Harsh Jegadeesan's | VIEWS

Meru Cabs | "Rely on us" - Really?

2009-11-07T11:53:00.008+05:30

Meru cabs - a radio taxi service operating in Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad and Bangalore says "Rely On Us". The Meru brand in their own words is "a symbol of our commitment to unshakeable reliability- the heart of our promise to our customers". Further, they claim that "It is this promise of reliability that drives us at Meru Cabs to endeavor to provide the most efficient services every time to our customers" (see Meru's Philosophy)

Really? For me, Meru is a perfect example of big brand, brag commitments but bad experience - totally bad and unreliable experience!

I booked a Meru cab for 21.30 PM last night (reference no. 323 08/11/2009). I wanted to go to the railway station, a 25 km ride from my home, to catch a train at 22.45 PM. At 21.00 I got a text message saying that a cab has been allotted. At 21.25 when I got no call from the driver, I tried calling him but his phone was unreachable. I called the call center and I was told that Meru's system already shows I was "picked up". When I told him I was still at home, he said that the cab is on the way and he will ask the driver to give me a call. At 21.39, when I got no call I called them again and I was told by a person that the driver is "not traceable" and that a new cab was being sent to pick me and it will reach me in "couple of minutes".

When nothing happened in "couple of minutes" and it was already getting late, I finally got the call from the driver who told me he will be there in another 15 mins and that he was told to go pick me up just then. Meanwhile, I really wanted to understand Meru's liability if someone misses a train, flight or an important meeting due to a late cab. I called their call center and asked for the information department, after I asked the agent about liability, did not understand. He put me on hold. After the hold time, someone else picked up the call, and this person did not know I was in hold and was seeking information. As I could figure out, the person I had spoke to earlier had just vanished very impolitely. So much already for "Relying on Meru". I asked the agent to put me in touch with his manager and he did reluctantly.

Finally, I spoke to Gargi - the manager, Gargi told me that they have 'technical problems' in their end. I did not want to waste my time and I asked her if she worked for Meru or for a call center. She said she works for Meru and she does really cares about Meru and it's customers. By this time it was already 21.55 and I still had to go 25 kms to catch my train. I walked down from my apartment to look for another mode of transport, by now giving up most of the hopes of catching the train. When I was down, I finally saw a Meru cab driving towards me. I was still talking to Gargi and she did not have answers about "reliability" , "time guarantee" and "liability". When I asked her if Meru was liable if I missed the train and subsequently an important appointment - she said I could call the call center and give them "feedback". She also said that I will get a call from Meru in 24-hrs explaining the whole "screw up" (update: it's been 48-hrs and there has been no call and I don't see any call too in the future). I asked her if there was a reference number for the complaint, she said there was no need for it and I will surely get the call.

On my way I told the cab driver my story, he had so many complaints against the call center. He said there was a "huge problem" with Meru's operations center and most of the drivers were very unhappy with Meru. He was also suggesting that I use Easy Cabs or CEL cabs as they were much more reliable. So much for employee engagement. I finally reached the station 4 mins before the departure and ran all the way to board my train. I could make it only because of the driver's creativity, skill and reckless driving.

When I called my wife and narrated my experience, she told me her horror story with Meru. She had to take a train at 6.00 AM in the morning. We are 7 months pregnant and she wanted a comfortable journey to the railway station. She "relied on Meru". The cab was late, the driver was rash and reckless and she had to run with her luggage to make it to the train. She vowed she will never call Meru again. She had told all her friends about her bad experience with Meru and almost unanimously everyone seemed to agree as they had their own bad experiences to narrate.

Before writing this blog, I googled "Meru" to see if the crowd shared similar experiences. Not surprisingly, I found so many blogs and reviews (see Mouth Shut's reviews), all narrating horror stories about Meru's reliability. Not sure why it is hard for Mr. Neeraj Gupta and his team along with India value fund - their investors, to see the brewing customer anger against Meru and its false promises. In my opinion, Meru will close shop in less than 2-yrs if they don't clean up their act! (I am no Oracle to predict, but I can see this from my CEL cabs experience).

Will I rely on Meru again? Are you kidding me! Neeraj are you listening?

If you have had bad experiences with Meru, please post your comments.

Social Impact of Microcredit - RangDe's Field Visit to Vandavasi

2009-11-01T20:58:00.003+05:30

I have been a micro lender with Kiva and more recently with RangDe. I've always believed that grassroutes entrepreneurship coupled with access to affordable capital is the key to poverty alleviation and a better standard of living for millions of Indians, especially in the rural hinterland.

RangDe is India's largest peer-to-peer lending platform and has doled out micro loans close to INR 8 million in a short span of 2 years. As I wanted to do something more than just micro lending, I joined them as a volunteer. Last Saturday, I had the opportunity to see how micro credit really works. I along with 7 RangDe volunteers from the Bangalore Chapter went on a field visit to villages around Vandavasi to meet borrowers and the field partner agency - ASSCOD. The goal of the field visit was two-fold. Firstly, we wanted to see for ourselves the impact that the loans were making to the community. Secondly, we wanted to conduct a social audit on the field partner and the effectiveness of the loan disbursement and the repayment processes.

Elzhumalai, the local ASSCOD coordinator joined us in Vandavasi. Sivagami was the first borrower we met. Sivagami and her husband set up a small eatery and when they had begun to do well, her husband passed away. After the initial shock, Sivagami was forced to take charge and be the sole bread winner for her family. Her eatery serves snacks for breakfast and simple meals for lunch. She is assisted by her 2 daughters before they go to school. Her son who is studying in an ITI is planning to join her in the eatery business after his studies. Sivagami took a small loan of INR 10,000/- from RangDe to buy utensils and a gas stove to expand her business. She quickly repaid the loan with 8.5% interest in 12 months. She acknowledged the huge impact the micro loan had made on her life and was really thankful to RangDe for providing her access to affordable capital. We left her eatery wishing her and her son best of luck!

Our next borrower was Fathima and her daughter Muneera. They are part of the Muthamizh self-help group (SHG), a group of 20 muslim women who engage in tailoring and hand embroidery. Muneera(18) really impressed us with her enterprise and confidence. She has formally undergone training in hand embroidery and is the local garment designer in Vandavasi. She trains other women in tailoring and employs them in her business. Fathima borrowed INR 15,000/- to buy a sewing machine and is repaying very regularly. The mother and daughter duo now want to buy a embroidery machine to grow their business. A lot of these women have to overcome social conventions and community customs to take part in the SHG. We were all overwhelmed by the spirit, enterprise and the positive attitude that these rural women exhibited.

Next in our list of borrowers was Fyrose Banu. Fyrose has 2 children. Fyrose is in the mat finishing business. Vandavasi is famous for its mats and a lot of people in and around Vandavasi are involved in this business. Fyrose's husband buys unfinished mats in wholesale; Fyrose stitches up the mats and they sell the finished mats to nearby villages. Fyrose took a loan to buy a mat making machine. She has repaid the load and is looking for a loan to buy a motorized vehicle to transport her mats to far off villages and towns.We took the opportunity to visit a mechanized mat making unit and see how mats were being made. I also bought a few mats from Fyrose, for which she reluctantly took money.

The last borrower in our list was Boopalan. Boopalan’s life presents a classic example of what can be achieved by sheer will power and hard work. Over the last 14 years Boopalan has grown from being a mere daily wage earner to a micro entrepreneur employing 3 persons in his own establishment. The secret of his success is dedication, sincerity and an iron resolution to excel. Initially Boopalan was employed as an operator in Southern Polymers where he learnt the tricks of making plastic goods. Soon Boopalan launched his own establishment to make a variety of goods like jewel boxes, plastic dolls, gift items, devotional gifts etc. Boopalan took a loan of INR 125,000/- to buy an automatic moulding machine to make plastic boxes. He is confident of expanding his business and employing more locals. He told us that he was deeply indebted to RangDe for providing him a loan and changing his life beyond his imagination.

As we were meeting borrowers, I couldn't help but think how small amounts of money we lend was make a tangible and real difference to people. I could really appreciate the power of micro lending and its profound social impact in a community. Earlier each of these borrowers had to borrow money at exorbitant interest rates from local money lenders. Banks did not lend unsecured loans. Now with access to micro credit through peer-to-peer lending platforms like RangDe, coupled with hard work, enterprise and self-belief, a mini revolution has started in our rural hinterland.

Make a difference today, invest in India's future: visit RangDe.org now!

