minD_Bloc

"The size of the thinking-organ of a man is confined to a small, rigid block.

But the MIND, which is responsible for one's thoughts and feelings and the seat of the faculty of reason, dwells in the most-elastic block ever.

If you think small, the block shrinks the MIND.
If you think big, the thrust of the MIND inflates the block into a titanic.

If you try to reach the TRUTH (in anything) and finally attain it, there is no more a block and the MIND is everywhere now. This Satyam(truth) is Shivam(God). "

GoodBye tentejswi.blogspot.com

Wishlist ...

What i am looking foward to ...

5:30 PM, 18th december 2005:
-The Sweet Whiff of some great Andhra air.

11:00 PM 18th december,2005:
-Sight of the huge torches from the burning furnaces of the oil plants at the suburbs of vizag.

11:30 PM 18th december,2005:
-Konark express leaving the vizag station, towards Anakapalle. Me sitting nervously, hoping there would be no squad asking for my ticket from Vizag to AKP.

12:30 AM 19th december,2005:
-Train stopping at AKP station ( ...and i fancying that mad wud be there waiting for me. no shit, huh !!)

1:00 AM 19th december,2005:
-lots n lots of hot Sambar and fried dondakaya(little-gourd) koora with rice.

1:30 AM-3:00AM 19th december, 2005:
-talking to syamu until she is tired and sleeps off, while i am still talking.

3:00AM 19th december, 2005:
-read FountainHead and sleep happily !!

from 19th december 2005:
-Good food (dosas for breakfast! and NO potatoes in dal n brinjal..Yeeww!!!)
- the long walk with syamu to the temple everyday. n also good-looking girls, dressed decently, at the temple on saturdays.
-Revanth, Bharath, Sudheesh,Indu, Munni ...
-Solitaire on dad's comp at his office, and disussion abt chiranjeevi and pawan kalyan with Pramod. Hot Mysore-bondas with ginger and coconut chutney at the office canteen.
- GeminiTV, ETV, MaaTV ....
-Jai chiranjeeva on 21st dec
-Jai chiranjeeva songs on the stereo.
-Loud arguments,discussion with Bamma (actually i am the one who gets loud) on international politics and vedas (god ! for a woman who is 70 and can only read telugu (which she learnt when she was 55), she is tooooo good !)
-No netbeans on my computer
-Lots of telugu movies, old and new.
......l.......

Swargam ela kanapaduthundhi

Gongura pachadi thaginantha vesukoni, neyyi lightga vesukoni, ullipayilu sannaga(chala sannaga) podugga kosi, pedha pedha green chilliesni niluvuga kosi, andulonchi konni ginjalu theesi paresi, vedi annamlo(chala vediga) gongura, neyyi kalipi unchukovali. Gattiga, challaga unna perugununchi, jagrathaga migadani bayataki thiyyali (ante asalu perugu rakoodadhu anamata). Ee meegada kalipi, syamu tho notlo pettinchukunte swargam kanapaduthundhi anamata.

Freedom

Freedom

And here is another post inspired by a movie. It is only recently that I have the learnt the ‘art of watching a film’. Not all movies are made to ‘strictly entertain and enthrall’ the audience. Currently the makers of movies in Tollywood, Bollywood are particularly bent on keeping it a ‘time-pass’, ‘as-vulgar-as-the-censor-permits’ kind. Oh yeah, the movies are really raunchy as promised in the trailers and the songs ‘rapchik’. (This word I heard from a friend describing the songs of a movie and I had to listen to the songs to understand what she meant.)

Wait, it is NOT the intention of this post to advocate a ban on “Aashiq banaya aapne”. It’s just that too much of ABA can be a real ho-hum.

Alas, I digress right from the start. (lol) . This movie is “KING ARTHUR”. Good story, very good screenplay, fairly good visual effects, a sexy looking Keira Knightley (to satiate the fans of masala).

But the concept. It appealed to me on a whole another level. Freedom. Arthur says, “There is no destiny. Only free will.”.
Aah, how I wish that some such ‘free will’ enters my life. Since a week, my brain is all fucked up with.. umm.. ‘conflicting emotions’ .

First, it is this place. I’ve been at home for only 25 days since an year, and this realization has evoked much self-pity inside me.
Since 5 months the only places I was present at, were the hostel, the college, Civil Lines. As badly as I want to go home, my mini-project holds me back. Sucks !

