Liar Liar
Do you remember when did you first tell a lie ? I am sure , it’s difficult to remember for most of us , as it started even before we understood what is lying and much before we learned it was a vice.
White lies , black lies , wretched lies , mean lies …name them and all of us at some time in our life have lied in one or more of the above hues. Lies, as harmless as a centipede have been erased from our memory effortlessly, while some venomous ones lie as coiled Vipers in our memory hideouts … still making us blue with its occasional pangs.
First, let us dwell for a moment on how we learnt to lie , ahem … for the habitual liars the word ” learn” may not tickle , but for those who abstain they may like to take it with a pinch of salt. Okay amendment , why did we on the first place start lying ?
Most of you may agree , our first lies go back to as early as 3-4 years , bordering our hazed and dusted memories of small lies to avoid our parent’s admonishing . Many of you may remember playing with cold tap water on a rainy day , barely four, and when caught and asked to admit the guilt, had lied tongue in cheek 
Here are some facts , seemingly tell-tale , from research archives. Although we think of truthfulness as a young child’s paramount virtue, it turns out that lying is the more advanced skill. A child who is going to lie must recognize the truth, intellectually conceive of an alternate reality, and be able to convincingly sell that new reality to someone else. Therefore, lying demands both advanced cognitive development and social skills that honesty simply doesn’t require. And as a natural evidence to this theory , it has been found that students who were outstandingly bright compared to their peers , started lying as early as at the age of 2-3 years. So here’s to the budding parents , if your 4 year old daughter lies with conviction , it’s a sign that she has brains .The corollary to it , if you have a smart and intelligent kid he/she is more at risk to become an habitual liar.
I think enough has been blabbed about the theory of lies , its origin , learning and unlearning . If it were this , I may as well paste a few links from research sites for your heavy reading.
It’s not , so move on .
Let us delve for a moment on the human side of lies . There are lies , we have said , enacted and lived in our lives and kept it under the wraps. As said earlier, reasons could be numerous on why you may have lied ( from fear of admonishment in the hands of parents to a royal treatment from your wives , ahem , if the lie was about your pre-marital escapades with your girlfriend 
) . A lot of times we live a few lies for our entire life , and they pass out with us at the end , untold and sometimes evading even a self confession. I wanted you to come up with such confessions on lies you have told ever since childhood , that have slipped the radar of the unassuming recipient, and yet lived to eke its presence in your minds. Why not come up with few such un-confessed ones , and proclaim them to the world … ahem … if not with pride at least for the sake of fun or even a delayed repentance . To take out the element of discomfort , I wouldn’t ask you to talk of lies ( told and untold ), that may put your personal life into tantrums , or lead to any social ignominy . Just the ones that have lost their venom with time , become sting and fang less and are harmless snippets from memory now.
I was in my 3rd Standard then , studying in a Hindu Missionary school. For those of you who would only associate missionary with the Christians, there are Hindu Missions and Missionary schools as well. DAV Public and schools run by the Bharat Sevashram Sangh are few. I studied in a School run by the latter until my 5th Standard. As with most schools of my time ,we had the First Term Exams , which used to be split into two Class Tests worth 50 marks each. These Class Tests were to be written in Exercise Books ( commonly called Copies, until I was scorned by a teacher for calling it so ) that were to be carried from home. After the test , the same were to be submitted for evaluation and finally returned back to the student.
It was a chill winter morning , and the paper with which the Unit Tests started was English Language. Essay writing and a lot of Grammar constituted the Exam Questions ( where I would be more than happy to only remember what were Nouns and Verbs and leave their “Pro” brethren for the top rankers in the class. Interjection and Conjunction are ones which I can spell only now , so I never turned the pages to reach them when in elementary .
That day the Language Paper unexpectedly went well for me (in English Language ‘well’ meant about 60% ish). Exam over, I packed my bag and ran merrily towards the school bus to get myself a seat in the cabin ( the most coveted few seats in a school bus were those ones, with heavy smell of diesel and a direct view of Driver Uncle)
Back home , I do not recollect which one, but had to prepare for another Exam the next day. Come evening, I started pulling out the English books from the bag to replace them with books for the next exam. And Lo .. there it was , a sight not really to behold , but one that sent a shiver down my spine. The English Exam Copy was popping from beneath a heap of books in my bag wheras it was supposed to be in my English Teacher’s bag, back in her home. In my euphoria of writing a decent exam, I had acted on reflex and brought the Copy back home instead of submitting it to the Teacher. Even on a winter evening , I remember breaking heavy sweat at my mega blunder. For about 15 mins , I sat quietly sweating and pondering over damage control. The biggest fear was the admonishing from my parents, some stern rebuke from my father along with nice spanking from Maa , and a whole evening of repentance over how their child was heading to only one direction …. Spoilt. For a moment, I thought of admitting my mistake in front of the Teacher , the next day. It didn’t turn out to be a great prospect , given the obnoxiously irritating ways of our English teacher with Third Benchers.
That was when the devil peeped from within the hood of fear … I had to hatch a plan , tell a lie and come out clean.
There was this guy Aniruddha Roy , failed twice in 3rd standard and the biggest bully in the class. Incidentally , I had been bullied and beaten up by him more than once in the bus over fights to get a seat in the Cabin. It had to be HIM.
I already had a pale and sweaty face to present for a disaster, and I knew I could shed tears at the opportune moment. Walking up to my mother , who happened to be in the kitchen , I stood by her side cosily. Then, offering a prayer to the God of Lies , I managed to state , in an unflinching voice , how this guy Aniruddha from my class had played the nastiest prank of the year on me. He seemingly , took the Exam Copy from me in the name of submission , and instead kept it back with him. To make a mockery of me and complete the act of vengeance he returned my Exam Copy while returning in the school bus . On top of it , he even bullied me and threatened me to dire consequences if I revealed this incident to anyone.
The cake was baked , and the icing put to perfection with some genuine tears … Some convincing wailing on how I had written a very good exam only to be deprived by this moron, confounded my mother’s belief. She in turn took it to my father and I had successfully triggered the chain.
