All Those Yesterdays

Sacrilege

2006-07-15T22:01:00.000-07:00

Well it has been over two months and there has been a lot to write and certainly no reason not to write my blog. But somehow I never felt the moment was right. There were some very strong contenders that made me think and rethink about resurfacing in the blogging world but none so compelling as THE ONE.

But as a good anchor let me keep you guessing till the end in the meantime I would nicely summarize the last two odd months.

4. MAY 31st - JUNE 5th: Somehow the farewells have lost their touch after school and nothing was to special about my repeat farewell with Techspan, but what followed was amongst the nicest memories from the last year. One man One bike 1100 kms. And a lot has been bragged about it already. Only because the story has a lot of repeated plots I guess it gets the 4th position.

3. JUNE 9th - JULY 9th: The football extravaganza that culminated with the whole world dripping in the colour of the azurees. Definetely a lot to write and discuss and celebrate and what not. And yes that match between germany and italy should have been a more fitting finale. The ending had a sad touch with Zidane head-butt and all n all there was too much information alraedy floating in the air to make you nauseous, yet Viva Azuree makes it the 3rd best contender.

2. JULY 5th: The ordeal finally came to an end. After this I knew I had one foot in the USA. And quite a story it was to travel in the submerged mumbai to get my visa. A tale of unprecedented anxiety and very anti-climatic ending, but a tale worthy of a mention here. This tale has had a profound impact on me and it had me on the edge for quiet a few days thus this has climbed all the way to the second spot.

So ladies and gentlemen we have come to the moment of truth and there is no more waiting and no more drama. The winner is

1. http://youtube.com/watch?v=RgfpzPFyaC0 ------ In an era when sacrilege is met with such hostile resistance and in an era when we are shown ways to rebellion through 'V(for Vendetta)' and 'DJ(RDB fame)'; I believe in these time s and circumstances such people cannot go unpunished. Pink Floyd, Led Zepplin and Stairway to heaven - this is the worst of sacrileges and justice should be done the Marv (Sin City) way ; Blood for Blood and by the gallon.

TravelBlog II : Show me how to live

2006-05-08T04:01:00.000-07:00

Three National Highways and three states, there is definitely a lot to tell about the recent escapade to chennai.

By the way the pic above is one of the points from where I managed to flash by at 100kmphs on my return jurn from NH-46 followed by a 90 km stretch on NH-7. The stay time in chennai was amazingly short owing to the elections. Anyway the weather in the city was horrible and one day of sweating was enough for me to consider the precious journey back to bangalore on my bike.

In the evening though we managed to have a trip of the beach (please dont ask me the names it was hard wnough to remember them for 10 seconds). And before the beach we had a trip to the famous fruit shop from chennai and had some refreshing juice after the horribly hot day. The trip to beach is always pleasant. I was very relaxed by the music that the sea offers to one and all, who give 5 mins from their time to stand next to it. It surely rates amongst the best music pieces that I have heard.

Anyways as we came back to our room the scary truth dawned to us, because of elections on the coming monday the selling of liqour in chennai was prohibited. Devastated I was but on the brighter side I had no realization how fast after hearing that bit opf news I went into a state of stupor.

5 in the morning and I was up and so was the sun. Within an hour or so I was ready to take the road again.( And just for record I saw with my own eyes, deers roaming around freely in IIT chennai campus.) Though within 10 kms it was sure that my mental preparation was complete but physically I was quiet down. And to top it I got lost once I left chennai, and as much as I tried to ask the locals the way to poonamhalli the more the darkness was enveloping me. I know it is wrong to strereotype but one can hardly help it if you stop at a tea shop and ask for directions the guy says something in Tamil and just when you offer him 2 bucks for the tea he loudly and clearly spells out "2 rupee aur 50 paise". Though I knew that it was still early morning and it was just 350 odd kms but I was filled with despair as no coherent answers were provided for my pleas to directions.

