Bangalore Shivers

Take a girl out of a sweaty, sand filled place with a couple of nice beaches thrown in and put her in a place where the biggest water body around happens to be called Ulsoor LAKE.

Now mix in a hundred even days dry as tinder, a fifty or so emptying the heavens and an odd eleven with temperatures of fifteen on an average.

The resultant is me shivering in my bathroom after dunking myself with water at sub zero temperature. It is a vicious cycle with a deep dark conspiracy thrown in. The thought process goes something like this, depending on the outside temperature...

Hmmmm, a nip in the wind... should I switch on the geyser? Hmmmm... yeah that should be about right...let me try anyway...(a mug of hitherto unknown, but very soon to be discovered cold water is on its way to my toes, which are about the only parts I can feel after the water flows down)...holy %^$@....the geyser is a good thing after all! (opens the hot water faucet)... ah! all that steam makes me feel that much better! Wait a minute now we would not want the water getting too hot ha ha I am not going to fall for that and scald myself let me see how hot.....aaaaaaaarrgh! !@#!^% &^%$%^!(*, bloody hell!

Lesson learnt: One can be scalded in one way too many, for example, by the water on its way into the bucket from the faucet which coincidentally might also result in a long long burn on your forearm.

If it only all ended there! But no, finally after one manages to collect enough water to take a bath, the first mug is warm enough not to scald you but cold enough to continue giving you goosebumps from the cold. Then the wiser-after-getting-burnt you decides to use all that calculus and begins to add hot water in delta amounts. And you wait, and you wait and you wait some more, while you freeze some more and the water, miraculously is nowhere close to that Utopian temperature. So you decide to defy all logic and add a heuristically appropriate amount of hot water now and get ready to soak in bliss when again, you cannot feel anything but your toes, this time for the rest of you is busy being burnt.

It is approximately around here that lesser mortals would just give it all up, drench yourself in freezing water and stumble out, grateful to have your skin still on.

As for me, I head to work and bully them into parceling me to warmer climes called Bombay

Long loops and noodle sticks

I generally love my hair and on most normal days it loves me back. So logically, Sunday must have been anything but normal. For one, it ended up in a lot of my hair lying on the floor without me attached at the right end.

It is not like I have a bad hair-cut history though. Hair cuts from age 4 (that is as far back as I can remember)to age 15 involved one-stool-with-white-sheet affairs. No fancy parlors with big shiny mirrors for me. No sir! Daddy used to lug me and sister to the local mustache trimmer and ask him to chop it all off as closely as possible (yes, you are absolutely right, there were lots of times when we were mistaken for a pair of particularly cute looking boys, specially given my mom's penchant for dressing us in corduroys).

But all this stopped when I decided to boycott hair cuts all together at the ripe age of 16. So it grew on and on till age 20 when once again I decided to shear it. Off went my knee length hair, to the background of my mother's tears and my glee and separated me from the oily plait for ever.

It was all bouncy curls, long loops, etc etc until last Sunday when I decided to see what noodle sticks would look like. After much youtubeing and googling for technique, there I was with a new pink Philips hair dryer in my right and a just-off-the-rack round brush in the left, newly acquired full length mirror in front and hope in my heart.

The first few seconds were fine. Round brush through wet hair, pink dryer on medium heat. Except, the brush decided it liked my hair a bit too much for my own good and curled up snug against my ear. One gentle tug, a couple more stronger ones and countless panicky pulls, twists and groans later, I recognized the inevitable - it was more tangled in my hair than a kitten gone berserk.

I hemmed an I hawed and finally had to lop it off with a pair of scissors. I finally did have my noodle sticks, except they where confined to a thankfully small portion behind my ear and horribly short compared to the rest of my hair. Horrible to the extend of almost 12 inches!

So if you now think I look like a wet puppy in profile it might be unwise to wonder what happened and possibly even fatal to ask me next becuase, pssssst... they are still looking for the last one who did exactly that.

I do! I do!

I enter.I walk.I pull.I sit.I stare.I read.I pretend.I think.I dream.I type.I stare some more.I call.I despair.I shake my head.I try not to.I fail.I weep.I talk.I walk.I eat.I call.I book.I smile and I am happy again!

A wee free read

Precocious kids bursting with all kinds of talents and waiting to become the next big promised thing has mostly always been a hallmark of fantasy and Pratchett is not to be left too far behind.

Enter Miss Tiffany Aching, 'hag' and 'spawn of Granny Aching', all of 9 years old and her adventures with The Wee Free Men. Little Miss Aching, dairymaid par excellence, 'jiggit grandchild' is tickling trout by the river when she first meets the only little men who pull of being cute and blue at the same time (and are not Smurfs too!)

Then, her teeny brother is whisked away by the Queen of Fairies (remember Lords and Ladies?) and our tweeny heroine sets out to get him back home, armed with First Sight, Second Thoughts and a sturdy frying pan made of iron and aided by wee Scotsmen in kilts. The rest of the novel is classic Pratchett and his raucous take on Snow Queen, Narnia, Peter Pan and most things Celtic with even the odd Moby Dick thrown in.

Though the book doesn't exactly leave you aching for more, it was an entertaining read in the usual Pratchett manner of being an exaggerated parody of real life "and it didn't stop being magic just because you found out how it was done..."

Lady, where are you from?

I know, I know. Even my computer seemed a little flabbergasted when I clicked the "new post" button. Not that I did not have a post until now. Just that computer technology thing hasn't evolved enough to keep up with me.

I think not in words, sentences or even exclamations. I think in paragraphs. Multiples of them too. So by the time I am done thinking, it seems degrading to actually write them down; on old fashioned paper or new-fangled TFT screens (mine is working no more by the way. If anybody wants to help me buy a new one, please speak up).

Hence, until brainwaves can be transferred to blogs automatically, well, the world will have to miss a lot of what I think.

Writer'sBlock - SPF 25

In lotion, cream or even goo form. Applies itself liberally and completely, preventing any kind of ideas leaking in and tarnishing that brilliant white text box.

The Basket Case

A couple of days ago, I added two essential things to my shiny red bike - a Hero wire basket and a Shimano battery light.

So now, I can cart around all that grocery without feeling like a certain quadruped and also not keep tumbling into all those potholes BBMP has strewn around like candy. Thinking about it, it is mostly potholes with bits and pieces of roads in them anyway.

And it is gone!

Looks like I was in the right. The saddle-raising exercise did banish that pain in the knee. Now my joints feel creaky, that's all. No pain at least.

Maybe I shall get the saddle raised by another quarter of an inch and then no more creaky joints too (one hopes).

From a heart-broken biker in Bengaluru

Guys,

I lost my trek 4300 from the garage outside my house on 7 Sep. I usually keep it indoors, but this bloody day there was mud on the front wheel after a late night ride and i decided to keep it outside itself. Unfortunately the gate was not locked that night and someone took it away possibly between 2:30 AM and 6 AM. My house is in 6th block Jayanagar.

People, this was a planned robbery, someone had a constant eye on my cycle for atleast a week time , as i had not kept it outside for atleast that long. Gave police complaint , but was nearly at tears , when i saw one policeman taking my purchase bill from BOTS and was running around and showing it to others as though the price was a biggest joke he heard this year. Bangalore police SUCKS.

I know it was my own mistake to leave the cycle outside, but guys, i had dreamed a long time for my cycle, painfully saved up the money for this. I bought it home on March 2008 and it not been even 6 months now.

Its really terrible to be this way, i request every fellow pal here to put up a bit of an effort to keep an eye on the below points when you next see a trek 4300 in Bangalore.

