भेडचाल

बदलाव हमारे अन्दर होता है। बदलाव निरंतर है और उससे रोकने का शायद ही को कोई उपाय होगा। पर क्या मैं बदलना चाहूँगा?

कुछ वर्षो पहले तक मुझे कुछ पता नही था की मैं जीवन मैं क्या करना चाहता हूँ, और आज भी मेरे विचार कुछ स्पष्ट नही हुए है। काम करना क्या केवल एक मजबूरी है, या इसमे कोई आर्थिक लाभों के अलावा लाभ है, ऐसे प्रश्न मेरे दिमाग मैं कुछ दिनों से आ रहे है। काम काजी जीवन जैसे जैसे नज़दीक आ रहा है, वैसे ही मैं थोड़ा उससे घबरा भी रहा हूँ।

प्रबंधन का अध्यन भारत मैं कई छात्रों का सपना है, क्योंकि इसमे पैसे अच्छे है और यह आजकल की नई भेडचाल है। पर मेरा अनुभव कह रहा है की आप जिस अवस्था मैं प्रसन्न रहे, वही अच्छी नौकरी है। प्रबन्धन के पश्चात् आपको इतनी म्हणत करनी होगी की वैसे भी आप ४० की उम्र के बाद कुछ करने के योग्य नही रहेंगे।

तो क्या मुझे चाहिए,

अच्छी नौकरी, अच्छी तनख्वाह और एक बड़ा नाम
या फ़िर कुछ अच्छे लोग, कम चिंता वाला काम, और ठीक ठाक तनख्वाह

फिलहाल तो मैं हमेशा की तरग इस असमंजस मैं हूँ की मैं क्या करू, मेरे आजू बाजू हर कोई जरुरत से ज्यादा एकाग्रित है, सबको साबुन तेल बेचना, बेंको मैं जाना, और संगणक उद्योग मैं अपना जीवन बिताना है। मुझे इन सब से कोई लेना देना नही, मुझे कुछ भी चलेगा। पर मेरे लिए सबसे जरुरी चीज़े है,

मेरे आस पास के लोग, एक अच्छा वातावरण, और निश्चित आराम और अन्य रुचिया पूर्ण करना।

पर मुझे फ़िर लगता है कीजीवन मैंने आजतक उस चीज़ को नही चुना जिससे मैं चुनना चाहता था, बलकी उन बातो के पीछे ज्यादा रहा जो भेडचाल का हिस्सा थी।

यह सब बस कुछ विचार है जो चले जायेंगे, मैं फ़िर इन किताबो और अजीबो गरीब काम के चक्कर मैं डूब जाऊँगा, और रह जायेगी यह भेडचाल, जिसका मैं सदेव हिस्सा रहूँगा।

खेल,इन्टरनेट और हम

कुछ बाराह साल का था मैं, जब मैंने पहली बार भगवान् को देखा, वो नीले रंग का मुकुट पहेनता था अपने घुंघराले बालो के ऊपर, और एक भारी लकड़ी की गदा थी उसके पास, और अपने चमत्कार से वोह दुनिया के सबसे महान गेंदबाजों का नाश कर रहा था. उस साल था विश्व कप के उपलक्ष पर उसने दौड़ो की झड़ी लगा दी थी, और शेन वारने नमक गेंदबाज़ को तो उस महान ने नेस्तनाबूद ही कर दिया था.

पर फिर वोह दिन भी आया, जब कलकत्ता की रणभूमि पर ९१/२ के स्कोर पर वोह आउट हुआ, और उसके बाद कलकत्ता की जनता ने उस देवता के अभाव मैं मैदान को भस्म कर दिया, लोग कहते है वोह शिवजी का दुःख था की उस नन्हे भगवान् के आउट होने पर उन्होंने उस दिन कलकत्ता पर आग बरसाई. पर उस रात मैं सो नहीं पाया, और उन आँखों मैं कही कुछ पानी की बूँदें ज़रूर थी.

१९९६ का वोह साल और मायनों मैं भी ऐतिहासिक था, जब इन्टरनेट नामक तकनीक मेरी दुनिया मैं आई. एक घर्र्र घर्र करते संगणक के सामने बैठ कर आप दुनिया मैं कही भी चिट्ठी लिख सकते थे. हॉट मेल , याहू, और मेरे आज के नाम से जुडी एक पोर्टल काफी प्रसिद्ध हुए.

पर मुझे क्या पता था, की कुछ १० सालो बाद, इन्टरनेट के जरिये मैं उन महान खेल के क्षणों को संभाल के रख पाऊंगा, जिनका इतिहास मैं कोई सानी नहीं, और जो मेरे दिल के बेहद करीब रहेंगे. इसी का प्रयास करते हुए हम कुछ मित्रो ने मिल कर "पेन द गेम" की स्थापना की. इसके पहले ही वर्ष मैं इसने indibloggies पुरस्कार समारोह मैं भारत के सबसे बेहतरीन खेल ब्लॉग होने का गौरव प्राप्त किया.

इस वर्ष भी हम इस सम्मान के लिए नामांकित हुए है, कृपया इन संदेशो का पलान करे, और हमें विजयी बनाने मैं मदद करे..

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जय सचिन,
आपका प्रिय

देसी

A Night at Lodhivali

Where the hell is everyone? I can’t find anyone today. Alone in room, no Khaut, no Sagun & Saachi. All gayab!!!

Living with all 3 has been awesome, I have had great time with them over the past month. The highlight have been the sex education classes we conduct once in a while for Sagun, super fun. Plus me, khaut, shotu have got access recently to this amazing library of Hindi Erotica which is helping us in our mission to get Sagun upto sexually acceptable standards prevailing in modern times.

