Mundane Musings

Finally went to a destination which was not Trichur or Chennai. This time I went to Hyderabad. For once it was a change. Of course it did look a lot familiar to me. As most buildings resembled the ones in my hometown of Chennai but this was more of a hilly city. The Salar Jung museum is definitely worth seeing especially for history buffs like me. But apparently they have removed most of the valuable stuff like jewels. (Or this is the news conveyed to me by a relative). But the statue of veiled Rebecca, the musical clock and the double figured wooden statue with Mephistopheles and the image of Margaretta in the mirror was really good. I am a museum geek. I have loved Mysore palace and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London in the past. But I know that this may not be very interesting to people who dont really care much for History. Next up was the Charminar. I really wished somebody would paint it with Apex Ultima. I mean when all  other countries can maintain their landm...

So my mom called me up Saturday morning with bad news. The shop I had been going to for the last eight years to buy salwar kameez closed down. She tried enquiring around if he had shifted but nobody at Alsa Mall had any idea where the shopkeeper left. We had the landline telephone number which is not working anymore. So there! One more shutdown of a location I used to frequently visit. First it was the Woodlands drive in hotel , then the beauty parlour and now this. While the hotel was shutdown for a garden being built in its place. The other two was mainly because of bad business. Just a week back my boss was talking to his colleague about the MBA student who had not paid his fees yet. Apparently the guy was the son of a small grocery store owner. And basically due to poor business the boy could not afford the fee any longer. Running a shop is no joke. Even if it is a small one. In fact I believe its harder if you have a very small shop. You not only have competition from the smal...

So Steve Jobs passed away last week. Zillions of people mourned over his death. People whom he never really knew. But seriously, if you could take a look at all the three famous products from the Apple in the last decade, they were all gadgets that we could easily do without. And basically they were stuff meant for just show off. Let's start with the ipod. There are so many lesser known mp3 players which are much more user friendly than the ipod. Then came the iphone with its oh so many add-ons for social networking. It just increased the number of useless status updates in my Facebook page. Because people bought this phone paying so much that they had to let the whole world know that they were using it. And then they started using it for all features except for making a phone call (which is what a cellphone was invented to do in the first place)! After that came the ipad. Now we have laptops, desktops and practically all internet browsing tools now on the phone itself, so why on...

Many a time I have felt that I have been discriminated against just because I am an Indian. The most recent incident occurred when I went into the Splash retail outlet in one of Dubai's malls. I had picked up a few clothes which were on sale and had proceeded to the billing counter. First the lady standing at the counter I chose left the counter at that very moment.I waited thinking she will be back soon. She just disappeared. The guy standing at the next billing counter was busy with another customer for a while. We were the only two customers at the billing counter by the way. Another lady from a different nationality walked into the shop and this guy at the counter instructs one of the sales girls to attend to her!! Hey there was no special attention given to me when I was shopping? And how does this guy assume who will shop for more money or what if that woman walks out of there buying nothing at all. I waited five more minutes and then I left the clothes on the counter and ...

Last week the news channels in India were agog with the news of Sachin Tendulkar moving into a new home. Apparently it cost him 39 crores in Indian rupees to buy it and almost as much in renovating it. So we are talking about a Rs 75 crore plus home! Well he is my favorite player , but all the same 75 crores for a house was a bit too much for me to digest. I mean 5 crores , 6 crores is also normal but 75? Is it really required? And what would be the yearly cost of maintaining all that? The Indian media is slowly going the British and the American way. All those guys ever used to talk about were the boooorrrring Beckhams. Hopefully they will not get into Sachin and Anjali's hairstyle and clothes!!!!Already they are behind Sakshi Dhoni's style of dressing. God alone knows what's next. Its like people dont care about meaningful news anymore. One of my favorite channels on TV is a German channel called DW TV. The programs are divided such that one hour in German is followed...

Since its introduction in the year 1994 this has been a memorable train journey for me. I am talking about this short train journey between Trichur and Guruvayur in Kerala, India. This is a journey that I undertake almost every year without exception Its 35 to 40 mins of pure lush greenery. Right after starting from the Gurvayur Station and the train moves a bit, we see the level cross from where we pray for one last time looking towards the East Nada of the Guruvayur Sree Krishna Temple(of course we cant really see the temple from the level cross but still we try to crane our necks as if we can). But thereafter the greenery along the route transports you to your own imaginary world and then you forget all your worries and problems till you reach your destination. Of course thereafter in my case I have to catch a train to Chennai and then a flight to Dubai. But for that half an hour you dont think about city life or work or anything and just try to store these images somewhere in...

