Chapter 6: Jaane bhi do yaaron

Welcome to season 2 of the Engineering Series:-

Starring: Nimit, Andy, Sid and Atul

Recap: 4 Engg friends got together to make the best IT software on earth. They meddled with Duckworth lewis, made a terrible presentation to their client,
had a gala time coding at each other's place. However, accidents and calamities later, they realized their software skills can take them only to the passing marks of the project curriculum.

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So, project deadline was a month away! The library management website that we were supposed to come out with was going through final touches "look n feel" as they say in the s/w world.
We were looking for some new homepage designs for our website.

Nimit:     These are the links that should appear on the homepage.

Andy:    Ekdum hotmail.com ka feel aana chahiye.

Nimit and Andy took us through that process of clicks and browse windows. Sid and I were waiting to pounce on any error in the page. However, one click and the page gave the 404! page not found error.

Atul:     Nimit, kya karta hai be! Yeh kya hai, tera planning hi galat hai!

Nimit:     Aisa hai na…ab tu kar. Aaja! Dekhta hun ek line bhi theek se likh sakta hai kya tu.

Atul:     arre, tu to naaraaz ho gaya, main to mazaak kar raha tha mere bhai.

Nimit (still angry! pointing towards Sid and Atlee): abbey tum log kuch kaam karoge

Sid:     aaa be…apun karega na…tu bus bol kya karna hai…kyu be Atul…

Atul:     kyaa…haa haa…

Nimit:    finish the homepage designs. It's the simplest of all tasks!

Atul:     yaar Nimit, tu bole to humlog woh email functionality bhi tere table pe rakh deknge

Nimit felt like Paresh Rawal of Andaz Apna Apna (Do line ka code nahi likh sakte hai yeh, aur itna bada email functionality karenge! Yeh kaise kaise khajur paal rakhe hai tune teja!) Sid:     pakka re! 2 minute ka kaam hai woh…par…arre yaar.. par abhi late ho gaya hai…7 bajj gaya…mereko swaminarayan jaana hai. Aur train main rush bhi hoga! Tu to jaanta hai , I stay in Vasai.

Andy:     shuru hogaya iska bahana!

Sid:     sachhi yaar, aaj Monday hai na. You know where I am every Monday!

Andy:     pichle Monday ko almost jail main tha! (due to a "raada" between local Vasai goons!)

Sid:     arre wo to social service tha re…par Nimit, pakka kal main aur Atul mere ghar pe sab kaam karenge.

Atul:     yes Nimit, apan kar lenge.

Nimit:     waise bhi mere gahr pe kal mehmaan aa rahe hai, so I will not be able to come for the next 2 days. But you guys please finish that part.

Atul:     pakka Nimit, Andy tu bhi chal na…

Andy cannot say no! He agreed immediately. The next day, we settled down at Sid's place.

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With his parents out on vacation, this was going to be fun.

Atul:     pehle email ka kaam karte hai, uske baad wo kya hai…design dekhte hai

Sid:     abbey email wala kaam difficult hai yaar…apne se nahi hoga

Andy:    who code apan Gaurav Shah se likhwaate hai, scholar hai who apne class ka

Sid:    arre Shah is baar bhi top kiya na!

Andy:    haan saala…uske wajah se aaj bhi mereko ghar pe gaali milta hai. Shah ko 90/100 mila, tereko 85!
I can take criticism, but i cannot take drawing parallels from someone else's life

Sid:    Abey Andy, itna angrezi!

Andy:    (visibly upset) school main humesha 3^rd aaya main, Std 1 to X tak! Har baar gahrpe sunaaya, usko 20/20, tereko 19/20!

Atul:    haha, main bhi life main sirf ek baar first aaya, who bhi kyunki actual topper ka hand fracture hua aur who exam nahi likha

Andy:    yeh tu hazaar baar bol chuka hai!!

Sid:    Atul, tu repeat mat kar be! Sun sun ke pakk chukka hun

Atul:    acha theek hai theek hai, kaam karte hain abhi. Email functionality…

Andy:     Ya, I was saying let Nimit do it. Woh hi accha karega, usko bolte hai apan ne try kiya par error aaya…kuch error ka naam bol

Sid:     null pointer exception

Hahahaha

Andy:     to designs dekhte hai new button ke liye

Sid:     arre uspe maine mast research kiya kal…I saw 5 -6 websites and this was the best design. I have downloaded the same. Let me show you!

