I think I should do a recap of how my life has turned out. It has been six years, and I will concede that six isn't that great a number. Not as good as five anyway.

But then I just think I have to. It's time.

By 2012 numbers, I am now in the top 1% Indians by affluence.(An annual income of 12.5 lakh and above [link]). Don't fret, it is not the point and the last thing I would want to brag about, is money. (Though I suppose it is harder to convince you of that now, and yes, I have been there for quite a while now :) .)

The weirdest thing is that no colleague of mine who makes just as much or more, is ready to believe this. They happen to know how much a Mainframe professional in Qatar makes, but not this. But more on that later.

A little over six years back, I was earning exactly zero. The ceiling for my inter city travel was reserved sleeper coaches in Indian Railways and the ceiling for intra city travel was shared auto rickshaws. My average meal budget was around twenty-five bucks and my average movie budget was twenty bucks going up to forty for the odd movie at Nandan. And the icing on the cake is that all three day vacations from college had a budget of five hundred bucks!

Today, five hundred is regularly not enough for a single meal. I have to decide every morning whether I want to take the car or the bike to office. All my travels are air-conditioned in some way or the other. And let us not even get into how much my last vacation cost.

The trouble is, most of this also applies to most of you. And if my guesswork is just as perfect as I think it is, none of you think you are rich.

Well the fact is this. You are filthy stinking rich (You might want to say that to yourself in your head once. And no, it does not help). Whether you like it or not. I do not like it at all. But this does not happen to be an argument; it is just a cold hard fact.

The first time I realized this, I also realized that I did not want any more money. I do not think I have the guts to refuse it, but I do not think it can be the driving factor in my life any more. Being in the top one percent will do just fine for now, thank you very much.

Because the surge in income has not come with a surge in happiness. I am just as happy as I was six years ago. Perhaps slightly less? I am not sure.

Everyone I know agrees when I say that money does not make you happy. All of them then say that they need to be making more money. "To be happy?", I quickly ask. "Nah, just need to", they say.

But what I have learnt from the past six years is that more money will not make me more happy. My happiness graph has just stayed constant. On the contrary, I have less time to do the things I really want to do.

Do I think I have all the money I need? No, I do not.

But what I have begun to realize is that I will probably never ever have all the money I need. Some billionaires do not. I am just a top 1 percent affluent Indian.

I do not think it is a chase that I can win. Why chase the carrot at the end of the stick?

As a footnote, I would like to leave you with an article I just happened to read [link]. Calling my problems as problems seems a little vulgar in comparison. Yup, that is India too.

Hence.....

It's an amazing place. 

The world is full of these living things called people. They are everywhere. In fact, there are so many of them that there is hardly room for anything else.

The people have decided not to live in some places so that other living things can live there. These places are called forests. Some people now pay large amounts of currency to see how these places look like. That practice is called vacation. When people go on vacation, they take pictures.

These pictures are exactly like one moment of the vacation frozen in time. People then edit these pictures so that they no longer look like that moment. Then they share these pictures with other people. The other people then say "Wow" and "Amazing". Then the people feel very happy and click even more pictures.

But enough about pictures. Let me tell you how the people live.

The people live in enormous concrete boxes stacked side by side on top of each other. People call them apartments. Every morning, the people get out of these boxes and sit in little metal boxes which can run very fast. These metal boxes are called cars. The metal boxes run on blackened strips of concrete called roads. These strips of concrete go from everywhere to everywhere so that metal boxes can run on them. Sometimes, while going over these roads, the metal boxes collide. This is called an accident.

Now there are so many metal boxes that sometimes they all get stuck. When they get stuck, it is called a traffic jam. When the people get stuck in a traffic jam, they get very angry. So they try to sneak into other sections of the road where they are not supposed to go. So the metal boxes that were supposed to go there also get stuck. This leads to a bigger traffic jam.

When the people get out of the traffic jam, they drive to another huge concrete box. This is similar to the apartment box, except that this one has smaller individual boxes that are open at the top. This concrete box is called office.

The office is made up of smaller individual boxes are called cubes. Each of the people is given one cube. Some of the cubes have doors. They are called cabins. Only some special people are given cabins. These people are called managers.

The people sit here and do an activity which is called work. This activity makes the people very frustrated. So they talk about how they want to stop doing that activity and make other people do that activity for them instead. This practice is called entrepreneurship. When people stop doing work, the managers tell them to go away. This practice is called lay-off. When people are laid off, they get very worried. So their friends tell them that they will get another office so that they stop worrying. Such friends are called good friends.

Sometimes the people also fight with each other. This is called quarrel. When lots of people quarrel, it is called war. When war happens, the people kill each other.

War happens very often. People mostly do war because they want control of a black liquid called oil. This liquid is used to run the metal boxes called cars that I told you before. I think people fight for oil because they want to run even more metal boxes.

Some people also fight because they believe in some imaginary all powerful creatures. So they hate other people who do not believe in the same imaginary creature that they believe in. This is called religion. When small number of people suddenly kill large number of people for religion, it is called terrorism. When small number of people kill large number of people for oil, it is called war against terrorism.

As he knotted his sunset yellow silk tie into a neat upturned triangle, he muttered to himself, "Perfect!"

Perfect was how he liked things. From his crisp Italian cotton shirt and shining shoes to his clockwork schedule, everything was simply spot on. His card read, "Saurav Kumar, Senior Analyst, Synthetic Equities, Affaires Internationales Bank".

He dabbed the final bit of Chanel No 5 on his wrists. It felt good, he felt good. Right at that moment, he was a man completely in love with himself.

There were of course people who were incapable of understanding such finesse. A prime example was the low life that was lying on a bed in the adjoining room with his ass pointing at the ceiling.

Bagchi, he was called.

Saurav had no idea why anyone would pay Bagchi for anything. For starters, he never saw him awake; all he ever saw was Bagchi's ass pointing at the ceiling. He was almost always late on his bills and Saurav was prepared to swear that Bagchi had never touched the washing machine. Everything about him reeked of Old Monk Rum, which apparently was the only thing that Bagchi ever drank. No wonder why the ceiling was pretty much what Bagchi's ass ever got to see.

Not that Saurav wanted to see him awake anyway. On a rare morning that Bagchi had a bit of trouble with his digestion, he caught Saurav in middle of his 'dabbing Chanel No 5 on his wrists' ritual.

"Why do you do that?", Bagchi shot a question as he sank into the living room couch, toothbrush in hand and mouth brimming with foam.

"Do what?” Saurav made little attempt to hide his irritation.

 "This", Bagchi replied nonchalantly, rubbing his wrists in imitation. A few tiny drops of white Colgate foam raced out landing dangerously close to Saurav.

Saurav paused in exasperation. Part of him just wanted to slap all the foam out of Bagchi. The rest of him wanted to see him lay bricks for the rest of his life.

