Life's a crazy mess!

The big move...

2010-04-11T19:41:00.003+08:00

Hey guys,

I've finally made the move. The new site will be hosted at http://www.shanim.me with the blog sitting at http://blog.shanim.me

It is still a work in progress and should be fully up in a couple of weeks. The blog though is there and barring a few tweaks, that's about as far as I can go with customizing code :D

Invisible Man

2010-04-04T23:46:00.006+08:00

Something's missing....hmmm...oh right...he ain't smiling!

The Thames always seems to have something different every time I'm there. After running passed the gipsy with a million and one rings claiming to know the future of my hair growth, I noticed this fella sitting on a chair with a couple of missing body parts. Definitely beats the weird Golden dwarf down in Bukit Bintang in KL who pretends to be a statue when we can clearly see he's getting pissed off at the pesky kid who's laughing at him.

To Wordpress or not to Wordpress...that's the question

2010-04-04T23:37:00.003+08:00

After a lot of thought....yes the process still does exist although it has been a bit of a rare phenomenon of late...I've been thinking of moving my blog from blogger to WP.

The move, however, is under serious analysis as this would mean pain and effort from yours truly and a sincere effort to really type down words in the right sequence that would eventually make some sense to the world around me....The second biggest hurdle in this troublesome endeavor is the search for the perfect blog domain that can host my photo albums....sigh.....

The decision should be made later this week and hopefully more regular posts shall follow. Watch this space for updates...

What "lah"?

2009-11-27T18:36:00.004+08:00

Another hot and wet winter in Malaysia and I'm still here....it's been a whole year and a half since I got here and well....I apparently haven't stopped cribbing. So let me begin with some questions that have been puzzling me since I got here:

1. What's the deal with 90kmph and 110kmph speed limits? Is it just to confuse all humans who have their speedometers with readings that are in multiples of 20?
2. 90kmph speed limit ends here......1km later, 60kmph speed limit begins here....what about the grey zone? Are we legally allowed to confuse the cop who catches us speeding at 160 in that stretch?
3. Where are all the cows in the country?
4. Correction to question 3, where is all the fresh milk in this country?
5. Why is a steamboat called a steamboat when it is not steamed food but boiled food?
6. Why Touch N Go?
7. Why don't Touch N Go cards work?
7.5. Why don't Touch N Go cards work on the Smart Tag lane with an expensive 110RM Smart Tag?
8. Why do people refer to Ringgit as Dollars?
9. Why do women coming the wrong way of a One Way road sneer at a person driving the right way?
10. Is it okay to look into your bag while driving into a wall?
11. Can malay food be made without oil?
12. Am I African?
13. Am I Tamil?
14. Am I Arab?
15. Am I Malay?
16. Why are all the big holes on Malaysian roads always on the fast lane?
17. Why lah?
18. Why meh?
19. How do you define lah?
20. What are the funny devices with numbers inside a cab used for?
21. Why do you have a Police Booth in Bukit Bintang when you can't lodge complaints there?
22. Are all Indians Tamil Hindus who don't eat beef?
23. Why is the English language murdered in Malaysia?
24. Why does KTM have a tiny door for entry and exit?
25. Where are the trains on the KTM line? Do they go missing just before the KL Sentral station and appear just after?
26. Why does the LRT slow down at a station and speed off just as it sees you standing there?
27. Is parking on the main road legal between 12pm and 2pm on a Friday?
28. Why are all signboards immediately after an exit?
29. Why do all signboards say KLCC although it goes halfway around the city before it actually gets you there?
30. Why do people use Shell and Petronas fuel pumps as landmarks?

More questions to come...

PS: Facebook and Twitter has made me lazy

Bon Appétit

2009-03-15T17:58:00.005+08:00

Yesterday while I was at a local mamak having another Roti Telur and Teh Tarik, I was thinking of doing something to kill time this Sunday. I had run out of places to visit to take pics on my beloved Canon 450D in KL (well the only place I've skipped so far is the Bird Park near Masjid Negara).....and then it struck me...the salt in the chicken gravy with my Roti Telur was waaay too much and complaining wouldn't have helped. I decided it was time I did something about it....I had two choices....walk another 50m to the "other" mamak or walk 1k to the Supermarket at Pavillion.

As always I decided to go the longer way and ended up at the supermarket buying myself a pan and a bunch of groceries to start cooking something. After 40 minutes of digging stuff and 40 milliseconds of seeing 100 bucks disappear I was armed and ready for a long and painful journey experimenting my culinary skills.

I decided to wake up early to kick things off...at 10 am I was out of bed (yea yea so the early bit didn't work out :P) and after a quick bath and the usual decision of skipping breakfast 'coz it was too late I stepped into the kitchen....and this is when I realised I had absolutely no idea what I was supposed to do. A distress call followed...the rescue team (also read as my sisters) that I have is luckily spread over 3 time zones and hence it's more or less a 24/7 line. I managed to get two of them for a quick and easy resolution and I was on my way...

A whopping 90 minutes and several big blunders later I was done. Rice and chicken curry, all ready for consumption.

And the results?

Voila!

Happy New Year

2009-02-08T12:55:00.002+08:00

A new year and a new Camera. More pics and blogs to follow here in the year of the Ox. Apologies for the laziness.

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

What's changed....

2008-07-07T08:52:00.003+08:00

30,000ft above sea level, I finally get some time to pen down my next blog entry. As promised, I was supposed to give you details of what has been happening around me and what has made me more or less a jumper :)

It all started a year back. I got my salary on the first week of August and I noticed how horribly low it was, which was then followed by a horrible session with my bosses in my previous company which involved pretty much everything that should not be said or heard in an appraisal discussion. A week later, I got a call from a company in Malaysia and six months of debating with myself later, I moved out of my previous company...alright...no surprises to most of you, out of Wipro Technologies...and I'm now officially a Technical Consultant for an aggressive startup company....well no longer a startup since it was bought over by a Telecom giant....

I left the Delhi and my job in the end of April, with a couple of tough goodbyes said I had moved on back to Abu Dhabi to be home with mom...and ofcourse spend time with a few of my best pals out there....I was even able to celebrate two of their b'days as well :)....an amazing week in Abu Dhabi (where I often heard "Why the hell did you come when you're here for just 5 days?!?!?") was followed by a trip to the hot and sweaty summer of Mumbai....now this I have to elaborate...

I had a pal, a very goooood pal of mine...who is now in Mumbai....his name...A....yep...my schoolmates (who would've guessed whom I'm talking about) would be laughing already or probably know the rest of this para by now...nevertheless...I'm gonna go ahead yapping about it...two days before I left Abu Dhabi for Mumbai to spend some time with him and two other great pals of mine in Mumbai, I had called A reminded him that I would arrive in the morning....the great buddy that he always has been, he promised to pick me up at the airport in the morning when I landed there......the words "Early Morning" needs to be stressed on here...and this is where I had completely forgotten my buddy....A always kept off from the early bird and the worms that the bugger picked up and had often had broken down a few alarm clocks (which is a similar characteristics of another best pal of mine, V...but we'll leave that for later)...I arrived in the morning at Mumbai sometime at 5am and was out of the airport by 6am. During the one hour that I spent waiting for my luggage and evading customs (something about them gives me the creeps...guess it's the extra bright white shirts and trousers they sport) I was attempting to get through A's cellphone...which although ringing....never got me through to him...yes...Airtel Failed me...The whole connecting people far and wide is all a hoax I say! A few white lies were then spelled out to prevent my parents from high pressure attacks and I finally managed to get through my buddy's phone...only to find him half asleep and shocked to know it was already 7:00am....2 hrs beyond his wake up alarm. A couple of "friendly" curses were exchanged and we finally settled on a plan. I was to get to his place by a cab as it would work out better than waiting for another hour or so for him to get to the airport.

Mumbai has a clever way of telling you that you're huge and ought to reduce weight pronto!....it's called it's black taxis....after a struggle with the door and the windows and everything else in the rear seat of the black Fiat taxi I was finally seated (barely) and my cabbie put the cab on gear and we vrrooomed (literally) to Khar....to my pal's place. 20 mins of Google Maps and confused by-standers later I was in front of my friend's place. I asked him to get down so that we could head out for b'fast once we put the bags in.....and well...I was in for another surprise...the dude wasn't home and was hoping his bro was home to open the door when I got there...sigh....and let's not forget...he stays on the 3rd floor in a building that doesn't have a lift....so yep....25kilos of baggage, a handbag of 5 kilos...and the 90+ kilos of my weight was being dragged up the three floors to his flat. Fifteen minutes of ringing the bell and a few phone calls later I was finally in the flat.....my buddy arrived an hour later....and well...it was fun getting back at him :D ..it's always fun being around the dude...it has been over 2 yrs since we last met in Bangalore and we had loooads to catch up on.....in particular...the music in his PC!

A couple of hours later I was in an auto..headed to Juhu...my first ever visit to the ever famous beach that we often see in movies...u know...the one with the chats and stuff....a ten minute wait resulted in me being completely drenched and dehydrated....my pal was late...and sigh....with my luck going all perfect....it was hot...and when I mean hot, I just don't mean hot...I mean humid, hot, sweltering, melt chocolates in your pocket type hot! Thankfully Mumbai does believe in air-cons and I was in a chilled Cafe Moka sipping toblerone shake in seconds....

The mumbai trip was amazing...I've always loved that city...barring the fact that I can never survive there...since I have a fear of going anywhere near a local train station and that I still can't figure how the meters on their autos work or that fact that I still can't understand how people pay 27k for a single bedroom house...but nevertheless...the city is amazing! and has given me some of the most wonderful friends in my life :) I could go on and on about the place and the fun times I had there but for now, I shall move on...else I'd never reach my final destination :) to brief it up...I was out in two malls...had over 6 snacks/meals in the one day that I was there....lost two games of bowling...watched a movie...damaged an escalator....saw ranvijay (the MTV Roadies guy)...or rather almost got him to fall off the escalator that I assume I damaged...spent a night walking around the streets of mumbai with a sandwich big enough to feed 4 people and a coke good enough for half (the sandwich ended up in the bin and the coke boiled over)...and spent 3hrs plus in Mumbai autos (staring at the meter and trying to figure out wat the numbers really stood for and trying to make conversation in broken Hindi with a Dilli touch to it...you know...with the whole "Dikath"s and the "Koi Nai"s)

Next stop, God's own country...a week spent with my most favorite person in this planet....my DAD :) It started off with a friend's wedding and then followed by a trip to all my relatives in the span of 3 days....shockingly I managed a visit to a backwater resort and the beach as well. The trip was unfortunately dead short...and I had to head to Bangalore to kick start my new job....

A quick break here....will continue in the next post which I shall pen down in Chennai airport as I wait for my flight to KL....till then....cyaz!

PS: I never got to writing the next blog in Chennai...the Laptop's battery died on me. Will pen one down soon

Confessions of a Lazy blogger

2008-06-30T08:32:00.005+08:00

Yes Yes! The truth is finally out....I've become lazy...and we aren't talking lazy of the kind who doesn't like getting up in the morning, but the kind who "gets up, walks to the couch with four packs of potato chips and 2 large bottles of pepsi and turns on the TV and stays put till late afternoon when the tummy grumbles for attention" lazy! It's been ages since I blogged, and I know it more than all of you do....'coz well.....hehe...the goldfish that I am, I f'got the password again ;)

So wat's been keeping yours truly busy you ask? Aaaah...it eees wonderful how life has changed from a boring routine wake up and get to work to a wake up and head to the airport, fly a thousand miles, head to the hotel and walk to work routine ;) Confused....don't worry...Shanim's here to solve your troubles and get you away from the terrors of a shrink. I quit my first company...yipeeeeee...ok not so yipeee but yipee nevertheless....felt the job was not challenging anymore and decided on making my first change in careers (not counting the brief stint with Tyco in Abu Dhabi where I kinda screwed up their design for the Central Prison....kick the access control and you're home free...Prison Break would surely be a bore if it were shot in the Central Prison I designed :D). I'm now a consultant traveling the world....or atleast one side of it.

And now...after 8 flights in two months, I'm headed back to the place that started it all...Delhi....

How? What? Which? Where? Will the internet at KLIA get faster? All these questions and much more in my next post....till then....Selamat tinggal

Lost and Found

2008-05-27T21:42:00.002+08:00

The things ppl lose at airports these days....phones, babies, baggage, pens, money, planes......PLANES???

Ooooh yeaaaa....apparently the new Airport at Bangalore is so confusing, the govt owned Indian apparently couldn't find it's plane in the tarmac and got my laughing away in a coffee shop sooo loud, people around me thought I had finally lost it. Now that's what I call lost and confused :D

In the Name of God

2008-04-13T14:55:00.006+08:00

What's the first thing that comes into your mind when you think of Islam?

Ten seconds of pondering and I'm sure your answers would've been something in the lines of anger, war, Taliban, Al Qaida, terrorism, or something similar. And this about a religion that has preached peace to all it's followers. A religion that has asked never to bring hatred in conversation or in action. A religion that has meant to protect......but reality is far from it.

Now you may ask, why is Shanim of all people preaching about Islam? The answer...."Khuda Kay Liye".

Shoaib Mansoor and the rest of his team has done an amazing job in portraying what Pakistan was and is going through post-9/11. A must watch for sure! And yep...check out the song as well :)

Punctuality

2008-03-06T15:45:00.002+08:00

As promised, I begin my short but totally weird stories of my life at work in Delhi. I work for my client, an American Telecommunications company. We are setting up a Cellular network for our customer, the Government Telecom Operator in Delhi (don't want the name to pop up in searches so let me give it a fictitious name, Doorsanchar).

A couple of months back, I was asked to get some work done in one of Doorsanchar's sites and complete it as soon as possible. Being from an environment where work starts at 8:30am and goes on till late evening, I had planned on getting to work a notch early. Since Doorsanchar's working hours (as stated in their employement policies) is from 9:30am to 6pm, I decided on getting there at around 9:15am and working on my task till a little after 6:30pm.

I managed to get to the Metro station on time and after a 35 min ride on the Blue Line of DMRC, I was finally at the site. After a quick breakfast at a local store I was at the gate of the site. The security was standing up in front of me and stopped me there.

Guard: Who are you and why are you here?
Me: Sir, I'm here for the new project on the 4th floor. Here's my gate pass for today.

After a long glance at the paper stuffed with 7 signatures and some horrible writing by some Doorsanchar Officer, he stared back at me......his pan clad teeth almost got me nauseous but I managed to keep a straight face.

Guard: Oh but you are early. The office opens only at 9:30, come back later.

With a confused face, I looked at my watch...the whole discussion had apparently taken over ten minutes and it was now 9:27am.

Me: Sir, it is 9:30 already. Take a look at my watch.
Guard: No it is 9:27, come back after 3 minutes!

..........a silence followed and I found my way out and sat down on the pavement, waiting for another 180 seconds to get done with......so much for punctuality!

Freezing again

2008-01-22T12:50:00.000+08:00

A reminder that I'm still in Delhi - "It's freezing cold!" (To all the guys and gals in Europe and America...yea yea...temps are lower but you guys have heaters to cut the crap! :P)

A lot has happened since I last started a conversation with you guys. For one, I've moved out of Dwarka and am now in East Delhi, a degree warmer and a lot closer to civilization. After 3500Kms being clocked on my bike, I've finally found Delhi interesting. I no longer crib that I'm missing Bangalore 'coz yes my dear friends....I now officially have a life! yipeeeee! (To all those weirdo pals of mine back in Bangalore...nopes, I didn't get married! :P)

Just thought I'd start off with a teaser and remind the world that I'm still alive...will get back to blogging as soon as possible...keep watching this space for more as I bring you - "Working with Govt Officials...A Revisit!" This is a sequel to my very first blog and should probably go on for a couple of posts.....so why am I going back to the same lame topic? Quite simple....I'm surrounded by them!!

Where's my beer??

2007-12-27T13:08:00.001+08:00

Click! Click! Clik!

2007-09-19T02:56:00.001+08:00

A friend of mine introduced me to the magic of flickr recently. I'm hooked onto it like flies on garbage now :)

Take a look at my shots at moi flickr page

http://www.flickr.com/photos/shanim/

A comfortable job...

2007-09-12T17:55:00.000+08:00

As all my blog posts start off with "It's been a long time..." I shall refrain from repeating myself as the statement is now implied :)

I was browsing the net in search of some information on Ramadhan and when it would start (apparently I'm lazy to go to a masjid and find out from there) and I stumble upon this new article on Khaleej Times. This made me think....how fun would it be to have a job just looking at the moon? They have a committee that works once a month, stare at the sky and search for a moon. Their conversations at work would probably be....

Guy A: Hey is that the moon there?
Guy B: No stupid, that's just the lights off the Burj Dubai
Guy A: Oh yeah...how had i missed that??
Guy C: Hey there there the moon!!!
Guy B: hmmm...let me have a look at it...ok this calls for a conference, get Moon Sighting Committee in Dubai on the line

135kms away

Dubai: Aloo alooo....yes yes...we are the moon sighting committee in Dubai...how may we help you?
Guy B: We think we saw the moon did you?
Dubai: Aaah...come to think of it, we were supposed to do that tonight right? Just a min...
(a couple of screaming and shouting later)
....yes yes...we too see it.
Guy A: Alright so we have seen the moon. Call the press, and we'll see ya next month.

Ka-Ching! Salary in the bank....

Now that's what I call a good job. Alright now if that was a weird job, let's move onto another scenario...this I am narrating out of a real life experience I had and although I'm known to stretch the truth a little, the following is as-is!

It was a bright Sunday morning....possibly 'coz it was 12pm...but nevertheless it was bright and it was well....uhm...(ok ok let's just take it as 11:59am)...morning! I had finally decided to have a haircut after 2 months. Those of you who don't know me, this is normal my hair doesn't grow much...and to those who do...."I DO have hair!!!". A friend of mine had suggested a certain hairdresser in South Delhi and said they did a wonderful job and wasn't too expensive (by this he meant it didn't cross 500Rs). I was in a mood to spoil myself so I thought I'd give it a shot.

An hour long auto ride and I was in Vasant Vihar. A quick bite at McDonald's and there I was at the store, wondering if I should go ahead and give them a challenge of a lifetime....ie. to cut my hair! My decision...as you may have all guessed...was to go in after all.

I walked in and my first query was with their charges. They had different rates for a hair cut and a cut with a wash inclusive, the miser in me decided to choose the former and I was stuffed in one of those fancy chairs in front of a mirror that did anything but show you your reflection. The barber (uhm....I learnt later that he was a 'hairdresser' and took quite a huge offense when I called him a 'barber' out loud...yes yes...and I've learned never to mess around with a man who cuts your hair and is armed with a couple of sharp objects) said my hair was too messy and required a wash...$$$$ was the only thing in my mind then...but I remind you once again...I never mess with a guy armed with sharp objects...

The pesky assistant kicked off his long and irritating conversation just about then. His questions ranged from "Where did you cut your hair before this?", "Are you losing hair?", "Sir, your blackheads are showing", "Are you from Delhi?","How much do they charge for a haircut in Bangalore?","Why are you looking so tired sir? Shall I suggest a facial?".....little was he to know that I was plotting a murder...the victim...as you may have guessed was right in front of me...all I needed was to distract the hairdresser for a few seconds and arm myself with one of his weapons....alas...it was not meant to be :(

I was stuffed back in the chair and was now staring at my face...which looked tired....and voila...enter hairdresser with a utility belt stuffed with scissors of various shapes and sizes and a wicked smile on his face. He observed his canvas for a while...and flinched...this was probably not one of his lucky days...he spent a whole 10 minutes staring at my hair...and occasionally shaking his head wondering why he was selected on this bright day with his toughest challenge. He finally decided to make conversation and asked me "What would you like?" to which I said that anything that looks presentable is fine. There was a momentary smile and then he went back to observing his canvas. And then without any notice, he picked up his scissors and was at work.

I spent the whole time observing how this artist was working on his masterpiece (if you may call it that). A clip here and a clip there, it was amazing seeing him go...after 15 minutes of intense struggle, he was done! The pesky assistant was now back and he began his questions once again as he banged my head into position (this is a certain thing exclusive to Indian barber shops...oops hair stylists :P). The hairdresser was back and he put on a hair styling cream and whacked my hand when I attempted to style it myself. He had a look that would probably get a lion to run for cover and once again I remind you...sharp objects. The final question that the pesky assistant left me with was "Sir, do they tip in Bangalore?"...My answer (quite predictable).."No we don't"...to which his immediate response was "But out here they tip a lot"...I smiled...He insults me about my hair, my face, my poor nose and then bugs me every two seconds with totally meaningless questions and now has the nerve to ask for a tip....yea right! The armed man took over and led me to the cashier. I was forced to pay for the wash as well and I made a quick exit...watching as I left, a tear on the hairdresser's eye ('coz of his miserable failure) and the disappointed face of the pesky assistant.

