Be proud to be an Indian...

....who owns his mistakes and wants to mend them. Indians are doing well in many different
spheres. However, there are definitely a few shortcomings and I would be glad if we could
overcome these and try going "that extra mile", as they call it. Sadly, even though it is
true, many would not even be ready to accept it :(. Of course, not all Indians do all that I
am going to write now. But those who do, should try not to get offended and instead,
understand my point and try to change their ways to make this world a better place to live in.

What tops my list is lack of basic courtesy and respect for another individual. Be it a lift,
bus, airports or any queue for that matter, we just want to push our way through and be the
first to enter. If not push, just try and sneak in somehow. If not that, we just ask a
'friend' standing in the queue to buy our stuff. This behavior is totally disgusting and I
really wish in spite of large crowds, we do not show this mad rush to somehow grab our thing
and not bother even if the rest go to hell.

On the same lines is the meager display of politeness. Given a situation where we know that
the other person is wrong, our first action is not to try and understand the other's point of
view. Invariably, we try to offend him, bully him, show him down by yelling at him. For
example, while I do agree that it is disgusting for one person to take a call on speaker phone
from his desk disturbing others, I certainly feel that there is a polite way of asking him to
pick up the receiver or book a meeting room. But what we normally tend to do is just stand up
and shout at him saying, "Hey, is that the way you take a call? What are meeting rooms for?".
And as you can imagine, he does not budge. The better way could have been to make him realize
his folly politely. Saying, "Hey, I am sorry if I am disturbing you. I was just wondering if
there's anything wrong with your headset. If so, can I help you? If not, would you mind
picking up the receiver." He would definitely oblige.

Another thing I wish to see tranformed in our society is all this hype and hoopla about
religion, caste, creed etc. Reservations are a pain. Not to mention, the age-old meaningless
traditions. I wish they all transform to take a more meaningful and logical form. A bride is
supposed to 'fast' on the day of her wedding right from the morning. What fun can she derive
on the most important day of her life. The list of such 'superstitions' is endless. Of course,
everything has been morphed to suit oneself. But there are many who are left with no choice.

Coming to creativity or inventions, I definitely feel that for the quantity we have, we
display really poor quality. It includes me too. We are such a huge population, but real
inventions seldom happen here. We are mere enhancers or implementers or even worse, just users of technology and science discovered by someone else. We can attribute a number of reasons to this like lack of infrastructure, lack of proper guidance, skills etc. But I don't buy any.
Think of creativity. There is no dearth of mediums by which we can display creativity. Still,
even today, we copy films, ideas for TV shows from other countries..:(. Its not that we are
doing NOTHING at all. But what we are doing is way too less when we look at the number of
people we have.

Then there is the much talked about Sports. We have this habit of appreciating and putting
people on pedestals for the smallest of their accomplishments. Fancy this - Ishant Sharma is
reportedly one of the greatest bowlers. I feel like laughing. In Australia, they are still
thinking if McGrath was indeed one of the greatest bowlers and a muchhhhhhhh junior Ishant has already been declared greatest in India. Its the same with Sania Mirza. The word 'great' is
used loosely in sports. Very similarly, teams are trashed after one single bad performance
also. If the Indian football team doesn't qualify for the world-cup, they are treated as if
they are the biggest traitors of the nation. These are major deterrents for sportsmen to do
well.

What should I say about our media. Lesser said the better. They anyway say everything. They seem to be the know-alls. We no longer have channels that report news. Or maybe, the word news has been redefined. Our 'news' channels have better stories than our soaps. God save us all in this regard. Everybody knows what 'great help' their live coverage was to our NSG commandos during the Mumbai attacks. And all channels are always the first to report whatever junk news. So what!!

Same is the case with law and order. Courts are a joke. Policemen are thieves. Lawyers are liars. Politicians are money-minting machines. Of course, similar is the case with other countries too. Magically, the country is till running. Defies logic.

