Category Archives: Men

Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009

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Have you ever felt the need to recognize a person from you locality for his or her contributions to the society, may that be big or small?nba logo Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009

Have you felt the need to recognize a Govt. employee that goes beyond his duties and sets an example by outright commitment to his work?

How about recognizing an NGO for its public service or a Residence association for its diligence in waste management, maintaining the greenery or its initiative in having a rain harvesting project?

Bangalore is a city that is vibrant because of its people that make so. There are ordinary people among us that do extra-ordinary work to help the society and each other. How about recognizing them? Wont that be an inspiration for them to continue doing what they were doing and for others to come forward, making The Garden City, truly a great place to live in.

Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009 is aimed to do that.

Straight out of their site  -

An initiative by Member of Parliament and Convener of ABIDe – Mr. Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Namma Bengaluru Awards is launched with the vision to inculcate a sense of optimism and interest in the minds of the common man and bring to the limelight ordinary citizens for their extraordinary contributions, recognize exemplary contributions made by individuals who have contributed to Bengaluru’s developments, for those who have enriched the lives of common man, to the ordinary citizens for their extra ordinary contributions and to create Ambassadors of best practice who set standard for the rest to follow.

The citizens of Bangalore will be recognized under two major categories -

  • Namma Bengaluru Awards for Public Officials and Agencies – To recognize public officials and government agencies (Like MPs, MLAs, MLCs, Officers & Staff of Civic agencies like BDA, Bescom, BBMP etc)
  • Namma Bengaluru Awards for Private Citizens and Institutions – Aimed at recognizing efforts of citizens and private institutions including NGOs, RWA, Companies, schools and others

I know what you’re thinking. Why would you ever want to recognize anyone from BDA, Bescom or BBMP or any Govt. Official for that matter. Thats where you’re missing the point. Inspite of the fact being that we all hate the govt. officials and brand them as lazy 9-4, job secure, bribe-demanding people there are some really gem-of-a-characters among them. Why cant we just recognize them? Why cant we honour them? Dont belive me?

Well if u ask me i would love to recommend the BMTC Volvo bus drivers and conductors for their courteous behavior. Every time i have travelled in one of them, they have always had service-with-a-smile motto. Same goes with the Bescom guy who turned up on a Sunday evening because there was power out-age at our area.nominate Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009

Last day i was at Namma Bengaluru Foundation‘s office, which is more or less the same as Mr. Rajeev’s office, to be briefed about the whole initiative. I was joined there by Balu and we were both surprised with the magnitude of responses that Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009 has received.

The nominations were opened on 14th of October and closes on 14th of November 2009. Guess how many nominations they got till now. Well Balu and me guessed somewhere around 250-300. No, they have so far got close to 2000 nominations. Yes thats right – 2000. And in one case, all the students of a class wanted to nominate their teacher for the award. Thats the beauty of this. Only two categories, Govt. or Private sector and you can nominate anyone!

Go ahead Nominate! Spread the Word!

Read more here about the awards and how to nominate.

Why you should and shouldnt get married early?

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Walking back home from work today, a friend of mine messaged me telling me about her plight. She goes on to say that she wont be marrying soon (reasons unknown) and eventually when she marries, she will be (in her own words) – ” married of to some geek for sure… all bald, fat buddas(old men)… 29, 30 years old “.

This made me wonder. Its not just her, its the problem with all women who are going to marry late. Since there was nothing else to think about, i thought about the situation from a guys perspective. After much thinking i realized that women who are marrying late and men who marry ( late / early / on time) are going to face this issue.

We all know that, every second person we meet has something to do with the software industry, so there is no escaping it. Hence i’m convinced that atleast 75% of us will face the following situation for once in their life and will be stuck there for ever.

