Saturday, November 11, 2006

Anupam Kher Unlimited

Anupam Kher Unlimited

Yes am talking about the famous actor Anupam Kher. It happened that my favorite news paper Times Of India was organizing a week long Bangalore Festival...comprising different areas...viz...music...dance...food...and theatre...the theater festival was the closing ceremony of the festival.

Manu called me in the office and asked me to get the passes from the itpl planet m, but I guess they were in so much demand that they all got picked up even before I reached there. The guy at Planet M told me that I might get it from brigade road planet m, but who will do a mistake by going to the brigade road on the busy weekday. Well we were both upset, moreover one of her friends was more interested in going than us. Then came this Saturday when we happen to be at the brigade road for some work. It was 11 am and I was alone, went to planet m asked for the passes(giving every possible try) but no success, then he gave me an option of going to the Times of India office and try there, it was 1 km walk…still I decided, I wont loose anything if I give it a try. I entered the office lobby, peeped inside, and before I could get a good look at the beautiful gals behind the desk, the guard asked me what I want. I asked him about the ticket, and he said he has last 2 available, I was like man, and these 2 passes were made for me only. I asked him for two more and he took away the passes he had just given me and said he would give them to those who need only 2. I settled for 2 passes. I was happy and full of joy; I was preparing myself for one more theatre, after a long break. Well we both were quite excited…

We reached the auditorium which was 25 kms away from my house 1 hr before the scheduled time, but only after waiting for 1 long hour we were allowed to enter inside.

Then after 15 mins i.e. @ 6.45 Mr Anupam Kher made appearance, and started shaking hands with everybody there in the public and guess what a guy came and kissed Mr.Kher.He was taken aback. Between a lot of hustle bustle the Monologue started, which was actually an autobiography of his. It was full of fun, humor, satire, love and emotions. He started with his birth, went till teens and then moved up to the current status. Anupam Kher again showcased that; there can not be a finer theater artist then him. He was self sufficient for handling around 500 audiences without any artist. Well I enjoyed to the maxim, and hope to witness more such events in future.

From his childhood in Shimla to his decision to study acting to his failures and his phases, Kher weaves in every aspect of his life in his autobiographical play Kuch Bhi Ho Sakta Hain, without meandering or delving too long in one phase. He makes you laugh, cry, ponder and go nostalgic through the two-and-a-half hours. And only makes you reflect over what Javed Akhtar had once said, “You cannot make a film without two things — raw stock and Anupam Kher.”

Cheers to that rare star who can laugh at himself effortlessly.

Tuesday, October 31, 2006

Journey to Ajmer

So the journey of thousand miles started late Image.

Yes we were leaving for Ajmer for Diwali Vacation. Firstly the traffic on the way to Bangalore Station was awesome. Seems everybody in Bangalore was heading to the station. It took us almost 1hr and 45 minutes to travel a distance of 13 kilometers, which other wise takes 30 minutes.

The usual financial crunch in the monthly budget made us travel thru the Indian Railways. Anyway we reached station and in a bid to save every single penny; we did not take the coolie. And unsure where the train would arrive we were waiting for the announcement on the over head bridge for around 20 minutes, which also gave us a chance to regain our lost breath. After asking several coolies we made a decision to go to the platform and then run at the runtime. But as not expected (yeah I know unusual when we are talking about IR) the train came approximately 30 minutes late and it started about 30 minutes later. So from the beginning it was an hour late. Well we boarded the train, but we got the seats near the gate of the compartment. So we were very unhappy, and more then me my wifey. The foul smell is one of her greatest turn offs. Then some gujjus gang was there near to us and one of them asked us to interchange the seats as they were 9 people and all had seats in different compartments. We thought god had listened to our requests and sent these guys, we happily got ourselves interchanged. So came to a new compartment and new bogie too. It had 3 gujjus, 2 rajasthanis and 2 cosmos (yes am talking about ourselves), the rest were not the part of the party. Well we immediately befriended each other. So now in more detail 2 were students, Himanshu and Garima and the guy was as usual flirting with the girl, another girl, Shalini pretended to be an employee of a leading Indian multinational who actually was an employee of the BPO arm of the same company. One guy Divyesh was an employee of US multinational and another guy, Satpal Singh was a practicing lawyer from a village in Rajasthan.

