The Threshold of Coolidity

Is it a blessing to be paranoid? Usually I expect paranoid people to be pushy, biased and generally weird. Hero's are cool, composed and practical. But could a paranoid man save the world? Or could a hero miss saving the world coz he wasn’t paranoid enough? Will come back to this digression in a minute.

Nostradamus, the man who saw tomorrow! Nostradamus was born in 1503 in France, and lived till 1566. Many people believe that Nostradamus could predict the future. I don’t know if this is true but he definitely managed to make himself part of the future. Stories have been told of his great powers, one being, during a visit to Italy, Nostradamus passed a group of Franciscan monks, and suddenly exclaimed and threw himself down on the ground, bowing and clutching the garment of one of the monks, Felice Peretti, a former swine herder. When questioned about his act he replied "I must yield myself and bow before his Holiness!" 19 years after Nostradumas' death, Felice Peretti became Pope Sixtus V. After facing several ups and downs in life, Nostradamus settled down, writing down his predictions in 10 books named the Centuries, each containing 100 predictions written in 4 line verses called quatrains. Historians have dedicated their lives to making sense of his predictions, and their greatest shortcoming lie in the fact that almost no one has been able to flag a prediction before the occurrence of the event. More than half his predictions are believed by some to have been true in 20/20 hindsight. This is attributed to the cryptic nature of his quatrains, maybe to evade persecution in his time.

Now, if you believed that I had the power to fortel future events, and I was a quack, I could sit down and write cryptic prose about a terrorist bombing (coz I know someday terrorists are gonna get their way), about a famous assassination, (coz some prominent figure will be assassinated someday in the future), about a devastating hurricane, a flood maybe just to cover global warming. After I am dead and gone, if any of these events come true and if enough people believe in my shit, they'll correlate it to whatever events match, wherever they match. If you wanna believe, you will believe. If I predicted events in 3000A.D and the world ended in 2500AD would that matter? No! When the world is ending, no one would be chanting "Oh Amrit fucked up!" hahahahaha. They'd be scrambling to save their behinds!

But, why would an extremely intelligent man, who knew he had the power to save people from the deadly plague, spend his time predicting events way into the future, knowing that correct predictions would benefit him in no way! Either he was crazy and warped, or he actually wanted to warn people of the visions he believed to be true.

Back to the points I want to focus on. Most of what I learnt came from an article I found online. It spoke of how Nostradamus predicted 3 powerful and tyrannical leaders or antichrists. The first is now believed to be Napoleon of whom Nostradamus is reputed to have written:

An Emperor shall be born near Italy.
Who shall cost the Empire dear,
They shall say, with what people he keeps company
He shall be found less a Prince than a butcher.

From a simple soldier he will rise to the empire,
From the short robe he will attain the long.
Great swarms of bees shall arise.

There are more passages that are believed to be about Napoleon and his conquests.

The second antichrist Nostradamus spoke of was argued to be Adolf Hitler from the passages:

He shall come to tyrannize the land.
He shall raise up a hatred that had long been dormant.
The child of Germany observes no law.
Cries, and tears, fire, blood, and battle.

A captain of Germany shall come to yield himself by false hope,
So that his revolt shall cause great bloodshed.

Beasts wild with hunger will cross the rivers
The greater part of the battlefield will be against Hister.

The article points out that experts believe that Nostradamus almost spelt out the name "Hitler" but missed it by an alphabet, others, further explain the difference in the alphabet with calligraphic explanations. The word Hister before the advent of Hitler however was believed to refer to the Danube (Ister).

And here comes the interesting part on the third antichrist in the article.

Out of the country of Greater Arabia
Shall be born a strong master of Mohammed...
He will enter Europe wearing a blue turban.
He will be the terror of mankind.
Never more horror.

In the year 1999 and seven months
From the sky will come the great King of Terror.
He will bring back to life the King of the Mongols;
Before and after war reigns.

The article then explains that Nostradamus predicted some long lasting war, and says that he predicted the first target:

The sky will burn at forty-five degrees.
Fire approaches the great new city

The piece then goes on to explain that Nostradamus used the words, New World, for America, and experts believe that the “new city” could be New York, especially since New York lies near 45 degrees latitude. It also says that this “strong master of mohammed” could be Saddam Hussain, but many believe he is yet to come.

