Not an Ideal Person met…

 

The other day, I was in conversation with this lady who I hope I do not have to spend any more time than I did.

 

Anyways, the discussion was one sided where she thought that she had the right to display the prowess of her experience as intelligence over people who were literally one-fourth her age…

 

But the point is, that somewhere in the conversation, we managed to put our point of view across wherein she thought I was an idealist (which I agree I am), but what I did not agree was that she dismissed me as a person, my viewpoint and also the clan of idealists for that matter…one, in my opinion, I ain’t respect people who cannot tolerate or accept different ideologies…so, you could be the head honcho of your organisation or the biggest literary talent in the whole wide world, but if your mind and heart is not open enough to accept or at least tolerate other ideologies you do not deserve my attention or opinion…second, I can never rule out idealists…not because I am one…but I think that is the basis of all great theories for humanity…

 

It is an idealist backed by statistics and math that makes an economist dream of a society bereft of poverty and bring in equality of wealth and labour,  which makes him write his theories of economics to balance the world, which probably wins him the Nobel

 

It is an ideal state that the Planning Commission aspires to reach in all those five year, ten year plans that they draw out for their nations

 

It is an ideal state of land and governance that is the basis for  the UN charter for all nations on this earth

 

It is an ideal state of mind that dreams and believes that the country has a scope to grow in the infrastructure sector

 

It is an ideal mind in all spheres of life  that is propelling all growth in the world over…projections are always keeping ideal situations of growth in mind

 

They are idealists who are protesting against quota systems in education, and they are idealists who are fighting for it

They are idealists who are fighting for the Women’s right to reservation and who brought in the Women’s domestic violence bill

They are idealists who are fighting for the freedom of expression for gays all over

They are idealists who are fighting for the lands in Singur

They were idealists who fought for the justice of Jessica Lall Murder Case

They are idealists who make plans for the city that will enable the normal human being live a civil life

 

We are upset with administrators when the ideal situation of law and justice fails

We are worried when our children do not behave in the ideal codes of conduct that we expect them to abide by

We wish to get the ideal husbands and wives

We dream of having ideal marriages and living ideal happily married ever after lives

We aspire to reach pinnacles of success in an ideal situation of acknowledgement, appreciation and trust

 

It is only to maintain ideal situations of peace and order that laws are made

It is to bring about ideal changes in society that make bureaucrats all over the world spend their times in summits and conferences to plan and chalk out solutions to do away with not so ideal prevailing situations

We all aspire to weigh the ideal weight, have the ideal skin, and flaunt the ideal luscious hair

 

Idealists according to me are not unrealistic and impractical….Idealists according to me are visionaries, who are the biggest optimists in the world…It is the hope of an ideal situation that keeps us going

 

Practicality demands cut trees for fuel…idealists say use bio-gas for fuel!

 

Maslow’s law of hierarchy is all about moving towards self realization, but not without going through each ideal situation in our lives of food, clothing, shelter, safety, security, self esteem, love et al. Not having gone through those stages of a human life cycle, we do not reach the ideal situation of self realization…

 

I am fine with the way the lady thought as long as she did not say she did not believe in idealists for whatever may be her reasons…

Existence is not about give and take, neither are relationships or businesses…if there is no ideal thought driving any act that you do, then I believe there is no intention of good will…coz we are not baniyas or merchants who justified everything with a loss or gain… we are humans who have the intent and desire of a heaven on earth.,…and so what if we know we cannot achieve that…I love the idea of living knowing that my utopia lies somewhere on this very earth, where everything is not about give and take, loss and profit.

 

Am sorry Ma’am, wherever you are…with due respects to your age, you are not quite my ideal elder to look up to

 

Newspaper Coverage!

What's the ad value here?

Thank you for not smoking!

