Short Story Contest and An Indecent Ending

Here’s an entirely useless piece of information for more than 6 billion humans and the entire Ostrich species. I am going home this weekend for a week. Yes, the economy would be spurred a little. But in the larger scheme of things, Milky-way shall continue approaching the Andromeda galaxy at the speed of 130 Km/s, leaving Bangalore Metro Corporation with just five more billion years to finish the work on CMH road.

Meanwhile, you guys still have time to read and write stories in the upcoming contest here. The contest opens on July 8th. You are supposed to write a story in 250 words inspired by the picture of a glass filled with red wine. Co-incidentally one of my posts (click here), written three months back, comes quite close to being an entry with minor editing. However, going by the level of stories in Jason’s contests, I would have to come up with something better.

His previous contest had a picture of escalator with a pair of legs riding it. My entry "Life is Beautiful” (click here) obviously didn’t win a place and I can see so many glaring gaps in it now. It did manage to be in Forties club which includes all the entries that scored more than 40 out of 45. The best part about the contest is the high quality of entries and super-kind comments you get there.

I would love to see fellow bloggers’ entries there. It is a rewarding experience. Get your creative juices flowing (rather unimaginative phrase, I know ).

If you are still here, join me in wishing my Vinnie a Happy B’day. She turns five today and is all mine now with the last installment being paid on first of this month. Here’s a humble picture of hers, two years ago. As is evident, the owner has never been a very colorful personality.



Below is the current-me after having gulped fifteen portions of dead chicken, goat and a fish. There’s a bottle of beer by the pool side. If one ignores the lingering finger and has noticed the thin half-naked me, one shouldn't have any doubts that my mom, as usual, is not going to like what she sees when I reach home.I've always been thin due to a high metabolic rate. Eight meals a day is the forecasted routine for the next week, without any consideration for the quest for a six-pack. Contrary to what one might infer about me from the content of this blog, I am a huge SRK fan. And if he can do it after forty, I am not going to die without a six-pack snap to show to my grandchildren. Like it or not, that snap shall be on display here too once I succeed. There are as many as nine bets running over it since the time Om Shanti Om was released.



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How not to get duped at the petrol pump

It’s that time of the month again when Vinnie needs her food. I usually get the tank full at the petrol pumps for three reasons. This avoids extra trips to the pump and it is good for the engine since it results in reduction of the amount of time the level of petrol remains low in the tank. The third reason is to avoid the prospect of a confrontational situation which is explained below.

During initial days in Bangalore, I noticed that my spending on petrol has gone up quite a bit even though the distances covered daily were less than those in Gurgaon. I attributed that to nearly 15% difference in petrol prices and slow moving traffic here. However, with time, it came to notice that there were fluctuations in mileage in Bangalore itself; thousand rupees petrol sometimes lasted 15 days while other times it got over within 10 days.

It must be mentioned here that I am not someone who keeps a notebook on expenses per month and then sits and analyzes them. It’s just that I have a fondness for numbers. I remember quite a few of them and catch any inconsistencies easily. That had led to the blasphemous allegation that I am an extremely caring person just because I never forgot anyone’s B’day. Now I deliberately don’t wish people even if I remember their all sorts of anniversaries. Enough of me, let’s move to the point now.

Since petrol-pumps were the only variables in this situation, it was natural to suspect them. However, even for the same petrol pump, there were considerable variations sometimes. It was turning out to be an intriguing problem. So this one particular time, I decided to be more observant and asked the guy to fill petrol worth Rs.500 instead of the usual Rs.1000. Here is what happened:

I parked my car and got out of it in order to observe the meter closely.

“500”, I said. It’s fun to communicate with as few words as possible.

“Zero Sir”, he pointed to the meter.

“Sir, Cardaa or cashaa?”, another guy approached me. Happens always; get your payment done while the tank is getting filled. Parallel processing; no rocket science here.

I gave him the credit card without uttering a word, which, later I realized, also meant that my attention was diverted.

“Sir! Over. 200.” the first guy pointed to the meter.

“But I asked for 500; you never listen properly. Last time too you did the same thing”, I replied irritatingly.

“Sorry Sir, see zero again”. He went on to fill 300.

