Life Isn’t A Race

February 9, 2018 Quotes

Life is a complex set of mechanism with as many connotations & combinations that we can decipher. One of which is clearly established that measures our rate of success as compared to our peers, which we have adversely labelled as a ‘rat race’. This thoughtful quote from an uncredited source which advocates everything is primed and bound to materialize at an opportune time. Don’t look back on your past and ponder on what you have lost or left behind, but acknowledge what you’ve achieved and how far you’ve come on your strengths. Stay positive!

[perfectpullquote align=”right” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]New York is 3 hours ahead of California,
but that doesn’t make California slow.
Someone graduated at the age of 22,
but waited 5 years before securing a good job.
Someone became a CEO at 25,
and died at 50.
While another became a CEO at 50,
and lived to 90 years.
Someone is still single,
while someone else got married.
Obama retired at 55,
& Trump started at 70.
Everyone in this world works based on their time zone.
people around you might seem to be ahead of you,
& some might seem to be behind you.
But everyone is running their own race, in their own time.
Do not envy them & do not mock them.
They are in their time zone, and you are in yours
Life is about waiting for the right moment to act.
So, relax.
You’re not late.
You’re not early.
You are very much on time.[/perfectpullquote]

Mumbai Delhi Mumbai (2014)

February 8, 2018 Movies

Mumbai Delhi MumbaiI had cherished the Marathi original Mumbai Pune Mumbai (MPM) a tale of two distinct personalities representing major cities of Maharashtra, a reluctant lady from Mumbai visiting a Pune guy whom she hopes to marry. Pune is a short train ride and hence the title of the movie from the Indian Railways’ name panel. Shot entirely in Pune the highlight about MPM was its cast of 2 seasoned actors Mukta Barve and Swapnil Joshi, with Joshi’s flawless enactment of the Puneri accent and his explanation of the steadfast Puneri Baana to a suave metro girl Barve who’s just as proud about her liberal Bombay antecedents as the man could have ever imagined resulting in a mind-blowing account of repartees. Importantly, the simple script through the eyes of the protagonists acquaints you to Pune’s Maharashtrian middle-class culture & sunny locales on a day’s trip. This film checked all my boxes for a good entertaining romantic comedy including its well-deserving sequel Mumbai Pune Mumbai 2. Then, Bollywood got into the mix and engaged the original writer/director Satish Rajwade to make an urbane Hindi adventure which unfortunately lost its way and failed miserably to do justice to the original.

So instead of a train, Pia takes a flight to Delhi and literally lands in an argument with a local upsetting her. From there onwards she becomes cacophonic, that seething rage of displeasure with Dilliwaalahs displayed with incessant shouting & heckling of her helpful partner. The character’s persona is so amateurish that she gets needlessly offended by ‘Goli’ her Delhi mate and vice versa much to my exasperation. But, it was her constant rebuttals & conversations starting with “Boss…Boss” that made me wonder if the swank Pia is indeed the correct personification of the city’s elegant diaspora. To make matters worse, the mellifluous Marathi song of ‘Kadhi Tu’ returned in an uninspiring avatar called ‘Tham Sa Gaya’. Skip this one by all means, but you don’t want to skip the original.

Rating: ⭐

SpaceX Launches A Dream Into Space

February 6, 2018 Happenings

It was business, as usual, today for SpaceX with their ambitious Falcon Heavy vehicle as I watched the rocket soar into the blue skies amidst cheers taking with it the aspirations of a billion humans to become interplanetary travellers. There was nothing about this first launch which would suggest SpaceX was testing this beastly projectile whose thrust would be equivalent to 18 Boeing 747 aircrafts or its technology of Falcon rockets with 27 core engines firing at full force during launch – the most by any working rocket, or even getting all the 3 stages back to the Earth safely. Everything went smoothly, just like the previous Falcon missions bringing SpaceX closer to realizing its potential of sending humans to Mars and beyond. For me though, that wasn’t the highlight of the launch today. What made it momentous was its rather uncommon payload of the ‘Starman’ in a SpaceX-designed space suit behind the wheels of Elon Musk’s cherry red Tesla Roadster which is right now orbiting the Earth on its way to Mars and will orbit the Sun indefinitely. On the Falcon Heavy, only time would tell how this behemoth will disrupt the commercial space industry.

Pencils

My Creative Endeavour With Pencils

February 4, 2018 General

Last week, at a meeting with a senior executive we were discussing design thinking and digital product management when during the final moments he asked me a question quite unexpectedly – what I would do with a box of 10 pencils. And adding that my answer cannot be related to using the pencil for any writing purposes.

That question involving a ‘pencil’ evoked memories of my art school and the innumerable creative assignments. By the way, if it wasn’t for my long stint at the school I could have never identified myself with the pencil types (H, HB, 2B, 6B) and how each grade could bring a proportionate effect to my artworks using the pressure of my fingertips, sketching actually became like an addiction. I have preserved some caricatures and most recently switched to a dedicated sketching book for collecting my artworks. At the school, I was pretty average at drawing the human anatomy with a live model where some of my classmates excelled beyond imagination, but I had picked up caricaturing on my own with pencils that gave me an opportunity of applying my style to any human form, which somewhat eased my discomfort of committing mistakes in art, besides being a great way to unwind after a hard day’s work. The pencil was that friend, that helped me grow in confidence. However, my colleague wasn’t expecting this answer, he was looking for something where the pencils were used in more ways than a common writing device.

Continue reading…

India U-19s Lift The Cricket World Cup

February 3, 2018 Happenings

Woke up to the news that the India U-19s cricket team – which had done extremely well in the tournament overall, had won the U-19 Cricket World Cup defeating Australia in the finals by 8 wickets. Opener Manjot Kalra remained unbeaten on 101 (102) and was declared the Player of The Match. India has most U-19 World Cup wins now with 4, second only to the Aussies with 3 wins. More than anything, this ought to be a proud moment for one of Indian’s greatest batsmen and now the U-19 head coach Rahul Dravid. Unfortunately, I was not able to catch on any of the live matches but I did see some clips of the captain Prithvi Shaw, who along with his teammates (I’m looking at you Porel and Nagarkoti) have become favourites to be picked for the India seniors’ team. It’s special to win a world cup alone, but what’s magnificent is to win it convincingly without losing a match in the tournament. Bravo Team India!

Source: Scorecard on ESPNCricInfo