Sunday, December 30, 2007

As you sow, so shall you reap

Little over a decade and a half ago, a suicide bomber assassinated Rajiv Gandhi. I vividly remember one Sinhalese student at that time telling me in an acidulated voice about how they have this saying in Sri Lanka that can be summarized as follows - if you feed a snake it is apt to bite you in the end. She was referring to Rajiv Gandhi's support for LTTE and its subsequent withdrawal finally culmunating in his assassination by an LTTE suicide bomber. I was shocked at that time. How could someone be so uncharitable? It is a convention that if one is unable to praise the dead one should at least avoid censure.

Benazir Bhutto was assassinated a few days ago in Pakistan and my first reaction was how sad. A little later the reaction set in. I now realize that the reaction from the Sinhalese student made sense in a perverse way. This is not to justify my uncharitable thought. It is my thought right now.

Almost all Pakistani political leaders typically follow a policy that can be summed by a saying - To run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. In a way Benazir Bhutto's assassination is a logical denouement; the proverbial chicken coming home to roost. For over two decade Pakistan has been been involved in a proxy war using religion as a strategic tool. It has had the tacit approval of all political leader regardless of their public utterances.

Well the creation has now fully come of age. The snake that used to dance to the piper's tune so well initially has realized that it no longer needs to obey the master. It now dances to a tune of its own.

May be some good could come from this. India lost two Prime Ministers to assassination; Mother and Son. Both of them were done in by creations of their own making. This I think lead to certain healthy introspection in India. Last week's event could lead to a maturing of body politic in Pakistan.

Friday, December 28, 2007

Can I sing Jana Gana Mana?

A few months ago, to be precise on August 14th, we were having dinner at our friends place. She had also included several other couple we have known for almost a decade now. All of us at the dinner were of Indian origin, settled in this country for over 15 years. All of us had chosen to take US citizenship voluntarily. You must be thinking "If there is a point, please make it now"

Since August 15th, the following day, is the independence day for India, some of the people in this group wanted to sing the Indian National Anthem. I asked the question that having voluntarily chosen American citizenship, if it was appropriate and pretty soon the conversation got pretty heated.

From this point on this post is nothing but me simply bloviating at the WWW. So stop reading if you so choose.

So let me pontificate.

To sing a national anthem of another country; let us face it; India is another country for some of us; is similar to swearing allegiance to another country. No one in US actually twisted our arms to become citizens here. We voluntarily chose this responsibility. In fact we wanted to be US citizens for the multitude of benefits that it gives is starting with no hassle travel all over the world. Moreover in the US thankfully for the white dude, we are just this brown skinned guy who speaks with a funny accent, worships strange gods, eats spicy food etc. We are not thankfully segmented by caste, language, region, and all the many ways we choose to divide ourselves. Don't kid yourself we do not; just check the matrimonial section of any newspaper. This is not to imply that there are not many advantages in remaining Indians. The fact is that all of us made some analysis and chose one over the other. Case closed.

Now obviously certain members of this crowd still felt guilty about their choice.

Some of them tried to gloss over it with the quip "It is just a song". If that were so, why sing it on only August 14th or 15th. Why not sing it in the loo or during showers. These individuals felt emotional and a strong sense of nostalgia when that song was played. Obviously symbols like the flag and national anthem mean something of belonging to a group.

Nuf said.

Friday, December 07, 2007

How I went on a hike and ended up eating a great Breakfast instead

Last weekend I was in Bangalore to visit my wife's family. I landed at the house at 5:30 and we leisurely talked about this and that. Usually my b-i-l and I make some plans or other to go see some nearby places. So after talking about various places of interest we settled on a day hike to a place called Shiva Ganga near Tumkur.

We had starting problem. To eat or not, to shower or not, to drive or not etc. Finally we hauled our butts at about 8:30 and left Jayanagar without having had a decent breakfast. Within 10 minutes it was apparent that we should have left much earlier. The traffic was stop and go and near Yashwantpur it pretty much stopped moving. After about 45 minutes of this intermittent driving I could sense my b-i-l getting a little frustrated and I suggested that we just turn around and go back and maybe plan on an early morning hike the next day. By this time our stomachs started making themselves heard rather loudly. As luck would have it we saw some signs by the side of the road that lifted our spirits. Turn left for Golden Palm Resort. It turned out to be a really posh hotel cum restaurant cum resort cum spa. Yup, just a nice place to have a much needed breakfast.

