beyond our stipulated time? Do we have some time like that? Is a Blackhole coming towards the Solar System soon? What's a Blackhole? Is it formed from Stars? How are stars formed? Are they just born out of nowhere? How was the universe formed? Does the answer to all this really go 13-14 Billion years back?

If the Human Race survives another few thousands of years, the age of the Universe will still be 13-14 Billion years, which means our entire existence is just a spec in an ocean. And we are making a big deal out of that?


That's the real picture of the earth taken from Voyager spacecraft. That pic had to go through many filters to show the earth as a spec and the distance is only 4 billion miles away. The universe is much larger that that!!

Now, if we zoom (1000000000000...X Zoom) back into the dot-like Earth, there's chaos everywhere. Terrorist attacks, bombs, fires, accidents, global-warming, all man-made. All resulting due to our own backfiring technology. Now does Nature really need to create elements to destroy us? We have learnt how to self-destruct. Just press the button and everything goes out of control. But still, we are fighting a unconscious war against Nature. We cut trees and over-use resources when we clearly know we can't exist without them. We destroy Natural resources and Nature, using a Natural reflex, fights back with Natural Things like earthquakes and tsunamis! It's only leading to a quicker end.

There's only one way to stop this. Not Superman or Batman or Spiderman, but a Superhuman within all of us. An inner soul that will show us, we are nothing but a microscopic spec in the Universe, and nobody cares if you own a Multi-Trillion Dollar company or a roadside hut. If there is something you can really do, make sure you leave a mark in such a way that your tiny spec of a lifetime is remembered by the future creatures that will rule the earth soon...

Rain Rain ...

Were we not praying for rain the whole of last month? Finally, it has answered our prayers. The dark clouds, rough winds, moist air, cold breeze everything clearly indicating the arrival of monsoon. We must all be happy. It's finally raining. The lakes will fill up, the water table will rise, the dams will run, flowers will bloom, greenery will spread, wow.. after a long wait life can come back to normal. Wait, seriously, can it?

It's raining! The roads will flood, drains will overflow, trees/poles/houses will be damaged, traffic jams, short circuits, lightnings, millions of problems. Think again, will life really come back to normal? But again, imagine life without rain. Rain or no rain, someone's got to be blamed! Shall we blame the monsoon? Damn it. Either it rains too much, or it doesn't at all. Why does Nature play this game with us? Who knows, there might have been a depression over Africa, and our dear monsoons got completely attracted to the low pressure. Or there might have been a depression over Bay of Bengal and our Killer monsoons brought 3 coastal states underwater. Shall we blame the govt? Aah, who doesn't like to? The list is endless anyway and it would take up another whole page to write that. Neither do I have the time nor the patience to handle such a task. Let the media play the blame-game with the govt, and let the monsoons play with our lives.

In the end, it doesn't matter if it rains more or less. Less rain, no water, no food, no power, no govt. More rain, excess floods, no food (crops killed), no power (power failures), no govt (blame-game). So how does it matter?

Life's observations are precious. We learn from what we observe...

Hurry!! It's 8 AM!!

Yeah! Hurry! But for what? Am I getting late for college? No!! It's the new 'Power Holiday' scheme that our government wants to run. Supposedly called an Obsessed-with-Tech state, AP has run into problems of all sorts. Blame it on the delayed monsoons, or blame it on the weirdo government's improper planning. Whatever it is, people will suffer. As soon as the clock strikes 8 AM, when someone wants to run his geyser, when someone wants to prepare his breakfast in the oven, when someone wants to check his last minute e-mails, or anything else, Bang! The power's gone! If you didn't do any of the above, you gotta get back to your traditional 'boil your water and take your bath' method. Of course the heat of the day is forcing people to shower with cold water, which is another issue altogether. A shout from the kitchen implies some work was left undone and that can't be done for the next 3.5 hours! Dude! You just missed your breakfast! Who knows, maybe your lunch is gone too... Style your hair in the dark, grab hold of any shirt you blindly lay your hands on, and pack off to work/study/anything. It's the closest to one can call 'worst kinda life'. It makes you wish you had some power to have power!! Got what i meant ??

Suddenly people want to get away from home quickly. Is this in some way, inspiring people to get to work early? But how about life in offices? How many of them are able to generate power from alternate sources? Lives in colleges are just the same with or without power. Nothing interesting there at least.

Oh wait a minute? You know what this means? Our Global Disaster of Global Warming might be getting delayed by a few minutes!! A 3.5 hour long power cut should have some effect on the emissions. But how much? Nobody knows ...

