Geminian's Odyssey

The Tally Lesson

2010-06-21T19:50:00.000+05:30

I had a bit of an adventure wanting to learn how to use the accounting application called Tally. I tried all ways to pick it up. The first thing I did was to get Tally installed in the system. Then I picked up a book that described how to work with Tally. Then I spoke to my cousin who had learnt it to help me out & give me some ideas. I also collected a book from her, which also helped me understand. Despite all these efforts I was not able to put it to use.

Thus began my attempts to learn it from some coaching classes. I finally found one near home. They charged me Rs 1500 for a week long program. I paid up, took a receipt & started the lessons. The course was being taught not by any experienced person but by a young girl, who was definitely younger to me & not having much work experience as such. She just knew the basics of what to do on Tally, how to create a company & how to create ledgers. I knew that already.

I went with the flow though & like a dedicated student did whatever I was told. I finished whatever was asked of me well in advance. And within a few minutes I was told that, that is all there is really to learn in Tally. I was disappointed no doubt. I thought paying up for this learning wasn’t really the idea. The teacher too understood that I knew these things already and was being very empathetic about it. She sat next to me & as softly as she could speak asked me why I had joined the course if I knew this already. I said I thought there is more to it. If I had known that this is all that was to be taught, then I wouldn’t have taken it up.

She reasoned with me & finally understood fully that it was really not needed for me to do the course. She said she would arrange for the money to be reimbursed and asked me take it & leave quietly before the institute owner could find out what had happened. I thought that was a very sweet & understanding gesture on her part, for I don’t know which institute would reimburse the fees taken from a student.

I was only happy to pocket my money once again & thanked my luck for it coming back in. So in that one day, I paid for the Tally course, learnt Tally (things which I already knew) and then got my course fee reimbursed.

I had to wait for some more weeks before our Auditor sat down with me & taught me how to put Tally to use.

Stars

2009-11-21T10:56:00.001+05:30

A few days back there was a news clip in the paper. It said that there was going to be a meteor shower in a part of Bangalore. Reading this clip I was reminded of a similar instance many years ago. It was pretty big news then. It was there in every newspaper & on every news channel. I was also very excited about the meteor shower & was expecting the sky to explode in some kind of natural fireworks display. I remember lying down on my terrace & looking up at the sky for many minutes only to be disappointed. It didn’t happen. Or if it did it wasn't visible from my terrace. Due to this experience I ignored the recent news clip of a meteor shower.

The sky has never attracted me much. I am not one of those star gazers or somebody who is interested in spotting planets or other celestial objects in the sky. But one thing has been very special to me ever since I got to see it. A clear star lit night sky. It’s a very beautiful sight indeed. It is very unfortunate I must say that spotting stars in the Bangalore sky is not a possibility. May be it’s the pollution that’s the cause, but apart from a few here & there its really not possible to see a proper star lit sky.

However I have been lucky to see it in other places. Most of these were during treks. One time we were coming out of Om Beach. It was late in the night. It was dark & there were no lights around. It was then that someone looked up & saw what a beautiful sight it was. Thousands of stars could be spotted. Some bright, some not so, some small & some others big. The setting was very romantic. The sea, the darkness & the stars above.

Another instance was during our Brahmagiri trek. We were stationed at Narimale Base Camp. And one night when we went hunting for some wood to light up a bonfire, we could see the night sky. Another time about a year ago when we were on our way to Coorg, we had stopped at the Nagarhole forest gate to open. Here sitting in the vehicle we didn’t know what a sight it was outside. Only when we stepped out did we see the stars shining in the sky. Everybody there was excited to see that sight. I think most of the crowd was from Bangalore.

There is a certain indescribable feeling about this, a feeling that fills your heart with joy & probably even makes u smile. It’s something that one has to experience. I sometimes wonder how many of us really have time for such natural wonders in today’s fast paced world. I wish I could see this every night from my terrace.

The first night (part 2)

2009-11-13T11:14:00.000+05:30

He rode behind the auto. The girl knew he was following the auto. But didn’t repeat the same mistake she had done of peeping out of the auto to confirm.

After about 4 odd kms & many turns the auto stopped. The girl hesitated a bit to get off. She decided to pay the auto driver from inside & after doing so scanned the place around. There was no one. She had stopped in front of a 7 storey apartment building. The main gate to the building was closed. The watchman was not in sight. Probably he was asleep in his little nook on one side of the gate, she thought.

She walked to the gate still very conscious of being watched by the guy. The guy of course was right behind. She finally turned around & gave him a look. He looked blankly at her. She approached the gate & learnt that it was locked. She could see that the watchman was sleeping in his nook. She shook the gate a bit so that it could make some sound. Unfortunately the gate hardly made any noise whatever it did make was very faint & didn’t shake the watchman up even a bit. She went closer to the side where the watchman was sleeping & called out not very loudly, “Watch man”. No luck.

She tried again & again, but the watchman was in deep sleep it seemed. The auto had left by now. She was at the gate. The guy on the bike stood watching every move of hers from a distance. She felt scared for the first time. She didn’t understand why this guy had followed her. She began to wonder may be it was a mistake to take a lift from him. With the watchman also not responding & the gate locked, she began to panic. So much so that tears welled in her eyes. She couldn’t believe what a horrible night it was turning out to be for her.

She tried again, “watchman”. This time a bit louder. But there was no response from him. She broke down. She cried. The watchman didn’t hear sob. But the guy on the bike did. He got off from his bike & walked to her. She couldn’t see it but she could feel him approaching. The guy just walked up, stood next to her & said loudly enough, “Hey watchman. Wake up. Hello…..”

She just noticed all this. She could see from the corner of her eye what this guy was doing. Strangely the fact that he just walked up & tried to wake up the watchman seemed to calm her down a bit. Suddenly she didn’t seem to panic anymore.

The guy looked around, he saw some loose stones fallen about. He picked a good nice one & aimed it at the watchman’s legs. He hit his target but the watchman didn’t move.

“May be the bugger is drunk”, he said.

“May be”, she agreed.

“Why don’t you call somebody at home, they can come down & wake up the watchman may be.” He told her.

“I can’t do that” she said.
“Why” he asked

“I just can’t”. She offered irritated.

“So what do you plan to do then” he asked

“Why do you care? I don’t know what I’ll do. May be just wait here all night till this drunk fellow wakes up or whatever yaaaa. Why are you here by the way?”

Her tone in the beginning was of anger then towards the end it was calm. She thought it was best to talk nicely & get rid of this fellow. So that then she can decide how to deal with the night.

“I just thought I could help” he clarified.

“Oh help” she said & sighed. She then shook her head, put her right hand on the forehead, looked up & did a shake of the head again. Obviously she didn’t know what to say. Many moments passed like that. He just stood there waiting to see what she would say or do & she just stood waiting to think of some way to get rid of this guy. She couldn’t think of how to react. In frustration she went over and sat down at the footpath, covered her face with her hands & put it down on her lap.

Many moments later she looked up. The guy was resting against his bike. What struck her more was that it was suddenly very dark there. She looked around a bit & soon understood what had happened. There was a power cut. She looked at the guy again; he was looking at her too. She got up & walked to him. He got alert by that & shifted to a standing position & faced her directly.

“You want to help right, tell me how can you help”, she asked firmly.

“I’ll do what I can surely. Tell me what help you need”

“God”, she said & put her hand to the forehead again & did a small walk around there. “Look” she continued “for now can you take me somewhere, I mean for the night, just go sleep”

Almost as soon as she said it, she changed her mind, “No forget it. No. No. I don’t think I want to do that. I just don’t understand why you are so keen on helping me here. I don’t even know you. I have never seen you. I don’t even know your name. Bad idea. I am sorry. Please forget I said something like that. I am sorry if I gave you ideas that I may need your help or something. Forget it. Just leave. OK…wait… why should you leave, you can stay here if you want…I think I’ll go….”And she began to walk.

He ran after her & stopped her by holding her hand.

“Don’t touch me” she screamed. Tears were rolling down her face & she began to walk faster.

“I am sorry” he said, even as she was walking away.

Food Delights

2009-10-30T10:27:00.001+05:30

There have been times when I have had a chance to eat some awesome food. What makes it all the more interesting is that this has happened in the most unlikely of places. And may be because it happened when I least expected it, that the memories have stayed.

One time, my brother in law & I went riding to my aunts place in Tamil Nadu. We had stopped at a regular Highway restaurant for breakfast. However that happened to be pretty early in the morning & the restaurant only had pongal ready by then. So we ate a plate each & decided to stop by at another place after some more riding. The next stop was some shack in some unknown village. We had stopped to ask directions & saw the place & in unison both of us decided we had to finish the remainder of the breakfast there. A lady there served us idlis, vada, poori & chutney. I must say may be it was the incomplete feeling of having eaten little pongal earlier or the very rural setting or just that the plain good taste of the food we ate, I have recollected & shared this experience quite a few times.

The other thing I can recollect is eating at some dhaba somewhere in Madhya Pradesh. It was a lunch stop. This place was in the middle of somewhere & I remember eating rotis & daal. I liked this meal so much that I have fallen in love with the roti & daal combination since. The daal was cooked just a little spicy & I thought that made it wonderful. Ever since whenever I order rotis & daal I make it a point to tell the waiter that I would like the daal a little spicy. Of course nothing has ever matched that experience yet.

The other thing that comes to mind is a lunch stop on the way to Mandi from Chandigarh. We were traveling in a public bus & the bus had stopped at some dhaba along the way. Again may be it was the hunger or just that the food was great I don’t know, the food was one awesome experience. It consisted of rotis, kadi, papad, rice daal.

A lot of times during our treks we’ve had a chance to savor some amazing local food. I recollect this one time during our beach trek we were staying at a localites house. They had served us rice & fish curry for lunch. This after a good long trek. Could you ask for more? On another trek to Kudremukh, we were once again staying at a local residents house, we were served Akki (rice) rotis for breakfast. They were thick & served with some amazingly spicy chutney. I ate to my hearts content of course sipping water after every other bite of the roti.

There are quite a few like this involving the food. However now I just feel like talking about some liquids I have got to consume. The first that simply has to take the cake is the lassi that I had during our Sarpass Trek. Man, what a trek it was & what moments we had there. Drinking lassi being one of them. We were sitting somewhere near a flowing river & surrounded by snow clad mountains & we had reached this spot after a long trek & some rapelling and here was a lady serving desi lassi. Very tasty & very timely it was. It was pure heaven for sure.

I fell in love with Chaas (Butter Milk) during our Sarpass trek. We drank so much butter milk post the trek that now if it is on the menu I want to have it. Of course no butter milk here in South India can match to what we had there up North. In the South its very watery, whereas its thick in the north, spicy too & simply tasted amazing. However one butter milk experience from down south I would like to talk of. This was also during our beach trek. Our guide Krishna stopped at a small petty shop in a small village. There he bought curds. And requested for water, salt & vessel to mix it all in. We poured that in our water bottles & drank like we were drinking butter milk for the first time.

If you notice all these are very normal regular food. These are not your special food. It’s probably their every day ness & simple good taste that made them special. May be also the very ordinariness of the place we consumed them at. I enjoyed each of these experiences & so eagerly look forward to the next such experience. Hopefully there is more in store.

The old rickshaw puller in Delhi

2009-10-10T12:15:00.000+05:30

I was very excited when I was in Delhi. I finally got to see the places I always wanted to see. I am not sure how many would fancy seeing the Parliament, the Rashtrapati Bhavan or the Red Fort, but I wanted to see it at least once in person and I got to do it when I was in Delhi a few months back. I have some very nice memories of Delhi & our stay there. The primary thing that comes to mind is the food we ate there & then the wide roads that we got to travel on & of course visiting old Delhi & the Chandni Chowk area was an experience.

The one thing I got thinking of suddenly & which eventually made me write this are the rickshaw pullers in Delhi. When we were there we had used their services in the Old Delhi area. I think they are largely found there. These are men of varying ages peddling away in the hot Delhi sun with two or three or sometimes as we actually saw 6 people on board their rickshaw. I like the idea of taking a different form of transport where available, mostly for the experience sake. And the idea of taking a cycle rickshaw ride was very exciting because that is long gone in Bangalore. The excitement lasted only until of course I was aboard one of them. Peddling the rickshaw is a tough task. Most times these guys are only constantly peddling never sitting down on their seat. And unlike your bike or car which u can accelerate again after you have slowed down, picking up speed on a cycle rickshaw after having slowed down is hard work & if the road is steep you can rest assured it will be doubly so.

We took a cycle rickshaw about three times we were there in Delhi. The first time was in the peak afternoon sun. The other two times were in the evening. The first time a young guy was riding it, the second time a middle aged man & finally the third time it was an old man. My first ride in the rickshaw was on a wooden plank kept behind the rickshaw & to sit there, one has to bend down & move himself up through an iron rod bent around the seat. The eventual seating position is such that you get to view all the traffic or people coming behind you, while the rickshaw guy & two other passengers get the front view.

The longest rickshaw ride was the last time we rode it in the evening & when an old man was peddling. The old man looked really old & I felt horrible about the thought that I was comfortably sitting behind when he was peddling away pulling three healthy young adults. He sweated profusely & not once sat down on his seat, this should basically give an idea as to how tough it must have been for him. Most of the other rickshaw guys were overtaking him comfortably. He only peddled on. Somewhere on the way the wheel on the left side got caught in a road crack & the rickshaw wouldn’t move forward. Only after I got off & pushed it a bit did it resume the journey again. A few times I considered getting off & walking but decided against it as it was his livelihood after all & I was glad that even at this old age he had chosen to earn his livelihood the hard way. After having negotiated some tight rickshaw traffic & other vehicles he took us to our destination, the Karims restaurant in Old Delhi. We gave him a bit more than what he had asked for. When we told him, he could keep the change, he smiled & mumbled a thanks. That is when I realized the amount of sweat on his face.

What an irony life is isn’t it? Here we are young, healthy individuals who can walk but wouldn’t because we are tired and there is this old man, old enough to be resting at home, ready to take you in his rickshaw. Some of us ride cycles as a health or environment friendly fad & some others ride it to earn their bread & butter.

An Invite

2009-09-23T16:05:00.002+05:30

Come on let’s get up & go
Walk up to the shore
Hand in Hand relaxed & slow
Talk, Listen, may be more

Sun’s gone down
Sky’s turned yellow & red from blue
Sand’s still brown
I am not lying its all very true

Can you see the ship far away?
And see here, a little boy’s making a sand castle
Look at those palm trees sway
It’s so calm here away from all the hustle & bustle

I love it when I leave my foot prints behind
When I play with the wave & try not getting my feet wet
When some sea shells I find
And wondering if the sky & the water have really met

Come on let’s go let's go
Walk along some more
Hand in Hand relaxed & slow
Talk, Listen, may be more

The first night

2009-09-03T19:03:00.000+05:30

He kick started his bike. The road was wet as it had rained a while back. The late hour also meant there were very few vehicles on the road. He rode the bike slowly. His jacket & gloves kept him warm in that chilly environment. He took a U Turn & approached the spot again.

There were a few people still there. Most of them were huddled together in groups of twos or threes. Drivers waited in their Hondas & Toyotas waiting for their owners to turn up so they could drop them home & retire for the night. Somewhere in this scene a girl sat on the step leading to the theatre. She had been there for a while. She was furiously typing a message on her mobile.

She wiped a tear & got up. She just walked. She seemed disturbed. She didn’t seem to bother about what was happening around her. Somebody had tried to approach her & say a hello may be but didn’t pursue it because she looked like she was in a foul mood. She walked in the front, would stop, then turn around & walk to the step she was sitting on. This she did a few times. Then she started to walk again, this time around though she kept walking. She walked & slowly but surely was getting away from the small crowd of theatre goers.

That is when he spotted her. He was on his bike when he noticed that a girl wearing a black skirt & a black jacket walking away from the theatre. He rode behind her. He had already slowed down a bit. In some time he crossed her. He turned a bit to look at her. She was wiping a tear with the back of her hand. However he felt he had seen her somewhere.

The girl continued to walk not aware at all of being watched. He had slowed down the bike to almost her walking pace, which by the way was a bit fast. He was surprised that she was managing that fast pace in a long heel & on a wet & uneven surface. He turned again to look at her. He had sure seen her somewhere her face looked very familiar. Could she be someone from TV? He had identified a few others from TV in the theatre a while back when he was there. But he couldn’t place her anywhere.

Just then the girl realized a guy on a bike was constantly staring at her. She looked up cautiously at him & started to walk faster. The guy on the bike didn’t catch up with her. But she couldn’t continue with her pace for long & when she had slowed down again he was able again riding the bike along side her.

“What do you want?” she asked him in a firm tone

It seemed to startle the guy a bit. He didn’t know what to say. But he stopped the bike. The girl stopped walking too.

“What do you want?” she repeated and continued “why are you following me?”

“I am not following you” he replied very calmly.

“What is this called then….YOU…..YOU…..what is this called following a girl on a bike… what do you call this…..”, she was losing it for sure.

He went on to reply, “I think I have seen you somewhere, I was just trying to figure out where I have seen you”

“what are you going to do if you figure it out” she queried

“Nothing I guess, but just felt I have seen you somewhere”

“God, I cant believe this is happening to me, first I get ditched then I get stalked”

“Ditched…..Stalked……what are you talking about….” Wondered the boy innocently.

“Look, just do me a favor OK….Stop this right now….alright….If you think you can get away with this, you are wrong…..You have no idea what this means to you…..I am going to walk again now and if I see you following me again, I’ll yell first & then call the police…..”

She didn’t wait for a response. He didn’t give any either. She began to walk. He just stood there & saw her walking away. After some distance she turned right on to a lane & went out of sight. The boy who had continued to sit on his bike, decided to start riding again. When he had gone some distance he noticed that the same girl running back on to the road from the small lane she had taken a while back. After a while he could see two dogs running behind her. He stopped the bike there.

She continued to run as fast as her heels could make her run. But she realized that it would be futile against the dogs. She stopped & noticed that the boy on the bike was still there. She resumed her run towards him. Once she reached him huffing & puffing she told him….

“Could you drop me at the circle further down, I’ll take an auto from there”

He nodded. She hopped on to the bike.

The boy rode away & not a word was spoken till they reached the circle. At the circle they both noticed that there was no auto available. He stopped in one corner. She got off from the bike.

“Thanks. I think I’ll wait & take an auto. You can carry on…” she said to him.

“Are you sure?” he asked her genuinely concerned.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. There are no dogs also here. You go please”

“Where do you have to go? I can drop you there. God knows when you will get an auto here”

“Look boss. Thanks OK. I am fine. I’ll go from here. You leave”

He rode off from there after saying an OK & again asking her to reconsider which was only received by a firm “No thanks” from the girl.

The girl stood there. There was no auto in sight. There were a few cars that went past. When ever it did she would turn away from the road & look somewhere else. After a few more minutes of waiting, an auto came into sight. She flagged it down. Told the auto driver where she wanted to go & got into it. The auto sped away.

When they went some distance the girl noticed that the bike boy had stopped at a corner and was talking on his mobile. She peeped out of the auto to see if it was the same guy. This act seemed to alert the boy too and he noticed the girl looking at him from the auto.

“I’ll call you back in a while” he said & cut the call. Hurriedly he put the phone in his pocket & started to follow the auto.

Paper less – The future

2009-08-25T10:15:00.000+05:30

Recently I walked up to the front door on hearing the door bell. A courier guy handed over the Credit Card statement letter to me. But just before doing so he put in front of me a mobile type instrument he was holding. I ignored that & took the credit card statement instead thinking that he had in confusion put the instrument forward. But after I took the letter he again gave me the instrument & a stylus & said sign. I was surprised. Generally all these courier people take a couple of signatures on a sheet of paper, but this person was asking me to sign into a mobile type instrument. I went ahead & signed on the wide screen with the stylus. I thought the signature didn’t come the way it normally does. But the signature got registered none the less. The person then said thanks & left. I do remember asking him though “What is this” when he thrust the mobile type instrument.

This was a first time experience for me. I mean I remember signing on something similar for my driving license. As I signed on it, I could see the signature also appearing on the computer monitor. But this was the first time I signed on something that wasn’t paper for having collected by credit card statement letter. I think this is really a great way to cut out paper.

Contrast this with this incident. I had the auditor in office taking a look at previous years financial statements all on Tally of course. In the due course he wanted to take a look at some credit card statements as we had made some credit card purchases. I opened the soft copy of it on my computer. It was obvious that he wasn’t comfortable with the soft copy. He immediately told me that I should take a print out of every month’s statement for the last year. I was aghast. Three sheets per statement multiplied by 12 months of statements. All so that he could put one tick against one entry in red pen. I told him in a clear & nice manner that I wouldn’t be able to do it as it would consume a whole lot of cartridges. He went on to ask about the cartridges we use, how much it costs, how much ml of ink is there in it but eventually gave up.

Being a paper less organization is a dream for me. The fact is we hardly use paper in office. The only place we use it is for Invoices & Employee Letters. This too is something that I would like to cut out if possible, but the recipients prefer hard copies so there is no escaping this in the immediate future. Of course all the other paper we end up with is hard copies of job seekers resumes & bills.

Welcome

2009-08-12T14:17:00.002+05:30

How do I describe this feeling? It is a mix of a whole lot of emotions. A sense of joy, a feeling of responsibility, a bit of anxiety…. There are also dreams, wishes, hopes from it, for it. I suddenly feel I need to behave grown up. But again do I really have to?

It’s a phase that I am very excited about. To know more. To do more. To be more. To be less. To pause. To stop. To drive. To let drive. To learn. To unlearn. To give. To do. To smile. To make smile. To be there.

Welcome. To a new phase of life. Welcome. To a new friend, Partner & Guide.

Sarpass – The Conclusion (Part 3)

2009-07-17T19:00:00.003+05:30

Simply put Sarpass Trek was bigger & better than anything I have done before. It is only fitting that a Himalayan trek should take the cake so to speak. For I have absolutely completely fallen in love with that region.

This trek was also special for the company we had. I remember discussing with a gentleman who had done the Everest Base Camp trek & then with some of the camp leaders with respect to how YHAI goes about organizing an event of this type. Also very motivating was the fact that in our group SP4 there were first time trekkers, experienced trekkers & intermediate trekkers. And something that I found very nice was to see among women a college going student to a married woman. Also nice was a Father & daughter pair doing the trek together, a husband & wife doing it together & a couple who did it for the second time in celebration of their meeting a year ago on the very same trek. In our very group of friends were guys who were doing this sort of a trek for the first time.

The other significant part of this trek was that it was a true camping experience. Sleeping in tents, resting in tents, playing cards in tents & working on various improvisations to make the tents warmer, it had its moments. One must congratulate YHAI for making some amazing arrangements in the most difficult of places. For example the camp at Fual Paani. Also a big credit has to go to them for the food arrangements. The cooks apparently get up as early as 3 or 4 AM to ensure the morning tea (which is served to you in the tent & is like a wake up call at 5:30 AM every morning) to breakfast to packed lunch to dinner. Add to that welcome drinks, evening tea with some snacks. In Biskeri Thatch we were served hot pakodas with tea. This to me was five star treatment. I don’t think at those altitudes we could really ask for more.

All said & done it was a trek that had to be remembered for trekking. End of the day that is what we were all there for - some hardcore trekking. And we got our money’s worth. Actually more than our money’s worth. For a little less than Rs 3000 I think we got a steal.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s) for Sarpass

What to expect during the trek? Food, Things to carry, Clothes, Toilets, facilities etc. There is a load of information out there however below is how we did it & what we experienced.

One has to really be prepared to extreme weather conditions. One definitely needs a good rain coat. Also the jacket that you buy for the cold should be rain proof. It helps big time. A good pair of shoes are really important. They are important because in snow & in slush it gets wet very badly. Our group used Woodlands & Lafuma shoes. The latter being the expensive option. We did most of our shopping in the Mayur Army and General Stores in Shivajinagar, Bangalore. We picked up Inners, Monkey Cap, Raincoat, Wollen Socks from there. We bought our gloves from The Brown Shop in Commercial Street. If you are investing in shoes especially Woodlands you can purchase it from a factory outlet it costs cheaper there. It is recommended that one either carries two pairs of wollen gloves or goes in for a pair of leather (basically rain proof) gloves.

We survived majority of the trek with one pair of clothes. With another pair being a back up. We were also advised to carry as less luggage as possible. This I think is very critical because it does help a lot in your pace & energy levels during the trek. We invested in Rucksacks in Bangalore. We bought them at Adventureworx in Jayanagar. However most of us didn’t use them during the trek because these rucksacks themselves weighed about 2 Kgs. The YHAI issued a simple bag that was very right & perfect for carrying just the required amount of luggage.

The food is basic & very good. Apart from lunch which is packed & hence cold, the rest of the meals are served hot. Dinner would mostly comprise of Rotis, Sabzi, Fried Papad, White rice, Daal & Pickle. For Breakfast we had broken wheat porridge, puris, Bread, Upma & so on. Also apart from the YHAI provided meals in a few camps the villagers also sell omlettes & maggi. At every Lunch point every day the lunch stop is where the villagers have set up shop selling omlettes, maggi, tea & coffee. Infact at our first camp Guna Paani we had the provision of charging our mobiles in these shops of course for a charge. The price of omlettes & maggi increased as we went to the higher camps. I also remember on our way to our last camp (Bhandak Thatch) savoring desi lassi sold by a villager at the lunch point. Yummy.

Although it is highly discouraged by YHAI, porters are available during the trek. Local villagers agree to carry your rucksacks up to the next camp for a charge. I think the charge was upwards of Rs 100 per day per bag. They of course come back next day to carry the bag again till the next camp. This is indeed a luxury thats available but at the risk of the bag owner. These porters don’t walk with you as they take shortcuts to the next camp.

There are toilet facilities at every camp. It’s basically a toilet tent. One each for men & women. Needless to say these are not clean & I also found these toilet tents very short in height & cramped for space. The YHAI is very strict about using only the allocated toilet sites. Any fooling around there could result in sending back the offenders to base camp. But of course apart from the toilet tent one was free to use the vast spaces in the allocated area. Which to me and quite a few of others was more convenient & some adventure in itself. Absolutely forget about bath during the trek. In the base camp there are bathroom facilities. The cold Parvati River water is supplied there. If anyone is game for a colder than a refrigerator water bath, could pursue it. Also at the base camp town Kasol, there are a few hotels that let you use their bathrooms for a charge. My suggestion would be to not bother and experience not taking bath for a good 11 days.

The tents provided are cosy. Some of them are not on flat ground so the sides or the corners could be open to the elements. We had some cases like that. We would either cover it up with our rucksacks or use our rain sheets (which we bought for 25 bucks in the base camp & please note this is more of a protection for the rucksack & not to be substituted for a raincoat). In all the higher camps , everybody was provided with a sleeping bag & a blanket each. These are very effective in keeping you warm at those altitudes. Also if you are forced to occupy more people in the tent suggest you don’t complain for you will realize it helps to warm up the tent in the higher camps. Our Tent strength was varying between 14 – 16 people.

Kasol, our base camp site is a small town. Largely inhabited by Israelis who have set up base there for what many say easy availability of pot/hash (Sorry I don’t know the exact term used). This trip taught me a lot, one among them was that Israeli women are very pretty, at least the ones we saw there were. There are some very nice restaurants, cafes, & bakeries in the town. After the trek got over we dined at an amazing restaurant. Our table was next to a window & through the window we could see snow capped mountains it was a very romantic place unfortunately ours was an all guys group. Kasol has many travel agents. We booked our Manali to Delhi bus tickets and Manali to Chandigarh bus tickets in an agency here. It is advised to think twice about booking anything with these guys unless of course you are in for more adventure apart from trekking like my friend had of sleeping in the drivers cabin from Manali to Chandigarh and three of us had in settling for the last row seats for our Manali to Delhi bus ride. This after paying up full amount & getting specific seat numbers on the bus.