"I haven't got time for that now, gotta rush", Saurav said as he walked out.

"Whatever works for you”, Bagchi called out as Saurav could feel the brimming foam spraying all over the living room.

2.

Just as he slipped his right foot into his shoe, pain shot through his big toe.

A chill ran down his spine.

He slowly brought his foot out and removed his sock, his nerves taut in anticipation. And there it was, an inch long nail sticking out of his big toe. 

Just like yesterday. He poked at it with a finger and discovered a small amount of pain.

Yesterday it was his left big toe where the inch long nail had appeared. He never missed trimming his nails every alternate night, so an inch nail one morning was shocking. He had dismissed it as an unimportant aberration.

But today, he was nothing short of alarmed, considering that he had double checked all 20 fingers last night.

Walking past Bagchi's room to get his nail trimmer, he could almost visualize Bagchi snigger, "Not so perfect now, eh?"

As the cab drove him to his office, Saurav considered his options.

Well, it was an abnormal nail each morning. No big deal, he told himself. Maybe it was some rare medical condition. It had to be.

The thought calmed him down. After a couple of deep breaths, a solution presented itself. He had to see a doctor about it, end of story.

Relaxed, he whipped out his smartphone.

"So, who do you see about a nail", he muttered to himself. 

He googled 'nails'. Along with a multitude of images of dotted nail art, he found a wiki page that said 'Nail (anatomy)' right at the top. It was an interesting page with details of parts of a nail, some geeky facts like 'nails contain 7-12% water' and a usual host of information.

Eventually he found what he needed in the 'Health and care' section which said 'Nail disease can be very subtle and should be evaluated by a dermatologist...'. His disease wasn't exactly subtle but he decided that it had to be a dermatologist after all.

After the initial flurry of morning activity, armed with a cup of steaming bad coffee, Saurav Kumar settled down to decide on a dermatologist for himself.

He went to Justdial to look for dermatologists near M G Road. Right at the top was Dr. Shetty's Medical and blah blah blah, which looked suspiciously like a sponsored ad. A quick google search confirmed his suspicion. Dr. Shetty had a 1.7 rating on google plus.

Next up was 'Kaya Skin Clinic' at Prestige Meridian building. 2.8 stars, familiar name. Could have been better but what the hell. He copied the number and the address.

He was lucky. Right after lunch, he managed to sneak out for a couple of hours for a discreet visit to Kaya Skin Clinic.



3.

The Prestige Meridian building was barely five hundred meters from his office. He decided to walk.
Saurav enjoyed walking, but on a busy stretch of road with ever honking traffic and 'pee-ed on' sidewalks, it wasn't much fun. At least Bangalore was cloudy this time of the year and it was kind of cool.

As he walked along the 'pee-ed on' sidewalks, he evaluated the gravity of this niggle in his otherwise perfect life. The cool breeze brightened him up. "It's a toenail", he told himself. "And I am going to fix this right away".

Reaching the Meridian building, he scanned around, looking for the skin clinic. He was not sure what he was looking for. Despite his affinity for perfection, he wasn't exactly the pedicure manicure type.
A security guard gave him quizzical looks. He walked up to him.
"Kaya Skin Clinic", he said out aloud. He suddenly felt uncomfortable, as if he was asking for a gay bar.

"Skin Clinic?"
"Right. Kaya Skin Clinic". 

"Where is this Skin Clinic", the guy proceeded to ask his apparent superior, who made a lazy gesture towards the right of the building.
Taking his cue, Saurav proceeded. All of the sunset yellow silk tie, crisp black shirt and 'not so shining anymore' shoes, thanks to the walking he had been doing on the pee-ed on sidewalks.

He found the entrance all right. A glass door with the picture of a woman with glowing skin that said "Kaya Skin Clinic".
Once inside, he paused for a second to look around. Water bubbled out of a small fountain in a corner. Much of the walls had been converted into shelves which were sparsely arranged with what looked like lotion bottles in numerous shapes and sizes. Rest of the walls had photographs of seemingly topless women who had either crossed their arms over their chests or did not have their chest in the shot. Despite the lack of clothes, the photographs looked weirdly demure. All the women, Saurav wondered, had expressions that seemed weirdly connected somehow.

Two north eastern girls in pink flowery Chinese tops completed the rest of the tiny reception area. He was apparently the only person whose skin needed care at the moment.
"Hello sir, may I help you?" The prettier of the two asked him.

"Hi, I am Saurav", he said, wondering why he felt the need to say that.
The girl arched her eyebrows in an quizzical expression of such absolute doll like cuteness that only oriental features can render.

"I need to see a doctor, I have some issues with a toe nail."
The girl handed him a medical form. The form was the usual medical template requiring him to fill out his name, contact details, diseases, allergies and such stuff. Saurav wondered why such information was not standardized, digitized and shared at the flick of a computer mouse. A neat idea for a startup, he told himself.

"Please have a seat sir", she said as he handed her the filled out form, pointing to the lone couch beside what seemed like a magazine stand full of Harper's Bazaars.

Some fifteen minutes later, during which she entered the data on his form into a computer at a painfully slow speed, she announced, "Sir, the doctor will see you now".
Saurav looked up from the Femina he was glancing at. Somehow, he felt a tad nervous. He proceeded to the door marked 'Dr. Suman Awasthi'.


4.

Thankfully for him, the doctor's chambers did not have the same 'beauty parlour' look as rest of the establishment. In the center of the room sat Dr. Awasthi, a slightly plump dark woman with a pockmarked face. Though Saurav felt sure that Dr. Awasthi must have had her face dug out before she had managed her 'skin' medical degree, he somehow could not rid himself of the feeling that she was not the best ambassador for a beauty skin clinic.

"How can I help you?", she smiled, gesturing at the chair in the room.
Saurav sank into the chair. "I have a problem with my toe...umm...toenail."
"Show it to me please", she demanded.

He removed his right shoe and sock. Dr. Awasthi made him move to the recliner and outstretch his leg so that they could together look at his toe.

"Does it hurt", she asked poking his toe with her index finger.
"A little", he truthfully replied.
"Your toe seems all right", she said after five minutes of careful examination. "Slight pain can happen due to a variety of reasons, including strain. I will suggest you take a painkiller and rest your toe." She proceeded to write a prescription.

Saurav realized that it had passed along all too fast. It was time to tell her his real problem. Unless he wanted to go home with a prescription of mild painkillers, that is.
"Well doc, the pain is not the issue."
"Oh! what is it then?"

Saurav went into powerpoint presentation mode. "You see that toenail right there? That wasn't there last night."
"Where was it?", she smiled, probably considering it as some attempt at humor.
Saurav was exasperated. "That inch long nail grew back overnight. It grew one fucking inch in one fucking night! That, dear doctor, is my problem. It is not the pain, it is not any strain, it is just that my toe nails grow one inch in one night. And there is no telling where it is going to happen. One day it is the left toe and the next day it is the right."
In his defence, he was stressed out.

