Nirvana @ Sports bar :-)

Being ‘The technical support team’, most of us, most of the time, will be away at customer’s place. For the first time in years, our small team caring for big projects is at ‘home’. I mean, in our Bangaluru office.
In the era of parties for the sake of partying, this was a reason enough for us to party. So, why wait?
After a not-so-thoughtful search for a ‘hangout’ party place, our lead organizer zeroed in on ‘Sports bar @ Cosmos mall’ near Kundalahalli gate. None of us realized that the place is perfect for achieving Nirvana, until we had some ‘sports’, some ‘drinks’(bar) and ‘hung’ in ‘cosmos’ 🙂
We started from office at about 18 hrs and captured ‘before…’ pictures of ourselves. Just to know how would we look ‘after…’ 🙂

Why only pictures? There was cricket & basket ball too in the ‘before…’ category.
Some lime, some vodka, some ‘malt’, some fries, some peanuts and a few chicken wings. It took only 2 sips for a newbie to ask for more ‘malt’ & to develop fascination for vodka. By then, our brains were lubricated to chug through the topic – Nirvana. One of my friends (we had transformed from ‘team mates’ to ‘friends’) pointed out to my oath for vegetarianism under the influence of ‘My experiments with truth – M.K. Gandhi’.
“You are eating chicken again! What happened to your Gandhian principles?”
“Well, I couldn’t follow it for long”
This is when they really wanted to know what made me become a vegetarian for a brief period. In the middle of my explanation, I uttered the word Nirvana.
“What’s Nirvana?”
“hmmm, it is a state of your mind & body where in you can remain calm, still & happy whatever the circumstance is. To make it simple, you have easy access to all the worldly pleasures (bars, beaches, …), still you don’t feel the need for any of that to live happily. You are happy within yourself”
A very spontaneous reaction from a friend “that’s mental stroke!!” 🙂 🙂 That’s when we realized he was already in the ‘after…’ state of a party.

A few more definitions followed and we all headed towards the basket ball net & cricket pitch. A few basket counts, 7/10, 6/10, 3/10,…and a few runs. Everybody appeared good in their play. It was my turn to bat. I swung the bat in the air & saw it fell 10 mts ahead of me 🙂
It was time we had our last round of sipping and an ‘after…’ picture. Look at that, we were at Nirvana!

I said not Found not :-)

A tale of conversing in English with the only lady, among the hotel staff, who knew the language:

16 Dec 09, 8:32hrs, left both of my rings in the washroom close to the wash basin where I took them off to wash my hands.
Having finished my breakfast in the hotel, reached office by 9.30hrs. Just about to turn on my laptop, ah, something is missing on my fingers! Two golden rings!

Of course, the best thing anybody would have done, dial the hotel phone number.
“GuangMing hotel, how may I assist you?”. This was my understanding of their response in Chinese. Except for “GuanMing”(the hotel where I stay), I really don’t know what they said!
“This is Kumar. I stay in room 915…”
“ok ok, one moment please…” “Hello..” (call was transferred to another lady who knew English).
“hey, I stay in room 915 of your hotel. I left 2 gold rings in the washroom & rushed to office. Can you please check & confirm they are there?”
“..hm…room 915.., sorry, cold what?”
“gold rings”
“sorry, how do you spell that?”
“Ah….!” This is when I realized one of my Chinese colleagues was sitting nearby. He communicated with her in Chinese. “They will check & call you back”. Thanks to him.

9:38 hrs, my phone rings.
“Hello”
“Sir, GuangMing hotel,…”
“yes, please. I am waiting.”
“no ring in table,…”
“in the washroom, please. Close to the wash basin, please check.”
“h..ok, one moment please.”

9:42hrs
“Sir, we found not in the washroom”
To my deaf ears, it fell as ‘we found in the washroom’. An example of, ‘we always hear what we want to, no matter what the other party says‘.
“ok thanks. Please keep it in the reception. I will collect it in the evening when I come back to the hotel.”
“…in the reception, ok” (God knows, why did she say this, if she had not found the rings).

