A Wednesday

Traffic in India is bad.. and Hyderabad definitely takes the top spot for rash driving. Driving in Hyderabad is really difficult. AND if you have ever tried to drive here, you must definitely have been warned, "be careful.. some people drive very fast and go bang into others on the road".

The warning came true in my life, just this Wednesday - my first in close to an year and half. Except that, I was the one going fast as crazy. But not my mistake, it was 9am, an empty flyover - i was easily doing 70. This guy, let's say Tughlaq (apparently going to a gym in the other side of the city at 9am on a weekday) on an Activa was driving on the rightmost end of the road at 30 maybe and suddenly decided to come left after I blew the horn. There was another bike on my left and a collision was inevitable. He couldn't control his rear tyre slipping, fell down, blocking my way and I fell too. (I'm guessing he pressed both brakes hard thinking it would save him from falling.) End result, both of us were pretty badly hurt - him more than me actually.

I have always believed that "Speed doesn't kill, insanity does". While going that fast might sound insane to a few, it wasn't actually. Going slow on the right side of an empty road is insane according to me. But there was my mistake too. While I do that speed almost everyday on that road, on Wednesday my mind wasn't there. I was riding, kind of, sub-consciously and didn't notice his moments until too late.

I had my helmet, jacket, shoes on though. So, even though I had a much worser fall than him, I was relatively less injured. I have got bandages on my left ankle, left knee and both wrists, and lots of minor scratches on both legs. Obviously, no more bike or car atleast for another week. But him, he didn't wear his helmet and got hurt on the face and jaws, apart from the hands and legs.

Moral of the story -

1. "Wear your helmet - Always."

2. "Don't go too fast. One idiot on the road who doesn't follow the same traffic rules as you, and your life could change in a second."

3. "If you think someone is right next to you or might even collide with you, then try to go faster. Don't even think of braking."

Science behind "Being Lucky"

Read the article, "Be Lucky - it's an easy skill to learn" by Richard Wiseman, a psychologist at the University of Hertfordshire. I'm also copying the entire article on this post because it makes for a good, interesting read and worth maintaining an extra (digital) copy.

And tell me after reading this article, did the author mean Lucky people are Optimistic or Pessimistic, the same question I asked long ago too.

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A decade ago, I set out to investigate luck. I wanted to examine the impact on people's lives of chance opportunities, lucky breaks and being in the right place at the right time. After many experiments, I believe that I now understand why some people are luckier than others and that it is possible to become luckier.

To launch my study, I placed advertisements in national newspapers and magazines, asking for people who felt consistently lucky or unlucky to contact me. Over the years, 400 extraordinary men and women volunteered for my research from all walks of life: the youngest is an 18-year-old student, the oldest an 84-year-old retired accountant.

Jessica, a 42-year-old forensic scientist, is typical of the lucky group. As she explained: "I have my dream job, two wonderful children and a great guy whom I love very much. It's amazing; when I look back at my life, I realise I have been lucky in just about every area."

In contrast, Carolyn, a 34-year-old care assistant, is typical of the unlucky group. She is accident-prone. In one week, she twisted her ankle in a pothole, injured her back in another fall and reversed her car into a tree during a driving lesson. She was also unlucky in love and felt she was always in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Over the years, I interviewed these volunteers, asked them to complete diaries, questionnaires and intelligence tests, and invited them to participate in experiments. The findings have revealed that although unlucky people have almost no insight into the real causes of their good and bad luck, their thoughts and behaviour are responsible for much of their fortune.

Take the case of chance opportunities. Lucky people consistently encounter such opportunities, whereas unlucky people do not. I carried out a simple experiment to discover whether this was due to differences in their ability to spot such opportunities.

I gave both lucky and unlucky people a newspaper, and asked them to look through it and tell me how many photographs were inside. On average, the unlucky people took about two minutes to count the photographs, whereas the lucky people took just seconds. Why? Because the second page of the newspaper contained the message: "Stop counting. There are 43 photographs in this newspaper." This message took up half of the page and was written in type that was more than 2in high. It was staring everyone straight in the face, but the unlucky people tended to miss it and the lucky people tended to spot it.

