E : Entertain / Engage / Enrich during Lockdown #AtoZChallenge2020

In current times, it is very natural for us to feel anxious or scared. It is easy to get into a dark zone when things are so gloomy. In fact on the third night after this lockdown was executed, I was so anxious that I couldn't sleep that night. My mind was largely blank, but I couldn't sleep. I have had this feeling before - the anxiety, the palpitations. Classic symptoms of that youthful love, when she had gone away from your life. When you feel, that your world is going to end. Only this time, it feels more tangible and more real. 

After that night, my mind eased a bit. It is not that I feel things have improved outside. But one has to make peace with this new normal. In today's post I am going to talk about three E's that have kept me in good spirits since that night, despite reading about doomsday scenarios daily. Hope some of these things help you too. 

E : Entertain

Do something daily to keep yourself entertained. I have been avoiding dark films or web series that I normally like a lot. Music is something which always lifts my spirits. Especially Punjabi songs. So I watch all peppy songs of Diljit Dosanjh, Sunanda Sharma, Ammy Virk and Sharry Mann, on repeat mode, for some time daily. And their music videos are fun too. But my current favorite is this song by Bilal Saeed and Momina Mustehsan titled Baari (Window). The lyrics are beautiful, almost profound. And their silken voices so soothing. The video is very earthy too, that reminds me of my home town. Watch the video below. The song actually kicks in after a minute or so in the video. Do write in comments to tell me what are you doing to keep yourself entertained. 

E : Engage

Work from Home can be stressful for a person like me who can't switch off easily. At the same time for others it could be a temptation to do away with their disciplined routines. Both problems have to be dealt through engagement. Ensure you meaningfully engage with your work and your colleagues even in these times. So keep your working hours as if you are in office. Also replicate water cooler breaks you take in office. Every day I do a non-work related call with one of my colleagues. It helps me feel sane. Also engage with your friends / family more than usual. I am video calling my parents more times than earlier. They make me feel, as if everything is normal. 

I also took up this blogging challenge, so that in my free time, I am more worried about putting the daily post up, than worrying about the uncontrollable things. I would love to know your methods to keep yourself engaged. Tell me in the comments section. 

E : Enrich

Enrich your body! Enrich your soul! One should follow this maxim even in usual times. But in these times I feel it is even more important. But don't stress if you are not learning a new skill, or doing meditation. If something stresses you, then most probably it will not enrich you.  Ensure you eat healthy food and walk / exercise if possible. I am walking frequently for some time on my building's roof top. I also continue to read as usual for about 30 minutes a day. My current read is Jaya - An Illustrated Retelling of The Mahabharata by Devdutt Pattanaik. It is a good time to read about mythology. About Karma. About miracles. It is not a taxing read and at the same time it is not fluff. 

I wish everyone good times ahead. Entertaining, Engaging and Enriching times too. 

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My theme for this year's #AtoZchallenge is Lock-down Blues. I intend to write and talk about how I deal with it, what it inspires me to read or watch or any aspect of it which fascinates me. You can read the theme reveal post here. 

Previous Challenges : Letter E

2017: Engineering

2018: Education Kills

2019: End Credits in Hindi Films / Bollywood

E : End Credits in Hindi Films / Bollywood #AtoZChallenge 2019

It seems Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has got it right. They treat their End Credits with a lot of respect. Though they don't know that in Indian cinema halls, lights come on before the End Credits start rolling and almost everyone in the audience stands up blocking my view. I don't budge though. I am Iron Man that way! I sit through the MCU films'  End Credits doing 3 things:

• Watch the Mid-Credits scene, despite the bright lights almost spoiling it
• Watch the Post-Credits scene, though it is almost, always underwhelming
• Note how many Indians have contributed to the making of the film (I am patriotic, nationalist and Iron Man that way)

Uri : The Surgical Strike a recent Bollywood blockbuster, had a Post-Credits scene too. I have a habit of sitting through End Credits - MCU or no MCU.  I think the scene was funny and unnecessary but still a great addition. You can watch that scene below. But let me remind you, this is not the norm in Hindi / Bollywood films. 

Hindi films these days have two kinds of End Credits. And both are pretty unimaginative and cliched. 

In the first kind, they show bloopers or making of the film as the End Credits roll by. And I have seen several bad films to reach a conclusion, that these bloopers are most entertaining part of the film. Some films are so bad, that I don't know whether I enjoy those End Credits more because the film has ended or because the making / bloopers are interesting. A case in hand is Housefull 2. I found the End Credits funnier than the entire movie, especially the beauty - beti (daughter) sequence, enacted by Ranjeet.  Watch the video from 1:18 minutes onward.

