philosophy has its uses

Five years back when Jispa was born, a friend of mine (Ashutosh) remarked that “the birth of the child is the death of the father” apparently quoted by the great poet Kabir. The statement has great significance. As he explained to me, that once the child is born, the father will do anything to save the child from harm. If it means putting his life for the child he will do so without hesitation. So in a matter of speaking the father’s life is not his own, he has already given it to / up for the child, so in other words he is already dead. Now that’s an interesting thought.
We were holidaying in matheran the other day. I got some hot soup for Jispa. I then got a two litre mineral water bottle and placed it on the table and turned. As I turned I heard a commotion and I turned back to see the bottle toppling over and hitting the soup bowl. Normally one sees this in slow motion. Not this time though. I saw this in super warp speed. The bottle hit the soup bowl and the soup tippled over and was falling on Jispa. My only reaction was to extend my palms as wide as possible in between Jispa and the soup bowl so that the impact of the hot soup was maximum on my hand and minimum on Jispa. Successful - Jispa only got a drop on her pants and I bore the brunt. I jumped around a bit and luckily it did not burn me much. But I realized what I did and what Kabir meant.


The other day the stupid IT guy in the office (they all are) decided to break a hole in my table and put the printer plug point inside my cupboard. This incensed me to a great extent. I tried reasoning with him but he just would not understand. The next day I realized the business at risk issue and wrote a mail. Result – the plug was dutifully removed within 24 hours. Here’s the mail. You decide.
The cast though – Nagraj – the IT guy, Shama – the admin, Vareena – the HR.
My next fight – get that bloody hole repaired.


SUB: Business At Risk

In my cupboard where I keep my books and papers we suddenly have an electric point!

Where there is an electric point, there you will have sparks (invariably). Even Jispa knows that. (if you don’t know who Jispa is, I don’t know you). When spark touches paper, it burns. Remember your 6th standard science class. When paper burns, more paper next to it burns. This leads to a chain reaction where the entire desk catches fire. Desks are predominately wood and what have you here? A catastrophe waiting to happen. Nero fiddled while Bakhtawar burned. Who is Nero? I dunno, ask him. Who him? Ask Nero for all I care. So it might be the boy who cried wolf, but who knows; if it looks like a wolf, feels like a wolf, behaves like a wolf, it is not likely to be a kangaroo. Jispa knows that as well. (what? you still don’t know who is Jispa? get outta here)

So kindly remove the point from there (the electric point, got the point?) and please can I have my desk back. Its missing me and the feeling is mutual.

How did this get about:-

I ask Nagraj, Nagraj tells me that he tell Shama, Shama obviously does it because Nagraj told her. Who gave Nagraj authority, well he spoke to Vareena. Why did Vareena say yes, well because Nagraj told her. Why did Nagraj get it done, beacuase Vareena and Shama said so. In excel parlance this is called circular reference. So where does the buck stop. You silly goose, the buck cannot stop – it’s a circle and it’s twisted, so that makes it’s a mobius strip. A mobius strip has no start no end, its just keeps going around. So much so that some scientists have hypothesized that if it does not start or end it does not exist. It is not even there.

A mathematician confided
That a Möbius band is one-sided,
And you'll get quite a laugh,
If you cut one in half,
For it stays in one piece when divided

So who has the hole in the end:- my desk. I am not sure about anyone’s mind yet. Hope this burned a hole in your mind as well.

While at the topic – does putting a hole in my desk require my permission? Oh ya – the circle has decided on its own I guess (the circular reference circle). It’s like a snow ball and it’s got sufficient momentum on its side. So, GET OUT OF THE WAY! But while putting the hole in, musn’t you remove my stuff so that it does not get dirty? GET OUT OF THE WAAAY, SNOW BALL IS SNOWBALLING. But….AVALANCE..tttttt.

I have just been exterminated. Exterminated employees need not feel anything. Especially motivation, desire to call the place your own, belonging, clean perhaps. Anything. Just work. But I have just been exterminated – so what? Those exterminated are transported to the netherworld – where you just work. Well at least you don’t burn here. Well the place night burn down, but you might as well might be saved. Should I feel grateful. I should.

Thank you

Yours truly

Do I need to add my name? is the email id enough? Sombody answer, someone pull me out, someone show me a sign that I am alive. Someoneeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee…………………………….aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

service and smile

I like, no no lets rephrase that, I love… that’s better… I love low points in life. That is what defines my high points. Whenever I have felt low is when I fight back to get my high. Till about a minute back I was low. Shit in office, shit everywhere. That has helped me define my high. I am suddenly on an adrenaline rush. I am giving shit back. And how! I could not have felt better. In the words of the Mask – Somebody….stop me.

I am just back from a trip to Geneva, Brussels, Antwerp and London. All official. Yaya… I am the lucky guy. One thing I figures. British Airways (BA) is a piece of shit. The brits have not learnt anything about service. They cant service to save their asses. I have always believed that good advertising will come to naught if you don’t follow through on the service. This is a classic case study. BA will have all the classic ads that have service written all over it. They believe in service they say. They will have a chick air hostess in a namaste. The stupid agency wont even get the bow right. The namaste in India is not like a western ‘hi, how are you doing?’ it’s a more submissive gesture (full of reverence) for Indian. Complete dickhead of a job and some amazing dickhead of follow through. For breakfast as we were reaching London, they served us milk and muesli. And I liked it and dared to ask for more. MORE?? Now I know what Oliver Twist felt like. They said they don’t have more. What the hell? They don’t have more food for someone traveling in Business Class. God knows what happens in Economy. Do they just stand up and start laughing. “hey somebody look at this guy. He wants MORE. Hahahahah.” On the way back I wanted to go to the pee pee. The seat belt sign just came on as I stood up. The steward told me to get back to my seat. Not do politely of course, but hell he is a BA staff. He is obviously near God. Then in about 10 seconds he tells me that if I want to go to the bath room I got one minute. That’s about the time he is going to take. So I better hurry up and get it done with. OK sir! Thanks a lot. Wow….that sure saved from pissing in their Business class water bottle. What a bloody piss off. I am not traveling BA again ever. I would not advise anyone either. The option – the best service I have seen is Jet Airways. Good old humble service Jet. They are way above every one. Not that BA is too difficult to top. I have asked for more in domestic flights in economy and have always got more in return. Ask for one small after mint and you always get two. Aks for a bottle of water, you will get two. That’s the way dude. Service is king! Someday the rest of us mortals will get it as well. I also have been in many hotels, no one even comes close to the Taj hotels. We do a lot of stay and banqueting. The Taj is head over heels compared to anyone else. Well its interesting that home grown Indian brands will teach eth world what service is like. Mr. Goyal, I don’t care what anyone says. I believe in you.

Coming to something else. People in office around the world are generally short on humor. I put an out of office mail that I thought was very average and not really funny. But I got a lot of kudos for it. I got people forwarding the out of office mail to others, I got people just mailing to check the response, and of course a few conversations begin with the topic. Here it is. You judge you decide. But one thing it has given me for sure, and that’s some more confidence to get whackier! Somebody Stop me.

(I have masked the phone numbers. This is the internet after all)

Hi,

Since you have got an out of office reply – well, I AM actually out of office. Cool nah?
I will be back on the 27th of September 07.

Since this is a tour on official duty you may contact me on my official cell. But before you do so, kindly keep in mind the following pointers:-

Think of the obscene roaming rates before you try my cell.
If you still want try and contact me please buy some telecommunication stocks before you call. Somebody must benefit in the bargain I guess.
Before calling minus four to five hours from Indian time and think a bit if you really want to wake me up for I can return the favor five hours past your bed time.
Try calling Ritu (XXXXXXXXX) for international work, Venkat (981XXXXXXX) for Wealth Management work and Manish (981XXXXXXX) for all the other group work.
And if everything else fails, have faith… for this too shall pass.

Have fun while I am hard at work

Jaimit

thats a fast one

We are jains but I am a little bit of a radical. Yah sure I believ in god and some super human power but going to temples for prayer is not my scene. The mega jain festival – paryushan is on. The seven days of fasting and I assume austerity is on. But there is nothing austere about it. It’s as in your face richness and silkiness (paradoxically for Jainism) as any other hindu festival. The temple is decorated with lights and pandals. Women and men roam around in their finest marriage finery with goady jewelry. People moving form one temple to another, form one golden idol to another. The orgy of flowers decorating is so sickening. The power of context is at its bets here. I would loved ot see flower décor but to see it in all splendor at a Jain temple is somewhat a bad idea. We gloss over the very principles we are celebrating. I even remember having a fight with my mom for letting me and Jasmine watch a movie during this stupid carnage festival. She said that its not right and you must not go, and for the hell of me I could not figure out why? I love Jainism but I hate the Jains!