My food binge in Bangalore's old and famous eat outs!

2009-10-25T12:16:00.022+05:30

After visiting every new restaurant in town, burning oodles of money on marked up (not necessarily good) food and guinea pigging for resta-experimenters (restaurants which experiment on paying public with their versions of global cuisine, read World Cuisine Network), this Saturday we decided to head out to traditional old Bangalore eat outs. I joined my wife and 6 of her colleagues to spend the whole day binging on traditional food in old Bangalore.

We started our day with the traditional "Bengaluru Masala Dosa" in Vidyarthi Bhavan in Gandhi Bazaar, arguably the best dosa in the world according to die-hard dosa fans. They have been in existence since 1943 and churn out thousands of dosas all day long. Because we were on a food binge and I did not know what was coming next - I wanted to try everything on the menu, including the hot water.

What followed next was plain dosa, karabath, kesaribath, idly vada, poori sagu, coffee/tea and hot water in that order. I must admit that except for the masala dosa, no other dish deserved the hype. Having said that, I'd go there just for the masala dosa :) The best part about the whole place was - it just costed us ~400 bucks for 8 of us for breakfast, can you believe that!

It was already 11.30 AM by the time we finished and I was assuming all the while that we were having a 'brunch', till reality hit me. I was told that we have to head out fast to MTR (Mavalli Tiffin Room) because we had a lunch 'appointment' at 2.00 PM.

Hang on!, did you say lunch? Suddenly I had self doubts, this would not have been quite a shocker a few years ago when I was a lot younger; now with age and years of eating at home I was not sure if my intestinal flora was ready to handle this :) But I knew I had to bring my years of experience into play here; really trust my abilities and go out there and carry on!

Just to relax ourselves before the next playoff, we took a stroll in a beautiful park in Basavanagudi, we visited the Bull Temple to see the monolith statue of Nandi Bull. According to the local legends, the bull is growing in size every year. We had a refreshing tender coconut before we headed out to lunch. Will I be able to do this?

Lunch at MTR is a completely filling affair. MTR has a great legacy - started it 1924, they have had Chief Ministers waiting in long queues to eat there. Even today, even if you have a reservation, you will have to wait at least an hour in the waiting rooms to get inside. Following the tradition, we waited in the long and noisy queue for our turn. Our turn finally came after a 1/2 hour wait. Honestly I had to really struggle through every course of the meal, but I really enjoyed the food thoroughly. By the time we came out, my stomach was just about to explode. We all had to take a walk and maybe follow it up with a nice nap. With great difficulty we walked across the road to Lal Bagh. The 240-acre garden is a treat to the eyes in a traffic-clogged Bangalore, where the green patches are rapidly being replaced by concrete jungles. We had a short walk and found the shade of a big banyan tree hard to resist, we all settled down to have a nap in the shade. After a power nap we were ready for the evening.

Our goal was to eat something 'lite' in the evening. Our destination was the Food Street - a road full of eateries in V.V. Puram. Each eatery is a specialized joint for certain items. For example, the dosa shop we went just sold ghee masala dosa. After binging on a variety of foods - dosa, idly, vada pav and 'obbattu', I was done for the day. My stomach could not stomach any more food. As we walked to the end of the road, we reached V B Bakery - again a old Bangalore food joint which has been doing yeoman service to foodies like me for decades. I had to pay due respects to such a revered food joint. I ate a bun butter jam and bought the traditional rusks and left the food street promising to come back soon!

That was it! I vowed to my stomach that I will completely rest it the next day. Finally we headed home after a whole day of traditional food in Bangalore's old and famous food joint. More than us, our li'l one got to savor Bangalore's best from inside momie's stomach :)

My Diwali in Chikkasugur - a village affected by flash floods

2009-10-22T22:24:00.009+05:30

In October this year, the water level in the Krishna river (the longest river in south-central India) rose to its 100-year high due to incessant rains. The resulting flash floods demolished villages and towns in Andhra and Karnataka washing away crops and cattle and rendering thousands homeless. Parts of North Karnataka that were suffering the worst draught were suddenly affected by these devastating floods in the same year.

All my life I've seen a lot of news, video footages and pictures of catastrophic damages caused by natural calamities. I've empathized, most often written a cheque and cribbed about govt. inaction and inadequate relief efforts and moved on.

This Diwali for the first time I saw it all live! Along with 8 other CLEAR PURPOSE (SAP's CSR team) volunteers I was in Chikkasugur, a village (not seen in Google maps, but existing) in North Karnataka and on the banks of river Krishna. Chikkasugur is a small hamlet with a population of 3000 people in the Raichur district, 14 KMs from Raichur.

Our goal was to assess the damages first-hand and decide how SAP could be involved in the rehabilitation efforts along with our field partner HOPE foundation. What I saw there was overwhelming and beyond my imagination. With houses reduced to rubbles, the villagers are living in makeshift accommodation, or in remaining parts of the houses. All the crops were damaged, leaving farmers penniless. The govt. has provided immediate cash relief with compensation between 2,000 - 12,000 based on the extent of damage. The govt. compensation is peanuts compared to the real losses. However, I am not blaming the govt. machinery. From what I heard, the govt. officers are doing their best and supporting locals and NGOs involved in relief efforts. I'd guess that the govt. has too much to handle and stretched too thin beyond their capabilities. Added to this, the village was strongly divided on lines of caste - hindus, muslims, the scheduled castes and tribes. Villagers were complaining of biases in distribution of compensation and were not willing to clear the rubble waiting for inspection from officials.

Under these circumstances, HOPE foundation was doing a commendable job. Prabhu Kumar (Sr. Director) and his team were working and still continue to work at a phenomenal speed to do all they can to put Chikkasugur back on its feet. I along with other volunteers was involved in talking to the villagers and conducting a survey to understand the extent of the damage and what we could do in a sustainable manner to help them. The immediate need was housing, followed closely by primary education and skills development to improve employability of the youth. Though we were met with initial skepticism, the villagers soon realized that we are genuinely and wholeheartedly trying to do our bit and helped us in every possible way. We also helped rebuild the village primary school. We replaced the roofs, cleaned the school premises, planted trees and were also successful in engaging the children in all these activities. SAP will now work with HOPE foundation to improve the primary and high schools in Chikkasugur. Also we'd like to start a skills training center to impart basic computer skills (DTP), spoken english and tailoring skills to the youth.

Looking at all the good work that a lot of NGOs, including HOPE foundation are doing - so selflessly, I wonder what a tiny drop I've been in this big ocean. However I am really happy being this small drop, after all small drops add to make a mighty ocean! If you are looking to help or donate, you can do it through HOPE foundation here.

SOA India 2009 | SOA and Web Business Platforms

2009-10-17T20:12:00.002+05:30

I was in SOA India 2009 speaking on SOA and Web Business Platforms.
This year the conference was just for 1-day. Does this signify that SOA is in the "Slope of enlightenment" in the Gartner Hype cycle or simply that people did not have budgets to attend conferences this year, I will not hazard a guess.

SOA India 2009 | SOA and Web Business Platforms

View more presentations from Harsh Jegadeesan.

CEL Bangalore Lecture Series - Latchaa with RedBus Founders

2009-09-20T10:19:00.023+05:30

CEL Bangalore (the Bangalore chapter of Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership) organized its first lecture (a.k.a latchaa session-laughter and chat for the uninitiated) as a part of the entrepreneurship lecture series and networking session on September 12, 2009. A similar series is organized in the silicon valley chapter of BITSAA CEL. The venue for the evening was the BITS PDC in Indiranagar.

We had the founders of RedBus.in, India's No#1 bus ticketing company to share their start-up fairy tale with a 30-odd BITSian crowd, which braved the drizzles(!) and the saturday after-lunch lethargy to attend the talk.

Phani, Sudhakar and Charan ('98) saw opportunity in a painpoint that they personally faced - getting onward and return bus tickets to their hometowns in a convenient way. Instead of cribbing and complaining about it, they created RedBus ( and a whole new industry) to ease bus ticket booking for them and for several thousand others. Their company Pilani Software Labs Pvt. Ltd. resonates their Pilani connection.

Sudhakar started off the session with how the "idea struck them", their early days and how they chose the RedBus name. The founders got so smitten by the idea that they worked around the clock after a tiring day-job to realise the idea. In fact the founders did not have any experience with e-commerce, they still learnt it all by themselves. They had to talk to a lot of bus operators to understand the domain. The RedBus story clearly shows that if entrepreneurs have the will and know clearly what they want to create, they can create it.

