I have been really traveling over the past couple of months. It started after I joined my new job. First it was Silent Valley. I took 2 weeks to recover from a 4 day trip. It was like touching my purest and deepest self within and then letting go to come back to this impersonal, mechanical and polluted world. Thats what being in nature, and away from humans generally, does to me. Thats how I felt staying in Kemmanu during my college days and I missed that so much after coming to Bangalore. The fact that I missed city life when I was actually in college is a different story, but the point is, I have lived that life of silence. That silence has enabled me to hear myself, my faintest whispers, the pulsations of the umbical chord to my higher self, the time between the blink of an eye and the spaces between the past, present and future. I have felt so connected that everything these days doesn’t get me any higher than I have been. And Silent Valley was like a mental refresher in drowning within. Within, without….actually makes no difference when you are so surrounded by nature. But that apart, I have really been wandering - and as some might say, living it up.

After Silent Valley, Hampi happened. And that was a totally different trip. Those 200 rupee cottages overlooking the river. The great food, the ruins….those efforts to shoot starry long exposures….all magical and one of its kind. Of course that trip also meant that Sandeep, Rajith, Kien and myself somewhere had the same chromosome in our blood - the one that makes you want to get out of the mundane and feel new places. Many a times I have wondered what kind of escapism it is to always looking around from the eyes of a traveler - distanced from the actual boredom, misery and drudgery of the lives we see through our cameras and by referring to our guide books. Its like the movie The Notebook I watched and felt so much in love with. I know I can never have a house over looking the lake with no one for miles around. I know I can never go on a boat ride with someone I love truly - but its so nice to watch it when projected on a screen - its so nice even though its distant. And this distance is what makes traveling so very appealing. The real distance covered by road v/s the distances between people. Between people you see around you everyday. Everyday - what a boring word. Its like prison. And the prison need not only have four walls. The prison can be because its the same people you see, the same distances that only seem to grow between you and them and the loss of wonder, curiosity, beauty, creativity. Familiarity breeds contempt.

After Hampi, we did couple of small trips - Mysore, Auroville, Jog….and next week I am off to Mumbai. All by myself. And I wonder - compared to my previous trips, whom am I really going to have for company on that trip? I am going to be on my own after a long time. Thats something I haven’t done in ages. Actually thats something I was so comfortable many years ago and which has changed with circumstances over time. Circumstances that make you want, but not get. The chasm of desire to connect that grows deeper. The connection you confuse with other connections….glimpses of which I have had in places like Silent Valley and before that in Kemmanu…The connection and the disconnect lived in one life time….

This desire to connect…this reason for hope…this hope that makes you get out of bed each morning…this pacemaker that ticks an ailing heart and make people confuse things that are with that which is not….these are the malaises of our times…and somewhere what I really need to build immunity against. But oh, time….its not on my side because I procrastinate…and I procrastinate because my eyes really open only when on a trip….rest of the time its just half open….another disease of the times….we have too much electric light…too much caffeine….information overload…and we don’t even notice our lives go overboard…

Ok, I suppose you get the drift.

One day the wind will change and blow away your wonderland
Blue skies will soon be overcast
One day the tide will turn and wash away your castles in the sand
And you’ll find peace ¡­ at last 

Alan Parsons Project - Ignorance Is Bliss

I switched jobs on August 1, 2007. Its been a tight two days since then, and I suppose its going to be a tight two months from now. Lots to learn, lots to prove. There is this little voice in my head which is crying out, “what about your hobbies? What about your life?” But I guess I should be able to pull it through. Problem is that for almost three years now I haven’t really worked on any tight deadlines or challenging projects. I always knew this is bad in a way, cos it builds complacency (but then, I finally found time to build my website). Now it is time to kick the past behind and forge ahead.

