Paradise City *

Last week, an accident happened to me.

It is thursday, a very cold and wet thursday. Sleet has been predicted for the evening and everyone is driving slowly. I am very cautious as ever. Since it's the route I take daily and the traffic is smooth, I lean back and enjoy the drive listening to the music. I am crossing a traffic light. Just one more traffic light and I'd be home. Suddenly there is a thud. My car is hit from behind. I stopping the car then and there, take my time to get down. And then I saw a big vehicle and a really young driver behind. She, in her teens, quivers and asks me whether everything is all right. I reply yes, eventhough I was in a daze. Seeing her state of tension, I just point her the damage to my car and exchange phone numbers and let her go.

I manage to drive the car home and call my friend immediately. First thing he asks, "Where are you?"
"Back at home"
"You shouldn't have let the girl go. You should've dialled 911 then and there. Let's see what we can do"
He comes to my place, and then in my "shaken but not stirred" car we go to the cops. They say that we need to bring the perpetrator too, to get the police report that I need for insurance.

We call the driver's father. We just inform that my car was hit on by her daughter not yet asking him to come down to the cops. We learn that he is a doctor.He asks to wait at a store front nearby, for him.We drive there and wait. And he comes there immediately after.

He takes one look at me. Figures me as one new to the city.
Pointing at the damage, he starts, "This looks like an old damage to me"
I shocked, say, "This happened just now"
He: "No way it could have been my vehicle that hit yours"
Me: Speechless, give an angry and shocked look.
We very reasonably ask him to call his daughter and verify the identity of the car, for I made her note down my car number too.He does that. The girl must have vouched for me. He asks her to talk later and cuts the call.

He continues, "I am here since before you were born. I can haul you up in jail for trying to cheat me".
An argument ensues. My friend intervenes here and takes all of us inside the store as it's freezing cold in the open. There that doctor tries some more brow-beating.

"I need to see that you are the owner of the car"
I show my documents.
" I need to see your passport. I can put you in jail for this"
I enraged, staring him down, say, " That I'd very much prefer. Let's go to the cops. There we will decide".
My friend sends me away on a pretext and starts drivelling the fact that I happen to be the victim. The fact that we are ready for the cops and not scared calls the father's bluff.

Then he gives his game away and admits that he doesn't want insurance to come into the picture. Eventhough he doesn't say, we know, and he knows that we know, that his girl is not legally qualified to drive.

And a lot happens after. The doctor haggles for the settlement, even offering a discount for his medical services as a payback, which we politely refuse. I am yet to receive the money, but have received a very good lesson. Never ever allow a person to leave the scene of an accident.

"If we were the ones to hit another car, would we have behaved in a similar manner?", I bemuse to my friend much later. He says the decent thing is to settle the damage. But people do stoop to such levels, I figure.

* - Guns'n'Roses were belting out this song for me, at the time I got rear-ended.

Rock you like a hurricane *

The Chicago auto show
Can't have enough of this!

The crowd

Sexy!!

Fundoo!

Cool looks!!

Hunk with a tank!! :-)

Hmmm...a car I would like to own!

I rest my case!!

* - Scorpions

Let it be

You step on a thorn. It embeds itself. After some efforts, you remove it. But still there's a niggling for quite some time.

I have the feeling now, for the past 6 days. I read an article in our local paper. A guy dies in a traffic accident. He all of 21 years. His mother plants a cross by the road as a memorial. There being creeps among humans, the memorial gets stolen. And for the past seven months somebody's removing all the memorials the grieving mom places. The reporter further talked to her and brought her anguish. And what she said refuses to go away from me, still.

“You never get over the loss. There is always that hole in my heart. Having a child is like having your heart walking outside of your body.”

The full article

Letterbomb

I came across this site Snapshirts , recommended by another blogger. You type in your blog url and they create a collage of words culled from your blog. You can even get it printed into a T-shirt, it seems. Go check out.




* The title is from the song by Green Day in their album, American Idiot.

Don't ask me why

Today at office, there is a technical environment issue, and we could not work for some time. That means some rare idle time. Rare? Yes, frequently we have free time, but idle time is rare.

So wondering what to do, I get an idea. Why not count my managers? Yeah, just like they do at the census. I start framing the rules (that much idle time).

The rules for the managers to be counted are, first I should be reporting to them directly. Second only line managers are counted.

Here's my list:
1.Team lead: She is the client manager whom my team reports to. She looks after all the day to day work I do. She should be looking into the data, but she is more interested in the metadata. They go to make the ppts, right? But a nice person.

