Another Brick in the Wall

The Fleeting Glory

2012-02-17T17:22:00.001+05:30

First and foremost, I am very grateful for my job; for everything it has offered me in the last one year, for bringing me to life after all I had been through and for making me believe in myself again at a time when I was alone, vulnerable and lost. I go back a year, and I still shudder at the memories: memories of being homeless, jobless, broke and broken.

Finally, after three months of waiting anxiously and living a life of squalor, this company pulled me back from the pits. And I started from scratch, in a new team, with new people and new challenges.

In the last year, I have seen myself grow, move on and make new friends. I have also seen the organization mature through management changes, restructuring and growing team sizes. That also brings me to the evident signs of a maturing organization:

a)Employees have degrees longer than their names: It’s almost a miracle when your four-letter surname is followed by a string of letters like B.E., MBA, CFA, FRM, CA, CPA. You look around you, and people are still writing some exam or the other, while all I am doing is wasting my time on my blog or reading books which have no academic value or taking vacations instead of study leaves. I am officially the least educated person on the floor.

b)More time is spent on meetings/operational formalities than on work: This was one of the main factors which literally drove me away from Company D, and as I spend more time in my current company, I shudder at the way it slowly but surely moves towards ‘processes’ and ‘best practices’ which are discussed in the different meetings where the same things are repeated but in different jargons.

c)Success becomes directly proportional to the number of big words used: Suddenly everybody wants ‘management responsibilities’ which involve ‘paradigm shifts’, ‘strategizing’, and ‘operationalizing’ and since I have no idea what they mean, I am left to do the dirty ‘grassroot level’ work which is beneath the dignity of other people, but thankfully, I am happy with that.

d)The focus shifts from working to networking: The early signs of a mature organization are alarmingly getting on my nerves, when my objectives are being modified towards ‘increasing professional contacts’, ‘collaboration’ and ‘exposure’ which when translated in plain English means ‘hang out with the people who matter’or 'make important friends'.

e)‘Value’ becomes directly proportional to your relationship with the manager: As it is, in a research set-up, it’s difficult to quantify ‘value’, and especially if you are in a mature organization, the big ideas have already been exhausted, and you are easily expendable in favour of someone who is less obdurate and opinionated or as HR will put it, ‘has better attitude’.

Well, so now that I am a part of an almost mature organization, I can see my foreseeable future, and as is always the case with most things in my life, it seems short-lived…

Happy Valentines Day to My Eternal Soulmate

2012-02-15T10:00:00.000+05:30

To all those people raving and ranting against Valentine’s Day: SCREW YOU!

It’s the single-most ROMANTIC day of the year. If you don’t believe me, go log in to your Facebook account. 337 people can’t be stupid. After all, they are your FRIENDS…

What makes it all the more SPECIAL is the way you usher it in. It’s not just about THE DAY anymore; you have this wonderful weeklong celebration which finally climaxes on Feb 14…

And, and, and, the jawdropping amazing thing is to make that climax all the more exciting, snapdeal offers discounts on condoms. I kid you not! Not to mention all the great deals on restaurants, gifts and salon services. Love was never so cheap as it’s now…

If you are planning to get married, then you can’t possibly choose a better day than Valentine’s Day. It’s just so sweet to sign a pre-nup and get into wedded bliss on this special day, knowing that you are protected once the heart-shaped cake is sliced into pieces. Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan anybody? Or may be Sharon Stone and Phil Bronstein?

If you ask me, the only people who are dead against Valentines Day are either single, hideous or belong to some political party, who secretly watch porn while preaching about the sanctity of Indian culture…

Me, I had THE MOST WONDERFUL Valentine’s Day ever. I spent the day with the person I love the most in this whole world, we had a nice quiet dinner at home and we basked in the glory of being in a comfortable, secure, long-term relationship which doesn’t need the assurance of flowers, chocolates and heart-shaped balloons.

I was in love with me…

The Dark Horse

2012-02-13T10:02:00.003+05:30

I was born simple. I was brought up simple. Life ruined me. With each passing weekend, I move from being corrupt to decadent. Like yesterday, for instance. We went down to the Mahalaxmi race course, ‘just to experience the whole deal’ AND my excuse was that it was a professional hazard (of being a wannabe writer who needs to broaden her horizons).

Except the occasional bet on cricket, I am not much into gambling. I don’t play poker, I don’t mess around with the stock market and I definitely don’t put my money on a four-legged animal. My only previous brush with race horses was four years back, when I was in my first year of MBA and as part of the Corpcomm team I had to interview a Symbi alumni, who had a flourishing business which dealt with buying and selling of race horses.

While the minor glitch was being stopped at the gate (deceptively school-girlish looks often let me down), I managed to sneak in and there was no looking back. We rooted for the underdog, or should we call her the ‘underhorse’, and unexpectedly, she finished third, leaving all of us smiling and a few thousand bucks richer!

Apart from the race itself, it felt like being transported to a different world altogether: with the men, dressed in formals and neck-ties and the women resplendent and sophisticated, it was the cream of South Mumbai gathered on a Sunday afternoon, carelessly elegant and carefully arrogant, while I looked down mournfully at my shabby outfit which stood out as a constant reminder that I DID NOT BELONG THERE.

I also dutifully stuck to my new resolution as I guiltily watched Manchester United vs Liverpool, almost like I was cheating on cricket. As I nearly knocked over my glass when Rooney scored back-to-back goals, I firmly reminded myself that I was only flirting with football, and the alcohol was the REAL deal. I even missed the major part of the India-Australia match, and just to prove a point, Dhoni chose to regain his Midas Touch and pulled off an unlikely win.

Now who would have bet on THAT?

As Good As It Gets

2012-02-10T10:06:00.002+05:30

Apparently Mumbai is cold these days; I mean literally! Now being a hot-blooded Bong that I am, sub-10 degrees temperatures turn me into this lazy, useless person, with an unhealthy attachment to the quilt, with, wait for it, a TUB OF ICECREAM!

Now the only thing better than tucking into bed on a weeknight with multiple scoops of the BR Bavarian Chocolate icecream, is tucking into bed on a weeknight with multiple scoops of the BR Bavarian Chocolate icecream AND BACK TO BACK AWESOME MOVIES!

Remember a few months back, I went gaga over a Bong movie, Autograph, the debut venture of a school senior of mine, Srijit Mukherjee. Now I watched his second film, Baishe Srabon, a psychological thriller and a tribute to all the unsung poets whose talent went unnoticed (*sniff sniff). While not as soul-stirring as his first movie, this one is gripping enough to make up for Raima Sen’s cringeworthy acting. I would have so loved to play her role as the sassy journalist, in an on-again-off-again relationship with the intelligent, yet somewhat uncouth lead detective. Sigh… some dreams remain unfulfilled. Make that TOO MANY dreams remain unfulfilled.

I followed it up with this year’s highly-acclaimed movie The Descendants: a remarkably nuanced take on a middle-aged man’s struggle with his dysfunctional family. The last movie which touched the audience with a similar theme was Sam Mendes’ American Beauty that depicted everything wrong with the modern American society. While Kevin Spacey won me over as an impressionable teenager, George Clooney’s drool quotient is unmatched. For a man who represents evergreen bachelorhood (but does so infinitely more gracefully than our very own Salman Khan), he impeccably portrayed the typical American father-of-two, who simply can’t get his act together, or his family for that matter. And the salt-and-pepper hair just makes him all the more sexier, if that was possible.

Is it weird that depressing movies manage to make me happy?

Beautiful Stranger

2012-02-08T09:44:00.001+05:30

Have you ever looked closely at the mirror?

Have you ever wondered what lies behind those dark lashes and the well-defined kohl-rimmed eyes?

Have you ever explored what hides behind those smiling lips, tinged with the light shade of lipstick?

Have you ever taken a moment to ask what goes inside the head covered with a mass of dark curls?

Have you ever paid heed to what the fine lines on the forehead are trying to tell you?

Have you ever noticed that those disproportionately big ears you always hated are telling you to listen more?

Have you ever realized that the turned up nose has a story of its own?

Have you stopped to wonder who you really are?

Have you met the beautiful stranger called You yet?

Times They Are Changing...

2012-02-06T10:27:00.001+05:30

I have decided to make sweeping changes to my life. Yes, repeat after me. SWEEPING. CHANGES.

1.I am going to STOP trying to write something which caters to the mass market 100-rupee segment. Over the weekend, I tortured myself with a recent “best-seller”, written by an acquaintance with a similar background. This was her first book, which was picked up by Rupa. While it was a fast-paced read with elements of good humour strewn in parts, I found the subject matter clichéd, banal and a complete insult to my intelligence. But what was worse, were the repeated spelling errors which stood out glaringly, page after page after page. Trust me, I don’t grudge her the achievement: it’s a big deal to get published at such a young age, and that too by a reputed publisher, and boy, do I know how hard it is. However, I also realized that now I don’t WANT to be just another ‘writer’ churning out rehashed versions of the same old junk. What makes the 'not wanting to be just another writer' part easy is that NO publisher would take a chance on me in this segment: my writing simply doesn’t fit in and I can’t compromise on my style or content to MAKE it fit in. Hence, I am going to wait, till I am mature enough or experienced enough to write something which is different, radical and most importantly, honest and unpretentious and not simple a "me too" version.

2.I am going to STOP obsessing about my boss in the India office. It’s an open secret that he doesn’t like me, and I just have to accept it. No, I am not going to change myself or try to get into his good books. In life, you can’t please everybody, and due to genetic disadvantages (my dad NEVER got along with ANY of his bosses and the trait has been handed down the generation), I ALWAYS pick the wrong battles. In Company D, my manager and I nearly came to blows, and while things are much more civil here, I don't fancy my chances for too long. As long as my work gets appreciated, I shall stick around. When it stops making a difference, it would be time to move on.

3.I am going to STOP watching cricket. Yes, you heard me right. If Sahara can take the bold step, so can I. Now that I have played a crucial role in India’s rise to the top, I have nothing else to offer to the game. While I have always been an ardent tennis follower, cricket overshadowed it. So now, tennis will lead the devotion quotient, and I will also focus on other sports which I follow intermittently: Formula One, Badminton and Soccer. Especially with the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, I have enough time to prepare myself for the event. And here I quote Subrata Roy, “I wish cricket well.”

Or may be, I should JUST wait till the India-Australia-Sri Lanka tri-series is over; for old times’ sake…

A rose by any other name would have a different spelling

2012-02-02T13:24:00.000+05:30

Shakespeare, I believe asked the question, “What’s in a name?” Plenty, if you ask me. He may not have grasped the significance of it, given his name was as simple as William. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for me.

So I have been blessed with (or so I believed) a unique and exotic name, and as long as I was in Kolkata, it got me a lot of compliments (as well as a pen friend request from a guy from Andaman, in an age when you did not have the luxury of adding random people on Facebook).

But as soon as I moved outside Kolkata, I was faced with the trauma of being caught in a trap with people who apparently pronounced names EXACTLY that way they are spelt! Shudder!! Not only could they not pronounce it the way it is supposed to be pronounced, they also failed to appreciate the exoticism of the name, and I was reduced to ‘that Bong chick with a weird name”. So over the years, I have gotten used to lame jokes and administrative confusions, as I patiently tried to overcome the challenges of the missing H and the use of A instead of O.

Anyway my name literally means maang, which signifies the parting of the hair, where married women put sindoor or vermillion. But of all the cruel jokes that I have been subjected to, this one takes the cake:

Picture courtesy, Neil

The name is Simanti, pronounced Shimonti…

Money for Nothing...

2012-01-31T11:47:00.001+05:30

Yesterday, it was finally there: the occasion we were all waiting for with bated breath. No I don’t mean the end of India’s humiliating whitewash against the Aussies. I assure you it was more life-changing, more significant and more important than world peace, environment and Presidential Elections in the US. It was the day when bonus and hike numbers were announced in our bank.

We were already repeatedly brainwashed to keep our expectations low. Fed with constant stories of cost cutting, headcount rationalization and slashed bonus pools due to the economic downturn, we half expected the bank to TAKE money from us. As if to prove a point, it also announced that it was offering junk bonds as a part of the bonus component to senior executives.

Now the communist Bong that I am, any blatant discussion about money embarrasses me. Though the only reason I am in this industry IS money, I wouldn’t be caught dead admitting it. Yes, I am hypocritical that way. So when my boss called me up to discuss my numbers, I maintained a staunch silence, and after he probingly asked me if I was happy with the revision, I hurriedly jumped into an incoherent explanation on how it was NOT all about money and the intangibles go a long way in defining my satisfaction. For a change, here was someone quoting obscene amounts of money AND apologizing that it was a bad year. All I could think about was all those coffee breaks I took or the time I spent writing nonsense or reading unrelated stuff or following flipkart, cricinfo, makemytrip and bookmyshow during office hours. Suddenly, I felt guilty, but thankfully got over it soon. However, this was where it ended. No phone calls to gush about it, no pondering over it and no comparing with other people. I smsed my dad who conveniently ignored it, only calling me at night to tell me how much additional tax I would have to pay.

Honestly speaking, I had not given much thought to the compensation aspect. I was happy with my appraisal, I was happy even with my current remuneration and any increase would barely make any difference to my life. I don’t have any financial responsibilities, debts or materialistic ambitions and the concept of diminishing marginal utility of money is very pronounced right now. It was good to know that I was valued enough for them to make a generous offer without me asking for it. Having said that, I know that the i-banking world is very fickle and short term, and I could well be discarded next year. I also know, that the increase in money will make no difference to my philosophy, i.e. if I feel stifled or micromanaged, I won’t think twice before quitting. However, more money does increase the exit barriers and make it all the more harder for me to give it all up to permanently retire to a writer’s life.

Money can’t buy a dream, but it CAN make it a disturbed sleep…

Roadtrip

2012-01-30T11:17:00.002+05:30

Two guys, two girls, an ugly car, lots of alcohol, good music, a beautiful view and a very bad sense of humour: that’s the recipe for a near-perfect roadtrip.

To begin with, I love trips where all I have to do is sit in the car, look pretty, pose for random pictures and make the occasional coffee, without having to use to my brains. It’s such a relief and a welcome break from my life in Mumbai where I am perpetually stressed out. For a change, I did not have to plan anything, I did not have to obsess about traveling/accomodation/sight seeing. Everything was taken care of by the Mallu boys who pampered anon and me and since they had a DSLR camera, we let them.

Going back to Mysore was a sort of a deja vu as I remembered flashes of my previous trip with my folks, two decades ago: the Summer Palace of Tipu Sultan, the beautifully lit-up Mysore Palace (thankfully it was Republic Day and the Palace is lit up only on National Holidays), St. Philomena’s Church and the panoramic view from the Chamundi Hills.

But Coorg really took my breath away. Not that we did any sight-seeing except the quaint Golden Temple and monastery on the way, but the experience of spending a day in a far-flung cottage, overlooking the valley, was something quite out of the world. The hills, the sunset, the bonfire, the star-gazing (cosmic scrabble to be precise), the dogs, the fireflies, and most of all, the serene virginal beauty just make you wish that you could stay there forever.

While I spent just an evening in Bangalore, I managed to sneak in some quality brother-and-sister time with my cousin as well as a late night dinner with some of the old college batchmates. I so love the city: the sprawling houses, the short distances and the luxury of a social life that I can never imagine in Mumbai.

However, the trip did bring out some disturbing latent traits in me. My appetite suddenly shot through the roof, as food just disappeared down my throat at the speed of lightning as I easily outate/outdrank everybody by a long way. I would blame the mountain air for my sudden fascination with food, but as it was logically pointed out to me, it’s unlikely that the mountain air would single ME out. Ergo, I am a greedy pig. Also, I didn’t know I had such a competitive streak in me. I mean all through my academic/professional life, I have been overtly laid-back as I went with the flow, be it during exams, placements or appraisals, not torturing myself by comparing my achievements (or the lack of them) with with that of other people. But suddenly, at 3 a.m., in the old cottage in the middle of nowhere, I became super competitive about, hold your breath, a game of carrom (or carrom board, as some people would call it). As my friends pointed out, there was a sudden cold wave sweeping across Coorg and it came from ME, as I sulked my way through both games. For the record, I am not a BAD player, though over the years, I have lost my magic touch, but I was doomed with a bad partner. So I did not lose, WE did.

So there it was: the perfect weekend, the perfect roadtrip, the perfect life…

Short and Sweet

2012-01-25T10:00:00.000+05:30

1.I watched Chaalis Chaurasi, the worst movie with two of the best actors (Nasiruddin Shah and Kay Kay Menon). Talented people make horrible choices.

2.I am no longer a whisky virgin. I made my JD debut and I feel extremely grown up now.

3.Come tomorrow and we are headed to Bangalore for our Mysore-Coorg roadtrip.

Life is short and sweet… pretty much like my bonus

Inseminated Adoption

2012-01-20T09:36:00.000+05:30

When others take time, they are SLOW. When I take time, I am THOROUGH…

When others talk loudly, they are OBNOXIOUS. When I talk loudly, I am CONFIDENT…

When others giggle, they are SCHOOLGIRLS. When I giggle, I am VIVACIOUS…

When others discuss their homes/families/possessions, they are SHOWING OFF. When I do it, I am SHARING…

When others screw up a dish, they are BAD COOKS. When I screw up, I am EXPERIMENTING…

When others discuss their bfs/gfs, they are MUSHY. When I do so, I am ROMANTIC…

When others buy stuff they don’t need, they are SHOPAHOLICS. When I do so, it’s because I NEED 17 pairs of shoes…

When others put up status messages on FB, they are FOLLOWING THE HERD. When I do so, I have a VERY IMPORTANT MESSAGE TO THE WORLD…

When others read cheap books, they have BAD TASTE in literature. When I do so, I am VERSATILE…

When others indulge in immoral acts, they have a QUESTIONABLE VALUE SYSTEM. When I do so, I am OPEN-MINDED…

When others speak their minds, they are RUDE. When I do so, I am STRAIGHTFORWARD.

When others are dieting, they are ANOREXIC. When I do so, I am HEALTH CONSCIOUS…

When others participate in a discussion, they are BANAL. When I do so, I am ENTHUSIASTIC…

When others give up their boring jobs, they are UNSUCCESSFUL. When I do so, it’s because I have a PASSION…

When others behave normally, they are ORDINARY. When I do so, I am DOWN-TO-EARTH…

Handbags and Gladrags

2012-01-18T10:09:00.001+05:30

Those were the days of running around bare feet, nails polished with mud and dirt…
These are times to tiptoe on high heels, wrapped around carefully pedicured feet…

Those were the days of climbing on top of each other to reach out for the tempting mango, high enough to avoid our greedily stretched arms, low enough to keep us interested…
These are times to delicately sip a mango shake in an expensive joint, cribbing about the dry day…

Those were the days of walking down the road, hand-in-hand, fingers twined together…
These are times to surreptitiously sneak inside a restaurant, sunglasses covering the face…

Those were the days of proudly donning old and ragged hand-me-downs from our sisters, safety pins holding up what missing buttons could not…
These are times to compare luxury brands and smugly complain about the prices, while paying for them…

Those were the days of being excited about a day trip to the nameless picnic spot 100 kms away…
These are times to jetset around the world, living out of a suitcase and getting the passport stamped without imbibing the essence of the place…

Those were the days of childish innocence enjoying the journey…
These are times of matured pragmatism of having arrived…

The Shantaram in Me

2012-01-16T10:23:00.001+05:30

Yesterday was the ninth anniversary of the Standard Chartered Mumbai marathon. While I am no marathon sprinter, like most inactive jobless people, I LIKE TO FEEL A PART OF A WORTHY CAUSE, especially if it involves celebrity spotting from close corners. Let’s face it, where else would you have the chance to stand at arm’s length with the rich and famous of Mumbai? I was in college when the first marathon was held, and I still remember standing right on Marine Drive with my Stats copy (for an exam the next day), my eyes straining to catch a glimpse of Rahul Bose, my longstanding crush.

Which brings me back to my undergrad days. Now I was a self-confessed LOSER then. Not that I was a winner in B school by any stretch of imagination, but at least in those two years, I did what every college student is supposed to do: bunk lectures, flunk exams, go out with random people, party, get drunk, travel on shoestring budgets and try new things. But undergrad was a different story altogether: all I did was study and hang out with my equally loserly roomie, admiring the “cool crowd” from a distance.

Obviously, over time, the boundaries of ‘coolness’ get blurred and now I am on quite good terms with some of those girls who intimidated me as a teenager. So, yesterday I went back a few years, spent a few pleasurable hours walking down Marine Drive and bargaining on Colaba Causeway, my eyes lighting up as I remembered those lazy evenings at Mondegar or Leopold. I also met one of my college friends after almost a year, and while we ruminated about the old days over a couple of Cosmopolitans, I realized a few home truths about my undergrad batch mates:

1. We are OLD…
2. Many of them are in MY dream profession (i.e. media / journalism/ advertising) and apparently, things are NOT quite as perfect as I believe they should be even if you are in a field that excites you…
3. Many of them have achieved a lot in a matter of six years while I was busy getting confused: some of them got married very early, followed by a quick divorce and now they are living it up either with some exotic foreigner or living life on their own terms in a foreign country; some of them got married very early and are now fretting over admission of their kids; some of them went to countries like Ireland for a course in bakery, came back to work as a chef in some posh restaurant, didn’t like the work culture and went to Paris for some other culinary curriculum; some of them ended up in modeling or entertainment (ad/movies/television serials); some of them became stewardesses, earned obscene amounts of money and went abroad for further studies; of course some of the losers went into boring professions like law/economics/business management but they are not important in this context…

What did I miss? Why did I choose a conventional life? If I had a chance to go back to those three years, would I do things differently? Probably. But then again, would I be happy if I did things differently? Probably not…

“I was going through deep and silent water. Nothing and no-one could make me happy. Nothing and no-one could make me sad. I was tough. Which is probably the saddest thing you can say about a man.”