Sid added the design change into our code and showed it to us!

Andy:     abeey! Yeh design dekha hua hai…copy hai yeh…pakka

Atul:     haan re, same to same color…abbey yeh to desibaba.com se uthaaya hai!! (Desibaba was the famous Indian porn site at that time).

Andy:     Sid, besharam! Tu kabhi nahi sudhrega na

Sid:     arre par, kya mast dikh raha hai be…dekh…the thumb is blinking!

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It was around 5pm…We had to work on the email thing! Andy was really geared up to work, and his enthusiasm translated into us also. However at 515 pm, the doorbell rang! It was Sid's cousin Saahil. He was just relaxing in the same room and giving us some expert advice as well on the email function. We decided to take a small break at 530pm. Sid had gone to get some snacks; Atul was over the phone…while Andy was generally browsing the desktop for some songs.

Andy:     ABEY….tere paas Brian LARA 1999 cricket hai!! Waaw!

Atul:     arre sahi! Sid ne bola nahi uske paas BC Lara hai

Andy:     yaar, mereko yeh game sahi lagta hai ekdum

Atul:     I have never played this yaar…lets play for 5-10 mins.

Sid came home with some samosas and dhoklas.

Sid:    Abey…Lara khel raha hai..

Atul:     seekh raha hun re…

Sid:     arre usme ek mast option hai…real time games ka, you can select a real life match and play that game

Atul:     samjha nahi

Sid:     I'll show you…See this one…It's an ODI between Pak and SRL, remember the one in which Afridi scored the fastest 100! So, Pak have scored 371 in 50 overs. And we are SriLanka and we have to chase it.
Atul:     wow! Will that be fun or what!

Andy:     chal try karte hai

Sid:     abbey par hum 3 log hain!

Saahil:     teen nahi…chaar

Sid:     oh yes… So, 4 of us, each of us is one batsman. If you get out, the next guy comes in.

Sid was Jayasurya, I was Kalu, Andy became Aravinda while Saahil donned the role of Ranatunga with the rest to follow.

Atul:    awesome!

It was almost 6 pm when we started, by 9pm, the closest we scored was 200 all out! Sid decided to order for dinner.
Sid: Yeh hotel ka Kofta mast hai! Mangaun?

Atul: kuch bhi chalega, Andy new match khelte hai, we are anyways 145/7. Quit kar!

Sid ordered the kofta thingy. Minutes later…At the dinner table
Andy: Abey yeh kya sabzi hai!

Sid: ananas ka kofta

ANANAS!! Trust me! It was the worst gravy I have ever had!
Post dinner! The match continued! The next time I saw the time, it was 2 am! This time, all of us were totally into the game and playing well also except me. The highest I scored was 25 runs. This time Sid and Andy did the running .The score was 300/5 in 42 overs.

Sid:     Is baar jeetenge pakka…

Andy:     haan…

It was 3am! And suddenly, the power went off in Vasai.

Andy:     abbey @#$$%^%

Sid:     oh no!

Andy:     saala tera Vasai! Bakwas jagah hai…yeh time pe bhi light chala gaya!

I guess, it was an indication to go to sleep. We woke up the next day at around 9am…Again continued the game till about 2 pm in the afternoon. We improved our chase, going down 348 allout!
Finally, after a full 24 hrs, after having failed to win the battle, we decided to go home.

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(The next day)

Nimit:     So, I hope you guys have worked on the email functionality

Silence!

 Closing Credits: Maximum inputs from Andy

CSR, Mayawati and IPL

1411 tigers left! Speak blog share!

Save paper, use mobile…what an IDEA sirjee

Jaago Re campaign

These are the 3 recent CSR activities that I can recall, and barring the Tata Tea campaign, the other two are simply "in your face" CSR activities. Idea! Deserves a kick on the backside for the stupid ideas it proposes…talk while you walk! said one… I tried doing that once and was almost run over by a BEST bus! And the current one with an Abhishake Tree is equally pathetic.

As far as the 1411 tigers are concerned, AIRCEL deserves a clap for coming up with a good storyboard, and a good recall as well. And it is matter of great ecological concern too. But then, in a land where poverty, diseases, malnutrition, terrorism, caste and racial issues exist, it really doesn't matter. The demand is for a decent standard of living for human beings first.

