VIP Frenchie

At the very outset, this is not yet another Rupa Frontline “Sabse Aage” competition. No sound human being could ever come up with an equally, if not more, abysmally pathetic advertisement for chaddi-banian! Of course, the slew of banian ads that have hit the television channels these days are increasingly making me question the sanity of the human race. Now that the intention is clear, let’s move on. The ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) had been in the limelight for a couple of weeks now. Yes, it is that part of the year when the Very Important Persons in the tennis world wage gladiatorial games on the blood-drenched courts of clay. Welcome to the French Open 2010! A battlefield where each of the soldiers is made to kiss the clay, irrespective of whether it is by victory or defeat – how French(ie)! So you would ask what’s the big deal about it, right? To which I say, there are 2 very important reasons for my affinity with the French Open. One, it is the only tennis Grand Slam played on a clay court. Being relatively slow (with special stress on the word ‘relatively’), watching matches on the clay court somehow irrationally gives me a feeling that one fine day I could be rubbing shoulders with those tennis greats. Two, I just love everything French... It’s such a ‘no-holds-barred’ attitude towards everything. I just love..., hey wait, LOVE – that’s the word I was looking for!
For the benefit of those of you who fall into the BPL (Below Poverty Line) in terms of tennis knowledge, let me share a couple of nuggets. Needless to say, the sum total of my insights about this game would be just about enough to land me as the captain of the BPL team, at the best! Well, like they say, forewarned is forearmed. Anyway, ATP is comprised of three major groups. First, there is men’s tennis. Then there is women’s tennis. And then there are the William sisters! Now don’t you dare laugh it off because one hit from either of their WWE-worthy arms and the kid seven generations after you, would be born with a crooked nose!(who says that only Fevicol can transcend death?) The future of women’s wrestling is on the tennis court! Sorry, I lost track as I was picturizing them. At the open end of the hemline on the micro-mini skirt, to be precise. My sincere apologies! Of course, of late, there is a fourth group that is threatening to create a cult status in the tennis world – a group that blurs the line(s) between the first and second groups. For once, I would like to partly blame the French for their contribution to this emerging group. So much for gender equality!
Coming to men’s tennis, simply put there are two groups of players. First, there are those who have lost at least once to Roger Federer and never felt bad about it! Second, those who haven’t! One direct conclusion would be that the latter haven’t played Federer ever! Otherwise, I believe even one specimen from the second group hasn’t been conceived yet! Let’s shift our focus to women’s tennis now. This is a phrase that spells doom, simply because it contains that exalted creation of God – Women! If God were to give me one chance to forgive him for anything, without a second thought, in Michael Jackson style, I would say “This is it!” Now don’t get me wrong here. I am not trying to rub charcoal and blacken their species. The question is “of what use is rubbing charcoal on tar?”

@All the lovely women reading this – “Please do not get the drift!” and

@ All the not-so-lovely women reading this – “Who gives a damn anyway!”:)
OK, lost again! Women, God! Coming back, women tennis players, much like their male counterparts, fall into two clean categories. First, those whose worst nightmares distinctly involve at least one of the William sisters! Second, those of them who do not sleep at all! I know some of you, in spite of not being professional women tennis players, still fall into that first category. Worry not, you could totally blame visual media for it... Of course, there are a few other interesting insights about the women players. For some unfathomable reason, much like the “did egg come first or the hen come first?” puzzle, I haven’t been able to solve the “did she become model first or was she a tennis player first?” syndrome. In fact, I have this Cold War with Russia because I hold them accountable for this dilemma of mine. Ever since USSR broke up, they have been shamelessly converting naturally-athletic bodies like mine into popcorn-chewing couch potatoes, gaping at women’s’ tennis matches on the TV sets, at the prime time in their lives! Not to take away the fact that for millions of lonely individuals, matches such as these, for whatever reason, added the only noteworthy purpose to their lives. Oh boy, how I envy those cameramen! Now, let’s talk about the third category of ATP players. In fact, just like the rest, there are two kinds of Williams. First, it is Serena Williams! Second, it is Venus Williams! No questions asked. It’s been this way since... World War II did you say?
Finally, coming to the emerging fourth group, the lesser I speak about them, the safer I would be. In this world of GLBT, freedom of speech has lost the race to the freedom of choice. So before things get murky, let’s move on. Guess this brief monologue about tennis should do. Coming back to French Open 2010! What finally transpired during the tournament was the kind of thing that has become the norm in men’s tennis these days. Federer leaves prematurely; Federer fans vehemently declare the French Open worthless; Anti-Federer fans fanatically celebrate his loss and start making Nostradamus-like-predictions that his descent has finally begun and doomsday is near; Nadal reaches the final and wins it; Nadal fans (read Anti-Federer) zealously declare the arrival of the present/future of tennis! Continue in loop. Of course, there was a time when if it was a grand slam, it was FedEx who picked the trophy (I know both Federer fans and anti-fans would be glaring, for different reasons though!)
Next, women’s tennis (only after the exit of William sisters it qualifies to be called thus) has its own favourites through the tournament who finally fail to win, every single time! Then there are those much talked about matches where past success (currently active models sporting Nike/Adidas accessories) meets budding talent (sponsored by Lotto or some such company). Eventually, exactly contrary to the predictions of the ‘trade pundits’, some till-then-not-popular girl goes on to win the tournament! On these rare occasions when two relatively unknown faces make it to the finals of a Grand Slam, I feel inspired by the cricketing cliché that could be repackaged as “It was a day when the game of tennis won!” And now those of you wondering as to how the William sisters failed to make it to the centre stage, here’s your consolation! Because they failed to qualify in the singles they had to remind us of their presence through doubles. And remind they did by winning the doubles championship! As simple as that. Sabse aage, always!
PS: Why don’t Rupa Frontline folks get the William sisters to do a jingle for them? Could turn out to be a much-needed moral boost to their grossly despicable ideas! Finger crossed though.

P.S. I Hate You...

