Sunday, February 17, 2008

“Feelitation”- Another perspective for meaning of words…..

Today’s English class was scheduled for “Word meaning”, the area in which I am very much interested (simply because I am weak in this). In starting of class she (believe me its very difficult to concentrate on words and their meaning when some beautiful teacher is teaching) gave some words, methods to remember word, type of words and last but not the least meaning of words. She told that there are generally 2 type of meanings for any word -first is denotation and second is connotation (please don’t ask me exact meaning for this also- but one is dictionary meaning & other is usage meaning depending upon context), but when I was thinking on this then I felt there is one more type of meaning for words which is – “Feelitation” (oh red underline, means MS word don’t have this word in dictionary). Now next question is what this “Feelitation” is, so I can say only it is combination of “Feeling + Tation” (both denotation and connotation have same suffix), means this is the meaning for any word depending upon individual’s feeling.
I know you all are agree with me but then also you want (NEED is better word here I feel) proper example for justification, which I have lot so no issue for me.
Till class 6th I used to sit between two girls in my class (that time I never released important of this), suddenly 1 day one of them said me hey “you are my boy friend and I am your girl friend” (thanks god both of my girl friend didn’t started fighting there). As I am a bit shy also I shocked after listening this and I asked her what exactly she meant by saying this? Then she told “I mean we are friends and you are boy & I am girl, so I used new words which I listened yesterday (thank god, whatever feeling she had for me but she told me this)”. We can easily understand two meaning of same words upon different feelings, she only said by combining Boy/Girl + Friend while I thought due to love or affection she said this to me (this word still confuse me lot).
As Valentine day just passed I remember 1 more incidence here, when I just passed my school first time someone (no need to say she is my girl friend, here again girl friend means “Girl + Friend”) wished me on Valentine day morning. I was very excited about this for full day because as I just entered in the college and moreover first time in life some girl wished me on Valentine day. That time I know only 1 meaning of this which some of our social and cultural security guards “Bajarang Dal and Shiv Sena” taught me (basically they play role of “Kamadev” for teaching us this meaning and spreading love across the city specially in Bhopal).
But when today I am working in S/W industry many of my friend (girls also) wished me for Valentine day but I never thought over this more than 10 sec. You can again see same words “Happy Valentine Day” but different meaning depends upon feelings like in first year of college what we felt (me and that girl) and what feeling today we have (me and my friends).
You can see strong influence of feeling in meaning of words – like many time we use very abusive words (please don’t ask me to use here, but believe me I know as I also did my engineering) between friends to show our affection but when same words used in quarrel between same friends then it means as same as their actual meaning. Here again feeling come into picture, first time we are saying same word but shaking hands or hugging friends and second time we are ready to destroy him along with same word.
I have many more example of Feelitation but now I want you to find out other example around you in your day to day life (as I feel we are the best teacher for us).
Many time people use some words as per their feeling and other understand or interpret same word according to their own feelings, and if there is gap between Feelitation then real problem occurs (implication of these problems may be either on +ve or –ve node).
As we all know feeling can’t be created it generates by default, so it’s not possible for us to control Feelitation meanings of words by our self but we can only try to reduce this gap in Feelitation among us and others.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

In reality who is in minority in India.................?

This is a Friday evening, which means starting of weekend. I along with 2 of my friends went to mall first for some shopping (not for me-as everybody know I rarely do shopping), then we went to Bobby Da Dhaba (so called Paratha Point as per one of my friend) very near to MG Road, there we had very tasty Parathas, Kadi Pakoda and Kheer (not for me-everybody know I don’t like sweet much). At table we had lot of topics to discuss, like- good Panjabi girls around us, taste & income of that small shop & last but not least hottest topic like Hot Parathas “Mumbai and Raj Thackeray”. In between talk one of my friends just said to me that-see what your Raj Thackeray doing in Mumbai. It was a bit pinching also for me, what does his meaning by My Raj Thackeray?