Finally, I would like to end with the list of people who I did this trek with. Imran – the initiator, planner, executor who also became the Group Leader of the SP4 during the trek. Dilip – The main Entertainer of the trip. Deepak, Devaiah, Dinesh, Jayanth and Gyan.

Sarpass – As it happened (Part 2)

2009-07-17T14:47:00.000+05:30

The below description is not a day by day account but covers the most memorable events during the trek.

Kasol Base Camp (6500ft) – Beautiful, Colorful & Small

After a flight, train, bus & taxi ride, we reached Kasol at 10.30 PM on a cold night. The camp was off to sleep. The only sound that dominated then was the sound of river Parvati flowing alongside the camp. We reported at the Reception & after producing our admit cards, were allowed into a tent. The camp easily had about 25 odd tents each having a capacity of about 15. On one side were the female tents and on the other side were the male tents comparatively more in number. There was one area in the middle that served as the dining area behind which was the kitchen tent. Considering that we had an early start the next day, we rushed to finish dinner. Dinner comprised of rotis, sabzi, rice, dhal, halwa & papad. This in addition to Kheer was pretty much our standard Dinner fare all through the trek.

After some discussion on how & where we should keep our bags & some confusion on the tent number allocated to us, the first night in the base camp was uneventful.

The Morning Exercise

The two days that we were stationed in Base Camp, we had a morning exercise. This was at 6:30 in the morning. After morning tea & counting, the group had to walk up to a ground about half a kilometer away from the camp. The exercise incharge was a localite by name Devraj, who also doubled up as the Sr. Rock Climbing instructor. Devraj looked a localite, spoke fluent Hindi & I remember the first day of morning exercise he saying to the group encircling him, “If anybody speaks during the exercise, I’ll make you run 20 rounds of this ground”. But as the exercise progressed & we got to see him more he didn’t seem much of a task master really. So I wondered why the tough talk. The exercise was amazing. He made us do some really basic stuff, which were more of warm up & loosening exercises. The sad part however was that even these basic exercises we were not very comfortable doing. But I enjoyed the activity.

Acclimatization Trek – Day 2

It took our group a while to come to terms with the YHAI speed. YHAI is a stickler for timings. In the process of Breakfast, putting on contact lenses & all that, our group got delayed big time for the Acclimatization trek. The rest of the group had started off long back & we were still trying to figure out what we should finish & where we should go. Finally after collecting the YHAI rucksack & dumping two blankets in it, we started off hoping to catch up with the rest of the group soon. The Acclimatization trek was a hike up a near by hill. We had to pass by a local school. The school building was in front of a snow clad mountain. Little girls dressed in salwar kameezes & guys in shorts sat in the corridor doing what their teacher was asking them to do. After a heavy breakfast it took a while to get up the hill. But as we climbed up, we realized how beautiful the route was. I have a fascination for the jungle terrain. Its my favorite among all terrains. Its probably because I love trees & walking under huge tall pine trees was an awesome experience. What we experienced that day was how the trek for the rest of the days going to be. Hiking & hiking all the way. It was challenging & tiring. However when we thought we still have a long way to go, we saw the group seated a few meters front of us overlooking a drop at the bottom of which was parvati flowing away with the snow clad mountains in the background.

When I took off my bag my T Shirt was all wet with sweat. The cool breeze under the trees helped regain some energy & sitting down was heaven. Most of us from the group felt the trek was too short & we were eager for more. We quickly got the guide to take us for an extended trek & announced it to the rest of the group. A lot others decided to join us. The trek that we did till that point had a clear walkable path. However the stretch that we pursued thereafter had no clear path. So that was a different experience. There were many plants with big thorns along that route. Slowly but surely we realized that this stretch would require some concentration & couldn’t be taken lightly. Especially the time when the group began to get down the hill it was all the more challenging. A couple of lose big stones were pushed off from the back & all of them had to alert the guys in the front about it. Some time later we were walking back to our previous halt position & rejoined the guys who had decided to rest there. A lime squash was mixed with all the water that each of us had in a plastic bucket. A bottle was cut to become a pouring mug & the juice was then distributed in the same water bottles to all. There was no need for ice or cold water. The water there is naturally so cold, one feels like drinking refrigerated water. After which we descended.

Orientation – Day 2

The next agenda for us on the first day was an orientation session scheduled at 3 PM. The orientation was important as our entire group was up North trekking for the first time & felt it necessary to get inputs from people who have been there done that. During the course of the orientation what we learnt were very basic things. One of the things that was communicated & which I too thought to be very correct was this statement – “Don’t be a porter, Be a trekker” meaning to say that most of us are so interested in finishing the trek that we hardly stop & pause to look at the sights around us. The next important message given was maintain distance between the person in front of you & behind you. The distance should ideally be such that the person in front you & behind you should be able to hear you if you call out. This also I thought was an important piece of advise. The other things communicated were not to break away from the YHAI route which was clearly marked with arrows all through the trekking path.

An experience of a life time
Day 5 - The trek between Guna Paani (8000ft) to Fual Paani (9500 ft)

The YHAI in all their communiqué describes this stretch to be of 5 kms in distance & 6 hours in duration. The previous day’s trek (Day 4 trekking between Unch Dhar to Guna Pani)) was very easy & we completed it by 2 PM or so. I remember a lot of people in our group suggesting to each other that the group should take it easy & not rush the completion of the days trek. At that time it made sense. One of the things that most of us did was to check with either the guides or the camp leaders how the next day’s route would be. And I remember very well that we were told that we will be able to complete the Guna Paani to Fual Paani stretch in 3 hours. In all fairness more or less that is what would have happened. But then one big lesson we all learnt was that there is one other important factor called the rain that had to be factored in. The day started off normally. Although we had to pass through a lot of slushy terrain initially as well, it didn’t matter much because we were more or less on flat ground. The fun started as we approached the lunch point. Just as we were about to reach the lunch point, it started to rain heavily. The lunch point was under a huge rock. Most of them had squeezed themselves under the rock which provided the cover from the rain. In this condition we finished lunch.

I have done one other trek in the rain. It was the Tadiyandemol trek in Coorg. On our way down from the peak it poured crazy & no raincoat or umbrella helped. This was very similar. Now, there are quite a few of them who love the rain. I think getting wet in the rain is one thing & trekking in the rain is another. The ground we would walk on was so slushy that every foot forward would slip. I wonder if there was any one from the group who did not slip & fall even once during this part of the trek. That was the only challenge but it made movement absolutely slow. Now add to the slippery ground the hiking part. This very same route on a dry day would have been a cakewalk. But that day it was like actually walking on a cake. You hike up & slide down, you hike up & slide down. Most of the time we were making movement on all fours. And here all cleanliness & hygiene had to be thrown out of the window. Irrespective of what color pant you wore it all looked brown end of the trek. I remember three instances which I encountered during this stretch. The first one was hiking up. Like I said the only way one could move up was to crawl. Hold a branch or a root or a rock & pull yourself up. This was the only way I was making progress. I was leading a group of 5 odd people. There wasn’t anyone immediately in front of me. After having gone fairly comfortably some distance I came to a point where there was absolutely nothing in front of me to grip & push myself up. I remember I was stuck there for may be a good 5 minutes. It was only when I put all my weight on one leg & pushed myself up with the help of the loose soil itself that I was able to move up. The second instance was of taking the wrong route. Somewhere on the route there was this huge rock which was like cutting in on the way. We had to maneuver ourselves around it. I observed very carefully how the guy in front of me did it and went for it immediately after he finished. It was a bit difficult, but I managed to cross over. And only after I crossed over did people realize that was not the path to take. Luckily I & the other person in front of me were able to rejoin the group after continuing on the same path further up. The third instance was the most mentionable of the lot. This time around again I was in the front. I just kept pursuing a path in front of me. I didn’t look left or right just kept going until I reached a point way above from the rest of the group only to realize that that wasn’t the way. I was really caught there. I didn’t know if I should go back down & rejoin the rest of them or pursue the same path up & try to rejoin them further up somewhere. But there was no clear path beyond the point I was standing and going back down didn’t look very easy. And nobody around there seemed to realize I had gone the wrong way. I was completely isolated at that spot. Then I noticed a fallen pine tree further up. This pine tree seemed to have been cut off its branches not fully up to the trunk but about two feet away from its trunk. It had fallen down on a proper slope. I pursued that path up with the support of the branches. It was difficult but I finally managed to go all the way up till the end of the fallen trunk. There another 2 meters of negotiation got me back on the route everyone else was following.

‘Sher ke Bacche’ reach Tila Lotni
Day 6 – From Zirmi (11000ft) to Tila Lotni (12500ft)

Being called ‘Sher ke Bacche’ is a very high feeling. I don’t know how the others felt about it, but it did lift the morale, confidence & gave a can do attitude. Of course this is probably what the guide said to all the trekkers. This was the day when we experienced our first snow on the trek. The initial snow patches were greeted with so much joy that when we reached the most stunning stretch of the day, we were wondering why we even thought of celebrating the initial patches. Simply put, this trek only got better as time progressed. We had in front of us a 2-3 km stretch & every inch of it was covered in snow. It was a breathtaking sight. And walking on it were trekkers one behind the other in a line carefully negotiating the path. It to me was like having got transplanted in to a National Geographic video. The only disappointment being that day we had a longer distance of trek to complete and hence couldn’t pause for a long time to savor the sights we got to witness.

‘Upar ja kar Pooja karna’ – Day 8 - The trek from Tila Lotni (12500 ft) to Biskeri Thatch (11000ft) via Sarpass (13800ft)

The D Day had arrived. We would have to get on top of Sarpass at a good 13800 ft. We had an early start that day not the normal 8:30 AM start. This was largely to make good use of good weather conditions. The task immediately was to hike up. The initial part was on a plain mountain. And this hike took a good bit of time as it came so early in the day & it was straight up. Once we got to the top the snow stretches began. That apparently was the peak of Sarpass. Sarpass peak we soon realized is very flat. It is not like a typical peak which tapers towards the top. This was flat & we didn’t even know we had reached the top. Only when the guides clarified that we were indeed on the peak did the celebrations begin. We had made our plans to celebrate on the peak by showing off our designed for the occasion T Shirts. But we had to do it in a rush as the guides first advised us against removing our jackets & then pushed us to get moving with the rest of the group. We got our jackets off just for the four or five pictures & put them back on & caught up with the rest of the group. It was only at Lunch Time that we learnt a pooja was done up there when we got the Prasad from a fellow group mate. And what a lunch point it was. It was right in the middle of nowhere. All around one could see snow. Nearby there was a little stream & there put on the snow was a plastic sheet. The group settled there & got busy eating lunch which was a little different from the routine. We got a tetrapak of mango juice, some chikkies and some other fried stuff. Of course we had Omlettes & maggi being prepared by the villagers near by even there.

“Waha tak chod do na yaar”- The latter half of Day 8

Post lunch for a long time we had long stretches of snow tracks to walk on. The only challenge that came on this stretch was a sharp right turn sort of bend which immediately after taking right went down. This spot slowed the group up. But after having negotiated this, we were in for the next challenge of the day. It didn’t come immediately & from where we saw it looked like it was going to be a nice hike up. And sitting on that peak were the porters who had carried some of our group mates luggage. It was an awesome sight. But of course as we approached it the challenge became clearer. Luckily standing mid way on that hike was a guide who was pulling us up when we got to him. And guess what happened there. Immediately after being pulled up the line stopped moving. It was an odd spot. It was not flat land. It was uneven terrain. Most of us were crawling up that stretch and some of us had our rucksacks on the back. No bit of yelling & pleading to the guys ahead to move helped. In odd positions like that your feet take a lot of strain. It finally cleared & we were on top. The relief was short lived. The weather had been deteriorating for a while. There were a lot of dark clouds up above. As we reached the top it started to snow. And a few meters ahead of us was the start point of our slide. Yes the famous Sarpass Slide. Basically we were standing on a 3 feet flat land & one side was a rocky uneven slope & on the other side was a snowy slide. And to add to all this it started to rain and the ground beneath our feet became slippery and the line was moving really slowly. Man, this moment is fresh in my mind.

To make matters worse all those porters sitting there announced that they had reached their last point. That put everybody who had given them their rucksacks to carry in a spot of bother. They had to pay off the porters & carry the rucksack for the rest of the day all by themselves.

Zoooom - The Slide - The finale of Day 8

I never thought I would ever do something like this in my life. Its one of those things that you read about, see from far and get really excited about but the true experience is in doing it. The first slide was about 200 meters. The guide gave me the instructions. He said the speed breakers are the elbows and said Go. I remember only one thing, when I started to slide I slid so fast that more than being exciting it was scary. It was like zoom. It also wasn’t very comfortable. We had our rucksacks on our back, our trekking stick & we were also very keen to not wet our clothes as much as possible. I also remember the burning feeling on the lower back when I was sliding. The T shirt was pulled up & the back was rubbing against the snow.

After having finally come to a halt and learning that I had torn my raincoat I turned around to see the three others behind me coming down. Two of them tumbled on the slide. One lost his sunglasses & rain sheet & the other lost his water bottle. The third managed it pretty much like mine. The look on everybody’s face was of pain & discomfort. Then it quickly changed. There were 3 more slides we had to do. Among them only another one was a major one. This turned out to be a lot more fun partly because we were now clear about what to expect & two also because it wasn’t a straight down slide. It was one with a bend. The bend made it all the more fun. It was like those slides in water parks. For the third slide we were all the more comfortable & started to enjoy it.

Bhandak Thatch – A beautiful campsite

This campsite was the most awaited of the trek for this is the campsite that has been described as Switzerland in India. And it did not disappoint. It was a green hill & there was greenery as far as you could see. The slopes were green with these little tiny yellow & white flowers growing on them here & there. And of course it was all surrounded by snow capped mountains. The sights around was very beautiful indeed. That being the last camp of the trek, made most of us very emotional.

This campsite also turned out to be very nice for other reasons. One for the game that the camp leader impromptu made us get involved in, two for the antakshari that followed the game & three for the closing get together in a tent for the camp fire. The antakshari was unbelievable what with kannada, marathi, hindi, tamil & telegu songs being sung. I found it fascinating that so many of them could sing old songs & that too completely.

Sarpass – Introduction (Part 1)

2009-07-16T18:58:00.001+05:30

City life treats you well. A home you can come back to from office, an air conditioned office you can drive to the next day, friends you can drink beer with on a Saturday evening, life in the City is great. Contrast this with Living out of wet rucksacks, hiking up to the next camp in wet shoes, a sleeping bag for comfort in the night, a tent over your head & answering nature’s call where else but amidst nature. This is what one would call a Trekker’s Life.

Despite having done many treks down South, this was going to be a very different experience. I always fancied camping, Camping the real camping way. Most times during our South Indian treks, which are of 2 day duration, camping would mean sleeping in tents for the night just for the kick. Near by one would have a concrete structure with basic toilet facilities. This time around though we got to do camping the real way.

Looking back at those amazing 11 days, I recollect how disconnected I was with the city life. The only connection I must admit was to make a call home daily to tell mom I was fine & check up on things here. Guess getting away from the family bond is never easy. Each day had its share of surprises. Each day was more adventurous than the other. Just when you thought you had enough, there came the next challenge. This trek to me was as much a mental thing as it was physical. This trek was a test to the very end. Now that it is all over, looking back at it all, I still have a feeling of disconnect here. It is taking me a while to come back to the city life’s demands and very soon I will have completely given in to it. Until then I wish to cherish this lazy disconnected feeling.

The calm & peace, the spectacular views, the awesome variance in weather conditions right from hot sun to pouring rain to hail storms to the flaky snowfall. One would want it to never end. This trip only strengthened my belief that there is a lot to see in India itself & one needn’t really go out of here for it.

Sarpass – A YHAI (Youth Hostels Association of India) organized trek in the Himalayan region in Himachal Pradesh. The Base Camp was at Kasol at 6500 ft. The highest point trekked being Sarpass at 13800 ft. Highlights included, trekking on snow, sliding on snow, the route itself which is very picturesque and camping.

Sarpass Group No. - SP4. Reporting Date - 1 May 2009

Birthday Wishes

2009-06-11T10:54:00.000+05:30

I celebrated my birthday yesterday. Another year got added to my age & the confusion of whether I got older or younger stays. But for all reasons of being positive & optimistic I would like to believe like a lot of other older people have been believing that age is just a number, how old or young you feel is all in the mind.

This year I got Advance Birthday wishes, Birthday wishes & Belated Birthday wishes. I have always noticed that how every year there is someone new who wishes you. I don’t know if this happens with everybody. And no, it is not someone new you got to know after the last birthday who naturally will be wishing you for the first time. But people who you have known for a while for many years suddenly realize it’s your birthday & send you their wishes. Of course in today’s world sending birthday wishes is as simple as sending an SMS.

This year one person first wished me through SMS, then made a call & wished me & finally dropped by in person & wished me. At office all my colleagues wished me except one, I wonder why this person didn’t wish me. I got calls from a few of my friends but not all of them. I got a message from a person named Sunitha, I am still wondering whether that was my cousin or my ex colleague. Another ex colleague called me a day before the birthday & wished me saying he wouldn’t be reachable on my birthday so may not be able to call. I got wishes from matrimony sites. One also gave me gifts for my birthday; they offered me 30 days free membership after I paid up for a paid membership of 90 days. Today I made calls to the credit card call centers to ask for some previous statements. ICICI Bank wished me belated wishes immediately after I punched in the credit card number & went on to say my outstanding was Rs 17000. The Citibank lady I was talking to said belated birthday wishes just before she ended the call.

Its nice to get these birthday wishes, especially when its from some unexpected quarters. Like you get it for your birthday I guess it’s natural to give it to others on theirs. Now that is where I don’t. And I don’t know whether I should be embarrassed about it or cool. For now I am checking out some birthday reminder websites.

I remember this one time I called a friend up & happily said Happy Birthday only to be told that day was not her birthday & it was coming up next month. God, I still remember that incident. Luckily for me she didn’t make too much fun of it. For her 2007 birthday it was back to normal. I had forgotten it. We were in office and we sit close by & can see each other. She came in & was settling down when she got a call and she was all smiling & thanking & all that & that is when it struck me that there was something that day, but I still couldn’t decide whether it was her birthday or wedding anniversary.

Another birthday another person. This was a new person & if I wished her on her birthday it would have been the first time. So I had made enquiries about the date & tried to remember especially because it was coming up. One day I got a message from her in the afternoon, the SMS read, “I didn’t know you were like this”. I was naturally concerned thinking I had done something wrong or she had got offended with something. A lot of these SMSs followed the entire day. I realized only the next day that it was her birthday that day & she was expecting to be wished.

Leave all this I guess the icing on the cake has to be this incident. Last year one of my friends called me up on my birthday & wished me. I was of course saying all my thanks & everything. Four days later was his birthday. By now you must know what happened.
This year too he was the first among my friends to call me. So now his birthday is coming up on the 14th. Wait a minute is it the 14th or….

About time Bangalore did away with plastic bags

2009-06-09T15:26:00.000+05:30

I have this habit of storing all the plastic bags that I end up with after whatever shopping I have done – clothes, books or something else. This is a practice that I have for quite sometime & you can imagine that I have by now collected quite a few plastic bags. Of late I am getting really conscious of this collection. And I have begun to discourage shop keepers from giving me a carry bag whenever I buy something.

I was recently in Manali. The honeymooners paradise in the North. I liked a lot of things in Manali. One that there are so many married couples around wherever you go there & two for the awesome weather there & three for the fact that Manali has banned plastic bags. It took me a while to figure why so many people were carrying these brown paper bags. The puzzle was cracked when I purchased something myself.

Honestly I felt really nice about it. No doubt banning plastic bags will cause some inconvenience however just imagine the world of good it’ll do to the Environment. Once the sales of the plastic bags reduce the manufacturers will naturally venture into more environment friendly bags & slowly but surely this menace can be countered.

Guess till then the least we all can do is to voluntarily discourage plastic bags.

That one moment

2009-04-16T11:25:00.001+05:30

“Excuse Me”

The lady blocking the way moved away slightly and he could check out the B rack now. He liked this place. A lot of books both new & used and both types were available on discount. As usual he surveyed the place around. There was this lady he had just passed on his left checking out books on the A rack. There was no one to his right. He continued to scan the books on the B rack. Nothing interesting caught his eye. He moved on to the C rack.

He scanned the place around again. He did this most times. What he looked for or what he wished to see wasn’t clear to him. But it was something he did. He walked to the parallel isle. There was no one there. Just a pile of books. He walked to the other isle parallel to it. There was a man checking out some books there. He just walked back to the first isle he came from.

No book was interesting him today. He didn’t know what he felt like reading for the next couple of days. He just stared at the collections hoping something would interest him. But nothing did. Finally he walked away towards a section that he always visited whenever he visited this bookstore. Once he had seen a girl quietly checking the books under this section. Occasionally she looked around to confirm if no one was looking towards her. He had seen her there & knew what kind of books she was going through, but he ignored it. The section was clearly titled “Erotic”. He looked around again. Scanned the place & pulled a book from the rack & browsed through it. He always thought why people got really conscious of checking the books under this section. He too felt uncomfortable being there for too long. Although he visited this section every time he visited the bookstore he never really bought anything from that section. Somehow he couldn’t get himself to really like anything in the first place & even if he did he couldn’t gather enough guts to take it to the cash counter. What he was uncomfortable about was not the cash counter staff but the other customers who could see what he had picked up.

The section as usual had a variety of books on erotica and sex. He was always attracted to the big books in this section. One reason being they had excellent paper quality & the other because it had nice pictures. Actually everytime he saw a new big book he invariably picked it out. Most of these books were on the Kama Sutra. He didn’t like Kama Sutra very much. The sketches in those books didn’t really excite him. But then, wait a minute….there is something else today next to the Kama Sutra book…. This book was big, really big. For a big book the cover was very simple. It was called ‘The playmate Book’. He pulled it out. It was difficult but he eventually managed it.

Holding the book in his hands he randomly opened to a particular page, what he saw stunned him. Although he was expecting it, he didn’t quite fathom what could be in it. He immediately closed the book & looked around. There was no one around. It was strangely less crowded that day. His heart beat loudly & his hand slightly trembled. He was confused. He couldn’t decide if he should put the book back in the rack or take a look at a few more pages. He decided to check out a few more pages. It was not like he handn’t seen these pictures earlier. He had seen them & he had also watched movies. But that was a private thing. May be sometimes in the company of his friends. But this was a very public thing now. All around him were people he didn’t know. If they got to know what he was looking at what would they think about him. Thoughts rushed to his mind.

The pictures were awesome. The book itself was a great one. He tried to figure out the cost of the book. On the back cover he saw the price tag. Rs 1500. The price didn’t seem too high for him. He was trying to reason with himself about buying this book. According to him it was priceless. He looked for some more details of what this book is all about. He soon learnt that the book was the compilation of all the playmates that had posed nude for the famous US magazine Playboy. It contained all the snaps from its first issue right up to the December issue of 2004. Simply this was a collector’s issue. He too had sometime thought of laying his hands on the Playboy magazine. But it wasn’t available around wherever he checked.

Unable to decide he put the book back in the rack. He felt relieved. He tried to relax. He scanned the place around again. There was no one. He saw a tiny book on erotica. He picked it up. Now he was just acting. He tried to look normal. Tried to look as if he was attempting to read a few lines in that book. But that wasn’t the case. His mind was still on the big book. His heart & mind raced. He knew he had to buy it. He pulled the big book out again. He looked on the back cover to confirm the price again. It still read Rs 1500. He wondered could this book be only worth Rs 1500. What if he took the book to the cash counter & they charged him much higher for it. But that was generally not the case. Whatever cost was put on the book was the cost. He scanned the place again. Nobody. What should he do now? He had to take a decision & walk out of the place. But what if somebody sees him with that book. What if there is someone at the cash counter. He held the books – both the big one & the small one and walked out. Right outside the entrance to the first floor of the book store was a Security guard. He usually doubled up as the person who was authorized to collect the bags & helmets of the customers & locked it up behind him in one of the baggage lockers. He handed over the keys of the locker to the security. The security opened it & gave him his helmet.

He looked down at the stairs he had to climb down to go to the billing counter. He could see there was another security sitting at the bottom of the stairs. He paused. He held the books close to his body & held the helmet in such a way that the books were not completely visible. He began to descend. The security sitting down looked up at him for a moment and then he turned away. There was a rush of feelings in his head at this moment. He finally descended. The security was seated in front of him. He had to go left & enter the ground floor to go to the billing counter. To his right were a few more stairs. If he descended them he would be on the road. In that confused moment, he decided to step down those stairs. Once down he began to walk away. He still had the books in his hand. He expected the security to stop him. But he didn’t hear anything. He continued to walk. His heart raced. He couldn’t believe what he had done. He had a book worth Rs 1500 & another worth Rs 65 in his hands and he hadn’t paid for it. He was just walking away from the store. Nobody seemed to be coming after him. But he walked faster. He just wanted to go out of sight before the bookstore people realized.

It was a wet evening. It had drizzled for a while & it seemed that it would pick up again. In that confused state, he walked faster & faster. In the rush of thoughts he decided to take a left. Why left? He didn’t know. Probably it was to get on to another road. He wondered what if someone had seen him. He thought of the consequences. May be someone was following him now. Would they beat him up? Would they hand him over to the police? God so many things could happen.

He walked more & faster. Somewhere along he stopped by at a petty shop selling cigarettes & asked for a carry bag. It had started to drizzle steadily and he was worried the books would get wet & spoilt. There was no carry bag with the shopkeeper. Disappointed he continued to walk. He was carrying a big white book of Playboy. It was not wrapped, not in a carry bag. It was in his hand. What if someone he knew bumped into him and what if they asked him what was that he was holding.

He slowed down. He stopped. He looked around. No one was running towards him. There were many people & nobody seemed to be giving him undue extra attention. He calmed down a bit. He pulled out his hand kerchief and wiped off the drops of water on the book & then on his face. He continued to walk but he was slower now.

He began to introspect. Although what he had done was something he could brag about to his friends. He didn’t feel very nice inside. It wasn’t like he didn’t have the money to buy this book. He had done it more out of the extra rush of blood to his head. He was excited that he had picked up a good book, but the thought of taking the book to the counter made it all the more heard pounding for him & in the rush of emotions he did something he completely wouldn’t if he had been in his normal senses. Now he was far away from the shop. Nobody had followed him even. Probably nobody had realized it yet. He could get away with it. But then what about the guilt? He felt he couldn’t live with it.

He took a right turn. The road he got on to was the same road that had the shop. As he walked he contemplated the idea of going back to the billing counter as if nothing happened. Producing the two books to them & paying for it. But then what if someone was outside waiting for him, what if the security guy got a feel of what had happened. What if he rushed inside to the billing counter & said, “I saw this guy leaving with these books earlier, now he is coming back to pay for it”

He was walking and he was getting closer to the shop. Probably he could just say that there was some emergency & he in the process forgot to get it billed & now had returned to pay up. Would that argument hold strong. It could, however may be it wouldn’t either.

