I've Vuittoned, have you?

(Wrote this 4-5 years ago and don't know why I didn't ever publish)

Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread. - Alexander Pope

When passing a Louis Vuitton showroom the average Joe might stop, shrug and move on. I, my dear reader, ain't no average Joe. So towards the entrance I walked with a sense of purpose.

Not that I had any intention of buying anything at that moment. It was, how shall I say this, the same reason some people climb mountains because it was a sort of a challenge, a test if I can call it that. Something a man measures himself against, in my case I just wanted to know if I could actually afford something in there.

Vain you think? Guilty as charged.  If there wasn't any vanity in this world, everyone would be driving dinky little Japanese electric cars and wearing Chinese watches.

So there I was, wearing my banker's best, a blue shirt and the company tie. (A Banker's attire thankfully doesn't involve a jacket here in India. Eets Mucho Hawt, see?), walking towards the Louis Vuitton. As I got close I saw this tall dapper gentleman, with the demeanour of royalty standing near the door of the store. When I reached the door, much to my chagrin the dapper gentleman quickly snapped to attention and opened the door for me. Apparently, he was the doorman.

It was at that moment that I knew I was way out of my depth.

The store was very brightly lit, and the lights were more than a little disorienting, I had never been to a large store that had so little items on display. A well dressed young store assistant walked over to me, smiling pleasantly yet giving me the once-over. I smiled back I think, I swear could feel, what had been hitherto a tiny, coffee stain on my tie beat heavily against my chest. It felt like some neon lights had magically surrounding it.

I blathered something which was intended to convey that I was just looking around.  

"Very Well Sir" he said with in an accent-less English. More to get some oxygen into the bloodstream rather than to just look around I walked around slowly, with my hands clasped behind me, he was never more than a couple of feet away. After a few minutes it became a little embarrassing, I had to engage him in a dialogue over some product or the other. The silence was thick. As my eyes searched for something to talk about it fell on the wallet counter. I breathed a sigh of relief. I could talk about wallets. What the heck, how expensive could they be!

I made my way over to the wallet counter and peered inside the glass counter with interest. As if judging my interest, the assistant walked around the counter and pulled a few wallets out. They were nothing special, just regular wallets with the Louis Vuitton symbol all over them as I riffled through them I couldn't find a price tag I wasn't perturbed because I knew that I wasn't going to buy one in anycase, I told him that those wallets weren't quite my style (they were hard..I preferred softer leather, I didn't realise till that moment!).

He looked inside his counter and was very apologetic, there wasn't a soft leather wallet inside. I nodded in the usual way a shopper nods conveying to the assistant that if there was a soft leather wallet then there was scope for some business.

As I was turning an odd thought struck me, I needed to know what these wallets were priced at. So, nonchalantly as I could, I asked him "Oh by the way, how much are these wallets?", to which he queried which one I was asking. I picked a rather cheap plasticky looking thing which I wouldn't be caught dead with and gave it to him. He then looked through his catelog and told me. Rs. 25,000!

My head reeled. A wallet that costs 25 grand? Thoughts ran helter-skelter in my head. What would happen if I had this wallet and I got mugged? Would I beg the mugger to leave the wallet and take all the money? Coz I don't think I'd ever carry as much money as the price of the wallet inside it.

I needed to get out of there, the air around me suddenly seemed to have lost all oxygen in it and I tried not to gasp. I weaved my way across to the counter opposite. There were a few gold trinkets. I picked one and said, nice earrings. "Er...Sir, they are cellphone handles" he said. Clearly I was at my wits end, I needed air..badly.

I nodded weakly and started walking towards the door, it seemed atleast 2 kilometers away.

With great difficulty, I reached the door and it slid open, the ever present doorman at work. As I walked past him, I swear I felt his moustache quiver.

A Letter to Shifrah and Annika

It's midnight and the both of you have been asleep for a few hours now. The reason I write this is not to tell you how much I love you both, I'm sure you know that by now but to share with you some of my thoughts as a father, a young father, well a young-ish father anyway.  When I get older and 'wiser' I'm afraid I may lose a some of the idealism and the restlessness that I now have and it is very important for me to write this down now so that you may be able to understand these thoughts when you grow up.

You are two fine young children and I can see the makings of two fine young ladies and there isn't a day that I am not immensely proud of the both of you. But I can already see that the weight of this world and our society impose itself on the both of you and that worries me.  Obviously this is more so with Shifrah due to your school, your homework and also because you are an elder sister who is expected to grow up just a little quicker than you would have liked.

Before you know it, you would be caught into what we fondly call the 'rat race', despite our words to the contrary you will feel that the world at large (and even us your parents) measure you by the marks that you score or the rank that you get in class.  You will be taught that success in life depends on those very numbers or worse yet, as young ladies, the men you marry.  You will be encouraged to do creative things as long as they are socially acceptable like painting or singing or playing a musical instrument but those too will subject you to a rigorous regime.