I normally won’t even know when the festival is approaching. Tomorrow is the last day and if somebody would have told me that I would be fasting, I would laughed my head off. But wonders never cease. I for some whacked off reason have decided to fast today. I don’t know why the thought popped into my head but no food today only water. There is definitely no religious belief – DEFINITELY NOT, but I wanted to know what it is to fast for a day. How does the body react, how does one feel, what is the meaning of craving. One can read tomes on hunger but one has to feel it to understand it. I remember I used to try and do some fasting as a kid. I remember giving it up at night and having food. How would I feel today? It’s a normal day as ever. I accidentally popped a small ginger chip in today, so I have definitely missed the religious angle. I have always believed on learning something new regularly, doing something new, something else. This defines us and shapes us as we go along. One more learning, one more step. Right now it’s fun to feel the stomach grumbling, making weird noises, asking for food. Good cleansing for the system. A bit of detoxification never hurt too many.

hush my boy, the puppies are shrinking

Does your foot actually shrink after a certain age... after lets say 32 years! Well that’s what happened to me, if hush puppies are to be believed. I have been wearing large sizes. Sport shoes typically are at ten and half, even 11. Most formal shoes are at 10. My last hush puppies were 10. So this time I walk into the store and ask for 10 in a particular type. I want the simplest one with no extravagant designs. He gives me a size 10. hmmm feels very roomy. My toe ends way before the shoe ends. Haan sir, is mein ek size chota hi chalta hai. Ok. Give me a size 9. whoops.. a little roomy again. Errrr… size 8, I ask sheepishly, a little hesitant. He checks for my foot size on his measuring scale – it shows a ten. He gets a size eight nevertheless. Size eight I keep thinking. The last time I wore 8 was probably when I was 13 – 14 years old. Size eight is just a little narrow, but marginally so. Funny. This is ridiculous. I wear 10 in hush puppies! I can’t believe it. I try all the other types, I ask for all the different sizes in the others. I cant just wear these new Italian styled narrow pointed ones. My feet are way too broad for that. I probably need to wear size 15 in those and end up looking like Ian Thorpe (the Australian swimmer, duh). While I am trying out all the others, I look at the poor size 8 hush puppies and decide to try them again. My wife is not a bit fazed. She had budgeted a good one hour as she knew I have to buy shoes. She has been through many of my show buying sojourns. I could buy a shirt and a tie and a suit fast but shoes take forever. Sport shoes, formal shoes, simple sandals, they all take a looong time to buy. I guess it’s my foot contours that make the entire thing difficult. They are definitely not the average Joe ratios for sure. So I pick up the size 8 and they seem definitely more comfortable than the others. Oh what the hell, let buy them. I have been wearing them now for three days. They sure fit well. So much for standard sizes!

morning musings

There are many benefits of coming in early to office, but there is one clear big one. NO SWEAT. Yes, no grimy dirty stinky sweaty people. It’s nice and cooler in the mornings so the people are also cleaner, still fresh from their daily lirils and pantene’s. The women with their hair freshly washed and brushed still smelling of fragrant shampoo. They keep the hair open probably because its cooler (heat means tied hair) and they need to dry out form the washing. Its so much a better smell than the silly pungent perfume that use after they reach office. Ya. I could stare at a women’s freshly washed, dry and clean hair for the entire bus journey. Well it does not last more than 7 minutes in the morning though. It’s nice to see the various cuts and styles. Men hairstyles by that yardstick are extremely boring and ugly. I always wanted to learn to cut style hair. It’s so much fun. There is always a style that changes the way people look and feel about themselves. But surprisingly I am quite irritated with my own hair. If I have to comb it too much I just go and cut it. Short – really short! What good for the goose is not for the gander.

Jo bhi hai… on another note I sometimes wonder on the pressure that I am putting on myself. It surprises me how my life has changed, my thinking has changed over the last ten odd years that I have been working. I still get worked about important presentations. I still don’t sleep well before them. Not that I get nervous. I don’t think that’s the issue, I am pretty secure, but the fact that my brain refuses to let it die out. It keeps that top in the mind, constantly thinking, constantly ticking, pushing the bar, improving…. Constantly. Move, shove, push, move, forward… every time. Constantly… PUSH…one day I will tire and rest. I hope I rest content. I cannot imagine resting but someday I hope to. There is also another side that says that I will push on and never rest. I hope never to rest to constantly push, push harder and harder. I like that T shirt sign with Gandhi on the design – ‘my life is my message’. Bang on! Like something profound that I learnt in Jainism (a nice book – a journey through Jainism). In Jainism we go to the temples not to pray and ask but to see the idols of great souls who have given it all up and get inspired by them. By their actions they teach. They do not preach they only do – it is up to us to follow. What a lovely thought. Tough on the others but brilliant. I have always learnt by watching and not by following what people teach. Watching and imbibing is the bets way. Many times, in cricket, in life, at work, i could visualize what the bets in that field would do and try to emulate. It’s like the story of eklavy and dronacharya. By having a statue of the guru is enough to learn. Its not important for any of my guru’s to be physically in front of me. Their images in my mind is more than enough. After all what’s the bloody brain for?

Yesterday was a high point for me in my life at this company. The company did something I cannot disclose but proved to me that I was valuable to them. In fact amongst the top guys in my division (strength 250 heads). That felt good. Emotional. That’s the bond which I have with my organization. That’s what makes us tick. Strong emotional connect? I dunno. Will tell you and let you know when I find out. I think it will be years before I understand, and I would have lost the question as well. So if you are reading this 20 years on and want to know the answer, let me know! I will tell you what I know at that point of time. The fun thing with perspective is that it keeps on changing. Just keeps on changing. PUSH PUSH PUSH…..

lots to talk about

Wowie.. Finally some time to write something here. Been some time now. Work pressure starts from the moment I step in. lots of things happened from the last time I wrote in the blog.

I had been to Turkey for an offsite.i hardly took any snaps of the place. I find it quite boring to do so. I prefer clicking peole I know. So that’s what I did. In the process I clicked some nice snaps of people inoffice. Ofocurse th women make prettier subjects than men but, hell I am gender neutral. I prefer anyone who is expressive. In lesser light conditiond I prefer the women as they are ones who are quite ready to pose. Some reason is vanity and some reason is charm. But who’s complaining. I am clicking and loving it. The best thing about clicking is to click and then pass on the snaps to the relevant guys and if they love themselves then that’s more than enough. Most people are so critical of themselves when they see their photos. Give yourselves a break guys! We love you when you are expressing something, that’s all. You are pretty the camera is just capturing it. I got the idea for my desk board. I am going to only put up photos of people that I click. I would like to call it the wall of vanity. We might have more women than men there but, who cares. I have clicked an large number of nice photos of guys. Sab daalte hain.

The photos I really hate to click are the silly ass photos of people outside monuments. I have been there type of photos. If you see orkut profiles of people that the first thing that you see in Indian profiles. Pictures of people next to monuments / sights etc in phoren land. I guess it’s a huge mindset issue. Phoren travel is still aspirational and the fact that you have traveled might be a point of pride and differentiation. You are not going to see pictures of me in front of monuments for sure, atleast not in orkut profiles. Pagal gaya hai kya? I rather have pictures of the monuments in interesting angles. That’s my type.

Taxi’s seem to be an issue when I leave early to drop Jispa to the bus stop. So jasmine’s been ferrying us. I ask jasmine to drop us before so that Jispa and me cross the road and have fun walking and spending some quality time. Today I taught her to jump from a height that she was not used to. Street jumping. Good. She was walking up the steps on her own. They were a little high and she wante dot do it without my support and without touching anything with her hands. Slowly she managed. Then we learnt jumping by slowly giving less and less support till she jumped on her own. Time will come for her to jump on her own, to fall down, cry a bit, wipe her own tear and dust herself off. And I will have to let go. Another step in growing up. Different times of our lives as parents we will let go of different things. This is one small step. One small step.

Check the pics. The first one she is climbing, the second one she is about to jump. Its no small step. In five minutes she went from being terrified to bold jumping. I could actually see her conquering her fear. Go Jispa GO.

baby talk

I loved the application on face book which allows you to input all the books that you have read / want to read. Finally a digital catalogue of my books. Good.

While I was having a look at the excel sheet that has all the books, I noticed a typo in one of the books names – it read – ten basic principles for goon parenting. Haha sure.

Jispa was telling me, “My school has one thousand students. But now there are only a thousand. One person from my class left the school that’s why only thousand, earlier there were one thousand.” That was easily the funniest one I have heard in a long long time.

birthdays...I am in love with you

Finally… oh my lovely blog, I finally have time to write in you. Kya timepass hai yeh. But there was so much to write and so little time. Office has been crazy with all hell breaking loose.