Charan, who currently heads engineering at RedBus spoke about the innovative marketing techniques they adopted during the early stages. The founders personally stood outside IT parks and handed out visiting cards during lunch. They handed out cards in loaded buses in majestic to gain visibility among their customer base, this caught the attention of a journalist who gave them their first press coverage. Charan, incidentally is the first employee of RedBus. He also spoke about how it was hard to initially convince his parents on this whole venture.

Phani narrated how they went to majestic to board their first customer - a lady from Infosys going from Bangalore to Tirupati. Phani spoke about the help they received from TIE and the importance of mentorship; he acknowledged the help they got from their TIE mentor - Sanjay Anandaraman, and the help and advice they continue to receive from several other mentors.

The audience was captivated and enthralled, at the same time motivated hearing the founders speak. The session was very interactive with no "powerpoint presentations", there were several questions, which the RedBus team answered with poise. Overall it was an evening to remember!

Watch out for CEL Bangalore events!

(The CEL Team with RedBus Founders: Sid, Sudhakar, Chaitanya, Phani, Harsh and Archana)

The CCD Horror! - A lot can happen over coffee?

2009-09-17T22:15:00.007+05:30

After a lot of thought, I am recounting a very bad experience I had at Cafe Coffee Day (CCD) in the Bangalore airport (BIAL). Honestly, I've been a big fan of CCD for all the coffee, free wifi and unlimited time spent with friends over interesting discussions.

The horror started when I ordered 2 regular coffees. We were 4 people and since we did not want to drink so much coffee late in the evening, I asked for 2 extra cups for sharing the coffee between 4 of us. By-two-kaapi is such a culturally accepted thing in Bangalore. To my surprise and dismay, the person in the counter (Manish - name unchanged) refused to give me to 2 extra cups, rather very impolitely.

When I offered to pay for the cups, he demanded that I pay 50 bucks (the price of coffee - anyway marked up 10 times from cost price) for an empty cup!

So much for "offering the best coffee experience in the world at affordable prices". A cup of coffee costs less than 5 bucks to make, CCD sells it for 50 bucks - they don't just sell you coffee, they claim to sell you the "cafe experience".

I am not sure if they refuse an extra paper cup as a policy, or if this is a one off incident based on the whims and fancies of the employee managing the cafe. To me, it is a real shame that CCD employees behaved in such a cheap fashion.

The employee also rudely suggested that we go to the other corner of the airport to get a paper cup from the water cooler. After this disgusting experience, we finally had to just do that - get a cup from the water cooler.

As a loyal customer, will I forget this one bad experience? Never

Will this experience overshadow all the good times and things I recall of the CCD brand? Definitely yes!

Will my parents, who were with me that day ever think that its justified to spend 50 bucks for a 'cafe experience' as bitter as this one? Not at all

Will I ever go back to CCD? I am not too sure!

Comment if you've had bad experiences like this with CCD anytime in the past.

Birth And Growth Of Enterprise Software

2009-02-19T09:34:00.002+05:30

Birth And Growth Of Enterprise Software

View more presentations from Harsh Jegadeesan. (tags: enterprise software)

Empowering Entrepreneurs at the Bottom of the Pyramid through Micro Lending

2009-02-11T10:46:00.015+05:30

In my opinion, the most audacious goal for the world in the 21st century is to alleviate poverty, a global problem that is ubiquitous and enduring. Extreme poverty is a result of a complex inter-play of various social, economic, political and historical factors. Poverty translates to lack of education, basic sanitation and health care facilities in large communities across the globe, leading to a huge economical disparity in the society. Till now, the solutions to alleviate property have had little impact to say the least. A concerted effort from government, non-governmental agencies, for-profit corporations and individuals, coordinated by UN agencies is required to address the problems of global poor.

There are complaints that for-profit corporations are busy chasing profits, but that's what they are incorporated for, exist for. CK Prahalad's book "Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid" has shown the way to alleviate poverty through profits. Muhammad Yunus's Grameen Bank through its financial innovation - "microfinance" - has showed that microfinance and entrepreneurship at individual communities can be an effective tool to address poverty.

I truly believe that micro loans - loans of small amounts made to a borrower with no collateral and credit worthiness - along with grassroots entrepreneurship is the way forward to alleviate poverty. At least it is much better than short-sighted subsidies doled out by politicians to garner votes among rural and urban poor. While the governments, NGOs and businesses have a part to play, can you and I do something?

Yes we can. We can make a difference by lending to entrepreneurs in a community to create small businesses. Micro lending platforms such as Kiva, RangDe and DhanaX have made social lending easy. Agreed that the loans have no guarantee of repayment and there is a risk of capital loss, but the total loan is raised through aggregated borrowing from various lenders, substantially reducing the risk.

Make a difference, give them a chance!

I am inspired by the "Starfish Story"
Checkout my Kiva lending profile: http://www.kiva.org/lender/harshjegadeesan

Web Business Platforms On The Cloud : An Engineering Perspective

2009-01-10T12:48:00.002+05:30

My talk in the Cloud Computing Symposium in ACM Compute 2009

Web Business Platforms On The Cloud An Engineering Perspective

View more presentations from Harsh Jegadeesan. (tags: acm compute)

Send a Child to School in 2009!

2008-12-26T13:16:00.046+05:30

This New Year I am running the Times of India Bangalore midnight half marathon (January 10, 2009) to support a millennium goal - Universal Primary Education in India.

Join me in sending a child to school in 2009!

Running a marathon is both physically and mentally demanding, especially when one is not in good shape .. like myself! So you might ask why am I doing this? I am doing this because I feel so strongly about the cause, about educating a child. This gives me the required mental strength to attempt the half marathon.

I, like so many of you, have had the very good fortune to be educated by my parents. Our parents put us through good schools and for so many of us Right to 'Good' Education was a given! Education has empowered me, it has enabled me to make a honorable living, so is the case with most of you. Let's do our bit, let's educate a child in 2009!

My goal is to send a 100 children to school in 2009!

I will not be able to do this alone, I need your support! If each of us pledge to send a child to school in 2009, we would have made a difference! The cost to educate a child through the SOS children's village, India for a whole year is INR 6,000 (USD 120) . Worldwide, SOS villages provide a family atmosphere and long-term care for orphaned and abandoned children.

Let's send a 100 children to school in 2009! Want to send a child to school? Send me an email.

Thanks for your support!
In order to send a child to school, click on the logo:

A different Christmas!

2008-12-26T11:31:00.010+05:30

Christmas this year was different! My wife Gayatri, her sister Sindhu (currently on her vacation) and I decided to celebrate Christmas and share our plum cakes with the kids in the SOS Children's village of India in Bangalore. The children's village, which is a part of SOS Kinderdorf International, provides a home, a mother, a brother and sister to young abandoned and orphaned children.

The SOS children's village in Bangalore, located on Bannerghatta road is a green 6-acre campus. The village has 16 homes with 8 - 10 children aged between 3 - 14 yrs along with their adopted mother. Each child is put through school and / or is given vocational training to provide skills for a sustainable future.

At 11.00 AM, we met one of the resident staffs of the village, Vinay. Vinay, who holds a master's in social work, started working with the village 5-months back. Vinay explained to us the concept of the SOS village and took us to Chetna - a home where Christmas was celebrated. This year the celebrations was low key to mourn the recent demise of their president - J N Kaul. Vinay knows all the kids by their names, and that reflects the warmth the kids receive in the village. We got introduced to the kids and we met the mother of the home, Shantamma. I bought a small basketball for the kids and I got to dribble a bit with them. We then shared our plum cakes with the kids and got to interact with them a bit more.

In Chetna, we met Roslyn, a former member of the house who came to the village as a toddler. Roslyn now has a university degree and works with a HR consulting firm in Bangalore. She was there to spend the Christmas with her family. We also met Arvind, the facilities manager of the village. Arvind told us that he was from a SOS village in Assam. After getting a polytechnic certificate in plumbing and electricals and working for a decade in Orissa, he has now come back to his home, to try to give back in his own way.

The stories of Roslyn and Arvind overwhelmed us. We have now decided to adopt this home in the SOS village, go there every Sunday to teach maths and english to the children. I have also decided to setup a computer center to teach basic computer skills to the children.

Currently the kids speak the local language, Kannada. Since we do not speak Kannada, we are a bit nervous, hopefully we will learn some Kannada as we go! If you are in Bangalore and would like to spend 1-hr (3.00 - 4.00 PM) of your Sunday with the young children teaching and playing with them, you are welcome to join us. You can send me an email.