Jaago Re, reminds me of Nitie, where one of our professors would always take the example of Tata Tea. Their ad, about increasing awareness of voting touched the right chord. However, inspite of a critically acclaimed awareness programme, the general elections in 2009 saw one of the lowest turnouts in Mumbai. Reason- The lack of planning by the EC for allowing a 4 day long weekend.

Talking about things that matter! What the hell is happening in U.P. Mayawati is garlanded with notes worth Rs 2 crores! Are we still in the 1950s! Sex scandals are on the rise… First it was the old man N D Tiwari, now Swamiji is caught with his pants, err garb down. Emotional Atyachaar TRPs are definitely soaring… are we in the age where soft porn has come out of the bedroom?

And now, the most talked about event of the week! IPL

Lalit Modi has a way with everything! IPL3 has kick started in fine fashion, and with marketers, franchisees and cricketers all trying to blend with the format. So, now we have ads in the middle of the over, shown from the stadium giantscreen, 2 strategic timeouts where strategy is hardly the talking point and slow over rates (possibly a ploy to increase the air time itself).

But whatever be the case, IPL is a blockbuster ! Running successfully in a stadium near you

India Today: United we stand?

Pick any newspaper and the headlines are screaming with infighting, defense lapses and a country on the verge of a regional divide. And now take a sneak peak down memory lane.

1953: Telugu speaking population is up against the centre for creation of a separate telugu state to be carved out of Madras constituency (which comprised of TN, AP, Kerala and parts of Karnataka). Potti Sreeramulu undergoes a fast unto death for this mission. After his death Prime Minister J. Nehru is forced to split the constituency based on liguistic boundaries. This leads to the formation of other South Indian states too.

Time turner to 2009, another such movement almost created Telangana.

1961: Shiv Sena is involved in cases of rioting and disturbances in its fight for a division of Bombay state into Maharashtra and Gujarat. The bone of contention is the financial capital- Bombay city. With both communities having a strong emotional and business connect with the island city, the centre is at its wits end to solve this issue. The state is finally divided in 1961, with Bombay staying in Maharashtra.

Again in 2009, The marathi manoos pride rises in the city, this time with twin thugs Shiv Sena and MNS fighting hard to take ownership of the issue.

History does repeat itself! And more often than not, the actors are very much the same. Reading India After Gandhi provides a detailed documentation of all such events which have moulded India from time to time.

Apart from the events, the historian Mr. Ramchandra Guha has dwelled into the insights and thinking caps of the individuals from that era. It is indeed an eye opener to read about Pandit Nehru, a man who lived most of the pre independence era in the shadows of the great Mahatma. His ideas of taking the fledgling country forward are acts of great determination, patriotism. Equally intriguing is his rivalry with Sardar Patel and his miscalculation of the Chinese.

We have always had a North -South divide. We love calling him a "Madrasi", while down south, a "hindi" speaker is ridiculed and taken for a ride by rickshaw drivers. The truth is both parties are probably just carrying a legacy forward. The origins of this divide travel way back in 1950, when Nehru proposed Hindi as the national language, a tongue which people in the Southern states were unaware of. This led to demonstrations, strikes and mayhem which compelled Nehru to postpone this to a 15 year change over period. However, things got worse in 1965 (notable post Nehrus' death) and since then, the North-South divide, esp. TN, has been a battle yet to be won.

So, what have we done to treat this issue? A whole lot of damage! By criticizing/ridiculing the Tamil accent, we have ensured Tams never learn Hindi correctly. By making fun of them, they are forced to make friends with Tams only, and then we hate the regional groupism that Tams create. I guess a little sensitivity is a must for the majority community in such issues. Kudos to Batty, who has managed to win over this linguistic divide!

Similar is the case about Mumbai! Locals, typically Marathi speaking youth (most of them uneducated) have been thrown off the radar. With the shutting down of textile mills in central Mumbai, they lost their livelihood and never could compete with the more ambitious and ready to work youth of Bihar and UP. And now, there are striving to earn their space, their rights through historical means. Although, I do not support their case, I believe a little bit of cultural appreciation helps in solving most cases. Simply put, a marathi movie "Harishchadrachi factory" was India's representative to the Oscars. The movie can do wonders in assuaging the swollen egos of politicians. Let Bollywood stars promote this movie (which is a very good movie too) and help in reviving Marathi cinema in their own way. This way, the politicians will have no option but to put down their stand and it will foster cultural integration as well.