Ever since I had noticed the advertisements aired about the supposedly ‘sabse bada ticket’, I had made up my mind about not watching any of the IPL matches live! Firstly, I have never displayed outstanding attributes of religious fanaticism (the sole reason for my rejection during the campus interviews conducted by LeT and a few other like-minded multi-anti-nationals). And with Cricket having the globally undisputed ‘highest religious following’, I did not really fit into this extremist population. Of course, I do not have anything against live viewership or cricket as such. My disinterest was to be my silent protest against the unduly increasing popularity of Lalit Modi, the ‘Primo Supremo’ (PS), whose actions these days are bordering pure evil! I even skipped an entire meal to drive the nail home completely (had to make-do with snacks)! @Lalit: Dude, I hope you do not take this personally! I would have felt the same way if anybody else had been in your place as well...
Anyway, as a part of my ‘dharna’ I watched every single match on the ‘TV set’! I listened to every single commentary (especially Anjum Chopra – even cricket transforms), including the Sherry Paaji one-liners (for later use to create ‘intellectual fog’ in my office). Though, I must admit that occasionally I did miss the ‘visuals’ of Mandira Bedi (no ulterior objectives btw). I did everything possible to make clear my non-acceptance of the devilish deeds by PS. I even muted the TV every time he appeared in a stadium with different celebrities to “fpeak about what he planff for the next verfion of IPL” or about “the two new fizzling teamf that have joined the IPL rafe”. Now I hate every person who says ‘fa’ as ‘fa’! Sucks! (Pardon the spelling mistake:)). Come to think of it, I actually took upon myself agonizing loads of torture just to thwack him on his posterior, mentally! Can you imagine listening to that brain-numbing cancer-inducing asylum-characteristic laughter of Akshay Kumar, an imitation, that too of Rahul Mahajan! Does even plagiarism have no moral sense of despondency? Micromax – I curse you that your sales will be lesser than even Dimpy Ganguly’s clothing (if there is any such possibility)!
Then there were those fifteen seconds of ‘undiluted buffoonery’ of Oongli Cricket with Baby AB assisted by his dim-witted portly prick and the totally-not-happening chick (hen)! It will really take an earth shattering idea ‘sirjee’ to create something more stupendously fantabulously pathetic than that. Absolute ‘loose motion of words and constipation of thoughts’, as my friend says! Rare though in frequency of telecast, there were indeed some moments of respite, advertisements that do not desperately call for my entry into the ad world ASAP. There is still some talent left in this industry. Sigh! On a side note though: I particularly miss that advertisement by JK Cement. To me that Gandhian babe (clothed to the basic necessity) was the ‘Holy Grail’ of the advertising world, an enigma that even ‘Da Vinci’ or ‘Dan Brown’ would not be in a position to solve! (no offense meant to the personalities named, including that ‘nameless babe’)
So when the option about watching a match live was actually put before me, I was not all that enthused (don’t you dare start doubting my ‘Indian-ness’ because of this!). Well, who would arrange for the tickets? This excuse died in the conception stage itself when I was kindly informed by my caring flat mate that with Reliance serving as exclusive outlets for Mumbai Indians’ IPL tickets, she would ‘home-deliver’ the tickets to me, that too enviable seats! Damn! Another defense wasted! But it is not really possible to watch the match live. Even before you start tracking the ball, the event is completed! A gentleman’s game that it is, the due credence deserving of every cricketing masterstroke is aptly highlighted only through a TV visual (better still a nearby PVR Cinema – you save on your A/C bill, at least that is what Irrfan Khan claims!). However, one of the bright researchers in one of India’s premier institutions brought to my notice two important points. First, that there was a Mumbai Indians vs. Deccan Chargers match in Brabourne Stadium @ Mumbai on a Saturday evening. So what? Second, if there were to be any rankings for Maximum Disclosure of 'Assets' (much like the Kingfisher Fair Play Awards), the Deccan Chargers’ cheerleaders would top the table for the next three years with the same set of clothes (possibly with appropriate adjustments for the rising inflation)! OK, this was an input I couldn’t just ignore! However; do not start making eyebrow-raised weird expressions at me. Miss Opportunity was desperately knocking on my door and I didn’t really want to upset this elusive lady... or whatever!
So finally, no excuse was big enough to miss this mega cricketing event, made all the more subtle because cricket remained a distant and inconsequential objective here. Only a fence stood between us and the charming (for want of a better politically-correct word) cheerleaders. The cricket ground extended beyond them but then for the rest of the crowds in our stand it wouldn’t have made any difference if we were in a mad cricket stadium or a life threatening Mumbai local! So near yet so far! I tell you even this cheerleading was a ‘hotly’ contested battle by itself. I was thoroughly overwhelmed by the antics of this small yet cult group. Allow me to, in typical MBA style with bullet points; highlight/exhort some of the salient features of this exquisite group.
· It was a thoroughly professional group displaying nothing short of the highest standards of ethical/moral behavior (you see ethics and morality are very ‘subjective’ words). Their dressing wasn’t scantily vulgar, it was adequately classy (after all ‘beauty’ lies in the eyes of the beholder!)
· Although only three girls did the dance routine, there was a fourth one present for substitution! Perhaps the only thing I couldn’t really figure out was how they would manage to injure themselves.
· The fielder at deep never missed fielding a ball. In fact, historically some of the most memorable ‘Karbonn Kamaal Catches’ have emerged out of these exotic locations. ‘Youngsters’ on the wrong side of 30 have displayed ‘Ripley’s Believe It Or Not’ moments during their fielding! Take a guess why?
· A good number of ‘bench players’ were invariably found hovering around these regions. Of course, they were only offering drinks/refreshments to players on the field:) Why? What were you thinking?
· A dedicated camera man (preferably imported) brought to our attention heterogeneously innovative ways of looking at the same issue:) Needless to say, he was left with very little time to cover the not-so-over-the-top-antics of the crazy public or say the cricket match itself!
· There was a healthy internal competition rampant between the different cheering groups. If one of the groups was able to create a frenzy in their stands because of their frolics, the other group taking cue, would come up with a mind blowing out-of-the-box routine to get their crowds even crazier. At the end of the day, this open economy system ensured that the consumer got the very best deal and it was ‘paisa-vasool’ all the way!
· Of course, not to forget, there were those other noteworthy ‘eye-turning’ actions of the cheer leaders that were lost within the first 3-4 rows. Well, lesser the revelation, the better it is:)

Now just because I have been going gaga over this particular group, don’t you dare start making judgments on my character and all that associated crap. It’s just that being a scrupulous professional myself, I couldn’t help but appreciate such astounding display of professionalism, slightly paradigm though. By the way, did I tell you that MI (Mumbai Indians) eventually won that match. No matter how much my loyalty to the MI team may be, deep down I wanted Deccan Chargers to bring the match to the line, if not for anything else but letting us watch the wild ‘cheering’! Finally, much as the cricketing cliché goes, “it was a day when the game of cricket won”. Damn it! I don’t actually recollect anything ‘crickety’ about that evening. May be, “It was a day when cricket also won” sounds better:) Primo Supremo – your ‘conspiracy theory’ actually worked! You fooled us gullible folks into believing that in fact DLF IPL was the biggest ticket, knowing very well our fickle fantasies on and off the field. Can I say that I hate you because ‘I just want to hate you’? Hell!

