REMEMBER REMEMBER

remember, remember the twenty-sixth of november,

the mumbai treason and plot,

i know of no reason

why the mumbai treason

should ever be forgot.

RE:

dear a-hole,
if calling or sms was possible, i'd have delivered this message personally. but seeing that you've flicked my phone, i'm going to do this with a wee-bit more publicity.
you've screwed my life nice & proper. it wasn't just any phone you nicked - my first earnings are enclosed between those two metal cases. if your pea-sized brain cannot grasp the magnitude of that statement, start by earning your money instead of pilfering it.

as for payback, you know i won't stop at lodging an fir at the local thana or blocking the phone. you'll answer to the karma police and you better watch out too - because i've asked for a sentence of lifelong impotency. and oh yeah, you forgot the earphones.

go [my mum told me not to swear, so i deleted this word] yourself.

polite as ever,
sidhartha

GRASS, OR SOMETHING LIKE IT

chetan bhagat did it with the iits. so it’s about time we got some dirt on the iims too.
‘keep of the grass’ is karan bajaj’s debut novel about a 25-years old abcd who decides to return to india (via iim-b no less) in search of his roots. i won’t even attempt at objectivity in this review – the author is an alumni of my institute and i heard about the novel from his classmate. and though the novel isn’t about bit mesra per se, the shades of ranchi are unmistakable.
the plot is a racy run thru a 2-year mba course interspersed with the usual clichés:  search for spirituality, patriotism, placement fever and uhh, plentiful grass. for indians addicted to mba-education, the story is remarkable for showing the slow destruction of a high-flying manager in b-school. the book would have been run-of-the-mill if not for the heavy dose of sarcasm which never fails to humour. the drugs really fuel the twists & turns of the plot and end it on a high.
there’s a genre in literature called chick lit that deals in light-hearted stories of twenty-something women. if so, this books falls squarely into what i would call ‘guy-lit’. i’d put a buy rating on ‘keep off the grass’ because it’s puff worth inhaling. the folks at mosaic media seem to agree with me because they’re turning it into a soon-to-be-released film!

AN UPHILL CLIMB

beating the flab is an uphill task but it never hurts to kick-start with a soft option. imho, junking the elevator in favour of the stairs counts as one. of course, it reduces carbon footprint and saves on gym membership but that’s not really the reason for trying it out. it’s the elation of reaching home after a hard climb of several floors that makes it all worthwhile.

LESSONS FROM A CORPORATE LIFE

i get a lot of dos & don’ts in the corporate training designed to convert me into a happy, productive employee from the sarcastic, lazy college grad i’m right now. what months of lessons couldn’t pull off was achieved by three short stories. it’s surprising how the complete wisdom of office conduct can be filtered into 3 simple tales. sometimes even advice that’s bullshit tends to make sense...

lesson #1

a turkey was chatting with a bull. “i’d love to be able to get to the top of that tree,” sighed the turkey, “but i haven't got the energy.” “well, why don’t you nibble on some of my droppings?” replied the bull, “they're packed with nutrients.” the turkey pecked at a lump of dung and found that it actually gave him enough strength to reach the lowest branch of the tree. the next day, after eating some more dung, he reached the second branch. finally after a fourth night, there he was proudly perched at the top of the tree. soon he was promptly spotted by a farmer, who shot the turkey out of the tree.

moral of the story: bullshit might get you to the top, but it won't keep you there.

lesson #2

a crow was sitting on a tree, doing nothing all day. a small rabbit saw the crow, and asked him, “can i also sit like you and do nothing all day long?” the crow answered, “sure, why not.” so, the rabbit sat on the ground below the crow, and rested. all of a sudden a fox appeared, jumped on the rabbit and ate it.

moral of the story: to be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high up.

lesson #3

a little bird was flying south for the winter. it was so cold that the bird froze and fell to the ground in a large field. while it was lying there, a cow came by and dropped some dung on it. as the frozen bird lay there in the pile of cow dung, it began to realize how warm it was. the dung was actually thawing him out! he lay there all warm and happy, and soon began to sing for joy. a passing cat heard the bird singing and came to investigate. following the sound, the cat discovered the bird under the pile of cow dung, and promptly dug it out and ate it.

moral of the story: 1. not everyone who shits on you is your enemy.

2. not everyone who gets you out of shit is your friend.
3. and when in deep shit, it’s best to keep your mouth shut.

