Infinite thoughts

As we landed in Benagaluru , first and foremost thing that I did was to have Bengaluru Coffee!! I just love this decoction coffee since the time I spent an year in Bengaluru (then was called Bangalore) about 15 years back! Obviously this was accompanied with Dosa and Kara Bath (also known as Upama).  On way to Coorg Once breakfast was done, we started our journey towards Coorg - our first stop in this trip. Weather was beautiful. Even though it was mid-may, the cloudy weather made the travel very enjoyable. Our vehicle driver, who was hired through South Tourism , seemed to have no clue about way to Coorg. Later he told that it was his first trip in Karnataka and he had usually been Kerala circuit, rather than Karnataka. Although we were digressed for about 20 KM, we were enjoying the journey. Mrunmay and I played our favorite word game i.e. Related Words. It is a very simple game, it helps one to think a word related to the word said by other player. At times, it gives goo...

So it was Kerala. The bookings were made through SOTC . The travel was to be started on 11-May. Lists were made for shopping, considering it would be 13 days of travel and that too a lot of car travel. Preparations Lot of car travel meant we needed to keep Mrunmay occupied. It is very difficult for children of his age to get lost in the scenic beauty of Kerala - may be for 5 minutes, but not more. Just listening to the songs is not really what he likes. If he is in mood, he would listen to baalgeete (songs for children) for may be 15-20 minutes, but definitely not hours together. Keeping all this in mind, we got ready with some on-the-go games, playing cards and mobile games. I filled up my mobile with about 8 games including Subway Surfer and Temple Run 2. And then I realized. With all the possible mobile playing, it would drain the battery a lot and it means I need some kind of power back up.  Started  inquiring about it in the network . Also, tried the usua...

After a short break in Mahabaleshwar , Meghana, Mrunmay and I have been looking forward to a big break, which is our vacation around Anniversary . Coincidently, it also overlaps with Mrunmay’s vacation at his day care. After much deliberation, we decided to go to North. In fact, North was the obvious choice given the summer season, the deliberation was around where to go. Given vast number spots that North India offers, we considered almost everything from J&K to Bhutan, Sikkim. Searching for a destination Considering the Election Result Dates, which were overlapping with the vacation plan, we ruled out J&K for this year. We didn't want to do the usual circuit of Shimla-Kulu-Manali . While these discussions were ON, our kiddo put up a demand-cum-request to go to a place where he would get a lot of snow. His last encounter with snow was in Bangalore last year when we visited the snow city. Unfortunately, he hit with snow getting inside his shoes and had ...

I am rather late in watching this interview of Ms. Indra Nooyi but had read bits and pieces of the interview as soon as it hit the media. Even our dining table witnessed the discussion around this topic. My response before watching the interview was solely based on the read articles and hearsay and it went like this  You can have it all. Only thing is - "you" define what is "all" for you and don't let other dictate what is "all" for "you". After watching the interview in its entirety today, I confirmed my belief. Even Ms. Nooyi , one of the most powerful women in the world, is driven by expectations from the society and hence there's this guilt trip. Seemingly the powerful position is not helping to undo the effects of upbringing and hence it makes all the more important for such a person to have a positivity towards the upbringing of her own children. I see quite a few things which are outright wrong and are attributing to the...

As Mr. Narendra Modi took oath yesterday, hist official journey as 15th Prime Minister of India started. Well, almost everything has been written about his journey until now and we'd all see how it goes from here. This particular blog is to express what I felt yesterday evening as I watched the ceremony. Not once in my memory I had the excitement to watch the oath ceremony. Forget that I didn't even care if it was being telecast live or not. But, yesterday was different. I was super excited to watch this live telecast and as I watched it, it gave me goosebumps. Right from the national anthem until Mr. Modi completed his oath and formally became the Prime Minister of India.  I see a sense of achievement in this. I had been a supporter of Mr. Modi right from the time he was announced the Prime Ministerial Candidate by BJP. Then was carefully reading news about his, listening to his speeches wherever available and whenever time permitted. He has carved out a victory with met...

Ten Years - may be a short period or may be a long period. It depends. It does not depend on whether those years were full of joy or full of tears. It depends if you enjoyed those days irrespective of joy or tears. It depends on the memories that you created for yourself.  And if I add another dimension to consider - a partner? It still remains the same. You would feel the time was short if you enjoyed every moment you were together, if you cherish every joy and every tear. And I am still wondering how fast last ten years have gone by!! Yes, today, Meghana and I are celebrating our 10th anniversary. It has been a roller-coaster ride. Lot of ups and downs. Lot of smiles and few tears too.  The story had started almost twelve to thirteen years back. It obviously was a one way traffic initially, which took more than 2 years to become a two way road and another year or so make it a highway :)  When I look back, I am very happy to have made a right decision. Meg...

I got a bit nostalgic when my friend Arun posted this link on Facebook - Winamp to say goodbye on 20-Dec!! For the uninitiated ones, winamp was THE media player in our 20's era. Windows Media Player was nowhere to be seen, forget about iTunes and everything else. A thin desktop client, with loads of feature and support for almost every audio format. And yes, we could put various skins as well to suit the mood of the day. This was fun, luxury and convenience. As we grew up, slowly winamp was taken over by Windows Media Player (only to a certain extent) and then primarily by Jukeboxes of the world and then iTunes. WinAmp slowly faded away. I don't remember exactly when, but probably around 7-8 years back I stopped using it.  The one important feature - from my perspective - that I'll always remember - was the remote control. By running a tiny server, it used to allow remote clients to connect to the server and could listen to remote playlist. And you can guess the u...

