Waning magic ...

Years ago, I used to read Harry Potter books with zeal and enthuse, outside in my garden under the warm and pleasant sun with the pleasant realization that there were still a couple hundred pages of the escapades of Harry left to be devoured. It was the time when the magic of the boy wizard had started to take over the muggle-world and when JKR had started to buy new vaults for stuffing all the dough she'd started to make (at an alarming rate), what with Harry Potter movies, games and anything conceivable to the mind of the profit-seeking characters holed up in their lush offices at the top of their lush sky-scrapers. I read Harry Potter books twice, thrice, wait ... I've lost count of how many times I read those books that're enough to make the most verbose authors blush and yell, "But my novel's full of scientific research, not the imagining of a woman!" Really, point noted. The long wait for Harry Potter movies to be released in India used to piss me off and I'd to satisfy my hunger for Potter with, ah, un-authorized CDs; but I used to watch them on theater when they released and it was all pure fun for me, no matter what others said about the movies being nowhere near the books. I told them to go fug themselves as I bought the original DVDs of the same. The long gaps between the release of the books was painful and I used to satisfy myself - like 50 billion others, perhaps - by combing JKR's and MuggleNet's websites. I was so influenced by Potter that I even made a website dedicated to the Potter-phenomenon (I never got the chance of uploading it though, and I'm glad I never did ... the website was very immaturely designed: I was only 13). But that was back then. Today, I don't feel as attracted to Potter as I used to. I blame JKR's tendency of popping off too many kids - and consequently delaying the release of the novel - for that.

- AG.

I hate fire-crackers.

Fire-crackers accompany the festival of Diwali in the same way ketchup accompanies the cheese burgers of McDonalds. And although the ketchup makes the burgers more desirable and give humans the inexplicable pleasure of squeezing the red liquid out of the packets and hearing an occasional rasping sound, the crackers do nothing whatsoever to add fun to this great festival of ours. Well, OK, I understand that whatever those public-welfare stickers and posters say about crackers, Diwali cannot be visualized without a kid holding hands over his ears and with a wincing expression watching a cracker go off; but still, I hate crackers and regard their use as over-rated and something we'd get rid off. Those small meek crackers that go off with a Pop! are fine, but those big ones that're perhaps enough to drown out a hydrogen-bomb explosion are what make me kick the shit out of the snickering kids who blow them off. Just an hour ago, while on my way back from gym on my bicycle I was occasioned with such an explosion followed with my usual reaction of "Holy fuck!". If I'd been an inch closer or had my bicycle's velocity been tad lesser, I'm sure I'd have been sucked into the craters made in the fabric of space-time by that explosion. But, what the hell, I cannot do anything about it, now can I? So, instead of critisizing and maintaining my usual pessimistic attitude towards anything that's not directly profitable to me, I'll smile and wish you all a very Happy Diwali!

Play safe,
- AG.

2006 SLR McLaren ... Pure Exhilaration.

In this video, this baby was cruised at 310 km/hr.
Just listen to the engine roar.

- AG.

Ride.

What happens when your father has a business friend who owns a Škoda Superb? Why, you ride in that car ofcourse! Unless you are unfortunate enough to have been endowed with a defective brain like someone who once commented on this blog. So, this morning me, my father, and Mr. Malik went to Gurgaon in the Superb that Mr. Malik drove. Mr. Malik has a reputation of being a fast driver which makes riding with him a lot more fun. First, some quick facts for the uninitiated: the car has automatic gearing system unlike a standard Indian 5-gears car; the car is an elongated version of Škoda Octavia and from what Mr. Malik tells me, he got the car specially imported to India back when it was not available here. Mr. Malik really opened 'er up on the Vasant Kunj highway (NH-8) where he got a speed of around 160 KM/hr and it was just pure exhilaration. On the same highway, I have driven my car at 90 KM/hr but in Superb it was something else. We reached Gurgaon at 11am and after an hour long meeting (during which I ate sandwiches in a fast-food restro), we were on our way back to Vasant Vihar. While going back, a cop hailed and we stopped the car. Seeing that the car was a luxury sedan and that it didn't have a Delhi number, the cop (most probably looking to make some easy money) asked for the stuff no one would even care to lug around in the car (in this case, the air-pollution check papers). After 5-10 minutes, Mr. Malik slipped him a Rs. 500 bill which the cop smoothly slid into his deep pocket. The car, the bribe and the sandwiches made this ride a memorable one indeed.

- AG.

A (special) friend.

What is friendship? Loyalty? Commitment? Or just a word with many syllables? I really cannot define friendship … actually, in my opinion no one can define friendship because it is not a term out of your science book but a deep feeling that can hardly be objectified. So I get an SMS from an old school-friend who tells me how he felt sentimental when he pondered over the times he and I had spent when we were in our tweens. He tells me that he cannot easily forget that time since I was his first true friend … someone who shared the good and bad times with him without flinching or moving away. I told him that even I cannot forget all those memories since without them I won’t be left with an identity. We spent the next half hour sharing silent laughs over our antics that drove the teachers crazy; how we used to be the “jungli jaanwars” of our class; how we used to scare away half a dozen bullies with the bond of friendship we had nurtured to maturity; how we used to stand united in the face of adversity …

Then came the unfortunate reshuffling of the sections and we drifted apart … he went his way and I went mine. I often ponder over what would have happened if we never would have been separated ... what wonder might have taken place ... what personality we might have endorsed ... then again, maybe fate planned it that way ... to make me the person I am today.

That friend's name is Aditya Deorha.

- AG.

It's that time of the year again ...

... and R.K.Puram's Sector 8 market was too crowdy yesterday. I must correct myself here: "crowdy" might not be the most appropriate word; "congested" is perhaps more condesending and appropriate. Besides the irksome market-holders who have taken the liberty of extending the display of their products to a couple of kilometers in front of their shops, there is the problem of the presence of too many cars, autos and stray animals on the slime filled not-so-wide roads of the area. I would never have went to that market with a 20-feet long pole (with a wide rectangular board fixed at one end) if the right part of my brain wasn't throwing a hissy fit over how messy my hair are. Therefore I had to go to that market to get a "trim" job. Owing to that day being the eve of India's (one of the) most hyped festivals Karva-Chauth, the market teemed with hopeful females standing - or sitting, as might be the case - in lines to get the weird green stuff plastered in weird patterns on their hands. Diwali, India's most hyped and enjoyable festival, is around the corner ... the time of the year when we literally burn away thousands of bucks in a burst of carbon monoxide and try to push our luck on Delhi's atmosphere which is consequently pushed to its limit.

- AG.

Oh, really?

I know what you are thinking about this blog: "First Global Warming, then Particle Physics and now this drivel about our Universe? Sheesh!". Oh well, I want you to know one thing: I like to expound my knowledge or anything new that I learn. And since it is my blog, I can blog about anything I want; so dear reader, kindly bear with me. If you think these posts are dauntingly long and deep enough, you should see my notebooks filled with all that kind of stuff (most of it is perhaps out of your scope of understanding). Anyway, maybe this knowledge will help me while I am at college ... which reminds me of the SAT 2 Test that I have on October 14 at American Embassy School. I have done most of the studying and I hope to get a good score. Those masses who are not agnostic, pray for me. A brownie for each who does! Which reminds me of the Brownian Motion which is the random and irregular motion of small dust particles in water ... Einstein used the concept of this motion to provide physical evidence for the existence of atoms (which actually mean "indivisible" in Greek) ... Geez, here I go again, I better sign off before I bore you all to death.

- AG.