(Re-) Kindle The Passion!

Kindle Paperwhite is a wonderful invention by Amazon. It has the potential to change the lives of reading enthusiasts all over the world. Of course, at present I mean to say that this potential could be something wonderful. 

I live at a place where English books are hard to come by, or, are quite expensive, even if bought on the internet. I could not even imagine procuring books in Bengali, my mother tongue, had it not been for Kindle, unless someone sends it over by international post. Bengali books are not that expensive, so probably it would take several times more than the price of a book to have it sent to me. Although very few books, and that too great books, that I would like to read, are available in Bengali on Kindle now, I hope this is going to change soon. 

English books are less expensive on Kindle than paper back editions. I hope more and more of the rare books are made available too, and the few typing errors that can be found yet, are also done away with. 

Kindle is simple and hardly any sort of rocket science technology. But it is soothing to the eyes, especially without the back light, and complete with the cover, it provides for a good reading experience. Well, the only other major difference is, you can drop a book many times over, or fall asleep on it without too much damage done, but don't try it with a Kindle. I am trying hard not to treat it as 'just another' book!

This is great for book lovers. The screen isn't glossy (I hate glossy screens!) and the battery lasts long enough. I am sure the future versions will make is easier to read pdf and word files too. But, what is most important is, it will keep rare languages alive. It has the extraordinary potential to provide reading material in any language anywhere on the globe. It would surely have taken this world several hundred years at least to provide books in every language everywhere on the planet. Now Kindle can make it possible sooner. I am excited about the future of Kindle, and the day when we can get books in so many languages at affordable prices. Imagine a world where entire libraries are available at your fingertips! Imagine a future, when students or not so well off people can buy a Kindle at affordable prices and pursue the reading habit, and consider it a good investment done!

※Thanks to my friend Abhilekh who introduced me to Kindle. 

Likes on Facebook...

Nowadays so many people click "Like" 「いいね！」 on FB. But sometimes it is regarding topics that do not have so happy a meaning! For example, someones child is sick etc. People have started using this for acknowledging having seen/ read the particular message. Maybe FB should provide another word as an option for such circumstances. 

In The Driver's Seat ...

Recently, during a trip to Chennai in India, I was chatting away merrily with the driver of my cab. He was in the driver's seat of course, while I sat behind. This man has been driving for 25 years, he is raising 2 daughters and lives with his wife. His dreams are simple. They are more singular than plural. 

He wants to give his daughters an education. His smile never faded as he tried to describe, with a perfect blend of mellowed pride, some of the famous places we crossed on the way in his broken English, and also talked to me about his family. He learned English without reading books, first by listening to people who always sat behind in his car, and then by trying to strike a conversation with them. 

He also pointed and showed me the area where he lived, and told me that he commutes from there to the hotel he works everyday by an ordinary bus. I asked him how long it took him to commute and came to know that he starts at 4 a.m., has to change bus once, walk some of the way, and reaches the hotel a little before 7 in the morning. 

It took less than an hour in the air-conditioned car ...

Life can be humbling at times. Talking to his man, I felt happier than talking to so many Tom, Dick and Harry's, who claim to be the bigwigs in the driver's seat, and own a lot of fancy things, while taking the back seat always. 

Over the moon!

Recently I read an article about a future aircraft that could be in operation in another 20 years!

That probably means somewhere in my lifetime huh?

We are talking of an aircraft that can carry passengers from Tokyo to New York in less than 2 hours. Great!

Who are the people who would require that kind of speed? Maybe the top 0.000001 percent of billionaires?

Well, don't go by that percentage because I just conjured it with a lot of zeros. We are also looking at a world with widening disparity and poverty, some veiled and some quite open enough to provide stunning footage's for journalists.  

We cannot solve our daily set of problems. We cannot make water for millions, a commodity touted to become scarce in the near future by famous experts. We dream of fighting aliens from outer space with our courage and technology when junior high school level physics should tell us that those "aliens" who have the technology to travel millions of light years to come and visit us could smash the best of our technology to smithereens within fractions of seconds. Also, think about this. Aliens who are so advanced as to travel millions of light years, do they also have time to be petty enough like us, spending hours, days, months and years thinking of revenge and jealousy and politics and gossip? Wouldn't they rather be having thought processes that have laser-like precision?

 We don't even know where to dump our garbage, both non-nuclear and nuclear. We haven't yet been able to visit our next planet. But, we must always try and fly over the moon to get to New York from Tokyo!

ゴミ "Gomi," a word I will never forget..

I have always wondered at the amount of garbage that piles up when I am in Japan. At times, it pains me, worries me and makes me wonder how one single human being could "produce!" all that stuff! Not that I haven't experienced the same when living alone in India, but the amount was lesser. Here, since everything is packaged from juice to chicken, as one consumes, there is a huge amount of garbage that piles up. Being alone, I typically move the garbage out once a week on the specific days and every time I do so it fills with regret and makes me stare with wonder at all the things I have consumed in a week! A fuel guzzling monster perhaps!(laugh!) On the lighter side, when will we have humans with hybrid technology who consume a bit less?!

Musings

今年の漢字は「絆」だって！Good one.
Yesterday I read the following in a book I was browsing through:
"Success is having what you want. Happiness is wanting what you have."
Precious words indeed!
I wish everyone "happiness" & 「絆」。
Take care and keep warm.

Corbett's India

"In my India, the India I know, there are four hundred million people, ninety percent of whom are simple, honest, brave, loyal, hard-working souls whose daily prayer to God, and to whatever Government is in power, is to give them security of life and of property to enable them to enjoy the fruits of their labours."

"...and when Hindu, Mohammedan, Depressed Class, and Christian could live, work, and play together in perfect harmony. As could be done today IF (emphasis mine) agitators were eliminated, for the poor of India have no enmity against each other."

"Those who visit India for pleasure or profit never come in contact with the real Indian - the Indian whose loyalty and devotion alone made it possible for a handful of men to administer, for close on two hundred years, a vast subcontinent with its teeming millions."

-Corbett, Jim "My India" OUP India.

This comes from a man spent most of his life among the admittedly poor often described as 'India's starving millions.' And, a person who once himself was reduced to a chapatti and dal existence.

Why do modern Indians want to "forget" this India? The qualities described above are the same ones required to make a great nation, both culturally and technologically. Do we need to look elsewhere for so called "progress"? Or, do we simply need to look within ourselves and listen to our soul?