Holi log

Thursday, 08 March
14:30: Buy copious amounts of Bhang
14:45: Consume copious amounts of Bhang
15:30: Start feeling sleepy
15:30 – 19:30): Resist sleep
19:31: Consume copious amounts of KFC and a virgin Mojito
20:00: Start losing short term memory. Everything is in episodes
20:15 onwards:
Start feeling giddy and start losing sense of Balance. House feels dark and depressing, even though there are many lights on. Unable to control my smile. Feel hungry again. It feels like there are ice cubes in my stomach. I must have something to eat and then go to sleep. I just had a phone conversation but cannot remember with whom. The computer monitor seems a long way away from me; a few hundred metres at least. But how am I then typing on it?
20:21: Filled my bag of Sun-dried tomatoes with Olive Oil
20:40: Am having sad thoughts. Maybe some ancient bad dreams. Of a place that is remote, full of water. Maybe rain water and a sharp metallic smell. Start listening to “Shine on you crazy diamond” to lighten the mood. The opening notes seem to be going on for quite some time. A long time. Stuck maybe?
20:45: Sudden craving to watch Michael Palin’s New Europe; although I cannot find the DVD.
20:47: Have that school-time Sunday evening depression; even though I am not in school and its not SUnday evening
21:31: Had a lot of dinner. Maybe worth 2 people. Kept having sad thoughts. Wondering of some time when I sat in front of TV all night long till it was morning.
21:34 Some hallucinations
21:40: Started watching Michael Palin’s new Europe. Stopped watching in 10 minutes and deleted
21:52: Started listening to Shine on you Crazy Diamond again. Music seems oddly low on Tempo.
22:01: Go to sleep
Friday, 09 March
12:00 Noon: Woke up after being asleep for 14 hours
Overall, this was nothing compared to this

Features I want to be implemented in the Nokia Lumia series

I have been a smartphone user for almost as long as I have used a cellphone. As a user, I have evolved over these years. Most of my smartphone experience has been with Symbian (95%) and Windows Mobile (5%).

Planning to move to a Nokia Windows Phone in the future, these are certain features I am used to, which I find sadly missing on Nokia WIndows Phones
Notification LED: Its an LED on the front panel of the phone which blinks periodically whenever there’s a new Missed call or SMS.
For me, this is highly useful because most modern smartphones don’t show anything on their screens when in standby mode and you have to press a button and go to the lock screen to see whether there are any messages or missed calls.
Windows Phone supports this for Missed calls and voicemails only, not for SMS.
Nokia Windows Phones don’t have a Notification LED at all.
Profiles: I prefer to use different profiles when I am at home (Loud Ringer, no vibration, email alerts), when my phone is in my pocket (No Ringer, vibrations, no email alerts), when I am sleeping (No vibrations, low volume ascending ringer , no email alerts, calls only from family members) and Silent (No notifications at all).
This is something I have gotten used to such an extent that I felt terrible when I had to use an iphone for a week.
Windows Phone does not have this functionality natively at all.
Without these 2 features, there is no way I can buy a Nokia Windows Phone.

