Using Americans!

I know thats an offbeat (earlier thought of using the word weird but a friend recently pointed it out to me I use that word too often) title for a post but I could not come up with a better name for it 9is there something as bloggers block?) How and why is this title is justified...well let me paint a picture for you.

You move from one country to another and apart from the geogrphy the cultures change a lot (LOT!) and when you come into the new culture you tend to pick up some habits. Let me delve a little more into details. back home the culture is you greet people only if you know them and dont greet absolute stranger it is considered rude and a sign of lunacy even, if you will. Out here people throw greetings around the way eople toss ribbons at a ticker tape parade or a brazilian soccer match without any care. Sadly they tend to be shallow as well and dont mean much other then just small talk. One of the things I like though out here is being able to go up to a person introduce yourself and start talking...which doesnt happen that often back home or maybe dint happen that often in the years gone by. Especialy if that involves people of the opposite sex.

So now picture the situation you are in an alien (their word not mine) country but with people from your own country there is this big dilemma do you behave the way you are supposed to in this country or you behave how you have been taught in your own what is the norm? here is where the usage of americans comes into picture. This happened to me I went to a gathering yesterday the room was filled with people both americans and non-americans and there was a girl from India. So now how do you behave do you go up and start talking to her (especially since she is standing in the same line for food that you are) or do you stick to your tradition and wait to be introduced. What happened was pure genius I started talking to an Amerian girl and got engrossed in the conversation and she started talking to an American guy. But the subtle message was that hey I am not averse to talking to strangers after all we are in a different country.

Needless to say when the gathering broke off we did happen to chat and it became second nature. I have come across similar situations of culture clash before and have found them amusing as yesterday. Why am i writing about yesterdays event today coz when I was writing yesterday this completely slipped out of my mind and maybe nothing very eventful happened today so i needed something to fill my blog with!!!

Toorrow more musings if nothing happens I a actually thinking of just writing this kind of crap instead of daily mundane activities maybe that way the blog would be more insightful and interesting

how should I put this

You know there are people who have this habit of inviting trouble at their door steps...well if you dont and you are reading this you now know one such person...nice to meet you.

I was chatting with a friend of mine today she being in India and I being in America that is the only communication possible and we reached a point in chat where we were just about ready to shoot each others head off luckily unlike real life here you cant express anger in way other than showing red smiley faces with angered expression...and I thought that was kind of neat it acts like an invisible barrier because of which you cant worry later that did you just make a big mistake fighting with your friend and then the ego gets in the way to make up and all kinds of crap comes into play...on second thoughts I am not going to complete this blog still got the new blogger syndrome I must admit

Oh ya I did come across something funny today as I assumed my last duties of an office I help out here at my University was introducing someone new to the job and frankly I kind of had a smug feeling at the end of the day about a job well done! Is this what they call a Narcipost? I hope not

The day of the media

Today I had decided that I did not need to go to work and I could finish more things from home...I should have known better than to trust myself on that. However one of the iteresting things that occured was that a new Pope was elected. However what was even more intersting is how I managed to find abou it.

There I was minding my own business checking my emails when a friend of mine from Bombay shows up on chat and says:

hey there is white smoke they have elected a pope

Now its a simple line but when I thought about it a person in India is telling me in America about an event that happened just seconds ago in Italy if that is not a victory for media and communication then I guess nothing else can be counted as that.

So off I ran to the TV and see the live pictures of the Pope being introduced to the world for the first time...a process that happened after 26 years...

efficient sunday!

I knew I could not get away today with being lazy so I perked myself up and managed to finish the boring chores out of the way. I also managed to cook Aloo Mutter with a twist and made them in a Korma gravy...they looked pretty bad but tasted good enough.

Tomorrow is the start of another week full of promises and work to do...enjoy today :)

lazy day

When your eyes dont feel tired and appear crimson in color and you have that warm feeling of not getting out of bed but just lay about in bed doing nothing you know it has to be a weekend. I was lucky to have one such day today and relished the change. I did know at the back of my mind that the house needed to be cleaned (hadn't vaccumed it in 5 weeks!) grocery was suppose to be done (no milk for hot chocolate!) and ofcourse laundry as well but those were 'evening' chores.

Had brunch with a friend of mine at a local Indian restaurant and made my tummy really happy and then finished some work...finished off a great day without doing any of the above mentioned chores and pushed them to sunday ( I did say it was a lazy day!) instead hung around with a couple of my friends had Thai food...soe icecream and followed it up with a movie called Melinda and Melinda.

