2007 To Do List

The days around New Year’s Eve can be called as the ‘Resolution Season’. Almost everyone around is talking about resolutions and looking out for things that they want to do in the New Year. I decided to give this a thought and came up with a list of things that I would like to do in 2007. ‘Resolutions’ is too big a word for me, so I’ll call them it as a to do list.

Here’s the list of things that I want to do in 2007:

1. Get back to my habit of reading.
2. Start my MBA prep.
3. Get back to sports – badminton atleast.
4. Maintain atleast 90% attendance at the gym.
5. Read a business magazine regularly.
6. Take formal dance lessons for atleast one dance form

P.S. I once read somewhere that in order to achieve something you plan, the first step is to jot them down and say to yourself that you want to do it. I don’t know how much I believe in this, but I’m going to find out soon.

With The Kids @ NDA

There were two main reasons why I had volunteered for accompanying a few kids from an orphanage to the NDA, the first being that I had been thinking of taking up some sort of a social activity for a long time and secondly due to the fact that till not so long ago, I wanted to be a part of the academy myself. So, even before the visit got underway I knew that I was not going to regret the early morning start I would have to give myself to make it on time for visit.

We were about six colleagues and we were at the pick up point at 0830 hrs sharp. The moment the kids got inside the bus, the excitement amongst the kids brought a smile on our faces. While interacting with the kids, the first thing that hits you, is their street smartness! They sure do know how to find a way for themselves. The kids were surprisingly well mannered. They would thank us every time we gave them biscuits or a soft drink or every time we did something for them. I remember as a kid, my mother would have to remind me in front of strangers to thank them. The kids here had learnt their lessons well and they did not need anyone to remind them of their matters in front of strangers.

Something in common amongst all the kids was their fascination for the camera. My photographer colleague was in high demand with all the requests of 'One photo please!'. Suprisingly quite a few of the kids were very well aware of the latest handsets and the their features. Something that I must admit, is not the case with me.

They were all disciplined. Be it the fear of their care taker around or the efforts to put on a good show in front of the outsiders, I thought the kids were a lot easy to manage than the kids from other schools that were also present there. This being a first of its kind trip for me, I had a lot of fun and I also got to see the lives of the cadets from close quarters and here's to many more such activities in future. Cheers!

Hindi ki Izzat

We recently had a colleague from our US office visiting India. The firang guy had a tough time surviving on the food in our cafeteria everyday. So, we accompanied him out for lunch on a couple of occasions. One fine day, we ended up talking about languages over lunch.

To start off with, he was amazed by the number of languages that we have in our country. The concept of Mumbaiyya hindi, North Indian Hindi and Puneri Hindi was also beyond his limits of comprehension. He was of the opinion that the richness of a language is based on the fact that there are synonyms for words in one language found in other languages. Like, fat in English is the same as mota in hindi. This got us to finding words in English that do not have synonyms in Hindi and vice versa. The very first word proved to be a show stopper.

While finishing up the last few drops of chocolate sauce on his sizzling brownie, he asked us for the hindi equivalent of the word - sizzling! And my colleague and myself had no clue about this. We tried different hindi words but could not get to one hindi word that best explains what sizzle means in English. So, in case you are proud of your marks in hindi in high school, do take some time off and think of the hindi equivalent for sizzle. Yeh hindi ki izzat ka sawaal hain.

P.S. I have another word that I would know the hindi equivalent of - dieting!

Shah Rukh Don

The Badshah of Bollywood has delivered another hit with his latest Don. Inspite of the not-so-good reviews that the movie got at the time of its release, the movie has managed to do good business as per the market reports. And making money is the prime objective of commercial cinema.

It is this money making ability despite all odds is what impresses me the most about SRK. I admire him, not for his work but for his ability to overcome the shortcomings. I mean here is a guy that has average looks, atleast as compared to some of his other better looking colleagues in Bollywood. His acting skills are not something to rave about, considering the over dose of acting that is there in all his performances. He lacks the voice of an industry icon like Mr. Bachchan (who can forget the K - K - Kiran?). His dances are not his USP for sure. He plays the loverboy who gets his girl in almost all his movies - read lack of variety in performances.

Inspite of all this he manages to do well not only for himself but for his producers too! Now that's definitely impressive!! Hats off to you King Khan - for achieving all that you have through hard work and making a mark for yourself inspite of a non filmi background.

Haan Bol

One thing that's definitely changed with the onset of mobile phones, is the way people answer phone calls (atleast with the people I call). Gone are the days when people extended pleasantries to you on answering your call. Phrases like "Hello" or "Hi, how are you?" are a rarity nowadays. Most of the time the response is a rude "Hmnnn" or a "Bol".

