Good Ones

It just so happened that I came across the following and considered it worth a share.

First: (an excerpt from WSJ’s news on Buffett’s USD 5 bn injection in Goldman)

Mr. Buffett received a call at 4:30 p.m. that Saturday from a private investment firm trying to assemble a group to buy the embattled financial giant. “I’m calling about Bear Stearns,'” the private investor began, according to Mr. Buffett. “Should I go on?'”

Mr. Buffett recalls thinking: “It’s like a woman taking off half her clothes and asking, ‘Should I continue?’ Even if you’re a 90-year-old eunuch, you let ’em finish.” Mr. Buffett says he passed on the proposed deal. Bear Stearns was bought by J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. the following day.

Second: (an excerpt from Bloomberg’s report on Buffett’s interview on CNBC)

“It’s nice to have a lot of money, but you know, you don’t want to keep it around forever,” Buffett said. “I prefer buying things. Otherwise, it’s a little like saving sex for your old age.”

Third: (Typical Sardarji joke)

“Hitler says, There is no word like IMPOSSIBLE in my dictionary” Sardar says:Ab bolne se kiya fayidah? “Jub kharidi thi tab hi check karna tha na”

Justice finally

Six of the 11 accused in the Khairlanji killings case have been given death sentence and two have been sentenced to life imprisonment sentence by a court in Bhandara on Wednesday. Source

It did take time for the justice to be delivered but indeed a job done. The gruesome incident is probably only one of the many such that take place on a daily basis in the casteist society of India. To one extreme, casteism kills people and to other it wins votes for our so-called leaders. And a large part of the so-called “educated” section of our society is even opposed to marriages between castes. Why does “Inter-caste marriage” need to be a label? Surprisingly, we try to discover aliens when there are so many around us.

One of the greatest ills of the Indian society (and even Mahatma Gandhi said that) is the Caste system that resulted in a completely oppressive system designed to keep a few sections of society in political and economic power at the cost of majority of the people. In the name of Hinduism and a large number of conversions, historically or even now, whether to Islam or Christianity, can be traced to people trying to escape the oppression under this system.

I wonder if its a sadistic pleasure but I am happy at the court’s verdict. Not that it is going to bring back the dead victims but if we live in a society of humans then justice needs to prevail.

Welcome to Sajjanpur

I am a fan of Shyam Benegal movies and there is always an endeavor to watch his directorial pieces. Most of us know him for his movies from the parallel cinema movement like Ankur, Nishant, Manthan and Bhumika. Other memorable ones are Zubeida, Suraj ka Satvan Ghoda, The making of Mahatma and Bose, the forgotten hero.

One can now add an altogether different kind of movie to this list of beautiful movies, Welcome to Sajjanpur. I do not intend to debate if this recent release is better or not than his previous ones. But it certainly is different going by his taste of cinema.

Welcome to Sajjanpur is a delightful satirical take on a contemporary Indian village. The protagonist, Mahadev, played wonderfully by Shreyas Talpade, is the only literate man in the village. He is popular amongst the folks for his ability of writing letters, dil se. This sets our meeting with other characters of the movie who visit his tree-shed dukaan (yes he has a rate card too) to get their letters read and written. I personally enjoyed performances by Ila Arun (as the orthodox lady who is hell bent to get her daugther married to a dog, that too born on a Saturday), Yashpal Sharma (the goon), the person who plays Munnibai (an eunuch who fights and eventually wins the panchayat elections) and Amrita Rao (as Kamla). Quite an experience to see a Bollywood actress in Saree, that too with a Ghunghat 🙂 Ravi Kissen was enjoyable too. In fact, this can be considered as Shreyas’ best performance so far. He is a fantastic actor. The movie is a bit slow in parts with probably a few unnecessary songs. In fact, I would not even consider music as a high point of the movie. 

Overall, its a big change from the usual more urbane kind of movies we have been seeing recently. Definitely worth a watch. An entertaining commercial flick from Benegal finally!!!

Amazing world, amazing people

Sheikh Muhammad Munajid claims that Mickey Mouse is “one of Satan’s soldiers” and makes everything he touches impure. The sheikh said that under Sharia, both household mice and their cartoon counterparts must be killed. The cleric has held off on condemning other Disney characters until he can figure out, “What the hell is Goofy?” (Source)

I thought Mickey Mouse was Ganesha’s best friend 😛

May be the current financial turmoil is because of Batman, no no, it must be Spiderman, because the markets remain shut during the night.

Now one knows how vela are these religious clerics.

