Category Archives: opinions

Personal opinion about culture, movies, books.

So I recently watched ‘Rocket Boys’ & ‘Oppenheimer’

But first, CONGRATULATIONS EVERYONE FOR CHANDRAYAAN – 3’S SUCCESS!

It is just fitting that I finished watching the Sony Liv series ‘Rocket Boys’ based on the lives of Homi Bhabha and Vikram Sarabhai, along with some bits of Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam just a day after the successful landing of Chandrayaan – 3 on the region near the South Pole of Moon.

Although the series is a somewhat fictionalized version, it stays true to the overarching events that showed the birth of the Indian Nuclear and Space Programme over a period of 30 years from 1940-1974. It is a slow-burn kind of series but nevertheless, entertaining. I am just glad that somebody had the audacity to adapt the lives of great Indian scientists and tell whether they were flamboyant or serious or both, which one cannot grasp easily as everything of the past looks a tad bit serious somehow. I am currently reading ‘Surely you’re joking Mr. Feynman!‘ and it tells details of major events like the building of 1st atomic bomb or the Manhattan Project as if it was just another day in a manner which makes you nothing but chuckle in amusement.

Talking of the Manhattan Project, I also watched Oppenheimer in IMAX a few days back. And I watched it alone. It is the 2nd movie I have watched alone in a theater, strictly for educational purposes. The first one is, Mohenjodaro, again for educational purposes only. The sheer intensity of the movie makes it an enthralling watch. And it again brings to light the various sides of scientists who are also people after all.

It is indeed a good thing that important scientific events and people get a chance to relive through TV shows and movies. With the amount of progress being made in tech, we take things for granted easily. I hope to see more such movies and series where they talk about sciency stuff. Like ‘The Vaccine War’ 😉

P.S.: What’s more annoying? Brits claiming that India is using its aid to fund the space programme or people calling Chandra-YAAN Chand-Ryan.

Header Photo by Dan Meyers on Unsplash

100 Days

Of return to Bengaluru

Ulsoor Lake

Ulsoor Lake

It’s been 100 days since I returned back to Bengaluru and have started to travel to work. Few observations, in no particular order:

  1. I wanted to avoid Traffic and Weather in this post but all in vain. No matter what, these 2 topics always come up in every other conversation. This city needs to rise up above this.
  2. Roads and Traffic are slightly better. At least on the ways I travel.
  3. So heartening to see Metro work nearing completion at some places.
  4. Rain now ruins both the road and the traffic like never before.
  5. New Eateries have opened up. They are now bigger, crowdier, and more Instagram-worthy! Many old places are now gone too. May be every 10 years things have a churn. This time may be due to Pandemic, changes are more intensive. Few comments:
    • The Rameshwaram Cafe: so much crowd that you want to avoid. But so much hype that you want to visit. Repeat.
    • The Filter Coffee, Indiranagar: becoming new Favorite. USP: Sambhar is not sweet here.
    • Iron Hill, ORR: Loved it.
    • Long Boat, ORR: Okayish.
  6. Working from Home, 3 days a week. Same feeling as earlier.
  7. Working from Office, 2 days a week. Welcome change. New faces. New seat. New view. But, it is not the same as earlier because it is still not feeling organic.
  8. Cycling is bliss. I bought a new one and am now very tempted to go everywhere on that. But, the mindset to give up generating pollution takes some time. Hopefully, the frequency of cycling increases.
  9. All the past relationships are almost vanished. Several people have moved out, or are yet to come back. Faces are becoming hard to remember.
  10. I am not regretting the return as much as I thought I would. It is like I just went away for a small break and life has become back to the way it was.

All in all, the return to Bengaluru is old news now. Things are returning to old times. Old is the new normal, I think.

Hello 2023

I can’t be the only one who still thinks March 2020 was just a few days ago. Many things have changed since then but some part of the mind hasn’t moved on. Maybe it would move on once someone officially says that “Pandemic is over now. Go and enjoy life like there’s no fear!”. I know, I know that 90% of the world has already assumed this and that’s great! Hopefully, 2023 would be the year when we actually move past this and start afresh.

