Back to basics

The other day, I went for a stroll with the cute lil' friend of mine, Kashyap. This kid wanted to go to a mall but it's too late to visit that mall. So instead, I took him to a supermarket and we were window shopping after buying a few chocolates for him. Suddenly, this guy started shouting "Whooost, uncle". I couldn't understand it and saw towards the direction which he's pointing to. There was a sale of the "Boost", a well known nutritional energy drink.
In childhood, this was my favourite but I don't remember what compelled my parents to shift to another drink "Bournvita". It's been years since I tasted Boost. So I decided to buy one this time and enjoy the flavours of my childhood. And the coincidence is, I'm writing this sipping a hot cup of Boost. Thank you, Kashyap.

India Report

As most of you know, I was just back from a short but sweet vacation in India. Surely, India has developed in giant leaps and bounds in the past few years. But there are a few things which I noticed, in this visit, to be in the same place ever since the times I can remember. Let me list some of them:
1. I was directly asked for a bribe at the Hyderabad airport as I was carrying excess cigarettes than those permitted. I was carrying 600 and the permissible limit is only 200, which I don’t know. I was told to either pay Rs 500/- as bribe or Rs 1000/- as tax. What I paid is an entirely different thing, anyway.
2. I went for a drive with my family on the main road when a police vehicle came in front of us from a sideway without any signal. What’s more annoying is that the driver was abusing my father for not slowing down and giving way for them, even though they came from the wrong side.
3. Another day, we were on the high way in our car, waiting at a signal. The signal flashed green and we started to cross it normally. We were in the middle of the road when a RTC (public transport) bus came towards us at high speed from the other side. The driver didn’t even slow down his vehicle when he saw people crossing the road. It was sheer luck that no one is injured in this incident. Maybe the people are used to incidents like this in such a way that they are able to get away just in time.
4. On the final day of my vacation, I was passing-by a flyover which’s under construction in the heart of the Hyderabad city. There were a number of child labourers working there. If it is like this in the capital of the state, imagine what might be going on at other places.

I noticed some more incidents like the above ones during my stay. India can never be called a developed country unless the government takes care of issues like this.


Note: I don't mean to degrade India by keeping "xx" in place of marks in the above picture. Inconvenience is regretted.

Rambo

I heard this dialogue yesterday but forgot about the movie that contained this one as I saw some 4 or 5 movies in the last 2 days. As far as I can remember this is from Rambo 4. Enough of crap…. The dialogue goes like this:
Live for nothing, but die for something.

Weird Habits

I’ve a sister. Not a normal one. Like God gives siblings, orkut gave me her. As she doesn’t have any work, she wrote something on her blog and tagged me too to write about the same. It’s about my six weird habits. First, the rules (this seems to be a custom):

- thebratbeanandbedlam (I didn’t get it. Got to read this one again tomorrow)
- Post the rules on your blog (Done)
- Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself (I don’t know whether these are important or not)
- Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs (very tough as Keerthakka already tagged all the persons whom I know in the blog-world, but let me find some bakras somehow)
- Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their
website.

Now the list of my weird habits:

1. I have lots of weird habits with respect to sleeping. I can’t tolerate any sounds while sleeping, be it snoring or even a person walking beside me. I wake up at even the faintest of the sounds. My roommates in engineering named my sleep as “kodi nidhra” which means a hen’s sleep. A hen wakes up at even a needle drop.
2. One other weird habit while sleeping is I can’t get sleep unless I play some games on my mobile or read some books. This one doesn’t change even if I’m too tired.
3. I like to spend lots of time with kids rather than grown-ups. I’ve kids as friends wherever I go. My latest friend is Kashyap, my colleagues’ son who loves to spend time with me rather than his parents. I just love this guy.
4. I love to watch horror movies when everybody is sleeping. Thanks to my home theatre and my neighbours, I watch them at full blast every Friday night after 10. There are lots of articles about this habit of mine in my blog.
5. I never care about my hair/dress. There are instances when I went to parties in the shabbiest of dresses and I went played cricket in brand new attires. Sometimes, I play with my hair applying styling gels and make weird hairstyles. But this habit is strictly when no one’s around me.
6. I curse my shopping habit a lot. I buy every stupid thing I like even though I know that I’ll never use it. One such article is a funky cargo trouser for which I shelled out 23 Bahraini Dinars(equal to around 75 USD). But in the end, it’s so funky that I didn’t wear it more than a couple of times.

