ILP – Honey moon days of job!

‘Good Bye dadi, dada, nani, nana, dad, mom, aunt, uncle, ramu kaka, chotu, browny (the family dog)…. ’ I said gasping without taking a breath in between like kabadi kabadi .. as I boarded the just started train and thanked God for the right departure of the train. I am that kind of person who can’t take emotions for long and my family is exactly converse. They wanted a whole 1 hour serial (without breaks) to happen on the platform and the whole family came to bid adieu as though I am going to a Kargil war!

The fact is I got through my graduation at NIT, Jamshedpur in just four years without any backlogs which is a great achievement to me and I was leaving for Trivandrum (otherwise known as Thiruvananthapuram, like Mumbai from Bombay) for a 2-month training at the company which hired me at campus placement. The college had bored me for 4 years and now this company was going to pay and bear me for ___ years, which was apparently worse! I wonder when I’ll fill the above blank ;-)

It was a long long journey and I finally reached T.drum the next day. I took an auto-rick which was again an hour journey to the hotel where I was given accommodation by the company. The driver was abusing traffic police which apparently I did not understand but gave back a smile saying ‘ohh’. I wanted to give him the impression that I know the local language, Malayalam little bit so that he won’t cheat me while taking the fare.

The hotel name ‘Highness Inn’ was deceiving; I took it for a 3 star hotel if not a 5 star considering myself being a fresher in the company. I got down from the auto after the driver killed the engine and I was looking into the skies for the 3 star hotel. The auto driver pointed his finger to a 2 storied mansion and looted 450 bucks from me. Feeling more disgusted about the hotel, I did not bargain with him. I entered the compound of the hotel to find a bar on the left, wine shop at the right and finally the reception at the centre! Well something good, at least I don’t have to go far to get the basic commodities. The receptionist (I want to emphasize it’s a male) asked me for an identity and gave me the room keys. I asked him if I could get warm water to take bath. He said ‘p~full hot water saaru, 24 hours!’ in his typical Malayalam accent. I later got to know that they give hot water for drinking also, not just at my hotel but in the entire city! The drinking water was purple in colour and hot (but they say it’s warm) which was nauseating (if you are a pregnant woman then you should consider it) and therefore I got something to blame why I used to drink more chilled beer than water ;)

Next day I slipped myself into a neatly ironed trouser and shirt and took help from my roommate to knot the tie which he did for the next 2 months! On some days after coming back from training, I managed to remove the tie without losing the knot to reduce pain to him the next morning. Back to those ragging days in college after which I never tucked my shirt in nor wore a formal dress & black shoe!! ‘So this is it’ I thought, ‘the end of immatureness and irresponsibility and a brand new start of fcuking professionalism to get screwed professionally!’

The first day of training itself was lethargic and the facilitators (as they say but I want to call them circus ring masters) have uttered this word ‘professionalism’ so many times that I had a professional nightmare that night. The first class which I can never forget was taken by a faculty named Alpha (sounds like variables xyz! as though his dad had a very few names to choose from in the entire world). He was a big psycho and made us memorize all the names of 45 members of T45 batch (45 was just a coincidence) in that hour with his circus games. Our names weren't as simple as his (Alpha) to memorize easily; take for example my own name, ‘Nagapradeep Chinnapalli’!! My batch mates must have had hell lot of time! ;-) But the bright side of it was we could get to know each other quickly. Fortunately there was no Beta and Gamma to take the next hours!

We were made to sit for 10 hours a day on those supposed to be revolving chairs, that my credit card (which my aunt lent me) in the wallet of my back pocket was bent (if not broken) and became inoperative on the very first day that made me borrow money from others until I got my first salary. Please don’t ask me the figures; it was again a sad story as the salary was just more than my pocket money. Our facilitators asked us to be grateful for getting paid to sit and listen to their torture (lectures).

Unlike in my college I found 50% of trainees were girls. It was like 1 girl for every 1 boy; It was like 'Dil Khush' for all the guys. My college had just 28 girls out of an entire batch strength of 240. In NITs you don’t find hot girls and hot girls usually don’t bother their grey matter. Hot girls with brains are dangerously rare like uranium and if found are supposed to be kept safely in museums and dealt with carefully as they are loaded with all sorts of weapon to make men dance to their tunes! I wondered where these girls were at the time of engineering! And from which college? And why was I not there? Nevertheless I found them now! ;-) It was a feast for the eyes initially, which died out eventually as they paired up one by one :-(

Without girls, any place is like a black&white TV or a TV without cable connection or like food which is bland. Girls are like masala in a curry which add aroma and taste. So the masala girl in my ILP life enters with an introduction from a common friend after a whole 1 month of training. ‘This is Preeti and Preeti, this is Naagaaa pradeeep’ the common friend ending the introduction in a singing tone to accentuate that I have got a long name! Common friends between boy and girl should be isolated after this kind of formal introduction as they feel it’s their birth right to be a part of every discussion, fun and decision between them!!