And the good news is - My travel time is now reduced to a max of half an hour per day. Thats such a relief to me. So basically I have to restructure my life around these new challenges and new routines. Change is in the air! (I know I am repeating myself)

The best part of about going out into the wild and facing life is seeing where you stand. No matter what the situation, if you take one step back and look at yourself from a third person’s POV, you’ll understand how you as a human contribute, respond and are part of the situation. If you see yourself evolving in various situations that you find yourself in, then that’s great. But if you see yourself avoiding unfamiliar situation and people, then you’ll never know where you stand. Of course, with age our ability to take risks comes down, and that is fine.  But the ability to see ourselves objectively shouldn’t. This is what I have learnt over the last few days. I now understand better where I stand in a crowd. I understand better how I respond to certain situations, and what is stopping me from doing what I ought to have been doing. There is change in the air. And it feels fresh

is everywhere. Read this and this. I will not comment on the subject that is being discussed, but I have this to say:

In our country, the moral police believes in only one thing - goondaism.

In our country we are more worried about protecting our gods and goddesses by doing the opposite of what our religion actually stands for.

In other countries people are really worried about protecting their kids from pedophiles because it is an everyday reality which they cannot escape. It exists in our country too (from what I have read) but we are just about learning to talk about it and it will be ages before we can do something about it.

So bottom line - we are a progressing country. What we will progress to at this rate is frightening. But everywhere else, societies are as depraved as they can get. I ask yet again, what is the world coming to?

Colonel Goldwyn asks Nathan (Tom Cruise) in the movie The Last Samurai, “What is it about your own people that you hate so much?”

I have asked myself the same question so many times.

When I was 20 something I first heard the words “why does anybody do anything?” on Pink Floyd’s DSotM. At that time I was looking for answers to questions I didn’t even know and somewhere this question got lost among many other things (including my gumption). But today while chatting with a friend about the state of affairs at work and my life in general, I realized that what I look forward to from life is definitely and intricately tied up with what I expect from work. But talking about work is not something I am going to do here. I’ll just talk about two things which I have always sought from life.

The first thing that I have always wanted from life is experience. This is a loaded word. For some it might be a comb life gives you after you’ve gone bald, and for others it might be the ‘rush’ that we all seek consciously or unconsciously (or have seeked). I use this word to mean something in between these two concepts. I have always wanted to experience what it feels like to be alone and have no one but yourself for company. I have felt it and it has given me a sense of fulfilement. I have experienced how it feels like to travel unplanned and get stuck in an alien city and I have learnt a thing or two from this.

The second what I have wanted from life is growth. Growth can come from experience, from a conscious effort to learn, from interacting with smart people, from failures…..from many things. But not to grow is to stagnate and to stagnate is to die. Even dogs on the street learn not to step in front of speeding vehicles because they know what would happen. And they have learnt how to cross roads. Which means they have grown from being immature four legged creatures that didn’t know that a car could kill, to being able to cross a busy street. Sometimes this growth happens out of the need to survive. But largely, growth has a lot to do with attitude, intelligence and willful need to want to grow.

How does all this relate to work? Simple. Everything I do, whether the profession I choose or the vacation I plan, is keeping either or both of the above in mind. Either I want to experience something or I want to learn (and hence grow). In every relationship I want to experience things like love, togetherness, happiness yada, yada and at the same time grow to be a better person. Basically, when I neither grow nor get anything feelgood out of a situation or a person, I quit. Cos there’s simply nothing more for me in it anymore. And this way I have either quit, or simply not even shown interest in many a people, places and things. For example I always avoided Bollywood movies cos there is nothing in it for me. I know people who have been amazed at the fact that I don’t watch Bollywood movies. I have always avoided such people too. Cos apart from the fact that they are not aware of an alternate source of entertainment, it also reflects the fact that they have not been ‘exposed’ to the fact that someone can actually not watch Bollywood movies. This probably sounds either totally absurd to you, or you might be thinking ‘I hear ya..’. But trust me, I have come across such individuals who have been completely surprised about someone not interested in Bollywood movies/music and staying away from them has never proved costly.