At this point in the article I was very confused! How come there was nothing about the events of September 11^th? And how come Bin Laden had not been tied to the third antichrist. I scrolled to the bottom searching for his name, and then scrolled to the very top to start the search again, and came across what did send a chill down my spine. The article was written in 1993!

After the events of 9/11, there were several sites/emails, that distorted the last two lines about the 45 degrees to make people believe that Nostradamus had predicted the attacks. They were all well-refuted and rightfully so.

However, nothing changes the fact that there is an article in 1993, that says that Nostradamus predicts that: The third antichrist is yet to come, will be a strong master of Mohammed, out of the country of Greater Arabia, and his first target will be New York which will have flames in the sky!

These are the last words in the article:

“Was Nostradamus a fraud or a prophet? There are some who say that the seeming accuracy of his quatrains are a result of their facile interpretations (Guentte). Still, more than four hundred books and essays about his prophecies have been published since his death in 1566, along with a great number of articles and other commentaries, in numerous languages (Randi 5). Even skeptics pay careful attention to Nostradamus' predictions of the three anti-Christs. If Nostradamus truly predicted Napoleon and Hitler we should take heed of his words about the future. Perhaps we can prevent the dismal fate Nostradamus has predicted (Guentte)”

Maybe if our author was more paranoid, someone who decoded one of Nostradamus’ predictions 8 years before the event, could have saved the day!

    I remember in Moral Science class back in middle school, all the kids were taught the Golden Rule! The rule more or less stated "Do to others as you would have them do to you!" Now in the field that I going to discuss this I am probably going to trip over my own words and trip the circuits in both ur and my brain. Anyways, the truth is this Golden Rule is awesome for issues like "If you dont want to be kicked in the balls, dont kick someone else in em!" U follow it and find out "Damn, the Golden Rule works, I dont kick people in the balls, and my balls remain safe!" However, in relationships this rule totally falls apart. (Assumption and Definition: Relationships are with people who dont want to kick you in the balls as a prerequisite!)

    Okay, so let me explain. Say, you and me are in a relationship, any kind. When you are troubled by something, and want to talk it out with me and I ask you if something is wrong, you first say "No nothing is wrong!" However, at this point, you wish I wud ask you one more time "Are you sure?" Now, the deciding factor at this point is "Am I the same type as you in this respect?" If I am and I follow the Golden Rule, I would want you to ask me again if I were in ur shoes and so I ask you "Are you sure?" and things are rosy coz I know something is wrong and would ask you till you tell me and both of us are happy! Now, what if I am the opposite variety? What if when I am upset, I want everyone to leave me the fuck alone? Then following the Golden Rule, I would not ask you a second time, coz I wudnt want to be asked a second time if I were in ur shoes, thus, I would have you leave me alone, so I would do to you as I would have you do to me and leave you the fuck alone! Breakdown, breakdown, breakdown! At this time you would have been upset with me and the Golden Rule fails. The same applies in the converse situation, if I were the one upset, you would keep asking me if I were okay, which is the way you would have had me behave and I would be upset with you coz I would rather have you leave me alone!

    So rather confusing, but what I am saying is that in relations, it isnt important to act as you would have others act with you, but to act as they DO with you. So since you are the "need to be asked again" variety and have done that to me before, when you are upset, I shud keep asking you till you tell me whats wrong. Conversely, the moment I say I'm fine or I dont wanna talk about it, U, knowing that I am the "leave me the fuck alone" variety should do exactly that! See, we disobeyed the Golden Rule, and things worked out just fine. Another example of where it works is next. Lets say, a couple is in a relationship. Everytime, lets say the girl gets angry and says she wants to be left alone, the guy does exactly that, and she spends the next few hours wishing he would just ask her more times. The next time the guy is angry and says he wants to be left alone, shud she keep talking to him remembering how bad she felt when he gave her "space"  or should she remember that he walked out and figure out that he did that thinking that wud make her happy, and give him "space" coz now she knows that thats the way he likes it! Easy, give him space! Conversely, Guy, dont walk out!

