Category: Personal

Lyrics: Chodo Kal Ki Baatein

Posting a song after a long time. Almost brought me to tears. Even after all these years, the song is still pertinent.

Movie: Hum Hindustani Naya Daur (Thanks Millind for pointing out)
Singer: Mukesh
Lyrics: Prem Dhawan (anyone knows more about him?)

Chhodo kal ki baatein, kal ki baat puraani
Naye daur mein likhenge milkar nayi kahaani
Hum hindustani, hum hindustani

Aaj puraani zanjeeron ko tod chuke hain
Kya dekhe us manzil ko jo chhod chuke hain
Chaand ke dar pe jaa pahuncha hai aaj zamaana
Naye jagat se hum bhi naata jod chuke hain
Naya khoon hai, nayi umangein, ab hai nayi jawaani
Hum hindustani

Chhodo kal ki baatein, kal ki baat puraani
Naye daur mein likhenge milkar nayi kahaani
Hum hindustani, hum hindustani

Aao mehnat ko apna imaan banaaye
Apne haathon ko apna bhagwaan banaaye
Ram ki is dharti ko gautam ki bhoomi ko
Sapnon se bhi pyaara hindustan banaaye
Naya khoon hai, nayi umangein, ab hai nayi jawaani
Hum hindustani

Chhodo kal ki baatein, kal ki baat puraani
Naye daur mein likhenge milkar nayi kahaani
Hum hindustani, hum hindustani

Har zarra hai moti, aankh uthaakar dekho
Maati mein sona hai, haath badhaakar dekho
Sone ki yeh ganga hai, chaandi ki yamuna
Chaaho to patthar pe dhaan ugaakar dekho
Naya khoon hai, nayi umangein, ab hai nayi jawaani
Hum hindustani, hum hindustani

Chhodo kal ki baatein, kal ki baat puraani
Naye daur mein likhenge milkar nayi kahaani
Hum hindustani, hum hindustani

Lyrics Credit: HindiLyrix.com

The power of human mind.

I had written this post 30th April 2007. Just found it buried under one of the folders.

As I was coming back from office today, in the cab there was this female who I thought I had seen somewhere. I could not place her in my mind. I came to the conclusion that I had seen her in my school and she was in one of the other sections.

I started talking and I was correct. She went to the same school as I went and even she thought she had seen me somewhere and she could not place me.

She could also remember one of my classmates. This classmate was the most connected person in my batch. And proves yet another thing – that the six degrees of separation is because of certain well connected people. I don’t know how useful this realization would be …

More Details to assist memory later
I was working with the MNC in their Gurgaon Corporate Park Office and I met this person in cab. She was from Greenfields and was in the commerce section.

A Marketers Delight

A friend once told me that I am a marketer’s delight. Looking back at the spending pattern of last few days, his words sound like prophecy to me.

I have bought a laptop bag because I was hanging out in a market full of bag shops (I needed a bag but the one I bought is something that I did not like).

I bought a PSP that I bought just because I wanted to own one and one of friends was coming from Dubai (I bought an iPod in 2006 for the same reason – that fake sense of ownership).

Two pairs of shoes (not that I hate shoes, its just that I did not need them. The other pair I had sufficed my needs).

This brings me to a confession. I might say that my interest lies in the area of decision-making, but I really suck at it. Need to think more before I make a purchase so as not to make myself a sucker.

And if someone wants me to gift things off my wishlist, please lemme know.

Delhi Street Food

Moment I landed in Delhi today, I had craving for the famous Delhi street food. I started with a round of kachori + aaloo at Nehru Place. Nehru Place incidentally is the largest electronics and computing equipment market at least in India. I followed it up with chole + kulche there only. I had to then eat two Veg Puffs at a Café Coffee Day because I was accompanied by a friend who hates street food. Moment she left, I had an awesome rajma + rice, again at Nehru Place.

Moved onto NOIDA and had this awesome Egg Roll. The rolls are called Calcutta rolls for some reason. Logic and assumption tells me that these rolls probably originated in Calcutta. Topped it up with a kulfi + falooda from another vendor. Met another friend over another cup of coffee (this time at Barista). And finally had some home made Daal Makhani. Now if you dint know, a daal makhani is not just any daal topped with lots of butter, but daal makhani is left to cook overnight.

Went to another friends place and since he is a fruit freak, I had to eat an orange. I know fruits are fun but I am not really a fanatic. Finally on my way home, I ended this small street food sampling exercise with Gol Gappe and Tikki from my neighbourhood stall. This guy has been serving Gol Gappe in my locality for last 15 years and people stand in mile long lines for an opportunity to eat his gol gapes.

In next posts, I shall be talking about few famous food joints in Delhi. I would talk about Karim’s in Darya Ganj, Paranthe Wali Gali, Karol Bagh’s Roshan di Kulfi, Pitampura’s Bittoo Tikki Wala, Nehru Place’s famous Rajma Rice.

