The dowry turnaround story

Turns out that the dowry problem has reared its ugly head again. This time, Mr. Selvam, the demander of the dowry in question, hanged himself because his wife didn't get the money pronto.

Darwin's theory in action. Can we now have all the terrorists do this too, i.e. hang themselves? I'll pay for the rope.

Gender test

"Indian Athlete fails Gender Test", screams the headlines. Santhi Soundarajan won a silver medal at Doha and them promptly failed a gender test, so they took back her (?) medal.

But there is something I do not quite get.

What the holy F is a gender test? Do they look inside your pant(ie)s for a visual obstruction? Or your chest for a couple of speed breakers? (Maybe that's why fat men are not athletes) Do they do the touchy-feely thing from the outside?

Or do they make you take online tests like this:

Which of the following most accurately describes you?

	I'm a real man.
	I'm a real woman.
	I'm not a real man or a real woman, but I'd like to be.
	None of the above. I'm something else entirely.

So if you click "C" or "D" they take back your medal.

The test statements say that Ms. S.S. "does not possess the sexual characteristics of a woman". If they got that from looking at a picture I will honestly say that this may apply to a lot of women in certain engineering colleges. We used to have a sexist joke in my college:

Why did Ethiopia get the drought and KREC get the girl's block? (the ladies hostel that is)
Because Ethiopia had the first choice.

Okay, not quite politically correct, so what. But I digress.

The medical team that did this "gender test" consists of "a gynecologist, endocrinologist, psychologist and internal medicine specialist", it seems.

Gynecologist, okay.
Endocrinologist, a complicated designation, but still okay.
Internal medicine specialist, uhmm. I think they invented that term yesterday.

What is a psychologist doing there? Testing if she had the mental make up of a woman? If anyone knows anything about women they will know that there is no standard mental make up of a woman. From chaos theory, the rule goes that you can never predict what will offend, excite, impress or otherwise affect any given woman at any given point in time, because of the butterfly effect, not necessarily in your stomach. Even if you are a woman. Even if you are THE woman in question, which is why endless phone discussions are about "I don't know why I was feeling that way".

If there is any recognition of this rule, chances are quite high that S.S. was, at that point, acting like a man, because she is a woman and can hormonally act any which way she pleases.

Now if they told me she went through a a simple chromosome test to find out if she's got XX or XY, that would be fine. Yet, they will choose psychologists to determine if a (tired) athlete is a woman, and that too, in an Arab country. Surprisingly stupid, no?

Theory: Maybe one of them tried to touch something they shouldn't have touched, and the penalty for that is that they cut your hands off, so it was probably better to decide she wasn't a woman in the first place. And to argue their case, we present Mr. Ram Jethmalani who says that she challenged their manhood, so they challenged her womanhood.

Ooh, it's started.

So I mentioned earlier that IIPM's trying to use Wikipedia for marketing. A "Mrinal" had suddenly appeared on the scene, threatening to remove any elements that don't reflect IIPM's vast superiority over mere mortal business schools. Out of the blue, Mr. Mrinal, who does not log on to Wikipedia but names himself, ostensibly so that anyone can call himself/herself "Mrinal", had set a deadline - the Wikipedia page would be changed without mercy on December 10.

Probably the Delhi sealing held him up, but Mrinal is back now. And changing the IIPM page furiously because, let's face it, this is the #3 link when you search for "IIPM".

The talk page has his war cry:

Hi Makrand, I accept what you and Deepak are saying. I think that if we believe in freedom of expression without benchmarking it with others, then just the three of us can keep having a debate forever. But I appreciate your and Deepak's inputs. So I'll start making changes from this week onwards. If you don't like it, do please revert them. And if I don't like your reverts, I'll revert the same back. Let's go on doing that till we reach a negotiated conclusion (or one of us blinks first :-)). Best wishes, Take care, and let the reverts begin :-)

He's now made massive changes, removing all elements of the controversy. And when I revert, stating this is not acceptable, he goes and does it again. Three times today, already and probably starting a major revert war.

I'm not going to let them get away with this.

IIPM on two months notice

Yes, beating this silly institution to death, but it seems that my earlier report that IIPM's premises was sealed has an addendum. It has been given two month's notice to "vacate its premises". And they've said they'll leave in two weeks, which, if I get the dates right, would have been December 1 or so.

Even if they haven't yet left, they have till January 17, 2007.

To recap, their premises was on land leased out from a welfare society in a non-commercial area and the courts ordered this office sealed on November 15, 2006.

A totally insufficient dowry

This is rip-roaringly funny. Rolling on the floor funny. (And yes, I've been youtubed)

Torn. Fascinatingly Torn.

Brilliant. I can imagine how much newsreaders on TV would like to do this.

Insane winters

Why is it so frikking cold in Bangalore? I woke up at 6:30 and practically froze my neenies. This from a 90 kg individual who has survived, among other things, Norway. The problem with Bangalore right now is the daily range: my body is totally flummoxed. It's so hot in the day I need the A/C on full blast in the office. In the night, when it's time for our daily midnight walk, i can walk with a milk bottle (not that I do) and end up with ice cream.

And this whole global warming thing? I think it's happening. (Duh) When people are working it's frikking hot. And when they're asleep, hell freezes over. For it's supposed to be frozen over, just that all those working people have made it a furnace.

At this point, I have to stop and think if I want a furnace or a freezer.

Ok, thought.

I want one of the above. Either stay a furnace or a freezer. Don't f*** me up with both, at different times of the day.

And if you (Mr. Weather) behave like this when my baby arrives, I swear I will shut you up with enough heating and cooling equipment to make the devil lust. Equipment which, I've suddenly realised, is not going to be available in this city that has always had a temperature regulator named "Nature".

Who has, I think, left the building.

If you're still with me, watch this completely out-of-context video: