Dollar | Jerry Mannel

Day 2 and i’m doing pretty good in US of A. Petaluma is where i stay and it’s more or less a residential area. Very quite, beautiful and a killer of a climate that begs to be loved. 30mn of drive to where i’ll be working, 15mn to Wal-Mart and 10mn to the nearest Costco outlet. Period! that’s all you all need to know. Now let me tell you the best things that has happened after coming here.

Since i have a strong attraction to anything with an engine and 4-wheels as opposed to anything with a tight rear and 2-legs, i couldn’t help, but notice all the cars on the road. Most of them are Chevys, Toyotas and Hondas. But it’s not that i’m talking about. I’m talking about the modified Ford Mustang that is parked in front of my apartment, the Chevrolet Corvette C6 across the road, the BMW M3-s, M5-s and Z4 and the Audi R8. Yes, there are a few Pontiacs, Subarus and Buicks but who cares!.

The drive from the airport was even interesting. I happened to meet this cab driver Ronald. He’s Mexican and he knew Tamil! Yes i did get the shock of my life. He knew India pretty well. When i said i was from Alappey. He was like, ‘Oh! it’s the place with the houseboats etc. right!’. It seems like his next door neighbors are Tamilians and he has a big liking for Masala Dosas.

Being in the tropics, you tend to have fairly normal days – 6A.M. the Sun is out & 6P.M. the Sun is gone. So with the summer season just starting here i’m still getting used to the fact that days are going to be longer. Twilight sets in by 8P.M. and i think it’s 6P.M. It’s fairly cold with morning temperatures hovering around 12 degrees and afternoon it hardly crossed 20 degrees. (Read all temperatures in Celsius).

Finally even after my 21hr flight, i didn’t get the in-famous jet-lag. Bad thing i’d never know how it feels like!

(pssst… i’ve located the nearest strip club in my area. don’t tell my wifey about it!)

It’s been on the news that the new symbol for Rupee, which we all so far passionately represented as ‘Rs’, will be be announced by some hot-shots at the Govt. later today. If you haven’t read the news it’s here -

“… the new symbol should represent India, it’s culture and it’s growing presence in the world…”

After an year long process of sorting, debating and eliminations, 5 have been shortlisted. There have been a lot of debate on what these symbols represent. If you want to know look no further. Here is the explanation to each symbol -

Symbol 1.

The roots of this symbol can be traced to the Mahatma. We put the greatest preacher of non-violence on the greatest preacher of violence (courtesy: some movie dialog). So if you take a close look at the following picture of Mahatma Gandhi, it all becomes clear from where the 3/4th circle and the vertical line takes inspiration.

Symbol 2

This one has been inspired from the Euro. Look at how the curves and the double dashes resembles a union.

Symbol 3

This is Rupee getting Dollar-ified. The distinct double vertical lines, common in the Dollar representation served as inspiration

Symbol 4

A tribute to our mother land – Britain. How cannot some one not take inspiration from the Pound Sterling. We grew on that, we matured, drove them away and made them half Indians who love curry. As a friend of this blogger told a Greek, ‘… these days we call it India…’

Symbol 5

Indians love their electronic appliances. It makes them extremely happy when they buy something that has the label ‘Made in Japan’, even though it was made in the slums of Dharavi!. The last symbol for Rupee will stand for Indian’s craze for ‘Made in Japan’ labels. Cheers to the Japanese Yen

My Vote is for the first symbol -

As it’s more Indian in a Gandhian way than the others.

Jerry Mannel

Eternally alive on the Internet

Category Archives: Dollar

Cars, Freeways and Pseudo-Tamilians

Meaning of the Rupee Symbols