All these cant really be compared to Mumbai’s late night chai, vada pavs, samosa pavs, omelette pavs, pavs with ketchup, pavs with chutni, basically pavs with anything and everything. They are class apart. Wondering if Delhi food can stand the formidable challenge of Mr. Pav – the staple food of Mumbai .. ?

Related Posts
Paranthe Wali Gali
The day for Junk Food

Food For Thought

Yet another blog (located at FooForThought.Wordpress.com). This time, I shall be talking about technology, businesses and perspectives of customers.

Here is a brief QnA with myself about Foo For Thought.

Why a new blog?

I realized that War of Words is a personal blog with too many things that a reader might not want to read. Hence a new location and a new start.

How is it different from other similar blogs?

First and foremost, I would not be peddling news like a lot of other blogs. I would talk about things that I think are relevant for businesses and what most people often ignore. These are softer issues related to how humans use and interact with businesses. I would act as a customer advocate, an eager student and an egomaniac visionary.

Are you trying to say that you are a visionary and an evangelist?

Not at all. I am not an expert and dont want to be one. I just want to meet new people, interact with them and learn from them.

What tools would you use?

I would use the most potent tool of them all – commonsense. Then I would rely a lot on feedback and observations. I would also use few examples from history, biology, anthropology, physics, politics, economics, design etc. One of my gurus taught me the importance of multidisciplinary thinking and Foo For Thought would echo that.

Keep watching it for action. I would give occasional updates here also.

Please leave your comments and thoughts.
(As if there are going to be a lot of visitors)

Presentation1.ppt

For my work, I have to make a lot of presentations. And lazy me takes the first shortcut available and calls all my presentations with the default word – Presentation1.ppt.

Today I was asked to hunt for a file and I keyed in .ppt on the search bar. I got a list of some 20 presentation1.ppts. No points for guessing how happy I was with the search results. I did not get the work done and now I am renaming all those files to something that is more searchable.

The key lesson here is that search plays an important role in the way we humans work. More than search, retrival plays even more critical role. It is so easy to stuff a closet with million things and it is equally difficult to retrieve one particular thing from that heap of million things. No wonder Google has done so well as a company. It makes the entire process of retrival so easy and intuitive. Google for me is more of a retrival compay rather than search.

And this leads me to my lesson # 1 for the day. Any business that I get into will have to have a minimal search cost. I define the search cost as the amount of effort on part of end user to identify a service provider (as one of the alternatives to fulfill the demand). And by virtue of this definition, lesser the search cost, easier it is for the end user to find your service.

In fact advertising is a way to reduce the search cost for consumers. Your product might be the best in the world but the customers will never be able to find it if the search cost is too high. The good news is that there are ways to reduce or eliminate this search cost. Case in point, Bisleri. Bisleri by virtue of age has now replaced “mineral water” in vocabulary of Indians. Search cost for Bisleri is hence zero.

Now this concept of search cost can be extended to any business activity. Take for example hiring. You are a growing company. You want to attract and eventually hire the best talent. There are two problems now. One, you dont know where to look for good talent. And two, even though you might find awesome talent, the talent might not know about you. He hasnt heard about you and in all likelihood he would join one of the better known brands.

Think about the Internet. On Internet, a lot of things are noise and a very very few are actually signals. Search cost for anyone on Internet is very high. All of us use feed readers, aggregators, social bookmarking etc. to discover content. Discovery is getting more and more difficult as more and more spam blogs are being published.

How do you then reduce this search cost? How do you make yourself as the default choice for any customer? Is advertising the only way? Is this the core function of advertising?

Any thoughts?

Appu Ghar being shut down



Someone once said that only thing constant in universe is change. Old has to make way for the new. There is no escaping for even things as iconic as Appu Ghar in Delhi. Appu Ghar is being shut down to make way for Delhi Metro.

Although I have not been to Appu Ghar for about 10 years but I have some really wonderful memories of Appu Ghar. I still remember a vague map of Appu Ghar. I sat in an electronic car in a closed ring for the first time. I entered a house of horror for the first time at Appu Ghar. My first visit to a water park was at Oysters at Appu Ghar. I was and I still am scared of rides like My Fair Lady and Appu Columbus. I shot air rifles at colorful balloons for the first time in my life at Appu Ghar. I still remember that I bought a box full of magic tricks from Appu Ghar and while going home, I lost one of the cigarette tricks.

Every time I went to IITF aka Trade Fair, my parents always took me to Toys and Games Hall, Good Living Hall and finally Appu Ghar. Last time I went to Appu Ghar was after my 10th standard CBSE examinations. For the record, I took my 10th standard boards in 1997.

There are now umpteen number of amusement parks now in India but no one comes close to Appu Ghar. Personally, I share quite a few things with Appu Ghar. Appu Ghar is not just a place I liked visiting but it also gave me my nick name.

Appu Ghar being shut down is a really sad event but I am all for it and hope more places like that would be developed in the heart of the city. More and more kids are now opting for indoor games, Internet and other virtual entertainment avenues. They are loosing out on the experience of being with a real community, meeting people face to face and arent getting enough exposure to be street smart.

