Where is the ice bucket?

Wash away with ice
With glee lights a face
Supporting a suffering
Inflicted are feeling
Giving away money
While pictures come out funny
Making all aware
How much I care
Something I know not
Little more than naught

Book Tales

So i am going to tell you 10 book writers and name of the book and here they are:
THE NUMBER DEVIL  HANS MAGNUS ENZENSBERGER,
CONNECT THE DOTS RASHMI BANSAL,
 THE  OATH OF THE VAYUPUTRAS AMISH,
 ROOTS ALEX HALEY,
 ASHOKA CHARLES ALLEN,
 BLINK MALCOLM GLADWELL,
THE TELL - TALE BRAIN V.S. RAMACHANDRAN,
 THE WORLD OF MALGUDI R.K. NARAYAN,
 THE DIARY OF A YOUNG GIRL ANNE FRANK,
SCENES FROM A WRITERS LIFE RUSKIN BONDS






BY DWARAK KRISHNA

Anvil's made out of metal

My Facebook was filled with entries from the night.  Many from one of the community pages I like - 80's The Golden Ages Of Metal.  Usually it was filled with YouTube links to songs by groups like Poison and Warrant.  These were not my favorite groups and I usually browsed on.  For the past few days, the administrators of the group were throwing in songs by some of the lesser known groups of the 80s.  That morning, I ran into an entry on a song by "one of the lesser and most under-rated metal groups of the early 80s".  The group was called Anvil and the song "Metal on metal".  The thumbnail of the song showed the face of the lead singer singing into the microphone.  His expression had an interesting combination of mean and mischief.  It reminded me of Eddie Vedder's expression in the video of "Ten" - A bit of mischief with an overwhelming dose of meanness.  

I clicked on the link and the song came up.  Crunching guitar, pounding drums and a mean voice - the perfect combination of heavy metal cliché.  The song was loud and heavy with a lot of chunka-chunka guitaring.  The singer sounded like a cross between Scorpian's Klaus Maine and AC/DC's Brian Scott.  It sounded like a classic thrash metal song from the mid-80's.  But this song was from the early 80's before the big four of thrash came by but this group was hardly heard of.  So I opened the Wikipedia and searched the group.  Anvil is a group from Canada formed in the late 70's and sure enough they influenced the big thrash groups of the 80's - Megadeth, Slayer, Anthrax and Metallica.

Anvil with "Metal on metal"

The site also mentioned that there exists a  documentary film, Anvil! The Story of Anvil, about their career.  I have been a sucker for movies on music bands for some time now - Woodstock, Doors, The last waltz, Rush.  Fascinating movies that described the route a set of people took to reach the pinnacle of rock's Mt.Everest.  So I got this movie and watched it.  It turned out to be more than fascinating.  The movie starts off with the statements "In the summer of 1984", "Some of the biggest rock bands in the world toured Japan together", "Scorpians", "Whitesnake", "Bon Jovi", "All these bands went on to sell millions of records", "Except one", "Anvil" and then band comes on stage to sing "Metal on metal" .  The movie goes on to tell the struggles that the lead singer and drummer goes through to keep the group kicking.  Rockers in their 50's trying to make that one record that will take the world by storm while driving trucks for Children's Choice Catering.  

A very emotional movie on the sufferings that the group had to undergo touring Europe, making an album and trying to sell it Music executive.  There are a lot of arguments and tears in the movie.  All seemed genuine and did not seemed staged.  A brilliant movie that brings out the passion these two people have towards their group and music.  A passion that started almost four decades back and continues till date.  I am so glad I came across Anvil and will be their fan through my life.

A possessed house possesses

Those were the days of house hunting - for rent that is.  We wanted to move into a good place not too far from the beach.  The search started with us walking around the area looking out for "Tolet" boards.  We also tried to identify uninhabited houses - Windows closed, no curtains, balcony doors closed, cobwebs in balcony and such obviously identifiable marks.  We approached apartment watchmen, random people staying in some house or other and iron-wallahs seeking information.  Some shooed us away, others gave an apologetic no but a few were good enough to give us a phone number or two.  These invariably turned out to be brokers with whom we did not want to deal - the charge of one month's rent for their minimal service (as minimal as "that is the house; now go and talk to the owner and fix it up") seemed to steep for our shallow pockets.  

