Droplets

After a stint of stupendous rain, droplets assembled for a conference with the reflection of a row of lights over a glass. This snap was taken when I was relishing hot tomato soup inside a cozy restaurant and it was raining outside. Bangalore is witnessing rains on daily basis, last week onwards. Hope the rain Gods continue to shower love over the city, as always.

Disclaimer : My mobile's camera is used to capture it, so, couldnt get a better quality.

Amruthavarshini

Its a radio time again for us. An FM radio war has begun now. Bangalore saw the rise of its first private radio channel Radio city in the year 2000. It first played very good Hindi and English music, occasionally Telugu and Tamil movie songs for its listeners. Some Kannada organizations objected, hence a Kannadiga RJ was inducted and Kannada was given a weekly slate on its calendar. However, it was only restricted to movie songs.

Thus started a journey which later got warring colours… Radio Mirchi was the next channel to be started. It gave a fitting competition to the lone Badshah Radio city. Here the Kannada connection was limited to RJs speaking distorted local language…. However, there was no much difference in terms of the music it played.

Later Akashavani came up with a unique FM station Rainbow. It played for a limited number of hours in a day and played Kannada, English, Hindi music, old, new alike. It gave importance to ghazals, folk music and Bhavageete too…

Then started Radio One, they innovated music playing concept by playing one Kannada song back to back with a Hindi song… It didn’t see any market in playing international songs…

Later started the warring channels…Big FM, S FM…

Some frequency all of a sudden started playing the stotras and Vedic chanting.. few days later that frequency was occupied by a new FM channel that played only international music. Radio Indigo, another colourful channel.

A new Channel Fever 104 is giving fitting competition to Indigo, only difference is Fever plays some popular Hindi and Bhangra music as well.

Realising that the Kannada songs were doing extremely good, all the channels started playing Kannada songs in abundance…and each claimed that they were the players of highest number of Kannada songs…. And all the channels employed mental manjas, jakkhas meenakshis to host their shows….

What they call ‘fun’ has now become madness. They are not doing any good to Kannada with their kind of accent, vocabulary or style. Pathetic….

Meanwhile, Rainbow gave proper slots to news updates and classical music too. Buoyed with the response, AIR started a new channel that played only classical music, very recently, named aptly “Amruthavarshini”. AIR has to its credit other variety channels like Gnana Vani that featured educative programmes with students and knowledge hunters as intended audience. It’s a hit with limited set of audience. AIR upgraded their vivid bharati to FM and played soulful music, as always. One great feature of Kannada Rainbow is that the hosts here speak a proper Kannada, though in a dull tone.

All in all, the radio war has given us some good music, and this has to its credit, helped in the success of movies like Mungaru maLe and others. These channels played the maLe songs non-stop and made the audience check that out….

Now some details about Amruthavarshini channel. It plies in the evenings between 6 and 10. First three hours being dedicated for Karnataka Shastriya Sangeetha and the last hour reserved for Hindustani classical music. They also play tracks from the legendary musicians of yester years, taken out from their treasure some plates. A wonderful daily dose of classical music without any intermission of news, advertisements, nor any announcements. A great channel to tune in to when you are tired and seek some solacing graceful moments.

There are 11 channels in Bengalooru as of today. List of them with the frequency to tune into is here :

Channel Frequency
Radio City 91.1
Radio Indigo 91.9
Big FM 92.7
S FM 93.5
Radio One 94.3
Radio Mirchi 98.3
Amruthavarshini 100.1
AIR Rainbow 101.3
Vivid Bharati 102.9
Fever 104
Gyan Vani 105.6

AIDS, Sex education and vaccination : A thought

by Dr. Rajan

Dear friends,

First things first :
I do not want you people to take me for your e-consultant, please.
My intention of interacting with you is just stimulating a scientific angle to the traditions and customs that we have in us as a treasure. Please read TKDL csri site. You will understand the magnitude of our traditional medicine and the customs. The GOI is now is collecting all these from people like you and me and trying to keep it in the open source domain and establish the source owner ship. Any way, I have my own opinion about them, that can be discussed later.

Early in the morning we do Pooja. Aarathi and Mangalaarathi are usually a part of that. Why do we do it? Why do we wave the lighted camphor in a circular fashion, that too in a clock wise direction only?.
Have you thought over these things ? Keep guessing until next class (!).

