Ever thought or felt being treated in a way which otherwise is claimed to be taboo by others? Fortunately or unfortunately we are living in an era (not that things were different earlier) where there is bias and prejudice every now and then. Be it in the outside world, or at home or at office, every damn place ill treats! At times it gets really annoying to make things simple and straight, to correct the people who ill treat, but it sort of seems useless at other times and we just move on.
People take advantage of your silence and you still wouldn’t care much about fighting them, it’s not worth it you think and move on. I guess that’s how it is, I’ve been taking it and guess will keep taking it as long as I don’t loose my cool (fingers crossed, am getting impatient very easily lately though). Just thought of venting out certain instances where I’ve faced or seen double standard treatment.
You must have heard this saying ‘a crowd in a train/bus feels sick but the same thing in a club feels happening’, this one is a really common thing the elder generation keeps saying. But what about this, when elders play divine/religious songs at home on full volume that’s a real good thing, but if you do the same thing with the music you like, you get a million things to hear and you end up being called a nonsense person. Tell me one thing – Both are one or the other forms of music, you like one and I like the other, you like to play your favorite at peak volume but if I do the same I am called manner less and many better adjectives! Why?!
Ever missed your friend(s)? Ever felt them missing you? Ever stayed out of contact for sometime? Guess what?! What ever the case may be, just because you were not in contact and you intentionally or otherwise dint get in touch with the other person. Just because you are polite and you agree to your mistake and apologize for the same, does that mean you cant/wont ask the other person why did he/she dint bother to do the same? It takes 2 hands to clap. If the other person is so bothered and concerned why dint they get in touch instead of just waiting to put the blame on you one fine day. It works both ways my friend!!
Ever got a dose for having spent that paper thing with a bespectacled old man looking beyond the purview of the glasses? It’s sort of a human tendency to always think that one is right in doing what he does but when a second does it, the second is wrong!! To put it simply if they spend, its necessity and if you do the same its extravagance. Only if someone could define and correlate ones necessity to someone else’s extravagance. It’s all in the thought!!
It’s a Double Standard World!!!!
P.S – Just a couple of instants for now, have a few other in mind.. will post them too soon.
Today’s Favorite Line – At times the equation of life is so weird ‘Give, give give and then? Forgive!! ’
Today’s Favorite Song – Tu Salamat Rahe (Adnan Sami)
We seem to live at the worst of times in the world. I’ve heard people saying ‘you couldn’t have lived at a better time, these are the best times for the kind of opportunities and growth India in particular and the world in general is witnessing’.
I feel its one of the worst times we are living in, decades later when we shall look back and talk to our next generation, we’ll have to put our head down in front of them for the kind of things that are happening during our lifetime (specially during our youth). The country is building various foundations or examples at this point in time which may not only spoil our future but also the future of the generations to come.
This state (its capital specially) in the country attracts the most money from across the world for various sectors which majorly imply finance and entertainment. But there are few anti social elements (according to me they are anti social!) in this state that is against even their own brothers from the other states of the country to live and work peacefully. How does this country grow? They don’t let a person call the capital city by a name he likes to, they don’t let a person release his movie just cos he feels in a certain manner about certain things, and they don’t let the god of cricket claim that his country is first for him and not his city. What the hell to do they aspire? What do they think of themselves and their own people? They mustn’t forget that their state today is what it is not because of its own people; it is more because of people who have got together on their land from across the country and the world. If they decide to call it quits, not even a dog will pee in their state.
Last week the CM of this state came up with a disastrous proposal of creating reservation in education for students of their own state, and students who were either not born in this state or whose parents haven’t been living in this state for at least 15 years will have to fight for a place in the limited space available after the reserved seats irrespective of how good or bad they are vis a vis the other students. I just for the sake of it hate the word reservation at the first place! How the hell in this world are we supposed to breathe freely? There will supposedly one day be reservation even to breathe. What are those students going to do whose parents get shifted to this state for work by their respective organizations? Their capital attracts the maximum number of people from outside, what do they do? Is it just to ill treat outsiders and make them suffer and spoil their future like this? What about being fair in this globalized, competitive world? There was another proposal a few weeks back that said; to obtain a public driving license a person must be fluent in terms of reading and writing the local language of the state. How fair is this? Think about the hundreds of Indians who are taxi drivers abroad! What if those foreign countries ill treat our citizens like that when we ourselves are treating our citizens this way?
