Memoirs from the Journal - Leh Trip

Mine and Lalits thoughts captured at the end of the day from the Journal. 

26th Jun (Sunday)

- The trip starts 35 days of vacation.. off to Delhi-Manali-Leh

27th Jun (Monday)

- Trains in India have not changed in the last 10-15 years

- There continues to be a severe lack of waste management everywhere & on trains

- "People Will leave things. As is where is" - improve the system and people will respect it ? 

28th Jun (Tuesday)

- The stations need to improve, Okla station "the entry was full of much"

- Shatabdi (Delhi to Kalka)  - "Excellent, Euro Class". Time and money efficient.

- Pahadgunj 'Heard of it many times, First time there'. A pretty filthy street.

- "Are we living in an Oasis in Bangalore ?"

29th Jun (Wednesday)

- Shimla and Mr. Bindra the 'Photo wala' who still uses 'Burmese Paper'

- Alfa restaurant with the excellent food and views from the windows (both Front and Back)

- The Kalka Shimla Heritage train journey. Good views but the speed sucks.

30th Jun (Thursday)

- In Manali now. The walk after Vashist Temple. The falls and smoking point next to the stream and Korean restaurant.

- Lunch and Beyond at Evergreen Cafe.(old manali)

- The score (Good and the bad wait) & Tashi Topgyal.

1st July (Friday)

- First good coffee of the trip (Amigoes German bakery + Honey nut). A good spanish breakfast with spinach omlette.

- Peed on the way to Rohtang and ate Bhutta. Rani Nala bad roads.

- Mika and Asha. The dutch women.

- Night halt at open tent (lalits stargazing between 2-3am)

2nd July (Saturday)

- Baralacha La - the first views of a glacial filled valley from here and being at the end point of the Chandartal-Baralachala Trek.

- Start of the rivers from Glaciers to streams to rivulets to a river (making of the Indus) 

- Tanglang La was the Roof of the hills around us. The first Head ache are felt here, acclimatization begins ? 

- Worlds highest transit camp 

- Claudi and the the Tirunelveli female

3rd Jul (Sunday)

-'Summer Kitchen' Lunch

- Nangso guest house , a quite and peaceful place.

- Candle light at Leh Cafe

- Discovery of a friendly cafe "Desert Rain" in Nausher Market. The best cafe in Leh (for me)

4th July (Monday) 

- Bike ride to Thiksey and the sunset ride beyond the airport

- Thiksey monastery was great and peaceful. Bhudhism , 6 stages of life and the view of the green and dry divide all across Ladakh /Leh.

- Winter gear purchase as a bargain. 'North Face' jackets and shoes + Sleeping bag

- Dinner at 'Tibetan Kitchen'  with Pankaj 'Surgeon', Prisellia , Mika + Asha. Best fired Momos here. 

5th July (Tuesday) 

- Ride to pangang so lake. And 'Soni' the pashminas.

- The wet cowboy cap and its final burial in a trash can (good lake side breeze)

- Sunset views and the walk beyond the flags  including the photography walk.

- Midnight hospital run and the tail of an unknown mountain creature. Yeti ? Snow Leopard? Lost dog? 

6th July (Wednesday)

- Oldest Theater in Leh. End of the search for 'Koflach' shoes (Siachen shoes) , quality vs cost vs utility vs bragging rights.

- Dinner of Wheat bread, Jam & Cheese.'Tang Party' organized by Pearl.

7th July (Thursday) 

- Rafting in Zanskar.from Scorpoche to Nemo (confluence of Zanskar and Indus). Lalit replacing the 'expert' Pearl at the front. 

- Jumping into the water. Thermal shock in the freezing balls and hands.

- Wonderful outdoor home cooked meal at 'Wimbeldon Guest house'. Rajma, palak, alu n chawal.

- Meeting 'Samara' and 'Patricia' the spanish girls. Organizing the Nubra trip. 

8th July (Friday) 

- Topless bums at Khardungla. A bet for a bottle. Still to come by.

- Hot springs from the Rock face, the dam building and Rock Climbing. How water shower in the bath.

- Double humped camels, Pearl the water baby in the stream and me and pearl as the 'Camel Rider'

- Hungry Lalit gorging on the biryani and loosing it in parts over the night.

