V for Spirit

This post is part of the Chennai Bloggers Club’s CBC VIBGYOR BLOG TAG where some of us will write a post on the colours of VIBGYOR each day starting 1st of September to the 7th of September.


When the idea was put forth on CBC, I wanted to write up something that I firmly believe in - the freedom to be yourself, no matter what !! Letting the mind wander, I settled on the most obvious choice - the Rainbow flag for the LGBT movement. A firm believer in equality, I am of the opinion sexuality is one's personal choice, not something to be judged by others.

I intend to use this blog tag to give some insight into the Pride movement, hoping to raise some awareness among all of us.

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Originally flown for the first time at the San Fransisco pride movement in 1978, the flag has undergone a lot of changes over time, mainly due to the non-availability of a few of the colored fabric. The San Fransisco gay community adopted the rainbow flag with much fanfare, particularly in the wake of the assassination of the openly gay supervisor Harvey Milk (remember the movie Milk?) Thirty volunteers actually hand dyed and stitched the flag for the San Fransisco pride movement.

Although the original flag consisted of 8 colors (the VIBGYOR plus pink), the color pink was dropped later, mainly due to its non-availability for mass production. Over the years, the rainbow flag has become the symbol for the pride movement all over the world. Each year, many cities across the world (and our very own Indian cities as well) celebrate the Pride March with much fanfare and gala. At each of these parades, the rainbow flag forms a very important element.


The color violet signifies SPIRIT.

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What's in a spelling

Inspired by Bragadeesh's post here about the troubles his name gave him, here I am, sharing my (mis)experiences with how my name is spelt.

PRASHANTH - Its as simple as that. 9 characters that's all. Nothing more, nothing less.

But over the years, how has my name transformed? Here goes:

Prasanth (most common)
Prasand (seriously? D?)
Prasath (Oh dear God !!)
Prashant (how much trouble is it to add a H in the end?)
Prasant (yeah, now take away that one H as well)
Prasad (how? Seriously, how?)
Prasan (does that even make sense?)
Prason (yeah, this is heights !!)
Prashan (ah, that's one H back)

Thankfully, my last name is a lot more common, so it has just one variance - Asok (again, the H is left out). I have just one question. What do you have against H? Is it too difficult to even type?

The irony here is, people pronounce it properly. The 'Sh' doesn't become 'S' when pronouncing. Then, why miss out when writing? What did the H do to gain so much of wrath? Poor H !

Please don't leave the H out. That's only my favorite letter of my name.

A-Z Singapore : I for Istana

Istana is the official residence of the President of Singapore; well the Rashtrapathi Bhawan equivalent of the country.

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Located along the ever busy Orchard Road (the shopping capital of Singapore), Istana is wholly surrounded by beautiful gardens and a lush green surrounding.

Although it is the ceremonial residence of the President, no President has ever lived there. It is mostly used for state functions, to receive visiting dignitaries and also houses the offices of the Prime Minister and his cabinet.

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Careless; callous; - where are we headed?

The video says it all.

A-Z of Singapore - H for Haze

This is perhaps the most apt entry for this post, something live, something concurrent

Every year, around the dry season (June - October), farmlands in neighbouring Indonesia are burnt down to pave way for palm oil planting. Around this time, the farmers practice the traditional slash and burn way of clearing the farmlands and this causes a rise in pollution levels in Singapore

Over the past few days, the whole of Singapore has been covered in smog and last two days since, it has risen to intolerable, like there's a mass Ganapathi Homam going on, as someone joked

All around, you can see people sporting swanky masks, with fancy names like N95 and so on, that I really got to wondering if this was the case when SARS hit the island big time ten years back.Almost every person on the streets has been wearing one and when you don't wear one, you feel a little out of place. No, seriously

While diplomatic tensions between both countries has escalated and some sort of a blame game is being played, the lovely Singaporeans go out of their way to help one another, distributing free masks being one of the many ways

The Pollution Index soared up to its highest ever (401) yesterday, with that being categorized as hazardous to live in, if sustained. But thankfully, it has been coming down and right now, as I am typing this, everything seems clear outside.

Lets hope the problem doesn't last long

CBC : Six Word Memoir

The following is a part of Chennai Bloggers Club Six word memoir tag where one runs a quick rewind on his/her life and comes up with a simple yet totipotent sentence having just six words that reflects on his/her journey

After much deliberation, I come up with this, something that I firmly believe in.

A choosy pessimist with perennial optimism

I thank Sriram Acharya for passing the baton on to me. Sriram blogs here and calls himself a "A Son, a brother, a friend, a HR professional , a science aficionado. In their respective order of importance !"

I now pass on the journey to dear friend Vid who blogs here. Vid is an amazing singer, I vouch for that. In fact, her dad is a great singer too. You should definitely hear her sing classical music. What a mesmerizing voice the girl has. I also like her blog's theme and design. She calls it the Pensieve, I am sure she was inspired by Dumbledore using it. But why don't you check out for yourself?

55 fiction - The One Night Stand

Two bodies became one, entwined. As we passionately made love, the whole night seemed eternal. Positions interchanged, over and over again. We never seemed to wear out. Six months apart can do wonders. One final time, we came together. For, he had to go away again. "Happy birthday, love", he said, drifting off to sleep.

