the law of averages

disclaimer: this post is based on true facts that have been unimaginably exaggerated to resemble the truth and at the same time appear fictitious to protect the legal rights of the author. any resemblance to any person living or dead should not be used to sue the author for slander of reputation.

School was ordinarily a blissful state of mind until of course the report cards were send home. My dad would ask me “who is the topper in that subject?”, “and this one?”, “and this…?”, “ why can’t u even score 90% while the topper can score 95…”… I don’t know what happened to that poor guy (let us call him X to preserve anonymity) who was at the bottom of the class… what would his dad have told him?

He normally used to be around the 50-70 range (when normally the topper would be in the 90-100 range). It would have been difficult for him to have that quantum leap to catch up with the topper, unless he did some Business Process Reengineering… (but I guess he was too young for that kind of complex and abstract thoughts). So our X plods on through school barely managing to scrape into the next level, having developed a rhino hide from his dad’s charades rendering him impervious to the empty threats of his school teachers… while let us say I manage to put in that little extra effort (also called sacrifice) by squeezing time from my leisure activities into that bottomless pit called study time and somehow manage to close in on the topper by the time I finish school…

Now that hardwork really seemed to have paid off because I finished my engineering and am now a zombie software engineer earning enough money to give back to the government through the other routes of paying tax (after exhausting my income tax limit), with movie halls, restaurants, bike shops, music systems, cablewallas, booze and so on… the guy called X on the other hand, went to study in some college that not many had heard of and into a course that even fewer had heard of… he comes out and starts a creative agency, handling advertising and media planning for big corporates… intellectually challenged everyday as he has to have a plan to earn everyday, he is not a zombie, has better ways of staying energized and motivated than by just paying tax… and his paycheck is normally proportional to the amount of work he does. Now, there are a few zombies that are not completely zombified and so they tend to look at people like X and have mixed feelings – ranging from raving jealousy to unconditional sympathy depending if you are in the early stages of zombiehood or really advanced into it.

It is not just the money I am cribbing about here… it is something more. Let us say that there are people who enjoy what they are doing and people who don’t. It is not just about the money making part… it is something that they feel good that they are doing what they want to do, just because they want to do it.

It is a general observation that everyone is born with some sort of differentiating factor that is slightly more intangible than the finger-print-pattern or the dna. For a lack of better word let us call it “talent”… most people have the privilege of discovering it during their short lifetime, but a vast majority in this category tend to ignore it or play-down these urges to exhibit their natural skills… (now skills is a different meaning in which it can be acquired through years of practice, hence the word natural here). The tendency normally arises from what is normally the peer pressure or even sheer pressure… blame it on parents, teachers, society, friends, media, money, Gandhi, Hitler, tobacco, alcohol, GOD, destiny, Disney… wotever… the fact remains that playing it down has helped it become a vestigial organ like the appendix, which when can take it no longer causes the greatest pain when leaving you…

Sometime back I saw an ad with the caption “the doctor who killed the photographer”… just because the guy went on to become a doc by giving up on his passion for photography, it does not mean that he is a bad doc or a quack. He is a good one, but he probably lacks the zeal in his work… maybe he comes home irritated at having to do something that he does not want to do… or maybe he feels that he is not able to do something that he wants to do… or maybe just a little nagging thought that he keeps feeling that he would have been happier as a photographer…

There are a lot of success stories that I have seen among my friends… almost all that have come about with a great deal of sacrifice, with just a handful that took the path shown by their heart… there was this passionate cricket captain who could score centuries and bowl faster than anyone with deadly aim with dreams of making it to the Indian team… but he had to give it all up for a traditional parents wished engineering and MS abroad… then there is this athlete who wanted to make it to the Olympics, but was made to sit in the same year twice because his teacher felt he was not ready to move yet unless he focused on his studies too… then there was this guitar player who would call himself a rock-star… now everyone else calls him a doctor… then this singer, who is now a highly paid banker, just because her dad was one… then there was this guy amazing at dramatics, but who cares… he now sells soap and the only dramatics he can ever practice is to tell the ugly housewife, how much she would glow like aishwarya rai with a straight and honest face… not even the son of the engineering college director was spared of the software bug – he who could actually make ARR awe at the ability with which he could reproduce his magical music… and I can just go on… most of them in the software business as that is the booming sector for the Indian economy right now… maybe they are all true Indians, putting the nation before the self…

Not that all are sob stories… many of them are happy… though maybe it is an illusion created by their heartless brain that puts a monetary value to it all… quantifying the benefits… and then there were those that followed their brainless hearts (or were forced into following it because they didn’t have the necessary scores), into teaching, into movies, into some computer assembly business, creative art, starting an NGO, research (now this guy really had a talent for studying and he did it because he was passionate about it), law, sports commentary etc… and it can go on, but the list is very short… I don’t want to embarrass myself by letting it end abruptly…

Maybe I should have worked myself in the opposite direction to catch up with the guy at the bottom of the class… maybe I should have ignored my parent’s ambitions for me… maybe I should have stubbornly refused the amazing salary offered to me upon my graduation… but maybe I am not in a bad situation after all… the world probably needs my skills more than my talent… maybe my skills would give me a better standard of living that my talent can only give in my dreams… maybe my brain is right and my heart is being stupid…

The generalization here is not that mediocre performers normally end up being the greatest achievers… statistics do tend to prove that, and more and more such kind of misfits are proving the society wrong…if it hadn’t been for them we would not be having stuff from windows to relativity theories… there are some high achievers who do make it big… the point here is how many of these high achievers tend to fall prey to social pressures to do what others expect them to do or just follow the herd… they should realize that it pays to unbelong and these mavericks are the actual change makers…

To all who have missed the train of opportunity and are lost in the own quagmire of disappointment at what they have become… there maybe justifiable reasons to what has happened and probably have no regrets… maybe just that small itch that we can scratch away… or hire some one to scratch it away…

the sixth day

When I began my odyssey 6 days back, people told me I had lost it… “me of all the peoples wants to go on this regime??? that was crazy!!!”… I was asked not to take an emotional decision and urged to use my sense of reasoning – commonly called the sixth sense which is a USP of the humans… (it is because of this that we are so intellectually superior to animals… much ahead of our closest competitors with dolphins and chimps at positions 2 and 3. Have you ever seen a dolphin play NFS underground with even half the dexterity I display?)

And frankly after the first session I really did feel that way… never guessed I would survive to see this day. But I am alive and taking each day at the pre-dawn time.

Ok, to break the great suspense… I am off into a self generated fitness plan to build up my stamina… so am jogging early in the morning (thanks for the applause and I am deaf to sneers)… for this I have entered into strategic partnerships to make this plan a success. I have found a couple of guys who are more dedicated to the cause than I am, and would passionately wake up at 6 am everyday and go for it; so passionate that despite my early morning reluctance to leave my bed, they would still come back the next day… that is the secret of successful partnerships.

The coaxing out of bed was the toughest to start with. My heart with its stupid conscience telling me “you promised” and my evil mind talking me out of it “it is just verbal”… finally I did make the move and man was it cold. You cannot expect much warmth from the pre-dawn haze just on the horizon (never seen it for a long time, in fact I don’t remember seeing it). On the first day it was a modest beginning – just 3 rounds, almost breathless at the end, just about to drop dead. But pure grit brought me back to my room.

My body initially didn’t take it seriously (as most others). It probably assumed that I was trying to spend some excess steam or maybe just a one day misadventure. The next day when I managed to land at the jogging track again, the truth hit it bad and it didn’t take it well. My body used to being pampered with a diet that is filthy rich in cholesterol and the luxury of just lazing around at any time of the day without having to expend too much of the energy just could not accept this change of plan. Rebellion was in the air and in my calf muscles – I could not walk for the entire day without using my facial muscles every time a shockwave went up. But I managed to pull on and the next day I was back… though this time I really needed to be kicked out. I could hear my partners contemplating a cold water shower right above my head… and that sounded an alarm in my head to open my eyes.

Day 4 and day 5 went on just as the others, and things were settling into the normal routine – my jogging partner would come to my room and wake me up, I would reluctantly trudge along to the track, do about 5 rounds and be back in the room in 20 mins.

Day 6, was when I realized the pact that my body and mind had signed up for the betterment of both. I was up at 630 and realized that my partners in crime had not yet come. So I waited and decided to spring a surprise on them and got into my running shoes and waited… and it was a long wait…

For about 15 minutes I kept my excitement contained and waited… but still no sign of the others. So I trotted upstairs, half expecting that they have gone off earlier and I had not been able to hear their threats of cold water too… the dreadful thought seemed proved rite when I opened the door of their room and found only one bed occupied… I decided to sprint to the track, just to keep the routine unbroken… the sun was already spraying its hue on the horizon and I was getting paranoid and I felt heartbroken that it is already over… then I realized I was in the wrong room…

I went over to my partner’s and knocked… out comes my groggy partner and with a surprised look… REVENGE is SWEET…

PS. I can’t take too much happiness as my heart is beating too fast already. I am back to the old regime of my partner waking me up.

