Crossroads

Trying to cross a street at 10 pm at Madiwala Bangalore to catch my ride home..
But first I need to cross the street to get to the stand -
Here is the "Blair Witch" type video on my brave and perilous journey.
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BTW Happy New Year :

Which Pulp Fiction Character are you?

I turned out to be the big bad Mutha Marcellus F Wallace..
The F stands for ST F Up or else I will eat your children!

Here is the link : http://www.pyrrha.org/pulp/

Your name alone strikes fear into others; but maybe, just maybe, there's a little vulnerability and weakness beneath that stoic, fierce exterior of yours. Take the What Pulp Fiction Character Are You? quiz.

Me & Sea Biskit

I was at the Embassy Riding School in Devanhalli, on the way to the new Bangalore Airport. It's spread over close to 250 acres of pristine real-estate, far away from the din and hum drum of the Eastern Silicon Valley. All my apprehensions of riding a giant spitting, kicking and insolent animal with a twitchy instinct was well laid to rest at the end of the day.

Mounting a horse isn't as simpile as it looks - especially if you or the horse carry a few spare tyres below the mid-riff area.
Holding the reins is an obvious key part of learning to make a horse go. You kind of clasp the reins in your middle 3 fingers while the thumb holds it over and the pinkie supports it under. A little foot-tap to the left or right along-with a tug of the taut reins push the stallion left or right. Its kind of key to not let the reins lurch over.



Adjusting the stirrup

The moment I mounted Slim, he went about munching the turf - a couple of kicks later, he decided to lurch forward. Honestly, if you thought riding a horse was bad, you should try a camel. I don't know how you keep your wits about, 10 feet off the ground, half suffering from vertigo, and half nauseated with all that swooning.
There was the handler hanging around my horse, and for some reason thought he neede to adjust the straps underneath the saddle - my horse absolutely didn't like it - now my handler had told me to keep my feet up front, to you know be able to kick the horse - now when the horse got pissed, it turned around and the first thing it would find is my juicy calf muscle - I had to check if this particular horse was a vegetarian.. Sometime later Slim settled down.
A few rounds around the paddock later, we did a quick trot, just about once, for about 50 metres, and I can assure anyone - the family jewels take a serious serious pounding, along with the lower back..



Riding the BEAST [His name : Slim Shady :-)]

Dismounting a horse requires a little bit of athleticism, and common sense. The first part I have, the second part is sometimes questionable - you need to get your feet out the stirrups - check - getting 7 feet off the ground in one action - hmmmm not quite sure - so I bent over forward and slid off the saddle. Phew, embaressment avoided!


Walking off, Veni Vidi Vici...

The 2nd half was to corral the ponies, my pony was called Muffin - and he was a docile chap - the others were little monsters running around - so I had an easy time - just pulling the chap over to the fence, tying in a reef-knot, and asking him to just settle down - after which we settled in to brush the little bugger, and what came out looked like horse-dandruff- not exactly highlight of the day!


Yeee-haawwww : Cowboy tackling the trouble-makers [note who leads who!]

The Hidden Power of Rhetoric

Oft times, we find ourselves tongue tied in situations. Situations where you plumb the depths of your vocabulary, situations where you attempt to find the best riposte and situations where you try to overwhelm your opposition with just the right words.
Certain other situations lend themselves to allow you the speaks to have an element of preparation to woo and wow the audience.
In this day and age of progress, financial turmoil, violent religious fervor and unprecedented overall greed and selfishness unseen in humanity of the past, it is important to dwell on what motivates us. How are we any different from being forced into action by a hate speech, or one of religious calling from say the time of Adolf Hitler or Nero? I doubt if very little has changed, except for the verbosity of speeches which may be contemporary, but the speech in itself would be so mired in bombast, rhetoric and pithy platitudes that we've in essence been listening to the same record, year after year, century after century and have somehow unwittingly not been able to assess the underlying driver behind all of them - to me the driver is Rhetoric

So what is Rhetoric?