Now, the final part of the article. As said above, Keerthakka tagged almost all the people I know through blogs. So I now tag the only one left, Deepthi, to write about her wackiest habits.

A masala filled journey to India

I just finished updating my blog with the news that I’m leaving to India on a short vacation and I’ll not be writing any new articles till I come back. But sitting idle in an airport is the most boring of all. I went for a couple of strolls in the airport but even the duty-free shops failed to ignite the spark in me. To sit idle for a couple of hours is one of the toughest things for a blogger. So I sat down in the aisle and began thinking of what to pen down to pass time. Just then, I saw a Telugu guy who travelled with me from Bahrain to Dubai. I waved towards him and gestured him to come and sit with me. He came to me and said the same old story of a villager duped by some travel agent. I ignored all that as I’ve heard it over and over with only the main characters changed. Then he said that he wanted to buy liquor and asked me to accompany him to the duty-free shop. I went along with him as even I’ve to buy some items from there. I bought my things and went to the payment counter where this guy was waiting with four bottles of scotch. I warned him that only two litres are allowed in India and he ignored my warning just like any other Indian.
Then we departed as he met some of his friends and I started listening to the just released “RACE” soundtrack. After six long hours of waiting, finally my flight to Hyderabad was announced. I boarded the flight without any interesting events and dozed off as soon as I found my seat. I was woken for the dinner(or shall I call it breakfast as it was served at 4 30AM local time) and then some conversations behind me caught my attention. One enthusiastic lady(she’s in her late twenties) was trying to start conversation with some other ladies. There was an elderly couple next to her who migrated from India to Canada. It seemed that our lady’s hubby was working in Dubai for quite sometime. Let me pen down what I remember from their conversation.

Dubai Lady: Pinni garu, meeru ekkadi nundi vasthunnarandi?

Canada Lady: We are coming from Canada.

DL: Canada aa? Aithe chaala rojulaki vasthunnaremo?

CL: Avunamma, after two years.

DL: Ayya baaboi, anni rojulu mana desaanni chudakunda ela unnarandi?

CL oka chinni smile vadhilaaru. Tharuvaatha vaalla aayanatho baathakaani modhalupettaaru. But naaku maatram adhi mana dubai aavidani thappinchukovataanike ani anipinchindhi.

DL oka five mins aagi, “pinnigaru” andhi. Dhaaniki aavida inka chachaanu raa babu annatto oka expression icchi “emitamma” andhi.

DL: meeku akkada telugu associations emainaa unnayaa?

CL: unnaayamma. But nenu vellanu.

DL: ayyo, adhemitandi? Mana desaaniki dhooram ga untu kuda ilaanti vaatiki vellaka pothe ela?

CL: udyogam lo padithe alaantivi emi important anipinchavamma. Ainaa akkada vaalla meedha veella meedha gossips cheppukovadam, cinemaala meedha discussions thappa inkemi undavu gaa. Naaku alaa time waste cheyyadam ishtam undadhu.

DL: pinni garu, meeru udyogam chesthunnaraa? (ikkada mana DL moham naaku kanipinchakapoyinaa aavida face loni expression maatram kallaki kattinattu kanipinchindhi.

CL: avunamma, statistics professor gaa panichesthunna.

DL: baabai gaaru kuda working aa leka retire aipoyaaraa?

CL: (maa aayana gurinchi nekendhuke annattu) aayanaki inka retirement age raaledhamma.

DL: oho, ainaa nenu vizag ammayinandi. Maa vizag vaallaki samskruthi, saampradhaayala meedha prema ekkuvandi. Nenu mana telugu vaallatho maatladakunda assalu undalenandi.

