Drop in the Ocean

Being positive

2010-10-11T18:19:00.001+11:00

I wasted an entire weekend being a sulky idiot! I wish to make a resolution that I will never again be negative. The power of negative thought is too great.
Worrying about worst case scenarios is that they always happen!
Here's to positive thought and smile!

The underground river

2010-09-21T08:19:00.000+10:00

This blog entry as a draft is more than 2 years old. Did I face a writer's block or a blogger's block?

This story is about the underground river in Tagore Nagar in Pondicherry. Many many years ago, when Kanna mama's borewell was being dug, at a certain depth (about 30 ft), there was white sand. And then within a couple of feet more there was water :).

Amma told me that she'd heard of an underground river used to flow in then Rose Nagar( old name for Tagore Nagar).

This incident fascinated me and in the absence of the Internet, my main source of search was the book of knowledge. I got interested in the Saraswathi river. There is evidence that the Rig Veda was written in the banks in the Saraswathi.

There's so much history in every piece of land. It is just so amazing that Pondicherry has so much of it. Agastya's ashram, the Vedapuri temple and then more recently the Aurobindo ashram. I wish we Indians had the ability to document things. Even now,we are such lazy creatures. I hope the underground river inside me to write starts flowing again. So much has happened since that time when I was a kid. I am a middle aged man now!

I hope we haven't bored out all the water from the underground river in Tagore Nagar.

The audacity of hope

2009-01-22T11:02:00.000+11:00

So, finally he has been sworn in. Barack Obama has taken over as President of America. It must be a special feeling for the African American community – after all that they have had to go through. His speech was a fluff talk in my opinion. But, we have to watch him cautiously as his team works its way through some issues.

In India, the equivalent of the blacks might be the Dailts, in Australia it’s the aborigines, in New Zealand the Maoris. All these countries have done their bit for the integration of the down trodden to main society. I guess India has actually done much better than a lot of the developed countries.

So – coming back to the concept of hope – it’s an important fuel for the world. If tomorrow is perceived to be better than today, it’s a great feeling. Change is the buzzword currently – it’s here to stay. In corporate life, will that mean a new twist towards socio-capitalism?

Sea of Poppies

2009-01-02T14:05:00.004+11:00

Amitav Ghosh's book by this title was my latest escapade into the imaginary world of books. This was an awesome page-turner set in the 1830s in a colonial India.
Deeti, kabuthri-ki-ma is a regular peasant woman, growing poppies on her field - primarily out of compulsion by the East India company. The company wants to make money by selling opium in China, exported from the fields and factories in India. It describes a time when the 'weed' was taking over the vast agricultural expanses of eastern India fed by the Ganga - to satisfy the greed of the company. Her husband, an afeemkhor or an opium addict dies after an accident in the opium factory. Kalua is the ox-cart driver of lower caste, whose destiny is, to rescue Deeti from a sati she was going to jump into to escape life in the protection of a perverted brother-in-law.
Zachary Reid, is a mulatto, freeman, who becomes second mate on ship from a carpenter, due to a twist of fate in which all the seniors on the ship have died due to disease. He has shown a lot of promise and the Raj has rewarded him by making him the second mate of the Ibis. The Ibis is a central character in the story - it's a former slave ship from America that is now being put to use to transport Girmitiyas or indentured labourers.
Paulette Lambert(or Putli), a french girl living in Calcutta, daughter of a botanist that worked in the Botanical gardens in Calcutta, and having been brought up by a local maid, feels more Bengali than European. As a consequence of living with her benefactor, Mr Burnham or Burra Sahib, must get on the ship to escape the torments of the lady like mannerisms being imposed on her; and more because she wants to escape from her new life in Calcutta. She wants to go to Mauritius too, where the Ibis was going to be heading.
The story has some other interesting characters - Jodu, Putli's brother by virtue of being brought up the same mother, Neel Rattan Halder, the zemindar of Raskhali, Ah-Fatt the half Chinese, half Parsi afeemkhor, and the most interesting one being Baboo Nob Kissin :)).
The novel gives a good insight into the personal lives of several Girmitiyas - giving us a peak into the migration of Indian labourers into Mauritius, Fiji, Suriname, Malaysia and scores of other countries with an Indian diaspora. It also tells a tale of colonialism, on the business acumen of the English, and their justification of the opium wars, which in a satirical manner is portrayed as being the protection of free trade, even if it meant death, destruction and addiction of the Chinese populations!
The language used in the book is an eclectic mix of English, Hindusthani and Bengali. Sentences like "Do a dekho of me" are common. Also, several nuances of Indian English are exploited to give it a humorous quote as well. The sailor speak of Serang Ali, is cute and funny. The Malay-English-Hindi mix comes out very funny and kudos to the author for getting such humour into a well researched, semi-historical account of several lives thrown in together by destiny.
Overall, an enjoyable page-turner and entertainment to the core. It transports the reader to a bygone era very effectively.

Mood of an Indian

2008-12-02T19:27:00.003+11:00

I feel injured, hurt and angry. I didn't personally lose anybody or any body's anything - but lost a few brave soldiers. Mumbai is hurt - this great city has been attacked. The whole country has been hurt ...
Will it be different this time? I have reason to believe, yes it will be different! I think the middle class and the upper classes will finally wake up. I hope I am awake too. I want to make a difference ... I will contemplate how, over the next few days ...
Enough has been written on how pathetic our politicians are. There are enough people in developed countries who laugh and make a joke of how Mumbai is burning ... I feel angry .. but I don't react to these jokers. I also realized how insensitive I might have been to others, when I might have spoken of the situation in Afghanistan or Iraq (though I should admit I haven't met anyone from these countries and spoken to them in my living memory).
As I feel sombre and my mood is grey - I hope I will be awake. I hope I don't go back to sleep. I hope our middle classes don't go back to sleep ... And deep inside, I have a dream! I dream of an India that is advanced - may not be in monetary terms, advanced in culture, in peace and above all - that one thing that is the greatest of our resources - love! India is about love .. We will share it with the world and the world will fall in love with us again.

Nostalgia

2008-11-19T21:38:00.002+11:00

I am reading Vikram Seth's book - From Heaven Lake. It's an interesting travelogue of Vikram through the western parts of China and then into Tibet. Anyway - an interesting quote in the book is - "My present is all about collecting experiences for future nostalgia".

Do we always feel that the past was glorious? Does memory have automatic filter by which it removes the bad parts and stores only the good ones? When I look back at my childhood, at first sight, it always seems like a perfect one. I was doing well in my studies, I played basketball 4 hours every day, I had the most loving of parents, I loved reading books and my parents always bought me whatever books I wanted. Fast forward to college days - days of fun, of being in a remote village cut off from civilization, of those late night lachaas ... and of aloo bhujia, girls on campus and travels through parts of Rajasthan!

Is there selective memory? In comparison, the present is a it dull, slow! Well it actually might be because of the environment/conditions in which we live. Professionally, we are going through a merger - lots of uncertainty, horrible market conditions outside! Personally, it's been a shitty year. I don't have many friends in office; struggle to get a decent conversation about anything outside of work with my colleagues. The most beautiful thing is my wife still loves me and is a pillar of strength for me during these tumultuous times. I feel lonely, I miss my father and I cry every other night. But, may be I will wake up at a later date and think this was a good time in my life?

Music can make one feel nostalgic; books transport you into another world that kind of equates to nostalgia. When I was reading Vikram Seth's book on travel through the Uighir regions of China, I myself starting floating into a nostalgia of visiting the Babu budan giri dagah near Chikmagalur. I relived that memory with a pleasant smile. When Pooja and I talk to Bangalore, both of us break into an involuntary smile - recollecting the memories of Jakarandas, Silk cottons and of the travels into Karnataka and the walks in Indira nagar park. Of the dreams that we lived in those walks and what the future would present to us.

Now, the future is here! Well, it seems like this is not what those dreams looked like. But, we have some money now - which we didn't at that time!

The big nostalgia I had when I sat by my father's bed in the hospital was one of the two of us on a scooter. We were going nowhere like we did so many times. He would kick start the scooter, and two of us would ride to everywhere and nowhere. Those were the days when the seeds of exploration, of loving suspense, and being part of the journey without necessarily knowing what the destination was, were sown. And here, I continue on that journey that my father started .. I hope he is continuing on that one as a soul - and I love him!

Life, death and everything else ...

2008-11-17T13:29:00.002+11:00

I miss him a lot. Every night I dream of having a conversation with him. Every morning, I wake up thinking; if only he was here … It was on the dawn of 31 August – this year. The living world changed on me. The amount of pure, unconditional love I got from the living world less than halved in a moment. I wake up in the middle of the night – screaming, sweating, shouting the question, “why?” Why did this need to happen. It was a happy world – full of love – full of unconditional and pure love.

A lot has happened this year. People who loved me – four of them departed, one by one in a span of 3 months. The year was horrible. When you are going through this shit, you pinch yourself and ask, “Is this real?” Sadly the answer is always, yes – this is life.

Never has my pursuit of the answer for what happens after life, or after death, been of greater significance. I had a theory long back – a result of probably a collection of some shallow thought on my part, and a set of stories from I gathered this theory.

Am I in a dream, or am I the dream? The concept of illusion or Maya might sound fatalistic – but I don’t have an alternative to that theory to explain why such things happen. Dream is the reality and reality is the dream. What is real, in my humble opinion, in this dream, is the love. Love is real and this is something I have learnt over the years.

Love stretches beyond dreams, nights and days. In the year of sadness, I also experienced love of some great people. I can still feel the intensity of the love of my father. I can see him smile at me, walk with me and speak to me. I can hear his voice, I can hear him sing and I can feel his hug. That’s what comes from pure unconditional love. But, the amount of pure, unconditional love I received from the living world, dwindled, folded and dwarfed into a tiny fraction of its original measure before that fateful day.

These incidents of the year have opened a can of questions. The questions come hurling at me at amazing pace every day and night. Some are tough questions I have not thought about … some are the same old questions that have suddenly become important again. Some are plain thoughts hurling past me … And I want to be aware - aware of the thoughts, questions and the love.

Blog therapy

2008-04-29T12:34:00.002+10:00

My wife loves me! I love her! One aspect of life that's not changed. She gives me love therapy - I feel alright when the balm is love is given. I feel happy ... but then, like a blood sucking snake takes me deep down again ... I am depressed .. nothing matters .. everything matters ...
That's not what it should sound like. We have both almost paid off the debt from the last big adventure - the MBA. That's a good time record within which we have done it. We both have permanent jobs now.
But ..... I am depressed! Nothing matters .. I don't feel like going to office ... I'm not excited by anything ... In my previous group, I thought I had done a good job - but, guess what - nobody cares! Not a sparrow's fart's worth of rememberance by people! It's as if nothing happened for the last one year. Some people who matter seem to convey otherwise, but in effect nothing!
I'm reaching stage of mental sickness. At work, I sit in a corner and read. Discovering a whole new world. That whole new world does not matter. IPL is going great on TV - but the idiots in this country telecast it recorded at 1 AM every day!
I need an oil dipping, sole searching ... it's not right! I shouldn't be feeling so worthless!!

Hello BlogWorld!

2007-08-07T18:55:00.002+10:00

I am showing signs that I want to write again. How will it manifest itself, I don't know yet! It's been such a long time since I wrote in this public scrap book of mine.

2007 is more than half over! The last time I blogged, I wished happy new year. Life has changed so much since then. To begin with, I am in a different part of the World to where I had been so far. Work is looking interesting - I am beginning to make some impact at least.

Australia is a different continent - different world, in fact! People are totally different. We have started watching a lot of movies. Some movies have been really good - I would strongly recommend "Crash" and "Dances with the wolves". Very deeply involving movies - both. Crash is shows you the essence of racial prejudice. You face or show it in different ways every day - depending on whether you are in the minority or majority. It's a very interesting - we talk extensively about it all the time.

Hopefully, will update this space more often!

Happy 2007

2007-01-02T14:01:00.000+11:00

Wish you all a very happy new year. We had a quite and common man's new year's eve. We walked around Boat Quay and then to Marina Bay to witness the fireworks along with thousands of people in Singapore. I was impressed with the fireworks.
Here's a picture from the pictures. Enjoy the new year and hope it works out well for all of us!

Game, set and match!

2006-12-15T03:52:00.000+11:00

The year of MBA at INSEAD is over! Time somehow seems to accelerate and fuel itself to faster speed. This year has rushed passed so fast - what did I want to achieve, what did I want to reflect on, what did I want to build into my personality - somehow all these questions still seem to be a blurr. May be time is the only solution.
How has his year impacted me? I've met some great people and also some not-so-good people. These friends will remain for life. I know that when I speak to some of them; their concern is genuine, their warmth is penetrative. Finally, management is about two things - people and negotiations. I think the business world just replicates these two simple factors of relationship management.
We have our graduation next week. This might be the last time I will be seeing many of my classmates. Some of them are on their path of become rich and famous; some of them are set out on journey to make a difference to the world; some of them as clueless as me and some of my mates. This year was supposed to be a year of reflection, a year to clear the muddle in my head. If anything else, I think the muddle's only increased; my confidence definitely been eroded. It'll take time to absorb the showers of knowledge blasted on this year; it will take time to know what the value of this MBA is; and most importantly, the message to be taken from this year will remain forever ...

Good job, bad job!

2006-12-12T02:50:00.001+11:00

So we are entering the last day of classes at INSEAD. A bit nostalgic, a bit hurried, a bit weird and a lot more restless. This year has opened so many options for many of us, and at the same time we have priced ourselves out of some other jobs. This is an interesting point in life to reflect and think of jobs!

One of my first bosses at work told me once that work itself is a bad thing – so why do you differentiate between good and bad jobs. I had used this on some of my reportees too – it’s basically a tool that managers use to fend off questions on change and challenge. Coming out of b-school and especially now, one faces a set of choices – not that there are many in my case, but even to justify to myself on what is it that I would like to do in the long run …. I had yet another bunch of questions asking me why I thought I was suited for a particular role and I had to rant off my usual answers. it’s amazing how the human mind works vis-à-vis job search. If there are many obstacles, you get eliminated anyway. If the selection is easy and straight forward, the the mind suspects it’s not going to be a challenging job!

As a friend once pointed out, for the first time in the history of mankind, the upper classes wants to and will be working much more than the lower classes. There is this drive to work harder and do that bit extra to impress someone in the business organization to get that extra bit of recognition. There are going to be situations in our professional lives from now, when decision making will be key. Till now, I’ve had it easy in a lot of situations being in operational roles, but increasingly, I will be moving to more front line and top line roles. Where is everything headed, time shall unwind and reveal itself ….. till then, I have to complete coursework and a few residual interviews.

Desi Week - We like it hot!

2006-12-10T19:39:00.000+11:00

Dec 4-8, we celebrated the Desi week at INSEAD. We called it Desi week to accommodate our neighbours Pakistan and Sri Lanka into the party. It was a lot of work by some people - but the end result was awesome.

Many thanks to the sponsors - Infosys, Nokia, Smirnoff and Taj Hotels. And very interestingly we got amazing help from India tourism with the Incredible India! posters, brochures and a bhangra troupe that cracked the show during the party. We had a splash of colours, desi-ness, food and party into one week.

The pinnacle of the week was on Wednesday when we had the Desi dinner and party. As part of the party arrangements, we scouted around the whole of Singapore looking for places for the party and finally zeroed in on the New Park hotel in Little India. It's a nice place for the occasion. The music was completely Punju types and all our friends from the whole world had a blast!

Some pictures that should speak for themselves.

The decor in school for the Desi week - good number of posters from India, a few from Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

The decor for the bazaar - where we brought vendors from Little India to setup stalls. We made a good impact in terms of the cultural exhibition, unfortunately couldn't plan enough for the business events.

With Abel during the party! We smacked every one's forehead with teekas. The party was a hit everyone swinging to bhangra numbers - we had an awesome bhangra group lent to us by India tourism office in Singapore.

Happiness and relief

2006-12-01T14:13:00.000+11:00

And I have a job offerJ. It’s such a relief to be on the other side of the fence! So I got a job offer from Westpac bank in Sydney, Australia – the same place where Pooja already has an offer. So it’s a big relief and joy that we will be in the same city without compromising on our careers. Never thought at the beginning of the year that we would go to Australia. After all this roller-coaster, there is happiness and relief. I’m really looking forward to joining the labour market again to contribute to the GDP growth of the world.

So the role is in technology strategy of a retail bank. It sounds exciting and it covers functions across risk management, finance, marketing and HR. I still haven’t been to Australia but trust in my sweetheart’s judgement about the country, its people and specifically the people who we’ll be working with. So, this is a General management career path and that sounds pretty exciting. I have a chance to be a ‘leader’, thinker and do-er.

The interview process itself gave me time to reflect on what I want out of a career or a job. I realized that it was not the type of job that was important – but more of a list of criteria that should be satisfied by a career path. I will discuss those traits in a letr post. In the meantime, business school is meandering to an end. I will graduate with an MBA degree in 3 weeks’ time. It feels too sudden, but at the same time feels like it’s been a drag. It feels great to be part of a global community of big achievers and yet feels like we’re all shallow running after we don’t even know what! Or like a friend put it, it feels like a good movie that’s coming to an end. And a good movie is never the one where you can predict the end! I believe this is just another beginning. Career is important because we spend more than 70% of our waking time at work. But, at the same time, it’s good to enjoy the God of small things J… Sydney – here I come.

Place to live?

2006-11-27T15:10:00.000+11:00

For the first time in life, I’m at a point when, I don’t know where I’ll be next month on this date. I mean, literally, not figuratively! As job search goes on and on forever, my stories also have their own ups and downs. From being a super-duper people manager to a strategic thinker I have played my part to the dances and tunes of the recruiter. This week’s going to be busy – with interviews and coursework. Talking of interviews, I’m a bit all over the place in terms of location, function and industry. Well industry not so much, but the other two definitely.

So INSEAD and a 1 year MBA in general is not that great for career changers. By career changer, I mean change any two of this set : {function, geography, industry}. It’s pretty tough to define these terms, but even after making the most drastic adjustments to your own expectations and also of the recruiters, it’s still so bloody tough to get a job!

Anyway, the scenarios and options look promising. Just the fact that I could be working anywhere from Sydney to London to the US – the geographical spread is broad and wide. But, Singapore stands out as a desirable place to live in. There are three main reasons to it: convenience, saving potential and proximity. It’s easily the most convenient city on earth to live in. One doesn’t need to own a car, the air, water and land are clean. Food is available cheap and plenty outside of home. It’s saving potential os great because the taxes are low and salaries though not that high, is still quite good for a decent life. Proximity to India is an attractive attribute for us – one can just land up in the airport and take a flight home. Not too many places in the world from where we can do that!