This was just about one state, now lets get to another state, this being the largest state of the country on various counts, attracting the largest number of members in the parliament. The CM of this state has been throwing away money like it grows on trees. Making a history, for herself and her party by building statues and what not of her own late leaders and herself by wasting crores of rupees that could have been used for various developmental activities to help bridge a lot of gaps in the state. Why isn’t she adhering to any constitutional body? Why no fear? Why can we as citizens do nothing but just watch such extravaganza? If this kind of waste of money was not worse enough, her party members have been garlanding her with crores worth of cash just for nothing. Why do we just read about this, talk about this for a couple of days and forget? How long will the judiciary and other powerful elements of our country remain corrupt and silent? Even after seeing such instances how come people still vote for such hypocrites? Our children will laugh on us because all this is happening during our lifetime! How will we face that moment, that day?
Talk about terrorism, we during our life time so far have seen almost a dozen blasts across the country, we have hardly been able to get hold of even a few of those masterminds, they keep repeating their acts time and again and even we forget the act over time (except for the friends and family of those who lost their lives). Some day it could be to one of us, none of us are prepared to face that day and neither do we want to prepare ourselves for such a day. 26/11 happened and one of the terrorist was caught red handed, but its been more than a year now since that fellow is being treated with respect and grace in our own prisons, he changes his statement every now and then and our courts tend to believe him every time. Don’t we trust the evidences available and our own officers who caught him red handed for us to be able to pronounce a judgment to punish him? His own country disowned him for once. He is playing around with the law of our country, his bosses must be making merry and encouraging more fellows into such crimes giving an example of this fellow saying ‘see nothing has happened to him, he is having the best life, good food, good protection and lots of amenities. Could there be a better life?’ why is a criminal of such big notoriety enjoying a damn respectful life? Such elements should be given the worst kind of punishments which act as an example for others to think a million times even before setting out for such inhumane acts! And I seem to have heard this inhumane soul has been getting amenities inside the prison in terms of human rights and so on, there can’t be a bigger joke in this country in our life times.
There are lots of other such gruesome things happening around us in the world, these were just the top of mind recall ones on which we almost have lost hope and sight. So I firmly believe we are living in the worst era possible in this part of the world. Where will money and opportunity get you while such freighting things keep you worried all day and night!! I’ve lost hope of a good life in this world at least as of now..
Today’s Favorite Line – Music is the best soother, through weakness and strength, happiness and sorrow, for better or for worse it will always be there for you.
Today’s Favorite Song – Waiting on the world to change (John Mayer)
The next day started quiet differently with beggars and hawkers of all kinds that you would (not) like to see, from people who would sing, clean the place, show their physical disability (& later appear normal on their return, tats once their collection time is over), to people who were absolutely fit and fine but lazy enough to work (tats what easy money makes u – lazy!!). The most annoying amongst all these people was a group of errrr transgenders. I was completely annoyed by them, not for the fact that they were doing the vasooli kind of stuff but it was more cos of the method they adopted to forcefully make us pay them. The 3 of us (friends) were sitting doing our own things (listening to music, eating, reading) when this human came to our berth and demanded money, we remained ignorant, not in the mood to give even a single penny, when really insisted up on, one of the friend picked up a nice piece of apple and said ‘wont give money, take this if u want to fill ur tummy’, which got refused instantly and to not waste the time and energy anymore that moron of a human being, raised the bottom of her sari till knee high ( obviously indicating to us that, if u don’t give money in a jiffy, this level could go even higher!! Grrrrrr). Totally frustrated by the act, we wanted to get rid of her (for the sake of convenience and for the fact that she was wearing a sari, no offence meant), so I quickly took out my valet and gave a Rs.5 note, which she dint like, but I some how managed to communicate to her that, that’s what is all the change that I have, she thankfully obliged and moved on.. Jeeeeeezz!!
