If the guys who set the syllabus for the Kerala University are to be believed, taking a seminar about a topic totally Greek to you is essential for awarding you a degree. Every year, thousands of hapless student scour through IEEE papers for a topic, a paper they can relate to.
You know us. With a syllabus that is at least five years behind the current technological trends, how can you expect anyone to read and understand the latest in technology? And make a presentation on it. Microsoft PowerPoint won't even have half the special characters used in a paper. You can't do a presentation in Latex, as far as I know.
You have to complete this presentation in fifteen minutes. If you believe that it can be done, you will believe in anything. It is funny. My paper, which was a discussion on three quantum cryptographic protocols, had to be presented in ten minutes. The remaining five minutes were for the QA session. You must understand that I was speaking to my classmates, who are engineering students and so think of quantum mechanics as only a branch of Physics. It is just not 'engineering'.
I exceeded the time limit by two minutes. I don't consider it a sin. I only regret not having spent enough time on the B92 and the EPR protocols. Spent too much time on BB84. I should have avoided that. Anyway, my seminar would never have ended in fifteen minutes, even if I were to just read my notes.
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Just heard that Obama's lead has diminished. I hope it is not a sign of things to come.
Pakistan is on the brink of defaulting its loans due to the problem of an abysmally small foreign exchange reserve. I was reminded of something. I guess it was last year when an article was published in a newspaper that the RBI is having huge foreign exchange reserves and that we should employ it in setting up a Sovereign Wealth Fund to invest them abroad, especially in the U.S and European markets, as China was doing. At that time I thought it was a good idea. Others were making oodles of money; why shouldn't we.? The guys at the RBI had no imagination, I thought.
Now I shudder when I think of that. (A rare candid moment for me.)Right now, what I want to find out is whether the people at the helm in RBI are that startlingly brilliant or whether they were just lazy fellows who wanted to avoid the paperwork. If the former condition is true, thankfully, we are having some really wise fellows at top and we can snore peacefully at night. If the latter is true, we have luck, a great deal of it, on our side. I mean, you are having a country running like a well-oiled machine in spite of the government. You may consider this an insult to the machines, but I can live with that.
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Another thing I cannot understand is why share prices go down even if an organization is reporting a 40% rise in its profits, beating all market expectations? I really need an answer for this one. It doesn't sound right!
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An advice to all the kids who are scheduled to come to the planet Earth. If you can help it, don't ever choose parents belonging to the same organization. If you do that, your parents will never have time to talk to you on any other matter. Greater danger if they are workaholics. I am telling this from my years of experience.
Wednesday 29 October 2008
Sunday 26 October 2008
We are living in strange times
It was a rather interesting piece of news: politicians all over the world are reading Das Kapital. Oddly enough, it doesn't sound bizarre right now. If they were seen doing it the same time last year, they would have been 'finished' by now.
The U.S elections will be held on the fourth of November. It is almost certain that Mr. Barack Obama is going to be the next President. However, our PTI is not so sure - it recently gave out an article stating that U.S. Police fears that riots would break out if Obama loses. Well, let us wait and watch.
If the American public elects McCain to the White House, we will have a pretty nice 'deluge'. I was exasperated when John Kerry was defeated by Bush. I could not understand the logic behind it, to put it rather mildly.
Our Sensex is nosediving as if there were no ground below. It seems that we will have negative indices very soon.
I found out that my SB account balance and the sensex are deteriorating at the same rate. I am looking for a bailout. Hope dad and mom would not 'Lehmann' me. It would have been nice if Paulson and dad exchanged their economic policies and outlook.
Sigh! That is not to be!
The only way out of this terrible situation is to invest in infrastructure development, says Paul Krugman. The opinion is shared by our Prime Minister, Dr.Singh as well. When two wise men say the same thing, which happens rather rarely nowadays (Hey, it is difficult to find out one wise man, let alone two and their having the same opinion on the same issue is like winning the jackpot.), we should listen to them.
