Never Mind

The Regret –

2011-11-09T22:15:00.000+05:30

It was month of November. It was early morning, around 7-15am. He was not feeling cold anymore even with the cold chilly wind blowing around. His eyes were moist. He had not realized that he would have to face this situation today. He was now thinking if only he had been a little bit brave on the previous day; this situation could have been avoided. After every few minutes he used to remember this very moment and again the tears would gush down his cheeks. Even the cold blowing wind could not dry the tears up on his cheeks.

It would take another half hour to reach home now. He was traveling on a two wheeler sitting on the back seat. His dad was riding the two wheeler and they were now returning home. He was hoping that they would reach home early, very early, but you cannot beat the distance by just hoping. Even without any traffic on road, his tuition classes would take atleast 45mins of travel on two-wheeler. Usually every morning his dad would wake him up early and travel all the way to drop him to his tuition class which begins at 7am. It was a daily routine, but today was different, a lot different. So his agony did not end even when he reached home after half an hour. His dad parked the two-wheeler in basement; he did not look at his son at all. He just entered the house and straight-away headed to bedroom and slept off. He knew that it was his son’s mistake but he had already forgiven his son for this. His mom followed him right behind and took his temperature reading and result read 103 degrees.

His tears were not stopping at all. He just wanted to say that he was truly very sorry to his dad but did not muster any courage to speak and he continued to cry and cry silently sitting in a corner of the hall.

It all started in morning when dad knew that it was public holiday today. Also he knew that he was not feeling well that day, so he asked his son – “Are you sure, you have your tuition classes today?” Son - “Yes, Sure dad, our teacher did not inform about the class being canceled today”. So he got dressed up as usual with an additional sweater on to protect as much as possible from the cold wind. At 6-45am Dad and son were in front of tuition place. The son gets down and rushes towards the classroom only to see that it is locked with a note on door saying – “Class canceled due to public holiday”. Son was shattered to see that. He had dragged his dad out in cold when he was not feeling well. He knew it was his mistake which he did on the previous day and he realized it now. He thought he would spend some time there and wait till his dad returns back. He could not dare to tell his dad that it was holiday and they had traveled all the way needlessly in this cold weather. He peeped through corner of the wall to see if his dad is still there and saw that his dad was waiting for him without returning. Son had no choice now. He had to go back to his dad now and tell him the truth. He mustered all the courage that he could and went back to his dad. In meantime, his dad had already asked the watchman of that building to check if classes were being conducted today or not and after knowing the truth he was waiting there for his son. He did not ask anything more to his son, just saw his son return and turned on the two-wheeler to return back home.

On previous day – At the end of the class, he knew his teacher had informed all students about something which he could not hear clearly. He now realized that it was this same thing about classes being canceled. If only he was brave enough to just ask back the teacher on what he informed or for that matter of fact, any student who had listened to the teacher’s information, this situation could’ve been avoided. But he did not, nor did he care to bother. His ignorance had now turned into a biggest mistake of his life. He could only sit in the back seat behind his dad and regret for what he had done.

Even after many years now, the regret still lingers in his heart and he only wants to tell his dad how sorry he was for that day but alas the hard truth is that his dad does not live anymore today.

[THE END]

Three Amigos and a memorable drive – Part – 2 -

2011-11-03T21:55:00.001+05:30

(Missed the first part…. Click here)

Suddenly we saw a hotel open and a petrol bunk nearby. We decided to intake our fuel first and let the car wait for sometime. So we barged into the hotel and a waiter came to take the order. Me: “Idli vada for all?” Others agreed, but it means nothing if we agreed, the main guy waiter replied: “No idli vada. Still not ready, sir” Ok, so we changed our order to masala dosa or poori. Waiter: “Not yet ready sir. Only vegetable upma is available. If you wait for five minutes, I will get vada also”. We all stared at each other then in one voice: “Get the upma first and start making vada’s and get them too.” When you are hungry, anything you eat seems tasty. That day, the upma was so tasty that we were almost tempted to order another plate, but just as we finished our upma, the vada’s were ready on our table. We pounced into vadas and finished that in no time. It was hot and again tasted delicious. Then had a cup of coffee each and then as we started to leave, we remembered that it was a decision time. Remember we had to take one of the two routes from spot 1. This was exactly the spot 1 where we had to deviate from highway. We looked at each other and discussed on which route to take. Obviously we were not able to decide. Best thing now was to gamble. Out came the one rupee coin, heads – route 1 (little bad one) tails – route 2 (better one). Flipped the coin in air.

We took car to petrol bunk, added fuel and continued on the route 1. Few kms on that route and it seemed to be nice road. So Prashanth spoke up: “Hey this is not bad at all. Seems good road” Just then the potholes started from nowhere. After some distance, the road got better. This time Prasad said: “Ok, seems like only that part was bad” Just as he spoke, again the road got bad. Some more time and again the road got better. We stared at each other and nobody dared to speak about the road condition now. We did not want to take any chances especially when we had encountered such situations with rain first and now roads. So we continued our drive silently. Thankfully the road continued to be better and finally we reached our first destination Sirsi. In Sirsi, we had to search for some new bus stand and continue on that route to reach Hulekal.

So whenever we came at some junction where the road split into two, we searched for sign boards as to which road goes where. Surprisingly the sign boards always pointed in one direction and always showed the way where one of the roads lead. There was not even a single clue as to where the other road leads. Somehow with our own guesses we took one or the other roads and at every such split junction, we always knew where one road goes but not the other. Thanks to the “well planned” sign boards. Finally we had to take help of some people who mislead us for some time on wrong routes and finally lead us onto the correct one.

Finally we reached Hulekal. People greeted us and gave us some scolding for our night drive. Then we freshened up, had one more round of breakfast and at this moment we were totally tired and exhausted. Our eyes were slowly coming down and vision was getting blur. At around 10am, all 3 of us thought of taking a small nap and slept off. We slept like logs on that day and don’t think we even changed the position in which we slept and finally we got up when we were forcibly woken up for lunch at 2pm. Then had lunch, went out for some shopping and finally returned home at night for yet another long sleep. Next morning we were supposed to leave back to Bangalore with my wife at around 7am, but as usual we got up late due to our tiredness and finally left for our return journey at 11am.

So this marked the end of my first night drive and the most amazing till now. I still don’t know how our elder people agreed for our night drive. We three amigos set off without any planning or schedule or the proper decided route on this memorable and the most enjoyable drive which I would cherish all the time. As far as possible, would be avoiding anymore night drives as it is always safer to drive in the morning than night. Nevertheless, this night drive would always remain as a wonderful memory for rest of my life.

[THE END]

Three Amigos and a memorable drive – Part – 1 -

2011-10-31T23:56:00.001+05:30

So it was decided, we three (myself and my two cousins - Prasad and Prashanth) will be going to my native place Hulekal (another 16kms from Sirsi) in my car which would be marking my first night drive of my life. Mission: - To pick up my wife from her native place and get back to Bangalore. Well, problem was to convince the elder people now. Since Prasad had done night driving many times when he was in US, it was probably not difficult to convince my mom and grandma anyway. So that would mean our key to this night drive was to get my mom and grandma convinced. Another problem – this was in month of November-2008, and it was raining from last couple of days.

It was Friday night and we 3 met at my place with our bags packed. Slowly we had to talk to my mom and grandma somehow. We were looking at each other to see who is going to start first. So then, I began “Hmmm… so shall we leave at 12 am?” This was only to get my mom’s attention and it worked like a charm. Mom: “WHAT? Did I hear 12am? NO…NO…No… It is very risky. No night driving.” Me: “No its fine mom, We 3 are there and all of us know driving. Prasad has done it many times in US… right Prasad?” I turned to him. My Mom too turned to him and gave him a scary stare. Prasad was cornered now, he coolly started back “Yeah Maami, its ok. We will manage.” Mom: “What if it rains, no no… cannot allow. You guys can go early in morning around 3am or 4am.” Prasad: “Oh maami, that would be difficult. It would be like we all will be half-asleep. Instead we will not sleep for now if we have to leave at 3am.” Mom: (cooling down but half-convinced) “Hmmm ok, alright. That’s fine then. So you guys decided on route? Check with your uncle about the routes once.” I agreed and called up our elderly uncle who was always the first pick when we wanted to decide on some routes to take to our native place.

Me: “Hello uncle… We wanted to know which route to take”

Elder Uncle: “yes. There are two routes from spot1. First route has some shaky road and second route is a bit farther but it is good. I suggest you take that second route. So when are you guys leaving?”

Me: “At around 3am morning.”

Elder Uncle: (Sounding disturbed) “You 3 people leaving so early. Don’t be stupid guys, listen to me. Have a good sleep, get up at around 6 have a cup of tea and leave by 6-30.”

Me: “Ok Uncle. Thank you. We will do that. Bye.”

So kept the phone and we discussed about that and again stuck with our 3AM plan. My mom watched for another half hour, none of us were willing to take a nap fearing it will be difficult to wake up early. Realizing that it will be of no use, she tells us to leave by midnight itself. Atleast we would reach there early morning and can sleep peacefully. Overjoyed with our plans on track, we freshened up and got ready to begin our journey. Exactly at midnight, we started our journey.

I suggested taking a short-cut and we start off. 10mins into that short-cut route and we see a road-block (Road under construction). We have to get back all the way and half an hour after our journey started, we are still in front of our home. We silently take the longer route and re-start our journey again. Finally we are on the highway. The weather is also pleasant with small drizzle here and there. One and half hours into the journey and I am beginning to enjoy my first night drive when Prasad’s phone starts ringing. It is my mom on phone asking where we are. Prasad says: “Yeah Maami, going fine. Everything is good…. Yeah… No rain yet…. Ok bye” Then he keeps the phone. As soon as phone is kept, it starts raining heavily. For the next 4-5 hours, this repeats every hour - Mom calls, we tell “No rain” and once we keep phone, it starts raining heavily. Then we take our normal breaks for photographs at night somewhere on highway. Finally at around 6 in morning, we search for fuel, Fuel for our car as well as for ourselves. All 3 of us are feeling hungry now. We had never thought staying awake at night makes you feel hungry sooner and much before normal breakfast time. So first we stop at a petrol bunk but find nobody there to fill the petrol. We search for a while, shout for a while but nobody yet. So we again continue our journey looking out for petrol bunk as well as a hotel….