Next day my parents were at the school , in an animated discussion with the Class Teacher on how their ward has been deceived , defrauded and above all deprived of a fair assessment
for an exam well written. Aniruddha was called , and to this day I remember the expression on his face. It was shock, bemuse, astonishment , anguish all writ in one on his bloated face. The poor guy , as much as he was a bully was poor with words, couldn’t utter a single coherent sentence. His track record which was full of complaints of misdemeanour , went against him , and soon the verdict was foregone . He was reprimanded , rebuked and asked to stand outside the Class for half a day. My Exam Copy was accepted with full honour and assessed.
So that was my story of an un-confessed lying .
PS : From that day on , Aniruddha Roy was a changed boy when it came to dealing with me. The best seat in the School Bus Cabin was reserved for me . His share of tiffin was mine so very often , and all of it with the same guy who had starved me many days by pecking on mine.
Soon though , I realized I had committed a severe offense , but before I could gather the courage and admit to Aniruddha , his father got transferred and they moved to another city. Since then , I haven’t heard of him.
If there was a way Aniruddha was reading this blog , or I could reach him through a friend of friend’s … here is my humble statement of confession and apology. Dude, it was me who had committed the wrong on that day and put you on the dock for no fault of yours. If there was anything I could send your way , it only had to be a big ” Sorry” and for once I mean it from the bottom of my heart.
Go ahead , the denizens of the blogging world , come up with your confession on lies , silly or smart , sweet or bitter, harmless or spitefull , I am sure it’ll make for good reading.
The lie lies until you bring it to light
The Search – From House to Home – Part I
One of the major reason of our worries is a self nurtured demonish apprehension , that something or everything may go wrong with me. I repeat , for most part it is self-inflicted and it always comes with the gift of anxiety along with it. A lot of times ,what appears is nothing but a reflection of what our apprehensions and fears wants it to appear.
Let me explain.
I have ventured out …ahem … let me correct myself politically before I head further , we have ventured out to buy ourselves a new flat. I said new flat , but that does in no way mean I was the owner of an old flat. According to my wife , we never had a roof above our head to boot for while I had always thought foolish men make great houses only to rent out a portion or whole of it to tenants.
For me, the first few days went in understanding , whether it’s an apartment that I was out to buy or a flat in an Apartment . Once , I happened to slip out my intent of “buying an Apartment Complex” little loud , in a busy corner of the cafeteria , which bought me few serious gazes.
The basics well learned, began the search. It reached feverish pitch and intensity in mere 2 weeks, and every house that my wife and her friend ( another spirited lady , who found a similar husband who she had hard coaxed to buy a flat ) saw happened to be the best flat in the whole of Hyderabad. Screams and swears ( forgive my blogger’s exaggeration ) would emanate the moment we entered a new flat , only to be replaced by a changed loyalty in favour of a new one , by the very next hour. Frailty …thy name remains woman …
By the end of two weeks , we had visited nearly 5-6 possible localities of Hyderabad which could cater to our miserly budget and over the moon specs ( well almost ). My wife even happened to whisper in my ear , if one of those 20 Lakhs Flats would offer us “CC TV ” facility , to which I sheepishly retorted , petty thieves don’t come by the common entrance, instead they use the pipes and balconies and hence “CC TV “s were pretty redundant for our budget.
One Sunday afternoon , we reached an area in the outskirts of Hyderabad , where a few gated communities were getting erected at frantic pace.That I was made to look for Apartments at the outskirts was backed by my self built vision and logic , for which my wife wasn’t a buyer. I remember, during my early days in Hyderabad I used to hear from my local friends how the Hitech City was a barren rocky wasteland at one time , and continued to remain at the outskirts of Hyderabad as a less lucrative residential area. Now I hear those same friends, without a batter of their eyelid , proclaim Hitech City to be at the heart of the city and supposedly meant only for AVPs and VPs to give a shot at a residence. I learned quickly, the city never stops spreading, and what is outskirt today is pretty much inskirt tomorrow and is much wanted ( forgive my chauvinistic pun ). During my search I also learned another nice thing , to which our wives ( I include my poor friend as well for solidarity’s sake ) remained ever oblivious. That even the best and costliest of Apartments in its early days would merely look like a stone and concrete foundation , bereft of any colors and hitherto glamour ,until they stand completed. Our wives more often went by the colors of the Apartments than anything else , and on three occasions downright rejected the Apartments, as Brown and Yellow didn’t soothe their senses. Aesthetics …ehh
Here was one Gated community , which possibly had a Builder with the mind of our wives , and happened to paint his Buildings in an attractive combination of emulsion paints which called for an immediate need to visit. The Apartment complex ( by this time I was fairly clear with my basics and my buying limitations ) promised a lot at less and was at its finishing stages. Enter the Celestial Towers …well there were still a few things in life along with mother’s love which came free and big , with little searching . Apartment names were one for sure. There was no dearth of sophistication when it came to nomenclature , and for a nine storey Apartment complex no wonder they named it ” Celestial Towers “. I was told, the next Project of the same Builder was named … ” Luxury Kailasa” and I dared not make a guess on its storeys.
After a good 60 mins of our customary floor visit, it was clear that there were no 2 BHKs that were ready for sale from the Builder. However, my mind kept saying , that an Apartment Complex with 100 2BKH flats cannot have everything sold so simple as a Nursery “Jack and Jill ” rhyme.A Builder’s story never ends with a “NOTHING” , it always makes way for a “They Lived Ever After in My Apartment ” ending, not to mention of the Happiness which keeps reducing in EMIs.
I got my call while on my way home , and was asked to meet up one Mr Rajesh who happened to be willing to sell off his 2 BHK flat in Celestial Towers.