- Nice trip with Particia and Samara

9th Jul (Saturday) 

- Good breakfast at 'Summer Harvest'

- Leh palace and views

- Patch up tea with Stanzin.

- Farewell dinner for Pankaj, Priscilla, Asha and Mika. Again bumping into spanish girls with Matt.

- Buying the North face pants.

10th July (Sunday) 

- Mask Festival in Hemis.  With the violent and abusing firangs (European and Italian) White bearded 'dadiyal' jumping around for pics and the trigger happy 'Thai' with the huge cameras.

- Red Masked dancer posing away including the shoes and hands.

- Watermelon, fried rice and chole bhature lunch.

- Riverside nap and relaxation.

- Our stuck car and the clevevr Sardarji helping with the science of removing it.

Leh (Overall) 

- Consistently bad toilets 

- Ginger Lemon Honey Tea discovered

- Very poor waste management in India

- A bullet ride to Thinksey

- Meeting a lot of interesting travelers. 

- thoughts recorded. Signing off. 

Cost of Mobile Phones - Trends among friends

Over dinner & tea we were discussing the exploits and the number of cell phones that each one of us have owned and how much do we spend on the instrument.

Self
- Since 2002 have spent 67500Rs. on buying phones. i.e. about Rs8,000 p.a.
- This is distributed among 8 instruments (4.5,11,10,1.5, 19,6.5,11, 4 = 67.5K)
- My average cost of ownership based on talk time usage has been about Rs0.85 - Rs1/minute of usage.
- 3 phone have been lost but the others have stopped due to technical faults.

Prerna:
-Has spent Rs 39,000 on 4 instruments over the last 5.5 years. i.e. Rs6K p.a.
-1 upgraded, 1 lost, 1 stopped working

Andrew - has spent Rs75K since 2002 on numerous instruments. The most expensive being a Rs 30K iPhone which was stolen from his car. Totally 3 lost.
-On an average having spent Rs 8.5K per year on an instrument.

Lalit has spent Rs53K on his 7 instruments but has sold phones for Rs8-9K hence cost of ownership is Rs44K for 10 Years i.e. 4.4 K per year.

Hence on an statistical basis you find people in the 20-30 year age group in India (upwardly mobile middle class) has spent from Rs 4.5k - Rs8.5K per year on instrument alone.
From an durable perspective the mobile phone stands only 2nd after Laptops in spends on white goods.

Hike 2 - Magalisburg Hills (above Hartbeesspoort Dam)

One more hike on the Magalisburg hills. Back 2 back on 2 weekends.. Yes i loved it..

This time didnt go along with the JHK (Joburg Hiking Club) , but with the PFHC [Pretoria Friends (or French) Hiking Club]. This was a smaller & more concise group and it was more fun.

Met a great bunch of people.. always nice to meet new and interesting people from different walks of life..



[From Left: Stephanine (Agri Economist), Me (Ram gypsy), Christine (French Embassy queen), Aurelie (Social reformist, Education), Luis (Brazilian - Urugian), Duncan (Cape budding Economist)]

Was the usual run of 400+Kms.. 4-5 hrs of hiking.. Peaceful sunday.. lunch atop a hill

Hiking in Magalisberg

Last Saturday i was at home thinking of ways to make the weekend more interesting. Using the power of google i discovered the Johannesburg Hiking Club (http://jhbhiking.org.za). As i have been always a person who loves outdoors & having gone on numerous hikes in India. I took this opportunity.
THe JHK had a good concept called 'Sunday Hikes', i liked this because of the convenience of not having to plan a hike.

Sunday morning i woke up at 5:30 am... quickly packed some lunch & water for the hike in my laptop bag and headed for Joburg (160Kms) with only 1.5 hrs to meet the rendezvous, i had to step on the accelerator. After a couple of wrong turns and realigning myself to the city map i finally made it, but 10 min late. Everyone was packed and were leaving, luckly i met one of the organizer and took him along to the hiking trail. This ride was 70Kms, totaling to 230Kms even before starting the hike.



We were asked to self profile ourselves into group (Slow, Medium minus, Medium plus). Having come with the leader of Medium Plus i choose this group. Bad choice. There was a group of around 8 ppl in this group who were just looking down and clambering up the hill. Halfway up i decided to desert them and join the Medium minus, to get an opportunity to enjoy the scenery, hike peacefully and meet interesting people. This was a larger group with 22 people (70% looked like they were retired in life), whew and i thought that hiking was for the young and energetic.