One more thing I wish to see as a change in us Indians is the way we behave when we go to
other countries. We should remember that we go there not for the benefit of that country, but
only for our own benefit. We should not try to behave as if we are in our own country. For
example, it was insane of that family to go and immerse Ganesha idols in Thames River in UK
and argue with policemen when they prohibited them from doing so. We must shake off some
practices and try adapting ourselves to their culture and respect their laws and ways of
living. Even small things like giving your baby an easy-to-pronounce name makes life easier
for everyone ;)

One last thing is the apathy we show towards things that do not benefit us monetarily or
otherwise. For example, we never show any responsibilty towards environment. At work, we have separate bins for wet and dry waste. But people hardly care and mix both. Isn't it the least
we could do to help recycling? We do not consciously try to switch off lights/fans when not
using them. We do not try to save fuel at signals and blah blah. I agree that this problem is
certainly not specific to Indians but to everybody. Still, if we as Indians try making a
difference, the difference made would be immense.

I think I have cribbed enough about our wrong-doings. I thought there is no point writing
about what we do well. We should continue to do that correctly and also try and mend our ways
wherever possible. A little consideration goes a long way in making us better people, if not
anything else...

Unanswerable marvels

In no particular order, I often wonder:

Where/Who is God?

Does anything happen to us at all after our death? Or are we mere biological organisms that'll
perish and that'll be the end of it all? Is there actually "the other world" that we go to?

How would the world be if everybody was nice? All the "bad" people have caused the world to
come up with so many laws, so many security devices - including doors :P.
If everybody was nice, there would be no doors, no locks, no keys, no road-dividers, no
traffic signals, no weapons, no identity cards, no police, no courts, no jails and so onnnn..
Even with all this around, there is so much unemployment. Imagine, what would the
manufacturers and employees of all the above do if those things did not exist at all!!

How does a language develop from scratch? How was the first dictionary written?

How did human beings manage to make so much machinery, so many vehicles blah blah. I feel
dumbfounded whenever I go inside a factory and I feel so useless for not contributing in
anyway to any of that. There are 4 kinds of people - the inventors, the enhancers, the users
and the breakers. All 4 are needed for the world to function. I can see myself as a mere
enhancer of the lowest degree.

What makes Nature work? Is there something governing it?

What do animals think/feel when they see human beings building things all around them? Do they understand that something is happening? If they don't, then there is such a high probablity
that we humans also do not understand even what we see or is brain the differentiating factor?

What all is mankind unaware of? I think the volume of that would be googolplex the amount of
things we have discovered so far

What are we? What's the purpose of our lives in this universe. Think of how extremely huge
this universe is, think of galaxies, space etc. and then you'll suddenly feel so
insignificant.. all our issues are so small and so irrelevant to the existence of this whole
universe

What would happen if we leave a bunch of new-born babies all alone in an island? Will they all
die or will they grow up to form a society similar to ours - with language, rules etc. or will
they come up with a totally different way of life?

And of course, why did humans make such stringent rules that many of them have to die of
hunger, have to face poverty, have to struggle so much to travel from one part of the world to
the other.

Who planted the seed of evil in this earth?

If ghosts do not exist at all, why are they talked about? Who imagined about them first?

Is it really possible to tell fortune?

How are interests formed? What part of the brain registers interests? What are emotions? How
are they formed?

To what extent technology will advance?

How long is the life of earth?

How was music developed?

And of course, what would I have been had I not been a software engineer :P

A hurried narration of our Thailand trip

I have been meaning to write about this trip for the past 2 days. But my mind is flooded with so much to write that I don't know how to frame the entire thing. Anyway, here is my sincere attempt to do justice only to the itinerary.

We started from Pune on 5th March at about 3 in the afternoon. Reached Mumbai by 8pm, had a sumptuous meal and reached the airport. The flight took off by 12.30am and we reached Bangkok by 6am on 6th March.

Day 1: We took a bus to Pattaya as the check-in time in hotels there was 2pm. We reached Pattaya by 12 noon. We had lunch and started off to visit the Noong nooch village. It had a cute pottery garden, an orchid garden, Thai cultural dance, Thai boxing, Elephant show and stuff like that. We roamed in that till evening and got back to the hotel. We took some rest and then left for a cabaret show called Alcazar show there. It was marvelous. Thai dancers put up a spectacular show. Rich costumes, lot of lighting made the show very very memorable.
We got back exhausted and crashed in the hotel.

