Origami and Childhood Pranks - All Harmless of Course!!

Origami is a Japanese word for "folding paper". It's resemblance to similar sounding words in English brings a completely different and misleading picture in the mind though and this can be pretty comical.

In this ancient Japanese art, the trick is to use one sheet of paper for creating objects without using scissors or knives. I have not seen kids using this art form at all. These days, I guess it is all about computer games that encourages shooting, killing and extreme violence. Destruction versus Creativity during our times. It used to be a fun thing and a rage in our good old days - late 60's and early 70's. New notebooks used to disappear in no time, much to the dismay of parents. Sheets would be torn neatly from the back side of notebooks and converted into various kinds of planes and missiles in the classroom and our teachers would have a harrowing time trying to find out the source of these paper contraptions.

Indian kids took a few concessions from their Japanese counterparts I guess, and cutting and tearing was generally accepted for making more effective flying objects with the purpose of mildly hurting folks for sheer fun during childhood days. One smart kid; smart in the wrong sense I guess, introduced the art and technique of using elastic bands to launch these paper missiles. They were indeed lethal as they traveled like bullets and for a good 90% of the distance in a straight line. One could aim quite accurately at the targets and Bingo! they would be spot on each time and every time. Nylon bands, what we see these days were not available in our days and invariably, the elastic bands available in the market were slim round portions cut from a cycle tube. They were not very flexible and would snap easily. It was primarily used as a substitute for colorful ribbons by girls to tie their hair. My sisters used to stock these bands made out of black cycle tube and lucky for me, this was my perennial source of supply. I am sure after reading this blog, my sisters will now be able to understand where all those packets of black bands disappeared. As long as they do not chase to clobber me now, 40 years later, I am fine. They surely cannot punish me for a childhood prank committed 40 years ago - can we say 'untimely filing of a confession'?

One black tube band was never sufficient to get the speed and momentum on these paper missiles. Another bright spark found a way to combine two or more of these bands to form a long elastic string and these became ideal launching pads. As long as it remained a childish prank and no harm was caused to fellow kids, it was fine. I was however a bit adventurous and wanted to use this to scare the hoards of crows flying around making a racket with their cacophonic caw! caw, every morning! Houses in Durgapur were built on huge plots of land; typically a 1,500 square feet built area would be on a land measuring 90' by 120'. With ample space for gardens all around, every house in the township had all kinds of fruit bearing trees like guava, mango, Jamun (Indian Blackberry), Jackfruit, besides the neem trees and the curry leaf bushes. Sparrows and crows were the most common residents on these trees and occasionally the owl, koil, parrot and pigeons would make flying visits. Come to think of it, I haven't seen many birds around in Bangalore; the rapid urbanization and chopping of trees have made the winged visitors run for cover elsewhere and what a pity! Only squirrels are visible these days with their cheep cheep calls. It is fun to watch them walking precariously on the telephone and cable lines between houses, balancing itself beautifully.

Returning to my childish prank, which eventually turned out to become a nightmare; one of my stray paper missiles launched with the use of a string of 4 intertwined elastic bands, whizzed past a crow which was a regular visitor to the mango tree in our backyard garden. I never imagined that birds could have a strong memory. Although, a bit startled at first with a paper missile flying past its beak, the crow obviously recovered from shock and quickly traced its path to see who had caused this disturbance. With another missile in my hand, it obviously put two and two together and then for the next week or so, I became the hunted and crow a hunter. It may sound a bit bizarre, but these birds seem to have a pretty decent memory. Luckily it was short lived, similar to the RAM in a CPU. Each time I stepped out of the house, it would come swooping on me and I must have a tripped on quite a few occasions trying to side step while looking up to see where and when the bird would strike next, to take revenge. This was straight out Alfred Hitchcock's movie "The Birds" released in 1963, based on the book written by Daphne du Maurier. This went on for a week or so until the RAM lost its power and the memory faded leaving me at peace!

Talking of memory, the human brain which weighs just 1.5 kilos has a staggering 80 to 100 billion neurons and twice that number of glial cells which provides nutrition support to the neurons. Even while asleep the human brain continues to handle traffic that would swamp all the world's telephone exchanges. Although very small in comparison to other organs, it demands 20% of the oxygen inhaled and a fifth of the blood the heart pumps. These 80 to 100 billion neurons are interconnected - some as many as 60,000 times. These neurons or nerve cells transmit nerve signals (electro-chemical impulses) to and from the brain at speeds up to 200 mph.

