My Contemplation

"Say Cheese" is what people say when they are about to click a photo. Photographers usually instruct their objects to say cheese to make them smile. When people say "Cheese" their face appear into the shape that is similar to a smile.The simple reason why everyone want people to smile when they are clicked is that everyone on this earth looks good when they smile.

Smile on the face can be of two forms; one is natural smile and another is artificial. One can have natural smile when someone is jubilant, joyous, ecstatic, felicitous, elated, gleeful. Alright, I know its getting too complicated so in simple words, you can have natural smile when you are happy. An artificial smile appears on your face when you are sad but you have to smile or you have to smile when actually you don't want to. However, an artificial smile never make your face look beautiful, in fact it gives you a strange horrible look and sometimes even make you look like an alien.

The bottom line is we should stop pretending to be happy and start finding out the reason for not being  happy. If we cannot be happy at least we should stop pretending to be, that make us look ugly. Now that we live in the age of globalization, a competitive world surrounded by practical people we have no option left with us but to pretend to be happy. Because we always compare ourself with others and we always want to be like someone. In this race, we always forget to celebrate our present. There are many things in your present for which you can smile and cheer, there are many people who feel good when you smile, there are many things/people trying to bring a smile on your face; smile for them, smile for yourself. At this note, can you even remember when you smiled last time? Anyways lets not get into that because I know, if we can pretend to be happy we can even claim that we are always happy and can proudly bring an artificial smile on our face.

I read a book Please, Mom! It's my Life written by Dr. Jaideep Singh Chadha and let me tell you it is a must read book for every teenager and adult who thinks that they know everything. This is because we may know everything in the world but we don't know how to be happy. Have you ever thought any thing positive about Donkey? Now that I have raised this question, you will start thinking and I can bet some of you are still finding the answer. The fact is till now many of us have never thought on it and this is because we are always surrounded by so many negative thoughts in our life that we never had a time to think any thing positive about our life and our surroundings. This book will reveal such small things which we loose by grieving on what our eyes could not see. To support the above fact, there is a very famous idiom which we studied in our school days but we never implemented it - "A bird in hand is worth two in the bush." We always desire of what others have and always miss out to cheer for what we have. 

I observed many people and could narrate one example that clearly differentiates materialistic/artificial happiness and actual happiness. When you get a message about your salary deposited in your account for the first time, you obviously get a smile on your face and then you get busy with your work; again after some time when you come across the same message or you recall the amount in your salary account, can you get the same smile on your face again? No, because it is a materialistic smile that occurs only once. However, every time when you remember - the help you provided to any human being in need, to any of your friend; an elapsed time with your friends; first time when you proposed a girl/boy; your first love; a first lust-less kiss; the joy that you had when you were with your near or dear ones and such simple and splendiferous occasions in your life, you will always smile and this is the happiness which we always miss out to cheer in our present.

So forget the past, stop thinking about the future and celebrate the present. Remember, you look very ugly or  even horrible when you pretend to smile or pretend to be happy, you look fair enough when you don't smile but also don't pretend to and you look good, bonnie, clean and honest when you are happy and when you smile.

"Save our Tigers" is a campaign recently launched by "Aircel" an upcoming mobile operator in India. Aircel has partnered with WWF-India to save our tigers. Its sad that someone has to make us realize our responsibilities - a responsibility to be a human being.

There are just 1411 tigers left and now that Aircel has launched a campaign to save our tigers I guess this will make a huge difference. Many celebrities and sports stars are promoting this campaign and has supported the move of Aircel. I am roaring for them and even you can join the roar to support the tigers; our national animal need our support. To support them please visit and join the roar: Save our Tigers by Aircel.

I am supporting them because I am a human being and I very well know my responsibilities. We all know we are human being and hurting, killing or destroying is not our activity. Why do we get involved in these kind of stuffs?

A human being is the most powerful creature in this world and we as a human being are utilizing this power to destroy the world. Today its our national animal, yesterday it were trees & forest, tomorrow it will be something else and someday it could be ourself. We need to understand the basic, we need to understand the difference between the good and the bad, the right and the wrong, we need to maintain peace in this world. For saving tiger we don't have to do any extraordinary thing, we just have to be a human being. Our existence is because of this world and we need to save this world and every creature that belongs to this world. No other creature expect human being has this understanding. So what we have to do is to understand our responsibilities and follow them.

