opinions – Page 17 – Abhinav Bhatt

Work From Home Guidelines from a Non-Expert

Oh, yeah. Oooh, ahhh, that’s how it always starts. Then later there’s running and screaming.
Ian Malcolm, Jurassic Park – The Lost World

Fiction has become a reality. Who would have thought that it would happen so suddenly? But it is not an alien attack, or Dinosaurs roaming around, or an asteroid coming (It is coming but it will pass from a safe distance, for now…). You just have to work from home and live with it. In the beginning, it looked like a welcome change. But I am not going to the office for more than 10 days now and real colors of Work From Home Life have started to show their ugly faces. I know it is more like Work From Bed, but here I am, as a Non-Expert, to help you rise up and beat your own expectations about yourself and do Work From Home, the right way.

Here are some non-expert tips to deal with the grim situation:

Bed is Bad

Avoid sitting on the bed for 20 hours a day. Maybe sit on the floor and keep the laptop on the bed. Or lie on the bed and keep the laptop on the floor. Don’t ask me! I don’t know… I am not an expert. But stay away from the bed because the bed will stay, backbone won’t. If you already have a desk and chair set up, use that setup. And like I showed in the pictures above, keep changing the directions to have some variety.

Distractions

Everyone is working from home or at home not working. This means you will have to deal with an uncountable number of distractions. Your maid, your family, your pets, your kids, in whichever order you prefer, are going to pester you. The way to deal with this is to turn the tables and become a distraction for them. Disturb them so much that they maintain a big social distance from you and thereby, isolate you enough so that you can work peacefully. There might be debates and fights though. Again, I am not an expert but I can just suggest.

Schedule / Length of the workday

Very subjective. For those who really work will struggle with this as there might not be a start time and end time. For others, a cake walk. They will start late, take breaks in between, shut shop early and when you message them / call them / ping them, they will have the connection problem, electricity troubles, and fought with spouse problems. For single folks, they will have movies open in another tab which would hog the bandwidth. Basically, everything is blurry so who knows who is working and from when.

Working Out

Make plans about how to work out as now you’ve got slightly more time. You needn’t go out but you can see on Youtube: How to meditate, how to do Yoga and which is the right exercise to do after every 25 minutes. Make plans surely. Implementing them can wait. Optimistic folks say that this will get over soon so why change your usual habit of not exercising at all.

Stay Connected

You will soon forget the familiar faces whom you liked, had a crush on, you hated or you were indifferent to. So, it is a good time to stalk or block them on social media sites. It is the right time to know their political views or what their hobbies are. This might change some perceptions, who am I to tell, being a non-expert.

Food and Hydration

You are going to become fatter. There’s no denying that. But everyone is going to become fatter, that’s nice no! Except for those with daily wage jobs (black comedy joke). You are going to definitely sit for more than you did in the office. In-office, you could take long breaks for tea. You could have water cooler conversations about Big Boss. You could sync bathroom breaks with colleagues (it is a thing, really). But at home, you just eat, drink water, walk 5-10 feet and come back and then sit again. You can go to your balcony to track the time and the Sun’s position at least, right?

Rest you can take care of yourself and come up with your own tips. I am not used to working from home and I don’t think this was ought to happen to everyone in this decade. But this is the reality so make the best of it.

Here’s a list of things which you can use to really spend your time wisely, while not working from home. Check the full thread below.

https://twitter.com/nickdennis/status/1241259501510184961

Happy Working from home. Enjoy till it lasts.

2020 will be full of fireworks

Back in 2002, when I was still in school, 2020 seemed like a far fetched affair. There was some discussion originating from Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam’s mind about 2020 would be The Year. It felt like it would be a time when the World would have totally changed. Technology would have made leaps and bounds. India would have become a superpower (wink). Unfathomable, mostly!

And here we are. 2020 has already begun and within the powerplay, life has been nothing but a turmoil with a lot of work, sleepless nights, weekend events, (thoughts and personal plan about higher studies) and before we could take a sigh of relief, we have got the main event of the year (perhaps of this century), the Covid-19.

