Jest for the health of it

If humor is "the best medicine," then how do we sustain it as a central part of our day-to-day lifestyle? While isolated humorous experiences where we fall over with laughter are an important aspect of the health potential of humor, the greatest benefits of humor lie in our daily ability to use humor to reduce emotional and physical distress which may ultimately lead to increased wellness. Expanding our "comic vision" is one way to increase our humorous lifestyle. Comic vision is the ability to perceive the humor around us and begins with discovering what tickles our funny bone. Some of us enjoy jokes or cartoons while others find humor in daily incongruities such as seeing a sign in a store that reads, "Children left unattended will be towed at the owner's expense." Our comic vision expands as we then share our humor with others. Surfing the Internet can be a great adventure to expand our comic vision. Props are a fun way to add humor to your lifestyle. Carry a clown nose for a week and wear it at least once a day. For those of you who prefer a more subtle approach, try wearing a humorous pin or keeping sets of wind-up toys at your work place. A few moments of fun can result in renewed energy and help us deal with frustrating problems. Many novelty shops and toy stores carry a wide assortment of toys and pins for every taste. One of my favorite pins reads, "My check just bounced." Read signs around you and take meanings literally. For example, at the end of a cafeteria line in Vizag I read a sign that stated "We only accept credit cards." I turned to the cashier and said, "I guess I will have to put everything back. I only have cash!" The sign wasn't meant to be funny, but I read it literally, and it became funny (at least to me). By sharing my humor with the cashier, I attempted to lighten her day as well. As for our individual sense of humor, the question is not what is humorous, but what is humorous to us. The healing nature of humor is experienced through your wit, mirth. As we experience wit we intellectually appreciate, understand, and "get" the humor. Wit helps us break up our rigid ways of thinking associated with emotional distress--such as depression, anxiety, and anger--it also helps us to see the world with perspective, thus reducing the impact of the stress around us. Mirth is the experience of uplifting emotions such as joy, pleasure, or inner warmth associated with humor. Distressing emotions and mirth cannot occupy the same psychological space. As we experience mirth, our inner distresses dissolve and a pleasant, sunny spirit takes their place. We know this intuitively as illustrated by someone using humor "instinctively" to reduce another's anger. Many of us have been in a situation where, in the midst of being angry with a friend, our friend uses humor to dispel our emotional intensity. Some of us have even been known to say, "Don't make me laugh! I want to be angry." To end this, well what can we say about the people who by birth are born huffy??? Nothing just laugh and continue laughing.

-D.N.Harshal, 3rd year IT.

Are you a Hyderabadi????

1. Your address reads as 23-404-32/67A-43 (New MCH number 56-678/4A/B-22), while you actually live in the second house beside Zamzam cafe in lane behind Anand Theatre on SP Road.

2. You end up buying only a salwar kameez, whether it is a theatre workshop, food mela, consumer expo, designer jewellery show, science show or an automobile convention.

3. Your street has at least one roadside mobile hotel that serves Chinese delicacies such as "Vegetable soft needles", "Navrotten Kurma", "Chicken Manchurea" or "American Chompsee".

4. Your answer is 'seedha chale jao' when somebody asks you for directions,whether it is to Malakpet, Masab Tank, Malkajgiri or Moosapet.

5. You come across tailors sporting the board: Immidiot delivery in two days onli.

6.You can speak Hindi, Urdu, hyderabadi hinglish, except Telugu, fluently.

7.You ask the waiter to get you some 'Mango pickle' even if you are sitting at a lavish continental banquet dinner with exotic Chinese, Mexican,Italian and Lebanese cuisines.

9. You order for a tea just after having had a Caramel custard.

10. You have at least one Srinivas, Prasad, Raju or Venkatesh within six square feet. OR you have at least one cousin, friend, colleague or acquaintance with these names.

