January 2018 – Abhinav Bhatt

How to look cool with cool Spectacles

Back in 2011, I wrote this: The World is Round. It was not only badly written obit for Steve Jobs but also very vague. Not that I have improved a great deal since then but I will go ahead and write another post about glasses.

I have been wearing Glasses or Spectacles since 2001 as I suffer from myopia. Most others also suffer from this and they don’t know it but I mean that figuratively. I will digress if I go in that direction more. Coming back, my story of how they came into my life is kind of weird.

Around that time, a Hindi Movie Kaho Na Pyaar Hai had released. That movie had Hrithik Roshan donning spectacles and probably for the first time a protagonist who could be said good looking, looked good with the glasses. Till then, rarely any Hero used to wear glasses. He somehow made wearing specs look cool and not come off as a nerd. So when I complained that I might need glasses, it was more so because of trying a new look for myself, instead of actual vision issues. Vision and Mission are to be ignored.

https://i0.wp.com/www.filmfare.com/media/content/2016/May/11_1463052529_640x640.jpg?resize=620%2C453 — http://www.filmfare.com/media/content/2016/May/11_1463052529_640x640.jpg Not the best image of course #teamKangana

So, funnily, when I got my eyes checked, I got +0.25 as the number, or whatever the terminology is, for both the eyes. That’s hyperopia actually! The ophthalmologist said that I can skip using glasses and if I eat healthy, leafy and green veggies, soon my eyes would be 6/6 again. But I had to look good. I went to the Optician and got myself a pair.

After a few months, when I got frustrated of wearing them and I had no hopes of looking like Hrithik, I went to get eyes checked again to see if I actually need them. That time, I was told that my eyesight actually requires something in the order of -0.50! <pause of comedy music>

Since then, I have to wear glasses while driving, watching TV/Computer and in general. Now the number has further increased and I have to wear them most of the times. I should have eaten those healthy, leafy and green veggies more. After wearing them for more than 15-16 years, I thought that I had become sophisticated enough to switch to contact lenses now. Also, because, somehow I still feel that my face is incompatible with wearing glasses but living with what you are most uncomfortable with is what makes the character, they say. They only make me look more sophisticated which is kind of redundant.

After trying the contact lenses for a day and putting them on and off a couple of times and failing miserably, I gave up. I have no patience to spend 1000 minutes in putting them on and taking them off every single day. People do it but they might have long-term plans about their lives. Not me!

I shifted back to good old spectacles and I am satisfied with my looks with them because I stopped caring about it early in 2001 itself.

But, the point of the post is none of the above. Sorry for wasting your precious time. Rather, I have to share 2 new kinds of glasses which are on the market watch nowadays.

Sunglasses by Snapchat

Snapchat made these sunglasses which have a camera inbuilt. You can make stories for your Snapchat, if you have an account, still. Or act like a funky futuristic but old James Bond from 1950s.

Via https://medium.com/@zachlieberman/daily-sketches-in-2017-1b4234b0615d

The above is an epitome of redundancy.

ThinOptics

Now, this is something Matrix-y. This company makes glasses which are so easy to wear that you will even forget that you have them on. Since I have failed with the contact lens, the next thing I want to fail with could be these. Check out their video on the link above.

Google Glasses

Hehe, no nothing to see here. This also failed to take off like Google+.

That’s all folks. If you try the above innovations, kindly let me know your review so that I see if I look any better with them. Nobody has called me chashmish yet as I still don’t wear glasses all the time but some might have thought of saying.

Photo Credits:

Photo by mari lezhava on Unsplash

Shoot for the moon

In case you have been following this blog lately and have noticed a break in the blogging streak so early, please note that I was out vacationing and all. So, kindly excuse. I said I will blog almost daily. 1-2 days off in between should be okay, I guess!

A few days ago, I came across an article/ news that ISRO and Indus Moon Mission have parted ways in a not so happy manner which means that India’s first ever private moon mission and in fact India’s very first mission with a Lunar Land Rover is in danger of getting scrapped.

This was heartbreaking. For those who are unfamiliar the Indus Moon Mission is a private firm based in Bengaluru which is competing in a brilliantly conceptualized Google Lunar XPrize contest.

As per the contest:

The competition’s $30 million prize purse will be awarded to teams who are able to land a privately funded rover on the moon, travel 500 meters, and transmit back high definition video and images.

This is the future we see in the movies. Private firms competing to land their spacecraft on different planets.