Why I hated Rockstar

First of all, I would start off by saying that many will be super-pissed to read this. This is purely my personal opinion and it is understandable if most people don’t agree with me. In fact I might have liked the movie if-
1. The movie was not named Rockstar
2. The second half was compressed into half hour
I had very high hopes when the movie was initially announced because the movie was to be shot mostly in and around Delhi and I have a soft corner for such movies. My hopes went considerably down when I came to know that A.R. Rehman would be composing music for the movie. I swore not to watch it, but was coaxed into watching it by friends. Here’re some salient points from the movie
+ Ranbir Kapoor acted well
– Ranbir Kapoor’s character’s (JJ’s) living conditions were totally un-realistic. Apparently the walls in his house (which by the way were covered with Jim Morrison’s posters) had big holes in them. Maybe they wanted to show that Jats are resistant to heat/rain/cold/insects.
– The music in the movie is not Rock. A.R. Rehman cannot get away with pretending to compose rock. The music in Rock-On!! was Rock; the music in Rockstar was Pop with heavy guitar riffs (which feel out of place in the songs) and guitar solos (which appear out of no-where and feel out of place as well). Well, you can’t have high hopes from the person who composed one of the worst and most hyped songs in the history of Hollywood and won an Oscar for it.
– Mohit Chauhan might be a good singer (I personally am not aware of his work), but he is no rocker. Shouting “Hey Hey” multiple times doesn’t make you a rocker.
– The actress Nargis Fakhri cannot act. Her pout is distractingly irritating. Her character was too extreme to be true as well. Her transformation from a Shareef girl from a well to do family to wanting to watch Porn Movies in the theaters of old Delhi and having Desi Daroo was too much to digest. Even Indian boys who leave home and go to different cities for the first time don’t do this. She could have settled for watching Porn at home and having regular alcohol.
– The movie showed it’s true Bollywood roots when Heer (Nargis) dies (in India) while the JJ (Ranbir) (who was deported from the Czech Republic on criminal charges, but is surprisingly allowed to return back) is in the middle of a passionate solo in a concert in the Czech Republic. How is JJ supposed to know she’s dead right at that moment? He can’t receive calls while he’s on stage. To make it convenient for him, Heer’s ghost takes a detour on her way to hell (remember the alcohol and the porn?) and visits JJ on stage as a final farewell.
The only reason I was able to sit through the whole movie was because me and one of my friends (who also didn’t want to watch the movie) made fun of it all the time and passed comments.
For some ligh-hearted fun, read the Vigil Idiot post on this movie.

The Great Gig (under the sky)

Last night was my third Think Floyd night. I have already covered how awesome the band is and how they play during my first and second gigs. This time was as awesome as ever and much better than the second time.
This time the gig was held on the terrace of Vapour bar and lounge, Gurgaon. The ambience was amazing; the best ambience I have ever seen for a live performance. There was a full moon out, there was a cool, pleasant breeze flowing and the metro would whiz by close to the mall every few minutes.
The set included more or less the same combination of songs as the last few times (Yes, Dark Side was played in its entirety).
Since this was an open venue (no entry fees or cover charges), some losers did make it to the venue. It was actually hilarious to watch them make a fool out of themselves.
Loser 1:-
Loser 1 is a short & thin guy, dressed impeccably in formals, sitting at the bar as far away from the band as possible. You can imagine that he grew up in South Delhi & when he was young, his parents didn’t refuse anything he asked for (probably got a BMW at the age of 11); which is why he turned out to be a loser. Suddenly he comes up to the stage
Loser: C’mon guys. Play some Morrison
Chintan: We’re gonna play Morrison next Thursday
Loser: But I want Morrison now
Chintan: Next Thursday
Loser: You don’t know how much money I spend. You gotta play my request
Chintan: Someday we’ll play requests
Loser: Some more fake-accented shit
Chintan: Man I’m not even listening to you anymore
Loser: Utters abuses in Punjabi and goes back to the bar


Loser 2:-
Loser 2 is with a bunch of friends, standing right in front of the stage, dancing, making rap signs and desecrating the best Pink Floyd songs. During an instrument tuning break, he gets up on stage
Loser: September 11 was worst day of life yaar. Mean worst day yaar. I cried yaar. I hate Pink Floyd yaar. I mean Pink Floyd legend yaar. I am Pink Floyd legend yaar. I cannot tell you yaar. I mean september 11 was just worst day yaar. I am the biggest legend of Pink Floyd yaar. I hate Pink Floyd yaar. I just so happy Pink Floyd come to India today yaar.
I works at Accenture yaar. I such big legend, I bunks office tonight for Pink Floyd yaar
Crowd: Fuck Accenture
Loser: You can say that
Crowd: Fuck you
Loser: I am TL!!! (Tech Lead)
With this awe-inspiring statement, he walks off the stage and goes back to dancing. His facebook update tomorrow will be about how he shared stage with Pink Floyd.
Videos (Make sure you click on HD before you start playback)

