Free Rice

After many moons of silence, here I am again awakened - um largely because I'm waiting for an email at work without which I don't really have much to do...

I'm here to pitch a new website from many different angles. So first off, you can visit http://www.freerice.com/ to see what I'm talking about. Here's the brief version of what this site's about - it gives you a multiple choice vocabulary quiz (GMAT nightmares anyone), and for every word you guess right, the organization donates 10 grains of rice to the World Food Program. Doesn't seem like much, right? So here's a keeper for all you data driven consultant-types out there...the exponential power of the internet demonstrated in stark relief...

Free Rice started on October 7, 2007 and managed to muster only 830 grains of rice. That's about enough rice for one family for a day. The next day, this had multiplied nearly seven times to 5,670. By the end of the first week, the initial number had multiplied nearly 4,300 times to almost 3.6 million grains of rice. By the second week, the multiplier was 50,000 and the daily total was 40.5 million grains. Based on our initial assumption of 830 grains for one family for one day, the website is feeding 50,000 families daily in ONLY 2 WEEKS.

And hopefully, with blog posts like this one, and more traction in the media, this number will keep increasing exponentially. In case you don't quite understand how revolutionary the internet is as a distribution medium, imagine achieving this scale of growth with a physical office and volunteers walking around getting people to sign up.

So here's why Free Rice is a winning proposition:
It gives 5-15 minutes of fun and perks up the day of vocabulary freaks, language nerds and GMAT/GRE takers everywhere.
It generates donations to the World Food Program by using revenue from advertising
It harnesses the power of the internet to achieve scale

Enjoy!

2 Fathers

S sent this link to me with the following email. I think it’s pretty self explanatory.

 

I don’t know why, I'm usually not keen on kids singing kitsch on TV shows, but this video was just incredibly astonishing moving, and touching - I was almost in tears by the end...

What’s amazing is this isn’t from an advert or movie...this is the real thing...complete with background chorus

Terence sings about his family on some kind of European (Dutch?) show for kids

Revisionist History

So I’m on this internet discussion group that generally discusses all matters under the sun. One of the members sent in this post with pictures of the Taj Mahal and a long diatribe about how the Taj was originally a Shiv temple named Tejo Mahalaya. This argument isn’t new, and has been used repeatedly by the Hindu fundamentalist right to shore up its position that nothing good has ever come out of the Muslims being in India.

The moderator then refused to entertain any debate about that particular post because he claimed that the writer was only expressing an opinion from a ‘history point of view’ and further discussion would make it a ‘hot religious issue’.

The dubious Taj Mahal story comes from the work of a certain A.N. Oak who writes extensively on how the Taj could NOT be Muslim but gives very little in the form of hard historical evidence to prove that it was a temple. I think the issue here is not that this particular instance of revisionist history is a Hindu/Muslim thing; the larger issue is that he somehow thinks he can claim scholarly legitimacy without a single nod towards due process and exhaustive research.

And for the record, all I have to say is that 'Prof.' A.N. Oak is the founder of the Institute for Rewriting Indian History - an organization whose name says it all and which does not have any legitimacy at any University campus anywhere in India. And before you launch into a diatribe about how Indian University campuses are run by Marxists, think for a second about how India 'shines' on the very backs of graduates from these institutions.

Hindutva history's biggest firang proponent is this guy named Francois Gautier, a man who again has zero academic credentials, his only claim to fame being that he is a journalist. How that qualifies him as a historian, I will never know.

I wonder if these people would ever present their theses for scrutiny by a PhD committee or submit them for publication in a peer reviewed journal (including those journals that are politically aligned with them.). My hunch is that they'd be laughed out of the room when most of their 'research' is thrown out the window for being, how do I say this politely, shitty.

The basic truth is that historical 'facts' can be cooked up as easily as I can write this message.

So as someone who is often mocked as a pseudo secularist, I propose the creation of a new moniker. Please raise your glasses in a toast to the pseudo-academics.