I am amazed. Very amazed, in fact, with the way law gets twisted and stretched to fit the blubber of archaic moral policing in my country, barely concealing the obscene, and yet, covering up just right. OK, there were five commas in the last sentence. So what?
I spent the three weeks in Delhi fretting over the minute details of, and the general public opinion about, the brand new anti-smokers’ law. October 2nd meant carrying coffee in a snooty paper cup to the car and looking at the sorrow-crowd outside the purple-red cafe. The day spoke to my kind in whispers of a foreign language and the only word we could catch was ‘discrimination’. Oh, I’m totally against curbing rights, even if they are of non-smokers forced to duel armours of nicotine rings which them smokers have around themselves in self-defence. Well, I still do not see why the addict needs to leave his drink mid-way and run down four floors for his fix by the roadside when the bar could’ve have a separate non-smoking floor if it weren’t for law. Will the law-churners protect the girl in the short-skirt stepping out at 2 am from the club to light up her Classic Milds? Maybe she shouldn’t try such ‘adventures’ when ‘the streets aren’t safe in the city’ (quoting Ms. Sheila Dikshit).
Whats a woman’s doing with a cigarette anyway? Aren’t we Indian women supposed to ‘maintain dignity’ and ‘values’ and simply indulge in some quality bitching and schemeing when we wanna have a little fun? Ooh, I can almost imagine Ekta Kapoor’s vamp in a saree (and slutty make-up) lighting up with a flashy smirk, while schemeing to take over her in-laws’ bank-balance right after making love to her chocolate-boy (and negative IQ’d) husband.

Anyways, coming back to the law which thinks roads aren’t public enough and private cars with windows rolled down are, I think I need a smoke break. Will see if I become poorer by 200 bucks in the process.

Less is More

Ok, so watching ads is one of my favourite pastimes and being critical of them is my passion  

Yeah, I never  swap channels whenever the 30 and 40 seconders are on…. rather am up alert waiting to see what unfolds in those few seconds….

 

Anyways, the point here today is about the absolute claims that some products and brands are making out there… about how stuff over the shelves are better and best than what we grew up with… now don’t get me wrong when I react strongly to the claims the brands make, it’s not that I don’t belong to the overtly obsessed hyper pseudo-consumerist generation… but then, hey…. some  rationality please….

 

Our parents were infants too, their parents were infants and every being to have breathed fresh air on this planet was an infant   by all means, and trust me to say this, they all grew up with cloth nappies and home-made blankets. But no, today, we need Snuggies and Huggies and pampers and I don’t know what all. It is almost like as if you would never grow up to be the right person without them. Then we have the entire range of child care books. I may sound ancient to some, but I will definitely have takers on this when I say that my parents never had to read books on child care and parenting to bring me up and I think I turned out just fine. Suddenly homemade food is not as good and nutritious as some biscuit company would have us believe. And I am more than sure that people who chewed away with datun or neem sticks instead of the innumerable toothbrushes and toothpastes have the entire set of 32 calcium intact and I have more of my generation visiting the dentist at pre ordained intervals. And suddenly milk powder is better than milk, Kurkures’ are better than pakoras, colas are better than water, bath fittings are better than sculptures,  Dentwhite is better than toothbrush and toothpaste, soaps for cleaning utensils have more real lime than maybe lemon juice and the list is endless. I do not relate to this. Maybe I am antique but I know I am real! Because I am comfortable not being a branded human being. I am more concerned about being comfortable rather than designed.

 

Image Courtesy: farisyakob.typepad.com

 I see this woman in the train with a child at her bosom. She knows nothing about nutrition because she does not look like someone who has even had food for the entire day. I cannot define her clothes to you because I simply cannot put it in words. She loves the child who suckles at her breast but the look on her face says that she probably was forced into motherhood. The child endlessly cries because she has nothing in her body to feed him. I do not need a Kodak camera to capture her image because she is too strong a representative for an entire segment of population who adorn this land of mine and trust me, for whom ads are nothing but a mockery. She makes me feel foolish for talking about target audiences, because the target audience that I am talking about is so minute, so negligible, almost a speck. And it still makes me want to believe that we are all living pseudo lives where the lines between reality and virtual reality are far too thin to distinguish and where maa ki banai roti is not as good as Mcdonald ’s happy meal! Our ideas are all warped and ideologies gone for a toss. Big words, huh! What to do? I am not too satisfied binding life in Kellogs and Liveons’ and Mountain dews and Sprites. I want to remind myself that life is not so frivolous  and trust me the ‘MORE‘ we get to know about life in real, the ‘LESS‘ it is. 

