Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans"

How apt these lyrics are. Seems like John Lennon was addressing me when he sang them.

Here I was, making plans to repair our house, working on the plans to achieve the next year's targets for myself and my team at office, dreaming and planning for the holiday with the family...

And then there was the accident.

All the plans went out of the window. Everything had to be re-organised, re-scheduled, re-oriented, re-prioritised.

Does it sound like deja vu?

It sure does to me.

I had moved to Jeddah with plans of working there for about 12-15 years, and retiring by 50. And less than 4 years later, I was back. Mom was ill and her need for us took priority over work and retirement plans.

Lest I sound like life always deals a cruel blow, let's make it clear - NO.

My plans of working in media planning changed when I got a good option in a media house, changing my career choice completely. The job offer from Jeddah came out of the blue, helping me clear off all my EMIs and get some savings to boot.

Doesn't it happen to all of us?

Just introspect. Have we become exactly what we had planned when we were in college? Are we doing exactly what we had planned just 5 years ago? Heck, what has happened to our New Year resolutions and plans just 5 months later?

It applies to organisations too. I remember reading an article by a leading businessman, in which he had said that it had never happened that his company worked exactly according to the plans made at the beginning of the year.

'The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men, Gang aft agley' (Robert Burns)

But does that mean that we should not plan? After all, life could deal a different hand the next instant.

Quite the contrary.

Life will always take some sudden twists and turns; we may not achieve everything that we start off planning to achieve, but it is these plans that we make - and the work that we do to achieve them - that will take us from our present state to the next, possibly better, state in life. It is what we plan that make us the person that we are.

Look at all the successful people around us. In their introspective moments, they will all confess that everything never went according to plan, but it is their plans, their dreams and their hard work that has made them so successful.

One could write so much more, and it would all revolve around the same. But instead of boring you will all of that, let me ask you to share your thoughts in your comments.

As for me, I can tell you one thing. Most of my plans may have come to naught, but working towards them has helped me achieve a huge amount of satisfaction as an individual, if nothing else.

Time to Slow Down?

I have been noticing during my daily visits to the physiotherapist that a number of people who come in for treatment are quite young. And they are not coming for accident-related physiotherapy, but seeking treatment for stress-related ailments!

I mentioned this to my physiotherapists, Dr. Hardik Patel and Dr. Swati, they shared certain information with me, which makes me really concerned! The numbers below may not be specific to all hospitals / physiotherapy centres across Mumbai, but I believe they surely could be a pointer to a larger syndrome.

More than 70% of the patients who come in for physiotherapy are not accident-related at all. And 5 out of these 7 patients are below the age of 50, with a large majority being in their late 20s and early 30s.

In fact, the youngest patient I saw was a girl of about 23, and I am told that she is not an exception!

All of these young people are coming in seeking help for ailments related to stress.

Apart from the usual suspects – IT and Software Industry; quite a significant number of patients are from Finance, especially Insurance Sales, and other salespeople across industries.

Most IT and Software Industry Professionals face issues with relation to the physical stress; the usual suspects - repetitive stress injuries, carpal tunnel syndrome, slip disc, vertigo (BPPV) etc. Salespeople are also seen suffering from Overuse Syndrome, where the shoulder and neck muscles are affected due to their habit of carrying their laptop around throughout the day.

But to my mind, the big worry is in the increasing number of cases that are related to mental stress.

Mental Stress for 20 and 30 year olds?

Yes! And it is getting manifested in stiffness of muscles; pain in the neck, shoulder, head and back etc.

And there is increasing agreement among doctors on the fact that these issues are all related to the mental stress and anxiety brought about by targets and deadlines!

We have all heard phrases like, “The reward for good work is more work”, “It’s a rat race out there” etc.

The intense competitive environment, as well as the unreasonable pressure put on today’s youth by themselves and their organisations to prove their relevance virtually daily, is resulting in their youth being spent between the office and the doctor’s clinic. One is also seeing an increasing trend among youth to take shortcuts (jugaad, as a research aptly termed it). This is a pointer to the effect the environment is having on their minds too. And the long-term effects will really only be known about 20 years from now.

The Pharaohs of Egypt were known to drive their slaves to death.

Are we becoming the Pharaohs of today?

Is it time we stopped and pondered about the ill-effects of high – maybe unreasonable – targets and deadlines on today’s youth?

Is it time to slow down? Before the problem becomes unmanageable?

Taxi Drivers (again!)

A lovely Sunday morning, a steaming cup of tea after a nice long bath, and my wrist now allowing me to type enough to put down my thoughts - even if slowly and with breaks. What a feeling!


My first post after my accident, and suddenly the rush of thoughts I had on the many things I wanted to write about seems to have rushed away. :-)

Gathering these scattered thoughts of the past couple of months is an exhilarating exercise in itself. So many thoughts, such feelings, experiences, people met etc. that one wants to write about.

I resumed office on April 5. And due to the fact that I still have the problem in the knee and muscles, I have been using taxis and autos to travel to office and back. And what an interesting mix of taxi drivers I have met!

