A Prison Diary: Belmarsh: Hell - FF 8282 aka Jeffery Archer

A Prison Diary: Belmarsh: Hell, is the first of three books written by Jeffery Archer when he was in Jail on charges of Perjury.

I completed the first volume in about 100 sittings. That is expected when you are trying to read six books together.

Some bits were REAL amusing like the joke wherein he predicts that the next sermon would be Honour Among Thieves after his previous two sermons were Cain and Able and The Prodigal Son.

The book gives interesting insights about prisons and the way of life on the other side of the fence. If someone is interested in knowing more about Archer as a person, this can be a fabulous guide. You could read about his daily schedule, his preferences, his choices, his love for the game of cricket and what not.

Apart from these couple of highlights, very ordinary book I should say. Very light read, chapters done as days make it easier to read and follow-up if someone is interested in reading in innumerable sittings (the way I did it).

I know that I may never know if he was infact guilty but as they say History is often skewed and is reported by the winning side, throughout the book, it is literally preached that Mr. Archer is innocent and there was a conspiracy against him. I sincerly hope he is NOT guilty. I absolutely adore some of the books and cant believe that someone like him would do something like that. Anyways, the point is not if he is indeed innocent or not, the point is to realize the fact that how to turn a crisis situation to your advantage. Archer was in jail and he had nnothing to do. What does he do? Write a book !

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 3, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell - David Michaels

Wow !!!!

The writing style is AMAZING. I have read so many books, fiction, non-fiction and what not, never came across something like this.

I would definately like to be like Sam Fisher in lot of ways. Infact I am almost like him in many ways. He hates human civilizations... I hate em too. He is not comfortable with people around, I definately aint comfortable. At one point he says that he appreciates beauty and thats that nothing more nothing less. Dittoo for me. He loves to read on history and speaks 7 languages, I sure want to know whatever there is to know about.

And since I am very passionate about anything remotely related to Computer Gaming, we have an entire game on Splinte Cell. I infact was one of the beta testers of a cell phone adaptaion of the title when I was working.

Great Character, Amazing Storytelling skills, All in all ... a must read.

Ratings: 8/10

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 13, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

15th August 1947 - Independence Day

Today, 15th August, we Indians celebrate our independence day.

It’s been almost 60 years since we were freed from British control and we became masters of our destinies. We have come a long way from what we were at the time of independence but there are long long way to go.

We are now amongst the top three countries on the watch list of everyone (along with China, Brazil and Russia). Economy has been doing very well. We are a world renowned source of competent and trained manpower. Our say in international political scenario has never been higher.

There are few things that we can improve on. First and foremost being the removal of red-tapism. The accountability is almost absent from all the sectors. If we can work on these and some other pressing issues, we sure would be going ahead in every sense.

Today I was part of the Independence Day celebration at my campus. Our director, Padma Shri Dr. Pritam Singh raised a question and asked us why do we celebrate any festival or for that matter Independence Day? He said that we want to remember the sacrifices made by millions of people to achieve freedom. I partially agree to what he says. I think I celebrate because its close to me. Its close to my heart. I cherish the freedom. Thus I celebrate the functions.

Also I never understand why do people think about and sing patriotic songs only on Independence Day? I think its all propoganda ! If you were truely patriotic, you could sing all the songs all the time. Why wait for a special day to sing your songs?

Talking of Independence at the individual level, even though we might be independent as a nation, there are many people (including me) that are still dependent on others.

Benjamin Franklin says independence is when he is lord of himself and accountable to none. I think no one else talked about independence in a better manner. When I try to define control and its antonym independence, I can come up with things like political control, physical control and thought control. A political control can only influence the actions; the thoughts however are as independent as a bird in free sky. The power of these thoughts converted into action and played a key role in the independence struggle.

I also believe that there are ways to control the thoughts as well. A very simple example from world of marketing: Word of Mouth Advertising. It is more or less a subtle form of thought control. One might say that since a friend liked the product, there is no harm in reducing the risk of trial and going for it, there is no kind of thought control being attempted here. I would like to disagree with this school of thought. When you are influencing other people, selling yourself to people, doing anything, you are trying to control (successfully in some cases) other people and their thoughts.

Another thing that comes to my mind right now is emotional dependence. As has been said many times, man is a social animal. Man can not exist in isolation. Everyone needs someone to fall back on.

There is yet another aspect called the interdependence. Interdependence is when dependence and independence coexist together. The first question that comes to my mind is how the two faces of coin coexist? How can independence be dependent on dependence? Simple answer ... change the very definition of independence to incorporate for necessary dependence. Very basic example is that even to think independent, sustain one self, one needs an elaborate support structure (like dependence on others for food etc.).

I think everything comes down to the definition.

There was this discussion in a class where a Prof and MS got into argument about the effectiveness of team vs. individuals. This is not related to independence and control and thus would be thought about later when I wouldn’t have anything else to do.

More Later !!!!