(To be continued… Click here)

Changing the light bulb

2011-10-11T21:53:00.000+05:30

"Hello Listen, the light bulb is not working outside. Replace it now." Came the voice from my wife. I was watching highlights of a close cricket match which I had missed before. I ignored the first request (order) from my wife and continued to watch the match. "Replace it NOW". Universe just got cruel, it does not want me to watch the match peacefully. I reluctantly turn my face from the TV and look at my wife, she is staring me angrily and does not look like she has any plans to let me watch match peacefully.

I calculate to myself, the match is there for another half an hour and it will take me 5 minutes to change the light bulb especially when the new light bulb is already available in home. This means I do not have to go to shop and buy a new one. So it was a piece of cake. So I get up quickly, go outside. I see that the lightbulb to change is hanging on the roof which I cannot reach without a ladder. So I go inside the house again get the ladder and come out. My mom is talking to someone on phone sitting on the swing in the portico. I set up my ladder just behind her which she notices and points to me at something and continues to talk on the phone. I tend to ignore my mom's action, climb the ladder remove the bulb and fix the new bulb to the holder. Get down and my mom again points at something and continues to talk on phone. I again ignore and go inside the house and switch on the just fixed bulb. It lights up. Mission Accomplished.

Happy at completing the job within 4 minutes, I go back to my position and start watching the match. My wife goes out and checks and again calls me that bulb is not working. I think she must've checked the wrong one and continue to watch my match. She again comes to me and pulls me out again and shows me that the bulb. I am dumbstruck staring at the bulb which is not working and which is completely different from the one I replaced. It is the other bulb which is just at the reachable height in the portico and does not need the ladder. My wife started again - "Oh God, I told you to change that bulb and you have changed this one!!!", I retort back - "Well, you did not tell which bulb specifically!! Hence I assumed to be this bulb". Wife - "Ayyo... Rama".

The complete scene just dawns on me that I just replaced the bulb which was already in the working condition. The whole 4 mins which I was proud of was now looking like a time-pass. Now I also realise that my mom was pointing to the bulb which was not working and I ignored. I just Feeling so stupid, I just replaced that non-working bulb with the previous one which I had removed from the roof. An extra 10mins wasted and my match over as well.

One more lesson for software engineers to properly understand requirements before jumping into the implementation.

--The End--

Harry Potter... Who?

2011-08-02T10:47:00.010+05:30

"Harry Potter... Who?". This is exactly the question I asked to my friend in college when he told me that a new movie called "Harry Potter-Chamber of secrets" was released in theaters. I asked my friend - "Isn't this a kid's movie? Just some special effects and nothing else right?". He stared at me as if I had made a crime in asking that question. He did not bother to answer me on that, instead he took out a book called "Harry Potter-Sorcerer's stone" from his bag and handed over to me. I always thought this Harry Potter was a movie made for kids and was also surprised to see that the movie was also based on book series with same name. I was also not a kind of novel reader at that stage. First thing after seeing that book, I opened up last page to see how many pages do I have to go through to finish this book. It was 236.

Somehow I made up my mind of spending some time on this book to see what is so special about this guy called Harry Potter. Opened up and started to read the book. Into second chapter and somehow the book had got over me completely. It suddenly turned out that I had actually started enjoying to read this book. Slow and steady read turned into a swift interesting read and within a week (I know its a bit long, time but for myself, this was a new record) I had finished up the first part of the series. On same weekend, some of us friends got-together and watched the first movie in a original dvd. The concept of DVD was new then. In the world of floppy drives, the word DVD made you raise your eyebrows and just say WOW. Naturally we were all excited about watching the movie on a DVD. It turned out to be quite a wonderful experience of watching the first part on DVD and since the book was read recently by every person there, we broke into discussions about some incidents which were not covered in the movie etc etc.

I had started becoming quite interested in this series now. I heard that that part-5 of the book had been recently released. I was still on one. Immediately the next day, I bought part-2 from my friend and started reading that. couple of weeks time and the part-2 was done and dusted. Then moved on with the third. The third was slightly complicated and the series had just moved into a teenage phase. Suddenly I realized this series was just not for kids anymore. We also booked tickets for this third movie when it got released. I had the pleasure of going to this movie with some friends who had not read the third book yet. As proud as I was about knowing the story of the movie, I had to explain lot of things from movie to my other friends. It turned out that I explained more than watching the movie.

Then came the fourth book which changed every view in me about this series. The fourth part was just so amazing and interesting that I could just not let the book down even for a minute. This was the book I finished the quickest with my reading sessions extending until 3am and I had to forcibly put the book down to get some sleep. Somehow I was turning into a novel reader now. Was getting to know some new authors like Jeffery Archer, Sidney Sheldon etc. Then came the fifth book. The slowest of the lot and the most boring on the series. Somehow dragged it for couple of months and finally completed that one too.

The sixth part was still another 6-8 months away. Everyone were waiting for that. When it came out, everyone in our class was eager to get their first shot at the book. Finally I got my chance after couple of week's wait and this was somehow again got the interest back in the series. Quite brilliant and a shock in the end which shook the whole basis of the series. This book induced few questions which were supposed to be answered in seventh part but the concept for seventh book was clearly laid out. Everyone were just eagerly waiting for the release of seventh book and it was an year away from release. When release date came near, I was so excited that I had pre-booked the book to be delivered on first day of the release. Indeed I got the book delivered on first day of the release and immediately started into it. Couple of week's time and I was finished with the series. Suddenly it felt so over. No more books, no more wait only waiting for further movie releases in this series.

So here I am coming out of the movie theatre after watching the final chapter of the Harry Potter. Somehow it was all over now. No more movies as well in the series now. Thinking back at how I had a belief about the series being for kids and later got me dragged so much into it that I had to pre-order the final part of the series. One year was all that changed my view about reading novels. Somehow I started feeling that reading a book was much more wonderful feeling than watching the movie. People say "A picture is worth a thousand words", but this series taught me that I would rather go for more words than picture. I had never thought about reading novel but here I was after completing 7 books which started my hunger of reading novels. A new change, still continuing to read other novels but none as exciting as the time spent on this Harry Potter series. Now I would never have to say "Harry Potter... Who?" because I know that he is the one who turned me into a novel reader....!!!!

Are there any silly questions?

2011-05-31T21:39:00.010+05:30

"Tring, Tring", the bell was ringing in my head or was it my phone ringing. Yes, it was my phone ringing but why am I not picking it up. Slowly, I open one eye and look at my phone. It is still ringing. Slowly I move my right hand towards phone and hold it near my right ear and speak "Hello, who is it?". "hey its me, your friend. Did I wake you up?". Its my office friend, suddenly I think I am probably late for office and open both my eyes. I look at the time, its 5am in the morning. So I am actually not late to office but my friend is really very early in calling me. I think do I really need to answer his question?. My mind answers "What else do you think I will be doing at this time".

With great control on my anger, I reply back politely - "Oh no.. not at all. Whats the matter? How come you called me so early in morning?"
He replies - "I was just heading towards Mysore. Wanted to know if the road near your house which connects to kanakapura road, is it proper? Last time it was under repair".
Me( Oh, do you think I keep track of all roads around my house on weekly basis? ) - "Hmm... Ah... I think it should be proper by now. Its been a long time I went that side. You better take the longer route."
my friend - "Oh yes. Thanks a lot man. You continue to sleep now. Will talk to you later. Bye for now".

So I keep the phone. With my sleep gone, I get up and think about the incident. Was the first question really genuine and was the answer from my side really mattered? I mean, obviously my friend DID wake me up and he knew that too, still he went on to ask the question as a formality. To continue with the same formality procedures, I did answer with a NO, but deep inside, both of us knew what went on. Also even if I had answered him with an YES, I think he would still have continued with his next question with a "sorry for waking up" statement.

Scene - 2 -

Recently I was watching the IPL final on TV. Suddenly my mom asked me "Which team has the highest score in IPL?". I replied - "Chennai - 246 or something".
mom - "Who won that match?"

I stared at my mom. Was that really an intentional question? My team was already getting thrashed on TV, over top of that do I really need to answer this question?. My mom was still looking at me and probably was expecting an answer too. Wasn't that obvious if Chennai has scored highest total, then naturally they did WIN IT. Yes, there are other rare conditions, if it rained and the duckworth-Lewis method was applied, but that would not be the case in 99% of such matches and I do not think my mom was thinking about that either. I just held on to myself and explained her the logic, if Chennai had not won that, then some other team would've got the highest total right?. Relief atlast. Obviously my mom got the hint and got the answer too. I continued to watch the finals where my team was getting beaten by same Chennai side.

Scene - 3 -

I got some news from a family friend. I told this to my wife. She was pretty excited and asked me "Who told you this?". Natural instinct, I thought. Obviously when some news is important people tend to ask the source. I told her yeah, that person told me. Immediately she asked back - "Did he message you or call you or email you?"

Now, here is a question again which I tend to think, should I answer. I mean how would the answer to this question make any difference to the news. I held on to silence for a while and really wanted not to answer this, but my wife peppered me with same question for the next 5 mins. I really ran out of patience and told her that it was through an email. She felt relieved and did not bug me any further. Looking happy she went away for other work. I really wondered, if that answer really was so important?

So here I am, still not conclusive about the silly questions? Are there really silly questions where answers really do not matter and yet we continue to ask them in our day to day life? I really think, yes since it has become a part of our life. Whats life without being a bit silly after-all. Have you guys gone through such stuff too?

Finally ending the blog with one from my side - "Did you guys like the above blog?" (Never mind to answer this...!!!)

--END--

Chakde India

2011-03-17T21:14:00.012+05:30

The whole Indian team is watching chakde India on a big screen on the eve of a big knock-out match in world cup to keep themselves relaxed and get some inspiration from the movie. The coach of the Indian cricket team (Gary) moves out for some reason. After sometime a watchman comes and tells Sehwag something in his ears. Sehwag gets up and goes out to the cricket ground. There he sees Sachin standing and waiting.