We parked our car and went through a lobby with vaulted ceiling. Beyond that were nicely laid paths with grass, shrubbery, flowers, and trees on either side. In front was a large swimming pool with a restaurant further away. I must tell you that the dosa was really good and so was the coffee. After eating a mere 6 masala dosas and 4 vadas and 2 coffees the world was at peace. I could hear birds chirping again. After idling over our 2nd coffee we paid our bill and drove away. At this point I made a supreme discovery. After the rather sumptuous meal I had lost my appetite for the hike. Moreover since I had landed just the day before from the US the jet lag kicked in making me very sleepy. So to cut it short we went back home!!

A small digression; while we were walking back besides the pool my b-i-l told me how he had stayed earlier at this resort and had met the person who was the manager of the pool. This man was a white man who looked vaguely familiar. My b-i-l could not resist mentioning the fact to pool manager and guessed if he was an ex-cricket player. The white man laughed and said "Jai Bajrang Bali" in anglicized accents.

Did you guess who he is?

He plays one of the bad guys in Mr. India, you know the one trying to steal India's heritage.

Tchuss

Puddle hopping in Velachery, Chennai

Today is December 3rd and it has rained in Chennai early in the morning. By most standard it would be an average sized downpour, something that when it happens in the US we do not take notice. But in Velachery, Chennai the streets are waterlogged. Not that anyone is making any fuss about, it is not a catastrophe. People just walk around the puddles. When they are unable to navigate around the puddles, the shrug the shoulders, remove their sandals, and wade in!! They are used to the corporation doing nothing and have no future expectations either.

Anyway, I set out to get something from the store near Vijay Nagar Bus stand and was navigating my way around the various puddles and really enjoying it. If you have not done it before try it; it is a lot of fun. Then I was in front of a mega puddle which means that the entire street, end to end, was covered in water. Unfortunately I was wearing shoes and wading in water was not an option. It looked like I was stumped and was on the point of walking back when I saw an ingenious solution. I saw this guy walking along the wall of a house holding on the metal grill set on top of boundary wall literally hanging on to it!!

I too tried it. It worked. As I was hanging from the grill, a car went through the puddle and my heart was in my mouth as the waves (yes they were small waves) washed over my shoes. Luckily I navigated without any disaster.

The next one was interesting. So far all the puddles were in the middle and the high ground was on the side of the road. This puddle was all on the side I was walking on and to get around it I had to go to the middle of the road and just then this huge van horn blaring came behind me. I was surprised by the agility I displayed. No one else seemed surprised; the speed with which I got around this puddle is normal for people here but it was a bit scary.

On the whole I loved it all. Puddle hopping, puddle skirting, hanging to the grill and evading a puddle.

How easily we lapse into our old self. For example I now nod my head side to side as Indians generally do. You know what I am talking about. The ambivalent, neither a NO, nor a YES, shake of the head!! It took me decade and half to cure myself of the side to side waggle of my head. A mere year and of half of association with India and Indians was enough to undo it!!

Friday, November 09, 2007

Odds and Ends from Chennai September 2007

Couple of months ago I did something that pleased my parents a lot. I joined them on a visit to see their guru (teacher). On the way I spent my time looking at other vehicles, the drivers, various billboards, and just about anything I could read. Here are some that sounded interesting

"We two, Ours One" - This slogan does not sound nice in English. Anyone who has heard of family planning (euphemism for population control) knows it sounded better in Hindi "Hum Dhow Hamaare Dhow". The important thing to note is; parents are now being asked to have one kid!! Growing up in India, the ideal family size was four; two parents plus two children.

Trucks that ply on the road have many interesting messages and slogan on the rear; such as "Conserve water" and the one we saw earlier "We two, Ours One" to name a few. But I am missing a very important one that is almost an order; "Sound Horn". Folks that have driven a vehicle in the US know that honking is akin to giving someone the middle finger!! Fist fights have broken out over this and here we have people asking for the horn!! Some of them even have a polite touch "Please Sound Horn" as if that made it palatable!!

There was a sign for a some training institute named "Pengvin". I wonder if their course material had one on spelling.

Driving through Chennai one sees some unusual sights; there was a priest dressed in his traditional dhoti, bare chested, but driving a motor cycle!! Another one was the sight of a conservative Brahmin lady dressed in a 9-yards sari and driving scooter. I never missed a camera more in my life.

Monday, September 24, 2007

Blogs I Read

This post is one that will keep evolving as I find more interesting blogs.

