I was recently robbed. In, as they say, broad daylight. I let a stranded commuter (or so I thought) hitch a ride on my pillion seat. He alighted at what seemed a funny place for a commuter to alight - no buildings or bus stops or road junctions nearby. Much later, when I fished out my wallet from my backpack to pay a shopkeeper, I noticed something seriously amiss. My wallet had contained many thousand rupees and a twenty when I tossed it into my bag at home. Now, it contained only a twenty. Very smooth. It was clearly an opportunistic pinch - all my cards and other important stuff were intact. The only thing missing were the big bills, which I'd just withdrawn a couple days back, since I'd intended to do some shopping for the home. My mind was such a whirl of emotions, that I had to sit down with a coffee to disentangle one from the other and make sense of where I was. The first thing I felt was betrayal. It's not about the money , I told myself, it's the feeling that

I don't pride myself on my photography skills. In fact, when Anurag and Senti get started on one of their all-too-frequent photography discussions, I feel embarrased to know I have an SLR too, but can't differentiate between a Kodak BW400CN and a Konica VX 100. Senti used to borrow one of my zoom lenses till the point it was more his than mine, and then he bought one for himself and returned mine. I had hardly noticed its absence. One day, I realized that a roll of film had been lying in my camera for close to a year, and thus jumped at Senti's call inviting me to go photographing in the countryside. We rode our bikes beyond Sus on the Pashan-Sus road. Senti firmly resisted my entreaties to go climb a nearby hill, and settled down to do some macro photography. Here he is, contemplating the scenery, and wondering if it wouldn't look better at f4.5 with a slight bit of overexposure. Thank you, Sentiman! We shall go on more such trips in future... and next time, we shal

I am as amazed by the amount of effort we put into creating new devices to make our lives complex, as I am by the number of simple loopholes that exist to resolve them. The red tape that's been on my mind for the past few weeks is called "The Address Proof", and the loophole that extricates one from it is called "The Company Letterhead". Let me elaborate... The first time I was introduced to the Address Proof was a few years back, when I went to the bank empty-handed (but for a cheque from my previous bank) and asked naïvely to open an account please, and bung my doubloons into it. The banker tried to shoo me away, asking me to return with an Identity Proof, and an Address Proof, since I no longer stayed at the address on the earlier bank's record. I dug out my drivers license, which the banker accepted as Identity Proof. There remained the question of Address Proof. Did I have electricity bills? (no, not in my name.) Telephone bills? (nope, yet to apply for

These days, I get the eerie feeling of living in a soap opera. Where I'm hardly in control of the circumstances, and the said circs. are leading me, slowly and inevitably, to Valhalla. But wait. Rewind. Restart. Such are not the wheels I intended to blog about. The wheels under scrutiny are literal. Namely, one shiny new rear tyre, bought when I was facing an average of a puncture a day, and an old cracked front, which "can go for another 250km", or so the tyre guy said about 500km ago. The last two Sundays were starkly different - one was spent at work and the other in leisure - and yet, they had a common thread (other than the fact that they both were Sundays, that is...) They both involved bike rides in near perfect weather. I was considering a hike on the Sunday before last, when at the last minute but one a client called and said he wanted to meet. Argh! Determined to make the best of it, I rode my Pulsar all the way to Ranjangaon, about 50km from Pune. It was a rai

It's been more than four years now I'm back in India. Yet, the reverse culture shock still hits me, often without warning. The following incident happened a couple of years back, but occasionally comes back to haunt me, especially when I get other reverse shocks. It was the middle of monsoons. Being completely bored at staying indoors all day, I took my bike one evening and went on a ride. After watching the sun set from the hills, I re-entered the concrete jungle and parked at a bookstore. As I was lugging the bike on to its stand, a kid approached me. He had a rag and a bucket in his hands. Stereotypical vehicle-washer. " Saab ..." "No." (vigorous head shaking) " Sirf do rupai saab ..." "Sorry" (commiserating look. I'm a pro at this now) " Khana saab ..." "Nah." As I walked away from this everyday incident, I reflected and wondered if I'd heard right. Two rupeees? The kid must be either incredibly desperate

The other day, KP and I took an afternoon off from work and went to the Cantonment to buy some trousers for him. KP was scheduled to attend some marriages, and he felt that his current set of four trousers wouldn't do the occasions justice. Since I anyways had to buy replacements for my existing pair of held-in-place-by-Fevicol shoes, I promptly agreed to the outing. Plus, I like going to M G Road. It's a vibrant place and frequented by shoppers from such diverse cultures that I never get bored people-watching there. KP is quite a particular shopper. He is very meticulous to detail, and always seems to know the right questions to ask of the salesmen. At the trouser store, he asked about the fiber content of the trouser-material. The salesman pointed to the information printed on the cloth, which mentioned that it was made of a certain percentage of Merino wool. On reading this, KP turned at me and gave a knowing smile. He drew a blank. He then said, "Merino Wool!?" an

The phone rang. Which was a relief, since Arjun had dropped it just a few moments back, breaking it into three pieces and hastily joining it back together. And I was curious to know, without appearing too rude, if the thing still worked. "Yo!", I said. It was Senthil , and it is always a pleasure chinwagging with Senti. Plus, I have to be on my best behavior with colleagues who have - and exercise - the power to ruin my vacation plans by giving me work to do. "I say, are you at the office now?", asked Senti. I replied in the affirmative, since it appeared from all sensory inputs that I was. "Are you very busy with work? I mean to say, do you have some time?" I have known Senti a while, and this is how he usually leads up to asking for a favor. Quite the polite gravedigger, he is. This time around, I decided to pull a friendly leg. "Well, actually, I am quite deep in work. Up to my neck, in fact, and getting deeper by the minute. But for you , I am a