Koteshwar Rao Sir: A legend passes away
It is really sad that Koteshwar Rao sir has passed away yesterday suffering a heart attack. Those of us who were fortunate enough to be his students know how much he meant to all of us. He was undoubtedly the best teacher I have seen in my life. His teaching philosophy inculcated passion for the subject and rarely do we come across teachers with such a firing passion for their subject. The tiny little math I know today (esp combinatorics, quadratic equations, real analysis) is because of this great soul. I do not know if I can write anymore about him. But I can say that the world has lost a great mathematician and more than that a great inspirer. Every batch has their share of anecdotes about him, their funny moments, their goof ups, the way they remember S. Chand bashing, therpooooores, balla guddings and rickshaw pulling.
Sir, we might have never had a chance to tell you this but we hope you knew it all along: we love you and respect you. We owe the passion we have for our work to you, we owe the logical thinking to you. We miss you a lot more than you could have imagined.
Humor
People have often let me know in no ambiguous terms that my jokes are very bad (or poor). I have just one thing to say to them. I agree.
However, the topic of todays enlightening lecture is not my PJs but a much broader one which deals with humor in general. Each person gets a kick out of something. Some like to be known as genii, some handsome, some kind, some cash ... my preference is to be known as the mushroom (a type of fun guy which is actually very tasty and edible or so people say).
The great science fiction writer, I suck as I move (Isaac Asimov... this one dates back to my undergrad days... a brilliant observation by some quiz stud), has hypothesized that jokes are merely a tool which the extra terrestrials use to test the humans. His funda was that no one really seems to know how the joke originated. That is why I take great pleasure in making up jokes. Think back and see if you can call some joke your won.
It is really difficult to cook up a joke which can be narrated without a preamble and can still evoke laughter. Most of the funny statements we make are either context dependent (our man Chomsky might look into this problem... to see if there are regular jokes, context free, context sensitive jokes and so on) or assume certain knowledge in a specific area. A particular joke on error floor cracked so brilliantly by Rahul (more about him later) would not make any sense to most of you. And so are the jokes on star wars and other similar stuff.
It is a good exercise to think what you consider as the best joke, in a sense that if someone asks you to tell a joke which one are you going to pick? The answer is not unique even for a given person. It also depends on your audience. Which brings us to the point of people who enjoy your jokes. Some people just do not appreciate jokes or at least things which I think are funny. Fortunately, I have been blessed with two wonderful sisters who laugh at almost anything I say (in a good way). Perhaps, Pallavi (the younger sister) is the person who understands the maximum percentage of my jokes. Most of it comes from the fact that she thinks like me and has been used to my antiques. Swapna, my darling fiance and the sunshine of my life and all the wonderful stuff you can think of, was quite shocked when she discovered my so called sense of humor. This was a feature she was not looking for in the deal. Well, God does throw in some bonii (a recurring joke on plurals). Indeed she has ranked my singing above my jokes and those of you who have had the misfortune to hear my vocal chords in action and not my jokes should feel glad.
So, basically, the point I am making is a small dot. Humor has lot of fundaes. Whenever you hear a joke try to classify it. Whatever.
I am just glorifying PJs. Ironic that I wrote all this quite seriously without actually telling a joke. Its like our engineering classes. So much theory and no practicals. I remember once when a teacher remarked that IITians are strong in theory and weak in practicals, all I said was she was only half right.
On a closing note, this blog was just to warn you guys out there that I am planning to archive my jokes and I have chosen this place as the forum to do such a thing. Do not say that you have not been warned. An appropriate start would be to remark that such a warning is coming from the famous studios Warner Brothers and if they were right they could have invented the aeroplane.
Ciao guys,
yours
Syntax (I have decided that I shall go by this name... a graphical representation of the name will appear later )
Since I read so much and know so much of random trivia and a bunch of nonsense which very few people actually care about, I decided that I will share this knowledge with others. I will post links to what I think are the most interesting links which I have come across recently.
1. Waterfall:
AnimationFundaes: M.C.Escher was a very talented artist whose works involved quite a few math fundaes. Something to do with perspectives etc. His official website is
here . The waterfall link is an animated video which shows this painting from different angles. Look at it and you will not be disappointed.
2. Planarity:
Planarity GameFundaes: A planar graph is a graph with no crossing edges. Though at first sight a graph may seem not planar, it might be possible to draw it as a planar graph. Try playing the game. Its so much fun.
3. Comics:
XKCDFundaes: A brillinat find by Rahul. Simple cartoons but brillinatly funny. You need to be a geek to understand a few of them.
4. Misinformation:
UncyclopediaFundaes: My favorite site without doubt. A comprehensive source of misinformation. Some articles might not be to your liking. Also, most of the humor is based on satire for which actual knowledge is necessary to understand.