The first one is Fake Steve Jobs. Although there is no mystery anymore over identity of Fake Steve Jobs, his posts are still hilarious. Here are a few of his posts I like a lot
  1. Regarding my management style : The picture at the top is worth a thousand words. But here are a few gems.
    1. "Never let people know where they stand."
    2. You don't have to hire the best people. You can hire anyone, as long as you scare the bejesus out of them.
    3. Hold people to an impossibly high standard, but here's the twist -- don't tell them what that standard is.
  2. Regarding our iPhone
  3. My lunch with Nancy Pelosi
  4. Hassles with Yoko : This one is about licensing Beatles on iTunes and how Yoko wants the band to be named "John Lennon and the Beatles"
Then there is Joel on Software. This is techie blog; to use his own words "Since 2000, I've been writing about software development, management, business, and the Internet". Some of the articles I have liked are
  1. The Law of Leaky Abstraction: This article shows how most abstractions (a concept widely used in software engineering) fail for various reasons and reveal the underlying details they are meant to hide or abstract away. He uses the TCP/IP as a example of an abstraction to hide the network.
  2. Pretty much every other article
I also like several article from Paul Graham. He was a founder of a company that was acquired by Yahoo and now he is a VC. He also is a great fan of Lisp and has written several articles on the subject.
  1. Why startups condense in America? describes the conditions that make america an ideal place for startups. It also analyzes the reason other regions have not be so prolific.
  2. Beating the Averages : This is also titled "Lisp for web based Development"
  3. Pretty much every other article
I have also read a few blogs of Guy Kawasaki.
  1. The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint
  2. An open letter to CXO is a reference to a very nice post a from Pam Slim where she exhorts management to not treat employees with dignity and respect, "to avoid endless hours of PowerPoint, buzzwords and meaningless jargon like "our employees are our most valuable asset." If you suffer from (mis) management (or even otherwise) please read this.

Wednesday, August 29, 2007

How my wife one day broke the weight barrier

Now I have been married close to 15 years. So I know the answer to this really, really, very dangerous question which if not properly addressed, few marriages survive the answer.

Q: Honey am I fat?
A: Of course not. You are as slim as the day I met you (remember opposite of fat is not thin, it is slim)

Now unlike other hubbies, I really do not need to resort to this lie. No really, I mean it. I have not hypnotized myself into believing my own answer to a point where I ignore reality. My wife really has not put on weight in the past 15 years. But you could say that if the spouse were 300lbs to start with, there is not much more to gain. As you will see shortly this is not the case.

Anyway it came as a surprise one day a few months when she came crying to me

"Raag, I am fat, I just broke the weight barrier".

She then added how she had been binge eating and was unable to stop. I did not really hear much past the word "broke" as I rushed to the bathroom where we kept the weighing machine and was relieved to see that everything looked fine.

Since I am used to getting the latest update on my wife's weight every week, I knew what my wife weighed to within a pound or so. So I asked her what was her latest weight wondering if she had secretly gained 20 pounds or so which she could really be hiding under loose fitting clothes.

My wife sobbed "119lbs"!!

For those of you on metric system it is 54Kg. Now by no stretch of imagination could 119lb be considered fat unless one is under 4 feet and my wife stood 5ft 3in in stockings!! Besides this was also very much in the range of her weight since our marriage except when she was encumbered by two pregnancies.

But as I told you I am a pro and knew several ways to address this issue. So I started by simply blaming the poor machine by telling her how really these weighing machines are retail machines calibrated with as much as 5% error. Being technical helps. Being able to talk confidently about statistics, errors in measurement, etc makes it plausible.

I also asked her what she weighed the last time and prompt came the reply 117lbs. It did not seem so bad, but I knew better than to tell her that. So I casually asked her if she humor me by checking her weight again for my benefit.

Imagine my surprise and her shock when the machine stubbornly showed 116lbs!!

My wife no longer likes to talk about her weight problem with me.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Jannavi's Moment of Clarity

Jannavi sent this as an email to some of our friends on May 28, 2004. She says nice things about my writing, but you all will admit that when it comes from the heart as this one does, it is really good. A cliche definitely, I just wish I wrote such cliche :-)

Disclaimer: I have taken the liberty of fixing typos and reformatted the email. No other change has been made to the original email.

Hi Everyone,

Sitting at home yesterday, I was just thinking about things that happened in my recent past and I thought I should send this mail to all of you about how my life, our lives, has changed, and how it is actually helping me have a different perspective. I do apologize if it is a bit long and disconnected, i am penning this as my thoughts are forming....

When I met Raag, in 1991, he joked at the way I planned my life, I only saw in multiples of 5 and 10 into the future. I planned for us, with an attitude that, I would make it happen exactly as I envisioned. I planned.

