A Dreamers Ruminations

For my beloved city and the best 5 days each year

2009-09-24T00:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, you can't blame a Bengali for wanting to write about his favourite 5 days of the year. However there have been reams written about this festival of the goddess and rightly so, for there isn't a festival that can simply match the spirit of the people who celebrate it (at least to a Bengali). So here goes some of the things that I love about Durga Pujo.
The feel of Calcutta about a week before the pujas begin. We Bengalis believe the sunlight changes to a divine golden, and special flowers begin to bloom. There is feverish activity in every 'para' as the pandals come up and discussions abound as to what vehicle (mythological reference of elephant etc.) that the goddess is coming in for each means something different. For example this year she is coming in a 'palki' meaning draught, and going on an elephant meaning 'good harvest'. The best however is that there is an upbeat mood and everyone is happy. It might be the poorest person shopping for just one t shirt or the middle class elbowing the crowd at Sree Leathers or the rich waltzing into Raymond but each one of them is happy and there is a smile on his face.
Romance during pujas is stuff of folklore. Guys eye the locality beauty trying very hard to catch her eye while every Bengali girl turns into a beauty dressed in white saree red border, open hair and red bindi. Places like Maddox Square for the 'upmarket school and college crowd' might be the in thing, but there is no hunting ground like your local para pujo. Invariably peaking around sandhi puja (maximum permission to stay out late from home) and seldom surviving beyond kali puja, these romances are about buying her jhal muri, or watching her perform rabindrasangeet at the evening concerts and even eyeing her from the corner of your eye during ashtami anjali that you have fasted for.
Pandal hopping has different modalities. From teenage boys out with friends (possibly only time parents give permission), to people from outside Calcutta pooling together a vehicle to come to town, or the likes of me who just like to wander the streets on foot. My family always sees a few pujas, ones they call 'abhijato' viz. Ballygunj Cultural, Samaj Sabi, Maddox Square (Richie Park) and the likes. Some pujas I have always wanted to see but balked at the waiting include Md. Ali Park (note secular nature), College Square and Babu Bagan.
The last is about the food... from kachuri alurdam at breakfast to ilish maach and chingri maach at lunch to shiraz biryani at dinner it is one gastronomical delight. I for one, prefer eating at home due to the simple variety my mom lays out (but my grandmom will always be the best) and because restaurants are a mess at this time!
The best part of the pujas is that while I adore every mythological facet (from madhu kaitav, to mahisasura's different forms to ram offering his eyes as a flower), it is an inherently family and social festival and if anyone claims its more religious than these two he/ she doesn't understand a thing about this festival.
So this is my initial list... what is yours?

Simple things of material impact

2009-09-18T02:30:00.000-07:00

I never get as irritated as I do when I see stupidity around me when I drive... the auto rickshaw that drives at 20mph but on the right most lane... the BEST bus that has to stop right at the middle of the road... the people who just can't learn to walk on the pavement... this list is endless.
However the point of this post is not to crib about what others should do. It is about little changes that we can bring about in our daily lives and how everyone's lives can be better if we do so. The list below follows very simple rules:
1. They must be inherently simple to follow
2. They must benefit others (apart from us of course)
3. They must be part of our daily lives.

So here goes
1. Take responsibility to be the one to switch off lights. This might mean your house while leaving, the conference room after the conference etc.
2. Follow simple rules that avoid wastage: don't keep the tap on while shaving/ brushing etc., don't always take a shower, but rather use the bucket and mug, ensure all electric and electronic appliances are switched off rather than put on standby
3. Don't honk on the roads unless necessary
4. Use the pavements when walking on the road
5. Try and organize a car pool. If not possible at least ensure you gift a lift to someone so that he doesnt use a taxi. Can't blame people for not using public transport given the pathetic state of the same in our country
6. Simple ones like not throwing garbage on the road, continues
These are just initial starting thoughts. As I think of more will update.

Why do we hate Mayawati?

2009-04-17T00:26:00.000-07:00

This is actually a question that I heard on NDTV being asked Prannoy Roy and it had me really thinking.

The little research that I could do on her showed that Mayawati had one major corruption allegation against her in the Taj Corridor case and another even graver but inderect allegation of murder and extortion by BSP for what is called her 'birthday fund'. Does that make an object of such hate in an absolute sense? Yes, definitely yes. However, when we look around at our political class, she is not the only one who has such allegations against her, then why single her out for such vitriolic hate. We seem to forget Lalu Prasad Yadav's Fodder Scam and invite him to IIMA, we forget Narendra Modi's state sponsored communal violence because he is an able administrator. and even think of eulogizing Jyoti Basu whose only contribution to Bengal is considered to be a film fraterntity at Nandan and his son Chandan.

The real answer to that lies in exactly what Mayawati has managed to achieve. She has come from what is arguably the toughest background in India- Dalit woman and risen to become the Chief Minister of the largest state in India. If anything, that makes her the pin up girl of Indian politics far more than Priyanka Gandhi's pretty face.

She has upset all our long held beliefs of social laddering and what we consider to be the rightful place of certain kinds of people. She is definitely not the most honest leader alive (she paid over 26 crores in taxes and has an ongoing case on assets disproportionate to known sources of income) but this mindless almost personal hatred towards her doesn't speak too well about us either.

Think about it and our closely held prejudices.

Those little prejudices that you don't even notice

2008-05-16T10:58:00.000-07:00

Like a lot of my other posts even this one begins after watching a good movie- this time it’s the Pakistani movie, Khuda Kay Liye. However this movie is not about the movie, it’s more about intolerance and freedom of choice.

The only limited point I am trying to make here is that almost all of us agree that everyone is entitled to an opinion and the right to choose, but when it comes to things that are close to us, most of us let our prejudices take the better of us. What is worse is that in most cases it’s not even a belief, or not even a prejudice, it’s a habit driven into us from childhood. This is what makes its correctness escape the question of a discerning eye and also the easiest to remedy.

Let us take a few simple examples. A Hindu mother will believe she s broad minded because her son plays with a Muslim girl, but come the time of marriage, all hell will break loose if her son chooses a Muslim girl. There cannot be any half way on the freedom of choice. It is absolute for an individual, obviously restricted to the point that it causes no harm to others. There can be a debate on this point as to what is “harm” and what is “others” but that will only trivialize the moot point of discussion here.

It is easiest to tell a person not to do something and then take the garb of abstract concepts like religion and what’s again worse, custom. However religions per se are I believe (and I am not qualified enough to say I know) far more based on sound logic than an irrational mind. So a Muslim father will tell his son not to eat pork, but not explain that the reasons lay in the fact that pigs lived in dirt and hence bore lot of diseases, that given the hot climate, in these parts we were most susceptible to.

There s another classic movie that probably explains it better. It’s a movie called “Gentlemen’s Agreement” on anti Semitism with more than a hint of sarcasm. The basic point that the protagonist makes is that a lot of these unfair prejudices continue even today is because, most of the educated genteel refuse to stand up and protest.

I’ll do my best to see what I can do about it. Won’t you?

Jannat

2008-05-07T01:04:00.000-07:00

I travel alone partly by choice and also partly because I hate the effort required to convince others to join you, match calendars, desires budgets etc. So when I set off for a five day holiday in the Kashmir valley I didn’t even bother to ask anyone else. I can write a book about this trip, but what I ll do here is cover some aspects of my trip that I want to talk most about (but may not be that you might want to hear about).

My travel took me from the glaciers of Sonmarg (Golden Meadows), to the meadows nestled among the hills in Pahalgam (Village of the Shepherds), and the ever so popular peaks of Gulmarg. I spent considerable time exploring the Mughal gardens of Srinagar, the dal (water in Dongri) of the lakes in Srinagar and around like Manasbal in beautiful shikaras. The lost secularity of Kashmir unraveled in visits to Hazratbal (where a hair of the prophet is believed to be stored), to Shankaracharya (where he is supposed to have gathered enlightenment before establishing the 4 dhams of learning). Finally I drove quite a bit to see the Jawahar Tunnel (2.54 kms of rock blasted in the Pir Panjal range) to connect the valley with the rest of the country. A couple of highlights apart from this were the visits to the saffron fields and the cricket bats being made from Kashmir willow. Now, that’s the basic data of the trip J

Yes, Kashmir looks like a land at war. The Indian security forces are everywhere, and the threat of attacks from the militants is alive all the time in the minds of the people. Having said this, one must also realize that Kashmir is nowhere as bad as it was in the earlier 90s. It’s perfectly safe for tourists and over the past five years attacks on tourists have been negligible. Most of the militant activities happen in the Kupwara and Baramullah districts near PoK or Azad Kashmir, as it is called, depending on your point of view. The shelling across the border happens near Kargil in the areas of Dras and Batalik but even that has been on a decline. None of these places are on your normal tourist beat. However, everywhere you turn you will see the security forces training the guns on you, every now and then your car will have to move away from the road to let an army convoy pass through, and you will be frisked and searched at various points. The idea is that now that we have gained control, we cannot let the hard fought gains go easily, else we ll be back to 1989 when our security system had all but collapsed.

NH1A is the life line of Kashmir connecting Jammu with Srinagar and then moving onto Leh via Kargil (which is my next trip). Another branch of this road goes to Muzaffarabad across the border. In fact the journey distance from Srinagar to Jammu is about a hundred kms shorter if we could have traveled through Pakistan! Every two hundred metres on this road, all through the five hundred odd kms you have our security forces standing guard through sun or hail or snow. Periodically mine sweepers move over the sensitive areas to sanitize the road. The security forces come from J&K police (who unlike our city forces are armed with automatic weapons and have their fingers on the triggers at most times), CRPF and Rashtriya Rifles. The army regiments have withdrawn to the barracks, and only take part in operations and not vigil.

I won’t delve too deep into the heavenly beauty that Kashmir is. Suffice to say, that it is as beautiful as you have seen in pictures and your imagination can paint it to be. The snow of the glaciers is as white as you thought it to be, the meadows are as green as you can paint it to be and the mountains offer views panoramic enough to delight any photographer. I just stood marveled at the beauty and wondered “AGAR FIRDOUS BA ROYEE ZAMEEN AST, HAMI ASTO HAMI ASTO HAMI ASTO”. The women of Kashmir are by far the most beautiful I have seen anywhere in the world. They are all fair, sharp featured, flawless skin and pink cheeks. However guys, please be very careful about checking them out, as you risk your progeny trying to do so!

I couldn’t get to experience much of the local culture given the situation of Kashmir today. Whatever I managed was because of the very nice family who run a small cottage near the Dal, in Srinagar. They shared their Kashmiri bread, the nun cha, the gustaba et al during the meals and the grandfather of the house gave me books to read about Kashmir. In fact it was they who showed me how the local papers are all anti India, as it ensures sales.

Kashmiris are a disillusioned lot today. They have been taken advantage of by both sides and been made mere pawns in the power plays of the two nuclear powers. “Yeh thakt ki ladai hai, ye kursiyo ki jang hai, ye begunah khoon bhi, siyasaton ka rang hai”. Needless to say, they are also to blame for their present misery and they realize that twenty years of fighting has only adversely affected their own development. We should also realize that the accession of Kashmir to India was not the smoothest and nor did it have popular support. It’s a different matter that there is no going back today, but we have to be cognizant of the fact that the average Kashmiri does feel betrayed by both India and Pakistan and some are still today waiting for the UN promised plebiscite of 1948. For twenty years, they have seen their folks either die in the hands of militants, or disappear in the hands of the armed forces and been subjected to daily identification parades. Most of the buildings they grew up with were either bombed or burnt. Corruption is rampant among the politicans, and all the money the Indian state gives to Kashmir goes to those pockets. Thankfully, the realization is slowly dawning on all, and, once again it’s the Indian Army leading the way with “Operation Sadbhavna”- efforts to engage the local population with slogans like “Jawan aur awam, aman hai muqam”.

