Edge of darkness

Edge of darkness (EoD) is definiltely not the most awaited movie but what made me watch this movie was the name associated wiht it, it's Mel Gibson movie. In past few years Mel Gibson's name is more or less associated with gritty, violent, gorry and dark drama kind of movies.

EoD unlike such movies in many ways, its neither dark nor that violent, though it has some blood sprouting scenes in the movie. The movie largely deals wiht Mel's character coming in terms with his daughter's murder, pyschic-spiritual angle, which involves hallucination.

The other angle involves Mel's attempt to investigate his daugther's murder, which turns boring. The most amazing point of the movie is one of the sub-plots, US government sponsored company assembling nuclear arsenal with material brough from other countries, thus absolving US from blame in case such weapons are used.

Frankly, nuclear weapon could have been major portion of the movie, it would have been more gripping movie. But the movies losses its steam by focusing on Mel Gibson's coming in terms with daughter's demise and really slow pace of investigation. At end of days EoD is long boring movie, it's definitely not for those who want to catch up typical clone of Mel Gibson movie.

A small ‘Update” and A Giant Leap

I know most of you would be thinking its too late to talk about leap year, if there was any. I’m not talking about it anyway. It’s about relationship. Once you get married and a few years pass by, then you see things stabalise around you. Its lot more peaceful as you are pretty sure when and how your partner gonna throw pan at you and you are very confidant that you will be able to catch it. Not only things stablise but also intensity and enthusiasm levels also come down, as every thing can’t remain same.

Once you are done with giant leap of slaying your bachelor life and years pass by then its very easy for everyone to sort life you or shall I say simplify it you…and the solution is always another leap (having kids). It’s the best argument, “what else you gonna do anyway”. But if you have not taken the second leap then you its somewhat different for you as you really need to do something before you start loosing some fizz.

It much like reinventing what you had already invented in your relationship (which described by women in two words is usually – stupid and useless). It’s somewhat similar like what corporates do, instead of launching a whole new version they release an ‘UPDATE’ when they are sure that their product is loosing some charm and they are not ready to take it to next level. Little bit shine over here & there, little bit re -jigging and result is an “update”.

“update” is the real short term solution to bring smile and excitement back in to the life. It’s a small step for man and giant improvement in mankind’s personal life (yeah, I get it its exaggerated). Oh, and talking about ‘leaps’, I saw leap of different kind when I visited a mall sometime back.

To my surprise, I saw a lot of the men holding their kid in hand while their better half enjoyed the outing. I had not seen so many men at same place and in similar condition (yeah its condition). I couldn’t believe it and I really didn’t want to! I cribbed to myself, how the hell men in this country took this leap of being “friendly” to their kids (all this bullshit was largely limited to movies), in my parents generation kids were scared of their father, now I see them hand in hand. Fathers were meant to be strict and scary, which always drove kids to their mothers and gave men free to do their stuff (which largely is doing nothing). Now this gone…gone forever. I couldn’t believe this leap had to happen during my generation only, couldn’t they have waited one more generation to pass by. But now, thanks to this leap by men of our country our lives are going to get screwed. Did I hear someone screaming??

Rush To Flush

Now that all hoopla around sania mirza and shohiab malik is over and they are done with chasing each other. I realised what just had happened and i know that it was result of being in one sceanrio that no one desires to be, i call it 'rush to flush'. It happens when you are just out of a relationship and the most unfortunate & immediate escape route goes towards another relationship.

Fall to 'rush to flush' is aided and abetted by two tools -'Stepney' and 'Open Window'. 'Stepney', as i call it, is mindware programme, it keeps tracks of all the alternate options, be it available or unavailabe in a person's life, it runs in the background while you continue your existing relationship (but remember 'stepney' turns from mindware to malware once you get married and has distructive affects). 'Open Window' as explined by our friend Ted Mosby, (in HIMYM series), is a real time relationship timeline alert tool that reminds you who has who has just moved out of relationship thus making window of opportunity open for the person.