With my experience of the both of you, you will rebel at most of these things and then accept, some if not all of these social do's and don'ts, eventually.  We all do.  I honestly do not know if these rules are right or wrong.  I do not know if a strict school or college brings out the best in people or stifles creative minds neither do I know if our social rules, especially the ones concerning young women, protect them or enslave them. What I do know is this, that there is but one life to live and I urge you my darlings to live it to it's fullest.

When I say that it does not mean that you break all the rules and live a life that you generally see in the movies but to live it like you have extracted the best of each day.  Most people I see around me are consumed by some quest or some need, it may be for work, money, fine things, popularity, a fitter body etc.  This quest is ever consuming yet unattainable. I have yet to meet a business man who says I have all the money he needs or movie star who says he/she has reached his/her pinnacle and is done with all the fame.  We move around like zombies, with only this quest in our minds, yet we don't realize the gifts of the world that surround us!

I read somewhere that if life was like a glass jar and the most important things in life family, friends, good deeds were pebbles and the less important things like work, money, fame etc were sand, you need to fill your life with the most important things first, i.e. the pebbles before you find space for the less important things i.e. sand.  If you fill the jar with the sand, there will be no space for the pebbles.

Even at the most important times, things like marks or ranks are teeny tiny grains of sand.  Yet many of us make that mistake of filling our lives with them.  The highest of marks, the best of colleges and the most sought after jobs (or husbands for that matter!) do not guarantee happiness.  Happiness is not something that you get from anything outside yourself, it is within.  There are a few exceptions to this though and mine are when Annika calls me 'Appa' or when Shifrah tells me 'I love you', I can barely contain the tears of joy.

If you have to be consumed by something, let it be that realization that you are given the gift of life, a gift that can only be realized by the sharing of it with others.  Being a part of a society does not just mean following it's rules but also being an active contributor to it and lending a hand to those who need help through thoughts, words and deeds.

Ever since Pattimma's passing away last year due to cancer, I have begun to realise one thing that all that we have in life, our possessions, our talent even our family have been given to us for a reason.  We are not owners of anything but are trustees.  It is for us to maintain them well and to use them in which ever way God intended us to use them. Hence hoarding or being foolish with them only goes against what we should be doing.

Another thing that will happen as you grow is that there will be a lot of guilt thrown at you because none of us can do things the way all of us think we should be doing.  In this, if there was one voice that you should hear and hear clearly, is that of your own conscience.  Realize this that all of us (even the ones that have forgotten their childhood)  some point in time have gone through the same issues and felt the same way too.  I used to think that my parents were very studious in their formative years and they have never had the issues that I faced in school and college. Only later did I realize that Thatha had almost done all the same things that I had done and gotten into trouble in the same ways too.  By the way, one of your great grand mothers had been known to jump the odd college wall to bunk classes by the way.   One of you parents has done this too.  I'm not advising you to follow their footsteps but in case you do, you sadly will not be the first in the family.   When you are both done with college, let us do swap stories of all the things that we have done, till then this is all you get!

Gobsmacked!

It is said that everyday you learn something new, I don't know if it's true but what I learnt today blew my mind away! Invisible Nail Polish! Yes, you read that right, there is such a thing! It makes your unpolished nails look like, well, unpolished nails.

This is extra special! I mean the male equivalent of this would be drinking tap water and calling it an extra mild beer! I know talking about something like this could end up sounding very sexist but trust me ladies I never written a word about the electrodes during a facial or logic of stilettos, hell I have even bravely ignored waxing and phenomenal underarm products but this, is SPECIAL!

Nail polish isn't a big deal really, some form of cellulose and a solvent is all it takes but the kicker is the colour, that elevates the very basic (and dirt cheap ingredients) into something women pay a lot of money for.  If you take that element of colour away from the whole thing then it's basically worthless, UNLESS you can put it in an extra small bottle and price it something obscene then apparently people will buy it.  A M A Z I N G!

I've truly wondered if there ever was a 'widget' (in it's true meaning) sold and boy now I know it's been right in my medicine cabinet! I'm hoping to start a line of invisible mascara...wait... don't tell me there is such a thing too!

My Father to my daughter- Random Ramblings

Earlier this evening I was sitting in my living room with my 3 year old daughter in my lap and both of us were watching a cartoon streaming on my cellphone. My wife was sitting next to us and feeding my daughter and those 30 minutes or so were by far the best moments of my day.