I get home and finally got to see myself in a mirror....sigh...and once again I'm in a loss of words....and hair!!

To new beginnings...

2007-08-28T03:30:00.000+08:00

Homesick...but where's home?

2007-08-27T03:53:00.000+08:00

Its just one of those days again....a time when you look back at images of a distant memory and wonder when you'd be able to be there once again...

NRIs, non-resident indians (non-returning indians to some) are probably the most confused souls in this planet. We often move out of our country in search of better futures and a better life on the other side of the world. 37 yrs back, my dad did the same, a long ship ride into a deserted country and a decade plus of struggles later he brought smiles to many lives around him. I've just completed 24 yrs, the time my dad made the decision to move out...here I am in Delhi, blogging this out to you as I stay completely confused abt my present, my past and most importantly...my future!

Let's just stick with the past...the reason I began this post in the first place. A couple of months back, Samir (a buddy from school) began posting pics of our good times in school...this was followed by a couple of others doing the same and I (being the non-imaginative one) followed suite as well. This was followed by a major frenzy of activities within Facebook: tags, photo comments, friend add requests, and the "Where the hell are you dude??" msgs flowing in.....a close look at the profiles and I guess I got to see close to 40 different cities listed there as current location!! A look at the pics....and few seconds of being in a trance later...I realize what we had when we were there together in Abu Dhabi might never happen again. The games of football, the bunking of classes, the broken basketball rims (courtesy of me and a couple others...esp when we were bunking and avoiding any form of attention), swimming competitions, the all you can eats at pizza hut and kfc, the meetings at the corniche we knew...the boring city of Abu Dhabi was not soo boring to us back then...

Missing you all...and wish going back home would really mean to all you guys and gals from ADIS and not just to the city we now know as "Boring"

Jai Hind

2007-08-15T16:38:00.001+08:00

60yrs of total bliss...60yrs of freedom...60yrs of crazy politicians....but all worth it! A very Happy Independence!!!!!

Across the border

2007-08-14T12:41:00.000+08:00

Wishing all my brothers and uhm....sisters??...naaaaaa....and all the gals across the border and very happy Independence!

Wish I was there....

2007-08-05T16:57:00.001+08:00

Just a thought...

2007-06-25T02:04:00.000+08:00

Observe closely and you will find a statement 'Crush the bottle after use.' on the label of a Gatorade.

I'd like to meet someone who was successful at that with a pet bottle, especially the Gatorade ones.

Of dreamers and cycle rickshaws...

2007-06-17T00:42:00.000+08:00

A long time away from blogging and I'm finally back! yipeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!! Guess the rains inspired me to finally blog.

The heat in Delhi was just unbearable and it resulted in constant loss of liquids in my body and a certain tingling feeling on the keyboard 'coz of all the sweat accumulating there (yes yes I can certainly be gross and I shall avoid getting into further details). A sweltering few days since the beginning for June...which had me doing quite a bit of jogging and jumping in my room (oh now...u know me, i can't be health conscious can I?) thanks to the hot floor :S. But yes...it did some good too, many of my long forgotten friends started messaging me and mailing me to see if I was still alive and hadn't melted yet :D

Now that I'm done with my ramblings, let's get down to business as I sip my Gatorade into the night. If Delhi's got me addicted to something, it's Gatorade! I could go on about it but I'm no cricketer to endorse products.

A few months back I had started using a certain cycle rickshaw regularly from the metro station to my office near New Delhi Railway Station. It wasn't me being lazy to walk, it was just that there was this one guy who always offered to take me there and was pretty good at convincing me to sit in his rickshaw. Let's just start from the beginning then....it was 9:35p...I was late (yes you all may have noticed the accidental p I placed there...let me correct that...9:35am :D) and one of our subcons had arrived at site and was calling me up and asking me where I was as the door was locked (I double as a security guard...or the 'Keymaker' if you want it to sound more matrix like). I had to get to the site and couldn't afford to take my routine 15 minute morning walk. A bunch of rickshaws stood before me and for once, the dim bulb in the brain shone bright!

Me: Bhaiya, I need to go to Zakir Hussain College. How much will you charge?
R1 : 15Rs
Me: Are you crazy????? I'll pay 5Rs.
R1 : Sorry I won't go

(moves to the next rickshaw and attempts the same dialogue again)

R2 : 10Rs sir
Me: 5Rs!
R2 : Sir pay 8Rs I'll take you there
Me (thinking) : hmmm....should I just go or waste another 10 minutes haggling?
Me: sigh...okay (yes, we indians love to haggle and hate losing in any of the Bargain Battles)

And that's the story of how I first got into that rickshaw. In the days that followed, he'd get ready with his cycle rickshaw when I got out of the metro station and ask me to get in. His rates went down from the initial 8Rs to 5Rs for the ride. Often I'd pay an advace for two or three days and he wouldn't ask for more (yes yes I did tip once in two weeks).

One morning as I got into the rickshaw, I noticed the guy looked pretty worried. Curiosity got the best of me and...

Me: Hey, you look upset...something wrong?
RW (Rickshaw walla...I just realised I forgot to ask him his name!): Yes sir, last night someone stole all my money, I was sleeping on that corner of the road and they took all the money I had made that day.
Me: Oh my God! That's bad!
RW: Yes sir, I had bought a new shirt for my brother and one for myself and kept it in a bag. In the evening I had downed a few and went off to sleep there and the next morning I see that someone had taken my plastic bag....the b@#%@!#s!
Me (thinking): New clothes...bag....alcohol...loss of senses...sleep on road...robbed....yep kinda makes sense
Me: That's real bad (yep...I was totally monotonous there and couldn't think of anything else to say...eventually the light bulb helped)...wrong time to ask you this but how much do you make a day?
RW: Sir, generally I make around 400-500Rs a day. After food and alcohol, I manage to save around 300Rs a day.

Me (thinking again): hmmm...500X25 (assuming he's working everyday) comes to around 1250...oh boy life must be tough for him....uhm...wait....500X25?? WTF!!! That's 12,500Rs without taxes!!!! I got paid that much in my first year in the company!!!!!!

Me: That's quite a sum, why do you keep all the money in your hand always? Why don't you get a savings account in one of the banks nearby and get an ATM card. You can put in money every evening after you finish work. You'll be able to save a lot more and send money to your family in the village too.
RW: Sir I already have an account, but it's on the other side of town. I've got 3lacs there which one of my relatives had given me. I'm saving that to start a business of my own in a few months. I'm hoping to save some from the work I'm doing now.
Me: Yeah and you can make it much better if you start saving your money and not letting others rob you
RW: Yes sir....sir...do you think they'll give me an account in one of those banks?
Me: Why not?? There are many banks nearby. State Bank of India will open one for you with just the savings you make everyday. And you can deposit money at any time of the day. Even at night.
RW: Really sir? I was thinking of putting it in my account there but it's too far and I can't go everyday. I think I shall do something tomorrow or so...Thank you sir...Sir if you don't mind, could you give me an advance for tomorrow, I haven't had breakfast.

Paid him 15Rs that day...yes a measly sum but it meant a lot to him. It's funny how we underestimate many ppl around us. These guys move in from neighboring states into Delhi and slog their days riding contraptions that carry 3-4 ppl in the summers of Delhi. Often having to bargain their fare for an extra Re or two.

Their dreams may be modest, but it's nice to know that this city....the Lazy Metro...still has it's dreamers...the ones who still dream of a future where they are sitting behind a store making money out of hard work than sleeping away in a corner office. Haven't seen the guy for almost 3 weeks now...I'm hoping he got his savings right and managed to get that store he was dreaming and telling me of.....the very Best of Luck to him :)

Peak a booo

2007-06-03T02:48:00.000+08:00

Sigh...I'm speechless!

The heat is on!

2007-04-01T03:30:00.000+08:00

It's summer already and Delhi is back on it's infamous heat streaks....a whopping 40 degrees for a while and lingering at 36+ in Celsius all day is anything but pretty...and to top it off, the Air Con at work was turned off....some intelligent soul decided that the Air Con deserved a holiday and thought of giving it one this Saturday. Uhm no...I'm not talking abt the situation at my company, but it's well....at a site where i'm working....the details, I shall refrain from revealing...let's just say an earlier cribbing session has come back to haunt me in the form of a project :( (Hey don't get me wrong, work's awesome!)

Another week ends and this time around instead of writing down my weekly report to my Technical Manager I thought I'd give my blog a shot...sigh and I'm back to having nothing to write. A long week can do things to you....but a long and eventful one at that. A friend flew in halfway around the world to meet me for one ;) Alright so she didn't fly down halfway around the world 'just' to meet me, there were other important things but hehe....let's just use the more appealing reason :D A Dilli Darshan that lasted almost 10hrs, loads of shopping and a goodbye at the airport sums up my thursday....did I forget to mention the amazing food? Sigh....I still drool thinking of the amazing stuff we had all thro' the day! Observe as I stuff in a 50Rs Momo :

Aaaaaah...now that we're done with the drooling...how many of you have got a compliment from a person who has later made you feel extremely uncomfortable with a racist statement? It was just another day at work, a site that is being set up by us Engineers and one of the officials from the client started up a conversation with me, let's just call him Mr K

This conversation has been translated from a combination of English and Hindi to English to assist the linguistically challenged and to avoid embarrassing myself 'coz of my extremely funny version of the National Language

Mr K: Hey Shanim, how's the progress on the site?
Me: Going on great sir. We're moving quite quickly and have managed to make and beat most of our targets. (yes yes I'm trying to make it sound 'professional' ;) )
Mr K: Do you know something, your Hindi is real good for a south indian

Blushes stammers and speaks gibberish and Mr. K regrets having uttered those few sentences mentioned above

Me: No sir, I'm far from perfect. I still make quite a few blunders as I speak. (sigh...modest ain't I?)
Mr K: Oh no, it is quite good. Since you primarily use other languages and use Hindi only to converse with us, I feel it is good. We find it very difficult to speak English, which we use only in rare situations, and you are quite fine with both English and Hindi. Even your accent sounds quite good and not like a southie.
Me: Oh!...Thank you :)

An awkward silence follows....

Mr K: So Shanim, what does your name mean?
Me (thinking): Sigh...hate this question!
Me: It doesn't really have a meaning. My dad had made it up and I find that a good enough reason to love it.
Mr K: That's real nice. So what is your full name?
Me: It's Shanim Sainul, sir.
Mr K: Oh, so you're christian are you?
Me (thinking): sigh....this would be the 2324112nd person assuming I'm X'ian...how do I tell the guy I'm agnostic?....uhm...let's leave it as Muslim
Me: No no sir, I'm Muslim

A silence follows, he looks uneasy and suddenly gets defensive

Mr K: Oh, I'm sorry, I shouldn't be asking you this. Hope you don't mind.
Me (thinking): WTF???
Me: No sir, why should it be a problem :) It's okay.

We move in different directions and he resumes his silent chantings from the Bhagvath Gita as I continue to watch my Malaysian friend talk to the sub-contractors in a language that baffles me, it's a mixture of english and a dramatic performance worthy of an award. (Uhm...yeah I do help out eventually....I mean I have to stop laughing to do so, right?)

A normal conversation isn't it? or is it? Aren't we all just plain racists? We walk around talking about people from south india as madrasis or southies and when we're down south in Bangalore, we abuse the 'northies' who have absolutely no care for the city and it's beauty. We call people Mallus, Gultes, Pandis, Chinkies, Surds....the list just goes on. True we never realize it. We probably have the worst case of racist behavior and it continues to be a part of us being Indian. I've often heard people talk about their caste and how it is not acceptable to marry someone from a different caste, or of how another person was of a lower caste and their 'kind' used to deliver milk in villages. Now why did all this spark a thought in my otherwise vacuum head?

It's 10:30pm. I walk home after a tiring day at work and a tough search for some snacks for the long night (fine....I choose to make the nights long by sleeping at 2am) and on my way to the gate I overheard a very weird conversation. A man, quite tall and bulky was talking to a cycle rickshaw guy. The only thing I heard (which was quite loud mind you) was "Tum Hindu ho ke Musalmaan??" (Translated as "Are you Hindu or Muslim??"). I was distracted by a friend of mine at this point and didn't see what happened next but.......does this question really matter???? I often get jealous of the Chinese....most of them are free-thinkers and are not limited in their sights and perspective to just religion or castes for that matter. A Chinese friend of mine was fascinated when we talked about religion. She had never heard of Buddhism and Islam before and she looked at us like a 5-yr old at a candy store.

We remain in our closed boxes, shying away from interacting with people from 'other' backgrounds. After all, they are different and they can be threatening to us. Why the $!#@# are we still living in a archaic society??? Isn't it time we moved on and changed our perspective?

A religion is merely our guide to be good to the world, it's there to give us peace of mind and more often than not, we're born into it (atleast in India). Is this a reason to fight on or profile?? BEATS ME!!

Dream

2007-03-04T02:51:00.000+08:00

"Hey...don't ever let somebody tell you 'You can't do something'....not even me alright?

You got a dream, you gotta protect it...people can't do something themselves, they tell you 'You can't do it'....you want something? Go get it!...Period!!" --Chris Gardner in 'The Pursuit of Happyness'

A couple of words that struck my heart like a sword and struck it good. I've no better word to say about this movie than "Amazing!!". Adding one more quote from the movie to end this tiny post.

"And it was at that time that I thought about Thomas Jefferson writing that Declaration of Independence. Him saying that we have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And I thought about how he knew to put the 'pursuit' in there, like no one can actually have happiness. We can only pursue it."

Maybe it's just all around us....maybe it's just waiting for us to call on it...maybe we've forgotten to smile and welcome happiness into our lives....maybe...just maybe.....

Incredible India

2007-02-17T05:47:00.000+08:00

An interesting conversation sparked up the other day while we were traveling to a site in Delhi. My manager and another of his colleagues were with me in a tiny cab which apparently had more accidents than engine parts. We were talking about some incidents that had occurred recently in the country and eventually ended up having a discussion on drugs.

It is known to most students in the country that drugs are very much in business and available cheap. Local panwallahs near colleges are often the easiest links to get 100gms of Weed for a amounts that can be considered pretty much like pocket change. And this is surprising?? Think again!!

We often hear from our conservative parents that such things are true only in places like "Bangalore", "Bombay" etc....me being from Kerala, they continue to vouch for the state and tell me that the state is a real nice place and doesn't have any influence of sorts. Reality, however, contradicts! It may be true that my college didn't have much of an influence to this and if it did, I was unaware of the same, but move out of the place and into most other cities and tourist hubs and you're bound to find a stoned foreigner or student walking around. The pretext of coming into the country for "religious" and "spiritual" peace is more or less a couple of words that just mean nothing if you were to look at it carefully. The reason why India is known to be mystical and magical is probably because half the tourists who come in here remain 'high' through their stay here and....well it's kinda obvious what happens then right?

So what exactly am I talking about here? An external link may help : High in the mountains...

Video Reports of the same : Video

A coincidence? Maybe not....with things happening around the country (and the world for that matter) it was bound to come out sooner or later. Kudos to the reported and CNN-IBN for covering such a controversial topic! And yep, the 3.9 million tourist inflow (as of 2005) may just surge higher after this report...

Missing...

2007-02-12T02:00:00.000+08:00

Last night I was unable to get a wink of sleep and spent 2 hours walking around my tiny room wondering what to do. Spent sometime online (yep nothing new) and then after a couple of blog reading and commenting I moved on to gaming and then a book and finally the newspaper. I've been keeping off the paper in Delhi lately since it's the Indian Express and the paper hasn't really caught my attention much owing to it's very brief content.....until last night ie.

The Front Page of Saturday's Newspaper had a disturbing tale to tell us and it shocked me.

Children all over the country seem to be going missing and not many seem to care, or atleast don't seem to notice. We often find kids walking around the roads and traffic signals begging for alms, we given them a cold shoulder and just walk by. How often do we stop to think twice or maybe ask them where they're from? I'm sure we being Indians love to know what's happening in our neighbour's house or maybe Amitabh Bachan's family but little do we care about the children walking around on the streets with tattered clothes abused psychologically, physically and often sexually. And where do they come from? Probably homes like ours or maybe our neighbours' (where we so often poke our noses into).

The recent Nithari case was a wake up call. And yet we fail to understand that this is just one of a million other similar occurrences around the country. A whopping 1,047 children go missing in Kerala alone, as per the article. This from a state that boasts to have one of the best Police forces in the country. I shudder to think what the numbers are in other states or of the many that go unreported! A child going out for a haircut, another to play cricket or another out to meet a friend....all missing, and we aren't just talking of young children but some as old as 16yrs.

Fear sets in one's mind just picturing this and I wonder...."How safe are our kids??"

A response to Gandhigiri Vs Gurugiri

2007-02-11T14:00:00.000+08:00

Hey ppl, as suggested by a friend of mine, I've decided to post one of my comments on her post as a blog entry. The discussion was on Gandhi and Ambani, as two movies (viz. "Lage Raho Munnabhai" and "Guru") have come on recently and brings in two schools of thought on how changes were made in India. Which thought would you opt for?

Original Post:

Gurugiri v/s Gandhigiri

"I thought I'd be diplomatic and keep away, but something deep within me wasn't letting me do that and forced me to begin typing...it's a curse I say!

Gurugiri Vs Gandhigiri...let the battle begin...

1) Gandhi stands in front of the British and says "Get out" (alright so maybe it was "Quit India") and they say no..years of non-obedience later they leave....Guru stands in front of the Parsi community in Mumbai and says "Quit killing progress with ur practises and let us trade in peace"...a couple of intelligent gestures later they cede defeat....Guru 1 - Gandhi 1

2) The British imposes a law that brought out a salt tax. Gandhi defied it and "Dandi March" was marked as a prominent mark in history and a twist (couldn't get a good word here :D ) in our fight for freedom....License Raj and complicated laws prevailed in India that restricted free trade in india...Guru defied it by cheating the Govt. out of export duties....Gandhi 0.5 - Guru 1.5 (since we are referring to Gandhi in Lage Raho....)

3) Gandhi along with many other freedom fighters including Mohd. Ali Jinnah (True he was also the reason why we have a Pakistan and a Bangladesh but hey...he was crucial in our freedom struggle) got us our independence....Guru (The real one) along with many other prominent businessmen provided valuable input that eventually resulted in the Govt. Of India to modify business rules in the country and eventually kill the license raj (although not completely)....Gandhi 1 - Guru 1

Hmm....Guru leads I guess...

my opinion?..they are pretty much the same...we are all humans and we all tend to have our shades of grey...I personally don't think anything in this world can be achieved by being a complete angel, often fighting fire with fire is an only option and if you were to fight it with water then (referring to an electrical fire) you'd probably lose the race (in a big way wrt. the example given) in the end. Being oblivious to this is pretty much living in a fantasy world...wake up and smell the thorns (where have I heard that??) 'coz life ain't a bed of roses!"

I'm High....uhm....or maybe Low...

2007-01-31T00:58:00.000+08:00

If there is one thing I hate, it's a writer's block...and this from a person who writes just once or twice a month is all the more shocking. The past few weeks have been quite eventful. I ended up with a sore stomach which resulted in a low bp. Yep...quite bad and the funny part of it, it took a visit to Costa Coffee for me to realise I wasn't feeling well.....I'll explain that in a bit.

Low bp reminds me of a certain day in Abu Dhabi in my 12th grade. Abizar, Akshath and Vikas (I think it was him), tagged along with me and we headed to a pool joint nearby. We thought of playing for an hour before we headed out for dinner and then back home...a routine evening after school......turned out that it wasn't really routine as time progressed.

We started playing and a few shots (and no I don't mean shots of vodka or tequila) later something was weird and I was flying....rather it felt like I was. Two seconds later, my right hand went off to sleep, followed by my right eye and gradually my speech was going astray. It took me a minute to get back to my senses, but something shocking happened just after that.....I pocketed a ball!!! (Oh yes...that is shocking since at most times I would just help the opposing team by placing the white right where they want it to score). My friends were alarmed...shocked I say...shocked! I could actually see Akshath's eyes pop out....thankfully the sockets that hold his eyeballs were stable enough to not let go of them. Two shots more and I was actually pocketing balls...ofcourse my winning streak didn't last long (sigh...it never does :( ) and I was talking normal....or so I thought....

