Lockdown #18 - a short story

Lockdown #18

The lockdown has been extended for the 17th time. Unbelievable. But it does not come as a surprise anymore. We are under the lockdown for over 6 months now. Every time it has been extended by a week, two weeks or three weeks.

 Looking back, it was good that I moved to the farmhouse just before the lockdown. What was supposed to be a short trip of three days has turned out to be a long long stay. Not that I am complaining. It’s better than staying in our small apartment pretty much in the center of the city which has turned a hotspot now - more than 3,000 cases and more than 100 deaths in the last 6 months.

 I am out on my daily walk in the woods near the farmhouse. It’s a boon. Having so much of greenery, waterbody, hills, and fresh air. At a stone’s throw from the city.

 The old man with long grey flowing beard in his modest clothes is there today also. He passes by me every day on my walk, whatever time of the day it is. Does he walk the whole day? He has a graceful calm on his face. He reminds me of my father. We nod at each other every day. He never speaks, neither do I. I am not the one to start a conversation.

 But today I am in a different mood. I decide to break the ice.

 “What do you think?”, I say.

 “About what?” His voice is deep and young and has a soothing effect. Defies his age. He smiles slightly as the speaks.

 “The lockdown”, I say. It looks like he does not like small talks.

 “Haven’t you understood yet?”

 “Understood what?”, I am puzzled.

 “Have you not noticed any differences since the lockdown”, he quizzes me.

 “Many. For one - nature has recovered. There is no pollution. It’s cooler. It’s much greener than it used to be. There is no traffic. No flights. It’s quiet. The way I like it.”

 “What else?”, he probes further.

 “Hmmm... the chirp of the birds is more pronounced. And yes, the flowers. They always seem to be there. Never noticed that before”, I am thinking now.

 “And?”

 “There is an abundant supply of everything - milk, eggs, chicken, vegetables, and groceries - though there is a lockdown. Everything delivered at home. I wonder how! The water in the lake does not seem to be receding. I remember it going down by a few feet by this time of the year”, how come it did not catch my attention before!

 “There is more”, the smile on his face is more pronounced though the voice remains calm.

 “You are right. My beard has stopped growing. I came here with only a few sets of clothes but they don’t seem to be wearing out. The fan does not make that irritating sound anymore. Everything is the way it should be!” I rattle out.

“Yes, I am missing out on meeting people. But for that, this is almost like being in heaven!”, I exclaim.

 The old man is almost grinning now!

 “Wait a minute. I am actually in heaven. This is heaven. I am dead! There is no COVID?!”, what is happening?

 “No. You are alive now”, the old man is consoling me.

 “And you are!”, now I realize who he is.

 “Yes, I am!”

 “But why this? It took me 6 months to realize where I am”, it’s my turn to question him.

 “This is how we ease people in this place. We don’t want you to die of shock”, he chuckles. He has a sense of humor.

“By the way, I met you every day.” He is defending himself. Ha, does he need to?

 “So this is how the heaven is”, it’s dawning upon me.

 “I wonder how the hell is”, I am curious now. For a sworn agnostic, this is the revelation of a lifetime.

 “Where do you think you were before?”, the old man is almost mocking me. 

He raises his hand and starts walking.

 I stand there. Still trying to absorb everything.

 He stops, turns and says, “By the way, you may stop wasting your time on all those office calls… with our AI engine. Start enjoying heaven.”

 “I have one last question”, I shout after him.

 “I know. I come like this because you don’t recognize me in any other form.”

2% for CSR - are you kidding Mr Minister?

This is the latest from the Indian government. While we are already dealing with so many scams, the govt is busy creating a platform for one more (or many more). Essentially, the govt wants companies to set aside (and spend) 2% of their net profit on CSR (Click here for the news article).

What does it mean? If there is a company with 5,000cr (US $1B) as revenue with 20% profitability, they need to spend 20cr on CSR. That's lot of money!

While I have fundamental issue at the philosophical level, there are others at operational level... And while the exact meaning of CSR is yet to be defined, India inc have their strategy ready... This is what is likely to happen in most of the cases - a set of shell companies will be created in the form of NGO or charity organizations... may be 2% of the 2% will be spent on real charity and 98% will be routed back to the officials of the company and the charity organization...

There you go - yet another opportunity to convert white into black without impacting the financials of the company...

Before the skeptics jump on me for doubting the integrity of Indian businesses (HA!), here is another perspective - the people/companies who want to do it are already doing it... they don't need a law... the ones who don't want to do it, will never do it... whatever it comes to... because they believe that charity starts at home... and ends at home...

So, Dear Mr Deora (and Mr Sinha for that matter), you must really be kidding...

Only if....

Thanks for the overwhelming response to my last post about my shenanigans in the share market... come on - 6 comments is overwhelming, sometimes I don’t get even one... so, thank you!
Well, some of the responses were pretty serious - guess most of the people can't take share market in other way but seriously, except for some jokers like me...

Anyways, let’s move on to the topic of the day…

I was thinking… what if Harivansh Rai Bachhan (Amitabh’s father) wasn’t a poet? He would not have used the title Bachhan – something the poets of those days used to do (may be they do it even today as well, I wouldn’t know)… Amitabh would have been Amitabh Rai, not Amitabh Bachhan (Rai is his real surname anyways) and Abhishek would have been Abhishek Rai… and, here is the funny part – Aishwarya Rai Bachhan would have been Aishwarya Rai Rai…

But then, do you expect a name like Amitabh Rai to be superstar (no offense to all my Rai friends!)? And we all know that Aishwarya did not marry Abhishek, she married into the Bachhan family… and if so, if Abhishek would have been Rai, may Aishwaraya Rai would have been Aishwarya Rai Oberoi!

Confused? Go back and read it again :)

Expert Advice...

After keeping away all my life, I finally added the vice to the long list of the ones that I already possess... well, I quit smoking last year and had a big empty space for a big one... I thought it was only fair and took the plunge (how the human minds rationalize – big asset and bigger liability)... I am talking about the share market – i started trading actively, especially in futures and options (F&O)... the fact that i had quit my job helped the matters – i had all the time to trade and do the “research”...

