The Complete Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

I have never come across such an insane book. I now understand why it was such a smash hit worldwide and particularly among the teenagers at the time of its radio broadcasts because it is so imaginative and very very(write as many number of 'very's you want) funny. The book isn't about the plot. The plot is just a mask to bring out the awesome one-liners. You never know where the story is going but frankly you don't care! The constant references to the vast universe and the triviality of life is so exciting! I am still in the process of completing the series but couldn't resist talking about it. I think why it clicks so much is because it is not only funny but couples it with amazing imagination and talks about 'The Life, Universe and Everything' ;). The whole mood is so up-lifting and takes the series to a much higher level.
        It is true that I found it a bit boring at some places mainly because the story is not gripping and bores you after a while. But it is worth reading for the crazy, wild and insane dialogues. I am thoroughly enjoying reading it and strongly recommend it to everyone. To further stress my point, I will soon come up with another post with a compilation of some of the best dialogues from the book which made me crack-up a lot.
        I rate it 4/5 for entertaining me so much.

The one with the 'Considerable Malpractice'

      This incident involves the Hostel Affairs Secretary of IIT-M. Now that I have captured your attention let me get to the details. It might take time to set the background so please bear with me. A couple of weeks back six of us from all possible divisions of Elec-06 batch(B-Tech & all 3 divisions of DD) went on a trip to Vizag & Aruku. Lets call the people thighs, HAS, potti, p3, dixcy and manav. We were staying at thighs' house. One night after dinner we all sat to play a game of cards. We played poker(Insti amateurs version) for a while and then decided to play Lit, a four player game.
      A small intro to the game Lit for people who doesn't know it: It basically involves four people divided into two teams(of two each). Pack of cards is divided into eight sets and the two teams have to build those eight sets(six cards in each set) by asking others for the cards. You lose your chance, if the person you asked doesn't have that card. A person cannot ask for a card of a set A if he doesn't have any other card from that particular set i.e. you need to have 'at least one card'(lets call it the base card) from a set to ask for other cards of that set. This small intro in enough to understand this incident.
      p3 & dixcy already know this game very well and thighs, potti & HAS learnt it the day before. potti, thighs, p3 and HAS started playing for a while as manav learnt about the game. After some time, dixcy replaced p3 and p3 being GOD at the game was just giving tips to the players in general.
     Couple of games went by when p3 thought of helping HAS what with insti elections coming by and told him that, it is possible for a player to fake by not asking any card from a set even if he has a base card theryby tricking others into believing he has no base card of that set. HAS was so happy at this gyan that he literally put up his famous glowing face. After some time p3 fell asleep and manav replaced potti in the game.
     HAS & thighs are one team and manav & dixcy, the other. I think its better to give the dialogue version from here.
(Right now, in the set of '9 to Ace of clubs', manav has J,Q,K,A and dixcy ran out of all his cards. So only HAS, thighs and manav are playing)
HAS to manav:     Give me king of spades.
manav gives.
HAS to manav:     Give me 10 of clubs.
manav doesn't have that card so the chance goes to manav.
manav thinks:        HAS doesn't have 10 of clubs(because he asked for it) and I don't have it which means.....
manav to thighs:    Give me 10 of clubs.
thighs gives
manav thinks:        I have all cards in the set except 9 clubs now. HAS asked me for card 10 clubs earlier which means he must have a base card at that time which must be the remaining card of the set, 9 clubs.
manav to HAS: Give me 9 of clubs.
HAS:                   yay. I don't have. I tricked you, haha.
everybody's face expression: what the hell?
manav to HAS:    How can you ask me for 10 clubs without having a base card?
HAS (again with his I-beat-you glowing face): I can do that. Ask p3 if you want. It is a 'considerable malpractice'.
Everybody started laughing at HAS when thighs mentioned that actually he too doesn't have 9 clubs. So nobody has 9 clubs! everbody is looking confused when lo and behold HAS takes the card from under his hip(we were sitting on the foor)!!! It looked to us like he deliberately hid the card and then feigned it saying its a 'considerable malpractice'.
    We were laughing our hearts out(even p3 woke up and joined us) when HAS started apologizing saying he didn't know the card was there. As we were laughing he tried to explain that he misunderstood what p3 said earlier about tricking the opponent.
      I never laughed like I did that night. From then on, till we were back in insti, we laughed at that incident at least 10 times. Now, it has become a part of our group's lingo.
I tried my level best to explain the incident but as they say, one has to be there and experience it to get the feel. So though it may not look that funny in writing, I can never forget that incident or the look on HAS face that night ever in my life.