When we had Devayani in 1995, I planned months ahead how I would bring her up. I had detailed plans of what she will be when she grows up. This, even before she knew how to walk! I planned.

When we were looking for a house in MD, I was paranoid I would not get into a good school district. My daughter was 3 and I was planning her high school graduation. Raag and I fought everyday about the house we wanted. He didn't care about schools, I didn't care about commute time. We bought a house far from his job, and not in the greatest school district and I was upset it did not go with my long term 'plan'.

When we started trying for a second child back in 1999, I was 'planning' yet again I wanted only a summer baby because I didn't want to have my child lose a year by being born in winter. I 'planned' for a summer baby because I thought it would suit Raag well during his trips to and from the hospital. I planned.

When I lost my job last year, my world came crashing down around me. We were going to have a baby. What were we going to do with one job down and how were we going to pay for college for two kids. My distant future plans were upset. I had to get a job, and I did. My plans were still intact, till the miscarriage.

After all this, here I am. Devayani is doing so well at her school, that I am happy we bought this house when we did. We survived a car accident that few can live to talk about. I have discovered that I have such a resilient daughter, she makes me proud everyday. In the end of March this year, I was laid off again. I realize I am actually happy. I am happy to be home. I haven't had any of the knee jerk reactions I had during last year's layoff like cutting down on expenses, vacations, activities for Devayani, none of that. We had such a wonderful vacation hiking in Utah and CA and for something we hardly 'planned', it was our best trip. And this was two days after I lost my job, very unlike me.

The events in our lives, has shown me what a fool I have been all these years. What was I thinking when I said I can tackle life and control it to my liking. How I have wasted my time planning into a future I have no control of. It is sad that we had to go thru the things we did to have such an eyeopener (I am not being sarcastic).

All I want to say is, live for the moment. Cherish what you have now, and don't think what all you can have in the future. Don't plan so far into the future, that you forget to enjoy the present. So if you ask me what my plans are for Labor Day or Jul 4 weekend, I will smile, and tell you, I don't know what I am doing tomorrow. And you know what, it is not because I am afraid of the future, it is because I am really enjoying life this way. Stopping for all the small joys around me because I don't know what is in store for me tomorrow, and I don't care to know about it
today.

I hope I didn't bore you.

Monday, July 09, 2007

Cliche

I never have original thoughts. I despair of ever having original thoughts. In fact I cannot recollect ever having had one. I have had a few quips, a pun here or there, some word play that resulted in a neat joke. But an original thought that can be go toe to toe with those by say Mark Twain; nah that does not seem to be in my fortune in this birth.

You must be thinking "What arrogance, guy can't bat 0.25 but wants to hit a Grand Slam!! He has to request, say please, sometimes pretty please, several times .... to get people to read his blogs and he has the effrontery to refer to Mark Twain. Get real!!"

Anyway, there have been times, albeit rarely, when I have had moments of clarity, when an epiphany arose (Disclaimer - moments not induced by LSD or any other stimulants). Later after passage of some time when I make an attempt to recapture those thoughts they no longer feel as impressive. In fact they come across as common place or cliched. But then after several days of inaction I am left with a feeling of discontent that maybe I had a good idea but never followed it up.

Maybe it is not merely having an epiphany that is important, it is what we do with it that makes it relevant. We need to develop them, polish them and finally present them to a discerning audience. Maybe all great ideas start as a epiphany, only in these cases the author has the extraordinary drive to take this idea from his brain and successfully plant it several million brains. It is our choice whether we let our ideas live or die. Does that make sense?

Hey maybe the previous para counts as a decent thought?


So when last time a thought occurred I took the decision to in the future put it down in writing. So rather than present it as original thought I decided to set it out in blogosphere and see what people think and let them judge its triteness. But thinking is hard and I do not mean idle thoughts of winning 100 million dollars in a lottery, but real, to the point, purposeful thinking. This is compounded by the fact that I am out of practice. If thinking is hard, writing is harder. Anybody can write, only a few can command the attention of the reader.

So what is the cliche for this week?

I am sorry I forgot what it is :-). It is probably not as important as the resolution it led to, which is --

In the future when a wonderfully cliched idea hits me you will be the first one to hear it.

Saturday, June 16, 2007

NONZERO - Book

Games like Chess have a simple proposition; I win, you lose; you win, I lose. Both cannot win at the same time. Games like these are called Zero Sum Games. The opposite of this is Non-zero-Sum where the sum of gains and losses by the players are always more or less than what they began with.

This concept was developed in Game Theory where players choose different action to maximize their returns. It turns out that although developed as a tool at the height of cold war, it has ended up being a useful in day to day affairs involving negotiations between two parties.

