Sanity Insanity and Moi

December 19, 2008 …

I didn’t expect to write this second part the very next day. But something really funny happened that i had to write about day 2.

After taking the session to a crowd, that enrolled itself for the advanced training, for something that they didn’t know, i was quite exhausted. Every time i finish a slide i’d ask them, “Did u guys understand that?”. They all will then have that look like Katrina Kaif just asked them out. Interestingly the only girl in the session, was trying out the student exercises and was cursing big time - “Yeh, kitna ghatiya system hai…”. With all that, i needed a break.

I decided to walk it up to the guest house. After all it was just a 15 min walk from the office. Got out to the main road and got on to a cycle rickshaw. I was told by my friend from Delhi that one of things to try out in Delhi was to take a ride in one of the cycle rickshaws. Hopped on to one of them and as i was nearing my guest house, i changed my plan.

(translation of my conversation with the rickshaw guy)

“Do you know any shopping malls near by..”

“Yes sir”

“Can you take me there?”

“Ok”

So he started peddling. On and on and on. On the way i see one Grand Mall, he didn’t stop there. Then i see a Mega Mall. he didnt stop there either. I asked him why he didn’t stop any where there? He replied that he will take me to a better place. 20 minutes into the ride i end up in a place like the BDA Complex in Bangalore and there was a big red board on top of that building and on it was written in white Arial Bold font - “DLF Shopping Mall”. Yes! he took me to a building named shopping mall. I just couldn’t stop laughing at myself. Paid the rickshaw guy and walked back to Mega Mall. All the way laughing at myself.

So if u ever end up in Delhi/Gurgaon/any NCR region, dont ask for shopping malls. Just ask for ‘malls’. I must warn you, if u cant say ‘mall’ with the ‘o’, and can only say that with an ‘a’; Oops! My advice - stay at home, Delhi is not the place for you. Or may be if you are lucky enough the mall can get you to a place full of ‘mall’.

She pinged me on one of the most laziest days of my life …

She asked - “Hi!!! How do i know you???”

For which i had no answer, Lord Google didn’t help, The Order of Orkut didnt help, staring at her photo for 10 min, doing a simultaneous name-to-face search and facial-recognition program on the reels of life gave “No Match Found”.

Getting ready to make a complete ‘rear-end’ out of myself, i told her “I don’t know”. She surprised me by greeting ‘G’d morning’ when it was half-an-hour past 3 in the noon and made me look like an idiot when she answered “Working for a project” to my question of “What are you doing in office on a Sunday?”. Made me think if she was was bitten by a well known Libran.

Whom so ever said, one cant beg on his knees on a chat, you now look like an absolute blossomed bottom!!! I forfeit if it was a game she was playing on me. For a person, looking so cute in her photos, to chat with a stranger for so long, proved to be quite mysterious. She vowed she had no clue.

She left me clue less, high and dry on chat. All i know is that she will be at the same location where my business travel is taking me to…

(P.S. - I did make a complete ass out of myself while chatting to her and in fact she stopped chatting after 30min. A personal best !!!)

Piece of advise : dont chat with anyone when you are drowsy, hungry, tired, lazy and have tasty food by your side ..

(Still wondering what a BFG is? read on…)

I was there, standing at a railway crossing. I can walk across the rails and go ahead on the road, on my way, where ever it can take me. But, No! I park my bike and start walking on the railway line. Minutes and hours pass by. I come across green meadows, houses, hills; it was a timeless journey. No thirst, no hunger, no pain, nothing. It was me, the railway line and the view. I don’t know how far i was walking. The sun was there shining high up in the sky. He never moved. I was lost in my thoughts.

It has been quite sometime that I’ve started hearing some strange sounds. It sounded like the ringing bell of an old steam-locomotive. Ting…. Ting…. Ting….