P.S. I hate you....

Rules and Resolutions are always made to break them!

From now on I will avoid long passages, to the extent possible. Will post the longer writings/thoughts with a statutory warning (may be with a gory picture as well, much like the state of our cigarette packets!). And yes, the resolve is to articulate more frequently, so the lengths of the relevant expositions will be appropriately optimized (Oh yaa, that's some Consulting talk!)
Also, bitten by the satire bug of late. Simply hooked, so much so that even as I read regular news I see the corresponding spoofs screaming multifarious circumstances at me... At the end of the day this world, with all its strange combinations, continues to remain a cosmic joke and we shouldn't miss out on the core of the drama - having fun!
So in Ekta Kapoor shooting style i.e. with my head turning from my right to the left where there is the camera (repeating the action 'three' times with appropriate 'Rajnikant movie entry music') I would like to declare - "I am Back", "I am Back", "I am Back"... God save the entertainment industry. Jai Rakhi! Jai Mika! Dimpy Ganguly - your marriage counselor is coming...

A Call from the "Land of the Holy Sands".. Part 3

Part 3: The 'First Night' @ Goa

The sun had retraced its way down the horizon to illuminate the other half of the world. While the rest of the sane-world was gearing up for bed, this owl named Goa was getting out of it. Based on a quick environmental survey, our group members had short-listed things that needed to be done on priority basis. First, we had to rush to the beach to catch a glimpse of the golden sunset. As a bonus, we got to snatch a fleeting glance at rows and rows of bikini-clad femella editions of homosapiens, deeply content after long hours of sun-bathing (for some in our group the order of the two preceding events may be conveniently interchanged).

Hypothesis Statement: “People say that the cleanliness of a beach is directly proportional to the number of Indians present!” (I repeat, these are not my words!) Anyway, the Palolem beach was as clean as ‘cleanliness’ could be! The water was sparkling, the grains of sand were absolutely ‘unsoiled’, the surroundings were spic and span and yes, almost all the people were definitely from beyond-our-shores... Strange! OK, Hypothesis proved. Once the two striking leads from our evening (the ‘sun’ and the ‘bathers’) departed from the scene, we were done with our appetizers and were taking some time-off before our main course, figuratively and literally! Let me now dwell on our beach house for a moment. Well, like I had mentioned earlier, this dude called Povi had reserved this house for us. By the way, his name is Praveen but the ‘foreign devotees’ who come there lovingly changed his name to Povi, how Goa-like! Although his frame was such that even a slight breath might blow him away, yet I was fascinated by his ingenuity and business acumen. With a good number of huts, a fine beach-facing restaurant, regular foreign customers, rare Indian customers – well he had all the makings of an awesome life. He literally owned that portion of the beach!
Anyway, coming back to our ‘appetizers’ world... All the tourists had slipped into their evening wear (‘party wear’ if I must specify the part of evening) and were making their way towards the beach eateries. The entire stretch of over 300-400 mts of the beach was beaming from the glittering lights on the eating joints. Some of those places were already initiating the speakers/flash lights testing, gearing up for the eventful night ahead. We drifted towards the beach on the lookout for ‘food’. Even as we were strolling in the dark towards this oasis, one of the members had a chance encounter.! (For extreme security reasons, I am not even changing the name of this person involved to ‘Anonymous’, let’s just call him 'XYZee'). ‘Fully dressed’ in a half sleeve vest and boxer shorts, this dude was all set to burn the dancing floor. With a manly strut and physique like that of a Veer (not Salman Khan’s misadventure into ‘historic movies’), this dude was all spilling attitude and awesomeness, in a single breath! As they say, even a tiny spark is sufficient to create a fire in a heap of hay, so was the case with this steaming guy. He walked into one of the beach shacks that housed a visibly beautiful firang and then what ensued is something I will desist from elaborating! Different versions with their corresponding spice graphically outline the subsequent moves, but, because this is a ‘Sooraj Barjatya’ type of write-up you need to pardon me for my secrecy. Just keep in mind that this steamy episode took place even before XYZee had set his foot on the dance floor. Now that’s what I call a truly “Ladies Man”! I want to stand up and say with my hands circling “Kya Baat! Kya Baat! Kya Baat!” (those of you who follow the show ‘Dance India Dance’ will know what I mean) Will return after a while to XYZee.

On the beach, everyone seemed to be in a different kind of world, there was a strange contentment all around. Yes, and people say Goa is not a very spiritual place! I dare you to go to the Goa beaches and just look at the faces of people (not shamelessly, you pervert!), you will undoubtedly find a golden glow of happiness engulfing them. That, my dear friends, is ‘practical spirituality’ (this is very dicey subject, so, will keep it for later). Anyway, after XYZee’s “Koffee with Firang” it was time for the rest of us mortals to settle down somewhere for food. Well, each of the food joints was as tempting as its neighbour. I tell you, even the sand is always ‘whiter’ on the other side of the fence. After orchestrating a detailed Integrated Cost Benefit Analysis, our team identified a restaurant where we should be entering. Everything was smooth sail till our rendezvous with the waiter there. For some incomprehensible reason that waiter gave an impression that he had completed his B.Tech from one of the famed IITs and then gone on to obtain his MBA from yet another of the IIMs and then on the very first day of placements had managed to get selected into this remote food joint on a God-forsaken Goa beach! (even God would not dare to venture into this beach because of everything that goes on here, well almost). Right from the word Go this ‘gyaani-of-a-waiter’ deluged us with a loose motion of words abysmally pathetic to say the least, nuggets of wretched ignorance, everything else except what he was supposed to do – “WAIT!” Anyway, forget it! By the way, I have nothing against people from IITs and IIMs:J

