Two nights back Vinita, my wife, said to me : "I know what you are thinkng."
“The single biggest difference between the infrastructure of an advanced nation and a backward nation is its footpaths, not its highways,”Enrique Peñalosa, the former Mayor of the Colombian capital Bogota tells to The Hindu.
... and I'm ashamed to say so.
Forgive me my fellow countrymen for not fulfilling the most important responsibility as citizen of a democratic country.
This is the first vote that I missed since I turned 18. I'm 28 now, and a Non-Resident Trivandrumite. And that's what I have become.
Let A = {Things which can increase the happiness of the larger society}
Let B = {Things which I'm capable of doing well}
Let C = {Things that I will enjoy doing}
Let D = {Things I'm doing now}
ABC = A ∩ B ∩ C
(∩ denotes intersection)
Questions :
What is the role of "faculty in charge" in various activities happening in a college campus?
Administration allots every non-routine and many routine administrative work to faculty. It might be because they believe that their job ends once the work is allotted. Getting hold of someone responsible for not doing that work is as good as (or sometimes even better than) getting that work done.
All student activities need a faculty "advisor". It might be because, for the administration, it a priori fixes the scape goat if something goes wrong. For the students, it gives a liaison officer to the administration.
So being a teacher in a college campus, you never know where and when you will step on a charge. It's like walking on a charged mine field. If interested you can read about the charged mines that I have stepped on in my three and a half years as a teacher. In fact this blog post was triggered by the above.
There are positive, negative and neutral charges. A positive charge is a kind of charge that charges you up. A negative charge is one which does the opposite and a neutral charge is one which does neither.
Charges can come either as orders or as requests. The second is very difficult to refuse, but the first is impossible.
Some charges can be transmitted from one faculty to another. It can flow even against the existing field. The barrier potential is different for different faculty. Barrier potential is defined as the work required in bringing a unit charge from infinity to the person.
Charges can be transmitted over a wire, especially those terminated with RJ11 or RJ45 jacks.
Charges can be stored and sometimes storing the charge does increase the potential of the storer.
Charges are particles - they take up (your shelf) space and time. And they have a mass too.
Charges are waves - they cause interference patterns.
A moving charge can produce a magnetic field. You can observe it as deflections on a special type of compass called the head. The deflection due to the magnetic field is often perpendicular to the direction of motion of the charge.
Charges are mortal. After death, they go to reports and home pages.
The word insubordination always brings to my mind a memo issued to me and Remesh Sir by Mr. Mahadevan (when he was principal of GEC Bartonhill) a week after we had entered his office with some 35 other faculty members to register our protest against his vulturous preying on the week.
That you, Mr. R. Deepak had broken into the chamber of the undersigned on the ... Your act amounts to insubordination, gross disobedience, indisciplinary behavior, dereliction of duty and instigating other staff members to revolt against the principal ....I had since then cherished that memo as a certificate of merit and throned "insubordination" as a virtue. But today, the word insubordination flashed in my mind for an entirely different reason.
You end up believing that you can even plan and find time to think nothing.--
Whether the answer is an yes or a no, its only what I think, and not what it is. Just a perception and not reality.
How do we find anything about the reality without distorting it by our perception of it? May be I'll find out tomorrow.
To me, 'writing' is a conversation with you. You are an infinitely patient and positively criticizing listener.
Before publishing any of my sentences to the world, I discuss it with you as long as it takes for it to reach a level of clarity and impact. Writing, many a times, turns out to be a process of crystallization of vague thoughts into a clear structure. And I like it that way. I loose the joy of writing if I wait till the crystallization is complete in thought. And we share the innate joy of watching an idea crystallizing into a sentence.
I like to be with you only when we have a room all for ourselves and I don't have any imminent deadlines to meet. I never take you along when I go out for work or to party. I don't tell you good bye when I leave and never tell you when I'll be back. I never call you when I'm out, or answer your calls. But you don't complain.
In fact you never complain. That's according to me your worst habit and that's the reason I love you most and that's the reason I write so less, and thats the reason I enjoy writing the most.
I know that you are nothing but a ghost of my own creation. But I can never believe so. At least, not when I'm writing.
I joined as lecturer in NIT Calicut yesterday. Inside the administrative block , on the ground floor, there are two small fish ponds. Some big gold fish were swimming in one of them in company of an angel and a turtle. I was waiting there for some reason and my mindless eyes were on those gold fish for a long time. When my mind joined the eyes, it started a conversation with them.
Fish (to me): Which direction should we be swimming?
My mind (to me): Ahh, It's that same old Alice in Wonderland question
'Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'My mind (to me): Ohh, let me not be so philosophical. Let me try, if I can help those fishes. Think. Think.
'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,'
'I don't know where. . .'
'Then it doesn't matter which way you go,'
We are just two lost souls, swimming in a fish bowl, year after year.
Running over the same old ground. What have we found? The same old fears.
Wish you were here.~ Roger Waters, David Gilmore, "Wish You Were Here" c. 1975 Pink Floyd Music Publishers Ltd.
There are two Trivandrums that I see. One that I see from the driving seat of my Maruthi Zen and the other that I see from the window seat of a City Bus.
No no, I'm not talking about the Trivandrum of the haves and the Trivandrum of the have nots. Even when I understand that it is an important topic to write on, I don't have statistics to do that. Now, I'm just talking about the looks of the city.
I had left Trivandrum in Island Express[1] in July 2002 and returned driving my Zen in March 2005. I've given the Zen to workshop yesterday for a round of patching and polishing and so he will be away for this whole week.