He approached the shop. The security guy was still sitting on the seat lazily. He didn’t seem to get alert or anything when he saw him. He climbed the stairs & walked inside towards the billing counter. There was no one inside there. A sales girl was some distance away and a guy was behind the billing counter. Both of them looked very normal. They didn’t react in any other way other than to smile & get busy with the billing. This calmed him down. It was a clear indication that nobody from the store had yet figured that something was stolen a few minutes back. However they did notice one thing.

Both the books were wet on the covers. The billing guy seemed to wonder how it was wet. He started looking for a cloth to clean it & seeing this, the sales girl approached to help. His heard started to beat faster again. He hoped the rain drops on the books are not going to give him in. The girl took a piece of cloth & started to wipe off the droplets of rain water on the cover of the two books. It was pretty clear what those two books were about, but no one seemed to be too bothered about it, the girl included.

The billing guy wrote out the bill & he handed over a card to pay for it. As he waited for the receipt to come out of the machine, the billing guy yet again looked at the book on all sides & wondered aloud, “how did this get wet”. But then, the receipt came out & he put the book down & proceeded to tear the receipt off and gave it to him to sign. He hurriedly signed it. The girl had meantime put both the books into a carry bag.

He collected the bag & said a thank you. He turned & walked out. He closed his eyes & took a deep breadth.

A girl walked in to the bus (Part 3)

2009-04-07T10:55:00.002+05:30

His eyes were closed. His face had turned towards her. He looked like he was having a good sleep. She had only turned to take a glance. She knew she obviously couldn’t stare in to the face for long. What if he noticed it? What would he think?

The travelers on the left side of the bus, especially those occupying the window seats were looking out. She could also see some visuals of what was going on. The bus had stopped for about 5 minutes, practically no where. The commotions outside made her think it was a puncture.

She realized she had a disturbed sort of sleep after the tender coconut she had. Was it because of the tender coconut, she wondered and immediately dismissed it because she knew that tender coconut was good for the body & it always helped her.

She moved the curtains on her side of the window & looked out. It was pitch dark outside. Every few seconds a vehicle would pass by & it was then that she noticed that beyond the road there was a vast arid ground. She sighed & hoped that the puncture would get repaired early & they would get moving again. She then put her hands on the handle on the front seat & got into the same position she had described to this boy some time back. She put her head down on it & turned towards the window. But there was nothing much she could see. She could see a slight reflection of hers on it, but not very clearly. She then turned to the opposite side. He still continued to sleep in the same position. She looked at his face & kept looking for a moment longer. She liked his face. He had short hair and probably a day old beard. What she did seem to register was that he had nice long eye lashes. Now that was not normal in a boy she thought. She tried to think hard if she knew anyone who had similar kind of lashes. She couldn’t think of anyone.

Just about then, the boy turned & got into a straighter position. She relaxed in hers & closed her eyes a bit. With her eyes closed she could hear the lady from the back seat ask “what happened. Why have we stopped here?” The male sitting next to her replied very softly, “It’s a puncture”

She sat back on her seat & stretched her legs well below the seat in front. It relaxed her. Now slowly more people were waking up & some of them were starting to get off the bus. It was when a slightly heavy man was trying to get off that the boy woke up. The man had touched the boy’s shoulders on his way out.

The boy woke up & registered that the bus was not moving. A man in one of the front seats was standing up & combing his hair with his fingers. He then looked left & saw 3 to 4 men all looking down. One of them was smoking. He seemed to get the hint. He then checked the time & looked right. The girl was sleeping. After shuffling uncomfortably in his seat for some more time, he decided to get a first glance of what was happening. He stepped out.

The bus driver & conductor were preparing to change the tyre. The other passengers who had got off were all looking at them do the job. A few had a normal & sleepy look. While others seemed upset about the break. One guy was smiling & typing away on his mobile.

The girl got down from the bus & walked towards him. He noticed that & smiled at her. She smiled back. The air outside was cold, not very but just enough to want a nice jacket or a shawl around you. The girl had her hands folded. The boy had his in his pockets. Both were looking at the work happening in front of them. They were not exactly next to each other. They were some distance away.

He looked around. The bus was in a nowhere sort of place. There were a couple of trees along that road. None close by to where the bus had stopped. A little distance away he saw some light & a couple of cars parked outside. It seemed like a shack selling some tea. He saw a couple of them from the bus headed there & that kind of confirmed it. The girl seemed to have noticed it too.

“How long is it going to take”, somebody asked the conductor who was fetching another tool from the bag. “Atleast another 20 minutes” he said without looking up.

The boy began to walk & looked at the girl. “Want some tea”, he asked her.

“Tea?”

“Yeah. I think we’ll get there”, he said pointing at the shack further down.

“Umm. Not sure. Not at this hour. But I think I’ll come along. Is that fine”

“Sure”

They began to walk there. She still had her hands folded & he had them in the pockets.

A girl walked in to the bus (Part 2)

2009-04-02T10:32:00.001+05:30

“Excuse Me”, “Excuse Me”. He woke up. The girl was looking at him. “The bus has stopped for a break. I just wanted to step out. Could you excuse me please?”

“Sure”

“Sorry I woke you up” she said.

“Its OK. Actually I am sorry. Hope you didn’t have to struggle to wake me up”

“No. Not at all” she said & began to walk away towards the door. He sat down on his seat & looked at his watch. It was 2 AM. He thought he could do with some fresh air as well and stepped out. The bus had stopped at some hotel. There were at least 4 other buses there. Even at that hour people were grabbing themselves something to eat. He walked to some isolated place away from the hotel & relieved himself.

When he walked back to the bus, he saw the girl. She was drinking a tender coconut. He noticed that she looked confident. He liked that. A girl traveling alone, talking comfortably to a complete stranger, stepping out in the night, drinking tender coconut, it was all very nice.

He stopped at the entrance of the bus & looked around. The girl was paying the tender coconut vendor, there were a couple of other folks near by smoking or drinking tea from tiny plastic glasses. He suddenly wondered if the girl smoked. Now, why was he thinking like that he asked himself. He shook his head a couple of times & tried to get such nonsense thoughts off his head. The girl was walking up to the bus.

“Hi”, he said & smiled.

“Hi”, she replied. “Its actually warm out here, No. The AC in the bus is set pretty high I guess”

“Yeah, think so. But between AC & no AC, I prefer AC”, he said.

“Me too, actually. Shall we get in, or you staying out” she asked him.

“No lets get in. I think I see the driver coming over as well”

Once they were settled in the seat, the girl once again stared out of the window for quite a while. He noticed it & sat quietly. A couple of moments later a beggar stood out side her window. He seemed to be staring at the bus & especially at the spot where they were sitting. The girl seemed to get conscious of that & looked away from the window.

“You know once”, she started to speak to him, “sorry hope I am not disturbing you”

“No not at all. Please go on”, he advised

“Once I was traveling in a friend’s car. We were on our way to Lonavla I think. We had stopped like this on some highway dhaba for some tea. I was sitting in the car at the window & I had put my head down like this…”. She then went on to enact the posture she was sitting in. She put her hands on the handle on the front seat & put her head on it & turned right facing the window. She stayed in that position like that for a couple of seconds. “…I was sitting like this & before I knew I felt drowsy & closed my eyes. There was no one in the car; all my friends were outside drinking tea. They were a little away from the car. Suddenly I feel someone touching my hands. You know for a few seconds I thought it must be one of my friends and slowly opened my eyes. When my eyes were wide open & I registered the view in front of me, I was shit scared & I screamed. It was a monkey”

“Oh Shit”, he said, the look on his face was also of shock. “God. That must have been scary.”

“Scary? It was shit scary. I screamed & screamed. I had a hand bag near by & I took that to shoo it away. Only when it was away from the window did I breathe easy”. She paused for breath & continued, “the worst part is none of my friends could hear me scream. They walked in like as if everything was normal. I was so mad, you know…God…”

“Some Adventure that huh”. She smirked & shook her head.

The bus started off again.

“So you watched the entire film?” He asked her.

“No yeah. I slept pretty early. How about you?”

“I slept early too”.

The bus was on the highway again & the driver shut off the lights. It was dark inside & both the boy & girl sat in silence for the next many minutes.

“No yeah” she had said.

A girl walked in to the bus

2009-03-31T16:04:00.002+05:30

He looked at her. She wore Jeans & a T Shirt. Had her hair lose. She was carrying a backpack & was looking at her ticket. She then looked at the seat numbers & walked in.

He wondered if he would be lucky enough. He had the isle seat & the window seat next to him wasn’t taken yet. Would she come in & sit there, he thought.

Almost as if the girl had heard his thoughts, she stopped at his seat & looked up to check the seat number again. It read ‘11W 12’. She then looked at him & said “that’s my seat” pointing at the window seat next to him.

He only nodded & stood up on the isle so that she could get in.

The girl sat down. She then looked to him & said, “can you give me a minute, I’ll just pull out some stuff and then I’ll put this up”

“Sure no problem”, he said and tried to distract himself. He looked around the bus. He saw another passenger getting in to the bus. Some other people behind him were settling down. Every now & then he looked at her. She had pulled out a shawl, a water bottle, an eye mask. She had zipped the bag & was out in the aisle to put the bag in the luggage compartment above.

The bag seemed heavy when she lifted it up. It was also fully packed with absolutely no space to squeeze in something. She found it difficult to push the bag in. He had been watching her struggle & volunteered to push. Just about when he got his hands to the bag she gave it one more big push & it finally went in. She turned the bag around such that the top loading zipper was in the front, probably for some easy retrieval later.

She said thanks to him & went over to her seat. “No problem” he said and sat down.

He wondered if he should initiate some small talk. He also thought of what he could ask that didn’t come across too intruding or too personal. He didn’t seem to get anything then. He however was excited that a nice pretty girl was sitting next to him. She looked like she was in her early twenties. He went ahead and put a number to her age. He thought she must be about 24 years old. If she is on the way to Pune, then probably she is either studying or working there. He suddenly felt the air around him becoming warm. The girl looked out of the window & had her shawl & eye mask on her lap. She had placed the water bottle in the bottle holder on the front seat. He noticed that she had only looked out of the window ever since she took that seat.

While he continued to ponder whether he should initiate a talk or not a rude thought struck him. He suddenly wanted to reconfirm if he had occupied the right seat. He immediately pulled out his wallet from his pant pocket & took a look at the ticket that was in it. Seat Number - 12 it read. He immediately got up to look at the seat numbers. That seemed to alert the girl. She turned & looked at him. When he realized she was looking & looked back at her, she smiled. He smiled back.

“I was just checking if I have taken the right seat”, he said. That was to her but he just said it without looking at her.

“So are you in the right seat”. She asked.

“Yes” he said & then looked at her. Her face looked pretty close. She didn’t seem to be uncomfortable by that closeness. It was also clean sans any make up & blemishes.

“So you going to Pune”, She asked.

“Yes”, he said & continued, “Guess you are too”

“Yes”, she replied.

“Are you from Pune?” He asked her. This time around he had moved himself back a bit. The extra distance between their faces seemed more comfortable for him now.

“No, I work there”, she said.

“Nice. Well I work there too. I work in a Recruitment firm. How about you” he replied.

“I work in a BPO”. She replied.

He didn’t think of asking her the company name. He felt that was not right. He also felt he should not be thinking like that & let the conversation simply flow. After all she had started it & it seemed she didn’t mind talking. So what was the harm after all. But some how he felt it was not right & didn’t pursue asking her the company name.

The Volvo bus they were sitting in was slowly getting full. The seats around them were all occupied. A couple of seats in the front & back were yet to be taken. The driver had got in & taken his seat. He switched on the engine & the AC. Somebody in the front seat had just started complaining how hot it was inside.

During the course of the next few minutes, the boy & the girl learnt a bit more about each other. She was in Pune for about a year now. She was from Bangalore & had worked there in an Insurance BPO. A better position & pay came up with the Pune based company & she decided to take it up. Her parents were not very excited by the idea, but luckily there were a couple of relatives in the city & their assurance on Pune being a Student & Employee friendly city, got her the go ahead. She didn’t stay with the relatives. She said it wouldn’t make either of them comfortable. She was anyway in the UK shift & that would also put some unnecessary strain on the folks who had got used to a particular kind of lifestyle. The guy worked for a Recruitment firm & was also from Bangalore. He had been deputed in the company’s Pune branch to help some local company find some call center boys & girls for them. She had asked for how long he would be in Pune. He had replied may be two months at the most.

All the passengers seemed to have taken their seats. The conductor walked down the aisle to the back checking if every seat had indeed been occupied. He returned to the front of the bus & instructed the driver to get started. The driver it seems had to only put his foot on the accelerator. The bus started to move. The TV was switched on & “Jab we met” began to play.

“It’s a very sweet movie”, she said.

He turned to look at her. “Yeah it’s a great movie”

The titles started & the girl began to open up the shawl. In the process her left hand touched the boy. “Sorry” she said. “its Ok” he replied. As if he could say anything else to her.

He felt very nice at that moment. He seemed to have forgotten about the task ahead for him in Pune. A nice movie was playing on the screen. A pretty girl was sitting next to him & more importantly they had started to talk. The girl had covered herself in the shawl & was watching the movie. He could notice only so much from the corner of his eye. He pushed his seat back a bit & relaxed. She followed suit soon after & pushed her seat back as well.

They didn’t speak a word thereafter. Both were engrossed in the movie. Every now & then they could hear each other smiling & laughing or just reacting to the movie. He continued to feel nice & at some time he pushed his seat fully back & dozed off.

Visiting Relatives

2009-01-14T21:29:00.001+05:30

I don’t quite know if I enjoy this task or not. The fact is most times I visit an aunt or an uncle only when there is a real need to do so, mostly when mom wants me to go over & give something. I did that today. Went over to aunts house to give them some of the food that mom had made today at home for Sankranthi and to my uncle’s house to drop a cousin who had come home.

In a way I enjoy the activity. It is nice when everybody gathers around & makes conversation. Most times this is with the TV on. Really what do you talk with your uncle or an aunt apart from probably the formalities like “how are you” & stuff. It is nice to see how they are going on with life. It is nice to know how the household stuff runs. For instance at my uncles, dinner is finished by around 8:15 PM. And at my aunts, my cousin was sleeping at around 6 PM, the time I was there. At home here, neither of this happens. We have dinner around 9:30 PM & we absolutely can’t be sleeping around at 6 PM. I guess even on a Sunday this doesn’t happen. Of late I have really wanted to nap in the afternoons on weekends, but no luck.

The TV it seems has become indispensable today. It is very amusing to see how the Saas Bahu fare is lapped up at my Uncles. And those comments that come, “Oh she is back to it again”, “Oh not again” and a loud laugh at some of the comedy tracks in these serials. My uncle holding the remote & like the king of the house flipping through channels every now & then, my aunt & granny just sitting through it all, with their right hand over the left.

And of course, some of the default stuff, like “you hardly come this side”, “you have forgotten us”, “you come here & hardly eat anything” & so on. Let me say that this doesn’t come from everybody. Quite natural I suppose, but yes Granny does say this.

Its nice though all this. I am pretty bad at this formal sit down & talk about how things are & stuff. It just doesn’t come to me, at least not yet. But I must say its really nice when someone treats you like that. You feel good.

A lesson in train timings

2008-09-21T10:59:00.000+05:30

The other day I had to leave to Indore via Bhopal. I had booked my train tickets well in advance online. Every other day I would check in the drawer if the print out was still there. Every other day I would remove it & check if I had booked it for the same date I actually needed it. This is something that I check & cross check a lot of times ever since I booked a train ticket for the wrong date for one of my cousins. I thought I had it correct this time. That is until the day of travel. Precisely until 2 hours before the time of travel.

I was all set with my luggage and food packed. For some reason I was keen on looking at the train ticket again & as I was doing so I got a call from a friend who was traveling with me. He said, “I called the call centre & they say that the Gorakpur Express has already left in the morning” It didn’t take long for me to realize what a foolish thing I had done. The print out was right in front of me and the Departure time was 7:30. The longer I looked at 7:30 the more evident it became as to what a big mistake I had made.

We were all geared to travel in the evening & were looking for a train that would start in the evening. While checking the various trains available I remembered that the Gorakpur Express was the only train where tickets were still available. But where I slipped was in the timing. If the train was to start at 7:30 in the evening the timing on the ticket should have been 19:30 and not 7:30 and I had missed that part. So the date was correct but the time was wrong this time.

When the realization dawned, I was stunned. Now what do we do. We had to be in Indore the day after at any cost and it would take 24 hours to reach Bhopal by train & another 4 hours by Taxi from there to Indore. Luckily I didn’t really have to think much about it because my friend & the other co passenger had his plan in place. There was the Karnataka Express starting that evening at 7:20 PM from the City Railway Station & he proposed we get in to it.

That is what we eventually did. Rushed to the City Railway Station & got into the Karnataka Express. A guy at the station overheard us talking to a few touts about getting ourselves tickets & approached us offering his one ticket. He said he was not traveling & just wanted to check if we would want to use his ticket. The three of us traveling deliberated on this option a lot & also considered the other options which were to listen to the touts. Eventually we bought the ticket from the guy who was not traveling. Got ourselves another two tickets from the ticket inspectors & got into the train.

I feared it would be a long night. Luckily it wasn’t like that at all. We were able to get ourselves two berths for the night.

I guess from now on I will have to do a double check one for the date & the second for the time.

No Kidding

2008-05-17T12:46:00.000+05:30

Many years back when I was pretty much a kid myself I recollect walking out of my mom’s friend’s house with tears in my eyes. Mom was following me way behind. The cause of such an emotion was, believe it or not, because my mom’s friend’s daughter who must have been about 2 years old or so wanted to apply a tikka on my forehead and I didn’t want to get something like that done. One reason was because I was really shy about the entire thing & two felt completely uneasy with kids then. Not quite sure if these two were the only reasons or if there were others. But I feel these were pretty much it.

Cut now to today. I have a nephew who is about 2 years old & who is presently at home. Everytime this fellow leaves home with the maid may be, he calls out for me, “bunteee” of course in his typical way, has this huge smile on his face & is waving his hand doing a bye to me. I smile & wave back.

If some years back I was uncomfortable with kids & didn’t like them to a certain level, today I feel I am more at ease with them, definitely some level of comfort is there at least. And although I am not very showy about the entire emotion thing, I just love some of his antics & how he manages to find just about anything interesting.

I also feel this is the best part of a kids growing up phase. This is the time they are beginning to learn to speak. So listening to them speak in the little way that they know is very amusing. And it does sound very nice & very special when a two year old responds in a broken language, “nothing much” to the query “What’s up?” And it does sound very funny when he says, “rama, Krishna” & sits down after he has done a lot of work or walking about or picked up something slightly heavy.

Apparently I was a pain when I was a kid. There was one occasion when dad so tired of my screeching in the middle of the night, that he just picked me up & put me outside the main door of the house & locked it up. And one of my cousin’s favorites is this incident. Apparently I created such a ruckus on the road once because mom would not buy me what I had just seen. And guess what I had just seen & badly wanted. Rat poison. Yes, rat poison of all things. Even today in Bangalore there are these guys who carry a bag on their shoulders & push a nice big poster that has the pictures & some description of the product.

An encounter

2007-12-28T12:18:00.000+05:30

I turned around in my chair and waited in that position for a few moments, I didn’t hear the call again. Was it just my imagination or did someone really call out from outside. I decided to walk to the door.

There was someone outside the door, no doubt about it. I headed close to the door & bent down slightly to take a clear look at the person outside. This time I saw him clearly. And immediately my heart started to race. As I finally reached the door, the person outside stood still, his glistening & cold eyes only staring at me. He had a few days old stubble & his hair although dirty seemed to be in its place. I noticed he wasn’t wearing any footwear. His shirt was untidily tucked in to his pants only partly, the rest just hung down. The full sleeved shirt’s sleeves were rolled up a bit.

I paused, looked at him & let the entire thing register. I still hadn’t opened the door. My fingers were on the latch but I was staring at him. He continued to stare back. What I still remember is how his eyes looked. Shiny and cold. I only managed to blurt out “yes”. “Do you remember me”, he asked pointing all the fingers of his right hand at his chest. I paused & remember saying “yes”. “Come out then”, he said. I took a moment & thought about it. Finally I opened the door but didn’t get out.

He called me by my brother’s name. I thought may be it was the state he was in that made him call me by my brother’s name. Or could be that he just thought that my name was indeed that. What I continued to be absolutely amazed was how he could speak such fluent English. No, that was not what I was really amazed about. Yes he could speak good fluent English but no that was not what I was amazed about. I was amazed about the fact that someone who could speak such good English had got himself into a position like that. Yeah that was what I was amazed about.

“Could you give me 100 rupees please, I need to get home”, he said. His voice sounded tired, sounded like he desperately needed it.

I initially struggled with my words. Finally I said, “No I don’t have that money right now”. The fact was I truly didn’t have that much on me at that moment, but even if I did I think I would have told him I didn’t .

“Please, I need that money. Look at my state…..I don’t even have my foot wear”. He pleaded.

I felt very sad. I couldn’t believe what I was witnessing. Could life be so cruel to someone. I remembered this very same person outside a house. He was on his bike & on the other side of the gate, stood a girl. He looked so much better then. His skin tone was white, that is what I can think of best describing it. So white that if he was out in the sun for a while his cheeks would turn pink. But now that complexion had completely disappeared. It had turned darkish brown.

“What did you do with the money you got yesterday”, I asked him. Mom had given him 100 rupees the day before when he came by.

He was taken aback by that question. He shook his head, looked down, then looked up at me again & said, “um….ah…..I spent that money on a call”.

I suppose he knew his explanation didn’t come across very convincing. “I am sorry I said, I don’t have any money right now”

“Please”, he said & got his hands together as if he were praying. Only, here he was begging, pleading.

“I will fall at your feet if you tell me to”, he said.

That was when I got a whiff of liquor smell from him. With that whatever little doubts I had was confirmed. I persisted with my stand. I told him I can’t give him any money because I didn’t have any.

“Please don’t come here” I told him. I remembered mom telling me the day before how scared she felt when she saw him at our gate. I didn’t give that a lot of importance then but when I saw him first some time back or even then when I was facing him & trying to get him to leave, I knew very well that I was scared inside. I later realized that such a feeling is possible & completely fair when you see the other person so cold, so emotion less. Like dying.

“I will not come again. Give me the money & I will not come again”, he said.

I repeated what I had told him all through. “I don’t have any money right now, I can’t help you”. That seemed to have clinched it. He turned & walked. I continued to look at him until his sight was blocked by the Tata Sierra parked in front of our gate.

Moments later sitting at my desk & looking down at the Balance Sheet & Income Statement that I was trying to solve for my Management Accounting assignment, I couldn’t help but again think back at those good old days this person I just met outside my door had seen. I recollected my cousin telling me that when he was visiting them one summer he would bathe four to five times a day with cold water at a time when the small town where my cousins come from had a water shortage. I remembered both my cousin & I smiling after he told me that.

I recollected mom telling me the day before, “That’s why one’s company of friends should be good”. Then later she had added, “Its drugs”. The recent case of a former model found on the road side creating headline news flashed to my mind. There they said it was the modeling world that could do it to you.

I wondered what had done it to this person.

Have you taken a rat around for a ride? I did

2007-12-04T10:27:00.001+05:30

Yeah strange as it may sound, I did take a rat around for a ride on my bike.

For many days right below the seat of my bike I would find bits of foam that is used in the seat lying on the ground. Initially I ignored it thinking that it must be some waste come in from somewhere. It was only later did I realize what it was & where it had come from.

On a particular day I took the bike out as usual & went about wherever I had to go. The bike started properly & rode properly as well. Then sometime in the afternoon I parked the bike somewhere and went to a shop to check something. The problem started once I got back. The bike wouldn’t start. I generally make an attempt to remain calm when the bike doesn’t start, especially at traffic junctions where bikes generally have a tendency to go off, as if saying I am tired I can’t ride anymore. I checked if the bike was switched on, then confirmed if I hadn’t accidently switched off the up/down button that is there on the right side of the handle bar. That was also fine. So I patiently kicked thinking it would start. But No, no such luck.

Eventually I had to push the bike home & after parking it near the gate I began to feel really angry about it because I wasn’t able to figure out what could be wrong. The nearby bike mechanic was shut that day. And for some reason I thought I should get this checked at the service center which I frequent. That was a fine idea but the only downside to it was I would have to push the bike for a good 2 – 3 Kms and to make matters worse for a small stretch the road is fairly steep.

That evening my brother in law came visiting & during conversations I happened to mention that the bike was not starting. He offered to take a look. He too tried different things but nothing worked. After coffee he suggested that we push the bike down to some mechanic shop & get it checked. I reluctantly agreed. Luckily not far from home there was a mechanic sitting outside his shop. We explained the problem to him. He first tried to start the bike but it wouldn’t relent. Then slowly one by one he began to unscrew the screws & loosen the nuts. As he removed one part after another both my brother in law & I looked & wondered how each of those parts make up the bike. Finally when he removed the seat, came the surprise & the shock. A rat jumped out of it. It was nice & big. I remember I only managed to jump on to a raised platform nearby & got down only when it had managed to run away. The mechanic now knew what the problem could be. The rat had eaten into the wires that run beneath the seat & this was causing the bike not to start. He removed one box like thing & showed us how the rat had chewed into the wires.

While the mechanic was fitting in a replacement, I was only wondering. God knows for many days the rat had been there inside. And God knows where all I had taken him. Just imagine the little big thing sitting right under the seat, constantly munching on to the wires, the basic life line of the bike. Or just imagine what if the rat got tired of the wires & decided to chew up the seat & work its way up to the top of the seat….God!!! what an escape.

Keep Walking

2007-11-29T18:44:00.000+05:30

There are moments when I am completely stressed out, fed up with things around be it at office or at home & I go completely blank as to how to go get myself a life. Umm…yeah get a life. The more I think about my targets at office & the more I wonder how I am going to achieve them the more depressed I get. The only thing I feel like doing is to get away from this once lovely city & escape to some quiet, scenic place & do nothing else but Keep Walking!

There is a certain joy in doing something like that. The vast open spaces, the noiseless terrain is like a beautiful girl spreading her arms wide & inviting you to hug her. What a feeling. Sheer Bliss. Walking amidst nature is also soothing to the extent that one can easily get switched off to pressures back home or office. No wonder that holidaying is being promoted a lot as a stress buster. Stress buster it surely is. And a stress buster which has a good mix of adventure & pleasant surprises

I still remember these few instances. One was when we were trekking from Edukemeri to Donigal (this is the route that the Bangalore – Mangalore rail will take). After a full day of trekking approx 18 Kms we were only thinking of reaching our camp site & take the load of our backs & the sticky socks off our feet & relax & may be eat a snack. But what we got instead was all that plus the most beautiful sight I have ever seen. A glorious water fall just a few meters away from our camping site. Although there was a hush sound that a water fall creates no body really knew what that was. Our walk path was also such that there was no sight of any water fall in the vicinity. Hence we just walked & looked ahead. At one point our walk path turned to the left, as we approached this point, the hush sound of the water fall grew louder and as soon as we took that left, the sight in front of us was breathtaking. A good 35 -40 meter water fall with bountiful of water. The reactions from all of us were the same – amazement, joy. A truly beautiful sight it was.

