GS' Beats

I have had the fortune of studying under some of the finest teachers. Totally selfless and sincere to the boot. I often recollect what one my school day teacher once told - "Your Efforts. Your success. We are just tools. An assist, like your book. Use it wise, you succeed. Use it bad, you lose out." Even today, I reiterate this point to my own students. A good majority of my own learning I can trace it back to specific teachers from my school. College was good. The teaching personnel bit more friendly. But nothing matches those teachers from my school days.   This post isn't about my school teachers or college teachers though. This is about those peer group teachers, who teach you something which you'd be using it day in and day out. Something that would have made you a far more better person or improved person, with that extra skill or knowledge. They patiently would have trained you or taught you all those little things, which may not seem bigger or better...

A line here. A sag there. Couple of bags around your waist. A generous paunch. And a barren head. These are not necessarily restricted to people who have aged. These are also for people who appear older than they actually are. The above description fits me well. I am Thirty Three and a Half, as I write this, and I can easily pass off as somebody who is actually ten years older than that. Now, this has its own advantages. For instance, you can't get any older. There are people who say I haven't aged at all in the past five years! Why you may ask? I looked forty plus even then. See, you can't tell the difference between a hundred year old and a hundred and twenty year old. Its the same thing. It doesn't mean I didn't age. It only means that I was frigging old looking even then, and therefore, I am not a new oldie. I am just an old oldie. If you understand what I mean. - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - + - Earlier today I did something ...

Conversation between an Entrepreneur Engineer and his CA "My knowledge in accounting is better than yours on Engineering. You know that. What's the use of a CA? Do you guys produce? Do you guys contribute to profits? Do you atleast move? I am the engine of growth of my country. People at my office are its wheels. We help the country move. We help it progress. What about you? Do you guys even light up ever or smile? The most useless staff on my payroll is my accountant, and the most useless person on my vendor list is the Chartered Accountant. You guys talk like a sheep telling not to do this or not to do that. What are you guys? My advisor or my grand ma? " "Tch. Tch. Tch.... Imagine a car without a brake and a stubborn steering, and an engine that is clocking few thousand rpms and the wheels spinning at around one hundred plus kilometres, and heading towards a tree or a rock or a truck... You get the point? We are the steering and the break. We help you no...

What is emotionally the most painful experience - You losing your loved ones? Your trusted ones stabbing you behind your back? Your relationship breaking down? Lives of your loved ones taking a nose dive? You having a miscarriage? What else could it be?  The answer would invariably depend on what one goes through at a given point of time.   For some, whatever they have undergone would be the most painful. For a few, they'd just be glad that they didn't go through the hell which others are going through.  Among the most painful experience can be the realisation that you have been fervently hero worshiping a false god all along. Nothing hurts your ego as much as you being proven wrong over an assertion which you were cock sure about. If that assertion was about your god or inspiration or hero, and later such god or inspiration or hero turns out to be any except that, get ready for an emotional extreme. The thing with hero worshiping is t...

I find most of the movies of the "Western" genre to be a pointless affair. They are mostly without any substance and over stylized to the point of looking indulgent. There are a few westerns which I enjoyed better, and " The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (1966) " isn't one of them. I found it to be good, but would not categorize it as great.  I am a sucker for "Drama", and probably Sergio Leone failed me on that.   " Unforgiven (1992) " was among the best that I have watched. It was and is, in my view, the a classic western should.  " Hidalgo (2004) " wasn't exactly a western, but it had all the ingredients of a perfect movie for me. It had Viggo Mortensen in the lead, and what more could I ask for. " Appaloosa (2008) " was another one that comes to my mind when I think of some really good western movie, again starring my favourite Viggo Mortensen.  And then there is " 3:10 to Yuma (2007) ", a movie I ...

As the word goes... if you hate a person, you will find a hundred reasons to hate him further, but the one that could endear him, is not the one you'd find ever. Hasan Suroor's pathological hatred for Modi is amply reflected in his barely unbiased piece in Firstpost titled as "No Job for Muslim MBA? This should come as no surprise in Modi's India". The article is on the denial of job to a Muslim Management Graduate by some nut job in Mumbai, who reportedly sent an email to the young lad that read "Thanks for your application. We regret to inform you that we hire only non-Muslim candidates". As dumb and dirty as it appears on the part of the Company to refuse a candidate on account of hs religious background, it sounds sinister and downright bizarre on the part of morons like Suroor to link or associate every single ill that is plaguing this country with "Modi" or anything to do with "Hindutva". Now the above reply could hav...

The recent mandate that AAP got in the Delhi Assembly Election has once again made me wonder where are we heading as a matured economy and country? The mumbo jumbo of the much abused "Religious Tolerance" can wait. That is, at the most, a political statement. And it barely has an impact on economics of a country affecting millions. The kind of promises made by AAP is putting the electoral promises made by ADMK and DMK in Tamil Nadu to shame. I thought that only down South, people would be swayed by such "bribery", euphemistically called as "Election Freebies or Promises", till I saw the Yadav clan win the UP Election on the basis of precisely these kind of promises. And I realized that the day was not far away when even elections of Metros, generally dominated by the "Educated" and "Well Aware", will be fought on similar lines. ( I don't hold Delhi anything more than a Metro. Its an overcrowded metro. The Assembly Election i...