So – back to the hunting and hoping for the best!

Risk aversion

2006-11-24T07:05:00.000+11:00

I realized that I have been so risk averse in life. An example to illustrate this - I cut my losses when I lost 2 $ in a slot machine in a Casino whose entry fees was probably 10$!!!! I wonder whether risk aversion is a genetic/upbringing thing or a huge deficiency in self confidence. Or is it lack of ambition?

My upbringing has been so conservative in terms of financial risks and thoughts, that probably the idea of taking up an MBA itself was quite a daring thing. When we were coming for the MBA, everyone thought we were taking very big risks; we always wondered where the risk was! So …. What do we want to take away from all this? Will I ever have the balls to become an entrepreneur some day?

Release ..

2006-11-23T23:12:00.000+11:00

I want this blog to be a release point .. release all my pain and frustrations … so I can look back at it and laugh at it some time in the future. What matters and what does not today, suddenly feels very irrelevent in tomorrow’s context. Some decisions and their basis shape our journey; and those decisions finally define who you are!

Anyway, a few things happening right now in terms of interviews and career. Only time will tell where these decisions take us.

The indian team’s performance yesterday was nothing short of pathetic. Unfortunately, our Desi week at INSEAD, the theme is cricket. It’s pretty sad and too late to change!

Random rambling ...

2006-11-20T14:12:00.000+11:00

Dale Carnegie once wrote a book called “How to stop worrying and start living” – I used to know how to do that a while back. But now, I seem a bit uncapable of doing that. Self- doubt is the worst enemy from within in times such as this. Loads of work to do – and the mind starts worrying thinking that there’s so much to do without actually doing them! It’s an interesting way in which our mind and body work.

Outside of abstraction, I have a lineup of interviews and I hope really do well in those. I guess everyone hopes that way, but somehow the heart beat is killing. Tension le le ko nakko, a friend of mine from Bangalore always told me. But, when you are at striking distance from a goal, and you have just stood there for a while, it’s a tough tough world to be just standing there. Add to that a very big eveil – peer pressure. Before an MBA, you always heard of those life transforming experiences. You go thhrough the whole thing in terms of effort, but not yet in terms of results. I agree there’s time and it’s only a question of time, but still that’s the way the humand mind works.

Among other things, I actually sat through classes the whole weekend doing a course called Art of communication. The less said about the class, the better. Anyway, back to real world …. Logout from the blog world for today!

Countdown to graduation

2006-11-17T22:06:00.000+11:00

So the INSEAD story is enterng its last phase. So more and more interviews are coming – not that many actually; but just that I know what I’m going to be doing next week. Besides, I have also loaded myself with academics! I have taken 4 courses; 3 credits though. But the courses are really good ones – Industry and competitive analysis, Business planning workshop, Pricing strategy and Art of communication.

I was talking to a potential recruiter today and for the first time I felt my confidence coming back. A very interesting exercise I learnt from my Negotiations professor came in really handy. He said that he had identified 78 interests when he joined INSEAD as a prof. I did a similar exercise myself through some soul searching and found that it is an effective way of convincing yourself of an interest in a particular job or position. The way it works is like this – you manage to convince yourself of why you want the job, it’s half the work done. The other half is then convincing the interviewer why he needs you. That process can similarly be built up – I haven’t done that yet with any employer, but I’m definitely going to try it out with some of the leads I have.

Finally – b-school in general and INSEAD in particular can be such completely different experiences depending on who you are and how secure you feel. When we were coming to Singapore for the MBA, lot of people were telling us that we were taking a big risk. But we never realized why they were saying that! The point is that when you are sold to a concept especially like that of an MBA, you see only the upside. The downsides and the risks somehow get lost in the pile of examples. Of course, the risk downsides are not really that much of a downside – but risks certainly exist. And these can be extraneous. The diversity itself gets us down in many situations. There are so many Indians; software background and speak good English. How the hell will a recruiter differentiate Krishnan from Rama from Ajay. Everybody is equally talented or mediocre!

So much has happened!

2006-11-12T05:30:00.000+11:00

The blog Gods won’t forgive me for not penning down this last month or so of my life. It’s been very exciting roller coaster! I have had so many dings in applications for jobs at various stages of the recruitment process. Firstly, the consulting companies gave me a total pass except for one mistake. Marakon called me for an interview and I got disposed off in the very first round. Reason: well, you are not structured enough! A very pleasant way of saying, “Who the hell short-listed this guy?”. Then I get some calls which were very doable. American express interview went pretty well by any standards; but again the result was the same. Reason: Not known! Google was supposed to be dream company. I interviewed with them for 2 positions. I screwed up by telling the less glamourous role’s interviewer that it was my second choice. And the more glamorous role of a product manager was anyway too good to be true! Result: Ding again!!

In the meantime, there was process that was going in parallel that always looked promising. BT – British Telecom. The call for the final interview came – I flew to London to give the interview. There were 5 interviews in 7 hours of a day. The undoing of Prashant was again in a case interview! I got the ding there also – which was the most workable scenario for us – that one of us finds a job in the UK; and the other goes there and finds a job in a short duration. Anyway, some positives from the trip – I visited my uncle, aunt and cousin in Dartford, south east of London. I had a very relaxed time and for the first time in life, I played with a dog. Their pappion is a cute fellow called Oscar. I also really enjoyed walking around London. For some strange reasons which people call Global warming, London wasn’t cold!

Back to Singapore now and back in the grind. Back to sending zillions of applications. I am going to fight it out! Come what may, I shall not get bogged down and somehow go there and fight it out at each subsequent interview. I need to increase my aggression quotient – not possible in the short run, but the business world demands of me to become aggressive. How I can achieve that in the short term, I don’t know. This is the age by when people are trying to sober down, but I’m going to be trying the opposite direction. Only time will tell where the drift takes us … as of now it looks like the Sydney harbour bridge!

Somebody give me a job

2006-09-24T14:36:00.000+10:00

So lots of things have happened since the last time I managed to write something on this blog. P4 courses are going on in full swing, writing cover letters and getting dings from companies. My wifey is going great guns in the meanwhile. She has an interview with Bain coming up – I really hope she cracks it and gets an offer with them. In the meanwhile my job search has taken proportions of greater geographical spread. I now need to start applying to Australia also – chasing my sweetheart as usualJ. Anyway, the long term plan is to let her go and earn the money, while I can sit home, philosophize and do some home jobs. Sounds like fun eh? ;).

Business world is a bad world of lies, cheating and increasingly of lower ethics. People just tell white lies in their cover letters – makes me feel I haven’t done anything in my career so far. Looking back at my career, there are so many things I could’ve done better. May be the bottom line of my career has been lack of ambition. I have been easy to satisfy in terms of happiness. I guess I will continue to be so – but there’s this new burden of a loan that’s accumulating interest at an alarming rate. Anyway, as the saying goes, everything happens for goodJ.

Bollywood song

2006-08-21T01:07:00.000+10:00

An american friend described a Bollywood song as "an expression of love between a man and a woman in the company of their 60 best friends of either sex". I just found this quite hilarious! We get to watch Tamil and Hindi movies on the regular local channel in Singapore - called Vasantham central. So the other day, an Irish friend sat through and watched "RHTDM" of Maddy and Diya Mirza fame - and he said he was watching without his wife's knowledge ;). He didn't want her to catch him watching a hindi movie :))).

Where is Ramar Pillai?

2006-08-19T04:10:00.000+10:00

Has anyone heard of what happened to this guy called Ramar Pillai. This guy claimed to have invented the 'herbal' petrol. He apparently demonstrated that he could convert water and a concoction of herbs and boiling water into petrol. He was then supposedly harassed by all oil companies. Then scientists from IIT, Madras proved he was a bogus. To refresh your memories of what then, here is a glimpse from history.

Today we are talking of bio fuels and bio-diesels from Jatropha plantations. What's the difference? Taking a long shot, could he have accidentally found jatropha like herbs? He was apparently selling this herbal petrol stuff near his village for a while. Hmmm .. food for thought!

Vande Mataram

2006-08-15T20:08:00.000+10:00

Today's India's Independence day! We are 59 years old now. Despite all the cynicism and apprehensions on where we are headed, it's time to look back. We have definitely progressed - may be not as fast as Ashoka's chakra is supposed to have - but still we won freedom on this day. The famous Tryst with destiny was delivered by Nehru on this day.

Independence day could mean so many different things to different kinds and types of people. To many poor people, it might not just mean anything. To the poor and unaware, it might not even make sense. To the ultra-rich, it means a day to recover from last night's hangover. To the political class, it's day to deliver big promises of words and garlands on the thousands statutes. To the Armed forces, it's a day of pride and hoisting the tricolour. To the middle class child, it means a proud moment at school and a little sweet distribution.

The day means different to various people because the country or the nation itself means so many different things. But one thing in common to all people, who live in the country, who were born in the country, who have even visited the country - India is this nearness to life! It's this land of uncertainity - a roller coaster ride. It can take you up on a such high one moment only to drop you down to feel like an inward spiral. It's a land of enormous beauty and charming people, to a country mis-governed and wronged by so many rulers.

The day is to remember the sacrifice of a generation - of Gandhi's leadership and Nehru's statesmanship and of all the millions of grand fathers and grand mothers who gave their everything to see the light at the end of the tunnel of foreign rule. Parts of Northern India(Delhi region) were free for the first time in 800 years on this day!

Saulte to the motherland! Vande Mataram!

Zen and the art of network maintenance

2006-08-11T16:52:00.000+10:00

Till six months ago - networking meant only one thing! Computer networks. Layer to layer protocols and stacks. Never really got the full hang of it, frankly!

Then came business school. Networking means talking to people and making acquaintances of them. There are events called 'Networking events' to facilitate people who want to make these superficial conversations - unite! There are websites like Linked in that help maintain and grow this 'network'.

When we started b-school, this was such a big deal. You had to land up at every party to make these so called insightful conversations that evaporated from people's brains when they woke up the next day. Though I must admit there are some people who are much better people when they're drunk - in sobriety - I don't even want to stare at their faces!

So networks again can be classified as professional or business related and social or fun networks. Very often you can cross-pollinate between the two types of networks. In fact it's the informal or fun network that gives you better insights into a problem than the formal or professional network.

There are some people who have mastered the art of networking. For a lot of others, it's a science. It's a formula. So they land up in these parties and start talking the same stuff. When you are standing with them, and they see a new node in the network walk in, you somehow seem to have become transparent to them - you are only a node in the network - if a peripheral node, too bad! There are some others who make you feel like you are the God, you are important! And they seem to give that impression to everyone they meet.

Just like a motorcycle, a network needs maintenance. It needs some oiling and service. Very often people walk in and older people walk out - a huge churn occurring all the time. The most important in networking is conversation. Conversations are your fuel in the tank. Networks don't work without conversations - they need to be interesting and likeable - to the listener of course!

I like stereotypes now. That's what business school teaches you. The idea is to get a general idea - that's why stereotypes are useful. Conversations are of several kinds in different settings. When a bunch of desis have a long conversation, especially in b-school like ours, we always end up analyzing the current situation in India - give a competitor analysis .. take the best case example of Singapore works and conclude and recommend how the problems facing India should be solved. When it's with a bunch of south Europeans - it's always single track - how do you get the women! When you speak to Americans, they talk so much in circles and bushes - you have to dig deep into the conversation to find information content in that! Now, these are stereotypes! I know there are a million exceptions and sometimes it's tough to tell which is an exception and what is a rule.

Happy birthday Singapura

2006-08-09T22:28:00.000+10:00

Today's Singapore National day. The country's 41 years old now. It's pretty sweet how there are national flags flying around and the brute capitalistic malls are making business out of the national day. No harm done - I completely support the business environment that's created here.

I managed to read Lee Kuan Yew's book - "From third world to first world". It's the story of transformation of a sleepy British outpost from a near nation of slums to what Singapore is today - a real first world country. In fact, in my opinion, it's ahead of most first world countries in a lot of respects!

So today was a holiday. I decided to work from school. When I was walking in school, it felt good to be back to student life. In the past month and a half I've been back in the corporate world. The comparison between school life and corporate life is striking. We have had the chance to sample both during this one exciting year in INSEAD. In fact Pooja's got to sample to two companies and a school!

Corporate life is the same old - lot of cynical people, challenging any new thought saying - "Yeah! what's he going to do that I didn't try earlier!". There are no real synergies between divisions, departments, regions and markets. School life is just the opposite. There are discussions and opinions floating around so much - everyone has a solution to every problem!

Being Vegetarian

2006-08-05T16:33:00.000+10:00

My jounrneys in search of food in Singapore have led us to the weirdest of places and taken our thoughts to even weirder directions. People eat stuff like the intestine of a pig - the picture is put on the stall! Other things eaten I believe are turtle soup - for which they just slow boil an unsuspecting turtle till it breaks up to shreds. Even listening made me puke one day.

Luckily there are one or two Buddhist places in the foodcourts where they serve vegetarian food - which is definitely edible, but not too very tasty. Taste and fragrance are very subjective matters, I agree! It's a bit unfortunate that I get to try only Indian and Italian food in the whole of Singapore. But the Indian food here is yummy - pretty much like how it's made back home - and more importantly available in plenty.

This led me to think of why am I a vegetarian. I am a vegetarian by upbringing - my parents and folks do not eat meat. As a child I always thought that people who ate meat became like the animals they ate. Somehow, the same concept of people eating plants becoming trees never occured to me then. But, anyway childhood aside - at different points in my life I have come in close encounter with meat eating. Again there used to be a time when I couldn't stand the smell of meat - fish especially. Now, as survival becomes more important, I can even remove the stuff from my plate and eat the rest. But I still can't eat meat. I once chewed into a chicken piece in salad. Now, I think that's the most cruel thing a chef can do - put a chicken piece into an otherwise vegetable looking salad! I somehow tried to chew it up and said to myself that I would somehow swallow this one! But I just had to run to the loo to throw it out.

There are different types of vegetarians - spiritual, psychological, health and vegans of course! I am by upbringing a spiritual vegetarian - which means I was always told that meat eating is not good. Then I guess I have become a psychological vegetarian now. Even as I was chewing that piece of chicken in my mouth - I could here the slaughter and screaming of a poor unsuspecting bird. I once mentioned this to a buddhist friend and he told me I was very lucky to be able to be able to 'feel' for life. I don't know why I feel for life.

The other argument is what I read in Anand Bhavan in Little India, Singapore. The restaurant has a whole wall dedicated to explaining the concept of vegetarian. There's a quote from Thiruvalluvar on the wall explaining why man should be vegetarian.

Then there is the intestine and stomach comparison. The intestine of humans is long resembling that of a horse or cow. Predators on the other hand have small intestines because they do not want meat to rot in the tummy. The acid levels in carnivores is also 20 times more than that of the herbiovores. We are pretty close to the herbivores again.

The final argument is that of instinct. If you gave a child that has just developed teeth, an apple and a chicken - the kid would automatically eat into the apple and play with the chicken. If you did the same thing with a cat, the cat would eat into the chicken! That explains how by physiology we might be herbivores. Then there are these arguments like - we drink water more like horse and cows by sipping; whereas carnivores put their tongue out to lick water! Again, pretty convincing.

A lot of people keep asking what percentage of India is vegetarian. To be honest, it's so difficult to generalize about the whole of India. Again many are vegetarian by religion, many by economics! So I would guess it's around 20-30%. Atleast in the south, especially in Karnataka I think there are a lot of vegetarians.

I also read that if the amount of land used in growing crops to feed livestock was put to use to grow vegetables and crops, we would not have to destroy any more forests! There will be enough grains to feed everyone in the world. I really hope that the movement for vegetarian food grows. A lot of times, I am shocked on seeing what all people eat - and they seem enjoy and relish the taste! How long is it before we become cannibals? Afterall, human flesh is also food - who knows may be it tastes really good :-(

Killing myself with Caffeine

2006-07-13T14:08:00.000+10:00

I am back to work - at least temporarily! It's a break from break neck school life - good or bad - I'm not sure yet! I have been given a challenging project. I really like the challenge in the work. But I am also tensed about my ability to deliver. This is not a game any more - where all that matters is a stupid grade in school. This can make or break a company!

I lead the life of a normal working man in Singapore. I use the MRT to commute to work. I walk 10 minutes in the sweaty sun to reach the station. I can stand in a packed commuter train to reach one station - change lines to another train and reach the destination station. I then walk another 10 minutes to reach office.

Office is like any indoor place in Singapore - freezing cold. They all have some tie up with wool manufacturers in the world. There are two seasons in Singapore - inside and outside. Inside is cold and freezing - they probably maintain it at some 15 degrees. Outside is like any other coastal city in the equatorial region - hot and humid. Evenings are better - windy and pleasant.
I sit in office with a lot of data to mine. I need some data and I don't need some. I need to use my brain. I feel happy about that part. But I feel scared I may not deliver. No bright ideas have struck me yet. But I kill myself with Caffeine. I eat biscuits and cookies - as if they would funnel into my brain and give it some energy. Am I really dumb - I wonder!

I look at the news - when I see what's happened in Mumbai - I get angry. I read a lot about India. A lot more than I used to when I lived in Bangalore. I feel happy for the country - its people are awesome. We do so much in spite of so many obstacles- those created by external and internal forces. I pray and hope for the billion countrymen that we find our way in the world.

I switched on the news channels the other evening - watching live pictures from Mumbai. My friends use the trains all the time. It could have been one of them. Luckily, all near and dear ones are fine. But, what's in the mindless killing?

I see the contrast in people from developed countries. People in Singapore have no clue what terrorism means. We did this project on terrorism in the last period. A bunch from Germany, France, Singapore and us - two Indians. They thought terrorism meant Al-qaeda. I told them what we've been through. They still don't understand. These people are most worried about the destination for fishing, the weather in that destination and of course football. I think of the millions of people who have much more basic questions - will I live to see tomorrow? I know so many of my Kashmiri friends - they were thrown out of their homes. They were told to leave by the loud speakers from the mosques. They were told to leave if they wanted to live. They are refugees in their own country.

Back to sipping my caffeine - I need all the luck in the world. Going by where the world's headed, there isn't much luck left in the world! Okay - let's go out in search for extra-terrestrial luck. Let's spread the scum ...