Sehwag - "Hey Sachin, why did you call me here now?"
Sachin - "Hey, I did not call you, it was you who called me"
Sehwag - "Why would I call you when watching a nice movie with others?"
Gary (comes out of shadows) - "I have called you guys here"
Sachin and Sehwag - "Why?"
Gary (Taking a deep breath) - "Tomorrow we are going to lose the big match"
Sachin and Sehwag (looking at each other in surprise and back to Gary) - "What do you mean? Have you fixed the match?"
Gary - "No, but we would lose the match because of you two"
Sachin and Sehwag(Looking perplexed) - "Why do you think so?"
Gary - "Because you two have been playing so well at the top and giving good starts for the team. With such good starts, our middle order has not even had any decent match practice. Also due to your good starts, the target is so high for oppositions, that our bowlers get relaxed and bowl as if they have already won the match.This has made our bowlers forget how to bowl under pressure. You know when you two go out into middle to bat, our batsmen do not even bother to pad up because they all know that you two do not get out so easily. They do not even turn out for batting practice sessions since they seldom get a chance to bat. The fielders field as if they have all the runs in world to defend and dont care if they just leave aa couple of boundaries. They do not understand the importance of every single run unless the match comes to a very close finish. It would be too late then to realize. One match if you two get out soon, then the rest of the team will not be able to cope up with the pressure. However there is one problem which is critical. Running between wickets from you two."
Sachin and Sehwag - "Yes, Gary. We are working to improve upon that".
Gary - "You guys always start hitting boundaries at will and when it comes to last couple of deliveries in an over, you guys try to retain strike by taking singles. Do you think the opposition captain/coach are fools to not notice this clear strategy from you two? They can keep the field out for first 4 deliveries and then bring the fielder IN with last two deliveries."
Sehwag - "You tell this to Sachin. The crowd always cheer louder when he is on strike even tough I give a bright start with boundaries. Also he is the one who takes quick singles with couple of deliveries left."
Gary(to Sehwag)- "So are you planning to not respond and get him run out instead?. This is exactly what the opposition captain wants too. And you Sachin, you have seen all these in your 20 years of cricketing experience, why do you still go for those quick singles in last two deliveries when you can take some more time and give Sehwag some strike too".
Sachin (looking timid) - "I... I never did it on purpose, it was just pure instinct in me, that urges me to keep the strike and get more and more runs for the country."
Gary(With full feelings and looking sad) - "You guys... you guys do not know how heavy the burden of defeat in world cup big matches are. I have been through this in the 1999 world cup when my mate lance and donald could not get one run which costed us the cup. The burden of that defeat is still lingering in the hearts of millions of people in my country even today. I do not want the same to happen with this team here. So how you want to play, you guys decide. I am going to dhoni to discuss about our other strategies for tomorrow's big match."

**** Gary leaves and joins the other team members who are still watching the movie ****

Sachin and Sehwag look at each other and Sachin speaks out - "I have been playing cricket for more than 20 years now and I am hungry for more runs. Since this would probably be my last world cup, I would still thrive to make runs for myself and my country and do everything right to win the cup for my country. I will also definitely be the top run-getter in this tournament."
Sehwag - "I am the leading run getter in this tournament now. Even I will see to it that I keep my position as top run getter in the tournament. Also what are you trying to prove to me by being top run getter?"
Sachin - "I dont want to prove anything to you, I just want to prove it to the people of my country who again and again point fingers at my calibre to win matches even after giving them so many centuries and so many victories. I want to show them what a single man can do if he is hurt by his own people. I just want to prove it to other people out there..."
Sehwag - "Oye, dont worry, even I will see who will point fingers at you. We will together score as much runs for the team as for the country, let other team members support us or not."

Both of them shake hands and move towards the team members. In the background - title track of Chakde India is going on.....
[Hoping India to win the world cup this time... not just for Sachin, but for his wonderful career which has entertained for more than 20 years now.]

Another eventful start for new year - 2 -

2011-01-20T09:00:00.002+05:30

Missed the first part? - Click Here to read the first part.

So the new plan was again laid out. It was time for lunch. Then we would first search the batteries in this mall and then take the car and go to bus stand to drop my mumbai cousin and finally retire to home sweet home. It sounded good only if things got placed as we thought. We had our lunch in food court of that mall and then asked some person if he can guide us to some shop where we can get the things we are looking for. He told us to go to Fizz, a photo shop on 3rd floor. Excited about getting the autocop batteries so soon, we ran to that place only to find out that he did not have that stuff. Again we asked him to guide us for next one, and he promptly showed us the Staples on 5th floor. We had to again climb two more floors just to see more disappointment. Then the same process continued until we were guided out of the mall.

Outside there was a huge stationery shop. I went in and asked him if he can tell us where we can find any car showrooms. This was our yet another master plan. Find nearest car showroom and he would surely have autocop batteries with him. That guy correctly guided us on next road, telling there was a skoda showroom. Hopes came back, yet again we hurried towards that showroom and yet again he did not have autocop batteries. Well, actually the showroom had only one car on display as well and looked like a deserted place. Then we continued along the same road to find Chroma. This was another huge electronic and electrical items showroom. We rushed in and showed him the autocop device and asked for batteries. He said he has those batteries. Aaah... Relief atlast. We looked at each other and gave a sigh of relief praising the whole showroom. That guy came up within 2 mins with a round button batteries in his hand. I told him, these are not the batteries we are looking for. To show him the kind of batteries I was looking for, I did not have a screw-driver to open the autocop device and hence started explaining him. After explaining the whole structure of the batteries in my device, that guy just said "I am sorry sir. We do not have those batteries here."

We came out of that showroom, now cursing the showroom saying why do they have such a huge one if they cant keep such small batteries in their stock. Then couple of electronic shops we asked and the result was still negative. Finally I was thinking it would be still worth waiting for those 2 long minutes even if it means avoiding stares from passing people muttering angry curses at us. Then one last try, we saw a small watch repair shop who was sitting by footpath. As soon as I asked him about batteries, he said he will get it in 5 mins. He asked us to look after his small shop and went off to get batteries. Finally here we were, waiting for the 5 mins to get over soon and ticket to home sweet home. After around 25 mins of wait, we still did not see that person back. Now the wait got a little frustrating and with the heating sun above our head, it was not easy.

Couple of more minutes and we saw that guy running and coming towards us. He had probably realized by now that it was well over 5 mins which he had committed to us. But more than the time spent there, I was looking to hear those magic words "I GOT IT" which would mean we can be home in no time. Finally he came towards us, my fear increased and suddenly it happened. He took out those batteries from his pocket and said those magic words. Smiles all around. He charged us 100 bucks which I knew was lot more than the cost of batteries, but I was in no mood to argue since he had got us what others in big malls and showrooms could not. At this moment the batteries seemed to be priceless. We grabbed the autocop device now loaded with new batteries and hurried towards the mall parking lot. Once I saw my car, I proudly removed the autocop device in my hand and clicked the unlock. "Beep beep" car shouted, which meant that we can enter the car and drive out.

Feeling good of myself, we drove out directly to bus stand. Saw my mumbai cousin to her Mysore bus and came back to parking lot in bus stand. So excited I was on finding the new batteries, I clicked unlock twice. "Beep beep" - Car shouted twice. It was sweet to hear those beeps now and finally drove back to home to end yet another eventful day which cannot be forgotten.

Important lessons learnt. Eventough the batteries last for over a year, when it goes out, it does not even warn. So now I have spare batteries in my car dashboard box. Ofcourse I do have a spare screw-driver too...

[THE END]

Another eventful start for new year - 1 -

2011-01-19T09:00:00.004+05:30

It seems to have become a habit now to have something eventful worth remembering for the new years. Well this time, unlike last year, not exactly on a first day of new year, but on first week of the new year.

Very much like last year, this time too we had planned for a movie(TRON 3D) to start new year with a bang. Some new entries to the family were available to join us for the movie. Me and my wife would be joined by my Bangalore cousin and his would be( Joining our baccha gang for first time ), then mumbai cousin who was doing her training at Infy Mysore and had been to Bangalore for weekend, and finally a special entry my Sirsi cousin who is yet another guy working at Infy. Finally we were six people altogether. Plan was to watch movie (morning show), and then me and my wife would drop my mumbai cousin to main bus stand from where she can go to Mysore, ofcourse after having lunch in that mall. My Bangalore cousin would take his would be and my Sirsi cousin to his place hence would not be joining us for lunch. So it was all set. Me, my wife, mumbai cousin and Sirsi cousin set out in my car towards the mall where we would be joined by my Bangalore cousin and his would be.

As usual for any movie, I did hurry up the folks to get ready soon and with no traffic on sunday early morning, we were at the mall 45 mins before show timings. I got the usual stares from my wife for getting there so early along with a stare from my mumbai cousin as well. I was spared from this stare from my Sirsi cousin since he was new to this role. I had to return back a short nervous smile to both ladies to cool them down. Finally my Bangalore cousin with his would be also arrived 15 mins before time and in next 15 mins we were inside theatre waiting for the movie to begin.

What followed for next 2 and half hours was amazing and due to 3D effect, it looked much better. With a great satisfaction of having watched a wonderful movie, we started moving towards our parking lot since my Sirsi cousin had to take his bag from my car and leave with Bangalore cousin. As soon as we reached my car, I took out my car key (Autocop) and clicked on the Unlock button. **Nothing happened**. I again clicked **Nothing yet**. Then I saw a small red light flashing on my autocop device. "Oh no, this cant be happening now" - I thought within myself realizing the problem. I knew immediately that my device had run out of batteries and by default it can only lock the car. If I use my normal key to unlock the car, then the autocop siren will shout loud. I could now sense the bewilderment on the faces of my cousins. I explained them the situation as not to worry, we have to just find a battery and replace in my device to get it working again. But internally I was wondering where the hell would I be able to find the battery now.

There were really two choices now. One - search for new batteries, two - just use the manual option to unlock and let the autocop shout. I knew it would shout for a period of exactly 2 or 3 minutes and then stop, but then that would be a very embarrassing situation for us. Those 2 mins span would be the longest I would have spent in my entire life. This was the time I requested my brain to think wisely and come up with a sensible solution, but it promptly rejected my request and started to go haywire. Spending those 2 long minutes did not seem to be a good idea now and hence I decided to go for option one which is to search for batteries. Before that, my Sirsi cousin's bag had to be removed from car. Due to the current circumstances, I came up with a master plan to get that bag out. It was on the front seat and I knew how to disable autocop for my boot door. I asked my mumbai cousin if she can climb from boot door into front seat and get the bag. She promptly agreed and then I disabled the boot door autocop, she did her best to get herself to the front seat and finally succeeded in getting the bag. Tough it looked like a very good master plan accomplished, a sensible decision would've been to just open door manually, take the bag out and close the door. The autocop would've shouted for few seconds anyway. My mumbai cousin did not have to go through the trouble of getting to front seat from boot door. But then master plans are always like that right...!!

Then my Bangalore cousin, his would be and Sirsi cousin went on their way. We had our own mission of finding the new batteries for my autocop device. We set out on our quest inside the mall but before that we had a main thing to accomplish. **LUNCH**. We were feeling very hungry, so I suggested we better have lunch first and then carry on with our quest.

To be continued... Click Here for the continuation.