Day 1 went without many events, and then day 2 came, which went without much trouble. We played cards talked about several stuff like dirty politics, good colleges, paying software companies, optional education, and unforgettable traffic of Bangalore. Also watched Rang De Basanti (courtesy my laptop), also towards the end of the day we watched Garima’s fusion dance performance.

Pune comes around 1830, we thought of calling Ankit to the station, so we called Aniruddha bhai for the same. Came Pune station. Met both of them after a long time. And Anirudha bhai was same as before, asked them to put on some weight for shaadi. It was good to see all of them. That night was the last night we all together, wished Himanshu Happy diwali, coz he was getting down @ Surat. We retired to our births and slept immediately, though we dint do anything great in the day, and still we were tired. When did Himanshu leave I don’t know, and when did Shalini changed the coach I don’t know.

In the morning, Ahmedabad was scheduled @ 7.35 and it was right time. Before that we exchanged cards. Fone numbers and the email ids. So now after Ahmedabad only Satpal Singhji and we were left in the whole compartment, and as I said briefly before about him, he sucks, is typical rajasthani and ganwar. Only God know how he became a lawyer. So the rest of the journey went into chatting with Manu, was very much excited about telling people about the H-1B. Did a bit of coding and listened songs too. Train was late by an hour. It took 2.5 hours to cover a normal 1 hour distance. Generally Indian Rails are made to wait for other trains for a crossing once it gets late, so once a late, always a late.

Saturday, October 07, 2006

Wonder La

Wonder La

Well 2nd October everybody was out of town, I was wondering where they actually went. Affter reaching Wonder La I got to know where they had gone. Can anybody imagine there were 7500 people inside?

Now something about WonderLa. We were there at 1 pm though we thought we would be too early but there were already 6k people inside. An attendant came and told us for every ride it would take almost 15-20 minutes as compared to 3-4 minutes in routine days. The weekend footfall is 3-3.5 k and the weekday would attract 1-1.5 k people.

As compared to other theme parks, this was far better in cleanliness, though management was bad at few places, but it still is ok. The best were the water rides. By the end of the day, the water was damn dirty, still people were flocking for the wave pool like anything. To best enjoy the place, one should be there @ 11 AM and leave only @ 8.30 PM. So that s/he can also enjoy the night lighting there. Also the one thing which is not to be missed is the Musical fountain-this one is better then the Brindawan Garden (as heard from others).

Well all in all, see it to believe it.

MG Road @ 70 kmph

Can anybody tell me if he or she has ever zipped past the busy, bustling and ever filled with activity MG Road in Bangalore. The long weekend of 2nd october 2006 was one such long weekend where everybody who was passing thru this road was not crawling but cruising. The reason being a long weekend, everybody, virtually everybody was out of Bangalore. It was good atleast for me Image

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Communication Meet

After repeated requests from the US counterparts and also due to influx of people from so many dialects, Tech Lead at last thought of doing a communication meet, so that everybody speaks the same tone. People from same states have different language understanding, and more over they never even try to rectify it, thinking whatever they know is the best of best.

So the tradition of meeting twice weekly started, spending some time together, and were asked to pick mistakes (if any) from an individuals' 2 minutes speech.

Some people welcomed it and some tried to escape it. Well they were even threatened that their performance will be measured on this basis too.

Well, days passed by and somebody got benefited with it and some wasted their time. During that 2 minute session people were more horrified than comfortable, as they were afraid, that his performance appraisal will be affected. Also, that became more off a tech session than a place to learn. Anyway after some time we all got bored with the monotonous routine; we decided to shift to reading session. And in between we also managed to have a group discussion.

One of the best discussions was when Chinna said English language should not be made mandatory for primary schools, and it should be the choice of parents in which medium they want their child to study. Topic came out to be a heavy blow on each others face, who were against it and in support of it. As all the discussions went on there was no conclusion. But the thing that I enjoyed there was that people who generally do not speak can be asked to speak and present their views as the topic is general. When a technical topic is discussed then it remains confined to the scope of its technicality.

Any which way, all in all the topic was really mind opening and I guess in future we should discuss more of general topics, to make all involved.

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Long time no see

It’s been long when I have written any blog, Vista was the one blog which I wrote recently.
Now being back on bench after 2-3 months of hard work (please don’t ask the definition of hard work) I’ll be writing more blogs, and reading them also.

