beingdesh

Category: Memoirs, stories, and poems

  • The Times of Navratri- Edition 1

    Sometime in 1998, somewhere in Chattisgarh

    Navratri is the best time of the year. Like yesterday I left from home at around 5 PM. After our customary cricket match at the abandoned tennis court we cycled to the Pooja Area. The Bengali Samiti in township begins the Durga Pooja ceremony on Shashti and so the preparations were on for that. After that me with few of my friends moved to Santosh Chaat Bhandaar near Indra complex. After a few paani puris we visited the Navdurga Pendal next to Ambedkar Auditorium. Here the Devi there for all 9 days of Navratri.

    After that we moved to the house of Ayush, next to his house in a Badminton playing area Chauhan uncle organizes Garba. We didn’t dance but went upto the terrace on Ayush’s block and were just looking at Garba & especially our new found interest of ogling at girls. Well Nipunjai says that there are couple of nice girls on the other end of the circle so we watched there, and then we watched a whole gang of them. Also behind them were the so called lafoots of the township. The difference between us and them, well we move around on cycles, them on motorcycles; we hide and watch girls and at max giggle post that, but they are quite visible and vocal in the way they WATCH.

    Anyway after lot of bird watching we moved to Jagran program at Navdurga Pendal. Its very peaceful and the best part is almost everyone from the township is there.

    Today I woke up late. The best part about this navaratri is that this one is after the exams, when it happens before the exams it kills the fun. Well today is when the Durga sits in the Mandir complex so should get ready for that.

    After the morning pooja there is Bhog. All the Kids are supposed to help in serving the Bhog to all who come to eat. Again the whole community is here to pray and have Prasad. So we served everyone and btw did I describe the Prasad.

    A sweet, but well that wasn’t the attraction. You have Khichdi & chutney. Superbly awesome Bengali khichdi cooked in Desi Ghee, and along with that Chutney made of Khajoor and Papita. Awesomely awesome…

    All who helped to serve get Extra Ghee as reward!!!

    4 days later…

    Another Navratri ended L. Dusshera was awesome yesterday and so were the Durga Devi visarjan in the morning, we went on the truck to the lake and danced a lot on the way. After that in the evening I watched the Dusshera from the balcony of Indian Coffee House munching on Special Masala Dosa and Frooti (felt like sitting in Royal Box at Wimbledon). Dusshera is like a mela, everyone from everywhere on earth assembles on the KV football ground. And the fireworks were awesome.

    Now school will start again, boring…

    Technorati Tags: Navratri

  • कॉमिक्स और हमारा बचपन

    लुईस कैरोल की एलिस को कल्पना के उस अद्भुत संसार में जाने के लिए खरगोश महाशय के घर का रास्ता नापना होता था लेकिन मुझे (याने जब में बच्चा था) या मेरे जैसे कई भारतीय बच्चो को अपने घर के कुछ आधे किलो मीटर की परिधि में कोई सोनू या मनोज लाइब्रेरी ढूंढनी होती थी | उसके बाद तो बस अपने कल्पना के संसार में डूब जाने के लिए हम आजाद होते थे |

    नागराज, ध्रुव, परमाणु, भोकाल, तौसी, हवालदार बहादुर, बांकेलाल, चाचा चौधरी, बिल्लू, पिंकी, साबू और ना जाने कितने ही किरदार जीवन का एक हिस्सा बन गए थे | अब जब में पीछे मूड कर देखता हूँ तो यह सोच कर ख़ुशी होती है की भले ही चोरी छुपे या लड़ झगड़ कर भी मैंने कॉमिक्स पढ़ी है तो अच्छा ही किया है, वरना जीवन की ये यादें कभी नहीं बना पाता |

    जहाँ तक मुझे याद है कॉमिक्स पढने की खुमारी गर्मी की छुट्टियों में सर चढ़ कर बोलती थी | और कॉमिक्स खरीदना तो काफी महंगा सौदा था इसलिए लगभग हम सभी मित्र किसी ना किसी लाइब्रेरी के सदस्य बन जाते थे और किराए से कॉमिक्स ले आया करते थे | उन चौबीस घंटो के समय में सभी दोस्तों को एक दुसरे की भी कॉमिक्स ख़तम करनी होती थी तो बस फिर क्या कॉमिक्स लाइब्रेरी से ली और पढना चालू एक आधी तो घर पहुँचते पहुँचते ही ख़तम हो जाया करती थी |