But the Shantaram in me continues to be confused…

Pride in the Name of Love

2012-01-11T18:27:00.002+05:30

Disclaimer: This is one of my rare cheesy, corny, super-girlish posts, so guys are forewarned to keep away. Nevertheless, I am sure all three of you will still read it and THEN pass judgmental comments like, “Women! So dumb” or more specifically, “Nefertiti! So dumb”

There is no doubt that I am a strong, straight-forward, no-nonsense girl who doesn’t take crap from anybody (not even a publisher, let alone a boss). Also I don’t like weddings, babies or gossiping. And I like sports, alcohol and most of all, SPACE.
Add to that the usual cosmopolitan argument: conventionally 'educated', IB-employed and away from home, and you would think I am devoid of any estrogen whatsoever (except that I do LOOK like a girl and I am bad at maths).

But the bitter truth is I AM a girl, a pathetically romantic one at that, who would do ANYTHING when she falls in love (EVERY BLOODY TIME)…

I would travel to the remotest corner of the world to be together: I know it’s impractical, especially in todays world where career choices force you to be flexible and I see so many couples around me living apart. My own parents have spent about a decade in different cities at different stages of their lives because both were pursuing their professional dreams. But I am old-fashioned that way and while I value my job/independence, it would never be so important that we stay apart for an indefinite period. I definitely don’t believe in the “distance makes the heart grow fonder” crap. I have to live together in the cramped one-room apartment and get on each other’s nerve to feel any fondness for the other person. In fact there was a time when I was barely six months into my first job and I had decided to give it up and become a teacher in a Tier 2 city which had no job for me…

I would not make any conditions: I always hear people explaining to me about how relationships are about making compromises, give-and-take and bargaining. And while I can argue till the end of time with a roadside shopkeeper, I can’t do that with someone I care about. Yes, I would sulk or scream, but not turn into a coalition partner who threatens to withdraw support to the Centre every time they don’t agree on something (Mamata Banerjee saved a guy’s life by not getting married). I guess after nine years of roommates/flatmates, you learn to let go of the little things and if doing laundry for one extra person or cleaning up one extra dish gives us the extra fifteen minutes, otherwise spent in arguing, I would rather do that. Let’s face it, I am good at doing laundry and washing dishes and it hardly takes any time. But of course, the line has to be drawn somewhere, like cooking, for example…

I would give till I have nothing else to offer: This is a tricky one, since it leaves you completely devastated and almost foolish, especially if the relationship does not work out. Having said that, this is also the ONLY way to do things: without expectations, without keeping scores and without asking for something in return. I can’t just make someone a part of my life and yet hold back. It remains a mystery how you can possibly be so half-hearted about something you profess to be passionate about.

One man come in the name of love…
One man come and go…
One man come here to justify…
One man to overthrow…
In the name of love!

Pride in the name of love? Not for me…

Disgrace Down Under

2012-01-09T19:09:00.000+05:30

This weekend I made a lot of trips to South Mumbai, or as we the poor cousins in Suburban Mumbai call it, “Town”. If you are from Mumbai, you would know that this is no mean feat and can only be compared to India’s current sojourn Down Under.

To begin with, anybody who had jostled against smelly armpits in a crowded second class compartment would know that the experience is as harrowing as watching Gautam Gambhir face an Australian fast bowler with the new ball. You may be the king at your own backyard, but when exposed to an alien environment, you are bound to be humiliated. So when I am navigating through the crowd at Ghatkopar or Mulund, I feel good about myself: confident, successful and quite an achiever, pretty much like MS Dhoni, after beating a weak and below-par West Indies team. However, as soon as I travel down south, I see genetically superior, better-looking, better-dressed and effortlessly sophisticated people who inevitably end up making me feel like Team India getting thrashed by Ponting and Clarke. If that isn’t enough to humiliate me, you have this constant reminder of the horror story that will follow shortly: like the green top at Perth awaits the Boys in Blue, I shudder to explore the sheer embarrassment of walking inside the Palladium Mall which reduces me to a worm in front of the well-heeled ladies from Malabar Hills.

Otherwise it was a good weekend… clothes-wise and rupee-foolish.

Also, for the first time, I held a 10-day old baby in my arms… it was scary: not the baby, but the fact that it belonged to my college roommate.

The Unfinished Coffee

2012-01-06T15:34:00.002+05:30

It was one of those January mornings: cold enough to hug the shrug close to her, warm enough to feel like the world still mattered and the empty coffee shop she was sitting in was not just a painfully perfect aide memoire of the past; the city was still asleep on a lazy Sunday morning.

She took a deep breath and held on to the delicious whiff of freshly baked croissants…

She savoured her Caffè Verona, a seductive blend of beans from Latin America and Indonesia, with a tender touch of Italian Roast lending depth, soul and sweetness to the drink. She smiled at the irony: Verona was where Shakespeare chose to stage his tragic Romeo-Juliet romance…

She flicked through the coffee table book, carelessly glancing through the pages which did not interest her yet captured her eye, pretty much like the world around her…

She tilted her head, trying to sing along with music playing in the background but gave up when it changed its tune just the way things eventually faded away to make way for something new…

She stared at the hand-polished woodwork and the wooden blinds, her eyes resting for a second on the settee at the corner, before moving on to the wall hangings, yet stealthily casting glances back on the settee, refusing to completely let go…

And something stirred inside her; she left her coffee unfinished, hurriedly paid the bill and ran out without waiting for the change…

The change can wait, she couldn’t afford it then…

Gazing into the Crystal Ball

2012-01-04T13:08:00.001+05:30

It’s not my blogging day. I blog every alternate day, not because I am busy on the other alternate days, but because I like to create the illusion that I have a life. But today, when I walked into the office and checked my mail, I got a pleasant surprise, only marginally less pleasant than the PREVIEW sale at Pantaloons and Lifestyle EXCLUSIVELY for members, i.e. losers like me who have spent shitloads of money buying stuff which they don’t need. My boss was on sick leave. The only thing better than your own IMPROMPTU sick leave (when you are actually NOT sick) is when your boss takes an impromptu sick leave. I should have believed it, when my horoscope in the Mumbai Mirror said that “seniors at work will be co-operative.”

Now I am one those people who absolutely definitely DO NOT BELIEVE in the bullshit called astrology. It’s no rocket science, in fact it’s no science at all, though it’s quite an art: the art of politely saying “no” to a marriage proposal. It’s more politically correct to say “our horoscopes don’t match” rather than saying, “you are downright ugly/stupid”. Despite my lack of faith, I religiously read my daily horoscope in not one, but two-three newspapers, and more often than not, that’s the ONLY thing I read in those newspapers (except of course the important editorial pieces like “how to lose five kgs in five weeks” or “how to meet your perfect soulmate” or “how to lose that perfect soulmate when you figure out he is NOT that perfect after all”).

So, given my wide expertise in interpretations of zodiac predictions, here are a few observations, which may seem completely inaccurate on the face of it, but if you scratch the surface, you would appreciate that even with Bejan Daruwala, it’s not just the alcohol talking: there IS about half a page of truth in those 535 pages of utter nonsense (don’t lie. I SEE you sneaking around in the Astrology section in Crossword everyday, reading your forecasts):

The most common goof up is: “Capricorn: Financially a good year” and yet, inflation keeps eating into your bank balance. The fine print you missed is, “financially, a good year. FOR. YOUR. BOSS.” He will get all the work done by you, and keep the majority of the bonus pool for himself. Or take this example. Year after year, your forecasts keep saying “Pisces: Marriage is on the cards” and yet you keep wondering why you are still single. What they mean is that you will receive plenty of wedding invitations (or as per our national language, “cards”). Of course, marriage IS on the cards, but nobody said it will be YOURS…

Or take the universal forecasts for which you don’t really need an astrologer. For example, “Gemini: Excellent year for rethinking career plans and options” or “Virgo: Friends and family will be supportive of your needs”. Really? Even I could have told you that…

The worst ones are which begin with an action-plan but go on to tell you why you should, in fact, NOT implement that action plan, thus making you feel comfortable with status quo. It’s not YOU who is resistant to change, but it’s your horoscope. Take this example: “Aries: It seems that you're ready for a major change in your life, but take care that you don't implement change merely for the sake of change. Think carefully about what you really want to do.” Yayy… time to sit back, and continue watching Emotional Atyachaar. You would definitely switch channels, if it wasn’t for the horoscope.

Please transfer 10% of the MRP (and not the price you pay on Flipkart) for accurate personalized interpretations of Bejan Daruwalla’s upcoming forecasts for 2012…

P.S. The "marriage is on the cards" bit is not original. I read it somewhere and it stuck.

Black...

2012-01-03T10:44:00.001+05:30

So almost five years of blogging and five and a half readers later, I have finally changed the template of this blog. No, it has nothing to do with the new year. Just that one of my readers complained that the black background was making it difficult for him to read FOR LONG HOURS (note the LONG HOURS) and of course, as insecure as I am about losing one of my five and a half readers, I immediately decided to do away with the design I so loved.

Back in the ancient times when I was preparing for GD/PI, my instructors at the coaching institute lied to me that some colleges have abstract GD topics like 'pink pajamas over the red fort' or ‘deep blue is not blue enough” or in some cases, just random colours like 'red’ or 'black'. For a change, these were topics I was comfortable with, because they did not require any knowledge/information/opinion/loudness on my part. But as luck would have it, in all my 13 GDs, topics were related to irrelevant issues like democracy, politics, economics or finance, none of which were of any particular interest to me.

Anyway, coming back to the post, I LOVE BLACK. It fascinates me. And I am not just talking about clothes and shoes, though come to think of it, I DO have an abnormal number of those as well.

But there is something ethereal about the colour: it’s classy and sombre; it’s dark and enigmatic; it’s poignant and spiritual.

Black evokes hope. We talk about the coming of age of the black sheep of the family or the proverbial “black coat” which signifies graduation…

Black stands for strength. It absorbs, it endures, it LISTENS…

Black represents nobility. It is replete with tradition, it is rich in culture, it smacks of sophistication…

AND YOU ALSO HAVE BLACK DOG…

Notwithstanding the Black Fridays, Black still manages to cast a spell over me…

New Year Nuisance

2012-01-01T18:17:00.000+05:30

Hello. Silence… Hi. Silence… How are you?... Silence… Can you stop typing on your BB for one second and listen to me? Silence... I have decided to get married. Silence…

WISH YOU A HAPPY AND PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR… Ohhh, same to you!

So that was me and my dad. After failing to get his attention for 15 minutes, I resorted to the ONE SENTENCE that seems to have garnered more interest this last week than Poonam Pandey’s promises to strip.

And at times like this, I thank my stars that not too many people like me. As it is, I have 332 ‘friends’ on Facebook and for the last week I have been bombarded with various wall posts wishing EVERYONE “good health, wealth, prosperity and fulfillment in 2012”. Add to that the random sms-es beginning sharp at midnight and some losers (like anon) had the audacity to call me in the middle of the night TO WISH ME A HAPPY NEW YEAR! Imagine the chaos and the sheer annoyance if I WERE POPULAR, like my dad, for example! Shudder!!

I LOVE text messages (in fact a witty tongue-in-cheek sms conversation in the middle of the night has a very high romantic quotient) but what I absolutely abhor are universal, impersonal messages sent to everybody on your address book.

Take the examples of a few common new year sms-es that nearly all of us have received sometime this week. If you haven’t, please tell me what you did right to piss off so many people.

The unimaginative ones which you get from multiple people: “Wishing you and your fly a very happy new year. May 2012 bring you lots of love, happiness, peace and prosperity. Ram and Sita.”
My first issue with this one is the use of the word ‘fly’ which makes you look down involuntarily. How difficult is it to spell out FAMILY really? I know it’s called short message service, but I prefer to use full forms at certain crucial places. Secondly, if you ARE wishing me so many good things, can you at least replace love, happiness, peace and prosperity with more tangible THINGS like money, alcohol, chocolates and sex? Finally, I am sure your poor spouse had nothing to do with this text, so why drag her into it at the end?

The poetic ones: “Nights are Dark but Days are Light. Wish your Life will always be Bright. So my Dear don't get Fear Coz, God Gifted us a "BRAND NEW YEAR" *****HAPPY NEW YEAR 2012****”
Not everybody can be Shakespeare, but bad poetry can really make you throw up. We already have a Kolaveri Di to deal with. Spare us the torture on this new year please. And what’s with the stars? We have a SRK to ~~throw starry fits~~ make movies like Don 2 and Ra.One, we don’t need more shocks.

The ‘nationalistic’ ones: These are inspired by patriotic sentiments which insist on the regional element. “Beet gaya jo saal, Bhul jaayein; Beet gaya jo saal, Bhul jaayein; Es Naye Saal ko Gale lagayein; Karte hai dua hum Rab se sar jhukake...Es Saal k Sare Sapne pure ho Aapke. *NAYA SAAL MUBARAK*”
I can’t criticize this one because I can’t understand this one. I dutifully reply with a “wish you the same”.

On that note, I wish all my readers (all five and a half of you) a very happy new year. I hope you all are promoted, get laid, lose weight, buy a house in Mumbai… (if you are being optimistic, might as well be unrealistic)

The Girl Who Ate Maggie (a lot)

2011-12-30T10:02:00.001+05:30

I remember the first time I met her… I was new to Mumbai, new to hostel life, first time away from home, away from family and friends, away from everything that was safe, comfortable and familiar…

I remember my first impression about her… she looked so matured, she was so different from me, she was so much of a “woman”, she couldn’t possibly be 17…

She didn’t even like cricket… how can ANYBODY NOT LIKE CRICKET? Ergo, I did NOT like her…

But it’s not like I had a lot of options. I was already late by two months, people had already formed ‘groups’ and she was the only company I had. Plus, she had a cell phone and she let me use it at times…

So we became ‘friends’ and here, I use the term ‘friends’ loosely.

We hung out, though we had very little in common. I was an Eco student, she was doing sociology; I was a hardcore non-vegetarian, she had never tasted meat; I was (still am) pint-sized, she was tall and broad; I was ~~a miser~~ careful about money (I still remember sulking about the one rupee she had borrowed and not returned), she was a spendthrift who made STD calls everyday to her entire khandaan; I was still a schoolgirl, she had already grown up…

Then compulsory Hindi happened. I was screwed big time and she came to my rescue. Before the exams she would take me to the study room and teach me, and once I managed to just scrape through the first year without a backlog in the subject, we had finally managed to establish a common ground…

The next two years were all about long walks on the Marine Drive, shopping sprees in Colaba, Crawford Market and Fashion Street, arguing about which movies to watch (we had the exact opposite tastes), trying out all the eating joints close by, late night chats and maggie (too much of it) and last minute cramming before exams despite our different majors…

She went off to Pune for her masters, and a year later, I followed. She became a media professional while I became a confused misfit…

I confided in her about my dysfunctional relationships and she listened…

She got married at 25 and babied at 26…

The baby was born on December 28, at 3:45 p.m… Coincidence? I don’t think so. It’s called friendship, and I do not use the term loosely now.

Guilty Pleasures

2011-12-29T11:07:00.002+05:30

On Tuesday, a few of us went to the MMRDA ground in Bandra to “lend support to the anti-corruption campaign by Team Anna” or as Mumbaiites call it, “winter vacation”.

There were a whole bunch of kids tagging along with their parents, making it quite apparent that this was more about a free outing for them (school is closed for a week, and they have already been to the Borivali National Park, Hanging Gardens and Gateway of India) than about a serious agitation against corruption. Otherwise, the turnout was quite disappointing which made Annaji call off the fast. Let’s face it, this is not Delhi; the common man here is indifferent to politics and for most people out here, life revolves around the 5:14 local from C’gate to Mira Road: the other passengers WON'T let us get off at Bandra to listen to the rants of an old inflexible man.

So why was I there? I would like to blame my “keen interest in democracy and heartfelt support to the cause of a clean India”, but the truth is unfortunately not so noble. See, irrespective of my cosmopolitan upbringing, I am essentially a Bong, and at times the temptation to shirk work on the pretext of ‘doing something for the country’ which doesn’t really require any ACTION on my behalf, except echoing some inane platitudes, gets the better off me. So those three hours made us feel extremely proud of ourselves, as we sat through the speeches, participated in patriotic slogans and flag-waving, interspersed with singing along to popular nationalistic songs. At the end of it, it was more like watching a sequel to Border/Lagaan/Roja or a combination of all three.

We came back purified and less guilty about working for a Swiss Bank.

Apart from that, there was a small matter of my birthday, but now that I am officially OLD, I would not like to dwell on the event too much. While my plan was to sit at home, watch India crush Australia and romp to a convincing victory and sulk about growing old, there are some people who hated me a lot in college and therefore they just can’t let go of the opportunity to make a big deal about me growing old AND make me pay for the alcohol. To make things worse, they gifted me something which can only be described as a bumper sticker to someone who has no car.

But the ghosts from the past still refused to let go for good…they are still lurking around in the dark corners of dimly lit roads at midnight…

Déjà New

2011-12-26T17:41:00.002+05:30

It’s that time of the year again when we look back at the past and also wait for the future with shameless optimism, like things are drastically going to change as soon as we step into the new year. I am sure I am going to turn into Katrina Kaif, Anna Hazare is going to stop being annoying, Mamata Banerjee will be kidnapped by aliens and of course, Kapil Sibal will finally do what I have been hoping for a long time now: GET RID OF FACEBOOK!

But, just in case, all of these things do not happen AND the world also doesn’t come to an end, as a back-up plan (we pseudo bankers always have a Plan B, because we KNOW that our Plan A sucks), I do have a few things on my to-do list:

1.Watch more stand-up comedies. Yes, this weekend, I hit rock bottom (actually make it I had hit rock bottom long back, but this weekend it manifested itself in terms of sheer intellectual decay) and shelled out money to LAUGH. It felt so awesome. It’s like having a shrink, only better, because you also have alcohol…
2.Travel more. This year wasn’t too bad, but I wasted the first half of the year, because I was busy ‘focusing on my career’. 2012 will be about getting away more often…
3.Work on the book. I made a start this year, but got demotivated. So to keep myself consistently motivated, I am going to put up my boss’ picture as my wallpaper…
4.Run more often. Now that I live two minutes away from the park, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to come up with convenient excuses like “I shall get run over by a drunk truck driver” or “If God wanted me to run, he wouldn’t make me live in Mumbai”…
5.Read less trash. No matter how depressed I am, my one-night stands with Indian authors HAVE to end. I am old enough, smart enough and matured enough to have more satisfying and meaningful experiences which stay with me longer than my mood swings…

And no, I DO NOT aspire to have similar satisfying and meaningful relationships, I DO NOT aspire to lose weight and I definitely DO NOT aspire to find a job with a newspaper which pays me well, because let’s face it, there are some things, which even the new year can’t change.

As for 2011, I am quite happy the way the year turned out to be:

1.I changed two houses, set up my own place completely by myself and finally, I can claim that I have indeed grown up, irrespective of what my dad says.
2.At work, I joined a new company, set up a new team and it turned out to be quite a ‘success’, as ‘success’ is conventionally defined. I got appreciated, got an excellent rating and managed to hold my own, DESPITE being headstrong, stubbornly anti-establishment and at times downright RUDE to my boss.
3.I read extensively, traveled a bit, wrote a LOT (over 100 posts and some freelancing), explored new avenues like theatre, lit fest, Kala Ghoda festival and stand-up comedy, though I can never have enough of these.
4.I spent more time with my folks, something I hadn’t done enough in the past for whatever reasons.
5.I also helped India win the cricket World Cup (this one is self-explanatory).

On the downside, 2011 also meant being single in the true sense of the term, for the longest time ever, which also meant getting used to loneliness like I have never known before. The silver lining is that it doesn’t bother me anymore…

Welcome to the Working Week

2011-12-23T10:31:00.000+05:30

This time of the year is the best at least as far as work is concerned. In the two and a half years of corporate life, I have learnt a very important lesson: NEVER take leave during the last week of December because most people (including your boss) are on vacation which makes your life so much better. It’s like vacation without vacation and you wouldn’t want to waste your precious 21 days by taking a break around this time.

So a typical day at work for me around this time goes like this:

1.Come to work thirty minutes later than I usually do
2.Check emails, have coffee
3.Fiddle around on my blog
4.Take a breakfast break
5.Read newspaper editorials
6.Take coffee/bitching break
7.Read other people’s blogs
8.Take lunch break
9.Listen to Sada Haq at maximum volume to ignore the loud people around you and keep an excel sheet open, pretending to work
10.Take coffee/bitching break
11.Check out yatra/make my trip/cleartrip sites and plan vacations for next year
12.Make frustration noises as if you are neck deep in work
13.Check out snapdeal/timesdeal for a good bargain
14.Take coffee/bitching break
15.Read random articles online
16.Sigh and say “I am so tired” and go home

I like the ~~work~~ life-life balance, even though it’s shortlived…

It's a Long December...

2011-12-21T10:05:00.001+05:30

So this friend called me up randomly. He was in his super-peppy mood, which I so dislike.
-“Heyyy!! What’s up? What plans for new year?”
- Groan!!! “Why?”
-“Because we are all going partying.”
-“Can you be more specific, when you say, ‘we’?”
-“It includes you as well.”
-“Don’t you know by now that I DO NOT PARTY?”
-“You were so much cooler in college.”
-“I wasn’t. I just didn’t have better things to do.”
-“And now you do?”
-“I have to watch the India-Australia test match highlights.”
-“But aren’t you going to watch the live match as well?”
-"What’s your point?”
-“Come on!! The world is going to come to an end in 2012. This is your last chance to live it up.”
-“If it does come to an end and I am being very optimistic here, I assure you I have better things to do than party all night.”
-“Yeah, like watching highlights of test cricket.”

