Friday, December 22, 2006

Winter Thoughts

Frosty Nights,Chilly Winds
Cut through my skin
Stil, I feel so snug
In the warmth of her presence;
Her vivacious smiles,her bubbling talks;
Her joyful spirits and life-giving touch;
Shields me from the snow that is cast
With her she takes me the world round
Alas, one day I know, I wont find her around
Fear makes me shut my eyes tight
I open them again to find
Frosty nights;chilly winds
Cut through my skin
I do not feel any snug
As under the bed has fallen my Quilt

Wrote this while waiting for the Qualis . Christmas will be celebrated in Kerela & may be in a houseboat :)

Merry Christmas to All!!!

-Anuj lakhotia

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Laughing All the Way.....

In the last post, I criticised Blogger for its generation-old software. And voila, this Christmas
Google has done what I wanted. I see some cool features around.
I know wiith Google in the hot seat they will be always coming!!!
Just waiting for my blog to be moved to the new Blogger :)

-anuj lakhotia

Saturday, December 09, 2006

I need...

Two two things that go hand-in-glove with the title are "Allahdins genie" or else the "ZANDU" ka kesari-jeevan. Well , my need is thoda hatkar. Often i have found myself wanting to say a little 'hello' to my blog by way of say, some photo I liked ,some article I came across, some of my humour wise-cracks, some video I came across, wishlists of places I want to go, books i want to read, things being added to my dream home, my present crush,the last movie i watched ....the list is endless.

I have always looked upon it as to be the centre-place of my online presence, to be linked to my other identities on the web say the Orkut, flickr,my wiki, my You-tube videos collections, ...be a medium to flash out the last coolest thing I saw evolving on the web.

But i realise that the blogging s/w has a long way to go. By the time I log in & start typing in this template page ,part of my writing-crazy grey cells are already asleep. I think i deserve the right to rightclick on a cool pic and say publish to my blog , Select a piece of text & publish it with ease or add a cool -blog to my list in split-seconds. But alas , the current solution forces my thoughts to remain as thoughts.

I tried the "Send the Blogger" button in the Google toolbar..and it was a big disappointment for things i wanted to do. I think Blooging is stil to evolve a lot further.

It dawns on me ,though a bit late, that I should hold blogger the reason for my hyper-low -blogging frequency. May be if I were in US i could have sued them for a million dollars...eh.

I think that I should try out a couple of other places like the Yahoo 360,MSN Spaces or the wordpress. I tried Multiply sometime back. I found it pretty nifty and good.
But my love for Google products has kept me here. Is someone listening out there??
or ppl are too busy with minting money & buying around companies :)

Some cells that have woken up remind me that I initially planned to write about the beautiful outing I had at my manger's place today. From the top of his home at seventh floor, it looked like as if i was looking into my future 5 years ahead :)

Alas!!....SOD-SOT

-Adios
anuj lakhotia

Sunday, November 19, 2006

Waiting For The 'Morning'

Darkness surrounds, Obstruct my thoughts
I can see the past; the future is though dark;
I stand by the Window
With me stands still the time
I want it to fly, run, race away
To show me the next day
It ticks; ticks slowly,
As if it also awaits something
My mind looks forward for the day
When I could see the fruits of my actions
When this Darkness would be cleared
If lil’ I will do, lil’ the clock will move
I have to look beyond; to illuminate the dark
As I start; Time soon starts flying past
The Gloom has moved; The moods have changed
Thoughts are back; Future does not remain Bleak
I can feel light cutting through the dark,
The Night Making way for the dawn
The day I am waiting for though hasn’t come
But has been brought near!