I met an interesting french group (Olivier, Christine & aurelie), they were a part of the french embassy in pretoria. We spent many hours swapping notes on africa, europe, india.Politics, economics, safety, multicultural integration etc. Time flew by, we had a nice halt for some snacks and later for lunch. tried to get a power nap though, but we got moving too soon.



The terrain was constant for most part, the formation looks predominantly made of wind & water eroded sedimentary rock, interspersed with a lot of ankle to knee high grass. The bright & sunny winter day made it perfect for hiking. I had earlier zipped around these hills in a car and longed to climb it. I was happy that i had got an opportunity to explore these hills.

We finished by around 3:30 pm. And i was back home by 6:15pm.
12 Hrs - 465 kms driving, 6 hrs hiking.... A relaxing day or a hectic one ?? I am choosing the former.

Jaisalmer - A Rendevouz with the Thar Desert

- Contributed by Prerna - 

Totally unexpected and out-of-the blue trip on the 12th and 13th September and thats what made it so much of fun. Jaisalmer has been one of my dream destinations and it was jaisalmer vs. Diu, but then the desert seemed more inviting..The journey was long - 600+ km from Ahmedabad (close to 65 kms form the border india- Pak ) and very uncomfortable to say the least, but still totally worth it. 

It is the golden city ( reminds me of greece where every bulding on the islands was painted white), every building uses sandstone. The fort is the only monument in the world that has people living in it- families and  hotels and havelis. We visited the Jain temples - which had very intricate carvings and staues of Lord mahavira all over. The only other hindu god present was Ganesha. The jeep ride to the camping  place next to the desert was amazing - on both sides there was only barren land with an occasional camel eating on shrubbery. The vastness and the expanse of the land was taking time to absorb in. The sam village( where the camp) was 45 km from the city and once we reached there, we immediately started out on our camels for the sunset on the desert. I cant even begin to express what it was like to be on the silk sands of the desert. We were rolling, running and diving over the sand dunes. Highlight of the evening was the Rajasthani folk music- it was brilliant and i really mean it.  The sky was perfect with the milky way that could be spotted and a candlelight dinner with rajasthani food was as good as it gets. 

Anchetti Ghats..A gruelling day ride

This Sunday (30 Aug 09) , decided to take the whole day off and dedicate it to cycling..

Its been some time since i have done some decent cycling (decent is a relative term and here i mean 100 Kms + rides ). Most of my cycling over the last 6 months have been in the 50-100 kms range.

The trip to Anchetti sounded fantastic and was coordinated by Georg Leuzinger. A trip from bangalore via kanakpura road to a place called Anchetti. The best part of the trip was the back roads / village roads.

Overall the trip was looong -- terrific scenes - awesome group ( around 50 riders ) - lot of rolling hills - lot of uphills.

we had lunch at Anchetti after 111kms and a pleasant morning of cycling. the ride back was more eventful and gruel some. My cycle punctured multiple times (3 in all ,by the time i got home). After completing 130+ kms called it a day and rode a bus to Hosur & then another to bangalore.

The 200 Kms + ride stilll eludes me. Both man and machine need to be in shape for the next attempt.

This time was it a failure of the man / machine ?? well more 100+ rides for the present till the next attempt at 200+

Mid Drive Break Pic

The gang / crowd before the start. About 50-60 riders in all

Hampi - A Refreshing Trip

Anniversary options are difficult to come up with. But once Hampi was conjured up, both Prerna & myself were sure of it.

Hampi, the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire ( Key ruler , Krishnadevaraya) is an exotic locale. It is cut off from the main Indian tourist routes for a number of reasons, (a) It is not close to any city, nearest is Bangalore 350 Kms away. (b) It has no major temple to note, we all know Indians, in hordes travel to see temples.

It is actually a part of the south Indian circuit most of the long staying international tourists do.

Our 2 day, weekend dash to Hampi was worth the effort to travel the distance. The key things about this place that struck us was the lack of crowds seen in most good places. The quality of the Ruins, much better than any we say in Athens (Greece). The good food. And the relaxed and friendly locals.

