The ideal and the perfect

This is officially my worst week ever. With unmet deadlines, defaulting vendors, confused stakeholders, hectic travel and endless arguments, I have to pinch myself to remember that I am actually on vacation. Yeah, you heard that right. And that too, with a surprisingly considerate bunch of colleagues not having e-mailed or texted me even once during the time, in any other world, this would be an ideal vacation.

Marriages are made in heaven, or so they say. But, wedding ceremonies surely were conceived in hell. And, they are here to stay. And, they are growing more nonsensical with every passing moment. And, they are giving rise to many a thriving business of sarees and blouses and return gifts and wedding invites and accessories and food and decorations and… the list goes on.

I am just back from a visit to my tailor, who, I suspect, must have been a research analyst in his previous avatar. Late last evening, he had called me with an estimate for stitching the Muhurtham blouse pegged at a staggering 25% to 40% range of the total cost of my Sari. So, I marched into his premises first thing this morning, demanding a break-up of the cost. He looked at me as if I have landed from a different planet. Apparently, brides are supposed to go crazy trying to choose the right things for their weddings and not bother about such teeny weeny things as expenses. But, yes, he did give me the break-up after much cajoling, with just a minor footnote saying, “The final cost might be 2-2.5 times the estimate. We will know once we start working on the blouse”.

And, then, there is the whole Sari business itself. I have walked into and out of 10 shops in the past two days looking for one Sari. Yesterday, I spent half an hour with a salesperson trying to understand pricing variations across Saris, all of which, to my naked eye, look exactly the same. He finally gave up any hope of my buying a Sari and turned his attention elsewhere.

The wedding invite is another mammoth affair altogether. Colors, font types, alignment, wordings, pictures… I really miss my beloved PPT pages. They are so much easier to create. And, they do make so much more sense, and can be reused too!

The next item that will come up my alley, as I have been informed (read warned), is the accessories shopping. That will involve trying to figure out, amidst multiple hues and shades of violet and green and maroon and light blue, the right colored bangles for my Saris. And, it will be another set of non-reusable stuff that will fade in color and style with time. Like it matters!

Sometimes, I wonder what the point is. What’s the point in putting so much fight into some six inane events spread across two long days trying to solemnize one wedding, when all that should actually matter is having a happy marriage?

I must be the most atypical bride-to-be in town, focusing more on the expense than on the wedding look, focusing more on the long term than on the short term. And, I am thankful the Universe made me that way. Perhaps, I will be able to drill sense into my next generation, and help them have an inexpensive wedding, yet a perfect marriage.

Some may call it love

Dear SRK,

Love is a beautiful feeling. And, it is very flattering to note that you love us so much, and want to remember us at every walk of life.

I thought it started off very well. You attempted speaking our mother tongue in our very own “Ulaga Nayagan”s movie. And then you screwed it up. You screwed it up so badly that I had to mute scenes that starred you in that movie forever afterwards. I wonder why no one gave you flak for that. We always get so much flak for not getting our ‘ha’s right in your precious language. You, on the other hand, were appreciated for having attempted what this country thinks is some remote and nondescript language.

Anyway, I thought that would be the end of it, and we would all move on with life.

But, you did not stop. You don’t seem to have understood that there is a very thin line between love and obsession. Of late, I have started worrying about your irrational obsession with us. It wouldn’t worry me so much if it was not so inaccurate and farcical.

Really? You think we have our noodles with curd? YUCK. That movie bombed. And, I hoped that was the end of you messing with our identities.

Now, you come up with this? Kathakali dances, lungi tribute to Rajini and a very irritating Deepika Padukone talking some gibberish that passes off as Tamil in a movie atrociously named Chennai Express. When the hell have you seen Rajini dancing in a lungi in his movies? And there is a world of a difference between the Tamilian Bharatnatyam and the Mallu Kathakali. By the way, one cannot stand Deepika Padukone’s Hindi dialogue delivery. What made you think her speaking Tamil would fly?

I hope this one bombs too, and while it bombs, puts some sense into your head to stop messing with us. We have enough artistes and performers doing us proud and going global, we do not need wannabe imports from Bollywood misrepresenting who we are.