The most striking feature is the back-up system. Memory is stored in various places. This amazing feature helps a person to recover even after a stroke. Even if one part of the brain is destroyed, the remaining part, over time takes over the job by setting up compensating networks of nerve connections. With time, stroke victims return to a near normal life - speech may return, movement in limbs return. Incidentally, brain nerve cells are the only cells in the human body that do not reproduce. A baby is born with a full complement of these 80 to 100 billion gray nerve cells.

Alzheimer's disease is the name for progressive cognitive deterioration. The short term memory loss or amnesia becomes steadily more pronounced with the progression of illness. Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system affecting speech and motor skills. During epileptic seizures, there is disruption in the generation of electro-chemical impulses as the neurons begin firing all at once and at a much faster rate.

While doctors and engineers have successfully mapped the brain to understand its complex operations, what still eludes mankind is the behavior different people display for a similar set of inputs. It is still very unique to each human being; hence, if there are 7 Billion people on this earth, we have 7 Billion different minds!! Is there a possibility for peaceful coexistence and mutual respect?

Diwali Gift

Last night while returning from Kolkata, Hiro and I without discussing with each other felt an apprehension when we heard a feeble voice on the PA system from the cockpit of Jetlite flight S2 364 on our return to Bangalore. We were not sure whether it was the pilot or the co-pilot we heard. It was an otherwise uneventful flight; it took off on the dot and commenced its decent into Bangalore exactly 20 minutes prior to touchdown. I noticed the pilot making a correction in the flight path just before touchdown and that caused some unknown anxiety and before we knew what was happening, the plane landed on all its wheels with a massive thud. Every passenger must have let off a shriek or a scream involuntarily. It made quite a few jump off their seats, so hard was the landing.

I quickly thanked my engineering fraternity for having designed the fuselage and the hydraulic wheel suspension strong enough to take such a massive impact from a careless nincompoop of a trainee pilot. It was so strong that the pilot did not have to either fire the retro or apply the mechanical brakes. It lost all its power and speed in that instant of impact. On a very warm day, with the runway getting heated by continuous sunlight, the temperatures can reach dangerous levels. Had this kind of landing taken place on a hot afternoon, say in Jaipur or nearer home at Madurai, the tyres would have probably burst.

Obviously nothing like that happened, the very fact that I am writing this piece kind off endorses that all was well in the end. The co pilot must have been shaken too and tried to turn this to humor when he said that it was a bad landing not because of a trainee, but because Jetlite wanted to give a cracker of a landing as a gift on the eve of Diwali. With our heart in our hands, it sure was a Diwali gift, to our families, though!

One interesting fact is the speed at which the aircraft makes contact with the runway during touchdown. The velocity of approach can sometimes reach about 300 km/hour, and a great impact in the horizontal direction is imposed on tyres of the wheels. This impact is referred to as an accelerating impact. Upon landing, the surface of a tyre of a wheel sometimes melts to raise smoke.

The black tyre marks that you see on the head of the runway are nothing but molten tyre material which sticks onto the runway. This tyre material sticking to the surface can be dangerous as it can make other landing aircraft to slip on its surface, especially on a very hot afternoon or when it rains.

If you recall, in the recent past a Concorde caught fire while taking off and crashed. Investigation revealed that the wheels collided with a metal piece lying on the runway causing the tyre to burst and a broken part smashed into the fuel tank, thus starting a fire. Engineers are now working on a suspension system that will prevent a tyre from bursting even when it collides with an object on the runway.

While commercial aero planes are considered path breaking in the list of mankind’s inventions, the amount of carbon dioxide it releases into the atmosphere is phenomenal. On an average, aircraft emission accounts for 3% of carbon dioxide emissions; the most significant greenhouse gas. This figure is likely to reach a whopping 5% in the next decade.

Another interesting fact for those of you with a scientific bent, a 1.5 degree increase in the average day time temperature, because of global warming will thin the air to such an extent that the runway would be required to be extended by 17 to 20% for the aircraft to get the float to lift off. This means new runways will have to be built longer and existing ones extended with more fuel being burnt to get the float to lift off. It is indeed a vicious cycle. One can imagine the painful changes in design that this will entail. Most airports are built within city limits where no further expansion is possible and some like in New York and Hong Kong are built on the edge of the sea. There will be a time in the not so distant future when Airlines would settle for smaller payload aircrafts and carry less of cargo.