We decided to quit the game....uhm....alright let's stick to reality for a bit...we ran out of cash and the guy running the place wasn't really interested in giving credit to 4 pesky kids who rarely came to his joint. He asked us to make a move or listen to some arabic poetry...hehe the only few words I recall in arabic are "Salam aleiykum, Valeikum As Salam, Shukran, La, Na'am"....with the limited vocabulary of ours, we figured it was no longer poetry when the amplitude of his voice reached alarming level.

Our favorite shawarma store was round the corner and two shawarmas later I was no longer in a state of trance...yet something disturbed me...we decided to kill time by taking a walk around the block and probably meeting up with a friend below his place nearby. That's when things started getting funny.....I spoke....or I thought I did...I had no idea what I had said.....frankly I never do, but this time around, neither did my friends...they just looked at me and had a puzzled look on their face...hmmmm....got me thinking....and then few more sentences followed...I believe I was arguing with myself on something....a couple of laughs later (when Akshath finally got back his breath) I said "Guys, If I fall down please do call a fire station"...."A What???" Abizar screamed out...."A Fire...uhm...oh an Ambulance...and take me to a restaurant maan...I need a panadol"....a loud laugh later Akshath realised I was talking about a Pharmacy.....I was then dragged into a cab and dropped back home....shut the lights and hit the bed...mom was worried as always and ten minutes later I headed to the bathroom and puked twice......

The next morning I was back to normal.....now why did I bring this up? hehe I just realised that was exactly what I felt the other day when my BP went down. I was walking wondering why DDA designed the footpath with an inclination of 45 degrees and I couldn't understand why the video store was making a big fuss about something called "Paisa"...headed home and a friend called up and asked me to go out with him to the market. I thought I could use the air and we headed to the Costa Coffee nearby...since I was feeling extremely weird in the Cycle Rickshaw (hallucinating basically) I decided to visit a doc and say hi....well the hi was followed by a lo....a lo bp and a ban from coffee for a week :( Turned out I was just extremely tired and had lost a lot of water and electrolytes thanks to Diarrhea...hehe interesting...I hadn't realised......Oh well...I guess I never do.

Back and kicking now and I still have absolutely no idea what I should write for this post.....hmmm...guess I should just get back to you guys when I think of something more relevant.....ofcourse there are a few things I wanna get out of my head...but I can't seem to get the right words for it....sigh...guess the low bp is acting up again ;)

Audio Detour

2007-01-13T00:08:00.000+08:00

A couple of months back I met up with a senior of mine online after a reeeeal long time. It's almost 8 years since I last met him, and from his pics...he hasn't changed much. It was absolutely great catching up. We were in the same house back in school (Spring House ROCKS) and swam for the swim team as well. He had told me then that he plays for a band and it wasn't surprising since he was part of the Band back then and played real good!

Now for the catch....when he said band, I thought it was something like the bands we had in school or like most here in Indian colleges...play popular tunes and modify some a bit and mark them as your own creation....sigh...guess again! Wait...why guess?? Check them out for yourself. The band is AudioDetour and my pal's name is Agul. He plays bass guitar in the band and they sound awesome! You can listen to their tunes at their site. Do check it out, it'll be worth it...trust me!

Damn my pals are awesome...wonder what happened to me! :) oh yeah I remember...we'll leave that for a later discussion...

A Little about them:

"About AudioDetour

AudioDetour is a four member band that strives to create a new musical experience that blends genres from two different corners of the world. The band has been and will continue to experiment with different sounds and feels of music that complement traditional Indian poetry.

The members of AudioDetour are:

Sai - Lead Male Vocals/keyboards/arrangement/mixing
Gary - Rhythm/Lead guitar
Agul - Bass/Rhythm/Lead guitar
Silpa - Lead Female Vocals

AudioDetour has been together for over two years and it all began when Sai took a leap into the world of composing. Having dabbled in it briefly, he turned his dream into reality by acquiring the precious music equipment that is the life of AudioDetour's studio today. Gary, a passionate learner of his instrument, was looking for avenues to explore further. Agul was active in the local circuit and quickly made name for himself as a dynamic bass and guitar player. A walk into Sai’s studio is all it took for these two guitarists to get serious about their passion. The three ended up working on their first song. Silpa was a popular performer of popular Bollywood numbers and Ghazals at local events. After being introduced to the band through a common friend, Silpa decided to lend her voice to AudioDetour.

Alongside composing and recording music, live performances have become a major part of AudioDetour’s journey. These performances have resulted in massive support from Indians and Americans in and around the United States. AudioDetour has also been featured on a couple of radio shows and podcasts including a popular show on BBC Radio.

The songs featured here are drawn from AudioDetour's debut album, "Transitions, Reflections and 9 kilos of Aachaar". The album contains 9 songs, which try to capture a gamut of emotions, from fun to romantic to pensive. Genre is not a boundary for this album, for which influences are drawn from carnatic, hindustani, rock, blues, and many more."

Share Auto Miseries

2007-01-08T13:56:00.000+08:00

It was a lovely morning today. I was finally able to wake up at 6am although the cold was unbearable. Got up from bed and turned on the Water Heater. Now since it is pretty cold, I usually leave it on for around half an hour before I take a bath. Went back to bed to escape from the cold and well...yep...you guessed it, I slept off and woke up at 8:15am...oh crap...there goes my cab :(....and what's worse? This was my first day in that cab!

Got ready and headed out by 8:45am and got in one of those Green Delhi autos to Kapashera border. The cold was as always unbearable and got me numb in a few minutes. At the border, after switching Auto Rickshaws to one of those share autos found here I was moving again......but not for long.....

For the unenlightened readers, the Share Auto I'm talking about has 15 people stuffed in a contraption designed for 4. I'm usually stuck in a position where a leg, both hands and my head would be outside the auto with just one leg barely hanging in. Today was my lucky day and I got a seat up front.

The auto suddenly stalled and the driver pulled over. He asked the two others sitting in front to get out and overturned his seat to see the engine. Now for the surprise, the accelerator's cable had broken and he was determined not to lose his customers. He pulled out the cable (or what was left of it), pulled it a couple of times to ensure that the acceleration was working fine, routed it over a couple of loops in the front and finally tied it to a point up front. This was kinda confusing at first and well it freaked me out. He asked everyone to get back in and.....brace yourself for this....he stepped on the wire and sped off!

So I reached my office safe and sound...blogging this out to you guys...hoping the guy did spend 15 bucks and got that cable repaired...

A Sleepless Night....

2007-01-06T09:47:00.000+08:00

A serious case of blogger's block has been looming around me and a couple of my blogging buddies. We constantly visit each other's blogs and notice that the other hasn't blogged and procrastinate blogging on our own. Today, I'm breaking this habit and finally penning down my thoughts.

I had a wonderful New Year's Eve, the jobless (uhm...let me rephrase that, lifeless) person that I was, I went to work on New Year's eve and spend the turn of the year working on keeping two of our switches up. Uhm...to the non-technical audience, I was just making sure you guys could call your loved ones and say "Hey!! Happy New YEAR!!!" :) yep...lame but hey, I wasn't the only one there :) hehe..so there are more of us who don't really have a life. A heavy fog had hit the city then and my cab driver had an awesome time stopping every few seconds to step out and ensure that we were still on the road....and occasionally to walk around and check where we were :) After a gruelling two hours of searching for streetlights, sign boards, and insanely blind bikers speeding at 120 in a fog of visibility 50m, he finally got me home. A short nap later, I learn that most of my friends got wasted the previous night hours before the turn of the year. Hehe...so I don't have a life, the rest had way too much of it to stay up to enjoy the countdown...so hey...guess it evened out :)

Well, speaking of night activities....guess I'm getting used to the fact that I do dumb things, I fail to notice them these days. The other day I had a night activity and was to reach an Exchange at Tis Hazari at 9:45pm. Since there was this huge confusion about cabs, I finally didn't get one and was asked to get to the exchange on my own. The miser that I am, I decided to use the Metro. Left home at 8:30p and walked towards the metro station at Dwaraka Sec 10 (This is the second last station on the westward direction of the Blue Line). My plan, arrive at CP in 45 minutes, catch my connection to Kashmere Gate through the Yellow line, get the last train out of Kashmere Gate on the Red Line to Tis Hazari just in time to get there by 9:45 or 10p. Oh well, with Delhi's well known punctuality, being 15 minutes late would actually be too early!

Sigh...little was I to know that the world was conspiring against me already. I reached the station around 8:50p and well guess what happens, no train....5 minutes pass.....10....12....and finally a train pops up...yep, I had forgotten that the frequency at this station was 12 minutes and I had just missed the previous train.

A whole 40 minutes later I get a call from one of my colleagues asking me where I was and that they were leaving Tis Hazari to the site as we were getting late. I'm sure all of you have been in situations like this when your mind just fails to perform a task that it has spent over 23 years perfecting....thinking! I jumped out of the train at the next station and jumped into a rickshaw and headed to the site....uhm...now for the punch line...my dearest readers, I didn't know where the site was :) I'm almost always sleeping just before I get to this site at a place called Shaktinagar. It's in a place I haven't ventured into during the day and hence I was pretty sure I'd get lost. The rickshaw finally entered Shaktinagar Circle (it's also the market there...read my prev post to understand what they mean by "markets" here)...and yes you guessed it, I was lost...we asked a couple of people around if they knew where I wanted to go...yep sounds demented, but we tried giving it a shot anyways...finally we were informed that we were on the wrong side of Shaktinagar, and we would have to travel another 5-10kms to the right place. Time's ticking away and my colleague rung up when I hadn't reached. Thats when my dearest brain decided to work for the first time that night, and I gave my phone to the rick driver and he gave him directions. Cold winds had me numb but hey I was finally there after a whopping 20 minutes!

Scheduled Time of Departure - 8:15p
Actual Time of Departure - 8:30p
Expected Time of Arrival - 9:55p
ACtual Time of Arrival - 11:00p (Oh yes...even with Delhi's norms for punctuality, I was LATE)

Sigh...guess some things never change!

Personalized Coffee :)

2006-12-27T16:32:00.000+08:00

Interesting images from imagechef

Brrr..the winter's here!

2006-12-12T03:08:00.001+08:00

A lovely morning welcomed me today as i headed to the office :) The weather's just awesome and the fog made it all the better

Kyapital D!

2006-11-26T18:27:00.000+08:00

It was just another day in the office when I got a call from my Technical manager asking me to prepare for an interview in a couple of hours by our client. Although surprised, I felt it was best doing something about it rather than brooding away. The afternoon on the same day, I finally had the interview and well...I wasn't impressed by myself.

The next day, my TM calls me into his office with a fierce look on his face. The client had returned with their feedback and it must have been bad....with a disappointed look on his face he showed me his laptop with the mail open...it read "We would like to hire Shanim Sainul for the project at Delhi"....WTF?? a big laughter by my TM later reality
struck..."Delhi" seemed to be brightly shining on my face like a billboard in Las Vegas....Oh Boy!!!

A long wait later, I'm finally here in the capital! My first day was uneventful, we spent 2 hours going around different sectors of Gurgaon in search of my company's office there. Apparently we had taken the wrong road to Gurgaon and ended up taking the wrong turns and were in a completely different locality. Finally at 3pm in the afternoon after a whopping 2.5hrs I was finally in the office. After the initial introductions and the reinstallation of my laptop, I was heading back home. That's when I realise how different things are in this city. I had to cross over the border and hence no through taxis to the place I was put up at, Dwaraka. My manager in Gurgaon dropped me off near the border, and I decided to walk till the border and look around for a Delhi auto. Alright so I did cross the border, but not a single auto in sight...it was as if they were alerted well in advance of my arrival and decided to evade me at all costs! A lone cycle rickshaw helped me out then...uhm...yeah I was hell guilty riding on one but well he insisted and dropped me off at the nearest junction asking me for just 2Rs!!! jeez...Guilt won over and I paid him 10 bucks....which again seemed too little for dragging over 80kgs of weight for over a km. The rickshaw charged me 60 bucks and I was finally at my pal's place around 10 in the night.

The next day was quite uneventful, besides the morning ride to my client's office. I went by three modes of transport spending over a hundred bucks to finally find the place, only to know later that I was to meet my reporting manager the next day. hmmmmm...oh well it was fun and I ain't complaining :) Under my better judgment I decided on going back home that evening by the company cab....was I relieved to reach home at 6:30! The next day was much more interesting, I was finally going into Delhi and not sticking to the routine Gurgoan journeys. My reporting manager had asked me to meet him in the GK-II (Greater Kailas) office in the afternoon. Had a relaxed morning and slowly moved out of the house and took a rick to GK-II....uhm...if u guys are wondering why I'm constantly on ricks and not on buses like it was when I had entered Bangalore...well...times change and company pays ;) (atleast I'm hoping)...and moreover, there are practically zero buses from Dwaraka to most parts of the city...hence not worth waiting for one.

It was an hour long journey and I was finally in one of the most posh areas in the city. When I got the address, I was told that the place was near the M-Block market....for a moment I pictured a vegetable market with bullock carts all around and hawkers screaming out for attention....sigh...yep I was wrong. The M-Block market is anything but that...the first shop I saw CCD, followed by Barrista, and a couple of other coffee pubs..I later learnt that this is the girl hangout...uhm...youth hangout in Delhi and has some of the best pubs....pubs like Diva and rpm...yep it's a hep part of town and trust me...it's awesome....as for the babes...well all of you who've seen the forward about India Pakistan Friendship (the huge crowd of girls at a concert to be more specific) apparently haven't been to delhi!!!! The below average looking girls here are as pretty as the above average looking girls back in Bangalore....and trust me...the guys who've been to Bangalore can surely get what I mean!

The weekend was quite ok, I couldn't go out much as my pal who was to give me company had work over the weekend and we just had the morning to go places. I was looking for a place to stay so it was more of house hunting than anything else. Took a ride on "Delhi ke Shaan"...no it's not my imposter...it's the Delhi Metro!!! For those who have been to London, well it's pretty much like the Tube...isn't that enough said? The Metro is just too good, and it surely makes you feel you've been teleported to some developed nation as you enter any of its stations. The only thing that gives it away is the hindi written along with english everywhere. Travel around the city is a breeze with the Metro and I'm just waiting for the time it covers the city as a whole....the second phase of the metro is expected to complete by the end of '07. Just dropped into Karol Bagh...saw a couple of houses....uhm...rather an excuse of a structure which was being rented out for over 4k and then moved back to Dwaraka where things seemed more sensible. The story about my house hunting would be a chapter on its own so I shall refrain from going into details.

Monday was an awesome day. I had woken up fully charged up and entered the bathroom to take a bath. The "courageous" person that I was, I decided to take a bath in cold water. Filled the bucket and the first mug sent shivers all over my body....with the second...I was numb! It kinda helped actually, didn't feel the rest of the mugs of water after that...so it was kewl...literally!!! The papers finally answered my puzzling mind...it had snowed in the north and has brought the mercury down in a big way...temperatures were now lingering around 9 degrees Celsius and was expected to slide further down....sigh...sweaters and two T-shirts followed. Yep the temp had come down in a big way and I could feel it all through my journey to GK-II that morning. A small chat with my colleagues and a meeting with my managers in Bangalore later I headed to Tis Hazari, a site where I would be working to check out a few things. The first thing I did notice there was monkeys! Oh boy...yes...just outside the Metro after a 2 minute walk, the place was filled with monkeys jumping around trees! hmmm...a transition from the most modern, to the India we read in most American books. It was 6 by the time I got out of there. Took the metro to Rajiv Chowk and waited for a pal at the station there and jumped out to see CP...ie. Connaught Place. The place where Ghandhiji's assassin made plans of murder. An awesome place is the smallest compliment you can give. The circular road surrounded by both International and Indian brands can surely bring out the shopper in you...and for us misers, the Palika Bazaar opens its arms out welcoming you into its stores. The place is just beautiful!!!! And as my manager said....greenery abundant ;)

Things have just begun, I'm loving it already...keep watching this space for more...for now...ciao!!

Time stands still...

2006-10-24T01:54:00.000+08:00

Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.

-Henry Van Dyke

The festival of lights !!

2006-10-23T23:44:00.000+08:00

Our neighbours rock! Don't you just love seeing such things...kills all your tensions in just a second!

Hydie Blues....and reds and greens and all the other colors you can think of!

2006-10-22T21:37:00.000+08:00

Well first before I start, I'm sure most of you must've noticed the number of pic posts have increased significantly from my previous posts....why you ask? I got a new phone!!!! Bought the new Sony Ericsson K790i on installments and boy am I happy with my purchase!!!!!! The phone has a feature that lets you blog directly from the phone onto your blogger account and I'm finally able to express my inner most....uhm confusions? Whatever...it rocks!! Btw..the diwali special pic is courtesy of the girls living opposite our flat...those kids took the pain of making a rangoli as well as decorating their flat with all the diyas possible....we haven't cleaned our room for the past 3 months...infact i've got a spider sleeping next to me....thankfully i've learnt my lessons from the bugger back home in Kerala and I've not asked him to move off yet...but yeah..the bugger does hog the blanket bigtime....sigh....shall refrain from complaining...not interested in bites anymore...

A couple of weeks back a friend of mine, Nida, had come down from Hyderabad to Bangalore on a visit...it's been almost 6yrs since I met her last and both of us were pretty excited about meeting after sooo long...Had an amazing evening and I had dinner with her mom and family...was awesome and as we split she invited me over to Hydie....which was on my to-do list since 2002 (thanks to Akshath)...took me a week of thinking and I finally decided on making the trip after all...three days of planning and I had my ticket, a place to stay, money and uhm....oh yeah...clothes :) oh no..i didn't buy anything...just did my laundary after a real long time :)

It was a friday, I was lazy to sit in the office long and well how could you...u've got Place #3 of the "Places to visit in India" list in your mind how can you? Thankfully everyone at work was in the TGIF mood and was hoping Hosur Road's traffic would disappear for the day....but alas that was a dream which would never come true. Fast forward to the time after I managed to get Vikas to sprain his leg...alright so maybe the bugger was too busy oogling at the girls at Brigade but it was me who got him walking for over 10 mins after that :) hehe...so I finally got into the bus and was on my way to the Twin City Metro of South India...the land of the Nawabs...the Charminar and most importantly....the land of Haleem and Hyderabadi Biriyani!

A short sleep that lasted just 4 hrs later I was woken up by a gullute cop bugging all of us to show our luggage....oh crap, I knew I shouldn't have taken my shaving gel in my hand baggage...uhm...wait...wasn't that airline regulations??? phew...took me a couple of minutes to realise they were looking for bottles of alcohol and my shaving gel was safe...a couple of minutes later we had entered into Hyderabad....and well I was shocked....y you ask? For one, they actually have roads....and no not like Bangalore where the roads are mere excuses of Tar laid on minute stretches...these were 8 laned dual carriageways and 6 laned dual carriageways with over 10 flyovers in the first leg of my travel alone!....I was later informed that the city has 48 flyovers!!! My friend and I were considering putting up two goal posts on either end of the road and playing some serious football....why AP could even host a friendly EPL match for the heck of it on these roads!...HDK...now you know why all the IT honchos are moving out!

The bus went all around town and I finally reached my pal Shamju's place at Tollychowki. I was to meet Nida later that day and we decided on meeting up at Hyderabad Central when it opened. The punctual soul that I am, I left at 9:15 and caught a rick to Mehdipatnam as my friends suggested. Supposedly there were regular buses from there to Punchgutta (yep Hyd Central is out there...and no I'm not nuts to go halfway round the world and then catch another bus to Hyderabad Central).....and I believed them...true there were quite a few buses, but getting onto one was something one could never dream of. Although 10 sumo wrestlers could fit in the bus and probably wrestle their way out of tickets in the bus, there would always be close to twenty people hanging on the footboards....to get fresh air i'm assuming. And jumping into one of these is as good as being roadkill. I noticed a lone bus sitting in a corner silently waiting for its prey and I jumped in. It took a lousy half an hour before the driver popped up, drove away a demented guy who was drunk from the bus (everyone in the bus was having a laugh ragging the poor guy....and i remained the silent observer....yep i'm mallu after all)...

It was close to 9:50 when the bugger finally got the vehicle moving. I was quite psyched out 'coz that meant I would prbbly be late and not make it at 10...but wait...apparently you guys don't know what I hadn't known then...this should explain things better...in a nutshell, I reached there at 9:59....and I had a whole 60 seconds to cross the road and get to the entrance. And lo behold....the store is closed...(?????) I look around, not a soul...a security guy pops up and informs me that I'm nuts....fine so I knew that before...what gave me away? "The store opens only at 11 saar"...I call her up, and she confirms this fact of hyderabad, the city sleeps till 11am!!! sigh, an hour of walking around followed and a conversation with another Bangalore based guy who, like me, ended up in front of Hyderabad Central at an untimely hour of 10am...I'm sure all hyderabadis would be wondering what I was doing outside so early in the morning!

