Holy Smoke!!

Yesterday I accompanied my roommates for a round of apartment searching. For the last 1 year we've been living in this amazing town house pretty close to our place of work. Now our contract has expired, we're forced to look for a new place. Not only that, its also because I will be moving out of Florida pretty soon. :-(

Its a fallout of the bleak outlook given by Motorola (my Indian company's client), which has asked many of the third-party contractors have been asked to leave. I'm one among those unfortunate who fall into that category. No, I don't intend to post about that in this post. Maybe I'll post about it later. By the way, no worries...I still have my job with my Indian company. (One of the joys of sub-contracted labor..I guess) :-)

So, we hired a car from our favourite (because its the nearest - about 4 miles from our house) AVIS and set off. We finalized on an apartment which was rather pretty and the patio was overlooking a small man-made pond. Not only that the rent was nearly 400 USD lesser than our current house. I'm glad that although I might not get to stay in the new apartment, my roommates allowed me also to be a part of the decision making process. :-)

Anyways, so as we were driving back, a car passed by us and I just happened to look into the passing car. I saw that a lady was driving the car and another lady was sitting next to her and there were two kids in the rear seat of the car. Both our cars stopped at a traffic light and I saw that the lady in the co-driver's seat was actually smoking. I was livid!!! The point of the post emerges!!!

You have kids sitting at the back of the car and you - being so educated and aware of the ill effects of smoking - are still smoking. Kids being kids will definitely see that and might get tempted to try it out. Wow!! you're setting such a great example for the kids sitting in the backseat.

The first time I became "aware" of smoking would be around the 4th or 5th standard/grade. My uncle WAS a chain smoker. I emphasize the word "was" because he says he's now rid of the habit. I emphasize the words "he says" because one can never be sure with addicted smokers that they've actually stopped the damn thing!

I've been brought up in an environment where I've been taught that tobacco is bad for health. My dad does not smoke, does not drink, but he chews tobacco. My mom - a complete teetotaller. Of course her upbringing was very strict and back in the 60s/70s these vagaries were not as accessible to the youth as it is now.

During my school days, I also remember a TV advt, a rock song sung by Gary Lawyer, (dont remember the full advt, only the last phrase, perhaps the most important ones) which goes - "Then I realized I had paid a price, with a cigarette in my hand, I was a DEAD man". The picturization is also awesome, until before the last phrase, its shown that a human hand is holding a burning cigarette and when the words - "DEAD man" were sung, the hand changes to a skeleton. MAN!! that perfectly conveys what you intend to inform.

So all throughout my school days the words "Smoking is bad" echoed through my ears. I entered junior college and I was ragged in the college canteen. One of my seniors smoked and to show off his so-called seniority blew out all the cigarette smoke on my face.

I coughed badly and could not control at all. I just could not stop. I could not stand up straight. My eyes had become red and my cheeks too. I could not breathe properly. Seeing me struggling so bad, the seniors panicked and ran off. My friend then brought the canteen owner who helped me on my feet, made me lie down on one of the tables, washed my face with cold water and also gave some to drink. I felt much much better.

That day I resolved that I will never ever smoke. A resolution which I am yet to break!

During my passage through junior college, engineering college, post graduate diploma, and now nearly 7 years of work, I have known a lot of people who are addicted to smoking, but I absolutely HATE it to the core. Now, thinking back, I'm so glad that the college ragging incident happened to me. Its because of that incident that I didnt get tempted into trying smoking. I'm also glad that none of my friends forced me to try it, but at the same time I've been strong enough to resist all temptations.

I also have strong feelings about others smoking in my presence.

• I hate people who smoke when they're eating.
• I hate people who smoke in front of kids.
• I hate people who smoke and blow out the smoke in my face.
• I hate people who smoke in my car.

I make it a very strong point not to allow any tobacco when anyone is sitting in my car.

In fact one day when I picked up dad from his work, he asked me to stop in front of a pan shop. I stopped and he bought some tobacco and put it in his mouth. Before he stepped into the car I told him to spit everything out otherwise he cant sit inside. He just laughed it off and sat inside. The moment he did this, I got absolutely livid. I pulled out the keys and told him, unless he spits out the whole tobacco or finishes eating it, I am not going to drive. I just walked off with the keys. Finally, he relented and he spat out everything and after that we drove off.