Movie - Tees Maar Khan - My Review

2010-12-24T15:22:00.027+05:30

Here it was finally, after lots of hype and tv appearances, finally the actors of the movie Tees Maar Khan would make their first appearance on the big screen. Me and my wife were right there on this first day first show of this movie believing that if we wait for the reviews, we might probably skip watching this movie in theater. To say the least that was our expectations from this movie. Afterall its a farah khan movie. But with houseful crowd mostly filled with college students, we were pretty excited after all the hype surrounding this movie with a "Cant wait to watch" attitude. Few whistles started for the first ads which were now playing on the huge screen. Then finally the time came when the sponsors list of the movie started followed by a wonderful title track of the movie. The title track is catchy and well sung by none other than the talented Sonu nigam. In one of the promos, they had shown that Sonu had provided 8 different voices in this title track. I could not figure out more than 3.

The title track has a neat animation with a baby portrayed as the lead role of movie doing some hip-hops which was good. Then the movie starts with the theme of some anticipated train robbery of goods worth 500 crores narrated by the commissioner of police to his deputies about the 3 people who can possibly rob out of them 2 are already serving in prison. So without any rocket science involved, the one left is Tees maar khan. The scene shifts and the hero enters with a title music track. Since the movie starts with this exciting topic of train robbery, I was hoping that something amazing would be following in the movie, but nothing of that sort happens.

Then in next 15 minutes, the time comes when the lead lady of the movie enters to the ear-deafening shouts from the crowd to much awaited song of the movie "Sheila ki jawani". The whole song hums admist the wild whistles and roars in the theater. Another 10 minutes and the crowd roars again for the special appearance from Salman khan. Then its all over. What follows in the movie is just the motions of actors moving here and there for the much anticipated train robbery which you wait and wait and when it comes, you dont even feel that the scene passed by.

I would suggest that you can just walk out of the movie theater as soon as the song "sheila ki jawani" ends. The dialogues are lame and the supposedly comic scenes just turn out to be nonsense comedy to say the least. Coming to the actors, Akshay kumar is good in his acting and dialogue delivery, but he alone cannot carry the hopes of a over-hyped movie. The lead lady Katrina is just a doll in the movie and used only for the glamour quotient in the movie and for songs (Ofcourse, she does not have to do anything with her acting skills). Akshaye khanna is wasted in a ridiculous high profile actor role in the movie and he does a good job of his over-acting in the movie. Rest of the cast has nothing to do in the movie apart from running here and there with the lead actor. I personally cannot recall any scenes that are outstanding in the movie which are the "Watch-out" types. In the end, a very silly movie and a time-pass (or time-waste) movie. It could've been much better as far as I think of it. Anyway the least said the best for this movie. A total slapstick comedy movie with no story, no stand-out scenes, no good dialogues and no performances. If possible, my humble advice is to skip this movie. Afterall its a farah khan movie.

Road to Ooty - Story of 36 hair pin bends

2010-12-19T20:57:00.020+05:30

"Hey. There are two ways to go to Ooty. One is the shortest and just 36kms from the deviation near masinagudi safari cross. But beware that shortest route is very steep and has lots of hair pin curves. Your car being santro should be able to make it easily, but lesser cars do not. Also traffic is less there since buses dont ply on that route because of steepness. Anyway happy journey". These were the words of advice given to me by my friend in office. Now those exact words were ringing in my mind when we had just started our journey towards Ooty from Mysore. Unaware of this risky road ahead, my wife beside me was pretty excited about the whole journey. I never dared to spoil her enthusiasm too (For now). Somehow I had got the feeling that I will be directed towards that short route itself instead of a nice long relaxing alternate route. My adventurous mind was wanting me to take that hair pin road but my heart was thinking otherwise. Finally it came down to that safari cross where we saw a sign-board showing Ooty direction and mentioning it as 36kms away. I felt somehow that this was leading to that risky road and soon after my fear was coming true. The road was clear with no heavy traffic, infact very rarely we could see another four wheeler passing by. I had seen lot of such mountain roads before so I thought this would just be another of such types. Being confident of making to the top of hill, I went forward.

Couple of minutes later I could see some sign-boards of caution like "drive slowly", "accident zone", "Hair pin bends ahead" and "Steep curve ahead". Then finally a big board read "36/36 hair pin bends". Looking at the board, I could make out that there would be 36 hair pin bends ahead and Ooty was around 18 kms away now. First couple of hair pin bends were just like any other normal ones which I had seen lots but then when the third one was passed, I could feel some fear within myself. I thought "the coming hour does not seem to be an easy one". Eventough I was beginning to feel nervous now, I could not show that nervousness to my wife who had probably realized by now about what lies ahead. She was sitting pretty stiff now. The small chats here and there had come to a complete standstill now. With the cool silent environment outside, there was a nervous silence inside our car now.

By this time we had crossed another couple of hair pin bends and the board now read 31/36. My car engine was roaring now toggling between first and second gears, but I could not be any nice to my car because of the situation we were in now. The left hair pin bends were really scary only because they were so steep that you could not see if any vehicle is coming from the other side. But the vehicles on the descent were really helpful. When they notice upcoming cars, they used to stop until we completely cross the hair pin bend. Guess usually thats one of the nice highway disciplines among cars when driving on such difficult roads which is seldom missing in our cities.

When the board read 18/36, there was a bit of relief since we had passed halfway now. I could see my wife still stiff beside. To release some nervousness, I casually asked her to take some photographs of the scenery outside. To this she just shouted back saying, "Just look ahead and drive, dont talk please". The situation was just worse than I had expected. The roads seemed good now and my confidence of making it to the top was back eventough my car was still roaring admist the foggy mountain. In my second attempt to cool her down, I asked her, "You have been on scarier rides in wonderla and other amusement parks on which I dont even dare to go, why are you feeling so scared now?". For this she just plainly and truly replied that "Are baaba, those rides get over in couple of minutes and we still have 15 more mins on this scary ride". I did not know whether to laugh or get worried for this reply, but I realized one thing that my wife would cool down only once we pass all the hair pin bends. So without wasting any further time, I concentrated on the road ahead and on the mission to reach the top.

Finally the boards started to look less dreadful when the reading came down to single digits Then once we saw the board which read 1/36, we both gave sign of relief and looked at each other and immediately I told her that lets not come on this way during our return journey. While telling this thing to my wife, Internally my heart and mind were both saying "Not only on return journey, never again we will come on this risky road again". Surely this was the most difficult pass for me with my aging car and nervous wife in my whole driving career until now. I have been to lot of such hills and mountains before but never had I been so scared with the doubt of making it to the top of the hill. Anyway, all well that ends well. On return journey we just came on the other alternative route and the road was not a little bit scary but took an additional hour to reach our destination than that risky road. At that time I thought we could just have gone on that risky road to save some time, but then...

Near miss HM Trip - Part-2-

2010-11-30T23:29:00.010+05:30

Missed the first part... Read it here - PART-ONE

After a long 5 minutes, my phone started ringing.

She - "Mr.Sachin, I am so so sorry, there was a slight confusion over your travel plans"

Me(Feeling my HM trip is over) - "Oh what? How? How could you do that? Whats the issue now? What do I need to do now?"

She - "Actually it seems that your tickets were booked for the date 29th Apr and not today. Wait, let me try to arrange something for your travel. I will call you back in 5 minutes"

Yet another 5 minutes. Every minute passing by was just making things worse. Just could not understand what went wrong. I was wishing if only I could have confirmed with the Agent once in previous week. But then how could you doubt a reputed agency making such a mistake. Just when I was wondering about various things that could have avoided this confusion, a person from that agency came to me and asked "Are you travelling to Singapore? If yes, please follow me." He saw the bag we were carrying which was given by that agency and after seeing us wait from a long time, he probably thought we needed some help. Indeed we needed a lot of help now. I replied back saying "no" and also told him the situation we were in. He dived in to help us out of this situation and asked for my printouts. Just then, my agent called back. Then I told my agent that some person from same agency is trying to help me out here. She warned me to check his ID once and then let her talk to him once.

Then they both talked for around a couple of minutes and then I guess my agent was convinced of that person's identity and she suggested me to follow him. That person promptly went to that control room which we had visited before, talked to that control room person for a while and then something happened. He asked me to follow him again and he led me to that ticket counter. There he talked again to some people and finally led me back to control room. Time was already short. It was already 2-30am now. Then again in control room, he took out his credit card and gave it to the man in the control room. That man swiped it and then took some print out and handed it over to my person. Then that person gave me that printout and said, "Have a safe and happy journey. Enjoy your HM". I just could not believe my ears that I would be hearing that. Seeing my surprised expression, he explained me a bit - "I have booked you new tickets on same flight. Since the time is less, you will have to adjust for whatever seats are available. Also enclosed are your return tickets from Mauritius. You do not have to pay anything extra for this trip. Just go and enjoy your trip now. I have talked to your agent too and she will get in touch with you once you are back in India." I thanked him very much and rushed towards the ticket counter for the third time in last couple of hours and this would probably be the last time before our travel I thought. The lady at ticket counter promptly asked for my passport which I forgot to produce due to the ongoing events. Finally the boarding pass was in my hand and that meant we could now enjoy our trip without any further problems.

Thats just a thought, but then how can you be sure about your return tickets being proper now? No way right?. Well, this thought crossed my mind when we crossed our security checks and proceeded towards the flight to settle down in our seats allotted. Ofcourse we did not get the window seats which we would've wished for, but then after such events had occurred, the window seats did not matter anymore. Then the same thought and fear about the return tickets kept me worried for long time until we landed in Mauritius. One look at that wonderful island and everything about the return tickets was forgotten. For the whole of one week, we enjoyed every bit of that wonderful trip until the time when we landed at the Mauritius airport to return back to India. Now again the dreadful thought of return tickets came to my mind when I was standing in line for collecting my boarding pass. Again several thoughts came to my mind about what are our options here if the return tickets are not valid too. Finally my turn came, looking nervous I produced the print out again to that lady at the counter. She stared at my worried face and then asked for my passport. Yet again, I had to give my passport only after being asked. Finally she gave me the boarding passes and wished me a "Happy journey, Visit again".

I just could not stop smiling back at her and say "Thanks a lot" and happily hopped to my wife and proceeded towards the security check. A wonderful trip which was nearly missed came to an end finally. The guy who helped us at Mumbai Airport was named Abhishek. I would not like to take the name of that reputed agency here anyway.

The moral of the story as I think would be to make sure and keep the bag which your agency gives at the top of your baggage cart, because it was after all the bag which saved us this trip. And in case your agency does not give any bags, then make sure you double confirm the status of your travel tickets before the journey.

Near miss HM trip - Part-1-

2010-11-30T23:24:00.003+05:30

"Hi, Happy Journey" - the caller told me in phone.

