Yes, I am back again from the dead. The last 6 months passed like nothing. I am now in class 12
and studies are becoming much harder. Still, when I get time, I watch movies, a lot of movies.
So, I thought a great way to start blogging again is by sharing reviews of some movies and shows
I watched recently.
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1984)
Throughout his many adaptations, the character of Sherlock Holmes has seen many interpretations from
many great actors. One which stands out to me is Jeremy Brett's take on the character in The Adventures
of Sherlock Holmes from 1984. I haven't yet completed the series but till now every episode has been magnificent.
Jeremy Brett really embodies the essence of Holmes better than any other actor I have seen. His mannerisms,
movements and speech help the viewer to get fully engrossed in the stories. I highly recommend this series to
anyone who likes detective stories.
Your Name. (2016)
There are only a select few movies that I have seen that can hold up after repeated watches.
Your Name. is one of them. Makoto Shinkai's magnum opus is truly a masterpiece. From stunning
visuals to great music, everything about this film is near perfection. Combining this with a
beautiful story makes for a film that can only be experienced and not explained. I think
this one should be on the list of the best pieces of media ever made.
Spider-man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023)
Alright, let's do this one last time. The name of this movie is Spider-man: Across the Spider-Verse
and it is the best Spider-Man movie ever made. A sequel to a masterpiece such as Spider-man: Into
the Spider-Verse had to be perfect and it is. Everything from the art styles, the animation, the
voice acting to the music are so well thought out. I never thought 3D animation can look better
than its predecessor but here we are. The only thing which slightly diminishes the experience is
the ending. But I am sure the next one will undoubtedly be a masterpiece.
Filmmaking is such a beautiful art form. One movie can be so vastly different from another yet equally
magnificent (or just as bad). The more I spend time watching them, the more I want to watch more.
Like every year in this decade, 2022 was an eventful one filled with joy and despair. It is
beneficial to look back at the past to figure out what to do in the future. So, here are some of
my stories from 2022.
Switching to Linux
For the entirety of my life, I have used Windows. It started from Windows XP then 7, 8,
8.1, 10 and finally 11. When I updated to Windows 11, I was excited but after using it,
the excitement went down the drain. It is perfectly usable, but it certainly is a
downgrade from the earlier version on the user front. I wanted to use something new,
something which I could customise to my liking. Here comes Linux. After a few tests on a
virtual machine, I installed a Linux distribution called Fedora on my computer. It took a
while to fix all issues and set everything up to my liking. After the first setup period,
I can say that I like it much better than I ever liked Windows. I still must use Windows
as Photoshop and Lightroom do not work in Linux and gaming is much better in Windows. If
you want to learn more about computers, I highly recommend giving Linux a try. Be
warned – Linux has a steep learning curve and breaking an installation is extremely easy
so, tread carefully.
AI is becoming scary
ChatGPT is a chatbot built using the GPT-3 language model developed by OpenAI. It is
designed to converse with humans in a natural and coherent manner, just like a human
would. It uses machine learning algorithms to generate responses to user input based
on a large dataset of human conversation. ChatGPT can understand and respond to a wide
range of topics and is able to maintain context and coherence in the conversation.
It is trained on a diverse range of data, including books, articles, and websites,
which allows it to provide knowledgeable and informative responses to user queries.
To use ChatGPT, a user simply needs to type in their message and the chatbot will
generate a response in real-time.
The last paragraph was fully generated by an AI called ChatGPT. I am both excited and
scared about this technology. It is by no means perfect, but it is good, like really good.
Enough movies have been made about AI take-overs to warn us about this. Humanity needs to
be really carful about new technologies. On one hand they can make our life better but on
the other, they can create new threats to us that we can never think of earlier. Still,
ChatGPT is an amazing tool.
Daily Photographs
For the last five months I have been sending photographs that I have clicked to some of my
friends and family, and I haven't missed even a single day. I am so adamant about keeping
this streak, that even on the day of surgery, I was more worried about sending a photograph
than the surgery itself. This is a challenge I took to improve my photography and it worked!
Admittingly, not all my photographs are good, but I have definitely improved on the course
of these months. I have no intention of stopping this routine.
These were three stories from last year. I hope that you also have stories that are worth
sharing. Happy New Year to everyone and let's hope 2023 will be a good year.