Miraculously after driving for 25 odd kms I came to a place which felt like the begining of a highway and gave me lot of hope. Unfortunately I had come to chennai via NH4 but I landed on NH-46. this time and decided to take it nonetheless, the best decision of the entire weekend. It was a fantastic 3 lane (each side) road with boundary. Full Throttle, top gear and I am a highway star !!

My spirits had risen sharply after seeing the road and soon my stoamch gave orders for a snack. Foodaholic that I am I stopped at a the first place that came into sight and once again landed at a place where we were to depend on the sign language. Some how I managed to eat 6 idlis and 3 wadas (typically dalwada from maddu mess) for 8 bucks !! I sincelrely hope that the hotel owner feels that he robbed me by charging me so highly.

Anyways I was back on track and inspite of the sore bottom desperate to clock a faster time than the previous day. Enroute I noticed that all the signboards that were written in Hindi were blackened and those on which directions were written in all three languages (hindi, english and tamil) they had singled out hindi and blackened it. It was not a good site, it spelt Tamil Nadu wanted me out. Though I guess there was a different message for me in the journey that remained. I managed to give lift to a guy, 20 km after vellore. As expected we had no common language to communicate. And he kept telling me something all the way upto Krishnagiri. Finally he stopped me at a trasport shop right after KG and took me to a mini dhaba for chai-sutta. There we exchanged arbit pleasnataries. Our conversation was typically :

Him: ....................... sir ............................ bangalore .......................... vellore............
me : ........................ chennai.............. yesterday................... bangalore ............
Him: ...................Tea ........................... Colddrink.............................
me: colddrink.................................. kings..................
Him:.........................BE..........................software............................
me: BE......................Software......................
Him: ...................................Buiseness............... Transport...................
me: .....................great......................

Hopefully I have the gist right. Though one of the guys at his shop explained to me that he was scared all the way because I had been driving too fast.

Anyaways I picked myself from krishnagiri for the last 90 kms and within two more hours I was back in my house. There was ofcourse a traffic jam in between and a nice juice shop at Hosur but I have a feeling that all this is getting repetitive.

So just for the records :

Bangalore to Chennai via NH-4
Bangalore (Old Madras Road)- Kolar- Palamaner-Chittur-Ranipet-Kanchipuram(outskirts)- Chennai

Chennai to Bangalore via NH-46 and NH-7
Chennai - Kanchipuram(outskirts)-Ranipet- Vellore- Krishnagiri(NH 7 starts)- Hosur- Madiwala(Bangalore)

Well I guess with the sunburns that I have and all the reasons that I have heard from friends about how stupid it was going all the way to chennai on bike and that too alone, I guess the purpose of my visist has been fully satisfied. Well as for the next trip I hope to be using one of these -->

And yes time to say adios to the my bike, you have been too good to me!

A breeze of fresh air

2006-05-06T04:48:00.000-07:00

Yesterday night seemed like the end of a lot of things. And so from today we see the changes, for starters this entry would be frest one about my journey from nimma bengaluru to the capital of TN chennai. But the story began yesterday. With the down of my 160 Gb harddisk it was never going to be an easy to spend the weekend at home.

Now 6th of May has always been an eventful date for considering the fact that I cleared my JEE, cleared my Btech and was born on the same date. But this was a different kind of 6th May, because for the first time I knew that it was 6th May before someone came ahead and wished me and that should pretty much end my senti spree because before I slept I had decided that it was going to be a special way in which this was going to be celebrated.

And here I am typing from this unknown IP in IIT chennai and sharing the quiet adventourous and at times horrible journey from Bangalore to Chennai. Well first and foremeost I packed my bag and was up and ready by 8 am to start this solo hike. The weater in mornings, be it any place is always quiet amazing. So without even taking a break I was at Kolar (70 odd kms from bangalore) when I first felt that I was a bit tired. It called for a tea break and once again the gods of traveeling smiled on me as I met with couple of bhajjiwalas (that too muslims) who helped him tie my luggage on the bike and literally get it off my back. It was a graet way to start the long trip.

