Windows Live writer...

Ah.. well... this is my first post using Windows Live Writer. As I write along, I will be looking around the tool seeking something really useful. As of now, I can only say that despite rave reviews I am yet to see something that is really impressive about it. It has some distinctly useful features:

• Its like writing in MS word. You get your familiar tools like "spell check", "bullets" etc
• Its far easier to add tables, images and links in this tool.

OK and that's it !Are these good enough reasons to use it? I don't know. May be I should use it a little more to find more !

a word about origin of Dracula...

Dracula has always been a frightening idea thanks to Bram Stoker's novel.
Most authorities believe the character of Dracula in Bram Stoker’s novel was based upon the historical figure Vlad Tepes (pronounced tse-pesh), who intermittently ruled an area of the Balkans called Wallachia in the mid 15th century. He was also called by the names Vlad III, Vlad Dracula and Vlad the Impaler. The word Tepes stands for "impaler" and was so coined because of Vlad’s propensity to punish victims by impaling them on stakes, then displaying them publicly to frighten his enemies and to warn would-be transgressors of his strict moral code. He is credited with killing between 40,000 to 100,000 people in this fashion.

King Sigismund of Hungary, who became the Holy Roman Emperor in 1410, founded a secret fraternal order of knights called the Order of the Dragon to uphold Christianity and defend the Empire against the Ottoman Turks. Its emblem was a dragon, wings extended, hanging on a cross. Vlad III’s father (Vlad II) was admitted to the Order around 1431 because of his bravery in fighting the Turks. From 1431 onward Vlad II wore the emblem of the order and later, as ruler of Wallachia, his coinage bore the dragon symbol.

The word for dragon in Romanian is "drac" and "ul" is the definitive article. Vlad III’s father thus came to be known as "Vlad Dracul," or "Vlad the dragon." In Romanian the ending "ulea" means "the son of". Under this interpretation, Vlad III thus became Vlad Dracula, or "the son of the dragon." (The word "drac" also means "devil" in Romanian. The sobriquet thus took on a double meaning for enemies of Vlad Tepes and his father.)

Bram Stoker probably found Vlad III to be devilish enough to base his idea of vampire upon Dracula!It is certainly no coincidence that Bram Stoker chose the Balkans as the home of his famous vampire. The Balkans were still basically medieval even in Stoker’s time. They had only recently shaken off the Turkish yoke when Stoker started working on his novel and the superstitions of the Dark Ages were still prevalent.

If you want to read in detail check this link out:
http://www.donlinke.com/drakula/vlad.htm

I also recommend reading The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova.

Angels n Demons and Da Vinci Code

I remember when i read Da Vinci Code in 2004, i liked it primarily coz of the information Dan Brown had packed. It was one of those few novels which blended fiction, history and facts very well. No wonder readers world over lapped it up.

There were some facts which i came across while reading Da Vinci Code and Angels n Demons:



1) Word Satan is taken from "Shaitan", a word in Arabic for the Devil.

2) In middle ages, there were Hashish smoking muslim killers. They were called Hassasins coz of Hashish. Over the years , Hassasin became assasin.