These two tools are though independent of each other but are also complementary.Sometimes, both of these run together on same person and sometimes separaely. In case of sania mirza it was desperate need to escape from aftermath of a disastrous relationship and she turned to 'stepney' to find solace. Sohaib Malik on the other hand waited for 'Open Window' alert to make his move. Both these tools work perfectly fine until your immediate reason to be in one relationship happens to escape ruote from another, as you are emotionally drained mind plays its own game thus leading to 'rush to flush'.

I have seen it happening to two of my friends, one needed stepney and other was waiting for window to open, they hitched in this scenario dated for long even got married but still couldn't save the relationship. And,i also remember thelast big celebrity 'rush to flush', aishwarya rai and vivek oberoi; we all know the outcome. It usually follows the same pattern withperson thinking why the hell i got into this situation.

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.

The Show-off Toyz of Next Decade

Saw an advt on tv with tag line what was cool yesterday isn’t cool today. True, what was rich man’s prerogative is common man’s mat today. So, in 80s when most of people had black&white television richer ones had VCR and telephone. Then in 90s when most of the people owned VCRs richer people had LD players. So what gonna be rich person’s toys in this decade. I have some of my guesses.

As technology is changing fast there are less chances that any consumer durable product will be top such list as we everyone has seen that how three different products like telephone, music player and camera, all of which were not owned by common man, has now combined into one and is owned by almost everyone. So a phone or mobile equipment is less likely to make it to showoff list.

But, some thing like electric sports car will definitely make it despite any advancement in technology or even with existence of conventional fuel based models if they survive the government onslaught on fuel efficiency.

Air travel has become less expensive compared to what is used to be two decades ago. Not much fad remains in air travel especially in India. I guess the outer space travel tour will be the fad in this decade. It’s cool and it’s expensive, chances of its cost becoming affordable wouldn’t be arising in a decade or so.

Robots, yeah its not a new stuff to this world but it isn’t not much popular either (Japan being sole exception). A good advancement in robotics has led to increased interactivity, mobility and their ability to multi-task, I bet more people will have robots in this decade.

Holographic projection tv, I thought it was fringe of my imagination till I googled it for good. Amused but not surprised that as a concept it already existed. Though, it will take time to come out may be by end of this decade. I would love three dimensional hi-definition holographic images, i would be real surreal everything.

My favorite concept is of smart phone with all the applications - universal remote, air conditioner control, lighting control and all electrical controls. But, then it would still be commonman's handytool (not my problem) than show-off piece.

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.

Thought for New Year's Eve

Today is the last day of the year and usually it’s the most overhyped day of a year on account of future excitement and largely as a cut day for partying. This over hype to enjoy the last day and to welcome a new year plays on everyone’s mind. I have also been part of this hype on numerous occasions.

But, this year has been quite different since the beginning and even the last day is turning out to be unpredictable with rains washing out everyone’s plan just like it did throughout the year. This year has been bitter-sweet for me and most of the people I know. Some good things started, a lot of things sustained and a hell lot went haywire. Unhappy, angry, despair, confused, lost, unwarranted changes and unfulfilled promises, this year was filled with all these elements.

So much going in a year, and the year itself not living up to expectations, when everyone was actually betting on it. I don’t know how much it’s worthwhile to place another bet especially for some one Indian like me. After all we have so many calendars in our country and there are so many new years going throughout the year. I think it really doesn’t matter which calendar year it is but sure time does matter and good time really does matter!!

Old for Gold

A lot of times we talk about face value and how everything gets judged around it. And, here I’m literally talking about “face” value, and how much it is looked upon to gauge your talent in professional world.

Most of us know about professions where looks play paramount role, in some profession its looks + smartness and for rest looks are supposed to play no role. But, Are there any such profession? I think it rarely does exist. Rarely not because people exploit their looks for success but actually how critically a profession judges a professional’s talent by his/her looks.

It was just a few months after my post graduation, my friend had mustache grown on his face. His answer to my enquiry of change in fashion was simple, he was handling his business and he didn’t wanted to look newbie and novice in business, who lacked sense of business; and off course he had to give slightly mean look. A few months later it my turn, a client looked at my colleague & me and got worried with our silly young excited face. He wanted to know how qualified we were to handle his research project.

