The Last One

Goodbye Blogspot !!

Whats the score ??

After beating the heavy morning traffic i reach my office and throw my jacket over my chair. As i sit down to give some rest to the rear quarters from all that biking, the boss guy next me asks:

Boss Guy: "Hey, morning!! did u see the score today?"
Me:"huh?? is there a match ? n whos playin?"
Boss Guy: "HAHA... yeah a big match!! govt vs opposition!! yesterday twas 268-269!!"

Oh hmmm... then it strikes me that the Govt is hanging by its fingertips... rather fingernails since all that crap about the Nuke Deal came up. What the hell is this N-Deal and how did it bring the nation closer to another early General Elections ??It all started way back in 2006 when the deal was initialized by the Indian and the US governments by signing the Hyde Act. Most of the politicians get scared when they hear the N-word.For the politicians it's more of a taboo than the F-Word. For them a nuke always is a bomb which fries up cities in one go. Little do they know that the deal will make the Indian vision of a developed nation by 2020 a reality.

The deal can enable us to buy nuke reactors and nuke fuels from Uncle Sam and the Nuclear Supplier Group and setup more power plants. We have meagre and almost non-existent Uranium reserves which reflects upon the few countable 6-7 functioning nucear reactors in India. I live in Bangalore, i face power cuts upto 5-6 hours a day in summer. Face it, we cant make electrcity out of burning coal or water and serve the ever growing needs. It's time we go heavy duty.

Almost all of the top analytical brains have confirmed that this would bring more benefits to the country than we becoming a pawn in Uncle Sam's hands. Yet the big shots of the Left Front are skeptic, sometimes it appears that they are more interested in China's welfare than our own. So now its a stalemate in the parliament with the goverment losing majority and India being pushed to another Elections.

The same story repeats, no single party gets the majority, the selling and buying of MPs,another coalition goverment, another argument on who wud become the PM, 1 billion Indians get fooled one more time. Well we are Indians, we are used to this. No Big "Deal". ;)

zzzzzz...

When i sit at my workstation at my new office... i feel as if i am stuck in a time warp in the Calabi-Yau space dimension. Dude... what a lousy first line!! But dont blame me, after joining my new employer, i have got so much free time that i sleep about ten hours a day and i guess too much sleep is not good for ur mind. Well the office hours are so monotonous that everyday seems like a repeat of yesterday. Still fresh out of training, i am still wondering the stuff thats goin on around me. Last week i was asked to make a GUI button. I made it... whats the big deal!! Then i showed it to the big guys... now they want me to make a PPT about the button juxtaposed along with the old screen buttons and show it to them in a 1 hour session.. "WTF?? it's just a button for chrissakes !!!". Well i can think of only 3 slides:

1. Presentation on the GUI Button.
2. Screenshot of the button with the button in red circle.
3. Thank You.

And i have to present this in one hour.But maybe all this freetime is the calm before a category-5 hurricane coz i am getting mails with weird technical subjects which i promptly put into the personal folder named "Overhead Transmissions" in my Outlook.

Sigh !! hope i will find the door which leads to the "real" reality like Mr. Truman Burbank did, and walk away from all this crap.

Beauty and The Beast

I was bowled over by her sparkling bright eyes and enticing looks. It was love at first sight, nope i am still single and happily unmarried. I am talking about my new car. A brand new '08 edition Suzuki Swift VXi !!! Since Maruti launched Swift in 2005, i had decided that my first car would be a red Swift but slight changes in that plan and i bought the silver one to make my parents happy, who believe that the red one looks more like a Hot Wheels toy. Anyways it's still as swift and as sexy as the red one !!

Having driven my dad's M800 and later Alto (also an 800cc vehicle) before, the Swift is really a good upgrade. With its 1.3 Litre powerhouse and 87 horses working under the hood the Swift is the perfect combination of beauty and the beast. The driver's seat feels like an aircraft cockpit with umpteen number of dials, chimes, beeps, indicators and warning flashes on the dash instrument panel. It's got some innoavative safety stuff which were not present in Indian cars before like for instance the "sealbelts-not-on" warning, Doors ajar warning, pretensioners on front seatbelts, computer chip embedded key etc.