Dr. Awasthi turned white as a sheet.
Exactly seven minutes and twenty-eight seconds later, Saurav Kumar, in a crisp black shirt, sunset yellow tie, in a single 'not so shining' shoe was seen shouting outside the door of Kaya Skin Clinic.
"You can't cure a toe nail and you claim to look after people's skins! Bloody quacks, cheating innocent people of their hard earned money. Watch your fucking ratings drop all over the internet, I am telling you. Saala, you mess with me! What is this, a joke? I come here with a real problem and you treat it like a joke? Who are you? Goddamn Clowns?"

The lady with the glowing skin on the door kept smiling at him.
The stunned security guys had slowly started to regain their senses. Even with his maddening anger, he could sense that he had probably gone too far. That infuriated him even more.

Someone tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around to look into a smiling Mr. Swarnabh Sahay.


5.

Mr. Sahay led Saurav by the shoulder. The security guy came up.

"Kya ho raha hai yahaan pe?"
(What's been happening here?)

Mr. Sahay took over. "Arey jaane do Sir. Garmi mein frustration ho gaya tha bhai ko".
(Let it go Sir. Bro got frustrated in the heat.)

Saurav wondered where the heat was. But that was Sahay's USP. He could get you out of tricky situations. And he could get you into even trickier situations.

Sahay had the hungriest eyes. Saurav had sometimes wondered why Sahay had the exact same hungry look while looking at say, a delicious pomfret, a hot girl or a tin can. The "hungry look" never left him. What did leave him sometimes was his smile. When he smiled, it was hard to tell if he was already crying or if he would start crying in a minute.

Right now, it was Sahay saving his ass. Saurav wondered if it was closure. Or if Sahay would now lead him into some bigger shit.

Back in Sahay's car, Saurav braced himself for some Q&A.
Sahay made the move, "What the fuck where you up to back there?"

An asymmetric monster toe nail was his spookiest ailment ever. Swarnabh Sahay was the weirdest man that he knew. Just fifty hours back, a nuclear holocaust was more probable.
But right at that moment, Saurav told him everything. Every tiny detail that had led him, Saurav Kumar, an otherwise perfectly rational and pragmatic person, to shouting at the door of a certain Kaya Skin Clinic, in a crowded shopping mall.

Sahay listened with interested hungry eyes. He asked a few questions of clarification and muttered a few words of much appreciated sympathy.
At the end of the tell-all, Sahay slowly asked, "So, what now?"

"I have no idea", Saurav replied. "After what just happened, it's not like I can go to a doctor anymore. I don't think I have a clue, Mr. Sahay".

As they stopped in the office parking lot, Sahay drew a card out of his wallet. Without a word, he slowly extended it to Saurav.
Saurav looked at the card.

Ritu Singh,
Bhakt Relationship Executive,

Bhaskarananda Ashram,
Jayanagar, Bangalore.



6.

"Get up!", Mrs. Bagchi screamed.
Bagchi missed Saurav. He hardly ever talked to him, and that was precisely the point. Life was peacefully good.
A few months back, Saurav had suddenly moved out of their apartment. Given their minimal interaction, he had no idea where or why Saurav had left. All he knew was that Saurav had been having some issues with his toenails.
When his mother found out that he had a spare room in his apartment, she decided to pay him a visit.

"In a minute Ma, please!", Bagchi screamed back. He knew it was a battle he had already lost.

Mrs. Bagchi wanted to visit an ashram that morning. It was his duty to drive her there, stay until she decided it was time to leave and then drive her back. The ashram days were the darkest in his otherwise contended life.

An hour later, in about as much time as it normally took Bagchi to brush his teeth, he was seated in his car, having taken a bath and eaten a plate full of breakfast. Mrs. Bagchi was fasting, it being an auspicious day and all. As he started his car, he was ordered to put the Gayatri Mantra on repeat.

The ashram was somewhere on the Nandi Durga Road. A snaky, pot hole ridden stretch that as a friend had remarked, clogged up even when the sky turned cloudy, let alone rained.
At the ashram, they were greeted by a rather short and stocky lady who introduced herself as Mrs. Ritagni Aggarwal. She was dressed in white and led them into a prayer hall which was sparsely done in white. Devotees sat cross legged on the floor in front of a two feet high stage on which several godmen were on display, all resplendent in white.

Out of habit, Bagchi scanned the devotee section for pretty females to gawk at. On certain lucky days, there were pretty women on stage that Bagchi could unapologetically ogle, pretending to listen to the discourse in rapt attention.

There was still hope for today, as the lead godman was yet to arrive. Swami Bhaskarananda, he was called. The chance, however slim, remained that he would arrive on scene with a pretty sidekick in tow.

They still had half an hour before lead Swami arrived. Bagchi wanted to scream why he had to wake up so early. Mrs. Bagchi however, was already swaying to the devotional music, her facing glowing with peace.

Five minutes later, Bagchi was already nodding off. Mrs. Bagchi cast an occasional look of acute disapproval.

Right on time, the music went louder, the devotees clapped and Swami Bhaskarananda entered the hall. Just as everyone settled down, Swamiji took to the microphone.

"Aur sab log theek hain?", he asked in a sing song, cheerful and effeminate voice.

The devotees replied over enthusiastically, "Ji swamiji".
The noise woke Bagchi up. He looked around, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
He froze.

Right next to Swami Bhaskarananda, resplendent in flowing hair and white attire, was Saurav Kumar, the guy who shared his apartment just a few months back!


7.

Bagchi stood stunned for a long time.
There was no way he could map this flowing hair babaji to the Chanel No. 5 rubbing Investment Banker that he knew.
And yet, there he was. There was no sign of the excitable, ill-tempered guy from the angelic smile that he wore.

Finally after the rice-dal-boiled veggies that they called lunch, Bagchi managed to catch up with Saurav.
"What in the name of the lord are you doing here?"
Luckily, there was none of the discomfort that Saurav usually had around Bagchi. If at all, he seemed far more confident.

"You want to know about it all?", he asked.
After Bagchi had conveyed his eagerness, he took a deep breath and started.

"Well, as you probably already know, it started with my toenails growing abnormally overnight. I am sure you understand the dilemma I went through before I finally made the decision to come here. And the turmoil I had to go through before I could actually open up about it to Sanjay."

"Who's Sanjay", Bagchi asked.
"Ohh, my mistake. You know him as Swami Bhaskarananda. That son of a bitch went to school with me, you see. Sanjay Gulati, he was called then. The lousiest ass you will ever find. Not unlike you, I must say. But smart, damn smart. It was he who managed to convince me of a spiritual career", he paused for a breath.