Like with my dad above I sometimes go to the extreme to get my friends out of the smoking habit. This leads to a big tiff between my friends and me. For example, some days earlier I had an argument with my friend about smoking. This guy smokes 7-8 cigarettes a day. One day he got a call from his wife and before he started to speak he cautioned me not to mention about his smoking.

After his call was over, I asked him whether his family knows that he smokes. He said they dont. I asked him why does he not tell them. He got pissed and asked me why do I not tell my family that I visit strip clubs. My reasoning was simple, visiting or not visiting strip clubs was a "Moral" issue. It doesnt harm your body in any way. Just harms your pocket. ;-)

Smoking on the other hand ruins your lungs. I told him, I can earn back the money I've spent on strippers and strip clubs, but he cannot "grow" his lungs once they are ruined, can he?? God forbid, if he's diagnosed with some serious medical condition and his family comes to know of his smoking habit then, would it not hurt his family?? Next I asked him, what will he do if his wife also hides the fact that she smokes, from him. His answer was he has full faith in his wife. So I asked him, doesn't his wife have full faith in him. He said yes. Then I said, so by not telling her that he smokes, he's commiting a breach of faith.

I asked him what if he becomes a father and his son finds out that his father smokes and starts smoking taking inspiration from his father. At that time how can he ask his son to stop smoking when he himself is setting a bad example. For all these questions, he just retorted back for arguments' sake.

The way the conversation proceeded, made me realize that ultimately its the individuals' choice. They can live their life in good health or they can **** it up. So now-a-days I refrain from such debates. All these people who smoke just look for an excuse to delay their abstinence. People say, I'll stop smoking when I get married, when I become a father and blah...blah...blah. Very few people actually do it when the time comes.

So any of you guys who smoke are reading this, its my humble plea to you all. Stop smoking. Make life easier to live for yourself, your family and every near and dear one around you.

My Tryst With Go 92.5

This post is about the now-no-longer-existing FM radio channel Go-92.5 and how I used to adore it. Its gone now and I certainly am definitely gonna miss it when I go back to Mumbai.

I dont quite remember when was the first time I heard it or who initiated me to it, but I do remember listening to it regularly starting 2003. The one thing that made me get hooked on to it was English music. It was the only FM channel in Mumbai to regularly play English songs. That naturally suited me because I like English songs more than I do Hindi.

Coming back to 92.5...I remember it was the cricket world-cup and all RJs used to talk about it. There was buzz all around about how well India is doing and that this might be a second time coming. It was also when for the first time half-celebrities (like Mandira Bedi) were initiated into the pre and post match telecast. I remeber in one show, this bimbo (yeah..thats the perfect word for her) was wearing a spaghetti top and a transparent black saree revealing half her cleavage to the whole of India. Yuck!

Okay sorry for the digression, I remember distinctly one evening I was listening to this show called "Horn OK Please" hosted by RJs Jak and Jaggu. There was some talk going on about if Mandira Bedi were to be removed then who would it be and they had asked opinion to the listeners. The listeners could SMS their opinions to a certain number. I thought I'll just give it a try and I sent an SMS saying JAK (the other RJ who had a very sweet voice) would be the best person.

After a few minutes, I'd forgotten about the SMS and just concentrating on driving when suddenly Jaggu read out my SMS...Live on Air!!! I was so elated and ecstatic that I forgot I was driving and almost banged my new car. For me that was it - THE KILLER BLOW. I had listened to number of channels and I'd sent numerous SMSs to these "other" FM channels but none were read out on Air. But this one did and instantly I almost felt like a celebrity. :-))

Mid-2003 I was on an official assignment to Germany and hence a break in my FM listening and when I came back to Mumbai after 7 months (in December), I saw (rather heard and realized) that JAK was no longer with Go-92.5 and Jaggu had begun to host the morning show along with Tarana. The show was called "Good Morning - Mumbai".