11:10, Nido arrives...and a quick walk around Central and we were off on our sightseeing trip of the city :) rather mine...Banjara Hills, Prasad's, Eat Street, Abids, McDonald's...uhm...McDonald's? oh yeah that wasn't sightseeing actually...that was feeding time :) Two burgers, a huge coke and fries later we bid goodbye and split.

The next day I'd decided to live the hydie way and woke up at 10am...yep I was still early since it was a Sunday and 10am was too early....jeez! The miseries of it all! It wasn't until 12 or so that I met up with another schoolmate of mine, Tariq...again in Hyderabad Central...we hung around Banjara Hills at his place, talking abt school and the guys around here...blah blah...nostalgia at its best....and I had to split to go to Paradise in Secunderabad...my pals had asked me to pop up there for Iftar....and to our surprise (and to the miseries of Shaheen) it was closed. It took Shaheen just 3 seconds to come up with an alternative, Pizza Hut Iftar Treat - Unlimited Pizza, Garlic bread and on ice cream for 175Rs only....sigh...this place rocks!!! We broke our fast at a masjid nearby and headed straight to Pizza Hut...a dinner that lasted over 2hours followed and we finally split. Shamju dropped me at the bus stop and it was back to Bangalore for me. Missed out on two things though :( Couldn't have Hyderabadi Haleem or Hyderabadi Biriyani when I was there :( Shaheen made it worse by explaining how Chicken and Mutton costs the same in Hyderabad and how they have huuuuuuge quantities of food...and this is not just for non-veg stuff but veg too....next time maybe...

The trip was awesome and since I hadn't purchased the k790i then, I don't have any pics :( Anyways, guys...I'm moving out of Bangalore soon....going waaaaay up North to Delhi...I'm sure there'll be waaaay many more posts once I get there...The southie that I am, I suck at hindi...the little I do know, is Mumbaiyya and that's unacceptable there....hmmm...in other words, loads of stupidity to follow...Keep reading!

Crack the code

2006-10-22T17:59:00.000+08:00

It was just another day in my life as i came across this sign..twenty minutes of pondering stil left me baffled..could someone help!!

Location - Near Scary House, Level 4, Garuda Mall, Magrath Road, B'lore

Happy Diwali

2006-10-20T16:53:00.000+08:00

Bigtime wishes to one and all!!!

Cost Cuts at a different level ;)

2006-10-19T17:11:00.000+08:00

I'm still searching for the desk.... :)

Thoughts from a different dimension...

2006-09-27T11:28:00.000+08:00

The other day I was reading through my blog entries from the past and I noticed something quite odd....I'm getting serious lately :( Working in a professional organization is taking its toll on my humour and my brain!!!! Its like they're sucking away my passion to strive for perfection in sarcasm...the horrors of it all! Alright back from being a melodramatic maniac...now lets get to some serious thoughts (i mean....non-serious...uhm..whatever)

It's funny how we often think from a different dimension on things. Brings out the best in us and we do come up with the weirdest similies to life. hehe as an example, the spider who asked me for a rental contract in my house after biting me for breaking down his home (he called it "Webzy") or maybe my imagination of dating my bike....and where did all this start off...it was 1987, I was getting ready for bed and I just couldn't sleep...I started buggin mom and dad asking them what I should do and they asked me to pray and close my eyes....hmmm..tried...didn't help...and well TV was never an option then 'coz we had just two channels there (Abu Dhabi TV 1 and Channel 2) both dieing off at an early 8PM. I was in a dilemma and poof I heard a crack....uhm..no wait that was my brain churning out ideas....This was the day my Dream Cable Network began. It had 4 channels (yep quite a low number) which had action, romance, humour and ofcourse horror. I never lasted long in the horror channel but well the others were quite awesome.

Are you guys confused? Well I'll explain then...I started imagining that my dreamland had 4 channels and I could switch to any one of them every night. I began telling myself weird stories in my dreams which included a war against people from the planet "Karathonza" to a walk on the nearest burial grounds....was awesome....never had a prob sleeping from then on 'coz I would get tired making the story and would get bored after 15 mins of narration...yeah I pretty much bore myself well...

Have we lost all this now? Rather have I grown up and forgotten how fun it was to be a kid and to imagine.....uhm...guess my roomies wouldn't agree....

That reminds me of a discussion we had the other day. There was this newspaper article that talked about the mosquito menace near Silk Board flyover and how the BMP stuffed it with fishes that ate mosquitoes to get rid of it. I'm sure many of you can't relate to this, so let me explain. Silk Board has this awesome drain running from Madivala towards HSR Layout...what's so peculiar about this you ask? Well nothing much, its just that BMP ran out of funds before they could finish the project and hence the drain is open! All the crap coming in from Maruthi Nagar, Madivala, Madivala Market, BTM, Jayanagar and probably the rest of South Bangalore ends up on this drain. It does give you a high walking through there though....a high that makes you wanna kill yourself! Ironically, there are three offices of the 2nd largest IT firm in India right in front of this drain....guess they use it to their benefit....picture this...a client comes to visit the campus, he has an initial round of talks and it fails as the company is expecting waaaaaaaay too high in revenues...the client refuses....a response follows "You wanna give us the contract or would u prefer swimming there?" "Kaching!!! Contract signed" ;)

Alright now back to our topic in question...Bobs (aka Time Management), on hearing this found it crazy and said it would probably be like killing those fishes straight out. The water that runs through is no longer transparent...why it isn't even translucent and it would be impossible for a fish to survive. I justified saying it is possible, and that the fish has probably learnt its way through the waters else they were already blind and it wouldn't be anything new. Bobs said that's a crazy thought. hehe...me being me felt I couldn't just stop there....so I said...no man BMP must've given each one of them flashlights to look around...a light laugh later bobs replied yeah and they probably gave them sticks and knives to whack any mosquitoes they saw....tom added that they probably added in some Piranhas to improve efficiency...and this went on to a point where we even felt they would have monkey caps on to prevent getting a cold from the night job and would probably get free food and a cab back home......then suddenly a door opened wide....AG (a guy who sleeps all the way till 9AM eventhough his work starts off at 8:30AM) starting walking like a zombie out of the room and headed straight to a knife sitting on the kitchen desk....picked it up....and bingo...I was the target! :) hehe...

I've got another pal, Ams, whom I get into real active conversations with.....on what you ask? well its just a chain of PJs....a chain that resulted in another pal of ours, Rush, to start whacking her head on the table and almost get into tears....its funny...we were going on for over 15 mins and only then did we notice what she was doing!

So where does all this come to? Imagination ROCKS!!!! And I'm gonna go on with it....;)

To Love or Not to Love...That's the question!

2006-09-16T14:24:00.000+08:00

It was just another day in office and well for a change I have work lately. All thanks to a training I had in the UK. And well things are supposedly gonna get worse....frankly, I'm happy....I've had my share of free time all through my life in the company and its about time I really picked up on work.

It was Friday and our Manager, the cool guy in the block, was asking us what our plans were for the weekend...i had a bloody geeky answer..."CAT" jeez...he had this weirdo look on my face which said "Don't you have a life?" hmmm...do I? I guess I do, the doc said I was pretty fine when I went for my checkup the other day. Anyways, the next question he asked us were if we had gfs and if dates were in line during the weekend....the three of us in the team had a negative in the first part of the question. He was shocked and even joked that he'd probably put in an objective for the next quarter..."Get a Girlfriend".....and well as usual...it got me thinking....sigh I wonder if there's anything in this world that doesn't get me thinking! :)

What exactly is the deal of getting a girlfriend? Spend a few months enjoying the sparks and eventually realise you weren't meant for each other. Put yourself in a lot of pressure, and emotional turmoils and finally call it an end. Wouldn't like to generalise though, I'm sure there are quite a few of you who read this who would say otherwise. But how often does it last for more than a couple of years? It starts off with a mushy relationship with loads of attention and understanding at first. A few months down the line it changes to jealousy and possesiveness and finally it just ends up in huge arguments that make absolutely no sense to the observers from outside. And at the end, each one for himself (herself).

Friends often say I have a very stringent criteria for my partner and that's the reason I've never really hooked up. hmmm...this could be true. I'd prefer a gal who doesn't bother going all mushy mushy and constantly want physical show of attention. I mean come on, picture this, you're all tired from work, your manager has asked you to stay at the office on weekends, you lost money as change in the bus (refer previous blogs) and your cellphone cuts off as you start talking to your dad and mom three thousand miles away. And that's when the inevitable call comes in and she goes "Hi janoo...how much do you love me?"....WTF??? Right so that doesn't happen too often...but hell it does!

Is it so hard to find someone who would understand you and could read your mind like it were their own diaries (true this ain't possible at all times)? One who doesn't have a care in the world and doesn't filter you based on your caste, colour, religion or zodiac sign (reminds me of lage raho munnabhai :) ). One who'd have had a long day at work and yet want to hang out with you to take a long walk, talk and get home with a smile....or maybe spend an evening bowling just to get the spirits up. One who wouldn't hesitate to go out horse riding (yep...i've suddenly got a craving to go horse riding...still trying to figure when and where though), bungee jumping or try something absolutely new in their lives. And yet beyond all this still realise that life's just not about fun and involves responsibilities...to their parents, family and friends. yep....my friends are probably right...I do think too much and hence remain single...

So is cutting all this down for the initial sparks in a relationship worth it?......I wonder

CATch me if you can

2006-08-15T17:57:00.000+08:00

Yes, I'm a victim of the CAT disease too. I've begun my pursuit to the IIMs, the most prestigious B-Schools in India....and well...I'm losing out on the race in a huge way! I start off with a relatively good percentile and as the weeks go by, my results seem to be deteriorating...blame it on the fact that I'm not preparing well while everyone else is! So now, I'm working on Plan B and Plan C. Shall refrain from explaining what those two plans are for the time being, lest I mess up those two as well....which I will!

Its a loong holiday and well I ain't doing much here. On realising that I was leading a miserable life by sitting home doing nothing...alright alright so maybe I was doing something...moving on...yeah so as I was saying, I decided to head to Coimbatore and meet up with my ol' schoolmate Gayatri, who promised me a bunch of books to prepare myself on a tests related to "Plan B". After a loong and bed bug biting journey of six hours, I was finally there. We had a ball of a time and managed to watch KANK (aka Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna...trust me I was repeatedly screaming out "Kabhi tho Alvida kaho"). The movie starts off with a pretty good note. Rani looks hot!!! and well I'm sure all the gals must've felt Abhishek was the "hot" one....I would know...there were four girls around me who kept oogling at him...and how would I know this...hehe...guess whom I was oogling at ;)

Trust Karan Johar to come up with a highly over budgetted fantasy movie in which everyone around lives in castles and works in high rises with the view you'd die for on a concept that well...at times is pretty controversial.

His first being the "love begins with friendship" which resulted in a massive turn of events for most guys and gals who were best friends...it took just 3 hrs and a lot of mushy mushy hindi dialogues and running around trees and playing basketball for them to realise they were in love! (Ref. Kuch Kuch hotha hain for more details). This time around we have a wild extra marital affair to talk about. There were parts of the movie i liked though...the first being Rani, the second being SRK being slapped (HARD!!) and the third, Abhishek's constant faint scenes. Now what's bad abt it? Well for once I thought SRK started doing something he was always good at...being the anti-hero and not the guy who everyone loves (Refer...uhm....ok i guess all his movies have a typical "Rahul" who's loved by everyone and he uses his masterpiece dual expressions in numerous permutations and combinations for a 3 hr movie) but I was disappointed...guess Karan Johar just didn't like the idea of keeping SRK upset so managed to end the movie with a moral that we should encourage extra marital affairs and infact once you divorce your betraying husband/wife, ensure that they meet and have a happy life together.

Oh well it was timepass so no issue :) Work is finally on the horizon with my boss having given me a bunch of stuff to get done by Thursday....kinda makes you feel important for a change..hehe I've got work after 10 months!!! yipeeeee!!!

Signing off for now....as I've just run out of topics to crib about...uhm i mean talk about :) catch u all laterz

A Reflection

2006-07-23T14:46:00.000+08:00

Hey guys....hope I haven't dissapointed all of you with a very short post earlier. The orkut one ie. Been too busy trying to have a life and well just realised I didn't have one.

The past few weeks has been a world of changes. For one, I had a lovely birthday!!! For all my readers who don't know when that was, it was on the 5th of July. The day...rather night started off with my mom calling me up at 12 in the night...she sang me the birthday song while my roomies were busy plotting on methods to pick and kick me on the ritual "Birthday Bumps". Mom kept the phone with the last words being...tell your roomies not to hurt her little son....and yes they didn't listen! Bang Bang Bang and well there were many more, I just lost count. Finally they pick me up and wish me a happy birthday.....for the record, this was my first birthday when I got the bumps. Usually its the summer vacs or something like that and the Bumps are delayed till school reopens....uhm...well that kinda makes it worse though.

It was a lovely morning, Bangalore was smiling at me with its cool breezes and fresh (well almost fresh) air. Got calls from all over India, thanks to my friends being spread across geographies :) Ofcourse calls from family too. My orkut scrapbook was overflowing with messages and so was my mailbox. Thanks to my company's portal and orkut, everyone around remembered Shanim was born 23 yrs earlier on the same day.

As usual there wasn't much work and I kinda left off early to meet up with a friend. A real cool pal of mine...and well mind you, she's got a pinch that stings baaaaaaad!!! I ended up with a scar on my arm thanks to her....bet she's enjoying reading this. Got home a notch late after doing a bit of shopping for my sis and mom as I was heading home that weekend. And the surprises just didn't end, my roomies got me a cake from CCD and although it didn't last long and was more on my face than in anyone's stomach, it was absolute fun!

Getting back home for the weekend was all the better. My second sis, Sanee, managed to arrange for a Birthday Cake from the US! I got to cut a birthday cake with my eldest bro in law (his birthday falls a day before mine) with my family watching over and my cutest niece singing the Birthday song along with her mom, my sis, Saina :) This was probably best week home I had in a long time...and probably the best birthday too!

But well...life isn't just about happiness is it? Its been 23 yrs that I've spent in this world, and well I've been thinking....thinking a lot lately. Besides this blog and a bunch of smiles, I've achieved nothing! There's this huge void in me and I can't understand what its for.....and no its not the void that pops up everytime you breath in air....but something a lot more confusing. Everyday I wake up to the world with a joke on life, and well have been looking at my life as one big comedy show. The world and God as spectators, having a ball of a time seeing me make blunders every second. From the days when I forget to fill fuel on my bike and drag it for over 2kms uphill, to the days when I go to my manager and utter something utterly irrelevant, its been just a joke.....yep that's my life....a joke. I don't aim for anything, I don't look at myself doing something good, and I don't bother thinking of something to make this world a better place.

Guess its time something changed. Time I grew up..........time I thought of what I want in life....and time when I decided on ways to chase that dream of mine....

For all those who know me well....stop laughing!!! :) Fine so maybe I just can't grow up so might as well quit trying. I'm sure the day I get married, there would be a case against my parents for child marriage ;) A kid I am...and I guess its never gonna change

Corny Lines from Orkut.com

2006-07-13T16:33:00.000+08:00

Its been ages since I penned down something and well I apologise for the same....was never in a mood to really write.

A few days back I was just browsing through a few of my pal's scrapbooks on orkut.com and well I was having a ball of a time laughing away. There are waaay too many ppl who are jobless in this world and this is just proving the same. But hey, they do deserve some credit, it does take a lot of courage to come up with the most corniest lines ever. I've picked up some of my favorites and am putting it up for you guys....Enjoy!

Hello XYZ, I ABC from Gurgaon. Hoping To be winning your friendship in life. God don't be giving chance to earning friendship every moment. Good friendship comes by in lifetime only once, maybe twice... max thrice, but not more. I await your friendly respond.
hi...to be frank u r so cute...that only impressed me on u.........can u be my friend..waiting for ur reply..............
Hello...How r u.. Whre r u frm.. What r u doing... Can we start a good frndship from today... If u r ready, I will be very happy... Expecting ur rply...Take care...XYZ...
you re really good looking...wht u do?
hi wana scrap with me for long period the srap and tell me yes or no
hey i dont know who r u, how u look, but dil na chaha ki tum sa dosti karun, so i am here, mujsa dosti karogi
I am XYZ Software Engineer in Mumbai(India). I have come to you crossing the limits of borders and relegions ,just to say lets be friends .Hope i deserve one scrap from ur side may be acceptance or deniel
hi lady....whats up in life want to b efrnds as i guess u looking fr some....will wait to hear frm u
Hi how r u???????Cochin a nice place,,,,,,,like to be ur friend
hi gorgeous :)
im in love with uuuuuu
hey ms XYZ u look so cool and a wonderful gal u r !!! u have a wonderful gang of friends do u mind accepting me as ur friend ???u can feel free to contact me on this number (He put his number here)
take care bye
hi sexu how r u...... like to be yo fren check out my profile...n reply
hi there..how are u doing?? To the true mantrap creation of the almighty... a call for an eternal frenship
U look BEAUTIFULL and CUTE with a SWEET smile.want to be Ur frnd.will U add me as Ur frnd.waiting for ur positive reply...
Haiiii...How ru????Cool profile and nice snaps with attractive smiling face which attracts the person very easily for friendship...I am XYZ from bangalore working for an MNC telecom in accounts & Finance...i like to know more about and keep in touch to build up good friendship..i hope u will reply me soon to get introduce...Have a nice day..Keep reply..bye for now..take care..
Cheerrss...XYZ
hi ABC how ru i ahve cn ur profile so i thougt y cant i invite u to join in my friends group.u look sweetwhen u read my messagesweeter when you read and smilebut you look sweetest when u read, smile & replyso try 2 look sweeest always

Artistic Pleasures

2006-05-26T13:07:00.000+08:00

Get your own at Spell with Flickr

I want a quota too...

2006-05-23T11:43:00.000+08:00

The year is 1947, our leaders stand proud and announce that the Republic of India is now a reality. No longer will we be ruled by a queen residing in an island nation over 7000 miles away, no longer will we have to listen like slaves to men and women from a different nation who claim to be our masters, and no longer will we be split up in the name of caste, colour or creed......or so they say!

A law was then put forward, to bring up those who suffered in the name of castes, by which Scheduled castes and Scheduled tribes were given priority in both education and jobs to help them climb up the ladder in a society they were long forgotten in. 59 years hence, we have politicians who believe everyone in the nation is now equally backward and handicapped and they too need help. The solution? Reservations for OBCs!
Isn't it time we woke up to reality and re-assessed where we went wrong? 59 years and things haven't changed? Doesn't that seem to ring alarm bells telling us we went sorely wrong assuming reservations were the answer. And yet its being implemented once more under the pretext that things will work out this time around. Come on! This ain't some sort of video game where all we have to do is move a dial and things just seem to work out. Real world scenarios ain't about just increasing or decreasing things, its about working out solutions, something our present politicians just run away from. Guess thinking is too hard a process for them..it would actually involve some work.

A recent interview of our HRD minister proves how incompetent our ministers are. The guy didn't know what percentage of the country are OBCs and yet he intends to increase reservations to a value much higher than the percentage of OBCs in the country! What's worse? Its just reservations...if you can't get a person to complete high school with good grades how can you expect him to study a course that even the best in the country end up dropping out of. Not stereotyping here, there are quite a few brilliant SC/STs and OBCs in our country and I'm proud to know many. Without competition however, they're minds are left to idle their way through education and pretty soon it will cover the job domain too. Are we really helping anyone in this context? I doubt it. Our minds excel only when placed in a situation when its challenged. If it isn't, we're just animals...or worse "bots"....we don't think, but just let others think for us.

"To our dearest ministers, I'm pretty sure you ain't listening to us but what the heck...if you really want to do something, do something that would help our nation rather than rape it of its good.

Bring in scholarships for those who do well, you want OBCs and SC/STs to get a bigger share, then give it in terms of scholarships rather than reservations. Remove our country's biggest hurdle, the caste system, once and for all. Its been over a thousand years and it still lingers in our nation, you are just making the whole system more concrete by doing this. Give aide based on the present financial status of the person rather than ancient castes which should no longer be relevant in our country!"