But all this talk about experience, growth and Bollywood brings us to something else - the kind of people who are out there in this world. Clearly there are people who neither want to grow nor want to experience something new, something ‘high’ (a subjective word, I know) or something fresher. I have seen blokes in buses carrying cellphones playing mp3 tunes of latest brash Hindi tracks, as though the stuff played on MTV (and a dozen other channels) is not enough. I have seen people resisting change, smug in what little they know or feel. But then, who am I to judge? That’s right. Everything and everyone’s cool about living and let living. But only as long as these stagnant people don’t stand in your way.

Coming back to what I was talking about initially - why do we do things we do, I can speak for myself and say I do things to either experience something or cause a reaction that will help me grow. I avoid spending time doing things that don’t have either of these two in return. Lately I have been indulging in petty things like road rage which, one moment after I’ve let out the steam does feel like a stupid thing to have done but that’s the part I need to work on - how to move on and not get bogged down by people who stand in my way. Needless to say, these people neither share my sense of direction (or search for a sense of direction), nor stand on my way because they want to. Such people generally exist pretty cluelessly, so ’stand in my way’ shouldn’t be taken as offensively as it sounds. It’s just that I see too many people standing around cluelessly and it gets crowded and hinders swift movement of people like me who want to get someplace fast. And I don’t like to push. To top it, these days we need to collaborate and work with all kinds of people without too much of a choice at times, and when the ratio of cool v/s uncool (categorize and judge at your will) becomes skewed, things get to you.

Of course life is not so easy that I can summarize it in a blog post. The interconnections spread deep and complex, and it takes more words to straighten them out for observation. For example, I have chosen to put up with lowly people where I presently work because in return I have more free time to learn new things and go to new places. That’s only part of how things are related. There’s more but I don’t want to get into that now. Cos when straightened out and observed with a keen mind, life’s problems always appear simple and the solutions seem so obvious that you might appear stupid for not implementing them. But it’s not as simple as it appears. Or you are not as simple as the solution can be. Always.

Nevertheless, remember that you always have to first get into yourself and understand why you arrived at this. And I have looked into myself and I’ve realized that I seek to grow and I seek experiences that gave me the direction that brought me here. Where to I go from here? Gotta see.

I have to admit it. After numerous failed attempts at writing a blog post, here is another attempt. I know I am and I feel terribly guilty of not updating my blog. And I just can't seem to do it. My brain is too muddled with petty things happening at work, and back home, there are so many things that I'd like to spend time doing that I actually don't do anything properly. Like coding my website. That came to an unceremonious halt when I realized that I need to design from scratch again (the template that I designed just didn't feel right). Starting from scratch meant going back to Photoshop and waiting for inspiration (which never came). Meanwhile, I wanted to get back to processing my old RAW files in Adobe Lightroom and start saving 16bit TIFFs with non-destructive edits (using layer masks). This meant dealing with files of up to 45mb, something which my poor AMD 3000+ system would really suffer under the strain of (so I either had to upgrade, or be prepared to spend lot of time staring at progress bars). As usual, my computer crashed (like the zillion times it has before) just when I got started on one of the above (don't even remember which) and I got backing up my data and reformatting my disk. I had enough unwritten data to spend my entire weekend doing nothing but backups, so I killed another opportunity to do something productive.

The good side of this computer crash is that I finally decided to upgrade but the sheer economics of upgrading (and Intel planning to cut prices in Q3) got me more seriously looking for alternate solutions. And I slapped my forehead so hard that I fell backwards when I did finally manage to nail the problem. It was NOT my motherboard, it was NOT my hard disks and it was not my luck. It was my Power Supply Unit that was causing all the crashes (for two years straight). When I posted the specs of my PSU on the MSI forums, someone actually said, "I am surprised your computer boots at all!". Imagine that. I have been choking my system with an underrated power supply and have been trying to fix crashes for 2 years by investigating everything else but the power supply. God, I wish the same PSU gives me an electric shock to cure my stupidity. 