Being a gay MBA

Interesting article from Business week about how financial services firms are finally waking up to the potential of queer MBAs and trying to attract them both by aggressive recruitment and by realigning their organizational structures to be more inclusive.

Read article here

ISB Retro Party

ISB Retro Party
Originally uploaded by apotia.

The GSB (Graduate Student Board) threw a big-ass party for the student body last Sunday.
Don't I look fabulous in my purple boa?!

Dunking people in the ISB swimming pool - the grand old tradition...

A Blessed Life

The following poem was taken from The Little Magazine, Vol. VI, Issue 1&2

Draw your own conclusions.

 

A blessed life

True,

I broke a commandment or two,

but I shall not plead for society’s pardon,

or God’s.

When I disobeyed

I tasted bliss.

Indeed

I count myself blessed

not for the fame

or fortune

but for those wanton hours

of pure abandon…

 

- Kamala Das

 

Debunking Myths

As I sit here listening to my peers learn in class I figure that I can start debunking some popular myths about homosexuality for the ISB community at large.

1) Gay people don’t automatically know every other gay person in the world. Just because I’m gay, don’t expect me to speculate about others’ sexuality.

2) Homosexuality cannot be acquired or learned or caught. Sexual attraction is a very complex process, and any attempt to use reductionism to simplify it is basically flawed. Some people figure out who they’re attracted to very early on in life. Others ‘experiment’ through their lifetimes. Limiting your sexual experience by labeling yourself as ‘gay’ or ‘straight’ or ‘vanilla’ is simply restricting yourself from the wonderful possibilities of lovemaking. If it seems right to go for it with a member of the same sex in a particular situation, it probably is.

Remember, your sexuality is inherent to YOU. If you think your environment, genes and peers are influencing your sexuality, you have the causality completely reversed. The only thing your environment and peers can do is to bring out inherent aspects of sexuality that are already there.

3) What the fuck is sexuality?

Sexuality is a total sensory experience, involving the whole mind and body--not just the genitals. Sexuality is about self expression. Human sexuality refers to the expression of sexual sensation and related emotional intimacy between human beings.

Most Importantly

4) Homosexuality is not contagious. This implies that just because X hangs out with gay person Y it does not mean that he is also gay. It also means that you can be my friend without significantly having to worry about your own sexual orientation being threatened. I don’t bite, and I don’t seduce unwitting straight men (I really do have better things to do with my time).

"The state has no place...

in the bedrooms of the nation"” said Pierre Trudeau once during a debate on homosexuality in the Canadian parliament.

I'’d like to modify that a little bit–

"“The ISB community has no business in the bedrooms of its quads"

What do I mean? It'’s really quite simple -– quit gossiping! The whole thing is starting to get out of hand with the speculation about people'’s sexuality and who'’s boning whom. I don't give a flying fuck whether people know I'’m gay or not anymore. In fact, if anyone cared to ask, I'’d probably reveal my entire sordid sexual history to him/her -– names of partners, locations of encounters, even positions if you cared to know.

This post isn't about me. No one really gossips about me anymore (that happened and finished in Term 1). I'm more concerned about people gossiping about other members of the ISB Community. If you think the person sitting next to you may be gay, just ask!!

But that's just me. And it'’s me because I'’ve been through a great deal of shit in my life because of my sexual orientation, and I quite simply refuse to take shit anymore. However, a lot of people still care whether or not the world at large is speculating about their sexuality.

A point to note here is that while it may be harmless gossip for a lot of people, homosexuality is still a criminal offence in this country. I know way too many families torn apart, lives driven to suicide and relationships soured because of inadvertent disclosures about someone'’s sexual orientation. So please, stop it.

Meri neend chura di

In case you’re wondering, no, I’m not in love. I’m sleepless in Hyderabad, but not in love. Maybe a little bit in lust – but not in love.