On Saturday morning I met Mr Rajesh. How often , we are fooled to make an impression of a person by their mere voice over phone. I have heard ladies with super sexy , huskiness personified voice over phone only to be greeted by a spectacle clad gal who could with little luck pass off as a minor. Rajesh , who had sounded like a suave and stylish businessman,in a hurry to whiff off the miniscule of a deal that his Apartment was, appeared straight out of some Telugu movie. He was clad in whites ( I was told by my friends from AP , that anyone who wanted to sell their squeaky clean image in this state, would opt for some shade of white ) . Apparently, there wasn’t much doubting that politicians and realtors were the biggest buyers of white laundry. Here was Rajesh,looking in his 50s and clarified later as 39, with Ray Ban even inside his office and bailing abuses in dozens to his half a dozen sidekicks. He chewed some costly Pan Masala , the smell of which made the already dark contours of his office room more heady. He made us wait for a good 5 mins in his sitting room before calling us in ( I forgot to mention, I had my old fiend, who was with me during the search,in tow along with my bro ,who had travelled from Bangalore to clinch the deal for me ).
Tea was ordered for us , and as if to drive home the message on who the boss was in the room, we were served tea in plastic cups while Rajesh helped himself with a large Steel Mug …( to be continued )
Bhaiya Aal is Well …
At one point , I dwelt around the prospect of becoming an amateur critic … the domain in which I wanted to wield my knife wasn’t really decided , it could be anything .. movies to mobiles , novels to novelties . Of course all this in my self-styled , self-proclaimed ways where credentials were barely needed and strictly with a Title ” To whomsoever it may (not) Concern”. The medium ? Well, until the time Rediff sends me a paycheck to write for them , it had to be this blog of mine .
That wasn’t until I had watched a movie , where three Idiots ..ahem , loveable rascals all …drew the divide between being a stupid and an Idiot. After 2 hours 40 mins of rib paining , jaw dropping unadulterated laughter , I came out an enlightened being … only to mutter to myself with conviction ” Critics are a Cursed Lot “.
What essentially is movie making ? Is it story telling , injecting a message subtly in the guise of entertainment .. or both ? I guess , movie making’s bottomline is none of these. Movie making for me is a way to entertainment on the first place … you take a message home, is like the garlic breads which come free with the Pizza.
Human beings , as complex creatures they are, with labyrinths of thoughts and layers making for a complex social animal, seeks entertainment in so many forms. Fairy Tales and Tom and Jerries , were entertainment ,when the mind’s twists, turns and taverns were less. With passing years and loss of innocence , we start seeking entertainment in various expressions and emotions which do not always have to be fairy talish. We find gratification even in sadness , we find fulfillment in viewing pain and sacrifice and we love our childhood fantasies of villains and heroes redefined on-screen ( remember Frodo Baggins and the Dark Knights in Lord Of the Rings ).
However, in all this modes of story telling , the bottom line remains unaltered, its entertainment. A plain jane fairytale , that doesn’t entertain is worth a few pennies whereas a dark adventure , unfolding the shades of a Hero where good and evil play hide and seek , is worth a lifetime’s treasure.
So what are all these lines for ? Think of a critic who always gives the magic a miss for the sake of catching the magician at his trick. Who spends half the dictionary to prove a story telling faulty by giving the story itself a miss … and who gives his mind the punishment by banishing it from being entertained and putting a taboo against the simple philosophy of taking a thing for its face value on the first place. I sometimes wonder , if it’s the urge to run against the grain or criticizing a work for the sake of it which is the driving force of a Critic. Or simply put, they are doing their job and can ill afford to walk alongside the populist opinions.
Since Lage Raho Munnabhai , I haven’t had such a prolonged period of entertainment ( sex and orgasms are way shorter in span ) , wherein I was plucked out of all my worries , inhibitions and stresses of stereotypic life and chucked into an orbit of pure joy. I was cautioned by friends of mine , about few moments of humour which may border embarrassment for my family , when viewed in public. By the time , those moments came ( Read: The famous speech by Chatur ) , the viewers had been transfixed into Raju Hirani’s world, wherein they barely had time to give a half smile or pass a quick glance from the corner of their eyes, to assess any semblance of vulgarity. The magic had engulfed the audience, and they were transposed to their college days in gay abandon.
In an industry, which thrives on viewers and their response to a story telling … the resounding statement of ” I loved watching it ” is the biggest litmus test that it has to pass. This makes me pause for a moment and introspect … do I side myself with the ” Mass” , or do I take pleasure in calling my taste as ” elitist” . If it is the former , I have to bear the pain of siding with all those who cried horse while watching Salman Khan in ” Wanted” , and if I take pride in being a vaunted elite , then I have to part with the joy of shouting aloud ” Yes , I want to be like one of those 3 Idiots” .
Heck … I will switch boats between the Elite and the Mass as needed , but for now I am with the Tide ” Bhaiya Aal is Well ” ( there wasn’t a typo in the last line
PS : Rediff’s resident ” Critic De Excellence ” Raja Sen with his ” I know all about movies” attitude rated ” 3 Idiots” with a measly 2 stars. I go one over Raja and help him by plucking the remaining two stars from the movie’s badge as well . How about giving it an ” One Sun (shine)” rating instead ?
A message to an unknown friend
A message to an unknown friend :
Friend … give a day for me from a day of yours , a day saved by stitching hours and minutes from those moments when you have wanted to share a piece of your mind …and then when we meet …we soak our whole day in the yellow sunshine of happiness …. bask in every memoir which is reminiscent of our childhood … shower in those little drops of innocence once more … turn the leaves back and pull a page from my first crush and your first sweet tear of love … live that almighty crush and your first moist eyes in love , one more time. Remember those futile attempts to keep forgetting the maths exam as if it were never there in the calendar … how dearly we wish we could meet those bitter moments once more , and this time with an assurance that they were destined to be coated sweet through time’s passage.
That yellow bird whose name I never knew, perched on the ageless Bell Tree near my window, will take flight once more , and the old bangle seller, whose face you had never seen and yet his voice filled your lonely childhood afternoons .. will trudge back one more time on that shady lane of yours.