Child Rehabilitation Center, Ampara, Sri Lanka

2008-12-24T16:13:00.006+05:30

As an UN online volunteer, I started working with the Child Rehabilitation Center, Ampara - a non-political, non-religious, not-for-profit working in the eastern province of Sri Lanka in Ampara. CRC is run by Chamila Kodagoda and supports rehabilitation and education of children from the war torn areas of Sri Lanka.

I support in the setting up of a computer training center to teach basic IT skills to the war affected children. Apart from providing technical assistance in the curriculum, I support them in forming alliances with NGOs, positioning them with donors to raise funds for the computer training center.

If you know of an NGO which would like to collaborate with CRC or if you are interested in supporting the CRC, Ampara by donations, please drop me an email.

Volunteer with the UN, work for the Millennium Goals

2008-12-19T15:46:00.008+05:30

Today I signed up to be a UN Volunteer. I enrolled to be an online volunteer for UN supported development agencies. As an online volunteer I would engage with and strengthen grass routes agencies and international NGOs involved in human development, under the UN mandate, to achieve the millennium development goals (MDGs).

The eight millennium goals have to be achieved by 2015 to counter world's important development challenges. The goals are no doubt audacious, but have to be achieved nevertheless for sustainable human development. I think it is the responsibility of each and every world citizen to contribute to achieve these goals.

I have decided to contribute in my own way to the MDGs. I adopted Goal 2: Achieve Universal Primary Education. I am currently pursuing volunteering opportunities in agencies working on children empowerment through education. I encourage everyone to choose their MDG they would help to achieve and sign-up to volunteer with the UN.

So what's your MDG?

Google SearchWiki does a 'Process of Me'

2008-11-21T15:02:00.004+05:30

Google launched Google SearchWiki a few hours ago, and boy am I excited! Have you ever been frustrated with the search results - from the world's best search engine? if yes, you would understand why. With SearchWiki, Google allows you to customize your search results, re-order results, add new entries even add notes to the results. With SearchWiki, Google just did a 'process of me', giving back control to users by letting them organize their search results for their own needs.

Though, Garett is not too elated with this offering and he even thinks spammers could feast on the 'add notes' feature. I have a reason to believe that SearchWiki would evolve. How could even Google, the world's best search engine, with its much guarded secret - its search algorithm - not use the wisdom of the crowds to improve its search results? you will surely hear more on SearchWiki in the days to come.

Extracting Maximum value from Enterprise Software

2008-11-21T12:00:00.006+05:30

Every season has its flavor, 'extracting value from enterprise software' by achieving the right ROI is the most important business imperative for every CTO, even the CEO this season. Especially when there is a global credit crunch, banks going down every other day and liquidity hard to find. Every serious enterprise software vendor has to be in this, as much as its customers, if not more.

Presently, for an enterprise software vendor, its all about 'making a sale', deploying its software (i.e. if the customers choose them to, and not their partners or other third-party implementers) , and interfacing with the customer for upgrades and add-ons and dutifully receive maintenance cheques every year. Though value engineering and iron-clad business cases play their part during pre-sales, thats where they end.

As is the norm, after a 'successful' implementation and the 'Go-Live', the deployment team transfers the running systems to the internal IT and move on to other projects. After all a happy ending?, well no. All the insights that a deployment team developed during the course of the project is lost forever.

In order to continue to optimize operations (after all bottom lines rule!) and extract value from an enterprise software deployment, customers and enterprise software vendors must work hand-in-glove to evaluate the roadmap on an ongoing basis, Value Engineering must be an ongoing activity than a one-off presentation during pre-sales. Account executives must actually be Value Engineers who work with customers to enhance and extract as much value from their enterprise software deployments. The insight built must be retained on-site - the value engineers at customers place - is where you store these insights.

The Last Mile Challenge in Enterprise Software

2008-11-19T12:01:00.010+05:30

Enterprise Software - the software machinery that runs the internals of an organization- is a complex beast. The enormous complexity enterprise software is often accused of, is more to do with the problems it tries to solve than the actual recipe it provides for these problems. For starters, every industry, every company in an industry, every subsidiary of these companies, every LOB and every team within a LOB has unique needs, leading to their own flavors of business processes. Enterprise software has to support all these flavors - rather seamlessly.

In order to understand the last mile challenge in enterprise software, one has to understand how it is brewed and served to customers. Brewed in labs and development org. units - I call them the creators, it finds it way to the customer landscape through consultants and partners. Consultants from either partners or from another organization unit 'flavor' enterprise software for customer organizations, based on their unique needs - I call these consultants the deployers. The flavoring is needed as enterprise software is almost always a shrink-wrapped product.

This process of flavoring the software is what I call the last mile of enterprise software. The last mile is as crucial for enterprise software, as it is to a moon mission satellite entering the final lunar orbit. To me, the challenges in the last mile stem from the 'knowledge' levels of the deployers and lack of effective communication of product capabilities across the continuum from creators to the deployers. The magic pill is effective communication and collaboration between the creators and deployers. This leads to a successful deployment and usage of enterprise software.

Enterprise Software and the Network Effect

2008-11-18T12:00:00.003+05:30

Businesses have always tried to exploit network effect and the bandwagon effect to their advantage to attract new customers and improve their top lines. Microsoft is a classic case in point - Windows is occupying more than 90% of the world's desktops largely due to the network effect.

How can enterprise software makers leverage the network effect to increase their installed base? the answer lies in 'business network transformation'. Earlier, enterprise software was used to automate internal businesses processes in finance, HR and operations. ERP software was ruling to roost.

Come Y2k, the new world order is:

- forcing businesses to focus on their 'core', their differentiating claim-to-fame capabilities and work with parters in the ecosystem to provide complete customer solutions - outsourcing

- forcing businesses to engage with suppliers and partners in different corners of the globe - off-shoring

From an enterprise software perspective, collaboration with partners is the new mantra, consolidation and automation is a given. If any enterprise software can support such kind of collaboration and enable out-of-the-box collaboration capabilities for entities in the business network, it would emerge as the de-facto operating system of business.

Business Stripped Bare | Richard Branson

2008-11-14T14:21:00.006+05:30

I must confess, one of the best authors of business books I have read so far is er eh hm - 'Sir Richard Branson'. While his autobiography 'Losing My Virginity' made me his great fan and a follower, his short and sweet 'Screw It!, Lets do it!' was a tequila shot!

Reading his latest - Business Stripped bare - was like having a conversation with Mr. Branson in real. In my opinion, he is as unconventional as an author as he is a business tycoon. In this book, he has simplified business and really stripped it bare to the basics - People, Brand, Delivery, Learning from Mistakes, Innovation, Entrepreneurship & Leadership and Social Responsibility.

To me the most exciting aspect is, Branson's art of leveraging the Virgin Brand to setup businesses from mobile phones (Virgin Mobile) to space tourism (Virgin Galactic), to Virgin Cola. The fascinating part is how he succeeds in keeping his businesses small and entrepreneurial.

Virgin still oozes youthfulness and provides 'value for the buck' to customers. Look at how Virgin Mobile launched in India as a MVNO with its 'Think Hatke' campaign, boy what an ad this is:

Heads and Hands

2008-10-16T15:16:00.007+05:30

In my experience, every venture worth its salt needs two kinds of people in order to sustain, succeed and thrive. I call these people, Heads and Hands. Heads and Hands are genetically different, they are just wired differently. Heads have a "broad horizon view", they get excited and driven by ideas. Heads are the strategic thinkers of a venture. No venture can be conceived without the Heads.

Hands, on the other had are people with an eye for detail. While Heads get their 'high' on ideas, the Hands are not excited so easily. Hands are keen on delivering. Execution runs in their blood. Their job is to operationalize the strategy. While Heads conjure up ideas in the cloud, Hands ground it and bring it to reality.

A venture would be able to survive only when there is a right mix of Heads and Hands. While Heads ensure right things are done Hands guarantee that the things are done in a right way. One is not superior than the other. If you have more Heads than the Hands, the venture does not come to bear. More Hands with fewer Heads would lack a roadmap and a binding strategy.
than having the right mix in the team, Heads and Hands have to respect, trust and work well with each other for a successful venture.

Competition is good, very good!

2008-09-17T22:00:00.008+05:30

Update - The Nano project pulled out of West Bengal and moved into its new home - Vibrant Gujarat. Reason, enterprise of the CM and his team, pragmatic land acquisition policies and a business-friendly environment. Most important outcome - healthy competition between states to woo businesses!