It was then time to ignore these hiccups and move on to the more inviting things – The Dance Floor! Gradually as our dinner progressed, our particular dance floor was picking up ‘colors’ (Cost Benefit Analysis was actually working!) Soon after, there were a series of ‘CID Specials’ (the TV serial on Sony with the highest degree of overacting ever recorded in motion picture history) where the detectives in our group went and performed Sherlock-Holmes-type-of-deductions about the different ‘angels’ on the block! By the way, some of these James Bonds were actually rewarded with background stories (not ‘bed-time’ stories!) from the angels themselves. Beauty, liquids, music and lights (in decreasing quantum) – man, they make the deadliest cocktail! With the air of excitement around, people did not need any excuse to do nonsense. For saying something provocative, one of the members ‘Voinn’ was air lifted from the dining table and royally dumped into the dark salty waters of the Arabian Sea. It definitely was fun and by the time people started getting tired, the time was close to 2:00/3:00 am (no one really cared to look at the time here)!
Even as people were walking back towards their shacks with their liquid-heavy bodies and drained-out souls, there were occasional heavy-alcohol-induced-outbursts from random folks along the beach. Some people had settled on the beach and continued swaying to the imaginary iTunes playing in their heads! Yet other folks wandered about aimlessly, leaving behind an erratic trail that no sane human being would ever be in a position to explain, at least geometrically! Perhaps the only people who could make sense out of all this nonsense were the ones who were totally drunk and smoked and whatever! Anyway, all of this only added up to the indescribable mystique of the entire place.

As we were nearing our shack, due to some sightings just moments earlier, the ‘Koffee with Firang’ starrer XYZee had been ‘aroused’ (the surroundings were cool, circumstances made it hot:J). With the generated excitement came a new ‘avatar’ of XYZee and now he was all ‘coolness and dude in the same breath’. By now you must have guessed that “Whenever XYZee takes on a new Avatar, something happens somewhere” (just like in the comic strip ‘Chacha Chaudhary’ where every time Sabu gets angry, a volcano erupts somewhere). This time it was the turn of the male edition of homosapiens who ‘slipped’ upon getting struck by the inescapable charm of XYZee. Well, what came next is something that only XYZee can explain best, simply because he was ‘in the battlefield’ at the time of action. The rest of us from our ‘balcony seats distance’ called it a case of Maxx Rear X (Maximum Rear Exposure). Reporters say that on seeing XYZee and more importantly his vigor, this portly videshi man did an immediate act of “Jahanpanah tussi great ho, tofa kabool karo”, of course sans the words and more importantly sans his underpants!!! Those of you who have seen ‘3 Idiots’ will know the dangers of the exact posture that I am talking about and those of you clueless, my advice – “Dude, you haven’t seen 3 Idiots, what’s wrong with you, idiot?” XYZee, the ‘ladies man’ in an instant had become the ‘man’s man’. And you people still complain about Sec 377? Come on, at least give him that! This confusing Dostana occurrence brought to an end the Christmas day celebrations for XYZee. Anyway, with the early traces of the dawn setting in, it was time to drop down on the beds and grab some much needed rest. Will continue once I am up...

Amazing Thoughts - From Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

Currently deep into the Magnum Opus of literary fiction - Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. With every description vivid, every tiny detail non-discountable, well she nearly captures it all. People may say that she has this obsession with the 'minutiae' of every event. However, I feel, it is this knack for freezing a moment, capturing every single detail in that scene and then unfreezing it all with as much ease is what makes her a compelling writer. Beneath all the fiction there is a fine thread of reality, all it needs is a bit of thinking... There is this particular narrative where she talks about the "Impact of broken faith and trust in childhood". Such a hard hitting truth! Simply stunning. I have reproduced the piece verbatim to avoid diluting the writer's intent...

"The great oak tree had stood on a hill over the Hudson, in a lonely spot in the Taggart estate. Eddie Willers, aged seven, liked to come and look at that tree. It had stood there for hundreds of years, and he thought it would always stand there. Its roots clutched the hill like a fist with fingers sunk into the soil, and he thought that if a giant were to seize it by a top, he would not be able to uproot it, but would swing the hill and the whole of the earth with it, like a ball at the end of the string. He felt safe in the oak tree’s presence; it was a thing that nothing could change or threaten; it was his greatest symbol of strength.
One night, lightening struck the oak tree. Eddie saw it the next morning. It lay broken in half, and he looked into its trunk as into the mouth of a black tunnel. The trunk was only an empty shell; its heart had rotted away long ago; there was nothing inside – just a thin gray dust that was being dispersed by the whim of the faintest wind. The living power had gone, and the shape it left had not been able to stand without it.Years later, he heard it said that children should be protected from shock, from their first knowledge of death, pain or fear. But these had never scarred him; his shock came when he stood very quietly, looking into the black hole of the trunk. It was an immense betrayal – the more terrible because he could not grasp what it was that had been betrayed. It was not himself, he knew, nor his trust; it was something else. He stood there for a while, making no sound, then he walked back to his home. He never spoke about it to anyone, then or since."

Am really speechless! Hats off to her ingenuity...

A Call from the “Land of the Holy Sands”.. Part 2

Part 2: Even "Impossible" says "I M Possible"!

