If I could be any character from a book or movie....

If you could be any character from a book or movie, who would you be and why? 

Ok so this would be no sugar coated answer or trying to be perfect but the truth.. If I could be any character from a movie , I would definitely be Akash from Dil Chahta Hai. He is sort of the guy I really wanted to be since my schooldays when this movie was released in 2001. He is confident, doesnot want to lead his life in a boring, scheduled way which is what I was the exact opposite of. He showed me the way to be confident and taking life as it comes. He is always there for his close friends which is very rare in today`s times to see such kind of a bond. 

The best thing is he has the care and love for shalini – a thing which I always say in real life that you have to be on the brink of really losing the one person you love, to understand the real meaning of pain and love you probably not might not have felt before. Its absolutely magical to have him confess his love for her in the climax of the movie, something which I would love to experience it myself too… that pain in the song before that , the realisation that all your pre conceived notions about love are falling apart and yes you are falling in love and by the time you probably realise it, she`s gone. 

Really speaking, probably I want to be Akash is because maybe I want my very own Shalini, a girl who can destroy all my pre notions and change me a bit for the better. What better way to be go get your girl by baring your heart out when you know that you have one of your best friend around with you for support. If I could summarise it in few words it would be due to an attempt for having all those positive qualities which I don’t have and ofcourse… for falling in love with someone and never letting her go… 

““THIS POST IS WRITTEN FOR NOVEMBERSCHILD IN ASSOCIATION WITH KALAMPEDIA – QUEST FOR KNOWLEDGE”. ”. 

WOW: 30 Things That Make You Happy

Well thinking even 1 thing is a tough job for aalsi people like me and 30 seems like climbing Everest every hour… nevertheless , I will try to reach 30 and see whether I reach there or not? So lets get started.. 

1. There is a dialogue of Gulshan grover , “ज़िन्दगी का मज़ा तो खट्टे में ही है “ .. So there you have it. This khatta comprises of the street food I can relish of any city and if its tangy in taste, then it’s a perfect icing of… chaat masala or lemon… take the pick. 

2. I am rediscovering music once again as I try to find some me time in the busy work life and its back to ghazals, the extinct Indi pop culture and the classical songs. My room, no lights and music…nothing is more bliss than this. 

3. Nothing is more fast paced in sports for me other than hockey and formula 1. I love watching live hockey matches in the stadium whenever they are held in cities I can reach. Nothing beats the atmosphere of a charged crowd shouting India India backing the players for the fast paced action for full 60 minutes. 

4. Coming from sports to attending live events. It gives a feel of doing something different. I am happy attending various programmes on different topics because it helps me think in a different way. 

5. I joined facebook in 2009 with the sole purpose of finding lost people and friends from as far as I can remember . Its always mission accomplished for me whenever I manage to track down people from my childhood days. That’s my sole purpose of being on fb. Relatives/family members/office colleagues are always blocked. 

6. Get me a do not disturb time and I can spend all my free time playing my old computer games all day/night long. 

7. I try to complete my whims. Whether its sudden interest to learn sign language or even French, I make sure to do that on DIY basis. When my sudden interest might spike in something new, even I don’t know. 

8. Although I am not a big fan of air travel but the only thing which excites me the most – takeoff. The sudden acceleration on the runway full throttle and the pull up gives me a thrill like no other (second only to me being around fighter jets). 

9. Give me time and throw me into any historical place and I`ll discover probably every mm of exploration space until my legs give away due to constant walking and exertion. I get lost in a place when I visit it and they take hours to complete. 

10. I love photography as it gives me a view to shoot from a different perspective which probably no one might have thought before. Although a dslr camera feels like a mix of quantum physics and organic chemistry but it gives me a wide range to shoot from. 

11. I love reading in my free time, if I am getting bored I pick up any book and finish it off. Be it Premchand`s novel, or Indian fiction- doesn’t matter. 

12. I love visiting places, the more landscape scenery it has, the better. Skyscrapers don’t excite me that much as sea, forests, greenery. 

