Travel related industries have crashed. It’s a safe time to talk about aircraft safety. By taking pot shots at Sri Lankan Airlines which bravely hauls back stranded Sri Lankans from all over the world. The big question : are Sri Lankan Airlines aircraft unsafe due short cuts taken in maintaining their aircraft? A friend claims … Continue reading How safe ...
Sri Lanka’s alcohol restrictions during the COVID-19 lockdown is a summarises the island’s free market socialism. It has 3 core rules: Restrict open economic activity through rigid, complex/obscure/inconsistent regulation/enforcement mechanisms which makes compliance time consuming/costly in the language of a socialist state Sell protection to a connected few who can operate outside regulations A facade … Continue reading Sri Lanka’s ...
Going back to the office isn’t a return to “normal”. The pre-COVID19 era isn’t coming back. The “normal” it represents is nostalgia. Like the pre 9-11, pre tsunami, pre war (you pick the war) eras there is no “going back”. The “old normal” is gone. Anyone who hopes for its return is asking for horse … Continue reading Return to a new normal →
There’s a point when digital productivity tools and techniques become a mirage. A “reachable” image of juicy productivity. Where setting up the tools, the configurations, the processes can keep you from getting any actual work done. It’s an infinite ocean of procrastination. It is the classic rearranging the desk without physical constraints. When you are … Continue reading Digital productivity ...
I’m no science fiction fan. Hard, soft or medium it doesn’t matter. Anything with the word “fantasy” or a space ship on the cover tires me. My reason is low brow and unliterary: I don’t have the patience to spend too much time someone else’s universe. The voices in the room in my head are … Continue reading Avoiding the science fiction →
COVID-19 takes Yudhanjaya Wijeratne’s unnerving Numbercaste to another level of frightening. This quote from the book (pictured below) gives an indication of its uncanny ability to hint at future realities. The future Sri Lanka is shown as having a population of 15 million. The reason: ..Sri Lanka once was home to over twenty five million … Continue reading Pandemic in ...
I find myself avoiding passive entertainment media. It goes beyond avoiding TV (its been 6 years). It extends to an aversion for films, online videos, digital games of any kind. Absorbing or interacting with visual content designed to amuse me is draining. At the end of it I feel I’ve wasted life’s ultimate resource – … Continue reading Are you ...
Traveling for its own sake is an education. Making both the luxuries of privilege. Road trips in a time of a plague is madness. Besides getting sick, there are mountains of logistical barriers. Curfew passes, securing lodging, fuel, scared locals. The list goes on if you spend time worrying about it. If you have the … Continue reading Road trips during a plague →
It’s an inauspicious start to the Sinhala-Tamil new year for Sri Lanka’s astrologers. Sri Lankans are lashing out at their astrologers for failing to raise the alarm about the COVID-19 crisis. The rage of a nation entering its first month under an indefinite curfew is growing. Curfew defying mobs outside the offices of prominent astrologers … Continue reading Astrologers blamed ...
Long forgotten Sri Lankan blog aggregator kottu.org went live 15 years ago (details at the end of this post). For most of the handful of people who are reading this, the previous sentence will read as an irrelevance. kottu.org is an artefact of Sri Lanka’s early 21st century “Digital Culture”. I had the privilege of … Continue reading Kottu.org turns 15 today →
I never thought I’ll live through a global historical event. With the history unraveling in my city. Impacting in the mundane minutia of my life. The whole thing unfolded in rapid slow motion. First there was the pure “international news” item. A place in China most have never heard of. Wet markets and the harsh … Continue reading Living in a global historical event →
You are one of the fortunate few. The elite who have access to food. Where you can do your job through a web browser. Thus stay employed – at least for a while. Whining about the “drawbacks” of “working from home” is an act of high minded insolence. So it’s worth while taking a hard … Continue reading Working from home : what you will miss →
There are people who drive cars for pleasure. In the good old days, one got carried around in a palanquin. Or rode a suitably caparisoned elephant before one’s grovelling subjects. At the very least, took a helicopter. As with the impermanence of all things, those refined days are gone. We live in the barbarity of … Continue reading Driven Pleasures →
The title needs a few paras of context to make sense in an one minute post. The Coronavirus is a significant event in global human history. It will echo in unexpected niches of human life long after the event is over. It is a major stress event for the organism called the global community of … Continue reading Telepresencing : a Coronavirus enforced change →
Do you have an “official photograph” ? Not the proposal photos that your parents sent around. I’m referring to the well lit one. Shot with you in business garb and professional confident smile. It will hang in your LinkedIn, company about page, Slack profile and heaven forbid, your email signature. When I meet people in … Continue reading Your official photograph →
It is my sub conscious motto for life. I’d prefer something positive, inspirational and fluffy. But this, like the lizard brain, is something I’ve learnt to live with. It keeps me calm. Sustains my mental health in difficult and non difficult times. An achievement when the news (when I used to read it) is designed … Continue reading Brace for impact →
At what point does an idea go from unthinkable to accepted as “normal” or “obvious” in any culture? In the 1700s USA, dark skinned/African origin humans were regarded as commodities. That was the “normal” of the time. It was unthinkable that a dark-skinned person could be president. Over the last 300 years, perceptions changed to … Continue reading Unthinkable to ...
Mine is a green WW2 era American machine gun. His is a Mauser ‘machine pistol’. I remember its box magazine and the ‘broom handle’ pistol grip. We are pointing the barrels into the camera lens. About them, our ten year old grins. The photo’s colours are a mix of faded oranges and black green shadows. … Continue reading Childhood Guns →