Okhil Babu's letter

2006-06-30T16:43:00.000+10:00

I got this forward from a friend.

Okhil Chandra Sen wrote this letter to the Sahibganj divisional railway office in 1909. It is on display at the Railway Museum in New Delhi. It was also reproduced under the caption "Travelers' Tales" in the Far Eastern Economic Review

Okhil Babu's letter to the Railway Department :

"I am arrive by passenger train Ahmedpur station and my belly is too much swelling with jackfruit. I am therefore went to privy. Just I doing the nuisance that guard making whistle blow for train to go off and I am running with 'lotah' in one hand and 'dhoti' in the next when I am fall over and expose all my shocking to man and female women on plateform. I am got leaved at Ahmedpur station.

This too much bad, if passenger go to make dung that dam guard not wait train five minutes for him. I am therefore pray your honour to make big fine on that guard for public sake. Otherwise I am making big report to papers."

Any guesses why this letter was of historic value?
It apparently led to the introduction of toilets on trains in India.

Pallavi Anupallavi

2006-06-24T18:26:00.000+10:00

From the world of macroeconomics to the politics of the world, here's my contribution to the God of small things. Pallavi anupallavi is an old kannada movie - in fact the first movie made by Mani Ratnam. It had Anil Kapoor in the lead role.

Among other good things in the movie was the music of Illayaraja. The guy was a true genius. The best song from the movie is called 'Naguva nayana'. This is a must listen - it melts my heart every time I listen to it!

http://www.kannadaaudio.com/Songs/Moviewise/P/PallaviAnupallavi/NaguvaNayana.ram

Sri Lanka in war

2006-06-18T18:03:00.000+10:00

Just tune into TV or surf the net - all you hear are about wars everywhere. Islamic militia have taken over Mogadishu, Chechen rebels beheading people, 12 killed in Afghanistan and n killed in Iraq every day. It is sickening how we just can't stand each other and how we don't mind taking each others' lives for whatever cause or reason.

The one war that disturbs me personally is the Sri Lankan civil war. The Tamil tigers(LTTE) are back in action. The Sri Lankan army must be a greater terrorist organization as they don't mind bombing hospitals, churches and civilian areas.

I have fond memories related to Sri Lanka from my childhood. Our neighbours in Pondicherry are of Sri Lankan origin. They are Catholic Tamils from the city of Jaffna. Back in the 80s, India was still confused as to what it wanted to be - a socialistic democracy was the intended destination. Sri Lanka on the other hand was far more developed socially. Social indices such as literacy, life expectancy and capitalistic economy were more towards the South East Asian model rather than the South Asian poverty paradox. I remember my neighbours visiting Ceylon and bringing back gifts for the neighbours and kids in the entire locality. I had a soft ball and a puzzle book from Ceylon as gifts from them at different times.

Rupavahini is the official TV channel of the Sri Lankan state. We had three antennae on our terrace - one for local DD, one for Madras DD and one for Rupavahini. The quality of the Ceylon TV programmes was much better than our own DD's Krishi drashan and magic shows. I remember watching 'Woody wood pecker' on Ceylon TV and would be in awe of what quality programmes are shown there.

That was also the time the entire LTTE movement started gaining ground. There were supposed to have been some training grounds for the LTTE around the woods around Pondicherry. There was a huge amount of sympathy for the Tamil cause - because of the horror stories of suppression by the Sinhalese majority of the minority Tamils in the north and east of the tiny country.

India's own stand was that of sympathy for a long time until the Rajiv Gandhi murder in 1991. Well, that has a lot to do with further muddling in politics by the not-so-great-visionaries of the Nehru-Gandhi family in India.

India's experience in the late 80s made it a very silent spectator of the entire Sri Lankan fiasco. In my opinion, we should have taken much more active interest in the whole issue. It's one thing not to interfere in another country's affairs, but it definitely affects us in a big way. To see what I'm saying, just a visit to the refugee camps in Rameshwaram or Point Calimere would give a perspective on the burning issue there.

Sri Lanka lost a golden chance to resolve the crisis - but the turning point again was the election of the Sinhala hardliners in the Govt. Mahendra Rajapakse is a hawk - and with a terrorist leader like Prabhakaran - it's only expected that the situation would get worse. Today, India will face another refugee crisis. The north and east of Ceylon will go through another ethnic cleansing by both parties.

Those cherished days of a prosperous Sri Lanka where they showed woody wood pecker will just remain a dream. It's funny to see how two countries deal with minorities. In India we go overboard to make sure everything is okay for them from the Govt point of view. In Ceylon, votes are won on the basis of who is more oppressive. And all this is under a so-called Buddhist Govt? This confirms the theory that religion has nothing to do with the agenda of oppressive Govts and even more brutal terrorist organizations.

Missing Bangalore

2006-06-11T15:44:00.000+10:00

We've been on this missing Bangalore trip for the last two days! The weather has turned quite Bangalorish here in Singapore - and that always reminds us of the beauty of addiction called Bangalore.

Also chanced upon some snaps of the blooms in Bangalore - felt very nostalgic about the cool crisp air, the blooms of the Gulmohars, the tabebuois and the flame of the forest. A trip to Lalbagh and you can see the nagalinga pushpa. The last time I saw that flower was in Phnom Penh in Cambodia. The hot idly breakfast - though it is possible to have that in Little India here. The walk in DRDO colony to head to expose ourselves to the sun ... Hmmm... have to get back to Macroeconomics now. Enjoy the picture of Lalbagh from last monsoon.

Knock, knock! Who's there?

2006-06-08T18:37:00.000+10:00

The biggest worry from the capital markets fluctuation of the past few weeks is that everybody's confused. The consumption data shows slowdown, job growth shows slowdown and there's confusion especially in the emerging markets. India has been badly hit the flight of capital from the stock markets is inexplicable - atleast with my limited reading abilities of analysts' reports.

Ben Bernake has a bit too much in his magic wand. What he says and what he breathes is interpreted, mis-interpreted and re-interpreted depending on whether one is a bear or a bull. The inverted yield curve from 4 months back is gone now. But the signs of confusion are more than visible. Emerging markets like India depend so much on temporary FIIs. This is an awesome video by Columbia guys on how much lies in Bernake's control : http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/?p=2478

The real problem also seems to be with inflation. With oil climbing skyscrapers, it's unlikely that this shock will not slowdown the economy. Historical evidence shows that similar shocks have always resulted in a slowdown. How much does the economy slowdown, determines if there's a recession or not. Anyway, it's a bad time to be in b-school waiting for the big jobs to be made. With inflation, people postpone consumption, which leads to loss of jobs and business downstream and this in turn fuels further slowdown. The govt must react with cutting down interest rates immediately, and encourage consumption so that the economy downstream heats up and propels the engine forward.

What does recession mean to a country like India? To begin with, lower job creation. We've been such fools in not carrying the economic reforms ahead. The left parties always hold back reforms and the Congress Govt itself does not make any bold moves with a puppet PM in place. What it means for b-school would be graduates like us is - possible unemployment! Really hope that doesn't happen.

We are living in some of the most interesting times in the world. The landscape of the world is getting altered like crazy all over. It's only a question of time now when Bush is thrown out of office - China's becoming more powerful and just when Japan is recovering from a long period of deflation and recession, the world's heading the same way again. Latin America and Africa are own their trip!

Anyway, coming back to the topic, the only way out now is some tough talking and action by Bernake and his tribesmen in all countries and hope for the best. Rest is up there!

Salaam Singapura

2006-06-04T17:01:00.000+10:00

There are constant debates on where to live and how an Indian is treated in different parts of the world. Whether there is life in a city, the weather, the people, the culture and the language - these are some of the factors that affect decisions in this regard.

Our first week in Singapore was quite traumatic! We were really tired, we couldn't see much vegetarian food food - we saw these massive electronics malls with food courts that had dead ducks hanging all around the walls.... Disgusting - was the only way we described the place. But gradually, when things started falling in place - one starts we started to appreciate the way this place works.

Imagine an immigration authority that welcome you with a smile. Asks your normal questions unlike the stiff upper lipped white man asking " Why have you come to the united States?". "What business brings you to Belgium?". The city-state is really green - the harmony between development and greenary is unmatched, atleast compared to poorer parts of Asia. The air is clean and there's public transport that keeps people connected in a human way. The multi-racial society accepts Indians in particular and any foreigner in general, in an objective manner. The taxis work day and night are so affordable. Just the efficiency of the place takes care of everyday daily activities. And then, you get the time to think of more strategic things for the business or academics! Now that is what is attractive about this place.

Take the story of good vegetarian food. There are plenty of Indian vegeterian restaunarnts in the city. And very affordable even as a staudent. There are movies running at 1 AM everyday. There is no crime at all. Even a woman can walk back home late in the night! The weather is a bit humid and hot - but you can't have everything. The air-conditioners take care of these comforts. Overall, I think it's an amazing place to live in! The regualr rains remind me so much of Bangalore ... imagine Bangalore without the traffic and the pollution ... Yes - Salaam Singapura!

Random bambling

2006-06-04T13:25:00.000+10:00

So many thoughts crowded in that grey matter! Whatever, is there of it!

The roller coaster is still on. Who is a friend, who is not a friend, who is nice, who is not nice? Why is someone nice or why is someone not nice? What wrong did I do? What wrong did I say? A multitude of questions, multiple answers … human psychology is insane, perverted and complex! I am sensitive, should I be more sensitive, should I just ignore and lead my own life? Another set of rambling mumblings! There’s so much shit happening in this world. So many people dying as I write so many wars for god-alone-knows-what happening in every nook and corner of the world. The other side of the spectrum, people talk about parties, about how their weekend was – damnit! I don’t want to know!

Should we be cynical and let the world be should we say “No – I’m going to change this world!” Likes, dislikes – endless possibilities, and multiple combinations. What do I want to do, where do I want to be, am I a leader, am I a follower- questions, questions and more questions! Should I think abstract, should it be more solid. Questions pounding the head, questions pounding the brain …. Will return to pound the head and use the brain!

One step forward, two steps back!

2006-06-01T18:19:00.000+10:00

Is this how one should best describe India? There is so much optimism that a giant has finally woken up and in the process improve the lives of millions of its children. But the politicians of the country don't care. It's the divide-and -rule policy that continues and only the ruler has changed. The latest row about reservations is in the 'three step back' mode.

Yesterday, in class there was a discussion on the corelation between democracy and prosperity as measured as GDP per capita. There seemed to a fair corelation in most of the world. The outliers were - Singapore, Hong Kong , UAE on the upside. But the loner exception on the downside was India. It pains when you see that everwhere else where there is freedom and democracy, there is prosperity - but not in my beloved country.

Theories to explain the anomaly? May be culturally, we never wanted to improve. May be we are just not ambitious enough a people! The other theory can be that inequality has been created as a result of the caste system. That people have been suppressed for centuries and this is the way they think of life! Whatever the explanation, I would really like to see us go with the rest of the world and converge to the line of corelation. I really wish it does ...

It's the last Compre :-)

2006-05-02T20:55:00.000+10:00

Compre is a term in BITSian parlance meaning – exam. It actually stands for comprehensive exam. And like everything else in Bits, it has a nice convenient shortened version. What we are going through in INSEAD makes one feel philosophical. Sometimes, you lose focus of the end goal and get lost in the world of doesn’t matters! Well, I know I’m making no sense here – but I shall type where my fingers take me.

So, all but 1 exam is left. We’ve been doing bad and worse among us. If we thought that the previous period exams were bad, this one’s running at worse right now! So, keeping fingers crossed for now. An easy exam is bad because everyone cracks it and we make the silly errors. A tough exam is bad because we don’t even understand the questions – so in short I hate exams. We hope and pray that this will be the last of the real serious exams to be written in INSEAD and hopefully lifeJ.

Coming back to the last compre phenomenon - we had this thing in BITS wherein the last compre was always neglected in terms of studies because everyone’s excited about going home from a God forsaken desert. Back to the niceties of getting pampered by parents and getting some rest and peace of mind. And guess what, INSEAD is turning out to be exactly like that in those terms. But unfortunately we’re all grown up adults now and the break is over before you even sleep through it!

Hopefully, this will also kick start my ability to write down and document things. Like I’ve always maintained, it’s so important to that in life – I think that’s where we Indians lost out – we forgot to document. It’s the chronicle of experiences that’s nice to go to later and have a laugh over. I’m also going to be playing in a basketball game tomorrow. That’s also not happened for a while now!

Till then …. Back to studies!

Cheers
Duncan

Life's tough! But we're ok :-)

2006-04-13T19:12:00.000+10:00

So that’s the new mantra or slogan to keep ourselves calm at b-school! There are so many ways one could get stressed in an environment like this. There’s the whole ordeal of cultural diversity and socializing … trust me it’s not that easy. Especially with the kind and quality of social events, it’s a tough life out here.

Then there’s this whole thing with summer internships. I have got dinged by everyone so far... not one interview call! I was supposed to be a smart guy. But I’m hoping that our day will also come. The work load is pretty crazy – I find myself toggling between studies, applications to companies, networking with peers and alumni – and the list goes on. So it’s tough to do all at the same time … but you still got to do the best of the 43 500 Euros L.

Among other things at school, we are making a few friends too. A few... Mind you! The importance of networking is driven and nailed into the head repeatedly and I understand why now. Okay – this was one scrambled attempt at bogging after a long gap. May be I will be in a better state of mind the next time I feel like bogging … and hopefully my mind’s also clearer than the way it’s behaving now!

One period over

2006-03-09T05:33:00.000+11:00

We survived! One whole period. We have 5 periods of 2 months each for the MBA.

So we completed 1 period today with our last exams getting over today. It was a big dejavu only far more intense and the chances of failing are BIG. We have this weird system of a z-curve in which the mean is at the center and up to to 3 std deviations on either side is tolerated. Beyond that we have to repeat the course :((. The exams were tough and competitive and we still have no clue where we stand in the class. It's very highly likely that I might fail in 2/5 courses - but who knows if somebody screwed up more than me, then may be I'm saved!

So it's time to relax now. We're off to Cambodia for the break - Angkor Watt specifically will be our main destination. I've been dreaming of going there since class 9 I think. It's the largest temple in ruins in the world. Just google on the name - it has very huge Indian influence. That is in fact one thing I've observed in South east Asia - the influence of Indian culture and languages is huge all over. Bali is a Hindu majority state in Indonesia where you find names like Yudhishtir and Pandav even now - where as these names don't exist in India any more!

Anyway back to the topic, end of period - lots of new resolutions taken and lots will be forgotten soon :). It's that time when you sit back and reflect on what went right and what we did wrong. This MBA is a big step, I repeat. It's not a joke to be in with people with such varied experiences - with people who have worked on the stuff your learning in class.

Hello again, Blogworld!

2006-02-18T17:12:00.000+11:00

Dear Readers,

Sorry for the break in my communication. Pooja and I are both in INSEAD now. We started session on Jan 9th, 2006. It's been a life shaking experience since then. We're slowly coming out of the shock!

Okay - imagine you are in a cozy little tent by the river side. You know that you can't live just by the side of the river and never even venture into it. You know that the river will be cold. It's a Himalayan river after all! You know that you can't sit in your cozy little tent all your life. You decide to shake up and wake up and prepare for your venture into the mighty Ganges. So you start arranging for the logistics, prepare yourself mentally.

But when the time for the plunge actually arrives, and you take the plunge - you feel the cold. You are mentally prepared but still reality bites! The river's flowing at an alraming pace - it's icy cold! People who've been ther before are doing much better than you. Your raft is going through rapids and rocks and beaches. The river's flowing downstream, there's no way you can row against the current and get back upstream!

MBA is the same story. So those of you sitting by the shores and waiting for God-alone-knows-what, think about it! The river's calling .. Can you hear it? May be you won't hear me that often while I'm in the river.

Log off for now - but promise to be back soon.

Cheers
Duncan

The last month

2005-12-26T23:56:00.000+11:00

The last month has been really hectic.

The first thing I remember that happened last month was that INSEAD gave me also an admit!! So that puts to rest the huge question of how we were going to deal with separation. It was the happiest day in our lives :)). So then, we celebrated with a nice dinner and beer at Rice Bowl on Lavelle Road. Immediately after the celebrations, it was time to start working on all kinds of things. Sale of items at home, the loans, the tickets and so on and so on. The list is endless!! We are now in shape to leave in 10 days' time. It's been one really hectic journey.

The financing was the biggest question mark. An angel came in the form of Deepthi - my cousin who lives in the US now. She agreed to co-sign a loan from IEFC for me. There was a point in time when we wondered if it was worth putting in all the effort of convincing the Adcom that I'm worth it - whether it the MBA is only for really rich people from the really rich countries. It's amazing there are organisations like IEFC and there are people like Deepthi :).

Next thing was to sell all the stuff at home. We are going to completely shift out of Bangalore - move to Singapore. The B-school dream. And that too, in our dream B-school, INSEAD. There is one problem in this compared to IIMA. It was so easy to tell folks and friends in India, that I had an admit from IIMA. But, INSEAD needed explanantion and riders stating that it is ranked No.6 in the world! And then even tougher, convincing them that the 'investment' was worth it. One thing we always wondered, was the way people ranted about their b-school experience. What did they mean by it? Well, since we're almost there, we'll experience it ourselves!!

Office work seems to be in control. But, I'm going to be working till Jan 4th next year. Yes, I need every paisa possible. This b-school is costly. Every b-school outside India is costly. Someday, we'll work on a loan scheme that's available right here in our doorsteps in India. I'm also going to be taking every other loan available in town - we need to live and eat too :)

We've also been having people over to enable them to say Goodbye to us and wish us luck. We need all the luck in the world! We're entering this new unknown world. But there's one thing out there - the Brand and the experience. Singapore's going to be different. It's not like India, it's not going to be like US or Europe - it's a different combination of peoples.

There's no TV at home. Life without the idiot box is difficult. We just realized how much of a stress buster this TV is. Especially missing some good cricket action .. The very idea that you give control of your mind to something else, something external - that's how the TV watching works!

Then set in this huge inertia. I haven't blogged in a while! So it I decided it was time to convert the inertia of rest to ineria of motion. So hopefully, I will blog regularly for the next few days :)

Roger Binny

2005-12-07T20:45:00.000+11:00

We both bunked office yesterday mainly to work on the loans for Pooja's INSEAD admission. So we had to spend half a day in Canara Bank Indiranagar. We were made to wait and wait for every little progress possible in the deal. The most exciting part of the wait finally was when Roger Binny walked into the bank and stood in a line for the teller. I told Pooja I know him and he's Binny and thanks to her encouragement I went and asked him if he was Binny. He said yes and I came back happy. Then again I ran out after he left the bank and got his autograph :-). That was the most exciting event in the bank in the morning!

