Bored Ruminations

It has been four months since I have been employed. And the only thing I have learnt apart form the fact that you actually wish your colleagues “Happy Weekend” on Fridays is to unlearn the theory that you have to work a lot while you are being employed while I was in college. Well, another thing I have learnt of course is that your supervisor will come to look for you to fill timesheets, to tell you about some non-technical training, asking you about the coming get-together, hand you your termination letter at the exact time on which you will not be present at your “work”place. Ok, he didn’t come to hand me my termination letter, but maybe he did come and didn’t find me anywhere. But Murphy taught us all this years back. Didn’t he? So there goes my chance to “learn” anything  because just learnt that before I should have learnt that. Frankly, why are you still reading this post??

And even more frankly, I don’t know why I am writing this post.  May be plain boredom at work. F act that I was in the organising team of our Annual Get-together, fiction that I actually helped in that organising. Fact that Internet has now marked my blogspot blog URl as a phishing address, fiction that I actually harboured fishes there. I even deleted the widget “Feed these Fishes”, but to no avail. Fact that I am thinking of buying a personal domain, fiction that I will actually do so. Fact that I am writing something meant to be a blogpost, fiction that I will actually post it. Ok, did you just say that it is not fiction that I will post this as you can read this blogpost. You too are damned bored right now, aren’t you?

So, if you are still with me you may have read that I was in the organising team of the Annual get-together of my firm. Forgive me if I make that sound like organising of Olympics, but still there were lessons to learn it. Like how to shop with ladies. “Shopping”, “Ladies” and “Men” have difficulty in existing together. I knew that beforehand, but I learnt it now. Then naming an event is the most difficult part and you have to start with that. Or that lucky numbers are not really lucky. Actually we had a lucky draw prize based on the coupon numbers allotted with the invitations to employees. Now as the organisers , some of has had first access to the coupons and selected numbers like 123, 111, 013, 007 or like in order to get lucky. But the numbers which won were 072, 078 and we realised that the numbers we thought were lucky were actually only good looking numbers. On second thoughts, 13 x 6 = 78. Now did you tell me to shut up?

Another lesson I learnt was that while expats got to know about the timing of event , 5.30 pm that is  by looking at the invitation card and arrive at that time , we Indians never require the invitation card to know about the timing. Like we Indians all arrived at 7.30 and that was the time the event started. Telepathy, anyone?

Also, recently we had a Rewards and Recognition felicitation at our office which is held to reward the outstanding performers of the last 3 months. Only, this time it was a little different. Instead of rewarding people with outstanding work in the last 3 months, the management decided to award everybody who worked in the last 3 months. And the awardees were in total 5 in number.

And at last, as the year draws to a close, it reminds of the number of great people we lost this year. Along with Shammi Kapoor and Dev Anand , the person whose work I liked the most was Shrilal Shukl. And,

मैं श्रीलाल शुक्ल के बारे में कुछ नहीं लिखना चाहूँगा 

क्योंकि वो शब्द सूरज को ना सिर्फ दीया, बल्कि माचिस दिखाने के जैसा

होगा, वो भी बुझी हुई माचिस ।

And to conclude , I must admit that I have not seen many movies of either Shammi Kapoor Or Dev Anand, but of all the old songs I love and they are far greater in number than the new ones, I realised few days back that 90% of them star either Shammi Kapoor or Dev Anand. RIP All.

Ghar Ki Baat

My father was recently transferred to a place called Hajipur. I visited my family recently during vacations. Now when you are at home and friends call you, there is a standard question which goes like," Kya Kar Raha hai?" . To which there is a standard answer, "  Kuch Nahi."

An Open Letter to Ms Priya Ramani

For Reference , please first read this link

Dear Ms Ramani,

Thank you, Ms Ramani for reminding me that I am an Indian. You know , the world cup is going on and I did not at all follow the Asia Cup . Actually I have not been following cricket since the World T20 started. This disinterest started to make me feel if I am cent per cent Indian still. But thanks to your article- and I am being polite and Indian enough to call it just an article- I now know that I am still an Indian . Cent per cent, or may be more.