Preeti was a local girl and unlike other Kerala girls she had a long straight non-oily hair. It’s her trademark and she can be spotted from any corner of the building because of that long hair. She was a very tall girl, very childish and always carried a big smile on her face. There was not even a single moment I saw her in a serious or bad mood. Cute girls look more cute when they cry. No no I am not a psycho/saddist to see them cry. But they are great opportunities to console them and score marks ;-) With this girl, I thought, I won’t be having such a chance. There was this irritating guy (chicken me haddi types) in the class, one day sitting right in between us and pestering her with various questions. His one stupid question was what her parents do and why her surname was Subbalakshmi instead of dad’s name. She smilingly replied which I overheard that her mom was no more and she passed away just a year ago! And that’s what touched me. Despite that fact; she was always seen happy. From that day I tried to stay with Preeti Subbalakshmi for most of the time to learn to be happy. With her childish behaviour like exchanging pens when writing, disturbing me from concentrating to lectures (ironically she was the topper in her engg. college) and indulging me to play silly classroom games, my professionalism went for a toss!

As I said earlier I was in serious trouble with a failed credit card; one day I snatched 1000 bucks from her ‘ladies’ bag like Gabbar Singh. Yeah, I am coming to that! The other items that were dumped in the bag were a long yellow comb, a small mirror, some hair pins, colourful stickers, kit-kat, room keys, potato chips, perfume spray, 2 creams (which looked similar to me), hand-kerchief, no books and some other stuff ;-) I learnt peeping into a ladies handbag (can be called a green room) was fun! The next day morning she came and asked me for 20 bucks to have breakfast, which was granted and the other day she asked me for 30 bucks to buy a tooth brush for which I didn’t have! How can I make her believe that I have used all her 1000 Rupees for ‘life surviving fluids’ with roommates a night before ;-) 

We had been good friends and bad enemies also who can hurt each other’s ego equally. Like one day in canteen while she was taking brown rice I commented ‘How can you eat such rice, big and brown; it reminds me of bugs and insects.’ She said ‘how can you eat such small white rice; it reminds me of ant eggs :P ’. This is the problem with ‘hot girls with brains’; they answer back with wit. I felt like zipping her lips ;-) I said ‘ok ok let’s not compare the food while we are eating’ myself going into a defence mode. Whenever she denied accompanying me for lunch, dinner or movies; I used to look straight up in the sky and scream ‘Subbalakshmi aunty! Your daughter is not listening to me. Please make your daughter come with me, else I’ll be bored’. She used to burst into laughter which was worth screaming like that :-)

We used to have a Business English class taught by Suja. She looked sexy, basically an Indian, born in Kenya, roamed around continents and I simply didn’t get what she was doing at T.drum teaching me or us! Most noticeable was her peculiar accent, feels like a talking hardware was placed in her throat. I mean it sounded good and definitely better than these call centre girls. The first class was on phonetics; she made us yell them so loud, it reminded me of those days when I learnt alphabets in kindergarten! On one day she asked us to go through any novel and narrate the abstract in class. It was my turn and I gave a brief on Wright Brother’s adventures to invent a plane. As I finished, my roommates cried foul saying it was a comic and not a novel. I hardly have any interest in reading big novels, so I got issued a comic book of 22 pages from library and I wondered when these dick heads noticed that :(  The hot phonetic teacher turned to me and said ‘jʊ  wɪl  hæv  tuː peɪ  fɔːr  ðɪs  (You will have to pay for this)’. It sounded to me like a call centre girl romantically asking ‘Is there anything I can do for you Sir?’ ;-) I made a sheepish face and fortunately she didn’t take any action later.

When we move closely with people for long, we start liking them even if they are not so good looking. Instead of asking ourselves ‘what’s good in him/her?’, we switch to ‘what’s bad in him/her?’ The answer might be ‘NOTHING’ for both questions but we fall into a self dug trap with the later question! Preeti and I used to spend lot of time on phone as well, after coming back to respective hotels which were 30km apart. On one day while talking on mobile phone she asked me to come near my window and asked if I could see the moon? I replied ‘Yeah it’s a full moon, but what are you trying to say?’ She said ‘We are so far, yet we are able to see a common thing!’ Girls are romantic in their own ways! And to magnify it, my brain always aids me ;-) I said ‘Yeah, so true but had I been an astronaut, I would have placed a large mirror on the moon so that I can see you!’ She burst into laughter. After few minutes of exchanging laughter I cleared my throat and said ‘Preeti could you be serious for couple of minutes?’ She replied ‘Oh my God after such a big joke, how can I? Ok sorry, tell. What is it?’ I didn’t know how she takes it, but I wanted to tell it. For I believe if you love someone, express it. Or let me put it in a bitter way; if you cannot express, don’t love! With all the gut feeling gathered, I just vomited what I had been practising before mirror for many times!!

I like u …!

I’ll love u … if u like me !!

I’ll marry u … if u love me !!!