CL: nee peremitamma?

DL: (lolopala pongipothu) lakshmi andi

CL: amma lakshmi, ilaa antunnaanani emi anukoku. Maadhi kuda vizag ye. Ainaa nenu alaanti associations ki vellanu anna gaani mana saampradaayala meedha ishtam leka kaadhu..

Ventane mana DL oka rendu nimishaalu silent. But adhi uppena mundhu vacche prasaanthatha ani naaku tharuvaatha ardham ayyindhi.

DL: meeru serials avi chusthuntaara?

CL: indhaake cheppakadhamma, naaku naa job meedha unna interest ilaanti vaati lo undavani.

DL: avunaa pini gaaru. Kanisam cinemaalainaa chusthaaraa?

CL: amma lakshmi, chaala sepu journey chesi alisipoyaa. Konchem sepu padukuntaa.

DL: ayyo, alaa adagaala pinni garu. Padukondi. Inthakee meeru direct gaa vizag vellipothaara leka Hyderabad lo aaguthaaraa?

CL: Hyderabad lo rendu rojulu untaamamma.

DL: aithe meeku Hyderabad lo chutaalu unnaranna maata.

CL: unnaramma. Andhuke rendu rojulu untaam.

DL: adhemitonandi, Hyderabad lo andhariki chuttaalu untaaru.

Paapam, mana CL gaaru konchem ibbandhi, konchem nirasam kaligina expression petti, vaalla aayanatho “emandi, aa window seat naaku ivvakudadhaa? Nenu window ki thala vaalchi padukuntaa” andhi.

Vaalla aayana maatram seat vadhilthe manassaanti vadhulukunnatte ani gurthinchi “nenu kuda tire aipoyaa, so nenu kuda konchem sepu padukuntaa” ani chethulu dhulipesukunnadu.

Anthe, inka mana DL rettinchina utsaham tho malle modhalu pettesindhi.

DL: pinni garu, adhi prayaana badalika kaadhu. Age valla alaa avuthundhi. Naa maata vini inka ee udyogaalu avee vadhilesi India lo Krishna rama antu brathikeyyandi.

Idhi vini nenu kuda shock. Entha close vaalla dhaggarainaa ila anamu gaa manam. Alaantidhi appude parichayam ayyina aavidatho ila anaalante ee DL ki entha gunde dhairyam anukunna.

CL: amma. Nuvvu entha varaku chadhuvukunnav?

DL: nenu BSc chesanandi. Mana Krishna college lone.

CL: endhukamma mari ala egiregiri padathaav? Nenu Phd chesa. Andhuke chadhivina chadhuvuku saardhakatvam kosam udyogam chesthunna. Naaku neela serials chusthu, pakka vaallatho sutti koduthu mogudu sampadhinche vaati tho brathakatam ante assalu ishtam undadhu. Inka suthi aapi nannu padukonivvu.

Ventane mana DL silent. Appudu thana face chudalanna korikani aapukovatam chaala kastam ayyindhi. Konchem sepatlo naaku nidhra pattesindhi. Ala oka 30 minutes gadichaayo ledho, malle venaka seat lo maatalu start ayyai. Evaraa ani vinte inkevaru mana DL ye. Ee saari thana pakkana unna aavidatho.

DL: edho pedhaavida kadha, mana telugu maatalaki moham vaachipoyuntundhi ani naalugu maatalu maatladithe ela visukkundho chusaaraa? Foreign lo ellaki ellu unte alaane untundhandi. Inthakee meeru maa annayya bharya laa unnaaru. Nenu mimmalni vadina ani pilavachaa?

Pakkana Lady: sarenamma…..(anaka chasthundhaa?)

DL: Meerekkada nundi vasthunnarandi? Meeru eppudainaa DSF chusaaara?

PL: nenu oman nundi vasthunna. DSF antey emiti?

DL: Dubai Shopping Festival andi. Meeku adhi kuda theleedhaa? Asalu evarainaa sare thama jeevitham lo oka saari adhi chusi theeralsindhe.