For Women marrying late, as the situation above describes-

You will be married off to someone in the IT industry, who after 7-8 years in the industry is a Team Lead with 10-15 credit cards doing balance transfers, cant run up 10 flights of stairs as he is only used to sitting, burps at the table and doesnt know much about manners, picks his nose in public, cant speak anything like a normal person without using technical jargons, cant see his toes anymore and the only smalltalk that he can ever have is about tax slabs about which he wont be having any idea about

For guys its gets tougher  -

.. you’d be marrying a chick (hopefully), which is more or less like buying a new car – diminishing value and performance and looks getting outdated with time. Then when you see a new car on the road, the latest model, you wish it was yours. She will initially be a beauty and then turn into a blubber, putting on weight over the years as she doesnt have to look good anymore, she has trapped her prey. She’d have flabs over the years, which can supplement for cusions. Fashion will be kurtas with long slits that show off her enormous thighs. I’d have to be on top of her if i ever have to do her, else i’ll be crushed to death. She with the 2 kids (which you’ll have over time) will go blah blah blah blah every time you’re stuck in traffic, watching the finals, reading, sleeping ….

In short  – Wish you a Happy Married life!!! icon biggrin Why you should and shouldnt get married early?

Why I Support The Attack On Women

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Off late there has been a lot of reports, both via the main stream media as well as blogs, about the increasing number of attacks on women. So i decided to do an RCA (Root Cause Analysis) of the situation myself. Basically i wanted to find answer to these questions -

  1. Why do such attacks happen?
  2. Who are these attackers? Are they teenagers or people well in their late 30s?
  3. Whom did they target? What was so special about the people who were attacked?
  4. What they did, is it wrong? … etc.

Problem Statement:

As far what i read in the news papers and what i heard from others discussing, these attacks were orchestrated by people who say they are supporting the ‘Indian Culture‘. They call them selves as the conservators of Indian Culture. The good Samaritans who resorted to a quick resolution of the problem, attacked the women to save the Indian Culture form getting westernized, the same evil forces from which the Mahatma delivered us (they might argue so)

Hence we have our Problem Statement as : The Attack was to preserve/conserve the Indian Culture.

Analysis:

Now that we have defined the problem statment, lets looks at the analysis. Lets define what happened, what were the public reactions like.

The people who attacked women in Mangalore, Bangalore, Mysore (???), some-other-’ore’ etc. ( lets refer them for the time being as SenaPpl), just couldn’t digest the fact that the bharatiya naari (Indian Woman) dressed in jeans and T-s. Plus the fact that they were dining at a lounge, crossing-the road, waiting for a bus or even minding-their-on-business when they where attacked.

The people who were attacked (we will refer them as Victims), were teenagers and techies. The Victims all had one thing in common, they were wearing western clothes – jeans, t-s, skirts etc. If you might notice the attacks were not on women who were wearing saree/salwar/any authentic Indian dress. The SenaPpl were all men. There were no incidends of women attacking men or women attacking women. It was the XY chromosomes attacking the XX Chromosomes.

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Bas Ek Haan Ki Guzarish….

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waiting for love by Lucem Bas Ek Haan Ki Guzarish....What is it about love that makes us so stupid? So stupid that we are ready to bear the agonizing pain of being in love…

At the end of the day when the dust settled, i saw her. The profile was like unmistakably hers. Felt a  familiar pain in me, that i thought would never come back to me ever again, yet there i was feeling vulnerable and my feet sinking.

I was waiting for her at Transit food court of Forum Mall, the place busting with people. She walked towards me with a smile…

6th Feb 2009, after contemplating a lot, from morning till evening, through the daily work, i mustered the courage to pick up the phone and talk to her. She greeted me with a hello, that felt so warm and fresh, that it cooled my senses and took out the nervousness in me.We exchanged the usual, ‘How are you?”,”I’m fine” talk, then i knew it was time for me to make the purpose of my call,

I murmured, “Hi, What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Nothing much, why?”

“Hey, if you are not too busy, would you mind meeting for lunch? Have to tell you something…”

“I’m sorry, i cant, promised that i will join my friend for shopping. But i will be done by 3, can we meet in the evening?”