    शुरूआती दिनों में जहाँ से मुझे याद है कॉमिक्स का किराया होता था पचास पैसे और डाइजेस्ट का एक रुपैया लेकिन हाई रे महंगाई बाद में किराया तय हो गया था कॉमिक्स के दाम का दस प्रतिशत याने ८ रुपैये की कॉमिक्स ८० पैसे में | कॉमिक्स न सिर्फ आपकी कल्पना शीलता को एक नया आयाम देती है अपितु व्यवहारिक ज्ञान में भी वृद्धि कराती है | जैसे आप देख ही सकते है की कभी न कभी तो आपने अपने किसी मित्र के साथ साझेदारी में लाइब्रेरी खोली ही होगी, और कुछ चव्वनी अट्ठनी का मुनाफा कमा कर खुश भी हुए होंगे | लो जी बन गए आप उद्यमी (entrepreneur) !

    लेकिन इन सब से बढ़कर बौद्धिक विकास में सबसे मददगार साबित होते थे मित्रो के साथ कॉमिक्सों पर गहन विचार विमर्श ! जी हाँ कौन सा नायक किस नयी शक्ति के साथ आया है, किस नायक को सबसे मुश्किल खलनायक से जूझना पड़ता था, यदि ये दोनों नायक साथ में आये तो ज्यादा अच्छा कौन लडेगा इत्यादि | बिना शक्तियों के दुश्मनों के मात देने वाला सुपर कमांडो ध्रुव मेरा पसंदीदा नायक हुआ करता था | और ध्रुव के खलनायको के ऊपर तो विचार विमर्श मैंने देशपांडे के साथ माइंड ट्री में रहते हुए भी किया था | उदाहरण के लिए चुम्बा, बौना वामन, चंडकाल हाँ लेकिन ध्रुव के दोस्त भी हुआ करते थे जैसे किरिगी, धनञ्जय, येती |

    अब तो कई सालों से किसी की भी सुध नहीं ली है | पर मुझे अभी भी यकिन है की ये सभी नायक अपनी जान की बाजी लगा कर आज भी विश्व को बड़े बड़े खतरों से बचा रहे होंगे और इसलिए आप भारत में या यूरोप में या अमरीका में चैन की नींद सो पा रहे है !

    A mail by my friend Kapil. I think so many of us would identify with the same. Plus I love his hindi writings (read a couple of his entries secretly in Bengaluru along with Mathuru ;)). Till he has his own blog, this one will be kept by me :).

    Also for my friends doing MBA, this is what a Dimdima should feel like, so maybe something like this would have determined your pitch for selling Dimdimas.

    Although this is a thinking of a kid 15 years back, things have changed now.

  • Theory of Sleep Management

    The best thing you learn at a B-School is “Time Management”

    Ok, there were so many MBA’s out there who said that to me. But that was before I joined a B-School, now that I have joined one of the best ones around, I have realised that its not at all about time. It’s about something which we all enjoy doing, SLEEPING.

    This is what David Allen says on Time Management (first thing on Wiki page of this topic),

    You can’t manage time, it just is. So “time management” is a mislabeled problem, which has little chance of being an effective approach. What you really manage is your activity during time, and defining outcomes and physical actions required is the core process required to manage what you do.

    We will try to rephrase it in context of Sleep through the length of this post. Anyway coming back to a B-School, in between all the subjects, quizzes, assignments, those group works, lectures, hostel, everything involves a bit of sleep. There is no more physical exercise (except the stupid dancing sessions we have at Boy’s Hostel sometime), it all about giving rest to your mind. Although sleep does provide for Physical Exercise, you can sleep on sides, straight, upside down (as I do nowadays), also while sleeping in classroom, you can bend your neck which is highly effective against neck pain, then you can stretch your elbows and press your cheeks against those cold tables….Ahaa

    People sleep in Class, thats a universal fact, the first time I slept in class was post school though, that was at a FIITJEE center New Delhi where I went for a IIT crash course. By the way I also slept while working on a B-Plan(plan related to IIT’s) recently.