For the past few days, I was disgusted seeing the news on Tata's Nano plant and the Singur agitation. A politician has been garnering press attention over a mismanaged land acquisition strategy of a state government, in the process holding one of India's corporates to ransom.

Though the leftist government headed by a not-too-leftist chief minister has been trying all it can to improve the situation and retain the Nano plant in West Bengal, there is competition now. Today, Karnataka offered to provide Tata's with the necessary support to setup the Nano plant in Dharwad. Such an offer has forced the leftist government to be more "competitive". The Chief Minister is trying to get on top of the situation and make sure that the plant stays in WB.

Competition has driven the leftist to act, and act fast. Competition has always been good, no doubt, our industries have improved and customers are smiling than never before. Governments have always been 'monopolistic', that explains inefficiency in governance and skepticism among the citizenry. Now I hope competition among our governments to attract investments and to create jobs will improve governance.

Developer Abuse - ThoughtWorks Ad!

2008-09-14T23:27:00.002+05:30

I really like this ThoughtWorks ad!

How is SAP dealing with the N=1; R=G world?

2008-09-14T22:47:00.010+05:30

See previous post for the context.

I was deeply wondering how SAP was addressing the N=1; R=G world? Here is my take on it!

N=1 - SAP through its business process platform and subsequently through its platform strategy is providing a means for customers to customize their enterprise software. Needless to say, enterprise software is complex and "no-one-size-fits-all". Companies, most often innovate on their processes to create "differentiating processes" - their claim to fame. In order to create customized processes, SAP provides the first-ever business process platform, a significant shift from its individual product offerings ( ERP, CRM, SRM, .. and other TLAs). Most importantly, the focus has shifted to end-to-end business processes, as business processes provide the link between strategy, business models and operations.

R=G - SAP is a truly global company with a "follow the sun" strategy to support customers. With a strong and wide-spread SAP Labs network, research centers with strong university collaborations, SAP leverages resources globally. Most significantly, SAP has built a strong ecosystem with customers, partners, supportive user groups, communities of innovation and industry value networks to collectively deliver value to customers. SAP has also jumped into the crowdsourcing bandwagon with its partnership with InnoCentive to tap into the "wisdom of the crowds".

In my opinion, SAP is well poised to address the N=1; R=G world.

N=1; R=G

2008-09-12T12:58:00.009+05:30

I am currently reading "the new age of innovation" book co-authored by C.K. Prahalad. The book talks about the interesting "equation" which represents the new age of innovation and value-addition through co-creation with customers - N=1; R=G.

N=1 - is about looking to target a market segment of size 1 with a single customer :0. Confusing? not really. What that means is personalization of a product offering to suit a single customer's need, to have an intimate understanding of a customer's unique requirements and addressing them with flavored offerings for a single customer. Work with the customer (delta revenue channel) to co-create products to address the segment of one. Bottom line, value your customer relationship like never before.

R=G - explains the business environment in the globalized world, where resources leveraged from a global context are used to succeed in business. Does this mean outsourcing to the far east? No it means, sourcing from global supply chains, engaging talent outside organization boundaries through smart crowdsourcing and outsourcing strategies and co-innovation with customers and partners in a business network.

In order to win in the N=1; R=G world, businesses must build strategic and operational capabilities in their business processes through social & IT architectures.

See C.K. Prahalad's interview in Business Standard

At world's end?

2008-09-10T10:49:00.013+05:30

Today, September 10, 2008 is a historic day for mankind as we try to recreate Big-Bang, the theory which explains the beginning of our universe. Our quest to understand the initial conditions of the universe as it was, close to 14 billion years ago will start at 7.30 GMT today in CERN. By doing so, we hope to answer elusive questions on mass, gravity and the theoritical higgs bosons - the "God Particle".

Scientists would attempt to re-create big-bang using a Large Hadron Collider (LHC) - the world's largest particle accelarator powered by nuclear fusion. Through this momentous and biggest human experiment, scientist aim to validate the Standard Model, the model of particle physics which explains fundamental interactions among elementary particles that make up all matter. However, there is a section of dooms sayers who believe that this experiment would cause minute "unstable" black holes which would cause eathquakes, tsunamis and eventually engulf the whole world. Some people are quoting a Nostradamus predication that the world would end due to a disaster caused by the LHC today.

Does that mean we are at the world's end? I really don't know. But I am scared and excited at the same time, a mixed feeling running through my veins! As any normal human being, I live my every day assuming perpetualty of life till one day I find I would live no more. My list of "to-dos" >> "already done". If I am at world's end, I would wait for the "Noah's Ark" - a space shuttle in its 21st century avtar to go to the 'utopian world'. An inclusive world where there's no evil, no killing over one's faith, no poverty and no hunger, where I can start all over with my unfinished business. But for the moment, I am waiting to watch the spectacle on television today evening!

Bhindra, Boxers and India's Sporting Renaissance

2008-09-08T18:09:00.005+05:30

When Abhinav Bindra clinched India's first ever individual gold medal in olympics, the whole nation erupted in joy! Chinese dailies featured Bindra on the front page, although with a bit of sarcasm, the headlines read "A nation of billion celebrates its first individual gold after 60 years". Coincidentally, China too got its first olympic in shooting (Xu Haifeng in 1984 L.A olympics).
Then came our boxers and wrestlers from small towns and humble backgrounds to win 2 more bronze medals, taking our total tally of medals to 3, our best ever performance in modern olympics.

Bhindra and our boxers have done us proud, will they lead India's sporting renaissance? Sports in India has always taken a back-seat due to lack of quality infrastructure, government funding, our ailing and corrupt sports authorities and federations, but most importantly the lack of desire and collective will! India in its bid to match China's olympic grandeur , is loosening its purse and upping its spending for the 2010 Commonwealth games. But are we making concerted efforts to up our medals too?

Indian sports for all these years has been centered around "cricket", thanks to the multi-million viewership and big money from corporate advertisements. Cricket coaching camps have mushroomed all over India thanks to the popular IPL's 20-20 format and our small-town boys who have made their money playing cricket! we are leading the world in cricket, a sport which we adopted from our erstwhile rulers - the British. Can we replicate our cricketing success to other sports?

China in a span on 2 decades (1984 - 2008) has increased its medals tally and got more gold than the U.S for the first time. China attributed the olympic success to the "emergence of Asia", its economic upheaval has no doubt attributed to China's success in olympics. Can India, the other asian tiger emulate this? We might not agree on or afford the means that China has adopted, nevertheless we must build a right ecosystem to chase our olympic glory.

The sporting culture must start at our primary schools, where currently sports is given up to pursue alternate and safer career options. In most cases, sports is never a career option, due to uncertainties, threatening injuries and simple lack of encouragement from parents and teachers. Our government has to increase the spending on sports, our sports bodies must manage these funds effectively to build quality sporting infrastructure, spot and groom talent. Our corporates and media have to endorse and glorify olympic sports! We have to aggressively target and pursue certain sporting disciplines for the 2012 London Olympics. India's sporting renaissance must begin!

Notes from Subroto Bagchi's Leadership Talk

2008-09-08T16:02:00.002+05:30

I had the good fortune of attending Subroto Bagchi's Leadership Talk today. The great orator in Subroto teased my mind onto topics such as leadership, multiple intelligence and the next generation professional. His talk had an overarching theme - the "Next-Generation Professional Leadership".

Some highlights of his talk:

IQ vs. Multiple Intelligence

Subroto talked about how Dr. Howard Garner, the Havard University professor's Multiple Intelligence theory is a better formulation of human intelligence than plain IQ. Prof. Garner identifies intelligence using eight criteria - leading to 8 intelligences. Howard also suggests that each individual has varrying levels of each intelligence which defines the individual's cognitive profile.

Five-Minds for the Future

Again Subroto quoted the book "Five Minds for the Future" by Dr. Howard Gardner, to emphasise the cognitive abilities a leader should cultivate. He highlighted the importance of sticking to one discipline and emphasized that it takes at least 10 years to build mental muscle in a particular area of expertise - the Disiplinary Mind. Subroto talked about the conflict of depth vs. breath. He suggested that while a disciplinary mind provides the depth in thinking, the Synthesiszing Mind provides the breath and the ability to integrate ideas from different domains. The synthesizing mind is the most important tool to solve today's inter-disciplinary problems. He also emphasized the roles that a creative, respectful and an ethical minds play.