Ever since I had returned to Trivandrum, I was mostly seeing the city from the driving seat of the Zen. And I too had the waves of surprise, nostalgia, appreciation and back pain. But today, with him in the workshop, I took a City bus from Peroorkada to Statue, and got a window seat on the left row. Since I wasn't going for anything urgent, I was just absorbing the view of the city as a function of space while the bus accelerated and braked its way through the same old city. And again a new wave of surprise, nostalgia, appreciation and back pain rolled over me.
From the driving seat of my car, I see the city as an arrangement of roads, traffic islands, traffic signals, turns and parking spaces. From the bus I see the city as a string of shops and people waiting in the bus stands. (A third way of seeing the city is when I take a walk with some of my friends, and then I hardly see the city.)
Is the first view when I traverse the city with a purpose and the second when I just absorb the journey? Is the first about the results and the second about the details? Is the first about the me of today and the second about the me of yesterday?
No no, I think the first is about me keeping myself busy in thoughts.
Am I depriving me of a sweet joy by keeping myself busy in thoughts? Plans, analysis and purpose. Are they all conspiring to take away a different view of this world from me?
Ahhh. Its analysis again. Stop.
Notes:
1. Thats not that train's official name since ages, but people just don't call it Kanyakumari Bangalore Express. Local historians say that It was originaly named after Wellington Island in Kochi.
An SMS conversation.
July 22, 2007, 2 pm at VHSC School, PMG.
1. My SMS to Biren, Divya and Baiju Sir :
Am I seeing democracy in action? I'm in ward sabha of kunnukuzhi ward on behalf of my principal. More than 90% here are women.2. Reply from Baiju Sir :
Its not for nothing that India is hailed as the biggest democracy.3. Reply from Biren :
Let us not glorify it seeing it as a surprise. In Kerala at least, we know democracy is in action at ground level. It is only that we never participate in it. So its a time to pity on us.4. My reply to Baiju Sir, Copy to Biren :
I'm hunting in the terrains of my memory to recollect even one meeting that i have seen in which women outnumbered men.5. Reply to Biren :
Ya true. I pity you. And you can pity me.6. Reply from Biren to 4 :
Almost all saksharatha classes were like that.7. Reply from Biren to 5 :
May be its time u are out of that US. Keep it up. I have to go a long way to be out of that. So let me pity myself.8. From Biren :
BTW, who is the councilor there? Kunnukuzhi Manoharan?9. Reply to Biren :
Ya. This is some experience da. And I know, this too won't contribute to any action from my part.
I have this odd (or is it?) habit of starting to read a new book before finishing the one that I have been reading then. Its quite usual for me to be reading two or three books at the same time . Usually I'll end up having one book for the lazy mood, one for the alert mood, and one for the inspired mood.
By the way, I'm a very slow reader and sometimes very disloyal to books. I abandon many midway and those which I finish, I take ages to do it. That is the reason why I keep out of bibliophile gangs. Reading never comes to me naturally. Unless it is such a well written book. Classics like Idiot and Love at the time of cholera were abandoned mid way. Thats the kind of a Brutus that I'm.
But this last month or so, I have almost lost count of the books that I have left open on my table.
[I had originally posted this some time during Feb 2007 in my class website (glassroom) under the tag introspection. The server crash there had wiped out this along with so many other articles. But today I stumbled upon an off-line copy of this in my hard disk. So I'm reposting it here.]
Christ Nagar School, my second home during upper primary and high school education, was celebrating her annual day on Feb 9, 2007. It was hard to resist when the present vice-principal, Thomas Mani Sir invited me that afternoon to come to the function in the evening. When I came to know that Vimal was also going to be there, I had no second thoughts in going there.
After the PTA executive meeting at college, in which I somehow managed to stay awake, there was still about an hour left before the function. So I went to Museum compound, made two rounds of brisk walking and then retired to one of the garden chairs. I had timed the second round in my stopwatch and noticed that I could complete one round (which by the way is said to be 700 meters) in 6 minutes 28 seconds, and made a quick mental calculation to satisfy myself that I'm keeping over the 6 kmph mark (100 meters per minute).
While on the chair I was wondering looking at the pigeons there - "I know the mechanics behind how these birds fly, but do I know how they manage to get that forward thrust along with the lift?" Hm, may be it is the shaping of the wings, but I was wondering more on why I did not wonder about this anytime till now.
When I knew Vimal was going to be late, I washed my face at the museum canteen and proceeded to drive to Christ Nagar. After parking my zen on the road, I walked down the lane past the imposing and unforgettable crescent shaped school building and to the ground where the function was happening. The function had already begun and most of the plastic chairs were already claimed. I was infact happy to find the gallery seats vacant, and promptly claimed one.
Watching the kids from there was thought provoking. The small ones, the big ones, the volunteers, the trouble makers, the crisis managers ... How do they all grow up so differently in the same school?
Then I met Rajani and her friends, then Biju Sir and family, then Vimal, then Thomas Mani Sir and also Ouseph Bhai. We discussed lot many things and enjoyed the mega cultural events. The major programs were a big concert by the students and a visualization of Kerala history from Vasco-da-Gama to present. Some factual errors like substituting the "urumi" of Unniyarcha with a "vadi vaal" could be ignored considering the effort that has gone in.
We left at around 8.45 pm, I and Vimal promising to return the next day morning to help Mani sir configure the moodle installation.
Next day morning at 9.15 when I reached the ground, I found the plastic chairs waiting for the truck. I was thinking aloud to Vimal about my days at school. When the volunteers used to assemble at school on the morning after every big function to fold all the steel chairs and stack them back in the go-down. When I told this to Mani Sir, he said :
"Those days are gone. Now parents don't allow their children to volunteer for physical labor"
I was thinking of the orange in the food pack that we volunteers used to get after stacking all the chairs.
PS:
Moodle is up and ready in Christ Nagar.