Thinking Fast and Slow.

Man thinking of which of the 2 directions to take

Currently, I am reading the book Thinking Fast and Slow and as of now, it is amazing. But, this is not about the book, I just wanted to use the title.

Alright, I will admit that I have been slow this time. Probably not paying too much attention to news/Twitter has made me so. But finally, I have made my opinion about the ongoing issues of the world which are bothering my brethren, if I may.

In the beginning, when Citizenship Amendment Bill was tabled before Parliament, my initial quick reaction was ‘Alright! This might trigger some disturbance due to it sounding like discriminatory’. Having said that, I had no clue why it was being brought. We all already knew very little about NRC thingy going in Assam. Who was left out, who was kept, what happened finally?

Then I read a bit more and understood that it was to fulfill the long-standing demand of providing safe haven to persecuted minorities of Akhand-Bharat region i.e. Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh who are seeking shelter in India, after all, India is the motherland of all the included religions and all.

Then I made myself satisfied by putting this CAB thing into Things-I-Need-Not-Fret-Over. By this time, Jamia students had tasted the brutal blow of Police Lathi in Dilli ki Sardi, as they say. Now that caused a brouhaha over social media in all shapes and forms. Everyone I knew online and everyone I know offline were divided if you know what I mean. I couldn’t decide at that time as I thought both sides have their valid points. While Govt. was doing what they promised, as per their agenda since time immemorial, the bright young folks of our youthful nation were protesting as it was clearly a cause of concern because of it being a prequel to NRC. Which side to pick? I am still a youth and I am also a law-abiding citizen, last time I checked.

Then some more protests happened, more violent it became, more vocal / creative / loud, the social media became and it became a bigger issue than you could ignore just like that. Then I read more and saw more. Both sides didn’t want to budge down.

I had a few points in my mind which demanded clarification. I am listing them down and providing an argument to them.

Argument	Possible Counter Argument
Minorities in Af, Pak, Ban need our support. We are big-hearted.	Can we first support ourselves properly before supporting others?
Where will poor Hindus come if not India?	They could go to Nepal, and anywhere else. Even the middle east. They are allowed mostly everywhere.
What would happen when NRC gets applied? After all, we should know who is a citizen and who isn’t.	We all remember what Indian Govts. are capable of in terms of mismanaging a reasonable idea? Does anyone remember Demonetization?
Shouldn’t we trust Govt. when they are saying that no Indian citizen would be harmed?	Harm is already done now. People have taken sides. The division has already happened. It has been there since 1947. Why fuel the fire? There are other ways to check borders? We can build a wall. ahem
NPR	What?
Yes, one more card.	Please.

And so on. My 2nd last post was about Indian Adhesives. i.e. movies, cricket, and ISRO which gave us reasons to celebrate and be united. Immediately after that, we have to see such scenes where police are brutally beating students. People who have no business and no understanding of the situation are burning buses and thereby making govt. more stern about their plan. The vicious circle has become more vicious and more circular.

So, what have I finally thought after thinking fast and slow? I think that if we align our energies to make simpler things better, we are better off rather than trying to be a Super Power by 2020. We have better aims to achieve. We have better things to create. We have better fights to fight.

We can do better than this.

P.S.: Don’t shut off bloody Internet again and again. And continue to try to avoid Social Media because everyone wants to shout out their opinions louder and the louder it becomes, the less truthful it remains.

Selfie with Foreigners

If you are a tourist in India and if you happen to be White (you could very well be a very fair-skinned Indian), then you would surely have been stopped anywhere and would have been asked for a Selfie. This would have generally been a polite request asked with such humbleness and doe-eyed facial expression that you would’ve agreed after telling yourself, what the heck, it is just a harmless picture!

To be honest, it is indeed a harmless picture. Your photo might only be used on barbershops and beauty parlors, and most probably on nothing illegal. In fact, thank you for letting us do it. It made you smile and amazed by us, so we are happy with that itself.