I was high on my spirits. After a long walk, i have a train to go forward. This was like the ultimate dream. Or am i dreaming? I stop to turn around. What the…. my legs are glued to the ground. I cant move!!!. I was struggling like hell to free myself. Behind me i could see the dust and smoke rising up in the horizon. What ever it may be, the dream was just about to turn ugly. My heart’s beating a 1000 beats per minute.

I look behind. I see a shining far behind. Its small, its fast and its coming my way. I’m struggling like hell. I hear the bell ringing even closer. I turn behind… What the #$#%^&^(*(&)(*_)… a pandit with neatly shaved head, big pony tail flying behind him, ringing his bell with one hand and a ‘portable’-fireplace (might be some new 21st century invention).. running towards me. What on heaven’s sake is that?

“Son”, holy crap!!! its my dad, standing to my right.

“What… How… Why…”

“Son”, jeeezzzz, its my mom, standing to my left.

“What… What are you guys doing here?”

“Tie the knot my son!!!”, they both say that with absolute precision that can even leave the most meticulously synchronized systems to shame.

“Tie what?”, i look in front of me and i almost faint. I’m holding a ‘mangalsuthru’ and there is this girl standing in front of me. I don’t know jack shit about her. Is this a right time to at least ask her name?. What am i doing …

Ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting …….

I was still sweating and breathing heavily as i jumped out of my bed. Checked around me and all round my flat just to make sure that i didn’t really wake up after my first-night… or worse 20 years after my marriage. So why do i get the feeling that this is what is going to happen to me????

Parental-pressure is high! By parental-pressure i mean damn crazy pressure that can cause you to go sleepless for days at end. If i thought that could only be the only one which can cause unrest in my serene life, i was wrong. There was… No… there IS a far more greater pressure that will eventually get happy bachelors to get married. Its scientifically called Peer-Pressure a.k.a Friends.

Celibacy is not my way of life. But Yes, face it! Its your FRIENDS who will eventually get you married. They will all be there. They are the greatest treasure that u can have. Even long after you are gone, you will live within your friends. ‘Gone’ as in not like you are dead. ‘Gone’ as in, you go on-site and they will still talk about you as, ‘Kaminaa Saala!!! On-site se kuch nahi leke aayega. Fakeeerrrr…’. You live now, not after you’re dead.

They are there. But have you ever though about what happens when they all eventually face the running-pandit, gets run over by him, never gets a chance to wake up and lives the ‘dream’. Oops you’re in trouble.

They all get married and start their family. They no longer enjoy the jokes that you shared. Even worse they even reach a point where they tell you, “Dude don’t talk about all that, she doesn’t like all that”. Worse still, his wife hates you and more worse, her husband starts having feelings for you.

Oops! your friend will change. They all change eventually and you are left alone. You just cant go and make more friends because, the ‘make-great-friends’ list gets shorter with age. Soon you will find yourself without the great friends that you used to hand out with, no new friends and you are being treated like an adult where ever you go. And i believe the later stage is definitely not where i want to find myself at.

So now there is even more pressure on you to get married…

Whats that… Ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting… Where is that BFG (Big Fucking Gun), i’m gonna kill that pandit…

WTF… its full platoon of relatives and friends marching towards me. Dad and Mom holding a garland each, friends with kids and its then i realize that the pandit was just a side-kick.

I just stand there like a scapegoat as they dance around me… Ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting ting…

I was there. It didn’t feel great.

I was scared, i was lost, i was wandering in the dark.

I hit the Writer’s Block.

Trust me its a damn scary place. Felt good when i reached there, mainly due to the fact that i was busy at work and i was in no way even getting time to pee. Forced into the dark the force grew weaker in me. Two days back i faced the bitter reality that i had hit the block, i shouldn’t have taken the left turn at the T-junction at the dead-end, for what joy?, i have no idea.

Goddess Wikipedia (a.k.a. Goddess Saraswathi in Hindu Mythology), describes Writer’s Block as :

Writer’s block is a phenomenon involving temporary loss of ability to begin or continue writing, usually due to lack of inspiration or creativity.

