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

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 12:16 PM

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 :)

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Heads and Hands

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 3:16 PM

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.

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Competition is good, very good!

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 10:00 PM

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.

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N=1; R=G

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 12:58 PM


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

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Bhindra, Boxers and India's Sporting Renaissance

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 6:09 PM

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!

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Remembering KK Birla

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 1:50 PM


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!

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Outsourcing in th Neolithic Age

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 10:53 AM

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!

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e-Relationships

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 11:31 AM

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.

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What's the cost of money?

Written by Harsh Jegadeesan on 11:36 AM

'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!'

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