D:2

dhoom2

starring suzuki GSK-R1000K6, GSX-R600K6 and GSR600K6, great locales, great babes, putting-latest-bond-to-shame gadgetry, stupid police, muscular men, and of course abhishek, ash, bips, hrithik and that chopra dude whose dad made the movie...

movie tkt - 180 bucks
auto - 30 bucks
coffee - 36 bucks
bunking class and bird watching before and during the movie - priceless...

yup i am excited... it is that way when u expect something and the movie actually lives upto your expectations, however low they might be. this movie is probably the return of the adulthood for hrithik... he really looks as good as a sexy hunk should... damn sexy and smart... ash (if u watch closely) actually drools for him in a couple of scenes (it might be mistaken for wet look lipstick). he is that smart sophisticated intelligent muscular athletic thief who steals for the challenge of it and not for the money... yeah yeah so wot is different from D1's John Abraham... well nothing actually hrithik has great abs too... but then i don't like the john abraham... and hrithik dances well too...

abhishek bacchan is his usual grumpy exterior soft interior self... and his nagging wife is comfortably pregnant at home so that he can romance bips... even if it means only for half the movie... adn in the second half he tries to bash ash, but hrithik does not allow it coming to the defense of his girl... wait i am day-dreaming... sorry...

the chopra guy is his usual funny stuff... but this time he has a pistol in his hand... man that is dangerous... there was once a joke about what is dangerous and swings from tree to tree... it was a chimp with a machine gun... this guy handling pistols is not safe... he was shooting aimlessly... now bips was shooting too... and that is what i call a touch-a-woman-can-only-give kind... she shoots a design into the practice bullseye...that is sharpshooting...

coming to the girls, they both like dolls and think like it too... bips is reduced from a sexy looking police officer with a special talent for shooting great designs in dummies, to a bikini totting beach babe who falls for the chimp, oops sorry the chopra dude... and ash plays the negative role, where she doublecrosses and triplecrosses hrithik and finally succumbs in the end to love...

now the music score is awesome too... the screeeeeeeeeeeeeeamm of the bikes and the banging of the drums (seems like they copied from southie gana-song) is just too good... what with hrithik and ash and bips and the chimp dancing away - truly their hips don't lie... and man can hrithik dance - his solo parts are truly mind blowing...

starting from namibia deserts and shot in different scenic spots across the world like brazil and mumbai, the pic is a treat for the eyes... but the way they use these truly blows your mind off... the sands are used for surfing and the mountains for bungee jumping... and the last scene when hrithik's bike jumps to its watery grave (oops, but i hate tragedies and don't want people to see them too). There are amazing stunts here that would put bond to shame... and the disguises that they come in are also truly magnificent - i dint know that adults could disguise themselves as kids... now that calls form some serious make-up...

some of the bloopers i wish to turn a blind eye to are the silly looking stunts that are attempted hollywood style, but remain bollywood isshhtyil... and the absurd stupidity of the policemen... those are like really irritating... i do agree hrithik's disguises were too good, but his gadgets are there for everyone to see... and people don't even notice that whatever they were guarding is missing... the star studded cast had to have that many songs and they are all there complete with all the disco music adnd lights and dancing girls in shorty shorts and guys with sparkling hairgels... in fact the whole movie gave an impression of a 2 and half hour item number.

overall i just loved this movie... though it is a tragic end, it has a neat twist at the end... no, the bike is not saved sorry (what else do you think could be a bigger tragedy than a hayabusa plunging to its watery grave... there is no justice in this world)...

warning:
this is only a personal prejudiced opinion. for the true picture, i advice you watch the movie. i do recommend the red lounge. my friend complains of a stiff neck in the economy class because of the uncomfortable position in which he slept.

DHOOM MACHALE (once again, if possible at a cheaper rate)

irrational opulence

Recently I had been to Tiruppur – the knitting capital of India. It would be heartening and disheartening to note that the cloth and often the garment itself for major brands like reebok, nike, adidas and many many more have their origins here for a fraction of the price at which it is bought off the shelves. This town (yeah it is still a town), and its surrounding towns and villages have a predominant occupation as either the textile industry or farming.

I could not digest the information I gathered on this town, based on a lot of hearsay and eye-seens. The people here are hard core business men… the business is flourishing as this was an outsourced business long before the word outsourcing became a common household utterance in our country… some of the finest cotton yarn is produced here and the worldwide brands pay a premium for these yarns and the cloth manufactured… actually the only contribution from these brands is the brand name… so truly a brand is a brand is a brand…

The people make huge profits and own big houses whenever there is a windfall of profits, but in case there is a bad luck and one consignment of the company results in a loss then the very same guys are reduced to poverty – but without loss in spirit. Earlier he might have been traveling in a merc E-class and now maybe a tvs-50 (yeah these mopeds are still sold here alongside the 100 color option scooty peps…) but he still travels…

On the flip side, the city is totally polluted and the ground water is colored from all the dyes. Traffic is bad on these roads with smoking trucks and buses plying these roads with overloaded cargoes of those expensive brands. The basic necessities are either expensive for those who can afford it or carcinogenic for those who cannot.

It is funny that such a rich town is so undeveloped in terms of attitude. This town has had a favorable economy for decades as Indian cotton and yarn is supposed to be of the best quality. At this kind of money exchanged, the town should have become a huge financial capital of Tamilnadu eating up Chennai in fame… really what is there in Chennai except for the government? This is maybe one of the richest zones of Tamilnadu but the people here have not come out of their cocoons…

The city still has open drains and many houses still manure their farms directly… they use tractors and heavy farm equipment, but still spend very little for their own travel convenience. The transports used mostly are 30-40 year old breaking down trucks and buses spewing smoke all over the roads… sometimes it makes me wonder if the black roads are actually due to the tar or the smoke settled over the ages… I really could not believe my ears when people said that the premium and pure petrol actually screwed up the engines and reduced the life of the vehicles.

The people who drive the vehicles are excited to own the steering wheel for the moment… in spite of the reality that they don’t have a valid license to drive, let alone kill, they own the roads and consider it a sin to adhere to the speed limits, or even twice that. One-way signs if at all they still exist are ignored and the roads are just barely wide enough to support traffic on opposite directions to cross each other and most often the outside of the vehicle is out of the asphalt… many of them don’t even have the asphalt and use the swampy mud that soaks up the rain water and moves deeper into the earth… the roads are often neglected and there are potholes at blindspots on the long but unnecessarily winding stretches…but still these are the roads that has produced the heritage of the Narain Karthikeyan… not the straight broad stretch called the “Mount road of Chennai”.

The kind of facilities that are normally accepted with even half this kind of wealth is conspicuously missing… I cannot find any coffee-days or shopping malls, the theaters are the old weather beaten moth eaten proud 70MMs… the food in the restaurants are good, though the hygiene factor is nowhere to be seen. If anybody has been following the personal hygiene rules taught in primary school, they would give out twice of whatever they have eaten. The romantic-time-spending-under-soft-lights fancy restaurants are missing… however the normal restaurants pamper you with whatever food they have… the reason usually being the importance attached to food rather than the customer-is-king concept.

Even though these extravagances are missing, the extravagance is not totally missing. People own mercs, lexuses and land cruisers. To quote my close friend from a nearby town – there were only 3 mercs at the time of their introduction in India – one owned by some business tycoon in the north (probably the ambanis, I don’t remember) and 2 in his town!!! Similarly after the major metros, the famous international standards icici bank opened a branch in this area even before visiting many major cities. People do get those jazzy bikes and cars and trucks… but you can still find that this has affected only a very small part of the population. The majority still relies on the bullet for the mirazdars and the tvs-50s and the bajaj m80s for the middle class transport.

Gold is something that the people here are usually decked in after their dazzling silk and polyester saris and dhotis. Of course the fact that Indians still revere gold above their husbands may be one of the principle reasons for their spending in gold. But the opulence is displayed only in the metal and the material and not in the quality. I doubt that anil ambani or azim premji would invite any of these business families to their dinner parties even if these businesses were richer than them – actually it could be true, the richer than the popular business houses part, that is.

Despite so many popular engineering colleges around the towns, they still lack the basic primary education infrastructure… and some industries do proudly sport the board “No Child Labor” (yeah right it is only some). The broadbands and the internet is still beyond the reach of even those who can afford and appreciate them… oops did I jump the gun, before talking about the black and green screen boxes also known as computers… some houses use perfect lan-cords with brand new connectors to hang clothes to dry… communication still usually happens through the government post offices and at the other end of the spectrum the all pervading cellular networks. No, no GPRS and stuff… just plain voice mail…

I am not cribbing about the lack of infrastructure at this place. Nor am I saying that the bigger cities that have adopted the western culture are better off just because they satisfy some of the above requirements. What surprises me is the attitude of the people here. They are earners and not spenders. Whatever they spend on is usually not the priority number 1 of the city dwelling people of similar income levels.

This town is a classic case of money can’t buy everything. For everything else they still don’t accept mastercard.

