Part 1: To the land of high passes we..... plan to go!

January, that time of the year when the winter has set up north, the weather is nice and cool down south, and Mumbai is..... well.... Mumbai!

 

It is also that time of the year when professionally, you get one of the most important pieces of information you would need for the rest of the year. And that is....... the holiday calendar! The relief you get when you see a 4 day weekend happening without you having to take any leave of your own is a feeling worth savoring!

 

So, in January, the wife and I set about planning our holidays for the year. And we had only one place where we just had to.... HAD TO go.

 

LADAKH.

 

For the uninformed, Ladakh is a district in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. It is famous for hosting some of the highest motorable passes in the world, and renowned for its mountainous terrain and beauty. And the people are just the best! This is a place everyone should visit once in their lifetime!

 

The number of days of the trip was decided by the toss of a coin. Heads, 1 week, Tails, 2 weeks. The first coin toss came up Heads......we said 'Let us take best of 3'! We continued so till we got a Tails maximum.

 

The route was simple to decide. We would be thorough in our travel, and go from Manali to Leh to Srinagar, thus enjoying two of the most mesmerizing road routes you will ever get to see on this planet.

 

The time of the year to travel was decided to be the time when the rains would have just started in Ladakh. Hence, July 22nd -August 7th was chosen. It also strategically meant we could take only 10 days leave, but still get a good 15 days out of it! SMART! ;)

 

We needed people to come with us! We spoke to people we knew, and 3 other people agreed to come along. AWESOME! It's always great to travel with good company! 

 

Having had just about the experience in riding a motorcycle as a young kid learning to ride a cycle for the first time, I did not want to take any chances (rather, I did not have the balls!!!) in doing a Bullet roadtrip. The fact that I did not have a car of my own (or people who were coming along who had a car of their own), meant that a hired cab was the way to go! Sorted!

 

The wife was very efficient in choosing the hotels. Those with a good rating with good comments as well were chosen. Ah, the vast amount of knowledge the internet holds, that is of so much value to us! If not for them, how would we even survive?!?!

 

On to the most difficult part of the entire planning process. How to get your leave sanctioned by your reporting manager. Here, each man (& woman) was to themselves, there was no other way out! It just had to be done, by hook or crook! Strategies planned to get them to agree to the leave were hatched, and they just had to be executed!

 

So the stage was set, the five of us were ready to take on the world! Nothing could stop us from experiencing the greatness that is Ladakh...... or could it?

 

Skip to June end, and the 3 other people who were supposed to come dropped out.......this left with just me and my wife, and having to go through the exercise of bringing in a few more people! With every 'No yaar... can't do it... won't get any leave' and 'I would love to make it, but I just did a trip recently!!', we were losing hope. Then, at the last moment, a lovely couple agreed to tag alongwith us! We were saved! The trip was ON again!

 

Then, in July, this happened. Our trip included a couple of days stay at Srinagar. We were close to the date of the trip. The situation was not getting any better. Others who we knew were traveling around the same time were frantically canceling or rescheduling their trips and skipping the Srinagar leg. What do we do? Do we take the risk and continue with our trip? Do we frantically change our schedule to limit it just to Manali- Leh? So many questions to be answered.... so little time!

 

What actually happened was a memorable trip that would be forever etched in my memory. The ups and the downs, the drama that unfolded closer to the end of our journey (During the time of our planned Srinagar phase) is something that can only be experienced! I will try my level best to pen down the phases of our trip as much as possible, in coming posts! Stay tuned!

Lord of the Cable, The Return of the Idiot Box

What I am about to say now, was absolutely, completely, 250% true. You may say "YEAH RIGHT! FEKU!" and just close this post right away, or just sit in front of the screen with your jaws wide open ( :O "Are you kidding me?!?!") but you just HAVE to believe me on this.

I did NOT have the IDIOTBOX at my home for 2.5 years!

Yes... it seems a long long LONG time ago, but yes, it is the truth. Those were the days when I had only one thing that I felt was worth watching... FOOTBALL! And with the advent of Internet, and faster and faster speeds, it just made more sense to just stream the games I wanted to watch, rather than invest on a gigantic screen. There was NO WAY I was going to have one at home... EVER!

Unless.... I wanted an XBox, or a Playstation. Mind you, this thought did crop up my mind many a times! But, I had the resilience and the will power of a thousand SPARTANS fighting against the Persians (rather, it was 300, based on my extensive research of the movie "300") to resist the need for it. It only made it easy knowing that buying such a device would cover more than 75% of my room, leaving me with enough space to cringe in the corner of the room and sleep. And blog about it too.

Oh...How I digress!

So, things were good. I'd say great even! No T.V..... Just chill in life! Nothing could stop me from NOT getting it! Or so I thought.......

