Thinking Out Loud...

The more I know about things, the more illiterate I feel. You know the feeling…that there’s so much to know about in this world, that you feel one lifetime is inadequate. I guess everyone has felt this at some point in their life. Physics, chemistry, biology, politics, geography, you name it, the subjects are endless. There’s so much of knowledge in this world that it makes me wonder if it’s ever possible to know everything about everything? And the funny part is, as a child, I felt school teaches us everything…naivety, thy name is childhood! Age teaches us how clueless we really are… Whenever I read something about physics, I wish I had taken it up as a vocation…then I go and read something else and it makes me want to be in that profession…Till now I have wanted to be a doctor, physicist, philosopher, writer, song writer, DJ, musician, chef, veterinarian, biologist, environmental engineer, journalist, dog psychologist, zoo keeper, teacher (of what I don’t know), an honest politic...

I remember as a child, getting this pamphlet at our home once, urging people to buy swadeshi stuff. I laughed at the prospect, dismissing swadeshi stuff as substandard…Imported was always better. I also remember the time when Chinese goods started to trickle into the Indian market…it started with Chinese made Diwali decorations…strands of musical lights that we proudly displayed at our home…then came the flood of Chinese toys, furniture… and now almost every thing you wear, use or eat is made in China. It’s true that the world has shifted its polluting manufacturing industry to China , which is good for the rest of us. But is it really? Not only the job losses, but also the toxic imports from China are becoming lethal in some cases. The toy recall, then the pet food recall, the baby food recall…you name it, and you will see a China link…At least the United States has a way to monitor and recall the products deemed harmful for their people, but I wonder if any body really cares in Indi...

I have been reading Jared Diamond’s book ‘Collapse’ for quite some time now. There are a few books that you breeze through and there are some that take for ever. Collapse took a while to get through, but I must say it has left an imprint on my mind. The author of the Pulitzer Prize winner ‘Guns, Germs and Steel’ presents a theory backed by years of research on ‘how societies choose to fail or succeed’. Starting with the inconspicuous Easter Islands to bigger countries like Greenland and China , he takes the readers through a tour of civilizations and how its people made choices and how those choices shaped their fate. It’s amazing to read that the ancient world had huge cities with millions of people living together for hundreds and thousands of years. And it’s scary to read how communal mentality or irrational practices cost them their downfall. The book touches on various sensitive issues like population control, environmental damage, free trade, religious practices, climate ...

There are a few songs that seep deeper into your soul and make your heart sing…Adele does that for me. The British singer with two Grammy’s to her credit has such an amazing voice that it tugs at my heart strings. There’s a magic in her voice that makes every song of her's special to listen to. Chasing Pavements is one of her better known songs but I adore all of her songs. Here’s a link to one of Adele’s number 'Right as rain'…check out her live performances/unplugged versions on Youtube as well…they are awesome! Adele rocks…or rather Adele makes my heart sing!

Original posting date: July 15, 2009 Going home is a highpoint for me. The moment the airplane lands at Mumbai airport, the stench in the air declares… “Welcome home!” I must say, it’s the sweetest smell for me, especially when I visit home like once in two years. The moment I leave the quiet enclosure of the aircraft, it seems like I am being sucked into a parallel universe…the sound, the smell, the hubbub of life and people is just overwhelming. My brain just explodes, trying to keep up with and comprehend the shock of stepping into a world of intense activity. Living in the US robs you of all the stimuli that life in India comes with. I cannot even begin to narrate what a regular day in India may come with. The ‘morning raagas’ consist of shrieks and shouts of children going to school; the vegetable vendors shouting on the top of their voices, trying to get a good start to a business day; the milkman delivering the milk so fast that you wonder how many houses he serves ...

--> Original posting date: July 10, 2009 I have been debating whether to write about my dog in a blog. I know I will go overboard when I write about her, its difficult not to. Every dog owner feels that their dog is the most intelligent, most beautiful creature that was ever born. So do I! I know I have to write about her, because I want to do this for myself. I cannot stop talking about her once I get started…some people have already had a first hand experience with this…I usually recount every little trick that she has ever performed and I don’t stop until I go through her eating habits, bathing habits, human habits, her doctor visits, her blood line, her friends… I guess you get the point. But I feel there’s no better way than to write this down so that not only my friends but I get a chuckle out of it every time I read it. I recently got a big scare about her health and I cannot describe how heartbreaking and helpless it feels when someone you love so dearly is i...

Original date of posting: July 6, 2009. This came up in a conversation yesterday…Is it possible to measure the capacity of the human brain? To be precise, can we know how many KB, MB, GB, or TB (terabytes) of memory we can store in our brain? The human brain can be compared to a computer, I feel. We have the working memory, i.e., the random access memory (RAM), that has the information to control the basic body functions, i.e., breathing, digestion, blood circulation, hormone production, cell multiplication, etc, so our conscious brain does not have to work overtime to remember to breathe every time. Maybe our DNA is also a part of the RAM since it contains our genetic information, and the conscious brain is the hard disk, where we store the information we acquire, from our first ABCs and spellings to grocery lists, thesis reports, and current affairs. Is there a limit to how much information we can store? Is it the case that when we exceed the limited quota, we tend to l...