Finding the right call

Get up at 530 am… not that we had slept well the night before… the time was mainly spent cramming some facts… and mostly studying the fin theory… it is time to move now… the huge waiting room is calling… it is a mad rush to beat the crowd at the common bathrooms… shaving hurriedly and finishing off the other chores… dressing up in the best possible clothes… deos, perfumes, moisturizers and hair gels and what not…

Reach the venue at 630 well a little later actually but in time to wait… we find that some of the comfy corners are already gone… taken by early risers and enterprising people who had the foresight to see what was coming… small sacrifice to beat the long waiting times… good thinking…

Somehow I find a place near a friend who does not normally say no and shamelessly sit in the chair next to him and plug into the network and power sockets… and begin the endless wait for my name to be called… it is not an unknown waiting time wait… I know that my turn will not come for some time… but it is agony waiting like this…

One by one my friends move out of the room when their name is called and come back smiling… they also have finished the race even before it even began for me… frustrating… I look at the watch… oh man it can’t be… just half an hour… I have been waiting for only half an hour… and already I find a battalion moving out of the race… so what if they are people who are not in the same league as you… so what if you knew that your turn will anyways come only later… but the subconscious frustration starts getting on your nerves… another 1 hour later the watch has only moved another 15 minutes…

Then one by one, your group’s turn comes… but still there is a guy called Murphy blocking your way… you are probably the last one… the queue moves painfully slow… this time you actually wait a real 2 hours before the name is called… and you meet your nemesis…

The formidable force meets the unprepared fear… the duel lasts for a torturous time… you don’t know whether you are at an advantage or not… no clear strategy no game plan… and nowhere to run and nowhere to hide… you just parry the blows as and when they are showered upon you… you make an occasional feeble attack but then mostly it is a defensive… then you are returned, an exhausted and tired warrior, breathlessly recounting the nightmarish experience to the next gladiator about to enter the circus…

Now the wait is even more agonizing… I don’t know whether there is another fight scheduled or when I would meet my doom… you don’t know how much longer… I just wait… a couple of more fights and I let caution to the winds… I don’t care what happens or how I fight, my only aim is to get out of the fight alive… no strategy seems to be working and I am just glad to walk out alive…

Then there is the long period of lull… you cannot move out of the race… and there are other warriors to give you company… but then you grow impatient at being unoccupied… there is still another half day to pass… and you know that you have signed up for no more encounters unlike many who just about are participating in all the jousts… but still you find the wait irritating… you cannot quit the race yet, unless the results are declared officially after the dope tests etc… but that is actually the work of Mr. Murphy again… he is holding up the declaration of independence for some silly reason like proof reading…

Finally, I can hear my name being called as the winner of some tournament… I cannot recall the events, so don’t ask me for the strategy I adopted… I don’t have any… and I am in the full mood to quit the race then and there… but then I want that one fight that would actually give me glory… you may call that committing suicide, but I would say that I am human too and want to have my shot at fame…

PS. But somehow better sense and Murphy prevailed and I did not waste my energy fighting another losing battle. I quit early the second day.

PPS. For those who did not understand what the above post means, I am sorry you have missed one of the greatest b-school life's experiences.

Lage rahoji…

Another +ve point about missing the train… a great movie… and what is to be appreciated is the originality of the script (it is claimed to be original and I have accepted it at face value).

Circuit and Lucky (arshad warsi and boman irani) two real good characters in the movie… impossible timing and till the end… VVC begins the movie well and ends it well and in between throughout it is in the same well… Amazing humor sustained throughout the movie and the senti scenes actually bring tears to your eyes… though a bit exaggerated as in the whole of Mumbai crying and all that stuff… Arshad warsi’s drunken expressions and the dry humor can never be replicated anywhere else… and Boman is the man – right from his punju ringtones to his photographic passion…

Vidya Balan is a gorgeous fresh face, brings in that homely and modern blend that most guys today crave for… funny she is not on many desktops and screensavers yet… but as she claims, maybe people do think she would be out of reach even on their screens. But credit given for the choice of the actress, though she does nothing much but form the main cause of the movie…

Sanjay Dutt is unbelievable in his role and it is quite difficult to replace him from that position… if this movie is gonna be repeated the prequel way and made into a multitude of indian languages with the regional actors, they may as well do justice by putting in a little effort in identifying the fit…

A full time time pass with a great message – don’t study too much and don’t put too much night outs… I don’t actually want some dead guy influencing my life… what happens if you are stuck like the guy with the beautiful mind but actually have lost it… anyways it was so convincing that Gandhi almost seemed to move into my good books… but that is another story…

On a scale of 1 to 5, I rate it a 7… it is too good and certainly worth the money… just can’t wait for the vcd/dvd release…

It is a full time lage raho with the movie…

Vettaiyadu…

Finally I guess tamil cinema moves into the shoes of bollywood shooting a major part of the movie in the US of A… but apart from this if at all a fault, the movie is an amazing amalgamation of music, songs and editing… throw in the right cast then you get a super duper block buster…

From the first scene the pace is extremely fast and you get to adjust your sitting posture only during the interval… even then you are cursing the break… kamal plays the role of the super cop with ease… the package is perfect… he is the right portrayal of an experienced confident intelligent super cool cop…

The plot is good, though could have been lifted from any bloody crime novel, and what actually helps it is the delivery… the shots are very fast and the camera does not delve on irrelevant details like the scenery and the buildings… even though it is New York I don’t remember seeing any important locales… even Jyotika somehow seems to blend in instead of acting as a separate mandatory but useless fixture…

The 2 villain boys are great too, playing the psychotic duo with casual panache… cold blood personified… but they are still kids… the precision with which they go about their revenges, even the minor ones, is spine chilling… and the best part is that no reason is given for this hobby of theirs… they just want to kill… scary thoughts…

Kaakka Kaakka and now Vettaiyadu Vilaiyadu makes me jealous of police officers… I want to become an IPS officer whenever I see this movie (funny I never wanted to be a superhero though I did watch krissh and superman…) they seem to have all the fun bashing gangsters and shooting them down… and the respect they generate from the people around them… the aura that surrounds them …

I think my sister made the right decision by watching it twice… a great positively silver lining in the grey cloud… really made us feel better for missing the train…

PS. When you want to say something nice about something the words are so less, whereas when there is something nasty, there is a flood of adjectives.

Picnic @ Andheri

I have a new found hobby… watching local trains while eating burgers. I will tell u how to have a great picnic in pursuing this interesting past time… and it really helps as a stress reliever especially after a grueling placement session and you are in the mood to make a hurried rush home to get back that lost energy…

First choose the right city… it has to be a great city like Mumbai where you have a lot of narrow roads to convert into one ways for the light vehicles like autos and bikes, but you can let the buses pass through them… make sure that all these roads are generously sprinkled with potholes… ideal setting is heavy rains and all the potholes filled with slush and other yuck… but a post rain road will also do…

And the station should be miles away like Dadar for example and you should be catching the local at a place like the Andheri station… and since you are not willing to waste 4 hours traveling in the comfort of the cab, you leave enough time to catch the train to your home; say about 1 hour… hostel to local train station should take about 20minutes, and from their to the outbound trains station some 20 minutes… so we actually have a contingency planning for about 20minutes when you leave with the luxury of 1 hour ahead of the departure time…

Make sure you have some loose cash… this helps make some rash decisions… like jumping out of the rick hoping that your other ticket mates would be in a position to carry the luggage… it also helps to follow blind and stupid instructions like buying the dinner while waiting for the rest of the ticket’s shareholders to arrive… also helps to find a “very” helpful water conserving vada pav vendor to help wash the slush on the trousers…

Another helpful factor is to carry a lot of luggage… and also heavy ones at that… this helps in generating that appetite for the dinner bought in the previous paragraph, by lugging it up and down the foot over-bridges and dodging hurdles like mindless people who pop out of nowhere like in a video game… unfortunately you don’t have the laser ray gun to vaporize them… and they don’t just stop with an “ow”… a great speech follows…

Once you reach the platform on which you hope to board the train, stand at the place where there is the maximum probability of either first class coaches or the ladies only coaches come to a stop… actually this is not too much of a problem, because it is statistically proven by a great visionary called Murphy that it is going to happen that way wherever we stand… though I would like to assume that god loves me and wants me to travel either first class or with all those lovely ladies, I am not willing to take that risk and trust someone I have not seen all my life… to me Murphy is the known devil and god the unknown angel…

All said and done, you should find a place to sit… so wait until the crowd clears and empties itself into the local train… now you will find a good clean stone bench to sit on the platform… but the reaction should be fast and you must plonk onto it fast before the next batch of the crowd for the next train comes in…

So, now that you have got yourself a nice cozy location at the local station from where you can watch trains come in and go out, pile up the luggage in front of you and start eating the burgers (you have done the cost benefit analysis and found that by the time you reach Dadar, the train would have left anyway)… it is an amazing and exhilarating feeling – eating burgers with a lot of ketchup while the train towards your home is chugging along on its journey without you some 20 minutes away… you feel real light hearted because you are doing something really worthwhile instead of traveling home… and you actually observe the crowd thinning out in the subsequent trains (after your home train’s departure time).