I ll leave you with a very interesting poster I saw when you exit from the Jawahar tunnel and enter the Kashmir Valley (which is a sight that is worthy of the Gods). It said “Welcome to Kashmir Valley (Paradise on Earth); Neighbours Envy, Owner’s Pride”

A day in Los Angeles

2008-04-02T03:41:00.001-07:00

The South West flight from Chicago to Los Angeles was a four hour one but my first experience with South West was very very good. The announcer had an awesome sense of humour and actually made me listen to his announcements by cracking a joke with even the most mundane security ones. The entire boarding process is very streamlined unlike our low cost aircrafts where a Mumbai local traveler has an advantage on any given day.
Anyway, LA looked stunningly dazzlingly beautiful before landing, far more than New York, Paris or Mumbai. My friend who received me and whose place at Irvine I stayed in took me for dinner to an Ethiopian restaurant and then for a drive around LA. I did all the standard tours of Beverly Hills, Sunset Boulevard, Rodeo Drive but I couldn’t resist getting off at the Walk of Fame. Apart from the names on the pavement, there seemed to be so much happening around, from nightclubs to gentlemen’s clubs; from classy ladies in their cars to the hookers on the street. I am coming back here for sure.
The next day was spent at Universal Studios. Now here you find rides like amusement parks; I took the Jurassic Park one. There are different shows, and I watched Water World, the show with Hollywood animals and a very enjoyable 3 D show of Shrek. The atmosphere is like a carnival with people dressed up (ala Venice carnival), performing tricks etc. You just enjoy walking about the place and interacting with people. The best part is obviously the studio tour, where they take you all around the studio and you see sets from Spiderman to Desperate Housewives, are shown how Jaws was shot and even pieces of history like the office of Alfred Hitchcock.
Once we had had enough of Universal my friend took me one really amazing drive on the Pacific Coast Highway from Malibu via Santa Monica and dropped me at the airport. This was my first sight of the Pacific and it was rather serene in this stretch. The surrounding was however almost picture post card material with small hills, sea rolling by and cars zipping by in the area where Baywatch was shot!
Just like London in this trip of mine, this day ended with a promise to return.

A day in London

2008-04-02T01:31:00.000-07:00

What would you do, if you had one day in London and it was your first trip to the city? Well, here s what I did.
The first question I asked myself is that having seen a few other European city what is it that sets London apart . The obvious answer which came to me was the monarchy and all things associated with it.
So my tour began at the Westminster Abbey where having only an hour to spare I had a sort of whirlwind tour. So I spent some time at the choir area, tombs of Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots and saw the coronation chair where for seven hundred years the monarch has got his/ her throne. In fact the abbey is the place where all the important functions of the monarchy have been held. St Paul's Cathedral is the other famous place (made more famous by the shot of Diana and Charles after their wedding, while her funeral was held at Westminster). The most time I spent was in the world famous Poet’s Gallery where you feel almost all of English literature lies buried and a few additions from the world of cinema and music like Sir Larry and Handel. To my surprise I never noticed much of Newton there even though The Da Vinci Code kept referring to it.
The rest of my morning was spent in witnessing the spectacle called ‘The Change of Guard’. I had already made great friends with a taxi driver (whose favourite cricketer was Sachin and professed to have played cricket with Saurav!) and he had explained the best way to see this event. Let me share the secret with you. The change of guard begins with the cavalry change of guard at Whytehall. So catch that first and then cut through St James Park and come out in Constitution Avenue in time to watch the infantry march out of their barracks. Walk down with them all down to the Victorian Monument in front of Buckingham Palace. This is where you face a bit of a problem in being able to cross the street to get to the gates of the palace inside which the rest of the ceremony takes place. There is always a crowd and so getting a view is not easy but my Indian friends if you can manage to get into a Bombay local why can’t you push your way through a crowd of foreigners J Even you can’t initially just hang around there for a lot of people come expecting to see guns booming and when they realize its all about music and not guns they leave and you can step up to take their privileged wasted seats.
After a lunch of very bad ‘fish n chips’ by Trafalgar Square I made my way to the final stop in my itinerary where I spent the rest of the afternoon, The Tower of London. Now, the tower was the residence of the royals prior to Buckingham Castle and the best way is to get a tour conducted by the Yeomen Warders or the ‘Beefeaters’ as they are popularly called. You can follow it with your own tour through the Crown Jewels (yes, that’s where the Kohinoor is), the ravens (whose wings are clipped since it’s believed that the British monarchy will survive till the time the ravens are there) and the armoury. Henry VIII and his absolutely mad ways form a lot of the stories here, including the ghost of Anne Boleyn believed to still haunt the place. You finally end with a walk through the Tower Bridge from where you get a good view of the Thames and its banks, along with the London Eye in the distance.
Dinner done safely and cheaply at Mc Donald’s I headed for the most expensive and enjoyable part of my trip, a musical at West End. I didn’t manage to get tickets for Les Miserable but I did get for Sound of Music. Now if you knew me you would know what this meant to me for ever since I remember anything I have been singing these songs. Palladium, the place where it was being staged is beautiful to say the least and Maria was brilliant (Von Trapp wasn’t). However I still think Phantom of the Opera at Broadway was a better show that I saw.
I consider this trip just an appetizer and would love to go and spend at least week exploring only London.

Yet Another Weekend Story

2008-01-14T01:16:00.000-08:00

I am the one of the biggest culprits for doing this- I ask all and sundry, “What did you do last weekend”. Some tell me in detail, some give only data points while some simply glare (for the life of me I don’t know why!). The reason I do is because it tells me a lot about the person and helps me see them in what I consider their elements.

Anyway, this is a boring post about what I did this weekend.

The Friday night was duly spent at my favourite pub in Bombay, Totos in Bandra. Lots of beer and rum flowed through the night spent with friends, colleagues at Totos, at my house, at another friend’s house etc. This was followed by the customer coffee at 4 AM from the cycle wallah post which S decided we had to see his house. He however was so drunk that he showed us the wrong house.

Saturday began with finishing some office work in the morning and picking Dad up from the airport. However Sa made the evening brilliant when we decided to fly kites (in Maharashtra kites are flown on Makar Sankriti), and also in the process discovered that we had a lovely terrace, which was duly celebrated with some beer (Yeah, in Mumbai you can get the shop to deliver beer cans right up to your terrace). Finally took my dad to see Taare Zameen Par (my third time). We both agreed that Darsheel has to be up for a Best Actor Oscar and if we edit the movie a little then there is no reason why we can’t win the Best Foreign Film award as well.

The Sunday began with a show at my Movie Club (www.enlighten.co.in) where they screened a Bengali documentary by an American called “Born into Brothels” on the children born to sex workers of Sonargachi. Dad gave them a 3 star while I being the more liberal kind gave them 4 stars. Lunch was at my favourite Sunday spot, Sea View Hotel and then the much needed Sunday afternoon siesta. I spent a lot of that time listening to the Christmas carols played by Amjad Ali Khan on the sarod and then watching the Accenture debate on a multi polar world. The evening however was the best part of the weekend. We went for a Hariharan Pongal concert at probably the most picture perfect venue I have seen, amphitheatre of Badra Fort. He sang Tamil and Hindi film music, ghazals, fusion and a brilliant genre he called Urdu Blues. For most of the concert we were sitting on a twelve feet high wall of the fort with the concert in the front and a brilliant view of the Bandra Worli sea link and the arc of Bombay lights from Bandra to Worli. I cannot but describe how beautiful the experience was and it showcased just how cosmopolitan city Bombay is. This city turns up in numbers to celebrate a primarily Tamil festival dancing to Tamil songs from Ilaiyaraja to Shivaji. The dinner (I must tell the bongs this) was golda chingri which my mom sent from Cal!

So here s the story of my weekend, the correct response from you will be, “So Why The Hell Are You Telling Us” Cheers!

Tourism

2007-12-27T06:26:00.003-08:00

A trip to Sunderbans is all about traveling all through the day through large and small rivulets, waiting for the low tide when the animal sighting chances are higher and admiring high tide when trees and land get covered with water.
However if you are willing to invest time then please do not go during the peak tourist season for our people are barbarians who have no idea how to behave themselves. Let me give you an example. Sunderbans in spite of having 278 tigers (2004 census) has very low sighting simply because tourists move on boats in the river while the tiger resides in the thick jungles where entry is prohibited, risky and very very dense. It is for this reason that watchtowers have been created in the sanctuary, and tracts of jungle cleared and fresh water sources created (even though the river water is salty, the RBT drinks it and in fact even eats fishes and crabs) so that tourists can watch if any animal crosses those areas. The least that people can do is sit quietly, wait and watch. However our tourists bred on a daily dose of instant gratification, mindless soaps misbehave just as they do in the zoos. They scream, shout, hoot, talk incessantly among each other (sometimes even on the phone- Yes, BSNL covers most of Sunderbans) and sometimes even sing. It took a lot of self restraint to not slap a few of them but just in sharp whispers to tell them to shut up or get lost. I sometimes wonder when, if ever will we learn to behave ourselves as a race.

Tiger

2007-12-27T06:26:00.001-08:00

The Royal Bengal Tiger, seldom sighted by tourists is almost always present in the minds of the local people. Hundreds of people have lost their lives in these rivulets to the might of the tiger, every local has encountered this beautiful savage beast numerous times in his life and every one knows someone who has been attacked by the tiger. These are very poor people whose livelihood revolves around the forest (shrimp and crab farming, honey collection, wood cutting etc.) and they have no choice but to expose themselves to this daily risk. The government on its part has tried to defend the villages by setting up nylon nets all around to slow down, tangle and discourage the tiger from coming into human contact. Numerous legends abound in these parts, and the local deity is Bono Bibi (Goddess of the Forest) who protected the local boy Dukhi (Sorrow- representation of the local people) from death in the hands of Dokhin Rai (Lord of the tigers). Even in the deepest jungles temples can be found as people pray before entering into the small rivulets where they are defenseless and vulnerable. In fact the local folk never mention the word ‘bagh’ (tiger) as they believe it will be like calling out to the beast. This is similar to the story of Count Vlad, where Dracula cannot enter a human household unless he is called in as God resides in every human house.
It is not only the tiger that is of danger to the local folk but also crocodiles which abound in these waters, and people have mostly been maimed by losing a limb if not outright death like in the jaws of the tiger. The Irrawady dolphins again made famous by the Amitava Ghosh’s book are present near the Mohans (where the river meets the sea) and hence sighting again becomes difficult. There is a life on the land and in the water but just that the impatient human used to instant entertainment is not deserving of being witness to it.

Tide

2007-12-27T06:24:00.000-08:00

The Sunderbans are a UNESCO World Heritage site and the largest mangrove forest and one of the largest estuarine deltas of the world. A little over half of it lies in Bangladesh and the rest in the South 24 parganas of West Bengal. Needless to say it is uniquely beautiful and one of the most different landscapes you can ever see. It’s a picture of about a hundred plus islands with rivers snaking through them. The most unique feature and what gives it its pseudonym of ‘Tide Country’ and the famous Amitav Ghosh book ‘The Hungry Tide’ is the havoc that the tides play in the life of this place. On an average the water level difference between high tide and ebb tide is over 10 feet. During this amazing daily natural event land masses are created and submerged, trees get half submerged in water and roots grow upwards instead of down for breathing creating what we call mangrove forests. You witness all of this in front of you as you go along the river banks on your boat, the movement of which is also governed by the tide.

Land of Tide, Tiger and Tourists

2007-12-27T06:05:00.001-08:00

If you go to Sunderbans thinking the sightings will be as glorious as the African Savannah or the orchestrated tiger shows of Kanha, you will return highly disappointed. I saw two kingfishers, three deers, two boars, half a crocodile and week old tiger pug marks. This post is not about sightings of wild animals, but if you believe travel can be about a lot more only then read on.
This trip was actually of my dad’s friend circle during his bachelor days along with the families. While it’s great to go with such a large group, the problem is most people have different priorities in life, each of which very justified. For some it was more important to spend time drinking with old friends, for some getting up at 5 AM on a holiday was blasphemy, while for some like my mother and me sitting in the resort was unbearable and we used to want to be out on the boat any time every time.
However let me not tell a story here but just describe a few things and you can try and put the rest together in your mind.

Land of Tide, Tiger and Tourists

2007-12-27T06:05:00.000-08:00

Before Sunrise

2007-11-29T09:48:00.000-08:00

Just finished seeing what must be one of the romantic movies I ve ever seen... in fact right up there with Casablanca and Bridges of Madison County... why are all great romances ones which don't work out.... thats besides the point

I had a slightly similar experience... obviously without any kissing, or promises to meet in six months... I was on my way from Florence to Venice... when I met this girl from Romania on the train and we spent the entire day together going all around Venice... in fact it was carnival time in Venice with hundreds of people wearing Venetian masks all around... there was hardly any romance but it was quite an experience to see a new place with someone totally new.

This brings me to another point of why I like to travel alone. The obvious one is that when you travel with someone you know, you are far too closed and you only sight see, you hardly ever interact with people. One of my joys of travelling alone has been that I have been able to meet people from different places in different sorroundings... be it Romanian in Venice or Mexican in Paris or Pakistani in Chicago. The other is that you are never in conflict on where to go and what to see. You don't have to explain to people why you want to go to spend half a day to go the second part of Kennedy Air and Space Museum in Baltimore. You don't need to explain why you would much rather go to Musee De Orsay than Euro Disney.

