Friday, August 27, 2004

Of Chivalry and Gentlemanliness

Gals, Ladies...Women............Almost everything revolves around them.
You see news articles claiming that the atrocities against women are going up and things that our friendly HumanRights Commission fellow doing to fight against these.Sometimes you feel that you have been very decent to gals or ladies or women when compared to some millions of others. You just think that all those people who are committing such things are either perverts or out of their senses. Think of those poor women who go through such hell silently because somehow they cant rebel against it.

If you are working in an IT company where fair sex is a minority, people just drool at gals whoever is around. The amount of attention, respect and popularity gained by a gal working in the Knowledge industry is enormous. People respect you, they do things for you, they listen to you when you talk and more over eveyone is a Gentleman, barring some exceptions( err...do I say barring people who are frank? ;-) )

There are hardly 300 people working in my office building and hardly some 30 people know me and talk to me. But, almost all my female team members are famous here. People keep asking me you are in the same team "that" gal is in and I listen to some remarks like " your team is quite colourful " ( yeah.....unfortunately I am in a female dominant team ;-) ) People keep walking around my bay just to get a glimpse of my team mates, they come and talk to them about various things... I get serious doubts like " why cant he talk to me like that?"...sometimes ...some guys go to the extra mile and start sending fwds to these gals...most of the guys I know dont even bother to send those fwds to me ..but they take extra pain to find out the names of my female colleagues from the Global Address list and save them. And, they are really very nice to these gals,...boy...I coudnt believe my eyes when I see them so nice....because it is something new to me..I get thouoghts like " huh...i never knew that this guy is so nice"...

And , their chivalry is just great. Holding doors, giving way, stepping aside and giving them place in the queue...what not. Sometimes I feel envious of these gals, I get weird thoughts like what would it be if I were a gal.... ;-)

If one of my colleagues ( male....) sees me sitting at my desk at 1 :00 PM his remark would be " khanan nahi khaneka hai kya?"...but the same collegue ..if he sees a gal sitting at her desk at the same time , his remark would be " hey, rnt u going for lunch??? what happened? "...he will start a conversation......am I too critical here????

I dont know what to call it......but these things come naturally. One cannot train himself to be Chivalrous and Gentlemanly to gals , ladies , women or whatever. I tried my best and failed at it...it just doesnt happen. I talk to gals the same way I talk to guys, I treat them on par with other guys. I think the gals who are working with me are just as capable as I am. They can open their doors, can stand in long queues at lunch and do thier things on their own. Treating them differently ( err...with resepct and decency ) would be discriminatory I think ;-)

I am the advocate of Gende Equalities and Women Empowerment ;-)
But , I found out something that there is no need to Empower these Urban gals , ladies or women....they are already Powerful..they can make things happen for them ;-)
They always have someone at their disposal to do thigs for them.
Way to go....my daughters will be luckiest that they would be living in the 21st Century, the Era of Gentlemen ;-)







Tuesday, August 24, 2004

Movies in Bangalore

2 years back when I came to Bangalore, the capital of Karnataka state, there were dozens of theatres showing Telugu movies. I could watch a new movie every weekend, a brand new movie every Saturday. Sometimes I used to watch 2-3 movies in the weekend, such is my appetite for Telugu movies.
The Krishna govt tried to restrict the number of non-kannada movies and to promote Kannada industry. So, the number of Telugu movies I could watch got reduced.Seriously, I dont like watching movies in a TV or Computer.

Now, due to the protest by the Kannada industry there are no new non-kannada movies in Bangalore. They want to promote Kannada films by putting restrictions on non-kannada ( errr...good movies) movies. They think that if not left with any option people will watch Kannada movies. How silly???

There is not even a single good looking heroine in Kannada industry..let alone heros...( shall I say " orangutans"?)..some pretty bangalore lasses like Namitha,Rakshitha etc head to Telugu and Tamil industry for better opportunities. When their own gals think that their industry sucks, how can they expect Andhraites and Tamilians living in Bangalore ( who constitute more than 50% of Bangalore population by some statistics...) to watch Kannada movies? err...how many Kannadigas watch Kannada movies???? ;-) and in Bangalore.....most of the people watch only "Angrezi" movies...hey...Bangalore is a cosmo...even kids talk to their mothers only in English...how can u expect these new age kids and moms to watch Kannada movies...???