For today please read this 'Bogale'

Social vaccine for behavioral AIDS:

Vaccines have done wonders so far in the history of human infectious scourges. True. But AIDS vaccine is more likely to prove itself as a social scourge than AIDS as such. None of the pandemic infections so far prevented by mass vaccination were related to Sex and sexual mal-behavior. AIDS, probably, is the only one which is most connected with sex. It also having prolonged incubation and the victim surviving for a long period and spreading the disease, unlike other killer disease which used to be fatal before spreading to too many people.

Billions have been spent in the public health and community medicine departments to bring around changes in the attitude towards sex. Counseling, training the counselors and sex-education and its trainers consumed an enormous amount of money. Sex education for school children and adults all over the world started with vigor. Awareness about perversions which were so far closeted and least talked about in the open, was taught to even children. The people were urged not to indulge in the forbidden pleasures and to follow the basic principles of infection control like commandments from heaven. School Teachers were forced to take up sex education classes to kids. Parents and teachers, who were shy and reluctant to answer questions on pollination, kiss and pregnancy had to teach what sodomy is and why it should be avoided at all costs. Children of today know more about abnormal sex and taboos, than affection, love and the value of blissful marital life. The time honored Rama-Seetha concepts have gone to background. What is left behind is only an obnoxious feeling about sex. After all this community based campaign against the evil, what we have achieved is nothing but education of the dirty habits. It was our sacred duty to create a nice world to derive the divine happiness in conjugal life; on the contrary we have successfully destroyed it.

Now if we proclaim from the top of the mountain we have successfully brought out an effective vaccine and say that the scourge is off the globe like small pox(!)……….. just imagine what will happen to the man’s monkeying-mind. Just remember what attitudinal change was brought around after the advent of Penicillin and infections associated with sex, like gonorrhea and syphilis were contained. The men and women started having more fun, an uninhibited one! This societal attitudinal transformation, especially in the West gave birth to biological mutation of the animal tumor virus to become a human pathogen and alas! it soon became a pandemic. This uncontrollable sociopathy can never be treated by any anti-AIDS drug or an effective vaccine. Only the drug companies and vaccine industry can really flourish (!). But the very fabric of a healthy society will be shattered, until probably the infection dies on its own (by gods grace) in the next hundred years. In this generation we are sure to witness only misery, a hell on earth, similar to what Adi Shankaraachaarya or Moses witnessed on earth in those days. Ask Mr. Yoweri Museveni, the President of Uganda, who has brought down the sexual pervasiveness remarkably by using ABC method. A stands for abstinence and restraint, B for being faithful and C for proper use of condom. This is nothing but a social vaccination. Probably the prevailing conditions in those by gone days inspired the social reformers to write the safety rules for the society and gave them in the form of scriptures, doctrines, mantras or commandments etc.
Only the Ten Commandments or the Shankara philosophy or any scripture for that matter can bring value to Values and save the human race from the AIDS of the society (!!)

ARE YOU STILL THINKING OF THE VACCINE against AIDS?

A Documentary....

A Documentary by a backbencher.

I recently went there, trekking inside a forest.
I used my mobile, and created a documentary video of sorts.
There was no intension, nor there was a ready script to do so.
At sun rise, may be, I wanted to test my mobile's capabilities.
It has been stretched to complete 3 minutes.

Hey you, stop laughing, its my voice from behind, I know :D

It has come thus, please do check and let me know if my effort was worth it.
- Srik.

Thought for the day

Shedding the morning blues

by Doctor Rajan.

We are required to participate with a responsive body and spirits and take every decision with highest accuracy and efficiency in all our daily activities starting from driving your vehicle, working school, office, hospital, or shop floor of workshop. We start the car engine and do check all the parameters like fuel levels, charge of the battery etc., bring up the temperature of the engine to an optimum, see if any thing is in the way or any body is coming from sides, then move out. For this, our senses and reflexes have to be in a state of preparedness and perform all the daily activities in near perfect way. It is always better to have a check list for a vehicle or a machine. Similarly it is wiser to have one for ourselves. In many religions they have a set rules or rituals to be performed early in the morning, often they are not aware of the purpose behind these morning prayer. In Hindu culture they have a ritual to say a mantra as soon as one gets up.

Sit in your bed cross legged ( like in Padmaasanam or Lotus posture).Rub your hands together a few times and look at the lines on your palmsSay this mantra either in the form of a whisper or only in your mind.Lightly rub the palms and move them on your face.All this may be done by taking one or two minutes.