PS. Some hypocrites may actually call this bad time management… but that is not true… we only say they don’t stop to appreciate the little pleasures of life…

The Art of Laziness

What the hell happened to me over the last few days that I never even logged into blogger? I will attribute it to blogger block… or the fact that I could find excuses to not write… I just wanted to do nothing… just lie around in bed and watch movies… when hungry order food… then continue watching movies… you understand that you don’t even have to move the fingers to type…

I would not call myself lazy… I will just call it extremely optimized mobility… I won’t move unless absolutely necessary… I will not move any part of my body unless absolutely necessary… for example if I am in a position where my eyes are watching my laptop, I would not move my head to talk to my neighbor sitting about a foot away from me… no I will chat… because I use only those muscles in my body that are already in the inertia of motion… the rest are in the inertia of rest… why expend energy unnecessarily…

Laziness as everyone calls it and EOM (Extremely Optimized Motion) as I call it, is a virtue… everyone should adopt it… it saves a lot of time and brings in great efficiency… Let me try to make some points here so that everyone can understand…

I don’t do more work than absolutely necessary… breeds mediocrity is the general verdict… no it does not according to the theory of EOM, you don’t want to do more than absolutely necessary… that includes avoiding rework… now any smart EOM guy would do the cost benefit analysis and realize that a little bit of extra effort today in doing that small piece of extra work saves a mighty huge load of effort in terms of harder rework… got it – a defect free delivery and great initiative in going beyond the specs (actually the specs were written by a lazy bum who left out this part where my initiative came in)

Sometimes I don’t speak out/up/to/beyond/on/etc just because I don’t want to open my mouth muscles and exercise my tongue muscles… I just listen… and man do people appreciate a good listener…

I go to classes early in the morning only because I have breakfast… you see the clever way in which I try to achieve optimized motion techniques to get 2-3 things done with one action… the prof is happy to see a sincere guy attending his classes… I am happy that I get to have my breakfast… a win-win situation for all.

I very rarely go out of my house… “great outdoors enjoy the fresh air”, everyone says… “you can’t even run this errand for me on your bike?” , says my mom… but don’t they realize all that petrol I am saving by not running my bike for simple errands…

Well coming back to the bloggers block, I attribute it to my EOM… I found a trigger on Friday… until then I thought a great thought leader needs to rest his most overused muscles sometimes…

Serendipity or Stupidity...

Before you start thinking I am gonna bash another movie again, I am sorry to disappoint you guys… I had watched the tamil remake of it too “JayJay” the only difference with the $5 bill replaced by a 100 rupee note and the flights with the Indian railways. I really liked that movie and it was a nice feel good movie which made me feel good… despite its predictability…

My discussion here is about fate… or rather the belief in it… or even better my disbelief in it.

For a background of the movie, it is about a guy and a girl who accidentally meet by some coincidence at the same point in space and time. And they spend the evening together enjoying each others company until things begin to get nasty. The girl, who believes in karma, (i.e., you will get whatever is predestined and all that crap), leaves him without her contact even though she likes him and the guy has been courageous or shameless enough to confess his liking for her. But they start a game, a dangerous one, leaving their fate in the hands of fate (somebody whom they don’t even know), hoping that someday each one would find the other person’s artifact and also actually get in touch.

Now though it appears to be a beautiful romantic adventurous thriller, it failed to appeal to me in that genre. I am an MBA and I do possess a very high self esteem quotient. I believe I control my destiny to a very large extent at least. And I live in the present never trusting the future… something called hedging I guess (if I am wrong, srk please correct me in private, not in the comments). So the best thing that they could have done was to spend the rest of their lives together from that moment on…

I don’t see any logic behind it but rather I see it as a shirking of a decision making responsibility… if by luck we are forced to meet again, then let us get married and let us call it a bad luck later. This technique is also called “passing the blame” and here “lady luck” will not talk back rite…

In today’s competitive environment I apply to some 20 companies for a job, even though my placement cell assures me of one. Now for a life partner, would I not attempt to apply to some 3-4 at least? Just think of the pure wastage of money – how many 100 rupee notes can I give away? I would rather spend 6 times that amount on two slices of cake for dessert in JW Marriott at midnight with the girl… where is the ROI immediate guys… I am not a VC and don’t intend becoming one to write off such wasteful investments.

A long time ago, when my dad wanted to cure me of my laziness, he used to say “God helps those who help themselves”. From that day on I stopped trusting God; I only expect help from humans, most often my mom. But here it really makes a significance. After a lot of years (though the movie says “few” years only) of seeing regular signs from the almighty, the 2 characters start realizing that they should have accepted the PPO than wait for the finals, as the profile was much better there (sorry for the jargon guys, but it is autumns time). So during those 2 days when they start the search, they both get the artifacts delivered into their hands at almost the same time. And they do some how manage to get in touch and finally live happily ever after… I looove happy endings…

But what really pisses me off – wastage… those years of wasted companionship… the wastage of another girl’s life and dreams when her wedding is called off… the wastage of another guy’s romance… the unnecessary violet suit that cost 700 dollars… the 95 dollar hideous looking purple tie…

So the next time u think of living by fate think again… it is ok to wait for someone whom you know will come for you, but it is stupid to rely only gut feel demand forecasting. It is better to take a wrong decision and make a mistake than be too stupid.

The love that broke all relationships…

And all the barriers to tears and laughter and all that mixed emotions let loose sitting right under the noses of those larger than life images er umm I mean characters… KANK (Kabhi Alvida Naa Kahna) was an absolute family entertainer… especially the kid with the violin brought back memories of a similar barrier breaking movie a few years back, amazingly with almost the same lead characters and one guest actor from today’s movie… yes of course there were wonderful guest actors in today’s grand party thrown by BigB.

Mentioning BigB – he rocked as always… and he was the “baap of chota bachan in all aspects”… smart, stylish, suave, sensible, sexy, seductive, and superb (fits the mckinsey 7S framework well) and and he really lived his part… and died it too… though for what bloody reason, I have no clue…

SRK does his usual role of a sad doleful faced acting which is turning into a common mimicry dialogues that any tom, dick or harry is doing these days. Preity Zinta tries to appear sexy, but she can do little to fight a losing battle with old age, maybe a little less hair color would suit her better, unless she is hoping for a role in “Legally Blonde-3” (I heard they were going to stick to the truly implied meaning of words this time”). Rani is good especially in that multicolored song that they do, but then I always had a soft corner for her. Chota Bachan needs a shave and a bit of slimming down, or probably it is the sadness in his life that has given him a sleepless bloated faced look… whatever be the case, next to BigB, he seems to be unattractive. Kajol and John Abraham did a great and important role… it was nice to see kajol keeping her eyesight and also her beauty… no comments on John’s musical know how required for DJ-ing.

The movie is an absolutely great value for money – for just 50 bucks I got to sit in an A/c theater for nearly 4hours and the closest to the stars than anybody else, with the maximum leg room. (Had a little neck pain and back strain, but those are small issues.) Had the right moments to stimulate your tear glands (but not before exercising those 15 facial muscles while laughing)… and they summarize the movie at important points to help you remember and even provide an executive summary in the beginning. I was thoroughly happy with the ending (or probably when it ended, can’t be sure).

A very well recommended family entertainer, though the families in the movie are rarely in the “entertained frame of mind”… but the ending is a happy one, and I looovee happy endings… absolutely touching piece of work. Highly recommended for a stressed out MBA breadwinner, coming home to a nagging wife and kid who constantly pester him for a family outing to the theater – it may provide you a permanent solution with just one stroke.

Over a cuppa chai…

During my engineering days we called it “maangaa” sessions (in tamil slang) or “laccha” or "guppe maarna" (in the general college lingo)… those were trivial pursuits done in unknown innocence… these days we call it “intellectually stimulating discussions”… how is that for the mba touch…

It all begins when at least one of the "thinkers" feels some kind of emotion – ranging from being down in the dumps or to the perfect ecstasy – in other words, any which way, who cares. It is almost always late night, but it can occur during the day too, provided rule 1 above applies. We just need a trigger and we somehow always find it.

What do these discussions contain? It is done generally as a feel good discussion where we discuss anything and everything ranging from politics to your roomies stinking underwear.

This is the place where we criticize AB for his expressionless acting talent. Here is where we criticize the guy who said “yaar, AB mein thoda talent tho hai”…

Here is where we criticize the subjects that we are forced study to despite their irrelevance… and here is where we criticize the prof when the subject is chosen by us…

Here is where we criticize the marking and grading system of the college… and here is where we criticize the management for not coming up with some form of evaluation that is overall fair and beneficial to all…

Here is where we discuss sensitive issues that are plaguing the Indian government like lack of education and the deprived mass… here is where we crib about our spacious and snug flats and crib how boring it is to study…

Here is where we talk about making drugs and alcohol legal… and here is where we talk about the benefits of making it into a slab based tax structure scheme based on the weight by volume ratio of alcohol in the drink to increase sales and capture market share…

Here is where we discuss about our placements and our dream companies… and here is where we criticize the ppt of the very same company for its lack of life and enthusiasm…

We criticize others and add points to our superiority score tally. We criticize the system and add more points. We criticize the system and others who follow the system and add more points. Finally we criticize the others who don’t follow the system and add still more points to the brimming tally. Here is where we draw energy from each others low stock and amplify it with each passing second. Here is where we revel in the fact that we are too proud to be proved wrong and how the others can never match in this level of intellectual maturity… and here is where revelations like “my mediocrity is definitely less mediocre than the mediocrity of others” happen…

Amazing thing I would miss when I leave this place – the intellectual cuppa chai… our intellectual stimulant.