Satisfied, I signed the credit card receipt and started the car. Surprisingly enough, the petrol indicator hadn’t moved to half of what it used to move for 1000. “Must be a calibration error”, the forgotten and ignored Instrumentation Engineer in me tried to soothe the rest of me and succeeded for a while.

However, as soon as the car moved, I had the Eureka moment. In the first half of the filling, the full 200 never goes in; there is a button or a trick which when used, directly jumps to that mark. Asking for a credit card, or car wash/paint are tactics to divert the attention. The lost 200 was a smaller part of 1000, but this time when asked for 500, the difference was clearly noticeable.

I got down the car and confronted that guy. Initially he insisted that he heard 200 first. My line was "how come you always hear 200 instead of 500"; not a very persuasive one; all rhetoric and no evidence. There was a deadlock in arguments and it seemed useless to fight with the group. Threats of never visiting their pump didn’t earn any respect either.

Logic came to rescue once again. The car was definitely having some petrol (though not much) before they poured any into the tank. The tank, when empty, used to get filled in around 1700 when you convert currency to liters. The capacity of the petrol tank cannot be disputed. So, if he had already filled in 500 worth of petrol, then he must not be able to fill in worth 1200 more. I asked those guys to go for a full tank and if the amount crosses 1200, then I wouldn’t be paying a single penny. Of course, they didn’t have any comeback for this; that’s the best thing about maths, number of people on the wrong side don’t count.

I had been tricked in such manner more than once at other locations too. When checked with friends, nearly all of them recalled getting duped similarly quite often. Easy money.

So now I always say “full tank”; it cannot be mistaken for 200 or 100. Coming back from Goa I had a thousand rupee note, which I had to dispense off. On my next visit to the pump, I raised 10 fingers and said “Thousand, and don’t play that 200-waala trick with me”. A few extra words, but they were necessary.

Radiosyncrasies

One of the many reasons why car-pooling won’t quite work for me is that I am too whimsical with the radio while driving. I don’t have TV as part of my family since that thing enslaves me. An hour spent in two parts listening to the radio while commuting between office and home is my only source of passive entertainment.

Radio-Indigo, FM 91.9: Amongst all the channels in Bangalore, this one suits me the finest. I love the daily stock market update when RJ Meghna calls up their stock market expert. My heart goes out for her. She usually starts with a witty line depending on that day’s events, like “Mr. Ahuja, Are the stock markets going to make us millionaire too?” when Slumdog won Oscars.

A pretty flat toned reply comes from the other end and then he straightaway gets on with the updates “The markets are seen up/down due to global cues. * ABC is at X. * BCA seems to be doing well due to the new regulations. * CBA is coming up with new product. * Inflation numbers are at low at Y%. * …” .

Now replace all the * with Meghna’s disinterested “OK” and “Umhmm”. Mostly there are 4 OKs and 5 Umhmms, in no specific order, which makes for a good guessing game. That man could as well have been telling the scores of a Test match between Baroda and Railways. You can almost feel the relief in her voice when she hurriedly thanks him in the end, “Alright Mr. Ahuja, THANK YOU VERY MUCH”. Many times she has to ask a question related to one of his updates and at the same time concerning the financially illiterate common man; in this case she would say, “So finally we can eat vegetables now, hee hee .”

Radio One, FM 94.3: This is the only channel which continuously plays Hindi music, but it’s too mass-oriented and marred with very long breaks. I can recite all the ads including the ones in Kannada without understanding a word. In the evening there’s this request show in which the lady RJ repeats “How sweet/cute” to all the callers. Imagine listening to a tired software engineer telling “I am returning from my office” and then the response “So sweet”, especially when you too are returning from the office after a hectic day. I admit though that I couldn't have done any better than her in long term.

The greatest insult to your intelligence is done when they air celebrity interviews which are obviously already recorded and of course not taken by their RJs. They try to build up the excitement hours before the interview, then they actually let us hear Katrina’s phone ring and in between the pauses that Katrina takes while talking, they provide fillers like “Yes, Katrina, we all do that.”

However, the most annoying part is when they play a song with Punjabi touch like “Uncha Lamba Kadd” . When the song is about to begin, the RJ Prithvi, in his josh, blurts out something on the lines of “Oye Sonniye, Haai Kudiye ,Mar jaavan..” in a horrible imitation of northie accent. My Gurgaon born Vinnie shudders at those sounds; her childhood memories are so timidly molested.