I am not going to rant too much about the practice and the Indian Obsession of still going gaga over such things. But, this is 2019 and this is getting more and more common as more and more Indians get mobile phones and travel opportunities.

But then, how does it matter! Except for everyone owning a mobile phone, not much has changed when it comes to getting validation by a foreigner. It might also be giving some bragging rights and if one thinks deeply, everything will be obvious.

We as a society are yet to come out of the mindset which makes us feel inferior. And when someone does come out of this mindset, they leave no time in making their peers feel inferior.

I recently read on Twitter that the Indian Brigade on Twitter is more hateful than followers of ISIS and all. That also reinforces the fact that once we are given freedom from the pressure of society, we break all shackles and just vent out everything we have and grab everything we get a chance to grab on to.

Maybe someday we would feel better.

You may read this too if you have 10 hours of free time: http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/society/the-ugly-indian-tourist

The New Indian Adhesive

It’s ISRO obviously.

What else could unite us all at 2 AM in the morning? It used to be Cricket only. Sometimes movies. But from September 7, 2019, ISRO is the next Indian adhesive, I think!

Well, Chandrayaan 2 is a partial success after all. It reached pretty far accurately, even became the first Indian object to touch the Lunar Surface (right?) may be through a hard landing, but lost the communication channel to tell us about it. As soon as this image came onto the screen, deafening silence engulfed everyone over. It felt a bit hollow inside as if the heartbeat had stopped.

It is certainly important to introspect this image and the data it brings, but this should never deter us from attempting it again. Yes, we didn’t make it cleanly but ISRO is a winner all the way.

Recent feats achieved by ISRO (including this) will go very far for our upcoming generation. Sheer excitement amongst the folks who are least interested in space, or are cynical about anything India does, certainly got us united and got us cheering for ISRO all the way.

I really liked this one Tweet.

https://twitter.com/Abhina_Prakash/status/1170084662233849856

This is exactly why ISRO exists. It tells us that impossible is nothing. If we dedicate our focus on the right things, we can reach anywhere. It might take more than 1 attempt, but we will be there sooner or later.

Next time, ISRO does Gaganyaan or Aditya Mission or the exoplanetary mission, the cheer would grow even louder and we will all be stuck to our devices, watching the live streaming. The next time, it would be a successful touchdown.

So I recently watched: Tumbbad, Article 15, Hot Fuzz

Of course, it is unfair and lazy to write my reviews of 3 movies in one blog post as a movie reviews writer, but I am not a movie reviews writer and I just want to get past this writer’s block so it is what it is. Also, I am writing all of these together because I am going to discuss Cinematography of all these 3 together.

Article 15

I once wrote off Ayushmann Khurrana as a Roadie. I am not going to take it back yet but I am impressed. Not only by the movie he chooses but also his drastic shift of tone in the recently released movie ‘Article 15’.

The movie is based on caste-provoked-hate-crimes (remember Budaun?) and how an honest new police officer deals with it when everyone else wants to ignore the heinous crime just because trying to solve it might upset the balance and status quo of the society. There have been several Hindi movies on similar narratives but this one stands out. It deals with the biases we all have, but we ignore them like nothing, head-on. It not only tries to shake that upper caste nonchalance and ignorance that we have now progressed and we view everything from an urbanite spectacle, but it also is a fine example of filmmaking. I was sincerely impressed by the fact that the screenplay kept on becoming more interesting the more I watched it. And to top it all, the cinematography was both beautiful and yet scary. It was also philosophical obviously that in order to clean the menace, one has to do the dirty work.

Although, it reminded me of the first season of True Detective but it is a movie to which I was hooked from start till it finished. It was an experience which made me think of my own place in the society and the privilege we take granted for. Well done!

Tumbbad

Tumbbad is like nothing you have ever seen in a Hindi movie. I can certainly vouch for that. I had watched this movie last year and I liked it so much that I haven’t rewatched it again, what an irony! It is probably because it is amazingly scary and beautifully weird.

The story shows a range of time from 1918s to 1940s. It is about man’s greed and the lengths one can go to in order to fulfill it. Except for the glaring CGI work at the very climax of the movie, it is an achievement to make such a movie, I felt. The production design, the haunting music, the scale and grandeur, and the performances are all top-notch.