 

Sleeplessness has mostly been caused by the insane workload at this school. Well ok, partying till 5 on Saturday has contributed a teeny little bit. However, I am averaging four hours every night, and the net effect of all this lost sleep is starting to compound. This translates into sluggishness, loss in concentration, weirdly mismatched accounts, tons of unwashed laundry and inability to communicate.

 

What, me fail English? That’s unpossible…

 

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** Current Music: The droning and deeply relaxing sounds of Prof J teaching me how to optimize my decisions

Snakes, scorpions and other creatures who bite

Many have compared the ISB campus to an idyllic retreat – a place to unwind, spend a few days in relative relaxation and then move on to bigger and better things. Unfortunately that myth needs to be busted. Today I shall focus on the natural environment, later posts shall deal with the psychological environment.

Yes, the campus is undoubtedly beautiful. It is lush and the buildings harmoniously blend in with their environs. The local wildlife consists of a couple of friendly strays who hang around for favours, loads of peacocks and other bird species including a pair of nesting vultures. It also includes what you see in the picture – a nearly 6ft king cobra coiled around a window less than 50m from mine. It’s a beautiful animal when you see it up front, except it’s a cobra.

There have now been 5 confirmed snake sightings in my student village. Not to mention hundreds and hundreds of frogs, apparently when the rainy season is in full force, you cannot walk on the grass without squishing a frog or startling a snake. Then there are the scorpions that like to live in people’s loos. And every kind of creepy crawly bug you can think of. All to make this zoological garden most fascinating.

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe

Maybe you guys weren’t as much in love with the He-Man cartoons as I was in the 1980s, but I fell off my chair laughing and reminiscing when I watched these.

He-Man does Techno

He-Man and his Man-at-Arms

and of course someone can say it more eloquently than I can:

Read the full article here.

By the Power of Grayskull!!
Rediscovering the heroic cartoon beefcake of my youth.
- Sam Anderson
Excerpt:

“The best part about rewatching He-Man, after the initial nostalgia-burst, was tracking the show's hilarious accidental homo-eroticism—an aspect I missed completely as a first-grader. In the ever-growing lineup of "outed" classic superheroes, He-Man might be the easiest target of all. It's almost too easy: Prince Adam, He-Man's alter ego, is a ripped Nordic pageboy with blinding teeth and sharply waxed eyebrows who spends lazy afternoons pampering his timid pet cat; he wears lavender stretch pants, furry purple Ugg boots, and a sleeveless pink blouse that clings like saran wrap to his pecs. To become He-Man, Adam harnesses what he calls "fabulous secret powers": His clothes fall off, his voice drops a full octave, his skin turns from vanilla to nut brown, his giant sword starts gushing energy, and he adopts a name so absurdly masculine it's redundant. Next, he typically runs around seizing space-wands with glowing knobs and fabulously straddling giant rockets. He hangs out with people called Fisto and Ram Man, and they all exchange wink-wink nudge-nudge dialogue: "I'd like to hear more about this hooded seed-man of yours!" "I feel the bony finger of Skeletor!" "Your assistance is required on Snake Mountain!" Once you start thinking along these lines, it's impossible to stop. (Clearly, others have had the same idea.) It's a prime example of how easily an extreme fantasy of masculinity can circle back to become its opposite.”

My friend V first posted a link to this article on a discussion group I subscribe to.

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** Current Music: Little Plastic Castle by Ani di Franco

Sugar Baby Love

An incredibly moving little video, located here on salon.com

"...So when we saw this great new three-minute cartoon by Wilfred Brimo, set to The Rubettes' 1974 classic "Sugar Baby Love" and part of a French AIDS awareness campaign, we could only wonder: What if all safe-sex ads were this fun (and sensible, romantic and moving)?"

I really insist you check it out.

And he made another one in 2005 for non same-sex couples. That's located here. It's just as powerful.