For fun, I placed a second large message halfway through the newspaper: "Stop counting. Tell the experimenter you have seen this and win £250." Again, the unlucky people missed the opportunity because they were still too busy looking for photographs.

Personality tests revealed that unlucky people are generally much more tense than lucky people, and research has shown that anxiety disrupts people's ability to notice the unexpected. In one experiment, people were asked to watch a moving dot in the centre of a computer screen. Without warning, large dots would occasionally be flashed at the edges of the screen. Nearly all participants noticed these large dots.

The experiment was then repeated with a second group of people, who were offered a large financial reward for accurately watching the centre dot, creating more anxiety. They became focused on the centre dot and more than a third of them missed the large dots when they appeared on the screen. The harder they looked, the less they saw.

And so it is with luck - unlucky people miss chance opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else. They go to parties intent on finding their perfect partner and so miss opportunities to make good friends. They look through newspapers determined to find certain types of job advertisements and as a result miss other types of jobs. Lucky people are more relaxed and open, and therefore see what is there rather than just what they are looking for.

My research revealed that lucky people generate good fortune via four basic principles. They are skilled at creating and noticing chance opportunities, make lucky decisions by listening to their intuition, create self-fulfilling prophesies via positive expectations, and adopt a resilient attitude that transforms bad luck into good.

I wondered whether these four principles could be used to increase the amount of good luck that people encounter in their lives. To find out, I created a "luck school" - a simple experiment that examined whether people's luck can be enhanced by getting them to think and behave like a lucky person.

I asked a group of lucky and unlucky volunteers to spend a month carrying out exercises designed to help them think and behave like a lucky person. These exercises helped them spot chance opportunities, listen to their intuition, expect to be lucky, and be more resilient to bad luck.

One month later, the volunteers returned and described what had happened. The results were dramatic: 80 per cent of people were now happier, more satisfied with their lives and, perhaps most important of all, luckier. While lucky people became luckier, the unlucky had become lucky. Take Carolyn, whom I introduced at the start of this article. After graduating from "luck school", she has passed her driving test after three years of trying, was no longer accident-prone and became more confident.

In the wake of these studies, I think there are three easy techniques that can help to maximise good fortune:

• Unlucky people often fail to follow their intuition when making a choice, whereas lucky people tend to respect hunches. Lucky people are interested in how they both think and feel about the various options, rather than simply looking at the rational side of the situation. I think this helps them because gut feelings act as an alarm bell - a reason to consider a decision carefully.

• Unlucky people tend to be creatures of routine. They tend to take the same route to and from work and talk to the same types of people at parties. In contrast, many lucky people try to introduce variety into their lives. For example, one person described how he thought of a colour before arriving at a party and then introduced himself to people wearing that colour. This kind of behaviour boosts the likelihood of chance opportunities by introducing variety.

• Lucky people tend to see the positive side of their ill fortune. They imagine how things could have been worse. In one interview, a lucky volunteer arrived with his leg in a plaster cast and described how he had fallen down a flight of stairs. I asked him whether he still felt lucky and he cheerfully explained that he felt luckier than before. As he pointed out, he could have broken his neck.

A day out of Truman's Life

(I wrote this post on Saturday, the very day all the events took place, but couldn't publish it till today. Read till the end and you will know why.)

It was a simple plan - wake up early. Give bike for servicing. Go out of city on a day-outing with two cousins. Return in the evening. And if back early enough, we could even watch the cricket match LIVE at the stadium.

I woke up early, by 7.30am (for a change). However, both cousins had work till evening so plan was postponed to Sunday. Incidentally, neither cousin had interest in watching the match LIVE either (which was strange considering that both are big fans of cricket).

So all that was left now for me to do was give the bike for servicing. I plan to go on long drives the next few weekends, so wanted my bike to be in the best condition. I had already collected the list of Castrol Bike Zones in Hyderabad from their official website and with a copy of it in my pocket, I set out.

