On the pleasures of Internet in Bombay
Who says the art of letter writing is dead?
—– Message —–
From: Manish
To: Amit et al
Dear friends,
Now that my dialup connection is working at a quarter its usual, blazing 3 KB/s speed, it’s freed up loads of time for me to develop my hobbies. For example, in the time it took me to send this email, I learned the art of bonsai, the war strategies of Dronacharya and Clausewitz and the complete works of Milton and Donne, especially the parts about Hell. Ha ha! Why no, there’s no relation, why do you ask?
Your loving friend,
Manish
—– Message —–
From: Amit
To: Manish
Dear Manish
I can understand your delight. In my pre-broadband days, when I used my Hutch GPRS, I read the entire works of Shakespeare while logging into Gmail. In three languages. I also copied out the Ramayana on a grain of rice and knitted a blanket that could cover my entire family. (All the way to ninth cousins.)
Sadly, my internet speed is now blazing fast, and I do not even get time to read the newspaper. How I envy you!
The very warmest of regards
Amit
—– Message —–
From: Manish
To: Amit
Dear Amit,
I do not wish to keep my good fortune to myself for that would be selfish of me and bad for our great nation. Accordingly, when I next see you I shall surreptitiously snip your DSL cable so that you may return to your thespian knitting ways. No need to thank me. I am only being a true friend.
Wishing my pleasures upon your soul,
Manish
—– Message —–
From: Another friend
You see, you’re approaching this all wrong. India has a surplus of labor and a shortage of capital, so you need to substitute one for the other. Hire a team of street urchins to run back and forth to a faster location and read your output to you, one word at a time. To make sure they’re getting it right, implement checksums in the data stream. This sneakernet will probably work faster than your cellular network, and employ many more people besides.
on Sunday, March 4th, 2007, 11:50 pm in Bombay, Humor, Tech › 
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Very funny. You should have more posts like this. Its rare to find good tech humor: one needs to understand both tech and humor. I don’t need to tell you how rare that is ;).
Heh!
pahahahahahaha. hilarious!!!!
This is funny but very true….I agree that thanks to broadband and wireless, I find myself on the internet at all kinds of times and all kinds of places…..the article on the the computer in bed in the NY Times some time back comes to mind! ;)
And this, while convenient and easy, has its negatives …and I do not get as of other things not done - like reading, hobbies, etc…., not to mention ending up upseting my SO often for being online all the time.
That said… I will never go back to dial-up and hope I never have to :)
I need to proof-read …grr! Sorry!
Damn…what timing. She is mandating no broadband in the house when we move…. little blessings - connections are not being snipped or cut off right away! But going by what Manish wrote to Amit, looks like she is only being a good friend and only has good intentions at mind.
Hah! When two of my favorite bloggers in action, whether it’s knitting of blogging, fun comes… most assuredly, my dear Nabobs
WOW.. very phunny
very funny..
its great that u find humor in such problems in India..great attitude Manish..
I felt the same last time when I was in India.. gave up checking emails..cant believe India produces best soft ware minds in the world and yet has such slow internet system,…probably too much population and too many people on internet..