Acceptance

Well, I am here again with yet another rant. I simply cannot get on with people. And years of observation have helped me conclude that it's due to my complete inability to talk. Put me in a party, throw me in a group of people or even in the midst of family/friends, I will sit still without speaking much. I am the kind of person who will return from a party being friends with the dog! And even if you get me speaking, it'd be extremely difficult to get a subjective viewpoint from me. For facts and all, I'm bang on - capital of a place, approximate currency exchange, cosmic stuff, mathematical formula, films (I so love them!). But ask me to take stand on a political party and you'd be disappointed.
At first, it doesn't seem so bad. But I've to face it every single moment. Yes, my writing somewhat compensates for the lack. But I got no ears to listen to my loathing, no voice to assure me when I'm sad. I know it works both ways. And yes, I have supported my friends and family in their time of distress. Being an INTP(yes I strongly believe that shit theory or whatever you may call) doesn't help either. I become too much of a self-critic to live up to my own expectations. So here I am pondering over what keeps on people conversing day and night. Maybe, I should take up the challenge and face my biggest nightmare: a date.

The Goddess of Ashtami

Today is Maha Ashtami, the eighth day of the nine nights festival, the later of which is worshiped as Durga Puja.
This day carries a very special memory in itself; not just that I hail from Gujarat, the land of Garba and Dandiya but because of the visits to multiple temples in our vicinity. I am not much of a religious person but gladly accompanied my grandmother(amma) and mother(maa) to wherever they would take me. The chief motive, of course, being delicious food. Maha Ashtami is one such occasion wherein we three would book an auto, visit three temples and be back having enjoyed the food.

Our first halt would be the home of an old, devoted and graceful lady who is popular by the name of Mataji. They have a beautiful temple set up inside their home and many devotees come to visit it. Mataji and her family maintain the temple and observe festivities every year. The most popular being Durga Ashtami where a havan is organised with free food served to anyone who visits their place. Our family has closer ties with theirs and so it became a norm to visit them on Maha Ashtami.

The second stop would be Bhaiyaji's (looks like our God lies in familial ties). I don't know much about the history of this place but recall visiting this since I was a little child. The caretaker of this temple was referred to as Bhaiyaji meaning 'elder brother'. My grandma knew him very well and so I'd get extra sweets from him every time. He passed away a long time ago. I was(and still am) always captivated by the idols of the three goddess (Durga, Saraswati and Lakshmi) there. They also had a havan every year.

The last point would be the pandal set up by the Bengali Association of our area. Every year we used to visit the pandal and check if it has anything new added, pray and then enjoy the food from local stalls there. This was my favourite part undeniably.

As I look back this year, there is no Bhaiyaji, Mataji is ill,  my grandmother has left us for the heavenly abode and I am in Singapore. Tonight on call, maa felt a little disappointed and a lot lonely. The neighbours helped her out though. They had a havan at home followed by dinner. Maa did attend it but couldn't help reflecting back, I just wish to be there. And more importantly, Amma to be there for she was the one with the greatest enthusiasm and energy.

For me, these two ladies are my goddesses of Ashtami and I just pray that just like Goddess Durga is immersed in water only to return next year, Amma returns the next year. But it won't be possible. So I am all devoted to Maa for now I want every day spent with her to be nothing less than an Ashtami.

A little place off the Edgware Road

Many years ago I came across this fantastic short story by Graham Greene. I took an immediate liking to this story. Here I attempt to present this in a rhyming poem:

A Little Place off the Edgware Road

To be or not to be?

That’s not the question;

For when goes all your courage flee

You don’t remember to have fun.

I know of an incident that makes me scream

It’s by the ultimate chronicler Graham Greene.

There was going a man, Craven by name

Tight in his mackintosh in thin summer rain.

All the way up the park, he was reminded of love & passion.

But for love, you needed money, suit car & a mansion.

It seemed as if he had a heavy mental load.

He came to A LITTLE PLACE OFF THE EDGWARE ROAD.

There he hated his hatred of hating the Guardsmen.

A better body than his was with each of them.

As he walked on the side streets round the Edgware road,

He noticed the posters outside the disused theatre in Culpar road.

No film had ever succeeded there;

Rat holes and spider webs were scattered everywhere.

Worth a shilling to Craven, the seats were cheap.

Protected from the rain, at least he could sleep.

The film was of ‘The Home of the Silent film’ race;

There were not mere twenty people in the place.

A middle aged actor lay on an elbow with his arm round a woman.

The song tinkled and the screen flickered like indigestion.

Somebody felt his way through the darkness past Craven’s knees;

Craven felt a large beard brushing his mouth and it didn’t make him please.

By the time, the actress had stabbed herself

The new man asked why she did so to herself.

None was interested and the film was not over yet.

But the small bearded man was absorbed only in the actor’s death.

Craven was a bit allergic to blood

But the man wanted it to flow like flood.

“What are you talking about?” asked Craven.

When the man spoke, he sprayed a breath albeit a damp one.