As we were sitting there, I couldn't help but remember the time when my Father was a teenager, living in Madurai, his whole world view came from sitting next to an old radio in the middle of the night, tuning on to the scratchy radio channels from across the globe. I have a vision of him lying down in the middle of the night, on his bed on the floor next to the two foot long valve radio, with a faint green light of the radio helping him navigate the vast oceans he was crossing with each twist of the radio knob. I'm sure he still has that radio stashed away in his attic. I think, most of the things he likes to do were shaped during those idle hours, like his love of rock and roll or his keen interest in world politics, his fascination for any scientific thought and writing. Even today my Father doesn't throw away newspapers or magazines till he re-reads them (which is usually months later) and cuts out interesting articles for his library.

During this weekend, I had the opportunity of taking a road trip with my parents. And like in all our trips we ended up discussing many things under the sun. The topic veered on to education and my father was categorical that the quality of education now across the world was very poor compared to that which was available to his generation. As such he believes that children today are mislead with vocational based education that makes them specialists in one area or another in a quest for being a 'success in life' but he doubted if these kids got a well rounded education.

Honestly, I don't know the answer to that one. in a way I know that my daughter would have access to a form of technology and probably the best of what the educational system had to offer, things that my father could not have even conceptualized in his teenage years yet, it also could be that she would take them for granted and not use them to their fullest potential. I think it's drilled into everyone's head that they need to succeed, though they have a very faint idea of what that success means. I guess 10 years ago, I would have thought that success in my banking career meant a country level role but now that I've reached that I don't see what the fuss was all about.

I realize that whichever period of life you belong to, you are what you make yourself out to be. The benchmarks of success and failure are very personal, they need to be and as for me off-late being a father, a husband and a son seems much more important than any other role that I play in life & as such, my life is full.

I've been around...

It's been a long hiatus from writing and this isn't even a tentative attempt at being back, just a random rant that has very little chance of being published. Anytime within the next five minutes, I prolly will delete this draft and move on in life. It's not that I've lost the appetite to write, I do have it but when I sit in front of the computer, I'd rather be on facebook or be reading random stuff...

I've had an interesting time the last month or so, hectic travel, lots of meetings, a quiet holiday and a light bulb moment. I'm not going to write about the first two but really about the last two. (This post is about the holiday since the lightbulb moment needs a bit more time to write about)

A week before Christmas we headed off to sunny Goa for a few days. The trip in itself was uneventful, we drove. We reached Goa just before the bulk of the tourists from Europe landed on the beaches (thanks to the weather caused flight delays out there). I soon realized that I'm so hooked onto work that it took me about 3-4 days to shake off all work related stress out of the system and start to relax. Once you detox all the work out of your system and give the blackberry a break, hanging around and doing nothing is quite fun! Anyway, these are some random thoughts on that trip,

a) Goa isn't really for the Indian tourist- In the sense that you aren't the first choice customer any hotel or restaurant or shop prefers. Maybe it's racism, maybe it's commerce but Goa creates a lot of opportunities for you to whip up righteous indignation if you are a brown skinned person. Like the time we (self, wife and the lil 2 1/2 yr old munchkin) were turned away from resort after resort when we were looking to use a swimming pool, after being looked up and down or even being told that the guests would be sunbathing and they might not like us around. This wasn't just an isolated issue, over the last five years we've been there 4 times and pretty much every day we run into some casual form of racism thrown our way by our fellow countrymen (and women). Yet the reason why we love Goa is that it is spectacular place, for every douchebag you meet you generally wind up meeting someone genuinely nice as well and plus the food is quite something else.

b) Indian women have spectacular legs! - They honestly do and you notice this only in Goa. The reason why I single them out is simply because, they are the most well kept secret in our country and our women go out of they way, often going to extreme lengths to avoid getting tanned (my favourite is the bicep high gloves that is worn in Chennai's heat). In Goa though they seem to have come to some kind of a truce with the Sun. So one seldom gets to see so many women wearing shorts in the rest of the country. It's nice to see people loose their inhibitions and leave their complexes at the Goa state border. In a country where getting two shades darker means a whole different life, this is quite a refreshing change.

c) Vacationing doesn't mean relaxing- When my cousin's found out that we were headed to Goa for a week, they had a lot of ideas on what we could be doing there, the many places to see etc. Thankfully, we did nothing of the kind. We woke up late each morning, had a long meal times, spent most of the time on the beach and had a whale of a time doing it! At the end of our trip, my thoughts were clearer and I felt that my body really needed the break that it got! Of course, my cousins think we've wasted our time but hey, it was worth the waste!

d) A Norwegian Rebuke- At our guesthouse there was this other family from Norway and we got to know each other during breakfast times. One of our conversations was about the poor in India and how they could not imagine how people cannot be moved by children begging on the streets. As we were talking about it, the lady suddenly burst out that if this was in Norway they would make sure that everyone was taken care of (and made a kind of a hugging sign with her hands, yes, language was a bit of a barrier). The way she said it and the look of reproach that she gave stuck in my mind. While I know that poverty eradication is a long term vision and not something that we can achieve so easily, yet it is also clear that not all of us (and I firmly include myself) are doing our bit. We talk about it, we have some arguments that we use to rationalize our inertia yet we know deep down that it's all bullshit. To be honest, a lot of folks prefer poor people to be exactly where they are. What would we do without our cheap labour, our maids, cooks, gardeners, drivers, right?