    Also you find variety of people obsessed with sleeping in different ways, my friend hasodi here asked me yesterday to ping her every half hour to keep her awake, but she slept before the first ping happened, then you see a nice chirpy fellow on the 3rd floor of my hostel who I have seldom seen fully awake, and then there is this lady here, who asks questions while she is sleeping, and a Happy Sardar who just ensures that his eyes turn tomatoes but he doesn’t sleep.

    I have my own unique style, its like a camera shutter, those eyes behind those specs of mine ( I have broken two since coming to Mumbai) shut on and off. Its basically my mind which tries to sleep, but somewhere there is that conscious which tells me, come on Desi, you should listen to the lecture, you should study. What finally gets through the mind is my favourite dish, khichdi.

    Any activity at a B-School and you need to cut down on your sleep, not on your time, although it might be related but I believe sleep and food are related to productivity than no other thing. A chain ki neend ensures proper completion of activities and better concentration. Now this is what the experts say, the more I sleep at night, the more I sleep in classes is the relationship I have observed.

    To summarise, your stay at B-School is a function of Sleep Management and not time.

    Success = K X SleepFactor

    Where K is a correction factor, for me its food, for some others it maybe finding a girlfriend at B-School etc etc. Sleepfactor is a number calculated on the basis of hours you sleep. Its basically an average number of hours slept for a particular time period. Although I am not sure whether this may follow inferential statistics and this maybe extended to the overall Success over two years…

    Enough of all this bakwaas, let us try to reframe the theory I quoted at the beginning,

    You can’t manage SLEEP, it just comes to you naturally. So “sleep management” is a mislabeled problem, which has little chance of being an effective approach. What you really manage is your activity during SLEEP(read dreaming, asking questions etc.), and defining the number of hours of sleep, and your outcomes and external factors required(read mattress, tables, chairs, music while sleeping etc.) required is the core process required to manage how you sleep.

    I just feel while publishing this that this is my worst post ever, totally irrelevant and useless, Dahi Vada and Aalasya, aahaa, those were the days.

  • Angrezi aur main…

    Class 4th-5th

    It all started with that, we were given some sort of scholar badges and all (for consistent performances with a particular score in core subjects), there was this English teacher who I didn’t like at all, you know the sorts who went ahead with people who get top marks in junior sections, all those cute looking piglets whom they think are brainiest who get everything right, although I wasn’t that bad but she never gave me marks, maybe I wan not a piglet anyway.

    Class 6th-10th

    Same not so old boring angrezi teacher who gave marks to girls and little healthier sort off pigs and screwed me up again many a times. I also had a fight with her which messed up my relations and so I never got a scholar badge till class 11th as they held me back some way other for English and sometimes Hindi. Maybe I behaved like a dog here, pigs were still in demand. My confidence in languages till 10th had already received a heavy blow though. worst still I became a horrible public speaker in those days due to that.

    Class 11th

    Probably one of the best teachers I ever studied under was Mrs. Biswas, elegant and caring are the words which come to my mind. She had such an awesome persona and like others, her marks were not based on pre-conceived notion of an individual. All notions of animalism chucked off for the time being.

    Class 12th

    The year I cherished most in the school because my favorite teacher Mrs. Ratnam taught me for the first time (sounds unusual but true). She is the one I knew throughout my school tenure, the bestest teacher there ever was at DPS Korba. It was delight as she taught English in an year when no one thinks about it. She took my interview way back in 1988 and its quite ironic that she retired the same year I left school, 2002. Best year for English and me 🙂

    College Days, one Cat, workplace, blogging etc etc.

    Everything went fine, reading speeds were good, although I was regualr reader earlier I improved, did more discussions, turned from a hand shaking- leg breaking speaker to a nice confident aggressive presenter. Did all of this stupid writing, all dung, read dung, ate dung. See now I became a Pig.

    Good days for English were obvious.

    CAT & XAT this year

    Similar percentiles of 84.16 (84.13 in other) (Overall 97.7 in CAT, 99.42 in XAT) help me secure a missed call from IIM’s and XLRI. All the AIMCATs I hardly got below 95%ile, my worst performance coming up in these two examinations.

    Although I am disappointed I would like to add that my English is not that great, its just the way people judge your language skills, the kind of exams they look for, I don’t know.

    In that regards the best language teacher I had was my French teacher at Ahmedabad, she had an amazing persona and I really excelled when it came French learning.