Naah!!! Nothing of these caused my condition. I had inspiration(lots of it) and i had lots to write but i didn’t. Why? I needed a reason and today i have a reason to write. Breaking the door, like Rajani, i’m out with the reason i needed (I wish it was more like a girl that i walked out with).

20th Sept, 15th Oct and this one on the 30th of Oct, that was the frequency of my posts in the last 2 months.

Looking back i ponder what made me stop, was it the work or was it something more noir. Yes, work was one of the reasons, undeniably. 20+ hrs of working on a single day, my friends began referring me as IBM’s bitch. Getting adjusted to the new life was one definite factor. But when i search deep it was something more than that. One that pains me still, tried shrugging it off, but couldn’t, it still lingers in the darkest thoughts. It can be described as one that is scariest for a writer. I was never credited for something that i wrote. Even my closest friends didnt acknowledge the fact that it was me. Bang! i got a “500 Internal Server Error” when i was expecting a “200 OK” with “Connection: Keep-Alive”.

Any way its all behind me, and i at least think that i’m back.

BTW my lingo has now been reduced into the results of an aftermath of heavy AS2/AS3 testing, with heavy dosage of XML and Development team that doesnt consent to bugs.

Taken this opportunity, if u would like anyone who is coming across this post to share, what made them hit writer’s block and how they did eventually overcome it….

Of late, especially after i booked my flat, my folks are after me, pressurizing every bit inside me to get married. Well, thought you should know, i’ve been a bachelor and i had my share of heart breaks and breakings. After the last one, i just decided to settle with the drunk chicks at the pubs or rather get’em drunk. But how the hell am i supposed to know that my folks were having such plans for me. Trust me, its tough to be a single, good looking, smart dark bachelor down south (i love vanity). The nosy neighbors and relatives makes sure that the juice is sucked out of you. Damn you Suckers!!!

The hard part is, you don’t get to choose or say a word beyond telling yes/no to the girls that they parade in front of you. I consider myself lucky, some guys i *knew* never even had that.

Son! THIS IS YOUR BRIDE! Marry HER!

Yes dad!!!

I mean whats the whole pressure thing about? I’ve been a really well spoiled bachelor so far, waking up and sleeping with the timings of people half-way round the world, eating anything that i could lay my hands on - stale breads, half-cooked spicy chicken curry that cleans your food-track once a month, Domino’s pizzas that run for 2 days etc. etc.. Now i’m being even more responsible by booking a flat (i need to mention that it was again pressure from folks). Now that i have a place for myself, the next thing that i need to concentrate is my career, blogging, make some money etc etc. I’m not ready to be tied down.

What are the odds, that the girl they pick for you is not gonna make your life miserable? Dad’s got a comeback for that too, “At least both the families are there to help you out with that”. Then why cant i just find someone with whom i’m comfortable with? Facts to be laid straight, yes they did take care of you for a long time, but do they have to pick up your partner too.

Am i ready to take the responsibility? Hell no! May be i would like to get married, after i know that person a bit more. If not, then jumping into marriage is no different than having sex, with her and your parent’s consent!

As a closing note, the last conversation with my dad ended with him telling me this -

“As a bachelor, you live like a King and die like a Dog, Once married, you live like a Dog and die like a King”

No idea who put that in his head, but i sure did got it out. Even my mom was left gaping after that dialogue.

What we do these days involves competition. No matter what. A a kid we race to the gate and back. As teens we race our bikes. As adults we race against time and colleagues. The time that we live in Competition is viewed as the source of creativity and self improvement. As a kid we are expected to be the top scorer in the class, not the smartest, as teens we are expected to be responsible but not creative and as the workforce we are expected to bring in profit and not innovation.

Why does competition has to be so bad? Slowly but steadily everyone starts to keeps expectations out of you and keeps reminding you about that. You fall victim to it losing your creativity. Its because we want to beat that record and get our names in there. We benchmark every thing everyday, we fall into The Curse of Great Expectation.