Now driving it is a breeze with the power steering which is extremely feather light, and the driving postion is very sporty with sunken seats and a sporty leather clad gear knob which shifts with precision and very small movement of the stick with a pleasant cluck-cluck-cluck sound (as in sports cars) while shifting. The power is amazing and i almost rocketed to a nearby treetop when i pedalled it like i used to in my dad's Alto. It's got quite luxurious interiors for a hatchback, with nice dual-tone seats, plain but efficient looking black dashboard and fabric lined doors with power windows on all four doors.

The cons i feel come in the form of less space in the rear. With very little rear legroom, u might hate grinding ur knees with the front seats. But it sure is quite wide enough to accomodate 3 adults in the back. Another problem is the low sunken seats, though it gives a sporty driving position, it hinders the view especially as the vehicle has got a bulging body from below the pillars and u get the feeling that u might nick the left side on tight turns. Suzuki could have added backlight in the power window buttons and its quite hard to find them in the night. Now that there are lot of Swifts On the road, nobody's gonna turn their heads for a second glance... but i can live with that, coz i now drive an international WRC car. B)

dont read... very crappy post

My plans of buying a car suffered another jolt when i heard that oil prices are again goin up. No point blaming the government, coz its happening at the international arena and from the news i gather that those big oil producing honchos are stubborn swines!!!

Our state owned oil companies are becoming bankrupt. Our oil firms have money only to buy crude oil till july and at the most till september.I will end up spending a fortune on quenching my car's thirst... zikes !!The big scientist blokes say that in the near future all the oil reserves will be depleted and then what?? How will i ride my bike ?? :(

I wish i were born in an era of hybrid hydrogen fusion engines and cars that run on cryogenic photon assimilator technology(i just made that up n shud get a Nobel for tht!!).I just hope that ONGC or the Ambanis strike oil soon somewhere in India and start selling petrol for ten bucks a litre !!

Yeah i know what a pointless and crappy post :P but do notice the bleak bigger picture which aint very far ahead. what the heck, screw the Ambanis i am gonna dig my backyard, what if i strike oil, i ll become a zillionaire!!

Breaking News !!!

I cant get my breakfast digested unless i read a copy of the morning Times, The Hindu or at least the super masala gossip suplement that comes with the Bangalore edition of Times of India - Bangalore Times. Lotta things happen around this little world and theres always this media eye watching and airing it minutes after it happens. The face of media has changed over the last decade. remember those overweight saree clad aunties and suited up uncles with colorful neckties reading out government edited news on the good old Doordarshan? To an average Indian the 8 pm DD news was the only source of information and the unlucky ones who missed it had to wait till next day's morning paper.

Now cable and satellite television have sparked off the birth of umpteen news channels vying for ratings and the top spot. But though the looks and the presentation have improved with corporate style attired newsreaders in their mid-twenties, the standards have terribly gone down especially in the Hindi news channels. These channels compromise on the quality of the news broadcasted whilst trying to reach the top rung of the ratings ladder.

Channels like Aaj Tak, Zee News, Star News(Hindi), India TV and others are ever ready to show utter crap news as "sensation" or "Breaking News" to gather viewer attention. The biggest crap of recent times is the coverage by Aaj Tak of what Mr Great Khali is doing in the WWE rings. If he so much as sneezes, snores or farts the Indian news crew is there to cover it. Wake up news junkies does Mr Khali compete for India in Olympics? Or has he got to do anything with the changing economy or global food crisis to be shown in primetime news overriding other national and international events?? BULLSHIT !!