 

Photo Feature: The World, According To The Americans

The New-Age 'Help The Needy'...!

The Savior!

The Map!

The World, as seen from an American satellite!

Have you wondered why no other country in the world spots an alien spacecraft?

Writer’s Block

I’m sitting and staring. At people around me, at the mirror, at the blinding lights passing by through my head, at the empty coffee cup sitting quite smugly on my work desk, at the to-do list…and at the two odd lines my wasted day has meekly offered as an ode to a rather mundane existence I trudged by today. Opening lines have never been so earnest. God help me.

I’m looking for some inspiration, to be able to jot down a thing or two about the evolution of my day, my past week, a significant thought, some memory, some plans, anything…

I do see something though..a seventh line trying very hard to fight for what the first started, something like a good friend doing his job-listening, pretending interest, pretending empathy…fighting just to keep pretending the pretenses…nice…i feel much better now

Perhaps I should go home- procrastinate some…maybe I’d have a better day tomorrow, maybe words will flow, maybe I’ll write a book someday, maybe I’ll help a blind man cross the road, maybe I’ll spill coffee on myself, maybe MS word wouldn’t stare back at me…challenging my intentions

Tomorrow, I will try again..I’ll scratch the surface again and again, till it turns red with vain attempts, and then some good ones..

Just maybe.

The Ant And The Grasshopper, Desi Style!

The Ant works hard in the withering heat all summer building its house and laying up supplies for the winter. The Grasshopper thinks the Ant’s a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering Grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the Ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering Grasshopper next to a video of the Ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor Grasshopper is allowed to suffer so? Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the Ant’s house.

Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other Grasshoppers demanding that Grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter. Mayawati states this as `injustice’ done on Minorities. Amnesty International and Koffi Annan criticize the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the Grasshopper.

The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the Grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance). Opposition MPs stage a walkout. Left parties call for ‘ Bengal Bandh’ in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry.
CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among Ants and Grasshoppers. Lalu Prasad allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian Railway Trains, aptly named as the ‘Grasshopper Rath’.

Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the ‘ Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act’ [POTAGA], with effect from the beginning of the winter. Arjun Singh makes ‘Special Reservation ‘ for Grasshoppers in Educational Institutions & in Government Services.

The Ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, it’s home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the Grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV.

Arundhati Roy calls it ‘ A Triumph of Justice’.

Lalu calls it ‘Socialistic Justice’.

CPM calls it the ‘ Revolutionary Resurgence of the Downtrodden’

Koffi Annan invites the Grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.

Many years later….

The Ant has since migrated to the US and set up a multi-billion dollar company in Silicon Valley.  100s of Grasshoppers still die of starvation despite reservation somewhere in India, and as a result of loosing lot of hard working Ants and feeding the grasshoppers, India is still a developing country!

(This was an email forwarded to me)

A face that rings in a million bucks?

I was reading the newspaper this morning and as usual the glossy paper was filled with the atrocities and grimness that has faced us recently, the usual political gimmicks, the bubble in US and then i chanced upon a grim faced Abhinav Bhindra not commenting in a column about his shooting skills but advertising in a commercial. Thus launched a question in my mind which i would like to raise here!

Well i dont have anything against celebrities making a quick buck but i fail to understand how it helps to sell a product. As an intelligent consumer i buy a product by doing the following – check the net for features about the product, ask friends their opinion and then actually check the product in the store before deciding to buy it.

So if celebrities did use the products that they so lovingly claim is the best – this would be the case – Sachin would be riding a bike to the venue of his next match, all electrical appliances in Abishek’s house would be of a particular brand just to name a few. I handle clients which have celebrities endorsing their brands and they do claim that their sales have increased because of a credibility of a particular star.

And then again there is a flip side. The particular celebrity when faced in a controversy the brand hastens to drop him or her and suddenly the celebrity does not fit the Brand Image anymore!