Also Shotu has created this alias Jenny73153, Yahoo ID which we all use for chatting like a female, awesome fun with people calling a number XXX73513 and then Jiri picking up and acting like an escort service agent. Well enough of this.

I think I should look in Pure Bhaiya’s room, one of my best buds in the senior batch. Awesomely brained & very hard working, I have real fun with him at times and he is a nice happy shappy types fellow. Cares for me & Sajeev a lot. I miss Sajeev though, quite some time since I experienced his histrionics, his would be a tale of simple boy going not so simple thanks to Sex (not the verb, but a proper noun, yes someone in flesh & blood, actually too much of flesh).

Oh even Pure Bhai is out, where the hell is everyone, being late from office doesn’t mean you miss the action. I think they should be in our township mess.

Trying to bring a revolution in Speech Technology, back in those days it was considered biggest thing after Graham Bell’s own invention, Voice Recognition and that too for so many regional languages. Daily office work included recordings, creating fancy scripts with JeDi, gaming & life lessons from dhavesh & his wonderful encounters with Bhakti our ex Mtech student. On top of it you had a bell labs return white shirted, steamy idli eating leader & a budding love story of geeky-techie IITian with a lady in office (who looked slightly older than him). The boss was a delightful idli-popping guy with super crisp white shirts (always) with changing trouser colours, accompanied by a recent Swiss import.

Also featuring were a few other teams BREWing mobile apps, Voice apps team back in college & a traffic signal team famous for doing mostly nothing. That team consisted of a brainy happy & a geeky chunnu mobile.

Walking down towards the mess I found chunnu sinking into his super cool blue displayed handset. Mobiles are a new thing, I have one from Siemens & it’s a rare thing to caryy one. But chunnu thinks in a few days everyone would carry this, I don’t think more than 10% of population would ever have it. Just now in May TRAI removed the incoming charges & at max it would let them sell a few more. This is a fad like many others.

I reach the mess and the first thing I see is a somewhat odd looking BPS sitting with Methi on the roadside. BPS is not regular today, with his long hair messed up and his fingers waving, he looks….drunk.

Are they all DRUNK???

BPS calls me as he is towards finishing his awesome lecture to Methi (lectured only first & last time in his life on this date) on the topic of “Ladki %$%$% hoti hai”, also walking at a close distance were a few females. Well I would leave them out of this story.

So BPS told me how I should stay away from girls and never get into them (I have strictly followed him after that J) and I could smell it. For the first time in almost 2 years I saw one of my friend’s in a drunk avasthta & it felt a bit funny. Well being in a dry state had resulted in a very different engineering college where students got a high from installing/uninstalling Linux, downloading movies & playing all types of games.

Off I moved to the TT table. On the stairs I met this bearded guy who said high, wonder what he does here, he always stands here, doesn’t look like the chaukidaar but his beard looks irritating. Few of us ended up having a discussion on the possibility of him being gay & maybe even hitting on one of our “HEALTHY” friend.

TT table was witnessing an amazing game of TT between (I don’t know who), but the spectator/referee was Pappa, his wavy hair sitting on top of a very brainy brain. But that day the brain had gone on hadtaal as he waved his mundi from side to side & kept on doing it continuously for indefinite time. When I approached to have a conversation he just sshhhed me away.

I met Sacchi in mess & he told me about the party thrown by Pure Bhai for some reason. It seems lot of everything had been drunk & everyone was waving around. And then I met khaut…

He shouted & became normal just the next moment. He asked me to play carom. The small boy who served us food in mess came to us and Khaut all of a sudden slapped him… “Ladkiyo ko pahle khaana deta hai, humein nahi “

Small boy stunned & I was in a don’t know what to do state. So I just walked away from there. Later that night I had the scary task of walking back Khaut to our room.

As I prepared my bed I thought, well I will never touch alcohol.

Omitted a few incidents, changed a few names, all for fun. By the way I broke the pledge sometime in the summer of 2005, had a White Mischief with Shotu & co. at Mt. Abu, then waited till Bangalore & CAT incidents to let hell break loose. But this was my first true interaction with the concept of getting drunk. All thanks to Lodhivali J

Yellow

All characters in this story are fictional and bear no resemblance to anyone dead or living

2005

After the great Mumbai floods engineers were repairing the sewer system of the city, an engineer mistakenly planted dynamite on one of the lines, the blast was big, and it released crores of tonnes of pure Golden shit on one of the suburbs of mumbai. To check the devestation all the shit was diverted to a large 25000 acre area designated for a SEZ soon. Area sinked, and it definitely stinked.

In that plot was hidden long back, a treasure of immense value, all of it pure gold.

Present Day

Bhairav is the coolest rag picker in the town of Mumbai, has two of everything, but misses the essential thing which should exist in pair. Apprently his boxing buddy, Langdu Sethji with manly boobs and a raunchy paunch kicked him in his gehnas once. From that day, Bhairav yearns for everything in pairs.

Langdu and Bhairav are the best rag pickers in town, but Langdu can swim saala, and that too in shit. Bhairav wants to go for treasure in the shit laden area, but Langdu says no.

Langdu's wife munni is an expert in picking rag underpants, which she even tries on herself at times. she is hot though and even Bhairav has the hots for her ;). Munni says she is poor (thats why lesser clothes) & wants to be rich & start a Safai Vidyalaya on the lines of one by Baapu at Ahmedadbad.

Cut Scene- Andheri

Langdu's brother is the top begger in Andheri, popularly known as Spam he also rides in a haathgaadi (Shaan movie's Mazhar Khan style). At night he takes part in an underground haathgaadi drifitng race. Haathgaadi race expert Don Karnash challenges him in front of his hot eucuch friend chikki. Chikki drops her pallu for the race to begin, and Spam wins it. Don Karnash asks spam to deliver a box for him which he misplaces. In between he falls in love with Chikki. Don Karnash him for life and even burns is haathgaadi. Spam hitchhikes and reaches the boundaries of Shithole where Munni, Bhairav & Langdu are waiting...

