Managers and Techies

Writing this time on an old debatable topic.

Yesterday evening, me and two of my best friends decided to check out a newly opened mall near my house. These two guys were out of my city for quite sometime, both of them extremely brilliant and smart, and no wonders, both of them have gone towards management education. One of them has become a complete manager from one of the elite institutions and has just returned back home. He will be taking up an important position in a well known company. The other, my childhood friend, is half a manager. He’s in town for the summers. Ok, enough on the managers or to be managers. Its my turn now. To start with, I am a plain old techie, the straight thinking one…and thats that.

By now, most of you reading this might have guessed the what I will be penning down here. The age old Techie v/s Manager stuff.

So, as I was saying, we decided to visit the Metro Mall. None of us had been there, so the way to the mall and the mall were both blackboxes for us. But still, adventurous as we are, we decided to go on forth with the challenge.

The first point of debate came up for deciding the time to embark on our journey. Manager To Be  calls me up and says “After a week of working 12 hrs a day, I wanna go out. Lets go to some place.”

I said, “I am in no mood to do so. Today’s the start of IPL…and I don’t wanna miss the very first match..that too..a Mumbai Indians match. So lets do it tomorrow.”

“Ok..that being the case…Lets plan to go in the afternoon.” comes the reply.

“What”, I yell, “Are you crazy? Its so hot in the afternoon. Why the hell would anybody want to go out in such heat!!!”.

“I am bored and want to go out..plus I am planning to do some shopping…plus we will come back before the matches start..so no issues”.

“Ya but…its too damn hot…I think we better delay the programme till the evening.”

“No, we can go and come back”.

“Ok…”, I say reluctantly.

“Lets meet in an hour.” And call ends.

I start getting ready.

As usual, a techie thinks of whats in front of him, what he is facing. But the managers just want the job to be done no matter what the conditions be. 

A few minutes pass, and the phone rings again. Manager To Be again.

“If we go out now, we will be charred…”.

“Well…what was I saying…was that in Greek or Latin for you?”…I scream out.

“Ok, calm down…Plan mein thoda change…we will go out around 4.30 or 5 in the evening.”

“No, way..I don’t wanna miss the match…”

“Mr. Manager won’t be there tomorrow…so we better go today itself”

“Ok..lets see…call me up when you think we should go..depending on the match, we will decide…”

“Fine”, is the answer from the other side.

[Time: Evening 4.30] Phone rings again.

Its Manager To Be. “You know the match is getting a bit boring. Lets go.”

Me – “Alright, meet you at the station in 15 mins. ”

Finally, we meet and travel to Kalyan station. On the way, we had seen that the mall is on the east side. But I knew that the mall is nearer from the west end, since there is no direct road from the east side. Now, when we got down from the train, the Managers make a decision that we should be going from the east side. I tell them that we should be going from the other side. But, being Management Guys, they don’t see the logic. They just see what is available and make their decisions without consulting.

We crossed the bridge and started moving in the direction of the mall. Then suddenly, the Manager thinks that its better that we ask for guidance. And he stops and asks a third party about the way. The third party advises us that we should cross over the bridge and take a rickshaw from the other side.

And by this time, I am cursing at the Manager and Manager To Be for wasting our time and effort. Finally,we reach our destination after many troubles.

So, the moral of the story is ‘Managers, please listen to the techies and have faith in them.’

NOTE:

This isn’t a work of fiction and is infact a true happening. A sincere request to all the Managers…please don’t be offended.

Dedicated to two of my best friends (guess they will know when they read this) – My best wishes to both of you for a great career ahead.

Tree Of Fear!!!

Been some time since my last blog. Been quite busy with my cousin’s wedding.

Ghastly things have been happening in our neighbouring country. The conditions there were,are and will always be volatile. Its upto the neck now there. And now things have gone out of hands.

The Sri Lankan Cricket Team was attacked. A daring attack by the terrorists on the whole world is what I would call it.

Sportsmen are the symbol of  friendship, brotherhood and the spirit of world unity. They are the ideals which the young look upon. They are the hopes of the millions of countrymen.

Philosophy of the terrorists is quite simple. The aim is to grow a tree –

 And here’s how the gardening is done.

1. Carry out such attacks and plant the  Seeds of Doubt.
2. Water these Seeds of Doubt with the Water of Religion Differences.
3. Let the Roots of  Hatred cause cracks in the Soils of Trust.
4. Add some manure of Corruption to the Soil and the Tree grows faster.

Thats how the The Tree of Fear stands tall and then they stand back and enjoy the Fruits of War and Destruction.

Once they have these fruits in hand, they will make sure that they eat these fruits to the fullest and become healthy in every sense.

And then they move on to the next land in sight where they would create another Garden of Terrorism.

So, its upto us to stop the cultivation of such Gardens.

So be tolerant, trust each other, respect each other’s religion and cultivate love is what I think is the solution.

What do you think?

The BEST Journey(2)

The BEST Journey continued…..

U r ready to buy the ticket..the condutor is ready to give the ticket..but wait..there’s a twist in the tale…u don’t seem to have the right amount of change…well, frankly in the eyes of the conductor, the sutte paise are never quite there and they seem to be some kind of treasure which the conductor is always seeking. The Conductor will scold you for no sutte paise but then again, he will give u the ticket and return u the remaining amount. This is when u start womdering if he has all the sutte paise in the world, why is he still searching for them?