Yours sincerely,

An irate Tamilian who does not reciprocate your love

P.S. Per Yogi's allegation that I have become too stereotypical and dead boring, I started out attempting humor. But, it has turned out to be an angst-filled crib session. Some people never change after all.

A vividly colorful life

What can be more detrimental to productivity in office than a dreary weather? To answer that question, I need to set some context first.

My childhood dream was to own a black sedan. Many sedans came and went, but my dream remained largely unfulfilled because Dad found it to be the craziest idea in town. “Whoever owns a black car?”, he tried to rationalize, with absolutely no logic to his observation.

In the same vein, it has also been my long time dream to own a pair of white trousers. Many trousers came and went but my dream remained unfulfilled due to numerous reasons, transport hassles being primary amongst them. However, as is the case with dreams that are pursued relentlessly, I recently laid my hands on such a dream pair.

And, life has not been the same again.

What does an innocent pair of white trousers have to do with work place productivity? Or, so you would be tempted to ask.

A pair of white trousers is as detrimental to productivity as a music system running at full blast next door when you are trying to concentrate on your board exam preparation. You are forever worried about coming in contact with any opaque surface, even mildly dusty. You are perennially concerned about that single drop of coffee or sauce or anything in any color other than plain (read water) on your person. You are paranoid about alighting from your car and walking those few steps across the patio to reach the lift lobby.

That is the cost you pay for dreaming big, or in my case white. And, all this while, I was thinking that having a car would solve the whitey problems of my life. Sigh!

The train party

A friend of mine, Nalini, once observed: “Facebook is more like going to a big party. You have these islands of conversations. You can choose when you want in. Almost everything is treated trivially including clicking and joining the most serious of movements. The best part is that you can exit without having to give the host any excuses!”

Back in 2008, I was one of the last to join this big party. And, that was only because some very persuasive friends had their way with me, what with wanting to play ‘Poke’ and ‘Superpoke’ on FB. Not surprisingly, I have not used any of those features till date.

But, even after creating a very insignificant FB profile, it took me a year further to actually get active on it. I was busy concentrating on Twitter then. Twitter was amazing; it had very interesting articles and videos. It was a window to much perspective on the hot news of the minute. Overall, Twitter offered me a platform to happily remain an observer, amassing knowledge, with no performance pressures.

I am not exactly sure when the transition happened. It must have been the winter of 2009-2010. I had just got back from a vacation and wanted to share the photos somewhere. You know how it is with these sites. You share something, then someone comments, you comment back, then you go to their profile to see what’s happening in their life and so on. I started dancing in the ‘party’ then , as Nalini would call it. I graduated from being a mere observer to an active participant, posting and sharing, liking and commenting. It would have been great if it had remained so. After all, who does not like partying once a week?

However, once I started dancing, I was not able to stop. I updated irrelevant and arbit statuses day in and day out, snooped around people’s profiles, took more pictures when I went somewhere just so I could upload them on FB. My life started revolving around FB. And, simultaneously, my Twitter activity declined alarmingly. Now, I hardly log on to Twitter anymore whereas I am forever hooked to FB.

Does this happen to everyone? Is it very difficult to concentrate on more than one social networking site at any given point of time? And, does usage of or inclination towards a particular social networking site really reflect the kind of person one is?

My constant presence on and participation in FB tells me that I am attention craving at the least and self-obsessed at the worst. I like the accolades on my smartness, intelligence, outgoing nature, fun quotient etc. I like being in the news (or, rather, being the news) all the time.

On the other hand, if someone is very active on Twitter, it might actually mean that they genuinely like following current happenings in the world. They also might like showing off their knowledge to others, but might not need external assurance on their capabilities. Just a ‘Re-tweet’ could be enough to make them happy.

I am sure there are a lot of ‘mere observers’ on FB too, and many, many people who use Twitter to share personal rants and cribs. However, it is easier to be tempted into becoming a participant on FB and much easier to be left ignored when ranting on Twitter, for there are not too many avenues to ‘Like’ and ‘Comment’ there.

If FB is a party, Twitter perhaps is like taking a train ride. You say something. If it is interesting and catches someone’s eye at that moment, it gets a reply and sometimes, even gets re-tweeted. If the bug catches on, it spreads like wild fire across the train. But, it doesn’t mean you have to stay on for it to spread. It makes friends with others and goes on. If it does not catch on, you linger on for some time, re-tweeting and replying to other observations, and then get off the train at some point of time. During days of IPL auctions and football matches, budget sessions and Nira Radia tapes, all the passengers get together for a beer and some discussion. But, mind it, nothing stays on for more than 24 hours, for train friendship cannot sustain longer than that.