Another 70 km of driving and I took a stop at Parampur. It seemed that the weather was on my side as the clouds kept hiding the sun for a long time. This part of karnataka was quiet different than the one that I had seen during my visit to mangalore. The trip to mangalore was all green and stuff and this was all rocks was various shapes and sizes. And these rocks covered entire hill range. The road zig zagged a lot and thats the way my bike likes it :)

It was 10:30 and I had already left bangalore around a 150 odd kms behind. And along came chittor in another half an hour. It was the half point my journey and I was alraedy there in 3 hrs. The weather was still pretty good but every coin has two sides and my as much as my head was happy, the other side had started turning sour. The sun took this opportunity to shine at its brightest and with a couple of more breaks I had entered the unchartered territory of TN.

It was another odd 100kms left and it was noon. It seemed like I would make a new record or something. And that is when the best road of the entire journey started. It was an absolutely beautiful 4 lane road with dividers and all in all an ideal road to test the highest speed of your vehicle (110kmps ie :)) . But the disadvantage was that the greenery had cme to an end. There were no shades on the side of the road where one could take small breaks and the temperatures were soaring too.

Here is when I took another stop and for the first time realized that I had come so far that my words no longer held any meaning. With pretty comlicated sign gestures I could get my small sprite and prepare myself for the killing sun. The next two hours were very painful but somehow with a very oddly placed punjabi dhaba I managed to reach my destination. I am still mazed by the location of that dhaba, arnd 10 kms from chennai and in the heart of a place where people refuse to cooperate with ppl speaking in hindi, it was great to watch a dhaba run by sardarji and all his fellow men who understood just hindi and nothing else. Also it was an amzing dhaba in the sense that I got a plate of bhindi and inf rotis for 36 rupees and I couldnt even finish my sabji (inspite of being hungry the whole day). Punjabi dhabas make you emabarassed to say the least.

Anyway once lunch was over there were harldy any other barriers and I smoothly reached Adiyar in chennai nad met up with my friend who is asleep at this moment in time. So lets wake him up and start the action.

I had always heard that its the journey that matters and not the destination and I think I have made the most of it today. SO happy 22nd to me again :)

Read between the lines

2006-04-21T04:37:00.000-07:00

Well yesterday I changed my orkut picture to:

As anybody coud have guessed, this is a struggling Death Metal band from Germany (ok !! germany was hard to guess). But I think that the logo is really cool ! All said and done germany had a special relation to the kind of emotions (or lack of them yesterday) that I was trying to depict. I guess it is hard to be in the position that I am and still hate it and get disturbed by it as much as I do. I think "Corporate culture" does belong to those that have come of age (and are especially endowed with enormous amounts of patience). It had been decided that I would be giving a small talk on a small component of a small project in our small company and for this moment I was on hold for 3 months. But the last straw was the fact that the small talk was shifted by another 4 hours without even a bit of information passed to the protaganist. The feeling of being lonely at a crowded place came running to me all the way from germany.

But then the sun always sets, darkness beckons and I go to dhamija's and bakshi's for a couple of hours of gaming. Who says violence is bad, after killing about half a dozen heroes and a trillion creeps in Warcraft I headed back to home with a satisfied spirit that had taken its vengeance.
Frank Zappa : happy together
And friday came with the news that we have to work on saturday too because of the unplanned holiday last week. Boy call it a starting of a bad day. But as the day grew we went for an unexpected treat and a beautiful hour spent playing TT and coming up to the climax of a real good novel has started to turn things around. But all said and done it is nearly my gaming time !!

Adios

Risky Reading II : Education

2006-04-12T04:59:00.000-07:00

Well today was the most anxiously awaited day for many a folks that I know. IIM results were out and there were happy and sad people all over the place. Fortunately for me most of my friends have had good results if not the expected highs they wished.

But I have pointed this out earlier and this is going to be my second take at philosophizing with bangalore on a bandh and the way to my home blocked I have decided to hit back at the world by sharing pearls of wisdom with them.

