The lost Soul

It has been more than three months now since I started working in my new company here in Trivandrum. There are quite a lot of changes in the culture and structure of this company compared to my previous one. First thing that I noticed was the high male to female ratio in this company, at least fifty percent of the members are female in most of the teams here. Compare that to a if-lucky-ten-percent in my previous company! Of the six people who sit in my cube, only two are male including me! Two among the females who are relatively freshers initiated a conversation and became friends with me soon. Since they were extremely talkative and our cube is towards a corner, their friends (all girls) would also come here often for the usual chit chat. Before you start imagining things, I am nothing more than a silent listener, though some of these girls were introduced to me.

I had noticed one of these girls who was also introduced to me during this time. She had light green eyes with a fair complexion, our initial and only conversation was about our names being not so common and difficult for people to remember. This should have happened about three weeks ago. Prior to last week she was taken to hospital from office after being sick, there was little drama when people moved her in a wheel chair to the lift. The girl next to me told she was weak because of not taking proper food. We used to pass by in corridors, I specifically remember we passed by on last Thursday and Friday because she gave me a beautiful smile on both occasions which I reciprocated.

Today, I reached office like any other usual Monday. I met some of my team mates on the way who told me about a girl who committed suicide on Saturday. She was a reclusive type, so none including her close friends have no clue as to what happened. I heard the story just like another one from a daily newspaper. When I came to my seat, the girl next to me was searching her friend's name and photograph on our local intranet, she turned to me and asked if I remember the friend. When I said yes, she told that she committed suicide. I asked her again to confirm though at the back of my mind I was sure I heard it right. I felt numb for sometime, I have never in my life had someone smile at me on the day before they decided to end their life. I just can't forget the smiling face and those beautiful green eyes. After sometime, I could see the people who were her friends or team mates working as usual. Life was just as normal to everyone. I, like in the company e-mail announcing the demise, would also use the cliched 'May her sole rest in peace' to end this post!

Catching up!

It has been more than a year that I made an entry in here. The last post was about Akkarakazhchakal and this week's episode, 50th in the series, was probably the last of the season or the sitcom altogether.

During this period quite a lot has changed in my life. I have quit my job in the world's top five software company and have moved on to a small company which may not be a tier-III firm that is not even listed yet. This, of course, is part of my long pending decision to move to my home town in Kerala. It happened sooner than I thought due to the poor health my father had, thank God he is doing better now after a bypass surgery in Chennai! Though my new employer have not yet given me the option to work from their Kochi office as promised, I am enjoying my life here in Trivandrum. What is more precious than having able to eat Kerala dishes thrice-a-day, be it appam, red rice, Malabar biriyani or Kappa and fish curry.

Trivandrum is not a place I like for various reasons, so much so that settling here is not an option for me. I have hated this place during the four years of my college life, the people here are not friendly and I do not like the culture. But for time being I am saving some money on my expenses, this city is darn cheap compared to the metros!

Today, I am a proud owner of a car and is plying around the city outskirts trying to be a comfortable four wheeler driver. I am also trying my level best to get my personal life in order, which includes target to be closer to the almighty and to be in better physical shape. With the slow paced life in the village ambience around here, I expect to be successful. All in all, I am having a good time when the rest of the world is worried about everything from recession to results of the recent parliamentary elections!

Ammachi

It is five months since I started my stay in this house here in Chennai. It is situated in one of the decent residential localities of Saidapet, my roommates have been staying here on a rent of rupees 6000 per month for more that two years. This rent was increased to 7000 one month before I joined them. Our house is on third floor of the second building in the compound, the owner and family lives in the ground floor of the first building. This is the history and geography, now to the present.

I first came here on a mid-night after my flight from Singapore and immediately slept off. On the next day (which was a Saturday) morning when I got down the stairs, I met Ammachi for the first time - an old woman in her early sixties, bulky in appearance with mannerisms of a typical tamil woman. She was staring at me from the moment I was visible from her verandah while I was climbing down the stairs. As soon as I reached the ground near to their Verandah and was about to open the gate to outside street, I heard Ammachi asking in Tamil. "Who are you?". That was a very shocking question, especially to me who had learned to say 'thank you' to all the strangers in those Los Angeles shops and malls who opened the doors for me or who asked 'how are you doing?' It suddenly reminded me that I am back in India and my polished manners wont help anymore. I managed to say in broken Tamil that I am a friend of her tenant and escaped the scene rehashing some of the Tamil words that I knew for my future use.

Later, when I met my friend and roommate he cautioned me about Ammachi, the wife of house owner who may ask about my whereabouts. My roommates were nice guys (like me!), and so did not comment much on Ammachi. So it was my turn to discover things myself. The house owner was a retired employee, they were living in that house with their son and family, and Ammachi ran the show in the household. She was weary of thieves, so kept the exit gate latched all the times and made all the tenants do the same. She locked the gate during day time and questioned anyone who came through the gate. She did not allow any maid inside the compound other than the one who worked in her house. This approved maid was the only option for all the tenants who wanted a maid, cook or helper.

Ammachi was usually present at the Verandah most of the times in conversation with some other old men and women who were their neighbours. When she was not and was without a company in the verandah, she would ask questions to her tenants if they pass by. It was not possible to collect all the information in one instant as the time she could see us from her Verandah till we reached the exit gate was very less. I some how did not like these conversations which were an intrusion into my privacy and managed to escape before many questions. Most of these questions were asked to find out how much I was earning, which religion I belonged to, etc. Moreover, information thus collected was the topic of discussion for Ammachi and company in their next meeting.

