Cochin

so a bit has happened between the last post and now. new job, new location, new home. another relocation. and now back to the city of my birth, Kochi. So it is back to being on my own in a new place, though it is home territory it is practically a new place to me. While Kerala has never been anything more than a holiday and weekend spot, and geographically limited to the Tiruvalla railway station and Eraviperur, it suddenly has taken a whole new dimension - this is my entire universe. Moreover, all the problems of Kerala were good for making jokes but now these are so personal.
wierd restaurants, staring people, attimari unions, single car wide roads, constant rain and super humidity, brown fat rice, lots of rice, insane bus drivers, closed shops.. are all here.. and looks like here to stay.

pack that bag again

now it is a year since we left college.. a YEAR!

i am tempted to do a mental account of what i have done or if i have changed in this year.. nay.. i shall resist.. why depress myself. anyway i think people around me have changed more, surnames have changed.. jobs have changed ..

all I have done is go from one city to another, rather town to another. and now suddenly it is Kolhapur! even Kochi was in the fray. At one point in time it used to appeal to me, to travel and live in different places.. the rather romantic thrill of finding new stuff about new places.. shoot and paint the new sights.

it is enough to say that love affair has died down now. and anyway the dream of living in different places was not limited to the indian map. still, now i get the feeling that that is not the problem. i am just not wired for this nomadic life. Home, car, friends, familiar hangout places, domestic help .. i want all that! maybe even a dog!

yeah i want that dog.

now i still live knowing i need to pack that suitcase again.

A hundred ways of sayin "Sir"

people in Madurai have discovered and over time mastered the art of expressing miriad emotions through the word sir!

for instance..
the word 'yes' has been nearly forgotten... why with this much btter word... sir. for instance if i ask do you have idli sambar.. the answer is 'saar'
have you finished your sales beat?.. answer is 'saar'

then.. if you were pulling my leg and i was tryin to say hey c'mon right you kid etc.. why say all this wen one word.. 'saaaar'conveys it so beautifully! note the emphasis on the 'a's

if someone was showing you the way and wanted to say "come this way" why try so much.. just geticulate and articulate 'sir'

i cant stand sir anymoore.. people of madurai the next person who says the word sir will get punched in the face by me!

Losing track

Pune to bombay to gurgaon to Bangalore to Chennai to Madurai.. in a week and a half. now 2 months in madurai n the other southern districts for me with this launch project.

waking up in a new place is distracting.. a different bed, different noises.. like this place i stay now in madurai has blocked ventillation and even by 7 in the morning the morning the room is dark.. the first morning it took two mobile phones and a watch to convince me it was actually 7 in the morning. still i wake up every day hoping it is some 2 or 3 in the morning and the alarm just rang early!

and again people are different in all these places.. for instance in gurgaon or delhi the hotel
guys are so nice to start with and slowly but surely sour within a couple of days.. in pune or mumbai they dont give a damn, in madurai they look real nasty to start with but in a few days become so sweet you think something is wrong.

living out of the suitcase has literally become a habit, the last 6-7 years has all been tough on my VIP's and i have run thru 2 of them really big ones.. now i am on my third vip.. this time a strolley heavy enuf that no porter has gone without cursing me.

in 2002 it must have been some wierd time i left my home, i have been literally lugging my bags around ever after..chennai>Kerala>AbuDhabi>Dubai>Oman>AbuDhabi>Kerala>chennai>Kerala>Pune>
Gurgaon>Kurkumb> Pune>Mumbai>Gurgaon>Bangalore>Chennai>madurai..and now god knows where else.

in the last week in Madurai the only words of English i spoke were into the phone.. t is so difficult to speak constantly in this language that i cant think in.. It is difficult to be in a place so devoid of style, romance or sophistication.

people are simple to a fault.. brands, modern clothes and accessories look ridiculous here, a girl in a jeans looks obscene even to me here! there is absolutely no cultural connect with the people here..

was the MBA and the FMCG career a right decision, was the fight for the few FMCG jobs worth it? even a short stint in Madurai makes me think all this!.. i dont want to be in Kerala or Tamil Nadu.. two places that look likely to be my final place of posting..
how can i live in a place that is not inspiring, that does not have a bit of romance in it, that does not imbibe some energy..

cobwebs..

going through some old messages while clearing my phone of old stuff, some of them brought back such vivid memories of when i got or sent them..
like this one in the sent folder.. "i got cargill" .. i remember the day. there was a cricket match and as i came out, india won and i got the job. as i sent this message out i dint know if i sh`ould be happy or relieved
again.. as i go through the messages. .for mushy sms's there s no shortage and some i wonder how i ever wrote them.. or what they really mean
being single again means all those cute messages look wierder with each passing day.
it also means all the simple things that became habits, rituals.. are missing in my life. suddenly i have a lot of time in my hands, much less time on the phone, much less time thinking..
it s fun to be out with friends, drinks and strangers..