How to beat a Hangover

Tonight’s party can be tomorrow’s nightmare. While heavy consumption of alcohol can liven up even the most boring parties, it can make the next day horrible and completely un-productive and make your head feel like a throbbing mass of shit.
Being a victim of this phenomena many times, I have found out a few ways you can salvage the next day.
First of all, we must know why a Hangover occurs. A hangover is simply dehydration (loss of water and salt from cells) caused due to alcohol.  Dehydration is caused by alcohol’s ability to inhibit the effect of anti-diuretic hormone on kidney tubules, which leads to a hyperosmolar state, which in turn causes shrinking of (by loss of water) the brain cells which causes hangover. Here’re a few tips which can be observed (while still proving to your friends that you’re a man) during and after Alcohol consumption


During:-

  1. Drink large quantities of water. Alcohol consumption does cause excessive urination, and drinking even more water will cause even more frequent urination, but it does help. I generally have one glass of water after every full mug of Beer (or a peg of vodka/whiskey).
  2. Don’t mix different drink types or different types of the same drink type (Hop-based beer with wheat-based beer, beer with vodka, beer with wine etc.)
  3. Eat well. Prefer starchy slow-digesting foods like rice and potato, just don’t sleep empty stomached.
 
After(If you already had too much to drink and now its time to go home):-
 
  1. If you feel nauseous and feel like you want to throw up, do so. Don’t hold the vomit back; instead let go and remove all the excess alcohol from your stomach. This will not only reduce the hangover duration, but will also lead to a good night’s sleep. Do remember to re-hydrate yourself properly though.
  2. Keep a bottle of Gatorade (or similar) next to your bed. You are bound to wake up at night to urinate /feeling thirsty and drinking Gatorade helps. If possible, keep a couple of Dispirins (Aspirin) next to the bed as well and have them during one of the mid-sleep urine sessions. Most of the times, I feel this cures the headache by the time you wake up.
  3. Have plenty of fluids and salts the next day. Avoid having more diuretics like coffee and soft drinks; which will cause more de-hydration.
  4. Do some light exercise. Go running (not in the heat) or do some cardios. This will increase the metabolism rate of your body and metabolize the alcohol faster.
Consuming a large quantity of plain water may cause it to drain more salts out of the body causing a salt imbalance in cells. If Gatorade is not present, Lemonade helps (with lots of salt). 
 
After a lot of unpleasant hangover days, I feel that these days I can get rid of my hangover by the time I wake up or by mid-afternoon max(If I have passed out and don’t wake up in the middle of the night). 
 
Hope this helps a few people out.

Different types of “Rockers” you might encounter at a Rock concert in Delhi

Well, going to different Rock concerts in Delhi for more than 3 years, I have noticed how peculiar the crowd is, that comes to these concerts. I have divided them up into the following categories