9:55hrs, my phone rings again.
“Hello”
“Sir, GuangMing hotel. we received call this number”
“I didn’t call again. that was for my rings, you already said you found it. Thank you for that”
“No sir, I said not found not..”
“what????!!!!….about 10 minutes ago, you said you found it!”
“who sir..what name of the staff?”
“phew! I don’t know. I got a call from GuangMing & a lady said they found it in the washroom”
“sorry Sir,..we found not rings in room 705”
A bolt from the blue struck me! It was ’found not’ and ‘room 705’.
“ROOM 915. PLEASE CHECK IT. I KNOW I HAVE LEFT IT IN THE WASHROOM. THE ROOM KEYS ARE WITH ME & WITH THE HOTEL CLEANING STAFF. IF MY RINGS ARE NOT FOUND IN MY ROOM, IT IS YOUR R.E.S.P.O.N.S.I.B.I.L.I.T.Y!”
“room 915..ok ok..one moment please.”
I am sure, she would not have understood anything of what I said other than ‘room 915’

10:00hrs
“Sir, two rings in washroom we found.”
“what is your name?”
“my name, Lina”
“Lina, 2 rings that you FOUND are golden rings, right?”
“yes, Sir.”
“one is green colored on top, the other red colored on top, right?” (though, it isn’t exactly red J)
“yes..”
“please keep them safe in the reception. You are responsible for them.”
“..in the reception. ok”
“yes, I will collect them in the evening”
“ok ok.. ”
“Thank you very much for finding my rings.”

After reaching the hotel at 21:14hrs, I was happy to see both of my golden rings back with me. Precious! One, gifted by my proud father, of his hard earned money. The other, by my beloved wife, of the savings from her monthly expense. (that’s my money, by the way :-))

One ‘small’ world, many ‘big’ things :-)

27 December 2009.

This year had many promises to many people. How many of them are fulfilled? Could be a boring question?!

A small celebration, to mark an end, to an eventful year that is passing out of our hands! A bunch of people, my colleagues, gathered in one of the ‘finest, affordable’ restaurants in Beijing. Planned to reach the venue at 13.00 hrs(it is a bit late for lunch in China. As far as my experience goes, most of the Chinese finish their lunch by 13.00hrs). It was just 2 days before vacation, held up with a ‘must do’ task. Two of us reached the venue at 13.45 hrs (not to maintain IST :-)). Most of them were having their last bite, a few waited for us, for one of the most important part of a luncheon. Chatting 🙂
We shared a few common events this year, having changed 3 companies while sitting in the same place! Many ‘big’ companies, one ‘small’ world. Corporate maya? 🙂

It was Christmas Eve, by the way. I had to walk about 1.5 kms to reach my hotel because of all pervasive traffic jams. I could reach ‘lucky street’ (one of the hot spots for international cuisine) much before all the BMWs, Audis, Mercs, Porshes, Bentlys, Rolce roys,… of the world could 🙂 Many ‘big’ cars, one ‘small’ destination! I could see all of them on the road, stopped, as if, it was an auto exhibition.
Beijing was sparkling with decorations in all the malls, restaurants, streets,…People awaited their turn to get a table to dine in their favorite restaurant with their near & dear ones. All the restaurants were filled with young & ‘younger looking’ populace. No wonder, China has 1/6th of the world’s population! (my country is not far behind :-)). Luckily, I wasn’t alone. A Korean colleague & I chose to eat in a Thai restaurant. We winded up the day by a walk in the Solana mall. I must admit, walking in sub -15 degrees temperature with wind blowing in my face was not easy! Still, there was no dearth of spirit among people to welcome Christmas.

