The Silent Tears

I have known for months that
This day would come and inside
My mind I prepared myself, but
My heart kept pushing it away...

Avoiding the inevitable...

So with almost no time left,
The pain wells up inside of
Me so bad that it goes beyond
A mere heartbreak...

Holding back the tears, as I lie in
the bed at night, turning away,
Hoping no one would catch me crying...

You would never know what it is I feel-
It would do no good to tell you because
It would not change how things are or
How things will be...

And yet it is I find myself saying
"I love you" under my breath,
Almost constantly...

It will get worse before it will get
Better, but with what I know and what
I have known, I cannot see beyond the
Pain that lingers in my heart, and
I am left wondering, will I ever know
Any other feeling...

Love without pain, love without loss,
I cannot fathom such a feeling yet
I long for it with you...

And that longing is like a thousand deaths.
And as I long to be released from that pain,
I know it will never happen because to be
Released from that pain would mean being released
From you, and the pain of that is death in itself...

So for the time I have left I will lie in
the darkness, hiding the pain that wells up
Inside and the pain that accompanies holding
Back the tears, and hope and pray no one
catches me with those tears in my eyes...

The tears in my eyes that come from loving you.

For The Love of The Game

What is common between Cricket, Baseball or Football? Confused!!! Don’t be. The answer is simple. All these have religious followings in different parts of the world with Football (or Soccer as they call it in the states) ruling the majority of the globe. Cricket attains the top spot in the sub-continent regions while baseball does so in North America but shares it with Basketball and American Football. I am sure all of you are familiar with one of these or some of the other sports atleast. But that’s not the question I want to talk about in this blog. It’s a much deeper topic than that.
What I would like to ask is, what is about sport and not any particular sport but all sports in general, that makes them so appealing to the masses that it sometimes crosses all boundaries of crazy and normal at times. If you don’t know what I am talking about then perhaps you need to attend an el classico or maybe a game between Celtics and Rangers or any game in a South American League. Trust me you have no idea how crazy even crazy can get. Over the years people have time and again said “It’s just a game!” But is it? If yes then what justification is there for all the craziness? That’s what I want to find out through this blog.
So lets focus our attention to the most basic question “Why so much passion?”, “What makes sports so special?” The answer to the latter will hopefully satisfy the first question as well. I think the reason sports appeals to so many people is because it is a flat out competition between two individuals/teams and as humans it is in our nature to appreciate competition and to reward the victor. But more than that it is a story of hope because only in sports can it happen that an underdog on any given day can come out of the closet and defeat the giant. This is so reassuring to so many people because it gives them strength in their real lives. This is the reason that people who do well on the field are idolized and many times worshipped because they are shining examples that anyone on any given day can be the best. These sports icons come from all walks of life but they share their passion and their determination with each other.
Sport has time and again proved to be bigger than barriers such as national boundaries or caste or religion. When India plays Pakistan in a cricket match, it does not matter whether you are a Hindu in Pakistan or a Muslim in India; you are always right behind your team. Every time during the FIFA World Cup, there is frenzy in India with people picking their teams. It’s not because our team is not there and we are trying to fill their void with someone else. It’s more to do with the fact that we appreciate what the likes of Messi or Ronaldo mange to pull of during those 90 minutes and it gives us a sort of happiness. This is the happiness of knowing that we have seen something special. That special thing is not just the putting of the ball in the goal but the fact that people like us were faced with opposition they somehow found the way to be successful.
In sports there is a famous saying that goes as “Sometimes you win, sometimes you don’t”. This is as close to real life as it can get. It goes on to show that sometimes even despite your best efforts things don’t go your way. You have to accept this fact and move on because you will get another chance to prove yourself and what happened today would act as a motivation to better next time. If nothing a defeat teaches us more than what a victory would. In this sense, sports are a miniature representation of life itself. For me, this is the greatest that anyone can teach us and nothing does this better than sports. Give a defeated man some hope that everything will turn out alright and that is the greatest gift you can give him.
To those who say sport does not matter and that it is insignificant who wins on the field, I beg to differ from you. I would like to turn your attention to the night of April 2nd, 2011. The venue was any street in any city of India. The scenes were totally similar in all parts of the country. People were dancing; people were celebrating the fact that India won the world cup. It did not give them any financial benefit or they had not won an election. Yet they celebrated like they had. There is no way to put their feelings into words. Why they partied when a bunch of 11 men and a handful of other support staff won another tournament is a question for you to find your own reasons for. But if you were to tell me or any one of those millions of people that it did not matter, I don’t believe you because I know it did. I saw that it did.
If you cannot appreciate sports atleast appreciate what it stands for.