Hug your Mother

This is a short one, I have been extremely busy the last week and a half, hence no posts, next week hopefully should be a lot better.

Just a small note to remind you dear reader that, even as I write this or as you read this, there is someone important in our lives who we love (and loves us) that we have taken for granted, haven't called or spent time with or just let them know that you care. As the cliche goes, life is too short, give them a call or better yet, spend sometime with them, now.

All my life, the one person I've taken for granted a whole lot is my Mother. There are stuff that I've always wanted to do with her, like lots of road trips or travel abroad but I've always pushed to some faraway time in the future since I never could find the time. But now that she has stage 4 cancer, it is hard not to think of those lost moments in the past. I can't think of a moment in my life when I needed some help or thoughts or ideas that she hasn't been around to provide it.

She is one of the coolest people I know, an intellectual, a voracious reader, a leader, a great teacher, a tough administrator, a progressive (and a conservative, she is quite the unique blend) a modest person and all in all a really fun person to be around. She always told me that she is extra careful about doing good things every since she had children because, she firmly believes that the good the parents do benefit the children. Given my past, where I was a total loser through school and college, I know there has been an angel looking over my shoulder, helping me clean up my mess and become something of a decent human being.

She's just 64 and it seems to be quite unfair but the one person who has been the strongest throughout this has been her. Everyone tells me that they are inspired by her courage, for me everything she does is just brilliant. And as I prepare to drive down to spend the weekend with her in the hospital, where she got admitted yesterday, all I can think of is it's so damn tough seeing her suffer. After working hard all her life, raising two kids, managing a home along with dad, getting two of her sister-in-laws married, being a Professor and then becoming a Principal of four different colleges often traveling long hours to get to work, I don't think she's ever had some time for herself in a very long time. I keep wishing that I could go back in time and force her to take more time for herself or take that holiday with my Dad that they always planned to go but never did. There are a lot of things that I wish I could do but for now the only thing I can do is sit with her.

(Please remember her in your prayers. Not sure why I wrote this, I didn't intend to write so much but the words just tumbled out. Not deleting them or editing them).

If I were Bond: A Short Taxi Ride

(I've been wanting to do this for a while, this is a dramatised version of a true incident that I wrote here. I've done this before, in a post titled Double oh Seventy Six, which I think was more funnier. I'm just trying my favourite styles to sort of get back into the groove)

I got out of the of the airplane and looked around to a distant spot, as I normally do in the beginning of each story. My sunglasses gleamed in the afternoon sun. I flipped open my tricked out cellphone and switched it on and I saw that there were a number messages welcoming me to the local mobile network and asking me to call customer care for any assistance. Damn! They new I was coming, undercover work isn't what it used to be. There was an urgent flashing message from HQ

I called HQ and got patched through to M. He was in the shower, I hate video phones.

I walked into the arrival lounge and saw a group of air-hostesses looking at me casually, I get that a lot. As I walked past them, I could see them fanning themselves. Was it my magnetic charm? or Was it my strong new minty aftershave? I didn't rightly know. After a quick trip to the washroom (I bet they don't show that in the movies huh?) I found my way to the exit looking for the local liaison officer to take me to my hotel. She wasn't there.

I gritted my teeth in anger, I bet this never happened to Pierce Brosnan! I evaluated my options, you see, I've been trained. I could either hang around till the she came, I heard that she was cute and I do like myliaisons, if you get my drift! Or I could show the enterprise that I'm known for and get local transportation.

I chose the latter, I was a man of action after all. I walked over to the taxi stand but none of the taxi drivers wanted to take me. When I walked towards them they seemed to turn away as if I wasn't there. Further proof that my cover was busted, why would they stall me from getting to my hotel? I checked my cool GPS cum video phone cum rocket launcher cum mp3 player watch, I looked at it intently. I couldn't tell the time, I didn't read the manual for I am Bond, James Bond.

I looked up at the sun and figured it might be about 5 PM. As walked over to one of the taxi guys, they averted my eyes and eventually started walking away. I grabbed one of them by the collar and shook him like I was some humour-less blonde Australian guy cum wannabe Britishspy, who shall remain nameless. I asked him why they kept avoiding me when I walked towards them. He croaked "cuzyerzipperisdown".

I dropped him down and he scampered away after his friends. I quickly did what I had to do, I buttoned my jacket. As I turned to head back to the arrival area, I felt a tap on my shoulder, I turned around to see this oily haired guy with metal teeth. "Ah you lourking foh ah texi sah?" he deadpanned. I knew this was trouble, guys with bad teeth always meant that, I knew it coz I floss, but trouble was my middle name. I said, "Why yes" in my fake British accent and he promptly led me to a taxi parked away from the others.

