To kill boredom

I always thought listening was an art and it just needed a spark and there on you were on your own. Determined to turn a new leaf, my thoughts were fixed on listening to the teacher. Sixth grade it was and there was something to it than the primary grades - a motivation to start listening and the making of the new "me". An imaginary fist pump to say 'yes from today' and drifting into the thought of that magical spark moment which will allow me to then stop worrying about exams - its just revision and not learning afresh. The bell rang and I realised the first 45 min had just gone by, the last thing I listened to, was my name called out for the attendance and I promptly lifted my hands and then drifting into the dream 'art of listening'. An introvert, occupying the middle benches, hiding behind the one in front and hoping the teachers would never pick me up for answering questions. It was working my way, except for the english teacher. I just did not have the ...

Longewala in Rajasthan, an military post on the Indian side bordering Pakistan, approximately 15 KM from the border hosts a small museum with the artillery that was used during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971 , couple of Pakistani tankers that were captured during the war and the memorial that bore the name of the mighty warriors who laid their life to protect this great Nation. It also housed a small bunker with a projector room with a video on the war that showed bravery and leadership second to none. The video that was played did raise goose-bumps and a few tears from the emotional ones. Well, yes a vacation for three families. A hard earned one to escape the concrete jungle and the corporate world of stressful chaos. Jaisalmer it was, the golden city sure is a feast to the eye with love for craftsmanship and architecture. The cozy hotel that we stayed in also provided a travel desk with an itinerary of places to visit. The Forts, the sandstone buildings, market place with wall ...

Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of single-seater auto racing sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) and owned by the Formula One Group . The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one of the premier forms of racing around the world since its inaugural season in 1950. The word "formula" in the name refers to the set of rules to which all participants' cars must conform.[1] A Formula One season consists of a series of races, known as Grands Prix ( French  for 'grand prizes' or 'great prizes'), which take place worldwide on purpose-built circuits and on public roads. That is the wikipedia explanation of the Formula one.  For me F1 is the ultimate one, in the world of racing and every time I watch a Grand Prix  it keeps teaching me new things almost every race. Vividly remember F1 and Ayrton Senna in the early 1990s, thanks to ‘The Hindu’, the news paper that I had access to.  ...

For a living, I help teams to innovate. How?… is a long story with loads of jargons and justifications, but so far it has worked…and let me not drag the ‘how’ part further. But some of the jargons which are pretty much inevitable and synonymous to innovation are creativity, problem statement, best practice, reuse, benefit and $ value (sounds like $ is the only currency world over).  Pondering on the multiple calls on the day, with enthusiastic young gals and lads explaining what their team has done and articulating every possible benefit to weave a large dollar value to it…after all Innovation is to do with evangelising your solution and branding it. Well, my little grey matter pondering for a longtime and slowly drifted towards ‘what exactly is innovation…or even further what exactly is creativity?’.  We have heard it a hundred times over and often referred to the great domain pundits as ‘something different which has a benefit tagged to it’. Okey agreed, then how on ear...

A new project and new set of challenges; like any other employee thinking about climbing the Corporate ladder or bare minimum fit into any of the buckets the HR department has carved out in the normalization curve, the manthra was ‘Customer is King’ and I thought no different. The Challenges Well, to think of Customer is King; was, is and will be the challenge for all employees and employers across the Globe. But the challenges, that too in a new Country, official challenges apart I had to think about personal challenges of my basic needs and which of course no longer is just food, clothing and shelter, few more dimension added to it from internet connection to money in my pocket. So Malaysia it was and Kuala Lumpur my new city for the next few months. Official challenges, I did have but the kind of team I was a part off, you don’t need to worry; hard work is all that is needed and I was willing to do that. Oh, did I mention the Client team was understanding enough and trus...

Bright sunlight, a set of bamboo chair facing the long never ending garden, a beautiful porcelain cup with steaming coffee on one hand and newspaper on the other. Well this is invariably the storyline for every coffee ad I see on TV. I used to wonder if this is ever true!!! I have never experienced anything of this sort in my life time. With my boxers, sitting beside the dining table (not beside the window, my already tanned skin might go even darker and I also don’t prefer the dust from the concrete jungle deposited on me) with hot steaming coffee in a stainless steel tumbler which quite literally burns my finger every time I touch it and hot news…not sure if there is hot news but sure the paper was hot with little coffee spilt on it. It was nothing different this Sunday…from sports page to front page one of the articles in the open page (now don’t give me that naughty look to say of course I have to open a page to read) caught my eye. The title read ‘ Come what may, Mera Bh...

It is still pretty dark and there are glimpses of the twilight round the corner. My eyes and ears were wide open as I looked around, we had kept vigil for more than 2 hours now; Switch’s confidence on a new low was facing down wards, Mosquito Repellent’s otherwise sliming face had a droopy look. Like a pulse monitor, Mrs. UPS’s gap between sob grew shorter and the inevitable moment of silence. Mr. Bulb and Mr. Tube showed a gloomy face, possibly the long vigil had taken the toll. The noisy and dancing Fanblade came to a standstill. I turned further to my right to see Fanblade’s cousin; AC had his jaws open with his pale white face. All of us shared our misery with inconsolable Mr. Mosquito. The twilight was out as the news of the inevitable spread, Mr. Kuku, Mr. & Mrs. Dog and Mr. Rooster cried their lungs out. All of us knew it was time to move on as I pushed myself up with a sigh to attend the Milkman and the newspaper boy. One thing that was firmly registered in my mind was...