Was in a sombre mood.Thought to write a similar poem.
But this ended livening me up.
-anuj

Sunday, September 17, 2006

Unknown Faces

Unknown faces, meet at some point in life
First imprints, thoughts originate
Views form ,break ,collapse, form again
Slowly a character is shaped
Lovable, Special in their own moulds
As they unfurl their folds
Some pass away as snakes slough skin
Others become a part of your souls
Time machine takes them farther
But now boundaries are mere perceptions
Spaces unfathomed are just thoughts away
They take away a part of yours
A part of them now runs in your blood
Memories would gush of the together times
Of Times of laughter, times of pain
Moments of anguish, moments of fun
Unknown faces, who touched you at some point in life
Till you again meet the now known faces

One of my friends/flatmates Anubhav Kushwaha joined Microsoft as a Program Manager
This was wishing him farewell.

Adios
-anuj

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Trip to Wayanad

Group( Interesting ppl coming together ,to make these moments eternal......


Prashant Maskara, Trilogy guy & flat-mate

Sudhanshu from TI

Ashish Nijhara from Infosys(claims to fame with his Infy chics)

Gaurav Punia from Magma,( He was wearing a football star LAMPARD tee, and was referred to as lamba-fart throughout the journey)

Anant from IIM-L(engineering+IIM has snowballed his desperation levels)


The Plan( The beauty of an unplanned plan,great moments of a bachelors life.....

Miffed by the monotonous life of a S/W Engg, myself & Prashant were on the look for an
refreshing break away from the cyber-city. A three day weekend & stories of plentiful interesting places in & around Wayanad made Kerela the destination-to-be. Warnings of hot-weather & absence of likeminded people in Trilogy for trekking did not provide much resistance to stop our plans.

The Shaky Start( why it has to happen like this always......


It started with both of us reaching out to our contacts to form an interesting group .Onset of Friday morning, three guys were sure including two of us and some other six guys

in their state of indecision. Then Anant called me up around 11 in the morning when I was in bed still that he was in & reminded me that it was Friday & I should be booking the Cab.
A scheduled maintenance in TI helped Sudhanshu to come .Punia managed to come despite his TL asking him to work on the weekend.

Nijhara being from Infy had all the time in the world & jumped in.

Each one reached to my place from their respective offices at the scheduled time of 10:00p.m Friday except for Prashant who was battling the bugs and got free only by 11:30

The Journey(Hitting the road,music,drinks,small breaks, pissing in open-air.......

The journey is always almost the USP of any trip. Partially because it is peppered with humorous anecdotes from every ones life ,latest music at high decibel being played & if it is all guys trip then one of the lesser mortals being made the scape-goat to entertain the party

Ashish was made the DJ, the front-seat guy in the qualis who was responsible for catering to the diverse public demand, fine-tuning the decibel levels for each song & getting down to ask the directions in case required. He was given the more frequent boos for Anu Malik songs & occasional good job for songs like“Kajrare,Kajrare”

Pooniah was made the treasurer & made to reach-out to his ass everytime someone needed even a penny. He was also responsible for getting the snacks & drinks from the on-the-way restaurantsHe had a tough time buying things and bargaining while he talked in English & responses came inMalyalamHe also talked about the latest chics he befriended on ORKUT

Sudhanshu talked about his no-time-to-spend-money life in Texas Instruments.And that he called a female DODO( dumb) coz she did not understood Circuit Theory. The same girl got 20 marks more than him in a viva where he answered all the questions on a project for which he has worked off his asswhile the female was unable to differentiate a resistor & a capacitor by looking at them.


Prashant meanwhile fantasised about the body-2-body massage he was expecting in Kerela.
He captivated everyone with the beautiful themes on his Nokia which made him to spend more time on phonecalls.

Anant constantly dwelled a lot in chics at TI ,the company has been ranking high in Employee Satisfaction & females whom Sudhanshu have admitted looked awesome while playing table-tennis


The First Day


We luckily got a dirt-cheap accomodation in Kalpetta. From previous trip experiences we already knew that the rooms were mainly used to get off the travelling fatigue on the first day & then to be used as a luggage dumping grounds for the rest of the stay.

There could not have been a better way to start the trip than the visit to the Eddakal caves.
We found the gates locked because it was the election day in Wayanad.. As we were discussing
the poor fate & next plan of action we saw some localites climb the gate,go past & come back.
It was good enough to motivate Sudhanshu who lead the pack to climb the 10 ft gate & go across.