1. The frame serial number is WTU270C2496C.
2. There is a noticable shreaking sound from the front wheel brakes.
3. There are white reflective stickers on the frame. Check the link
above for a pic of my cycle.
4. Its an 19.5 inch, orange/silver and almost brand new. well
maintained parts, just oiled a week back before this mishap.
5. It has half of my broken heart with it.

Call me at 9886237395 , if you have any clue.

Friends, take care of your cycles.

Syam KS

So people, please keep an eye out for an orange Trek

The longer left

Since I have started biking, I noticed the gradual sneaking in of a sharp pain in my left knee. It was just at the knee. It made my knee feel like a creaky, un-oiled, rusty joint. It hurts when I put any load on it. Specially killing when you have to start your bike on an uphill. A few turns of the pedal-crank, and it gets better. Even stairs became difficult.

Got the saddle raised by a fraction today. It already feels better. Shall have to wait for a week though to see if it has made any difference.

Is my left leg longer than my right or what?

Wooooooooooo hooooooooooooooo!

I know this is juvenile but woooo hoooooooooooo! Yet another RBI top man from my wonderful state, Andhra Pradesh.

I am not racist/regionalist/sexist or most other ists (feminist doesn't count). When I was a child, I used to listen to all those adults go on and on and on about 'Swarna Andhra Pradesh', a certain Mr. N T Rama Rao, etc etc. 'What dwarps!' was my reaction and I solemnly swore to myself in my heart to never be like them.

After three years outside my beautiful, tiny city called Visakhapatnam, it only looked even tinier (though admittedly, more beautiful than the last time).

So how do I explain this feeling in my heart as it does somersaults yelling yippeeeeeeeeeeee that two successive top men at RBI are fellow Telugus?

Brains in size zero or less

I understand obsessions. After all, an obsession is just the next level in passion and what is life without passions? So if you set out to taste every flavor Baskin Robbins has ever come up with, or read every book ever written by Robert Heinlein or even re-read 'Gone with the Wind' every second day, I would say, good luck fella and move along.

But this, I fail to understand. So Kate Moss in gold now. But why in this entire galactic system and all the other galactic systems would anybody want to do that?

The only bright side is Kate Moss and her size zero came to be useful for once. Imagine the amount of aurum that would have been used up if she were to be even a size zero point zero zero one.

I am in love (yet again)! Sigh!

If you miss somebody so much that you wish you could rewind the day and change it so that you could be together again, does it mean that you are in love?

It has to be so. I decided not to bike to work today (the rain last night must have washed the road away, it is blazing today, blah blah) and hopped a ride with my flat-mate. It was alright for an hour. Then I started to squirm. After all, did that weak front tyre actually warrant that I leave the darling behind?

Another couple go by and I am actually obsessing. Sitting in front of my comp, all I can think is what a dratted fool I was not to bring it today. A heavy lunch with AR later, I know I would rot in calorie hell ( You would roast very nicely too, my my, all that fat!, a little red man seems to whisper in my head) as a reminder the next time I get such obscene impulses.

The priceless 'office day' ends, and I think I am going to die, finding an auto, telling him where I need to go to, that look on his face as he gives me the 'and you actually thought I would go there?' , my cursing and finally relenting and being robbed of my hard earned hardly any money.

I think I am going to fit an auto response device on my bike so that one press of a tiny button on a remote and my shiny red bike comes wizzing to my rescue a.k.a Bat Mobile.

PS: I think my bike would make the whistling noise that those bombs made as they were being dropped during the WW II from a B-52 (maybe? one hopes...) as it comes to my rescue.

The 'chai' in Tchaikovsky

Beautiful things must be come across in a beautiful way to be truly appreciated, or so I thought until I was made to eat my words.

Quite literally too. My mother was making jantukulu and a seven year old me had snuck up into the kitchen when she wasn't looking and had managed to spell my name out with the dough in , what at that time, seemed to me like a display of amazing dexterity. Only, when my mother came back and saw the mess her precious kitchen was in, she was ummm, mad, to put it very lightly.

As, a punishment, I was made to eat the fried version of it as owing to the amount of dough in it, it was bound to come out of the oil, all soggy and messy (I agree, my mother never could think of suitable punishments. That was when she used to spank me).

Anyway, so there was me eating it all up and pretending to be feeling bad too when all of a sudden this beautiful sound filled the room. I watched, riveted, as Jerry, after finding himself on a table filled with food set out for a very formal dinner, gorges on it and then proceeds to dance with a little show-piece maiden.

And that was my introduction to Tchaikovsky.

Nobody in my family was the least bit musical types. True, there was the stack of cassettes of Boney M, Tina Turner, Asha Bhonsle and other assorted odd singers belonging to my Dad but that was that. Then me grew up, and also grew up with me, my tastes in music, ranging from ABBA's Dancing Queen to Metallica's Am I Evil? ( All, I have to admit, fallen in love with haphazardly, some heard in Hollywood movies and some at homes of my Dad's Russian and French colleagues).

But all that was more of rebellion than anything until that fateful day when ironically, Tom & Jerry was to give me my first peek into the bewitching sounds of a true maestro. It was years later when I was being tutored in Carnatic Music like most good South Indian Girls (SIGs), that I discovered who the maestro was. My music teacher had a showcase full of 'weird English music' and one slow day, when I randomly inserted a cassette in to the player and pressed the 'PLAY' button, there he was, finally proclaimed in his full Russian glory. Of course it took me another 10 years to get the name and the spelling right!

After that, I started my inroads into Western Classical music and discovered the beauty of Mozart, the structure of Beethoven and the melancholy tunes of Chopin ( the No.6 Prelude) but Tchaikovsky returned to haunt me again and again. So much that there finally came a time when the only way I could fall asleep in strange new hostel life during my post-graduate days, was while listening to Dance of the Sugar-Plum Fairy, The Chinese Dance, The Waltz of the Flowers and the Arabian Dance (I have to profess my obsession for The Nutcracker here).

It became my comforter (I used to play it on my machine at Cognizant at an ultra low volume when the others around me used to complain about the noise and then immediately play jarring Bollywood numbers on their phones), my means of getting over emotional turmoils (the best way to getting over a fight with your boyfriend is to imagine glaring at him with the First movement of Symphony No.5 by Beethoven playing in the background), and generally getting lost in myself.

True, I did not know a thing about Classical Music. True I could not distinguish the Baroque from the Classical and again, the Romantic. I could not play the Piano and not even knew of anybody who could. But that did not deter me. I did occasionally come across "Oh Western Classical? Thank goodness, my mother had cultivated in me the art of appreciating it from a very early age", "Western Classical? What a snob", "Like fine wine, like a good scotch" and even " Bah! All that humbug. Too complicated" but I refused to let go.

As for me, I rallied on, perfectly happy with Tchaikovsky in the background, a good book in front and a cup of chai in hand content in soaking in the beauty first heard on Cartoon Network by a seven year old.

Weight(y) issues

If you thought you were too fat, think again.

How does this sound: You kill a child 'accidentally' and then not get indicted as you are too fat and instead, your sister gets the rap as she shouldn't have left the kid with you in the first place.

And if you think I am making all of this up, go check this out

Pop goes the weasel

My bike passed air for the first time yesterday.

It happened while I was nearing the Cauvery Junction signal on MG Road. One moment I was weaving through the traffic and the next there was a loud 'pop' and my front wheel tire deflated instantly.

Since it happened when I was very close to my workplace, I walked the bike to workplace. No such luck while going back. Had to walk it 6 km back home.

