Randomize(Things) * 25

Amrutha has tagged me to write 25 Random things about me.

What is Random? Is it something that is not in particular, that doesn’t belong to a category, something that you just pick with no reason associated with it?

But here is a truth, That particular thing is a Random thing only until you pick it. But the moment you pick it, you have it in your hand and you know what it is and you know how to categorize it. A Random thing that you picked is not Random anymore. It is sort of like Quantum Physics.

The Random thing that you are yet to pick can be anything from Freedom to Boredom, but the moment you pick it, you will be able to see that it is your Kingdom. You have a specific thing in hand now, not a Random thing.

Anyways, Here are 25 Random things from my life which became specific after I picked.

1. As a Kid, I once tried to look under the Godrej Bero (Armoire) and got my head stuck there.

2. Once, when my uncle was sitting in the living room, he pulled my head out, from under the Godrej Bero. Somehow I can relate this with point 1.

3. I used to be afraid of Rats, that my Grandma used that fear of mine to feed me (Not with Rats, but Just Food, Not Rat Food, but Human Food)

4. In those days, a candy used to cost 5 Paise or 10 Paise. That became my salary if I help out on a chore at home.

5. The First Rajinikanth Movie that I ever saw and liked was “Murattu Kaalai”.

6. The First Kamal Hassan Movie that I really liked was “Vikram”.

7. I used to make cricket ball out of a small stone and wrapping Paper on top of it, very tightly.

8. I used to play cricket on the terrace of our house with my homemade Paper ball. The ball was very durable until you hit that out of the terrace into the ditch in the road.

9. I once went into a dreamless deep sleep state when I was alone in the house. Calling bell, Violent shouts and Knocks on the door didn’t wake me up. People had to break in and wake me up. As a prize for doing this, I was given coffee.

10. I used to be among the shortest in school, but somehow I became relatively taller in College.

11. The first Six I hit was in my 6th Std, No one could believe I was capable of hitting Six, including me.

12. I learnt to dance from my Younger brother, who was a Natural dancer.

13. I wanted a Younger Sister who I was going to name as Kavitha. I consider all the Kavitha’s that I come across in my life as my Younger sister, except the older ones.

14. I was a Car Crazy Kid. I used to have a Sack full of Toys that were variety of cars.

15. I have the fear of Unknown. I am beating this fear by trying to know as much as I can.

16. When I used to live alone as a Bachelor, the moment there is a Power cut at night I used to come out of the house and sit in the balcony, unless I am in deep sleep.

17. I learnt the Guitar for 3 months and then quit. I still have the wish to learn to play someday.

18. I once won an impromptu competition to sit still for 1hour in school during Yoga Class. I have no idea how I did that, because I am unable to do that now!

19. My First Crush was when I was in 12th std, over a 11th std girl.

20. My Second crush was when I crushed a lemon with my bare hands for making Lemon Rice as a Bachelor.

21. My First car was a Fiat Palio which I sold before coming to US.

22. My First cell phone was an Ericsson world phone, which I lost in an Autorickshaw in Bangalore.

23. My First jeans was a local branded jeans named – Hara.

24. This blog is my second innings.

25. I found my Humor sense in this blog.

If I equate 1 Random thing to 1 year of my age, I am still left out with 5 years. Instead of writing 5 more things, I will just tag 5 people whose blog I read, but I don’t have them in my blogroll yet, because I am terribly lazy!

They are – Gauri, Chutneycase, Anu Ramakrishnan, Inbavalli, Kavi.

10 Things you should know about 10 Things

If there is a topic then there must be an article with 10 things on that topic. Since this itself is a topic, I am going to write 10 things you should know about all these 10 things articles.

1. There are not actually 10 things to say, it may actually be 7 or 8 but to make it a round number the author rephrases a couple of them and makes the count to 10. Or he writes a classic last one – “10. There is no 10th thing!”

2. The title is not written first. The author keeps writing whatever comes to his minds and then writes the final number in the title. That is why we have a non standard 7 habits, 5 things, 10 steps etc.