Trivial as these concepts seem at first, it turns out the life itself is a large scale Non-Zero-Sum Game operating at many levels!! Nature has been doing its own research on Game Theory for billions of years!! Genes subsume their individuality teaming with other genes to form viruses, bacteria and other single celled creatures. Cells get together and form multi-cellular organisms with continuous evolution in complexity. At each point the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. The implication here is that life presents us with scenarios that may seem adversarial at first glance only to reveal opportunities for cooperation.

The book I want to talk about is NONZERO is by Robert Wright

This book takes a slight slant in it that; it claims that cultural development is predictably always in forward. Although politically incorrect to label earlier cultures as progressing from "Savagery", "barbarians", "low barbarians" to finally "civilized", it was felt by looking back at over the past several millennium that historical forces inevitably forced a cultural evolution along those lines.

This book describes several cultures spread over several millennium with examples spanning five continents. In each case the author makes a convincing case for direction of the arrow of culture as moving forward; towards greater social complexity and interdependence. He shows by clear examples how repeatedly in history there has been major technology shifts that convinces that generation that they are living in a period of great change!! Each technological leap increases the possibility of Nonzero-sumness leading to even greater interdependence.

Read also The Evolution of Cooperation by Axelrod for more on this topic.

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Importance of a 20 Rupees

As you all know (since I do not fail to mention it in all my conversations) I have been travelling to India often in the past year and a half. The past 3 visits have all been to Chennai which happens to be the location of the company we are doing business with. The name of this company is Adventnet and they have a unusual product line called Zoho. Adventnet is well known in network management circles and Zoho is now making a name for itself. Rather than describe the various Zoho Products in any level of details, I will just say this; very soon (no prediction on the time line) you will not be using Microsoft Office. Check them out. Consider this para as a plug for Zoho.

Getting back to my topic; I usually take a cab to go back and forth from my house in Indira Nagar where my parents live when they are not in Delhi. Yup, my parents are very Cosmo. I get my cab from Sai Cab, decently reliable guys, average cars, and affordable (definitely a plug). The bill for the trip is 280 rupees and I always round it to Rs. 300.

On one of the morning rides I did not have change and that is also OK with these guys, they do not mind accepting payment the next day. In the evening I got both the receipts but the evening driver (heretofore referred to as Driver II) was a different person and I was wondering how I could ensure that the tip from the morning trip reached the correct driver (heretofore referred to as Driver I). So I did a quick addition and proffered 600 rupees and asked for 20 back (280 from morning + 280 from evening and 20 for evening tip, in case you are wondering). Needless to say these guys do not carry almost any money!! I got a little flustered and it showed in my face.

If you are wondering where this is all going, be a little more patient. The end is near.

Driver II was quite astute (he in my opinion is under utilized) read my mind clearly. He told me not to worry and that the Driver I from morning had given him the bill from morning ride and told him clearly that I would give 20 rupees tip for the morning ride and that he (Driver II) better see to it that it reaches him (Driver I). The man actually gave clear injunctions to ensure that that this seemingly small amount (for american: 20 rupees = 50 cents) reached him!! Yeah, I intended to tip him, but I was also merely rounding the number to make it easy on myself!!

Monday, April 09, 2007

One year later

Last weekend I went yet another time to Bangalore and this time due to time constraints I took a Volvo bus. If you have not travelled by one please try these out. They are stretched buses with 2 wide comfortable seats on each side and a narrow aisle. The seats lean back almost horizontal and in the private operators there may even be leg support. Overhead rack for smaller luggage is available inside with a storage space for larger luggage underneath.

On the return journey we took the bus from Majestic. The trip itself was uneventful but the less said about Majestic the better. Never mind, I will say more. Banglore bus terminal is a mini version of their airport; messy, disorganized, chaotic. No one seemed to be in charge. The stand itself has long ago outgrown its capacity.

In contrast my eyes lit up when I saw the Chennai bus-stand. You have to take a look at this terminal Koyambedu. This terminal is almost futuristic and infact better than most airports in India!! Very huge with both local stand next to the intra-state/ inter-state stand. The only thing that would make this more useful is an auto stand that is also integrated into this stand.

Sundry comments

There was an usual sign on the side of a bus "Dehradoon education, available now in Bangalore". I tried to translate this to US English "Boston education, available now in DC". Did not make any sense.

I saw a Bar & Restaurant in Bangalore near a place called Minerva called "Coastarica". The question is do you trust his food and beverages if you do not trust his spelling!!