The evening show was being hosted by Malini. The name of the evening show is rather catchy. "Horn OK Please". Anyone who's driven in Mumbai would immediately realize that when you're driving and you're in a traffic jam stuck behind a truck, these are the exact words that you would read again and again and again until you got out of the jam or you overtook the truck.

There are 3 things I liked about Go-92.5 - the music (good mix of hindi and english), the amount of user involvement and interaction, the RJs. I think for an FM channel to be really successful, you definitely need these three things.

I loved the user involvement and interaction. I used to send a phenomenal number of SMSs. I can safely say that atleast 60-70% of my SMSs were read out on AIR. No Kidding! I am not exaggerating or boasting . Its the truth and I became an expert at the art of typing an SMS while driving. Thanks to Nokia and predictive text of course. :-) I regularly used to send traffic updates. I remember, once there was this huge traffic jam and vehicles were moving at a snail's pace due to the amazing number of potholes and I sent a message saying "There are more potholes on this road than the number of pores you can find on a single slice of bread". And this was read on air by Jaggu in the morning show.

I participated in lots of contests run by them and I won prizes in 3 of them. One contest was that you had to narrate your experience of being stranded at an airport. I SMSed this incident that I experienced when I was coming back from London to Munich and I won 2 tickets to watch the movie "The Terminal" at Regal.

In another contest I had to sign up for a contest where you had to speak about your interests, activities, hobbies and the listeners would guess your age, occupation and your sun-sign. The RJ Malini selected me for this and for the first time I was on Radio, On-AIR. Quite a number of people guessed right and I won a Go-92.5 umbrella. :-)

In the 3rd contest - and this was the funniest of all - there was this song snippet which Tarara (RJ for Good Morning Mumbai) hummed an instrumental tune and the listeners had to guess the song and complete the tune (instrumentally). The contest was called "Aao Guess Karen". I messaged in saying the tune was the "Tom-And-Jerry" tune and I can hum it. A few minutes later, I got a call on my cell, it was from Go-92.5 and it was Jaggu and Tarana. I was absolutely over the moon. They asked me to stop driving, pull over and asked me if I could do it on air. I emphatically answered yes. They put me on air and I did it. They burst out laughing and later Jaggu said - "you've guessed the tune wrong but for you being a sport, we'll give you two tickets to watch a play at the Prithvi theater".

I also participated in another contest where you had to select a subject of your choice and you would be asked 5 questions and if you answer them correctly you'll be given a prize. I got selected for this one too and I was on air, but I didnt win. :( I got nervous here. My topic was world capitals and I screwed up bad. I was asked the capitals of Kenya, Indonesia, England, Thailand and Vietnam. My answers were Dar-Es-Salam (wrong), Djakarta, London, Bangkok and Ho-Chi-Minh City (wrong). The right answers are Nairobi and Saigon.

There were innumerable times when I sent a message to have them greet someone and my SMS was read out. I have a very good friend, she used to work in my firm in Mumbai but later she left. This one time (I remember American Pie when I mention these words ;)), I dropped her in my car to her house and I thought it'll be fun to send a message to the radio station and greet her. So I discreetly did and she was pleasantly shocked! It was awesome fun.

I've also many-a-times requested for songs and they have been played. I remember when I'd requested the song "Kiss From A Rose" by Seal and it was played. I was overjoyed. I adore the song and whenever I listen to the song, I just pause whatever I'm doing and just enjoy it. It's sung so beautifully.

I was so addicted to the channel that when I came to US in 2005, I used to listen to snippets of the shows on their website and relish hearing the voices of my fav RJs. For full 2-and-a-half years, the channel was an integral part of my daily life. Be it driving to work, driving back from work, visiting friends during weekends, going out with family, only one FM channel used to play in my car.

In early 2006, they decided to do away with all English and started playing only Hindi songs. I was absolutely devastated. Now, after this change, I no longer visit their website and no longer keep track of which shows are being hosted by which RJs.

I miss those old days of driving and listening to Go. I wonder if they'll ever come back.

Surviving a Nasty Scare..

Last weekend was a horrific nightmare. In the recent times (read - last 2 weeks), I'd been lazy in calling up home and my phone call frequency decreased steadily from twice a day after I came back from my sister's marriage to once a week (last week). So, to make that up, I called up home again on Saturday.