Recently I went to one of my friends place to pay my regards on auspicious occasion of his Birthday :) . He had turned 23 and as I heard the age I remembered what a golden age that used to sound when we were little kids in school. Infact it has been pumped into us that these couple of years might be the best that we have been offered by sarcastic almighty.

Today on my breakfast table I reacalled a real good argument that I had with my hindi teacher back in 8th class. It was on a poem where the poet wished to tell that a river chooses its own way as opposed to the common belief that it has to move according to the georgraphy of the location. All metaphors apart I had choosen the path more traveled and offered my complete support to the idea that the poet was a moron. On the other hand my teacher was vehemently suggesting that we must have fighting spirit and "rasri avat jaat te til par banat nisan"

And today I was sure that Sushma madam had been right, life was really what we wanted it to be. And there is no obstacle that can be removed and so on and so forth .........
until that is I really really remembered her !!

Education is india has been in the dumps for a long time with (I am sorry to say this) people who werent good in their studies earlier end up being the teachers. Undoubtedly there have been some real good teachers that have crossed my path. There were many who really wished to be teachers but none that I can remember of can claim to have taken the the poet's path (which now does really sadden me a lot ! )

Take your pick:

But I would like to end on a happy note. Oh god please give me the strength to change the things I can and the knowledge to understand those that I cannot.

And that is the thought for the day

A curious incident indeed

2006-04-03T07:11:00.000-07:00

With more than ample free time in my life I guess I have turned to lots of things but most of them aren't worth mentioning in this blog but some of them definately are. I have developed a voracious appetite for

Web Surfing
TT
TV Reruns
Books

I had visited Blossoms (a second hand book shop in Bangalore with millions of books and they do have a section devoted to erotica :) ) last week and bumped into this strange book by Mark Haddon called "A curious incident about dog at the night time". It is surely a brilliant account of a autistic child who undertakes a huge journey from a small town all the way to london to meet his mother. I am amazed at the ease with which the author enters into such a weird (technically) mind. Infact something that really leaves one preplexed is the fact that the the line between a autistic and a normal person is and in what pathetic ways do we handle that !

Well please read the book if you are either a fan of "Catcher in the Rye" or you have had the opportunity to see (and appreciate) "I am Sam".

Risky Reading !!

2006-03-28T05:57:00.000-08:00

This is the third time that I have taken up space on blogspot and it seems third time lucky as I have reached a landmark number of postings till date. But the saturation has arrived, I have been refraining from postings off-late because of two major reasons.

hattrick.org : An engrossing website for football lovers and ofcourse meant for people alloted with abundance of time in front of a computer with apparently no other work !
Secondly for philosophizing (if a word like that exists). There is something special about a blog that makes you want to start writing about philosophy and patriotism and what not as soon as you create a new blog.

Till today I had successfully avoided being tempted in the lures of writing lengthy and boring philosophies but not anymore. I was a bit impressed by this article. I have known this guy for 3 years and I must admit that this article was a bit of a pleasant surprise.

So let us get back to the main point. I really wont press onto the topic that was dealt in that article but just pen down an incident that changed my outlook about india to a great extent.
It was during my second year, rock music was starting to create its impact on my life. A large group of students from my college were headed towards Delhi for our annual sports meet. And among the Volleyball contingent was this guy called Robert (transfer student from Deutchland) . I went ahead and started a chat with him about Du hast Mich, the song that had been creating ripples in the amateur rock arena those days. It was a pretty stupid idea in retrospect because the guy clearly hated rock music and was asked about the question barzillion times before. But anyways pretty soon we had this big group chatting about various things.

And then Saand, our hero, interjected with a brilliant question, What was the most affecting thing that he had noticed in India ? Well I agree that it was a lame question and one couldnt poosibly be too excited about the answer , as I was sure it would be something so common for us that it wouldnt matter very much (like people dont drink too much beer here etc.). What made the question brilliant was ofcourse the unexpected answer.