In between I even had my birthday. On my birthday while having bath (no not a birthday bath, just one of the regular everyday bath) I was thinking of when I was little and how we could get to wear colored clothing in school and give out sweets. Earlier till the third standard I studied in Dubai and our vacations were in July and August. That meant no colored clothes for me and no being hero for the day. So when we shifted to Mumbai, one of the look forwards (there weren’t too many) was that in August schools were on. So I could wear my safari to school. I distinctly remember wearing my light bluish grey safari and distributing sweets in school. Before you distribute and the entire class singing.. happy birthday to you. Clap clap. Man it felt so good when that happened for the time in IV B. I remember counting the days left to my birthday and what I would wear. The sweets we used to give out were parle orange flavored hard boiled confectionaery. They used to cost around 10 paise each in retail and lower if you bought them by the bulk. Every guy in class (60 of us) would get two. And I think the best friend secretly got more. One would get more number of best friends on a birthday than other normal days. 10 paise I guess went a long way those days. Or should I say friendship was cheap. Whatever it was it sure was fun.
Oh I wish I had the same excitement of remembering my birthday two months in advance and counting down from there. This year my bachas at office gifted me a bat and a pair of jeans. The low waist, tight fit jeans. How the hell do these kids wear these low waisters, especially the women? Don’t they feel naked from the back? There is considerable amount of air that you feel your ass is getting and that the crack is showing. But I am sure the guys are not complaining. Every time you go to a store there will be one stupid lady bending down wearing a short t shirt and how could they not know? Well... I am sure the guys are not complaining.

teddy bears

Oh man, my blog is really suffering from the work load. There are tons to do and tons to follow up on. But then that’s the fun of it all I guess.
Yesterday Jispa must have been awake by 4 in the morning. For whatever reason. Now if she is awake and bored what to do. Get up, walk into the bedroom and snuggle up to daddy. And its always daddy, because mommy will send her packing off to her bed but daddy loves to get a teddy bear to sleep with. But there are small differences between a teddy bear and Jispa.
Teddy bear don’t hug you back
Teddy bear don’t shift positions again and again.
Teddy bear is asleep when you want him to
Teddy bears weigh much less
Teddy bears don’t suddenly feel thirsty in the middle ofthe night
Teddy bears let you sleep
Teddy bears are comfortable any how you hug them
Teddy bears can take your weight
Teddy bears don’t smile back
Teddy bear’s fingers don’t play with your face while you are sleeping
Teddy bears don’t kick their legs about when they are not sleepy
You don’t like kissing teddy bears too much

So bottom line – she gets up at 4 am and then ensures that even I don’t get sleep after that. But, who’s complaining. Not me. I love it. Anytime.

gaali mut de

I have been panning to write for some time now. The days have been so busy that it is almost impossible to get some tie out for writing. The whole day is one big incessant blur. From the time I come in early to the time I leave. Yesterday I thought I will finally write something and I was insired as well in the morning but my laptop password refused to connect me in. What the hell man? Nevertheless here I finally am. I have stopped swearing. My dear student Khyati was in office for a month doing her summers with some other department. She told me to stop and there I said why not. It’s been quite some time since I have stopped with only an occasional one coming in. not bad. After ten years of expletives I could not say a few sentences in office with using colorful words. Chalo theek hai. Dekhte hain how long it lasts.

I am so goddam sleepy. I have some obscene backlog of sleep which I wan to catch up on. And tomorrow I am going to Goa with the cricket team for a picnic. There goes some more sleep. Raat ko baith ke daru sessions mein bore hona. Oh dear me really really pathetic.

jispa jispa jispa

Here is wishing a very happy birthday to Reshma. She reads regularly and prods me when I go lazy. It is only fitting that I not miss to write my blog today. Happy birthday Reshma.

I was brushing away the little dirt that was near Jispa’s eyes. “You don’t let me wash your face, see, its dirty”. I was explaining to her that now she is grown up, she must let me wash her face while giving her a bath. She is not small. She used to cry when I washed a face a few year ago. She asked me “why was I not allowing you to face my face?”. “I don’t know” I replied, “you were too small to tell me what you were thinking”. She wondered and asked “I also did not know the meaning of my own thoughts?” oops. I don’t know if you knew the meaning or not.

Since I keep harassing her on what she ate at school, I have told her to call me as soon as she gets down from the bus. She used to call and then rattle off. Sometimes I could be in a meeting so I asked her to first ask me if I was free. Today she called me and first asked me if I was free. Then she rattled off what she ate and what she made in school. Some jam tart and some cake. She then asked me if I was in my company restaurant (she means cafeteria) because of the noise in the background. Smart girl. She was right.

She is learning the letter B. So generally while dropping her to the bus stop we start of saying a lot of things that start with B. ba ba ba…bucket. Ba ba ba….book. and so on. I said ba ba ba … broom. She replied ba ba ba…. Supaddi (scoop in gujarati, as in opposite of broom) she found it extremely funny. She kept repeating it and laughing. Hahahahahah sure...

shopping withJispa

Walking into malls is injurious to your wallet, especially when you are feeling rich. Jasmine and I are felling a little rich these days I guess, guessing from the battered state of my wallet! Yesterday we were at Centre one mall attending a birthday party of one of Jispa’s frinds. We decided to stay on post the party. There goes the budget… right into the well or should I say right into the deep well like atrium that most malls have. We bought an arrow shirt for me. The cheapskate that I am, I only buy if the dam thing is on discount or in seconds. The piece I bought is an atypical printed shirt. I have been trying to ruffle a few feathers in office and prove that marketing is different and has a whack on the right side of the head. This is in continuance to the printed gujju type shirt I wore the last Friday. Karo… lets see where the twig breaks. We then went to do some more shopping. While Jasmine was browsing through her stuff in the sale, Jispa and me were at the toy section. I too have not gotten over my boy toy fixation. I can spend hours in a toy store. Jispa is normally never hyper ina toy store. No faltu zid that I want to buy this or that toy. She is a balanced kid in a toy shop. Also she like the baby toys that do something on pressing some buttons. Then at the Barbie section, she sat down and was intently staring at the Barbie house sets. I let her be and was looking at the other sections. I came back to see her still there, just sitting and dreaming looking at the set. She must have been in that place for atleast 10-15 minutes. Till of course she wanted to do potty urgently. MOMMY – come fast. Post her detour, she comes back to stare at the set. Finally she tells me that she wants to buy the set. I look at the back. 699 bucks huh? Not so bad, I can definitely afford it, but should I buy it for her. I show her the other sets, but she is intent on buying that one set. I look at Jasmine, Jasmine looks at me. It’s definitely not the question of cost. We were both wondering on the same thing. What to do when she asks to buy a particular thing. Saying yes would mean saying that we will buy what you want and that could snowball into some hugely bad stubborn habit. Giving due credit to her, she has so far not been that kind of a kid. She normally understands when we don’t buy what she suggests. But this time she really liked what she saw and she wanted it bad. Well what the hell, go buy it, but we will not buy what you want every time. Yes, yes, mummy, it ok… thank you…hmmmm. So much thought into parenting. I have no clue how much is really important of not. But we can only do the best from what we understand at that given point of time.

oye cudly

These days Jispa has acquired a funny habit. In the middle of the night she gets up and gets onto our bed. Just like that. I turn and I suddenly find her sleeping next to me. Kya hai yeh? Jispa singles me out as normally I am the one to allow her to sleep. I don’t ask her go back. Jasmine normally gets her to go back on her bed. I kinda like sleeping with the cuddly. But only thing is that this cuddly is growing bigger everyday and requires more place to sleep.

Well, I did finish reading the Harry Potter in two days and I found it interesting. But I am not going to comment on my earlier blog that was predicting Harry to be a horcrux. I may be right or I may be wrong. But if someone is reading the books I would not want to spoil it for them. Confirming either way would be being a spoiler. So that’s that.

harry

the latest and last harry potter book is releasing tomorrow. For all those who care, here's my prediction - Harry is a horcrux. Hopefully we will know by my Monday's blog how wrong I could be :)

aao bachon

I was getting off the VT railway station with my big yellow umbrella today morning. It was a nice rainy day. As I getting out opening my umbrella, a very young boy in a school uniform came upto me, “uncle, mujhe andar aane do na”
“aaja hero, kidhar jar aha hai?”… We start walking. I try to crouch to ensure he’s covered under the umbrella better. Finally I figure that the only way is to put my arm around him and his bag to get the coordinates better and match foot speed.
“mera school handloom house ke wahan hai. Aaj idhar bus ka pass banana aaya tha”
“lekin main toh idhar bus stop tak hi jaa raha hun” “ok”. I think a while and then figure that what the hell. A small detour will get the kid to school without wet socks. Oh yes… one of the big memories of school during rains is dirty wet socks hung at various angles to dry on the benches. Yup, lots of them were stinking. Boys are ungly
“Chal main aaj tereko school chod ta hun”
Hmmmmmmm………..
………………………..
…………………………
……………………..
“pass acha hai kya?” I asked.
“haan. Pachaas rupiya mein full month unlimited jaa sakta hai. Smart card hai. Waise roj ka che rupiyah hota hai. Dus din mein hi sixty ho jata hai. Pass se JJ se handloom house kitna bhi chaho ghum sakte ho”
We had further conversation on school times, the fact that he is 5 minutes late, his mom is going to be called, that he is going to be marched out to school office etc etc. we reached his school and he thanked me and apologized for me being late thanks to him. Oh chill, I tell him, I am an hour early for office. Bye kid nice knowing you. Bye uncle. The uncle tag on me wears very well.... very well indeed.

5 minutes with an absolute stranger kid left me with such delight

the journey of a thousand steps begins with a ......

