The Indian Adventures of Sherlock Holmes 2

Continued -

“You must be thinking how I guessed that it was you and you had a little adventure of accident when coming here. Well, you know my methods. I know very well the distinct firing of your scooter, which has never been tested by pollution control authorities. That is how I knew that it was you. But when I expected the ‘clink’ of your side stand which declares the presence of the spring at the time you park the vehicle, all I heard was short struggle between a metal rod and concrete floor. By that I knew something was wrong with your stand. What could it be?

“But then you surprised me by ringing my bell in half the time you usually take to climb two stairs to get on this very floor. You could not have used the elevator as they are load-shedding right now. What made you run so fast? May be you wanted to hide from people looking at you. And sure enough, all your arm and leg are covered with mud. It must be the pipeline they have broken while digging on the side of road and never cared to fix it.

“Considering all the facts I had in my possession, it was a child’s play to guess that you had slipped over the speed breaker they have recently made on the blind turn. Not only it is on a wrong place, but also its height is much more than it should have been. I have written a letter to the road authorities, but it takes them few weeks and a dozen of more such accidents to realize that something has gone wrong.”

As was his habit, my friend never failed to surprise me. Pointing at my dirty linen, he told me “Now change these clothes and put on fresh ones, if you will. I will give you mine for the time. But first get yourself clean”.

Soon I found myself all fresh and clean as ever. By that time, he had made a cup of tea for me. I took a seat on his sofa, when the expected question came. “What brings you here on such a beautiful morning and in such a hurry?”

-  to be continued

The Indian Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

Whenever I think of the amazing display of reasoning powers of my friend Sherlock Holmes, few cases stand out. I found one of those cases when I was re-visiting my records of our stay in India.

I was hardly half a dozen months after our arrival at the port of Bombay Docs in India. At that time we had settled ourselves in a mid-sized town in Maharashtra region, thanks to the ‘fees’ Sherlock got to stop the investigation case for which we were appointed. In the short period of first two weeks, the ever observing eyes and quick mind of Holmes had recognized the amazing potential of constant supply of challenging criminal cases and the hefty fees both the parties would pay him, one to stop the investigation and the other to carry it on. And as far as I was concerned, it was Holmes who pointed out to me that nobody checks the validity of your degree in India. So, I could easily start and run my clinic here. And so did I. I also owe the ever-increasing stream of patients to the departments of health, food and irrigation of Indian government.

It was a hot afternoon that day. When I rang the bell of Holmes’ flat, a voice belonging to the owner of the flat came to me. It said, “Pray come in, my dear Watson. How did you like your little accident aver the new speed-breaker?”

I was speechless even if I was well-familiar with the ability of deduction of the sharp mind sitting inside the head of my friend. The first thought which crossed my mind, was he must have been watching me from the gallery. But as I stepped in, I saw him coming out of bathroom wrapped in a towel and dripping wet. It was clear that he was taking a bath at the moment I had entered the building compound. Then how did he recognize that it was me, who is standing out of his door? Not only that, but he also knew that I had a misfortune of slipping over the speed breaker on my way here? Smiling at my face expressions, he pointed to a chair to tell me to sit down.

“Friend Watson, I know what you are thinking and I can explain” said he, his eyes twinkling.

to be continued -

The Facebook

Just watched ‘The Social Network’ for the third time. The makers say that everything shown in those two hours is true. Mark obviously denies. Whatever is the truth, but one has to accept that it’s an outstanding story. How many people get a billion dollars for a rigorous session of ASP coding? By the way, what is the income source of ‘facebook’? I mean, they don’t put any ads. I hear something about them selling private data of the users to marketing companies.

If that is true, then it’s the private little information of people like you and me who made this nerd world famous, youngest billionaire ever. It’s quite disturbing to know that MNC are ready to pour billions to peep into our lives. They want to know everything. What have you done? What are you doing now? What you plan to do next? How do you relate with others? What is your marital status? What you like to wear? What is your favorite drink? Everything.

There are phases when I enjoy conspiracy theories. That is one of my favorite pastimes. It’s amazing what different people pull out of same set of facts. There are all kinds of these theories. From “NASA never landed on the moon” to “the ultimate aim of Google is to rule this world”. And interestingly, they use YouTube, a Google service which is based in USA to spread their ‘message’.

Coming back to the topic, they show Mark writing a blog. When he completes a paragraph, he puts a </p> tag. What the hell? How a non-technical person is supposed to write a blog? Or was it just an HTML page Mark used to edit every now and then? Were there no blogging platforms there back in ’03? Whatever. But the typing speed is worth watching. I bet everybody who has watched the movie has, at some point, wished to pull up a keyboard and test his or her skills. They must have boosted the video speed.

Anyway, the movie is a treat if you are a nerd, not bad if you are a lover of sci-fi Hollywood movies and a nightmare if you are a regular watcher of Bollywood movies. So, go ahead, make some pirated copies ;)