Another hindi news channel was showing how a giant bald eagle picked up a little goat and soared up to its nest.This was being shown on prime-time and was being "analysed" by a team of animal experts. Now are they gonna compete with Discovery Channel and Animal Planet too?? "Some" news to be aired at primetime with a red tag on the bottom of the screen proclaiming "Breaking News".Sometimes these ratings savvy news channels make such hype out off worthless news which dont even qualify for a 60 second roundup.

And when little kids fall into uncovered pits/borewells and battle for life(now a frequent happening in north india)these channels add background music from Taare Zameen Par and market the news. This is sick. This is not journalism. This is pure moronism.

Paintball – Combat Evolved

It is really fun watching Hollywood action stars jump off helicopters and going gung-ho firing all kinds of weapons made on this planet. It would be really fun to feel like Bruce Willis of “Die Hard” or Tom Cruise from “Mission Impossible”, at least for a day. Well, for us software junkies this is a far cry. But if you wanted to be in he army at some point of time in your life or flunked your NDA examination, then as a mark of retribution you can always try playing Paintball game on a hot sunny weekend afternoon.

I never thought India could be a home to seriously Yankee type adventure game like Paintball, that was until last weekend when Jerry invited me to join his group for a Paintball game. I was thrilled to hear that we had Paintball Arena in Bangalore and jumped the opportunity. For those who don't know what Paintball is... its like splitting into two teams and shooting your opponents with guns loaded with spherical pellets with paint inside, hence the name Paintball !! This is the closest thing to actual combat with the real feel but instead of blood spilling we get splattered with PAINT!! It could be regarded as the Holi of modern times !! ;)

So on the D-Day we set off to the Paintball Arena on Banarghetta Road about 10 kms from Diaries Circle. We reached the place when the sun was smiling at his devilish most. We got a small debriefing by the organizing guys:

Rule 1: Always follow safety regulations and wear ur safety gear all the time.
Rule 2:No other rules except rule 1.

The guns(which are pretty heavy) are known as markers, powered by a compressed air canister at its butt. We were shown how to fire the markers and use the safety catch on it. Then we padded up for the game. We had to a wear very uncomfortable vest with an attached neckguard, combat gloves, and a skull cap. After posing for some John Woo style “demo” pics we went into the fight-yard and discussed the war-cries, strategies and tactics to be used while engaging the enemy.

After pledging our allegiance to the Gods of Paintball, the referee blew the whistle and we released the safety catch of the guns and attacked the blokes in the opposite team. Kaashif was the suicide squad leader with his sole motto being “kill or die”. While me and Jerry grouped up and used some stealth tactics to sneak up on the enemy from behind. It was pure rush and fun dodging bullets, running like crazy, dashing, rolling and sliding on the ground. The stamina meter went terribly low by the end of third round and we monitor-staring- corporate blokes were dead meat in no time. We continued for two more rounds and called it a day. The experience was far too exhilarating to be put in words. You need to actually feel the rush. After a sumptuous lunch at 5 in the evening from a nearby dhaba we headed back home worn out and totally wasted. Three days have passed since we went for the game, the cramps in my body are still there and i cant walk or climb stairs. So much for my fitness levels, guess the game should ve been titled "pain"ball for me. But these cramps aint gonna stop me from goin back there again for another day of Paintball !!!

ah..ummmm..hmmm... naaaah !!

The last few week's been hectic, funny, entertaining, enthusiastic and quite educational. It's been more than a month since I joined SAP AG, and al I know about the place is its expansion and my pay package. Being aware about my “exceptional” knowledge about the organization and is products, my manager (female) advised me to go through some presentation slides and documents for the next 4 days. The analytical room of my usually vacant top floor quickly calculated the total number of slides and the days in hand – 227 slides per day !!! What the heck !!!!!! Are you kiddin me ???