11. You have at least one cousin, friend, colleague or acquaintance in the US in software.

12. Everytime somebody gives you a piece of good news, the first thing you ask them is 'Party kab hain?'

13. Refer to any past as 'parso', be it yesterday or long before three hundred years.

14. You call 11 AM as subah subah.

15. You label your boss as 'Dimakh Kharab'

16. You are 15 minutes late and you feel you are on time.

17. You look at the fixed price stand and still ask 'dene ka bolo'

18. You are reading this and secretly admitting that you are, after all, a true blue Hyderabadi.

And realize: Once a Hyderabadi, always a Hyderabadi

- Mahinder 2/4 Mech

My perspective on “Perspective”

Perspective, though, one of the many English words, seems to hold profound importance when we start analyzing human nature. Though abstract, perspective can be defined as the way a person sees the world around him judges its faults and virtues and makes decisions. A person's perspective personifies itself in his choices, prejudices, outlook and decisions. Technically, it is a self-set standard, relative to which, he understands the world around him. It develops depending on his upbringing, experiences he has been through or simply, his whims.

Perspective provides an explanation for the nuances of human nature. It is crucial in one's understanding of God and religion. It justifies why, Hitler, a tyrant and a mass murderer, was to his fellow Nazis, a patriot who was cleansing the earth. It is an answer to why a few think Harry Potter is overrated while a few feel it is great.

Be it a family squabble or a World War, they are nothing but consequences of conflicts of perspectives. Didn't the poor Hitler start of a World War just because no one seemed to agree with his perception of an Aryan world? I can hardly comprehend why two of my best friends always start arguing about who is better, Amisha or Bipasha? The argument usually includes a full evaluation of the two stars. You could bet they have never heard about beauty being in the eyes of the beholder. Parents and children quarrel over which is a better career option among GATE, CAT and GRE because they hardly see each others points of view. The father feels GATE means a secure and well-paid job at home, while the son finds GRE & USA appealing.

Though having firm conviction is suggestive of individuality, we need to develop a wider, positive and flexible perspective to be a better and a wiser person. The day we begin to accept that others also have their own viewpoints, which are definitely different from what we hold - it makes us loving children, understanding friends, cooperative team members and leaders with a humane touch. This acceptance of others' views imparts a positive attitude to our outlook in life which helps us remain unfazed, by giving us hope in tough times - tough times which will never last but will make a tough person last.

Think this is too much of ink wasted on a single word - perspective? Well, I attribute that to your perspective.

Technology – Not Guilty

Sometimes fueled by need and at times by pure curiosity, technological pursuit has led to many path breaking discoveries and inventions over the centuries, inventions that have made man’s life better by improving his life span, speed of transportation, and communication and his understanding of life around. Technology has crowned the man unchallenged Czar of earth and in the due process, has become so indispensable to an extent that life without comforts provided by it is unimaginable. But for all this, technology and its advance have faced more obstacles and criticism than was their due.

Pollution was called the child of technological advancement, while loss of life in disasters like Chernobyl and Bhopal gas tragedy undermined the very cause of science. Crashes of The Concorde and The Challenger threatened to end their respective projects while zeppelins altogether crashed into oblivion. But, it was Hiroshima and Nagasaki that gave chance for science to be disparaged by many as another modern day evil.

Honestly, loss of life and ecological balance is not justified even if it serves a greater purpose but is technology really blameworthy of all it has been accused of? No. How can technology be guilty when it is a mere lump of clay in the hands of man, waiting to be molded? – a soul pristine and untouched by malice, which can be either a humane or an evil mind. Yes, it is the human who decides whether an innovation will be a benediction or a curse, for isn’t it man’s lust for domination and revenge that led to a Hiroshima and his carelessness and greed that gave birth to pollution.

Notwithstanding all the undeserved accusations leveled against it, technology still condones humanity and continues to serve it. It progresses, bettering our comprehension of life around and will never be fettered as long as man’s curiosity gets the better of him.