+ A Little Stink

Yesterday, I went to Landmark at Forum and bought a book. I generally don’t. My place is Strand – one, because of the homely atmosphere; and two, because of the book-lover discount that you get on anything you buy!

My wife and I had gone to Forum to catch a movie, which wasn’t to be, so we walked into Landmark, and bought this book ‘What Should I Do With My Life?’. The rupee-conversion was precise, and the book was priced Rs 260.70. Fine. I went to pay the bill, gave the cashier a Rs 500 note, and he nonchalantly returned Rs 239. What about the 30 paise...?

Yeah, what about the 30 paise? I wouldn’t have minded the book being priced at a rounded off Rs 261, or even a further rounded off Rs 265, if the store doesn’t like dealing in smaller denominations. But, no! They price it at Rs 260.70, and then take it for granted that the 30 paise don’t matter to me. Like hell! If the frigging 70 paise matter to you, the 30 do to me, too.

I had a good mind to demand the 30 paise, except that both my wife and I were feeling pretty sick from the combined scents assailing our nostrils from the perfume counter facing the billing counter. What’s with that perfume counter location...? Is it supposed to remind you that all the perfumes of Arabia or wherever can’t get rid of the stink of dubious practices at the billing counter?

+ The Day My Life Changed

The other day, I was flipping through the channels late in the night, which is when I usually relax with inanity on TV, when I came across a Tamil channel playing a film. I stopped for a while, and – I don’t know about this, but sometimes I think I invite things on myself – there was this absolutely mindblowing sequence.

There is this woman (Madhavi, I think) tied to a tree. She has a horse and a dog for pets/companions, and the horse unties her. She gets on the horse and rides away and the villain shoots and injures the horse. Heroine gets down from the horse, looks at the wound (let me not get too much into the details here), and then I think the villain who is following comes up and shoots the heroine.

What followed was straight out of a bloody fairy tale. The dog sniffs around, spies a visiting card on the ground, notices that it belongs to a doctor, goes to a public telephone and – you won’t believe it – dials, and barks loudly into the receiver.

It took me a while to gather my wits around me and to convince myself that I wasn’t dreaming. The next thing I know, the dog is walking into a house – presumably the doctor’s house. Once inside, the dog, that divine creature, goes straight to the typewriter and – I swear I’m not making this up - types out an SOS in the Tamil script. That was the fastest I’d seen a paw work on a typewriter. Hell, that was the damnest thing I ever saw a paw do. Going by hunt-and-peck standards, this dog was good enough to compete with humans – and win by a mile.

10 minutes later, after I’d recovered....

I am humble. I accept that life is strange. I concede I don’t know what could be. I know now that what I know not to be is actually what I haven’t known to be. I should believe...I should believe. I am in awe. I would like to meet these extraordinary people, the filmmakers, the story writers, that creative ocean that came up with this...this...this (please provide a suitable word – I am completely chastened and at a loss for words).

Whether I may or may not believe more in God, let me assure you, I already believe more in DOG!

+ I Met Life Today...

I had this bizarre conversation three days ago with someone who called me on the phone.

My mobile rang. I picked it up, and said hello.

“Sir, I am calling from Metlife(-something). I wanted to talk to you about our financial services (blah-blah).”
My stock response: “I am sorry, I’m not interested. Thanks.”
“Ok, thank you, sir. May I know your name?”
!!!!!!!!!!
“You don’t know my name??!! You just called me and spoke to me!”
“Yes, sir, but I don’t know your name.”
“If you don’t know my name, why did you call me?! Where did you get my number from?”
“The number is there on our company database, sir. That’s why I called you.”
“You have my number on your database, but you don’t have my name!! How can you just call up someone without knowing who they are...??!!”
“I’m sorry, sir. Goodbye!”

Have you met life today?

Oh, yeah, I have. And I didn’t like the experience one fricking bit!

PS” A point to ponder. All sorts of your personal, professional and financial information is floating around. Do you have any idea who knows what about you, and what they are doing with it?

+ It's Safe...See, I'm Even Putting The Bottle To My Mouth!!

I had written about the righteous indignation in the Pepsi ad (It's Safe...See, I'm Holding It In My Hand!). But then, I don’t watch the usual crap on TV (except the really bad movies) and I heard only when someone told me about the similar Coke ad. But I realized today that watching crappy movies on TV has its benefits – I got a glimpse of the Coke ad!! :-D

A visibly concerned Aamir Khan – understandable, after how he was pilloried for zipping up his mouth during the cola controversy – makes a visit of the Coke factory and is explained the awe-inspiring safety procedures that go into making a bottle of Coca-Cola (no pesticides, nothing harmful, absolutely totally completely mind-bogglingly safe!). Aamir then faces the camera, spouts the lines about the utter safety of Coke, takes a bottle off the assembly line, flips off the cap, puts it to his mouth, and tilts it up.