3) Many ppl, including me, are under the impression that Xmas is celebrated coz Jesus was born on that day. However,apparently Bible says He was born in March. Xmas is celebrated to mark Sun God's return. Remember days become longer after Dec 25. Theres one more funda. Pre-Christain God, Mithras -Son of God- was born on Dec 25. He was also resurrected three days after being buried in a rock tomb !! hows that for similarities? I am sure part of the focklore added to Jesus's life has come from earlier Gods.
4) Vilain used to mean villager. Church in an attempt to get rid of Pagan culture, vilified the word and now villain means .......humm... u know what.
5) In a pentacle all lines divide themselves in the Divine ratio (phi=1.618).
6) Ok , heres the one which guys will love: how did the word "horny" originate? Amon is the Egyptian God for masculine fertility. He is depicted as a man with a ram's head, having horns. Hence anyone with "horns" became associated with masculine fertility and hence the word "horny".
7) Reasons why Mona Lisa is smiling: a) She is aware that her face is androgynous b) Lisa or isis is the Egyptian goddess for fertility. Amon i have already explained. So Amon+Lisa when rearranged become "Mona Lisa". Funda is that the painting is a celebration of the the male+female union.
8) 300 years of witch hunt pursued by Church killed five million women. Phew !
9) Dan Brown says that left was traditionally associated with females and right with men. To vilify women, left became the symbol of radical thoughts. Right became "righteous" !
10) Apparently in archaic Italian, sinistra was left. Sinister comes from it. phew ! hows that for demonising women !
11) One of the reasons why friday the 13th is considered a bad omen: On Friday the 13th, Oct 1307 Pope Clement ordered massacre of Knights Templars. Most of the templars were killed on that day.
12) Jesus was king of Jews. He was a descendent of King David and King Solomon.
13) Apparently for three centuries after crucification, Christ was considered a mortal human being. It was Council of Nicaea which voted that He should be made divine. This was when Constantine was promoting Christianity.
14) Noah ( from Noah the ark ) was an albino.
15) Mary Magdalene, allegedly Jesus's wife was also royal. She was from the house of Benjamin.

Of course there are many other interesting theories. But i found these facts very interesting. All religions the world over have a widely-debated history. So is Christianity.
Coming back to the world of novels, I am sure novels in future which connect history and fiction seamlessly will do very well. umm... aint there symbols and hidden societies in Hinduism? Well, well...

A Malhi killed Alexander the Great !!

I am a Malhi by caste.Malhis are Jatt Sikh clan from Punjab. While i have always wanted to know the roots of my ancestors, i hardly got any reliable info from anywhere ( of course, it was a laid-back attempt).
Let me post what wikipedia has to say about Malhis:

Quote:
Earlier based in the region around Sialkot (now in West Punjab, Pakistan), the Malhis were mostly rich landlords. One of the earliest Jat clans, the majority of Malhis migrated to Punjab (India) during the Partition of India in 1947. It is believed that there were twelve villages of the Malhi clan in Punjab (British India) during 1850-60. One such village is Kotli Soorat Malhi, a village in Gurdaspur district.
Extract From the book *Handbook on Sikhs, by Major A. E. Barstow, 2/11 Sikh Regiment (late 15th Ludhiana Sikhs ). Written in 1899 and later revised at the request of the Govt of India in 1928.
From a historical standpoint, the Malhi clan is most famous for its association with the death of Alexander the great. It is believed that Alexander the great died from a spear thrown by the Malhi clan as he tried to invade their fortress during his retreat from Northern India.
Unquote.
Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malhi

hows that? always makes me feel so humbled when i look back at the histrory of Malhis. May i prove myself worthy of the surname i carry so proudly. Amen!

Gujjars and Supreme Court

Reservation is a topic which is close to my heart and you will regularly see me posting my views over it. Yes, i am against reservation which is based upon caste and i made my reasons clear in one of my earlier posts. Although i know that there is little chance of getting rid of this malaise soon, i would love to see more people coming out in the open and declaring that it benefits no one but the richer section of low-caste.
Its interesting to note that proteste began in Dausa where Sachin Pilot is the MP and he himself is a Gujjar. Now my question for all the pro-resevation ppl: does Sachin Pilot or his son/daughter deserve reservation? I think now these so called ppl fighting for social justice would like to come up with a lame duck answer. My answer :Tell me about ur vested interest.

Supreme Court has rightly taken up the issue and asked the police to explain their action to contain the stir. Thats fine but my point: Why has the Court and all the leading newspapers and statesmen of the country left out Mr Arjun Singh? Isnt he the one who instigated this issue again? Isnt he indirectly responsible for the deaths? Why is no one asking these questions?