ALL IN GOD’S NAME

It’s been more than a year since I last wrote a blog and I hope to make it up by writing something thought provoking in my first comeback (always wanted to say that) blog. Anyways, first things first, let me take this opportunity to wish you a very happy new year. Hope the coming year brings with it, lots of joy and prosperity for you. Now that we are done with the formalities let’s get down to some serious stuff.

I am not sure whether many people will be comfortable with the topic I have chosen. And I want to assure you that all I write here is my view of things and I fully respect that people might differ in opinion. In fact, I would be the first one to welcome a difference in opinion. Only one request, if you are ultra-sensitive to the topic of religion, please do not read further. I would really appreciate my readers to have an open mind while reading this material.

You may ask why I want to write on something like this and not on some light hearted stuff. For starters, it is something that I feel very passionately about and I believe everyone should write with passion and not just for the sake of writing. Growing up as a young child, it would have been easy to do what others did. Leave everything to god and just relax; have the copybook lifestyle. Why I chose differently is a story in itself, but that some other day.

The biggest problem that I have when it comes to religion is that people seem to have very fragile ego when it comes to it. Suddenly, they become intolerable on the smallest of issues. A wise man once said “Tell a man to kill someone and maybe he won’t do it, but tell him it’s in god’s name and he would be glad to kill”. The question I have is how someone can be so blinded by faith that he loses all sense of logic. Would you believe me if I said I saw a monkey-man fly in the sky yesterday. But it’s so easy to believe if the same thing is said by religious texts (which by the way make no sense at all).

Being a science student (and this even applies to many others), I just cannot help make fun of the “all faith, no questions approach” that religions around the world are more than happy to preach. What I don’t get is how people believe that crap? At one time, the Vatican church said that the earth was flat and it was the center of the universe. And when a certain genius Galileo proved otherwise, what did he get in return. The guy was punished for contradicting what the church said. This is just one of the many incidents in history when the rigid approach of religion got the better of mankind and although the truth was eventually found out, the church has still not apologized for the treatment meted out to Galileo and the thousands of others like him who suffered the same fate.

During the early years of his papacy, the late pope John Paul II was once shot by a crazy lunatic. A team of four doctors struggled for hours in the operation theatre to revive him and later eventually succeeded. At a later sermon, the pope in all his grandeur said that he believed it was only due to God’s will that he was saved. It is interesting to note that it is enough for him to “believe” (for everyone to be sure) that it was indeed God’s great deed and no credit was given to the brave doctors that actually did everything. What I wanted to demonstrate by this is that religion does not require logic to operate. You just have to say you believe in something and that’s it, end of discussion. While science on the other hand has to back up everything it says with proof. I am no expert, but even to me that seem unfair. Is science being punished for being the sane one? Common people think rationally for once and you will realize the sham going on in the name of religion.

I would like to state that religious is the biggest scam in the history of mankind. It was thought of by crazy people in the early centuries and eventually passed on from generation to generation. And I can understand it is very easy to believe what it says. The world seems so perfectly designed that you are almost certain that it was hand crafted by someone. But then doesn’t the question arise that if someone was so perfect in designing the world and everything in it, then the guy himself must be so perfect. And most religions describe God as the most near things to perfection as can be possible. Then logically, who created the creator? And who created the creator’s creator and so on? These questions are never answered. The reply you mostly get is “Don’t ask too many questions. Just believe what is being told to you.” This is mostly followed by a glamorous statement like “For there is no greater gift than the gift of faith”. Well I have two words for you: Not Interested.

I have to appreciate religions around the world for one thing. The way they have people hooked onto them. Trust me it’s not easy to convince people of this shit. And they have done a wonderful job at it. Even Shakespeare himself could not achieve such perfection in his plays. It truly is a Mass Hypnosis.

