An Attitude of Me and I

“Treat yourself right – your energy is almost entirely focused inward, and you may want to try treating yourself to a little life of some kind. It’s a great day for a walkabout, if you can!” – so this is about me and my day today. This is what my horoscope is talking about me insinuating me to guide my day according to it. I found it soon as I was flipping through the pages of our national daily, “The Kathmandu Post”. This is what I use to do every morning till some few years back, but the days now are not still the same. Time changed and so do I – so, finally, I have stopped looking through my horoscope every morning. Now, this has been changed to “FACEBOOKING” – and  I have been habituated to it now.

If you think a little bit meticulously, you will find that we have now become more habituated to an attitude of “Me and I” kind of things more than just a Facebooking, and Facebook has provided us its platform to cultivate it. Over time we have become like egotistical and we have been developing it with leaps and bounds. In this context, it might be somehow situation-generated while some are natural – in anyway, we have finally been trapped within its seine . Even a person rebuffing the claim has in them somewhere.

Every morning we get up, the first thing we notice is ourself, and the first thing that rushes through our mind is, “How is our day gonna be today?” and then followed by the number of work loads that we have to accomplish and even that without having any kind of problems whatsoever. Because we have been consumed by ourself-attitude we try to find and run after horoscopes every morning which might not be true for everyone of us, but, yes, certainly for many of us – those who believe in astrology and mostly consumed by the thoughts governing orthodox.

Every time advertently or inadvertently we have been thinking of ourself, but this is justifiable being a human. Just try not inviting a tone of “Me and I – attitude” in your talk, you will be amazed to know that 3 out of 5-times we are talking about ourself with the same tone, gesture and posture that turns out really unnerving. This is just a form of human nature which might work best in the time of crisis and thus the kind of eternal law of Charles Darwin would hold to be true.

I think its just a situation that has made us self-centric, so I thinking blaming ourself might not be completely fair, but not working on it to mitigate might not certainly be inculpable. I have ever heard somebody saying that, “No body owes me anything that they will hail me or praise me vociferously, I have to do it by myself”. I think its funny and I have not idea how much it holds to be true.

One of the things that creates animosity among our friends and our connections is the way we speak. There is another saying that there are two thing that can’t be reverted back once it is released: one is the bullet fired from a gun and another one our own words that pops out. And these two things are really really very lethal. In fact, both hurts others but we are the culpable and we will be the sole loser and not the one to whom it is fired to.

So, thinking of not using the term I, me and myself might be a most prudent choice if we want to be gregarious. Using those words most frequently just simply makes people offended and will might not work to elevate our dignity, people’s look and reverence towards us. So, think about it before you make choices of making use of those filthy words most frequently in your words – in your speeches!!

Sadist: A Voice of Animal

I am now confused when I hear somebody saying that they are kind to animals and they are the voices of animals, and boast to speak in favor of animals. Now, I am enjoined to ask to myself whether we are really kind to animals and whether or not we are the voice of animals which unfortunately I doubt. Can we say that we have been able to reach the millennium development goal (MDG) in terms of animal right? I doubt, again. Have we been able to say that we are more conscious than ever before when it comes to abusing animals?  I doubt !! There are numbers of fair and transparent examples which is still elusive as ever before. In straight forward tone – We have not yet achieved even 1% in making people aware regarding the animal rights and making them accountable for their abuses towards their pet or some other street animals.

From bench of lab to the food table, there has never been a single day where we don’t find an animal being sacrificed for the so called, “for the benefit of mankind”: we have our delicious food of chickens, fish, pork, beef, goat, lamb, mice, cat, dog, snake, frog, and god knows what else – everyday. We have not left anything that we have not laid of mouth to. We have savored everything either one way or another. The reason we put forward to justify this heinous crime  is that, “It is for the benefit of mankind – for us, for our goodness, for our health. At least we need to feed these unfathomable ever growing billions of population around the world, right?

This is not a scenario of one part of the world, but this has been a part of every part of the world. The problem for not yet implementing and taking a strong law and action against the animal right is because none feel the agony of losing one like we lose our loved one. We miss them immensely, but in case of animal its other way round and we all know this fact. It has a kind of secondary impact which is less picking then losing the loved ones or something that we are attached to. However, there is always a form of exception in every case. So, we are not talking about the exceptional cases, but the one that is felt but not yet dealt by the world as a whole.