Anyway, rest of the day went really well. Later in the day we went to KSCA for a bookfair happening there. In the Pavilion, was Binny's portrait. I went on a little memory lane trip on his bowling. I remember him as being a star in the 1983 world cup win as well as the 1985 Benson and Hedges World series in Australia. I have very fond memories of that world series under Gavaskar's captaincy. Waking up at 5 o'clock in the morning to watch India get almost every team all out. And of Kapil and Vengsarkar's batting - of Ravi Shastri splendid all-round performance - of Srikanth's blitzkriegs - and of course of Roger Binny's swing and Mohinder Amarnath's batting and walk-bowling :-)

Power of Gandhi

2005-11-28T17:14:00.000+11:00

I'd seen this ad of Italian Telecom sometime back. Just chanced upon it again today.

The power of Gandhi is a well-debated topic. The power of Gandhiji is the inherent strength in the concept of non-violence. It's again debatable whether non-violence was the right approach to win our freedom. Every other nation on earth went through some really violent struggles for nationhood. They value that freedom. I don't know if that means we take freedom for granted. Whether we would've been a more disciplined society. I guess not!

When India got independence, we could've taken two different paths - one is the way we are today a single nation politically, but more of a continent, culturally. The other way could be that we got split into independent nation states and princely monarchies. We would very well been another Africa - civil wars and tribal rivalries and equally forgotten to the rest of the world.

That's exactly the power of Gandhi! It's him who got us our spiritual maturity and political democracy. Salute to the Father of the nation!

Do watch this ad!

The Passion of Christ - the Movie

2005-11-28T03:32:00.000+11:00

This movie will go down as the worst movie we have ever tried to watch! I say 'tried' because we couldn't watch it! What is point in making a movie so gross and so cruel and just show the sufferings of Jesus through the process of crucifixion.

It's the most atrocious attempt to show that Jesus suffered for us. There is so much violence shown against one man. We couldn't understand how human beings can be so cruel! Of an entire lot of guys trying to inflict wounds to a lone unarmed guy.

We wanted to watch it for just curiosity! Really regret that decision. For others, please .. to maintain your sanity, don't watch this movie! Don't even plan it.

The Crusades

2005-11-28T03:26:00.000+11:00

We've been trying to catch up on the series on The Crusades on the history channel. My God! I had no idea that the crusades were so brutal and vengeful. Violence and so much of it to prove what? That My God is greater than yours!! The way the crusaders butchered and vanquished anything that came in their way is quite gross.

Here are two religions trying to take control of the 'Holy land' - Jerusalem. In a way, the persecution of the Jews started right then. I guess it started much earlier, but they bore the brunt quite some bit during the crusades. The word 'Jihad' was born in that period meaning holy war. I don't understand the concept of war - even less of 'spiritual wars'. What is the point?

The Abrahamic religions are very different from the eastern religions. Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Taoism are very mystical. And the western religions have something in them to prove that they're better than the others. The concept that 'only my way' is weird. Quite a contrast to what we are used to in terms of pluralism.

Christian crusaders described the Muslims as Pagans and the Muslims described the Christians as Infidels! Today these are the most dominant religions in the world in terms of numbers and wealth. Though the depth of belief in the Christian society is much lesser than the faith in the Muslim religion.

Religion itself is a oncept introduced for the sheep that follow the shepherd. The Abrahamic religions were spread with the concepts of devil, fear and heaven/hell concepts. So in today's individualistic societies, is there place for religion? I guess not.

There must've been some level of fanaticism that fuelled wars for 3 centuries! The kind of injuries and fatalities inflicted by the crusaders are part of Muslim folklore even today. Doesn't help much in the cause of world peace in the unstable world of today.

It's a very interesting series and gives a good insight into western religious conflicts. Yes, I'm on a history trip these days :)

Who are my ancestors?

2005-11-24T20:59:00.000+11:00

I came across a very interesting link about tracing human ancestral trees. Independent of that, I've wondered about my own ancestors. I don't know why it matters, but somehow I feel the urge to know what they did for a living, where they lived, how and why they migrated. I have only wondered about these questions and probably won't do more than that. But I'd love to speculate on them.

I belong to a Madhva family that has origins in Coimbatore. Now, that itself is a mystery in today's conditions. How did my ancestors land up in Coimbatore. They were probably just scholars or temple priests and probably moved to places where they had work. Traditionally, brahmins never owned anything in terms of property. So, brahmins never had any great emotions attached to a particular place or state or kingdom.

So who are the Brahmins? Should I believe in the Aryan invasion theory. I came across some very interesting points of view while researching this on the web. Firstly, I have always refused to believe that I'm Aryan. But if I'm Dravidian, why is my skin colour lighter than other proclaimed Dravidians? So, may be I'm a mix - which is most probably the case. I have wondered if our origins can be traced back to say, the Caspian Sea or the African continent. May be the Dravidians came from there - like some people say, the most original Dravidians are in the Andaman Islands.

What is Hinduism? Was it the religion or way of life of the Aryans or Dravidians? I had a theory regarding Ramayana and Mahabharata. Rama and Co were the Aryans and Ravana represented the Dravidians. And Ramayana was a propaganda war to enslave the dravidians. But somehow, things don't fit in with this theory! Dravidians were supposed to be worshippers of Shiva and Aryans of Vishnu. But the concept of Vaishnavism was completely in the south! So again things don't fall in place. So I don't believe in my own theory any longer.

May be, then, that Hinduism was the religion of the natives. Aryans just came in and got localized? What about the theory that the Rig Veda was written on the banks of the Saraswathi which was probably in Iran when the Aryans were moving from West to East? What about the Sanskrit origins of Aryan languages like German and Polish etc? So, there is some connection.

Lots and lots of things to figure out. It may not be important, but I'm just curious. Hope I will find answers soon .. somewhere .. Till then, I will keep time travelling on the blog.

Whistle-blower!

2005-11-23T22:37:00.000+11:00

Manjunath was an honest man. He wanted to set right a few things. He was just doing his job. But, he's been killed just for doing his job. I salute his conviction and his ability to stand by what he believed was the right thing to do. But, did he have to pay the price with his life?

What is this society we are trying to create? Corruption! The word is so rampant in our daily lives. We accept it for convenience. We always shrug our shoulders and say what can one man do. We accept defeat even before the battle begins. He was 27 years old. IIM-Lucknow. SJCE, Mysore before that. Nice brands. Big future! Good career. Does his death have a meaning?

Corruption itself can be of several kinds. The common form of corruption we see in India is people and officers taking bribes to do just their job. Ministers and politicians take money to just shut their mouths. If they remain silent on an issue, it's bad! If they talk, it's even worse! Deve Gowda - the man who holds Bangalore's future in his hands the biggest example. Lalu Yadav - held Bihar in darkness to achieve his own goals - which are themselves not recognizable to the common man. We see it rampant in every Government office. Is there a solution?

This is the second such death in recent times. SK Dubey, of the IIT Kanpur fame, did the same job, that of a whistle-blower. He too was just blown away, just like that! Isn't death too heavy a price to pay for honesty?

Book Review: God of Small things

2005-11-16T19:57:00.000+11:00

I finally read it! It was second attempt at reading it, first time I couldn't cross Page 50 because I thought I was going into a depression. But that was four years ago! I'm much more grown up now and like to read for the sake of reading.

The book is a perspective of life as seen by a real cynic. Happiness is not common to the people of Ayemenem, one would believe, after reading the book. It's a reflection on south Kerala society. Deep divisions between the touchable(the Syrian Christians, the Pillais and other caste Hindus) and the untouchables(the Paravans, as they're called in Kerala).

The language used is beautiful and the creates its own vocabulary. The description of some incidents just transports you to that place and environment. Description of development over the Meenachal river brings out the conflict between environment and economics in a nice way. The best description in the book is that of a Kathakali performance in the Ayemenem temple. The description of the incidents of Mahabharata and the expressions of the performers described is so real. It felt as if I witnessed the whole performance live!

The Story - it's a lot of sadness packed into this book. The concept of the 'laws of love' - that prescribe "who should be loved, how and how much?" is brought out powerfully. The story is that of non-identical twins Rahel and Estha. And of their family - Ammu, her brother Chacko, Baby grand aunt Baby Kochamma and the grandmother Mamachi. Almost every man is shown as a wife-beater, drunkard or an unfaithful. Except of course Velutha. Velutha is the untouchable Paravan who has achieved more than his due as per the laws of the society. The style of narration does not maintain chronology in the strict sense. So, it takes you back and forth in time and the puzzle is revealed part-by-part.

It also gives a good description of the Syrian Catholic society of Kerala. Of the rise of communism and how comrade EMS' appeal to the Hindu masses of Kerala. Descriptions of the adventures of Estha and Rahel to the other side of the river are so real. The story of Sophie Mol - the child of Chacko and Margret Kochamma is touching.

Overall, a very good book. But read it slowly and let the words and language sink in. One does get a feeling of melancholy when he/she reads it! Pooja also can certify this as a book that is beautiful but the story is very sad.

Sandpaper article

2005-11-16T04:11:00.000+11:00

My article on the diljales' work for the Ramana Maharishi Academy for the Blind got published.

As usual, the photos are thanks the best digital photographer known to the discovered world - wifey, Pooja.

http://sandpaper.bitsaa.org/12_community/diljales.htm

Cities and People

2005-11-10T23:29:00.000+11:00

It's amazing how we form an opinion on a person based on where s/he's from. In India, in particular cities seem to have character and characteristics. And based on which city a friend likes, you can judge a lot about his/her character and what s/he enjoys the most in life.

Let's take the city of Bangalore. Once a sleepy pensioner's paradise, I would still rate it to have the best climate in the whole world. Good natured people are a natural consequence of such an ambience. Even people who come from outside love to absorb Bangalore into them and feel good about it. A long walk and feel like sipping a coffee, it takes 5 rupees and an idly to cool you off. English is understood and spoken by most residents. Nature is part of life - there are no air-conditioners and weekend getaways are plenty and interesting. So, a typical Bangalorean loves nature, loves the rain, loves his coffee! Bad roads and crazy traffic are just collateral damages of the unplanned expansion of the IT world into Bangalore.

Bombay. I have never lived in it. So all my opinion is based on perceptions and what I've heard from friends. Well, Bombay is hard working, work-hard, party hard kind of place. It has resilience and is mighty active. Food again is cheap and plenty. South or North Indian - any food is available. It's also the city of Bollywood. Plenty of action out there in terms theater. Again, rain is part of life and so is the train. The local trains carry people up and down from work places and the city just does not sleep! Weather's okay - I love humidity so it doesn't affect me much.

Delhi. Fast and furios. Agressive and brazen. New Delhi is an awesome place for checking out cinemas, monuments and is full of history. It's been a capital city of the sub-continent for centuries. But, it's populace is largely of refugee composition. Have fought their way up in life from harsh conditions of the partition and the aftermath. The landscape is a dull shrubbery and lots of dust in the air. There is a natural amount of SPM in the air! The city has extreme weather. With horrible summers and not-so horrible winters. Two months in the year are lievable! Overall, I'm a bit biased against this city - it's people seem loud and have started occupying the rest of the country with aggression.

Pondicherry! The word is a magic. Beautiful seashores, lovely beaches and warm people define this 'not-really-a-city'. But, I've lived in it for most of my life. The air is dense with water vapour - but love humidity. Life is slow paced and the landscpaes are occupied by kids playing cricket and basketball and football. Eating some french cuisine and visiting the serene places of the Ashram and Auroville are a pleasure. Like the Pondicherry tourism advertises, it's a place to 'Give time a break'.

Dallas. Resembles Delhi in landscape and climate. Big cars and fat texan dudes and a whole lot of George Bush worshippers. That's not much of a praise for the city. I hate flat landscapes. It's boring and all one can do is drive a few thousand miles to find the nearest green spot. Finding a tree is an achievement here. Shopping and watching TV is about the only thing one can do here. Desis in plenty in this Amru city! Overall, too much of an indoor place.

There's one other city I've lived in and I really hated every moment of it! Madras. Chennai. Horrible weather. This is the city where I hated humidity! Always thirsty. Always short of water. When it rains, it stinks. When doesn't, it still stinks. But I've always got along well with people from Chennai. English speaking. Philosophical. And I love the beach in Besant Nagar :). But it's main asset - it's only 160Kms to Pondicherry from there.

Chandrashekara Temple

2005-10-26T21:41:00.000+10:00

I'm still on with a hangover of Hampi! Hampi is a world heritage site, formerly a capital city of the Vijayanagar kingdom.

Some pictures from the area near the Chandrashekara temple.

There was one guy who was reading sitting in the temple premises. It just added to the serenity of the place!

This is an Octogonal bath near the temple. Seems like bathing was a pretty public activity is all historical civilisations.

The best way to explore Hampi is by bicycle. The slopes of the landscape and the beauty of the ruins flex different parts of the body - the legs and the heart respectively!

The landscape is weird like in no other place. There are rocks of various sizes and shapes hanging and placed in precarious looking equilibria. Nature's creations and man's manicuring - giving fantastic visual delights!

'Bangalored' has a new meaning!

2005-10-26T16:35:00.000+10:00

Wet, wet, wet! That's the theme of the month for Bangalore and it's 8 million populace this October. All old records have been broken in term so rainfall and wetness of every day.

Under these circumstances, the daily woes of the residents of Bangalore getting stuck in no man's land and having to wade through water all the time has become a common story in every hosehold! May be, that's the new meaning of 'Bangalored'! The infrastructure or whatever is left of it, is in shambles. Complete shambles!

The reason for this deluge is more man made than nature's fury. Earlier, Bangalore was known to be the city of lakes. Lakes had natural inward and outward flows that could distribute the rainwater among themselves. Then came the ugly side of 'development'. Layouts were created out of Lake beds and reclaimed land. Damn it, when there is so much land in the country, why destroy a lake to claim land. Well, such is the mentality of land sharks and their real estate dreams - money and only money is their motive. And look who's paying the price for such deeds! Are we all not 'Bangalored' now?

Do we have disaster fatigue?

2005-10-21T22:04:00.000+10:00

This is a thought that has been haunting me in the last few days in the aftermath of the Kashmir earthquake. I'm forced to compare my own feelings as well as the reaction of our nation to the disaster that has struck Kashmir(both sides) in the form of the earthquake! When the Tsunami struck the East coast, we all toppled over each other to rush aid and rescue materials to Nagapattinam and Cuddalore. When the earthquake in Kashmir happens, not even my company which is a very socially conscious firm, has declared any kind of donations to the Prime Minister's Relief fund! Why? Are these Kashmiris not our people? It's true that most of them don't consider themselves Indians, but I'm beginnin to wonder how much we consider them Indians. There's a feeling that had the same thing happened even in Jammu, just south of Kashmir, we would've again given the same kind of reaction as what we gave Tamil Nadu or Mumai or Western Maharashtra.

That brings us to the next question. Are we doing this because or religion by any chance? Had it been Hindus/Sikhs/Christians killed and affected, would we have reacted differently? Or may be even if it was a mainland muslim? By mainland I mean the large parts of India that does feel part of the same country. I'm not saying that this would've been the case, but just thought occurs in my mind. I'm appalled even at my own biased reaction to these incidents!
I thought this would've been a golden oppurtunity to send the message that we care. But we have failed quite badly. Even the media has largely ignored the tragedy. We don't find that many articles in newspapers! No coverage!

The other argument is that we are truly fatigued by disasters. We are beginning to accept them as part of life. First the Tsunami, then Mumbai and then these incessant rains that continue to lash Karnataka, Maharashtra. May be we have started treating things as everyday occurences!
Any thoughts? Any alternative explanations ?

Humans the Virus : Perspective

2005-10-18T15:42:00.000+10:00

This is a picture taken in the Valley of Flowers in the Himalayas - Uttaranchal state of India. This is a very unique ecosystem where you can see green, white and multitude of colurs of the flowers. This is from a friend's recent visit to this valley.

Consider the Earth as a human being. What happens when a virus attacks us? We get a fever - that's Global warming for you. The virus cannot survive outside a host - so it kills to survive - that's what we human beings have done!

Virus spreads from one part of the body to another rapidly - virus multiplies at a alarming rate and can even cause death if the immune system cannot cope. That's why you see flooding in NJ, Bomaby, a Tsunami or an earthquake - that's the body of the Earth reacting to us - the viruses!!

The more powerful viruses take more than the weaker viruses - that's why a human being in US consumes 1000 times more paper than an average Indian. Dumping toxic wastes in all parts of the body - that's exactly what a virus does!! The only way this planet can survive is when we stop taking more than what we deserve! Money is a device created by the more powerful viruses to occupy more space and more power .. let's stop being viruses and start using that brain of ours! Otherwise, death for the planet is certain - and death for a host also means death for the virus ..

The point is - how do we start? Begin by saying 'No' to plastics. Use for really essential things. Don't cut yourselves from Nature. Stop enclosing your souls into closed spaces with air-conditioning! We have a beautiful ecosystem of existence in India now - we need to clean up surroundings definitely - but let's not cut ourselves off from the host called Earth!

First day at School

2005-10-09T14:20:00.000+10:00

I have very fond memories of my school and of the JIPMER campus. Most of what I am today in terms of opinions and impressions were formed from those days. I trust fellow human beings so much because Pondicherry is a place where nothing wrong seemed to take place! I am optimist who believes that the world will find its balance eventually - because even if wealth was not around so much, there was always happiness. Even today I see glowing faces, smiling teeth and an unshakable faith in the world, in Pondicherry. An extremely mild people who do not talk too much - is a gift of Shri Aurobindo and the Mother to Pondicherry.

But in today's world, will people like me get consumed? Am I living in a fool's paradise thinking everything is alright with the future of the world and my place in it? Everywhere I look around, aggression seems to be the way. And I can never get aggressive for any logical reason, I do get aggressive as a reaction to something stupid! It's more a form of defense.

Coming back to those days of Childhood, I took photographs of the hard copies of the snaps from those days when I went to Pondy last weekend.

This was the first day at school in Kendriya Vidyalaya, JIPMER! The other kid in the photo is Sandeep, my cousin-bro.

This snap was taken in Wilson Garden house with Sandeep and Ashwin. People say there's a huge resemblance between Sandeep and me - lot of teachers at school always confused our names!