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Gah-Rham Restaurant

This translation was forwarded to me by Jannavi

Gah-Rham Restaurant

5027 Garrett Avenue, Beltsville and Maryland 20705
Phone: 301-595-4122

As for Korean restaurant there is a large quantity, but price, taste and service etc synthesizing, you think that here reputation is best. When it is from the campus, when Route 1 it goes north, Powder Mill Road (Route 212) exceeds and goes a little (MVA compared to forward), is Seven Eleven in the left hand, is Gah-Rham on the reverse side. Because there is Korean restaurant classified by another in the same site, will try not to make a mistake.

Most the fact that it has popularity Buffet which is done in the lunch is the eating at will. Also the sushi comes out in addition to various cooking. But as expected the first-rate sushi shop it is not compared, to grasp, because you can eat building, if of price is thought, you think that it can be completely satisfied. If it is the dinner, the burning meat and meal served in hot pot etc are popularity.

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Roads in India and Software Development

Having traveled too many times to India, I am now jaded. I am no longer excited either by international travel for purposes of work or about the prospects of being in India. I no longer notice anything interesting at all. I suppose if a person lives 4 months in a year in a certain place it grows on you. It reached a point when I heard my mother complain bitterly about the beginning of summer heat whereas I found myself defending the heat; in fact I find that it is quite pleasant. Don’t get me wrong, it is warm and definitely humid, but nothing like late April or even middle of May when only (as the saying goes) “mad dogs and Englishmen roam the countryside”!!

As I drive through the roads of here in India, the one thing I noticed over the past two years is there is a lot of construction going on our roads all over India. On an idle whim, I began seeing if there were any parallel between the two processes, road building, and software development. If we could this is what I feel would the position of various cities.

Work with me here, OK!!

Bangalore would be in a state of perpetual requirements gathering. They will do one of the following
1) They will check of the roads are by any chance going through a rich neighborhood and if so raise so raise pro-socialist slogans and accuse the government of selling out to multi-nationals.
2) They will check if this somehow benefits Tamilnadu and raise the bogey of Kannada being belittled and tie the construction of the road to release of Cavery waters

Chennai would be in state of perpetual alpha with various major roads seemingly always under construction. One particular road called RK Mutt Road connecting Mandaveli and Mylapore probably has never been completed since the time it was laid. Construction and commute seems to have decided to co-exist peacefully!! Anyway the only topics that the government here cares are
1) 69% of all employees must be from minority communities. Woe betides the contract that is based strictly on merit.
2) Is the contract written in Tamil in triplicate? It does not matter that the officials cannot read it since their parents while touting the fact that Tamil is a classical language (someone please enlighten me what it means) gave them a convent education.
3) If either of these criteria is not met, both leaders will accuse the other of having treated the Tamils unfairly and call a bandh (it may sound interesting, but a sitting government not opposition calls a bandh; you are in power, how can you call a bandh against yourself?)

Roads in Bombay (oops I mean Mumbai) will be in beta state, mostly functioning wide roads, well laid befitting the financial capital of India. Only thing the roads will be built to handle capacity from 30 years ago!! When people complain about this is what would happen
1) The government would complain that Mumbai is for Maharastrians and the rest of them should leave especially those Tamil, Muslims, Biharis, UPites, people who have ruined "Amchi Mumbai"
2) Provide an impractical solution such as building a bridge that runs past (say) Lata Mangeshkars house. The resulting commotion will probably kill the initiative.

In Delhi, no one will gather requirements. The central government will decide arbitrarily that all 2 lane roads will be 4, 4 to 6, 6 to… you get the picture. Delhi will be as close to production quality as possible in India. Even roads 50 kilometers from city center will be built that are 6 lanes wide in each side built to international standards. One road will contain no less than 20 flyovers and as we all know since that is not adequate they are in the process of building 5 more. No one dare question the government’s rationale since we all know Delhi is the capital and it must be ready for Common wealth games in about 3 years.

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Raag gets used to India

I sent this as an email to some of my friends on March 27th 2006 when I went to India on a business trip.

I took a day off from work to see my parents in Delhi over the weekend where I met some classmates of mine from Delhi College of Engineering (Friday). It was nice after 3 years to meet them all again. This time we met at Sandeep's house. He is a DIG!! (Observe how well I drop names and my relationship to important people). Well he lives in a decent area near Delhi University and has a huge flat with 3 servants, couple of drivers, and 2 person security detachment!! It is all very impressive. Anyway my friend has this house servant, medium height but looked rather ferocious with a mustache big enough to hang on!! But when he talked to you it was obvious he was a meek man, someone who would not say boo to a mouse. After a while I heard my friend's wife call out to him, guess what his name was; Ghabbar Singh!! I kid you not. Poor man saddled with a name like that. Later Sandeep was kind enough to lend me a cell for the day and told me that since the airports come under his supervision, he would have one of his men come and escort me around and then take the cell phone back. He used hindi to say this "Mere aadmi tumse airport mein milenge", I could not resist asking him, if he was going to add "Tum mujhe woh phone vapis de do nahin to mein Ghabbar ko tumhari ghar bejh doonga"!!

