Life at Large Reynolds Numbers

==========================================================================

I may often sound bitchy about America and Americans but it is not true.

The only thing I have about it is that it is a childish civilization; it is like Ishani (nearly 2) to me (nearly 70) on a logarithmic scale...200 odd years of the US compared with 5000 odd of India. I can't cope with Ishani's physical vigor. I can't run after her. I have to constantly devise guileful mental games to keep her at one place and fascinated.

America is a vast continent...five or more times than our subcontinent. But its culture is all black and white like Ishani's Chota Bheem stories...good vs evil and finally the good wins, Ishani smiling and clapping when the big bad bully is busted. But every thing about India is in technicolor.

Listen to RKN in "India and America":

"...The quality of life in India is different. Despite all the deficiencies, irritations, lack of material comforts and amenities, and general confusions, Indian life builds inner strength. It is through subtle, inexplicable influences, through religion, family ties and human relationships in general...let us call them 'inputs', to use a modern term...which cumulatively sustain and lend variety and richness to existence..."

I have had uniformly excellent contacts with those half a dozen American academicians during my 4 decades at KGP. They were all so kind, and not patronizing.

When I was just a kid of 25, the book by E M Purcell: "E&M" (Vol 2 of Berkeley Physics Series) fascinated me. I bought a cheap paperback and taught portions of it...it was a perfect complement to Feynman Vol 2. And I wanted a Solutions Manual (if one existed) and wrote to Purcell on a wafer-thin Aerogramme with the IIT KGP insignia and forgot all about it. Within a few weeks I got an Air Mail packet from Purcell himself, with the 'from' and 'to' addresses in his own hand. How did I know? Inside the packet there was a 'mimeographed' booklet with the Solutions in Purcell's own hand. How did I know? On page one, he wrote a nice 'best wishes' and signed it.

My joy knew no bounds. Not just that he was an NL...I had read, during my Post-M Sc stint at my University, the path-breaking BPP Paper of 1948.

Anyway, here is a unique paper by him dedicated to Weiskopf:

http://jila.colorado.edu/perkinsgroup/Purcell_life_at_low_reynolds_number.pdf

It is titled "Life at Low Reynolds Numbers". I enjoyed it thoroughly when it appeared in AJP in 1977. Oh, well, it is about situations when a thing has to move fighting slow in a turgid heavily viscous medium...typically the thing whose single-minded swimming you and I needed for our creation {;-}

************************************************************************************************************

That brings me to the title of this post: the exact opposite...life in the highly turbulent Hyderabad traffic.

This morning I suddenly decided to go to my book binder at Khairatabad, 25 km away, and collect some books I gave for binding last Saturday. I was in no mood to call a cab for the to and fro journey which would cost Rs 1200; or my favorite autowala who would run to me by a 'missed call'..he would charge Rs 500.

I decided not to drive down in my Maruti due to the perennial parking problem in the area. And I just can't walk on those busy roads without the hint of any pedestrian sidewalks...they are all occupied by thela gadis.

So, I asked my son to drop me in the chaurastha of the Hi-Tec City on his way to his office; which he gladly did.

The famed X Roads don't have cabs, nor 'singleton' autos...all they have are 'share' autos. I have no problem, because with my gray hair, even the ladies in 'hoods with double slits' don't object to my being squeezed between them...they don't know that 70 is the most dangerous age for girls...ask Maugham...

Anyway the auto picked up and dropped at least half a dozen customers on my way to Ameerpet...beyond which they are not allowed. The chap charged me Rs 15.

I took a cup of Irani chai. And I didn't want to climb up and then down a lofty ROB (that is Road Over Bridge for you). So, I asked a 'singleton' auto to take me the other way and go to Khairatabad Colony taking a U-Turn. He wanted to go by meter...he thought I was a novice! After some haggling, he came down from Rs 50 to Rs 25.

After picking up my books and buying a few sweetmeats for Ishani (Bandar Laddus if you want to know) and some dresses, I took another 'singleton' auto @ Rs 15 to the MMTS Station (that is Multi-Modal Transport System..big name for what Bengalis call EMU..not the running Australian bird but Electric Multiple Unit).

That was the most pleasant part of the journey...the ticket is Rs 4 (four only) for a 25 km ride... India at a glance...with urchins singing their hearts out for a 'penny' and me with a hand firmly on my wallet-pocket...

I got down at Chandanagar; and another auto for Rs 20 and I was home...

The total cost was: Rs 15 + 25 + 15 + 4 + 20 = 59 (Seventy Nine only)

But what a pleasure!...RKN would have loved it...particularly because it was me all alone most of the way, to contemplate whatever pensioners contemplate....




==========================================================================