13. I liked to write poetry…liked because poetry brings me some memories which pain a bit so I tend to stay away from writing but once in a while I pen something. 

14. A big bowl of custard in dessert at any time of the day and year can surely brighten up my heart. 

15. Claiming my childhood back, I dive deep into the comics world with all the characters I grew up with. 

16. At late nights away from the maddening world, I take out my cycle and just paddle on the deserted roads. 

17. I have heard the names of many classical and must watch movies which I haven’t seen yet…So whenever I more gets ticked off, its a delight. 

18. People might say that its related to blogging but I say that I love writing…my thoughts , ideas etc. Blog is just a place where I keep it safely away from the prying eyes of the family and yet close to people who feel related to it after reading that. 

19. I day dream a lot.. and it can be on anything but my fav. subject to dream – Katrina…and my family knows about it very well. 

20. Don’t need it really kind of shopping. Well that’s done only in fairs and exhibitions from stalls where the products have been made by underprivileged children or people, I buy items in bulk just for the heck of it for use to make sure that the amount I pay to them would bring happiness to their efforts, although majority of times I donate all the stuff to the needy. 

21. Minimum 8 hours to sleep to make sure that I am not cranky the next day. 

22. In summers I love to gulp down one glass of “Aam panna” from every thela in a different locality when returning home from finishing some chore. 

23. My experiments with spices in recipes. I love doing experiments in the kitchen and also when I get a chance to prepare even a most basic dish for myself if my mother does not send me into exile from the kitchen. Normally I am not allowed there. 

24. Staring into a star filled night sky. 

25. Cuddles with my soft toys. 

26. Getting drenched in rain. 

27. Trying to get the pitch right in singing some of my most fav and yet toughest songs to copy. 

28. In this era of tweets, whatsapp… getting replies through emails. 

29. Gardening. 

30. खुद के तो बहुत काम किये, कुछ उन बेचारों की मदद करके जो ख़ुशी मिली उसकी बात ही अलग है. 

‘This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.’

Never use Dainik Jagran for career advice

The title of this post might confuse you that in the area of Google and information so readily available what he’s saying? But this is a true incident which happened with me some 13 years back and till date I haven’t trusted the Hindi newspaper “Dainik Jagran” for any sort of career advice and I’ll tell you why. 

The small incident actually saved me. The year was 2005 and I had just decided to leave my course of company secretary and was looking for alternate career options. In that era Internet was all dial-up, all the information you needed was because of newspaper columns which used to publish weekly. I had no knowledge that what could be done if not C.S. I wrote to the career counselling section of the newspaper and my query to the idiot counselor employed by that newspaper was that which career options would be okay for me as a commerce grad having just left CS? You know what that idiot newspaper actually published? 

With my name and question the counsellor replied saying that all you people care is just fast money without any real effort to put in education or studies. Itss better instead of taking short cuts you should try to focus on studying longer. This was a summary of the response which was published in the next week in the newspaper and created a storm of sorts because all the colleagues of my father told him about it. Even I didn’t knew about this all happening, it was only when my father asked me “ Did you send any question to a newspaper” that I came to know about it. 

I was so furious that had it been today`s times I would have surely given DJ a piece of my mind but I let it go. They truly manipulated or god knows what they were thinking while answering it? Having been left in the lurch, I went to a professional career counsellor to get help. Although it had cost me a fortune back then for the session but the good thing was that it gave me 2 choices- The army and an alternative in the form of MBA (which at that time was pretty unknown and which I took up years later). 

So after this fiasco I never turned to this newspaper ever again for career related advice and in case you also know someone who is grappling with career path just like I used to be, tell them to stay away from this so called hindi daily..You never know what wrong and misleading info it may provide you ? 