It is astonishing how quickly acclimatized I am becoming to India; not just getting used to more obvious things like hot weather and dirt, but to the roads and the driving habits. In fact I have now become inordinately proud of my driver's skills. On the way to the office there is a place where the road goes from 4 lanes to 2, actually it really does not, but the drivers merely go over the yellow line and drive on the other 2 lanes. Did you not know that lanes don't matter? Then very logically there is an extremely narrow bridge, that allows only 1 lane in each direction. In this stretch, my driver was playing chicken with a bus to our left as to who could get ahead. Earlier I would have cringed, but now I found myself rooting for my driver and thinking, if he could only shift a little faster after each stop he could really get ahead.

When he finally put our nose ahead and won the race, I almost put my hands up. YES! You have no idea how happy I felt at my driver's achievement. But in India I have learned that managers and bosses (addressed as Sir) do not behave in this undignified manner. Observe again how used to India I have become. Note the repeated use of the phrase My Driver.

Last week I asked the my driver to turn into Brigade Road to see what is it that people are raving about. It is extremely crowded but I suppose it is the place to hangout. As we were stopped at another of the traffic jams, (I will no longer explain that I was stuck in a traffic jam, the only reason traffic stops is for a jam), I saw a couple of young guys riding on a motor cycle. The guy in the back had his hand on the shoulder of the driver and in his left hand he had a paper bag with something to eat. Periodically he would put his hand in the bag and eat something from it. Then he did something that surprised me, he took another piece and lovingly fed the driver!! I tried to picture Ravi's reaction to this, but failed!! (Let us say, Ravi is allergic to men touching other men and leave it at that).

We had interviews yesterday during the day at the hotel where I am staying. We invited about 95 candidates and only 55 came for it and we made offers to 3 of them of which I am happy with maybe 2. It is hard.

Later in the evening I went to a mall since everyone talks a lot about them. This one is called Garuda Mall off of MG Road on a road called Commissariat Rd. It is hard to imagine the crush of people, the beleaguered air conditioning was working hard but it was still so warm inside. As far as the mall itself, it is nothing to write home about. 6 to 7 floors tall with a food court on one floor, theatres on the top floor and shops everywhere with mostly over-priced items.

News flash - India beats Raag

I sent this as an email to some of my friends on March 23rd 2006 when I went to India on a business trip.

*** News Flash ***
Raag the ever timid takes strike. On Sunday, his first day he eats at the Chancery hotel and everything is good. The next days he feels emboldened and eats at the office cafetaria and everything is good (or is it?). Thinking he is very much the punter now he attempts to repeat the stroke and eats again on Tuesday at the cafetaria and disaster strikes. He is clean bowled and by the end of the of day, the bathroom is very well acquainted with Raag. Furthermore he has been reduced to fetal position all of wednesday and has retired from the test match!! Henceforth he has decided to eat idlis and dhahi for breakfast, pack idlis with dhahi every day for lunch and eat curd rice with pickle everynight for dinner, all only at Chancery hotel .
*** End News Flash ***

This is good for two reasons.
1) I will be able to survive India.
2) I can prove to certain people, notably my beloved wife Jannavi, my friend Jeshmi, and Jeshmi's mother that I am very easy to feed and I am not at all picky.

On the side, here are some phrases that are funny.

1) I saw a road sign "Hump here", there may even have been the ubiquitous prefix "Please" !! To the pure of heart and mind, go to dictionary.com and check out "Vulgar Slang".
2) My driver has a simple explanation for traffic in Bangalore "Bangalore roads very traffic".

If I like Bangalore for it weather, then I hate its traffic and its roads. The conditions of the roads are such that I think Bangalore is a dream market for shock absorber companies.

Speed bumps here are another story, I am not sure how it is elsewhere, but here I think they took the standard speed bump and then redesigned it in such a way that you cannot get over one at any speed without a spinal injury!!

Less said about traffic and traffic manners the better it is. In a traffic jam, everyone honks, although it is not clear to me yet why they do so. It practically achieves nothing at all. The other guys looks ahead and plows on ignoring it anyway and if he is unable to, he honks back.