"What about your high flying investment banking career", Bagchi asked.
"They are more similar than you think", Saurav smiled.
"How come?"

"Well, what do I sell people as an investment banker? Dreams of money. Do I always deliver on those dreams? Not really. If the markets are good, people make good money and I take the credit. If the markets are bad, they lose and I blame it on the markets.
You see, that's exactly what I do in this profession. I sell people dreams of peace and happiness. If they become peaceful or happy, I take the credit. If they don't, I blame it on their stars and sell them some stones. Profit, either way. Add to that, no legal hassles.", he grinned.

"You realize what an explosive exposure you are setting up right here?", Bagchi winked.
Saurav laughed.
"That's exactly what I told Gulati the first time he told me all this. And you know what he told me?
He told me to go ahead and help him. You see, any exposure could only help me by bringing my followers closer".

"What?", Bagchi challenged.
"It's human nature you see. What if you made a really big bad investment? Now if you are really cool about it and tell everyone that you made an ass of yourself, you are just not insecure enough to be in our devotee list anyway.

So what happens if you are in our devotee list? You will use the last fiber in your being to defend your investment. If your spiritual guru is suddenly proven be a creepy pedophile, you realize how stupid that makes you look, don't you? So our devotees rally in unison and tell the world how everyone is out to malign their saintly swami. Gulati, I am telling ya, is obscenely smart."

"But how do you manage to start? Now do not tell me that you have a spiritual venture capital firm."
"Nah, not yet. But cool idea man!
As for your question, that works like the stock market as well. Why do people invest in startups? Because they get better ROI if the stock does well. This is exactly the case. You invest in a new swami, and you get access to the stage. After a while, you get to give mini discourses before the main act and when you are ready, you might even be bootstrapped into a spinoff. The guys you saw on the stage today, are all early investors."

Bagchi giggled in amazement at how complete it sounded.
"But what about your toe?", he asked.

"Ohh that! Well Gulati told me how he would kill for something like that. You see, godmen all over the country, right at this moment, are trying to find ways to conjure miracles. And here I have, inbuilt right into me, an abnormal nail. You realize what this means, don't you? All we really need to do now, is to tell our devotees that this nail is my way of soaking up the injustice in the world or some shit like that, it just works! Gulati is working on it.
That's exactly why I got access to the inner circle anyway. Otherwise, I just do not have the experience you see. But for this nail, I had little hope in a spiritual career.", Saurav smiled.

"Gotta go man, it's spiritual time", Saurav prepared to take leave.

"But where do you go from here?", Bagchi asked.
"Ahh! I have a big launch coming in six months.
Anguthananda is what I shall be called.........", he trailed off.


P.S. Inspired by real characters. Probably why the caricatures took precedence over the story at some point.

We are all fans of someone or something. There are a large number of things that I readily proclaim to be a fan of, just like everyone else I know. And without thinking twice.

So far so good. Until I read a post by a friend of mine where she demanded that Salman Khan should be unconditionally pardoned just because he is simply so handsome!

No, I did not flood her with "how ashamed she should be of herself" comments. To tell you the truth though, it was kind of hard not to. It isn't really about her anyway, it's about a specific culture that causes this. Welcome to the world of fans!

The  Merriam-Webster, the Oxford dictionary and other sources define it as a shortened version of the word 'fanatic'. Think of the word fanatic and you form a mental image of mullahs with chest length beards and Pandits with vermilion smeared foreheads running around with swords ready to kill everyone who does not agree with what they say. Well, think again, cause it's YOU!

Come to think of it, the Oxford definition is pretty apt.

As fans we agree to look beyond the mistakes that a public person makes. Now that defies rationale, does it not?

Hang on, we actually take it another step forward. The internet is full of people trying to defend the wrongs of a public person. If it's a person, he is certain to make mistakes.

Not convinced? I will give you an example.

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Mr. Narendra Modi is a better candidate for the nation's Prime Minister's post than Mr. Rahul Gandhi by miles. Now that said, he still needs all the help he can get to become the Prime Minister.

So is he going around gathering all the support he can get from long standing supporters of the BJP's   ideology?  And perhaps trying to win new and good allies? No, he is doing exactly the opposite. Does he believe that he alone will lead the BJP to majority in the new parliament? Well, he better. Otherwise it just makes him look plain stupid, doesn't it?

Even if he believes that he alone would be able to do it, there is still no harm in not antagonizing a lot of people I believe. Maybe Mr. Nitish Kumar had some pretty unreasonable demands, but the way in which he was hounded out, seemed very brash. I am sorry, Mr. Modi.

Well try explaining that to Mr. Modi's fans. Or posting that somewhere. (Mr. Modi's fans will find you, no worries.)

They will flame you to death. They will compare Mr. Modi to Rambo, saving twelve thousand people in a matter of a couple of days. They will upload Youtube videos with captions like "Narendra Modi's tight slap to ...........". And for anyone who tries to make a watertight argument on something that Mr. Modi did not do right, they will question his right to criticize someone whom he cannot match up to in achievements. That's an absurd argument. Criticism is the only right that I practically have anyway, hindered occasionally when Mr. Kapil Sibal decides to intervene.

But I miss the point. It's not about argument. Fans are not interested in argument or rationale. They would not be called fans then.

Not the political types? More examples.

The Dark Knight Rises was simply not as good as the second part of the Batman trilogy, "The Dark Kinght". And that's immaterial anyway. If I do not like a movie, I have the complete right to say that I do not recommend the movie. Apparently, that's not what the 'fans' thought. 

In fact, a pretty otherwise rational friend of mine, who happens to be a Sachin Tendulkar fan would scream himself hoarse if we said something critical of the little master. And that was when he was perfectly aware that the ONLY reason why we criticized Sachin around him was because we enjoyed watching himself scream himself to throat ache!

So starting today, I admire much of the world, some of it an obscene amount. But I am not a fan of anything, thank you. It's just that I value my rationality a little too much.

Sheldon (USA) - You must stop building nuclear weapons.
Iran - I am not building nuclear weapons.
Sheldon - I do not trust you.

Sheldon - You must let me inspect your apartment.
Iran - Why would I do that?
Sheldon - Because the security council told you so.

(Turning to Leonard(EU), Howard(Israel) and Raj (South Asia)) - Tell him.

Leonard - Leave the guy alone.
Sheldon - Do it or I will tell everyone about ur goof-ups with Penny, Bernadette and Lucy. TELL HIM!

Leonard, Howard and Raj (in unison) - Please let Sheldon inspect your apartment.

Iran - I do not even have nukes. You have nukes.
Sheldon - My nukes are good. Yours are for terrorism.
Iran - I never ever attacked anybody. The same cannot be said of you.

Sheldon - Doesn't make a difference.
Iran - Why is that?
Sheldon - Because I said so. I am brilliant.
Iran - How is that even relevant?

