A new look for your old car

A quick thought about a new look for our cars.

I was traveling in an auto rickshaw through the rain stricken roads of Chennai when this thought occured to me. To those who do not know/ have not experienced the pathetic traffic conditions of this city, please have a look at one of my earlier post on the city.

Here the vehicles have very high rate of PDA and no moral policing applies for them, so you know they are an indisciplined lot. When my rick was bumped at the back by an oncoming car, I became desperate to find a solution for this recurrent problem.

I wondered how about having a very large car top carrier with edges fitted with rubber cushions or some other form of shock absorbers so that they protrude beyond the area of the car and thus ensure a safe distance between adjacent vehicles at all times?

Then, I thought why not put this to some good use? Since I am hearing everything solar around me these days, it didn't take a long time for the thought to take form. Cover the roof with solar panels that will power the car's air conditioners. Now from the energy saver's point of view, this has added advantage.

Sun ->Heat -> Solar power->AC
No sun/No heat ->No solar power ->No AC!

If it is hot, your AC will work. Otherwise, it will not! Smart right?

Now, will this not make my car very expensive? Hell yeah! And hence I say the government must make this compulsory as part of PUC certificate. Because of this, the number of cars on the road will reduce drastically and with that the traffic as well. People will prefer public transport, so less polution and congestion!

Most road problems addressed in one single shot; Howzzat?!
[Poppin' my collar with pride, and yeah... NO BRICKBATS PLEASE! My insurance has not been renewed yet! :-) ]

At Gunpoint

Here's the link to my article 'At Gunpoint' published in the latest edition of 21fools magazine.

At Gunpoint

My Meeting with Mr.T

Mr. T is not a most wanted gangster or a high profile businessman as some of you would have thought. Far from it, he is a school going kid. A true millenium kid, to me Mr.T represents the generation of children who are fed on cell phones, computer games and countless other gadgets since birth. And probably because of such an upbringing, I do not see much difference in the levels of our awareness. Hence I prefer to consider him as equal and that is why the 'Mr.' part that I added to the kid's name is important.

This is how the conversation went. The way it went, I had an irresistable temptation to blog about it and by the end of the post I am sure you will know why.

Mr. T : Hey! I am ______

Me : [A little startled by the kid's boldness to initiate the conversation in no time] Hi dude...

Mr. T : Are you on facebook?

Me : [Now definitely shocked] Umm... Yeah! (followed by a 'So?' expression)

Mr. T : Will you add me on facebook?

Me : Umm.. Yeah sure .. Why not!

Mr. T : Whats your name on facebook?

[I tried to ignore that one, to go easy on 'facebook'. I prefer to keep my facebook activities very much restricted to close friends. But... ]

Mr. T : Whats your name on facebook?

Me : Uh? [followed by a 'talking to me?' expression] H-N-S-H-Y-A-M hnshyam

[Following this, I went into my 'I am thinking' facial expression. I do this whenever I want to avoid some conversation. But this time it was more to relieving me from the shock of this conversation I was having with a ten year old kid]

Mr. T : What's the full form of HN?

Me : (This is one question I have learnt to conveniently evade in the last twenty two years, simply because it calls for further explanations. So...) Umm.. Nothing dude.. Its a single thing.

Mr. T : Really? You are joking.... Right?

Me : [smile] (and thankfully, the topic was changed)

Mr. T : You have a computer?

Me : Yeah, of course!

Mr. T : Can I use it?

Me : Sure. Come with me, let's go to my room.

In my room,

Mr. T : Oh, so you have this small laptop?

Me : Yeah, its called a netbook.

Mr. T : Let me add you on facebook. Whats your name you said?

Since my profile was already logged in, I did the honours myself. And he promptly logged into his id and accepted my friend request.

Mr. T : You know my bro has got a new tattoo on his hand! You want to see?

Me : [Startled again] Umm.. Yeah.. Sure.

Mr. T : (While loading his brother's facebook profile) You know, all his friends wanted to get his profile pic clicked with his new girlfriend. But he smartly avoided it.

Me : (Girlfriend!! WTF? Oh Btw his bro has just joined undergraduation) Umm.. Yeah? That was smart of him...