All India Radio (AIR) Channels: Let’s start with the irritating bits first in continuation with the cribbing I’ve done so far. Most of private radio channels have pretty catchy brand music/song. They have their tag lines too like “Radio Mirchi, It’s HOT”, “FM 94.30, the Station For The Fatafat Generation” or "Radio Indigo, The Color Of Music" and you can clearly sense the hard work gone into creating these and ensuring that everything together present a coherent image to the listeners. Here’s what our Sarkaari channel FM Rainbow has to offer: A girl sings, just like a kindergarten kid would, “FM Rainbow Aaha , FM Rainbow Aaha”, twice, with no background music to speak of.

Then there are these poll/request kind of programs. The private channels come up with questions like “What would you do if the man you've been dating for two years tells you that he actually wears a wig?” or something contextual like “How safe do you feel the next day whenever there is a Bomb Hoax in Bangalore?”. You can see that they TRY.

Sometimes back this is what I heard on one of the national channels, in a fake American accent, and even shallower deep voice “I have a very interesting question today for you. What you would ask for if a Jinnie, you know the Aladdin Jinnie, grants you three wishes. Please sms to xyz number. Now listen to the song Mahi-Ve”. Then they went on to play Mind-blowing Mahia. That song too got interrupted all of a sudden. There’s simply no attempt towards creativity and there are just too many mistakes to ignore.

Meanwhile someone in fact replied to the above question. I was surprised to hear that. So now our RJ goes “We have a very funny reply from number ending with 666. His first wish is a hundred Armani Suits. What would you do with these many suits? Haa haa. His second wish is a Ferrari car. And his third wish is a big house”. You wonder whether the sender was sarcastic enough to send the apt reply to the ordinary question. Our dear RJ found it very funny though.

However, the programs on Vivid-bharti are very genuine. Their target audiences are small towns and villages, the three fourth of India. The requests come to them in form of hand written letters and the language is totally earthy and unpretentious.

Personal favorites are “Fauji Bhaiyon ke liye”, a program where mostly the requests from soldiers are entertained and “Sakhi-Saheli”, a program for housewives in the afternoon, where they discuss domestic issues and homely tips like how to prepare pickles, what are the benefits of sending girls to the school, how to handle family finance and save money, how they celebrate Holi. You realize that these things are not as simple as they sound and such programs are very much needed for the entertainment and information they provide. The best thing is that everything is so real.

When I hear “Jhumka Gira re” is requested by Billu, Tinku, Jamuna, Suman from Nagda, Nafeez, Tinu, Babu from Betiya.., I slip into nostalgia. As a child I had a peculiar insomniac condition of not being able to sleep in the afternoon (which is now getting compensated for). While my mom and younger brother used to sleep, I would be listening to the radio waiting for a request from Dewas. The other times I would just play cards by myself or would kill the passers by with my gun as the radio played. Of course this was before we had a TV.

The year that wasn't

This has been a dull year for me. Not a great way to start a post but I do find myself questioning “Did I simply sidestep and let the driver of the bus (rather train) pass by without noticing me?”. I didn’t even yell back at the driver; just sat there chewing paan.

That this has been the most uneventful year of my life is an uneasy fact which can’t be denied. I look for answers. Mathematics provides some of them, rest I explain with the help of cricket.

In general (not always), we characterize situations in personal life to be significant when they happen for the first time or have an high intensity of experience. So first day at the college is a day we all remember but at the same time no parent would not cherish the birth of the second child.

Life is such that the probability of anything happening for the first time reduces with age. When exactly do you expect the first shower of monsoon to drench you: June or September? The first word is uttered in months, first step taken in a year, first crush happens before you’ve seen a decade and so on and, as the usage goes, so forth. I don’t expect to have my first pimple or the first job on the wrong side of twenties. Yes, there are things like the first white hair which will take its own sweet time, but that’s what the point is: number of such events reduces with the age. At the cost of sounding sissy, I must admit that the only first thing I see happening to me in near future isss …welllll..."samajh me nahi aata kaise kahun"…MARRIAGE (which, for information's sake, and for the delight of lovely ladies reading this blog, I must mention, is not yet fixed).