"Thanks" - I replied.

"So tomorrow morning, you will be landing in mauritius" - caller confirmed the status

"Excuse Me? Sorry, I am on my way to Mumbai, I am leaving to mauritius after 4 days"

"Oh yeah, ok Happy journey to both the trips, bye" - caller said and the call got disconnected.

Well it was simple, Me and my wife were on our way to Mumbai, 4 days before our honeymoon(referred to as HM) trip to Mauritius. The caller was the lady who had arranged for our Mauritius. Previously I had given two dates for this trip, one was 29thApr which was this day and other was 5thMay and then finally had made up my mind to travel on 5th may for 6 days. So the lady probably got confused and wished me on this day. Our plan was to stay and meet relatives in mumbai for the first 3 days and then be on our way to HM. Alas we landed in Mumbai safely and off we went to my uncle's place. Being newly wed has its own advantages, ofcourse we got a terrific reception on arrival and the same ooohs and aaahs continued for next 3 days. Then finally the day of our travel came.

The flight was scheduled for 4am from Mumbai International Airport. So naturally we had to be at airport by midnight. My uncle dropped us to the airport and he left after seeing us in at 12-30am. Being the more experienced of the two for international travels, I was feeling a bit of pride in myself to guide my wife towards the ticket counter to collect our boarding pass. Then when my turn came, I produced my ticket print out to the counter and our passports before the lady asked. That counter lady seemed to be kind of worried for a while and then she returned my print out and said "I am sorry sir, your tickets seem to be canceled. Please step aside for others to proceed." I could not understand what the matter was. I asked her "Err... Excuse me? What?". Then she told me the same thing again and asked me to verify with the person in some control room.

I could not believe what was happening. This was our HM trip and how could I have overlooked some details regarding ticket bookings. Without wasting any time, I rushed towards the control room to check the status with that guy. He welcomed me with a casual smile and showed no concern over my disturbed face. I told him the whole story and then he replied back saying he will check on his system. After 5 minutes he came up with same answer saying the tickets have been canceled. Now I did not know what to do. It was around 1am now and I had to call up that lady who had booked and confirmed our tickets. Time was running out, I had to act now. Somehow gearing up the courage to call her, I dialed her number. No answer. I dialed again and this time luckily she picked up. Being half sleepy she asked - "Hello, who is this?"

Me - "Hello its me, Sachin. You had booked my tickets and I am here at Mumbai airport and people are saying that my ticket is not valid. Can you tell me what is going on?"

She - "Oh, just a minute Sachin, let me check and call you back in 5 mins"

I said ok and disconnected. These 5 minutes were looking like the longest 5 minutes in my life now. In these 5 minutes lots of thoughts came to my mind. "How could this be happening?", "How could my HM trip get ruined after 3 months of planning?", "What would my wife be thinking now?", "Maybe we can visit nearby places in Mumbai since our trip is now canceled." I had even gone ahead and short-listed places like Khandala, Shirdi, Nasik, Ajanta-Ellora etc in my mind. I had to be careful not to discuss these options with my wife, because I was not sure how would she react to this change of plans. I was so disturbed that my wife consoled me for sometime saying its ok, we will wait and plan for some other time. But I knew if we miss it this time, there is no some other time for an international travel. I again began to read word by word in that ticket print out to see if there is any mention of the cancellation and tried to recall all conversation with the booking agent if by any chance I had mentioned to cancel my tickets... but as far as I could recollect, there was no such incident.

Finally the longest 5 minutes came to an end and my phone rang....

To be continued.... Click Here

Skandagiri Night Trek

2010-11-17T19:37:00.002+05:30

“Wow, looks like a lovely place” – I said looking at the Skandagiri hills, which was visible in the moonlight. It was cloudy and windy as expected but it was 2 days for a full moon day. The moon was playing hide and seek under the clouds. Also it was good that it wasn’t raining. So this was it, my first night trek with my office friends (Who forced me into this) was about to begin.

**Flashback** 2 days ago, at my office –

“Hey guys, what is the plan for weekend. How about movie? – I said. Few responded with Yes and others a plain NO. Finally 5 of us decided to go to this movie Inception evening show on Saturday. Later the plan extended to a late night trek. 2 more people who would miss the movie told they would join for the trek. I had never been on such a trek before. So physically and mentally it was a challenge for me. But being a confident guy, I always thought I would come up triumphs on this trek and it would be a cake walk for me. Two days I did attempt a couple of warm ups like walking around half a km briskly and thought I had warmed up enough for the trek. Alas, if I only knew then that this was not enough.

**Flashback ends** In front of Skandagiri hills –

I had a backpack with a heavy windcheater which I had packed after one of my trek friend told it would be required for this chilly climate. So the cakewalk was about to begin. I was very confident of scaling down this peak within no time. So we started off on a trail towards the hill. Since this was my first night trek, I was pretty excited and with full energy I was at top of group. 15 mins into that trail, we realized that this trail was heading nowhere near the hills and we were totally on wrong trail. This happens when you are over-adventurous at times. So we had to trace back the same trail to the starting point again and had to start on the correct trail all over again. At this point, my energy level had suddenly dropped by 30%. For first 15 mins, I kept talking/chatting continuously with my fellow mates but then I suddenly realized I had to save my energy for the trek. My energy level was dropping down rapidly now as the time spent on trail increased. I realized that may be if I can stop talking and save whatever energy is left, I can probably make to the top of the hill. Suddenly half an hour later, I had to take a break. So it meant everyone had to take the break.

Took few snaps of non-existent scenery of the night. After a good refreshing break, we again set our foot on the trail. As the trail went on and on, my energy level went down and down. Looking at this, my friends started giving some words of encouragement like, “Its done, just few more mins and we will be at top”. Tough it sounded very good to the ears, the truth as it stood that the peak was not few minutes away but rather few hours. Consoling myself at every step, that I can still do it, I carried on. To help my condition, the weather was cool and windy so it was not that tiring. After sometime, I had to give my backpack to one of my friend and I carried on solo on the trail. Now my energy level was almost at zero and we were probably halfway to the peak and I had to break for a while again. This time, I did not have strength to take even few snaps of the non-scenic sight. Then we set on our trail yet again.

At some point of time, when you get very tired and you still have to carry on, the body reacts in a very mechanical way. This makes you look like a zombie. This was the time, I was walking like a zombie with no energy left. My body had become mechanical with only one goal “WALK to the TOP”. I was still confident of making to the top and when you know you are not the weakest in your group, it adds to your confidence even more. Yes, I was not the only one to feel like a zombie, one more of my friend was already considering not to continue on the trail and wait for us at this spot until all of us return back from peak. Anyway, the whole point now was to reach the peak and I was just counting on minutes when I will hear those magical words “Yes, here we are finally”. Alas the magic did not happen for next couple of hours. Few more breaks on the way when I could not feel my legs anymore or the pain in them. My energy level had already reached the negative level and was few more minutes away from hitting rock bottom. And then suddenly I could not believe my ears when I heard those magical words. Indeed we were at top of that hill, but then it was not the way I expected it to be. The time was 4AM and it was still dark out there and it was so windy that we could not open our eyes and see whats in front of us. The morning mist or thick fog was not making things easier too. This was the time, my backpack was most needed. I immediately took out the windcheater and put it on. Some relief finally and the dropped energy level suddenly went up after feeling the top of hill.

Then there was nothing much to do there, so we took a short nap until the sunrise (which we were expectant of watching). Finally the time came when we got up and expected to see the morning sun, but alas the cloudy sky had other ideas. We could not see the sun anywhere in the cloudy sky. Since we had taken some rest and refilled our energies to some extent, we broke into a talking session which went on for an hour or so. Then we decided to head back towards our cars and started our descent. Climbing down the hill was not so exhaustive and this time around we could take few good snaps of the existent scenery. The climbing up of hill took us around 4 hours while getting down took us just over an hour and a half. So that was it. I had scaled down the Skandagiri hill on my first ever night trek.

Altough this trek exposed lot of my physical weaknesses; it was a wonderful experience and a night worth remembering. I would love to go on more of such treks but only after doing a very good warm-up. Fitness sessions begin now and lot more of such sessions needed to scale down other peaks which are more adventurous than this one.

Life from a near-death

2010-11-09T14:53:00.001+05:30

“Ding dong, ding dong”, the alarm went on in my mobile. Slowly opening my sleepy eyes, I laid my hand on my mobile and saw the time. It was 5-35am on 4^th of Nov 2010. Me, my cousins and one of my uncles were sleeping in a hotel room and had planned for a bath in the morning sea. So we had to get up early in order to enjoy the morning sea and return back just after sunrise. I called everyone to get up and then we were all set to move in next 3 mins. It was still dark outside when we started to walk towards beach. The beach was around 15mins walking distance from our place. So after 15mins, we reached the beach. For a moment, we stared at each other for a second. The vast Arabian Sea was beckoning us. The next second we were stripping our clothes and running towards the cold water. Recently I had learnt this new technique called floating on water with heads looking up towards sky. The beach looked very calm without much waves at the moment. I started my float immediately as I hit the water. “Aaaah… Awesome… it was a pleasure…” I thought. Indeed it was a pleasure watching the brightening sky upwards and then closing my eyes for sometime to listen to the wonderful calmness of the sea. Then got up couple of times and again went into my float. After what looked like a long time around half n hour had passed by.

“Hey come, its time to go home” – I heard someone shouting. Cursing the moment, thinking, the wonderful time is up let’s come tomorrow and start afresh, I slowly got up from my float position. Suddenly I realized that my feet were still floating under the water. I tried to reach the ground beneath, but then I could not. I saw the land quite far away from where I had started floating. It took me a moment to realize that the waves had calmly drifted me away from the land and here I was trying to think hard how to get to the shores of safety. Realizing I would drown at any moment, I immediately called my uncle for help. My uncle realized that and started swimming towards me. Suddenly one more of my cousin who was sitting on the shores also started coming towards me when he heard me call for help. Finally my uncle reached me, but then he also was not able to touch the ground beneath. He pushed me from behind and then he had to regain himself and push me again. After few pushes, we were still long way from the shores.