Travel & logistics:

We traveled from / to Bangalore using the Airavat (AC Volvo) buses, booked through the KSRTC website. Took an Auto from Hospet to Hampi. Local transport was walking and hired 2 wheelers. (Didnt hire cycles because of the heat and the distances)

Accommodation:

There are 3 distinct options available

(1) The hotels & tourist bungalows - located a few (4-12) Kms away Too far away from the action.

(2) The main Hampi Bazar - filled with guest houses. Cheap but crowded & poor quality.

(3) Across the Tungabhadra River. More secluded yet 10-15 min from the crowd and action. But need a boat to cross the river.

We started with (2) but soon found the boat and shifted base the (3). The cottages by Shanti were cheap & comfortable, the location was fantastic to say the least. I guess this is by far the best accommodation in hampi

Eating:

We ate at 3 different places, an Italian restaurant ('Best Italian bakery in town') , the 'Mango Tree' and the 'Laughing Buddha'. The last 2 were in mesmerizing surroundings and we spent considerable time in the couple of meals we had at each spot. While the buddha had great music and a laid back hut atmosphere, Mango tree had a great view of Tungabhadra along with great food and options.

As it was the rainy season , it was overcast thought out. We rented out bikes and spent a considerable time on the road. Riding , exploring the hidden paths, taking hikes into the bouldered hills, zipping in and out of temples.

The other interesting activity was to walk up to Tungabhadra river through intervening paddy fields and taking a bath in it.

Gazing at the boulders and imagining the grandeur of Virupaksha Temple.

People: Talking to the french teacher couple. The Indian French lady and her kid. The locals at the first Guest house. The Baba with the 4 Ft hair and his tales. The nepali managing laughing Buddha.

Overall it was a great experience and i wouldn't mind going to the place again. Great memories and a great weekend. And thus ends our first anniversary.

Pics @ http://picasaweb.google.com/ramanathan999/Hampi#

Life, happiness and Societal Roles

What is happiness and who are the people who are truly happy ?

Happiness is a state of contentment. It is a state of acceptance of yourself and your role in society. It is a state of accepting limitation on what you can or cannot do.

Hence is being happy truly being happy ?

There are various roles we play in society. Some at a personal level - a wife, a father, a husband, a friend etc.. And there are some roles we play at a professional level - A sales person, a lawyer, a consultant, a government servant, an analyst , a secretary etc.

How does a person get into a certain role ? Society, environment and lack of information play a major part. One does various things according to the inputs and guidance they receive all their life. Then once they have sufficient training in a facet of life they are pushed forth to play their role...

Socially - they get married, they have a child , they make relationships etc..

Professionally - people get into job roles according to the skillset they are able to portray to a group of people to convince them to let you join their kind. Hence it is not by a pure choice buy by the choice of a set of people they you get into a role.

e.g. out of a B-School a person can get to be a sales guy, a marketing professional , an advert guy, a finance analyst, a mgmt consultant , a manager in a firm , an entrepreneur etc. but mostly he has only limited scope to make a choice, but instead he parades his skills and wares to all the professionals who are willing to look at him and then lands into a given role.

There are various people who have trouble adjusting to their roles in the first year of being in it. It is a time of frustration , exploration , looking at change opportunities etc. Hence it a period of mental trauma and turbulence.

Coming back to the main thread, accepting a role is the only way of contentment or happiness. Else this will lead to depression and could show as aggression (passive or active) and you will be antisocial in some ways.

What should one do ?

- a person could accept a given role by controlling his/her mind. else can make changes to the way they do things, This can me manifested by a change of role by changing a job. Quitting and exploring life to understand it better. Taking education as a route to change your skill sets and hence job role. Do a drastic change in profession.

- One should remember that any harsh action in one role will definitely have an impact on the other roles that you play no matter how separated you keep them.

- Every decision is a choice. Every choice has an impact. One should be willing to accept the implication and live with it. Else happiness will be an eternal delusion. -

CYCLING: My first 50+ Kms on a my Merida 880..

 

 

Today was my first ride out to Nandi Hills (base).. 

It was my first 100K+  attempt , and formed a part of the TFN training.

