Insight

“Anna” “Anna” yelled the kids by the wayside. They were waving frantically and get somebody to who could drop them near their school. 9 times out of 10 I would have sped away, ignoring them, lost in my own world. Today I decided to stop. As soon as I moved to the side of the road, 5 kids ran toward me and started climbing all over the bike. I found out first hand that it was impossible to take five kids on a two wheeler. I told them that I could not take all of them with me and could only take a couple of them with me. The Kids got into a small discussion. I waited patiently beside them, and the eldest came out and said “Anna, take everybody or you can go alone”. I was not going to take the risk and took off alone. But so many others do oblige. The drive becomes a balancing act, and a safety hazard for the kids as well. What Has Changed Five years ago, the words Perungudi, Karapakkam and Metukuppam would not be familiar to many people to the people living in the City of Chennai. Today...

A couple of things happened that made me see through another layer of myself! Last July, I completed five years with my company; A rarity among the IT professionals in India. Today i was awarded a Service Anniversary certificate by the CIO of a Fortune major Client. Pretty cool huh? Me liked that bit a lot. But hated my guts for being part of a team that put up a FAKE show to welcome him! walls were painted again, the emergency Yellow lines were drawn for the floors only which he was expected to visit. He was also gifted an elephant and a drawing of him that was signed by all! How low will we stoop to get more business? A project is being closed after three years, and the team is planning to go out for a movie and dinner. I am supposed to be one of the sponsors. I don't mind giving out the money but i do NOT want to go out with them. I know i will be called a lot of things for doing that. People might call me things, even think i am big loser. Isn't it better to be different a...

A very average day at work was made the most exciting when my friend yelled “S1365”. I immediately knew what he meant. “Seriously” I asked. Yeah man I had to go get a new laptop from the Store and I found out her cubicle. Before he could say another word I ran out of the guest suites to the main building. I never realized I could run so fast and made it to the building in a minute, S 1365 I kept repeating to myself, and reached the South section. I found the cabin almost immediately. As the computer guy of the firm I had access to most systems and with a lot of help from the network guys, I was introduced to her as the “guy to call in case of problems”. I managed to run into her accidently a lot of times, though this involved walking close to 3 miles every day across the two buildings, missing many important calls and at last after 3 weeks I asked her out for dinner. When she asked How about Today? I was jumping like a madman on the inside. I was too excited to do anything else that da...

After moving to the new apartment complex a luxury that I have been using regularly is the gym and the swimming pool. The best way to beat the boredom was to hit the gym and relax later at the swimming pool. Every day I push myself to run the extra minute not to be fit or anything, I do it because it gives me a chance to be with some people and restore sanity in this strange lonely Haven. As I started to go about life with the precision of a Swiss watch, I noticed two people who shared my routine. Everyday Big Ron and Joanne would be at the Gym, and then walk back to the swimming pool. Big Ron was 78 years old, had Parkinson’s disease and came to the gym to use the treadmill and for his physiotherapy sessions. He reminded me of Clint Eastwood from the movie Gran Torino. They used to sit and talk about anything and everything. Soon I joined them and the three of us shared stories, jokes and strangely enough we enjoyed each other company very much. After our Gym Session we would walk ba...

We were lazing around in the swimming pool at our Apartment Complex when one guy pointed to a notice board near the gate. He asked me what were the Girl Rules? As i looked confused he pointed at the gate and asked again? What's the Girl Rules. It was about 30 minutes when all at the swimming pool stopped laughing If you want to know Why, look at the image again and read the Girl...oops..Grill Rulez!

I love music so much that i absolutely hate it when I do not enjoy it. I’ve enjoyed listening to songs in languages which I will never comprehend, but I hate it when the song is composed as a jumble of retarded tones. Of late thanks to a large crowd of people from a neighborly state I am getting used to many songs that do not rhyme right, do not sound good and that do manage to increase my blood pressure. The concept of Keyboard beats. Yes they do sound good on your Contra video game, but why does it have to be on a full length video song where the hero vigorously shakes his hips is what I do not understand. Then there are rip offs, if they had been faithful to the original it would have been some justice, but attempts to modernize it with hype beats and jingles does make it a very painful exercise for your ear drum. The worst part is when you have the idiots sing along. DO THEY EVER REALIZE THEY SOUND WORSE THAN A FREAKING CROW? I need Advise folks, need to survive this.

Life has been hectic. So hectic that I keep thinking about work at the GYM or even while watching a movie, I was so engrossed about the tasks that I had to for the day that I never noticed my roommate stop at the nearby motel. He asked me to wait downstairs while he went to meet a friend.   I tried to take my mind of work and started to gaze around. I saw two birds, one inside the hotel's reception and the other outside in the parking lot. I was intrigued by the chirping and started to visualize what the conversation could have been about. I thought the bird in the hotel was a bit arrogant and trying to show off some tricks of a ladder and kept chirping loudly. The second bird looked on silently and hopped to the window, it had been trying to nibble at a few crumbs that was thrown to it by passer by’s. The first bird did something that resembled a maniacal laugh and started to show off its prize possessions: the toys, the pipe that fed water when it wanted, the plate full of breadc...

No matter how many sky miles you have clocked, every time you cross the Atlantic there is a small voice in your head that screams its head off. Well mine did, and I found the best way to fight it. Of the 30 hours that I was stuck in the tube with flashy air hostess I slept for 24. And as always at the airport on entry the customary Immigration questions were followed by a secondary check and special interview with United States customs, I do not know what these guys have against me, but every time I come here I am like stripped to the bone, or refused a visa. I had to cross the Atlantic, clear 2 immigration checks to blog about life at Covington, a small town in the state of Louisiana. It’s been about twenty days here. For starters the place resembles towns in the psycho films which has the most devious minds around. Everything is too quiet that I can hear my own breath at times. Everybody whom I meet smile, I do not know why they do that and have the customary greeting “How are you to...

Guys are supposed to be cool, savvy and handle emotions pretty well. But with 26 years behind me I found out something very “not cool” about us the “Boys”. We are emotional freaks. I mean we find love in a minute, pick up fights in seconds. It is just that being “Men” stops us from crying out loud or show the sentimental side of ourselves. Women have an active social life, they talk more, they react to everything, but their emotions are quite controlled. I have had my share of disappointments; the last couple of years have added a lot of grey in my hair. But to the outsider, you wouldn’t find a more carefree person in the world. To my surprise I found out that many “Men” I knew reacted the same way. Parties started to resemble Groups like the ones in the movie Fight Club. So my new post is actually dedicated to a few women, who by showing excellent purpose in life have managed to convince me that it’s time for us to see them in a new light. • Grandma: Can you imagine a woman who ex...

“One Sleeper Class Ticket to Salem Please” I managed to yell over the counter. The guy behind the counter didn’t even bother to look up. He pushed the ticket through the small gap and was already typing the next ticket out by the time I turned around. I liked to plan my journey well ahead and with the Online Ticket reservation system, I used to book tickets well before the actual date of travel. This meant no long queues in the railway station. No pleading with TTE’s. Today everything was different, this was not planned, that meant no reserved tickets and doing everything else I detested. I managed to pull myself out from the long queue and saw that I had less than one minute to reach the platform. I ran to the overcrowded platform. According to the Information Board the Superfast Express was supposed to arrive at 2.00 PM, and here I was waiting for it at 2.30 Pm. Half an Hour Later the train slowly pulled into the station there was not an inch of space in the General Compartment. Plan...