आपबीती : 1 रुपया 300 का पड़ गया

बात पिछले नवरात्रों की है. घर के पास वाले मंदिर में घर वालों ने दुर्गा जी को चढ़ाने के लिए कुछ सामान दिया था.दूरी होगी कोई 1.25 km. सनडे का दिन था, जब तब तैयार हो कर निकले तब तक 10 पार हो चुका था, गाड़ी उठाई और चल दिये. अब वहाँ पहुंचे तो भई साहब आंटी लोगों की वो मार भीड़ कि क्या बताएं?? मंदिर के बाहर ही कुछ लड़कियों ने एक लोहे का जूता चप्पल स्टैंड रख रखा है , वो बात अलग है कि कोई भी उन्हें पैसे नहीं देता, वो खुद ही हर किसी से मांग लेती हैं.3-4 मुझे पहचानने भी लग गईं थी तभी मुझसे कभी नहीं मांगा क्यूंकी मैं 1 आध रुपया दे ही देता था. 

अब उस दिन किस्मत इत्ती खराब कि जल्दी में न बटुआ ले कर गए और न ही चिल्लर. बस जेब में 5 का सिक्का पड़ा हुआ था. भीड़ देख कर हालत खराब हुई, हवाई चप्पल उस जूता स्टैंड के पास न उतार कर उसकी बगल में बैठे फूल वाले के पास उतारी. अंदर कुम्भ मेला माहौल से जब 5 मीन के बाद निकले तो आप सोच ही सकते हैं कि क्या हुआ होगा – चप्पल पार. अब हम यहाँ देखें वहाँ देखें तो मिल के न दे. फूल वाला अपने बिज़नस में लगा हुआ है – उसे क्या मतलब ? यह सोच कर कि भीड़ में कोई भरोसा नहीं उनही लड़कियों से चप्पलें स्टैंड पर कर दी हो क्यूंकी बहुत थे और मंदिर का रास्ता भी रुक रहा था (उनसे जो मंदिर के ठीक बाहर उतार देते हैं). अब लड़की से पूछा तो बोली भैया देख लो, आपने यहाँ उतारी होती तो मिल ही जाती. हमने भी माथा थोक लिया कि कमबख्त जल्दी के 1 रुपया बचाने के चक्कर में चपत लग गयी. अब कमबख्त जो कोई पहन कर गया था वो न जाने अपनी कौनसी छोड़ गया था वरना मैं भी उसकी छोड़ी हुई पार कर देता. अब सारी वहाँ लेडिज सैंडल और चप्पलें. अब वो तो गनीमत थी कि मैं हवाई चप्पल पहन कर आया था, अपनी सैंडल नहीं वरना और फटका लगता. शुक्र था कि activa थी वरना मेरा तो घर पहुँचना मुश्किल हो जाता ( न रुपए, न जूता चप्पल और न ही मोबाइल – जो कि मैं मंदिर कभी साथ नहीं ले जाता) तो पैर में 2-3 पत्थर चुभवाने के बाद गाड़ी स्टार्ट की और चल पड़े घर. रास्ते में बस येही मना रहे थे की कहीं पैर से गाड़ी रोकने की नौबत न आ जाये . घर पहुँच कर तीनों चीजों रख कर निकाल पड़े बाटा. 

वहाँ पे वही नयी चप्पल मुझे 300 की पड़ी. वो जल्दी में 1 रुपया मुझे आखिर में 300 का पड़ गया. अब जब भी मंदिर जाता हूँ तो देख लेता हूँ कि और कुछ हो न हो 1-2 रूपया चिल्लर ज़रूर होना चाहिए.

Uttar Pradesh Roadways: Watch when you travel with it

Months back I had written a post about how my train journey from Kanpur to Lucknow was a nightmare , courtesy Indian Railway. Now the reverse happened just a few days back courtesy State Roadways. 

Due to the rains and all, the schedule of trains has gone haywire and it being a Monday I had to reach Kanpur, my office from Lucknow. Morning was drizzling a bit but I rode racing against my watch to catch the before 7.10 am bus from Charbagh. Due to the fact that many more people were taking the bus, it filled quickly and departed around 7. After purchasing the ticket I dozed off to complete my sleep. Due to the fact that the bus was going through the city we did not sense anything wrong. Trouble started when we had crossed the dense habituated areas and still the bus was moving at a very slow pace. It was so slow that even tempos and 2 wheelers and others started to overtake it. 

