STRANGERS

They say, strangers are friends you haven’t met yet. However, the bitter irony is that we so often hear disheartening and daunting stories of how people fall prey to the ethics of these strangers that our mind clock ticks a zillion times before befriending anybody. Our guarded mindset warns us to be alert. There is solid evidence that most people are quite cynical about human nature, and this cynicism is nurtured right from childhood. Even babies show some variant of this ‘Stranger anxiety’, because they question if someone else can really be trusted to come and soothe their upsets.

Think about it like this: the first time you trust a stranger and are betrayed, it makes sense to avoid trusting other strangers in the future. The problem is that when we don't ever trust strangers, we never find out how trustworthy people in general really are. As a result our estimation of them is governed by fear. If you try trusting others in this viscous circle, you'll find they frequently repay that trust, leading you to be more trusting.

In a world where everyone is out for themselves, who should we trust? One signal that suggests we are trustworthy is a smile. Genuine smiles send a message that other people can trust and cooperate with us. But there are some instances when no signal helps; it is just your plain intuition, and before you know it, you just CLICK and become acquaintances.  You develop a strong bond with some strangers, but it is quite amusing when sometimes, just spending a minute or two with some, leave an ever-lasting imprint on you. 

I recently encountered a stranger on the busy streets of Camp, who happened to open my Locked Car using just 2 simple pieces of wooden plank. As I watched him jaw dropped, it left an immediate impact on me. The incident, and through it this stranger, is something that will always amuse me.  Similarly, the quakes, bomb blasts in Japan, Mumbai have taught me a lot about strangers. How these humble people can actually go out of their way to provide food and shelter to the victims runs shudders through my spine; how the rich, the poor, the young, the old put their own lives to risk and save children. It makes me proud of the humanity that still persists.  When you shift to a new place, the people you see, the neighbours you meet are all strangers until you make an effort to befriend them, or give them a chance to make you understand and know them. You might never imagine in what way, one day, these very same ‘Strangers’ will be of your help.

All these stories now, really makes me wonder, are we doing the right thing, questioning all these Anjaan people we meet, or it is simply our perspective? We need to come out of the barriers that we have built around ourselves and realize that Fear only makes strangers of people who otherwise could be our friends. So give it a chance… For the worse, you simply get an experience, but you never know, many a times it might all be just worth it! J

The investing Icon: Mr Warren Buffett

Some refined personalities just sweep you off your feet; you simply tend to admire and idolize them. Their overwhelming humbleness and modesty makes you understand why! You try to incorporate their thoughts and apply them in your real life situations. I have read quite a few articles on one such man, Mr Warren Buffet. His intellect engulfed me, inspired me in lot many ways, and immediately made me his ardent fan!

Warren Buffett may be amongst the world's richest men, but they say you wouldn't know it if you met him. He wants to be liked far more than he wants to be famous, and his sense of humour is far more indicative of his personality than his ego. Even today, being the most successful investors in the world, it is not uncommon for him to take a visitor to McDonald's on the way to the airport. 

He articulates practical investment strategies, the base of which greatly rely on ‘Investing in Yourself and making your life your greatest asset’. Then of course, there is a part of Buffett's appeal; his charm and charisma that he brings to the normally pretentious world of finance. His magnetic aura makes you realize that it is important to keep life simple, not easy!

Here, I thought of sharing some of my favourite quotes from one of the greatest investing legends of our time:

1. A very rich person should leave his kids enough to do anything, but not enough to do nothing.
2. It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.
3. It's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price.
4. Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken.
5. Let blockheads read what blockheads wrote.
6. I don't look to jump over seven-foot bars; I look around for one-foot bars that I can step over.
7. Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.
8. Time is the friend of the wonderful company, the enemy of the mediocre.
9. Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked.
10. In the business world, the rear-view mirror is always clearer than the windshield.
11. Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing.

12. Look at market fluctuations as your friend rather than your enemy; PROFIT from folly rather than participate in it.

13. Wall Street is the only place that people ride to in a Rolls Royce to get advice from those who take the subway.

14. The rich invest in time, the poor in money

15. I never attempt to make money on the stock market, I buy on assumption they could close the market the next day and not re-open it for 5 years…

16. If past history was all that was needed to play the game of money, the richest people would be librarians.

17. We should enjoy the process, far more than the proceeds.

18. I have no idea on timing. It is easier to tell WHAT will happen than WHEN it will happen.

19. Only when you combine sound intellect with emotional discipline do you get rational behaviour.

20. You only have to do a few things right in your life, so long as you don’t do more things wrong.

As a novice in investing, these simple postulates (and I call them so, because they come from a legend) made a lot of sense to me, and I hope they do the same to you!