Various seating permutations and combinations were tried during the journey to make it to Goa alive! Who on earth says that "Size does not matter"? Trust me, like hell it matters! Everything around us changed – the weather, the time, the people, the roads... everything.... well almost everything, except the speed of the driver! Perhaps the most distracting elements that further hampered the speed of our journey were the frequent calls from his girl friend/newly-wedded wife! (the amount of blushing that he did while answering those calls made me actually wonder if ‘she’ was the girl or ‘he’ was the girl!). Anyway, with the help of a few soul-stirring singers (and a majority soul-tearing/sole-elevating singers – ‘Chappal Slap Worthy’, if I must explain!), we attempted to ‘rag’ this blushing Romeo by belting out sensual and romantic Bollywood numbers. Music, I believe, takes two forms – the first being ‘music’ and the other being ‘Himesh Reshammiya’! Well, till date I used to consider Himesh as the flip side of music. However, my musical world was to receive a severe cultural shock! To our utter bewilderment, this driving ‘Kaminey’ joined in rendering the song! It was humiliating to say the least. The hunters had become the hunted! The sound that emerged when he let loose his vocal chords, with due respect to their community at large – Donkeys are Gods! I had always thought that ‘music’ and ‘Himesh’ formed the ‘Good’ and ‘Bad’ of the music world respectively. That day a new dimension was added to my definition of music – now I had the ‘Good’, the ‘Bad’ and the ‘Ugly’! Sorry, is there anything shoddier than ugly? I would prefer it replaced!
In an attempt to save our ‘already rocking journey’ from his phone calls, we had unknowingly landed ourselves in a deeper abyss. Our musical outburst had woken up the apparently ‘music loving’ element in this character. Utter blasphemy followed thereafter. One after another, the spirits of all the old-time immortal songs were raped and brutally killed and mercilessly chopped to pieces! The long-dead composers of those immortal songs must have had a hell-of-a-night in their graves! A quick bio-break at that point in time saved limitless more musical geniuses from further torture! I am glad that we contributed at least that much to music! The journey resumed, but, without any more killings! We had travelled a very long time yet we were surprisingly far away from Goa. No amount of mile stone calculations or time verifications could solve this mystery of our ‘distance vs time’ concept. Even ‘time’ itself stopped for some time to let us cover some distance, but it gave up! For convenience, henceforth I will refer to that Qualis as the ‘treadmill’!
The subsequent ups and downs during the ‘jog’ turned insignificant at the thought of approaching Goa. Let me fast forward at 32x now............ After... a... long... time, we could begin to smell a change in the air. This is no joke, but, even as one approaches Goa there is a different kind of air that permeates everywhere. It definitely has to be something more that just a psychological feeling! Anyway, even as we approached the border we were stopped by Maharashtra police. We were asked to give some money. What the f#%^! (the driver meant to say ‘Suck’, remember the ‘S’ and ‘F’ syndrome?) Even to get out of a state we needed to give money!? Were we still in Mumbai or what? Having paid the same, we then approached the Goa check-point. Let me tell you, we saw why Goa is different then and there. The Goa police did not even bother to bother us! They were already having a blast, they didn’t need us to ruin it. Finally, and let me say it slowly to match the speed of our entry, we... had... entered... Goa...!.! Hail the Bloody Mary!
Very quickly we needed to urgently attend to our basic needs! First it was ‘nature’s call’ and then it was ‘Need for Food’. After touring a few hotels (no food left!) and drinking two shockingly expensive tender coconuts (beer costs a fraction of any other health drink, so why the hell would anyone care for their health anyway!?), we arrived at a place which had semblance of a hotel and the proprietors promised us food! Even as we were awaiting our order to come, in walked an overweight man with two aides. As soon as he sat on the table, his antics began! It was Christmas and I am pretty sure this dude was no Christian, yet he had taken the opportunity to ‘drown’ himself in celebration! He was completely in a parallel world – "absolute talli" is what the Punjabis would say! He went on screaming something and after a while simply walked in to the kitchen shouting! Well, we were partially relieved because a bulk of our order had already arrived. No risk there! Anyway, by the time the 12 gluttons on our table finished our food (2 extra-large capacity ‘Tamilians’ had joined us from Channai by then), the owners had decided to close their hotel forever! What 7 generations of entrepreneurs had efficiently managed for over decades, this gluttonous 12 member team had wiped out on one single day! At least the morally gladdening part was that it was Christmas and what better day could you get to close your operations on!
If the Qualis was a treadmill till then, after the ‘final-rights-of-the-hotel-completed’ incident it had become a immobile/dysfunctional treadmill! Each of the occupants had achieved an unbelievable 10% improvement on their personal best weight (you call this improvement!) and to top it all the driver had achieved an unthinkable 20% increase (thanks to his girlfriend/wife’s phone call of over-an-hour and the freedom of having a separate table)! If that Qualis was a human being, I am pretty sure it would have attempted suicide at least a couple of times after its death!! (think of it – a dead person attempting suicide!) We had to travel to Palolem Beach, the southernmost point in Goa, the place where our imaginary beach hut existed (none of us had any idea where we were staying except for the fact that we had the phone number of a dude who had promised us the beach house). Whomever we asked for direction they just pointed their hands right ahead, indicating straight! After some time I started to wonder if ‘pointing hands straight’ after all meant anything different. I am reminded of a similar episode from a colleague’s life and need to deviate for a moment. Two of them had been to Kodaikanal and they were on a rented bike. They asked the traffic police guys to guide them to a particular location. The police guys had responded with a harsh "Poh Daa". One of them convinced the other that it meant ‘go straight’! The similar thing repeated with many other police folks ahead! Finally they found themselves stranded in middle of nowhere! ......As you may know "Poh Daa" simply means "Get out! (you idiots)"
After some ‘city darshan’ (the event when a driver takes you round and round a place to figure out the right address) we reached the beach and yes, there indeed was a lovely beach house for us! The ‘Guinness book worthy’ travel that we had just completed warranted a desperate need for relaxation of the body and mind. The natural choice was to head to a massage parlour. On enquiry, a Mallu girl from one of the neighbouring parlours offered massage services to all our gentlemen, one by one! But then, thank the heavens that we asked for the fine print and were politely informed that it was a ‘package deal’ - with the Mallu girl, you would get her husband as well! What the #%&$! (feel free to use any four-lettered words, probably "Fork" or say "Pork"! Why, what were you thinking?) These MBA Marketing folks, just to increase the short term sales of their companies have come up with such impossible gimmicks that they have forfeited the value of human species and thrown them to the dogs! Even for a peaceful thing as massage we have got ‘package deals’ now... "Take the wife and get the husband free!" That is taking complementary gifts to the next cheap level! Angry with life for this unfair treatment, the group dropped all plans for massage. The very thought of these complex deals had relaxed our minds and our bodies could just manage along as well! Having done a quick survey/foot drill of the neighbourhood, we were all set to get to the right places at the right time. It was gradually getting dark and Goa was beginning to wake up! In Goa you know, the day actually begins at night... Our group has a long ‘day’ to cover... Must take your leave now....