Day 2: The next morning we left for Coral Island. A speed boat dumped us there by 9am and they said the boat will start in the evening by 4pm. The island had options for scuba diving to see corals, some adventure sports like banana-boat ride, water scooter etc. It was very much like Goa but a lot more cleaner. We hired the beach-side chairs, had coconut-water and took a good amount of rest. It was hot and humid but the day was very relaxing. We left the island in the evening and got back to the hotel. We hired a 2-wheeler and happily roamed around in Pattaya. We went to a place called Mini Siam. It had miniatures of many famous monuments around the world like the Statue of Liberty, the Sphynx, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the Opera House etc. etc. We roamed in that for a while, then went to the Ripley's Belive it or not museum. From there, went to the night market called Walking Street. Apparently, this market is famous for flesh trade. The girls in Thailand were extremely beautiful but it was very very sad to see them earn their living by such means. Every here and there we could see hefty foreigners hanging around with frail Thai girls. That's their way of life..We didn't realise when we got back and when it was morning and time for us to leave the hotel.

Day 3: We checked out and proceeded towards Bangkok. The hotel here was awesome. The interior was extremely modern and I cannot stop raving about it. But, later..
We had plans to see the traditional Thai Wat Trimit etc. which houses the Golden Buddha, Emerald Buddha, reclining Buddha etc. But we were late so missed it all. We decided to take some rest till evening. In the evening, we went for shopping to the MBK Market, Siam mall etc. by their sky-train. People would not believe if we say that we did not buy ANYTHING AT ALL. We roamed in the mall for about 3-4 hours and got tired and got back and slept.

Day 4: We had booked a trip to the Safari World there. It was a full-day trip. It had Orangutan show, sea-lion show, cowboy stunt show, dolphin show, bird show, spy-war show and a zoo and a crocodile farm etc. The whole day was quite enjoyable. We did a Jungle Safari also. From there, we directly went to a dinner cruise. It was supposed to be very romantic with candle-light dinner and stuff. We were feeling a bit out-of-place. But we got bored and the speed of the ship was, I think, 1 Km/hr :D.. There was Thai dance and English music on the ship. People seemed to be enjoying the candle-light dinner. We got so bored that we chucked the dinner and stood on the deck for a while. That was the only nice part of the cruise. We understood its not for practical people like us, its more for the mushy romantics at heart. Again, back to hotel and crash.

Day 5: We woke up early in the morning by 5am and left for the Damnuen-Saduak Floating market. This is a Thai village completely on water. Their houses are on water. And they sell fruits, vegetables, clothes, hats etc. on water. It was very nice. They took us on a long-tailed boat and we saw the enire market. From there, we left to the Bangkok airport, reached home by half past midnight and slept away to glory.


In the whole trip, the only trouble for us was food and language. I had to wonder if this whole country would perish the day fish become extinct. Every food of theirs had something to do with fish or oyster or duck et.al. We somehow survived on salads and thanks to a few Indian restaurants. Non-vegetarians would have had a blast. As for language, the only language that we could use was sign language. Surprisingly, people hardly spoke English. Everything was in the form of signs aided by some sounds like ah, aha, then shaking head vigorously for na. It was hilarious at times. Whatever you say in English, the reply was always the same - a wide grin with foolishness writ all over :D

The other thing that I must mention is the girls there. I couldn't help but be envious. They were so good-looking, had such flawless skin, such perfect weight :( :(.. Its paradise for bachelors.

Thailand is supposedly famous for shopping. I saw Indians buying things by cart-loads like there was no tomorrow. We did visit the most famous malls there but could not find a single thing worth buying. Surely, some thing's wrong with us 'cause so many people can't be wrong.

In all, this was quite a hectic sight-seeing trip, not a relaxing one.. :)Hope to have a rejuvenating trip next time...

Wake up gals!! Chuck the protocols.. There's only one life!!

I often wonder - how free are Indian women? I agree that the urban women enjoy much more freedom when compared to the women in rural India. However, there is still a huge gap to bridge.