PEBBLES AND SAND

Recently, I came across this really interesting article. It not only caught my attention, but it also made me pause and think for a while, what the true worth of life is... Is it simply just 'living the moment', or is it much more intense than that. I realized we often take our closest people for granted; ignore them, get mad at them over the silliest reasons, hate them at some point or the other, and in short make them the 'obvious' part of our lives. 

A philosophy professor stood before his class with some items on the table in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly he picked up a very large and empty jar and proceeded to fill it with rocks, about 2 inches in diameter.

He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

So the professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles, of course, rolled into the open areas between the rocks.

He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else.
He then asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous “Yes.”

“Now,” said the professor, “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The rocks are the important things – your family, your close friends, your health, your children – things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter – like your job, your house, your car.

The sand is everything else. The small stuff.”

“If you put the sand into the jar first, there is no room for the pebbles or the rocks. The same goes for your life.

If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are really important to you. Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. There will always be time to go to work, clean the house, give a dinner party and buy a new dress.

Take care of the rocks first – the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand."

Time flies, only when you are in a Hurry!!

These days I’m up to no good and surprisingly enough, simply enjoying doing absolutely NOTHING! It always feels great waking up late in the morning, with no alarm clocks snoozing till the battery is dead, no gulping tea down my throat just to save a few seconds, no stuffing breakfast into my mouth till I almost vomit, no kick-starting my pep till I break my legs, no routine, no college, nothing… I’m having all the time to myself. It just feels as if I have written my last engineering paper yesterday… but NO; Even after a fortnight now, with all the time in my hand, what have I really done? Well, I’m clueless! My mental clock is telling me, it’s only been like 5 minutes since the big vacation started… The real question plaguing my mind here is, where does all the time go?

Well I did observe a few years ago, the irony in living close to your college. The closer you live, the more late you tend to get… How weird is that… Have you ever noticed that when you are in a hurry to go somewhere it usually takes twice as long to get there? It does not matter what time of day it is, or which day it is for that matter. You just need to be running tad late for an appointment across town, and the Time insists that you go through an intricate obstacle course. It is his way of having a little fun.

For example, if I am leisurely driving across town with plenty of time in hand, I never tend to hit a red light. Not that I reach my destination before time, but on-time is good enough too right? On the other hand, if I am in a slight hurry, this is immediately brought to the attention of Time. He rubs his hands with glee and begins his work. Immediately, every traffic light in town is on the alert for my arrival. It is as if Time commands them to turn red the condition being, me in their proximity!

Sometimes all the attention Time gives me, really embarrasses me. As soon as I think I have a few hours in hand to complete another work, right then, a huge red light goes off to alert Time of my intention. Time roars with a unique devilish delight. It goes into hysterics. He lives for this kind of situation. And my work, which is believed to take a few minutes, hence goes on endlessly, and never really finishes… Trust me, it’s not just poor prediction… I think there is a lot more to it…

We often waste our time planning things out, only to realize that things never really happen when we want them to. They always take their own special time! It is as if Time has a premonition that I have planned a few things out for a day and that I would be in a hurry to accomplish the well - planned agenda, and so it works its own way, taking its own time – all in my honour!

Well, I figured out that Time is a plain mystery… The trick to comprehend is that NOW is the right time to act, to believe, to experience.. in short, to live... :-)

15 ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY PLOTS FOR A BOLLYWOOD BLOCKBUSTER

Movies are not mere entertainment. They are immensely informative and enlightening. Creativity indeed goes a long way in convincing our soul that the most impractical situations and reel stunts, are rather real in all possible ways… But, we, the audience watch these movies in willing suspension of sheer disbelief, and actually get amused by the heroic Shahrukh dancing on train tops, Akshay Kumar laughing his way to glory, Govinda dancing to the tune of high voltage power… But what is it that adds the real ZING to these performances… Well, let me tell you, there are a certain set of rules and regulations that abide every film maker… I’ve listed some here… Please feel free to add as many as possible.

1. Large, loft-style, humungous villas in Paris, Cape Town, LA, London and all other exotic locations, are well within the price range of most people whether they are employed or not.

