Hamara Bajaj

Many of us can instantly recall the advt of the scooter company in India, Bajaj, when we hear the line "Buland bharat ki buland tasveer".
And those words were in fact true with India at that time slowly opening up its markets
and liberalization taking place. The emerging India was taking shape.
I recall my father telling me of the days when scooters, TV, cars were under governments control and you had to wait for years after booking to get one.
If you were lucky and could pull some strings, you could get one early.

Bajaj recently announced their intent to discontinue making those iconic Bajaj scooters.
I use to ride one in my early youth (college days). Now I have moved on to a bike.
We are moving on...
Bye Bye Bajaj.

Here's the Hamara Bajaj video.

The Pumpkin story

While shopping this weekend, I happen to lay my eyes on a beautiful pumpkin.
That reminded me of an old friend from Delhi. No he doesn't resemble a pumpkin but he was the one who introduced me to "Pumpkin Kootu", a delicious south indian dish from the heartlands of Tamil Nadu..
For many and to me till then, the pumpkin was a Big bland Orange blob. My friend introduces me to the delightful world of pumpkins.

So the instant I saw this beauty, I picked it up and brought it home.
Well thats when I realised that its been a long time since I have made the kootu.
So it was time for pestering my friend to part with the recipe. My persistence paid off
and finally I got my hand on it.

Well folks, heres the recipe.

1. Peel pumpkin and cut into small pieces (say the size of a cashew nut)
2. Add water and boil or pressure cook for just one whistle (don't add in pressure cooker along with dal, will get over cooked)
3. Cook toor or moong dal separately
4. Grind little bit of coconut, jeera, red chillies into a paste
5. Mix dal and pumpkin and the paste add salt to taste and bring to a boil
6. Fry curry leaves and mustard seeds and add to the mix.
You are done!

Note: If coconut is not available - add sambar powder and fried urad dal, asafoetida and red chillies to the mix.

So tonight it will be the special pumpkin kootu.
Lets hope I dont end up like this (and I am sober tonight).

On a rainy evening

Its raining and raining and raining here in bangalore.

Yesterday while returning home, we got caught in the rain and were drenched by the time we reached home.
And what did we shivering rats do ....

We had hot onion pakoda and a tall piping hot glass of tea.

You thought what :)

Now Showing: Jackwa aur Jillwa

Haven't we all recited this nursery rhyme "Jack and Jill".
Let me help you recollect it.

Jack and Jill, went up the hill
to fetch a pail of water.
Jack fell down and broke his crown,
and Jill came tumbling after.

Now imagine singing this rhyme Rap style and that too in Bhojpuri.
That is what Raju Srivastav, an Indian stand-up comedian attempted in Big Boss 3.
Here is the lyrics (and remember, sing it rap style)

Jackwa aur Jillwa ....
Jackwa aur Jillwa ....
gaye uppar hillwa
paniya bharan ke wasthe .... paniya bharan ke wasthe.

jackwa girgawa ... jackwa girgawa ....
khopdi phatgawa ... knopdi phatgawa ...
jillwa aawat ladkhadake poore raste.

Is Winter here?

Diwali has come and gone. Its the time of the year when Indian climate undergoes a change and the chill sets in. Its the time of bye-bye monsoon and the onset of winter.
But looking at the Bangalore climate, it doesn't appear so. The mornings as usual all 12 months are chilly but by 10am its blistering hot.
Where have those cool afternoons gone?
Same was the case with monsoon too. It didn't rain when it was supposed to, and rained when it shouldn't. The barren areas had ample rainfall and even floods while the fertile plains had a drought.
Is it the El-Nino playing tricks or are we having a climate pattern change, the global warming to be blamed.

With industrialized and developing countries adamant on not taking the pollution level cut and adhere to the Kyoto protocol,
Pray God save the EARTH.

Of Mud Forts and Atom Bombs

Diwali (Deepawali), the festival of lights, lamps and diyas, the festival of fire crackers, of rangolis
and also the festival of noise and air pollution is being celebrated in India and the world over.

Diwali always transports me back in time to my childhood days. How we used to wait for the diwali vacations to start. We used to have our semister exams just before diwali hols. The last exams usually either moral science or community living.
All of us used to write even after the final bell rings for other papers, but for these subjects, all would have finished atleast half hour early and would be excitedly looking around for the final bell to ring. On the final bell everyone would rush out as if there tails are on fire.

We would exchange our plans for diwali with friends, buy those crude mud bombs from outside school gate. These mud bombs were small round mud balls covered with glitter paper. They had those explosive material inside.
We used to lurk around unsuspecting victims and throw the mud bomb hard near there feet. The tiny explosion would cause them to jump like crazy much to our amusement.