If this was the pleasant surprise part then there is the adventure part as well. This was during our trek to Brahmagiri. Anybody who has been to Brahmagiri will know that the final part of the trek to Brahmagiri is more of a hike. It is like climbing a 70 -75 degree slope. This time too, we had been walking a long time & we were keen to scale the Brahmagiri peak at the earliest. Our guide for this trip was guiding us at a nice even pace & we were also enjoying it because we had just sighted a herd of wild elephants along the way. The peak of Brahmagiri from a distance looked pretty flat, meaning it did slope upwards but from where we were looking at it, it looked like the slope was scalable & will require no extra effort than just a walk. But as we got closer & closer to it the slope got steeper & steeper & at one point we were actually climbing like I said a 70 -75 degree slope. Some of us were able to do it only after getting a good hand of support from some brave souls in our group. Of course when we did reach up the peak eventually not only was it a relief but the view around was simply marvelous and made the effort all the more fruitful.

Recently we did a day trip to Galibore. A 100 odd kms away from Bangalore near Muttati village. As part of the package was a small hill hike. Having climbed peaks like Brahmagiri & Thadiyandamol this hike got over in a few minutes but was definitely not an easy hike. When we eventually reached a watch tower we only wanted more. From the top of the watch tower we could see that the hills around were very nice & scalable. So off we went to climb up the nearest peak. At the top of the peak, we had a beautiful view of the cauvery river snaking its way through the forest. Being up there & looking at the sight is one thing & describing it is another. Of course being up there & looking at it is the best part. As we rested there, ate snacks & clicked photographs we noticed that the entire area was getting covered by grey clouds & it began to get windy. Within seconds there was a strong gush of wind & a drizzle. Somebody in our group spread his arms wide & lifted his face up towards the sky as if saying, “you want me to hug you…here you go”. Everyone followed suit immediately & loved those few moments of romance with nature.

After some time we were at it again….we were walking…. to another spot, another place, another adventure & another pleasant surprise….how I wish I could just Keep Walking.

‘Yenaku oru girl friend veno’ (I want a girl friend)

2007-10-04T21:29:00.000+05:30

The quoted words are from a very popular song from the Tamil movie Boys, which translates into “I want a girl friend”. Recently I was browsing online & I came across a classifieds website where there were categories called ‘Girl friend wanted’ and ‘Boy friend wanted’. I found it pretty strange for I didn’t know one could get oneself a boyfriend or a girlfriend by posting a classified & that too on a nondescript website. Out of curiosity I clicked on the ‘Boy friend wanted’ link.

What I found inside was even stranger. I was expecting posts by girls who wanted boy friends but what I found were postings made by guys saying they wanted a simple/cute/pretty girl for friendship. That was indeed quite strange because the link outside was ‘Boy friend wanted’. So to cross verify I clicked on the ‘Girl friend wanted’ link. No surprises here. All posts there were of guys looking for girl friends.

This incident was something to me. Yeah this is the day & age of organized dating, online dating & what not. But guys getting so desperate that they advertise not only on ‘girl friend wanted’ but also on ‘boy friend wanted’. Also there were hardly any posts from girls in the ‘boy friend wanted’ category. So does that mean boys want girl friends & girls don’t want boy friends? No probably not. Girls probably want guys to approach them. I suppose that is how it is right? So if girls want guys to approach them, then why do guys find it so difficult to approach girls, get a conversation going, build it into friendship then courtship & finally marriage? Such are the ways of this world. Incomprehensible!

But nice idea that. Put it up on the classifieds website & sit back thinking that somebody will call. May be I’ll try it here. I want a girl friend too…and now I am waiting…. J Guess the similarity between the classified website & my blog? It’s very easy. There are hardly any visitors!!! But what the heck…I want a girl friend too…

On my pin up board

2007-09-23T12:54:00.000+05:30

Yeah I’ve got a pin up board. Who doesn’t have one? Well I didn’t have one till a few months back. I was lucky to find this one day. It’s a nice medium sized one & hangs in my room. Once I got it, it took a few days to fix it up & then a few more days for something to get up on it. Initially I had put up a few snaps of the numerous treks I had involved myself in. Then over a period of time it began to change. This is what I have today on the pin up board. These are things that I have once again accidentally come across & those that I looked for particularly here & there & found.

To me these are some of the things I have started to believe in, I want to follow & to a certain extent a reflection of what I am as well.

The first thing that one can see on the pin up board is the two pictures of me with my friends. These two snaps taken on two different occasions include all my friends from my college days. Nice snaps, creates a feeling of nostalgia.

The other prominent thing one will find there are a collection of words that each go on to make so much sense in its own way. I call this collection of words because I don’t know what else to call them. Some of them are quotes, I suppose there is a proverb or two as well, but others are words & then sentences. They are so beautifully written that I had to put it up there. The first set of words reads as follows:
“I shed my inhibitions, my fears, I traveled light. I traded my stock options for a lonely planet, my cell phone for a compass. My briefcase for a backpack. I took off. I wandered in the company of tourists, revelers & a guitar as old as me. I learned that people are good. Strangers are fascinating. And that every journey reveals another. I’ve lost track of time. And perhaps my job, my apartment & my fiancé. But I have my compass & I know its pointing me in the right direction”

The above set of words is from the Femina magazine’s ad. I so loved the words. To me it describes what I want to do. I really wish I could do something like that. It’s scary & at the same time so exhilarating & will be so much fun. Recently I watched the movie “Wildhogs’” with my friends & this movie again is on similar lines. It has so driven my to do something like this. But I know it is not going to happen for a while now.

The second set of words is basically a color Xerox of the back of a GK Vale album. I found these words also so beautifully written & communicated so much. I like this also because of the way it explains what it tries to explain. It to me makes a very complex thing like dreams very simple. It goes like this…”As someone once aptly put it, ‘Dream Hard’. That’s the best way to achieve what you want in life. Remember the days, as a child, you dreamt of owning a watch. And dreamt of splurging on bubble gums! As you were growing, these dreams began taking a different shape; a car, vacations, profession, fame…priorities change, but not the process of dreaming. Because dreams keeps hopes alive. Dream on. Make things happen.”

Apart from these big set of words there is the small set of words. Once again all these are some things I liked largely because what it communicates. Some of it here I believe in & follow while there are few I would like to start doing or start feeling.

“A person who is nice to you but rude to the waiter is not a nice person”

“Map out your future but do it in pencil”

“No matter how big or soft or warm your bed is you still have to get out of it”

“If your mind goes blank, don’t forget to turn off the sound.”

“Some people travel. I explore”

“To the mediocre, mediocrity appears great”

“The biggest enemy of future success is past success”

“Why should I follow anyone’s footsteps?”

And the latest thing I added is, “It’s lonely at the top, but the view is breathtaking”. This again is so full of meaning. It means so much especially now, keeping in mind what I am doing & so on. This is part of the Samsung ad that appeared in the papers recently so it is basically a cutting of it.

That’s pretty much it, on my pin up board.

The outdoor experience in Indore

2007-08-02T19:20:00.000+05:30

The sight of the mall was very energizing. As the taxi passed the Mangal mall the crowd & the color simply reminded me of Bangalore. But before the mall the two huge buildings of Dainik Jagran & Dainik Bhaskar was something as well. The buildings communicated how big these two newspapers are in that part of the country. In Bangalore the two leading newspapers Times of India & Deccan Herald are also located on the same road but their buildings don’t quite give away their standing in the city.

Being in the heart of India (that is what Madhya Pradesh is promoted as) one would expect Hindi to be the preferred language for communication. There were no surprises on that front. One thing that I noticed on the very first day in Indore & the few days there after was how the medical stores were named. This side in Bangalore it is largely called medicals/ chemists/druggists and of course would be prefixed with some other name. But that side I noticed that there was no such thing. It was simply called “Dawaiyaan” (meaning Medicines) & it wouldn’t be prefixed with another name. That was strange. The other thing I observed was that most of the shops would have a very simple & obvious name to it. For example if there was a shop selling mobile phones, it would simply be called “mobile phones”. But yeah I found something interesting as well. A place called Ding-Dong hotel. Now that’s something right?

Indore being close to holy places like Ujjain & Omkareshwar one would have expected a lot of sadhus around there. But that is actually not the scene. Infact that is not how it is even in Ujjain for that matter. But yeah I did see some sadhus in Indore. Just try to visualize this. A group of sadhus in langotis are walking by and then suddenly you realize that the one who is leading them is not even wearing that. That’s exactly what happened with me. I did see a sadhu in Indore and a completely nude one at that walking down one of the city roads. I can tell you that was not a pretty sight.

For us city bred people some habits die hard. One thing that we wanted to do in Indore was to go to a discotheque. For obvious reasons of course. That is have some fun and get a fair idea of the kind of crowd that is there. After realizing that Geoffrey’s in the Treasure Island mall does not have a discotheque, we hopped into an auto after explaining to the driver that we wanted to go to the discotheque named Volcano. After a short ride were outside a four floors building. The security tells us that Volcano is not in this building & somewhere else. The auto driver is clueless as to what is happening. After a short argument with him we hop into the auto again. Once seated inside he reveals, “why did you have to ask the security. There is a disco inside. Don’t I know? It all happens here. You guys should have just gone up”. But the place hardly had any trappings of hosting a discotheque. No crowd hanging around. No fancy name board, nothing. But after the auto drivers explanation we realized may be it was a dance bar & not a discotheque. We finally reached another building that had a big board saying “Volcano”. But the thing written under that was weird. It read, “the family discotheque”. Now what was that? Once again no trappings of the building actually hosting a discotheque. Nevertheless we went inside hoping for the best. Outside the entrance to the disco a security guard stopped us and asked us what we wanted. When we announced that we were there for the discotheque, he asked us all to sit on some chairs that were nicely placed around there. The owner was summoned. A fat man wearing all white appeared. Gold chain, bracelet & a mobile in hand. We repeat our purpose of visit. “So you are four?” he asked. “Well now not possible” he says. We all looked at each other trying to comprehend what the owner chap was saying. Some more dialogues were exchanged. When we stepped out, all of us had this feeling that the discotheque seemed less a discotheque & more something else.

Feeding the crows

2007-07-11T10:06:00.000+05:30

As a custom it is mandatory for us to feed the crows on the day of the rituals that are held for the departed soul. How such a practice came about is not known but it is being followed. Since I am not very clear about why something like this is done, I wouldn’t want to comment on the reasons.

Over the last few months we’ve had to feed the crows. Whatever is made for lunch that day, a little bit of all the items are laid out on a leaf & kept on the terrace for the crows to eat. People are supposed to eat only after feeding the crows. Since it is believed that feeding the crows is equivalent to feeding the ancestors or the departed souls, it is a ritual that is taken very seriously & done with due respect. However the superstitions attached to these things can sometimes get very annoying. And since it is part of the ritual that is being held for a departed soul, no questions are encouraged. If it is done, it is considered as no respect shown to the departed soul.

Once no crow turned up to eat the food offered. All the relatives had gathered around and looked up at the sky anxiously. Every moment was a nerve racking as no crow coming to eat the food is interpreted as the ancestors being angry. Someone shouted at the youngsters to start calling the crows. Next moment the ‘kaw’, ‘kaw’, ‘kaw’ were reverberating all around. Still no crow was in sight. Much later a crow came by & picked up a little food & flew away. Shortly thereafter an uncle revealed that the crow finally came by only because an aunt (his wife) apologized to the crows & begged for forgiveness. What for? No answers were provided. It was left to the people to either accept it or reject it. Nobody was willing to accept that the food was offered at a time when the sun was high up in the sky & very hot and it is very possible that the birds stay under the shade of the trees at such hour.

In another instance, we kept the food on the terrace & waited for a long time. Once again there was no crow in sight. After much effort & thought & persuasion we concluded to proceed with eating. (remember we are not supposed to eat until the crows eat). After we had just begun to eat, somebody announced that a crow had come by & picked up some food. The honorable elders revealed that may be the crow didn’t like the idea of us starving & wanted us to eat first before it could eat. Trust our elders to give befitting replies to all such things.

Even small things sometimes are made big. Like if there are too many people & too close to the food, then there is someone commenting that it is because of that that the crows are not stopping by. What about those times then, when one can see many crows feasting on the roadside, when there is heavy traffic & a lot of people passing by? How is it that they can comfortably eat then?

Something to think about is what people do when there are absolutely no crows around. Like in many countries outside India that is the state. Or for all you know what will happen if the crows disappear like the way sparrows have.

Good questions you said, but we are not supposed to ask questions.

Marrying people off – A national past time it seems

2007-07-09T17:44:00.001+05:30

“So what kind of a girl are you looking for?” asked my aunt. “Go on, go on tell me it’s OK, you need not feel shy”. Feeling shy I definitely was not, but feeling angry I definite was. But she is my aunt, so you know how I am expected to react. I just smiled. “You should get yourself a homely girl who will stay at home & take care of the house. Somebody has to be at home always you know, its good”. So there you go the answer was given by her even before I got a chance to think about it.

A few days back a pandit was at home to conduct some rituals. While all the necessary items required for it was being arranged around him he looked at me & asked in chaste Kannada, “What is your Nakshatra?” I looked at him & gaped & then I looked around to check if anybody could help me with that. Luckily my sister answered that for him. He then asked me my date of birth & I immediately knew where this was headed. Obviously I couldn’t do anything else but tell him my date of birth. He removed a big bag, put on his glasses & started looking for something. I quietly got up & moved away from there. For all I knew, if I continued sitting there he would have shown me a photograph of a girl & asked me if I liked her.

I suppose most of us have already been through this situation or will shortly undergo something like this. I suppose it is a pretty obvious topic at some point of time in one’s life but it is quite unbelievable how people you just know somehow, somewhere wanting to play the role of a match maker without any initiative from your side. Just about everybody wants to know what kind of a girl you want and invariably end up giving their own opinion on what kind will suit the concerned person & why & so on. I don’t understand why people don’t value the fact that someone’s marriage is a very personal thing for the person getting married & that way the responsibility of his immediate family. No, that is not so simple at all. They are all our well wishers, so everybody will want to play a part.

But I find this experience also funny because I wonder isn’t there anything else that some people can think of while having a conversation. A few days back when mom & I were at a supermarket a lady who mom knew was right behind us at the billing counter. So after all the initial talk, she looked at me & asked mom “Is this your son?” Mom nodded & guess what the lady’s next question was - “Is he married?” Mom answered “No” & for that the lady’s reaction was “When are you planning to get him married”

At some point I think it also starts getting to the parents as well. For how long can one possibly go on giving answers like this? They would obviously like to simply answer “Yes he is married” or “He is getting married” & be done with it. So that pressure starts percolating down to the boy or the girl who are left with no choice but drop all other plans & take the plunge.

The only place where I keep my fingers crossed

2007-05-21T08:47:00.001+05:30

Its easy for the girls I suppose. For us men it is a monthly (sometimes fortnightly) torture. Don’t quite know when one realizes it, but there comes a time when one starts to feel that the time has come. But yes there have been instances when mom looks puzzled sometimes & says, “you just had one a few days back”.

Getting a haircut done is a nightmare. A few years ago I had accepted that I was destined to have a bad hair cut, so I wouldn’t tell the barber chap anything. I would just go hop into the chair & look at my reflection in the mirror. The barber would make eye contact & then I would pick one among the two options - short or medium. Most times it would be medium. But the barber shop near the Sivan Shetty Garden post office, seem to have their own definition of short or medium and that would wary depending on the mood of the barber or the time you are getting a hair cut done. If you see the barber in an aggressive mood rest assured short for him would then mean shorter & if you are there at say eight in the night, then medium would automatically translate to long. He would hardly do anything & the next minute you are paying him. End of it all, I would only be saddened. Either too much of the mane was chopped off or too little.

Thus began my quest for the just perfect hair cut. In a city like Bangalore there are barber shops at every other street, at least the area where I reside is like that. Trust me I have tried almost all the barber shops around there but none fit my requirement. But yes these are all simple ordinary guys who burp right in front of your nose, bend forward right in front of you at an angle such that the sweat marks under their arms is on full display & the smell heady. These were those days when Limelight didn’t exist & unisex salons were unheard of in Bangalore. But when a man decides something he pursues it & if it is as basic as a hair cut, it is very important that he pursues it as well. So there I landed one day at an upmarket hair salon on Brigade Road. I heard of this place from a friend. He said they talk in English, serve tea & every few minutes ask you if they are doing it right. I thought these guys must have definitely mastered the art of hair cut & should visit them despite their hefty price tag of Rs 250 for the haircut.

Two chairs to my left a girl sat getting something done to her hair. But all I could notice was the barber/stylist just comb the hair again & again & again. When the guy started to work on my head, a lady with colored hair approached & kept staring at the guy work. I wondered, can a simple thing like a hair cut be a fascination for someone. Well the way she looked at the hair getting chopped off indicated that to me & I thought I was finally sitting under a good well trained barber. End result, almost there, but not where I wanted it go. Yes I got my cup of tea, but the experience on the whole didn’t live up to the descriptions I had got.

I explained the problem to a college friend of mine who got a good hair cut done every 15 days. He said the barber shop he went to in HAL 2nd stage did the good job for him and I should try it out there. Well no harm whatsoever, despite the fact that the place would be a good 8-9 KMS from home. I thought I should try the place out. The place was pretty ordinary, the type I have near home, but the guy did a decent job. My only bit of dissatisfaction was that he left a bit too much hair right in the front. On the whole well you know how it is…

My desperation for the good hair cut reached a stage where I would walk into any fancy salon I saw somewhere. Once I landed knocking on a door. It was opened by a pretty looking lady who responded in perfect English, “we are opening one shortly for men” & handed over a card that detailed out the address on one side & the route map on the other. Then Limelight started advertising in the Bangalore papers. I read every ad & gave it a thought. Once I also went it into the Brigade Road branch just to check out the place from inside & quizzed a guy there on what I can get done from them. But it wasn’t until a few months later that I eventually went in to get a haircut done, and I chose the Vittal Mallya Road branch on recommendation from a few of my colleagues. It’s a nice place from the inside. It also had a lady in the front office, now that is something for a salon right? I was quickly summoned by the barber who wore jeans & a Limelight T Shirt and who himself had a good hair style. Once I settled on the chair which was in front of a tall mirror the barber guy asked me how I wanted it. I told him what I wanted. But he didn’t seem to understand. I clarified and I thought he understood but it was only when it was finally done that I realized he hadn’t quite understood.

I feel all these barber shops should ensure to put across a particular customer only to a particular barber. So that they could communicate over a few months on how it was the previous time & get to a standard wavelength. It is very surprising that none of these barber chaps actually want to indulge in a conversation. All they want to know is how we want the hair cut. Charging Rs 250 for a mere hair cut is very cruel but yeah it would be worth it if the guy understood what one wanted, then the money would be worth it. Also it is surprising that none of these salons have come up with a regular hair cut package or some such thing. Considering that for the men it is a monthly affair why can’t they give a discount for the guys who go there frequently?

The search has not ended yet. I have identified some options in the malls now. But I fear they will charge me a bomb & I will still end up with a hair cut that I don’t like. Tired of this ordeal I asked the guy at VLCC (yeah I am trying this out now) to crop my hair to the extent that it looked like I had a tonsure done sometime back & it was going back now. (See I don’t even know what this kind of a cut is called. This is where the barber should come in & educate). That hair cut worked cos there was nothing there. It also saved me some money for a good two and half months.

Now I am just thinking of growing it long enough and may be have a pony or something. But then I have my boss to answer at office….aaaarrrghhh…..not easy this.

Try it – Its Quality stuff

2007-05-18T17:07:00.001+05:30

Some good places around in Bangalore where some basic food is of top quality. These are all my favorite options but obviously don’t get to go to these places too often. I highly recommend this Jalebi place on Ebrahim Sahib Street. Eat a piece and you are sure to take some home.

Good place to eat a plate of Idli – Brahmins Coffee Bar, Sankarapuram.

Good place to eat a dosa – Vidyarthi Bhavan, Gandhi Bazaar.

Good place to drink a cop of coffee – actually quite a few…Coffee House, MG Road, Chandrika, Cunningham Road, Koshy’s, St. Marks Road

Good place to drink a cup of tea – Mecca Café, Johnson Market, Hosur Road

Good place to eat Pani Puri – Karthik’s Mithaai Shoppe, CMH Road, Indiranagar

Good place to eat Jamoon – Bhagatram Sweets, Commercial Street

Good place to eat Jalebi’s – Rawal Jalebi, Ebrahim Sahib Street (parallel to Commercial Street)

Good place to eat Chicken Kababs – Fanoos, near Johnson Market, Hosur Road

English as mother tongue

2007-03-28T16:37:00.000+05:30

Ever witnessed a situation where members of a family talk to each other at home in English and not the mother tongue? Sure we have. We ourselves do it, don’t we? Knowing English today is considered a basic necessity. If someone isn’t good at it they are looked down upon & are at a disadvantage in terms of their professional life. But then knowing English is one thing & talking to members of the family in English another.

My colleague seconded the view when I told him that kids today speak much better English than what we probably used to when we were their age. There could be various reasons for it. English is there everywhere. From newspapers to TV Channels (yeah kids watch a lot of cartoons on Cartoon network don’t they?) to someone who walks up to them and asks them their name, does so in English. And if folks at home talk to each other in English then that alone is good enough for the kid to pick up the language.

There have been so many instances be it at bookstores or somewhere out on the streets, when I see kids convincing their parents to buy them something. Of course all of that is in pure English & sans any of those Indian suffixes like aa (as in yes-aa”) etc. I am dumbfounded when I see & hear that. I must also say that something like that is very encouraging, because being a recruiter I know how important it is for people to speak & write good English. But then again, I wonder do they speak in their native tongue at all. Although I don’t talk in English at home I still can’t understand some numbers in my native language, I will require a translation to understand it. Needless to say English has indeed percolated down nicely into regular every day usage. I find it amusing on one side when I hear my maid servant who speaks Tamil say “too much” but on the other side I know that is the kind of pull the English language has. It is like a magnet. There are also those people whose English language skills could be best categorized as “Average”, talking like as if they have mastered the language but only causing amusement to all around. Then there are also people who will talk to their folks at home in the native tongue but to their pets in English! Now, why is that!?

But I have seen a trend. If the husband & wife are from different castes or religions then such people are more likely to talk in English at home & when the folks at home are the intellectual kind, you can expect English again. But what I think is a fair way of looking at this is that if the people in the family are all educated in English & can speak good fluent English then it is generally found that they are speaking in English. The other important reason could be the fact that at work or at school we are only conversing in English & English is what we resort to when we are getting a thing or two done over phone. This is definitely not a cause for worry as the fact remains that English is still not widely used across India & we have a long way to go to reach large scale literacy, then English literacy & its everyday usage & then finally English could really replace our native tongues at home. That is a long way, but the optimist in me says it will come, the recruiter in me says the sooner it is the better & the Indian in me says the slower the better, for our native language has its own little aura attached to it & the best way to treat it is to speak it.

Are you what you are today because of your dad?

2007-03-01T23:31:00.000+05:30

Are you what you are because that is what your parents wanted you to be? There is a high possibility that the answer is yes. But why is it like that. Why do parents have such a big say in what we should be? Why do they push us into becoming a doctor or an engineer when we want to do management or the arts?

I remember this school friend of mine. Both of us studied together till the 10th standard & later I decided to take the commerce stream despite my parents advising me to take up science. My friend was also pressurized to take up science and eventually did that only to flunk his 12th exams. Being a recruiter I have seen so many candidates who have done their 11th & 12th in the science stream & then shifting to the commerce stream for their graduation. Some of them end up doing two graduations; say a BCA & then a B. Com through correspondence. Some of them discontinue whatever they are doing because they can’t cope with it & end up doing Diplomas. To top all this, I came across a case where in the parent just crossed the limit. There was this girl who wanted to pursue her BA but her dad wanted her to do B.Com or BBM. The girl of course didn’t agree. So how was it resolved? Dad asked her daughter to quit studies & work instead. The father wasn’t really keen on her doing BA because he was of the view that someone doing a BA didn’t stand a good chance in the job market. Today the girl is working & still has no permission to pursue her graduation in BA.

I suppose its in our culture this entire thing. What the elders say is right? And what they say should be followed. We are brought up with such thinking. But today when there are numerous career choices open parents forcing their children to take a particular path is completely unfair & unwanted, because most of the new career paths pay well & are proper careers not just jobs.

Everything in life has its extremes. So here too, its not always like the parents are forcing their kids to become what they want them to become. The other extreme of this is when parents give too much leeway to their kids to decide what they want to do with their life. They are like ‘whether you do Commerce or Science, that doesn’t matter, all I want is you to be happy & successful.’ Sometimes that goes even further, ‘even if you don’t work its fine.’ Such an approach isn’t healthy either. Such a casual & free approach will not help the kids and at a later date when they are faced with a situation where in they are not enjoying the job, the parents ‘you do what you want’ approach could be detrimental to the kids future.

Parents have to partner with their kids & help them understand the merits & demerits of pursuing something as a career. Today being a doctor is not all & all those who did engineering because that was like the next best option after medicine are now also doing MBA to equip themselves with the management knowledge so that they are not left behind by those who learnt Accounts & Finance in their graduation.

Office cafeteria – Coffee, Conversations & more

2007-02-16T19:24:00.000+05:30

The office cafeteria is an interesting place to be. It is a melting pot of employees from different departments, different teams & different groups. Between sips of refreshing hot coffee, the discussions and the camaraderie on display tells a lot about the organization, its people & how the day’s been for them.

One of the most visible aspects of the cafeteria is how people gather around & seat themselves. Things to note here are who sits with whom. Most times people from the same team sit together. If it’s a large team they break into smaller groups. It is likely that one group is all male & the other all female. In such a scenario, there is a high possibility of one of the guys to be two timing both the male table & the female table. Then there are these ‘couple only’ tables, where a guy & a girl sit across & talk not realizing probably that ‘they’ are being talked of in the other tables.

The other aspect of the cafeteria is what people do out there. Most talk, some sulk, a few of them come to check out the other crowd there. Those who sulk keep staring into their coffee cup probably trying to count the hole like depressions into the froth of their coffee. Those who come to check out the others, position themselves in strategic locations in the cafeteria from where they could get a glimpse of anyone sitting at any table. They generally hold their mobile phone in one hand & the coffee cup in the other & act like they are busy reading or sending a message it actually seems more like by-hearting the numbers & the spellings in the names. And then the it-moment comes when they lift the coffee cup to have a sip & simultaneously scan the scene around in the cafeteria. Some do this with such style & elegance that you think you are watching a Hollywood movie.

Of course the conversations in the cafeteria take the cake when compared to all the other aspects. Conversations could be about anything. Be it news from the newspapers, be it the discussion on the day’s work, or be it plain gossip they all bring the cafeteria alive. Even if someone isn’t the kind who would initiate a conversation, he surely will get drawn into it. Some of the interesting cafeteria conversations I have been involved in were nicknaming some of the senior people or on a serious side, a discussion on what our company should do to cut down attrition. Once we debated a topic like, “Recruiters don’t have to use their mind to do their work”. Somewhere in the middle of all these conversations some one liners that registered & I could recollect is “Management sucks” & “God should not make Guys fair (appearance wise)”.

Cafeteria = Coffee, Carefree, Casual, Comic, Come-when-you-want-go-when-you-want…well almost.

Meeting People

2007-02-05T17:15:00.000+05:30

When I ask candidates who want to kick start their career as a HR person, “Why they chose the HR stream”, the answer I get most times is “I like meeting people”. Sometimes they also say “I am a people’s person” or “I like talking to people”. Either which way it means the same. Although being a people’s person is an important trait for any HR professional, that alone is not sufficient & should not be reason enough for someone to take up the HR line. I ask them why not Marketing or Sales or Market Research or PR or Advertising or even something like Media. Don’t these streams also require the “people’s person” trait?