Mr Sachin Pilot is a congress MP and hence he has more involvement with the issue (apart from the fact that he is a Gujjar). In a recent interview he says :
"Caste predominance and assertions are on the rise. It is not confined to just one set of people but exists in several communities and many sections of society, especially those who have lived on the fringes for long. The whole question of granting reservation begs a wider debate".
Source: http://www.kalingatimes.com/interviews/news_20070611_Gujjar_Meena_conflict_was_politically_motivated.htm

Aha, Mr Pilot!! Now you are saying the issue begs a wider debate!! Where exactly was your view poin when an older luminary of your party was pegging resevation as the sole saviour of downtrodden?
Sheer nonsense. There is no other way to look at these happenings. While all this drama is being played by the elected jokers of our democracy, eligible students suffer and richer kids from SC/ST/OBC make a killing in IIT/IIMs.

Times of India....

TOI (Times Of India) has been my favourite newspaper for quite some time now. I have read it in three different cities and the mumbai edition is my favourite (I found chandigarh edition to be a lil dull and the Banaglore edition is far too obsessed with Bangalore to be considered a national newspaper).
Of late, there is one thing about it that has been irking me a lot. And that is "as reported by TOI". Along with any thing that TOI thinks was first reported in it, this tagline is highlighted. Agreed its a good paper and the most read English newspaper in the world, but there should be a limit to self-advertisement.
Interestingly, on June 10, it reported quite proudly that Mr Ford is quite keen to join BCCI at the earliest. Everyone knows what happened next. Now i would like to see "unlike what was reported in TOI" line in the paper !! Of course, it was a mistake made by many but there should be something which should separate the best from the common.
I have always appreciated the views aired on TOI, the editorial and columns like Swaminomics. However i think time has come for TOI to go a step further and educate public on important issues. Why wasnt Mr Arjun Singh's name dragged into the discussion when Gujjars were on a rampage?Why is there no attempt to educate ppl on stocks although business sections is regularly printed?Why is there no effort to highlight the fact that Global Warming is a hypothesis proved by none and understood completely by none?
These initiatives may not interest all, but if undertaken regularly, they will benefit a huge cross-section of population. I wonder if TOI will be the first paper to undertake these.

my days at ANZ....

ANZ was fun, i must admit. I met some really cool people with whom i never realised that an year had gone by. Since i knew the system they were using pretty well, it made life a lot easier. I was given the credit for contributing and my designation reflected that when i quit. Having said all this, i would still suggest ppl to give it a long hard thought before joining ANZ. Reason? well,
1) first is the question of existence. Since its a bank,u dnt get the best of tech work. As far as the business is concerned, its done out of Australia and u dnt get to know much. End result: frustration. If you are looking for a cool life which pays well with an occasional trip abroad, go for ANZ.
2)ANZ's habit of experimenting too much with everything. Yes, they love to change things around, starting from groups to managers to policies. You never really know whos heading which group and which group you gonna belong to the next day. Its called "change" in ANZ.
3) IJP !! Its actually internal job posting which means all jobs are advertised internally and all can apply. Sounds good? ok, here is the downside: lets say you want to move to Database side. In TCS or Infosys, they will send u to some 1-2 month training and get you a project where you can learn on the job. Here its different. There is no separate training centre. An effort may be made to get some external trainer. But heres what takes the cake: officially you are supposed to get in touch with team which is handling dbase and ask them to help u outside office hours !! LOL !! Do u expect that to work? ANZ does. Wanna know more? here goes: in an interview for a job, if an external candidate has also applied which in all probability will happen, ANZ guys will not be given any advanatge!! So if that guy has worked in Dbase as in previous example, you know your chances are next to nil. So how are u supposed to shift to anyplace where the skills are different from what you already know? humm...ANZ doesnt like to answer such questions.
4) HR believes they rock the place as ANZ employees command above avg salaries. Well, that may actually be true. But there are lotsa exceptions to that :). E.g. A fresher is recruited at 4.5 lacs package(yes u got it right,its 4.5 !!). Now lets say a guy with arnd 3 yrs of work-ex is recruited from outside. He would be given a salary of arnd 5 or 5.5 !! LOL!! yah, thats their idea of lateral recruitment. Theory is lateral guy will get promoted soon and will get the package he deserves. Downside is, since he is at the lower side of package at the previous level, he will remain at the lower side of next level also. This may not be always true but its highly possible. Also, they love to change things right in the middle. Let me tell you what happened when i joined ANZ. It so happens that after 6 months of probation when i am eligible for promotion, our esteemed HR dept has made it illegal to promote anyone. Yah !! Coz IJP was getting rolled out. So everyone is supposed to wait and when finally IJP got rolled out, they took their own sweet time in advertising, interviewing and finally selecting. All this nonsense delayed my promotion by six months. Whos responsible ? Well, no one !!
5) Then theres a small matter of changing the definition of TEC. When i joined bonus used to be part of CTC offered. Bonus was offered assuming i will get an avg ranking. And bonus used to be offered twice coz there were two ranking given in an year, one in sep and the other in march.I thought it was fair. In between , in oct,they changed the policy saying ranking will be given once in an year.So in effect, u got ur sep bonus but march bonus wont be given as it will be an annual event now. Sep to Sep would be the ranking and hence the bonus. Cool. But what if i quit in april? Shudnt i get the bonus which was due in march since that was part of the CTC offered to me on the basis of which i joined? Why was the policy changed midway?It shud hv been changed in april so that effect was minimal. Well, in ANZ, u dnt ask all this.

