… from the episode “The Package“.

Unfortunately, the rain gods weren’t too happy with my plans. And as has happened on countless other occasions, it started drizzling as soon as I got out of my apartment. By the time I reached MG Road, the rain got worse and in the 2 minutes that it took me to find a parking space and get to a safe place which could shade me from the rain, I was completely drenched. I spent the next 15 minutes inside an ATM waiting for the rain to let up but when it showed no sign of weakening, I decided to do something drastic. Now, I am generally really cranky in such situations but I felt like a really fun guy for the rest of the evening. Since I was already totally wet and dripping, I got out of the ATM and started walking towards the bookstore in the rain. I was walking swiftly but slowed down from time to time to look at the people who were standing at the entrance of shops to save themselves from the rain and give them the look – “Hey sissies! Look at me! I’m not afraid of the rain!”. Yeah, I can be a real jerk at times! Although, some people did look at me with a hint of admiration in their eyes. Or so I imagined.

Anyways, I soon spotted a Bombay Dyeing showroom and an idea popped into my mind. I went in, with a trail of water following me, and asked for a towel. Now whats interesting is that the shopkeeper and I spent the new few minutes figuring out which size and color was right for me even though there was a huge puddle of water that had dripped from my clothes around me. I decided upon a dark blue, medium sized towel and bought it. When he tried to put the towel in a bag, I asked him if I could use the towel instead. He smiled and said yes. And then I happily dried my head, face and arms (all the parts accessible without taking off my clothes) and then I put it in the bag and proceeded to the bookstore. I quickly got the book I wanted but spent the next 20 minutes or so to look for a book I could gift a friend. My clothes were still wet and stuck to me. When I came out of the store, it was still raining but it wasn’t as bad. The temperature had dropped by a couple of degrees though and wearing wet clothes didn’t help much. So I thought of going to the nearby Barista on Church Street. As I was walking towards it, a girl who was walking behind me on the sidewalk took to the road instead and suddenly started tip-toeing. In the middle of the road!!?? (I wonder if the new Shoppers’ Stop ad inspired her to do so) I couldn’t help but smile. Some other people were also looking at her but she didn’t seem to care. And then she stopped and started walking normally again.

I was still trying to make sense of what had just happened when there was a huge blast-like sound and bright lights emerged on my right. I turned back a little and it was the the electrical meter of a building that was giving out huge sparks. I tried to keep walking but others came running towards me and one guy kept his hand on my shoulder(??) for support, I guess. He was still looking at the meter and after a second or so, he went back where he came from cos the sparks had stopped. He never even cared to look at the guy he had been holding for support. I was laughing and then I saw that the tip-toe girl had also stopped because of the whole ruckus and she was also smiling.

I started walking again. It was still raining and I was still wet. Only now, I felt like I was in a Seinfeld episode. The rest of the evening was uneventful. I spent a total of three and a half in my wet clothes before I finally reached home and got out of them. Phew!

The first picture is of a shop on Whitefield Road that I pass everyday on my way to work and back. It was first noticed by a friend who shared it with me and its been the reason for many laughs for the two of us since then. But I felt something like this should be shared with the whole world so here it is in all its glory:

Notice how there’s no space between U and S which makes me believe that the apostrophe was just an afterthought. Now you know where not to go for all your refractory needs!

The second picture was taken by me just before the sunset last Monday from the terrace of my new apartment. Everything was just perfect and I was lucky enough to capture the sunlight piercing through the clouds:

The picture made one of my friends a little envious cos he’d been trying to get such a shot for some time now. I think its beautiful! The sunset can be seen here.

Interestingly, in the post that I wrote an year ago, I had mentioned how my broadband provider was being a real pain. What I didn’t tell you was how I called up its customer service center everyday and gave the guy/gal a piece of my mind. They somehow always managed to get on my nerves. They made me discover how much hatred I was capable of. After a point of time, I started to talk to them with sarcasm only. As a result, I said some stuff that I have never said to anybody in my life. Here are few samples. Remember, they drove me crazy and I do not repent saying any of this:

“Not all of your customers are as dumb as you!”

“Does your company only hire retards?”

“Can anybody on the field team read?”

“How many of your company’s employees do I have to kill to get my connection fixed?”

“Do you use a different system of units for measuring time?”

“You suck at your job. Please quit!”

Ah, good times!

This is what the bill I needed to pay back then looked like:

So I logged into their website and went through the whole process of payment using a credit card only to get a timeout error in the end. So I restarted the process, choosing to pay using my bank account. The same error resurfaced. I got a little worried now so I checked my bank account’s statement immediately only to find out that Rs. 1908 had been debited from it. So I called up Tata Indicom customer care (cc) and I was informed that they had in fact received the payment both the times but it was alright because that just meant that I wouldn’t have to pay the bill the following month. Phew! So I had payed double the amount I was supposed to, right? Wrong!

The bill I got in October looked like this:

So instead of Rs. 3816 that I had actually paid, they somehow received Rs. 22896! Could it be that they are trying to make up for the hell I had to go through because of them? I don’t think so. I still called up cc and asked the guy about it. He told me it was a system fault which would be rectified and that I didn’t need to worry. Since I had already paid for one extra month, I didn’t care much and forgot about it.