One week ago, I had the most nerve-racking experience of my life – a surgery. Don't worry, I am alright
now. In fact, I am better than ever! This is going to be a short one as there isn't much to talk about.
The Problem
The surgery was for the removal of something called a nasal polyp. I did not have any idea
about its existence until about a month ago. I was visiting the doctor for an ear check-up
as my ears were blocked by ear wax. He just looked at my face and said that I look like I can
have a polyp in my nose. After a quick endoscopy, it was confirmed. I had a problem with
over-congestion of my nose but never suspected this. Well, then came the surgery.
The Surgery
22nd December, the most significant date of the year. In the morning, I went to the hospital
and after some paperwork, got admitted. After a while, they took me to the Operation Theatre
and gave me the injection for general anaesthesia. Everything got hazy and that was it for
me, but the real work had just begun. It took 2 and a half hours for the doctor to complete
the surgery. Waking up felt weird, I could hear and see everything but could not do
anything. It took a while to wear off. In the end, I was discharged from the hospital at
around 6 pm. It took a further 2 days to recover mentally and somewhat physically. As of
writing this blog, I am much better, still recovering but mostly normal. To end on a good
note, there will be a blog tomorrow!
80% - that is the percentage of my life I have spent in school. It comes to be about 13 years.
That is a huge time commitment for anyone let alone a child. One would assume that students
would love school as they spend so much time in it, but if one asks the students, they will
(mostly) say otherwise. This leads to the question – Is school effective?
School as in the Present and Past
Humans are naturally curious. Anyone who has ever spent time with a toddler can understand
that. At that age, they experiment on everything and everyone. They ask questions that grown-ups
will never imagine. That curiosity is our natural learning process. But this cannot be seen with
a high school student. Most of them will agree that they do not like the way things are being
taught. School, as it is today, is like a mental prison which traps us in a curated curriculum
designed to strip us from our creativity.
Education, as a concept, is necessary and it always will be. Education, as it is today,
feels artificial and somewhat unnecessary. Everything in the curriculum is only there for exams
and not actually for one's education. Objectifying a complex thing such as education through
some numbers from a few tests is both inaccurate and foolish. When a student who only learned
and quoted the textbook in an exam gets better marks than someone who understands the topic,
there is a problem. This does transcend our immediate education system in India and applies to
(almost) every country.
School as in Dreams
If we ask ourselves what makes (or made) us keep going to school, it would most likely be
because of our friends. We treat school more like a place to socialise than learn. But why
can’t it be both? A school should be a place where students come together to learn new things
in a fun and natural way which does not create hindrances to their creativity and friendship.
It should be a free space to nurture our knowledge of significant subjects like science, history
and maths in a way we come to like them. In the Japanese book
Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window written by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi, a school
like this is described. I will not get into the
book as one should just read it.
School Without Classrooms
When I was in class VI in 2017, certain circumstances led me to dislike school even more.
I did not want to go to school at all. South Point High School’s architecture was part of it.
I longed for a school which was fun, and which understood the needs and wants of an 11-year-old
child. My mentor (who is an architect) wanted to help, so he found an architectural competition
in which the prompt was to design a school without classrooms. We took a part in it. I gave
ideas and some designs, and he and his friend translated them into something which grown-ups may
understand. Along the way, I learned many things about education, architecture, astronomy and
much more. Although we didn’t win, I find it very uplifting that by working together, we could
make something worthy to be sent to an international competition. Well, I think so, you make
your own decision.
Trees and Branches Credit: me, Subrata Ghosh, Chiranjeet Ghosh
In our lives, we always try to preserve our present to look back from the future.
Be it with photographs or words, it inevitably creates a snapshot of that moment in
time. Throughout our history, humans have found many different methods for achieving
the same.
Words are better Written than Said
Perhaps the most influential way to do this is to write. Even before the invention
of paper, humans have used inscriptions on stones to put into words their stories
for future generations to read. Thousands of years later, we still use writing
as one of our primary ways to communicate and take down notes. Anyone who has ever
opened a history book knows how important they are for our understanding of the past.
Even this blog can be said to be a snapshot.