A-Z of Singapore - G for Geylang

When I decided to take up the A-Z, I knew what I was going to write up for G. The choice was pretty obvious. G for Geylang - the red light district of Singapore.

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Initially built on reclaimed land to build a commercial airport during the British days, Geylang has seen much transformation since. Current day Geylang road has been built in a strategic manner. The main road is divided into North and South sections (called Lorong, in Malay). The beauty of this road is it retains the colonial style buildings, cramped one right next to another

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While during the day time, Geylang looks like any other place, with people carrying on with their usual day jobs, come night (more specifically post 10 PM), the area completely transforms itself to what some may term paradise.

Although prostitution is legal, related activities including public solicitation are not. Various spas and massage centres do exist, that cater to various needs.

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That said, people here sure do know how to enjoy life - something we really must learn from Singaporeans, how exactly to enjoy

A-Z of Singapore - F for Flyer

So, Singapore wanted its own EYE. Much like London. Some even say the island wanted to compete with Britain. Thus came about the Singapore Flyer.

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So this gigantic wheel is located along the Singapore river, overlooking most of the traditional tourist places of Singapore - like the famous Marina Bay Sands, Gardens By the Bay etc.

Airconditioned capsules that rotate as slow as an ant can accomodate close to 30 people and an entire round takes about 40 minutes. The idea is, as your capsule rotates, you get different views of Singapore, but since it rotates very slowly, that isn't always the case. Although, I must admit that it is definitely a feast for real photographers and self-proclaimed ones as well.

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One must definitely get to see the Flyer at night. Towering over the skyline, the blue lights of the flyer are a visual treat and makes you wonder how brilliant these Singaporeans are, with construction. 

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What's interesting is one of these capsules has a small make-shift restaurant which can be used for "romantic dates", as a friend puts. I haven't had the chance to go on such a date, but if I do, I would definitely share my experience.


Until then !!

-Prashanth Ashok

Modern Healthcare - touching lives

Over the last two decades, the healthcare industry has undergone radical transformations. Just like any other field, medicine has been no exception to adapting to technological drive. Indeed, the usage of technology for medicinal purposes has just risen manifold. The latest addition perhaps is open-source medicine where open source software tools are used in hospitals and labs. While it is no surprise that the US and Europe are leading this race, Asian countries - particularly countries like India, Singapore and China are catching up pretty fast. Of course, for these countries, it is only natural to be part of the race, considering their stronghold on Information Technology and its services. Apollo Hospitals in India certainly is one of the pioneers to tackle complex medical problems with the effective use of IT. 

My post on this topic comes out of personal experience. Five years ago, I visited Germany as part of an internship program. I worked in a biomedical research company there, where I was part of a team that developed an application to detect the presence of cancer. So, this lab treats cervical cancer among women. Until then, tissues and samples were processed onto a microscope and analyzed manually by experts. Needless to say, this was prone to human error. The lab, thus decided to automate the whole process.

So, the idea was to take these slides, digitize them by transferring onto the computer. These cell images would then be subject to various image processing algorithms. On level one, all background information would be removed, leaving only the actual cells. On level two, cell borders would be identified. Moving further, a split algorithm would be applied to try and separate individual bunch of cells. After this, a watershed segmentation would be applied to separate individual cells among a bunch. This is very tricky, since no part of the cell image (that being actual samples from the body) should not be lost, as this would then prove to be utterly pointless to analyze. The last level is sending these processed images to a system that uses Neural network and Artificial Intelligence techniques to actually detect the presence of cancer.

I was involved in the first four phases of the project, the most critical ones. This involved a lot of research on the Internet about both Mathematical/computer related algorithms as well as biological concepts. Now, that proved quite difficult, but was informative nonetheless. More than anything, it made me realize the actual potential of such a vital aspect of medicine.

What I have explained above is merely one particular idea being explored. Tons and tons of such research is being carried on worldwide even as I type. Scientists and technologists are working in parallel to expand the reach of IT into medicine to ensure effective treatment. This gains prominence in the wake of the emerging medical tourism industries.

The purpose of healthcare is quite simply to ensure everyone's wellbeing. Gone are days when primitive or not-so-developed facilities actually resulted in lack of healthcare welfare for the needy. I personally have experienced losing a really close family member due to non-availability of the right treatment. I have also heard of successful treatments which have saved a person's life. Critiques always argue about the demerits of the use of technology. However, breakthroughs are proving them wrong. Everyday, we read of success stories about how a patient's life was saved due to timely use of technological expertise. Such stories are always heartening, at the same time, putting faith in the use of technology in the healthcare industry.

The journey traversed is fairly small, the path sure has been difficult, but the journey ahead is going to be a lot more challenging and the path all the more difficult. Yet, the final goal is crystal clear. On that note, I would like to reaffirm my firm belief that modern day healthcare, with the usage of technology, would go a long way in enriching and enhancing the lives of people

- Prashanth

(This post is written as part of contest titled How does Modern Healthcare touch lives organized jointly by Apollo Hospitals and Indiblogger.)