Indiyeeeeeeeah!!!

Im back in India after nearly 3.5 yrs in UK. It’s been a month since I’ve found this new job in my hometown, and now I’m trying to weigh my pros and cons about my decision. Making the decision to return to India was not done in haste, it’s was a conscious decision but most importantly it was ‘my’ decision. I would have followed the heard all along but this time I decide and I follow. I don’t know how its gonna work out, God willing if it does I’m gonna pat myself in the back else I’m solely responsible.

So what did make me come back to India, from a developed to developing country, from being a desi to being an Indian, from a weakening to a growing economy, the list endless. I might never know what triggered my move. I would say a sense of belonging and a passion to experience the growth of India first hand triggered it, but I might never know the answer.

I’ve come back to my land where people drive in the most undisciplined way, don’t say thank you, don’t hold the doors open, have no courtesy, and throw garbage right outside the garbage boxes. But i can see a million smiling faces, a will to succeed and survive in spite of the competition being cut-throat. I can truly see a million youngsters driving to work; I can see a sleeping giant awakening in spite of the corrupt politician, red taped bureaucrat and the all powerful entrepreneur trying to sell this great country. We will survive, we will succeed, and we will conquer.

-Jai Hind

For all thats worth.....!!!

Either im trying too hard to rake my non-existent brains to come up with appropriate headings or im just running out of vocabularies to come up with anythin suitable for my posts.......

Well "For all thats worth" is a genuine attempt by me to address the concept of designer labels in everyday lives. My friend is crazy abt DKNY labels, she normally doesnt mind buying stuff which has got somebody's name on it. Not that i dont buy designer stuff but im quiet apprehensive abt having somebody else's name on my underwear.

People buying designer stuff can be broadly categorized into 2 types, 1) the thrill of flaunting 'u have it, u flaunt it' and 2) some just like the feeling of being in that exclusive club(limited editions) ' im classy, im rich'. The underlining principle is that ur gonna shell out a lot of monie for something thats not worth even half of the retail price. Im no God either, id happily buy a FCUK T-shirt coz its cheesy but i dont have the monie nwayz ;)

If we do a little bit of research ud notice that most of these so called exclusive designers get their stuff done in third world countries or developing nations where they can exploit the cheap labour and to an extent even child labour. No buyer is interested where his stuff is made, all he needs is some guys/gurls name written in bold on his/her underwear respectively.

U dont need designers to look good, u need confidence!!! The next time you buy designer stuff think again, your gonna blow ur money on something totally unnecessary, whereas the same people who made the stuff struggle to eat one full course of meal a day.

F-C-U-K U DESIGNERS!!!

Culdn come up with an appropriate heading!

Priyanka, my collegue is a typical indian girl, witty, smart and very strong willed, oh not to mention very stubborn. She is wat i wud typically classify the indian girl of today. U can see the dreams in her eyes, a lost trance as she guages the people around her when i sit with her in our office cafe. She talks and talks like most girls and typically she would discuss her aspirations, the things she wud buy for her house, etc etc......alwayz dreamy.

Had i met Priyanka a couple of years back i wud have categorized her in a totally different league, the rebel of indian girls, picking guys, never subdued and never beaten in an argument with the guys. Now shez happily married and very subdued, its only occationally i get to see the real her when she rolls her eyes and smirks at my male chauvnistic jokes.

My point is, indian girls once married somehow seem to loose their real self, they relate a lot to their husbands and their society, they tend to project an image which may or may not reflect their inner self. In short they confine themselves to their immediate surroundings, let me stress that in most cases they dont have an option, the society demands.

Oh...sayin so ...Raj....Priyanka's hubby is a charmer, guess very few people can see the 2 sides of a coin unless ur marrying the girl u fell in love with. Raj is lucky, most of us would never know the flip side of the girl we are goin to marry.

Saying that, im thinking abt a joke i cud use to crack Priyanka up tomorow, its nice to unleash the devil once in a while.

