Read this nice interview of Sachin's wife. http://www.hindustantimes.com/I-didn-t-even-know-who-Sachin-was-when-we-first-met-Anjali/H1-Article3-476335.aspx

Somehow reminded me of the days when people I knew frowned upon her because Anjali was not a Maharshtrian. Now these people had no business in judging her, but then we Indians have opinions about everything that our public figures do.

There was a similar conversation I had heard when Ajit Agarkar's star was on the rise and he married a Parsi/Muslim girl. One peeved uncle in the local train was so venting his frustration about why these successful cricketers from mumbai do no marry maharastrian girls. Did he feel like our demi-gods didn't find Maharashtrian girls good enough. He was very vocal about Mahrashtrian girls being attractive, well educated and cultured, yet these sons of our soil cared to look elsewhere :D

Well, uncle still didn't have any business about judging Agarkar but then he was not factually wrong. lets look at the three cricketers from mumbai at the top of our minds: Sachin Tendular, Sunil Gavaskar, Vinod Kambli - all have married non Maharastrian ladies :)

Happy Diwali

Dear All, Let me first wish you a very Happy Diwali. May this festival of lights bring you much joy and happiness

I didn't go home for Diwali, wanted to , but decided not to. The short leave and the prospect of piled up work after coming back and the fact that I am planning another trip again in November made me stay put.

And although I have felt jealous of people who have made statements that they are having fun with their families and friends in their hometowns :), this break has been good to me as well.

I have caught up on sleep and the positive effect of which is already showing on me. I don't feel like I am running on reserve battery.

Basically I have been lazing around, watching movies one after another and hogging on the sweets. Something I haven't done since I left NITIE. :)

Until next post. cya

Follow up to last post

more than a month since last post. So let me check what's new since then... referring to the last post and updating
1. India stuttered in front of some real competition, I cant take any more jitters
-- Aah...the bliss of non-cricket, Ashes is just a peripheral feeling

2. Sensex continues to boom, time to invest some more
-- Hehe, Invested a lot and then the markets dipped, thankfully they are up and I have made enough profit to buy a handkerchief (Recently bought Van Heusen kerchiefs - 180 bucks for set of 3!, gone are the days of haggling for 10 ka 3 in mumbai locals?!!)

3. Signs of Throat infection, need to take care
--I think the infection took me down on one weekend, but the ice cream bonanza continues everyday post lunch

4. Bought a book on Calvin and Hobbes..pricey @ 620 bucks something that could be read up in just 2 hours...need to check if getting a set from abroad works cheaper
-- I guess money well spent, still to finish the book though, couldn't find the 2 hours all this while. eh :D

5. Reading Bill Bryson's Neither here nor there (Thanks M for the reco), falling in love with Europe's charm without even being there once. Gotta save enuf money for such a trip
--- Middle of the book, Mr. Bryson seems to miss his wife and keeps fantasising

6. Kailash Parbat is coming to chennai and opening next week. Must visit with the NITIE junta here
--- Gentle Reminder, Pathak, Subbu, Saifee!!!

7. How I seem to make more sense when I use numbering even for the most mundane of thoughts
---This is not going anywhere

8. Goan cousin hitched with a Punju gal, am gonna have distant Punjabi relatives, people expecting me to learn Bhangra
--- Don't even think about it! ;)

9. meebo access in office, now on gtalk all the time
--- Hathway shut shop, so making use of office access :)

10. Obama wants to spoil the childhood of American children by making them study hard
--- he shouldn't spoil my children's American dreams

Done with is hafte ka "Dus ka Dum!!"

thoughts this weekend

1. India stuttered infront of some real competition, I cant take any more jitters
2. Sensex continues to boom, time to invest some more
3. Signs of Throat infection, need to take care
4. Bought a book on Calvin and Hobbes..pricey @ 620 bucks something that could be read up in just 2 hours...need to check if getting a set from abroad works cheapers
5. Reading Bill Bryson's Niether here nor there (Thanks M for the reco), falling in love with Europe's charm without even being there once. Gotta save enuf money for such a trip
6. Kailash Parbat is coming to chennai and opening next week. Must visit with the NITIE junta here
7. How I seem to make more sense when I use numbering even for the most mundane of thoughts
8. Goan cousin hitched with a Punju gal, am gonna have distant Punjabi relatives, people expecting me to learn Bhangra!
9. meebo access in office, now on gtalk all the time
10. Obama wants to spoil the childhood of American children by making them study hard

Political commentry

This post might be a little late. The hype and hoopla around the elections is well past. But I have been pondering if we got the best result. I did not vote this time. I am registered in Thane and didn't take the effort of a getting registered in Chennai. So I am not sure how the more "awakened" (Jaago re campaign ;) ) junta will think about this post.

I don't think I would have voted for Congress. I do nurse a grudge against them for implementing the OBC reservations in higher education institutes. I find it grossly unfair and against meritocracy and nothing but a political gimmick which might have long standing repercussions in the years to come. On second thoughts I have realised India has got a strong Prime Minister.