The beautiful disney musicals

2007-11-18T23:27:00.000-08:00

The beuatiful Walt Disney musicals can easily be called my favourite genre of movies.
At times I have wondered how in spite of being more than a quarter century old and well on my way to becoming a cynic how is it that I still adore these movies so much. The answer I think I lies in what I ve lost that this world of disney brings back to me. The values they teach, the simple love they show, the innocence they celebrate, where good wins most of the time in the end and music is all pervading is probably not very far from the dream world that I would have created myself if I could have started all over again.
What I will endeavour to do here is give you a sampling of the amazing lyrics. The rest unfortunately is a discovery you have to make yourself. So here s what I suggest. Spend about Rs 1000 and buy 5 of these VCDs- Lion King, Alladin, Pocahontas, Beeauty and the Beast, and Finding Nemo. Sit down one Saturday afternoon after lunch and instead of going drinking to the nearest watering hole watch these movies one after another.
If you are a man who can still feel and get moved in spite of everything you ll find yourself a better person at the end of the experience.
Now for the samples

Lion King
"Some say eat or be eaten
Some say live and let live
But all are agreed as they join the stampede
You should never take more than you give
Some of us fall by the wayside
And some of us soar to the stars
And some of us sail through our troubles
And some have to live with the scars"

Alladin
"Can show you the world
Shining, shimmering, splendid
Tell me, princess, now when did
You last let your heart decide?"

Pocahontas
"You think the only people who are people
Are the people who look and think like you,
But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger,
You learn things you never knew, you never knew"

Tehzeeb... Lucknow

2007-11-12T08:50:00.000-08:00

Finally went to a new place. I had been to Lucknow over the weekend and spent a day going all over Lucknow. It’s a city soaked in ‘tehzeeb’ where kebab walas when rushed don’t say ‘ek minute’ but say ‘janab thairiye tho sahi’.
This visit was a gastronomical delight where I feasted on the best non vegetarian food from gilavati and kakori kababs, to nihari gosht to bhuna gosht, from dum biryani to chicken avadhi with generous amounts of rabri and thandai.
I also had a few very nice experiences during the trip, like being present at the chota imambara during the namaz with an elderly gentleman guiding me on what to do, listening to ghazals in a bar called mehfil with the singer asking me ‘kya farmaish hai aapki’ to even chatting up with a Bengali construction supervisor in La Martineire, Lucknow.
I immensely enjoy sightseeing and so went all around Lucknow, both the Chota Imambara and the Bada Imambara. In fact in the bhool bhulaiya there the guide showed me the origin of the term ‘deewaron ke bhi kaan hothe hai’ by speaking in the opposite wall over a hundred feet away. I also managed to get lost in the bhool bhuliya when the guide asked me to lead him. The place I liked most was the Residency. In fact there s something about our family and ruins, as we all love exploring ruins. So I spent a lot of time going through every part of the residency including cemeteries covered in weed. I also ended up disturbing quite a few couples who were enjoying the secluded lush greenery prevalent here. I ended the trip with a drive around the old parts of the city and a visit to the famous Lucknow zoo which I was surprised to see is in fact very well maintained. Oh yeah not to forget the kababs I picked up for my friends from Tunde Kabab in Ameenabad.
This was a city I had been wanting to visit for a long time and if nothing else will endeavour to bring a little bit more decency into this crazy city of ours.

The great Sawariya- OSO battle

2007-11-12T02:19:00.000-08:00

There s a meatloaf song "Is Nothing Sacred Anymore"? Are our movie critics now so easy to buy that an absolutely useless movie like Om Shanti Om is proclaimed as a better movie than Sawariya. Or are we so much hypocrites and losers that we actually like a movie that just blatantly copies and parodies compared to another which truly creates a dreamworld that you can get lost in.
Om Shanti Om is a remake of Madhumati, where the humour is not original but derived from mimicry of the past or greats like Rajnikant. It even borders on offensive. The saving graces of the movie are its music and the lead actors. Shah Rukh Khan as usual can make any role special and Deepika Padukone brings a Vidya Balanish freshness to the screen.
Sawariya on the other hand has a visual brilliance hitherto unmatched in Indian cinema. This movie is the brilliance of Sanjay Leela Bhansali all the way. The way he tells his story, the way he ends it beautifully, the magic he weaves with colours, and the detailing of his sets, all make it an uniquely pleasurable experience. He creates Paris, Venice and Mumbai on screen in one frame and transports us to dreamland where love and music could be enough for sustenance. The two lead stars do a good job of not getting in his enough. In fact Ranbir Kapoor has every bit of a budding star in him while Sonam Kapoor is refreshingly beautiful, almost innocently beautiful one can say.
Guess am no good at movie reviews but thats an honest opinion.

Faces- Love Stories- Beauty- No link

2007-11-12T02:08:00.000-08:00

Just finished watching a movie called "The Lady Eve" starring Henry Fonda and Barbara Stanwyck. There s something about watching pretty women and simple love stories that appeals to all of us. I just am a part of the few who accept the non machismo in saying I like a love story and the machismo in saying I like a pretty face.
Anyway, this movie along with Sawariya which I saw yesterday has shown such hopelessly beautiful stories of love and such astonishingly pretty faces that I offer these film makers the classic Jack Nicholson line :"You want me to become a better man".
There s something about these faces that I like a lot- Ingrid Bergman, Barbara Stanwyck, Donna Reed, Jodie Foster in Hollywood and Madhubala, Waheeda Rehman and in recent times Sonam Kapoor. I keep trying to find the common factor so that I can give to anyone who asks me next "what kind of women do you like" but alas this simple exercise also fails me and I end up giving some gibberish or smart ass answer to basically avoid the question.

A rather interesting day

2007-11-04T01:52:00.000-07:00

Every time I decide that I will stop my wild ways and get back to a little bit more semblance of decency there comes along a day which makes it all so worthwhile.
So here was a Friday when I didn’t do a lot that I could have done, hardly touched alcohol, came home in time and went to sleep.
The next day was truly memorable. I woke up with a very stiff back coupled with pain in the neck. The fever of the past few days had also not subsided. However I somehow managed to pull myself through the morning and after a few medicines was feeling a lot better. So went over to a friends place for lunch and then ended up having a few tiffs with a friend on unwarranted comments. Came home and watched a decent movie and as I was feeling better came a call to tell me that a project that I had been very interested in was lost and hence my future was again uncertain. Out went the resolutions, the rum bottles were opened and normalcy was restored. Post dinner, another friend wanted a few discs from my car and so I gave him the car keys. The poor guy ended up banging my new car and it will cost me quite a few thousands to get it repaired and will leave me without a vehicle for a few days. In fact we were planning to drive the car down to Kashid for a holiday but don’t know if it will get repaired in time. Oh forgot! Anyway we didn’t get hotel reservations in Kashid.

A few new songs

2007-11-01T06:25:00.000-07:00

Ok I ve found a proxy through which I can access youtube in office and needless to say I am exploiting it to its fullest but I usually use it to play songs while I work.
So here are four songs that I feel you could give a shot to:
Kailash Kher- Saiyan (For some reason whenever he screams saiyan it seems so hearfelt)
Silk Route- Sabse Peeche Hum Khade (The ultimate losers song and hence mine too)
Rmember Shakti- Sakhi (Shankar Mahadevan simply rocks it even though legends like Zakir Hussain, Mandolin Srinivas and John McLaughlin are present on stage with him)
Salam-e-ishq- Ya Rabba- Kailesh Kher (Once again Kailash Kher excels in this lament of lost love due to circumstances. The best part of the song is the Indianness in it where unlike Eminem and GNR we do not want to today kill the person we loved yesterday. If anything we are willing to take more pain so that the one we love can be happy)

Folks

2007-10-30T04:18:00.000-07:00

My folks were here last week and tried to do my best at being Raju guide... taking them all over Mumbai from Hyper City Malad to NCPA Nariman Point. Took them out to eat at Pouche, a Kashmiri restaurant and also the Pav bhaji. However I soon realized how woefully inadequate a few days are to see this mayanagri or for that matter any of the great cities of the world. So when I say I ve been to Chicago, New York, Rome, Paris etc. thats exactly what I ve done... been there. To live and to experience is another city. What I need is a rich patron to pay for my expenses as I travel around the world. Anybody out there?

Uncertainty

2007-10-24T00:56:00.000-07:00

Well this is one position where I am definitely not at my best... options in front of me and I have to make a choice... I teach decision making models to clients but in my life I am a big "I want it all". The consequence of this is that I am all the time having post purchase dissonance of some kind and options acquire differing priorities based on my mood swings.
Any practical help around? No, please avoid theoretical frameworks... I make those for a living

A Sunday well spent

2007-10-16T04:38:00.000-07:00

Finally it was a Sunday well spent. I managed to push myself and go for a meeting of the Bombay Quiz Club. Needless to say got walloped by the other quizzards there but it felt so nice to be among people who believe there is a world beyond their jobs. It felt nice to be among people who were so well read and generally knowledgable about so many things including needless trivia. To be a good quizzard you need to be not just well read but also observant, have a good memory and most important of all be intelligent enough to work out the correct answers from whatever he knows.
After dropping off a friend at the airport went to Bandra fort to listen to Shubha Mudgal sing patriotic songs, composed by tawaeifs etc. that have got lost in the course of time. Two of her renditions were brilliant to say the least. The first was "Khub ladi mardani jhansi wali rani thi" and the other was the timeless classic "vaishnava jana ko". I had driven two hours through painful traffic but her voice made everything worth it.
After a quiet dinner at a friend's place where her mother had made Bengali delicacies I retired tired satisfied and well fed after a Sunday well spent.

Haitus

2007-10-10T00:47:00.000-07:00

Most of my haitus is that which shouldn't have been and ends when I find some free time with no more avenues for wasteful indulgences of time left.
So here I am once again with a promise to myself and the very few readers of my blog that I ll be regular.
A few changes have happened in the last few months. I have grown old, turned 26, developed a bad back, lost a little hair, developed something called "Dry Eyes" and even have a bit of wisdom tooth problem. In addition I have been promoted, making a little more money, and have bought a car. So you can see there s nothing great about the last few month. Most of this happens to most people in natural progression with nothing to write home about.

Religious Rome and me

2007-02-14T07:57:00.001-08:00

Finally let me talk a bit about Rome and I shall begin with my favourite place til now. A visit to the Vatican is a humbling experience. This trip has made me an early riser and so I was the Vatican metro station Ottavio by 7 AM. So I first went straight to the St Peters Basillica. Its huge and its beautiful. Not only is it among the largest church in the world, it is probably among the most beautiful. It has tombs of various popes apart from the main one of the apostle St Peter, it also has varied places of worship and someone like me found himself kneeling down to pary. Art is all around beginning from the statues of various apostles all around St Peters squares and moves on the frescoes and paintings along the celings and walls finally ending at the altar designed by Bernini and where only the pope has the authority to hold a mass. However the main piece of art is to your right as soon as you enter, Michaelangelo’s Pieta. Now I am not sure but I think a pieta is basically the virgin Mary holding Jesus Christ after the crucifixation and to that effect the statue is marvellous. I am no critic but pure beauty does not stay hidden from a human eye. Today it is protected by bullet proof glass ever since a maniac attacked it and broke a part of it claiming he was Jesus Christ! The walk to St Peters Square and the exit from the Basilica gives you a chance to see the famous Swiss guards, who are the police of the Vatican. I am trying to avoid most of the material you can get in any tourist books and making it a far more personal piece. On my way out and in between my ‘Excuse me sir! Could you please take a photograph for me’ I met an Indian lady who studies and works as a guide at the Vatican and unlike us consultants she was willing to share her knowledge and help me out without any charge.

After about forty five minutes in the line, making friends with Alessandro, braving tha rain and interacting with all the Bangladeshi street hawkers I finally entered the Vatican museums. I try and use the audio guide wherever available as it lets you go around the place without a group accompanying you and a guide rushing you and so declined the english tour got myself an audio guide and entered the museums. This place is beauty and history rolled into one that makes a very ordinary man like me a romantic and a believer at once. The romantic in me spent an inordinate amount of time in the very first gallery almost spell bound by the frescoes all around. Most of the works all around here are inherently religious in nature and so my missionary education did help a great deal in comprehending the stories depicted. I spent most of time in the first gallery looking up or sitting on the floor hopelessly trying to catch in a frame that which can never be done justice through that medium. The reason is that it is as much an experience of the human mind and heart as much as it is a feast of the eyes. It was finally when the guards politely asked me to move on that I realized how much time it had been.