As this session of stupid drama started to fade, came the most interesting part of the journey, u enter Maharashtra and u get to drink this special brand of tea called ‘chaudhry ki chai’. Man!! if u could find a person selling tea any better I’d give u all the wealth I have. These set of people start someway like this at the other end of the coach ‘Chaudhry ki chai peeeo, chaudhryyyyy ki chai peeeeelo’, ‘achi lage toh paise dena, nahi toh paise mat dena’ and the best one amonsnt many other 2 liners, which hits u hard, real hard!! ‘achi lage toh peeo, nahi lage toh khidki khula hai bahar phek do’. Ever heard a marketer/seller be so tough to u, he’s sure u wont dare him by saying u dint like it, remember u r in Maharashtra!! This friend actually wanted to have a cup of tea, so he stopped the chai wala ( I was seriously in the mood to mock at him, just by buying a cup of tea and telling him I dint like it and then throwing it out in front of him, but sense still prevailed so I managed to stop myself from getting into useless trouble! :D ) and got a cup of tea, when asked how it was, he managed to say that it was really nice. (am not sure if he really liked it or did he sense what kind of crazy ideas were going in my mind and so avoided telling the truth ;) )
The chai wala left and then came a young guy (10-12 yrs old) with a hell lot of key chains and other kid’s games; he had an accent and attitude of his own to sell those beautiful key chains for rs.10 each. My friends did buy a few key chains from him; both cos they wanted to help the innocent lil kid plus they really liked a few key chains from a huge variety that he managed to carry on his small shoulders. One friend also bought a couple of JLo ( just a few ppl know here wat it means, so pls ignore wat JLo is, I just couldn’t resist myself from using the term though ;) ) kind of mobile pouches, but I was wondering why he would buy 2 pouches? He told us, he was buying them for his wife! But why 2? Won’t 1 do?? Oh then we figured he bought 2 of 2 different colors, ah married he is now, obviously understands that women like to match things to their clothes (sorry dude I doubted u unnecessarily ;)). Do I need to mention he bought a purple and a pink one.. God!!!!! I thought it was just girls, see what marriage does to men…! And then since we had bought enough from about a 100 rupees or so, we started doing time pass with that guy, seeing key chains just like that to kill time, for which that small lil kid gave a fitting comment ‘lena hai toh lo saab, kahli pili time pass mat karo, aur bhi dhanda karna hai abhi’, my o my, 12 yrs old he was I thought!!
Last thing I’d like to mention about the journey is again about this same friend, we would have laughed at least for 15 mins non stop at this particular incident. There were these set of ladies selling a floor mat kind of thing which we use for sitting on floor at home. It was made out of some different material and did look really nice; it at least looked costlier than what this friend bought it for. He bought it for Rs.10 each and asked us what we thought it was worth, to which we unanimously said, must be about Rs.20 each (conservatively) and he was glad that he had bought something nice for home and tat too cheaper than what it looks worth. Once his purchase was over, just a minute later the next lady selling the same stuff entered and started shouting ‘2 for 15’ ‘2 for 15’, one must have looked at this friends face, he already felt cheated :D. this wasn’t the end, a few minutes later the next lady entered the coach and yes u have guessed it right, she shouted ‘2 for 10’ ‘2 for 10’. There couldn’t have been a better expression on some ones face to make us laugh anymore that day: D hilarious!!
Tats what Indian railways makes ur journey – Hilarious!!
P.S - Quiet a lengthy post, guess i need to work on making my posts shorter!! thank god I got the idea of splitting this post into 2 parts :P
Today’s Favorite Line – Honest people have a value, corrupt people have a price.
Today’s Favorite Song – Anyone else but you (The Moldy Peaches)
What’s the first thing you should expect when ever you board an Indian railway coach? Chaos, Quarrel, filth, strangers or entertainment?
Wondering why entertainment also features as an option u got to choose from? That’s cos that’s wat a journey using the Indian railway provides you, that too without any additional charges! Great!! Aint it?!
