Lights. Camera. RCNM.

Situation at hand - Those of us who had Economics in high school are very familiar with the concept of 'substitutes'. That is, if I cannot get A then I am happy to stick to B. The most widely used example when we explained 'substitutes' in our exam papers was the so-called alternative between tea and coffee. If the price of coffee beans goes up, we wrote, it's not a problem at all -- we just buy some more tea bags and get on with our lives! The Back-story -  After two years of college, which I can safely say were the most caffeine-intensive days of my short life, I can't help but question this concept, because when your assignment is due in eight hours and you've written exactly three words, will a cup of tea do the job? Or when you're having a laid-back hangout with friends after dinner, who wants to gulp down black coffee and stay up all night? So here was the clincher: are tea and coffee really substitutes? And which one do you prefer? N...

As young boys we were all very fascinated by the creepy ghost stories. Every camping trip from our school had this one occasion when some guy would narrate us a ghost story or some other scary incident which he either recalled or made up. We would all huddle around him and listen to him carefully, trying to soak in the supernatural aura created by the story. It was all in good humor, only, not on that night. The night was rife and we were all set for a story. Our bus was about to leave in the next hour on our our journey back home. We had early dinners during our camping trips and hence we were all stuffed. We all huddled up in a small tent and a torch was passed on to the guy who was going to narrate the incident. He began his story, ironically in the way all fairytales begin.  " Once upon a time, there was a small village of poor farmers. They were harassed by the local landlord for money. The landlord used his influence and muscle power to acquire more land. H...

'Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering,  fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before!'   - Edgar Allan Poe. Which is the foremost thought darkness evokes in your mind?- Fear? Batman?  Nothingness? Emptiness? Vampires? Ghosts? Werewolves? Dracula? It is self- evident that darkness has always been associated with all the negative things in the world. As a kid, I never used to enter a dark room alone, not because I was afraid, but because of the never ending void it created within me. But as I grew, I equated darkness with fear. I'm quite sure most of us have a similar story to tell. But there is a lot more to this never-ending expanse of nothingness.            There is an age-old saying which goes ' the night is darkest before dawn'. It is in these dark times that a person encounters his innermost fears and desires as well! The void that darkness creates inside us makes ...