Names Names!!!

Couple of days back, I was browsing channels and found the movie “Yes Boss” in one of the movie channels. Since there wasn’t anything interesting elsewhere, I continued watching this. My father in law was also there, and he heard the name Rahul. The conversation went like this:

FIL : There are so many people named Rahul
Me : Yup
FIL : This is not fair to Ketu
Me : (Confused) huh??
FIL : see Rahul = Rahu + L
Me : ooooooohhhhhhhh
FIL : But there is nobody named Ketul = Ketu + L
Me : hmm..
FIL : That’s unfair to Ketu
Me : Well, there is the name Ketan, little bit modified but the nearest
FIL : But it doesn’t beat Rahul
Me : Yes Boss

Reasons Reasons

I have read so many posts where we crib about our company. Even though some feel we don’t have the expected monetary benefits. I still have a list of reasons why I wouldn’t crib about it

1. Joy on my parents’ face when I got the job.

2. Liberty to get them any gift, which I have always wanted them to have.

3. I found the love of my life here.

4. Roommates/training mates became friends for life

5. Superb onsite trips.

6. Amazing friends made at onsite, it was because of them that homesickness was not a routine. Infact, when I came home for a vacation, I missed them so much that I wanted to go back.

7. Learnt to be independent. Earlier, I wouldn’t even go and buy a chocolate on my own (unless for gifts), had never paid bills of any sort.

8. Financial independence.

9. Bought my first mobile phone.

There might be lots more, and I agree that any first company which we join gives us joy. The fact that in my case it happens to my company, just gives the company that vantage point that I would be ever grateful.

Namma Bengalooru

Bangalore, or Bengalooru as it’s called now, was always one of the best climatic places in India. It was not too hot, not too cold. We never felt the need of an AC, fans were more than enough.

For the past few years, due to increase in traffic and population, there has been a change, we have started to have hotter days. And when, we started complaining that Bangalore’s climate is changing from pleasant to hot, the weather just surprises us by a chilling morning.

Friday morning was one such day, when even at 8.30 AM, the Hosur Expressway was so foggy and it was so cold. It just felt like B’lore was just getting back to the it’s groove. Well, once in a while such nice mornings just bring back the faith in you, that namma Bengalooru is still the place to be.

To hide or not to hide

There was a discussion on who is the best actor oops!! I meant who is the super star of the country.

One of them wrote “He is transparent in all his activities, people know that he Smokes, drinks.” He refers to the actor and I don’t wan’t to mention the name, since my post is not about the actor.

I just cracked up looking at this. From when did Smoking and drinking become an offensive activity which needs to be hidden?

I don’t smoke or drink, but I remember when I first started working, attended a project party (not company sponsored), this was some birthday party I think. When my team mates ordered drinks and cigarettes, I was quite shocked. Call me naïve, but I had never been to a restaurant which had both veg-nonveg, no bar attached. This was probably my first cultural shock.

As days passed by, these never bothered me, ofcourse I don’t like people smoking in front of me, so I request them and they oblidge. When I went onsite, when any of my teammates ordered for any of the alcoholic drinks, I used to promptly ask for an extra empty glass, and pour my glass of coke into it and cheers with them. My teammate always said “Arre yaar, humesha alcohol ka apmaan karti hai… uss glass mein coke kyon peeti ho”. What can I do if people give these drinks in nice glasses and give coke in a ordinary glass. Anyway, that was not the point.

I completely agree that smoking and drinking are injurious to health, well lot of things are like eating junk food etc etc, but are these something to be hidden. I know, lot of people who smoke or drink hide it from their parents, but lets says the family knows about it. It’s not something you would hide from the general public.

So does hiding or making it public, make any difference to anybody, except for your own health?

Locked Up

New year has just passed by, and I remember the 1st new year party after joining the company.

We were in Mysore, and that was my first new year away from family. We had decided to have a girls night out. We borrowed speakers from friends, got some cake and chips and sodas.

We stayed in a 2BHK, with attached Bathrooms. It was around 10.30 PM, my friend/roomie went to restroom, and since I had to change, I locked the bathroom door from outside, changed and came out of the room. After 10 mins, we were wondering why my friend hadn’t returned. And, I look at my phone, it’s the same friend calling. “why was she calling me, when we are in the same house” was my first thought. I picked up the call and she was yelling “Open the door”. I rushed and opened the bathroom door. After this, all of us were laughing non-stop for 10-15 mins.

We kept teasing her, why she had to take her cellphone in the bathroom. So she said, that saved her, else we would have celebrated new year by locking her up.

Phir Mile Sur

“Mile sur mera tumhara” – This is one song which most of us would have heard while growing up.