This is about a train journey that I undertook a couple of weeks back to and fro Ahmedabad. It was not my first journey, but still I feel every journey with Indian railways leaves you with unique experiences and this one couldn’t have been any better in terms of free entertainment. Let’s see what kind of entertainment this journey was filled with…
The journey had just begun, it was not even 30 mins since the journey started, I was travelling with 2 other friends of mine and apart from the 3 of was there was an old man sitting opposite to me. The 3 of us were randomly exchanging pleasantries and wondering to ourselves how we were gonna bear each other for the next 7 days, when this old man out of the blue started speaking looking at me. At once not sure whether he was speaking to me or to one of the other 2, I just looked at him and turned back to the conversation with my friends. But then the old man wasn’t done speaking, and I realized he was saying certain things about me, he said ‘you have a flickering mind, its really difficult for u to take decisions generally!?’ I looked at him for a moment but I still couldn’t care as much and turned back to my friends. 5-10 mins had passed and the old man started again ‘who asked u to wear this ring? R u wearing this on ur own or did some astrologer suggest u to? Please show ur ring to me once’. This time again I wasn’t really listening to what he had to say, but he kept saying things to somehow grab my attention, but this time he had gone beyond just speaking! My mind was raising different questions ‘how can a person u don’t even know ask u to remove ur ring?’, ‘who is he? Why is he making statements about me?’, ‘why is he just talking about/to me, why not the other 2?’, I was really confused, but I decided to act as if I wasn’t interested (I genuinely wasn’t anyways!) so I told him that I wasn’t supposed to remove my ring under any circumstances, but he kept pressing and finally said ‘don’t worry, just remove ur ring and hold it in your own hands I want to show u something’, I was still in dilemma, every now and then we keep hearing about stories of how people get cheated while they travel in a train, but the old man sure dint look like someone of that kind, but how could I be so sure, no one has it written on their forehead. So I obliged to just show some courtesy to the old mans requests, removed the ring till the tip of my finger and held it there tightly pressed with an other finger (so that, just in case even if he had a trick to snatch it away from me he cant that easily, smart enough eh?!), to which he said ‘can u see some dust inside, u should wash the ring regularly so that u get the real benefit of the ring’. I wore the ring back immediately and sighed to myself ‘huh, he could have said that even without having me remove the ring’. I once again shifted back to the conversation with my friends and the old man kept speaking every now and then interrupting our talk, till he finally got down at a station after some 7 hours. And before he left, he told us everything about himself and had enough content to boast about himself and also made us nod at a lot of things he had to say. My friends got interested in his talks and they did show their hands to the old man to know their future. I remained indifferent so that neither I would be sad if he said something that I dint like nor will I be over excited for something good that was supposed to happen to me in the future (it’d get boring to know about something and wait for it everyday to actually happen!)
Part 1 of our entertainment filled journey had just got down, now we were again bored and in came another gentleman in his 40’s, he took a seat next to me though he dint have a reserved seat anywhere around us ( that’s the kind of courtesy less ness u can expect in India!), a friend of mine took the pain to ask him if he had a seat reserved or not, to which this gentleman raised his hand like the congress party symbol signaling to my friend that he need not bother about that and just stay put with whatever u r doing (now that’s another thing u should know while ur travelling in Indian trains, u need to just bother about ur own seat, at times u wont get even that..). Then this gentleman was kind enough to grab a copy of the business magazine that I was carrying with me lying in between that man and me. No, I dint bother to ask him why he had picked it up even without asking me, I know Indian travel culture really well, when ur travelling in Indian public transport system, everything that u carry with u is also for other publics use, u shouldn’t raise an eyebrow if u want to have a so called ‘Happy Journey’, plus I was already too occupied with my tryst with Nandan Nilekani’s ‘Imagining India’ I dint have to imagine any differently by interrupting both my own reading and the gentleman’s pursuit of looking at pics in the biz mag!