Today, we see everything from commercial angle. We only think about our profits, our increments, our gadgets, our lifestyle and all that funnels to our commercial world. The usage of bones of wild tigers for traditional oriental medicine along with the international trade of tiger skins continues to be the main reason for poaching tigers of India. Approximately 121 tigers were killed in 1995, 81 in 1999, 72 in 2001 and on an average 35 tigers are killed every year since 2005.

I don't have the data on number of human beings killed every year but I am sure the number would be worst. I hope, wish and pray that a day never comes in future when someone has to run a campaign "Save Human Beings."

One more holiday is what the corporate India is thinking on this republic day. Many must have applied for a leave on Monday so that they can enjoy a long weekend. Sat - Tuesday. This is true with almost all Indians (even I am not an exception) and for almost all the holidays or festivals in our country. Few years back I used to ask question why do we celebrate Republic day, I used to get some shocking response from people. I observed that majority never knew the answer. The reason is that during our childhood we mugged up the reason to write it in a history paper but never gave a thought on it or understood it. For those who don't know the importance of Republic day here is brief history why we celebrate 26th January as Republic day every year.

After Independence, we decided to govern ourselves. We prepared a constitution - Law determining the fundamental political principles of a government, a document which shows how the people of country will be governed. This constitution was approved on 26th November 1949 and came into force on January 26, 1950. With this India became a "Sovereign Democratic Republic."

Sovereign means "not controlled by outside forces, autonomous (controlled by the people)."

Democratic means "representing to or adapted for the benefit of the people at large (for the people)."

Republic means "a political system in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them (power of the people)."

The constitution says people of India shall be the real rulers of their country, and each citizen shall have right to "Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity". There will be no King or Queen to rule the people.

And we started to govern ourselves.

So all those who still feels that this is a mere holiday for them, think about it again. Understand what it means and try to fight for your right - Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.

For this Republic Day I tried to write a verse, but I am very bad at words and writing poems. This is my first attempt so please accept my apology for not able to make it up to the mark. As I am proud of being an Indian I thought of writing something on it and would like to publish it on my blog.

I am proud to be an Indian

                                                                             - by Bhuvan

Chetan Bhagat one of the famous young author of 4 bestselling novels - "Five point someone", "One night at call center", "Three mistakes of my life" and recently published "2 states the story of my marriage" is in the middle of controversy after the release of bollywood movie 3 Idiots starring Aamir Khan, R. Madhavan, Sharman Joshi, Kareena Kapoor & Bomen Irani directed by Rajkumar Hirani and produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra.

The movie 3 idiots is loosely based on novel Five point someone by Chetan Bhagat. If I go one year back when the star cast of movie went to IIM Bangalore to shoot for this movie since then I am hearing that this movie is based on the novel Five point someone by Chetan Bhagat. Five point someone was the biggest hit among the bestselling novels and majority of Indian crowd was really excited about the movie 3 Idiots as they had a impression of being based on the novel which they liked a lot. However today Chetan Bhagat is in middle of controversy as it is claimed by the crew of movie that Chetan Bhagat is trying to gain the publicity as movie is a big hit.

My view is that Chetan Bhagat is himself a big celebrity and he does not need any kind of publicity. His writing is enough to make him notable. His novels and articles written in TOI reveals his talent and is followed & respected by many young Indians. He has nothing to gain by getting into such kind of controversy. In fact he don't need any publicity; my personal belief is that more people in India know about Chetan Bhagat as a famous author than people who know Rajkumar Hirani as director. I found this example in my office itself - one of my colleague was aware that 3 Idiots is based on some novel by Chetan Bhagat but he was not knowing anything about Rajkumar Hirani even though he was hardcore follower of bollywood movies.

The coming year 2010 is really going to be strange for me. The reason that at start itself I got many surprises. We had a Christmas party this year in our office (this was probably the first time that I had a Christmas Party, 1st strange surprise) and we played a game in which I got a gift (an iron manufactured by Bajaj, I was really lucky to get that, 2nd strange surprise) and a message - "All your sorrows will vanish" (3rd strange message). I hope if I have any sorrows it get vanished this year. My luck never favored me in getting such gifts earlier, so indeed it was strange for me.