(if u r planning to quit because i am talking about share market, pls don’t... stay on...)

The experience of the last few months has been exciting... The things started very well... I made money for the first 2 months... (i know, i know – i am the same guy who kept preaching people to keep away from the evil called F&O and how everyone i know who did not has only lost money and how i am yet to see a person who has made ANY money... may be i am like one of those catholic church priests...)

Anyways, you can call that beginner’s luck... it indeed was – for the next two months, i lost all the money i had made and more...

I did some thinking and realized that after having made money for two months, my mind rationalized that i had become an expert, that i had cracked the code and as a result i was doing deeper research and was making the “sure shot” calls... i knew everything!

Oh, that was so stupid – to think that i had become an expert...

Let me give you an example of how the so called “experts” assess the market... i get a weekly mailer, following are the excerpts –

It starts thus – “We understand the need for the right research to make smart investment decisions...”

That’s good, very reassuring... then it goes blah blah bluh bluh bleh bleh, sprinkles some data points from here and there and comes up with the following conclusion –

“For the Nifty, the 5,150 remains an important resistance sustaining above which it can test 5300 levels. On the downside, the 4,960-5,000 zone would act as support for the coming week”

For uninitiated, it simply means – the market will go up, go down or remain where it is right now!! And they call themselves experts!!!

In other words, the so called experts are no experts – their predictions are as good (or as bad) as the “daily forecast” column of the newspapers OR the weather predictions...

And there I was, fooling myself thinking I had “cracked the code” and was making “sure shot” calls... no wonder i lost money...

So what did i do? Very simple... i went back to the basic reality of “i do not know anything about the share market”... which is what i was doing for the first 2 months... i was going with a very basic technical call to assess if the share is going to go up or down... it worked more often than not...

Result – the approach worked and i started making money again...

So, where do i stand right now? In the 6 months of existence in the share market, i have broken even – made, lost and made... wait a minute... that’s if i don’t consider the brokerage... after considering brokerage, i am still in the RED...

So here is an “expert” comment – the only people who definitely make money are the brokers – doesn’t matter if you make or lose money in the process... they definitely do...

So do i plan to stick around or get out?

Of course i plan to stick around – it’s so much of fun! And what’s wrong in making money when “you don’t know anything”...

ps – If you need help with “making money while not knowing anything”, i provide “expert advice” at a very reasonable price... call me!

Oh! Mr. Modi

It's amazing how the human mind works. The most amazing of the minds start breaking down beyond a certain point. It's greed that got better of Raju - he took his book cooking innovation a bit too far...

And now, it's Modi. Is it his ego or unedning greed or is he just too high on the success of IPL to realize what he is doing... First, he showed the middle finger to the govt during IPL2 by taking it to SA and now, someone who was once implicated for an armed robbery and has enough and more dealings within IPL setup to be easily pointed a finger at, decided to take on a union minister... I dont know (and don't care) if Tharoor is at a fault but Modi is plain stupid... Sheeshe ke gharon mein rahne wale doosaron par patthar nahi phenkte... it's the golden rule that Modi has blatantly broken...

"The issue will be swatted and it would be over soon... just like before" is what Modi claimed a couple of days back... I have my doubts... And I suggest he prepares himself for some good, nice swatting... coming soon!
 
I love the game of cricket and IPL has been a great entertainer... The events of the last few days has taken the fun out of IPL... I feel sorry for myself as well as for Mr Modi... Oh! Mr. Modi... All the best nevertheless...

Am I going to die in terrorist attack?

Public safety is a huge concern in India today. Threat perception is very high. And it's getting worse and closer by the day. On Feb 11th, I was discussing the security issues and terrorism in India with a distinguished gentleman at the Pune airport. He was in a hurry so I had to meet him at the airport. Two days later, on Feb 13th, the unfortunate German Bakery incident took place. Less than 4 kilometers away from the airport.


This morning, I saw the bomb squad entering State Bank of India. I still don't know if it was a drill or a hoax or an actual threat. There is nothing in the news yet. The bank is less than a kilometer away from my house. It's getting closer and it's scary.

But wait a minute. Why am I talking about all this on this blog? This is not supposed to be serious blog. Right? This is why – I am gung ho about the upcoming IPL. Version 3.0.

For the uninitiated, IPL is the Indian Premier League - T20 matches played between clubs of a colonial game called cricket – not played in white clothes anymore, unless you play for five days. This one is a three hour version and apart from cricket , you get to watch skimpily clad women dancing at the drop of a hat, sorry catch! Another thing – the game is played on a pitch about a hundred yards away while the girls dance right in front of you. You know what I mean. It's more than cricket and you might be interested even if you don't know what this game means. (Disclaimer – I love the game and insist on watching even five day version, including the ones between Australia and New Zealand – which, btw, has become easier now that I have quit my job. Disclaimer 2 – I did not quit my job for watching cricket (or for writing stupid blogs, for that matter))

Coming back to the game of cricket and IPL, some of the games will be played in New Mumbai and Nagpur which are not very far from Pune. I do want to watch some of the matches in the stadium (apart from some in the multiplex – another novely of IPL v3. Lalit Modi ji ki jai ho!). Now the issue is this – there already is lot of discouragement from friends and family. It's supposed to be risky. What if there is a bomb blast (which, in fact, is a possibility)?

Now, please consider the following data (sources: various) -

Odds of dying in a car crash – 1:185
Odds of dying in a terrorist attack – 1:19,159,765
Odds of winning a jackpot – 1:13,983,816

My chances of winning a jackpot are higher than my chances of of dying in a terrorist attack. And I know it for a fact that I will never win a jackpot. Yes, I do increase my chances by going for an IPL match or by going to any other public place but so do I by buying an actual lottery ticket. The buying ticket thing hasn't worked for me till now. Also, my chance of dying in a car crash are really scary. I should stop travelling in a car before I stop going for movies and IPL matches, I guess.