A confused desi

A group of abt 5 young desi indians hustle and bustle near a busy bus-stop in Glasgow city center, they are holding a map and are obviously trying to figure out a way to get to some place, I watch them with keen interest as they talk excitedly among themselves, they were kicking up a riot. It was then i heard one of the most absurd comments from a Pakistani guy standing in the same bus-stop , "Bloody immigrants"!!

That put my brains into overdrive, blood pumped into my heart at a furious pace, i wanted to grab the guy by his collar and remind him of his roots. Obviously he expects some peace and quiet in the bus-stop of the country he was born but that numbskull didnt probably know the phrase "Bloody immigrants" refers to him as well!! He may be 3rd generation but hez definitely an immigrant in the eyes of the natives.

I sniggered with contempt, the confused desi that he is, cannot comprehend the fact that be it how much u try to emote a 'white' guy u will alwayz be 'just another immigrant desi'.

I've got nothing against the guy, hez probably just as confused as any 3rd gen desi born in UK wud be, their loyalties always doubted abt their adopted country. But this particular guy cracked me up, confused bloody idiot!! "Roots stupid......remember ur frikkin roots....!"i told myself.

Desi's last thoughts abt Glasgow!

Its almost my last few dayz in this beautiful country, not England.......Scotland. My mind races back to all the fond memories and moments ive endured in this place.

#The Glagow Platter: One of the very first things which occured to me when i landed in Glasgow International Airport is that these guyz speak a totally different twang(slang), its English alrite but its so very different, "Yes" is "Aye", "No" is "Nae", Coke/Pepsi/IrnBru is referred to as "Ginger", "Whityedaein?" meanin "Wat are you doin?" It was a weird experience, waking into Burger King or McDonalds i wud hardly understand wat the girl in the counter wud say, there have been umteen times wen id ordered a particular Burger and wud end up having another most notably in my case wud been a Cheese Burger (oh, cheese is not ur average cheese, cheese in this part of the world is mostly pork or other Red Meat)!!!!

#The Bus Journey:First Group is the bus operator in Glasgow and the thing with them is that u have to tender exact change to the driver(there are no conductors). I remember the first time i walked into the bus and handed over a £5 note for £1.50 ticket. U dont normally hand the monie to the driver, u just drop the monie into a glass box situated in front of the driver. I dropped the £5 pound note into the box and watched in horror as the driver simply smiled and said 'thanks mate', 'thanks??' wer is the remaining change i asked, he simply pointed to a small sign board with even smaller writing 'pls tender exact change'. Immediately my desi brain did the maths id effectively blown Rs.290 on a 2min bus journey!!!

#The Pub: ive gone to this pub with my collegues for the very first time, i assumed that we wud normally buy drinks for ourselves and pay for it. But these guyz apparently had other plans, one person at a time wud buy drinks for everybody. Now this is a problem, im sittin here with less than £20 quid in my pocket. Round 1: £10 blown, Round 2: £20 blown....now im dredding the inevitable, these guyz usually dont stop till Round 9. Now u can imagine my dire situation, one more round and im bust, i was makin plans to go to the toilet and drown myself. But a miracle happens, the guyz just stop suddenly for no reason. Everybody just decided to stop and go home, God surely does exist, well atleast HE was drinking in the same pub as me at that day!!!

There were many more moments and embarrasments i had to endure in this country. Id cherish every moment for a long time. Id miss Glasgow, the pubs, the drunks, the football fans and chanting, and most of all the Kilt.

Diamonds are priceless?? very true

Diamonds are indeed priceless, they are beautiful, exotic and there is something abt them that makes them really really special..... they mostly come from Africa! A continent torn by civil war and poverty, rife with epidemic and aids......and all the world is bothered abt is ...the bloody diamond.

Conflict Diamond:

"...diamonds that originate from areas controlled by forces or factions opposed to legitimate and internationally recognized governments, and are used to fund military action in opposition to those governments, or in contravention of the decisions of the Security Council.." - United Nations

We as consumers, esp little princesses who want a fairy tale wedding should take into consideration that the diamonds they buy may be tainted with the blood of kids who have their arms chopped off if they dont support the Rebel movements in Sierra Leone, Liberia and other parts of Africa (remember the movie Blood Diamond). We as consumers have a responsibility to authenticate the source of the diamond we buy, any diamond which does not have a cretificate of its source is a conflict diamond.