Presentations and the paucity of time

Presentations are one of the most abused forms of evaluation in a mba program… whatever happens we are to give a presentation… and what a presentation in total contrast to the “communication skills” one that we made in the foundation course – all with jazzy animated gaudy pictures text and graphs (Disney would outsource its next movie to us…)

I am a scaredy-cat when it comes to public speaking… general gyaan is a different matter – I can give a discourse on my beliefs and the futility of the human existence in a materialistic world, but mugging up a bunch of facts about some company set eons ago in the early 80s or 90s from some 20 page case… and giving gyaan after the insufficient analysis. What are we? Magicians turned consultants? Giving direction to the company on what it should do after reading about it for the first time the previous night? And the prof sitting out there who would have been giving the same case generation after generation and have gained enough knowledge to ask questions that would stump even the master gassers…

All the above factors always work against me during presentations… whatever little confidence I used to self generate by looking at the ppt would dissipate when I find my groupies rehearsing… well I never believe in mugging up “good morning ladies and gentlemen… thank you for providing this wonderful opportunity for me to show you how I can put my foot in my mouth…”. I always was confident about speaking impromptu than I was about rehearsing because I at least had the excuse that I didn’t rehearse and I got intimidated by the crowd…

What is worse is the situation where in you are expected to wait like a sacrificial lamb till your number is being called in a random fashion. You know that you are gonna get screwed but don’t know when… and the longer he takes to call out your number the bigger the butterflies become – you know the ones in your stomach… they suddenly start feeling like dinosaurs and having dinosaurs in your stomach is not a very comfortable feeling. The slow fear avalanches into a trepidation and then makes you jump at any small twitch from the prof…

It all begins when the unprepared feeling kicks in at 3am the previous night… now you are so sleepy that your eyes remain firmly closed and have switched off all the character scanners… but your mind has that guilt alarm that says “boss it is ok if you sink alone, but today you are going to pull others in your group with you…”. That starts the dilemma – my bullet ridden body wants to sleep and my guilt ridden brain does not. A very disturbed sleep with bad dreams of daggers and blood and white tunics my eyes open to realize that the dagger was actually my roomie’s finger jabbing me. I hurriedly go about putting on formals after a hurried bath (both of which I hate) and stuff the tie into my bag and rush to the great dome triumphant at having accomplished the impossible – being there 5 minutes early before my group. I have missed my breakfast but so what? That shows my dedication doesn’t it?

Slowly my group filters in muttering their speech under their breath. First impact on unpreparedness. Then the CA in our group asks us “have you guys read the financial implication of the 600,000 we put in the lean management for increasing our throughput time”. Externally I remain silent like the rest of them, but inside I have my second impact – what if the prof asks me that question instead of the rest of the group, and what exactly was lean management? …throughput? …increasing ?

I open my laptop to go through the manual again, but the prof asks us to shut it and the show begins. Luckily we are not the first group and I seem to have time to find out what exactly was lean management and the rest of the question. But now during the presentation I cannot open my laptop… so I surreptitiously open it up under the table and I hear some tearing sound – I pray that it is not my LCD screen doing the honors. Somehow I manage to locate the manual, my face glowing like a beauty soap model in the light of the laptop screen. But I also read more unfamiliar symbols in the manual. I ask my groupie sitting beside me what they meant and he said something that sounded like greek and latin…

By now I am petrified as the probability of our group being next is increased (as the denominator is one down). And the prof calls the other group in our industry – am I to breathe a sigh of relief or should I fear the next new symbol that I am about to discover. But my CA now borrows my laptop for a quick glance, and I am forced to look at the action happening in the center of the room. I find some of my brave comrades being barraged under the machine gun fire of questions and fault finding under the effect of which the prof was just orgasmic… and after the brave soldiers were buried by their own countrymen (well who do you think asked those questions?) the prof dug up their graves to put them in deeper by pointing out presentation errors.

The butterflies were growing into the size of small birds now and I notice some really obvious errors in our presentations. Of course not my part, but my part was anyways strung with loads of gas and he might ask anyone to present in any order at any point in the presentation. We are not next nor the next. But the gunfire continues and my stomach is now host to a t-rex (and maybe more dinos) stomping in rhythm to my heart beat then ripples through my skin…

And finally the time comes, I am called in to do the most dreaded area of the presentation that I had no idea whatsoever (didn’t have time to ask our CA). And I go onto the center, a deafening silence surrounds me. I start speaking, the source of the words unknown, the meaning of the words unknown; in fact I can’t even hear what I am saying above the buzz of silence in my ears. Somehow I mechanically move to the laptop and press enter to move to the next slide. Then I hear the verdict that my turn is done and the other person substitute. I walk back in the same stupor that I was while in the center. My group finishes and the firing squad takes its shot. And then the prof puts our final writings on our tombstone and we are done. We go back to where we were seated, a huge sigh of relief washes away the t-rex and the other dinos. As the desk thumping fades, a fatigued relief washes over me and I just want to curl up under my blanket. We congratulate each other over the narrow escape that we have had and cross our fingers for a non-bottom of the pyramid score.

I go to my hostel to prepare for the other presentation in outsourcing that I have the next day. I go through the same dilemma and have a troubled sleep. But this time I dream about a freefall into darkness. I wake up to realize that there are only 15mins. I rush through my formals and into the classroom to see my group setting up the presentation; we were the first this time. They heave a sigh of relief on seeing me, as if I am the messiah; little do they know. My turn comes in pretty fast and I go ahead, gas away to glory and end the presentation. Desk thumping follows, and a couple of questions and some professorial criticisms later, I am back in my seat, indifference personified, eyes on my laptop screen, hands on the arrow keys, mind on winning the 7 lap race – deaf ears to what the others are presenting and the profs caustic comments.

What was the difference between the first and the second day – no time and so no evolution from butterflies to dinosaurs and hence no fatigue.

Happy Birthday

they said… "Hypocrites", I say…

Well how can one be happy when his butt is stinging and he cannot sit anywhere, with loads of yolk running over his hair (I have heard of egg in shampoo, but this is not to my liking) and cold water running along your back…

Yes… my birthday was on the 27th of this month… well actually it should have been 26th, but due to our highly efficient data recording services, my birthday was decided by the government of India as the 27th. (But my governing planets and lucky numbers and gemstones are those of 26th and that is another sob story.) Has that changed the world’s perception about me… I am not a great soul for whom the stars shone down on the birth night… nor was I born with some number tattooed on my head… I was not a Siamese twin… I was not one of the bi-quadruplets of genetic multiples… I was not born during a tsunami or a flood or under any major natural disaster and survived it… nor was I born under some great time of the economic boom and prosperity… I was a simple normal usual healthy child. So what is the point of celebrating my birthday or rather what is wrong with not celebrating my birthday?

I have outgrown my fascination for cutting cakes and having parties ever since I was 5 and learnt that I could say no without getting punished. What exactly is the point of paying some 200 bucks for a pineapple cake that was just eaten in those days and today just smeared around… cannot people just go about and buy a slice of cake whenever they wanted it? They would just spend a fraction of the money they spent for that worthless present… Or littering the house with all that confetti and burst balloons… that is something I felt sorry for the person who usually cleaned up – usually my mom… and since it was my mom, I was obliged to indulge in the hard work too…

What is so great about remembering birthdays… it only represents ominous hypocrisy to me… it reminds you that you are one year older and one step closer to the end of your life… it reminds you of those kiddish joys that you enjoyed doing which you have to now stop doing because you have “mentally matured”… you are supposed to shoulder some responsibility, something that people would never trust you with when you ask to be trusted… it brings an empty hollow wish from some people who never even acknowledge your presence on most days… it puts your best friends at a discomfort for they have to behave differently during those few minutes in which you gain the importance – a glaring difference from being taken for granted to being treated special… it puts you at a major discomfort when asked for a treat and you think of the shock your dad is going to have when he sees your credit card bill… so what is good about birthdays…

Let alone my birthday… what is wrong with forgetting other’s birthdays… every year I forget some birthdays, and some I do remember… it is not that I cannot recall my mom’s date of birth… it is just that on that particular day I forget to wish her… does that mean that I love my mom less… or does it mean that all the love I show for her is a lie all because I forgot to wish her on the birthday? I have forgotten the birthdays of some of my closest friends… I have lots of friends, who are really great friends, but forgot my birthday… now are they my enemies? And those friends who kicked me after that treat – well with friends like these who needs enemies?