So that got me thinking. What IS it about this holiday season that gets everybody excited like Anna Hazare? What are we celebrating exactly? The end of a miserable year or the beginning of another?

Especially if you are in Mumbai, it’s a nightmare with the cramped space, the overcrowded dance floors, the toxic smell of smoke and alcohol AND being charged the entire bonus pool of my company this year for one night. Definitely not my idea of a ‘celebration’.

If I did have a chance, I would spend it differently, so so differently…

Emptiness

2011-12-19T15:35:00.004+05:30

This weekend we tried to be ‘cool’ and watch Mission Impossible 4… but secretly we were happy when we didn’t get the tickets and gleefully settled for Ladies vs Ricky Behl. I don’t know if the movie was really entertaining, or it’s just the fact that I am suffering from the trauma of watching a lot of bad films lately, but the truth is I quite enjoyed it.
Conclusion: I am NOT cool.

This weekend I tried to be ‘intellectual’ and read The Argumentative Indian. Instead, I spent the whole of Sunday curled up with Dilbert and the Way of the Weasel, laughing like I haven’t laughed in a long time.
Conclusion: I am NOT intellectual.

This weekend I argued with my dad because he refused to be supportive, logical and understanding. Instead, he proved that I am a sulking 3-year old with an attitude problem.
Conclusion: I am adopted.

This weekend I went back to my college photographs, trying to convince myself that I have grown up. Instead, I cried.
Conclusion: I have NOT grown up.

This weekend I decided NOT to get depressed over Christmas and New Year. Instead, I kept wishing that I could get away.
Conclusion: India-Australia Boxing Day match better be something special.

This weekend was empty… like most others

Hell Frezes Over

2011-12-16T10:16:00.001+05:30

This last week has been crazy at work, and by ‘crazy’, I don’t mean busy or hectic, I mean, ‘crazy’; literally!

So I have a new boss, who was visiting the India office and being the only ~~pretty~~ girl in the team, and no technical skills or expertise, I was the easy target for all the administrative duties: i.e. taking care of IT and access card issues, booking cabs, making restaurant reservations, dressing up and receiving him from the hotel. Sometimes you really wonder about the use of HR anyway. Now since I am perpetually in my ‘corporate world sucks’ mode, I do not invest in formal wear on principle and I also don’t have a car. So on such occasions, I find it rather embarrassing to dress up in my shabby clothes and enter a 5 star hotel in an auto (cabs don’t ply short distance in suburban Mumbai), sandwiched between luxury vehicles. The embarrassment reaches its peak when I am stopped at the main entrance by the security and a dog just walks inside the auto.

We also had long-winded meetings and they all lived up to the expectations of a successful meeting, i.e. wastage of man hours with no concrete results but a feeling of satisfaction. Now, one way to measure the success of a meeting is by counting the amount of meaningless jargon thrown at your face, while the other person is rambling on, operating under the illusion that he is making sense…

Jargon 1: This year we should sharpen our offerings to focus on more strategy/high-level projects.
What it means: This year, we don’t expect to have too many projects in the pipeline.

Jargon 2: We should evaluate our current subscriptions to the various databases and make the necessary adjustments.
What it means: We should start copying from new sources, as people have now figured out that our forecasts are really those of XYZ and ABC.

Jargon 3: We should avoid re-inventing the wheel and leverage the best practices already existing in the marketplace.
What it means: We don’t have budgets or expertise to introduce new innovations and therefore we should follow the herd.

Jargon 4: We should enhance our interactions with stakeholders and encourage them to take ownership of projects.
What it means: We can’t solve their problems; we can only PRETEND to care.

Jargon 5: India is a country rich in diversity and natural resources with an extremely young and dynamic workforce.
What it means: I don’t know the answer to your question, but please, please transfer me to the front end.

Hell has a new synonym; it’s called Knowledge Process Outsourcing…

It's Now Time...

2011-12-15T09:22:00.001+05:30

There are times when you just want to be angry…
There are times when you just want the other person to shut up…
There are times when you just want to stare at the menu card and ignore everybody…
There are times when you just want to feel wronged though noone agrees with you…
There are times when you just want to get up and leave…
There are times when you just want to point and laugh…
There are times when you just want to sulk and be left alone…
There are times when you just want to rant on the phone and expect the other person to LISTEN…
There are times when you just want to press the ‘send’ button on the long, strong mail sitting ugly in your draft folder…
There are times when you just want your dad to be more supportive and IMPROVE that long, strong mail and not the logical, rational PARENT that he is…

These are the times known as the year ends…

Who Let the Dogs Out?

2011-12-12T10:30:00.000+05:30

So the much ~~awaited~~ dreaded company annual party happened on Friday night at (the garage of) The Intercontinental. The food was awful, but obviously noone cared, because of the OPEN BAR and the home drop facility. The idea was to officially get all employees smashed. Now I have this peculiar drawback in my otherwise flawless character: I CAN NEVER GET DRUNK AT OFFICE PARTIES. I guess the sight of your boss in a red T shirt (don’t blame him, the dress code was red and black) takes all the fun out of the red wine. So there I was, holding my glass of orange juice and holding my breath simultaneously to tuck in the stomach flab, wishing I had listened to my mom, when she suggested I buy the dress in one size bigger. But no, I take pride in squeezing myself in the smallest size available, though I can barely breathe in it.

Anyhow, as the three of us took a stroll in the quiet, breezy lane outside the hotel, NOT NETWORKING, I was so glad that my happiness was not defined by the empty chitchat of senior people, the smoky dancefloor or the pungent smell of alcohol…

I was so glad that I was still untouched by this aspect of the corporate world…

I was so glad that I was still not completely consumed by Mumbai…

I was still me…

You Gotta Be (kidding me)

2011-12-09T10:51:00.003+05:30

I have always been a true blue GIRL, in every sense of the term. I don’t get a perverse pleasure running down women or their “annoying” habits like shopping, matching clothes/shoes/accessories, reading chicklit or watching demented movies/serials, because I DO ALL OF THOSE THINGS. And no, I don’t consider it “superior” to be a tomboy or being ‘one of the boys”. I am happy being slightly stuck-up, moderately shy, terribly moody and I don’t need to swear/smoke/drink/backslap/all of them together ‘to be different’.

Having said that, there are some things about women (no, let’s make it, most of the women I HAVE SEEN) which I don’t understand:

The washroom bonding: Why is it that in any public place, women tend to go to the washroom TOGETHER? Is there a scientific reason that automatically co-ordinates the physiological aspects when more than two women get together?

The changing room discussions: Why is it that women ALWAYS need a second opinion while shopping? If you look fat in that dress, you probably are. No friend waiting patiently outside the trial room can change the fact.

Elaborating minute details of personal lives: I totally subscribe to the ‘best friends forever’ and ‘sharing’ and ‘emotional support’ and all that jazz. But once you make me a part of your bedroom antiques on a daily basis, it makes me feel like I am in a threesome. Thanks but no thanks!

Spending ages on getting ready: I know we have long hair, lots of clothes which make it confusing to pick JUST ONE, make-up which we HAVE TO USE and shoes which DON’T GO WITH ANYTHING, but seriously, how long does it take to make up your mind? It’s NOT cute to be fashionably late when you are just trying to be fashionable.

The Wedding Fixation: How, I repeat how, can you think spending so much money, wasting so much time, taking so much trouble, going through painstaking planning for ONE SINGLE DAY is “all worth it because it’s THE MOST IMPORTANT DAY OF YOUR LIFE?” I mean HOW?

So men, don’t fret if you don’t understand women completely. I don’t either…

God of Small Things

2011-12-08T18:05:00.003+05:30

I thought there is no God...
I was wrong.
There IS a god, and his name is Virender Sehwag.

Clueless!

2011-12-07T09:41:00.001+05:30

This post is for all you “independent, successful, intelligent” power women who are secretly vulnerable, lonely and scared…

This post is for all you “vivacious, cheerful, witty” girls who howl away to glory for no apparent reason in the middle of the night when nobody is watching …

This post is for all you “strong, practical, no-nonsense” re-incarnations of Jane Austen who resort to the high-calorie chocolate ice-cream hidden in the deep dark corner of the refrigerator, nursing past memories…

This post is for all you “pretty, well-dressed, carelessly stylish” young ladies who lounge around in tattered polka dot pink pajamas weekend after weekend after weekend…

This post is for all of you who spend your weeknights watching re-runs of Sex and the City, guiltily binging on greasy takeaway food, simultaneously worrying about fitting into the body-hugging red dress for the Friday night party…

This post is for all the single women out there, especially those away from home, alone in a big city...

And no, this post is definitely NOT for me, because I would NEVER publicly own up to watching Sex and the City…

Maximum City

2011-12-05T10:50:00.000+05:30

Just when you are sick of this city, just when you think it has nothing more to give to you, just when you are pining for another vacation (it’s been almost a month since I got away, so yea, I am itching for a break), it opens up a new horizon just like that. I am talking about the first Times of India Literary Carnival held in the Mehboob Studio in Bandra.

I spent the whole of Sunday shuttling between Venue A and Venue B, the calendar in my pocket, excited like a schoolgirl. Now, thanks to my dad’s poor taste in friends, I have met a few of these CXO-type people, the who’s-who of the corporate world, and honestly, instead of being awed and inspired, I have always wondered what the big deal was. But yesterday, when I was faced with some of the eminent personalities in the field of journalism and literature, I felt a shiver down my back. True, I did stick out like a sore thumb despite my desperate attempt to blend in with my whole jeans-kurta-jhola-junk jewelry-generous dose of kohl get-up. This was an entirely new world and I was a wonderstruck kid trying to break into it, as I hung on to every word uttered on the podium by the likes of Bachi Karkaria, Vinod Mehta, Vikram Chandra, M J Akbar, Swapan Dasgupta, Jerry Rao, William Dalrymple to name a few. The only person I could identify with to some extent was Anuja Chauhan, the writer of the best-selling book, Zoya Factor (though I have no intentions to read it). After a long and successful career in advertising, she was also an outsider to this hallowed intellectual arena, as she sat perched up on the sofa, petite and confused, rarely opening her mouth (pretty much like me in most team meetings). It was only a sneak peek into my Garden of Eden, as I kept struggling to find the keys to it.

I also watched The Dirty Picture, the way it was meant to be watched: in a shady theatre on a Friday late night show, as we sat in the fourth row, right in front of the screen, amid rowdy men whistling each time Vidya Balan set the screen on fire (which was pretty much all the time). For a movie where the main cast was cleavage, Vidya Balan did manage to hold her own, albeit in the supporting role. Hats off to her for getting under the skin of the character, though the film was repetitive and tedious at most places.

And oh, I have a brand new 32” Sony LCD which has all these features that I have no intentions of using, but I got a good deal from a guy in Lamington Road, who knocked 20% off the MRP, and therefore I HAD TO HAVE IT, though I didn’t need it. Finally, to treat myself after all the hard work, I bought the most expensive pair of shoes EVER.
To think I spent so much on sports shoes… impulse purchases are so not worth it.

Anyway, now that I have a park close by, loads of eating joints right across the street, a TV AND a library membership, I just don’t have enough time to do all the things I want to do regularly: jog, read, write, eat out, watch back-to-back episodes of deranged serials. So I am seriously considering doing away with some of the excesses like WORK. Spending 10 hours everyday in that demented environment with people I don’t like doing things which doesn’t excite me is a sheer waste of time.

Time to set my priorities right...

Survivor!

2011-12-02T10:24:00.001+05:30

After three weeks of uncertainty, chaos and a LOT of phone calls, bargaining, arguing and new experiences, I have finally settled down at my new place. Well, almost. I am still pondering over which television to buy, but hopefully by this weekend, I shall make up my mind. Last night when I finally reached home, I felt a quiet sense of peace and achievement, when I looked around. I know, the house is old, the flooring is ugly and the elevator refuses to stop at the second floor (anyway I take the stairs, so doesn’t really make a difference). Still, this is the first home that I set up ALL BY MYSELF: right from sweet-talking the security guard, deciding which bed to buy, hanging up the curtains to choosing which pictures to put up in the hall. In the process, I did fall off the chair a couple of times (still got bruises on my left arm), I did visit the police station and I did miss out on my beauty sleep for quite some time. But, finally, it seems all worth it. I go to a park twice a day and my office/ bank/ dmart/ KFC/ Dominos/ Aromas/ a mall are all five minutes away…

In the process, I also saw gut-wrenching poverty, like REAL POVERTY: the pint-sized old woman who helped me clean the apartment or the emaciated labourers who moved my stuff. The advantage of growing up in a middle class family is you have the highest respect for dignity of labour and I don’t just mean lip service. So I didn’t have to think twice before I doubled up as the third labourer when the two fragile men struggled to carry the refrigerator up the stairs or cleaned up the bathroom, previously used by other people.

Obviously, my parents weren’t exactly thrilled with my adventures and found it very difficult to accept that their ONLY CHILD (note: now I am a CHILD, but when it comes to the marriage discussion, I am an old maid… talk about double standards) was “struggling so much”. They even felt guilty and helpless because they “couldn’t do anything to make it easier for me.”

But I assured them they had given me the greatest gift that any parent could possibly give their kids: EMPOWERMENT. As a kid, I was sometimes resentful that my folks ALWAYS made life difficult for me: no private tuitions, no maid to clean up after me, no car to drive me to school, no cell phones till I was in my 2nd year in college, limited pocket money and definitely no spoon-feeding. The most annoying part was they NEVER told me what to do: like ONE SINGLE COURSE OF ACTION. They would just give me options (clothes to buy, holiday destinations or even college major), explain the possible constraints and the consequences, but leave my young, inexperienced head to obsess over the final decision. More often than not, I would make the wrong choices (relationships included), and it was at those unexpected moments, that they would spoil me rotten when I least expected it.

Anyway, long story short, when I look at myself or my quaint little home, I feel like Barbie in her dollhouse, but a responsible one, who can take care of herself, irrespective of the circumstances.

Cop Killa

2011-12-01T18:04:00.005+05:30

There are three sets of people in Mumbai that I am still scared of despite so many years in the city: short-distance auto drivers, real estate brokers and most of all, the Mumbai Police. They are powerful and they are dangerous; almost dangerously powerful, because they know how important they are to the common man, and they are not shy of abusing their power for that extra buck or that extra bit of sadistic pleasure in harassing helpless people.

One of the main reasons I moved to my new place was because it allowed me to do away with two of these three sets of people, viz. the broker and the auto driver. But still, the local policeman had to be dealt with, and I was postponing the inevitable, because every time I thought of walking inside the Powai Police Station by myself and cajoling a slimy policeman to do HIS JOB, I chickened out. Usually administrative hassles like police verification for moving into a new house are handled by the broker, thus creating this broker-policeman nexus which is more complicated than calculus. However, since this time I had taken it upon myself to NOT avail of a broker’s services, the dirty work had to be done by me. To make things worse, our lease agreement wasn’t registered, which would give the policeman enough reasons to harass me. But, yesterday, when the society in-charge told me to get my police verification done immediately, I knew I had to get it over with.

After a night of worrying and tossing and turning, I got up in the morning as if I was about to appear for an interview in my dream company, armed myself with all the documents, practised the excuse for not having a registered agreement for the 100th time, dressed conservatively in a salwar suit and off I went for my first tryst with the Mumbai police. So far, my criminal activities have been limited to a legal suit by a certain telecom company and underage drinking.

I saw a couple of familiar brokers who went in before me, exchanged pleasantries with the police officer on duty and got his valuable signature under 30 seconds. But before I could break into my Aishwariya Rai-like giggle, it was my turn. I sat down nervously, and though I was trembling inside, I tried to maintain my composure. He addressed me in Marathi, I listened hard, nodded and smiled brightly, though I had no idea what he said. I handed him the papers, hoping he wouldn’t notice the unregistered agreement. But of course, he could smell a chance to make money like an I-banker can smell an opportunity of an unethical way to increase his bonus. I argued, I made a few calls to my landlord and most importantly, I persisted. After an hour and a half, he gave in, and finally I got what I was waiting for: the precious signature!

Now you know why women take so long to climax… the men just refuse to do the right things upfront.

More importantly, I DID NOT PAY HIM A SINGLE PENNY.

Smells like 'team' spirit

2011-11-30T17:38:00.002+05:30

Remember growing up on a heavy dose of family unity and melodrama churned out by the likes of Suraj Barjatya and Yash Chopra? No? Good! Neither do I. But I have heard that these are long sagas of endless artificially-created complications of usually very good looking, well-dressed and stinking rich people with nothing better to do in life. Throw in a dozen songs, a few action sequences and some exotic destinations and you have enough masala to keep a generation of extremely bored and jobless people entertained for half a day.

Now apply the same analogy to an offsite “team building event” organized by an investment bank. Replace the very good-looking, well-dressed and stinking rich people with many bespectacled, pot-bellied, semi-bald, jargon-spewing men, a handful of bespectacled, superior, efficient women and a ~~misunderstood~~ stupidly rebellious, ~~introverted~~ unsocial, ~~differently-enabled~~ misfit ME. And instead of exotic locations, take Khandala, instead of laboriously-composed Jatin-Lalit music, imagine repeated amateur renditions of Sutta and instead of testosterone-charged action sequences, consider some artificially designed “problems” which would “test our endurance, co-ordination, communication and teamwork”. Also, instead of Johnny Lever making funny faces, you have an old, retired colonel as your instructor who offers the adequate comic relief. And the lady with a fake accent as his sidekick can best be described as Katrina Kaif in any movie.

I have always thought teamwork and group activities to be unnecessarily hyped. If you think about it, things get done much slower when there are more people involved: parliament, judiciary, meetings, which is why I have always been more productive when I am working on my own. But no, HR has this obsessive compulsive need to prove that ALL employees belong to this one happy family which results in these completely pointless events. While my friend (let’s call her s2, s1 being me) and I kept our participation to the minimum level, we could not escape the ordeal of being put through a day of “fun activities” as we kept grappling for the “fun” part. We dealt with the situation in a matured grown-up way: SWITCHED ON OUR HEADPHONES…

Quite a long way to go before we become the teary-eyed Karishma Kapoor suffering in quiet dignity…

She's Leaving Home

2011-11-25T10:11:00.005+05:30

Tonight is the last night at my current ~~house~~ home. I just loved this place, even though it signified the larger part of my life this year: loneliness, independence and a tinge of nostalgia. But I did learn a lot here: I managed to learn cooking, I managed to run a house by myself, I managed to keep it in shape without a maid and most of all, I learnt to sleep alone and live alone without getting scared.

And somewhere in between, I also learnt to become a decent host and throw some alcohol parties though most of the credit will go to my friends who came with very little expectations.

After everything I had been through, this house was just what I needed: quiet, peaceful, uncomplicated: Far enough to get away from all the bitterness, close enough to avoid the Mumbai peak hour traffic.

I will miss my long walk back home everyday from work which helped me to switch off while I listened to music…

I will miss the calm Sunday evenings, sitting by the window, sipping coffee and reading…

I will miss the long phone calls in the middle of the night, unable to fall asleep after that, as I stared out at the dimly lit Eastern Express Highway…

I will miss my enthusiasm while preparing the “most awesome chicken curry”, which would quickly get dismissed “as bland hospital food” by a certain Jehadi brother…

Most of all, I will miss being a neighbour to the certain Jehadi brother, who surprised me with his kindness, who moved my stuff and set up my kitchen, who listened as I cried on his shoulder, who sat there in my hall binge drinking with me, who wheeled me to the hospital when I got hit by a bike and who, most recently, annoyed me at lunch…

I so hate change, especially the kind which makes me more lonely, more independent and more cold…

Material Girl

2011-11-21T11:08:00.003+05:30

I have always been scared of commitment: the very word screams of PERMANENCE, which scares me and hence I have avoided renting an unfurnished flat so far. I just want that flexibility to get up one day, pack up my bags and MOVE. But a few months back I was forced to buy a refrigerator because the old, rented one gave in. While that was a big step for me, it also made me realize the joy of possession, the excitement of buying something new which is MINE (not my parents’, landlord’s, flatmate’s or broker’s) and the satisfaction of doing it all by myself.

Which is why, I decided to take up an unfurnished apartment (it was also financially more feasible) and do it up myself, adding my own creative touches. Obviously, the first step was to buy furniture.

So this is how you go about it:

1.Research, research, research, so that you know your options and price ranges for both second-hand and new furniture. There is a reason why your company provides you with high speed internet access. USE IT.
2.On the day of furniture hunting, wear your shabbiest clothes (or look like a tramp as my dad describes me) and DO NOT shampoo your hair.
3.Go to the shady lanes next to the railway station which sell second hand stuff, haggle with them, but don’t buy. Move on to a proper store right next to the second hand shops which has new furniture and innocently ask if they have cheap used stuff.
4.Use your natural qualities to your advantage: in my case, I look like a school girl, lost and confused in a big city, which is why shopkeepers assume that I am a student looking for the cheapest alternative. Obviously, I don’t correct them. There are places to flash your MNC badge, but the roadside furniture store isn’t one.
5.Tell them you are planning to share an one bhk flat with three other people, which clearly establishes your financial limitations AND explains why you need a four-door wardrobe (it’s embarrassing to admit the number of clothes I have).
6.Tell them you want to buy EVERYTHING from them, if only they had it second hand.
7.The kindly shopkeeper offers to sell you new stuff at extremely reasonable rates AND agrees to buy it back (in case you want to sell) after a couple of years at half-price, when you presumably “finish your studies”.
8.Use ‘thank you’ and ‘bhaiya’ (but NOT ‘uncle’) at regular intervals and smile brightly.
9.You walk out with a neat quotation for a double bed, double-door cupboard, divan, side table and centre table, to be delivered at your doorstep, all within your budget (i.e. the money you saved from brokerage)
10.Most importantly, IT’S NOT PERMANENT. You can give it back to them and get some money back.

