Spoken words

My team and I, recently had the opportunity to interact with clients who happen to be French. It was to be an informal (with stress on informal)   meeting, over teleconference. The objective of the meeting was to " get to know each other ". So people, both on-site and offshore, were supposed to talk about themselves, their hobbies, talents etc etc.  Powerpoint slides were prepared by the offhsore team, amidst the tight schedule of work and stuff. Anyway, no one here cared to even write anything beyond 4-5 lines. If at all anyone wrote a lot, it was just about their academic excellence and the amount of work experience that person had - studied here, studied there, worked 5 years here, 4 years there and so on. I thought this presentation was supposed to be this way, and filled in two lines about what I studied and how much(or little) my work experience was. Ahh well... there were other more interesting thing on my mind than this stupid video conference. When the meeti...

As a keen observer of the politics over the years, one can easily sniff out a messy brawl months ahead of the elections. Get ready for a "all-is-fair" battle of the General elections. One of the greatest spectacular event that an Indian voter witnesses every 5 ( if not less ) years. Its the first General election that I would have been voting in, that is, if I was in Chennai. That, unfortunately not being possible, I would have to leave the fate in the hands of my fellow country men, who if not lured by freebies and lame unrealistic promises would make a "decent" choice. That is easier said than done. Well... as a matter of fact, its very difficult to make a choice. The problem is of plenty, or rather the lack of it. The general belief is that "every" or "most" politician are crooks. So ultimately the choice that people have to make is to chose someone who is the least crooked or someone who has at least a slight intention of doing good for the c...

Well, I am not talking about the India - England ODI series, but rather the situation of Tamil Nadu, currently under the siege of heavy rains. Many parts of the state have been severely battered by cyclonic winds and torrential rains. The losses have been huge - both material as well as of life. Well, we cant control nature, but what we can control is how we handle the situation. We cant stop the rain, which is actually a good thing, but at least the losses and inconvenience can be minimized. Fine, let me not get carried away too far. Helping out the rural villages seems very far away, when we cant even manage the water in the capital of the state - Chennai...!! Every year its the same old story. Promises are made to improve the storm water management infrastructure, but barely a line is drawn after the rains stop. Badly planned suburbs as well as major streets submerged in a lot of water, with floating debris, doesn't make for a very pretty sight. And having more than a foot of ...

The global financial crisis has affected almost everyone. Either its the looming danger of losing your job, or the fear of complete closure of the industry itself. In this current scenarios, as small and large companies are desperately trying to be in the green, cutting down on the excess workforce seems to be the first viable solution for them, as generating any profits seems definitely seems out of the question. So spending so much on operational costs seems most "wasteful", given the fact that they are getting back very little in return. Cutting cost by other means, certainly was of some help, but wasn't enough. Like the lavish perks showered on the managerial level have been choked this year. So no expensive gadgets, leather handbags or luxurious Caribbean cruise for them this year. Others got their salaries cut down significantly, or were denied the raise that was promised to them. Companies planning to come up with new launches have put their plans on hold. But thin...

Any one I am sure would agree to the fact that our law system and judiciary are one of the worst functioning bodies in the country. We never have much respect for the law -  and we make it a point to safely break as many as possible. As for those who are well read with the subject of law - the lawyers - don't have too much of respect for it either. As it turns out they learn law only to find ways to break it. No wonder most turn out to become politicians ( read as criminals ). Lawyers are quite plainly associated to be liars and criminals. And judges are assumed to be corrupt and inefficient. This doesn't mean everyone is like this. Just that the general  perception is such. And unfortunately its true most of the time. So why this sudden interest regarding the lawlessness in the country? That's because, I like many others, just had the opportunity to see ( on TV  of course ) some hideous acts of violence amongst aspiring lawyers, at the Dr. Ambedkar law college in Chenn...

D iwali is here.. and like every time its a joyous moment of celebration and festivities. Not just in India but also in lots of other countries, where Indians are in abundance...! So as usual it involves a lot of celebrations, shopping, traditional stuffs... and the dreaded crackers. I am not a big fan of crackers, as anyone who knows me for more than 2 years would be able to guess why. The reasons are many, but the solution is in fact very simple. Don't burst crackers...!  One of the reasons is the pollution it causes. The other reason being the alleged use of child labour to manufacture them. And of course the fact that they are highly irresponsible objects to have fun with. F or the first reason, well, i suppose everyone knows the smoke and and noise that they produce. They hardly think of the long term consequences of them. We are actually contributing to Nitrogen Dioxide, Sulphur Dioxide as well as other harmful gases, raising the levels considerably on the days of Diwali. ...

Really funny things happen when you throw in big corporates, innovative ideas and a lot of competition. Like this whole ad war that started around the big red couch. Well, the story goes as follows.Airtel in a bid to spice up their launch of digital television service, started a series of teasers, without giving  a hint to what it was about. Just a red couch and the line "See you at home" was said by a cowboy, an African Zulu tribesman, a rock band , cartoons resembling Timon from the Lion King.... and many others. But no one had much of a clue as to what it was or which company it belonged to. Though probably someone could connect it to a television based product or home delivered pizzas. Anyway, the build up continued... So Reliance's digital TV service - BIG TV - decided to crash in on Airtel's party by putting up their own promotional advertisement with the big red couch. To suggest as if the whole build up was for their BIG TV. How they came to know ofAirtel...