Next we scanned through the "house for rent" columns in some of the local papers.  We marked the advertisements that fit our requirement and started calling the numbers provided.  Most times the call was received by a voice that said "Allooo".  Soon we realized that this was the Hello of a broker.  The first day we ended up calling 8 to 10 brokers and no owners.  We decided to ignore them and continued to walk around the neighborhood.  The walks continued to be pointless.  We covered a big area and hardly found any house potential.  The few that came our way were controlled by the brokers.  So now our only hope was the newspaper.  The next weekend, the papers had the same result as the previous one.  So we sat for an emergency session and passed a resolution to include brokered houses in our search.  

The resolution filled up our afternoon with houses to be seen - one every 30 minutes .  By the evening our heads were spinning with the words spacious, well lit, airy and the feelings with dark, dingy, suffocating.  Nothing seemed satisfactory; every one of the houses promised a lot but gave little.  Every owner behaved like a king doing us a favor by letting us set our feet in their palace.  A near messy situation also cropped up when we ran into a broker with whom we had a fight a few years ago.  We kept our shades on as long as that idiot was with us.  Fortunately he did not identify us; unfortunately, we bruised ourselves by running into a few walls.  We reached back home defeated at around 7 and plopped onto our beds.

In a few minutes the phone started ringing.  It was a broker who claimed he had found something cool overlooking the beach.  We were too tired for this and really did not want to get out of the house.  But the broker was extremely persuasive and soon we were on the road following the broker on his bike.  The road ran by the beach with some very beautiful houses onto our right.  Whenever we saw an unlit house we started imagining living in it but the damned broker did not stop.  In a few minutes, the houses thinned away and the place was lit by our headlight and the moonlight.

The broker's bike finally stopped in front a lonely house.  Though we could see a few houses around, this one found itself in a lonely stretch.  In the moonlight that small house with a 40W bulb lighting the porch seemed eerie.  We switched off our bikes and walked towards the dimly lit porch.  The sea was roaring behind our backs. It seemed to threaten us with dire consequences for hanging around in its territory.  We felt very uneasy and did not want to proceed further.  I tapped on the broker's shoulder.  The tap startled him enough to let out a snarl that sounded like a "WHAT?".  I informed him that we were not interested in this house.  The anger held on to his face for a moment.  Slowly but forcefully his face eased and a smile ran across his smoked lips . He asked "Why sar! Such a beautiful place.  So quiet; only you and sea.  You should see in morning; very beautiful.  Peaceful, no disturbance and very safe".  I looked around the lonely place in an attempt to take in the beauty, peacefulness and safety of the place. When my sight reached back to the spot where the broker was, I found it empty.  The guy had reached the porch and we had no choice but to follow him.

As the broker inserted the key into the lock, the light went out and we were immersed in darkness.  It took us some time to get used to moonlight, which showed us undecipherable forms moving around us.  We were getting to understand the phrase "gripped with terror".  As the forms closed in on us, the light came on and we were blinded by the brightness.  The forms had disappeared by the time our sights got back to normalcy.  We turned to see the door wide open but there was no sign of the broker.  We tentatively walked into the house and called the broker's name.  No response; we called out his name again; no response.  By this time, our eyes settled into the darkness and our attention was captured by an object swaying in front of us.  Now it was the turn for us to understand that other phrase - "a chill ran down his spine".  The lights came on suddenly.A lady with big terrifying eyes underneath a even bigger bindi stared down at us.  "You are inside is it?" said a voice from behind.  We are not quite sure how we reacted but the thing we remember now is holding the broker by shirt collar while shouting obscenities at him.  The broker was letting out a bleak "What happened?"
"Where the hell were you?"
"The fuse tripped and I went to back to put it on sar."
"Could you not have informed us?"
"Why?"
"What the hell is that object?"
"That is a dupatta."
"Oh! Ah! And why is a dupatta hanging down from the fan?"
"The last tenant left it there"
"But why is it hanging from the fan?"
"I don't know sar.  Maybe they left it there after cleaning"

We asked the broker if the house occupied still.  He said no.

"Then what the hell is that photograph doing there?"
"The last tenant left it sar."
"Why did they leave the photo?"
"Maybe they don't have time."
"Yeah right! Let's get out of here."
"But sar, the bedrooms."
"To hell with the bedrooms and toilets; this place is giving the creeps."