2. Should you decide to defuse a bomb, don't worry which wire to cut.

You will always choose the right one.

3. Most laptop computers are powerful enough to override communications system of any invading UFO/alien society… and their password??? Well, punch in any random keys till you by chance set up a melody, that fulfills the immediate needs of our music director.

4. It does not matter if you are heavily outnumbered in a fight involving martial arts - your enemies will wait patiently to attack you one by one by dancing around in a threatening manner until you have knocked out their predecessors. Mind it!

5. The fun in including a set of twins in a film, is just to separate them for 25 years and then get them back (preferably with the opposite partners).

6. If you want to impress any member of your family, immediately prepare everyone’s favorite dish – “Gajar ka halwa”.

7. Rather than using simple guns or knives, the villains generally prefer to kill their arch enemies using complicated machinery involving fuses, pulley systems, deadly gasses, lasers, and man-eating sharks. This is the THRILL factor you see…

8. All police vans flooded with policemen come into picture only after the hero has taken complete charge of the situation and has succeeded in finally impressing the heroine… The police come just to watch the melodrama that follows!

9. Once applied, lipstick will never rub off even while scuba diving.

10. You're very likely to survive any battle in any war unless you make the mistake of showing someone a picture of your sweetheart back home.

11. The Eiffel Tower can be seen from any window in Paris.

12. If a large pane of glass is visible, someone will be thrown through it before long.

13. All bombs are fitted with electronic timing devices with large red readouts so you know exactly when they're going to go off.

14. A detective can only solve a case once he has been suspended from duty.

15. Police departments give their officers personality tests to make sure they are deliberately assigned a partner who is their total opposite and then bond so well that they just can’t seem to do without each other!

Republic Day Renditions!

Here’s wishing all my countrymen a very Happy 60th Republic Day!

Unfurling of the National Flag, 21 gun Salutations, National Anthem, Patriotic songs rendered by some of our finest singers, Gallantry awards, grand parades upto the Red Fort, the Prime Minister of India laying a wreath at the Amar Jawan Jyoti at India Gate, commemoration of all the jawaans who sacrificed their lives for the country, the fly past, put on by the Indian Air Force, the bands marching to the tune of “Sare Jahan se Achcha”, all these and a lot others make me bask in the glory of the nation which has given us our identity, our own established place in the world today…

On 26th January, 1950, a new Democratic country, with its new-formed constitution, took over the attention of the world with its principles of Non-violence & peace & above all, had many challenges before it, to stand in the world scenario. A truly sovereign state with all due pride and respect, India had finally realized the dreams of Mahatma Gandhi and the numerous freedom fighters who contributed immensely in changing our tolerant mindset.

And here we are, 60 years hence, making good progress on the long winding road to success. On this special day, let us take a few minutes and undergo a self-introspection… think deep what India has gone through in the past 60 years, glimpses of what we, as a country have achieved, what we have lost. Look at the Social, economical, political challenges that India had at its birth. Partition of the country had serious consequences of violence, communal riots & a chaotic situation all over. On the economic front, Britishers had exploited unimaginable resources of our country. Politically also we had to face many hurdles as we had no constitution, no bag of borrowings, no law of our own. Overall, the country's position was into pits. Here, we started applying all possible trial & error methods. With all the above mentioned problems India struggled to make its own place in the world.

Well success has different interpretations. For me India breaking out of the shackles and becoming a free economy is success, that we are the fastest growing economies in the World is success, that we have become an important factor in the IT revolution is success, that some of the richest people are Indians is success, that we have had the most beautiful women in the Miss World and Universe competitions is success, that we are moving towards an unmanned mission to the moon is success. The country has carved a niche for itself in the field of IT, which has thrown open a goldmine of opportunities for the middle class. Our big IT companies like TCS, Wipro, Infosys etc. also have the same bug as Tatas, Birlas and Bajajs. It has been a long journey from extreme reliance on khadi & village industries to Heavy duty markets in all the sectors. This is quite evident from the inflow of huge FDIs & FIIs in the country. Today we have industrialists like Azim Premji, Ambani's who are competing with the world to keep up to their acknowledged global recognition.

On this special occasion, Dr. Manmohan.Singh quoted "While there is much to be proud of in our record of the past 60 years, the unfinished agenda should make us humble and energize us to work together. The emerging challenges, at home and globally, should make us firm in our resolve to be united and to be cooperative". Very true indeed… we still have a long way to go… Sowing the seeds of oneness and emphasizing Unity in diversity is sure to work wonders for our country.

