Saturday, November 01, 2014

(Wo)Man Vs Food


Man Vs. Food is my favorite TV show.

Food, water, shelter and books are four most basic needs for survival. But at times its the excess and not the dearth that is challenging.

Water and books can safely be overindulged in. But we need to be careful with Food and Shelter. Mortgage acts as self correcting element to save us from superfluous shelter, and leaves just some celebrities so that loony magazine will have something to feature.

Food however is complicated. 

Oktoberfest Food Fest
Food is cheap, abundant, diverse, almost everywhere, associated with happiness, celebration, sadness and boredom...And Boy difficult to utilize with the life style comprising of long office hours, big TV's, frozen food and a button to hit to get everything done. 

Food and its affordability becomes an intricate puzzle to solve a couple of times a day, everyday ... to indulge just right. While the fight between what the body needs and mouth wants continues, there is a always a mountain of insatiable cravings.  

Food experience is amalgam of what the eyes see, nose smell and tongue tastes ... and with so much forbidden ...Adam Richman ( along with iron chefs, celebrity chefs , home chefs and many others) provides 1/3rd of the experience, in the healthiest possible way.

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

I’m loving it ...

So this week is another birthday for me. My birthdays no longer have a number. They are like many stars in the sky, a head full of hair, building blocks of the house, leaves in a bush ..

Yes, I am growing old. When product advertiser talk about the rejuvenating creams and hair colors …they make old age sound so ominous like slipping grains of sands of hourglass, an irreversible damage.


They don’t talk about the most amazing effect of age, wisdom.

Like, after you are done running around, stressing out about your lost keys, screaming 'god why did you do this to me?", blaming others for the messy house and shuffling through the worst possible consequences, you really start searching for the keys or a feasible alternate. 

Time redefines life, happiness, relationships, work, love , friendship, success, family, prayer and faith.

Time destroys pride, fear, anger , hate

Time highlights the subtle differences between wants and needs, self respect and being obstinate, adjusting and giving up, confidence and being a student, sounds and noise,cover and content, heart warming and soul stirring, help and support, you and divine

Ok so yes, i am not old enough. 

But its good to know what you want, what you have and what you treasure. Its good to know how little you know and how much there is to learn. Its good to know that time will never stop and just living through it is a privilege, a blessing and a celebration.

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Tough Life of a News Junkie

When you see your dad follow a process to devour the newspaper everyday, starting with the top bold letter headlines and eye catching news in the morning, details in the afternoon and almost every written word by the evening... you develop a fascination for news.

News, is only second to travelling, if you are looking to change your outlook. 

The benefits of knowing about your society, town, city, country and the world are not even in question. The matter of concern is the changing face of the source. I don't have a newspaper a day for my fix. I have access to multiple news sites and many news channels to indulge in. Not to forget radio. 

But no one tells you the news as is. The need to run for hours and hold Readers/viewers/audience attention corrupts the medium. The news channels sensationalize the news. The 'Breaking News' becomes an essential job description for journalists. The paraphrasing of events to 'add description' reminds me of padding words in essays while in school, in lieu of researching and finding more content. I support a policy for News channels and New sites to accept an abbreviated telecast/webpage in respect of a quieter, event less day.

Another problem with trying to grab attention of the audience results is news falling off the headlines when the “news reporters” assume that their audience is “bored” of the news. The first Ebola patient makes headlines. The second Ebola patient comes down a little in priority and by the time it’s an epidemic, only change in scene or region, cause a reshuffle the priority of the news.

If you want to find today what happened to the girls kidnapped by Boko Haram. You will find no news today. Pretty much like Drone strikes in Pakistan, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Human right violations in North Korea, Israel-Palestine relations.

God save you if you are trying to listen to actions of a democrat Federal Government through a TV/Radio channels in a republican state.


It’s up to an individual to filter the news to understand the events and not the views, visions and ideology of channel/reporter. Also wear blinkers to the life-altering information like celebrity divorces, weight gain and baby names.