I had ever mentioned about the cruelty against animals in China in one of my previous blog,  but I think its easy to point finger to others than to looking ourselves in the mirror. I have just come across a news in our national daily newspaper: The Kathmandu Post. It is not in fact a news, but a personal experience of the local from Chitwan district of Nepal who have seen the cruelty towards Elephant in Nepal during the International Elephant Polo and the race competition being held there annually. Different countries from all over the world participate in the context and the program is conducted with elephants where elephants are forced to drink alcohol, and then are set for competition where elephants have to please their mahout by winning the context. Those elephants are whipped, goaded and prepared for the competition two shits a day before the commencement of the international competition. Sometimes these international competition costs the life of those poor creatures, but everyone turns deaf ear to those horrific incidence – their only prime aim is to win the competition at any cost as they are rewarded with bounty of money, of course.

Either one way or another animals are put to these kind of tribulations advertently or inadvertently. But, either way, those are the animals which have to bear the brunt of human sadism and sadistic behavior. We hope that this situation will not persists any more longer, but even this scents of hopes are still elusive as well.

A Christmas Message

Before I begin my verboseness talk right here, I would like to wish you all a very very Happy Merry Christmas. Hope you guys are doing well in your life with your work, study and everything that you are into – not to mention everything.

For the Asia Pacific region, yesterday was Christmas day, but for those who are staying and living in the western part of the world, it is today. Not to mention, its because of the approximately 10 to 12 hours of time difference. I don’t know how you guys celebrate in the western part – might be something in more vibrant way than it is being celebrated in the countries having majority of population with other religion than the Christianity. However, it is being celebrated in almost all countries all over the world – even in the countries which are not a secular states like Nepal and India – just to mention few for example.

Its been quite a while I have not blogged something in the regular fashion as I have been doing in last couple of months. Sometimes it use to be like 2 blogs-a-day. But, ironically, being busy during the Christmas time, I have been unable to update it. So, I thought of putting something during the Christmas day or the day-after-Christmas. So, finally, somehow  fortunately I got little to insert in the big space of this big-blog-space this time.

When I post some blogs, mostly my blogs have some Thailand-touch specially Bangkok. In fact, this is what happens when you stay in some place – you have got little knowledge about that place, but everything else is just blank except with few news from the websites. I have been getting complains from my friend that I am not writing anything about Nepal from where I belong. But, I guess this can be understandable. You can’t simply copy-and-past information from some news sites, and it doesn’t sound any good to mention the news from my family or something – this will just simply be quirky, irking and creepy.

So, for Bangkok specially, I think there might have been some fun because I ended up celebrating my Christmas this time in my advisor’s house with my friends and technicians from our lab. In Bangkok, I guess this didn’t go much better-and-bigger this time because of the bomb threat in some places inside Bangkok – to specify more precisely, it is something like 10 places – largely parts of the city that is usually crowded with the tourists. And according to the governmental Intel source, this threat remains till this new year 2012. But, I hope everything will be fine and the new year celebration will not be marred with the security issues because the government has already beefed up the security system inside the city and elsewhere. And, also because the city dwellers have not yet sensed anything suspicious and haven’t heard anything saddening regarding threat. So, hope New Year will be even more bigger than this.

This time the Christmas and New Year in Thailand has been welcomed by a little bit of cool climate. I say cool in a sense that in most part of Thailand as you know, you need at least a fan to cool yourself in the sultry weather and without a fan or AC it will be like a hell to stay. But, for now, we do not need fan during the day time and the nights have been little bit more chiller, so you might need to use a light blanket to warm yourself. Usually this pleasant weather lasts for few days to maximum a week every year, but this time its been like more than 10 days or so. So, I guess, this might bring a better experience to the tourists and the locals who will be celebrating New Year inside Thailand.

One last information, if you are a tourist, do not forget to attend the New Year countdown in front of Central World in the downtown Bangkok. 

Perception of Social Media

Social medias have taken a huge swing in recent times. Everybody is talking about the social media – some are wise-geeks, while some are buffoons, but whoever they are, the most surprising thing is that everybody has got more or less knowledge about the social media.