And then when we are tired surfing through the sunshine … we allow the day to pass into dusk , my shoulders for you and yours for mine, as the canopy of gray engulfs us ….we light a candle to celebrate , I light another to look at the tears that kiss your cheek wet ….
The night will pass into the lap of a new sun…a new day in the life of friends … it’ll again be the same din of your life and mine …. as we bid innocence on its one way road, a last bye .
PS : A blogger’s article doesn’t need any explanation on what , why or why not ? As a passing note , this article is a short testimony to my lost innocence … the fervour of childhood friendships and a yearning to relive few moments from those good old days.
Would you “Blink” :-) ?
Scenario 1 : I had just met one of my friends for the first time at the cafeteria . It was an acquaintance on that day, which turned into friendship later. She was with her boy friend and it was again a few days and meetings later that I realized they were a pair . What was a pretty innocuous meeting apparently , turned out to stand in my memory for at least one flip thought that crossed my mind. In about a few seconds that I saw them together , my mind somewhere said if they were a pair ,they were not meant for each other and that undefined yet unmistakable zing was missing in them . A blink judgement with no material or circumstantial evidence to reinforce it, nevertheless one that stood in my mind. Call it instinct , incorrigible habit of getting judgemental or a snap observation, it happens with all of us at some time or other.
Scenario 2 : I was visiting a music shop to pick something for my listening. I had gotten bored with the trimmed and barely musical MP3 musics and wanted to listen something which was classical Audio ( the cda s and midi s). I wanted to buy myself a collection of the 80s popular swinging Hindi numbers , and was going past the Western Instrumental gallery up to the Indian section. That was when I caught a glimpse of a CD Album named “Golden Flute ” by Adrian Brett. I scanned around every corner of the shoppy and finally almost like an insect drawn towards light with a sense of inevitability , picked up Adrian’s CD and put it on the counter for billing. Till today I enjoy listening to this metallic flute in my long moments of solitude.
Another case of blink decision without any preparation whatsoever, that meets the normal eye.
Scenario 3 : The moment I caught the first promos of a supposed to be blockbuster Hindi Movie ” Chandni Chowk to China ” ,
I knew it would be a box office dud. I am sure the critic’s band would ridicule me for being judgemental to the extent that a
single promo was good enough for me to trash the whole volume of work , but that’s the way lot of things work in life. It sometimes just takes a few seconds , or even a blink for you to know whether something or someone would tick.
If you have read this far and wondering , being judgemental is no great art or even science and that it is more of a vice than a virtue of the human mind , I’ll request you to hold on for few minutes.
In between the three instances where my flip observations and judgements turned out to be correct on at least two occasions ( the first one remains debatable ) , there have been plenty of occasions where my ( and I believe yours as well ) instinct driven decisions have gone awry.
Malcolm Gladwell ( a best selling author ) in his book titled “Blink”, puts forward a new concept called “thin slicing” . The author describes “thin-slicing” as our ability to gauge what is really important from a very narrow period of experience. In other words, he means spontaneous decisions are often as good as—or even better than—carefully planned and considered ones.
Gladwell also mentions that sometimes having too much information can interfere with the accuracy of a judgment. The challenge is to identify and focus on only the most significant information. The other information could be just noise and can confuse the decision maker. Collecting more and more information, in most cases, just reinforces our judgment but does not help to make it more accurate. He explains that better judgments can be executed from simplicity and frugality of information, rather than the more common belief that greater information about an event or occurence is proportional to an improved decision.
A lot of these instinctive decisions are soft coded in our genes and have evolved in the subconscious through generations. The sixth sense is nothing but an extension of the primitive man’s ever alert mind to react to an impending danger , which in those ages were in every other step. Even though we do not live in a Jungle or dwell in caves now , a lot of times this sixth sense of yours comes in handy . Sitting in a busy pub or restaurent , your sixth sense tells you if someone has been prying or gazing at you ( I know gals would agree more than the guys ) . Similarly , walking down an isolated road in the night , you know without looking back if ever there was someone stalking you.
What we call as “Gut Feeling ” or “hunch” is again our subconscious computer’s silent analysis of a given set of limited information, in reaching a quick conclusion. A lot of times the conscious mind is unaware or completely oblivious of this analysis that goes on deep inside. Its kind of “thinking without thinking “
There are plenty of reasons why such snap decisions may go wrong , and the major one being an inherent chance of a system failing as is the case with any system. Every computer in this world, has in it a miniscule probability or chance of failing , so why not our brain .
However, the second most probable reason of a “blink” decision going wrong is prejudice. Prejudice or any preconceived opinion either favourable or unfavourable, can mask our ability to make snap decisions correctly. Let us take a quick real life case :
A recruiter in one of the reputed IT firm, shared with me how she was fooled into forming opinions about possible candidates and how they would fare, when they appeared for interview in her company .She used to conduct initial screening of candidates and shortlist prospective good ones for subsequent rounds of interview. This lady , over a set of events and past experience got prejudiced into thinking that most of the times people who are prospective right candidates turn up in best dress , neatly combed hair, trimmed and shaven cleanly and have a ready smile to offer at the first possible interaction. According to her such candidates more often were good communicators and went on to make for successful hires. This was until the day she met someone who presented himself for a position , no less than a Manager’s . He was neat and clean , yet didn’t have the shine and shin that she associates with prospective good hires. He was approachable and yet reticent in a stark difference to lot of other candidates who speak out in every possible oppurtunity. It was only a chance that she actually took a passing glance at his CV and got the shock of her life. The candidate held all possible meadallions of academic achievment that one can boast of. An alumnus of IIT and holding a MBA from a reputed institution, he has been an extremely successful professional until then.
As it turned out the candidate was sent by her for the next round of interviews and happened to clear them with consummate ease. In fact , she said , her company was more than proud to hire this candidate .
This experience changed her complete approach to how she viewed , opinionated and judged candidates by their first appearances. To this day, she still rues if she has had missed such great hires on the prejudiced pretext of looks over matter.
