payallal

The Dark Ages: Revisited?

The last week has been a bad week for the human race. With all the blasts, the earthquake, and yet another atrocious rape case in my city, we are once again reminded that although we have come a long way in terms of science and technology and human development in general, there are still parts of the world which remain far behind the 21st century.

It makes me realize that the old ways are so etched inside our being that it is often hard for people to let go and give way to the new. In my country, women are not respected as much as men. They are wives and daughters and sisters before they are human beings. And no matter how many women start entering the work world, or start living independent of men, they are still wives and daughters and sisters first. They are to serve men and take care of them before they take care of themselves.

Similarly, when it comes to violence and terrorism, it is mostly just a convenient way to get what you want and protest against governments. But at the end of the day, it doesn’t make much sense to harm those who have nothing to do with it. Before the concept of ‘nations’ came around, this is pretty much how things worked. People’s lives were irrelevant compared to rulers’ egos and power. I am not suggesting to compare present day governments to kings who used their citizens as puppets, but I am saying that people’s safety seems to matter less as compared to politics and establishing beliefs.

People like to think that we’ve come far and are propagators of ‘modern’ thinking. But somewhere inside us, the past remains. While some of us still yearn for power and attention, some of us forget the new times we are now living in and have a tendency to think like we would have in the past. We forget that we still haven’t developed the ability to win against nature.

Some part of the past, the dark ages lives within us, and there is not much we can do about it. But what we can do is to fight that part of us, and start living in this amazing new world that the human race has built for itself.

MBA=Assured jobs? Not so sure about that.

I was on vacation in Kerala last December, a state in the southern part of India, when I truly realized why thinkers and philosophers were cribbing and whining so much about this thing called “education inflation”.

We were driving past the country side, on our way from the airport to our hotel, when my dad started making conversation with the taxi driver.

As the taxi driver told my father about his family and home, I tried to catch a nap. But my attention was suddenly back to the conversation when I heard the word “MBA”.

Yup. This is what our world has come to. The once celebrated MBA degree, has officially become a piece of paper.

OUR TAXI DRIVER HAD A FREAKIN’ MBA.

We were driven to our hotel by a man who had an MBA.

A man with an MBA, puts on a white uniform every morning, to drive families like mine to and fro from the airport to the hotel.

Since I was too confused and tired to think straight at the time, I ignored this mind boggling discovery, and indulged myself in a nice long nap as soon as we got to the hotel.

But as we walked around our hotel grounds the next morning, talking to people, and interacting with some of the staff, we realized that the taxi driver wasn’t alone. There were all kinds of people with college degrees doing blue collar jobs. People who had spent at least 16 years educating themselves, were now doing jobs that had nothing to do with what they studied. More than that, the jobs they were doing didn’t even require them to read or write.

This state of Kerala, which has a 99% literacy rate ,has a large population of MBAs who drive taxis and engineers who wait tables at local restaurants.

So if this is what a college degree is worth in a state where everybody is “educated”, what will happen to us in a world where everybody has a masters degree? What will happen when our scientists invent robots who can do that cooking and cleaning? What will happen when the self driven car gets commercialized?

Its really easy to get a degree and then a job that pays you regularly and assures a roof over your head. Maybe its time to start thinking differently. Think of learning, and not getting grades. Think of exploring the world beyond what school or college teaches you.
In a world where everyone has fancy degrees, actual merit and ability are what will really count.

Ideas Ideas Everywhere

Coffee Houses, Metros and Buses, Malls, Bathrooms, Restaurants, Middle of the Road, Parties, Dinners, Dates, Facebook discussions and Blogs.

In case you were wondering THAT was the list of places where people often come up with business ideas and opportunities that can be converted into organizations and startups. Yes, people get ideas in the weirdest places, at the weirdest times and in between the weirdest conversations. And if I were to go around counting the number of great ideas that are mentioned every day, I would soon run out of numbers.

Everyone has ideas. Some have the aspirations to make it a reality SOME day. But few have the courage to actually go out and execute them.

I’m not writing this to criticize the passiveness of people in executing. There is a lot of thinking that goes into a startup and a lot of courage to invest time and money into it.

I write this for the people who are out there executing their ideas and living their dreams and also for those who dare to dream and think of executing their idea some day.