This reminds me of a scene I witnessed in a Temple.

I go , almost every weekend, to the Sri Venkateswara temple in J.P.Nagar with my cousins. Though I am a forced goer there, I like that temple somehow. Oneday I was sitting outside the Sanctum with my cousin and I saw a tiny tot beside supposedly his father. The father was explaining him how to pray to the Lord. In his words

" son, pray, pray ...

oh Lord , please bless me etc..."

I burst out laugning...........

they looked like a kannada family....they are in a temple...and he is talking to his kid in English...
hmmmm...that is how Bangalore is..................

there are many people in Bangalore who prefer to watch "The Rock walking Tall" or Van Helsing( two of the bullshit english movies ..as far as I am concerned ...) rather than watching a Mani Ratnams' " Alay Payuthe" or Upendras' " H2O"( i liked this movie..it has some real stuff..though the presentation is a bit awkward)....

Let God help these Kannada film makers and make them realise that Bangalore is not a part of Karnataka as far as Movies are concerned...

I pray God for the release of many new Telugu movies in Bangalore...............................

Wednesday, August 18, 2004

The Olympic Medal

Finally, an Indian wins a Silver Medal in Olympics after Independence. It reminds me of my Principals' question after I won an Inter College debate competition. The competition was big and we never expected any prize at all. But, everything fell in place for me and I ve dont well to win the debate. When I showed the prize to my principal ..his reaction was

" Good , but how many people did participate? Have you won because you are good or because others are worse than you? "

I was really psyched ...but a win is a win...

Olympic silver is something to be proud of...Congrats to the Winner.
I was watching the Hockey match b/w RSA and India y'day. 3 min are left in the first half and India was lagging behind by 2 goals. The defence was horrible...no player was marked , no strategy to defend. Suddenly, a great player comes to the rescue..yes Dhanraj Pillai scored a blinder and Indians got some boost....soon the score was 2-2. I was thinking abt the Olympic glory of pre Independent India. 6 Consecutive Olympic golds, none could match that ability.
3 min are left in the match...again the great player comes to the rescue...with his fluency, he made the other two goals possible.

So, it clearly proves that..whatever is the game or sport, the class players are always in the league of their own. They make the game look very smple, they just make things easy when others struggle to do anything...Hats off to that Talent.

Sachin has to bat the entire 50 overs

Our dear skipper sahab wants Sachin to bat through the 50 overs. I have a suggeston for our skipper. BCCI is very rich ala the football club Real Madrid. So, we will also buy either Matt Hayden or Ricky Ponting and make them play for India.

Then, Sachin and the other player will bat through the 50 overs and our Skipper can go for Ad shoots...errrr...all the other 9 players can go out and shoot for Team Samsung or Team LG.


Monday, August 16, 2004

Idiot Box

Yahooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
At last I could convince my elder brother to get an idiot box into the house. I bought a new Sony Wega over the weekend and it entered with a bang. A nice telugu movie to start with, next 2 days witnessed a ManU Vs Chelsea EPL match and the Invincible Schumi in Hungary. Now this insomniac has a company to stay awake. I missed TV a lot for all these days as I am staying away from home. Added to that, a room mate in the form of my elder brother could stop me for all these days. But, this time around I could convince him. His theory of Idiot box makes you lazy and listless couldnot stop me.

Ahoyyy! I got my CAT 2004 application form on Saturday. Not sure whether I will prepare for it..but I cant resist the tempation of writing CAT. This time I made one of my friends take the form for me ...luck factor...:-))).

I am sure the idiot box will reduce my reading time and activity time. I will be sitting and watching some or the other sport or a gulti movie rather than reading a book. But I need to read some good books I have with me.

Monday ... I am in my new office location. This is one of those typical Wipro Offices without Yahoo! messenger and MSN Messenger. I will miss most of my Chat friends. But the ambience is good, the coffee you get here is supposed to be the best among all Wipro Banglore offices. Even, Mr. Premji was surprised that this quality coffee is available here. His heart might have skipped a beat thinking that they would be spending extra money for this coffe. But, nothing is like a good coffee especially for a Teetotaller.