Today’s generation is so frantic about the social media that they keep on hanging 24/7, specially the people in the developed countries and the countries which are on the final stage of getting into the list of developed countries – thanks to the uninterrupted power supply and the cheaper gadgets in the time of competition which is pushing the trend to make it happen and give it a successful tag. The number of people using social media to get connected is not as surprising as the way it has taken the toll of our generation.

Within these last couple of years it has risen so unprecedentedly that it has become quite hard for the older generation to catch up with it. They feel like its something out-of-the-world for most of them and they are struggling to match their steps of the current generation’s pace of development.

It is quite incomprehensible to know why it has gain so much name and fame in such a small period of time. One possible reason can be that, it has got something stored in for almost all generation, though it is difficult for the peoples from different generation to comprehend it at the pace it is developing or changing. It means, people from different walks of life have different tastes – some are technology freaks who are always in search for something new, something different, while others are like, they just need something that will suffice their work load for a period of time after which they will never care to look back and see what it really was when they need it. In straight forward tone  — they never had that kind of taste a person usually have that have made this social networking rise with leaps and bounds.

There has always been some kind of perception for things to be comprehended by the people which varies within a population and in between the people of same generation also. But, we can’ t blame a person for having a sense and a taste different than somebody else, because its just a human nature and we have been made so to maintain the balance of earthly nature.

Some people take social networking as something to kill time, to pass time, some take it as enjoyment, some as a hub for the intellect where all their friends are intellect and often have real-time discussion on things that is relevant for their work or something. Some take it as a platform for the educational purpose where they can share what they feel about and then get feedback from their friends, colleagues, and their peers.

Whatever it is we have been blessed to enjoy all these new technologies first hand. Thanks to all engineers who are working hard day and night for making this happen to give us their best. 

Thank you so much for stopping by and reading.

Everybody is beautiful

Wait! Before you make some conclusions with just the topic of this blog, let me make it clear to you that this is not philosophical and this is not something that is guided by emotion — THIS IS THE FACT!

Everybody is beautiful, everybody is perfect, everybody is nice, everybody is suave, everybody’s idea is wonderful — in one word, the world is perfect. The only thing that we need to do is how we perceive things. It is only our perception that makes our ideas and ideologies bend. That’s why it is said that, “Beauty Lies in the Eyes of Beholders”. But, ironically, we can’t our self boast about anything. It is the world to determine and decide what we are, how we are, and who we are. 

However, as a rule of thumb, there is exceptions to everything, and so does it has. This set of ideologies are only applied to the common people who are normal except those who are radical, those who are aberrant and those who do not think of assimilating things in their life, the one who doesn’t like changes. In fact, changes is the part of our life — and this is all about entropy. And, we have to follow the rules of universe — we have to accept the changes.

This is not from Gita, this is not from Khoran and this is not from Bible or the words of Buddha. This is our generally accepted truth. All holy books says the same thing, the only thing necessary (again) is to think, analyze, assimilate and try to converge it into the factual detail — YOU WILL FIND THE SAME ANSWER.

God!

“God will not reward us for what we have done right. But, he will surely punish us for what we have done wrong”.

From the movie “Courageous”.

Is Everybody Flaunting Blatantly?

Even when I am writing – it is flaunting in someway, but not sure whether it is blatantly, purposely, in deliberately in calculated manner – but, yes, again, this is flaunting in someway. If you do not flaunt about your views, your ideas or your dogmas, then I guess it is better to stop using your blog, if not your official website which might somehow be more formal and might hold more responsibilities. Now, when we talk about our writing-responsibilities, it also do have some form of structure we have to follow and some set of rules we have to come across through. But, it should not be a blatant. I mean, every internet writing, news, articles, editorials, blog posts is fettered with set of rules and law as stated above. But, when we use our mouth and lips it doesn’t have any boundaries – so you can flaunt anything, everything, every time and anywhere unless somebody listening to you do not know your very closely and deeply – like, about your potential and what you are capable of.