Overall the talk was really engaging and enlightening!

Chrome is interesting!, will I swtich?

2008-09-06T08:40:00.000+05:30

After all the rumors in the grapevine, we have the Gbrowser out finally - Google Chrome. The cliched "David vs. Goliath" - Chrome vs. IFS (IE, Firefox & Safari) war has broke-out.

Here is my take on Google Chrome, it is "interesting", but will I shift? I am not too sure. Before I go ahead, I have to tell you one thing - I wrote this blog using Chrome.

- The installation was easy, all bookmarks and saved passwords were updated. But even other browsers do that - so no differentiator.

- The interface is clean and "no nonsense", like all Google properties. The speed & slickness which others find as"the differentiator" for this browser over its rivals did not seem to be differentiating for me, at least for the naked eye.

- Separate processes for tabs to make sure "rogue tabs don't kill your browser" is a good to have, but not quite "differentiating" for an average web user.

- Aw, I love the "Search History" feature, Google is the best in search and they are leveraging it well. The "New Window in Incogito Mode" saves me a "Ctrl+Shift+Del" to clear private data.

As an end-user I do not find real differentiators for Chrome, I love Firefox!. However, I must admit that I did switch to Gmail and Gtalk when I was an avid user of Y! mail and Messenger. There is something about Google, which makes you shift - the mesmerising effect of google!

For the moment, I am still on Firefox!

Update:

Alt-F-C or closing tabs don't work :(

Remembering KK Birla

2008-09-01T13:50:00.001+05:30

KK Birla, the noted industrialist and a three-time Rajya Sabha member is no more, leaving behind an unmatched legacy. His contributions to corporate India and higher-education, no doubt, stands out. He was the doyen of the Indian industry and was a major supporter of open-economic policies during the license raj.

I vividly remember his speech in BITS, Pilani auditorium in March '04. He narrated an incident where Indira Gandhi, the then Prime-Minister of India had recommended some students for admission in BITS. He was the Chancellor of BITS, Pilani then (a position he held till his death). He politely declined the recommendation. This incident explains the conviction of this great institution-builder, to build a center of higher-learning based on absolute merit - an institution where established processes could not be tampered!

Long Live KK Birla's Legacy!

Inspired by the "Starfish Story"

2008-02-10T13:47:00.003+05:30

A young girl was walking along a beach upon which thousands of starfish had been washed up during a terrible storm. When she came to each starfish, she would pick it up, and throw it back into the ocean. People watched her with amusement.

She had been doing this for some time when a man approached her and said, Little girl, why are you doing this? Look at this beach! You can’t save all these starfish. You can’t begin to make a difference!

The girl seemed crushed, suddenly deflated. But after a few moments, she bent down, picked up another starfish, and hurled it as far as she could into the ocean. Then she looked up at the man and replied,

“Well, I made a difference to that one!

The old man looked at the girl inquisitively and thought about what she had done and said. Inspired, he joined the little girl in throwing starfish back into the sea. Soon others joined, and all the starfish were saved

(adapted from the Star Thrower by Loren C. Eiseley)

Outsourcing in th Neolithic Age

2006-07-14T10:53:00.001+05:30

The neolithic age was marked by the devleopment of human technology which started with farming and ended with metal tools. My claim that outsourcing started in the neolithic age might seem outright ridiculous to people who profess outsourcing and claim that its a new age tool to improve efficiencies and boost stock value.

Basically, outsourcing is a philosophy which lets you focus on your 'core' and let specialists handle the pheripheral 'context' jobs. This is exactly how our society has evolved from way back in the neolithic age (4000 - 2200 BC ). In the neolithic age instead of each tribe hunting and gathering their food, different persons within each tribe would become experts at a certain task such as hunting, gathering, cooking, tool making, shelter making, or cloth making.

This evolved and different communities were formed in the society. These communities developed special but complimentary competencies. The barter system facilitated the exchange of goods and services. Hence outsourcing as a concept is borrowed from the neolithic age and is not a 21st century revolution!

e-Relationships

2005-10-07T11:31:00.002+05:30

e-Commerce, e-Business e-this .. e-that .. adding an 'e' to everything has become the norm of this century. The 'e words' are making waves in the media, the boardrooms and having a profound impact on the economy at large.

Apart from all these common 'e words', there is something which is, for a change impacting the social fabric of the world but is still going unnoticed - 'e-Relationship'. Yes! this is the age of e-Relationships where we are connected with family and friends through the electronic medium.

The fiber optic cable is connecting the hearts of parents, their sons and daughters. Sibblings in different parts of this world, the 'man' and 'his woman' connected through fiber is reshaping the social fabric.

What's the cost of money?

2005-09-14T11:36:00.000+05:30

'trrr..trrr.trrr', the alarm on my mobile was hammering my head! oh its morning so soon', I cribbed! My head was still heavy, by cosy bed becokned, but I had no choice. I had to catch my shuttle to work in another half hour, I had slept very late after my routine conference call with an important partner on the other end of the globe :) Thanks to technology and special thanks to 'Google Talk', I was spending 'zilch' for this everyday conference call. Imagine spending a 'fortune' on international calls everyday for couple of hours, I would have gone bankrupt by now!

As I got up to get ready, the conversation I had with my partner was 'live' in my head. Suddenly, I faintly heard the tender coconut seller tell me last night 'Sir, seekarum kudinga, veetukku poganum ellam enakaaga kaathu kedapaanga sapdaama' (Sir, drink fast, I have to go home, everyone would be waiting for me for dinner' in Tamil). I saw excitement in his eyes to get back 'home' after a long hard day. I got reminded of the last time I had dinner with my parents. It was '3 months' back when I had gone back home down with hepatitis. The last time my family (My parents + my brother + I) had a meal together was '2 yrs' back. The last time I celebrated a 'Festival' with my family was '7 yrs' back before I went to Pilani (one of the Top institutions in India) chasing my dreams to attain immortality. Here, I saw a 'Tender Coconut Seller' not making a 'million bucks', but still extremely happy with family in his own means! Was there something fundamentally flawed in what I did all these years, far from family, far from loved ones? The dark clouds of suspicion covered my mind, it burst and resulted in a heavy downpour. I quickly took shelter in the thought that "C'mon, thats what the whole world does in this generation, look at people who go away in early 20's to the land of opportunities and never come back". They go out early to fend for themselves, to fight for their future, search for the utopian world where 'money' would buy them all that they want.So what if they had to do a few small sacrfices of staying away from family, staying away from their roots? They do it for 'betterment' afterall !" . So I told myself, after all staying seperated for a few years is a 'Sacrifice' that I do to reach the 'pinnacle of life', to attain immortality. I felt a bit relieved that the whole world was with me and I was not 'alone'. As all this happen, I am still in bed and my alarm snoozes again. I get up with a sudden shock, 'I am getting late!'. I took a quick shower forgetting all that happened a while back. The 'present' was more denser and hence was above all transcedental thoughts. I quickly dressed up and left home. I walked fast to take an auto to 'Mayo Hall' from where I board my shuttle. I got into the auto and told the driver 'Jaldi Jao!', a word that has become synonymous with the present generation! During the course of the '10 min' auto ride, I saw huge billboards, 'Super S.I.P from Meril Lynch', 'Take advantage of the Mid-Cap boom, invest in SBI Mid-Cap'. All these bilboards re-assured me that the whole world was indeed with me. As we moved through Bishop Cotton Boys School, I saw young kids being dropped by parents. I remembered those days, it was great staying with family. So many people caring for you, eating home food, people paying attention to your whims and fancies. It flashed images of the past in front of my eyes. Those wonderful ol' days!

As I reached my bus, I quickly jumped out of the auto. I had a few minutes to board the bus. I looked at the auto meter, it showed '20.50'. Oh! wait, does it not take just 13.50 every day, I just realised the auto driver had pledged his 'honesty' for a few bucks more! I just smiled, told him 'Your meter is hot!' and he gave me a mischievous smile. I paid him according to the meter and got into the bus.

I settled down with my mp3 player playing 'anthragini' with the 'Business Standard' in my hand. The headlines read 'Sensex zooming! is this rally real?', a booming market is a real good news and it really doesnt matter whether you have invested in the market or not! The hot acquisitions were 'eBay takin over Skype for $2.6 billion', 'Oracle taking over Seibel for $5.85 billion'. Working for a competitior to Oracle, I was always keen to watch their consolidation moves!