It was Ammachi who told my friend and told that the neighbours have complained about our unruly behaviour after consuming alcohol. (My friends are social drinkers if you know what does that mean. No, no, do not count me). She also told him that her husband was really angry for making this an issue in the neighbourhood and wanted us to vacate the house as soon as possible. My friends being nice guys, and me being a nicer guy who did not know the local history, we began to look for a new house. But two days later my friend again talked to Ammachi (apparently on the trajectory between stairs and the exit gate) and she came down on her terms. If we were ready to give a higher rent, she was ready to convince her husband to let us stay (whose agent is she?). So we finally decided to give that extra rent which we thought would be 8000 rupees, a 1000 extra. But Ammachi gave one more shock, she (her husband!) wanted 9000 rupees from three of us. Since this was a convenient house for me who worked near to LIC building and my roommates who worked near to Porur, we decided to stay back.

After paying the additional rent for two months we decided to find one more guy to join us since the expenses were going higher. We got a new guy who was colleague of my roommates, and my friend went to inform Ammachi. Before my friend could finish, she demanded another hike in rent to 10000 rupees. This was considered as a big insult by my roommates who were staying there for long, so we decided to shift. Meanwhile the new guy who joined us for time being was having a tough time. He has a bicycle which Ammachi made him to carry and keep inside our apartment on third floor. Her agent, our house maid complained to Ammachi that he keeps his shoes inside the house. So he was asked to keep his shoes in the shoe rack outside. He found a house near porur and shifted today with one of the roommates, in a hurry to escape from Ammachi. Me and another roommate will be shifting to a near by house in Saidapet itself.

There is one thing that all of us agree, that Ammachi is a misfit in the locality. She would have done better had she been a commander in the army.


* Ammachi actually means Mom in Malayalam, but is used colloquially as a reference to any old woman.

One more day in the life of a Software Engineer

We, three team members, were gathered at one cubicle and were discussing about some defects when our Senior Project Manager (SPM) came. We were little worried as he had told in the last meeting that the defect count in our project was raising and should be checked. He saw three of us standing there actively discussing something technical which he could not understand. He was in a very happy mood, and saw one more team member approaching the scene with a slip on which was written a defect number. And here is what followed:

SPM: (smiling) Defects?
One of us nodded, and the fourth guy talks something about his defect to us.
SPM: One more defect...good


SPM moves off to the next cubicle where a Junior Project Manager (JPM) sits.

SPM: What is the planned work % to be completed?
JPM: 28
SPM: How much did we complete?
JPM: 27
SPM: Any surprises?
JPM: no
SPM: (happily) good

I know that this has close resemblance to a scene in Schindler's List, we are still investigating who had seen the movie and fooled the other guy or if both of them had seen it and was trying to fool us?

Another Day in the Life of a Software Engineer

So here starts another day in my professional life.

My earlier project had been in the concluding phase for many months now. After my return from on-site I had only minor tasks to accomplish till this project successfully concluded on last Friday. Since everybody was aware of this from earlier, a new project to enhance the application was scheduled t o start on the very next working day.

As per the above plans I was entrusted with the task of creating design documents based on another document which provided the requirements. Today being Monday and the first day of this new assignment which spans over two long years, and with the guilty feeling that I have been sitting idle for so long a time, and with the interest to do something productive and brain cracking (duh!), I started to office one hour earlier than my usual time (which I wont declare here, read the disclaimer if you have doubts. )

(If you still have doubts don’t read further)

As expected, no one had come in the cubicles near to mine when I reached. The usual start time for my fellow colleagues on Monday was later than usual! (not a bit of doubt allowed!)

So, with the satisfaction that I have already achieved something I opened the Mainframe terminal and started my analysis to find the design changes for the requirements. During this time my team members arrived one by one and were amazed at finding me working. Well, my sense of achievement increased.

Again as expected, my manager came to office about one and half hours after I reached. And he began to forward those mails which he normally would not understand but will forward to the team member whose name is mentioned anywhere in the contents or cc list. And I got three mails in order!

I opened the mails to see three documents attached with a note that those were detailed description of my requirements. I opened them with apprehension that "detailed" is another word to make my task difficult, and what did I find?

There it was the line by line design changes to all the requirements, the very facts which I was trying to find out by coming early on a Monday morning. Thanks to the on-site guy who thought that me (the dumbo) cannot create it from his requirements document.

Well, I did the next best thing you are expected to do at that moment. I logged off from Mainframe, opened my Firefox browser and started typing in the name of one of my favourite websites...

Its life as usual, again!

NRI to ex-NRI

On 10th Septemebr 2007, I landed back on indian soil after a six month long stay at Los Angeles starting 10th March. The trip back to India was better than expected, Singapore city tour organized by Singapore Airlines and the roaming with my friend and her husband in Singapore Metro rail was enough to spend the eight hours delay time between the flights. By taking the transit pass in Singapore, my passport now has the seal of one more country other than US!

