rantlust

Posted by tafkap on August 23rd 2009 in India, Mythology, Religion
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Dear Radha,

You couldn’t possibly remember me.
I was four and your brother’s best friend.
Four is too young to have a crush on your friend’s didi, isn’t it?

You were beautiful.
You had to be.
You had sweet multicolored saunf to offer me - every time I knocked on your door.
The saunf could not have been sweeter than the palms that held them.
How come your bangles always matched the colors of the saunf?
Those bangles couldn’t have been more delicate than the wrists that wore them.

I hope you found the man of your dreams.
I pray that your children are as beautiful as you were.
I wish you all the happiness that you gave me and more.

But dear Radha, sometimes I can’t help but wonder.
Are you sad? Now?
If the waves ever carry this message in a bottle to you …
I hope you never forget that you are Radha, beloved of the Lord Krishna.
And that this four year old still thinks that you must be
The most beautiful girl in the world.

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Posted by tafkap on April 17th 2009 in Art, Computers, Games, web2.0
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Our most controversial post.

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Posted by tafkap on December 12th 2008 in Language
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Dear rantlust, polyglot that you are:

Heard on A way with words. Supposedly, people in New Orleans say ‘Get down from the car’ as opposed to ‘Get out of the car’; the former being a ‘calque’ from French. I can see why using ‘down’ in this context can be amusing to a native English speaker, but that was not my initial reaction. That is perhaps because in Malayalam too, you would say ‘Get down from the car’.

I think it’s the same in Hindi. Gaadi se neeche utheriye, though is it correct to drop the neeche (down) altogether?

How about other languages, rantlust?

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Posted by tafkap on July 25th 2008 in Entertainment, Science
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Followed this link to an article by Richard Muller on Popular Mechanics.

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Posted by tafkap on February 04th 2008 in Sports
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In the NFL, there are only two possible outcomes when you win the first 18 contests of the year. You win the last game, finish with a perfect season as champions, repeating a feat that has been accomplished only once in the history of the NFL (though the season was 17 games long then). 19-0.

Or you lose the last game, with a record of 18-1 and go home, wondering about that 1 game that got away. It sure feels better to end the season 0-16.

What does an 18-1 season sound like, you ask? Quiet as a pin drop. My otherwise garrulous 7 year old whose entire footballing memory consists of ‘and the Patriots win again’ was speechless for the first time I can remember. I hear the clackety clack of the keyboard from the next room (no I tell myself, the office isn’t any quieter today), and I swear I hear the distant roar of laughter from not so distant New York and perhaps the rest of the country.

Life goes on. It’s just a game. There’s always next year. 18-1 must be better than 0-16.

But, why does it hurt so?

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Posted by tafkap on January 31st 2008 in Economics, Society
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Nice article on ‘repugnance constraint’ markets - how moral repugnance may constrain a free market and if/what should be done about it. Very interesting to me was the reference to a paper [pdf] that I tracked down. It estimates the price at which the kidney wait backlog would be eliminated if live donors were allowed to be paid (see pages 11, 12). This is for the US, and the value they come up with is $15,200 per donor. Among other things, they take into account the value of a ’statitistical life’ ($1.5 million to $10 million for an average annual income of $35000), lost wages pre/post operation, risk of death, etc.

They did not have a good way to quantify loss of quality of life (they added an arbitrary $7,500), and they did not as far as I could see, take into account the ‘repugnance factor’ of paying for an organ. Not much comfort I’m sure for all those people who are waiting for a transplant.

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Posted by tafkap on October 24th 2007 in Environment, Nature, Photography, Science
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A view from space (courtesy NASA)

For the image (and others) in hi-def see here

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Posted by tafkap on September 05th 2007 in Society
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If Venezuelan officials have their way, children will no longer have to endure their parent’s idea of what makes a good name. In the case of Venezuela, the names that we bid adieu to would be the likes of Hengelberth, Maolenin, Kerbert Krishnamerk, Githanjaly, Yornaichel, Nixon and Yurbiladyberth. Except for a “list of 100 names established by the government, with exemptions for Indians and foreigners,” all other names would be out of bounds. The goal would be to

preserve the equilibrium and integral development of the child” by preventing parents from giving newborns names that expose them to ridicule or are “extravagant or hard to pronounce in the official language,

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