Job Opening

Just wrote down a possible job advertisement.

Dear All,

This is to inform all that our Hostel HouseKeeping Service is looking for
hiring a few motivated professionals for their Washing Department. Please
note our requirements:

-Candidate should be willing to Work-with-Hands!
-Knowledge of English Language is absolutely redundant.
-Candidate should be familiar with latest Soaps/Detergents
-Experience in maintanance of Washing Machines will be an add-on.

If you feel you have in you, please feel free to mail [by post] us your
resume by this month end.

Best Regards,
Sukhi Ram.
HR Head.

Richard P. Feynman

First heard about him in sixth grade. Yeah, seriously! My dad had gotten the complete three volume set of "The Feynman Lectures on Physics". I was always fascinated by new books in my younger years. So this natural curiosity got the better of me and I started flipping the pages of those volumes. Frankly, I read only the foreword by the author, but even then, I was impressed by the book in a strange kind of way. It was really my first close encounter [no not of the third kind!] with physics. I remember that I just browsed through the contents and stopped there. Anyways, it was not until my ninth grade that I could begin grasping some of the chapters especially on Classical Mechanics and on Gravity. It soon became my bedtime book! I used to read over the same chapters again and again, marvelling at physics more than at the author at that time. There was a chapter on Algebra which I used to find particulaly fascinating. It was written in a story kind of style and consisted of the history of number development and the ideas that brought about that evolution. I must have read that chapter not less than five times!

It wasn't until I joined IIT that I realized the books I had been reading all along my childhood were one of few classics in physics. Also, I learnt that the author, Dr. Feynman [CalTech] was a celebrated physicist of his time with extensive work in the area of quantum-electrodynamics [For which he was awarded the nobel prize]. Indeed I owe a lot to this man for whatever scientific temper I have, or maybe ever had. Listed below are few links which may be used to know more about him.

-Dr. Richard Feynman
-Feynman's Classic Talk [A must read]
-Feynman's Noble Lecture

My DDP!

Well most of you got it wrong as the title is not even remotely close to what I have in mind. Actually this self-made acronym stands for My Drop Dead Poo. Ok now honestly speaking its really difficult for anyone to have a close look at my poo. Its incerdibly obnoxious smell has a lethal effect on its beholders. Some may cry out in pain. Some may manage to puke the thing off, but to most its a drop dead experience. It needs a huge heart and the nose of a sanitary worker to stand my excreta more than a few seconds.

I have well thought out plans to turn it into a Weapon of Mass Destruction. The only preparation required is a good diet of Eggs, Aloo Parathas with Biryani to top it all off. And there you have a potentially life-threatning chemical weapon. If you have a person you hate like hell, please do read on. The weapon can be purchased in a variety of colors, ranging from white (!) to yellow, to green and to even black at rough times. But dear potential customers, a worst case scenario of a permanent state-of-extreme-shock is guaranteed.

I have the state-of-the-art testing facility in my wing "Lesunos" here in my hostel. The testing procedure involves having a shit and leaving the toilet un-flushed, only to wait for the test subject to arrive. You may pretend taking a piddle just beside the toilet. The reaction of the unfortunate onlooker instantaneously testifies the quality of my product.

Hope this has generated enough interest for my newest range of products. Still unconvinced ? Try it out now, its free as a special introductory offer!