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* Current Music: Certainly (Flipped it) by Erykah Badu

Getting Laid...

Well, V. Boy did, so props to him for that.

Party time

We seem to be doing the party thing waay too much at ISB. But then I guess that's what orientation week is for. I think the girl in the striped shirt, let's call her M, has figured out my, umm, tendencies towards men.

She keeps asking me which guys I think are hot. I'd say that's a pretty good sign that she knows, no?

So anyway, I did this drag performance at ISB talent night, and since then, all the girls have been complimenting me on my fabulous skills of observation on all the little things women do - something I translated well onto stage.

In case you're wondering, the role called for me to mime the role of a flirtatious girl who will go to any lengths to get exam answers out from the invigilator and other students. There was handkerchief dropping and all.

It's weird being a popular kid. I've never been popular before.

I hope I use my powers for good and not for evil.

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* Current Music: Eastern Awakening from Buddha Beats

It's difficult...

to make friends with new people when you've got such great ones already. Especially if the new people are straight and not-so-interesting.

A view of my 'Student Village' - a rather glorified way of saying dorm. I live in a quad, which is basically four bedrooms arranged around a living room and a kitchenette. It's superbly equipped, and very comfortable. Of course, my only frame of reference to compare is the dorms at McGill (about which the less said the better). The architecture is really brilliant - quite harmonious with the environment. I'll be posting more pictures, so watch this space. For clarity's sake, I didn't take this picture...

So here’s my first official post from the campus of the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad. In case you haven’t been following the news on this blog, I had applied for an MBA program at the ISB last January, and I got in, and the rest is history.

Being in business school seems a little counter-intuitive to what I’ve maintained about myself since my days at McGill.

Quote: “If I ever do an MBA, please come shoot me.”

This past week, I was introspecting about my motives for coming here, and I couldn’t quite look beyond all the fluff I wrote in my application essays – so I came to the unfortunate conclusion that I decided to go back to school because I had nothing better to do. And once I reconciled myself to that, suddenly, being here doesn’t seem all that bad. And then I started asking around, it seems there are many other people here who feel the same way.

The scary ones are the ones who are terribly focussed on the killer consultant/investment banking jobs post MBA. They seem to know exactly what they want, and how to go about getting it. I’m just hoping that ISB helps me get some focus. I guess I’m looking at marketing and social business as areas that I want to focus on.

 

The class strength is 428. Of this, exactly 2 are non-Indian. The rest may be foreigners, (I think the international student body is around 15%) but they’re all of Indian stock. One out of every 5 students is a woman. That’s the highest percentage of any business school in the subcontinent.

 

 

 

First party at ISB. It was raining heavily and we were soaked but really having a great time!

My count goes up

I think you, my three loyal readers, now have company. From the looks of it, I may now have SIX loyal readers. I'm so excited. I just can't hide it. I'm about to lose control, and I like it.

 

Rural Assam shows us where it's at

This article was in the Hindustan Times this morning.

'WINDS OF CHANGE - Assam village votes for lesbian rights'

WHEN 'MAINSTREAM' India burnt over Deepa Mehta's Fire, a nondescript tribal village near the IndoBhutan border in Kokrajhar East constituency displayed unusual tolerance in accepting a lesbian couple - Thingring and Roinathy Basumatary.

Half a decade later, Bodo tribal residents of Simlaguri village have made a plea that whoever wins should ensure legal status for Thingring and Roinathy. Sitting MLA Pramila Rani Brahma of the Bodoland Peoples Progressive Front (BPPF-Hagrama faction) and rival independent candidate Rabi Ram Narzary, head of the rival BPPF Rabiram faction, must have been taken by surprise at the voters' demand.

"We have gone through a lot since we fell in love with each other 15 years ago, eloping from home to get married in a temple to escape the wrath of our respective family members," said Roinathy, the 'man' of the house. "We want our MLA to ensure legal status to our marriage." Simlaguri residents have come to like the couple so much that they don't want them to run from the law. "We shall vote for a change of attitude at the political level," said Thingring.