People senses that and asked the conductor and driver and then came the shocker… there was issue with the gearbox of the bus and the transmission was not moving beyond 1st gear. It was 7.10 am. People started shouting when they told the driver that he shouldn’t have operated the bus if there was fault, even the conductor was angry. As the bus was coming from some other place and the traffic had not necessitated the need to go much faster, the driver did not pay any heed. The fundae with road transport is that there are NO refunds of the tickets, only transfers into another buses. The people had alighted but it had started raining and we had come out so far ahead that it was impossible for any bus coming from behind which might have seats . 

We got into the bus to save ourselves from the rain and the driver started driving again. All the helpline, toll free numbers you see written on the inside of the buses proved to be useless as no one was picking up the various numbers and the request to send an empty bus from Lucknow depot was not being paid heed to.. all the customer care person on the line was saying was to wait for a bus coming from behind and transfer. In the meantime we had crossed the limit of Lucknow and even my GPS was not locking on to my location so that I could request either an Ola and Uber outstation cab (would have been possible as Amausi Airport was within a 8 km radius but even then it needed 45 mins to reach ) . Majority of people in my bus were office goers so everyone was eyeing that 10 am deadline. 

People got down and a few boarded taxis going to Kanpur. The clock was ticking. It soon launched into a full fledged downpour, we all got inside and then decide to roadblock the whole way in order to force the vehicles to stop. We forced the bus driver to angle the bus across the whole road and turn the engine off. So we created a blockade of the whole road and forced all the vehicles coming from Lucknow to stop. Our plan was to create such a huge traffic jam for kms so that the authorities of any kind take notice because the deaf people were just not listening. Our plan worked but only half. 

The vehicles began to stop, on a fast paced highway we managed to stop vehicles for as back as 100 m. The trouble started when the other bus drivers / conductors were not stopping the buses/opening the doors. The people of my bus were even ready to travel standing but to no avail. Some conductors pushed women off the bus and some made a getaway with some women even dangling from the doors. They were saying to the drivers, “ बस चलाओ, मरते हैं तो मर जाएँ “ (Drive the bus, let them die if they do). All this while our conductor was arguing with other bus conductors to let us on in batches. Our driver did not had the guts to leave the bus as he knew that he was the reason of the mess we were in. All the while I was kind of a de facto navigator while eyeing all the buses coming from Lucknow and shouting “ Kanpur Kanpur” while looking at the destinations so that the people left know which direction and bus to run to if the current one they were trying became full. I had become drenched by now and considering all the chaos that was happening around me, there was no way I could take out my umbrella from my bag and use it. 

When I had decided to bail out and hitch a ride letting my ticket go to vain and incurring extra money on the ride, the conductor sensed something in my way of navigating and handed me the whole transfer slip ( its nothing but the complete list of all tickets booked in the bus on a particular journey) for the rest of the people left behind. There were just 9 of us left now. He gave me the instructions, “ Just take this and hand it over to anyone who asks you the ticket, be it this conductor or any official from the roadway.” Just then a bus slowed down, we shouted “ Transfer “ to the conductor , he nodded, I let all 8 get in first out of which 2 were families and then got in handing the conductor the partially drenched slip. Thankfully the bus was only some 40% full so we all got seats. I glanced at my watch, it was 8.10 am , a full 40 mins had passed since our ordeal had begun.. The bus took a shortcut once we were in Kanpur so that saved a lot of time and by 10.10 I was in my office but that was some kind of nightmare. 

With various options like Ola, Uber, Extra cash with me all with me but still I could not use any of it as the phone was not able to get a GPS lock on to my current location to be able to book a cab and all. That day it also told me that all those numbers in the inside of the bus are useless and of no use when most needed. The person manning those numbers would only listen and do nothing about it….then you would be at god knows whose mercy?? 

So be extra alert while travelling with UP Roadways. 

For those who want to read my train ordeal…here it is: 

http://www.shwetabhmathur.in/2017/08/indian-railways-chaos-and-my-17-km.html