While landing in Chennai, I was thinking about what one of my managers who was settled in US told. Only when you land back in India you will feel how better the US actually is, how good the infrastructure is and how better the roads are. But while in the car, I felt as if I landed after a domestic trip and found everything normal except for the noise outside (of automobile horns). Its true that later on, I came closer to reality when I had to fight hard with the Chennai mosquitoes to sleep!!But none of these small inconveniences could overcome the comfort I felt for being in my home country, being able to eat Dosa-Idli for breakfast and rice for lunch, and being able to walk un-afraid on the roads where you are never alone.

From another perspective, life becomes tougher when you are back here. Travelling in Chennai buses is horrible as you have to struggle to find leg space, compare it to the big spacious air conditioned Metro buses in LA!. You obviously start missing the all-time-pleasant climate and the cleaner surroundings in LA. The simple courtesies of life - of saying thank you and opening the door for a stranger - makes a lot of impact on your daily life. Back here its a cat race where everyone is in a hurry to get ahead, yet we say life is faster in US!.

On this Sept 21st, I am four years old as a software professional. I felt really happy and contented while walking through the roads near Satyam, Thousand Lights, and the CSI building which was the training center for my first job. Those were enthusiastic days, time of curiosity to find out what the job of a software engineer was and preparing best to do that dream job well. I felt proud for reasons not unknown, probably the thought that I have achieved what I have never thought about when I started my career, which kept my spirits high while walking through those roads again.

To check how the old places have changed, I went to T.Nagar shopping area near Ranganathan street. I was in the Titan watches showroom inquiring about some of the expensive models, the sales guy looked at my company ID and asked "are you working for XYZ company?". I got amused, I did see the guy looking at my Id card to read the company name but it was surprising that he knew about my company. Has my company name become famous in India while I was in US? With pride and lot of self esteem that I am working for one of the top MNCs I said "yes". Then came the next question: "what is the fees for MS office training now?". He had, as any local Chennaite would, thought that I am from the popular local training center with the same name!! I quickly concluded my browsing of the premium watches then and there and ran out of the showroom with a quick explanation of what the three letters on my ID card meant!. Later, I found myself happy that not much has changed here while I was out of the country and this city!

TWTWT: The Weekends That We Toured

We learn a lot of facts from our text books in school and forget most of them in due time. But there are some tidbits from these books that make a permanent mark in one's memory. I still remember a picture in my primary class text book, of a big tree that is hollow near its root with a car inside it! I had the chance to see these trees in real during this weekend at Sequoia National Forest.]

The trip was a two day weekend outing to Kern river valley starting on Saturday morning 5.30!, first time I was awake this early here in LA after my jet lag days. We first went to River's End Rafting at Bakersfield. They take you to a place some what upside of the stream in a bus, and after rafting will collect you from end point and bring back to the initial place in the same bus. The rafting was my first experience and was a decent one though not very exciting as the water in the river was less. We had a detailed lecture on classification of stream currents called rapids from one of the guys with us who is actually the coordinator for the event. By 12 O clock we started from the rafting place for boating and jet-skiing at Lake Isabella, and then for camping at one of the camp grounds. Most of the camp grounds have the stream near-by, we did enjoy the bath in the stream. For me, it brought back memories of our trekking to Deviyar while studying at school. First event on next day morning was a trekking on a near by trail, and then we went to the Trail of 100 Giants in Sequoia National Forest Area. While returning in the evening we visited the Red Rock Canyon in Mojave desert, and managed to be back home at 10 O clock night as per the plan.

I wanted to visit San Jose and San Francisco but thought it would not be possible for me in this time, but then I got this call from Anoop to visit these cities last weekend. He wanted to visit some of his friends, only two of us were in the final trip though the initial plans were to have more people. Anoop was the only driver for the trip to San Jose, we took only five and a half hours though he was complaining about the pulling of Kia brand rented car. I liked San Jose the moment we reached there, it had the serenity of a small village but actually was the silicon capital of the world with offices of all major and minor companies one has ever heard. Added to that was the taste of food at Spice Hut, one of the many Indian restaurants owned by a partnership of mallu and tamil guys. I am not really sure if this one is the best South Indian restaurant out there, but I would recommend it for every mallu in San Jose.

By evening we left to San Francisco with a friend of Anoop. The road from San Jose to San Francisco goes through some of the places which I have only heard before with respect. Sunnyvale, Mountain View which has Google HQ, Stanford University, Oracle HQ and University of Berkley were some the land marks on the way. We went to the Golden Gate Bridge on the same day and stayed with two other friends of Anoop in their apartment in downtown. I found the San Francisco downtown streets the most scariest of all I have ever seen in my short stay in US. We went to Napa Valley the next day morning, it is a scenic place with full of wine yards and wineries. We visited Artesa Winery which is on top of a hill, the view from their was superb!. The return journey which started in the afternoon from San Francisco ended when we reached LA at mid-night, I was fully exhausted but was happy for not missing these wonderful places before I start to India after two weeks.

Velluppa - My Grand Father

While walking towards my office today morning I got a call from my brother back in India, I was a bit worried when I took the call at an unusual time. He was calm when he told me that Vellupa, our dear grand father has expired. At first I was a little shocked, I thought I will cry but I did not and I am surprised at the numbness I felt and is still feeling about it.

Velluppa, my mother's father was the one who looked after me till the age of five when I stayed at my mom's house. My mother got employed in government service as soon as my younger brother was born, she found it difficult to leave both of us at home while she went to work. I was a very troublesome kid then, so she had left me with my grandmother and grandfather. I lived with them for quite sometime (I do not remember how long), till I was five when I started going to school.