The whole quota fiasco has now entered its second phase, job reservation in private firms too. Supposedly our Minister of Social..blah blah (I really don't care what they call her/him) had asked all private companies to implement reservations in their job recruitment practices. This will be monitored for 2 yrs and if it isn't implemented as they see fit, they will impose a law forcing them to do so. If this ain't a threat, I don't know what is! Freedom in our country seems to be a mirage at present. Equality... a distant dream....and what's worse? The opposition is quiet. They say the parliament is accountable to the people...yet I don't see that happening....

If this is Democracy..somebody please tell me what Dictatorship is please?

"No..No!...Please Don't..."

2006-05-11T13:59:00.000+08:00

"Could you teach me a little bit of that subject. I can't seem to understand how we do that" he said and without hesitation she agreed. They moved to two empty seats in their college classroom and started engrossing themselves in intense studies. Exams are nearing and its not easy to mug up the whole course material without some help. An hour passed and suddenly the room fell empty. It was just them and then suddenly he held her hand and rubbed it around his body moving it closer to his privates. The girl was shocked and tears popped out of her eyes when she realised what her "friend" was doing. She pleaded through her tears to let her go and pulled her hand back but he wouldn't stop. He slowly moved his hand around her admist the tears and her pleas to let her go..."No...No!...Please Don't..." He wouldn't stop...and then he heard someone coming and let go off her and she fled.....her tears flew fiercer than a river during a flood but she couldn't complain for he had a girlfriend and she was too innocent at heart and couldn't hurt someone by telling her girlfriend how ruthless and pathetic he was. Time passed and the hurt girl continued with her life, suffering all the pain she had gone through and the incident just never leaves her, haunting her everyday as she sees him sitting on the other end of her class....tears escape her eyes everytime she thinks about it...yet she can't speak it out and ease her pain...

Why is this world so cruel???? Rape attempts happen all over the world every other day. These days 4 yr old kids aren't spared either....I had to learn that the hard way when one of my best pal's sister was raped and murdered. And the court of our beloved nation let them go 'coz they were juveniles! If I were the judge I'd probably put the kids into prison and put their parents in too. Are we guys that bad? Can't we think of anything besides sex in our lives and constantly abuse the fairer sex? Life just doesn't seem to be fair.

How many of you girls reading this can relate to incidents like pinching or fondling in public places by strangers around you? Or even further a casual touch on the wrong parts with all the wrong notions by guy friends of yours?...or worse...an attempt of something a lot more serious? Why haven't most of you voiced out your pain? Do you think the respect we have for you will die down 'coz of it? Get real ppl, its just gonna get better and we'd probably help you fight it. It took one of my friends 10yrs to tell her parents of being molested when she was a kid...I'm glad she did. Most don't and things just seem to get worse for them in their lives.

People often condemn my religion and its concept of Hijab. I'm no religious preacher but there's one part of the hijab that most of you might have not heard of. The first part of Hijab is meant for the guys and not for the girls. If a guy were to see a girl who is provoking his desires he should not look at her and keep his eyes down. The covering up for the girl and the scarf is the second part of the Hijab. Its funny how only the second seems to be practised now.

The world seems to be going to the dogs and nymphomaniacs....and I'm getting pissed with life 'coz of how many of my friends are being victims of such crazy acts.........

As I say..."Life's a Crazy MESSSS!!!"

A blog entry that took 4 days in the making (laziness at its best)

2006-05-06T17:16:00.000+08:00

After a lousy post...I'm back :) Apologies to all those who'd gone nuts over the last post...to tell you the truth, I have no idea what was going on, guess I was just disturbed...uhm....but then again, I always am....

Pepsi Cola, Pepsi TV and now Pepsi C.....uhm...naaa lets not get into that. That was a topic I had already talked about in Sam's blog. SRK seem to be on a roll now. He had a ball of a time with a number of chicks posing next to his nude body in the bathroom for Lux explaining how his skin's beauty was from it and now he's out as a couch potato in the Pepsi TV ad. Awesome concept I must admit, drink Pepsi and all channels become Pepsi TV...hmmm...do I see a lawsuit coming up? Enough of the guy who has just two emotions pasted on his face which he uses in a number of permutations and combinations to generate "sad, upset, happy, romantic, constipated, nausetic.." and various other emotions to perform award winning movies.......somebody please buy brains for all those jerks who actually judge for movie awards...they really need one and seem to have lost it after the last David Dhawan movie.....speaking of which...where is he???

Gangster, the music of which had blown me away, and the acting of the lead female which has kept me away from the theater for a while now. Alright I do admit, she has her good points...for one she dresses well..except in the hot scene with Emran will-scr*w-anything-that-moves Hashmi....wait...she wasn't really wearing anything then....aaah! The movie started off pretty good and I was hoping it would be a good one for a change...but I was disappointed. I expected more with all the hype going on about it. hmmm...but then again guess I was still all high after "Ice Age 2". The censor board must be pretty happy with all the E.H movies coming in, they really needn't watch it and just stamp in an "A" on the certificate. You can't expect him to go around in the movie without doing something to the lead female which would eventually lead to adultery right? Its against his way of life. He was born with just one mission in life...cause adultery and prove that there is absolutely no use of condoms...speaking of which...couldn't Kangna Raut think of protection? Come on..with the keep away from AIDS and soft drinks messages Pepsi has been giving out...someone's bound to notice!

There's a huge commotion about quotas these days in India. Some hilarious ones being, what if we had only OBC and SC/ST doctors treating politicians and blah blah....We are splitting our country and loads of other things...yep guys I'm very much against the quota system but seriously take a look around, we've been splitting up with every second of the day. Be it quotas in education, the income divide or even the never ending arguments between religion. One of our arguments led to us breaking up with our brothers and uhm...no i can't call them sisters...and ur bhabis ;) from pakistan! Its kinda shocking how the media there potrays our country to be blood hungry of all muslims and everyone in our country wants another country of their own. Hilarious statements keep coming around forums all over the internet about the same. I really can't understand what's with the hatred.

Getting back to quotas, ppl all around who don't seem to understand what the comotion is all about, well its something that's been in everyone's heads for a while now. I for one, am part of an OBC community and although I'd be the last person to be complaining, I'm not happy with the system where true competition is not being welcomed. We don't need you to keep aside a seat for us and the various other communities in India but what we need is a more sound education system and scholarships for those who perform well. This can be implemented with a higher regard to those who have greater challenges in their lives, which maybe physical, or monetary. The only reason why the whole caste system still seems to linger within the minds of everyone in our country is probably 'coz of the reservations that the earlier govts had introduced...something that needs to be wiped out at the earliest! Bring in more quotas and we're just gonna get all the more angry.

Well I'm signing off for now and shall be back with more later. For now, its Tata bye bye see you from me :)

My destiny...where are you?

2006-04-24T18:27:00.000+08:00

I'd been on a short trip to my hometown this weekend and it was real good. Both dad and mom had come down for a vacation and being there felt great. But alas...good things never seem to last long and I had to return on a Sunday evening by the low-cost airline we call Air Deccan. Not really low-cost since I had to shed some Rs.2.9k on the flight tickets thanks to me being extremely late in booking. I realise now that procrastination doesn't really help.

Dad and mom dropped me off at the airport and my journey began. A quick walk through check-in and the security got me into the passenger waiting lounge...well obviously I don't like attracting too much attention while I travel, picked up my copy of the Alchemist, which a pal of mine recommended and forced me to try it out....(hehe rather advertised it well...Sheetal, you seriously ought to go in for marketing, coding ain't ur area of expertise..marketing surely is!)...alright so back to wat i was doing...took the book and pretended to read as I observed two real cute females who were flying along with me :) yep...I just can't concentrate on a thing...The reading never really worked there in the lounge...but hey it was an effort...

They finally asked us to board the aircraft. I don't think many of you have flown in Air Deccan, if you have...try skipping a few lines. We fly in ATRs from Trivandrum to Bangalore....all small sectors have tiny planes while the big ones like the flights between Mumbai and Bangalore have Airbuses. This is a aircraft's equivalent of a rickshaw. Ofcourse its not that bad, it does carry around 40+ passengers and is sufficiently spacious. It does have a low roof so I end up head banging quite a bit....and yes my bag never seems to fit in the overhead cabins.....speaking of which, that bag never fits in any airlines overhead cabins....someone remind me to get a new bag!

The plane being small doesn't have seats reserved as per your boarding pass...you just sit in any seat you like...more like the ol' cinemas in india where you run in the moment they open the doors and jump to your fav seat and book all seats around u for ur friends claiming that there are ppl sitting there (and argue like so "Can't you see...there are people there...to which the person sighs and moves on thinking as he does on how he missed seeing a human being on a seat!). Yep pretty much the same scenario with additional headbanging. So I finally pick a seat...thankfully a window seat...sadly on the wrong side of the aircraft...it faced the west and the sun was setting...the bugger didn't let me open my eyes till we decided to land....yeah i know we have the shutter there but hey...I wanted to observe nature's beauty...which again didn't make much sense since it was cloudy all the way.....now why didn't i put the shutters down....hmmmmm.....I really need to get my head checked!

After a long procedure of settling down and a take off later, I finally opened up the book, and this time started reading. Yep the girls were still there but they were beyond my vision owing to the poor design of aircraft seats...how I wish they were designed like trains :(

The book is about a boy who ventures out to the unknown to live his dream...a dream that told him of treasures on the other side of the world (well almost)...and how he worked his way there through all his troubles...walked away from the person whom he'd fallen in love with just to live that destiny and not spend his life regretting he hadn't tried. The book really moved me. And well it got me thinking. I can't seem to figure out what I dream of....what I aspire...my life has no definition. I live in the present, plan too much in the future and now I've realised, I've lost all creativity and along with it....my dreams. The boy...an educated shepherd leaves his family and prospective career to travel along with his sheep. His dream tells him his treasure awaits him much farther away and he persues his quest...leaving his sheep and his country to a strange unknown land where ppl speak an unkown tongue...crossing dangerous deserts and living through numerous miseries to live his dream......

"I may have left my family and my.....fine i don't have sheep, but well I've left my family and come into a strange land to persue a dream...which....i don't think belongs to me. I don't know what I dream of....I really don't know what I want..." Crrrrrk..."Ladies and Gentlemen, we are now approaching Bangalore Airport and will be landing in a short while...." That broke my thought and as I looked out I saw the beautiful city which I now call my own...I landed and I saw her...she smiled and there was a spark in the air (fine it was lightning but hey gimme a break...i need to add some pizzaz into the story)...we were moving onto the bus that took us to the terminal and a minor miscalculation in the trajectory of my bag's path as i put it down resulted in me almost hitting her.... A "Sorry" and a smile later she looked into my eyes....and returned the smile...stealing looks in between a crowd of ppl where there was barely a volume of space for a hungry mosquito to jump in on his buffet dinner...something seemed to be happening. We finally alighted at the terminal. I slipped...yep as usual...and managed to control my fall as she giggled at the sight. A slow walk into a smoked terminal (nope it wasn't on fire and there wasn't a guy trying to make the whole scenario more romantic by placing a fog machine but our dearest BMP had a wild idea of blowing in pesticide smoke all over the terminal....you could see numerous moqsuitoes running around trying to find the word exit written somewhere...i believe some where trying to help the others by flashing fireflies who appeared in the midst to assist in the easy evacuation...it was a depressing sight.....I was blinded and with all the might in my navigational skills found the baggage delivery area and the story goes on...). She stood a few feet away from me and chatted with her pal as I waited for my luggage...a few looks were exchanged...my bag appeared and the fog subsided...I moved off with a final smile and was off in a rickshaw to my apartment....

......and once again my quest to determine my dream was lost somewhere high up in the air never to return.....for a while atleast.

My sweet nephew and niece

2006-03-27T20:29:00.000+08:00

Aren't they the sweetest and cutest things on this planet?

Five Months and counting..

2006-03-27T13:10:00.000+08:00

A whole five months have passed since I joined my company its been one hell of a ride. A good one at it :) After a month long training we were made to put our learnings to practice. This involved skills on kite flying, dancing, and screaming the hell out of our brains with the Rock Concerts followed by strenous physical torture on the basketball field, and the TT tables of the campus. The fun was short lived though. They had then realized that although our skills in the above were great, we were far from their desired requirements on the IT front. And poof...another training. And now another....which will be followed by another and another and another.....basically its just gonna go on till they are certain we have brains. Sigh....a never ending scenario in my case. Its what one would call an infinite loop.

Start -> Does Shanim have the required intelligence? -> * If yes, Place in project ; * If no, Place in training -> Add another training to list -> Repeat query, if no re-iterate, else case yes.

Basically I've never been able to reach the "case yes" criteria as of yet. Hence, I'm enjoying the training :) But hey I ain't complaining, I'm joining my time in the company, its an absolutely lovely place to be in, not just for the chicks, but for the work culture and every bit of the company. Uhm.....guess I haven't mentioned the company's name yet have I? Its none other than the third best IT firm in India, the Rainbow flowered Wipro Techonolgies :) The place to be in!

Last night I'd met up with one of schoolmates at Indranagar. Sundays do change the whole traffic scene in Bangalore. The roads are more or less empty, and I love riding around in my ever-loving CBZ then. A quick trip on the Inner Ring road and through CMH, I finally got to where we had decided to meet. "Cake Walk" was our destination but to our luck, it was full. We decided then to move onto the Cafe Coffee Day at CMH - Full again, 12th Main...full....100ft Rd....Full...finally after a long ride into Jeevan Bhima Nagar CCD we found a space to sit! Phew! And this is with Coffee Days ever few metres in Bangalore. I wonder what it would have been without them. hmmmm....yeah I guess the Barissta at Leela would overflow then. Oh well back to what I was getting at. We had this conversation that kicked off with the traffic at Bangalore and moved onto VAT and Power distribution in India (which according to a mag which he'd read is poor in india with approximately 50% loss in distribution alone!).

What got most of my attention was his conversation on the traffic scenario. Its true, Bangalore does have its share of good roads, why it has good roads all over and not just in select regions but the catch? All roads lead to Rome they say, in Bangalore, its more like "All Roads lead to a galli". Wide roads that have over 3 lanes suddenly disappear into tiny half laned roads with the same volume of buses, cars and ricks plying. Its more like a funnel trying to stuff in as many cars as possible to their destinations (A good example beng the Inner Ring Road as you head towards Koramangala). What more, we have a junction or a traffic signal every few metres, on an avg 500m apart. Yep, these are the reasons for our gridlocks.

"What about Hosur Road?" would be your question. Yep that was mine too :) Local traffic and the devious plan on BMTC to place all bus stops immediately after a junction! We spend over 10 minutes waiting for all the bikes, ricks and tempos to cross over in a junction...say in Singasandra and just as we assume the road has been cleared for movement, a BMTC/Tamil bound bus decides to stop and take in passengers, taking in not just the hard shoulder but the left lane to prevent anyone from moving ahead.

For the first time, I seem to see a solution in the right direction by our govt. They're off to build an elevated highway. But what I can't seem to understand is that why couldn't they think of this ages earlier? Did they really have to wait this long?? Bangalore, 5 yrs ago was probably the best place to be in...lovely roads, great weather, beautiful green promenades, shady trees, sparkling lakes and the works! Now, when you think of Bangalore, you think of cars, bikes, cars, bikes and more cars, and dust all around. A prayer goes out to all those who decide to take the Hosur Road to work (Electronic City ie.) for we may not know which Hosur bound/Wipro/Infy bus or truck would run over him. Quite a contrast won't you all agree?

The world hasn't really ended and there's always a second chance, lets just all pray that things do get better and the present HDK govt. keep their word on bringin back the Bangalore that we all once knew to be the "Green City of India"

A Religion for you and a religion for me

2006-03-12T17:45:00.000+08:00

A long conversation with a friend made me realise how narrow minded the whole world is....

It all started with a lousy forward which involved a kid's hand being run over by a vehicle all 'coz he had stolen food. The blame was targetted on Islam and the muslims who enforced the punishment on the poor kid. Kinda shocked me actually, seeing such a forward was nothing near amusing and I still can't understand why the acts of fundamentalists end up being blamed on the religion. I responded (yep the idiot that I was...i actually did) by saying that it was not the religion but the idiots who felt their religion preached violence and nonsense. This resulted in a huge debate on how that person's religion (not mentioning names or religion) was superior to others. Ok, it kinda got far and I had this lousy taste in my mouth at the end of the day....

First and foremost, I'm no orthodox believer of my religion, but the essence of my religion or any religion for that matter is nothing but love. Impart love, do good and be good. Although all religions seem to impart the same thing, why do we argue over the fine prints of the religion and make a big issue of the same? Does any1 have a clue on this?

I'm an Indian. A land where almost a zillion religions (literally) survive together and our laws promote secularism. But hey its not like we don't have our share of problems, we have our Muslim Leagues, VHPs and a billion other extremists who test the country's secularism but hey...wats the deal?? Why bother with such lousy arguments?? Life has better things which are far more important than religion. What makes a billion ppl around the world argue on religion and make a big deal out of it i can't seem to understand. Take a look at the US for example. All muslims according to them are extremists Jihadi terrorists. And this about a religion that talks about love for all humans.

Sigh...oh well this is more or less a lousy topic, but I just had to get some steam out. Oh well...sorry guys, shall get some better topic next time around..

Be a Rebel!

2006-01-31T15:20:00.000+08:00

Hey ppl...yep i know its been a while since I last posted something significant...so let me attempt something :)

Last evening was great...barring the cold that I caught in the night walking around in the terrace of my flat...yep I was nuts to walk around in the cold for about half an hour doing practically nothing..but hey...we are talking about Shanim here...let me get back to what I was trying to bring out here..."Rang De Basanthi" happened yesterday...roughly translated as "Give me color Basanthi"....if I've made a bunch of heads spin in confusion by what I just said its a movie guys and a really good one at that! Alright so I'm gonna give you an idea of what the movie is...India has a wonderful history, a history that most of us are proud of, on how we managed to get the British colonists out of our nation after a 200 years struggle....and what worked was non-violence. Our freedom fighters did a great job by sacrificing everything they had just to give us the world's largest multi party democracy.....but what we are with right now is not a democracy, but more of a democrazy...

The movie brings out the patriot in us, the guy who sitting behind most of our heads wondering why we are doing nutty things and screwing up our nation instead of actually doing something to make it the best in the world. And we needed a bunch of kids to come out into a revolution and kill a minister in the movie to awaken us. But guys...seriously, is that the solution? Killing a bunch of politicians? Yeah...all you end up with is a name that you are a terrorist and a traitor to the nation.

True we are in a country of free speech and a lot of things along with that, but free speech just causes more confusion to an already confused nation. We have corruption out here that reaches all the way from the roadside beggar to the journalists who bring us most of the news. Wouldn't want to speak too much about our journalists, they seem to be running out of topics to talk about that they've actually come up with some of the most hilarious reasoning for issues that pertain our lives here (with reference to some guys working off TOI). Hey I ain't saying the whole country is a mess, but we have our share....and we have our share of greatness....thank you NDTV for bringing the best out of journalism in india.

There have been a billion and one comments about me complaining of everything under the sun. Why do I do that you ask? Well I'm frustrated. Our country doesn't deserve the treatment we give it. Our country would probably be the only country in the world who's so obsessed with everything and anything that comes with a sign that says "foreign". In a country like Britain, they shy away from all products that are not "British"...some of which aren't half as good as the foreign counterparts...I know of many restaurants out here in India that actually charge you tenfolds for something that has imported written on it. What's with us?

Now this would get me a free visa into the world of Shiv Sena and the million others who talk about patriotism and swadeshi blah blah. Hey I don't believe in that. We need all the foreign influence we can get in our country, 'coz that's the best way to learn and work on our own. As an example, look at the car industry...if it wasn't for competition from the likes of Toyota and Honda, we wouldn't have seen a Mahindra Scorpio....or for that matter a Bajaj Pulsar (one of the best bike in india purely designed in India...atleast I was told that). What we guys lack is the drive to do anything in the country we call our own.

Where have we made the mistake? Blame the govt...they don't do anything for us....i beg to differ, they've given us education, good (atleast some) roads, freedom to do anything we want...even get to the parliament and scream out our views or spit on the roads and get away with it. If there is any1 to blame it would be us, our education and everything else.

We have been told, from the moment our minds can recognise an apple from an orange, that the world in india can be taken for granted. And our minds are moulded to mug up anything and everything that has the word 'Text' on its title. We haven't really given the oppurtunity or the freedom to think for ourselves. I remember when I was a kid, I had written an answer for an exam on my own with the end result more or less the same as what was written in my classwork note book (yep we had a bunch of questions which were pre determined as important by our gurujis in school) and I was scored low for the same. When I had asked for a feedback from my teacher on the same, the response was that it wasn't the same answer as that in the classwork book.....come on!!!!! Thankfully my lecturers and teachers in the later years were the kind who encouraged me to think and bring on my own thoughts in the books rather than a bunch of nonsense in our texts...

