Happy Deepavali!

Happy Deepavali! I shot this photo at 40k ft from an Airline magazine ad for Abharan with my iPhone. The best piece of Indian jewellery I saw in a long time.

I am ruminating about Bhakti Yoga Ch. 12 of the Gita for the past few days. How do I really pray to the personal God when I know that everything in this universe seems to be on a kind of Autopilot and everything turns out always right, yes, but nobody seems to be listening to my prayers?

This morning, while listening to Osho on Kabir, I got some answer.
All our love and attachment  and felt need in this world is to expand our being into infinity... this is a primordial urge. The real expansion comes from leaving my petty self, ALSO leaving my petty attachments, my petty prayers (=demands) and then connecting with the Infinite. That process of connecting with the Infinite CAN ONLY BE through love as stated in the Gita... or Bhakti Yoga!

Let me share Edwin Arnold's wonderful translation here (click to see big)... no better way to celebrate Gita, Deepavali and Life!

Garbage, India's symbol of progress

I am struck as I walk along Bengaluru roads by the mounds of garbage strewn at every street corner. Most of it is plastic, and shows how India is progressing economically rapidly. Here are some proofs.

1. Lots of food packaging like Haldiram pouches : food revolution!
2. Lots of wrappers of chocolates, sweets, Pan Parag and chewing gum: youth revolution!
3. Pizza leaflets. Colourful, modern, westernisation!
4. Cheap paper leaflets that spill out of daily newspapers, selling pure silk Punjabi sarees for Rs.130 and so on. Consumerism!
5. Lots of thermocol packaging, the electronics revolution!
6. Lots of carry bags. That is the Mall culture.
7. CD Roms (not many yet): shows that we have moved to the download & piracy era.
8. Just the volume of garbage. Urbanisation!
9. Shikakai Shampoo pouches - Indian women woo beauty products!
10. Disposable Tea cups - by millions - catering revolution indeed.

Now remember, the garbage as a symbol of progress is more ubiquitous than mobile phones, electricity or television, it is from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, and from Himalayas to Arabian Sea.

Jai Ho India!!!

Mahishasuramardini Mural, Mahabalipuram

Happy Vijayadashami!

Time: Steve Jobs, Technology's Great Reinventor

 

"You put soul into technology. Thank you, Steve!"

I bought my first Apple iPod Nano with Nike Sensor kit at their wonderful store on the Magnificent Mile in Chicago 7 years ago. It increased the joy of walking to music, urging me to achieve greater distance and speed, as I walked listening to my beautiful music collection.
I managed to get an iPhone in Sydney a year before it was officially launched there. These products and the iPad I write this on, add a spark to my everyday.
My tribute to Steve Jobs: "You put soul into technology. Thank you, Steve!"
Without adding religious overtones, I can compare what Steve did to technology to the event of Brahmopadesha which makes a man twice born, adding a soul to his body, so he can begin his journey towards liberation. So I really like the Time title "reinventor".

Steve Jobs The Time article link

Wednesday, Oct. 05, 2011
Technology's Great Reinventor: Steve Jobs (1955-2011)
By Harry McCracken
Steve Jobs, whose death was announced on Wednesday night, wasn't a computer scientist. He had no training as a hardware engineer or an industrial designer. The businesses that Apple entered under his leadership — from personal computers to MP3 players to smartphones — all existed before the company got there.
But with astonishing regularity, Jobs did something that few people accomplish even once: he reinvented entire industries. He did it with ones that were new, like PCs, and he did it with ones that were old, such as music. And his pace only accelerated over the years.
He was the most celebrated, successful business executive of his generation, yet he flouted many basic tenets of business wisdom. (Like his hero and soulmate, Polaroid founder Edwin Land, he refused to conduct focus groups and other research that might tell him want his customers wanted.) In his many public appearances as the head of a large public corporation, he rarely sounded like one. He introduced the first Macintosh by quoting Bob Dylan, and took to saying that Apple sat "at the intersection of the liberal arts and technology." (See photos of the long and extraordinary career of Steve Jobs.)

NSC Bose Airport Kolkata - Didi, please do something!

I am waiting for my Spicejet flight to Bengaluru. I came more than 3 hours before departure as I got SMSs and calls telling me of the huge Puja rush. Since I already had a very bad experience of this airport in last May transiting to Bhutan I wanted to take no chances.

Everyone tells me that Ms. Mamata Banerjee or Didi has fixed a number of things including getting banks to serve the Puja rush without downing shutters for 5 days at a stretch. I hope she can fix this airport. Here is my list of things:

1. The airport wears a decrepit look like many other buildings in Kolkata.
2. As usual you find many people coming to see off their beloved ones and like in Sahar or IGI, you can be put off by the milling humanity.
3. The airport check-in counters wear a scraggy look and show the staff as harried, perhaps exhausted dealing with crowds.
4. This airport handles LOTs of flights, from the Seven Sisters, Bhutan and Sikkim, and all metros etc. So you generally find lots of passengers waiting.
They do not have enough seating, eating, clean toilets or easy security checks. The air-conditioning was working today, but last time was ineffective.
5. Such crowds and poor ambience allows people to show their 'lower' side chucking foil wrappers and snack packaging here and there.
6. There are not enough seats, and some of them are stained with food/vomit not cleaned for a long time. Many cushions are damaged.
7. There is lousy eating. Budget travel means you eat before the flight. Given long waits for flights, one has to make do with some overworked cafeterias selling wraps and sandwiches. There is no sense in limiting catering facilities.
8. There is hardly any shopping and I did not see any bookshop after security.
9. The international airport is woeful and much worse than the domestic terminal. I also found last time loud-mouthed staff making a huge racket about something, totally impervious to the irritation this caused passengers. Add to that overflowing dust bins into which staff and passengers alike spit their pan masala stuff. What a poor advertisement for incredible India.

Pretty bad experience. I wonder where international travellers and airport rating agencies rate Kolkata. Cannot be very high.

Happy Durga Puja!


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