Paintings are a part of Human Character
Even before humans learnt to write, we learnt to draw. Cave paintings by early cave
dwellers have survived long after them. Paintings throughout history have been used
to not only describe the immediate surroundings of the artist but also their
feelings. While Picasso’s Blue Era describes his mental state at that time, my
grandfather’s simplistic village scenes describe life in villages in his youth.
Both serve as different types of snapshots.
The World is made up of Photographs
Probably the most realistic snapshot of a moment, photographs are a relatively
recent invention. Originally photographs were taken by the camera on a piece of
photosensitive film which later required special chemical treatments to make them
permanent and then print. In my home, my father has a huge collection of these
photographs. Nowadays storing huge amounts of photographs is incredibly easy
as everything has moved to digital. Still, there is a certain charm in physically
holding old photographs in our hands to see them, not just viewing them on a screen.
This must be the most accessible way of capturing a moment as every smartphone in the world has a camera.
Videos are even better
The only things better than photographs are moving photographs! That is what video
is. Why capture a small image of a moment if you can capture the whole moment?
Since their birth, movies have captured our imaginations and made them real for us
to see. With the advent of affordable video cameras, filmmaking has expanded into
our lives. Anybody can make a movie if they possess the necessary skill. Nowadays,
homemade videos are extremely popular on websites like YouTube.
An Archive for the Whole World
With all these ways of storing moments of our history, we need a safe and
accessible place to store them. This is where the internet comes in. The internet
has made it easy to store huge amounts of information for the entire world to see.
Take my website, for example, I created it myself to post my blogs. If one lacks the
skill to make a website, one can use other services to store and express their
thoughts. Websites like The Internet Archive try to archive as many things on
the internet as possible. You can even see what the homepage of my website looked like
at the time of writing this blog here.
The Ultimate Time Capsule
As humans do, we want to preserve our culture in something that is virtually
indestructible. Aboard NASA’s Voyager 1 and 2 spacecrafts, there is a Golden Record and a
record player containing information about humanity and Earth. It is designed to
exceed our very existence as a species and be decipherable by extra-terrestrial
intelligent lifeforms whom we call Aliens. This creates the ultimate snapshot which
can be understood by anyone even someone out of this world.
Today marks the first anniversary of this website. One year ago, I made my first blog and posted it on this self-made website.
Concerning the fact that I made my last blog Nine and a half months ago, you may be wondering where I have been.
Exams and the Indian Education System
The first half of this break was for exams. This year many of my friends and I gave the AISSE – the All India Secondary School
Examinations or known more commonly as CBSE class 10 examinations. It was brutal, both the exams and the preparations. I somehow managed
to get good marks but that’s beside the point. This system of examinations in our country hardly measures the capability and merit of
the student in a subject but certainly measures how much the student has learned the textbook. Students may not be able to understand
how plant biology works yet if they were just to mug up the whole textbook, they would get good marks. That is unfair to the students
who have good knowledge of the subject. This is just part of the problem with our education system.
Class 11 and a new Environment
As the exams are now over, we must forget everything we learned and move on to class 11. Till class 10, I have been studying in
South Point High School. Now, I have changed my school and am going to Delhi Public School Ruby Park. The main reason for this change
is the inhuman amount of stress SPHS puts on its students. In that aspect, DPS is much freer. Still, it hurts to leave behind my
friends whom I have known throughout my entire childhood, especially when it seems that I will never see most of them again. But I must move on to
class 11. Higher Secondary is just the worst. The syllabus is so vast and complicated that it takes an extremely long time to understand
anything, and it takes up so much time of the day. But what can one do? This is the reality of education in India.
The Future
Now that I have explained where I have been, let’s see where I will be. I have decided to continue blogging once every month to
have as a hobby. Finding time to do anything I love has become very hard nowadays because of my studies. But I will try to manage, and I
hope you will be there too. If this makes me fail at every academic subject, so be it! At least my English will improve.
This is a continuation of yesterday’s blog. Today, it has become 2022.
On this day people think about what they are going to do this year. In my opinion, to plan for the future, we must look at the past.
So, here are two more stories from 2021.
Encrypted Gifts
Much like 2020, 2021 was also a stagnant year where nothing much good happened.
So, when my cousin’s birthday came, I knew I had to do something. I decided to organise a sort of treasure hunt.
I tested him on what he could do by giving him a cryptic letter on May 24 which was apparently Brothers’ Day.