As the day passed, the charge in my mobile phone eroded faster than time, so I thought of getting my phone charged from one of the charging points ( there r 2 points in each coach supposedly) in my coach. But it was not surprising at all to find that both the charging points of my coach weren’t working, so I thought I’d check it out in the next coach but not as exactly expected out of the 10 coaches that I quickly checked out, only 1 point was working!! I had to wait just for an hour to get my turn since by then the most of them travelling in the train weren’t aware of this condition of the train. Luckily I figured this out early and spent almost 2 hours to assure myself that my phone battery would last for another 28 hours that I had to spend in the train. From the time I had started charging, people from across the train had started looking out for charging point and they enquired with me how long I would take, to which I had a standard answer ‘just some more time’, I had waited long enough to give it to someone else so early and easily ;). The charging incident was not just about the waiting time or the non functional charging points, it was also about the way I had to charge my mobile ( was literally holding the charger into the socket for the 1hr tat I charged my phone) and about the constant nagging by the people to remember their face and give them a chance to charge their phone after I was done! (Why would I bother who does after me?! Fight till u either break the only working charging point or be patient and get ur work done!!)
P.S – The post has already reached the 2 page deadline, so I rather split it into 2 parts and call it day 1 & day 2! ;)
Today’s Favorite Line – There will be no reason for love, if there is a reason, then it wont be love – Shakespeare
Every individual has some instance or happening in their student life which they cherish for all their life and boast about it whenever possible. If there has been one such thing in my student life, it without any second thought has to be Abhyudaya.
Getting admission into a premier bschool is a dream of thousands of youngsters like me. But after crossing all the hurdles and getting into the bschool the next challenge is to find yourself in that over hyped crowd, people with white hair (work experience), people with gold medals & national ranking ( in academics, sports & what not!), people with different ambitions and attitudes, one seems to be lost. There is this feeling of doing something by which you could stand out, make a name for yourself and be recognized!! No one’s out there to help you, no one to tell you what to do and how, one needs to get there and do it by one self.
September 2007, I was wondering sitting in an Abhyudaya meeting listening to the Coordinators, I am here without any work experience, without any gold medal or national ranking to flaunt, not even an attitude to show! What do I do? How do I make myself known? When’ll people start recognizing me? I am not even a club/ committee coordinator here. And that’s how and when I started getting involved in the organizing of, one of the finest Bschool fest of the country. And since then I was convinced to exert all my skills and energy to make this event the best.
It was just the 3rd edition of the event, but the previous batches had set such a nice platform for us that it never felt like it was still in its early years. Abhyudaya was already an established brand across bschools in the country, all we had to do is keep up the expectations of the world. Must sound easy, but for the kind of standards in place, it required real effort and time. Being in a Bschool one is expected to be in class most time of the week or doing assignments or solving cases written by the best nerds of the world sitting there at Harvard. To which I thought this is something that every other batch mate of mine is doing, so I decided to differ from at least a huge number of them and chose to simultaneously work with the team that was working towards the success of Abhyudaya.
Not knowing even a bit about how events are organized, what all goes in the backdrop behind a successful event, I was quite eager to learn it all myself and that sure did take all the time after classes and in fact lot of time during classes as well (multitasking my friend!!). Grades and sleep both started going south, meetings and tense situations started moving north, friends and family started moving east and west randomly. But all that was well worth it. Learned a lot of skills and lessons that a lot of other friends dint quite get a chance to learn, even though they secured outstanding grades and long horns.
People management, funding, planning, compeering, politics, soft skills, execution and last but not the least calling for/attending a zillion meetings are all things which others would have started getting used to only after they started working in organizations, but I can proudly say I have done all that while doing my MBA itself. And my concerns with regard to being recognized and standing out in the crowd got addressed just because of Abhyudaya. If today I have an identity w.r.t IFMR and people connected with it, its precisely because of Abhyudaya. I am sure all my batch mates, seniors, juniors and IFMR staff would agree with me on this.
Enough said about my own experience of Abhyudaya, I have seen it growing year on year for 3 years now, both as an insider and outsider. This year it looks and is much bigger than ever. Astounding participation and sponsorship, interesting set of events, the number of people behind the show during my batch was just 1/3rd of the number now and so is the level of the event (multifold bigger).