The reason I quoted the above instance was to validate the fact that, prejudice formed through experience , can mask our ability to make correct snap decisions , in very subtle yet definitive ways.
Does this mean there is no place for deliberated decisions and well thought measures in managing life’s events . There definitely is . But the whole point here is we live in a society dedicated to the idea that we’re always better off gathering as much information and spending as much time as possible in deliberation. As children, this lesson is thrust into us again and again: ” haste makes waste, look before you leap, stop and think “. But I don’t think this is true. There are lots of situations, particularly at times of high pressure and stress, when haste does not make waste, when our snap judgments and first impressions offer a much better means of making sense of the world.
Before concluding my article I wanted to ask my readers few questions
When Sachin Tendulkar hits a ball hurled at 100 mph from Brett Lee , does he analyse or ponder for minutes or even seconds on which is the best shot to offer to that ball ?
When Tiger Wood tees to take a shot , does he ever think of calling a board meeting lasting hours to decide the angle of his swing ?
When you had fallen in love for the first time and if it had been the proverbial ” love at first sight” , did it actually take you hours to reach that state of mind ?
Write in your thoughts on ” blink” or ” snap” decisions and please quote instances when they have either worked or fired back for you .
Our “not so popular” Favourites
When was the last time you found out that you actually like a film so much .. but cannot really proclaim your liking to the world ,worrying it would belittle your “choice and taste” as the film is simply a “okay types ” in other’s hallowed opinion . A simple case of what others might think .
How many times have we stumbled across songs and movies ,which have otherwise minimal mass appeal or are offbeat in their content , but hold special significance for us. If I am allowed to put it simply .. let us take the case of movies . If each one of us sit down to put a list of our favourite movies , I am sure there will be few in our lists which will raise a few eyebrows. These movies may not have been the biggest commercial hits, nor they may have always been critically acclaimed with 4 stars from Rediff Review , but they continue to hold a special place in our hearts.
May be its the enormity or the speciality of an occasion when the movie was watched , makes it special , may be its the company with whom you had shared the movie more than the movie itself .. or sometimes its an inexplicable “x” factor of the movie which has struck a chord in you. I know a good pal of mine who inevitably mentions “Hazaron Khwaisein Aisi ” or ” Woh Lamhe ” as her favourite films, even though lot of people wouldn’t put them in the pantheon of greatest Hindi Movies ever made.
In the same way, some songs keep an indelible mark on us and continue to hum in our minds for years . Our minds switch on to them even when we hear them being played on a neighbours television or in our office cab. A lot of times ,we relate some songs to special moments and periods in our life , and continue to find them special forever.
I am trying to pen down few such movies and songs, which I like, not because they are always likeable but for the simple reason that they hold a special place in my heart . And who knows , when you see them you may be able to relate to some of them as well .
And for the reasons , why such songs and movies hold a special place , I am sure some of them demand anonymity
My Favourite “not so worldly special” Movies ( outside the acclaimed big hits )
Tum Bin – Anubhav Sinha – cast has Priyanshu and Sandhali – Remember ,Koi Fariyaad Mere Dil mein …. ?
Dasvidaniya – One of the best proposal of love I’ve ever seen in a movie
Life in a Metro – wonderful narrative and you keep finding real life villains like KK , aplenty
Dil To Pagal Hai – I hate Shah Rukh Khan for what he did to Akshay ..but I love the film as it helps me relive a special phase of my life.
Rehna Hai Tere Dil Mein .. This one never grows old for the two loveable rascals and one helluva gorgeous lady.
Teesri Kasam – Raj Kapoor and Waheeda … again something special about it makes me watch it over and again.
Favourite Songs ( again outside the chartbusters )
Roz Roz Aankhon Taley – from the Film Jeeva
Katra Katra Milti Hai – Ijazzat – Its a different thing altogether that I am madly in love with all the songs from this movie
Rishtey Toh Nahi , Rishton Ki – Life in a Metro
O Saathi Re .. Din Dubey Na – Omkara .. poetry at its best.
Yaar ko maine , mujhe yaar ne – Seesha … never mind the overdose of erotica in the video , its Kunal’s lilting voice that makes this song so special.
Looking forward to hear few such ” unconventional and hatke ” favourite of yours
Did I Leave my first Company ?
I remember, in our school our English teacher shared with us lot of terminologies from the world of “movie making “( possibly he had fascination or an unfulfilled dream). “Cuts and Jumps” was something we found very interesting and used abundantly in our story writing sessions… so much so that some even used the technique to leave the entire plot at the mercy of the reader’s imagination and from no where they jumped into writing the climax. Our teacher used to call their efforts ” cut ..killed … jumped and ran away “
Anyways ..I didn’t sit on the keyboard today to write an essay on movie making techniques . It is just that I’ll take the liberty of using a “cut and jump ” to fly past my school and engineering days to perch on my workingdays. I must say , for all the hardships that I had faced in moving into IT (from my Electrical Engineering stream) and my stay with HCL , I have some wonderful memories to warm the cockles of my heart, even this day.
It was May 2004 , my fifth eventful year in HCL. When Vizag in its routine summer cycle was getting rosted every inch of its length and breadth. Vizag is one such city that has managed to hold on to its many names with rare elan. Be it “Waltair ” from the early Raj days , to its cosmopolitan “Vizag” and finally the soil’s call to rechristen it to “Visakhapatnam” .. you’ll find a fair mix and mention of each of these names in and around the city proper. It is a laid back city in every sense … with its sprawling beaches, winding wide Ghat roads and perpendicular residential avenues providing many a hang out and rendezvous for people of all ages.
For those of you who do not know about my early career , I joined HCL from my college campus and was sent to the picturesque sleepy lill townish city of Visakhapatnam. I started with the decoration of a “Customer Engineer” but in essence it was a hardware engineer’s job, who at times was even called as “Computer Mechanic” ( phonetics ” Kam-poo-trr Mek-nik ).
That the job was tough was to say the least, it sapped us and left us like squeezed sponges at the end of the day.