Classic Definitions
1. Lecture : An art of transferring information from the notes of thelecturer to the notes of the students without passing through "the mindsof either".
2. Love affairs : Something like cricket where one-day internationalsare more popular than a five day test. 3. Marriage : It's an agreement in which a man loses his bachelor degreeand a woman gains her master
4. Divorce : Future tense of marriage
5. Cigarette : A pinch of tobacco rolled in paper with fire at one end &a fool at the other.
6. Conference : The confusion of one man multiplied by the numberpresent.
7. Compromise : The art of dividing a cake in such a way that everybodybelieves he got the biggest piece. 8. Tears : The hydraulic force by which masculine will-power is defeatedby feminine water-power ..
9. Dictionary : A place where divorce comes before marriage.
10. Conference Room : A place where everybody talks, nobody listens &everybody disagrees later on.
11. Ecstasy : A feeling when you feel you are going to feel a feelingyou have never felt before.
12. Classic : A book which people praise, but do not read.
13. Smile : A curve that can set a lot of things straight.
14. Office : A place where you can relax after your strenuous homelife.
15. Yawn : The only time some married men ever get to open their mouth.
16. e.t.c. : A sign to make others believe that you know more than youactually do.
17. Committee: Individuals who can do nothing individually and sit todecide that nothing can be done together.
18. Experience : The name men give to their mistakes.
19. Atom Bomb: An invention to end all inventions.
20. Philosopher : A fool who torments himself during life, to be spokenof when dead.
21. Diplomat : A person who tells you to go to hell in such a way thatyou actually look forward to the trip. 22. Opportunist : A person who starts taking bath if he accidentallyfalls into a river.
23. Optimist : A person who while falling from Eiffel Tower says inmidway "See I am not injured yet."
24. Pessimist : A person who says that O is the last letter in ZERO,Instead of the first letter in word OPPORTUNITY
25. Miser : A person who lives poor so that he can die rich.
26. Father : A banker provided by nature.
27. Criminal : A guy no different from the rest... except that he gotcaught.
28. Boss : Someone who is early when you are late and late when you areearly.
29. Politician : One who shakes your hand before elections and yourConfidence after.
30. Doctor : A person who kills your ills by pills, and kills you withhis bills.
31. Computer Engineer : One who gets paid for reading such mails......

Infy to bhaiya infy cool hai!
Well its no secret that India is always short of icons, people/things which we poor souls can look up to and probably get somewhat motivated. You can count them on your fingers [yeah even with a normal hand ..no need for sixth Hrithik Finger]. Here's my list in no particular order...

{Sachin Tendulkar, Amitabh Bachhan, Mahatma Gandhi, IITs, Bollywood (?), Indian Railways, Spirituality, Taj Mahal, Infosys}

Well, the last entry in the above list is what I had intented to write about. Infosys is the dream come true for India. A lot may written about its success story, but the recent news that has made us all proud is that it crossed $ 1bn. in revenues! Here's an excerpt from the rediff article on the story...
----------------------
Is there anything that can go wrong for Infosys?
No, say information technology analysts from leading equity research companies.
Infosys is clearly on a roll and its results declared on Tuesday morning have beat market expectations. Despite, an appreciating rupee, volatility in the United States over the outsourcing issue and margin pressures, Infosys has managed to show a 31 per cent growth in revenues and has issued a glowing forecast for the forthcoming fiscal. Infosys earned a thumbs up from the stock markets when within a few hours of the announcement, its share prices went up by over 5 per cent

"It positions the company to increase the strategic relationship with its customers and drive incremental revenue opportunities in its customer base as well as with new customers," says Sameer Nadkarni, a technology analyst with WR Hambrecht, a financial services firm headquartered in San Francisco, in a research note put out a day before the results were to be announced.

Infosys added 2,425 employees during the last quarter compared to 3,052 in the previous quarter.As of March 31, 2004, Infosys had 25,634 employees compared to 23,209 in December 2003. During the entire year, Infosys added an astounding 11,900 employees. Analysts say that they are confident that Infosys can manage its growing flock. "The business model and the management are capable of handling these issues. Infosys has proven that it can handle large scale employee training and retention issues," says an analyst with a Mumbai-based equity research firm.

With the announcement of these results, Infosys has also managed to achieve another milestone - become a billion-dollar company. Apart from Infosys, the Mumbai-based Tata Consultancy Services is the only other company to touch the billion dollar mark in revenues. The scale will definitely help Infosys compete on a global canvas against established players like IBM and EDS, says analysts.