Caught up with my old buddy and went for a movie the other day. I was going through a streak of bad dumbass movies for the last three months. If this one were a dud too, I would have given the Bangalore Royal Challengers a serious complex.But the jinx broke and “Iron Man” turned out to be one awesome movie. No this ain't a patriotic documentary about our iron-man, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. It's a superhero movie, with lotta nail-biting moments and some fresh, hilarious and sarcastic jokes which will actually make you laugh. The character is not your cliché underwear-over- pants superhero who is saving people, whilst managing a love-life and other personal problems. This guy here is a filthy rich inventor who at the same time is a complete asshole, but an asshole whom you ll love !! For all the movie buffs out there, watch this movie... it's money well spent !!

IPL IPL IPL IPL IPL
The three letters that have taken the nation by storm. This “manoranjan ka baap” has given all the prime time soaps a run for their money. After the recent footballizing of the otherwise boring game of cricket, suddenly T20 is the new mantra. Take the regular old cricket, chop down the overs to 20, add some fun elements, some imported cheerleaders, movie stars and VOILA!! cricket becomes the most promising business opportunities of all times !!! Of late there have been controversies of players getting slapped by opponents, cheerleaders doing much more than cheering, Dada and Warney locking horns etc. But what the heck, as long as it rains sixers and cheerleaders shake their legs, an average cricket fan like me would me more than happy !!!

Today I had my first team meeting at office where some big blokes from Germany, Singapore etc came over tele-conference to discuss about development plans, deadlines, task planning, global warming, oil crisis, George W Bush's lost underwear etc etc... at the end of two hours they declared that the meeting was successful and were looking forward to a better tomorrow blah blah... It was quite fruitful to me too... see below to find out how I spent those boring hours...

Fitting in...

Its been nearly a month since i landed here in Bangalore, after taking up a new job. Kinda difficult fitting in to the new place, language, people blah blah. Beginning with my vehicle, which bears the licence plates of Tamil Nadu, it's an easy prey to the bumbling traffic cops of Bengaluru (here i guess the cops are John Wayne fans, they wear cowboy hats !!). Already pulled over couple of times by cops with tummies bigger than my bike's tank, i decided to pay up the Karnataka State road tax and bail myself out of all the irritating John Wayne.. er .. traffic police troubles...

But that aint as simple as it sounds... heres my tale of filing the road tax in Bengaluru RTO.

Day 1: I found the place on google maps, and drove to the RTO office without any good samaritan help. Yeah, it seemed more like a fish market than a RTO, anyways always optimistic, i walked in with my documents(RC book and insurance).MAYHEM. It was a Kannada only zone... even the forms were in kannada !! Somehow i understood where to pay the tax... the fatso behind the desk said i needed to pay 12% of my vehicle's cost as Tax !! that comes close to Rs.6000 !! I went out to an ATM and withdrew the amount and came back to the fatso's place... now he says he wants a Demand Draft as they dont accept cash above 5000 bucks... grrrrrrr wanted to stuff the 6000 bucks wads of notes into his mouth !!! It was pretty clear that the fatso wanted some under the table financial transactions.. i gave up and headed back home.

Day 2: My dad went to the same place. He found an "agent" outside the RTO office who demanded 500 bucks (his fees + the bribe to be paid to the RTO officer).Dad returned home half an hour later with the Road Tax bill .. Voila!! Thanks to corruption in India i could pay the Tax !!

Thats just a trailer of what happens in Indian government offices.Things havent been very smooth so far for me here. Yesterday some shithead-tuna-brained thief stole my helmet from the parking lot of a high profile shopping mall... Sigh dunno whats yet to come for dear old moi... :(

Lead India - 2 minutes of patriotism

The first time i saw this video on TV about a month back i was petrified, stupefied and dumbfounded by its sheer power. This isnt an ordinary ad for some campaign... the people who made this really mean something. This video doesnt just pass the message of patriotism but hammers the nail of conscience into every Indian's heart who watches this. This is a kick in the crotch of those who cry about the corrupt system, we forget that we ARE the system. Face the fact that to change the system we need to change ourselves and change the way we think. Nobody is gonna clean our clogged drain, we have to do it ourselves.