I am moving. Hence more excrutiating details to follow. Live with it.

Black Swan

2011-11-18T10:04:00.001+05:30

My MBA gradesheet shows that I have majored in Finance (which also explains my huge number of backlogs), but somehow I am ashamed of that fact (not the backlogs, the Finance major). I find it so much cooler to say “I specialized in general management”, which is a polite way of saying, “actually I fooled around in my MBA.” I could still get away with it in Company D, but when you join an I-Bank and say, “Oh I am a right brained person”, people look at you like you are Paris Hilton.

And it doesn’t help when you sit right in front of the Equity Research team. As soon as the markets open, everybody gets excited as if Aishwariya Rai just gave birth to a baby. All kinds of alien jargon like “rally”, “short sell”, “stop loss”, “option trading” are thrown around by people (why is it mostly men?) and the next half an hour would be spent on the geek’s version of locker room discussions, i.e. vomiting the contents of the Economic Times they just memorized on their way to work. Male bonding amazes me at times…

No, I am NOT passionate about the markets and no, I do not trade, but that doesn’t mean I am not human. I may not get orgasms comparing the P/E valuations of different companies, but I also have feelings. Every time someone at work asked me, “So where are you investing these days?” like an innocent, truthful person, I would say, “Actually I let my dad handle my investments”. Over time, I have noticed that this honest admission leads people to treat me like Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man.

But thankfully, I have discovered some sane people (all of them women) on the floor with whom I can take coffee breaks and discuss the Kardashian sisters, travel destinations and other people’s shallow tastes.

At times, you wonder if there is indeed a valid reason for stereotypes…

Struggling Writer Turns Struggling Broker

2011-11-16T09:28:00.004+05:30

When I was a kid… I wanted to be a globe trotter
When I started reading… I wanted to be a private investigator
When I began to follow cricket…I wanted to be a cricket commentator
When I was trying to fit in… I wanted to be an engineer
When I didn’t get admission in engineering… I wanted to be an Economist
When I read Education Times… I wanted to be a MBA
When I was in B school… I wanted to be… ummm… EMPLOYED (2009 batch, remember?)
When I joined a consulting firm… I wanted to be a banker
When I joined an investment bank… I wanted to be a writer
When I failed as a writer… I TURNED INTO A REAL ESTATE ‘CONSULTANT’

Yes, ladies and gentleman, I have finally found my calling. How could I NOT see it? How could I be so blind as to not notice it when it was RIGHT THERE? How could I be so FOOLISH?

So far, I was kidding myself that I am a ‘gifted’ writer; the obscurity was only temporary and it just added to the romanticism of a struggling author who was waiting for the eventuality of being ‘discovered’; and one day some publisher/newspaper would just call me up out of the blue and announce that “You are the next big thing in Indian literature and we would like to make an offer that you cannot refuse. You can sit at home and make a living out of writing.”

But no, I have finally woken up to the reality… I am not supposed to be a writer (that’s just a temporary distraction) but my true calling lies in real estate, more specifically, central suburban Mumbai real estate.

So I have been in Powai for two and a half years now, during which I have changed four houses. I have dealt with different kinds of brokers, societies and owners, I have had lunches/coffee with them, I have whizzed on bikes at all hours with them and on any given festival, the brokers are ALWAYS the first to wish me. Even at work, every time someone new joins, he/she is directed to me as I am the in-house broker who has the real estate market in Powai at her fingertips.

On that note, I embarked on a new challenge, i.e. finding a house WITHOUT a broker, and preferably one close to work so that I don’t face rejection from a dozen haughty auto drivers every morning. And yes, I walked into the building right opposite my office in the middle of Hiranandani, made small talk with the security guard, charmed my way into an empty second floor apartment, got hold of the landlord’s phone number and in 20 minutes, I had a deal: a decent one at that, WITH NO MIDDLEMAN milking me for his services.

(note to self: always wear a salwar kameez, preferably with a bindi while embarking on a house hunt)

Admittedly the house is not as nice or as spacious (even by Mumbai standards) as my current one, but the location more than makes up for it. Now I can go home for a quick nap in the afternoon, go for a jog in the park close by, admire from outside the dozen expensive eating joints right opposite my house and tell people that I live in Hiranandani. That’s like poor man’s Bandra, and while it makes no difference to my life, my ~~friends~~ anon can no longer make fun of me, saying that I live in “Chindi Valley” or “Kanjoos Marg”. Most importantly, I DO NOT HAVE A SLIMY BROKER TO DEAL WITH…

Say hello to the new broker in town...

Homecoming

2011-11-14T12:21:00.007+05:30

I assure you this weekend was more than just going back to college, meeting the same set of people, talking about the same stories for the hundredth time, going for a sleepy LONG drive to Mulshi dam, drinking, having breakfast at Café Good Luck, lunch at Blue Nile, high tea at Chaitanya and dinner at Mezza9.

It was also about suffering a slow death inflicted by Nargis Fakhri. Katrina Kaif, take a bow. You have competition. Who said, you can’t act?

Now, as a group, we are very diverse. We have very different personalities, tastes and opinions, which is why it takes us at least 30 minutes to reach a consensus, even on simple things like in what order we should use the loo. The process can go on for over two hours if it involves critical issues like, say, how to have fun, because we can’t even decide on a common DEFINITION of fun. But Rockstar achieved what nobody else had ever managed: instant agreement.

Anyway, moving on, the trip reminded us of the old days, the carefree life, the little things that made the two years so special. But it also confirmed something which we already suspected, i.e. certain things/people never change:

Like the awesomeness of the bun maska/baked beans on toast/scrambled eggs at Good Luck, the Patiala lassi and parantha at Chaitanya and the joy of ravishing daal chawal at 1 a.m. after four hours of binge drinking…

Like repetition of the same jokes which still manages to bring a smile on your face…

Like huddling over the laptop to watch old videos and snaps and randomly hugging each other…

Like revisiting every corner of the college and trying to recreate the same memories: sitting on the swing where we had our ‘deep conversations in the dark’, crowding around in front of the Sweety Stores (only it’s now called the Rangoli Stores), arranging ourselves in the exact order in which we used to sit/sleep in the classroom (Room No. 307) or sitting opposite the canteen by the Zenia flowerbed (the guys arguing over who gets to face the girl’s hostel)…

Like barging into Room No. 213 (the hostel room we shared) and squealing like excited schoolgirls as we posed for random pics (me cursing ‘my’ wardrobe by the door)…

Like the guys taking care of us (booking cabs, buying tickets, food and alcohol, arranging mattresses and pillows, making tea and waking us up in the morning) while we let them…

But then, we also noticed the differences: like getting older, getting married, talking about bosses/investments/property/family, tiring more easily and slowly giving in to mundane mediocrity…

As I tossed and turned on a rented mattress, I found myself a little less impulsive, a little less spontaneous, a little less uninhibited and a tad more scared than I was two years back…

Good Riddance (time of my life)

2011-11-11T10:04:00.001+05:30

There are reunions, and then there are REUNIONS. The first one implies the formal alumni meet organized by your college strategically timed (during summer/final placements) so that the college can hand out colourful and badly edited (trust me, I worked in the Corpcomm team; I know how we made these pamphlets) placement brochures in the hope that some bigshot alumni will be charitable and nostalgic enough to “give something back to the college”. The alumni, on the other hand, with nothing better to do on a Saturday night, will turn up for the free food and the booze, in the hope of networking and passing around business cards, while comparing their cars/houses/size of… (I was going for bank balance, you dirty-minded losers). Thankfully, I haven’t attended any such meets (except as a student, when I was there to hand out the colourful, badly edited pamphlets).

But this weekend, we are going to Pune for the REUNION, which implies that our small but extremely confused group of 10 people (the other three spoilsports apparently have better things to do and I am jealous of them) are going to get back together to mourn over the misfortune that hit them four years back, when they met in Div B. The idea is to revisit college life, i.e. do all the stupid things we used to do, get drunk at the same place, watch the cheap morning show movie at the same theatre and generally try to go back to the past on a very expensive time machine ride. If you ask me, it’s just the desperation of a few OLD members, pushing thirty, trying to hold on to their youth.

Anyway, as much as I tried to get out of it, I couldn’t think of enough creative excuses, and hence I have reluctantly agreed to spend my otherwise happening (yes, I can never get enough of cooking/cleaning/washing/doing laundry/reading/watching marathon episodes of BBT) weekend in the most unpleasant way: meeting people who got on my nerves for two years, getting drunk, dressing up, staying up and discussing the same old stories about college life.

The sacrifices you have to make for family… oh yea, they are like family (remember, you can choose your friends, but not your relatives)

Purani Jeans all over again… time to buy a new pair?

Fatherisms

2011-11-09T10:10:00.001+05:30

A couple of days back, there were some disturbing changes in my team, none of which I liked. Let me rephrase: all of which I HATED. So I did what my instinct told me to, i.e. call up my dad and whine.

Me: Dad, I have a problem.
Dad: Only one? Aren’t you being too optimistic?

One other recent conversation…

Dad: I think you should get married.
Me: Do you want me to be happy OR married?
Dad: Either way, it doesn’t matter. But I want your mom to be happy and myself to be happily married. So till you get married, she won’t be happy, and till she is happy, I won’t be happily married. It’s about me, not you.

Another not-so-recent conversation…

Me: Do you know XYZ paid Rs. 20 lacs for his son’s education abroad? You are so lucky you never had to invest anything in MY education.
Dad: Is that your excuse for being uneducated?

This time a consultant is at the receiving end…

Consultant: Sir, given our current pipeline and bandwidth along with the demands of the urgent deliverables, I guess we can come up with a timeline for the actionable granularities regarding our end-to-end services as well as our value proposition. I shall bring my manager up-to-speed on this and give you a heads-up as soon as the project gets traction at our end so that we can circle back around and close the loop on the next steps.
Dad: Call me when you learn to speak English. If I can’t understand you, I won’t hire you.

And then the boss…

Boss: Can you please write the CEO speech for the Press Conference?
Dad: Err… but aren’t you the CEO?
Boss: Yeah, but I am a little tied up.
Dad: In your left brain.
Boss: What?
Dad: Nothing. Sometimes I forget you are an IIT engineer. I shall take care of the speech.

About a Boy

2011-11-07T10:36:00.001+05:30

So once upon a time, I turned three and started going to school. There I met a boy, who was made to sit next to me (if I remember correctly, he was kicking and screaming and wasn’t too happy about it). The boy also happened to live in the same locality as I did. After the initial phase of sulking and ignoring, he gave in and accepted me as a part of his daily life, at least for the next one year, till we were promoted to Nursery II. And obviously, the cute, charming and hilarious little girl that I was, he soon became my friend. Or may be because I was the smallest in class, he found it easy to bully me. Before we knew it, he had given me all sorts of nicknames (none of them flattering), but he shared his lunch with me, so all was ok. We even started hanging out AFTER school, and being in the same locality meant we would also play together in the evenings, and get to know each other’s parents/friends.

Now, he was much smarter than I was, but he had terrible handwriting. And he was lazy. He wouldn’t pay attention in class, he wouldn’t take down notes and every evening, his mom would come to our house, and with a hassled look, borrow my notebook. So while I was an average student, he was a slightly below average student, purely going by marks. We had this perfect quid pro quo: I helped him with my notes and he made me laugh. Of course, I was hanging out with all HIS friends, and NO girl in class would even speak to me. I didn’t miss much…

By the fourth standard, he had decided he wanted to be a forest officer, while I had decided I wanted to marry “someone exactly like him”. Not him, because he was my best friend, but someone identical. But then we went to junior high and then high school. I was now starting to hang out with girls, and before I knew it, he started dating one of my friends. Suddenly I was this studious (I had to be an engineer you see), bespectacled kabab mein haddi who wasn’t welcome any more. So I studied harder and became fatter.
Anyhow, 12th standard was a mess thanks to organic chemistry, calculus and physics and my dream of being an engineering graduate in a reputed IT company in Kolkata was dashed to pieces. So my mom would often call the boy and ask him to cheer me up, the boy would bring me ice-cream and explain complicated Physics equations to me. Also, for the first time, the boy scored more marks than I did and went to a good college in Kolkata, while I had to “settle for” an Arts degree in Mumbai.

After that I am not quite sure what happened. The boy tried very hard to screw up his life and he almost succeeded. The worst part was I was no longer allowed to be a part of his life. My calls went unanswered and every time I landed up unannounced at his place, he wouldn’t meet me. So I lost my best friend, and after a point I gave up trying (too easily perhaps).

Until yesterday. When the boy called me out of the blue, I couldn’t believe it. Seven years lost in between, and we still spoke like we used to. He called me some of those unflattering nick names he had christened me with some twenty years back. But for a change, I was happy…

I have no memory of him as an adult, but the picture of the restless, naughty, tongue-in-cheek schoolboy is as vivid as it was two decades ago.

Every Dog has its Day

2011-11-04T09:51:00.003+05:30

Last weekend was sort of a landmark for India, especially Delhi. What with the Metallica concert on Friday and the inaugural Indian Grand Prix, just following Diwali, it was quite an occasion… for the airlines and the hotel industry.

So we all know what happened to the Metallica concert and we also know how successful the Grand Prix turned out to be (bit of a salvation after the tainted CWG event). The obvious question is why am I writing about it AFTER one week? For a wannabe journalist, I am wayyy too slow.

No, my intention is NOT to debate/argue/discuss who should be blamed for the cancellation of the concert or if we need a luxury like hosting a F1 event in a poor country (incidentally, if we are talking about criminal waste of money in a state like U.P., Mayawati’s Rs. 685-crore memorial park is probably a better starting point). Of course, another interesting observation was that there were hardly any takers for the India-England one-day series, tipped to be a ‘revenge series’ for the World Champions, as for the first time, I saw empty stands in the Eden Gardens, something which was considered almost blasphemous when I was growing up. Good thing is we won. The bad thing: nobody cared. May be that’s why we won. Our ~~men~~ boys in blue perform better when there is less pressure.

Anyway, I am rambling. Some old habits (like trying to get a word in, even when I have no value to add, amid ten screaming powerful voices in a GD) die hard. The advantage of blogging is nobody interrupts me as soon as I say, “To add to that” or “I agree with you but…”

I just have a simple question: WHY IS THAT DOG SO FAMOUS?

The funny part was the odds on a dog running on to the track and interrupting the inaugural Indian Grand Prix were priced at 100-1. Bookies don’t leave any stones unturned, do they? Or any Pakistani cricketer, for that matter. That’s a different story altogether…

Of Mice and Men

2011-11-03T10:38:00.005+05:30

Lately I have noticed that Flipkart was enjoying my salary more than I was (as it is, my landlord and various creditors receive a major chunk of it), since I was buying a lot of books: mostly forgettable ones which I laboured through and would probably never pick up again. As much as I love Flipkart, I love myself more, and these are tough times (my bank has again announced further job cuts).

So I did the smartest thing ever since I convinced my mom NOT to buy the IIT entrance exam form in class XII because it would simply be a waste of money. I became a member of a library after spending a very pleasurable lunch hour browsing through its vast collection. Now for a mere 150 bucks a month, I can borrow upto 30 books, and knowing the kind of person I am, I would probably give up eating, sleeping and working just to utilize my full quota of 30 books, even if I don’t enjoy them. It also means that I can read all the trashy stuff I have always wanted to but was too ashamed to own permanently.

This also explains why I called in sick at work yesterday so that I could stay home and READ. Now readers of this blog (all five and a half of you) would know that I try very hard to portray myself as this “deep, intellectual and matured” reader: look at my reading list on the right sidebar or the books I talk about on the blog, and you would think of me as someone with a “refined taste” who only reads classics/critically acclaimed books/ books featuring in the BBC Top 100 list. While I do like all the books I claim to like, the unpleasant truth that I have never admitted so far is that for every “good” book I read, I also read at least 10 “mainstream, trashy, intellectually stunted, shallow books”, after which I end up feeling slightly cheated (not by Flipkart, but by the “author”).

Now, one such popular book which I didn’t particularly like was Karan Bajaj’s “Keep off the Grass” which I read while I was in my 2nd year of MBA. Yes, I was young, and at that age we all experiment and make mistakes. Other people in college were falling in love and I was just flirting with new-age “Indian literature”. Anyway, after reading it, I was not tempted to pick up his second book, “Johnny Gone Down”. But now, two years later, when the librarian informed me that the book I was looking for (D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover) was in circulation and would take a day to be available again, I had to settle for an overnight breezy read (remember my 30-book resolution) and so I picked up Johnny for a one-night-stand, with very little expectations. And I never thought I would admit this on a public forum, but I ACTUALLY LIKED ~~HIM~~ IT. I don’t know if it was the Ivy-league educated guy’s brush with a whole new world, very different from the cushy corporate rat race charted out for him, or the one-armed man’s struggle for survival or simply the vivid descriptions of the places I dream of visiting someday: Khmer Rouge and Rio de Janeiro. The wit was sharp, the story, despite the over-the-top elements, was engaging, and most of all, it did not degenerate to the ridiculous levels of melodrama. It laughed at itself, before the readers could do so. Like the author himself admits, new-age Indian writers are like the Rakhi Sawants of entertainment. The point is, it’s an insult to Rakhi Sawant and not the writer.

Oh screw it, I just liked it because the protagonist was my kinda guy: morally corrupt, financially broke, adventurous, impulsive and running after things just because ‘they felt right’ and getting himself into a bigger hole each time, instead of milking his MIT degree to settle into a comfortably ~~numb~~ boring life ‘with a sweet pregnant Indian wife’.

Urban Jungle

2011-10-31T10:35:00.004+05:30

For a change, this weekend I did the “cool stuff" that you are supposed to do if you are in Mumbai: like dressing up, going to Bandra and spending one hour sweating in the traffic just to travel from Bandstand to Carter Road to Pali Hill. If that wasn’t being a “happening” Mumbaiite, we also had dinner at a nice-sounding place with very expensive alcohol. But of course, the climax was the 11:30 3-D show of Ra.One! No, I would not like to waste blogspace articulating what I thought of the movie, but let’s just say, I would have loved it if it remained a video game and did not inflict excruciating pain on the audience by turning into a “movie”. Even Ravan would be turning in his grave after this mockery of anti-heroes. Anyway I guess these days there are two kinds of movies: good movies and movies which make money, and unfortunately 50 percent of the reigning Khans of Bollywood are ONLY making movies for money. Now I am having recurrent nightmares of Ra.Two…

For a change, I also became this social person and visited my relatives (don’t you just love Mumbai for its lonnnng distances between places which always provide you with excuses to not meet people you don’t want to). After sitting through a two-hour discussion on death, diseases and failed marriages (I am not implying any correlation among the three completely separate topics), I was finally rewarded with the elaborate spread I had been eyeing ever since I entered the house: indeed, there is a reward for patience, and who am I to refuse a reward this delicious?

For a change, I also decided to pay attention to company policies and got my annual health screening done. Now I have always been a strict believer of ignorance being bliss. If I was carrying some deadly disease, I preferred not to know about it, even if the knowledge came for free. That would only reduce my life expectancy further. Besides, repeatedly having my blood sucked out of me or peeing in the cup or having strangers (even if they were doctors) feel me up wasn’t my idea of a perfect Sunday. But it turned out to be quite an experience: if you are a single woman in India and opt for certain tests (even if it’s because they are free), it gets the hospital authorities all hot and bothered, reaching out for all kinds of consent forms and asking all kinds of concerned questions that only make you laugh. If it wasn’t so regressive, it would actually be funny…

After so much of uncharacteristic activities, I restored some sanity by reading this year’s Man Booker Winning novel, “The Sense of an Ending” by Julian Barnes. Thankfully, all award winning books are not all hype. Or may be, this one struck a chord because I identified with the sheer mediocrity of the protagonist. There is some comfort in the story of an ordinary, unimaginative, conventional, slightly coward guy with dysfunctional relationships and all the human insecurities and imperfections.

There is comfort in other people’s shortcomings…

The Lil Brother Who Grew Up

2011-10-28T09:54:00.003+05:30

So did you have a happy diwali? Did you dress up? Did you burst a lot of crackers and light a lot of diyas? Did you eat a lot of sweets?

Surprisingly enough I also had a good time. I got dressed up (is it my imagination or does the mirror play tricks when you wear traditional wear), I had awesome seafood (Bombay Duck is a fish by the way) and LOTS of chocolates, and I spoke to a few people.

But this post is about my my newly-employed, first-time-out-of-home kid brother. Now growing up with ten cousin brothers is no mean feat, let me tell you that. When I was not getting bullied, I was busy trying to fit in and not get dismissed as “oh she is a girl! She can’t play soccer or she can’t bat or she can’t climb up that wall.” Alright, may be I COULDN’T play soccer (I was a decent enough goalie though) or bat (someone should be in the field doing the dirty work right?) but I DID CLIMB UP THE WALL faster than any of those big fat bullies. Anyhow, just because it’s bhai fota today, doesn’t mean I am going to vent all my childhood frustrations.

But this brother was always special and I spoilt him rotten. Every year when I would visit him, I would save up my allowance and buy him ice-cream or video games or one of those useless things that teenage boys are crazy about. Every year, we would disappear for hours, going for long walks and then when he started driving, for long drives, when the crowd at home would be desperately looking for us. Being the shortest in the family, he was the only one who restored my self-respect, because at 18, I was taller than the pint-sized 13-year old boy. Unfortunately, that changed soon enough, and while I remained the shortest in the family, he grew up to be a strapping young man, head boy in his school, captain of his football team and most recently, placecom lead in his college. Besides being a computer geek, a car/bike enthusiast, he also cooks awesome and plays the guitar better than anybody I know. He knows how to live life king-size while I TRY to teach him the merits of frugality. But most of all, he has been my best friend in the last few years, who confides in me and vice-versa. From arguing over Sachin Tendulkar vs. Mohammed Azharuddin, we moved on to arguing about which one of my boyfriends sucked the most. And oh, unlike many grown men, he actually knows how to make a long-distance, childhood relationship work. So yes, he is the epitome of the “perfect guy”, and at times like this, I really miss him.