But yes, as I am a Maharashtrian person along with Raj Thackeray so now he becomes my Raj Thackeray. But then main question in front of me was what Raj Thackeray is doing and most importantly why he is doing all this. If we try see something more towards the problem then it’s very easy to identify that problem is preventing the cultural changes in Maharashtra (especially in Mumbai) by people from other regions of India who come there only to earn livelihood (otherwise everybody wants to be at home). As I also live in Bangalore I feel same problem Bangalore also facing today. I am not saying that changes in cultural is bad, but rapid cultural changes are coming due to fast rate of people coming from outside. People from other parts change culture significantly (intentionally or unintentionally) according to their own culture as well as their needs & at the same time it is very difficult for local people to save their own culture and identity. Sometime local people also participate in this process of changing culture along with people from outside of that region (but mostly process of cultural changes do not initiate by locals). But when this change accumulates more and more then we can see drastic cultural difference which leads to revolution to save original culture by local people.
Sometimes local people also start feeling that they are going into minority at their own land due to which this kind of issues come in front of us with horrible implications.
Today I am noticing this problem in Bangalore, people from other parts of India come here and earns lot (everybody say IT/SW Persons are always overpaid) which leads raise in prices of every commodities and things goes out of common man (largest in numbers), then sometime local common people may blame on people from outside of Bangalore (who neither know about local culture nor speaks to them in their own language). Then feeling of insecurity also come which raises issues like-“Maharashtrian are in minority in Mumbai”.
We all know that India has a vast width-breadth in terms of geographical, political and cultural difference. Also the availability of resources differ in region by region, so people leaves their own family, home and land for better opportunities and relocate in other parts of India for earn livelihood along with earning livelihood they also contribute in overall growth of country.
Now if our aim is India’s overall growth then we need to seriously look toward this day by day increasing problem and also try to find its solution.
As we discussed about the problem/issue, now our next step is to find solution but not like in the same way Raj Thackeray trying to solve problem (basically this will increase problem more due to feeling of regionalism among people).We know that issue is correct but the way it putted along with violence is not correct. There are other more important steps need to be taken to solve this problem. Right action need to taken by both people from outside as well as the local people also.
In my opinion obviously first step must be taken by the people from outside, first they need to respect local culture and language, along with they should also try to learn local culture and language without leaving their own cultural and language. This will create atmosphere of trust between the local and people from outside.
Some actions also need to be taken by local people. They should stop feeling and saying that Maharashtrian are in minority in Mumbai or Kannadiga are in minority in Bangalore or Tamilian are in minority in Chennai. They should remember this if all this what they are saying is true then “Only Indian are in minority in India” because everybody here want to be either Maharashtrian, Kannadiga or Tamilian but nobody want to be Indian, then only Indian will become in minority in India nobody else.
Finally I just wanted to say “Think about above problem along with some possible solution mentioned (I know you can think many more other solutions also) and please try to implement them soon for India’s growth and for not bringing Indian in minority in India.”
You may think why I am writing this so answer is – “I am doing this only for me because I am an Indian & I don’t want to be in minority in my motherland”

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Paper_Presentation_Is_Not_As_Easy_As_It_Seems....

After finishing my 1st year of college I started visiting my seniors more frequently in semester break. So as I got to know them closely I found that they were intelligent also & knew a lot apart from that nonsense ragging.
My seniors told me that if I’ll do some paper presentation then I’ll have some good certificates (which are very helpful in Campus Interview) as well as knowledge about advance and latest technology. Hence after finishing my semester break, my first priority was to do “Paper Presentation” in some reputed college of India.
As we all know time runs very fast so I got my first opportunity to present a paper at NIT Rourkela very soon. I knew the importance of this chance very much. I also had heard from seniors that generally paper presentation should be done in pair of two so I chose my partner as one of my best friend in college & eventually in life “Sumit”.