A Call from the “Land of the Holy Sands”.. Part 1

Part 1: The longest distance in running is from the ‘bed’ to the ‘floor’
Note: The names of all the people in this series have been changed to protect the identity of the individuals! In spite of this, if there are any name matches, it is purely co-incidental and un-intentional! As they rightly say, “Prewarned is prearmed!”

You know, in India, there are pilgrimage centers, beaches, hill stations, back waters, tourist destinations, et al... and then, there is GOA! A brief look at the holiday calendar for the year 2010 made me shudder and plot an escape from the hullabaloo of day-to-day living. Goa had been calling for a pretty long time and for some reason or the other my telephone line never got connected. Finally ‘Christmas 2009 at Goa’ was a call from Mother Nature that I could not ignore! Then began the planning with its fair share of ‘more-downs-than-ups’ – nature’s way of telling us that “The world is not a bed of roses”. Even until a day prior to the supposed departure we weren’t sure how many people were going! Forget that, even four hours prior to our departure from Mumbai we were not sure how we were travelling! We just knew that no matter what – we were going to Goa!
Even as the rest of Mumbai, at the stroke of midnight, huddled in our churches to celebrate Christmas, we were rushing through every conceivable hurdle to make our trip possible. Two delegates from ex-AP (Krishnan from Andhra Pradesh and SAM from Telengana!) initiated the delay in the departure from Mumbai. We had known that they had departed from Hyderabad but their arrival at Mumbai was still a puzzle! Neither did the news channels talk of a mid-air strike in Hyderabad (how the hell do you enforce a mid-air strike in the first place?!) nor did they talk of any God forbid! ‘natural/man-made’ calamity (all the readers – “Please touch wood!”). So finally, the two Telugu Brahmins arrived safely with their bulging paunches on Mumbai soil... just two hours late! One Acid-test had been passed!
With a few other ‘complementary hurdles’ crossed (even God loves the concept “Buy one, get two/three free!”) we were beginning to see light at the beginning of our Goa tunnel. Finally, it was 2:00 am on the 25th of Dec and we had started for Goa. We had done it! But wait, if 10 adults getting set into the Toyota Qualis for a 14 hour drive was the mystery ‘Da-Vinci Code’, the driver himself was ‘Mona Lisa’s smile’! He was literally travelling at ‘brake-neck speeds’ (someone taught him this wrong spelling resulting in a speed crisis in his life). More than the accelerator he used the brakes! No amount of cajoling/pep talk/appeal/threat could budge the driver from his seat (including an offer to exchange seats with one of the occupants!) Adding to that Mona Lisa mystery was his accent – he would pronounce every ‘S’ as ‘F’... So when he asked you to get your ‘Foot-Kaif’ (Katrina Kaif’s Chinese name?!?), he actually wanted you to pass the ‘Suitcase’. Shahid Kapoor’s character ‘Charlie’ must have taken some inspiration from this ‘Kaminey’! I will return to talk about this guy at a later point in time.
Anyway, the journey began and the 10 specimens inside the Qualis kept themselves busy with light talk. But the journey was no joke! One, because there were 9 human beings and 1 baby-elephant (actually I would rather say ‘elephant in his teens/twenties’) unceremoniously dumped into this Toyota baby called “Qualis”! Two, there was luggage as well (one of the gentlemen in this group from Germany, SET JIT (you will find no trace of ‘Just In Time’ in this JIT...), had brought provisions to last his to-be progeny @ Goa, at least for two-three generations!! Third, it was the speed of the driver! The speed at which we were travelling was too terrifying to even speak of. Every conceivable vehicle had passed by us on the road. Vehicles ranging from the Mercedes, Maruti 800s to our rickety CNG auto rickshaws had shown us as to who was the king of the road... Yet we went on... Forgive me, but at one point in time, I even though I saw an ‘immobile, dilapidated and broken down car’ and a huge tree overtake us! Lastly and perhaps most critically, it was the driver again! Apart from his death-defying speeds (at that speed you cannot even dream/think of dying!), another recurring phenomenon was his tendency to sleep off on the wheel! Why God? Why this? Perhaps the most memorable moments came when we took the ‘midnight/wee hours of the morning’ coffee breaks, when the vehicle came to an absolute halt!
Sometime in the morning we came to this amazing hillock covered in dense fog. Of course, one of the pro-scientific brains in the group, known as Sainath to a few (people say that his brain works faster than a computer!), offered the conclusion that it was a lake! A lake in mid-air??? This Chacha Choudhary should have lived his life with Newton (for sake of clarity I have not changed Newton’s name, for a change)! I swear by the apple that fell on Newton’s head, ‘law of gravity’ would never have seen the light of day! The slow and painful death (journey in that Qualis) resumed, heavier with the intellectual fog that Chacha-jaan had introduced in the minds of the rustic aamchi passengers! Following in quick succession to the ‘fog vs lake’ debate, was a loose motion of intellectual outbursts. Next, it was the driver’s turn at showcasing his intellectual accomplishments. The driver came out with an equally, if not more, stimulating theorem on ‘speed vs distance’. I was left wondering as to why this ‘Einstein’ was just whiling away his time driving cars, that too slowly! No matter what, we were slowly and steadily ‘jogging’ towards Goa...

Zara Hatke Zara Bachke, Yeh Hai Mumbai Meri Jaan...