The other day I was lazily browsing different channels on TV. On one of the sports channels, they were showing a cricket match. Just outside the stadium, there was a group of women playing beach volleyball wearing almost nothing. They were totally having fun. I was wondering if it is possible for any Indian woman to do that - be it urban or rural. You may say that it is by their own choice. But I completely disagree. Think of the ruckus that is created over Sania Mirza's attire. What I mean to say is that Indian women are brought up in such a way that they are taught not only to suppress their own desires but also to not even think of anything that does not comply to the 'template' created by God-knows-who. So leave alone playing in those clothes, they would not even think of wearing it. Of course, clothes is a very small example to elucidate my point. The so-called values are hammered into their heads so much that they cannot make their decisions purely based on what would give them happiness, or purely based on logic. Their decisions have to consider a lot of meaningless parameters. After all, there is only one life. What is the point in living a stifled life for nothing.

Poor thing is caught in meaningless traditions. Even women working in commanding positions cannot decide not to cook at home without considerable amount of guilt 'cause she is supposed to 'take care' of her family, even if it consists of grown-up adults only. As if her family cannot make arrangements for their own food. A woman breaking out of a bad marriage is never appreciated by the society whereas one putting up with the atrocities of the husband and crying in a corner is supposed to be the ideal Bhartiya naari. And please note that the so-called society will never ever go to help the woman suffering a bad marriage. In case of joint families, women have to give least priority to their friends (with whom they enjoy life) and instead, they are supposed to please in-laws day-in and day-out (who might not even acknowledge her deeds, forget praise). I am surprised to see even women working in MNCs following this and cribbing. What does she gain by all this? To understand my point, you must watch the movie Dor. It excellently depicts the plight of rural women. As for urban women, their situation is better because they are at least financially independent. However, they are not free to make their choices in a society such as ours.

A lot of these rules, rituals were made for a society where living was totally different. Circumstances have changed but Indians are taking their own sweet time to adapt. Though there is a lot of change, a lot more is yet to happen.

What made me loathe these so-called values even more was an incident that took place at a wedding I recently attended. The groom's father had expired many years ago. So, it was his brother and brother's wife who performed all the rituals. Their family was supposedly very modern. However, the groom's mum was not allowed on the stage. The whole stage was crowded by relatives. I was almost moved to tears when I saw the groom's mother standing in a corner and raising on her heels to catch a glimpse of what is happening on the stage. For God's sake, it was this woman who made a man out of that boy when all the relatives had deserted them. And now, just because she was considered 'inauspicious'........ Crap!!!

Having said all this, I want to reiterate my point that I am only against all the social obligations that a woman is either put though or a woman unknowingly puts herself through in India. However, I am totally against reservations for women, tax benefits given to women, thousand women groups formed within corporates blah blah. If you really want to respect a woman, give her the ability to decide her own life and do not judge her by how much she complies to the 'template'. Judge her by her intentions and her deeds.

There is one serious question though. In spite of all the freedom that the women playing beach volleyball enjoy, I am not sure that I can say that they are happier than this woman who had to stand in a corner in her own son's wedding. This has always been defying logic. Who is happier and how? Needs a lot more pondering before I come to any conclusion. There has to be a balance somewhere I guess. But I still feel freedom is important. Its better to be free and make wrong choices and regret than to be tied and forced to make right choices. You anyway won't enjoy the choice made for you. Or you resign to circumstances and force yourself to find happiness in what is bestowed on you. Maybe think about the women in some other countries who are even lesser privileged. I'd rather be called an arrogant girl by living life my way than being called an obedient girl by dancing to someone else's tunes.

So I will decide not to wear skimpy clothes only because I DON'T WANT TO, not because I HAVE BEEN TAUGHT THAT IT IS WRONG. I will decide not to drink and smoke only because I DON'T WANT TO, not because PEOPLE MIGHT THINK I AM A ROWDY. So whenever you make a sacrifice, make sure its worth it. Don't do it because protocols demand so. Its all too complex.

Mumbai Matinee

I had been waiting for this for a long time..March 1st. It was my colleagues wedding. Both of us had joined IBM on the same day and had undertaken the ELTP training. We were very much in touch with each other for the subsequent 5 and half odd years. A lot happened in these years and we had known about each other's life fairly well. I was even involved in his 'girl-seeking' process. Finally, the D-Day had arrived. I had decided to attend his wedding come what may.