Yesterday, on republic day, Zoom TV in collaboration with Times Group aired the “Phir Mile Sur”. I was excited to see the new one. I couldn’t help but compare it to the old one. The video starts off with AR Rahman with a orange Keyboard (instrument) and green Kurta (the flag is suppose), and then the obvious Big B came up with “mile sur” in his voice. He sings one line and then makes it a prose. There was a mixture of musicians and bollywood personalities. In between, a few states were showcased. The song is too long, so I can’t mention every person in the song.

On the whole, this is my review:

Good points:

Good locales, scenic places
Girl education, women employment, showing the children with hearing and talking disabilities were shown
Other sports (esp. no cricket) were given importance. One of my friends said, atleast somebody ignored cricketers.

Not so good points:

Very long
Seemed like bollywood song or a film fraternity song
Overacting by some actors (SRK, Ash)
Voice didn’t match for many of them

Even if I don’t compare with the old one, I don’t see any national integration message here.

The old one made us feel that “Mile sur mera tumhara to sur bane humara” but this one has got too many surs, that the humara feel just doesn’t come.

It’s a nice effort, may be not be very good though.

Flower show

Saturday we had been to the LalBagh Flower show. This was my first time ever. I would say it was worth the visit...

Let the pics do the tallking














There are some more...but may be some other time :)

Alone Alone!!

Alisha, could sleep anytime of the day, the moment her head touched the pillow. One day, her parents had to bring groceries, so they left her at home to watch TV, while they came back in half an hour. They wanted to lock the door from outside, but Alisha insisted that she will take care and lock the door from inside.

Alisha was enjoying the TV show, but slept off in between. Her parents came back home after half an hour and were knocking the door, rang the calling bell, called out for Alisha. But she slept like a kumbhakaran. No noise could even bring a change in her face or sleep. Finally they found a long stick outside, and tried to poke her from the window. Luckily, she woke up and opened the door for her parents. No guesses on how much scoldings she got. It took a long time for her parents to leave the house on her responsibility again.

Hide and Seek

“Hide and Seek”.. Wait!!! I am not talking about the yummy choc chip biscuits, I am talking about the game.



Hide and Seek used to be one of the must play games, esp. during summer vacations when all the cousins would come together and we could hide anywhere in the house. All the cupboards, under the tables, under the cots, bushes would be occupied.

I heard this song in the morning, “Kanna muche kaade goode”. I realized all of a sudden, we used to play hide and seek saying this too..

There were times when we would gang up against the youngest cousin or the innocent (read silent and the usual bakra), and make him/her the seeker. As soon as we knew the bakra is going near one person, rest of them would make sounds. We would add in new rules and change a few existing ones. We were a little cruel that way. Unless, we made one person cry out of frustration, there was no satisfaction.

We used to play this with neighborhood kids too. There was a lot of favoritism when this happened. Irrespective of who was out, the main of the game wasn’t hiding and seeking, it was to trouble the seeker :

Probably, we still play the game these days. In office we keep hiding from the seekers… if you know what I mean ;)

Movie Marathon

I know calling it a movie marathon is an understatement. But, considering the situation of obtaining tickets here in B’lore, I would surely term watching 2 movies in theatres on weekend as a marathon.

Yes, I watched the hyped Avatar (3D) and 3 Idiots.

Do they live up to the hype? I would say, pretty much yes.

Avatar:

If only I could watch Avatar in IMAX, it would have done complete justice to the movie. It was a simple story, told in the most magical way. The story was similar to any bollywood movie (mind u just the story). The whole new world was created. As everybody else said, it was a visual treat. The animals, the plants, the way the Navi’s connected to each other was just out of the world. When they prayed together, you could sense that their ancient gods actually listened to these prayers. I personally loved the floating mountains, magical tree, also their home tree, the hammock beds. Jake was really handsome (earth waala), I liked his Navi avatar too, but considering his long plait and the long tail, I would rather stick to the earthly Jake. He was the Hero, no doubt, esp with his big orange dragon. For a change, it was good to see that we were the Aliens, but the bad part was earthlings went to destroy their beautiful Pandora. Well, each and every point is worth a mention, and I don’t want to leave out anything. So, I better stop here… Go watch it.. if you haven’t…

Watching it in 3D was good, but I wouldn’t say it was outstanding. Either I watched a lot of 3D movies or it was because of not watching it in IMAX. I felt it was long for a English movie (considering no intervals). But, watch it in IMAX, to get a thrilling experience.