Briefly contemplated loading it into an auto but considering the fact that I don't get an auto to oblige me on normal days, decided to ditch the idea on a strike day.

An hour to walk some 6 and odd km and I was home. The bike-repair guy showed me a hole in the tire the size of the back of the barrel of a ball point pen.

Mud trails and muddy weekends

Sunday was spent in slush. Not the kinds that give you brain-freeze but the kinds that give you muscle-freeze!

It all started with a motley crew of tough bikers from Bengaluru deciding that getting muddy would be fun. So they thought up a bike-race where you got to see a lot (a real lot) of mud. People were told, registration forms made on Google docs and the trail was marked.Since the race-place was a good way off from where I stay and I had nice obliging friends who were fond of putting me up for the night (they must be, else, how come they do it all the time despite by really sound snores?), I had decided to camp out at Parul's along with my bike (Saturday night with bike and me is another story all together. Lesson learnt: Bike+Beer=Bad Combination)and started for race-place bright and early from Koramangala. Joined a couple of dudes with bikes which looked like machines (cmon, they had gears man!) unlike a certain red shiny bike which well, looked like a bike. That should have warned me, but no, me was the type that assumed the converse of "no risk, no reward" would also be true.After biking for what seemed a long long way (it was 8 Km actually), we finally arrived at race-place and were greeted by bananas, salted peanuts and what at that seemed like a stony path leading to somewhere pretty. Waited the other brave-hearts out and finally this was (a part of) the group that was flagged off


What happened next, I am yet to take in; all I can say is that it involved arrows, exclamations (marking where you had to jump over a ditch 3ft deep-probably in reference to the "Holy Shit!" that you tend to say after you jump), recalcitrant cows, local kids jumping out at you, getting lost for a while, and acres and acres of glorious slush and other riders passing me by on my first lap and their second.
Did I say "my first" by the way? Ha! Ha! I was lying. That was my only one! 13 Km on a red shiny bike without gears and minus suspension and my lumbar support balked and refused to support me further. So it was the support station and blanching at the grin on other riders' faces each time they finished yet another lap (there were 4 in total)for me after that.

After men and their machines finally decided that they had fun, bikes were hosed, men were hosed, stories swapped, falls compared and finally people departed (few braves ones decided to bike back too; and it included me).Reached home in a huff (quite literally) and first thing polished off food enough to feed a small Amazonian hamlet which was followed by calling up everybody and crowing about my 30 Km bike riding weekend.

Oh, btw, I was not the last to complete (or not complete) the race after all, thanks to this big guy



All in all, yet another wonderful nick in the wall of accomplishments!

Death of a post-girl (?)

I have not posted now on my blog in like a gazillion years. Why?

1. My boss probably noticed how happy I was. Decided to rectify matters at the speed of light

2. The death of my laptop (to be more precise, the death of the screen of my laptop)

3. Weekends being spent in actually doing something as opposed to generally doing nothing

4. Here is where I run out of excuses, but shall try to pass this off as yet an other one

5. Oh wait, I do have yet another one - ennui

'B' is for bewitching

Am sitting in my office, hacking away at keyboard, trying to make numbers match on spreadsheets. Suddenly, notice the increase in general noise levels. Peek past the wooden partition that obstructs my view of the windows behind the cladding, over looking M G Road.

Nothing. No water drops racing down the window to prove rain.Go back to work.

Yet the noise doesn't stop. Lean back in chair to peek past blinds covering the window overlooking the lane leading to Church Street. Aha! Now I can see the drops racing each other. Again check the M G Road window. Zilch.

30 second later, no water drops anywhere. Sigh and get back to work. This is the second time it has happened. Do you believe me? And the roads are perpendicular to each other with a hypotenuse of less then 500m from where I sit.

A little treat to a little lane like a chuckling mother handing out candy secretly to her youngest?

A little this, A little that

Not all South Indians have no family name. I am a South Indian and I do have a family name and so does the whole Andhra population. If you are a man, it can continue as long as you have sons to carry it on. In case you are a woman, it changes each time you get married. You take on your husband's family name.

I am less South Indian than most South Indians. I am more South Indian than most South Indians.

I love to eat food cooked by my ammamma. Eternal favorites being

Chinna mukkala bangaladumpa vepudu
Guttu vankayi koora
Maamidikayi Pulihora
Hyderabadi Dum Biryani
Mirchi ka Salan
Tomato Rasam
Lemon Rasam
Tomato and Egg Curry
Ullipayi Pulusu
Sambar
Fried Fish
Kaima Cutlets
Mudda Pappu
Saggubeeyam Payasam

Ammamma is the best cook in the world. Your ammamma could be called the same by you. My ammamma is still the best cook in the world.

Not everybody from Andhra has to be an avakayi pacchadi guzzling daddojanam lover.

Not all South Indian girls need to be married by the age of 25.

Food, gorgeous food!

And an other



Beautiful food, Le Café, Pondicherry, India

Good old days of Jabberwocky

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought

And as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! and through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

Think your brains are addled enough? Now go read this. Gives a whole new spectrum to the phrase "So, who do you want to be today?", eh?

But why would anybody want to do that, I say!

Butter and Mashed Banana

Think dark chocolate. Now pair it with a glass of Shiraz. Add some crackers with pate to it. Finish all of that with candied fruit. I present 'Butter and Mashed Banana' to you.

Sweet, aromatic and full bodied, subtle yet not oh-so-sophisticated, not to forget the cheeky fun. There was all of this, and yet, more too. Ajay Krishnan's debut was raved and ranted about and you will have to watch it to understand why.

This is one play where I will have to say there was nothing but perfection on stage. The script was enjoyable, identifiable with, beautifully directed and even more beautifully performed. It was a a bit like a comic musical and a bit like a gentle mock. The lead is a child conceived out of mixed ideologies and carries that with him throughout. He is a writer, a wannabe politician and later a nobody, all in the quest of the so called "Free Speech". "Don't you dare say that!" is the recurring theme.

He writes a book, which is instantly censored, he decides to become a politician, he is instantly censored, he then makes movies, and is censored again. A more than subtle dig at the 'freedom' that we all claim to enjoy, the play is a bouquet of many things.

I do not know who those actors were, nor do I want to Google about them. They had immense talent, and when provided with an outlet as refreshing as Ajay Krishnan's 'Butter and Mashed Banana', the result was astonishing. There was so much energy on that stage that I never even knew when the performance came to an end.

I must say I was grateful for watching this after 'Hair'. This spectacle would have created so many expectations that it would have been impossible to give 'Hair' its due which has the capability of gathering its own followers for Ajay Krishnan, though not in the same league as his debut.

A delectable fare, to be enjoyed by all.

PS: Just as I was hoping, today was very boring, and I had almost forgotten this post, which I did not hope for. So if this review seems like it was written when the super-fast was approaching with my foot jammed in the line, you know that is how it was indeed. My office was being shut down.

The ride back home (and more)

Congratulations to me on successfully riding to and from work!

After all that exhilaration about the ride to work, I was looking forward to the ride back. I must admit I was slightly apprehensive about it as this time I would have to encounter traffic and horrible rolling roads near my place. Hence had decided to start at 1730 ( I know, I am one of those lucky b@^&@$*# who get to wrap up the work day at 1730 but I generally leave at 1800).

Turned out, the greater scheme of things had other plans. The mad hatter tipped his watering can at 1700 and so was forced to coop up till 1800 post which I decided to take the chance and made a dash for my bike (besides, I could not give up an opportunity to bike in the rain now, could I?). I had chained my bike to a railing in the morning and was sitting smugly in the knowledge that it would be safe but when I went down to fetch it, it occurred to me that I had probably been a wee bit over cautious. There were a zillion bikes (those nasty gas guzzlers, not the nice shiny red types) parked normally against mine and it looked worse than a badly made capex spreadsheet!