These days everyone of us have something to share, something to say and something to preach. I mean, its like we are growing in an intellectual environment where intellect is virtual to some extent. Ironically, it might be real in most cases and might not be as virtual as we are thinking. One plausible reason in a sense might be because we have got access to internet these days and the information of any sort are just within the reach of our finger-tips. Everybody is getting abreast with the latest news, information and discoveries these days as the world’s data shows that number of people using internet has surpassed 2 billion in 2011, and it also shows that Asia having the highest number of internet user – i.e. 44%, which is really something to flaunt for us as an Asian.

We just have to instigate the talking and you will see how many more will then follow you, will join you in your conversation. I still remember when I use to stay with my friends in dorm, we use to chat till late night with lights turned off – sometimes even till 3 AM in the morning. The reason is everyone had something to say and we were were supposed to pay by listening to each other; doesn’t matter how futile the talk would be and how gibberish a person delivering the talk was.

When people talk, you will feel like, you are the only simpleton there and the person talking is the, “Mr. Know All”. Even s/he feels the same when they are talking. Later when you rummage deep into his understanding, you will find that,” Wow! s/he is a real genius”, “At least I was made to believe falsely about his intellect and what s/he really knows”. Even I am also victimized to this situation plenty of time but overtime I got to garner my sense and lost-strength and slowing I start believing the real scenario – this world is not the same as it seems from outside. Sometimes I feel like I should start believing better that there is an alien world somewhere else the inhabitants of which might be more intelligent than what we are flaunting our self about and they might be laughing somewhere light-years always.

I doubt sometime myself whether I am a bigger simpleton than the one who is doing the talking because they never realize that we are thinking somewhere inside our mind that, “Okay, I know you and what you want to flaunt – keep going, I will not disturb you and make yourself light believing that we are buying your talk”.

Listening is the best practice unless it gets to your nerves!! So, keep listening!!

 

 

My First Experience with Internet

What does blog stand for?

This is a kind of mind-bogging question that has inflicted some kind of agony in people’s mind, and its because its very difficult to answer it precisely – What does it really stands for? Even when I first started using internet, people use to talk about a kind of free sites from where we can earn money. Later I realized that it is the blog where we can create our blog and then start posting thing with AdSense already activated. I use to use internet in cyber café and it really use to be painfully expensive in those days. This is a story of few years back – to be more precise – its my story, my person story of an encounter with internet and these blog things.

For now, for me, I feel like, I am a story teller in some third-world-country village sitting in the bonfire and charming small kids around the bonfire in the chilling winter evening with billowing smoke all over making hazy cloud all over the sky that might have raised from the clay ovens in the villages. (If you imagine this, you will find it really peaceful, out of clamors of metropolitan cities, far from the blaring horns of vehicles and the gasoline smokes and dusts all over.) This is the true pristine clime of the third-world-country, and my village is one of them. And, I am proud to flaunt that I come from that village!!)

So, coming back to my story and me (goddamn snake charmer) – charming kids all around me in front of bonfire.

So, when I first started using internet I had no idea even where to put even the address and from where to proceed to make good use of it – I was like complete cypher in that case, but later came out to be the one, even when, now, these days people come to ask me to fix their computer – literally!! I still remember the days when I use to ask my friends to teach me how to use internet, but to my dismay they use to teach me just for five minutes, and instead they use to use it for an hour or so in the cyber café enjoying in my money. Then finally, one day I decided, not to ask for any AH’s help (I have made the short form of the word which I think you might have by now guessed what for hazing obscenity).

I started using internet and I was so attached to it that I could not stop myself than getting my hands on internet and doing whatever I like. I remember once I somehow changed the wallpaper of the desktop in the cyber and I was like kind of WOW!! I use to be so proud of myself of those petty things that made me escalate to the higher degree of using computer and internet and even more than that – though it doesn’t make sense now. Because these days even small primary school kids can use it more dexterously that us. The first page that I saw in my life in the internet was Yahoo home page. Then, when I was in my undergraduate I got the highest mark in the first internal exam of bioinformatics – it was 48 out of 50 marks. Again it was a kind of wow for me, as it was something unexpected. However, in the other internal exams other students overtook me later. This is my short experience story of 10-years ago. This was because  of my attachment with the technology things and more specifically internet and computer. Even till today, I can live without water for a day – but imaging my life without internet for a day is like crossing the entire Kalahari desert without a sip of potable water.

