Tomorrow will exactly mark my two months, here in Bangalore. Time flies....I am craving to visit mumbai....my karmabhoomi :)
But somehow, it seems now i am stuck in Bangalore, and it seems for ever !!! Fortunately appa and amma will be here in the first week of april. Right now they are in Davangare, at Harish and Venkatesh's place. My grandparents are also there, so its a good reunion for amma and ajji. I am looking forward to seeing my parents. The only time i was away from them was last year during my summer internship (april 2003 - June 2003) in Delhi. I hope they will join me, permanently in Bangalore 5-6 months from now.

Discoverer, Creator, Explorer and Innovator are the four towers at ITPL. None of their denizens here innovate or create or discover ! They just explore into the huge volume of knowledge and processes created by the parent behemoths and follow them religiously. How i wish we could start something from scratch..some new technology wave that will change the world. Answering customer calls and speaking with a foreign accent seems the easiest alternative for creating a global facade and more dangerously inside oneself. The local populace assumes that with all the tall buildings and the neck-strapped patta workforce, India is an IT superpower and bangalore in particular is the silicon valley of this shining India. In this make-belive mirage, lies the ultimate degenration. Degradation of todays youth, minds, attitude is due, sooner or later !!

ITPL houses some 15 companies. Most of them are BPO companies (eupemism for sweat shop call centres!!). And all of them have these huge queues of the young and restless waiting to be interviewed. Not surprisingly an equal number (or probably more) leave these companies daily !! But the silver lining (or india shining) is that these organizations are generating wealth ! Not only are they creating jobs (maybe at the bottom of the value chain) for the educated masses, they are giving a huge fillup to the affiliated businesses. Catering, Transport, Housekeeping, Phone services...etc etc are all getting a huge demand surge...and this inturn creates entrepreneurs who invest in providing such services to these companies. The derived demand (as in 'economics parlance' ) gets a huge boost. Thatz all the more reason that BPO should be given a chance in India and not nipped in the bud itself by Senator Kerry and his henchmen...+

Enuf of the cynicism...Ruchir is off to Chennai for the weekend to meet his aunt, so is Vishal to meet someone else. Simran and myself are staying put at home. Although i am planning to meet some of my old school and college pals. Probably i will go to Davangere. Lemme see.....

India won the Samsung Cup. We could not witness the triumphant moments as we had a townhall meeting scheduled at the Leela. All the global SAP CD Managers and our head were here in Bangalore. For the first time, the townhall was organized in Blr. The managers presented their plans and some key projects were discussed too. A few of our senior members were promoted. For new joinees it was a glimpse into the world of SAP CD. And I surely liked it .....:)

Adios

Here I am, this is me, this is where I rather be .....

I have shifted to SAP's ITPL office. Cool place....Its my first day today...Still waiting to hear from my boss about the project...
Ravi has come to bangalore. He took the cauvery express from chennai. Ironical, as cauvery express is the samjhauta express to calm down the age old disputes between TN and KAR over the sharing of water resources ! The scene is not at all good in the interiors of KAR. In chitradurga, water comes once a week in a tanker !! Chitradurga's inhabitants do not invite guests to their homes...for the lack of h2o!! Sad state...

Our presentation yesterday went off smoothly. All groups were good.

I think i need to sleep for atleast 48 hours. For the past two weeks, I havent slept fitfully. I will surely skip this week's travel plans...our entire nitie blore junta is planning a trip. I so desperately want to go...but i neeeeeed to sleeeeeeppppp !!

yawn, yawn

Good nite,

Prakash

PS: have a huge backlog in terms of novels to read.....:(

Its SUPER SUNDAY today. Wow, Reminds me of the weekends at Bombay. Used to go home and watch TV, especially the EPL. Nothing of it now...just laze around and ummm...laze around....and...nothing much. But this sunday i did take the effort of going out and purchase a mobile phone. Ya, the same old Samsung R220, a similar cell that i had lost in Mumbai just before leaving for bangalore. Cost me a thousand bucks less this time. But i simply love the R220. A very simple piece, but extremely well connected. If i cud compare it with the Nokia 2200 that I had bought for my brother, the SAMSUNG piece outscores in terms of connectivity. Fucntion wise, its ok. Waise bhi, aaj kal, a mobile phone needs to have a camera...or rather a camera needs to work like a mobile phone :)

Rented a VCD (Munna Bhai MBBS). I had seen it but vishal persisted on and on...good movie with some fine bits of emotion and great humour. Arshad Warsi's acting is simply cool. Some sterling performances from the 'Carrom Freak' parsi uncle and the 'psychosomatic story narrator' are worth remembering.

Its HOLI today. Miss my parents sorely. Called home today. Hearing mom is like the most soothing and reassuring voice.

Last week, had a special People Interaction workshop at the TAJ. The trainer, George Joseph is simply amazing. Guys, I totally recommend him for any communication skills/negotiation skills/actvity management workshop u want to conduct/participate. He has his own consultancy firm named Ginosko Consultants. Later in the evening, went to CROSSWORD. Wanted to read an agatha chrstie novel for a long time. Bought ' Passenger to Frankfurt ' and also a biography on appa's favorite J.R.D.Tata !

Wat else? Well tomorrow is the time to pay our house rent, the maid, the electricity bill, water bill....phew, i hope somethings left to save.

March 16th is our big presentation. Our project is sorta 'bhagwaan bharose' ! GOD HELP US !!

Tomorrow will buy the SIM CARD from Thakur and activate my cell. Old wine in a new bottle !!!!!

Adios, Till next time...
kash

Good morning, world !! Had a good and not so good weekend ...Smitten by the 'Personal Finance' Bug, I engrossed myself into robert kiyosaki's books...the famous ' Rich Dad, Poor Dad' and 'CashFlow Quadrant'. I had read these books during my first year in Management, but frankly It makes more sense once one starts earning ! Yearlier it was all 'yearning' ....Ok, so with the new found energy i decided to make my tentative financial plan...was a tuff job though...too many cash outflows....digicam, books, some jogging shoes, two regular trips to Landmark, weekend getaways....well well this doesnt leave me with many saving options....
then came my happy-g0-lucky friends..ashwin and rahul came to our place to upload the Bylakuppe pictures onto Simran's Laptop. Once done, we headed out to Marthahalli for a movie. We were told about a new Multiplex called INNOVATOR and boy, it was a major KLPD. The place looks deserted even on weekends...and we reached there at a wrong time. No movies at 3 pm ! One of us suggested we go to Koramangala...theres some mall called FORUM , good for shopping...i cud already see myself in deep debt, which is what Kiyosaki exactly tells us 'NOT TO DO' ! That mall is a devil...It is like emotions that the famous RING conjures...greed, envy, desire...to BUY and SPEND ! If u go in with a credit card, woah...be rest assured to get into the TRAP....


I think my elder brother, Ravindra will be coming to Bangalore on 17th. Looking forward to meet him.

KASH