Notion or Nation of Blind Drivers ?

There is no doubt about the driving skills of Indians, it ranges from weird to disgusting. I can’t talk about road manners as we don’t have it; most of Indians are bully on roads. But the most dangerous trait of Indian drivers are any of these, its blind driving that Indians indulge in is most dangerous.

Most of the people will disagree with it saying that Indians have habit of meandering on road especially driving on both sides of the lane bar just to redeem every penny spent on road tax. Indians, actually don’t have much understanding on driving on their lane because lanes almost didn’t existed in most of the places and wherever they did people really never cared about.

Our country men are so damn blind drivers that they slip from one lane to another, you constantly have to honk to thinking you need to wake people up, sorry, and it’s actually not waking them up. I realized it big time when my car horn suddenly stopped working while I was driving. Indians drivers are like bats with car horn and ears acting sonar instrument, Indians actually don’t see and drive, Indians hear and drive. When the sound of the horn hits their ears Indian drivers decide if they are off the track. If you don’t honk most of the Indian drivers would have changed three lanes even without realizing it.

Most of the people would give damn only if you honk more than twice because their sonar radar ears have become weak over the period of time and some case their radar is so weak that you have to pray to god to save you and may be your car. Another thing that you have to constantly remind of your existence is because if an Indian driver realizes that there are no vehicles in front of a side lane then Indians instantly conclude that no one is coming from behind, and if you don’t honk your existence then there are chances you will repent your existence.

The only occasion when the blind Indian drivers actually start looking with their eyes happens when its starts raining. Then, Indian men’s sonar ears don’t work well with sound of rain pouncing upon the car. It was my lucky day that it rained and rained badly, so almost everyone got in the lane, no one was meandering; otherwise it would have been hell of ride to home driving whole stretch with blind drivers who actually can’t see you around.

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.

A Dog's Life

It was usual weekend morning and I was at my apartment’s gym trying to negate the weeklong affects of deskjob with some exercise. The gym is on the first floor and overlooks a large empty plot as it the case with most of the newly developed areas in the outskirts of the city. I was running on the treadmill and I saw few street dogs playing in the ground. They were having the playful start of the day, a few dogs chasing each other, time after time.

Suddenly one the dog got tired and sat down facing our gym. Soon other dogs joined the first dog and started looking at me. They saw me running; there was some distance and a huge wall between us. The dogs were anticipating the running guy will come to them and they will run after him or bite him. Then, after a few minutes and dogs still waited in anticipation that I will cross the wall and they would jump on me. Some more time passed by and dogs started looking at me with different angels by twisting their heads to make out what was exactly happening.

Dogs stood up and they were tired of watching me running but not coming to their side. I smirked, these rural dogs (yeah they became urban because city moved into it); they aren’t exposed to many things and were unaware of changes around. Dogs hadn’t seen a treadmill and they were totally amused and it was culture shock to them, total change of life style they had never seen before.

Just as I was taking shots on those newly urban stray dogs, the “other dog” came out of a big housing complex from the opposite end. I couldn’t have felt better. There it was, a sophisticated dog with knowledge of changes surrounding him, he can distinguish between marvelously carved garden in the apartment and government property, knows where to shit. I was going gaga over dogs knowledge and acquired skills, then I saw the “other dog” being pulled by his owner (dog wasn’t ultra rich, the ones with a servant attached for their service).

Suddenly, I realized his miserable life. So, the “other dog” was forced out in the morning for his morning ritual. I pity the life of “other dog”, he had not much freedom, time everything to owner’s requirement and worse – shit on time and that too day after day. I could understand that the “other dog” was under pressure to maintain efficiency in meeting timely requirement of his owner. Living shity life to shit on time, fun had totally gone out of the life of “other dog”.

By the time stray dogs had given up on me, I was no fun like rural fellas who run into them and then get bitten by them, dogs walked out of disappointment. Finally, as I completed my exercise a thought creeped into my mind about lives of rural stray dogs’ vs “other dog” and us humans. It didn’t seem much different how we live today.

The Mystery Look

Just a few days back I was having lunch with my colleague and was joined by a another colleague with whom I hardly have had any interaction. The other colleague was surprised to know that I was married. “You don’t look like married”. This had happened a lot of time and it was followed by a similar reaction in all the occasions, but I hadn’t paid much attention to it. Suddenly, after lunch i thought how does a young married man really look like?