Btw, I am planning to drive down to the stadium. I will drive carefully!
 
Happy Living folks!!
 

Hollywood vrs Bollywood

 
The purists don’t like Bollywood being called Bollywood. And there are some big names out there, the machos who would won’t mind changing the geography of your face for calling Bollywood Bollywood. In any case, l decided to take the risk of using Bollywood for couple of reasons – it rhymes with Hollywood and the topic sounds natural... and hey, do you know the real name of Bollywood (don’t give me “Hindi movie industry” or “Mumbai movie industry”... they sound so uncool and unnatural...)

Anyway, the main topic of discussion is comparison of Hollywood and Bollywood (er!)...

“East is East; West is West and never the twain shall meet” – This is what Nobel laureate Joseph Rudyard Kipling said in his poem ‘The Ballad of East and West’... And this was “oh so true” for when you consider the movies – the storyline, cinematography, direction, acting, special effects... Hollywood was a winner hands down... our only forte was music – music being at the very core of Bollywood...

That was till recently... The more number of movies I watch and the more I think about it, the more they seem to be converging... in fact the lines are getting blurred more and more... there are a score of movies where if you mask the faces, cut out the sound (well, include subtitles) and, of course, take the songs out, you wont be able to figure out the origin of the movie... and I am not talking about the “scene-by-scene copy” kind of movies only...

The extend of convergence is amazing...

The special effects in Hollywood are getting better and so are they in Bollywood – the only constraint seems to be the money – while Bollywood producers are also splurging money on special effects, we still are a poor country...

Consider the movie Krrish... special effects are as good as it gets...

And consider Paa (while it’s not about special effects and is more about make-up)... except for the eyes and the unique shoulders and that too if you watch carefully, you cant figure out that Auro is played by Amitabh... not even the unmistakable voice of the great actor...

The Hollywood story lines are getting more Bollywoodish...

And I believe this is the biggest let down... gone are the days when Bond was a womanizer... he is a one woman man now and ready to die for his love of the life (what was the recent Bond movie?)...

Have you watched 2012? Great special effect but the story... the world is coming to an end but the “good black guy” (this is what I call reverse stereotyping) makes a passionate speech about the values Americans stand for and hence why it’s important to save a particular family at the risk of killing the last surviving set of people... how stupid and how Bollywoodish!

Watched Avatar yesterday... amazing special effects, out of the world... but again bulk of the storyline is around “haves vrs have nots” that was so typical of Bollywood some 20 years back... rich vrs poor and urban vrs rural... more or less... And the romance between the hero and heroin... they get cosy and express their love for each other, well, under a tree... I almost thought they would break into a song and dance around the pious tree but they settled for the old fashioned sex instead... thanks goodness for small mercies!

The only marked difference that remains is songs... Or is it? Do you consider Slumdog a Hollywood movie or a Bollywood movie? I have already heard rumours of Brangelina dancing around the trees on a song put together by Rehman!

I would honestly like Hollywood to go back to their old storylines as far as action and thrillers are considered... please keep the emotions out... keep the romance out... give me pure action and violence... give me my Rambo back... For the emotions and all, I still have my DDLJs and my KKKGs!

Tanya's dance

Gandhiji's German Connection

It all happened when I was roaming around in the Inorbit mall in Vashi sometime in September… I am not really a fanatic shopper though I do like shopping for myself once in a while… The reason I went all the way to Vashi from Pune – a distance of over 100 kms – was because I had heard a lot about this mall… In fact my sister-in-law Pallu (who is a “reluctant compulsive shopper”) told me that it’s like a “Dubai mall” (If you have seen some of those malls in Dubai, you would know what I mean)… I had to go and check it out for myself!

I am sure you are already wondering about the connection between a mall and Gandhiji… Germany and Gandhiji... please have patience…

I know you are also thinking… isn’t it a bit late considering Gandhiji’s birthday was around 15 days back and this is more appropriate a time to write about Diwali… True. Agree. The reality is that this posting would have come out irrespective of the timing… after all, Gandhi is a man of “all times”…

The India today is definitely not the India as thought of by Gandhiji. There are too many stinking rich people around… Too many for the comfort for Mr. Gandhi, I would say, especially considering the fact that way too many poor remain… There are too many other things but I will not get into the details (and make this a serious blog, which is not the intention) but I am sure Gandhiji must have turned, rolled and spun in his grave (in a proverbial sense!) over last 60 years since his death… But this one must have woken him up…

Coming back to the “roaming around in the mall”, I noticed Gandhiji’s portrait in the window of a Mont Blanc outlet. It aroused my curiosity. While Mont Blanc is a status symbol, article of show-off, luxury, for the rich people of the world, Mr Gandhi is a symbol of austerity, stands for the poor and naked of this world. They are poles apart. What on earth Gandhiji’s portrait doing at a Mont Blanc showroom? (Btw, Mont Blanc ha German roots)

I walked closer. It was a well “decorated” window with Gandhiji’s portrait, some charkhas, trademark round glasses and so on… in the center was a white-cream pen… and there was a small plaque. I read the plaque and lost my consciousness. Some passer-bys revived me (don’t remember if they sprinkled water or slapped). I read the plaque again. It essentially said that there are two types of limited edition pens. For one type they would donate Rs 10,000 for charity for each pen bought. For the second type they would donate Rs 50,000 per pen!!

What’s the price of each pen? I did not have the heart to ask. I checked over the internet later. It seems the price is some Rs 11 Lakhs (for one pen, in case you are wondering!) and Tushar Gandhi (great grandson) helped launch and supports the initiative. Well!

I have done and seen many senseless things in my life but this one takes the cake… While I was driving back, I saw Gandhiji walking dazed somewhere out there... I dont think it was due to “chemical locha” in my mind... Thanks to Mont Blanc, Gandhiji walked out of his grave!

