The Maanga

Badri Raina, in a beautiful piece that addresses one aspect of the past week writes,

And to South-Mumbai India we say, ask yourself what sort of unity you are looking for? Such as allows you peaceably and happily to continue to cream off India, or a just unity that, seeing with a “single eye” everywhere, gives in due measure?

There have been a couple of aspects about the events in Bombay and the ‘national mood’ afterward that have struck me as odd. Badri mentions one and the other I have rarely seen mentioned is the schizophrenia of  urban middle class. Amit Verma or Nitin Pai would have written a million times about how inept the government is — how it can’t make a telephone work, a light bulb glow or an airplane fly. Yet, their call at this time is for a SWAT team of the highest ability, a political leadership that’s non-partisan and a first response mechanism that is textbook perfect.

If their answer is, the government has monopoly over the use of of force, I am tempted to take to violence. Which I am not even very good at.

Firstly there is Dilip. Who starts as usual in the most cliched form of someone doing something and writes an essay at the end of which one is left wondering why it was written and worse, read. Then there is Nitin, who after every strike gives out platitudes that implicitly assume the nation state as concept is inviolable. Thankfully, there is also Anand Ramachandran. Who does not say much either but certainly does not leave the reader wondering why it was written.

Timothy Gowers may be an exceptionally gifted mathematician to a degree most of us cannot comprehend. Maybe he is not even one. Or, Bertrand Russell hangs as a cross across all British Mathematicians. Whatever the case, his Short Introduction to Mathematics probably will light the eyes of some young new age Aeronautical Engineer whose sweaty shirts will be hoarded.

Web 2.0’s problem was solved back then, was it not?

With the Chetty all set to takeover the portfolio that marks the end of political careers in India, it is now apparent that the posters of Karthi Chidambaram all over Madras did not go well with Gopalapuram. So, all talks of a compromise Congress Chief Minister after Mu Ka have been dealt with.

Dear Tamil, brace up for Madurai again becoming the center of all things Dravidian.

Was it not Richard Feynman who said,

The American Civil War will fade into provincial insignificance in comparison with this important scientific event of the same decade

when referring to Maxwell’s equations? I wonder what the politics of this age will pale in comparison to. After all, a couple of hundred people being shot dead or a heritage building being damaged does not even warrant for public spending that may pull someone or something out of recession.

What I wouldn’t give to take a two day tour of the Earth in 2500.

There are about 20 armed men in one City. And, a cyclone over an entire state.

I don’t get this. Why does this idiot want to be an onlooker?

For future attacks, dear terrorist person, let us strike a deal. Stage a small but spectacular strike. Barkha Dutt will fly in to cover. Kill her in your next bigger strike. Stay out of Madras.

Terrorism is too weak a threat to mankind. At least, until the weapons being used have such levels of entropy.

Shut up.

This country cannot afford a fancy police force. That it could not did not strike you until yesterday? Now, stop typing inanities and live a life — or die. No one fucking cares. In a country of a billion slaves, if anything, one only wonders why it’s not more frequent. But then, the frequency happens in Naxal held regions which your middle class ass won’t defecate on. Bitch.

to stop the woeful Cricket.

What bugs me is the thought that this Shanthi and gang will go home and tell their husband/friends, “we had sooooo much fun ya! theater’la orey galatta panni kallakittom theriyuma”.

Haven’t people been telling this idiot exactly this all his life? Some just don’t spell irony. Or, their.