Ahh Pondicherry!!

2005-10-07T16:16:00.000+10:00

Pondicherry is home. That's where I spent my formative years. Everytime I go back there, I feel part of the environment. Outsiders say people don't talk much in Pondy - life is a meditation living there! Here's a photo essay of some of the places in the old city or town area of Pondy. These pictures should speak for themselves.

North-east Monsoon?

2005-09-30T05:40:00.000+10:00

Growing up in Pondicherry, I was always a weather freak. Well, the growing up in Pondicherry part was just for effects. Anyways, being a weather freak and observer of nature, it always mattered to me which side the wind was blowing, which clouds are going to bear rain, and whether we would get a school holiday due to a depression the in Bay!

Like I know that the wind reverses direction around September 23 year after year. It's definitely something to do with the equinox. Same with March 23, when the official summer begins in the northern hemisphere.

Last morning's rain in Bangalore reminded me of those monsoon days in Pondicherry - the typical depression rain; of a continuos and determined bunch of clouds to not stop raining - without any hurry.

Well, I'm off to Pondicherry today to see the real North-east monsoon :). Here I come, the holy land ..

Rainy bandh day

2005-09-29T15:55:00.000+10:00

I woke up at 7 AM - an hour earlier than usual. It was still pretty dark outside. Ah, there's the reason - it was raining. It'd started raining last night! The front door opened to a beautiful world outside. But my sweetheart was away in Delhi - can't hear the music of appreciation of nature from her today :(.

The day crawled in anticipation of a break in the rain. The wind chimes in the balcony refused chime. This house is so different without her. Okay, she's only gone for three days! So I pull along.

I decided to chug along in the rain. Today's a bandh called by the communists. I still saw school kids arunning in their colorful raincoats. As I went past the ADE campus, I saw a few red flags and a couple of workers standing there. Others just went past them for work. So much for communism in Bangalore city!

As I took a turn towards Krishna temple road, the inevitable happened. My bike stopped! It's been giving me so much trouble. Rain or heat or traffic or speed - just any reason to stall. So I push it along and let it dry the electrical circuitary. I left with my mechanic and told him to do whatever to do something with the electrical connection.

But, now - no autos! Those contraptions I'd belittled just yesterday; they were off the roads. And the steady rain had no intention of letting up. So I walked along in my new role of being observer. The traffic seemed to flow better than normal. I thought what a pity that some companies are closed today to compensate on a good saturday.

As I walked along, I was also getting pretty wet, naturally :). In my observer cap, I thought about the amount of rain that just drains. If only, we made good use of this water ..

I just stood on old madras road asking for lift - and got dropped at the ulsoor fork .. then i walked from there till office again - drenched pretty badly ..

IT and the farmer

2005-09-27T15:27:00.000+10:00

We've all seen the ITC ad on how they're tranforming lives in rural India. The e-choupal is an interesting case study on the Supply Chain System.

ITC, in a bid to shed its image of being a Cigarette manufacturer and take up a social cause combined with a long-term sustainable profit introduced these e-choupal concept. We do see ads on Indian television about these e-choupals about how ITC is transforming lives. Well, there really seems to be some changes happening.

Check out : http://www.digitaldividend.org/case/case_echoupal.htm - a very interesting case study.

And for a feather on their cap : ITC has won the 100,000$ Development Gateway Award : http://home.developmentgateway.org/award

Hope for a better future for the poor farmer!

Letter to the Editor

2005-09-23T18:40:00.000+10:00

My letter to the editor of Deccan Herald was published on September 12th, 2005. This is a subject close to my heart.

http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/sep122005/editpage1554292005911.asp

The Braille Slates

2005-09-20T01:18:00.000+10:00

At the Ramana Maharishi Academy for the Blind reception. In the background, you can see the trophies and awards won by the organisation. For the 2500 alumni of the school, "respect not sympathy" has been the motto.

The Braille slate being used by a visually impaired. We - the diljale, had donated for the purchase of braille slates. This girl was extremely enthusiastic to show us the use of the braille slates.

Six Years ..

2005-09-06T22:57:00.000+10:00

6 September, 1999 was the day I joined Infosys Tech Ltd. It's been 6 years already! My God, time flies ..

Such milestones are good times to reflect back on what's happened.

How do I rate myself career so far?
What have I achieved so far in my career?
What is my action plan for the next few years?
Where do I see myself 2 years from now?
Where do I see myself 5 years from now?

These are the typical questions to my mind whenever I think of my career. But overall, to judge in a qualitative manner, I would say average. I have followed the path that a average Indian IT male would've had. Very average indeed ..

In terms of my aspirations, if I look at my yearbook, I wanted to be a manager - I still want to enter the management field. That way, my long term goal from a 10Km height still remains the same. What else has changed? I started as a enthusiastic Telecom development guy - I was very enthu about writing code for the Telecom network and swicthes. Over the years, certainly a lot of events have influenced me. And, I took to testing as a career. Boy, that was one significant move in my career. Today, I lead 4 engineers in a multi national product company. But, I need more .. I want to direct and manage an entire project on my own. Some day ..

Now, an MBA looks more achievable than ever before. My wife has played a huge role in this transformation. It's amazing how much life's changed since she came in into my life! In terms of experience and reading and knowledge, I'm more ready for an MBA now than ever before. Only time will tell, where my career is headed. But, as of now it's Chalti ka naam Gaadi. :-)

Book Review: Managing in the Next Society

2005-09-06T16:17:00.000+10:00

Peter F Drucker is a man of experience. This book is a collection of essays from Drucker on the trends of change in society and the way people work in the next century. This was published in 2002, so certain conditions and trends might not be covered in this book.

But, overall his analysis based on the 250 years of Industrial revolution and how the Knowledge revolution will impact societies and economies is amazing. His description of how the railroad changed the concept of distances and how the internet has zeroed the distances now is excellent.

To summarize the book, the take away are as follows:

In the Knowledge society, the specialist will be in demand and so instead of generalists that we have in the IT industry cannot differentiate for too long.
The developed countries of the world, especially in Europe, will start facing a demographic crisis in the sense that the average age of the population will steadily increase and so also their competitiveness.
As the average age of man increases, people will see the beginning and end of corporations within their lifetimes.
Temp workers will also start be dominant component of workforces as companies will increasingly find it difficult to employ everybody that works for them.
The world is definitely gravitating toward the east - China and India to be specific.
His view on China - there is a huge discrepancy between the public sector communist West to the highly Capitalistic Eastern Shanghai region. There is very low quality in the produce of the Chinese public sector.
Manufacturing will face the same future as Agriculture faced after the second world war. It's no more going to be capitalism, it's going to be a Knowledge Society.
Two areas that desperately need management are : Non-profits and Governments. As I speak to my counterparts in Europe and US, I realize that nowhere in the world, politicians are respected! These areas need focus because the Goals are not easily identifiable.

Weakness of the Book : It is very repetitive in the messages it tries to convey. Also, I was specifically looking for any views and opinions on India - but could not find too much reference to India. His later articles though have to lot to say about India.

It is definitely a very good read for all who plan any venture into the Business world.

Blind Candidate's exam

2005-08-31T22:59:00.000+10:00

This is an open letter to the Vice-chancellor of Bangalore University. I'd written this letter to the VC, but haven' received any response yet. Yet, I shall not give up.

Dear Sir,

I was a scribe for one of the blind candidates for the correspondence course II Year BA examination. Some of these sentences below describe the situation in the exam center, the tasks I had to do and what actions I took.

1. The exam center had no special arrangement for blind candidates. I had to run around the exam center with my candidate and serach for the location of the candidate's roll number. After a lot of huffing and puffing, I managed to locate the center. And then, all we get is a table and two chairs to sit in the corridor!! Pathetic is an understatement!!!

2. In the History question paper, there were map questions. How do you expect a blind candidate to 'dictate' the answer?

3. The course material distributed had nothing in it for blind candidates.

Some small steps that can be taken to make life easy for the visually impaired candidates:

1. Please arrange for a special room for the blind candidates.

2. Please have a look at the curricullum and make some small adjustments for the sake of visually challenged people - make it a fair playing ground.

3. As a whole, we in our society should be sensitive to these people. They don't need our sympathy, they need their own self-respect! And we can help them achieve that ..

No more plastic bags in Maharashtra

2005-08-25T15:02:00.000+10:00

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1210272.cms

I hope this ban by Maharashtra sets a precedent for other states to take up similar measures. Hopefully, this gets passed and strict enforcement happens. But, you never know what the communists might say. They might come up with an argument that the scavengers will lose their livelihood. Trust them to come with the most obscure of reasoning.

The last two days' rain in Bangalore caused so much confusion and Ulsoor was beginning to break the barriers and overflow. It was just some timely action by the army folks that saved some very serious flooding!

The essential areas that might be of consequence will be for milk packets and waste bags. Other than that, I don't see any other area where we would need plastic bags. When I buy vegetables, I too use plastic bags. But there must be some other way of buying vegetables. When the vedors with pushcarts come on the streets, it's very easy - we just use the direct container that is needed for storage. But for the big chunk of bikers who buy vegetables on the way back from office, it will be a challenge initially. But, it can definitely be worked out. Say, carry a cloth bag in the office bag along with other stuff. After all, if the planet needs to be a safer place, we need to sacrifice some 'conveniences'!

STAR

2005-08-24T22:24:00.000+10:00

A very important learning as I was doing my MBA essays was that whenever you describe an achievement or failure, you should structure it in this way. It kind of kills the creativity, but acts as an effective checklist while writing a formal business communication.

S - Stands for Situation : Describe the basic situation that you intend expanding on.

T - Task : What was the task assigned or initiated by you. This is a specific thing like a deliverable.

A - Action : What Actions did you take toward fulfilling that task.

R - Result : What was the result of that action? Did it succeed because of something specific step or method you followed?
If it failed, what have you learnt from it. How do you say that you have learnt something?

Strategy

2005-08-23T19:51:00.000+10:00

I've been involved in formulating a Test Strategy for our project. I just wanted to list some of thoughts on the process of formulating this. I really want to check later if I achieve the objectives set here.

First thing about strategy - I can never forget a Sam ra Babu quote "Never put tension, put strato". I think the first learning is that very fact - that in order not to put tension, you need to have a strategy. It's indeed a very interesting subject on its own.

In short, what the strategy involves is : stating what, how and when - whatever be the project for which we need a strategy. More sermons on strategy as I develop one. Itih ~!

Patience quotes

2005-08-22T20:21:00.000+10:00

There's some nice soul who puts up colour print-outs near the coffee achine in office. Today's quote was on Patience - something I consider to be a key strength of my personality.

The main quote stated there was an old chinese proverb -" It is through patience that a mulberry leaf turns to silk".

I did some more search for quotes on patience. Some of them listed here:

"Patience and perserverence have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish."--
John Quincy Adams
"Patience with others is Love, Patience with self is Hope, Patience with God is Faith."--
Adel Bestavros
"If you would know strength and patience, welcome the company of trees."--
Hal Borland
"Forgive, forget. Bear with the faults of others as you would have them bear with yours. Be patient and understanding. Life is too short to be vengeful or malicious."--
Phillips Brooks
"Our patience will achieve more than our force."--
Edmund Burke
"We smile at the ignorance of the savage who cuts down the tree in order to reach its fruit; but the same blunder is made by every person who is over eager and impatient in the pursuit of pleasure." --
William Channing
"Patience is power; with time and patience the mulberry leaf becomes silk."--
Chinese Proverb
"Patience is the art of caring slowly."--
John Ciardi
"Patience is bitter, but it's fruit is sweet."--
Lida Clarkson
"The greatest power is often simple patience."--
E. Joseph Cossman
"Patience serves as a protection against wrongs as clothes do against cold. For if you put on more clothes as the cold increases, it will have no power to hurt you. So in like manner you must grow in patience when you meet with great wrongs, and they will be powerless to vex your mind."--
Leonardo da Vinci
"There is no road too long to the man who advances deliberately and without undue haste; there are no honors too distant to the man who prepares himself for them with patience."--
Jean De La Bruyere
"Patience and time do more than strength or passion."--
Jean de La Fontaine
"If we could have a little patience, we should escape much mortification; time takes away as much as it gives."--
Marquise de Sévigné
"Beware the fury of a patient man."--
John Dryden
"Infinite patience brings immediate results."--
Wayne W. Dyer
"An ounce of patience is worth a pound of brains."--
Dutch Proverb
"Patience can't be acquired overnight. It is just like building up a muscle. Every day you need to work on it."--
Eknath Easwaran
"Everything comes to him who hustles while he waits."--
Thomas A. Edison
"I think and think for months and years, ninety-nine times, the conclusion is false. The hundredth time I am right."--
Albert Einstein
"Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."--
Ralph Waldo Emerson
"No greater thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen."--
Epictetus
"He that can have patience can have what he will."--
Benjamin Franklin
"To lose patience is to lose the battle."--
Mahatma Gandhi
"The key to everything is patience. You get the chicken by hatching the egg, not by smashing it."--
Arnold H. Glasgow
"Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success."--
Napolean Hill
"There is no royal road to anything, one thing at a time, all things in succession. That which grows fast, withers as rapidly. That which grows slowly, endures."--
Josiah Gilbert Holland
"With love and patience, nothing is impossible."--
Daisaku Ideda
"Patience has its limits. Take it too far, and it's cowardice."--
George Jackson
"To hear complaints with patience, even when complaints are vain, is one of the duties of friendship."--
Dr. Samuel Johnson
"You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance."--
Franklin P. Jones
"All fruits do not ripen in one season."--
Laurie Junot
"Face your deficiencies and acknowledge them; but do not let them master you. Let them teach you patience, sweetness, insight... When we do the best we can, we never know what miracle is wrought in our life, or in the life of another."--
Helen Keller
"Patience is necessary, and one cannot reap immediately where one has sown."--
Soren Kierkegaard
"The practice of patience toward one another, the overlooking of one another's defects, and the bearing of one another's burdens is the most elementary condition of all human and social activity in the family, in the professions, and in society."--
Lawrence G. Lovasik
"Genius is only a greater aptitude for patience."--
George-Louis Leclerc de Buffon
"Never think that God's delays are God's denials. Hold on; hold fast; hold out. Patience is genius."--
George-Louis Leclerc de Buffon
"They also serve who only stand and wait."--
John Milton
"Patience is the key to contentment."--
Mohammed
"Patience and Diligence, like faith, remove mountains."--
William Penn
"All's well in the end, if you've only the patience to wait."--
Rabelais
"Good ideas are not adopted automatically. They must be driven into practice with courageous patience."--
Hyman George Rickover
"Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves ... Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point it, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps, then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."--
Rainer Maria Rilke
"Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet."--
Jean Jacques Rousseau
"Patience is the companion of wisdom."--
Saint Augustine
"The two most powerful warriors are patience and time."--
Leo Tolstoy
"Patience is the key to paradise."--
Turkish Proverb

Aug 14, 2005

2005-08-17T21:56:00.000+10:00

Time 9 AM : Trips, Heku, Pooja and I left Bangalore for a 1 day picnic to the Shivasamudram falls. We were having lots and lots of topics for debate - about life, about software industry etc etc. We had a nice journey until we crossed Malavalli - there was a traffic jam there as half of Bangalore was heading. The usual problem we face on any long weekend - everybody's heading for the same destinations!

12.20 AM : We are just 12 Kms from Shivasamudram. Trips was driving. A Maruti Omni right in front, breaked while trying to overtake the car ahead of him. Trips applies the break and the car skids but hits the Omni van - result - a crashing accident. The radiator and engine had imploded! Luckily, no major injuries to anyone. The guy in front started arguing. We had a huge build up of crowd. Every passer by became an expert on driving and justice. After debating and fighting and talking for about an hour - we had to yield to the driver and pay him of 1000 bucks! Also, it helped in dispersing the crowd and think of what next. As always, the accident occurred in the middle of nowhere and Airtel or Hutch did not have connectivity there.

1.15 PM : We just drove the car back some distance. But it was fuming all kinds of vapors of weird smells. We suspected that it might be the coolant burning. We opened the bonnet and saw that the coolant pipe was broken and something like battery acid was leaking all over.

1.25 PM: We decided to walk to the nearest village and call somebody from insurance or Maruti emergency helplines. Some villagers told us that it was 1 Km away. But never believe a villager when he says something is just 1 Km - it just went on and on. Trips and I'd walked more than a Km. Pooja and Heku stayed back to look after the car remnants. After some distance, I decided to try my luck with asking for lift. The only gracious soul who took pity and offered help was a tractor guy. He also said that he could arrange for the car to be towed to the nearest town - Malavalli. We stopped at the first village. There were phone booths there. We told him that we would take help if needed. We made a few frantic phone calls to all Maruti helplines/emergency numbers. Only one Mr. Shankarappa picked the phone and he said he would start from Bangalore only at 7 PM - the time now was 2.30 PM.

2.30 PM : We hitched a ride in a posh car. 1 man, 2 women - gave us lift to sight the of the accident. They were drinking beer while! The irony - nothing happens to such people! We got back to the sight and decided that we would go back to the town of Malavalli to get the car towed till there atleast so that we are back in cell phone territory. So that we could talk to people and get some help. And people trying to help us could contact us.

3.00 PM: After hitching another ride from a bunch of guys this time to Malavalli - we found a garage. The foreman picked up some 'tools' which included a couple of spanners and a hammer. He said he would talk to some taxi guys and we could all go there and if couldn't make the car worthy of driving, he would tow it back to Malavalli and work on it. Our hopes were dwindling - and increasingly, the option of calling for help from Bangalore which was 100Km away seemed like the best option. We started in an ambassador car and on the way the car ran out of diesel. When things go wrong, the world conspires to screw you! After some huffing and puffing, we reached the sight. They connected the car and started the towing process.

4.30 PM : We reached Malavalli. Malavalli is a small town - there were restaurants/tea shops and a horrible main road. We parked ass at a school playground. It had the paintings of Nehru/Gandhi, painted with the tri-colour in places! We had a big argument with the foreman and the car towing guys. The argument went on and on - finally we gave in and gave the towing guy another 100 bucks other than the 200 we'd alreday given.

5,30 PM : We were still desperately trying to call all helplines of Maruti for towing service. Bangalore was 100Kms away. Finally, Prakash and Shankarappa said they would come to tow us back to Bangalore.

