The start-up

Life is like a start-up. You start off with something in mind but end up doing something totally different as the market (read life) dictates.

I had a plan, a perfect model for my life which was suppose to reveal on its own. As a kid, wanted to be in army and then wanted to be an electronics engineer with a short spell in the middle where I wanted to be a chemical engineer and eventually ended up doing electrical engineering. Then wanted to study but worked for some time. But then I did study computer engineering with seed funding from my family.

Followed my heart to do nothing and did precisely just that. Finally started working for reasons best known to me (or not) and then went on to join a start-up for again the same reasons as above.

I am slowly inching my way from red to black. The RoI is still to be recovered and break even is far off. When will I make it to getting listed in the history remains to be seen. Because it was never a question of whether I will but when.

Treadmill

Life feels like a treadmill.
I keep running faster and faster to stay where I am.
I need to find the stop button to slow down, step back and re-assess.

Have you felt like that ever? Do you know where your stop button is?

5 point someone's time-table

Is time a man-made dimension ? A figment of our imagination. A concept that was created to help us lead our lives in an orderly fashion. For me, it is enough to drive me crazy. So what have I been doing all these months. Let me surmise in 5 bullets as to what have I done:

• Well, its been 3 and half months since I joined a start-up (sic). That keeps me busy for 1/3 of the day.
• Read iWoz, iCon, Founders @ Work, Freakonomics, half-way through Getting Things Done.
• Watched Chak De! India, Identity, Shattered Glass, Dhamaal, Chashm-e-Baddoor, Jaane bhi do Yaaron! and of course T20 world cup (no, its not 20th sequel of The Terminator but just as action-packed)
  
• Trying to go to gym. Nothing to do with some six-pack abs inspiration. I have been trying for past 4 months.
  
• For the rest, I have to really think hard as to what I am doing. I really don't know, I have to think hard and I don't have the energy left to think. No more a thinking man. Never was, for some. That does not change a thing, even a wee bit.But, its just that I have been busy, really busy doing something or the other though no way to show any tangible outcome. Messed up time-management or my watch stopped.

So there, most of them merit a post, at least. Hopefully, I will get 100 % coverage in coming days.

Missing in Action ?

Summer is here. The days are getting longer. But I still don't find enough time to complete my things. That was my excuse for not writing since long. To quote SRK, "I am running 2 days behind in my life". Well, in my case, it will be weeks.

So far, work is keeping me busy. Also, we started off with volleyball tournament at my work place.
Lately, I have been busy with the blog and the website for the tournament.

We won our first match. It was relief more than anything after being "minnows" in the last tournament where we were beaten left, right and center.

Do visit the blog and the website.

All in the day

The other day, I went to Crosswords and bought Po Bronson's Why do I love these people ? (The name may sound cheesy, but the book is not. More on the book some time later.) When I came out of the book store, a 5 or 6 year old kid stopped my way.

Saahab, Can I polish these shoes.

These were suedes, I told him, the usual polish wax won't work on these shoes. Never to give up so easily, he said at least I can get them brushed. Somehow I relented, one of the reason that I attribute is, he did not try emotional black mail on me but only sold his skills.

How much will it cost ?
Pay as per your will.
5 is good ?
Haan.
If I get the shoe box, I can carry all the wax and brush along with me and earn more money. It will cost 120 rupees.
What's your name ?
Vijay
Ok ? You work in this area all the time?
Haan.
Where is the shop that sells the shoe-box?
Its near the railway station.
Vijay, not today, but one of these days, I will buy it for you.

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While driving back to office, a van with school kids over took me. While it was beside my two-wheeler, someone threw out a stone. No,that was just for the effect, in fact, it was a ball made out of crumpled paper. It was enough to startle me and break my reverie. I was suppose to take the next left and I was thinking I should go and yell at the kid. The van raced ahead and one head poked out of the window and looked at me. Was it guilt or was it relief that he did not get caught ?. I am not a good face reader. I took my left turn.

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It's worse than Sahara in Ahmedabad this summer. Though I have never been to Sahara, neither have I travelled with Air Sahara but that's beside the point. The point is, it's worse than Sahara in Ahmedabad.
So at work-place we had a power cut. May be due to over-load or may be somebody tired of working tripped the circuit-breaker but that's beside the point. The point is, there was a power cut.

Few of my co-workers and me landed up in the lounge and we were cribbing about the Great Indian Robbery where 1 billion were robbed of their cricket dream and some more nationalistic issues that may or may not have included Rakhi Sawant. Suddenly, the Sage spoke : "You know, the best thing we can do right now is to serve chilled water to those people out there". Everyone looked at the direction that he was indicating. Now, we are on the 4th floor and we have long corridors with glass windows on one side and halls having Dilbert-ish cubicles on the other side. The corridor broadens up near the lounge where we have couches. So the view through the glass windows had the top floor of a building being brought down by few labourers.

There was a silence that lasted a second longer. I said
We do not have enough water to serve them.
We can buy a 20-liter bottle.
Another period of silence.

Do you really want to do it.
Actually, no, the building seems far. And we will have to take it to the top floor.
Umm ok.

A customary silence where the intention was acknowledged.
We revert to pressing national issues which at that moment of time required our undivided attention.

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Adventures on a Saturday Night !

All you sneaky perverts who think that I will write here about my love life, can go take a hike here. For the rest who are still around, I am talking about a show that I attended this saturday.

"If you have no great plans for the Saturday Night, please visit the Annual day celebrations of Visamo Kids", a non-verbatim gist of the mail I received on Friday. Normally, I am not the one who goes for any celebrations except of my dear and near ones ( geographically speaking). But this was different, not only because of who wrote this mail but also somewhere I blinked that I am going to have good fun. And of course, being in Gujarat, we value freedom a lot. Anything that is free is always welcomed and this being a free entry show was just an icing on the cake. So off went Tina and me to Tagore Hall.


Let me not go on to write an "aankho dekha haal" account cos in this case, seeing is believing. So what was it all about, Visamo kids foundation is about few children who have got everything in them to be a success except the opportunities. The organization tries to prepare them for such opportunties. And what these children have.... a dyslexic kid playing the protagonist in a drama on Lord Krishna or an amazing performance of Rajasthani folk dance that truly deserves an encore. Though my vote for the best act goes to the terrific foot tapping instrumental rendition of Tu hi meri shab hain.


The kids are bright and smart, and I am very sure that they will go on achieving much more. But these are just 40 kids. I am sure there are many more such talented prodigies all around India who are waiting for their Visamo Kids foundation. If they don't, we (the society) will suffer as much as they do.


I am not saying that do something about it as a charitable cause. Because to have a better society is not charity but a way of life.