Young is not the look that most of the young professionals want and truth is that young look in most of profession is not looked upon. How many of us can ever believe most of the senior level person look at young professional and say “yeah, I think s/he handle it”. If you want to move slightly upward then young is out and mature is in. How many people ever trust young doctors irrespective of their talent? I have seen people making themselves look older than they actually are to gain trust of their patients/clients.

It’s so ironic that anyone and everyone who wants to look younger in their personal lives and does whatever possible to look young actually wants to look aged in their professional lives. Sometimes there is pressure to differentiate. I have seen young people with managerial roles trying hard to create differentiation between themselves and their team members and that begins with facial hair.

French bread is most popular it seems people take French beard route to look more matured compared to rest of team members. I don’t know how much of this effort is directed towards their bosses that help in identifying a young manager from his team or making boss believe that they have really become matured in life with straw of facial hair. I’m not sure if this one is global phenomena because if French people would come to know this then would have heart attack that people use French beard to fake their maturity and the killing part would be you look notches up older with it.

Men at Malls

A lot of those who were distraught by reading one of my previous posts asked me “then what do men actually do?” well there is lot that men do/don’t/can’t or are forced to do at mall.

Making payment was actually the thing that most of the men are proud of, though most of men still swing their wallets at payment counter but they can’t claim to be the only one as nowadays women does the same.

So what do they do?
If there are two or more guys together then window shopping and bird watching is subconscious outcome. Men don’t do window shopping but as there is usually confusion about what to buy and what not, men usually end up doing window shopping. And with women, men are perpetually confused and they don’t mind adding distraction to their confused state.

The funniest one that you will ever see is men holding women’s purse and waiting near trial rooms. Nowhere else you will every see so many men holding their partner’s purses and waiting patiently. You really got to see it, how funny it looks with so many men are holding women’s purse and are totally clueless what to do next.

Flirting with sales-woman is not habitual act for men (though, there are always some exception) but every shop expects this to happen. So, they have already worked on to steal man’s charm and when man is thinking that he has charmed the lady, the sales-woman knows her counter charm is very well working.

Walking around the shop is certainly what most of men don’t prefer especially when they don’t have to buy anything. Meandering around the shop mentally tires men faster then gym routine; you see men looking out for chair to relax. You will always find some men at a corner on chair, perfectly relaxed knowing why he is there.

What men don’t do (here) is checking out woman’s section and you would rarely find men checking out women’s clothes. If you are standing and find other people giving strange look then it is more likely that you are standing in front of lingerie section. In last five years I have seen only one person (man) in lingerie section actually trying to buy something, I could see other men at distance really wondering “what the hell this guy is doing” and sales-women was actually blushing (as they are hardly used to sell lingerie to men).

One thing that men are not allowed to do at certain malls is standing near woman’s trial room, they are kept at some distance. I can understand, men are supposed to be perverts, always looking at other women. But then, how many men would be really interested in watching their women when their comment really doesn’t count.

District 9

This is one of few movies that comes once in a while and when you sit down to watch it you really don't expect too much out it. District 9 is pathbreaking in all sense for a sci-fi movie especially those dealing with extraterrestrial lives. The beginning bugs you off with its docu-type depiction of events and that keeps on going throughout the movie. Even the climax fades out in similar fashion, then you think what the f**k!!

By the time credits starts rolling you realise that you have never seen movie like before, not because it has news documentary feature-film kind of treatment ( which nowadays lot of movies have) but its paradigm shift in a depiction of handling of an issue- what happens when aliens visit our planet? Normally most of the movies depict such scenario with a resultant clash of species (which i don’t deny is the possibility) but they have never tried to look into other aspects.

District9 brings to light different such scenarios.
What if aliens lands to take asylum? How do we deal with them? How we going to live with them?
What happens when aliens visit a developing/poor country instead of new york/london, how do people deal with it?
How a poor/developing country is going to manage this mess?
What if aliens are not strong enough despite being technologically advanced? Are we going to rule over them just like we do over other animals? Do we gonna give them any fundamental rights? Will we give our piece of land to aliens?