The ground beneath was uneven, the place where I started to float was at a much higher altitude than where we were now. That was the reason we were not able to find the ground beneath. The higher ground was towards our right. My uncle started pushing me towards that higher ground level. Whatever we tried, it looked as if the silent waves of the sea were pulling us towards itself and away from the shores. One more cousin of mine was standing on that higher ground level and shouting at me to try and reach there. My uncle was now tired, he started swimming back towards that higher ground. Maybe he would regain some breath and return again for another push. But since I saw him move out, I thought I must be too far away and was difficult to be saved. Thoughts came to my mind that this could be the end of my life and started looking at various moments which I had spent in my lifetime. Then one final time I started praying to the god and thought that this is it. Then suddenly I realized I was still floating, not drowning. This was weird. I was not drowning, at the same time I knew vaguely on concepts of swimming. So putting all my effort, I thought, one last chance let me give it to myself and started kicking my hands and legs to move towards the higher ground. Suddenly I felt some sand below with my foot finger, but I was still not feeling safe. I could not stand on the ground below and the waves were still pulling me away from the land. Then after few seconds of struggle, I could finally land my foot on the ground beneath the water and struggled to walk until the water level came down to my knee level. At this point, I felt completely safe and turned back to see my cousin who had dived into sea was double the distance from land from where I was at some point of time. It was merely impossible for any of us to swim back to him and save him. We could only watch in horror for couple of minutes when few village people gathered around. None of these people came for our rescue and instead they were scolding at us for going so far in the sea.

From nowhere in crowd, one man with 6.5ft height started undressing himself and started towards the sea to save my cousin. We watched him easily swim across the dangerously calm sea and catch hold of my cousin and then with the help of a long rope, we all pulled him back to the shores. My senses were not working at this point of time and at that moment realized that everyone of us were safe now. Somewhat regaining the strength to face the shouting and scolding villagers, we put on the remaining strength and courage to start walking towards our home. We thanked the hunk whose name was Martin and he was from England. He wished us back a “Happy Diwali” and for the next 15 mins, nobody talked and we were in state of shock. We were also wondering how to face the people back in home. Then our nerves slowly started settling down. We told all the people about this incident back home and then there were usual “I told you not to go…” speeches from our elders. Not that, we did not know about this before, but then some lessons are learnt in a harder way.

There is a saying “Calm seas are more dangerous than the roaring seas”. Even today when I see the calm sea and think of this very day, it sends down shiver to the spines of my body and makes me think how true the saying is. Also this incident told us not to underestimate the strength of a calm sea. Nevertheless, I am thankful to all people who came to my and my cousin’s rescue without which I would not have seen another sunrise in my life.

Test Cricket at its best

2010-10-07T14:28:00.002+05:30

The only thing which prompted me to write this blog today is the high emotions which turned out during the recently concluded test match between India and Australia (1-5 Oct 2010). India won the match by a single wicket in hand and VVS Laxman became the hero of the nation yet again. The best part was, Laxman was even doubtful of batting in second innings and the media was all over the place saying, "Laxman will bat only if required". True, he was really really required and what a way to show all the other fit players, the WILL power to do well for your country.

After the first 2 and half days of test match, it seemed to be heading for a tame draw and most likely the only team which had chance to win the match was India by taking a huge lead and handing over an innings defeat to Australia. But then, a mini-collapse in Indian batting order put the match wide open. India not only failed to take a lead in first innings, but
condeded a lead of 23 runs to the Aussies. Then again on fourth day the fortunes swung wildly. First half ,it looked like Aussies all the way, but in second half, by tea time, it was India again on path of likely victory. Thanks to an inspired bowling by Ishant Sharma and Zaheer khan brought down high flying aussies to the ground. Finally by end of Aussies second innings, the target was set for India. Fairly easy target in modern day test cricket and with a batting line up of Indian calibre, you would not hesitate to think otherwise. The target of 216 would have on any other day be a easy one with Sehwag and Gambhir starting off well. Sehwag with quickfire half century and Gambhir with more accomplished half century. Then the next two players Tendulkar and Dravid sharing the rest of runs and India winning by a 7 or 8 wickets in hand.

Bet on India to make any normal match a thriller and you will not be disappointed. By end of day four, India had lost 4 wickets with just 55 runs on board and the target of 216 looked like a mountain. On the fifth day again, there was a collapse by high boasted Indian top order then it all depended on two injured people. VVS and Ishant. Nobody would've given India a chance at this stage when there were 92 runs to get and only 2 wickets in hand. One batsman playing with runner, other not known for his batting skills and the one to follow was still new to pressure situations. Yet, they were able to get India home by one wicket which triggered wild celebrations in Indian camp. Truly one of the best matches of all times.

For India, which has played cricket from a very long time, this was surprise that this was the first time, India had won a test with only one wicket to spare. Reason could be either that Indian top order has always taken up the responsibility to see the game through or the Indian tail has not been so good to take up pressure and bow out before a victory. No matter, what the reason is, the final result of Mohali would be a confidence booster for all the Indian players as well as Indian fans. Wish India plays out such thrillers more and more and come out on top everytime.

New Year - A day to remember - 2

2010-07-23T11:52:00.004+05:30

If you have not read the first part - CLICK HERE

"...OH NO NOOO NOOOO!!!"

Life is never so simple right?. So there was a small twist in this tale now. The tickets as expected were in the dashboard of the car, but then the main question now was, where was the CAR?. The car was on its way to Mangalore at this moment since my cousin had taken it the previous evening from me. Immediately the mobile phone was in action and he picked up the call. I asked him where he was now, he said he had just crossed NICE road and was near first tollgate of Tumkur. That was both good and bad news. Good news - He had just crossed the city and was not very far from city limits. Bad news - it was improbable to drive whole way back to our theatre to return bunch of tickets. Then again it stuck me, that one of my wife's relative was closest in distance towards city. I got my wife into action on another phone to call that relative and ask if they can collect the tickets from my cousin. This meant my cousin had to drive back 8kms towards the city. The whole purpose of riding on NICE road for my cousin was to avoid city traffic and that was undone now. They had to drive back all the way in traffic to the city to give that purse containing 20 tickets to our relative and delay their journey by an hour. Another small twist is that, both of them had never seen each other before....!!! But then there was always ways to identify people and the same happened. Thanks to mobile technology, this was not a big problem. So finally the tickets were back in city. Now the plan was to watch movie, and then go home, take my bike n ride all the way to other end of the city and come back to get my refund.

As planned, we came out after watching movie, took an auto to reach home. Had lunch and straightaway took my bike and left for the long journey. The bike was not in action for around an year now and the question was whether it will last the whole journey of 28kms and back to home. It took a complete 6mins to start my bike and then our journey started. During this journey, bike stopped at 3 places and had to spend 5 mins on each occassion to start the bike again.Finally we were at our uncle's place, grabbed the tickets and were on our way back to the theatre. couple more stops on the way to theatre and then finally at ticket counter. I produced that 20 tickets at the counter, the ticketfellow stared me as if I was robbing him of his money. Then he said, this is huge sum and somebody at higher level will come and give me my money back. 20 mins of wait and that higher level guy finally arrived. Then he asked few questions to know the reason for getting 20 tickets. Probably he thought, I had bought these tickets to sell out in black outside theatre. finally his interrogation ended and he looked convinced that I had no plans to sell tickets in black and then returned my money. With a huge sigh of relief, we headed to our home. It was 6PM. Our neighbour saw us coming and he came to give us a DVD which he told was a nice movie. I saw the DVD and a smile came out on my face. It was a movie DVD of "3Idiots". We had decided we will watch this movie in theatre only, but then since its an Aamir Khan movie, could not resist to watch it. OH, by the way there was another journey awaiting us. We had to leave to Kukke Subramanya that very same night. The bus was scheduled to depart at 10-30 meaning we had to leave home by 8-30. So we had exactly 2 and half hours. I immediately put the DVD in the player and again we were watching the movie. The movie was so awesome that none of us moved an inch. Finally when it ended, we hurried ourselves and got to our local bus stop at 9 and subsequently a the main bus stand at 10. The bus arrived at 11 and finally we were on that bus. During the journey, we wished each other a VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR just before the midnight. Never had we travelled 3 times in a day and watched 2 movies during the same day. For the very first time the complete 15 hours in a day was utilized. Probably the best and very pacy NEW YEAR with full of action, tension and travel for us until now, surely a day to remember for a long long time...

New Year - A day to remember - 1

2010-07-22T11:31:00.010+05:30

"Happy journey, Have fun, bye." - I was in call with one of my cousin and his family was going on a trip to Mangalore, Udupi and nearby places for 3 days. After the call, I had to shout again -"Hey Common guys, get ready soon, we will be late". This was for my wife and other cousin. We had booked the movie tickets for morning show in a single screen theatre for AVATAR-3D. We were excited since this was first big screen 3D movie which we were going to watch in theatre. The show was supposed to start at 10 AM, it was 8-30 AM already and we needed atleast half hour to 45 mins to reach theatre by auto. Finally everyone was ready and we left home and reached theatre by 9-15. Now we had lot of time for movie to start, got the normal stares from my wife for getting here so early. I had to return her stare back with a wide smile. Then I realized something and went into the ticket booking counter and asked ticket fellow -

Me: "I have 20 tickets for the show which was cancelled, Can I get them on Monday for refund?"
Ticket fellow: "No sir, today is the last day for giving all refunds, We need to close our calculations by this weekend.
"Me: "Ok, then I will get it by evening"
Ticket fellow: "Sure sir, anytime before 6PM, you can get it."
"Thank you sir", I said and left the ticket counter.

***FLASHBACK***
Rewind a week back, we from our office had decided to go for a outing to watch this movie on a weekday in same theatre. 20 people had confirmed their participation and I had volunteered to book the tickets online. So as planned, I booked all 20 tickets for a wednesday evening show. One day before the show, I collected all the tickets from the ticket counter. The plan was to give individuals their own tickets so that nobody had to wait outside theatre before the show. So I thought I would give their own tickets on the day of show and everyone can make their own arrangements to arrive at theatre on time. Everyone was excited, and looking forward for this show. When everything is going according to the plan, there is always something waiting in store to disrupt the plans. So it hit as a lightning the next morning when all newspapers and television channels had only one news. "Breaking News - Kannada movie superstar passed away....". Because of this incident, city was expecting lot of violence and hence there would be bundh kind of atmosphere in whole city. Naturally, the theatres wont be screening any movies too. I called up the theatre and they said there will be refunds for the tickets booked. I told them I will collect the refund some other day and kept the phone. On same day, I booked 3 more tickets for the same movie to watch on new year day.

***Back to new year day-2010***
I came out of ticket counter and explained my wife about this -Me: "The ticket fellow says we need to get those tickets today itself for a refund. Else we wont get any refunds."Wife: "20 tickets is huge, lets go and get them after the movie"Me: "Yes... sure. After the show, we will go to home and get the tickets. I have kept the tickets in dashboard of our car...." The moment I said this, I realized something else...and had to shout again "....OH NO NOOO NOOOOOO!!!"....