The drive from my home to this office is about some 15 Kms , including an 8 KM stretch on the Killer ( Hosur) road. Wipro has so many buses to this place, but I prefer to come by my bike. The ride was awesome this morning, I loved it.

Errr...need to catch up with some work now.....



Friday, August 13, 2004

Of Sports and Sporting Legends

The Master retires from International football

The great Zizu retired from international football. He wont be playing for French national team any more. Though we would see hin in Reals' team , we would miss him in the next Soccer world cup.
He is one of those class players who is very simple and humble. He is not over hyped like a David Beckham, but his greatness was underrated in non-football circles. That trademark header is a joy to watch and the way he can change the game is incredible.

We definitely will miss one of the class players in International Football.

The Champion Keeps Going

Hungarian Grand Prix..and it will be another win for Michael Schumacher. As there is lot of noise going on about Jenson Buttons' move to Williams next season, this grand prix will be very interesting to watch. Though McLaren is looking good, Kimmi has to pray for some luck in this race. Anticipating another Ferrari whitewash......

The weekend would be great with some EPL Football action and the Grand Prix...


Ohhh....I forgot completely about the Kick Off of Olympic Games....being an Indian what can I talk about Olympics. Hope our Hockey team tries to Salvage some lost pride. Atleast a Medal for more than one billion people.

Thursday, August 12, 2004

Double Taxation - The Azim suggestion

I dont know what is there in Mr. Premjis' mind when he suggested the Karnataka Govt to increase the professional tax on IT workers by 100% because they are earning " handsome" salaries. Why cant he pay 70% tax on his income because he is one of the richest in India?
He talls the govt that by doing this they can improve the tax collection. Yeah , Mr. Premji is correct. IT workers cant hide their incomes like politicans and the tax can be cut directly from their salaries.

Mr. Premji wants sops for IT industry but wants his employees to be taxed. How sad???
It is time to move from this much Hyped IT industry..... :lol:

The great Indian Inferiority Complex

May be centuries of foreign rule is the cause for this that we as Indians always think that the so called " White" are superior to us. It is not people who are illiterate and unlearned but those who are highly educated and learned feel inferior to average whites. We compare whatever we do against the standards of the west, we aim to match the quality of the west in whatever we do.
Right from school poems to university education, we are obsessed with the west. Though we learned english from the British, we try to speak english like Americans do. Let us look at various aspects of this "aping".

India has a rich cultural heritage which gave us lot of literary and aesthetic works which are non paralled in human history.

How many of the kids( even youngsters ) know that there is something called " Panchatantra " which teaches various aspects of living in society? But they know Aespos tales which never match this great Panchatantra.

How many of us even bother to listen to our Classical Music let alone appreciating?
But we head bang to Metallica, swing to the music of Santana, Bryan Adams etc....

Hollywood makes a crappy movie starring a female nothing more than an Anorexic and dressed in pushup garments...tells us that it is the real story of some Erin Bro......( I dont know the spelling)...announces an Oscar.
We say that the movie is " awesome"( this word is peculiar to Bangalore..there is nothing good or bad..only " awesome" or "sad") and Julia Roberts is the most beautiful woman on this face of the earht.

A Mani Ratnam makes a movie like " Nayagan" or " Agni Naksathram" ...and we say that the movie is ordinary and our industry should look upto Hollywood to make movies.

It is not only movies...ask any youngster about his/her fav dish. You get a reply which will surprise you. You start thinking whether his/her mom makes any Indian dish at home.
We like to go to Pizza Huts or KFCs regulary though the food you get there is not worth the money you pay for it.

How many of us read books written by Indian Writers? Are we well versed with the literary works compiled by many great sages aeons ago? We say that they are old fashioned and not relevant to the present times.
We flock to bookstalls to buy LOTRs' and Harry Potters which are nothing but fantasy. There are some umpteen number of Indian books containing better fiction. We never bother to read them as we cant tell our friends about it. They will look at you as someone cheap and uneducated.
Many argue that language is the barrier. Most of the literary works here are in Sanskrit and not many people know it. Are we born English? Havent you learned english as another language?
Ofcourse, learning sanskrit is a bit tougher than learning English.
Then, how many of us read books written in regional languages and our mother tongue.