That’s it; She again burst into laughter uncontrollably for the next 120 seconds and finally said ‘where did you copied this dialogue from?’. Damn it was mine and original and it was for her! How can I make her believe after such a question. I was waiting for an answer and not questions!! Sensing that I was not laughing this time, she calmed down and said ‘I am speechless. That was a great one. Though sounded conditional, I know you are trying to make it poetic and funny. I too like you Nags, but… (I wondered who coined ‘but’) this relation can’t go any further. I have to marry a Mallu guy, my dad gets for me. You will find a better girl definitely. I hope you understand…’ I hanged the phone down thinking where to re-use my poem ;-)

The next 2 days weren’t normal but she was one kind of a girl who tries to bring smile even on animals. That essentially doesn’t mean that I am a beast. Just a week before her birthday, I came to know about it. I had no clue how to make it special or even buy a gift because I never gifted a girl. It doesn’t mean that I am Kanjus (miser) but I never felt like gifting anyone till then! So I approached one of my batch mates, a girl to get an idea. She suggested me to go for ear rings as it is considered as a personal gift by girls. My next question to her was where I can get some good pair. She said there are many jewellery shops near the railway station! I said I can’t go there as it is very far, remembering the first day when the auto driver looted me 450 bucks. ‘arey stupid it is just 1.5km from your hotel, if you can’t walk, take a rick which shouldn’t cost you more than 20 bucks!!’ she exclaimed. What the fcuk! I was fooled like an illiterate. I responded ‘forget the rick, I will take a walk and thank you so much’. After exploring exhaustively all the shops to and fro, I settled for a pair of silver ear rings with lavender colour stones studded on them. I just loved them and patted my own shoulders for such a great selection, the very first time. I gifted her on the birthday which she accepted (without nautanki!) and even wore it the next day. She wore them on a matching top and looked stunning. I had to search for the ear rings amidst her long hair. My batch mate who has given the idea congratulated me saying ‘good going boss!’. But I knew there was nothing great going to happen :-(

One day when Preeti left for her home, I tried to call her on mobile but the routes were busy. So I called her home landline only to hear her dad take the call. Feeling a bit scared I asked ‘umm, this is Nagapradeep; can I speak to Preeti, Uncle?’ like a studious guy. He replied ‘Oh Nagapradeep! She left for her sister’s house. Take this landline number if you are unable to reach her on mobile.’ I thanked him and wondered about the tone he was speaking (‘Oh Nagapradeep!’), as though he knew me from ages! I dialled the landline number he gave and this time it was her sister who took the call. I thought this idiot, Preeti must be a lazy bone to attend the calls! I again repeated the same question but this time friendly and not studiously. She replied ‘Oh Nagapradeep! Yeah she is there. Umm.. It was you who gifted the ear rings right? They are really pretty, nice selection!’. I felt the sarcastic tone in the compliment and that she was trying to pull my leg! This idiot had shown the ear rings to her sister and dad also! Amazing! I used to pester her to take me her home and treat me with home food. Now I won’t ask her anymore as her family knew the entire drama! Anyways I wanted to take the chance and pull her legs back. So I replied ‘Thank you! You must be Deepti Subbalakshmi, Preeti’s elder sister right? You have studied medicine, you are a doc; you made a love marriage and it was you who proposed your husband in the 1st year of college, right?’ That’s it; she banged the phone down, ran away to call her sister and Preeti took my call ;-)  Thanks to Preeti who used to get candid and tell me all about her family.

Preeti and I were posted to different locations; I in Mumbai and she in Bangalore. Even if I was posted to Bangalore, it would not be of much help as she was a daddy’s girl and was very firm to listen to her dad and marry a lungi (dhoti) wearing Mallu guy with tummy and curly-oily hair :P .. So be it! The last day I started missing the training centre, the faculty and the batch mates. It was quite shocking to see people of other batches weeping at the railway station. This time I gave only 20 bucks to auto driver and appreciated him saying ‘Thanks chetta (brother), you are romba (very) good’. I took my train to Mumbai. 6 years later I got to see Preetis wedding snaps though I couldn't manage to attend the wedding itself! In the bride’s attire she looked like a gold mine and was hardly left with any place to wear an extra ounce of gold. And now I don't miss her exactly, instead the gold mine ;-)

Taking a long breathe after writing such a lengthy one; I am signing off! Aloha folks! And yeah please leave your comments below. 

Cloud Computing - Future Business?

Are you bored of getting rid of virus from your PC? Do you feel if there could be cheap softwares for day to day use instead of frantically using pirated versions? Are you fed up of hard disk crashes and losing your data? Have you felt the need of having your personal data while you travel anywhere in the world without carrying your own desktop or laptop? How many of you stop using your computer when the internet is down!? How many of you search the songs on YouTube though you have a copy on your own machine?

I think it's time when someone will take the advantage of Cloud computing and become as big companies as Google or Facebook. Cloud computing is Web-based processing, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices (such as smart phones) on demand over the Internet. The technology has been already in use in the corporate world. It's not yet made available to the public. I have used softwares like Citrix where all my personal data and softwares are not stored in the machine I am using, instead on a server. So is the data of 400 colleagues in my office. My office desktop CPU hardly has any hard disk hence it's so thin like an Apple iPad!

What if there is some service provider where they charge you a minimal sum for the services I mentioned above? Then we don't have to carry our laptop all the time to access our data. We can have all our data on a secured server located somewhere in the world and we will be allocated some memory (as much as we have in our laptop) for some price and it should be only accessible by a secure password or RSA tokens!!

Moreover we don't have to buy daily use software like Microsoft office, photoshop etc as they will be installed on the server and we just have to pay a price shared by say 1000 people around the world for single software!!

This way the piracy can be reduced and the individuals can afford use expensive softwares like photoshop or cad/cam … The service provider should have a backup of the huge data in case of any eventualities the same way we have in our software companies. If this is the case even a simple iPad or smart phone could be powerful machine in hand as it is just used to access the data and softwares which are online.

