Finally, I'm back. Due to the not so subtle hints of some of my friends, I am forced to post something. Well, not exactly, as I have something to mock now. :D
I am in kolkata now, at the fag end of a month long mathematics camp. Its been overload in more than one way. The mathematics, the people and the food. Ah, I finally come to the food. I lick my lips in anticipation, not of the food, but of the chance of attacking some cuisines. If there is one word which sums up the culinarily challenged cultures of the world, both present and past, it is the following, much dreaded word - POTATO.
see this link for reference, if you do not know the meaning of this word, which is highly unlikely, unless you come from a culinarily advanced planet (by implication not the earth) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato
I hate people who peer at the screen while I am posting or mailing someone. OK, sorry for the interruption, I think the fellow who was committing this indiscretion has been scared away. I felt too tired to communicate verbally with him, so I had to say this.
I think you get the hang of this article. It is going to be highly non-linear with arbitrary interruptions - that's what potato has done to me. I feel a familiar stirring in my stomach when I say the word "potato" (aargh there goes...), so from now, I am going to refer to it by the euphemistic "!*!@#!@#" from now.
I find that eating the !*!@#!@# has an unsavoury effect on people, turning them one step back on the road of evolution. It can be seen in the behaviour of people in the educationally backward regions of the country like UP etc, where eating !*!@#!@# makes the people also like !*!@#!@#, big people with that familiar look in their eyes, the same look that says "so what if the world has changed and gone forward? I have my !*!@#!@#". So they stay culturally, educationally, sanitarily and culinarily retarded, giving headaches to the people who have experienced subtler tastes than that of !*!@#!@#, torturing them with !*!@#!@# morning, afternoon, night and anytime possible between. (If you do not understand why I am making a fuss about such a "trivial" matter, you can try eating the stuff sold on the railway platform in Kanpur or in any of the roadside eateries of UP. Notice: Do not say I did not warn you)
Also, notice that most of the scientfic talent of the country emerged from places like Bengal, many parts of the south, etc. The same can be said about the cultural aspect too. It seems too much of a coincidence that the set I have just described forms the compliment of the !*!@#!@# land. (Though Bengal's veg food is little better, I am weighing the culture on the majority food, and it has infinite non-veg varieties.)
As I write, most of the jests which pass off as projects seem to have finished, and the "junta" (read gen public) of IITK is "gearing up" for another year of swotting. Most of these people have nothing else to do. Their year can be concisely described as ragging the juniors, "magaai" (literal totally brainless mugging), having the "time of their lives (if you can call them that)" in the cultural fest, !*!@#!@#, and pro"jests". Give us a break, if this is the educational elite of the country, then it represents the apotheosis of the !*!@#!@# culture. As I write this, in the camp, some other IITians have just shown their pedigree. One of them attended around one-tenth of the classes (though I would say that he understood more than the others), and the others might as well have attended one-tenth. Their attention was confined to the institutuional pastime of the IITs, orkut. When they began the camp, only one of them had a profile. Having come into contact with him, the others realized that it would be a great idea to join and learn some "sophistication", having had precious little exposure in their !*!@#!@# cultures, so they joined in. Now they have more scraps than me. In fact, the state of affairs disgusted me so much that I renounced aorkut for the rest of my stay here. People who are not comfortable speaking english suddenly sprout "sophisticated" profiles, saying I'm cool, I'm hot, I'm !*!@#!@#... I hate it.
Well, I seem to have vented most of my venom, which seems to be in low supply today, so I'll leave now.