3. Readers attention span is very important. So the author will make sure he doesn’t exceed beyond 13 points. 13 is the unlucky stop point number. Any more number of points he is going to get with the article, there are high chances that it will get converted into a book.

4. If it was written as a book, it will be publicized as the NYTimes #1 Best seller with a round, starry edged, fluorescent green sticker on top of it. No such thing will be done to the blog article. Heck, it won’t even make it to the WordPress front page. I mean take this one for example.

5. If it is published as a book, the front cover will always have the 3/4 portrait of the author standing at about 30 degrees to the side, arms folded, dressed in a blazer with a silly grin on his face.

6. Women don’t write 10 things article or the book. They just have too many things to say to be written in One article or One book. So they just have a TV show by their name like Oprah Winfrey show, Suze Orman Show, Rachel Ray show, with the word “Show” following their names, even though every one knows that it is a TV show!

7. This is the step the author finds out that there is no clear direction in his article and he cannot give a proper meaningful name for it. He will simply choose to name it as “10 things You should know about …”. Also, You will notice that Point number 8 will be missing.

8. This point is supposed to be missing. So you should not be reading this. No stop, stop! Don’t read it. Come on, This point is hidden! You are not supposed to read it, argh!!!!

9. There is no 10th thing. No Really, I mean it. I am going to stop at point 9.

10. Oh what the Heck! There are actually 11 things about the “10 things” articles.

11. Point no. 10 was not actually needed and I could have simply written Point 11 as Point 10. But, I just added it to show how clever I am. So, In essence, There is not really a 11th thing.

There, if you always keep all of these 10 or 11 things (with the 8th point missing) in your mind, you will be able to judge what those 10 things books are.

A “10 things to know about” article or book never goes complete without written testimonials of experts. Hence, I had an imaginary conversation with my fellow bloggers and I am coming up with their testimonials on this Article:

Anshul @ Brainstuck: (Scratches Head) WTF, 10 things about 10 things Article! (Scratches Head again!)

KrishAshok: This article is very inspiring it will definitely make me write 10 things to know about Jalsa and Jilpa.

Maxdavinci: There is only one thing that is true in this world – Dappankuthu. Everything else is written in this article.

Nikhil: The author is a very nice fellow. He bought me 10 beers, one for each thing.

Vishesh:  (and then when asked to elaborate) LOL

Sakhi: There is Fiction and then there is true story. This one is neither!

Twisted DNA: Just put on your bluetooth headset and read this aloud, no one will even notice, these sexy supple white 10 things.

Rads: Yay! I mean Yay!

Commentakshari

Did you like to play Antakshari while going on a trip during school or college? We used to love it because, whenever we cannot think of a song for a letter, we just sing “Tunuk Tunuk Tun, Tunuk Tunuk Tun, Tunuk Tunuk Tun, Tanana!”.

This particular tag reminds me of that game, where you sing a song starting with a letter the previous person ended with. The rule of this tag is similar to this:

You are assigned a letter by the person, when you leave a comment and the person has to write 10 things you like, that starts with that letter.

I am assigned the letter ‘R’ and these are the 10 words I like that start with R.

RAIN

I love the smell of the ground when the first drops of rain fall. I love the rain that falls for an hour and disappears after that to reveal a mild sun through the clouds. It is a very pleasant feeling. It is like the nature wanted me to cool down for a little bit.

RISK

Sometimes you need to take risks to get what you need. While I don’t like to call myself a big risk taker, I like to take risks when it really matters, when I feel that I am supposed to take that risk.

RIVER

It is a unique property of water to blend with the shape of its surrounding. When water flows in the plains over sand, rocks and plants, a beautiful phenomenon called the River is formed. The sand and rocks might not be beautiful by itself, but when the water drapes around it to form the River, it is simply amazing.

REFINE

There is always room for improvement. So, I keep myself open and refine as and when I can.