My last work involved lot of research and development in the field of ELMAH, which is actually a plug-in from GotDotNet. Will write a new blog for that, explaining all about it.

I have been doing lot of orkut in last few weeks, don’t know how but u tend to take time out for those message and crazy scraps. I found almost 15+ long lost school mates. And then there are some crazy people also who try to add you in there list for any reason. Orkut gives you communities also where in people with similar interest can join and share there views.

Well if I remember I might blog for my trip tp Pondicherry, Tirupati and Shravanabelagola too.

MS Vista

Manu was gone.
I was alone.
It was very dark outside.

I was sitting and watching my pc staring me back. Have been trying to install Vista Beta 2 on my desktop for long, which I downloaded spending almost 3 days, yes 72 hrs (24hrs * 3 Days) and not 24 hrs (8hrs * 3 Days). Have been trying to upgrade but something or the other keeps coming in.

Then finally decided for clean install.
Not enough disk space.
Spent around 2 hours in making space, and then finally started installing. It took me almost 3 hours to completely setup the computer with Internet working, but every now and then there was this feeling some where erupting inside, what if it fails to install, what if the downloaded file is corrupted, from where will I get bootable CD, and all those cowardly ideas. After, 3 hours my mean machine was ready to roar. It was up and running. With all that beautiful landscaping on the desktop, it was a 3D imaging, all shimmering black. Only if you know all those shortcuts which you have been using in older OS's, other wise it takes lot of time in going through all those new applications, new naming, and new place for folders. My Documents has been relocated under Users/ folder and all those in documents and settings has been moved under Users folder.

Then came the Office 2007 Beta 2. This was equally dominating. Microsoft has tried lot to come out of that old look, and is a complete winner. Vista is not similar to any of the old OS’s. If anybody has not worked on XP or older then going down from vista to older OS would be like going from Windows 95 to windows 3.1.

All in all Microsoft has done a lot to come out of that old blue green colored image. A small tip - press windows key + Shift + tab, you will see 3-D view of all application running.

For those who want to have a feel without installing it, can have a look over Yahoo widgets.
Any comments any additions are welcome.

Monday, April 03, 2006

A Visit To A Restaurant called Tamarind

After a long drive, Bhabi said she is not cooking, Manu (my wife) said manage yourself as she had fast for Gangaur (a typical north Indian tradition) and she was badly tired, had no other option left, we planned for Tamarind, Outer Ring Road (Hyderabad Highway), which is close to our house (Kalyan Nagar) also and as per Abhishek Bhai's past experience of four years, its good.

After reaching there only I came to know that Bangalore is one place where people do not want to cook on weekends, gosh, it was jam packed, with not even a place to wait, we were told to wait for 30 long mins.

Little Amishi was happy, she got time to have fun with all types of jhulas, I guess that was a major attraction for all the kids. Manu was baby sitting her.

At last, after lot of wambling with Waiter, and having been bitten by I think thousand mosquitoes; we got a seat for 6. Arumit was also with us, Abhishek Bhai's cousin. We ordered for a plain dal and very popular subzi Kadhai Paneer with tandoori roti, I opted for pudhina kulcha, with soup as a starter. After starters, came the dinner, for which we all were waiting for long. First the plates were layed which were wet; I will leave this to your imagination. And then this waiter, who was serving us, was not courteous enough to give us tissue paper, I literally screamed at him. We started with food, mostly the food was ok. But we had to ask for spoons and onions, which is given as a general practice. I remember those days in Coimbatore, where eating with spoon was almost like a sin.

I don’t know what was so great about that food which compelled people to stand for waiting, ours was majboori ;-). Anyway, to my astonishment, that guy took away the subzi while Abhishek Bhai was trying to eat that rubber roti. Man, this is really bad. How can a person take away the utensil, while eating? I understand everybody was in hurry coz it was almost 11 o'clock, still.

By the time all this happened, the person who took the order has already left. We called the other guy, and asked him to call the Manager, but he didn’t call him. After waiting for some 5-10 minutes I stood up and told him, if you are not calling the manager, we are leaving, without paying the bill. Then suddenly Manager kind of person was seen with the same food server, who was listening to the stories made by him.

Manager came and apologized for everything. He asked for something, we would like to have in lue of the loss happened, Bhai said it’s no point waiting for the sabji and roti for another 15 mins. Bhai paid the bill, and thought that he will refund the amount charged for the subzi, but it dint happen, he returned the exact change. Bhai then had a word to word fight with the Manager. Its a general etiquette that one should refund a part of bill, to patch up the things, but it dint happen, more over Manager was fighting over manners he showed when asking for anything in return.