This duration, we were just observers of the small town life. Friendly and concerned people, smiling kids playing cricket and goli, smaller kids using the ground to cycle around. That was the general atmosphere on the ground. every now and then people came asked what happened and we would repeat the story over and over again. We took turns to explore the town and have chai/coffee. First, Trips and Heku went on a walk - then Pooja and I went around. We were just killing time waiting for the promised Mr. Shankarappa to come.

7.00 PM : I called Shankarappa again. He tells me he's started from Bangalore and already travelled 30Kms. So we estimated that he would reach by 8.30 PM. In the meantime, we had so many topics to talk about. We generally discussed the freedom vs development debate that I so much love nowadays. I also made some friends in the village - some kids, some middle age men. Time just crawled by ..

8.00 PM : I called up Shankarappa. This time he shouts at me saying don't keep calling every 2 minutes. He assured me that he's on his way! Whatever happened to the concept called Customer service.

We just lay around there. Took a walk to the medical store - Pooja wanted a lense case. We made conversation with more people - the general attitude of people was that of help and sincerity. This medical shop guy gave us bondas to eat and didn't charge for it! Something we forget living in the hustle-bustle of a city. Time still crawled .. Trips was beginning to sulk a bit!

10.00 PM : After a long wait, again I call up Shankarappa - he gives the heart attack. That they were in Ramanagaram - on a completely different highway towing somebody else's car!! We scream in vain and again he assures us that he WILL come. Pooja and I took a walk to the town and got some food. Again, the restaurant had closed down - we told them our situation and they opened the hotel for us and made fresh food! Some jeera rice and friend rice! We again thank the niceties of small town India.

In the meantime, some people from the office opposite the school offered some temporary accommodation on 'humanitarian' grounds. It was getting cold sitting out in the open in the school grounds/verandah.

11 PM : We woke up the watchman of the BESCOM office and asked him if his offer still holds. Graciously, he agreed and we pushed the car into the compound. He made a small arrangement for us by putting some tables and desks and made a temporary hard bed for us. Pooja and I slept in the room - Trips and Heku chose the car.

Finally, Mr. Shankarappa arrived at 2.30 AM, 15th August. They toed up the car's front wheels to the tow crane. We all decided to sit in the car itself. So thus began our final journey towards Bangalore. The weird spring action of the chain attachment between the truck and car made us swing like crazy. Our driver was not least bothered about potholes - he just anted to get the hell back to Bangalore. He said he'd one 30 service calls that day!

7.00 AM, 15th August : We are back home, back broken, neck sprained! But thank God! It could've been much worse.

The talkative Indian

2005-08-12T19:52:00.000+10:00

If I have to describe life in Bangalore in three words, I would say - booming energetic anarchy! This I guess will represent the general state of the Indian mind in general, and of a booming creative city like Bangalore in particular.

To describe the energy of us Indians, take the example of a average conversation of the common man in any of Bangalore's darshinis. Firstly, we all have so much to talk! Whether it's the state of an unfinished flyover, or the water-logging in xyz colony, or the stock price of the reliance share and where the economy in general is headed. An average man is aware of his surroundings - of what's happening to the country, the economy and his job. One can judge this energy from the animated way of talking in coffee joints. There are so many business ideas floating in the air - it's this energy that's driving us currently.

Amartya Sen's new book, The Argumentative Indian, must be a good read. I want to pick up and read it sometime soon. The french guy who interviewed Pooja asked what she thought of our argumentative nature - whether that causes a lot of delays. In my opinion, it's a historical and religious trait we have possessed since time immemorial. The great debates that happened in the courts of Krishna Devaraya or Akbar or the great religious debates by Vadiraja are all proof that our religion by origin and nature encourages us to debate. And I think, it is this trait that has been genetically preserved and progenated that makes us what we are today. We are ready for the Knowledge society precisely for this reason.

We are good readers in general. On any bus journey, whether it is through the traffic jammed roads of Bangalore or a train journey from Bangalore to Mysore or the bus journey from Madras to Pondicherry, I have observed that people like to read their books, magazines, politics and newspapers. Though I haven't really travelled a lot through any other country as much as I have through India, I'm generally happy to see that people read and are aware of things around them. This is particularly prominent if one drives through Kerala - I really admire the political awareness and societal consciousness of the average mallu.

History is one area we desperately need to improve on. We all love to talk how great our history was and so on. Our sense of history and pride needs to be improved a few thousand folds. Especially I guess in heartland of North India, unfortunately a lot of the cultural pillars and identities have been destroyed. And the punjabi society is doing itself any service further westernizing itself! A point of history is that we lack documentation as a culture. I was showing to my sweet heart a sculpture in Somnathapura. There was this carving of Vishnu holding the Earth in his hands as a Globe - an elongated sphere. Now, this is sculpture from the 11th century of the Hoysalas. It took the western world another 400 years to re-learn the same fact. And yet, from our textbooks, we have to learn that Copernicus/Magellan proved that the earth was spherical!

We also talk about the daily comparisons between China and India. There this mail going around about how Nandan got Bangalored in Beijing - the vast expansions in infrastructure. In contrast, we have to wait for Deve Gowda's death before Bangalore can go somewhere in term of infrastructure. But hey, hold on! Do we have to make a choice between infrastructure and democracy. Any day, I would prefer my freedom. I don't want to live in a country where the state controls what I think and what I write! Blogs are screened for words like democracy and freedom! Ideally, I want both my flyovers as well as my freedom. And I know that with time, I will get my flyovers. Delhi's showing us the way today. I don't want to lose my talkative Indian .. Never! It's just not us!

MBA Apps so far

2005-08-12T16:08:00.000+10:00

It's pouring outside. Can't go home yet, and so I write this post.

This is one activity we've been involved in for sometime now. But, I've just not been in a mood to document it!

To begin with, I must admit that it's a completely satisfying satisfying experience in terms of getting to know about oneself. What're you strengths, weaknesses, goals, failures, perspectives etc. Kind of represents who you are to the Adcom of the University.

Our first app was for INSEAD. The apps went off well - so did our interviews. Now, the waiting game till September 10th.

Meanwhile, IIM-A has shortlisted both of us for an interview. This one's going to be very tough!

The questions for the essays are as below:

1. What do you expect to gain from the PGPX at IIMA?
2. Describe a situation in your life that demonstrates your leadership qualities.
3. Describe the single event or achievement that has significantly influenced your life.
4. Give a description of yourself, stressing the personal characteristics you feel are your strengths and weaknesses.
5. Any other information that you believe may help us make a decision on your application.

I'm goign to recycle most of my INSEAD essays. The Why IIM-A question needs some research. But, neither of us has the same enthu to research and find out about faculty as much as we did for INSEAD. God, God, God - please get us into INSEAD!

Bad tummy and Philosophy

2005-08-08T19:56:00.000+10:00

I have an upset stomach! Actually, it's not an upset stomach. It's a stomach that's not digesting the loads of food queued up in my intestine. I ate only one solid meal yesterday and still there's no sign of hunger today. Had a lovely preparation of honey and bread made by my cutie wife. I had some curd rice and more curd for lunch. I thought that would help me get some food in and also help the digestion - but no luck!

When you have an upset stomach, and not slept enough the previous night - the mood is ideal for philosophizing. I'm not feeling good - mentally and physically. I'm trying to listen to some Clapton numbers and do some work. But no, somehow work's not kicking off! Today being Monday also doesn't help.

I tried the drinking-water-to-flush-the-bad-things-from-stomach technique also - but no success! My tummy's feeling bloated like a balloon. It feels ugly. It's not a good day. The weather outside's also pretty murky. No sunshine - yesterday there was plenty of it. It was such a beautiful day - until ..

I'm gonna try and do something - like say read something interesting. Like say Bertrand Russell's book - "Our view of the external world". We all love to philosophize. More so when you have an upset tummy - okay, I know I've spoken enough about it!

On the more serious side - what is our view of the external world? I haven't read the book yet fully. But independently, I do have some views. It's basically my upbringing. Our view of the external world is largely based on the environment - parents, family, friends etc.

My philosophy is based on these two points I list below:

Happiness is a decision, not an outcome.
Nobody means harm - I mean nobody is out here to mean bad things for a person.

I love the first quote. It really keeps me going. Also, removes all hang-ups I've had. I had a lot of hang-ups in life before I went to that magical place in the North-west of India called Pilani. My friends in college have given me the exposure and strength to get over these hang-ups. Today, I'm a relatively hangup-free person. Somebody calling me something, or telling me something really doesn't affect me. I'm glad I'm here today. It's the desert that makes you stronger. It's the ability to see things in bigger picture!

The second point - I really am not sure yet on what I mean by this. All I know is - that when people try to harm you, it's for a reason - there're no psychopaths in real life who just get kicks by harming you. Everyone's out here to do something - whether for themselves or for the world! Mostly, for themselves - so harming you can't be their priority. This gets me going too - especially in corporate life - when one faces allegations, challenges, questions, reasons - the why, how and when part of everything. I'm getting used to this as part of a minuscule manager. Someday, I hope to be a little further up the corporate ladder.

Getting bad to the upset tummy - I'm already feeling better. I've blabarred enough on this blog. Weird, bad tummy implies philosophy implies better tummy!

End of Capitalism?

2005-08-04T17:25:00.000+10:00

Listened to Peter Drucker's interview at http://www.onpointradio.org/shows/2005/08/20050802_a_main.asp.

Quite an amazing interview considering his age is 95. I haven't read any of his books. But I've heard so much about him from so many sources including the course on Management I did during my second year in college.

Just a brief of what he says :

America's domination of the world are over
Leaders can't be trained into leadership in B-schools
Multi-polar world with Europe, China and India as other powers of center is a reality now

The most interesting point he made was the days of Capitalism are over - we are moving to a knowledge society! I really have to think and research on what he mans by that.

Most knowledge workers like me and my team members have this habit of thinking that any tom-dick and harry can do the work we do. But that's actually not true. Specialists are the reality of the day and nobody can do my job as well as I do :). An ego boost ;).

India's headed in the right direction I would say. We are a very hard-working people - atleast I believe we are heading that way.Everybody wants to make it somewhere in life - hopefully this intent and hard-work translates to results. Only time will tell!

Tadiyandamol Trek

2005-07-19T19:41:00.000+10:00

This is from my archive of trekologues. We went to Tadiyandamol in Dec 2003. Truly an amazing trek. Read on when you find time.

hey guys,

3 of us 'd been to tadiyandamol in coorg last weekend .. everybody shud go there ! we really had an awesome time there .. read on the trekologue when u find time .. it's a really looong one !

Tadiyandamol

------------

This was one trek that was pending for so long. I think we'd set our sight on this peak at least 1.5 years ago. But somehow it kept getting postponed due to some reason or the other.

Since we were only 3 of us going for the trek, there wasn't much planning required; a couple of googles was enough to get almost all the info required for the trip.

Day 0 (Friday night)

-----

We assembled at Majestic bus stand for the 10.45 PM bus to Napoklu. It was a luxury KSRTC bus - much more luxury than we usually have on trek journeys. The bus left the Blore bus stand almost on time and then our journey into the unknown had begun.

Day 1 ( Saturday )

-----

We reached Napoklu at 5.30 AM. Already we'd started feeling the cold of the Coorg winter when some of the windows in the bus kept opening on their own. But we got the full picture when we stepped out of the bus. Man, it really was a freezer. All 3 of us were shivering almost immediately. We spoke to some of the local guys in the bus stop to enquire about how to get to our immediate destination - the Nalaknad Armane ( Palace). They told us that the next bus to the place was at 6.45 AM. So we just ambled around the main road in Napoklu; we found a Tea shop just opening shutters. We rushed in and sat on the wooden benches inside the tea shop. Dennis and I went into the kitchen; given a chance we could even have sat on the stove !

At 7 AM , our bus slowly started moving to the tunes of some lovely devotional Kannada songs. And then we kept telling the conductor to tell us when we reach the bus stop for the armane. But he told us to get off at some place; and on enquiring with a guy at the tea shop he told us the we should 've got off 3 Kms earlier. So there began our trek on the road itself. We walked till the armane bus stop and then reached the armane itself eventually.

There was a film shooting going on there. The name of the movie is "Shanthi" - a kannada movie being made for award purposes, so we were informed by one the guys in the shooting crew. Then we freshened up and did basic morning duties in a nearby stream and started off for the peak. By this time, I'd lost track of time or consciousness. Just let myself free and was enjoying every moment of the trip.

The trek started off with very easy looking jeep tracks - intermittent spells of open tracks and forest cover. Over all it wasn't too difficult terrain. We had company in the of another threesome with a guide - they were Belgians. We were doing the hare and tortoise with them; only difference being the hare and tortoises - both taking rest and breaks at regular intervals.

I was already feeling full happy coz this was the first dry and leech less trek in a very long time I could remember. We trekked and trucked along gradually - we had more than normal level of luggage to carry. A tent , 2 sleeping bags and loads of food. So the weight on the shoulders was always dragging us down on every upward climb.

After a while, the jeep track ended and so did the forest cover. Then it became a full open grassland trek with trails. A landmark in the trek is a huge boulder. There was another group of french people on the boulder when we reached the place. We decided to halt ass for a while just after the boulder We just sat and chatted - also heard a stream in the vicinity - the pure music of water gushing through the gaps in the rocks and mountains.

After the break, we started again - chugging and puffing. We started on one trail and after sometime the trail just vanished ! We sat and wondered what we should do next. We started on another trail we saw nearby and again hit another dead end. We were definitely lost ! Dennis was leading the way in exploring the trail and route. Shiv and I just followed him quitely. The scenic view of the place where we got lost was qute amazing. We just feasted our eyes with the views all around !

We trekked and trekked trying to somehow get back to the stream. We put all kinds of fundas in listening to the sound of water and try to reach the stream. And the finally we crossed a point that looked familiar - and oops - where are we ? We were back at the boulder after 2 hrs. And we had the the belgian man greeting us " you guys still here ? ". He had gone halfway to the peak and returned coz his physical condition couldn't drive him up. His other 2 pals and their guide had gone on all the way.

We sat and had our lunch - some readymade rotis and mango pickle. After the lunch we had a small siesta and decided to give one last try at the peak. At this point, I went to speak to the begian guy. He told us to take the straight trail ; he also warned us the night would be really cold. He said the previous night they'd slept at the village and he felt as cold as he feels back home in belgium. We looked at each a scared glance at each other. Anyway, "no matter what" we were going to camp in the wild for the night. After all the effort of carrying the tent and sleeping bags.

Then started our ascent toward the peak - it kept going up up and away and reminded me of the Poochipara peak we'd climbed earlier in Silent valley. There's this with peaks - the more you climb the same the distance it looks as earlier. The views we got as went higher and higher improved in quality and sheer beauty of the entire place sinks in to you. You feel the present and only the present - I think that's the best form of meditation.

Finally we reached the peak ! We were on top of Tadiyandamol - meaning the highest point in kodava language. The elation and high that scaling a peak is unmatched. In the far distance we could see the outline of a meandering river merging into the ocean - the Arabian sea was visible from that distance.

We just sat in silence for a good amount of time. And by 4 o'clock in the afternoon, cold winds had already started on the peak giving a trailer of what was to come. I feasted on the all the views and sights I could set my eyes on. It was simply superb and no words can describe the feeling.

We slowly and sadly started our descent from the peak. The climb down as usual was steep in places and quite a strain on the knees and ankles. And by this time, Shiv had twisted his ankle quite a few times. But he kept going. Then we reached the place near the boulder where earlier itself we'd decided to pitch the tent. We sat down there and had a quick nap, before putting up the tent. I felt so happy about my tent. Must be the most decent purchase I'd made in the recent time. In the meantime, the cold blast of wind had set in on the lower plains and reaches also.

We pitched the tent and then we saw yet another beautiful sight - the moon. It was almost a full moon and by that time we could already see Venus in the western sky almost about to set. And the wind just kept getting stronger and colder !

We had dinner in the moonlight - it was so bright that we could see our shadows in the moonlight. The stars also started multiplied in number kept getting better and better with time. And so did the cold. After sometime, the cold winds had started cutting through our bones and then we decided to get into the cozy interiors of the tent. Parked ourselves into our sleeping bags and then I slept like a log.

Day 2
-----
Since we'd slept pretty early the previous night, I was up and awake by 5.30 AM; waiting for the Sun to come out. For once, I'd won the battle of waking with the sun ;). Shiv also woke up and we started preparing ourselves for the sunrise. We climbed a distance on the adjacent hill till a rock and sat there waiting for the sun to come up.

This sight is a really divine experience. When the first light lights up the eastern sky, the beautiful red line and then the adjacent areas getting slight tinge of blue. The sounds of the animals from the forest hardly 500m from our campsite; the chirping of the birds all over. The first light in the morning is simply brilliant. This was also the clearest ever sky I'd seen for a perfect sunrise. Shiv and I were just mesemerized by the beauty of the entire place. The different shades of red orange and yellow of the light, the lighting up of the peak with this light, the shades of green in the adjacent valley - simply fantastic ! We kept clicking snap after snap. And then I dropped my camera and just felt the experience. Both of us did a brief version of surya namaskar.

If anyone saw this sight, you would really salute the sun for its brillance and life sustaining light.

Only when the sun was up sufficiently, did we climb down back to the camp. We then woke up Dennis and headed to the stream for morning duties. We then had a quick breakfast and packed our stuff and left toward the Armane ( palace). One last glance at the peak and the surrounding forests and valleys and plains all around and I could get high on this sight for ever and ever ! If at all there was a way to do a trek, this was it, I thought.

On return to the Palace, the film crew was still there. We made PC with the heroines of the movie, Bhavana, who's apparently won the national award for the best actress last year. She was quite friendly babe, and we assured her that we'll try to watch out for her movie.

Then we hit the road and took a bus to Madikeri. And guess what, it was the same conductor who dropped us off far away on the 1st day ! Anyway, didn't feel like asking him any soul searching questions, and we just enjoyed the bus ride toward Madikeri. The views were enchanting - of the hills, plains, the coffee plantations and the valleys deep down below ! The statue of upright Gen Cariappa welcomed us into the town of Madikeri.

We had a nice lunch - hot steamed rice and hot sambar - awesome change from the bread and cheese we'd had for the last 2 days. Then took a bus to Kushalnagar and reached Nisargadhama. The highlight of this leg of the journey was a cool elephant ride we undertook :). We had a nice refreshing bath in the Cauvery river and then headed back to Kushalnagar. From there we took a bus to Mysore and from there to Bangalore.