 

My route:

Indiranagar - Outer Ring Road - Hebbal - Met the gang (names below) - Nandi Hills base - Bfast - Return Airport Exit (then i had a flat)

 

The ride was great. By far my best experience on the road. I started from Indiranagar @ 5:50 am. Reached Hebbal by 6:30 and Nandi Hills base by around 8:30 -8:40am . Except for a 10-15 min wait at Hebbal it was a non-stop ride.  At Nandi base i had some idlis for the breakfast.  Saw a car with the cycle attachment, guess it must have been Nupurs. Started back to bangy by 9am.

 

The morning drive in the outer ring road was an awesome experience in the back of trips to Hoskote where i need to keep dodging the traffic. The Ride to nandi is definitely recommended over Old Madras Road.

 

The return trip was not so pleasurable. I got a flat near the Airport exit. Then had to hop onto a Truck carrying stones till the nearest town and then take an Auto all the way back home.

It is here i realised the handicap of not  having a standardised Tube. It needs a special valve to fill air and hence couldnt get the tyre repaired at any of the cycle shops on the way.

 

At home i checked my speedometer. It read 81+ kms in 3hrs 15 min. With an average speed of just below 25 KM/ Hr.

Still short of the average 27-28km/ hr that Venkat says could be the average TFN speed on a road bike.

 

A failed attempt to join the 100K + league. Can't wait to get my bike repaired and give it another shot.

 

Reached home by 12Noon in time to have lunch with my visiting parents.

The Credit Card Creep

 

There is an interesting phenomenon i noticed today.. mostly by chance..

 

I was looking at my Credit Card due date and suddenly realised that it was for the first of the month. i.e 1st Dec 08.

It was periliously close to my salary due date and it got me thinking if i may miss by deadline as i was travelling. But then i was never this uncomfortable between my due date and salary remittance date !!

 

Something was up and i was not sure..

I quickly looked up the statements for my past 11 months, and saw the creep in due date.

 

Month	Bill from	Bill To	Due date	Max Credit Period	Payment Period	Billing Days / cycle
January-08	17-Dec-07	15-Jan-08	2-Feb-08	47	18	31
February-08	16-Jan-08	15-Feb-08	No payment	#VALUE!	#VALUE!	29
March-08	16-Feb-08	16-Mar-08	3-Apr-08	47	18	31
April-08	17-Mar-08	16-Apr-08	4-May-08	48	18	30
May-08	17-Apr-08	16-May-08	3-Jun-08	47	18	31
June-08	17-May-08	17-Jun-08	No payment	#VALUE!	#VALUE!	30
July-08	18-Jun-08	17-Jul-08	4-Aug-08	47	18	31
August-08	18-Jul-08	15-Aug-08	2-Sep-08	46	18	31
September-08	16-Aug-08	13-Sep-08	1-Oct-08	46	18	30
October-08	14-Sep-08	14-Oct-08	1-Nov-08	48	18	31
November-08	15-Oct-08	13-Nov-08	1-Dec-08	47	18

There was a constant fluctuation in the credit period extended and the number of biling days. This was not linked in anyway to the number of calender days in a month.

 

I am not sure why firms are not consistent with the billing. Is there any scientific or business logic behind the changing and fluctuating due date on the creit card bills.

 

Some thougths:

 - Depending on credit requirement of Citi.

 - Strategy to confue gamers , as every cycle will be a diff date. And if this is followed by all the credit card firms then a person cannot predict in advance the due date.

 

If you have any guesses just shoot.... while i arrange for funds to pay off my bill for the month.

Online shopping and opening new vistas.. COD (Cash on Delivery Option)

I am completely new to using online shopping as a serious tool.  Like any other ardent reader I have heard and 'test experienced' [when you do everything till the point of purchase except give the credit card details] the purchase of many products online.

Today I did not commit myself to one but 2 things online..

Firstly,  I was browsing for news and spotted a rediff shopping thingy. It was a tool kit, with drill. I was in one of the moods when I though what the heck lets give it a shot. Went ahead with the forms, filling out contact details ect. Then I was surprised to see the option of COD (Cash on Delivery) I was pleasantly surprised. For a small fee, of Rs 20 /- , I was able to avoid the risk of online payment and get a delivery assurance guarantee.  I liked the experience of online purchasing, I got a call from an executive about 1 hr after the online transaction, I was pleasantly surprised at their promptness.

