Few words from Last Pages of Am-Be-Yeah !

They and the grey car were crossing the Lucknow 16km milepost. It was an  exhilarating night for both of them. They had decided to check out the end of  the road after the ' only non veg starters, dessert and Red Label' dinner at  Barbeque Nation,Lucknow. The road had taken them through villages,unknown nooks and corners, uninhabited patches towards Kanpur. 90 km was the writing on the first overhead blue panel across the width of the road.

The fleeting grey Maruti resuscitated the spirit of the biker Bharat Satija to make the digital speedometer display the three digit mark again. The car raced ahead , the red lights changing intensity for the pillion as they played a catch-me -if-you -can game. The bike swerved sharply behind the car across the turn with an Abhishek Bachchan hoarding. 'An IDEA can change your life' ,it read . Very true for the two of them. 2 years back they had taken the plunge to do their MBA. Today was the culmination of it all - they had written their last examination in the noon. "It is a great day." he had said to Bharat in the morning and had added "Need to be celebrated in a special way". A big acknowledging smile is what he had received back.

 The bike had left many a vehicles behind to conquer the road and then felt a no-one-to-chase void. This car driver was different, skilled,maneuvring through the trucks fast. The night sky looked brilliant. The stars shone brightly above the 'stars' tonight. The ever indolent Bharat was dreaming about 'a scrambled egg and beer'  holiday in Goa. And then the digital display went from 108 to 26 in split-seconds.The car raced far away as the bike slowed behind a disobliging trailer truck. 'Stil there, stil alive . Can't be dead before I see  Malaysia' shouted the pillion,as they laughed. 

It had been a bit of chase now. The hands rolled over the race and the wind started enjoying its touch with the jacket again.A blue overhead panel read "Lucknow Zila Panchayat welcomes you".The biker raised his right fist to the imaginary chequered flag and the sexy babes in red as the pillion waved a bye to the grey car.

Werfen

No arrows for direction, No measures for distance
The roads I can ask; the skies I can talk.
Rays of sun to tell me the time
And winds to sing story of older times.
The little girl speaks words so polite
Alas, for the language I am naive.

Mountains to give me a high
And castles, if only one, I could buy;
Sit on swings of leaves when the legs get tired;
Drink from the river when the throat gets dry.
Take company with edelweiss and hyacinths
Holstein and Simmental to bid me good bye

Oh tram, take me to my ElDorado
Terra firma where i am Incognito

Adios
-Anuj Lakhotia

This is written after visiting Salzburg, Innsbruck and Werfen in Austria.

The Beach at Cannes

The beautiful boy playing with the ball
Behind the dog, occasionaly taking a stroll
Jumping and splashing up water
Building castles and making merry
Running behind the pigeons to make them fly

Grows up and swims far in the water
And picks up a friendly fight
Jogs across the beach to see the chics

When he finds his honeymoon mate
Sits, Loves and makes imprints
Enjoys a ride in the yatch
While the Chinese walk with a guide
His psyche thinks of the boy and the dog

And grows his hair white
He then spends hours playing the poker
And see the child do a somersault.
Drinking his favorite brand of wine,
He comes there to see the October sky
and sit with the pigeons he once used to fly...

-Anuj Lakhotia

NAINITAL

Flowing waters, moving Boats; Thumping yatches against the winds,
Sunshine shining as pearls on the algae-colored water;
The red-colored trees
And the yellow foliage trotten pathways,
The honeymoon couple holding hands
Sharing Moments of Laughter;Moments of love;
School kids playing cricket on the skating ground
Places on hill, where life comes to stand still
She stands there in her black overcoat and white winter cap
Eating the pink sugar candy
As I pen this eating the pancake
Heaven, I feel, is where I am
Ironically, hel(L), I know is where I come from


Welcome retreat from hel(L) after summers .Penned this down while eating at a restaurant facing the Naini Lake.

Adios
-anuj lakhotia

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

Trekking in Kerela

Coming Soon......

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??

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/

The Two Birthday Theory (unleashed)

"Today is Lakhotia's birthday.Guys, bumps....lets kick some ass....hard". This is how I remember memories of my last birthday. Those were the hostel days when someone bithday would mean all the hosteliers getting a free-chance to kick a guys back-bottom with things varying from bathroom slippers to leather boots , bisleri bottles and finally dragging him on the ground.

Things as weird as throwing water, beer or drowning the guy in mud would be some of the things the birthday boyhad to go through before treating a group of gourmands at the local dhaba.(Budget,everyone remembers the coll.. days)

Some of my older memories include me getting a full-blown round of bumps and then being thrown awy on the main road(yes, lookin bak it looks pretty cruel. But that was partially because this date generally collided with the end/or near-end of endsemester exams in my college.And one knows how desperately ppl want to vent out their frustration at the end of those gory enginering endsems.I have suffered quite a blows in atleast two years in my coll. And yes these guys demanded a treat after giving thier share on the day.