Why did Aamir just tilt the bottle up? His adam’s apple never moved a millimeter. Why didn’t he just gulp down the cola in the bottle and give out a contented burp? Why don’t these ambassadors of the myriad soft drinks of dubious value ever actually drink the stuff? At least the Pepsi CEO looked honest, even if stupid....

I guess Aamir put his mouth where the money was – no reason to put his entire intestinal tract there, is there...?

+ Rant on Civic Behaviour - 3

More traffic nonsense has been perpetrated on Bangalore in the last one month or so. Autorickshaw lanes. This is actually Act 2; Act 1 started quite a few months back with Bus lanes. After the initial media hullabaloo from the guys in charge, it was given a quiet burial – as usual.

The pattern is always sickeningly similar. Talk initially as if it is the most revolutionary thing that has happened in India in the last few decades. A month or so on, it finally dawns on everyone that it was just another daft idea.

To digress, about three months back, they had dug up the “free left” part of the junction near the Indian Express office. It lay dug up for a few weeks. Then some commissioner or someone from one of the departments responsible for the thing spouted in the newspapers that it was just a niggling little problem with supply of materials of something of that sort, and that the surface would be ready for use in the next 15 days. Two months, I thought. And it was!

Going back to autorickshaw lanes, a few issues:

Are autorickshaws the only slow-moving vehicles on the road? I constantly see slow moving trucks hogging the middle of the road.

How do you tackle junctions? As it is, you have all sorts of idiots turning routinely from the left lane to the right, and from the right lane towards the left.

Why would anyone on earth earmark an entire lane for autos, while leaving only two for all the other vehicles together? On Cubbon Road, close to two lanes have been given over out of a manageable four – including one for parking, I presume, though how anyone would reach that lane is anyone’s guess.

Bangalore’s traffic will never improve. Because, one, drivers don’t care a hoot for rules, and there is nobody to make them. There is a pedestrian in front of Wockhardt Hospital on Cunningham Road, and in the last six days, I haven’t seen even a dozen vehicles - in all the time I have stood to cross the road – I haven’t seen even a dozen vehicles stop for a pedestrian green signal. This happens routinely at the Cantonment railway station pedestrian signal, too. Every pedestrian green signal at Queen’s junction on M G Road sees at least 20 guys driving on even as people are crossing the road. On top of this, there is generally a twit of a traffic constable who turns a blind eye, or horrifically worse, actually waves the vehicles on.

The less said about the pathetic flyover projects, the better. This is one of those fantastic places where a flyover takes two and a half years to complete. And ditches take forever to be covered. And two-wheelers always get the better of traffic jams because they take to the pavements by the dozens.

The only way to rectify the situation is to go back to the basics and force people on the road to follow the fundamentals.

Slow moving vehicles on the left
No talking on the mobile phones while driving
No cutting signals
No waltzing across lanes at junctions
No parking at junctions
No double parking
And so on...and so on....

But who the hell is listening?!

+ It's Safe...See, I'm Holding It In My Hand!

I like that new Pepsi ad that protests its purity. None of that irreverent sense of fun that overruns the other Pepsi ads, though.

The lab scientist and the CEO of Pepsi India both make almost agitated statements that the Pepsi that you drink is absolutely pure and the same as the one that a guy drinks in New York, or wherever. Mr CEO, during his entire monologue, holds a bottle of Pepsi in his hand, which he has borrowed from a youngster. The youngster asks for his Pepsi back - and is given it - after the strong and apparently convincing statement.

But why is it that Mr CEO shows no interest in taking a sip from that bottle that is supposed to entice everyone else and actually is supposed to do things to them? Not one sip? Sensible guy, maybe...?

+ It Doesn't Matter... But It Does!

There are quite a few things I remember – mainly because I want to remember. Some good things. Some bad. If we are a function of our memories – and I think we are – then these chosen memories are necessary.

Everyone has their own paradigm, and I have a strong distaste of prescriptions in these matters, and chicken soup in general. But it is easy to get caught in generalities and the macro picture, in a way, miss the trees for the wood. And there was this little starfish tale I found somewhere that has stuck in my mind. Let me relive it this moment.

The Starfish Tale

A young man went out to the beach early one morning. He found the shore littered with star fish that had been washed ashore during high tide the previous night. They would gasp there for a few minutes and soon die.

As he walked along, he found an old man picking up a star fish, taking it out to the receded waters and laying it down in it. He did this for an hour, after which he did not need to, because the grounded ones were dead. The young man went to the beach every day and every day he saw this sight.

One day, he went up to the old man and asked him, "Why do you indulge in this futile exercise? There are thousands of star fish along this beach and you at best would be able put a few dozen of them back in the sea each day. All the others would die anyway. How does it matter?"

The old man stooped down, picked up a star fish, cradled it in his palms, looked at the young man, then at the fish, and said: — "It matters to this one."

+ Acceptance

Nobody is saying anything new. So, what makes the words of a person appealing depends on how we relate to what they say, and also on how we relate to how they express it.