As we started to go out, the lights went out and a gust of wind whooshed in through the open door.  The wind rattled the window panes and the all other rattl-able objects in the house.  Our pace hastened to a run by the time we crossed the porch.  By the time we sped away all those undecipherable forms that come out when the lights went out had started chewing our soles.

Memory improves during sleep while languages disappear with cultures but the size of space is a question

Scientists have discovered what happens to memory during sleep.  Apparently, new neuron connections occur during sleep and this enables memory.  This was experimented in mice and discovered.  The article goes on to say that sleep deprivation leads to a lot of issues and on the other hand sleeping is actually good for our head.  The article ends with the recommendation to students to learn and go to sleep early rather than sit into the night and learn.  The former ensures that the stuff learnt are imprinted in the memory.  Now if only someone could inform the sun to come up later, we could actually sleep more.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-27695144

Languages also convey unique cultures. Cherokee, for example, has no word for goodbye, only “I will see you again”. Likewise, no phrase exists for “I’m sorry”. On the other hand, it has special expressions all its own. One word – oo-kah-huh-sdee –represents the mouth-watering, cheek-pinching delight experienced when seeing an adorable baby or a kitten. “All of these things convey a culture, a way of interpreting human behaviour and emotion that’s not conveyed the same way as in the English language,” Belt says. Without the language, the culture itself might teeter, or even disappear. “If we are to survive, to continue on and to exist as a people with a distinct and unique culture,” he continues, “then we have to have a language.”
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140606-why-we-must-save-dying-languages


How big is space?  Find it here.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140305-interactive-infographic-of-space

43

I did not have an opinion about the number 43.  I knew it lived between 42 and 44 but beyond that it really did not have anything to catch my attention.  I suddenly thought maybe 7 was affectionate enough to make it divisible but soon realized that 7's affections are with 42 and not 43.  That's when it struck me that 43 is probably a prime number.  I was obviously not going to find it out the hard way.  So I searched Google and the first result from Wikipedia told me that it is the 14th smallest prime number.  The 13th smallest number is 41 and the 15th smallest number is 47.  So 43 is not even located in a "prime" island.  It seems to be a lost case for 43 - all others 40 numbers has some personality but not 43.  40 has a zero at its end.  41 is one after 40 and 1941 is a movie made by Spielberg.  42 is nice and even with 2 times 2 making 4 and all such stuff.  Also, the history books from school make it impossible to forget the Quit India movement of 1942.  44 looks nice and cure with two 4s.  45 has a five stuck in its rear end and that always make a number attractive.  46 is a well rounded even number.  47 is the 15th prime (bravo!) and for over a billion people on this planet 1947 is a very important year.  48 is another of rounded number which forms a vital part of that sad year named 1948.  49 - is 7 squared, which means it can magically transform into a cool 7 under a square root.  Clearly, 43 is a miserable number.  Now to check one last time about the happenings in the year 1943.  Interesting!   The world was stuck in the thick of world war 2 and a number of interesting personalities took birth.

1. Janis Joplin

2. Joe Pesci

3. George Harrison

4. Bobby Fischer

5. Keith Relf

6. John Major

7. Vangelis

8. Christopher Walken

9. Illayaraja

10. Christine McVie

11. Mick Jagger

12. Richard Wright

13. Pervez Musharraf

14. Robert De Niro

15. Roger Waters

16.  Lech Wałęsa

17. Chevy Chase

18. Mohammad Khatami

19. John Kerry

20. Keith Richards

21. John Denver

22. Ben Kingsley

Quite an impressive list - It has half of Pink Floyd and Rolling Stones in it.  43 holds some hope!  Maybe this is the number to sow seeds for the future.  Maybe this is the number to break the mirror reflecting the past and look at the future.

A small accident

The car was speeding away from a small temple town in North Kerala.  The name of the town is a tongue twister even for a few of the native speakers.  When written in English it starts with a "P", from there it travels to a "Sh" and finally settles down in a "U" (which is not quite pronounced a "U" but more a combination of "A" and "E").  The town houses an unorthodox temple for a tribal god who has over the years been brought into the fold of Hinduism.  The temple is crowded, at most times, with people requesting their deliverance to happiness (or other's deliverance to misery).