On 31st eve we had a another party in our office which was actually a party for all bevdaas. We had Whiskey and Vodka along with Fanta and Thums-up to welcome a new year 2010. All those who preferred hard drinks started their drink with small peck of Whiskey and later switched to their own choice of drinks i.e. few continued with pure (only) whiskey while some tried it with cold drink and other tried vodka. All non - alcoholic drinkers started with Fanta and Thums-up. I too was among non-alcoholic drinkers and had never tried alcohol in my life and reason was that I never felt the need of it. I was born & brought up in Gujarat (which is known as dry state) but I did my college in Pune where drinking alcohol is permissible. However I never touched alcohol during my two years of college in Pune (for some it must be very boring, but thats how I am). I used to go out with my friends many times and every time they offered me a drink but I never felt the need of having it and I used to accompany them by drinking cold drinks.

But don't know what was wrong with me on this 31st eve in my office when few of them offered me Vodka and I could not resist (the 4th strange shock). I tried to convince them and waited for cold drinks as it was out of my reach but I could hardly succeed in resisting myself. All my friends would be wondering why I could not resist as I used to during my college years. They will be shocked because I had never listened to them during college years on this matter, how could I get convinced by few corporate colleagues and friends. People usually gets more mature and strong as they grow up but for me it was completely different. People tend to start all these in college but I surpassing all of them started in corporate life.

But later when I gave a thought on it I came to know the actual reason for it. Let me clarify I just had a 30ml of Vodka and that too with a full glass of Fanta and so I was not going to fuddle. At the time when I agreed to have a small peck of Vodka, few old talks and promises with my friends were running in my mind. One of my friend promised me that one the day when I will start drinking he will stop drinking. Also I had a talk with another friend and she told me that unless you don't taste it you will never realize the fun or pleasure of drinking and this conversation started because at that time I was trying to help her to get rid of smoking habit. But I could hardly argue them as I had never tried alcohol and they always used to pitch in the discussion with this point. So when all these thoughts were running in my mind, one more thought leaped out of the queue and got the highest priority in my thinking process and it was: what am I going to loose or gain if I will have a small peck of Vodka. I was not going to loose anything but yes I can at least prove my point to her that there is no such extraordinary pleasure of having an alcohol and that I was true that there is no need of having it or help my  another friend to follow his promise and ask him to stop drinking.

I know my this move is not going to make any change in their life, but now at least I can strongly argue with them when any such point is raised. They will surely argue that drinking 30ml of Vodka with full of Fanta is not called drinking, but let me clarify that now I am not going to drink any more, this was my first and the last drink. Now its their turn to keep their promise, I have done my part.

I know no one will believe that only for this reason I boozed so I would like to clarify that among all those thoughts hovering in my mind one thought was in favor of tasting it "At least once in my life I should taste and feel it to know what it is?" And probably because so many different thoughts, few for my friends and few on getting an opportunity to taste it, I think I could not resist. The fact is I enjoyed the party, I enjoyed the stay of people when all were drinking and I enjoyed drinking as well (but yes it tastes like hell and I still hate boozing). Also nothing among these (fun, pleasure, people around me) would have changed if instead of Vodka + Fanta I would have had Fanta alone, the fun and the pleasure would still be the same and sometimes I even regret for that. With such as start of new year I can at least make sure that this year is really going to be strange for me.

6^th December, a date that will be always remembered as a most distressing date in the history of India for years to come. However the last 6^th December, 2009, made this date as one of the most remarkable date for few of us – SCIT Systems 2007-09. This was the most memorable day for all of us as majority of our class mate (SCIT- systems 07-09 batch) were together for the whole day after a long period of time. This memory will truly be cherished down the line. We had convocation on the same day but hardly 4 or 5 students from our class went on the venue to attend the ceremony. Its not that we were not excited about our MBA degree, but we were more thrilled to catch our friends after such a long time and more important we were seeking the opportunity to remember those good old hostel days and being together. Nostalgic you see!!!

It’s always great to be with friends… no doubt…nor can anyone debate over this…and dare not.