Almost running through the other rooms I headed straight for what is arguably the world’s most famous chappel and also the greatest of art: Sistine Chapel. This is the place where the pope is elected and where the fire is lit for the white and black smoke signifying the election. That however is just a marginal occurrence in comparision for that which existst in the walls and the ceilings. Michaelangelo was just thirty three when he was commisisioned to make the frescoes and paintings on the walls of this chapel. The creation is timeless and inspires awe. The entire length, breadth and height of this place bears the mark of his genius. The walls and the ceilings depict stories from The Bible starting from the genesis, moving on to the stories of Moses and finally culminating in the life of christ. The word frescoes is derived from the Italian word fresh and means that the paintings were done when the plaster were still fresh. While the ones on the wall resemble rich drapery that on the ceiling took a heavy toll on the health and eyesight of the genius since for four years he had to lie stretched on his back to paint them. Legend says that the size of this chapel resembles that of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem to a tee. There are security guards and no photography is permitted at this spot but I must confess that I did steal a couple from my phone, since taking out the camera was out of question. If I have been saying that it was genius written all around I don’t know what to say about The Last Judgement. Is there a word above genius? Depicting the scene of the last judgement it is almost very similar to the picture of Krishna as seen by Arjun and described by Sanjaya in the Geeta. It shows Christ at the centre, with the virgin Mary beside him astonished at what is unfolding. The apostles are all around Jesus and man is being resurrected to either be allowed to cross Hades to heaven or for the gates be closed forever. There are numeroud other angles ranging from a human skin with what some critics believe Michaelangelo’s self portrait to pagan symbols and various other numerous insights. This place was full of tourists but I found myself silently praying moved beyond words. If you have ever prayed without really saying anything to God you would know what I felt at that moment.

I moved through a lot of other galleries but spent some extra time at three Raphael’s Rooms where my favourite painting is the one called School of Athens. This picture shows all the greats Greeks from Socrates, Aristotle to Pythagoras and Euclid along with a self portrait on the same canvas. Raphael tried to combine the religious with the humanist creating an unique spiritual experience. So while you have pictures of Peter’s sufferings to Charlamagne’s coronation.

The religious history of Rome has another rather different but equally famous resting place: the catacombs. In the times before Constantine made christianity the official religion of Rome christians were not allowed to bury their dead in the city. Hence a vast labarynth of tunnels were dug outside the cities were the dead were buried. Today these are places of tourist interest and pilgrimmage both. Being property of the vatican but being outside the walls photography is prohibited by law. A walk through these tunnels lined with graves on all sides is quite a harrowing and enlightening experience. An enlightening one because of a very personal reason but a harrowing one because if you imagine being caught alone at night in those labarynthine corridors it does cause a some discomfort.

As I said the personal reason for interest in the catacombs of San Sebastian believe it or not comes from a movie Quo Vadis. Forgetting the movie the story is that persecuted by Nero, Peter was leaving Rome for Naples when he saw a boy standing by the stone looking at him. Finding something strange Peter approached the boy and asked “Quo Vadis Domini” the translation of which if I am correct is “Who are you?” or “Where are you going?”. I am not exactly sure which one. Anyway at that time the boy replied “My people in Rome are in bondage and I am going to Rome to be crucified a second time” and disappeared. Realizing Christ had spoken to him Peter returned to Rome giving a lot of courage to the christians but himself was crucified upside on the cross. This stone where Peter met Christ is present in the church which is also the resting place of San Sebastian. In fact walking through this underground maze you are told that not only were christian catacombs found here but also pagan ones. This place was also the resting spot of Peter and Paul at the times when christians were being persecuted before Constantine. This entire knowledge comes from the graphitti on the walls, the study of which is a special part of archaelogy. You also see the fish in places which was an earlier symbol of christianity before the cross took its place. The fish was chosen because it was a secret code. The Greek translation of fish gives an acronym for Jesus Christs Son of God Saviour. In fact in the approach to this place you drive down the new Apian Way, a replacement of the famous road that many a victorious army walked down and my mother’s favourite Marcus Venicius (Robert Taylor) too!

The dimpled beauty and other stories

2007-02-14T07:56:00.002-08:00

For those of you who read my blog would know how much I adored this lady whoi taught us a course in St Charles. I had thought that would be the first and the only time I would meet her but was pleasantly surprised when she turned up as the course co ordinator for this course. In fact she even remembered me from those classes! While a lot of us come to these courses thinking that we would get to meet people from different parts of the world, we get to do that but precious little more. Its absolutely a lie to say that Indians are clanish. I have seen Britishers totally closed to meeting outsiders and Spaniards stick to their group. Its not that they do it out of malice but just thay they are as comfortable with the known than the unknown as much as we are. In fact this brings me to an interesting point. Even for someone like me who spends time either travelling or dreaming about travelling (the latter a lot more), I do tend to from time to time start missing my familiar sorroundings. In fact on this trip I was totally alone in a country where I couldn’t even communicate properly and so I won’t deny the fact how overjoyed I was to see a colleague of mine walk into the class, who had decided to join at the last moment.

Boarding Lodging

2007-02-14T07:56:00.001-08:00

Since every time I travel a part of it is on official work and the other personal I experience the two ends of the spectrum. While the official is about five stars and stretch limousines the personal is about youth hostels and close interactions with fellow travellers. In fact the five stars are full of snooty people looking down at this brown guy staying at a place that they assume are for more priviledged people. On the other hand in the hostels you come across Austrian girls staying in Italy since they were ‘tired of Austria’, boisterious Americans who consider visiting a pub as much important as seeing the Vatican. In fact for a guy brought up in conservative India staying in mixed dorms where women go to sleep just next to him wearing nothing more than their under garments and consider it nothing abnormal.

Airlines

2007-02-14T07:55:00.001-08:00

This is only the second time that I have travelled outside the country but with every experience I get a feeling that the service orientation of Jet Airways is among the best in class and far better than KLM and Air France at least. Not only do the air hostesses smile a lot more they are also far more efficient in servicing your needs. Flights of Air France and Al Italia are also delayed and even in those cases they take far better care of their passengers.

Restarting engines

2007-02-08T22:38:00.001-08:00

Well if I am back writing and actually posting something here means only one thing that I will be once again on the move. This time I will really be travelling and it won’t be the weekly travel across metros in the same kind of aircrafts, through same kind of streets meeting same kind of people.
I had thought that this time I ll keep the trip quiet but being a true Bong couldn’t help blowing my trumpet all over the place and consequently ended up telling all and sundry that I am going on a trip after promising myself to keep it a secret.
I have probably never spent as much time pouring over the internet or talking to people as I did in preparation for this trip. You see for an Indian travelling to USA there are always relatives or friends living the american dream and so you seldom face any sort of trouble. I was about to write you feel at home but then realized how stupid it was. You travel thousands of miles to feel at home! Of course not! You travel so that you witness and explore the unknown. However in Europe you don’t know people or the language and its very expensive. Hence this is truly alien country.
A few of my close pals ask my why are you planning so much. Well you see there are two ways to do this: Either you have lots of money, in which case you can travel whenever wherever you please or you have lots of time and so you have the luxury of travelling whenever wherever you can afford to. Since I have neither or both in short supply I plan to make the most of my small window of opportunity.

Nemma Top 10

2006-10-25T02:16:00.001-07:00

Yes its for someone new to the city or even if not new someone who wants to know whats to do in this really great city.

1. Breakfast at Koshys: Please go left and not right once you enter, with some time on your hands for a lzy breakfast. People with an aversion to smoking are advised to stay away.

2. Saturday Lunch at Angeethi: They have a lovely buffet spread and after a few beers its just the right place to gorge.

3. Saturday or Sunday evenings at Java City: Take a book, order some coffee and settle down for a few hours of good live music. The crowd sometimes is very wannabe but look out for the old timers. Please go with someone interested in the music and not jabbering as thankfully the music is loud enough to cut out needless conversation.

4. Conversations on the steps of MG Road: If you don't want to spend money but just want to sit down at chat with a friend find some tree shade and sit down on the steps of MG Road. You can watch the traffic, the people and the lights, none of which will infringe on yur public privacy while you sit down and talk.

5. Nights at Purple Haze: Probably my vote for the best pub will go to this place. Go there only if you appreciate good rock music because you just might get thrown out if you want Bryan Adams. The only problem is that it gets very crowded on weekends but if you manage to get in early and catch a seat then this pub is heaven.

6. Cauvery Sitting: Ever since they re did the front part of Cauvery on MG Brigade crossing many a blossoming romance got nipped. The official place for lovers to meet and then go their way in Bangalore, me and my friends have spent a lot of time sitting here and hoping to catch someones eye but alas our wait is all that we have to show.

7. Cubbon Park: If you enjoy a walk, then Cubbon Park is the place for you. Start around the Raj Bhavan walk in front of Vidhan Soudha then turn right into Cubbon Park and continue walking as long as you feel like. If you like holding hands with special someone's last I knew the cheap moral police were not around but check before you do.

8. Forum and Garuda: Yes, Bangalore too does mall, albeit not in the monstrous scale of Gurgaon but these two are where teenagers romance, people watch movies or generally hang out and shop. Its a place to go if you feel its too hot outside.

9. Open Air Barista: If you don't feel like going home today evening but just sit and catch up with an old friend and you enjoy open air then the Barista below Barton Centre is a pretty decent place. However I suggest you go there in the evenings and not sit near some awkwardly placed speakers. And yes let the idiots trying to shut it down know that Bangalore is too beautiful a place to be spoilt by such hawks.

10. Ebony: Come on, this is the only fine dining place I am recommending. Situated in an open terrace on the 13th floor of Barton Centre it offers one of the nicest views of Bangalore and if its just about to rain then all the better for you. Order some wine, nice appetizers, nice company and sit down to enjoy the view and let your mind wander.

Things to do in Bangalore

2006-10-25T02:16:00.000-07:00

I just had to write

2006-10-25T02:03:00.000-07:00

No, I didn't have to write about something. I just had to write, write about anything in order to let myself know that I can still write.
My life nowadays revolves around office, and dreaming about a life that I want to have beyond it. I dream about far off places and make excel lists of places that I want to see. I surf the net and read of all the places I will see one day, add them to my excel sheet and thats the end of it. I think of leaving people I know and going somewhere far away but I end up in some friend's house sipping a beer, and well do what I do best, think. I dream of adventure, glory, new places, new people, new experiences, new things to learn and then I come back to the comfort of the known and the boring. I want to live but I don't.
If you are making the mistake of asking "why" I am going to give you the answer you deserve "I don't know".

History of the Land of the Free

2006-06-26T05:19:00.000-07:00

These cities might as well have been twin cities and any visit to one is incomplete without to the other. Philadelphia and Boston, both cities over three hundred years old and collectively hosting the history of America’s fight for liberation lying in the state of Pennsylvania and Massachusetts are to be visited if you believe in knowing the history of the places you visit. I for one believe that turning your back on your history is giving yourself no chance with the future, for that which is your future today is your history tomorrow.

Anyway, my visits to these places can broadly be classified to a major and a minor part.

The major part consists of tracing the history of America’s struggle for independence. I began this journey in Philadelphia, the oldest city in United States and the bedrock of the revolution that liberated the America’s. The streets here are narrow and so while you drive down to the city centre (where all the attractions are) Chestnut Street, while driving up you have to use the Walnut Street. Very few streets are broad enough to support two way traffic.

The first thing to see here is the Liberty Bell that was the clarion call for American Independence. In fact the security for this bell is as much as any international airport if not more. Right next to the Bell is the Independence Hall, where USA declared its dependence and the declaration of independence was signed. After this we can take a walk through the rest of the city centre to the other various attractions. These include the house and grave of Benjamin Franklin, the father of America and the Betsy Ross House, the lady credited with sewing the first Stars and Stripes national flag. The walk down the by lanes will lead you to the first Anglican church in USA and the Franklin Court, where we could say the first American Congress met. This august gathering of the founder fathers of America included names like George Washington, Samuel Adams (presidents of USA), Benjamin Franklin (father of the nation) and John Hancock (first signatory in the declaration of independence). Since Philadelphia was also the first city of USA then you have two other star attractions: the first stock exchange and the first bank in the United States. I further spent a lot of time simply walking the streets, as they seemed enticingly charming to me, and even went to a tavern that has stood since the time of independence. For those from Calcutta, this place was like Coffee House, as it was here that the intelligencia met to discuss and decide the fate of the nation.

In Philadelphia, the way to go about is to identify the places of interest, chalk out a path and then keep visiting them, while reserving some time to simply walk the streets. Boston on the other hand has the Freedom Trail. So if Philadelphia is where the actions were carried out Boston is the place where the seeds of thought were sown. The Freedom Trail is a marked path for tourists to see all the places of historical relevance in Boston. It’s a path marked out by red cobblestones and red lines across streets and pavements that takes a total of about four to five hours to walk. A lot of the historical buildings are very contextual to USA history; the purpose is not to see great buildings. It’s to experience the places that lead to the Boston Tea Party, the first organized revolt against the British. This city, also the birthplace of Franklin do have a few important buildings and so on but the best thing about the walk along the freedom trail is that you get to experience American history that very few people who visit this promised land ever do.