Which reminds me I need to get stuff off my chest about the movies I see I like some and I hate some but more importantly like every arm chair critic I have some opinions about movies I see and how I look at them. I am thinking I should create a separate blog for them and other such things...maybe I will create a blog for all media where I can write about movies books games radio etc... that I come across...the question is time...or rather how to effectively use the amount I have. Maybe another summer project

aaaah beauraucracy

Today is a good day like I felt yesterday the reason being I received my paycheck so I can survive for another month out here :) and look forward to the next one.

BUT what was more astonishing is how I managed to motivate myself to get up early (7 am! thats early enough for me) to go and attend one of the committee meetings that I am a part of. Maybe it was the feeling that it was the last for this semester and I would not have to do it again for a while helped matters.

My experience with working on this committee has taught me one thing there is one universal language that every office in every country on this globe understands and that language is beauraucracy...how to make a simple task difficult to accomplish and make sure it takes the most amount of time possible. I mean the issues we discussed today felt the same as we had when we met the first time and a lot of time has passed since then...well I am gonna be out of here and it will be someone else's headache next year but the thought lingered is there no way to make a difference in things do they really have to be this slow?

Kind of a depressing thought that you cannot make any difference whatsoever in the sytem :-(

off with it!

After 4 months of carefully preserving them I realized they had served their purpose long enough so now what should I do? The logical idea would be to wait for some more time if I wanted to save some more money but they were becoming a hindrance when I started working on the computer I mean how 'long' can you take it the constant irritation so I decided I was better off eliminating them and make sure they dint come back for a while to hinder me.

With that in mind I took the 10 min lesirely stroll to one of the exterminators around the area a sweet faced and skinny looking exterminator by the name of Courtney greeted me and assured me that she will do the job thoroughly and make sure I will be satisfied with the result. It was a pain to think about it at first the time required the constant position that I would have to maintain and keep listening to orderes like 'down' 'left' 'right' etc. but I decided to brave it and get them eliminated. At the end of the hour when I looked in the mirror that she held aloft I was very satusfied with my new haircut I was now ready to face summer :)

I just love blogs helps you convert the most mundane of activities like a haircut into an interesting experience...

Tomorrow is going to be a very good day I can already feel it!

two edged sword

Today I took a very nice and productive day and converted it into an absolutely unproductive and wasteful one. This is an art I had not come across until today hence today is a red letter day for me. Thanks to a bunch of passwords, security alarms and a set of keys. the very essence of security in life can sometimes be a burden on it. Ask any person who has forgotten an important password to an email address in that moment of selective amnesia that the brain indulges in and hence could not send the report in or open a file or set up a meeting.

I spent six hours running between the server room, my office and the office of the person who held all the passwords. To top it the server room is protected by a lock whose key obviously I dont have being just a minial helper and all. Then the server room is also alarm coded to prevent the data within and finally my office and the server room are physicaly apart enough that it is not a casual walk there but close enough so that I dont have an excuse to not go there especially with the demo tomorrow. Oh ya completely forgot there is a demo of my project tomorrow which i am working on and from the looks of it I dont think its gonna happen tomorrow unless some miracles take place in tandem.

I hate passwords...security alarms...and keys!!!!aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhaaaaaaahhhhhh

That felt good...on second thought arent they suppose to protect us from mailcious people?

On a totally different note I just confirmed that I will be going to E3 this year wooooohoooooo!!!! If you are totally clueless what it is shame on you (just kidding!) find out here

I guess I will end this here and get back to work...my longest blog yet :-)

chasing frisbees!

Spring is here! Spring is here! I felt like shouting but i realized it would be a bit to late to shout after 2 weeks of great weather out here. The temperature has been the in the upper 50's for a while and touched the earlyr 70's today. So a couple of friends of mine and I decided to bring out the frisbee that was hibernating due to the winter and give it a whirl. To our dismay we were so uncoordinated that we ran around after the frisbee hoping (almost willing it) to come in our hands but no such luck but at least we dint break it like we did some time back...

On a side note did you realize only humans can take a dull boring piece of plastic and convert it into a game and add layers upon layers of rules to make it a game. I was kind of curious and stumbled upon this

I havent forgotten to blog its just that I am an old fashioned person (in some sense) so I wrote things down on pieces of paper as and when they came to me and havent had the time to just put it up...I need to find time to do that but at least my thoughts are not lost.

I am really getting into this blogging thing now...started a group blog for my friends lets see how many of them take it up and are keen about posting something there other than mere trivia!

fooled you!

the blog and photo yesterday have no significance in my life nope sir that is not my guardian angel...my guardian angel is Murphy! been always that since the age of 12

But it does have one significance that was my first photo blog using Hello and picasa put together. Kind of a long process and I dont think I will be indulging in it till I have experimented enough with it...

Ok I am off to see a movie...

the angel that watches my back!