My grandfather was one of the most humble and soft spoken personalities whom was acquainted with in my childhood, and I am sure he has gifted me some of this behavioural traits to me as well. But for the naughty kid I was, I still remember the many occasions when he has beaten me for creating problems. And I still have good memories of those days when he took me for the daily walk and the trips we have made to Kara Vakkadapuram and Kodungallur Bharani, specifically I remember the incident when I lost one of my chappels in a crowded bus while returning from Kodungallur.

I know no other person who loved walking as much as he did. He used to get up at five in the morning everyday and would go to a teashop in town to drink tea, and then for his morning walk. While he was still working as a teacher in the near by primary school, he used to walk long distances after his job hours. After he was retired, and got affected by old age illnesses, he was forced to discontinue his morning walk by doctors and his children. But still he continued his evening walk, as he did not have many friends of his age he started making a trip to nearby houses of his son and daughter after his usual visit to the village market.

He always wore white shirts and white mundus, he was an orphan from childhood and had only one elder brother who is no more. His wife, my grandmother also expired ten years ago while I was studying in 10th class. I am sure he became alone after that, though he stayed with his elder son and grand children. Even being that old, he still had a good health and vision, only disability was with hearing and we had to talk loud to him. My mother used to tell that his good health was due to the walking that he did all his life and she used to encourage us to do the same.

It was one of these evening walks during last week that he got hit by a cycle and got admitted to hospital. He had to undergo a head operation two days back, and was improving in strength. But he left us last night when it was raining heavily as told by my brother. The news was not a surprise to me as I new that he was in hospital, but I am still surprised at the numbness I feel towards it. Am I slowly changing to the American way of living where you have no time to worry about anything else but only you?!

LA Experiences - Epidose 2

Its been four months since I have landed in Los Angeles and I have roamed around for quite some time, but I have only one entry on this blog about LA. So with a broken wish that will never again be fulfilled, here is a second list of itinerary before I forget what I did.

Of all the things that I have enjoyed here, the visit to Sixflags will unarguably be the best and unforgettable experience in my life. The roller coasters there rotated me in all the directions which my mom would have done while I was a baby. The rides Tatsu, Xtreme, Dejavu Superman, Riddler's Revenge etc gave an experince that was thrilling and unexpected. After the visit to Sixflags, the Universal Studios trip was not so exciting though there were some good shows like Waterworld and some rides like Mummy returns. And there was a trip to Sandiego for Seaworld and then again for Sandiego Zoo's Wild Animal Park. While the first was good, the latter was a waste of time and money. The list of parks was completed yesterday with a visit to Disneyland, it was a wonderful experience and for a kid its always "where dreams come true". The fireworks they have at the closing ceremony makes an experience of a lifetime. I did also visit the Peterson Auto Museum and Natural History Museum during this time.

Other than the the theme parks, my usual hang outs in LA have been restaurants. I have tasted quite a variety of food by now, thanks to my colleague who was generous enough to take all of us to these places. If I put the hierarchy of tastes I liked, it will be in the order - Thai, Italian, Chinese, Mexican and then American! Yeah, I also found that none of these tastes are as good, nor does have the variety that Indian food provides. I did taste Srilankan and Pakistani food also, but these are actually Indian food in different name!

The climate in LA now almost same as a typical Hyderabad climate during start of summer. But unlike in India where people wait for Summer to get over, everyone enjoy the climate here. They have special barbeques in offices on first day in summer - yeah summer has an official start date here!

It is less than two months for my date of departure, and I am eagerly waiting for it. But during this time I may go for a trip to Las Vegas though I feel its not a must see tour. So let me conclude this post with a punch line in Hollywood style, "Las Vegas, here I come!".

Balle Balle Hyd to LA

The previous post titled "Long interval" was to put an end to the long interval for which I had written something on this blog, but that turned out to be an excuse to take another one!

But this time I have enough justifications though. After big confusion and tension, I decided to travel out of India as part of my job and here I am, writing this very line from Los Angeles - the entertainment capital of the world. Obviously this has been one of my most awaited moments in my life and something which I was looking forward to from the day I started my career three and half years ago. And yes, life is quite different on this other side of the globe.

It all started when the Chennai US consulate decided that I am fit to be in US of A during my second appearance for the visa interview. I had already planned my visit to Kerala after the interview and the trip was good with me being the next-lucky-guy to go to US next week, the 9th of March 2007.

The international travel in Singapore airlines was another first, when I realised that treading half the way around globe is quite different than the usual one hour domestic ones. The latter is short and simple while traveling a full day in the sitting posture on that "less comfortable economy class" is difficult. And since you have started it, there is nothing doing until you land at your destination as an alien!! Even after having two stoppages at Singapore and Tokyo, I found the travel tiring.

