Thursday, March 30, 2006

Intention gone bad

Have you seen the new State Bank of India’s debit card advertisement on the television?

This is what it wants to say

“Welcome to cash less world, its fantastic even pick pockets need to look for jobs”

This is what it says

“See this hard working, under fed, man; “bholu” ( bholu means simple), he is dying to make his ends meet and can barely have dry bread by the end of the day, but hey viewer you don’t need to worry, you can use our debit card for all your lust”

Somwhere on the screen you can read that the guy who is doing all the hard work is actually an ex-pick pocketer.

Actually the “ad” is very S”ad”.

Such ads are the outcome of forced innovation / forced style of a wanna-b- creative director.

SBI being a non private bank, a government property, it’s hard to imagine of what can be the motive to air such an ad.

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Broken and Slow

I FELL

I Broke my knuckle and i broke my wrist.
My typing speed has reduced by 50%, and now i realize the importance of customizing mouse clicks :)

4 weeks to type with both hands again :( hopefully




Sunday, March 26, 2006

Will there be an awakening

Why does it happen, that you believe something is right but you still can’t convince yourself to do it. Does your brain repel the discomfort that the right thing can/will cause if you do it? Is that the reason? Or does the reason lie in a deeper Zen?

My wife was forcing me for more than a month to go and watch “Rang de Basanti”, well I was aware of the reviews that were in the air, some of my so called same bandwidth sharing friends also gave some seriously high ratings and I was very sure of what I would be getting to see on the screen.

So, the day came, today and we went for the movie, this was the second time for my wife (now I know why).

This movie moved me, I felt different. This was not the first time something moved me I have had this feeling many a time, while watching seriously good movies, playing seriously good games, listing seriously good music, but this good feeling also had some not so good about it.

I got the message in the movie loud and clear and I know it’s correct. I consider myself above average in connections, deductions and conclusions. My mind can extrapolate, differentiate and statistical figure out problems. But after watching this movie and giving it some serious thought on the drive back home I cannot stop questioning myself as what can I do as an individual for my country. (Or is it really just about my country, my home, my continent or my earth or my universe, or is it just about me?)

Okay seriously, coming back to the country thing, I am not talking about any killing or going against anything and all that.

I am talking about just myself and my country as a place, what can I do about it?

Do you feel guilty (ever) when you throw an empty Pepsi/coke glass on the road? Well I do feel guilty quite often, but then I think “What the hell”, who cares and why should it matter.

If my grandfather reads this he would say, “Yes it matters, if everyone stops doing this we will have a cleaner place”. My mind computes the logic but does not respond to this statement emotionally well.

When one thinks, “hell no one will stop doing this’ - OR – you might think “most of the people will not stop doing this”. Both of these thoughts are correct but the deduction is wrong.

What deduction?

Hell no one will stop doing this - OR - most of the people will not stop doing this, therefore what difference it makes if I just throw the damn glass here.

Will you see the place cleaner if you don’t, will you see the place dirtier if you do?

The answer is we don’t care, its SEP (Somebody else’s problem). Its invisible to us, till the time it becomes so much that you start noticing it and start hating it and then you say “this place stinks man, is desh ka kuch nahi hosakta hai”

I don’t know what the solution is and neither am I looking for someone to give me a solution. Or for that mater if there is a genuine problem for which I need a solution

All I know that the tag line of the Movie “a Generation awakens”.
…..Is true…It’s true for me.