There comes a time in a man's life, when he think's he is making a decision that is of his own will, and that everything from there on would be smooth going, with a common consensus always being reached before anything is done. It is only AFTER marriage (which is "that time"), that he realizes that he is actually akin to the President of our great motherland! The head, but "naam ke vaaste" only! Of course, we men only realize this AFTER the blissful event has happened.

So on comes the wifey to her new home....and before you know it......BOOM! There it is.. in all its shining glory! THE RETURN OF THE IDIOTBOX!

It all happens so subtly, you don't even know what hits you. Next thing you know, your day after office goes in watching Wipeout, 2 and a half men, I survived a Japanese Game show (HAAAIII MAJJIIDDEE!! Oh that just cracks me up everytime!), Friends and what not. It's like smoking cigarettes. You can resist all you want before you take your first one.... but once you start, it's just so hard to let go! Time just flies when you have the TV at home! The only thing is that it's not just time that flies, you will find a lot of other things flying towards you! The rolling pan....the high heels... what not!

"hey... HEY!!OYE!!! CAN YOU HEAR ME?!?!" *After no response from the hubby, who is hypnotized by the movements and the sounds of the idiotbox, wifey throws any object in her reach right at him* (In case you are wondering what this paragraph is about...it just describes the last 2 sentences of the last paragraph in a bit more detail!)

So guys... yes... ONLY THE GUYS!!! Please note, in order to lead a peaceful, wonderful life.... PLEASE HAVE ADEQUATE COVER TO SURVIVE THE ONSLAUGHT!

Random Musings of a Romantic kind!!

Romeo! Romeo! Where art thou Romeo!!
Don't let me go 'Ayyayyo'!Don't let me go 'Ayyayyo'!

(Sorry, I could not help resist coming up with that one!!)

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We keep on hearing of flash sales these days. Mobiles and what not getting sold in .00000001 of a second! Wonder if matrimony sites would come up with something similar!! This would be called 'Flash Matrimony - get your loved one in .0000001 of a second'!!

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Saw this on someone's Facebook timeline, and couldn't help but think 'OK. This is sound advice. To be followed religiously.'

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Talking about Facebook, it's uncanny how they manage to bring you the right advertisements at the right time.

When you are a bachelor : It's all matrimony sites! FIND YOUR LOVED ONE HERE! ONE IN A MILLION AND JUST FOR YOU! CLICK HERE! And what not...

Once you update your status to "engaged" though, the whole thing changes.
Now I see "Wedding Photography.... for the best clicks of your special moment!"
"Choose the best Wedding locations and Honeymoon destinations. CLICK HERE!"

I can only wonder, after I get married, what would Facebook throw at me?
"CLICK HERE TO GET YOUR FIRST CHILD!!!"???

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I just realized that the heading for this blog post may be a bit misleading. The random Musing bit would be perfect, but the romantic kind? Is there any romantic bit in anything I have written above?.....well, that's a tactic to bring people to read this space!! HA HA!

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Random conversation with a friend of mine.

Friend : Dude, What are you doing now?
Me : Hey buddies! Whatsaaaappp! I've just finished dinner at home. You?
Friend : Oh man.... Stop being such a Husband already!
Me : :| :| :|

Love is in the air...

... And it is entering this blog as well!!!

Stay tuned for more here!

The Great Indian Love Story

NOTE: I do not know anyone by the names I have mentioned below. If there is someone by that name, it is purely coincidental! PLEASE EXCUSE! AND BE HAPPY YOUR NAME IS IN A BLOG! OK let's move to the post now.....

Ah yes. Love. The time when the guy sees the girl and gets that feeling neither he nor she can describe. That innate feeling of happiness, joy and freedom. The need to keep on staring, whatsapping, FB chatting or Facetiming the other person. On to take the relationship ahead, and end with marriage, if the girl accepts his proposal. Oh! The good times!

However, in a country like India, things are not as simple as that. Oh no, not by a LOOONNNNGGG way. We Indians, when at the ripe age of 25 - 30, look at taking it to the next level. And that is where all the complications arise. For we are not a country with a single religion, single belief, same customs. No we are not!! Far from it, even God would have a hard time finding out the total number of religions and customs in this country!

We, as the youth of the country, are at the forefront of technology. This means, free access to all religions, beliefs, and of course, the women (or for the women, the men) of other religions, castes, creeds etc etc.!!! So much choice!!! What can do we do at this point?

1. Go after who we want : In 99% of the cases, this would mean going against our parents wishes. This invariably leads to years and years of bloodshed, chaos, and most importantly, missing out on those delicious home made goodies!!!
2. Go with what they (meaning, your parents) want: This way, your profile would be posted on all matrimonial sites, with yourself being projected as "Another man Superman!" instead of "Anantharaman Subbaraman". Families from the boys and the girls side meet, exchange many pleasantries, plan the engagement, wedding and the honeymoon of the boy and the girl, before the boy even gets the chance to meet the girl.
3. OR, follow a third way. A blend of the first 2 ways. A 1.5th way, if you may put it that way. In order to illustrate how it goes, I shall put a "case study" below.