To be continued... CLICK HERE

Movie - INCEPTION - My view

2010-07-18T21:22:00.006+05:30

It all started on a friday night, when I was in a conference call with a US client and my phone rang. I had to wait till my conference call ended. It was 11pm when I called my cousin back.
Cousin: "Hello, how r u placed for tomorrow evening?"
Me: "No plans as of now, anything in your mind?"
Cousin: "How abt movie, night show? There is a new movie called Inception which got released yday."
So there it was, I had not heard of this movie, only thing I knew was Leonardo di caprio was the male lead in this movie. So was worth a shot, but was bit hesitant after his disastrous "Shutter Island". Then I checked for tickets online, but to my surprise the multiplexes were booked out. So I had to settle for a single screen theatre and booked 4 tickets( me, my wife and 2 cousins). First step done. Next day morning, I checked the reviews in the newspaper, and it gave a positive sign. Then finally the time came when we were in front of the movie theatre, and again the theatre was packed completely. There were few trailers which were good (including Harry Potter-7) and what followed them was awesome to say the least.
From the first frame the movie was gripping and the packed crowd roared in anticipation.The theme of the movie is well projected in the first 15-20 mins so that the audience is very clear on what is about to follow. This leaves the audience to think of various twists and turns that might come in the movie, but the director has bigger thoughts in the movie. Afterall his previous movie "Dark Knight" was biggest hit of the year as well.
"If you cant convince... confuse them" seems to the theme of director altough the movie posters say "Dream in a dream..". The concept of movie reminded me of MATRIX which was on similar lines, but the cinematography, editing and the direction are way too good. The challenging part in such movies are to keep your audiences interested in the movie all through 2hrs 45 mins, and the director does not miss a trick to keep up with this. Its so well architected that probably for the first time I felt bored during the interval. The movie is so pacy and fast moving, it gives you very little time to think and analyse on whats gonna happen next. Finally a fitting climax ends the movie leaving the audience in a superb state of mind where they cant decide if there is gonna be a sequel to this movie or not. The movie is all about living your world in dreams and when you come out of theatre, you feel as if you are already in a dream.... Finally a MUST WATCH movie for all creative and innovative movie lovers.

Most Romantic Evening

2008-04-14T11:49:00.011+05:30

It was silent... Very silent... unusual at this time of the day. The silence was frequently broken by the sound of thunder. Little drops of water had started knocking the windshield of my car. I could observe the splash of each drop on my windshield but soon the drops of rain got heavier and suddenly I could see only the flow of water on the windshield. The most unusual thing about this was, we were in the middle of road and none of the vehicles seemed to move an inch. Inshort we were in middle of a traffic block most commonly known as Traffic jam. "We" would refer to me and my "would be wife". This was our first date after our engagement. Infact we had just come out of watching a movie and then I had to drop her to her aunt's home which was around 25kms from my place. We had started our journey an hour ago and just after half an hour of journey we were stuck in this Traffic block. Initially we could hear lots of honking from other verhicles (including mine), but slowly everyone started realizing the honking would not clear the traffic on road. So one by one everyone had turned off the engine and it was very silent now (apart from the noise of rain falling over the rooftops). So with nothing else to do, I turned towards her, she was busy admiring the heavy rainfall outside the windows. I wanted to start some topic for discussion, but just kept looking at her for sometime. Guess she realised that I was watching her and she tried to look back at me. Realizing that, I started the conversation -

"So as you see, this is how our overcrowded city looks like, unlike your calm city."

She: "Hmmm... yeah our place is so calm and silent when compared to yours."

Me: "Well, I guess for sometime tough, our city has become silent anyway" and I start to laugh.

This did not amuse her to some extent. So clearing my throat again I start thinking on my next conversation topic. "So you liked the movie?" ... She: "Yeah... it was good".

Now there it was a typical situation where you are searching for topics to talk and make use of this good time and the topics are not coming out. Also the situation is worse since SHE is not helping in getting a new topic either. SHE is just replying to my questions without giving anything back for me to answer and find some time for next topic. So my mind was again racing to get on with some good nice topic and nothing was coming out. I had to spend some time asking her some basic stuff like Favourite food, Favourite hero etc... This helped since she gave her answers and responded with "What's yours?". We spent around 20-25 mins on this "Favourite" game and then it was silent again as we ran out of all "Favourites".
The rain outside had reduced a bit but the traffic was standstill yet. There were no signs of traffic getting cleared in near future, when suddenly she started the topic of "how was your college?". Aaaahhaaa... That was nice, more relieved now, since this topic could be extended further to pre-university college, high-scool and primary school. So there was plenty to talk. So we got started with this and as expected it lasted for more than an hour and was still going on, when suddenly we heard few car engines getting started. Finally the time had come to start my car engines as well to proceed to the destination.
This journey of 25kms took us 3 and half hours to complete in turn starting a new journey in our life symbolizing the beginning of a new relationship in which we are committed to each other.
By far the best evening of my life till now, hoping many more to come in our way...

Proposal - 2 -

2008-04-03T22:11:00.002+05:30

Missed the first part. CLICK HERE to read the first part.

So we reach the front door and Mr.Everything now rings the bell. The door opens and the man himself is standing in front of us.
"Hi Uncle. How are you? This is my friend and we have come to meet... Ms.Lovely. Is she at home?"
"Hello. I did not recognise you. WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?"
"Uncle... its me... Mr.Everything... Ms.Lovely's friend uncle... "
I was almost on my way back to the gate when I thought Mr.Everything would get beaten up, but then Mr.Uncle somehow seemed to recognise my dear friend and finally he called us back and let us into his house. Then he called Ms.Lovely who came and took us upstairs with the permission from her dad. So here we were on the terrace of Ms.Lovely's house. It was quite a huge house with lot of space to waste. They had beautiful green lawn in the backyard and lots of flower pots on terrace. This was just the perfect house to lead a retired life.
"So whats up. How come u r here? Who is this guy?" - She started.
"Oh yeah.. forgot to introduce u to my close friend.. Dear buddy" - He replied
Then the usual hello Hi happened and then there were lots of talks between us about general stuff. This made Mr.Everything frown a bit and he had to make up a fake cough to interrupt us. And then suddenly this guy bent on knees in front of her and started -
"Ahem...uh.. Ok... Can I ask you something?"
"Oh Sure, why do you have to bend on knees for that?"
I could not stop my laugh coz I knew exactly what he was intending to do, but poor girl did not even realise this. Everything stared at me and then turned back at her to continue -
"Ahem.. Will you marry me?"
That hit the girl as a bullet and suddenly she came down on knees. She was totally in confused state and could just ask "Excuse me... WHAT?"
"Ahhheeeem... I just wanted to know that if I propose you, then will you accept it?"
"What IF? You have already done that!!!!" - I spoke and realised this was probably not the best time for logistics. I got a cold stare from both of them and then they continued to stare at each other.
"So....?" Our hero was still waiting
"Wait a second... I mean... I just cant accept it now... U see... I am not sure... Actually I dont know... I need some time..."
To make things worse, her dad ends up on terrace. He sees both his daughter and Mr.Everything on knees. He is totally confused.
"Is everything alright?" - he asks.
"Yes yes.. everything is fine" - Both my fren and she speak up at once and get back on toes.
"So what happened?" - Dad asks still with a confused look on his face
"Oh..Uncle, I was just looking at this flowerpot here and she was just showing me how to sow a seed into this flowerpot"
Dad looks at them and then stares at me expecting some truth from me...
Taken by surprise.. I speak out saying - "Uh..I am actually not interested in flowers uncle"
"Ok... You all can come down... Tea is ready and have some snacks too"
Realising that her dad had probably not listened to any of the proposal conversation, we all proceed downstairs. While going down the stairs, lovely asks Mr.Everything to talk to her dad about the proposal. I could see Mr.Everything already shivering. But neverthless, this talk has to happen in any case. So we are in the Hall and uncle has started general talks about the daily work in Software companies and then he starts explaining some techniques in gardening. The talks were getting boring and I was just waiting for the moment when Mr.Everything would speak out about the proposal. The girl standing behind her dad indicated through her eyes to my fren forcing him to interrupt the uncle's gardening techniques -
"Uh...Uncle... I need to ask you something..."
"Yeah sure.. go ahead my boy"
"Uncle I want to marry your daughter.. Ms.Lovely"
Suddenly the frown comes back on uncle's face. I am all set to run towards the gate for the second time today but then something unusual happens. The girl speaks out - "Dad, I think even I like him very much and I would want to marry him, only if you are willing to agree"
Dad, gets more angry now and then calms down a bit realizing there is no point in getting angry and starts asking the general marriage questions to Mr.Everything. Ofcourse he is able to answer since he has come well prepared for the general questions.
Then there is a moment of silence for sometime and then Dad takes his daughter to some room to have private conversation.
"So... would you like to have some snacks? I am feeling hungry" - I say
My fren gives stares at me. I realize that he is probably not hungry but nervous. He has done everything fine and now there is the room door behind which probably the most important decision of his life is being discussed. He is totally restless. I enjoy my cup of tea and some snacks kept on the table. Finally the time comes when the room door opens. Our hero is anxiously waiting for the answer. Dad has mixed emotions on his face with mixture of worry and anger. The girl is crying behind.
Dad comes to Mr.Everything and says "So you want to know if it is a YES or NO from my side right?"
"Hmmm.... I would like to know the answer uncle."
"My son... The answer from my side to you is ..... "

[THE END]

Proposal - 1 -

2008-03-26T13:16:00.002+05:30

Sunday morning. Door bell is ringing. I hope its a dream.
"Oh.. Hello.." comes the voice from my mom.
"Hello.. Aunty... Where is Sachin?" Replies the person at door.
"Oh.. Sachin is still sleeping..Come in.. Sit down, I will wake him up..."
I really hope no shouts come from my mom and this is still a dream, but then u cant really hope that ur hope is true, so the inevitable finally comes - "SACHIN....SACHIN... GET UP SOON... UR FREN Mr.Everything has come and waiting for you downstairs". There is no choice left for me as I have to get up on this early sunday morning (10AM) to meet Mr.Everything. Downstairs, I saw Mr.Everything, a little nervous, biting his nails and waiting anxiously for me. I came down yawning, told HI..HELLO.., he seemed to be taken by surprise at first and then returned with a nervous "Hello, good morning". I washed my face and took him upstairs to know why he was early to my home. The conversation went in this way -