  1. The Posers:- These are cool Delhi dudes whose main aim in life is to impress  girls and would go to any extent to do so. They come to these concerts impeccably dressed up, cool glasses, hair done up using copious amounts of hair gel. To give themselves the “Rocker” look, they wear things like scarves on their elbows, bad-ass gloves, chains hanging from their pockets etc. To complete the wannabe impression, they talk loudly in fake accented English and address each others as bros/homies/fellow-rocker. Before the concert starts, they would keep shouting things like “We will rock tonight” and “Rock my brains out” etc. It need not be said that their idea of rock music ends at bands like Linkin Park, The Rasmus, Green Day etc. They are mostly accompanied by rocker chick(s) (to be covered later) whom they explain the band’s history in detail and the songs to look out for. They are also apparently friends with at least one of the band members and would try to meet him in front of his friends to prove this to them. During the performance, they would frequently break into fake air-guitaring bent backwards. Why do they do all this? So that they can update their facebook profiles with their photos from the concert so that everyone can know how cool they are.
  2. The Rich:- These are men in 40s from areas like Vasant Kunj, Defence Colony, New Friend’s colony etc. They would come to a concert in their Mercs/BMWs/Jags, dressed in expensive suits with their socialite wives and crap-spoilt-fat children. They would keep checking and replying to e-mails from their smartphones (Blackberrys 2 years ago, Androids these days), “sit” at the back (so that no one steps on their expensive suede shoes) and pass the whole concert without any expression. The children would play games on their iPhones. They would  also look at distaste at the poorer crowd and leave some time before the concert gets over, so as not to mix with the poorer crowd.
  3. The Clueless:- These are mostly Jats & Bhaiyas with a lot of money but no culture/class/education. They would be passing by the venue (in their open air jeep) when they would see a crowd gathered and since they have no jobs or anything else to do, would buy tickets (not without haggling) and come in. Inside they would be clueless as to what is happening and would ask young folks “Yo kay chal rahya se” . Once the band starts performing, they would laugh at the type of music being played and also laugh at the headbanging audience and say ”Inme to bhoot chadh gayo”. But since they paid money for the tickets, they would stick around till the end, abuse everyone and leave.
  4. The Rocker chicks:- I should start off by saying that 99.9% of Delhi girls should not be allowed to enter rock concerts at all. They are an insult to the band as well as they fans. These are upscale Delhi girls. Their idea of being a rock-chick is to apply heavy makeup and wear small clothes (or Lady GaGa T-shirts). They would let their boyfriends (see: The Posers) haggle with everyone to let them be at the very front of the crowd, have the boyfriends (see: The Posers) bring a chair and sit and watch the concert. They would frequently ask the boyfriends (see: The Posers) to muscle their way through the crowds and bring them drinks. After drinking a little, they would dance to the solo of Comfortably Numb with their fellow rocker chicks while their boyfriends (see: The Posers) keep others away lest someone touches them and derives them of their virginity. Needless to say, the sight of such women makes my blood boil.
  5. The Dopers:- These are mostly Delhi University students. They drink and dope before turning up for the concert. They have long hair (if any) and thin emancipated bodies. They are mostly dressed in black with all-star sneakers. Their favourite genre is Death Metal. The louder the music and more incomprehensible the lyrics, the happier they are and more furiously they bang their heads. Between bands, they go to the corner to smoke some more dope (hidden in their socks or underwear) and then return for some more furious headbanging. After the concert is over, they stand clueless outside the venue with no idea of how to get back home. Surprisingly, this is the least dis likable groups of all the above.

PS: Thanks to Papa tere Papa of Baytay for the Haryanvi text.

Why Delhi/NCR doesn’t deserve Metallica (or any other band)

After the Bryan Adams fiasco and concert cancellation in February, here I am, spending another disappointed night at home. Metallica’s first concert in India, one I was looking forward to for months was cancelled. I don’t agree with what most of the news channels are saying; here’re the events as I saw them myself from the venue

