Everything is fine :-)

Going through a new phase, appreciating these times more, I'm feeling good :)



Read Very Good Jeeves! by P G Wodehouse.




As usual, an impeccable work by the genius. An easy read. Delightful to say the least :)


Watched Dostana :x

Well I knew it was going to be a holy f*ck movie, yet didn't want to miss on getting together with friends. Plus there were girls ;-) Hence, yours truly obliged and went along.
This is the first movie where I ever got out of the theater while it was being screened. Damn! Seriously a brain numbing, no brains movie with carcass stupidity splattered generously. And people were laughing!! :O :O
Priyanka in skimpy clothes was the only part that I thought would be worth at least 50 of the 150 bucks I spent for the movie. But even she didn't appeal to me :|


Of the 80 odd minutes in the first half, I might have spent at least 25 near the snack bar.

Well, in the second half, I got a girl to sit beside me and there on I didn't even know when the movie got over! ;-) :D


Truly a crap movie. Guess Tashan was better :|


Then watched some more on my comp.



Mumbai meri jaan

Honestly, I didn't understand it. Watched it in 10 parts. A heavy movie.


Quantum of Solace.

Damn! I expected more from a Bond movie. The action scenes seemed lifted from Casino Royale. Craig looked tired all through. The girls were :| The story also wasn't that great.

C'mon get back the charm of the Bond movie.

Honestly, Casino Royale is the only Bond movie I actually liked:D

The Dark Knight

All the hullabaloo went waste. It wasn't that great except Joker who stole the show. Damn cool performances. If you've got enough time to waste, go, watch it.


Hello

Wow! I meanter say I never expected it to be this good. I threw away the book after reading just 50 pages of it. So put it on with zero expectation. Makes for a good watch. Get your popcorn and go for it.



Apart from that, I've been battling with my nose for a month now. Caught cold twice!!
The first one- when i returned from Kerala owing to the drastic climate change.
The second due to the cold wave :x ( Damn Ankit)
Still struggling with it.


In between, I'd a wonderful birthday :)

Enjoyed, some what :D
Can say had fun :P


Met some old buddies, looking to meet some more.

Rest, as I said earlier, I feel good, blessed, gifted :)
I feel closer to life. And all those philosophical things repeated over and over. :-P



And yes,
I'm looking forward to watch Ghajini. I liked the corporate look of Aamir Khan in it.

And about Rab ne bana di jodi- I didn't dare. That's it!

Just read somewhere else with the song changed to:
Sab mein rab dikhta hai yaara main kya karoon :D :D


Chalo, as I said earlier I need to study and I want to study.
But i know that i won't study. :|



Hope it changes for the better :)



PS: Tomorrow marks the first year when I entered the world of blogger, That's the 1st b'day of my profile. :) And I can say safely that this is the best blogging site B-)

Cheers to google!!! ;-)

Twenty six days since I last posted and been through what not.
Made a trip to Kerala again, turned up in a panel debate on NDTV :D, have been discussing a lot of things, been more focused , people very impressed with me, a lot of introspection and other things.
I won’t bother to mention all of it here.
The wedding was great; really enjoyed and will love to get back again. :) :D
The mind’s full but I don’t have the stamina to write.
Everything’s going really well. Just that I need to start studying well.

Kerala- wonderful trip, miserable travel.

Back!
And with a bang! Or a phuss :-D
Whatever!
Back from a Kerala trip. And boy, Wasn’t it great! Had a rollicking time and in between there’d been
some tough moments too. Overall it was wonderful to get back to my people.

Some excerpts from my travel:

** Six feet syndrome- I just hate my height when it comes to travelling in a train. I just can’t stuff the whole six feet of me in those side berths in a compartment; nor can I lie in peace in any of the other berths. My feet get constant whacks from the passersby which robs all my sleep after sitting the whole day in utter discomfort. I end up losing my sleep and having severe neck and back pain.