Apart from that, I struggled to finish a booker-winning novel, and finally accepted that may be it’s alright if I don’t understand why a certain book won critical acclaim, instead of ploughing through one painful chapter after another, trying to find a reason. So I pulled out old boxes, located “The Last Lecture” (thanks to the sixth reader of this blog) and finished it in one evening. And after a long long time, a book managed to reduce me to tears, and these days, that doesn’t happen too often…

Diwali Dampener

2011-10-25T08:52:00.004+05:30

I always had a sneaking suspicion that I was a loser, but now I have proof!!! So apart from everything else that is wrong with my life (stark staring singledom for over a year, a job that only gets worse by the day and a book that refuses to get moving by itself, if you leave out the other macro factors like inflation, recession, corruption) there is also Diwali.

I don’t know whose “bright" idea it was, but I think it’s a completely useless festival. I came up with this illuminating hypothesis when I switched OFF the lights in the washroom at work and walked home by myself. The roads were empty, but the whole of Hiranandani was lit up like we were in a developed country with ample power supply. Add to that the waste on diyas, crackers, gifts, sweets and two days of holiday, and it runs the risk of being the most senseless event right up there with the IPL.

This morning again, as I walked into my office, all decorated in ugly rangolis, I switched ON the washroom lights, wondering why I even bothered to go home. Oh, TO CHANGE from ONE OVERPRICED NEW OUTFIT TO ANOTHER.

On that note, happy diwali, if you are reading that is. Why should you get to enjoy a long vacation when I can’t?

Sunday with Morrie

2011-10-24T09:57:00.003+05:30

It was a pretty awful lonely weekend. Everybody seems to be going home for the festive season, while I am stuck here in this godforsaken city, working like a maniac. I was planning a solo trip to Ajanta Ellora during Diwali, but had to cancel it because of work.

I am so sick of the computer screen that I decided to spend the weekend doing something completely self-indulgent, and yes, away from the screen.

Of course, there is nothing more uplifting than SHOPPING! So yea, I spent a very satisfying five hours in the mall, buying completely unnecessary stuff at prices I can’t afford. Dear showrooms, DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT assume for a moment, that just because it’s Diwali, you can fool people into buying overpriced clothes for sentimental reasons. I was completely aware that the dress I bought wasn’t worth the price tag, but still I bought it, well, because I WAS DEPRESSED. Anyway no regrets. At least I can look pretty at work while I sift through slide after slide of gibberish. Not that it matters; almost the entire floor is on leave but still I like the smell of new clothes on me.

More importantly, I did a LOT of reading these two days. What with the assassination of Gaddafi and my complete ignorance about the dictator’s whims and fancies, I had a lot to catch up on. At times like this, I do appreciate why my dad calls me UNEDUCATED. Besides, for a change I read a good book. Lately I had been reading a lot of junk dished out by Indian ‘writers’ (because someday I aspire to dish out similar junk), so I had almost forgotten how it felt to read a really good book. Thankfully, this weekend, I found one. “Tuesdays with Morrie” is no highbrow literary masterpiece, but it sure is a breezy read with just about the right sprinkling of humour, philosophy and candour. And oh, before the book became a worldwide success, it was rejected by several publishers and one went as far as to declare that the author didn’t know how to write a memoir! So I guess there is one thing common among publishers across geographies: STUPIDITY!

“Don’t let go too soon, but don’t hold on too long”… as you say, Morrie Sir!

TGIF... Really?

2011-10-21T09:53:00.001+05:30

I have been staring at the screen for over 60 hours this week: vacant, blank, empty. My eyes are lined with dark circles, my head hurts and my body aches. I have work piled on my ~~desk~~ email, and I am completely lost. It’s Friday (and I have no plans, except that I do know I have to work late and fill up the damn year-end appraisal form), next week it’s Diwali and yet, I am as far away from the festive season as I could possibly be.

What happened to those Friday nights when we would brave the Mumbai traffic and local trains just to go to HRC or ogle the Bandra crowd?

What happened to those Friday nights when we would have all the enthusiasm in the world to dress up at 10:00 in the evening and go for the latest movie on the first day itself, irrespective of how bad the movie was? (ajab prem ki ghazab kahani anyone?)

What happened to those Friday nights when we would rush straight to the bar from work (to take advantage of the last 30 minutes of the happy hour) with me cribbing about the huge laptop bag and the shabby outfit?

What happened to those Friday nights when we would just stay at home, watch Friends and kick off our weekend pizza marathon?

What happened to the kohl-rimmed eyes, the high heels and that transparent shade of lip gloss?

What happened to the uninhibited laughter?

What happened to me?

Three Wise Men

2011-10-19T10:19:00.003+05:30

Some of the most famous and talented people passed away recently, and they were relatively young as well: Pataudi, Steve Jobs, Jagjit Singh…

They were all achievers in their own right, they all touched a lot of lives, and each of them made a huge difference in their respective fields. Sure I have never seen Pataudi play, but I have heard about his charismatic leadership qualities as well as his regal presence in the field. Being a completely technologically challenged person, my exposure to Steve Jobs has been limited to using the i-pod and listening to his presentations during the launch of a new product. As for Jagjit Singh, one of my biggest regrets is that I never saw a live concert of his, even though some of his songs are forever etched in my ~~mind~~ i-pod.

They all seemed invincible at their peak: the world at their feet, enthralling people with sheer genius, touched by the magic wand of success, glamour and fame. Every little kid had a poster of them by their bed, inspiring them to dream of making it big as they went to sleep. They taught us that obstacles were just minor distractions, if you were passionate enough, if you worked hard enough, if you wanted something bad enough. If Pataudi could do it with one eye, if Jagjit Singh could continue performing despite a tragic personal loss or if Jobs could do it without a college degree, surely there was something more to success than conventional wisdom.

They gave us a reason to be mad, an excuse to be impulsive, the courage to follow our dreams, the nerve to stay foolish despite failing repeatedly.

They taught us to LIVE, even if they died young…

Message in a Bottle

2011-10-17T11:22:00.001+05:30

This is an alcohol post… pure, unadulterated, shaken but not stirred, though it does stir up quite a lot of memories!

Now people who know me well will vouch for the fact that I am an occasional drinker, who, can at max hold five (at times as little as two and a half) drinks. Anything more than that, then beware of your car/home/clothes, because I can throw up on any of them. And that too, as my dad aptly says, like all other things (meaning guys), I have very immature taste in alcohol as well and his isolated attempts to help me acquire the taste of whisky or red wine have fallen flat. Me, I prefer to stick to my breezers/ vodka/ gin/ tequila/ LIT/ margarita and the occasional sex on the beach (the cocktail).

Over the years, I can confidently say that alcohol is one thing that has stood by me thick and thin, in the hardest of times as well as the happiest of days.

My tryst with alcohol started in high school, when as a seventeen-year-old, I was pining for my “best friend” who was leaving the city for good and we drowned ourselves in an entire bottle of port wine kept in the fridge and then filled it up with water. Ahh… “love”, separation and alcohol make for a lethal hangover…

My initial days in Bombay were pretty mundane, when I was this sincere, demure ~~career-oriented~~ CAT-oriented girl, “who did not want to let her parents down or misuse the trust vested in her” (my mom’s words, not mine). So for three years, I just studied, topped my exams, took CAT classes, discovered the joys of roadside shopping and street food, without giving in to peer pressure to party. Thankfully, I never felt I was missing something, as I watched sloshed girls sneaking into the hostel from the safety of my 8/8 room. May be the watchful eyes of my religious Muslim roomie who prayed twice a day and stayed away from all the ‘vices’ kept me in my senses…

But soon, I was working (after failing to crack CAT in my first attempt) and then I decided enough was enough. Being “good” and “responsible” was getting me nowhere AND my above-mentioned “best friend” was now moving to the States which meant our occasional phone calls and annual Kolkata meets would also come to an end. Now that I had a little money, it was time to “misuse the freedom and trust vested in me” by my parents. So the next year, I really “discovered” all that Bombay is famous for. The vodkas and the LITs poured in, affections were showered, the music became louder, the nights longer and the morning-after hangovers more frequent. So yes, I was finally ready for B school…

The key takeaway from MBA was discovering my OTHER passion (writing, and no, the first one isn’t finance). But very close was our ability to find the most creative excuses for drinking. You give us an event (say xyz company is visiting the campus for placements) or a non-event (xyz company cancelled its visit due to recession) and we would automatically reach for the bottle. And then add to it, freshers’ parties, farewell parties, birthday parties, clearing exams, failing exams, placements, lack of placements, Neev, Kerala, Goa, well, you get the picture…

Company D was just an extension of college, except now there were occasional company-sponsored parties which meant you could get drunk for free. And now that we had more money and we were yet to learn to cook, we would be eating out multiple times a week, and of course, no self-respecting first-year analyst has ONLY dinner at a restaurant. But, but but, then we discovered the beauty of home-delivery of alcohol. So on a particularly lazy weekend, we could just order for tandoori chicken, beer and vodka to be delivered right at our doorstep. Of course, having a flatmate who prided herself on her “refined tastes” and relaxed with a glass of whisky after a long day, was constant peer pressure, one that I didn’t mind giving in to. Now that bachelor parties were starting to slowly replace birthday parties, the only thing that restored the sanity was alcohol. Admittedly, I have a very poor track record as far as bachelor parties are concerned (I have thrown up on each of them), but I completely blame the enormity of the occasion rather than my inability to hold my drink.

And then it was new year’s eve… and it turned out to be the longest and most expensive hangover of my life!

After some impromptu drinking binges, t-shirts soaked with tears and sweeping changes, I am sober again, and except the occasional moment of weakness, I stay conscious and careful and very much in control…

Once Upon a Time...

2011-10-13T10:05:00.001+05:30

Once upon a time I wanted to be a cricket commentator… and then I saw Mandira Bedi

Once upon a time I loved reading fairy tales… and then I realized life isn’t about happily ever after

Once upon a time I watched all romantic comedies… and then I discovered the ugly appeal of American Beauty

Once upon a time I listened to mushy pop music… and then I came to know George Michael was gay

Once upon a time I was seduced by Mumbai… and then I fell in love with the small-town charm

Once upon a time I was a little girl… and then I lost my rose-tinted glasses

Once upon a time I was happy… and then I became ‘independent’

Paper Planes

2011-10-11T10:21:00.001+05:30

There is nothing romantic about poverty. Trust me, there isn’t. I respect money, mostly because growing up, we didn’t have much. So every time people tell me how money isn’t important or how it can’t buy happiness, I nod along respectfully, though in my heart of hearts, I do know that it makes life a lot better. Let’s just say I would rather be rich and miserable than being poor and miserable. So yes, while money can’t buy happiness in the long run (neither can poverty), it works wonders for instant gratification!

Take my Kerala trip for example. The first time I went there, I was 11 years old. We traveled for 44 hours in the general compartment and by the time we reached Ernakulum, I was almost sick with exhaustion, dirt and pollution. The second time was a lot more fun, when we went from college (more details here and here), piling on a Mallu friend and the famous ‘Kerala hospitality’ ensured that the shoestring budget didn’t affect us.

But this time around, the four-day self-indulgence with all the luxuries just made me realize that probably money isn’t a dirty word after all.

So there we were, at The Leela Palace in Kovalam, soaking up the sun, the beach, the pool, the rejuvenating spa treatment, wondering if this was what heaven was made of, while I secretly harboured apprehensions of the next day, when I would be back home in Mumbai, in my one bhk pigeonhole masquerading as an ‘apartment’. I was used to it, but I was scared of how my folks would react to my minimalist existence.

But as it turns out, I had nothing to worry about. We checked out of Leela, boarded the flight, braved the peak hour traffic and finally reached my handbag (aka 'flat') in Powai. Obviously you can imagine the drastic transformation in a matter of few hours as I nervously welcomed my parents inside. They didn’t bat an eyelid, as my mom quickly took charge, sent me for grocery shopping and within an hour whipped up a sumptuous khichdi that only my mom can make, while I made my “delicious” chicken curry without any major mishaps. And there we were, just like old times, sitting on the mattress, newspapers spread on the floor, eating home-cooked food. As they relished the food, I stared at their happy faces more out of relief than anything else, deeply grateful. As we sat by the window in the dark, my dad smoking and both of us grumbling (much like the old times), he summed it up, “I have traveled all over the world, stayed in the most luxurious suites, tasted all sorts of exotic cuisines, but nothing beats this moment.”

May be there is something romantic about poverty after all… or may be it’s just the nostalgia!

Is it Me?

2011-10-10T10:13:00.003+05:30

Is it the glistening sand, the virgin beach and the out-of-this-world sunset?

Is it the serene backwaters, the fishing nets and the charm of the local fishermen?

Is it the quaint little church with the rich history?

Is it the pristine waterfalls lashing against the boulders, the gurgling resonance breaking the early-morning tranquil?

Is it Kerala?

Or is it just me?

Wedding Jitters

2011-10-05T10:35:00.001+05:30

If you have been reading this blog for long enough (yes, all five of you. I was told that there is a fifth reader lurking around), parts of this post may be familiar to you. Anyway, here is my Viewspaper column this week.

Now am off. Flight in two hours.

And shubho bijoya…

Happy Days

2011-10-04T15:37:00.003+05:30

So today is “Oshtomi” or as all of you spell it, “Ashtami”. Don’t worry if you are a non-bong and hence it means nothing to you. I am a bong, and STILL it doesn’t mean anything to me. Except that I do know this is supposed to be the most important day of the five-day circus or what Bengalis call, Durga Pujo.

I don’t even remember the last time I spent this auspicious occasion in Kolkata. Ahh, the dhak, the crackers, the excitement, the décor, the waste…

But what I do remember are my childhood days when these five days would rank as THE MOST IMPORTANT OCCASION right up there with my birthday and bhaifota.

Each year, the Durga Puja event would have three distinct stages:

Stage 1: The Preparation
This would start a month or even earlier, when my parents would start working hard and shopping for the occasion. The instructions were clear. As a seven year old who was newly exposed to multiplication, the math was simple: five days of Durga Puja equals 5*2=10 instances of going out (mornings with friends and evenings with family) and no self-respecting seven-year-old would be caught dead wearing an old/same outfit on these 10 occasions. Ergo, Durga Puja DEMANDED that I should have ten NEW outfits. Ergo, my dad had to work overtime.

But they (evil parents) also did their math. I was told that my budget would be Rs. XYZ and I could choose how I wanted to spend it, i.e. divide Rs. XYZ by 10 and buy 10 NEW BUT CHEAP dresses. Alternatively, I could divide Rs. XYZ by 5 and buy 5 NICE dresses, though I would have to repeat/wear old stuff in the mornings. Unfortunately, my division was a weak link at that point (why have TWO methods of division anyway?) and I agreed to the first option without really understanding the implications (me sticking out like a sore thumb in my ankle-length, ill-fitting 50-rupee frock when the others were fashionably dressed in branded clothes).

Stage 2: The Event
The actual five days had NOTHING to do with religion or worship. It was about having a legitimate excuse to dress up and hang out with friends since morning, sing along to bad music played at the pandals, participate in all the art competitions, eat roadside puchka without having your mom looking over your shoulder and play antakshari (our contribution to the overall bad music) sitting five feet away from the place of worship.

In the evening, I would again dress up in the different set of new clothes, go out with my parents (and relatives) pandal-hopping across the city, comparing and counting. Now for those of you not familiar with the chaos that ensues in Kolkata during Durga Puja, the closest analogy I can offer is the Indian fielding team comprising Navjot Sidhu, Bishan Bedi and Saurav Ganguly. The traffic goes haywire, there is no such thing as parking and everywhere there are separate entrances for men and women. So inevitably we would lose track of one another and in an age prior to mobile phones, it wasn’t as much fun as it sounds like. Besides, being the precious little princess (I can so imagine someone commenting on this) that I was, I would refuse to walk after the first 45 minutes, thereby spending the remaining night happily perched on my dad’s shoulder.

Bijoy Doshomi (Dushera) would be the final day when there would be tears all around, the women would feed sondesh to the idols and we would swear that even Ma Durga had tears on her painted clay cheeks (I am not exaggerating). All the kids would bring their text books and place them dutifully at the feet of Saraswati (for the uninitiated, Ma Durga is always accompanied by the entourage of her children: Laxmi, Saraswati, Ganesh and Karthik, each with their respective accessories/pets). I would make a last-minute dash to our third-floor apartment (we didn’t have elevators) and come down panting with whatever book was lying nearest to the door (come to think of it, it was NEVER Maths). Finally, it would be time for visarjan and this was my favourite part where we would dance on the roads as we followed the matador carrying the idols. It’s pretty much close to what happens in a Punjabi baraat (I have attended one and hopefully that will be it), only it doesn’t have the tragic ending.

Stage 3: The Depression… and The Anticipation
The next few days following Durga Pujo would cast a shadow of gloom over all of us, who had gotten used to the luxury of indiscipline. Now it was time to go back to the books, eat boring home food and wear boring old clothes. But we would soon cheer up as Durga Pujo only marked the beginning of the festive season. There would be Laxmi Puja, Kali Puja, Bhaifota, Christmas, MY BIRTHDAY and New Year punctuated by something called Half-Yearly exam which nobody bothered about.

Sighh… those were the days. It’s oshtomi today and I am at work in my ONLY new outfit, with my colleague forcing me to listen to Akon singing Chammak Challo.

But, tomorrow I am off to Kerala for the third time. Self-indulgence, here I come!

Three Mistakes of My Life

2011-09-29T12:15:00.003+05:30

Mistake One: Economics? What were my parents thinking? MBA Finance? What was I thinking? Investment Bank? What was the Bank thinking?

Mistake Two: Mohammed Azharuddin. I showed early signs of falling for the totally wrong guys. It should have been nipped at the bud and I would have been this nice, homely, conventional girl married to a rich left-brained banker by now.

Mistake Three: Mumbai. I am more of a Greece/Barbados/Mauritius sort of a person.

Now let’s assume that my parents and I did NOT make these three mistakes. I would have studied English Literature and been a poor but thoroughly fulfilled person living in Kolkata, doing my PhD (everybody there studies till their 30s because there are no jobs and further studies give us the satisfaction of doing something useful with our lives) and sitting in the Coffee House in College Street with my equally unemployed friends in our Fab India kurtas complemented by the junk jewelry and the jholas, discussing the shortcomings of the current government/cricket team/contemporary Indian literature.

My parents would be registering me to some/all matrimonial sites (~~short~~ 5”3, ~~dusky~~ wheatish complexioned, ~~tolerably decent-looking~~ pretty ~~unemployed~~ B.A./M.A./M.Phil/PhD freelancer ~~virgin~~ girl with traditional values from ~~middle-class~~ good family, seeks ~~rich~~ professionally-qualified well-settled suitable match) and every evening I would come home, sip the chai that my mom makes for me (after all, her ‘baby’ has had a long hard day), religiously sift through ‘profiles of the day’, shortlist a few and ask her to fix ‘meetings’ for the weekend. After a couple of hours of channel/net surfing I would retire to bed early with a ‘headache’, have my dinner served on bed, shut the door and talk on the phone with my intellectual, equally unemployed B.A./M.A./M.Phil/PhD ‘boyfriend’ who ‘UNDERSTANDS ME’ till 2 a.m.

Weekends will be solely dedicated to visits to the beauty parlour, getting decked up in a sari, learning to balance the tea tray in my high heels (the ad said 5”3, remember?), faking a plastic smile and making small-talk with ~~perverted~~ IIT/IIM boys (why grown men are referred to as ‘boys’ in the marriage market I would never understand) trying to ‘size me up’ (literally).

-“Boy”: “So, you are a freelance writer? That sounds fascinating.”
-Me: “It is. It’s so nice to have a job I am passionate about.”
-“Boy”: “I wish I was doing something as fulfilling. But you know, the jet-setting corporate life with its 7-figure salary and perks is exciting too.”
-Me (thinks: why else will I be even talking to you?). Aloud: “I am sure. So what do you like to do when you are not working?”
-“Boy”: “Oh, I like to track the capital markets, read management books and travel. I prefer to go abroad though. The weather and the grime in Indian cities just don’t agree with me. I plan to visit Greece, Barbados and Mauritius soon.”
-Me: “Let’s cut to the chase. I will marry you.”

So both families exchange mishti doi and sondesh and the wedding date is fixed three months down the line on December 11.

Later in the night, I would call my ‘boyfriend’ to give him the ‘good news’.
-“Boyfriend”: “How can you do this to me? I thought we ‘UNDERSTOOD’ each other.”
-Me: “I can’t help it. I have to do this for my parents.”
-“Boyfriend”: “But can’t you tell them to wait?”
-Me: “Wait for what? Are you going to marry me?”
-“Boyfriend”: “You know I am not ready.”
-Me: “Well, then you have to let me go.”
-“Boyfriend”: “But noone UNDERSTANDS you the way I do.”
-Me: “Yea. But this other guy works in an investment bank.”

And there you have it: the perfect life, had I not made the three mistakes. A freelance writer married to a rich banker, traveling around the world, specifically to Greece, Barbados and Mauritius…

Heroes

2011-09-28T09:08:00.002+05:30

Ok, so I have already spoken about my love for anti-heroes (in excruciatingly painful details) in this post.

So this post is about heroes I hate: I mean I know they are role models when we were growing up or we would be made to read about them or watch them over and over again on TV, that they are perfect and larger-than-life, but the very fact that they are larger-than-life, makes them somewhat unreal, somewhat vague and not quite identifiable…

And I am not even talking about super-heroes, i.e. the supermans, spidermans, batmans or catwomans.