Also, I didn’t do a roundup of the whole of last year this time. In fact, I did only 1 blog post in the whole of 2022. I usually write when I want to write as a habit. Or when I feel something strongly about something (even if that strong feeling is temporary). But in 2022, I didn’t feel strongly about anything and I didn’t want to delve into a habit that cannot be sustained.

While sounding bold, here are my predictions for the year 2023, for the world and myself. Humor me:

World

Work from Home / Hybrid Work / Regular Office fans would try to stick to what they like and if someone tries to force them to do the other, it would lead to friction and that would generate heat. This might lead to further division in society and an increase in global warming. Blame Modi for this, of course. Meanwhile, choose your favorite while adjusting to what your manager wants.

Ukraine Russia War will reach its conclusion this year.

India-China Competition will intensify. India will try to manufacture like China and ‘Made in India’ will become synonymous with ‘Made in China’.

AI-generated content may seem novel and exciting at first, but it will eventually become just as mundane and predictable as human-generated content. This is because both AI and humans are limited by their programming and experiences, leading to a limited range of ideas and expressions.

Obviously, the above paragraph is from ChatGPT.

https://chat.openai.com/chat

MCU vs DC rivalry (which isn’t a rivalry as MCU has already won) will diffuse and a new superhero movie or series would change everything. It won’t be The Boys even if that seems anti to everything.

Reels and Social Media – Social media is dead. How long ago did you spend a whole day on Facebook now when you can waste it watching Reels/Tictoc/Shorts. The shortest video snippet-type content would stay and would become the biggest waster of time on the planet.

Electric Vehicles will become normal. Their charging stations should start appearing everywhere. Outside actual petrol pumps as well as near your favorite paan shops.

Elon Musk would get tired of his own tweets and start to concentrate on making some things that are actually useful for humanity.

Personal

I have to move back to Bengaluru and find a new place to stay. Whatever savings I have done in the past 1 year would be evaporated for the new accommodation. I haven’t watched KGF yet so not sure if Karnataka is open to accepting me again.

I will definitely visit the office this year while inhaling the freshly stale air of office air conditioning, regret coming back.

Staying Thethered

A couple of days ago, I appeared for the final exam of my Masters in Data Science. So, it’s finally over, done and dusted.  Did I learn something? Yes. Could it be done better? Definitely. Do I feel happy? Of course. Do I need to study further or is it the end of education? Hah no. Struggle has just started.

It has been an amazingly unpredictable last 2 years. This blog has been a witness to it. Many new things happened lately too. Mostly good, still some bad. I finally received something due at workplace which was pending from a long time. Should I jump in elation? Yes. But has the work reduced or became easier? No.

All in all, the point of writing this post is to remind myself that no matter how high one can go, there would be something which would keep you grounded, thethered or in orbit. There will be happy news in life. It might be delayed but they will be around the corner. There will also be some regrets, some health issues, some outrage.

I guess, it is okay to be tethered. Even when one takes a leap of faith and jumps, there is bungee.

What’s really natural?

Anything which hasn’t been meddled with by humans yet could be called natural. But everything gets impact by human activities. The remotest place on the planet would have had some impact of things happening elsewhere. El nino and what not!

When it comes to food, normally we wouldn’t check ingredients. But there’s a reason that there is a requirement to show the ingredients on the packaging. So as one grows older (and pants become tighter), we start reading what makes the thing so tasty: generally added flavours, emulsifiers, refined sugar. But then what’s actually natural? Potato, tomato, chillies weren’t naturally available anywhere except few countries. Now we have them everywhere, GM or not.

It is indeed difficult to find natural things. So what can be done? What Tradeoffs between luxury or taste, economic value or ease can be made?

I guess, the expert answer as per me is this: As long as you can tolerate, enjoy what you think is natural (or what law allows). Later, everyone takes support of unnatural things like medicine, technology, and luck. Enjoy.