Back home, fire crackers lit during Diwali can be a source of air pollution as these emit toxic gases besides carbon dioxide. 95% of the crackers come from a town called Sivakasi in Tamil Nadu and this is a Rs. 1,600 Crore business. There is very little authentic research done on how much effect the crackers have on global warming, but it certainly leaves thick smog in the air and with the pre-winter chill, the plume tends to hang low for a long time making it terrible for all those who suffer from lung related diseases. What can be certainly avoided is the loud decibel level cracker bombs that can even cause an increase in BP and deafness. It is a good feeling when I hear the younger generation wanting to stay away from bursting these crackers and wanting to go green. We all must take an equal responsibility…Planet Earth is not ours to stake a claim…we have merely borrowed this from our children.

A relatively harmless but effective way is to light up the house with diyas, giving the dwelling a bright and elegant look. Celebrating Diwali is all about heralding triumph over evil, light over darkness and knowledge over ignorance. It is a time to reinforce friendship, unite society and bring the family closer. It was a pleasant surprise to see Barack Obama, recently conferred with the Nobel Prize for Peace, lighting the ceremonial lamp at the White House amidst the chanting of Vedic Mantras. Not to be left behind, Brown in UK, likewise participated in a similar function at London ushering an era of brotherhood through intelligent use of religion.

Cheers and Wish you all a very Happy Diwali.

Food for Thought!! Pieces from my mind...all my own, of course!!

Folks,

When I see our people flaunting their laptops and their PDA, Blackberry’s etc I am reminded of the yesteryears and honestly, we don’t have to look too far into the past. Sam Pitroda had not appeared in the domestic political scenario and we had an ancient and archaic telephone network that generally worked to your disadvantage. If you were extremely lucky and got through to hear the ringing tone at the other end it would invariably end up at the wrong number. The increased palpitation for having finally got through to the person would be short lived and the excitement would deflate like a punctured balloon. Such was the dependability of the so called wired telephony network.

I still distinctly remember the palpable excitement with which we, my sisters and I, observed the linesmen draw two sets of thin gauge GI wires from the nearest telephone pole to our home. Our joy new no bounds when the black telephone instrument manufactured by ITI out of Bakelite was finally connected to the set of wires. The instrument was pretty heavy and it took an effort to hold the handset for long. More often the shortest and the longest sentence used to be the word ‘Hello’ and nothing beyond. In our lives those days we must have chanted the word ‘Hello’ a million times or more, but each time the excitement would be fresh with an expectation of hearing another voice on the ear piece, but in vain. Both my sisters were lucky, though…they would talk for hours with their friends and my parents forever would be asking them to put the handset down, lest an important or an emergency call from the Plant would not get through to my dad. They had a huge number of friends, as Durgapur had attracted talent from all over the country.

Establishing a Steel Plant at Durgapur was the dream of Jawaharlal Nehru to make India self sufficient in basic infrastructure. He had adopted a socialistic pattern in building our nation and indeed that was the need at that point in time. Eminent Engineers and personalities from various walks of life had gathered in this distant village called Durgapur, a place selected by the then Chief Minister of Bengal Dr. B C Roy for starting an Industrial revolution on the banks of river Damodar. At one time, Durgapur with its sheer size and number of large and heavy industry was often called as the ‘Ruhr of India’. The Ruhr is an Urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany with an Industry backdrop. With 4435 km² and a population of some 5.3 million, it is the largest urban agglomeration in Germany and 4^th largest in Europe after Moscow, London and Paris.

As the saying goes that Life goes on in circles…it was a full circle when I came back to Kolkata in 1982. After graduating from Durgapur in Higher Secondary, I went on to do my Chemical Engineering at Trichy, worked for a brief 9-month period at Bangalore, then at Mumbai for a year and half before heading home to Kolkata. Work life at Kolkata was quite eventful. I was part of the sales team within an SBU (Strategic Business Unit) selling air pollution control equipments like bag houses and electrostatic precipitators for Steel, Power and Cement industry. Project sales can be very different. The minimum price of the equipment we sold as a project from “Concept to Commissioning” – C2C was easily a Crore of Rupees and I am talking about circa 1980 to 1992. We would end up talking to Assistant Engineers, Procurement Engineers, and even to the Managing Director at the customers end to help them take a decision. Obviously the gestation time was huge from the first quote to getting or losing an order. It could even take a year and half for that final decision.

You can then imagine the sheer number of visits we made to talk to our customers. With phones virtually non-existent, the next best thing was a Face-to-Face (F2F) discussion. We were forever on the move!! Our brief case would be ever ready with the basics for survival. A hard box with a stainless steel band around it, the VIP or Aristocrat as it used to be called, God alone knows how many unknown Indians would have gone for a knee replacement because of these hard brief case. Perched neatly in our hands it would hit the onrushing and unsuspecting fellow human beings in a crowded bus or a train. Looking back at the past, the absence of telephones honestly made us talk to our customers more F2F and we spent quality time with them during office hours and if acceptable, outside office hours as well. We would get to know a number of people in their departments, knew how the hierarchy worked and who would eventually influence the decision makers.