"Today, we have the required size, brand, compelling value proposition and ambition to build the next generation software services and consulting company," declares S Gopalakrishnan, COO, Infosys proudly.
-----------------------
Congrats Infy! You've sure done the country proud.

Lara Lappa Lari Lappa!
Lara tussi desh ka naam roshan kar ditaa puttar!! No this isn't a punjabi munda lavishing praise upon Lara Dutta, instead the desi version of a Windies Fan crying his lungs out for the man called B. Lara. He yesterday became the first person to score 400 in a test match. And this is the second time he has smacked the three tonner. Can you believe it ?!! Boy! he sure started the agelong controversy over who being the current best batsmen all over again. Here's some comments posted on iitb.general by random users.

[1] history repeats itself after exactly 10 years!!!same opponent(england) and the same venue(antigua)....the only difference is the phenomenal decline of the windies in worldcricket....in '94, west indies were still carrying their unbeaten streak in testcricket (to be broken by the aussies in the very next season) and antiguawas hosting a dead rubber...now too, it's hosting a dead rubber, but with the windies desperatelytrying to avoid a whitewash....how times hv changed!!!

[2] I have seen 2 GODs , one from Bombay and another from Trinidad.

[3] Nah...i wonder if you can call Lara better than Sachin coz of this record. Maybe saying both of them are almost equal wud be fair.Sachin has greater consistency. If you see Lara's career graph it has many ups and downs. Sacin on the other hand has been quite consistent. That explains his 34 centuries. And all this inspite of the number of one-dayers he's played during this time! I think that's remarkable.

[4] sachin has accumulated a lot of runs. but seldom has he won test matchesfor us. u will find that his record in the fourth innings of a test matchis not so good. lara on the other hand has singlehandedly won matches forwindies over past years. hes definitely the better batsman.

[5] Lara has 24 hundreds, yaar. He has 5 doubles and 2 triples as compared tosachin's 3 doubles and no triples. in tests , lara is a touch better thansachin , while in one-dayers sachin rulz.

[6] Let's all remember that we ppl judge based on statistics...we can't judge the talent coz we know nothing about good batting...But look at ppl like the Don...he knows. He can judge who the best is. So can Barry Richards and Ian Chappel...and they all choose...not surprisingly...Sachin

[7] Well look at the stats given in the newspaper today...yes lara has more runs in lesser matches but onhly marginal...and sachin has a higher average...both have equal no. of man of the match awards...so both gave equal no. of match winning perfomances...its only that Lara's team went on to win and India failed... So Lara is not all that much better when compared to Sachin...and if u consider one-dayers too and the no. of matches each one of them plays...i think over-all Sachin stands out as the best.

...and the debate continues!!

[Listening to Upparwale from Khakee]

The "Simplex" Phenomenon!
First heard about the company from two of my batchmates taking refuge in my room after being alomst thrown on to the road!!

[Aside: Nagax/Golu if you happen to read this piece, you know I love you guys :-) ]

Anyways, back to the theme, these two informed me about some Japanese company in the process of recruiting for the post of quantitative analyst. Now one may talk about the "right career options", the "most suitable career path" almost endlessly, but $60K are enough to water any and every mouth. More so in IIT, where an elec punter is ready to give up his four years of "education" for a career in Finance! So when the news of this particular company spread like fire inside the IIT Bombay's campus it required no survey to conclude that EVERYONE who can, is going to apply. So started the process of converting one's resume to look attractive, even if remotely, for a finance job. Last heard from some completely unreliable source that around 200+ people applied for the single post. All this, when there was absolutely no information available on the company's website.