But the disadvantages being the individuals should have high speed internet access and it will be a huge initial investment for the service provider. They will have to buy these hard disks in the order of Zetta(10 power 21) bytes. And also get approval from the software companies to distribute them on shared basis on internet. However I believe this will be an advantage for the software providers too.

In the years to come I am quite curious to see if such a provision will be available for common man like us when computer & internet becomes a basic amenity like food, water and shelter. I hope I'll be using these services sometime soon and getting a top-up whenever I need new software for a particular time and stop it when I don't need it anymore. Or I can ask them to add a 20GB to my account while I pay for it with my credit card! Ahh sounds like fun on the tip of fingers!!

PS: I am gonna sue them for copyrights showing this blog if someone comes up with such a technology :P .. hehe

Critics and suggestions are most welcome guys in the comment section! Thanks.. 

My first interview for the last turning point of life !

Tring.. Tring.. I didn't move an inch. Tring..Tring.. I woke up from fresh sleep and realized it was the door bell. I lighted my mobile to see the time. It was 10pm, I went to the living room to open the door to find it was a post man with a chit like thing in his hand ready to hand over it to me. ‘It’s a telegram sir’ he said. I was surprised to hear it, I used to think telegrams are extinct. I grabbed it from him and it read ‘Father serious, open heart surgery in 2 days, start soon’. Jesus Christ! but why a telegram, they could have called me on my mobile. I signed the postman’s acknowledgement and rushed to my bed room to call home. My home is in a small village where there are no mobile networks still. There are only few land-lines of which my home is lucky to have one.

I called the landline many times, but no one was picking up. I thought everyone might be at hospital. I searched in Google for phone numbers of hospitals at my village and another Google window to book the cheapest flight available to Bangalore. (My village is just 2 hours drive from Bangalore). I quickly dropped a mail to my manager about the news and about my absence for few days. I also mentioned the fact about the poor signal at my village and that I’ll not be contactable (this line will drive him crazy for sure).

I tried many times calling my home, few hospitals while packing and while on the way. I was getting more and more worried with each unattended call !! I reached my home by 7 in the morning. People are surprised to see me. My uncle, aunt and my mom; they don’t look so depressed. It was hard to read them. I asked my mom slowly ‘is everything all right?’ She replied ‘How come you arrived so early? Beta I am so sorry. We lied to you. Actually your father is not ill.’ I was confused and tried to recollect the date. No it was not April 1st. ‘Then what was that telegram for?’ I added in an angry and frustrated tone. My mom showed me the way to my dad’s room and left for kitchen. I can see he was all fine and he just finished his coffee and paper.

I repeated the same questions to my dad. He smiled to me and said ‘we got a marriage proposal for you, it is really from a good family and more over the girl is the only child they have. We cannot afford miss it.’ I was spell bound, they are nuts!! Then I realized why they were not taking my call. Wow, they are genius, they could not act telling a lie on phone and that’s why a telegram. Old tactics!! ‘Dad you can’t do this to me. This is crazzzy! Can you at least imagine how much work is there on my head at office?’ I said getting the picture of my ugly manager on mind. ‘Go and fresh up, you need rest’ he added, gently running his palm on my head. I know they don’t talk much until I get cooled down. I had my shower and straight away went to bed closing the bed room door behind me.

I woke up in the evening, had my lunch+supper and my mom was ready with tea and gossips. She told all about her colleagues (she is a house wife and no women is employed there). So is the girl I am gonna see next day !! My mom started pestering me ‘Don’t you think you are getting late for marriage? It is our duty to get you married. If you wait for few more years no one will give you a girl ;-) ‘ (That's the biggest joke she can crack on me!! Actually she doesn't want to hurt me cracking menacing jokes :-) )

”ha ha ha ha .. big joke! .. now listen I am a big boy now, I really don’t need you to guide me still. When are your duties towards me gonna end ? You know what? These days dogs are also getting married, why not me? First of all I need to settle in my career. I have to get married one day, it’s inevitable, even God cannot save me from happening that.” I replied innocently, hoping the next day’s program would get cancelled. Without uttering a word she left the place giving a hard knock with her knuckles on my skull. It hurts, she is all bones !! I thought during these recession times, arranged marriage is not a bad idea as it comes handy with lot of dowry.

Water sprinkled and then splashed on my face. I was waken up forcibly at 8 the next morning, and was pushed into bath room, but there was no breakfast on table!! My mom whispered ”have it as much as you want in the girl’s home!! ” Ah, two birds for one stone, practical example! Recession has crept here also! My managers can learn a lot from her about cost cuttings. “Oops I wasted water and soap taking bath in our home ;-) ” I replied sarcastically.

They gave us a warm welcome as we entered their house. The girl’s mom walked in and served us with coffee. After half an hour of gossips, (I should call it a battle ground instead, as my mom was boasting about me and the girl’s mom was boasting about her daughter) the food arrived and the girl’s mom heaped up our plates. The more I denied, the more I was served, I tried the other way round also asking for more, but in vain.