Robert said he had never seen so poor people anywhere in this world and the worst part was that common people had started accepting this great divide. So as we move ahead with our service industry and our nuclear programme etc the other side of India remains so much out of focus.

Infact that was when I realized that we have definately learnt the art of totally giving a blind eye to the stark and disgusting reality in our country called poverty. And I would just like to say that we ought to open our eyes a little bit !!

2x23 # "How I'm Spending My Summer Vacation"

2006-03-23T00:46:00.000-08:00

Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you're in diapers, the next day you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place, a town, a house like a lot of other houses, a yard like a lot of other yards, on a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I still look back, with wonder.

The unforgettable wonder years !

I finished Eldest and was unsure of how to pass my time. The second of inheritance was again a great read but the suspence was killing me and I had to step back in the real world. And what could be better than the good old Wonder Years. I have finished watching the first two seasons already and it never stops to amaze me how much of emotion can be depicted from a 30 min episode focussed on life an Average Teenager. I do, still look back, with wonder.

There are a lot of episodes that can be pointed out as The episodes but I wouldnt gloat on each and every one of them. Rather I would just share the last episode of the second season in which Winnie's parents are about to seperate. It is a nice flowing episode and provides the occasional laughs that a popular comedy sit-com is required to. But then something amazing happens in the end. Winnie is sitting dejected on the porch of her house and Scarborough Fair is playing in the background, that is when Kevin arrives on the scene to say something intelligent. The limelight though is again stolen by the narrator as he qoutes "That summer kids everywhere swam,water-skied and sailed, while winnie cooper struggled to keep her head above water, in a family torn apart by anger and grief. I pretty much did nothing that summer and for that I consider myself lucky"

And what better way to end this blog then with one more qoute "We didn't have to hate ourselves for getting older, we just had to forgive ourselves for growing up" How true, if only I could live the third year of college again and again !!

Femme Fatale

2006-03-17T05:04:00.000-08:00

Sorry women readers but this has to be dealt with. I was nearly killed thrice today .

So you want to know the details. Well the first one occured near the closest signal from my home (the over crowded manipal signal). This female driver on her scooty is nicely going in the left lane without a worry and suddenly she realizes that she had to take the right turn. Now I dont mean to be insulting or anything but common sense urges us to look and then turn. That is definately not the case with some people and she just about crashes in my (nice looking) bike. I swaer I was angry but then I was ready to accept that it was one stupid girl of the three billion.

And the journey to office continued till I reached the MG road. Just try and understand the irony of the situation a woman driver and her officer husband sitting next to her in her maruti. Vehicles are for once given the acceleration that they deserve in bangalore. Again this female has to take a right turn without manual or electrical signal, boy was that close. I screech and curse, what else is their to do. That ends the second one of the day. On days like these you are thankful that this city with so many women behind the wheels doesnt allow you to speed very often.

And thats when the third attempt was made. Just as I took a left to get into cubbon road there comes this woman with her Honda City smoking a ciggarette and driving at around 80 kmph trying to overtake everyone on this turn. Ofcourse because of her speed she has to handle the steering efficiently and ofcourse she fails to do that. And to top that she over turns just in time to realize that a bike was on her left all along. This time she screeches and the people behind her get to curse. Meanwhile I am speeding on my bike to somehow get to the parking lot of my office before one of these dreaded females succeeds in her deeds and all along the road I sing "With a cigarrette in her hand I felt like a dead man". Now, here I am just about to leave and hoping that I get to write more blogs.

BTW this blog is dedicated to one character (X) who wished to be mentioned in my blog and surely this blog is dedicated to X who once dropped from a 2 wheeler trying to take a turn at momentous 10kmph. X i hope u are happy :)

Also for all the people who read my review on Eragon, I have started with Eldest and in the first 4-5 chapters the dragon gets drunk and performs a lot of antics. Still not encouraged enough to read the book, then go ahead and grab a read Amartya Sen's "Poverty and Famines : An Essay on Entitlements and Deprivation", published by Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1982. You guys are meant to change the world.