But for instance, take Hercule Poirot, the little Belgian detective, created by Agatha Christie, who is always using his “little grey cells”. Of course, I have read ALL his books, trying my best to find him likeable or at best, tolerable. But each time I read about him, I only found myself more alienated from the character. His arrogance, his condescending attitude towards his friend and partner-in-crime, Hastings (who is infinitely more lovable) and his fastidiousness (really, who keeps a consistent bank balance of 444 pounds, 4 shillings, and 4 pence?) often annoyed the hell out of me. I couldn’t agree more with Ms. Christie when she said she found Poirot “insufferable” and a "detestable, bombastic, tiresome, ego-centric little creep". However, the public loved him and he continued to survive for as long as he did…

Or let’s look at James Bond. According to the creator, Ian Fleming, he named the character James Bond, because he wanted the simplest, dullest, plainest-sounding name he could find and it’s a pity his character didn’t stay that way. If you ask me, for a grown man, his penchant for sophisticated clothes, gadgets, pretty women and fast cars is almost juvenile, smacking of insecurity. There is something cold, ruthless and cruel about him and he lacks the vulnerable charm of Rocky or The Terminator. He seems more like a comic caricature to me than anything else…

Now as much as I love Fountainhead or completely subscribe to Ayn Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism, Howard Roark’s character makes me squirm. Not because he is anti-establishment or independent or individualistic or because he ‘draws outside of the lines’ (these are qualities which make him stand out), but because he is so, well, inhuman, selfish and puerile. Blowing up a building? Not cool. Walking around like the whole world is a fool? Not cool. Forcing himself on a woman? Definitely not cool. And dude, stop taking yourself so seriously. Get a sense of humour…

No, I am not a misandrist. I hate women heroes (or heroines?) as well. Jane Austen’s Anne Elliot from the novel Persuasion fails to stir any sort of empathy for her. Give me a break from the Cinderella Story: overshadowed middle daughter overlooked by her father and manipulated by her sisters, heartbroken after her failed relationship with the unsuitable Prince Charming and resigned to a life of loneliness and emptiness, she is the quintessential patient, strong, wise and gentle ‘lady” who makes me want to throw up or die of boredom. Give me a scatterbrained, foot-in-the-mouth Emma any day.

And last, but not the least, closer to our generation, there is Harry Potter. This one is self-explanatory. Case closed.

But the hero that I DO like: Aticus Finch from ‘To Kill a Mocking Bird’ (yea yea, call it the “my daddy best” syndrome)...

Say a Little Prayer

2011-09-26T10:30:00.002+05:30

It’s Monday morning. So let me start by saying a silent prayer, that I love my job. No, I seriously do. These are hard times, and when I listen to stories about ruthless banks firing people, or the crappy work or the long hours or the mean bosses, I thank my stars for everything that this company has given me.

I love it because of the complete freedom it offers me: to do my work the way I want to, when I want to and how I want to…

I love it because of the minimal pretentious frills that are a part and parcel of corporate culture…

I love it because my boss lets me be: we can spend days without talking to each other and I can leave office right under his nose without worrying how it will affect my appraisal…

I love it because I hate it enough to hanker after an alternate career…

But most of all, I love it because it pays the salary on the 24th of every month…

Which brings us to the weekend…

Lately I had been a little cash-strapped given the inflation, my sudden urge to ‘explore’ as well as the last-minute vacation plans. Goa was expensive and add to it my next trip to Kerala next week, which is going to be a completely self-indulgent one, as well as the Pune get-together and the tentatively planned Coorg visit.

So my joy knew no bounds when my salary got credited this Saturday, thereby allowing me to buy a pair of shades (replacement for the ones I broke in Goa), an ipod shuffle (replacement for the nano that stopped working in Goa), two horrible books (the benchmark for Indian writing is so low that the only explanation for my script getting rejected is that I wasn’t bad enough. No seriously, think about it) and watch a horrible movie (what is Kevin Spacey doing in Horrible Bosses? Jennifer Aniston, I can understand, given her bad taste for, well, everything…but I still love her.)

I also watched an awesome play, “The President is Coming” at Prithvi Theatre. While Konkona Sen Sharma was thoroughly missed as the Stephen’s-educated intellectual bong, Kunal Roy Kapoor was mind-blowing as the racist IIMA graduate social-activist-turned-MNC employee. The other stereotypes like the geeky closet-homosexual IITian Microsoft employee or the stockbroker with no social skills kept me in splits though the screenplay tended to drag at parts. And oh, should I be concerned that I am seeing more of Dilnaz Irani than my boss?

Well, speaking of the devil, switch off your mobiles and your cameras, because the ~~President~~ boss is coming…

When Harry Never 'Met' Sally...

2011-09-23T10:08:00.002+05:30

You are mushy if you celebrate your anniversary over a candlelight dinner at an expensive place…
You are romantic if you celebrate surviving another year together over daal-tadka at the roadside dhaba where you had your first date…

You are mushy if you like exotic vacations at luxury resorts…
You are romantic if you like getting drenched in the monsoon on an impromptu off-season trip to Goa…

You are mushy if you surprise your spouse on her birthday with a lavish party, lots of gifts, 100 guests, 200 balloons and 400 “cute” pics on FB…
You are romantic if you show up at his/her door at midnight, light a candle on a single pastry and take off together somewhere randomly…

You are mushy if you tell someone you love her after you dedicate (and sing) “Lady in Red’ at a Karaoke Bar…
You are romantic if you tell someone you love her when she is reading The Economic Times, with specs firmly on her nose, oiled hair and bushy eyebrows…

You are mushy if you propose on Valentine’s Day with 100 red roses to signify that you would like to spend the next 100 years of your life with her…
You are romantic if you propose when both of you are drunk and in pajamas, when she is least expecting it…

But you are her best friend if you can make her laugh year after year after year...

The Curious Case of a Corporate Bitch

2011-09-21T09:40:00.001+05:30

Do you believe in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs? When I look back, I can almost classify my life in those five parameters, if only in an inverted pyramid, pretty much like Benjamin Button.

Age 1: Self-actualization
Spontaneous- cry/poop/pee whenever I want to
Lack of prejudice- anybody who pinches my cheeks is a creep (no exceptions)
Acceptance of facts- Without mom, I am screwed

Age 5: Esteem
Self esteem- I go to school; don’t mess with me
Achievement- I can count one to hundred AND sing the alphabet song
Respect for others- I have other five-year-olds as friends; don’t mess with THEM or else…

Age 13: Love/Belonging
Loyalty- My friend has a smartphone. Ergo, she knows everything
Family- They say NO to everything. What a pity I can’t choose my parents
Sexual Intimacy- What are those two doing on TV? Why is my body acting funny?

Age 18: Safety
Security- I have a 6”3, 150-Kg boyfriend
Employment- I got through the best private engineering college within 100 yards of my locality. TCS will surely take me in
Resources- I emotionally blackmailed my dad to buy me a smartphone, an i-pod AND a second-hand car

Age 26: Physiological
Food and drinks- I eat healthy (fresh from KFC) and drink moderately (only five times a week)
Breathing- Fresh air please (only first-class compartments in Mumbai locals)
Excretion- I work in an Investment Bank

P.S. From blogger to failed writer to columnist, I have come a long way. I was approached by Viewspaper to write a guest column for them. Here are the two articles: Status Message and Terrorism.

Final nail in the coffin: Humour Columnist...

The Age of Murkiness

2011-09-19T10:34:00.001+05:30

After a long time I watched a bong movie: not just ANY bong movie, but one of those new-age, trying-to-different, interspersed with English and Hindi (it even has a Hindi song) dialogues kinda pseudo-intellectual movie. The difference is that this one actually works…and I am not saying it because it got rave reviews, ran in Kolkata for a record 114 days and bagged some 38 awards in different film festivals. I am also not saying it because the Director happens to be my senior in school (my school had too many students. Two of them turned out to be famous directors. It’s no big deal) who then went to JNU, worked in the corporate world and then quit to become a director and this is his first movie. I am saying it because I identify with it at so many levels; plus it’s a REALLY GOOD FILM.

I identify with the childish reverence to Satyajit Ray and Uttam Kumar (the movie is a tribute to the classic, Nayak)…

I identify with the sheer annoyance at the mis-pronunciation of perfectly-spelt Bengali names and other stereotypes…

I identify with the protagonist: the young guy, educated and employed in Mumbai, who struggles for two years to get his script accepted and finally ropes in the famous actor to produce and act in his debut movie, ON HIS TERMS (without changing the script to make it ‘commercially viable’)…

I identify with the protagonist’s live-in girlfriend: the way she passionately gives herself first to the relationship and then to the movie, but walks out on both when she is used for a cheap publicity stunt…

I identify with the elements of their relationship: the friendship, the lack of jealousy/possessiveness or the non-existence of any claims whatsoever on each other…

Finally, Prosenjit, as the famous actor with a chequered past completely takes your breath away. I don’t identify with him, but his performance carries the movie to heights of creative excellence.

The movie has no heroes and no villains: the characters are vulnerable yet strong, imperfect yet humane, believable yet surreal.

Oh I forgot, the name of the movie is Autograph. And here is a review

East is Easy-Going

2011-09-15T13:27:00.003+05:30

Ok, swear to God, I promised myself I shall stay away from the blog today...

But this calls for an emergency post.

The world (accha India, sorry I tend to get carried away) has been shaken by this post: Open Letter to a Delhi Boy

That's all it takes: one good old North-South rabble rousing post, and you are famous. And here I am, blogging for more than four years, for a grand total of four readers...

Why, oh why, am I from the East? My parents are responsible for my obscurity... and Tagore too (don't ask me why)

It's Alright To...

2011-09-14T18:00:00.002+05:30

Ever since I was in school, I have found it difficult to be ‘successful’, ‘to make friends’, to ‘blend in’. Often I have felt left out, when I was home alone reading or watching Friends and binging on pizza (cheese burst) on a Saturday night, wondering what’s wrong with me. And I have often wondered why I NEVER get approached by guys. Surely, NOBODY can be THAT ugly/dumb. Then when I started working, my dad’s banker friends will often try to ‘counsel’ me about the exciting and rewarding career opportunities in investment banking and I would feel ashamed of my mediocre aspirations (of being the writer of mediocre, light-hearted books). But with years of experience and ‘wisdom’ behind me, I have learnt to accept myself as I am.

I think it’s alright that I don’t like to party every night, that I don’t have to drink and smoke up thrice a week and that I don’t find it cool to get sloshed, make out with random strangers and pass out.

There are enough drinkers/dopers/smokers in the world, without me trying to be yet another wannabe…

I think it’s alright that I am NOT ‘helplessly feminine’ and I can travel alone, eat alone in a restaurant, roam around on bikes with brokers past 10 p.m. or give directions to the cab driver without a guy to ‘take care of me’.

There are enough damsels in distress, without me trying to twirl my hair or bat my eyelashes…

I think it’s alright that I am feminine enough to love baby pink, to prefer dresses/skirts or to match my shoes/clothes/handbags/accessories.

There are enough ‘sensibly dressed intellectual women with thick-rimmed glasses and flat kolhapuri chappals, without me trying to fit in as a ‘woman of substance’…

I think it’s alright that I don’t chase the carrot called ‘front-end investment banking’, that I am happy being a good analyst rather than an average relationship manager and that I would rather go on a vacation to Kashid beach than to Phuket for a client visit.

There are enough smooth-talking, high-flying bankers, without me trying to be the next Naina Lal Kidwai…

I think it’s alright to be the best Nefertiti I can, even though it’s not conventionally ‘cool’, ‘attractive’ or ‘successful’.

Cuming of Age...

2011-09-12T11:28:00.001+05:30

This weekend I finally watched the much-touted, controversial and banned-in-many-Indian-states play, “V**ina Monologues”. See, I am this sushil bharatiya naari; I can’t even spell it out without the asterix, like it’s some kind of an abusive word.

Let’s try again: V-A-G-I-N-A Monologues. There, I did it, finally…

It feels so liberating, to say it out loud; but that’s just fleeting amidst the sheer embarrassment, stifled laughter and restrained admiration for a bunch of women, who just sat there and made it happen: every bit of it…

Does it mean I can now go about discussing intimate details of my life openly? Of course not…(You see I am too classy for that)

Does it mean I am empowered enough take up the issues highlighted in the play which we all read about, but don’t discuss? Are you kidding me?... (You see I am an analyst, not an activist)

Does it mean I am suddenly going to be a feminist ranting about my ‘rights’, voicing my ‘preferences’ and defending my ‘idiosyncrasies’? No way… (You see I am a middle-class Indian woman)

But what I can do, is to write about it, subtly…

My Tryst with Ivy League

2011-09-09T09:56:00.003+05:30

Never in my wildest ~~dreams~~ fantasies, did I imagine that someday I would be inside an IIT Bombay classroom. Sure, I have been to the campus a few times, but for strictly non-academic purposes (it’s the most romantic place in the whole of Powai), but yesterday, I was actually INSIDE the classroom, and ON THE DAMN PODIUM…

So the question is how the hell did I sneak in there and what business did I have in the most revered engineering college in the country which has given multiple orgasms to both parents and students over decades.

Well, I was there to attend a ‘creative writing’ workshop conducted by writersmelon. Obviously, I know nothing about ‘creative writing’, so I wasn’t the one conducting it. There was a professional writer/journalist who was taking the session and I was just there to ~~look pretty~~ and talk about the journey of a struggling writer who has a cushy job but in her heart of hearts, is a wannabe Chetan Bhagat. Talk about low aspirations! Apparently, ~~nerdy~~ brilliant teenagers connect well with such stories. And the fact that I live and work in Powai makes it logistically easier to invite me.

Anyway, so I had my fifteen minutes of fame: my first brush with talking nonsense in front of 50-odd people (college presentations aren’t counted, because there was a strict quid pro quo there: you scratch my back, I scratch yours). Here, they had every right to boo/throw chappals/walk out and I was prepared for all such eventualities.

So I took the safe way out: humour. I made a joke, I waited for the crowd to burst into laughter/roll on the floor.
Silence…
I waited for some more time…
Silence…

Ok, either my joke was too subtle to be appreciated by normal people or worse, it wasn’t funny! But, but, but these are IIT kids, therefore they are NOT normal people. Ergo, my joke wasn’t funny. Horror, cringe, run…

But I moved on and continued. There were a few laughs, much to my relief. Also, the fact that I have names like Company D and Company C on my resume seems to work with kids, because both are popular recruiters in campus placements. They were reassured that if this dumb girl can get in, so can they. Thankfully, noone asked what is it that I do in these companies.

My moment of glory: they clapped in the end. They were just being nice, but they clapped…

Ugly Truths...

2011-09-08T13:46:00.004+05:30

Why do I blog?

Is it because I lowwwwe writing?
Complete BS… if it was ONLY because I lowwwwe writing, then I would be typing on a blank page/diary instead of on a public forum.

I blog for hits/comments/recognition…
I blog because I am insecure and I constantly need to be told what a wonderful writer I am…
I blog because I like to talk about myself without being interrupted…
I blog because I am bored and I don’t have a “life” as life is conventionally defined…
I blog because I am not good enough to be a writer…

Why am I on Facebook?

Is it because I lowwwwe to be social?
Rubbish… I have 321 “friends” on FB; if you know me well enough, you would know that’s not possible in my real life.

I am on FB because it helps me remember people’s birthdays…
I am on FB because it helps me snoop on random people (cute colleagues/ex boyfriends/potential boyfriends/celebrities)…
I am on FB because it helps me promote my writing (and still people don’t seem to be interested)…

Why am I on Linkedin?

Is it because I want to ‘fast-track my career through enhanced networking’?
Trash… I have no aspirations of being a corporate slave for thirty years.

I am on Linkedin because it allows me to snoop on random people (cute colleagues/ex bosses/ex colleagues)…
I am on Linkedin because it allows me to “feel good about myself” when I compare my career with those who haven’t done “as well as I have”.
I am on Linkedin because it allows me to “feel above narrow bindings of corporate rat race” when I compare my career with those who have done “better than I have”.
I am on Linkedin because it allows me to promote my writing (and still people don’t seem to be interested)…

Why do I love gtalk?

Is it because I am so popular that people are ALWAYS pinging me and I can’t help it?
Nonsense… The people I like talking to are rarely online.

I love gtalk because it’s emotionally less demanding and lets you be ‘invisible’…
I love gtalk because it lets me express stuff which I can never say otherwise…
I love gtalk because it lets me promote my writing (and still people don’t seem to be interested)…

Why do I prefer smses?

Is it because OTHER PEOPLE are always messaging me and I only reply?
Crap… The only messages I get are spam and from telecom companies/banks (informing me that they are going to debit my account for services they haven’t provided).

I prefer smses because they are emotionally less demanding and short…
I prefer smses because they allow me to write stuff which I am too cowardly to say on the face (doesn’t mean I have broken up with people over a sms)…
I prefer smses because they allow me to lie in bed, scroll through old messages and smile…

Why do I like social media?

I don’t… but it gives me a false sense of “being connected” without invading my privacy

What's common between Aishwariya Rai and an Investment Banker?

2011-09-07T16:36:00.001+05:30

Disclaimer: This post is what you get when you cross supreme boredom with top management…

Both think that a good launching pad in modeling/Ivy League is a ticket to be successful in completely unrelated fields, i.e. acting/banking…

Both look good in swimsuits/ three-piece suits till they open their mouths…

Both believe that giggling idiotically is the way to dodge difficult questions on chat shows/investor presentations…

Both flirt with exciting ideas (Salman Khan/Alternative investments) but settle for the safe option (Junior Bacchan/ Fixed income)…

Both think that the solution to Box office failure/recession is sex…

The English Teacher

2011-09-06T10:14:00.003+05:30

I had a tumultuous start to my career: no, I don’t mean the misfortune of being a 2009 pass-out, I also don’t mean the 25 interviews I had to take in a space of four months and I definitely don’t mean the way things are shaping up right now (that’s another story altogether)…

But let’s go back a couple of decades, when I was this 3-year old with pigtails and my parents were struggling to get me admitted to a “good” (read CONVENT) school where all the “good” (read dad’s colleagues’ daughters) went. Thankfully, I was born with this inherent ability to screw up all interviews and that talent was apparent even in those early years. So there I was, sitting in this very posh (read SNOOTY) room in a sprawling campus. The lady opposite to me (must have been the Principal of the school) points to the fruit kept on the table in front of me and asks gently, “So, dear, can you tell me what that fruit is?” Now I HATE it when unknown people/acquaintances address me as “dear”. Plus, it’s an open secret that I don’t like making small talk with people I don’t know. So I chose to maintain a dignified silence and stared back at her rudely. She asked me, AGAIN. Annoyed, I replied, “aapel” to get her off my back. Now, the fruit in question was an APPLE, but since I didn’t know the English word, and was too proud to admit it, I did what I could: I replied in my mother tongue, Bengali.

The rest, as they say, is history. The school refused me admission and this pattern was repeated in all the convents in Kolkata. Like they politely say in HR terms, “I wasn’t a good fit”. And thank god for that! So I went to this co-ed state board school which admitted pretty much everybody (and ended up in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most populous school in the world). This was a school where I could be myself, I could hang out with rowdy, ill-mannered boys and most importantly, I could speak in my mother tongue. All the students spoke in Bengali amongst themselves (those who didn’t, gave in to peer pressure) and so did most of the teachers. Obviously, the flipside was that my English was horrendous (yes, o readers of this blog, that explains the childish simplicity of my writing… I never learnt the big words till I wrote CAT and then it was too late), I suffered from an inferiority complex because I wasn’t “smart” like the other kids and I could NEVER make conversation with the above-mentioned dad’s colleagues’ convent-educated daughters till I was in Class IV.

And then, the English teacher stepped in… who decided enough was enough. I couldn’t keep failing my English paper and I couldn’t keep miserably staring at the food instead of playing with other girls.

He introduced me to the world of Malory Towers and read them with me so that I could discuss what I understood and what I didn’t…

He helped me with the painful ‘make sentences’ and ‘sentence correction’ exercises…

He made me give up my repeated readings of Feluda and instead take a chance on Alfred Hitchcock…

He bought me one Hercule Poirot book, and then another and then another…

He refused to let me take the easy way out in middle school and enroll for coaching classes and instead made me sweat over complicated interpretations of ‘The Lady of Shallot”, “Charge of the Light Brigade” and “The Daffodils” while he edited/corrected my convoluted summaries…

He held my hand as I nervously ventured in the world of classics: Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Bernard Shaw, Emily Bronte…

He pretended to look away while I stole his Sidney Sheldon and Jeffrey Archer collection instead of studying for my Boards…

He encouraged me to take up English as my first language in High School simply because I wanted to study the history of English Literature though it was suicide in terms of grades and he never blamed me when I ended up with 55% in my Boards…

He taught me to speak, read and think in English, simply and crisply and without jargon…

He is the only Chartered Accountant I know who can make sense of old Russian literature as well as he can point out loopholes in GAAP and IFRS…

He is my dad…

2011-09-04T18:32:00.002+05:30

What Happens in ~~Vegas~~ Goa?

…
…
…
…
…

Stays in Goa…

When the Going Gets Tough, The Tough Gets Going... To Goa!

2011-08-29T10:19:00.001+05:30

It’s been raining like a bitch over the last few days. Now people who do have a life have been cribbing about their weekend being spoilt. I would do no such thing because it’s not like I go out partying every weekend. For me, it was just another normal weekend when I stayed at home, cleaned my apartment, cooked, did my laundry, had a friend over, spoke to another half a dozen people over the phone, read and planned exotic vacations to exotic locations. But the rain does get you down and it does perpetually remind you of all the things in your life that you would want to change. Of course, Anna Hazare finally ended his fast and the dance of democracy itself was entertaining enough to keep your blues away. But even my new-found admiration for Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan was not enough to cheer me up.