    Although disappointed I am not broken, its enough of these exams for me, maybe something better out there for me. No one is an authority to comment on what I am like in anything, English has screwed me for a long time and hope it enjoys f**k*** me again and again. At least the language will get some pleasure out of it.

    Living in Bangalore has made me a dog again, pigs are the most intelligent ones, thats why there English is good.(George Orwell says so, although both the species should control there reproduction rates :))

    Technorati Tags: CAT, XAT

  • Dreaded S-Word

    1993

    two kids from class 3 fighting as Abhishek watches on (still be christened with any of the present day nicknames).

    bippu*- saale kutte kahi ke???
    ritesh*- shocked and about to breakdown
    Abhishek and rest of the audience- Haaaaauuuuuuuuu……
    ritesh*- full-tu crying, I will complaint this to Ratnam Mam [My fav teacher in school, bestest teacher ever, will write about her sometime)

    Pumped by anger, insult and what not ritesh decided to complaint and bippu got punished, junta was obviously shocked at bippu’s behavior and happy that bippu got punished.

    1999

    All of us on the playing, tiddu*-famous for not blurting out any bad word till date fires one on pattu, pattu laughs like hell and so do the others, tiddu rages and starts a bat-beating session on pattu, pattu and others still laugh and welcome another member to the gang.

    [*Names have been changed to confuse identities]

    Gone are those days, in primary school using the S-word (something similar to a Brother-in-law too, your wife’s brother, I don’t know why it became an abuse in the first place) meant that you were the full-time rowdy in class, other kids parents wanted their kids to stay away from you, and it was not at all good public behavior, you were the big time culprit of every wrong deed done in class. Slowly though, with secondary and higher education an Indian student gets graduated in profanities too.

    Nowadays when I see kids using the F-word is much more than feeling, its mostly going away from our culture of using the S-Word to perfection. Although lots has been said about girls not using it but I know a few who use it nicely. But lets not get into gender aspects as of now.

    Although the Hindi/desi equivalent of the F-word is considered quite crude in its usage but I don’t know why people consider the formers usage as much more decent (relatively). Both are the same, a conservative may say that they are bowing to western culture, but I think its much more to do with the popularity of such terms in Hollywood, its counter-part Bollywood has been not so liberal in usage of abusive language.

    I picked up foul language sometime in mid-school, when we passed school there was only one or at most two boys still away from its active usage. In my college I found only one among 200+ boys (but he had his own versions of curses, which went quite above everyone’s head). The good things about using foul language are,

    • Good way to throw out your anger and frustration, go and shout from a roof/hill top, or do it after getting drunk.
    • Gives you a good time cursing your bosses, peers, any boy who roams around with good girls or mostly anyone.
    • Comes for free and is quite relieving, much more than dhyana or yoga.

    The only things about it which is not good and I don’t like is when its done in a seriously serious manner. People start fighting over it and makes matter stupid. When I and most of my friends do it, its mostly for fun, although we know making fun of other people is a serious crime, but everyone does it, and criminals are bound to use some foul language here and there. Some serious misapprehensions which are associated with this are,

    • it slows down with age- I think this skill mellows with age, the usage becomes more or less perfect and less hurtful to others.
    • you shouldn’t say it in front of girls- ???? pointless

    Although in front of parents and relatives better don’t use it. I mean you can but better don’t. You might have noticed it, sometimes when you are at home, and things haven’t rubbed off from your tongue you feel like shouting sometimes, do it in a bathroom, safest place to do it.

    By the way some unique ones which I have come across in my life are,

    – Indi-Poi Indrapal- used by a schoolmate, he considered this to be the mother of all profanities
    – Dusht Bijuke – Bijuke is Pure hindi for Scarecrow, my friend in college made it quite popular.

    I am not mentioning lots of them which would like a bit indecent on my blog.

    Whatever be it, never ever use it to hurt anyone, as long as its for fun, use it…

    And for all those like the F-Word, try using the S-word!!!