Let me however, get back to the point…I am certainly digressing from my original thought process….in a lighter vein, did I have one?

I wanted to talk about the black-out of information in the family once we moved out of town on duty. Having a phone at home was a luxury we couldn’t afford as we were in the early days of building a career. It came as a shock, when I told my wife, just a week after marriage that I would be traveling out of town. First question was, “Where and how will you travel?” Her heart sank when I said I had to first go to Delhi by flight and then by a train to Chittorgarh, in Rajasthan. To her next question, “When will you return?” I did not have any clue! We were always given an open ticket, since it was impossible to gauge the requirement of time for a decision by the customer and secondly it would cost a bomb those days to change a flight option. The time span between ‘Bye Bye’ before starting and ‘Hi’ after returning was always a big question. The good part of the story is that we survived, and we ended up selling very well!!

Compare this to “Now”….I send an sms after reaching the airport – the speed at which our folks zip on the way to Devanahalli airport will prove the old adage right…..that there are more people dying on their way to the airport than those flying!! Then the sms after reaching destination, at the end of the day in case of a stay back or just after landing back….so on and so forth. In spite of an information overload, we tend to worry these days and less of talking happens.

All the gadgets in the world will not come anywhere near a F2F conversation and for building a rapport with customers. We have learnt to flaunt them, in fact, go to the extent of saying that we cannot achieve anything without them, but touch your heart and think, has this brought you closer to your customers in the real sense? Do you really know what he or she wants from your organization?

I am not for a moment saying that we should not graduate to own these smart gadgets. But, to say that work will be hampered and nothing will get done without these instruments is hard to understand. Before the PDA arrived, a laptop was a ‘must’. With the arrival of PDA, laptop was forgotten. Once these are shut down in the office, it is switched ‘ON’ only after returning to the office the following day. PDA’s aren’t used to their capacity either. Only emails which require a very urgent attention get to be answered in an sms style abbreviated text with scant respect to language or the flow of content.

The above is only a small example of how things are shaping up here in India and hence, the question! Are we Indians getting more and more expensive to operate and thereby pricing ourselves out? In the Year 2000, the slogan for outsourcing work to India was “Come for Cost and Stay for Quality”; can we say that this slogan still holds good or have we somewhere lost control on costs? Are we thinking about what the customer wants and at what price points or, are we happy stating that we are like this only! Take it or leave it!

What worries is the slow change in our mindset about Customer Satisfaction. Gone are the days when we were more than willing to sacrifice ourselves to keep our customers happy and satisfied with our output. We were more than willing to put in additional hours of work to complete a job in hand. Is that fire still burning or has it got doused? Remember, we as a country took pride in our speed of response and the no-nonsense approach to work, similar to other Asian countries. We were once upon a time workaholics, but not anymore. We were known to perform multiple tasks, save on manpower costs with less dependence on technology.

While affordable technology and gadgets have arrived, the old values and the ethos seem to have taken a back seat. Is it then time for us to re-look at ourselves and re-define our goals and objectives with respect to ‘Operational Effectiveness’? While the answer is an overwhelming ‘YES’, the issue is who will show us the direction. While it is easy to point a finger at others, remember, when we do point a finger, three of them point back at us and ‘THAT’ is our answer.

Cheers!!

Leaders are Readers!

Friends,

Reader’s Digest is a storehouse of information, in case you can tap into!! Sometimes, they come out with special editions containing gems from their earlier publications – what I call “Masterpieces”. I picked the following from an article ‘The Puzzle of Personal Excellence’ written by Dianna Booher. Dianna is CEO of Booher Consultant, a communications training firm.

In one of her articles she has made an important observation: Leaders are readers!! An excerpt:

Stay informed: Chief Justice Oliver Wendall Holmes said, “Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.” When I started my consulting and training business, I read everything I could find on the subject. Only high school seniors know it all. The rest of us have to read and learn.

When a US team traveled to Japan in the 1980’s to study the Toyota production system and the innovative Japanese just-in-time concept, they met with the system’s creator, Taiichi Ohno. When the Americans questioned him about what inspired his thinking, he laughed, “I learned it all from Henry Ford’s book.” The book he referred top was Today and Tomorrow; written by Ford and published by Doubleday in 1926. Leaders are readers.