Prashant had problems to carry over his weight on the gate but manged to use his height to his advantage.

Pooniah faced the same problem& later admitted that he started sweating from places he had never before which was visible in the wet marks on his cargoes. Possibly the female hormones in his body took over & he vowed to go back & get a detailed checkup. The caves led to a beautiful view of the valley & opened up to a mountain peak which had to be climbed using some ropes alreeady hanging alongside the mountain rocks. Reaching to that point using them brought us a sense of victory an intangible feeling of pride & having conquered something. We knew that coming to Wayanad has already paid off.

Later on the day we went to the Soochipura waterfalls which disappointed us because it came at the end of a pretty long trek & the waterflow did not meet the documented expectations. Partially becausewe were there before monsoon. Anyways,part of the group found it good enough to have a bath even thougheveryone realised that they havent got their clothes.

Anant & Sudhanshu had a long discussionwheteher to go on in a jockey or their full attire , keeping in mind the sanctity of the place & having an eye on the fellow tourists from the fairer sex. Both of them took the plunge with their respective perspectives finding a commonality in hiding behind the rocks during bathing While the rest of the group made some videos which they are sure would sell like hotcakes. Also a perfect present to give on their respective marriages I t was a good time at the not-so-good falls.

Dinner at night was pathetic because everything was cooked in Coconut oil. Ashish & myself could not bear the idea of something which is applied on head going in our mouths & had to leave the dinner halfway. The other gourmets though not liking the coconut oil taste in their mouths decided to go ahead motivating themselves by appreciating its divergence from the normal cuisine.
The history though recorded that even they could not finish off their meals.

The night was marked with the cant-do-without drinks party , the continuation of anecdotes from the jouney,the stories becoming more livelier & interesting than before, and ended around 3 with a decision to wake up at 6 in the morning

The Second Day

Wake up time: 10 a.m

This day was planned for the notorious Chembra Peak Trek. Though in the end we found out thatit was much more notorious than said. It is a tough trek,extreme at some places enough to break the motivation of the trekking parties ,pretty steep and a series of unending peaks to climb.
The climbing was accompanied by some1 getting breathless, another one dizzy finding out his vertigo limits,scarcity of drink n food we brought with us, some Indian parties leaving mid-way,while some foreigners coming back saying aixcellent trek , people taking off clothes to keep off the sweat.
We scaled till two peaks which ended in a heart-shaped lake. Though right now it looked preety dirty & having only mugfuls of water.

Meanwhile Gauravs TL has called up & we had to abort our plans of night on Kozhikode beach
so that we can reach back Bangalore before Monday.

The trip back home , we stopped at Mysore for dinner where Ashish relived his halcyon training days at Infosys. The Infy Campus from a top-view spells as INFOSYS & there isanother campus which is coming out and is in the form of Narayan Murty's signature NRN.

Overall the trip was good & a pleasant break from the Bangalore heat.Though Prashant admits that he has done away with his trekking-quota for one year.Pooniah decides to take up more chancs on females he make friends with. Some of us decide to pursue the more professional rock-climbing with equipments et al.


Huh, managed to write a trip memoir. Though I have missed out the police escapade while we visited the Archaelogical site Eddakal caves which were closed, the breakfast stories, the Punia talent show and some other threads which ran during the trip. The essence of them I expect to be covered by the other fellow trekkers in their comments /respective blogs or the pics & the videos will fill in those voids

-Anuj







Tuesday, May 02, 2006

Trekking in Kerela

Coming Soon......

She , I And Rain

She was standing there,dancing
Looking beautiful as a fairy
Wet & drenched she shimmered
Like lightening in the night rain
Rain dripping from her eyebrows
like pearls falling from the sky
Sweet ,serene her vivacious smile
Redness of the rain-frozen lips
Tender touch & sweet talk
Cajoling me to forget worries of past
She & I met,we were together
when it rained last night


She stood there,hands outstretched
Waiting for me to fill her arms
She was calling ; it was time to go
As water dropped between us like heavy blood
Moments of laughter were soon few
As I died a hundred lives
The clouds were clear; my eyes were wet
When it rained again last night

- Anuj

Unstructured flow of thoughts which if lent an editing hand can become much more aesthetic.
But I find them beautiful in the same shape as they came to my mind.