The word mother tongue reminds me of a funny conversation I had with one gal.
I met this gal in one of the trainings in my prev org. We were talking about different languages and I asked her about her mother tongue. Here is the reply
" well...ummm...actually...I dont have a mother tongue. The only language I know is english"
I asked her whether english is her mother tongue
" well...ummm...not exactly......"

I almost burst out laughing...how is that possible?...I thought abouot it for some time and left it at that stage.

Yea, liking some of the things or all the things which are western is not wrong. Diff people have diferent tastes and some of us might like things which are not Indian. But, aping others blindly is worse than any other form of depravity. We should never forget what we are and where we came from. If we dont know about ourselves and try to be like somone else...we lost our identity and Individuality. Other might feel good that you like their things ..but they will not respect you because you dont have any individuality or orignality.

Most of the things I listed above make me think that we will lose our Indianness in the course of time. We might become another colony of US of A, a pool of people without any thing of our own, witout any identity....my heart shrinks at the very idea of that state.

Just we need to realise that " a civilisation or culture that survived centuries of foreign rule, centuries of looting ,centuries of other religious and cultural invasions is something we should be proud of. We need to have self respect to respect out traditon and culture. Even though you reach great heights in a foreign land, you are a stranger there. "

To respect others and like others, you need to repsect yourself and like yourself. Anything else will be just " aping".









Monday, August 09, 2004

Nostalgia

It's really great to see your old friends after a long time and spend some time with them recollecting the events of those old days. I met few of my engineering friends in the course of the weekend. I met some of them almost after some 3 years....and we spoke about those college days...it is really amusing....

all those days i was in college, i used to dream about my job and my work...i was eager to work and learn real things....

but now, I think about those days and wish that had lasted forever....the joyful days will never return.........wittisms' in classes, sarcasm towards the profs, who cares attitude, those regular " get out of the class " diktats from some of the irritated lecturers, those manipulations in Labs ( I never got any graph properly, i used to draw the graph and mark the points ..:-D..)...and those gyaan sessions by some of the successful and talented seniors....

and gals....my class never had a good looking gal atleast....so, we used to go to other classes sometimes ...in the name of meeting some frns in other classes...though everone knows the reason.....

and the amount of leg pulling ...it never had any limits...even some generous profs were victims of this ....

and the skits on annual fests....we used to spend days to pen down the scripts..select the cast....reharsal.....

those all skits were superhits in college and we used to get lot of compliments from the profs' and expecially Juniors ( read as Junior gals .. ;-)...)...

for the first one year these junior gals used to call us " Sir "....it was funny man...really funny.....

there is no end to these little sweet things......i was bound by a sense of nostalgia for the entire Saturday.....and ended it with a dinner in Pizz Hut with cousins.....though admired a gal waiting outside for most of the time....

Sunday :

hmmmm.....missed badmintion and swimming....slept off till 10 AM....

got a call frm cousin asking y I was missing.....hmmm....spent some 3hrs playing Carrom with cousins....and headed to the so called Southindia restaurant " Malgudi " on Outer Ringroad....
Lunch was not that great but okey there....not upto the hype....

but the evening ended on a high with Arsenal and ManU match....Community shield match...

that was really great....a matcg worth watching....my fav Arsenal won hands down against arch rivals ManU.....

cudnt get sleep in the night as usual....but had to sleep to wake up on a Monday Morning..thinking about another monotonous 5 day strectch......




Thursday, August 05, 2004

Of "F" words and "B" words

Gone are the days of "stupid", "idiot", " bloody fool". I dont think any one uses the word "scoundrel" any more. It is the same with even Rascal.

The new genration has found new ways of abusing...there are better words to express anger and disgust. People used to utter words like "oops", "shuks", " oh my goodness" to express annoyance ....
but times chaged a lot...from British english to we graduated towards American English...not only the way we dress , do business and think...but the way we use our language is also influenced by the one and only US of A.

What do you utter even when something falls from your hands???? no doubt the golden four letter word "F***".I would recommend the speech of the great Osho on this word. It is use in anger, despair, distress, surprise and even when you are happy. This word adds itself very comfortably with other words as in f***ing bast***, f***ing a**ho**....there are so many of this genre....