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 15, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

Independence Day - Wallpaper

Samit made this wallpaper and gifted to me and told me that I can use it once on my blog and I cant redistribute it. He can be reached at samit_india@yahoo.com for getting the permission ;)

EDITED LATER
============
Actually he din't make the wallpaper from scratch... he edited it from www.aqshar.com. Aqshar has amazing collection of wallpapers and computer generated art. A must visit place.

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON Friday, August 16, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

And as I post this, tomorrow is our Republic Day !

Q and A - Vikas Swarup

Ever since emergence of "Indian Writers" on the literary scenes, there has been a rush amongst people to start writing. Some good and some ... not so good.

The entire book has a negativity attached towards it. There aren't many pages where you don't read about a bad thing happening to the characters in the book.

I agree to the fact that India as a country lacks few things. We might not have the best of the regulators, honest people and kind hearted people but there ARE a few people who are absolutely wonderful. The book portrays India as the nation having the biggest slums, where train robberies are common-place, where no one can be honest and make his living without any unethical/illegal act, where there are two sides to everything. I know these are very hard words against a book that has been made available in 15 countries and a motion picture is planned around the plot.

A typical masala film end plot where the hero gets the heroine, punishes all the criminals, helps his friends achieve his dreams and live happily ever after. The last act is adopted and as they say, is INSPIRED from one of the biggest bollywood blockbusters of all time - Sholay. There is more to it but I think there is no point putting it in words here but there is a certain character who says he can't reveal the actual thing. He would instead give a hint. Here is my hint. The lead character in the book, whenever in a fix, does whatever his coin tells him to do. He tosses the coin and if it's a head, he takes the right decision and if it's a tails, he would take the wrong decision and somehow it is always heads. Sounds like Sholay?

However there were few things that I certainly liked about Q and A. After reading about half of it, I knew the book is not up to the expectations and I should stop reading it but something kept my interest alive and I completed it. I don't know why, but I kept reading it, enjoying some jokes (since may be I can relate to them).

All in all an interesting read but not upto the expectations.

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 21, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

Crossword Books

I finally decided to go visit Crossword. It opened some time back and ever since I have been trying to go and have a look.

The place is absolutely stunning. There are other bookstores in and around Delhi (like The Om Book Store) but few things that set this place apart are the number of titles they have, their ambience, the wide open spaces and the people there.

They have these sofas spread here and there among the book shelves where you can sit and read through the books. There would be soft instrumental music in the background. People said you could buy coffee there and sit as long as you want, I however din't see any coffee outlets. May be next time.

The staff there was VERY helpful. I wanted Freedom at Midnight and I could not spot it. I asked the people there and they wasted there time to locate the title even though I had told em that I would not buy it, I just wanted to have a look at it.

I ended up buying two titles, need to gift them to two very special ladies. And I am sure that I would be buying many more titles.

The website can be visited at http://www.crosswordbookstores.com.

And yeah a visit to Crossword added yet another goal in my kitty - Own a bookstore :D

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 22, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

The House of Bamboo

Stuff hanging from the roof
2005 December: Imperium Farewell Party

There is this place called The House of Bamboo at 32nd Milestone in Gurgaon. We went there for a party ... with my camera and this is what came out ot if.

And by the way, the first post for 2006.

Tuesdays with Morrie - Mitch Albom

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom is simply put superb. I don't respect things like Good Living, Happy Living, Art of Living and things like that but Tuesdays taught me lots and lots of things. Actually it ain't taught me things but helped me realize. More importantly it gave me few answers to things I was always thinking about.

I was always wondering if I should conform to the norms laid down by the society and even if I feel limited in them, shall I try to break out of them. Morrie gives me the answer. I always thought I would end up doing something like Morrie - things that won't exploit other things (quite a change from my previous thoughts where I wanted to be rich at any cost). I started answering the basic premise behind the concept of Marketing. Again Morrie provides the answer.

Few things that I can instantly recall from Morrie are Live in Now, Say things you wanna say, Don’t wait forever to let people what you always want to say, Listen - Listen, Listen and Listen. Nothing is as good as listening to people.

I always knew these things were important and I knew them at the back of my mind but Morrie made me realize them. Will make sure I implement them.

They say Paulo Coelho authors some life changing books, I say NO. I never really appreciated his work. Morrie changed it ! Morrie has the power. MUST READ.

Some people say that Morrie is a real story. I probably would never know but I would sure want to meet a man with such personal strengths. He is staring death in face and still he is as strong as anyone. I always thought one must be independent of others. I always practised it but I realized that what I was doing was following independence in action. My thoughts were very much dependent on others. My very self was, is, will be dependent. Forever.

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 28, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

The Turning Torso

While reading the newspaper today, I came across The Turning Torso. It is a skyscraper in Sewdan is the second highest residential building in Europe.

I found The Turning Torso one of the most goodlooking skyscrapers I have ever seen. The pics that I have seen so far are awesome and I can't imagine the view when I get to see it for real.

The tower is modeled on Santiago Calatrava's design Twisting Tower. They say it is inspired from the human body.