Funnily enough, if I look at my transaction history on their website, it gives the correct details:

But this month I again got a weird bill:

The due date has already passed and I did not receive any warning. My connection is also working perfectly. I still thought I would pay the Rs. 1123 that I should but their bill pay screen scared me. They want me to transfer a negative amount. Take a look!

I called the cc again today but I was told to call later because their systems were down. Lets see what happens now!

1. Have you ever seen a store with a glass door use this kinda lock with a chain? Well, I hadn’t until I saw this at a mall in Lucknow.
   

   

2. This guy is some yogi and probably respected by some (??) but this photo of his holding a gada(mace) is just plain funny! Caught this in Gopinath Market, Delhi Cantonment.
   

   

3. Do you want a new child in your family but think the whole process is too cumbersome. Well, a multiplex in Sahibabad has just the thing for you. Take a look!
   

   

4. For people who can’t read Hindi, the next picture is of a store’s ad which lists all the things sold there. What makes it special though is that the list is extremely comprehensive and yet there’s a note at the end which claims that the store sells some other stuff too!
   

   

5. The next picture is of a caption at a fruit vendor’s stall. The caption says “Fix Rate” [sic] which is okay but look at the nicely drawn fruits. Reminds me of my art file from primary school.

   

6. As a bonus, here are two older pictures from Bangalore (both from Banaswadi Road) that have been on my flickr for a while now.

   

   

I bought my second cellphone more than two years ago. I had just started regular blogging back then and I wrote this post about it. I had promised myself that I will use the new phone for 2 years and then buy a new phone. I kept my promise and two weeks ago, I bought a shiny new HTC Touch. Its been called an iPhone killer by few sections of the media but that doesn’t really matter to me. What I like is that its tiny (its codename was elf!), sleek, sexy and most of all a windows mobile phone which lets you do everything with just a finger. Honestly, I don’t have to use the stylus at all!

The morning bus to work hates me. I have to fight with the window for 2-5 mins to get it to open. And because it always loses to me, it decided to get back at me couple of days ago by spewing its venom on me. Sure, it was intelligent enough to disguise it as muddy, rain water but I know what it really was. If I had an open wound, I could have poisoned! But it isn’t the only evil bus I have to deal with. The new evening bus is the most sadistic bus ever. Its so uncomfortable that one can never sleep even for a second in it. And I have to spend close to 2 hours in it. It has made my life miserable. Its hard to resist the temptation of setting it on fire. And if you are wondering why I am writing about buses all of a sudden, I spend 3 hours in these buses everyday! What else do you expect?

On Wednesday night, when the illness started, I employed my mp3 player to help me sleep and it worked for sometime. I was starting to feel really sad about the whole situation cos I was sick and all alone but Frou Frou helped me get over it by singing “There’s beauty in the breakdown” in my ear. And so at 3:15 am, I called up my landlady and asked for medicines.

I am much better now. The motivation for getting better, of course, is that I’m going to Lucknow tomorrow for Diwali. And its been a year since I went home. I last went on last Diwali. The difference this time would be that my parents now have broadband at home so I will keep posting and keep reading other blogs. In fact, I may be able to post more than I do now.

And even though I don’t write too many posts these days, its good to know once in a while that my blog can keep people occupied for hour(s) and even make them come back as is evident in screenshot 1, screenshot 2 and screenshot 3. (The third visit was longer than the screenshot). I think that’s enough reason to feel good about. What do you think?

Update: In a major offence, I forgot to tell you all about my new pictures from my trip to Nagarahole in which I saw crocodiles, elephants, dears, birds, a fox and a will boar. The pictures can be found on flickr, as always.

Update 2 This is a small clip from one of the funniest episodes of Family Guy. Take a look. It’s just too funny!! Watch it, please!

• On my first day to work after coming back, my cell phone’s alarm stuck to following the German time zone (even though I had changed the time zone) and went off at 9:00 am which meant I had to go through a harrowing experience of getting from the centre of the city to Whitefield during the peak traffic hour.
• Last Sunday, Sonia Gandhi decided to visit Bangalore and since her rally took place near my home, the traffic situation was horrible. No, not everyday-Bangalore horrible, this was at a totally new level. I’ve never really liked her but now, I hate her. It now seems like Congress might be fined for all the posters they put up all over the city. But don’t we all know that its not really going to happen.
• It’s good to be back home and watch Indian television after a month. I missed it. Last Sunday. I turned on the TV and saw the headline “Salman ke ghar Ganesh” (Ganesh in Salman’s home) and it felt so familiar and good.

This is the first time I’m visiting a foreign country but what’s weird is that I don’t feel like I’m in a foreign place at all. I feel like I feel when I visit any Indian city for the first time. This in spite of the fact that Germans are all around me. Is that weird or normal? Whatever!

I have seen quite a few new things here though. Graffiti being one of them, pin drop silence on the streets being another and most surprising of all, cars stopping for the pedestrians to cross the road. Plus it was a li’l difficult to adjust to the fact that it gets dark only after 9:30 pm.

I know this isn’t a long post but I wrote it using a German keyboard which, I tell you, is not easy to use.