One of my good friends reminded me about this song when I mentioned about the diversity in Mumbai. Well, after the eventful first day, I was eagerly awaiting the days that would come ahead. The second day began on a relatively expected note. As I got into the appalling traffic, I was flooded with an overpowering feeling of déjà vu. Everything about the streets seemed to be unchanged. It is like the streets of this city are eternally frozen in time and almost every successive day seems to a repeat telecast from the previous day.
Little did I realize that no matter how predictable the entire day seemed, there would still be something about this place that would defy my expectations. So much of the spirit of Mumbai had already been captured by my experience on the very first day itself. What could be more scary than trying to capture a history of centuries in a swish? Yes, later during the day I was hit by an occurrence so hard that it has left an indelible mark in my mind, almost to a point of no return.
Fateful was my tryst with the Mumbai suburban local train! Believe me, it is not an event, it is a phenomenon! No amount of storytelling and Bolly/Holly-wood coverage can ever come close to giving you the real experience of travelling in a local train. Getting into this not-a-fairy-tale train is by no means a joke. Even as one approaches the station, the density of the crowds almost gives one a feeling of stratosphere (low-oxygen-levels). Coming back, it seemed like the entire humanity had conspired to arrive at this particular station on the very fateful day when I had chosen to make my local train debut! I was desperately swimming against the tide of the home-bound rushing Mumbaikars.
Let me deviate for a minute. Even as I was preparing myself for the destined rendezvous with the overpowering phenomenon called Mumbai locals, I had sufficiently managed some background research. I have listed the key findings below:
•The local trains help over 6.6 million people commute on a daily basis!
•The local train routes are spread over 464 kilometers... and people call them local trains....@#$%^&*()!!
•The peak hours (at least 6 to 8 hours every day qualifies as peak time!!) are the most excruciating moments in the life of any travelling passenger – people say it is worse than marriage!!! (no comments)
•The subtle difference between a first class coach and a general coach, apart from the few bucks, is the feeling involved - nothing else. In both the places you get kicked – you could at the best choose between getting kicked by a slipper/foot or by a polished shoe. In both the places your ADA (Aroma Detecting Agent - read as ‘nose’) would be put though stringent testing – either it would be undiluted sweat or a confusing mix of deodorant spray!!!! (I know it sounds disgusting, but yes, ‘Welcome to the Mumbai world’)
Having drained out my inner strength with this disturbing analysis from a ‘friend’ (with trepidation I still choose to call him my friend even after this episode), I summoned my remaining courage to get onto the platform. Once I made it to the platform, life was in automatic mode. I have a feeling that the person who invented the automatic transmission for automobiles had spend considerable/some time on the Mumbai local platforms! All I had to do was stand, the world moved on and it moved on real fast! Trains came and went, some people were moved, others weren’t. Finally, the train that I was to take arrived. Trust me; people were not hanging from the train. The train was trying to hang around the people... I embraced my prized Wipro laptop (fortunately for me, the unfortunate experience of a dear friend had warned me that a lost laptop would make my pocket lighter by Rs. 5,000). The rest of the things were taken care of (like I told you, life was in automatic mode then). I was taken into the train, I was made to stand and I was made to move.
Stations came and went and I was made to create space for incoming and outgoing crowds. The same set of faces continued to hang outside the train, yet the faces inside kept changing! It seemed like people were passing through each other. Finally we approached my destination. All I needed to do was identify the crowd getting down at the station and again things were in the automatic mode. I was brought down from the train, taken towards the exit and was left outside the station near the auto stand, sweating profusely. Apart from the copious amounts of water, I had lost another chunk of my sanity...(after my reverse gear street race - explained in the previous installment). I convinced myself that I had enough of it to last me a lifetime. All those people who commute by those trains every day, I know not how many lives they must be going through in a single lifetime...
You must be wondering why this episode should take such a significant portion of my experiences during the entire week. Well, like I told you before, a Mumbai local is a phenomenon by itself. You should get into it to appreciate what it is like. Moreover, it changed my perspective on things. In short, it was a life changing melodrama that unfolded that day. I swore by the metal in those rail tracks that to the extent possible I would use every excuse in the book to avoid travelling by the famed (rather infamous) Mumbai locals. I have managed, till date... I went through the entire week in a haze, with unique experiences every now and then, which appeared pale in comparison to the harrowing experience that I underwent in the local train!
Allow me to now cover another equally titanic (if not more!) phenomenon in Mumbai. Every shade of lipstick fails and fades away when this creation ‘touches’ their lips. It is the ‘foundation’ that gives every Mumbaikar the fuel to face the daily grind! Well friends, let me introduce you to the Marilyn Monroe of the acting community, the Princess Diana of the ruling community – It is the luscious Vada-Pav! Apart from the fact that everyone wants them, the decisive factor that gives Vada-Pav a higher ranking compared to the other two mentioned similies is that it is ‘available to anyone who wants it’! It is that very good friend which keeps people engaged before they board the trains, during the train journey and as they walk the final distance towards their homes. I have no statistics to showcase the business implications, but my gut feeling says that this has the potential to become another MacD, something on the lines of Chennai’s Saravana Bhavan! (watch out for any Tamilian – their eyes would have popped out with pride on reading the previous line...)
Moving on... If you were to ask me as to what is that one mammoth difference that I see between Bangalore and Mumbai, I would say the word is ‘HOT’! Everything is ‘hot’ here... The weather is definitely hot, the houses are hot, the streets are hot, tempers are hot and well... even the people are ‘hot’ here. Whoever said that “Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder!”, well, let me tell you – “In Mumbai, beauty lies in every nook and corner” You can see beauty emerging from the local trains, you can see beauty engrossed in the local kirana shops, you can see beauty gliding through the shopping malls, you can see beauty bargaining (‘fighting’ or ‘negotiating’, whichever you prefer) with the sabji-wala... The moral of the story is that beauty is all around – you just need to keep your eyes open!
The very thought of Bangalore makes me want to go there for a few days... I look at my travel plans and voila – Two weeks have gone by and I am indeed making it to Bangalore this weekend! Not sure if I am excited or not, but for sure I am looking forward to it... Need to take a chill pill for a couple of days and get back charged to this furnace, this gold filtering furnace called Mumbai.