He completed the cipher which led him to an animation on my YouTube channel. You can watch the animation by clicking here.
This led me to organise a jigsaw puzzle-like cipher on his birthday with my mentor. It is safe to say, he enjoyed it very much.
I continued to do this type of encrypted gift-giving with some of my other friends.
It amazes me what simple acts, like hiding a gift and letting the receiver find it, can do to one’s excitement even if the gift is not that exciting.
The Website and Blog
Now, it is time to address the elephant in the room, this website. If you haven’t guessed,
this website and blog were created by me from the ground up. It was a technical as well as a mental challenge.
I wanted a platform where I could share some of my thoughts with the wider world, but I did not like Facebook,
Twitter or even Instagram for this purpose. These social media sites rely heavily on algorithms to recommend posts to users.
I wanted a blog with no distractions where I could control every aspect of its appearance and feel. So, I had to make one by myself.
I learned a lot along the way, mainly how to make websites, but also how to express my thoughts on a subject in a few paragraphs.
With these two blogs, I shared four of my stories from 2021. I hope you also have some stories which are worth sharing.
Let’s look forward to what is to come. May you stay safe and have a very Happy New Year.
Today is the last day of 2021. This year was filled with grief, frustration, and anxiety. We hoped for a better time on this day a year ago, but it did not happen.
Still, in this year-long struggle, we all had moments of happiness and joy. Here are some stories from 2021.
Reunion of lost friends
This global pandemic has been going on since the start of 2020. That is hard to grasp as it started two years ago! 2020 especially was a hard time as everything went to a
standstill in the lockdown period. There were no physical meetings between friends at all. Everything went online – Online Meetings, Online Classes, Online Parties,
you get the idea. So, you could probably guess what my reaction was when it was announced that schools will resume in February. It was pure joy,
not because I could finally learn something but because me and my friends could meet in person outside of the computer. It felt great.
It reminded me of the significance of a physical presence. But it only lasted for a short time as the number of covid patients increased rapidly.
Nodevember 2021
Two and a half years ago, I stumbled on a video by a channel on YouTube called Blender Guru.
It was about a software called Blender which is an open-source 3D animation software. This intrigued me. So, I started to learn about VFX and Blender.
I did not have the courage to show any of my animations or renders to the public until this November. Every November, there is a small event in the VFX community,
it is called Nodevember. The premise is that you have to make a 3D render every day according to a given prompt, but you can only use procedural tools i.e.,
a set of tools that only use mathematics to create a model. This year I decided to participate, and it may be the best decision I made this year.
I could only complete five of the fifteen prompts as my exams were nearing but I think I improved a lot doing this. Here are three of my favourites:
What I am about to tell you happened exactly three years ago on this day – 24th October 2018.
My father and I were returning from a two-day trip to Bolpur.
We made this journey countless times.
As usual, we caught the Santiniketan Express to
Howrah Station at 1:10 pm.
You may think something happened during the journey to Howrah, but you would be wrong.
We arrived at Howrah Station at 4:00 pm merely 20 minutes late than the scheduled time.
Everything was going as planned but that was about to change.
The Decision
Usually, we take a ferry to the other side of the Hugli River and ride a taxi home.
But that day we decided to head home via train on a line we call ‘Chakra Rail’ or ‘Circular Railway.’
As you will soon see, we will regret that decision.
Bagbazar Jetty, photo: Sunando Bandyopadhyay
The Journey Home
There was a Circular Railway station just at the opposite bank of River Hugli but, we were doing this for exploration and fun so,
we took a detour and went to the station at Bagbazar via a ferry. It took about an hour instead of the usual 10 minutes.
We missed the 5:00 pm train as my father stopped for an unnecessary cup of tea. Nevertheless,
the next train to Tollygunge was at 5:15 pm or so we thought.
At the ticket counter, we were informed that trains were running under a new schedule and went only till Majherhat Station. Why?
Because a road bridge had collapsed over the railway lines at Majherhat! Worse still, the next train wouldn’t arrive until 6:30!
As the sun went down, we spent the time roaming around the station and making calls home to let them know we would be late.
The train did arrive at around 6:30 pm. It was mostly empty. We took a seat at the back as the train left. The line went along the bank of the river.
It was really beautiful to see the city lights glistening on the waters. We passed the Kolkata Dock area which was filled with big and small ships.