People seem to perceive Manmohan as a soft PM. But in the last 5 years, it seems to me that they have been more hard lined than BJP was. Be it the above mentioned OBC reservations or the nuclear deal or the guts to tell Karat and his Politburo to buzz off.

BJP finally got its chance in 1999-2003 after waiting in the wings for many years. They did well but messed up a few things. They like to be seen as a hardline party when wooing voters, but when it came to governance, they couldn't find the magical middle path. The Ram temple issue , the uniform civil code, the unfortunate Kandahar hijack, the spiralling onion prices, the divestment of PSUs, Godhra and so forth...they always seemed to be swinging in opposite directions.

The Varun Gandhi issue where they wouldn't publicly admonish him gave an impression to me that if they won then their second innings with new captain (Advani) also wouldn't be much different. I just hope that BJP collects itself, starts building again from the grassroots and begins resolving real problems. It will be a sad thing if they go back to the recluse of "Ram Bhoomi" and "Hindutva" campaigns. The Congress needs to be kept on its toes and who better than Loh Purush and his young turks.

On a lighter note, the incessant election coverage on TV and newspapers finally affected the brains of one of our close NITIE batch mates. So much so that he grandly announced to me that we wants to be the Primer Minister of India. He made this comment NOT at a election rally or, when he was campaigning for his party but in the couch comforts of his living room :). Thankfully all that is past and now he is back to normal, worrying about cracking his CFA Level 1.
Also I and Arup Angle think that Prakash and Brinda Karat's story has something common with Hazaaron Khwaishen Aisi. Looking at Brinda's snaps I am sure she was a charming lady in her youth, Prakash was a dapper youth with ideals, rich and sophisticated chick falls for emerging leader of tomorrow and the rest is history ..hehe..atleast in my imagination...

Frasier

Frasier is a tele series I strongly recommend to every one. I first watched it about 5 years ago when it started airing it on Star World. But the succeeding seasons were not regularly aired.

Thanks to isohunt and Hathway, I have been hooked now for past 3 months
It is a humor based series about the life of a radio psychiatrist (Frasier) interspersed with his brother,father,maid and producer.

What has me hooked to Frasier is the kind of humor. It is a highly intellectual, hardly anything vulgar or below the belt. People who enjoy satire or irony will love it. Apart from the refreshing genre of humor, I am sure what gets you hooked is that you start seeing parts of yourself in Frasier and his family.

It could range from waiting forever to tell some gal that you are crazy about her ever since you met her to wanting to belong to a royal family and desire to be addressed as "His Royal Highness" or the love for your parents where you want them to live with you or the desire to hob nob with the top echelons of the society...to being recognized as a popular figure.

The sibling relationship depicted between Frasier and Niles is a never-seen-on-TV before kind.
Here too the series stands like a mirror. I am the elder brother and I see myself in Frasier. My roomie (who is now even more hooked thanks to yours truly) is a younger sibling and sees himself in Niles.

Kudos to the writers for weaving our dormant aspirations into such a fantastic story.

So the next time you decided to download Lost or Prison Break, do search for "Frasier" an start from Season 1..let me know if you don't like it

Until next post then..take care

Back after a hiatus

I just checked, the last post was way back in Feb..as a friend put it very well..Years go by so fast..yet each day goes so slow, especially after a heavy lunch ;)

From what I remember in the past 3 months
1. I worked on a large deal which we won
2. Enjoyed Business Development
3. Studied and passed Spanish Level 1 course with flying colors
4. Tried and enjoyed free style dancing, but couldn't keep up with the schedule
5. Continue to jog often
6. Made a trip to Mumbai
7. Attended my best friend's engagement in Satara
8. Watched Frasier and Scrubs TV series relentlessly
9. Finished reading the entire works of Sherlock Holmes..Sir Arthur is forever going to be my favorite author
10. Work has has started creeping into my home and weekends, so I have started using the dormitory more often at work

Cya Soon

My Housekeeper

Barathi: My HouseKeeper

I have just completed 6 months in chennai and some of them have just whizzed by. I continue to stay at the same place where I first moved in, enjoying exemplary companionship, first with Arup, then Ramesh and now with Amaresh.

Barathi,my housekeeper has been an integral part of my stay here and my ex and current roomies think he deserves a mention on this blog. So here we go....

I vividly rememeber my first day when I met Barathi. I had come along with Arup to check out
the place. The landlady had told me to call "Borraatee" once I reached the house. It is normal
to come across girls named Bharati in Maharashtra and so I when, I learnt that is the name of
the housekeeper, I was expecting a middle aged woman to turn up. And then from across the road comes a strapping young man of 25 zooming on his TVS bike. That was my first realization that Barathi is a guy's name in chennai.