So say we have this guy, a queer sweet vegetarian Tamil Brahmin who goes by the name Thiruvillai Krishnaswamy Ranganathan Kunjappan Iyer (Yes, we Tam Brahms have tongue twisting, never ending names too!) . He sees a girl.

Immediate thoughts in his mind (basic instincts, rather, of any male)

"The girl looks good!"

"Oh man hope I can talk to her atleast once!"

"Hope she can say my name properly! Otherwise I'll just ask her to call me KR... much simpler no?"

He meets the girl. He asks her name

"Harminder Singh Sobti"

His heart sinks. "OH NOOOOOO!! Ayo parents will never accept! Marriage alliance down the drain, we can be only friends!"

The problem doesn't end there. KR meets another girl the very next day! The same thoughts go through his mind...... He asks her name

"Sapna Narayanasami"

His heart skips a beat. "TAMIL IYER PONNU!! OMG OMG OMG! YESSSSS" He thinks. He smiles at her and decides to take the next step in interacting with her. There is only one way this conversation is going.

"What is your Gothram?" (Don't ask me what this is called in English, I have absolutely no idea!)

"Kaundiliya"

He screams his head off! ITS THE SAME AS MINE! NOOOOO! All efforts to woo this girl down the drain!! Have to go back to friendship zone! What a waste of effort!

LO AND BEHOLD, the very next day, he meets this simple, studious Pattathi (Iyer) called Azhagia Brahmakumari Chidambaram Dorai (or, very conveniently, ABCD in short! I'm not sure Azhagia is a girl's name, but I just wanted ABCD to come in the first place.)

Our dear KR goes through the motions once again. This time his hopes are a bit low.

"Azhagia?? Is that even a name?? Ummm... she looks cute BTW!". For us men, after sometime, all it takes is a bit of cuteness, to set the ball rolling.

This time however, ABCD starts asking questions to him. His antenna goes into alert mode. He thinks "This is not standard protocol!!! Better alert the relevant authorities!!" and swiftly goes and tells his parents of a possible alliance, even before he talks to ABCD.

The parents huddle together and deliberate. KR watches on nervously as they go through her Facebook profile. "Good looking", "Well educated".... the vibes are coming out good! KR gets asked a lot of the standard questions. However, as he has already gone through the motions a lot of times before, he had done his homework!! He already got all the relevant details from ABCD in his own sweet way and presents them to his parents.

And finally, the outcome. Parents say YES!!! KR is ecstatic! FINALLY ALLIANCE APPROVAL FROM PARENTS! I CAN GO AHEAD AND ASK ABCD OUT!

Parents ask "DAI! How are you going to take this ahead?". KR actually becomes "Another man Superman" and replies "Don't worry Amma, Appa! I got this!" and promptly goes ahead to date ABCD, and get things in place before the parents can change their mind!

So you can see, the Indian Love story is not a simple "I love you, you love me, lets live happily ever after". There are a lot of external factors, unknown variables, and complex solutions, that even a creative MBA (HA, yeah right, that was an oxymoron right there!) would find hard to decipher. And that is what makes this, the great Indian Love Story (Or South Indian, as I have put all Southie names here, ah but it would be the same all across the country!!)

What I took from the first week of the BPL

YESSS!!! It's that time of the year when all males (and a few females too, I must say!!) find themselves more busy than the president of their respective countries. Want to go shopping? Plumber come home to fix the pipe? The girl you like/love asking you out on a date? BAH!! All that can wait!!

Weekends are never the same without the beautiful game coming every weekend on TV. We watch with bated breath every pass and assist made, free kick taken, goal scored! We scowl at every foul,  swearing at the referee and the players alike! (That's a #^$£#+#^#£#£ foul!! RED CAAARRRDDD!!)

So it all started last Saturday. And there were quite a few things that happened that would indicate how the rest of the season may go. Of course, this is just one game, you would say. But there's a lot to learn from a single round of games!

1. Man Utd fans of the world (me included!!!)!! Please stop having very high expectations of the team. It has not changed much from last season (I would say it has reduced in quality!!). Please wait for a few months to see how many formations Van Gaal can make the team play properly. And what reinforcements he brings in the summer transfer window. The team is in dire need of reinforcements at the back and in the middle. The formation change will take time to adapt. The lengthy list of injuries are not helping either. But not all is bad!! This is United. We will recover!