The train was filled with people by then. We reached Majherhat at about 7:15 pm. The station was really busy. My father bought some snacks.
We ate it while waiting for a train on the mainline to come to take us to Tollygunge.
We wondered, what we would be doing that day if we took a taxi instead of getting in this mess.
The train arrived at about 7:30 pm. It was full to the brim with people. It was quite difficult to fit inside with a rucksack.
We reached Tollygunge at about 7:45 pm. We bought two bottles of Appy Fizz and walked home while drinking as they wouldn’t allow luggage on the metro.
We reached the end of our journey at 8:00 pm as we arrived home. It took us 3 hours and 50 minutes to reach Howrah from Bolpur,
but it took 4 hours to reach home from Howrah Station! This will remain a worthwhile story to tell for years to come.
I am fortunate enough to travel to many places with my parents.
As a result, I have a fair share of interesting stories and experiences from different places.
Two of which I would like to share today.
The Game, photo: Sunando Bandyopadhyay
The Game that one never wins
I have been to Paris because of a conference my parents had to attend in 2013.
In my short stay at the City of Lights, one thing became clear – scammers were everywhere.
At all places of interest like the Eifel Tower
or the Louvre, there were signs saying, “Beware of Pickpockets”.
I didn’t think much about that until this incident.
We were on our way to visit Sacré-Cœur
church when we saw a group of people playing a game.
At that time, I didn’t know what they were playing, but after some observations,
I found out they were playing a sort of guessing game and were gambling for money.
As we passed, we didn’t think much of that, and went on our way. After few hours, when we were returning,
we again saw the same group of people playing the same game. Again, we didn’t think much and went on our way.
We returned to the same place, the day before we would return to Kolkata to roam the markets beside the church as everything was cheaper there.
There we saw that same group consisting of the same people playing the same game after two weeks!
Even more surprising is that the person who was orchestrating the game two weeks earlier was playing as a stranger.
Then we understood the group was scamming people, taking their money, and distributing among themselves.
They even tried to confront us for taking photos of the scene! But stories get much more shocking.
The Doors of Paris Metro, photo: Sunando Bandyopadhyay
Return of the Passport
This story is about my father’s friend who went to Paris with us.
One day in our trip, he went to a metro station to catch a metro to
Cité des Sciences,
where the conference was being held. The station was very crowded that day and when he boarded the metro,
he suddenly realised his wallet with all his money and passport was missing from his pocket!
He looked around trying to find his wallet and then he saw it lying on the floor at the station.
But it was too late, the doors were already closing. Meanwhile, a lady on at the station saw the wallet.
Realising what was going on, she threw it at the closing doors. Like a scene from a movie, the wallet just made it through,
and the doors closed behind it. All the money was missing but fortunately, the passport was still there.
This has only one explanation – someone took the wallet out of his pocket, took all the money, and left it on the floor with his passport.
We should all take care of our belongings in an alien environment.
Room Tilt Illusion is an extremely rare neurological disorder which makes your vision rotated by right angles for a while after waking up from sleep.
This may look absurd at first (one might even laugh) but, it can be serious. This rare disease has affected a close friend and mentor of mine.
As the doctors are unable to point-out which part of the body it has affected, we can make many hypothesises. Here is one.
Brain and Computer
A computer runs on bits i.e., ones and zeros. These bits are converted to electrical pulses, which the processer understands.
The brain also does this. It converts our senses and feelings to electrical pulses which are processed and then we feel what we feel.
The difference is that computers use electronical circuits made of wires and metals,
and our brains use organic compounds and neurons to form a neural network. But fundamentally they are the same.
Room Tilt Illusion in perspective of a Computer
An interesting fact about Room Tilt Illusion (which may be true only for my mentor),
is that he does not feel disoriented by the rotation of his vision.
This fact has given me a very interesting perspective, the perspective of a computer.
A computer has input devices, the motherboard and all its components, and output devices.
If something like Room Tilt Illusion had to occur in a computer, it has to happen after all the processing is done but before the display.
This places the pin at the GPU where all the graphics related computing is done for rendering every frame of the computer screen to the display.
In the organic counterpart of our bodies, this is the visual cortex.
I do not know where the display of our mind is or how the image is processed in our minds.
That subject is for the doctors. I am only here to give ideas.