Down with wine flu

Swine flu scare is not really at it’s peak in Pune though people are still dying. May be people have given up on cumbersome precautions and have taken it as a fact of the life. The restaurants, movie theaters and malls are back to “business as usual”… Hardly anyone is wearing a mask. Considering the number of cases still being reported, I guess the virus is as potent as before…

Anyways… I had a real terrible cold for last 3-4 days… it wasn’t really flu but the usual cold that I get once in a while… I had a runny nose, mild headache, watery eyes and mild fever. On the third day, it was almost unbearable and I went to the GP. He checked me thoroughly and wrote down couple of medicines. I asked him, half jokingly, if I need to worry about the H1N1. He as if suddenly remembered something and immediately wrote down – “H1N1 screening”… I tried arguing that my symptoms weren’t really of the swine flu. He pulled out a notice from Pune municipal corporation which states that if an H1N1 case is diagnosed and the patient had already seen a doctor with flu like symptoms and if the doctor had failed to send the patient for screening, the doctor would implicated under IPC 319 ("IPC 319 - Hurt - Whoever causes bodily pain, disease or infirmity to any person is said to cause hurt"). He almost pleaded with me that I should go for the screening else he could be in trouble. I realized that the screening was for him, not for me :)

For my dear doctor's well being, I went to Dinanath Mangeshkar hospital. Luckily the crowd was sparse. Since we were at the “fever OPD”, my wife had covered her mouth. I, like a hero, did not cover myself. We were called in soon and the nurse asked if my wife was the patient!!
The doctor checked me thoroughly and sent me back home. She said I didn’t need swine flu test… I did not even need flu medicine, forget Tamiflu or equivalent… she gave me a course of anti-allergic tabs. One tablet and I was back on my feet.

So much for the swine flu! I think it was regular "wine flu" that I picked up over the long weekend. Too much of ice cold diet coke I guess and of course, some eh, ahem…
Also realized that I have an allergic condition (took anti-allergic tab for the first time in my life), thanks to swine flu era!

Where was I?

It happened! This is what I was afraid of. Before I could apply for the leave, I got the automated message saying I was “almost absconding”. It did not matter that I had taken permission from my boss, it did not matter that I had informed all my colleagues, it did not matter that I was checking most of my mail every day, it did not matter that I was on calls almost every day of my leave. Damn computers! They aren’t smart enough yet. Not yet in the self learning mode. They just executed the policy!
(Btw, it’s all about how you put together and analyze all the available data to draw conclusions. For example, two of the 9/11 suicide “bombers” had their names in the terrorist watch list, were staying in the US under their own names, had their phone numbers listed and had bought the 9/11 tickets on their own names. All the data was available… just that no-one including NSA could put it all together… not in time at least. The future lies in collecting and making sense of data from varied sources. Not only in case of terrorism but also in case of retail (sounds familiar?) and jobs. It’s all about maths. The future lies in maths. A recommended read on this topic is “The Numerati” by Stephen Baker. The first 2 chapters are a must read. A copy is available in my library.)

Coming back to the main topic, it was very uncharacteristic of me to go on an unplanned/unscheduled leave of a week. Not that I never take unplanned leave but never for a week. In my case, any leave more than a day or two is planned at least 3 months in advance due to real life constraints. So this sudden leave took everyone by surprise. I conveniently ducked the question of “where I was” by saying somewhere in India – which was very true. This got the tongues wagging.
A colleague of mine told me that I or rather my leave had become a topic of discussion at lunch table – how flattering! Another one guessed that I was enjoying the nice weather of Nagpur (I had originally gone to Nagpur for the long weekend – Apr 30, May 1-3 – and had extended the leave) – how lame is that? Nagpur is the hottest city in the country with temperatures going up to 48-degrees. That’s HOT - trust me.
Another guy guessed that I was in Bangalore and a good friend of mine said I was in Pune. How stupid is that! Why would I stay in one of these 2 cities and take leave? Why sleep at home when I can do so in an AC office :)
The best one was – I was in some Ashram in Haridwar. Well, I am not as old as I look and I am not there yet – to be going to an Ashram for 5 days.

Btw, by now, I wonder why people have been so curious about my whereabouts. Why can't i go missing for 5 days?

Now, the Sherlock Holmes of worlds, here are some clues for you to figure out where I was –
1. I was somewhere in India – already mentioned
2. Already mentioned some of the places where I wasn’t
3. On my trip I visited one of the ancient universities (The clue!)
4. On my way back to the Pune, the last flight took 50 minutes
5. I was back on a Friday (i.e. in Pune ver the weekend)

Those who already know where I was, please, please, don’t spill the beans and spoil the fun. Others, all the best! Let’s see if you have it in you!!

Time to get serious?

One fine(?) day(!), just a few days or rather nights ago, I got up in the middle of the night and laid awake for some 2 hours. Sleeplessness is not really a problem I have… instead, the contrary is true. I need my 8 hours of beauty sleep. I can sleep at any time of the day or night. This, some say, is a good thing because as the age progresses one needs less and less of the sleep. May be that means I am not getting old with age!

Anyways, coming back to the sleepless night… I was awake of some 2 hours… may be it was the chicken last night which decided to give it a fight! Too little, too late, I guess… 2 hours of heavy encounter between the digestive juices and the chicken who refused to chicken out decided the ultimate winner… hope you can guess the winner!

Coming back to the sleepless 2 hours – the funny thing about being awake in the night is that one can’t do much – you have this hope all the time that you will fall asleep soon, you can’t make noise lest you wake others up and you can’t switch on the lights to read a book for the same reason… so you just lie there and think…
I believe this is the most divine form of thinking… more divine than the one you do in the toilet because toilet thinking is now polluted by newspaper/BB reading and you also need to focus on you know what!!
So I laid there… thinking…

I almost invented a machine… a gift wrapping machine… The most painful part of shopping, apart from the long queues to pay, is the longer queue to get the stuff gift wrapped… it feels more painful as it comes right after the queue of paying and the wrapping activity seems sooo slow… I realized that there isn’t anything powerful, commercially viable enough in the market yet… at least I haven’t seen any retailer using one… I almost designed the whole thing in my mind – including a special type of paper required for such a machine…
I looked this up on Google later and realized that there is indeed such a need in the market! The sorry part was that the idea has already been thought about... on exactly the same line... Check out the link - http://www.whynot.net/ideas/2732. The good part is that I don’t think there is a commercial avatar in the market yet… And one thought everything possible has already been invented!!
There is an engineer in the US who did a whole project around this. And if you think this a lame idea, don’t worry, you have got supporters. Check the same link.