I tried catching the attention of the parking attendant(this old toothless bozo) who however, was more interested in saving his skin form the rain than helping me. After a few more attempts, just as I landed a well aimed kick at the nearest Luna (which immediately ensured that the parking attendant came flying, notwithstanding other effects like a dozen vehicles toppling like dominoes), that nice juice shop guy decided to come to my rescue and lifted my bike out of that mess for me and just in time too as I was worried that it might stop raining any moment then.

After that, it was a smooth ride (bad bad me jumped a light too though I think I shall try not to do that again) until I reached those rolling roads near my place where I got off my bike and walked it till what I thought was a nice and easy short-cut to my place. Big mistake. That road must have been laid by some guy who thought the way to nirvana was up north and kept laying the road at 90 degrees to the surface. To make things worse, I could not recognize where I was too. So all that huffing and puffing continued for a really long time but like all happy stories, I did reach home in the end.

I was wet, drenched to my skin and was finely sprayed with mud on my trousers ends but I was also high on adrenalin, ecstatic and eager to do that all over again. Happy me.

Today morning was equally great though this time, I have wisely chained it to the pole announcing '2 wheeler parking Bangalore Traffic Police' and it also did not have that cow (actually it was there today too, but I was expecting it and steered clear of it from a long way. Hah!) and I behaved myself better on the roads. Still happy me :-)

PS: Pray hard that nothing interesting happens tomorrow. I just have to review Butter and Mashed Bananas. If I delay it any longer, I think I might pop like a bubbly cork. All those happy thoughts, you know.

I did it! I did it!

After a lot of plans and postponing of those plans, I finally did it today!

I rode my shiny red bike to work today. Oh boy, it was SO much fun! Started around 0750 at home (right behind the Banaswadi Railway Station) and touch down at M G Road happened at 0820. 30 minutes. Considering the auto meter generally reads 5.4 kms, that is 10.8 kmph which is not bad for me at all (all you Speedy Gonzales' out there, stop rolling your eyes).

I had bought a red shiny "Hercules Apex MTB" (nothing fancy, just plain vanilla bike with no gears too) from CMH Road a while ago for general sauntering around purposes and was busy stuffing myself on visions of the 6'o clock early morning riding around when my mother promptly pricked that lovely bubble by exclaiming, "How wonderful! So now you can bike to work". As the standard reaction to parental expectations, I promptly vowed to do everything but that.

A month went by and the everyday morning ride became a once a week morning ride and slowly, the bike started looking like a dust covered thing chained to the grill cover of the water pump.But that was not to be. At least, not for long!

The autowallas, that nasty breed, decided to go back to being nasty to me and after tolerating it for a long while, I finally snapped when yesterday, 16 autowallas refused to take me to M G Road.

The situation was not that bad while coming back though (only 4 refused hee hee) but that was enough to say no to the auto torture everyday. The first thing I did after arriving home was to check my bike and then noticed to my dismay that it had a flat. The 'puncher' guy told me that somebody had stolen my tire valves! Got that set and finally vowed to bike to work morrow, helmet or no helmet (the lack of a helmet what was I quoting to those nasty questions in that drawl, "Sooooooooooooooooooo, have you started biking to work yet?", by friends who I had gloated to about it in one of my stupid moments).

Woke up today at 0600, finished cooking and eating by 0700 and left home by 0750. Nice ride and all till I met my first obstacle - a HUGE black and white cow, which was headed straight towards me! (all cows, always, always head towards me. Them nasty things with all that horns and all. Not my fault if I am terrified of them). Had to swerve and almost caused a 14 yr old pedaling furiously on his bike to ram into me from behind. He first gave me a dirty look but after taking in the cow and the look on my face, he kind of forgave me with a knowing smile and went on his way. I almost fell off my bike though when I braked in terror on seeing that cow and got my scratch for the day.

Even the Bengaluru traffic which I cuss under normal circumstances gave way to me today when they saw me, which I guess was more from the shock factor on seeing a female in nice Blackberry clothes with red lipstick, pedaling away on a bike and quite happily too. And oh yeah, it would be a wise idea to take your heels in your backpack and change after reaching work than riding your bike while wearing them. I wore my turquoise Crocs for the ride which was a good idea as if I had been wearing my funky heels, I am sure that cow would have given me a broken ankle instead of the small scratch I escaped with.

Finally made it to M G Road after panting my way through Kamaraj Road and wooshed into the parking lot out of which the guard promptly threw me out with a "no parking for your firm madam"! So I had to chain my bike to a handy rail erected by the benevolent Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike and bribed a nearby juice kiosk guy by buying a pack of juice from him into keeping an eye on it.

Shall now have to see how the ride back home will be.

One handy lesson learnt for the day: Always carry a bottle of water in your backpack

Doubles, Triples and Quadruples - Nobody Stays Single

This production by Evam promised to be like fine wine, a brilliant comedy and a little peek into your own life. What it was was, a crate of beer, a stab in the dark at crude humor and a peek into what would probably be best described as a collegian's view of life.

The "play" (rather, "The Show") was about the varied facets of relationships, a pair of bickering newlyweds, cheating partners, a birthday girl and her father, a gay (???) patient and his therapist, two strangers coming together while waiting for therapy (again?), a performer, a birthday boy and his father, a gangster standoff and an old couple, testing the waters of a new relationship. Some stories were good,even funny but some were frankly, quite dull.

What made it worse was the crowd. Bangalore theater crowd seems to be made up mostly of Page 3 wannabes than any real theater lovers but for this particular play, it hit a real time low. From cheeky and inappropriate comments to even hooting, it was more like a college football game than a play.

Extensive use of a particular four letter word was the highlight rather than the actors or the play itself. Though the play was well written, it could have been more refined and some of the actors could have practiced their diction a little more. Overall, it is definitely a comedy, even providing some very humorous insights into relationships occasionally but on the whole, fails to live upto it's hype.

One year vintage Pink Champagne

Today was the day when the first glass of Pink Champagne was handed out to the Masses. What started as a trickle slowly turned into a gurgle and now you almost can hear it roar by.

To lots more Pink Champagne! Cheers!

PS: Doesn't it mean Mr.Gordon Brown completes a year in office too?
PS, again : I am trying to modify the flavor a little, you know, like a special edition but sadly, need more time. Wait and thou shalt be rewarded for your patience.

Mice and men

There are beings which burn dogs and then there are people who do more than just love them and guess who is punished?

PETA says no to even zoos, haranguing all those poor souls who are only to trying to bring awareness when there are people like this walking around.

Irony or what?

PS: Got the photo off the Beeb. Why would anybody want to separate those two? Will this topsy-turvy world ever make sense to me?

Pint sized monstrosities

I met this guy last night. He seemed to have the potential to turn out nice. A friend of a friend. The dude was a doctor, studying to be a surgeon. Since he also happened to be my sister's senior from med-school, we stuck a good rapport. The party was already on and we talked about this and that, made the usual jokes, spoke all those niceties, and were helped along by the amber flow.

Anecdotes from the right side of the scalpel were floated, laughed at and more rounds ordered. After a lot of other things, the following happened:

Characters- S(the good friend), N(me) and D(the doc)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
S:blah blah blah blah blah
N: Ha ha ha ha ha!