I really am done with the party now. I want my train days back. I want to spend some time loitering online mindlessly, not wondering all day how I should perform online. Then again, while I was writing this post, resolving to leave the party, I logged into FB four times.

So, hail FB! With more than half a billion active users and a valuation amounting to billions, my one second, half-boiled rant read by a paltry hundred people is not going to change the popularity of the party, is it?

Sibling-hood redefined

A few weeks back, my kid cousin listed me as ‘Sister’ on FB. I got very excited, and fondly accepted and reciprocated the gesture. Today, when I was snooping around her profile (shameless that I am), I figured out that she has listed almost 10 people as sisters and brothers.

Other than feeling a tad disappointed that I am not an exclusive ‘sister’ (Leos love exclusivity, or so someone tells me), I almost immediately got transformed back to my college days.

We were fresh out of school then, reveling in the new found freedom that only a Government college can proffer. There were no 8.30 a.m. prayer sessions, no first bell and second bell, no full day attendance. We could bunk classes, or just sit around and sleep. No one gave a friggin’ damn.

But, for many of us poor kids from girls-only schools, the freedom came with a huge price tag. And that was to live in peace and harmony with those monstrous beings called boys. At least that was how the 16-something never-been-friends-with-boys* me chose to categorize them then.

Nah! I am exaggerating. You have sure heard of that whole adrenalin pumping thingy associated with adolescence. It is not all over-rated. It actually used to happen, in fair frequencies and adequate quantities too.

It was quite a big deal to converse with a guy. There used to be a sense of accomplishment around such interactions, though paltry and restricted to answering questions bordering along the lines of “Do you have all the notes of all the Data Structure classes ever conducted in the history of this college?”

As the terms went by and the data structures graduated to algorithms and the algorithms to dynamic programming, the friendships happened too. The friendships were funny though. The minute a guy and a girl became close enough, they would term it a brother-sister relationship. Even if they did not announce it so, their associates would discuss very authoritatively on the pure ‘siblingy’ relationship evident between them.

There were girls who tied rakhis on their ‘brothers’ hands and then started going around with them. There were guys who publicly proclaimed who their ‘sisters’ were and then proposed to them. I found it hilarious then. Well, I find it amusing even now.

What kind of society produces humans who are scared to acknowledge a thing called ‘friendship’ between man and woman? What growing-up pressures force people to give a safe label to such a relationship? From where do so many of us get the idea that it might actually be wrong to get overtly friendly with a person of the opposite gender.

So what if it does not remain just friendship in some cases. To me, that sounds much healthier and more logical than having an entire world of brothers / sisters.

* I had exactly one male friend before I went to college. Weird? Blame the same-gender school :P

Some pressing matters

I am not convent educated, unlike many of the leading ladies of Chennai. In fact, I was ruthlessly pulled out of a famous missionary school when I was barely six and enrolled in an extremely serious, very studious school. It was because my parents valued “no-nonsense”, “nationally accepted”, “rigorous” education over chaste English.

Ah well! That is quite some drastic stereotyping. No? Not my fault, blame my parents!

Though not convent-based, the school I studied in did teach me really good English. Or, so I have prided myself in thinking thus far.

However, of late, I have had some serious doubts about my mastery over the Queen’s language. What else could explain my confusion when I am repeatedly subjected to phrases such as these:

• Looking forward to meet you – I have always thought that it should be ‘Looking forward to meeting you’. But, the sheer number of people who use the former has intimidated me into believing that I might perhaps have been wrong all along.
• You can be rest assured that – This I know is completely wrong. You ‘can rest assured’. Or, you ‘can be assured’. How the hell can you ‘be rest assured’?
• Historic growth has been around xx% – How can all growth be of historic significance? For that is what ‘historic’ means. It is something out of the ordinary that happened when we were not around. Otherwise, it is simply ‘historical’.
• Between x to y – This used to be my Dad’s favorite. Every time he received a wedding invitation that stated that the reception would be held ‘Between x p.m. to y p.m.’, he would start arguing very excitedly. You either say ‘from x to y’ or ‘between x and y’, he would say. I do agree whole-heartedly.
• Forecasted – This is my latest problem. Would any of us have the nerve (or even the heart) to say “I putted everything in order before leaving for the day”? Then, how can one make a statement like “It is forecasted to be low”?
  