Sunday, June 15, 2014

Someone Is Always Listening …

Say you prayer …
Sing your Song …
Tell your story …

Someone is always listening.

So we provide coffee, breakfast and cloths for some homeless individuals in downtown phoenix. The organizers are faithful disciples of God, and there is a lady who sings hymns. Her job is tough because we use a parking lot close to a cluster of shelters in downtown. We mostly cater to people who did not get a place in these shelters, which means they slept on pavements and are anxious for some respite and food. With burning hunger, cold and soar body, lack of basic amenities, this nice lady's services usually lack any spotlight.

People leap and rush and hurry to get to what they need...

We volunteers also scramble at times to compose the modest breakfast packet or look for sizes in the stacks of cloths or try to hand a quick cup of coffee. Most of the time, I don’t even notice her presence.


But today I did. I heard clapping, a sound again, very misfit in the circumstances. I tuned towards the sound to notice that she had a sole listeners among hundred’s of us. This was a homeless guy with no shirt and one shoe. Somehow while others scrambled for food, he drew towards music.He sat on the hot and uncomfortable asphalt coated ground few feet away from her, facing her and he clapped when she finished singing. 

I am not sure if she expected someone to applaud and acknowledge her or was just doing her duty of mixing some music and kind words in the cacophony of sounds. I am also not sure, if she felt this was special or something will change for future Sunday mornings...

But i see it as a reminder ... to pray hard, speak our mind and sing from heart .... for whoever is listening 

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

New and improved…

With time everything changes, so hell and heaven have also evolved based with new definitions of bliss & pain and of course based on some very “soul-stirring” feedback of honest souls. With the increase in population the “admission criteria” is much simpler now. If you have a Facebook account, you will go to hell because you have judged, looked down upon, been arrogant of your common sense and been a show-off  ...brazenly disregarding GOD's will, hence

If (Facebook account)
{
 Go to Hell
  • It still is characterized by for soul wrenching torture; they have slow dial-up internet and free online movies!!
  • The new dress code is all white.
  • Friends and toilet paper, 2 essentials of happy living, are rationed.
  • There are no weekends.
  • It’s a “approval-based-lifestyle where you need others approval to exist

}

Else
Go to Heaven
  • There are a lot of books and rain and COFFEE  … and patios where you can drink coffee and read a book when it’s raining
  • They decommissioned harps when they saw that Freddie Mercury was right there. Now HE Rocks heaven.
  • You can choose "family plan" and bring your family and friends along
  • You have a full time job and a car that never breaks down
  • It’s a decision-free-lifestyle with no agony of weighing pros n cons or evaluating “what-if” situations.
}

Friday, February 07, 2014

Shit Happens!!

It’s quintessential for any organization to underline itself as a system that works. Be it a school, army, workplace, family or society, there success depends on selling a belief that learning, defense, productivity, values or life is a cosmos. There are well defined process, rules and practices which when followed diligently yields a perfect and desired result.

Like hell, it works!!

The success of a system is in not working continually. It’s in creating an impression that it works continually and any failure is due to lack of compliance by the participant. Once it’s established as a fact that when a student fails, its lack of hard work and dedication of the student and not because of ambiguity on the part of educational system, the myth becomes self propagating. A failed student is considered an anomaly and its made an example to prevent many more going that way, even though majority are gravitated towards the scary “F”. The day most people fail, schools will have to reinvent themselves.

Of course, questioning all the elements of a system will breed anarchy.


But reiterating the system, without adulterating it with doubts fortify falsehood that hard work is rewarded, sincerity is met with its likeness, practice makes one perfect, love exists, training doesn’t fail, happy endings and yada yada yada ... without explicitly stating that things do go wrong, failure cannot always be analyzed, success cannot always be guaranteed, you don’t have to be successful to say that failure is ok, pressure don’t always turn carbon to diamond ...

I was a mess this week after orchestrating a debacle of a demo to client. And in my despondency, I truly identified with the people behind this picture. And wondered what will the world look like if there is more tolerance to failure and everyone can say aloud what everyone knows .... that "shit happens!!"