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*Current Music: Je Joue De La Guitare by Jean Leloup

Am I chopped liver?

Seriously, I may have put on a little weight recently, and yes, I do have quite a lot of body hair, but am I chopped liver? Why am I still single? Maybe the pool of men to choose from is just extremely limited.

Actually, you know what? It's not me, it's everybody else.

Here's a random sampling of some of the messages I've gotten over the past two days (I kid you not, TWO DAYS!) on this internet gay thingy I'm on:

Specimen A:

"hi dear sanjay here im 26 5.11ht 32wst 75wght fair checkout my pro for more of me" (your pro tennis player? your pro-fit jock strap? your profit statement? your process flow? Help me out here man!)

Specimen B:

"hi....wanna BOINK???" (ummm NO!)

Specimen C:

"I Am Simply A Man With My Own Weakness, With No Effort To Change Myself, If You Accept Me, Thanks a Million.
I Got Not A Yahoo Messanger, Please Ask Not For it, And Read The Profile Before Hand (before the hand job?) So That You Sound Not Eccentric Before Me. Thank You
I'm 171cm Tall, 135Ibs And A Funny Man. (you certainly are, my friend...you certainly are)

If You Wanna To Know More About Me Please Get In Touch With Me On My MsN. And Ye' One Night Stunner I'm Allergic To You. (So if I'm stunning EVERY night, does that mean you won't need that anti-histamine?)

Gracias Senor" (I have two words. Shift Key: Off! Now! - oh and what's with the Spanish?)

Specimen D:

"hello h r u can we just frndsss" (I would, if I knew what the FUCK you were saying)

And the pièce de resistance - Specimen E:

"hi ..this is abhi.. nice meeting u.. (we haven't met you freak!)
mayiknow ur good name? (no you may not)
im 23 old..working for MNC..(ooh, I'm impressed - I can almost see him in the Roop Amrit infomercial. "Roop Amrit made me fair, and now I am gotting job in MNC")
i m, 5.9/very fair/cute looking...(yeah, let's not be the judge of that)
would appreciateur interest if u would give ur interests n preferences...
any number to reach u dear//
which part of the city u stay in?
abhi"

I can keep going ALL night with these, somebody stop me! Thanks to http://therewasthisman.blogspot.com for the inspiration... (V. Boy, you know who you are)

So if you think you're capable of coherence beyond these messages, and would like to date me, then you know where to find me.

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* Current Music: Sampooran by Mekal Hassan Band

Aaah, the moral police...so reassuring

I use the word moral police literally. Mumbai fashion week was last week, and there were a couple of rather unfortunate wardrobe malfunctions involving items of clothing falling off and/or ripping to reveal the undernourished tits and ass below the crappily manufactured clothing.

Bombay's finest smelled a conspiracy to poison our youth and make them think lascivious thoughts. Just for a second ignore the facts that:

a) most people at the fashion show were either buyers, high-profile gay men or already quite sexually permissive - either way, a 3 second glimpse of Carol Gracias' boobs makes no difference to them.

b) most young people in India are far more sexually sophisticated than the narrow-minded moral freaks are willing to admit.

However, what best encapsulates how ridiculous the whole scenario is, is a story on the front page of this morning's Hindustan Times.

No Peep Show: Fashion police to screen shows

...the city police have decided to give licences for such events only if the organizers meet a host of conditions.

The aim: to avoid a repeat of the peep show that left the city's self-appointed moralists seething. "The clothes should remain firmly on, they shouldn't fall off," {say what?!} said the Deputy Commissioner of Police.

It gets more Orwellian

...The DCP said instructions were also given asking the organizers to ensure that "things that are not allowed should not happen."

An image of the now infamous wardrobe malfunction (I SO hate that hackneyed phrase) at the recently concluded Lakme Fashion Week in Bombay.

