From Tahir square to Wall Street

I arrived in New York sometime in the afternoon. The rash driving, the honking, the narrow streets, the potholes, all made me feel right at home. Was this not reminiscent of Bangalore? I reached the hotel and had some time to kill before my room was ready. I was pleased to find that 2 blocks from my hotel, the entire street was filled with Indian restaurants. Having eaten a modest meal in a South Indian resturant, I got ready and  hailed a taxi to my destination, the intersection of Wall Street and Broadway. The cab driver refused to go near Broadway and dropped me a couple of blocks away. "Too many cops there! It's just a short distance away, you can walk from here" so saying, he dropped me on wall street a couple of blocks away from Broadway. I walked the entire distance and I was in awe. Loads of cops from NYPD and barricades the entire length and breadth of wall street. I was amazed. It seemed as though someone had laid siege on the Wall Street and it definitely turned out to be the case. As I went about my business finding the required address on Wall street by asking some cops who directed to my destination, I couldn't help appreciating the concrete jungle in all it's glory.

Protests in Wall Street

As I was in a meeting, I asked my friend about these protests. She said "Most of the people do not even know what they are protesting about. They seem to be inspired by the Arab spring. It seems to be a hodge podge of issues, but one of the key issues seems to be social and economic inequality, corporate greed, and the influence of corporate money and lobbyists on government. They feel most of the money in America is in Wall Street!". "Funny, I thought it was in Fort Knox" I joked. Well they might have felt that all the people in fancy suits on Wall Street were wealthy. Well I wasn't one of them, I can assure you that!




A lot of things were happening that day in New York. The UN meeting was scheduled to be held in New York. There was a lot of talk in the news that day about the creation of a Palestinian state and what the members of the UN and mainly the US thinks about the whole issue. A few weeks later I saw two amazing speeches by the current Isreali Prime Minister on why creating a Palestinian state right now is impractical unless Mahmoud Abbas decides to make some compramises. I leave it to you to listen to this charismatic leader and decide for yourself what is best for the world. A small nation, fighting every day for it's very survival and doing a very good job at it. They know how to survive. Our country must take a cue from them. And our spineless and gutless prime minister, who is like a butler to an ex-waitress, said he wants to "welcome Palestine as a new state with East Jerusalem as it's capital. But what more can you expect from him. He wants to woo certain section of the Indian society to vote for his filthy party. Doesn't these videos of Mr.Benjamin Netanyahu make you wish we had a strong PM like him.

The evening I had made a reservation to go the World Trade Center Memorial. In the very same month of Septembe, 10 years ago, 2 planes had hit the twin towers of the World Trade center. The two towering sentinals in New York City. They had crumbled killing many people, including many brave firefighters who selflessly went into the building to rescue the thousands of innocents who were trapped in the twin towers. I still remember that day. I was watching a Wrestling pay per view on TV. My mother just happened to hear the news and switched the channels. I was shocked by the events that were unfolding. I was a person who believed in equality of men. I used to feel all are equal. But that day, I realized that there were people, worse than the lowest filth on earth. People who wanted to hurt innocents and kill them with a religious zeal. It angered me and led me to do a lot of research into who these people were. I only realized that such people had harassed my motherland for thousands of years and are continuing to do so. Anyway, this isn't the place to discuss this. I will  write more about it in my history blog.

The "Sphere" which stood in the Plaza of WTC for over 3 decades

I walked from the intersection of Wall Street and Broadway towards the harbour. I wanted to catch a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty. I saw her but briefly as I landed in La Guardia airport at New York. She was such a magnificient sight. As I walked towards the harbour, I saw the sphere, which was a atop the WTC. It was damaged during the terrorist attacks but has now been placed as a memorial at a park for all those who lost their lives 10 years ago.

I went to the harbour and walked for a while near the Smithsonian Institute of Native American art. I then saw the Statue of Liberty from a great distance. She stood there as she always does, standing tall and majestic. How I wish I had time to take the ferry and to see her from nearby.