The memories from the childhood though are much pleasant .I would generally wait for a gift
promised by my parents (a gift better than my younger brother whose birthday would have
gone couple of months back!!!)and then an outing to the favourite ice-cream parlour.

Officially I turn 21 today.But I wont say thiat Iam celebrating my twenty-first birthday.It could be anything between 21 and 42.Well the reasons behind that are pretty funny.My birth certificate shows myDOB as 7th Dec 1984. but all my chacha-chachis,tauji n all sayi was born on Nov 7 and due to some reasons the birthdate on my certi got messed up. I do not blame anyone rather i used to enjoy this paradox. I used to celebrate on these dates alternatively. But as one grows up, things get forgotten and i start getting confused remembering the date .Morover, the ppl who got ot know this fact started taking multiple treats from me. This world is so mean!!!!!!!!

Nowdays, i celebrate 7th Nov with my family and 7th Dec with my school,coll,company friends.
Ppl say that as you grow old you lose the charm of celebrating birthdays. But now i feel
more happy for this paradox.I have two days officially where i feel happy , to look forward into my life,to party and cut through life's unnecessary frets & troubles and feel close to myself.
Another thing is that you can separatley give time to family and friends.And yes, when you have a demanding girlfriend then you dont need to give your family excuses either :)
I feel happy for all those officials who messed up the date in my certificate.Thank you guys!!

Cool Facts:
Here are things that are related to the same date
7the December 1941: Japanese attackedthe Pearl harbour, getting US into World War II
7th December 1972: Apollo17, last Apollo mission was launched
7th December 1984: Birth of Prince of WonderLand
7th Dcember 2006: Bill Gates is releasing Windows Vista


Happy Birthday to me!!!!

ps: As i write this i have already had my GPL session. Thanks to my DCX team, TU2k5 guys
and my flatmates.

Anuj

Night On the Beach

 

Trip Down Memory Lane

White sand beaches, exotic natural beauty, people revelling, lots of booze around, para-gliding, cruises, water-scooter, trance- music flowing through your veins,nothing but the sky line and the sea-side to be seen around......doesnt need to take the name, one can gues what place i am talking about in India
Three days in such a setting & you suddenly start feeling life is so good & why there are only 24 hours in a day.Life suddenly starts looking rosy...

Wanted to write more about this trip to GOA. Some other day... The pics are there to be seen @
www.flickr.com/photos/anujlakhotia
Caution: You wil droll around your bed if you watch those pics for long

FROM anuj@nsit TO anuj@trilogy

It is going to be a culmination of one week here @ TRilogy. The first week in the so called software city of INdia is filled with some really good experiences of my lifetime.

Firstly the city It has been gifted withan awesome weather....but that ends the good things abot the city. WE have an IIM here, companies which have written the Indian software story but ...the city as a whole does not reflects that it is a powerhouse of such intellectual peoples. The locals are aware just of their day to day business n nothin else. there are stray dogs everywhere n the saying goes tat...they bark at you for a week or so...n then they recognise you. JUs in case when they run after you , stop n stare in their eyes n they wont do nethin. I was wondering who sane person wud try that
In the buses you see the kannad script...i call them jalebis.. i havelearnt how to say a couple of sentences in Kannad.It is really cool

i've had a coulpe of ever-lasting memories....finding myself an appartment....I have a 3BHK
for rent with a coll balcony view...will upload the pics soon...n yes have some cool padosans..hope i will get lucky soon.....tried my hand at kitchen, n yes laundry also......n ya i know it was tough when i went on for a grocery shop...neways it has been really fun

At Trilogy it has been a phenomenol experience . THe intellectual crowd here will make you gasping. JEE 100 rankers, GRE full scorers, maths n physics olympiad toppers, toppers in rewoned programming contests, not to miss me and the NSITians.....the list goes on
THe first week NEO (New employee orientation ) is goin on...n we have had opportunities to meet
some of the top-notch guys at TRIO, listen to them, drink with them, dine with them n even dance alongwith....So the culture is really really cool , ver very open...n definitely the people are studs.
THere are a pack of chinese guys n it has been fantastic with them....i will pick up some chinese
also soon. hAve had a couple of pub nites already n lots more are there in store i will say THis job has beaten all my expectations.

Now to get on to the heading of this post...
NSIT was a great place n so looks TRilogy
It was one of those defining moments of my life n i guesTRilogy is gonna other
THere were no females at NSIT.....n by that standard we have a fa