We got out of the temple town at around dinner time.  The driver was engrossed in reciting the legends associated with the temple, its deity and the town.  Soon, the car reached a fork with the left of the fork curving away and another going straight ahead.  The driver did not notice the road to the left and continued towards the road ahead.  He did not notice the bike coming from the left either.  In a few seconds, the bike was right in front of the car.  We were jerked off our seats as the brakes were hit.  The squealing of the tyres coincided with the noise of the car hitting the bike.  The bike and the rider disappeared and the car came to a halt.

The driver gave out a "Oh my Guruvayurappa" and got out.  I sat in the car and could not force myself to get out.  I looked around and saw a few people running out of the few shops in the area and crowding around the car.  To my relief I soon saw the bike guy getting up.  He seemed to be in a reasonable shape and I could not see any obvious damage on him.  By then, a bus from behind started honking.  The driver got into the car and moved it to the side.  He was invoking Guruvayurappan's mercy non-stop.  He apologized for the inconvenience before getting out to deal with the situation.

Soon, a drunkard came by and started asking questions.  I thought this to be an appropriate time to get out and be with the group.  As I walked towards the group, I could hear a lot of talking but no shouting.  The discussion seemed reasonably calm.  I saw the bike standing besides the crowd.  It had a couple of scratches and a broken mirror.  The guy who was on the bike stood in the center of the crowd holding a wound in his hand.  In the middle of the road, food lay scattered from a torn plastic cover.  The discussion was on how unfortunate it was for the accident to have taken place but everyone seemed glad that nothing much had gone wrong.  They blamed the government for not having put up warning signs and not taking care of the lights on the road.  My heart skipped a beat when someone mentioned on how the guy in the car had directed the driver not to take a turn in the last minute and that it was not the driver's fault.  Fortunately, that comment went unnoticed. 

I walked back to the car and stood in a shade to be out of sight of any drunkard.  A few minutes later, the driver came back, got into the car and mentioned that the bike guy is being taken to a hospital to ensure he had no internal injury.  Just as he started the car a face peered in from the driver's window.  The faced apologized profusely to me for the inconvenience caused by this event.  He said I will be taken to a restaurant and while I had my dinner they would visit the hospital.  I had not expected an apology and this unexpected blow made me incoherent.  I answered with something that sounded like "eh ah no bobem".  By then a crowd had gathered in front of the car and they were all trying to determine how to fix the broken bumper.  The driver cursed and got out.  He had a brief and patient discussion with the others.  They brought in a rope, tied a bit here and a bit there.  Then they looked at the bumper and discussed some more.  Another piece of rope came out of someplace and some more tying up took place.  They then looked at their achievement with a satisfied expression on the their face.  As the driver got into the car, the drunkard came by and started questioning the driver.  Fortunately, someone from the crowd came by and took away the drunkard.  The driver now started the car but saw the way ahead blocked by some remnant of the bumper fixers.  He called out to Guruvayurappan in exasperation and backed his car.

Soon I was dropped outside a good looking restaurant in a 3-star hotel.  The driver asked me for a thousand Rupees for the hospital expenses.  My mind gave out an "Oh no!" before parting with the said amount.  All through my not-as-good-as-the-look-of-the-restaurant food, I was thinking of how much more money should I shell out.  I came out of the restaurant after paying the not-as-expensive-as-the-look-of-the-restaurant-but-still-expensive-for-the-way-the-food-tasted bill and stood on the road a bit before the car arrived.  The driver informed me that all was well and that I had to part with another 500 Rupees.  Some more "Oh no!"s went through my mind.  A little later, we were zipping through the road towards home.  From time to time, we heard scrapping noises from the front and the driver stopped to check.  Every time he came back with a no problem smile.  He continued with his amusing legends right through the journey, which by god's grace took place with no further incidents.  But the nagging thought of "1500 already but how much more" in my head made the journey seem tiresome.

When I reached home, I asked the driver about my dues.  He calculated an amount and subtracted from it the 1500 rupees I had paid for the incident.  To my mind this seemed like indecent behavior; he should have asked for more money instead of reducing it from his tariff.  I did not expect him to take the complete responsibility of everything that happened.  I thought he will hand it over to me and ask for more money.  That thought had been with me all through the journey.  Now, he was making me feel ashamed and I tried to fight my tendency to fall into it.  I took out my purse singing in mind "I shall overcome right now".  But my mind caved in just as I was taking out my money and I said "No, its alright.  I will pay the whole amount."