As I sat in the back he went over to the driver's side, got in and started the car. Before the car moved, the front passenger door opened and another goon jumped into the car and snarled at me menacingly. I chuckled, amateurs!

As the taxi moved out of the parking lot, the goons in front started snarling at me too tell them the details of my mission. I took out a nail file and started filing my nails as I was whistling, this song was stuck in my head, I couldn't remember the singer. I made a mental note to ask HQ. The goon in the passenger seat tried to grab me, I just swung away, I wasn't going to let these guys upset my day, I just grinned back at them. The goon was more agitated and started telling me that they would torture me with 100 hours of Ricky Martin music if I didn't tell them the details of my mission. I have to admit, there were little butterflies in my stomach. I had to end this now before they messed with my mind with 'She Bangs'!

I leaned forward and fired the nail file gun at the passenger and grabbed the driver by the neck. I checked my stop clock, 4.35 seconds, not bad. The driver stopped the car and I patted him down for weapons. I found a Wrigley's Juicy Fruit.

I knocked him unconscious and got out of the car and I could hear the distant wail of the police car. I leaned against the taxi chewing the juicy fruit, waiting for the police to arrive and the background score to end.

Monday Morning Blues

Earlier today as I got into my car and eased into the traffic jam right outside the apartment building where I live on my way to office, my mind was quite filled a lot of things, primarily relating to my job. Things that I needed to get done and the things that I can only worry about and not do much. Plus with my wife and daughter out of town, two illnesses in the family and a dozen things I have to do personally, I had a sense of uneasiness which isn't so good on a Monday, the stress levels were already rising and I hadn't even stepped into the office yet!

To add to this was the great Indian stress machine, the traffic. Anyone who has travelled through Nelson Manickam Road or Sterling road in Chennai at 9 AM on a week day, would attest to the kind of craziness that goes everyday. I'm sure it's no different in the thousand big cities across the world.

As I weaved through traffic with cars, bikes, auto-rickshaws, buses, cycles, pedestrians all jumping in at inopportune moments, yelling or staring at each other, the normal twenty minute drive can be quite the torture. Some days, sitting in a car with the windows rolled up feels like a cozy world with the world and sometimes it feels like it did today, a prison. As I was stuck in a longish traffic signal, something high above caught my eye. It was a big bird, probably a Kite, flying high in the air making a graceful pattern against the blue sky. It didn't look like it was going anywhere but was gliding around just enjoying it's freedom. As I watched I got drawn into it's pattern and I could feel myself getting a little relaxed. Then I noticed the sky itself, with it's spectacular blue dome, partly covered with beautiful white and grey clouds. Everything looked so serene up there when compared to the madness that was down below.

As my car moved extra slowly through traffic, I started absorbing my environment probably for the first time since I've taken this route in the last 3 years, the beautiful trees covering the Sterling Road providing a wonderful cover in the hot sun only interrupted by the busy crows that looked like business executives rushing from one meeting to another. The sky was one that took my breath away, it was like a large blue canvas stretched overheard filled with a beautiful abstract art that was the clouds, the colours so pure and compelling. By the time I reached my office, I had a smile on my face which I couldn't explain to anyone.

The point that I'm trying to make is that, when we search for beauty in these big ugly metros we live in, all we have to do is look up.

(Update: This post got a kind mention at my friend Hilary's fantastic blog, The Smitten Image, as one of the posts of the week. Thanks DJ for adding this post to your POTW list! Now, I'd like to thank the academy....)

Weather

With the gloriously blazing summer this year, everyone I meet in most of the metros around the country talk about only one thing, the heat. The weather as a topic, comes up within five minutes into any conversation. 'It's too hot', 'it's too humid', 'it's too dry', 'have to buy a new fan or air conditioner' or 'fix the one that's not working so well' etc etc, these are the stuff that dominates all our conversation. It's almost a national obsession, that and all the mess that we call the Indian Premier League. I don't think the weather has changed much over the thirty six years of my life (global warming not withstanding), come summer the mercury touches 40C and sometimes goes beyond. But somehow, it's almost like we've become a nation of tender skinned people in dire need of SPF40, waiting to get out of the sun and into the cooler confines of our homes or offices.

I can't remember a day during my summer vacations as a kid or anyone I knew having a problem with the weather. If it was daytime, it was time to play cricket out in the open, plain and simple. Of course, would be interrupted by the infrequent visits of the Water Lorry, which means you get stuck with standing in longish queues, carrying loads of water inside the house etc, which was tough work and nostalgia doesn't make it seem any better now. But most of all the time was well spent in getting dirty in about a hundred different days and landing up back at home when the sunsets and waiting for the daylight to come the next day.