Ilaa oka 10 minutes saagesariki naa meedha naake virakthi kaligindhi. Ee picchidhi thana paruve kaaka vizag paruvu kuda thega theesesthundhi anipinchindhi. Ventane air hostess(kathi laa undhi) pilichi vere seat unte shift cheyyamanna. Thank god, ventane maarchesindhi. Inka happy gaa bobbunna.

Hyderabad lo dhigina tharuvaatha budhigaa velli immigration counter lo nulchunna. Naa venakala US nundi vacchina oka telugu janta nulchundhi. They are in their late twenties. Vaallu vaallalo edho maatladukunte, endhuko interest kaligi vinasaaga.

Mogudu: Chi, mana pakka line chudu. Ela padithe alaa nulchunnaru. Assalu India vaallaki discipline ledhu.

Pellaam: Aunandi.

M: Andhuke ikkadiki raanu anna. Ikkada drainage kampu, rules leni traffic……… naa valla kaadhu. Chudu chudu, vaadu madhyalo ela dhuripoyaado!

P: Avunandi. Ainaa naaku maatram India raavatam ishtam anukunnaraa emiti? mee chelli pelliki kuda manam raakapothe andharu nannu blame chesthaarani vaccha. Elaago ee 15 days gadipi velipodhaam. Meeru evarini emi anakandi. Konchem temper ni control lo pettukondi.

Ee maatalu vinesariki okka saarigaa naaku thikka regindhi. Intha kante “made-for-each-other couple” ekkada undaremo anipinchindhi. Vaalla vanka oka saari chusesariki naaku participate cheyyakundaane KBC lo koti rupayalu vacchinantha aanandham kaligindhi. Endhukanukunnaru???? Vaalla venakala mana DL undhi gaa. Ventane oka verri keka veyyaali anipinchindhi. But airport kadha ani aagipoyaa.

Mellaga immigration formalities anni complete chesukuni kindhaki vachesariki customs dhaggara oka bulli godava. Emitaa ani chusthe, first naaku parichayamaina athanu. Customs vaadu rendu bottles maatrame allow chesthaam, migathaa renditiki tax kattamantunnadu. Mana vaadi argument chusthe bhale navvocchindhi. “Dubai airport vaallu ammuthunnaru, nenu konukkuna, madhyalo meeru fine kattamantaaremiti” antunnadu. Ventane manam broker avataaram etti, mana vaadini pakkaki theesukelli situation explain chesesariki naaku dhula theerindhi. Tharuvaatha customs vaadiki “paapam andi, mana vaadu akkada labour. First time India vacchaadu. Vadhileyyandi” anna. Vaadu konchem aalochindhi, sare aithe tax Rs 2000/- avuthundhi. Mee vaadini Rs 1000/- ivvamanu annadu. Mallee vaadini brathimaali oka 500 ki oppinchaa.

Adhandi, naa vacation inni godavaltho modhalayyindhi. Inka migathaa rojulu ela untaayo?

Oh God

Today morning, I was watching NDTV as I got ready for office a bit early. There was this particular news which literally shocked me. Tamilnadu govt donated a piece of land to an NGO who intended to build a school for the blind there. Everything is ok till then. The residents of the particular colony where the land was allotted are against the building of the school for two reasons:
1. It's inauspicious to look at blind people early in the morning.
2. The school will damage the reputation of their colony.
And the residents filed a case and the court promptly gave a stay order on the construction of the building. All I can say after hearing the news is "Oh God".

I'm back

Hello friends, I'm back to the blog world after my short vacation to India. All your wishes paved path for a wonderful trip. The trip was great with lots of fun and entertainment. Met a lot of relatives and a few friends this time. Fifteen days is really very less time. But I utilized it well with some out of the box things like a small boat trip with my reltives on a fishery boat in the Bay of Bengal etcetera. Ate lots of our Andhra special dishes like Panasapottu kura, Ulava chaaru, Uppu chepa kura and few others. I have lots to write about the trip but it'll take a li'l while for me to settle down here. Will update lots of details by this weekend. Till then, adeos....