My project. This has been the only silver lining in my academic chart this sem.(well, the exams aren’t over yet, but I give myself an A+ in this one.) Finally, I had found something I am obsessed with, in IT. And just when I hit upon something new, and sincerely pray for 2 uninterrupted days to work on it, some mad-fucker will announce a quiz, report submission, java swing, netbeans, udl, midsems, effervescence, midsem viva, mason rule, endsem viva, …aaaarrrghhh !!!!

I hate,hate,hate all this. The idea of cramming a textbook just before an exam really sends me into a million meters of depression.
And the results are equally gloomy. (Sigh !)

“Nothing is permanent except change itself.” Heraclitus has never been to Allahabad.

And the 'latest amazing thing' is “Relationship- making and the problems as a consequence of making”. Everybody and everybody seems to suffer from this. My roommate was almost ready to forfeit his once-in-a-5-month chance to go home, to go and visit his girlfriend. And the way he gets emotional when he speaks about her makes me want to kill myself. Whatever happened to ‘flings’, female-ogling, casual flirting etcetc… A lot of my frnds are already in full-time, serious “love”, and quite a few are worried about not getting into one before college ends. God save ppl.
(I dunno y I wrote about this… what the fuck… call it free-will).

I am really sleepy now …. Will stop before I can write further non-sense.

Got the news today. She died on saturday and I came to know about it today through a scrap in orkut. Like an obituary in a newspaper. Still, I did not fully give in. I called up home and demanded to know how vinny was. But even as i made the call i knew it was true. It was an intution and however hard i tried not to listen to it, it's screams just got louder.

My mother initially played bluff and tried to sound normal. But as soon I heard my father's 'hello', i knew it. My dad was most attached to it. Calling it 'attachment' would be an understatement. I have never seen anyone so single-mindedly devoted to a dog. With her around, he would forget everything else and spends his time doting on her, for hours.

She has been with us since I've started going to school and was one of the first friends i have made. And since i was the only kid in my home, I had all the usual sibling fights, the make-ups etc ... with her. She was really good at making up after a fight (which meant it got beaten and i got bitten). U did not have to say 'sorry'. Go to her after an hour and show her the bitten toe, and she would sit down and lick it solemnly.

I cried uncontrollably. It was the first time someone, very close to me, died. But somehow the news still did not sink in completely. No. It would still come running to me when I go home for holidays. With a smile. Yes, It had a beautiful smile. Not, many people saw this. But, I always did.

My mom says we are to feel thankful that it had died peacefully without any pain.... I feel nothing now. No pain, no sadness. Because still the news did not sink in completely.

It wont, until I go home and not find her. But as of now, Vinny, the only dog that could ever smile at me, would still come running to me with her million watts bright smile.

The stuff Baba is made of

I recieved a mail from the Baba yesterday. It was an apology from him for not coming to 'Magnum Opus' until Sharat n I went and called him personally, that too, after the event has started.

Dear Tejaswi/Sharat
It was indeed a surprise to me, that only 7 of the 22 registered people
had turned up. I am extremely sorry for being one of the other 15
earlier. I thought I would not take part in the competition due to
faulty hardware, but I absolutely forgot that such a decision might be
detrimental to the enthusiasm of you organizers.
I am thankful to you for correcting my incorrect decision. Even more
thankful, for the broken hardware still fetched me a prize.
Organizing any event is a difficult task, I know, and I congratulate you
for having made an excellent organization of Magnum Opus. Keep it up.
- Alok

My first reaction was that of shock and surprise. Imagine receiving e-mail from God... an apology, at that. Well, this man is regarded no less than a God here. I braced myself for a rebuke for having disturbed him (He was taking part in IT-Guru contest..which he, ofcourse, later won). As I read the mail, my shock slowly transited to admiration for this guy. The humility and candidness in the letter caught me completely off-gaurd.

One thing, I absolutely love simple and straight language, regardless of where it may be used. High funda language simply kills the effect the author wishes to convey and makes the sentences sound phony.

I was just very proud of myself, for reasons unknown. I wrote back a letter thanking him for his gesture. And, he replied back in an hour !!


Dear Tejaswi,

> apologised for not coming early to the event. Contrarily, I am the one who
> should be apologising for persuading you to come, even though you were
> busy. Thnk you very much for promptly agreeing.