Please do clarify my doubts; right now, despite a round-the-corner vacation, these pertinent and perhaps, elementary questions seem to be weighing heavily on my heart (or is it mind).

Geeks, nerds and... some normal people

I am a geek, I have been reminded more than once. All engineers are, apparently. Even former ones.

Yes. I do the geeky talk once in a while, the theoretical geeky talk that is. Like theoretical computer science as against information technology. If you have lost me already, you should stop right here and head out to celebrate with some wine. You are NOT a geek.

To elucidate, just in case you are still around, I am a theoretical geek who can think algorithms, talk shortest paths and mull over integration to infinity at the best. I can appreciate geeky shows and plays, laugh over geeky jokes, and stand some geeky talk as long as it makes me a little intelligible on Nokia E5s, Blackberrys, Kindles, Nooks… whew! However, the minute someone gets into nerdy bits about software, middleware, upperware and some such, they have at best lost a friend, if not an acquaintance, for life.

I digress today, significantly from what I really wanted to write about. Which is about the latest Samsung Galaxy advertisement*.

There is nothing wrong with the advertisement itself. Well, almost. If only I were that gadget freak I would never be, I might be writing this post from there. The ad is that tempting.

Nevertheless, whether or not I acquire a Galaxy or an iPad (tech geeks would find that debatable, but I have a thing for the Apple brand), I would ensure that I never date a pest like the one shown in that ad.

No, really. Who wants to hang out with a guy who will photograph my handbag and web search the brand. How embarrassing for me if I were carrying a cheap replica of a Hidesign or a Chase (I am told they are dime a dozen on the lanes of Dharavi). And, who wants to go around with a tiresome bore who figures out how many calories I have burnt at the end of a dance. I have enough trouble avoiding the ugly truth from weighing machines. And, why on Earth would I be impressed with this smart-ass if it is not his own GK but Google that helps him figure out what song is playing on the disc.

In fact, I did not mean to crib about the ad. It is just an illustration to give a piece of advice to my male friends and acquaintances – geeks, nerds, normal – all of you.

Buy your androids. Give even a demo to your girlfriends. Women like “geekiness” in men, to some extent at least. Be geeky, crack some puzzles. We might actually be impressed. But, for heaven’s sake, don’t ever use your gadgets to tell us how many inches we should lose in order to fit into the latest Ritu Kumar creation on the display window.

* - I searched on YouTube for the advertisement with little success. If someone finds it, please provide the link as a comment. Thanks.

Distressed, rather

I have put this off for too long. It is high time I did it else my whole life will be in doldrums, not that it already isn’t.

Well, that sounds a tad too dramatic, even by my standards.

Without digressing further, what I need to do at the earliest possible is hit the send button on this very important e-mail.

Dearest Olay,
Can you please come up with a pro-ageing formula as soon as possible? I need something urgently that can accelerate my ageing specifically on the face.
Regards,

What may have prompted this outburst, you would wonder. Ladies and gentlemen, this is no outburst. This is a much planned, calculated, thought through, analyzed, sane (please feel free to add some more such adjectives at your whim and fancy) decision, not influenced by any person living or dead. Or maybe, it is.

Am sure anyone in my age group would be in seventh heaven hearing people tell them, “You look really young. Perhaps, you graduated this year.” And, what if different people in different situations and different environments tell this repeatedly? Isn’t it precisely what one wants to hear when going through this over-hyped quarter-life crisis?

However, I belong to a profession where women selectively color their hair so that grey strands are visible at strategic interludes and men wear spectacles to give them the ‘look’. I am surrounded day in and day out by people who perennially pray for wrinkled skin and grey moustaches.

I guess everyone has heard of those wise sages of epic fame, whose names I fail to recollect right now. We are a people like that. We need to, if not grow flowing beards and wear saffron robes, at least have sagely looks and stately manners so that we can advise wisely.