Also, the one important thing that most people don’t understand is that as a HR person you are not meeting “people” in the real sense but you are meeting “colleagues” or “employees” & if you are Recruiter then you are meeting “candidates” or “job seekers”. I suppose “colleagues”, “employees”, “candidates” and “job seekers” are not the same as “people”. If one really wanted to meet people, I feel one should join a club - may be an entertainment club or a photography or public speaking club like Toastmasters.

That said, I must say that as a HR professional one actually has a fair chance to get to know people, albeit limitedly. It’s obviously not possible to get to know them completely but it does give you that opening to set the ball rolling in terms of knowing them. For example when you are in an interview a question like, “Where are you from?” can create that opening to know the person. Recently I met this candidate & I asked him the same thing. His answer, “Port Blair” registered really well. Later when he got through the interview & joined the company, “Port Blair” became a conversation piece in the cafeteria over a cup of coffee. Another candidate was from Honnavar & I got talking to him about that place & the means of travel available to get there.

In the course of interviews you also get to know some little secrets about the person that wouldn’t be shared under ordinary circumstances with a stranger. There was this candidate I met a few days back who told me what kind of an impact her personal decision is having on her career. Being a Muslim, she married a Hindu and the company that she works for comprised of a management team that was predominantly Muslims. This personal decision of hers had set the tongues wagging & she had begun to fear that she would see no growth and hikes there.

On another day, I met a lady who said that she was going through marital problems and was in the process of getting a divorce from her husband. When I asked her why she did not work for a particular period after her marriage, she said her husband did not like the idea of her stepping out of the house. This attitude and approach from a guy who is supposed to be an actor was shocking & unbelievable.

In another instance, I met a candidate who for some reason didn’t look normal enough to me. Nevertheless we proceeded with the interview in the normal fashion. When I asked her why she is considering leaving the present company she told me that she was “Male till sometime back” and that she had recently undergone a sex change operation to become a female. This decision of hers was causing a lot of uneasiness with her present employers and as a result she wanted to move out.

I never probed these issues further, my job was to check the suitability of the candidate for a particular job and I did just that.

My own emotions & feelings on these issues make me pause and think about it & question if it is right or wrong, do I accept it, would I do something like this & so on. Some times these short sessions of “meeting people” teaches you something, makes you realize something & sometimes it just leaves you blank.

Being Kind

2007-01-31T14:35:00.000+05:30

I am not a big Shah Rukh Khan fan, but I love the way he is anchoring the show, Kaun Banega Crorepati. Since KBC was earlier hosted by Amitabh Bachhan, every one is busy comparing Shah Rukh to Amitabh. I suppose one thing that stands out like an elephant is the kindness of Shah Rukh. Not that Amitabh wasn’t kind, he was kind too but that was more formal. Shah Rukh is being kind to the contestants like he has known them for a long time. It’s anyone’s guess as to how many watches he is going to be giving away like this!

Kindness obviously is a nice thing isn’t it? Everybody likes it when the other person speaks to you well, understands what you are going through, is there for you when you want him to be there, helps you with the bags, advises you even before you have shared the problem. That said, kindness also comes from unknown quarters when one is least expecting it. I remember this one incident that happened somewhere in a small little town of Tamil Nadu. I had boarded a town bus to get to another place. The place where I got into the bus was full of people that day as a weekly fair was organized there. As you would expect under such circumstances, the bus was over flowing with tamil speaking, simple village & town folk. In such a scenario I was offered a seat by an ageing woman. She preferred to sit on the floor of the bus instead. My limited knowledge of the tamil language let me down at that moment and I was struggling to tell her that it was nice of her to do that, but I would rather stand than take the seat from her. Amidst the smell of sweat, sand & fish that was emanating from the bus, the old woman just waved her hand down at me & asked me to sit down. Probably my city bred mannerisms & appearance and the very visible awkwardness that I was feeling at that time, led to such an act of kindness.

As a contrast, a former colleague called me recently. I was surprised that he actually called as I hadn’t heard from him since the time he left the company. No greetings, no Hi – Hello, he got straight to the point. He had an issue with some post exit task. When I expressed my inability to sort the issue out immediately, he asked for the line to be transferred to the senior person. I promptly did that and hung up. The brief conversation left a bad feeling. Absolutely no courtesy was displayed whatsoever, so much for knowing him for over 15 months and being lunch partners while we were colleagues, I thought.

Being kind is something that doesn’t come to everybody and frankly it requires a big heart to be kind. At a time when reality based shows like Kamzor Kadi Kaun, Big Boss, Celebrity Big Brother, Indian Idol, MTV Roadies & so on are showcasing rude behavior and we are beginning to accept it as part & parcel of life, comes Shah Rukh Khan with KBC. Suddenly things are beginning to look positive & happy yet again….at least on TV.

Is India ready for the Butt Cleavage?

2007-01-09T19:40:00.000+05:30

Forget about PDA (public display of affection), this is the day & age of PDBP (public display of body parts). And no it’s not the mini skirt effect or the low neck line effect. They are all passé. Today is the day of low rise jeans. Designed to showcase the curves, it seems to be ending up showcasing a lot more than that. The rear till sometime back which was something that even the person himself couldn’t see comfortably is now out & for everyone else to see.

For a country known for its chastity, these are monstrous developments. Body parts that were till sometime back revealed only to a partner in a darkened bedroom, is now a free show. Its there everywhere, & if you are thinking pubs & disco’s you couldn’t be more wrong, from the street corner café to the neighborhood traffic junction you can spot it.

There is a debate going on these days about public display of affection. While learned people are talking about if it is ok to hold hands, kiss or hug in public, another set of people somewhere are showing off their rear cracks. Call it disgusting or fashion, this is one topic that the talk shows will surely host in the near future. The way frontal cleavage has become regular on the street it’s only a matter of time before the butt cleavage starts giving it some competition.

All this begs only one simple question – Where is all this headed? If a part of the top & a part of the back is now on public display, what next? Is it the middle? Possible. Imagine someone walk down the road, showing off his or her pubic hair. Braided pubic hair, anyone? Colored??? Considering how broader & wider the meaning of Fashion is getting these days, I am prepared!

Who wants a job you or your Mom?

2006-12-26T11:21:00.000+05:30

There are numerous occasions when I get calls from friends, relatives, or friend’s relatives asking me if I can help them get a job. If one is in the recruitment industry this is not surprising and one more or less begins accept the fact that there will invariably be someone who will approach you for a job or some other assistance with respect to landing that “good job”. And by the way it’s good for a recruiter, one never knows when one of these guys help in closing that long pending job opening or achieve that ever elusive monthly target.

But what surprises me & also irritates me is when someone calls up & says “my daughter is looking for a job, she is working here, doing this currently. Do you have something suitable for her?” There is nothing wrong with a general enquiry like that after all, isn’t it? May be they will pass on the info to the person who is actually in need of a job. You bet that happens. You feel happy you have done your bit in improving someone’s life & if you are handling that position yourself then you await the resume to see if it can have some positive impact on your life, at least temporarily (like telling your team lead that you finally sourced one resume). As expected the resume does come but who sends it –the job seeker or the person who enquired about it? If you said the job seeker, you got it 100% wrong!

Yeah, that is what this is all about. I feel the role of a parent, friend or relative should end once they have shown the job seeker the way. Once it is pointed out to them that you can approach this person, send this person the resume, I think they have done their job. Thereafter it should (& must) be only the job seeker who should follow up on the developments taking place in terms of he/she landing a job. So many times moms call & ask ‘have you got my son’s resume’, ‘when is his next interview’, ‘we haven’t heard from you yet’. It’s understood from their point of view. But from the recruiter point of view it comes across completely differently.

I believe in the power of “follow up”. It is extremely important that there is follow up and that follow up should happen only by the job seeker & no one else on his/her behalf. When the job seeker follows up it comes across right. When they don’t do it and someone else does it, it seems like job seeker is not really keen on working & is being forced with the idea. It seems like they are shy/afraid to ask the status. But most importantly when someone else is following up on their behalf they usually end the conversation with a “please do your best”, “he is just watching TV all day”, “your help will be highly appreciated, because his health has deteriorated ever since he took up the night shift job” & it becomes very difficult to listen & respond to such things. Please remember that the recruiter is a professional at closing the open positions & not necessarily getting people a job. Hope you are able to understand the difference that is there between the two.

So a professional recruiter must get the necessary vibes from the job seeker. When the job seeker is the one following up it comes across like he is serious about it & he means business. It highlights one important plus for the job seeker that he is really keen on the specific position or the job in general. It also shows certain qualities in him like taking initiatives, that of being a finisher & so on. These qualities register positively with the recruiter who in turn sells the same to the client.

Getting a job is a task in itself. If these minute things are kept in mind it would help the job seeker immensely, first in landing a job & second in building a long term relationship with the recruiter…for your second, third, fourth job…

Info: For Movie Buffs – VCD & DVD Library

2006-10-29T21:02:00.000+05:30

There is a real good VCD & DVD Library near Lifestyle. I have been a member there for a while now & pick up movies every other weekend. The place is called Swagath Business Center. It is situated on Victoria Road, near Lifestyle. Apart from renting of CDs & DVDs this place also has internet browsing, STD/ISD phone booths, Photo copying facilities & a Stationary shop.

They have a good collection of English, Hindi, Tamil, Telegu & Kannada movies. The majority of the collection is English. The quality of the CDS & DVDS are excellent. It’s a good place to rent your movies from if you are put up near the Lifestyle area.

They charge Rs 25 per CD/Day & Rs 40 per DVD/Day. I think the rates are lower to most of the other stores. They are flexible on the number of CDs & DVDs you can pick up at a time, though it may take a little while for them to get familiar with you for them to go all out.

Their number is 080 41126122

Tell me something about yourself

2006-10-18T18:49:00.000+05:30

Having worked in a recruitment company most part of my career that is probably the question I have often asked of all my candidates for the various positions I have wanted to pursue them.

“Tell me something about yourself”? is like the ice breaker question. The answer to this question sets the ball rolling for the other questions, the answer to which ultimately seals the fate of the candidate for the position he has applied for.

Although the question sounds pretty simple & straight, I often find people not being able to do complete justice to this question with their answers. All that people can manage to say as an answer to the question is their name, their education & their family.

What I find very funny & also feel sad about is that sometimes when I put the question in the following manner, “Hari, can you tell me something about yourself?” the candidate answers, “Sure Sir. Sir, my name is Hari, I have done my MBA……” I do not understand the purpose of repeating the name when I already know the name. When this happens the whole answer seems like a well rehearsed one and not impromptu, the way it should actually be.

What is the correct answer to this question? Well there is no right or wrong answer. All I wish to say about the answer is that it should neither be too short or too long. Candidate should ensure that he doesn’t get into too many minute things. He should consider the question is answered well if he can touch upon the following areas – His Background in terms of education & experience, His interests & hobbies and a bit about his family. Most times the questions that follow will be about his experience or in case of freshers about their education.

It is important to make an impression with the first question. The candidate has to ensure that the answer is crisp, loud & clear. What I would like to put forth is that the job of the interviewer is to interview different candidates. Most times either the interviewer is meeting a series of candidates one after the other, who they are asking the same series of questions or they rush to the interview leaving behind whatever they are doing. Under these circumstances, a good reply to the interviewer’s first “Tell me something about you” question can actually get the interviewer interested in the candidate & help him do a good interview.

A trip to Brahmagiri Wildlife Sanctuary

2006-05-10T12:40:00.000+05:30

Part 1 – the drive inside Nagarhole National Park

“There is an elephant behind there”, whispered Imran. Owen & I looked at each other & smiled. The next moment Krishna beckoned us to get a closer look at the mammoth creature. We rushed in the direction not making much noise. I suppose running quietly & trying to remain unnoticed comes naturally to you when you are in an environment like that. Krishna had already stretched out his hand & was pointing toward the elephant with his index finger. I stared at the point trying to spot the elephant. Not that I have never seen one before, but seeing a wild elephant in the wild is never the same as seeing an elephant walk down the city roads. I could only see huge trees & a little movement. I stood there patiently & stared in the direction a little longer. I gave up when the movement behind the bushes stopped. May be it was a tamed elephant I told myself just to console myself for the missed chance.

We were at the entrance of the Nagarhole National Park and it was a little past 6 o clock in the morning. The park is closed for traffic between 6 PM & 6 AM. After a simple registration process we were let inside the park. The greenery on either side was an awesome sight. “Get ready with your camera Lokesh” said Imran. I nodded without turning away from the window. Although I kept a steady view outside I was skeptical about spotting any wild life. I could not have been more wrong.

The drive inside the park was slow. Every member inside the vehicle looked out eagerly hoping to spot the evasive tiger or gearing themselves up to see an elephant lazily walking down the road we were on, preferably coming in our direction. The concentration & the quiet were broken when a Sumo honked loudly from behind. “You are not supposed to honk inside here” said Krishna angrily to nobody in particular & then realizing that it wasn’t feasible to advise them at that stage advised our driver instead to give way to the vehicle behind so that any further honking could be avoided.

Shortly after, the quiet was broken when Krishna looked out & said, “Stop”. “Reverse the vehicle”, he ordered the driver. All of us looked in the direction he was looking. What was that he had seen? In the path going inside the forest we saw some movement. And then we saw a wild boar sniffing around there. It was a far sight, so no cameras clicked. Also there was no much excitement on spotting a wild boar. Yeah it was a wild boar but can we see something more exciting seemed to be reaction of everybody. The excitement didn’t stay off for long. We saw a pack of spotted deer grazing next to the road. I must say that it was a pretty sight. As if on cue all of them looked in our direction. A few stared at us till we were there & a few others got back to their business of grazing. It was their breakfast probably. We were the uninvited guests. Cameras clicked. What amazes me is how these animals live in the jungle, wandering around, eating & drinking what they find, playing around. Its such a carefree life that they have. Now, don’t we want to lead a life like that?

As we drove further we saw more deer, also a Stag. Suddenly spotting them wasn’t a task in itself. There were plenty. Apparently there are 20000+ such deers in the wild in the Nagarhole forests alone. The only exciting part about spotting these animals was the number of them that were around in some places. At one spot we found a good number of them on either side of the road. A little ahead somewhere behind the trees that line the long road inside the forest we saw hundreds of deer. Its sad that we cant go closer to them, I would have loved to.

There are plenty of tribal huts inside the Nagarhole forests. The children (toddlers included) walk about the jungle like it was one big play field. The sight of the tribal huts is very bland actually. It just makes you think how far this whole concept of development has gone. Even the tribal huts look like any other hut in an Indian village. I wondered if that is how it was from the beginning. May be not. The tribals also didn’t look like tribals. Of course the images of tribals that I have are mostly of what I have seen in Hindi films. And in Hindi films they cover themselves up with leaves & paint their faces & have spears in their hands. These tribals that we saw had none of these features about them. They looked like any ordinary man. Men were wearing shirts & pants & Women had saris on them.

We stopped at the spot where vehicles can actually stop in the forest. That is where the forest authorities have some basic facilities like toilets & a canteen and organize for the jungle safari. There were a lot of people there & vehicles parked in line in the parking lot. It was as if there was a civilization in the middle of the jungle. When we finally got off & stretched our legs & walked a bit, a bit of energy seeped into us so to speak. Krishna suggested that we freshen up at a tap there & get ready for the big one.

Yeah the big one. The Brahmagiri peak. This was the focus of the trip. This was the final destination. We saw the glimpses of this peak once we drove out of Nagarhole forest & entered Kutta, a small town south of Coorg. The peak was Majestic in itself. Huge, Really Huge. It was well past 7 in the morning. All of us were wide awake after the freshening up. When would we start? When would those backpacks get on our backs? And when would we start to sweat like a pig.

The vehicle drove through a road full of potholes. The drive was uncomfortable no doubt but the view outside of the coffee plantations & the trek ahead of us kept us in good spirits.

Coming up shortly: Part 2 – the climb up to Narimale Base Camp.

Everybody F****

2006-04-26T10:17:00.000+05:30

Boys do it. Girls do it. Every person who has visited this site has done it. The old do it. The young do it as well. In fact even kids do it. People across different countries & continents do it.

What is amazing is how you can do it anytime anywhere without any issues or problems. Yes sometimes doing it when someone is around is embarrassing & requires guts. But it is something that can be done just about anywhere. Most preferred seems to be the bedroom or the bathroom, some also do it in the kitchen, some on the living room sofa. Some prefer the outdoors, while some find comfort & ease in the car. In fact it can also be done when you are riding the bike. It was known that the employees do it even at their work place it is only now that it is in the news.

There is a lot of emphasis given these days to the position. Which position do you like, is the common question asked these days. Well there are a variety of positions that one can choose from for this. It all depends on one’s comfort level in such a position.

Yes, different people do it with varying sound levels. Some keep it quiet. Some make occasional noises. While a few others enjoy the loudness of it all. They seem to have great satisfaction & relief when they hear that high-pitched sound.

This has become so common & regular these days that we have begun to see this in Hindi movies. Our Hindi films were considered very clean & wholesome family entertainers. But nowadays families themselves have become broadminded & don’t mind taking in this when they watch it on their DVD or at the theatre in front of young & old from their family. Of course whether they watch & hear it in all seriousness or in a happy smiling way depends on the way it is portrayed in the movie.

As most things in life this too sometimes doesn’t happen the way people think it should happen. Sometimes they try too hard & it becomes that much more difficult. Some people consult doctors & take medication to ensure they have a comfortable & joyful existence.

The bottom line is everybody does it. It’s become a way of life. If somebody doesn’t do it he is probably not man enough for it. Or to be fair he’s got a problem & needs some help.

So take it easy & go ahead and do it freely. Enjoy the experience. The high & the relief when it is all over. So what are you waiting for go ahead and F***.

FART, I mean.

The boy, girl and the plastic bag

2006-04-18T15:32:00.000+05:30

He was woken up when the dog jumped up on the bench and sat near his legs. With his right arm behind his head acting like a pillow & his legs stretched long, he looked at the sky above, yawning & scratching his face above the nose & in between his eyes. The view up above was clear. Dark sky, little stars here & there. The leaves of the trees around the bench shook & made a sound. It was cold that night. The torn & wretched vest & the shorts that the boy wore should have made the cold unbearable. But he didn’t seem to be affected. Years of sleeping on that bench had made him strong enough to brave the cold breeze without a shiver.

On the ground, a white plastic bag flew around in circles lifting with it dry leaves & small pieces of paper. He turned and watched the plastic bag. It floated in the air, sometimes flying high up, sometimes rubbing against the ground. Sometimes the air would get into it & it would fly like a blown up balloon. The flying & floating was like a dance. There was an element of ecstasy in its movement, a feeling of freedom.

Although the sight was very soothing to the boy, the interest with which he saw the plastic bag suddenly vanished & he turned back again & looked at the sky. He stared at it until he felt drowsy & went back to sleep again.

Elsewhere in the park & outside it the world moved on. Time ticked on. The road outside the park was choc a bloc with traffic. There was also a huge crowd gathered outside the park to eat roadside delicacies like chana, chaat, groundnuts, & bajjis. There were couples inside the park seated under huge trees enjoying the setting & each other’s company. In another corner of the park were young boys doing push-ups, stomach crunches or plain jogging in circles.

When the boy woke up again, the cold breeze had stopped. The dog was not sitting at his leg & the plastic bag had stopped flying. After having registered these developments he simply got up & walked, scratching his head at the back. He had a thick and healthy growth of hair on his scalp but it looked dirty & unwashed. His dark face had the tired & sleepy look. His eyes were hardly open. He rubbed his eyes, yawned & walked further on. When he saw the plastic bag lying on the grass stuck onto a stick, he walked up to it to release it. After doing so he threw the bag up in the air expecting it to fly like he had seen sometime back. But the bag hardly went up & came back down in a thud. The boy looked at the bag & then at the huge tree in front of him. The lack of any movement among the leaves hinted to him there was no breeze & that the bag wasn’t going to fly. He then walked towards the huge tree. On reaching it, he pulled down his shorts & peed. The small stream of urine flowed down behind him & wetted the plastic bag on its way.

Without caring to give a look behind, the boy then walked towards the exit of the park in front of the tree. That is where the snacks were being made, sold & eaten. As he walked, the quiet and the dark of the park began to give way to a faint din & the light emanating from the gaslights atop the pushcarts of the vendors. Pretty soon the din became louder. Traffic moved, honking along for people to move out of their way. People were talking, laughing & eating. Vendors screaming out their wares to attract the buyers.

A middle-aged couple exchanged a plate of bhel for 10 rupees. As if on cue, the boy was there in front of them, his hand held out asking for some spare coins, a rupee or so or if possible the whole plate of bhel itself. There was not a word from him, just a look of desperateness in the eyes, an act of crying without tears & the held out hand tugging at the man’s pant. The man tried to ignore him first. But the boy continued. Frustrated the man transferred the plate to the lady with him & searched for a rupee in his pockets. On finding it, he put the coin into the boy’s outstretched hand & turned around without giving the boy a look. The boy pocketed the coin & moved on. The desperateness was gone; the crying act was not in place anymore. His eyes only searched for the next target. He found one pretty soon.

People in a car were gorging onto a variety of things offered by a pushcart vendor who had named his pushcart, “Mohan’s Bombay Chaats”. The boy went up to the fat man seated in front next to the driver’s seat. The look of desperateness in the eyes, the act of crying without tears was back. He stretched his hand into the window close enough to touch the plate that the man was holding. This time he addressed his target as ‘saab’. “Saab, do din se kuch nahi khaya saab, kuch do saab”. The man looked up at the boy & replied “Ye, aage chal. Kuch nahi hai yahan”. The boy persisted, “do din se kuch nahi khaya saab”. Then without bothering to say much the man grabbed the boy’s hand & moved it out of the car & closed the window. The boy then tried his luck with the people seated behind. No on looked at him & neither did they ask him to go away. They continued eating, completely ignoring the boy’s presence. The boy gave up after some more attempts.

It was pretty late in the evening. Almost dinnertime. In some time all the customers would drive away from there to their homes. The boy had just a few minutes to get whatever he could from them. Money or food, food would be best. The boy looked around again. His eyes searched for a sympathetic soul who would part with some big amount or some food he or she was eating. That is when he saw a young girl seated on the edge of the footpath resting against the railing. The boy had a feeling that the girl was looking at him. Then he began to feel that the girl was probably tracking his progress ever since he came on to the scene there. He walked towards the girl. The girl looked away realizing that the boy was coming in her direction, and knowing that he will come up & ask her for something.

“Memsaab do din se kuch nahi khaya memsaab. Kuch khane ke liye do memsaab”. The desperation was not there & neither was the fake crying act.

“Kya khaoge tum?” asked the girl.

The boy was alerted by the question. Nobody really asked a question. Every body would either give something or ignore him or ask him to go away. But the girl had asked him what he wanted to eat.

“Kuch bhi chalega memsaab. Bhuke pet ke liye kuch bhi chalega”

The girl then went on to order a plate of Sev Puri from the vendor near by. Then she looked at the boy and asked him, “Naam kya hai tumhara?”

“Raja”.

“Kaha se ho?”

“Yahi se”

“Ghar hai? Kaha rehte ho?”

“Nahi. Yahi park ke ek bench par sota hoon”

“Raat ko thand nahi lagti?”

“Nahi. Aadat ho gayi hai”

“Aur kon hai tumhare saat. Ma. Baap. Bhai. Behan”

“Nahi koi nahi hai”

The girl looked at him with certain eagerness in her eyes. The boy tried to think why she was asking him so many questions. What was she going to do with that information? The Sev Puri was handed over to the girl. She looked at the boy & said, “Yeh lo. Kha lo”. The boy took the plate, looked at her and thanked her. “Shukriya memsaab”. And then sat down beside her to eat.

“Yeh kafi hai yaa aur kuch chahiye?”

The boy looked at the girl for a while & then at the plate. He wasn’t able to make up his mind. Even before he could say something, the girl ordered the vendor to give the boy another plate of Sev Puri. Then the girl went on to pay for the two plates. After paying she looked at the boy once again. The boy was eating like he hadn’t eaten in days. Then he looked up at the girl & muttered, “Shukriya Memsaab”. The girl smiled and walked away.

The boy watched the girl walk away. She was a beautiful girl. The boy hadn’t seen her at the park earlier. This was probably her first time there.

The breeze picked up again by then. The dust on the road & all the papers strewn there began to move & fly once again. The boy hurriedly finished off his second plate of Sev Puri and walked back to his bench inside the park. The noise outside had subsided because a lot of the crowd there had left by then. Inside the park dull lampposts took over from the bright gaslights on top of pushcarts outside.

There was a spring in the boy’s steps as he walked back to his bench. He jumped around, kicked a few stones with his bare legs and spread his arms wide to enjoy the breeze. With just a few meters away from his bench he saw that the white plastic bag was once again flying in the breeze. Floating. Dancing. He got excited when he saw the bag in the air for a long time.

He slowed down his pace as if not to disturb the bag’s movements. The bag flew higher in the air as if acknowledging the boys effort.

Sitting on the bench, the boy recollected the sequence of events over the previous few hours. He thought about the girl who bought his dinner for the night. He wondered why she did that to him. Especially buying him two plates of Sev Puri. Nobody had ever done something like that to him.

The plastic bag flew toward him & fell down in front of him. The boy picked up the bag and threw it again in the air. This time it flew, slowly rising & descending depending on the forcefulness of the breeze.

The boy sat back & watched. He was going to have a good sleep that night.

Write your Name. Leave a Mark.

2006-04-17T09:40:00.000+05:30

All of us want to leave a mark behind. The value of which will be felt long after we are gone. Lets take the example of Kannada super star Dr. Rajkumar. The thespian actor of the South Indian language is no more amongst us today but what he did during his prime got him the respect and the adulation which was clearly on display at the time of his funeral recently. To me that is the perfect example of leaving behind a mark. Of course each of us leave our own mark behind in whatever we are involved in. Most times they are either at work or at home or something else that we are associated with, like a charity or a club. But this though is more about the literal thing. Leaving a mark in the literal sense.

You will find people leaving off their marks by scribbling their names in just about any place possible. The ones that are preferred as of today include the desks in schools & colleges, the Toilet walls, the backsides of public bus seats, the walls of historic monuments or the rocks enroute to the monument, the other day I saw two names neatly carved out on the footpath in some nondescript corner of some nondescript road. Looks like someone had been watching or had been plain lucky to be there at the place at the right time, for as soon as the cement was neatly applied to join two stone slabs somebody hurriedly wrote down their names. If all these could be called permanent options then there are some temporary options as well, like the walls of a building under construction especially the wall that is likely to be tiled. Such walls need to have a rough finish & the rough finish is given by drawing some designs on the walls or like you must know by now, writing names on it. The others among the temporary options include writing on a dust-laden car or on the sands in the beach.

Some people go to the extremes. Along the ever-increasing Q line in Tirupati you will find business cards clinging on to the tube lights. Do those who put it up there expect somebody to view the card & get back to them for business? Could be possible.

The literal leaving behind a mark thing has become such a big menace that we now find posters saying, “Please do not scribble on the wall” or “Please do not deface the walls”.

Wont it be a good idea if somebody came up with some innovative way of promoting this whole concept of leaving a mark. Really, I think it makes good business sense. How about a Name gallery that’ll display names on granite, marble & the other stones? Umm…. on second thoughts may be not a great idea. People have some innate fascination for their own names. Sudha Murthy has described candidly in one her books how some people will donate only if their name will appear on the granite blocks under the heading donors, little do they realize that nobody really gives a second look at those. Because who a Soubhagya Ramamurthy is or Govindraju Gowda is doesn’t really matter because nobody cares.