  1. Gates were to be opened at 3:00 PM. The security personnel/organizers didn’t anticipate people queuing up since morning. By the time it was 3:00 PM, there was a huge dis-organized crowd, almost 30,000 strong, impatient to get it. The security personnel should have started organizing people in queues from the very beginning (Hats off to concerts I have seen in Mumbai; excellent organization and obedient people)
  2. Before the gates were to be opened, the security staff shouted at the crowd that unless they get into proper queues, they won’t open the gates. A 30,000 strong crowd (especially a metal concert crowd) can’t organize themselves in a queue just like that.
  3. After failing to form a proper queue, the security personnel just opened the gates. The crowd mass directly in the front of the gate surged forward, the ones on the left or the right, sensing that they aren’t making much progress, started pushing the whole crowd. This was sheer torture. For almost 40 minutes, we had to almost suffocate in the unruly crowd and risk being stampeded if we fell down. The ground was uneven. Many girls almost suffocated and had to plead with the crowd to let them leave.
  4. During entry, the security staff failed to keep up with the massive crowd surge. Not all tickets were checked and frisking was a joke.
  5. Once in, the people right at the front rushed towards the stage, banged against the barriers separating the stage from the crowd and broke them. Slowly people settled down and the crew members noticed that the front barriers were broken
  6. Crew members politely asked the crowd to move back a little so that the barriers could be repaired. The crowd did nothing
  7. Another crew member asked the crowd to do the same. They just kept standing like they couldn’t understand what was said to them.
  8. Another crew member called the crowd ‘buttheads’. At this point, the crowd started abusing back (but still didn’t move)
  9. Another crew-member politely told the crowd that the concert cannot start unless the barricades were repaired and that cannot happen with the crowd still pushing against it. Still, nothing.
  10. This went on for some more time. They also flashed the text on the screens which said the same thing. The crowd just laughed, abused and threw bottles towards the stage
  11. The crowd waited till around 18:30 when they were told that the show was postponed till tomorrow because of technical difficulties. At this point, the people standing towards the front went berserk and passing the already broken barriers, climbed up on the stage. They broke microphones, monitors and speakers.
  12. A few people gathered a banner and set it on fire.
  13. While I decided to leave, my last view was of a group of people trying to pull a huge speaker (towards the middle of the ground) down. There was not a single policeman to witness the whole event
I think the following factors contributed to this disaster
  1. The organizers/security personnel had little or no experience of dealing with a Heavy Metal concert crowd. The failed to ensure order from the very beginning. They didn’t anticipate such an early turnout and didn’t make arrangements for queues.
  2. Press says that the organizers were facing technical issues with sound, I cannot comment on this because I don’t know this for sure, but they did goof up big time. They failed to control an already unruly crowd and kept them waiting for too long before breaking bad news
  3. I feel the crowd was the biggest factor. Most of the people were unruly, already drunk/high and very different from rock/metal crowd you see in cities like Mumbai and Bangalore.
I see reports coming in now that the gig won’t be held tomorrow either, but will instead be scrapped. I understand that a band needs some rest between subsequent gigs (Metallica has another gig in Bangalore on Sunday), but the unruly behaviour/vandalism by the crowd ealed their fate. Metallica will not risk performing before such a crowd. Here’s a video

The people of Delhi/NCR don’t deserve to be rocked by Metallica (or any big band for that matter).

Mobile OS feature Comparison

I wrote a post earlier comparing various mobile O.S.es on things like features, stability, battery backup etc. Here I’ll do a comparison of some features I find unthinkable to live without. This is not an exhaustive feature comparison, just some features which I regularly use. I have used Stock OSes to compare. CLick on the image for a bigger version






