Better Language

Pratap Bhanu Mehta says what i have been saying in a few previous posts, but does it more succinctly and powerfully:
The imperative of identifying citizens through communal categories has distinct sources. The first is the understandable proposition that the axis of identity might also define the lines of disempowerment and subordination. These forms of injustice [...]

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Is the parliament supreme?

The General Secretary of the INC asks
“The Congress has always supported reservation. An elaborate debate is needed on whether the elected Parliament or the Supreme Court will runthe country under the present democratic set-up,” Digvijay Singh toldreporters. Parliament, which had put its stamp of approval on theConstitution, also holds the right to amend it, he [...]

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The true path to happiness?

Quoted from “The Fifth Discipline – the art & practice of the learning organization” by Peter M. Senge:
“…If we live our lives in pursuit of what matters to most of us, and if we do our work with people whose friendship we value, we will have all the happiness we need. In this sense, happiness [...]

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Feynman

Professor Feynman was a very exciting person. I got an insight into his life recently while I was reading “Surely you’re joking, Mr. Feynman”, a book on the exciting things that the noted physicist has done in his life – he was filled with a sense of adventure and a desire to do what he [...]

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Buddhist thought

We use terms and descriptions in this world of experience and say ‘it is’ or ‘it is not’. Yet neither may be correct when we go behind the superficial aspect of things, and our language may be inadequate to describe what is actually happening. Truth may lie somewhere in the middle of ‘is’ and ‘is [...]

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Reluctance

Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?
~*~
Words by Robert Frost in ”Reluctance”, sentiments shared.

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Fortune Cookie

At a local Chinese diner called the Bonsai Grill, today i got the following fortune cookie:
Success is a journey not a destination, stop running.
Profoundly meaningful; i like the fortune cookies at this place with their words of wisdom; even though the cookies themselves are rather bland.
On other things, I am slated to return to India [...]

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Email etiquettes

An introduction to the actors:
Actor 1 is a developer
Actor 2 is the technical design lead – the boss!
This conversation occurred over emails today in a chain that had several members:
Actor 1 (Matter of fact tone):
We did some testing today and blah blah … it is not working.
Actor 2 (Neutral):
[...]

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Kipling

A woman is only a woman, but a good Cigar is a Smoke!
Ha!
Read the complete poem “The Betrothed”
“You must choose between me and your cigar.”
–BREACH OF PROMISE CASE, CIRCA 1885.
Open the old cigar-box, get me a Cuba stout,
For things are running crossways, and Maggie and I are out.
We quarrelled about Havanas–we fought o’er a good [...]

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Thought of the Day

When I was at school, one of our teachers, Mathew Sir, distributed a set of motivational books amongst us students. I think I was in Std VI or VIII at that time. There were several books that moved from one hand to another on a rolling basis; but i recall the title of one of [...]

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