Then I realized that now I have perfect partner to win prizes but not any paper for this? Then it struck my mind that I had my college computer center which allows surfing facility from 7-10 in night for boys .Some R&D at computer center provided me inspiration in form of lot of old papers and articles to write a paper.
Now it was time to write my own paper at home from that inspiration .But very soon I realized that inspiration is not useful at all. Again some seniors told that books are source of all knowledge (inspiration). Also this advice gave me the opportunity to become member of British Library (again an input from seniors). But till I became library member last date of abstract submission arrived. So in a hurry I went to library in order to search some books on VLSI design or Embedded Systems which were “latest & hot topic” (again information courtesy seniors).
Now the next question was how to write an abstract from the book? At last, just 1 day ahead we decided to use Preface of books (looking good also) for our Paper’s abstract. Finally we came up with 2 abstracts from the prefaces of 2 books & sent them nicely with proper changes required.
But our abstracts were not selected which made us to read abstract again, those were really looking nice, then we noticed that we made a small mistake in E-mail address (wrote ____@yahoo.co.in instead of _____@yahoo.com) and thought that may be due to wrong E-mail address we haven’t got confirmation. As the date of presentation was near, we called them for clarification & luckily they also informed that our paper was selected.
Now the next problem was that we haven’t got any confirmation mail from NIT Rourkela to get college permission letter for travel reimbursement. But as we didn’t have that mail it was not possible for us to get permission letter. Again one of our senior, who knows HTML, helped us & after some modification in web page we had fake confirmation E-mail with us.
In this way finally we got permission letter of college at 2:00 PM on the day when we had to board the train at 8:00 PM in night. But we had neither reservation ticket nor any paper to present with us. Here I got to know value of partnership as I went for ticket reservation & Sumit went home to prepare Presentation slides (though he was able to prepare only 8 slides, out of which first contained our names & last contained thanking note).
As there was no direct train to Rourkela I got ticket from Bina to Rourkela which obviously was in waiting list. Finally we boarded train at 8:00 PM from Bhopal to Bina and in the way to Bina Sumit informed me that he had also kept those 2 books along with him to complete paper slides, it was really an intelligent (smart) move.
Luckily all reservations from Bina to Rourkela were confirmed & we enjoyed the long journey along with friends and seniors.
We reached there next day at 9:00 in night where they had a separate welcome counter at railway station to receive us; also they had provided buses to take us from station to college hostel. But it was a shock for me to not found our name in their list of delegates. But in India we believe “Atithi Devo Bhava” & same tradition was followed by them and in spite of not having our name in the list they took us to hostel to accommodate us. This means one more problem other than presentation slides. Then we talked with organizer by showing him E-mail printout (fake) along with college approval letter. He was also stunned to see our E-mail letter which they never sent to us, but after a long research finally he informed us that our abstract was selected for poster presentation under the topic Embedded Systems (and we had prepared slides for VLSI design only).
I have never heard about Poster Presentation but luckily here also our seniors were with us, and their abstract was also selected for poster presentation under same topic (Embedded systems). So again our seniors helped us by giving 2 pictures from their downloaded stock for our poster, means now we had something to start. But paper is paper and poster is poster so we were emphasizing again & again that we have got confirmation for paper presentation and then only we came here with full preparation (really we were good liars too).
Now our next challenge was to search an internet café to complete slides. In between, the organizer told us that there is an internet café after hostel boundary but warned us to return soon because area was not safe, especially for Boys (I heard this first time). We (4 friends) went to café but were able to add only 3 more slides to presentation. After finishing that it was already 12; also we were very tired, so 2 out of us took lift with café owner and me along with 1 friend returned by walk.