S: Know what, D is a pyromaniac
N: Hey D, welcome to da club!
S: No, he IS a PYROMANIAC. He set a dog on fire.

N:
N:
N:Ummmmmm, a dog on fire?

D:Oh yeah! There was this dog and I set it on fire using petrol

N:
N:
.
.
.
N:A dog on fire?

D:Hey you are talking to a guy who was in a coma for 3 days. I had killed a guy in a crash. Anyway, I was in this tunnel and wanted to set something on fire and there was this dog irritating me, so I kept kicking it away and it kept coming back to lick me so I poured petrol over it and set a match to it

N: All it did was try to be friendly

D: What the hell? It was irritating me. The best thing is to set a tortoise on fire. It was this big with a huge shell and it burned so amazingly, with its fat and all. There was this guy who got an erection just out of watching it. He went crazy!I once set a clump of trees on fire. You should have seen that now.

N:Huh! Can I get the check please? Shall we leave, everybody? X says she is not feeling too well anyway and if everyone is done, then why not leave?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
After a long drive home through dark streets, the following conclusions were arrived at:

1. The next person who talks about the nobility of Doctors and all that bull is going to get shot. Can exposure to too much life make you feel blase about it that you just do not value it anymore?

2. Eating animals is not cruelty.

3. There are a lot of beings on the Earth, who exist in the guise of a "human" and yet are so far from it.

Red Letter Day today (and my fav day too)

Today is the most wonderful day. I love today as it is my birthday!

Happy Birthday to me! Yeayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. The joy of 25 years of being alive.

Pineapple cake, a knife with a pink ribbon,streamers in variegated colors, 10 roses, lotsa golden-rods, a pink teddy bear holding a red heart, a satchel from Tommy, 2 numbers salwar kameez, a pair of new shoes, and still counting...

Update: Add a box of chocolates and a promise of a bike-helmet to that

On watching 'Hair'

Saturday saw me watching the play 'Hair' directed by Ajay Krishnan at Ranga Shankara. Hair is the third directorial venture by Ajay who had made his debut with the much acclaimed 'Butter and Mashed Banana' in 2005 (which I shall be watching on Wednesday or Thursday at the same venue) and produced by Evam Youth Forum. It was an attempt by the 24 year old (so claims a news article I came across through Google News) director to reinterpret the classical fairy tale of Rapunzel.

Almost all of the Google searches for various references to the play returned only pre-staging reviews but none of the post-staging kinds. I was looking very hard for them hoping that they will help me make better sense of the entire thing.

It started off with a sort of prelude in the form of a dialogue between a man (I love my hair) and a woman (I hate my hair) about hair which leads to the story of Rapunzel and questions as to why Rapunzel, The Witch and The Prince did what they did and said what they said. The scene then moves onto Rapunzel in a tower along with The Witch and explores the complex relationship between them until the arrival of The Prince onto the scene ("She loves me a lot too", says Rapunzel at one point).

White rope (hemp?) is constantly manipulated through out the play, alluding to hair and how it binds us, entangles us and entwines us. The play ended with a projection of clips from (the Turkish staging of the play by tiyatro 0.2 Istanbul?) a different performance of the same play with Rapunzel watching her life go by.

My reaction was mixed, as I could not claim to have completely unraveled the play and I had to leave with a faint feeling that the tiny key to completely understanding it had somehow eluded my grasp. The odd thing about this performance was that the actors did not introduce themselves.

On the whole, in spite of a lot of talent among many of the actors (notice I do not say all), the play refuses to bring out their full potential. The performances by Rapunzel and The Witch were par excellence. The script is ambiguous, even if so deliberately, which though adds to the mysticism, also helps the audience interpret the play in their own way. On a scale of 1 to 5, I would give it a moderate 3.

Crib.com

I don't know what I was more upset about - this article or the comments which followed. It was sad enough that a life was snuffed out because of appalling commuting conditions. Those people, instead of offering condolences in her memory, were busy taking shots at the blame game.

Think about it, bad roads, crib about the politicians, traffic jams, bash those city officials, the Indian Cricket Team gets trashed, heckle those same guys who a while ago were national heroes and if somebody dies, crib about the infrastructure?

What is it that prevents people from doing something themselves? "Democracy honey", says B, "people have a voice, so they comment. It is a free country". Apathy, I say. Of course, it is always easier to pass the buck along. I once read (me thinks it was in some old edition of some publication by the LSB)about a kid who was so fed up with the state of the buses in London that he decided to intern there for the summers and had even managed to set a few things right! To think there is no dearth of things in our Country to be fed up with and yet no body volunteers.

Claiming that you can do your bit but it won't matter in the vast cesspool is inexcusable too. At least make the effort and things will get better by themselves. I agree you will not see Bengaluru traffic jams clearing up if you get out of the car and start directing traffic around. Instead, you could take public transport to work or even better bike to work, and if you make an effort to spread the awareness around, maybe the roads will clear up.

It is the effort that is more important. High time that we turned action-oriented doers from arm-chair critics.

PS: There was a dead pigeon in my 'balcony' yesterday. I don't know what killed it. It was just lying there, dead.

Cyclist Ahoy!

I shall get rid of these obnoxious loser type auto-guys from my life. Though I had bought a bike a month ago for 3400 bucks from one of those cycle shops in Bengaluru ( I wish I could say which one, but my obscure knowledge of local geography prevents me again. Darn!), I have ridden it for a very round figure of 10 times probably till date.

I did venture out a few times when I managed to wake up, brush teeth and get into Reebok Red Riding outfit before the clock struck six and wandered about till seven, braving hooting auto-weennies at Bangalore East Station too!

My bike is one of those old fashioned gear-less types so the rolling roads at Wheelers Road area were not too alluring either. However, after watching the poor baby lie around unused for long enough, I am now going to try out cycling to work.

Wish me luck in this venture amigos!

Have wealth, will spend; Have wealth, will waste?

In a capitalistic world, unequal wealth distribution is acceptable. I am not a Communist. I like wealth. Wealth in the form of the Louis Vuitton luggage, that YSL pantsuit. Those Jimmy Choo shoes. That perfume by Chanel.That kind of wealth that Scrooge McDuck dives into.

But food fights? I am not a party-pooper. I am no saint either. I don't claim to have finished every morsel that had ever found it's way to my plate. I have chucked food into the bin as there was too much of it or even because I simply did not like it. Was I sinning? Probably not. After all, it is not like the food on my plate, which I might have thrown away, would have otherwise made its way to Sudan.

Truckloads of tomatoes, oranges and even a few custard pies being squashed, flung about, smeared, jumped upon, swum in and even dived into. Probably too expensive to ship around. It is not an everyday occurrence either. Some fun ain't ever hurt anyone. Look at the bright side of things. Get my point?

Great!

Now try explaining that to them.

Sniffle , sniffle, aaaaaacchhooooooooooooo

I assure you I do not ramble on like a particularly extravagant victim of Alzheimer's. I had started off with a definite idea of what I was going to write about today but the clichéd 'one thing led to the next' happened and TWO entire posts bit the bullet and got relegated to draftdom. It also involved one number phone call from Bombay (a lecture on the importance of food, instructions on the periodicity of medicine-imbibement and declarations of affection to various degrees), cackling on about mundane stuff by my MALE colleagues (duh, as if I have any other), visits to other people's blogs and staring into nothing for short passages of time.

A Powerpoint presentation on The Indian Power Sector due on Saturday and various assorted information pertaining to the former also had their way.

So many things happening in the life of a sick baby is unfair. Somebody give me a hug :-(

BIAL: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

I can now add BIAL to the ‘been-there-done-that’ and can claim to have survived to tell the tale.