It feels great to have an economist-Prime Minister in this Great New Depression. At least, the government will have an idea of what is going on in the economy. Imagine what would have happened if someone like Bush was governing our country.
God save America!
The U.S elections will be held on the fourth of November. It is almost certain that Mr. Barack Obama is going to be the next President. However, our PTI is not so sure - it recently gave out an article stating that U.S. Police fears that riots would break out if Obama loses. Well, let us wait and watch.
If the American public elects McCain to the White House, we will have a pretty nice 'deluge'. I was exasperated when John Kerry was defeated by Bush. I could not understand the logic behind it, to put it rather mildly.
Our Sensex is nosediving as if there were no ground below. It seems that we will have negative indices very soon.
I found out that my SB account balance and the sensex are deteriorating at the same rate. I am looking for a bailout. Hope dad and mom would not 'Lehmann' me. It would have been nice if Paulson and dad exchanged their economic policies and outlook.
Sigh! That is not to be!
The only way out of this terrible situation is to invest in infrastructure development, says Paul Krugman. The opinion is shared by our Prime Minister, Dr.Singh as well. When two wise men say the same thing, which happens rather rarely nowadays (Hey, it is difficult to find out one wise man, let alone two and their having the same opinion on the same issue is like winning the jackpot.), we should listen to them.
It feels great to have an economist-Prime Minister in this Great New Depression. At least, the government will have an idea of what is going on in the economy. Imagine what would have happened if someone like Bush was governing our country.
God save America!
Tuesday 21 October 2008
What to do now
A question most of the humankind is facing right now. We are having an exponential growth in the number of problems. The economy is slowing down, a government that doesn't seem to be sure about itself, let alone others and loss of public confidence in anything that matters.
Gloomy picture. Still, the situation has improved a lot. The British government ought to be praised for dinning some sense into every one's head. I am a Gordon Brown fan, whatever the British voters might say.
Government of India, it seems, is not sure about whether it has a serious problem in its hands or not. The truth is, I don't have any idea how badly this crisis is going to affect us. Foreign demand will surely go down but we have more money with the population-sixth pay commission, debt waiver and all that. Having a billion people in your country is right now a sort of relief.
Chandrayaan will go to moon soon. My best wishes to the ISRO. Hats off to our scientists and engineers who have made this possible. Ours is a space programme which makes a lot of sense - I mean, we are doing it more for public good than for any other reason. I feel good about it.
India gets her first saint. St. Alphonsa was declared to be the first saint from India by Pope Benedict XVI in Rome a few days ago. Its a great honour for us here in Kerala.
Coming to the problems I am facing right now. My sessions exams start tomorrow. I am not really prepared for it. There's still plenty of time, however.
I am taking a seminar on quantum cryptography next week. I don't know whether I will understand what I am going to take. Plus, I have to make the abstract, the presentation and the report in an incredibly short duration of time.
The project is going haywire. god alone knows how we will convince the ma'am to allow us to work under our current guide. I am banking on God to do this for me. I have no other option left and if she refuses, I am going to be in Mariana trench-depth trouble.
Our dear University has postponed the exams yet again. I really do not know whether I should feel relieved or scared. While it is true that the earlier timetable made no sense, we will be losing precious time with the new one.
The sweetest piece of news this week. I am sure nothing will beat it: SACHIN MAKES A NEW WORLD RECORD AND INDIA THRASHES AUSTRALIA BY A RECORD MARGIN. What more can we ask for? Good to see a silver lining somewhere!
Gloomy picture. Still, the situation has improved a lot. The British government ought to be praised for dinning some sense into every one's head. I am a Gordon Brown fan, whatever the British voters might say.
Government of India, it seems, is not sure about whether it has a serious problem in its hands or not. The truth is, I don't have any idea how badly this crisis is going to affect us. Foreign demand will surely go down but we have more money with the population-sixth pay commission, debt waiver and all that. Having a billion people in your country is right now a sort of relief.