The mantra goes like this :
1)
“KaraagrE vasatE lakshmiiH karamadhyE saraswati, KaramoolE tu govindaH prabhaatE karadarshanaM"
OR
“KaraagrE vasathE lakshmi karamoolE saraswathi,KaramadhyE sthithougowri prabhathE karadarshanaM"

"Samudravasane devi parvatastanamaNDale.VishhNupatni namastubhyaaM paadasparshaM kshamasva me”.

2)
"GangEcha yamunEchaiva godaavaree saraswathiNarmadaa sindhu KavEri jalEsmin sannidhim kuruh"

These mantras, of thanking god for having given us the rivers of life may be chanted three times, looking at the branching curved palmar creases. We can continue to chant the second prayer during bathing also.

Explanation: It is a common experience that after a good nights sleep we feel low, groggy and will not be in a position to do anything as accurately as after a little while. This is because, in the horizontal position, with our limbs outstretched, all the skeletal muscles are relaxed; the propriocptive (deep) sense of joint position and joint movement sense will be less efficient, the cerebellar, cerebral and the autonomic nervous system also will be in a state of depression. Senses like vision, hearing etc, are at lowest ebb. Performing any function like sudden standing and getting out of bed, in this sate, we feel unsteady and may even have a fall. So we need to have preparedness before we intend to do any function. Chanting these mantras taking one to two minutes and do the exercises will give sufficient time the reflexes to come back to normalcy and so we can avoid accidents.

Physiology: During sleep the blood pressure and heart rate go down because the sympathetic system also goes to sleep (except during the REM stages). The eye balls get adapted to darkness and the pupils are dilated widely, and this causes a feeling similar to what we feel while coming out of a theater after seeing a movie. The visual axes of the eyeballs will have become parallel and hence the focus on the objects will be inaccurate, thus creating a blurred image on the retina. It takes a few minutes for the convergence accommodation reflex to come back and the eyes converge again to focus on a nearer focal point (the palms), to form a clear image on the focal point of the retina. Now you are able to see clearly.

Defect or disorder of sympathetic system, may cause delay in reflex time and cause unsteadiness in young age itself. Diabetes mellitus with neuropathy is a common disorder which causes such a problem by giving rise to delayed reflexes and orthostatic hypotension. Immediately on standing, the pooling of blood in the lower parts of the body causes drop in blood pressure. Sitting in the bed cross-legged (may be for 30 to 90 seconds), the vessels bend and improve the peripheral resistance, and then standing for some time (20 to 30 seconds), help reestablish the vascular tone. During this short period, surging of hormones like adrenaline (epinephrine) and nor-adrenaline (nor-epinephrine) takes place. These hormones cause constriction of arteries and arterioles and the veins and venules and also stimulate the heart. The blood pooled in the lower limbs and the lower portion of the body gets pumped towards the heart more efficiently and the low blood pressure is made good. The stimulation of heart causes increase in heart rate. Restoration of blood pressure, heart rate improves the blood supply to brain and retina. Now you do not feel imbalance and can walk steadily and also converse with your head on your shoulder.Rubbing the hands on the face including eyes helps in stimulating the trigeminal nerves giving a refreshing feeling. It also helps bring the two sides of the brain start coordinating with each other through the interconnecting corpuscallosum fibers.In this ritual you are sitting patiently for a while and taking a good look at a near object, your own palms. Saying theses mantras reminds you of the life giving rivers, the power of knowledge and helps develop a ready-to-serve attitude and humbleness. Your understanding of yourself in relation to the world helps you take correct decisions like the GPS (global positioning system) helps the driver. Accidents and near-accidents cause a lot of stress-reaction. So it is better such simple exercises are inculcated in child hood so that it will help one to be more patient, fit and productive and avoid falling or getting involved in an accident/near accident.

In this ritual you are free to chant the names of your own gods and goddesses, and rivers if you so choose. But remember and appreciate the purpose behind the mantra that is hastiness upsets everything.

Hence our elders have coined a saying “ThaaLidavanu baaleyaanu". See the physiological truth that was understood by those original thinkers which helped them to build these mantras and establish this as a ritual. There is no need for any training course or to shell down money.

Sandhyaavandanam, PraaNaayaama and ‘Gaayathree mantra japa’, if added to this, suffices to keep your body and spirit, in every way, to be ready to take on anything through out the day. We should never forget that a sound mind and a sound body always go together. A little bit of waiting, patience and perseverance keeps your body, mind and spirit fit for a long time. Thus I have made some effort to explain one of the rituals observed in the morning time in India. This is just a humble beginning.

