Can you please explain?

Bangalore's weather is AWESOME! My internship is progressing nicely. Weekends have been fun as well!

Last Friday, we (the interns and the research team at Bell Labs India) did a bit of trekking, rowing and river-bathing in the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary. The trekking was adventurous, the destination (peak of Bheemagiri) was a delight, the banks of river Cauvery presented a serene sight! A psychology game on a tree-hammock on the Cauvery banks surprisingly revealed that Shamik sees 'beauty' in 'beasts' and Adhiraj finds 'thoughts' 'dirty'! :P

What I am more interested in describing articulately in this article are incidents that occurred during the next couple of days. Some of us had been to Puttaparthi to have a darshan of Sri Sathya Sai Baba, considered to be the spiritual guru common to all religions. Frankly speaking, I do not have much belief in the saying that he can perform miracles; what I admire about him though are his teachings, which offer so many good things to learn, his simple messages "Love all, serve all" and "Be good, do good" that have won him followers across the globe and the large number of social initiatives that he has undertaken for the betterment of mankind in general and the people of Puttaparthi in particular.

But a couple of incidents there have left me somewhat disturbed!

1. After a satisfying morning darshan and just before the evening darshan, I realized that my phone’s battery was totally discharged. Since I had not called home since quite a long time and also had a train-trip to make to Bangalore later that night, I thought it was better to charge it at the earliest. I struggled to find a plug-point (it's not very easy to find one!) and placed my phone for charging. When it had charged to 63% in about 20 minutes, I removed it, switched it off, placed it back in my bag (phones are not allowed into the darshan hall) and ran for the darshan, only to reach late and miss the initial part of the session. When I came back and switched the phone on, the charge was just 6%!! Such a thing had never happened before...and has never happened again since then!
   
   
2. Later that night, when I tried playing songs on my phone-walkman, I could hear no audio. I thought there might be a problem with the walkman. I tried setting an alarm to hear the alarm-tone; there was none. I asked one of my friends to give me a call, there was no sound of the ring-tone! I tried re-inserting the battery and resetting the phone, nothing worked! I believed my phone-speakers had somehow got screwed. Back in Bangalore, I tried connecting an earphone to see if I could hear any sound; I couldn't! The problem then definitely didn't lie in the speakers but somewhere else. A service centre was the only option to get it repaired at.
   
   Next day, Monday, I went to a nearby service centre but it was closed by the time I reached there. That night, frustrated, I again tried removing the battery to see if I could be lucky. And surprise, the sound was back! Everything worked PERFECTLY!!
   

I could come up with some sort of an explanation for the first incident. When I removed the charger, it was damn hot! I do not clearly know how a charger or the charging process functions, but perhaps some current limiter somewhere had got screwed up, thereby allowing a large current to flow through and causing the charge-level to be shown high when actually it wasn't! Or probably something similar! Or maybe something entirely different!

But I have absolutely no explanation for the second incident. This, even after having studied cell phones, their hardware and software aspects, for nearly two years!

I’ll be the last person to say that these incidents were miracles or occurred due to divine intervention or anything similar! But they certainly can't happen without an explanation! And I have still not been able to find any. Can you please explain?

Because, we care...

It has been a while since I posted an article here. I have been busy with my summer internship since the last month and half and have hardly had the time to update this blog.

Recently, I happened to meet some amazing people and had been longing to write about them ever since. It was Alcatel-Lucent's International Day of Caring (IDoC) and these people belonged to the Association for the Mentally Challenged (AMC), Bangalore.

Believe me, they are some of the most extra-ordinarily wonderful human-beings I have come across in recent times. They belong to a class of their own, beyond our match.

They personify purity. Their smile, their joy, their excitement, their anxiousness - everything is so pure! Their emotions, unlike ours, are very genuine. Beyond that, they are not very different from us. As one of my friends mentioned, it's on seeing these kind of people that one feels like singing, "Tujh mein rab dikhta hai..."



They value achievements as intensely as we do. During the various running races that were conducted for them, I could see, in their efforts, the desire to succeed. Some would win and start yelling in joy. Some others would come last, give a smile and join the victors in their celebrations. Intensity during race and camaraderie then-after - they showed how healthy competition should be; wish everyone on earth could be like them!