I just wish the event reaches greater heights and goes on to become the best management fest of the country in the years to come.
Here’s wishing the team and all the participants’ good luck!!
A new dawn has begun – Abhyudaya!!
P.S - This post is coming now cos Abhyudaya is happening this year on Feb 20 & 21 and the same write was also posted on Abhyudaya's official blog.
Today's Favorite Line - There is this thing about people who mean everything they say, they think everyone else does too...!
Today's Favorite Song - From this moment (Shaina Twain)
The only second movie* in my life that I watched first day (not the first show though) that too after trying multiple times and ways of getting tickets and waiting in the queue for more than half hour (something which I hardly like to do). The movie was extraordinarily rated on TOI (5/5) on the morning of release and also got a fabulous review on Headlines Today the previous night, convincing me to try for tickets first day itself, that too this being a come back flick of Srk-Kajol duo, made it an even more not to miss kind!
The movie though is well made, with really nice acting by Srk and show stealing music by SEL (the ‘tere naina tere naina’ keep my head filled though I don’t have a pair of headphones on my ear!!) and obviously the central theme of the movie about all muslims not being terrorists keep you glued to your seat, still I felt something was missing in the movie, certain parts of it seem not properly connected/ conveyed, and the sequence of events is also confusing on a few occasions ( at least to me).**
MNIK owes a lot to SS & its chief BsT for the publicity it got without spending that extra bit on the additional unplanned promotion of the film. No one so far has dared to stand up so firmly against the old diktats of Bombay ooops Mumbai, which Srk quite well managed to pull off with support from across the country (indirectly only).
And talking about the issue on which SS has targeted Srk and his film, I was watching a talk show on some news channel and happened to get really nice thoughts on the issue and the general reaction of educated youth of the country (remember the majority population in the country is of youth and their voice almost means country’s voice!!)
One gentleman said, since BsT has targeted Srk for making a comment which intended to invite Pakistani cricket players to India for the over hyped IPL, then he should also be targeting the respectable Government of India, its PM, President and the cabinet as such for inviting Pak for peace talks at the same time. If Srk inviting Paki’s is wrong then how can the honorable Govt of India alone be right in SS’s eyes??
One youngster from the audience also mocked at a SS member who was taking part in the talk show via video conferencing, (guess he was scared to be present there, knowing how wrong his party is and what his condition would end up being if he came to the studio in person) this youngster said the SS member something like this ‘Sir, I represent the educated youth of the country and you could well see how you and your party has become a laughing riot stuff in the country as you must have seen even during the show now, take this as a lesson and get wise!!’
Coming back to Srk and why he is not a Fattu, he chose an incredible subject for his movie which people across the world feel and want to convey but fear to do the same. He would have said this one statement a zillion times in the film making it clear enough for everyone across the world ‘My Name is KHAN and I am not a Terrorist’.
Remember he was frisked at some airport in US some time back, he also made sure he gave a glimpse of that to everyone on how he was treated (or better put, how US officials treat people on such instances).
Next he handled the SS issue really well and stood firm with his beliefs and statements by not budging to the threats given by BsT and his troop. Remember last time when our own Mr.Johar personally went to apologize for something even sillier (I get a feeling that Srk must have got some pressure from karan to apologize so that the film doesn’t get affected). But Bravo Srk! He stood to his guns!!
Finally to close this up, Srk said 2 sweet little words to all the ‘sickos’ which I loved the most ‘Shut Up’. I guess that sums it all up.
* First one was ‘China Gate’, yes of the ‘chamma chamma’ fame, that too two shows the same day
**That’s all is the review I could manage to write, just as an attempt though.
Today’s Favorite Line – ‘khush hain hum, kyunki hum phool nahi jo murjha jayen’
Few deserving candidates dint get an international job that would have earned them a fortune in case they got selected. But the companies were/ are more keen on their own profit maximization which while recruiting these candidates may become a little uncertain. That too when the companies have a lot of other good candidates to choose from, then why knock the doors of uncertainty?!