All that done…things settled…u join the hordes of people standing in the aisle waiting for someone to get up…so that u can make a beeline for the seat…but there seems to be a kind of unwritten rule which governs the laws of getting a seat..no don’t be mistaken..its not the first enter, first seat way..first and foremost…u have to be the most luckiest person in the world, second…keep ur eyes open…and when u see a seat being emptied…run for it as if u r running for ur life and u will never see an vacant seat again…So now u see, why seats are so important for all Indians…is that where all the so called netas in Indian politics learn to make a run for the kursis ..certainly some food for thought, isn’t it?

After many futile attempts, suddenly u seemed to become pious and start praying God for a seat.And out of nowhere there’s an opportunity which springs up and u grab it with both hands..and u r finally seated…and u start thanking God… The BEST teaches us to believe in God too…there now…thats an interesting lesson…

The journey continues…u wait for the destination…but thats not coming that easy.  Its time for some jam…traffic jam…long queues of vehicles, flying smoke and dust…the endless wait starts. So, this teaches to be patient…one more virtue…

Mind you, this is the best time for some introspection..u r sitting on your seat..staring out of the window..there are a lot many thoughts that come to your mind…

as visuals fly by the window, so does the flow of thoughts floods ur mind…u see a big building and u think when am I going to get a good house…u see a Honda City fly by and u think when am I going to have a posh car and what should i be doing to get it…u see a beautiful girl standing at a bus stop and u go …wow, i shouldn’t be in this bus..i should be at that bus stop with her…thats how the traffic flows in the mind…superfast, no jams, no bad roads…just smooth flows..but alas..u are brought to reality by the bus braking hard…with such brakes, even the thought flow is halted…when it comes to the human mind, one can go on and on with the kind of thoughts that zoom in and out of it..this space will seem so little if we can write down each moment’s thought…

Suddenly, u realise that its time to end the BEST Journey..u have reached ur destination…time to get off and move on with the other journeys of life. That’s it for now…and there u see it..a poster for the new film on the side of a bus coming from the opposite side…it’s a poster for ‘DASVIDANIYA’…BEST GOOD BYE ever…there now BEST does it again…it teaches u that when u r aiming to get to some position, place, or trying to achieve something in life..keep focus and u will have it…distractions and roadblocks will come but u will sail thru..

– dedicated to all the BEST employees…who do such a wonderful service to us..

The BEST Journey(1)

Its been a while now that I had wanted to post on such a everyday topic.

The travel in Mumbai’s BEST buses..

BEST has really been the backbone of the Mumbai Public Transport System.  Hundreds of the buses running round the clock … carrying lakhs of people daily… manned by the drivers and conductors doing their work most diligently and efficiently…

It was only after my graduation that I regularly started commuting on BEST. I had been a regular on the Lifeline of Mumbai ..the local trains till then. So this was a new experience for me.

In those early days, it was like learning new things with each day. Unaware of the BEST routes, I had to keep on mapping the bus numbers with the routes. With the numbers, the mind also used to keep track of the timings and frequencies of the various buses. As I think back now on this aspect of the BEST, this is a kind of an exercise which develops the brain and improves your memory. No wonder, people in Mumbai are quite sharp.

Some of the buses are crowded to their brims. Its like all of the people in Mumbai have just got one bus to travel. There is a fight just to get onto the bus….forget the wars that people really have for the seats. While boarding a BEST bus, there are 99% chances that you will hear some good expletives being hurled between 2 parties. So thats the point you get to catch up on what all you can particularly use if and when you ever get into such a fight.

Well, somehow, you are into the bus. Now’s the time to be the most alert, skillful and flexible.  You have to buy a ticket. Yes….firstly, you have to reach your ..mind you….yours and only yours pocket for ur wallet…I say this, because the bus, being so overcrowded, there’s every chance that when you put ur hand down to reach wallet, often it will go down some other’s pocket. But you have done it, u have reached your wallet. This exercise really helps you to be the most flexible and lithe, so much so that you think you will be able to compete in the Olympics against the Chinese and Russian gymnasts and win the gold for India. After all the twists and turns of the body, having stretched all the muscles of the body, u r ready to buy the ticket.

Here comes the conductor of the bus. When you are in such a crowded bus,u really think if you will ever be able to buy a ticket, coz u r at one end and the conductor over to the other end and in between there’s this whole sea of people. While the bus continues on its path and while u are still settling in with the crowd, the conductor, being the champion swimmer that he is, crosses the vast expanse of the human ocean,  and reaches you for the ticket.

(seems that I have lost count of the number of words…all the  brain juices are flowing…and still have many things to boast about the BEST…so will continue in the next part of this blog…keep watching this space for some more BEST action)

Hello Moon!!!

 This is my first blog and couldn’t find any better topic to start off…Chandrayaan touches the moon.

The Moon is within our reach!!!

 

India has been progressing on the space front and its happening quite fast…Hats off to ISRO…ISRO had promised Indians the moon and it has delivered….

India is 3rd country to have put a probe on the moon…the other two being of course the USA and Russia.

But I would like to put forward a question here…whats in there for the common man in this?

The common man who struggles hard for the daily bread, spends time in darkness for the lack of electricity, stands in long queue for a bucket of water…how will the probe benefit him?

Progress should be made..we are not against progress…but to achieve that progress and enjoy the success entirely, we need to get our basics right, isn’t it?

Some food for thought, isn’t it?