Thoughts of a 17-year-old Indian

It's that time of the year again. Every body's scrambling for their books to study. The bright ones take it with casual ease, while the slackers struggle to cope with the massive syllabus. As my friends and everyone around me move with worried expressions and exam frenzy, i wonder whether they realize that the Mid-terms or the Quarterly Examination as we call it, marks the end of our last year in school. Only 6 more months to go for college or whatever plans we have after school. So I sat and thought about it. Do I really regret leaving school? I'm surprised at the answer i come up with. 12 years of education in the same school and i realize I WANT to go. Move on to bigger, better things. Not only that, these last two years leave a bitter taste in my mouth. They weren't exactly the 'fun filled years' that high school kids in other countries(or even cities, in my case) enjoy. They were mostly dreary, study-24x7-and-still-cant-get-a-good-grade years. And I've

The age of computers. That's what they call our generation. With every home having a computer, one knows how to operate a PC before learning to read and write properly. So, it's quite obvious that kids know how to use a computer and inevitably, the internet. In such a situation, it's reasonable that parents should be concerned about the safety of their children. After all, there are a lot of harmful stuff on the net like viruses and stuff that can affect the computer and worse, even things that can harm a child mentally. I'm sure you all have heard about many children being kidnapped by a guy they met on the net. Chatting with unknown people, accidentally inducing viruses into the PC(or laptop), porn, etc. are a few of the many dangers of the virtual world we call 'the net'. But does all this warrant the measures which parents everywhere have taken? Newspapers like Chennai Times actually advise parents on how to keep 'tabs' on kids!The nerve of them! And

It's the start of another year and the annual Mylapore Festival came around! If there was ever a more busier week in Mylapore, I'd like to ask when. Huge stalls of food varieties(idlis, dosas, vadais and such)were piled everywhere, with people having leaf plates in their hands and eating them. The coffee i had was simply superb. It was a funda time for students as well, so many of them were there with their friends. It seemed the whole of Mylapore had come together to celebrate this one week and the result was astounding. But let's talk about the other stuff there as well. Not only food, but a lot of stalls happened to have marudhani(henna) designing, small artefacts were sold and many other curiosities as well. The Mylapore Festival is not only a time where people come and eat food at cheap rates, but it's also a cultural show. Many dance programmes, awareness plays and other forms of entertainment were provided throughout the week. I happened to see an art contest whe