After few minutes, they asked the girl to come and she arrived for a fashion parade. I waited till she took her seat to see her (Can you believe, for most of the married couples in olden days, this used to be the love at first sight amidst their parents, somehow it didn’t happen to me!). She was a beautiful tall woman. She stood 5’ 6” or 5’ 7”. She looked gorgeous in a white, green bordered sari worn in a typical Andhra style and was heavily adorned with gold (I can establish 2 jewelry shops with them in future ;-) ). She has got a shy smile with couple of wrinkles on her cheek. Her thick black hair was flooded with flowers like a bouquet. Her hands were almost covered with mehandi and bangles, concealing the only part where I can get the view of actual complexion of her skin, as the face looked artificial with lots of make up!! She started greeting ‘Namaste’ first to my dad, then to my mom and when it comes to me she gave a big smile. She must have got enough guidance or at least had enough experience on how to treat the guy and his parents. I came to know that this was her 6th such encounter and it was she who denied all the previous 5 cases!! What an embarrassing moment will it be for me if she denies me before I do?

There was a panel of judges to take my interview. My “may be in laws”, “my may be wife”, her brother and few other guests from their side were ready to shoot questions at me. First one came from her mom asking ‘you liked the coffee?’ I just nodded, perhaps it must be prepared by the girl, it wasn’t bad. Next her dad comes up ‘Where are you working at?’ I can read the next hesitating question on his mind about the salary. I waited a while anticipating for that question. Then I replied ‘TCS, I work as a s/w engineer’. Most of their faces looked confused, before I added ‘It’s a Tata Company’. They felt much relieved when they heard I work in some company which they are aware of!!

“What kind of work do you have in office other than signing papers?” the girl’s mom came up with her 2nd question. Signing the papers? When did I tell this? This must be my mom’s exaggeration. “And how many people work under you?” she added to the question. Typical question but I have to answer it with wit. Burping in between I gently replied ‘I work on a computer hitting the keys for most of the time and no one is above or below in a s/w industry. It’s all about team effort more than an individual’s play’.

“Ah computers?” She instantly replied “If you don’t mind could you please do something to make our computer work which my son bought just 4 months back?” she asked me very pleasingly. I didn’t want to take any risk. I had to gently deny it patiently explaining that my job in office is more related to s/w than hardware of computers. I can read questions on their face as their eyebrows frowned, doubting my capability and knowledge on computers!!

Abruptly interrupting the conversation the girl said “I wanna speak to him in person if there is no objection (that is what I wanted to ask after some time to tell her all about how it happened!)”. No one said anything, smiles everywhere! I followed her into a room in the back yard. It was much pleasant there except for the bangles and anklets sound when she moved her limbs. I was totally dumbstruck; I couldn’t find a single topic in the whole world to start with! Well she had many though. She was staring at my lips for a while, I was not feeling comfortable and I realized how girls must have felt when I stare at them ;-) . “Do you smoke?” She asked me. My goodness girls are girls; that’s the reason why she was noticing my lips!! My interrogation already started! What if I actually marry her? I said ‘no’. “Don’t lie, I have seen you smoking when you were in school itself!” she added with firm proof. Feeling nostalgic I replied fumingly “what!!? so you know me much before since I was in school. Now listen, I tried smoking some 10 times till now. But I am not a smoker. I don’t like smoking because I have smoke allergy!! (and not because it is injurious to health ;-) ) I have no reason to lie you because.. ” I was stuck here, I swallowed the second half of the sentence. What the hell I was saying. I should have lied na, I have no intention marrying her! Hell, I lost a golden opportunity.

So what I can create opportunities. “Okie I can read your next question on mind. Yes, I drink a lot, almost every day. I end up all my salary and one day I came to my room with the bill and bar owner behind me. I asked my roommate to pay it. When denied I bet him mercilessly. And one day I even tried to snatch his gold chain!! ” I added all masala possible enacting and imitating Bollywood villains. She was open mouthed for a while, her next and probably the final question came in a meek intimidated tone “Do you have a girl friend? Don’t misunderstand me but I heard almost all girls in Bombay have boyfriends”. This is the most expected question and I had a premeditated reply. So I replied without any second thought “What do you mean? I’ll show you thousands who doesn’t have a boy friend or a girl friend in Bombay. I don’t have a girl friend; I have two instead ;-) . I am being so frank because its better if I tell bad about me than you hear it from someone outside”. Oh my God I was so professional in lying; even a lie detector machine will have to fail ;-) I felt like patting my shoulders. I gave her every reason to hate me and cancel the proposal :-)

I left for Bombay hoping everything would happen as I planned. Two days later I got a call from my dad saying “they were happy with you and the girl also quoted that you are very truthful and that she is ok with you” I was so depressed and helpless as I felt my last turning point of life is just before me when he added “..almost everyone was ok with the girl, I am not sure why your mom didn’t like the girl and cancelled it without telling a reason”. ‘Yes!’, I hanged the phone down and jumped on my cot overjoyed, my head almost touching the ceiling fan.

Now you must be wondering what could be the mystery behind her denial :-) While returning from home I tricked my mother saying “Mom, I want to marry someone who is more beautiful than you ;-) ” Which she or any other woman can never find ;-) New tactics!! .. haha 

Girls are Krazzzy ;)

‘You may go now…’ exclaimed my project leader as she gave her crooked winning smile ‘but come early tomorrow and finish off the testing before we have company at onsite (Amsterdam)’ she added. The clock already struck 8 and I have to dart to catch my last bus home. I have got no new words in my dirty dictionary to castigate her. Yet I managed to show my teeth and said ‘Yes, for sure I will complete the testing and send the code across. Also I wish to start off with the design part of next module.’ I was hoping to hear some encomiums from her mouth, but she didn’t utter a word nor looked at me. I failed to impress her and I was getting late, so I had to ask her the favour.