So where have we lost it? We have lost our imagination. Even the IT industry that our country is so proud of is doing more or less the same. The prime of our imagination is when we have just joined a company fresh from college....when management jargon hasn't taken over our minds and what are the jobs we are alloted? I'm sure most of you would agree when I say its either documentation or some unworthy jobs....thankfully I haven't yet been put into a project so I can't really say where I'm headed. Everyone in our country is here to jeopardize our imagination and they are pretty much succeeding in the same.

Oh well...I may just never end with my cribbing....but someday I hope...I too would be able to leave a mark on my nation and the world as many in our country have.......someone like a Bose maybe....or uhm....Sabeer Bhatia? Oh well...life's just begun...I'll get there....

Peace out ppl

Ho Ho Ho!

2005-12-25T17:48:00.000+08:00

A very merry Christmas to all of you out there! I love this day....quite a few reasons, one of it being gifts...sadly Santa seems to be forgetting me almost every year, but its always fun seeing kids' eyes glowing when they see themselves surrounded by gifts.

And there is something else special about this day. Its the only day when overweight guys (I plan on joining this group pretty soon) are really looked upon :) After all...Mr. Claus is hell overweight! And all of seem to be spoiling his diet by treating him with milk and cookies on X'mas eve......hmmm...think about it, with a population of over 1.5 billion, lets say around 40% of the same celebrate Xmas.....of which a generous 40% (most of us are lazy to bake those cookies in the first place, the rest would've finished it before our moms could leave some for our fat delivery boy :) ...ok ok sorry Santa...now i know why he's been forgetting me)....now with those numbers, its a lot of cookies...the guy must be gaining atleast 300kgs every Xmas eve! Poor him...uhm...wait I should be feeling sorry for his reindeers!

Speaking of giving, since I'm completely broke, I've decided to dedicate this blog to all my friends whom I had planned big gifts for but ended up being broke and couldn't even afford a 'Mentos' for them. This blog is dedicated to all my pals who made me who I am....will be mentioning a few names, but since I have too many complaints coming around about how long my posts are, I wouldn't be able to put all your names...sorry guys

First and foremost, let me start with my dearest gang in school....Akshath, Jameel, Jasim and Livin....the five of us were often call the Backside boys...no we weren't a band and we sucked at singing...but well there was another reason for the name. It all started with our Math sir in the 11th grade..the bugger couldn't speak english for peanuts! We guys prefered sitting at the back, you see its more comfortable sitting there and sleeping rather than smelling his mouth stuffed with 'paan' and suffocating to death! He hence called us Backside...we modified it a bit :)

uhm...small rewind, going back to my 9th and 10th, it was Mudassir, Abizar and Osama...something common here? Yep all four of us are muslims and we lived nearby...I was the only southie in the gang and maaan did I have a tough time learning Hindi (Mumbai-style)....rather learning how to speak the language...I still can't write well...hehe I studied the language for over six years and I still suck at it! The last Hindi exam I wrote, I passed with just 5 marks above the pass mark...and this was after a 11 hour phone conversation with another pal of mine Ajay (the guy was a brainiac!!!!) discussing every single mathra in the bloody classwork book...did it work? naaaaa...:) Muddi is out in Dubai trying to figure out why he is still studying when all of us are working and Abizar is in Pune trying to figure out which chemical would result in the next fuel revolution (he's a Chem Engineer)...as for Osama....if any of you know where this guy is, please do inform me....the last I heard was that he was walking around someplace in Mumbai looking like the local "Bhai"....hmmm...

Mumbai reminds me...Vicky...buddy how can I forget ya??? Vikas is a guy who is still a kid by heart....and he's got a stomach that seems to have no end. Doctors tried to figure things out by telling him he had a stone and operated on it...they're still baffled. The guy can stuff himself with two whole pizzas, 2 burgers and a 1 foot Subway sandwich and still have enough space in his stomach to eat dinner at home.....which usually is a lot of rice and a couple of curries. Yeah now you guys know where I got my eating habits from! The guy is a big fan of Manga cartoons...so if any of you have a bunch of Pokemon or similar cartoon tapes...let me know..

The blog would seriously be incomplete if I don't mention two gals who really left a mark in my life...Aparna and Zahabiya.......yep yep thaliya thaliya...and yes I was teased with both these gals in school....uhm...come to think of it I was teased with all gals in school....sigh...A2Z...now I remember :( alright let me get back to wat I was trying to write out here. Two real sweet gals, seriously! Zahabiya was the short tempered...wait...wat am i saying "was"...she is still the same short tempered idiot who keeps getting bugged about everything around her...esp me :) hehe I'm scared to meet her now actually, might end up getting my leg amputated or something....but I admire the gal a lot for the strength she had and got through some of the worst things in life :) as for Aparna...she's one of the sweetest gals I know...yep I know there are quite a few of her classmates who would beg to differ...but hey...she is!

Speaking of strong ppl...I can't forget Sushmita there....she's actually the strongest gal pal I've made in my life...and probably the most creative of the lot...she's out there planning her new Youth Mag for Chennai...the very best of luck to her!

So I've missed many pals but I better move onto college else I just won't finish this post! College got me a big sister (yep in addition to the three I already have)...her name's Sheetal...the gal has soo much energy in her, I'm sure it would be enough to power the whole of South India!!! She was more or less my mini mentor in college, esp during those lousy Jr-Sr ego clashes...Vicky is busy looting her off her salary at this very moment by hogging away a bunch of free dinners :) Sheetal...don't worry, I'll be there soon :)

My hostelmates....Vijay, Ajith, Aji, Aneesh, Bobby, Jom, Saras, Abhi, Fiyaz, Ameen, Jose, Sujith, Jobin, John, Mathai, Pattar, Sukesh, Thahsin, Shaheen, Tinku, Shamju, Anuraj, Geo, Sony, Costy, Naigil, Sanju and every1 else from the MH....thanks for bringing a smile on my face everyday and the billion kicks on my ass for my birthday!

My roomie for three years, Shameer....the guy has seriously great talent with his guitar...wonder if he'll make a good replacement for Santana.....hmmmmm...naaaa maybe not ;)

My projectmates...Basheer and Manoj...these guys are the best...Basheer for one taught us all to take life as cool as possible and Manoj...the guy can make any situation hilarious.....if he were writing this blog instead of me, I'm sure half you guys would end up having a high BP for the laughter induced!

Anu Jose Pala....the idiot whom I made my little sis...she's the gal who taught me how to talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk....and then realise that my bill has actually sky rocketed!!!

Jayarani...a gal who thinks of everything...let me explain, on our tour to Goa and Bangalore in the 3rd year, she carried everything except the kitchen sink....seriously! anything we needed, she had in one of her bags!

Deepak, Manu, Vivin, Silas, Sajan, Sneha, Bency and all the other juniors in the Training and Placement Cell of my college...it was teamwork in lieing to different companies about how great our college was.....it was only when I was out of college that I realised we weren't really lieing!!!

Alright so maybe she's not from my college, but Susan...a friend who has always managed to bring a smile on my face even at my worst days....yeah she doesn't realise this but everytime I call her to console her about her endless problems ;) (she's surely gonna kill me for this), she goes on laughing at every sentence I speak...yeah some call it madness...but I call it cute...and yeah...she's one of the only ppl who comment on my site every other week....(Sameera you're another one...shall include you in my next post for sure)....speaking of Susan...how can I forget dear ol' Anoop...the nutty idiot who does the craziest of things...as an example...this guy actually travelled from his college to his place in Trv around 4 hrs and then went back halfway and got back home all in a day's time (or was it two?)....watever and the reason was pretty funny...not getting into that, 'coz im sure he's already ready to beat me up!

And last but not the least...Tina...the sweetest gal I've met...she's celebrating her Birthday today, so lets all wish her a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! :)

So that's my Christmas gift for this year...hope all of you enjoyed it....

Merry Christmas once again!!!!!!!

PS: To all those whose names I haven't mentioned....am reeeeally sorry, but this post is getting waaaaay too long...sorreeeeee

Bengaluru

2005-12-13T17:58:00.000+08:00

Did you guys hear the latest? The ppl in fat chairs who call themselves politicians have finally decided to heed to the tears of the 6.5million people in Bangalore and are doing something about it....uhm...well i guess they took it a bit too literally when we asked for a change in Bangalore. They've decided to rename the city to Bengaluru....hmmm....sigh if only they had the brains of an ant to think straight! And what more? We've got a bunch of crazy journalists who have suddenly voiced their concern regarding the same, and that the government is making a mistake by doing so (to which i partially agree...not until i read the rest of the sentence) as this may lead to a confusion with the state 'Bengal' (trust me guys, i couldn't stop laughing reading that...I'm sure a bunch of my senior managers would have been staring at me when i did). Talk about the world going nuts! We've got a city who has barely 10m of tar remaining on all its roads (which theoretically comes to over 300-500kms in length) and yet all they can think of is a change in name to bring back the sentiments in Kannadigas...Man I'm glad Kannadigas ain't as insane as the bunch who rule the state....watch out kerala...you've got competition!

Now that you get an idea of how much i detest crazy politicians who seem to crap a lot about doing stuff let me get into another thought. Have any of you bought gifts for girls? Maaaan seriously complicated...its an absolute injustice giving us sooo much of choice....gals have it simple, all you need to do is get something that uses a battery or an AC adapter and we are absolutely happy, on the other hand with gals you've got a billion and one choices and you are bound to go wrong watever u get! (and this from a guy who has three sisters!!!) If only we could get into those heads for just a tiny second to figure out wat they would like and not frown thinking how cheap/boring/unimaginative/....and anything else that matches the criteria of loser about us.

Haven't really talked much about my company to you guys have I? Well its a fun place, you get good food for cheap, and Wipro has done a great job in improving the environment (no not just in terms of gals, but the campus is kewl). We've been having fun from the day we've joined, no pressure, no1 to boss us around, our managers are all smiles when they talk to us (and yes...quite often I've wondered if they are plotting against us while we think they are happy about us) and well........yep we're jobless! Atleast for a while...we are in what we call 'Free Pool'....

Its pretty simple, we come to work early morning at 8:30 and we are asked to report to the billiards room and play pool till 6 in the evening...:) alright so maybe we don't have a billiards room, its just what companies call 'Bench'. The transition period between training and being in a project....won't be long before I curse myself for having written this post coz of how busy I will get....sigh....being a Software 'Techie' (don't really know wat that means but it sounds kewl when Times of India keeps referring to us like so) can be a pain, but well it pays for my food, fuel, iPod, cellphone, etc. etc :) so can't really complain!

Taking off for now...CIAO

Bangalore's way of saying...you're dumb!

2005-12-04T18:08:00.000+08:00

Ever heard of a place that sells you Reebok shoes for under 1000Rs? You do??? hehe address please :)

I really can't understand the concept of charging over 30% of the price for just a lousy logo which is bound to come off in a month's time anyways. Anyone from Nike or Reebok who could enlighten me on this? Ok so I guess all of you are busy trying to figure out what the @#%#$#@ is this bugger getting at? Is there a point...uhm...confession..nope :) Was out shopping yesterday, went out to Marathahalli...and for all those guys who haven't heard of it, its a part of town where you can get almost all branded products for half the price...why?? why you ask me? well these are factory seconds...and no that doesn't mean that the janitor in the textile factory used the clothes to wash the floors or something like that, it just means that there is a defect in the clothes which no1 would notice in the first place...uhm..yep an ant might, 'coz u see the bugger might just trip over the loose thread as he heads to his destination..with only his mission in mind...'bite shanim bite shanim'....ouch! alright I get the point, won't steal your bread crumbs anymore...happy? alright now that the guy has gone to reinforcements I shall continue...

Just realised I hadn't finished my earlier sentence....alright so basically we were there buying clothes and shoes and whatever food I could put in my tiny stomach (it ain't all that tiny actually) and at the end of it we decided to push off to MG Road...nope we had no plans of comparing prices and no we weren't there to tell every1 how brilliant we were to have purchased all those things for under 400Rs each...but well I need some eye exercise you see....Its funny how we always manage to enjoy the beauties of life when we are there....but its sad we wouldn't even bother speaking to a single one (to all those who have been confused till this point about heavenly bodies...nope im not talking about stars...talking about the fair sex :) ) 'coz somewhere deep within you feel they just might end up being a pain in the ass eventually. Come to think of it...most are...and yep half the world is out to get you broke...and the other half is already broke 'coz well...that half are us guys! A friend of mine was just telling me how she makes her guy recharge her cellphone and how she doesn't call him but makes him do so....hmmm...tragic situation i must say...but then again...hehe if I were the guy, I would do the same....maan we die for attention don't we????

Enough of that crap....the worst part of my day was just approaching...we had this long day and we decided to end it by one last hurdle...getting into a BMTC bus from the commissionarate bus stop (yes yes i got the spelling wrong and I have absolutely no plans of walking all the way there to correct myself!)...It was waaay past 9:30 and my last bus, which is the 9pm '141E' was long gone....speaking of which, BMTC has this lovely way of numbering their bus routes....they put numbers and this is followed by letters....and the source and destination of the bus will always (as a law set by a saddist who is laughing away somewhere in his guest house at this very moment) in kannada. The number seem nice and well organised, but there are over 26 routes on a single number...as an example, there is a bus route 201...suffixed by A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J,K,L,M,N,O,P,Q,R,S,T,U,V,W,X,Y,Z,AA,AB.....etc etc and if you were dumb enough to get into the wrong bus, you wouldn't know until the bus driver suddenly took a turn off some traffic light from where it is absolutely impossible to get off...simply because the buggers in the bus just don't let you move! Mumbai Suburbans seem soooo much better...you ain't travelling blind there!

Alright so as I was saying...we were waiting at the bus stop and I had just realised that I was to take one of the million 201s....sigh I hated that bus! Why you ask me? Well for one, I almost lost my mobile in that bus and well its almost always crowded and most of the trailer type buses that run on that route barely move...I'm sure a snail walking behind these buses would be cursing the driver to move over so that he can overtake us....I had absolutely no choice but take the bus...lest I decided to walk which well...I wasn't in the mood to after walking around the whole of Marathahalli....stepped in and I was just too late to realise that I had forgotten to get some change and was stuck with just 100 buck notes. Yes all of you...not just those from India, but those abroad do know how irritating it can be for a conductor/driver when you give him a huge note and expect change for a ride that costs you a measely 5% of the note...oh well...I was faced with my tormentor now and presented the 100Rs note and spoke my destination as gentle as I could. He gave me a big smile and handed me my ticket after writing 95 on the back of it and just walked onto the next person. Now I was confused...was I just presented with a new currency which was used only by people living in the buses of Bangalore or was that just an autograph?? I bumped into him again and asked him for my change...."Change illa saar" and then there was a lot kannada which just passed by my brain as though they were directed to the person walking on the other side of the road....I rougly figured out that he would give me the change when I got off at my stop.

A little info to all those people reading this from countries in Europe and America...buses are pretty busy in India and when I mean busy, it doesn't just mean we have to stand and we don't get a seat to sit down, I also mean most of the people are either hanging on their arms outside the bus or defying every single law of gravity by actually hovering in air all thanks to the N number of people pushing them from behind. This was exactly how this bus was....I was stuck inside this bus and was just praying I would get home in one piece....sigh...I stood there wondering where all these guys were headed to late in the night at 10pm....guess they were wondering the same about me....my destination arrived and jumped off the bus and started walking as fast as I could away from the bus...trust me I had had enough!

Reached home and decided to lie down and watch a movie and that's when i put my hand in my pocket to find the ticket with the magic number '95'....oh CRAP!!!!! yep....i had lost 95 bucks :( I had spent 100 bucks for a lousy bus ride...the bloody ricks charge just 50 which again is pretty overprized as the ride is generally just 28!

Sigh...guess that's life and for one thing, I've learned my lesson....if a bus has the number 201 on it, I'm not stepping in again!!!

Bingo!

2005-11-29T22:22:00.000+08:00

Yep...even i felt the earlier blog was crappy!!!!!! alright so basically it was like this...i was in a bad mood and needed something to cheer me up and well blogging didn't really help....a phone call did cure it though :D

So let me get started...firstly...a big thanks to Sameera for suggesting Chethan Bhagat's books to me....maaaaaan that guy is good!!! That guy actually got Shanim...yes Shanim of all ppl stuck to a book on a Sunday!!! I just couldn't put the book down although i had this huge test the very next day...aaah it was worth it...and luckily i did manage to do the test pretty ok...Speaking of the book...its a must read..ofcourse the making out scene reminded me of some lousy porn posts put up on sites...so don't get disappointed......modify the things there and suit it to your own thoughts...and guys..don't get carried away :)

Speaking of bangalore...I'm loving it!!!! and yes...the pretty heavenly bodies are just part of the reason...the rest of it...uhm...well its tons better than being at home in Trivandrum counting the droplets of sweat dripping off my forehead....alright so maybe that was a little gross...but that's wat usually happens when i stick in front of my pc for over 8 hrs at a stretch without the fan or ac working......

You won't believe this but when i typed or...i was wondering if the syntax was right...yep the IT fever has stuck on...and I've been doing a bit too much of SQL....that reminds me, guys I've been put up in the Oracle division of one of the depts of Wipro.....the name of it won't really matter...trust me...hehe it took us over 3 weeks to figure out wat exactly the dept was :) and I wouldn't want you guys..my poor readers to break their heads on it...no i don't underestimate you guys but...hey come on...its not worth it :) So guys..the next thing you know, you'll hear of a professional DBA named Shanim who has suddenly taken over operations of Oracle and brought the share price of the same to an all time low with over 40,000 databases crashin at a single instance....yep the day is not too far away!

Alright outta there and into another weird thing that happened in my life...yeah i know it should be called normal since its my life but then again...i need to emphasize na? alright...have you ever had a situation when you a call a friend and you get some1 else on the phone asking you wats your problem and why you called? Well yep...I've had this situation once when I was like...uhm...12 and now!!!!!!! For a moment I thought I was finally admist professionals and stuff...but hey the kids are still around...had a fun laugh after that situation :) reminded me of how we used to fight for girls and say things like "you keep off or we shall meet outside"....uhm...wait...that was a dialogue in one of our bare-shirts' movies.....fyi...Salman...oh well...kids :)

Hmmm.....can't think up anything more....food just arrived and i've lost all concentration :) that reminds me...been working out a lot...its more of being stingy...been walking like 10kms a day :) hate paying for a rick...so i prefer walking..yeah true it takes a lot of time and energy...but well i gotta burn the thousands of calories i put in every day don't i? hehe...been eating like I haven't seen food ever in my life...food's cheap in some places and I managed to find out exactly where those joints are...and I've been feeding myself crazy! Shall explain...we were getting free lunches during our training at an external location...on Fridays we get noodles, fried rice, some chinese dish, another fried dish (usually paneer or potato) and then a bunch of other goodies....I usuall have four servings on these days....two for the noodles and another two for the fried rice :) ....not to mention...deserts!! and guys the food is amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Alright...me quitting for now...till next time...Peace out!

Its been a long time....

2005-11-25T22:58:00.000+08:00

Hey guys, yep I know...haven't been blogging for a while...uhm...a little too long if you ask me. But hey..wat am I to do...I spend most of my life in a vehicle getting back home now....yep I'm in Bangalore.

After a year long wait, I've finally joined Wipro and well the magic of being there has kinda dried off and life's just getting too busy and I'm getting a feeling that its really going nowhere. Its funny I was so keen on getting here and starting off and now all I do is wait for a weekend to get some sleep. Strange....this from an insomniac!! Alright quitting the boring serious talk and back to my own dearest self.

Lets start off with Bangalore...its a lovely place, beautiful ppl......uhm...let me be a little more specific...beautiful babes!!!!!! then moving on, superb weather...barring the two weeks after I joined when the Rain Gods were working overtime....yep the beautiful floods of Bangalore which shattered one of our offices down at Madivala (for all those of you who have no idea wat that is, its the name of a place...and no its not Mad I watever!!). And then we move onto the most talked about topic in Bangalore....the roads and the traffic.......uhm...let me explain, have you ever parked your car and sat inside it for 2 hours just looking at the boot of the car up front with a bunch of ppl honking at you for no reason watsoever and a rickshaw and a bike fighting it out just to pass through the square inch of a space between your car and the car beside you? Welcome to Hosur Road! Adding to injury...the roads are far from smooth, its more like going through a roller coaster with the cars having square wheels! Anyways I've moved off from Electronic City for a while...been pushed off to MG Road for training and uhm...nope its no better on this side of town either.