This experience got me thinking …

The second experience happened just 30 min after the first one. I got a mailer from Irctc promotions about a sweepstake contest. Which I could enter , it also had an offer to purchase:  16 CD pack fastive pack(Rs 2499) +Free Reebok shoes (rs 2699) + Exciting holiday for a couple (Rs 5000) + Booksbuddy membseship i yr (Rs 300) all for Rs 2499/- I went through the details of the offer, and I felt really good about it and the promoters of the offer i.e. India Today group. I applied for this too with the same COD option ..

 I feel more empowered and better about placing orders and transacting online after experiencing the COD (Cash on Delivery) available.

 The links to the offers I subscribed are below, if there is anything I should know, update me on the same.

1.       http://www.offers.indiatodaybookclub.com/c054/page_6.jsp

2.       http://shopping.rediff.com/shop/productdisplay.jsp?prrfnbr=10307871&source=browse&frompg=frompg=supersale_rdhmpg

Paragliding - A week long Sojourn

This week long break from work and routing was one of the most relaxing of all breaks that i remember taking. The trip to Kamshet between Pune and Lonavala came at a good time, hey i had not taken a break for the last 3 months.

How did Paragliding happen ?
Well flying was a long standing desire and i was on the lookout for avenues to pursue the same. Among Manali & Pune (the 2 main places where flying happens in India) the latter was closer to home and an unchartered location for me. I went to this website (http://www.templepilots.com/) and got inspired by what the couple Avi & Anita were doing. I also had a chat with a couple of people who had done paragliding earlier and before i knew it the deal was finalized. I had signed up for both the P1 & P2 courses , running a duration of 7 days.

Location and Experiences

I was put up at Japalouppe equestrian centre (also called More Stud Farm.), this is located around 30 Kms from Pune towards lonavala (near Talegaon). Here i had dormitory type of accommodation , sharing it with the instructors and the other co-pilots who had come down for the course.
This was a very beautiful place full of dogs of all breeds and i had a really fun time playing with them. i also got down to some serious Horse riding sessions, and is it painfull on the ass !!
Times spent chatting away at the sitout, sleeping on the 'charpai', going for a walk throught the entire 30 acres of the farm , making havoc in the name of cooking in Aarthi's kitchen, playing around with the dogs & pups and spending numerous hours talking and dreaming about paragliding gave a feeling of a continuous 'high' in the place.
[Pics: Horse Riding Session , Pups Playing Around , Newly Born Kitten ]

A Typical day

A day is typically divided into 4 parts.

The Morning session - Waking up at 6AM. And leave for the flying site by 7:30. Mornings typically used to be for shoring up the basics and learning new techniques for ground handling of the glider. It was a continuous learning process. We went on till around 10 AM after which the sun got unbearably hot and the rumbling in the tummy too loud to ignore. It was usually followed by breakfast either at the location itself or at base camp. It was typically followed by a debrief session for around 30 min.

The lunch Period - This was a time for resting, relaxation, story telling and most importantly Theory classes. The Theory on various topics of aerodynamics and flying were taught primarily by Dhawal the assistant instructor, but were complimented by words of advice from Avi the chief instructor (He basically had left Indian Air Force after doing his NDA and being a pilot to pursue his love of flying and traveling at leisure).
We usually settled in for a short siesta to get the much required rest or pic up the phones to catch up with the running world. (You had no sense of date or time at this place)

Evening Session – We usually get ready to leave by 3:00PM. Reach the flying location. And have the session till it becomes dark. Evenings the winds used to be stronger and more favorable for flying. Also it becomes progressively cool and you get to see the great sunset. This was followed by yet another debrief , to make us aware of our mistakes and learn from others.

Dinner Time – Was a time of fun and frolic. Carom board game. Chatting away on all topics under the sun. We also took over the kitchen a couple of times. It served as a good time to unwind and know more about the various people in the group. We had people who were apparel designers, IT professionals, advertisement designers, Businessmen, A farmer ! , senior sales people among others in the group. Apart from this each of the instructors had their own stories on how the came to be.

Access Denied !!!

The pain of "Accedd Denied !!!" is all to well know to employees of companies who are paranoid about security and who like to monitor the movements of the employees. These companies believe that restricting an employee from a few handful of sites is the best thing it can do to increase productivity.