All religions around the world say there is only one god and yet fight for the supremacy of their own gods. It is the biggest hypocrisy I have ever seen. Almost every religion preaches peace and tolerance towards others. And you know what the ground reality is. I don’t even want to comment on that. The priests are supposed to lead a life of sacrifice and in denial of worldly gods. Try visiting a priest’s house (of any religion in the world) and you would be surprised at his wealth. Trust me on that one. Life is filled with examples that expose the hollowness of all religions and yet people conveniently overlook it all.

Come to think of it, religion has been the biggest mass murderer in history. Lets take a look at the biggest problems in the world today. It may be the Israel-Palestine issue or the India-Pakistan problem and so on; the core issue is always religion. Truth is that religions around the world are nothing more than giant political parties with each party aiming to destroy the other. Just imagine a world without religion, no conflicts, no problems; just everlasting peace. As a matter of fact, religion has often been used to justify some of the most evil deeds in history; right from the holocaust in Germany to jihad of the present day terrorists. Can you still say that religion is not the root of all evil in the world?

The only reason that religion continues to enjoy such loyalty from people around the world is just one word: Fear. That’s right, its fear. I can be very sure when I say that almost every one of the so-called “theists” has had some moments in life when they had doubts about religion. But why those doubts never grow is because of the fear of the unknown that people have. They are just afraid just in case what religion says might be true. Nobody wants to take a chance. That like it or not, is the mass perception. At times religion is the easy way out. But as I see it, it is the cowardly way out. How convenient is it that when things are going good, god gets all the credit. (“Its all because of god’s grace”). But when things aren’t going so smooth, the problem always lies with the person. Its ridiculous. I cannot help but laugh at such ignorance.

At this point I would like to quote George Carlin who said “Religion has actually convinced people that there's an invisible man - living in the sky - who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time . . . But He loves you!” And that for me really sums up the sorry state of affairs that religion has put all of us in. It’s sad but it’s the reality of life.

Before I conclude, there’s one question that I would like to ask: is it necessary that you vote for the same political party as your mom and dad vote for (for those of you who don’t vote at all, you get the question I hope). My point is that in case of other decisions in life, parents don’t interfere (almost all times I hope). But when it comes to religion, any difference in opinion is taken as an insult. Before young kids are mature enough to understand the difference between right and wrong, they are fed with all crap about religion that it just hampers their sense of judgement. In The End of Faith, Sam Harris writes:

“The danger of religious faith is that it allows otherwise normal human beings to reap the fruits of madness and consider them holy. Because each new generation of children is taught that religious propositions need not be justified in the way that all others must, civilization is still besieged by the armies of the preposterous. We are, even now, killing ourselves over ancient literature. Who would have thought something so tragically absurd could be possible?”

With this I would like to conclude my latest blog hoping that I made some sense to the reader. If you have read it till now, I would thank you for your patience and request your feedback in the form of comments or emails. And if you like what I had to say here, I recommend you read the book “The God Delusion” By Richard Dawkins. It’s a treat for the open minded people.

Install Vista From USB

I've been thinking about writing a post about "How to install Windows Vista from a USB Flash Drive" for a while but just never got around to doing it. It seems to me like there's be a lot of folks who would want to install Windows Vista entirely from a USB Flash drive as well.

BUT THEN THE QUESTION WOULD ARISE AS TO WHY INSTALL FROM USB FLASH DRIVE?

Why would someone want to install a client OS from a thumb drive instead of a DVDROM or over the network? One reason: Performance. Installing Windows Vista from a high speed USB flash drive is in my experience the easiest & fastest way to complete a Windows Vista install. This is much faster than using a DVD, gigabit ethernet, or possibly even some external USB 2.0 hard drives, due to differences in access speed & transfer rate. To put this into perspective, y'know how installing Windows on a Virtual PC virtual machine from an .ISO CD image is really, really, really fast? Imagine something roughly just as fast, except for doing installations of the OS on to actual workstations.

STEP-BY-STEP INSTRUCTIONS

Here's some step-by-step instructions on how we do this:-.

Run CMD.EXE and type the following. Note: This set of commands assumes that the USB flash drive is addressed as "disk 1". you should double check that by doing a list of the disks (type "list disk") before cleaning it. If you have multiple hard drives, like an SDFlash drive or a Multibay drive, you could end up wiping your second drive using this command.

