Cleaning my room

Another step towards decluttering. It was surprising how many useless things me and my roommate had kept cupboards. Now that he has gone, I was free to decide what to do with it. Well, I kept it in the corridor. Uncle who cleans the building took it away in few minutes. I am now left with one less bed a huge sack of electric wires and damaged connectors and a clean cupboard.

I have ordered a new fridge. Yes, I really need it. Without fridge I was not able to buy milk and milk products (mainly "shrikhand" which is not available in small quantities in Delhi); leftover food had to be thrown away. I am also trying to get rid of the cockroaches in my room which was handed to us by people who lived before we came over. Cockroaches have become a lot less in number but eradicating them would take a few more turns of thorough cleaning. Fridge has taken away almost all of my saving for this month and I have to start afresh.

What remains ahead?

• I am still left with one bed. Bed consists of only the mattress. I want to give this away and get a pair of  "satranji". Its perfect for summer. Its just thick cloth and  can be folded and kept away easily. It will not be useful in winter though. I can buy a good mattress afterwards or may be a sleeping bag which I can take anywhere I go.
• The loft needs to be cleaned. I have to take someone's help for that.
• Maintaining the cleanliness. Everyday fresh dust comes. A few minutes everyday will do the job.

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Yogasan / Yoga - Basic principle

Yogasan is about doing the asans by moving gently with appropriate breathing patter, without stress. Many western trainers tell to do warmup before doing yogasan but the main principle of yogasan is  increase the heart beat. "Shawasan" is actually to be done before and after one does other yogasans so as to relax the body.
I know it may sound dangerous to stretch before warming up but yogasan achieves this by doing a single asan more than one. You don't have to stretch all the way at first time. Your body will become flexible with days/weeks of practice. Remember these things while doing yogasan:

1. Do NOT cause your heart beat to increase while doing yoga, else, do "shavasan".
2. Breathing pattern during each asan is specific. Try learning it from some non-westernized teacher.
3. Repeat each asan twice or thrice. Stretch only until it is confortable. You will be finally able to increase your range of motions.
4. Yogasan is not only about flexibility, there's more to it depending upon different asans.

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Thorns

Two thorns got stuck in my soles yesterday. I sat after dinner with a needle probing my heel to find them. It was fun back then when we were kids. We would try taking out thorns from each others' feet and admiring how big a thorn was from someone's feet. We took pride in inserting the needle at 3-4 points in the soles as if the soles were a cloth. :D Then we used to sit for sometime with a godly smile on our faces.

With growing age, playing ceased (in my case)  or was shifted to playgrounds (my brother's case). No more thorns. A small woodland in Delhi brought back the experience but there was is no one now to probe the soles, to press the needle hard into the feet deliberately so that we could have some laugh after a brief moment of pain. We all got sophisticated.

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Ultrarunning and Age.

Two papers published recently tell that ultrarunners are in general more healthy and biologically younger than their actual age. Well, you would be better off if you just ignore all this and try achieving your own goals of running. My aim to be able to run most of the day at a time but all I can say is it can only make me more fit and not healthy or younger. I read the paper which talks about the younger thing. I would throw that in dustbin if I had a printed version.

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Rumblings

It becomes uneasy sometimes being a PhD student (in India). All one does in his term is clone a gene or two and express some enzyme, which in most cases have no chance of having any use to society.
It all finally seems to be a drama. A country shows how much it is spending on research and development. A lots of funds are literally wasted over expensive chemicals which eventually come from foreign countries ( why not do some research and produce ones own chemicals first?). At the end someone develops a technology outside which we buy/rent or a weaker version of it outsourced to the third world. Anything, from clothes, shoes, to chemicals in lab. More money flows out which totally is unnecessary.
Why shouldn't we just use technologies that are already established or invest in developing technologies that we might be able to do successfully (oh, all of them know it!). But yes, people get employment. Some get even rich. Few even become great scientists! Most waste half of their lives and  go back to find some jobs in schools and colleges inspiring next generation to follow their route.

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Feeling sorry about greenpeace.

I don't yet fully understand how NGOs work. Yet, I expect some things from them. I had been and online e-mail subscriber of Greenpeace for a few years now. I get mail about signing petitions. Most of them I agree with but other times I don't (GMOs, for example). 

Today I got a mail about helping to free the volunteers arrested by Russians. I did send the readily written mail to Russian ambassador, but wait there was more to it. I needed to select one twitter millionare so that "I" could approach them via some e-communication to tweet for the same cause. Why the hell would I need to do that. One message from Greenpeace must suffice. Or is there something fishy (read corporate interests) involved. It was really saddening.


I would like to ask the people who work for such organizations:

• Do you use cars?
• Do you sit in A.C.offices?
• Do you meetings involve playing of music on good kind of speakers? See  its wattage please.
• Are you really minimizing the environment damage yourself?

Oh, don't talk about your "need" for such luxuries. All, the people in world deserve what you think you deserve. And as it is obvious, we can't achieve this without affecting the environment. We have two clear choices, serving humanity or the environment. "Sustainable development" seems pretty word but then you have to give away your "needs".

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Freedom of dressing.

The issue of women safety has recently been vigorously debated in India. One such argument supported by many men and  opposed by most urban women is about the way girls should dress.
I was discussing this topic with friends at lunch. One of them was saying that revealing clothes shouldn't be warn.  According to him it was responsible for agitating male's feelings which in some cases led to eve teasing or harassment. According to him, the frequency of rapes was related to the amount of stimulation such clothing gave. Neither he nor I  knew the statistics of rape all over India but it can be safely said that rapes even occur in Indian villages where women  rarely come out without their faces covered (by pallu or burkha).

Anyways, he and other person who joined him said that revealing clothes did distract them and most men which in general is  “mentally harming” them. I told them that a few years back wearing of jeans and t-shirt was uncommon and at that time, even  'that' harmed 'mentally'. So, why was that gradually accepted? This is because, the society evolves to new changes. After  a few years, this revealing thing would also become normal in society. However, they did not agree. I also argued that if  people like me who come from small cities (most people in Delhi come from such places) where even jeans & t-shirt are  uncommon get agitated by it, so, according to their notion, even jeans & t-shirt should be banned. Is it possible today? NO.  Then, why not accept the new trend and move forward.

Social changes have always been opposed in India, who at large is so proud of its culture. Be it Sati (probably eradicated  now), castes, untouchability, or child marriages; everything is part of culture. What are we proud of?

On the other side, girls going vocal say (The famous sentence probably imported from western countries) "Don't teach us  how to dress. Teach your boys not to rape." This is absolutely correct. Girls are not doing any damage to anyone by  wearing dresses, but the rapers are. I support every human action coming out of his/her freedom that does not harm any  other individual and oppose every action that does otherwise. However, what is this about raping with eyes (from BBC documentary on Indian women's safety)? Girls must have absolute freedom to wear anything they like. However, people will  see what you are showing. If girls are "mentally harmed" by this, then it is their problem now.

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