(I am cutting on the hit song, Haggi Waggi, by Chilly Min-Hug and few other songs...)

These guys hang out near the shit pond, singing Balluuuu, yeh saans pukaare, Baluuu...

and all of a sudden appears Balu, along with Madam Ritika Mahalingam and Kid Cloud waala. Punter and Dolly are not seen though.

It seems Balu is a dushman of Don Karnash & wants him badly. In the mean time Langdu developes a liking for Madam Mahalingam, much to the distaste of munni, who starts wearing even dirtier and smaller rags to catch his attention.

Climax

Don Karnash wants money from spam for loosing his box of whatever, 50 Mn Zimbabwean Dollars. As Spam and others are unaware about the latest currency rates they get scared and plan to go for the treasure. Balu has a seaplane which can carry them to shitpond and Langdu knows the location. It seems his dad almost reached the treasure. When he tells the story Kid Cloudwaala realises that he is Langdu & spam's brother who got lost on the day of floods.

But Langdu has a secret to share.

It seems their dad was off to find some treasure and he found it somewhere in the mid of shit pond, but Langdu was having loosemotions that day, and he used to the pond to do you know what. The level started rising and his dad lost control and sunk and died. Langdu is scared of that place.

But he is convinced and Balu drops him using his seaplane to the location. Here they put the anchor, Madam Mahalingam & Munni cook food and the guys go for treasure hunting.

Shit main tairne ke teen golden rule,

- Never breath
- Hamesha Saath main raho
- Never shit...otherwise, you know what can happen

They find the treasure, but Don Karnash comes and as usual grabs the heroines. Then they come out of rooms and the dress area of their arms is removed (remember the old movies, what this signified, confused me ). Anyways heros have found the treasure now (100 20 KG toilets made of solid gold), but Balu starts breathing and dies of the smell, being heavy he sinks too. The others float back, fight and rescue heriones. Bhairav is found missing.

Don Karnash tells everyone that he and Bhairav planned this and now he would kill everyone. Bhairav comes up and tells that he fooled everyone because Langdu being color blind too was the only one who could have spotted Yellow in Yellow. so he picked him and made a fool of him. He runs away and kills Don Karnash on the way by flushing him in the pond.

Madam Mahalingam uses the seaplane to go away and other live happily, but one day Bhairav calls and tells them that he has progressed from being a rag picker to India's largest toilet manufacturer, all Yellow in color. And Chikki is his wife or something.

**The End**

Request: Dont watch Blue, please

मदन - कहानी एक Pub की

***Starring ***

Chipu
( I have decided to write a book on the life and times of this guy)
Rattu
Bhussu


***And***

Dandit
Mimpy
Bho-Bho-ti
Pat-rick
Nippu


***Friendly Appearance***

KAddu
Piddu
Anit Pacob Jillpose
Khakre

***Scene-1 ***

Somewhere on quite nice crowded street on Bangalore (crowd is implicit in Bangalore), ambling around are three stupid looking individuals, quite visibly mistaking the road as a Bird Sanctuary. ( For people in Bangalore I am referring the set of perpendicular roads connecting from Jyoti Nivas College-Koramangala 4th Block side to Forum-100ft road connection).

But enough of birds, these guys have never got them, one of them although carries the distinction of breaking eggs :), lot of them :D. Who's interested, Chipu, Rattu and Bhussu just want some beer, and they will get it at Madan Pub. Small shabby looking place where evil ideas thrive, men with rotten faces, dirty lungis and unbrushed moustaches laugh like Ashok Vatika Sita Kidnappers, light is dim, TV always throws a classic Rajkumar Classic (the same one always where he plays a Rajkumar) and waiters serve with uncut nails filled with smudge..yuk

But beer is cheap and thats Ok, for us :)

This place was discovered by Fake Kannada speaking Bho-Bho-ti, patronised by the wide assed king of bangalore, Pat-Rick & made popular by rattu. Anit Pacob Jillpose lived in Pune but he dreamt of going to madan, and Khakre cracked up as we muttered him stories of Madan.

Madan Rocks, no... Madan Mahaan hai :)

In an area full of beautiful chiks and chikkis, this is the place, where Men can be Men, and not those spiked hairs, loose jeans, jockey showing lean kids, they can hold their drink with pride and drink and bask in the glory of the super dim lights which make you look, evil.

I dont remember whether Mimpy visited it, but this is a place liked by 3 of us who came here tonight, me, Bhussu, Chipu. Bhussu loves drinking, and following it up with Hyderabadi Biryani, Drinking loves Chipu, and will always love him. As for me, I can walk downstairs to pick up Mysore Pak off Adayar anand bhavan :)

But as Mimpy says, yeh ek Mahaan jagah hai, so ashtumaadi

Kahani starts when Nippu comes to Bangalore... till then wait maadi

Another Kiddie incident

Posted one long back on Kids. Today was time for another classic incident:)

Words from a 6th Class Kiddo on the car backseat,

"Virginity is a man's gift to his wife"

Couldn;t stop laughing for the next few hours, Gen Next/X/Y/Z/Whatever is really scary at times :)

life with an addict...

He was happy, used to talk while he slept, but apart from them, quite Ok. Used to loose apetite once in a while, but apart form that, Ok. He thought smoking is bad, drinking is bad too. But he was addicted. And that too to...

Well I entered the room that day, and he suddenly had hidden it. He used to hide it in drawers, almirah, below the bed in a suitcase. I knew every spot, but how could he, I still didn't believe it.

