New shirt, new watch, new bag - बढियां है

Richa just returned from US, and she got me some gifts - a swiss gear sack, a caravelle bulova watch, a wawa coffee mug, a sweat shirt from Atlantic city.

The swiss-gear sack (made by victorinox - makers of swiss-knife) can carry a laptop, has in-numerable pockets, an audio-port, and is very very sturdy. It has got very sturdy zips, unlike other bags. You can keep your mp3 player inside and can connect headphones to the audio-port which is outside the bag.

The caravelle bulova watch is also very nice. I like the small inner dials, and the color and feel of the strap.

The coffee-mug is a big one. It can store 3 cups of coffee, is microwave proof, works like a thermos too, and is spill proof. The best part is - it came for only 1$.

So much for the shopping which was done for me. I am happy she returned safely w/o any unwanted incidents.

Makkadman and India

Today, I got two interesting forwards - one was how India should go about developing the second rung cities to ease the pressure on the metros. You can read it here. The photo shown in the article is that of Westside in Landmark building in Nagpur (my native place).

The second one is really funny. It is a perfect Indian adaptation of spiderman. See it here.

Enjoy your weekend!

Time to take a back seat

There are times when you get so caught-up in the rat race that you forget to enjoy the little things in life. You are so caught-up thinking what you want to do in future that you forget your present. What you end up being is just a "rat" - nothing more, who is being fed by somebody to run as per his whims and fancies.

At times like these, some words of guidance from "dad" really help. They have gone through situations like this many times in their lives. After all, they have seen at-least 21 more summers than you.

The important step here is not to take a step forward, but to take a step back, and see where you are, and cherish what you have accomplished. Sadly, most of us have lost the ability to cherish what we have done, and have become some sort of cribbers. Another important thing is to develop some hobby - as it tends to support you in times like these.

I now realize the importance of taking time off, and having a hobby, or not pursuing those which I had :-(.

Experience of a lifetime

I just happenned to read an article posted by Alistair about his experiences with hair-cut. You can read his experiences here.

This has inspired me to share my experience with hair-cut too. This one was no ordinary experience but taught me something which I will remember for my lifetime.

We had gone to भीमाशंकर on a hot afternoon, to visit the Shiva temple there. भीमाशंकर is one of the famous ज्योतिर्लिंगs. However, it is quite far-away from Pune, the road is not good, the journey is quite tiring, and there is nothing except the शिव मंदिर. By the time we got back to Pune, I was pretty tired.

When I am pretty tired, and incidentally have a long hair, the only thing that appeals to me is having a nice hair-cut. In such situations, if the thought of hair-cut even crosses my mind, it stays stuck over there till I am done with it. I get withdrawal symptoms if I don't get a hair-cut.

This was just the sort of time I wanted a hair-cut. I went to प्रशांत in औन्ध. It was all going fine till the bastard slit the back of my neck with his उस्तरा (blade). Blood started oozing out of it. I just asked him for a cotton swab so that I could stop the bleeding, and do the necessary dressing.

But no! My barber thought himself to be the dresser-in-chief of Apollo Hospital. He took the cotton swab, put it on the wound. Then to my horror, before I knew, he rubbed the wound with something. I did not know what.

The only thing that I could was - "ऊह आह आउच". I shouted at him - "ये क्या लगा रहे हो". To which, he said "फिटकिरि" (alum). I was zapped.

Now these barbers watch too much of hindi cinema. When the hero gets a bullet wound in his arm, what does he do? Yeah. He did the same with me.

He took a cotton swab, took a match-stick, and lit a fire on the cotton swab. He then rubbed my wound with a burning cotton swab.

By now, I had totally lost it. I shouted at him again - "खबरदार जो ये सब किया तो. चुप-चाप जो बचे कुचे बाल हैं, वोह काटो."

Since then, I have never gone to प्रशांत again, and I have never allowed any barber to use उस्तरा on me, even if he changes blades or does any damn thing with it.

Waiting for monkeys to complain

TOI today reported an incident where some prominent doctors from Nagpur had gone to a reserve forest called Nagzira. In their merry-making, these people got a bit too drunk. The generous people they were, they offerred their drink in steel plates to langoors. As it would happen, some of the monkeys also got drunk.

Then a fight erupted between the doctors and the monkeys. The doctors were abusing the monkeys, pelting stones on them, and even throwing chairs on the monkeys. The monkeys in response were doing what they could.

The forest guides, who are on govt. payroll, were mere spectators. Some of the nature friendly tourists registered a complaint with the forest authorities against those erring doctors. When contacted by TOI, the forest in-charge had this to say - "We did not receive any complaints."

I suppose he is waiting for the monkeys to register a complaint with him.

Oh No! Not again!

Shilpa is in news again, thanks to her, Richard Gere, and the nation's no. 1 news channel - Aajtak.

The not-so-general public, the moral brigade, the guardians of Indian culture - generated a lot of heat because Richard Gere kissed Shilpa Shetty on the cheek.

There were several reactions, and if you are not a cultural-moral policeman - you will find them hillarious.

- Shilpa Shetty defending Richard Gere - "It was an impromptu act he did for the audience’s entertainment."

We were certainly entertained. The credit definitely goes to you and the moral-brigade, and of-course to Aajtak for bringing the issue in prominence.

- Shilpa Shetty criticising the moral brigade - "It is really sad that the issue for which the two of us came together, AIDS, was totally sidelined and this frivolous issue has got prominence."

Good you realized you were indulging in a lot of frivolous acts these days.

- A moral-general - "We are a culture that worships women, we believe in ‘nari shakti (woman power)’. Padmavati, Durgavati and Rani Laxmibai are our ideals."

Oh! Cut the crap man. We all know what you do when you are not morally policing the rest of India.

- The real reason - "We are not bothered about how many times he kisses how many women in Hollywood. We are troubled with Shilpa’s behaviour. When the man was being outrageously indecent before a large gathering, why did she keep giggling?"

Whats the real issue here? Was it the man's indecency before a large gathering, or was it Shilpa's giggling? Decide your problem dear

सर्जरी - द्वितीय भाग

Starting where we left off - well that is strictly not possible because as I said previously, you don't have any recollection of what happenned during your surgery.

When your anaesthesia starts wearing down, you can sub-consciously hear a few things. You still can't see anything because you are बेहोश for all practical purposes. I could hear my surgeon say - "सब कुछ ठीक हो गया".

In my opinion, this particular stage is extremely dicy. You are in a state which is similar to what you would be in, when subjected to narco-analysis. You react - w/o any fear, w/o any restraints which the society puts on you, w/o any restraints which you might have put on yourself.

If, at this time, your wife asks you - whom do you love the most, well don't be surprised if she later tells you that you named your ex-girlfriend, or a girl whom you had a big crush on in your college days. Believe me, it is that dicy.

Fortunately for me, my wife did not ask that kind of a question, but I guess, next time she won't spare me. One incident that did occur, as per my wife, was this -

Sub-consciously, I was afraid of the vasofix - yeah - the same vasofix. I had felt a needle going in, but never felt the needle coming out. I was under the impression that the needle is still sitting in my vein, and the axis of the needle and that of my vein are identical. Any disturbance in any axis could lead to my vein getting ruptured. Hence, I was sub-consciously very "conscious" of anybody coming close to the vasofix.

My wife was making me drink water periodically, to prevent my mouth from drying. In this attempt, she was coming close to the vasofix. According to her, I had a raised voice when telling her: क्या बार-बार इधर आके पानी पिलाती है. उस कोने में जाके बैठती क्यों नही?

To this day, I am conscisouly repenting for what I said when I was unconscious.