As per the initial plan, my friend Ananth and I were supposed to go together. But we found out that 3 others from our office were also going by bus to Mumbai to attend the same. So we decided to go together. From the word 'go', we had nothing but a series of comedy of errors.
The first one being Ananth forgetting to pick the other 3 up from their houses. Poor guys kept waiting only to realize at the last moment that they had been subjected to this. At 5.30am, they had to hire a rick and come rushing to catch the bus. So there we were, waiting for the bus. A mini-van came and picked us up and took us till the bus stop. We boarded the bus and it was all confusion inside 'cause there were no seat numbers. Somehow we managed to seat ourselves. The rest of the journey till Mumbai was mostly eventless.

At about 9.45am, we reached Andheri. We had to take a rick to reach Versova, the venue of the wedding. Rick guys pounced on us the moment we alighted from the bus and they said it would cost us 180Rs. After much haggling, they came down to 150Rs. since 5 of us were there, we would have had to hire 2 ricks. so, we thought a single taxi might prove to be cheaper. The moment the rick guys overheard our decision, they dropped their quote drastically to 100Rs. The fact that they were pestering us so much made it even more evident to us that they were taking us for a ride. We walked about 50 meters and found another rick guy who was willing to use the meter installed in the rick. Finally, we reached the venue and had to pay only 44Rs. IMAGINE!!

The wedding was in a bungalow which had a beautiful sea-view. We had tea and stuff and were just wandering here and there aimlessly. Soon we met some colleagues there and started chit-chatting, then had lunch, bid good-bye to the newly weds and decided to head back to Pune. We did not have tickets though.

One more person joined us and we were now 6 - Ajith, Ananth, Humayun, Nizar Sujith and I. After loonggg discussions on how to reach Pune, the final decision was, hold your breath, to take a local train from Andheri to Dadar and then a bus from there to Pune.

We bought 6 tickets. 2 people's tickets were combined into one ticket. After much deliberation, we figured out which direction the train to Dadar would come from. The train arrived. I got into the ladies' compartment (my ticket with sujith) and knew nothing about the mix-up the others created. Apparently, Nizar and Ananth could not board the train. And, the great Ajith, Humayun and Sujith got into the First Class compartment thinking they had my ticket with them and that I might be caught in Dadar when I get down. No prizes for guessing that the TTE caught them. Don't laugh if I say that they were using their tickets to fan themselves like heroes. What followed next is history. They had to pay a whopping 450Rs. fine (err.. rather bribe). And subsequently, got kicked out in the next station. They were determined this time. They went and bought First class tickets and got into the next train. But, much to their dismay, none checked their tickets this time. Life is ironical...

In the meanwhile, Ananth and Nizar thought they'll act intelligently. They went ahead and bought 2 more tickets for a fast train from Andheri to Versova. It turned out that the tickets they already had could be used for the fast train also. All this while, I was putting up with the pushing and shoving happening in the ladies compartment. The only entertainment for me was Ananth's phone calls which kept pouring in every 5 minutes to tell me a new sob story.

Finally, I got down, or rather got pushed down at the Dadar station. Soon Ananth and Nizar followed. It took a while for the heroes of the day - Ajith, Humayun and Sujith (now known as sujith, the jobless) to reach. Then we had to stand in a looonnnggg queue to get our bus tickets to Pune. In the bus, 2 blabbering aunties forced their company on us by blabbing away to glory about their kids and husbands. We alighted from the bus and 6 of us cramped ourselves into a car and reached our respective homes.

In all this confusion, there is only one thing I learned. It is the fact that Ajith and Sujith are neither brothers, nor twins. I always thought they were. One funny question enlightened me. In the rick, I asked them if they had any sisters.. Sujith replied saying he didn't have any but Ajith had. After yet another round of quarreling, I believed that they just looked similar and spoke the same language and were roomies.. but were not brothers.


If this can't qualify for a matinee movie, what else can??