‘And …… and … what about my leave, Could you please approve it? I need to attend my cousin’s wedding’ I added. For a while seriously scribbling on her diary (that’s the way she thinks what to answer) she replied ‘come tomorrow and finish off the work, I’ll let you know after consulting your module leader!’ what the hell? Should I book my tickets or not? If I don’t, I may not get a confirmed ticket the next day, and if she says no after I book the ticket then also I’ll be at loss. She is very diplomatic; perhaps that is how managers are made. I should have used my grandma saying that ‘She expired’ (oops I have already used this fact many times with my ex-managers & teachers at school ;-) ). I thought even a fever or stomach upset lie could have worked. Yes only lies works with managers. Lesson: Never be true to your managers.

Grabbing my backpack, running down the stairs (my office lift never comes when I am in hurry), I felt relieved when I saw my bus waiting. I boarded the bus and took my seat at the centre of the bus to the aisle and right below a light so that I can read my novel. I barely noticed that I was sitting beside a guy who was busy on his mobile.

Most of my colleagues have this habit of calling someone or other whenever they find some leisure time. It’s a common sight in the office premises that people are seen with either tea or cigarette in one hand but a mobile in the other hand. People are so much obsessed and addicted to mobile that they can’t live without it. Mobile comes next to air and water; but before food and shelter in basic amenities of humans these days.

The voice from his mobile speaker was slightly audible. Although I couldn’t hear everything properly, I was able to make out that it was a girl on the other side of the phone. She was talking endlessly in high pitch, excitedly and was exaggerating about something. This guy hardly got any chance to speak over. I heard him speak only mono syllables (umm, no, ok, oh, so ..) in between. It happens :-( It happened with my dad, my grand pa, may be with me and probably with many men that they don’t get much to talk. And there is this most disgusting one liner from the girls when they say ‘you talk very less, you also tell something’ and before the guy feels happy that he could now open his mouth, the girl must have had started with another topic; bla bla bla ..

To quote a very good incident (guys you can adopt this trick!!); I have a friend in Pune. She called me one night when I was ready to open a pizza parcel, just delivered steaming hot, with my mouth watered. I wanted to take the call (because if I don’t she would go Mike Tyson on me) and also have my pizza while it was hot. So I picked the call, put it on speaker and left the reporter to narrate news and gossips. I opened my pizza and enjoyed it thoroughly but yes all I had to do was sound the mono syllables in between. In the end I got chance to speak and I also told her that I just had a pizza. She thought I had it before she called me ;-)

I took my novel out and continued to read the story from the page marker, when suddenly I heard the guy who is sitting next to me say repeatedly ‘I love you, I love you …’ perhaps for 3 times or even more (I could have counted it for him but I was left breathless). I was scared initially, then confused and then I thought that I can never do such a wild thing in public.

My eyebrows frowned, my eyes wide open, my eye balls popped out, my ears stretched to his mobile and 101 doubts scattered on my brain in those few seconds wondering what could be the reason for his strange reaction. Biting my nails, I thought the girl must have accepted his proposal and this guy must be glad Or may be their quarrel must have had ended Or if they weren’t still married, the girl’s parents must have accepted him. What do you think, if you were in my place? I felt like asking him the reason for his excitement. I was so curious, I just wanted to check whether his answer will match one of my doubts or not :-)

I could hear the girl’s guffawing now, she seems amused. This guy said a meek ‘bye’ to her. He hung the phone down, resting his head on his palm and murmured to himself “kya pakati hain yaar e ladki”. Holy shit, I never expected such a serious joke! I wanted to laugh uncontrollably rolling on the floor but couldn't, seeing the face of that poor guy ;-) He looks intimidated by the girl’s voice itself. What would be his situation when he actually meets her? (In her presence, he must be like a street dog with its tail winded up in its hind legs when it sees a huge hound :-) ) Guess what he must be yelling like that daily, when ever his girl/wife asks for or when ever his girl is angry or whatever. I pitied him in hearts. I recommend euthanasia to him ;-) haha… Girls are funny.. no crazy.. no no scary !!

Later I tried to take a nap but the filthy roads and air of Mumbai didn’t let me rest peacefully. I thought it would be better if I call my mom to kill the time. She always complains that these days I don’t call her often. I had to call on the land-line as no one was picking up the mobile phone at my home. My mom lifted the call and said ‘hello’. Impatiently I asked her ‘can’t u hear the mobile ring?’ And from the other end, ‘Arey beta, is it you?’ she answered in a surprising tone ‘I don’t know, I couldn’t hear it. Anyways, I am watching a serial on star plus. Do you mind calling back at half past 8, but before 9pm?’ and before I denied, the phone was already hanged up!!! This is the height of addiction of house wives to family serials. Can someone tell me where I can find Ekta Kapoor? My poor dad had to buy another TV to watch cricket matches.