I really didn’t have the answer, how can I! And last person to answer this question would be your wife, how could she believe that you don’t look married. So, how does a person who doesn’t know the other person really makes out if the other person is married? This ‘ring’ thing doesn’t really work out in India as Indian wear too many rings (sometimes they double up on same finger!!).

So, what does? Apparently aged look may be a good proof, especially in countries like India where traditions are upheld, age and marriage are very much interlinked, and everybody can’t be George Clooney/Salman khan (old and in demand). Though, I must say that aged look can’t be strong argument in urban India as now it is at par with global trend of marriage at late age. But, anyways, this argument doesn’t suffice for young people.

Male balding, I thought could be another clue; but I read that at least a quarter of men start going bald in their 20s itself. So, young, bald and married is a weak correlation. But, my hunch is that men always resist baldness until they get married. Once, married they don’t resist this inhuman torture to their heads. And off course this argument doesn’t apply to men with congenital divorce defect.

I’m not sure if married man looks grim or aloof, it largely a media creation. Married man is always presented as tormented in visual media, which makes everyone belief that’s how a married looks. If this was true then around a billion married all over the world have be identified with a single expression. Not knowing where to look for further clue I looked other way, Google way, which has invaded our lives; surprisingly image results were totally incoherent with my expectations. They were the same images depicted in movies and magazines (and there was an unexpected discovery, I realized that in most of unchoreographed images of couples they were looking in different directions).

Well, I have realised that it is quite difficult to indentify young married man until unless it’s very much written on his face. I know this will one of my friend (who still has not changed his status on social networks) very happy that his market value is intact. I’m totally out of ideas But, I really want to know if you still find how a married man looks like, if anyone can help me out then this would be discovery than Monalisa smile.

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”.

Anniversary Special: Discovery of “LazyMan”

There was time not long ago I used to here this mythical stories married man being lazy. It was all over be it movies about couples, television or any conversation about couples that you ever overheard. Though, I didn’t believe it much.

Laziness is something which is almost impossible for a man to be unfamiliar with, throughout the history men have actually been competing with other lazy animals for dominance, so that only man survives. Dodo, one of the laziest and popular birds in recent history was made extinct by another lazy animal and most probably it was sub-species of social animal known as “Married Man”.

Laziness comes to the male character unknowingly since childhood, especially Indians, after being spoon-fed and pampered. That’s how we grow up, getting everything without having to make much of an effort. By the time man grows up he remains totally unaware of his super abilities, till he gets married off course.

For women, men have always been one dimensional figure preferably known by words such as stupid, dog/kutte, pervert, and for married women it’s always ‘lazy’. It does takes a wife sometime to realise how movable a man can be and in most of the cases they turnout to be immovable, even then this immovable property still offends his ‘laziness’ title by twisting his fingers on tv remote, on mobiles and computers.

A wife’s sixth sense comes to this realisation soon (usually after a year) that there is inherent relationship between man’s DNA and sofa design and they stick to each other. On the other hand, it is always incomprehensible for (lazy)man why things have to happen and needed to be done!! (I guess this is the reason why lazyman despite being available in abundance is not popular as spiderman or superman if someone dare shout “lazyman” for help in a public space then a lot of heads will turn on and then they will quickly turn-off as well.)

I think at this point of time wife names married man as ‘lazyman’ for perpetuity. Then, it makes appearance in your conversations, one out of ten, and most probably it is the first word that falls into married man’s ears, when he runs into argument with his wife. Soon, this word spreads like wild fire and married man discovers that it is by this name that he is more recognised in the neighbourhood and social circles. But, smartly married man makes out that ‘lazyman’ is a common noun, which he can easily masquerade in public, but at home he is more comfortable with this identity.

When Pajamachaaps Reunite with Queens

During my school days my classmates were greatly inspired by a hindi movie ‘jo jeeta wahi sikandar’, especially for classification of lousy guys with low sense of dressing guys as ‘pajamachaaps’ and then there were well dressed babes called ‘queens’ after their school, no names for well dressed dudes. My friends preferred themselves being ‘pajamachaaps’ chasing queens, which I despised. I thought those days were long gone until pajamachaaps made comeback. I’m not talking about myself, neither my friends nor colleagues, it’s about my organisation.