But then if not anything else a name is the only thing that each of us have, which is our identity, which we can call our own and which stays even after our body & soul is gone. That way what lives on forever is the name. That said naturally we want our name to be popular & well known by all, but does that mean we should resort to such desperate levels of making our names eternal?

Looks like a lot of people don’t quite agree to what the great bard asked once.

“What’s there in a name”? Well, quite a lot it seems.

The voice of we the people

2006-04-11T15:15:00.000+05:30

Yesterday I got a forward in my inbox from one of my colleagues, which had the subject, “Please help me protest”. I opened it thinking may be the colleague had some serious issue at work & wanted to garner support towards it. But what I actually saw took me off guard. It was a mail about the proposed reservations of up to 50% for OBC’s in institutes of higher learning in India. After an introduction the mail posed the following question to me: “Are you ready to face the fact that - Our half of our nation will be nurtured not on the basis of merit but some other considerations (Sic)”. Then even before I could make up my mind it continued: “If you want to raise your voice against it, then please sign an online petition here”.

I not only signed in for the campaign but also sent a small note of appreciation to the person who started it.

This is not so much about my opinion on the reservations but the fact that I can have an opinion in the first place.

Not too sure if we ever had this much liberty to express ourselves? Today wherever you see you have opinions galore. The newspapers have articles written about what people think. Sometimes they have reproduced what is being said by bloggers in the blog world. Television news channels debate with the involvement of the general public, issues that are affecting the entire country. NDTV started it with ‘We the people’; now every news channel has programs that involve the general public. The latest thing that is catching on is the SMS polls that are available to us on one side to decide the fates of future singers, dancers and Miss Indias and on the other side to give our views on a variety of developments through the news channel polls.

This is a new revolution that is sweeping across the country, a revolution of garnering opinion and being a democracy we’ll find a variety of views on a variety of subjects. Not that nobody had any views earlier. They did. It’s just that today there is somebody to ask & a platform to speak out thus bringing them into national prominence. The reopening of the Jessical Lall murder case is only a result of this revolution.

As of now the only source to garner public opinion has been the media, both TV & print. We need more sources like that. Blogging seems like the next best media in this endeavor. But blogging has its disadvantages. The main one being that each blog is like one view & each blog stands on its own. It’s similar to each person having an opinion, now that alone can’t change much can it? For an impact to happen we bloggers have to become one somewhere somehow & speak with one voice and have one forum. Only then will the blogs be able to make a difference, else as of now with so many blogs around we only have writers and no readers and as a result no impact.

That said whatever little efforts are being made by the mainline media & bloggers is definitely praise worthy & should be continued with because like we have seen its worth the effort.

The value of one rupee

2006-04-08T12:29:00.000+05:30

At a time when we hear of 1 crore salaries, thousands of crores of budget allocations & struggle to figure out how many zeroes it has, we seem to have forgotten about the ubiquitous 1 rupee in it all so much so that yesterday the Times of India (Bangalore edition) carried a front-page obituary of 1 crore. So now even a 1 crore is losing its value and you can imagine how long ago rupee one must have lost its value. We just seem to have taken for granted or completely ignored the fact that the crore salaries & the crores of budget allocations are made up of hundreds & thousands of the Rupee 1.

The lack of importance to rupee 1 is understood. Just like a newborn child takes the importance away from the other children in the family, the same way the thousands & crores are taking over.

It would be fair to say today that nobody values the value of one rupee. Big deal ‘its just small change after all’ seems to be our attitude. It’s the rupee that we hunt for in our pockets to get rid of the beggar at our car window; it’s the rupee we comfortably hand over to the guy who pumps up the tyres of our vehicles at the petrol pump, it’s the rupee that we don’t bother to take back as change when we buy products prized Rs 99 or Rs 159. It’s the rupee that we don’t mind dropping off at temples before we take the aarti. It’s the rupee that we joyfully put into the pumpkins on festival & pooja days & watch with glee when street urchins scamper to pick it up when you drop the pumpkin with as much force, it’s the rupee that we don’t mind giving to the five year old kid at home when she pesters you for some money so that she can go buy a chocolate.

It is also disturbing when people say, “It’s OK its one rupee after all”. For example when the auto driver or parking assistant harasses you for that extra buck that is the comment that comes from some people. Is it just a rupee after all?

Every rupee put together makes a bigger amount. When an auto driver or a parking assistant asks for the extra buck, to us it is just another rupee, but imagine on an average he does it with 10 people, he has earned 10 rupees that day which translates to 300 rupees in a month & 3600 rupees in a year. So is it just another rupee after all?

The beauty is in the power of the one rupee. If banks took it as a deposit it would earn you interest & become two rupees. If you bought something with it & sold it after you’ve added some value to it you’ve made some profit. If each of the taxpayers contributes one rupee extra along with their taxes towards an account for children’s education or elimination of poverty then thousands of children would be educated and there would be no poverty and India could actually call itself a developed nation.

One rupee is a small amount but of immense value. One of my colleagues has the following message in her signature. "VALUE HAS A VALUE ONLY IF ITS VALUE IS VALUED BY YOU".

We’ll leave it there.

Wardrobe Malfunction – Better Prevented

2006-04-07T12:48:00.000+05:30

A model walks down the ramp (like the way Aamir Khan describes it in Rang de Basanti) left right left right, a thousand eyes are on her analyzing the dress worn by her for its cut, the look & whether it will rewrite the future of fashion. A dozen video cameras & photographers are waiting to capture those moments to telecast it later into millions of homes. Just when everyone thinks that it is going to be just another one of those shows comes the “ooohs”, the “aaahs”, the “oh my gods” and the “such a poor things”.

The live crowd just witnessed a wardrobe malfunction.

What is Wardrobe malfunction? In a very understandable & down to earth language, if the dress you are wearing lets you down & gives a peek at your assets its called wardrobe malfunction. For example it’s like the joker in the circus who does some acrobatics & in the process tears the stitches in the middle of his pants. We laugh & jump out of our seats & think we’ve got our money’s worth of entertainment and go home happily. But when a model in a fashion show accidentally (or deliberately?) tears her dress or her dress falls or slips off, your eyes & mouth open up wide, you skip a heartbeat, national headlines is made, the state assembly debates it & the police tries to figure out if it was illegal.

The media getting excited over a Wardrobe Malfunction is obvious. Beautiful model, pretty clothes and the pretty clothes falling off or tearing off the beautiful model, aha you have the next breaking news, flash news, news alert and what else do they call it? For that matter, imagine a wardrobe malfunction happening in your college fashion show, don’t you think the students there are going to get crazy about it & discuss it. The media is not blowing it out of proportion its just that today there are over a dozen news channels & all of them are 24/7. So what happens is most times they have to create news if there is none happening to ensure that there is a variety to the viewer any time he flips on to the channel. So invariably we had the recent wardrobe malfunctions news played on every channel with the images of Carol Gracias and Gauhar Khan beaming into our living rooms every half hour.

In today’s world something like this happening is really unfortunate especially for those involved because the video is going to be available in the form of MMS & sent across to thousands of people across the world and will also be there on the Internet. Thereby accidentally or deliberately they have entered the world of soft porn. Its time that the Fashion fraternity in India took some serious measures to counter this before it even threatens to become big. The government discussing the issue in the assembly is also being debated & criticized. There is nothing wrong in that. They are just doing their job. Their job is to discuss the different aspects of society & they did that. That per se is not wrong. The only thing is when politicians raise topics of this nature they need to look at all other areas as well where things like this can happen. If anybody has been to the bathing ghats of the Ganga or the Cauvery will understand what I’am talking about. Infact there are pictures being circulated as forwards of people bathing in the ghats & their wet clothes. Why doesn’t the government discuss that? It’s just that Fashion Week is an organized show and an incident happening there in front of video cameras will be given more coverage. The police have done the wise thing to let the incident pass by giving the benefit of doubt to the organizers.

All said & done the whole concept of a fashion show itself needs to be checked. Really what is their purpose: to show off clothes or to show off something else? What really is the difference between a Fashion Show & a Dance Bar? At least the girls who are employed in those dance bars wear more clothes and are completely covered (my knowledge of the kind of clothes dance bar girls wear is from the movie Chandni bar). Now compare that with the girls in a fashion show. Completely opposite don’t you think? Still nobody talks of a ban on the fashion show. Why? Also, at a fashion show, do people really come to appreciate the dress? How many times have we bought a dress by just looking at someone wear it? Aren’t dresses bought after touching it, feeling it, trying it on?

Wardrobe Malfunction – Prevention is better than cure especially when there is no cure.

PS: Never heard of a Wardrobe Malfunction involving a male model. How is that possible? Probably there lays the answer to how to prevent a wardrobe malfunction.

Speak Out and make a difference

2006-04-04T10:42:00.000+05:30

We have heard of the term ‘speaking out’ haven’t we? It’s used often in the context of government work, companies, social issues & so on. Outlook magazine has the term as its byline and follows its philosophy. But what is speaking out really? Is it to highlight the wrongs that exist in a particular place? Is it to highlight the wrongdoers in a particular place? Well not really…

It is beyond just highlighting something right or someone wrong. Speaking out is being able to say what one feels. And what one feels is neither right nor wrong. And neither should it be only the negatives, it could also be about the positives. It is plain & simply what one feels. Why is it important to say what one feels? Because by saying what you feel, one, you are making your presence felt and two, you make it clear that just because a certain something is like this it doesn’t mean it is right. Also when you don’t say anything it comes across as acceptance or like it doesn’t make any difference to you whichever way things are, which is of course incorrect.

Lets take the case of our freedom struggle. If the likes of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and others didn’t speak up & let known their feelings about the British ruling India it is anybody’s guess what India would have been today. Even at that time a lot of people didn’t like the idea of an outsider which is what the British was, ruling them & telling them what to do & not to in a land that they were born & brought up on. End result the British left India to be ruled by Indians. Or lets take the more recent case of Jessica Lal after all the accused in her murder were let off for lack of evidence, the public took over and voiced what they clearly thought was money & power being the reason for the accused being let off & not lack of evidence. End result, Sonia Gandhi asks for some changes in the law, the police decide to try again with renewed vigor and the general public now have hope that the guilty will be punished.

But not everybody has the capacity to speak out & say what he or she feels. Speaking out for some weird reason requires a good helping of confidence. Confidence to be opposed, to hear others say you are wrong, to bear the brunt of rubbing off someone wrongly, to know that it could land you with dire consequences like may be you losing your job or in worse cases even being put into jail. But once this initial barrier of confidence is crossed then what starts is a life of making a difference. Making a difference to the way things are around, to the way people react & feel about various things and thus changing the whole system that exists.

Apart from the confidence issue the other reason why people don’t speak out is because they feel nothing will change. The movie Rang de Basanti captures this aspect beautifully. The fun loving, carefree youngsters only crib about the mess that the whole system is into and feel only one thing about it that it has already gone to the dogs & will never improve. Then an incident where one of their friends dies in an accident and its after effects triggers off the urge to do something & make a difference. Of course what they do thereafter is slightly at the extremes which cinematic creativity & license allows them to do. The same solution can’t be applied for every problem that exists today in our government, in our company, at home, school or locality.

So the need of the hour is to speak out. Everybody can do it. The easy way to start is with something that affects us everyday. Are there things at home that you oppose like curfews, pocket money etc? At work are there issues that needs to be dealt with like too much workload, no over time allowance etc? Speak out. Say it the way it is. Yes nothing will change over night. But it will, it should especially if what you are saying is right then nothing can stop it from becoming the next big revolution.

This is the story of the Balls

2006-04-01T13:34:00.000+05:30

Heard of Balls? Got them? Everybody of course has it. Seen it. Felt it. Guys think they are the proud owners of it; girls are either into it or are not. If they are they play with it, if they are not they either like guys playing with it or are totally indifferent to it.

Balls: Passion. Pleasure. A never let down attitude. Reach the goal at any cost and reach it as many times as possible. Being kicked around by both boys & girls, by both young & old, at pubs, homes and beaches.

What comes to your mind when you think of the balls? Spirit of life? No future without them?

How true. Can we imagine a world without balls? Don’t you think it would be just too boring?

Yeah, considering the kind of involvement balls have in our lives it would be fair to say that they are very much part of our lives and decide to a large extent the extent of happiness and satisfaction one will have in his or her lifetime. This applies to every single ball. Whichever you take be it foot ball, baseball, cricket ball, basketball, tennis ball, golf ball, volleyball just about every ball has a role in our lives. Can’t imagine a child growing up without holding one in his hand & playing with it. Can’t also imagine a child of the future growing up into a life of ball less existence.

Its unbelievable don’t you think how a simple rounded movable object like the ball has such an important influence in our lives. The child wants to go play with it when you ask him to study. The couples fight over it when they decide whether to watch saas-bahu fare or the sports channel on TV. Players are not just booed but killed when they don’t play with it well enough to win (Remember Israel-Munich-football?). Political organizations dig up grounds to prevent a game involving the ball (Shiv Sena digging up a cricket ground to prevent the Paksistan Cricket Team from playing). And of course playing with the ball involves big money. Learning a game like golf involving one of the smallest balls around could set you back by a few thousand dollars. When you master the game rest assured for success, fame & money. In fact players today don’t make money just playing well with the ball but also by not playing well (match fixing). There are companies who are making money just making balls, there are sports organizations making their share just by organizing the match or the tournament.

The very basic necessity in a game is the ball. Simply put there can be no game of basketball, football, cricket, baseball etc if there is no ball. But what does the ball itself get in all this. Being spat on (cricket) kicked around (football) and hit around (cricket, baseball). No publicity and no recognition for their contribution to mankind through the sport they are associated with.

This is the story of the balls. Dirty, Sweaty, Smelly but still liked. Still enjoyed.

60 seconds at the Indian Express Circle

2006-03-31T21:39:00.000+05:30

Yeah Bangalore has poor infrastructure & slow moving traffic. But the fact is despite this downside there are some roads in Bangalore where life goes on at a lively pace and is anything but slow.

The Indian Express Circle in Bangalore is a case in point. Poor infrastructure & slow moving traffic is the common complaint of the software guys. To understand the scene at the Indian Express circle forget the software guys & their companies & think government offices & banks. Forget ready-made suits & ties or even jeans & T – Shirts & think stitched pant & shirt, sari & blouse. Forget leather bags or briefcases & think lunch boxes & cloth bags. Forget traveling in AC cars think stuffy public buses.

The Indian Express Circle is a junction of 5 roads. The converging roads are Cunningham road, Infantry Road, Park Road, Queens Road & another road that connects to Vidhana Soudha & whose name I’am unable to figure out. Due to its proximity to the Shivaji Nagar bus stand a lot of buses converge at this circle & either go out into the city or are returning to the bus stand. It is also a hot spot as Infantry Road & Cunningham Road are business centers & thereby there are a lot of people getting off there to go to their work place.

I touch the Indian Express circle through Park Road on the way to work. After the brief stop here I continue on Cunningham Road. So my position is like when I look ahead Cunningham Road is in front of me & Queens Road is to my right. From this spot I witness every single day the on street extravaganza & heroics of ordinary women, cyclists & the bus drivers. And there is never a dull day.

My stop at the Indian Express circle is approximately for 60 seconds. As I shift the gear to Neutral & rest my feet firmly on the ground & relax, what follows for the next 60 seconds will put the who dares wins & fear factors on TV to shame. People get off their bus to my right & cross the road to my left with no consideration for the traffic turning in towards their side. Ladies in their saris & flowers in their hair run across to catch their next bus on the other side of the road and the only direction they look is ahead like it were a 100-meter dash. Girls decked up with talcum powder & wearing high heels walk across in a guarded manner as if they were on the ramp. Some even stop mid way & adjust their sari or dress. Cyclists think that the whole concept of traffic signal is totally non-existent for them and freely ride across the road and the way they manage to do it by evading the crowd of people from one side and the autos & two wheelers on the other side leaves you totally flabbergasted. The cop is very much there but is switched off, his hand raises not to direct the traffic but to salute at an officers car.

The best part of a gondola ride is when you are coming down and though it is not really the same thing here you are sure to get a similar feeling when buses take their turns like they were not on a public road but in one of those formula one races. And magically all the people & other vehicles in front of it move away just in time for the bus to continue its curvy dance. Can you believe it?

Countdown timers above every signal post were introduced to help vehicle owners know just how long it would take for them to move & thus letting them switch off their vehicles confidently for a fair time to save on fuel & cut down on pollution but then they are used for totally different purposes. The quiet that is prevalent at 50…. 49…. 48 seconds gives way to a sudden burst of excitement once people see the countdown reach 10…9…. 8, when they become impatient & start to move not bothered about the still moving traffic from the other side. And unbelievably the traffic in the other side stops not because the signal has turned red at their end but because the traffic in the other direction has already started to move. Now in a democracy when the concept of freedom is taken to various heights how can behavior on the road be left out, so if on one side you find people who start early then on another side you will find people continuing even if it is well past their time. So an auto or a car will invariably continue like it is some joy ride that they are on. The other traffic for sure slows down. Some move on when the vehicles are past them while others hurl abuses & then move. Like it makes any difference.

When the countdown timer in front of me reaches 10…9…. 8 the vehicles behind me start to honk hinting to me to get involved in the entertainment. I keep an eye on the countdown timer 6…. honk… 5…honk…4…what the hell… I move and join the party.

The show continues.

Should the government give incentives to every girl child that is born?

2006-03-24T10:27:00.000+05:30

That is the question being asked on Doctor NDTV. The responses to this are unbelievable. 75% say Yes and only 25% say No.

The reason for asking such a question in the first place could be the Indian attitude toward the girl child. The girl child is disliked as it is considered a burden on the family, as end of the day the girl child has to be married off into someone else’s family by giving a big dowry. The killing of female fetuses & female infants & the thriving illegal sex detection clinics are indications of this fact.

As a result the sex ratio is skewed in favor of men in India. As per the 1991 census number of females per 1000 males is 927. What is more horrifying is the sex ratio in urban India. It is 894 per 1000 males. Strangely it is better in rural India 939 per 1000 males. The only state where the sex ratio is the other way round is in Kerala. The number of females per 1000 males in this southern state is a encouraging 1036. (Source http://www.censusindia.net/fsex.html)

It is important for the government to take certain initiatives to counter this & improve the sex ratio. Although on the face of it the idea of giving incentives sounds convincing, on going deeper into it, a move of that sort could only back fire. The very basis of that thought needs to be questioned here. We are not talking of somebody achieving some target or doing something good, we are talking of the girl child here. Are we saying that we will have girl children in this country who exist not out of love from their parents or relatives but out of some incentive that the government has given? It looks more like one of those marketing gimmicks. Buy one bar of soap & get one bottle of shampoo free. So if we translate that to the topic we are discussing then it would be something like you have a girl child then you get free education for the child.

Also what kind of incentives can the government really give for people to start feeling that the girl child is not a pain? Sponsor the child’s education? Give her a job once she completes a certain age? Give a certain amount of money to the family who has had the girl child? What else can the government possibly do other than these things? The primary reason for the hatred for the girl child as already stated is because of the notion that she is ‘paraya dhan’. How can the government change that?

One of the cons of giving incentives to the girl child is to give a boost to the sex trade. Some two people can get married only to have a female child & then to get the incentives & put the child into the sex trade. Also it could be mired in scams & controversies thus trivializing the very coming into existence of the girl child. And what is the guarantee that the parents after claiming the incentives will not leave the girl child at the entrance of a temple or an orphanage or worse kill the child or dump her in the garbage bin?

Ok if all these things can be taken care of in some form or the other. There is one thing. How is the girl child supposed to feel when she grows up & has the capacity to understand the whole incentive thing? Is she supposed to feel normal when she realizes that she is in existence only because of some incentives that the government gave and not out of any love from her parents to have her?

It is important for the government to deal with this problem. Giving incentives may not be the correct way forward. What is required instead is a long-term measure. Measures like education to the children & their parents, poverty alleviation, good jobs & some strong measures to eradicate the concept of dowry in the system.

8th Main, Opposite Mount Carmel College

2006-03-20T13:55:00.000+05:30

There are landmarks, then there are famous landmarks, then finally there are famous & glamorous landmarks. Mount Carmel College fits the bill for the last type of landmark. On second thoughts may be the word glamorous should be in Uppercase & Bold, like GLAMOROUS!

Mount Carmel College needs no Introduction. Well definitely not if you are a Bangalorean. But if you are not a Bangalorean & want a little more info about the college suggest you give a “Mount Carmel College Bangalore” search in Google & get your information there. Why get into boring things like the history of the college, the alumni & the courses they offer when the Google Search gives you about 118000 pages of that info. We can better spend the time on something more interesting something more…. Well what do I say…?

By the way here is a little bit of trivia, which you will not find anywhere else. If you have not already given the “Mount Carmel College Bangalore” search on Google, suggest you do it now. The results are about 118000 pages as already stated. Then give another search for “Bishop Cotton Women’s Christian College Bangalore” the result is 21400 pages. After this give one last search for “Jyoti Nivas College Bangalore” the result is only a paltry 846 pages. Both Bishop Cottons & Jyoti Nivas are the other two prominent Women’s colleges in Bangalore. We will leave this here & not get into any analysis. May be you can do that & have your interpretations. Like we said earlier why waste time on…. when we can rather use that time to….

8th Main, opposite Mount Carmel College, Vasanthnagar is like any other road in Bangalore. Houses, grocery shops, utility shops, business establishments, hotels, juice centers & the like. But there is one feature about this road that you will not find on any other road in Bangalore. Heard of how a local economy is dependent on the local factory or the local tourism centers. The same way the economy of this road is dependent on the Mount Carmel College students. It’s a boring fact but a fact nonetheless. But then again why waste time on boring facts when we have other…

8th Main, opposite Mount Carmel College is a nice road; I mean why not, I mean why shouldn’t it be. Yes there are potholes, yes there are blocked drains, yes the traffic there is scary what with middle aged auto drivers & the youngsters in their cars & bikes wanting to get some attention when they are riding. Yeah these are all big issues that the IT & BT industry is fussing over a lot. But we do understand the kind of pressure the civic bodies have on them to deliver & we don’t mind overlooking the problems on this stretch of road. And what a road it is…

OK enough is enough let’s cut the crap & get to the point. I want to ask this question to anybody who can answer. Is there any road on this planet that you can walk on & use as a stress buster? To walk on & not to worry about your pending targets? To walk on & ignore the state of the infrastructure of the road? To walk on & feel like you are in heaven? To walk on and say “God is Great”?
If your answer is NO then come visit this place at least once in your lifetime because this is the road…

If your answer is YES please let me know about that other road immediately…got too much stress these days.

Things people do to be in the good books of a Minister

2006-03-20T10:30:00.000+05:30

Today there is a picture in The Hindu (Bangalore edition) where Dr. Jaipal Reddy, Union Minister for Urban Development is being taken to some place and some ladies are showering his path with rose petals/flowers.

Although “Atithi Devo Bhava” has been our guiding philosophy with respect to how guests should be treated, this philosophy sometimes is given too much importance in case of receiving, welcoming, treating our Ministers. Who is Jaipal Reddy? Why does he deserve such a treatment? Who is it that is giving him such a treatment? Why are we stooping to such low levels? These are the questions that need to be asked.

It is disgusting that we resort to such low levels to be in the good books of a Minister. May be it is the people who need to be questioned here. It is unlikely that the Ministers ask for such treatments. It is more the people involved in organizing the events who need to answer these questions.

Also, a question needs to be asked with respect to who are the ladies who are showering rose petals in Dr. Reddy’s path. For all you know they belong to the locality’s government school who have been asked to leave behind their household chores on a Sunday to welcome a Minister. After all apart from teaching students the other default responsibilities of a government teacher is to welcome Ministers by showering rose petals in their path, serve them coffee, go door to door & ask people how many kids they have during census & tick off names from a sheet at the voting center at the time of elections. No wonder the quality of teaching at government schools is at the level it is.

Of course we can never quantify the benefits of keeping a Minister happy. One never knows when it will yield results & hence we continue to please them by doing things like this. Seen how people fall at Jayalalitha’s feet? Do you think they are doing this out of respect for her as an individual? No it is out of respect for the position that she holds. It is out of respect for the power that position yields. By the way falling at the Ministers feet is passé; the new in thing to be in the good books of Ministers is to nominate them to the Nobel Peace Prize. That is what a Chennai based organization did. They nominated Jayalalitha, the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu to the Nobel Peace Prize. Well, we can only wish her the best of luck.

Politicians in India are like Demigods. That is the sad truth and a truth that we have to live with. It is sad that people we elect to represent us are treated like this when it should be the other way round. The Ministers should shower our path with rose petals of jobs, better roads, drinking water, electricity & so on.

This said there are some positive things that the new Karnataka Chief Minister has put forth. He ordered his party men to take off all his larger than life posters as soon as he became the CM. Then a few days later revealed that he would go around the city to check on its issues only in the night so as to not inconvenience the common man during the day.

These are good signs from a young CM. How about taking it a little further & laying down some guidelines in terms of how a Minister is welcomed & treated at official functions?

What is our identity?

2006-03-17T14:18:00.001+05:30

What are we coming down to? What is this all about? Why are we encouraging this? Why are we losing it? Is this good? Is this bad? What will be the impact in the long run? Will anything change? What will we be called? What will be our identity?

What is our Identity today? How do we identify ourselves today?

We are what we are, we shouldn’t let things change & our age-old practices become extinct. Somewhere a little bit of us will have to remain for our future generations.

People speak English at home instead of their mother tongue. People prefer burger to a vada pav. Namaste has given way to a Hello (even Hola, Hey What’s up!). Cola drinks are preferred over a Nimbu Pani. Underwear, which was till a few years back a under garment is now out in the open. Holding hands & touching in public was considered taboo, today we kiss & make out in the open. Despite Khajuraho & the likes we never discussed sex earlier, today people are accepting that they have affairs.

Where is this headed? What will be the consequences? Will there be any consequences?

Do we even need to worry about this? Is this a topic even worthy of a discussion?

Are we only lapping up the good of other worlds or are we taking in anything that looks rosy & shiny & tempting? Are we losing our Identity?

What is our Identity?

B – School Salaries – Is the hype justified?

2006-03-15T14:15:00.000+05:30

The ever-increasing salaries offered to B – School students at the end of the placements have become one big media event. Although the salaries offered are big enough to talk about, sometimes the excitement goes over board.

Also, the exceptions are singled out & the averages are ignored. How many students in the leading B-Schools of India take home a salary of 35 lakhs per annum? End of the day the fact remains that the average salary offered is approximately around the 7 lakhs to 10 lakhs range.

The big salaries & the hype about it are good only for two people. One is the student who got the huge offer & the other is for the institute where he studied. The increase in salaries is making the brand value of the institute increase as well. This is where the media should pitch in & put things in black & white.

Of late there is a lot of talk about the CTC. It’s now well known that the salary amount offered is not the gross salary but the CTC (Cost to Company). CTC covers all the perks, benefits extended to the individual, which he can take home only on reaching certain performance standards. There have been a few occasions when the relocation costs have also been added to the CTC, that way making it that much rosier.

The other areas where we need more clarity are on what is the hike a B-School student gets at the completion of his 1-year with the company. It would be interesting to know the % hike. One of the recruitment strategies of companies today is to hike the initial offer to the candidate & not have any hikes at all at the time of appraisals for a few years thereafter. Also does the student stick with the company forever there after? So if he moves does he get a hike as per market standards?