Time: 10.30am

Nearest Bike Zone - Was still closed. And their phone wasn't working.

Next-nearest Bike Zone - Spoke to them on phone first; confirmed that I was giving my bike to them. And when I asked where exactly they were located, I realised it was on the other side of the city. There are two Sangeeth theatres in Hyderabad!! :(

Still next-nearest Bike Zone - Phone number had a digit missing. I decided to go check it out anyway, as there wasn't much traffic - it was Saturday and it was nearly noon. I was weaving through the traffic and suddenly, everyone was just stuck... in front of me... and soon behind me as well. No one on the road seemed to be moving - FOR MILES. By the time I reached the place, they had reached their daily limit. They didn't even have the coupons I wanted to buy, nor the racing-style coffee mug.

Nearest Bike Zone farther than the previous one - Again incorrect number. CRAP!!!

I went back to check if the first Bike Zone had opened atleast by now and this time round, I noticed a small, red "TO LET" board. More crap!

All this time on the bike with my head fuming, I was going crazy enough to go on 'planned' long-drive on the bike with anyone willing to come.

Called La. - No answer;

Wanted to call Rag. - Realised that I didn't have his number despite having asked Nik. for it 3 times the previous day;

Called Nik. - No answer;

Messaged Geo. to send me Rag's number - No reply (I later got to know that she didn't even understand who Rag. was - she called him Ragzz);

Generally messaged Tas. to know what she was doing - No reply;

Called Mom - Even she didn't answer;

Called La. again and again and again - No answer, no answer, no answer.

By now I began to doubt the network, how could NOBODY answer?

I called Aur. (who was sure to be awake and also have her cell with her) - She answered. Awesome. But she was terribly busy to even wake up La. (and they are flatmates).

Was I doing a Guest appearance on The Truman Show?

I gave up. All plans CANCELLED.

My mom called me back just then. I told her I was going alone on the drive and wouldn't be back home till night. I obviously didn't mean it, but I just like threatening (troubling) her like this. She gave me a piece of her mind and I told her I didn't care for it. But reality is that, she didn't care for what I said. She even prepared lunch for me.

Not willing to go home so quickly, I went out shopping for toy cars (more for myself than for my nephew). I even bought a stuffed tiger, which definitely made heads turn sitting on the tank of the bike.

And then, in a gap of 5 min, all the people I was trying to reach for the past 2 hrs replied back.

I don't quite know what to call such a day - miraculous maybe? What with a girl having insomnia sleeping soundly for '10 hrs'. And it doesn't end there. Soon after having lunch, I sat down to write this post. Having finished just 2 lines, Google Chrome crashed and took Windows down with it. For heaven's sake, since when did it begin to happen this way round. And right after the system rebooted, there was a power cut! I can't take it anymore, God. I resigned long back.

(After that, I continued this post on paper.)

How about a 3-wheel drive Nano?

The article One for the common man was published in The Hindu on October 6, 2009. If you don't feel like going through the entire article, here is the summary - author feels Nano is a great car and it is just like when the first 800 was launched in India. It's an article I completely disagree with as I don't think there is anything that exciting about Nano as has been hyped, for multiple reasons:

1. It's not really 1-lac. If you want something that can be called a car and not a metal box, you need to pay much more.

2. It's looks silly with its diminutive design and 12-inch wheels.

3. In this age of iCrap when 2-lacs isn't really much money, its pointless, infact harmful, to create a Nano. It's better to invest in building a 1-lac Harley Davidson than a Nano.

Anyway, coming back to the article, here are a few statements that I just have to comment on.

"it’s a rear-engined, rear-wheel-drive car... if you want the tail to step out, you will be disappointed" - Ofcourse! It's not Porsche Nano, it's TATA NANO.