The walk along the freedom trail takes you through graveyards with the tombs of John Hancock (first person to sign the declaration of independence) to Samuel Adams (which my friend insisted on being photographed by, since its his favourite brand of beer), moves on to places of residence of the people who lead the revolution and more importantly the meeting places where they discussed their thoughts and firmed up action plans. Somewhere along the way, we stopped for lunch in what appeared to be a very old market place and had chowder, supposed to be a speciality, shopped at the souvenir shop and then walked through a market as crowded and as dirty as Gariahat market. The trail finally ends where two historic war ships are kept for display and maintained by the US Navy. The first is USS Enterprise which is about 300 years old, and had seen action in the War for Independence. The second is a more recent one and was used in World War II, a destroyer, USS Cassin Young. In fact this ship was hit by a Kamikaze bomber and survived that to tell its tale. I was super thrilled to see what depth charges and torpedoes really looked like and ended up chatting with the US Navy officer on duty for quite some time.

The minor part is very interesting for anyone connected with the world of education. I managed to visit three of the world’s most famous institutes. The first was obviously University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, having the Wharton Business School. The other two were in Boston; Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the mecca for all engineers of the world and host to the famous Sloan School of Business, while the other is simply the historic Harvard University. Each of these institutes at least in appearance was unique in their own ways. UPenn for example has a huge campus right inside the city and the Wharton School is one impressive building inside it. The guards were kind enough to let me go inside and wander about the corridors, class rooms, cafeterias etc. in what I thought was one modern swank jazzy building. To find the Sloan School in MIT however I had to literally hunt around for however famous the B School might be its not what makes MIT what it is today. It still appears to be a real techie place with not much pretence in the architecture. I did however take a walk down what is known as the endless corridors of MIT and take a look at the majestic dome of MIT right on the river. However the place that I liked best was Harvard, which had class, elegance, heritage and quality written all over. The campus is probably the most pictorious, even though among the three most famous departments only law is situated inside the campus. The B school is a walk across the river while the med school is in fact somewhere else in downtown Boston. I spent a lot of time walking around Harvard Square where you have a place where you challenged to play chess with the people there, some of whom professors at Harvard and some even rumoured to be Nobel laureates!

As usual on the way back me and my friend managed to lose my way and walk what would easily be a distance of about six to seven miles but I seem to not mind this getting lost at all as there is no better way to know a city than to walk about it when lost!

The Capital City

2006-05-27T18:48:00.000-07:00

There aren’t too many places where after you have to walk some 20 kms a day and on top of that lose your way and end up circling for an hour, that you would call a beautiful city. However Washington DC is one such place. Its’ truly beautiful and the walk all around is worth every bit including the part where I got lost.

To tell you about my visit to Washington I must first praise the great subway system that was my life line during the duration of my stay and the very helpful people. With the people and maps for my guide and the subway as my tool I managed to travel extensively around the city. This was also a city with lots of friends who ensured that I had a time of my life and was taken care of and pampered like a child when I got back from the tours of the day.

My favourite place in Washington has to be what is called The Mall. It also is the area around which most of the areas of interest are located. The areas that I visited in Washington can broadly be classified into three: The first is the set of museums of the Smithsonian Institute, the second is the monuments and memorials of the past and the third is the continuing set of official buildings.

James Smithsonian, the founder of Smithsonian Institute which houses all the museums had visualized it as what he then called “a quest for the increase of knowledge among men”. This place has lived up to its reputation. The range of museums range from Air and Space, to natural history, to fine arts, to American history and even Holocaust history. I realized that it would be foolish to try and see all of the 8 odd museums. I spent most of time at the Air and Space museum (the world’s most visited museum) given my long standing interest in aircrafts. In fact I went to both their museums including the one an hour away in Virginia. I saw a Concorde, the fastest aircraft ever flown (Blackbird), Enola Gay (aircraft that dropped the Hiroshima bomb), Colombia moon landing module and also USS Enterprise. While this was the newer breed the older breed included Wright Brothers aircraft, Lindbergh’s aircraft and a whole lot more. In fact the museum also has a simulated flying experience where I am quite sure I crashed the aircraft quite a few times!

The other museums I spent time in were the Museum of Natural History (with an amazing dinosaur collection and the famous Hope Diamond), Museum of American History (which has a motley collection from Judy Garland’s slippers as Dorothy, Lance Armstrong’s bicycle, Ray Charles’s keys, IBM Deep Blue Machine, Edison’s lamps and even First Ladies costume) and finally the deeply moving Museum of Holocaust. In the Holocaust museum they give you a card at random where you can read at random about the life story of one holocaust victim and trace his life while you move through the museum. I took a short walk in the end through the Hoshbourne sculpture garden but its slightly difficult to appreciate it without proper guidance.. Each of these museums I can spend a page writing about at a précis minimum level which I ll refrain from here.

The second set of places I visited in Washington include government official buildings. My favourite among them is the Capitol. It is a truly majestic building sitting at the head of the table of the Smithsonian institution buildings. It is flanked by the different ministries, and behind it lie the Library of the Congress and the Supreme Court, both equally majestic buildings. However they are all these buildings very similar in architecture, made out of white marble. If you drive down Jefferson Drive from the Capitol you get to a very significant building today, The Voice of America, the propaganda radio of USA internationally. However if you drive the other way down Pennsylvania Avenue you come to J Edgar Hoover Building, the headquarters of FBI. The other building that I did see and take photographs of (even though its actually not allowed) is The Pentagon, planning centre of most wars in the world for good or for bad. The striking thing about the Pentagon is that nowhere does the building say its pentagon. It just has one single colour face to the world manned as heavily fortified fortress which reeks of a simple message: Stay Away, You are not welcome here.

This brings me to a beautiful walk you can take from the Capitol down to the Washington Monument and then on your way to the Lincoln Memorial, if you pause and turn right you will see it, The White House, abode to the most powerful man in the world, home of the President of the United States. It was such a disappointment. The first view I got was from the back but I walked all around it to the front and beyond but trust me the building is nothing as grand as the Rashtrapati Bhavan you see in New Delhi. I saw all the parts of the building you can from outside including, the place where the president helicopter lands to the place where the press is briefed. It frankly looks a lot like Calcutta Club. In fact I was reminded of a Michael Douglas and Annete Bening movie, I forget the name where before they make love for the first time, a rather sheepy Michael Douglas confesses to Bening, if you think that because I am the most powerful man on earth, I really may not be one. None of the places mentioned here did I actually enter even though I believe that tours of the Capitol is possible if you go early and give a line but for the White House, you need a Congressman’s letter of recommendation and you need to apply six months in advance! I did also manage to take a photograph outside the Paul E Goddard Centre of NASA, only because Swade was shot there!

The historical places in Washington are all political in nature as you would expect in a capital city in a nation only three hundred years old. I began my tour with The Washington Monument, the tallest structure in Washington. In fact this is the reason why there are no sky scrapers in Washington as by a decree there cannot be any construction taller than this one. My favourite obviously had to be Lincoln Memorial. This is one person both me and my mother have always admired. As for me his speeches are probably the best I have ever read. I wonder what it would have been to hear him though. So I spent a lot of time reading those two presidential addresses written next to his huge statue that I was so familiar with from childhood. In fact I then went down to the basement and read up even more of his speeches. I got the snap clicked which had been in the planning for a long time; I stood at the place where Martin Luther King Jr had delivered his famous ‘I Have a Dream’ speech on the steps of Lincoln Memorial as if it was me delivering some speech from there.

I continued my walk after Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial and saw the three war memorials; World War II memorial, Korean War Memorial and Vietnam War Memorial. I was deeply moved by a couple of sights at the Vietnam War memorial. There s a book kept there with the list of names of all those killed or missing in action and their names are also sculpted on the walls. There were two couple who stood there obviously searching for their son’s names, photographing the pages and the walls all the while silent tears rolling down their faces. I saw letters written by the friends of those killed in action kept next to their names and also roses with letters from schools in USA. If there is one thing the world can learn from USA, its how to honour your war heroes. The Korean War Memorial is slightly smaller in side and less personal in nature but has this amazing inscription which reads “Our Nation honours her sons and daughters who answered the call to defend a country they never knew and a people they never met”. You can abuse this nation as much as you want and claim that all it does is out of self interest but I for one trust their inherent belief in freedom and liberty as principles of desire and appreciate what they think is their responsibility to ensure freedom and liberty across the world. The instruments and instances might have gone wrong a few times but as a philosophy I support it wholeheartedly. The last and the latest of the war memorials is the World War II Memorial and here its evident that USA wants to tell everyone why they go about the world exporting forcefully what they call liberty and democracy. The first inscription here reads “Americans came to liberate, not to conquer, to restore freedom and to end tyranny”. I feel the confidence missing and a mechanism of self defence move into its place.

This entire walk from World War II Memorial to Lincoln Memorial is on the banks of a lake both sides of which has cherry trees which when in bloom, you have the Cherry Blossom Festival here. However the interesting point being that these were all gifts of friendship from the Japanese. Having seen Enola Gay, I couldn’t see how the Japanese were gifting cherry trees of friendship to the Americans! The last place I visited was the Jefferson Memorial, which is located very beautifully on the banks of the Potomac River. I successfully managed to lose my way trying to act smart and take my own short cuts through the city and ended up walking a good one hour at least in circles. The point however is that even though at the end of it my legs were aching a bit, and I was running horribly late, the walk itself was so beautiful that I didn’t regret it even for a minute. A couple of other places that I did visit the next day again from outside were the Watergate Building of Nixon fame and the Kennedy Performing Arts Centre.

The final place in this itenary is obviously Arlington Cemetry. While everyone seems to go there for the tombs of the Kennedy family I found the shrine to the Unknown Soldier with its own change of guard ceremony to be a much better thing to see. In fact the memorials to the Challenger and Columbia tragedies and the house of General Lee (including the view from there) were also attractions far more worth a visit than the grave of the Kennedy’s, no offence meant to yet another great American president. If the tragedy of the Vietnam War wasn’t obvious at the memorial, the never ending sea of graves for this war made almost everyone; child and old alike in the trolley sit up and take notice. This is what I guess makes the Americans ask, are we ready to pay this price and get the reply, no price is too great to protect the rights of free men.

The City of Al Capone

2006-05-21T22:38:00.000-07:00

Well haven’t said much about Chicago, the windy city, the city of rail roads, the city of the great fire and obviously the city of Al Capone. I had always thought that I was a thorough city person but well the downtown in Chicago made me feel there s still a lot of citying left to do. If you stand anywhere in the downtown and just raise your head a bit and look around you see towering sky scrapers dwarfing you from every side; quite a humbling experience.

For a good beginning there are two quick tours to take that gives you a very decent idea about downtown Chicago. First is the trolly tour that tells you all about these towering buildings and the other is the cruise down the Chicago river snaking through the city (where they actually tell you about how and why they made the Chicago river actually change direction and flow out of Lake Michigan than into it). A few places that I would now say is a must see is the Shedd Aquarium and the Art Institute of Chicago. The Shedd Aquarium is one of the largest in the world and recreates both the marine world and fresh water bodies with its associated aquatic life in an uniquely represential natural habitat. My personal favourite however would remain the oceanarium with the sea lions, dolphins, penguins and otters. The Art Institute of Chicago was my first true introduction to the world of fine arts. With my friend acting as a guide I was introduced to impressionism, cubism and the renaissance styles of painting. Tagging along with a guide and my friends’ knowledge we managed an initial understanding of Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh, Remi etc. Oh one important trivia is that if you see outside the building you will find the names of Donatello, Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael inscribed. No there s no art funda here but the real fund is that while we were having lunch at Benigans right opposite it, we were told that others had also sat like that stared at the names and decided to name a few of their creations after them: the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Keeping to the museum trip the Field Museum is really worth a visit too, to see Sue (the largest T Rex ever found) in all her resplendent glory and also to pay visits to the Egyptian gallery and the House of Gems.

If you are like me and like looking down on cities from heights I guess Chicago is the place to be. You get two of the best views possible, one obviously from the world’s 2nd tallest building’s 103rd floor Skydeck, Sears Towers. Coming to think of it Sears Roebuck was the first case taught to us in B School. Just trivia, ignore. However the slightly lower but much better view is from the 94th floor Observatory in the John Hancock Centre. From here you might be a little lower than Sears and also the view of downtown might be a bit more restricted than Sears but its more than made up by the stunning view you get of Lake Michigan and the Lake Shore Drive running around it. In fact you can even see Wisonsin and Indiana in the distance. I didn’t manage to go up either at night but I guess it must be worth a visit.

A couple of other attractions that you can do but which is nothing to really write home about is the Millennium Park (just another park with couples all around) and the Navy Pier (akin to a cleaner Chowpatty by the lake; the only good thing being the music). Navy Pier however had a ship with cruises and dining on board where the best of Chicago went to dine with the finest ladies in their finest dress. Well I think someday I think I ll come here with her, gen for kicks! I didn’t see a couple of other places like the Adler Planetarium and the Museum of Science and Industry but yeah if you taking the City Pass, you might as well see it. I am a major wildlife lover and so couldn’t miss the Lincoln Zoo and managed to see a lot of animals from the Americas that had hitherto only heard about or seen on National Geographic.