I guess this was the worst ever experience I had while visiting a restaurant. Guys, it's a humble request; please do not go to those restaurants, where you do not get respect and value for money. We pay for the services and we should get them in return.

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Fwd: Is Pune really cheap?

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ravindra Chandak
Subject: Is Pune really cheap?
To: Saurabh Moondhra

Check the price.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From:
Subject: Re: Kapil Malhar
To: Ravindra Chandak

Dear Sirs,

The rate at Kapil Malhar is Rs. 2450/sq. ft(+Rs. 15 floor rise). Other costs include Car park Rs. 1,50,000+MSEB Rs. 50,000+Soc. Formation Rs. 15,000+Applicable stamp duty. Area for 2 BHK flat is 1283 sq. fts. The Completion date is Dec 2007. Booking amount is Rs. 50,000/-

Pl. let us know your floor preference so that we can mail you the availability & exact cost details. Also pl. let us know any furhter info. you require.

Regards
For Shree Bal Developers

Hemant Jain.
----- Original Message -----
From: Ravindra Chandak
To: enquiry@shreebaldevelopers.com
Subject: Kapil Malhar


I am interested in 2-3bedroom Kapil Malhar . Could you please provide the availability,rate, completion date, payment plans and any other details you may have.

Also could you provide your contact details.

Thanks
Ravindra

Sunday, March 05, 2006

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Friends Reunion

Friends Reunion

I was in Pune for the last weekend, to celebrate the Valentine's Day with my beautiful wife. So I thought of meeting few school friends there, with whom I have not met for last 5 years. So I called up those people day before yesterday and set the program to meet in the afternoon for the lunch. As usual Mr. Tits (Titash Neogi) was late, came along with his sweet, cute wife. And then it all started with leg pulling, information hiding with wives, sharing etc, and then it was Maloo's turn to say hi. It was Mr Shalabh Maloo, who was there with us. He added some salt and pepper in the discussions. We also discussed about old teachers with there same old nick names, and also about old classmates. Well all in all it was a good experience. Meeting those oldies and then discussing those things.

Alone I can only say but together we can shout, alone I can only smile but together we can laugh, alone i can only live but together we can celebrate. That’s being Friends.

Hope the love we shared, stays there.

Monday, February 13, 2006

My Valentine's Day

My Valentine's Day

A letter from my wife to her friends, telling them about my first ever valentines day in her own sweet words.

Hi Frends….



How r u all!

Actually I had to tell u all something very sweet tht my darling hubby did for me….he is such a sweetheart….

As u guys know I was in pune for the weekend, my darling hubby gave me a valentine surprise….he planned it out wth my bro….!

U kno earlier I was nt goin to pune ..only he was goin and then he tells me why don’t u also come along .without gvng it a secong thot I said Yes( had to).

U kno why he asked me to come to Pune so tht he cud gv me tht surprise..sahi chaloo hai na….thnks to St. Valentines else I wud have sadofied in Bangalore tht too alone for 2 nites……

Anyways , I had no clue wht was up…we were goin out fr dinner to a place..cool place guys..live rock and females were hardly wearing anything ..my bro,his frends and of course my hubby had a gud time..:)
my bro stopped on the way to pick up a cake saying it was his frends bday and they r goin to celebrate it at nite…had no intension whatsoever to look at the cake and I dint…..to the mercy of the guys involved in the conspiracy.

We had a blasting dinner…on our way back …it was 12: 30…my bro got down to pick a few roses saying his senior had asked for it..he has to tk it for him..i said why the hell does he want it at this hour,…he ignored me and gt the roses…

We reached CME , and u kno tht place is like a big jungle with buildings here and there…there are two lakes also and a bird sactuary…to sum it up a nice green place.

My hubby was very excited driving my bro’s bike..Avenger-the land cruiser bike…he told me lets go for a drive..i sd its too cold..he sd chalo na..bore mat karo…we were on the bike and Ankit and his frend in the car…they took us to the lake. Fir Ankit bola didi u hv seen the other lake ,go show jiaji the other lake as well…I sd fair enuff… !

I tuk Saurabh arnd CME..the places I knew…then told him to go bck as it was pretty dark and I was scared and also feeling cold.