1. diskpart

2. select disk 1

3. clean

4. create partition primary

5. select partition 1

6. active

7. format fs=fat32

8. assign

9. exit

Copy Windows Vista's DVD ROM content to the Flash Drive

Simply issue the following command to start copying all the content from the Windows Vista DVD to your newly formatted high speed flash drive.

* xcopy d:\*.* /s/e/f e:\

And that's it. Boot up the machine, have it boot off the USB drive, and watch how fast the installation completes. If you thought Windows Vista installed quickly before then let's see how you like it now. The slowest part of the install will probably be the computer waiting for you to type in information in the setup fields, and even that can be automated using the Windows Automated Installation Kit.

Remembering Michael Jackson

On 25th June, 2009 the World lost one of the greatest entertainers of all time. This blog is dedicated to his fond memory....

Michael Jackson aka The King of Pop was born to a steel worker Joe Jackson and his wife Katherine Jackson on 29th August, 1958. One of several brothers and sisters, he was always the darling of them all especially since he was the youngest. He rose to fame at an early age of 11 when he along with four of his brothers started "The Jackson Five". Working with Motown Record label, they won over the audience. The fact that Michael was the soul of the entire group was never hidden. It was in time that he realized that and separated from the group to go solo and launched his first album "off the Wall". It was a huge success but Michael always wanted more. Next he came out with "Thriller". This was the album that shot him to fame. From there he never looked back.The Guinness Book of World Records noted thriller as the greatest selling of all time. The video of the title 'thriller' was the longest video ever made and 'Billie Jean' ruled the charts for a long long time.

Micheal's greatest moment perhaps came on the 25th anniversary celebration of Motown label, when during the live television event Michael performed the 'Moonwalk'. The entire crowd went wild and it became his signature. Later, Michael came with a host of other albums which tasted success on the Charts but none could match up to 'Thriller'. 'Bad' became the first album ever to have 6 of its songs in the top 10. Till date, Michael has the record for wining the maximum number of Emmy’s in one night, a staggering 9 awards out of 13 nominations.

Michael not only set records in terms of album sales and awards. He also has the Guinness record to his name for the maximum number of people gathered at a concert. Michael Jackson concerts were always a huge attraction to youngsters all across the globe. His series of comeback concerts to be held in July this year, known as "This Is It" became the fast selling concert of all times with the tickets selling at a rate of 11/second. Unfortunately, his bid to again become the King of the World was halted midway by tragedy.

The life of Michael Jackson has been an up and a down story. From the success he enjoyed on the stage to he controversies he courted outside. It was any paparazzi's dream story. His colour changed dramatically from a black African-American male to a surprisingly white looking pale guy with feminine features. His strange sometimes bizarre behavior did not sit well with a lot of people. People gave him the nickname "wacko-jacko". He had multiple surgeries done on his nose to rectify its shape and his photo sleeping in an oxygen chamber became widely publicized. He was criticized for hanging his baby from a hotel window in Germany and later apologized. His greatest downfall came when in 2003; he was charged with child molestation charges and tried. The trial went on for 2 years and the Los Angeles court later acquitted him of all charges. Though he emerged victorious in his legal battles, the toll that it took on him personally was too much to bear. He suffered financially and kept away from the media. He even shifted to Bahrain for two years. His famous residence Neverland Ranch had to be sold to pay off some of his debts and when he did return to the United States in late 2007 he rented a home in a posh neighborhood in downtown Los Angeles.

Whatever controversies may have dogged him through out his illustrious career, to his loyal fans he will always be the King, yes the King!. Here's is my tribute to the man around whom a generation grew....

"He showed us how to 'Heal the world'. It does not matter whether you are 'Black or White', just 'Beat it', beat the problem because 'We are the World'. When in doubt just look at the ‘Man in the Mirror'. Remember 'You are not alone', but 'Don't walk away'; that is not the ‘Human Nature'. Sing the 'Earth Song' with a 'Smile'. Even though he is 'Gone too Soon', he is here in our hearts 'Moonwalking' forever.
Here's remembering the 'invincible' MICHAEL JACKSON ..."

Elections 2009

Well hello to whomsoever is reading this. This is my second blog here on blogger and i must say it has been a long time since i last wrote a blog.Well i hope to be regular this time and hope you enjoy reading. Remeber do comment.

Anyways coming to the point, as i began to think on a topic to write, i can assure you that process took some time. To be fair to myself there is no shortage of things around the world. There are so many issues on which i’d like to express myself but i chose elections 2009 because that is something that affects the life of each and every one of us.