"you have to wait nearly half-a-minute to see 100kph on the speedo" - Nano reaches 100kmph :O

"The Nano can seat five people comfortably... The 800 just about squeezes in four" - Really? My eyes must be deceiving me. And for the record, 800 seats 5 comfortably. But if you are an Indian, you definitely would know that even 6 people can be squeezed into an 800. Infact, I'm sure in the near future you would see 6 in the Nano too (only if the Nano is able to pull them, ofcourse).

"What’s more is that men in their Audis will stop to check out a car that costs a little more than two Audi side mirrors" - They must have stopped just to check that they don't kill the poor little puppy. If at all they were interested in the Nano, such Audi customers should be sued and shot to death.

"The Nano is the new status symbol" - Please, I can't stand it any more.

"The M800’s 796cc engine develops 39bhp. The Nano is not far off — the 624cc engine developing 35bhp" - What are we comparing here? A bullock-cart to an older bullock-cart?

"Why does the Nano catch more eyeballs per km than even the Ferraris did on their Magic Tour of India?" - It's because of idiots like him (and me).

Honestly, it is definitely worth more buying 3 bikes in lieu of the Nano. You would have a 150cc x 3 front-engined, rear wheel drive vehicle(s) with a collective power of 13.3 x 3 bhp (you beat the 800, yay!) and can also seat 6 comfortably (one more than the 800!). What more, you could go for a drive on 2-wheels, 4-wheels or even 6-wheels - a luxury even BMW doesn't offer yet. Added to all this, you also get greater resale value and it would be WAY MORE FUN.

The Best of Worlds

The below article was published by Sandipan Deb on May 29, 2000. Sandipan is an Electronics Engineer from IIT Kharagpur and was then the Deputy Editor of Outlook India. Currently he is Editor-Magazines, Indian Express Group. You can also find the original article here.

Every IITian I have showed this article to, has been able to relate with every single word. And so do non-IITians.

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Contrary to popular belief, the vast majority of IITians do nothing of note in their lives. Indeed, many of them became IITians because their parents told them that’s what they should mug their butts off for, and aim to hit the US of A, so that’s what they did. They attended classes, took notes, passed exams, took the gre, applied to a dozen American universities, and disappeared into that country’s vast technological underbelly, to reappear only in the matrimonial columns of Indian papers with a dollar salary multiplied diligently by the day’s exchange rate. Or they stayed in India, working at unexceptionable jobs, doing reasonably well. In either case, they got beautiful brides (often from rich families) and presumably lived happily ever after, meeting classmates once a month and chatting about their IIT days, and how Hippo has just changed jobs, and Zap is three rungs away from the top in Cisco Systems. Each of them had intelligence well above the average, and most, exceptional academic tenacity.

A decade and a half out of IIT, I wonder how many of us IITians achieved our potential? How many went to seed in remote dusty townships, tending massive pipelines and drinking in the township club? How many wilfully walked away from their natural talents in favour of safe MNC jobs selling diapers and hire-purchase schemes? How many, trained to think rationally and without bias, never managed to figure out the nuances of Indian office politics, and were relegated to obscure corridors in huge buildings? How many, obsessed with the American dream, settled for second-rate US universities, hung in for a green card, and today work at unfulfilling jobs in Idaho?

There’s another angle too to this. How many IITians, determined to stay engineers and in India, ignored the siren songs of the USA and the IIMs, and joined Indian industry, only to find that all the technical designs came from abroad, that you couldn’t change them even if you knew they were flawed, that all the engineering you got to do was maintenance, and knowing all that, they either settled into mediocrity, or went off to the US or the iims?