Talking to family always rejuvenates me and I feel charged up for the next couple of days atleast. This time it wasnt so. After talking to Mom and Dad, I felt I should be with them. I felt I should just shun everything here and just go back home.

I knew that Mom wasnt feeling well the whole of last week. Actually she has not been feeling well since my sister's marriage got over (last 5 weeks). She got sore throat, chest congestion and dry cough which subsided a little bit. Then sometime (3 weeks) back she got some kind of ulcer in her mouth which resulted in an inflammation and it become so bad she wasnt able to open her mouth to talk. That got cured and then the cough started re-occurring. The whole period I used to call up regularly.

Now, after 3-4 weeks when the cough did not subside, she went to her son-in-law (my sister's husband, who's a chest specialist) who advised her to take some X-Ray. The report came and my sister's husband (I'm still hunting for the relationship word) told my dad that something might be wrong here and he advised mom to take a CT scan.

I got to know of this last Wednesday when I made my usual call and I pressed for them to get the scan done ASAP. I called on Saturday to find out about the CT scan report and Dad told me that my sister's husband is suspecting Tuberculosis. I was shell-shocked! I didnt know what to say. Also, dad told me that mom doesnt know about it. I'm all the more flabbergasted. Dad said that the report will be shown to the senior doctors on Monday and further details would be available then.

I spoke to my mom and she spoke to me coolly and I was treading on a knife-edge here...in complete two minds whether to mention this to her or not. On one hand I know that she is a very very strong lady - she has shown immense resilience to overcome all hardships, but on the other hand I dont know how she'll take this news. Ultimately, my discretion prevailed over my valour and I kept mum.

I was eagerly waiting for Monday to come. I spent two sleepless nights on Saturday and Sunday just praying for everything to become normal. I called up again on Sunday to speak to her and she was coughing badly and I told her to take a rest. I couldnt help but think the ominous. Call me a pessimist, call me negative, the thought crossed my mind. I searched about TB on the internet, its symptoms and it seemed to fit. I was scared.

I've never waited for any morning more eagerly than Monday morning. I called up dad at 05:00 am EST and I wasnt able to get through to him. Dad had already told me that nobody at home knows about this condition. I tried my sister but she wasnt reachable either. I was getting restless. Reluctantly, I got ready to go to work. I tried dad once more and I could reach him. He told me that there was nothing to worry and the senior doctors have said it cannot be TB. I WAS RELIEVED!!!!

Apparently doctors said that its just some bacterial infection and they're keeping mom on antibiotics. I spoke to mom and her voice sounded angelic (if there's such a word). I've never been happier speaking to her. I told her that the doctors were suspecting TB but they've ruled it out. She said to me that she was confident that it wasnt TB.

I was stunned!! I asked her how did she know and she said some 10 years back when she had such a bout of cough she went to our family doctor and told him to perform a TB test which finally had come out negative. So she said she was suspecting the same thing now, except that it lasted longer than that time. I was in 7th heaven hearing her voice being almost normal. Mom told me that the new cough syrup which the doctors prescribed is more effective than the earlier ones.

So, finally, after a couple of days of despair and insecurity, I'm rejuvenated again. I just hope and pray that my mom gets over her cough and her infection soon. May god bring her back to good health soon. Amen!

New Look...

Its finally happened. The layout revamp. Had been stuck with the old layout for almost a year and had gotten bored of it. Each time I visited my blog, I felt as if the blog is screaming out to me to give it a new fresh look. Being the laziest bum on planet earth, I was postponing it endlessly until my eyes could take it no longer.

Okay so here's the logic behind the revamp. I love green. It gives me a feeling of freshness. The sandal background gels pretty well with the green all around and of course there's white the purest of all colours. Or is it a mixture of all??? I ask this question because it just occurred to me that black is not a colour in a real sense. The absense of any colour is what is "defined" as black. Anyways I digress. The sandal-green combination reminds me of a thick foliage consisting of young fledling tree saplings just planted, with their sandal coloured barks and fresh green leaves.