3I:

Aal is well… This is the mantra of the movie. Most of them including the baby go by this mantra. From Millimeter to Wangdu, from Chatur to Virus, I loved all the characters. What can I comment about Aamir. He can totally convince the audience, that he is just a college boy. The speech from Chatur had the audience in splits. Everytime Virus had an encounter with Rancho, we would expect something to happen, and something unusual did happen. Ofcourse, Madhavan and Sharman made it look like cake walk. It wasn’t boring in any part. Every small incident, seemed to bring atleast a smile on your face.

All this aside, the beauty of Shimla and Ladak were so beautifully captured. I am almost planning my next vacation there.

Only misfit according to me was Kareena. I don’t know why, but felt that she looked older than Aamir. But as they say Aal is well… Way to go all you IDIOTS.

Baarish kar de paison ki

When I heard this line for the first time - “Main Baarish Kardoon paison ki jot u hojaaye meri”, we were travelling in car. I turned to G and we had this conversation

Me: “Ab baarish kar tu paison ki, main to hoon ab teri”.

He: “Meri to tu kabse hai, ab kyon baarish karoon?”

Me: “Pehle pata hota to itni jaldi nahi mannti :)”

Royal Bird

On Sunday, we went to the Royal Enfield showroom to check out the new 500cc classic. G is crazy about bikes, so this was going to be the first on his list.

This is the pic

At first, the guy in the showroom thought, it may not be possible for us to take the test ride, G being the persistent one, somehow got the bike out of the workshop. He took it for a ride and then asked me if I wanted a ride... Ofcourse, I went :)

Things I did not like :

1. Looks - Nothing special. Its a classic, so ordinary looks, esp with the back seat, looks too ordinary... Our Thunderbird has got super looks
2. Feel - It just dint feel like riding a bullet. Well, if it was 500cc, dint feel like it.
3. Sound - Well, seems for the wonderful sound, they would have to add another silencer for Rs.3000. Else, its bullet with no sound !!!!
4. It costs a min of Rs. 1,40,000 on road. Even if we are ready to pay the total amount in cash, it can be delivered only feb end.

Thinks I liked:
Dint like anything... May be I like the thunderbird better.

As for G, I am still not sure if he liked it or not. But I dont think he is ready to pay the price for it... So the thunderbird is here to stay with for a while :)

Let's do charity instead?

I have read it in many articles, seen it on TV, but fail to understand. Why should we not enjoy just because it can go to charity instead?

Before, anybody thinks I am mean. Let me clarify. People say, instead of doing such and such a thing, you can give it to charity. I agree, charity is a very noble thing to do. But, I don’t understand, just for the sake of charity, why are we depriving ourselves of the little joy.

Let’s say I am spending Rs.1000 on something, it irks when people come and say, it’s a waste of money, and some needy person could have used it better. I agree, but this is my hard earned money. If I feel happy spending it in one way, why should I always think about a needy person. I might be donating a 5000, when I really feel like it. At such times nobody says, oh you really deserved it.

Charity shouldn’t be forced. If people feel like contributing, they will definitely do it. I also think sometimes people do charity more for the peer pressure rather than the actual feeling for it.

Next time, when somebody wants to promote charity, why tell people to kill their desires for the sake of charity. Instead suggest that they can share it with the less fortunate people.

PS: Nobody has come and told me anything like this. But I have seen people saying – Instead of spending money like this they can as well give it to charity. Come on it’s their money, their wish :). I do charity too. I dont need anybody telling me that instead of enjoying I should be giving this money to some one

Blunder

The incident happened couple of years back. I was at the client office in US. We were used to the people overloading their desks with photographs, magnets, souvenir and lot of stuff on their desk. One of client project managers also had a lot of photographs. He had his wedding picture, Then a picture with 3 beautiful ladies. I couldn’t recognize him in his wedding picture, it was a few years old. There was another picture with one beautiful lady in it. This lady was one among the 3 beautiful ones. I assumed it was the eldest daughter. I went and complimented him.

“Hey Brian, Your daughters are beautiful, especially the eldest one. She is very pretty”

And I pointed to the single picture. “Oh! She is my wife” was his response. This was so embarrassing, I wanted to go and bury my head in shame.

He sensed this, and then comforted me “Not your fault, This picture is 10 years older, and yes she is very beautiful. I take that as a compliment. I am sure my wife would be thrilled to hear this”

I was so relieved, that I just scraped out of the blunder I had just commited.

Techniques

Attended a session few months back. The instructor said this quote, which makes a lot of sense

The quote :

You tell me, I will forget
You show me, I will remember
You involve me, I will understand....

As I type this, I go back to my 6th standard, where we had to read details about a leaf (botany) and cockroach(zoology).