I got a hint, that day at Bandra, near carter road CCD, we saw a bunch of young kids smoking it, and it smelled like, you know what. He had won a bet and asked me for something. I paid 150 bucks for it.

It was Chocolate, and in the room were being gobbled up tonnes of Lindt, Toblerones, Cadbury, Ferreros and what not. I knew it. He was an addict.

Addicted to chocolates.

I just pray he returns to the original addiction, unAdulterated. The new one doesn't suit him. It suits me :)

Of things Artificial, and those Natural

Love being Natural?

Yes you would say, but are we ever natural!

On an auto ride with my friend in Delhi we debated the artificial vs. natural thing like never before, especially in the context of Delhi, debate continued at an engg. college friend's home party.

We have two sides (we is generalized by people coming from smaller towns & cities), one is natural, likes meeting people, sitting with family and friends, enjoying nice street food, being part of festivals, going to temple sometimes, roaming around and having a nice relaxing evening followed by a movie on TV and some nice sleep.

The other side, goes to Pubs, drinks the hell out of oneself; multiplexes: buys popcorn worth 70 bucks (within 44 Rs. I used to enjoy pop corn, a movie, cold drink and a two way bus ride to city during school days), watches a movie a week, walks into a mall: window shops, really shops and just keeps on spending through the clutter of restaurants, food courts and ice cream parlors.

And after moving to cities (and especially after we started earning), we sort of have started living more like the latter than former. Although the joy of living life this style is hardly long lasting.

For a city, you would consider Gurgaon the best in India, super awesome roads, beautiful buildings, so many malls. My first day here I wanted to buy some innerwear, and I told my friend, so my friend asked Levis or Nike store? A city where people think of malls even while buying chaddi baniyaan!!! Its not their fault, this place is the pinnacle of consumerist culture and show-baazi, a practice linked to most of North India. Although I am not accusing all of this, there have been strange exceptions right from UG to PG days and they are all dear friends. But mostly a region characterized by slight rudeness in the way people talk, slight aggression, and a fascination to show that one can splurge money.

Compare that to the long walks I had in Old Delhi near Redfort through Ramlilas. Regular people, enjoying with families, having fun and a great time, & contrast it too hardly-anything-wearing-girls in GK or South ex at night, have seen a bit of all in the past few days. From the aloo chaat & paani puris in Old Delhi to 70 Rs dosas in Gurgaon fort, a nice mix of Artificial and natural awaits us everywhere we go.

Its on us and only on us, that which path we choose.

Many here want to fake it to make it, but I think they would be just fine if they just try to make it…

Right now for me I am trying to balance the two, somehow unsuccessfully

The Times of Navratri- Edition 4

Sometime in 2008, Mumbai J

Midterms, horrible they are. I always thought the worst gets over after coming to a b-school, this is over and above worst. Midterms are on and Falguni sings daily next to the hostel, well Navratri used to be different earlier.

This Navratri hasn't been great, it had been just Okay, before it turned slightly awesome. Till now just one day it felt like Navratri as I kept a fast and went with one of my friend to Vrindi to have sabudana vada. Apart from that it hardly feels like one, b-school surely kills all the festivities and festivals.

So our midterms ended and a senti Ajayjeet cribbing about not being at home on Durga Pooja for the first time in his life told me about Lokhandwaala Pooja. (senti Ajayjeet and Tommie had also tricked one of the profs using this sentipanna to get a deadline extended J). By being as dramatic as Ajayjeet can get, he convinced me. Another option to celebrate was that few of my friends were heading for the Falguni garba.

Garba- well childhood and Gujarat I had lot of it but Durga Pooja, haven't been to one for many years now. Ajayjeet's pitch of having khichdi, mishit dohi & bong sweets finally had me in. Although he also pitched about Bong Girls (arguably amongst the best in the country), but that was a point of parity in both the options (Garba Costumed girls giving them equal, if not more competitionJ)

So I, Ajayjeet, and lot of us went for the durga pooja, few of them also opted for Garba.

As I entered the pendal, it was time to get nostalgic, the beautiful pendal, the sound of shankha, the dhol & the beautiful idol of Maa Durga. We had a few sweets and then Ajayjeet with couple of guys met Abhijeet- the Singer. Awesome guy he is, talked nicely to all of us and arranged entry passes for the Euphoria show, for all 28 of us!!!

So we entered, danced, singed and enjoyed that night with Palash & co. One disappointment was the fact that the crowd was short on bong girls, or maybe I didn't spot them J, ajayjeet does that too well ;)

Not an elaborate celebration, but enough for b-school days, more than enough.

p.s. - I have forgotten about episode 3, i.e. the Bangalore days, sadly didn't visit Mysore Dusshera, but don't remember anything at all on what we did?

Technorati Tags: Navratri

The Times of Navratri- Edition 2

Sometime in 2002, somewhere in Gujarat

Hostel life, weird quizzes & scary electronics course make up my life nowadays. Although I am enjoying riding cycle daily to college and me and my roomie Sajeev have been losing weight, and lots of it. I enjoy programming, and lot of bak bak we do in hostels. But midterms are coming up.

Bored by studies me and Prajjwal were thinking of only one thing, Navratri. Apart from my memories in childhood and Prajjwal's quest of finding cool places in city another motivator was Vishal- our hostel supervisor. His story of condom sales spiking up 10 times during Dandiya season in Gujarat & all nooks and corners of building being occupied by couples doing you-know-what was enough to fuel… fuel us to goto Garba.

So we tried to convince everyone, starting from our dear 83 block. Puneet & Krunal; the lovely legged Sainy, simple Sajeev, tanabesh & his peacocked roomie. Prajjwal asked a few girls, but given the midterm was on, no one was ready for it. So me and Prajjwal begin our journey towards the nearby Sector's garba.