Shur'tugal and all those nice sounding words

2006-03-13T01:47:00.001-08:00

Another teenager to rule them all and into the darkness bind them.

I guess the wikipedia gives an insight into the reactions that this kid drew after writing the Eragon. And why not, there are numerous similarities in both the books. Christopher Paolini has not taken upon himself to create new races and to certain extent a new names for the various cities and characters in his novel attempt at a novel :) I will go ahead with the lambating and also say that for all the work that Paolini has done he can never be put in the same class as the Tolkien and his Lord of the Rings.

Yet there is something compelling about Eragon that forces the reader to complete the book in minimal number of sittings. Well before I heap praise on Paolini and his fantasy attempt let me just point out that I am bound to like any book with ....

pictures like this. A tale about fantasy and adventure and some amount of magic and minute amount of storytelling is bound to keep me happy.

But Paolini has more to offer, inspite of his stolen (which I would come to shortly) concepts he has still not lacked innovation at all. The communication via mind sharing is a fantastic concept and I can just say to the Harry Potter's reader that it is much more advanced than the Rowling's Occlumency. Infact Eragon is much more advanced reading than the entire Potter series. Secondly the ancient language again a concept taken from Tolkien but taken to a completely different level.

The bottomline is this : It is an interestng book to spend time with on vacations, WTF if some parts of it are copied ?

Les Blues defeated !

2006-03-08T04:04:00.000-08:00

Well for all those who find it difficult to say this, Chelsea were defeated by a stronger opponent yesterday to book a place in the QF of the Champion's League. It was more disaapointing because a 10 men chelsea had been much more threatning than the 11 men side. And because I have been surrounded by so many "Beautiful game lovers"(read Chelsea Haters) that I am going to put my opinions with immense relief. So here goes the list of issues followed lots of free flowing words.

Rijkaard tactically better than Mourinho: Let me set the record straight here. It was a victory only and only because of the Ronaldihno and he has been given that talent by god almighty himself and not by Rijkaard atlaest. Chelsea could not play their trademark all-out-attack-under-pressure game and most of it was because the one magician on the Camp Nou ground who had them scared throughout the night. And many can defend their lactlusture performance to the fact that one goal from Barca in the earlier half could have sealed the game the other way and thus complete discipline was required at the back. Post this game Mourinho still keeps the best manager tag (present) and Ronaldihnio proves his worth as the best player.

Is 10-men disadvantageous ? This question really gives me the heebie jeebies. Of course 10 men is not disadvantageous if you have the Ronnie magic on your side. It really doesnt matter then if your team gets 1 red card or 5 red cards. Of course Ronnie shouldnt be red carded but then with his class of play he really cant be. There is no need for him to go ahead and tackle a person, his legs are like magnet to the ball and they stick together.
But on the other hand if your opponent team has Ronnie on their side then you cant even keep a slightly injured player on your side let alone play with 10 men. If somebody saw the second leg he could easily appreciate the tactically beauty of hte manager who had nearly stopped the Ronnie genius by using his Chelsea machine. And yes chelsea kept fouling all over the field but the number of fouls on Ronnie was pretty less !! I dont know why Makelele had decided that he was going to break Motta's back (of all the people, probably wanting to get him red carded). But all the same the tackles around Ronnie were really worth wacthing. They really couldnt take the ball of his feet, but they definately stopped him from having a go at the goal. And with all 11 men on field they could occasionally (though not as much as they would have liked to) could run up without the fear of conceding a goal on counterattack.

Beautiful Football And this third section is dedicated to the hollering people who claim that it was a victory of beautiful football. This is an absurd argument considering the fact that there was just one player playing beautiful football and his rest of the teammates werent even able to get the ball to him.
And honestly it is a defeat for those who wanted to see attacking football emerge victorious. I mean the best barca could have done was to finish the tie with 2 straight goals. Now tell me whats the use of blaming a team for playing counterattacking football and then beating them by playing with the same technique and claim that boring football has lost. Terrbile arguments tend to happen in places where people have mastered the art of discussions :)

Mourinho How can this blog be complete without the mention of the man himself. Infact I feel the need to add the weekend game of West Brom in between to draw the complete picture.
1st Leg CL Del Horno gets red carded for all the wrong reasons in the clash of titans. The manager is angry and has all the right to be.