Sheldon (exasperated) - I will impose sanctions on you.
Iran - Hello, I do not trade with you, what will you sanction?

Sheldon (Turning to Leonard, Howard and Raj ) - Tell him you will impose sanctions on him.
Leonard, Howard and Raj (in unison) - Not again!

Sheldon - Well gentlemen, you had your chance....
Leonard, Howard and Raj (in unison, cutting him off) - We will impose sanctions on you.

Raj - Come on Sheldon, now let the guy go!

Sheldon - One last thing.
Iran - What??
Sheldon - You really should bring in democracy.

Iran - Really? The last time I had democracy, you were the one who destroyed it.
Sheldon - Well, I must tell you that it was for your own good.....

I have been looking to do some 3D art for a long time now. 

Finally, I found something I absolutely loved.

Sculptris is free and awesome software for sculpting stuff. And after playing around with it for a day, here is a stylized version of the predator from the crap movie "Predator" starring Arnold Schwarzenegger (I hope I got his surname right).

Supposedly, this design file can now be fed into a 3D printer and I could have a small figurine of the guy. If I am able to spare the around INR 7 lakhs needed to buy the cheapest 3D printer possible, that is!

And finally, one in gold!!

• Try to request people to participate in at least one of your surveys every year (maybe twice). Do not forget to post a reminder (or two) saying how desperately you need it.

• Try to post at least one album full of pictures where everyone in sight is wearing a business suit; no problems if it's June.

• Try to give us some expert comments every time our Government is on the verge of making a much publicized policy decision. e.g. FDI, Nuclear deal. Preferably align with whatever the US/Europe happens to be pushing at the time; not that you will ever feel the need to do otherwise. 

• Keep sending us some links to articles that happen to rank your alma mater favorably. If there happen to be no such lists (:P), try posting some which talk about some excellent initiatives that have been taken instead (hint: Dainik Jagran).

• And last, but not the least, as an MBA student, it's part of your social responsibility to keep educating half-literates like me. So keep posting fantastic tidbits of knowledge filled with MBA jargons that make me gasp in wonder. Accentuate the effect by having your classmates comment in equally incomprehensible literature.

P.S. I never did an MBA. Nor am I an aspirant.

Do not get me wrong. I have but the utmost respect for people learning so much more. Just because I dropped out half literate doesn't mean I cannot appreciate that.

And any intended offence caused is humbly apologized for.

Man will always be a man. There is no new man. We tried so hard to create a society that was equal, where there'd be nothing to envy your neighbor. But there's always something to envy. A smile, a friendship, something you don't have and want to appropriate. In this world, even a Soviet one, there will always be rich and poor. Rich in gifts, poor in gifts. Rich in love, poor in love.

- Danilov, Enemy at the Gates.

Inequality is here to stay. There has never been an equal world, and there will never be one. That said, I believe that almost all human beings operate in a self constructed notion of fairness (I do not have even the most basic education of human psychology). And yes, that includes your corrupt politician, terrorist or the sabziwala giving you 950 grams instead of a kilo.

Of course, it includes you and me. I will give you an example. Most people I know inflate a few bills when it comes to filing their income tax returns, read rent. They are all very honest people. Some will perhaps donate considerably more than what they save this way to charity. Most will return the extra money to the shopkeeper if he has made a mistake. Quiz them why they do what they do and they will tell you that it is only fair to save some hard earned money rather than give it to a corrupt government which will pocket a chunk of it anyway.

I find it a bit difficult to fathom how anyone could be comfortable with the idea of being a villain. Hence, I can only conclude that it is this same customized sense of fairness that drives what we do; often things which really aren't fair. 

Maybe Salman thought that it was only fair that he could shoot a black buck for a little fun after some grueling shooting schedule, of what use are the animals anyway? Maybe Mr. Bachchan thought it was only fair to declare himself a farmer to get the land for a farmhouse, he was going to do some cultivation on it anyway. And maybe Mr. Praful Patel decided that with him being the aviation minister, it was unfair to not have a business class flight on the route to his home town, even when the airline was bankrupt and no one else would fly business on that route.

Now take the example of our very own Mukesh Ambani's billion dollar most expensive home Antilla; which incidentally, is the ugliest possible construction in the world, atleast on the outside. It somehow violates the simplest possible notions of geometry. Ms. Nita Ambani however, makes a poignant, heart touching story of how it is their only home in the world, how they live on the top floors of the 27-storey structure in the quest for a little sunlight and how like a perfect doting housewife, she tries to put up a smiling face at the end of the day when her husband comes home. Well, you mean after he has climbed 20 something floors with that tummy of his? Just kidding, I'm sure Mr. Ambani can afford an elevator just to get into his parked car (probably would, a few years down the line :P).

Mr. Ambani's abode does not seem all that unfair if you want to believe that he has put in his talent and hard work to earn such obscene amounts of money and choose to ignore that a vast chunk of his wealth has been earned off exclusive access to oilfields and natural resources in the country. Incidentally, Mukeshbhai allegedly obtained access to those not by providing the end products at cheap, reasonable prices but by generously bribing much of the parliament.

So, I will give you a better example. Coca Cola or Pepsi, as most of us are aware, costs less than a rupee per 300ml bottle to manufacture. You and I happily pay 10 bucks for the same. Well, the rest of it goes to marketing ;as they say, to pay super rich celebrities to tell us that it really is a cool product. Well, when you justify the 7 bucks with feel good terms like marketing, brand positioning etc, it sounds okay. But when I consider the fact that I bought a product that cost a rupee to make and someone spent 7 rupees just to tell me that it is a cool product, I do feel stupid, even if a little bit. More importantly, is it fair to ask a 700% premium on a product?

The whole point in all this junk is a question that I often ask myself. Is it fair that Mukesh Ambani's opulence happily co-exists in a country where billions of people cannot afford the basic daal-chawal every day? The pepsi comes in because it cannibalizes a market where rich educated aristocrats (and the wannabes, you and me) could be drinking say, lemon soda manufactured by some agro-industry somewhere in the country. It could have been sold for 5 rupees a bottle. But the educated, socially aware Indian who lights candles in protest of certain social ills and discusses "death sentence for rapists" on facebook, is happy to pay the 700% premium on the bottled beverage and contribute to the "trickle-down economy" as some would call it, rather than more ROI 5 rupees to a road side vendor. Is that fair?

Do not get me wrong here, though. The one thing that I am not trying to ask, is for Mukeshbhai's wealth to be distributed among the needy, just like that. In fact, to a certain degree, I agree with Ayn Rand's theory of objectivism, and agree with the concept of the  free market in principle. I am the firmest believer that people should not be given anything for free, because it acts as a deterrent to motivation to work hard, which, at the end of the day, is what creates value in a society. In principle, everyone should have an equal opportunity to succeed in a free market, and whatever product holds the greatest value should be the one to succeed. In a real free market however, this is hardly the case. Because the humble 5 rupee lemon soda, though holds more value, is significantly less likely to succeed.