But what is this I hear? The state's going dry trying to buy power and there's free power for villages, and worst of all, the power's available in places where 'VIPs' live?? Maybe they are taking 'important' decisions like "Cutting power for the Rest of the State" in their brightly lit, Air-conditioned offices. These 'nice' things I read in the paper make me burn like diesel vapours... "Hey! There's no diesel too, you can use me to run your car. But I am so sorry, you can only manage to go to the end of the street running on the Fuel-me. Try creating an engine that runs on water. But Hey! There's no water in the state too! Try running it on Mud/sand. There's plenty of dry mud all over the state which isn't fit to grow plants... ". Oh we are in a serious crisis!!

The Myth

After 3 slogging years of Engineering life, here's what I have noticed in people around me. There are a certain myths that need to be broken, but I don't know by whom.

Myth 1: Engineering Students are born to break Rules!
Heavy misconceptions about this. First of all, the management thinks students are going to be crazy and reckless, and they make stupid rules. And then, the students prove themselves to be equally stupid, assuming they were born to smash everything put in front of them... just for the fun of it. A rule to break rules! And people follow only that.

Myth 2: Drink, Smoke and Dope! It's life!!
Well, little do our 20 Year old mud-heads realise what will become of their life due to this obsession. An occasional drink won't hurt, but an occasional skip?? That's getting serious.

Myth 3: Live life on the FASTest lane
This ain't no news anymore. The Formula 1 of Hyderabad can be seen on any road at any time of the day. And most of these stunts are performed by 'Non-Professionals' who recommend trying this not just at home, but also under trucks.

Myth 4: I have the Power !!
Suddenly we like to take things into our own hands! Some guy commented about someone's someone, and that starts a raging fire. And it's just the beginning. People add up as if to show their 'loyalty', and that adds the fuel. By the end of it all, the real guys involved are nowhere to be seen, the 'Fueling' guys are bleeding and the Police Sirens are screaming. Weird!!!

Myth 5: Movies are my Gods!!
Whatever happens on the Reel, seems to be happening in real. People love to dress up like their favourite stars (even if it's a pant on another pant!!), to talk like them (this is very very true!!), to behave like them and also to fight like them! People tend to learn weird things from the movies, and because of that, they are made especially for these kinda people.

There may be many more which I have noticed but can't remember right now, but when I do, there'll be a post to continue the list of myths that are unconsciously followed...

Europe's New Campeones

Decades passed, but Spain, with all the class and speed never made it large. They faltered every single time. They seemed to promise with new and energetic players, but never tasted success like real champions. At last, the Matadors took home something to cheer about. The Silverware of the Euro Cup.

The time zone difference forced me to miss all the matches that were played in Austria/Swiss. All I could do was hook up to the television early in the morning and find out what happened last night. I repeated the same after the night of the finals between Germany and Spain. I knew Germany would win, but longed for Spain to do so. Little did I know that I was in for a big surprise. A Spanish Surprise. The 1-0 scoreline didn't tell much of the story. My ill luck always reigned and I never got to watch the single goal that was scored. What I heard was, it wasn't a classy goal from Torres but it was the touch that made all the difference between the two sides. After a not-so-great tournament for himself, he would never forget that goal or that match. It's more of an emotion than a Cup Victory for Spain. Surely they were dying to lay their hands on any damn major Tournament that came in their way. I always considered Spain a tricky side, but they never converted that to major victories.
This Euro was exciting to say the least. It was full of surprises and the 'biggies', like France, Italy, etc. gave up too soon. Teams with no hopes turned into squads of Heroes. Remember the celebrations in Turkey?? You need nerves of steel to win a row of matches in the dying moments. Remember Russia?? The return of Arshavin transformed Russia overnight. Though the whole tournament was filled with upsets and shocks, I knew Germany would make it somehow. And they did. I expected to see Portugal in the finals again, but they left suddenly without a trace. Spain seemed to stay away from the limelight all through and showed themselves right at the end. Atleast it wasn't a final like last time, a major upset. If anything could have gone wrong for Portugal, it was then, against Greece. Though some would call Spain beating Germany as another upset, I wouldn't because the creativity and skill of the spanish players should never be underestimated. They all play for big clubs in big leagues and they know exactly when to flick the ball to the unmarked player...

As a whole, this tournament lived up to it's promise of entertaining. It's all we need in the end. I am saying this wearing a Made-in-Italy shirt depicting a German spraying Champagne against the backdrop of an Italian supercar-giant. A World Champion. You don't need to think twice to remember his name ...

The Black Theme

My sudden interest in black themes led me to this. Ignoring important printing work to be done at home, I sat on this. I searched and searched for good black wallpapers, but found none. So I decided to make one (or two) for myself. Some thinking and some photoshop work brought out this:

I uploaded smaller resolutions to save time and space.