Out here in LA, things are amazing for this newcomer. The first trip from airport to apartment in yellow cab on freeways, the orderly fashion in which the streets are planned, the roads are built and operated, the red and orange Metro buses which look better than the best "videocoach" in India, the line discipline on the roads, the fire engines and cop cars which rule the roads, the occasional bikers with best-of-its calls bikes were things to get used to. This place has all the characteristics of a developed country. The luxury cars you would dream of in India with mostly single occupant, beautiful houses with no sign of occupation which gives the feel of a postcard picture or a painting, skyscrapers in downtown are few examples. The city has a good bus service which charges you one dollar and a quarter for any trip you make. We use the monthly pass for the trip to office which needs two buses. Then there is the 9-1-1 service of which you get amused at first and then reminded of always by the sight of fire engines in the road and the sound of fire alarms at night. I have my colleague who was served two times in two weeks since he reached, once by accident and once in real emergency! And lastly yeah, I can see the famous Hollywood sign if I get out of my apartment!

But everything is not as cozy as they show you in Hollywood movies. There are many beggars around in streets, whom they call here home-less. They tend to wear all they own on their body, so look fat and stinks at one mile distance! People say they are dangerous too, especially at night and when you are alone. I am not sure why such rich a nation who have aid fund allocated for the whole world cannot manage to give shelter to all of its people!

Of all the things that I will learn with my USA experience, I think my cooking skills will be the most polished. Though there are some Indian restaurants around and places like Artesia - a mini India with restaurants and theaters which show Bollywood movies, they are not easily accessible and are costly. So we are depending on the desi stores which sell Indian groceries and food where you will get all you want to experiment in cooking. And these are places where they sell Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi food together and people form all these countries do not think twice while buying!

The first two weekends were busy ones with a travel to Cachuma lake for camping and Seaworld Sandiego. Both trips were really amazing with lots of new experiences. And a trip to Hollywood street completed the first month roaming.

Long interval...

The last post I did on this blog was in April! Like this one, that was an attempt to restart the habit of writing on this page!

During this period- I have been denied permission to enter into US once (you doesn't seem fit yet!), I have worked hard and have enjoyed it, some of my colleagues and roomies have left this place, I have moved one place forward in the family queue of unmarried eligible bachelors, another CAT year is over and I am probably thinking about a location change! But in totality, everything remains the same!!

I visited Kerala once during this time, just after three months of my last one making it the shortest duration I have been away from my home after coming here. Kerala has not changed much, except that now the ruling party is the one with red flag. I had thought I am becoming more and more ignorant about the state, but realized that it is not the case. I am not the only one who is not aware of the ministers ruling the state, people living there seemed to know little about them. All the projects announce by the dethroned Congress government seemed to be re-launched, some in another name altogether! And the yesteryear's hero as leader of opposition has become a zero in Kerala's chief minister. He was still trying to get into his old clothes, last heard was him blaming the UDF government for the spread of Chikungunya in Alappuzha.

I read some really good books in the meantime. Anne Frank's Diary, The Fifth Mountain, The Fountainhead, and To Kill a Mocking Bird being some of them. Latter is the one i liked most.

Google has done some really amazing things during this time. I have integrated my blogger account with my Google account while writing this, thus releiving from the hazzle of remembering one more id-password. I have started adding my documents to google docs, and have started reading blogs and news from my enhanced and not-anymore-beta Google reader. I would like to conclude this post here, hope to be more active on this page in future!

Surprisingly SBI

The boom in the indian economy has made me an investor in stocks. My portfolio includes stocks of State Bank of India. I have read about the vast expansion plans of the bank and have been impressed by the new "surprisingly SBI" series of advertisements they have been using for a brand make over. The advertisements aim to create awareness that despite all the competition from private sector banks it is SBI that is numero uno. After an attempt to open a PPF account today, which is allowed only in a public sector bank, I have come to know the employees of SBI take this change very seriously.

The story goes thus:

We four from my company set out for opening a PPF account which would help us to save some tax, the destination being the SBI branch in Cyber Towers, Hitech City. We had taken with us the address/identity proofs and PAN card that are required to open a PPF account as per the government rules. We reached the bank and went inside, to my amazement the infrastructure looked world class and at par with any other private bank. But inside the bank we could find only to three officers seated and many of the seats were empty. We asked one of them that we have come to open a PPF account, and the reply was nothing one could think in the wildest of imaginations. She said "There are not enough passbooks available" and started doing her work. For sure I was surprised, but thought she must have some grudge towards the guys there at PPF that she gave such a silly answer. We approached another guy who was well dressed and even wore a tie (I am not sure if he intended to surprise the customers who thought they wear ties only if employed by private banks). But his reply was far more surprising "We do not have enough staff to do this, already some fifty PPF applications are pending here". We have got money that we are ready to invest, (for which a private bank would send a hundred executives to you), but these people are telling that they do not have enough staff and passbook. What the hell do we do? We sort of begged to the guy-with-the-tie and the reply was "You can check with State Bank of Hyderabad in the next room".

The infrastructure at SBH looked great. The lady at the first desk whom we approached asked "Do any of you have an account here?" None of us had one. "You should find out somebody who has account here to introduce you, the Reserve Bank of India is very strict now-a-days on this rule." But we do not know anyone, none of us are locals. "Then you can check with SBI in the next room". What?!

We then looked up the name boards inside the building to find out other nationalized banks. Only Punjab National Bank and Bank of India were there. My friend told his brother had a PPF account with PNB. We went there, but the guy told "We do not have PPF accounts, you can go to SBI". And the reply at Bank of India was same, though I am not sure if it is a nationalized bank. We then tried Madhapur Post Office and SBI branch at Jubilee Hills but was of no use. After two hours of toing and froing between banks and post offices unsuccessfully we decided to give up.