No, I don’t spit in public, haven’t ever tried to watch any Indian soap let alone trying to like or understand them, don’t like mangoes either and only if necessary start the conversation with remark, “How slim you have become!!” instead of going other way around. Heck , I have even resisted the temptation to ask Harsha Bhogle on his timeline as to how he got his crop of new hair, in spite of the fact that I am going to be completely hairless in two years. But yes, my father likes mangoes. And he is an Indian. And as a public servant done more for the Indian people than you ever will through your journalistic duties. And yes, he does his work as dutifully as ever and in fact loves his work. So technically in your eyes , he is not an Indian. Indian bureaucrats don’t do that, do they? But paradoxically for you he still calls himself Indian. And so do a lot of other people who continuously strive to make India the “greatest place on earth” that you so frown about despite of numerous hurdles and cynics.   People like Mr. Kalam, Mr E. Sreedharan, my father, me if I do my work well, and even you Ms Ramani , if you aspire to bring about some change through your writings and try to  write well.

Ms Ramani I celebrate all my festivals the way the way they are meant to be celebrated coz I think the person who invented festivals must have been the greatest psychologist out there , ever. And he did not tell us that we should not be up on Christmas as people are supposed to sleep in night or that we should all turn vegetarian as it is so cruel for the poor turkey to lose its life for us to celebrate on thanksgiving or that we should not get spongy drunk and get all brash and loud on the new year’s eve. Likewise he did not tell me that I ought not burst crackers on Diwali night coz it disturbs the dogs and the people who are old or that I should refrain from pouring colours on Holi just because I think colours are more ‘colourful’ than being bland. Tell you what Ms Ramani, if I do not care about the Turkey, I might as well not care about the dogs and  those old people must have done the same when they were of my age i.e. burst a lot of crackers and throw colours. But then you might choose to disagree with the shrink or with me. Bloody well, you can – I am not going to burst crackers in your house or throw colours on you. Because it is in India you are. You can easily say screw off without the danger of being screwed yourself.

You curse a politician and well, any one should for what he has done. But I really don’t think that a major chunk of our politicians are Indians at all. They are Hindus, Muslims, or Yadavs, Brahmins , or from any other caste before being an Indian. Or else they are Biharis, Bengalis, form Telengana, or south Indians, or Marathis . Or in this case they are simply being males than being Indians. May be you have been looking in wrong places Ms Ramani.  Indians are not like Politicians that they have. It is the other way around. Politicians are not like the Indians they represent.

Yes, I  too don’t think that India is the greatest country around. But still I am Indian because as long I try to work to make it the greatest country , I will be Indian I guess. Most of the chest thumping on Jai Ho came from the NRI community who for all there ‘Indian-ness’reside In their USA and Canada for the ‘standard of living’ they get there and have scantly done anything for their INDIA. If you think that they are Indians , may be you have been using wrong frames as well. For most of the Indians, Slumdog Millionaire was an overstretched tale of the notion West has about India. That while we are no more a country of snakes and elephants, all we have is abject poverty, software professionals, and riots. It only interested us because it won us two Oscars. Did  you find Slumdog Millionaire insightful? Watch  Bawarchi -  a Rajesh Khanna movie. It will tell you more about Indian values than any Danny Boyle America can bring here. Danny Boyle would never tell you that India is the only country where you will get away with calling the national God “A Loser” as you call Ram or publicly bashing the very existence of the major festivals being held here.  It is not that we don’t care. It is because we know how to keep quiet when someone disagrees. How to make the other person feel acknowledged in the peaceful terms even if he says ‘no’ in the most blasphemous and ridiculous manner. We are not going to tell you to buzz off in the manner  Joel Stein does. He is an American you  know. But still if you think that his version is more respectable, then you are still welcome. It is India, after all.