Should anyone remember my birthday? I ask why? I am not a great freedom fighter nor have I done some great deed during some big disaster… I don’t want that kind of fame either and most of the birthdays that are remembered are for exaggerated deeds – October2, September5… no one remembers small accomplishments (I don’t think we celebrate Narayanmurthy’s or Azim Premji’s or Lakshmi Mittal’s birthdays on a national scale).

So how do I like my birthday being celebrated? During my engineering college I was thankful that I was born on this day as it usually fell during the vacations… there was no mercy shown… and the more popular you were the greater was the “attention” "showered" on you… somehow after managing to escape the wham-bam logic in engineering I landed up in a great big company that claimed that it loved its employees… what they actually had done was gotten the receptionist’s mail id configured to some cheap birthday reminder service and allocated a budget for some pineapple cake… so every day there would be some pineapple cake for the cafeteria guys to clean up and the rest of the year that employee would be treated like horse shit (not cow shit as that is sometimes considered useful)… after all this ways of celebrated birthdays, I just want the anonymity of 364 days to remain on this particular day too (as it is too much to ask for the same attention for all 365 - too much pineapple cake)…

Last year nature was kind to me, though I am sorry for all those it has been unkind to… People were so preoccupied that they were able to forget poor lucky me… But during this year it was not to be… nature forgot her deadline and even though there was something to keep them occupied, my friends remembered it and they said better late than never… though there were some good things that happened to stop it like power cuts and a delayed return from a movie, it was still not forgotten… my birthday "bash" happened at 2am on the 28th… 2 days after I was actually born, and after 26 hours of delayed honor… I was suspended by some arms and then there was this funny feeling of levitation after a few whams… it went on like this – a hazy looking leg shooting up and WHAM… lost count after that floating feeling and finally when I was let off, I was feeling as if I had been stealing in the arab countries and been whipped and flogged in public… luckily due to the early morning time, all the eggs were locked up…

It was not over… I was asked to cut a cake – a thick chocolaty one – but that was not to be eaten, at least by me… I was smeared head to foot with chocolate… I have heard of sexy relaxing chocolate baths that were in vogue today… but in no way was this one sexy or fashionable…

Thanks guys for breaking me into the tradition… and thanks for the birthday that I will probably remember for time to come…


PS. Sorry SRK for plagiarizing the title… the least I could do to repay a debt…

free speech for the dumb

This is not a post on the freedom of speech in India… but a feeling expressed by “dumb” as in “those who don’t speak out/up” people like me… those who found a way to express their thoughts and feelings through another medium… those peace-loving citizens who found a way of raising social issues without kindling a revolt… one of those bloody bloggers…

A couple of days after the Mumbai blasts I had put up something and wanted some close friends to read it (yes, it was a mutual agreement – u read my blog and I will read yours). But then I got some complaints that it is not accessible… I thought it was a problem as usual with our network that had a infinite number of problem points and asked them to keep trying silently cursing the poor committee in-charge of it. But even after about 24hrs when nobody claimed responsibility (a “we donno” mail which was usually sent by the committee was missing too…) it started worrying me… I started sending out test cases to my friends across the globe… result I found was that it was blocked only in India and only this domain… a little bit of research and some confirmed rumors helped me understand the reality – the DoT of India had exorcised its rights… to block the domains… and in turn the freedom of speech and expression…

Me and a few of my scratch-each-others-backs friends were thoroughly disappointed – we had just begun our writing careers… we wanted to bring in more itchy-scratchy friends… we had begun a new initiative at SPAMming and had many plans for the blogs in the future… all would go unnoticed as our friends in India (a little arm twisting made them our best friends and regular readers) would not be able to read it… Of course the DoT didn’t realize that we could still post but only the viewing was blocked… that brings us to the next paragraph…

Now this word dumb can be used in another context as well… the dictionary says it also means lacking intellectual acuity… now is that the word I should use for the IT law enforcers in the country ? A country which has suddenly shot into the limelight because of the numerous IT companies that have sprung up… a country that prides itself that a major chunk of its GDP comes from IT exports… a country that prides itself on its intellectual capital based on which it has built its IT outsourcing concept… a country that boasts of the IT infrastructure setup by the many service providers… a country whose IT law enforcers lack the acuity to discern the perpetrators of the IT crime and the innocent… a country whose IT law enforcers lack the common sense on how to punish the cyber criminals…

A few days back in Tamilnadu (and a few other states too probably) a huge quantity of pirated stuff in the form of CDs were seized and an elephant was made to walk over the pile… I fail to understand the elephant part… is it to prove that lord Ganesha in the form of the elephant disapproves piracy and we should take it as a will of god to buy the original stuff ? what do we do for Christians? nail all the CDs on a cross? And about Muslims? I seriously can’t think of any punishment there… or maybe I am wrong about the religious bent to it… maybe it was because the then chief minister could not herself walk over the pile and she sent a “representative” instead… but the big Q – was piracy stopped? It has returned in quite a short while…

I read a news report (can’t exactly remember the source), but it goes something like this… there is some guy who had some objectionable material probably porn, (I don’t think anybody would be stupid enough to have defense secrets on his comp for so long as the police to arrive… well come on guys, as soon as he gets the blueprints probably they are gone onsite already and his swiss account is already credited unless he is on a monthly payroll)… coming back to the case, the police when they sniffed out this guy, they immediately launched an offensive and seized his monitors (and left his cpu and hard disks)… man that really crippled the “criminal”… well that reminds me of a surd joke, but let us not get into the details, I have more to write…

Or how about this recent case of baazee when the CEO was arrested for allegedly selling porno material in the form of the school mms clip… the allegation was not to save that poor girl’s dignity or anything altruistic or moral… it was about baazee selling porno stuff… and how is the CEO liable to be arrested? He could probably take corrective action, but arresting him? How does this serve any purpose? Talk about understanding business models and laws… the mms clip is after all an mms clip… it will continue on its circulation via the most undetectable medium – the mms way… how does arresting the CEO help in curbing pornography circulation in India?

Well coming to the principal issue that triggered this outburst – why block blogspot domain? There were some theories put forth by the scratchy club when we were discussing what to do next… some of us even considered migrating the entire set of posts to some other blog sites… that set us thinking… all the other sites were working? Only blogspot domain was not opening up! Was it to promote the Indian blog sites? Like the Indian government slaps restrictions on MNCs from doing business in India so that it can force people to buy the products from the Indian industries. Well the Indian blogs were as comparable to blogspot as were a broken down old car and a brand new Mercedes… the user interface is plain damn shitty…

Now there could be another reason – the terrorists were using these blogs as a free medium to pass information in the form of code… well come on man… which terrorist organization has a blog? Or why should a terrorist go through all the rigmaroles of writing blogs in code? Anybody could do anything in India – it just won’t get noticed… man any terrorist could carry a shipment of arms through our railways or roadways or seaways… come on guys we have too many people that 1 or 2 extra, normally dressed terrorists would never get noticed anyways… they would just blend in with their bag of bombs with the shopping crowd…

Or was it that these blogs were raising some sort of upheaval to overthrow the government by organizing a coup – inspired with blog posts… wow that sounds like a new plot for a rang-de-basanti types movie… straight from the heart… can’t wait to see one… hey come on man, people don’t get aroused (I mean angry uprising) by the injustice meted out to them in every walk of life but would get inspired by the writings on some obscure blog?

Or was there was some objectionable content on the blogs… like a cartoon depicting something that was extremely funny about some religious icon… and are these cartoons only on these blogs… if so then there are two things to learn from this – 1) bloggers are damn creative and innovative and (2) they are not afraid to express their views. And does blocking these blogs avoid the spread of such “malicious” content? For all you know the stuff is already safely stored away in the infinite inboxes around the world (in fact the storage space they provide of the order of GBs even help people to store complete movies). And doesn’t blocking these stuff or trying to police the internet against the very principles that the entity called the internet stands for? It is an uncontrolled growth and a treasure trove of information… and it is that way because there is no restriction. I personally believe that if the internet is going to be shut down, you better be careful of the cascading effect it will have in shutting down b-schools too…

Well anyways, all that is just an excuse for sighting aliens… you know the elaborate stories spun by the US agencies that take care of people who sight alien spacecrafts or have an interaction with aliens… they give weird reasons to them saying that it was an experimental weather balloon, or a planet… the truth is probably what ET put up in the bottom of their front page a couple of days back… some 17 blogs were named heretical and blocked… now call it stupidity or callousness or autocracy the whole blogspot domain used by above 40,000 active regular users was blocked… and to think that these 17 people would not be able to cause any more harm – they would just open a new blog in another name… and they could still edit their posts remember… and in fact the worst blow for this government initiative was that a leading national daily published an article teaching people how to circumvent these bans…

Come to think of it, how many such bans actually work? Right from movies to drugs, whenever there is a restriction, people always find a way out. In fact it increases the demand for these restricted products and services… Curiosity killed the “good intentions” of the government…

PS. If anybody has a list of those 17 sites, please send them to me… I would love to read them.

the learning curved

After reading a post of mine someone asked me whether I really believed in the concept of learning from other’s mistakes in a mba… well there cannot be a better person for the job… or maybe there are more like me out there. In fact I was following this principle even before an mba – that is probably the reason I did my engineering, don’t smoke, don’t have a girlfriend, am still a virgin and I am doing an mba.

