I am still hesitant to call this news article lame; maybe because there could be many things i dont know about cancer research. I hope I defend my case on the basis that studied chemistry for four years and had taken biology courses two years before that (11th and 12th)
The study about which the reuters report talks about reminds me of the "projects" used to be done in my college.
The study wants to say that there is a gene in humans - caspase 8 (CASP8) which controls cell death or apoptosis. So this dude is the one which will stop the goddamn virus from running amok in a body.
What they did was take DNA samples from 10,000 Chinese guys over 6 years between 1997 - 2003 (4 years ago) . Half of them were suffering from cancer and half of them were not. So we suspect that since caspase 8 is so brilliant, it should be, if not outrightly beating its chest belligerently,but at least holding some swords in the cells of most of the 5 thousand cancer free people. But the stats are that this gene's variant is found in just 25 % of the cancer free people while this figure is 20 % for the cancer patients. A meager difference of 5 % .
That means that 20 % unfortunate cancer patients are not getting any help from the gene even if its there in their cells.
ahem ahem!.....the population of china is 1.3 billion and here every year cancer claims 1.4-1.5 millions lives.
what does 10,000 mean at all when 1.5 million have been dying of cancer per year since your four year old study.
It got published in the journal nature genetics, the report says. Kudos!
I feel good to have finished two reports, one on the national income of India and the other on the growth of service sector in India for Amir Ullah Khan in economics Confidence level is up and my point of view has changed!
PS : I would like to welcome my friends to my friends list - Vishal, Anuraag and Arpit!!
Blogging rocks!!
Monday, April 23, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
food
I have started eating outside here in bangalore. the food doesnt seem to get any better over here in the mess. so i started scouting and found chaat place nearby. for the past three days i have tried all the dishes he had to offer. the pani puri was good. i get so much less for 10 bucks! alas that was bajaj nagar road in nagpur this is thipsandra in bangalore. that was 6 years ago! i used to love the burp after a dahi puri which cost just ten bucks. i used to get such a plateful, this thing which i got for 15 bucks was bland and quite mild, chillywise i mean. today i checked out dahi samosa which was much better. curd was thick and not sweet, samosas were freshly fried and crisp.
good food is bliss. i found my bliss one freezing winter morning in pilani. it was 8 am. my probability and statistics class got cancelled. so i headed to the cafeteria. the mild and milky sun was filtering through the neem leaves and me fully covered in the woolens was hungry. i remember the practically empty IC (insti cafeteria).
steaming hot idli sambhar made my day. i have never ever had a better breakfast in my entire life.i have no words to describe what that single idli did to me.
mind you, the quality of food in the ic too hasnt always been consistent. yes, i admit that i was lucky that day.the timing was perfect, early morning the food is absolutely fresh, the most important thing, sambhar was very well made. i love, love, loooooove the little red dal sort of pieces which occur in the idli which is served over there in ic. you feel very satisfied with just one idli (which you get for 4 bucks) the second one actually makes me a bit too full. after that its coffe for the winters and for summers its the heavenesque shikanji (sweet lemon juice).
how will i ever forget pilani, this was just one of the things which clasps me so hard to that place. the stories of my childhood in that that place are far too many and indescribable.
i love south indian food. i love the sambhar which my mother makes. the taste of sambhar changes so much from place to place that i am very much disappointed. the sweet ones i tasted in delhi and pune, a bland one i tasted right here in bang, just across the street from my hostel.......why why why, in the name of hell are the chefs all over the country are hell bent to ruin this blessing of god?seriously i will never get better sambhar than the one my mother makes. or of course better than the one Malathi aunty and Poonkuzhali Tai make.
Current music: O saathi re - Omkara
Current Mood : Hopeful/ Determined
good food is bliss. i found my bliss one freezing winter morning in pilani. it was 8 am. my probability and statistics class got cancelled. so i headed to the cafeteria. the mild and milky sun was filtering through the neem leaves and me fully covered in the woolens was hungry. i remember the practically empty IC (insti cafeteria).
steaming hot idli sambhar made my day. i have never ever had a better breakfast in my entire life.i have no words to describe what that single idli did to me.
mind you, the quality of food in the ic too hasnt always been consistent. yes, i admit that i was lucky that day.the timing was perfect, early morning the food is absolutely fresh, the most important thing, sambhar was very well made. i love, love, loooooove the little red dal sort of pieces which occur in the idli which is served over there in ic. you feel very satisfied with just one idli (which you get for 4 bucks) the second one actually makes me a bit too full. after that its coffe for the winters and for summers its the heavenesque shikanji (sweet lemon juice).
how will i ever forget pilani, this was just one of the things which clasps me so hard to that place. the stories of my childhood in that that place are far too many and indescribable.
i love south indian food. i love the sambhar which my mother makes. the taste of sambhar changes so much from place to place that i am very much disappointed. the sweet ones i tasted in delhi and pune, a bland one i tasted right here in bang, just across the street from my hostel.......why why why, in the name of hell are the chefs all over the country are hell bent to ruin this blessing of god?seriously i will never get better sambhar than the one my mother makes. or of course better than the one Malathi aunty and Poonkuzhali Tai make.