As far as Telangana goes, I believe the contention to most is the status quo of Hyderabad city. A new state is a boon for towns like Vizag, Vijaywada which have the potential to become cities as big and flourishing as Hyderabad.

We still have problems in J&K, internal and external... North East is neglected as usual, in spite of serious problems in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and Nagaland.

And last but not the least is the growing headache of the Maoists. In states of Bihar, Jharkhand, WB and Orissa, Maoists have a clear presence and what is alarming is the violent means used to achieve their mission.

Isn't it a miracle that a country of 28 states, each culturally different than the other, bordered on militant intentions is still one!

2 Kartiks played teen patti...both lost

Two exciting flicks hit the multiplex last week... The talented although overrated Farhan Akhtar's KCK and another Big B apriori experiment Teen Patti. For some reason there was hardly any buzz about them...Sachin's 200! hogging the limelight first and the adrenalin pumping Ind-Pak hockey match.

Neways, like a mandatory assignment I finished both the movies, with a late remark on my blogsheet...

Waise koi compulsory nahi hai review likhna...but then...I just cant write anything else...

So first, Teen Patti...Directed by Leena Yadav, one of the few woman directors the country can talk about...she had previously directed the Sanjay Dutt-Ash starrer "Shabd". Infact, Shabd is one of the reasons (apart from Big B's and Sir Ben Kingsley's presence) to catch this movie. Inspite of being a dud at the box office, Shabd had an interesting script which went wrong at the execution table.

Talking about the table, patte batt gaye hai...Big B is doing some calculations in his mind...

FLASHBACK

A: Probabilitiy of getting an ace

n(A) = 4

n(S) = 52

P(A) = n(A)/n(S) = 4/52 = 1/13

When my maths teacher taught me this way back in school, I fell in love with playing cards. Maths seems so simple, also encouraged one to play a game, which only the unemployed, the drivers, or rogues in trains would play.

Lecture 2: The maths teacher opened up permutations and combinations...and my world came crashing down.

Woh wo din tha aur aaj ka din hai... I avoid permutations and combinations very much the same way like one without a driving licence would avoid a traffic cop.

Back to the teen patti table...The movie starts with a conversation between Big B and Sir Ben, horribly dubbed in Hindi, when the two characters are talking in English. They cud have easily provided Hindi subtitles instead of killing the joy of watching two mastreos on screen. Big B is a whacky mathematics professor at BITS Pilani, who accidently comes up with a technique of mastering playing cards using probability of course. Now, in order to carry out a reality experiment, he forms a team of students and fellow professor (Madhavan).

Their first exposure to underworld dens' is chilling and danger prone, yet successful. This lures them to venture on similar missions and win money...and then money wins over..Greed starts talking and a simple experiment becomes a life threatening journey.

However the movie, which again looks pretty solid on paper, goes for a toss in its execution. Barring Big B, no one even comes close to winning the audience sympathy. The young brigade of the movie (barring the rich guy) deserve a F grade for this performance and should go back to FTII for another year.

Madhavan! absymal performance...He is totally confused... he hangs out with his students all the time. I think he mistook 3 Patti for 3 Idiots. The only reason I stayed till the end was completely out of respect for Mr. Bacchan.

Rating: 1.5/5

About KCK!

A movie which starts as the typical romcom- popcorn entertainer and changes color into a psycho thriller definitely stirs you for a brief moment.

Applause Moments: Watching Deepika, whenever she comes on screen... The daaru party sequence! "Safe Boy" was pretty good. And yes, the haunting phone call.

Disappointers:  Farhan Akhtar...was a little irritating...the movie is only about him, him and only him. Others are all reduced to caricatures. And his voice! Plus, the screenplay fizzles out in long one liners... how can Farhan who cant open his mouth in front of Deepika suddenly come up with witty one liners (some of them are pretty banal though).A clear inconsistency in  the character buildup of Farhan Akhtar.

But, the way the director steers his ship towards a logical conclusion helps in winning back the audience. Only this much for now...  

KCK: 2.5/5