After much deliberation, I had decided to spend Saturday night at a friend’s who stayed pretty close to one of the Airport bus-stops and take the 0600 bus from Koramangala. So Sunday found me rushing to the Koramangala stop by 0600 and was pleasantly surprised to see the bus already occupied by some 6-7 people. Soon, I dumped my bag and laptop on the luggage rack and seated myself in one of the available seats. The bus finally started on its way at 6:15 after the driver handed around flyers and cards giving bus schedules and phone number of Taxi service to drop you off to the bus stop (Cel Cabs, the card claims. On call 24 hours taxi. 60609090 You can now book CelCabs in: Bangalore 080) and the conductor came around duly to collect the fare. After handing over 150 bucks I enquired more to satisfy my curiosity than anything else about the travel time to BIAL. One hour 30 minutes. That saw me smirking in his face and him smirking right back with a just you wait and see face.

After making past traffic jams (yes at 6:20 in the morning too) at Madiwala market the bus settled into a smooth pace and I almost dozed off but sadly, that is one thing the BMTC buses do not facilitate. If those school-boy benches did not allow 154 cms of me to doze, then I am sure no body can achieve that mean feat comfortably. The bus has got plenty of stops and the driver even stopped whenever people stuck their hands out to flag it down! After staying awake to watch Yellahanka go by, I finally plopped into la la land even if it did involve rather painful bumps at the contact point between the window pane and skull and was woken up by a particularly steep curve by which time; the bus had almost made it to BIAL. I did manage to catch a fast disappearing glimpse of rolling greens and all that (for those to whom such things really matter) and finally set foot at the BIAL. One look at my watch and I was gloating. The conductor was wrong after all! It did not take me 90 minutes but only 60! (Does it really matter? I won in the end)

Now that the traveling bit had been taken care of by nicely air conditioned though a wee bit noisy and on the whole rather comfortable BMTC bus Route No.7, I was in a much better mood with the whole new airport thingie. There is even a BIG BIG Louis Vuitton case in the lobby (darn, I did forget to take my camera along) and that itself notched BIAL a bit higher in my cool list. The rest of the story was a breeze. Sufficient signage around and wide counters and even shopping places etc (Crossword, Shoppers Stop, French Connection, Calvin Klein, Hidesign, some sweets store, Cookie Man and Barista) in the post Security Check hold all added to the charm. The toilet facilities, I did not check out though I did see suspended signs for them.

My flight did take off surprisingly on schedule too. The return journey though saw me waiting for a full sad 30 minutes from landing of my plane to getting out of airport and into bus and that was the sore bit. Waiting for baggage is still irksome and my guess is that all the aero-bridges do not function. Bus ride back to Koramangala took another hour and was back home eventually by 00:30. So 90 minutes plane ride from Bombay to BIAL and 90 minutes getting home from BIAL!

The only other International Airport I have been to is O’Hare International and though BIAL has its own merits, I have to concede it is no where near that scale. On the whole, BIAL has been managed quite well and for a week old airport, I say cheers to it.

PS: Thank You Thulasi for the pic! Dude, with friends like you around, who needs cameras I say!

My bag of BIAL woes

The dreaded time has finally come. I need to fly out from the new Bengaluru International Airport on Sunday and I am dreadfully nervous about it. The website claims to have taken care of everything like a benevolent God. I have my own doubts.

Staying near the Banaswadi Railway Station has already proved to be a nightmare with the auto drivers (I promise I shall post more on this tomorrow). My flight to Bombay from Bengaluru is scheduled to depart at 0900 on Sunday. Which means probably I will have to start from my place at around 0600(I am not sure as I am yet to figure out how far is it exactly. Even Google Maps has failed me this time).

Transport Option 1: Take the BMTC Shuttle to the Airport

Catch: They seem to have forgotten Banaswadi completely. I think the closest point would be Ulsoor Lake though my abysmal knowledge of the local geography hasn’t been of much help here either. So either I hold an auto driver who has managed to show his face around at that time at knife-point and get dropped at Ulsoor or shall have to ask my room mate for a saintly favor (considering it is a Sunday, I can only imagine the choicest, delectable and most foul of the English lexicon that me shall be subjected to).

Transport Option 2: Airlift Cabs

Catch: Despite all their mean claims of “Bangalore New Airport To Any where in Bangalore @ Rs.300” they suck because that is just a mean claim. Read about their air-conditioned Innovas with Bucket Seats and Wi-Fi and you would have been salivating like Pavlov’s minion too until I called them up to book. The executive told me in what apparently was her most polite tone that currently they operate pretty much like the BMTC buses and that the nearest point for me would be – INDIRANAGAR! Need I say more?

Transport Option 3: City Taxis

Catch: The fare was not as much a deterrent for me as was the safety factor. My return flight from Bombay has been scheduled to arrive at 2210 in Bengaluru. For once, even I was in no mood to try coming home past midnight.

Transport Option 4: Helidrop to BIAL

Catch: Ambani has yet declined to even look at me. If he does, then probably I would not need BIAL in the first place.

Until then, I guess lesser mortals like me will have to continue to chew on their hair trying to figure out "issoos"!

Booklists for the junkie soul

It was while searching for Lessing on the internet that I was directed to a list of 1001 books that you were to have read before you died or so it claimed. Though the list seems to have a proportionate share of well known and obscure (for me) books, I found it interesting mostly for its omissions than inclusions. For example, there are hardly any works by “those dreadfully depressing Russian author types” (as my sweetheart likes to call them). Now the Russian author types as such, I agree, do not make or break any greats but the very prominent exclusion left me a little annoyed.

So I went ahead and dug out a few more lists and a little out of every thing practically covers all of my favorites. Now, there is no dearth of people telling you what to read and trying to make you feel like ignoramuses if you haven’t and personally, I am not the oh I have to read this as it is on the list kinds but for the interested, here are a few lists in no particular order:

ManBooker Prize for Fiction

Pulitzer Prize for fiction

BBC - The Big Read - Top 100 Books

The Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction

Hugo Award for Best Novel

Costa Book Awards

Nebula Award for Best Novel

Nobel Laureates in Literature

The New York Times Best Sellers

Still obsessive about such kinds? Check this out.

Though many do find reading according to a particular list useful as that way, you can ensure that you have not missed out on the popular works, there is nothing like the joy of discovering a book on your own.

I on the other hand tend to pick authors first and read them in chronological author. It doses take me a lot of time to move on from one to the next but I prefer it that way as it gives me a way to know the authors along with their books and by the time I am done with one, I feel like I have known the person all my life.

One way or the other, nothing beats a good book and the warm feeling that you get after you are done with one. So, happy reading then!

The story of my Period

The very first time, I thought I was dying.

What else can you expect from a twelve year old? I still remember the amused smile on my mother’s face when she exclaimed “Now what have you done?” followed by all the hush - hush phone calls to relatives to announce that the prodigal daughter has now become a “woman”. Then came all the relatives with smiles like split bottle gourds on their faces and all the petting and beaming with me wondering when I was going to be asked about what was it that I had done. Strangely, everybody but me seemed to know and I was desperately hoping that someone would ask so that I would know the answer too! Of course it did not help that of seven girls; it had to happen to me first.

After two days of dazed smiling for the photographs, all decked out in a saree and all that hitherto forbidden gold, followed by cruel restrictions of forbidden passage to the kitchen, bedroom, puja room (confining my life to a rattan mat), not to mention the forced ingestion of Castor oil (it gives you ache free days from the next time was the explanation) and sesame laddus, I decided I shall ensure that it shall never happen to me ever again, come what may!