Like a friend who was involved in campus placements pointed out recently, there was a time when colleges (Graduate & Post Graduate levels) were ready to welcome recruiters for placing their students in various companies. Today there is so much competition to tap the best talent first that unless the recruiters plan months in advance as to which college to tap they will be left high & dry at the nth moment. This can be attributed to the increasing coverage of B-School campus placements.

Apart from the news itself, it would be worthwhile if the media presents the other side also to such results.

Morphed pictures – The modern ‘Avatars’

2006-03-03T14:28:00.000+05:30

Like all things in life, Technology too has two sides to it. Lets take morphing as an example. It can be used in a disgusting manner or in the most creative & positive manner. If the recent issue of Maxim publishing a morphed picture of Khushboo in a skimpy bikini constitutes as an example for the bad side of morphing, then the variety of morphs we have seen of Mr. P Chidambaram post his 2006-07 budget should be considered the good side of morphing.

One morphed picture of Mr. Chidambaram shows him as the Amitabh Bachhan of Bunty aur Babli complete with the gamcha & the tooth pick (was it that?) in the mouth. Another picture shows the educated Finance Minister sitting on a rock & blowing soap bubbles at us.

Today there are pictures of the American President morphed like the characters played by Amitabh Bachhan from his movies Bunty aur Babli, Sarkar & Black.

The extent to which morphing can happen today is amazing. The morphed picture of Mr. Bush is complete with the Bachhan style goatee and tilak on the forehead. Now, was that a result of Photoshop?

Morphing pictures are like today’s answer to Cartoons. Cartoonists would project leaders in whatever form they desired. Today, the guys involved in morphing can give us the same taste of a cartoon albeit with real life like features.

Get comfortable with the media, Mr. Prime Minister

2006-03-03T14:26:00.000+05:30

Mr. George Bush – Smiling, pointing & waving at the cameras & the press. Body Language easy & free. Puts his arm around the Prime Minister
Mr. Manmohan Singh – Smug smile, no pointing at the cameras & the press. Just a small wave, more as an after thought, to the press. Body Language not relaxed.

This is what the viewers got to see after the press conference outside Hyderabad House on the occasion of the Nuclear Deal between India & the US.

The contrast in vibes of Mr. Bush & Mr. Singh was like that of a birthday celebration & a death anniversary respectively. (On second thoughts may be its too harsh). But the need of the hour: Body Language experts should be quickly summoned to provide necessary training to our Prime Minister on how to open up & feel relaxed in front of TV cameras & the press.

Although Mr. Manmohan Singh is known to be the way he was yesterday, that doesn’t mean he continues to be like that. Its time he understood how important it is to project a happy & smiling face to the cameras. We understand that the office he holds is not an ordinary one. That said it actually becomes that much more critical for him to look relaxed & spread the happy feeling around him.

Look at Mr. Bush, all smiles, waving & the putting his arm-around-our-Prime-Minister. It comes across as he is enjoying himself here & feeling at home with the Prime Minister. Just imagine Mr. Bush, very reserved & not freeing up the way he did, what would that communicate?

All politicians who become Ministers should be sent to classes on how to become media savvy. Our media is coming of age, but our Ministers seem to be far behind in terms of how to use it to their advantage.

In the coming days, our politicians will lose/win elections for how they are seen on the media. That is how influential the media is getting today. Of course it’s another thing if people become Ministers (even Prime Minister) without contesting elections (like Mr. Manmohan Singh.)

Economic Times & the Cleavage

2006-02-28T17:43:00.000+05:30

Ever laid your hands on the Economic Times and seen its contents? Business News did you say? Market news did you say? Yes, it has both kinds of news but it also has a lot of pictures in their articles. Most of the pictures have women in them & some pictures have women showing their cleavage, bare legs & the like.

Can’t understand the connection between the Economic Times & the Cleavage. How are they connected? Are they trying to indicate something through this? Are we supposed to interpret their articles in a different manner after we see the picture?

Pick up today’s Bangalore edition of the newspaper and you’ll find close to three photos of women showing their cleavages in articles that have headlines like, “Education share down despite more allocation”, “No current a/c deficit woes“ and “Watch It, Monsoon Unyielding”. Now what is the picture got to do with such stories.

One has to compare the Business Line (a business newspaper from The Hindu stable) and the Economic Times. Business Line does look scary what with column after column & every inch of the newspaper having only the written word and hardly any pictures interspersed in it. Contrast that with the Economic Times, ads and pictures make it anything but scary. Their objective with inserting pictures in their articles is an understood thing but not to the extent that they have stooped.

Economic Times is considered one of India’s leading & respected business dailies and they need to ensure that they don’t give the readers crap or soft porn through their newspapers. Already the Times of India (from the Bennett Coleman & Co Ltd, the same company that also owns The Economic Times) has crossed into trivialization & can be safely called a tabloid. Do we need their business newspaper doing the same?

The issue is also to do with the levels we have made women come down to. It is really sad to say the least. Do we really need a cleavage showing woman to tempt us in reading an article? It is probably time that the Economic Times bring an end to the cleavage showing, short skirt wearing pretty women from their newspapers. The readers have plenty of other options to satiate their desires for the fairer sex.

There is no doubt that business newspapers are often considered boring as a result of which the newspapers have to make their articles easy for the readers to understand. It is probably in this context that the Economic Times is resorting to the use of pictures. May be they pushed it a little too much.

Ironically the readers are lapping all this up without any complaints looks like. The Economic Times is India’s No. 1 Financial Daily. Whoever said sex sells….

Today is my last day

2006-02-28T09:17:00.000+05:30

When an employee leaves an organization it leads to cost of replacement & cost of training the replacement. Also the employee morale takes a beating, work gets held up and if the person who left was someone very close to you or simply sat next to you, then the vacant workstation gets you nostalgic about those fun/sad/bad moments you had with him or her.

But this is not about all that. This is simply about the mail that the person leaving sends to all his colleagues or sometimes to the entire company on his last day. I have had the privilege (?) of working for two companies in my career so far and in both places I have witnessed this ritual of sending these good-bye mails. In fact I sent one myself when I left the previous company I worked for.

This mail is to thank everybody for everything, to say how much they (the leaver) learnt being in the company, to say how they’ll miss some of the fun moments they had and finally to let the mail recipients know of their new contact number & personal email id with the line “you can reach me at…”

Some of them list names (10…15…. 20…. names) & also the ubiquitous “regret if I have missed out any names” and go on to thank even the top Management for “all their support & encouragement”. Some of them go on to say where they are headed, most stop short of doing that & say it more generally like, “its time to move on keeping in mind my future goals”

In my previous company, anybody leaving would send a mass mail to all the 500+ employees causing much embarrassment to the HR & the management especially because default we would get at least one such mail daily from somebody who we didn’t even know existed. Imagine the state of the individual reading the mail, what he must be thinking. One thought that most certainly crossed our mind: “Oh God this company has so much attrition…”. By the time I left the company, the mass mail facility was disabled. May be the attrition continued but we didn’t get a feel of that by the “today is my last day” mails.

From the point of view of the person leaving the company, it is his/her way of informing all who matter that that day will be his/her last day in the company. When you read the last line “wishing you the best…” thoughts like clouds begin to gather in your mind and until you are distracted with details like your target, you have already imagined the new salary & new designation of the person who left and think of how relieved he must be for not doing the same old boring work that you are still stuck with. The grass after all is always greener on the other side.

Don’t be evil

2006-02-27T16:43:00.000+05:30

Intel apparently fired 250 of their employees for faking bills to claim allowances like conveyance & LTA.

The company I work for has also taken many decisions of this kind. Apart from issues with fake claims for Conveyance & LTA, customer & client data is the other most critical area that our company has had to deal with.

Employees’ filling up their pockets by wrongful means has probably been there for a while now. If earlier they lost out on promotions or simply got away with a warning, today the cost of cheating the company one works for could be their job itself.

Companies today give their employees the best of benefits, treat them like a King, but what they expect in return from them is not to be evil. “Don’t be evil” is the unofficial mantra at Google. Looks like a lot of the companies are not saying as much but following the mantra nonetheless.

Most of these people, who are asked to leave, are sent away (or should we say – got rid of?) in a dignified manner. But getting rid of them from the company is not the solution in the long run. Although such people carry with them the ignominy of that episode things don’t stagnate that way. After lying low for a few days they invariably end up looking for another job and once they find one things are back to normal again. This way although the company has got rid of the bad employees there is no guarantee these bad employees will not indulge in the same (or similar) activity again in the new company they join. Some would argue why should the company throwing out the bad employees worry about how they are behaving in another company.

This is where the NASSCOM initiative of maintaining a database of all IT & ITES employees a step in the right direction & should be lauded. When such database becomes a reality all these evildoers better watch out as their background will no longer be secret and any company they apply to would get to see all about them in black & white.

Integrity is taken for granted as a virtue that everybody possesses. However things have come to such a state that it’s become imperative for companies to resort to the kind of audits & checks initiated by Intel.

The Art of being busy!

2006-02-24T13:00:00.000+05:30

This is not so much about being busy per se, but more to do with what it communicates and what it communicates is very important to the image you’ll have in the organization you work. Lets take for instance you see your Manager walking in & out of meetings carrying files & a tense look on his face, the thoughts running in your head are “Oh my God, he must be going through hell”. Indirectly it communicates that you cannot disturb him & that if you want to discuss your long leave this is not the right time.

Most of the time people are busy only because they have a lot of things to do. They are running against time & running against deadlines. Like someone told me recently, if he knew someone selling time, he would buy it immediately. The present day jobs are like this and everybody must have faced this situation at least a few times.

Are busy people really busy? Or is it more an act? Or are they just confused with what they are supposed to do? Or are they not interested in anything other than their work hence use the “I’ am busy” tag? Whatever the case, the fact of the matter is if you are not busy, then something is really wrong with you. Being busy commands respect. It communicates to the others that you are involved in making the next best policy that’ll change the way things happen in the company. It also indicates that you are a lot into your job & that you want to leave a mark behind in that role. So therefore the need of the hour for a successful career is to be busy.

Here is a first hand tutorial on how to look very busy in your workplace.

- If your office hours are 9 – 6, then ensure you leave office at 10 PM everyday
- Have a totally harassed look on your face. Feel lost.
- Prepare detailed ‘to do’ lists & take print outs of it & put it on your desk everyday
- Have at least dozen post-its stuck on your computer
- Never finish any task given to you on time. Take at least a few hours extra to finish it.
- When someone approaches you for a conversation, complain to him or her about your busy work
- Make people follow up with you a hundred times for getting their work done.
- Eat your lunch late & hurriedly
- Ensure to take all the time you think you require to answer all your phone calls and remember to talk loudly and remember to make a face every time the phone rings

Last but not least, ensure you are constantly improvising on the art of being busy and constantly go on increasing the above list.

Gossip zones! What’s that?

2006-02-24T11:37:00.000+05:30

Gossiping is something that everyone indulges in. Lets accept that. Yes there are various levels of involvement in an activity like that. Somebody may be too much into it, while someone else may do it occasionally. The fact remains that no one can claim to not indulge in it.

So is it OK then that some companies are coming up with gossip zones?

The realization that gossiping is unstoppable is appreciated. However the concept of a gossip zone doesn’t quite make sense. People anywhere have their views & want to express them. Like wise in office, people may see two colleagues walk hand in hand and that may become a talking point. So with the concept of gossip zones are we expecting them to go to the gossip zone & only then discuss it? Sounds ridiculous.

Gossiping today is a casual anytime anywhere thing. That way it remains a simple past time and a stress buster even. By having designated gossip zones, we are taking away the very spirit of gossip. We are making it more of a formal meeting ground. May be that is the objective, to cut nonsense talks & utilize that same time in discussing something else in a more concrete manner.

May be on a more practical basis, these gossip zones will be clubbed with the smoking areas in the office or may be even the cafeteria. It is unlikely companies will have separate areas only for gossiping. Considering the space crunch that most of our modern day offices have, providing space for a gossip zone is probably the last thing they may want to deal with. That said the very concept of creation of gossip zones is nothing but gossip topic in itself. If I were in that company I would ask…

Why are they doing this? Will they have spy cameras & voice recording instruments in that room so that they can record what we are discussing & then take us to task later on or may be use it against us in our appraisal? I thought gossiping was a bad habit, why is our company encouraging it? Is our company headed for a close or something? Are there some big issues with the HR Manager (or whoever initiated the concept of gossip zones in the company) & the top management?

What do you say? Do you know something?

“Yeah I heard that they are doing this because…”

Happy Gossiping with or without Gossip Zones.

The joy of being simple

2006-02-23T10:13:00.000+05:30

Being simple. That is what this is all about. Being simple not in terms of what one wears, where one goes or how one speaks. Being simple from the inside.

If I was asked to define or give a meaning to “Being simple”, I would say it is being content with the simple things of life. And what “simple things” means probably varies from person to person. For me a simple job that gives me enough money is probably simple. My wants & needs could be simple.

There is this show on a TV Channel called, Deal ya No Deal. The first host of this show was Madhavan, the actor. One day they had a coolie special. In the course of the game with one coolie, Madhavan teases the coolie who is a big fan of Karishma Kapoor, by asking him who he would like to go out with if he wins the prize money – Karishma or his wife? The coolie says “My wife, She is the lakshmi of my house”.

That statement by a small town coolie left me thinking. It touched a chord somewhere. A simple man likes Karishma Kapoor and it just ends there. For him his “ghar ki lakshmi” is over & above someone he fantasizes about. Is that being simple? Frankly I don’t know. So may be being simple means one can have desires but should still be content with what he has. Now, that is easy said than done. It has to come from inside. There should be a feeling of “Yes I’ am happy” from the inside.

No tensions, No worries. Not wanting to be ahead. No desire to earn those extra thousand bucks. A simple comfortable life. No pressure to prove to someone that you can also buy a car.

The term Simple is actually not simple enough. It means giving up on all the worldly pleasures. No not really on the lines of a Sanyasi but basically being able to know as to where to draw the line. No show, No pomp. Small desires, nice & likeable. But it really is a very difficult thing to be like that.

Being Simple - Content - Happy - Satisfied.

Big Celebrations - dirty & unnecessary

2006-02-22T18:49:00.000+05:30

The silver jubilee celebration of Art of Living was a huge affair. I asked my friends, “from where do you think they got all the money for that” & somebody said the Art of Living Foundation has it. Despite the answer, for some reason I couldn’t & still cant comprehend the logic or the reason behind a show of that sort. What were we celebrating really? Ok its 25 years old. So what?

I’ am not against the idea of celebrating the silver jubilee, the only question I’ am asking is why should it be so huge. Why should so much money be spent on it? Why couldn’t they have scaled it down to a simple function where may be a thousand odd people gathered at one place at one time & then continued with the celebrations across many days at their center in Bangalore?

I suppose irrespective of what one’s job is, there comes a time when he wants to sit back & enjoy all the praise & adulation thrown at him. Can we say the same about the Art of Living? Were they also just sitting back & enjoying all the appreciation they were getting for the good work they have done? Can they actually afford to do that? Should they do that? Shouldn’t they have put that money for better, useful purposes? The Art of Living anyway indulges in a lot of developmental activity, which is greatly appreciated, may be they should have just continued with that.

This was like a celebration of doing good. At least those who are involved in the process of doing good shouldn’t resort to such show of pomp. Imagine a case where every NGO that exists starts to throw big bashes when they complete 25 years. Incomprehensible, isn’t it? To me the Art of Living silver jubilee celebration was like that. Unnecessary and a waste.

Such huge celebrations should be banned in India. These are fruitless exercises leading to only cost & nothing else. I tried to figure out the cost of this celebration & didn’t get any information on it. May be it ran into a few crores, we’ll never know.

Bloody Auto Drivers

2006-02-22T14:56:00.000+05:30

Harassment by Auto Drivers is not a new thing. But with time, some of the strategies to exhort more money are also changing.

Consider this, a friend of mine took an auto to her residence. The auto driver all through the journey made conversation with her & told her things like, “I like the way you dress. These days women dress so disgustingly”, “You are like my sister” & so on. My friend as anyone else in her position kept quiet & just patiently waited to reach her destination. On reaching her destination, the auto driver who hadn’t demanded anything extra at the time of engaging the auto, suddenly made an emotional plea for extra bucks. All the talk through the journey was only to bring in that emotional connect, it seemed.

In another instance, the auto driver demanded extra money above the meter charge. When I refused, another auto driver who was with him & until now just a mute spectator offered to ride me to my place just for the meter charge. Happy that someone had decided to be fair to me, I took the auto. At the end of the journey, I made the mistake of giving him a 100-rupee note. Smart that he was he withheld an extra Rs 10. When I demanded for the ten bucks he said, that it was agreed. No amount of arguing got me the 10 bucks & I left the place & the auto & the auto driver fuming with anger & desperation.

These strategies & others like these are taking a lot of people off guard. And it has become increasing difficult to trust these auto drivers, as we don’t know what is in store.

Considering that autos are one of the most widely used means of public transportation in Bangalore, it is time that the Auto unions, the police & other agencies did something to deal with such cases.

Some time back when I used to frequently commute in autos I noticed that there would be a message inside for the passenger, which would read, “In case the driver demands excess money, kindly report to the nearest police station”. Not too sure if there are any such messages any more and even if it is, not too sure if they really serve any purpose.

That said, every auto should default have the following available on the inside of the auto:

- The registration number of the auto
- The Auto Driver’s Name & Photo
- The contact number of a centralized ‘grievance against auto drivers’ cell.

The public should be educated to call the grievance cell & lodge a complaint against the auto driver by giving the details like the registration number of the auto, the drivers name & photo. With this may be I will still pay the auto driver the extra money, but by reporting it to the grievance cell I’ am enabling the authorities to take certain action against the driver. May be if there are more than say, 5 grievances against the same person then the police can take action against the auto drivers.

The details inside the auto will also help the passenger to recollect the details of the auto he traveled in if required. How many of us even bother to check the auto’s registration number or even give a second glance at the auto driver’s face? With both these details plus his name available inside the auto, one will at least look at it once & may be able to recollect a part of it later if required.

Also, to be on the safer side, women passengers should take some precautions themselves.

- Take an auto where the auto driver is a middle aged person
- Make a note of the auto’s registration number & message the same to a friend/colleague
- Avoid conversation with the driver especially if he is touching upon topics like your dress, how you look etc
- If the conversation or anything in the auto is disturbing you, pick up your phone & call somebody. In the conversation give details about where you are, what is happening etc.

Considering how the whole system is lackadaisical to this growing menace, its time that we public bring in measures ourselves to safeguard us from the harassment of the bloody auto drivers.

Selective Forwarding

2006-02-22T09:59:00.000+05:30

“Good Morning”, the subject line screams. When I click on it, a bunch of flowers with some flowery language wish me a great day. Cute did you say? Well I beg to differ.

The other common message one gets is that of “Happy Weekend”. Beer cans & (lately) sex has become the sign of an activity to be done in the weekend. Do I really need to be reminded about the ensuing weekend? Don’t I know it myself?

Then of course there are baby pictures, Gods & Goddesses pictures, and send-it-to-10 people-and-get-what-you-have-always-desired-mails as well.

Forwarding mails has become the corporate world’s favorite past time. The only thing I want to ask or say is whoever it is that first thought of ‘forwarding’ as one of the features in email is one great guy/gal. The fact that it is so commonly used is unbelievable.

This gets us to the point of explaining the title of this piece, Selective forwarding. Forwarding in principle is not bad. But like they say too much is too bad, the same way too much forwarding is too bad. One, it loses the value & importance, two, it makes things very monotonous & three, it becomes really boring.

What is instead required is what is called selective forwarding. In this system, one forwards only selected things. Things that the other person will value (as a good piece of info or just as a time pass mail). This will ensure that worthy forwards are not lost in a crowd & also that the reader can spend a considerable amount of time to understand & relate to it.

The advancements that technology has made has created a new category for etiquette. Forwards for the above reasons are one of them under the technology category and Selective Forwarding is probably the solution to it.

Mantras & Rituals in English

2006-02-16T11:32:00.000+05:30

The most hilarious moment every time we have an abhiskheka at home is when the priest asks my Dad to repeat some mantras after him. The priest doesn’t give a damn about whether it is pronounced properly or not. So long as some voice is heard that is even slightly close to what he said, it is accepted & the process continues.

Frankly how many of us really know what the priest is reciting? Yes, it may be from the religious texts, the Bhagavad Gita or the Upanishads & so on but what they mean is very difficult to comprehend.

The other day, I was at my uncle’s house warming ceremony, where a Satyanaraya Pooja was organized. And like in any Satyanarayana Pooja, there was the satyanarayana katha (story) read out. Most times this is in Kannada. But for some strange reason the elders present there decided to ask someone to do the honor of reading the story & he chose to do it in Marathi. I was entrusted the responsibility of keeping the camphor burning all through the stories. The fact that keeping the camphor burning was a really difficult task is a different topic for another day, but in the process I realized that not a single soul there understood the story being read out, partly because it was just READ out & partly because it was in a language that no body found easy to understand. Although all of us speak Marathi, the difference between spoken Marathi & written is like sky & earth. At least to me that is how it is.

That got me thinking about why shouldn’t the katha be in English. Would that be wrong? Would the culture police raise an objection to that? Well, what the culture police raises an objection to & to what they don’t is very difficult to say. But for some reason I feel, if the story was read out in English it would have been wonderful. All would have understood the story & the whole process would have made that much more sense. I would have loved to do the reading myself if that was in English.

I feel what today’s youth craves is reasoning & some excitement. Anything that is slightly on the boring side is abhorred. Remember how popular A R Rahman’s version of Vande Mataram became with the youth. That is what I’am talking about. I feel we need to do things that the youth can understand in their language.

So the Satyanaraya Katha should be read out in English, or if purists have a problem, may be it could be read out simultaneously with whatever other language it should be read out in. Also, every time a mantra is read out, wouldn’t it be great if the priest or whoever is reciting it, explains the meaning in English. Again, the whole process would make that much more sense. May be, the whole process of whatever happens in a pooja, right from the burning of the camphor, or agarbathi or breaking the coconut should be explained as it is happening, preferably in a language that most people would understand & if that is English so be it. Pushing it even more, how about the mantras in English itself? May be on second thoughts it’s far fetched right now. How about before starting the celebrations of a festival, if we could have a session on the why’s & the hows. Yeah may be we know the funda behind a Diwali but how many of us can say the same about Varmahalakshmi Pooja or Ugadi & so on.

Yeah there is the Internet from where I can get whatever info I want. But how many of us you think would give a search related to Rituals, Mantras, Poojas & so on.

If we can take some of these & other related measures & get the youth hooked, we can rest assured that our centuries old traditions will live on for another century & more.

McJobs – Ok, Good… But…

2006-02-16T10:45:00.000+05:30

A McJob is a low-paying, non-challenging job with few benefits or opportunities, typically in the service sector.

In this day & age of job-hopping & attrition there still exists jobs that are at the lowest end of the spectrum. Jobs that for some reason need to be done in our country.

Lets take the case of the Lift operator. The guy you will find in a lift seated on a small stool, with a look that is totally uninterested. His main task involves operating the lift. Operate is a big term, if you know what I mean. All they have to do is press the button of the number of the floor the visitor is headed to. Of course some would argue that they are also there to take care of any untoward incidents like the break down of the lift or in worse scenarios to act as a guide in events of accidents.

Lets take another example, that of an Elevator Guard. They have come into prominence post an accident that happened in one of the shopping malls in Bangalore. I must also say that I have seen these guys at only that shopping mall so far. I suppose their job is similar to that of a Lift operator - guard the elevator & prevent any untoward incidents around there.

In India the concept of escalators & elevators are pretty new. Earlier it was limited only to high-rise office buildings & had to be dealt with only by the office goers. Today we find them in shopping malls, hospitals, and multiplexes, places that are frequented by the common public. Considering that the Indian public is still not adept about the operating of such machines, people around to help them is a good idea. However for how long are we going to spoon-feed the Indian public for every small task?

In India, there are men (& women) at the petrol bunks to fill your car or bike up with fuel. Elsewhere in the world (mostly west) filling up on fuel is a self-service job. Even tasks like painting, plumbing is generally done by the members of a family. Professionals are called upon only in serious circumstances or when the task is huge.

With over a billion in population no wonder such jobs exists in abundance. This is good because these people can live a life of dignity for doing a decent job that obviously pays them decently as well, but in the long run such jobs should be phased out & more challenging jobs should be created.

Leave the Gods alone

2006-02-14T15:04:00.000+05:30

For all those religious enough, it must be annoying to see how Gods & Goddesses are being used & made fun of these days.

If it was M F Hussein painting hindu deities in the nude. Then the recent issue of cartoons has taken things to unbelievable heights. To add fuel to fire, the Times of India carries a news piece today that the picture of Goddess Durga in ads for a whisky bottle.

I suppose there comes a time in the life of a person, brand or company when all else has been used to the maximum extent & the only option left for them is the creator. And unlike Khushboo who atleast got a chance to react to a morphed picture in the first Indian issue of Maxim, Gods & Goddesses can’t have their say in this regard and therefore the only people who will rise in their defense are their so called followers. Thus starts what is called ‘communal tension’.

I remember the brief I got when I was assigned the task of shortlisting cartoons for our company calendar. My boss told me the cartoons you select should not offend anybody, should not be sexist, shouldn’t be biased in favor of someone & so on & so forth. If all this is for a company calendar then I can’t comprehend why someone like M F Hussein would paint Hindu deities in the nude. Is that creativity? Art? Same questions can also be thrown at the Danish newspaper that published the cartoons. Didn’t they know that they are venturing into an area that is risky? Didn’t the other newspapers that reused those cartoons know that this could be an issue? Doesn’t the liquor company who has used Goddess Durga in its ads, know the consequences?

I’am sure they knew the consequences completely. May be that is why they did what they did in the first place. There was this term social responsibility being thrown around during the cartoons issue. Today, The Times of India clearly states that they didn’t deliberately publish the picture of the liquor bottle so as to not hurt the sentiments of a certain community, that is a right thing to do. They could have easily put the picture in the paper & created a controversy.

I also feel we make only selective noises when it comes to issues like this. If I wish to stand up & oppose I will do it. Haven’t the Hindu Gods been made fun of in our movies? Why doesn’t anybody rise in protest then? In some Tamil movie (which was shown over the last weekend) a Goddess is begging in the modern day world’s traffic signal, complete with a begging bowl & so on. Isn’t that scene worthy of protests? Seen those pictures of Gods (or religious signs like Om/Cross) of various religions to prevent people from urinating or dropping off garbage in a particular place? Is this OK? Is this what we have reduced our Gods to? Doesn’t this require a protest?

The fact of the matter is anything-religious fuels passion. That is the simple fact that all of us will have to understand. No wonder the British played the policy of dividing the Hindus & Muslims & ruling India & no wonder, the BJP played the Ram Mandir issue & came to power. May be that is what a MF Hussein or the Danish newspapers want. Attention & success, because that is what they get easily & freely.

It may be easy said than done, but we need to leave the Gods & Goddesses alone. Involving them or anything to do with them to either start or douse a human problem will only lead to their reaction when we go up to the heaven or hell.

Unlimited Thali - Unlimited Wastage

2006-02-08T15:43:00.000+05:30

Ever ordered for the south Indian or north Indian thali at a hotel? Unless we are one of those pizza-burger-pasta types, most of us must have tasted the food in the thali.

Today while I sat at one of the hotels & sipped coffee at lunchtime, the guy in front of me had ordered for a south Indian thali & was gorging on the food like there was no tomorrow. But what he ate was only the rice. The good helping of side dishes was ignored completely. As he drank his glass of water & proceeded towards the hand wash, the leftover side dishes, a bowl of dahi, a bowl of rice kheer & may be a good 5 spoonfuls of rice got me thinking.