But what about creativity? If i have ever done anything that is creative or innovated an idea, its because i didn’t take part in a race. On the same grounds i hate taking exams too. Exams for me is again about breaking records and false derivatives. With time being most valued, exams seems to be the only way people want to find talents.

There is a trend with the organizations now. They are still competing and very much in the race. They do it in more ‘innovative’ ways. They ask you to just innovate and come up with some thing very brilliant. Even if you didn’t mean that to be part of any race or drive the race. Its used by the organization to outrun their competitor.

The human cost to win the organization’s race or the cost of health on onself is often disregarded. But what happens to those who stay out of the competition and decide to be .. uhh .. say free. They have immense potential to be creative and inventive. But why don’t they?.

The Society is stereotyped in believing that competing is the best way to progress. So much of the things that these so called ‘free birds’ innovate are considered inferior. They eventually gets into the race to survive or fall.

I knew of a person during my college days. He was this extra brilliant guy. There wasn’t much that he couldn’t answer about technology. Few professors realized his potential. But but the rest of the folks were unforgiving. Had the mentoring right he wouldn’t had to settle for a rather uhhh normal techie kind of job with an average company.

Its time we wake up to say no to the unwanted competitions around us.

Take my advice.

If u don’t have a Reliance connection phone/datacard or anything similar don’t take it.

And if by chance and you had to take it. Don’t think of Canceling it!!!

Why? Hear my story :

It was during Barcamp Banaglore 5, that i had discontinued the Tata Indicom Broadband connection as their service was shity. YES damn SHIT!!!.

My thoughts went like this - i have a laptop so why don’t i go for mobility. Let me take the the Reliance NetConnect connection. The data card looks good and works out of USB plus their tariff plan is also good.Finally at an unfortunate moment i took that connection.

Is there a word in the dictionary that describes worse than ’shity’? Even ‘ultra-f***king-shit-able’ doesn’t properly suffice. It disconnects if i try to check Gmail and connect to GTalk at the same time.

So i decided, after 2 months, enough is enough - cancel the connection. Filled all the forms, submitted the application, paid the outstanding amount and answered two rounds of dumb feedback calls.

Q : Sir, why did you cancel the connection?

A : The Service is BAD.

Q : Why sir?

A : Its Shitty!!! (how the hell am i supposed to know why its BAD. You should be knowing it)

When i thought all was done, in comes a bill at my door step, the next month. Dialed the customer care, told them the scenario. Thought it could be a genuine mistake. WRONG!!! In comes another bill the next month and the next and this month too.

After that a wave of calls in  Hindi, Kannada and English asking me to pay the bill. Still the woes continue and the bill amount keeps on adding every month

Nothing helps. Complaints at customer care doesn’t help, blasting them for calling me doesn’t help, pleading doesn’t help….

PLEASE DON’T EVER TAKE A RELIANCE CONNECTION…

Yes!! Mr. Anil you’re having a very sustainable and rewarding relation with ME.

I have been blogging for more than 2 years now. Though there are no hard and stead fast rules on blogging. Its a free space, people start with enthusiasm and finally their blog just die out. Why?.

“What not to blog!” or “How not to blog!”, though was never discussed as a topic, but at times we have had discussions on this. Surprisingly majority of the bloggers had the same views on what they promoted, what they looked in a blog, what they expect in a comment and the commentator, what was considered as a good post and when they thought as not so good blogs too.

As the blog-o-sphere is free to any one and any one can write about anybody, doesn’t really mean that you can post about anything. People have secret blog shrines for their love, have extensive write up on the topics that they love, that’s all fine, if its really yours …

Everyone agrees to the fact that, when they visit a blog, they believe that what ever you have written is yours. So if you are not writing yourself and just doing the Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V (copy and paste), chances are that the person wont come back, ever!!!. If you are desperate enough to put a mail forward, as it is, even if its a very good in reading, make sure that you give a brief intro to it. Like

“This is a mail forward that i got this morning. It is worth a read ….”