Their desire to explore new gadgets is as strong as ours. They had somehow figured out that a snap captured by a digital camera can be immediately viewed on its opposite side. As soon as I would click a snap, they would entreat me to show them the image; not to mention the joy with which they would pose for the photograph in the first place!


We painted together, we played together, we ate together, we sang together, we danced together, we celebrated together! They enjoyed our presence; we enjoyed their company. Those were some of the most memorable moments I have ever spent anywhere!







My sincerest thanks to all the organizers of IDoc 2009, you gave me an opportunity to interact with my more fortunate brethren. Congratulations to all my co-volunteers, we showed that we care...


P.S.: Here is an official report on IDoC 2009 at Bangalore.

Wingmates of Fire

It was a historic event! Atleast for me. For the very first time in three years, my entire wing went out together for a treat!

Yes, all 26 of the 31 of us who were present then in the institute came along, inspite of some of them having some more important commitments elsewhere in the institute. Three Branch Councillors in my wing had a Placements Meeting going on at the same time. Four others had extra classes during the same hours. Another had already fixed a lunch commitment. But nobody could say 'No' to this idea of a full-wing treat. Every single person ensured his presence. Even people like Kunhi, Sufu and Dhawal, who generally do not wake up before noon on holidays, were up and ready in time. Wonderful wing-spirit!

Just the fact that the entire wing was out together had given me such inexplicable satisfaction that I wasn't thinking too much about the food. But the food turned out to be equally satisfaying! The Gujurati-Rajasthani thali at Rangoli was finger-licking good. The Dhoklas and Kachaudis were so delicious that Arjun made a meal just out of them. The Srikhand truly tasted like a piece of divinity. Rotli, Bateta nu Shaak, Ghooghra, Daal Baati, Chana and Ghevar were simply awesome. There were so many other things as well, not to forget the paan at the end. As someone reminisced, "I did not know the names of more than half the things on the thali, but I sure did know that all of them tasted great! "



I would like to make a special mention of my friend, Mukunda, the only non-Gangaster who was specially invited for the treat (that made it 27 treat-goers altogether). He touched everyone's heart when he declared, "I'm a pseudo-Gangaster da! I'm one among you only!" Yes, you're right. Afterall, Ganga is your "hostel-away-from-hostel", isn't it? Welcome!



Some unforgettable moments of the day:









A big note of thanks to all my wingmates for making themselves available for the treat. We have set a trend; now we'll see many other "full-wing treats" (FuWiTs) happening in future.
My heartfelt thanks to my co-sponsors - Hippo, Baba, Parabola, N2O, Sufu, Gunda and Tile. We played a small part in making history happen!
All of us missed the 5 who couldn't make it to the treat - Harish, Vignesh, Rituraj, Achal and Jay. It would have been great had you people been here on that day; nevertheless, be prepared for the future FuWiTs! :)
And Sriram, all of us miss your presence in the wing!

A couple of original video-clips: | Video 1 | Video 2 | The clips have been intentionally left unedited so that the background prompts and comments are heard clearly. Real fun they are, check them out!

Another account of this treat is here, the debut blog-article of my friend, Shankar. Welcome to blogging!

To all my wingmates, I must bow. What wonderful times we have had together so far ! We have been living together, dancing together (Oh no! :) ), 'mugging' together and enjoying life together. I miss those days in the first semester when all of us would be mugging together for the same courses. I still remember the last year's inter-wing tug-of-war when all of us turned out for the sake of our wing. I cannot forget my last birthday when you contributed together and gifted me a birthday present. What a touching moment that was! You all have inspired me, guided me, encouraged me and stayed by me during my low-points in life. You, truly, are my wingmates of fire!

By the way, I'll remember forever the way the entire wing returned back after the treat. As all of us walked together on the pathway connecting the front and rear wings, shouting "Go 5th wing" at the top of our voices, I felt like a king, like being on top of the world! Goose-bump moment that was, seriously!

I'll leave you with a loving recollection of some of our past times!