Sometimes back my organisation merged with a company that is better know in the public eye as a ‘media’ outfit. On the D-day, when all employees came together to celebrate the formation of new company, my colleague gasped while looking at the employees of other company. They were starkly different from our fellas, who are simply dressed but largely with no sense of attire to be worn in corporate environment. I guessed the other guys needed to project image for being a media outfit; I could see my colleague almost felt like pajamachaaps not because of one or two persons but because it was the crowd. I know how dangerous crowds can be, if you ask a Mumbai teenager which college he wants to go, it wouldn’t be collage’s acclaim or toppers’ list but ‘the crowd’!! Man, crowd really psyches you up. I knew that this newly acquired ‘crowd’ had over-glossed us, it was creating clash of class in the newly merged environment, “we are better than those types”, which people do to get upper hand.

Anyways, employees started getting swapped in new setup. But, despite intermingling you could still identify ‘the crowd’. One of my colleagues hated it, while my other colleague started to enjoy the change, suddenly grass was greener on the other side, and remarkably he identified ‘the crowd’. As it happens in the movie, ‘queens’ really didn’t look up to the ‘pajamachaaps’. In all this I realised that there was uncanny similarity in their attire, it was their style. The style made all the difference between the old fellas and newly acquired fellas. It was as if they had special induction lecture on corporate fashion, what they can wear and what they can’t; which shades of eyeliners would do and what was strict no..no. Nothing like it ever existed in the subconscious of employees of my pre-merged company.

I didn’t feel bad until after a month, when I realised that spiky hairdo of a guy survived for more than a month. This never happened in my five year career that a hairdo survived the corporate dictate. Maybe it was too much of shock values for old fellas of my organisation, may be no one gave damn to the five year old hair style, heheeehe!!!

Unfortunately, our old junta is still pajamachaap but some are happy with ‘queens’ around them. ‘The crowd’ still thinks (I believe that) they are ‘In-thing’ in the new company. Superiority and inferiority of egos gets settled in same old way, one-upmanship of work. The company still remains worried about the bottomline as it was before this brief period of honeymoon. As it happens in corporate marriages some people shine while others whine and a minuscule of us are just there to enjoy it!!

Anniversary Special !

A week back, a year had passed by and I almost didn’t notice it. Though, I remembered it and everyone did remind it was my first marriage anniversary. Good thing that a year of married life passes away and you don’t feel it, probably don’t have marriage blues in the beginning. The week coincided with three of my friends getting ready marriage and they all asked me how I felt like and what my experience was.

Though I could hardly recollect (see the impact, man) but I tried for them. I realized that by the time you get married, you are so molded in your personality that its hard to adjust. It is even more difficult to adjust to traits of other persona or even make other adjust to your personality. And that too for everyday, I think it is quite a mission impossible task. If your habits match then it is good as it is duplication of activities (as said in our biz lingo). But if your habits are different then it is mostly fun, sometimes its weird and sometimes its fight. When it is fight, it is really tough. Because, when you are newly married then it is really difficult to fight, I mean REALLY difficult ‘coz you are really not sure if you should argue!! If you can then you don’t know how long and how far you can take it. If you do indulge in fight with a friend then you can go and make up with your friends after a week but that time you don’t have in marriage because by that time damage is already done. To undo that damage you have to damage something else- your money. That why for whole year I have been trying to preempt such situation; me and my wife have been practicing and hurling those filmi punches (and we never forget to add that background), so if we are angry we make it look really REAL. I must tell you that I still don’t experience in facing assault of all kinds of kitchenware, so can’t tell you how you can defend. In all, you may forget anything but you remember what time of night you have to reach your home. And, yeah what’s case of hair loss, I still can’t make a right guess, if its Bangalore water or marriage taking toll of my precious hairs. Sure, would like to believe its water.

RAMA Needs Birth Certificate Now!!

