chaotic order

Jottings - Slice of life - 113 ( Anna, congratulations!!!) It is not often that one gets to write congratulatory notes on the growth, evolution and promotion of two individuals close to you. I wrote a short piece on Rajan’s remarkable journey today morning, and in the evening, as I was sitting in the sauna basking in its intense heat and sweat listening to the sonorous voice of Abida Parveen singing rapturous poetry of Kabir , my brother called to inform his elevation to a very senior position in the oil industry and will now move to Mumbai - the heart of India’s business. I felt twice blessed with good news today. Driving back home, My thoughts went back to the mid eighties, when my brother had just finished four years of bachelors education in Chemical engineering at coimbatore, and was with us in Hyderabad applying for jobs. It is always a pivotal point in a Man’s life - the pregnant waiting, the undetermined transition from secure student life when no questions are asked to a

Jottings - Slice of life ( A remarkable professional journey) RV college of Engineering, Bangalore may not be in the same league as IIT’s. At least, not in general public perception, but for those who have lived in Bangalore, interacted with the college, met its professors or head of departments, mingled closely with its alma mater - it quickly becomes quite clear, those who have studied and graduated there possess an ambition, charisma, grace, leadership and an ability to continuously learn which have often propelled them to highest echelons of success in many organization across the globe. This is not to say it is the atmosphere of the college alone which contributed to their success; we must give equal or more credit to the quality and calibre of students it has managed to attract from all parts of Asia. Over the last half a century, it has produced stalwarts in virtually every walk of life without too much fuss or propaganda. Sapnesh Lalla, our new CEO- designate ( announced

Jottings - Slice of life - 114 ( frequent flyer - eccentricities and uncertainties) Every seasoned flyer will have at least one; most likely many personal stories to share about flight delays, interminable waits at airports, missed flights and bags, bad seats, re-routing, long layovers, unexpected upgrades, bad food, ineptitude of flight personnel , so on and so forth. In fact, in most airport bars this is the most common subject matter of conversation - whose and which flight stories are more entertaining or excruciating than the other? But I believe the true sign of a frequent flyer lies in the composure and presence of mind they display during abnormal travel conditions. How well and how quickly can we accept the fact that running this complex network of air travel , including a zillion variables - both man-made and natural - can break down in so many different perceptible and imperceptible ways. While, as travelers, our focus is to reach our destination as painlessly as possibl

Jottings Slice of life - 109 ( Salman Rushdie - my muse) There are only few contemporary novelists who can match the torrential and luxurious prose style of Salman Rushdie. Perhaps a Mark Helprin, Julian barnes, a Kazuo Ishiguro or an Ian McEwan can sometimes write few paragraphs that transcend normal semantics of writing, but no one, in my opinion can consistently, page after page, sentence after sentence, pour into a novel so much lingual virtuosity, elegance of phrase, clarity of thought, audacious flights of imagination and characterization, spell binding story telling; and a seamless narrative gathering itself like a river in spate all that it encounters into one magical climax without , even for a minute, losing track of the central thread, the axle of the story being told. Reading Rushdie is losing oneself in a world only pure geniuses can create, where imagination is everything, and inhabiting that magical world of imagination is a rich profusion of ancient and mythical sym

Jottings - slice of life - 108 ( The taming of a beautiful, cold beast ) To observe a snow storm from a Hotel room is spectacular. Especially those of us for whom snow is a rarity. And what a blizzard it was. For five hours, little, cold, sizzling flakes of soft ice cut through strong winds with ceaseless precision. Within no time, the brown earth was covered by a patina of white coating, which grew in density every passing minute. Vigilant snow ploughers standing by with their machines would sweep the roads, only to be covered again with a rich, copious deposit of fresh snow, even as the plough engine moved ahead. Relentless!! is the word that comes to mind. I took some time off from my meeting, put on my wind sheeter, and stood out in the front lobby, hearing the merciless drone of cold winds, witnessing a face of nature that was at once fascinating and terrifying. But what impressed me is the state of preparedness of Man used to living in such conditions. The city of Boston

Jottings - Slice of life - 107 ( "Technology evangelist" and not a technical Instructor) As a teacher, the only consolation and joy at the end of the day is to have inspired, modified and enhanced the levels of understanding of your students. Nothing more!! This week was an extraordinary adventure. In the class were fifteen senior participants, six in the class, and the other six attending online from different parts of the world. They work for one of the biggest payment solutions business in the Western hemisphere, and for more than two decades all their data is stored and managed on standard relational databases. We are talking in the magnitude of hundreds of terabytes every two days. Each one of them in the class have solid background in Databases, back to the days when Fox-pro ruled the roost and before, and from there moved to become DBA’s ( Database Administrators) for large scale data storage solutions for transactional processing. The challenge is now to move

Jottings - slice of life - 106 ( “The innocents” - an Anne Fontaine film) “Faith is twenty four hours of doubt and one minute of illuminating hope..” - Wise Sister Maria explains to the young French red cross Doctor Mathilde Beaulieu, as she attempts to convince the Sister of the need to look beyond religious beliefs and vows to God. The history of sacred faith hinges around this pivotal point. Can one forsake deeply inculcated beliefs around God, heaven and sin to yield to matters of flesh? Can we abandon convictions of Hope, comfort and security in an afterlife to the ravages of the daily living and its horrors? Can we reconcile what happens to us now to what we have been given to believe for ages? Can we live for that one minute of clarifying hope while enduring every hour of unceasing doubt and apprehension? These are questions this beautiful film raises in our hearts and minds. Much has been written, said and discussed on the horrors of second world war, and the moral depriv