Things have been pretty slow at work. While I believe that my job is safe for now (not because the company can’t do without me, but because I am too cheap to be fired), a lot of restructuring is happening around me, and I no longer have any clarity regarding my role/objectives/mandate.

Then I am obsessing about what to do with my life. Should I just write CFA like everybody else around me (that should keep me occupied for the next five years till I give up)? Should I go abroad to some Ivy-League University for some fancy one-year course and study something impressive (Public Policy, International Relations, Media and Communications)? It will be quite an experience but the middle-class accountant’s daughter that I am, I can’t help worrying about the opportunity cost, not to mention the cost itself. Also, what will I do AFTER one year, once the course is over and I am back to India with no job and a 20-lac loan? I am pretty sure I don’t want to go through the MBA/Finance/Economics grind all over again.

Also, Mumbai is sort of getting on my nerves and I just want to get away. So I have been doing a lot of research. Ajanta Ellora, Coorg, Kumarakom, Ganpatiphule, Angkor Wat and Sri Lanka are some of the places I want to visit in the near future.

But as of tomorrow, I am going to Goa, AGAIN: a place that never fails to cheer you up, a place which has a lot of memories and a place which is so beautiful in the monsoons that it takes your breath away. Even if it’s an impromptu trip, even if it’s to celebrate the bachelor party of some random stranger and even if it means going back to the same old places. At least 66.6% of Room No 213 is going to be there, but the remaining 33.3% will be thoroughly missed.

So it’s time again for lot of cleavage, bare legs and beer bellies (none of it mine), it’s time for cheap alcohol, it’s time for soaking up the rains.

It’s time for Goa…

Should I Write CAT Again?

2011-08-26T10:21:00.003+05:30

First there were SC/STs…

Then came the OBCs…

Now it’s time for the women and non-engineers…

Finally it’s the ‘lowest of the low’ species, the kind you wouldn’t touch with a bargepole, the kind your parents had nightmares about, the kind who would be reduced to holy matrimony at 21, because the academic/professional/corporate world shunned them: yes, the NON-ENGINEER WOMEN. Especially if you are an ARTS GRADUATE like me, then, well, you have no hope.

But, but, but NOW, the premier management institutes in India have decided it’s time to finally sit up and “emancipate” this downtrodden, intellectually disadvantaged species by “donating” GRACE MARKS to US. Yes, all the six new IIMs along with IIML and IIMK are now introducing measures to “address the gender inequality in their campuses”. IIM Rohtak, in particular, is awarding, hold your breath, 30 EXTRA MARKS to NON-ENGINEER WOMEN. Flunking all the engineering entrance exams is finally going to pay off!!

I still can’t decide whether to laugh or cry, whether to be offended or liberated, whether to brush it off as yet another idiotic idiosyncrasy or a noble intention to “encourage diversity” in oestrogen-starved Indian B schools.

I have never subscribed to the cut-off based admission process, be it CAT or any other management entrance exam. Not because I failed to crack Quant cut-offs in my two attempts at CAT, not because I can’t calculate 1/17th of a million under a millisecond and definitely not because I think entrance exams give an “unfair advantage to engineers”. Honestly, they don’t. The syllabus is based on your 10th std Math, and if you managed to get through your Boards, you are as good as anybody to write CAT, without the crutch of “grace marks”.

But I sincerely believe that there should be more to a worthy application than a 99.99 percentile in CAT and your entrance exam score should be just ONE of the parameters, even for a shortlist. In that respect, I think SPJain, SCMHRD, TAPMI and MICA are much more evolved in the way they shortlist candidates (I won’t get into the admission process of ISB or B schools abroad because their target audience is different). Now, there will always be counter arguments of lack of transparency, but I would rather risk not knowing why I didn’t make it despite a high score than being reduced to a number.

I am all for diversity on campuses and I fully support some of the recent changes like introducing a written assessment task instead of a GD, taking account of the overall academic record as well as work experience along with CAT scores. But I just don’t agree that awarding grace marks to girls/non-engineers/dusky people/short people is the best way to go about it, because, well, they are so rare.

By that logic, I am an East Indian, non-engineer, short, dusky girl, and therefore I should have automatic admission.

May be it’s alright to have a qualitative aspect to the selection process…

May be cut-offs are not so sacrosanct after all…

May be, just may be, you can still be a decent manager even if you can’t figure out the probability of that damn spider reaching that corner of the room, given the complex web of complex numbers…

Elevation...

2011-08-25T09:41:00.001+05:30

Every morning I meet this middle-aged man in the elevator sharp at 8:20 a.m.: he is there with his copy of the Economic Times, his lunch box and his laptop bag. We exchange polite smiles, sometimes we mourn the weather or the traffic and sometimes we just stand there silently. He is the most soft-spoken, harmless-looking gentleman and yet he scares me. He is the nightmare; he represents everything that I dread fifteen years from now: the pink paper, the lunch box, the 2 BHK apartment in suburban Mumbai and most of all the tired, quiet resignation to the mundane life. That elevator ride almost becomes a time machine ride: a peek into the future which I am headed towards, but don’t want.

What can possibly be worse than this existence, I ask myself. Well, I could end up being his wife…

Lonedependence...

2011-08-22T11:06:00.002+05:30

I have been on my own for almost a year now: by ‘on my own’, I mean without roommates/flatmates, without someone to come home to, without a daily support system and without someone to share birthdays/celebrations/sorrows/expenses in the middle of the night. Of course I have people I meet/talk to regularly but it’s different from sharing an apartment with someone. Initially, it was very scary: who is going to fight with the broker? Who is going to fix the tubelight? Who is going to negotiate with the plumber? Who is going to cook and force it down my throat? Most importantly, who will deal with the maids? (which explains why I don’t have one now)…

But now, I have got used to taking care of myself and while it’s lonely at times, it’s peaceful too. There is something addictive about independence (emotional, financial, social) and after a point it becomes a habit. So much so, that you guard it fiercely, you create a fortress around you and you strengthen it one brick after another. God forbid, if anyone/anything even threatens to squeeze inside, your heightened sense of self-defence forces you to destroy it immediately. You no longer reach for the phone, you no longer stare at the email sitting pretty in your drafts folder and you no longer argue…

You just let go. And you discover a new world: a world full of new opportunities, new aspirations and new challenges. For a change, you live for yourself, you live to make your dreams come true, you try things that you have never tried before. May be it’s not conventional wisdom, may be it’s not something you were conditioned to do as a little girl, may be it’s selfish to some extent: but it’s still what makes you happy…

Finally, you begin to live and live on your own terms, finally you have the courage to explore and finally you become independent, in the true sense of the term…

Newton's Laws of Corruption...

2011-08-17T10:09:00.004+05:30

It’s been a strange week so far: we celebrated Independence Day on Monday and the very next day it was pointed out that like most things, freedom too is relative. We are free only till we exercise it according to the boundaries defined by our ‘leaders’, we are free only till we toe the line of the government and we are free only till it’s convenient.

Now ‘convenience’, ‘compromise’ and ‘collective good’ are words that I would never understand. I still believe in black and white. You are either right or you are wrong, you either love someone or you don’t, you are either corrupt or you are not. It’s like math: there is no such thing as ‘it depends’.

So we have all seen/read about the circus yesterday when Anna Hazare was jailed in what could only be described as an ‘undemocratic move’ and he in turn, refused to come out of the Tihar jail despite being offered a release. Anyway, I am just a soon-to-be-fired analyst and not a journalist/celebrity/social activist, so I shall refrain from voicing MY OPINION (partly because NONE OF MY FIVE READERS CARE WHAT I THINK). Instead, like the five-year-old that I am, I am going to make it very very simple: as simple as Newton’s Laws of Motion (which, for the record, I never understood).

1st Law: If a system is at rest it remains at rest until it is acted on by a resultant Anna Hazare
There is something so comforting and convenient (there, the C-words again) about status quo that we cling on to it, despite knowing in the heart of our hearts, that it’s no longer working. Like our legal system for example. We all know what happens if we go to court: years of long-winded struggle, expense and SLOW DEATH. It’s just easier to give in and compromise, because the law doesn’t protect us.

2nd Law: Force equals mass times acceleration
This one is self-explanatory. If everyone is doing it, it must be right. And the more people do it, the more accepted it becomes, so it becomes a vicious cycle. The parallel channel is more efficient simply because more people are queuing up for it. It’s simple demand and supply.

3rd Law: For every action of corruption, there is an equal and opposite criticism
We blame politicians, bureaucrats, cops for taking bribes. But what about us, the common people, WHO ARE ACTUALLY GIVING THOSE BRIBES? Yes, it’s convenient, it’s quick and it’s tempting. Sometimes, it’s about “our future”. So, next time we hand in that stash of cash for that coveted engineering seat or the twenty bucks to the cops for a quick fix to a speeding ticket, may be we can take a time out before we lay down our lives for ‘Anna’s cause.”

Some of us are born without values, some of us lose them on our way and some of us fall prey to the 3 Cs…

R-Rated

2011-08-15T11:40:00.003+05:30

So it seems like another recession is around the corner, and every time you utter the R-word, you automatically turn to the HR team of every global investment bank: how many, in which locations and which teams? The risk of you being among one of THE ONES magnifies especially if you are in a support function (polite way of referring to the cost centre). So as I read about our competitors cutting staff across the globe (the number runs into thousands for most banks), I waited with bated breath for a similar announcement in my company.

Sure enough, it was there. I read about our dismal 2Q results, about cost reduction and headcount rationalization across the bank, but it only sunk in when a mail was marked to OUR TEAM of fifteen people informing us about the “tough decisions that lay ahead” and how “every team has to contribute to this cost cutting”. Incidentally, I was the second person marked on the mail. Ironically, I had just finished my mid-year appraisal, and despite the fact that DK Bose doesn’t seem to like me, it was a generous review with considerable sweet nothings thrown in. Not that I believe everything that HR and top management tells me. They are like shrinks and consultants (yea, I worked with one previously): they just tell you the obvious, which you already know. Anyway, here I was, hailed as being an “excellent performer who has exceeded expectations” on one Friday, and being subtly threatened, the very next.

I don’t deal well with double standards, nor can I be diplomatic. So, for instance, if I want a promotion, I say “I should be promoted” and not “I am ready for the next level”, or if I want a raise, I say, “Give me more money” and not “financial aspect is not an important consideration, but I would like to believe that I am fairly rewarded for my contributions.” So, after receiving this very disturbing mail, WHICH WAS CLEARLY DIRECTED AT ME, I called up my boss, and demanded that if he was firing me, the least he can do is to tell me now (before I renew my rental agreement). While he hastened to assure me that I had nothing to worry about, I am not convinced. I think I should quit before they fire me; I think I should graciously take the high road and salvage whatever pride while I still can; I think I should go back to school, and this time not a B school but a J school.

Finally, I have become a successful I-banker: I am insecure, I am desperate and I have a Plan B. Ahh, I have finally arrived (though it’s almost time to go)…

Modern Day Cinderella

2011-08-11T09:49:00.004+05:30

As little girls, we have all read and empathized with Cinderella: her vulnerable beauty, her quiet subjugation to the constant tortures of her stepmother and her ugly sisters, her fleeting moment of glory as she was blessed by the fairy godmother, her Prince Charming, but most of all, her escape from her paradise at midnight before it all came crashing down.

Mercifully, today, in urban India, we no longer have to put up with the vicious stepmom or the bullying sisters, we no longer need the fairy godmother and her magic wand and we also don’t need the Prince Charming to rescue us from life: we have education, employment, alcohol, chocolates and beauty magazines to empower us. But the running away from the ball is still a part of who we are: on most occasions, like Cinderella accepted the domestic tribulations as a part of her life, we also learn to deal with the daily miseries (office politics, inflation, plumbing mishaps), but just as she ran out on the perfect evening, we often run out on things/people which/who make us happy, because we are scared.

It’s midnight again: time to run away, time to get back to the familiar humdrum of life, time to put the perfect evening behind…

Groundrules for Guys

2011-08-04T16:14:00.003+05:30

You want to take your girlfriend shopping… take her to Pantaloons
You want to check out hot women on the pretext of taking your girlfriend shopping… take her to Zara

You want to watch a movie with your girlfriend… go for Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara
You want to make out on the pretext of taking your girlfriend for a movie… go for Cowboys and Aliens

You want your girlfriend to meet your friends… invite her to your place for a soccer game
You want to go for a boys’ night out without upsetting your girlfriend… invite her to join you for a soccer game at the cheap local bar

You want your girlfriend’s folks to like you… tell them you are non-smoking, non-drinking, non-flirting
You want your girlfriend’s folks to hate you…tell them how non-smoking, non-drinking and non-flirting guys are practically NON-LIVING

You want to ask your girlfriend to marry you… change your relationship status on FB
You want your girlfriend to break up with you… change your relationship status on FB

Paintbrush...

2011-08-01T08:38:00.004+05:30

The colour palette…
The brushes…
The plain white paper…
The smell of charcoal…
The clothes lying on the floor…
The kohl-rimmed tear-stained eyes of the most beautiful woman…

The portrait… smudged with red ink…

Boulevard of Broken Dreams

2011-07-27T18:05:00.003+05:30

This is the last post of this one-month challenge that I took up to make my already difficult life more miserable. Or so I thought. But honestly, it just became a part of my life- like I would check my mail first thing in the morning and get a cup of coffee, I would also post something. Probably a few times, I struggled, wondering what I can write about, but once I opened that blank word document, it wasn’t a problem anymore. It was easier than I thought I would be, it was more fun than I thought it would be and yes, it was definitely more rewarding than my work! Anyways, it’s now over and it’s time to move on (all FIVE readers can heave a sigh of relief).

Now a lot of people have asked me, why this sudden urge to post everyday, why this sudden desire to get noticed (I even signed up for a twitter account) and why this sudden obsession with my online persona? Some readers went so far as to accuse me of selling my soul to the devil (and I don’t disagree with them). Of course, I can be politically correct and say it was ‘passion’ or ‘a challenge’ or ‘something I did for the love of it with no ulterior motive’. While all of them are true to some extent, the real reason is more practical. I don’t know if it’s exactly a ‘diplomatic’ thing to declare on a public forum, but at least two of my FIVE readers want to be writers some day, and I hope this post will give them some idea about the jungle out there, because, guys, even I have been there and done that. And will continue to do so…

So here goes, the bitter truth behind this blogathlon (apart from love and longing and the other mushy reasons):

A couple of months back, I finished my first full length novel (all 77k words) and about a month back, I sent out the proposal to half a dozen publishers. While I would be the first one to declare that it wasn’t a literary masterpiece, it was pretty much just another story of just another MBA girl: a novel set in a premier B school of India, written by a young girl and written for the other young people. I thought now that my work is done, I might as well indulge in some brand building and increase my next-to-nothing readership, while the publishers take their time to get back to me. Once I have THE BEST PUBLISHER knocking on my door, I would also have the LONGEST fan following who will obviously pay through their nose to buy my book. (I was beside myself with joy and patting myself for my brilliant social marketing skills apart from my inherent gift for writing).

So it was quite a shock when the good ones didn’t bother to respond to my proposal and the better ones sent a rejection mail declining to publish it. Surprise surprise!! But the ugly one gave me hope: too soon!! Now without taking any names, I would just say it was a fairly well-known Delhi-based publisher, and once I got the acceptance email, like any wannabe writer I was very excited. The fairly innocuous reference to “subject to certain conditions” failed to deter my enthusiasm. And the terms WERE fairly innocuous, if you take the larger picture: they just wanted me to contribute towards publishing. While the sum was not too significant (much less than my one month’s salary) it just didn’t feel right. I reasoned that it was a small price to pay for a dream (imagine MY book adorning the shelves of Crossword) but that was precisely the point: my dream was not so cheap that it could be bought for such a small price… Was it about principles? Being an unknown wannabe author, could I afford to even have principles? Was I being too idealistic? I don’t know; but it just didn’t feel right…

So I obsessed for a couple of days, and then on Friday night, I wrote the hardest mail of my life, before I became too weak, gave in to temptation and changed my mind:

“Dear so and so,

Thanks a lot for sending me the terms of the contract. While I am very grateful that you have decided to take a chance on a new author like me, I regret to inform you that I cannot convince myself to accept the same. Please understand that while the financial implications are not important, I feel that you do not have enough faith in my script to whole-heartedly commit to it. I would not like to begin a professional relationship on such a foundation, and I would not want my first work to be anything close to a vanity publishing deal. Being a writer is a dream for me and I would not like to make any compromises. I already have a day job for that.
However, if you really see any commercial value in my work and would like to help me improve on my script, I would be happy to work with you. But if not, I will wait for the day when you can consider my work purely on its merit.

Thanks again for taking time out to consider my proposal. I look forward to working with you in future.
Regards”

I slept really well that night, though it may be at the cost of a dream.

I may work in an investment bank, but I haven’t sold my soul for money… not yet.

I may be hungry, but I am not greedy…

SunScreen

2011-07-26T10:08:00.003+05:30

Alright enough of sarcasm, enough of cribbing, enough of DK Bose bashing and enough of anti-Sachin sentiments. Tomorrow is the last day of my month-long blogathlon (alternatively known as ‘torture’) and I already have a sentimental, oh-what-a-great-experience it was, sort of a post for that.

Anyway, today, for some reason, I feel like humming the song “Sunscreen”…

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth: (I am NOT as fat as I imagine)…

Don't worry about the future; or worry: (The real troubles in my life are imaginary)…

Do one thing everyday that scares you: (I am going to do my taxes today)…

Don't be reckless with other people's hearts, don't put up with people who are reckless with yours: (delete certain phone numbers)…

Don't waste your time on jealousy; sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind: (I am going to start running the race backwards)…

Remember the compliments you receive, forget the insults: (DK Bose can go take a hike)…

Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements: (bank statements are like love letters for my dad, so successfully offloaded them to him)…

Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life: (I do know what I want to do with my life, the question is HOW?)…

Don't congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either: (Why not? I am a sucker for extremes)…

Enjoy your body, use it every way you can: (Mallika Sherawat, here I come)…

Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly: (NOW you tell me)…

Read the directions, even if you don't follow them: (If they wanted me to read them, they would write it better)…

Get to know your parents; you never know when they'll be gone for good: (You must be kidding me! Parents are forever)…

Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few you should hold on: (All NINE friends of mine: love you guys)…

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard; live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft: (Lived in Kolkata and left before it made me soft; will leave Bombay before it makes me hard)…

Travel: (Yes)…

Accept certain inalienable truths, prices will rise, politicians will philander, you too will get old: (Hope for double digit hikes even for an average performer, hope for the Lokpal Bill to mean something and hope for better anti-ageing creams)…

Don't expect anyone else to support you: (Not anymore)…

Don't mess too much with your hair, or by the time you're 40, it will look 85: (No more rebonding/straightening/smoothening)…

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who supply it: (Cancel appointment with expensive shrink)…

But trust me on the sunscreen: (I do, I use it everyday)…

Travails of a Struggling Writer

2011-07-25T10:30:00.003+05:30

We all know about the ‘struggling artist’ syndrome where talented painters draw cheesy posters of C grade movies to make ends meet while dreaming of becoming an MF Hussain someday, where gifted photographers float around from one friend’s wedding to another hoping someday someone will pay them, where small-time actresses become the victim of the casting couch so that someday they can become a Katrina Kaif and wannabe singers sign up for each talent hunt show, hoping to snatch glory from the jaws of humiliation. What is common to all of them is the belief that they all have a GIFT and the hope that someday someone will have faith in them.

Now, I have never harboured any romantic notions of being ‘talented’ or ‘gifted’, which is why like a sensible girl, I listened to my parents and did my MBA. However, today, when I am possessed with the idea of being a writer, I take a walk down the memory lane, trying to chart out MY struggles to get noticed:

1.It all started in school and college where I would contribute poems, stories and articles for the in-house magazines which nobody read.
2.It became more of a passion during MBA when I started this blog and became a member of the Corp Comm team where it was serious business.
3.This was followed by contributing to ‘letters to the editors’ and sending my stories to random newspapers/magazines trying to get somebody to publish my work.
4.Some concrete work started coming in when I would do some freelancing for online portals (and I still do that).
5.Calling up/sending emotional emails to newspapers/magazines (with my blog link and sample stories) hoping to get hired.
6.Writing articles/introductions for start-up portals by cousins/friends.
7.Editing CVs/ Appraisal Forms of friends.
8.Writing resignation letters and farewell emails of my colleagues.
9.Writing wedding invitations for friends who wanted their invites to stand out and not follow the usual sloppy (forever together) styles.
10.Finally, yesterday, I hit rock-bottom when I created the online matrimonial profile of a friend, in an attempt to make him stand out among the numerous other cocky, “modern yet traditional” and ‘simple living high thinking” creeps.

And yes, I am STILL struggling to get noticed…

Sachin Rocks, But Dravid IS the rock

2011-07-24T15:28:00.002+05:30

I know I am going to lose MOST of my readers after this post, and chances are that MOST will not even read through the entire post, because they will be too busy reaching for their hidden revolvers/swords to KILL me.

So I am stating the disclaimer RIGHT.AT.THE.BEGINNING: “I DO NOT HATE SACHIN TENDULKAR, I just like other people more.”

Lords, the mother of all cricket stadiums (now despite being an eternal Eden Gardens loyalist, I would have to give it to Lords when it comes to all the history and heritage), is currently hosting the 2000th Test Match, between India (We may be the champions but we STILL struggle to save the follow-on when it comes to playing Test cricket in trying conditions) and England.