Most forward thinking Indians are against all forms of caste based discrimination, right? Why? Because we, in all our brilliance conclude that it is grossly unfair for someone to be entitled to something by virtue of birth. Why then, is Mukesh Ambani entitled to an Antilla, which needless to say, he wouldn't have gotten close to had he not been Dhirubhai's son? Why is then Rahul Gandhi, in some dark day, destined to rule India by virtue of being the heir of a family? Or why then, does flop show Abhishek Bachchan get movies at all?

And why then, is a beggar's son destined to not go very far, despite what his IQ, EQ or such other Q's might be, while I get to drink a coke for which the Salman Khan's get paid 70%, because they are telling me that coke might help me jump off a cliff?

Now, is that fair?

There was this time when he felt like a spark....
There were these moments when he could feel electricity inside.
When he felt like a live wire..

Today, he feels like a light bulb.
There are no electric patterns anymore;
He radiates a dirty yellowish light.
Ever responding to the flick of a switch.

No one really needs a spark,
Not many can live with one.
Everyone needs a light bulb.
Most cannot live without none...

Why then on some lonely nights.
When the switch is open,
And there is a queer calm all around,
Does he long to be the spark again?

And why does the line spin in his head
Barely noticed, but always there...
Like a small old wound that never healed right
I was not born to do this.....

One good thing about me switching jobs is that I eventually make a post out of it every time. Thus happened with IBM, Samsung and now Cisco. In retrospect, that is kind of expected. A quick jot of the reasons would look like this:

1. I get loads of time to kill. Wait. Loads is an understatement; its more like Mountains.

2. The Internet speed has improved from College to IBM to Samsung to Cisco.

3. More of alone time leads to more philosophy (not essentially better).

4. I kind of miss the old environment (read people I used to work with) and this point should have been clubbed with the previous one.

5. An entirely new set of females in and around the campus has the creative juices flowing. No pun intended here!

6. Every time I switch, I realize that despite the trillions of pages, there is only so much internet that you can browse.

The body of the post is not related to the title in any way, it's just that the title keeps rolling over and over in the back of my mind as I type.

To end, I would like to say that I find the updated blogger interface decent; this being my first time using it.

Finally, I would really really appreciate if anyone is kind enough to drop a comment, just to let me know that people do still visit my blog.

You are the same

And I haven't added fame (sadly)

The same is my mood

And I still cook my food (I wish)

The same stays my money

And no one calls me honey (still)

I still walk to work

And I still have no perk (Team lunch twice a year doesn't count)

My flat is the same

The same stays my name

There's still traffic on the way

And I'm still late every day

The same jokes people still crack

And HR's still say, "Let me call u back"

My Manager still sits at my rear,

And people tell me "HAPPY NEW YEAR"?????????????

[Consider reading this before you proceed]

Badam became very fond of movies in a very short time. So I decided to take him for Ra.One. As luck would have it, we reached early and Badam started asking me questions again.

Badam: What does Ra.One mean?

Me: It's a sci-fi movie. Ra.One is the name of a Robot.

Badam: So it means nothing. Finally a name that is just a name.

Me: Not really. It stands for random access one.

Badam: What is that? Are they connected somehow?

Me: Not even remotely. Dude, it's just a name.

[The crowd that had turned up was huge]

B: It seems to be a really good movie. So many people have come.

Me: You bet.

B: The acting must be amazing.

Me: Don't bet on that however. Heard SRK plays a Southie nerd who can neither manage the accent nor a believable nerd characterization.

B: Ohh, the story must be amazing then.

Me: Nay, the story doesn't make any sense.

B: Oh, I get it. It's sci-fi. The special effects must be great!

Me: I think everyone here has seen far better special effects; courtesy Hollywood.

B: Why are we here then?

Me: Dude! It's SRK! We have to prove he is bigger than Salman.

B: How come?

Me: You don't get it do you? Salman made a movie that didn't make any sense. It was a blockbuster. Now it's our turn to show them who the star is.

B: But it doesn't make sense either. Anyway, what are we going to gain?

Me: [exasperated]. You materialistic savage, not everything is about gain. There is something called loyalty. [I am furious by now].

B: [mumbling] I don't quite understand....

B: Okay, tell me what I am supposed to say at the end of the movie?

Me: How about this? "I enjoyed Ra.One. I don't know what people are complaining about. Anyway if Bodyguard can be a hit, so can Ra.One".

B: Did you read that on facebook?

That morning was weird. I always knew that. Even before I met him.

He was this half naked dude and he introduced himself as Badam. I asked him what that meant and the following conversation started:

Me: What does that mean?

Badam: Nothing. Why should it mean anything?

Me: Come on, a name's got to mean something after all.

Badam: What? A name is used so that I can understand when I am being called. What's your name?

Me: Mahul.

B: And it means something?

Me: Yep

B: What?

Me: It is a fruit.

B: So you are a fruit?

Me: That's not the point.

B: Then what is your point?

Me: I mean everybody has a name that means something.

B: I still don't get it. Give me another name.

Me: Okay. Let's say Nilesh.

B: That's also a name? What does that mean?

Me: It literally translates to "BLUE GOD".

B: You know someone named Nilesh?

Me: Yep, I do.

B: Is he blue?

Me: [frowing] No

B: Is he a God?

Me: Please. No.

B: Then why is he called blue God?

Me: Forget it. So why are you called Badam?

B: Because my grandpa was named Adam and he named my Dad Madam and he named me Badam.

Me: Was your grandpa out of his mind?

B: He kinda was you know. He ate the apple.

Me: You mean THE apple? In THE garden of paradise?

B: Yep.

Me: That's impossible. You can't possibly be here.

B: I know it is. The world is going crazy. There are brown people named blue god.

Me: Don't start that all over again. So how do you pronounce that?

B: Bad-um.

Me: That's better. Luckily it's not pronounced Bud-aam.

B: Why? What's wrong with Budaam?

Me: You know. It's the name of a nut.

B: So what's wrong with nuts? They are perfectly good to eat.

Me: You know. NUTS, NUTCASE and you can't say "My Nuts" cause that would mean something else altogether.

B: Why does nut mean all that? This is crazy and confusing.

Me: [Tired by now]. Has anybody ever mentioned that you ask too many questions, you dumb psycho savage? Get lost.

B: Don't get angry man. I'm just curious.

[The phone, a Galaxy S2 beeps. I bring it out]

B: Wow! What's that?

Me: That's a smartphone.

B: What's that?

[So I spend the next fifteen minutes explaining what a what a smartphone is.]

B: Awesome. Is that like the coolest device on the planet?

Me: No, I think not. It's the iPhone.

B: What does that do?

Me: Pretty much the same things.