Chandrayaan will go to moon soon. My best wishes to the ISRO. Hats off to our scientists and engineers who have made this possible. Ours is a space programme which makes a lot of sense - I mean, we are doing it more for public good than for any other reason. I feel good about it.
India gets her first saint. St. Alphonsa was declared to be the first saint from India by Pope Benedict XVI in Rome a few days ago. Its a great honour for us here in Kerala.
Coming to the problems I am facing right now. My sessions exams start tomorrow. I am not really prepared for it. There's still plenty of time, however.
I am taking a seminar on quantum cryptography next week. I don't know whether I will understand what I am going to take. Plus, I have to make the abstract, the presentation and the report in an incredibly short duration of time.
The project is going haywire. god alone knows how we will convince the ma'am to allow us to work under our current guide. I am banking on God to do this for me. I have no other option left and if she refuses, I am going to be in Mariana trench-depth trouble.
Our dear University has postponed the exams yet again. I really do not know whether I should feel relieved or scared. While it is true that the earlier timetable made no sense, we will be losing precious time with the new one.
The sweetest piece of news this week. I am sure nothing will beat it: SACHIN MAKES A NEW WORLD RECORD AND INDIA THRASHES AUSTRALIA BY A RECORD MARGIN. What more can we ask for? Good to see a silver lining somewhere!
Saturday 11 October 2008
Days getting blacker
Well, yesterday saw one of the steepest falls in the BSE Sensex. 800 points down in a single day! Market indices everywhere are nosediving. Seems we will soon have negative indices. Price of gold, on the other hand, is skyrocketing. Are we going to have Great Depression Part II now?
How long will it be before the financial institutions regain public trust is a big question. Even the question 'Will they be able to do that?' seems harmless now. Greed is not good anymore.
The decision of the Reserve Bank to reduce the CRR by 150 basis points to increase liquidity is a welcome move. But liquidity cannot replace trust. At least, not for now.Going by the present trend, we will need a lot more money to stay where we are. That means that RBI will have to reduce the CRR as well as the other rates. However, that cannot solve the problem. We are facing high inflation as well. Increase in liquidity can have negative implications as well.
Financial institutions everywhere are failing. We have escaped so far because we are relatively isolated.
The financial crisis seems to be precipitating diplomatic crises as well. The spat between Iceland and Britain which went to the extent of invoking anti-terrorist laws to freeze the assets of a financial institution, is unfortunate but thought-provoking. We seem to be sitting on a time bomb without being aware of it.
How long will it be before the financial institutions regain public trust is a big question. Even the question 'Will they be able to do that?' seems harmless now. Greed is not good anymore.
The decision of the Reserve Bank to reduce the CRR by 150 basis points to increase liquidity is a welcome move. But liquidity cannot replace trust. At least, not for now.Going by the present trend, we will need a lot more money to stay where we are. That means that RBI will have to reduce the CRR as well as the other rates. However, that cannot solve the problem. We are facing high inflation as well. Increase in liquidity can have negative implications as well.
Financial institutions everywhere are failing. We have escaped so far because we are relatively isolated.
The financial crisis seems to be precipitating diplomatic crises as well. The spat between Iceland and Britain which went to the extent of invoking anti-terrorist laws to freeze the assets of a financial institution, is unfortunate but thought-provoking. We seem to be sitting on a time bomb without being aware of it.
Friday 10 October 2008
Tough times ahead
So a neat, idiotic, exasperating global economic crisis, bomb explosions everywhere and attacks on minorities - what more can you ask for? It seems that this world is going mad, really mad and we have no good psychiatrists living around!
Sensex dips below 12000 - not unexpected, but shocking still. With demand down and speculators' days over, crude price is on a downward spiral. It seems that soon we will have water costing more than oil. (The government has hiked water supply bills by 90% - 140%) Inflation has 'dropped' to below 12%. Can't understand whether the times are really bad - it is confusing! Has madness caught me as well?