We spend a good portion of our life working and it's important to make sure that what we do is meaningful and fufilling. Regardless of your current job, take time to mull over whether what you're doing is what you want to be doing. If not, consider how to take another career path. You never know where you might end up! The above paragraph and umpteen other articles that I have read in books and internet articles have not helped my career much. I am still back to square one. I was a not-so-bad computer science engineer. Although I hated the job I was still respected in a society which churns out God knows how many software engineers every year. But I am still lacking one important factor essential to every person's career i.e LUCK. I know I have mentioned this before, but seriously I need this factor more than anything else now.This must be something running in my family. I mean my dad worked under a boss for more than 20 years. My dad had been a qualified chartered ...

My Annual Vacations are mostly an ordeal. Its a shuttle between the place I was brought up i.e. Chennai and the place I was born i.e. Kerala. Needless to say I hate vacations, but it is a neccessary evil that I have to do at least once every year if not more. My BP shoots up higher there than my normal working days in Dubai. Because there the tensions range from why so and so commented on me this way starting from you have grown so fat to when are you giving us good news and why did you change the job line from IT!!! Like they really cared a damn about me. They just had to ask questions that hurt me. The kind of questions that bring an expression on my face that is quite similar to that lady's in the nappy ad where she sees her baby boy sitting in a pool of his urine(I think it was huggies, not so sure though) when they are playing hide and seek. Anyways I know now that I will never be able to get into the marketing department of any company, because I have lived for five years wi...

My entire weekend was in front of the TV this time. I have watched Just Dance in three languages namely Hindi , Tamil and Malayalam. Believe me when I say that the tamil and malayalam versions of this program were hilarious. Rather than dubbing the program they should have just shown the subtitles in those respective languages. But no they dont do that. They make Farah and Vaibhavi speak in Malayalam and Tamil instead. But while even that was watchable, the worst part was the fake accent they gave to the contestants who had auditioned in London. It reminded one of the ab trimmer exercises in teleshopping where they have foreigners speak in tamil and malayalam. Speaking of the program itself, while watching it you are aware that there is immense talent in India. But then again most of them were doing locking, crumping , piping , whatever whatever. And everybody seems to have a lot of knowledge about them, But what about our bharatanatyam or our folk dances. A few dancers attempted ...

A couple of years ago, I was invited to address the Trivandrum Management Association on the subject “energizing Kerala”. I found that odd, because the only place in the world where Keralites seem to need energizing is Kerala. Look around the planet, and you see Keralites everywhere, working extremely hard, from menial jobs in the Gulf to professorships in the States, displaying their entrepreneurial energies and achieving remarkable successes. So what is it that holds them back here, in their home state? Is it resources, policies, attitudes, politics? All of the above? It’s always been a curious paradox that Keralites put in long hours in places like the Gulf, where they have earned a reputation for being hard-working and utterly reliable, while at home they are seen as indolent and strike-prone. Surely the same people couldn’t be so different in two different places? And yet they are – for one simple reason: the politicized environment at home. It’s a reputation that has come to h...

Recently read this interesting article in Bhavan's Journal. Its about people being happiest after they turn 80. Their lives are easier because they have taken care of everything by then, their children are looking after them. The proverbial rat race is over. You have more time for family and friends. No more politics to play (except for the ageing politicians in India of course). But otherwise life is generally the best in your 80's. I dont think I will live that long but I agree with the being happier part. Despite all her worries my grandmother is definitely happier than I am. I am all of 28 years old. I lost my dream job thanks to the recession and some other reasons. I have been trying since then to claw my way back into the job with no success. I dont have any kids of my own, though kids of other people somehow magically seem to get along with me. I am not getting any richer. I dont have anything new to celebrate about, I am trying my level best to lose weight and going ba...

Now there is a furore over Jairam Ramesh's remarks of IIT's being glorified. I have to agree with this statement though. Not because I never got admission into IIT considering I didnt clear the cutoff or that I happened to be from a caste that does not get any reservation benefits but simply because I have come across many mediocre people in my life who have also been to IIT. I have often wondered how these mediocres made it there considering that IIT's have a really tough entrance exam. Maybe its because they just paid more attention than I did at the IIT coaching centres. Or maybe because I spent only one year preparing for the entrance test whereas they did that for four years starting from 9th standard? Whatever it is , it does not speak of a high quality education! Nowadays there are so many other engineering colleges with as good if not better infrasturcture than IIT's, but somehow in India and abroad the brand name of IIT is bigger than all these other engineerin...