Oh crap....gotta cut this post short...shall get back to you guys soon with a lot more crap in a day or two...gotta run....

What was the Rickshaw guy thinking???

2005-10-06T06:28:00.000+08:00

Ok so maybe it wasn't one of dearest rickshaw guy taking a wrong turn and ending up on top of a building...its a restaurant in Nottingham. Its called "4550 miles from Delhi". Quite a funny logo if you ask me!

A big hi from England

2005-10-06T05:50:00.000+08:00

I know its been quite a while since I penned down a few words. And yes, I am not responsible....its just that I haven't been inspired to write something for a while....uhm...guess i was just bored...

Alright, now that I've started off on a lousy note :) lets get to the better part (if you wish to call it that) of the post. To all those who guessed that I would be suspected to be a terrorist at the Heathrow airport...three cheers to you...it did kinda happen! I was the only person who was stopped twice, frisked and my baggage was checked too.....strange, guess those doggies really liked the chocolates I'd got my little niece...they just wouldn't budge from my bags....crazy buggers....have a feeling they were plotting against me, had seen these two doggies giving me a strange look...talk about racists! hmph! anyways, the cops were better off...they made up for the rude attitude shown by their dogs (yes i was offended)...they were sweet and were pretty surprised to know that my niece loved story books in comparison to PSPs and other such electronic goods which leave a huge dent on your wallets....hehe infact they were asking me to help them convince their kids to start reading...suggested they speak to my sis :)

All those who wish to lose some weight, I would suggest you drop in at London without a valid visa, trust me guys...its a huge walk from the airplane to the passport control....guess the architect who designed the airport used to work for an animal testing lab and was a quite used to designing mazes for the mice used in the tests, coz i seriously felt like i was in one. I had seen the same point around 10 times and must've walked atleast a mile or two before i got to a rather rude lady from the home office who kept asking me why i was there....well duh! I was there to get my passport stamped so that i could go forward and collect my baggage...come on, is that so hard to understand??

Anyways, the weird experience I had with that female (mind you, she's an indian/pakistani born in britain) things kinda changed when I got down into london. My little niece ran up to me with a huge and tight hug. Reached my sister's town of Grantham a couple of hours later and trust me, I've been going crazy since! why you ask? These ppl here are just tooooooooooooooo polite!!!! There isn't a moment without a smile or a "thank you" uttered from their mouths.....and all you guys, trust me....this town has some of the best looking brits in the whole wide world! hehe I love going to the supermarket 'coz of that....all the helpers there are blondes, green/blue eyed, and have a lovely smile that keep you drooling away...and yep tongue twisted too...i got sooo bloody damn tongue twisted once i forgot wat i was gonna ask her!

Speaking of confusion, the roads out here are seriously confusing...oh no they aren't a bunch of criss crossed roads and no they aren't designed by the same dope who designed the airport...its just that they have sooooo many rules that keep you wondering why they hadn't started a PhD on the subject "Driving on British Roads"....trust me, even Issac Newton wouldn't get that degree....hmmm..guess that's why they never bothered having one! That reminds me, Grantham is the birth place of Issac Newton....went around looking for the apple tree which helped us realise that blunders can result in the discovery of gravity....but well was disappointed to find out that it was in Oxford and well....i guess its dead by now.....

alright back to the roads...think about this, there are rules on how to walk on the sidewalks too...infact they also tell pedestrains to wear something reflective at nights....and that's actually a law! The other day i was walking down the road, there wasn't another human in a 2 mile radius...a car was heading towards the crossing that i was gonna use...and well the guy...who was driving at around 25mph (roughly 60kmph) slew down and stopped for me....i spent a few minutes trying to figure wat he was doing, with a smile he gestured me to cross....my mind went crazy...made me think of india....even if there was a mob waiting at one of the crossings and if a guy tried to put a toe on the road, it would prbbly be crushed...and yep...we would prbbly have to wait another 3 hrs before we can even think of crossing the road.....sigh...if only we guys could learn something from these ppl...and yeah...i come to know later that pedestrians have the highest priority on these roads....and drivers have to stop!

if you guys don't believe wat i just talked abt in terms of British Roads....take a look at their rule book (which is followed to the fullest mind you) at the Highway Code website

shall keep you posted on the various sights and sounds of uk till i get back in india...and btw...had a lovely flight here once again :) hehe a small stop in Abu Dhabi too....and yeah I did meet my air hostess pal, the same female whom i met on a flight to Mumbai from Abu Dhabi the last time i flew...she recognised me and we had this short chat....she was in the First Class section....(unfortunately :( ).....oh well...didn't stop me and another mate i made in the journey from chatting away with the attendants...we made a romanian, swedish, indian, and arab friend in the 7hr flight to London....hehe all thanks to Airbus' design flaw of keeping the air con lousy near the wings....(where we were seated)...we couldn't stand the heat....rather we were hunting for an excuse to go to the back and chat with them :)....had fun...obviously!!!

till next time

ciao

And I'm off on vacation

2005-09-16T06:51:00.000+08:00

Its almost 4am and has been one long night. Yep, I’ve been packing and since I leave at 5:30 in the morning to the Railway Station to catch my train to Cochin it doesn’t really make sense sleeping. All those who don’t know me too well, yep I’m a crazy insomniac who doesn’t like the idea of sleeping. I’ve always come home for the weekends from my college in Chengannur during my four years there and there have been days when I hadn’t slept on both Sat night as well as Sun night and I would end up having a nice nap during my labs. Its always fun being caught ‘coz at most times I end up answering all the questions asked by my dearest lecturers when I’m half asleep. Hmmm…have a feeling I ought to sleep more often, might actually come up with some innovation that I can patent and make millions…

Wanted to start this blog entry talking a bit on marriages. I really can’t understand the concept behind putting tons of gold on the bride. I really pity brides on their marriages, they’ve to paste a smile on their faces 24X7 as well as hold all the gold on their neck without stooping. Hmmmmm………guys seriously wats the point in all that? Yes ppl, it does imply that we guys will have to end up giving her a massage on her neck for atleast a month plus to get it back to normal….in case you’re a keralite muslim....increase that tenfold! Our cultures are pretty unique…and I guess I kinda figured out where the world got an idea of putting an ‘L’ board on vehicles with users who’ve just got a new license (alright its not exactly a new license but more of a learner’s license…didn’t want our naughty users to get ideas). You see our nation devised this ages back, its called “virunnu” in here, when the newly weds have to visit every single household in a 3000 mile radius and yep the poor bride will have to carry the ‘L’ board (read ‘tons of jewelry on her neck’)….why? I’ve never understood. Guess it was a scam that was created by our forefathers and the jewel tycoons like Alukkas and Bhima back when we were some molecule of carbon deep within the crust of the earth…..if it were…you guys at Exon and K-Mart…learn something!

Alright I’m kinda happy with my research and I have to say it out again (all those who’ve heard this before..sorry…I’m too excited)…well its something pretty interesting. “More than 90% of all Indian girls have their names ending with a vowel.” This does include names that end with a ‘Y’…replace that with an ‘I’ or and ‘E’ and it’s the same result…..yaaaaay!!! Three cheers to Shanim and his discoveries :)

There’s another thing I kinda wanna tell you guys about. A friend of mine was telling me about a forward he got. I can’t really remember the exact thing but it was something like this. A guy and a girl were on a bike, the guy was going fast (duh! nothing new!!) and the girl asked him to slow down as she was getting scared (quit nagging for a change). The guy said it was fun and he refused to slow down but after a while he did….and then he suddenly asked her to tell him how much she loved him and then asked her to take his helmet and put it on. The next thing you know the newspapers scream loud and wide that there was a bike accident and the guy dies while the girl survives….

Ok so it does sound pretty sweet and romantic and stuff…but lets give it a second thought. Theoretically, brake failures aren’t dangerous unless you’re going downhill, you’ve run out of road or you’ve no brains. You see, there is something called engine braking wherein you just leave the accelerator, and start lowering the gears as you gradually reduce speed. Yeah it may cause you engine to blow, but hey wat’s more important, your bike’s engine or your life? You decide! Secondly, he asked her to take his helmet off and put it on…now if I were riding a bike with a brake failure, the last thing I would want is a big huge thing taken off my face to take my vision off the road for a few seconds…the way helmets here are designed, lets make that a few minutes! If they did get into an accident, I’m sure it must’ve been ‘coz of that! And lastly, what was he thinking in the first place?!?!?!?? Its his love we’re talking about right? Who would in their sane mind ride a bike recklessly fast when you have your most precious possession behind you? Ok this sounds pretty weird from one of the most reckless bike riders living inside the Corporation of Trivandrum (also known as Thiruvidangore/Travancore/Thiruvananthapuram…and if some ppl have their way with it Ananthapuri)…but well its true, I wouldn’t ever want the person who sits behind me get hurt ‘coz of me, and well if its someone I love, trust me I’d be going as slow as possible :)….you see, knowing ‘that’ person is sitting behind me, I wouldn’t want the ride to end in the first place….so why move fast??

Weird thoughts yes…aaaah weird reminds me, does any1 really know wat the red button with an inverted triangle on your car is for? Apparently none of the drivers in Kerala do. According to them it’s to tell everyone around them that they’re moving forward in a junction and not taking a turn….hmmm…I personally think most of these guys are just warning us how dangerous they can be in a junction and to keep off. For God’s sake it’s a Hazard light!!! Pissed me off the other day when I had taken my darling out to celebrate the lowering of fuel prices here. Got into sooo many thoughts I’d forgotten to pay attention to the road……a long ride later I came to my senses and well I was halfway to Kanyakumari and had already crossed the border into Tamil Nadu!…I really gotta start concentrating! Speaking of which, I made a huge blunder a while back. Had to get tickets for the morning train and since I hate standing in a long line early in the morning, I decided to get it at 9pm….left home and headed to the railway station which is around 13kms from my place, stood in the line and when I had just another person in front of me I realized I had left my wallet in front of my PC!!! sigh, had to come all the way back and go again to get the ticket :( pathetic me!

Anyways, guess this entry is long enough already…stopping for now…will be back in India second week of October and hopefully shall keep blogging during my vacation.

Cya guys….

My Dearest Family!

2005-09-15T15:33:00.000+08:00

Alright ppl, let me introduce you to my lovely family.

The cutest gal in the pic is my little niece, we call her Aachi...her name's Sereen though, next in line my eldest sister, Sainaja...yep the one in UK...she's a bit famous of late...you see the Malayalam papers here had this competition for the best looking marriage pic and...yep u guessed it right, she won and her pic was on the pprs...hehe my bro in law was jealous..he was hoping his pic would turn up :) Next to my sis is a smart young guy...hehe no not talking about moi...talking about my dad :) He's the best!! I'm standing there in the center with my trademark Close-Up smile...yep I'm hoping that some day I'd get into one of those ads and prove that the toothpaste doesn't really work! My third sis, Saneeja, is standing next to me...yeah she looks dazed...don't ask me why...My mom's standing on the right, as you may have noticed all of us are real pooped...explanation? Its my second sister's marriage and it was in the summer...hot is not the word!...My second sis, Sanuja, is seated (duh! its her marriage!) and that's her hubby Binu...my eldest bro in law, Ferozka (that's wat we call him...a mix of Feroz and Ikka...just incase you didn't know that muslims from Kerala call elder brothers ikka) wasn't able to make it 'coz he ended up in bed with Chicken Pox and yea my third sis ain't married then so Sreejith ain't there either...

Will blog again soon...kinda fascinated by this software called Hello...playing around with it....btw...I'm off from Trivandrum tom on my long holiday before i join my company on the 21st of Oct....yep I'm joining Wipro at Bangalore on the 21st of Oct :) yaaaay!

On a serious note....

2005-09-09T11:37:00.000+08:00

Hey guys, I'm back...was a little busy with life and hence didn't really get the time to blog. Alright, first for some news, the queen of England has invited me for tea ;) So maybe the queen of England in reality didn't but my cutie pie niece did...and I'm off the UK for a holiday! Yep, will be off in a week's time and will get back prbbly sometime next month. Shall blog from there as often as I can and keep you posted on how pretty the daffodils are.....uhm..alright other stuff too.

Started the day on a very wrong note today....had to drop my dad off at the airport and since I happened to have an Indian license, I can't drive a car :) Just kidding, so maybe i can drive a car, but well I don't have one and hence can't get anywhere. We rented a cab to get to the airport and on the way back I made a huge mistake of responding to the cabbie's conversations. Ended up getting pretty pissed off and well I still am a bit.

It all started off with a discussion of the recent revision of fuel prices here. Hey I agree it may not be thoroughly justified, 'coz all of us have to end up paying a huge sum from our tiny pockets on fuel, which is an essential commodity. But when you think in numbers, it doesn't seem so bad, considering the fact that the oil prices have risen a whole 10$ a barrel while the increase has been restricted to just 3Rs a litre. Yeah I know, there is a huge difference between a barrel and a litre and they could have kept it a notch lower. Oil prices have been on the rise for the past few months and continues to rise all over the world, and India ain't the only place this is happening. Why else would you explain ppl around most developed nations switching over to more efficient engine technologies and environment friendly means of transportation (read as walking). Our country, atleast my state seems to think otherwise. Guess the communism inside them just makes them want to give everything off for charity and put our government in a greater loss than it already is in. Alright so they want the excise duty reduced, I agree that could help. And I really wish the Central Govt does take a look into that....but seriously, will that end all our problems? I don't think so, if its not fuel, its something else! Yesterday was a state-wide protest on the same and none of the taxis, ricks, and private buses were running. Thankfully Trivandrum has a mass transit system that is run by the State Govt, and hence we weren't affected, but the rest of the state suffered....and well this ain't the first time!

Most people here love talking about how China did this and China did that and then about how Russia did this and Russia did that...hey im no anti-communist, infact I was a pro-communism guy till I got down to Kerala (odd isn't it, most ppl change otherwise...guess my Civics texts had me fooled for a while). At present I just can't understand why each party in our country seems to be contradicting their views which they held when they were the opposition. So China has been growing fast, well so have we...the figures show, and that's one of the reasons why Foreign investments in the country are on the rise and that's the reason why most of us have jobs with pays that our parents and grandparents couldn't dream of when they were youths. China has a lovely way of giving everything to their ppl, but they expect their ppl to do their duties perfectly as well, if not....guess I wouldn't know much but I've heard its hell...Indians on the other hand love getting freebies and goodies out their way, but if you ask them to take a walk down the park and buy a newspaper on the way, they'd say its none of their business! You have people here who actually run around protesting for "God knows wat" just 'coz they get a free meal and 50 bucks at the end of the day (at most times even they have no idea wat they're protesting for!). If they had used their senses and just worked for something that could prove to be productive eventually, we'd prbbly never have had to protest in the first place! What's worse? There are people here who complain about VAT. Guess the rates aren't really all that sensible but well I'm glad they're finally auditing taxes...and hopefully within a year or two the rates should come further down rather than the usual up. More than 50% of our population doesn't really pay taxes properly. Do you?? Why even I doubt if I do. Lets take a normal procedure of buying a computer for example (alright so maybe its not normal but this is one instance i could think of), most shops ask you a question before you pay up....do u want a bill? Uhm...if this was any country besides India, the consumer would have screamed the hell out and probably called up some friends in higher places 'coz of that question, but we indians casually ask if the rates would be lower, to which we get a response that we don't need to pay the sales tax then and we readily agree to purchase a 20k-40k commodity without paying a penny to the government. The government at this point must have an idea to probably build a lovely new road from you home to your office, but its short of funds thanks to you not putting in your part. We end up with a road that has more holes than the moon has craters and end up protesting for the same (oh yes, ppl in here would protest for that). I pity our finance minister who tries so much to get some sense into our ppl's heads about this fact, 'coz well as we are, we just prefer taking everything for granted!

Anyways, I put the conversation to an end when he actually mentioned that he would prefer having the rules of Saudi Arabia in India (no offense to those from KSA). hmmmm...so i guess he's a guy who prefers being held on four sides by bars rather than the freedom which our forefathers so bravely fought to achieve. The air we breath, the words we speak and the thoughts we let out....our freedom! Just can't understand how ppl could have such thoughts crossing their minds. Trust me guys, I've seen things there and I've met people from all over the world (Indians ie.) who just wanna get back and get work here if our country is ready to provide them a decent living. Something that at present seems possible, provided we do something. :) You have no idea how proud I felt when I was in Abu Dhabi talking about the oppurtunities that our country promises us now, our IT sector (it has its problems but its great)...our airlines industry....and almost everything under the sun. Life's just so much better here and we've got all the freedom our heart desires. And yet we complain about the same freedom we take for granted! Oh well.....this is out to deaf ears...so might as well shut up.

Disclaimer:

To all those from the US (including any Govt Agency that may be reading this including Blogger.com's administrators), these are individual views and not meant to cause hatred, but just love for my country. I have absolutely nothing against any of the nations I've mentioned in the article or yours and respect the way of life in the respective countries with all my heart. All I wish to express in this is my frustration at my own people who so readily complain about their Govt, when they are not ready to do anything themselves.

Just another Friday in Trivandrum

2005-09-03T00:43:00.000+08:00

Hey guys, thanks for all the feedback :) Alright Alright, I get the picture, will cut down the length of my posts from now on. Hope you guys will continue visiting.

Today I finally went for Friday prayers after a whole 2 weeks....no I wasn't lazy, its just that life wasn't letting me. Two weeks back I was halfway home from Abu Dhabi (ok so maybe Bangalore ain't halfway, but you get the picture) and then last week I was in Administrative hell....also called Kerala Water Authority....the buggers actually charged us close to 5k on water! Alright so we haven't been paying for 10 yrs, but seriously, hasn't God gifted us water and hasn't He given us the right to use water without paying for it!?! Sigh....anyways after a bunch of walking up to different offices strategically placed 10 kms apart from each other in the city, I've finally been instructed by the accounts dept in my ward to pay the bill 4 days later (4 days from today ie.) as he has to update the details of my account. Four days to update a record?? Talk about efficiency....uhm...but wait, I would too, 'coz it would take forever to find a record in the piles of dusty files that lie in these offices.

Anyways, back to where I'd started, I went for prayers and it felt good. Finally got to talk to God about a few things I needed. Its like a huge shopping list everytime I go for Juma'a. Once the prayer was over, I was out and on my way to my bike, which I had to park on the other side of the newly constructed underpass in the city. This is another architectural wonder in Trivandrum. Why a wonder you ask? Well firstly, it really doesn't serve a purpose (yet). The approach roads are designed such that you will reach the tunnel at an alarming speed of 10kmph! No I didn't miss a digit there, I actually meant ten kilometers per hour! The other day I had decided to actually use this underpass....wanted to go from Palayam to Bakery Junction and well this was the best option (the alternative was to drive...ok ride my bike 4kms round two stadiums and cut in to ..... oh well u get the pt, go a long way round). I moved in a real slow pace and finally got to the tunnel, was impressed at the design (barring the bump at the bottom of the tunnel) and was able to cruise through at 80kmph (yeah guys 80 is pretty fascinating here....and considered reckless, more on that later) and finally when i got out of it I get to see a broken down sign that says "One Way"!!! A huge screech and a stare from the man in white and khaki later I was stopped right at the center of the road. Started moving reeeeally slowly and with a huge smile I asked the cop if it was safe to move further or had I lost another 100bucks as a ticket. He just laughed and said it was ok...shocked me! Supposedly PWD considers all sign boards on the road as art and they refuse to remove the same once its no longer required....wats worse? The real "One ways" don't have signboards, just a cop on the other side of the road with a big fat book of tickets. (I've always been lucky, high speeds and tactical movements behind buses and ricks have always helped)

Speaking of my riding, yes ppl I'm considered unsafe on the roads, and so are the rest of the licensed drivers in Trivandrum. Owing to my speeds, most people refrain from sitting pillion on my bike (barring a few friends who love taking risks....got all of them to sign Life insurance with me as the benefactor ;)). So the next time you are in Trivandrum and you see a Blue CBZ with a person whose face is blinded by a bright white light (no this is not my halo....neither is it an ad for a toothpaste...its just the glare off my forehead) avoid sticking your hand out for a lift, 'coz im sure you would regret it.

So what exactly had I started this blog for again....aaah yesh, the Palayam underpass...Its soo beautifully constructed and the engineers have to be applauded for their innovation. This can surely be considered the most idiotic construction as we actually have to walk almost a km to cross over to the other side of the tunnel thanks to there being no provisions for pedestrians....to the guys at Punj & Lloyd, atleast a ropeway would have been good.....besides that, well I'm in for progress, and I'm sure within a year or two, once the road works are finally complete in our heavily dug up town, its gonna be one smooth ride.