I have now become doubtful about the validity of the statement "elephants can dance" that they use to indicate that SBI can still perform well in the stock market. I had bought the shares for long term investment but am doubtful now of keeping them for long. I believe it would be illegal if I provide the passbook and staff for the SBI even if I can, so I will put my money in any of the other tax benefit schemes that are less surprising.

Done with Half-Life! Almost...

Today on twenty fourth December, Yours Truly, the owner of this blog is twenty four years old! Assuming an average life expectancy, I have already spent almost half of my life on planet earth. The past had been good and future looks promising provided I put some hard work.

But at this very moment, I must admit I really do not know why I have been doing what I have been doing and what I want to do in life. I have started thinking now-a-days what life is all about and why is I alive here.

I do not want to write anything further but would like to quote from a passage I came across titled Being Twenty-Something, It's Really Hard, the source of which I actually do not know. I think it sums up the dilemma to an extent.

They call it the Quarter-Life Crisis. It is when you stop going along with the crowd and start realizing that there are many things about yourself that you didn't know and may not like. You start feeling insecure and wonder where you will be in a year or two, but then get scared because you barely know where you are now.

You look at your job, and it is not even close to what you thought you would be doing. Or you realize that you are going to have to start at the bottom of hierarchy, and that really scares you. You see what others are doing and find yourself judging more than usual because suddenly you realize that you have certain boundaries in your life and are constantly adding things to your list of what is acceptable and what isn't. One minute, you are insecure and then the next, secure.

You laugh and cry with the greatest force of your life. You feel alone and scared and confused. Suddenly, change is the enemy and you try and cling on to the past with dear life, but soon realize that the past is drifting further and further away, and there is nothing to do but stay where you are or move forward. You get your heart broken easily and wonder how someone you loved so much could do such damage to you. Or you lie in bed and wonder why you can't meet anyone decent enough that you want to get to know better. You question your existence, you're beliefs and all that you thought was right. You go through the same emotions and questions over and over, and talk with your friends about the same topics because you cannot seem to make a decision. You worry about loans, money, and the future and making a life for yourself...and while winning the race would be great, right now you'd just like to be a contender!

Over a plate of curry...

Yesterday, I had traditional Kerala chicken curry for dinner, Lucky Me! Not only that it has become several months since I last tasted it, this was prepared my classmate in school who has come down to Hyderabad on a job hunting visit. He (yes, he) has become a great cook if not anything else, and the taste of the curry prompted me to offer him an immediate full-time job, as a "guest" cook in our house. ;-)

Being overtly fat (as per our school standards then), this guy was called "thadiyan" in school. Mine was a residential school run by central government; it was always celebration time for us during the weekends when his parents visited thadiyan in school. Actually this parental visit was allowed only once in a month, but some of the parents visited their wards quite often and thadiyan's parents were among them. When they came, they brought packets of eatables good enough to start a new bakery, a major portion of which was shared by his classmates (including myself). I still do not understand if this surplus quantity attributed to their fear of thadiyan being starved once this sharing happens, or to their desire to make him more fattish. Whatever it was, we had a nice time during most of the weekends, for otherwise we usually starved due to the poor quality of food being served in the school mess.

After four years since I left the school, I came to know that the mess-in-charge who had been administering the food supply for students was caught for cheating and was transferred to some other remote place. At present the school has appointed a student committee for running the mess and the students they are getting a very sumptuous food. This guy, the mess-in-charge looked very "pavam" in his behavior and mannerisms, so I considered him one of the very few harmless individuals in school then. Now when I know that he has made us starve (or prevent us from getting better food) for seven years, he seems to be my first example for "looks being deceptive".

And yes, after eating the delicious chicken curry prepared my friend, I have started rethinking about my decision to marry a girl who is good and interested in cooking. After all, who knows my tastes better than me? ;-)

Oil, Oil, We Say...

It was a year before when my manager told me, during my appraisal meeting, that I have to improve my oral communication skills. And yesterday my new manager in my new company gave the first positive feedback as "you have got good written and oral communication skills". If you are wondering what I have done within one year to improve my English, I would have to admit that I have not done anything except that I was more conscious about my Mallu accent. In the appraisal meeting with my first manager in my first company, though there were many things that I had disagreed regarding his feedback, some of them which ultimately lead to me quitting the company later, this one about my bad oral communication was one I whole heartedly agreed. (Even he had opined that I was good in written, so no issues there)

Till I left Kerala for my first job in Chennai, my notion was that Mallus had the best accent in the world. The widespread belief in Kerala that Malayalam is the most difficult language to speak when compared to other languages and thus Mallus can easily speak any language in the world made me proud for being a Mallu and for knowing Malayalam. In fact I still find this statement true, but with an exception, Mallus can speak any language easily but with a Mallu accent.

My pride for being both a Mallu and a linguist was shattered soon after I came to Chennai. My training batch in my new company consisted of three Mallus, all from my college, and others from Tamil Nadu. We were trained on many subjects, being from non-computer background and these classes were handled by different people. A self introduction was a usual routine in these classes. I realised that there is something wrong with how we Mallus introduced that we are from College of Engineering Trivandrum, because our fellow Tamilians started repeating this as if we were singing some song or something. But I could not really make out what is wrong? Many of our seniors had joined this company earlier, and once we did the intro, some of these trainers would say "Ya, I guessed it by the time you said "College"!" What??