"SARE JAHAN SE ACCHA,
HINDUSITAN HAMARA...,
HUM BUL BULEN HAIN ISKI,
YEH GULSITAN HAMAR!!!!"

Today, on this very special day, I salute my National Flag and hope and pray that our Nation crosses all boundaries….

Jai Hind!

Here’s a beautiful rendition of the National Anthem by the country's best performers. This album is very very special and brings tears to my eyes.. Just saw it again in “Mile Sur Mera tumhara” today morning!

THE COFFEE DIARIES

Coffee, one of the jewels of beverages, is primarily enjoyed for not only its taste and aroma, but also for its well-known positive effect on mental performance. Drinking coffee has been demonstrated to improve an individual's alertness and concentration so aiding better performance and also helping reduce the feeling of tiredness or lethargy. Coffee is something that soothes our mind and refreshes it from all the anxieties… This biased definition is enough of an excuse to admit how I love slurping each cuppa coffee till it’s ‘VIM drop’ clean.

A CUPPA COFFEE IS A MUST:

1. During College/ Office breaks… when there’s nothing better to do… a cuppa coffee is always to the rescue!

2. Study night-outs… well, OF COURSE! What else can give us the energy to stay awake that long… remember?! Coffee aids better performance!

3. Freezing cold rainy days… when u have to just stay home probably completing some boring journals, a hot coffee mug is your true buddy.

4. After long journeys/ jetlags… or actually DURING long journeys and jetlags… Trust me coffee really gives you the kicks you need here.

5. Coffee helps the ‘Suppression of depression’… here’s to the ‘Devdas’ ’ around… Coffee’s a much better solution!

Sure, coffee boosts your spirits and rejuvenates your mind, body, soul… but the PURRFECT blend and roast is as critical too! Imagine you are depressed, desperately hoping you would find something exuberating in that special cup…but end up with the most boring milky bitter disaster! Ugh… I’m sure you’d rather consider being a ‘Devdas’. The point is, coffee is too precious to waste… If and when you have coffee… have the BEST one!

I would like to share with you my favorite way to have a cup of coffee… I never was a coffee-buff. I was always the TEA person… Slowly and unknowing, my fondness for coffee grew… I soon realized that the coffee I drank so intriguingly, was somehow always the one prepared by my grandmother. The warm emotions we share, her love, care and comfort all blending into the drink so willingly! I found myself sharing time with my grandmother working out the troubles of life. She asked how I would like my coffee. I wanted it just like hers, real strong and two sugars. I wanted to be just like her. Well, as my life went on, I didn’t get to spend so much time with my grandmother, but I always found myself, and still do, reaching for that cup of coffee whenever I needed to work things out!

Rightly said so… Your mood is often etched on the coffee you make. Apart from the right amount of milk, coffee beans and sugar, there are quite some other dazzling factors that assist in the coffee creation… Ingredients like dedication, love, haste, excitement, wrath, envy etc… all convey their respective flavours to the coffee you prepare!

Another way to look at this is that there is always a unique recipe for every mood and time of the day. There are strong hot coffees, for the busy bees to keep them active and alert all day round. Then we have Expressos topped with vanilla and cream, for the more stylish to sip for hours… Don’t forget the bitter but classic mochas, lattes and cappuccinos with chocolate syrup… And of course, ‘cold coffee’ the usual hit amongst the college crowd! This is what we call ‘Unity in diversity’ in the true sense! 1 coffee with many descriptions: nutty, chocolaty, flowery, Citric- orange or lemon, earthy etc etc…

Coffee Trivia: Some tips to make the best use of coffee!

• When shopping for perfume, take some coffee with you in your bag and have a good sniff in between smelling each perfume to refresh your nose!

• For the fitness freaks: Coffee is the only beverage having 0 calories… yay!

• The caffeine in coffee helps reduce the chances of developing Parkinson’s disease. Coffee is also rich in antioxidants which play an important role in fighting off cancer, diabetes and liver cirrhosis. However, coffee should be still consumed in moderation since the caffeine in it is a stimulant that may become addictive.

To date, there are over one billion coffee drinkers on the planet. The rest don’t know what they’re missing out on.

Here’s an interesting video that will thoroughly delight you! Sit back and enjoy the COFFEE ART!!!