This is just one story and can’t be taken as a golden-rule-of-thumb. But, there are other instances also when we realize that learning through our personal experience is the best learning methodology and pedagogy to ourselves than anything else. Even till these days there are very few people who believe in learning through their experience, though they flaunt in their webpages and their social-networking-sites like Facebook  and Twitter that, “Learning through experience is the best experience”.

Foreign Education–What Does It Really Hold for Us?

In regard to the rising brain-drain-rate in the developing countries including my own country – Nepal, this has been a very huge hot topic-of-debate these days. And, this has taken a huge swing in the recent times after insurgency took a very nasty turn overthrowing the monarchy system of Nepal and declaring it as a Democratic Republic of Nepal and one of the secular states of world. Earlier to this date, there has been just two countries in the world (if I am not wrong) which used to be considered as a country of Hinduism – one was India (though it has already been officially declared as a secular state long before), and another Nepal and have been considered as one of the most revered states in the world because of the rich tradition, culture and Hinduism ideology. And, for that one of the reasons, people of the world have been practicing a kind of exercise in Hindu culture popularly known as YOGA. I do not want to get you marred in this long text of explaining what Hinduism and what this Yoga is (also because I do not want to preach about the ideology), but I just want to make few points clear before you will continue reading this paper in confusion and bewilderment. Yoga have a very long lasting history of being practiced in Hinduism and it has been being used by the saints, which is now one of the world’s most famous form of exercise which helps us maintain our mental imbecility and composure. 

Now, coming to the point of discussion, Nepal brain-drain rate has elevated unprecedentedly in recent years. Not stated clearly about the exact data one the rate of brain-drain of Nepal, but Nepal has been mentioned as one of those 50 different small states of the world having the huge brain-drain rate – this has been mentioned in the survey-research being conducted in 2008 by Maurice Schiff and Yanling Wang called “Brain Drain and Productivity Growth: Are Small States Different?”.

There are numbers of reasons that makes it quite reasonable and logical behind this brain-drain rate. One prime reason behind this might be the unstable government of Nepal which has failed number of times in implementing the strict rules in the government run and controlled states universities, and keeping them out of politics. This incompetency of governance has made the universities difficult to deliver their timely work and helping students to finish their course in timely manner. Because of the few rotten apples of the university academic infrastructure, it has been fairly difficult for the good students from poor family to finish their education in timely manner leading to their accumulating financial debt in their family. Secondly, because of the partiality and partisanship behind appointment in the jobs for the same post. There has been a huge discrimination when it comes to offering job to the holders of same level of degree – one from the home university while another from abroad or foreign university and it has been engrossed as form of culture rather than being rational in terms of providing the job to the fittest one. And, of course, since the US universities are in the top list of world’s best universities ranking, students have been trending towards the US universities, putting US destination as the foremost choice for all students graduating all levels of college after their intermediate and in some case even after the high school.

In a way this is a kind of good move for a country to develop. This situation was same for the South Korea after World War II. But, the only irking and deeply saddening thing is that we are little bit different than the South Koreans – they came back after finishing their education, but in our case, we try to spend as much time in foreign land as possible. So, in everyway, we have been helping them develop their nation in whatever way we can and spending our energy and our earned education in their land for their development. And the determining factor is just the one thing – money. If dollar would have been our currency and if would have been the world’s reserve money; “who do you think would have been traveling all the way across the continents and seas to the another corner of the world?”

Its not just the case with Nepal, but this is same for almost all developing countries. They put their everything on stake to get this golden-egg-laying-chicken – i.e. foreign degree. Doesn’t matter what you study and where you study, if the degree appears to be from somewhere out from country, you will definitely be able to secure your position or else you will have to find a job or the person facilitating that work of finding and placing you in the job if you will be able to oil his hands with more money, and that person would most probably in most cases are the politicians – a politicians those who are good for nothing and just a pimp.

Another important thing that needs to be told and that needs to be assimilated by our fellow Nepalese brothers and sisters is that we have till now failed to deliver the way we were once supposed to be. For me, foreign degree is not just for the titular purpose and a gateway for entering a nice perfect job that can help us garner lots of money (that’s what I believe a nice job means), but we must be able to deliver good mannerism and the good practices we have learnt and will learning in the days to come. It should not be that like, we follow it today in the foreign land with a fear that we will be punished for our insincerity and then after returning back to Nepal, we start repeating the same mistakes of our life. In short, the mentality has to be changed, otherwise, there is no difference between we learning in the foreign land and the one who have finished from the home university. And, in no way we deserve a position in a job in comparative manner than our contenders.