Soon we reached hostel at 12:25 but didn’t find rest 2 guys there, I was bit scared too by the warning of organizer. So first we searched them till 12:45 with some friends but finally at 12:45 we informed to coordinator of event that 2 of our friends are lost around college hostel. As soon as he heard this he was shocked & came at 1:00 in night to see us. He tried a lot by all means to search but was unable to found those 2 guys. Suddenly they appeared from the 3rd floor of hostel coming out of a room; it was around 2:15 in night. Actually they reached early and went in room of a hostler from MP for gossiping. First I thanked coordinator for his support and then I ran behind those guys to beat them for creating such a scene. After lot of time pass & fun we went to sleep at 3:30 in night.
Next day morning we became famous and everybody was asking about us that where those 2 guys are who lost last night. Everybody wanted to meet us, its great na? Next morning first we registered for poster presentation (also the fee was only 100/-) then our struggle started for paper presentation registration. But it was really impossible for them also to accommodate us because they had limited slots. In between this we got to know that in their list there was 1 paper of our friend who could not make due to Minor exams. So we requested them to accommodate us in place of that friend of us and after a lot of discussion they were finally convinced.
Next day also we didn’t read slides and enjoyed Rourkela campus & hostel (especially girl’s hostel) whole day (In between we told our good seniors to bring a poster sheet for us too). When we tried to read slides at 5:00 PM in evening we slept (as you all know we had very less sleep last night) & woke up at 9 for dinner. After dinner and some walk via girl’s hostel. Now real problem was there – we (at least me as Sumit made slides) didn’t read a single word so we decided that out of 13 slides I’ll describe only 3 and rest Sumit will describe. Also we decided 2 of our other friends will sit in audience to clap and to ask us question prepared by us. During preparing for presentation in night once I woke up one of my senior at 3:00 AM (we already set his watch at 7:00AM), when he saw his watch he was very scared because already he had set alarm for 6:00AM for preparation.
Next day we woke up early in the morning for some practice and for making poster but our helping senior helped us there too & made poster for us (he did some mistakes in our names also but as we were not in a position to say anything because we didn’t have time to see it even). Basically he copied some part of text from his poster along with 2 pictures which he donated for our poster. Fortunately we had to present both paper & poster at the same time. So first we went to paper presentation team to inform them that we have to present poster too, so please schedule our paper in last so that we can come back for paper presentation. She was really helpful to us & permitted us for doing so. When we reached poster presentation hall we realized that there were lot of mistakes in that poster (we didn’t know about topic but mistake was in our name too), its time for us to be stunned. Now our next aim was to stick with poster till evaluator comes, but in between some students also came to see the poster but we handled the situation nicely (by asking them question about their college & city and by not giving them chance to ask about our poster), but as soon as evaluator came he told that he had seen same poster somewhere, then with due respect I told him that our seniors are also presenting poster on same topic; he just laughed (its enough hint for him to understand full story about poster)& asked some question which we handled boldly (I even told him Embedded System could be use in Cars for automatic breaking systems when a cow or buffalo comes in front of car, he was also surprised and amazed by my answer and might have been thinking why he hadn’t thought in this way hitherto).
After finishing there we reached in paper presentation room but nobody was there, everything was finished. Now it’s our time to call that nice girl, she informed us that only 2 papers were presented there, also she waited long for us but finally judges left.
Basically we were more than happy after listening this but I told her that we are very disappointed by this because we came here only for winning 1st prize so she said sorry to us and finally I closed discussion with –“its ok, I know u tried your best for us”. So she was also impressed by our calmness under such situation.
Without wasting time we went to see the city and some special attraction around the city. We saw longest Hanuman there.
After returning back to campus we collected our certificates (for both events) and travel reimbursement from their side. At night we enjoyed cultural programs and various games.
We played cards whole night and disturbed others a lot (other delegates were really trying to sleep after putting their hard efforts).
Next morning we caught train for Bina with our paper and poster presentation certificates. After that I never presented any paper in my college life (though that time also I didn’t present).
After much experience in this field I participated in paper presentation at my college many time but only as a member of organizing committee which gave me lot of other experience too, but its better to write that next time, for now I can only say- “To be continued………………..”