Current music: O saathi re - Omkara
Current Mood : Hopeful/ Determined
Saturday, April 14, 2007
finally,all by myself.
Its a saturday morning and i am all by myself. good, thank god for this gift.
there was this marketing event of BMA in collaboration with times for which they needed volunteers.
no sir, thank you. nothing matches freedom and leisure on a saturday morning.
the week slipped away in a jiffy. felt nice. many night outs, upset stomach,tests and slippery deadlines of the assignments. all went well. now is the time for some flow of nike consciousness.
last saturday i watched the namesake (the movie) with arpit. but i was so upset with the sunday that i couldn't express my gratitude for the saturday in my last blog.
you watch such films and feel good about living. life is so many things good and bad, that we don't know. but living, you create it every now and then. its who you are and what you create.
i wanted to see ashoke ashima and gogol on the screen. see the life that ashoke and asima made.
it is too much risk i must say to put your trust on mira nair. after i have read the book, ashok and ashima and gogol live so vividly in my mind. they are delicately placed. i look at them with such compassion and longing.
where will irfan khan,tabu and kal penn be? yes, it is quite a risk. but there was this smidgen of hope.
the movie satisfies me 90 % perhaps. and thats a lot. i wouldnt critique the film, its a well made film, with meticulously written script which stuck with the sequence of the books events and caught all the little emotions and of course the big ones as well. i loved the photography.
all the three actors pass the exam. though kal penn doesn't with as many of those flying colors as the other two do. sonya is exactly how i thought her to be, maushumi however isnt. its a beautiful movie. please go watch it.
review of the movie is here.
we could talk about gogol though.
some people just dont get gogol. the fact is, its very difficult to understand what gogol went through. the same way that its next to impossible for people in general to listen to Chieko in Babel
was ashoke unfair to gogol?
was gogol in turn unfair and ungrateful to his parents?
these questions popped up in my head last week in the middle of my quantitative techniques assignment. and i thought of something which i had similarly said about some other people.
they are simple people, not heroes. they are susceptible. they should be allowed to be weak, make mistakes, do what their heart screams out. what ashoke and asima did was the best that they could do. the same for gogol. if gogol fell prey to the dilemma, it was not his fault, things were decided for him before he was born.
Just yesterday I got photographs from vishal which were snapped four years ago from my own camera. they scanned it and put it on picasa. they are amazing. us, barely out of the high schools, the first semester at bits.
by the way, yesterday was aks's birthday!!
you are one of my best and oldest friends......
happy birthday once again aks!!
current music : new york nagaram - a r rehman
current mood : planning/ thoughtful
there was this marketing event of BMA in collaboration with times for which they needed volunteers.
no sir, thank you. nothing matches freedom and leisure on a saturday morning.
the week slipped away in a jiffy. felt nice. many night outs, upset stomach,tests and slippery deadlines of the assignments. all went well. now is the time for some flow of nike consciousness.
last saturday i watched the namesake (the movie) with arpit. but i was so upset with the sunday that i couldn't express my gratitude for the saturday in my last blog.
you watch such films and feel good about living. life is so many things good and bad, that we don't know. but living, you create it every now and then. its who you are and what you create.
i wanted to see ashoke ashima and gogol on the screen. see the life that ashoke and asima made.
it is too much risk i must say to put your trust on mira nair. after i have read the book, ashok and ashima and gogol live so vividly in my mind. they are delicately placed. i look at them with such compassion and longing.
where will irfan khan,tabu and kal penn be? yes, it is quite a risk. but there was this smidgen of hope.
the movie satisfies me 90 % perhaps. and thats a lot. i wouldnt critique the film, its a well made film, with meticulously written script which stuck with the sequence of the books events and caught all the little emotions and of course the big ones as well. i loved the photography.
all the three actors pass the exam. though kal penn doesn't with as many of those flying colors as the other two do. sonya is exactly how i thought her to be, maushumi however isnt. its a beautiful movie. please go watch it.
review of the movie is here.
we could talk about gogol though.
some people just dont get gogol. the fact is, its very difficult to understand what gogol went through. the same way that its next to impossible for people in general to listen to Chieko in Babel
was ashoke unfair to gogol?
was gogol in turn unfair and ungrateful to his parents?
these questions popped up in my head last week in the middle of my quantitative techniques assignment. and i thought of something which i had similarly said about some other people.
they are simple people, not heroes. they are susceptible. they should be allowed to be weak, make mistakes, do what their heart screams out. what ashoke and asima did was the best that they could do. the same for gogol. if gogol fell prey to the dilemma, it was not his fault, things were decided for him before he was born.