I then walked back towards broadway and wall street and asked the policemen for directions  to the WTC memorial. I reached the site after a few minutes. My heart was heavy and I was feeling very depressed. All those tragic events from ten years ago flashed before my eyes. The memorial itself was closed at 7 PM.  I had just missed getting in. I could see from outside. I walked all around it. I saw the various murals on the walls nearby dedicated to the firemen on New York city. All this while unkown to me, involuntarily the place made me feel sad. I felt as though I was carrying a heavy load. As it was getting late, and I was in a new city (To me), I went ahead, hailed a cab and went back to my hotel. In the next blog I will narate what happened during my return flight and we will also journey to a city  which was the jewel of the Islamic world once upon a time.

Here are some pics that I took.

A virtual visit to Egypt

I contemplate quite often on how and where we came from? And where we are heading towards? From antiquity there were various theories that tried to answer these questions. But from them arise only more and more questions. As to the former question, one needs to go to the ancient sites of the world like Giza in Egypt, Harappa and Mohenjadharo in India and Pakistan, Tenochitlan in Mexico, Machu Pichu in Peru, Baalbek in Lebanon and the list goes on and on. An insatiable thirst to find out more about life in antiquity always makes me feel that I should visit these places in life and investigate for myself the mysteries that they present to the world.

Well, I do not know when this dream will be fulfilled. But the next best thing to visiting the actual place would be to talk to people from that place. And where would you find people from almost every part of the world? In United States of America.

And as I was taking a cab to the airport, I struck a conversation with the driver, who was from Egypt. I naturally enquired about the political climate in Egypt after the end of the regime of Hosni Mubaraq. "It is very bad" replied my friend much to my surprise. I thought this is what the Egyptians wanted. They wanted an end to the long reign of Mubaraq. This was very much apparent in the huge number of people gathered in protest at Tahir Square in Cairo. "Why is it so? Is the interim government now entirely a military one? Are they violating any human rights? I thought there would be a slow transition to democray?". "The military government is not able to control everything that is happening in the country. There is a lot of looting and violence happening in villages and cities. The military cannot control everything. There is no police like there was during Mubarak's time. Also I fear the rise of Muslim brotherhood!" said he.

Oh yes! The famous Muslim brotherhood. Many were skeptical about their rise in prominence. Whilest claiming to be a moderate group opposed to the violent form of Islam practiced by Taliban and Al-Queda, they still want Sharia to be imposed in Egypt. Many find their rise in prominance to be alarming. Sharia could be a curse to women and minority religions. The coptic Christians living in Egypt are alredy fearful of the developments. "The Muslim brotherhood, if they come to power, they will say get rid of cell phones and other forms of communication because they are anti-Islamic. They will say let us use good old pigeons for sending and recieving letters". This was indeed the mode of communication that the early Muslim rulers of Egypt were using. However I found it hard to beleve that the Muslim brotherhood will be that illogical. They do not seem that hardline to me. However, who knows? Maybe the cab driver is right.

"During the holy month of Ramzan, the Muslim brotherhood opened grocery stores in all villages. They were selling everything at half price. Rice, chicken , vegetables etc everything was at half price. They are winning over the villagers. What do the villagers care about Sharia or no Sharia. They want food, water etc. They get it cheap during Ramzan, they are impressed. I know not where the Muslim brotherhood gets the money to do such 'Chariatable acts'".

"Maybe from the Sheiqs in Soudi Arabia? Probably the Wahabi fundamentals from Soudi,Yemen etc? " . "Maybe!" agreed the driver. "The most fearful thing is, if the Muslim brotherhood were to come to power, they would urge all the Arab nations to wage war against Isreal! That is scary. It would disturb the peace in the Middle east. Mubaraq somehow maintained peace with Isreal."