Wow! ‘Advise’ contains ‘wise’, in some convoluted form. It also contains ‘vice’, in a more straight-forward form!

Digressions apart, that is the long and short of it. Hence, I need to age soon so that I can join the bandwagon of wise sages and not stay young and foolish.

Before my boss voices it out some day, let me pre-empt my youth from becoming a ‘career-limiting’ move!

Color, color what color do you choose?

Thank you very much, Sony Vaio, for coming up with such a brilliant concept. It makes me feel special every morning I turn on the television and experience the ‘vivid’ness that is me, in the myriad colors of green and red (or is it pink?). And, may I add that you would have done a great disservice to mankind had you not roped in the symbol of femininity, the size zero queen, Her Highness Kareena Kapoor herself to endorse the series.

Now that we are done with the pleasantries, can we please get down to brass tacks?

I want to bring to your kind attention the simple fact that it does not exactly sound very cool to walk into a workshop or a meeting armed with a pink laptop. And, this holds true for all populace, gender disparities notwithstanding.

In layman terms, what it translates into is this. We women do like our pink dresses, the occasional pink footwear, and the pink umbrella on a nice, bright, sunny day. Pink is a pleasant color, it definitely goes well in a bedroom setting. So, we also like our pink curtains and pink bed sheets. Some of us even like our pink teddy bears in our bedrooms. (Although I do know of some women who hate pink, at the risk of sounding stereotypical and, more importantly, to appease the male of the species, I am considering them outliers). However, that does not mean that we love parading the roads like pink fairies (ugh! sounds repulsive), with pinked gadgets.

I remember the time when my Manager was gifted a pink mobile phone by her husband of 7 years. The phone became the butt of all office jokes instantly. She is a strong woman, stood it for a full 2 days; and, then, had the panel changed to blue.

The other day, I saw a Beetle on the road, in a shocking yellow color. My colleague was most certain that it would be a woman driving it. Unfortunately for him and fortunately for me, it was a guy.

There! Now you are getting the point, perhaps? That women may not actually like weird colored gadgets but are assumed to like them because of the whole gender thingy.

I hereby humbly request the product development and marketing teams at Sony, Apple, and other geeky companies to spare us of the vividness please. We already have enough trouble trying to decide between types of gadgets, not to be burdened with the extra load of having to run an elimination algorithm based on colors.

Fear of GOD

I have many a time wondered how easy it is to scare people.

Terror strikes, bomb scares, kidnapping, homicides – all these sure put fear in to people’s heads. But, they are coupled with in depth planning or extensive damage to public and private property or both.

What is the easier way to put that fear in to people? To keep them on tenterhooks, not knowing what would happen next? To make them look around with stricken eyes, restless thoughts and a readiness to bolt and run at the simplest sound?

Call a strike.

In a span of two years, I have had my fair share of strikes in this city. The reasons have been many – fuel price increase, arrests of noted political personas, regional disfavors. However, the result has consistently been the same.

Fear and panic.

So, whenever I have got into a vehicle during any of these occasions, the driver has always asked me, in rare concern, ‘Akele jaa rahe hai aap?’, and then proceeded to bolt all the doors from the inside and roll up the windows – even those rickety old taxis where locking is of no use and the windows no longer roll up.

I very badly need to digress here to provide some unwarranted information.

I hate dependencies. For instance, I hate having to wait for someone to pick me up and drop me. I would much rather prefer getting out of my house and finding some public transport that would take me wherever I want to go. That is one big reason why I love Mumbai much more than, say, a Gurgaon.

On a similar note, I hate having to curb and foil my plans, ‘voluntarily’ of course, because someone decided somewhere that normal life should be disrupted. I become fiercely defensive at such times. Wanting to rebel and prove a point to no one in particular, one of these days, I might just step out despite all warnings and go wherever I am scheduled to go, as if nothing is wrong with the world at large.

Today, despite not being crazy enough to do something like that, I had some other reasons and more importantly, the right support systems, to venture out and, as a result, got a chance to write this –

The roads were empty, sunny and wide
But, there were policemen on the side,
And, a bandh with no taxis to ride,
And, a bandh with no taxis to ride.