The real problem became clear when we had our Personal Development Training towards end of our whole training schedule. This was handled by a lady who was a consultant and had much experience in the field. Part of the training class was about accent, and she began to discuss about typical Indian accents starting from north India. I did agree with her and did laugh with others when she told how people in north won't say "Z" in zero and all that. Atlast, when she came to Mallus I must admit I was surprised, more so when other students were laughing as if this was the funniest of them all. When she told Mallus pronounce "O" as "Oo", I really did not get it! Then she told about a previous incident when she was teaching the same stuff for the managers of a reputed company in Chennai. And when she said Mallus pronounce "O" in Oil etc wrong, one fellow Mallu in the audience asked angrily "What Madam, we say Ooil, Ooil...What is the problem?” I was pacified when she admitted that Chennaites are worse as they pronounce it as aail.

I have been trying for the past one year to get rid of my Mallu accent for English, which I think has become successful. But I must admit, after two years of living outside Kerala and after getting all these positive feedbacks about my communication in English being good, I am still afraid when I pronounce "O". Am I saying it right?

TWTWTW - Hyderabad Tour

That Was The Week That Was. Last week was the most happening, busy and enjoyable week I ever had in Hyderabad. My family was here for five days on a visit to Hyderabad. We toured the whole city and covered almost all the famous tourist destinations. I was having fever which would have become a show-stopper but I managed to carry on so that they made maximum of their available time here. The itinerary is below.

Day1. 18th AUG.

I had already decided to avail the standard tour packages from any of the travels for City Tour and Ramoji Film City tour. So today I decided to go the places which would not be covered by this tour i.e. Snow World and IMAX theatre. It was 12'O clock in the afternoon by the time we started from Madhapur. We first went for a visit to Hyderabad Central in Panjagutta, which is big shopping mall owned by the Pantaloon group. After that we went to Mangatrai Pearls and Jewels, again in Panjagutta junction. Mangatrais are the famous vendors of the Hyderabad pearls and also give a huge discount for corporate employees. My mother purchased some pearls and they gave us a 30% discount on the final price! The next planned destination was Snow world, but by this time I was feeling the grip of fever more, so we decided to drop the plan and went to IMAX instead. Prasads IMAX is the biggest multiplex theatre complex here in Hyderabad with five screens. After taking some snaps, we went for a walk to Necklace road near Hussain Sagar. An exhibition of agricultural products were happening there, which my parents found interesting. We returned to the room by 6'O clock in the evening.

Day2. 19th AUG. RAMOJI FILM CITY TOUR

I had gone to this place 4 days before, on 15th of August with my friends and had found the place boring. So the expectations were low and that may be the reason it was better this time. The place which is just a cluster of shooting locations has been converted to a tourist spot with few rides and all that. There is not much that you would find entertaining for a whole day. If you go by a tour package, the buses would start only after the closing ceremony at 5.30 pm. So you will have to find something or other to spent the day. We took photographs from all the possible places we could, especially the ones which we had seen in films like Darling Darling and Udayananu tharam. They have two tours inside the campus in the red buses you see in the film Udayananu Tharam. First one will take you through some of the shooting places like Taj Mahal, Golden Temple etc. I found the second tour more stupid. It will take you to a cave called "Kripalu". I doubt if the entire structure was carved out, though they claim it was found during some excavation work. Anyway they have done and are doing some sculpturing using cement and uses video projector to show a dancing sculpture, in which century do they think the tourists are from?. We started from the place at 5.30pm, after the closing ceremony. I think the visit would be more interesting if you plan it for half a day.

Day3. 20th AUG. CITY TOUR.

A day's tip through the famous tourist spots in the city. The Southern Travels bus for the tour picked us from Madhapur, but the tour was officially started from Birla Mandir at 9 O'clock. Then we went to Golconda Fort, there are about 300 steps to be climbed to reach the top of the fort from where you can see almost whole of the city. The Quli Qutub Shahi tombs also can be seen from there. Then we went to Salarjung Museum, from there the Mecca Masjid and Charminar which are ride-through, Sudha Car Museum and then to Nehru Zoological Park which was the last destination. Only one hour each was allowed at Golconda, Salarjung Museum and Zoo park due to which we could only have a glance of things. The time duration was obviously not enough but this helped to cover all these places in a single day.

Day4. 21st AUG. CHARMINAR AND MECCA MASJID.

My father was not happy that he could not see the Charminar and Masjid in detail, since both were ride through in the city tour package. He was also interested in shopping at the place. You have lots of jewelers and ladies item shops near Charminar. So after visiting my office at Hitec Sity we went to Charminar. I should say that we made a wise decision. The view of the Masjid was magnificent. The Charminar was an experience, the view from its top refreshing. Mecca Masjid was built using the sand from Mecca, I am not sure it is the story since my guide on previous day did not explain it well. We also bought some chains and all that from hawkers. Then we left to Secunderabad railway station where my brother was to catch the Chennai Express by 4.15.

My parents left the next day, on Monday. In all, the trip was memorable and I am happy that I can now leave this place without any regrets, at any time.

Water Water Everywhere But...

It was raining continuously for the last one week, here in Hyderabad. All the lakes, that are existing (including Durgam Cheruvu lake in Hitech City) or has become non existent by encroachments were full, unable to contain any more water. Newspapers carried photographs of submerged houses, and there was fear that the situation will get worse. But then the rains stopped and water began to recede.