The deadline for this is March 31, 2018. But due to this fallout between Team Indus and ISRO, it seems bleak that India’s entry would have much chance, as of now. Fingers crossed. Not only that, PSLV of ISRO was also slated to carry another competitor of XPrize Japan’s HAKUTO.

I have always envisioned our country (no sarcasm) as one which will always be at the forefront of space missions. Despite our economic conditions, I strongly believe that if we put aside some budget to aim for these gigantic scientific feats and put trust in our able team of scientists, it would always work in the end. For those who argue against this and put forward the notion of spending money only in uplifting poor should understand that the amount of inspiration a young poor kid can get by seeing their fellow countrymen sending things in outer space on a tight budget but with an unmistakable accuracy, that amount of inspiration is unfathomable and can lead to an amazing future generation. Each such mission could mean putting seeds of inspiration in young kids minds who would turn up and be the next Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam.

This setback for Indus Mission was quite a shocker as all these days, they were very much enthusiastic regarding this partnership made in heaven. However, things might not be that bad as Indus Team is still marching ahead with their plan and looking forward to another partner.

It would have been doubly great with ISRO but if they are able to sustain and maintain their zeal, hopefully, they will shoot for the moon and hit the target (via a soft landing).

I wish them the best and hope to write another congratulatory blog post after March 2018. Also, ISRO is planning for their own Moon Mission pretty soon as well. Kudos to them as well, as always.

You may read more on Indus Moon Mission here:

https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/team-indus-the-first-indian-space-start-up-drops-out-of-moon-race-1797928?amp=1&akamai-rum=off&__twitter_impression=true
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/science/isro-teamindus-deal-falls-apart-japanese-moon-mission-delayed/articleshow/62502748.cms
https://sputniknews.com/asia/201703021051195419-india-moon-mission/

Update on Jan 24, 2018

Welp pic.twitter.com/weQ62yPpr9

— Loren Grush (@lorengrush) January 23, 2018

Last Presidential Address

The script for my last presidential address at my Toastmasters Club. I didn’t deliver it exactly as the script but you can still read it for free:

Today is my last Presidential Address. Please don’t cry at the end of the speech. For the last 25 odd Toastmasters Meetings, I used to prepare something for each week.

How many of you read the December 2017 edition of the Toastmasters Magazine? (How many of you know that there is a Toastmasters Magazine published monthly?)

On the very first page, there’s a line by International President DTM Balraj Arunasalam, where he is quoting Mark Twain,

“A person who won’t read has no advantage over one who can’t read”

In the same way, he says that

“A Toastmaster who won’t lead has no advantage over one who can’t lead”

It means that if you have an opportunity to lead a group of people, for your and their betterment, you must grab that opportunity with both hands. As Robin Williams said in ‘Dead Poets Society’,

“Carpe diem”

First of all, I would like to state that Trailblazers Toastmasters Club is not my baby as in I wasn’t a charter member or part of the executive committee until January 2017. But, when I had joined it in June 2016, soon I did adopt it as my baby. I saw it as a place which had huge potential for me to grow as a person. It was a place where I could meet new people and develop my communication skills. I tried my best to capture the moments I had in the club. Over the course of last one and a half years, I have seen this club grow from a novice club to a sophisticated club now. We now have proper standards, practices, procedures, and processes to run the club. In the recently held elections, we not only got the 7 officers elected on time, 3 more people stood up and took the responsibility of Associate Officers.

During my time as acting VP-Education, VP-Membership and then as President, with the help of the executive committee, we tried to do whatever I could to make the club beneficial to everyone. I hope that our efforts were useful to all the members. I said this in my Presidential Acceptance speech 6 months ago and I will say it again that if we take our role in Toastmasters a tad bit seriously and see it as an opportunity to help others, we can do wonders. I will share a small story about helping others which I had read in a book some time ago. I hope you see some lesson in it:

In 1892, at Stanford University in the US, there were 2 poor students who were not able to pay their college fee. So they approached a pianist Paderewski to perform in their college. Paderewski was quite the superstar at those times. They thought that they would raise enough money from the tickets that they would be able to pay the pianist as well as pay their fee. They asked him to perform for $2000. He agreed and performed.

But, they could raise only $1600 from the concert. With their heads hanging in shame, they went to the pianist and said that they will give the rest of $400 later when they will be able to pay for it. Currently, they said that they were not even able to pay tuition fees. So, they gave him a cheque for $400 and requested him to encash it later. Instead of shouting and scolding them, to their surprise, Paderewski told them that they don’t need to worry. He will not only deduct his fee for this concert but also agreed to pay their tuition fee for them.

