changing 'times'?

When I went home for my sem hols,my dad had a surpise in store for me. Guess what??He had started subscribing for "times of india" which meant we were getting 4 newspapers everyday!!!(times, hindu, economic times(for my dad ,of course),indian express(i seldom read this)). Sounds Crazy?? Yeah, me and my Dad are crazy about newspapers.

Earlier our day used to start with "hindu".Not that I am a fan of "hindu",in fact , me and my Dad hate it.One of the prime reasons for our antagonist feelings is that "hindu" is a highly left-ist paper while both of us are extreme right-ist( ok, atleast i am).The reporting in "hindu" is also highly biased(if you are as ardent a reader of the sports page and the cricket comments as i am ,you would be nodding vigourously in agreement).Several important news items do not find an appropriate place and end up stowed in some small corner in the company of news that is much less significant.Some of the news are highly outdated and would have been covered by some other newspaper a couple of days ago.Hence,I hoped the entry of "times" would be a welcome change.

Now,after having read "times" everyday for several months I have a few words about it. While the volume of news in "times" is much more than in its competitor the quality of news is highly substandard(as my mom puts it).One of the "best" articles I have come across in chennai times is tittled"Hrithik Roshan has nothing to say" which goes about saying that Hrithik has no comments about Harman being his look alike!!!! And this is called news which is what chennai times is filled with!!! ("hindu's" supplements are so much better).One thing Ive noticed after having read the paper for several days is that once you read the title of the article and go on to the piece you find its got nothing more than the heading rewritten in more words.

Now that Ive spoken about some of the despicable aspects , let me come to those that I appreiciate.The reporting of several cases of public interest (like bomb blast)is highly praiseworthy as the final reports fill up the reader on the earlier phases of the case.The reporting is a highly balanced one(if the reporter has personal views ,it is seperately given as times view).The "times view and counter-view" is one of the best sections which elaborates on the pros and cons of a topic instead of just putting down a highly opiniated view of it.

After balancing the good and the bad points, I feel "times" is way better than its counter-part though all my hopes about it haven't come true.Actually ,nowadays ,after reading "times" I no longer feel like reading "hindu".

P.S: One of the articles in "times" that takes a dig at "hindu" for its biased reporting ,titled "Paper tigers , Tiger Papers" is an amazing read.

hail D.A.V

As I trudged to school everyday, I used to contemplate on how unlucky I was to have landed up in a school where teachers couldn't complete their day without burdening the students with unreasonable amout of homework.As my thoughts rolled on , I used to curse all those teachers who had a feeling that theirs was the only subject students were supposed to study ( this includes all teachers in my school).

When I used to imagine about other schools,my devious mind always came up with a rosy picture where there were better teachers,a canteen to laze around (that was very important as it was the time when we were not allowed to go McRennet),no homework , lots of free time... The list of nice things was endless. I had no means of checking out if this was the case in any of the other schools (as I had never been to any other school... now I thank god for that) and my mind was happy enough to retain this idea.

When I enrolled for IIT classes in 11th , it was the first time I got a chance to mingle with people from other schools. As I listened to tales about their school , teachers ... the unrealistic picture my mind had created underwent a complete makeover and for the first time I realised how lucky I was to be in my school and not one of theirs...

Thats when I started saying ...HAIL D.A.V!!!

the transition

When I returned blue-eyed, to the hallowed corridors of my school , I hadn't foreseen that the transition from 5th standard to 6th standard would be as drastic (to put it mildly) as it turned out to be.

As a straight-forward person who took everyone at their word, who hadn't ever dreamt of doing anything else but listening to the teacher in class... I was in for a rude shock. During the first week of 6th class , I suddenly found myself inattentive and uninterested (to say the least) in almost all the classes.I was silently rebuking myself for having changed for the worse. When I asked around in my group of friends , I found out they too were in the same state of mind as me(thank god...).

After almost a month and an exam later I gave up hope of ever being capable of listening in class.
My friends and I became this last-bench gang (I used to the tallest in my class then... sigh) who used to play bingo, eat lunch during class . Though later I cut down on the eating part of it, I could never resist myself from playing bingo ,hangman during class.

Everytime I look back and think about how different life would be if I had remained the sincere self I was ... I come up with a blank . Probably its impossible to be that way ...