I also got to see that fear again in people’s eyes, the same one I saw on television during 26/11 days. Yet, it did not take much doing. No guns, no bombs, no terrorists taking the sea route, no demolition plans. Just one simple ‘Bharat Bandh’ to show “solidarity”, a solidarity that would ensure that stones are pelted on transport systems, shops are shut down for no rhyme or reason. And, that 10% of Mumbai's populace which has traveled defying all odds would be shivering inside office cabins, not knowing how it will get back home.

Then again, we need to be rational and reasonable. Life is full of trade offs and we get only an assorted deal if we want to enjoy the luxuries of a developing, democratic country. Like how we are entitled to elect our favorite candidates, write and speak whatever we want to and migrate freely across the country, unlike some of our dear Asian neighbors, we are also at liberty to call our own bandhs and strikes and ensure general disruption of life.

Yet again

It is high summer, that time of the year when the sun beats down on Chennai like a mad man out on a rampage to drain our brains out. But, more importantly, it is that time of the year when campus joiners infest our office space or whatever little of it we have at as early as 9 in the morning. 9 in the morning. Not having fixed seats in office does have its problems, doesn’t it?

However, having new people around provides much needed fodder for this blog (that’s my selfish avatar with the evil laughter intact).

Sample this conversation one of them (N) had with our HR Manager soon after joining. “Can you please send us the welcome mail?” Now, get this straight. We, like other normal human beings, do feel a little jolted when bestowed with the presence of new faces in humongous numbers. Nevertheless, we are not evil enough to make someone feel so unwelcome that they start demanding for written proofs of how warmly welcoming the firm feels towards them.

So, I rechecked with N whether I had heard it right. She said, “Yeah, we need to have the welcome mail to finish other joining formalities.”

Processes, processes and more processes. That’s the challenge with huge organizations. We need to get a welcome mail in order to receive the access card. We need to have the access card in order to enter the firm and log in to the network. We need to log in to the network to receive the welcome mail in the first place. Quite a vicious cycle, ain’t it?

But, I am no one to crib about huge organizations. I like them so – large, widely spread over the place and hyper networked. The plethora of choices, the might of the fun, the number of faces one meets day in and day out.. it’s bliss.

Then again, small organizations sound exciting too. The comfort in knowing everyone, almost like family, is hard to pass off as non beneficial.

Ok, you can see that am ‘see-sawing’, or rather, what is that word, yet again? Oh yeah, I am swinging (thanks Shift+F7) like a see-saw! ‘Cos it is Sayonara time yet again.

And, unlike last time, this once, I am quite apprehensive, senti and majorly excited, all at the same time!

P.S. I know it is quite an irony, me cribbing about new joiners, when I am going to be one really soon. As an aside, I heard there are fixed seats over there.

P.P.S. One more label joins the list of city labels with this post.

It's a funny world!

Caveat: The observations made in this post are based on limited experiences during a limited window of time under certain limited circumstances. These are not meant to be generalizations though they might “sound” generic.

I have ranted extensively on this blog. After all, I am an SME* on that, there is even a label named ‘Cribbita’ on this blog. My rants have ranged from vending machines to “name calling” conventions to professionally acceptable language. However, I have consciously steered clear of never ending, debatable topics. Save this once.

At the risk of sounding contentious, here we go!

The fact that one is a woman does not mean that

1. One does not know the first thing about numbers – Gender has nothing to do with being marketing pro or finance pro. Personal preferences have. And, as an aside, the two need not be mutually exclusive, there are people who like and know both Finance and Marketing.
2. One can talk only the supposedly ‘girlie’ stuff (like shopping) – One knows how to hold a reasonably interesting conversation (interesting to all parties concerned); or, one does not. Period. One need not be of a particular gender to be stupid enough to talk about subjects that do not appeal to everyone in the group, when in a group.
3. One has no career aspirations – This is what beats me the most. Beyond a point, gender has very little to do with aspiring for an interesting career. How can being a woman be so much of a barrier at this level that it is even taboo to “desire” things, which are quite common place and not too out of the ordinary otherwise?

It is quite hilarious to note how easy it is to stereotype. And, ah, well, to generalize too.

* - Subject Matter Expert

The great Indian employers' struggle

The news came in today morning. Yet another was poached by a rival. This is the second time it has happened this quarter; and, by the same rival.

Tempers have been flying. It is so unnerving it’s not even funny. After all these days of sharing, caring and working together, how could employees turn disloyal over night?