I agree that with caller line identification, you no longer have to use the voice recognition mechanism in your brain and so you know who you talking to before you pick the phone. But yaar, how difficult is a courteous response while answering a call? No matter how busy you are a simple "hi" or the age old "hello" is always a better response to get than the ones listed above.

Is this change because of our busy routines or is it just a case of the growing impoliteness around? Whatever be the excuses, I think I deserve a better response when I spend my time and money to call up people. One of the most ridiculous responses that I've got is from this friend of mine. I called him up to wish for Diwali and the dude answered the call by saying "Haan bol, sun raha hoon." Got an apt response for that?

Brangelina in News

Ever since Brangelina landed in Pune, the local newspapers have made them their top priority. Especially the local edition of The Times. The esteemed editors of this paper think that covering the movements of a celebrity couple is more important than any other news in the city. Or is it that they can't find anything more worthwhile to adore their pages.

On one particular day, the entire first page was filled up with details of the couple's visit. I agree that it is not everyday that such famous hollywood actors come to Pune and Brangelina have a huge fan following but still, I don't want to have the local edition's entire front page dedicated to them. To make matters worse the star couple tried their best to give the media a slip and so all the stories appearing in the paper were speculations and details of the couple's stay in the city.

The newpapers even acorded celebrity status to the rickshaw driver in which Brangelina went around town on one particular day. There was a whole article based on the 20 minute ride that he gave to the couple. Another article was based on the couple's future prospects as predicted by an astrologer. They also had a story speculating about the food preferences of the couple. I am not against glamour and have my favourites too, but isn't page 3 meant for all such news? So, to all you journalists out there, stop acting like you've never had a celeb in town before and start looking around for some real news that is worth reporting.

Celebs and Issues

Besides being acclaimed actors, what is common between Amitabh Bachchan, Richard Gere, Amir Khan and Angelina Jolie? Its their support for social issues in various parts of the world. While Angelina and Richard have lent their support to more international causes (human rights and AIDS awareness respectively) AB senior and Aamir lent their voice for polio awareness drive in India and the Narmada Bachao Andolan respectively. But, are these celebs supporting social causes any better than having the average low profile social activist fight it out on the streets?

I think having a celeb involved with a social cause works. As a matter of fact, I think that it works for both the celeb and the cause. It works for the cause as the news hungry media follows the celebs wherever they go, even to places where they would not have gone otherwise. This results in a lot of visibility for the issue at hand. I think that having celebs is the best way for getting the masses involved in social activists. Most people may never spare a thought for street children. But the moment they see pics of Salman Khan at an orphanage, visiting orphanages is something that they wanna do too.

Sanjay Dutt got a whole nation to recognise principles of the Mahatma Gandhi by his latest flick. And all of a sudden every second guy in town is talking about non-violence and Gandhigiri is cool now. How many of us were aware of the details of Narmada Bachao Andolan till Amir Khan came along. Wouldn't you willingly attend a music concert of your favourite stars even if you knew that they would drum in doses of AIDS awareness in between performances? Glamour is an essential part of every celeb and it sells for sure. So why not just use it for a good cause?

Colours

Feeling blue ... Feeling blue ... goes a popular Hindi number from the movie PKSE. For some reason, unlike the song, I don't associate the colour blue with feelings of sadness or unhappiness. I kinda like that colour. This got me thinking about my interpretation of colours. So here it is ... MY take on some of the colours and what they mean to me.

Red - First thing that comes to my mind about red is the feeling of danger associated with it. Be it at a signal or the sign hanging on an electricity pole or the card shown by the referee during a match. Red spells trouble for me. Red is also something that I would associate with the Chinese. I think that's the only country that I would associate with just one colour.

Black - Black is a colour that I would associate with power - superiority. It has the ability to override all colours and its difficult (if not impossible) for any colour to hold on to itself over black. I also associate black with disrepute or shame (moo kale Kara die). Black can be sexy too -- there's little that beats a well toned female body in a well fitted black outfit - Indian or western! ;-)

Blue - My favorite colour. Blue signifies calm to me. Apart from this, I don't think about or associate this colour with much. Just like it plain and simple, especially the darker shades.
Green - Refreshing. Green is refreshing. A lush green grassland just after the first few showers of rain is always a welcome sight! Green is a colour of acceptance. Green is also something that I would associate with prosperity and growth.

White - It signifies purity to me. The colour also has an emptiness or a hollow feeling associated with it. A noteworthy point about the colour from my perspective is its ability to tone down all other colours.

Dandiya Washout

Ever been planning something for a long time with a select group of friends? And ever had such an event cancelled at the last minute after all the planning?? Well, I had something similar lined up for this weekend and it turned out to be a flop show.