At least you will let the reader know that its not you who wrote it. If possible avoid mail forwards as posts in your blog.

Plagiarism is a strict No! If you want to put someone else’s content in your blog, give them the damn credit. Wont you feel happy when some one credits you for your work? and feel dejected when some stranger reaps the fruits of your creativity.

How to do this?

Link back to them from your post and give and excerpt of their post with your views. That will be appreciated, the other person will sure visit your blog too. Trust me, thats one way to build the network and gain popularity.

Internet is a good place to remain anonymous. So if you want to buildup credibility and wants to be known, then include a name that doesn’t look like “3l33t_wr1t3r”, “the nice blogger”, etc. Put some creativity into the naming, because at the end of the day, you will be known by that name. I remember calling up a fellow blogger who by the name Woke (full name - wokeupjustnow), and asked for “Woke??”. Well i gave him a shock, as nobody had ever called him Woke before.

This particularly helps in commenting, as the author of the post will only recognize the person by the name and blog id that has to be provided. Having a personalized Gravatar or Globally Recognized Avatars is a good idea.

So your comments will look like the ones shown above.

Everyone may not be a master of English, but just avoid making common spelling mistakes. It really turns down the audience that you have in hand. Just like you wont really enjoy reading

Dont be hasty, take time. Get used to the keyboard.

Its all that i can think of and from my experience. Urging others too to share their thoughts ..

Happy Blogging!!!

Do we really care about the environment? NO! Simply because we only care about ‘today’. Spare a few, but we never think of tomorrow beyond our savings and how to survive another day. A few is really a few, not even 1 in 100, not even a 1000, may be one in a ten thousand if we are just lucky enough.

Yes i know that countless many actions, meetings, movements, walks, runs, talks, videos, documentaries, features, etc are happening to many people aware of the changing face of the environment. But, if we really look at it, at the end of all these, we still drive the same oil-spilling, low mileage, polluting vehicles. So who is to blame? Is the common man still to blame? Should we point our fingers at the authorities for not enforcing the laws properly. Talk about enforcing!, they don’t even have time to set up a stable government up there after satisfying all the mouths.

Developed nations are like that model in the Marlboro advt., smocking the cigarette and showing off; while developing nations, they are trying to imitate the model by breathing in that smoke and saying, ‘Hey even i’m cool enough!!!’. Don’t they know cigarette is - fire at one end and idiot at the other end. Be at either side you stand to loose.

Take a look in that mirror. Look at you. Are you even half healthy as what your parents used to be at this age. Ya you do earn 10 times as compared to what they earned. We don’t even get up from our butts to get our own food, we ‘get’ in by punching numbers into a machine that is speculated to cause impotency in men and brain cancer.

Carpal-Tunnel Syndrome, was for some hardcore keyboard player. But now every one has one or the other wrist problem, have we all become Elton John. We are the Elton John-s of a different keyboard playing generation, of a different economy, of a different industry.

The 3Rs - Reduce, Recycle, Reuse - are still motto’s of this generation; Reduce physical exertion, Recycle gossips, Reuse inner-wears. I see people taking tonnes of print-outs every day at office, some times they do it by mistake; pages with just one line printed. What do they do? Leave it at the shredder. Cant they just take that can use it for scribbling notes?

As mentioned by Al Gore in An Inconvenient Truth - We all are like the frog sitting inside boiling water, not realizing that we are getting cooked…

…Unlike elsewhere in the country, no farmer in Kerala can use  “bourgeois” things like harvesting machines, unless they have the comrades sanction. Each farmer must apply to the local office of the CPM’s Travancore Karshaka Thozhilali Union (TKTU), part of Kerala State Karshaka Thozhilali Union (KSKTU), the party’s farm worker union…

Here is a rather comprehensive coverage of what lead to the loss of crops in Kerala

Good one Panchajanya…