High Society Ladies sunning themselves on a bench in Montreal!

Umm, what happened to Ali?

In case you (yes, you, my three loyal readers) haven't noticed yet, if you look near the picture of Spongebob on the right, you will notice that my name has been replaced by the word 'Fanaa.'

"Who be this fanaa? And what happened to the Ali we all love and know?"

Fanaa is a Persian/Urdu word that is commonly used in Sufi poetry. I love the sound of the word, and what it stands for.

faná': annihilation; passing away. The way-station in which the changing spiritual and psychological states of the voyagers disappear and their abiding stations come to naught, until that which has never existed (illusion) perishes, and that which has always been abides and remains. It does not mean the nullification of the conscience of the human, or the obliteration of the essence itself, nor the effacement of the Sufi's attributes. Nor does it mean that all things become one thing so that obedience becomes like disobedience, or what Allah commands becomes like what He forbids. Disobedience passes away and obedience abides.

In a nutshell, fanaa is the verb used to describe the end of illusion and the journey into the true. It is also my general internet name on various websites.

"Ok, we get it, you freak! But why call yourself that on your blog?"

Two rather creepy things happened to me last week. These got me thinking about my online identity in general.

First, I received a random e-mail from someone I once met in the frozen food aisle at Trader Joe's in Boston. I had given him my name, and he was resourceful (some may say stalker) enough to google me and to find me and my email address. This is something I have no control over, I am on google, and people will always be able to find me if they look hard enough. What I hope to do is minimize how easy it is.

Second, (and this one is creepiest) After four years of complete silence and relative obscurity from the credit bureau type people in Canada, I received a MasterCard statement for a card I had up to 2001 in Montreal - a card I never cancelled. How the fuck did they find my address in Bombay? HOW?
The upshot is that I don't actually owe them money - I have a credit of 24 cents on the card. Phew! However, it's the principle of the thing that is SO scary and bizarre.

Existential question of the day:
Unless he changes his identity, is it possible for someone who has lived in the Developed World to really, truly disappear?

Fabulous Response

On Wednesday, March 1, 2006, in Annapolis, Maryland at a hearing on the proposed constitutional Amendment to prohibit gay marriage, Jamie Raskin, professor of law at American University, was requested to testify.

At the end of his testimony, Republican Senator Nancy Jacobs said: "Mr. Raskin, my Bible says marriage is only between a man and a woman. What do you have to say about that?"

Raskin replied: "Senator, when you took your oath of office, you placed your hand on the Bible and swore to uphold the Constitution. You did not place your hand on the Constitution and swear to uphold the Bible."

The room erupted into applause.

Vashi Boy

So apparently Vashi Boy doesn't like his moniker on my blog. What shall we call him? He'd much rather prefer not using his location (downmarket, that it is) to qualify him.


I'm taking suggestions...

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* Current Music: Last Kiss by Pearl Jam

Isn't it fascinating how a building that was considered an eyesore and the worst travesty against good taste can now be one of the glorious shining examples of modern architecture.

Brokeback Tears

Have you ever seen someone cry? There are basically two types of non-melodramatic crying. The first is the pretty cry. This consists of dignified sobs, maybe a lace hanky reaching up to gingerly wipe a tear away, and a little muffled sniffling. The second is the ugly cry. This is the one with the dry heaving, the snot running, tears streaking down face, runny mascara producing halloween eyes and strange noises from the throat.

All I have to say is that this is only the second movie in my entire adult life that has got me to the ugly cry.

(Vashi Boy, in case you're wondering, Regal was the pretty cry)

P.S. The first time was during Romeo & Juliet with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. And I only did the ugly cry when the gloriously camp Mercutio died, not at the end, and only because I felt he could have loved Romeo more than that usurper/harpy Juliet. I was also 18.

Brokeback Mountain

Saw it on the big screen finally. Had seen it before (clearly, you know I can't wait for these things) when I downloaded a DVD rip of it.