A friend of mine and myself have been trying to execute a dandiya outing with our college group for the past four consecutive years. But for one reason or the other the plans never materialize. During these four years we have gone out with our other groups and had a ball at various dandiya parties, always hoping to dance to those very beats with our college friends. But it never seems to work for us as far as dandiya is concerned. Its not that we don't keep in touch or that we don't party together. We do ... and we do it quite often. Its just the dandiya that is jinxed.

The biggest challenge in the past has been of getting everyone to agree to a common date and venue for the gig. This year we even managed to do that - but planning is the farthest that we could go. Though I must say, that 2006, has been the closest we have ever been to a dandiya together. We finalized the venue, chose a date when everyone left of the group in India could make it and also fixed the logistical problems. But the rain gods chose this very weekend to vent their fury on us poor souls. It rained like there would never be a tomorrow and we had to drop all plans of a dandiya!

So here I am, back to square one, hoping to plan and execute Mission 'Dandiya 2007' successfully! Moral of the story: If it isn't supposed to happen ... It isn't gonna happen!

Do you vote ...

... I don't! And I am not talking about the voting that's an integral part of a democracy but of the one associated with contests on television that have left the telecom company bosses grinning from ear to ear. Almost every television channel in the Indian living room has a contest / show that asks the viewers to vote for their favourite contestant. There are also lakhs of people who vote for their favourite contestants.

I watch / enjoy many of these reality shows and would prefer them over the regular, run of the mill rona dhona on television. But somehow I cannot get myself involved with them to an extent that I vote for the contestants. I also fail to understand the people who do. I have my reasons for staying out of this show of solidarity - first of all, the votes cost too much. All messages and calls made to such shows cost a lot more than the message or call that we make on an average. Secondly, how do I know that the results are not rigged by the channel to please a section of the audience and thus better their TRP ratings? Also, this might be an excellent money making venture but I think that by selecting the winner on the basis of public votes its not neccessary that we get the most talented artist. What we get in most cases is the most popular artist with something that's best described by a term being used by everyone - X factor. There have been instances wherein the participant has survivied elimination solely on the basis of the votes recieved from his native place! At times, the participant adjudged as the best by the jury on the show has not been accepted by the masses.

I think that for winning such shows, talent is not the only thing that you need in your arsenal. Marketing is also very important. Though I must add here that just the latter is just going to help you survive the initial rounds. You need a certain amount of talent to actually bag all that there is at stake, which I must add is a LOT. Another thing that is very important is the ability to connect with the audiences, as ultimately they are the ones that decide your fate.

But my main question here is who votes? And why? Some of the contestants recieve lakhs of votes, so this surely means that there are a lot of enthusiasts out there who are willing to spend their time and money on someone who they don't know personally. Could this be a way of them patronizing artisits? Or is it just the glamour that they are attracted towards?? Or worse, is it just a regular trend that they want to be a part of??? Or is it bus aise hi ... ?????

Thank you Ma'm

Yesterday, one of my favourite teachers, Mrs. Meera Janardhanan (a.k.a Janna to her students) retired from St. Joseph’s Boys’ High School after devoting 35 years of her life to teaching. I had the honour of having her as my math’s teacher for three consecutive years in school.

During the lectures, she was always like a typical math’s teacher – strict, sported a no nonsense attitude, stick in hand and ready to catch students who were gracing the class with just their physical presence! She had a penchant for giving impositions and firmly believed that giving remarks in the student’s school diary (to be signed by the parent) was the best way of keeping the parent abreast with the student’s progress in class. She was one of the few teachers that could control the students in our division.

But, looking back, I think that our respect for her was not due to the fear for the stick or a way of escaping the impositions, it’s the teacher in her that we respected. The number of ex students that turned up for her farewell function in school is ample proof that josephites across generations have respected her knowledge of the subject and her teaching skills. There were 1986 pass outs that had turned up to express their gratitude towards their teacher at her farewell.

I had the rare distinction (it’s a distinction now!) of getting the first remark from her in my batch. The remark read ‘Protractor not brought’. To make it worse, I had to write it in my diary myself, as I was the row monitor. But, this one incident ensured that I never fell short of instruments during the geometry class. Even if I had not brought it along, I ensured that I borrowed it from someone in the other division just before she entered the class. Another typical thing about her related to me was the way she pronounced my name in a distinctly south Indian accent. ‘Aish, on the board’ is what she’d say to signal that I had to step to the blackboard for solving a particular math question.

I may have probably never expressed my gratitude to her, but today I would like to put on record that Mrs. Meera Janardhanan has played a major role in shaping my personality during the years I spent in school. Thank you ma’m. May God bless you and your family with good health and prosperity!!