What happens, sir, to the intensity, you might ask. It reduces logarithmically. Your tenth year is 10% of your entire lifetime you have lived till then while your 30th is 3.33%. dY/dX=1/X implies Y=log(X). So a bonus or a promotion now doesn’t thrill me as much as it used to about three years ago. I am pretty calm now whenever my Vinnie nudges a fellow passenger. She’s got bruises all over her anyway. Of course there are certain things like wine and wisdom that get better with age, but that’s an ongoing process and not accountable. Saying that I grew wiser this year is like taking comfort in “You are unique”. Nothing different from others here and hence the intensity is lost.

The above two observations do provide a logical justification for the current state of affairs; some introspection is still in order. I wasn’t a lazy bum for the entire year and did lead a cheerfully optimistic and active life; didn’t stop trying either. To say that this was a year of consolidation and strengthening wouldn’t be miles away from the truth. Talking cricket here, I must say that the batsman didn’t score a duck or a century, but did manage a whole lot of runs and improved his technique. So if the “events” are scoring 0 or a 100, the statistics wouldn’t show any ticks in those columns but the averages and strike rates are a pleasing spectacle.

Let’s take some of my team’s batsmen one by one in this 2008 innings. Mr. Health was the man in form and scored a flourishing 88; he had never looked in such fine touch. Regular practice and disciplined approach, he claims, is the key to his success. There was a promising debut by Mr. Blog with his 45. Some of his shots showed solid technique and promise of a stable future; we’ll have to wait and watch how far he goes.

After scoring back to back centuries in last two innings, Mr. Finance returned with a measly 14. The bodyline bouncers from Lehman Brothers got him retired hurt and specialist say that it might take more than a year for him to recover.

Mr. Relationships worked pretty hard to get back in form and scored a gritty 40. There were some poor shot selections, but overall you got to admire the skill, courage and patience he was showing on the bouncy tracks which he is not very accustomed to bat on. Unfortunately he feels that he was a victim of a bad run-out decision by the umpire; in the hindsight he shouldn’t have attempted the risky single. Ususally , the batsman gets the benefit of doubt, but such has seldom been the case with Mr. Relationships.

However, Mr. TripToGoa was the unluckiest of them all; he didn’t even get the strike due to bad light. However he is destined to play up the order (read January) in the next innings (read 2009).Mr. Job did well with a handy 76. He makes batting look so easy and comfortable. Not the one to shy away from playing the risky reverse sweeps, he has been a soothing delight to watch. Mr. Rubbishknowledge steadily accumulated 69.

Similar contributions have ensured that the innings total is around 424 (even though there isn’t a single century) which is not bad by any standard when you look at the pitch. The batsmen have learnt their lessons and are improving further. I take solace in the fact that the team never looked getting out below 200 and steady progress was the theme of the day. Gaining the advantage of this innings, they can play an attacking game further; I anticipate firecrackers in 2009. Someone told me long ago, there’s calm before the storm.

PS: My friend Pravu has suggested an engaging topic after reading this post. Why don't you guys submit the runs scored by your batsmen in 2008: Mr. Health, Job, Relationships and you may add further. Check out the comments to get an idea :).

Tricks of trades: Introduction

Friday night. Music was exploding inside Vinnie as she zipped through the traffic at dangerous speeds to bring me back to home from work. All bills are paid ahead of time, car has been serviced and insured last week , groceries are well stocked, hair are short enough; in short, the weekend ahead had nothing better to do other than watch me switching between the bed and the bean bag . As the song goes, I had no deeds to do, no promises to keep. I really was feeling groovy, a drink was in order.

I parked the car and walked towards the “Happy Wine Shop” nearby to get a quarter of whisky. I had a 500 note along with a few 10’s. Something within me told me that the shop-keeper might try to cheat: he’ll pretend that I gave him a 100 rupee note instead of 500. So I memorized the number on the 500 note as an alibi. The romantic in me imagined that it would be pretty neat when I’ll grandly challenge him to check the 500 notes in his stack for the number I memorized and once vindicated, fellow customers would clap for me with admiration.