The second kind and more popular, and thus more hackneyed way End Credits in Hindi Films roll by is that they accompany a ridiculously popular song and dance routine. A song and dance routine which mostly will have nothing to do with the plot, grammar and tonality of the film. Sometimes the actors in these songs are not even in the movie. A recent hit film Luka Chuppi, had in fact two songs (not the usual one) during the End Credits. 

Karan Johar, produced a horror film called Kaal, that released in 2005. He claims in his autobiography, An Unsuitable Boy, that when he saw Kaal, before its release, he didn't feel scared at all, despite it being a horror film. This horrified him. So he shot two music videos and put one in the titles and one in the End Credits. Those songs were super-hit and brought in the unsuspecting audiences to the theaters. That helped him recover the money he had put in the film. End Credits saving a producer! What more can be expected from these humble End Credits?

There are times when I miss the most common way the films used to end earlier. Credits were usually shown in a 2-3 minutes montage at the start of the film. And after the last scene of the film, simply, a frame will appear with "THE END" written on it. 

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My theme for this year's #AtoZchallenge is Hindi Film Industry / Bollywood cliches. You can read the theme reveal post here.

2017 Challenge Post from Letter E: Engineering - It was a post about fun times we had during the engineering days. Click here to read.

2018 Challenge Post from Letter E: Education Kills - It was a post about ills of our education system and how to change that. Click here to read. 

E : Education Kills... #AtoZchallenge

The brouhaha over recent exam paper leaks, yet again, brought to fore the rot in our education system. But as usual, the discussion is about controls and systems to not let such leaks happen in future. No one really discusses the overhaul this obsolete education / school system requires. 

"What are the things that education kills?"

When I posed this question to some of my colleagues today, they responded with the following answers: 

* Creativity

* Individuality

* Innocence

While I totally agree with the first two, the third one was surprising. I think, killing of innocence (if this phenomenon really exists) must be an output of growing up rather than the education system. But is that all? A country which always puts conformance on a pedestal and the world which increasingly is moving away from appreciating differences (of opinions, color, race etc.) of any kind, isn't it expected that creativity and individuality will suffer?

I believe educations kills Creativity, Individuality and few more things. It kills:

1. Curiosity - Our education system is designed to answer standard questions, not to ask new ones. (Why apples fall from the tree, wondered Newton)

2. Passion - Our education system is designed to feed the job market and thus kills passion for anything apart from conventional. (Anything apart from science, maths and literature, is still called extra curricular activity in schools)

3. Creativity - Yes, our schools kill creativity too. The focus is on the right answers, and the speed at which you give those right answers and not on the right approach. (Do teachers encourage students to think about problems or do they ask them to find answers from a text book written decades ago?)

4. Individuality - Education kills the spirit of the child by killing his / her individuality. Known by their roll numbers and standardized by their uniforms, they all are expected to behave the same. (When everyone scores above 90% and still don't get admissions in colleges, what are they supposed to do?)

5. Learning - That is the biggest sin our formal education is committing today. Killing the very reason for which the schools exist - Learning. Yes, kids learn things that are prescribed, but the system kills the fun in learning. So they learn only for exams and that too near exam dates. So learning gets associated with stress. (When was the last time you picked a book on your favorite subject and read it just for pleasure?)

It is high time, we do the following things right:

1. Invest in good teachers. Ensure teaching becomes a high paying profession. I have seen too many teachers, who actually are not that great in their subjects.

2. Teachers shouldn't only be qualified and well paid, but they also must be evaluated for their sense of duty towards building a better future for the country. There are too many teachers, who are knowledgeable but are not good teachers.

3. Schools should promote diversity of all kinds, including diversity of ideas. The pedagogy should include lot of debates and discussions on varied subjects. Instead of asking students to solve 10 math problems for homework, wouldn't it be great if they are asked to manage the expenses of a class trip?

4. Travel as a tool for education should be encouraged. Nothing opens a child's mind more than getting out of school.

5. Scoring mechanisms need an overhaul. Instead of scoring on subjects, can their be scores on cognitive, emotional and technical skills?

I am sure given the state of affairs, some of the ideas given above, sound far fetched. So can we have a larger group, doing something about this issue seriously?

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it - Aristotle

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My last year's challenge post from letter E was about life experiences during my Engineering. Read it here.

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My theme for this year's #AtoZchallenge is all about writing stories, anecdotes and observations from my life in form of easy to read listicles. You can read the theme reveal post here.

E : Engineering

Engineering - the word, the sound of it and its construction will conjure different images in minds of different people. But I am no hi-fi engineer, like a computer engineer. I am not even a mechanical engineer. I am a humble agricultural engineer, proverbial Son of the Soil. I bet many of you wouldn't even know such a field of engineering even exists. But here I am talking about it. 