Does the above statement make things any simple? We are talking about IPL and it’s strictly business!! Be it the BCCI, the franchisees, the players, the sponsors or for that matter even the cheer leaders! Everyone’s there to make money and not for the sport as such, so when its business stop talking about emotions and relationships.. all that matters is the moolah!!
Why can’t someone concerned come forward and make such statement and shut the discussion and debate once for all? We all know the above statements are the exact reasons for why the things are the way they are. We all know that no one ever wanted to snub Pakistan or any other country for that matter. So why play this blame game?
Maybe Aussies coming to India would become uncertain if the franchisees seem to think so, Shiv Sena can’t be taken as lightly, though their nephew has been much more disastrous in the recent times. Everyone is aware of the kind of security threat that increases in India if the Pakistani players are around, specially after the Mumbai attacks. The threat is not internal alone; it could also be to the Pakistani players. Who is ready to take a risk that puts questions to lives?! No sane businessman would do that.
Agreed that the Pakistani hockey team is expected in India very soon for the hockey world cup that India is hosting, but don’t we know the kind of differences in attitude and money these 2 sports have. So its useless to argue and point fingers.. Let the businessmen stand up and say what they did and why instead of making this a political stunt.
I do feel bad for the Pakistani players, especially cos they were the ones who played exceptional cricket in the previous editions (am not as interested or convinced about their T20 world cup win to be a reason for the inclusion in IPL, both are 2 completely different set of events with a lot of difference in the stakes that they come with).
So lets just talk straight.. lets not go round in circles to each and every person concerned and then make an issue out of their statement (Yea, I do mean the statements from IPL chief, GOI, GOP, Franchise owners including Pretty oops Preity, sllipa… ouch Shilpa, and none other than the KKR top shot SRK and many more)
P.S – I know it’s a real tough kind of an attitude that I show while writing this, but I think its rather good to say what u feel than to play the blame game and create excuses. If someone would have taken such a stand long back all mouths would have been shut by now across the country and beyond!
Today’s Favorite Line – “Nothing is interesting, if u are not interested”
Today’s Favorite Song – Little moments like that (Brad Paisley)
Be it the stock market, the bullion rate, the popularity of Mr.Tharoor, the brand value of Mr.Woods or the activity on this blog, 2009 was a really volatile year. Highs and lows everywhere, so how could I have remained unaffected. One of the most volatile years in the 2 plus decades that I’ve lived so far. Gave me a lot of highs and as many lows if not less. Just a small flash back into the year that started with a lot of hopes, expecting certain important transitions and much more.
The year was obviously going to bring certain important changes into my life, as I was fully aware that the end of the first quarter would also bring an end to the 2 year post graduate program that I was undergoing and yes I did manage to get a degree and have become a so called ‘MBA’. The one question lingering in a lot of minds during the first couple of months of the year sure had to do with just one thing – WHAT NEXT?!?!?
This one question had (& has) a lot of significance to my life for the coming years and may be even more. But suspense and patience have been 2 crucial things in life and as ever have been ruling my life till date. With the completion of MBA a lot of things were expected to be different but nothing was certain, no idea about how things will change and when. All I had to do was wait and watch and at times ACT!! Which I did and yes quite strangely with respect to most of the things..
(Finally!!! Yogesh Chordia MBA ;) :P )
Who knew that the year would end up being as volatile as it did in most of the things/ people I was concerned with. Every other thing I used to do or be a part of hit a low and a high this year. Just a quick recap of whatever things I could remember and make public ;)
Ever thought of having a so called “best job” or a job that a million would die to have?! I did secure a job which turned heads!(damn.. look at the times we r living in! it was girls who used to turn heads but now its jobs! Sigh…) There were times when I never had a job and people used to get concerned about the careless attitude that I carried though I dint have a job. Securing the job was a cake walk but taking it up was a real tough call (one would have expected the situation to be vice versa in such a recession hit world economy). The story doesn’t end with the HIGH that I secured a super duper job, it just begins there! How about putting my papers just a week before I had to board that flight to reach the 2nd best country to live in the world, the toughest & the biggest decision of life till date!