The point that I'm trying to make is quite simple, we live in a country that's hot 7 to 10 months of the year, depending on where you live. The more we hate it, the more it becomes a factor in our lives, either you move to New Zealand or Canada or Iceland (and start obsessing about the cold) or just enjoy the weather for what it's worth.

The New Look

There are so many similarities between my fitness regime and my blogging that it's a little eerie. Both started around 6-8 years ago (6 years for the blog and 8 for the fitness regime) and were both pursued with passion. They both achieved their peek 4-5 years ago and roughly 3 1/2 years ago, both came to a screeching halt.

There have been many a (false) start since then. I haven't yet been to a fitness club that I haven't paid a membership to, nor have I wasted an opportunity to write a random post stating that I'm back for good. But I guess during these three and a half years, I've started to be a more active participant in life rather than being a passive observer. For instance, a lot of my blogging was about my time at various airports or flights, so much so that I looked forward to flight delays and extended travel times. It gave me the opportunity to sit on a rock and watch the world go by. When I met Shireen (my wife), I got off that rock. There was no void that needed to be filled with stuff like blogging or going to the gym (for 2-3 hours a day). Through this time though, there has been a growing need to both get fit and also start writing. The fit part is because now that I have a little girl (2 years old), I really need all the energy that I can get to keep up with her. I can't describe the joy she gives me and the happiest portions of my life is when I'm with her and my wife. And I'm sure most of my friends who have known me know that I've always had this major yearning to write (and to be read).

A lot of times I believe I think when I write, it is an integral part of me that I've missed, the ability to explore every nook and cranny of my mind. Hence this attempt, like my (re)visit to the gym on monday is not another whim but a decision (hopefully) taken with a strong will for it to succeed.

Over the last week or so, I've been jotting down some thoughts in a book, which would soon be blog posts, hence I hopefully have the material for the next month or so.

I hope you like the new look. The picture above the blog was something I took at Mirvana Nature Resort, in Jaisalmer (Rajasthan), which can only be described as an Oasis in the desert. A beautiful garden resort (in the middle of the desert) run by a friend and her family. I highly recommend it.

To any of my friends who have yet kept the faith and kept a tab on this block, I'd like to say firstly that you are crazy and secondly, I thank you from the bottom of my heart!

A Short Taxi Ride

A few days ago, I landed up in the Mumbai airport at 5 PM in the evening to attend a formal dinner. I was supposed to meet up with my colleague from Delhi who was landing at the same time, it turned out that his flight was early and mine was an hour late and hence he had left by the cab booked by the office and I was stuck looking for a local cab. As I walked over to the Taxi area, I was accosted by a number of taxi drivers and auto drivers, I politely refused as I walked over to a line of the blue Cool Cabs.

When I reached there I found out that these cabs have all gone pre-paid and hence I needed to go back into the arrival lounge to book them, which given the security concerns around airports was easier said than done, hence I was advised to seek a taxi from a lot which was near the arrival pick-up area.

As I was walking towards this place, another driver came to me and asked me if I needed a taxi. Realising that I had no choice, I nodded and immediately he reached for my strolley bag and guided me to a solitary (blue) taxi on the side of the area. As I got in to the Taxi , along with the driver another guy jumped into the car in the front. Since I was on a phone call by then I couldn't do much and as I was talking on the phone the taxi pulled away. The guy sitting next to the driver turned back and showed me a card which I couldn't figure out much and told me that the trip to Colaba would cost me thousand five hundred rupees. I knew that the normal fare was around four hundred or five hundred rupees. I held my call and told this guy that I wanted to be dropped off immediately and I didn't want his cab. He started arguing with me asking me how much I wanted to pay etc. I told him I just wanted to be dropped off and I'd find my way. By this point the taxi was weaving through a slow traffic inside the airport premises.

After my insistence that I be dropped of he said "OK give me 800 now" (To be honest I am not sure if he meant for the destination or just getting out of the cab). I refused him and told him that I wanted to be dropped off. His voice got louder and more threatening. The driver was looking around nervously. I weighed my odds and given that I was stuck with the two guys I really wanted to get out of the cab before I left the airport premises. The guy next to the driver pulled out two hundred rupees and thrust it at me, asking me to give him a thousand. I felt that the only way the taxi was going to stop was if I showed them some money so I hesitantly pulled out my wallet and took eight hundred rupees and handed over to his guy. He grabbed the one five hundred and three hundred rupee notes I gave him and turned forward to hide his body away from me and I could see him switching the five hundred with a hundred he had in his pocket and then he turned to me and told him that I'd given him only four hundred and I had to give him another four hundred now. Now, this got me incredibly mad and I started yelling at him and started rolling down the window started screaming 'STOP!' (or something quite similar) from the top of my voice. The guy next to the driver kept yelling at me that I needed to give him more money NOW!