Hindustan Petroleum was one account, I was entrusted to take care from my very early days. By takingcare, my Manager meant taking almost any and every care and chore of HPCL’stop management, including visit to their homes to set right issues with their home computers.
With time I moved from an hands on engineer’s role to more of a marketingengineer( a limbo I soon realized ), who would participate in Bids on systems , solutions and almost anything under the sky that could be sold with HCL’s logo on it.
Coming back to that summer afternoon of May 2004, I was busy putting the finishing touches to an important bid for HPCL. We were asked to quote the best price for supplying 500 systems in a sealed tender . HCL’s Pondicherry Manufacturing unit for some reason used to wait until the very last hour, before emailing the best price that we could offer. The cut off time for receipt of tender was put at 2 PM on that day. As has happened few times, I received the price at 12:30 PM and had to rush through the last minute formalities. Lunch was never a priority while at HCL , so by 1:00 PM I had checked and rechecked our papers against the given checklist. I was all set to start on the 17 kms course to HPCL’s Visakh Refinery.
I had bought a Bajaj Boxer bike during my early days in HCL, as Conveyance Claims and bachelor’s pride were both given a mighty boost by it. As I walked down the stairs, helmet in hand and the toolkit round my shoulder, I realized, for all my engagement in the tender I had barely noticed that the heavens have opened. Vizag never had a well defined rainy season, which meant you could expect a sudden downpour much before the Met office had announced the arrival of monsoon. It indeed was raining heavily and my blue raincoat suddenly found relevance as I pulled the curled roll from inside my toolkit. I ensured, I tucked the tender inside my toolkit and to protect the whole thing from the rain, I put my raincoat over and around the bag.
I trudged carefully through the many pot holes and the haze in front , to reach a treacherous stretch of road near the Naval Dockyard. This stretch of road had heavy vehicles moving in and out of the Navy and Petroleum Terminals , resultingin lot of oil sleek on the road. Rain and oil on a road awash, with hidden pot holes were a bike rider’s nightmare. The clock was running out for me and the 18 kmscourse had suddenly doubled itself. I stopped a few times , to wipe the rain off my helmet visor only to have the haze return. I rode down the newly constructed flyover and sped along the stretch of road makingway to Navy. I hit a small pothole , and while I tried to keep the bike in balance , the little twitch in my shoulder swiveled the heavy toolkit from my back to the side . This swayed my balance , as the bike hit a slippery patch of the road. I knew I was losingcontrol on the bike and as it skid away from between my legs. I ensured, I allowed it to go the other way as I fell on my hands and chest to the left. Dragged a few good feet , I was lying on my hands and chest … the bike gave a huge groan and turned off. Mud splurged on my face through the visor … and as I slowly got myself on the knees and back to my feet , I knew my palms were peeled off. The trouser was tattered near the knee and the mud water on the bruise was telling. As I pulled myself up slowly , I noticed there wasn’t a person anywhere to give me a hand. Rain and salt water rolled down my face , as I wiped my wrist watch to take a look at the time. It was 1:40 PM and I still had to travel 6 odd kilometers. In such moments your physical pain easily takes the backseat.
I limped to my bike , pulled up the fallen beast and kicked to start it once more. Amongst all my misfortunes on that fateful afternoon , it was almost a miracle that the poor machine roared again. I rode fairly fast and reached the gates of the HPCL Refinery with about couple of minutes left to 2 PM. The adventure would expectedly have ended there, except that I had to travel another couple of kilometers inside the refinery to reach the Purchase Department and submit the Bid. I knew, I couldn’t make it for all sane miracles in the world.
To go inside the Refinery Offices, I had to take a Gate Pass from the security. I picked the phone at the gate and called the Manager , Purchase. I knew he was a tough nut , as most Corporate Managers who deal with vendors normally are. After introducing myself briefly , I said I wanted to come in to submit the bid. A cold voice replied from the other end …” But young man , do you think you can make it to the Bid Box before 2 PM ? I knew it was slipping away from me … a lump formed near my throat and a foreboding sense of loss gripped me. I made a fervent plea ..” Sir, I have put in a lot to reach until the gate , please please ,don’t disallow our tender. This bid means a lot for me “
There was a long pause ( a few seconds was like eternity then ) on the other side. Mr Raghavendrachar, asked me to give the phone to the security officer. The security officer spoke over the phone , kept looking at me and threw a meaningful smile at the end of the chat.
He took his pen and wrote over the tender envelope ” submitted at 1:55 PM at Security Gate ” and put the official stamp. He looked at me and gently said , your Tender is being accepted as the Tender did not have a mention of the specific place within the Refinery where the bid was to be submitted by 2 PM. Since you have reached the gate by 2 , we are accepting yours.
Cut and Jump … A month later, bids were opened and HCLwas awarded the deal worth about 2 crores. Mr Raghavendrachar, the tough Purchase Manager whom I had by that time met a few times, patted me on the back and with a wide grin told my boss , “you must take care of your engineer, he has great passion for his work”.
Cut and Jump … another month on, it was the July Quarterly conference of HCL at Hyderabad. The serious and rather unwanted dissection of achievements, targets and other mundane matters were over by afternoon. It was evening, the lawn of one of this many Hyderabad resorts was brimming with young hearts who by now had tottering legs and wobbly eyes. Some of my HCL colleagues, admittedly waited only for this evening through their four good months of hard grind. Drinks were the order of the evening and people had the luxury of choosing. Being a teetotaler, I had very few for company and there was very less to enjoy than the spectacle of drunken Managers and inebriated Engineers. On such days you get to see the otherwise reticent , obedient engineers giving vent to their long nurtured anguish, courtesy Ehtyl Alcohol. I still remember, how one of my ever shy colleague … came up to our Manager once in a party( by that time both had more alcohol than blood in their brain ) and calmly asked ” Akbar , what the f*** do you think you have done in this quarter ? I f***ing can claim with all my honesty, that I am worth the pay that HCL gives me at the end of the month , can you B****y claim the same ?