Nearly every taxi driver who has taken me to office and back had to ask me the same set of questions, “Accident? Kaise Hua (How did it happen?)”. And then the standard “Chalo kam mein tal gaya. Aur ho sakta tha (Good it was only this much. It could have been worse)”.

It is interesting how we tend to look at the positive of life. I mean, here I have a broken wrist, broken toe, missing toenails and a crushed kneecap. And it could have been worse! Someone is in hospital with a serious ailment where he would take months to recover. And it could have been worse!

But then, it is this positive outlook that takes us through the ups and downs of life!

Anyway, as usual, I digress.

After the standard questions – which I have now learnt to answer in about 9.37 seconds – the drivers launch into sharing their own experiences for the rest of the journey. And that has my hair standing on end.

Virtually every driver has a horrific accident story – if not his, then of some other driver closely known to him. And these stories are around broken ankles, shin bones, femur etc. It is as if nearly half of Mumbai’s taxi drivers are driving around with some injury or the other. One driver even took advantage of a traffic signal to show me the scars on his stomach and right leg, and believe me, it was as if he had come out of a war zone!

It frightens me to be sitting there in the front seat of a half battered car with a driver who should be eligible for a disability pension, and yet, driving away with the zest of a Sebastian Vettel!

And for all those Mumbaikars who have the experience of flagging down an auto or a cab, only to find the driver refusing your fare, I must share that I am not in that league any longer. Just the sight of my crutch and splint are enough for them to open the door without even asking the destination. I’ve had only a couple of drivers refusing, for genuine reasons, and they were so apologetic, I had to pinch myself. One driver ferried me from Wadala to Lower Parel, and only when we reached my office did he mention that he had to go to Sion – exactly in the opposite direction!

A few drivers have even got out, helped me out of the cab, and carried my crutch and bag for me right upto the office lift.

Made me change my opinion about whether these drivers had feelings!

But there is one thing on which my opinion has not changed. Irrespective of the nature of the passenger, and the lovely stories he has shared with him, some drivers have to cheat on the fare.

What else explains the 25% variation in the fares that I pay for the same distance?

India’s Madame Tussauds

Hi blog.

I know I’ve been away from you for a really long time – more than 6 weeks!

It’s been a hectic time. First, the two weddings. Then the travelling and looooong days. I just wanted to sleep whatever little time I got.

And the few times that I really sat to write, my fingers just started writing about two incidents of January that I really do not wish to write about here – the demise of a young person I had met just a week before her accident, and an incident that I witnessed while on a tour in Rajasthan.

It took me a while to bury them somewhere deep in my system.

Anyway, we keep going to Pune and Lonavla very often, and pass by the Celebrity Wax Museum at Varsoli.

A fortnight ago, on a whim, my wife and I decided to step in – and were bowled over by what we saw. Real, life-like wax sculptures of various celebrities - Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Satya Sai Baba, Babasaheb Ambedkar and so many others.

The scultpture of Mata Amritanandamayi Devi is so life-like that for a moment, I felt she would get up and hug me in that famous embrace of hers. And A.R. Rahman with his Oscars...

My wife had a ball getting herself photographed with Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussain and Micheal Jackson!

It is a very small museum – one can go through in less than 15 minutes. At Rs.75 per entry, possibly one might call it a bit expensive. And some of the sculptures are possibly not 100% accurate (e.g. of Shivaji Maharaj; though on the whole they are definitely very good). But when you bear in mind that all this is the work of just one young man – Sunil - and he did not have access to any of these celebrities – with the microscopically precise 3D measurements that people give to Madame Tussauds, I could not help but doff my hat to his skills.

Am going to try and post some pictures on my facebook page, as well as here. And I would urge you to go to the museum once, if only to encourage such artists. It is not very far from Lonavla – if you are going from Mumbai, just cross Lonavla on the Expressway and get down at the other (Pune) end on NH4 (the old highway). Puneris can get down onto the old highway just before Lonavla, at Balaji Restaurant.

The wax museum is just about 300 meters on the right side, before the NH4 toll gate.

(And no, Sunil has not paid me to write this. Nor does he know that I am writing it :-))

 My wife at Saddam Hussain's trialDr. Babasaheb AmbedkarThe sculptor with his daughter

I’ve joined the League

After nearly 15 years of having a mobile phone, finally I have joined the League of people whose mobile phone has been stolen!

It happened in Kolkata last Monday, and I admire the person’s guts. He stole it from right under my nose – the phone was kept by my side, along with my tie and glasses. And within less than a minute, the phone was switched off.

I immediately went to the nearest Vodafone Store and got a replacement SIM card. The executive assured me that it would be activated within 4 hours. We then went to the Nokia Store to block the phone using the IMEI number.

And here’s a lesson, folks. The IMEI number blocking is a sham!

The store owner himself said that it would be worthless blocking the phone, because the thief would walk up to the grey market and erase the IMEI number, making the phone usable all over again!

I said a prayer, got a temporary old handset, and life continued.

At night, I checked the phone. The SIM was not activated yet.