A Sunday with myself

I woke up early with a vague idea of how my Sunday would be.
My first decision was to go to office. I left home around 8.10AM and reached office, had a nice breakfast and reached my desk only to find out that I was not able to ping the machine that had my environment setup. That machine was in another office that is about 10kms away from this one. I decided not to get disheartened and waste my Sunday. Having come this far, I ran a few personal errands and then decided to go to a nearby theater to watch a movie, Billu. The choice was obvious 'cause this was the only movie which none of my friends wanted to watch. I reached the theater around 12.30pm and bought a ticket for the show at 2.20pm. I had a solid 2 hours for myself.

I always knew spending time with one's own self, at times, is rejuvenating. This day completely proved me right. First of all, I was extremely hungry. I decided not to binge and settled upon a green salad. But gave in a bit to my taste-buds and bought an Appy Fizz also. I happily gobbled them all.

I got up wondering what to do next. I am not too much of a 'shopaholic'. However, they say girls always have an unending wish list of things they wish to have someday. On the same lines, I had been wanting a particular type of skirt for an insanely long period. Every time I laid my hands upon one, either I had no cash, or I had just splurged money on a lot of other things, or I didn't get my size in that, or it was way too expensive for me to consider or I didn't like the fit blah blah. I had even decided to stitch one. Luckily (or unluckily :P), for me, I saw a 'Nun' showroom there. I had seen their red skirt on display and had even seen it on their website. I always adored it. The shop had a Flat 50% off offer and I greedily grabbed the skirt this time without thinking twice. This gave me a sense of accomplishment and I reluctantly agreed that shopping is a great way to unwind.

I still had some time left. So I did some more window shopping, called up my parents, called up friends and then started observing people. There were 2 guys playing a very good game of pool - solids and stripes. I watched them from a distance for a while, lest they become conscious. There was a TeleShopping joint and a girl was desperately trying to sell a hair-curler to a girl. Poor thing, she could just not curl her customer's hair and obviously, the buyer chucked it and moved on. The multiplex was swarming with people and surprisingly today, there were a lot of good-looking girls. Maybe because I was noticing only today. I saw some guys drooling over girls, saw some parents getting irritated over their young-ones' rants, saw the wares displayed in Archies gallery and then realised that it was time for the movie.

The movie had a Bollywood superstar being cast as a Bollywood superstar. So, I knew what to expect from it. I bought a cup of steaming hot tea for myself and managed to smuggle my Appy Fizz inside. The movie was crap but I enjoyed watching it. As usual, I laughed and cried along with the cast. Irfan Khan, the lead actor, was fabulous and Lara Datta, the actress, was cute, though I didn't expect her to act so much. As the movie was nearing its end, I could hear pesky kids getting impatient in the theater. The movie ended with a so-called emotional, but actually hilarious sentimental speech delivered by the Bollywood actor who played a larger-than-life role. I could just not control my laughter. I must mention it here. Apologies to those who cannot read Hindi. SRK said, "mera dost Billu tha.. usne apne kaan ke sone ki baliyan bechkar mere liye Mumbai ki tickets karaye. aur bache hue paise usne meri jeb mein dal diye.. maine kaha in paison ki kya zaroorat, to usne kaha ki kisi gareeb ki madad kar dena". And this was just a small part of all his 'comedy'. I thought, sometimes, movies also are a great way to unwind. Underline sometimes :) Anyway, the movie got over and I took a rick and came back to office feeling completely rejuvenated and ready to take on Monday.

At office, I found a couple of friends online, chatted with them, penned this blog and now, off I go..No A/C in office is making me sweat like a pig, so I should sign off.

It, indeed, was a Sunday I'll remember and cherish. After all, one needs to be gifted to experience all of this. Oh! Ya.. the movie made me realize that again.

Me, the aurora

I am extremely beautiful, resplendent and I completely delight one's senses. The very sight of mine refreshes people. People say, Pleasantness thy name is the early morn! Yet, I wonder why so few people see me. Those who do manage to see me have a very limited set of activities to do. Some are seen exercising, some are seen yawning and waiting at the airports, some are seen busily segregating newspapers, some are seen delivering milk and so on. I feel even though I fill every bit of freshness into people, they are not very eager to see me.