    The conclusion suggests that in a relationship, we should not "do to others as you would have them do to you" but you should "Do to others as they do to you!". Sounds good, but there is an underlying fallacy. If everyone did to others what they do to them and followed my Golden Rule, people might already be doing things for the other based on their personality analysis, and this action might be the opposite of what they would want for themselves. Therefore, the rule should be ""Do to others as they WANT to do to you!" coz back to the first example, even if I learnt that you need to be asked twice and keep asking you, I still WANT to leave you alone, so  you should do what I WANT to do to you!

    Now, to figure out what someone wants is not the best solution. So the proposed algorithm involves a synchronization phase and a Processing Phase.

Synchronization Phase: In the synchro phase two people meet and should behave spontaneously. if you need to be asked twice, ask the other twice, if you need to be left the fuck alone, leave the other the fuck alone. So, everyone in the synchro phase should show what they want they want done to themselves. The other should record these events. In the Processing phase: the partners in the relationship shud start doing what the other did in the synchronization phase in a similar situation. The result will be perfect bliss! Hence proved!

 The synchro phase can be used to unveil tastes, desires, weaknesses, turn ons, unacceptable actions, etc etc. The more ground covered, I hope the happier and smoother and more honest the relationship. In the processing phase, each one blends to the recordings of the other in the synchro phase.

Duration of synchronization phase(friends): Synchronization phases of various lengths may be required for different pairs of people. Suggested durations, for friends, synchronize till you buy each other presents. (note: people who wanna be friends and not lovers, and buy you gifts within the first month of knowing you are CREEPS)

Duration of synchronization phase(lovers): Until the first time you sleep together. Well, if you are the variety who sleep with each other within 20 mins of meeting each other, please synchronize till ur first time one-month anniversary at least (Yes, yes, the Bandy et al "First Understanding, Common Knowledge (FUCK) Synchronization Algo" works for SLUTS too.  And yeah, if you are the variety who must refrain from sex before marriage blah blah, this might keep you synchronizing for ever, so synchronize till ur first kiss! If even that is gonna happen after ages, then keep synchronizing, God knows you'll need it! Bandy et al do not guarantee algorithm for people who kiss only after marriage!

Claimer: I am writing my thesis, and this is what one month of writing a thesis on clock synchronization and data fusion in  Wireless Sensor Networks has done to me. help! help! help! The sequel to this will be the intro to my Thesis stating how human beings are the best wireless sensor nodes. (provided my boss allows it!)

Thank god we are not perfect! Well, depends on what we consider perfect. Sexual attraction and its forces vary from person to person. Some people think that those who arent attracted to certain people based on their looks are fickle, in other words less than perfect. Again there are people who dont want to sleep with someone else coz they dont have the right personality. Which means that they fail to recognize the beauty within that person, coz everyone is beautiful right? So even they are less than perfect!

So imagine a world where we are all perfect. We are so perfect that every person of the opposite sex (or same depending on preference, lets assume opposite ...) would be able to appreciate both physical and spiritual beauty of each other, making every two people of the opposite sex (with a few exceptions) intensely mentally and sexually attracted to each other. Now would this be a beautiful scenario or a catastrophe? I wonder. We'd definitely be nicer people. Would hopefully hate less people, coz even when someone wrongs us, their beauty might outshine the wronging. But then again, in a world where people struggle to remain faithful to their partners, would being attracted to eveyone just make that concept collapse? or would monogamy not even exist in this case? I dont really know how "Laws of attraction" work in the animal kingdom. enlighten me! I do know that there is a sense of pairing amongst some creatures even after copulating. So, would this perfection make us more of animals? So is being human the art of being "Less than perfect"!

Coz loving only one person and being sexually attracted to one person is professed to be holy. Ref "Oh honey, I love you and dont feel like touching anyone else" -- most couples to one another. But is that an insult to everyone else and a procalamation that everyone else is ugly (or atleast not good enuff). If we were perfect and saw every bit of beauty in each other would exclusive "love" survive or would everyone just be sleeping with and loving each other.