My flight from Beijing to Hong Kong was pleasant enough to get a nap for 3 hours, stretching myself to the adjacent seat that was vacant. Transit time got shorter by 50 minutes due to delay in take off from Beijing. Just another hour to spend in the much familiar HKG airport (had spent 23 hrs in the past due to flight cancellation), before flying back to Bangaluru. I was thinking of another pleasant nap for the 5.30 hours of journey. But, law of equilibrium had its plan ready! The luxury of stretching into another seat was contained; I had to crouch on to 3 quarters of my own seat. My neighbor was ‘big’ enough to occupy a quarter of my seat towards his left and another quarter towards his right. A nap in 3 quarters of an economy class seat? Forget it!
I acquired a new habit to free my ears from the high decibel snoring of my neighbor. For the first time, I tuned into in-flight radio. Some of the English classics from ‘80s, some jazz, some Chinese melodies and a few Hindi filmy tunes! Of course, I didn’t understand most of the lyrics, but the music bore similar emotions. After all, it is a ‘small’ world!

Wish you a very happy & prosperous year 2010.

Chinese GPS

Nov 8, 2009.

Ever used Chinese GPS in Beijing? Think twice. You may wonder why did you take that risk!
We experienced it once. Not by choice but by chance. As usual, Anshuman, Estelle & myself finished our breakfast in Guang Ming hotel & boarded a taxi to go to Nokia office. We were in for surprise! My little knowledge of saying “Ee Jhua” (supposed to mean BDA in Chinese) didn’t work that day. So we showed the address in the visiting card to the driver. Phew! He started dotting the address on his touch screen GPS system. Wow, that’s cool. Isn’t it?

The road he took was different than the usual one. Guess what? We were thinking GPS is taking us in a shorter route than usual. After 20 minutes drive we had our second surprise. We connected to the 4th ring road to a point where we normally reach within 10 minutes of starting from the hotel!

Another 15 minutes drive, our taxi stopped to ask a passerby, “how to go to Nokia?” That’s our third surprise. And the fourth & final one was when the taxi fare was 20 RMB more than the usual!

Snowy Sunday Morning in Beijing

Nov 1, 2009.
Having seen some exterme sports action organised by the CESA (China Extreme Sports Association) the previouse night in Solana mall on the Lucky street, bumped into the Punjabi restaurant close by. Mouth watering delicacies awaited me enclosed in glass top, sensor activated, warm containers. Starting from fresh green salads, munched onto a variety of starters to placate those insatiable (?) taste buds that just go wild when our image sensors grab a high qaulity picture of the spread buffet menu.

Ok,..let’s leave the dinner at that; coming back to the subject – the plan for Sunday was to visit the Temple of Heaven, Summer Palace & buy some toys for my 2 year old toddler who always says ‘toys’, the moment he hears my voice on phone. Though the universal truth among kids is to break the toy before even knowing how to play with it 🙂

As per the plan, the alarm bells rang at 7.00 am and the morning routine done with by 8.30 am. Knowing that the whether outside has decided not to show mercy to any one confronting her without winter clothing, prepared myself appropriatley!

Oh! what a realization! One should look out of the window ealry morning to make sure the whether is conducive to venture out. Little late that I did open the window screens, just to know, I planned to be surprised :-).

From the sixth floor suite (a genie gets a suite for the rate of a room!) all the vividly colored buildings, cars, green trees, black/grey roads looked as if they are (being)/painted white. I was surprised to see cold, soft, brittle, white droplets painting everything white around me. Hailing from southern part of India where one cannot see a snowfall, I was amused by the sheer pleasure of watching one of the marvels of mother nature.

How can one resist the temptation of letting the ubiquitous cameras out from their covers to capture this beautiful scenario? Here it goes, the 5MP camera on the phone that I am working on was under test. Under a not so good light condition due to a generally cloudy, misty Beijing atmosphere coupled with snowy breeze, from an ~40 foot height, camera on my phone gave this descriptive picture, attached. A thick mould of ice, about 5 inch deep, on a car, being wiped by a man whose steps are imprinted on the snowy stairs and the white plants & trees!

Quote- Little genie said, “stupid wanderer, you planned to be surprised!”

Welcome!

Dear visitor,

Leisure Time Reading is a blog where in I express my views & experiences of few incidents in my life. If you find it informative or fun or entertaining or useful in any which way, I am pleased. Other wise, I am happy:-)

Your feedback is respected 🙂

Thanks,

Kumar