In fact I learn only from others mistakes, I have begun to forget that there are some learnings from what they do right too…

This is maybe why I never take risks. I have read about people who have taken risks and done great and about people who have taken risks and have gotten screwed. My mind decides to retain the latter at the forefront and keeps the others just for the sake of GK.

This is maybe why I never speak up… I have seen people voice their opinions against things that are against their principles and get respected for it and I have seen people voice their opinions against things that are against their principles and get ridiculed for it. My mind decides to retain the latter at the forefront and keeps me reminded to keep my mouth shut even if my heart gets torn to shreds.

This is maybe the reason I don’t try to make new friends too easily… I have seen people start off by forcing themselves onto groups and people they know nothing about and get accepted as part of the gang and I have seen people start off by forcing themselves onto groups and people they know nothing about and get rejected and dejected. My mind decides to retain the latter at the forefront and keeps me reminded to approach new people with caution and not to open up.

This is maybe the reason why I don’t have faith in the unknown angels… I have seen people put in too much expectation in divinity and fate and get rewarded and I have seen people put in too much expectation in divinity and fate and go bankrupt and lose everything. My mind decides to retain the latter at the forefront and makes me paranoid about expected outcomes and gives me a pessimist tag.

This is maybe the reason I stick to conformity and not try something new… I have seen people doing something outrageous like humorous presentations or even proposing to the girl they love and being applauded and I have seen people doing something outrageous like humorous presentations or even proposing to the girl they love and getting the spirit beaten out of them. My mind decides to retain the latter at the forefront and makes me a coward constantly afraid to step out of the boundaries defined.

I have learnt so much from other’s mistakes that I am beginning to believe that it was all a big mistake…

7 blasts of 11-7

Sitting far away from the blasts affected areas and victims, in the college mess with a hot cup of chai and couple of eggs with upma and chutney, I thought a lot about our great Indian culture. I know it is easy to comment from where I sit and I would be a good for nothing piece of junk when it came to actually delivering in these emergency situations. All I know is contributing some old clothes, some blood donation and shooing away beggars at railway stations and traffic signals. But this is my blog and I am the king here. I will just put down what I felt as I read through columns and columns of facts and feelings from one of the nation’s many war wounds.


When the local residents helped the victims, it showed the great solidarity and altruistic attitudes of our people.
It also shows how grossly inadequate and inefficient our rescue and emergency operations are.

When Mumbai is up and running within 24hours of the disaster, it showed how professional and how quick we are at recovering from our losses.
It also shows how indifferent and casual we are about the whole affair.

We showed how much of information we have when the LeT man arrested a few days back gave us news about the possibility of such an attack.
It also shows that even when we have the clues staring right into our eyes and telling you of your impending doom, we are callous enough to ignore it.

When our politicians empathize with us and condemn the terrorist attacks, it shows how caring for the people and the nation and how outspoken we are.
It also shows what a bunch of hypocrites we are.

When the local transports are crowded and people help each other in through the crowd, it shows how helpful and friendly we are.
It also shows that we don’t need twin towers for victims of that number when one local train will do and how seriously insufficient our support systems are.

When the media puts up all the bloody and ghastly images on its front page, it shows how the media cares about the criticality of information it gives its readers.
It also shows how they leverage on creating excitement and reading frenzy by printing the most happening horrifying news items and pictures so that it sells.

Reminiscing on our history and finding that India has never attacked another country even though we have been attacked and plundered and raped and wounded by a thousand miscreants, shows what a peace loving country we are.
It also shows, what a set of diffident spineless forgetful complacent weak worthless cowards we are.

Lurrrnings del Lohgad

Recently enticed by repeated mails containing explicit pictures of the pristine and undesecrated beauty of a place called lohgad we decided to take advantage of a god sent Sunday of cancelled classes to make the trek. It was an opportunity not to be missed, to quote a regular trekker. At that time I was skeptical, to be very euphemistic… actually I wanted nothing of it. I was used to the comforts of planned holidays and outings even if it meant a little bit more money. Why would anybody deliberately go through all the hardships consciously aware of his impending doom?

I was torn between the devil and the deep sea – actually I would say “sleep” and “a long awaited trek” or the pessimist in me says “deprived sleep (on a chance of a lifetime)” and “an unnecessarily uncomfortable dirty wet tiring journey”.

Well these were what I actually learnt from the outing.

1) If there is something interesting to look forward to, then sleep deprivation does not actually bother you.
Rudely pushed into the trek which began at 5am and the preparations for it started at 3am and considering the football match preceding it – well in other words I didn’t sleep that night. And I even considered dropping out of the expedition. But then after the journey began in the cool morning breeze, I lost all the sleepy feeling and actually felt energetic. Wish I could say the same for all those classes… profs and wannabe profs who are reading this may take some pointers.

2) When chilled to the bone, the feeling of indifference that sets in actually lets you enjoy more.
My rain jacket gave up on me. What else could it do if being clearly outsmarted by the heavy and continuous rains… after a few hours of soaking, it started transferring water through to my t-shirt. Sometime later my t-shirt passed it on to my innerwears and so on. So finally I was wet to my skin. Since the wind also wanted to show his fury, there was continuous buffeting of the rain by the wind around us and whenever this happened, a shiver would run down my spine. But on reaching the peak, it was just chaos unleashed. There was a fog made up of the wind and the water. So thick it was that it was just… just… umm uh… er ah thick. With the chilling winds lashing at us, we were feeling cold in the bones. But the indifferent walk on the top and the opportunity to see the topmost source of the waterfall is a feeling that just cannot be described.

3) Even the most difficult of journeys can be a great one if you have friends along.
We traveled by the general coaches of the Indian railways. I have always had an aversion to traveling by the trains as I have always considered them stinking and dirty. I am yet to be proved wrong. But the fact that you got friends along gave me an entirely new area to concentrate on. At least, even if no other topic was being discussed, I could crib about the trains (reminds me of the homing journey experience during my engineering days). Another thing I hate is wet clothes. Now both were combined into one combo-offer, but I just didn’t notice.

4) Simple things in life make the moment.
The occasional views from the train and the trek path, the lush greenery around, a walk in the clouds, posing for photographs, silly poses caught on candid camera, the occasional mock fights, PJs, good jokes, slapstick humor, biscuits, hot chai, the long forgotten lowly but extremely tasty bread-jam, running downhill, the pain in the thighs, the pain in the joints, the pain in the soles, the limp, the sympathy from friends…


There were other very obvious things that I had unlearnt, which I learnt again like indiscriminately eating food that appears tasty can lead to bad stomach problems, wearing shoes on treks is actually safer, polythene covers keep clothes dry and if you want dry clothes it is better not to keep them soaked in water, rain is mainly comprised of water, and so on.

In summary it was a ruggedly refreshing experience much different from the artificially planned ones. Thanks a lot zombie, tripathy, ani, sush, tanu, shacha for making hell enjoyable.

photos from the trek are here

Perils of Pokerfaced Pleasantry

Joke Type 1: The Slapstick Comedy
Situation 1:
This guy with a small toothbrush moustache makes a lot of contortions on his face and wears a tattered costume and falls down flat on his butt.
Response:
Ha ha ha ha !!!

Situation 2:
This guy runs around a big guy, keeps falling and getting beaten.
Response:
ROTFL*… Ha ha ha ha !!!

Situation 3:
Situation 1 and 2 continue for about half an hour with just changes in the background.
Response:
ROTFSCAL*… Ha ha ha ha !!!


Joke Type 2: The community based jokes
Situation 1:
This sardarji/tamilian…
Response:
Ha ha ha…

Situation 2:
This sardarji/tamilian naa what he did you know…
Response:
Ha ha ha… ho ho ho

Situation 2:
Arre baba, listen to the joke naa… This sardarji/tamilian, naa what he did you know blah blah blah blah
Response:
ROTFL… Ha ha ha… ho ho ho… Hee hee hee…


Joke Type 3: PJs
Situation 1:
Q: What is big red and goes ding ding ?
A: A fire engine
Response:
:)

Situation 2:
Q: What is big red and goes ding ding ?
A: An apple. Big and ding ding were given to confuse you.
Response:
:)

Situation 3:
Q: What is big red and goes ding ding ?
A: A book. The data was given to confuse you.
Reaction:
:-|


Joke Type 4:
Situation 1: dry punchline jokes
A great story --> a great build up --> appropriate voice modulations --> one great punchline
Response:
So…

Situation 2:
A great story --> a great build up --> appropriate voice modulations --> one great punchline higlighted
Response:
Ok, so is the joke over already ?

Situation 3:
A great story --> a great build up --> appropriate voice modulations --> one great punchline explained
Response:
Is that what everyone calls a PJ ?


Now I am thoroughly frustrated… what happened to the world of witty and dry humor ? I just love those great punchline jokes… slapstick comedy used to interest me once but I remember getting annoyed with it when I was around 10yrs old… well tom and jerry still amuses me sometimes but then the head banging with saucepans only invoke a smile (very very rarely am I ROTFL).