  • Multi-tasking:- Symbian/Android & Blackberry OSes support full multitasking, where any program minimized will keep running in the memory in the background and will be able to perform all functions it normally can, in the foreground. This means that a minimized browser will continue to load a web-page in the background, a messenger application will continue to stay connected to its server and keep you online.  iOS and Windows Phone 7 on the other hand have a slightly different concept of multitasking. Any minimized application is frozen in memory and can perform only basic functions in the background. This means that a browser will not continue to load web-pages in the background, but will resume where it left off. However, messenger applications will be allowed limited connectivity so that they stay connected with the server and can show notifications whenever there’re any updates. They below semantic explains how this works on Windows Phone 7.
The latter method is inherently more restrictive, but more efficient in battery, RAM and CPU usage, especially for users who forget to close apps after using them.
  • Notification LED:-  Symbian, Blackberry (and some) Android phones support a physical LED on the phone front, which would blink whenever there’s a notification (Missed call alert, unread message, email etc.) that needs attention. Blackberry goes a step further and employs 7 different colors in its notifications LED depending on the kind of alert. Now this feature was present on feature phones since the last 10-15 years but has conveniently been left out by Apple & Microsoft in iOS and Windows Phone respectively. This feature is even more important on modern smartphones where the display is  switched off when the phone is in standby. There’s no way to know if you have any notification without bringing your phone out of standby and looking at the display.
  • Profiles:– I have a been a Nokia user ever since I started using a mobile phone and this is one of those features I am completely used to and cannot live without. Basically, profiles allow you to configure different behavior exhibited by the phone when there’s a notification. I have at-least 4 different profiles I use everyday (General, Pocket, Car and Sleep). e.g. in General, there’s high volume ringing and no vibration, in car, there’s low volume ringing and no vibration, in pocket, there’s no ringing, only vibrations, in sleep, there’s no vibrations but ascending ringing tone. This is just one aspect that can be customized; I am used to customize everything e.g. message tone, e-mail tone etc. iPhone, Windows Phone 7, Android all allow just a toggle between “General” & “Silent”. For me, this is not enough.
  • Free turn-by-turn Navigation with offline maps:-As the names saw, this is the ability of the Mapping/positioning software to provide turn-by-turn voice based navigation. Nokia has an excellent Maps application which can do this with ease, Android’s Google Maps version supports this only in a few countries, iOS doesn’t support it a all natively, nor does Blackberry or Windows Phone 7. However, it is confirmed that Windows Phone 7 will get Nokia Maps for Nokia Windows Phones. Offline support means that the maps for a certain country/region can be stored on the device rather than the device downloading it from the server every time the maps application is invoked.
  • Access to device Filesystem:- This mean that you can simple connect your phone to the computer using a USB cable and without any software installed browse the device memory card/native filesystem, copy files to and from the device. Nokia, Android, Blackberry all have it, but iOS and Windows Phone 7 don’t. This means that you have to reply on a software like iTunes and Zune respectively to copy files to and from the device and also that there are only a few supported file types you can copy to the device. Far cry from how I often use my Nokia as a USB drive to transfer files
  • Custom ring-tones:- Frankly, this is not a must-have feature, but something I have got used to. Symbian, Android, Blackberry all alow you to set any mp3 file as a ring-tone. iPhone doesn’t allow this without a jailbreak, Windows Phone 7 allows this, but you have to trim the mp3 file and rename it etc.
Everyone may not want all these features, but are something I would look for whenever I would like to switch to a different O.S.

I want a new phone, but I don’t know which

It’s more than 6 months since I got my Nokia E7-00 and I am already bored with it. Earlier, I always knew which phone I wanted to buy if I had the money, but currently, there’s no phone in the market I would rather have.
This is why I want a new phone:-

  1. Software update roll-outs are too slow. Belle for newer Symbian phones is already out but update for existing phones like the E7-00 would still take at least a month more and maybe even 2 months.
  2. The beta applications by Nokia (Maps etc) which make the experience bearable are still un-refined
  3. Widgets are fixed at rectangular shapes and suck big time. There’s no good weather widget available at all
This is why I don’t know which to buy:-
  1. Apple iOS is still restrictive/too proprietary to hold my attention for long
  2. Android is too un-refined and power consuming
  3. There are currently no good Windows Phone 7.5 with a physical keypad available (Dell Venue Pro does not have good reviews and HTC HD7 is HTC)
My best bet should be to wait for a Nokia Windows Phone device with Nokia Maps and other Nokia add-ons.

Kolkata – Still the City of Sorrow

This is not the first time I am ranting about this city. See these

How to win a cricket match

Why Calcutta sucks…

Kolkata

P.D.A. in Kolkata

Last weekend, I got the opportunity to visit the city after a span of 2.5 years. Here’re a few things I noticed that have changed and some things that have not
Changed:-

  1. Some signs of development are showing up (2 new Metro Lines)
  2. More cars on the roads
Not Changed:-
  1. The filth still exists everywhere and in greater quantities
  2. People still bathe on the streets
  3. The cars still honk like crazy; driving etiquettes are non-existent
  4. City is still severely polluted, buses still run on cheap Kerosene/Diesel Mix
  5. People are still Lazy, un-friendly & in a state of perpetual anger
  6. Kolkata Airport is the worst airport in the country at the moment

The city has a quality of bringing a lethargic feeling even to high-spirited individuals. I used to leave the place I was staying at to go out multiple times a day, only to feel tired in some time and come back.
I had given some thought to shift there in the past few months (to save on money), but all those thoughts are now gone.