Suggestion to Punj & Lloyd, please allot a lane for protesters from the Secreteriat to the Legislative Assembly. You really don't need to build more roads, just get that done and all traffic problems in the city shall disappear.

A Trip to Abu Dhabi

2005-08-29T18:01:00.000+08:00

Time for my first blog entry. Alright so I finally decided to get some air and sunlight everyday for atleast 2 hours. And taking advantage of this decision I was stuffed with a bunch of bills which were due by my dad. Darn! Oh well, another visit to BSNL's office, the guys whom I really adore, won't hurt would it?

Anyways, thankfully the customer care offices out here are more friendlier than the buggers who end up in the technical support, so that went well. That reminds me, I installed a new device on my bike. Its something that sounds whenever I change the gears on the bike. All you have to do is listen up for the "aaah" coming out of my mouth! :) Alright so its not a device, that spider really had a good bite on my left foot. Maybe I shouldn't have been so harsh on the guy. Could have signed a contract with the guy for Pest Control. Ofcourse, I would've had to take the pain of preparing a Specs list which he would have to oblige to and then this would be followed by setting up a good site for his home. And then I would have had to get some rules set apart for cleanliness and noise levels. Hmm...wonder if the corporation would require me to fill some forms for all this. Oh well, guess the kiddo wouldn't be able to handle the pains of reading through my Specs list anyway.

Was gonna tell you people of my hometown right? Not talking about Trivandrum, but Abu Dhabi. So where shall I start? A pretty expensive flight and a huge crappy procedure of purchasing a Visit Visa for around 500Dhs (revised to 1200Dhs now) will give you the access to one of the most happening town of the middle east (NOT! Although an hour and a half drive would get you to Dubai which IS the MOST happening City of the Middle East, this is more like its sleeping brother). Speaking of flights, you do have a cheaper option. Its a tube which is fitted with two cows up front, has wheels similar to the ones on bullock carts and runs on grass and has been christianed Air India Express. You needn't worry about anything as long as you don't get into one of these cheap excuses of air travel. They flight attendants will pretend you're not there, charge you for the air you breath and probably a dollar for the earphones which were used by drunkard who threw up on the last flight. Hungry? Yeah they do provide food, its a round thing the shape of a donut but chewing the same would remind you of pebbles you stuffed into your mouth when you were a kid....(you guys didn't? ok i guess its just me), they call it a vada and charge you 2 dollars for the same. Hmm...oh well lets get back to the flight I went by, Ettihad Airways! That's the true way to fly, not too expensive yet its got features that put Emirates to shame. Sigh, I manged to bug all the flight attendants in there. Coffee, Cappuchino, Hot Chocolate, Arabic Kebabs, Lamp Chops, ..... aaaaah my mouth still waters thinking of it. Poor them, they must've banned me from that airline after the pain they went through in the two and a half hour flight that I had from Mumbai to Abu Dhabi.

Now once you get to Abu Dhabi, you have to go and get your eye checked....or that's wat the security officer said. How nice of them, I was having trouble with my contact lenses anyways. There was this huge line there, but what the heck, its free and I don't really need to take the pains of going to a lousy doc who keeps complaining about how rare I take those lenses off. It was my turn, a stylish "Asalam Aleikum" later, they stuff me onto a machine where I was to show my eyes. Two seconds later an alarm pops up and I find a bunch of security guards around me. Jeez, I never knew having a problem with my eyesight would cause such a big problem. One guy kept his cool and asked me to try again, and well it came off pretty well and the screen showed a green light indicating my eyes were fine after all. Gotta get that report from them and meet my doc. Took me a while to realise that it wasn't a eye test after all...hehe was a retina scan and I was actually identified as a terrorist! Ouch!

A small wait at the baggage counter and I was outta there, a big smile in front of the security guy who opens up bags was enough for him to say "Stop!" Crap...there goes my pirated DVDs, but to my surprise all he said was, "use this door you crazy oaf!". Phew! that was close, I remember a friend of mine being caught for bringing a tape of his tour across India, supposedly they felt it was some porn movie and made him stay for a whole three hours to check the whole tape. Pity the guy! :) Parents were waiting out and as usual I had grown thin. Parents have this funny way of visualizing you as a real thin baby everytime you gain 4kgs! Out into the sun and into the silky roads (as expressed by a British reporter) of Abu Dhabi. A half an hour drive takes you to the island city of Abu Dhabi.

Alright now that you have reached Abu Dhabi, I shall point out a certain pecularity about my town. There is a certain big white thing with a blue stripe across it which you may come across if you are lucky. We call it the Unicorn of the City.....the Govt calls it the Municipality Public transport. The city has the most lousiest excuse of mass transit in the world! They have a bunch of bus stops all over the city, but even a 24hour wait in there won't get you anywhere! Ofcourse you'll get a bunch of cabbies honking at you, mocking you rather than offering a lift. If you have some sanity (its a measely 48 degrees in the shade), you would probably get into one of the white golden cabs. A word of caution, do not sit in the front seat!!!!!! esp if you are a girl.....uhm....no actually the rule applies even if you are a guy.

Coming back to the ride. Well Taxis are pretty cheap, guess the guys who set the rates do realise that no1 would pay any more for the smell and courteous nature of the cabbies there. You will be greeted with a lovely smile and a smell that would probably get you a one way ticket to the nearest morgue. Try your best to pretend that you don't know hindu or arabic or any other language he tries to speak to you in. Just tell him your destination and pretend your on a call. Trust me, its not worth it. I've made a bunch of blunders by being friendly with these guys....uhm not really friendly, just spoke! Well there was once when these guys started talking about all.....gals close your eyes...the oh crap i can't say it....gals you can open your eyes...anyways, there was one incident that I could tell you about. I was silently sitting in the cab observing the Corniche on my way to my gym (yeah guys I was soo insanely bored I was a regular at the GYM!!) and suddenly the cabbie next to me picks out his pompons and cheers "give me a J...give me an I...give me an H...give me an A...give me a D...goooooo JIHAD!") A strange stare later he starts talking to me...oh no i can't handle this! Keeps asking me to listen to the radio and puts the volume on max...uhm..well I tried...tried hard, but i just couldn't understand Pushto! And there he started off explaining how 3 americans were killed in a bombing in Iraq! Uhm...he rejoices for that?!?!?! oh well a long conversation (owing to my destination being a 5dh journey....hehe guys from Dubai get jealous!! ;) 5dh journey = approx 10kms) followed and I asked him why Islam seems to be preaching hatred when the religion is the most peaceful religion the world has seen. And he gives his views on how Americans has oppressed his ppl and he feels happy everytime an american dies. hmmmm....Just couldn't get this into my system anyways....'coz well I'm Muslim and as far as I know it, Islam doesn't believe in walking around with massive loads of explosives strapped on and blowing up ppl! Fine so Batman did have a utility belt with the same number of explosives....come to think of, I wonder wat would've happened if he accidentally pushed the wrong button on his utility belt. July 4th a little early maybe ;)

Oh well those are the bad parts of it, but well Abu Dhabi is lovely. Get out of your Ice Cold flats, that often remind me of Tensings journey to the Mount Everest, you get to see lovely gardens, malls, and the works. The city boasts of many wonders, as an example we have an underpass on the corniche road which always makes me wonder why only one side of the Dual carraigeway seems to be going under while the other side of the traffic is up, with absolutely nothing above the underpass but a small patch of grass. hmmmmmm architectural wonder. And then you have two buildings with a ball on its peak which houses some of the richest and craziest corporate executives in the country. Its the HQ of the only Telecom company in the country...trust me their rates are alarming! I spent over 300Dhs....uhm...maybe more than that on just telephone cards! Uhm...alright so I was calling IDD but still! (Dad Mom, Don't believe this, I'm just lieing...its all part of a humour exercise that I'm going through)

Talking about rich people, well the city also hosts the most expensive hotel in the world! Expensive in construction, expensive in cost of rooms, expensive in all aspects of life! To give you an idea of how expensive, the cost of the construction is in the tune of 5 billion dollars! Each room has two 67 inch plasma screens and a walk in wardrobe and....oh well I can't get in there so why talk about it? Its the Emirates Palace Hotel. Abu Dhabi felt that they were not in the map and so they built it in the span of two years. Word of advice, sue the guy who sold you the Atlas of America and told you Abu Dhabi wasn't in it. Oh well they are happy and I'm happy to be a part of the construction of that bldg. You see, as i said I was extremely bored in Abu Dhabi and ended joining a company there as a trainee for a month and a half. They were the guys who did the security systems in the Palace Hotel. Trust me, technology can get no more sophisticated than it is in there!

Hangouts? Well you've always got the Marina Mall and the Abu Dhabi Mall...if you're interested in having a petty quarrel over a 11th grade girl, you might as well go to the Grand Al Maria Mall :) Speaking of food, there are a bunch of outlets there that I'm sure most of us would fancy, but well a word of warning you're sure to gain a lot of weight and then repent for the rest of your life! Look at me!!!

Well hope you had a nice visit to Abu Dhabi, hope to see you again when you're out of the Immigration Prison here...

cyaz guys

I'm seriously inspired...

2005-08-29T00:57:00.000+08:00

Hey guys, thanks for the response. You guys made me think twice(it was hard) and actually start a blog. I'll probably get that ready by the year 2010, so keep watching this space (or rather any other space you find that suits your fancy) :) Alright, I'm kidding, shall get one up real soon and let you guys know about it. Finally something to kill time.

Sameer, bad news, I never write :) you see I'm a pack of lazy bones and although I've been pestered by a zillion* of my College Magazine Editors, I haven't taken the pains yet. Let's see how the blog goes. Btw, to keep you guys occupied, I would seriously recommend Vinod's blog. The guy is from Chennai and placed in Infosys and trust me he is GOOOOOOD!!!! I had a lovely time laughing reading his thoughts on the ever famous Captain. For those of you who haven't seen tamil movies, he's the guy who's got his left leg on the grave (he's still pretty young though, just a measely 84), the right leg on the police jeep, armed with a pistol that can pierce through the toughest of concrete walls. And yeah, you won't find this guy going after gals, 'coz he's trying his best to get all the younger cuties off his back...supposedly he's irresistible! Uhm...if any of you girls actually find him so....pleeeeeeease let me know wat I could do to get that popular ;) And yeah, he has one thing that's a trademark of all police officers in the country. Come on guys, you don't need to work that brain of yours for that...its called a potbelly!

check it out, its http://vinodg.blogspot.com/ If you want that particular artile on the captain, its http://vinodg.blogspot.com/2004/10/unforgettable-captain.html and hey i don't know the guy...got this link through a friend of mine and I'm pretty impressed by his smart use of sarcasm. I really loved the intro on that particular article....its a must read guys!

So we have a huge conversation of stocks. Talk about the world's most formal word for "Gambling". :) Alright alright, we need a lot more brains that just the know-how of how to pull a stick and yell hoooray to get some money out of a Stock Exchange, but when you think about it, isn't all those fancy words just a ploy to get more of your money? For those of you who are pretty much illiterate on this, stocks don't usually reflect on a company's profits or losses or their performance over a fiscal. Those are valuable only to those people who eagerly wait for the dividends that the companies issue once every year. The price of these stocks, like most commodities in the market increase and decrease based on demand and well if I had a trillion dollars in my pocket (wonder how I could stuff that into my pockets in the first place) I could probably get the price of the most lousiest company up by over 20%. Thankfully such things haven't happened out here in India yet, but it did happen out there in the US a few years back and ended up with a bunch of corporate heads being sued bigtime! I see the same thing happening in the most youngest and promising stock markets, Dubai Financial Market, as well. Out there you see a bunch of oil rich guys in white dishdashas (for those of you who think that's a boxing match, think again, its the arabic word for their dress which is a national heritage and can get u behind bars in some prison halfway into a lonely desert if you put it on :) ) have a nice coffee at the coffee shop located inside the market and decide which stock to sc@#w and which no to. So I get back to my initial question, how is this different from gambling?

Today i discovered something on the net. Pretty proud of it actually. I discovered that too much of it can get reaaaaaally boring! I spent three hours this morning staring at the numerous instant messengers that I have installed for someone to come online. Took me a while finally decide on getting out of my home and getting some fresh air. Opened my door only to find a certain spider who was actually shouting at me for having messed up his 3 month old home. The guy had the nerve of settling in without a lease and now he refuses to leave. When i finally kicked him out, he spat on my face and bit me on my leg. Thankfully it has resulted only in a minor swelling which i'm sure would lead to something drastic tomorrow and my left foot might need to be amputated. Anyways, one thing led to another and I was blinded for a whole 15 minutes. Got scared seeing something soooo bright on my face....it seemed soo beautiful yet it hurt my eyes soo much.....took me a while to realise it was the sun shining onto my face. Yipes! I really need to get my head checked! Anyways managed to get outta my house on my bike which has been due for service for the last six months....sigh....poor darling of mine...she was coughing all the way, patted her as much as i could and apologised for not thinking of her for quite sometime. Think she's angry with me....she didn't speak to me halfway through.....

uhm...that reminded me....don't believe in ads! The other day I decided to fill Extra Premium on my bike, filled a whole 100 bucks worth and it looked pretty neat on my fuel dial as well. Took my darling for a spin, went around almost all parts of this beautiful town of trivandrum which is oh so filled with protestors and lazy govt staff who love taking their day off. Come to think of it, they really do exercise a lot. I mean it does take a lot of energy to scream out the same ol' slogans through the roads and walk around 4 kilometres from the Kerala Secreteriat to the Kerala Legislative Assembly. Why didn't I think of that? Hey anyone from Trivandrum interested in blocking traffic for the next week, I think I have a protest up my head.....lets see....yeah "A Protest against protests!" :) how's that? Alright back to my darling and me on our romantic ride around .....uhm...alright lets just picture a beautiful green grassland (can't really make trivandrum seem romantic)...felt my darling screaming for a drink in between, but like the ad when i checked up the fuel dial and the length of the road, it seemed fine guess i could get to the next fuel station without a prob. ...... you guessed it right...my guess was absolutely wrong! Had a ball of a time dragging my bike all the way to the nearest BP station for some Speed (and this time around no way there is absolutely no gain of Speed by putting that thing in her!). So guys don't believe in ads.....or wat Shanim says, 'coz I just made that up :) hehe...alright fine so maybe i forgot to put the fuel position back on main after a long drive in reserve...but hey I need to blame some1!

Alright guys, guess most of you don't want me to write long mails so I shall cut this short....uhm...oops...its already long! aaaaaaaah I really gotta do something about my fingers!

* zillion = 3

The miseries of dealing with Govt Organisations...

2005-08-29T00:53:00.000+08:00

Alright call me lazy. This morning i woke up to find my ever so efficient broadband connection dead. I was in a state of shock. Without hesitation, I'd called up the local customer care center here in Trivandrum and I got an appointment for the evening. Aaaaaaaaaah! How was I to survive the whole morning without exchanging bits of 1s and 0s to ppl around the world?!!?!? I would be cut off from civilization for just too long! Naheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! Alright once the whole drama queen session was done with i decided to get some sleep and wake up when I was a little more sane. Guess I needed a real long time for that 'coz i ended up waking up at 12pm!

Anyways, lets get back to my connection. Thought of doing some diagnosis on my own. With my excellent skills in networking (NOT!) I was determined to get my connection up and running before BSNL could even call me back and say they're coming. Sigh failed miserably, called up a friend of mine working in Dell and armed with his suggestions I tried again. All in vain! In protest I decided not to eat food until I got it working. But well my darling network adapters still wouldn't budge. Talk about arrogrance and being stubborn.

Few more hours of struggling and I figured that the DSL modem was working fine and so were the cables that connected it to my pc. Figured that it was some configuration fault and thanks to Bill Gates ingenuity of making things soooo simple, he had actually managed to do away with most of the tweaking options that were once available. Sigh...alright alright, Tux fans are gonna be real happy with this. Finally I get a call from the buggers at BSNL asking me to get out for once and open the gate! :) was sooo stuck onto my PC that i didn't realise they were standing in the sun waiting for me to open the door :) Thought my worries were finally over....sigh if only.

They came, checked the modem and actually duplicated my connection (don't ask me why, guess they felt that duplicating would force the NICs to behave and listen to the commands behest upon by his masters). You guessed it right, didn't help. They played around with the Ethernet cables, switching from one NIC to another (btw...i have two, the second one was meant for my internal home LAN which i never got to execute....lazy to pull the wires and do the trunking :)) all in vain. Finally they came to the conclusion that it would work in Win 98 but no WinXP...ironic since i've been using it on my Windows XP system for almost 3 months now. Oh well, they're the "engineers", I let them have it their way. Rebooted onto Win98 and thanks to the "plug and play" wonders of the OS it didn't detect either of my network cards. So they confirmed that it will work on Win98 and that it was not their fault.

They were fleeing immediately after that but I didn't let them out. Slammed the door shut and sealed all exits. Asked them to prove it, and I brought one of my ol' shabby laptops (alright alright its not mine, my sisters which I was supposed to have sold off six months ago...hehe I've already told u guys, I'm lazy). It took almost eternity to load and finally i got the network set up on it. Sadly for me, (something I already knew) it worked fine. And they said "See its working now we leave", I blinked and they were gone. Houdini would have been proud!

With my last ounce of energy, i sat back in front of my pc and decided to have one last shot at it. WinKey+Pause/Break, Hardware Tab, Device Manager, right-click NIC1, uninstall, right-click NIC2, uninstall, F5, new hardware found, your hardware is ready to use, close all windows, start, connect to...., bsnl, connect.....VOILA!!!!! It worked!!!!!

You have no idea how many times I'd banged my head on the wall for being sooooo stupid!! And well, I suddenly have a real big disregard for BSNL employees. I did the honour of asking them if they were engineers just before they left. They said they were and that they had never encountered a problem like this before and that they usually just install and go. It was not their duty to make sure that the OS understood what they did and worked as they wanted it to. Sigh...

Oh well, that's my story for the day. Moral of the story....Don't pick up the phone and dial BSNL's customer care for an Engineer to visit your house when the lazy engineer in you is screaming for exposure.

Doesn't make sense does it? hehe....i know it doesn't to me, but well im bad at literature :)

Applying Thought

2005-08-29T00:50:00.000+08:00

As I was browsing the net, came across an article on economictimes.com that got my interest. It said "Wipro plans European acquisitions". Since it was about our company, thought have taking a good look at it. I'm glad I did read it.

The following statements caught my eye:

"Wipro can choose from 280,000 engineering graduates every year, with another 200,000 college diploma-holders who are easily trainable. In the United States annually there are just 50,000 engineering graduates. In fact colleges produce more sports therapists than engineers," Wipro's chairman said. Education, Premji said, is the fuel that drove India's growth. But he knows that while there has been investment in higher studies, there has not been the same commitment to primary education. The result is that a third of the population over the age of 15 has no schooling, the report observed. So the Azim Premji Foundation, a not-for-profit organization which spends 5 million dollars a year, focuses on improving India's elementary education.

Wouldn't all of you, my future colleagues, agree that our Company Chairman deserves more than just a mere applause for such a gesture! Education in our country surely needs all the funds it can get. But does funds really materialize into educated youths? I wouldn't think so. Literate, maybe, but far from educated. India really needs to look up its educational policies once again.

I come from Kerala, which boasts to be one of the most literate states in the country. However, our state does suffer from the lack of major developments owing to the pessimism shown by people in the state. It isn't a wonder that Keralites are second only to Bihar in terms of emigrants. Almost all major development programs are looked into with skeptism, too much if you ask me. Who do we end up blaming? Our Government. Personally, I think its our educational system that is to blame. Our schools have syllabi that force us to sit in the corner of our room and read through big fat books and produce essays ten pages long for our exams without any understanding whatsoever. And what more? Taking any course besides Engineering/Medicine is considered a shame. Aren't there a million other professions in this world? If it wasn't for the commerce stream, we wouldn't have Chartered Accountants or Businessman. Wait, we don't! I guess its the same all over India,
and besides funding primary and secondary education, I believe we could do a lot more.

Ironically I am studying for engineering as well, but I did so out of interest and not of compulsion or that a certain fortune teller told me that there would be a boom for the IT industry in 2005 :)

Kudos to Azim Premji and Wipro. Let's Apply Thought not just on our computers, but for humanity!

Intro...

2005-08-29T00:46:00.000+08:00

Hey ppl!

Alright guys, finally thought of starting my blog. Since I can't seem to think of writing anything now, I'll just post a few crazy mails I'd sent to the groups I subscribe to over the past few months.

Take care

Shaan