Note - Bangalore-philes, please note that most of the comments above may apply to almost all of India. So please do not flame me.

Initial impressions of India

I sent this as an email to some of my friends on March 21st 2006 when I went to India on my first business trip. During the past 6 years before that, I had been to India only once, for a very short while in 2003 and on a personal trip. Jeshmi is a friend of mine who grew up in more affluent circumstances and Krishna always had a sense of his own importance and hence handled these situations with a certain skill

All of you will find this funny, I walk into IonIdea building yesterday morning and the first thing I see is "IonIdea welcomes Mr. Raag Srinivasan" at the front desk !! Later in the evening the HR manager unloaded a boat load of butter on me saying "everybody is singing your praises". I could not resist asking her "what song were they singing".

It has been a while since I worked in India, so it is a little unnerving when people rush to open doors for you. You cannot leave the hotel room without someone outside saying "Good Morning Sir"!! I have to express a desire for water and 2 people will rush to get me bottled water!!

I am a misfit in this environment, but I can see Krishna and Jeshmi thriving in it lording over people although with Jeshmi we all know it is very natural for her.

There is a real class distinction (it always was there), although there are definitely more affluent people than before.

Saturday, March 10, 2007

In which Sridhar plays the guessing game

As many of you know, my wife's brother-in-law is Sridhar (my co-brother for those of you who speak Indlish).

The event I am describing here happened several years ago. He was escorting his older daughter to her dance class which was then in some school in Northern Virginia. As it so often happens, the dads of these aspiring dancers hung around the class trying to somehow kill the one hour that seems to drag on like the days before the start of vacations. One such dad who looked like he had landed from India just the previous day, made eye contact and Sridhar felt impelled to introduce himself. So here is the rest of the conversation.

"Hi, My name is Sridhar. What is yours?".

The most unexpected response came back at him, "You guess".

Now Sridhar had not been in India a while and had not moved in FOB circles a lot. So he was nonplussed for a few seconds, but decided that he should humour this person inquired politely "Rakesh?".

The other person had a strained smile in his face but persisted in playing the game said "You guess" again.

Now Sridhar was unsure what to do, he decided to mentally profile him and came up with a list of common names asked "Ramesh, Mahesh, Shailesh, ...?" all in a row.

Visibiliy upset the guy still said forcefully "You guess".

Thankfully, a parallel thread had been running in his brain which told Sridhar, if this guy were recently from India then potentially his accent is suspect and at that instant a flash bulb went in his head and he exclaimed

"You mean, your name is ......!!"

Did you guys figure out what his name was?

Yup it is Yogesh !!

Disclaimer:
The events described above did take place. Jannavi, Sridhar, and Yogesh are real. The conversation between Yogesh and Sridhar did take place in the manner described above. The words of the conversation may not be accurate but I hope the spirit is captured reasonably well here.

After reading the previous edition of this blog, I found some people did not get the joke. Yogesh has a thick Indian accent and pronounced his name as "You Guess"

You Guess = Yogesh

Thursday, March 08, 2007

Jannavi meets Super Tim

I have been really lazy; consequently I have not posted on the more than a dozen good books I have read since then. The longer the delay the harder it was to get back on the saddle. Finally I decided to break the logjam and write not about any book, but instead write something, anything.

Some of you may not know this, but my wife, Jannavi, has moved to another job and her first day was just last Monday. She spent early part of Monday at orientation and then met her boss. Although this man is a veteran of almost 2 decades (or maybe because of that) he seemed an extremely informal and relaxed person. He took her to her new office (BTW J has a office, she no longer works in a cube farm!!). Soon after that she jumped straight into her first team meeting. The meeting was already in progress and meeting coordinator was on the phone with someone, who happens to be her colleague working from home.

The coordinator was asking a question, "So Super Tim, What did you do about this so-on-so proposal?". Jannavi assumed that she did not hear the name correctly and waited for more. Her boss promptly chimed in with a question, "Super Tim, did you do XYZ?". Jannavi was really impressed at the informality of her team wondered what her new nickname would be. Dr. J was her first choice (Julius Erving for the basketball neophytes). The meeting came to an end before she could think of many more names. As she made her way back to her new office, she saw an nameplate with an Indian sounding name. On closer look the name was

Supratim Banerjee!!

She is yet to get her nick name!!

Disclaimer:
Supratim is my wife's collegue's first name but I changed the last name for reasons of privacy.

After reading the previous edition of this blog, I found some people did not get the joke. Supratim = Super Tim