I love the film. And like someone said, "do you remember A Beautiful Mind or Shakespeare in Love the way you'll remember Brokeback five years from now?"

So what if Crash won Best Picture. It probably deserved it looking solely at the filmaking merits and the general politics of Hollywood - but Brokeback will linger, the way the film's haunting score stays with you.

Now, about my reactions to the film:

I had read Annie Proulx's short story a couple of times last year, first when I heard it was being adapted for the screen and the second time when the movie opened to huge critical acclaim. It's a beautiful story - very subtle and graphic at the same time. What the film adaptation does very well is to fill in the broad contours of the story without mucking with it. It colours within the lines so to speak. This is unlike another recent film also adapted from a short story, India's entry at the Academy Awards, which took a lovely story and added entire sub-plots and wholly irrelevant characters and unduly lengthened what could have been a tightly edited, colourful two-hour movie.

The sex scenes are there, pretty much as Proulx describes them - they haven't been made more explicit, and I didn't feel like the filmmakers self-censored too much.

Can I just say, those two boys are HOT! Break me off a piece of that!

Also, the two main women in the movie are brilliant, both having been recent teen queens (one's from Dawson's Creek, the other from the Disney factory) who have clearly grown up. Britney Spears at 25 should learn some lessons from them.

For those of you who haven't read the story, or are blinkered enough to not have seen the film, I'm not going to give away anything about the plot except for saying it's a tragic love story. You know the drill, boy meets boy, society doesn't sanction boy on boy action, and stories are woven as a result.

The setting of the movie is such a visual treat, alternating between the Rocky Mountains and the Great Plains. The cameraman has little more to do than point the camera at the scenery and he's a shoo-in for best cinematography. The film is very languid, the camera lingers, sequences get dreamy, even the characters' accents seem more drawn out. The net result is an almost complete lack of pitched drama, which is wonderful. Lee spends a lot of time establishing the mood of a scene before getting to the action, much like how Proulx has written the story.

How did I feel? - I LOVED the movie. Halfway through, I sort of decided that it was dragging a bit and it wasn't all that great. Then it got to the end...

I'm Brown

eeew

 

Did another quiz, and it told me my true colour was Brown.

 

eeew

 

Brown

You're brown, a credible, stable color that's reminiscent of fine wood, rich leather, and wistful melancholy. Most likely, you're a logical, practical person ruled more by your head than your heart. With your inquisitive mind and insatiable curiosity, you're probably a great problem solver. And you always gather all of the facts before coming to a timely, informed decision. Easily intrigued, you're constantly finding new ways to challenge your mind, whether it's by reading the newspaper, playing a trivia game, or composing a piece of music. Brown is an impartial, neutral color, which means you tend to see the difference between fact and opinion easily and are open to many points of view. Trustworthy and steady, you really are a brown at heart.

 

My personality - apparently!

I'm a sucker for Cosmo quizzes, so when my sister forwarded me this link, I just HAD to do this brilliant online personality test at www.personaldna.com

Evidently I'm a 'Benevolent Leader'

If you, my three readers, end up taking the test, then why not post your results as a comment to this post.

Below is my unique personality colour mosaic - If you mouse over each colour, then you'll see the results of my personality.

For example, the magenta swatch says that I have Very High Empathy, the dark blue swatch says that I have Average Masculinity...

go figure out that one for yourselves.

Benevolent Leader

If you want to read my full results i.e. what makes me a Benevolent Leader - they're quite accurate!
Click here

And if you think you know me and want to answer questions to give me an external, unbiased assessment of my personality, then click here to assess me.

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*Current Music: Freddie Freeloader by Miles Davis

India Rising?

Fareed Zakaria writing in Newsweek. One of the more balanced and nuanced pieces about modern India that I've read in a while. Some of the things he says are problematic, but overall, quite well written.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11571348/site/newsweek/