Facebook sometimes drives me crazy. I was a software engineer hailing from a state in India which churns out about 1 lakh such software engineers every year. And almost all of them got a chance to go to my dream destination which is the United States, while I sit around pessimistic about my future in Dubai! I dont post my updates on FB anymore. It just drives me nuts. I have no achievements so to speak , no exotic locations that I have ever travelled to and the one or two trips I took with my husband turned out to be nightmares, that I have decided not to repeat that mistake again and I shall do all the travelling sitting at home watching Highway on my Plate, Sanchaaram , Travelogue and all those programs on exotic locations in Discovery channel and National Geogrpahic. Let's face it I am not going to be able to travel to all these places in this lifetime and that is a bitter truth that I have got to accept at one point of time in my life. All I can think of now is to concentrate o...

How often we have heard the words "Best of Luck" from our wellwishers? I never thought much about the importance of this word until recently. I used to think it was just an obligatory statement that people made when they knew you are about to take an exam or in case of Dubai , a driving test. But I have realised that nothing in life is more important than luck. There are so many instances of people whom I have studied with or somehow been acquainted with who have marched ahead of me in life because of a windfall. And really a windfall it is, some professions just tend to pay you more than a crazy software engineering job. But it is not enough if you have got what it takes , you have to have that extra luck factor in life. It not only applies to professional life but also personal life. How many divorces and breakups we here of everyday. Why, there are so many people I know who are single because they werent luck enough to meet the right one! You have got to have luck to have ...

If there is anybody I know in my life who always wants to find a double meaning for every sentence uttered by any other person and who decides to get hurt by it , it is my husband. Honestly if there were an award instituted for such behaviour he would win it hands down. I mean which other Indian couple in this world would have fought after India wins the world cup?? Well, we did. And that I guess is why now the world cup is so memorable for me. For all the wrong reasons that is. Now I kinda half wish they hadnt wont it. I remember a saying by Emerson, which goes something like this.."I cannot hear what you say, because what you are shouts loudly in my ears". And this is precisely what went on on Saturday. I have just had enough of this attitude that I am now ready to call it quits!!

The last few weeks have been equally hectic and thought provoking for me. My folks came to Dubai after a lot of cajoling. They stayed for all but two weeks, and were generally not interested in going anywhere because of the great deal of walking involved. And well buying anything here is expensive. The only thing free is the air or rather the air-conditioner! Everything else is charged. To the extent that even relationships with people come at a heavy price. When my aunt recently became a widow, she requested her children two living abroad, and one in India in a different city to stay for some time, none of them could stay. Not that they could be blamed. They had all become successful after they left their hometown , after all what could they expect by coming back to the hometown which gave them nothing to begin with anyway. So my aunt had to finally settle for the maidservant who had to be paid a hefty sum and who had to be treated like a queen. I guess I am going to land up in the sa...

I have had enough of this place ! Every day I think why I chose to work in this place when I got the feeling that I was not suited here almost the minute that I joined here. Improvising the quality of anything or anybody for that matter is not easy. My salary is less, I am pretty sure I will get no promotion and I totally lack the motivation to continue working. All I can do is to curse my fate for coming to Dubai and ruining my whole life by coming here. When you apply for a job which you have all qualifications for you are not even given a telephone call. On the other hand when you apply for a job with which have no relation to you, you are scheduled for interviews. Makes me wonder about the quality of all the HR professionals in this city. Do they even read the resumes here?

If 2008 was the year of the recession then the year 2010 is now being hailed as the “year of scams” in India. Although the start of most of the scams this year can be traced back to two or three years ago most of them have come into light in 2010. It all started with the Indian Premier League and has now ended in the mother of all scams the “2G Spectrum” which incurred a loss of Rs 1,76,000 crores to the Indian exchequer . Wedged in between these were the stories behind the Adarsh housing scheme and the Common Wealth Games. The only difference between the corruption in the 20th century India and in the 21st century India is that earlier the amount used to be of the order of only a few crores, now it runs into a few hundreds or even thousands of crores. The 20th century did not see so many news channels or the rise of the power of the media as in the 21st, yet our politicians continue to loot the Indian treasure in broad daylight. Frankly speaking this makes politics a lucrative car...