90% of all the worlds diamonds are cut and polished in India, so india does have a hand in the 'blood-diamond' trade. So we are responsible as well for the current state of the beautiful African continent.

There is this unforgettable quote from the movie Blood Diamond "...Sometimes I wonder... will God ever forgive us for what we've done to each other? Then I look around and I realize... God left this place a long time ago..."

I would never buy a diamond ring if i knew its going to cost somebody their hands, God bless Africa.

Guys and Gals- a marked difference

Its been a wierd experience, not many guyz get to take a gang of girls on a tour of Scotland, i being the only guy among the 7 of us, was their official driver, photographer and tour guide. The reason for this post is that, one of the more mature girl int the gang asked me this particular question-"wats the difference between travelling with guys and travelling with girls?"

Let me stress that the viewz expressed are my own and i dont take responsibility for any offense caused- hope u(u know who u are ;) ) get the point, no point arguing with me!

The marked difference between travelling with guyz and girls is that, girls tend to forget they are on a tour and concentrate on songs, antakshari and snacks. They hell care abt wats going on outside the car apart from the occational "how beautiful is the lake, how nice is the cloud formation!"

Guyz tend to observe a lot, they wud spot a parking space or a road sign without a hitch, they wud see the tree on a mountain as opposed to a girl seeing the mountain as one big entity. Guyz dont play antakshari and will never pay attention to a lyric of a song when on a tour, they are more bothered abt wat's goin on outside the vehicle not wats going on inside the vehicle. Guyz discuss politics and history of the place to an extent but girls dont really seem to bother abt the history of the place they are visting, all they need is a photograph.

Guyz have a better sense of direction and stick to a schedule, girls dont know that a schedule exists and dont tend to stick to the itenary, time constrains are never given attention, they think we cud somehow reach the place on time. And guyz dont normally eat inside a car, even if they do...its only goin to be crips for their beer.

I dont know abt other girls but these girls are total foodies, i was under the impression i was driving a food van for 3 days, oddly enough the van and me smelt the same, imagine Walkers crips and Chocolate Muffins!! Im pretty sure they(girls) wud have bought some 300 Muffins for the 3 day trip!! When i went to drop off the van, i cud see the disgust on the guys' face, im pretty sure he wud have spent the rest of the week cleaning the vans interior alone, every possible space and gap was occupied by a piece of crisp or a cake!!

As far as ive noticed, girls tend to be concious eaters, i.e they cannot make do with a snak instead of stopping over for a light brunch, guyz wud happily skip a meal or two but girls tend to pay attention to eating on time and also wat they eat.

Now coming to the good part, The best thing about travelling with girls is that girls are real fun to travel with(i was the only guy among them ;) ), though u can never really find out the exact meaning in a girls vocabulary, i mean their 'yes' is a 'no', their 'maybe' is a 'BigNo' i kinda got a sneak peek into their minds. They talk and talk non-stop like there is no tomorrow. The music is non-stop so is the gabbling, ur eyes and ears are engaged 24hrs. They kinda eat ur brains inside out like a parasite, but in a totally good way.

Oh I must not fail to mention "getting fed", an apple, a cookie, can of coke or watever it may be will surely find its way to my mouth ;) This wud never happen wen i travel with my guy friends, they 'wont' pass on food items to the 'driver'. They just cannot comprehend that i also need food to survive!! Whatever little snack we buy for our beer is finished in a jiffy and the driver does not get to either drink the beer or eat the food...pathetic B%£$*d$!!

So in all i cud conclude that girls are afterall not that bad to travel with apart from the constant nagging behind ur ears. But i got to travel with some real lovely gurls so no regrets for me though ;) Im a guy afterall, girls are alwayz welcome aboard!!