Yesterday Jispa saved me from falling down the steps. I always hold her hand while climbing up and down the stairs. Almost always. This is an old habit mainly due to the fact that I am normally overtly cautious and believe that what can be avoided must be. I was getting off the foot over bridge when due to the light rain the steps were slippery and I slipped. Luckily I was holding her and she held on to her balance well and truly firm and bore my weight. I was thus saved by my little one. Am I a proud father or am I a proud father.

This Saturday we went to Aamby valley. I had to go on an official visit and decided to take my family along. The road up from Lonavala was thru the clouds. Jispa got a chance to see the clouds and while we were massing thru it I rolled down the windows. She stuck her hand out and felt the clouds / mist in her hand. She felt it to be ‘gluey’.

Jispa taking off.....

cukoo talk

Guess what a lovely little cuckoo told me today morning – the plane flies over the clouds so that when it has to apply the brakes the plane does not fall down. Apparently the clouds support it.

God and Jispa

When we went to Singapore, it was about a year since Jispa went in a flight. When we took off and were flying high, Jispa was enjoying it. She said ‘wow – we are going up high?”. Jasmine replied in the affirmative and said “we will be as high as the clouds”. Jispa then said “NO… we will not go as high as the clouds, we cannot go”. “ofcourse we can” said jasmine. Jispa looked at me. I too confirmed “yup, see… we will be as high and higher than the clouds”. Jispa half confused, half happy asked “then we will get to see God?”. Whoops. What to answer now. I half tempted to say – sure, look hard, unless he is taking a vacation himself, you might just spot him. I don’t remember what I said. I think I said that you cant see God or something to that effect. These days, we have been having these conversations on God and his presence. Once while sleeping, she refused to sleep alone, saying that she was scared. I had to explain that there are so many Gods to protect her all around her. We have also locked the doors and the windows, so that no one will come to harm her. And from somewhere the conversation went to a point where I was explaining to her that God is inside her, inside everything and every place. Today morning while having a bath, there was another conversation on God. I was saying God is in everything. God is inside her. It is inside everything that is nice and good. So she went one “god is inside everything. It is inside a banister because it helps us and stops us from falling. It is inside the walls.” “walls?” “yes, the walls protect us and don’t fall”… “hmm… yup, God is inside everything nice and good. Now go on you have finished your bath. Tell this to mummy.”
Her brains are amazing developed for some logical thinking. When you talk to her you can make out that she is thinking, registering and then only accepting. Her mind is working. It’s not blank acceptance. Then comes, the confirmation in the form of examples of proving what she just understood. Very very cool. I am impressed.

dont just accept it

For some reason from some where hidden in my memory a story line from something I had seen popped up. someone (I would imagine the devil) comes to a person and offers him money. In return all he has to do is press a button. One pressing this button someone somewhere around the world, someone you did not know will die. That’s it. For the hell of me I could not figure out which movie or serial it was. What would you do? Would you just do it? Interesting question… and after you do it.. the devil takes away the button… where to?... well to someone else you don’t know… hehehehehhe.
Kya pakau idea hai. Disturbing hai.

I never did realize that by watching Khini kum, I would get depressed today!. Let me explain. Before the movie I walked into Crosswords at the multiplex. I picked up an interesting book – confessions of an economic hit man by John Perkins. An outstanding must read about the global level of corruption, power and immorality. Post that the same guys came out with another book that I saw before watching the Fantastic Four. A Game as old as empire. Oh man… this is another depressing book. “here other economic hit men, journalists, and investigators join Perkins to reveal many more disturbing stories of greed and international corruption.” This book is an amazing brain fuck. To continue “in gripping detail, they describe the schemes and subterfuges that multinational corporations, governments, powerful individuals, financial institutions, and quasi-governmental agencies enrich themselves behind the façade of ‘foreign aid’ and ‘ international development’.

If Jispa comes across these books early enough in her life she is going to be a radical.

I reminded of a poem I had heard years ago. It was in television series about the Vietnam War and some soldiers’ fire at a woman who opened fire at them. From her diary the soldiers read out a poem. It goes something like this…
If you want to be a flower, be the prettiest
If you want to be (something I don’t remember) be the (some superlative)
Etc etc etc…. (I don’t remember)
(It ends this way though)
But if you want to be a human being be a revolutionary….

Of course I am not expecting her to be a naxal. That’s definitely not the way. There are also books about Gandhiji that if she reads will tell her a lot. Those are outstanding insights into his mind and his fight for the truth.

This tank man at the Tiananman Square China who with his presence and a bunch of groceries, stopped a battalion of tanks by just standing there is an inspiration.




Video of the same.

weekend musings

What an action packed weekend. It started with an action packed movie Die Hard 4.0 on Friday evening. Mad movie. Bruce Willis does all the unbelievable moves with the same dead pan expression that made him, well, Bruce Willis. Your average city cop who can jump on F16’s, shoot helicopters with cars, fly helicopters, jam cars down lift chutes and the rest. Wowie. Complete humbug stuff…. Did I like the movie you ask? I absolutely loved it. I am going to see it again. Complete action movie. Can’t believe a second of it.
Next day was tons of rain day. Did not step outside the house – the movie rubbed off on me the wrong way I guess. But I did something that I found absolutely fun. I took a lot of Jispa’s toys and dumped them on her writing board. I then took top views of them and voila – I spy with my eye. We printed and stuck it on her scrap book for the school. Here is the one. See if you can spy –

I spy with my eye

1. a blue bird
2. a kiwi
3. the missing shoe
4. a fairy (from peter pan)
5. a blue crayon
6. a trophy
7. a hair dryer
8. a flagpole
9. ganesh
10. a book
11. a hat
12. bob the builder
13. steering wheel(s)
14. a mobile phone
15. a pair of red sandals – ok they look a little pink
16. a candle
17. a tap - not fair actually
18. Exxon
19. the magic lamp
20. pedal
21. a bow
22. chopsticks
23. a lego seat - again not fair if you have not played with Jispa
24. two running men - very very unfair.

Vinu’s reaction -

Can we play the Beginners version of the game. I'm not a grand master yet.
So how about spying
Princess Jasmine
Ambulance
Green balloon
Purple/Violet balloon
Mickey Mouse

Damn it. For a start with a bang, I can't spot the blue bird. Its easier for me to list what I can spot.

Heheheh – he was always the blind one. How many can you spot?

Then on Sunday we saw ‘khain kulli ki main kulli’. Cute kiddie movie about a magic bat helping India win. FTR – Jispa cried in this one as well. This is when the bat broke. I console her ‘ don’t worry, all is not lost. Keep seeing’. She asks “will they still win”.”I don’t know – keep watching. Its ok to lose as well you know”. She sobs a little and says,”in school when I run, it is not like ‘sometimes you win, sometimes you lose’. In school in running I always win”. She is quite proud about her running skills in school. She manages to win all the time. Very cool. I love it. I wish for her to take up any sport. Any one sport and play well and under professional coaching. Always good to understand one sport to the best that you can. Post which we went for a kiddie birthday party. Jispa does not like to miss any parties. She loves the games, the cake and everything in middle.

free hugs

thats the way it should be

Trimurti

Knowing a word is interesting especially when it describes a feeling. After writing about catharsis yesterday, I experienced it. Hehehhe now I know what I expeirencied. After two and a half years of beautifying my desk I got rid of everything. All the photos, greeting cards, everything on the desk. Completely. It is bare bones clean. See the before and after pics… from super creative to super clean.

mmmm…does it reflect a new way of thinking. My guys were wondering what came over me. They were almost scared that something’s gone completely wrong. I have been thinking about getting rid of it all for sometime now. Too many people were commenting on it and calling it beautiful. I don’t like when too many people like it! Now slowly let me think of something new to put on it.

It’s also in many ways symbolic. One of the best management theories I read was concerning, Brahma (creator), Vishnu (preserver) and Maheswara (destroyer). This was from Circle of Innovation by Tom Peters. I had read it years ago while browsing at Satyam centre at Churchgate. Those were the days that I could not afford to buy books. I hope Jispa never has that problem. So I created it, I preserved it and now I destroyed it. Every company needs a mix of this if it has to survive and grow. I so believe in it. After two and a half years I am trying to actively destroy a lot of processes, thinking and way of doing. Only from the ashes of the present will we be able to do anything more path breaking.

Despite the difficulties, all the frustrations, there is a joy in having done something as well as you could and better than others thought that you could. – JRD Tata. Very true.

I picked that up from the Kishore Biyani’s book, it happened in India. When the book first released, in all my arrogance I did not pick it up. a big launch, widely distributed, how could it have given me all the intellectual fart that I so crave for. I will learn constantly that I must not judge a book too soon ands not to get intellectually arrogant. It’s turned out pretty decent with enough leanings and anecdotal value. Not bad at all. Once I complete it let me see make an ‘intellectual’ comment.

rediscovery of emotions

Years ago, eons ago… when I was in school I read the knowledge bank series. There I remember reading about dreams and rapid eye movement. It was very interesting. Today morning I was just looking at Jispa sleeping. She was sleeping peacefully. But her eyeballs were moving inside her closed eyelids. Left right, up down. She was dreaming. I don’t know why, but it was a pretty sight. Just knowing that your child is dreaming is such a lovely thing. Hope fully they weren’t nightmares.