There were 3 experiences that I will remember above this sightseeing and I must tell you about them. The first was that I went for my first classical concert that I had long been dreaming about. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra were playing Bach’s Magnificent and Mozart’s Requiem. I was initially hesitant about spending the $40 on the ticket but I finally gave in and once again with Ditchie and Ranga for a guide dove right into the world of art. The first thing that strikes you about these concerts is the grandeur of it all. The auditorium is grand and awe inspiring, people come dressed in their finest (even though we weren’t and hence looked quite an outcast but what the hell!), and decorum and propriety is written all over. If you don’t know how to behave here you better just follow the crowd else you will make a real fool of yourself, but it was just like I had seen in the movies. The concert at least sounded very good to me (I can’t comment more than that), but the composers went in and came out for the bows 7 times spread over the interval and the end, which was slightly too much if you ask me. I was also pointed out that there was Itzhack Polin, playing the violin in the concert who s among the greatest living violinists!

Anyway from here we went straight to a jazz club, called House of Blues, from where we were kicked out because of me, since I was not carrying my passport to prove my age. The good that happened was that because we had to go back to pick up my passport, we ended up going to the most famous jazz place in Chicago called The Green Mill, which I believe was frequented by Al Capone himself and even to date has tunnels below that he had built to escape out if need be. There were 2 saxophones, drums and an organ and the music was very good. The band would have played till 5 in the morning but sometime after 2 we decided to call it a day. Since this was my first visit to an American night club I wasn’t very sure of what to expect but I would just say maybe people are just 25% more liberal than we would see in the up market night clubs of Bombay and Bangalore. Yes there were couples making out at different places but hell they do that in Indian cities too and its pretty sweet and you Bajrang Dalites can go take a hike.

The third was a walk I took along Michigan Avenue or what is called the Magnificent Mile in Chicago. It truly is beautiful. It has famous buildings, shops, musicians lining this walk from the Chicago river to a little further than the Hancock Building. So while you can walk into a Cartier or Tiffany’s, you also have an official Walt Disney Store and also the Apple showroom. While you ll have the street musicians playing over turned paint buckets as drums and trumpets, you ll also find protesters (one of whom had a poster which read ‘FBI Stop Raping my Wife’; I don’t know why). One of the major attractions here is the Chicago Tribune building which has rocks from different parts of the world that their correspondents have been to embedded all through the structure. So you have rocks from Taj Mahal, Great Wall of China, Berlin Wall etc. and also a moon rock which I m sure no correspondent of theirs ever went to.

A mention must be made of the place where we spent a couple of nights, in the Chicago International Hostel. These are places where international travellers can sleep in the dorms at a low rate. It’s a place where you basically sleep and I believe they exist all across the world for travellers to use. We made friends with Andre, from Australia who had been back packing around USA for more than a month. These are nice affordable places but it would help if you were travelling with a friend. We also managed to eat at an Ethiopian restaurant and also at Pizzeria Uno, the origin of the Chicago Deep Dish pizzas.

I have spent a lot of time walking around the Chicago downtown and have come to really like the place. In fact couldn’t stop singing Sinatra’s ‘Downtown’ all along and would recommend that everyone stay close it in Chicago and spend as much time as you can walking around it, especially at night. I think its safe. Right now I await the departure of my US Airways flight to Washington that’s delayed by more than an hour for no apparent reasons. Yes, such things happen here too.

School

2006-05-18T16:35:00.000-07:00

This by the way is the real purpose of my visit... The Accenture Strategy training school for Analysts.

I feel the best thing about this trip was being able to meet people from different countries. Its seldom you get to work in teams with British and Japanese Managers, American consultants, Korean Analysts etc. The more I see of the British I just love their accent. In some ways it does tell you that the world might speak it but at the end of the day its still their language. The Indians are by far the best in numbers in class but I must add a caveat here that while American analysts are all grad school students, the Indians are from B Schools. One unfortunate fact is that in spite of this great opportunity people really weren't mixing as much as they should have and there was a Brazilian ghetto, a British community, an American gang and we desis.

The courses were taught by people with really great backgrounds, mostly senior managers and partners in the firm with a Wharton or Harvard B School background to them. In fact I fell in love with my instructor of value creation. She s this amazing 35 year old lady who is probably one of the most graceful, knowledgable and spirited I ve come across (not to forget her great dimples). When she went into the depths of why ROIC is a better medium to compare firms than ROA and ROE, it all started to make sublime sense. We were also exposed to some amazing tools for analysis like Crystal Ball etc. It was what I would call a further consultization of us, with structured thinking being drilled in at every step.

Here I must mention a couple of things. The food here is awesome and one day I counted they were serving beef, pork, lamb, duck, chicken, sword fish, salmon, prawns in addition to some 15 varieties of vegetarian fare and more. I hogged and hogged and hogged til I grew tired and started having salads!

The other is that while a dynamic business modelling class was on in full swing it also happened to be the time Dravid and Kaif were batting against the windies and you could see all of us toggle between excel screen and cric info. In fact one of us found an amazing site where you could track the match in animation. When the class got over some 6 of us stayed back to track it on one screen cheering all the way making smiles go around as people watched us cheer India to victory.

Early to bed and early to rise

2006-05-16T16:43:00.000-07:00

For all that we’d heard about America being the party place what surprised me no end was the fact that people here have dinner very early. In fact they finish dinner even more we used to in Pilani in winter. I learnt it the hard way because when I turned up in the dining room at 8:15 it was only to find them washing the dishes! I was told by my friends that they go to sleep by 11 and get up by 5 on the days of work. That’s what my grand mom does! I guess it comes from one word that’s deep into their psyche: professionalism. However they still do pack their night clubs while the streets are deserted. In fact let me tell you about a rather funny situation I fell into.

After I had missed my dinner I just wanted to go somewhere for a quiet dinner and see the town in general. I soon realized that its impossible for the training centre itself was so big that walking to the gates was impossible for reaching the main parts of the town. So I had to go to the only place open for food: the night club when I was in no mood for a drink. So here you have a funny picture of people who eat dinner by eight latest, desert their streets by 9 but keep their night clubs going till late! Maybe one of the reasons I felt so restricted as not having a car in USA is a bigger problem than not having a roof over your head. Sometimes I wonder why a country becomes so dependent on two products that they themselves can’t produce enough in any way: gasoline and coffee.

Systems, Processes and Honesty

2006-05-15T21:23:00.000-07:00

This is a country of systems, processes and honesty. Everything here from flirting to eating has a certain system and is governed by processes. People seem almost dependent on it, and almost revolt if anybody dares to do otherwise. This is necessary since most things here work on a self service manner be it ordering food at a restaurant or paying at a toll way or doing your own laundry. However there s one thing that is taken as a given for these systems and processes to run and thats honesty. The country expects its citizens to be honest and most people are.
So you take your food first and pay later but nobody goes off without. People tender the exact amount at the unmanned toll booths without acting smart. The next person simply keeps your laundry out without stealing it. In fact this sense of honesty and civic sense is so ingrained in the American psyche that they seem to be doing it all without any apparent effort whatsoever.

Hats off to you Sir!

2006-05-15T19:36:00.001-07:00

Chicago has a very high number of taxi drivers from the subcontinent. In fact we met a Mr. Nathani from Ahmedabad who s been driving taxis in Chicago for 29 years and has a perfect American accent. However this piece is dedicated to someone else.

The story happened during a short taxi ride from Wrigleys building to John Hancock Building in downtown Chicago. It was very cold and 5 shivering Indians got into the taxi of Mr. Abdul Benaras Khan. Mr. Khan realizing that we were Indians started talking to us in Hindi and upon our enquiry told us he s from Pakistan. He immediately launched into a tirade against politicians for constantly wanting to keep the countries at war, and especially the Biritish blaming them for partition. In fact we got into a rather interesting discussion on what would happen if the two cricket teams were to be playing together (Gavaskar/Miandad; Kapil/Imran etc. etc.).

We were fairly convinced that he wanted to sweet talk us into tipping more than the customary 15% especially with the ride being so short. Stupid and prejudied that we are was given a deserving slap on the face when on disembarking, forget the tip he refused the basic fare itself saying "Aap mere beta ho" and "staying away from the country I can do just this little to ensure that our relationships improve"

Hats off to you Sir!

Colours

2006-05-15T19:36:00.000-07:00

The world outside is really not as different as I had thought it would be. Yes, the obvious differences are there of cities in the developed world being cleaner and more organized; you seeing a lot of white, brown and black instead of just brown skin around etc. At the end of the day however you see that it doesn’t hit you as much as you think it would as they are all people at the end of the day. They all get off jet lagged flights and then fight for seats to sleep in the airport. They all loiter around aimlessly in the same way in the airport and chatter in a very similar fashion.

One thing that however struck me is that racism does exist though the form has changed. We might not be having “Indians and dogs not allowed” written but wherever you go there is a second glance, raised eyebrow, smirk or sometimes total ignore to greet you but please note the use of the term wherever and not whoever. Just like most things it’s a very visible minority that gives this bad name.

It is this obnoxious minority that looked at you earlier as a total misfit, trying to enter the white man’s world where you don’t deserve to be. Today however there is a grudging acceptance that Indians or even maybe Asians cannot be ignored. They have arrived and are demanding their place in the League of Nations. So while you can despise the fact that they have reached a position to negotiate you cannot do anything about it. There s something of the white mans expectation that its his birthright that the black man will serve him and when the roles reverse and the white man has to ‘Sir’ the brown man, something inside him revolts.

The majority however is immensely polite, helpful and decent. This sense of decency, propriety and gentlemanly behaviour seems to be ingrained in them. So you will find him getting up straightaway to give the lady a seat or putting up the luggage for the elderly lady.

Bawal works

2006-05-15T19:35:00.000-07:00

The immigration and security check SUCKS in Delhi airport and it’s primarily because of the inefficiency of our staff and the much rightly maligned infrastructure. I stood an hour in line for each of these. The KLM guys had suddenly decided to change my seat and put me wherever they wanted but on me raising my voice and basically telling them to go to hell but I wanted the seats I had booked had to concede obviously after initially telling me it was impossible. Basically ‘bawal’ works everywhere.

Madhu’s an angel. He came to drop me at the airport and then waited outside for an hour for Josh to arrive who had fought with Jet to take an earlier flight in order to meet me. Now the guard at the gate would neither let me go out nor them come in. In come God handy. Madhu had a Ganesh idol with him which became the family deity I had to carry and that’s something people can’t deny. So they came in gave me the idol and we managed to catch up for a while.

Views from people

2006-05-15T19:31:00.000-07:00

I fortunately met a couple of people today who were from New York and Amsterdam, both places there on my itenary. Jay, who s from New York kept maintaining that Washington is probably the best place to visit, and said Smithsonian, is the thing to see in USA. He seemed to be that kind of a person since he is a jazz listener primarily. Did I ever tell you about profiling personalities given the kind of your music preference? I’ll do it some other time. Anyway Jay also dashed my hopes of seeing a Broadway musical saying that they needed a six month advance booking but also gave a silver lining saying that if I was willing to risk a 3 hour useless wait I could try standing in a line in Times Square, where they sell spare Broadway tickets a little before the show.

The other gentleman, whose name I forget (come on Dutch names aren’t easy to remember) told me what all to see in Amsterdam and amply warned me to beware of thieves while travelling in Holland. Poor guy didn’t know that I had grown up seeing “Pocket maar hoite sabdhan” on Calcutta buses and learnt to guard my luggage on Poorva 3 tier through Bihar. I just hope I don’t need to eat my words by the end of the trip.

Restarting Engines

2006-05-04T22:26:00.000-07:00

There has to be a good enough reason for me to come out of this hibernation of blogging. Well in pure JU lingo I think it can be called 'ladh' or you could say that there was nothing that caught my fancy and made me want to blog. There are two kinds of bloggers according to me: One kind talks simply so that they can be heard and the other because they have something to say. None is superior to the other. Its simply the readers prerogative to decide what kind of blogs he wants to read but again true to my nature I digress.

The reason I am back here blabbering is because in some ways my process of closing chapters and restarting engines is well and truly on.

One important dimension of that is that I will shortly be travelling again. Those of you who have been in touch with me will find it suprising that I say this considering that I ve been travelling almost every weekend but then thats not travelling at all since there was nothing new that I was seeing.

The circles in which we move are so similar that it doesn't matter whether you are in Bangalore, Calcutta, Bombay, Delhi or Chennai. You fly in the same kind of aircrafts with the same kind of airhostesses with their same food. You start finding a bit of variations in the taxis, the pubs, the friends but you know at the back of your mind they are all the same. Not that you have a problem with it... in some ways you love them for it... but you also know that you are not growing. You have reached a certain kind of plateau and the only thing growing is your frequent flyer miles not you.