Sunday, April 09, 2006

Reservation in IITs & IIMs & other Professional Courses for OBC

The heat is on. Once more the so-called politicians,bureaucrats or the self proclaimed self reformers have taken the plunge to uplift the backward classes in India, the reality is that anyone who is even deaf,blind & mute can feel that they are here again to rot the system furthermore


Latest Update
The Ministry of HRD says that they plan to implement 27% quota for OBC in premium colleges like IITs n IIMs. This will take the total reservations to 49.5 % from the current 22.5% for SC/ST.

More Background
The announcement comes just before the Assembly Elections of 5 states. Clearly the move is a populism move .The Election Commision has asked Arjun Singh for violating the. model code of conduct. The Knowledge Commision which gives recommendations for excellence in education
has criticised the proposed amendment. Ratan Tata has gone ahead to say that it is "bad".
The reality still is that : No political party has the political will to oppose such a move.
Also not many famous stars of todays shining India would like to bring out anydispleasure to the
government by openly ,vehemently criticising such an abhorrent move.
The IITs n IIMs may have to tow the government line ,after being able to say that this will only
dip standards in these institutes.
Also the amendment is based on the Mandal Commision report which was brought out in 1980s
and first implemented in 1990s by V.P Singh only to gain political mileage & now it is again used
after 20 years when the country has dramatically progressed to new frontiers though the
classes for which the recommendations were applied in 1990s still continue to be a laggard pulling back the rising Tiger

Arguments in Support & Opposition


[+] The OBC are the ppl who have lagged behind & havent enjoyed the current socio-economic upliftment of the nation. Education is one mean to empower these so called backward classes
Also they form around 75% of the population(SC/ST +OBC), so it is legitimate to have reservations for them as they have remained underpriviledged as the other 25% has rose to power in every sphere of life
[-]The reservations have been there for some decades now. But there have been not any significant increase in the status of so called underpriviledged classes.Only the well-offs in these classes have taken the advantage to get the handsome jobs by reservation.
What use is providing reservation to a child whose father is an IAS or a police commissioner
on the basis of the class.
[-] Reservation are meant to provide some assistance to those capable people who due to
their penurial background cannot compete with the affluent in this hyper-competetive world.
But somehow the disadvantaged cannot take the advantage of the reservations as there are great costs involved in the preparation & reaching till the post graduation .

[-]If an assesment be made then a good chunk of "quota" ppl drop out from the IITs and IIMs
unable to face the stress and pressure of the day-to-day life over there.Also if they manage to
cling back their performance is no where near the people who have gone through the pains of getting admission by clearing the competition exams in the "general" category

[-] A lot of ppl who are in villages dont even know to write English alphabets properly. Neither
they do know about the education options avaiable . For them, it is important that the primary
education be given to them either by reservation or compulsorily. Somehow ,reservations are only made in IITs n IIMs and other prestigious centres of Education because these names
can easily fetch votes during election time
[-]Reservation is not the solution if someone is capable but not good enough. The best way is to
give proper training to these capable people , help them at each step, subsidise resources from them and then give them the assistance while considering their admission to halls of excellence.
This will strongly boost the confidence in these classes & empower them
[+] The so called 'elite' class is protesting beacuse the reservations have come for IITs n IIMs
But no one would have protested if the reservation would have come forthe government jobs