Yesterday I was on a word understanding spree. I was understanding the real meaning of the word Catharsis - A release of emotional tension, as after an overwhelming experience, that restores or refreshes the spirit. I was speaking about this to Satarupa (a friend from Kolkata), she gave me one more word, Epiphany - As a feeling, an epiphany is a sudden realisation or comprehension of the essence or meaning of something. The term is used in either a philosophical or literal sense to signify that the claimant has "found the last piece of the puzzle and now sees the whole picture," or has new information or experience, often insignificant by itself, that illuminates a deeper or numinous foundational frame of reference.
Lovely words, if one understands the depth of their meanings. Good fun.

Dimag laga

Movies allways have an impact on people. I am no exception. Yesterday we went to watch the fantastic four. We were most enamored by the ‘fantastic’ bunch. I remember seeing Jackie Chan movies when I was much younger and then doing those imaginary kicks and punches and jumping away from danger. The mad escapist world of movies!!! This time we were returning home and we were in the lift that had gone bonkers, thanks to the rain I think. While going up it just stops on the 9th floor and remains open for a random period of time. Wife and Vinu who were along were busy pressing all the various buttons in the hope of getting the lift door to close. I calmly said “move aside”. I put my arms on either side of the door and said “I will make it close by the power of a magnetic force, like the fantastic four”. I stood there humming and touching the sides of the lift in a picture of intense concentration. Voila – it closed… I could not help laughing looking at Jasmine and Vinu’s faces.

We went to the Magnet store on Saturday. I picked up a bottle of ready to drink Tabasco Bloody Mary mix. Just add vodka and there you have a ready bloody Mary. Most of the time when we go drinking I am forced to drink Virgin Mary, so by default it has become a favorite drink. I normally check out the ingredients for non vegetarian contents. I could prima facie spot none. It also had a green dot mark. On reaching home Vinu saw the ingredients and spotted Anchovies. Anchhovies - Small, silvery fish that are usually cured with salt. So that’s pretty non-veg by my standards. It was imported by some United Distributors inc co at Dr. E Moses Road. The dickheads put the vegetarian mark on it. Good luck I did not open or drink it. Now whom to catch for this transgression. Absolutely no concern, that too in a large vegetarian country like India. Let me try calling them up and seeing. Dekhe.

Dharam and Karam

Dharam
For quite some time now, I have avoided watching too deep movies. They might be nice and real, but they somehow disturb me. Especially if they are really well made. Dharam is one of those. A lovely movie with some fantastic acting by Pankaj Kapur. He is really outstanding in the movie. It also has some powerful moments. In fact it’s so good I wished I had not seen it. The impact remains for a few hours afterwards. I prefer the brain dead escapist cinemas that way. I think fantastic four would have been a perfect substitute. Funny. I don’t regret watching Dharam, in fact I am glad I did but I still would have loved to watch Fantastic Four instead. Opposites reconciling? … hehehe.

Karma
I have realized an important skill set that I have acquired over a period of time. The ability to have fun, be friends, guide my bachas at office and then if they go wrong be the strict masterji. I can’t tolerate ineffectiveness and other wrong doings. The companyis not going to pay for your mistakes dude. While accepting salaries one does not tolerate mistakes then why should one expect the company to tolerate bullshit. Galti karo, galtiyaan karo, Roz karo, Sau galtiyan karo, par ek galti dubara mut karo.I also realized that the team is a little scared when they do go wrong. Not that I scold much. A few lines strongly spoken would do the needful. Scolding as well as praise must be short and to the point. Praise might be a bit longer if needed but never scolding. I have managed to at leatst balance friendship and toughness for now. This was something I dunno why I could earlier could never do.

Things we keep discovering

After knowing Jasmine for 16 plus years there are still things about each other that we keep discovering. The other day I saw my daughter eating dal roti sabzi on her own. She took a piece of roti dunked it into the dal and then took some sabzi with it and ate it. I found this different. I normally pick up the sabzi with the roti and then dunk it into the dal before eating it. I was about to correct her when I looked at Jasmine eating. She too was a roti – dal – sabzi person. A-ha, so it was Jasmine teaching her. I spoke to Jasmine and figured that I am a roti-sabzi-dal person. Funny I did not notice this all these years of eating together. I guess when Jasmine and me ate together we were always busy, lost into each other eyes! hahahahahhahahah.. funny, nah?

One of my old trainees called me today. She said that she was about to get remarried. I was happy on two counts. (a) She was getting settled (b) She told me about it. It hardly anything but it matters to be in the loop

theory of scarcity and abundance

Hmmmmmm….. Breathe easy. I am just back after a week long vacation with family Singapore. It was quite a lovely vacation doing all the tourist things. I wanted to take my family ever since I first saw the place during one a business trip. It’s a kiddy paradise with the opportunity to get up close and personal with a multitude of animals.

Also for an arm chair anthropologist any new city especially a new country is a wet dream come true. It’s amazing to see the difference in the cultures. In just one generation they have transformed their culture and discipline.

As always it was depressing to see the Indian tourist making a bloody ass of him self in a tourist spot. We tend to behave as if there is no tomorrow. I have a theory here. I guess what has happened is that we have become a country of scarcity. The developed countries have a culture of abundance. They can handle abundance and we can only handle scarcity. We are trained and ingrained to survive scarcity. We always behave as if there is no tomorrow and that the first one wins. At Sentosa after one of the animal shows the handler invited the crowd to then get themselves a picture clicked with a python. The Indians jammed the guy by surrounding him, breaking lines, pushing and shoving to get first. The guy kept saying to have patience and that every one will definitely get a picture. One lady decided to get the snake on her head on her own while the handler was about to call some one else. Then she gets her entire family involved one by one. Tony idhar aa, photo le, bhabhi aap bhi aaiye, and so on. We just cant handle abundance. We can handle the trainer picking one person on a lucky draw but we cannot handle the fact that everyone will get a chance if they just wait. For anyone trying to test the theory just try giving free bananas to street urchins, or slum colonies or even free anything to office goers at Nariman point. Ensure you have an abundance of bananas. The more the bananas, the greater the chaos. We see abundance and just lose it all. It just seems surreal to us. Let’s run and garner the most for us. Like wise I think the developed guys can’t handle scarcity. Looting, anarchy and riots in times of scarcity are common. Just remember the riots at US when they had massive flooding and at the same time the order and restraint shown by Indians during the Mumbai flooding.

I see this changing slowly though. My generation was largely fed stories of thrift, conservation and survival. We had one chocolate being divided into three pieces for three siblings. Most of what we wanted was unavailable or unaffordable. Jispa’s generation is of abundance. She has choice in what she wants. She chooses what she wants, has more books than she can read and generally has abundance of what is primarily made available to her. We try not to spoil her but yes she definitely is the child of abundance. Hope she grows up with a level head. She must be able to reconcile abundance and scarcity. Heheheh…. Opposites reconcile.

remove them

Nothing has changed since high school. Everyone has a frustration in office that they wish to remove. I have concluded that the birthdays are the best way for people to remove their frustration just like high school. The guy everyone wants to take out their frustration on will always be the guy facing the most violent celebrations on his birthday. Our office techie guy celebrated his birthday on Friday. Everyone who is anyone would have a bone to pick with the tech guy responsible for running our systems. Over years I have figures that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. An understanding techie is a paradox. Most of these dudes will behave as if resources are super finite and sit judgment on what you can or cannot use or are entitled to. It is he who ordains how much RAM is enough for some one or has his own convoluted formula for processor speed. It is he who rules over the infrastructure monarchy with typically the business head not understanding the function and therefore letting power corrupt. With my few years of tech background (was a part of the first dot com gold rush) I have managed to give a few things back. Sometimes even explained to them the way to do things. That keeps them in check. A fine balance office life is. So coming back to the point. The poor guy was someone who the entire office had a bone to pick with I guess. Actually sometimes it’s not about the man but about the position he is in. He is not that bad. So this poor guy had everyone there on his ‘birthday cake cutting ceremony’. He got plastered with his own cake. Now that’s normal. Lots of them get plastered. But then he has the honor of the only guy to have got birthday bums in office. Oh man that was bad. That was frustration removal of the highest order. When I heard the counting around the corner, I realized it was bum hitting of the poor guy. In spite of my bad knee, I ran across and joined in the revelry. The poor guy got a few more bums than what his age warranted. But then, when the guys are at you, there is no stopping them from going overboard. Mob mentality at his best! I was quite worried if they would push it too far. Thankfully the hero took it in the right spirit and everyone was happy. But it was fun to see how frustrations have their own manifestations.

book book ki baat hai

I have had an amazing run with books. I went through 6 to 8 books in a row that were “unputdownable”. I have learnt a few things. When it comes to books, don’t listen to too many reviews. What some people praise to heavens may not be for you and what some people deride may be just up your alley. Also books have a timing problem. What I might hate today might be just the book I want to read ten years hence. Some require a level of understanding and openness; some just are something’s that cut across all ages. There is probably no bad book or good book. It’s either the right book or the wrong book. God knows which one you like or find useful. There was one book which I found too superficial to read. I kept ignoring it. I ran out of books one day and picked it up. One of the chapters spoke about employee communication and the need to communicate the P/L in simple. At the same I was doing a little work for the group finance office. Bango…. Sold them the concept and the result was a much appreciated piece of work. So its just a question of the right book at the right time. Here… this was the stuff that got appreciated a lot. As the boss said:- this time mktg, HR and finance is working together. I replied one back:- we were always here, kabhi maang ke dekha hoga. I can get senti at times I guess.