"So what brings u here so early in the day dude?" - I ask.
"Hey maan, I am kind of worried. I need to tell u something" - He replies.
"Sure. Go ahead. Anything to help you out man".
"U see, this is very critical for me. This is a decision of my life"
"hey its ok dude. Tel me whats the problem"
"You know my girl friend, Ms.lovely, right? Today I am going to her home"
"Ahhhaaaa... So...."
"Actually, I think you did not understand. I told.. I AM GOING TO HER HOME DUDE"
"Oh... Haan... So... Which part do you think I dint get? U r going to her home, Right!!!. Is this some kind of trick question or statement?"
"Abbba... Ok, its like this, I am going to meet her parents, GOT IT?"
"If you are going to her house, u will OBVIOUSLY meet her parents.. Whats the trick?"
"No use explaining to u, Ok listen.. I am going to meet her parents to ask her hand"
"Oh...Like that.. Oh... U mean u have decided to marry her?"
"OBVIOUSLY da..."
"Wait, this is confusing.. if u want to meet her parents, u should be going to her place, so why are u here on an EARLY SUNDAY MORNING!!!!"
"Oh, U see I am feeling bit nervous and couldn't muster the courage to go to her place alone..."
"Aaaha.. I see that.. So what do you want me to do now?"
"I want you to come with me to her place"
"Oh... oh... Hold on mister... NO WAY... What will I do coming there... I dont even know them."
"Oh Dont worry dude. I am there right. It will be fine. Dont worry."
"Hmmm... Alrite if you say so, I will come with you. So the girl knows that you are going to talk to her parents about the proposal?"
"Actually I want this to be a surprise. She doesn't know about the proposal. But I am sure she wont deny my proposal. We are sooo close."
"hmmm...Lets hope so..."

So we head for Ms.Lovely's house. Both of us now nervous. Him for obvious reason, me for being stupid enough to accept the invitation of going along with him. I am wondering what would I talk to her parents and what questions they might come up with. The same worry is going through Mr.Everything's head as well. I start the talk during the ride...
"So what do you think her dad might ask"
I was already feeling bad and to make the situation worse, I got the following reply -
"Oh I forgot to tel, her dad is a retired military officer."
"Oh I see....!!!, So what do you think he might ask?"
"Hmmm... Dont worry dude. I have come well prepared for general set of questions which he might ask. I did a research on FAQs for marriage selection process and have come up with this list".
He showed me a list spawning through 3 pages of A4 size sheets written on both sides. Probable questions and most likely answers and he proudly announced "The most likely answers are all written by me. I am totally prepared dude. Dont worry."
"Hmmm... Not bad dude. Nice... Ok then lets just go there and u do the talking"

So finally we reach her place. The place looks deserted with a warning on gate which reads "Beware of the dog". In this situation, the word dog did not seem to scare us than the word "DAD". Carefully we reach the front door and Mr.Everything now rings the bell....

[To Be Continued...]

TRUE LOVE

2008-03-11T14:12:00.001+05:30

“LOVE” a very sweet little 4 letter word which can make a lot of difference to any person in this world. The definition for love varies from one person to another and hence there is no actual perfect general definition on Love. Love as I say can be defined as a feeling in which one feels happy. In current generation Love is always assumed to be either from a GirlFrend or BoyFrend which is not always true. A general frenship can generate love but lets not get into these details now. So let me talk about the current generation itself. Love is categorized into 3 types – Attraction, One-way and True love.

Attraction – This is just another form of love. Attraction can be defined as an illusion of love. Some people are instantly attracted toward opposite sex. This is similar to what they call as “love at first sight”. I personally believe that there is no such thing as “love at first sight” simply because you cannot experience love by watching others. Hence I classify love at first sight is just an attraction. Some people claim that they had love at first sight and hence they got married etc etc, but I believe they got attracted at first sight and love gradually developed. I have seen a person who claims to be in love with different girls on a monthly basis. The best part is when every girl disappoints him, he finds another one immediately to share his grievances. There is a saying “History repeats” and this situation is like “His-story keeps repeating”.

One-Way – As the name suggests, this is only a one-way love. But again, for a love to blossom, it should be from both the people falling in love with each other. Yet again, one-way love deals with failure being the end result in most cases. There are cases where one-way love has given happiness to both people (one unaware of the other person loving him\her) but let us not get into these details anyway. So One-way love is just an elongated version of Attraction. Attraction is the common action which happens before turning into a One-way love in most of the scenarios. In One-way love, one who loves is usually the person who ends up spending more for the other person. The other person gets benefited by such a generous donor and would not hesitate to take advantage of it. Although you can argue that when a person is in love, spending should not matter, but then I would say, “Hello, THIS IS A ONE-WAY LOVE…..!!!!, Spending surely matters. Don’t you wanna save it for your TRUE LOVE???”. Anyways not much to talk on one sided affairs, so lets move on to main topic….

True Love - Aaah.. here it comes. The one thing which most people want to have in their life. In this form of love both people fall in love with each other and usually it ends up in a marriage. Well thats how Love marriages come into picture. There are constant debates on which is better, the love marriage or arranged marriage, but then both have their own advantage and disadvantages. But in both cases, you would have gone through a phase of true love. So essentially what it means is, true love involves compromises, but then the compromises are well worth for your true love. There are some lucky ones who don’t have to go through compromises, but then it’s a very rare case. Anyways, now I don’t have much to talk on this and hence I would conclude by giving a major difference in love marriage and arranged marriage - you don’t have say “I LOVE U” in arranged marriages. It is just implied…..

AMALL… THE MOVIE – Part – 2 –

2008-02-02T19:00:00.001+05:30

You can read Part – 1 – of the blog by clicking the link - http://sachinss.blogspot.com/2008/02/amall-movie-part-1.html

Loud cheers started from the crowd (Well… WE WERE THE CROWD)… So finally the movie AMALL began… First 5mins it was all going fine. Movie looked good, they were still showing the names of all people in the movie. Then it happened. Nobody had thought about such a thing would hit them. From the first frame of the movie, people started to point out mistakes. So most people started making fun of the characters in movie including the super duper hero. Well, it was a hindi movie afterall and the hero in question was not among the popular in our class. This was bound to happen and it happened. This continued till the interval and since there were seldom any people watching movie in the theatre, it really did not matter how much noise we were making. The hall looked like anything but a cinema hall. The first relief finally came when we saw some scribbling on the giant screen which kind of read as “Interval”. The whole of first half of movie had one song repeating again and again. Everyone of the 25 people ran out to get some fresh air. Half of them were already thinking of just leaving the theatre right there. Finally after a 5mins gap, everyone decided to just go in once again and have some more fun by making funny comments on the movie. So the second half was about to start.

Suddenly we realized that one person from our gang was missing. It was funny, we had seen him enter the hall after interval, but now he was not in our group. We looked around in the hall, but we could not see him because of the darkness. Anyway after 5mins of vain searching, we continued with our normal chitchat stuff. The movie was just going on and on and it everyone was now starting to get desperate to get out. The movie was going to the limits of torture. Around 10 people started walking out of the hall, since they could not tolerate anymore. So here we were sitting and waiting for the end of the movie to come. Finally there it was, the movie finally ended. Ofcourse it was a happy ending since we were all getting out from the torture hall. At this point of time, we realized that the trailers were just the amazing part of the whole 3 hours. And once we came out, we found that missing guy out there. We asked him where he had disappeared suddenly, and immediate reply was “Oh…I was actually sitting in the last row and meditating!!!”. Aaah… there… meditation in the torture hall. Nice idea to try to relax, we thought and then the person who had suggested this movie was surrounded by the whole of 25 people. Now she really had to come up with some nice reason for suggesting this movie without which she would not be spared by the tortured group. The reason came out as “Dint you people really enjoy the movie? It was so nice. I liked it so much. You should appreciate the hard work that goes in for making a movie…. Blah blah blah”. She went on and on giving out reasons and one by one everyone started to get out of this another torture session. This was the first instance of watching such a underrated movie. Ofcourse even after such a movie, we again fell for the same girl’s suggestion on 3 more occasions. But none of them were as horrible as this one. Hence this movie stands out as the best of the worst movies our class group has ever watched.
Oh btw, the movie was AMALL – Aap Mujhe Acche Lagne Lage.

AMALL… THE MOVIE – Part – 1 –

2008-02-02T18:39:00.002+05:30

You people must be wondering what AMALL stands for… Keep waiting for a little bit longer, you will know the expansion. So now let me give you a hint of what you will be reading in coming paragraphs. This blog is about people from college bunking the class to see a junkie movie. Yes after a week long discussion on which movie to watch, it was finally decided that around 25 people from our class would be going to this so called movie AMALL. Everyone were wondering would we get tickets for this movie.. etc etc ( The usual worries ) and finally decided that all people would be going to theatre a clear one hour prior to the start of the movie and take chance of buying the tickets. Oh btw, we had all decided to go to a morning show. So a clear one hour prior to movie start means we had to be at theatre by 10.

So finally I arrived at the theatre at 10 past 10 to see only 3 of my classmates on time. The ticket counters were empty and there was no hurry to buy the tickets. It was really shocking to see such an empty theatre especially when the movie got released just a week ago. This was probably a hint on what followed next, but unfortunately nobody seemed to get that hint. So we decided to buy tickets once everyone arrives. So now here was a tricky situation, I was alone, and the 3 classmates who had arrived were girls. And by the past history our class girls do not come close to having any girly characteristics. They were commonly termed as “Unruly girls”. Hence the constant fear was always there before talking to them. Being a daring guy, I had to talk to them somehow. So I slowly approached them, they were having some private giggling conversation. Ignoring their giggles, I went and said “Hi, so how long have u all been here?”. One of them replied “15mins. So u came now?”. (What a dumb question. Should I say “No I am still on my way”) instead replied “Eh… Yeaaaah!!!”… At this time, one of my close friend arrived. First time I was very pleased to see him at right time. Then he just said his formal “namaskara” and then we both proceeded to talk on our games stuff. Soon one by one, all 24 people had arrived and we were waiting for one guy (Who was known for his untimely appearance…). One of us called him and as usual we got a reply saying he will be reaching in 5more mins. So we asked him to buy his won ticket and enter cinema hall. We 24 bought the tickets and went into theatre. We saw few people here and there but by large ours was the biggest group in whole theatre. This was a good license for us to scream and shout whatever we want since it would not disturb anyone ignoring the empty chairs.

The big screen lit up with a few ads followed by 3 trailers. The trailers were probably the best part for next 3 hrs, only we dint realize it at this point of time. Loud cheers started from the crowd (Well… WE WERE THE CROWD)… So finally the movie AMALL began…

To be continued... Click Here