“Oh that will be great. You pick the place, i’m fine with anyplace”

“No, i fixed the time, you pick the place…”, she argued..

“Ok how about Transit at Forum, 3:30 sharp”

“Ok”, she agreed.

And the call ended with the “Buh Byee’s”, from her… Wow i was so elated that, my team mates asked me why i was smiling without a reason. I didn’t had an answer for them.

She was special. The past experience, had left a deep gash in my heart and the way i looked at life. I felt it healing and no longer felt dead at heart. I felt revived and relived. Rest of the day, went by without even me realizing it. She was there in my thoughts, i didn’t know what else to do. I counted the seconds that went by, but didn’t realize them turning into minutes and minutes into hours. I was lost in her thoughts, thinking how i would ever be able to confess to her what i felt.

Before even i realized it was Saturday, 7th Feb 2009, dragged myself out of the bed, to take a peek at the time, 12:30PM. Good, i have slept well past the morning, that means that in another 3 hrs i will meet her. I had effectively reduced the heart-ache by sleeping. Had a quick snack, and made me believe that that’s gonna be my breakfast and lunch. I left home at 2:45, to be sure that i’m well ahead of time and she doesn’t have to wait for me. I was there 10 min before our fixed rendezvous time, got a nice cozy place to sit and started counting the time, with occasional glances to the entrance and the mobile awaiting her call.

I spotted her, entering the place, stood up and waved at her and caught her attention. She walked towards me with a smile and sat across the table. I had ordered my favorite Torpedo Prawns from the SeaFoods Bay outlet, (they serve real good fish ‘n chips and prawns), i slid the plate towards her. She took a bite and smiled. She was telling me some thing about the shopping that she did with her friend, smiling occasionally.

I was lost, the earring dancing to every movement of her head, the pearl pendant that went up and down with every breath of hers, constantly tucking the strand of hair that fell on her face… At the corner of her lips i found solace…

“Hello… Are you listening to what i’m telling you…” snap!!!

“Oh sorry! i didnt expect you to turn up in the first place and more over speak so much. We had hardly met more than a couple of times and …”

“Oh c’mon, you have been a cheerful person, so that gave me the comfort factor, so i’m here… Now tell me why you wanted to meet…”

To be precise, i have no idea what i was telling her. But i did speak for 20 min. The conversation was about telling her that, i’m here for a friend of mine, who was interested in her. Finally when i had beaten around the bush, so much that no more bush was left neither here nor in America, i had to tell her the truth.

“The fact is, its me. I really like you…”

I expected her to say a no, and tell me why it cant work out between me and her. But she smiled. She blushed. It felt warm there. She was silent for a minute or two, making eye contact with me occasionally. Those moments was truly unbelievable, it sank the whole hustle around us, everything was quite for those few moments, we looked at each other and smiled…

There was a bottle of water on the table, in those few minutes, she drank half of that and told me, “No one has ever made me drink so much water in so little time, i’ll give you that credit…”, i didn’t really had anything to tell her, just smiled and stared into those eyes.

I had to ask her eventually, “So what do you think…”

“I knew something of this sort was there, but was hoping that you wont say it….”, she smiled after saying this.

“I’m not asking you to take a decision now, think over it, take you time, let me know. The fact is i like you…”

“I know, but you’re JERRY…”

“What do u mean by that?”

“Nothing, you are JERRY!!! I dont know, i’m confused…”

“Look dear, you dont have to give me an answer soon, take you time and i’ll wait. Don’t worry i can take a NO for an answer. So just think and let me know …”

There was a certain relief on her face. She was still smiling. I wanted to shout, ‘Kudi hasi tho phasi…’, but it just died within me. We continued talking and enjoyed the rest of evening in each other’s company, till she parted to get back home.

Now i’m waiting… for her reply

… haan, bas ek haan ki guzarish hai ….”

(pic courtesy of – Lucem @ DevianArt)

Mallu in Delhi – Part 2

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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’.