Keep trying, and keep dreaming, because a 90 storey building was once just a pile of rubble.

28 Days

February is the one month of the year which can teach you a lesson that no other month can. Any guesses? No? Alright, I’ll tell you!

February is the one month which familiarizes you with the price of procrastination. As I recover from the consequences of procrastinating all my February tasks, here is what I now know about not procrastinating:

1. Reply to your messages and emails right away
There is always a reason to not reply to your text messages and emails right away. There is always a reason to not open facebook messages for the fear that the sender will see the little ‘seen’ tick mark there and take offence at your ignorance. But believe me, there comes a time when you have 500 unread messages in your mailbox, and a group of friends on facebook who know you are consciously ignoring the message they sent, because lets face it, facebook’s technical errors can be blamed only some times.

2. Never convince yourself to do a task later
Whenever I think of getting to work, I simultaneously think of a reason to not get to work. And these two thoughts are a split second apart. So before you can even think of a reason not to do the work, get your lazy ass of your over used bed and get to work. There will always be a millions reasons to not finish writing that blog article, or making a call to your clients, or doing your homework. And these reasons will always overpower your reasons to work. So the best solution? Don’t even think of them.

3. Just because you aren’t tired right now, doesn’t mean you won’t be after another hour.
You know how there are those nights when you’re full of enthusiasm and energy? You sit down and make a list of things you have to do and you promise yourself that you will do each and everything before you sleep. Then, after making your list, you look at the time on your laptop screen, and are surprised to see that its only 9:30 p.m. There’s a long night ahead, and you have enough time (and energy) to get to the things on your list. So you decide to watch Grey’s Anatomy before you start doing your to-do. Grey’s Anatomy’s wonderful episode ends, and you look at your to do list. But now, the human craving to sleep dawns on you. You run your eye down the list again, and realize that there is nothing so important that it can’t be done tomorrow. The world will certainly not end if you don’t do those tasks right away. Its the story of my life, and I can totally relate to it. My point here, you may ask? Don’t watch Grey’s Anatomy.

If nothing else, make sure you know how many days there are in a month. Because when your boss or your teacher ask you to submit that piece of work by the end of the month of February, just try to remember, that February only has 28 days.

My NOT-TO-DO list for 2013

They call it a “New” Year. But despite that, every 1st of January gives me a deja vu, mainly because of the people talking about New Year Resolutions and how they never last.
Lets face it, not more than 1% of New Year Resolutions last beyond 3rd January (okay, i confess. I made that up).

So this year, I decided to make a list of things NOT to do in 2013. Here goes:

1. Do not stay in Delhi for more than 200 days. TRAVEL!

2. Do not let anything remain the same. I love change. Monotony disturbs me.

3. Do not say things you do not mean, “Lets meet soon”, being a classic example.

4. Do not spend TOO much time in front of the computer or TV. Read more!

And one last thing,

5. Do NOT STOP BLOGGING!

Inspired by PeaBee’s My 2013 To Do List

How NOT to get lost in Delhi

After having lived in New Delhi for 19 years, I surprised myself at my ability to get lost despite that.
Over the past few months, my friend and I have ventured out to look for manufacturers, delivery services and what not for our new business. And each time, we somehow manage to spend 90% of our time looking for the place.

So after having been lost a million times (no, really), I thought it’s time to share my wisdom with the world. Although I am in no position to give advice, here is how NOT to get lost in New Delhi.

1. ALWAYS have GPS. Auto waalas are likely to take you on a joy ride if they realize how clueless you are. (for exceptions, refer to point 3). And that reminds me, act like you know it all when you’re getting into an auto. As they say, confidence is key.

2. ASK the locals. Believe it or not, the fruit vendors know everything. Ask them anything. They’ll know. Try it. Really. When it comes to directions, they own google maps.

3. DO NOT trust GPS when you find yourself in a place with more stray animals than people. It is very likely that google maps does not know where to go either. These are typically places where fitting a four wheeler on the road is a big achievement. With lanes that narrow, you do not want directions from a satellite.

4. NEVER assume that the driver knows everything. There is a good chance that the driver won’t know how to get to the place you want to go to. Cab drivers, especially, are notorious for “not knowing” where to go. So once again , refer to point 1.