All this while, my BIG luxury bus was cruising at 30 Kmph in the Bangalore traffic :( I thought I will take a small nap. As I closed my eyes I could hear strange but faint noises, I wondered where the noise was from. It was from 'within'. My heart and mind was still in deep conflict, a conflict started by what the tender coconut vendor had said last night. It reminded me of a presentation that was circulating in the corporate email networks. Chandu (a good friend at office) had sent it to me as well. It said

"Money can buy food, but not hunger,
Money can buy a bed, but not sleep,
Money can buy sex, but not love "

How true it seems! But I am sure it does not change anyone's perception. After reading such presentations, for a minute we're touched, but it lasts just for a minute and we get back to our routine. All this makes me wonder how 'costly' money is? It costs us relationships, It costs us love, It costs us the happy present. I swear any investment banker worth his salt would fail to arrive at a valuation for any of these. After all 'Cash is King!'

My tete-a-tete with Coorg

2005-08-28T11:39:00.000+05:30

It was 5.00 PM on a lazy Friday evening. All my Friday evenings are filled with a great rush anticipating a leisurely weekend. This Friday was different, I was lying on the couch celebrating the birthday of 'Lord Krisha', thanking him for the holiday that he gave all of us. I was also watching India fare miserably against Shane Bond's express speed with disgust. It gave me a feeling that the Indian team had forgot its cricket. Being a passionate and an ardent fan, I vowed I will never watch cricket again. I cursed myself for watching cricket than working on my research paper. I slowly realized my eyes were slipping into sleep. I did not bother to restrain them. When I fell half asleep, the phone rang and rang hard. I was anxiously expecting a call from Priya to confirm the travel plans to Navdarshan for Saturday. Navdarshan is an eco-friendly place near Bangalore, the whole concept sounded so fascinating that I longed to go there with Priya and few of her other friends. As she had left her phone back in Chennai, I could not reach her. I had to wait for her to get to me! After a hectic week, all I was hoping was for a great outing in the weekend. I answered the phone expecting Priya and there was a familiar male voice. My excitement went down by notches. I managed to stay afloat and answer the call. It was Anand. I thought he was lost in space as he had not spoke to me for ages (or so it seems!). After enquiring about how I was, he asked me whether I was free in the evening to go attend a brain-stroming session on taking entrepreneurship to BITS Alums in Bangalore. It was the familiar CEL group with Naina, Anand, Srinath and Jamps.The session happened in Leela Palace, Airport Road.

Anand offered to pick me up in the evening from DivyaSree chambers. The trip to Leela Palace was very eventful. After flouting all traffic laws and parrying a blow by a traffic cop we reached Leela Palace safely 15 mins late. On the way Anand asked me what I was doing for the weekend when I told him about failed weekend plans. He asked me whether I would want to go on a trek. He also said that he could get his car and that we could go 'somewhere'. A pulse of excitement ran through my veins. I was really excited at the proposition and agreed immediately without bothering about my plans to finish a research report by Monday. I was so desperate to trek that I failed to think about anything at all. Soon after the session, we made an open offer to the other people to join us on the trek. Naina accepted immediately with no coersion. Poor Srinath and Jamps had their life (or gfs!) to take care of.

We came out of Leela Palace with an exciting sense of satisfaction about the session as well as the trip. Anand acted fast. He called up Daitmar (didi, I am sorry if I am spelling it wrong!), a german project manager based out of Munich, currently on a trip to Bangalore to put a project back on rails. Daitmar, being a travel freak and having trekked with Anand to Bandipur Santuary readily agreed. We had to decide a place where we could trek. I came up with Coorg instantly. Coorg was becoking me for a long time. The coffee estates, the valiant coorg tribes and the mystic beauty of the western ghats with cauvery running naked was hard to resist.

Anand wanted to look at options. My heart was racing, I wanted to go to Coorg for a long time. He spoke and spoke and finally found from Neeraj (head of the Bangalore Mountaineering Club) that coorg was indeed ideal. I was so happy. There was a sense of achievement within me. All the trips that I had undertaken so far from Uttaranchal to Himachal have always been planned in the last minute. Something uncharacterestic about this trip was that it made me realise that the saying 'If you want something so hard, the whole world conspires to give it to you!' was in fact true. We left Leela Palace with Anand's promise that we will set things ready and call us up in the night. Anand dropped me back at my home and on the way I packed myself some pizzas for dinner.

I reached home, washed and sat down in front of the Television with my pizzas anxiously waiting for the phone to ring. It rang and gave me the happy news that we are going to Coorg the next day morning (Saturday) at 9.00 AM. I called up Amma and Appa and told them about the sudden but exciting plan and like usual they told me to 'have a great time but be careful'. I was so elated and I wanted to share this with Gayatri (for people who don't know Gayatri, its an interesting story about which I will write in a seperate blog!). It was 1.30 AM and I could not think of any ISD booth being open. So I decided to send her a message and she dutifully called up. I shared all my happiness with her at the cost of few dollars :) I went to bed looking forward for the great trip to coorg.

I woke up early the next day (the excitement did not let me sleep!) and got ready to go to DivyaSree chambers. I packed my back-pack with some change clothes, my deo, mouthwash, antiseptics and some chocolate bars and reached DivyaSree in 10 minutes. I had enough time to catch up with a tea and bun. I was in front of DivyaSree at 9.00 dot waiting for Anand to come.

With my tracks on and my backpack on my shoulders, I listened to 'Durr' of Strings in my mp3 player. While I was listening to the song, I was also reading 'A few questions that every entrereneur must ask' by Amar Bhide in the Harvard Business Review. I was thinking to myself that if I had this book a year back how useful it would have been! As I kept reading and listening to music sitting on the compoud of DivyaSree I noticed that the Security Guards were giving me dirty looks. I realized that I was waiting there for more that half-hour and there was no signs of Anand. 'What could have happened? Is the trip happening? Is he stuck in traffic, oh common there is no traffic at 9.00 in the morning ' All this was running through my head and I started glancing around every 5 mins. To divert the attention of the guards who were looking at me for a long time, I went inside the towers towards the ATM. I looked at the ATM and it said 'Loading Money, sorry for the inconvinience'. I had no money in my wallet and I told myself that I can withdraw money on the way. 'But wait, are we going at all?' was the question at the back of my mind. I decided that I would relieve myself. when I came back from the restroom, I saw the ATM functional. I was really relieved! Things suddenly started working for me! I withdrew some money for the trip and came out. The security guard's eyes had become more suspicious by then. I was cursing Anand and I decided to call up his house. His sister who answered the phone told me that he had left as early as 8.30 AM and that he would go to the browsing center before he would meet me. I felt eased, I remembered Anand telling me that he would take print-outs of travellouges that Neeraj promised to send him. But still I was wondering what he would be doing for 2 hrs. It was 10.30 AM already. When I was thinking, I got a call from a local number. 'This must be Anand', I told myself. Luckily to me, it was Anand indeed. He told me that he was around and that he could not find me there. I told him that I had gone to the ATM and that he had missed me then. It was near noon already and I could not wish didi 'Guten Morgen!', so much for the german language skills that I attended. I wished him 'Good Morning!' instead and introduced myself. We started to move to Koramangala where we picked up Naina.

By 11.00 AM we were on the Mysore highway heading towards Coorg. Since I had not had my breakfast, I felt really hungry. I was glancing over the motorway to find tender coconut, which has become a standard diet these days. Since I could'nt find one, we stopped over at a Cafe Coffee day. Being a south Indian by choice of food, I compromised and had Pizza and Irish Coffee for 'brunch'. We continued our journey to Coorg and I continued reading the HBR. After couple of hours, we stopped by to have coconut ('Kabala' in Indonesia. Courtesy: Didi). All the while, Anand was navigating from behind with a map, that he got from Outlook Traveller, in his hand. As time went by I realised how different Didi was when compared the the views that I had got from my cultural orientation session about Germany from SAP. I thought it was his education in Britain and his travel worldwide that had changed him. He was in fact thinking like an Indian most of the times.