** People acting funny in trains. All right! Now that’s not anything new!
Complete chatterboxes who beat even me! :-D
Pesky, very naughty kids running around and scaring away the last wink I could get. One of them actually came up to me and said, “Oye! Main tere ko sone nahi doonga!” And he made sure I didn’t sleep. He was some 4 years old.
And why don’t I ever get a young (forget good looking) girl anywhere near me? :x Every time I get only uncles and grandmas and naughty kids. No young soul. Ughghgh!
Very untidy people! :x Spilling food and making the compartment as dirty and noisy as possible.
Also, once as I was going to wash my hands, there was this girl who literally screamed in my face!! It almost got my hair standing! I stood there shocked for two seconds. Then I realized that she was actually warning a small kid who got up the side upper berth! Duh!
And you can’t beat this one. This actually typifies an Indian passenger. This guy burped on my face!! Ughghghghgh. And no apologies :O I washed my face five times.

** Romance with Coffee: I had several cups of coffee. Some 35 cups in the first three days; most of them in train. And had it all the time in Kerala too. But I donlt understand why no one ever gets a full 150 ml of coffee in a 170 ml cup as written in the rules! Everytime I get some 120 ml in a 150 ml cup! Bah!

** Insipid food while going; pathetic service while returning. God help the railway caterers. Wonder when they’ll learn to be courteous! Here also, they charged more than what is the norm.

** And guess what? While I was returning, we had some guests waiting to welcome us. Hiding in some deep, dark, unknown spots. And as soon as we sat to have our food, we saw the first glimpse. And then on we had a tough time warding off every single one of them while eating, reading, sleeping!! The place was infested with cockroaches damn it! And this was a second AC compartment. Is this what the junta pays all that money for?


And a word about my trip: It was really memorable. The nostalgia, great sceneries, the people, great food- everything was just so special. Specially the food. Amazing! Both in Bangalore and Kerala.

Another thing: One should learn from the civilized people out there. I was just stunned by the sheer contrast between how things work here in Jodhpur and the way they do in Kerala. People are much more aware and better mannered. An example is the railway reservation system. At both places, queues start forming at 2 in the morning. But the queue is maintained in Kerala when the shutter opens. And here in jodhpur, the queue is nonexistent by the time the guy comes to open the shutters. It’s just pushing, hitting and everything crap that you can imagine happening in a crowd. Just crap.


All this done, when I returned home. I found yet again to my dismay that the place was ruled by rats while we were away. The fridge was attacked, the photo frames out of place, things here and there. My room was safe though :-D
And we found that our landline number was changed to a stupid one and also wasn’t able to access the net all these days. Was confined to my home ( as usual :-P) reading a novel. It’s a good novel though.


Rest, oh yes!
I’m going back to Kerala on 20th :-D to attend my cousin’s wedding. Really looking forward to it :-)
This was it from my side.
Adieu!

Happy Deepwali :-)

Khushnaseeb hoon main jo tumhe dost paya hoon
Hazaron se mila fir tumpe aaya hoon
Aapas mein samjhe, dono khoob boojhe
Diya jo jala kabhi na wo bujhe
Mann karta hai har ek se jakar kahoon.
Deepawali mane to aise mane,
Warna aangan mein diye to khoob jalate hain
par mann mein diya tale andhere ka kuch nahi karte.
Kisi ke paas dost ho tum jaisa to koi samjhe.
Deep aise ho to parv na hota teen din ka.
Zindagi bhar ke liye deep jala laya hoon.
Khushnaseeb hoon main jo tumhe dost paya hoon.

Book review again

Just finished reading a book recommended by everyone who has read it.

tuesdays with Morrie




But I didn't like it too much. I mean it's a good piece of work but doesn't seem to be a life changing piece of literature; at least to me! The pain of the teacher, his sufferings and how he rises above it to teach his student, Mitch and so many others around the world, the greatest lessons of their lives has been well described. The way he looks at life in his final days, his understandings, theories, everything written in a lucid style. It manages to churn the emotions in some places.

But in my opinion, it isn't that great as it is hyped to be. It might be appreciated, lauded, might have moved people to tears. But still, I feel it won't do any good to any person. Because such lessons in life can't be explained like this. You need to experience everything first hand to get the real gravity of things. Like there is sympathy and empathy- another aspect is living through it. The first hand experience which actually gives you real insight into things is the best teacher.

Plus you don't find reading through things, you already know very well, interesting. Do you? ;-)

For that matter I didn't like Rang De Basanti too. Coz it's something like- you have already thought about all this earlier and someone else copied your true script and put it in a less effective way.

