Just a short drive from Mysore is the village of Bylakuppe. It is an inconspicuous detour off the main road. The town is called Kushalnagar that can be best described as Little Tibet. The town is home to the Namdroling Monastery which has over 5000 Tibetan monks and nuns.
I moved to Bangalore last October. To be interviewed for the city's website mybangalore.com was the equivalent of the neighbors peeking over the fence to check how you are settling in. It just feels good. That is just how I felt when Dhanusha Gokulan spoke to me. To be counted on as a Bangalorean felt good. The conversation was free flowing - from books to my meeting with the Dalai Lama in Dharamshala, India. Just what was it like to meet His Holiness, she had asked. The fact that you do not know what to say to someone of his stature. Seriously, can you think of one really smart question to ask?
Take away this ritual of NYRs and you have a greater chance of improving the level of honesty of the masses. The world needs flawed people like me – in urgent need of making resolutions. Heck most of us know just exactly what improvements we have to make in our life. Why wait for the stroke of midnight of the New Year to start doing what we should have been doing anyway? Who needs more broken promises? Here I am – resolution free and loving it. I like the freedom from guilt and broken promises. Any takers?
These were two memorable days spent meeting my classmates from the batch of '84 at XLRI, Jamshedpur, the B-School (see photo) where I was a student. We were all having a grand reunion back at the Alma Mater. The last few months have been spent by the enthusiastic organizers of our batchmates trying to trace out every friend now liberally peppered across the world. Some have turned entrepreneurs, some are stay at home parents, some of them are leaders of the corporate world. It was if anything, a time to change and a time to celebrate.
How do they start their novel? Do they need to think about the opening lines and closing lines?Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk agonizes over the first line – rewriting it 50 or 100 times.John Irving begins his novels by writing the last sentence first.Do they plan out their novels or do they just write and stuff happens* Plot and story structure is all very planned for Pamuk* Ondaatje says he does not even know what the next sentence will be.* Margaret Atwood starts with a rough plot which is usually wrong.* Colum McCann prints out a chapter or two in large fonts and then take the stapled pages to a park to read. He uses eight-point Times New Roman, while he edits dialog because that forces him to squint at the tiny type and read the lines carefully* Anne Rice will spend a year or two researching a book before writing the first draft. She edits continuously as she writes.
Webneetech.com is interviewing bloggers especially those who can share the secret of how to quit your day job and start making money by blogging. I am very jealous of people who make money in this fashion. If I am unable to do it, how can someone else do it - kind of jealousy. Or is that called envy? What's the difference between the two? Anyway... they asked me about my first blogpost and why I started blogging in the first place.
There are days when you are the pigeon and there are days when you are the statue. The trick lies in getting an early warning especially on the statue days, so that you can take in a deep breath and last out when your head is being held underwater. In my case the pigeon days are few and far between. It happens ever so suddenly and if I do not immediately take advantage of that tiny sliver of an opportunity I have only myself to blame. Horoscopes are helpful to take a sneak peek into the future. I read them regularly. My newspaper carries two of them (written by two different blokes) on Sunday.
And so, Bhaduri’s hero, Abbey passes out of IIM, Jamshedpur, gets into Balwanpur Industries, works at the township, chafes at the fishbowl existence he has to live there out of necessity, marries, gets estranged from, romances a woman or two, and slowly climbs up the corporate ladder. There is no discernible line of wit in the book; at best it is a collection of puerile jokes; the IIM gang comprises the usual suspects; the career climb is predictable, the women all coalesce into one another, come and go without leaving much impact. So what is the leavening factor in this ‘MBA’, a tenuous title at best? It’s lessons learned on the job which Abbey/Bhaduri imparts in a chatty tone that loses no relevance in the telling.Human Resource/Human Capital Practice/Personnel Management, whatever the term du jour is, it’s a fast moving track, creative and exciting, a track where you think as you run. To that extent, Bhaduri’s case histories with their solutions, make for interesting reading. The way Abbey handles the enforced VRS scheme initiated by the MNC that takes over Balwanpur Industries, is both informative and entertaining.
The morning newspaper and a cuppa chai is a ritual that is common to a large part of the human race. But people read it in their own manner. Some glance at the headlines and head straight for the sports page. So open the editorial page and shake their head disapprovingly at the affairs of the world. I head for the cartoons. I grab the newspaper and head straight for Ajit Ninan's cartoon. I look for two elements of wit in a cartoon - the visual and verbal. Ninan excels in both. Usually one lands up choosing between the two. Ajit worked for many years with the India Today group as cartoonist and illustrator, before moving to the Indian Express newspaper in 1992 eventually switching to Outlook one of India's top news magazines. He is now with The Times of India as their Chief Graphics Consultant. Ajit used to run a cartoon strip called Detective Moochhwala (and his tail-less dog called Poochh, which means tail in Hindi) for the childrens magazine Target. That comic strip had cult status amongst readers and it was amazing to see Ajit pack in a tight storyline and brilliant graphics in about 35-40 frames.