There was also a little bubble in his speech

As if he wanted blood like a leech.

Soon they got caught in a small wrangle;

The man made Craven to come in a tangle.

Craved turned and tried to see him

But he couldn’t as the light was dim.

The man talked to himself as if he was sane

Spraying the same breath to Craven, again.

Suddenly and confidingly, he laid on Craven his hand;

It was so damp and sticky that Craven was about to stand.

Craven replied with horror “What are you talking?”

“A man in my position gets to know almost everything.”

Knowingly, the little man began to titter;

Unless for those hands, Craven would have ignored him altogether.

The man’s head had a habit of lolling sideways

He mentioned ‘Bayswater Tragedy’ anyways.

Craven had seen those words on a poster at the park.

When asked about it, the little man began to bark.

He began to cough right at the face of Craven;

‘Twas like vindictiveness, more than that of a raven.

“Let me see. My umbrella”, the voice said

Losing the word, past Craven’s knees he got laid.

Craven was to see him but the screen went blank and bright;

Somebody had turned up the dirt-choked chandeliers’ light.

Craven then saw on his hands a smear;

At the sight of blood, he began to fear.

He went to look out for the madman, but in vain.

So he dialled 999 with a sense of sane.

There he got a horrible news-

A man’s neck was cut from ear to ear in Cullen Mews.

He told that he had sat next to the murderer, as to him it had appeared.

A voice from next end said, “We have the murderer. It’s the body that has disappeared.”

Transferring contacts from Nokia 108 to Android

My father uses a basic Symbian feature phone - Nokia 108. It is a decent and robust phone, good for the rough n tough life he leads. Unfortunately, this little wonder is not smart enough for the modern world. So when the time came to transition from Symbian to Android, the one (and important) thing we dreaded was transfer of contacts.

Nokia 108 is a peculiar model. It supports various media formats but doesn't have a file explorer (or Gallery as it's called on Symbian), has Bluetooth but no marking for contacts, saves all contacts to an SD card but only from device memory and supports external memory card but has no micro USB slot. Duh! So my journey began to transfer all the contacts to a smarer LG-L3 II (Android 4.1.2) with a caveat of finding a better way and not doing so one-by-one.

I am a bit reluctant to use third-party apps. So didn't want to install any of the applications either on my PC or on my Android. And here are the things that won't work:

• Mark all contacts -- no marking support
• Rename .nbf (Nokia backup file) to .zip -- 108 won't make .nbf
• Rename BACKUP.DAT (yes, that's what the contact backup in Nokia 108 is and no, I am not screaming) to Backup.zip -- creates an invalid archive
• Rename BACKUP.DAT to Backup.vcf -- shows only the first contact

There just has to be some way to get that BACKUP.DAT file working. Now, in case you haven't figured how to do that, follow these steps:

1. Copy all the contacts from SIM to device. Menu -> Contacts -> Move (or Copy as you like) -> From <SIM name> to phone -> Move all (or One by one as you please)
2. Create a backup of the contacts. Menu -> Contacts -> Back up contacts -> Continue  (note: in order to see the back up menu, you must have a memory card inserted)
3. Tada! The file BACKUP.DAT is created (although you cannot see it using the existing phone)

Now transfer that file to your computer. Use a card reader or insert the card in a different phone and connect it, whatever suits your appetite. I inserted the card in my Nokia X2-02 and connected it via USB to my ThinkPad PC. 

This DAT file cannot be directly used to transfer contacts, neither does converting it to .nbf, .vcf or .zip helps. I struggled a but and recalled from the old times of DAT to CSV conversion. So just rename the BACKUP.DAT to Backup.csv

Try to open the Backup.csv file using MS Excel or Notepad. Make sure it doesn't have any special characters. Once all right, we are good to go.

Google supports importing and exports contacts via a CSV file. 

1. So just log in to your GMail account using PC. Use the same one as the one on the Android device you want your contacts on.
2. At the top-left corner, click Gmail -> Contacts.
3. On the left hand side bar, click Import.
4. If you are using the newer version (and if it doesn't support import yet), select Go to old contacts.
5. From the left hand side bar, click Import Contacts...
6. Choose the Backup.csv file that we had created earlier and click Import.
7. Voila! All the contacts should be imported to the Google contacts.

For more help on importing contacts, visit https://support.google.com/mail/answer/14024?hl=en

Now we have all our contacts on Google cloud servers. We just need to sync them with our Android phone. Make sure the phone is connected to internet and follow these steps:

1. Go to Settings on the Android device. 
2. Select Accounts & sync (or just Accounts in some devices)
3. If you have auto-sync checked (ON), just give it some time. The contacts will be synced automatically. If not, proceed as:
4. Select Google from the account list.
5. Tap your email id (it should be same as the one we used on PC to import contacts from CSV).
6. Tap Contacts. And wait till all contacts are synced.
7. Congratulations!!

This took me some time but it ensured I wasn't using any third-party apps that bloat my system. Also, keeping contacts on Google servers would help ease the switching process the next time.

Hope this helped you.