2. Arsenal are looking quite the compact strong team this year. Winning at the last moment, the never say die attitude is in the team. But why do I keep getting this feeling that Arsene Wenger will 'Arsene'  himself again this year? (Going great guns in the beginning, only to falter in 2 weeks of continuous losses) The FA cup and Community Shield wins (Especially the community Shield) were impressive. And they have the German trio yet to come!! Things are looking up at the club now. But then, it was looking up at the same time last year as well!!

3. Liverpool might just end up doing a Tottenham this year. The only difference being they should still make it to the top 4 (Stress on JUSSSSSTTTTTT). They did buy half of the Southampton team (and a whole host of others) over the summer using Suarez's money. But they are still a bit short in the midfield which may just haunt them later on. Meanwhile....

4. Tottenham would look to push for the champions league spots. Lloris showed once again why he is pivotal to their charge this year. Some quite brilliant saves made!! This should be the season where last years recruits should start paying dividends, and they should be playing exciting football.

5. The major contenders for the title look to be Chelsea and Manchester City. Both eased to wins in the first round. Chelsea have made some fantastic signings (Mourinho factor always plays a part, of course!!), while City are consolidating on last years champion team! But I would not be surprised one bit if any one of Man Utd, Arsenal, Liverpool or even Tottenham give them a scare!!!

6. Will Keane (now assistant manager at the club) be able to make a difference in Aston Villa? They did start off well against Stoke. Some good play and a disciplined defence, I expect the fiery former Utd captain to make his presence felt in the style of play at the club!

There's so much more to happen over the rest of the season! So much to look forward to!! The scrap at the front and back of the league table will be exciting! New signings, new formations..... Each season just gets better and better!! BRING IT ON!!!!

A different world, a new perspective!

Imagine yourself in a place where you are the odd one out.  A place where you are the only one with the kind of education and work background. Yes, I understand. Given that most of us are MBAs who have also been Engineers, it will be pretty hard to imagine!! But still, give it your best shot. 

So you are in this party, and you have budding singers, bass guitarists, people from the media and advertising industry, a cricket player even, all around you!! It's like a whole new world out there, and you are a new entrant to the scene.

At the tender age of 30 (actually, if your a normal Indian, you would at any age after 20), a whole lot of things start going through your mind. 

• THERE IS A WORLD OUT THERE OTHER THAN ENGINEERS AND MBAS!! This is a world I never knew even existed!! There are people out there with lives outside of a laptop, iPad and smartphone!! 
• You would start questioning your own life, as it is. "What the hell am I doing? Going for an 8.15 hour job, working on excel sheets and ppts. Look at these guys!! Value creators right in front of me!! What awesome lives they must be living!!"
• Giving business cards and waiting for the other person to comment on it may not be the best way to introduce yourself. You may actually have to say something!!
• People cringe when they hear what you do. "So buddy. What is it that you do?". "Oh. Well, I work in a manufacturing firm creating innovative strategies for large corporates to make immense profits!!". "WOW!! You must be earning enough to buy flats in Colaba man!!". At this point you just nod. It's better if they have that image of you. You'd rather not spoil it by telling them the truth!!
• You wait for sometime to try and understand the language they speak, for you have been too long in the corporate world to understand words like chords, octaves and clefs. The words you would be comfortable with are synergies, syndications, and Eyyafyallayöküll.
• You hear someone talk politics, and jump on it, talking in true MBA style, starting from the history to the mystery of the current elections. This is the one chance you get to open your mouth!! You suddenly realise, however, that the room is quiet and everyones gone to the other room!! You also overhear the media guy say "I said anything is better than politics" and realise you had been listening too little, or were just not able to comprehend the conversation that was going on.
• Hitting on someone is next to impossible for you, for they would assume you're imitating a character and call you a copy cat!!

Me : Heyy.. How you doing?

She : Ugh!! Look at him Joeying me!!

Me : What? No way!! Have you met me?

She : Oh now he is Stinsoning me!!

Me : :|

• Everyone has an interesting story to tell. And I mean, EVERYONE!! The closest to interesting you have ever had was when you went to the amusement park, with your parents. Sigh!!
• They start talking about places you could only think about going, and as though they have been there their whole life!! "Oh yeah New York! The Brooklyn area is just awesome. The media scene is just amazing!! There are some outstanding singers on the scene out there!! The burgers over at 5th avenue, 2 blocks away from the subway, is fab dude! Don't you dare compare New York to New Jersey!! I shuttle between NY and Mumbai". You think in your mind " Ummmmm... Have you ever heard of a place called Surat? No? Durgapur? No? OK.." And continue listening to the rest of the conversation intently, nodding your head as though you understand everything they say.
• People actually know to dance! It's not the usual two hand up in Bhangra dance, or the dhappanguthu (south indian) dance that you would normally get to see in any normal party. No. People dance and dance to the tune of the music. 

So, I guess it's good that you be out of place once in a while. Gives you a whole new perspective on yourself, and on the world around you!!