I could have written more about it but it has been more than 6 months since I watched it but I can still not forget the wonderful imagery this movie portrayed. Each shot has been meticulously designed and planned. It is a pity that not many have watched this yet.

Hot Fuzz

You must have also come across a movie which you enjoy like anything and want to discuss that with some friends who have same taste as you in the movies but then you don’t discuss it with anyone and just feel sad because your friends don’t have the same taste as yours and also they don’t get it the way you do. Sigh, me too!

I watched ‘Scott Pilgrim vs the World’ a few days back and was happily surprised that something like this can exist. Then I read about its director Edgar Wright and thought of watching some more movies of his.

So I recently watched ‘Hot Fuzz’ and what a fun ride it was. Without going into the details of the story, I would just comment about the editing of this movie. Brilliant! The distinctive cuts, the music, the parody, and the overall visual comedy had me in splits. I am going to watch the rest of the movies of Edgar Wright soon, is all.

A word about Cinematography

Since I am a man of not so simple tastes, ahem, I think I am not impressed by a few things which others might do. Same way, they might not get impressed with things which I find very interesting. One of the things like that is movie cinematography. Movies mean different to everyone, we all know that. So, for me, Cinematography: the camera placement, the editing, the subtext matters a lot.

In all of the movie I wrote about in the paras before, Cinematography is a thing which carved its own niche into my mind. Article 15 shows the same grim, dark and scary wide shots of a rustic Village scene multiple times in which the protagonist has to immerse himself into in the movie to cleanse it otherwise his own surroundings keep getting dirtier, representing our myopic view of thinking about our own lives and only dealing with things when we are affected by it. Tumbbad shows grunge from a close-up which shows how greed can turn anyone into a devil. Totally contrasting to the previous two, the editing of Hot Fuzz shows how to make a serious matter funny while adding music to it to transform into something else.

There are so many movies around. Only a few of them make you think about that particular scene and the intention of the director behind them. I like those ones.

So I recently watched ‘Mission Mangal’

I distinctly remember this. I was in a bus travelling towards my office and while it took a U-Turn in front of ISRO office on Outer Ring Road towards Marathahalli, Bengaluru, somewhere far away Mangalyaan was getting inserted into the Mars orbit. I was following the news on Twitter and the event just happened. The Bus completed the U-turn and the ISRO HQ remained as calm as it has always been, as if nothing happened. No fanfare, no bursting of crackers like Diwali or post-elections scene outside political parties offices, not even a single soul but the guards visible from outside. That’s ISRO for you. I looked around me, and nobody was bothered to share my happiness as they were busy in their phones or were dozing off. I sighed and continued with reading more about the news.

That was 2014. ISRO has done a lot since then. They do use Social Media now but still only those who are interested follow. But for the first time, someone has brought them on to a medium which nobody in India can ignore. Yeah, the movies.

So, I recently watched Mission Mangal and felt happy. Neither the movie was mind blowing, nor it was a bore, neither it was 100% scientifically accurate, nor it was completely filmy. It was just a feel good movie with an appropriate amount of stuff which could make your heart fill with joy when you realise that ISRO was able to do this near impossible feat so nonchalantly. Of course, this is just a fictional tale of how the mission came to be. But it surely reignited the feeling of pride that we live among such geniuses of humans who are so good at their job that one can only wish them more successes.

I had brushed it off when they had announced that such a movie is being even made. But I got interested in it lately when the reviews came in and it paid off. I won’t go into the details of the movie as that’s irrelevant. I am rather happy that such a movie was made. There’s a scene in the movie which showed the reminiscences of actors’ childhood times of becoming scientists. That did me. And I believe that’s what have been the intention of making such a movie. Apart from earning money and all.

If even one out of 100 can get inspired from such movies which show human’s scientific prowess while they deal with life’s daily chores, the job is done.

Hoping to see more such initiatives which can rekindle the childhood dream in you.