See the Verdict is now well out in the open. The UPA has won a thumping majority and the NDA is well and truly out of the picture(for the next 5 years atleast). Its been a historic election in more ways than one. To begin with Dr. Manmohan Singh would become the first Prime Minister after Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru to be voted back to power after serving on the top job for a full five year term. The verdict also marks the end of the typical hung assemblies that we were used to getting since 1990. Hopefully this time, the congress having made a government on its own would provide a more stable government and push for more social reforms. A big relief would be the absence of the left parties whose approval would no longer be needed before taking any measures.

Advani’s prime ministerial hopes are now dashed completely and i think i can safeky say now that he is on his way out. As to who will replace him at the helm of the BJP is still not sure. But one thing we can say with surity is that many contenders would spring up and we can expect ugly infighting in a party that is already trying to save its face amidst an embarrasing defeat.

Another key question that this verdict raises is on the ability of the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi to be as effective outside Guarat as he is inside Gujarat. This result will surely deal a huge blow to his ambitions for this countries toughest job. his aura of invincibility has definitely been broken. Although in Gujarat, he still remains a force that the congress is far defeating. This made clear by the defeat of Shankarsingh Vaghela, the parties topmost candidate.

One of the biggest consequence of the unanimous verdict in this years electin is that it has dashed the hopes of many potential prime ministerial candidates and the so-called “King Makers”. This is mostly true for parties such as the BSP which lost huge ground in UP. BigWigs such as Deva Gowda, jayalalitha, Prakash Karat and Lalu Prasad Yadav who were looking for big deals despite small numbers have cut to size. Lalu even lost the election from one of the two constituencies that he had been contesting. The victory of Trinamool-Cong combine in West Bengal was a huge turning point and could mark the beginning of a change, a change in a state where the last one and a half generations have grown up under the red rule. I see better times ahead in WB.

Moving on, not everything was well for the congress party. The fact that four of their cabinet ministers lost the election would not go down well with party that otherwise saw a nearly perfect election. The biggest surprise was the Home Minister P. Chindambarams failure to gurantee a Lok sabha Seat. The others include A.R. Antulay, Ambika Soni etc.

All in all the point i’d like to make is that the congress party may celebrate today but there is no shortage of tough tasks waiting for them once they resume power. There is an economy in turmoil that is suffering the effects of a global recession. The issue of 26/11 has not been taken very seriously by pakistan. The war in Sri Lanka and pakistan poses real security threat to us. And top of it lies the main issue of internal secrity.

UNITED IN GRIEF

Last month, on November the 26th, INDIA was shaken by a bunch of 10 men with a couple of AK-47's and some grenades. What happened in Mumbai was unprecedented and unique in more ways than one. For example, the amount of media coverage it received was what made a huge diffrence. It was the first time that people were able to follow a real time hostage situation. It was the first time the common man saw the battle our country has been facing for decades now. First it was confined only to Kashmir but today it has not only diversified over the country.
2008 was an year of terror for the country. After the entire year had bombings throughout the country from Delhi to Bangalore; from ahmedabad to Guwahati, it ended with the country's worst terror attack ever at 26/11. What this heinous terror attack has done is that it has reminded us of how vulnerable we are as a nation? How worthless is the life of a common man in this country? think for yourself, two terrorists are able to enter the CST station with AK-47's and a bag full of explosives and nobody even stops them. We have 10s of commandos guarding single so-called VIPs but no one guarding such an important public building.
I mean, common give me a break, there are serious questions to be asked to ourselves. We have to mean serious business because our enemies mean it.
If it had not been for the courage of people like Tukaram or Major Unnikrishnan, god forbid what would have happened and how many more would have died? Someone said once that you don't have to be superman or human to be a hero. One does not become a hero by the powers he posseses, but by the choices he makes. I understand its meaning today as i read about the sacrifices these people made for us. What separates a hero from a villain is not that he possesses more power, they both have some or the other power, but the choice he made. You can be a hero or a villian, the choice is always yours.
I wanna take a moment to remember all the brave men who laid down their lives for this country, for us, and to tell them wherever they may be that they will always be missed. They will always have a special place in our hearts. Your sacrifices will not be in vain. You are and forever will be our true heroes.