One night @ a railway station

Foreword: The series of events described here are real-life experiences.
          A couple of months ago I had to go home suddenly(I feel so lucky for that now). So, I went to Chennai Central at 9pm in the night to catch TN express. To my utter disappointment(at that time), it was announced that the train will start late by at least 2 hours. Dejected, I was just walking to the far-end of platform 8. That is when I saw her. She was on a train on platform 7. She just took my breath away for a couple of seconds. I have never seen someone so beautiful. In true filmy style, several songs started playing in my head. I sat on a bench opposite her coach and was just staring at her. The angel was deeply immersed in a magazine. She didn't notice me for several minutes. I still remember the beautiful smile on her face when she saw me. I tried to return the favor.
        While all my world was concentrated on her for those few minutes like Arjuna's was on the bird, what I didn't realize was that her mother was sitting next to her! Gathering all my courage together, I looked away immediately on finding the mother looking straight at me. But alas, my heart could no longer bear the burden and I had to turn back and look at her. My joy knew no bounds when I find the angel still looking at me. I had to do something. I can't just keep smiling at her. Her train may leave the station at any time. I want to talk to her at any cost.
       I took out the cream biscuit packet I was carrying and walked to her window and offered it to her. She took it shyly, put the Tinkle she was reading away and proudly displayed it to her mother. The mother smiled and asked her to thank me. I asked her what class she was studying in, what her favorite cartoons are and many other things which I don't remember now. Sadly the train started leaving a minute later and she kept on waving goodbye to me till I can't see her or the train. Thus ended a beautiful half-an-hour in an otherwise tiresome journey to home.

Thinking about 'How I am able to think of myself'

         I always have these thoughts about concepts like 'self' or 'consciousness' etc. but I never had more chances to discuss  it with others. I guess at least by jotting down some of my ideas, I will be able to make the picture clearer for myself and I can start a discussion with you people as well.
         First of all, how do we define consciousness? Is it the thought process initiated when you try to question yourself? I mean like 'who am I?' or 'What am I?' etc. All the thought processes happen inside our brain only. So, when an entity which is 'intelligent' can question itself or let's say 'realize' its existence, is it what is called consciousness? To put it in a better way, is it possible to be 'intelligent' but not 'conscious'? i.e. how do we separate intelligence and consciousness?
           A small child say of age 2-3 years is intelligent in a normal human being sense of view. But is he conscious? Is he aware of his 'existence'? Does he 'feel' his existence? I some times think we unnecessarily glorify this term called 'consciousness'. What I mean to say is, maybe this realisation of 'self' is inevitable given the presence of 'intelligence'. Maybe this is what happens in case of the 3 year old child.
           Maybe when an intelligent being(say small child) learns to distinguish between things similar to itself, the natural next step is to distinguish 'itself' from others. For this to happen, the senses through which it perceives outside world plays an important role in my opinion. Some sort of self feed-back should happen to these senses which then results in recognition of self. Take the example of  Vision. Something like say mirror might play an important role here. When the child sees the outside world it questions it, remembers it, analyzes it and takes decisions based on it. If I put a mirror before it, it will try to question it like 'Did I see it earlier?', 'What is it?' etc. When it sees itself in the mirror only, it realizes that  it is seeing 'itself'. If this is correct what are the equivalents of mirror in other senses? But does this mean a thing which is intelligent but has no senses can't be 'aware of itself'? Of course, without senses/inputs there is no point in being intelligent.
          Another basic question is how do we even test whether an intelligent thing has 'consciousness'? Does all living things like ants, birds, insects have 'consciousness'? They definitely have brain and are intelligent, for one thing.
         Another interesting aspect is if we take 'consciousness' for granted like we took 'intelligence' for granted to look at 'consciousness', emotions and other 'thoughts' attached to 'self' might be the next logical step.(or is it not?)
          Let me stop here for now. I sometimes think the most challenging thing for our race is to figure out "How we are able to figure things out" or as I like saying "How are we able to think about brain using our brain".
         When one sees all this from a still broader view like life being a negligible part in such a huge universe which is in existence from billions of years, it feels kind of weird. Once we realize how trivial our existence in this vast universe is, our everyday  worries, goals etc look comical sometimes. We fret over things like bad food in mess, stupid weather etc. Even 'big' things like 'corruption', 'war' etc seem so silly from the point of view of the universe.....
         I only wish I get answers to at least some of these questions before I 'die'(what is death anyway?).

An ATM from Tirumala

I recently went to tirumala and see what I found in an ATM there!

Looks like God really is omnipresent :)

P.S: This was taken using my newly bought digicam