There was no clue of it, no signs of the bad times to come. Everything was normal; life went on as usual, and we were blissfully ignorant of the developments happening behind our back.

But now this big blow!

We are crippled, till we find a worthy substitute. The amount of training that needs to be given, the time that the new one would take to settle down and actually start working… It is going to be toil, a painful tussle, a fight till the end, by when the poaching would start all over again.

Oh God! If not for sneaky neighbors and unfaithful servant maids, the world would have been a much better place to live in.

Human Touch

Ehsaan is busy overseeing the preparations this morning. No doubt he is ticking off in his mind all the important parameters including presentation, style & spread as his eyes go over the choice dishes of the day.

Introducing to you Ehsaan, the meticulous, young entrepreneur, in fact the most enterprising businessman I have ever met. To him, quality comes first, things like break-even and profit just incidental. He dons the many roles of Chief Accountant, Front Office Manager and Executive Chef, Kitchens at the Cafeteria, **** Office, Chennai.

The one thing that I missed to add in the preceding paragraph, albeit intentionally, was about the whole love and affection part. This bit definitely deserves a dedicated paragraph. And, also the surprises that are sprung on us in the form of ‘Dish of the day – Chef’s Special’. Let’s take them one at a time, or, perhaps, together, as a package.

So, we go up for tea at 11 in the morning. Everyone orders ‘Adhrak waali chai’s. I call for a lemon tea. You heard that right. We order for tea, having done away with robotic things like the vending machine. We, as a whole, completely believe in the mammoth impact of the human touch on everything including our morning tea. Getting back from that (this time quite) significant digression, once we place our orders, some heated discussions ensue in the kitchens. Out comes Ehsaan’s trusted envoy (whose name I do not remember now). He says, “Saab, adhrak nahi hai. Masala chai chalega?” Everyone at the tea table nods their head enthusiastically. Masala sounds far better than adhrak after all. And, then everyone gets their chai. I do not, at the same time as the rest. Remember, mine has a far more special ingredient than some chindi adhrak. After around 10 minutes in to the chai, the sandwiches arrive – Chise and Vag sandwiches (as they are spelt on the white board in the cafeteria). The other things on the board include Orinj Juce, Lemin Juse, Bel Pure and Samsa (optional dishes – dynamic on an hourly basis –that is why a white board and not a fixed menu – so on and so forth).

Digressions, digressions. Let’s focus. My colleague says, “Arey bhaiyya, yeh toh veg sandwich nahi hai. Sirf cheese hai andhar”, to which the envoy says (definitely ‘pyaar se’), “Saab, yeh hai na, tamatar. Toh veg sandwich hi hai saab.” He walks back, muttering to himself, am sure just these words, “How nice & accommodative (irritating) of these busy (jobless) guys. They just accept (complain & complain about) whatever is offered!” Trust me, he is a really sweet and nice guy, the best you can get around there.

15 minutes down. Everyone is done with their masala chai and respective sandwiches. My lemon tea is yet to arrive. I make a personal visit to the kitchen. “Bhaiya lemon chai kahan hai?” Ehsaan is luckily around. I am quite happy. He will take care now, being the budding, enthusiastic entrepreneur he is. “Madam, nimbu nahi hai.” I am dumbstruck. My colleagues chide me for having inconvenienced Ehsaan and his team by asking for lemon tea in the wee hours of the morning. That is apparently an afternoon delicacy. I go to my desk crestfallen.

Nevertheless, we, the shameless tea lovers return bang on at 3.30. This time, I do not ask for anything. Ehsaan personally makes sure that I get the best lemon tea around the place. Bina cheeni, mind it. I have by now given up trying to explain to these guys that I might be on a strict diet, but I am very particular about having enough and more sugar in my tea. Ehsaan and his mentees have much more pressing issues like presentation, style and spread on their minds. Not such operational issues like sugar and no sugar for them, no Sir.

These days, Ehsaan does not serve us personally any more. He handles only the premium guests, like partners, directors and other heads.

However, he has left us with a rich and experienced team, which follows to the 'T', his presentation style, diversity and more importantly, the spellings on the white board.

Footnote: I have never in my life missed a Vending Machine more than in the past 7 months. To hell with burnt out chais and the human touch!