Done with designing the gift wrapping machine, I started thinking further… about this blog… realized that if one types my name in Google (www.google.com), my blog comes up as the first link… realized that its not necessarily the best thing… especially for a professional like me… especially in the times like these… and thus came the idea of starting a serious blog… a blog on views on the Indian industry – in a very serious way…

Have already implemented this idea. check it out at http://bhaskarwaruday.blogspot.com/
Someone has already commented that I have too much of time on hand… well, that’s not a good thing again… especially in time like these :)

Bye for now…

Moviemania - Part II

Okay folks, this is going to be a short one…

I recently watched this movie called Dasvidaniya on my “home theater”… my home theater essentially comprises of a flat screen LCD TV and a LG dvd player (LG = Life’s Good or Low Grade?!)… the movie is essentially a touching one and worth watching (be in the movie hall or on home theater – you decide)… first I wondered why the movie is named what it is named…
The hero is Vinay Pathak, yes our own Vinay Pathak… I realized that he is the co-producer of the movie… who else would make him the hero of a movie but for himself?... Sorry Vinay, nothing against you and your talent but you and a hero, nah!

Anyways, the gist of the story is that the hero comes up with a list of 10 things(and hence the name Dasvidaniya, I realized!) he wants to do before dying of cancer… and achieves all of it…
This part is really inspiring… dying or not dying, one must have a to-do list for life… I know a friend of mine Maku who has a list of 25 things… yup, it could be a little annoying when he insists playing tabla (one of his list of 25) for you in the middle of the night when the only thing you want to do is hit the bed… I wonder if annoying his friends is on his list… may be he is trying to do "ek teer, do shikar" like the hero of Dasvidaniya who does “foreign” and “love” at one shot (both on his list)…
I decided to work on my own list and realized that 10 is too small a number… without creating a formal to-do list, I already have more than 10 things to do (including a trip to Switzerland and one that I am already trying to do – sorry, no public announcements yet!)… may be my list would be "Beesvidaniya"! HE HE HE!

Till we meet next time, take care...

Moviemania (or to be precise, "Movie mania")

The moment I started writing this posting, I noticed the red wiggly under the word moviemania. It’s a surprise that “moviemania” does not exist in the dictionary as a single word – well, at least not in the MS-Word dictionary. Anyways, I love watching movies and my style of watching movies is not about getting a CD at home and watching it on “home theatre”… for one, I don’t have a home theatre… I used to have a kinda one – a Sony system bought from Malaysia some 10 years back which I retired couple of months back (it’s still taking some shelf space so if you are an antique collector, be my guest!). In any case, I don’t want to have a home theatre (in case this posting is read by an enterprising salesperson, pls don’t bother) because watching movie at home is as good as kissing your beau over phone. Good but not good enough (more often than not, kiss over the phone is a majboori). Movies should be watched in style… it should be an event… you must spend good 4 hours on this activity and you must watch it in a real theatre…

I am fortunate to have friends who share this passion and we end up watching a movie almost every weekend… you can spot me, Priti (my wife), Munje (oops, sorry – Munjay) and Dolly (Munje’s wife) at E-square almost every Saturday/Sunday (in case you are planning to kidnap me for a ransom, the movie theatre plan will not work because we are shrewd and wise enough to go for a different timing everytime… an easier plan might be on my way or back from the office... or may be not!... in any case, kidnapping me may not be such a good idea – try an easier pick like Laloo… if not anything, you will get some chara (fodder) or alkatra (tar) as ransom)

Coming back to the topic of movies, the real issue with watching movie in a theatre is that it really hurts when the movie is a cropper… The year 2008 started very well with lots of good movies… but last few months have been really bad (including Rab Ne..., Singh is King (sorry Harsh) and Ghajini)… I think “A Wednesday” was the last good movie that I saw in the theatre… a movie like “Welcome to Sajjanpur” is good enough to watch at home (without a home theatre, mind it and no CD please, let it get released on UTV movies) but not in a theatre… a movie has to be really good if watched in the theatre (or hall)… I was fortunate enough not to watch Rab Ne… Munje SMSed me from the movie hall that he was choking to death and I must send an ambulance along with paramedics for his rescue… That was good enough a hint for me not to watch the movie…

Tlatest that I watched was “Delhi 6”… I did not know much about the movie (in fact, the only thing that I try to figure out about a movie is if it’s “good” or “bad” – once you get more details like story etc, its no fun watching the movie)… just knew that it had Rahman’s music and the song “Masak ali” is pretty catchy… I had seen some promos and realized that it was based in Delhi (yup, the name also suggests so!). Anyways the movie was a real sixer… a real mind boggler… I wonder what the director was trying to show… and why the movie is called what it’s called… Someone told me that it’ because the place shown (Chandni Chowk) in the movie carries the zip code “6” in Delhi but I think differently. It's because there are some 6 stories running in parallel –
- The story of “Kala Bandar” or black monkey (someone told me that one Harbhajan Singh is refusing to even talk about this movie out there in New Zealand… guess he thinks he is pretty close to Australia and any monkey talk can land him in trouble)
- The story of a 2nd generation Indian American trying to come in terms with his roots
- The story of the sweet romance between Abhishek and Sonam (difficult to believe that this skinny girl used to weigh 90 kgs only a few years back – there is hope for people like me)
- The story of a girl from a lower middle class family, trying to fight her destiny (Am sure the Sony folks have paid a bomb for getting “Indian Idol” mentioned so often)
- The story of the fragile Hindu-Muslim peace and unity in this country
- The story of an untouchable and the double standards of the society around untouchability

I know there are many more stories but unless I limit this number to 6, my theory around the name of the movie fails!