Mr. T : All his friends have girlfriends. You don't have a girlfriend?

Me : (Now this is terribly embarrasing, everytime!) No dude... I don't.

Mr. T : Oh... I see.

Me : [Relieved for not being asked 'Why?', and amazed by Mr.T 's maturity or thoughtfulness you may say!]

Mr. T : BTW you know I joined facebook only last week and I have 114 friends. How many 'likes' do you have?

Me : How many 'what' ?

Mr. T : (pardoning my ignorance) You know, my brother does dissection in his college. The other day they dissected a frog, and all the intestine were out but the heart was still beating!

Me : [Surprised to see this amount of science knowledge in a ten year old] Yeah? I dropped biology way back in class 11 dude. So I never had a chance to do any such thing.

Mr. T : (Hardly interested in my reply. Now showing me some of his brother's pics) You see this boy in this pic?

Me : Yeah.

Mr. T : His mother died. She was only 56, you know?

Me : Oh is it, thats sad... (Not expecting knowledge of any further detail from the kid, and also not feeling it right to quiz him on such a topic. But...)

Mr. T : Apparently she was sleeping in the back seat when the accident occured and the balloon (air bag) came only in the front seats. So when they finally tried to wake his mom up, she did not get up! She had died by that time.

Me : (Now, literally lost for words) Hmmm.... I see.

We moved to the living room, where his mom was talking to my parents.

Mr. T : [Looking at my phone] So you have a blackberry eh?

Me : Yeah.

Mr. T : [Turning to his mom ] Hey mom, the model of your phone is popular. See even he has a similar blackberry.

Me : [Shocked again. The first time I learnt about Blackberry phones was barely a few years ago. Here is a ten year kid discussing Blackberry phones with his mom! ]

Mr. T : You don't have games on you comp? What do you do with it?

Me : [Smiling in an effort to hide my mixed emotions at this strange question] I work Mr.T. So I have something or the other official to do all the time.

Mr. T : [Giving me a 'what a loser' look. Now looking at the golf club in my house] So who goes for golf coaching here?

Me : Golf 'what'?Err... No, no one does. I play around inside the house, sometimes. Haven't gone for any training and all.

Mr. T : Oh... [Browsing through the television channels] Did you watch any tamil movie off late?

Me : Yeah, I watched Enthiran.

Mr. T : Oh.. I watched Manmathan Anbu! Enthiran was long back, right?

Me : Yeah... I guess.

By this time, Mr. T's mother had decided that it was time for them to leave. And in matter of no time, Mr.T got himself ready to leave and he was ready at the door.

Mr. T : Ok dude... Tata! Take Care.

Me : [Now quite use to think of Mr.T as any other friend from college or work] Yep mate! You too...

Mr. T : Hey, is there any sports shop around here?

Me : Yeah, there is one right down this road.

Mr. T : Oh.. k!


I saw Mr.T off from my balcony, as he got into his Manza car with his mother and they drove down the road.

As their car disappeared from my sight, I thought for a second about myself as a ten year old. I still remember the excitement of my visit to a McD (near Andheri station) to have a burger and softy, and getting my first email id '@usa.net' (I don't know how many of you remember it, but it was a craze in those days to have a usa.net email address). Those were probably the biggest things in my life until then, besides a few flight trips and eating American Choupsuey in a chinese restaurant! That was the extent of my exposure.

I looked at the calendar hanging on the wall. It said 'January 2011', and don't know why everything seemed to feel perfectly in place then.

I heard someone tell me, "Its just normal man; 21st century kid afterall! "

I smiled to myself affirmatively and walked into my room.

Welcome 2010

New Year is here again! Never dreamt of spending a New Year Eve in the cold of London city reading Guardian newspaper and drinking Scotch. And with it brings, this year, some of the most significant turn of events in my life. Where will I be spending the next New Years Eve is the most important of them!

It was an amazing decade that saw the evolution of mobile communication, great socio-political changes and some really sad percolation of terrorism to mainstream lives alongwith a global economic meltdown. Overall, a very eventful decade coming to an end and with it bringing a lot of unanswered questions for the next decade!

Happy New Year!