That was a simple equation for me. I put myself in your place and
understood what I should do.

> Lastly, you did half the work for Magnum Opus. Remember that I had come to
> you earlier for evaluation criteria etc.. ??. So, I thank you again for
> that.

Oh.. I obscurely remember them: On the way from library. I don't know
what I had told you at that time, and how helpful that was. In fact, to
be frank, it was till 3 oct morning, that I didn't even know that
TeleByte was a part of magnum opus
- Alok

Actually, I goofed up big time on the day of the event. I was busy helping ppl in a (crazy, stupid, useless) fashion show until the day before. I only had an hour left that morning before the event starts and I still did not have even the evaluation sheets ready for the judges.
I got hold of a bike which consumed tons of my energy before it wud start.... the xerox machine in the college did not work... i went to jhalwa to get the job done where the machine conspired against me once more and I had to wait for 20 minutes before it cud be repaired.

I was very sore with myself for having made such a mess of a simple job. I was so tired that day ( and very low in morale lol) that i went straight to bed after the event. The next day i find this mail from Alok, apologizing in all humility. And words cannot describe how grateful i felt !!

"Organizing any event is a difficult task, I know, and I congratulate you for having made an excellent organization of Magnum Opus. Keep it up."

Venu, Sharat and Tejaswi, the organizers of Magnum Opus, are very thnkful to Him for the acknowledgement !!!

Advantage of Vedanta

In Vedanta, the chief advantage is that it was not the work of a single man. and therefore, naturally, unlike Budhism, or Christianity .. , the prophet or teacher did not entirely swallow up or overshadow the principles. The principles live, and the prophets form a secondary group, unknown to Vedanata. I donot mean that it is bad that these prophets should take religious hold of a nation. But it is certainly injurious if the whole field of principles is lost sight of. The persons appeal to our emotions; and the principles, to something higher, to our calm judgment. Principles must conquer in the long run, for that is the manhood of man. Emotions have more connection with the senses than with the faculty reason; and, therefore, when principles are entirely lost sight of and emtions prevail, religions degenerate into fanaticism.

-Swami Vivekananda


What this great man meant by this is the following. Any religion is divided into philosophy, mythology and ceremonial. Unlike other religions, where philosophy and mythology are so much interwoven that ulimately mythology dominates the philosophy. Mythology is made of heroes.
Hence the hero becomes larger than the ideal he stood for. And persons appeal to our emotions. What I understand by this is, take lord Rama for example. He has killed Ravana for the welfare of the world. He is the god, the saviour. Rama represents the victory of good over evil and we are happy that the "good" has won. The word 'happy' is emotion; so, is the word 'sad'. Reiterating the point in a not-so-abstract angle, When people shout at the top of their voice about Hindutva, they are more focussed on the heroics of Rama and his crusades against the "evil", and hence feel privileged to imitate the same. Here, the personality called 'Rama' has overshadowed the idealogy upon which the personality itself was built.

On the other hand a principle is a Truth. Nothing can beat it because it has always been there and is the mother of all the facts we know. Hence it unaffected by 'materials' like emotions. Vedas encourage every man not to learn the truth but to realise it. How do u realise the truth? For this Swamiji gives a humorous example. Suppose a man is a chemist, a great scientific man. He comes and tells you this. If u say to him " I donot beleive anything about chemistry, because i have all my life tried to become a chemist and do not find anything in it" he will ask ,"When did u try?" " When I went to bed I repeated,"O chemistry, come to me", and it never came ". This is the very same thing. The chemist laughs at you and says, "Oh, that is not the way. Why did you not go to the laboratory, get all the alkalis and burn ur hands from time to time?" .

Most of us take god for granted, too easily, like a bed time story. Say a prayer in the morning, be kind to a beggar in the temple u go to in the evening and say another prayer at night, and that will do. God shall be appeased and give u good a CGPA. That is not being religious but it is just fear from an unknown.

But Vedanta encourages man to question and reason our concepts; that too in very practical methods. Yoga is said to be one of them, though i plead ignorance on this topic.

This blog is dedicated to all the athiests. I hope most of them are really not 'atheists' ( in the way the word is understood) , but are just looking for a reason to believe. This is not a test which god puts us to, but one which we put god to. :p.