The same however did not happen in Mumbai, India's industrial capital. Rains poured 94cms of water within 24 hours, beating the earlier high of 82cm in Chirapunji. The city choked, came to a complete halt with no power supply and dead telephones. People spent whole night in their offices or railway stations or even double-decker buses. I could read about the "spirit of Mumbaikars" in newspapers, which I came to know from friends working there.

It is raining heavily in Kerala for the last two days, flooding many of the places from Kotayam to Kannur including places in Palakkad which was drought hit one month ago. I do not know yet what is the situation today, and am wondering which place is the next target of monsoons?

The most astonishing fact had been the performance of Indian stock markets. It seems they have become resistant to all this, both NSE and BSE have been rising constantly for the last two weeks finding new all time peaks even though BSE stopped trading for a whole day due to the floods! As of today, this trend looks eternal!

Payarum Arippayum Pinne....

What do they tell "Payar" in Hindi or in English? We did not know till yesterday, until we decided to cook Payar curry.

I, Jose and Ben decided to cook dinner. But the "Payar" which I had bought from Foodworld had finished. So we had to buy it, and had no time to go to the Foodworld outlet at Jubilee hills. I suggested buying an "arippa" also, a device which is used to remove water from cooked rice. Now, none of us knew what they tell for "payar" or "arippa" in Hindi, English or Telugu. But now that we had decided to cook, we had to buy! So we started off. We went to the local stationary store at Madhapur from where we usually buy utensils. I explained to him in Hindi that we wanted "the device" to remove water from cooked rice. Luckily the guy understood, but he did not have "the device" in his shop. He advised us to go to a near by bigger shop. So in order to make the discussion that was going to happen at the new shop simpler, I asked him what they call this device. And he replied in Hindi, "Chaval se pani nikalne ka barthan!" Utensil to remove water from cooked rice!

In the new shop however everything was on-display, so we could handpick the "arippa" and buy it without much problem. Next one was "payar". Unlike arippa we could not explain what payar is! We checked two shops from outside but there were no payar packets visible. Losing all hopes, Jos decided to try his luck. He went to one of the shops and started making some actions with both hands and explaining in Malayalam that he meant "payar". Ben and I started laughing and obviously the shopwala did not understand anything. We were about to leave the shop when somebody asked from behind in Malayalam "Payarano vangendathu?" Do u want to buy Payar?

The guy who was standing beside us was a Mallu, and knew what they call Payar in Hindi. Finally we could get payar for our dinner! And by the way Payar in Hindi is Moong!

To code or not to...

I am confused and little frustrated. The guy at onshore does not think my design will work. He wants it another way, in a much simpler way actually. He cannot be blamed either. The problem is, I like to write code that is confusing at first sight! :-) (Its just COBOL, so confusing code here refers to a set of nested IFs and PERFORMs and no hard-to-crack coding concepts)

My requirement is to include a provision in the existing code, to check for two new possible values of an existing field. I knew that there are two options to do that. Either I could add some more IFs to the existing set of loops or I could replicate the existing code and use the new values of the field in place of old ones. The first option would make the code a little more confusing but need only few changes and second one would require replicating all the junk in four existing paragraphs. I preferred the first one, but my onshore reviewer tells me that other one is better. I do not want to do it, and do not agree with his comment that my code will not work. (I am sure he got confused by the code! ha..ha...ha...)

I have been sitting idle from morning, thinking whether to make the changes or wait till night to talk to this guy and make him understand my code.

I have had a similar experience in my previous company, where I made some similar "beautiful" coding which the reviewer, a guy with 20 years of experience on the system did not understand (which made me proud of my coding skills), but agreed to proceed with. But the code had a small bug, which became evident on the first day of production run, when the program crashed!

This previous experience and the lack of interest to sit here till night persuades me to think otherwise. I will do what my reviewer says!!

Monsoons Again!

After almost three weeks after the first showers in Kerala, monsoons have finally reached Hyderabad. The change in climate is quick and beautiful. But I am missing monsoons in Kerala, second time in my life!!

Monsoon for me was, like any child in lower primary school, raincoat-clad trips to school carrying heavy school bags, desperately trying to save it from getting soaked in the rain. That was till my 5th standard, after which I got admission to the residential system of schooling in Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Neriamangalam. For those who do not know, Neriamnagalam is the Chirapunji of Kerala, the most raining place in the state. I think the long seven years of stay at this place made me a lover of monsoons!

Neriamangalam is a very beatiful place, right at the border of Ernakulam and Idukki districts, on the way to Munnar from Kochi. My school was situated between two parallel hills (mountains is what we called them then), and they somehow created a feeling that the campus was surrounded by mountains on all four sides, creating the best scenery you can think of, with two water falls visible throughout the year. The place looked most beautiful when it rained, the rains were so heavy that you would see countless water falls all over these mountains in minutes. And suddenly the whole campus will be full of so much water that the unusually big drainages in the school campus would seemed too less to accomodate the water. And I have never found more fun than playing in the big football ground when it is water soaked and when there are no body around scolding you to come out of rains ;-) I can write non-stop on my school and life there, but may be on a separate post!

Rains in Hyderabad are also beautiful. This place being a hilly terrain, it almost makes me remeber Neriamangalam. I miss my school days!