Same with tuesdays with Morrie.

But one can't deny that it'll make a great read for those whose thoughts never touched these lines. Not bad to buy one and go through.Cost me 175 bucks. Happy Reading! :)

aa jaye pal jab banke toofani hawayein
Cha jaaye zindagi par kaali ghata ke saayein
andhera mitega, aisa khud se kehte jana
yaad karna mujhe,aa jaaunga main
in andheron ko mita na paoon to kya
andar dhoop ki kiran to jaga doonga

aayegi zindagi mein fir bahar
khila khila uthe phool jaise
hogi jeevan mein nayi tarang waise


baad mein poochogi apne aks se kabhi
ye janogi wo jo main tha;
tum hi ho
tum hi ho

I am in a mean mood as I am writing this.

I am frustrated with the pathetic services offered in different places in my city. Always pisses me off and leaves a really bad taste in mouth.

Anyway, what caused this to come up as a post is something I experienced umpteenth time and now deserves to face the wrath of my fingers.

I used to like Bank of Baroda a lot (partly because Rahul Dravid smiled through the hoardings telling us it’s really good and cares for its customers) until I visited it today to collect my ATM card. The time was eleven o clock. The place was so crowded that I could barely step in; the rush was due to the submission of the receipts of some examination. Never mind, the gentleman I first met affirmed my belief and gave me the PIN letter and he directed me towards the person who was supposed to give me my debit card. I knew I wouldn’t like this guy the moment I saw him. The usually super cordial guy that I am, I got a hideously curt (and low key as if he was almost uttering expletives), “Come after three o clock”. I thought I heard it wrong and confirmed twice (again yours truly was amazingly cordial perfectly understanding the great issues he might be dealing with at his workplace). Fine, three o clock it was. I returned home, told dad when he came for lunch. He also was surprised at this response. He told me go back again at around four. I did! And to that polite question, I got the very same guy telling me to come after one hour and he walked away into some other room. Now this got up my nose. I was wondering if this is some bloody govt organization where these people have no accountability of their behavior or the so called great customer service; called dad. He, sensing I lost my temper, set upon a discourse saying I will deal all sorts of people. True! I thought, but in lame govt places like RTO, the collectorate office, not in a private bank.
Whatever, dad called up, I got two more such cold responses and I finally got to know that the person who was actually supposed to give me the card wasn’t there at all. He had gone out for a tea break!! Bloody hell. I waited patiently; reading a book. Finally, he also not being the kind of person aiming at making the customer happy, behaved almost the same way; but later on I realized that suchwas his tone. Anyway, I ran out of that place as soon as I got the card. Came home and I’m writing it now.

Now, this thing has always got up my nose as well as that of my brother. Good customer service is quintessential in getting your business successful; the feel good factor needs to be there. Now this problem isn’t there in Jodhpur only; I’ve seen this happening in many places in Delhi, Mumbai too. Ventures once successful stop taking care of the customers, don’t behave cordially and will do all sorts of nonsense that will get you angry; and a person like me who insists on good response will make sure that I recommend everyone against it and cause it maximum damage in business.

Prominent places in Jodhpur that I have some serious allergy with are:
Ashok Vatika, a restaurant right near my home. The service used to be splendid once upon a time. Now, it’s crap.
National Handloom, an epitome of shitty services that will make you feel like murdering the person who is supposed to show you the products and make feel like purchasing it( that is defining selling products as an art)

The same applies to other places like grocery stores, dvd outlets and almost every venture that has tasted success.

What they forget though is- the moment they lose the magic connection with the customer; they are as good as dead. Something, the great entrepreneur Kishore Biyani has emphasized in his book, “It happened in India”.

On the other hand, some places which I love going to again and again are: Moti mahal, the tandoor trail; though on the wrong side of the expense graph, this actually defines customer service- the personalized attention that you get makes you want to go again and again despite it causing a deep hole in the pocket. Another place I would like to mention is the place I get my clothes dry cleaned from- Lovely Dry cleaners :-D He is prompt, amazingly cultured, make s you feel good and has got really good work ethics.

Anyway, the issue has always been a pain in my neck. I wonder when the service industry will wake up to the fact that the customer decides their future and they need to keep him happy!