 
Enuff babbliographical questions ... Will hit this up later. But seems like .. Thank God, we are less than perfect, fickle, choosy, hypocritical, mean, differentiating, racist ...... it makes the world go round and round!

Dear readers, I am not well! I have been tripped by an uncurable disease. My PCP has no idea how to cure me, and my condition gets more critical by the day. These are the disease symptoms: I am usually lazing on the couch … One of my roommates loiters by and pops a horrible, horrible hindi movie into the DVD player … I inadvertently watch along. Within the first 45 minutes I stand a chance of rescuing myself, the moment 45 minutes are up, however bad the movie, I cannot get up. I must know how everything turns out; hearing the story wont suffice, I can’t even watch it in fast forward mode, I must watch every minute (except the songs – don’t care). At this point my roommate who starts the movie has gotten up and gone about his life, I am left on the couch alone wallowing in my misery. My roommate Vishal has access to every hindi movie released since his uncle and aunt collect DVDs. Who watches them? Not Uncle, not auntie, not Vishal but Me, Me, Me!

A little background about me. My kind of movies are Memento, Adaptation, Usual Suspects you get the picture. I DON’T like hindi movies. I have probably enjoyed only a handful of movies including DDLJ, Dil Chahta hain, and Teen Deeware. That’s about it. So when I am left on the couch I invest 3 hours of my life watching something that makes my head hurt but I can’t stop.

The one that made me cry was Rudrakshas. Sunil Shetty and Sanjay Dutt were flying in the movie, fighting with swords, defying gravity. I hated it, but guess what? I watched every minute. In addition to the movies that are sci-fi but claimed to be normal life in hindi movies, is the advent of Indian Soft Porn. Hindi movies have advanced. The top actors are involved in rather passionate kissing scenes. No longer is the kiss hidden from the audience taking advantage of the heroine’s long hair masking their lips. However with this advancement, the lesser actors must participate in more provocative movies and scenes from the same.

Now the regular porn industry comprises several variations to cater to the wide receiver base:

Single X: Usually passionate love scenes, with some glimpses of breasts, usually very sexy

Double X: Usually have plots such as a man hiring a private investigator to spy on his wife, and the private investigator spies on her and ends up in bed with her, (real “private” investigator, I guess) and in the end the man is back with is wife and her affair has brought back the lost zeal in the love making. Very “happy ending” The audience is blessed with tons and tons of heated scenes and lots and lots of focus on very shapely breasts. Double the breasts, double the fun!

Triple X: Now triple X’s don’t really have a story. Clothes vanish before you can blink your eyes, and the rest is more like watching a lathe machine move back and forth. Sometimes there are tons of lathe machines. Once in a while when there is a plot it usually is a young girl interviewing for a secretary job, and proving that she can “do” the “job” well.

The new hindi movies are Single X’s (without the glimpses) in implementation and Triple X’s in spirit. The girls are bending over without reason, wearing skirts that are shorter than my boxers, the camera focuses harder on key areas than in 2Xs and very young girls are having lots and lots of sex with men of varying ages. I wonder what motivates these rather pretty women to jump on these roles.

Well the bottom line is that I am inextricably hooked to movies with horrible action scenes, horrible acting, and horrible exposure. The biggest science fiction movie was this movie called Tango Charlie! It was hardly as irritating as the others so why science fiction? What is a science fiction? A movie that contains feats that defy present day science. Well, it was a war movie, well made, but then the actor (Bobby Deol) came back from the war front for a day to meet his girlfriend (for one day I repeat), he din’t even touch her, instead he was writing in his journal! That my friends is science fiction! A man who hasn’t been with is woman in years, comes back for one day, and writes in his diary all day? If my girl were here you think I would be writing for you guys, hell no, hell no .. check my India post and see how the last 20 days are unreported ..... thats what Fact is like, Hindi movies: Fiction, fiction, fiction, I scream ………………………..

Even as I write this I am watching some movie where some actor is kissing a mannequin to make his to-be girl jealous. Somebody help me, Koi Hain? Koi hain?