All in all, this would have been a good novel to read… it’s a good “art” movie under the wraps of commercial cinema – may be to attract the multiplex crowd (which essentially decides the fates of the movie these days)…
If you haven’t watched it, don’t bother – wait for it to get released on UTV movies or Sony or whatever…

That's all for this edition... Till next time - Dasvidaniya...

ps - My comments on Dasvidaniya (the movie) in the next edition (whenever that happens!)

The secret of my "success"

I am asked this question sometimes… Before you start grunting oohs and ahs, please read through…

Success is a very relative matter. A certain Stuart Charles Glyndwr MacGill might be seen as an unsuccessful player because he did not get a chance to play enough for the great Australian team… only because the MacGills decided to copulate around the same time certain Warnes were doing the same and were able to produce a much better offspring (when it comes to cricket!) named Shame, sorry Shane, who made sure that MacGill stayed out of the Oz team for most of his career. Had MacGill been in any other country or was borne at a different time, he would have played at least 100 test matches… he ended up playing only 40 odd while Shame played 140 odd… Playing 2 spinners in an Oz team is unheard of (Btw, Has anyone seen Cameroon White bowling? Someone rightly said that he won’t be picked up as a spinner even in Zimbabwe team… with this kind of quality, no wonder Aussies are losing)… Coming back to success, while a Stuart MacGill is more or less a loser, a relatively senior one-of-100 in one-of-100 company might be genuinely seen as successful by some… it could be naivety (some of my relatives think that I am the 2nd most powerful person in my company after the President… I don’t try to break the delusion of obvious reasons) or for some 1-of-100 is still 1-in-100 and hence good enough (alas! that’s a very low benchmark!!)

Sometimes I wonder if the other person is trying to take my pants off (in an intellectual way) when he/she is asking me that question… Or may be they want to make sure they don’t do the things that I did or do to be successful!!

In any case, I play safe. My standard answer is “Act Busy”. The answer is both genuine(I will come to the point soon) as well as funny and serves both the classes of people. The naïve ones think I am being humble while the smart asses (the ones trying to take my pants off intellectually) get beaten in their own game.

I strongly believe that one can’t be too busy in his or her life… if someone says s/he is too busy, there could be only two things – 1. s/he is lying or 2. s/he is trying to achieve impossible (for example, if someone wishes to jog a marathon every day, they would be “too busy” in other things to achieve this or something similar)…

I always have time on my hand. Time is never an excuse for me. Some examples – I always get time to watch 8 hours of one-day cricket match; I slept for 3 hours last afternoon; and I always get time to write this stupid blog…
At the same point of time I ensure that I look busy – impresses the boss, impresses the colleagues, impresses the team, impresses the family… essentially I can get away by doing less in professional as well as personal life…
Trust me – “Act Busy” works if you are a mediocre like me and don’t have very high goals…

In case you are still with me, here are some tips on how to “Act Busy” –

1. Don’t sit in the headquarters. Be stationed in a different city. The boss is smarter than you and will figure out soon if you are very close to him physically. I have been able to achieve this with last 3 of my bosses and it hasn’t hurt.
   
2. Don’t pick up all the calls. But make sure you call back and call back at some unexpected hour (i.e. between 8pm and 8am). Btw, make sure you pick up the calls from unknown numbers – else you might miss the chance to get that credit card or that home loan that you have been waiting for since you were borne.
   
3. Make sure you do pick up some of the calls – especially when you have given X the time for a call and Y calls. When X calls, switch over between X and Y several times. This is bound to show you as busy and important!
   
4. If there is call scheduled with your boss, make sure you call a friend of yours just before the boss is about to call. Apply #3 when boss’ secretary calls at the scheduled time. This is bound to impress secy as well as the boss (remember to explain that you were speaking to a prospect for that 100M$ deal)… and I can’t tell you enough about the importance of impressing boss’ secy (that can be a separate blog in itself!).
   
5. Don’t reply to mails… WRONG! If someone gave you that stupid idea, don’t follow it – it would only end up showing you incompetent. Trust me, it does not work. Do reply to some of the mails. There are some rules here also…
   
6. Reply to the most unexpected mails.
   
7. Reply to the group mails.
   
8. Reply to the mails in the evenings or early mornings (there are ways of doing this without actually working in the evenings and mornings).
   
9. Make sure a glut of mail goes out of your mailbox in a span of 15-30 minutes (“mail diarrhea”). Two things – the other person remembers getting mails from you at unearthly hours (“brand recall”); secondly, because of the mail diarrhea, some of the mails would be missed which means less trouble for you (in terms of return mails and action items)
   
10. Make sure you keep lot of unread mails in your mailbox. Allow others to peek in (or in a meeting, project it on the screen by “mistake”). People are bound to notice.
    
11. Do not settle your expense accounts for long periods and when you do, don’t forget to write a blog cribbing about the red-tape in your company.
    
12. Don’t take vacation when most of the people take i.e. Diwali, Christmas etc. Make sure you work “hard” during this period. Trust me, scarcity is very valuable.
    
13. Travel! You don’t need to work while traveling and you still get to log “on-duty” hours…
    
14. Spend lot of hours in the office. The hours logged look good and you get away from doing mundane domestic chores. Thanks to internet, there are enough things you can do to kill time. For example – last week I found this great website called www.wikihow.com... It covers pretty much everything from “how to survive a fall from an airplane” to “how live in a car”… The latter would definitely come handy if I am fired from my job or thrown out of my house or both if certain influential people in my life stumble upon this blog…
    
15. When the boss calls unscheduled and hence you are not able to apply trick #4, make sure you put the boss on hold and tell the empty table and chairs in your room – “Guys, urgent call from the boss. We will have to reschedule the meeting” (Caution – Don’t try this trick if you are on video phone).
    