As the traffic the car braked in traffic, I quickly got out the car and started looking around for some help. The guy next to the driver got out still asking me (in a low tone) that I needed to give him money before I can go. Fortuitously, I looked around and I saw a Police Jeep d coming up on the side doing it's rounds. I flagged it down and the driver seeing this quickly got out and unloaded my luggage

As I approached the Police Jeep, the taxi driver zoomed off, since the road was now clear in front, leaving his partner in crime. As the cop was listening to me and asking questions about the taxi license (or something like that), the guy told the cop that he wanted to call his boss to come and clarify that they were a genuine taxi and took a few steps away holding his phone to his ear. As I went back to narrating my story I could see a figure darting off to my right from the corner of my eye. It was the taxi guy. No one from the Jeep got off.

After I narrated the story, the Policeman in the front (who had taken the car number down) asked me if I was OK. They flagged off another cab and told the cab driver to charge me the actual cab fare and as I was loading my bags I realised that I not only had that eight hundred rupees I'd given to the guy (which he thrust in my hand just as the cop vehicle stopped) but also the two hundred he had given me in the car in anticipation of a thousand! I walked back to the Police vehicle and told the Cop that I had this money. He asked me to put the money on his dashboard, which I did. And then I was on my way.

(Not proud of the fact that I intended to hand over the eight hundred bucks to these taxi guys but all I could think off was that I wanted to end the issue before the Cab got out of the airport premises. And I'm not sure if the Cops did do anything, no one stepped out of the Jeep, I had to rush for this dinner and I was already behind schedule plus I had to catch an early morning flight to Baroda, which I did. Bottom line - when in Mumbai Airport, get a pre-paid).

Lessons from Dante's Peak

Indian movies generally cop a lot of criticism for being a little over the top but I'm watching Dante's Peak and I realise that Hollywood movies really don't lag behind either. So here are some of the stuff I've learned from this movie today

a) Vulcanologists know how to hot wire a car. Pretty much anyone in a Hollywood movie when encountered with a keyless car, can quickly pull out some wires, connect two and have it started before you can say Oprah! Caution: Don't try this at home, you just might connect your radio to the windshield wiper.

b) You can drive a car through a flow of Magma, get stuck badly stuck for a long time, look constipated as you press the accelerator while you mutter "it's ok, it's ok", and your car will eventually start moving forward and cross the flow of magma and still have major bits of rubber clinging on to the rim of the car.

c) When you encounter a metal boat in a river of acid, the metal boat will absolutely last you till almost the last second of your journey through the river of acid and then sink, ie nothing happens to the boat when it was just floating around.

d) This one is my favourite. When you have a Pyroclastic Flow, ie fast moving (700 kmph) hot (1000C) gas and rock, racing your tyre-less hobbling car which does about 40 kmph to the entrance of a mine . The fricking car will win. That too after being followed for around 3-4 minutes on a long road.

What more the Flow will not follow the car into the mine, Lest the Hero gets singed.


e) Lastly, the mine once everyone's inside will collapse BUT will do so AROUND everyone.


Watching movies is so much fun, when you are a cynic!

Are these guys for real?

A CNN Anchor quite seriously to to an 'PR Expert', "How much remorse should Tiger Woods show in public so that he can regain his former reputation?"...eh?

A simple question which provides a profound insight into how mass media works nowadays.

I wanna write so badly! Which I do whenever I write! (he he)

2009

Over the last few days I've been reflecting back on this year and I can sort of encapsulate what I feel about this year in one sentence, 'I'm glad it's almost over'. Yeah sure there were moments which were truly fantastic, my daughter's first birthday, my daughter's first swim, the first family holiday I've had with both my parents and my parents in law etc spring to mind.

But all in all, what a horrifying year. A year when I felt truly powerless to navigate my own destiny, a year which started with each week feeling like it was a life time when success meant getting through to a Saturday with my sanity intact. Despite this, I know I'm one of the lucky few, coz there are a lot of people out there who have lost a loved one or have lost their job or their savings.

Someone told me a few days ago that whatever happens in 2010, it can't be as bad as 2009 and all I could think was, don't count your chickens before they hatch.

The Miracle Man

Another morning, another airport, I walked into the security hold area sleepily. The crisp and mildly chilly air in the new Bangalore airport felt like the tender caress of a sedative to an insomniac, something that doesn't quite put you to sleep yet dulls the senses into a pleasant haze. As i wandered past the open restaurant through a maze of blackberries, laptops, cellphones and the hapless humans attached to them I was suddenly brought to a stop by a startling sight.

There was this 40 something guy in a suit sitting at the counter, drinking a tall glass of beer. Normally this wouldn't be such a big deal but I looked at my watch, 7:15 AM. I looked up again, he didn't look the drunk type, no pouches below his eyes, no glassy eyes, in fact he looked like he was in the prime of his health. What more he seemed to be relishing every sip of his ber. I didn't even know that the served beer this early in the morning. As I stood there gaping at this guy enjoying his beer, I realised soon that I wasn't alone, there were quite a few people staring at him too.