B: Then why is this not the best?

Me: You know. Android and iOS. iOS is very easy to use.

B: How come?

Me: You can't do many things with it. But what you can do is right there in front of you.

B: So you can do more things with Android? Then that is better, right?

Me: No. Like I said, you have to be curious to find all that out.

B: I don't understand. People are not curious? Who uses this iPhone?

Me: Pretty much everyone in the developed countries. From homemakers to stock traders.

B: What do homemakers do?

Me: They cook and clean and maybe go shopping.

B: And?

Me: That's all. I mean things like that.

B: And they are still never curious?

Me: What's your point?

B: I don't know. What do stock traders do?

Me: They buy and sell stocks.

B: That sounds cool. So they negotiate and try to prove their products and do stuff like that? Man, I must tell you, my Dad made javelins and he was such a good trader that he could trade them for jungle hens.

Me: It's not like that. They don't negotiate.

B: How come?

Me: They just buy the stocks that they think are going to gain and sell the ones they think will lose.

B: And who decides if the stock will gain or lose?

Me: Traders decide that. When they buy more the price goes up and when they sell more it drops.

B: So what happens if all traders mess up together?

Me: I don't know. Recession maybe. Man, I'm not good with this stuff.

B: You guys are crazy.

Me: I gotta get out of here.

Diya Mirza (the poor man's Aishwarya Rai) , once revealed in an interview how she would skip meals to be able to afford the cab from her way back from work, back in her struggling days. That was long back, but I guess the information stayed with me because I thought the story was kinda inspirational.

Or was it?

Diya Mirza could have taken a bus/train/tram from work as well. That way, the whole skipping meals sob story wouldn't have been essential any more. But that was Diya Mirza. Or was it?

Our generation suffers from a weird insecurity. Let me give you an example. Back when I worked at a consulting firm, everyone came to office in Levi's denims. Well, to be truthful not everyone did, but more people did than otherwise. Now that I work at a product based organization (where the average pay is considerably higher), most people I come across dress in more sensibly priced brands. I once went for an interview at Google India, and the interviewer came dressed in a fluorescent orange turtle neck that I'm sure came off a flea market for not more than 150 bucks.

We seem to have reached a stage where we do what the market demands of us. Another example? How do you explain the obscene percentage of students who chose

1) Engineering degrees

2) Software Jobs

3) Management degrees

in that order? Hell, software doesn't even pay more these days! And I have lost count of the number of people who hated their engineering courses, went on for management degrees and then hated those even more.

Personally, I always feel the pinch every time someone goes for higher studies in the US. Why? I have no idea. I would enjoy creating an android app or optimizing an SQL query far more than say, mugging up a network packet structure; but the market tells me that the action is abroad.

I recently bought one of the best (and the costliest) phones in the market. The price was certainly way out of my league, but I still did. And now I think:

1) The screen is definitely huge and gorgeous, but I spend almost 18 hours a day in front of a screen which is 4 times larger; the PC monitor. 9 hours out of these 18 are spent in front of two such display panels.

2) Games do run butter smooth; thanks to a dual core processor, but I would prefer the FPS games that run a tad awkwardly on my single core PC any day.

3) My office is just a 20 minute walk away, and I could do without any music during this journey.

4) I really do not need most apps on the go, as I have better softwares installed on my PC; and I am in front of it most of the time anyway.

Point is, I still love the phone. Forget love, I am crazy about it. That's in part because I can appreciate the elegance of the product and the design of the software, which a big section who buy such phones cannot. (Not because they are dumb, but because they aren't into engineering per se).

And buying a phone is just the start. After the phone, I bought an elegant case for it which incidentally cost me more than what I would get for reselling my old phone. Now, I have realized that the 2G data connection on the phone can hardly do any justice to its abilities, so the solution seems to be an obscenely priced 3G data connection. Next, I would be buying 500 bucks apps on the market. At the end of the day however, playing Need for Speed on my PC is still going to be a hands down better experience.

I remember a health drink ad which talked about how we should run or fall behind. Well, we are running, but where are we running to? And what are we running for? I completely advocate running for a goal, but truth is, most of us are completely clueless. I still remember when a trainer asked this question to a training room of 15 people.

What do you want to become in life?

It's a simple enough question. One that I am sure every 5 year old can answer at the drop of hat; Pilot, soilder, actress, teacher and the like. Most people out of a class of 15 answered what sounded like,

"I want to fulfill my responsibilities to the best of abilities; rise up the value chain and network across my peers".

That's one answer that my simple brain cannot make any sense of. Is that what you are running for?

So what are we losing out on? Relationships? Perhaps values? Baba Ramdev can tell you more about them.

What I feel that we as a generation are losing out on is creativity. I know that for sure when I look at someone wearing a (fake) solid colored tee with "being human" written in a simple font in white, and I feel, "this doesn't look bad".

How do you sneeze? Yes, you heard me right. How do you sneeze?

Do you go all aa-aaa-AAA-SNEEEEZEEE!! or one of those "fich" sneezes that a person would miss if he happens to be opening a can of soda?

Why? Because my friend, it's important.

Now that reminds me of that Dabur Lal dant manjan ad where Sunil Shetty tells a beefed up guy (who cannot bite an apple) how teeth should not be neglected. Well, neither should the sneeze.

A sneeze is more than what you think it is. A sneeze is an extension of your personality. Think of the chick who sits 10 cubicles from you in office (and despite your extensive efforts, you haven't been able to get introduced to). She knows how you look, and she knows how you sneeze. If you are capable of sneezing loud enough, that is. Btw, if you are one of those guys who thinks that women do not go by looks, think again. How many good looking girls have you told that looks don't matter for you? You can do the math.

So what does a sneeze tell about you? Lots actually.

There are the lion heart sneezes that threaten the window panes and there are the sheepish weak "fich" ones that get you all irritated. There are indecisive "aa-aa-aa-chhi"'s that will take forever to come and there are the violent "HAN-CHHI" that speak of anger and frustration in the underlying souls. In short, there are as many types of sneezes as there are people.

Just as websites have digital signatures, human beings have sneeze signatures. You can copy the content of the website but you cannot copy the signature. Just as you can copy a human, thanks to modern cosmetic surgery, but you cannot copy his sneeze. You might ail or age or be sad or happy, but your sneeze will sound just the same.

Luckily, I happen to be blessed with a powerful sneeze. When I sneeze, one floor below and above know. When my Dad sneezes, two floors above and below know. When Grandpa would sneeze, half the village would know; I attribute the degradation in sneeze quality to the adulteration that has crept into human civilization over time.

So my friend, this rainy season, work on your sneeze. For you never know, you might get caught in a little drizzle and start sneezing. And you will never realize when you let out a sheep sneeze and lose the girl. You look cool, fine; you dress cool, great; it's time you sneezed cool.