Repercussions
Will anyone would like to go a doctor who has earned his degree not by merit but by reservation?? What kind of faith can one have in such a person abilities
Will a person who has been supported throughout his life by reservation alone face the challenges of the real world??
Arent we breeding hatred & angst amongst the so-called "general" class against the so called
"quota" classes?? The students from the general category tend to vent out their frustration by talking foul about these classes and the opposite might start happening soon.
Will a person now try to work hard to get their education or will start focussing on
"how to get a class certificate"??
Isnt this leading to create stereotypes about the behaviour of SC/ST people??
The leaders of these underpriviledged classes may try to cut a bargain b/w current 22.5% & proposed 49.5% which would again be a step in the wrong direction
Or, The government migt try to increase the seats in the prestigious colleges such that the
increased seats can accomodate the reservations thus claiming that no loss has happened to
the general classes. This however will hugely affect the quality of education as we will be putting undue pressure on the already crippled infrastructure(read faculty,books,resources) besides diluting the brand value of the institutes
In Mandal Commision part-1 , students self-immolated themselves...hunger strikes & college boycotts have already begin in Delhi.One needs to understand that these are not the right approaches to tackle the problem but one can clearly see that the situation can outbreak to a potential epidemic.






Need of the Day [ Immediate Action Plan]
Our future is at risk. So is the future of our country if we fall to these gimmicks of the politicians.
We need to create a realisation that 22.5% reservation is more than enough. It is already doing no good to the underpriviledged. But only dividing ppl by one more classification. More fragmentation of the already broken Indian society

The need of the day is that the SC/ST people understand what is required for their children growth. They have to be aware about the political motives behind these announcement.
At the same time the elite classes have to realise that the country & they themselves cannot
progress without uplifting the people at the bottom of the pyramid



Solution To The Problem


India has been facing this problem since its originThe solution to the problem is not a matter of a day or in the hands of couple of ppl. It would require collective effort to create awareness by
way of healthy discussions , to improve quality of thinking of thr ppl





Saturday, March 18, 2006

Good Things In Life


Asking for gifts on birthday night,
Running the race first time in school
Winning that younger brother fight,
Falling from the cycle from the first time
Good or bad, Bitter or pleasant
These are some of the sweet things in life

Teachers scolding , Principal warnings
Being kicked out of the class for the first time
That new girl in class; And falling in love at first sight
The roaming on bikes; the partying with friends
Another one is seen in colony; And Yet again you feel lonely

First Day in College and the Seniors ragging
The first smoke; getting sloshed for the first time
The bunking of classes; the flunking of exams
Calling her late in night & those endless talks
The street side walk in the moonlit winter nights
Cool breeze blowing and into you her hair blowing

Moving on to the charming first job; First piece u bought for mom
Keys of that new car; U and Dad going for a long ride;
Thinking of your boss chair ;Big Dreams of flying high

Making love for the first time;
How it feels on hearing your child first cries
Buying presents on Birthday nights
Scolding for that younger brother fight
Good or Bad; Bitter or pleasant
If you can enjoy life
These are some of the sweetest things in life

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Got ill these days. Cholera n Viral are in prowl in Bangy these days
And I am always among the first ones in the city to get to know without the newspapers telling
Surprisingly 7 ppl in my project team are also down due to viral

Wrote this one while I was taking bed-rest. Illness is one of the things I dread the most. And this would have been the first time I took to bed after I have come to Bangalore.
Though, this time around the 2-3 days went quite interestingly.
Took good care of myself. Boiled water,stem inhales, gargles etc......
Watched couple of good movies. Played some guitar, Did some cooking(home-made food is prescribed)...yes it was fun cooking for myself. And yes the thing which is the most difficult to do
..Take medicines on time. Till Now, i have never done that. A two day course would finish only in 5 days. But it happened automatically this time. Only God knows how..

I have started believing in thought that "It(Illness) is merely a state of mind". Yes it helps....

My temperatures did touch around 103. But above is the best I could get out of the remaining time

Adios
Anuj Lakhotia

Monday, February 27, 2006

When the Chips Are Down

Everything seems dark, disillusioned;
One feels weak both in mind; and in heart;
Life looks encumbered, entangled;
Negativity takes helm, Vanishes the self-pride;
The world looks low on you, you feel like an unworthy clown
It all happens when the Chips are down.