Rhetoric in itself is a branch in politics and distance from logic. Not alarmingly it finds its best proponents in politicians, leaders and various religious rabble rousers over time. It is not far removed from political debate, courtroom arguments, and the typical lets-tighten-our-belts kind of speech given by hopeless CEO's in times of crises. While there are many branches to rhetoric, depending on which end of the chain it gets applied - we often as a humand race find solace in lofty words, false promises, and hope for a better dawn. How else do you explain time after time when people go out to exercise their franchise to listen to the bijli-sadak-paani nonsense time after time - bewitched by the utopian promises by spineless politicians and yet end up voting option 1 or option 2 back in power on a flip-flop. It really doesn't - we know what we like to hear, and our leadership panders to such cravings. Rhetoric is a key essence of motivation, however it loses its place in actual problem solving - If I, as an engineer, listened to a bombastic routine from any of my top management and if they could actually see the smirk and smug look on my face they would immediately stop - certain problems call for immediate and quick resolution. All others which require healing over time, can have the woollen gauze of rhetoric applied over them...

"Chronos" - ne pas abuser

In Greek mythology Chronos is THE personification of time.
In the modern day and age, I, the author, upholds Chronos with the dignity he truly deserves.
One of the primary principles, my pet peeves, and something that I find more insulting than someone calling me a "curd-rice eating whore" is when people don't keep appointments.
Have you heard the : "I shall have it done by 5pm" at 6:30 pm?
Have you heard the : "I shall be there in 5 minutes" an hour later?
In this day and age, when people carry watches, have cellphones with alarms, it is basically disrespectful when you propose to have something or commit to something and not deliver it by that time. In fact I am even willing to go out on a limb and allow for some latitude in when you cannot finish that task, its only because you are human - what is not acceptable is that you take your own sweet time in telling me that you will be late.
Following are the rules
1. Make a time-related commitment with me, if and only if you can adhere to it. Or else tell me you will be done before I die of old age..
2. Do not let me know you wont be done after the deadline has passed. That is strictly unprofessional. Also not when the deadline is about to pass.
Two things tell me about a person who would call me if he/she isnt able to make it to an appointment well in advance. It tells me the persons cares about my time - if you don't respect my time, I don't have the slightest iota of respect for you as a person - I don't care if you are Warren F-ing Buffet.
And time management has nothing to do with if you are the giver or the taker in that particular relationship - self-respect above everything else. Business is secondary.
So if you plan to meet me, let me know when - and show up at that time. There has been no appointment - either personal or professional where I havent showed up 10 minutes of before it - It is a habit I cherish a lot, and it tells a lot to people about me as a person - it says "I care" in louder words and makes an excellent impression. I have my flaws, of which there aren't many ;-) , but if you matter to me in the slightest possible way you will have my respect, and you will have my time - Question is, do you respect my time, ergo do you respect me?

Of "Nice" sugar-biscuits and "Monaco" salt-biscuits

I was in Nice .. I still am at the time of writing this.. There are no big biscuit factories as I was lead to believe by the Parle biscuit manufacturers! In fact all "Nice" biscuits come from - hold your breath - Vile Parle!! Oh my God - I was duped as a kid!!
And while I was just settling in from the shock I went over to Monaco - expecting a nice salty treat - the ocean breeze from the Mediterranean blew into my face - aaaah mining the ocean to make biscuits - brilliant - even the Tata's couldn't have thought of this brilliant business idea, me thought! Just when I stepped in and out of a few stores to find out if I could get a tasty salty treat - unamused French shopkeepers shoo-ed me away - my despair grew into a saddened acceptance that Parle manufactures Monaco in, of all places, in Vile Parle! Oh, the duplicity of the Indians.. I was seething with rage.
Meanwhile I snapped a few pictures of the place - It wasn't too bad as one might think [;-)]

Nizza!

Imagine working in an office atop a mountain which overlooks the azure blue mediterranean sea..
Been there, done that..
Here I am in Nice [Nizza], France - and the picture is of me atop one of the mountains in a place called Villeneuve-Loubet.




Yes that is a HELIPAD! SWEET innit?