16. Keep your calendar busy. Create some dummy entries so that your calendar seems full on any given day. (Caution – Don’t “open” your calendar completely else one can figure out that you are playing around)
    
17. When you walk around (mostly aimlessly), walk briskly and look worried… very worried as if tsunami has struck the city and its your duty to save it… avoid smiling at people…

In a nutshell, successful or not, if you want peace and at the same time want to feel and be seen as important by others, follow my mantra – “Act Busy”… It’s also one of the surest paths to “success”…

What's the good word?

The origin and journey of words across geographies is a very interesting subject. Any and all the languages in the world are infested with foreign language words and of course, words sounding similar, having same meaning and root… for example, father, pater (German) and pita (Hindi/Sanskrit) sound similar, have same meaning and have originated from the same root word.
A more interesting aspect is migration of the words – sometimes retaining their meaning, sometimes completely changing, sometimes used for a different purpose. Many a times, the pronunciation gets corrupted so much that it’s difficult to figure out that it’s a foreign word and not native to the language.

Here are a few of my favorite words from different categories –

1. Dahi – Dahi is popularly called curd or even plural curds(!) in English. If you check the dictionary meaning of curd, it does not mean dahi but rather chhena (the milk product used to make rosogulla and other sweets). In fact, if you ask for curd in a shop in the US, you would get blank stares. You need to ask for yogurt instead. The popular (Indian) notion is that yogurt is not actually dahi but a close cousin of dahi which is not really true. The fact is that curd is a distant cousin of dahi!

2. Narbhas - In Bihar and Jharkhand, rural as well urban, narbhasana is often used word which essentially means “state of confusion/fear/scare”… Pandeji narbhasa gaye, wo gaye hi nahi (Mr. Pande chickened out, he did not go). It struck me very recently that narbhas is not really a native word in Bhojpuri or any other Hindi dialect in Bihar/Jharkhand. It's nothing but "nervous" pronounced in a convoluted way. How this word made inroads into even rural Bihar is anyone’s guess.

3. Myad - In Maharashtra, myad is often used word to describe someone crazy or stupid. For a long long time, I genuinely believed that it was a native Marathi word adeptly used by my not-so-educated Aunt as well as my grandmother. Only after I started living in Pune, I realized (and that also took a while) that myad is nothing but mad, just like pyad (pad), syad (sad) and glyad (glad)!!!

4. Compromise – I used to live in a toughish neighborhood with lots of street gangs of yound people, each full of themselves and protecting their "honor" and territory. I never fell for it (and fortunately so!) and kept away from any major association though I had many “friends” in many of these groups. I used to play with many of the kids who later started carrying knives and guns (katta). I though I had nothing to learn from these guys (in terms of traditional education) till I stumbled upon the word “compromise”. A gang would compromise and change its stance when it realized that the other gang is much more powerful. The word was used in the right way and with the right pronunciation. I have no idea how this word made it to the unlikeliest crowd of people in a English starved city.

The dictionary meaning of compromise is essentially “to settle for a middle ground”… basically accept something which is not the best and may be go for the second best.
Then why funny headlines – “caught in compromising position”… oh yeah, they compromised and settled for the sex instead of watching TV since there was no power?!
Sometimes, it’s used for a totally different purpose. For example, some people compromise on a 2-bedroom house and go for 3-bedroom one!

It has other practical uses. For example, if your parents really find a really good girl for you, how do you ditch your girlfriend? Well, very easy – tell her it’s a “compromise”, you have to give in to the parents wishes and hence you can’t marry her and hence you are forced to marry the other girl (who by the way is better looking, brings in more money, is more educated, has better manners, has a better lineage, no nakharas and no scandals)… say a sweet “Oh sweetie, it’s a compromise! But for this compromise, I would have married you!!” and get out...

Btw, I realized that no one can touch Dhoni. I tried and got completely boycotted. I launched a scathing attack on Dhoni in my last posting and the result was not a single comment on the post– it hasn’t happened before!

Dhoni baba is tired

Oops! I was wrong. The poor officials turned lucky turned poor again – thanks to Monika, Gold at Beijing and Bindra’s outburst – in that order. I was expecting Bindra to take care of Mendis but he trained his gun on the officials instead! Well, looks like this chap is clear of his priorities – officials now… Mendis can be taken care of later…
Or may be Dhoni has figured out a better way to handle “Mendisis” (sounds like a disease, no?) – we won the one-day series after all… I am sure Dhoni’s idea must be costing less than 30L to BCCI… and in that case, Bindra can kiss the 30L promised by BCCI goodbye!

People and newspapers are already talking about Dhoni being the test captain as well… Poor Kumble… but does Dhoni want to play test matches?? If my memory is right, he refused to play the test series against Sri Lanka last month because he was “tired”… hmmm, that’s interesting… very very interesting! One plays some 20 IPL matches under scotching heat and does not tire and just a month after that, he is tired because of “too much of cricket”! So mister Dhoni, why did not you take a break during IPL? Why did you play each and every match?
Wait a minute – aren’t you the highest paid IPL player (Mundu endorsements extra!)? And isn’t it true that you get paid full only if you play every match? If you decide not to play a match, proportionate amount of money would be deducted from your fees? Well, that explains…
By the way, can you tell me how many ad shootings you did while you were “tired”? One Pepsi ad for sure – both Dhoni and Sri Santh missed the Sri Lanka trip and only these 2 guys are there in the given ad… and some Mundu ads for sure which have mushroomed up on TV…
Now, now, don’t tell me that ad shooting is not as tiring… I am sure all the bollywood actors are not lying when they say it’s lots of hard work!

I think Dhoni is very lucky… I see luck playing a bigger part in his success as a captain rather than some high funda strategy… The commentators go gaga over his cool demeanor… All this makes sense when things are going good. Ganguly’s aggression was his biggest “asset” when he was winning and biggest “liability” when he wasn’t!! Let things go bad (don’t start cursing me - it happens with every team and every captain), the same commentators would say – “what kind of person is he? No impact even when team is losing. He needs to show some emotions, aggression and show to the world that it matters”… and so on!