Yet another amazing trip came to end when we reached Majestic bus stand. The recollection of all the beautiful feelings, the air, the wind, the tricks of the moon and the sun, the different shades of green on the peaks, in the valleys, on the plains, off the coffee plantations - all will remain etched in memory forever. Just can't forget that sunrise we saw from atop the rock ! Over all, a very very satisfying and memorable trip.

Lighter moments
---------------

- We kept bugging Shiv for all his pronunciations and English language usage of aint, cant etc ;).

- He called "Elnir" or tender coconut as "Bonda". That was the first time, I'd heard anyone call it "bonda" .. we just burst out laughing ; that really got psenti ;)

Swings of Life

2005-07-14T20:46:00.000+10:00

Life is nothing but a see-saw of emotions. One feels high for a period of time and then sinks low deep down the woods at other times. The aim of spiritual gurus is to balance these emotions and be free of this world of being-affected!

I am not a believer in the sheep-shepherd way of life. That I live in the dark and I'm a sinner and a messiah will come and show me the light and redeem all my sins. I don't want to believe that I'm sinner in the first place. Makes me feel like a hopeless case. May be the thoughts and prayers of those type were valid for a certain period of time and the conditions that prevailed at that time. But certainly not in my case.

As I examine the vagaries of emotions one feels - I think the enemy lies deep within. It's so easy to take offence to what somebody else says and dismiss the person a 'weird' guy/girl, stupid, mean etc etc. But the effect of being hurt is completely internal. You feel hurt only if you want to. And I know for a fact that people want to! If only we sat and cried for all the pain we cause to ourselves, a lifetime is not enough. Atleast for some people.

The main culprit I presume is the devil called 'expectation'. One does so many things in anticipation of something in return. That's living in a world of expectations. I somehow have got out of that world a long back. When I do something good for somebody, it's because I know that that person will be happy if I did it. Not because I expect them to do something for me someday when I feel that someone should do it for me! Whether it's buying a sweet for a near one, whether it's making the person by showing around some place - it's completely out of the feeling of doing good - not out of expectation.

Today I'm in the trough of feelings. I don't know how to express it! So I blog here.

In conclusion, there are two ways of being philosophical - happily philosophical or depressedly philosophical. When one is happy, the philosophy is not evident. You just want to have the moment with you. You don't even realize that you are happy philosophically or spiritually. But when the going gets tough is when one realizes how tough it is lose that spiritual capital.

Visitor

2005-07-12T16:35:00.000+10:00

I saw this bird in a quite corner of the Kaveri river in the Ranganathittu bird sanctuary. Did he need a visa, passport or other documents? Fly like a bird and go around the world! Any ideas on what he's thinking?

Weekend TV and some preaching

2005-07-07T01:17:00.000+10:00

TV viewing over the weekend, suddenly there was so much to watch on saturday.

Simultaneously, there were three amazing events happening:

- Wimbledon women's finals which was a good fight right through to the end. We watched this between the over breaks of the Cricket match.
- The best cricket match I remember watching in the recent times - the England - Aus Natwest trophy finals. The way it swung from one side to the other; the the best 2 teams in one day cricket today showed why they're up there. The way England's going, I don't think Aussies are gonna be the no.1 for too long.
- The live8 concert had some of the best music in the world being played across the world. The highlight of course was the Pink Floyd got together after 20 years. Their part came at almost 4 AM on Sunday morning. Luckily, we had to go for a party which which was on till 3 AM .. so just got back home in time for the GODs. The other band which was simply awesome was The
Who. I've listened to their music for a while now. It was amazing watching grandpas playing like they always did! Class is permanent is the best way to summarize what we saw.

Some of the ads and documentaries shown during the show were quite psyching. I didn't know Africa was in such deep shit. I thought they were only a little worse off than India.

I hope the CDs of the show are sold. It was really one event the world won't forget in a hurry.

On another note, the BIG jokers of the world, lead by the chief is meeting in Scotland. I sincerely hope they do something about emission of carbon. Bush in an interview yesterday that it "might" be possible that global warming is being caused by human activity. How much of it has been
contributed by bombing Afghanistan and Iraq, should be a study on its own.

As all you guys in the US get used to the "lifestyle" of America, and as this "lifestyle" spreads to India also, I think some very simple steps can be taken for the overall cause of the energy crisis and global warming:

- Especially in India, use the Sun to dry your clothes rather energy guzzling washing machine dryers. I don't know how much it applicable in the US, but I'm sure there must be a way
- Always ask for paper covers or no covers - no plastic please! I hope plastic is banned in Bangalore very soon!
- I know it's damn cool thing to be driving SUVs - but be concious that fossil fuels can't last too long. While today you still get the fuels of the world by bombing and capturing all oil containing nations.

Okay - that's a lot of preaching for the day :) .. Good day!

Imrana and the fatwa

2005-07-04T18:39:00.000+10:00

TV channels are buzzing with activity on debates over the Imrana issue. There are so many articles written in all newspapers. It's a shocking discovery to many, that in a crime, it's the victim who is being punished!

This article gives a summary of the issues involved.

The so-called muslim elite have been interviewed on so many channels. What I fail to understand is : How all of them are compltetely against or very vague in their opinion about a uniform civil code? Is there something wrong in implementing a civil code that is equal to all?

The great secular leaders are also pretty silent on the issue. Why should anyone have a problem with a law that treats all communities equally ensuring gender justice? Beyond politics and that too of the vote bank kinds, I see no reason at all!

Evolution obstructed!

2005-07-01T22:52:00.000+10:00

As we move into more automated homes and jazzy home theater systems, are we cutting ourselves off from a very essential component in our environment called Nature? The more we lock ourselves into our rooms, the less resistant we become to diseases.

Isn't a construction labourer more resistant to common cold and fever than I am? Is a guy richer than me and one who's not seen or felt anything of nature less resistant to virus and bacteria than I am? As we go through our so-called economic 'evolution' the less resistant we become to changes in nature. Weather changes inflict diseases, change of water cause colds and fevers all over. A guy who lives in India is quite resistant to diseases and pollution. When you take him and put him in an environment where everything around him is more protected like say in the US or Australia, he's doing great while he's there. But the moment he returns to India - he needs mineral water, he gets bronchial diseases and can't step out in the traffic! What's happened to his body's ability to fight the disease?

In the animal world, there's no concept of medicine. How does an animal survive a disease? I guess, only the fitter ones survive? The weaker ones are eliminated gradually and what you have is a gene pool of strong individuals! As the genetic pool keeps its variety and strength, it aids in evolution. Over centuries and millennia, the need to perform some particular activity lead to some adaptations and consequently evolution. In the human world, we have successfully prevented this from occurring!

The invention of Penicillin was a revolution indeed. It was a revolution that prevented many deaths at that time. But, the bacteria we were fighting got stronger! Today, penicillin is useless. The dosage of antibiotics have increased - so have the strength of many of these antibiotics. But, what's happened to our bodies? What's happening to our WBCs which are supposed to fight anything external? Weakened! By what? By our own action of cutting ourselves off from the rest of our planet!! And fighting every damn problem with external medicines.

Today we have WBCs which can't do anything on their own. Whether it's a skin acne or common cold or headache, there are scores of people who love to chew their antibiotics and 'just get rid of the damn disease'. Hello, what happened to your patience? The next time the same bacteria would've learnt to survive that stupid drug. Next stop? Stronger anti-biotic!!

Imagine a completely different situation. I'm talking about a world without drugs and medicines. Our WBCs would've become stronger? Result? Stronger lot of humans. So that's the evolution we've arrested on the biology front.

Now, we have automated accounting and counting. The human mind slowly loses its ability to think. As we get greater to automated lifestyles, the human mind draws a mental map of familiarity. And what happens when this mind is taken out of its familiar territory? Chaos! Insecurity! Take the simple example of the art of counting and mental arithmetic. Growing up in India, the best exposure to arithmetic came from the neighbourhood grocery shop. The kanaku pullay or the accounts guy always seemed to have a way with numbers. Today with automated cash registers and billing systems taking control of the world of arithmetic, even simple addition and subtraction has become quite an arduous task for the mind.

Automated lifestyles prevent evolution of the second kind - of the mind! If everything is so well taken care of by the system in which we live, what does the mind do? It wanders into so many feelings and thoughts. As we grow into emotional islands, we start suspecting everybody of deceit! Anger and frustration grow ! Alas, that is the evolution of the mind obstructed!

Mysore Trip - Day 2

2005-06-30T17:13:00.000+10:00

Day 1 of the trip ended in some confusion over the hotel rooms. We needed 2 rooms because we were four people. But the guy in hotel goofed up and we had to find another room at 11 PM!

Anyway, the next morning we woke up at 8.30AM in our new room at The Gallery view hotel right opposite the Jaganmohan Palace which is also the Art Gallery.

After a few hiccups with an auto driver which led to much bigger hiccup between me and my wife, we started planning our day. We ate mallige idlies for breakfast in Hotel Siddhartha. I strongly recommend this place - very clean and reasonably priced.

Our travel day started with Chamundi betta.

Chamundi Hills

The drive up to Chamundi Hills is serene. On the wat there is the Karanji lake. The views of the Lalith Mahal palace on the way is fantastic.

On top of Chamundi betta, is a huge statue of Mahishasura greeting you. The temple's gopura can be seen from quite a distance. Like any other pilgrimage place, it was very crowded. Sunday is completely different day in the calender of the indian tourist. Every place looks so scrowded. And the same place when visited on a weekday would seem like heaven!

Anyway, it was a long queue for drashan of Chamundeshwari. There were lot of people and quite some pushing around. The sevaks also looked ill-trained to handle crowds. But on darshan it felt good. The deity was done up nicely.

Shots here:

View of Lalith Mahal from Chamundi betta:

Somnathapura

Tucked away deep in Mandya district are the magnificent ruins of Somnathapura. It's 40Km from Mysore near Bannur. We drove through the countryside of Karnataka - the richer side of Mandya district.

As we arrived in Somnathapura, we had some Tea in local tea shop. There was an art store with bronze structures and carvings made by different tribals in India. That was a unique collection of bronze art and resembled the kinds we'd read in history textbooks about the Harappan culture. The stuff there is really impressive - but then so are the prices! There were art items from Todas in Nilgiris, Gonda tribe in Madhya Pradesh and some Naga tribal art too!

The main monument of Somnathapura is very well protected. The entire complex is beautifully maintained. The lawns all around the temple gives an impressive backdrop for the main attarction.

The deepa sthamba of the Keshava temple:

The temple has some of the most intricate carvings I've seen made on soapstone.
Most of the sculptures are based on Ramayana, Mahabharata and other Vishnu's avatars. As we drove out of Somnathapura back to Mysore, it was a feeling of satisfaction.

Mysore Trip - Day 1

2005-06-28T18:34:00.000+10:00

Last weekend was yet another fantabulous weekend. We traveled to Mysore and wanted to show Aunty and Pixie around Mysore.

We left Bangalore by the 5.30 AM train – Kaveri Express. We reached Mysore by 8.30AM. We found a hotel Abhishek assisted and recommended by an auto driver. We checked in and wasted no time in getting onto the road.

Mysore Palace

We reached the Mysore Palace by 10AM. The first sight of the palace is impressive. The new palace was built to completion in 1912 by JayaChamaraja Wodeyar. The older palace as one is told repeatedly was burnt down in 1897. A few parts of the old palace have been preserved. The old palace was built in wood. The new palace in contrast is a modern structure.

The palace looks grand from the outside. The insides of the palace are stunning in places and a bit mediocre in some other. There are a huge number of paintings in the palace, not necessarily connected by any particular theme. Most of the paintings depict the royal processions taken out during the dashera season. I believe that Mysore is completely lit up quite spectacularly during the dashera season. The flooring had very interesting patterns of what I thought looked like regular symmetrical figures. I was seriously reminded of some algebra from college.

It takes a long time to explore the different parts of the palace. It requires good stamina and enthu to completely go through all the art work in the palace.

There are 6 temples inside the palace complex- very nice sculpture on the Gopuras. One such temple is:

Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary

20 Km drive from Mysore is Ranganathittu. It’s a group of small islands on the Kaveri River. Some of the most beautiful birds of the world have made it their home for nesting. One auto driver outside had this to say when I asked him what was to see in Ranganathittu – “Saar, adu foreign inda paksheegallu ella barrate saar. Tumba channage irratey nodakke.” – meaning that there are lots of birds that come from foreign countries and nest here.

As you go into the sanctuary you are greeted by some loner birds here and there. But as you go deeper into the woods and the riverside the beauty and serenity of the place magnifies. The best part is the boat ride – one gets to see such amazing flying angels. Storks, Herons, Pelicans, Swans, Ducks and a good variety of other birds rarely seen in everyday life are in plenty. This is not the season for migratory birds in India and yet we saw so many varieties of birds.

I tried my photography skills with the limited feature set available on my Sony DSC-P2. I did manage to get a few nice shots of the birds.

Here’s a shot of a bird walking straight into a croc! But we didn’t witness any predatory scene there.

Even the lawns of the sanctuary outside are very neatly kept. We just laid there and chatted for a good long time about the beauty of the flora and fauna of the place. We took a long walk along the banks of the river. The sound of bamboos in the cool wind was music to all our ears. An abandoned boat on the bank fascinated Pixie quite a bit and she went crazy clicking the snaps of the boat.

The Lover trees as we named them was another fascinating display of nature’s magic. See this snap and you’ll understand what I’m talking about.

These are actually two different intertwined into each other’s metabolism so wonderfully. I really wonder what phenomenon of nature caused this kind of Siamese twin like trees!

This is a shot of the herons I took just before we left Ranganathittu.

We just relaxed in the lawns for quite a while and took a walk around the sanctuary. Some more shots we took there:

Brindavan Gardens

We drove off in our hired cab from Ranganathittu with memories of the beauty of the place and music of the wind in the bamboo shoots.

Brindavan and KRS are nice sights but a bit too crowded. The dancing musical fountain and the illumination is definitely good and worth the hype.

Vehicles of GODs

2005-06-27T19:07:00.000+10:00

Yesterday we were in Somnathapura near Mysore. It's one of the most amazing monuments I've seen of the Hindu civilization. More details about the trip will come later; but here I just wanted to recap some points of Hindu mythology before I forget. Most of this recap is due to the guide at Somnathpura, Mr. Ramakrishna, an amzing guy - deserves to be a teacher!

GOD	Role	Vehicle used for transportation
Bramha	Creator	Swan(Hamsa)
Saraswathi	Goddess of Education	Peacock(Mayura)
Vishnu	Protector	Eagle(Garuda)
Lakshmi	Goddess of Wealth	Elephant(Gaja)
Shiva	Destroyer	Bull(Nandi)
Parvathi	Goddess of Strength	Lion(Simha)

Other important Gods and their vahanas are :

Indra - Airavatha - 4-tusked White Elephant
Ganesha - Mushika - Mouse
Karthikeya - Mayura - Peacock

Another recap - the 10 avatars of Vishnu were :

1. Matsya avatar - Fish
2. Kurma avatar - Tortoise
3. Varaha avatar - Boar(Pig)
4. Narasimha avatar - Half man, half lion
5. Vamana avatar - A dwarf brahmin
6. Parashurama - Angry sage
7. Rama - We all know Rama
8. Krishna - Hare Krishna
9. Buddha - Messenger of peace
10. Kalki - Yet to occur!

I went into a nice trip of hindu mythology yesterday.

I'm also trying to recap some other childhood stories. I've already forgotten the details of these told by my grandmom, Appa and Amma. I'll just list down the titles for now - but I really want to jot down the details somewhere :

1. Ottey Chana kathey
2. Mudki Payasa
3. Kagi Gubbi kathey
4. Orulu beku

Will post a detailed account of the trip tomorrow.

2 more fundas I learnt from the Guide:

GOD = Giver, Operator and Destroyer -> The trinity of Hindu Gods

LOVE = Look, Observe, Verify and Enjoy :)

Lalbagh

2005-06-24T16:48:00.000+10:00

Wednesday was an awesome day. Both Pooja and I bunked office and decided to chill out at home and go to Lalbagh. It started off very well with a lunch at MTR. Yummm ..hmmm .. Those're the word to describe the lunch at MTR. It's a long 6-7 course Karnataka meal. I went on almost till the last course. Pooja and Aunty retired much earlier!

Then to cool off and help the cause of digestion of the food, we went for a walk into Lalbagh. Lalbagh has always been one of my favourite places in Bangalore. The walk around the lake is usually divine. But this time it was really special. The weather was simply superb. The grey skies have returned to Bangalore and brought back its old glory.

This is a shot I took from the Glass house.

The view from the bench where we sat and chatted for a long time. What you can't see in the picture is the wind and feelings of the people at the place. Divine - is an understatement!

We discovered this Nagalinga pushpa by accident. This tree was near the nursery. When you open up the flower, it looks like a small Linga covered by the hood of snakes above. Quite a rare and exotic flower that grows straight out of the trunk of the tree. It was a beautiful sight with the wind blowing and the slight drizzle making the flowers drop down at a regular rate.

The famous Queen's flower seen all around Bangalore. The pavements off MG Road have a lot of these trees.

This picture summarizes the day. Quite an amazing day! After that we went to Prasanna doddappa's house and Anand Uncle's house. Spent very good quality family time. God, I love them all :-)

Mumbai Xpress

2005-06-23T20:58:00.000+10:00

We watched this movie day before yesterday. Kamal Hassan's Mumbai Xpress is a total laugh riot. That's the only word that aptly describes the movie.

Forget your brain and logic, just enjoy the moments in the movie. Vijay Raaz as Digambar is amazing. The entire story has been very well intertwined as a comedy of errors. The planner of the kidnap plot, Digambar has his assistants in the form of Johnson and another guy.

I think I'm pretty bad at reviewing movies. I can't write a story too well. So I leave you to google for the movie's reviews. But, I would strongly recommend it as a 'must see' wholesome family entertainer.

Tanjore Paintings

2005-06-20T20:24:00.000+10:00

Yesterday we visited Vimal's Aunt's house. She is into making Tanjore paintings.

Thanjavur, situated in the Kaveri delta is the origin of one of the most exquisite arts in South India. It's an amzing amalgamation art and crafts. The basic paintings are all based on mythology. Some of the famous paintings include the Ramar pattabhishekam or Rama's coronation ceremony. We have this paiting at home in Pondicherry.

The way the painting is created really painstaking and cumbersome. The base painting is first created on cloth. Then using only vegetable dyes and water colour, the figure is enhanced. Then, gold paper is stuck and stones are planted at appropraite place to create a 3D effect. The end result is quite stunning.