Personally for me, if its a star i currently like, i dont mind watching the advertsiment only to get a glimpse of him. So i am waiting for Farhan Akhtar to lend his face to a brand!

Star Blogs Episode 1: The Goofball Menace

A long time ago in a galaxy far away, Amitabh Bacchan sat down for a bowl of cereal and thought, “Hmmm, the cereal is a bit too soggy today. I should blog about it.”

He thought back on his life of misery, crime, deception and blogging. He knew he was a goofball, yet he didn’t want to accept the harsh realities of life. He remembered how he was Anichated with the 2008 Most Boring Blogger Award. He gulped down a glass of water and saw a tiny ant in the glass. “I should blog about this,” he thought.

A few people still worshiped him and from time to time, he received a fan letter praising him for his role of a drunk kid in Laawaris. He glanced over to the framed photograph that captured the stark contrast of his appearances in Laawaris and the more recent, Last Lear.

Stark Contrast: Laawaris And The last Lear

He decided to blog about it. He wrote about how he felt and how he knew that he was the world’s biggest goofball and how he wanted to make this fact known to the world, yet, not to himself. Tiny tears forced their way through his eyes and blurred his vision. In the haze, instead of clicking the ‘Publish’ button, he clicked the ‘Delete’ button, without realizing.

When he viewed his site, he obviously could not see the post. Confused, he called up the Big Adda tech support.

“Hello, this is Amitabh Bacchan!” he boomed over the phone.

“Oye, they’ve started KBC again??” asked an excited kid on the other side.

“No, you fool!” said the burnt-out actor. “I can’t see my blog!”

“Eh, what?” asked the kid.

“My blog, on Big Adda, I can’t see it! I just published it and it’s not visible on the page.”

“Eh? You blog? Since when?” asked the kid.

“What’s your name, you insolent pig?” asked an enraged Amitabh Bachchan.

“My name is Abhishek Bachchan,” said the kid.

“Abhishek, I am your father!” said Amitabh Bachchan.

“Reeee-ally?” said the kid, not at all convinced at this revelation. “If you’re my father, what’s my mother’s name?”

“I don’t remember,” said Amitabh Bachchan, making a mental note to blog about it. “Stop fooling around and help me! I can’t see my blog post that I just published!”

“I will, on one condition,” said Abhishek Bachchan. “I want to act in movies and I want to get married to that dumb-yet-hot model Aishwarya Rai.”

“Sure, I’ll make a few calls. You fix my blog!” said Amitabh Bachchan, and slammed the phone down.

He sighed and walked back slowly to his room and wore his favorite Darth Vader outfit and stood in front of the mirror.

“Not bad,” he told himself. “Not bad at all. I should blog about this.”

The profanity switch

Having read my friend and colleague, Bhuvana’s post i just had to add to it. Sometimes i get so so so pissed off with clients, colleagues, the irritating folk at my cellular service provider, the super irritating folk at my bank, that all i can do is imagine bad things happening to them and just leave it at that for want of courage to actually go ahead with what i so creatively imagine

What really irks me at work are clients that think we are completely at their beck and call. Yeah we are in public relations but give us a break once in a while guys!!!

Yesterday i was stuck in a traffic jam (nothing special about it, considering that if you werent stuck in a jam in Bangalore, its nothing short of a miracle!) and this annoying a**h*** of a driver decides to entertain himself by honking repeatedly. This despite the fact that none of the vehicles could be moved an inch.

So while i was giving angry glances at the moron and muttering curses under my breath, i happened to have a brainwave!! Why not have a special switch installed in cars, bikes, heck even public transportation that will instantly display nasty unmentionable phrases???

Just think about it: You are listening to your favourite music or reading a book (or at least, trying to listen to it over the cacophany that Bangalore’s traffic provides free of cost) and just chilling in your car at the signal and this idiot is blaring his horn incessantly. a flick of the profanity switch and voila!! choice abuses are displayed. hand gestures that are hard to understand can also be incorporated. you dont even need to look up from your book or take off your earphones and scream your guts out.

What do you think? Do write in and in the meantime, i’m accepting donations to make this a reality