We were all meeting after 7 months and the best trait was none had changed; one by one everyone was taken into consideration (scapegoat) very well and their good and bad memories were brought back live before everyone. The whole day we were laughing at those, who were been selected as the center of discussion, enjoying and making fun of each other (making sure that no one takes it personally) being in limits, without hurting others sentiments.

Sharp at 10.30 in morning, Dinap (we call him “Tao” as he is known for giving advice for free) first time raised the question: “What’s the plan?” Since than every half an hour this question was raised as we always used to get diverted to our talks and used to get engrossed to our memories of blunders done during the college days…

Few to recall here:

Rohi known for his rapport with Admin (Very cool - I mean “very Sh__t_l”) used to get many of our lectures and exams postponed/cancelled…by his sweet/flirting behavior…which would suffice Rohi to sweep off her feet…hahahaha (being a CR his name should be the first one)

Subu’s lungi, his funny jokes and the most important, his creation (meaning “R_chn_”)

Mayank’s Full moon story (meaning P__n_m). Chai wala…Mak Chai was amazing. I badly miss your tea.

Venky’s Lemon Tree brownie (I am still looking out the opportunity to eat a brownie at Lemon Tree, Venky!!!)

Ingle’s chicken parts (Rahul, ye kunsa part hai?) and admiring him for watching “Radio”

Mohsin’s Thunderbird modified to Unicorn…may b Luna in few years

Rahul Singh’s “Subh__” Undergarments (Rahul Sir don’t get angry it’s just a fun)

Mayank and Manu – the tale of never ending Friendship and LOVE

Samuel’s hits (most of them were recent ones and the best one was “Spot jogging”) and his marriage. If Samuel gets married, then only we guys are eligible for marriage, this is the oath taken by System 07-09 Boys…not mentioning Girls…bcos u never know about them…

Yogesh finally got his degree correctly though his marksheets were never correct. Commonly known as “blockale” he was blocked in Convocation as well.

Samudra’s BevDas (Bevda and Devdas) Devdas bcos he lost his love -”Sharif”

My BI’s relation (more importantly with BI Ma’am); thank God they didn’t recalled “DCS”…and Fragrance (Kh_s___)

We also recalled one of the Samuel’s greatest hit of millennium and we ended up laughing boisterously:  “About IS audit objective paper where Ingle asked Samuel answer for question 1 gesturing his index finger, for which Samuel looked up.”

In between all those hilarious conversation after raising the same question for almost 20 times (I know 20 times is exaggeration), somehow by 4.00 pm we could manage to decide that we will go to “Toons” – all thanks to Sharif.

For me it was difficult to reach Toons as I had to catch the bus to return back to my place. But Tao as usual known for his experience, suggested me an excellent plan that can help me attain the fun at Toons and catch the bus on time. However to fulfill the plan Mohsin’s Thunderbird aka Unicorn had to suffer.

All said and done (this is the most used saying during the presentation in our class), we reached Toons and there we saw Mayank in cool Brown Leather Jacket making a statement for the girls out there – Beware the men are back…… Though it was looking bit funny out there but Mak that jackets suits you.  Hey guys I wonder I saw similar Jacket with Manu as well, I guess it could be MP’s style statement or something fishy between them he he he.

After the permission was granted we all set in and tried to order some drinks. Me and Yogesh were new to such place so were planning what to drink? All bevda’s ordered Beer and to the surprise Samudra was not among them. Subu and other few who don’t drink ordered Red bull the energy drink, I am sure they could have banged the table after having a sip. Me and Yogesh hardly aware of any such drinks were still struggling to decide the drink and finally an initiative taking skills started pumping (I recalled many things from this word, Rohi) out of me and asked me to order some drink called “KHUS SODA”. Yogesh has always been a good follower and so he also joined me with Khus Soda. Aiweeeeeeeee…….. it was so…………pathetic. I request Toons to stop selling it or people to never order it if you go to Toons. Venky again an exception to the list…call him “Foreigner” or “CEO”…had his own drink (Breezer). You know “Unche log Unchi pasand.”

Looking at two huge Jug full of beers Samudra could not resist any more and he finally had a peck, which was very much obvious. But something was wrong with him; he went to washroom thrice that too at interval of 5 minutes. Either he must have seen a hot babe somewhere near the washroom or his natural call was activated (Aage vala nahi peeche vala.. stop thinking weird).