I have another theory why no books can be bad books. Even an absolutely bad, ugly book will at least help you know understand what’s so bad about it!

ceaseless whispers

Whrrrrrrrrrrr….sometimes its just is difficult to write something. But the trick to write anything and hopefully the sting catches on with one thing leading to another ad another. Khyati, a very dear student of mine is in office these days. She is doing a project with some other department. We are using the time to catch up during lunch time and coffee breaks. We share a special relationship and she comes every day to say hi and bunk for coffee. And I guess that we are pretty close, laughing, talking in whispers etc. I had a doubt but then it came to the fore when someone commented wryly – you are spending a lot of time with trainees, huh?. You dickhead, she is my student from long… ohhhhhhh… some wise guy then says, sir, I am also your student, introduce karoa na. Oh god. Corporate life never changes. But then I guess its their fault. Khyati will treat me like some kind of papa figure, so she obviously is much more comfortable with me and office will never see it the same way. Hmmmmm…. Kaa Karen?

as someone once told me - platonic relationship.. hahahhah new words... how about good friends?

mind map

Once on a lark, when we were in a lift, I just asked Jispa “which lift do you like”. Our building has two lifts you see. Why would she prefer one over the other? Nah. Didn’t expect her to. It just was one of the stupid questions that Daddy likes to ask daughter. Absolutely stupid. She replies in an instant “ I like the other lift better”. Huh!!?!! “why?”. She replies “the other one has a round zero, but this one has an oval zero”. What? I don’t believe that. On closer inspection I saw that this one has an oval zero on the ground floor button for sure. See below.


Then I saw the other lift. Sure enough, that one has a round zero. See below.

Jispa – either you are some prodigy or you just plain whacked

Mom and Dad often sent us on stage when we were kids and made to compete on stage, talk on stage and generally help us overcome stage fright at an early age. Thanks to that I was always ok being on stage and I did not care too much about it. We have been trying to get Jispa on public forums as much as possible. She has to be comfortable with mikes, audiences etc. we go along with her for that as well. There are tons of malls with some contests or the other constantly happening. We keep sending Jispa for that. Now she is quite comfortable with it. There was one in which the compere kept urging anyone to come and scream – I love you mom three times. She asked me if she could go and scream. For sure, what do I care? There she went on her own screamed and came back happy. Attaboy girl! Way to go. Here is a pic of her with Jasmine kissing her 20 times with heavy lipstick on. Yuck! She won something for the effort.

eat a lot

My wife is very rich. She decided to buy grapes. Not just any grapes but grapes imported from New Zealand I think. Reason – Jispa likes them and the normal grapes are out of season. Fair enough. She refused to tell me at what price did they come. Yup they were tasty all right. I happened to see the price sticker and I fell over. 179 bucks for a packet. Each grape was a nice big piece. So since I was at home resting and nothing to do, I counted the number of grapes that came in the packet. Bottom line – each grape costs around Rs 1.75. hmmmm.. oops I dropped a pair – that’s three bucks. Should I eat ten pieces or should just eat one mango. Hahahhahah. Man the last I knew what fruits cost was around ten fifteen years ago when I used to go with mom to buy veggies and fruits. Now I have no clue what they cost. So they always come as a surprise. Jispa, you better like the grapes. And the mangoes.

Jispa can sleep anywhere when she is tired. Here is she sleeping at the Café Coffee day chair.

Wheel-chair anthropology

I have an allergy cold, a bad knee, body ache, troubled tummy, a little rash, a bad morale and a little resilience. I am bouncing back … not so fast as ever but bouncing for sure.

Thanks to the bad knee, I was not going to spoil our family outing to InOrbit mall. We went after checking if there were enough wheelchairs available. My wife’s granny in one and me in another. That was really cool. Its nice to see Mumbai reacting to wheel chairs. Some make way, some smile, some ignore and some don’t care. While getting into the lift nobody cares for your wheel chair. Everyone wants to go in first. Dam cheap. They get out without bothering to see how I can get in. since the doors close fast enough they close before I manage to wheel in. I had to request some one getting out, to hold it open for us to get in. Not happening. But I recommend all the arm chair anthropologists to get on to wheel chairs and see how the city truly behaves with the not so privileged. My final take, Mumbai in a mall is polite enough, but enough to give up on their time for you. Time is this fast city is money. I can smile, talk, show sympathy but I can’t wait. I got to go >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> next time, try and give time to others, that’s the only thing we have a need for. As once I learnt a valuable lesson from Rajesh, his daughter had brought two books to my home with the aim of giving one away. He asked his daughter (Twishi) which one she liked more and to give that one away to Jispa. I saw, I learned but did I conquer? I hope to.

tie me up

I can’t believe that I used to wear ties once upon a time. Today is a big meeting that we are getting done and it’s obviously a formal affair. I got my tie and jacket to office to wear just before the function. On a lark I just wore the tie while still in office. Oh shit man. That thing feels like a rope around my neck. It was off in less than 15 minutes. How the hell did I ever wear ties to office? Unbelievable! How could anyone wear ties to office? How could any one wear ties at all? That too in the Mumbai heat. Then we wear jackets. Oh man. In marketing most of the functions that we organize are in the evening, so I normally get away by wearing a jacket and no tie. But these afternoon functions (HIGH TEA) bloody require a tie. Oh man. Why do we do it at all? Why cant we just wear what is comfortable for us? When I was in sales I used to wear a tie in office as it was expected of you, but I never wanted my sales guys on the street to wear one. What’s the bloody point? The guy roaming around buses and train and oppressive heat has to figure with a tie. Most of the time he was not a tie enthusiast as well, so that made for ugly ties. Most of the heros did not even know how to tie a knot so, they would be roaming around with two three ties, whose knot has not been removed. SO they just wear them over and tighten them. Lengths, knots be dammed. Purple ties on brown pants, green shirts with ties with psychedelic prints and God knows what not. Ah, yes the lengths… some would be longer and would hide the crotch, the others would end above the navel. Some would be broad and some would be “that 80’s” think look. Almost all of them were stripped, and when stripes finally come into fashion they would be prints. They would be worn over every kind of shirt, even the ones with two pockets and a ruff washed look. Oh the death of the tie. So, I just banned them. It’s more convenient, the team loved me for it and the poor fella looked better. Improving motivation was never so easy.

Murals

Jispa did some murals...priceless i say on the walls. She had some finger paints which she decided to experiment with. I sure love her painting the walls of the house. Slowly but surely we would have no bare walls.

Now the problem is I dont think I will ever have the heart to paint these walls over.

Har Ghar chup chap se kehta hai ki andar isme kaun rehta hai

the following one is a butter fly with antennas

Papa, mama joined in to leave their mark as well

The Rainbow lollipop, done with a brush

A tree with a black outline followed by yellow and green outlines.

crutches

Continuing with the cricket series, I learnt something new. One cant be an Australian on Indian grounds. I was fielding in the seven a side tournament and the captain decided to experiment a bit. He kept only one person on the leg side, ME, and everyone else on the off side. Interesting strategy it was, to use the fastest fielder for the covering the most ground. Fair enough. But then the bowler is supposed to bowl on the off stump, full pitched not short balls that can be swung around on the open leg side boundary. I saved one boundary, then some more runs, and then I was running to stop one more when I suddenly felt my ankle turn (uneven ground) and consequently my knee. Oh shit. I twisted my knee big time. Dead duck. I collapsed on the ground. The medic ran in. I know this medic from a lot of matches, all he does is put a lot of spray and some screwed massage. He can’t make out a dislocation from a fracture and he won’t know what to do about it. The only time I screamed was when I screamed at him not to touch my knee. I was scared about a crack and I didn’t want him testing it for sure.
So that way I spent most of time yesterday with the knee strapped up. I was at my in laws and my wife found the sight of me hopping around using her granny’s crutches extremely funny. In office my guys also find it extremely amusing to see me stuck to a chair the whole day. In fact they are dying to see me limp somewhere. They are also plotting on how they can get me to drink lots more water.
I only hope I get some cute chick sympathy in return for all my troubles… aaawwwwwwwwwww.

soul

Barista has closed down their Nariman Point outlet. Sad. The only decent coffee shop in the area. I wonder why there aren’t more coffee shops in the country’s densest and possibly richest commercial district. Coffee probably makes less money than lunch and dinner, thus making a coffee shop unviable. Hmmmm. The NCPA bang in Nariman Point has a decent ‘campus’ with a few gardens thrown in. it must converted to a coffee shop during the day with some decent food for the lunchers. That might work. When developers develop land as a commodity it will purely price it self out most of the time. You cannot just sell land to the highest bidder. You need a good mix of all genres. Mall development is not about just leasing out the land and keeping it clean. It’s about getting your mix right with the complete package with some loss leaders and some winners. If Nariman point has to thrive as well, it must see itself as a one big entity and not as some disparate parts that make a whole. But our town planners will never understand that, I am sure. Nariman Point has no soul. What a pity. It is perfectly poised to have one.