And what is this with the surd and tam jokes doing the rounds… in fact you can put anyone there – gujju, mallu, northie, southie, Gandhi, little Johnny, George Bush, lawyers, doctors, engineers, software guys… just anybody and you could form a series of jokes around them. It is as if only these people can do all those comical blunders that they do… in fact once I had a fight with my friend over whose "ticketless traveller" joke was better – the one involving lawyers or the tamilians, though essentially the plot and the words were the same.

The PJs are very person specific… they appear funny only to the person who tells them and the person who is actually in the mood to listen… usually a couple of jokes evoke a pleasant smile, but if you overdo it, the listeners may actually get aggressive and change their smileys. But then they have their audiences too and there are far too many books written about them.


(Now the author would like to put in some research theories of his own. He dares you to disprove any of them.)

Slapstick comedy seems to be the joy of people who are overworked. No need to think, an on the spot humor, instinctive. Kids enjoy them because they don’t have the mental maturity to go in for long story based jokes. Those adults who engage themselves in watching slapstick comedy are usually in a state of mind where they don’t want to think to laugh. Which is the spontaneity aspect of this brand of humor.

The ethnicity jokes just generate a trigger based on the person. People just think the joke is funny because the image they have created upon the character. Even though there are some people who say that branding people into the jokes is not good and we are actually degrading them. I would disagree as long as everything is done in good humor. In fact it is usually the other way round of seeing things, as in someone really intelligent doing something stupid as in the joke would appear rather funny, like the Einstein/Newton jokes. See what I mean, these jokes are virtually substitutable and there is no necessity for any community to take offense.

And PJs… why would anyone in their right frame of mind like PJs… like the one that my friend always does – he adds a "pun intended" at the end to tell us that we got to appreciate the “joke”. As if we didn’t know his intentions; what are friends for (also with friends like us he does not need enemies). But the truth on PJs is that it is very situational… people relate to something at the spur of the moment some remark or comment countering a profs statement or some weird play of words that the joker thinks to be funny.

Anyways now it is time for me to crib… why is it that not many tend to appreciate wit in the jokes that are dry and straight faced ? Is it because the straight face does not provide the cue to listeners as to when the joke is over. Isn’t that the whole idea of straight faced humor… Or is it because they require that little bit of intelligence and concentration to appreciate these jokes?

The other day I was reading through Sidin’s posts and was laughing my head off. My roomie was bugged with my happiness and asked me to read out the joke despite my warnings… so I went on

“There was this football game between the polish and the english. Both teams walked out to the pitch. The english were soon warming up while the polish coach went around reminding his players to use no hands and that biting and head butting was not to be done, as far as possible.

Coin tossed. Whistle. And the game is afoot. However soon the english complain of rough play and walk off the pitch. The game continues. Twenty minutes later the Polish score a goal and win the match. “

Response: A blank expectant stare with a pitiful gaze (that was evoking no sympathy from me). I was planning to land him a new punchline – one from my fist to his nose… but being a roomie and him being bigger and stronger and persistent I had to give in to his requests and repeat it again this time highlighting the punch line:

“There was this football game between the polish and the english. Both teams walked out to the pitch. The english were soon warming up while the polish coach went around reminding his players to use no hands and that biting and head butting was not to be done, as far as possible.

Coin tossed. Whistle. And the game is afoot. However soon the english complain of rough play and walk off the pitch. The game continues. Twenty minutes later the Polish score a goal and win the match.”

He still didn’t get it. And I am not explaining it again.


PS. For those who didn’t get the title, it was my attempt at straight faced humor.

*Glossary:
ROTFL => Rolling On The Floor Laughing
ROTFSCAL => Rolling On The Floor Stomach Clutched And Laughing

Krrash !!!

The moment we entered the hall about 10mins late there was an ominous feeling… a sort of eerie emptiness that you can actually feel inside (and also see outside)… u get a feeling that you are probably in the wrong movie… maybe you should have stayed back and watched that re-run you have watched about a million times on the same channel already… or probably have read that book you have been fighting to finish… or maybe it is time to look at your dismal grades… or maybe just rolled under the cozy blanket and caught up on that much needed sleep… so many things that could have been done and you were here with about 8 others like you – 4 of them coaxed into it by you and 4 others who succumbed to peer pressure of simple majority…

Well ok, now there was no going back… we are here we are here… so let us as well enjoy the movie while we are here getting our money’s worth… there are some fringe benefits of watching movies in Mumbai cinemas especially those that charge a premium even for those late night ones… once we saw a well known actress (I am not mentioning her name here to protect privacy – mine that is)… well we “casually” kept bumping into her (well not literally you know, our paths just crossed… that was a just a figure of speech I used… no need to get jealous already) until her bodyguard or dad (can’t say which and we could not do any post situational analysis as we were not looking at him, well who would with better options… wow that is some language skills 4 words starting with “w”… oops sorry for digressing, will save it for some other post, maybe titled W… wotsays?)… I think I will remind you that we were at the bodyguard – and he gave us a sort of stare and we decided to move into the hall and keep an eye on her in the darkness… she had this great makeup which showed up well in the dim light too…

But this time there was no such distractions... Hey now where was I… thought I was talking about some movie… yeah let me start with the title… Krrish – hey why the rr? Is it for the sake of numerology or for the number of hrithik “r”oshans on the screen… well can’t say but I have not come across the emphasis on the creaking sound for Krishna… Krishna – now isn’t it simple to spell ? and say too ?

As for the cast, Rekha seems younger than preity and probably she was expecting a meatier role… maybe opposite the younger hrithik… but since the role was awarded to piggy chops, she seemed overcome with professional jealousy. There is absolutely no life in her dialogues, or maybe it is because she is actually playing hrithik’s overly overprotective old "grand"mother… man I have never seen anyone get so shocked when the principal wanted to take an IQ test of the child hrithik… she acts as if the principal wanted to take a dna test (well actually that would have been interesting as papa hrithik is away for nearly 2yrs in Singapore with wife in India when baby hrithik is born… and in the end jaadoo is thanked… very fishy…) well she plays the typical young grandmom and watched over her grandchild through her thick glasses… (well actually above the glasses, and I still can’t figure out why she wore it, she looked very old).

Now piggy chops also affectionately called priyanka chopra, is the babe who sizzles as the woman in red, yellow, blue, black, mini skirts, mini tops but no swimsuits… (don’t remember seeing her in a saree as in aitraaz, but still ok wardrobe). Man what a babe, and what a dumb babe… I remembered the joke where adam asks god why was eve so beautiful and dumb… anyways some new thing I learnt was that glass walls can be occasionally opaque, especially when you are talking ill about someone and they are standing right in front of you, but the other side of the glass – u simply cannot see them ! (try it if you dare to prove me wrong then we can both sue the roshans).

Now coming to the asli hero. One serious doubt – is hrithik planning to enter politics? If we calculate his entry into politics would be in about 20 years time and the kids who watch his movies about jaadoo and superspiderbatneomorpheusphantomandwhatnotshakti-man would be grown up to think that their superhero hrithik would save India as the prime minister from all the bad people in the world and also outside it. My deduction is that hrithik would follow on the footsteps of one such role model in the US and is trying to get a man-machine interfacing movie sanctioned from papa… quite costly, but then we should look at the long term holistic picture… (maybe rekha can be requested to play the harassed gun toting mom who is considered insane as she sees people from other planets and time…)

Now if you guys would excuse me, I would dedicate this paragraph also to hrithik bashing as rekha stole the limelight from the previous paragraph… well hrithik seems to be catering to his kiddy fans so much that he is turning out to be a kid himself… his expressions, actions and dance steps seem to have that fluidity of a skinny kid who is trying to dance… now I am not saying that he is a bad dancer and I certainly did like his dance steps in his adult only movies like KNPH and lakshya… but in these movies when he speaks and jumps around waving his arms especially with that stupid expression on his face… that is too much self degradation when he is not even getting the money (remember papa makes the movies and the money comes from the family corpus… )

Naseeruddin Shah’s moment of truth has arrived in this movie and probably he would be honoured at the Oscars or at least our local film festivals organized by that paanwala every year for being the best villain role performed… sad to say except for one line which made me smile, the rest of his show was stupidity… (wot people do for money and friendship sakes…)

Overall, the film seemed to have catered to its intended target segment… well piggy chops was never seen in a bikini or even a swimsuit was she? or did I miss it in those 5 minute powernaps during the songs (well if I did miss it, parents can just probably keep quiet about it or take their kids out for pop corn)… to me it felt like it should be certified “below 10” – that is can be viewed by people under the age of 10yrs (some exceptions can be made on the basis of mental maturity shown by them)… but since the kids cannot be brought in without their parents, I am sorry the parents would have to grin and relive their old days of reading indrajal comics…

I don’t know why I sat through the whole movie… but on second thoughts, maybe I will have to endure such movies pretty soon…

PS. Do not let guys from the IT sector watch it. They will find too many faults with the execution.

PPS. Maybe Pamela Anderson can audition for hrithik’s grandmom in the next movie… just give her a chance guys, she uses make-up too…