Rs. 10 entry was well within our budgets, although it sounded insane to me that people paid for entering garba (of course later on I came to know about paying 1000 bucks for entering it J). As we entered it was a mix of nostalgia, teenage fantasies and bhakti bhavna all packed into one.

Well we entered and kept on watching junta dancing, and we kept on watching and watching.

Garba is the bestest form of dance ever I thought, and Prajjwal agreed, still trying to look for his favorite Dilli-ish girls. But he too lost interest and then we just immersed into the excitement of dance & music. We didn't enter the arena, firstly we didn't wear proper attire and secondly we were too shy to dance in front of these awesome performers.

We were standing and we found our ever sweating- rock music loving- calculus prof. Nice Guy he is. So we chatted with Prof. Chatterjee on a zillion things. An awesome night where we were mesmerized by dance, the devotion for Devi Ma & and slightly disappointed at our Prof. not offering us a cold drink.

And the initial thoughts, well in teenage days they are never gone, but still parked for sometime J

2 years later

Garba time in college, the arena is ready, guys dressed up in Kurta-Pyjama, girls shining in their traditional attire. That day most of them had taken a bath it seems ( a popular perception within my batch that like guys, even girls were lazy enough not to take a bath J) and sort of put some make up too. A rarity again J

Well we danced and had loads of fun, this time it was post the midterms too.

Few days later

Chachu said, yeh ek aitihaasik kshaan hoga, jab hum Ravan ka dahan karenge. So all of us started from a few Bamboo frames, loads of Fevicol (everyone smelled of it that day), crackers and whole loads of masti constituted the process of making our college's first ravan. Painted black and around 15 feet tall, it was constructed on the A-D wing junction and carried to the ground. The night was fun as the Ravan caught fire and Chachu set up his famous havan later.

But us raat sab Pyaase hi soye the J

Final Year

Puneet still believed in the first year Vishal theory, and he insisted that during our final year we try out the Hot Shot Garba at Karnavati Club. For a Rs. 200 entry it was worth the no. of well tattoed backs we saw, and heard a 3rd/4th runner up Indian Idol singer. All of the city's super rich were there and it seems lot of so called setting is done there. Still this one didnt beat the simple garba of sectors near our college.

And Puneet still remains, well he remains... :)

Technorati Tags: Navratri

The Times of Navratri- Edition 1

Sometime in 1998, somewhere in Chattisgarh

Navratri is the best time of the year. Like yesterday I left from home at around 5 PM. After our customary cricket match at the abandoned tennis court we cycled to the Pooja Area. The Bengali Samiti in township begins the Durga Pooja ceremony on Shashti and so the preparations were on for that. After that me with few of my friends moved to Santosh Chaat Bhandaar near Indra complex. After a few paani puris we visited the Navdurga Pendal next to Ambedkar Auditorium. Here the Devi there for all 9 days of Navratri.

After that we moved to the house of Ayush, next to his house in a Badminton playing area Chauhan uncle organizes Garba. We didn't dance but went upto the terrace on Ayush's block and were just looking at Garba & especially our new found interest of ogling at girls. Well Nipunjai says that there are couple of nice girls on the other end of the circle so we watched there, and then we watched a whole gang of them. Also behind them were the so called lafoots of the township. The difference between us and them, well we move around on cycles, them on motorcycles; we hide and watch girls and at max giggle post that, but they are quite visible and vocal in the way they WATCH.

Anyway after lot of bird watching we moved to Jagran program at Navdurga Pendal. Its very peaceful and the best part is almost everyone from the township is there.

Today I woke up late. The best part about this navaratri is that this one is after the exams, when it happens before the exams it kills the fun. Well today is when the Durga sits in the Mandir complex so should get ready for that.

After the morning pooja there is Bhog. All the Kids are supposed to help in serving the Bhog to all who come to eat. Again the whole community is here to pray and have Prasad. So we served everyone and btw did I describe the Prasad.

A sweet, but well that wasn't the attraction. You have Khichdi & chutney. Superbly awesome Bengali khichdi cooked in Desi Ghee, and along with that Chutney made of Khajoor and Papita. Awesomely awesome…

All who helped to serve get Extra Ghee as reward!!!

4 days later…

Another Navratri ended L. Dusshera was awesome yesterday and so were the Durga Devi visarjan in the morning, we went on the truck to the lake and danced a lot on the way. After that in the evening I watched the Dusshera from the balcony of Indian Coffee House munching on Special Masala Dosa and Frooti (felt like sitting in Royal Box at Wimbledon). Dusshera is like a mela, everyone from everywhere on earth assembles on the KV football ground. And the fireworks were awesome.

Now school will start again, boring…

Technorati Tags: Navratri

Back to Regular stuff...

As tonight's super-heavy, super-aweFome Gujju/Rajasthani dinner struggles to sink in my belly I can't help thinking about the past few days. After a trimester where I indulged in activities beyond my comfort zone, there was hardly any padhai in my life, I lost touch with most of my friends & my beloved acts, and the final day even my cavity dilling erupted out :), but in the end was Happies Endings...

Looking at everyone over the past few days, I found many new things about many people, found so many broken at times, fixed up the other day, and in that dily-dobly state of being happy-sad. I too went through the curve, but as another new chapter in long cherished firm of mine beckons I am super excited about just being there. Also staying childhood langotiya and meeting him after so many years would be awesome too. Gurgaon-Delhi-Noida sounds great as of now :)

Although sometimes I felt not so good too about all this, and a few things were dissapointing at times. But finally as everyone is happy, I feel good too.

My team was awesome, and so were my boss log who kept there calm throughout it, team was simply awesome :)

Plan to be more regular with regular things in life from now on ... :)

is this the end???

