All about me, me and more me :-D
I have finally decided to book slots for GMAT and TOEFL. Actually started reading up on the tests and going through the site in my lunch break and looked for available slots in late July or early August. But that caused a mild panic to set it because no slots were available for GMAT in Bangalore for those periods except 24th July which I did not want to take. So decided to check again when I got home.
Now once I got home, I found out that I must first register on the site and registrations take upto two days to get approved. So I cannot book a GMAT slot until friday I guess :( :((
Then I went about reading up on TOEFL and it’s new scheme and decided to book a slot in it, or if like GMAT, atleast register on the site. Thankfully, there I could immediately book a slot. But, if afternoon was mild panic, the evening was “major panic”.
Why? Because I could not locate a single available slot in the months of Late June, July, August and even September, in 10-11 centers spread in 8 cities. This was for the TOEFL CBT. I then surfed back to the slot booking options and selected the TOEFL iBT. (Yeah this is conducted on a computer too, don’t ask me, I didn’t keep the name ;) ) And to my amazement and thankings, a slot was available for the 4th of August which I booked without hesitation.
Now I only need to start studying for the TOEFL ;) :D
Wish me luck :P
Update:
My account has been approved and I’ve now booked a GMAT slot for the 27th of July, but the center is in Hyderabad :(
So the temple is finally a “temple” (before all these functions, it was just a building) and all the ceremonies and functions to deem it thus are finally done with and over. I attended everyday in the evening and took half a day off today to attend the final function.
Well, I cannot honestly say I took part though because of my disinterest. But I enjoyed meeting up with friends who I had not met in over a long while. Almost 5-6 months or maybe more :( That was good fun. Plus quite a few relatives had come down especially for this so met them as well.
Now it’s done with and hopefully I can get back to my regular routine, regular schedule and get some serious studying done..
Ps. My mom has gotten me a tiny silver ring and a chain-bracelet which is supposedly “holy”. Seems I’m building up a collection of jewellery what with 3 rings and the bracelet on my left arm ;) :D
We (as in the Jain community in Bangalore) have recently constructed a new temple. Whenever a new temple is constructed, to ordain the “building” as a temple, a series of Poojas have to be performed. These take about 5-6 days and this will happen starting this weekend on the 3rd. In addition to this, there will also be some other religious preachings and cultural programs to further the knowledge of our religion.
Now, I am an atheist. I do not believe in God or the concept of God. But not having explicitly stated this to my parents who are quite religious and take active participation in the community events and occasions pulled me into the preparations for the ordaining ceremony. The entire ceremony is being managed by my uncle with a lot of other people along with my dad being delegated the smaller details. So yesterday, I was assigned something to do as well.
Though I have never told my parents outright that I am atheist, I have always shown a disinterest in it. But I have to force myself to do all this for their sake which I do not quite welcome! I plan to just grin and bear it for the next few days!
Sigh :(
The Skeletor and Hordak community on Livejornal.com has to be one of the funniest nonprofessional (not to be confused with unprofessional)comics I’ve read in quite sometime. Since Skeletor is in the public domain, anyone can create a strip on him and post it there. From the past couple of weeks I’ve been reading it, there have been 3 main story-lines proceeding in parallel. And all of them are good.
The strips consist of Skeletor and his interactions with his mentor Hordak. Since it’s got multiple authors, the stories are different in humor, quality etc. But they are all fun! :D
Dani California is the latest single from Red Hot Chilli Peppers and is also a part of their latest album, Stadium Arcadium. The music is typical RHCP but it’s the video which is very different. In this, they have, in their way, paid homage (parodied ?) to the best rock bands from the sixties.
I watched the video yesterday and was left laughing at their idea and antics. I mean, some of the bands they have represented (which I could identify) were so real looking I was amazed. Watch the video and try to identify the bands on your own before reading further. It contains the bands I identified, and am quite certain about.
And how Kavya Viswanathan got busted and got dissed (lol could not resist that ;) )
Oh well, when I’d first seen the book, just as it was released, I thought it seemed like a pretty neat book. I mean a good idea, probably well written and a good storyline. But I did not purchase it at the time since I already had like 3 books in a queue to read and decided to maybe purchase it after I’d finished those. I guess it was a good decision in hindsight. But the decision to borrow it from a cousin to read it unfortunately wasn’t.
After the plagiarism scandal broke out, I thought I might as well take a look at the book. So borrowed it from a cousin since the book was not available in any book stands due to it being pulled off the shelf because of the scandal. I’ve heard that the book, after the pull out, was selling for about 2-3 times it’s original price on EBay
Anyway, back to the book, I’ll not disclose the story of the book. But I’ll rant about what I disliked in it. Firstly, it does not really portray Indians in a very favorable picture. Now I don’t know any NRIs so I don’t really know how they live and behave. And another thing I did not like is the portrayal of the main characters.. They were, for my taste, far too artificial. The way their behavior is described, I just could not picturise them. Again, maybe US teenagers are like that, maybe they are not. I have no way of knowing that but they just did not suit my taste.
The humor is good in some places, especially the way the parents go about planning the whole charade et all. But it is not enough in my view to justify the entire book sadly :(
Reparatios:
1. The act of putting something in working order again
2. Something done or paid in expiation of a wrong
I was supposed to go for a friends wedding today. Unfortunately I had not booked my travel tickets earlier and when I tried over the weekend and today, there were just no reservations available :(
And I so wanted to go for the wedding. Well, I wish best of luck to her and hope her life turns out great :)
Thus speaketh