Search for "alcohol" on google ..

This is interesting ... When one searches for "ALCOHOL" on google, the first link is that of Alcohol 120%, a virtual CD software.

To a con man, this might look like a very absurd result. This particular case motivates the need for "context-sensitive web searches".

Amazing barber

5th April, 2006

As I decided to have a haircut with a difference. I went to a shabby barber shop on the side of the Solapur Highway at Fatima Nagar. The barber was wearing a torn banyan and was working on his sole customer. I thought I would be next, but then he said that someone was coming and if he comes he would take him and I wud have to wait. I decided that if that person comes I would go to some other barber shop. neways this place wasnt cool at all.

The person came and I started to move out. But the barber gave a very needy look and said that I must come back. The look appealed to me and I waited. When I came in barber was wearing an ironed shirt. I had to wait till he finished shaving the other person. Then I asked him to trim my hair. He did that with atmost care, stopping when I coughed, asking whether I am comfortable when I moved a little. It was very clear that he wanted to impress me. Also, I was sure that people like me were not frequent visitors at this place. He called me "Sir", which embarrased me and I asked him not to call me that. He gave me the cliched reasoning of customer-barber relationship has no bound to age. So I started a conversation with him. He revealed that he was in the profession since last 40 years. Some 12 years back the whole of Fatima Nagar wasnt there. There were farms instead. His baraber shop was a small 50 square feet room which had a similar room adjacent to it, where his family lived. He had a young son around 14 years (I guess) and an old looking wife. He revealed that he was already 54. While he was working on me, he had some guests and he had to hurry. But he made them wait and completely his job faithfully. After he had finished he gave me massage which was really great.
All-in-all I was touched by his hospitality and customer-friendliness to the core.

Breaking the routine ... meeting people

5th April, 2006

I was kind of bored of the routine life. So I decided to complete some work and then roam around the Pune roads to peep into the city life. Daily I get to see some 10 faces and talk to not more than 5 people. But this day was different, I was roaming in an unknown territory, asking for directions to people. The place where I wanted to reach was clear but the path was not. This is not true for my life. I can see many clear paths that could lead to different goals, but I do not know where I want to go :(. Senti-stuff apart, I was really feeling very light and happy, meeting people. I must have talked to more than 25 people, I gave lift to 3 people who made a mutually benefitting travel with me.

As the day dawned I decided to get back to my nest. So I decided to have a hair cut. This time I wanted it to be different. I went to a very shady looking barber shop. The barber experience was also great ... see the next blog.

To summarize I had a great refreshing day when I got to peep into the city life and forget about the monotonous routine which has no glamour in it.

SBI ATM story

5th April, 2006

I was in need of some 200 bucks which I needed to pay at the RTO office located at Khadki. I had never been to khadki before. But I was sure that there would be some ATM in the vicinity. I had ATM cards for my accounts with SBI, BOB and HDFC. So I started my quest for ATM hunting. I first went to a UTI ATM. It was unfortunately short of cash. Then I scourged the whole area running around for ATMs, I found 5 SBI ATMs and 2 UTI ATMs. But I wasnt able to get money from any of them. This was due to the SBI bank employee strike. Finally I got to an ICICI bank ATM and removed cash through by BOB card, which cost me Rs.55 for cross-bank transaction.

This was an unfortunate incident that might have happened to many people who were running arond like me during those strike prone days. But this reveals that Indian people are also benefitting from the use of latest technology. Rural people have also started relying upon ATMs for their cash needs. This would work in favour of SBI bank which has the most ATMs in the non-urban areas. Also, I noticed this cool feature in SBI ATM at Koregaon park, it had ATM locator which showed all the SBI ATMs across India. I was impressed.

3 ways to handle other people

There are 3 classes of people with regards to commenting on the actions of other people:
Class 1 (Ideal) : They show tolerance to the way different people think and respect the freedom of expression. They try to put themselves into other persons shoes and try to understand the circumstances and other factors that are instrumental into influencing one's thoughts. They are also ready to change their opinion if they are convinced by the other person's point of view.
Class 2 (Indifferent) : They are indifferent to what others do and just do whataver they feel like. More or less they are harmless creatures, but they have a very stereotyped manner and a predictable behaviour, since they do not tend to adapt themselves to the environment.
Class 3 (Adamant) : They insist on enforcing their thinking on people around them. Whatever they think is always right and they closed to other people's opinion.

I partially believed in this classification. But IMO most people have a blend of more than one of the above classes. People assume different roles and so they adopt different behaviour under different circumstances. These circumstances are driven by fear. Fear of losing something, fear of looking stupid in front of loved ones, etc. When a person is asked to be an arbiter in a dispute in which he has nothing to gain, he would behave according to class 1.

In short, humans are designed to be erroneous in nature. In fact the unpredictable behaviour of humans is one of the factors which differentiate them from machines or rather monkeys. But I believe monkeys are not as stupid as they are portrayed in folk tales. After all History is always written by winners ... More on this in the next blog.

IITB Nostalgia

It's already been 8 months since we all departed from our hostels and almost got lost in the daily chores. But time and again we do get opportunities to meet up and cherish those sweet memories. These memories really prove to be a great asset when u feel down and require some reason to cheer up.

Nitina landed from Bangalore. Nitinlko, Vibhav, Arumay, Aniruddha, Biswarup, Shubro were already there in Mumbai. The recipe wasnt complete without me and anant, we jumped in Indrayani express on Friday evening to reach HN for the memorable Friday evening. We made a racas at Mochas by singing C grade songs from Hindi films .... after catching up with everyone's life. It was a perfect bachelors party with an exception that there was no groom.

Then there was usual night out ... but the morning was special. The same old maddu aunty served us dosas and vadas to quench our hunger. Next we all went to the jetty at mid-powai, where we saw heavenly beauty in mid-summer and that too in the middle of a crowded metroplois like Mumbai. I repeated my same old dialog, more than 80% of mumbaikars cannot imagine that such fantastic and picturesque beauty exists amidst the concrete jungle. There was mist all over the powai lake. The jetty is a special place where one is surrounded by the lake from three sides. One can see fisherman in their hand-rowed boats trying to catch fish, mebbe. Coconut trees emerged out of the clouds in bunches of 4s and 5s from a couple of places in the lake. If we delete the buildings from the horizon, we would be at Nakki lake of Mt. Abu or at Kerala lagoons, mebbe (I havent been there, yet).

Before we reached this place, there was already a couple indulging into intimate acts at the jetty. They were initially shocked by our unsolicited arrival, but soon they felt at ease after they sort of confirmed that we are not their acquaintances. The couple must be young students, most probably from first year or so. Neways this reminded me that, how I always wished to have a girl friend with whom I could have spent intimate moments in company of natural beauty. How I always wished to show to my friends that IITB is the most beautiful place on this whole earth. But only the lucky ones get their love.

All in all I enjoyed being back at this place again. In fact, when I was staying near to it for around 2 yrs, I never took conscious effort to get up early and witness this miracle everyday. Only when a thing is gone, humans appreciate it's true worth. But most times it is too late when one realizes this. In this particular case, it is not gone yet. Before pollution engulfs this beautiful lake IITB authorities must take some good care of it. And assuming that they will I cud still join this place for further studies. Bcos I believe, there are a lot of avenues to be explored and lot of secrets to be revealed.