As we closed on Coorg, we found out that most of the places close by 5.00 PM. We decided that we will stay in the woods on a Tree house. We went to Dubare first. Dubare is an elphant santuary. When we reached the place it started drizzling, it was almost 4.50 PM by then. Luckily for us, we got a boat that took us across the Cauvery to Dubare. Cauvery was muddy and turbulent. I was so excited that I put my hands into the water. The boatman warned me that there are aligators and it would be risky to put my hands outin the water. I quickly withdrew my hands when I heard of aligators. We crossed the turbulent Cauvery to go accross to Dubare. I could see huge pachyderms drinking water, a few others being washed my their mahouts. We quickly bought tickets (each costing 50 bucks!) and got onto a tree top to board our Jumbo! It started raining cats and dogs by then. We decided that we will brave the rain and go on the royal elephant ride. It was amazing, we felt like we were flying as our darling Indira took us around the wild woods of the western ghats. There was smell of alcohol in the air and I realised that the mahout was drunk, but the way he handled Indira was remarkable. Indira looked very beautiful as she wandered into the woods carrying us on her back. After a ride of 20 mins she bought us back to the same tree-top. We got down, took a few snaps and waited there for the boat to come back and take us to the other side. The rain started intensifying and our hopes of staying in the woods on a tree top went down with the rain.

The boat came back and took us accross Cauvery. Cauvery was wild and after a risky ride back we went all out to get an accomodation. A few wise men suggested that we go to Madikere and take up some sort of a guest house there. We followed their advice as we had to anyway start our trip of Coorg from Madikere. We drove through the rains on the western ghats to reach Madikere by 7.45 PM. We took up a place to stay. We ate and slept there.

In the morning I woke up to the phone ringing. It was Deepak (my room mate!). He had gone to Chennai and was returning back to Bangalore. He said 'Machaan, I forgot the keys, can you please open the door?', I told him that I was in Coorg. He got physced but allowed me to sleep further. I was tired after travel that I was tempted to sleep. But I quickly realised that I had a wonderful day of adventure ahead and got out of the bed in flash. I woke up Anand, Didi and Naina and we quickly got ready to leave. By 7.00 AM we were in the car heading to Abby Falls. Abby falls is 9 Kms from Madikere. The car stopped and we had to trek through a slippery route worsened because of the rains to reach the falls. It was an amazing sight to watch. The cauvery at her emphatic best flowing over two huge boulders causing a waterfall, which was a delight to the eyes. We walked accross the cantilever bridge and got down to go near the falls against the advice of a BIG BOARD which said 'DANGER, Slippery Surface'. We continued to walk down on the slippery sand and rocks paying no heed to the caution sign till we got down to the falls. There was a huge rock in the middle and I wanted to go there. It needed a perfect team effort between me and Anand to reach the rock. Alas, what an effort! It asked for a snap and we posed happily to the cameras.

After spending close to an hour on this trek we walked back to the car with gyan sessions from Anand on how to conserve energy and how to breathe through the nose and keep breathing continously when you trek. We reached our car and started our journey to Talacauvery. The birthplace of cauvery matha. After an hour and half of drive we reached Talacauvery. On the way we stopped at Bhagamandala to have idlis and dosas in a small shop called 'Janani' managed by an impressive, smart and shrewed looking middle-aged woman. I asked her 'Coffee?', she nodded in affirmative. I asked her 'Filter Coffee?', she nodded again and then I said 'Coorg Coffee', she flashed a huge smile. She got us good, strong coffee which was refreshing for a caffaine addict like me! We drove to Talacauvery which was 11 Kms from Bhaghmandala. Talacauvery was a revelation. When I expected a huge stream gushing out from the hills, to my surprise I saw a small pond with an idol of Matha Cauvery. The water levels remained constant. People say that the river originates here and vanishes to be found again in Bhagmandala. It sounds so fascinating. We trekked up a steep hill near talacauvery. I struggled to get there and I was telling myself that it has to be worth the effort. Since we had to go through Talacauvery, we were not allowed to wear footwear. That made the task even more painfaul. Imagine going up a mountain with bare foot! All the effort was worth and even more. It gave us a breathtaking view of the mountains and I basked in the scerene beauty of the hills. Suddenly, my mobile phone started beeping and it said '1 message received'. When I read the messge, BSNL Kerala welcomed me. Then did I realise that we were very close to Kerala. We came back in the same route to our car. Naina bought a few 'malas' each costing Rs. 10/- and Didi picked up a CD in Kannada on Cauvery Mata pooja :) On the way back in the car Naina taught us how to sing a Assamese song and we spoke about north-east and how beautiful it is, about the assamese wedding, about Tambrahm (short for Tamil Brahmin) weddings etc . She also put us to sleep by singing her lovely assamese lullaby.

We were riding back to Madikere to a place called 'Nisargadhama'. Nisargadhama is a river island in the Cauvery 23 Kms from Madikere. We crossed Madikere and stopped there to have Kabalas (coconuts) and then headed straight to Nisargadhama. Once we reached Nisargadhama I called up home to tell them that I am all fine and having a nice time here! I bought 'nuts' as we entered Nisargadhama. We had to go through a Cantilever bridge to the island and I was challended by monkeys which were interested in the nuts that I was carrying. I meekly surrendered and offered them all that I had and went through to the beautiful island. The island was full of teak, timber and bamboo and the people there had used bamboo to make beautiful tree houses. We climed a ladder to get into one of those houses and sat there for a while. We climbed down and took the path which said 'Way to Elephant Ride'. Blown over by the beautiful tuskers we walked down that lane to have another elephant ride. We stopped by to ask a small boy who was selling peanuts. I asked him in broken kannada, 'aanai elli kalustare' :) He said there were no elephants in Nisargadhama and we had to go to Dubare for a ride. Duped by the signboard we walked sad to another path which said 'The River'. We walked and walked for more than half hour, when we realised that there was no river front. We thought we are going around the whole island. We did enjoy the beauty of the raw woods but it was a scary experience. For a moment I though that we had lost our way. So we trekked back through the same route and finally realised that we had missed the entry path to the river. We quickly went to the river front and posed for a snap and walked back to the car through the cantilever bridge. On the way to the car we stopped for coffee and refreshments.

From Nisargadhama we left for the Tibetian settlements in Bylakuppe. Surprisingly, Bylakuppe has one of the largest tibetian settlements and beautiful monsatries. As we drove through Bylakuppe, I got a feeling that we were in Lhasa. We finally reached the Namrodling Monastry or the Golden Monastry. That was a first time I was going inside a monastry and it felt really good. I apprerciate the Buddhist religion and hence going into the monastry was peace. We took photographs inside the monastry and no one seemed to object. The monks clad in their traditional dress were busy praying to different forms of Buddhas. As we came out, we met a monk whom we engaged in a conversation. The monk spoke to us about like and it was a spiritual food for thought for our materialistic minds. I wondered how a young monk who was in his early twenties could be so knowledgeable. He told us about 'Samaskara' where a human is above all desires. He said that meditation is the only way to reach your innerself. Worries are because of the outerself and solace comes through understanding the innerself. How true he was. If only we could put this in practice, we would reach samaskara and be born in 'Brahmaloga'. The next state to Samaskara is the 'Nirvana', where one is free of sufferings. He said we are given SEVEN births to reach Nirvana. If we try hard we can reach it faster. His ideas about religion made me his instant follower. After a while, he answered our questions on life. After this session I really thought I had met the 'Monk who sold his Ferrari'.

After this thought provoking session, he told us that it would rain and we better get going. It was warm and sunny then. Once we got out of the monastry, I could see black clounds engulfing us, it reminded me of the similey he used while explaining desire. He said desire was like black clouds and understanding your innerself through medidation was like the wind that clears these clouds from your mind. Though the time we spent with him was just little over that a quater of an hour, it was so rewarding.

It was 5.00 PM then. I got reminded of the 5.00 PM of the day before when I was aching to go on a trek. I felt really happy that the wish was fulfilled. I thanked almighty for making my wish come true as we headed back to Bangalore. The milestone said 242 Kms. As we headed back it started raining. The driver was cool and composed and never troubled us the whole of the journey. He was a master at his art and made us feel really safe and comfortable. As the rain stopped, my stomach slowly reminded me of dinner. We stopped in a Dhabha to have dinner and followed it up with dessert in Cafe Coffee day where I generously treated myself with a Chocolate Fantasy and Cafe Frappe. After this pitstop where we refuelled our stomach we continued this marvellous journey back. The thoughts of office came to haunt me on the way. We had a BIG loud discussion on corporate ethics on our way back and then I suddenly realised that we were in KH road, close to home. I bid good bye and shook hands with Didi and walked back home tired. Appa called up like clockwork to find out about my well-being. I told them all that happened and stopped bye to call up Gayatri to tell her how much I missed her during the trip. I walked back home and hit my bed hard to wake up to another week of hectic activity at office!