Someone said of us knowledge workers, “Wealth was once measured in gold. Now it’s measured in what we know.” Stay alert and informed. Read voraciously.

Cheers and Best Wishes!!

Pieces from my Mind!! All my own, of course!!

Indeed 11^th April 2008 at Chennai was an unusual evening on our way to the airport. With the departure time beyond 8:00 PM we, Siby and I thought it would be a normal evening with just a few busy signal crossings on our way to the airport. But not willing to take a chance, the over cautious approach that I take when it comes to traveling, we left early by Chennai standards at 7:15 PM. Karthikeyan wanted me on a call with Ranga and that took us a minute beyond 7:15 PM. While we were on the call, I sent Siby an SMS to get ready and head towards the car.

To our dismay, the car driver had chosen to take a small detour of the surroundings as we had not informed him that we would be leaving at 7:15 PM. By the time we located him and he was able to get the car to the front gate of our office, precious minutes were just gone. The traffic was unusually dense that evening with no apparent reason. We tried asking the driver in our broken Tamil whether we would reach in 45 minutes….he readily said yes. As if it were a statement coming from God himself, we believed him and got into some serious conversation about the Humana visit and what else we could do for the client to earn further support for our expansion plans. When the cab was standing still for a good 5 minutes at a signal crossing, I began to panic. It was the same clammy feeing one gets when watching a horror film when you do not know what to expect next!! Flashes of doubt whether I would be able to reach the counter 30 minutes before the flight take-off kept appearing on my mind.

Siby, as usual, kept assuring me that it would be absolutely okay and we would reach in time. Since it was an Air Deccan flight, I thought maybe Siby was right. Seldom does an Air Deccan flight take-off on time!! Prabhakar in the meantime had reached the airport with our distinguished Humana guests from a trip to Pondicherry. He called in to confirm whether Siby was on the way to airport. We asked him to check at the Air Deccan counter whether the Chennai to Bangalore flight was departing on time? Surprise! Surprise! – it was indeed scheduled to fly on the dot at 9:00 PM. Fate was perhaps being cruel to me...this was another stray thought that crossed my bewildered mind, now fraught with pessimism.

After a long and a seemingly endless drive we finally reached the airport with 25 minutes left for the flight's departure. Would I make it…God it seems, enjoys once in a while playing a cruel game with his followers and believers. Between the flight and I, there was this devil at the counter who said, 'Impossible, the counter is closed.' We lost precious minutes explaining that the roads were congested and we were held up in traffic snarls. Aha!! Remarked the guy at the counter, 'pray, tell me how did the others traveling in the same flight manage?' Although it wasn't the time to give a lecture on time management, much less listen to an unknown Indian teaching the basics of keeping time from Air Deccan guy at the counter, well I had to. He was unrelenting and so were we, as stubborn as we could be.

This went on for a good 15 minutes until Siby asked him why he was being so adamant. His reply was "go and see the 'Q' at the security check". There were at least 150 people waiting for their chance to get through security clearance. Not wanting to be browbeaten by a nondescript guy at the counter, we ventured by telling him that we would manage the crowd and sail through the gate and that responsibility was just ours, not his. He spoke to his counterpart inside the plane which was in its final phase of preparations for take-off. Imagine our relief when the guy at the plane said. 'Send him in.' Our friend, was still unrelenting, he was getting some kind of a sadistic pleasure through this denial process: two guys wallowing in front of him requesting that one of them be accommodated. Tables apparently, had turned for Air Deccan I guess. It was time to tell people that Air Deccan meant business and that it was ready to shed its earlier image of a laidback airline meant only for holiday makers where time was not a premium.

We gave in and told him to hand over the boarding pass only after I got through the cordon of people at the security. While I was running, Siby had already reached at the head of the 'Q' and had made an earnest appeal to people at large to accommodate a colleague of his and allow him to pass through, ahead of the bunch. Couple of folks at the head of the 'Q' decided to play good Samaritans and allowed me to slip in. Only then did our friend hand over the boarding pass.

Rest is history. On hindsight, it was pretty comical…could we have avoided? I don't think so. I came to know from the other passengers in the flight that Friday evenings are a nightmare. Chennai has a huge floating population, thanks to the economic awakening that India is going through in the last 3 to 4 years. This floating population heads home during weekends. Coupled with a plethora of low cost carriers now crowding the Indian skies, all roads lead to Chennai airport every Friday. I am not going to Thank God anymore, if it's a Friday!!