Productivity ! - Well here is an oft used word. I am not sure the employees actually know the meaning of it. Like all that is said about convincing a person here to the Carrot and the Stick ideology will hold. How can a persons productivity incerase. The first method is to understand at an employee level what is his most cherished thing and what will he get out of the same. It could be Modey , Big bonus, travel , lax work timings , the role responsibility he is looking for. But who decides what is fair and what is implementable. Well a manager could try to employee better and accordingly put it across and get it implemented. Because if a person dosent get whats he believes he is ment to have then in effect he becomes a process runner and productivity gets affected.

Hence let the person be free. See what really drives a person .Instead of denying access to certain websites track usage on what are the type of sites he is visiting or keeping open for a long time. This could give a topic of conversation to managers and could also make them more atuned to the subordinates. But the eternal question remains that what do you do with a gamer ? i.e. a person who is clever /intutive enough to understand the system and then play it towards his advantage. Ahh! but this to is an indicator to what the person wantes. Hence dont Deny access.

Access Granted ! Proceed with caution.!

HR Tips - woah i should be involved wit hsome of this non-implementables.

Car Hunting - New Vs Old ??

Today after a long break i an my brother decided to do some car hunting. Well the initial thinking was that we would like to look at an old 2nd hand vehicle and then resell / trash it after 2 years of usage.

Following the thought we visited several 2nd hand car vendors around the indiranagar area. Visited 1 in CMH road, 1 in 100ft road , 1 in Old madras road and 1 in Double road. We found that the bangalore market has a thriving 2nd hand car market base, if you have 4-5 prospering vendors in a 2 kms radius then the scene for the new car market should be really good.

Comming back to the car itself. I had test driven a Honda city a few days earlier was good but done quite a few kilometers. Then yesterday i had a look in at a Cielo . The cielo was in great shpe looks wise and the ride was also reasonably comfortable but the thought that it may crash anytime was in our minds. The greatest motivator was the cost of the vehicle, at sub-1 lakh unbelievable. This apart from the numerous indicas and santros we rejected. Didnt even look at the smaller varieties of Santro.

We then were by then quite exhausted by the older cars. We then went to the Maruthi showroom and Test drove both the New Zen Estilo and the Wagon R . The drive quality and ambience of the Estillo was far greater , but it seemed that the Wagon-R may have more space in-car. We the most negative aspect of both the offerings was the on-road cost, at greater than 4 Lakhs for the LXi they were pretty expensive. But i guess that is the market premium for a trouble free vehicle for atleast 5 years.

Depreciation. The greatest enemy of a new car is the depreciation. You tend to loose upward of a lakh in a year and after 2 years babout 1.3 lakh for a 4 lakh car i.e 35 % of its value. The cost of the music system and other accessories aspect of the car have not even come in.
Cost of ownership of a new car (not considering Interest of any loan that you might take).
1.3 lakhs - depreciation
0.1 lakhs - Maintainance
0.1 Lakhs - 2nd year insurance
0.1 lakh - loss in value of accessories
--------
1.6 lakhs - for a 24 month period
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i.e 6700 rs / - per month apart from the petrol cost. i.e. a high percent of your monthly salary. Will need to throw in an additional 3000rs for the petrol that you will use.
So a 10,000/- per month of usage of car is a relistic estimate.

Well not lets look at getting a beat up Cielo (hoping it works)
Cost 100,000 rs. + 20,000 Maintainance + 10,000 sundry expence (old car na)
resale value - locky if you get a buyer. ha ha. But junk value at least say 30000rs. So you spend nearly 4000/- p.m. if you scrap it after 2 years. Well might as well use it till it lasts.
Cost of fuel may work out to a little more , but if you have gas the same.
so you are capping your expense at arond 7000/- Rs p.m. considering decent driving.

Quality of ride and other aspects:
- The new car being new will feel great.
- But the space is lesser and cannot have an option of a driver in the future.
- The accelaration and feel of a new car will definately be good. The old car will be a little sluggish
- The boot of an old big car cannot be reached.
- Manuverability of the smaller car is much better but the Power stearing (ps) of the old car will compensate for it in some measure.
- finally the peace and assurity of working of a new car. The main reason for paying the premium.