The movie tries to explore many such issues. The news commentary/documentary style does help keeping the flow of the movie in check (though it could have been avoided to some extent as you continuously feel like watching news documentary). It is fast movie which sticks to its plot. The cacophonic in-charge of alien handling unit does his job, as it has been played by a lesser known international actor we aren’t too bothered by him though he turns out to be a pivotal character and you may even end up sympathizing and sobbing for him in the end.

Portrayal and the setup of movie is very realistic (and that’s the reason it remains in your head). I was amazed by the scale of production design, the whole district 9, the sci-fi setup, army and the weapons, didn’t much look like indie film. It was only in the end I realized the culprit- peter Jackson, when his name rolled up. Finally, this guy well spent his money on something. He will be very happy because I’m sure this movie will become a cult classic, sooner or later.

Woman's Activism!

Every time I enter a shopping mall I face the same irritant, and no they are not sales persons offering new schemes. If you ever go to men’s section/floor, you will find more women then men. More women in men’s section is not a headache but the women activism sure is a headache. The sense you get on men’s section is almost like it belongs to women, the smell of perfume tells you who dominates the floor, you always see them calling shots taking decision about what men should wear, which they actually should take. I can’t believe that I have seen woman actually deciding undergarments for her men (yeah and this doesn’t happen vice versa in India) and the man looked clueless, what kind of looser that man can be who doesn’t know about his undergarments.

I fail to understand one thing, how come men have really no idea what they should wear. Men’s fashion is not as complex as women’s fashion and there aren’t many frequent changes in their fashion either. Still, most of the men seem to be clueless about what to wear. Lack of sense of fashion amongst men is acceptable as lot of men have this particular quality, but not being able to make decision about your worst sense of dressing is more appalling.

Last time when I went to a mall, it was usual, women commanding their men. I saw a person being dished out number of shirts for trial, all by his wife, he got a good number of options to choose from but unfortunately none were his!!! Well, this is classic case of clothing decision made by most of men in India; they get to make none of the decisions.

Since childhood, it’s mother who makes all decision about her son’s clothing (sometimes fathers too) though kids go out but decision is generally don’t get to take any decision, this usually goes on until child reaches to college gates. In some unfortunate instance even during college days moms decide what their kids would wear, this one can still be observed in any mall in India. But, these guys are not the most unfortunate; the unfortunate ones are the guys who bring their gal to decide what they should wear. This usually is freedom time to develop your own style and sense because at next leap this freedom usually gets curtailed. I still don’t know why guys do this because girls don’t really get impressed with it but they do get idea whether guy is conformist/confrontationist (and you know who a girl would better like!).

For married men the problem is very different, despite being financially independent devoid of any upper-hand from parents, he still can be coerced to accept choice of her partner. Married men gets bewildered by the consequence of saying no to his wife, anyone can guess the consequence of saying no to the parents but in case of wife consequence is always unpredictable. I kind of sympathise with married men especially the ones who are cheered at lot when they come out of the trial room and has no idea about what he is wearing, a reluctant smile and deal is sealed (..so is his misery).

I’m not pretty sure what trigger this indecisiveness amongst men, lack of fashion or lack of judgment. Though, space for lack of fashion actually never gets filled but women don’t give second chance to men when it comes to occupying the ‘lack of judgment’ space.

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.

Lost in Version

Just a few days back one of the leading photography technology company launched a new breakthrough product – 3D(dimension) digital camera. I banged my head, with joy and frustration. 3D sounded cool but I’m dead sure that this would make all simple cameras obsolete in two years and our lives will be lost in managing the changing compatible formats and version. I remembered, many months back when my friend and I were talking about vanishing physical form their personal memoirs (letters, cards and photograhs).