It is not uncommon to find someone agreeing wholeheartedly with someone’s sentiments or ideas while rejecting the same stuff from someone else – only because it was presented differently. Or, maybe, because of the person who is saying it.

+ Kadi!

Desert-la irukkara post office-la ellaarum aen letter ezhudhittu, stamp vaangittu, veliye poraanga?

Veliye thaan otta-gum irukku!

+ Mannai Yirundhu Thuzhaavi...

Thiruvaaimozhi - Naangaam Paththu

3156:

maNNai yirundhu thuzhaavi
....'vaamanan maNNidhu' ennum,
viNNaith thozhudhavan mEvu
....vaigundha menRugai kaattum,
kaNNaiyuL neermalga ninRu
....'kadalvaNNan' ennum annE!en
peNNaip perumayal seydhaaR
....kenseygEn peyvaLai yeerE..............4.4.1


3163:

thiruvudai mannaraik kaaNil
....'thirumaalaik kandEnE' ennum,
uruvudai vaNNangaL kaaNil
....'ulagaLanN thaan'enRu thuLLum,
karuvudaith thEvilga Lellaam
....'kadalvaNNan kOyilE' ennum
veruvilum veezhvilum OvaaL
....kaNNan kazhalgaL virumbumE......4.4.8

+ Kadi!

What is the similarity between Krishna Jayanthi and Communism?

Kaal Marks.

+ Checks & Balances

There is something called the system of checks and balances – essentially, a lot of people watching each other’s backs. However, this requires that everyone put up their hands and choose to be counted. What usually happens – and this is true, whether we are talking about India, the US, or any other democracy – is that the only people who are involved in anything proactive are those who are looking for power, prestige, gratification, or big bucks. So, this has become a game of looking for and finding one’ own needs. No wonder, politics is called the art of the possible.

And empowerment does happen in a cynical sense – I might be a nobody, but if I grease a few palms, I could get a lot of things done my way. The way to go about it, I would say, is to appeal to groups of people who are idealistic about certain things – environment, civic infrastructure, health, etc – and create groups with them to build active and sustained pressure, and ensure that there are numbers and names to make it count. And macro issues don’t make as much of a difference as specific points. Macro issues enable authorities to waffle, specific issues do a much better job of pinning them down.

Coming to the issue of two parties, bad and worse, it is the same. They are bad and worse also because it is possible to be so. The first thing is for the people to get the right to question, convert that into power to question, and extend that to the ability to get answers.

Recently, three idealistic iit-ians have got together and started a political party. The momentum is important, and also the results they can show quickly - these will determine whether this venture succeeds and to what extent.

In a truly open and empowered system which continually produces results, checks and balances will work well enough. Of course, there is nothing like the perfect system!!

+ Rant on Civic Behaviour - 2

Traffic in Bangalore is nightmarish. When will it improve?

Improve?? One instance.... At one of the busy junctions where four roads meet – what the hell, I am talking about the junction of M G Road and Kasturba Road - there is the ubiquitous signal. Pedestrians get the green signal for all of 15 seconds every three minutes. And the moment the pedestrian signal turns green, the vehicles start moving, not waiting for their turn. There might be a few conscientious souls prepared to wait out the 15 seconds. But then, at this point, the police constable, otherwise just an eyewitness, turns activist and urges, even forces, the vehicles to move! I have seen him get agitated, and almost physical, when someone refuses to go through a red light.

Bangalore makes a dozen mega traffic management plans every year, but with such souls directing traffic is it any wonder that nothing improves on the city’s roads?

+ Rant on Civic Behaviour - 1

That was a long hiatus. Anyway, this is the start of a serial rant on civic behaviour. Here goes....

Two days ago, I was driving back home at around 9.30 pm, and got caught in a stupid half-hour-long traffic jam at the usual bottleneck (more about that later in this serial). As I parked in the basement, I wasn’t particularly in the best frame of mind. I reached the lift, and immediately heard the whine of the lift warning announcement: “Please close the door. Kripaya darwaaza bandh keejiye”. Yeah, sure!

I was on the basement, and the lift was stuck on the first floor because some uncaring ass hadn’t bothered to close the lift door properly. I could hear the irritating music and complaint through the lift shaft two floors down, and I know that all the eight flats along the corridor on that floor could hear it too. And the fellow who left the door open would have heard it right through his trudge to his front door. And nothing was done about it. The basement had a guy ironing clothes. He would have heard it too – didn’t do anything about it. The watchman was out at the front of the building, and he had to go up and close the damn door.

This had happened at least once earlier too. We could hear this monotonous alert on the third floor, and my wife finally had to go out and close the lift – stuck on the second floor!!

This kind of nonsense goes on all around, and really pisses me off. And this is not the only thing that happens in our building. The basement has a large bin where residents are supposed to dump their garbage bags. It is routine to find bags lying on top of the lid, and next to the bin too. I would bet the refuse makes them queasy. I would also bet that they scrub their toilets clean everyday.