I am sure this writing will not be a game-changer because it is easy to wake the one who is sleeping but it is IMPOSSIBLE to wake the one who pretending to be sleeping!!

Subduing Challenges in Our Way

Life is adored with number of beautiful intricacies of challenges. But the cherishing this is that we all have been dealing with it, solving it finding our own way and then moving on with some new challenges. We all know that our life is full of challenges and we all know this fact and this has now become a kind of dictum – “Life is full of challenges”, and “Life is not always a bed or roses”. This is easy to say and easy to preach, but it becomes a tough hard mountain of rock when it falls on our way. Most of us simply get blank for a while and feel like slipping into the darkness which doesn’t have a lightning end on the other side.

I have just finished watching a speech by one  of the most renowned actor of Indian movie (Kamal Hasan) in IIT, Mumbai, India. Not to get confused with the name of the institute, this is called Indian Institute of Technology. And, this is the first time I ever heard and come to know that he is also a high school dropout. The first thing that makes me confuse and have become a kind of maze that I have been trying to disentangle is how come all these people who are school, college dropouts comes out to shine like this. It has always intrigued me.  When you count, you will find that there are number of people and great personalities who are school and college dropouts have achieved something that is a kind of dream for most of us or even sounds fairly and virtually impossible to achieve. Now, believe me, this is not a fate that has determined our destination, there is hardly anything like luck – its all the byproduct of our input and our contribution in what we are doing. If it is bad, its just because we have done something wrong and if it is good, its just because we have paid our 100% heed and our devotion and we have become faithful to our responsibilities which have been bestowed upon us.

Just to name few of them, these are the world’s most famous college dropouts: Steven Spielberg, Harry Truman, Ellen DeGeneres, Bill Gates, Ted Turner, John Glenn. Apart from these, there are still numbers which is very difficult and incongruous to include all from all over the world. Some are in media, some are in movies, some are in education, some are in research – which sounds really uncanny in someway. It is very hard to believe a guy dropping out of a college and becoming a world-renowned business man and a programmer, for example: Mark Zuckerber in our generation – a founder of Facebook social networking site which is billion dollar worth now. You might be thinking or might already have the question like, “How can somebody strive to achieve something without having a proper and incomplete education?”. But the more irking is that, IT IS POSSIBLE AND number of standing proofs are in front of our eyes and still they are alive and kicking in their respective filed.

These great personalities have achieved this degree of fame and fortunes all because of themselves – they have did it their own way, they have fought many battles of obstruction in their way – but have finally been able to come out of their nerve-racking situation in their own way. They did it their way!!

The essence of writing this post is to recall all those struggles of our life that we have and are still encountering everyday in our life and this is a never ending process. It is filled with humor, fun, love, but life is not always a bed of roses. This is also filled with the number of Jigsaw which is difficult to disentangle, it is difficult to sway it off, it is difficult to buzz off, it is difficult to solve it. Sometime  it is also irking to experience that even after our too much devotion, our labor and our perseverance, we do not simply achieve our goals and sometimes even reach to its vicinity. Call it a kind of puzzle or something, this is that fact, and we all know this.

The first thing to notice and bolstering our esteem is that, if these school and college drop out guys can do it, if they can make it, if they can achieve so much name, fame and fortune even without having a proper education, why can’t we – at least we have a kind of proper education and we are going along with it as well. The only thing that is necessary to assimilate in our understanding and our ideology is that, its not the education that will make a human perfect, it is not the education that will be a turning point in our life – this is just a bolstering fact – something that gives us a confidence that, “Okay, I can do it too!”. Putting our understanding into action is the only thing that will be determining factor in our life and what we will achieve, and obviously, it is not the education. No matter how much we learn, it is futile if we can’t assimilate literally, if we can’t put into action, if we can’t implement it, if we can’t analyze it, and if we are not able to make a niche for the next stepping stone in our life.

So, do it in your own way!! Wishing you all a great bright future embellished with wonderful colors ahead!! Good luck!!