5. When you walk past the same place more than three times, you’re doing something wrong. Come back and read my post.

But in case you haven’t been lost even once, be it in your own city or another’s, get out there, and WANDER! Getting lost has a thrill of its own. Its like a mini-adventure.

When Film Makers do things a little differently

I recently went to see Breaking Dawn 2. (Yes, I happen to be a twilight fan )
I sat through the entire first half of the movie cursing the directors and the horrible job they had done with this movie. It was too fast moving and far too inaccurate. I didn’t like it. At all.
Then the second half started and I spent the first few minutes promising myself never to see a movie made by these guys again. But the last 15 minutes of the movie changed my perception entirely.

These guys had done things a little differently from the book, and I really liked that. It came off my black list in a second.

There really is no point watching a movie if you’ve already read the book. You know what’s going to happen in the end. But when movie makers decide to add some twists and turns contrary to the book, it makes seeing these movies worth it.

I know that there are movie critics out there, busy writing negative reviews about how movies often take away the essence of literature, but I love seeing film makers do thing differently, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a Harry Potter movie in which Harry’s parents are still alive.

Do I know you?

Have you seen any of those films where the hero walks upto a very pretty girl and tries to hit on her by saying “Have I seen you before? You look familiar.”

You’ve probably seen it in more films that you’d want to. Over time, it’s become a cliche.

But I realized, that as you meet more and more people you start forgetting the people who you have met briefly or in a crowd. You cannot remember everyone you have said hello to!

Today I was at an event where I saw someone who seemed strikingly familiar. I couldn’t place in my head where I had met him. But I knew I had. And this wasn’t the first time such a thing was happening.

Three fourths of my mind in such cases wants to go upto the person and ask if we have met before. The other one fourth fights back and tells me what a horrible idea that is at the risk of sounding like a hero in a movie. I normally end up listening to the other half.

That’s what happens to most people. It’s sort of like the fear of rejection. If the other person doesn’t recognize you or can’t remember who you are, the joke is pretty much on you.

Well, next time, I’ll try not to bother. Who knows! I may not end up being the weird stranger and instead, it might just turn out that I know that familiar person after all.

Password Mania!

Can you put a number on the websites you have made an account on? Probably not. At least I can’t. I sign up for just about everything that catches my eye. And a lot of things catch my eye. So you can imagine the number of websites I have accounts on.

Accounts require passwords, and passwords you have to remember. For most people, this isn’t really a problem. Most of us have these standard passwords which we use just about everywhere. But the problem comes in when you have been using the same password for 2 or 3 years and you come across an article on the web which talks about how a lot of accounts are being hacked these days. These type of articles usually suggest ways and means to keep your account from getting hacked. And the one thing that they ALL mention is to keep changing your password on a regular basis.

Resetting passwords over and
over can be very very stressful.

This is when that feeling of apprehension creeps onto you. You realize that it is time. It is time to change your standard password. It’s kind of like a feeling of enlightenment.

And then the lengthy task begins. You go from account to account changing all the passwords, trying to remember the important places where you have online accounts.

It’s kind of like cleaning. No one likes to do it, but when you reach a certain saturation point, you don’t have much of a choice!

TV time

When my brother and I were little, our parents had set a “TV time” for us. We could only watch TV for one hour every day. My brother and I would usually divide it into two halves. We used to watch half an hour of TV in the afternoon and half an hour before sleeping.

The love of our life- the television!

But those were the times when the advertisements weren’t longer than the show itself. When the two of us finally realized that the lengthy advertisements were costing us a lot of TV time, we came up with a strategy. We used to sit in front of the TV with a stopwatch. When the ads would come, we would stop the time running on the stopwatch, and turn our heads away from the TV, claiming that since we weren’t actually looking at the TV, this shouldn’t count as TV time. It worked very well for a few days. Then our parents realized our tactic and that was the end of our astute (but very effective) scheme.

Although our clever trick didn’t last very long, our efforts to prolong TV time never failed. I no longer have a TV time, but my younger brother does. And he still finds ways and means to violate it.

Some things never change! Be it people, their strange or wonderful habits, or our desperate attempts to trespass our TV time.