  • Long Live the Aam Aalsi Aadmi

    If R.K.Laxman gave The Common Man (Aam Aadmi) to World, we give the world the Aam Aalsi Aadmi. Some of the charecteristics of AAA,

    • He is Aam, Aam as in Aam- the Common.
    • He is Aalsi
    • First two sentences prove that He is a Aadmi

    Also rather than being a silent witness to most of the events around him and having an opinion about it, AAA is suppose to save his energy by having an opinion but not being at the site of incident. AAA is gifted with a strong sense of instinct which helps them form opinions without even observing an incident.

    The Cartoon character is still under design but he is supposed to look quite shabby due to his Aalasya preventing him from taking a bath.

    We are in talks with Air Deccan for replacing their mascot with ours once its designed, the Aalsi theme much in sync with their timings…:)

    This character is truly inspired from one person whom I consider to be the human incarnation of the Aam Aalsi Aadmi. In his own words,

    alasya kabhi marta nahin hai…bas so jaata hai

    meTaL or LKP (its pronounced as ल क प ) is the true representative of the Aam Aalsi Aadmi, one who inspires everyone to Billi glory. From the sleepy hostels of DA-IICT to the irky dorms of IIM-Indore he effuses laziness in its full glory. In his company I have spent countless hours just doing nothing and creating some silly things like the once famous DTC (DA-IICT Tond Club). He is a true inspiration for millions of us showing that sleeping is far more superior mechanism of nutrition than food itself. Sleep gives us more energy than Carbs to basically do nothing and save it for future, quite important as the world moves towards an imminent Energy Crisis.

    Other members which truly deserve the company of ल क प,

    • Inzamam-ul-haq aka Inzy, former Cricket Captain of Pakistan.
    • Sarat aka TTY (read as तू तो यार), aalasya and intelligence zipped in one file, currently lazying out at IIIT Hydbad
    • JD who is heading to IIIT HydBad 🙂 (We will all miss you at office, volleyball, home and Bangalore 😦 )

    Me leaving myself out, I am aalsi but not in the league of these extraordinary Gentlemen.

    p.s.- No offense meant against any of the above-mentioned individuals, I think they are truly all amazingly intelligent individuals…(including the great RK Laxman). And all of you take bath for sure…maybe!!! Thanks to Jaine for telling me the famous quote of LKP to work on…:)

    p.p.s- The character will be copyrighted by me soon, so no infringement…:)

  • Dahi Vade and Women

    An excerpt from the conversation between Pushpa and Urmila(Bindiya Goswmi) from the 1979 Hrishikesh Mukherjee classic GolMaal.

    Pushpa: Le Dahi Vade kha le
    Urmila: Nahi Mann nahi kar raha
    Pushpa: Arre Dahi Vade khane ka Mann nahi kar raha. Agar kisi Ladki ka Dahi Vade khane ka mann nahi karta to do cheeze ho sakti hai,

    • ya to woh dheere dheere ladki se ladka ban rahi hai…
    • ya to usse PREM ho gaya hai

    Ek din mujhe bhi Dahi Vade khaane ka mann nahi kiya, teen din baad pata chala ki mujhe Bunty se Prem ho gaya hai 🙂 (and bluntly blushing)
    Bol ri! Kya naam hai unka

    Urmila:(sharmate hue) Lucky naam hai…continued

    Some questions arising from the same,

    1. Is it true? Girls visiting the blog may share there own experiences with Dahi Vade, boys may just share there opinion?
    2. If a person doesn’t it Dahi Vade how can a she become a he, and is the process reversible, maybe a new innovation in the Gender Change operations?
    3. What if a boy rejects to eat Dahi Vade, what are the possible scenarios?
    4. Why Dahi Vade, what if Sambhar Vade was the rejected entity?

    That’s enough for now, I am no expert on Woman… Wooooo… Man! issues like Naresh neither am I a philosopher of the rating of the quark. But I want an answer. Maybe if the theory is found to be authentic next year we will have girls throwing/eating away Dahi Vada plates in response to Valentine Divas proposals.

    I have my own way of resolving issues and maybe whatever sounds complicated to me is best resolved by relating it to food. My favourite director maybe just gave me an opportunity to do the same.

    Do answer the questions, additional practice for the RC section at Billi this year.

    p.s.- Golmaal is one of my favourite movies, yesterday night while watching it along with Kapil and the quark, we realised this is the only sequence in the movie which didn’t make sense to us. Rest of the movie we had a great time playing Karaoke with the dialogues and songs in the movie. Error rate of us getting the dialogues wrong was minimal.