Or, maybe you tried to inject some humour or to use a better word, some ‘sarcasm’ in your piece, and maybe I didn’t get that. But I have always believed that it is not your readers fault if he doesn’t get your sarcasm, it is yours. You  were not subtle enough or maybe you were not revealing enough. What do you think? You may choose to disagree and say that I am not intellectual enough to understand you ‘intended’ humour. And I am okay with it. I give you the right to disagree because I am an Indian. I have seen a lot of people crying hoarse on a lot of matters like region and religion. People who tend to think that people do not have the right to think otherwise in their so called ‘jurisdiction’. Ms Ramani, did somebody attack your office or your car or your house for writing what you did? I would think not. Maybe you will reckon the reason for that is that more people watch My Name Is Khan in India than those who read an English newspaper- a business one at that.   But I think that it is because there are more people in India who are Indian than those who are merely Hindu, Muslim or Marathi .  So while you say that my fellow Indian lot is deeply unaware of the existence of anybody other than his own , he is wild, uncouth, uncultured, do not respect women, eats mangoes(!!!!!), watches dumb shows etc etc, I am just going to smile at you and politely say that while I do not agree with your views, and so will millions of my fellow Indians whom you so conveniently choose to keep out of the definition of being ‘Indian’, I will not vandalise either your home or your office, will not try to get you to leave the country, or to get a fatwa issued against you or try to get a hefty bounty placed on your head.  Because you are in India, does not matter whether you think yourself as an Indian or not . And by the virtue of being in India, you have the right to disagree. And if Ms Ramani, by any chance you somehow read this post where I disagree with your views, and still you do not flag this blog for having difference of opinion,  Ms Ramani, sorry to say, but you are still an Indian.



Welcome to India,
Sumit

Ek Katora Khoon

There was a wallpaper in the hall. It had a small picture of Amitabh Bachhan in one corner. And almost the rest of the wallpaper had a picture of a man with the words scrolled over, “Amitabh Bachhan is alive today because of me.”  Apparently the blood given to AB during his recent stomach infection was his. Guess they could not find the person who gave blood to AB when he was hurt during  Coolie. Then there would have been a picture of that man and the caption, “Abhishek Bachhan is alive today because of me.”  I began wondering where my blood will go.  A poster in front of me said that my blood might save the life of 4 different people. Below that something was written in Greek. Actually it was English only, but medical science (allopathy) which had its origin in Greece , is still so infatuated with the language of its mother place, that anything related to it sounds like Greek , even if it is English. So I went to the first person who could understand Greek i.e. the doctor and she told me that my blood will go to a man, a woman, a child and a dog. DOG??? She shrugged and said that the dog can be excluded if he does not belong to the family. But if otherwise, be prepared for the dog kind’s ultimate reply to Dharam Paaji , “ Look who is drinking whose blood now?????”    Okkk , I made up that last bit, Dharam Paaji .  You can rest peacefully - Gabbar is long dead and dogs do not reply.  

                          There were reasons I did not want to write this post. One, I had decided that I would henceforth not write any personal post, as my personal life is as boring as watching dry paint get wet and peel off during rains, and therefore so will be my blog. Secondly this post has the ability to make my only reader -my friend Nivesh baulk off of the idea of visiting my blog anytime soon. But this is for “The Bigger Cause”. Just like blogging about tigers will somehow help to increase their numbers, blogging about blood donation will also help the cause. How?? I don’t know. And I doubt anybody knows either. But still.....

                               So, I went to donate my blood. It was under a campaign titled in a very cheesy manner called, “Hum tumhein khoon denge,Tum humein DCE do.”  DCE happens to be our college which has been converted into a university in an even more cheesy fashion. So , a lot of things have been going around. Politics, playing with politics –both inside and outside, playing politics-both inside and outside, trying to get oneself made PC, trying to get a friend made PC, trying to get an enemy stopped from being made PC and shedding blood , tears and swaet, obviously among other things. For the uninitiated, PC stands for placement coordinator. Strangely, it also stands for Political coordinator.  Politics and blood always go hand in hand. But the good thing has been that this time blood has been ours and not others , and it has not been wasted even if the movement comes to a standstill.

