Road side banners – copying Pune politicians

In PCMC and Pune you will find that road side banners are put up on every chowk and street corner for the local leader, corporator, MLA, MP’s birthday.


These are not made of cotton, with text and pictures painted by hand – as you would have seen during election times prior to 1996-97 era. The banners that you see nowadays can be mass produced, they are made of glossy, synthetic plastic type material – can have pictures with digital image quality printed by machines.

These are the “coding” standards used –

Every one is called “Bhau”, “Sheth”, “Dada”, “Saheb” or “Rao” and every one is a “Karya Samrat”. There is lot of “urf” terminology used (in English - a.k.a or also-known-as)

So if you are a budding “nagar sevak” or even the 5 year old son of a “nagar sevak” – you will find 10 feet * 10 feet banners put on roads for occasions like birthdays, any major festivals etc, with probably 20-30 small size photos of people who are “shubhekshuk – or “compliments from” inserted at the bottom of the banner.

For MLA or a minister, the banners will be 30 feet by 10 feet – with full body size pictures – shown in different style/poses – one in the traditional white political dress, one with a suit in color, and the same one in black-and-white.

Taking inspiration from this, few of my Capgemini and alumni friends made up a 6*4 feet banner for one of our alumni member who was getting married – they actually put this up in the lane where this person (who is getting married), lives. Here is the actual picture of the banner put up in the Aundh area – I am sure the locals would have been amused!!!

Movies to watch when you have nothing to do!!

If you have time, and nothing worthwhile to do, you can watch these 2 movies – (I watched both of them last month). Another equally irritsting movie is FARISHTAY - with dharmendra and Vinod Khanna.

Tehelka – A 1980’s film directed by ANIL Sharma (the same person who directed GADAR and VEER). An atrocious film - out-of-the-world dialogues - Indian army officers (Shammi Kapoor, Mukesh Khanna, Aditya Panchsoli, Naseerudding Shah, Dharmendra trying to bring down a dictator from a Kashmir type country/state ruled by evil Amrish Puri. The guns used in the movie are iron pipes, painted black, and welded together. Even a kid can tell that those are FAKE guns. I guess the first movie which showed “real” hardware being used was Roza.


Hum Saath Saath Hai – A not-so-successful film from the Barjatya’s – very character is not only named – “something”-Babu, but also uses the Babu suffix in every dialogue, not only referring to the character in 3rd person, but in face to face talk as well.

While on the topic “Babu” – lot of Gulti film stars are “babu” - Aditya “Babu”, Naga “Babu”etc. I can’t imagine why would a film start want to be called “Babu”.

Imagine Shahrukh “Babu”!!!!! or Hrithik “Babu” on the credits!!

Trivia –

One thing in the gulti movies – if a star is famous by a particular screen name or epithet – he HAS to be introduced in all movies with the same name – the junta will cause a riot in the theatre if a different name is used. So Cheeranjeevi has an unique epithet, Nagarjuna has one for him and so on..

This was told to me by one of my friends – I will need to verify by watching a gulti movie in the theatre.

Haircut

An haircut - a simple 15/20 minute "task" - but a great stress reliever. And if you happen to be in India  (I do not go to the "salons" where you may end up parting with INR 200-400, but not have all the small things that a smaller establishment has to offer), an additional 20 Rs will get you a nice head massage - leaving you completely relaxed and fresh after you come out of the shop. And if you tend to visit the same barber shop each time, an haircut becomes the perfect place to catch up on area gossip, cricket news, and how-xyz-should-have-played type of arguements. Also, if you are a "regular" , you also enjoy the the tea brought by the neighborhood "baarkya". And those "Mayapuri" magazines giving you the latest gossip of Bollywood. Sportstar (generally old editions, purchased from a 2nd hand book shop) are found - you can get to catch up on the older news. Also, an additional 10 Rs buy you a perfect shave

Alas, you cannot enjoy these simple pleasures in the US. A typical barber is a "She" instead of a "He" - unless you go to the old fashioned barber shops on Main Street that are run by old African Americans.

The thing that irriates me is that you are foreced to have a conversation about things (how are you, and the weather, and the Bears and the Sox - No God, I just want to relax for a few minutes without spending time in meaningless talk) that you are least interested to discuss while you are getting a haircut. And then you part with a tip, which is not really deserved. Well, these US-Barber-shop discussions lack the passion that a Sachin Tendulkar discussion would generate back in India.

Anyways, you do feel "leaner" and "younger"- as if you did loose a couple of pounds  after an haircut, whether done in India or the US!!

Trip to Richmond, Virginia - WHERE IT ALL BEGAN

Virginia  -This is where the seeds of the soon-to-be "United States Of America" were sown with the Jamestown settlement of 1607. It was the same timeframe in history when the English were courting with the Great Mughal (Jahangir) to get trading firmaan (permit) to establish trading outpost or "factories" in Surat, India - then the most busiest port in India, though monopolised by the Portuguese.

This is also the heart of the US Tobacco Industry - Tobacco was the leading crop of the southern colonies of the original 13 - before it was replaced by cotton.

Tobacco is still a very big industry - Philip Morrison has its headquarters here in Richmond - though the cigarettes were not "cheap" in Virginia by much - YES - they were cheaper than what it takes to buy a pack in COOK County, Illinois ( 4.X $ in Richmond vs 7.x $ in Cook County)

Visted DC as part of the 2 day trip - spent a day visting the attractions around the Mall - all the "Patel" value activities that a Indie tourist usually does.

3.17% (6 out of 189 )

Now moving on to countries...the number of independent countries, as recognized by UN varies from 189 to 195 - I am using the lower number (to improve percentages)

These are the countries that I have visited ( or transited) -

India  (Home Country)
Germany
USA
Switzerland
UK
Netherlands

And while we are at it, I do have a 100% - touched the water of all the 3 major oceans (Indian, Atlantic, Pacific)

29.41 % (15 out of 51) - 3 more to come

No.. this is not my examination percentile. As I move back to India, a random thought came to my mind - how many of the 50 US states (plus DC) did I ever grace with my visit -

Ranked below are the states (based on the  date of the first visit - there are states that I stayed/visited multiple times. Also, D.C is counted as a state though its not really a state)

Illinois
Ohio
Indiana
Missourri
Pennsylvania
New York
California
New Jersey
Wisconsin
Iowa
Minnesota
Florida
Michigan
Virginia
Washington, DC

So lets see what the future has in store - will I ever complete 50 :)

My first "5K"... and my first blog....

I "completed" my first 5K race in 42 minutes - I say "completed" because I did not run the distance non stop - though the 1st mile was run non stop, and then a walk/jog combination as my lungs and legs allowed. It was fun to finish the race, with total strangers cheering you on, and a table with hundreds of glasses of Gatorade/water waiting at the end. It was fun doing "bottoms-up" on so many glasses - and even more fun to get the bragging rights of completing a 5 K run.

Fun aside, it was a fantastic event organized by a charity organization (more details on http://ashanet.org/chicago/5k/ ). The next goal is to complete a "non stop" 5K before this winter sets in, and running outside is no longer possible!