Welcome Doctor

Friends, I feel happy to announce that a learned man, a physician and a teacher in medicine has agreed to contribute articles to the backbancher's corner.

Welcome on board Doctor. We are honoured to have you here!!

Lets know about the nature of articles being posted here, in his own words...

I, as a physician and a teacher of Medicine for over three decades, have taught hundreds of medical students and young physicians and trained dozens of trainers.

Traditions, customs, or rituals have been followed by our people since ages, often without raising objections or questions by most of us. It is also observed that ever since they were started, there have been people who contradicted or defied or at least were indifferent and turned a deaf ear to them. Let us now, before dubbing them as false or myths, try to take a fresh look with an open mind and try to unravel the mystery or hidden meanings of these traditions or beliefs and try to see if they served any purpose at all.

Let us just light a lamp and throw a little light on these shaded areas using our scientific mind. We all know that the necessity is the mother of inventions. Let us examine as to what was the need to formulate and implement these traditions. We will also discard, if they are found to be meaningless and absurd.


It was my inquiring mind, from the beginning of my college career, which kept me interested in traditions, (although as school children I also did not like them much), and made me choose a different angle, as I learnt the basics in Medical science.


It was the doctors’ logic, philosophy and a problem solving mind which helped me to see the truth in many, if not all, of the traditions that I observed in my life.

I thought it is time that I shared with you, my explanations, concepts, and analytical conclusions, for the so-called false or blind beliefs and attribute a meaning to some of the traditions in our rich culture and heritage.

I also feel that there is an imperative need for more and more people to come out with scientific explanations and tell the scientific world the importance of looking at the old with an open mind and save the treasure. I have known that good things are there in many other religions and faiths and often similarly sidelined.


Dr. Rajan.



P. S. First post in the series will be up on Friday.

Spider Man Kills

He is a man who rescues every child from every absurdity. He safeguards citizen in trouble. He is a demigod in New York that every daemon is afraid off. He is a man with no enemies. All the wrong doers are afraid of him and others are aware of his riches. All feel safe thinking…”Spidy is there”!!

A genuine notion of ‘Spiderman never kills people’ is a New Yorker’s religion.

But some strange parasite infects him, spreads across his spider suit. This amplifies the spider powers and adds a darker shade to the personality called The Spider Man and also to the man Peter Parker, who does the spider act. This transforms both into powerful men. Spider & Parker then go on a vengeful drive.

And then how Parker does shed the dark parasite, wins his girl friend (Mary Jane, who had drifted from him, owing to his ignoring her due to his spider man heroics) and some emotional stints with a lost friend, Harry Oswald, forms the rest of the story.

Add to it some flashbacks, some breath taking graphic sequences, some fun intended personalities, some hip frolicking song sequences….some emotional scenes with a granny, giving lessons about Love and a happy marriage…….And an enemy, a not so convincing, but good hearted enemy….to add to it… all the spider man haters join together and attempts to kill him. Whole exercise is telecast live on a television….

Are you sighing enough?....There is much more…If interested, please go and check it out yourselves…

There is a big hype in India about the release of Spider Man 3, that interested me to go and check out…I was totally disappointed, I must say.

A Complete Masala stud Telugu movie would’ve been that, I thought at the end. This one was pretty long, without any particular story, logic or any enthralling scenes.

One saving grace here was, it was not boring at any given moment, and the actors have not disappointed, but a weak script, wrong timing and over dose of sequences frustrates you. I didn’t see even one child in the hall screaming aloud over any scene, I guess, their summer time would’ve been better spent in front of a cartoon network instead.

Some better things about it all - Back ground scoring is good. It has a villain that no one had ever thought of before…a sand man…concept of a sand man stands good, but the main purpose of having him in the plot sucks. Some comic relief is also in store with a hyper active editor of The Daily Planet.

All in all, the spider man failed to move me, for the lack of the thrill of fighting with a Spidy, or the feel of baddies taking over me…Spidy help.??

I have not seen the first two parts of Spider Man. Probably I would’ve liked them better.

If you consider my advice, better not waste your 100 bucks(or more) over a spider man who doesn’t want to enthrall you.

Rajiv Masand doesn't agree with me.

My Rating : POOR.

Anniversary

I don’t generally understand the concept of celebrating one’s anniversary. Birth day, marriage day, Union day etc…

One thing behind it might be to go thru the major events that happened during the cource of the year gone past and learn from them… lessons.