On the other hand, I envy the dark night. Though I give way to it, so that people get to sleep, I see the late night is so full of energy and life. And the activities performed by people are so varied. Although I agree that a vast majority of the people are busy sleeping, but those awake more than just make up for their absence. Its at this time of the day.. (er.. can I call it that.. well, whatever..) when I hear people chanting Life rocks! There's booze flowing, there are all illegal activities happening at its peak, there are fast cars and bikes zooming past on the roads, there are girls and boys having fun in many different ways. In brief, most of the activities happen to make life 'livable'.

Of course, the rest of the day is spent in endless pursuits, duties, whiling away time blah blah..

I know of a person called Amudha. She wants to see both me, the idyllic and blissful early morning and him, the zippy and mysterious dark night. But her body does not allow her to do that. She assumes its the same story with everyone else. Today was one of the days when she experienced my cool breeze and wondered why she ends up ignoring me and yearning for the Nox..

To each his own...

'Life' in the lift

Gone are the days when people used to greet each other irrespective of whether they knew each other or not. Or so it seems whenever I take the lift. Journey in the lift hardly lasts a minute. But I notice that everybody is uncomfortable and wants to get out of it as quickly as possible. Not only that, everybody makes a conscious effort to not even glance at each other, lest they might be in an 'awkward' position - not knowing whether to smile, whether to say hello or just look away. God forbid, if anybody does end up looking at someone eye-to-eye, they invariably choose the last option i.e. look away. People even go to the extent of acting as if they are 'texting' someone, or staring at their own shoe, or even better, simply closing their eyes and waiting for their 'floor' to arrive. But the attempt that beats all of this is the constant staring at the LED display in the lift that shows which 'floor' is next. It surely seems strange to me that people find it more comfortable to look at that non-living thing pointlessly than offering a simple smile to the other occupants of the lift. After all, aren't they also human and won't they reciprocate? And even if they don't, what do you lose?? Isn't it any day better than consciously striving to avoid human beings by taking the aid of small nothings in the lift? And they say its a global village.. To me, its so near yet so far.. Don't we prefer to 'ping' people than even talking to them on phone??

I often wonder if the excessive invasion of technology in our lives is resulting in all this.. Guess its a never-ending debate... Technology, surely is a necessary evil and now , a resident evil :P.. And the reason I am ending this post so abruptly is because my work is calling - And yes, my work is to add a drop in the ocean of technology.. :D

Hail Thom!

Nope.. I am not hailing him for winning the game of Scrabble that day. But its for this wonderful piece that he came up with. I can't stop raving about it. I understood the true meaning of elegance after reading it.. Here's his reply to my "poem":
[THOM]
i've tried twice to write a poem response but simply had to beat a retreat both times. But now I think by throwing out the requirement of rhyming, i'm able to express myself............

O triumph!!!
O shining crystal tower on the mount of overwhelming VICTORY!!!
Presiding over the vast plain of mediocrity and stale, barren, broken hopes --
Here I dwell !!!
[umm... and Bhavan too]
O supplicants,
O vanquished plains dwellers devoid of scrabble skills
Weep not !!!
Instead -- rejoice!!!
For you breathe the air
and you eat of the earth
just as me and Bhavan do !!!
You just don't metabolize it such that you end up winning games of scrabble


Actually, I sort of see myself fitting into the metaphor of this poem as the window washer in the crystal tower on the mount of overwhelming victory. I just kinda happened to be washing the windows when Bhavan won overwhelming VICTORY

[/THOM]

Ananth and I went down fighting!!!!!!!!

Saturday evening fiasco
----------------------------

It was a Saturday evening
Nothing about it was demeaning
In fact, it looked perfect for a game of Scrabble
Little did I know that in store for me was a squabble

I have nobody but myself to blame
'cause I tried to grab undue fame
We commenced the game with 2 teams
Rules were stated so that cheating is nobody's means

Bhavan and Thom were a pair
That put Me and Ananth to despair
Their first double-word score was Cozy
which, for us, was not all that rosy

Coffees were ordered
Our hopes were soon murdered
They made scores that they could flaunt
Still all I did was meaningless taunt

The game seemed to go on forever
Our team never got better
It was only once that we overtook their score
but soon we were left wanting for more

Triumph was theirs
All we had was tears
This time it was Thom's turn
to make my heart burn

All he said was to jot down my emotions
And here I am simply executing his suggestion

After all, the winner takes it all!!