Mirza Asadullah Baig Khan Ghalib

Yeh na thee hamari qismat..

Yeh na thee hamari qismat keh wisaal-e-yaar hota
Agar aur jeete rahtay yehi intezaar hota

Tere waade par jiyee ham to yeh jaan jhoot jana
Keh khushi se mar na jaate agar intezaar hota

Yeh kahaan ki dosti hai bane hain dost naaseh
Koi chaarasaaz hota koi ghamghuzar hota

Kahoon kis se main keh kya hai shab-e-gham buri balaa hai
Mujhe kya bura tha marana agar aikbaar hota

Huay mar keh ham jo ruswa huay kyun ka gharq-e-dariya
Na kabhi janaza uthata na kahin mazaar hota

Yeh masaael-e-tasavvuf yeh tera bayan ghalib
Tujhe ham wali samajhate Joh na badaakhwar hota.

T R A N S L A T I O N
I N
E N G L I S H

It was never in my fate to meet my beloved.
Even if more years of life was to me allocated, I would have been still awaiting the prize cherished.

If you think that I had been living on your promise, it is a lie.
For, if I had faith in you, would not of joy I would die.

Woe betide, my friendship, that the friends give pious advice and sermons they deliver.
I need someone on whose shoulders could I weep, who could allay my grief and my fears.

Whom should I tell that the night of sorrow is full of pangs.
I would not have resented the death, if it comes only once.

Disgraced, as I was after my death, why didn't I drown in a river or sea.
Neither, there would have been a funeral, nor tomb erected for me.

The marvels of ethical problems and your statements full of meanings.
I would have counted you, "Ghalib" amongst dearest friends of God; if only, you had not been a lover of drinks.

This is the translation of one of Ghalib's ghazals by Mansurul Hoda, author of the Urdu book "Dusra Rookh." He is one of the scholars of Ghalib poetry. He has translated many Ghalib ghazals and also published many articles on different Urdu poets and their poetry. He can be reached via e-mail


Taken from: http://members.tripod.com/~Hoda/mansur.html

ab neebu ki taazgi aapki baniyaan main - Dollar Baniyan
now get lime's freshness in your vest - Dollar Vests

Heard this from radio while commuting to office

ROFLOL, ROFLMAO

Eklavya

Brilliant! Bravo! and kudos to Mr. Chopra to make a thoroughly perfect movie. Excellent work of picturization. He takes whatever is required out of tradition, mythology, dialectic discussion of right and wrong, caste system and ignores the crap. What I really enjoyed was the pace of movie with good twists and turns in the story.

He has made me believe again that story and script are the heroes of cinema. I thought it to be another bleak, 'ART' movie and why the hell is he not showing his story in the promos, but when you do watch the movie you will realize that it is the story which carries the whole weight.

Another point is Mr. Chopra doesn't go overboard with scenery, art as does Mr. Bhansali where actors are mere puppets strolling or living in front of a picturesque background. Let the background be background because it is meant to be at the back Mr. Bhansali.

Amitabh Bachchan at his best. Now this is what is called acting. Not to make people cry or laugh because politicians and Mr. Chidambaram are best at it but to ACT. To behave as some one else
to personify some one and when you see Mr. Bachchan you wont be watching Mr. Bachchan. You will be seeing Eklavya.

So it is with most of the cast. Boman Irani really great, Jimmy Shergill in a small yet well done role. Saif very good (though not as overpowering as Langda Tyagi)

A must watch for those souls who are fed up with crass comedies, heart wrenching NRI drama, bleak underworld stories (Actually the term underworld is a misnomer because we all carry our heaven and hell with us)

Things that I despise but do watch. No reasons, no infatuations, no obsessions

Crazy Kiya Re...... :: Aishwarya Rai with skimpiest frock she has ever worn
Tofee with Taran :: Mutual Back patting pack of brats and babes and a karan johar
Sawaal ka sawal :: Body huggin Tshirt on a toads body SRK. Funky video
Great Indian Laughter Challenge:: from class to crass, I still await a good laugh

Code for Thought

Requirement, value for customer, usability, testability and all the other 'ilities' are debilitating. We need the hackers (not the password stealers), artists, craftsmen in our coding/programming industry.

It is good to take note of formal procedures, processes etc. but coding/programming is a human activity involving a lot of thought and creativity. One should experiment a lot. Write code for the sake of it, don't think about its usability or better write code for yourself. A nerd wanted to solve a problem of formatting text data and existing tool could not do it. The person concerned being the lazy programmer that he is, decided to over-kill the problem with a general-purpose tool that he could use in at least one other place and lo behold it is Perl made by Larry Wall.

So start making your own code, tools which solve your own problem chances are that others will also be facing similar issues. Or better write code for fun, just pure unadulterated joy. Work as the child plays in a sandbox

Sexy & Sex

I'm bringin' sexy back (Yeah) (dhinchik dhinchik and all other unspeakable sounds in Just-In Timberlake's latest song)

Don't know whether this gentleman is speaking about bringing a sexual renaissance or talking about posterior of an alpha female!

But no no no sexy has no connection what so ever with copulation not even the hint towards it.

Sax man! Saxy phone! Sexy Car! Sex Bomb! SAX!

Yeah these are some of the words I hear often and wonder what has car, phone or bomb has to do with coitus. In this age of seduction everything has to be sexy. Even your ads have to have sexual undertones to it

Dabaa ke piyo!

Choos ke khao (Parle Orange)!
In the last case if you have seen the ad then you will realize that the kid is no archetype sample for Dr. Freud's Oedipal study but he needs to suck on an innocent candy as to make a gesture of a kiss. Talking of advertisements made in a bad taste!

Aam (the common)

no no this not any of Indian Hindi movies (Bollywood smells of American fixation, foreign fetish and reactive self perception of Indian psyche) like 'Daag the fire', 'Eklavya the royal guard'. Aam in Hindustani means common, though it also means the tropical fruit - mango. I am considering the common aspect.

'XYZ toothpaste daaton ki sadan se lade aam toothpaste se 10 guna zyada' (XYZ toothpaste fights tooth decay 10 times better than common/ordinary toothpaste)

'Kisi bhi aam detergent se de behtar dhulai' (Gives a better wash than any common detergent)

Now I am no ad or media expert but this doubt still lingers. Where are these 'Aam' toothpaste, detergent, nappy, etc sold. Who buys them? 'Aam' people?

I think these 'Aam' set of products are the only non existent products which give such a tough competition! Talking of hyper reality Mr. Baudrillard are you listening!!!
Hello !

(In the quest to be different we all are same)

Valentino Diwas

Phrases like Special Day, V Day, D Day, Just another day, Love is in the air (but I only see air pollution) are all hackneyed phrases over used abused misused. Spoken over and over and over to the point where my brain marching ahead in its evolutionary path silently ignores these noises as they hardly contribute furtherance of the species and nearly nill in the process of natural selection.

Valentino Diwas is a conspiracy played out by archies, hallmark and all goody goody stuff producers. Mass produced, templatized love. Diamonds are forever well they have been here forever!