                                                                                So, where will my blood go?  I sincerely wish and pray that my blood is never needed by anybody. Not that I am infected by HIV AIDS or the likes. It will be nice if I get  a picture with Sachin with myself being projected as the star. But that will mean that I will have to wish that Sachin gets through a tragedy grave enough to require blood.  That cannot happen. Wouldn’t it be nice if my blood comes back to me when I  need that?  Like a bank, where you deposit money when you do not need that and take it away when you are in need. But in a bank, you lend money to the bank, whereas in a blood bank, you donate  blood. Guess, therein lies the difference.

                    Inside there was another poster which said that only 5%of all eligible Indians donate  blood. Sordid fact , for sure. But what is the eligibility? Any person who weighs more than 45 Kg and has not suffered from diseases like typhoid or jaundice in the last 3 months can donate. That makes around  70-75% of Indians eligible to donate. But only 5% do so.  Another chart inside told me of the things I ought to do after having donated. I should not carry heavy weights for the next 24 hours.  Now, that makes around  40% of Indians who sustain their families through daily labour-intensive jobs ineligible to donate. That chart also advised me to take a lot of liquid food within the next 24 hours. Now around 55-60% of Indians cannot afford any sort of liquid food other than water. And about 65%of Indians do not have access to clean drinking water. Wonder how much does the eligibility of such people count. One of my friend there collapsed after giving blood because he had not had any solid food since morning. So, I guess that must be criteria as well. Now, I assume that around 40% of Indians are not quite acquainted with the idea of “Breakfast” and they have their first meal of the day as lunch at noon at around 12-1 pm. And the blood bank opens till 4 in evening.  Now, I do not remember set theory, terms like union and intersection etc.  I also am not trying to prove anything, nor am I trying to make a statement. I am just trying to look at things a little differently. Now each one of those people- one who is a labourer, one who does not have access to clean drinking water and cannot have the luxury having breakfast , might need blood in their  life at one stage or other, without being eligible per se.  That is why blood bank is not strictly a bank, more a trust , with each one of Indian who has got the luxury in monetary terms, has the luxury in terms of time, has the luxury in terms of health, has the luxury to be strictly eligible , as one of it trustee. And that is why everyone should donate. Also they give you a pack of Tropicana juice of your choice. Guess, that should be reason enough.

             Also, I will have to break the news to my mother. Donating blood is still a taboo in majority of middle-class households. She will create a scene at home and send me its commentary on phone. Some of my friends also face the same problem. But, mothers are like that only. She will understand.

UNVIELED

We are proud to announce another remarkable addition in our glittering list of previous brand ambassadors like Bill Clinton, Silvio Berlusconi, Nikolas Sarkozy. May I present to you our next and perhaps most apt brand ambassador till date, ex-because of sex- Governor of Andhra Pradesh 85 years young Mr. N.D. Tiwari. A truly inspirational figure for all the Japani Tel users . May he continue to inspire us with his jidhar dekhi naari, udhar aankh maari ways till the end of his days and keep increasing our pride and selling stocks. And remember, Tel ko maliye, Kaam par chaliye.

We are truly yours,
Phuc Pho Lai
CEO,
Japani Tel Ltd.

NO 1

Yay, we are the no.1...... NO.1 NO.1 No.1. And if I couldn't believe it yet by now, every English , Hindi, Urdu, Bengali , Marathi, Bhojpuri, etc etc news channel has strained every nerve and sinew to infuse my mind , body and soul with this earth-shattering, zamin-hilaoing bit of information. Everyone. probably except CNN . They care as much about cricket as we do about global warming. But we are NO.1. Australia teri monkey(or maa ki) , POM POM POM, you baby bums. And Proteas.... unko karo khallas.