The stage would ve been different if we had corrected ourselves way back in the beginning. Some good old dudes shed their blood and gave us freedom thinking that we would carry the flag forward... but that didnt happen. If things had gone right from day one since independence Americans would ve queued up in front of Indian Embassy to get their Indian Work Permit Visas and not the other way round. Well things arent that bad now. We are in better times and if the youth think like the lil kid in that video there is no limit to where this nation can reach.

24

happy birthday to meee
happy birthday to meee
happy birthday dear meee meee
happy birthday to meee...

clap clap clap clap clap !!!

Today i turned 24 !! one of the best birthdays ever !!

The Bite

I saw it. The weirdest bug i had ever seen in my life, crawling up my arm. I flicked it off and it landed on its non existent ass on the ground... i had a closer look at it... i aint an animal planet fan but this little thing WAS weird !! Then the train came by and i boarded it unaware that i was scratching my right arm unknowingly.

Now back to dusty Chennai from the pristine Ottapalam countryside I forgot all about the bug, save for the mild itch on my right arm. Couple of days passed by, the itch turned to pain, couple more days and the pain was unbearable... now with a blister... eeew. My right arm was so swollen that i could make John Cena look like a kindergarten kiddo !!!

Ok now this was a medical emergency. I went to the hospital where normal people were quite amused to see an underweight guy with a huge wrestler's right arm :P. I went to the casualty where the sadist evil Doc examined my arm and squeezed it.... "AAAAAAAARGH... F*** MAN... thats my swollen arm not a red juicy tomato..." After careful squeezing and examination the sadist evil Doc said

"Hmmmm... this is bad. I ll refer you to Dr. Boazo, he is a surgeon. We might have to cut it open".
"What!!!!!! cut..cutt it open??? cant you gimme pills for this??"

Oh my... and what kinda name is Dr. Boazo, the first doc was a sadist one but i was sure this one was a mad scientist... zikes!! I stepped into the surgeon's lair with the blood test report. Thank almighty...this doc looked very pleasant and experienced. He had a look at my arm then the report...

Doc: "Oh my God!! This is a case of severe staphylococcus infection !!"
Me(thinking): "Huh?? What?? Isnt that a dinosaur??"
Doc(Still deeply thinking and frowning over the report):"Hmmmmmm"
Me(on the verge of tears... thinking): "Ok are you gonna cut off my arm?? How many days i got to live... zikes..."
Doc:"This is not very bad. I will give you antibiotics and the wound will heal in 5 days, but make sure you dont strain your arm"
Me(so happy to hear that):"Strain?? the heaviest work i do is clicking the mouse."

The doc's magic pills worked and now my arm is back to normal size and the wound is healed... except that now it looks like a tattoo of a satellite photograph of the nuke bomb crater at Hiroshima.

And as for the bug which bit me.....

Choti choti baatein

Some little things that happened recently....



1)Was returning from my hometown, Trivandrum. There was this beautiful european tourist in the next seat. Suddenly she turns to me and asks "Mavellikkara ethra manikku yethum?" ("What time do we reach Mavelikkara?") in perfect fluent malayalam. My jaw dropped and hit the floor in amazement. I was surprised, shocked and quite amused to see a firangi speaking my native tongue. I assumed that she must have learnt a few phrases or sentences, but on "further investigation" i learnt that she speaks mallu more fluently than i do and though she was from Germany she even learnt to read n write mallu coz she was born and educated in kerala...boo hoo then i realised that i cant read mallu !! what a shame !!! :(


2)Took the local train for the second time today. It's been two years in this unforgiving city and i had never traveled on the famous MRTS* trains of Chennai until last week. By far the most efficient , the fastest, the greenest and the cheapest transport available in chennai. Hey bangloreans u dont have an MRTS to boast of :P. I was quite amazed at the frequency at which the trains run and the best part is that there are no traffic jams or roadblocks. Most of the train routes are on overhead tracks giving you a snapshot of the chennai city... and er dont forget to hold your breath or pinch your nose when running over the open sewers though... ugh ;)