Years passed. It was the time for the First World War. The pianist Paderewski had now become the Prime Minister of Poland. Poland was ravaged due to the war and was in dire needs of food and ammunition. He approached the United States to help them. US President Hoover quickly sent food supplies and helped Poland during the war. When Paderewski went on to thank President Hoover, Hoover said that he needn’t thank him. He was just returning the favor. He said he was one of the 2 students whom Paderewski had helped a few years ago to pay their tuition fee.

Think of your Toastmaster role as a role of not self-improvement but helping others. Improvement will happen automatically if you come to the meetings. By helping others, by doing small things, can have a huge impact on others lives. Like taking up roles in a Toastmasters meeting. Your role as Ah-Counter can help someone stutter less and become a better speaker. I could go on and on.

Before I sign off as the president, I would just request all of you, the new officers and the members to try to help each other. I am always there to help. You just need to be proactive and ask for help. You just need to capture the moment before it is too late. You can take my adopted baby now and help it grow more into an awesome person in the future.

Continue reading “Last Presidential Address”

Saying Thanks

This question might sound rhetorical but please tell me how many of you buy things online?

Have you read the order confirmation email when you receive it? Doesn’t it sound so automated and without any emotion right?

There was/is a company which used to sell CDs online. When someone used to order CDs, they used to send the confirmation email like this:

Thanks for your order with CD Baby!

Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with sterilized contamination-free gloves and placed onto a satin pillow. A team of 50 employees inspected your CD and polished it to make sure it was in the best possible condition before mailing. Our world-renowned packing specialist lit a local artisan candle and a hush fell over the crowd as he put your CD into the finest gold-lined box that money can buy. We all had a wonderful celebration afterwards and the whole party marched down the street to the post office where the entire town of Portland waved “Bon Voyage!” to your package, on its way to you, in our private CD Baby jet on this day.

We hope you had a wonderful time shopping at CD Baby. In commemoration, we have placed your picture on our wall as “Customer of the Year.” We’re all exhausted but can’t wait for you to come back to CDBABY.COM!!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Sigh…

We miss you already. We’ll be right here at store.cdbaby.com patiently awaiting your return.

Noticed the difference? See in whatever way you connect with people, it might change their perception of you and vice versa. I had read this in Tools of Titans in the profile of Derek Sivers. I thought this email confirmation story might have been then in the past but apparently, it is still on.

How many times have today you said Thank You to someone with honesty? When was the last time, you were said thank you by someone else which was genuinely heartfelt? The thank you which genuinely moved you?

Thank you are just 2 small words which, if said genuinely, mean a whole lot to someone.

In my email signature, it always used to be ‘Warm regards’ or ‘Thanks’. But I saw one colleague of mine who had the longest 2 words ever: ‘Thank You’ for his signature. If you read it a couple of times, it would genuinely appear better than our usual stock replies.

I changed mine to ‘Thank You’ as well. When I am actually not thankful, I make it back to post-millennial ‘ty’.

Featured Photo on Visual Hunt

Skin Whitening Shit

Whether you were near or away from the Equator,
You ought to have the tone which you assumed to be better

You tried to apply balm, creams, multi-colored ointments,
Still, you couldn’t get rid of the obvious resentments

Did you think it was NOT because of the color of your skin?
Or your short-sightedness or your current/last birth’s sin

You gave up, gave in and considered yourself inferior,
You let them have it, for superficial fun, you ruined your interior

How does it matter, what is the shade you have now, your life’s up for bids
You learned it from your elders and taught the same to your kids

Be Black, White and Asian like panda, they said
But you handed over your soul to the rules they laid

Till when will you wait, to raise your voice?
Most of it anyways will fade into the noise

It would work better if you could do see a bit,
First stop applying yourself any Skin Whitening Shit

Continue reading “Skin Whitening Shit”

Happy Birthday Minimal Movie Posters India

Thriving Minimal-ly since Jan 2012

On January 5, 2012, I published a minor unnoticeable poster of Mr. India on my blog and shared the link on Facebook. Some of my friends liked it and shared the post with others. That encouraged me to make few more posters the next day. Then some others started to contribute. Then it went on and on and on. I have written enough about it already here, here and here (there is no third link but triads look good, is all).