Tata Nano shifted to Gujrat. I do not know what to say. I never understood why they chose Singur in the first place. What will Buddha do now? Will Nano still cost only one lakh? It would be a miracle if that happens.
U.S signs nuke deal with India. I cannot understand why anyone is opposing it. Does anyone really think we are dumb enough to trust U.S. for eternity? We have got Russia, the European countries and a host of other sellers as well. This world is a village 'mandi' and we can get anything if we can pay for it.
The U.S Presidential election got really interesting with Sarah Palin. I really do hope that McCain doesn't win. I want to have at least a minuscule amount of sanity in this insane world. I am not a great fan of Obama, but I think Joe Biden has some sense and it will rub off on Obama as well. However, I believe that either of the Presidential candidates is going to be better than Bush. I do not know how he got re-elected. John Kerry was a lot better.
I really wish that Al Gore had become the President after Clinton. This world would have been a far better place to live in.
Now, back home. I really got into an argument with my parents after a couple of years. I do not get into arguments easily, and I have heard lots of comments like, "Anu, you should really go for the IFS. You will make a great diplomat." My greatest hobby is playing Devil's Advocate at home with (hold your breath) my mother that leaves my father and my sister shaking their heads in disbelief. (So I believe) . Getting into a verbal duel or a 'truel' is an annual ritual. But even that has become infrequent because everyone has become busy and we have our own businesses to mind. So when we got a two days' holiday, I 'ruined' it neatly. Actually, we all know that everyone loves it - the next day after we have a duel, we have a blast - we travel somewhere, go out to eat and enjoy ourselves - all in the name of 'consoling me'.
Arguments are good, sometimes.
P.S. I have started going for morning walks again, thanks to mom. She comes with me to ensure that I go the whole mile. (Pun intended). Seems she won't let me R.I.P.
Sensex dips below 12000 - not unexpected, but shocking still. With demand down and speculators' days over, crude price is on a downward spiral. It seems that soon we will have water costing more than oil. (The government has hiked water supply bills by 90% - 140%) Inflation has 'dropped' to below 12%. Can't understand whether the times are really bad - it is confusing! Has madness caught me as well?
Tata Nano shifted to Gujrat. I do not know what to say. I never understood why they chose Singur in the first place. What will Buddha do now? Will Nano still cost only one lakh? It would be a miracle if that happens.
U.S signs nuke deal with India. I cannot understand why anyone is opposing it. Does anyone really think we are dumb enough to trust U.S. for eternity? We have got Russia, the European countries and a host of other sellers as well. This world is a village 'mandi' and we can get anything if we can pay for it.
The U.S Presidential election got really interesting with Sarah Palin. I really do hope that McCain doesn't win. I want to have at least a minuscule amount of sanity in this insane world. I am not a great fan of Obama, but I think Joe Biden has some sense and it will rub off on Obama as well. However, I believe that either of the Presidential candidates is going to be better than Bush. I do not know how he got re-elected. John Kerry was a lot better.
I really wish that Al Gore had become the President after Clinton. This world would have been a far better place to live in.
Now, back home. I really got into an argument with my parents after a couple of years. I do not get into arguments easily, and I have heard lots of comments like, "Anu, you should really go for the IFS. You will make a great diplomat." My greatest hobby is playing Devil's Advocate at home with (hold your breath) my mother that leaves my father and my sister shaking their heads in disbelief. (So I believe) . Getting into a verbal duel or a 'truel' is an annual ritual. But even that has become infrequent because everyone has become busy and we have our own businesses to mind. So when we got a two days' holiday, I 'ruined' it neatly. Actually, we all know that everyone loves it - the next day after we have a duel, we have a blast - we travel somewhere, go out to eat and enjoy ourselves - all in the name of 'consoling me'.
Arguments are good, sometimes.
P.S. I have started going for morning walks again, thanks to mom. She comes with me to ensure that I go the whole mile. (Pun intended). Seems she won't let me R.I.P.
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