We came bck to the lake…Saurabh just walked in the garden beside the lake..Ankit was still there waiting for us..us time meri ghanti baji and I told Saurabh u r behaving as if something is planned but he obviously ignored me.

Then Ankit bola u guys sit , we r goin bck to our room.Saurabh sd ok and sd we will sit on the lake shore for some time…..

Those guys went away and only two of us were left.

It was a full moon nite…(chandani raat)…I was scared as I cud hear some noises cmng from the lake and was wondering why is Saurabh not scared..(he usually is...!)

There were stone made seats…we walked further and I cud see something on the seat!

Here is the SURPRISE!

The cake,flowers (Ankit forgot to put the candles) and of course my gift….!

It was so sweet..so romantic..my eyes were filled with tears…I dint hv words…

I opened my gift …it was Swaroski pendant,earrings and a bracelet….too much to digest!

It was beautiful….we sat there for some time….ek dum filmi tha…but after some time those noises strtd to scare Saurabh also..i told u na he was also scared.We cud see something mvng in the lake and were too scared to wait there…so tuk everything and came bck to the room…cut the cake there..without the knife…finger se hi cut kar liya and finger ko hi spoon bana liya….;)

( u kno I had been askng him since mny days for my valentine gift …and he md me count all the gifts tht he has given me till now…whether bday,anniversary or valentine…sahi chaloo hai)

I love u S!

U kno guys I hvnt bot anything for him…..!

Love u all…

M

Friday, February 10, 2006

Just Another Day

I got up @ 6.15 in the morning today to reach early to office, only to find that, my lovely beautiful wife was already ready to go to office with all breakfast made and ready to move out. I was just wondering, how does she manages to wake up before me and then too, without disturbing me at all. I was talking to this friend of mine this morning, and i was just amazed to know that she leaves for office at 7.30 am, for that she wakes up at 5.30 am and then reaches from office to home at around 8.30 pm just to get a full night sleep. Well, kudos to Women of India. She does everything to keep her husband, her new family happy. Cant men be less demanding. Regards to all ladies in World.

Saturday, February 04, 2006

Wedding Party

It was some time ago, before i went for my wedding that i got a fone from one of my school junior, saurabh, saying come back and it's a surprise, i thought gone man, these guys will leave me with a deep whole in my pocket.

Few days back i was told to keep myself free on 4th Feb 2006, i was wondering days are very near, so start saveing :).

Then on the same day, i was told to reach Chandni Chowk, a good hang out restaurent in Koramangla, Bangalore, by 7.30 en the evening.

I reached an hour late, as expected, coz my beautiful wife was busy getting ready. There these ppl have arranged a dinner for the newly wedded couple. Well these ppl are my school juniors cum brothers...

So there we had a good fun with north Indian dinner. Ice cream was planned later. Also decided that all gonna come to our place in some time, may in the next fortnight.

But all in all it was a good experience. It was a real heart warming treat.

Sunday, January 29, 2006

Rang De Basanti

Rang De Basanti

Just came from the movie.

Dont know how to start and what to write. The movie was truely awesome. And really a thing to learn from. These politicians are like......... Hang Till Death.

There are two types of people in this world, who live life as it comes , and the other who stand up and make the difference . Now one has to decide, to which side he wants to stand.

While returning back to home I was thinking, which side do I stand. And it was quickly decided that am the later one, but question arises how to make the difference, in which way I can change this wide spread corruption in my country. Ofcourse no body can leave the life on its own, but the difference lies in the way they live their otherwise ordinary life. The only difference they can make is by being honest and stopping corruption in their day to-day life. The other day I went to commercial street (a famous market in Bangalore) with my ex fiance(now wife), and parked my bike on the no parking zone, as usual my vehicle got lifted. After much of walking into number of Police Stations we found our vehicle, and to our amazement, there were couple of people who were standing in the other 'Q'.

Whats this other queue?

One queue was the one where Traffic police man was there and the other was the driver or the agent or dalla(in typical hindi slang). Before I could walk towards the traffic police man the agent came to me and asked for Rs 100/- for settlement, I ignored him and straight away went to the traffic police man who made a Rs 200/- challan and to much of my amusement there was this couple who went with the agent and settled in Rs 50/-

Am still thinking....... how to save My Country from this dalla rajnetas...!

Jai Hind!