So here s to the travelling, the real travelling that will begin soon. Did I ever tell you that a secret ambition of mine is to visit all the countries who are members of UN before I retire to write my books?

In Search of Glory

2006-03-02T03:04:00.000-08:00

“There comes a time in the affairs of men when they must prepare to defend not their homes alone but the tenets of faith and humanity on which their churches, their governments, and their very civilization are founded. The defense of religion, of democracy, and of good faith among nations is all the same fight. To save one we must now make up our minds to save all.”

Franklin Roosevelt address to the Congress

There are very few times when we get an opportunity to do something that we could really called glorious and a lot of us spend an entire life without possibly even one opportunity. What is sadder however is that when these very few opportunities arise most of us are caught lacking in our response to them. Generations of teaching that put self preservation above all makes us end up "exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage".

However I am working on a premise here that we all seek a life of glory. That need not be true. Not everyone needs to romanticize life on a 70 mm screen with Dolby digital sorround sound the way I do. Lets keep them aside for a moment while their contribution in terms of fulfilment of duty and creation of a social fabric cannot be over looked they aren't the ones who create history.

This brings me to my next basic question... is life meant to be one where your endeavour is to create history or one of honour, glory in every small thing we do. I sincerely believe that people who are not flashes in the pan but real history creators are ones who lead this life of glory every single day in every minute detail. That is why when the real opportunities come by they are ready to respond in a way that become legends long after they are gone.

There is however no guarantee that we will get opportunities but if we lead this path of everyday honour and glory then one thing I can guarantee... you can hold your head high every single day and look at anyone in the eye and sleep sound at night and if I may say so be a happy man. Trust me, this is one of the toughest things to do and I ve lost my way on this path before and today hope to have regained it.

I however still seek that calling that will give me glory in my own eyes and give some amount of fulfilment and meaning to my life. My greatest fear is that I ll move to so far ahead in life that I won't be able to seek it out or worse even recognize it even if it decides to present itself.

So maybe the best way is to lead this everyday life and stay a seeker for that calling. What do you get at the end of all this? Maybe a chance that when you die they will say as they say at the end of the movie Troy "I was priviledged to have lived in the time of Achilles"

The power to hurt

2006-01-10T05:35:00.000-08:00

First a few rather very common lines...
"With great power comes great responsibility"- Spiderman
"A Hero lies in you"- Mariah Carey

We are often plagued by the fact that people hurt us. This is a fact of life. This simply means that people have hurt us in the past and will hurt us in the future. Is there a way to insulate ourselves from it? The answer is no and should be no as a painless existence cain wait for those of us who attain paradise but for me I m pretty happy at the present life on earth with its vagaries of pleasures and pain.

However the one important fact that my past experiences in the last two months has taught me is that the power to hurt is something you give people, consciously and unconsciously. You give it most of the time unconsciously as you fall in love with them, get attached to them, respect them etc.

But, once they hurt you they fall from that pedestal. This is when they didn't live up to that first rule from Spiderman. They didn't live up to that responsibility which the power gave them. They let you down. They were wrong. They can justify it in whichever way they want but the fact is that they don't deserve that power any more, and now more than ever is the time for you to consciously take it away from them. This is not just necessary but right too. In some ways its even linked to the Ayn Rand philosophy of "The evil of the world is made possible by the sanction we give to it". This is evil and you should not give sanction to it. It is in fact the duty of most people around to take away whatever they might have given to this person because this person has proved to be unworthy of such a priviledge.

Its also in times like this that you look at the fact that not only is the power being taken away; it is being taken away by you. This is where the second rule comes in that "A Hero Lies in You". As far as you are concerned this is probably the lowest ebb your life has ever hit and if anyone has to pull you out of it it has to be you. As one of my friends once put it aptly "Go through the process... it makes a man out of you".

My request to those who can

2005-12-13T00:29:00.000-08:00

This is my request to you; you of the gifted men; you who can move people with your words; you who think your pen can make a difference:

There is enough sorrow in the world. I am here talking of personal problems and not of corruption or poverty. People who are truly sorrowful, know what their sorrow is and trust me don't need others to tell them what it is in different ways. They do not need every song to highlight their loss to them. They do not others to romanticize what they have lost or never had.

What they need from you is an inspiration; a reason to carry on in spite of it all; a determination that tomorrow will be better than today not because of any other reason but that they possess within themselves to make it so.

Tell them that no situtation in life is ever beyond repair simply because the power of one human to change things has always marvelled even the God above. Tell them things can better for as Lincoln said for every scoundrel there is a hero.

Let your job in society be to goad man to reach heights unhiterto reached and not wallow because there is some dirt somewhere for that is the path of progress.

I have tried to put it as plain and simple as I could.

Finally got moving

2005-10-06T04:31:00.000-07:00

Finally it happened! I moved my ass! And now that I have got it rolling will try to ensure it stays so.
Heeding Anyesha's advice have cleared up the re postings of the previous blog by mistake. The Paise Bachao Andolan has been a moderate success. Its on suspended animation this month as even the most miserly Bengali splurges during this period.
About a couple of weeks ago, I went to Gwalior. It was an one day trip; went by the Morning Shatabdi and was back by the night Shatabdi. However managed to cover entire Gwalior so for anybody planning to go there one day is fine and two days in maximum.
Gwalior has been ruled by different dynasties at different times and the Gwalior fort which stands atop a hill like a lot of other Indian forts overlooks the city. It has been held by Man Singh Tomar, Ibrahim Lyodi, Mughals and finally the Scindias (puppets of the British). While the fort offers a panoramic view of the city and is truly awe inspiring, there is one little fact that got etched into my memory. There is one part of the fort that Man Singh had kept for his eight wives, so that could enjoy the breeze while on their jhoola. However this place of romance got totally transformed once Aurangzeb took over in his reign ( a few centuries later though). He converted the same spot into a prison and hanged his brother Murad there.
Now, Man Singh Tomar's eight wife was no royalty but a Gujjar, local lady. When Man Singh proposed to him, he kept a few conditions, one of which was that every time the kingdom would face a war, the queen would not sit behind the purdah but go out and fight next to the king. For all those who talk of women staying in the house as a part of our tradition really need an education.
The next stop was the Scindia royal family palace. Splendour, wealth arrogantly displayed; there is no doubt that this was aristocracy and style and class is written all over the places. The place which stands out however is the royal dining hall where wedding feasts have been heldd and even Bill Clinton has dined. The two chandeliers are by far the largest I have ever seen and each is supposed to be heavier than ten elephants put together. The famous silver train bearing the letters S C I N D I A on each coach is kept here. No, this is not a train to travel in but one in which food moved all across the dining table stopping in front of each guest to help himself before moving on.
The last two places were connected to the Gwalior gharana of music. The first is the ancestral home of first family of Sarod; the house of Hafiz Ali Khan, Amjad Ali Khan and Bangash brother. Presently they have donated it to the HRD ministry who have converted it into a Sarod Ghar, which has photographs of famous Indian classical musicians and their instruments. The Padma Bhushan given to Hafiz Ali Khan is also kept there and so I managed to see what it looks like for the first time.
The final place in my itenary was Tansen's Makbara. It was a sad sight that a person who could be considered the father of Indian music has a totally unkept makbara. There were kids and beggars all over the place, running amock in a place which should have been silent moved only by the soft strains of music. A note by the archaelogical survey of India said that the Neem tree next to the tomb was revered and it was said that chewing leaves from it gave all budding singers voices as sweet as Tansen (but thats not even half the job as the riyaz is something you gotta put in). Anyway before I could do that it started pouring. The rain cleared the sorrounding of people and dirt. Somehow the story of Tansen bringing rain by singing Megh Malhar seemed so true in that sorrounding of the makbara, the neem tree and the rain.
Oh I forgot to mention I had lunch at the Usha Kiran Palace, one more palace taken over by the Taj group. Very costly nothing great!
Well so thats how I got going (don't think you ll be interested in my story of playing twenty questions while waiting for the train at Gwalior platform; or having a cup of coffee at Gwalior's Barista 'United Coffee House')
I am going home to Calcutta for the pujas on Saturday. Its been a while since I saw the entire pujas in Cal and its also the first time I m going home since I started working. So will meet you soon once I am back to tell you more as I now will hopefully continue with my travels.

Drudgery

2005-09-15T02:46:00.008-07:00

Its funny how one can so easily get used to the drudgery of life in general, in fact not just get used to it but even start liking it, loving it and then get passionately protective about it.

I always thought I was a person who liked to be on the move and if someone asks me what my ambition in life it is really to see as much of the world as possible. Lately however I have been reduced to someone like Mini's Baba (for those who read Tagore, thats from Kabuliwala those who don't just ignore) who while in the comforts of his home explores the world in his mind but when the time comes for him to step out is gripped by a sense of paranoia.

In some ways I can blame my job, and also the fact that I m new to it. Hence even though I have plans made for lots of getaways, long trips etc. none of them seem to be materializing as I m stuck with work. I don't say its completely my jobs fault because I sincerely believe that no organization on earth will collapse if we take weekends off. Rather the weekends off ensure people work smarter and better in the weekdays. Anyway, I hope once I m through with my first project and on confirmation will be able to start on these getaways. If you make yourself available on call always you will be on call. If you are not you won't be. Contrary to all the HR jargon of the world I don't think any organization becomes great by making the individual subservient to the organization. Ironically this idea is far more in line with communist states than a democratic world, and it is the latter that the free market forces prefer.

I digress.

Anyway so right now I am in the process of limiting my expenses (the biggest chunk of which was treating people!) and have launched a 'Paise Bachao Andolan'. Hopefully this endeavour to save will ensure I can earn enough to finance my trips.

What was the purpose of this piece I do not know, but just felt like writing hence let the pen flow.

Sorry to bore you

India Shining

2005-07-19T08:11:00.000-07:00

Well this piece is not about political campaigns. Its about Marine Drive in Mumbai.

There is always a breathtaking view from you, be it at differing times of the day or be it from differing heights.

If its early in the day, the sea somewhow seems calmer and bluer and it is truly a humbling experience to think that there exists a world beyond these endless waters that you still have to visit and explore. While you are on your way to office towards Nariman Point this sight gives you a very good perspective to things as you start your day.

Somewhere in the afternoon, when the tide is high and the road is full of cars and people you can experience something very unique. Sit on those embankments, turn towards the road, you see life in all its action and you turn towards the sea you sea tranquility once again (there aren't much waves around here). In fact I have often marvelled at the lovers who sit on those embankments totally oblivious to the bustle behind them as they stare into the horizon, hands quietly held.

However its the early evening which is when this place is resplendent in all its beauty. At this hour of dusk, the sun sets on the sea filling it with an orange glow while slowly but surely the lights on Malabar Hills come up in the background. As darkness sets in you see a panorama of lights, some call it The Queens Necklace. I however call it India Shining.

While the former name comes from the ring of street lights, mine comes from the lights of the towering buildings at Malabar Hills. It is a different sight from the beach at Chowpatty or from the heights of Express Towers but beautiful neverthless.

Yes, I did give this name about a year back when the BJP name was at its full and I used to come out of office everyday on to Marine Drive and every single day be astonished by this show of lights. Malabar Hills also happens to be the most expensive residential area in not just India but also quite a bit of South East Asia and seeing the lights there and with this campaign in the background, the little part of communist in me ( I come from Calcutta after all) couldn't help but wonder who India really shone for. I must still stand and testify who ever it might shine for this is is one breathtaking view, and this beauty is mine to see, who cares if I own it or not.

So someday if you want to catch me in a really really good mood for cconversation join me for some beer at Mondegar and then we ll catch up on this fabulous road.

Lolita and Parineeta

2005-06-20T02:37:00.000-07:00

I watched Parineeta alone on my birthday and was floored... simply floored by the character Lolita... I believe that which Lolita felt for Shekhar is the only one worthy of calling love.

However thats not the basis of this piece. This piece comes from a comment a friend made when she said "That kind of love was possible only in the 1960 s and that put me thinking".

Yes, that kind of love was 'plausible' in the 1960s but its not that its not 'possible' today for however much we say dedication and commitment are an integral part of this emotion we call love. If we say the defiition has changed today and dedication and commitment are no longer part of it then lets call it a relationship yes but love, no.

What Lolita offered to Shekhar was herself... completely... thats dedication and only to him... thats commitment... any deviations are just not welcome. It did help matters that she was near perfect in all other matters. She knew just how to behave with whom, cared for one and all, sensitive, unpretentious, reserved when necessary, independent but selfless and breathtakingly beautiful.

Anyway, guess the real beauty of this emotion is each one experiences and defines it in his/ her own way but that is how I would define it.