I dnt think i need to mention small problems like if u want to delay your last day in ANZ after having given an earlier date in the resignation by a few days for whatever reason, its not possible !!
Anyway, all said and done, ANZ was probably the best time in my working career of 3.5 years. Ppl were really really cool. We had parties for no reason at all !! You will find some really supportive team mates. After leaving ANZ , i have realised i made some really good frnds there. Thanks ANZ.

downloading movies from youtube,ifilm etc...

For a while it was fun watching clips on youtube but after a while it became painful to go to the site, hunt the clip down and then watch it.

Heres one cool way to download movies from youtube. Download orbitdownloader software from http://www.orbitdownloader.com/. once you have installed it, go to ur fav video on youtube and u will see an icon saying "get it". Click and choose from a couple of options abt the format u want and thats it !! Its a great utility since everytime u go to youtube, "get it" icon always is arnd.
But some ppl dnt like flv formats. But there are many converters like total video converter available on the net.

Enjoy!

another way to add subtitles in divx movies...

I know that there are many ways arnd to put subtitles while playing a divx movie. Heres one that i found recently.
Download the DivX Subtitle Displayer from www.coolsoft.com. Once you have installed the displayer play the movie in the displayer. From the subtitles menu u can just browse thru ur directories and select the associated subtitles file (many sites like www.divxtitle.com let u download subtitles). thats all.

Pretty cool i would say.

reservation - latest victim

Reservation has always been a touchy topic in India. I remember waiting for final call from IIMB while the drama was being played out in the Supreme Court. Only those who were waiting for the results can tell you how traumatic it can be. The latest in the Great Indian Reservation Drama is the conflict between Gujjars and Meenas in Rajasthan.While lives are being taken there, i dnt see proponents of caste-based reservation doling out gyan in newspapers and TV. I wonder what are they thinking while sitting in their houses. Is this something totally unexpected? Wasnt it natural that all communities who are backward would like to receive the benefit? Doesnt this vindicate Supreme Court's stand that the basis on which castes have been selected is questionable? Why isnt a certain Arjun Singh standing up and telling us again that its our social responsibility to provide reservation based on caste and in the process if lives are lost and more divisions are created,thats perfectly fine? Wasnt it expected that the flaws in the policy will keep bubbling up? Its a dangerous ploy which is bound to have far-reaching consequences.