There is another interesting twist to the whole cost and pricing aspect of the vehichle that can change the dynamics on the head. The "depreciation" benifits of a self employed person. If you can charge of 40% of the value of the vehicle as expense and in a5 year period get backthe entire cost of the vehicle as expence including the cost of running it. Then you get a 30.2% benifit on the entire cost by way of saving s on tax. Hence a 4 lakh car will cost 2.7 laks. That change the entire cost landscape.

now:
cost of new vehicle Rs 7000 / -(effective) = cost of old vehicle rs 7000/- (assuming nbo depreciation allowed as the vehicle is already 7 years of old. , will have to look into the IT rile book for the same.)

Well the decition is finally at the same place.
i.e. Cost (downpayment + ownership) VS Comfort (size + ease of use)

Am yet to decide if you can get closer to yours that will be great.

Mumbai - Kaleidoscope of Relatives

28th thru 30th Jan, was a hugely eventful , tiring and an interactive experience.

Why ? What happened !! .... Well i had been to Mumbai after a gap of 5 years and was met by a plethora of relatives.
The main reason was Umesh's marraige (look at the post below) , but apart from this Amma, had come along and it was a time for networking with all the relatives , it had been a while.

Day 1 :
Myself and Ravi (bro.) flew in together to the mumbai airport. There we waited for an hour before amma and patti (we call her perrima) came along from chennai. As we stepped outside we met Radha Perrima and Ganesh (Umesh's brother , who had come all the way from london). After this closely nit gang met, we split into 2 groups , 2 taxis, and went to chembur to char ammai's home. Here Santosh (younger one) had come from his Naval classes and was asleep , we also met Geetha chitti and Ramdas. Laxmi (ramdas's wife) had cooked food for us. Rasam and keeria molakutal , was a nice change of food for me. Indira Mami from Bangalore was already present there. After all the chating we headed for Deepam, with ganesh.

At deepam we met up with Tangumani (the grooms mom) and kanna na (appa there). Also present was umeshs cousin from Chennai , Annupama, with her parents. Were chatting away. Here Umesh who was out for a friends marriage was back and we met him. Later in the day Sindhu (ganesh's wife) and Sxxxxxxxx (his daughter) came back from her chittis house and we were a full house here too.

That evening after 11 PM a small gang went to the kalyana mandapam and took care of the cleaning, kolam and other mandapam related arrangements; as it was being cleared by another party. Returned around midnight. Talked away listned to perspectives etc.. In the night spent some time on the computer sending mails and also trying to speed up the computer...

Umesh's Marraige

Hey umesh got married. He is a cousin in Bombay always been there and seldom left the comforts of those environs. Finally met up with a colleague from his workplace. A gujju girl , Sapna, mind you. But in these times when people are not sure if you are gonna get married to the same person from your country , him marrying a girl from a nearby state is not bad. Hey though he is a tamil iyer , being in mumbai all his life makes him a hard core mumbaikar.

But the process was not smooth. They were going around for a few years now. A Yes here a 'no' there, there was a certain degree of uncertainity behind it all. But as it is known that time is the eternal healer , also age caught on, and finally both ties the knot. But all that after a zappily decided date and virtually no time for people plan and comment about. But all is well that ends well . decided on the 15th and married off on the 29th, man that was fast.

The time was also good for a few cousins like me who were totally out of the Bombay scene. I Hadnt been there for nearly 5 years, also the 5 day vacation that came along provided the opportune moment for all the cousins and relatives to congregate. Apart from this there were a beavy of parents who were busily trying to look at young adults of maraigable age and trying to pair them off with there children or to someone in the family.

Well wishing them a good time and life together.

The second comming.

It has baan a longish wait for me. i havnt started blogging ..

Buy why ? when the n number of people around me are blogging why did i put this though out of my mind for so long? I guess it was a crossing of two aspects of personality... the time factor and the mood factor...

Guess now comfortaly nested in a chair in my living room , going thru the various blogs and posts that many known souls are maintining i have finally reached the point where i see value in describing my thoughts in words. I feel it is a good camvas to reflect back upon at a later point of time.

Getting more people to read is not the objective , but the prospect of having an eternal diary is an interesting concept and i hope plan to try out.

But what i fear most i what is going to go into this canvas. Will i be able to make entries only when i am in the same state of mind and mood ??? well guess i will have to wait and hope that the words are not a superimposition of a particular type of mood i am gonna have but on reflection will be an interesting read from the various experiences in life..

My First Time

Wow what is this..... My friend asked me to start a blog....

Golly what to do with this ...... Dont know if it will be useful

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