You had to see the expression on my Manager’s obese face on that day to believe. I must say , I laughed more than I ever had that day on my bed and later came to know congratulatory calls were not looking to stop the next day on my colleague’s phone .
But on this day , there wasn’t any such amusement. I was caught up by our Accounts Manager in the lawn , and he was trying to impress upon me the good sides of drinking( as if there were many that were not known ). As usual I was givinghim a ” I knew it ” kind of admiring look, when my Manager stopped by us. The Accounts Manager, looked up , glanced at him and as if he had remembered a long forgotten Accounts figure , asked him with a wry smile … “so how much of the 50K sales commission for the HPCL Order, did you share with Anir ? ” .
Some facts are so brute, that even in intoxication you cannot hide from their impact. The already dark face of my Manager turned darker … and he pulled the Accounts Manager to the side.
For a moment, I wished I too was intoxicated, for good. I looked at my open palms , the marks of the bruise had long gone … the mud on my raincoat had been washed away to perfection and I had tucked away the torn pair of trousers into a corner. But the indelible mark in pain, that the evening etched on my heart, remained for years to come. I remembered , how I had read in an Article in the Economic times on the morning of that day, ” 80% of employees do not leave their company, they leave their immediate Manager ” . Prophetic … ehh
July 30th , 2004 : I completed 5 years in HCL
July 31st 2004 : After five long years I parted ways with my first company.
PS : HCLoffered sales commission/profit sharing amounts, to Account Managers and Engineers for clinching large and profitable deals from their customers. Until my stay in HCL , it used to be handed over to the Engineer’s immediate Manager for sharing.
Failure, Sweet Failure
How many times do we see time being touted as a “great leveller” . However, time also has an unfailing ability of turning apparently bitter life events into sweet memories . This happens without an iota of consciousness , almost within a sleepy little chamber in the corner of our minds, where sugar is slowly but surely coated on to many bitter experiences and events of our life.
Then, when years or even decades pass by, much like the surprise of a butterfly taking to its wings for the first time … the bitter lill event has transformed and lo it has come back as a sweetly reminescing memory with consequences so light.
As many of you have had … I grew up studying in a disciplinarian yet buzzing little convent school called St Michaels. When I joined Michael’s in 6th standard ( little late for changing school ) , I always had a stigma in my mind whether this one would be as accomodative as my earlier one , which was a missionary school run by Bharat Sevashram Sangh. Almost following Murphy’s Laws , things started going wrong from day one at my new school. I was bullied by a fat bellied ” I know all ” guy in my class … who took to me as the antibodies would take to foreign body in ones blood. To make matters worse , I was fined on the very first day of my school ( a large sum of Rs 5 , for being found talking in Bangla . How much was I missing my last school and its good old Bangla speaking teachers and staff. Here , even the Bengali teacher would speak half her words in English … except for reading through the Bengali text book.
However, things started changing with passing months. I took to Michaels like an gingerly dog takes to swimming but with time started finding the company of ducks , not too unsavoury. I found ways of speaking Bangla in the school premises without getting caught and made my way with a section of the teachers who would appreciatively admire some of my academic and extra curricular abilities.
There was one subject with which I ( and most of us ) couldn’t really make ready friendship with. More than the subject , I guess it was the subject teacher and the associated exams that created a dread in my mind. After reaching Seventh Standard, we were introduced to the new world of Physics , Chemistry and Biology ( some of you may confirm, if its introduced much earlier in our “super early” days of now ). Of all these new hurdles on the block , chemistry was the tormentor in chief. Mr Biswas , a middle aged ( then middle aged meant about 30 , now its pretty young as I have reached there ) man … with English accent near to today’s Pranab Mukherjee’s , discipline rivaling even the principal of the school and dedication that demanded absolute awe, he was the man eternally meant for teaching those bizzarre symbols and formulaes. Not limiting his hands to Chemistry , he often voluntarily veered into English , as if to scorn at what our accented English Maams used to teach us. I still remember , how he made the whole class stand out “Kneel down” for half a period after none of us could spell ” Aqueous ” correctly for him. To his credit , to this day I don’t have to blink or stumble, even as I typed in the spelling in the aritcle above.
But the most memorable phase of learning chemistry with ..ahem ..under Mr Biswas were the Unit and Terminal Exams. We used to have two unit exams of 50 marks each , followed by the Half Yearly and Annuals which were 100 a piece. As much as we thought we have written our chemistry papers well , we used to pray, the marks be revealed as late and if possible never ( through some unthinkable geopardy that may hit the school ).
It never happened that way though , and one fateful morning Mr Biswas ( by that time we used to call him ” Chemo Da ” … a testimony to his entire existence around this subject ) would enter the class, with that specially wore ” super sarcastic” smile which he reserved for such days. The whole bunch of answer sheets rolled up .. with the white threads we used to attach extra sheets hanging out like tentacles of an octopus … and the ” Red Pen ” running mayhem like a sword on the bottom most answer sheet, revealed, there was blood bath in store. As I said .. his eyes glint behind the thick glasses with the message ” Huhh … I knew this is what you guys are capable of ” . On this day he took special care to arrange the answer sheets by the roll number of the students ( which was alphabetical with the surname ) ,and called out each name loudly with their marks spelled out with a rare found clarity . His voice still echoes in my mind ” Roll Number One – Anuff Agarwal ( his father and the school rolls had his name as Anup ) … Zero Two , Two . Which means poor Anuff for all his scribbling on 10 sheets has barely got a mark higher than his Roll Number. There was a sudden gasp of awe when this killing had a momentary thaw as it reached roll number 2 … who incidentally happend to be the first boy of the class . Saugata Banerjee always scored in high 40s out of 50 , but that was almost it. By the time it reached roll number 10 which was mine , there were 8 single digit numbers like on a telephone with the exception of a lone student. Then it was “Roll Number 10 , Anirban Chakrabarti … One Three , Thirteen … “. Never was failing such a relief and thirteen any luckier number, simply because I had reached double digits
The agony was not over with receiving the marks , the papers were now to be signed by our fathers. There was a specific mention of father and not parent ,as Mr Biswas was dead sure in his mind unassuming mothers can be hoodwinked to sign on almost any paper. And for those who thought of using their father’s ever imaginary stay “out of station” as the excuse , their mothers had to come and meet Mr Biswas.