When reservation was first offered after our independence,it was supposed to be only for a period of 10 years. And as always in politics, you cnt take back whats been given. So reservation continued and more & more policies were woven arnd it. Now when we look at the result of 60 years of relentless pursuit of caste-based reservation we find:
1) Govt all set for 49.5% reservation for SC/ST and OBCs. How was it decided that which caste should belong to this? well, that beats me. Mandal commission which surveyed the districts with a given set of parameters was long long ago. Jatts in some states are OBCs while in others they are not. Gujjars think they should get a cut of the cake and obviously Meenas wouldnt let them take away what they think is rightfully theirs. When so-called higher-caste ppl protested against the reservation, they were labelled as selfish lot who dnt want to undo what their elders had supposedly done. Now can we label Meenas as selfish too? how long will it be when the same drama will be played out between another set of castes in another state? what will we do then?
2) Why aint creamy layer excluded from the reservation benefit? is it because they still need it? If yes, then you are telling me that son of a lower-caste IAS officer studying in some of the best schools in the country needs reservation while son of a poor farmer in Punjab doesnt need it simply coz he was born as higher-caste although he couldnt buy a book, couldnt go for tuitions, cudnt pay high fees of private schools and had no future to look forward to. I am sorry but i dnt see any logic behind this. Isnt all this gimmick just to ensure that the govt keeps the vote bank of such castes intact? Today when i look around, i see students from some of the best schools in Banaglore and Delhi getting the advantage of reservation while someone who studied in the dusty fields of Punjab or Haryana or Bihar, slogs it out in the general category. I am sorry Mr Arjun Singh, but either there is smthing that you are not telling us or there are vested interests. My heart,thoughts and feelings go out for young guys and girls who fight it out with no resources.
3) Why is it that a poor Jatt farmer's son is not allowed any benefits? Isnt he as much eligible as a poor son of any other caste? If not ( and thats how it stands today), is he a lesser mortal or is the govt saying he has to pay for what his elders did for centuries? Its insane.
4) Why caste? Why not economic parameters? Isnt it logical, easier, fairer and more understandable that reservation should be based on economic factors? How will our Mandal commission heroes explain that Gujjars dnt deserve it but Meenas do? Will they try to cover up their sham and include Gujjars? If so , wnt other communities stand up? what will they do then? This is a vicious circle which will never end and hence beats the very purpose for which it was created. I just fail to understand that when every other minister and IAS officer these days goes to US on a yearly basis, they fail to notice that Harvard University also has a certain mode of reservation. When blacks (akin to our low-castes) got their rights, these universities also faced the same problem. As it stands they have a point based system where you get a certain number of points if you are economically weaker. There are similar other measurable paramters for which you get points. These parameters can be suited/remodelled based upon our society. For example, we may want to give some benefit to children of border villages.While we copy almost every other thing from US ,why cnt we copy whats good there? We run to them to copy their designs in nuclear technology but in education we think our policies are above the world.
5) By promoting reservation based upon castes aint we ensuring that the stigma of castes never leaves us? Aint we creating more divisions? Studends and scientists came out in huge numbers to protest against the increase in reservation. As and when its implemented, are we expecting them to just accept it with no hard feelings although no plausible explanation has been given for the same? To the extent that Supreme Court has raised objections shows its a farce.
6) Our society is moving rapidly into an era where knowledge will rule supreme. Such vote bank agendas will never last. But they are dangerous coz of what they are capable of unleashing.
While i have nothing against ppl of lower-caste, i have nothing against poor ppl of higher-caste or higher-caste ppl of border villages also. And to my mind they are all equal human beings.

Dangerous policies like this can only be nullified/annulled if the public wakes up. Media and intelligentsia are the only hope. Otherwise insanity will continue to prevail.

(P.S. :politicians play with the lives and careers of ppl. I dnt have any respect for such a lot. I also accept that this is a limitation of democracy that such agendas take roots.)

Why blog ?

I guess i am very late with this blogging idea.In fact for a while i was debating why should i blog...ppl write some sense on blogs ( trust me some of them really do).... i have no gyan to give...my thoughts are generally useless.....but finally i decided to give it a shot....Why? Coz 1) Who gives? 2) I want to kill some time.

Whoever feels offended after reading something on my blog is requested to move to next blog. Since a lazy dud like me has made the effort of writing,pls let him have his say....haha...