THE CRAPBOOK

Attention, there is a cat in the apartment. And then started the hate emails.

This is how the story goes. Since the apartment I stay have net savvy residents, the Management committee started a group on yahoo to help people be in touch with each other. This was to let everyone know about changes, water problems, generator issues etc. But mostly it would be used by people to bark, threaten, abuse others since all you have to do is write and then wait for the reply.

One mail read “I’ve seen couple of  Cats creating havoc in the complex ..atleast they are a source of botheration to me …..they relieve themselves in my private garden and today they crossed the next step…entered via my back balcony door inside my appartment“

And then he sent another one “I‘am not sure if the cat has any owners but if it has , then they should teach her some manners and they themselves should learn some manners as well.Couple of days back ,she entered my back balcony . A good shot of stone missed her my whisker or else I would have know who the owners are“

I did not understand his email completely but with the reply from an animal activist (living in the apartment) I got the point.

She said “Looks like, unfortunately, u have been brought up in a posh villa with no nature or animals around you due to which you speak like this or throw stones at animals with out any feelings for them. You have no understanding that there is actually no difference between animals and children, and you are a father of one.  The black cat might not have been ours, but still I will warn you that if you are so rude, then there are many animal welfare associations that can arrest you for illtreating animals“

oh !!!

And then it goes on and on and on. All mails copied to the group id with all individual flat owners/tenants reading them and then laughing about it.

And the cat? He/She is sleeping sound somewhere in the basement, away from all the hatred !

*All emails conversations copied directly from the actual email.

Have you lost things and then you were never able to find it? My brother has many things that are under missing tag. Once he lost the wireless router antennae. Yes you heard it right. We searched for it all over the place. In the closet, under the bed, 50 ms around the router itself. We were not able to find it. We declared it as “Lost” and moved on(moved closer to the wireless router to be in range).

Months later he was on his way to the U.S.A for an overseas assignment and like normal people took a flight to US . (Unlike HCL guy in the ad who takes helicopter rides for his on-site assignments).  He got down at London Heathrow Airport to catch the transit flight. While he checked in, the airport security did scans and searched his suitcases and then they found something. The security staff reached over and displayed it to my brother. It was the antennae.

And it took 4477 miles and an Englishman to find it. My brother thanked the staff for helping him find it. “Glad to help sir”  the security staff replied.

Once I went to the nearest studio to take some passport size photographs. I picked the prints from the store the very next day. And when I reached back home, I was not able to find it. It was not there in my pockets, nor in the car. I went back to the store to check with them to see if I misplaced it somewhere in the store.  Retraced my steps in the basement to see if I accidentally dropped it when I took the lift. After 2 hours I declared it ‘lost’. I went back to the store and ordered some more prints. “Tomorrow sir” He said.

Arrgh. I picked it up from the store the following day. After parking my car in the basement, I opened the passenger door and noticed a yellow cover in between the passenger seat and seat belt. It was the photographs.

I took the lift home with 25 smiling photographs of mine, passport size !

Saying thank you would be the most difficult thing that our country face. People never thank the cab driver who drop them off at their doorstep late night from work. Nor do they thank the auto driver when they are dropped off at their homes.

 This is not a rant post. But I just trying to note down some points on how our citizens are facing this acute problem of ‘not’ saying ‘Thank you’. Some think that you don’t need to thank the waiter when he serves you as ‘its his job’. Nor do they think that an auto driver is worth the ‘thank you’ that he has to offer.

Le’s take the white collar job scenario. Everyone at work would want to be thanked either by their client or their manager each time they do their work. I have even heard colleagues telling me that all they expect are simple words of appreciation. They even go to the extent and proclaim that they don’t care about bonuses or hikes, all they care is about the ‘kudos’ they get from their manager. Yes everyone needs it to keep going. So why don’t we start doing it?

Start a day by thanking your wife/maid/mother when she brings you the early morning coffee. Try saying it to the autowalla who drops you at the bus stop. Or the cab driver who drops you at work. If you driving to work, try thanking the other drivers who stop at a junction for you to take a turn. How do you do that? Salute him/her !! Or a small hand gesture would do. Try thanking the bus conductor when he gives you the ticket. Thank the people who stop the lift for you. Thank the security after he checks your bag/car. Thank the person who holds the door open for you. Thank everyone.

Would people think you are crazy? NO ! They would love it.

 Few months back, when I visited my hometown, I went out to a small sweet place to buy some sweets. I requested for a discount as I was buying a lot of sweets. The shop owner declined my request and proceeded to bill for the entire amount. When I was collecting the change back, I told him ‘Thank you’. The shop owner was confused on what to do next. He did not smile, nor did he nod. He just looked at me. I said ‘Thank you’ again and stepped out.

 I am sure that many like the shop keeper at my home place are not used to these two words. No one would have ever thanked him after paying him for the sweets. Try thanking the autowalla. I have done that all the time and many of them were very happy to hear that. Especially after the fight over meter charge and his customized charge. He would never expect a person to tell him that.

