Links to interesting blogs / articles I read & have a view on

Vir Sanghvi of Hindustan Times wrote this thought provoking piece, and I contributed to that discisson.

Check the link at: 

http://blogs.hindustantimes.com/medium-term/2009/10/27/is-it-really-racism/

Cheers!

Vasu

Hello world!

Hello world!

This is not my first blog, but it’s my first at word press. After irrationally switching blogs from different sites just to see if I am more active with it, I am here!

Sounds fairly stupid, but what is a life without any stupidity or silly acts?

My “About me” section is not going to tell you anything, and most probably a few good friends would be the only people to read his blog to start with, so I thought I would start with a short intro and a long list of topics I want to write about.

I am an Indian man, in late twenties, single, working in business consulting, and living in Europe after seeing a few snippets of other countries. The rest, you either know if you are a friend, or would know if and when you read my blogs.

So without further ado, here is a very ambitious list of topics close to my heart that I have strong views on, and where I wish to write, and get critical feedback on: 

1. The story of my experiments with charting my own path to life:
   • The middle path to almost everything in life that takes a stance on being balanced, and not taking an extreme stance: Is this possible?
   • Liberalism, the way I have seen it evolve in  my life
   • Cultural sensitivity
   • What I learnt, and continue to learn from relationships
   • My circle of love: Family and friends for life.
   • My faith system: Individual excellence + Knowledge +Love  + What you give back to the world= God
   • Why I hate to the established notions of marketing, branding, and managing perception; and why I am yet forced to play the game
   • What makes my entire life a big, risky, and exciting experiment?
   • Can a rebel and iconoclast, be truly happy?
   • Why am I a terrible misfit in most parties, and a complete natural on top of a mountain?
2. Role models:
   • Cricket: Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Kapil Dev, Viv Richards
   • Movies: Clint Eastwood, Kamal Hassan, Aamir Khan, Hrishikesh Mukherjee
   • Tennis: Roger Federer
   • Music: Ilaiyaraja, Pink Floyd
   • Corporate world: Nandan Nilekani
   • Fictional: Tintin, Howard Roark
   • Daily life: Heroes from my circle of love, starting with mom and dad.
3. Indian politics and social issues
   • Media watchdog: An informal super media / fifth estate that calls the bluff on biased and shallow mainstream journalism
   • The need for a strong opposition party
   • Indian communists: good as devil’s advocates when not in power, devils when in power!
   • Who are the liberals, who are the centrists, and who truly represents them in my country?
   • Why do we know so little about our own history, and how is our lack of knowledge exploited?
   • Activism, and participation in democracy
   • Why are Indians so damn racist?
   • Why is a strong India important to the world?
   • Our education system
4. Religion & faith
   • Religious, ideological and cultural dogmas that ail the world
   • Can you be rational, liberal and not a communist
   • Can you be a believer, spiritual, and not religious?
   • The supremely powerful entity called I
5. Globalization: the Good, the bad, and the Ugly
6. Us and them: Impact of globalization on India:
   • What are the changes in society, I would wish India (US) embraces from other countries (THEM – refers to the few parts of US, Europe, Far East that I have visited, could be extrapolated to denote the “developed world”)
   • Where we should stop aping them, and pursue what we have been doing all along instead, and
   • What are the areas, where we can lead the way
7. Relationships
   • Why do we complicate, essentially simple things?
   • Inter cultural relationships: why I find the concept so exciting!
   • From an Indian perspective: why are most Indian men jeans wearing patriarchs?  Family system and feudal mindset vs. western inspired romantic and sexual awakening: where is this clash going?
8. Travelogues from planned and spontaneous, long, and short trips, to faraway lands, or nearby villages
9. Funny / light hearted tales from everyday life
10. The life of an expat
11. Movies I have loved and watched over and over again
12. My bucket list of whims and fancies that posses me, what I managed to do, and what are still pipe dreams: Ranging from owning  a German Shepherd, to making a film,  to climbing Everest
13. Epics and mythologies: what we can learn from them, and what should be taken with a pinch of salt
14. The big, bad, virtual world: How a lot of us have learnt a lot using the internet vs. how stunted our social skills could become due to / in spite of social networking
15. Links to interesting blogs / articles / videos  that I have an opinion on, or that I find just plain funny
16. Quotes and statements that resonate with me 

That’s it for the lofty plan! 

I have started at this website by sharing links to a few select blogs I wrote earlier, and are dated pretty much mid 2007

Cheers!

Vasu