2.Project lead: This is the MS Access guy. He is a freelancing contractor, out to justify his position. His responsibilities are the timelines, deadlines and dependencies. He gets himself interested in the actual work that is being done, without being qualified/empowered to do so. A micro manager, a dilbertian classic.

3.Resource lead: While my manager #1 is from the client, this manager is from my employer. She approves my time sheets, leave and gets feedback on me from the clients. A macro-manager, good one.

4.Offshore lead: He is my manager who conducts the appraisal, decides on the rating, promotion and consequently the hike.

5.Matrix manager: He is the guy whom I should be copying my reports. He is to participate in me-management, and is to have a say on everything that #4 does. It's not far removed from line management, in theory.

6.Informal manager: This person, asks a lot of questions, replicates what i do to see what I say I get, is what it is, and constantly looks over my shoulder and does a lot of back seat driving. This person, part of the client team, is not accountable but takes all the credits ensuring I don't get any updates as well as limelight.

Oh my God! The count is already six.Six people for one. That's too many cooks and I am the broth.

Please somebody reading this hurry up, run and close down those IIMs. Shutter them down. I have a cousin and friends out there, but I don't mind. There are too many of their species roaming about.

P.S: 1.The intelligent IIM grads reading this will argue that I am not the only guy reporting to all those people. On this my take is that it's still a many to many relationship. :-)

2. For my managers who may chance upon this post, it's all in a lighter vein. I am trying my hand at humour. Please do not mistake this as my opinion. :-)

3. The title, one may know, is from a song by Billy Joel. Here onwards, I'll find titles for posts in songs I like, and from artists I favour. So all you out there, you'll get an idea of how my taste runs. This would help you in choosing a birthday gift next month for me (Hint! Hint!). For further important details like my address to send it to, mail me. :-)

P.P.S: Free time is when your load is a bit less and you feel like going for a coffee, take a leak and answering personal mails. Idle time is when you've done all that and still left with some time and some problem that inhibits work. :-))

Mine my mind

Hurtling through life
An express train, I am
Passengers are the people
Who board on the way

They stay in my mind
Seldom they alight
Their trains may end too.
They would still be in mine

Compartments, I am made of
And they are made of me
Always ever increasing
Rarely do they fuse off

People in one, wonder 'bout the other
Some know not. Too much to bother
For netherly dark, everything else is
Nary a light, all sigh and hiss

And some try to pass through
The aisle doors of my mind
Amusing it is,While I idly watch
The attempts of my friends
Through the eyes of my mind
For I am the train

Maybe a stray one or two
I'd like them to visit all through
But it's all in vain
They don't know the depth of the train

Some do realise, they who hearken
what that's beyond their eye
They haven't been there, though
Still, perceptive they being
For them it isn't too hard
Seeing through, the ornate lard

Some coaches do carry
Roaches and rodents as quarry
Memories of many an event
Which have me still in torment

For those who are in here still,
You won't find rhythm in my verse
B'cos journey is rough and tumble
All tense and terse
Never a dance or a prance
Grey and black, do my mind fill

The train never laughs
For the terrain is tough
It's all grunts and squeals
Careening through the turf

I am Alice's train
I don't know where I go
Rolling on the track
Running in my brain
Journey knows not its end
Not even what lies around the bend

Now it may be coasting
Smooth may seem the trip; but
It had its share of roasting
In downs that've wrenched the gut

All along as the train whistles
One thing deep inside rankles
The passengers who threw out
This passenger of a train
From the train of their brain
Why, Oh Why?

Mine my mind
It may reveal its gems
Or it'll throw up its bilge
But never mind!

Excuse Me!!

From The Hindu frontpage
Saturday, Jan 28, 2006
U.S. tells India to back off Syria oil deal
NEW DELHI: Taking strong exception to India's recent decision to buy a Syrian oilfield in partnership with China, the United States has asked the Manmohan Singh Government to "reconsider" its proposed investment.
A demarche to this effect was made earlier this month and an aide memoire outlining Washington's objections handed over to the Ministry of External Affairs by senior diplomats here. In December last, ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL) and the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) teamed up to purchase a 37 per cent stake in the al-Furat oil and gas fields from Petro-Canada for $573 million.
The mature fields, jointly run by Shell, have proven reserves of 300 million barrels of oil equivalent. Indian officials consider the Syrian venture to be of enormous strategic significance, both for the value of the underlying assets and the role it will play in cementing the China-India partnership for acquiring oil and gas equities in third countries.
The U.S. aide memoire, a copy of which is in the possession of The Hindu, says: "The United States strongly opposes such investments in Syrian resources."
Pointing out that the United Nations Security Council unanimously passed two resolutions, UNSCR 1636 and 1644, "mandating complete cooperation by the government of Syria with the U.N.'s investigation into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri," the U.S. note says: "Now is not the time to send mixed messages to the SARG [Syrian Arab Republic Government] either through investment deals or through any form of economic or political reward to the Damascus regime."