In between all this, I have been fighting hard to stay afloat and not drown in a sea of stupidity at work. I am learning lessons on how NOT to be like and what NOT to do, but with the monotony of things, I get this feeling everything is happening at cost of my youth. Youth? I am 25 alright, but I still feel young :). Maybe its because I have a short attention span or maybe cos I have outgrown the project environment, but watching (and being part of) a company's growth from 20 to 100 is not actually as exciting as my boss would want us to think. (I have been on the same project for 3 years now so 'short attention span' doesn't actually sound right :)) In fact, I totally appreciate the enthusiasm of certain individuals who have a vision of making it big (for the entire organization and not for themselves), but we are a services oriented company seen as a low cost vendor for mighty rich MNCs, so the reality is that we are operating within a very limited framework. In fact, the reality of the situation hits us, who are in the front and facing the customer, evermore than the others who shout orders from the back. And do we have a good set of people in the front? Hell, thats where the problem starts and I believe its not unique to our company. Over a span of 3 years I have hardly seen even 1 individual who can be called a bright spark. Our education system is entirely at fault and all this is a topic for another day and another blog post. Bottom line is that we have a dull set of people who while away their time indulging in petty things. But then, haven't I seen this kind of situation before?

Right now, I need to catch some sleep

PS: Over the span of blogging this (probably an hour), Askimet has caught 15 spams. A total of  26,085 since when I installed it 6 months ago. Can someone tell me whats going on? 

Since the death of TV and new exciting music in my world, I haven't quite been inspired or blown away by any other's creativity in a long time. I picked a book - Life on Planet Rock by Lonn Friend recently and this post is a result of that. After reading the book, I revisted GN'R by watching some videos (like Estranged and November Rain), but the feeling I used to get some years ago did not come over me again. My hair didn't stand on the back of my neck, and I didn't play the air guitar. Instead, I started recalling those Axl worshipping days and tried to see what I knew then, that I seem to have forgotten now. What did we see in these musicians? Why did we place them on a pulpit? Why aren't there new heroes to replace the ones who have faded, thanks to Time and the general spinning of the earth? What is the brainfeed I seek now?

If there is any one stagnant thought I can pick up from the many running in my head, it would be what I described above. Yes, the nostalgia associated with our teen years and rock n' roll is something very stagnant, and little has happened since then although we have grown in years and stacked up abundant music on our hard drives. The feeling has long gone and around us, the generations are becoming shallower and art is becoming bleaker. My radar yearns for new creativity, new brainfeed, but there are are hardly any blips (even when there are, it is surprisingly from our own Eastern music). And since music and creativity is what I have lived off, I now have a choice of gasping to survive, or submitting myself to the darkness and embracing what comes with it. In fact, I have nearly done that and discovered something new. Enter Photography.

Yes, Photography is my new brainfeed in these times superficiality. I once had my hands in my pockets and whistled tunes carelessly while the winds blew my hair. I could do that because my pockets were empty and I could feel the winds. These days I drag myself to work to put some wind into my sails and money into my pockets. All that money I offer at the altar of Photography where I pray for salvation and an all-access badge to the kingdom of creativity. But the so called 'hard work' is not without expectations so there are strings attached. The very same brain that was once freely injected with the rush of Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and the like, is now most of the time running full throttle calculating for that telezoom or macro lens or attending stupid meetings to stay on the job. So there is no time to indulge in gay abandon or lesbian voyerurism (;)). Instead, when the calendar presents a holiday or the evening comes with a breath of fresh out-of-office air, I try and go out to shoot. I do it because that is all I can do. For everything else, I depend on friends. I hope to get by with a little help from friends. But too bad I belong to the Lonely Hearts Club Band. And so life has managed to fuck with me again. But hey, there is always some nostalgia and rock n' roll to fill in. 

So this is how it is. That was how it was. How will it be? Where do we go from here? Let's just wait n' see….