 Try it.

Thank you for visiting my blog.

 PS : Never expect a ‘You welcome’ or ‘Not a problem’ or ‘My pleasure’ or ‘Anytime’ anytime !

Travelling by bus is a great feeling, it gives me time to think and gives you a peaceful travel to work without having to pay attention to the crazy drivers and notorious traffic. This also reminds me of the days I used to go to School taking the bus. It was an hour long ride. I used to spend that time observing things around me. That’s what I do all the time.

The conductor who always shout ‘ticket ticket’ and scribble the change on back of the ticket.  He seldom offer you the change, unless you pester him every other minute.

A daily wage worker with his tools including a spade, boards. He places the tools under the seats. Takes out his cellphone and checks something.

The young lad with earphone squeezed into his ear blasting ’94.3 Radio One’ on his cell phone. Everyone including the pedestrians on the road can hear the music.

The IT guy armed with his tool (read laptop) board the bus. The white earphones clearly says that he has an ipod. He nods his head at each beat.

The 60+ year old shows his id card to prove that he is a senior citizen. Quietly sits at an empty seat and pays the fare. He open the day’s edition of Times of India and starts reading.

Three college goers board the bus, laughter. Discussions in Kannada, english..laughter again.

A man in his late 20′s board the bus. He is wearing  a tie and neatly pressed clothes. Might be a salesman. Asks the conductor for a day pass.

“Change illa ” says conductor seeing the 100 Rs note that he extended. “iradu rupaiya kodey”. The salesman checks his shirt pocket for change.

The 40 year something old lady boards. She opens her purse, takes out a bunch of cash. She counts through the five hundreds, hundreds, fifties and finally hands a ten Rupee note to the conductor. “Majestic” She said.

She kept the rest of  the money ‘safe’ in her purse.

A shabbily dressed man walks in. He looks drunk. His breath angers the conductor. “At this time of the day?” The conductor might be thinking.

A young mother along with her kid board the bus, she scans the bus for a seat, finally found one at the centre. Made her talkative kid comfortable. Answered the kid’s curious questions every 5 mins.

A young female talking on her phone. She got down from the bus, crossed the street and boarded an auto. She talked on her cell all the way.

And then there is a silent guy sitting at the back, looking all around. That would be me.

I guess you would have seen one of these characters on any city bus.

A man neatly dressed, walks into the elevator. Once making sure that his floor has been chosen, he searches for something in his pocket, takes out a cell phone and starts fiddling with it.

A woman carrying her laptop walks into the elevator. She chooses her floor and then takes out her blackberry and starts reading old emails. (I admit I peeked)

A housekeeping guy walks in, takes out his cell phone and start fiddling with it.

I am not sure how many of you might have noticed this, but this is called the elevator syndrome. We all suffer from this. Even when we know that there are no new messages, calls or emails(thats why cell phones have vibrator/ring alerts, if you did not hear it means ‘there are no new messages’), we tend to check it again and again.

Not when you waiting for the lift, but soon after you enter one, you have this sudden urge to know if any new messages have come. If not check the old ones and re-read the emails.

If its not a blackberry then people go ahead and check the call register, inbox for those ghostly messages which is not there.

Do you suffer from this?

No, Not in my code. My research for the this unknown insect has been going for sometime now. Its everywhere, (when I say everywhere trust me its all over). This is also known locally as ‘Mupli’. I am not sure why its called that way. May be because its the newest member of everyone’s family at Kottayam.

The endless rubber estates. The tapper (person who taps the rubber for latex), gets around our place at 4 in the morning. He takes his knifes and other materials and walk to our estate to begin his work. He taps every rubber tree and collect latex and come back around by 10. The rubber sheets are made out of the latex by mixing it with diluted acid. This is then sold after drying it out in the sun or in a ‘smoke room’.

This post is not about how rubber is made out of the rubber trees. Thats normal, usual thing that happen around. You might have even seen it, if you have been to Kottayam District in Kerala.

What I want to talk about is the new member in the family. Or should I call it members?

Its the newest bug in town. When I say new, its just a few years old. Noone (not even the government controlled Rubber board) have clear idea on how this bug came into town. There are zillions of them, everywhere. Once the dusk is near and people turn on the lights, they come over. They invade the entire house.

People tried different things to get rid of it.

1. Tried starting a fire, people guessed that all the bugs will get attracted to the light and eventually perish in the fire. But instead the fires were killed by the number of bugs.

2. Poisoning the entire house. This did not help either, because this did more damage to the people than the bugs. Their population was the key to their survival.

Food Chain

The bugs are at the top of the food chain, with no natural predator they multiply in millions. They feed on the dead rubber leaves(thank god as the rubber industry would have gone for a toss if they started eating the fresh ones). Rubber itself is not a natural tree in Kerala, it was bought to India by the British, where they saw a huge potential for rubber cultivation because of favorable climate.

Noone in my previous generation has see this bug. It’s either a mutated bug or took a boat from some other country.