I also, just want to say the following:

Main akela hi chala tha janib-e-manzil magar
Log saath aate gaye aur karwaan banta gaya
– Majhrooh Sultanpuri

मैं अकेला ही चला था जानिब-ए-मंज़िल मगर
लोग साथ आते गये और कारवां बनता गया
– मजरूह सुलतानपुरी

میں اکیلا ہی چلا تھا جانبِ منزل مگر
لوگ ساتھ آتے گئے اور کارواں بنتا گیا
– مجروح سلطانپوری

(H/T to these folks for the above)

Anyway, this is going to be a very short post because today is the birthday anniversary of Minimal Movie Posters India. I would like to thank again all the people who have made this community a successful one. All the contributors, the people who liked and shared the posters, the friends I made through this, and the media people who published about MMP on Newspapers and sites.

Minimal Posters don’t go viral anymore but the community is still thriving and pushing out content regularly.

Here are some numbers, for stat nerds:

800+ Posters
More than 20 Contributors ranging from Age 16 to they-didn’t-reveal-their-age
Indians from all over the world contributed
10,000+ followers overall (it is a big number. I think.)
Over 2,50,000 page views

Way to go!

How to start a Blog?

I had started blogging in January of 2007. That time, my sole intent was to earn money. So, I quickly set up a Google Adsense account and started putting ad banners of all sizes on my blog. Initially, there were more banners than blog posts. During those days, even the Earnings Per Click (EPC) was good. I started writing more and shared the blog link with all my friends. I even went on and set the Home Page of the default browsers in my engineering college to my blog. That time, I hadn’t created a Facebook or a Twitter account. Probably, no one I knew had. So, the only way to share the blog links to get more readership was to go to other blogs, comment there and hope to get a reply. If you were lucky and your comment made sense, people would click on your profile which would then lead them to your blog eventually. And guess what, people were less cynical those days. Most of the bloggers of that time connected with each other. Commenting and regularly sharing new links among each other had become common. By 2008, the camaraderie grew and joint-blogs started. Bloggers started networking and regular meetups were organized. By then, I realized that I liked writing. I realized that putting thoughts on a blog opened up many new avenues in the mind which I didn’t know existed. I made many friends that way as well. (Also, I never was able to reach the minimum 100$ mark which is needed for Google to release the payment. So, it means I haven’t earned anything yet from my text-blogs).

So, I continued with blogging without worrying about money, although not very regularly. But I kept on publishing some content here and there even when most of the bloggers I knew gave up and switched to usual social media microblogging.

Now, I am proud to say that I am still continuing. Writing and sharing means a lot. It makes one minutely better than those who don’t. Not everyone can write. Not everyone who can write is brave enough to share. So if you are writing and sharing, it adds a bit of flair to your persona. Also, this is always a give and take relationship. To write more, you have to also read more. Reading other blogs can give you as good an insight as a good book will.

As I have declared that I am going to blog regularly this year, I have already started to write daily since last 2 weeks. At least 6 people I know, have shared their intentions of starting blogs of their own. The main aim of this very post is that I want to help those who want to blog, but either doesn’t know how to blog or need a push to blog.

Here are some pointers which would help you:

Make Writing Your Passion

Don’t worry about the readership or money. First, start a blog and write.

Make an Account, NOW

To start a blog, you can make an account on WordPress.com or Medium.com. These 2 are the most popular platforms nowadays. You can use tumblr.com or blogspot.com as well. Personally, I would suggest Medium because it is also a great way to start reading more.

Start Writing

What to write? It could range from your movie reviews to your travel experience, or something you know which you want to share with others, or some quote which you liked, or your opinion about a certain issue. You can write about your cat or you can write about how to file Income Tax Returns. One thing I know and have experienced is that writing can help you understand yourself better. By writing, you don’t react, you respond.

Where can I help?

For your and anyone new who wants to write, sake, I have started a New Publication on Medium.com. On that, I would encourage everyone who is new to join. By doing so, we will create a small community of new bloggers. Whenever you think you have matured enough as a blogger, or have reached a threshold of say 10 posts, you are free to leave the community and carry on with your posts elsewhere. No hard feelings.

We can figure out moderation rules and stuff later. I just encourage you to jump in and start writing. Please drop a mail to [email protected] once you have set up your blog.

Mutual Benefits

If we can start this community with even 5 people, your 1st blog will already have 5 new readers. We can encourage each other to write more. You encourage me. I will keep a check on your progress. What say?

For the above point, the link to the publication is this: https://medium.com/kycnow

Kickstart Your Creativity Now — A Blogging Space for New Creators

Mail me / ping me / talk to me and start with your first blog. Share the link with me and I can add you as a Writer on KYCnow. You don’t need to link your aadhar to be a writer, I promise even if the name is misleading. 🙂

Monthly Archives: January 2018