I've been noticing an interesting thing during my morning walks. Old men with transistor radios in their pockets. No need of earphones, no need of programming. Music from a small portable device, ala the Apple Ipod. Nice :) 

Continuing the same stream of thought, I am beginning to re-realize the importance of keeping it simple. Having invested a lot of money on camera gear, the thought of losing it to thieves or an accident due to carelessness looms perpetually over me. But that's how life goes. I used to live off 2000 bucks once. Things were simple. Today I have learnt to manage ten times that amount. I cannot refuse to learn. I cannot ignore the fact that this is natural progression. I find it strange when people I know refuse to change. Change is difficult, I agree. Especially when the forces that molded you into what you are, still influence you in your everyday life. But simple to complex happens naturally. The challenge lies in how you learn to live with it. But there will always be people who don't need an ipod. It's up to you to see which class you belong to. Don't go for an ipod just because everyone has one. And if you really need one, and payed through your nose for it, then accept the fact that it may go anyday. Yes, everything that you painstakingly build over years can disappear any moment. And then, remember people live without an Ipod. Its not the end. Life will go on. 

There have been many a times in the past when I have been on the verge of losing it. But for the first time it is for something as materialistic as a digital SLR. Call me mad, but ever since I sold my 350D, I've been a nervous wreck. And at one point of time, I even thought of selling 40k worth of Canon lenses and moving to Nikon because of the new Nikon D80. It took me a while to understand that having to wait for the review of the Canon Rebel XTi was getting too much for me and that is why I was swaying towards buying a D80 (whose review is out, and which has been judged as a gaint leap for Nikonkind). Of course, the irony of the matter is that just when good friend Akshata was supposed to buy either of the cameras from S'pore, she has completely disappeared (and I sincerly hope all is well with her). Not seen her online in a while and that worries me. 

Actually, upon further introspection I realized that the 400D forums on DPreview is a bad place to hangout when you are a cat sitting on the wall. Until recently I was totally convinced that Canon is a great company because of being R&D driven, but after hearing so many rants about the 400D, I almost regretted being a Canon shooter. Hell, I even thought that the 400D is a bad decision!

Of course, now I know better. The 400D forums, remarkable as it may sound, is almost giving rise to an Urban Myth. A Myth that has many shades to it:

• Canon has bad QC because some guy couldn't see readings on the viewfinder when pointing his camera at the TV
• Canon's 400D is a failure because some guy couldn't get sharp shots indoors with flashed turned OFF (!!)
• The 400D underexposes to preserve highlights/show less noise/Canon has a Nikon spy inside it's factory. Some guy even started a thread saying "Buyer's Beware - 400D underexposes". And the best part, he uses the camera in auto mode.
• Some guy is convinced that the 400D has lock up issues. He calls up Canon and points them to the DPreview forums to show them the same. He wants to set the ball rolling on getting Canon to release a firmware update. How he got this strange idea of400D having lockup issues, I don't know. I have seen no one complaining of it.

With so many 'duhs', I won't be surprised if Canon starts including a disclaimer stating that buying a digital SLR does not automatically get you great photos. And when you don't get great photos just because you got a DSLR, don't blame the camera.

From my own learning curve, I can say that photography is both an art and a science. The science part I am yet to completely grasp, and it is indeed fun learning. With new DSLRs falling in price, I am not suprised that many people don't see it that way. Spend more money - get better photos. That seems to be what most people think when they upgrade from a P&S. A similar analogy would be the general thought that having a big car would get you good chicks and that's all you need in life. Ok, I am going overboard here

Nevertheless, I have somehow convinced myself to stick with Canon. On the other hand, the Nikon is really a great camera. Especially the viewfinder. It's addictive, I would say. And that's exactly what I need to go out an shoot more. I need a camera that screams "look at me sitting here doing  nothing. Take me out and SHOOT!" Yes, I somehow deep inside believe that the Nikon D80 is that kind of a camera. As Phil concludes in his review, the D80 is a "photographer's camera". And without even seeing the 400D's review, I can say that Canon's entry level DSLR is just that - an entry level DSLR for P&S upgraders.

However, when it comes to image quality, Canon has always had an advantage, and is still leading over the D80 by a whisker. I would certainly want to opt for the best image quality. But the fact that I want to move up from an entry level DSLR to a 'photographer's camera' makes me still consider buying a Nikon. Aaaarrggghh…..i'm starting it off all over again!!!