So imagine my horror when I saw the blood the next month.

You see, it had occurred to nobody that this bewildered child might not know what had just happened to her. So continued the horror, month after month, until a year later, deliverance was given, unto me, ironically, in the form of Carrie. Though it did explain a lot of things, that what happened to me happened to others too and it was not my fault, it did not explain the pain every month and the misery that accompanies it.

It wasn’t until much later, while I was well onto my way into adult hood that I came to terms with what it was and why it was. Later it even became comical, the hurried recollections of all things done under the duress of alcohol whenever it was late and the relief it brought when it did finally begin but it was a long journey for my period to become a thing of shame, the knowledge of which was to be kept hidden to something that happens every month, bringing with it the assurance that everything was going on as intended and as things were to be.

Backpacking beckons

The normally subdued wanderlust flares like a sun-burst through me periodically and I end up scrambling to the nearest bookstore to wrap my itchy fingers around the spine of a Lonely Planet guide, or under poorer circumstances, towards the fiction section.

The world is ours to see and observe and that alone should give infinite happiness. Head to the continents, absorb the places, sink in them and revel in their existence. Expensive hotels, places serving Indian food, comforts of pre-booked transport and fixed itineraries are not for me.Give me a sturdy backpack, a passport with enough pages and a robust lock and I am well on my way.

I do not claim that I am on of those globetrotters. I want to be one. Imagine the joy of heading off to a place with a one way ticket and no fixed plans. No pressure to come back to your cubicle on the Monday, no worry about bank balances and credit card bills.

I am going to do it one day and in the next five years too! After all, putting off the departure does not help but planning it would.

PS:The picture belongs to a guy called Troy M Litten

Captain Corelli's Mandolin

Happy mistakes happen. This is how I got this book. The cover made the book pretend to be some other book and after a lot of putting-off, I finished reading it for the second time on the morning of today. It blows your mind away after throwing you into the heart of Cephallonia, a lovely Greek island (about which you can read here)and the Greek way of life

The book is set in the Italian occupation of the island during WW2 and deals with the futility and brutalities of war along side leading you by the hand into the frangible shades of human life.

Louis de Bernières is not only an exceptionally fine author and a word-smith, but also a man who paints resplendent pictures with his prose. He infuses personality into characters that otherwise would have faded into the background of the events and brings out the most poignant of emotions with the delicacy of gossamer.

Dr.Iannis and his daughter Pelagia are lost in their mundane lives on the lovely island complete with Lemoni, Psipsina, and the goat, and various other characters, each with their own story until they are sucked into the vortex of the Italian occupation of Greece during World War II. The lovely Pelagia who was previously betrothed to another of the island finds herself falling for the beautiful Italian, Captain Corelli and his Antonia. The Greeks, though initially hostile to the invaders, cannot help accepting them and the invaders become deeply entwined into the fabric of Cephallonia to the extent that it is the Greeks who rescue the bodies of the soldiers executed by the Nazis and give them a burial.

The tale is about love, war and love in the time of war.

Highly recommended to anyone who is fan of war books, historical novels, a different point of view on the good and the bad, love stories and music (yes, the book is all of this and yet, more).

My boss cannot play peek-a-boo with my machine anymore!

Here is my first post from my workplace. The I have so much free time at work that I don't know what to do is yet to afflict me though and last I heard, was thankfully, still slinking around the fashionable IT circuit.

Life here mostly seems to revolve around arcane regulations by RBI (trivia: I am currently on ECBs. I might even post on that one next!), badly put business proposals which aught to scare the shit out of any Investment Banker, prudent or otherwise, and Gigabyte sized Excel Sheets. With the appreciating rupee and all the slash-hacking of interest rates, people seem to be running in droves towards the External Commercial Borrowings route and only time shall tell how wise/unwise the exodus.

By the way, did I let you onto the furore being created by SEZs? Looking at their numbers, one might even think every ha'penny might send his coin up and come down with an SEZ. It ain't complete bollocks either! Though the inflation figure was a bit of a fright and the IIP figures saw the dumps, everybody seems to be still wanting to jump on to the bandwagon. Hope the chappies do manage.

The stock markets are keenly continuing in their dance of the Yo-Yos and busy losing my money too. What can I say? Life has to go on.

Information is power

A month's hiatus and I post again. New job, new place and new issues to deal with and now you know I was away for a reason (really, am mostly consoling myself). Did I mention the contribution of the lack of an Internet connection? The Silicon Valley of India and ask me how not to get a line onto the web.

The place has now finally settled on my nerves and am getting along quite alright with it despite all those horrible things about it. A few good things have happened too though! For one, I am back to being the bookworm I was and with dear Blossoms right behind the building where I work, I won't be surprised if all I end up doing while I am here is reading.

Of course there is the whole affair of the does-he-love-me-does-he-love-me-not too. Wedding bells on the horizon?

Information is power too. Most things look foolish in retrospect so no point haranguing about it I guess.

One good thing, Alliance Francaise might become and thanks to Dans la main de l'ange along with Parias. Along with the Bangalore School of music (a voilin rendition of Tchaikovsky maybe?)

Viva la compagnie

Creamy layer or Sour Cream?

Yet another controversy over reservation for the "backward classes".

Though the verdict by the five judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Balakrishnan is astounding in itself because of it's fairness,(anyway, I think it is a criminal offence in my country to criticize the decision of the courts, but that, I assure you, has nothing to do with my reaction), it is the implementation of the whole thing that brings on the jeepers creepers.

The judgement withheld the 93rd Amendment to the Constitution providing a reservation of 27% for the socially and educationally backward classes or the so called OBCs in all centrally funded educational institutions, taking the percentage of reserved seats to a whopping 49.5%! But the proverbial icing comes in the form of the caveat which fundamentally excludes those who have already managed to climb out of the OBC category and remain so only on papers.

Thought the courts have laid down clear rules as to who can claim the reservation and who cannot, in a country of more than a billion people and over half of them hungry for everything, getting on top by trampling on everybody below is not exactly a difficult task.

Even worse, try explaining it to the occasional survey that decides to include the IIMs and the IITs in it's global rankings. Who would, in his right mind, like to believe that an institution where about a half of the students are there because of reservation and not merit, can have the balls enough to hold it's head high and say "I can be the best"?

Though the reservation system might be required according to the greater good for the greater numbers, it would have been wiser if the whole thing was chalked out more thoughtfully by either incorporating an exit time line or by first revamping the infra available and then getting hunky dory about the increase in intakes which are inevitable to calm down everybody

Though in a country of a pantheon of 13 million Gods, it might be best,as they say,to "Swalpa Adjust Maadi" and get along with it.

Dungbeetle looks at the IMF and says H(i)mfffffffffff

The IMF is a loser thing and that is that.

Dorky, The Deadbeat Dungbeetle (BTW, spell check suggests Tinkerbell. Duh!) was sauntering along the chic DC addresses and came across the concrete cube and was surprised to find itself going round and round in water. After suitable cusses thrown randomly around like cheap Chinese Goods (as it had lost the rubbish collected ecstatically just a little while ago. You just would not believe the shit that can be found THERE!), it decided that all that liquid could not be piss from all those scared pin striped Wall Street junkies and decided to investigate thoroughly.

Turns out, the little people inside the cube were weeping just looking at the amount of money flowing away. One moment they were pretty pretty happy rubbing their hands in glee at all that future cash flows from all that interest from all those driveling nations and next, they were on their asses looking at nothing.