How little we know

2005-06-10T04:36:00.000-07:00

There s a line that I keep remembering from an old Bengali movie called Herok Rajar Deshe (A Ray classic btw) in which the evil king to keep the students from learning teaches them "Jaanar kono sesh ne.... jaanar cheshta britha tai"

Now a bit of the background. The last month or so has been pretty much very hectic on the job front but now things have gotten slightly easy. Now when you are sitting in the office pretending to be serious when actually you don't have too much work one of the safest things to do is read on the net. So over the past few days I ve been reading up on a few areas that I ve wanted to know more about.

The present one is Che Guevara its been a very revolutionary reading period... with the readings moving to Cuba obviously and finally yet again obviously Castro. However what stood aside is that while I ve seen Che s face in mugs to t- shirts its funny how little we know about him in general. If you expand it a little bit more you ll see how poorly read we actually are. The Cuban crisis remains some missile thing that brought the US and USSR to war and my friends seem to know more about Havana cigars than the revolution. How much do we know about say Latin America apart from their soccer stars, Samba and women?

The moot point here being how little we know. So this plea is simply one to you all that as and when we find time which we waste uselessly lets read. The internet is an amazing encyclopedia not just a chatting place. The television carries lots of good channels and we needn't restrain ourselves to the Floydian "Fourteen channels of shit on tv to choose from".

There is as it is so much in the world that we cannot know in a lifetime but there is a lot that we can if only we are willing to put in a bit of effort. Isn't it worth that much?

Maybe I am the only ignorant one around but something tells me that I m not. Am I preaching too much here or just getting too old?

After a while!

2005-06-08T02:15:00.000-07:00

I guess its been quite a while since I posted anything on this blog. The reason has been that I just joined my job and hence there has been a bit of travel, relocation etc etc. Anyway now I m more or less settled in and so decided to take a look at things around me... actually not around me rather inside me... and this space has let me talk of things that I believe in... in some ways it lets me talk to myself first and then to others

A City you just might fall in love with

2005-04-13T03:29:00.000-07:00

There are very few cities that I love like I love my hometown of Calcutta. A huge part of it is simply because I spent 18 long years here before moving out in search of greener pastures a lot is also because of the city itself. This city has a heart that beats, and an endearing nature unparalleled in most cities at least in this country.

Unlike Delhi it simply couldn’t care less who you were in terms of status, power or money but is more bothered about the value systems and character that you are made up of.

Unlike Bombay it has time for itself and others and is not lost in a mad rush having no idea where it’s going. It does not move fast simply for the thrill of it but rather savours every moment of this journey we call life.

Unlike Chennai it doesn’t make outsiders feel out of place at every given opportunity but welcomes them and in its genial nature makes everyone a part of one big whole.

This is also not a city where you can come as a tourist for even a week and feel u know something about the city. You could have seen it but you wouldn’t have known it. As Tagore once puts it aptly “Tate chena shuno hoy, jana shuno hoy na”

Anyway so it has always been a dream of mine to take this one amazing lady I will meet, around my city, following which she will fall in love with both me and my city and then we ll make movies about us!

Since, “I dream about movies they won’t make of me when I’m dead” I ll be very glad to take any friend of mine around this city on a totally platonic platform (absolutely non romantic for me if that’s what u want but I can’t guarantee u won’t fall in love with the city) and make u experience if possible what makes this city to difficult to forget.

Insensitivity?

2005-04-13T03:13:00.000-07:00

I have always marvelled at our insensitivity. Whenever we hear of some pain, suffering or sadness we get considerably moved but after some time when the moment is gone we return to my normal life and do nothing much about those things which barely some time ago had moved me so much. This continues till the next tingle comes along but after that the cycle just repeats itself. I wonder if its plain laziness or inertia but whatever it may be it restricts us as human beings and lowers us if nowhere else then in our own eyes. What do we do about it? Guess the best thing is “Start Me Up”

Is it Really Possible to Share Pain

2005-03-26T12:29:00.000-08:00

There are times when we all feel pained, by people primarily, and at a lot of other times by situations created by destiny. In times like this the very common and human reaction is to reach out to others and use their support to tide over this period. A lot of times I have done that and am very sure will also do so in the future.

The point that I am trying to make here is if it is really possible for anyone else however close that person might be to you to comprehend what you are going through. If they are not able to then is there any reason to share it with them?

It’s my personal take on the situation that it is not possible to do so. There isn’t another person who will be able to see everything in its entirety. The primary reason for this is that no one knows our lives completely; none know what incident in our lives have affected us in what way to make us the way we are. Since it is not possible for anyone to have complete knowledge it is not possible to have complete understanding.

A mother knows a child’s grief because she knows more about the child than the child knows about himself and so can comprehend. As we grow older our parents stop knowing everything simply because either we don’t tell them everything or because there is a natural gap that comes about as we grow, have new experiences and primarily think for ourselves. Then come the friends in school, college, work etc. who know what they see and what we tell them which obviously, is never, everything.

This is why grief is an intrinsically internal and lonely thing. It cannot and should not be shared. Efforts a lot of times meet with lack of understanding from the concerned or insensitivity from the unconcerned but the worse is when people accusing you of wallowing in self pity. It hurts more then as in addition to your original cause of grief you are being told either that you are over reacting or that you have no cause of grief!

Does this mean that others have no role to play when we are in pain? No, but they have a far more evolved and subtle role to play than that which they normally do. Be there for me, but be there when and how I need you but not as you deem fit. Be there by letting me know that I am still valuable and matter to you enough that you will stand by me. If you can’t prevent or understand what it is that hits me you will at least take care of the consequences from it. Not only need it, in fact I am one of those people who hate pity from others but when and how much is a call that has to be left to the aggrieved party. Simple presence of a friend during this time most of the time doing maybe nothing can be the biggest support that he could give.

A few people have written on similar themes… Nazrul when he wrote “Tumi shunite cheo na aamar moner kotha” and then Tagore when he writes in one of his poems about the futility of sharing your grief with everyone and waiting for that one person with whom you can. To a certain extent Dream Theater in “Take Away My Pain” speak on similar lines or Lennon in “Nobody Loves you when you’re down and out”

Are their exceptions to this… yes there is… your soul mate… but how many of us are able to find it and lesser still how many of us are able to hold on to them

As in most of my writings in this blog I don’t claim to be right or having the answer. My only interest or desire is to provoke your thoughts and then listen to you.

orientations

2005-01-20T01:27:00.000-08:00

Kipling again... instead of saying that the east and west will never meet he might have said that "the north is north and the south is south and never shall the twain meet."

I happened to study at a place where almost the entire population consisted of people below Madhya Pradesh and right now sitting in Delhi I mostly have the Hindi heartland, Punjab and Haryana all around me.

Their lack of knowledge about each other sometimes makes me wonder if our education system even makes us aware of our own country forget developing an open mind and a global perspective. The north seems to think that the south is a bunch of dark sambar eating tilak smeared bunch of oorthodox people who will never change. They are thought of as intelligent but in a sly sort of way. As far as they are concerned there is no difference between any of the four southern states: they are all Madrasis abnd a bunch of hypocrites. The southern states more than return the compliment handsomely by thinking that the north is composed of barbarians who hardly have an iota of sophistication or finese in them. They are looked upon as rowdy troublemakers who are perpetually on the liability side of the balance sheet. They are to be avoided like poisonous snakes.

If we go back in history there are very strong reasons for this. The north has always born the brunt of all the wars and battles that have raged. The north has not just had different rulers but been looted by raiders like Nadir Shah and finally have til date not been able to put the ghost of partition to rest. This is what gives them their natural aggressiveness. On the other hand the south has been relatively peaceful with hardly having great battles of the stature in the north and also so be cut off from the rest of the mainland. While this has helped art and culture to flourish and made intellectual labour a far more acceptable thing they simply refuse to budge at anything. At the risk of stirring a hornets nest it would not be very wrong to say that even during the freedom struggle the involvement of the southern states were considerably lesser. In the last few years if we look at the social movements that have happened then we see the dravidian movement when their identity was challenged and the protest against imposition of Hindi. The other major one against the cast system was also an inherently internal matter.

However the point of this piece is to question why does it still exist even today? If our communication system along with other electronice gadgetry has really removed distances between us and made us one global community then why don't we see it here? How can a house divided among itself contribute meaningfully to a social set up? How can a country not united become a global power? While it is right to celebrate our diversity it has got to be one where we acknowledge, are aware of the differences and then celebrate them. It cannot and should not be one be based on ignorance.

I then thought it might be a phenomenon with the older people and so asked a few friends around. An obscure minority of my friends had even heard of M S Subbalakshmi on her death and similarly very few of my southern mates had heard of Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan. Now aren't both of these people national icons? Then why this dichotomy ? I then thought it might be a problem because the listeners of classical music are not many. So I asked the southerners if they had heard ghazals and the northerners if they had heard of Illye Raja. Once again the replies lead to more disappointments.

This is a great country and different corners of the land have varied treats to offer. Let us no longer live in ignorance but in knowledge of them. Watch Kamal Hasan's 'Nayakam' and the Marathi oscar nominee'Swaash', listen to Kandukondain's "Suttum Vizhi" and Rabbi sing "Bulla" for they are both beautiful and OURS.

Only then will Tagore's prayer of "Into that heaven of freedom my father let my country awake" be answered.

I thought I knew

2005-01-17T23:04:00.000-08:00

I had always believed that I was one of those enlightened beings who knew what he wanted in life and there were these fixed targets that he was moving to. I guess I had taken self deception to the level of an art and soon realized thats not true.
If anything there are these few pictures I have of myself... snapshots in time framed in the future... its from this that I started back calculating and realized what a difficult thing it is to decide what you want to do.
If I give you an assimilated picture of what I want to do in life am sure you ll think am one confused being which I am by the way.
I see myself having opened a school where kids are being brought up to be self righteous, upright human beings who refuse to conform, have the courage to think for themselves and hence bring change in this world.
Then I see myself as an IAS officer working in the districts of India and bringing tangible change in every action of his.
Then I see myself in Nagapattinam reporting on the Tsunami for NDTV and also hosting Hard Talk on BBC.
I also see myself globe trotting as a lap top carrying consultant with McKinsey.
This is immediately followed by a picture of me criss crossing the country seeing every nook and corner and basically living a bohemians life.
Sometimes late at night I also see a happy family gathered around the fire laughing at jokes being made on each other. A picture of "har ghar kahta hai is mein kaun rehta hai".
Then I see me and my love at two places... one is this huge verandah wala house overlooking the sea on a moonlit night with the breakers crashing on the shore with a deafning roar. The other is this 50 storey penthouse in Mumbai over looking the sea. Its raining outside and there is beautiful music being played on this system with Bose speakers. To describe this house let me quote two examples... one is the penthouse Richard Gere was living in Pretty Woman. The other is the initial description of Guy Wynand's house with glass ceilings. Amalgamate the two and you will have the house I want in Mumbai.
Then I see me bringing up my children and being proud of them in every act of theirs.

Maybe somewhere within all this is my Raymond's 'Complete Man'...Maybe I am just another average person who dreams of all this but doesn't have the courage to follow any leave all of these dreams.
And know what its so bloody difficult to accept that! But somewhere there is this flicker of hope that tells me that I will one day maybe achieve all this and also guess what this flicker has been growing every day.

ganda hai par sab dhanda hai yeh

2005-01-16T01:57:00.000-08:00

I happen to study in what we like to believe is a Tier 1 B School but placement time is one when I think I can feel what Newton must have felt when he said "The more I see this world the more I love my dog"

I have no problems with people who have never claimed to be good samaritans but simple normal self centred human beings but what makes me irritated is when I see the obsession to appear holier than thou in people who are intrinsically puny beings.

So once this time comes and there is a whiff of jobs in the air everyone realizes that its finally its every man for himself and so starts off a process which can descend to depths that are unimaginable to people not involved with this process.

Suddenly people become very posessive of what they know forgetting that knowledge grows only when shared. Even sources of information are hid and wherever you go there is a conspiratorial whisper around.

There is a famous Rudyard Kipling quote where he says "Half the world love and half the world hates where is my place in these that are so evenly matched". Guess that sums up the state of my mind very well. However I have chosen to sit back and watch the fun and if possible be extra open. Yes, there are times when I feel I too should be like the sorroundings coz after all "Do as the Romans do while in Rome" but there is something within me which has always refused to unquestioningly conform. I thank God for that now for that is what has helped me keep my head above the water. Maybe I will be the loser at the end of placements but I have this deep seated conviction that I will win in the end.

wonderings

2005-01-15T02:03:00.000-08:00

was just wondering why there is this co relation between love and marraige... y does marraige have to be the ultimate culmination for any kind of love... i mean a person is supposed to be liberated in love and not consumed by it (no i don't believe in love that consumes) but marraige intrinsically is a kind of bond isn't it. Don't crucify me but just think it over....
Imagine a situation where both of you live your own lives together and are in love. The only impediment I can see is that your kids will not be brought up properly and so you need to get married and get under the same roof. Am not suggesting any alternative here because I don't have any but was just wondering aloud. Maybe you could give me one. Can you?