Is this the end of the much thought of Small City Dreams, or is it just another passing phase. Past few months have been the most boring in my life, I am through my worst days in terms of doing what I was best at. I miss the detailed research I went through for every new food item I had & every new food joint I tried, I don't watch, hardly anytime for digesting news items leave politics. I have read just one book in the past more than one year & above all I have lost touch with most of my friends (which brings to end the notion that MBA enhances networking, it just kills it, you hardly can sustain your existing network, for those who say who do it, maybe they hardly had any before coming here.), and also I realize that I am hardly any good at writing anything.

So maybe the end of the Small City Dreams as all this bound to happen, but I am sure that they would soon to surface, not now, but maybe a few years down the line.

Till then I think it would be great if get back some other pleasures of my life back in place.

Last Week

I have worked for two years, but sometimes a week can be heavier than that and much much longer than that. Some happiness followed by tonnes of feedback, mostly not so good about whatever you thought you were always good on, coming mostly for people who are not that relevant, but sometimes they are too.

Then an odd day when you don't have anything to worry about, you had the whole bunch of people you like so much to worry about. All of them with their sunk faces was hardly encouraging.

And then there were submissions, exams and some scribbling on forms and papers as always.

All of it is hardly joyful, dissonance resonates here, (and as one of my friend here tells me, all this effect is getting cumulative, lost and getting further lost) and I need to get over it. And at the end of it all, being high on a bit of Vodka remains the only bit of bliss I had.

Looking forward for a happier week ahead, but I hardly remember what being happy was, those moments are hard to find nowadays.

Me Too...

While writing this short writeup on Me Too Brands, I realise its already 03:52 AM.

Me Too is sad today because,

1) India out of T20 World Cup
2) India out of T20 World Cup
3) Me got pissed of in class today, my so called Intellectual Class can show all sensually charged ads, but giggles kiddishly when Freud was discussed
4) India out of T20 World Cup
5) Some regular no sleep syndrome after doing tonners of clerikal work
6) Writing a writeup for another irrelevant assignment, few will read, no one ever implements anything here
7) India out of T20 World Cup
8) India out of T20 World Cup
9) We couldn't work properly on another bplan contest, again!!! :(
10) Haven't met one of my friend for ages, the dinner got canceled, and now she is nowhere to be found!!! btw she is in this college too :((
11) India out of T20 World Cup
12) India out of T20 World Cup
13) Memory getting worse
14) India out of T20 World Cup
15) India out of T20 World Cup

Last time when we lost in 2007, it was sought of ajeeb types bad...

Me Too was sad today, as many others, I just hope I get some sleep tomorrow in class, and then Me Too can dream of the next world cup...

Speaking as someone else...

Every new stage in the life introduces you to lot of new things. This one has brought an environment Cultural shifts, a maturity level in establishing relationships, mood swings arising from a hectic schedule. And as everything else in this program, it fails to be consistent.

People swing from extreme forms of conservatism to the radical, and hardly any stand is conservative. Stupid-Dumb to the extremely intelligent, laziness to diligence, I fail to understand most of it.

And people it, from giggling on everything "Sensual" shown in class, to justifying the rationale behind "sex sells", I hardly find a strand of conviction. One second they are the all progressive kinds, hailing from metros, the other they cant digest petty things here, leave alone someone's freedom of expression.

I still am caught in the small town idiosyncrasies of conservatism and rigid thinking, but I think its sometime better than switching so much....

And Respect, well I have my biases, which everyone has, but atleast something is left.

Influencing People and all the other things...

It can be an extremely simple act, you want people to do what you want, to induce yourself in them. All of you which is Good, Bad or Ugly tries to penetrate them. We need a mirror everywhere, we want to see self in everyone.

And the preys, well they are freely available, vulnerable souls waiting for someone to take control.

I sometimes wish I could be a prey, but I am not at all that types, I sometimes tend to be blatantly expectant and try to be the hunter.

Leave me though, I am not relevant. I see the few influenced ones around me, and just wish that they were better off. Changing patterns in their life keeps them away from normal, way away.

Let things be simple and normal. Again.

Simplicity would be the way to happiness, maybe not eternal bliss, but just to keep things normal.

Ghajini-isation of my once famous memory

It pays to do an MBA, but we part with things to do it too. Money, Sleep and now memory top the list of my key take-aways from this course.

Once called DesiPedia I still am doing well with my strategic memory (so called long term memory, the junk facts and figures, although doing bad with names), but I tend to forget small regular items ( read tactical memory loss).

My story might be similar to a not upgraded computer which boasted of a 20GB hard disk 4 years back (or that of Chacha Chaudhary: His brain used to work faster than a computer, but those were the days of the great 386, and maybe thats why this generation of Kids moved away from him).

My memory tools: a small spiral pad which helps me remember tasks and followup with them. Most of the people who tend to be busy around me are found with that item nowadays. And it helps.

I know it can get worse than this, but still I will never ever go for tattoos :) or that haircut.

Strangely all this happened without Asin in my life ;), wonder if it would have made things much worse or better?

My playlist plays Guzarish from Ghajini :D

Short and Sweet Holi :)

10-11:15 Am on 11th Mar'09

Shortest Holi ever for me, it started and ended pretty soon. But we won.

We won over the Kala Bandar of exams, quizzes, tension of assignments of the two end terms tomorrow.

But still Kala Bandar managed to win over a few... :(

Still BH and GH celebrated a quick, nice, rangeen, kichad bhari Holi. As always we have had maximum fun when the batch has been together.

Last year was a classic Holi, rooftop in Bangalore, sipping Kailasa made Thandai, Mithai and then drinking beer basking in sunlight, ekdum Shawshank Redemption ishtyle :)

Wishing a Happy Holi to everyone visiting the Blog.