Now the ramifications of the rise of Muslim brotherhood hit me. Any war in the region could well turn into a third world war. The last thing we want in this world is war. I certainly do hope that the muslim brotherhood never comes to power. Of course, for all we know, the Muslim brotherhood may be a benign and peaceful organization. But if the words of our friend is to be believed, they are not! What might happen in the future only time will tell.


I will continue from this virtual visit to Egypt to a very real visit to Wall Street, the concrete jungle in New York city.

Steve Jobs and the iGnorant!

I still remember the day I went on a cruise in San Francisco bay near the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz island. For one thing it was a cold foggy day. I took a couple of great pictures on the trip. One more unforgettable thing happened, when I stood at the ticket counter with my good friend Sujay. The ticket seller or guide (I do not know what he did exactly for a living) was a very loquacious man and went on rambling about something or the other! He probably realized that we were from India, and when giving an analogy said "It's like Mrs.Gandhi is the real ruler of India and Mr.Singh is merely a puppet in her hands..." . I must admit I did not see that coming from him. Was it so apparent that even a guide in a ferry knows about it. Either that, or this was a guide well versed in world affairs. But whatever the talkative guide said was the truth and there was no denying it. This is what makes me despise everything about the ruling UPA govt in India. This is just one of many many reasons. Their pseudo secular policies. Their scams. They are neck deep in corruption. And they want a person who is probably good at nothing to become the future prime minister of India. I am sure many share my opinions and want to get rid of this wicked autocratic regime.

Because of this, I came to know of several people who were quite vocal in their criticism of this current regime. I respected them and started following them on twitter even. But I found a couple of interesting characters about whom I felt I should write a post. Not only are these people hilarious, and end up making a mockery of themselves, but they have an ego as big as the Milky Way.

The first person that I wish to speak about is a person called Vishwabandhu Gupta, a former Income Tax Commissioner. He came to the limelight, when during a rally by Baba Ramdev, he openly declared that most people in the current UPA regime like Chidambaram,Pranab Mukharjee and even Mr.Singh are crooks. He called Pranab da a "Hijda" (eunuch) . I was quite impressed by this speech and started following him on twitter. Many were his tweets about Rahul baba, Antonio Miano, Chidambaram,Pranab Mukhargee. He did not even leave Baba Ramdev (With whom he had shared a stage in Ramlila Maidaan) and Anna Hazare. He suspected them of selling out to the govt and said their character is dheela (Tainted) and started tweeting the lyrics of a popular song "Main karu to saala character dheela hai"! (If I do so, they say my character is tainted). These erratic tweets and conspiracy theories made me doubt his credibility a bit, though I do not doubt his allegations about UPA to be untrue. I think he really became famous with his supposed speech on cloud computing. It was an instantaneous hit on Facebook and many people started sharing the video on facebook and twitter. If you haven't seen it already, watch it and enjoy!!!



I watched this video countless times and laughed to my heart's content. What I find amazing is the confidence with which this man speaks about something about cloud computing about which he hasn't the slightest idea. Bursting with curiosity I went to his twitter timeline. I saw that someone had tweeted "Sir, please take back your comments on cloud computing", to which our scholar had replied "Haha, that was said in good humor. I did not know the talk was getting recorded and would go live". I did not believe in this, but since he is someone who also shares a hatred for the current UPA govt and believing him to be a patriot, I felt I should help him with some good advice. Therefore I tweeted " Sir, perhaps you should give another interview clarifying that the cloud computing concept was mentioned jocularly and that you were just kidding with the interviewer". I do not see any tweets from him after that for a long time. But my friends on Facebook kept talking about more extraordinary conspiracy theories coming from him.  When I went to his profile, my suspicions were confirmed. He had indeed blocked me. In his paranoid head, that concocts a 100 conspiracy theories per second, he probably felt I was in some way connected with the UPA govt or even worse. Probably he thought I am an Italian. If you come home from a hard day's work and find nothing entertaining on TV, follow this guy on Twitter. He is sure to entertain you each and every day. His twitter id is @vbg111.

