Writing on the palm

It was so common when I was in school. I remember the days when some damn red coloured dot on the hand was called as "Jolly". The game was called as Jolly-Jolly and participants in that game had to have that dot on their palms whenever they met, failing which they would get either ten shots on their back(pun not intended at all) or a plate of batata vada from our famous IES canteen. Not that I enjoyed that game, but nevertheless I played along with a select few who would not beat me hard when I forgot to tatoo my hand with the ball pen ink. Though this game was played primararily when I was in primary, but it didnt mean that writing on the palm stopped when I went to the fifth standard. Big boys, bigger games. Somehow I was infatuated with the Nazi Swastik(and some weird signs like that) and used to draw it on the forearms to make sure everyone sees it. Somehow, like everyone else, I loved attention too. And yes, how can I forget practicing my signature....many times on the paper and a few times on the palm. Must have practiced atleast a thousand times before I got the 'perfect' one. (do you ICICI Bank guys know what efforts I have taken just to practice the signature I have on your forms)
I dont remember when things changed. I dont remember when I started hating writing on the palms. Probably when I was no longer a innocent kid, I realised that writing on the palm was 'bad'. Was this after some elder in the family told me to get rid of this habit? Or was it after my brief stint with the leaking ink pens. Probably because of the leaking pens, I guess. They really made my hands look ugly and that must have been when I must have realised that unwritten palms are cleam palms. And yes, I stopped using ink pens while I was in school and this tempts me to conclude that I stopped writing on my palms when I was in my last years of my school. Probably the last time I did it must be while jotting someones phone number. But soon hated the habit of jotting phone numbers on palms after I realised that these phone numbers are always soaped away.
Today when I was in the gridlab and was talking to the CCD(computers and communication dept) guy on the phone which was a good ten feet away from my AIX machine, I had to write on my palm-- not the jolly sign or the Nazi swastik, but the MAC address of the machine.

Eavesdropping on Hosur Road..

Well not exactly eavesdropping. But then you cant possibly turn a deaf ear when someone in your bus is shouting at top of his/her voice. And consider the time I used to spend on Hosur road a month ago. It was almost an hour and a half per day. And as I dont usually read books or play games in the bus, listening to such conversation becomes my prime pass time. As it used to be when I used to travel by train to college for 4 long engineering years. This not only helped me to pick up quite a bit of Gujurati but it also made me interested in the stock markets. All that I have got from the stocks...I owe it to you Gujurati brokers who used to commute with me.(Well, Mukul was the guy who really pulled me into the market..he must get due credit for that)
Coming back to Bangalore, now that things on Hosur road have improved, my entertainment has reduced. But nevertheless I would like to share these two incidents with you.
The first one is about a girl who was talking in English. She was loud enough so that her voice could reach the other end of the bus, but I dont know how many people were not reading books or playing games so that they could catch this bit of humour.
Infy Girl(IG) : I cant eat. My gums are swollen.
Other End(OE) : .......( I couldnt hear this...but could figure what was said after IG said the next line)
IG : Stupid...GUMS GUMS
By the way, did you get it?
The other one was a guy talking in Marathi either to his wife or would be in Marathi. And thats the problem when you are in some other state. You tend to assume that none of the people around you can speak your tongue. This guy persistenly kept asking her, " Maazya barobar anghol karayla nahi ka mhantes?"(Why are you hesitant to bathe along with me?). Well, the sad part about the second conversation is that I couldnt make out what the other person replied.

Petit Infoscion Day..

There were days when I did not come to office on Saturdays and Sundays. But looks like the things are changing. I wouldnt say that I have tons of work pressure. That would be a blatant lie. But, then I have to come. Demo on Tuesday : -( But then, I still found some time to write this.
Well, so today when I came to Infy, I was in for a big surpise. I saw so many families in the campus. It looked like a big wedding. It was the Petit Infoscion Day. On this day, you bring your kids to office and kids have a blast. At the entrance, I shook hands with a Donald Duck. But then he really scared the shit out of that poor two year old who started crying.
The foodcourt was converted into a big stage. There were programmes and programmes for kids. There were about 20 stalls put up with some interesting billboards. Dont know what they were for. These stalls will open in the evening. Will check them out later. There was a merry go round. And kids rode horses and camels(non-living). I still remember that kid with helium balloon tied to her neck. I wanted to bring one to my work area. And if the kids grew tired of all this, a canteen was converted into a dormitory so that they could have a nap. But then, I hardly saw anyone over there.
I recollected the videos of the last year's Petit Infoscion day, which were screened on the billion dollar day. Recollected the kids saying, " When I grow up, I want to work with Infosys", "My father works in Infosys, Infosys is a great company". Yes, Infosys really is a great company. When I compare Infosys with my previous company where I worked(or for that matter with any other company), I feel privileged. Its a company which cares and shares.

Neel, the cartoonist.

I became interested in cartoons when I was in my eighth standard. Not that I had never drawn a cartoon before. I loved drawing Mahatma Gandhi. After all, simplicity had been the greatness of my sketches. It was in this very year, that I failed in my elementary drawing examinations. But, elementary examinations are different from caricatures. My sister had been to some workshop and I learnt to sketch Dr. Manmohan Singh from her. From then I have been drawing Manmohan over and over again---because, I cannot draw any other caricature. More and more I drew, the more famous he became. And now you see-- he is the Prime Minister of India!!!