Holidays at home were fun. It involved helping in cleaning the house, sometimes painting the walls too. Help mom prepare sweets (many of them disappeared during the making), then putting up the diwali lights.
A couple of days before diwali we used to shop for crackers and earthen diyas.
We would have much disagreement whether or not to buy bombs (atom bomb and hydrogen bombs). Rockets were a strict no no. Dad always feared that it may go fall inside someones house.

And for us kids, after all this helping parents stuff, we had the fun thing.
That was to build the mud fort. All we used to care was to build the best, biggest and tallest fort in our area.
A day or two before diwali, group of friends would set out with tools to gather soil,
water then, stamp on them to make a nice smooth dough. Then we used to collect whatever scrap we could like wood pieces, cardboards, old news papers etc.
Next was to plan the fort. That took considerable discussion to finally reach the conclusion on how the fort should look.

The hardest was to assemble the thing, but it was a passion which everyone took mighty seriously.
We used to work through the afternoon, sometimes even forgetting lunch to build the dream castle. It took a day or two to dry up and ready for diwali explosion. Till then we had to protect it from predators (read other groups) from damaging it.
But now when I think about it, I dont understand why we took so much pain in making and preserving it when on diwali day we used to fill it with atom and hydrogen bombs (crackers) and see it blast to pieces.

Another of our pastime was to buy toy pistols. We used to get roles or dots with small explosive charges. The pistols used to ne loaded with them and we run around playing chor-police (thief and police).

Ooh how I miss those days. I feel so sad for the young crops of today. They dont have space at all to do these things. They are now confined to the house and virtual reality, maybe playing these games on there comp.
But sadly they do not know its such fun to be out there playing and create the mud forts and bursting them with atom bombs in real.

Heres wishing all you guys a very happy diwali. Have a fun filled diwali.
amen.

Can I borrow a Jack

Heres the next article I promissed to publish.

Long ago I read an article in Readers Digest. I think I was titled "Can I borrow a jack".
Then it was just a read. But now its more like a lesson in anger management.

The article goes thus -
Once while returning late in the night, at an isolated location, the car tyre of Mr. X gets punctured. He has a spare tyre but is not carrying a jack.

While contemplating on what can be done, he sees a light far away. The light is like a god send in this isolated location.
He decides to walk down to that house to borrow a jack.
On his way, he is thinking this over. He shall knock on the door and politely ask the owner for a jack. On explaining his plight the owner should give him the jack. But its so late in the night. He will definitely will be disturbing them. What if they get angry. He should apologise he thinks. Slowly he starts to get irretated. they should help a stranded person and not get angry he thinks.
But what if they dont open the door at all or refuse to give him the jack and ask him to go look elsewhere.
These thoughts are going-on in his mind and he becomes really furious by the time he reaches the house. He knocks on the door and a friendly looking man opens the door.
By then this guy blows his tops off and shouts that he does not need his jack and turns away.

I have this habit of contemplating a situation and run it through me head (like the guy in our story).
And many a times I find myself in a similar situation. Well I remind myself then "can I borrow a Jack".

Put the glass down

I recall reading a couple of articles long time back. but these articles have had a profound impact. I shall write them in parts.
The first one I remember was something on the lines of work-life balance. Well we know how hectic our lives have become. Even after a 12 hour work day, we tend to carry some more work home.

The article goes thus -
A professor and his students are having a discussion.
The prof picks up a glass of water and asks his students how much would this weigh.
Well the students cant gather where the prof is going to but try there best to reply.
There answers vary from 100gm to 600gms.

After hearing them out, the prof explained. The weight of the glass depends on how long you hold it.
Says the prof, If I hold it for 1min, the glass may weigh 200gms, but If i hold it for an hour or two, I may feel it weighs much much more.
And imagine If i have to hold the glass for a whole day. I may have to be taken to the hospital.

Well, the same fact applies to work as well. After a hard days work, if we carry the sack of work home too, the burden keeps on growing and one day we might not be able to carry it anymore or our back will break.

People tend to take the uncompleted work home. But they forget that they will miss the quality time one
gets to spend with the family and the loved ones (and these days its so very little).

So whenever I leave from work and get tempted to carry some home, I tell myself to "put the glass down".

Cloud of water vapor

I happened to watch a Q&A session between Ed Zander (erstwhile CEO of Motorola and erstwhile president of Sun) and Larry Ellision (CEO of Oracle Tech).
A wonderful and informative session. Among the things discussed were Larrys passion for sailing, Oracle and Sun, future roadmap and Cloud computing.
Cloud (computing) is water vapor says Larry.