Now … standing years away from those days , the memories of some such failure and apparent agony stand out over a hundred deeds of success and ecstacy. Life and memories of school would have been so much more mundane with shades of only one color, had persons like Mr Biswas not painted their different hues to the canvas.
More of my school day snippets in coming blogs ….
PS : Whenever you read my blog or an article, please take a few moments of your busy time to let me know , even if in a few words , if you think its worth penning down my experiences. Please do let me know ,if there are any changes that you think would make this articles more readable.
An underachiever’s admission
I have always pondered over reasons why some people are achievers, others who are non- achievers and a third , lurking yet definitive category, who are underachievers.
I observe people around me and try understand, who amongst them are underachievers and non achievers, as you don’t really need a bifocal lens to detect the achievers. In correlation with my observation , I figured out at least 5 people around me who I identified as under achievers. They , according to me have talent in some or other form, but due to some reason haven’t honed, practiced and brought them under the limelight of recognition. For all the talent in a person, recognition and acknowledgement remains the only way of showing your talent to the world and get to be called as an “Achiever “. Interestingly , 4 out of the 5 people I spoke informally, have come out with laziness as the prime cause of their under achiever state. It took me some time and a series of logicaly acceptable conclusions to drive home to these people , that all their reasons ( at the end they admittedly turned out to be non-reasons ) for not achieving were metamorphosed forms of their laziness . Laziness over a period of time evolves with cocoons of excuses around it , to make a person believe there are reasons for him to not achieve and good ones at that … The fifth person I had spoken , didn’t need any logical cajoling to admit that laziness was the sole reason for him to not really achieve things in life. Tragically enough this person was yours truely .
The other day I recieved a forwarded SMS from one of my friends .. which read like this . “Lazyness is your biggest Enemy – Nehruji …scroll … scroll …. Always Love your Enemy – Gandhiji. Ab Bapu ki Maney Ya Chachu Ki “ an eternal lazy’s doctrine I must say ).
So it was time ,I turned my attention to a few achievers . Mind you, to be achievers you don’t always need to scale the Mount Everest or represent your country in some Pyjama form of Cricket . Achievers are around us , they could be the person sitting in the cubicle opposite you who has won a singing competion in your Office Summerfest or someone who has designed a slogan in a contest and won a prize for himself. I got to talk to a performer for whom dancing is the passion of her life. She by her own admission eats, sleeps, drinks and lives (probably only Dance and very recently won herself a prize in a dancing competion. A closer observation clearly revealed , achievers ( including her) with all their talent that may be at par with an under achiever, unmistakably carry an antidote to laziness , which is “Inspiration” . Inspiration , and most often much of it from within the person is what drives him/her to doggedly hone, perspire and elevate their talents to successfully transform them to performance. More often than not, such performances bring along accolades,achievment and recognition with them.
So, is the conclusion so simplistic, as to if you have talent and are inspired to showcase it, you transform into an achiever , sometimes sooner while at other times with time ?
I guess the answer is NO.
There is another element to achievment that is abstract and cannot really be sharpened or practised. Yes , I am talking about the ephemeral, magical and transient ” Lady Luck ” . For all the ” Go Getters” , I am sure it would sound a dampener if luck is touted as one of the essential elements in a person turning into an Achiever. However, it is sheer luck that an Abhinav Bindra gets to shoot on dummy targets without being shot at while a marksman of the stature of Capt Amol Kalia after hitting his targets with nerveless accuracy for 25 times , isn’t spared even one shot from his enemies,only to die a cold ,unheralded death in the icy peaks of Kargil. Its sheer travesty of fate , that one lives to savour his achievment while there are others who can only look down from heaven.
Doesn’t this make you think , if you are reasonably lucky ( these days people travelling in a Maruti 800 call the ones in BMWs as lucky .. without ever having to travel in the backtrack of a Shaktiman Truck )… if you have been bestowed with a special skill and offered with a fair chance to showcase it … you should beat Nehru’s ” Biggest Enemy ” hands down ?
Friends .. Romans and non Romans .. lend me your ear ;-)
For those of you who are fans of Shakespeare and Caesar will all but kill me for denigrating the Bard of Avon … but then , there’s no better way to make you read through all this . So take back your ears and lend me your eyes … and do lend your eyes the help of your thoughts.
The biggest dilemma in recorded and written history has to be embodied by those famous Shakespearean lines ” To be or not to be “. My writing skills ( in its literary sense ) are almost vestigeal now and any day I might see it lying in the trash like an appendix. Before the evolution of my self takes its toll on my thoughts and my typing skills , and sends them to the ” just extinct list” I thought I’ll pour some water at the roots of my thoughts and allow them to sprout via this blog.
If you read till this and are still reading , while wondering ” can this guy ever say a simple thing simply ” …. let me say ” yes” . I would like to share my thoughts with people around me , know what they think about so many things which lie unspoken or less spoken around us. Share a few ideas which are innovative to me, but could well be qualified with ” apparently ” by you , know people and persona .. and thats it.
As my “tag line” suggests , I am not sure who I am … but I am very sure what I like …
I know I prefer the ” moon ” over the ” sun”,
I prefer the ” dew on the grass ” over the ” last drop of Pepsi” ,
I prefer “exceptions” over “rules”
I prefer “thought of being in love” over ” lovelessness”
I prefer ” rains” over “raincoats”
and ” raincoats” over ” indoors”
I prefer the absurdity of writing poems over the the absurdity of life without poems
I prefer being the ” stupid ” over the ” smart who can catch a magician’s act “
So that was fairly a long list of my preferences …. more of my dreams and day dreams in the coming blogs