Just a few weeks back India discovered its own foot and mouth disease, where it was one’s mouth and someone else’s foot. So, ASI guys were asked a simple question if RAMSETHU was natural or manmade? Being hard thinkers and hardly working they thought the easy way out - why find out the root cause when you can actually uproot it! So they came out when Rama didn’t exist so what was the need to prove anything about Ramsethu! In a country where so many departments equipped with all resources and evidence can’t crack a simple case - our ASI chaps concluded that pre-medieval God didn’t exist, woha!!

But that was not enough, so Mr Karunanidhi thought he can help it out, so he added Rama’s technical know-how to the simmering question.

Oh, so now Rama needs birth certificate and other documents to prove his existence and his capability. In our country where history and knowledge was long recorded and protected (also for selfish means) in human memory and not in documents it’s stupid to only look out for documentary evidence. So, documents may not reveal everything every time. Yeah, we really need to document everything to make a proof but can we just rely only on them especially for unwritten history. In a country like ours where anyone and everyone can get such certificate, not to forget the media reports of fake Indian voters ID (with photographs) made in the name of Osama and Musharraf. So forty years down the line Karunanidhi family can go on to make claims about Osama and Musharraf being Indian and holy warriors!! Who knows that might be possible.

Now tell me why Rama needs civil engineering degree for Ramasethu. In a fully democratic country like India, where most of the politicians have got some nook or the corner named after them without any contribution and when Manmohan Singh can become PM without fighting elections, why Rama needs to build Ramasethu himself? Like a common man and globally known business practice, Rama would also have subcontracted Ramasethu work to others!!! Afterall Chennai didn’t become Outsourcing hub just like that, hehehe!!

Such stupid comments by Mr Karunanidhi were not enough for himself. He goes on to say that Valmiki commented that Rama was drunkard. I say so what!!! So many of Hindu Gods used to drink, what does he exactly wants to say? Please complete the sentence, man. What’s even more stupid is that for Karunanidhi Rama never existed but Valmiki from same era existed and why because our dear Karunanidhi found his membership card of “Tamilnadu Writers Association”. Hahaha, bang on Mr Karunanidhi, we really need your logic.

The same Karunanidhi who uses his atheisms to mount attack on Rama goes on to ban “Da Vinci Code”, a movie with some theory on Christ for hurting Christian sentiment. Wow, so much for our secularism, you can bash up anything native. And add to it, our government also teaches us one theory – AIT (Arayan Invasion Theory) as the only theory and that too by dropping the word “theory” from it so most of the people can’t even think that there can also be several other theories on same subject. This same theory is used by him for his divisive politics.

Well you might be thinking that I’m just trying to defend Rama, but do I really need to protect him against a man who himself doesn’t have any social, moral or ethical credential worth mentioning. The man who practices bigamy (against law of the land and can’t admit legally) and who lies to protect his murderer son from killings of innocent civilians or I may say “Innocent Dravidians” talks about Rama’s lies. The same man who pulls down sari of ex-CM in legislature thinks he can take moral high stand against Rama?!! Give me a break. He is not the right person to challenge Rama. But do you really think morally and ethically bankrupt person like him is worth listening? May be to some, especially those who are insecure about their own identity and in need of “Tamil Idol” without realising that their biggest demi-gods MGR and Rajnikanth are non-tamil identities. Will Karunanidhi dare question them?? Can they even dare tear posters of those two demi-gods?

My Corporate Pickup Line

“I am available.”

How this will sound to you if someone says it to you?
What exactly would you infer from it? Will you slap the person or laugh at it?

Well, this statement is actually our corporate jargon that means availability of resource for assignment. This is the first thing that most of the people in my division say in the Monday morning meeting, yeah it doesn’t get them really HOT date of choice but may add to your Monday morning trauma.

Though I have never dared to say it in outside world, but if you are a guy and you happened to make this statement unfortunately, this would perhaps be considered as one of the worst PICKUP lines ever used!!

It may never become a hit pickup line to get girls but in our division it is more used as seduction tool to get the exciting piece of work. Everyone makes a point to stand out when they say “I’m available”, so, the manager can see the passion (which may be very dim on Monday morning) in your eyes and may assign it to you (though it doesn’t happen).

Just imagine different people in your division saying it and that too in different styles. Try out people and see what it does to you? Post Austinpowers movie on Sunday, every time I hear people saying “I’m Available”,
Yeah babeeh!! I see Austin whispering into my ears – “Corporate Slut Babeeh”