The thing costs 130; I gave the 500 note, he asked me for a change of 30 which I gave him and naturally expected 4 hundred rupee notes in return. He began packing the small box and gave it to me in a bag. I took it and then walked back without taking the 4 hundreds. I forgot!! Forgot to ask for the change, forgot the whole 500 vs 100 analysis done just minutes ago. I still remember the number on the 500 note, but when it mattered I forgot the reason why I memorized it. The next morning when I looked into my wallet, I realized my mistake. Going back to the shop was futile; still went there. Someone who sells liquor can’ be expected to be so honest; God knows how many men he has to bribe and how many weird characters he has to deal with in a day’s work.

The shop-keeper tried his luck and he succeeded against a fully prepared customer. He must be doing this many a times; sometimes he would win, the other times he’ll sheepishly return the change feigning oversight. Not much risk involved there. That’s one of the many safe long term strategies that people use quite often. Then there are other tricks too, some brilliant some naive, successful to varying extents.

Most of the professions allow the cunning ones opportunities to cheat/trick/take unfair advantages. A few of them might not even be illegitimate; rules & law can get you only so far. I recall being taken for a ride by the folks at petrol-pump, house-maid, shop-keepers, bank, land-lord, restaurants, cab-drivers, sales-persons, two professional con-men and some more. My story would be an antithesis of the movie “Catch me if you can”. I see a lot of smart ones around me fallen to similar stuff at the hands of apparently less educated and intelligent ones. The reason I think it is possible for a worker at petrol-pump to cheat an IITian with a degree in Economics from LSE is that he has a method. I have caught him when the same trick was being played the third time and when I shared this with my friends, most of them admitted being duped similarly and now are thankful for pointing it out.

I’ll be starting a series “Tricks of Trades” devoted to these incidents. Would take up examples from the list mentioned above and try to analyze the strategies that the subjects involved use. All these posts shall be under the label “Tricks of Trades”. The analysis would be around the forces that help these subjects take the advantage. I’ll try to see what is the economics involved, what kind of statistics favor the modus operandi and what are the psychological factors that are used. Also would think on the lines of risks involved, repeatability, longevity and long term pay-offs of the strategies from the trickster’s point of view.

I’ll follow it up with the way I felt and reacted after realizing the truth of the situation and what could be done to prevent/detect/minimize losses in such cases. Even the best prepared would loose sometimes. As the example above shows, I had already sensed what was to come, taken the precaution and yet when the time came my mind chose to reflect on other things in life and the preparations went in vain. The excuse given in such cases is that we are only human after all.

My Sweet Family

Refrigerator: Hi, my name is Calvin. This chap bought me three years ago. I have seen few things in life: Apples, milk, coke, beer and whisky (why whisky??). My freezer has never been used. This guy doesn't know whether and how to defrost me. Though my top is over utilized. He keeps nail-cutter, car-keys, expired pizza-hut coupons, coins, chewing gums and a lot of trash there. Spiders love my back side.

Washing machine: Hi, I am Whirly. I am in comma since last 2 years 10 months. The lazy bum doesn't use me any more. My work has been outsourced to a maid; reason being sighted was management overhead. He further harasses me by daily putting the clothes to be washed on me.

Laptop: Mr. Louis Dell here. My memory has been corrupted with porn, pirated movies and music. I seldom visit good sites; mostly browse through tabloids and junk sites dedicated to filmy-gossips, relationships ("10 ways to tell your boyfriend is bisexual" type) and explicit videos. First look at this geeky-looking dude and I had high hopes of running high-end algorithms on me churning out zillions of bits. Haven't executed even a single excel macro on me. The most respectable job I've done is preparing a word-document (the idiot's resume). I've never been entertained with a 3-D game; never gone beyond "Hearts" & "Solitaire".

Bed: He hasn't given me any name but I fancy myself being called Trash-bag. Anything in his house that is not at its allotted place is on me. 90% of his stuff fall into this category ; they are all in search of the promised land. Of course, the mattress is not on me. Poor her, she lies on the floor.

Chair: No name for me too. I service his feet more than his butt. I've been used to change tube-light and shove all the utensils given by his mother in a rack above where no one sees them. Mostly I am used to block the door from shutting when he needs breeze to flow through the house.

Car: My name is Vinnie (cause my number is V9920). I've been injured a lot in past; no medical care has been offered. He doesn't care whether I am serviced, whether the air pressure is enough, blah blah blah. All he does on time is insuring me; I believe he is waiting for me to die and claim the money. I haven’t seen any place outside the cities he stays in.