Did I have an alternative? I am sure, there was. I could have traveled the next day by the same airline or could have bought myself another ticket in one of the three remaining flights to Bangalore the same evening. The 'Joy of Flying' (pun intended!!) in the same Air Deccan flight (now christened Kingfisher Deccan) which appeared seemingly impossible, was sweeter than tamely buying another ticket and building a plausible story to get the bosses approval for wastefully spending another Rs. 4,000.

Cheers!!

IC 609 - Weekend Humor!!

I wonder how many of you may recall the history of the Airbus Industry manufactured A320 aircrafts in India. This airplane was conceptualized in the year 1984 and the first maiden flight was on 22^nd Feb’87. Indian Airlines placed an order for 43 such aero planes for its then growing network. On 19^th Feb’90, one of the planes while approaching the Bangalore airport, descended 800 meters short of the runway and veered into the Karnataka Golf course killing 92 people out of the 146 people in the aircraft.

This is not meant to be a disaster story being re-told; it was just a small introduction to the start of A320 aircrafts flying in Indian air space. Honestly, these aircrafts brought a great deal of comfort, space, legroom etc. during those days and it was a welcome change from the then cramped and overused Boeing 737-200, called the workhorse during the pre-A320 days.

After a fairly long gap, I had this chance of traveling in an A320 Indian Airlines flight IC-609 from Mumbai to Bangalore on Friday, 20^th June 2008. Saumya, who was also traveling with me was sitting in a row behind me and was banking on my luck to be brought home in one piece and with little or no delays. Both of us reached Mumbai domestic airport well ahead of the departure time, expecting inordinate delays. It was hence a pleasant surprise when we heard over the PA system that the flight was on time and they expected all passengers to check-in, go through the security check and await the final departure call.

15 to 20 minutes delay should not raise any eyebrows these days. When invited to board the aircraft we were already behind time. From the hot and humid departure lounge of the common terminal 1A used by Indian Airlines and Kingfisher, it was a comfortable drive in an air conditioned bus from the terminal to the parked aircraft. When we got out of the bus, something appeared different and odd and it took me a few moments to realize that we were asked to board from the service entrance door to the left of the aircraft. Was this over-aged airplane facing a jammed door on the right side? We have no way of knowing the truth, for the Govt. run operator does not share much information any which way. Those grouchy cabin crew, with a glum, constipated look on their face, feel that it is an insult to smile. They go about doing their job by not uttering a single word. This brought back nostalgic memories of my yesteryears – unfriendly airport terminals across the country, delayed departure and arrivals and the ‘special’ breed of not so friendly Indian Airlines cabin crew. It also reminded me of the poker faced entertainment staff who usher in people into a closed chamber for an experience of the spooky world – “Ghost Rides” as they are called in Madame Tussauds gallery of the ghosts in London!! Not knowing what to expect, every passenger wears a surprised look on their face when they walk into the aircraft. There was only one difference however. In these world famous and much talked about museums, the authorities take elaborate pains to make a new equipment look like a vintage to bring in some semblance of the bygone era. Well! It isn’t a struggle for Indian Airlines at all…these are true vintage class aircrafts in an “as is” and hopefully flying condition!! No wonder the two recently married couples sitting on either side of my row were behaving as if there was no tomorrow. On-screen escapades of Kajol and King Khan would perhaps pale in comparison.

Poor maintenance of these lovely flying machines was quite glaring to say the least. The floor was completely worn out; the side walls/panels wore a jaundiced look. The once upon a time fresh white side panels have given way to old, musty yellow panels, something similar to the way you would find on your over used and over aged kitchen appliances at home. Even the seat covers looked as if they could do with a wash, even if it were an annual ritual. The food and snacks tray do not correctly fit into the slot in the front seat and it was pretty comical to see some passengers juggle and struggle with it. The lighting had an eerie effect; as if you were walking in the corridor of a Govt. run hospital. Toilets at the rear reminded me of the general toilet in KSRTC’s Kempe Gowda Bus Terminus and hence the less said the better. Yet another thing to be spoken about is the food. Agreed that one cannot satiate the different palate of the wide cross section of the India Diaspora, but aged food? Aged and ailing aircraft…I can understand, but food that is old and revived through constant re-heating!! Yes, that was the case of the food given on the aircraft. Rice had dried to reach its former stage of being raw and the onion pieces sprinkled over the so called fried rice was emaciated, burnt and had reached a crispy stage. Even the hostel food in my college tasted better. At least, it was fresh.