It was quite evident that post new millennium my personal history had taken a beating as everyone switched to emails. I still look at with amusement on those old letters I was so stupid, funny and freak (just like my friends who wrote me). But, time and technology later wiped all that as most of such emails got lost or erased by the providers (when I didn’t use to log-in for months) till few years back and before the advent of unlimited email account stuff. This unlimited email account has not helped much as you can’t bring all your friends to same account and thus limits the possibility of chatting with them and that too for long duration. Plus, you may search whoever you had conversation with but you don’t store that with yourself, neither you look up to your email account when you get nostalgic or trying to remember a good conversation which was neither ‘tagged’ nor ‘starred’.

Now, I hallucinate of this free email account as more of trackback on personal lives proxy funded by governments with intention of keeping tab into the lives of everyone (its one of the cheapest means afterall). I know there will be no addition to my collection of letters which actually stopped almost a decade back. May be everyone is loosing some of their memoirs and their history in making. This thought really freaked me out because nature has always been though on civilizations, all ancient civilizations have been wiped without trace (ours survived but not completely, though the knowledge link went missing). We were able to regain some knowledge about them because they were not in digital format!!!

Well, my suspicion gained ground on last Sunday when i watched “Megatron” and “Opitmus Prime” fighting over their knowledge cube, which too was in physical form. Even so called fictitious advanced civilization on silverscreen were keeping thing in physical form. All we are doing is digtalising everything, The future looks kind of creepy to me, as just in few decades kids might not need to learn to write the alphabets because of computers so we may stop inscribing every message. Though, in India it may not be entirely affected (some 100 years down the line you still may see “Mayawati” written on Taj Mahal thinking that it was built by Mayawati). I know the strong argument is about advance civilization would have elctro-magnetic technology but we still forget that we ourselves have not been able to decipher languages from our past.

Anyway, looking into future is not going to help me when I find it hard to collate all the digital photographs, which now scattered over different electronic forms and formats in comparison with hard-copies of old photographs (I know this is not environment friendly argument). As looser to this world of technology now I have to prepare for the life with three dimensional photographs and for sure it will freak out all men who don’t have flat stomach (hahaha).

Punch Indian Politicians before Racist Australians

It has been two weeks since racist attacks on Indians in Australia and it now seems to be an un-ending saga. I really don’t understand what kind of government we have!! Worst part is that our Government (actually Congress ) for past five years have been mute on their ability to protect Indians in India, now they are way to timid to protect its own nationals in other countries.

Indian government should have declared indefinite unilateral ban of issuing visa to Indian students for Australia. This would have send strong signal and would killed cash cow approach of Australians towards Indian students (who later treat Indians as beef available for slicing). This would also have given a really tough message all the countries that take Indians students but care least about them, but it didn’t happen. And, doesn’t surprise me at all our government is filled of big time loser and timid people who can’t take a single tough stand. Can you imagine our PM tough stand (I don’t think he can even spell the word ‘tough’).

When Indian students were protesting to bring world’s attention to the racist tendencies of Australians then our very own External Affairs minister gives ‘gyan’ to the students to show patience & restraint….restraint from what…..shouting while getting killed !!! He goes on to add that “Indian students should concentrate on their studies rather than retaliating”. Yeah, this is what expected out of Indians and this is exactly what are image outside…..somebody beating us black and blue and all you are doing is shouting the answers you have mugged up for the examination.

We never take strong stance on any issue, just because of our weak stand on such a important issue others can think of messing up with us. We couldn’t dare talk tough but Australian PM knew what he had to do…he counter attacked India by saying that Australians are attacked in India (well foreign tourist do get mugged in India but we look at the money not the nationality). Can you imagine a country’s PM instead of apologizing for racial attacks and talking of stern measures to curb such attacks goes on to hit back at us, the same country which funds its education business.

It can only happen to country like ours; can they do it to Chinese, no they cant. No country in this world can dare china even for good reasons…it immediately punishes politically, economically and militarily. Our leaders do sit back and sulk.

That’s not the only thing Indians could have done, we could have called for boycott of all things Australian. I know there is hardly anything Australian comes to our mind except beer and their tourism; we could have well boycotted that, but it didn’t happen or we can say that conveniently that no one was bothered about doing something.