There is one coming up at NOIDA with even better rides and water games. Dont know how many of us would still go to NOIDA for those rides. Dont know if there would ever be a sense of belongingness.

And in the end, Appu Ghar is more than just a place for Delhites. It was and will remain an integral part of everyone’s life. Appu Ghar will be missed.

Please send in any pics you might have. And if you want to share an opinion or thoughts, please comment.

Links
Appu Ghar official website
Wikipedia

Brief Bio

I created a brief profile to be uploaded on few websites. It is attached below. And I stand by every single word that is written below.

Saurabh is yet another typical Indian who thinks that he can change the world and in the process, become filthy rich. His interests range from reading, writing, computer gaming (Yes counter-strike and Quake 3 Arena), travelling, photography, trekking, advertisements, entrepreneurship, talking, cartoons, eating, technology, blah, blah and more blah.

He believes that one life is too short a time to live. He is on a never-ending quest to find perfection and wants to learn everything he can. He is 26 and wants to retire before he is 30. And finally he is a firm believer in sifr.

Saurabh has a technology background and is a MBA from MDI, Gurgaon. Was hired by a large MNC for their Young Leaders Development Program. The program lasted 12 months and it taught Saurabh how large companies function, how egos are important and how pleasing the bosses is the only bottomline. Unable to understand this dichotomy between ideal-world (and much talked about) functioning and real life functioning of businesses, he decided to move on. He is currently with Creativeland Asia, an advertising agency based out of Mumbai and looks after new initiatives, strategy and consumer insights function. All opinions expressed on any public forums are his personal only and his employer might or might not subscribe to them.

I would like to reiterate that opinions expressed are solely mine and not of my employer.

Taare Zameen Par

Movie: Taare Zamme Pay
Lyrics: Prasoon Joshi
Singer: Shankar Mahadevan

One of the best lyrics EVER. Yes Ever. Hats off.

The lines in BOLD are awesome.

Dekho Inhein Yeh Hain Oos Ki Boondein
Patton Ki God Mein Aasmaan Se Koodein
Aandayee Lein Phir Karwat Badal Kar
Nazuk Se Moti Hans De Phisal Kar

Kho Na Jaaye Ye Taare Zameen Par

Yeh To Hain Sardi Mein Dhoop Ki Kirane
Utarein Jo Aangan Ko Sunhera Sa Karne
Mann Ke Aandheron Ko Roshan Sa Kar Dein
Thithurti Hatheli Ki Rangat Badal Dein

Kho Na Jaaye Ye Taare Zameen Par

Jaise Aankhon Ki Dibiya Mein Nindiya
Aur Nindiya Mein Meetha Sa Sapna
Aur Sapne Mein Mil Jaaye Farishta Sa Koi
Jaise Rangon Bhari Pichkari
Jaise Titliyan Phoolon Ki Kyari
Jaise Bina Matlab Ka Pyara Rishta Ho Koi

Yeh To Aasha Ki Lehar Hain
Yeh To Ummeed Ki Sehar Hain
Khusiyon Ki Nehar Hain

Kho Na Jaaye Ye Taare Zameen Par

Dekho Raaton Ke Seeney Pe Yeh Toh
Jhilmil Kisi Lau Se Ugey Hain
Yeh To Ambiya Ki Khusboo Hain
Baagon Se Beh Chale
Jaise Kaanch Mein Choodi Ke Tukde
Jaise Khiley Khiley Phoolon Ke Mukhdey
Jaise Bansi Koi Bajaye Pedon Ke Taley

Yeh To Jhonke Hain Pawan Ke
Hain Yeh Ghungharoo Jeewan Ke
Yeh To Sur Hain Chaman Ke

Kho Na Jaaye Ye Taare Zameen Par

Muhaley Ki Raunak Galiyan Hain Jaise
Khilney Ki Zid Par Khaliyan Hain Jaise
Muthi Mein Mausam Ki Jaise Hawayein
Yeh Hain Buzurgon Ke Dil Ki Duwayein

Kho Na Jaaye Ye Taare Zameen Par

Kabhi Baatein Jaise Dadi Nani
Kabhi Chalkein Jaise Mmm Mmm Paani
Kabhi Ban Jaaye Bhole Sawaalon Ki Jhadi
Sannatey Mein Hansee Ke Jaise
Sooney Hothon Pe Khushi Ke Jaise
Yeh To Noor Hain Barse Gar Teri Kismat Ho Badi

Jaise Jheel Mein Lehraye Chanda
Jaise Bheed Mein Apne Ka Kandha
Jaise Manmauji Nadiya Jhaag Udaye Kuch Kahe
Jaise Baithe Baithe Meethi Si Jhapki
Jaise Pyar Ki Dheemi Si Thapki
Jaise Kaanon Mein Sargam Hardam Bajti Hi Rahe
Jaise Barkha Udati Hai Bundiya…

Source: Hindilyrix