High – Securing an international placement offer, taking up the job, waiting for the visa to process for 104 days and killing time on the internet for as many days while getting paid ( I know that’s something anyone would envy!)
Low – Quitting this international job on the 109th day just a few days before a new journey that I was getting prepared for during the last 100+ days. Even worse was the feeling of being irritated of having nothing to do during these 109 days in office but having to still go there every day for 6 days a week just for the sake of it. Killing time became a challenge every morning, noon and evening. Life seemed to be even more boring than what monotony would make it and finding ways of still keeping me going became the priority over and above the confusion and tension taking the big decision ‘whether to go to Finland or not’. Those 3 months sure did take the hell out of me, the mental pressure was horrendous!! ( Gosh!! Seems theres more pressure while u don’t work than while u work, I still don’t work.. think abt the kind of pressure I live with ;) )
High – A whole lot of friends to talk to, to go out with, to share things with and most importantly to be in contact with. Missing them was out of question, keeping in touch happened so naturally.
Low – Keeping in touch became a thing that was required to be mentioned to (& from) a lot of them (in fact almost all of them, irrespective of whose ever attitude was the cause). The friends that used to occupy most of the time in the day almost disappeared from the ‘things I did today’ diary in the latter half of the year.
High – Involving myself in ever other thing tat was happening was something but natural in the first half of the year, ‘things to do today’ always was a long list. There was hardly anything that was going around me and I wasn’t involved in it.. (I know, people liked to tell me ‘stop poking ur nose everywhere’)
Low - As the months passed, specially after the first quarter of the year the list kept eroding and there were hell lot of days when the ‘things to do today’ list almost wasn’t even thought about, leave alone having something to do! Cos I actually dint have anything to do..
High – Going out, watching movies, treats, get together(s), been long time lets meet ups (long time = 1 week), lets discuss/talk, were things that happened so very often that at times I had to ask myself ‘if I was going out too often? I guess I need to spend some time at home also!’
Low – Watching a movie after more than a quarter of the year was no big thing, going out required a thought, treats and get together (s) were mostly missed with ‘I guess I wont be able to make it’, lets talk/discuss kind of talks never happened only, in fact even phone calls and messaging hit an all time low!
High – Started driving my car after really long, though not yet back to road as much as I should have been, but this happened after a lot of patience and overcoming the usual laziness. Might sound really silly but think of it, having your driving license for like 6 years but not having driven even six times since then! (u’ll know why this is a high once u read the low)
Low – Met with accidents twice this year while riding my bike (Activa of course). Though neither of them were fatal but minor injuries kept me off for some days.. Though I firmly believe and understand that neither of the accidents were cos of my own driving skills or attention, a lot of people have given me left and right on my driving. So obviously the reputation of mine as a driver lost credibility significantly, making me even more lazy to start driving the car again.
There are so many other things that were as volatile as a few mentioned above, but I guess I’ve already reached the 2 page limit I set for this post.. so I rather stop :P
P.S – this one should have come at least a month b4 it has actually come, but tats how things r these days.. laziness is as high as like at the peak of Mount Everest (if tat makes sense ;) )
Today’s Favorite Line – I've thrown my words all around… But I can't, I can't give you a reason..
Today’s Favorite Song – Behki hawa sat ha woh (3 idiots)
Age 03 - Sang a bollywood song to the school principal during the admission interview when asked "what is your name?".
Age 07 - saluted using both hands posing for every photo.
Age 11 - played divide and rule with a pretty girl who shared the desk in school.
Age 13 - failed the first test in school.
Age 15 - overtook a bus riding a bicylce on a highroad, got kissed by a van and lost senses for a day.
Age 17 - parents were called at school for the first time ever and to everyones surprise was pronounced as a notorious guy.
Age 19 - was specially treated at college for not having seen the classrooms for over 7 months, cos i was busy seeing the city around.
Age 21 - Gave a once in a life time kinda speech and stones and brick bats having been pouring since then ;)
Age 23 - quit a well paying reputable job to do just nothing...
Age 25 - Did just nothing (as planned ;)). Finished training about 20000 unique individuals.
Am no super hero... but I've been trying hard you see!!!
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