I had a glance at the people in the bus. Most of them were sleeping, some on mobiles, some were in deep thinking, few of my friends were playing antyakshari at the rear seats, they beckoned me to join but I denied as I was out of mood thinking whether I would get a leave or not. With mixed emotions, I watched the uninteresting traffic jams before I reached my room.

Notice: For few days I will be out of reach as I will be moving to a safer place away from the women activists ;-) hehe

Education — A pain in the ass of every child!!

“I was born intelligent, but education ruined me!!” — Anonymous. I am not aware of education system followed in other countries. But in India it’s pathetic and parents just catalyze it!!

If anyone asks me why you have chosen to be an engineer, I’ll say my dad wished for it and yes even forced me to do it. Though he was a bit generous to me giving two options (Engineer or Doctor?) when I finished my 10th standard successfully in just one attempt! The later was even worse for two reasons I didn’t opted for it. One is I don’t like to be a butcher (then I was a vegetarian!) and the other a medico is not certain when he finishes his education and earns money (forget about marriage and children ;) ) !

When I watch discovery, Ftv, or any sports channel, I feel very frustrated when I see people doing great adventures and the fabulous, meaningful life they live. Sometimes I think ‘kaha aake phas gaya hun yaar as a s/w engineer ‘. I always dreamt of being either a good athlete or a fashion designer or a five start hotel chef. To emphasize, yes I have my strong points which I believe would have fetched me one of the above professions, if my parents would have encouraged me to do so.

I came 2nd in 800 and 1500 meters track at school. I wasn’t aware of my capabilities until I got a chance to run when there was a vacant place for my school team. Other fellows didn’t even dare to try to run so long! I was the school chess champ for the year ‘99. I started learning cooking at the age of 14, I hate cooking same dish again and again like house wives, but I love experimenting! I used to mix different masalas to invent something. I used to like the aroma at least, though the food was not even tasted by my dog ;) When left alone at home, I used to watch Ftv, very fascinated by the photographers and their paradise land, photography has also inspired me.

I used to have this friend, Kiran. His dad is a big loser. He made no big efforts other than dreaming to become an IAS officer. And now he wants his son to do it, virtually making him follow his wrong steps. He never tried to find his son’s strong and weak points, neither my dad did!

I also had this friend Neha, another victim of her parent’s aspirations. She wanted to do engineering as it is quick to get settled down and earn. But her parents insisted her to do medicine. After 6 long years of MBBS, she now settled as house wife of a NRI engineer in US!!

One more funny case was there were twins in my class. I don’t think they ever bought two sets of text books in school, but I believe they maintained their home work books separately! After matriculating, their dad asked them to study anything but same!! That’s because there is no need to buy two different text books in case they opt for different fields!! They nick named their dad ‘Kanjus Hitler’. I believe they will get married also on the same day!!

In school we used to have 4 unit exams and 3 big exams namely quarterly, half yearly and final exams for a year. 7 exams in 10 months!! Apart from these, we used to have class tests, surprise tests, quizzes, home works, assignments, practicals and what not!! And the most fcuking part is we were loaded with assignments in summer vacation!! I believe even parents don’t like that. Each time I came home after writing an exam my dad used to ask me ‘will you come first at least this time?’ and one day I answered back ‘Perhaps God also doesn’t know!!’ and guess what, bang.. as though a bomb blasted ; a tight slap. Aftermath, I couldn’t hear anything properly for 4 hours!!

My dad used to take me and my brother to circus, movies and parks seldom. He repeatedly used to tell us that his dad has taken him only twice to circus in his child hood. So he has taken us thrice!!! While enjoying the circus feats, I used to pray God to let the time stand still and I didn’t want the circus to end. After the circus show ended, in 15 minutes my dad brought us back home and made us sit to study, we didn’t even got time to discuss about the magics performed in the circus! It proved in 15 minutes one can reach from heaven to hell!!

My dad didn’t used to give us pocket money :( Reason: his dad used to give him and he learnt smoking and even got addicted in school itself!! He always regrets that he learnt smoking with his dad’s money!! I hated my grand pa for giving him money!! But we were so desperate to eat the ice creams, buy tops and kites at school. That made me naughtier and more innovative. To quote an example once my dad asked me to buy a ‘All Out’ refill pack; I filled the used empty refill pack with refined oil and packed it with an old cover and gave it to him ( that was the last refill pack we ever used at home, because it never worked against mosquitoes ;) and it never emptied, that’s because the boiling point of oil is much higher than the temperature produced by the heating coil of All Out machine!! ). And I was happy for a week eating ice creams, because I earned it instead buying ;)

And when caught for doing such mischievous things, we were punished severely. My dad also used to pound me for scoring less in exams. Of course yaar, I used to tell him that I already got punished from my teacher at school, but that didn’t help me to get a double quota from my dad also!! In UK I saw no child cry or were beaten or even pestered to study by their parents. My dad punished us because his dad did? Or his colleagues also do? Or is it a custom in India? I wonder what I would do when I have a child one day!! I wish my child have my dad as his son and he takes revenge on him … good idea na ;) Anyways I am gonna show circus to my child at least 4 times.. he he and give him pocket money because one I don’t smoke and two I can’t sleep without an All Out ;)

PS: The character mentioned above is partly me and the rest is written imagining about a typical Indian child. I hope my dad doesn’t come across this blog, if that happens I am sure he will kill me ;) 

My (n+1)th crush

It was an unusual over crowded canteen at 4pm, one very seldom gets to see. And the cause is none other than a heated up India Pakistan cricket match, all waiting eagerly to see the last winning shots by team India.