What was my IIT education all about? It was about IITians: 400 academically exceptional boys (and 12 girls) on a campus, which, in the case of Kharagpur, where I went, was far enough from civilisation to have very interesting effects on our coming of age. Many of us were truly extraordinary. There were boys from village schools who were leagues ahead in knowledge of the urban convent-educated type. There were those who mugged night and day, or simpered at professors from first benches, and there were those who also had a vibrant and busy life outside academics. I’ve found that the latter did better in life, even in fields like pure research. I also had friends who never needed to study, they had been apparently born with engineering wisdom in their genes. There were guys who spent most of the semester in a drug haze, but sobered up a few days before the exams, cracked them, and went back to their pharmaceuticals. Others did not have such control. Like Allen Ginsberg, I too saw some of the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness. A few dropped out (I met one of them years later in Shillong, a stridently devout convert to Catholicism, and a lowly government clerk, but he seemed happy), a few killed themselves. But, most of us survived. I suppose we became tougher, more mature, more knowing, and more aware of our dark sides.

We lived and ate together, and shared our joys and heartbreaks and good times and bad times, in competition and camaraderie. We compared our philosophies and, bit by stumbling bit, developed our value systems. Never were stronger bonds forged between young people. Years from now, if I meet an IIT wingmate on the road, I know we will carry on as if nothing had changed, and nothing actually would have. A couple of years ago, there was a small visual trick on an Outlook cover, which was my idea. A close IIT friend, whom I had not been in touch with for years, called up from Singapore: "Some other name is mentioned in the cover credits, but it was your idea, right? I know the way you think." No one knows me better than these mates of mine from IIT.

IIT was also a whole insular world in itself, complex and complete, and it sucked us in. As The Chosen, we lived a full life with no necessity of any contact with the outside world. Totally cut off from politics and "the bigger issues", our delights remained in competing fiercely on the field or the stage with other hostels or other colleges. There were few material pleasures. Lifestyles were spartan, the food abysmal. The vast majority of males were totally deprived of female company. The girls lived a strange life-on the one hand, they were hounded by dozens of would-be suitors; on the other, they faced the petulant hostility of the majority which saw them as undeserving of so much adulation and so many free lunches.

When we graduated, we went out into the world with a rare confidence and strong tribal loyalties. The confidence eroded a bit over the years, and we learnt some humility when we discovered non-IITians as smart as we were, and also people who could outwit us because they were intelligent in a different way-in a sly political way-an acumen we had not developed in our isolated environment which, above all, inculcated a sense of fairness and a respect for ability. We came to terms with a world that compared poorly with our beloved campus, and some of us even went ahead and conquered it. Others didn’t do well, but knew that the ties between them and the masters-of-the-universe classmates would never change. They were ties born of the pride of being an IITian. That pride would never diminish.

It never can.

Slam book

A few days back, I was thinking about what could be the Worst job. And then the idea to write this post occurred to me.

WoRST JoB

The worst (read least exciting) job for me would be -

A Security Guard's could be the worst. I feel pity for them as they have no other activity than just having to stand at the entrance all day long and observing people. There isn't even anyone nearby to talk to, as they are all placed at strategic locations, far from each other. That said, I guess the worst (read least exciting) job according to me, one which I wouldn't take up even if I was paid a Million dollars would be - Salesman in a Jewellery store or a Sari shop.

BEST FEELiNG

To be loved. Even better if it's someone you love too. :)

WoRST FEELiNG

Not getting what you expected (and know you deserve) - be it love, be it glory.

MoST iRRITATiNG

The most irritating feeling would easily be - Getting a sneeze when you are on your bike with your helmet on. Only thing that beats it would be, getting a sneeze again right after you have put back your helmet.

WoRST SPoRT

Formula 1 without Ferrari.

BEST SPoRT

hehe.. no comments.

I feel as if I'm filling my own Slam Book. But help me, what else can I write on? You say.

Am back!

I wasn't in the greatest spirits since Pakistan's Independence Day and so temporarily stopped writing on my blog. After that, due to an "IDIOT" I decided to take a long break from my blog. Besides, things weren't exactly going on great in my life either.

But NOW, I feel happy. Things aren't yet exactly the way I would have liked, but maybe I just got used to the screwed-up world. I feel more drowsy and things seem less chaotic. :) And I have also decided not to pay much heed to that "IDIOT" unless I like what he says.

So, I guess I should be writing reasonably regularly from now on.