REFRESH

A nice calming cool shave and a face wash or warm shower or a evening cup of tea is always refreshing. But refreshing is more than physical. So I like to empty my mind of whatever I have been thinking once a while, that way I can allow fresh thoughts to emanate. That doesn’t mean I forget, it is just that I clear my cache and browser history and start afresh once a while. It is refreshing and I like that.

RESOLVE

A problem has to be resolved and I like it when I have to resolve. I do not like it when I don’t resolve or if it doesn’t get resolved.

RANDOM

Because everything around us seem to happen in a Random fashion. I like Random and I dislike it at the same time and that makes that word very special.

RAILROAD

I like to look at the rails during the train journey. I like the way it splits and joins. It is like, it is alive and does all this as the train moves.

RESPONSIBLE

If I take a task, I like to take the responsibility of doing it on myself. That is the only way I can do it whole heartedly and give my best.

REJECT

It is not a very positive word. But it can be of tremendous importance when used in the right sense. The challenge of creating something is not in knowing what you need, but in rejecting all that you do not need. Once you master the art of identifying and rejecting what you do not need, you will be able to create what you need. I am not a master at this, but I try to do this.

Now, It is your turn. If you would like to play “Commentakshari” you can pick the starting letter of the word from your comment number. For example, if you are the 3rd commentator, you can pick the first letter of the 3rd word in your comment. If you do not have a blog, you can write your words in the comments section. If you do not like to play “Commentakshari”, you can comment on my post but you are free to reject it and move on.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to All!

An Opinion on God

Everyone has an opinion on God. Everyone who has a blog, at some point tends to write their own opinion about the being called God. A post at Paul’s blog made me write my opinion on what I think about the phenomenon of God. I am posting my idea of God here.

God has been equated to a super natural being so far by Humans (including Atheists, because Atheists use the God in the same meaning as theists, for argument).

If at all there is a being called God, and if at all the universe is created by God, there was no intelligent design behind it. God probably did a one time random work of art called the universe or a river of multiple universes and probably stands back and enjoys the work of art. It is like a painter making a unique painting, standing back and enjoying it for as long as he/she likes. The painter is not a God here, he is an artist who splashed the colors and whatever happens later he doesn’t interfere with it. He doesn’t sit down to alter the finished painting, but he rather moves on to the next. A Random work of art can also happen by accident. When you accidentally spill a plate of pasta on the floor, it can look like an art. My Tamil readers will be able to relate this to a scene in the movie – “Anbe Sivam”(which means Love is God). So God might have ended up creating the Universe while he/she dropped his/her lunch on the floor. This can only mean that the existence or non-existence of God doesn’t matter to our own existence.

Imagining this or Accepting this as a fact or trying to prove it right/wrong does not matter.

Because whenever we try to prove it either way, we only end up in an argument and cause division among ourselves. Whatever thoughts we have, we shouldn’t force it on others. This means that you do not have to take whatever I say, You are free to have your own opinion and I will not sit and argue with it. My friend who had read J.Krishnamurthi, used to say the same thing. Not forcing one’s opinion on others is also a principle of Zen.

What matters is we are intelligent beings born out of the universe like how a flower or fruit blooms out of a plant. We are part of this work of art and that is the connection that needs to be realized between us and the Universe we live in. We certainly did not jump out of nowhere into this Universe. Since we belong to this work of art, to us there is no relevant external divinity. The Universe itself is God(You have to change the definition of God here) and since we are born out of it and connected to it, we have God in ourselves. I have another post that will illustrate this. It is an idea that I read in a book.

Due to this reason, I really do not like to describe the term God with the dictionary meaning of “God being an Omnipotent being”. These are all not entirely my thoughts. They are just some thoughts read, understood and inferred from few books and websites. I do not claim to know everything on the topic and I do not mean to say I am completely right. I keep an open mind to accept new thoughts and correct myself once a while. I also do not believe in standing one way or another and arguing. This doesn’t make me an agnostic either. I could use a new category to describe myself, but I am really not interested in forming another new school of thought, because any form of cult only separates us from each other, than unite us.