Just yesterday I got photographs from vishal which were snapped four years ago from my own camera. they scanned it and put it on picasa. they are amazing. us, barely out of the high schools, the first semester at bits.
by the way, yesterday was aks's birthday!!
you are one of my best and oldest friends......
happy birthday once again aks!!
current music : new york nagaram - a r rehman
current mood : planning/ thoughtful
Sunday, April 08, 2007
I feel sick........
Today was such a fine sunday. Now its a depression.
It started out like every other beautiful sunday, bright sunshine, fine breeze, slow hours of leisure. I live in a spacious building, lots of air and sunshine flows in unobstructed.
All I wanted was good food. Could we please not have red/brown/orange or all these in one coloured pulpy masala gravy curries for the battered palate? I knew it was coming my way before I went downstairs for lunch. sigh. My stomach is upset. Please dont try to make north indian food. I dont mind idli sambhar,dosa or utthappa. i really don't. but bland oily curries with rubbery maida chapattis are playing havoc with me. i am at my wit's end. I am not healthy.all the time i feel like there's something wrong with my stomach. I feel uncomfortable all the time.
Since yesterday night i wanted to blog. there was no wifi since morning. passing the day without the net was yet another torture.
I couldnt eat more than 3 chapattis and was hungry 2 hours later.
i got another item of a roomie. we dont talk much. well, really not at all. Its far less than the amount i used to talk with the one i had during my internship at GRASIM. Its the nutcases like him that put me off. Please never try to tell me what to do and what not to do. Please dont try to kill me of suffocation by closing all the doors and windows of the room! all the time! Please dont hiss under your breath "oh shit" 24 times a day. superficial concern for perfection.
I am socially unfit. Last week I had yet another bout of misanthropy. felt like blasting cowdung at the faces of the people around me.
I realised that my behaviour in the face of competition changed radically. yes, its very positive most of the times but sometimes i am not able to control my temper. at the PDW (personality development workshop) i almost blasted smokergirl. she was absolutely aghast! "why are you yelling at me!!" ...gosh, we lost the last PDW exercise. i was in a state of numbness. i will probably be able to put the video of this exercise; my friend siezed the opportunity and recorded it on his mobile.
current mood : uninterested
current music: Nelly Furtado
It started out like every other beautiful sunday, bright sunshine, fine breeze, slow hours of leisure. I live in a spacious building, lots of air and sunshine flows in unobstructed.
All I wanted was good food. Could we please not have red/brown/orange or all these in one coloured pulpy masala gravy curries for the battered palate? I knew it was coming my way before I went downstairs for lunch. sigh. My stomach is upset. Please dont try to make north indian food. I dont mind idli sambhar,dosa or utthappa. i really don't. but bland oily curries with rubbery maida chapattis are playing havoc with me. i am at my wit's end. I am not healthy.all the time i feel like there's something wrong with my stomach. I feel uncomfortable all the time.
Since yesterday night i wanted to blog. there was no wifi since morning. passing the day without the net was yet another torture.
I couldnt eat more than 3 chapattis and was hungry 2 hours later.
i got another item of a roomie. we dont talk much. well, really not at all. Its far less than the amount i used to talk with the one i had during my internship at GRASIM. Its the nutcases like him that put me off. Please never try to tell me what to do and what not to do. Please dont try to kill me of suffocation by closing all the doors and windows of the room! all the time! Please dont hiss under your breath "oh shit" 24 times a day. superficial concern for perfection.
I am socially unfit. Last week I had yet another bout of misanthropy. felt like blasting cowdung at the faces of the people around me.
I realised that my behaviour in the face of competition changed radically. yes, its very positive most of the times but sometimes i am not able to control my temper. at the PDW (personality development workshop) i almost blasted smokergirl. she was absolutely aghast! "why are you yelling at me!!" ...gosh, we lost the last PDW exercise. i was in a state of numbness. i will probably be able to put the video of this exercise; my friend siezed the opportunity and recorded it on his mobile.
current mood : uninterested
current music: Nelly Furtado
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