Yet another extraordinary event

The yield on 3-month U.S. Treasury bills fell to 0.02 percent early afternoon New York trade on Wednesday amid investors’ panicked scramble into the safe haven of ultra short-dated government securities.

The 3-month U.S. Treasury bill yield last traded at 0.02 percent as an actual trade and had traded negative earlier yesterday. Its so bad that the common man does not want to keep his/her money with the banks. A negative yield would mean paying someone to keep your money safe. People are just panicking and they just want their principal. They are willing to deposit stuff only with the govt.

Credit has frozen. Morgan and Goldman on the verge of extinction? 

For India too things look not so good. Capital is flowing out of the country. RBI is finding it difficult to manage the Rupee. 

Its unbelievable how things have changed in the last few months. From India Rising to India Confused!

Risk

My definition of RISK: Reckless Investing Sans Knowledge!

We used to play “chidiya ud”, “tota ud”, “bhains ud”………

Now we will play, “lehman furrr”, “bear stearns furrr”, “merill furrr”, ……..

Extraordinary times ahead!

The hope

More than 20 people have been killed in the Delhi bomb blasts. A chance of anything like this happening anyday anywhere can’t be completely avoided. It has now become a part of our lives. I dont think the police and the Intelligence have been idling. Many would brand it a failure on their part to prevent what happened this weekend in Delhi. The good part was that 3 bombs were defused even in Delhi, several in Gujarat. Some lives were saved indeed. I congratulate the police for it. You may not like it but its good to be paranoid.

You are delusioned, thinking you are fighting for His will

leaving any mercy for your brothers, you are out there to kill

The games never end this way dear, left only would be anger and fear

The plans for the next one are brewing in your mind,

Do not you know that an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind

Yet many would survive, many would live

The walls you’ve build will be broken, your faith will be shaken

hope will reign, peace shall prevail, 

Yes with each blast you make me pause and think

Deep inside, I know He will not approve of your bloody binge

Forget the past the past has gone, But where there’s life hope springs eternal 

And hope helps us to keep going on  

–Sudhanshoo Maroo

Avoid Credit Cards

I have had a really bad experience with credit cards. It might be difficult to narrate it here owing to certain confidentiality issues, however, my only advice to everyone around is to avoid the use of credit cards. Most of the transactions (even purchasing airline tickets) can be done using your normal i-Banking or debit card anyways.  Interest rates are very high on credit cards and with the recent RBI hikes, even the credit period has been shortened by the banks. Sometimes the rates are 40 percent. Sometimes they are 45 percent. If I borrowed money at 40 or 45 percent, I’d be broke. On top of that, they levy various surcharges, penalty fee, etc if you miss a payment. One might argue paying in time is a good option. I had been doing that. I never delayed a single payment. Doesnt really help. The difference between buying something with cash and using a credit card is like day and night.

To quote the Guru Warren Buffett: “I need to learn not to spread my legs beyond the reach of the blanket. We are conditioned to spend money before we earn it. We are sold on the fake happiness of “Buy now, pay later dearly” – It’s nothing more than buying possessions that we cannot afford. I have my share of insanity when it comes to mindless spending, but lately I try to pay for most of my purchases with cash. It creates awareness towards the impulse buy when I pay by cash. I have also started red lining items on the credit card statement that I consider useless spending. All of these efforts have built my awareness towards my impulse purchases. I have been using mantra of – “less is more” to simplify every aspect of my life. It’s a work in progress but the results are astounding.”

Last but not the least, there are fraudsters out there who are looking for every opportunity for you to fall prey to them. Never agree to purchase a credit card if someone calls you on phone (saying he/she is from XYZ Bank) and agrees to send someone to fill up the forms. There is a good chance that they are not related to any of the banks. Even if they are, its good to be on the safer side. NEVER share your credit card details with anyone. To avoid doing all these NEVERs, avoid the use of credit card.

Things to say during sex

This is called creativity. Definitely the work of a geek. The image is too big to be displayed here. Source

Lustful behavior

An excerpt from my chat with a dear friend:

sudhanshoo: dead or alive?

are the bacteria causing cold and cough dead or alive?

Friend: my WBCs have already won the battle dude

sudhanshoo: sahi

Friend: tum batao

sudhanshoo: your WBCs are lustful

they rape all the bacteria

Friend: yeah.

sudhanshoo: aakhir tumhara hi khoon hai 😛 

Friend: and their post – rape stuff is coming out of my nose

sudhanshoo: ha ha ha

No prize for guessing who the “friend” is 😀