If that exactly is the intension, why do people celebrate it? For another round across the Sun? Or just to remember the plights of them then?

Whatever the reason behind it, I feel, it’s the time to recollect the events, thank the people those helped us achieve whatever we did, if any, learn from facts and get on in lives. Basically, it is one day when one can say, “it belongs to me”!!

And, folks, today belongs to me!!

Yes, today is my first anniversary in the blogoworld. It seems it began yesterday….and….I am an year old already.

Welllll wellll…. A year is not a very big time if we consider the universe as a whole, but a human being…with a small life span, an year is a big thing…

Achievements : I have made a lot of good friends. Some friends whom I have met, some friends whom I have not yet met…. Some of them are elder to me… some younger… and some of my age..

Flashback : It all started with me reading and commenting on Sanjay’s Muktha blog. His random rambling went on to become a club of people’s discussion forum about Muktha the serial…and most of the times everything else… We had good debates, mind blowing factual learning, superb acquaintance with some regulars… And then there was one man who’s articles I was an avid reader of, Srivatsa Joshi on thatskannada portal. Then I decided to write a few lines on my village, at an apt time of Ramanavami. That post was published on thatskannada portal and got some good reviews too…

In a few days, I visited Hampi… and my emotional account of my visit came out in the form of an article that was intended to be sent to my friends. Then having seen Sanjay and Shruthi write articles, I thought of publishing it myself, thru my own blog.

Thus it started….. a jouney…I wish it goes on as long as I do....

There were times when I cribbed against some Govt. policies… or times when I took sides with one community… or times when I wrote somethings politically… or times when I wrote some things poetically….There were times when I ranted on some issue….there were times when I tested people’s patience by putting up lot many stories on the same subject…And were times when people were made wait to read a part of some story that was started in parts.

In all those times, all of the following people have stayed with me…commented and encouraged me to post the next one… I must Thank all of them(you) for this un-precedented support.

Shruthi, Harsha, Praneshachar, Usha, Anu, mouna, December Stud, Savita, Ashwini, vicky, usha, Gautham, K.Pal, Maddy, Sanjay M, SHEELA, Rakesh, Prashanth M, Raaji, Mohan, Chaitanya, Samudyuta, Vijay, bellur ramakrishna, reborn, Bhargav, AJEYA RAO, Sharu, child, Balaji, Gini, Prasanna L.M, opinionated indian, Pegasus, s.b., shark, Veena Shivanna. DutchDerk, Prashanth M, Mahesh, Deepshikha, tpraja, Shiv, sprash, Vani, ರಾಜೇಶ್ ನಾಯ್ಕ, VENU VINOD, Sundar, neela, Diya, ANAND BALAJI, Tttozz, astroshiva, bachodi, Mysorean,

Sometimes I used to feel it’s a huge responsibility to carry forward a blog over the time….An year has passed and it has progressed along with me… I have taken pleasure in presenting my stories to my readers(I rather call them friends), scribbling some things that I like to see… ending up writing nostalgic accounts of my childhood…and what not….

Now I realise…Its not a responsibility, its all about one’s priority and understanding. One need to love being a reder for being able to present various information in the most apalling way as a writer.

But one question remains….Why do you write? So as people read and Recognise you? Or people get to think for a moment in your point of view?

I feel the second answer is nearer to my interpretation of writing. Blog is a space where one can make his argument heard and felt, I think.

A recap of the year that was :

Un categorised article : SHE

Ramblings : Superstition, Iqbal Part II,

Scribbles : Aa yaa India…!, Good Bye and Thanks for all the ad campaigns!!, Reservation series, Kannada in Bangalore, Mercy upon one kills the nation as a whole!!,

Stories : Malgudi Days, Living Perplexed with a news, An unforgettable accident, Electing a chief minister

Maga series : Meghane Trek log, Licence to Kill series,

Visits : A small walk into the past...., Ramakrishna Kendra, Kuditini, Bellari, YaladUrina rAmOtsava, Kurudumale, Oh! It was a thriller!!!!!!, A blissful dread, Children for equality, Remembering Independence, A stranger that was not, Meghane,

Light ones : Juduciary, When I met a friend, Superstitious practices

Movie review : Mungaru MaLe

Apart from the above, there were celebration, tribute and gyaan sessions on this forgettable corner of a backbencher….

Thanks for all the wishes and blessings.