What I did like about the flight is something that some of the other airlines must learn to emulate. The announcements in “Hindi” were truly a refreshing experience. It was in chaste Hindi and as spoken in the Hindi heartland. The pronunciation and choice of words were perfect. Not that this would matter in a state of emergency but nonetheless it was pleasant on the ears. It was a welcome change from the Americanized Hindi spoken by the red brigades of Kingfisher. Thankfully they only speak of the ‘Joy of Flying’ and not listening!!

Saumya had told me something about his previous travel in an Indian Airlines flight and that had set my mind racing. Having a bent of an engineer’s mind in fact, came to my rescue and I could pass the comment of Saumya as a figment of extreme imagination. He had mentioned about sitting next to a leaky emergency door and the cold pencil thin stream of air coming from a hypothetical gap!! This is an impossible possibility, to say the least. For those of you who may be interested to know the finer points, as we ascend, the air gets thinner and the air pressure and temperature falls. For the comfort of passengers and crew, the cabin is pressurized to near normal atmospheric pressure by way of a mechanical devise, also called a ‘pump’ and the air conditioned to be at 22 degrees centigrade. Further, the doors of the aircraft are designed like the lid of the Hawkins pressure cooker. It can close in one direction only and once the pressure inside is higher than outside, it gets completely sealed. The pencil thin stream of air as told by Saumya could have been from a leaky air conditioning duct and nothing else, as air flow in the other direction would defy the laws of physics!!

The flight was otherwise uneventful excepting for the one-legged landing and the nose coming down with a big thud!! Our now famous cabin crew were successful in yanking the correct door open and we got down to a waiting Volvo and from there to the terminal’s arrival gate. In all we were just 45 minutes behind schedule and Saumya attributes this luck to me.

Cheers for Safe Flights and Happy Landings!!

Chetan Bhagat's address to BBA Freshers forwarded by Pat

Good Morning everyone and thank you for giving me this chance to speak to you. This day is about you. You, who have come to this college, leaving the comfort of your homes (or in some cases discomfort), to become something in your life. I am sure you are excited. There are few days in human life when one is truly elated. The first day in college is one of them. When you were getting ready today, you felt a tingling in your stomach. What would the auditorium be like, what would the teachers be like, who are my new classmates - there is so much to be curious about. I call this excitement, the spark within you that makes you feel truly alive today. Today I am going to talk about keeping the spark shining. Or to put it another way, how to be happy most, if not all the time. Where do these sparks start? I think we are born with them. My 3-year old twin boys have a million sparks. A little Spiderman toy can make them jump on the bed. They get thrills from creaky swings in the park. A story from daddy gets them excited. They do a daily countdown for birthday party – several months in advance – just for the day they will cut their own birthday cake.

I see students like you, and I still see some sparks. But when I see older people, the spark is difficult to find. That means as we age, the spark fades. People whose spark has faded too much are dull, dejected, aimless and bitter. Remember Kareena in the first half of Jab We Met vs the second half? That is what happens when the spark is lost. So how to save the spark? Imagine the spark to be a lamp's flame. The first aspect is nurturing - to give your spark the fuel, continuously. The second is to guard against storms.To nurture, always have goals. It is human nature to strive, improve and achieve full potential. In fact, that is success. It is what is possible for you. It isn't any external measure - a certain cost to company pay package, a particular car or house.

Most of us are from middle class families. To us, having material landmarks is success and rightly so. When you have grown up where money constraints force everyday choices, financial freedom is a big achievement. But it isn't the purpose of life. If that was the case, Mr Ambani would not show up for work. Shah Rukh Khan would stay at home and not dance anymore. Steve Jobs won't be working hard to make a better iPhone, as he sold Pixar for billions of dollars already. Why do they do it? What makes them come to work everyday? They do it because it makes them happy. They do it because it makes them feel alive. Just getting better from current levels feels good. If you study hard, you can improve your rank. If you make an effort to interact with people, you will do better in interviews. If you practice, your cricket will get better. You may also know that you cannot become Tendulkar, yet. But you can get to the next level. Striving for that next level is important.

Nature designed with a random set of genes and circumstances in which we were born. To be happy, we have to accept it and make the most of nature's design. Are you? Goals will help you do that. I must add, don't just have career or academic goals. Set goals to give you a balanced, successful life. I use the word balanced before successful. Balanced means ensuring your health, relationships, mental peace are all in good order. There is no point of getting a promotion on the day of your breakup. There is no fun in driving a car if your back hurts. Shopping is not enjoyable if your mind is full of tensions.