I think the issue is something else, this chap is an expressionless dud(remember Clint Eastwood?)… Can’t you figure out by watching his ads? Anyways, works well for him (at least for now)…

Btw, if you spot Dhoni and Bindra together, they would mostly be exchanging notes on “Mendisis”…

Gold and Supari

Poor Monika Devi and lucky officials! Abhinav Bindra’s Gold killed the most exciting story till then, i.e., “politics of nothing” and changed the focus to some real stuff. This is really exciting stuff. India has 9 golds in the history of the games now – same as what Phelps got in the current version of the games.

For a brief period (a few hours) I thought may be we have found a sport that Indians can excel in – first Rathore and now Bindra. It’s all about focus and concentration – mental strength rather than physical strength… then in the evening I saw the footage of Bindra’s way to glory… the moment I saw his superman like suit, I realized the sport must be beyond the reach of most of the common people.
My doubts were confirmed when I got to know that this dude is rich and practices in his personal air-conditioned shooting range (while other shooters cribbed about the lack of proper infrastructure in India).
The newspapers the next day were full of all the money showered by various – PM, CMs, BCCI, Lalu, sporting bodies et all… with the value going up to Rs 1 cr!! And what was dad’s reward to his prodigal son – ahem… a Rs 200 cr hotel!!! It not only humbled all rewards and awards (as far as $ figure is concerned), it made me realized that this dude is not rich… he is very very rich…

But wait a minute… one unlikely name in the long list was BCCI – that’s “Board of Control for Cricket in India” – Rs 30L. Why would a cricketing body which can't spend on it’s own infrastructure would do something like this? They have some of the worst cricket stadia in the world – Bangalore is one of the worst. Once I paid Rs 5K to watch a match between India and Australia – travel from Pune costed me on top. Before it was washed off by rains, I could see 2/3rd of the ground. I was given a hole to watch the match from for the Rs. 5000 I spent on these jokers. Every time there was a high shot towards the 1/3rd of the invisible ground, I had to guess and judge by crowd’s reaction if it was a catch or a 6 or a 4. And then there was a pillar right in the middle bisecting the pitch into 2 parts. Guess I was fortunate enough to be able to see the stumps, well in fact spot them from my hole.

Coming back to Bindra - one of the things the gold did was that it lightened the pain of the humiliating test series defeat in Sri Lanka. But why would BCCI reward him or pay him? Are they thankful that the attention was taken off cricket and there was less of flak for the Sri Lanka debacle?
Or may be IS Bindra (one of the top officials of BCCI) is related to Abhinav and he wanted to reward his biradari-wala!
I think the real reason is something different – it’s a Supari… yes Supari. Very clearly, Ajanta Mendis was the difference between win and defeat for India. But for him, we would have definitely won the series. And he is young, has just come in – its not only the current series… if this lad continues to bowl like this, we can kiss the next world cup good bye already… so what’s the solution? Take him out… literally! And hence the Supari to Bindra, the sharp shooter…
And what a brilliant way to pay the money – Khule-aam!!
This might sound like dark humor to you all… the time would tell…

The politics of nothing a.k.a. India in Olympics

Monika Devi tests positive for banned substance… Monika claiming innocence (weightlifter in tears – it was pretty ironical)… Monika claiming it was to get Shailaja Pujara in… Monika cleared of the charges (how does that happen?)… But it seems it’s too late and her name is already withdrawn from Beijing Olympics…

Frankly, the whole thing smells of rat, stinks... stinks big time. The timing was perfect. An announcement on a sample taken on June 6th! An announcement made at such a time that even if it turns out be wrong, it would be too late for Monika to take part. Though it’s all circumstantial and I might be completely wrong here, I think Monika played spoilsport by going to the media and making very direct statements and thus foiling the chances of Shailaja.

I saw this very funny interview given by Shailaja which was given in Telugu. The subtitles read something like this – “I have been told that I am not selected for Beijing. The only way I can go is if Monika falls ill or is caught of doping.” Dunno whether it was before or after the Monika doping news came out but hello! “caught of doping”… who says such a thing? Well she missed couple of options like “Monika running away with an Iraqi weightlifter”… I suspect Shailaja is a bit naïve but there are others who are not!!

In any case, what are we fighting for exactly? Of all the news items I have read or seen, I did not see any which even remotely mentioned that we lost a medal. While I am no authority on this subject (in fact I had not even heard of Monika or Shailaja before this controversy), I am kind of sure Monika was not even close to getting a medal…
Isn't it “politics of nothing”??

Btw, Anup Sridhar won the first round today pretty easily... Lets wish him all the best!

Out of office mail

It's very clearly my real life frustration coming out but what's a better way to vent than a post :)
Very short and sweet for a change :)

Read through...

Hi,

Thanks a lot for your desperate mail, phone calls and SMS. Sorry I can’t mail, speak or SMS back to you today. Don’t try knocking my door as well, I am not in my room.

I am away on duty today. No, I don’t have any client meetings or travel… I will be busy doing settlement of my last trip. This was week before last and after sending 3 reminders they have threatened to cut my salary – it’s quarter end and if I don’t settle my trip, the results would be off by 0.000037% which of course is not acceptable.
It’s a different matter that after the much sought after trip, I have been again traveling all the time… I pointed this out to the juniormost clerk of this company and he had gracefully extended the deadline by a day which happens to be today.

Naveen, sorry, I cant review the Rs 250cr proposal that we are working on and Sanjay, I cant take that escalation call from the client. Radha, your CRR can wait. Prashant, you can forget about the 360-degree feedback – I know today is the last date but juniormost clerk’s command is more important than your career.

Ps – I am actually in the office but I have locked the door from inside and unhooked the phone so that I can “settle in peace”

Happy Christmas!!

Best regards,
Uday Bhaskarwar