The tower is roughly divided into 9 five story cubes. As the tower rises in height, with each subsequent cube, the tower twists around the axis and the ninth cube is rotated by 90 degrees with respect to the first tower. The first two cubes would have meeting and office spaces and the rest seven cubes would be resedential with 149 deluxe apartments. I sure would want to have an apartment there. The tower officially opened on 27th August 2005 and infact they are offering people a trip to the tower for five days... Wish I was in Sweden...

Detailed information about the architect, design and history is available at the links mentioned

I off late have started taking a lot of interest in large structures, buildings, artefacts and similar stuff.

This started as a post about The Turning Torso and I am afraid it would end with the Calatrava and praises for him. The work he has been able to conceptualize inspire people. Atleast I am having second thoughts about my choice of career and I thought about quitting everything and get into designing and sculpting.

Following are few links about The Turning Torso and Calatrava
http://www.turningtorso.com (Official Turning Tower Website)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turning_Torso
http://www.bizzbook.com/map/turningtorso.html
http://www.pbase.com/mistermattias/torso
Real Time Turning Torso Webcam View

http://www.calatrava.com (Official Calatrava Website)
Calatrava.info (Unofficial Calatrava Website)
Calatrava Designs

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON August 29, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND

Uncommon Common Sense

In the last 6 hours, I have been told twice that Common Sense although appears very common but in fact, in reality it’s very uncommon. The first person to do that was Prof. Ahluwalia when he came to teach us Advertising Management and the second was Prof. Sanjay Bakshi when he came to teach us BFBV. I talked about him in my other BLOG at http://egyaan.blogspot.com/2004/12/prof-sanjay-bakshi.html

I had been waiting for this cause ever since Term 3 started and today I finally got to see him. As they say, the looks could be deceptive, I expected him to be a funky kinda person, who would have an athletic, lean body type, would be wearing Denims to class. I expected him to be very informal kinds but when I finally saw him, I realized that I shouldn’t make presumptions about people.

I thought I was the biggest techie around until I saw his desktop. He had about 20 icons lined up on QuickLaunch, and I could not recognize most of them. His taskbar was as heavy. He of course had minimal icons on the desktop. Just like any other techie ;)

Coming on to the class, he talked about Mental Models today. Everything was fine and going good until something called Backward Thinking was introduced. Simply put, Backward Thinking is not doing things that are not expected. For example, you want to run a business effectively. You list down things that you should not do to avoid ruining the business. And you make sure that you don't do the things in the list. Sherlock Holmes said

It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

So everything is fine, he said it, gave a few supporting arguments and that was that. But when you actually think about it again, you realize that Backward Thinking is just another tool to just be in the rat race, not win it or emerge as a winner.

Here is a very simple example to illustrate this further. You are among a batch of 100 students in a school. Assuming that you won’t be expelled until you fail in academics, your objective is to pass through the school, you just need to get passing percentage in the examinations. For passing percentage, you don't have to read the entire text, don't have to attend all the classes etc. You do just the bare minimum. The result: You are not expelled, you pass but you don't perform exceptionally or you don't top the class.

Extending this further, assuming that the objective is not to just pass the course but actually come first in the class. Now not to be the first among the class, you don't have to skip anything (means read everything), not miss any class etc. Two inherent problems here are identifying the right variables (you are never sure that the thing you are not doing is the right thing to not do), interaction of variables (you don't know how other variables that you have not considered affect the outcome). Bottom-line is that you do not do the things that you decided not to do and still might be far from the objective.

I know due to the amazing control over the language, I have made Backward Thinking absolutely gibberish... :( Wish I was better at English.

According to backward thinking, if you want to prove something as correct, assume that it is incorrect and prove that it is not incorrect and hence the original proposition is bound to be correct. Taking an example where Backward Thinking has been applicable (according to Prof. Bakshi) and extending it further to prove it wrong. He says that

Instead of thinking how to make your business better, think how to ruin it, and then simply avoid those things.

is an example of application of Backward Thinking.

Our ultimate objective here is to make the business better. We list things that would ruin it. A list could be ignoring the daily operations, getting the wrong people for the wrong situations, taking decisions without analysis etc. Assume that there are no interactions and the list of variables is complete. Now to achieve the objective (to make the business better), we just have to make sure that we don’t do these things. We do the opposite. We concentrate on day to day operations, get the right people and processes in place, and take decisions rationally (another word and concept I am fond of). The result? We run our business just normally, not exceptionally. We end running the business the way others do. We thus should be able to get the result others are getting. Others are doing well, We also do well, X also does well, the level of average is raised and end of the day everyone is pretty much same. We do not achieve the objective. The preposition is thus wrong. Backward Thinking thus failed.

More Later ...

Comments
chirayu said...
how about thinking "not to be placed below the top 10% in the class" ?
Sunday, September 18, 2005 2:55:17 AM

ORIGIANALLY POSTED ON Tuesday, September 13, 2005
REPOSTED FROM ABOUT2EVOLVE TO SEPTEMBERTHE22ND