3)Went to watch a movie tonight. Rambo !!! It was more of a cannibal cuisine cookbook. It has got full instructions on how to make human salad, sambhar, thoran, chammandi etc. CUT, SLICE, SMACK, ZAP, SWISH, DICE, CHOP, MINCE... And if u are thirsty... just take a truckload of bad burmese soldiers... pop a jeep mounted high calibre machine gun in front of them and squeeze the trigger. Who wants a blender... huh?? Tasty burmese soldier soup ready to serve !! Or maybe if u r old school type like Mr Rambo, u could experiment with a machete to make some bad guy tikka at home.... eeeeeeewwwww grosss !!!


*MRTS = Mass Rapid Transit System... cool huh !!

The Concert

Went to Saarang '08 at IIT Madras yesterday. Was an amazing night rocking to the tunes with Lucky Ali and Karthik. Some snaps from the memorable evening.



Amazing Crowd !!


The maestro at work...



Now this is called "setting the stage on fire!!"


Twinkle twinkle mobile phones !!



Rock n roll !!

Masti ki paatshaala

Saw one hell of a movie recently... Taare Zameen Par. Nope… not writing a review on some movie again. But I must say that it’s an awesome watch and missing it would be a blasphemy. Kinda reminded me of the "growing up" stage of my life. I am 23 now, supposed to be grown up but dunno where I currently stand in the “grown up” ladder.



I could relate the kid’s life in the movie to my own when in was in school. Nope I wasn’t dyslexic. But moi was kinda imaginative and had a keen passion for colors, paintings, pencils and teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles while other kids of my age found bliss in street cricket. And even I had my share of getting punished and being sent out of the class 

I remember when one of my dad’s colleagues visited our home with his family… he asked me…

Mr.Dad's Colleague: “Beta tum bada hoke kya banoge??”

8 year old me: “I wanna be the guy who waves the green flag at the end of the train!!!” (Followed by dead silence in the room for 2 minutes.)

Er... not quite the right answer that would be expected from an engineer’s son. But what the heck, when I was 8 I thought waving green flag from the last coach of the train was pretty cool!! It was a genuine innocent answer from an eight year old who had no idea what to become when he grows up!! Kids are programmed to become either doctors or engineers right from the first day they step into school.

Middle school was the best part of my kid life!! Studies, vacations, cricket, soccer, bicycles, aimless explorations with buddies, bruises, cuts phew… those were the days!! Nothing much has changed over the years… GI-Joes, cricket bats, bicycles have changed to nokias, ipods, playstations and street-biking!! Grow up??? Who wants to?? Abhi to poori life baaki hai dost!!

The Vantage Point

Being a guy torn between two cities I shuttle between Chennai and Bangalore quite often. My favorite hangout place in Chennai Central, while waiting for the train, is the Pizza Corner overlooking the gigantic ticket booking hall. A perfect vantage point, where you can feast your eyes on the sea of people going around with their life, always late to catch a train (both real and the train of life).



Some happy, some sad, some tense, some hungry, some full, some beautiful, some not so beautiful, some sleepy, some tired and some simply oblivious to the confusion around them. So many lives, each an untold story, pass in front of you.

It is weird, as if watching a live telecast of life and you can’t change the channel. When I look at most of them I feel so content. I don’t have to eat stale food, sleep on the floor or get bullied by stupid policemen who can’t see their toes when they look down (cos their pot-belly blocks the view).

After finishing my pizza I walk down and join the rest the world, becoming one of the untold stories myself. But unlike others I never miss my train.



As I walk towards my train I spot a huge ad hoarding with a catchy punch-line “We all change for the ones we love” which I found to be unusually true!!


PS: 1. Dear reader, do try out the pizza corner, it’s not as big a brand as dominoes or the pizza hut, but believe me they serve the yummiest pizzas in the country.

2. Dear policeman reader, stop trying to look at your toes and start working out.