During our usual story time, rather reading time, Mrunmay picked up his current favorite - The bird with golden wings  - by Sudha Murthy and started reading one of the stories. Story had a reference to a couple having wealthy lifestyle and then loosing money in business, moving into a smaller place, with no servants etc. The story read - she had to do all the work at home as she couldn't afford the servants. And the question came beaming to me - "But baba , why wasn't her husband helping her instead of she doing all the work alone?" I didn't have immediate answer, but it got me thinking - he is trying to relate what he is seeing at home to what he is being told in the story and he is picking up the contradiction quickly. Same thing happens when the story contains "thief", he asks but why did he start stealing? And usually there are no answers to these questions. I think time has come to rewrite the stories that actually tell what our futur...

First of all Happy Diwali to all of you. Albeit late, but intentional. I wanted you to read this mail :) Hope you have enjoyed your Diwali a lot and have come back in not-so-working mood. So, have some fun reading this mail. About 6 months back, we shut shop at mSauda and I was out looking for some interesting opportunities to work upon. In that process, I met few of you who offered some connects and contacts for me to explore. While looking for some work, I got to know few more folks who are out there to do something different!! I learnt how difficult it is to do freelancing, how difficult it is to sell your skills and most importantly, how to keep yourself busy when you don't have a set of tasks chalked out for you nor you know which direction you are heading to. I tried quite a few thing, but most of those things didn't work out as I was expecting, except for this one. I got introduced to a startup in gifting space -  http://www.giftease.com . After few meeting...

Yesterday Zee Marathi aired one of the recent movies in Marathi - BP (Balak - Palak) . I had heard a lot about the movie and also had planned to watch it in theater, but somehow I couldn't. So when I get to know the timing, I blocked my calendar and also ensured that Mrunmay doesn't disturb in between :p The theme is very different from the movies that we have seen so far and very happy for the BP team to take up such a subject. It is about the children with their unending curiosity for everything including sex and some of the side effects of it. You can read more about the storyline and other things at imdb and other sites . What I liked about the movie: All the kids (not kids really) - Avya, Bhagya, Chiu, Dolly and Vishu. Very good performance by each one of them. Kadam kaka by Kishor Kadam Song selection when the kids were trying to peeping through the window - That one is too hilarious!! The emotional disturbance after the kids watch the BP aka "Dhinch...

Are you living in the moment?  Do you think of taking out your mobile phone and click that beautiful scenery even before you spend enough time appreciating and enjoying it? You are not... Do you take out your camera and start clicking the photos when the birthday girl is cutting the cake? Are you paying attention to her happiness or focusing on focusing your camera? You are not living in the moment.. Do you get urge to check your facebook profile when someone is talking to you? You are not living in the moment... And yeah, this is the picture I should post on my instagram stream.. You just missed living in the moment... This is the feeling I always get when I walk around. Recent example is Ganesh Wisarjan (Idol immersion procession). More than 50% of the crowd were taking out their mobiles and cameras and shooting the procession. Most of them video recording it. This was happening at the cost of other view's sight. When you raise your mobile or camera to shoot/click somet...

Last few days I have been hearing the radio ads by Jay-Vijay motors on various radio channels in Pune.  First one is for persuading the Volkswagen owners to get their vehicles to Jay-Vijay motors for servicing. The punch line is that "you" get your vehicle to their service center in the heart of the city and do not rely on some unknown person to do pickup and delivery. Unknown driver may cause damage to your Volkswagen car.  The second one is for availing attractive discount on the Volkswagen cars between 21-Jun and 23-Jun (yeah, for three days and it looks like the ad started running today morning itself).  Jay-Vijay motors is located near Managla Theater and the service station is very much at the same place.  AFAIK, Jay-Vijay motors has only one competitor in Pune area and that is B.U.Bhandari, whose showroom is located on Pashan road near Abhimanshri Society and the service station is near Wakad on Pune-Bangalore Highway. So every Volk...

It was time to meet one of Meghana's classmate - Deven - while we were in Bengaluru. We decided to meet at CCD in Jayanagar. The store was easy to find and nicely located on a first floor at a junction. When we entered the store was almost full except for 2-3 tables. We occupied one that was comfortable enough for three and close to the main door so that Deven could locate us very easily. Within few minutes Deven reached and we got involved in conversations varying from Meghana's school to Deven's profession (Merchant Navy) and shopping in Bengaluru and many others. In due course, we ordered some coffee and snacks for ourselves. While enjoying those snacks, something very weird happened. Suddenly two kids - one boy and a girl - entered the store. No, they were not customers. Each of them started approaching every table and started begging. Being very close to the main door, we were the first ones to be approached. The boy was not so persistent and at a wave of a hand ...

After not so satisfactory trip to Bandipur (more about it a little later), we returned back to Bengaluru to my sister's place. We had 2-3 days at hand and were wondering what to do in those days. Conversation led us to two interesting locations in Bangalore - Nehru Planetarium & Science Park and Snow City . A quick search on google informed that there is a English show at 12:30 PM. Unfortunately there is no provision for online booking and some reviews suggested to reach the venue at least an hour in advance as there are limited seats per show. The trio (Meghana, Mrunmay and myself) didn't want to miss the show and hence rushed to the Planetarium located in Vasant Vihar.  The booking was yet to be started and there didn't seem to be much rush. So we decided to take a stroll in the park in the same premise. It turned out to be science park and that too well designed!! We started with the principle of lever and Mrunmay was amazed to see the difference in the force...