I am not the kind of person who can by heart/mug things... I need to understand what the topic is all about. I tried my best to read about these 2, but in half an hour I was just forgetting this. And my usual resort for all my problems is just one person –MOM. She has a very good ability to make me understand things. She read the whole stuff and explained it to me. My brain, I think had taken an off that day. It just wasn’t registering in my mind.

Point 1: You tell me, I will forget

Next my mom got a leaf from the hibiscus plant from the garden. She showed me each and every part of the leaf, according to what was in the book. I could slowly remember what a leaf is all about. The same thing with the cockroach. I could remember it for days after that.

Point 2: You show me, I will remember

I had to keep going back to the books to keep my memory fresh. An idea struck and I got a leaf from the plant and read the whole stuff again with the leaf in my hand, I did the same with cockroach(this was yukky!!). And I never had to read this part again as I had totally understood how things were :)

Point 3: You involve me, I will understand

Isnt it amazing that these simple rules are followed in our daily lives but we never realize that all we are doing is following certain techniques :)

Time

There are times when we wake up in the middle of night and wish the sun rises a few hours later than usual.

Last night, I happened to wake up and saw that it was still dark and there were no sunrays trying to peep in through the thick curtains. I thought it might be around 5.00 AM, and I would just have an hour more of the blissful sleep and then the rush for office would start.

I just turned around and checked the time in my cell phone. When I looked at the time, I felt like dancing around, but then I did what was best to do. I slept again peacefully, it was just 2.00 AM

On Call

When you are on phone, and if you happen to be in front of these:

computer or laptop.

On the desktop, keep clicking the right mouse button and then refresh. I wonder what special animation is going to come out of the desktop.

If you have a paper and pen

The artist in you emerges and all sorts of sketches appear on paper. The moment the phone call is done, the pen stops and you don’t know what needs to be done to complete the sketch :)

Candles or Charity

Recently, as a mark of respect to the 26/11 victims, lot of drives happened. People payed their homage in many ways. One of this was the candle lighting event. I thought like many other people, what a sweet gesture until I saw this programme in the evening.

I don’t remember the channel or the name of the programme. This is one, which my Father-in-law doesn’t like to miss. There is a senior journalist and every now and then he puts a lot of politicians on the hot spot and asks them some rigid answers to his questions. I like this show too. On 26/11, the guests were a retired army officer, 2 wives of late army officers. One of the ladies runs an organization, which helps the family of the officers who are no longer alive. When asked about the candle lighting event. This is what she had to say:

These are not the exact words, but the gist of what she said.

She respects and is very grateful that people have cared to remember the men who have sacrificed their lives. But, instead of lighting the Rs.5 candle, if they could have just collected that same amount from all of them, it would have actually helped the families.

This made me think. What she said really made sense. Just imagine, even if 10000 people had lit the candles, it would be around 50000. This could have really helped the families. May be the money which was collected by selling these candles were sent to these families. I don’t know what happened, but if such a thing happened then the candle lighting has actually served the purpose.

Whatever may be the way, just remembering them on the anniversary of this incident and then forgetting the rest of the year, is of no use. If we really need to help them and pay our respects, this has to be a progressive activity.

Belts on the seat

“Why don’t you wear the seat belt?” Anvesha yelled at Nikhil for the 5th time in 10 minutes.

Nikhil impatiently replied - “It’s not mandatory anyway”

Anvesha was tired of this excuse “You always wore it when we were in US. Why do you ignore these things when you come back to Bangalore?”

“You can also take it off. It’s free without the seat belt” saying this he took off her seat belt too.

A truck in front of them made a sudden halt and Nikhil put sudden brakes. Anvesha was sitting at the edge of the seat, and the sudden break and collision pushed her forward to the windshield.

This jolt suddenly woke her up. She was happy to see that, there was no collision. Nikhil was just frustrated with the traffic, and was trying to find a way out of there. They were still on Hosur Road. Anvesha checked if she had the seat belt on and drifted back to sleep.

Lesson learnt

Traffic in Bangalore is too exhausting. It can teach you the value of time though. Since we take a bus to office, we leave at a certain time daily. We reach office in half an hour. One day we were 5 mins late to the bus stop. Ofcourse, we lost our usual bus, but got another one in 5 mins. But to our dismay, the traffic had increased so much, that we had crossed only 2 blocks in 10 mins. This time it took 45 mins to reach office.

We learnt the lesson, delay of 5 mins caused us a final delay of 15 mins. If we had stayed someplace else, where its only 1 bus every morning. They would value each and every second.

It is said, every place has a lesson to teach, may be Bangalore is trying to teach time management.