Apparently eye experts all around the world share this opinion that of all colours that exist in the world, green is the most soothing to the human eye. Scientists have now mapped the "colour response" of the human eye and have found that the response peaks for green and tapers down as we go away from green on either side.

Maybe god knew about this and hence created all the plants with green leaves. Well, this statement is actually false because if you actually look at how life evolved on earth, the plants came first and then came humans. So maybe god gave us eyes to be in tune with nature and admire it. Ooops, I digress again...going from science into deep philosophy. Oh Moi Gawd.

Anyways, back to the topic, I spent two-and-a-half hours manipulating and modifying the template, chosing the colours I need and then also played around with the basic template, removed some stuff that I didnt like in the original template. Searched for specific CSS (Cascaded Style Sheets) properties so that I could apply those to my template so as to get my desired look. And finally this is the end result.

I also spent a huge amount of time researching on the colour response until I found a graph which I have added here. All-in-all a total of 5 hours spent on "blogger.com". Not in vain I hope. As I sign off this blog entry, I wonder how long will this template remain before my eyes get tired of it. ;-)

Tell Me Your Dreams...

No, this is not a book review of the Sidney Sheldon bestseller. Actually far from it. This is more of a continuation from where I left off from the Mind Reading post.

It is so very very interesting to understand the working of the human mind. It plays awesome tricks and creates some illusions which it knows will have an effect which will last much after the desire is experienced. Not only that, the mind is so devious that - in creating the illusion, it somehow uses your deepest, ardent unfulfilled desire and manipulates it in the illusion.

Okay so you think whats my point here? Let me cite you some examples which I've experienced.

A couple of years back there used to be an FM channel which was being aired in Bombay by the name Go-92.5 FM. I used to love the channel. I was addicted to it and completely into it - of course one reason was that they were the only channel which played a good mix of English and Hindi music. Even the RJ-ing of the prime-time programmes was in English which suits me just fine because I normally prefer English to Hindi.

I used to listen to the station from Mon to Sat. I loved the morning show. It was called Good Morning Mumbai and used to be aired from 07:00 am to 11:00 am by two RJs, Jaggu and Tarana. They were hilarious and made an awesome pair. I also participated in some of the contests they ran and also won a couple of prizes.

So everything was hunky-dory until one fine morning in 2006 they decided to go ALL HINDI. There was a huge public out-cry. There's also an online petition and if you're interested please click here. I was pretty upset to know about it and of course I signed the online petition. In the deepest corner of my mind I knew that I adored the channel and felt really really sad that it had become a Hindi-Only channel.

Now, a couple of months later I woke up from a very startling dream and as soon as I came-to, I just laughed my heart out. Why?? The dream that I had was related to this above incident. I had a dream that one morning I come to know that the FM channel has decided to become Hindi-only channel and my favorite RJ's Jaggu and Tarana were no longer hosting the morning show together.

So I become so enraged, that I barge into the office of the Radio Station and storm into the room from where the broadcast was happening. I can see both Jaggu and Tarana sitting and chatting about they being separated and I just slap them hard not once, not twice atleast 4-5 times. They are shocked to see my behavior and call the studio guards who then try to subdue me.

I kick and wriggle like crazy to get away from their grasp and thats when I feel something hit my head and I scream and my dream is broken. I find that in all the wriggling and the excitement I had banged my head against the wall and thats why my head hurt.

This is just one such example of how the mind manipulates our desires to create an illusion. I've had many such dreams.

Before coming to the US, I used to work for another boss and because of this new assignment, I reported to a new boss. I used to admire my old boss and always nurtured this feeling of going back to working under her. She is a lady of very strong character and dedication and she's always given me good support. Of course my new boss is also good but since I had started of my career under my old boss I always wanted to work under her.

So one night I had this dream about my old boss calling me here in the US and asking me about my present work. She tells me about an opportunity of working under her and I promptly answer that I am ready to join her project immediately.

Now I don't exactly remember how the dream got broken but then when I woke up I realized that I had this dream and again just smiled.

It is unbelievable how the mind "knows" about our desires and manifests our dreams based on our desires. Its fascinating. Mind-Blowing!!