Banglore Metro Trials

View of Bangalore Metro trails on MG Road from my office.

Auto Drivers Customer Support Message

Bangalore Auto drivers message to its patrons post fare hike !!

Fool's Day by Politicians

This is for what should be a poster for April Fool's Day celebration by politicians ( if they ever do it to common people). Mr Politician got his name well explained by his workers but forgot got to explain the first two alphabets of abbreviation- N.A HARIS,

which stands for Not Applicable.

Running Commentary

Another event that is more or less becoming annual ritual is 10K run. This year Bangalore 10K got bigger and so was the fun and experience. Recession hit sponsors gave a-year old manufactured medicines as gifts, I hope none of the oldies got that arthritis pain reliever balm; it would have been crude joke on all the elder participants. Anyways, when I entered the stadium crowd was ecstatic and raring to go. What came next was one of the most memorable moments of the event.

As announcement was made for the open 10K participants started jumping off the stand fence into the ground, I along with many participants had to move forward to another stand before entering the stadium ground as the two stands were separated by fence wire. Because of staircase structure of the stadium, the bottom parts were left fence-less. You might have seen dogs digging into fence to cross over, well, people at stadium were lucky, they don’t have to do even that. Two firangs (foreigners) aside me looked with awe of what was happening. I knew what they were thinking –“man, this is India, its inevitable; if you got to cut the chase then you got to do it”. Next moment they struck me with their adaptability when the leaned to cross into other side.

The race started and as usual most of the people ran very fast, i smiled as I knew what was going to happen after first few kilometers. The number of people actually running kept declining kilometer after kilometer, this brought my dark side to the fore as I grinned at the people, I knew this was going to happen; afterall it wasn’t 100m race. Strangely, it made me feel good and confident that people were going down and I was doing alright.

A few kilometers down, I saw something which my eyes couldn’t believe, it was sight that people mostly see once in a lifetime; just at the corner of the road there was huge queue of 10K runners who had lined up for ‘loo’. Fifth kilometer mark infused life in almost everyone who was walking, people suddenly started running as if it was finish line and a hell lot of people posed on the mark as if they had completed the race, people couldn’t believe that they had covered five kilometers. Next few kilometers people were looking for motivation. A few teenagers were running after/behind firang female (and people say youth of our country has lost direction!!). A lot of people were disappointed by the cheerleaders, who were not at par with those seen in Indian Premier League. Since cheerleaders were positioned at every kilometer mark of the run, people’s disappointment grew with the distance.

Finally, there were elderly folks, who have been the usual bystanders at 10K, they kept cheering everyone like they do when their grand kids learns to walk. As I finished the run I was overjoyed with my own achievement of completing the run without having to walk a single step and for not having pain calf. But, then I stood in line for my certificate and the moment I walked I realised why they say “no pain, no gain”.

An Indian Cut Above The Rest

After long time, actually many years saw a true ‘Contessa’ lover. The guy driving it looked like aged hippie in love with all things Indian!!!

Ulta Run at 10K

Running 10k was quite a different experience in Bangalore. I don’t know if it was fault of my company or the sponsor of the run, I got a bag full of chilli powder, pasta and not to mention the most useful item-soap. Probably they thought precipitation and scorching sun will make me use it. I never got it why anyone would like 1kg on his back to run 10k. So, I ran but carried only my little i-pod to minimize the load on my body, I didn’t wanted to look like those wannabes who can’t run without music but probably I looked more like them. Just after completing a kilometer most of the people realised two things, one, that 10 km was big distance and second, the usual Bangalore problem-planning and execution. A lot of people cribbed why it didn’t start a few hours early. Anyways, their anger was cooled down by hurling mineral water bottles on runners. But, so many plastic bottles dismayed all those environmentalists who were running for it. 2km down the run, people started kicking those plastic bottles, though initially I didn’t mind it but when it started hitting me then it really bugged me. What bugged me more was that with every kick on those plastic bottles the whole ‘clean Bangalore’ thing got booted big time.

After 3kms some people realised that they had phones with them, so people got busy with their phones. I overheard one fella, in his slowmo walk, lecturing someone how important this day was for him and how much he was doing for it, I really could see it. Some people started clicking their memorable photos of the event, missed having not brought my phone, but not much longer ‘coz media was there motivate everyone. Whenever and wherever cameras appeared people started running and showing how motivated they were!! A lady even ran in other direction following cameraman, people were busy asking which tv channel was covering them; some even called up their family that they were LIVE on a channel. After realising how entertaining run was, a few kms through the run I also realised how it brought people together. While running, we asked each other how many kms had passed by, then suddenly other two persons realised that they were from Microsoft and Yahoo. I saw rivalry fading into friendship; they even started discussing their work. I never realised the potential of networking in such places. I didn’t know how many from our HR team were running, but came to know that head hunting sure has immense potential in these runs. I even tried finding someone from same industry but unfortunately there were none in the sight, I could only sulk.

My best part of run came when we entered Cubbon Park; there was a group of cheerleaders cheering the runners. But runners noticed them only when their ‘HUHAA HUHAA’ was reciprocated by barking dogs!! Laughter came out inadvertently. Well I took that moment to thank all the dogs; afterall this city has gone to dogs. Just a week earlier I had to take their permission for running in early morning or even late night. I walked 3kms to be identify by dogs of my area on first day, else I would have ran that 10k on last Monday itself. I thanked them for their grateful gesture.