As he smacked his lips after a long sip, I could feel my lips turning dry. The very concept of having a beer that early in the morning seemed so wrong yet so alluring. He represented everything that was the exact opposite of me. Here I was running against time, all the time, I couldn't think of the last time I had that look that he had on his face, the one of absolute contentment. For that matter, I couldn't think of the last time I had a beer, I mean sit there and just enjoying every sip. It was almost as if I stopped living, a long time ago.

And there he was, drinking that beer, looking like he didn't have a care in the world, didn't look like he had any to worry about, nor a boss to pander, a team to motivate or even a a family to get back to that day. Heck, he was in a suit, so there wasn't a pre-packaged three nights four days whirlwind trip of Europe, which we working stiffs call a holiday to go to either. He was just like me and the dozen other who were staring at him, yet so different.

He could do something we couldn't. It was as simple as that.

After 15 years, of working my heart out, I couldn't do what he did. Frustration welled in my heart, I looked around, at the terminal screen, I had 20 minutes before boarding. I walked over to the counter next to the man with determination, sat on the barstool and set my laptop below and call the bartender over. 'A pint of Fosters please' I said. I swear the guy did a double take and with a slow shake of his head got a clean beer mug, filled it up and placed it in front of me. My fingers were shaking a little as I held the mug and took a long resolute sip. I couldn't describe the feeling of thrill that I felt when the golden nectar flowed through me. After a few more deep sips, I looked around, at the man and the others who were now looking at me. Suddenly my shoulders felt a little lighter and I flashed a smile at them, then I lifted my beer mug in a salute to my fellow working stiffs. The world seemed like such a cheerful place after all.

Just then, I heard the man beside ask the bartender for the check and as the bartender rang up the bill I choked on my beer when I saw I the display screen of his billing machine which was customer facing. My inspiration for corporate nirvana had been drinking a popular non-alcoholic beer which was no more potent than a glass of coke.

Yesterday my daughter said the first clear sentence on the phone, 'Appa, I love you!', of course she did not realise that I was on the other end of the line, she thought as usual her Mom had given her the phone for her to have her make-believe conversation.

I don't really have words to describe..

Deep Thought

Is the goal of television viewing to watch the programs which are interrupted by advertisements or watch advertisements interrupted by programs.

Numb

Mumbai - 26th November 2008

I feel Numb.

I feel angry.

I feel frustrated.

Most of all I feel let down, by myself and my society.

We in India live between two poles, one of idealism and the other of crass opportunism. Very seldom if ever do those two poles ever cross each other's paths. It is as if we dream of an ideal india but have settled comfortably in this opportunistic version without much qualms (have I read that somewhere, maybe).

We accept loose standards as we expect others to accept our loose standards. We object to corruption and inefficiency till the same corruption and inefficiency is needed to get us out of trouble.

The change we want, we expect others to deliver, maybe our politicians, maybe our media, maybe our police or judiciary without realising that these are people are but reflections of our collective souls, they are us. Change if anything needs to come from within and if we ever inventory the things that need change, it is indeed a very long and depressing list.

Only in moments of anger or sadness do we voice our idealism yet we willingly shelve the idealism along with the changing winds of the media stories.

In time, we will forget the security lapses, the huge delays to get the NSG in action, the snipers who didn't even have telescopic lenses and the absolute leadership vacuum this country went through the last few days.

I would daresay we would forget even those who lost their lives and also the bravery of heroes like Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, ATS Chief Hemant Karkare and many others. As horrible and callous as that thought sounds now, history suggests that we will do just that.

I feel angry with us the society, individually and collectively for this ability to easily forget and move on. We may be eloquant in our words, for awhile and even be moved by our own belief of what is right but let a few weeks pass and we WILL forget.

We will go back to our coccoon of our daily lives, living in the false impression that we and our near and dear are and will always be safe, not knowing that our very acceptance of the inefficiency that surrounds us and is fed by us is putting everything we cherish in danger.

If we crave change let us change ourselves first and let us for heavens sake never ever forget.

Who Wears The Pants? An Economist's View

Tim Hartford of the Undercover Economist fame in answer to a question "I am a father of three teenagers and happily married for almost 20 years. In my opinion the secret to my success is a traditional one, which is that there is no doubt about who wears the trousers. I am wondering whether there is any support in economic theory for my view?", opines,

The paterfamilias household is no more.

How, then, should we reconcile this with your own situation, which seems comfortably wedged in the 1950s? My guess is that your wife and children have decided that it suits them to maintain your delusions of control.

Sigh. Guess my gut-feel was right after all. Read the full reply here.