You must have read some quotes - Life is a tough race, it is a marathon or whatever. No, from what I have seen so far, life is one of those races in nursery school. Where you have to run with a marble in a spoon kept in your mouth. If the marble falls, there is no point coming first. Same with life, where health and relationships are the marble. Your striving is only worth it if there is harmony in your life. Else, you may achieve the success, but this spark, this feeling of being excited and alive, will start to die.

One last thing about nurturing the spark - don't take life seriously. One of my yoga teachers used to make students laugh during classes. One student asked him if these jokes would take away something from the yoga practice. The teacher said - don't be serious, be sincere. This quote has defined my work ever since. Whether its my writing, my job, my relationships or any of my goals. I get thousands of opinions on my writing everyday. There is heaps of praise, there is intense criticism. If I take it all seriously, how will I write? Or rather, how will I live? Life is not to be taken seriously, as we are really temporary here. We are like a pre-paid card with limited validity. If we are lucky, we may last another 50 years. And 50 years is just 2,500 weekends. Do we really need to get so worked up? It's ok, bunk a few classes, goof up a few interviews, fall in love. We are people, not programmed devices.

I've told you three things - reasonable goals, balance and not taking it too seriously that will nurture the spark. However, there are four storms in life that will threaten to completely put out the flame. These must be guarded against. These are disappointment, frustration, unfairness and loneliness of purpose. Disappointment will come when your effort does not give you the expected return. If things don't go as planned or if you face failure. Failure is extremely difficult to handle, but those that do come out stronger. What did this failure teach me? is the question you will need to ask. You will feel miserable. You will want to quit, like I wanted to when nine publishers rejected my first book. Some IITians kill themselves over low grades – how silly is that? But that is how much failure can hurt you.

But it's life. If challenges could always be overcome, they would cease to be a challenge. And remember - if you are failing at something, that means you are at your limit or potential. And that's where you want to be. Disappointment’s cousin is frustration, the second storm. Have you ever been frustrated? It happens when things are stuck. This is especially relevant in India. From traffic jams to getting that job you deserve, sometimes things take so long that you don't know if you chose the right goal. After books, I set the goal of writing for Bollywood, as I thought they needed writers. I am called extremely lucky, but it took me five years to get close to a release. Frustration saps excitement, and turns your initial energy into something negative, making you a bitter person. How did I deal with it? A realistic assessment of the time involved – movies take a long time to make even though they are watched quickly, seeking a certain enjoyment in the process rather than the end result – at least I was learning how to write scripts , having a side plan – I had my third book to write and even something as simple as pleasurable distractions in your life - friends, food, travel can help you overcome it. Remember, nothing is to be taken seriously. Frustration is a sign somewhere, you took it too seriously.

Unfairness - this is hardest to deal with, but unfortunately that is how our country works. People with connections, rich dads, beautiful faces, pedigree find it easier to make it – not just in Bollywood, but everywhere. And sometimes it is just plain luck. There are so few opportunities in India, so many stars need to be aligned for you to make it happen. Merit and hard work is not always linked to achievement in the short term, but the long term correlation is high, and ultimately things do work out. But realize, there will be some people luckier than you. In fact, to have an opportunity to go to college and understand this speech in English means you are pretty darn lucky by Indian standards. Let's be grateful for what we have and get the strength to accept what we don't. I have so much love from my readers that other writers cannot even imagine it. However, I don't get literary praise. It's ok. I don't look like Aishwarya Rai, but I have two boys who I think are more beautiful than her. It's ok. Don't let unfairness kill your spark.

Finally, the last point that can kill your spark is isolation. As you grow older you will realize you are unique. When you are little, all kids want Ice cream and Spiderman. As you grow older to college, you still are a lot like your friends. But ten years later and you realize you are unique. What you want, what you believe in, what makes you feel, may be different from even the people closest to you. This can create conflict as your goals may not match with others. . And you may drop some of them. Basketball captains in college invariably stop playing basketball by the time they have their second child. They give up something that meant so much to them. They do it for their family. But in doing that, the spark dies. Never, ever make that compromise. Love yourself first, and then others.

There you go. I've told you the four thunderstorms - disappointment, frustration, unfairness and isolation. You cannot avoid them, as like the monsoon they will come into your life at regular intervals. You just need to keep the raincoat handy to not let the spark die.I welcome you again to the most wonderful years of your life. If someone gave me the choice to go back in time, I will surely choose college. But I also hope that ten years later as well, you eyes will shine the same way as they do today. That you will Keep the Spark alive, not only through college, but through the next 2,500 weekends. And I hope not just you, but my whole country will keep that spark alive, as we really need it now more than any moment in history. And there is something cool about saying - I come from the land of a billion sparks.

Thank You.