Jispa at a movie….

tararumpum

I saw tararumpum over the holiday. It’s a movie that I will feel a little ashamed to say that I enjoyed. But fact of life is that I kinda liked it. I like any movie that shows struggle and triumph against odds. No matter how humbug it might be! Down and out, resilience and victory. Seeing this movie made me think that some day I must write about the various companies and the bosses that I worked for and my learnings from the same. I started very bad in corporate India. Very very bad. Some day I will write it about it and what I learnt from it. I almost got fired from my first job. The reason I did not get fired was that I resigned in time. Oh man. How wrong could I be in understanding job requirements.

In any case, the movie is quite ok. Not too hot. Might be a decent forgettable movie. But not irritating on your senses. Which compared to many other movies seems like a stand out. At least the stunts look nice and real. Jispa is slowly getting used to movies. Till now she could see only movies that were happy through and through.

Typically I have always had short closely cropped hair. For some reason I am growing it. Not that it is very long. Even remotely long. But it’s longer than what I like to have. Normally I just love the crew cuts and I realize that I need a haircut if I have to comb hair. So if I need to comb it then I NEED to cut it!

drop me

I should be dropped from the Kotak team, that too from the bloody B team. I seem to be in horrible form and like most bad patches, bad luck runs along side. The first match that I played this season I was doing well, knocking around, decent contribution. I hit a lovely cover drive on one knee piercing the offside. I am not likely to forget that shot. But then on some 20-30 odd I got run out. It was a silly mistake by the other guy and I was the one out. It was downhill from there. A few more lackluster matches thereon. On Saturday for some reason I was feeling like I was in some great nick. I knocked a few balls at the side and they went like rockets. I went in to bat with a swagger. This is my day. The first ball I got was a full pitch outside off stump. Bread and butter shot for me. Whack! Neatly hit over the long off area sailing away. I did not run. Six for sure, worst case a boundary. Now in Mumbai cricket is played on infinite maidans and the pitches are spread all over. So some pitch you will find that the offside boundary is at 35 yards and the leg side at a 100. Sometimes the long on is a normal boundary and sometimes it is defined loosely by a tuft of grass, a tree or the end of some other pitch in the maidan. The lengths can be completely random. So, coming back to the shot, I saw it sailing high and then to my horror, I saw someone under it looking at it. With over 50 - 60 cricketers on the field, you never know who for sure are the opposition fielders. Caught! First ball duck. When I hit the ball, I loved the noise of a sweetly timed shot, the trajectory, the feel. The team in the tents shouting, SHOT SHOT, six, four. Followed by the leveler – walking back into the tent without even a sweat, leave alone a score to your name.. On Sunday, was the lovely seven a side game. My traditional favorite. I normally do very well here. A few balls inot the match I was bowled by a decent Yorker. Fair enough. Happens to the beat of us. It did not help that I was in bad form. The next match I concentrated hard. Knocked a few balls around. Stroking it well. The guy bowling was pitching it well and bouncing it hard. You normally gauge the bounce in seven a side and hit through the line. With the old balls used you don’t get the swing that beats you. I charged down got to the length I wanted to swing over the top and the ball never got up. It kept low, almost close to the ground. It was the only ball in out innings that got variable bounce. Out again. When form deserts you, luck will too. Or is it vice versa. Ha-ha!
This made me even more focused on the fielding on both days. I am easily the best fielder in the side. I run the fastest, stop everything. No one ever chances my arm for a double. Now with the benefit of experience and reading of the game / batsman style, I normally know where the ball is going to go before hand. There was a key guy batting us out of the game. I knew he kept hitting to the covers. The bat face was opening a bit and the bowler was maintaining a decent offside line. I was fielding at point, just behind covers. I screaming at captain to get me one more fielder. I tried again after a few balls. I got the fielder from wide midwicket to point and stood at covers. Sure enough, two balls on and I got an awkward ball into my stomach for a nice sharp catch. Game changed. That opened their batting at the other end. We got them all out. The significance of the catch was not lost on the team who knew that they had dropped three before.
The fun of cricket for me is now completely mental. Physical is fun but the mental side is it. The ability to mentally change the game is a different high. I explained to the batsman later how I plotted him out. The seven a side game, the match can change by clever handling of the bowlers. In the B team we have many captains, but I was happy that the guy leading respected my experience and effected the changes I suggested. That way we start strong, hide a bowler in the middle and have options to finish strong. With only seven over to be bowled, it’s a rapid fire game with one mistake costing the match. We won both.
But I still need to be dropped on batting form alone. Probably my fielding and experience is letting me remain in the side. Not bad – best fielder and good experience is not something that comes together. Opposites do reconcile.

Here is Jispa's drawing and coloring. Ain't I a proud pa?

long live buddha, kill him on the road

One thing leads to another. Someone left a small note “check out 'if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him!' by sheldon b. kopp”. I checked it up on the net and found a para which I think is bang on. I have always looked for answers within and I so believe in this and i quote from the link

The Zen Master warns: "If you meet Buddha on the road, kill him!" This admonition points up that no meaning that comes from outside ourselves is real. The Buddhahood of each of us has already been obtained. We need only recognize it. Killing the Buddha on the road means destroying the hope that anything outside of ourselves can be our master. We must each give up the master without giving up the search. The importance of things lies in the way we have learned to think about them. How often we make circumstances our prison and other people our jailers! At our best we take full responsibility for what we do and what we choose not to do. The most important struggles take place within the self.

bananarama

A small banana is a roughly 5 inches tall and 100 gms in weight. Around the same as a cell phone. Let the significance of the size not be lost on you.

A man going home from work likes to buy something to eat before the commute.

Men are normally paranoid about their belongings, specially in public areas and keep checking their pockets to ensure that the wallet, cell phone etc are there.

Normally the cell is kept in the top right hand pocket of the shirt.

Most people in trains are helpful and point out if you forget something or the other while getting off.

Bananas are seen as nice nutritional food by the common man.

A man can eat one banana easily, the second one may be eaten after some time.

Bananas normally get squashed quite easily.

Your shirt pocket can’t hold too many things together.

People normally keep the same stuff in the same pocket everyday. Habit.

Bananas are often sold as a pair. 5 for 2

People normally read books in trains to pass time.

Now to connect the threads...

One man bought two bananas for five bucks. He ate one. He then boarded the train. He put the second banana in his shirt pocket. When he sat he put the cell phone beside him. He began reading a book. When his station came he did a mental check. His felt his wallet and his cell and got up and began to leave. The guy sitting opposite pointed out that he left his cell behind. The man turned in horror to find his cell on his seat. He then realized that the weight he felt in his top pocket was actually the banana and not the cell as he made it out to be.

I am that man.

cut throat spirituality

On Sunday we decided to go for the build a bear workshop at the juhu shoppers stop. This is the local franchisee of the global build a bear network. Its quite a cute place to take your four year old. Here Jispa would get to customize her own teddy. First she chosses the basic type of bear and the ‘skin’. She had to choose from bears, dogs, lambs, leopards and different colors. She quite went bonkers. Then she chooses the sound that goes inside – she choose ‘I love you’. How typical a girlie. Then she has to name it, and push the pedal through which the stuffing is filled in the bear. She named the bear chocolate brownie. She even got to put inside a small heart. Then she chooses the clothes, the accessories, the cute chappals and finally prints the birth certificate. Pretty cool. Almost a version of the all American Quasi Spiritual Experience. Very cool I say. The price tag – like the bear , completely customizable. Every thing that goes in has a tag attached that decides the cost of the bear. And the bear is a small teddy size not a jumbo size. So with the bear, one pair clothes, one pair chapels cost around 1500 and then a carry bag like the baby sling bag adds another 500. Making it 2000 odd bucks. Not cheap but then that cost of making your kid feel like a mother. I don’t think Jispa enjoyed it as much as I did. I thought the whole experience was just great. At least she will remember the entire buying, oops, ‘birthing’ process of her chocolate brownie. Hopefully! I loved it for sure.

Here’s a pic of her with the skin she choose.