Before I write further let me get few things out of the way:

1. This post is not about Agricultural Engineering or for that matter any field of engineering. The post is all about the four years of my engineering and what I did apart from academic learning in it. So I will be narrating some of the anecdotes which you may or may not identify with.

2. I have met several engineers (who have done engineering from Indian colleges) over the years and irrespective of what college they come from or what branch of engineering they have done, all engineers seem to have similar life lessons revolving around similar subjects like alcohol, hostels, tech fests, fights among different groups and of course Girls. Girls, also because in a typical engineering batch of 100, there will be 2 girls only. This paucity of the females is more acute in mechanical and agricultural branches of engineering. The computer geeks have it good here as well.

3. I was the gold medalist of my batch, with highest OCPA ever till then. (I completed my engineering from College of Agricultural Engineering, Punjab Agricultural University.) In fact the second best in our batch was 10 percent points behind. Yes, academically, I was good. But mind it, I was no nerd. I was part of the coolest gang of my batch and we had loads of fun in those 4 years. But all that doesn't stop my batch mates from calling me one. They have always pulled my leg for being a topper, but in a good, fun way.

4. They say you keep learning throughout your life. True, but 90% of your life lessons, you learn in Engineering. If you are an engineer, you can survive anything. Any disaster. Physical, Mental or Emotional. You can manage with no resources and no girls ;-). You are no less than that resilient cockroach hidden under your bed / desk right now. Don't bother looking for it, as you can't do much. So read on.

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So this post can be endless. There are so many incidents I can recall. So I will limit myself to some funny anecdotes I can remember right away. You will get the drift. May be I will come back to this subject some time again. May be in next year's A-Z Blogging challenge and add more such anecdotes to it.

Anecdotes below are not narrated in chronological order. Just in the order I remember.

1. I was very good in all the subjects. I have opened and assembled hundreds of tractors during my engineering and during my on job training at my first job. I was default topper in all subjects. But there was this one thing which I couldn't do. And that was driving a tractor in reverse in straight line. So when the tractor driving exam happened, I drove the tractor in reverse, but the line was not straight. It was not a line. When I was asked to back it up to hitch a disc plough on its hydraulics, I reversed it and straddled the disc plough with the tractor on concrete. I was the target of all jokes that day. Tractor driving is the only exam I have ever flunked in life. Life Lesson here is that Every Superman has his own Kryptonite.

2. Some of us engineers were part of Youth Parliament wherein students from all six colleges of the university used to come together to present in a contest at the end of the year. And the grand prize was visit to actual parliament in New Delhi and meeting a sitting MP as well. Well most of us engineers didn't join the forum for any grand reason. Our sole motive was to use this platform to interact with girls of other colleges. And sometimes dreams used to come true. I made some of my best friends there. I met one girl there who remained my girl friend for a long period. But I am digressing. So we won that year and we all went to Delhi. We were made to stay at IIT - Delhi. We were amazed at the campus. This was a destination, all of us had failed to reach and so we ended up doing engineering from lesser colleges. But if you ask me today, I think COAE, PAU suited me well. In hindsight, I will not change a thing. And, I am digressing again.

So the engineers decided to go out binge drinking that night on streets of Delhi. We went to a wine shop and around 6 of us finished one bottle in about 5 minutes, outside the shop. Then we sat in a dark garden hiding from everybody and finished another bottle using paper cups. We didn't have money to go to costlier places. We didn't have money to buy snacks. We had never gone to a five star hotel before. So after we got drunk, we hailed a cab and asked the driver to take us to a five star hotel. We went inside and peed. Then we went to another five star hotel and used its washroom. We were mighty impressed with the cleanliness. You need to visit our hostel toilets to know what I mean. So that night we got a kick by peeing in five star hotels. Today, it is common for us to stay in one every time we travel. Life Lesson here is that money doesn't buy you most memorable experiences.

3. Once our gang went to Mcleodgunj and Dharamshala for a trip. We didn't see much what tourists generally would, because we were busy drinking. A lot happened in those three days. But one thing which I clearly recall is that, after binge drinking for three days, when we returned to our base, the hostel, we had some money left. Everyone was hungry and due to vacations hostel mess was closed. So the question in front of us was whether to buy food with that spare money or drink more. Naturally we decided to buy another bottle of liquor. Life Lesson here is that food is nutrition for body, liquor is nutrition for deep friendships and soul.

As I mentioned above, I can narrate several such incidents. I think by taking theme for this challenge as anecdotes from life, I have opened a Pandora's box. How can this post be complete without talking about our experiences with our respective girl friends, or those college strikes, or those violent fights or that memorable educational trip (It was educational but not in the way intended by our professors) to Mumbai, Goa and Bangalore or those several other alcohol induced disasters etc. But that requires time, which we had a lot of during engineering. Now you can just remember those days, only as much as time permits.