You can watch the youtube video here.
Its an hour and a half so watch it when you are free.

Chiropodists and Podiatrists of UK

Britain's trade union congress have proposed a ban on the "killer heels". See here.


It got me thinking why all this ruckus. Well I realized when I tried and could stand on my toes for a mere 10 seconds. Just cant imagine how our women counterparts carry themselves 5-8 hrs a day on those stilettos.


Is it that they want to make a fashion statement or rise above oneself (philosophically haah), do they undergo this painful ritual ever day.
Or does it have more of a sexist overtone, the men of yore being responsible.

This is what wikipedia has to say.
Till then happy stiletto'ing in your "killer heels".

Roaches roaches everywhere

We are have a roach-infestation at our place.
The huge ones are few. Guess they are all hiding in there underground heaven and producing the
litter by the millions.
The tiny tots and the teenagers run around everywhere, like its there playground.

Few suggestions I received to wage a war against the roaches, I thought of sharing with you guys.


Suggestion 1:
=============
Mix wheat flour and boric powder and prepare a dough of it.
Boric powder to wheat flour should be in 1:4 proportion.
Make small balls of this dough and place it in different locations where
you find such small cockroaches.
The cockroaches will go away in few days. You will have to repeat it
every few months when cockroaches start appearing again.
Refer here for more info.

Suggestion 2:
=============

Use any of these options-
(1) Chipcon Bagho original Rs40/- for 80 grams gum/paste.
 It is basically cockroach repellent. You have to take small amounts and stick it at the corner, replace small amounts for every three months. No hassle to clean.

(2) Maxforce IC, House hold insecticide filled Injection pack, Cockroach gel Rs450/-.
 No smell, no hassle to clean, no question of spray, It looks like fevicol, Inject a small amount at the corner.

(3) Responsar(Bayers), insecticide/cockroach controller, 1 liter bottle Rs750/-.
 No smell, dilute with water and spray.

(4) Roach Ex, Rs1200/- for 1 liter.
 It smells, dilute with water and spray. Cockroach controller, normally apartments uses this item.

(5) Boric acid is the best to control pests in the rice, Mix boric acid with rice and store for months. While cleaning the rice it goes.

Where to find these?
Item (1) and (5) are distributed through medical shops.

Others are available at pesticide shops.
OR
S.V.RANGASWAMI and co,
Narasimharaja road, K.R. Market
Phone no: 222-39774.
After town hall, behind 'last but one' busstop to K.R.market.

Suggestion 3:
=============

Best is "Knockroach". You will get in all M.K.Ahamad Retail shop.
 It will look like a white tablets, place them in a corner wherever you find more cockroaches.

The E-Vantage

Recently, the world heralded the e-age by celebrating the 40th year of the advent of the internet.
From a modest beginning in the research labs of America, what we have now is nothing short of a Genie of the Arabian nights tales.
A vast resource of everything, an avalanche of information at your fingers tip, e-banking, e-business. It has the good, the bad and the ugly.

The ugly is what used to scare the daylight out of me. Anything involving online cash or credit transactions was a strict No No.

But recently I used a cool e-shopping portal E-grocerymart.com to buy home needs. Actually I was forced and coxed into using it as it happens to be of an acquaintance of mine.
This portal is actually good and to have my grocery needs delivered home and moreover on-time is super na.
And the best part was I paid on delivery :)

Then I scouted around to check portals offering similar services.
But many a things I found different and useful here was
- Save for later option (add on to the list as and when you remember stuff to buy).
- Selection of date and time of delivery of your convenience.
- You can even pick up your order from the store if you so wish. They claim to have your order ready by the pickup time. Need to check this though.
- For people staying abroad, can place order for your loved ones (old parents) who don't wish to be too adventurous and venture to a store.

You can check out e-grocerymart here. Presently the services are available in Bangalore and Hyderabad only.
Well guys, check it out.

Onam PoonOnam

Onam, the harvest festival of Kerala was celebrated with much aplomb throughout the world.
Me had a grandiose celebration here in the IT city of Bangalore. This was the first Onam since moving in to my new home. That added the zest to the celebration.

We made the much famed pookalam and had the grand Onam sadhya (lunch). The lunch was a vegetarian affair with about 8 different veg accompaniments (curries), sambar, rasam, and the yummy payasam.

What I like about Onam is, it is not tied to any particular religion, but rather a multi cultural, multi religious affair. Irrespective of the religious leanings, every malayalee celebrates Onam wherever S/he is. And this festival doesn’t have any political undertones too.

Heres wishing all a Happy and prosperous Onam. Lets pray we have a good harvest and offset the drought like conditions our country is facing.