There are amazing photos on the web describing the Tanjore paintings.

saraswathi

Water

2005-06-16T21:37:00.000+10:00

June 5th was World Environment day. We celeberated it on June 3rd at Philips. One Dr. Rajeev Gowda was invited as Chief Guest on that day to speak on Green Cities. He is a Prof at IIM Bangalore and a Ph.D from Wharton. He's also a budding politician - a congress party member.

He made a very interesting point during his speech. India certainly missed the industrial revolution. But when it happened in England, London went through exactly the same mess as Bangalore is goinf through today. Bangalore's the spear head of the IT revolution. This en-masse migration to the city, unscruplus expansion and rotten politics is killing the place defintely. But, there might be hope! London went through the same kind of mess - pollution, mass migration and poor infra-structure.

Very near home, Delhi's been doing pretty well. Thanks primarily to the supremem court. CNG buses and autos - half the pollutants are off. Bring in a mass rapid transit system, people start discovering each other! Hopefully, Bangalore may be saved before it drowns.

The real danger is in fact Water. We know the famous saying that the future wars will be fought over water. We know from the past the way Tamil Nadu and Karnataka fight over the Kaveri. The same story is repeated in Punjab and Haryana for the Yamuna waters. Across the border, Punjab and Sindh fight like dogs for the water of the Indus.

Traditionally, south Karnataka had a very good system of water conservation through keres. Whether it the good looking Ulsoor kere pretty much in the heart of the city, the Lalbagh kere - south karnataka has a system of channels where in the overflow from one tank goes into the next and thus also recharges the ground water. We don't have any major rivers in South Karnataka. The Kaveri is a good 100Km from Bangalore. This great river also is in the record books for being the most utilized river on earth.

With these keres slowly disappearing - some dried up, some lost to utter negligence and hyacinth, lots lost to so called development of layouts. Jayanagar T Block today stands on a former lake. So the Majestic bus stand. In my lifetime, I've seen the disappearance of a lake in Pondicherry. The lovely greenary on the way to school, suddenly became a VVP Nagar one day!!

What is the way ahead now? Compulsory rain water harvesting? As usual, the biggest problem is : how do you enforce it? The crazy floods that happen after every rain are a direct result of the blocking of the natural channels of water flow. Somehow, we need to restore the old dys of water conservation all over south karnataka. It was a sad state when I saw Arsikere completely dry on the way back from Kemmanagundi. So are numeruos lakes in Tumkur district.

Okay - that's the bleak picture. Some kind of time travel - we should see the glorious past. We love our glorious past don't we? All of us Indians .. Do we have that glorious a future? May be the pollution and public transport will be taken care. But, Water will be the most important decider!

Adityaya Namaha

2005-06-15T20:22:00.000+10:00

We have saluted the Sun in Indian culture since time immemorial. It's an infinite source(may be infinitely measurable) of energy. We worship it in the form of Surya bhagavan. We salute the sun as part of Surya Namaskar. We assosciate exposure to sun to perform yoga as a divine routine.

Now we need to extend this practice to other spheres of life. The energy is there to be tapped. We are blessed with so much sunshine every year. Let's start utilising this abundant source of energy for our needs.

Some ideas and products that already exist :

- Solar water heaters (domestic and industrial)
- Solar Cookers - We've seen this in action
- Dry your clothes in the sun ( rather than use high energy consuming washing machine dryers)
- Solar recharge batteries ( if they dont exist already, i hope they are developed soon enough)
- Solar buses ( Heard that Reva is already getting down to this)
- Solar street lights ( This concept has been around since my school days - but may be it is still very expensive - but in quite a few remote locations, this is the best source. I remember that in Jungle lodges, this was the mode of camp lighting)
- Photo Voltaic Cells - Imagine the power that can be tapped from the Thar desert
- Water purification - Read the dynamised water concept of Auroville
- Water desalination kits

Imagine, the amount of energy saved by these small steps will relieve the country's energy bills. The Govt. also should promote these by giving good concessions. I've heard that in Germany there are very good incentives for solar energy usage.

The per capita carbon emission of India is around 0.25 metric tonnes. This is still one fourth the world average. This is still 1/22nd of what that terrorist country in the West which Columbus discovered by accident, emits. All this despite the sad statistic that 65% of the rural households in India still burn firewood or animal dung for fuel. Isn't it time to change the face of India? We can show the world how to efficiently re-use and recycle energy.

!! Om Adityaya namaha !!

Where do I want to be ..

2005-06-14T15:31:00.000+10:00

Don't we all have that dream profession that we really think would be the ideal one? I so often sit and wonder what is it that will make me really happy doing.

The list of things that fascinate me are :

- Travel
- History
- Talking - may be eventually some kind of a public speaking
- Teaching mathematics - high school level

I wonder what's happened to my academic enthu. I used to love reading .. I loved solving problems in Math. Now everything work related takes a cynical twist. Where's that enthu gone?

I thought I was good at writing. But when I started writing those essays for b-school, I was pathetic. My english was bad! My sentences had grammatical mistakes!! And I thought I was used in writing !!

History fasciantes me still. If the history is related to mystery - even more so. Hampi in North Karnataka is so mysterious. So is Angkor Vatt in Cambodia. That's the latest addition to my list of must do historical places. Of course, the pyramids of Egypt are still high in the list.

I really want to live in an Indian village for a while. Say teach some high school maths to kids. Tell them the basics of calculus. Wouldn't that be fun? Implement some basic things that will improve the life of those people. And live in the midst of green fields and clean unpolluted air while doing this.

Solar energy is of course another interest. I need to go beyond just redaing about it and make something. Some sites give procedures to make these things.

Ok - to begin with - I still need to start gymming and cut down this flab of mine!

The Grand Wedding!

2005-06-13T17:27:00.000+10:00

We are back after attending the Prince of Pattambi's wedding reception in the capital of his kingdom.

Trips, Pooja and I left from home by around 12.30 PM on Saturday afternoon. We drove drove and reached Pattambi at 11 PM that night. The Prince was in the hotel where we were staying. Met him for a very brief period and just damar crashed.

The next morning at around 10 AM Trips came and woke us up saying the reception had been advanced and it was in the afternoon itself. So we got up and started getting ready at a good pace.

When I was in the bathroom, I heard a loud orchestra of conch shells and drum beating in traditional kerala style. That was the arrival of the Prince to the stage. We got ready and went to the hall. The Prince and the new Princess Sharanya were there attired in suit-boot and saree
respectively.

There was an elephant parked outside the hall decorated in gold the kinds i've seen in mysore dashera functions. So we suspect he either rode in to the hall on that or was going to leave on that !!

The praja that attended were from far away lands and places. The whole of Pattambi was definitely there. So were people like Ankur who had flown in from Jammu for the occasion.

We had a full scale mallu lunch. After the lunch we were so stuffed - we wanted to take a walk in Pattambi. So we asked people around there whether there was anything to see in Pattambi. One uncle's jaw dropped and said you have already seen whatever is there to see in Pattambi. We decided that it was a stupid idea and so left Pattambi by around 1.30 PM. Drove through the greenary of Kerala's Palakkad district.

Some comments on the drive part :

- The contrast in the green levels of Kerala and TN were sucha contrast. The moment you cross the border, the trees are gone! The thick lush greenary is replaced by shrubbery all around!!

- Had fun driving on the highways with zebra-crossings ;) .. Not a joke!!

- The four lane highway from Krishnagiri onwards is cool. But the people driving on them are as stupid as they were!! Slow trucks spewing smoke and taking a good 1/2 hour to overtake the guy in front and thus causing a convoy of vehicles to be formed behind!

- On the return trip, we stopped at Tiruppur - the T-shift capital of India, Did some cool shopping of T-shirts that were meant to become Banana Republic and Sears branded - for 70-80 Ruppes :))) .. that was really worth it!

We have a photo taken at the reception. Will upload it tomorrow.

Motorcycle diary

2005-06-09T17:30:00.000+10:00

I just wanted to blog that crazy trip of ours. It all started when on Friday morning we felt like getting out of town. I started looking up jungle lodges and some other resorts. All were booked!

Tour sketch:

Bike travelled on : Suzuki Fiero

Start 6.30 AM, 4th June, 2005 - Bangalore

Route followed : Blore - Nelamangala - Kunigal - Hassan - Belur - Chikmagalur - Kemmanagundi.

Time taken : Close to 11 hours - breaks almost every 1/2 hour. Final stretch from Chikmagalur to Kemmanagundi was bad! But very scenic and beautiful :) NH 4 upto Nelamangala - NH 48 upto Hassan - SH from Hassan to Chikmagalur - village road from Chikmagalur to Kemmanagundi.

Reached Kemmanagundi : 5.30 PM

Here's the general landscape of the area between Chikmagalur and Kemmanagundi.

5th June, 2005 : Woke up to see a beautiful mist outside our room. Slight rain!

Started trek to Hebbe falls at 1.00 PM .. Couldn't find the way on our own. Spoke to 3 kids and engaged them as our guides - Harish, Nagaraj and Manikandan. Amazing trek through forests and coffee estates. One part is very steep - down, down and down while going! Up, up and up while climbing back.

Saw some wonderful wild flowers and orchids growing on trees. We've brought home 2 orchids. Hope they grow on our tree.

We saw this beautiful sunset on the way back:

Got back to the room by evening. Shifted to Raja Bhavan in the morning. Much better room, awesome lighting.

Had a cold water bath. Sat down in the garden steps. What an amazing sky we saw!! Star-studded. Fantastic wind. Spoke and chatted and felt very romantic!

6th June, 2005 : Woke up to a lovely day again. Went down to the canteen for breakfast. Started on a trek to Z-point by accident. What an amazing place! What views! Really awesome.

This snap was taken on the Z-point:

Started back to Bangalore at 1.30PM. Decided to take the other route.

Return journey: 1.30 PM

Route : Kemmanagundi - Lingdahalli - Birur - Arsikere - Tiptur - Tumkur - Bangalore

NH 206 was beautiful. Lovely views. Landscape changes with every district. Hassan district had coconut trees. Tumkur had cactus!!

It poured and poured on the way from Lingdahalli to Birur. We continued for a while then got too wet. Stopped under a tree.

Took breaks almost every 1/2 hour. Was very necessary! For the sake of our bums :). Reached Tumkur by 7 PM. Then on to the 4 lane highway to Bangalore. Reached home after a stop at IISC by 10.30 PM.

What a lovely trip! One of the best!

Photos here : http://www.kodakgallery.com/BrowsePhotos.jsp?&collid=128417334205&page=1&sort_order=0

Bike trip ..

2005-06-03T23:20:00.000+10:00

We plan to go on a motorbike trip starting tomorrow morning. Hope we succeed in our mission. May the force be with us.

Destination : seriously thinking of Kemmanagundi near Chikmagalur. My bike's not exactly in great condition but what the heck! We really need to get out of town for a couple of days ..

Anyway, every Indian must visit this site on th enet : www.kamat.com - one of the best websites and collection of photographs I've seen. Really gives me enthu to take up photography as a hobby!

See you people on Monday if everything goes well :-)

The storms and beyond ..

2005-05-26T16:49:00.000+10:00

The last 4 days we've been witnessing storms every evening in Bangalore. The pattern is so typical - it starts getting windy and there's a dust storm like gale - the temperature drops like crazy and then it hails and rains.

The worst was day before yesterday. 2 Trees and an electric pole fell in our street. The we had a power cut that lasted 29 hours :(((( .. The night and early morning were manageable - the air was cool and there was a pleasant wind blowing throughout. But then around 9 AM came the surprise - we ran out of water :( - coz there was no power to pump the water up!

Anyway that was one horrible day. The electricity dept took a whole to put the pole straight up.

Yesterday was another storm. There was a picture in the paper the other day - it seriously looked like the sea - but it turned out to be a road in bangalore.

And all this - before the monsoon has set in !!

The INSEAD App

2005-05-20T21:31:00.000+10:00

While writing my INSEAD essays I realized a few points about my own character and my future plans. The entire apping process was really useful in that regard. Even though it can pain quite a bit. Some important takeaways from the entire excercise :

1. It's difficult to be prceise and convey all that you wanted to say. Every point needs to be substantiated. But the word limits are so damn low. Brevity certainly is not my current strength. I need to work on how to make my writing intersting, brief and humurous.

2. My long-term gaols certainly got clarified. I do want to be an entrapreneur. And I do want to be an entrapreneur in the renewable energy field. How, I don't know yet! But "why", I'm pretty clear. The world is goddamn dying. It needs an answer to this madness for the oil. We have the Sun shining away to glory all the time in the year especially in India. Why, can't we use it? I want to change this world, yes. There are so many different routes to it. I could be a peace volunteer, a politician, an environmental activist. But, I'm chosing the MBA route. Yes, I do want to change the world!

3. My short-term goal is also very clear now. I want to revolutionize the way these solar products are sold. So for that, I want to sell some existing product! I'm in the field of product management in a way. I do Release management. So the natural progression for me is product management.

4. I feel proud about my country. India is where the past meets the future. This is where business is going to grow. China's much bigger - but the stability of the Indian democracy is where I would invest in. If the chinese wake up one day to fight for their freedom, then it'll roll back their economy by a significant number of years! No such problems with India.

5. My character : what are my strengths and weaknesses. Frankly, my main weakness is laziness. But can I say that to an Adcom! Hell, no ! I'm sure I wouldn't want a lazy guy in my team. So no point in telling the truth. So the next big weakness is certainly procrastination. That's what I've put in there. Hope the story works.
My strength definitely is my pateince. I've done very well on the personal front only because of my patience. Actually it's a combination of patience and thick-skin. That makes me cool in a lot of situations.

6. My english language skills are dan lousy. That's one thing I figured out from the various reviews by my friends. And God, help me acquire brevity !

Anyways, the Reccos were okay. My past managers - actually Shirish was never really my manager. But he is a manager! Gayathri also was a manager with whom I had good relationship. Hopefully, she's given me a good recco.

Anyways, more on the apping front soon. To be continued ..

Firefox

2005-05-20T20:01:00.000+10:00

Just downloaded Firefox 1.0.4 from the Mozilla website. I've used it before and I really love the TABbed browsing. More than anything else, it's the tendency of the human brain to seek change that is the biggest plus about Firfox. Of course, the tabbed browsing also means the browser does not open infinite windows on the taskbar.

I can now set the 2 proxies in two different browsers. Of course the security related aspects are much better in Firefox than IE. Would like to try out some other browsers too! Anyone has any idea?

Browsing

2005-05-19T20:24:00.000+10:00

I've been browsing so much of late. Till the apps for INSEAD were sent, I was browsing for loads and loads of stuff on renewable energy. It's a very interesting topic to browse on.

Then of course the second most browsed topic is why MBA and essay writing tips sites. That's not all that interesting. Only when I wrote these formal essays did I realise that I'm such a verbose writer. I take up so much space for writing something very small!

Now of course the new topic for browsing is my profession. Testing as a profession is pretty young and interesting. There are lots of articles on the topic. I found James Bach's blog very interesting : http://blackbox.cs.fit.edu/blog/james/

As I explore more and more terms for the upcoming apps and also my own work, browsing adds huge value to one's knowledge. Be it registering in the Wharton or INSEAD knowledge sites or taking subscription of the Earthscan online magazine.

Pondy!

2005-04-25T23:09:00.000+10:00

Pondicherry is my home town. Everytime I go there I feel more psenti about it. Its a beautiful place to re-discover with your beloved :).

We went to Repos beach late evening yesterday. I've always wanted to show her the spectacle of a moonrise in Pondicherry. I'd seen it once before in the main city beach. But what we saw yesterday was something totally blissful and mind-blowing. The full circle of the moon could be seen rising from iside the ocean. The cool breeze blowing, the height of the tides increasing and the sounds of the birds returning home :) and your beloved in your arms - the feeling was surreal !

As the orange-white ball rose higher into the sky, I was reminded of an old doubt I'd always had. Why does the Sun appear to move faster when its near the horizon? I'd asked this question long back in a Science Program called 'Turning Point'. Never really got a satisfactory answer to that question.

Anyway, coming back to the point - Pondicherry - alas - it feels like a poem everytime I visit the blessed land. I just hope it continues to stay as beautiful ...

Listen O Janamejeya

2005-01-10T18:50:00.000+11:00

That was the name of the play we watched yesterday at Rangashankara. It was directed by a junior of ours called Okri.

The story was pretty awesome. The acting was even better. The story revolves around 4 characters - one an old man who believes experience is everything; a youth who belives that zeal alone can take him far far away; a pretty young woman who is a normal woman who wants security and believes that it's determination that will take anyone somewhere! And then the common man called Samanyappa - who belives that one should work hard and not allow oneself the luxury of thinking of unnecessary things. Just eat before you sleep, sleep after you eat, get up the next morning and work and tire yourself out and just repeat the process over and over again.

Then there are 2 other characters - one is a director of the play; the other is the leader who preaches that everything's wrong with this earth and we need to transport ourselves to the moon or mars! That's where the solution lies.

The story progresses act by act - the first in which the inside of the characters is revealed; the second one in which the outside occupational life of the characters is enacted. Then the final act with a lot complicated dialogues such as "Let the living live and dead die!". And "in the kingdom of the dead, the alive person is called a ghost".

I haven't fully analysed the impact and meaning of the play. But the performances were superlative! I think the general conclusion is that just live your life the way you want to. Don't over philosophize.

Rangashankara is doing a great job in the theater scene in Bangalore.

It's already 6 days !

2005-01-06T15:38:00.000+11:00

Happy new year to you all! Had an okay new year party.

We've been mad running around looking for houses. It's easily tyhe craziest thing one can do. The houses look so sad, located in pathetic localities or they're like some Aushwitz ghettos. Finally we found a house that looks good but has a greedy owner. Tried some hard bargaining. Got a few concessions.

In the meantime, dealing with in-laws and parents is getting to be quite a challenge. I don't intend calling them dad or mom ! Uncle and aunty should be good.

Really need to relax now. More updates to follow!

Gizmo man

2004-12-14T23:51:00.000+11:00

Got my new laptop :) .. I've become a gizmo guy. An awesome mobile phone and now an awesome laptop. Got a Dell Inspiron 700m .. It's really sleek and light.

Never imagined myself being such a gizmo freak!

Wow quote

2004-12-10T21:33:00.000+11:00

Just felt "wow!" about this quote .. Dont want to lose it ! So blogging it !

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.

---- Mark Twain