Barathi makes a good sales pitch of the place and we decide to move in. Barathi appears as a
industrious person and has a decent grip of hindi which is a godsend in chennai. He is
generally attired in a lungi, folded up! He has 2 assistants at his disposal. Barathi has a TVS
bike which he regularly uses to commute between our's and the landlady's house for food etc.
For a long time his bike had a torn seat. My landlady had told me to rely on him for all our
daily needs. So right from breakfast to dinner and to cleaning the house, this was our guy.
Both Arup and I were pretty impressed.

2 days before we are to move in our room, Arup gets into some candid chat with Barathi. He
tells us that the incumbent resident of our room is a bad person and that he is happy that Arup
and I are taking his place. Naturally we ask him about the person and he tells us... "Woh
Daactar Hai.. Gandaaa Aadmi hai...45 years age hai....shaadi nahi kiya hai....daaru peeta
hai.....cigarette bhi... gandaaa aadmi hai....". The next day he tells us same
dialog..."Daactar gandaa aadmi hai... sirf 45000 salary hai....shaadi nahi kiya hai....daaru
peeta hai.....cigarette bhi... gandaaa aadmi hai....".I and Arup just cant figure the
co-relation between 45 years of age and 45000 salary. On the terrace, Arup and I come across
lots of empty beer bottles and cig stubs and we acknowledge Barathi's words. Our belief in
Barathi is accentuated when the incumbent visits on his last night here in a slighlty
inebriated state.

It took us only a week to realise that this Barathi who derided the incumbent, himself swigs a
bottle of beer every evening before having a number of smokes. A closer observation of the beer
bottles on the terrace, which we thought the incumbent left, turn out to be a local brand of
"Bir" that we had so often saw Barathi consume.

Then one day, Arup was returning late from work. In the dark corner of a street, Arup sees the
shapes of a young man smooching a girl. Arup thinks the shape is familiar and then realization
dawns when we come across the all so familiar TVS bike with the torn seat. It was the same time that Barathi was not responding to my calls to turn on the water pump!

I have to follow up small things like cleaning the room, starting the water pump, fixing the
lights in my room on a regular basis. Even before I finish my instructions, Barathi will start
saying..."Haan Ok Ok Ji...Pakka Pakka..".

Brijesh: "Barathi...Paani nahi aa raha "

Barathi: "Haan ok ok ji"
Brijesh: "Barathi..kal bulb le ke aao"

Barathi: "ok ok ji.. Pakka Pakka"
Brijesh: "Barathi.. thoda doodh le kar aao"

Barathi: "Ok ok ji.. Pakka pakka"
To expect Barathi to do whatever is told is akin to expecting our Congress government of
"hataoing garibi". To expect him to do the work promptly is akin to expecting Sachin Tendulkar
to win a final.. it will happen sometimes but mostly not.

All these are just many of his antics that spice up the life here (and increase my BP sometimes). He can be trusted with the room keys, gets the food on time - esp imp in the morning, has taken a sick colleague to the hospital, got warm milk when I was down with severe cold, helped me get my clothes back from a useless dhobhi and has told me about the "Naarth Indian and Keralite" "Figures" (young female residents) that stay in another house besides our's.

He is now starting out with his own guest house and wants me to move there. He has "promised" me excellent service and is ready to take payment only after the first month. Knowing Barathi, I am staying put in the current place, but I can wish him all the best.

Jargon Ride

Jargon Galore

As an MBA, jargon should be coming out of my ears and I know lots of people who love doing that. Now jargon are useful but over the past few months I have started finding it really amusing when people fit in one jargon-in every line they speak.
So while appending "business" (as in business process or business logic or for than matter even Business Analyst) is passe here are some of the "it" jargon I keep coming across

1. End-of-the-day: Now many people have been using this as "End-of-the-day..." but seriously, nothing happens at the end of the day, we just go home :)

2. Pipeline: Ah.. the favorite line of managers in IT, have been hearing this for years now..we have a strong pipeline of projects, when basically we might not have anything in hand right now and the future can be blamed on a strong engineering structure which although strong might be leaking

3. Leverage: I DON'T "USE" my expertise.. I"LEVERAGE" it :D, sometimes I just wish to leverage such people out of this world

4. problem statement: I DON'T understand "objectives".. I understand only "problem statements"

5. agile mode: Inspired from the agile methodology of software development, our bosses want us to work in the "agile" mode, which basically means I turn in his work super fast and not that I can run at 40 KMPH

6. touch-base: Now this one was a real shocker when I first heard a female senior manager use this.."I will touch base with him"..I mean touch what... base...?? base means bottom..touch what !!!! and there I thought whether it a series of levels in which one gets intimate with one's partner..first base..second base..touch base!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! thankfully I realised quickly that it is just used to contact someone like maybe over the phone :D

7. deep-dive: I will NOT just study the finance sector, I will in fact "conduct a domain deep-dive" in the finance sector. As if, after a whole day spent googling, I will return to shore with pearls of knowledge like a deep sea diver. :D Once a document I prepared was not considered insightful enough to be considered a dive, so I just went ahead and named it a "dip" :D..ab samandar mein dive nahi mara toh kya hua...swimming pool mein dubki to lagaya

I request my readers to post their favorites. Cya until next post.