Was supposed to write this article last night after "The Kannadian Stage" but couldnt since I drowned myself in alcohol all by myself and passed out on the couch. The result, I woke up at 4:30am and transported myself to my room and have been awake since. Now I feel like a good Christian boy going to church as I am about to write something about religion on a Sunday morning. The truth is that I have never been a religious person. I have once in a while turned a couple of wishes usually for others to him, and probably spent more time saying thanks for whatever came true. I am not going to unleash my views on the God in this article. As I said, I have never been a religious person. Miku has always been extremely religious. She turned to her faith in Sai Baba (The Kannadian Sage) when I was sick and I have never seen her so peaceful. My grandmother was a very religious woman, and was one of Sai Baba's personal devotees who used to receive personal preachings from him before he became famous enough to sit infront of a thousand people, wave his hands, and make them all feel that they had been blessed. Well, my parents have always stood behind and supported me in every wild fancy that I have cooked up. Miku had visited Puttapurty (The home of Sai Baba) when I was sick and this time when I made my trip home I realized that she cherished a desire of taking me there with her to say "thanks" for me getting better. I was more than happy to make this wish come true and visit Gaurav and Nidhi at the same time. Sai Baba was in Whitefield, Bangalore making this plan mcuh more convenient. Just before the went to Bangalore I decided to turn to my best friend to acquaint myself with the situation. So I asked google who Sai Baba was and I came upon some rather amazing stuff. I am not trying to say that I believe it, I just claim that it is omniously amazing. 

Fact #1: Christians believe in Jesus Christ. Okay, you knew that right?

Fact #2:  Some Christians believe that Jesus Christ will be born again.

Fact #3:  I think this is a fact but please correct me if I am wrong coz I dont think I am gonna read the Bible to figure this out. There is no record in the Bible stating that Jesus said that he will  be born again.

Fact  #4: In the bible at the time when Jesus was merging in the supreme principle of divinity, he communicated some news to his followers. The statement was "He who sent me among you, will come again," and pointed to the lamb. "His name will be the TRUTH. He will be dressed in a robe of red, a blood red robe. He will be short, with crown"

I dont know if these are the actual words stated in the bible. These have however been dissected by several people trying to make sense of them and my Sai Baba's devotees and I hear that he has made the claims personally once on Christmas, 1972.

The claims seem to be,

Sai Baba's name is SATHYA SAI BABA: Sathya means the truth.

Ba-Ba is the voice of the lamb.

Sai Baba wears a blood-red (orange) robe.

Sai Baba is short, with a crown of hair.

Therefore he is the father whom Jesus was referring to.

Interpretations are always based on what you want to believe. I find the Ba-Ba lamb thing quite a stretch. The others seem spine chillingly amazing. It almost sounds like it's true. Or if false, that someone tried to fabricate it from the very start! A bit too much of a coincidence. The options that crop up seem to be extremes too. I don't really ponder on subjects of this nature at all, but if you find this more than a co-incidence it almost seems that either God, Jesus, and Sai Baba being his father are all true -- a rather big stretch,  or whoever exalted Sai Baba to his current state was fashioning him with the Bible in mind from the very onset -- a rather big stretch to assume that if his powers werent true and he was a phony, instead of conforming to Indian prophecies, he would try to trap the Christian world.

I stumbled upon some other prophecies from both the Hindu world, and the Muslim world that are equally spine chilling and thought provoking. You can check em out at http://www.saibaba.ws/avatar/propheciesabout.htm

I personally don't know what to make of all this. All I care about is that Miku who was in turmoil with the way our lives were, got more peace than I have ever seen anyone achieve from her belief in him, and I thank him for that. I actually showed some interest in it coz I have heard lot of people shower me with their beliefs, and seen much more on TV. I am tired of hearing that I am going to hell because I am not Christian and not Muslim. I prefer to believe I will go to hell coz I am not a good person. However, he is the one preacher I have seen who acknowleges every religion, muslim, chirstians, buddhists, sikhs, everyone of em saying that their deeds will take every good person to heaven. All over his ashram are signs to the effect "Rather than pray to me go and help someone." I find both these views worshippable!

As for more than co-incidence,  our trip to Bangalore cost us Rs 27000 in airfare. The day after we bought tickets Miku received a check from some savings fund accumulation of years for Rs 27, 432. But again, thats just a coincidence right?