It s a time to reason, not for excuse;
A moment of dark, before the light dawns;
To see the Invisible, to think the Unthinkable
To hear the Inaudible, to feel the Intangible;
Time to introspect and not circumspect oneself
To see the Reality clear of illusions
Time to change Direction; and again rise,
Time to go beyond and face the challenge;
Time to be a man when the Chips are down


Time to see things in the light of the dark;
Listen to your heart while the world speaks;
To see the low as the bottom of the next high
To gather courage from the weakness,
To feel the pleasure that will arise out of the pain
Time to feel free coz you have nothing more to loose;
It is sometimes good when the Chips are down

Sunday, February 19, 2006

So Much To Say, So Less to Write

Books Read Recently

















The reviews of each of these books would need a separate post. The essence is though that the Indian writer Amartya Sen scores much higher than the other two renowned
authors of similar class,erudition & eminence.
Also the hype about the two books " thw Worls Is Flat" & "Freakonomics" does not sustain. Both are interesting , excitin & entertaining to begin with but somewhere
lose to grip the reader.

Movies Watched Recently

English :Forrest Gump, The Green Mile,The Life of David Gale,Harry Met Sally
Hindi :Andaz Apna Apna, FightClub
Tom Hanks literally sweeps you off your feet in the first two classics

Another series of posts will be essential to describe how Indian movies are coming with dry comedy, & the Indian audience desperately tries to entertain themselves
in the hopeless,senseless movies of today

Trip To Delhi was fabulous, highly-recharging n refreshing,and awesome fun

Delhi looks like an International capital once ya go there after spending some time in Bangalore.The highways & the metro seems to make a diffeence
Couple of my friends got married. Wishing them a Happy married life once again. The bachelor parties I attended , I will remeber for a while

The destruction of malls was a bit sad. Alas my School is also on the hit -list. But
fear not it is only the extraneous Art ?& Craft Hut which had been build behind
the school building which will be going away. I feel both good & bad at the same time as I remember that place where I was used to ask to stand out most of the times for not being able to complete my art& craft homeworks or where I would get a 'D' again n again for my drawings.

Meeting up with college juniors was fun, so was giving Dad an account of my extravagant habits over here in Bangalore.

Caught up with my school friends who are working in BPO theez days & who said I did greta good by doing Engineering. Well, my answer was " I dint knew why I did it in the first place & I am still figuring out why it was better than attending a DU college" except for the fact that u get to while ytour four years in hostel & then get a reputable degree which fetches you a good job somehow. As one of my friend says, A surely vacation where u sleep endlessly, talk endlessly, somehow clear ur exams,just manage ur attendance, make some amazing friends, forget what the world 'female' means, spend time in the college canteen & the baba ka dhaba, learn to live without bathing for couiple of days, nighouts where ya do everything except study....& at the end of it you are an...gues what " ENGINEER"....

Took my Parents to watch "Rang De Basanti" where they enjoyed the movie throughout
but at the end of it stll kept their point that they dont like going out for movies


At job
, Life is gud except for the fact that the salary comes once in 30 days only.
It is bad when the neighbourhood ATM fails to doa transaction on 2-25 of the month
Jan-March you find yourself paying taxes...the proverbial earning from ur blood-sweat going into some corrupt peoples coffins.
You see amazing ways to save taxes and you get involved in the endless debate...the moral way or the prudential way??

Have somw writings in the pipeline,and some ideas brewing.....just wait till they get their final shape

Adios
Anuj

Saturday, February 18, 2006

An Excerpt from A Chinese Blog

I read the following excerpt on a popular Chines blog. Pretty Interesting..........

My conversation With an Indian

In Shenzhen, in a small coffee shop by the road, I was meeting an Indian from our client company, on a business trip to China. I started my first conversation with an Indian. Indian asked me: “Why don’t you ask for a receipt for your coffee?”

I, confused, said, “I can’t reimburse it, why receipt”?