West Brom EPL Refree books Robben for all the wrong reasons again. And then Robson decides that he can go ahead and abuse the diving Drogba in all manners that he feels possible and even then the media decides that Mourinho is at fault for trying to defend his player. Both the manager dont shake hands and ofcourse for this Mourinho is called "sour loser" !!!!!!! Wake up guys they won 2-1.
2nd Leg CL Chelsea draw level with Barca at there home, when everybody thought that they would be demolished. Terry claims a controversial penalty but other than that the game has been full with the refree's whistle. Mourinho has been realtively quiet throughout the match. And in pre match reviews Deco made it clear that Mourinho has created this footballing personna for himself to rile up his enemies. And honestly till this point everything is ok.
Post match Mourinho says that "The better team over the ties did not qualify" and that I must say is bullshit

So thats that !!

Sahib Sindh Sultan

2006-03-06T04:57:00.000-08:00

This saturday we decided to explore another theme restaurant developed by the BJN group (courtsey suddo). I was with Jay as we travelled the entire outer ringroad to finally reach our destination through the muddy banks of Koramangala. Somewhere near our coveted destination we were informed by a phone call that there was no parking space left even for bikes. So we found for ourselves a beautiful corner to park our bike and started our long journey to Forum. With the increased traffic in that area our chances of reaching the destination were pretty slim but on the other hand the idea of reaching a railway platform of the British era (theme of the restaurant) after the hard day wasnt to inspiring. But the tough blokes that we are we made it and guess what had we been 5 more minutes late our reservation would have been cancelled , a perfect icing on the cake one would assume.

And as we entered the restaurant lots of things changed and one of the first changes was "the kick" that Jay got because of the ambience. This kick was to prove very crucial in our having a real good time there. Once in the restaurant we felt like we were teleported to a different era (read: away from the crowd at the other side of the door ) . One thing must be noted about the reastaurant though the food was GOOD if you are vegetarian but it was GOD if you are a non-vegetarian. I hope I get one more shot at the Roti pe Boti.

We were really stuffed like the heavy stuffed kulchas that are offered at the place by the end, but who can resist the temptation of an "oversized gulabjamun in brandy". So we went ahead and ordered for the same. And rarely does one get to see such spectacles. The guy brought us a gulabjamun and then set the brandy on fire and poured it all over the gulabjamun. The taste was definately screwed but the sight of a sizzling gulabjamun was pretty much worth it.

So what are you waiting for, if you visit Bengaluru then go ahead and try it !!

Calvin and Hobbes rocks.

2006-02-28T05:11:00.000-08:00

It made my day in this gruelling and full of pressure "Corporate" environment.

"Why should I have to WORK for everything?! It's like saying I don't deserve it!"
-Calvin

"What assurance do I have that your parenting isn't screwing me up?"
-Calvin

"Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us."
-Calvin

"Do you hate being a girl? What's it like? Is it like being a bug?
I imagine bugs and girls have a dim perception that nature played a cruel trick on them, but they lack the intelligence to comrehend the magnitude of it."
-Calvin

"So the secret to good self-esteem is to lower your expectations to the point where they're already met?"
-Calvin

"I don't know which is worse, ...that everyone has his price, or that the price is always so low."
-Calvin

"When I grow up, I'm not going to read the newspaper and I'm not going to follow complex issues and I'm not going to vote. That way I can complain when the government doesn't represent me. Then, when everything goes down the tubes, I can say the system doesn't work and justify my further lack of participation."
-Calvin

"I used to hate writing assignments, but now I enjoy them. I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog!"
-Calvin

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."
-Calvin