Curtain Raiser – Day 1 @ Mumbai

(This is something that I had written mid way through last year, the time I moved to Mumbai...)
Even as the Jet Airways flight from Bangalore to Mumbai was tearing through the clouds high up in the skies, it kept getting those sporadic convulsions. The flight had given glimpses of what was to come over the next few hours. And true indeed, the first day at Mumbai was not without its fair share of wows and what the @#%$ (four lettered, read as ‘hell’)!
On arrival at the airport, I got the first feel of Mumbai. Having been in Bangalore for some time, I was left hydrated by the heat of Mumbai in no time. My first task (after I had water...) was to look for a taxi. There was a counter offering booking facilities for prepaid taxi services. And it is but natural that on the very first visit to a new city (especially a place like Mumbai) calls for extra precaution (else I would have completed Mumbai Darshan on Day 1!). As a result, the prepaid taxi counter was my preordained destination. I was given two options: Regular taxi or Cool Cab! Of course if you were to give these options to any level-headed someone, I would say at least 8 out of 10 people would opt for the Cool Cab! And yes, I was among those eight!
The entire cab selection was something like an arranged marriage, with the subtle difference being that I hadn’t even seen the cab, forget the other details! I had to walk some distance to get to the cabs and when I got there I could see two sets of cabs – one the ISC (Indian Standard Cab – black and yellow) and the other a ‘cool blue’ colour. Like any sane homosapien, I assumed I had my booking in those Cool Cabs, the blue ones. And no marks for guessing, I got the ISC! What the @#%$?! (the same four alphabets still hold good...)
Now coming to the cab, the bride in this entire marriage affair... Well, if the rendezvous with the ISC was unexpected, shocking was the unveiling of the taxi itself! The cab was none other than the famed relic from prehistoric times – Premier Padmini! Everywhere I turned, I saw these long extinct black and yellow baby dinosaurs. The skeletons of the long buried automobiles must be incessantly turning in their graves at the thought of the immortality of this puny Padmini.
Well, the taxi driver agreed to take me to the guest house (with the promise that he would eventually figure out the way to get there). After some ‘deep delving’ and ‘soul searching’ (we needed to search for the right ‘soul’ who could guide us to our destination!), we managed to figure out the overall route.
That Padmini aroused the seeker in me. It must have borne the brunt of the pot-holed Mumbai roads for not less than 30 years and yet its engine gave the whirr of a teenaged roadster. We tore through the streets with a gusto usually reserved for the technically and commercially far superior cars! And kid me not, those drum brakes worked with such finesse (and a complementary background score/music...) that it would put the disk brakes (and the Bollywood sound editors respectively) of the future generations to shame.
I know you must be wondering why this freak in me is ranting and raving about some stupid cab somewhere. You could blame me for it, but my love for automobiles in general and weakness for outstanding illustrations of automotive engineering in particular are the reasons for this magnum opus on automobiles! I am sorry I need to go on – bear with me for this last paragraph on my metal friends.
So finally we thought that we had reached my destination. However, we were very unceremoniously told that we had over-crossed the destination by an entire street. We went back the entire street at top speed – all the way in reverse gear! Are you really sane? Vehicles were racing past us in a blur and there we were, cruising on reverse gear in a shot taken from some Hollywood flick. By the way, did I say it already? Most of the cabs here do not have the luxury/burden of a rear-view mirror! I emerged from the taxi ride mature and richer by experience and poorer by a few bucks because of the customary “Chai Paani, bhai saab”...
The first thing that struck me about Mumbai was the crowd everywhere. The other thing that fascinated me even more was that there seemed to be a bigger crowd in every successive suburb. Everything and everyone seemed to be in a hurry to ‘move on’, including the afternoon drizzle! The roads were practical examples of the highest level of difficulty in racing games. Surprisingly, there was this mutual respect and trust that I found continuously demonstrated on the roads. At times people made way for the vehicles and at times vehicles made way for people! At times the roads acted as footpaths and at times the footpaths served as fine roads!
Another thing that struck me was the spirit of the place. There were no ‘airs’ about anything – no ‘class and mass’ feeling. Everything seemed to be in sync with everyone and everyone seemed to be running everywhere. I found traders – both lungi-clad vegetable sellers and tie-clad businessmen, huddled around the local ‘chai shops’ chatting away, some waiting for their ‘cutting-tea’ and some creating a smoky halo with their tobacco rolls.
Office was a similar projection of the streets – ‘n’ number of people fighting for ‘n/2’ space! In spite of all these little distractions, work went on and life moved on. The modest dramatics of life went by and I came to the end of my first day at Mumbai. The breezy air conditioning in my guest house accommodation kept me oblivious to the heat and the late sunset outside. There was a clear binary relation running through everything. And I guess that is what makes this place what it is today...

PS: Those of you who have stayed in Mumbai for some time will clearly figure out some significant omissions about Mumbai, say for instance the overflowing trains! But trust me; what I have penned above were the facets of Mumbai that I got to see on Day 1. The others would follow as the days go by...

Welcome to 2010

Even as I was wading through the social networking sites, bang on my profile, I was being asked the question – “What are you up to?” I saw a lot of people had updated posts such as “Happy New Year to all”, “God knows what will come my way in 2010”, “God save me this new year!” and some messages of outright disregard such as “New year – so what’s the freaking deal?” These posts kept me thinking for a while. Well, as far as I see, New Year is a convenient time to carry out extensive post mortems of the year gone by and star gaze through predictions for the year/s to come... No matter what, at the end of the day, life just goes on!
Then comes another New Year tradition where people religiously assume resolutions upon themselves. Phew! What an exercise at caressing the self-introduced overwhelming outpour of human obsession with their imaginary ‘better-selves’! Well, I too belonged to this extremist outfit of traditional ‘annual resolution makers’ but gave up on it because of the historic results from these vain exercises. Don’t get me wrong on this - the spirit of making resolutions for personal betterment is not something I am against! What I despise is the continued use of this exercise as a mere mental cushion to convince oneself that ‘a step taken in the right direction bodes well for oneself’. What people forget is that more often than not that very first step ends up becoming the last step as well! It is this turn of events that I so much deride.
Perhaps the only thing that I have wished upon myself to do the entire year is – “Have fun! Live life to the fullest!” It is definitely easier said than done. Most of the human race is hurling fervently towards death forgetting the most important thing in life – to live! We live the life that others want us to live; we create an illusionary persona and delve so deep that our real identity faces a crisis! We live our lives according to the terms set by the world. And we say “It’s my life”? What on earth does that mean?Anyway that’s enough of whining that I have done! The quintessence of this entire exposition is that I have to live life to the fullest, on my own terms. No radical thoughts here – just the simple dictum that I will enjoy everything that I do and do everything that I enjoy (in no particular order). 2010 – here I come!

Enter 2010!

I have made only two entries during the entire year 2009. I had a total of only four posts during 2008. That too after deciding to write more frequently! God save me...