Ritvik Mandyam Citizen Matters, Blogs

Teenager Flicks

May 12, 2017 Ritvik Mandyam

Last February, Marvel destroyed all their carefully set precedents by making a movie that the fans actually wanted to see: Deadpool. Deadpool was one of those movies that you had to be 18 to watch

In Defense of the Code…

April 7, 2017 Ritvik Mandyam

I’ve been writing code for a while now. I first learned to program at age nine, and can now write an entire app on my own. The thing I’ve noticed, though, is that a lot

Around five months ago, I started working out in an attempt to look less like a non-green version of Shrek from the movies. I stopped eating cheese, butter, sugar, chips, fries and everything else that

‘Subjective’ education

January 3, 2017 Ritvik Mandyam

I’ve been thinking about our education system a lot (again) lately. Mainly, I’ve been trying to figure out what it is, exactly, that I dislike about it. After much introspection (read: “Ten minutes of trying

Wrestling the Box Office

December 27, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

On Friday evening, I went with my parents to watch Dangal, the new Aamir Khan movie. There have been a lot of videos floating around Facebook lately of Aamir Khan’s “transformation” for the movie –

An Artifact of History

December 5, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

Here’s an interesting story: in 1849, under the treaty of Lahore, a certain diamond was taken from India and moved to England. The diamond, originally known as the ‘Samantik Mani’, is still quite legendary. It

The Donald

October 10, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

A few months ago, on my other blog, I wrote a post about Donald Trump, making less-than-gentle fun of the man. At the time, he didn’t seem like much of a threat. I was fairly

The Learning Game

May 16, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

I’m sure all of us have read a fair number of posts about the negative effects of gaming (it promotes violence and a desire to drag people out of their cars and beat them up,

Tales from the South Side

April 12, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

Hello, all. I apologize for my long absence (I vanish way too regularly, don’t I?). I’ve been a bit busy with things like my board exams. However, I am now back, although my skills (as

Where Knowledge Is Free

February 24, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

I don’t know how many of you have ever had to switch schools in tenth grade and/or have kids who switched schools in tenth grade. If you have, I think you’ll agree with me when

1K:) (And why I’ve been AWOL for two weeks)

January 18, 2016 Ritvik Mandyam

Hello all! After a two-week hiatus, I’m finally back at the old stand and churning out blogs again. I’ve had my pre-board exams for the past two weeks, so between studying for them and wishing

Will you help me bring smiles to a thousand faces?

December 28, 2015 Ritvik Mandyam

This week, I intend to have a stab at one of the most difficult tasks known to mankind: persuading an adult to part with a sum of money. Not a very large sum, but a

Life, the Universe and Auto Drivers

December 12, 2015 Ritvik Mandyam

In quite a few of my previous blogs (I don’t remember if those blogs were here or at Funny Side Up), I’ve referred to conversations with auto and cab drivers. Generally, these have been in

Game theory

November 19, 2015 Ritvik Mandyam

When you saw a teenager glued to a video game, did you think, “That kid is going to make seven million bucks!” That’s what people like Felix Kjellberg (PewDiePie) and Sean McLoughlin (Jacksepticeye) are making

The race for superiority

October 19, 2015 Ritvik Mandyam

What will it take to accept people for who they are? Image Courtesy: www.facebook.com/TRRAIN Have you ever noticed how we Indians tend to accuse everyone else of being racist while conveniently ignoring our very own

Articles by Ritvik Mandyam