My eyes were stuck on the TV set, yeah one can tell I am a crick-maniac, not from long but from recent years when India started to win in a row and proved it can find the world’s best 11 from a billion population, without any politics in selection.

Ads were popping in the midst of the overs, and so as to give my neck a brief rest I lowered my head from the TV’s view and just had a glance at the overwhelming crowd. In the middle of the crowd something attracted me, they were the eyes of a girl perhaps the most beautiful eyes of a woman I have ever seen which dragged all my attention on them. At some point, I felt some reciprocation happening and the eyes were noticing my stare! Unwillingly, I had to take my head back to the game on TV, only to find that I already missed an over. But that didn't bother me much.

I kept lowering my head cautiously and then lowered my sight to get back to the eyes. Again I stared at them for quite a long time, when they noticed that I am actually gazing at them purposefully. I felt some sort of chillness and hollowness running down deep inside me, which I can compare with the feeling I experienced coming down the London eye! This cycle repeated couple of times more!

It happens quite number of times that we try to see again and again some person just to check, whether he or she is still noticing us or not. It’s a beautiful psychological feeling I witnessed not just in humans but also in animals. My pet dog used to be the best example. It was a big flirt and had 3 girl friends. Alas it’s no more, I wish I have a clone of it. They say ‘every dog has a day’! When is mine?

Playing the final shots India won but I lost, I lost the girl in the crowd as the crowd started to disperse. In the crowd I couldn't get to see her face, all I remember is the eyes covered partially with silky strands of hair. My task to find her was complicated which involved only a retina scan!

I was lucky I could use silky hair criteria to filter the girls and then come across from the front to do the retina scan. This continued for a 2 month long process. This way I actually came to know of many beautiful chicks in the office. One fine day, to my astonishment, I found the girl whom I was searching for, works on the same floor as mine!

Well I found out she not only has sharp eyes, but has got great features, incredible smile, good dining ethics, good sense of humor and probably much more! She has got an amazing walking style waddling like a swan. And I can say she looks the best in a black suit! A thought came on my mind that God gives all things to only few persons and she is just one of them. If at all there are any voids in her life I felt like doing anything to fulfill them. Oops am I not being too emotional? ;)

I continued to stare her, and I really wondered how awkward she must have felt when a guy stares so long and so many times! But I couldn’t help it, she looks amazing and incredible. I encountered her many times in canteen and in bus, a common place for both of us. Most of the times it was accidental and sometimes very deliberately, waiting for an hour more, famished, I used to take lunch at 2pm. Well that’s her lunch time to avoid long queues in peak hours.

She probably doesn’t know how awesome her smile looks; she has got serious looks who smiles rarely and I didn’t see her smile for many days in the beginning. I doubted she might have lost some molars and pre-molars and that she must be undergoing some orthodontics treatment for a while!!! Very crazy doubt ryt (that’s why I am not in CBI), more to go …

Many times I felt like talking to her but how without a proper introduction? What to talk, where to talk were the most common questions. Stupid questions like ‘What’s the time now? or where will this bus go or who is xyz from your project or what’s the menu in canteen!!! or I am so and so .. !@#$ (followed by a big blank) or how about a cup of coffee or a SRK movie?‘ occurred to me, and yeah such bizarre ideas occur only to me ;)

I have been a mentor and philosopher to few of my friends and they approach me for suggestions and tips! I just used to repeat to them, what all I see in the latest episodes of Mtv Love Line. Thankfully, they either don’t watch it or may not be able to co-relate it with my suggestions. Anyways they nicknamed me Love Guru ;)   But what’s happening to me? Were they kidding? Or my tactics don’t work when it comes to my case!!? I seriously have no idea.   

In between as part of project work, I traveled to London and frankly speaking I didn’t miss her! I witnessed pretty European girls but desi, desi hi hoti hain. I missed Indian girls as a whole :)   That spicy flavor was missing in them. In contrast to my beliefs, I learnt Britain girls are committed to their boy friends for long, but they are more independent, more individual and demand space and time for their own interests.

Inspired by movies like ‘what a woman wants’, I prayed the Almighty to give me some magical powers to know what she or for that matter any girl thinks of me. This way life becomes easy, spoon feeding and one can stick to the girl who is interested in them ryt, rather investing time in others :-) . Well life may not be so interesting, in contrary.

It took me many months just to know her name, as we don’t have any common friends. Well frankly speaking the name was not as interesting as she is. I discovered she is somewhere from Delhi, thanks to the search engine, Google. To my biggest disappointment, though expected, I learnt she got engaged to someone :(

Seriously I feel like going straight to her and ask only one thing ‘tumhari koi behen hain kya?‘   haha… I know… I am a big badmaash!

All I can say is, it’s yet an another crush tale!! What’s next!!!? An another Indo-Pak match?? ;)

Disclaimer: The characters in this blog are fictitious and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental and unintentional!!! ( in case she comes across this blog ;) )

Keep visiting this space/page for new blogs. Bye, take care and a happy new year ‘09!!