Sad..but i gotta go

Pune rocks.. a month here and now i realize i love this place, that there is no other place in india i like more. only a week remains of the month i am to be Pune this time around. So many memories i have of this city, of the people i have met when i was here, 2 years of college.. people who will stay with me all my life, in memory and in person
and now a month here with these new friends of mine, people i have come to like too
i remember the day i came to Pune first, the time i met a girl on the train .. the phone number i took from her promising to call. :) i never did
i remember the first people i met, Goks, Santhosh, African uncle :) neel d iranian and the cafeteria guy. the wierd priyanka rungta who was unfortunately the first person i said 'hi' to in college and who sadly refused to acknowledge me..
i remember the first session in the Audi with Subbu and Mohan
I remember the apprehension rumbling in my stomach as i wondered how i would gel with this crowd for two years, how i would claim my turf
i remember my learning group members, samleen the most for her irrestible energy, Sam, rads goks and kapil too. all the assignments and late night sessions.
i remember the first drinking session at mudra a week into college. how many people started drinking around me!.. goks (how he threw up at mudra that day!).. and today adi and aby
i can never forget sh and the magical days at the start of the second semester. the bad days and the good, the pain that made it forever memorable
summers in bangalore fresh like morning dew on a leaf.. fresh in my memory. days and night that stay unerased in my mind. the iim bangalore campus, the walkway from her room to mine. the trip to coorg and the stolen moments together. the rain and wind, sweet and sublime.
nyways, i can be as poetic as i want to be and as much as my nice mood tonight allows me to be.. already the happiness from a great evening out is coming to an end.. i promise not to edit what i have written here and post it as it is. i am sure tomorrow morning i will not feel this poetic and happy..
today was a boring day at office and so we headed out to ABC farms in KP.. and i had as much fun as i have had in a long time.. whiskey after 2 months off it tasted so nice. the company was attractive and interesting, so were the sexy parsi girls next to us..
the food was amazing, every single dish. there was a game and we stayed up leading till the end and ended up in a three way tie.. and the hotel guys gave us a bucket of beer n vodka.. :) lotsa drinks for tomrw nyte.. yay!
anyway i look at it this was the perfect night to drown the end of my pune stint.

Back in Pune,. hu haa ye yaa

huhaaa! i am back to civilization .. the lights and the tall buildings..how beautiful they are :).
nyways it still takes a moment to realize i am back in this city i love. the young crowd, its slow yet energetic flow. ..i tell you it s cool man
net is still limited to GPRS on my phone(which here is fast enuf for me to connect on to my lappie and browse at nearly acceptable speeds).. unless i go to the cyber cafe's - which is something i am very reluctant to:i'd rather have my net slower than in some smelly dank place

we appreciate the mundane stuff of the cities only when we are forced away from it for some time..so what are the ten best things about cities..
1. lights.. man! how important it is to have some light about! if after 7pm roads become dark and empty i am psyched.. i want people around.. and decent people..which brings me to the seconds point
2. PEOPLE.. cities have educated, good looking and well dressed people to hang out with. and rural india does not!if i am forced to stay in a village, i still need some educated and polished people with me!
3. european closets in the toilet. i cant squat
4. phone and net connectivity..i
5. people can speak english or hindi. tamil or malayalam.
6. FOOD..FOOOOD..how could i have left it down to 6th place... food. i wanut some fine dining once in a while. i want clean restaurants. i want my waiter in full pants. i dont want my waiter digging his nose with his left hand and serve mw with his right. i dont want to search for the meat in the oil...
7. grocery.. i want to buy that particular flavour of lays and want to drink a appy or minute maid as and when i want it
8. stores.. i want them all close by.
9.

It appears the company has planned my next three months.. a month in the Kurkhumb Plant and then another in the Pune office followed by time in Noida and Gaziabad
three months down i might know where i will be for most of the next year or two.
there is another plant in Orissa even that would have been an interesting palce to go..
right now i have three days off and i guess am just goin to c delhi

somebody invent really fast trains....and a lot lot of them

i really like traveling, but to an equal measure i hate planning and booking the tickets, stay, people etc. it sucks, looking at irctc web site which works like an overcrowded old bus,just about working.
and this site gives you the very feeling of living in an overcrowded packed to the rim country.. like there are a hundred trains going all over the place but there ain't a single ticket you can get anywhere. and like everything Indian there's a que and a fight and a rush at godforsaken hours for that tatkal ticket that does not happen. okay so hell yeah the flights are cheap these days (well not really) but then i don't like flights. i want to do the train, i love the train. dirty stinking and late as they are - they have scenery! they have chai and cheap food. i can lie down and read a book! hm i don't have to check in my luggage and hope that bored looking dude remembers to throw it into the same flight - throw yeah luggage becomes throw-things - and my packed to the brim (yeah we Indians like to fill that bag sit on it zip it up till it bulges and leaks) suitcase looks back sentimentally at me as it's shoved down the conveyor by unfriendly luggage of my co passengers.
then the wait at the airport again for the bag to roll back and u know my bag is always the last to arrive on that belt, like t he belt goes around and around and when it's just me and few old men around there it comes slow and peeking around the corner.
then of course in between there is the flight itself which i guess is the least painful, except the bored yet i should serve you with a smile and yeah i know i look good and you can stare if u want look on the air hostesses face as they stand and invite us in (but yeah i am with them..that job of standing and inviting people 5 times a day and doing that same acrobatics of pulling life jackets with a hundred eyes looking at ya ain't fun am sure)