So now they are busy sniveling and planning to sell their carefully hoarded gold to tide through.

Good too as finally somebody recognizes a rainy day when they see one (the little people, not Dorky, though he too was prepared and has started rolling off more than he can roll). There is always the Big Ass (big brother=big ass naturally and so am concentrating on the most visible aspects here)who can veto any move to give the pants to somebody else to wear and so the poor little people are finding themselves increasingly pant less too (now, do you see all that ass?)

Dorky did what he is best at doing - blew a raspberry and went about collecting all that shit.

Inane conversations of a Deadbeat Dungbeetle

Lazy Saturday morning intutions lead to long drawn conversations (mostly with myself but the is hardly the point here.)

Crazyness starts like a cold bubbling soda poured down your shorts and creeps up into your head where it makes itself comfortable after going round and round like a cat patting it's bed before sleep which reminds me, last night I saw a dog go about tugging clothes of clotheslines and shredding them up efficiently down a row of houses. Wish I had stayed long enough to watch the reaction (of the people, not the dog)in the morning and the pleased grin on the face (of the dog, not the people) at a good day's (night's in this case) work. At least it doesn't have to long for company.

Maybe, I was deprived as a child of playthings called people. Maybe, that explains why I am like a puppy starved for love. The pupplebubble needs to be invented.

It keeps a person in this bubble with an Internet connection and a laptop with people all around outside the bubble. It also helps you blend into the background so that you are alone but not lonely.

And nights need to be banished along with the terrors it brings

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

It has been riled for it's traffic and scorned for it's auto drivers.

The traffic and the auto drivers are the only two things I love about it.

Traffic jams are my recourse to staring at closed office doors. I instead have a merry time yapping on the phone during those wonderful things. The auto drivers too have made a not so bad impression on me. Though they can be construed to be rude sometimes, I am yet to come across one that horribly rude.

Seems like the rude minority give the nice majority a bad exterior.

Should it not be in the interest of the greater gains for all the auto drivers to be nice?Though it might be nice and profitable in the long run, I guess they just live for the moment and thus the bad behaviour by the rude minority.

Call me an eternal optimist.

Dream Principles of a Plastic Clutcher

1.Always dream in plastic

Celluloid dreams are so bygone

2.Never eat vegan

They are people too. You can skewer them instead

3.Black is not a color

It is a colour

4.Plastic sheep do not exist

They are created by foaming accountants for the purpose of increasing inventory levels

5.Monopoly is a game

Monogamy is not

6.Stiffen eyelashes

Black for once, is beautiful

7.Spear the Agassi

The tribe might be different though

8.Galloping Horses?

Walloping gorse's

Why eight of them? What did you expect from a plastic clutcher?

Kabooooooooooooom!

US bombs this, US bombs that. It came as a pleasant surprise. The proclamation that the US of A is committed to promoting equality is not mere ad lib. They bomb the rich and the poor alike.

Do not get me wrong, my lovelies. This is not another US bashing post.

Latest to be bombed is Somalia. So if Iraq was for oil and Afghanistan for I don't know what, Somalia is for it's, well let us see, for it's famished, oppressed and emaciated citizens? Naaaaaaa. The less the 2% arable land? Ahem! Ahem! Oh wait, I think I have got it.

The US had decided to bomb a town in Somalia in which a Muslim terrorist has decided to loll around. You see dearies, sending a set of highly trained people to take down that guy would not only have been less expensive, but it would also go against what I think my Business Values and Ethics prof taught me as "The Utilitarian Principle".

Good for the greater numbers. Since a small town in Somalia can hardly match up to the teeming US masses, they will have to bomb it as otherwise the teeming masses would be very unhappy about where their defense dollars are going and that would make the already raving government look like a dud.

So the next time your friendly next door terrorist decides to hatch one of his diabolical schemes, ensure that you get to the local police with the speed of a Carerra or else, next thing you know, you will wake up under a pile of concrete rubbish!

Everybody has a sob story; Here is mine

I have stopped going to work since the past two days now. Given the approaching weekend, that will make 4 days of no work. So why am I not going to work? One reason could be that I have put down my papers and so am not inclined to work. But did this happen the last time I had quit too? The answer, funnily, is no. I worked as usual till the last day. So what was different this time? At first, I was quite inclined to blame myself for it, citing laziness and classic indifference. On delving deeper, the answer is much more complicated than that.

The missing factor was motivation, all other things being equal.

The last time I worked, it was my first job, a job against which I had no preconceived ill feelings against, and most importantly, was game enough to test waters. Just as I was getting out of the honeymoon period and had started feeling like a seasoned hand at it, wham! I was knocked off my high post into doing an MBA, not entirely to my liking too. After two years of MBA, due to more of circumstances than initiative, I landed where I was working (or as the case is here, not working).

However much as I was not interested in it, it would be unfair to say I was unwilling to give it a chance. Sadly, things went from bad to worse and from there to frightfully dreadful, and all in a span of 6 months.

The firm was a good firm. So what was it that drove me against it? Now, after much discussion about over endless pints, long distance phone calls, impromptu treats at Barista, and finally sighs drawn in between quick puffs, a few things congealed into hazy mass-forms:

1. A very small percentage of the working population is actually happy with their work.

2. Another very small percentage is satisfied as much as smug about what they do

So how did these people manage to do it? What did their jobs offer that mine did not?

The answer seems to be more of a let down than anything:NOTHING

Seemingly, the people who can be stuffed into the list above thought that their expectations were matched by the company actually never had any expectations in the first place.

So, is this the secret to a happy, motivated work-life then? This is what I am set to find out now in my new job. Hopefully, the jinx is finally broken!

Whoever is afraid of Gentle Giants?

Well, for one, Microsoft is or so it proclaims, though not in all black & white.

Why is Microsoft stoking the Yahoo fire?

Yahoo has not been able to recover lost ground with or without Jerry and Tom, being Tom, seemingly wants to take advantage of the situation. Does this deal also mean that Microsoft has finally woken up to the power of the Internet? Given Microsoft's penchant for monopoly, what will it do next if the deal is indeed through? Maybe IE 8 with Yahoo set as the default home page and unchangeable too?

Questions, questions everywhere and not an answer in sight anywhere!

In case the deal does happen and then fails miserably, who will be held responsible? Not Mr.Smart-Gates for one, as he will be far from the maddening mess by then.

So, what next? Google announcing one day the acquisition of Wikipedia Foundation?

After all, he who laughs last, laughs best!

Lessons for the time

Today is a proverbial "red letter day". Life has it's little ways. So much for all the talk about the flashes of insights when everything becomes clear and the mists clearing away. All that is a load of animal excrement.

It is more like life giving you little peeks into what things really are and then wanting you to piece it all together and before you realize it, there you have it, one of life's truths given unto you.

This is what happened to me today. So, for those who are yet to be given these little peek-a-boos', here is me, summing it all up neatly:

1. Life is never fair. When I say it is not fair, believe you me, it is REALLLLLLY not fair.
(Lesson to be learned here: Shut up and move it. There is not much you can do about it.)

2. If you think you can be the one to change it all, maybe you need to get a certain part of your anatomy to a hospital real quick as you have just been trampled all over and worse, you have not even realized it.
(Lesson to be learned here:You ought to pay more heed to Lesson 1.)

3. Everything goes on to be nice in the end, only in a)Books, b)movies and c)dead people's biographies. In your life, well, that is called life.
(Lesson to be learned here:Always remember Lesson 2 and consequentially, Lesson 1.)

PS: I hate saying "learned" instead of "learnt" but my spell - checker is currently set to "English/United States"