But what overshadowed this historic event was the fact that Sachin Tendulkar was expected (and technically he still can) to score his 100th century. Quite apt for the man who has rewritten the history books (making kids revise their knowledge before sitting for the Bournvita Quiz Contest) and continues to do so. Reaching a significant personal milestone in Lords has a special feeling. And, I hope he gets it (and for once, hopefully his personal milestone can save India the Test match)…

However, for a change, his party was crashed by the unassuming (and according to Harsha Bhogle, phlegmatic) Rahul Dravid, who not only saved India from an embarrassment, but did so in style, scoring his first century at Lords 153 tests after he missed out a debut 100 at the venue back in 1996 (when I was a pigtailed schoolgirl who was still in love with Mohammed Azharuddin). For a change, he is in the limelight that he so deserves. For a change, he is the man of the moment…

Now, the past 20 years have mostly been about Sachin: the God, the Little Master, the Master Blaster- sometimes all at the same time. And don’t get me wrong (please don’t), while I love to see him bat at full flow (who doesn’t) and I have the highest respect for him as a cricketer who has successfully managed to stay clean and out of controversy even after two decades, but to me he was just a visual delight while batting. That’s it, not a role model, not an icon, not an inspiring personality, but just a remarkable batsman who sometimes rolled his arm over with very good effect. To some extent, I even resented him because, well, he (or rather the media circus) overshadowed everybody else; and I have always liked the understated people, who never got their dues, despite being legends in their own right. So each time the country went gaga over him, the more loyal I became to VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid. Each time Laxman made a statement with his bat and pulled India out of trouble or Dravid stood his ground true to his nickname, I became a complete underdog loyalist…

Sachin may be God, but he is no leader…

And I am not anti-establishment, I just don’t agree with the establishment…

Things You Didn’t Know About Me

2011-07-23T10:09:00.004+05:30

Not that you care, but I am running out of ideas, so please allow me this self indulgence…

The Likes:
1.Shoes (especially my pair of black boots)
2.Girly clothes (dresses, skirts, floral tops instead of the ubiquitous jeans, capris, tees and the hideous Allen Solly collared shirts)
3.Books (no management or self help books though. I throw up each time I see ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’)
4.The combination of junk food and The Big Bang Theory
5.Eden Gardens (the open air seats)

The Dislikes:
1.Lizards
2.Heights (overbridges, mountains, basketball players)
3.Dadar Station
4.Parties (especially office parties/discs)
5.Excel Sheets

The Dreams:
1.Getting my book published someday
2.Watching the finals at Wimbledon
3.Watching Formula 1 live on the ground
4.Traveling to Egypt/West Indies/Greece
5.Getting my own small place right on a beach

The Conflicts:
1.I am a Bong who doesn’t like fish/sweets/tea
2.I am a girl who doesn’t like weddings
3.I learnt classical dance for nine years and yet I am terrified of the dance floor at any party
4.I am an Economics graduate and Finance MBA working in an investment bank who HATES numbers (and excel sheets)
5.I am a cricket fanatic who disappears from the world during the IPL

The Secrets:
1.I haven’t read/watched ANY Harry Potter/Lord of the Rings/Twilight books/movies
2.I find older men very attractive (Sean Connery/Michael Douglas/Bruce Willis/Bruce Springsteen/Steve Tyler/Bono/Nasiruddin Shah)
3.I have hugged a stranger from behind thinking he was my dad, I have entered the men’s room by mistake and I have accidentally asked out a strange guy over the phone
4.I have a red dress which bought while I was in college and I am STILL waiting for the perfect occasion/perfect body to wear it
5.This one is a real secret…

The 'Right' Thing

2011-07-22T09:45:00.006+05:30

Remember those days when you could just run around with oiled hair in pigtails (it looked ghastly till you figured out that was your mom’s way of making you boyfriend-proof till Class VII, which is when you started rebelling), not caring what the world thought about you…

Remember those days when the concept of ‘just friends’ meant just that and you could just spend hours with the best friend (the sweet guy who would share your desk/tiffin/notes in school, AND come back in the evening to play) without your other friends teasing you about him (the pre-Class V days)…

Remember those times when you weren’t aware of the ‘competitive exam’ (doctor/engineer/MBA) bandwagon, and happily wrote essays on ‘I want to be India’s first woman cricket commentator/globe trotter/private detective’…

Remember those days when ‘happiness’ meant those annual diwali meets with cousins, ‘traveling’ meant a weekend trip to the nearest beach (Digha) and ‘celebration’ meant the quarterly Chinese dinner at Bar-B-Q (and you would get depressed when the soup got over, because you would have to wait for another three months before you can have it again)…

Remember those days when you politely put on the dowdy frock (which reached almost your ankles and made you look like a village girl) that your mausi had stitched for you and thanked her, secretly eyeing the trendy denim skirt and T shirt sported by the ‘spoilt rich girl’ from school…

Remember those days when life was not about ‘looking right’, ‘hanging out at the right places’, ‘being with the right kind of people’ or ‘working with the right companies’?

It was just about feeling right…

The Thrill of a Chase

2011-07-21T09:27:00.001+05:30

So you have had a dream that you have chased for as long as you can remember: it gave you a reason to live, a reason to wake up and a reason to look forward to something each day, irrespective of how the other aspects of your life kept falling apart. And suddenly, overnight, you are so close to it, you are almost there and it’s no longer just a dream…

And it scares you: what if you woke up and discovered that it was just a dream, what if something goes wrong or the worst, what if turns out to be a disaster? Then, you would no longer have the one thing in your life which made you go on, you would no longer have a passion to work for and you would be a failure at something you really love…

For once, life is not about just existing, it’s about making a dream come true…

Why Me(rc)?

2011-07-20T18:11:00.003+05:30

Welcome to disaster: Mercedes is now offering individuals the option to lease a car at 50% of the price!

We are slowly, but surely going the American way, where we become slaves to our materialistic desires, buying things which we don’t need at prices we can’t afford. Credit cards and EMIs are the buzzwords, and we no longer believe in our parents’ conservative approach towards consumerism. “Debt” is almost “cool”: earlier we had home loans, then came car loans and education loans, but now we have it for everything, including the split AC we can do without or the designer mobile phone with features we hardly use.

I am very old fashioned in that sense. Even if I borrow five bucks from someone, I feel uneasy till I have returned it (and it works both ways, though now I have learnt to let go of the small sums). I absolutely hate leverage (it’s my typical middle-class bong upbringing I suppose). It’s an irony I work in an investment bank. I am a cultural/psychological misfit with the business model. That also tells you they should probably revamp their recruitment policy and introduce psychometric tests.

I hate debt especially if it’s for luxury cars/phones/other gadgets. Why can’t Mango come up with such a scheme? I can rent their clothes for half the price and then return them after a month or so.

Life is so unfair for women...

Friends Vs. F*** Buddies

2011-07-19T09:14:00.003+05:30

So there are friends, and there are f**k buddies.

By friends, I mean all of my FIVE friends (give or take a few): people I have shared rooms and closets with, people I can call at any hour, people who have helped me move and move on, people who have cooked horrible food and forced it down my throat, people who have carried me home when I was drunk and people who have wheeled me to the hospital when I couldn’t walk…well, people who ARE JUST ALWAYS THERE AND WON”T LEAVE ME ALONE…

And then there are people (in this particular case, a girl) with whom I had awesome chemistry (in a completely non-lesbian context), with whom I shared some wonderful (albeit a few) moments in college, talking about the most random stuff. Even though she wasn’t a part of my everyday life, she had all the rights a friend has (including turning up at my room at midnight and planting herself on my bed because she suddenly wanted ‘to talk’ as I yawned away to glory or singing ‘masakali’ till my head was about to explode)…

But that was two years back. We both left college and promptly lost touch, till yesterday, when she suddenly pinged me from nowhere (in her usual ‘invisible’ mode). After our usual sarcastic exchanges, she started with her probing questions, as I unceremoniously dismissed them on grounds that she no longer had any right to my personal space. So her counterargument was, “Like it or not, we are f**k buddies, if you leave out the f**k part. Now come off your high horse, and TALK.”

And there we were, in another of our 30-minute exchanges, back to the old times.

The ‘masakali girl’, who has all the rights, and none of the responsibilities, and yes, we are f**k buddies…

Zindagi (Na) Milegi Dobara

2011-07-18T09:11:00.002+05:30

No, I haven’t yet seen the movie, but let’s say, hypothetically speaking, if you DID get a second life, if you did get a second chance, if you did get another shot? How would you change things?

I would just want to be extremely beautiful, like Lebanese beautiful…And I don’t mean the “inner beauty” crap, I mean the conventional, on-your-face beauty.

The rest would just take care of itself.

It did for Katrina Kaif…

P.S.: This post dosn't have any "inner meaning"...

Fantasy vs. Reality

2011-07-17T10:34:00.003+05:30

Ok, so my mom called to ask me the usual question, “When do you plan to get married?” for the third time in the week. And for the third time in the week (and the 312th time in the last two years), I replied evasively, “Umm… as soon as I am ready.”
-“Which is, when?”
-“Told you na, I have some things in mind. Once I settle those, then I can think about marriage and stuff.”
-“I am not falling for that again. First there was a job, then there was the second job, and now there is some other nonsense.”
-“So what? You are giving me deadlines now?”
-“No, I am giving you phone numbers and email addresses.”

And of course, the conversation ends there, as I disconnect the call. I miss the old days when we still used landlines and had the luxury of SLAMMING down receivers.

So why don’t I want to get married? Oh come on, of course I do. I am a girl, and the job description of being a girl requires me to be crazy about marriage. And I am not one of those super-ambitious, completely career-oriented, aggressive feminists (I like stereotyping) who are against the whole of mankind. Me, I love men, may be too much. And I love the idea of falling in love with the totally wrong people and being miserable for the rest of my life. So, despite having made my share of mistakes, I still want to be married, eventually…

But what I DO NOT want is a wedding. I positively hate weddings; every bit of them: the preparations, the invitations, the decorations, the thousand gawdy outfits which you will never wear again and the thousand random people whom you will never meet again. Add to that, the dedicated relationship status updates on FB (from ‘single’ to ‘in a relationship’ to ‘engaged’ to ‘married’) all within two months followed by a flurry of albums (‘engagement’, ‘wedding’ and ‘honeymoon’), each of them with over 100 snaps, and you have successfully managed to make me throw up.

If I had my way, I would just land up at a court with the guy, sign a few papers in front of fewer friends, get drunk and spend the rest of my life arguing with my best friend (the aforementioned guy).

So that’s the fantasy...

But the reality will be some fairy-tale wedding with some random person straight out of FB, with some thousand random people celebrating something that doesn’t concern them AND making us pay for the alcohol…

If only happiness was more important than peace. If only…

Bombay Blues

2011-07-16T10:13:00.003+05:30

I used to love Mumbai; I used to believe that I would live here forever; It was the city which accepted things no questions asked; It was the city which shrugged its shoulders and moved on from one tragedy to another; It was the city which gave you hope; It was the city where people from all walks of life could just walk in to make their dreams come true…

But most of all, it was the city which let me be…

Some people call it apathy, but for me that was the biggest gift: I could walk around alone not caring what time it was, I could wear what I wanted, I could be with whoever I wanted, I could be free…

I was addicted to the indifference, the chaos and the life in the fast lane…

Until, I don’t know when, I started feeling differently: the city has stopped making sense to me, it has slowly but surely robbed me off the finer sensibilities, it has made me so tough that I have learnt to just exist without living…

I have stopped caring, I have stopped crying, I have stopped being…

I have started shrugging, I have started surviving, I have started selling my soul…

Now I have goals instead of a dream, desires instead of a will, tasks instead of a passion…

I have BECOME Mumbai, instead of just living here…

Guys Will Never Get This...

2011-07-15T09:57:00.003+05:30

Have you wished that baby pink top you love so much was available in a smaller size?
Have you ever wished that Remanika dress that looks so awesome was cheaper (EVEN AFTER THE 30% DISCOUNT)?
Have you ever wished that you were slim enough to slip into THAT?
Have you ever wished you were tall enough to carry off that pair of capris?
Have you ever wished you were slim enough AND tall enough to effortlessly look good in ANYTHING instead of trying to find clothes which “flatter your curves?”

Basically, have you ever visited the mall and come out depressed wanting to go straight under the knife?

That’s what the sale season does to me…

Another Wednesday...

2011-07-14T10:14:00.001+05:30

I remember posting this entry two and half years back about the 26/11 blasts. Today, after YET ANOTHER TERRORIST ATTACK, I really don’t want to repeat myself (we have politicians to do that). But one thing has changed though: in 2008, I was this student who had been remarkably close to the attacks but was not really touched by them. Yes, terrorism was a reality, yes Mumbai was the darling of terrorists and yes, I had been to all those ravaged places, but I was never personally affected. Terrorism was something that happened to other people, we just watched it on TV and shuddered. But I can no longer say that…

Mercifully I am safe, my family, friends and colleagues are safe, but that doesn’t stop me from going back a year, February 13, 2010: a time when I was lost in my own world (and not blogging). Ok, fine, it was Valentines Day eve and I was busy. But one phone call, and it sort of changed things forever. We were no longer a distant observer who sipped coffee, discussed the atrocities and abused the politicians; we had become a victim. There was a blast in German Bakery in Pune (a place we would often visit during our MBA days) and five of my close friends (including my ex roomie and the anon commenter on this blog) who were just revisiting the old days on a Saturday evening unfortunately chose to do so at that very hour. The rest is just blood and shock and trauma. The incident changed their lives but we are just thankful that they lived to tell the story.

Terrorism teaches you to be grateful for things which are our fundamental rights…

This post is for those five people (the anonymous commenter included)

Rebel With(out) a Cause

2011-07-13T09:22:00.002+05:30

Most of my friends who have stuck around in the company they joined from campus (we all know what happened to the 2009 batch) and completed two years have been doing really well and getting promoted. I say this with genuine pride and happiness because (and I am sure they will agree with me) it wouldn’t have been possible without my support and encouragement. The very fact that I touched their lives ensured that their bosses recommended them for a promotion.

My boss, on the other hand, sent me a mail saying I should consider taking the training on “business etiquette and corporate behavior” (I hate when people spell behaviour without a ‘u’). It’s actually funny if it wasn’t so bloody insulting. Anyway, the lesson I have taken out of this little altercation is no matter how much you dislike your boss, never make it evident in the monsoon season. Now that I don’t get along with him, I can’t afford to slack at work (in fact I work harder than ever) which in turn means struggling to work at 8:30 a.m. even when it is raining cats and dogs and I am the first person to turn up AND SWITCH ON THE WASHROOM LIGHTS.

But after a lot of thinking last night, I have decided that it’s not ENTIRELY DK Bose’s fault that we don’t get along. Of course, he is not the best manager (though he is super smart) but I am also this moody, stubborn, rebellious kid who is yet to learn to say the right things at the right time to the right people. It worked against me throughout B school (I could never plead with the faculty or indulge in mindless CP for the extra GPA even if that meant writing a backlog) and while things were pretty smooth in Company D, towards the end, I got into a showdown with my manager. So I observe a trend here: the problem lies with ME and not the whole world.

The root of the problem is: I DON”T WANT TO DO THIS WORK…

I Am...

2011-07-12T09:29:00.002+05:30

So what if I am a little crazy?
So what if I am a little insecure?
So what if I am a little rude (ok VERY rude)?
So what if I have my foot in the mouth a little too often?
So what if I am a little undiplomatic?
So what if I am a little impulsive?
So what if I am a little dumb? (refer to point number 2)
So what if I am a little proud?

I am still me…

A Year Ago...

2011-07-11T09:44:00.004+05:30

This time last year: this was when it all started and turned your life upside down. It was just another usual weekday morning when you are flipping through the newspaper, having the morning coffee and making idle conversation. And then, suddenly, one thing leads to another, and the next thing you know, your life changes drastically. It doesn’t take a major FIGHT or a major EVENT, but, one fine day, all these small innocuous conversations add up and blow up on your face. Then it’s all downhill: you start arguing about the stupid things that doesn’t even matter, you become insecure about things which aren’t really important and you say things which you can’t take back. What follows is a huge mess that still makes you cringe…

So it’s been a year. Things have changed, circumstances have changed and people have changed. Mercifully, you have survived, though you are still scared: scared of trusting, scared of being emotionally attached and scared of getting hurt. So you pre-empt ANY possibilities which may make you vulnerable and you run: from yourself and the situation. You protect yourself through destruction, you choose loneliness and you freeze, no matter how much you want to let yourself go...

It’s ALWAYS peace over happiness…

But It Rained

2011-07-10T11:26:00.003+05:30

See, I am this very mature, pragmatic and realistic person who doesn’t believe in ‘happily ever after’ or romantic love stories that I read or watch in movies. That’s just ‘research’ for ‘understanding the human psychology’ and for those who may have seen me cry while watching “KKHH”, “DDLJ”, “Object of My Affection” or “When Harry Met Sally” for the nth time, well, it was just that I have a problem with my contact lenses, which make me LOOK like I am crying, when I am actually NOT. And just for the record, I have read ONLY ONE M&B and two Danielle Steele novels in my life.

Anyway, so EVEN for someone so practical (as clearly established above), there is something about the Mumbai rains which turn me into a hopeless romantic. I just can’t help it.

It makes me want to go to Goa, get drenched and dance (jump up and down) uninhibitedly...

It makes me want to go back to my college days and sit on Marine Drive just staring at the sea…

It makes me want to cuddle under the blanket, eat khichuri and aloo bhaja…

It makes me want to go back to school and play football (even though I was the goalie) because that was the only way I could spend some time with the boy…

It just makes me cry... (damn the lenses)

When Leadership Fails to Lead

2011-07-09T09:24:00.002+05:30

Yesterday was like THE longest day of my life. Or may be it just seemed so long because it sucked so much. Now I am not one of those frustrated, disgruntled employees who vent about their jobs (and bosses) on online forums which nobody reads. I go a step further, and ABUSE them on online forums which nobody reads.

So here goes:

I hate office parties: They are the single-most pretentious exercise ever devised to ruin Friday nights. Even the free booze and food are so not worth it. I mean, think about it: listening to some firang bigmouth (who has forgotten how it feels to stop and breathe once in a while) and half-a-dozen MBA grads pretending to be interested in ‘land monetization’ and ‘low P/E valuations of Russia’ at 9 p.m. so sucks the blood out of your system. Then when your boss (let’s call him DK Bose henceforth) follows you around and tells you to ‘mingle and network’ instead of sitting in one corner looking at your watch, it makes you want to throw up on his expensive suit.

I hate ‘showcasing our good work’: Now don’t get me wrong: of all possible corporate jobs out there for me, I think my current job is the best. I get to read a lot (even if it’s a whole of financial jargon), I get to write reports and make creative presentations and the best part is I have complete freedom to do what I want. I have full responsibility, accountability and minimal interference as far as my reports are concerned. And in the last six months, I have done some good work even if I say so myself. (I have got client emails to prove it, which I save and back up on gmail for year-end appraisal when I am sure DK Bose will try to screw up my case and tamper with my mailbox). That’s not because I am god’s gift to Company C, but because I slog 10 hours a day (without long breaks) and I really give my best. I am secure about my capabilities and I think my work speaks for itself (and hence we get recurrent client projects) rather than me doing so. So I don’t feel the need to pander to leadership and throw jargon or book airtime ‘with the people who matter’.

I hate jargon: If I ever get a chance to redesign the MBA curriculum, the first thing I would introduce is the Primary English Language course, which teaches you the very function of ANY language is to COMMUNICATE, and not CONFUSE. I mean, imagine this: two newbies just making casual (the guy trying to sound funny) conversation and DK Bose or firangs are not even around to assess your “team skills”:
Guy: "So what do you think I am drinking?"
Girl: (staring at the glass): "Err…. Vodka?"
Guy: "Are you sure? Within what confidence interval is your answer applicable? 90%-95% or 95%-99%?"
Girl: "95%-99%"
Me (who was stuck between the two): "Can’t you guys like be normal or something?"

Sighhh.. I miss Company D. I had REAL friends there, who just drank without talking about confidence intervals and central limit theorem (this came up during a lunch conversation which I am not even going to repeat here).

Why can’t parties be just parties and MBAs be, well, you know, PEOPLE?

Sorry Mr. Vadukut

2011-07-08T10:18:00.004+05:30

This was supposed to be another rant: life has been tough lately (what with work and the rains and the waiting). Turns out that “being dignified” and “letting go” are not as easy as they sound.

But, something happened THIS MORNING which shocked me considerably but made me happy too. Sidin Vadukut (yes, the famous writer and editor of Business Line) commented on my post, “Pride and Peace”!!! Now, I have no idea how he came about the existence of my blog, given I have like FIVE readers (now that Neil is no longer here)… sniff sniff. I don’t mean “no longer here” as he is dead or something, just that he has stopped visiting/commenting on my blog. So the only explanation I came up with is the respected Mr. Vadukut, being humble and down-to-earth as he is, refuses to get carried away by his success, and looks for critical feedback online. So he must have randomly typed in “sidin vadukut + bastard” on google and lo and behold, he was directed to my blog. My sincere apologies Mr. Vadukut. In my defence, I never imagined in my wildest of dreams that you would EVER visit this godforsaken blog!

So all you anon readers, now that you know FAMOUS people are not ashamed to leave a mark on my blog, please own up and introduce yourselves. It would mean a lot to me.

This is what Mr. Vadukut had to say:
Lucky b***** indeed. :)
Thanks for reading the book.

My sincere apologies. I may have used the b-word, but what I actually meant was ‘brilliant’ with a few stars missing. Really really loved the book, and I am not just saying that because you are famous and I abused you on public forum.

So should I like post my resume or something on this blog and abuse nwspapers/editors/pulishers so that in case they are also looking for critical feedback may come across my blog and discover my HIDDEN TALENT? Should work better than sending emotional emails about how writing is my lifelong dream even though I am a MBA working with an investment bank?

Sigghhh… I need a break or just a publisher may be…