Letter Writing: A Case Study

Last post, we saw the different forms of communication prevalent in our forefathers’ times. Now, let us go back further in time to understand the predominant form of communication in the prehistoric era of the 20^th century.

Perhaps, that is how history would introduce the concept of a ‘Letter’ to its students five hundred years from now.

When was the last time any of us wrote or received a letter? Letter, as in, handwritten (however bad the handwriting may be) and delivered either through India Post or in person? Except for the occasional note attached to a gift, it has been ages since I received a nice handwritten personal letter. And of course, more than ages since I wrote one too.

I still remember the time I used to write to this pen friend of mine. It was during secondary school. She was technically not a pen pen friend if you know what I mean. A friend of mine had moved to a different city and we used to correspond through letters. E-mails were not popular options those days; we were still programming (read playing) with Logo on a now ancient black and white computer. Her friend in the new school somehow got introduced through mail to me and so we started corresponding too. I vividly recall the expectation with which I would await each letter of hers and the happiness with which I would write to her. Aah well, it died down due to some reasons. But, that is for another day!

One of the most memorable gifts I received for a birthday was a very smartly masqueraded, apparently alarming letter trying to profess love finally ending with a ‘Happy Birthday’. My reaction changed from speechless shock to undying laughter for the rest of the evening. Anyway, that is again a story for another day totally!

Many are the stories of the letter. These are some I remember off hand now. And I still have a file (hard bound) containing many of these letters, reminded of which, I think it is time to go through them today and relive old memories.

Today, we have only e-mail and chat history to go back to. But, what is scarier is we are very quickly migrating to Facebook and Twitter. The quick fix solution of updating statuses on Twitter* instead of sitting and writing a mail, even an electronic one at that, has become the trend of the day.

This post will be antique material in five years’ time. Already, ‘letters’ sound slightly dated.

Anyway, let me stop being so cribby about the whole thing and tell you about how we got around the problem of the ‘dying art of letter writing’.

Rashmi got married, very vividly recounted here. We, some very arbit almost 12 people (some did not participate to their full potential, so am not going to count them completely :D), started a thread to discuss operational issues like when we should reach the venue etc. Sometime down the line, the mail thread reached a count of 50 and we realized we had been mailing random stuff very similar to spamming on BR (our internal messaging system at IIMB). And, then, we thought we should take the thread to perhaps 1000 and print the same and give a hardbound copy to Rashmi to read and enjoy!?! We did not reach 1000. We ended at 263 odd. And, being an extremely environment friendly group, we translated the mails in to pdf, wrote it on a CD and gave it to Rashmi as a wedding gift. Last heard, Rashmi’s husband very patiently read through the entire set of mails and thanked us for the same. Some novel ways to keep the art of letter writing going!! What do you say? J

* – It would be extremely unceremonious on my part to not acknowledge that the minute this post is published, the link would be up as a status message on both Facebook and Twitter

Random Observations

How many B – school grads does it take to fix a projector?
Twenty to strategize, advise and attempt; one IT support person to actually fix it.

One day, twenty of us had assembled in the conference room for a presentation. For a long time, we were unable to commence the presentation because the projector didn’t seem to be working. The twenty of us devised different strategies and “envisaged implementing a varied set of solutions” to fix the projector. At that precise moment, a lady from the IT Support Team walked in and removed the protective heat absorbing glass from the focusing lens.

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Friends Vs Colleagues

When friends get together, lay offs, the impact of recession and the ‘worst is over’ phenomenon put together take the first place, with an extended gossip on the current relationship status of various people we know taking second place. If we have a little bit of time left amidst discussions on who attended the alumni meet and who is looking at quitting, we talk about what is happening in our lives too.

When colleagues get together, not the dominant but the only thing we do is crib. And, the fact that we are not the only ‘miserable ones’, as we think of ourselves to be, makes the meeting so much more sweeter.

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It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But the half-wit remains a half-wit, and the emperor remains an emperor.

The quote is not mine, and I am NOT going to go romping all over the internet trying to figure out the ‘Source:’ to be included in Arial, Italics, Font Size 8 at the end of this post. The content is not going to change either ways. If I am going to actually tell the emperor that he is naked, I would be branded a dim – wit and banished from the kingdom forever, as I am not an Emperor. Period.