    Update: In the words of the quark

    Regarding dahi-vade it might be post modern dilemma of love, food and women & gender… 🙂

    Technorati Tags: Hrishikesh Mukherjee, GolMaal

  • Desi aur Uski Pyari Billi

    Billi Do Hazaar Saat
    Ek Lagan Nayi

    Sawaal- Billi Do Hazaar Che main kya hua, diya kyon nahi?
    Jawaab- No Comments!

    Sawaal-Kya is baar Fotu Chipkega?
    Jawaab- Ji haan chipkega!

    Sawaal-Billi swasth ke liye kyon zaroori hai?
    Jawaab- Billi nahi nikli to Bill bharne mushkil ho jaayenge, hamara swasth to thik hi hai lekin kahi mansik swasth na kharab ho jaaye. Aji ho hi jaayega. Billi main nahi hona swasth ke liye hanikarini rahega.

    Sawaal-Bangalore main to itne saare kutte hai, fir Billi hi kyon?
    Jawaab- Kisi mahaan vyakti ne kaha hai,

    Bangalore main agar patthar faiko to ya to kutte ko lagega ya fir abhiyanta ko lagega.

    Humen socha kutto ka to yaha khatma ho raha hai, to ab hume hi patthar lagenge, to humne Billi ko chuna. Billi hume Bangalore ki takniki duniya se door jaane ka suvarna mauka degi.

    Sawaal-Billi ke liye aajkal junta main utsukta kafi jyada hai?
    Jawaab- Ji haan, Billi kafi garma-garam ho chuki hai. Kuch varsho pahle yeh nahi tha. Bharat ki nayi artha-vyavastha main in naukriyon ko kafi badhawa mila hai.

    Sawaal-Aap kya sochte hai kya is baar aap “Billi ka Tod” ya “Billi ki Ghanti” prapt karne main safal honge?
    Jawaab- Pata nahi, dekhiye kuch kah nahi sakte, baat yun hai ki aajkal Billi badi anishchit ho gayi hai, yeh ek aisa khel hai jiska nirnay hamare uttaro aur bhagwaan ke aashirwaad ke alawa, mananiya nyayalaya, kuch dangayi aivam mantri bhi nirikshan-parikshan karne ke baad ghoshity karte hai. Yahi saal le lijiye abhi tak Billi ke nirnay latke hue hai.

    Sawaal-Aap to teesri baar Billi dene ki taiyari kar rahi hai, kuch hamare darshako ke liye sandesh?
    Jawaab- Ganit aur Anglya Bhasha prayog hi zaroori nahi hai, lagan aur mehnat zaruri hai. Dete rahiye, ek na ek din Billi aapke kadam choomegi. Jai Hind!!!

    Kya Desi Billi prapt kar payenge.

    SMS kijiye Desi Y (haan ke liye) ya Desi N(na ke liye) 242424 par

    Dhanyawaad.

    Pichle Varsh ke Desi ke Billi-Adventure

    Technorati Tags: CAT, Humor

  • Girls just Love me, and boys love …

    “Girls Just Love Me” and boys love Jamola (couldn’t think of another name which won’t be offensive to anyone)

    If you know me as desh, click here

    If you know me as desi, click here

    If you know me as pattu, click here

    If you don’t know me click anywhere

    Awesome one, have send it to around 30 people with a modified link.

    Technorati Tags: Humor

  • Its Prayer Time…!!!

    No pre-match discussions, no predictions, no prophecies, its time to pray
    Let us pray so that we don’t become Sri Lankan Lion’s prey;

    A prayer from heart is what they say, will help the Men in Blue save,
    but don’t let the prayer be too strong,
    as the Blue may become darker and the colour a lil wrong;

    The last one for Dada, Dravid and Tendulkar,
    the first one for Dhoni and Pathan,
    Let all the firsts lasts and middles go on,
    Not tumble upon and fly back home so torn;

    Somehow I feel the prayer will succeed, as will our team,
    but we are habituated to hiccups and our team to indigestion,
    even if they win it will be surreal and even if they loose it will be quite away from real;

    But still let come together and Pray,
    as I, we and everyone from India doesn’t want this to end up as a messed up fray.

    Techonarati Tags: Cricket, World Cup, India, Sports, Poem