कॉमिक्स और हमारा बचपन

लुईस कैरोल की एलिस को कल्पना के उस अद्भुत संसार में जाने के लिए खरगोश महाशय के घर का रास्ता नापना होता था लेकिन मुझे (याने जब में बच्चा था) या मेरे जैसे कई भारतीय बच्चो को अपने घर के कुछ आधे किलो मीटर की परिधि में कोई सोनू या मनोज लाइब्रेरी ढूंढनी होती थी | उसके बाद तो बस अपने कल्पना के संसार में डूब जाने के लिए हम आजाद होते थे |

नागराज, ध्रुव, परमाणु, भोकाल, तौसी, हवालदार बहादुर, बांकेलाल, चाचा चौधरी, बिल्लू, पिंकी, साबू और ना जाने कितने ही किरदार जीवन का एक हिस्सा बन गए थे | अब जब में पीछे मूड कर देखता हूँ तो यह सोच कर ख़ुशी होती है की भले ही चोरी छुपे या लड़ झगड़ कर भी मैंने कॉमिक्स पढ़ी है तो अच्छा ही किया है, वरना जीवन की ये यादें कभी नहीं बना पाता |

जहाँ तक मुझे याद है कॉमिक्स पढने की खुमारी गर्मी की छुट्टियों में सर चढ़ कर बोलती थी | और कॉमिक्स खरीदना तो काफी महंगा सौदा था इसलिए लगभग हम सभी मित्र किसी ना किसी लाइब्रेरी के सदस्य बन जाते थे और किराए से कॉमिक्स ले आया करते थे | उन चौबीस घंटो के समय में सभी दोस्तों को एक दुसरे की भी कॉमिक्स ख़तम करनी होती थी तो बस फिर क्या कॉमिक्स लाइब्रेरी से ली और पढना चालू एक आधी तो घर पहुँचते पहुँचते ही ख़तम हो जाया करती थी |

शुरूआती दिनों में जहाँ से मुझे याद है कॉमिक्स का किराया होता था पचास पैसे और डाइजेस्ट का एक रुपैया लेकिन हाई रे महंगाई बाद में किराया तय हो गया था कॉमिक्स के दाम का दस प्रतिशत याने ८ रुपैये की कॉमिक्स ८० पैसे में | कॉमिक्स न सिर्फ आपकी कल्पना शीलता को एक नया आयाम देती है अपितु व्यवहारिक ज्ञान में भी वृद्धि कराती है | जैसे आप देख ही सकते है की कभी न कभी तो आपने अपने किसी मित्र के साथ साझेदारी में लाइब्रेरी खोली ही होगी, और कुछ चव्वनी अट्ठनी का मुनाफा कमा कर खुश भी हुए होंगे | लो जी बन गए आप उद्यमी (entrepreneur) !

लेकिन इन सब से बढ़कर बौद्धिक विकास में सबसे मददगार साबित होते थे मित्रो के साथ कॉमिक्सों पर गहन विचार विमर्श ! जी हाँ कौन सा नायक किस नयी शक्ति के साथ आया है, किस नायक को सबसे मुश्किल खलनायक से जूझना पड़ता था, यदि ये दोनों नायक साथ में आये तो ज्यादा अच्छा कौन लडेगा इत्यादि | बिना शक्तियों के दुश्मनों के मात देने वाला सुपर कमांडो ध्रुव मेरा पसंदीदा नायक हुआ करता था | और ध्रुव के खलनायको के ऊपर तो विचार विमर्श मैंने देशपांडे के साथ माइंड ट्री में रहते हुए भी किया था | उदाहरण के लिए चुम्बा, बौना वामन, चंडकाल हाँ लेकिन ध्रुव के दोस्त भी हुआ करते थे जैसे किरिगी, धनञ्जय, येती |

अब तो कई सालों से किसी की भी सुध नहीं ली है | पर मुझे अभी भी यकिन है की ये सभी नायक अपनी जान की बाजी लगा कर आज भी विश्व को बड़े बड़े खतरों से बचा रहे होंगे और इसलिए आप भारत में या यूरोप में या अमरीका में चैन की नींद सो पा रहे है !

A mail by my friend Kapil. I think so many of us would identify with the same. Plus I love his hindi writings (read a couple of his entries secretly in Bengaluru along with Mathuru ;)). Till he has his own blog, this one will be kept by me :).

Also for my friends doing MBA, this is what a Dimdima should feel like, so maybe something like this would have determined your pitch for selling Dimdimas.

Although this is a thinking of a kid 15 years back, things have changed now.

Hardly anything great to Talk about...or maybe

When I used to read Naresh's blog while he was doing MBA I always thought it is surely something which I will enjoy. Talking about things which we {include DAIICT E-Wing, Bangalore BakarBandhooze} had made a habit of was about to find its glorious destiny at a b-school.

At almost of the end of three trims it has been,

- a fight for marks, dirty one at times, me being a party to this constant usage of rand() function...
- my database of facts eroding, that too eroding badly. Desipedia is history :((
- Lack of attention, lack of focus, a future prospect for me becoming a Ghajini hero someday :) (atleast I will get Asin ;))
- horrible writing skills (blogs, reports, I cant write anything properly now)
- lack of movie gyan and watching very few movies
- a whole lot of keywords, but everything is in air. I first thought Fin was grounded, but slowly as I understand it in a better way, that too is highly Airy (financial crisis was bound to happen)
- loosing touch with zillions of my friends back across India...
- less sleep
- no more following news and random data and discussing it over ...
- no more roaming around half the hostel block and doing bakk...
- no time and no money-> (-5.5 lakhs) and further drain of cash :)

Overall the first year has been a bit disappointing for me, or maybe I expected a bit too much... but there were good moments, and they came in company of my nice of no-brainers like me here. They have been together in all the great fun here...

Memories from my Div although didn't make me that senti and all today, but they would linger around.