Now jokes apart. Today was a very sad day for the technology world, and the world at large. Steve Jobs, co-founder, ex-CEO of Apple died today after battling Pancreatic cancer for many years. Now this man needs no introduction to any person who loves technology or gadgets or even anyone who uses any of the amazing devices that this man helped innovate. Who can forget his unforgettable commencement speech at Stanford in 2005. Whenever I am depressed or when life's problems and troubles seemed overwhelming, I used to remember this. It made so much sense. I am sure this is something everyone will have heard, but will still go ahead and share it for those who might have missed it.

Now the man behind the Mac, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad. The man behind Pixar. I mean who has done so much for technology as this man has. An extraordinary innovator and a genius.  There are really none like him in our era. His death today saddened me a great deal, as I am sure, it did to most people in the world. I was amazed at how much it saddened me. As a music lover, I bought my first iPod classic in 2007 and absolutely loved it! I bought the iPhone4 the moment I heard I got a job (Which eventually I did not get because of budget reasons.) I guess I was just looking for a reason to lay hands on the iPhone. The job may have got whisked away from me, but the iPhone stayed. I have become so accustomed to using it. Now this man was one of the key reasons why these devices came and revolutionized the world around us. Here was  a man, who brought forth a tablet and created a market where there existed none before. The man deserves respect and notice.

As I was browsing through facebook and twitter reading various tweets and status messages mourning the loss of Steve Jobs, I ran into an interesting tweet "Amazed how some of mature tweeps gets carried away by drama on TV like BB and videshi singer like Steve Jobs… " . Obviously BB refers to an idiotic reality show called Big Boss which deserves all the censure in the Universe and more. Videshi (Means foreigner) singer. So Steve Jobs according to this tweet is just a famous singer from the West. This tweet was by another famous critique (at least on twitter) of the UPA regime called  Vijay Bahadur Singh (Twitter id @vbsingh60). This is how he describes himself on twitter "Supdt. of Customs (Retd.), Legal Practitioner, Awardee of Navleen Kumar Award in 2004, Whistleblower, Anticorruption activists." I was surprised at his ignorance and shocked at the confidence with which he was displaying it on twitter.  According to him no one cares about the poor people in India who are dying every day. Well, I ask you does he? He seems to spend all the time on twitter cursing the UPA govt. How is he helping make the life of the poor any better. And what is wrong in mourning the death of a great man, whoever he is! (Indian or otherwise). Does that make me less patriotic.  Now I found an interesting reply to this tweet of his, which I feel I should share here "@vbsingh60 SirJi, Steve was not singer.He cam to India to meet Neem Karoli Baba and returned as Hindu,later followed Buddhism.True Karmic." Now this was interesting. Baba Neem Karoli was as I know a great saint from UP who  had attained self realization. It was great to hear that Steve had actually met him. Now this should not be a reason alone to mourn his death. But it is one of his many facets, something that I did not know. I knew remotely that he was influenced by Eastern mysticism just like Einstein and Heisenberg.  When I sent out a tweet in reply to this, including Mr.Vb Singh that some people are so confident about their knowledge (Or in this case, ignorance which they think is knowledge) and do not care to open their eyes and learn the truth. That he should be more careful about what he tweets. And lo and behold! What does he do, but block me! 

Two strange people indeed. Both are so vocal about their criticism of the Miano family and the UPA govt (They are one and the same). And I concur with them fully in this criticism. But on certain matters, it surprises me how ignorant they are and how narrow minded they are. They are oblivious to whatever exists in the world, apart from their own worlds of conspiracy theories and hatred. I am glad they blocked me. Following them on twitter and reading their tweets everyday might make one just like them. A frog in a well, who thinks the well is the very universe itself.  I have met a lot of unique people in my life, but these two are so unique and strange that I thought I should mention it in this post. And in ending the post, as a proud Indian, I hope Steve Jobs has reached Nirvana (Since he was apparently a  Buddhist) and has escaped the endless cycle of birth and death.