It is not known whether China has been told such. And I am not sure it will be. And No, Shell is not an Indian Company! Yes, Shell has huge business interests in the U.S. itself. And yeah, Shell could have been easily arm-twisted. Ofcourse, US-Canada relations are cordial and not affected by Petro-Canada's investment in Syria for this long.
Getting a warning is one thing. I am trying to figure out what we did or did not, to let others think that they can poke their noses in our affairs. Our policy/attitude must be introspected upon. We should try to rise a little bit higher than the door-mat level.

Inquilab Zindabad!!

Do watch RANG DE BASANTI. The movie must be made a hit!
I am not going to dissect its storyline or whatever. But I swear by it!!

Driving Mad - Part II

Part I

Last week, I had to buy a car. Till then, I was enjoying my company's hospitality and latest cars. That had to end. Here I go with what happened after.

I put down the loan my company gave me for one pre-owned car. The second day I take the car to office, we had to have a snow fall. :-( And a good seven inches at that! Nature knows that I was yet to buy the snow shovel cum ice scraper.

I decide to leave office early, and still the snow catches up with me. Not sure how my new acquisition would behave in the inclement weather. I am all nerves inside as I try to gingerly drive out in the falling snow. For some time traffic is heavy making my job easier. Then I turn to the desolate road which takes me to my place.
There the road becomes a single lane either way, cars are sporadic, and people are in a hurry to reach home. They try to drive at the maximum speed possible. But one guy in his new car is blocking their way. I crawl at 25 mph, wipers work furiously and my eye balls stay glued to whatever I can see. The guys behind cannot take it after a while. They overtake me by moving into the opposite lane! Voila! I have made Indians out of disciplined law abiding Americans. Ignoring stares as they zip by, I continue to drive them mad by driving at snail's pace. Finally I reach home after an hour's crawl which usually is done in 25 minutes drive.


The next day, being a weekend, I wake up in the afternoon. Armed with a credit card, and my hands rolled in a polythene bag, I proceed to remove the snow from my windshield and scrape the ice coating that is beginning to form. One helluva job.

Above, is my car with a white fuzzy top! If you carefully see, there are lemons under the wheel to be crushed!

Fighting hearts; Connecting pain!

You have a neighbour. You have fought with him. Bigtime, thrice. And you daily argue with him. Skirmishes are there all time. It's rare that smiles are exchanged, leave alone congenial talk. Is it possible to sympathise with such a person? I thought not.

But I was wrong. Last week I was sorry for Pakistan. Here they are, bombed in their sovereign territory, by a person who is their ally. Some seventeen of their countrymen die, and all they can do is wring their hands.

I could feel what their countrymen are going through. That's because I hold my country dear. Crazy? Ironic? Seems weird, but I'll try to explain.
Long ago I had my blood boil with rage, when my stupid foreign minister went to Kandahar for the release of hostages. Submitting to the captors' demands was inevitable then, but what got my goat was the external affairs' minister's pose holding hands with the terrorist who was to be released.

Another time. This time the government was the same but the ministers had changed. We conduct a nuclear test, and the superpower frowns at it. Each country has its own reason to behave the way they do.You do what is good for your country and stand by it, come what may. But what we saw was our minister chasing the super power's then under Secretary of state, all through the world, buttonholing him wherever possible. It was almost like a sub begging a dom after playing truant. I personally felt humiliated. If you don't have the guts to do something, you shouldn't do that at all.

Okay, I'll stop here, for still I get worked up just thinking of those incidents. Such events like these humiliates the ordinary patriotic citizens. And because we have had our own share, I am able to relate to the collective psyche of the Pakis.

A government is not some amoebic torso of a creature. Ultimately it boils down to some individuals who take decisions what are touted as Government's actions. And when they have no sense of self respect, integrity and steadfastness, first their character taints the government's actions. Then such an action stains the country. And this, pains ordinary people like me.

My sympathies are with such ordinary people of Pakistan who are caught in a vicious cycle of jingoism, over dependence on military and religious extremism. It seems that to keep people from asking to be alleviated from poverty, the prescription world wide is fundamentalism. It is the opium of the masses.

Ofcourse, I can be thought of as mistaken. I have read only our history books.