Probably, the guy’s stomach could only accommodate what he ate. May be he didn’t like the food. May be he didn’t like me sitting in front of him & watching. Whatever the case the bottom line is the amount of food going waste in a thali is enormous & a cause for worry. And if you consider the ‘unlimited thali’ then the wastage is a lot more. Ever been to the Nagarjuna? Seen the way they serve food there?

The amount of food wasted by two people eating out of a thali could easily feed an underprivileged child.

I wonder what the hotel does with all the food that is wasted. It probably goes to the bin & dispatched off the next day with the regular garbage.

This has to stop. I know of a few small hotels in Bangalore where they actually shout at you for wasting food. The others haven’t done anything like this, probably for fear of losing out on their customers & business. Neither can the hotels put up grim statistics or images of how people are dying of hunger. It will require better education & awareness on the part of the hotel staff & the customers.

We should also get rid of this concept called unlimited thali, its actually unlimited wastage. Customers should consciously say ‘No’ to items that they don’t generally consume even before it is served to them.

The hotel that I visit regularly for the excellent coffee available there, serves an enormous amount of food in its limited thali. To me no normal person, including me, has been able to finish the whole plate completely. They should limit the amount of side dishes & provide dahi etc only on request. In case of waiters serving rice, they should be educated & trained to serve little first & an extra serving only on request. May be the customer should himself be allowed to take how much he needs. May be hotels can also put up boards saying, “don’t waste food” along side those “No Smoking” ones.

I remember seeing the conserve water campaign on TV. For whatever reason conservation of cooked food hasn’t received the same kind of treatment. Its time it does.

Finance or HR

2006-02-07T10:32:00.000+05:30

I have heard of debates about what is more important for an organization - Finance or HR. I feel these topics don’t really get anywhere & at no point of time can somebody put their foot down & say its Finance that is important or HR.

As someone who has been closely associated with a HR company, I thought I should, well not defend my community or anything like that, but just drop a few thoughts of my own in this regard.

With respect to what is more important for an organization, Finance or HR, I wish to turn that around & ask Who is more important for the birth & growth of a child? Mother or the Father?

Can anybody answer this question? Is it easy enough to answer in the first place? If this question is put to a Mom & Dad who have a child, they’ll probably joke around & each will say “I’ am”, but later don’t you think they will conclude that it is both who are important?

Yes, we need a dad, who can contribute the sperms. But then you need a mom, to contribute the eggs as well. Can a Mom or a Dad by themselves get babies? We need to understand this funda.

Applying the same logic to the Finance or HR question, when an organization starts off, what they need first is the HR department. Ever heard of a finance department being in there first before the HR? It’s the HR who recruits the Finance guys.

But there is another side to it. Yes there may not be a Finance department as such but HR will require all the money the company can afford for the recruitment purpose. So that way Finance (somebody who gives the money & tracks it) is also very much there. And like during the birth of a child, other people also play a part. Remember the doctor, the nurse & so on. As the child grows, the teachers become the other set who start to play a role in the growth of a child. Can you guess the equivalent of a doctor or a teacher in a company? To me this role could be that of a consultant whose services are in demand by most of the companies today or in the absence of a consultant, the promoters themselves chip in here. Some hardcore HR guys will probably argue that the HR guys themselves play the teacher’s role, as they are the ones providing all the training & development.

The Finance or HR question is worth attempting, because it gives the individual answering it great insight. One of the insights could be that his department is the most critical. So that way it goes back to square one & we can start all over again.

Finance or HR? I say Finance & HR… & Admin & Operations & Technology… all one happy family. Too utopian isn’t it? So I say…. HR.

In love with Mannequins

2006-02-07T10:15:00.000+05:30

Window-shopping is a favorite past time these days. If one walks through a mall or for that matter even a street full of shops one is bound to see a lot of mannequins dressed impeccably & drawing our attention toward them. These life size plastic creatures show off on them the latest in fashion or at least what the particular store stocks.

These mannequins are one amazing piece of invention aren’t they? To me they are for a lot of reasons. To me they don’t just exist to show off a dress, but for a lot more than that. Ever wondered why none of these mannequins come in the real shapes but only in the thin, curvy ones? That of course must have to do with the worldwide phenomenon to look trim, slim & healthy. They indirectly seduce the shopper into believing that they’ll look as beautiful as the mannequin if they were to wear the same dress.

Of course, they are available in various kinds. The life sized ones are in the female & the male variety. Then you will also get to see a life size mannequin without the head. Then we have the busts. For reasons completely unknown to me, I like the life size ones, complete with a head.

On Com Street, there still exists a shop where a heavy bosom mannequin stands wearing a sari, bindi & the works. Oh, what a sight! The Indian woman in her complete glory. Very pretty indeed.

Of late, there are the mannequins that are dressed in western wear. Trust me, any honest guy will confess that he just loves to ogle at them. Low waist jeans, low neck lines and all. Any guy would want his girlfriend or wife to be like that wearing the same kind of dress.

Then of course there are the ones that are clad in lingerie. Umm, actually not very exciting this. Yeah, a guy can once again let his imagination run wild but in reality when they are lingerie clad, they are showing more plastic than skin and that way becomes very boring.

With the kind of technology we have at our disposal today I feel there should be more research done to improve their lot. Instead of being stationed as statues, there should be some movement instilled in them. I remember seeing a mannequin outside Big Kids Kemp which would every few seconds raise her two hands to do a namaste. That is what I’am talking about. Give the following a thought:

-Imagine mannequins looking in your direction once you go past them. Scary did you say? May be not.
-How about the mannequins wishing you good morning or some thing like that? May be a “Hi Hottie” or some such thing would make the shoppers day.
-May be a wink or a whistle could make it interesting as well. I’ve seen this stuffed monkey at Hallmarks that whistles as you go past it. I think that is really cool & will invariably bring a smile to the shoppers face.
-On a more serious level since the mannequin’s main job is to show off a dress, they could be programmed to describe the dress they are wearing.

With more & more malls coming up, this could be one of the innovative ways to attract more footfalls and all those of us who indulge in window-shopping could have some nice fun out there.

Support Sania

2006-02-03T11:45:00.000+05:30

Sania Mirza, the teenage tennis player from Hyderabad, has become a sensation of sorts. At 19 years she becomes the youngest to receive the Padmashri. This has raised quite a few questions. The questions being does she deserve it? Has she got it too soon? & so on.

For a country satiating only on cricket stars, Sania Mirza is a welcome break.

Sania Mirza has been in the news as much for her dressing sense as for her tennis. I guess the people thronging the courts to see Sania are also interested in other things these days as a result of all the hype about her dress.

Lets be fair to this girl. At 19 how many even know what tennis is, leave alone play it & play it at the world level. And in a country like India, how many girls get the opportunity to even THINK of what tennis is? Aren’t they married off at that age or even probably mothering a baby? So the whole country should support Sania in her journey.

Having said that, by giving Padmashri to Sania after an Arjuna award, we are making a hero out of somebody who is not yet a hero. Sania’s only worthwhile achievement has been to break into the Top 40 of the world rankings & her third round foray in a grand slam tourney. May be a Padmashri will give her the confidence & add to the already overflowing star like persona, but what Sania needs at this stage is all the money she can, so that she can get herself trained by the world’s best pros (and may be a media adviser/consultant) & go on to achieve what no Indian woman has ever achieved before – a Grand Slam Singles Title.

Coming to the other aspect of Sania Mirza, i.e. her dress on the play court, which has antagonized a certain section of the people, I would say it’s a bit of both fair & unfair. It’s unfair because one obviously can’t expect Sania to wear a burqha & play. Also if one applies the same logic then India would never have a participation in the women’s version of aquatics & gymnastics, for players involved in such sports have to wear a particular type of clothing.

Its fair because, Sania, like it or not, has become a role model for the youngsters. So what she does, what she says, how she says it, all will matter. That way, it is important for her to ensure that she wears the right things, says the right things & in the right manner.

I think it would be fair to say that Sania is a media created star. Remember Anna Kournikova of Russia. Anna made news for exactly the same reason Sania is today. Both Anna & Sania are the kind of girls who draw most of the attention not for their on court performances but for the glamour they brought to the courts. The fact that Sania’s matches are being staged in the bigger courts indicates the growing magnet like attraction she has with the followers of the game & even the non-followers.

And what the heck if Sania doesn’t give a damn about the theory that only the balls should bounce. What matters to us is her success in professional tennis.

Let us Support Sania. She is a young girl with immense talent & places to go.

News - Then & Now

2006-02-02T19:31:00.000+05:30

When I was in school, in one of my classes we were asked to maintain a 400 page notebook and write in it nuggets of the days evening news & submit it to the teacher the next day. I remember how petrified I was at the thought of it. Dad would religiously watch the news those days, and it was he I turned to, to help me in understanding & making sense of the news. He would make quick notes of the news being read out (bear in mind that those days we only had Doordarshan news, wherein the news was read out by a newsreader.) and later mom would help me write them in the 400-page book in a meaningful manner.

The teacher’s objective through this exercise probably was to get us young minds to see the goings on in the outside world & thereby improve our general knowledge. However the everyday checking slowly reduced & eventually stopped one fine day and with it, my ordeal of sitting through the evening news bulletin. Dad probably was glad that he could watch the news in a relaxed manner.

I’ am not aware of any school doing this today. If any school is indeed doing this, I feel it probably wont be one bit as difficult as it was for me. Today news is no more the boring kind. The newsreaders have been replaced by presenters & news anchors who not only present the news but add a line or two of their own opinion at the end of the ‘story’. Ever seen NDTV, especially Prannoy Roy & his senior Journalists? More specifically the task of writing the News in my News Book (if I could call the 400-page book that) would be much easier today because all the news channels have the main news as a ticker at the bottom of the screen passing through all day. All I would have to do is replicate the same in my book.)

Over the years I have become one of the avid news TV watchers. I can go on & on watching the same news over & over again without really getting bored. I attribute this largely to today’s generation of news channels, which present the various interpretations & perceptions of a case, so that the individual can ascertain for himself what is right or wrong.

Things have changed a lot otherwise. Remember, the male newsreader on the Doordarshan news would only wear a tie & no blazer or suit. The female newsreader would default have a bindi on her forehead & wear a saree. Today’s news anchors wear a bindi & a saree only during National festivals & events like may be a holi, diwali or Independence Day & Republic Day. The men are always clad in a blazer or a suit.

A few days back yet another news channel hit the Indian Television. Apparently there are around 20 odd news channels today trying to grab eyeballs so that they can grab the pockets of the advertisers. When you have a case of plenty, you invariably get a variety as well. So you have regional news channels, business news channels, and current affairs/consumer affairs channels. The latest news channel claims that their news stories are aimed at the urban viewer. So that means we have news for urban viewers & rural viewers as well. And in this variety we get crap.
In the desire to be the first to tell the world the news and to grab those eyeballs & pockets, there have been cases of the News Channels crossing the line. Remember the telecast of the breakfast meeting of President Pervez Musharaff with the leading media personalities of India, during the much-hyped Agra Summit a few years back. That telecast apparently derailed the talks. Or a recent case of a news channel showing the unedited version of a rape by a senior police officer.

Of course, on the other side we also have the brave attempts of the coverage of the Kargil War & the sting operations that have led to many resignations & terminations.
News today is simple & easy. Simple & easy for the viewer to see & keep track of and simple & easy to get those eyeballs by showing whatever, however.

One Summer Morning

2006-02-02T18:18:00.000+05:30

It was a summer morning,
Bright, sunny & hot,
In the verandah I saw a girl walking,
Whom before I had seen not, I thought

She was dressed in white,
Which looked very bright,
She was quiet and all alone,
As if in an environment to mourn.

I looked at her with delight,
But also a little bit of fright,
She was tall & fair,
Up to her shoulder she kept her hair.

Engrossed in her reading she was,
But I was looking at the twinkle,
That appeared from her eardrops
At that time I only hoped she was single

She had rosy cheeks
Quite a contract to mine, which were unshaven for weeks
Her split lips increased my heartbeat
And I only wondered, in the night, if I could sleep

When she lifted her face from the book
For a few seconds I was hooked
I wondered would she respond, would she answer back
When I speak to her using my entire knack

I was worried I was scared
But I knew in these things I kind of fared
But again, will she respond, will she answer back, I wasn’t clear
I was a nervous wreck with this fear.

Finally, I cleared my throat
Made proper my coat
And walked closer to her. Suddenly I stopped.
What the hell to speak I thought.

What would I speak, what would I say,
As I kept wondering, something happened & I stood stunned, like a statue made of clay,
Another pretty girl, walked up to the first one, kissed her & took her away.

A lot can happen over coffee

2005-11-06T16:57:00.000+05:30

A lot can happen over coffee, is the punch line of one of the coffee chains in India. Very true indeed.

Relaxing over a cup of cappuchino, my preferred hot coffee these days at the café, I look around & get to see a nice blend of different people, their behavior, their talks, their clothes & so on.

Observing people has been an unconscious habit of mine. Its only recently I realized I have such a habit. While my college friends joke over old events & continue to rag each other I quietly sip my cappuchino & look around. Every now & then I fill myself in on what is happening at my table, who is getting ragged or what is the joke all about.

The crowd at such café’s is fairly young. If not young in the real sense you will surely find people young at heart. On one occasion, a fairly middle aged couple sat on one of the very comfortable sofas. The man was wearing figure hugging shirt & trousers & the lady wore a long skirt with a long slit & a top. They sat side by side & the man had his arm around his lady & was constantly stroking her hand. Their faces were so close to each other that all through whatever conversation they were having I’am sure they could get a pretty good look at each other’s features on their faces.

What was the need to sit so close? What kind of a conversation were they having after all? And in the midst of their conversation they would laugh, may be they were cracking some jokes. May be dirty jokes. But they were having a good time. The loud music & all the noise of so many people chatting all around only resulted in the couple having their privacy even amidst such an environment.

Fashion is a very subjective word. I feel I should be comfortable with what I am wearing & confident to carry it off & if I have even the slightest of doubts with respect to these two parameters I avoid buying & wearing such clothes. But that is my view and not all of them have to think the same way.

On yet another of those meetings with my friends at the café, I was involved in observing & overhearing a conversation by a few school kids sitting across my table. Very enthusiastic bunch they were. Their school uniform indicated that they were from one of the most prestigious schools in Bangalore. Considering the time, which was late in the evening I assumed they were sitting at the Café after attending a school fest or something. Some of them had changed into civvies. One of them who wore civvies I noticed had a decent amount of make up on her face & wore a top with a low neckline thus revealing a hint of cleavage. She sat on the armrest part of the sofa & thus was seated well above the rest of them who sat in the actual seating area of the sofa. I noticed how carefree this girl was with herself, her clothes & how she sat & how she sipped her cold coffee. Way to go I thought for a school going girl. I remembered my school days, yeah there were no such café’s around then so that is why may be I didn’t go to such expensive places.
I also wondered what is happening to the children of today. I don’t know why I started to think that way, because I knew it was not correct to think that way & jump to conclusions, for I have always believed appearances could be deceptive. So may be what I saw was just posturing by the girl, who probably wanted to look cool or whatever in front of her friends or may be she is just plain modern in her dressing sense & partying sense which is not bad or wrong after all.

I also looked at the only girl at my table, my friend’s wife, looking at the cleavage-revealing schoolgirl. The look on my friend’s wife’s face was of shock & disbelief. I’am not a very good face reader so may be I’am wrong there. But it looked like that to me. In the midst of all this one of the guy in the group across our table stood up & looked down at the stairs & shouted loudly at someone & used the F word quite liberally in the process. All the girls sitting around him, I think there were 4 of them, ignored him & what he said & were engrossed in eating their chocolate ice cream.

I don’t use the F word too often, only when I am really upset or irritated that I use it & most times in a very hushed tone so that others don’t hear it. This guy was loud & the girls didn’t bother about it. Nice approach I thought.

My friends were deliberating whether to order something to eat or not. I wanted to eat something too. After some more discussion we freezed on a pizza.

I’am not a very talkative person, so I continued to look at some of my friends rag one of the fat friends in the group at our table. I find it very difficult to understand how they can manage to laugh at the same jokes pulled on the same guy again & again. The fat friend ofcourse seemed not to mind & seemed to enjoy the attention he was getting.

Two couples walked in & after looking around which table to occupy decided to take up the table to the right of ours. After they decided which table to sit at they took some more time to decide who should take which chair.

Its actually fun to look at how some people go through such mundane things with so much interest & thought.

After having made up their mind, they decided to sit down. One of the girls in the group took a chair that was right next to me. As she was sitting down I noticed her jeans around her waist slide down at the back & within no time I was looking at the crack of her butt, as she finally settled down on the chair. Then she pulled down her top & covered it up, I’am sure unaware of what had happened & me looking at something that she herself doesn’t get to see much.

Crack of the butt, or otherwise called butt cleavage is in vogue these days. I feel one of the reasons for that is the growing popularity of low waist jeans. The other important reason I feel is a neat paunch that just about everybody seems to have these days including girls. I feel the paunch in the front contributes & helps for the already low waist jeans to be worn further lower resulting in revealing the backside to others.
To be fair to all such people who show off their backsides I feel it’s not their fault. My way of looking at it is the regular cleavage (the front side one) is something that is most times intended. The girl knows she is showing off her cleavage. But the backside one is most times accidental, like what I witnessed.

Intended or accidental I feel it’s taking the term fashion to disgustingly low levels.

We decided to pay up & get out of the café. Outside at the parking lot as I walked towards my bike, I saw a guy sitting on a bike & a girl very close to him standing in front of him with the guys face in her small hands. She had bent down on his face & there was probably just enough distance between their eyes for them to keep it open & look at each other. As I walked away from them I noticed another group consisting of only guys discussing something in hushed tones & giving occasional glances at the ‘very close’ couple. Something told me that they were not ogling at the couple but were eager to know what happened & what is happening. I passed the group & came ahead & stationed myself near my bike & waited for my other friends also to assemble there.

The ‘very close’ couple hugged each other & the girl planted a kiss on the guy’s fore head. Then she held his hand & walked him to the group of guys sitting next to them. They spoke something & then she hugged each of the guys. When the ritual was done, the ‘very close’ couple held their hands again & very closely walked away from their friends & us.

The hugs are in fashion these days as well. I hesitate to hug even my guy friends because I feel a hug is a very strong show of emotion. I feel one doesn’t go around hugging everybody & anybody whenever one sees them irrespective of if they met each other the previous day or that morning. Then again that is my view.

When all my friends gathered around we said our byes. We say our byes differently. When we have decided it is time to leave, we shake hands with all, then when we are about to leave somebody will ask, “Ok when are we meeting next?” someone will speak up & offer a date & time, some others wait for someone to offer the date & time. Then when the date & time is offered, someone will say, “No I have exams at that time” or “I have to go to my aunts house”. Thus nullifying the initial date & time suggested by someone. Then we conclude & arrive at an alternate date & time, if no one raises any objections to the new timings we shake hands with all of them again & say our byes again.

That way we shake hands as many times as possible. It’s free after all isn’t it? Yes some of them in my group are also into hugging & yes sometimes we hug more than once.

I just stand there & wait for the hugging to get over.

Kissing on the Street - Ok to look or not?

2005-07-10T12:59:00.000+05:30

Is it ok to look when someone kisses on the street?

Just to clarify I’am not talking of a father kissing his first standard kid, a dog lover kissing a dog. We are strictly talking of a couple, old enough to understand what they are doing & doing passionately.

I’am not even talking of kissing in pubs or at parties I’am talking of kissing in public, on the streets.

We are not even discussing why this is happening & even if it is good or bad & so on.
Strictly, if someone kisses on the street is it ok to look.

Well that is a tough one isn’t it?

I have had the privilege (?) of being in places & at times when some couple or the other have wanted to express their love for each other. Considering that most of us these days are ‘open minded’, ‘broad minded’, ‘modern’, ‘very today’ & so on may be this happening in the first place is actually not a topic of discussion at all. Well needless to say I think differently. I think it is actually important to discuss. For the moment though if we assume that it has been concluded that it is ok for such things (i.e. kissing in public) to happen then I have the above question to ask.

Having asked the question I also feel there cant be a Yes or No answer to it. I mean come on how can I go about saying Yes I can look at a couple kissing on the street or even No I cant look at a couple kissing on the street.

Let me explain.

Firstly it is important to acknowledge that this is a new phenomenon. This kind of stuff is not something that used to happen in the past & it still doesn’t happen a lot even today. It’s just the rare cases. May be that is the problem that it is still rare in India. May be if it isn’t rare & one gets to see couples kissing just about everywhere then one wouldn’t react like this.

I’am of the view it should be ok to look. I mean come on if these guys who are kissing don’t care a damn about the fact that there are people around then why should I care about looking. They kiss & I look. They kiss some more & I look some more.

I’am trying hard to write, NO it is not ok to look but I’am unable to come up with genuine reasons for the same. Not that I have come up with genuine reasons for looking in the first place.

Let me deal with this question a little differently from the perspective of the kissers. If I were kissing someone in public would I like being looked? Umm may be not. But then having said that since it is not a regular phenomenon one is generally bound to give a second look at someone kissing in public. It’s only natural at least till it becomes a regular thing.

More than just looking what is important is what one feels about the whole thing. If I look & ignore then it is fine. If I look & start calling the couple names & start concluding they are this & that etc then it’s a problem. Then its getting to me & I should probably avoid looking at them kiss. May be even stop going to places where they are likely to kiss.

On a more serious note I feel it is important to give the couple the freedom to do what they want and the same way I feel I should get the freedom to look at as well.

It’s a win – win situation after all!

Perfection - Good, Bad or Ugly?

2005-07-10T12:56:00.000+05:30

“I’am not perfect”, I told my friend. “Nobody is perfect”.

“Perfection is a process not a state,” I said finally.

Her reaction to it suggested I had made a very good and valid point.

What is perfect really? May be it simply means something that is good to its maximum extent. It could be a thing or a person. I never really had an opinion on what Perfect means and I have no idea how I got the above view into my head. When I said it I said it for the first time. Let me try to analyze the point that ‘Perfection is a process and not a state’.

Lets take a simple Reynolds pen. It could be perfect in all possible manners at any given point of time. The body is good, the refill is good, the ink in the refill is of very good quality etc but are we saying it cant be better? Can it not actually be better? I say it can be better, much better. The next version of the pen with some improvements will surely be
better. So is this perfect then? Once again I don’t think so. The better can improve to Much Better and so on.

This way I don’t think anything or anyone can be called Perfect. Perfection is indeed an ongoing process and not a state.

Of late I have heard the term Perfect being used very liberally by a lot of people. I wonder if they really know what they are talking about. If they think a little they wouldn’t use this term.

I would like to delve a little more on the concept or theory of people being perfect. Once again I want to ask the question – Can a person call himself perfect? Is there anything like a Perfect Human Being? What is a perfect human being after all? Are we talking about his physical appearance, his attitudes, values, the way he speaks, the way he walks, the way he is with his folks at home, friends etc. Or are we getting to things like emotions, moods, ideas, thoughts, opinions and so on. Even if say it’s the whole package of whatever I have listed out above and more, can I still go ahead and call someone perfect?

NO.

There is always a possibility of improving something or the other. When I say perfect it means it needs no improvement, no change, NOTHING. Can I really confidently say something or someone is perfect to that extent?

The other term that is used very often is Perfectionist. The following are some of the meanings to Perfectionist: Stickler, Purist, Someone who likes to do things properly, obsessive, thorough person, uncompromising worker.

I know three people I can confidently say are Perfectionists. One is Aamir Khan. Two is my Boss and three is Me. Yeah I don’t know Aamir Khan personally but from whatever I have read and understood about him Perfectionist describes him Best. Being an Aamir Khan fan I have always admired him in the way he goes about doing things. Again all the views & opinions about him are strictly from what I get to read in the books & what I see on TV.

Of course when it comes to my Boss I know him, though at a professional level only. And when it comes to me I can say for sure that I am one as well.

Apart from all the other meanings that I have listed above I would like to add one myself. Perfectionist is one ‘who does things in style’ or at least someone who strives to do things in style. The question though is how does one define style? Or if we go with some of the above meanings, how does one define a ‘stickler’ or a ‘purist’ or an uncompromising person’.

I got myself thinking on these lines as a result of a few things that happened.

One, I have become the nitpicker, if you know what I mean. I don’t think twice about telling someone that is not the way it is suppose to be. I have also become the uninvited counselor, giving advices and telling people how they should do things or solve the problems they are facing. This accordingly to me is a result of me being a Perfectionist. I feel I know it all.

Two, lets take one example about Aamir Khan. Yesterday I was watching the immensely popular chat show called ‘Koffee with Karan’. The guests were former Miss World turned Actress Priyanka Chopra and former Model turned actor Arjun Rampal. The show is a very candid one where the stars are grilled by the host who also happens to be one of the most talented Directors of recent times, Karan Johar. In one section called Controversies, the guests on the show are grilled on some of the controversies surrounding them. The question posed to Arjun Rampal: why is he not part of the movie named ‘Rang de Bansati’ which has Aamir Khan part of it as the lead star. The initial answer by Arjun: “ there was no clarity as to what I was expected to do and it just prolonged for a little too long and so I backed out. But on being prodded a little more by Karan if Aamir Khan had anything to do with it, Arjun clarifies, “Well I have heard rumours about Mr. Aamir Khan getting involved a little too much into his films and I think he had some fears about me being part of the movie”

So the question I would like to ask is, “Can it be possible for Asmir Khan to have objected to Arjun Rampal being part of the movie as a result of whatever doubts Aamir Khan might have had about Arjun’s capabilities as an actor?” I think it’s highly possible. The only question is, is it possible for Aamir to think that way and is he thinking that way as a result of being a Perfectionist?

Three, My Boss is a very nice man. Once he openly told me he is a perfectionist. He shared this little experience with me. Apparently he had asked a couple of people at work to send some promotional mailers across and gave them a surprise visit as they were in the process of doing so. He realized that the job being done was a very superficial one and of very bad quality and as a result he reacted the most natural way – He blasted them. Over 250 mailers had to be reworked on and he insisted on taking a look at the improved one before they actually mailed it.

I want to know if Perfectionists can limit their urge to be perfect only to themselves. Going by the above examples it not only seems difficult but just not possible. All the three examples above very clearly suggest that the Perfectionists look for perfection beyond themselves and their work. So is this good, bad or ugly?

Being a perfectionist myself I can understand how easy it is to start influencing others to do things my way. For some reason I feel my way of doing things are the best or the correct way of doing it. Since I cant quite explain or speak for the others let me explain this from my point of view.

Let me take one example. MS Excel is one of the frequently used applications at work.
I have learnt to work on MS Excel the hard way. I have learnt most of the short cuts, the ways & means to utilize the application to the best possible extent and. Therefore as a result of knowing it all, I would tell others how they could use some of the shortcuts and also go one step further by telling them which finger to use for pressing which key on the keyboard. This habit of mine annoyed quite a few and actually became an issue between a team member of mine and me despite saying it in the nicest possible manner.

Going by all the above examples, The Perfectionists don’t seem to be most liked by others for how they are. So to the Perfectionist is this not a very contrary thing to how he/she would like things to be for them. I mean if someone is truly and completely a perfectionist would he/she have being liked by all also as one of their objectives?

Not that the others like it. I am very confident that they think I think they are not capable of doing it without my advice or guidance. This is

I feel all these perfectionists including me don’t quite know where to draw the line. In our strive for pe