Indian proudly said, “When our company sends us on business trips, all meals are reimbursed”

Before I can answer, Indian asked, “Do you know Tibet?”

I said I do. Indian started again, “This small country is between India and China.”

I replied immediately, “You have the Dalai of Tibet. We have the regime of Tibet.” I was about to kick him if he wasn’t an employee of our client company.

As we left the coffee shop, Indian mentioned Hong Kong and said randomly and stupidly, “Is Hong Kong right beside China?”. I was amusedly depressed. Must be very good propanganda in India for their citizens to receive this kind of knowledge!

So I replied, “100 years ago. China fought a war with Britain, and lost. So Hong Kong was taken away by Britain. 100 years later, China became stronger, and so took Hong Kong back.”

Indian thought a bit, and said “So Hong Kong belongs to China?”

I affirmatively said, “Just like New Delhi belongs to India.”

Indian changed the subject.

He’s from the TATA company in India, working as a software programmer for TATA. TATA is one the biggest company in India, leader in automobile and steel.

He started to proudly show me his employee ID. And said, “In my company in India, I can take this ID and face a scanner, and all doors would open for me.”

I said, “We can do the same here.”

India coughed a bit, and asked me, “Do you know TATA?” I said yes I do, it’s a big company.

He looked very proud, and said, “Is your company a big one?”

I said, “It’s not so big. Only average in China. China has about 12 cell phone companies. Our is just an average-sized one”

He felt surprised for the first time, “China has 12 cell phone companies? I always thought there are only 1 to 2 companies in China capable of producing cell phones.”

I replied, “Our company is not so big. We only sold 10,000,000 phones last year.”

When Indian heard the figure 10,000,000, I noticed a big change in the color and texture of his face. His left eye twitched a little bit.

I then continued, “Hmm, yes. Last month, our company just sold half a million CDMA phones in India.”

Indian was shocked again, said, “half a million. That’s a big number. How many cell phone users in China?”

I replied, “China has China Mobile, and it has about 200,000,000 customers in China. Another one is called China Telecom, and it has about 100,000,000 customers.”

Indian looked he was about to faint, and said, “Oh my god.”, his voice a bit unstable.

I continued, “Usually for a Chinese, he buys a new cell phone every 1-2 years.”

Indian still could not believe his ears and thought I was lying. So he asked, “In China, can a software engineer make 150 dollars a month?”

I was about to cough blood. How can India fool its citizens like this? I said, 150 dollars? That’s about how much they can earn in 1 week.

Indian was visibly shaken and could not say a word for the next few hours. In his mind, Chinese are poor, Chinese could not effort cell phones. Chinese’ salaries are lower than Indians.

Then at the end of that day, he did something that made me laugh for days.

He took out a CD, and came to my laptop, and asked, “Can your laptop support CD Rom?”

I thought to myself, “This is the level of an employee of India’s biggest software company?”

I lent him my USB harddrive. But his old IBM laptop did not support USB ports…

Then we went to our hotel, and in our hotel, I connected online using wireless. I then opened a friend’s MSN Spaces site, and showed Indian a few pictures of the city of Wu Xi. I told him, this is my hometown.

Indian was psychologically wounded, looked at the pictures, and said, “This is the most developed city in China, right?”.

I told him mercilessly, “No. There are a few hundred cities like this in China. Wu Xi is a very average one.”

Indian said, “Oh.”

I said, “Can I see some pictures of Indian cities”?

Indian, stated shifting his eyes, and touched his face, and coughed, and said “Tonight is too late. I am kind of tired, let’s sleep first.”

Posted by HongXing at January 17, 2006 02:27 PM

Original Source

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

IN OFFICE AT 9:00

Lately, I have been debating with myself the advantages of being a contrarian.
A contrarian is a person who would generally do things which will be directly opposite
of the common man perception.
It all started with me always getting up late in my bed. Compensating for that,I have been doing
all things in my life with a lag or as I say a headstart if you see it as the next day
Travelling at 9:00 in morning is such a pain. Everyone rushing to their offices, the traffic is huge
You will see Infosys buses here in bangalore one after another. It can sometimes take more than 5 minutes just to cross the road. Eh!
The story is same at night time if you plan to leave office at usual 7:00 p.m in the evening

On my usual time coming to office at 1:00 p.m , the traffic is generally smoother, execpt for occasional days.
And while leaving office at 12:00 or 1:00 in the nite, you have an awesome ride on the
bike. You get totally refreshed by the time you reach home.