We are the NO 1. So what if they had Kangaroo curry in Kangaroo land and after all the bandar shorba we tried, all we were left with was maa ki, behan ki and Irfan Pathan's fiancee. We are the NO 1.

And all hail the Almighty and omniscient BCCI ,who of course foresaw it years back when it designed the FTP for India. After all, you remain champions until you lose to any other team .And in order to lose, you have to play. And since Bangladesh has been begging us for a test series for the last 4 years, lets us oblige them then. Since it wouldn't be the world cup, it is rather unlikely that we would lose. Damn those ICC rankings which will automatically dethrone us in time to come. This is the BCCI way of setting benchmarks. Anybody who becomes No 1 , we would snicker and mockingly say them ,"But you haven't played us, we suppose!!!!" And also officially at last we have something we are better than China at. Given the fact that they have started thrashing us in hockey and have taken a liking to learn English as well.

We are the best . Even as I write this , a T.V. channel is going bonkers about this at 12 at midnight. Yes, after we were thrashed in a 20-20 just a couple of days ago , which the captain described as a practice game . How one can regard a game in which he is representing his country at par with a game between Board President XI and Timbuktu XI is of course rather beyond me . Perhaps representing India Cements (CSK) is more Indian for our captain than representing India itself in an admittedly hit-and-giggle format.

But what has been rather surprising for me has been the general surprise and shock that has preceded happiness and satisfaction displayed by Indian media. Reminds me of India playing tests in South Africa in 2007-08. By winning the first test they surprised themselves so much that they promptly ended up losing second and third . As they say , winning is a habit. But as much winning is a habit, losing is also one. It has taken more than a quarter of a century to lose the habit of losing. Losing the habit of winning can be much easier and can be rather swift. Specially when confronted with spiteful Australian and South Africans on their home turf.

But then after all it remains rather debatable that how much importance need be attached to the rankings of a system which until recently ranked Nuwan Kulasekara as No1 ODI bowler, Sri Lanka as No.2 ranked test team , and Gautam Gambhir(though rather good, but....) as No1 test batsman. The same council, recently adjudged on its "All Time Great Bowlers List" that Dale Steyn is No.22 on the list and one highly ineffective , inconsistent bloke called Wasim Akram whose 900 + wickets chiefly consisted of the tailenders only, be rightly placed at 59. The same system on the batting list opines that Mat Hayden be at No.10 and a certain flat track, small ground bully called Sachin Tendulkar be languishing at no.26. If a drunkard like Shane Warne puts him at No1 on his list, lets punish him by throwing him off at no.15 on bowlers list. Is it that important? Blogs like Greatbong or Amit Verma don't even consider it important enough to even post about it. Sections of Indian media has been honking about it and I wrote a post. But then some people are rather less occupied and rather less important.


P.S--- Icc is considering introducing two balls from either end in ODIs thereby effectively eliminating reverse swing as each ball will be maximum 25 overs old. As Dennis Lille once said," Maybe they will ban the yorkers next." But probably, next may be they will ban bowling itself, installing a bowling machine instead which can be adjusted as per to the whims and fancies of ICC.

Of Birds,Of Bees , Of Nabi's and OF T.Vs

Did your parents have a T.V. at home prior to nine months when you were born? If yes , then chances are that you do not exist. Wait, if you are harboring thoughts of flagging my blog for questioning your very existence. These are not my words, but were put in my mouth ,rather in my pen by this. A full page analysis on Sunday Times of India followed.

When I was in class IX, there used to be question in my syllabus which went like," What are the reasons for the growing population of India?". In answer, there used to be 9 reasons and on no.9 the reason given was," A lot of people in India being poor, do not have any other source of entertainment than sex." Why was it at no.9 intrigued me a lot. Either reasons no 1-8 were more important than this or else the government wanted us kids to believe that there were more important reasons(and causes) of so many children being produced other than sex. But, what intrigues me even more is that what makes the Health minister see the no.9 as a sudden no.1 ?