Maybe I talk about thing in extreme extremes, maybe its not that bad.

Just this internship in Himachal and then I am BACK :)

Although the long term plan or Strategy ( as me and my roomie recall, the most used/abused word this year) remains to minimize my un-learning and maximize sleeping time :)

Situation: Studying Convertibles and Business Law before that, have exams tomorrow
Song: Pardesi, Toshi, Dev-D...the one with 3 dancers and abhay deol drinking, right now my While(1) song :D

This movie would have surely triggered a discussion on nihilistic intentions of Dev back in Bangalore... right now they talk only about the music which is good, but something else missing

Vada-Pav, Totos and ... Girls :)

Vada Pav is God's Own Food in Mumbai. Have gulped thousands of them since being in Mumbai, it comes in various formats and my favorite one is one near NM (Vile Parle) and at Shetty's in front of my college gate.

This place in Bandra, Totos- Garage Pub is really quite nice. The first time I was there back in Aug'08 with my friend we ended up standing on a small table on the side, enjoying the view of tonnes of good looking girls on the Table on View, and obviously having Beer :). I really like the place, a Chicken Roll near Carter Road CCD and a Brownie nearby always precedes the events at Totos. Overall good place...

Girls... well I hardly have had any luck with them... lets not talk... ;)

Kissa-1:

Sometime in August, me along with two of my friends, goto Totos. We drink a bit and then come across few of my friends juniors from his college. So we sit and share the table. Enter this girl, who we all know has to be good (otherwise the story won't be told :)), who comes and sits with us (seems she knows someone among the Juniors). So everyone is talking and fortunately I get a seat in front of her which gives me the freedom to talk with her for ages (it was just two hours:)). Ahha, and her boyfriend too ... he was sitting next to me. But who cares, the girl was good, enough :D

So when all the bills were cleared, she leaves a Rs. 10 tip (or maybe 20, I was drunk, but my bill was already cleared) . I told her why Tip, I think I brought a Pitcher to the Table too, why not Tip me.

"What would you do with this?"... kuch nahi, mujhe tip do, isse vada-pav khaaunga :)

Shocked and Stunned, she Tipped me :), my friend who was the closest linked to her was hiding his face and all other laughing. Don't know why they were, because I kept the note and had an awesome vada-pav of it the next day :)...

Kissa-2:

She is a nice and pretty girl, (self claimed hottie, which I dont agree :P), He is the CUTEst kid in the batch (so much so kid that he was asked for AGE proof at Totos :)). I thought will do them both a favour.

I two years of Vada Pav- for Preety Girl given that she takes Cutest Boy and introduces him to the CUTEst girl at Totos and helps him to hit on the Cutest Girl :). (No one knows who the CUTEst Girl was, rest two are friends )

Cutest Girl was sitting in a corner (with no boys around). So again will the vada pav make it, or break it. I offered Pretty Girl Beer, she refused, but then when I offered her Vada Pav, she agreed. So she took him to meet the CUTEst girl, and the rest as they say was LEGEN...DARY (Barney Stinson's Blog)

Kissa 3:

My friend enginerd was roaming in Bombay it was the day of Chatt and thousands were performing Pooja on Juhu Beach, enginerd was there too, to have a glimpse of Priyanka Chopra who apprantely was there too. I divert him to this party of bloggers (also on http://www.thevoiceinmyhead.com/2006/10/29/mandira-meets-bloggywood/) hosted by my once favorite blogger (once because I hardly read anything nowadays :)). As I was lucky enough to get invited, I thought if I am in Bangalore why doesn't my friend get the chance to have a bit of fun.

But the passing of invite came at a cost, I asked enginerd to buy 4 vadpavs from NM (or mithibai) get them packed and hand it over to the hostess. Surely something that she would remember for quite some time :) (in a party where people are bringing wine and flowers over, that was surely a differentiating factor :)).

2 years later at my college canteen I see her sitting ( i never met her but wrote for her blog sometimes long back), so I go and meet her, and remind her of the vada-pav. She recognises me on the basis of Vada Pav :) and then she remembers me as desh and then we talk :).

Conclusion:

Girls come and go, a vada-pav is forever :P

Who Enjoys It?

Some are doing it, some do not. I always seem to fall in the latter. They do different things, different activities and seem to enjoy it all. For me somehow once the Primary activity starts turning a bit and infact a lot boring I seem to shed the other added ones too.

Some stand up and like giving motivational speeches, which I think are mostly worthless, some do all the work in life and you never know, and some write sitting in their 3 seater room ... :-|

I sometimes end up drinking along with my similarly-bored friend, same Old Monk with dry peanuts, Chakli and watery green chutney and discuss the same things over and over again. Its all about thinking about those great days of Work. Did I say great???

It was thinking about BTech days while being at work, although I thought that the next degree would be back to that kind of fun, but I miss something.

Miss TIME, just to be, just to roam around, discuss stupid stuff with people, read some nice stuff, read books, watch cricket all simple things in life. Taking walks during night-time through the dusty lanes here, me and another of seemingly lost friend, talk about not getting what we wanted here and what we will get after here, thats one of those simple things, but not much otherwise.

I am sick of those same old jargons, I am bored of people not knowing and saying anything about anything without thinking (ha, they call it thinking on the feet), tired of the same old classroom, excel sheets, mera DELL and writing the most stupid pieces of assignments in the history of assignments.

New Year, already half a month past and still to add that much needed freshness, because all things tend to become same over a period, especially when you are in this corner of Mumbai.

Desperately looking forward to March, time for escape to Villages and it would be fun for sure.

People think that I am frustu, but its just the lack of time and senselessness of what I am doing, I know that I need, a new pair of lenses to view the world.

Literally, these specs are old and loose now :D