We don’t have long term plan to plan to control such violent act against Indians despite the fact that India sends one of the largest numbers of students abroad for higher education but it does nothing about checking their race-related issues and their credentials. Look at the US, it has black list for almost anything and everything, Indians and Indian companies get banned just for conducting business with such black listed nations. Everybody can rank Indians and Indian institutions but we can’t do that. Why can our government rank foreign institutions on various parameters including racial discrimination and past attacks on Indian students? It would discourage Indian students taking admission at such places thus hitting the business of such foreign institutions in long term. All such foreign educational institutions would dread being on such lists.

But, alas, our education minister would be busy in making changes in educational system to suit party’s electoral needs and our external minister is busy in kissing white a**.

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.

The Blackberry Punishment

I finally got nailed by my company; it firmed up with the final brick in the wall by handing over me the final tool in corporate slavery- the blackberry. It’s an amazing instrument that shrinks world further and personal life even shorter. It makes you so smart that you end up reading mails twice on lot of occasions.

I tried to get feel of it, keeping in hand itself was quite a task in the beginning. After trying to hold it in hand for several times I tried putting it in the traditional blackberry way- on the waist. It was like a policeman putting his gun in his holster, I tried on right side then left side, but it looked funny on me, I looked like over-promoted pandu (constable).

I tried to sooth myself trying to create a style of picking blackberry out of its cover, james bond came to my mind and for a moment I felt great. The “007” background score rang in my ears, then I took it out in slow-mo in the same way as double 0seven does, I did it a few times in the office lift (which I avoid to take), I was in haven but then I realised that it required too much of leg-space and I possibly wouldn’t be able to do it everywhere. Then, I tried ‘good bad and the ugly’ style in true cowboy fashion. I think it is preferred style in the corporate world as it gets things done. But, its rash, jerky and fast way to pickout you phone and it might even injure a bystander in most cases. So, I decided to drop this style and made mind to pick-out my cell like a common man does in his boring life.

Even as I had ended my flirtation with new blackberry had ended in dismay, I realised for most it had just began. Blackberry creates it own set of onlookers. Suddenly guards at my office realised that I had one and they assumed that my position in the company had climbed a few notches up, though in reality it wasn’t the case, but it still had impact on them, they became more formal in the mannerism. Then, there were “the others”, who were amused with blackberry on my hand, I looked too young to have it and definitely didn’t fit into the image of mid-level-mid-age-grouchy person.

People still can’t help talking about it when they see me with blackberry for the first time, their love for this instrument really surprises me. For me, it similar to the school days punishment when teachers used to put a not behind your back and you used to pretend that it was really cool and used to show-off.

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!!

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!!!

Yo Momma !!

There are very few television series that ever get made on youth sub-culture, and most of them come from west (largely the US). Americans are good at highlighting some of them, which in case of India unfortunately remains unexplored. VH1 new series “Yo momma” is all about trash talking competition on the streets of US. It is different from our regular desi jibes, which are centered on some abusive words.

Guys from neighborhood (somewhat like Mohalla committees in our case) come together to challenge each other in bad mouthing competition. Contestants are young street-smart junta, both male and female. White men still struggles to match his off-white cousin, they don’t have this creative venom spitting ability, which is clearly dominated by ghetto junta.

Competitors throw a few lines on each other but, the best part of the show is reserved for trash talking on the show title – yo momma, where each competitor hurl really nasty comment on other beginning with “yo momma”. These are very delightfully creative, ugly and disgusting one-liners that go beyond our regular maa-behan ka ashirwad or the arguments that you hear on roads. The most decent ones that I can recall were “ yo momma so cheap…made in china written on her a**” and “ yo momma is like public toilet….free and disgusting”. You can gauge the level of trash talk as some are ‘beeped’ by VH1 itself, if it were to pass Indian censor board probably whole 20mins would have been beeped up. Thankfully the series is not much talked about program on the tube; else there is little hope that a program with youth bad mouthing in the name of “MAA” would have been aired at all.