Post this we were hungry and therefore we decided to try out Govindas at ISKON (part of the ‘Hare Rama Hare Krishna’ movement. Govindas has built a reputation for offering ‘spiritual’ food. I assumed it would be like something like pure ghee and ‘satvik’ kind of food. Jasmine also told me that it should be nice and less oily. We enter the place and board outside proclaims – Govindas – “the cuisine with a philosophy” and “spiritualise your eating”. Wah wah! What a stylo! It was a thali buffet system that day. Possibly due to Sunday. Quite a crowd. Hmm I assume this is good. Jasmine says – thali!! I am not sure. I ask for two thalis in any case at the billing counter. You need to pay first and then get in the restaurant. Spirituality comes only with cash down. Fair enough. He asks for 500 bucks. At 250 a head, philosophy especially about food is not cheap. Theek hai. Must be expensive to make good food with the purest of ingredients. We settle in with a welcome drink. Option of juice, jaljeera or chaas. Cool. We get to the buffet counter. I see the salad counter an almost die in shock. The fucking place resembles a marriage set up. The salad counter has green salad, Chinese salad, dhai vada, dahi bundi, fried ticklies, fried wadas, fried everything. The main course has veg clear soup with the Chinese optionals like soya, vinegar and chilly sauce. At the main course I just froze and died and went to heaven. There was paneer makhanwala, bhendi fry, some other stuff, schezwan rice, manchurian and a some thing else, actually much more something else. Full shaadi mandap it was. The ISKON guys seem to have got this right. Get the food oily, greasy and unhealthy, the gujjus will come in and then spirituality will spontaneously occur. Well, its not like the food was really bad but it definitely was not ‘spritual’ or with a philosophy. It was your plain old marriage pandal food. I am sure the gujjus enjoyed it. But also it must have brought them a little closer to their cardiovascular bliss. I had regard for them when a good friend of mine went over and dedicated his life to the movement. Today after this I have no respect or regard. They must be doing a lot of good but one such experience is enough for me to be on guard. See what’s at the entry of the restaurant. Such blatant spin doctor stuff. How can one trust spirituality to them?

weekends are best for thinking

Today I seem to have a lot of things on my mind to write. It’s always a lot after a weekend. There are so many things that one notices and promises to… well… make a note of. To start with I have always seen a lot of women crossing the road on a lark. Most of these kind are in their own world while crossing the road. No left no right just cross and then look at the incoming car in their path with horror as it swerves to avoid them. Aaiiii. Its not that I have anything against women (for those who accuse me of type casting), there are many men who seem to do this as well but the sheer numbers of women who do this is unnerving. The man will always at the last moment jump out of the way but the women will just stand there and scream. This thing is going to get worse. Why? Because of the earplugs that are now in their ears perpetually as they listen to their iPods or the music from their FM/MP3 phones or they are simply merrily talking away. This way they won’t even notice the most blaring of all horns. The numbers of iPod accidents are set to rise before we see an outrage in America calling for banning them due to this increase. Or closer back home I assume some fanatic mob will break the shop of the nearest iPod vendor blaming them for the accidents.

I put another call to the bubbly content editor at Oxfords (random) and was pleasantly surprised to get a warm bubbly conversation at the other end. This is the same lady whose service paeans I was singing. I remember reading one book that said that customer service people are inherently a different breed of people who are naturals. There is nothing you can do with the rest of the sad people. You have no option but to recruit only the good ‘born with the attitude’ guys. Hmmm.. I am beginning to believe he is so right. You either have it in your blood or you don’t. People who are cynical or skeptical of all around and believe that the world is out to cheat them make for lousy customer care people. I think people with inborn trust and cheerful disposition must be kept for these roles. Thank you Ms Ray for teaching me more.
People teach by just being themselves.. what say?

I went to attend a wedding of an old kid who used to report into me. She and her team will always be special to me. This was the first team that I led purely by following Theory Y. I refused to get angry, always believed that they were right, treated them with love and affection and protected them from the horrendous sales guys. They were the customer service guys who used to get smashed left right and centre. They had no leadership, no standing and were generally bad on delivery. I was heading marketing then. I was given additional charge of the team. Past sales experience always taught me to crack whip and kick them into performing. I remember changing my mental note when I took them on. I transformed them slowly but surely into a team that believed in themselves and gave the sales guys back when they deserved so and also built a sales focus so as to not unnecessary kick the sales guys as finally that’s where the moolah came from. So coming back. The head of that team was Kavita and I took a particular fondness for her. When she was given to me she was broken, her review had just gone very average and she was bypassed for a promotion. Her morale was down. I worked on her, gave her ‘teeth’, and energized her. The result that at the end of the year she got her promotion, performed phenomenally, and a huge raise and bonus. She almost had tears in her eyes when she got that letter. More than that the best compliment came when the operations head (a person I really respect) told me that Kavita has come of age and she now has the confidence she required. She and I have now gone on to many more milestones in our respective lives. I was attending her reception on Saturday. There was a queer sense of pride in my heart while I saw the couple arrive. I don’t know but I found myself grinning from end to end. I felt so nice to see one more milestone in a nice person’s journey.

There is more that I want to write but generally I try to limit myself to not more than one page. So tomorrow I shall some more about the experiences about the weekend.

Can god die?

Well, if my daughter Jispa is to be believed then for sure. “When all the men die and then god will die and then the world will become smaller and smaller and then break”. Something like that. So yes God can die. To which I asked how is it possible for God to die. “If God does not eat then he will die” – came the matter of fact reply. Fair enough I say. “But God is in everything, plants, leaves, flowers. So God will always live” To which she asked – “do flowers die?” “Yes”, I said. She then looks with triumph and says – “see then God can also die”. “But then he is the sky and the ground. Does the sky ever eat anything? Can it die? See, God cannot die.”. “Noooo. How can God be in the ground” she laughs. Ok at this point I wanted to tell her that I am a pantheist, but I decide against it. “look, see, your school bus has come. Bye, see you”
Saved by the bus.

Another sign of daughter growing up:- she went to the loo at Imax alone. She went in on her own, did her pee and came outside to me waiting. This is around two month’s old photograph. I never did manage to put it up. But I thought ut might be well worth capturing. Quite a historic moment in the journey of our little Joan of arc.

work hard then fry bheja

Its been a long time since I have written anything. To use a popular phrase – I think what is urgent many times takes precedence over what is important; there is a lot to do in office these days. Some amount of fire fighting. I have been very busy mentally and therefore physically. I think I its time to take stock as one needs to from time to time. I had given a free hand to a lot of my kids. I am disappointed that it did not resulting higher productivity. I guess it takes time for people to evolve and mature. Well this will definitely reflect on their overall growth but hell, at least I tried to make them grow. End of the year there is no blood on my conscience that I did not try hard enough. There is a fine line between outstanding and exceeds expectations. This line is for an employee to see. You get salary to do your job well, very well, but growth; you bloody need to be outstanding and a clear outlier to go beyond. That is instinct, that is something you push your own self for, that comes from within. It is that push that you make when no one wants you to. You do it of your own accord. PUSH PUSH PUSH. It has its own perils. By pushing you do sacrifice a bit of yourself. You lose yourself, your heart, and bit of yourself. But it’s a choice that you have to make. When you are in the shower and you are thinking, do you think about your love life, your hobbies, your passion or your work. What is the big thing that you are pushing for? That big thing will decide your fate and your life. If that big thing is your job your work, then you are looking at your self make that transition into something that can give you growth at your office. I am not for once advocating that that is the right thing to do but then that’s the truth. What you want to be the big thing in your life will have to occupy that much more of your life. Work, painting, love, whatever…… so the question is what do I do? Well my work is not my life, in fact I do not define my life from it, but it does pay for a lot of things that define my life. That too my mind is the clincher. So work has taken a part of me, a large part of me. I think about it a lot of the time. I get ready for to do’s, follow ups, ideas, directions etc before hitting each day. So I have given up a part of the soul to work. But what to do? I try and balance it.

Yesterday was wifef’s birthday. Thank go I remember it. Now I try my bets to remember it well in advance. I saw two movies – the march of the penguins and Bheja Fry. The first one was a classic National Geographic style special. Nice but quite boring. Bad prints that have been played in a zillion theatres before coming to us and a tad too long. In fact, when the interval broke I thought that the movie would have ended. Slow paced, but ok ok. The other one was a masterpiece. Bheja Fry is easily one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. It is just too good. I dare say – its in the same league of Jaane bhi do yaaron. Dam funny. No crude vulgar comedy. The whole theater was laughing non stop and that too very loudly. One joke would make the people laugh loud so much so that the other joke was lost in the din. The newspaper (HT) gave it a one star and the penguins got a 4 star. Oh fuck you raters…I am never going to believe in the ratings. I guess they just want to guess the reactions and give smaller ratings to movies they assume will be a flop and more to those they believe to be “classy”. The director is definitely going places, if he does not burn out – Sagar Bellary I think. Dam funny guy. It reminded me of the plays that are played at college festivals or annual day. I would like to see this movie with my entire joint extended family. I hope it runs well and encourages more such movies as opposed to the fucking irritating movies like Namaste London. The only time I laughed in Namaste was actually in the emotional spiel that the protagonist was giving in defense of his motherland “India” to the gora’s who were degrading it. Really sad.

There is so much to write. There is backlog of ideas and photos in my head. Hope to clear my head and write more, and more regularly. I think the break from the blogging was probably a cool thing to do.