As Grandpa would say, "A tiger fears you only as much as you fear it. Where it wins is strength and desperation". It's in moments like these than a tiger sneeze could turn the balance.

- Success.

- What is Success?

- Who is supposed to define what success is?

- Some hot-shots would say linkedin.com is a success.

- I would say linkedin is dumb.

- I am aware that linkedin is valued in billions of dollars.

- There was time when I was little and innocent and what I do today was success.

- There could be a time when what is success today will no longer be success.

- That is, if I get there.

- Does Bill Gates feel the need for more money?

- I am pretty sure the rest of the people on this planet do.

- Who is Successful?

- Is he delusional?

- How happy is he?

- What the heck will he do now??????????

There are three types of people in this world - Normal, Genius and Frustrated.

To illustrate further, I would like to give you an example.

Three people named Normal, Genius and Frustrated walk into a bar. There's a band playing a very catchy tune. None of them has ever played any musical instrument before, but they're all impressed with the music. All of them develop this desire to learn to play the guitar.

So far so good. The story was uniform. Not any longer.

- Normal toils hard to learn the guitar. Ten people say they do not want to teach him because he understands no music. Ten others refuse to teach him because he is not gifted enough. Normal doesn't give up and after what can be called a fair amount of time, he is able to play the tune decently well.

Normal invites his friends for a party and shows of his skills. His friends clap and Normal is happy. He goes off to sleep contented. End of story.

- Genius picks up a guitar. After some time alone with the guitar, he is able to understand how the thing is supposed to work. Some more time, and viola! Genius, is able to play the tune. But does Genius stop here?

No. Genius has a great inspiration and he creates a new tune that is kind of groundbreaking stuff. Next the story can go in two directions.

Rockstar Genius goes on stage somewhere and plays his tune. Instant fame and recognition. End of story.

Shy Genius hides his tune somewhere until a smoking blonde manages to dig it out. She coaxes him (:P) into playing it in public. Instant fame and recognition. End of story.

- Frustrated is kinda lazy so he takes a long long time before he actually picks up a guitar. During this time he is very frustrated because he is not picking up the guitar. When he finally does, some pretty teacher agrees to teach him. She is fairly impressed with him because he is able to learn it really fast. After what some people would call a small amount of time, he is able to play the tune.

Frustrated (like Normal) decides to invite his friends for a party where he wants to show off his skills. Another associated desire is to ask his Teacher out after the play (She is also invited). Frustrated plays and all his friends clap.

But this isn't Normal's story, so it gets complicated. Teacher tells him that he is really cute and talented, but she already has a boyfriend. Some *&#$@? friend tells him how the rendition was almost as good as the original. (Incidentally, he had mentioned this to Normal as well, but weirdly enough, he seemed fine with it).

All this is too much for Frustrated. He continues to go to sleep jittery and frustrated.

I rest my case. :)

P.S. Not to be taken seriously

Some days back my manager came up to me and asked me if we could show a particular stock animation on the Interface at some particular event in the hardware. What happened to that is another story saved for some other time, but what happened a week back is interesting.

I was trying to connect my PC to the internet using a nokia phone and nokia PC suite. This was something my mom and dad had tried sometime back at home (without child supervision :-)) and failed.

Whenever that happens, I get a call explaining the problem and expecting a fix. I had never seen that software at the time, so all I could come up with was some 'useless beating around the bush' which, needless to say, failed (My Dad, as usual, thought my engineering degree was a waste of money).

So coming back to previous week, at the climax of the connection activity (while the PC was trying to connect), there was a decent, neat animation showing waves travelling from the PC towards the tower (You must have seen it if you have ever connected to the internet using nokia PC suite). My Dad, who had been watching wordlessly till now, commented -

"As long as no waves come back from the tower, this cannot possibly connect."

Animation brings life to UI's and has enormous potential to confuse simple people.

Once during my first experience of Windows OS, something that I had put for copy hung. The progress bar wouldn't budge a millimeter, but I was happy because I could see bits of paper flying from one folder to the other!

To tell you the truth, I never intended to guide people in becoming entrepreneurs. Far from it. It just happens that three people pinged me on facebook to tell me that they thought my blog was good.

I believe in science. And I believe that science says that when you have the same observation thrice, it's about time for deduction. Which in this case has lead to an attempt to bring my dead blog back to life.

Before you start, to prevent you from getting any false ideas about me, I would like to clarify the following.

• I come from a family where they have never been any entrepreneurs/businessmen. In short, no one I am related to has ever made a "profit".

• My family does not believe in entrepreneurship. In short, everyone I am related to tries to explain why the whole idea of entrepreneurship is not a very smart one.

If you still want to learn from me, I would gladly feel sorry for you. Here goes the list of do's and don'ts.

• Don't start deciding the name first. We spent the first two months doing nothing except working on the name!! And what we finally agreed on (and have stuck to), in our college lingo means 'idiot'.

• If it's an internet/software startup, forget about getting a server. We wasted the next two months thinking about the advantages we would have with a dedicated server. When we finally worked on the disadvantages list, it turned out to be so long that today we host our website on a free webspace.

• If you haven't already, do not watch the movie "The Social Network". Not that it isn't an awesome movie, but they day my partner watched it (I recommended it to him), he started talking about how much each of us own and how we should always inform the other before every decision taken. *wink*

• This one is very important. Never, and I mean never ever announce a product before you have it completely ready. The following things could happen:

- Out of the blue your day job may start demanding hectic hours and you won't get any more time to work on the product.

- You may start getting bored with working on the same thing for a long time.

- You start getting the feeling that the product is useless. This is usually the most common.

• Well this one is a revelation. You have your website up and running which tries to tell people what you intend to do and how you intend to do it. Simple enough. You post the link somewhere (a little bragging never hurt anyone), and next thing you know is you start getting the following type of messages on Facebook -
  
  
  "Awesome work man! Btw what are we supposed to do on the site?"
  
  
  You are not supposed to do anything dumbo! All you are supposed to do is to look at it and tell us if you think it's good/bad.

• If you are a group of one/two/three etc people, you must understand that you can't be one/two/three for the rest of your life. So you need to bring in new people. How? Don't ask me, we are still two.

• This one is a secret. Odd jobs never hurt anyone. I suspect that all entrepreneurs have done some at some point. For example, I sometimes do assignments for grad students in US/Europe to keep my paypal account ticking. *wink*

• You always live in the morbid fear that you are getting accustomed to (and maybe even interested in) your day job. Trust me, it's not true. After spending an uncomfortable more than a year, I finally realized this. "All day jobs suck and have always sucked".

• Try not to tell everyone you know that you are the proud owner of a company without a product. I understand that at it's really difficult, but atleast try.

Well, I suppose that almost sums up my knowledge of becoming an entrepreneur. If you are a lonely reader who happened to wander to this dead blog, post a comment if you feel like.