Here is a photograph to give you an idea on the numbers and a closeup.

The bugs don’t harm humans, unless we squash it on our body. Then it excretes a fluid which is second cousin of some acid that will burn our body. This is very rare, the bug is not dangerous.

But the number of them in a house will mean, bug in your food, shirt, trousers and even undergarments. It will walk all over your body and give you little time to sleep as you will spent the entire time picking them from your body.

Now that’s one irritating member in every family.

I tried everything (not) to go to the gym. For me, the gym was where people get tortured.

“Get me a Nike shorts and I will go jogging” I said.

“Whats wrong with the shorts you have now” Wife

“I need branded ones” Me.

“No one would be watching early morning, there would be hardly anyone around” Wife.

“Early Morning? I should get up early morning?” Me

And it went on. Finally I found a new nike shorts resting on the couch.  ”For you” the note read.

With no excuses left I got up early the next day after snoozing the alarm dozen times (5 min interval) for running. It was 7AM in the morning. The air was fresh, the sky was waking up, and there was an empty road. I ran for 200 meters and was tired already. I walked another 200 meters and realized that if I go on, I goto to walk back all the way home. I jogged back home and took rest for an hour. 

“Not bad” I thought. Exercising  is cool. 

Next day. After snoozing the alarm a dozen times I got myself up for the ‘run’. The air was fresh and I was not alone. After 50 ms there were 4 dogs with me. Then there were 10. And the faster I ran, the faster they were following.

There was no way out, other than to run as fast as I could and reach home.

I escaped unhurt. I guess, they were just interested in this new fellow in their block with blue shorts and a green ipod clipped oh his t-shirt. They were having some fun.

And that was the end of the routine run (you can call it a routine after consistently doing the same thing more than once).

The wife did not allow me to sleep through the snooze sessions after a week. ‘Go to the apartment gym’ she said.

“You dont have to worry about the dogs, or your shorts”

“Why dont you go?” I challenged her.

And she did.

I got my ‘ego’ right and paid a visit to the gym, stood on the thread mill for the first time in my life. The machine roared and moved. I walked. I ran.

It a routine for me now. I learned that you can think of your work and you would run faster. You think of your manager and you would run even faster. Great way to lose stress.

I go to the gym now. Its a miracle !

The apartment dhobi was a good man. Lets call him Dhobi2. He would collect the clothes and return it promptly, well pressed. He was good at his job, never lost/misplaced any of my clothes and was always on time. One fine day he was missing.

I asked the security guards about him and came to know that no one had any idea about his whereabouts. But he left only after returning all the clothes to the people staying in the apartment.

One of the security guard explained how he became the apartment dhobi. He had a predecessor who was serving the apartment for quite a long time. He was a local dhobi who goes around the neighborhood pushing his cart. One of the families who stay in the apartment invited him to be the apartment dhobi. He was given a small space at the underground car park to press clothes. The on one fine day, the predecessor was missing and there was Dhobi2 pressing clothes. The family who bought him here questioned Dhobi2 about the predecessor only to know that he had sold the ‘rights’ to press at our apartment for 10,000 Rs. (yes ten thousand !!) to Dhobi2.

Now this story is true at the same time strange on how the ‘rights’ to serve the apartment was sold for 10k to a poor man.

Now my best guess is that Dhobi2 would have sold the ‘rights’ he bought to a third person who would be taking the post of the ‘Apartment Dhobi’ soon. Strange??

I am back. Got an airtel connection. Hathway was cheaper for my kind of usage, but seems like they don’t service my new place.

The old (land)lady.

She deducted a month’s rent as painting charges. For that money she could paint it thrice. Once the cheque was handed over and I got into my car, She said “I am getting a new scooter”.  

‘Its my money’ I thought.

The Newspaper Boy.

My landlord was so happy that I moved, she informed the newspaper boy, just incase I have defaulted any amount.

In three hours I got a call.

Newspaper boy “Sir, heard that you have moved”

Me : “yes”

NB: “Sir you did not give this month’s fee”

Me :”Oh yeah? I thought we were paying fee in advance”

NB :”No sir”

Me :” I have bills”

NB :”I will come to collect this month’s fee sir”

Me:”Okay, I will give you the fee for 105Rs, you give me the advance 120Rs back, so when are you coming???”

click !

I will be now regular with new crap. I got a huge unread blog list in my reader. whew!

From the News Today.

Jet airways fired 800 people. Now that news is pretty sad, but the statement from Mr Raj Thackeray is well…. Decide for yourself. “MNS would not allow any Jet plane to fly over Maharashtra”. I wonder how he is planning to do that. Well its not that simple to block all the air routes. Throwing stones wouldn’t help either. May be a Trebuchet would be handy.

I noticed the poll button on WP editor, so I thought of testing it. Do take part in this poll. (Crap – Rank 1, Notbad Rank 2 and “I regret….” as Rank 3). So if you would vote crap, I would consider this blog a success.