In the morning, I checked it again. Nope, no activation yet. I was with a colleague, so that made matters easy. At about 10, another colleague called up, saying that he tried calling me up, and the thief had picked up the call. He was using my number.

And that led us on a wild goose chase for about 45 minutes. We called the thief, who said that he would return the phone, but kept giving wayward directions, before I finally gave up and decided to go to the police. My worry was not so much about the phone, but about the possible numbers the thief may have called. Nowadays, you never can be sure...

We stopped over again at the Vodafone Store, where the same executive was about as helpful as a clerk in a Government Office. He had sent the e-mail to Mumbai, and that was the best he could do, etc.

So unlike Vodafone Mumbai!

After finishing my client meetings, at around lunch time, I called up Pallavi, our Vodafone Relationship Manager in Mumbai. In less than one hour, the old SIM was inactivated and my new SIM was on. Thanks, Pallavi!

We then went to Shakespeare Sarani Police Station, who said that while the place where the theft took place, though closer to their station, was in another jurisdiction. Upon hearing that I was a visitor to their city, they went out of their way to be helpful, coming along with me to the crime scene, and then escorting me to the Beniapukur Police Station, under whose jurisdiction the theft took place, in their vehicle. The Sub-Inspector at this Police Station was even more helpful, as well as extremely apologetic about a visitor having to face this problem in his city. He helped us in writing the proper report, and got it logged in very quickly.

Thank you, Mr. Vaibhav Shroff of Shakespeare Sarani Police Station and Mr. Nazrul Islam of Beniapukur Police Station!

Anyway, now I am still using the temporary old handset. Still undecided on which handset to buy!

Ahmedabad

What a change this city has seen!

In the 90s, when I stayed here for a while, and then kept visiting regularly, this city was no more than an overgrown village. The airport resembled a railway station, with crowds, congestion, and absolutely no facilities to talk about. Traffic sense was non-existent, possibly because roads were pathetic.

The changes over the past decade are just amazing, to say the least! Wide roads, organized traffic, eating places, malls…the works! And the airport can now be bracketed with possibly some of the best in the world!

However, beneath all this glitz and glitter, I also notice a strong underlying current of disquiet. People are generally wary of trusting each other. One particular community in the city has been clearly pushed into ghettos, as it were!

Makes me wonder. What would I choose?

A city where people trust each other and feel safe, but which lacks infrastructure, basic needs, quality of life. Or one which boasts of great infrastructure, a high quality of life, but where a person would not trust his neighbour, and always be worried for his and his family’s life!

A Morton’s Fork, isn’t it?

“Allah loveth not those given to excess”

Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Amr bin Al-'As:
Allah's Apostle said, "O 'Abdullah! Have I not been formed that you fast all the day and stand in prayer all night?" I said, "Yes, O Allah's Apostle!" He said, "Do not do that! Observe the fast sometimes and also leave them (the fast) at other times; stand up for the prayer at night and also sleep at night. Your body has a right over you, your eyes have a right over you and your wife has a right over you." (Bukhari 7:62, Hadith 127)

Someone very dear to me was hospitalised last week. He had fainted at his office. His BP had fallen to critically low levels. After a battery of tests (including MP and CBC! I wonder why MP and CBC when it was low BP? Maybe the doctors and insurance companies know better!)...

Anyway, as usual, I digress...

After a battery of tests, they have diagnosed a problem in his inner ear, and it would need to be operated upon. This problem was also diagnosed a few years ago, but was taken lightly by the person.

This person is also actively involved in a few social causes which take up a lot of his time – sometime at the expense of his family, in my reckoning.

And despite our repeated entreaties, pleadings and even admonishing from his mother, he is adamant on following his lifestyle, which we all know his detrimental to his health.

Consider the weeks leading up to his hospitalisation. The social organisation for which he gives of his time had organised a seminar / workshop on Oct 29-31. He was running around for it for a couple of weeks during the day, and was at office at night. Sleep – about 2 hours daily. Some other jobs came up the next week, and he volunteered for them. No sleep again. The weekend before Eid, some people had come from out of town. Who will take care? Who else? And when he had some time off, you could find him online.

Not only that, he also fasted for the 8 days leading up to Eid, and wanted to also fast on Tuesday while in hospital. It was only because of a trick played on him by my wife, the hospital staff and I that he could not do so.

All of this, I daresay, with complete disregard to his wife’s feelings and concern, and his own health.

On Eid, the doctor agreed to our requests to release him for two hours so that he could attend the Eid prayers. We drilled it into his head that he has to go with us to the masjid, sit in one place, pray and accompany us back.

Do you think he did that? Oh, quite the contrary! Knowing that we could not scream at him and stop him in front of everyone at the masjid, he went ahead and did his own thing, till I finally had to lose my cool.

I know you are reading this, my dear brother, and wanted to highlight the above Hadith to you. You are disregarding the above words of Rasool Allah (Sallallahu alaihi wasallam) completely! And I hope you change. Do what you are doing, but stay within limits. Do not go to the extremes that you are going now.

After all, at various points, the Qur’an highlights that Allah does not like those who transgress limits. And you know that much better than I do!