Rohi and Abhishek were trying to replace Subu’s glass of Red bull with beer but they hardly succeeded. Subu is street smart no one can bit him except his best friend … Guess who???????? – The answer is “FUNNY V_j_y.” He was also one of the topics of our discussion but he not being a part of SCIT - Systems family; let’s not get into it.

All together it was a great fun meeting friends after such a long time. But all good things have to end and so was this get together. Finally having drinks and dinner at Toons we departed. Subu, Rohi, Venky, Abhishek and Samuel went back to Mumbai; Ingle, Mak, Tao, Samudra, Manu & Rahul Singh back to their house in Pune itself. Mohsin unfortunately was tied up with me so had to drive fast his bike to drop me at my bus stop. Apologies to Mohsin…his thunderbird had to suffer…a scratch or couple of scratches bcos of me.

I hope we always get an opportunity to meet atleast once a year. This post was possible because of the efforts from two people, one is me and other is Venky. He has helped me a lot (in fact contributed equally) in writing this post. Thanks dude. So we both are equally responsible for whatever we have written, if any of you feel it’s personal and think we should remove it, go ahead and let us know, but we are not sure whether we will remove it or not? he he he he. This is not to hurt anyone’s sentiments but to cherish those memories in the years to come. Also I request all those who all were part of this memorable day to contribute to this post either by posting their comments or reminding anything missed out here so that I & Venky can further add them to this post.

SCIT Systems Rocks!!!!!!!

- by Bhuvan and Venky

Everyone in India celebrates 30,000 milestone reached by Sachin Tendulkar and we all Indians are proud of Sachin Tendulkar being Indian. We all cheers when A. R. Rahman wins Oscar, when Yuvraaj hits 6 sixes in a row, when people like Rabindranath Tagore, Subrahmanyan, Venkartraman shares Nobel prize. We all, no matter which religion we follow, in which state we are located - Gujarat, Maharashtra, UP, AP, Delhi, we all celebrate the victory of India.

At one end we want to develop India globally, we are fond of globalization and want people to know more about India. We want to go abroad and make a mark on the globe and tell everyone that we are from India. Globalization has given India a great growth potential and India is certainly growing (are we?). Whatever the case but globalization has created tremendous opportunity for Indians and we are enjoying the consequences of globalization.

But if we look on the other side of the coin, then a question always beeps in my mind that do we really deserve globalization. We Indians are very double minded or two faced people. We want to be a part of other countries, state and city but we don't want others to be part of ours. We want to go US, Europe, Australia and other states and cities of India and settle there, make a mark, grow and simultaneously make India proud. But we don't want people from other State, City of India to migrate in our City or State. When some one from one state of India migrates to another for better opportunity people there don't like it, but when any one from later state moves to any other state in India or out of the country, they celebrate the success. We are not happy with nationalization how can we be happy with globalization?

People are now fighting with near and dear ones, with whom they leaved for years together. They say people staying next to them for more than 20 years, with whom they would have shared food many times, does not belong to their religion or their tribe. People now want separate state for each tribe, each religion and each language and don't want people from other tribe or religion to be the part of it. If we cannot be happy with people around us because they belong to different tribe or religion, do we deserve to be happy with globalization?

In many states and city of India people are reluctant to national language and if they heard other speaking national language instead of local language they are looked upon with humiliation. We are not ready for national language do we deserve to be a part of global language? No offense against using local language but if someone does not know the local language, can't we help him by speaking in national language (if we can do the same thing in global language why can't we do the same with national language)?

Several people in India are not allowed to visit various places in their own villages including temple or where religious ceremony is taking place. Dalits face untouchability mostly at religious places as untouchability is centered around the religion and purity. In some areas of India Dalits do have good lifestyle but in few regions its still a harsh reality. We cannot unite regionally how can we expect to unite globally?

Do you think we Indians deserve globalization?

First we need to unite regionally and nationally believe in INDIA first and only after that I think we deserve to think about globalization. If we celebrate India in all prospects by uniting in same way as we celebrated India in every Cricket Match and when some Indian wins a Nobel Prize then India will truly deserve to be one of the best country on the Globe and we being Indians will deserve to be part of globalization.