INDIASTRUCTURE

there’s only one truth in the lie that is indian infrastructure: we don’t have enough of it.

when it comes to basic amenities such as roads, power and water supply, the rich buy it off, the poor steal it and the middle class is left to fend off for themselves. the use of diesel gensets and bore well pumps has shifted the problem-solving from government ministries to individual households. so it’s about time that the administration reclaimed its role as providers-in-chief.

nothing riles the public more than the lack of bijli, and the cure currently being offered is the construction of 12 large scale power plants across the country. i had the fortune of visiting mundra in gujarat, a site for one of these proposed ‘ultra mega power plants’ a.k.a. umpp and came away impressed. the huge concrete-and-steel structure is not only a great sight, but also a powerful idea.

here’s why. firstly, it’s a win-win partnership between the government and private sector where the country gets plenty of power and the corporate get their profits. secondly, in a country of billion-plus citizens, it shows the benefits of thinking big – really big to solve problems on a large scale. and thirdly, it’s a sign we’ve shed our inhibitions about using world-class technology for solving problems that are uniquely desi.

in the infra sector, mobile telecommunications has been a riotous success and it’s heartening to see electricity generation follow a similar strategy. perhaps it’s the only way to make electricity as widespread as mobile networks.

TATALKING ABOUT TATANAGAR

as celebrity worship goes, jamshedpur beats everything else hands down. so how does it actually feel being a tataployee in tatanager?

the day begins with a tatalarm that makes you rush to your tatoilet and tatub. after a quick wash, it’s off to the tatactory by, you guessed it, a tata bus.

at the tataffice, it is customary to greet other tataployees in the local language, called tatalk. tatalk is a rapidly growing dialect learnt even by foreigners in companies like torus, taguar and tatover. this post too, is part of my tatraining for tatalk fluency.

after drinking some tata tea, coming around for small tatalk with colleagues and drinking some more tata coffee, its back to tathome sweet tathome. on arriving at the hostel for food, the familiar sight greets you: utensils by tata steel, water supplied by voltas and food garnished by tata salt.

evenings are definitely the best tatime of the day here: the horizon blazes orange due to slag dumping at tata steel. and the day ends as you switch off your tata power electricity to go to tatleep.

THE DAILY OLYMPICS

daily life in mumbai is an olympic struggle and best described by pierre de coubertin’s expression citius altius fortius.

citius: faster. if life in mumbai was a race, the local trains would be it’s timekeeper. the trains are, quite simply, the most impatient transport system i’ve seen in india and there’s a rush you get in using them. entering, standing – never mind sitting – and exiting from the bogies is a pain but this daily struggle just spurs commuters to push the tempo even further. speed is a drug on which every mumbaikar wants to get high.

altius: higher. what mumbai lacks in square feet, it makes up in stature. every inch of available space in the city is being taken over by new skyscrapers, flyovers and elevated tracks. the entire city seems to be adding another floor to itself to tide over the lack of space. it must be the only pace in the world where real estate of dizzying heights & prices stands alongside derelict slums where people live for free. the difference could not be any starker.

fortius: stronger. every indulgence can be bought off in the metro – for a price. the madness of materialism is antithetical to the indian idea of wealth that’s supposed to be spiritual, but nobody can argue with the financial clout the city commands. the bse, nse and rbi are just some of the potent symbols of this authority. the flow of power beats to a heart of money in every part of the city. strength, then, is just another redeemable currency.

THE NEW PANDEMIC

the h1n1 swine flu has been beaten by a new endemic condition in mumbai. the cheer of Ganesh chaturthi has the whole city up in religious fervour for their favourite god. the time-tested rituals of installation, worship and immersion of Ganesh idols embody a prayer for wisdom. everyone’s invited to the festivities - all you’ve to do is shout Ganpati bappa morya!

IN COMPANY OF FRIENDS

the milaap 2009 welcome party given to the graduate engineer trainee batch in our company had all the elements of a perfect evening.

as fresh trainees, our schedule over the past month-and-half has been a whirlwind of technical and corporate lessons. so the invitation for a welcome party from our senior batch came as a pleasant surprise. all the class training was soon forgotten and the party was on everyone’s lips.

on the 28th, all of us trooped inside the banquet hall of the mca recreation centre in bandra-kurla complex in all our formal finery. all invitees had been neatly organised into teams so that people of all ages – from the directors to trainees – sat on every table. true to tradition, our live-wire hosts kicked off the proceedings with a safety drill, and followed it up by introducing the senior management to us.

the party got really cracking once the team competitions started. from quizzes to creative editing to clay modelling, nothing fosters collaboration better than contests. working as a team, everyone around the dinner tables turned from strangers to acquaintances to friends in no time. it’s not often that one gets the opportunity to team up with cfo of the company sitting beside you.

at the end of the day, it was time to share experiences and our directors were suitably impressive in their diagnosis. but the evening held one more surprise before the start of the sumptuous buffet. mr dilip vengsarkar paid a surprise visit to the party and as you’d imagine, he was swiftly mobbed for autographs and photograph requests. not only was he the chairman of the party’s venue but also turned out to be a company employee of several decades!

in retrospection, the glamorous night had it all: fun, friends and food. what more can one ask for?