Then after a few days [or weeks ?] people started receiving international calls. Some did for the first times in their lives. There was absolutely no prewarning of this "attack" from the company. Some of the people were reported to taking a shit while they got that all important call [Of course its another matter, that why they carried cellphones in the toilets. Some had the excuse that a lot of thefts were going on in IIT Campus, so nothing's safe these days! ] The lucky few who had the honor of attending that call, started googling for finance papers, reading about fixed income markets, derivatives and such stuff. People started analysing why a particular person got the call and why not the other. The conclusion was that the people who got the call possessed one or more qualities from the following set:
{Astronomical CPI, Courses in SOM, Neural Network Fundaes}

Finally, a mail from the company gave the rude shock [to most] that they had shortlisted only 4 from
the institute and 5 [!!] from outside IIT. Later on the knowledge that those "outsiders" were also IITB alumuni, the hullabaloo died somewhat down. So now I reach the climax of this story, which I guess I'll divulge in my next post!

PS: The Shrek OST is godlevel.

Kill Bill Volume I

Don't know how many I have watched this film. QT's is GOD. His Pulp Fiction was equally superb with excellent dialogues and some great acting by Travolta, Samuleson & company. But personally, I found KB a class above. Probably bcoz of it's distinct story line, god awesome soundtrack, and of course the fight sequences. Anyways, the movie's definitely not for pussy-hearts, with the blood show and all!!

Here's excerpt from IMDB Review of the movie [Rating =8.3]

The fourth film by Quinton Tarantino', as the credits shamelessly explain, is yet another bankable classic from a director who's already changed the art with `Reservoir Dogs', `Pulp Fiction' and `Jackie Brown'.

From `Kill Bill's first surprising gunshot to its monumental cliffhanger ending (right up there with `Luke, I am your father'), the movie is relentlessly intense, tearing an audience between wanting more action and wanting a cigarette to calm frayed nerves. We follow the tale of `The Bride' (played to convincing, vengeful perfection by Uma Thurman) as she sets out to murder her former colleagues, members of the `Deadly Viper Assassination Squad', and their leader, the enigmatic, faceless Bill. After attempting to leave the group of assassins for a normal life, the Bride is tracked down on her wedding day and witnesses the murder of her wedding party, right before Bill puts her in a coma. Four years later, a very angry Bride wakes up.

Tarantino pulls no punches, creating, as one critic put it, `The most violent film ever released by an American film distributor'. Squirting blood and flying limbs abound, but the director does it all with a breathtaking sense of style. We witness one sword-dance in silhouette, one in black and white, one over a beautifully filmed snow-covered Japanese garden, and even a sequence in Anime. `KB's story is minimal, but Tarantino's aim is style: Sergio Leone, Cheh Chang and Bruce Lee are all paid homage, and then gracefully outdone.

The soundtrack, primarily Japanese artists performing American styles, is haunting: Tarantino breaks form by not using well-known American classic rock (who could forget being `Stuck in the Middle' of Mr. Blonde and a helpless cop?), but by doing so sets the perfect mood of the film. They're songs we've never heard before, but feel strangely connected to.

Yes, the movie is in two volumes. However, the end feels right, coming after an epic battle that puts `Reloaded's `Burly Brawl' to shame. `Kill Bill' is a testament to Tarantino's ability to take the craft of his idols and make it his own, mixing classic cult film style and mixing it with his own wicked sense of Cool. Not for the faint of heart or anyone looking for a `feel-good' film, but `Kill Bill' is at the very least an instant classic.

been playing bouncing cow for the last 15 min. my highest so far is 420. its a cool game, especially when u can't think of anything else to do :D.

Also, don't miss the Yeti Sports. just search google for it and enjoy the coolest games ever !! My personal highest in Yeti Part I is 323.5. and in Yeti Part III I have managed 1709 (too bad i missed the last rank in top 1000 :(( ) Try out these super games and I bet u'll be addicted!

Okay! So this is my last attempt at blogging. dunno whether i'll return to write anything else. mebbe i'll set a yahoo reminder to do so every nite!! anyways, gentle reader, for now please visit my homepage. and here's the link to it. yeah u got it right. i want it to be on google! u can help me in the process by mentioning the above link @ur homepage.