Learn, because the other option is to fail.

Don't be a cookie cutter. Be a scientist.

- Wisdom from Gretchen, at 8 pm in Char Fac.

To summarize

I will like to take this moment to very briefly state the things which should guide me where to go next, live, settle down etc. I have decided that before deciding where to settle, I will look for only two things:

1. Meaningful Labor

2. Love

If your work is motivating enough to make you wake up at 7 and come to work at 9, it is worth it, do it with all your love and dedication.

-Palak

Planting Hope

Winter is approaching slowly. I brought all the plants inside today from the balcony and potted them in bigger pots. They have plenty of space and sunlight and soil and water and air but there is this doubt. It's their first winter and I don't know if they will survive. I have somewhat a similar doubt about my life too. I dont know if I will survive the next big cold hurdle of my career as a scientist. People say that basil will be fine indoors, its a weed. It's ironic how unwanted plants grow just fine in any season without any love or care, but the prettiest of the Crotons fade fast. There are some other tiny plants in my pots. I am sure they are weeds because I did not plant them. They are tiny but sometimes they get flooded in rains and still come up nice and bright when the water dries. Sturdy little things they are! I potted them in their small separate pots too because as I told my room-mate, I don't know who they are or were they came from, now that they are in my house, they are my responsibility. I can't control their roots and if weeds are what they meant to be when they grow up, weed they will be but they will the most well-fed, well-cared for weeds anyone has ever known. My job is just to help them be who ever they are meant to be! As Guru Granth Sahib says, He who feeds the birds and trees, will not let you stay hungry. You will be loved. You will look pretty. You will survive the winter. Have faith.

My shelf of seasons

There is a shelf above my desk

I call it the shelf of seasons

It has but one treasured gift

From each of the four seasons.

From summer, it has a parrot's wing.

Glistening, green and light

When exuberance was not an offense

And pleasure was in flight!

From Autumn, it has the cone

Fallen from an ageing pine,

A tribute to his humble land

To his lady, his rhine!

From the winter, it has a dried twig,

Which holds in it a fire,

To some it is a life well-lived,

To some it is a pyre!

At last from the spring, there's a hydrangea dry,

Still alive with its hope and scent,

Preserved still in that foot of length,

Is the memory of the year that went!

- Palak

Oct 1st 2010, CST

Lessons from the South

I am writing this from Pennington gap, VA. For the record, I have learnt all the 50 US states, their capitals and their state codes. I am not entirely sure how this will change my life, but at the moment, it felt like knowing all this was mighty important, so I did it. Something more important I learnt in this process was that I am still capable of learning new stuff, and the tricks used to help kids learn stuff apply to adults too. First, be convinced that you need to learn that which you are learning. Second, no harm in turning it into a game! Third, no harm in fantasizing about defeating others at it!

Anyway, those are not the lessons I am talking about. These are:

1. travel light. Ok, I agree that anyone who has gone anywhere ever even once in his/ her life should know this by now, but it took be a zillion trips and 24 years to really learn this. I will remember this trip as my lightest trip. This is the first time ever in my life that I have travelled without any book on me. I had two magazines which weren't heavy at all, but no books, none what so ever (nice change from the usual 60 books I love to carry). Here's something I should remember for life: When on a trip, look around, observe, understand, pick up a new word, take pictures, don't bury yourself in books. It's bad enough you have to do that for a living!

2. be yourself. Again, same old, same old advice. Again, I am sorry, took me a while to get it! Bottomline, irrespective of what goes on around you, be yourself! Don't be shy to voice your opinion, ask questions, throw a fit or whatever it takes to be yourself at that moment. That's how you'll learn about others and others will learn about you. How is pretending to be someone you are not going to help anyone in this world? Maybe if you work for the CIA or the KGP or whatever, this may not hold or you never know, it just may :)

3. travel a new path. Even if it is to the same old place, take a new road, open up your mind a bit. You may just land upon a new flower, a new leaf, a new you! Go out somewhere little far every two months. Work will take care of itself. Meetings happen every week and not just once! Go out and see the world, there is a lot of it out there and it may not be there forever.

4. sleep for 7 hours a day, make use of each and every minute of the remaining 17 hours, 10 for work (only the boring work for more than 10 hours a day, only the dull accomplish only 10 hours of work in 10 hours, the lazy just die young irrespective of when they die), 4 to take care of your body, 3 to develop your mind (hmm this one is kinda random :D)

5. believe in yourself, you are not stupid, you are not boring, you are not ugly, you are just fine as is everyone else, move on with your life, do something interesting, something new, something exciting, get on TV before you get wrinkles!! What are you waiting for! Don't waste time in trivialities, other people's opinions etc., life is too important to be wasted on all this.

6. Watch the news, read magazines, know the world around yourself, lest you be surprised when you clash with it tomorrow.

7. Know when its time to stop writing the blog and watch TV :)

Get up from ur ass and go out!

The world is yours!

The Rain!

It's raining outside. And it doesn't matter what zip code of what American state my couch is placed at, it's Bombay just outside my window. The way the water collects on the road in small puddles; the way the road light reflects off those puddles; the way the branches of tall trees bow to the supremacy of the weight of the wet tyrant; the way the window captures only a certain frame of the moment - only the puddle, the light, the bowing branch; the rest of the world is of little concern; the way the eye can capture only the splash of the water droplets on the road and not their whole path down; revealing time only moment by moment, splash by splash; its not 8th ST SE Minneapolis, its the road outside Hostel 10, IIT Bombay, Powai, Mumbai. Everything else maybe where ever it is supposed to be but that one frame is wrongly placed in space and time! It belongs to a land far far away and time not so distant in passing but unapproachable in direction, long lost to the land far far away. A frame so far and distant that the heart is tempted to believe it exists only in thought and not is matter. What may appear to the eye to be outside my window, may just be inside my heart. The tender branch of time bends under the burden of memory, like the branch of the tree outside my window bowing to the weight of the rain. The longing is so strong it creates inescapable puddles down memory lane which glisten on a rainy night. Somewhere out there wanders my heart, flipping through life frame by frame, passing though time splash by splash, until the sunlight brings it back inside.

Random Science Thoughts!

This is the curse of our generation of scientists: we can't compare the atom to plum puddings and win a Nobel Prize for it!

When Schrodinger put the cat in the box, he put all of us in it too!