It is really surprising to listen all these uttered by many gals to a guy like me who came from a small time town. But , Bangalore is a cosmo. No offence to anyone...this is the only big city I ve seen for more than 2 years.

I have seen most of the guys using only "f" word mose of the time and they ve a diff lingo for diff things. But the urban gals ve a very unique lingo which comprises of "bitch", "basta**", "SOB", MFs.....the liste is endless....the more you use these words the more aggressive and bold you are.
They associate boldness and outspokenness with these words....

To them, every other gal they dont like is a "bitch", every other guy they dont like is either "basta**" or " SOB"....I think an overdose towards the fair sex....err...lets take a break...

we stopped using words like nonsense and rubbish....we use crap and fuc*all.....

I was talking to a gal whom I know about a traffic jam and the word used to describe that jam was " Fuc*all" traffic jam....sounds really good...isnt it?

But I really wonder about onething....do they really know the meaning of the words they speak....words like " bastar*", "MF", "SOB"......or do they really mean those?

It is the new world and it is going to be newer.....and think many more words will join the above list....

last but not least.....which word do you use to disagree with someone....??????

"balls".....i really dont know how this word came into existence.......

Tuesday, August 03, 2004

Friendshipday.......errr.....what do I call it?






Good that 31st August was a Saturday. I saw my cell phone chirping at random intervals on Saturday night. I was surprised to see messages from people I never bothered to talk to, wishsing me Happy Friendshipday. Most of them are just strangers to me, I dont even talk to them regularly. Then , one idea struck my mind...let me see how many of my really close friends send this message. But, I didnt send any message to any of my friends. So, do I expect any mesasage from them????....Blank...Man...I never bothered whether my friends wished me on that night , because I know friendship doesnt need all these things.

I started thinking what exactly is this idea of friendship. I felt really strange to think of one person whom I can call a very good friend., because a friend is someone who knows you in and out. wait.....is my definition of friendship correct????...Many people esp in Bangalore,...call whoever they know "friends"...err I am not talking about that Series on Star World. I dont kow...I cannot call any one my friend just like that....because I attach some value to it and it is something beyond loafing around and freaking around.

You meet someone over a chat or online forum and suddenly he becomes your friend...BS....you dont even know an ioata about him/her. But, it is okey because people behave errr pretend nice with the people they dont know..and someone else recently gave me a gyan saying that you should not be selfish in Friendship.......BS...what is that Selfishness.......goddd....I get goose pimples to think about not being selfish.....someone( so called friend ) asks for your help and you are not in a situation to help though you can help....gawd...they start calling you selfish and conceited....

I give up....if it is helping and taking help in return which defienes friendship....we better call it Business rather than friendship.....I got confused thinking about all these things Friendship and Selfishness......

I am happy to breathe for my self and eat for myself....I can not breathe and eat for someone else.....

The Selfish.....errr most selfish.....I am proud of it........................

Monday, August 02, 2004

Chokers.....errr.....Choker leading other bunch of Chokers...............

Our great Skipper gave a paper statement day before the Asia Cup Finals. Mr. Ganguly said " we are not chokers". Yes, he is right. They are not chokers, but HE ...He is a choker...bloody...he is one of the reasons India lost in Asia Cup finals. Bugger, didnt have any idea what he was doing. Played 20 balls and made 4 runs.....increased the burden on Sachin....., the great wall played like a Hole in the Wall and went away cheap.....wat happened to all the promising youongsters..........all BS...

Now , I think the Indian Team is just overhyped....Sehwags, yuvrajs....nuthing but a bunch of over hyped youngsters like Wayne Rooney of Football.....they cant play .....they cant play any quality cricket.....

Every time people blame one and only great player for losing.....he was the one who was stranded without partners and put under some stupid pressure...

I see a conspiracy theory behind.....

If India had won y'day.....Sachin wud ve got all the name for his bowling and batting....and our skipper and Wall dont want it to happen....they think Sachin is becoming a legend ...lets put him down....bloody buggers.....they can lose a because they dont watn Sachin to get all the name.....

but onething they dont know...what ever happens...Sachin is already a Legend and nothing can change his status of being the Greatest Batsman of all the time...........................