As one of my friend says, we should look forward to have some offices & markets opened
during night times and ya will see it as an automatic remedy to the prevailing traffic problem

One can argue that to beat the traffic one can start even more earlier say 8:00

I suffered the consequences of trying that approach. I came out of my place looking for somewhere to have a good breakfast but alas, it was too early for the restaurants to open.
Never mind, i ate something in the Office pantry to satiate my appetite. But now i am sitting
in office at 11:00 extremely hungry waiting for lunch time like anything.
Man, why did i start so early??

Same thing happens when ya will go for lunch as soon as it begins. Huge crowds will throng the
cafetaria. Ppl can sit outside & have lunch but they wont like coming a bit later.

When i go to play lawn-tennis on weekends, if one goes early morning one will always find
ppl arguing over court-space & time to play. You spent more time arguing than playing.
But if you wake up at 12. Have a light breakfast and go around to play at 2:00 you will
find it a deserted place. Coz it is the official time to have lunch in India while morning is the official time to go for jogs n sports. Thanks to Bangy weather u can play comfortably at that time until u drop. Man, i am a contrarian.

On weekends, evry1 would like to go to the same restaurant n maals to have their dinner.
One does not have a problem of a 1 hr waiting time at PizzaHut rather than finding out a good restaurant somewhere nearby.

You will see junta standing in queues infront of PVR carrying their movie tickets. Thatz because
on the ticket that particular hall No. is mentioned. Why cant one look for a lesser-crowded
hall, make an entry and use the lobby to move to his desired hall.
Ah , is it the difference between the educated n the callous class...
Nope yaar, it z just observing the environment around yourself. Thats it!!!

Cmon yaar, right now right here i see ppl queued up in front of the printer.Today, is the day to submit your phone bills for reimbursement. Oh, still another queue outside the bill submission
room.The person will be here till evening but as the forest-fire spreads , this thing also spread
and it is the first thing evry1 wants to do. Thanks to this post, by the time i complete it
i wud submit my bills relatively hassle-free.

I sometimes travel in bus just to re-inforce in my life that life is not as rosy as it seems and just
to have a feel of life of a common lacalite. When i take bus from a major bus-stand, one will often
see ppl josting in thru that small gate to get in just for that lucky seat.Often i have seen that there are not enough ppl and so if you can wait for the initial crowd to subside you can
enter bus painlessly n still manage a seat.

Well, one can say that I came here at 9:00 , n hence i got the time to write this post but again man, that was a contrary thing. My team had a night-out yesterday & no-one was to be gonna
here early in the morning.
Just some observations n ur life will seem much more smooth,much easier n less painful
Are ya all looking around??

Sunday, January 15, 2006

The Trip



THE TRIP

It all started on a Friday night,
Undefined Paths,Defined Destinations
With a sense of joy,mind filled with pride,
Eight Punters took it in their stride

A trip to Pondicherry was it,
To welcome the year that was knocking
And bid farewell to the one that was going,
2005 had been memorable we all said...
But none knew what was still in store
In The left 25 hours of da annee
We all had lived a different life
The memories of which will eternally remain ripe.........

As Usual I want to write the " Travelogue" for this trip. And again as usual, am late to do so
Distractions,Diversions,Commitments.......will still find some time to update this.


Till then, the onus of penning down the memories lies on some more responsible mortals
Read what the protagonist of trip,the cowguy aka DJ has to say.
DJ's blog
Read Xp's literally rich travelogue
Trip's blog

Pics as usual : http://flickr.com/photos/anujlakhotia/