The Best T20 Team

 I wish I could see these 11 players play together. The best T20 team I can think of.

1. Chris Gayle
2. David Warner
3. Kevin Peterson
4. Kieron Pollard
5. AB De Villiers
6. Mahendra Singh Dhoni (Captain)
7. Dwayne Bravo
8. Dale Steyn
9. Lasith Malinga
10. Sunil Narine
11. Saeed Ajmal

The Yega Bomb

The moment I stepped out, I noticed couple of things - The man who was chasing people for alms wasn’t there anymore and the chilled breeze of Seattle started fondling me. I have always found her very very pristine and healthy. I savor every moment of her softness and never feel satiated. But this time it was different and pleasantly special – I wasn’t walking, I was wobbling. Mind was drifting as though keeping pace with the wind and very importantly the Thinking machine was off after a long long time.

Rajat, Umesh and me were walking towards Hotel Pan Pacific through the silent corridors of down town Seattle. As we reached the Hotel entrance, Umesh got ready to drive 20 miles back to his house in Bothell.

‘Drive safe and see you in the morning’, we said while he left.

The lift beeped stopping at floor number 4.

 ‘Don’t hesitate to call me for any help, I am in room no. 429’, Rajat said getting off the lift.

‘No, I am….’, the lift doors closed before I could complete.

I reached my hotel room, threw my shoes apart and stared through the large windows into the darkness for good two minutes. I tried every bit I could to keep the eyes open.

Nothing much changed since morning. The pavements were still painted white by the layer of snow. The only extra were the foot marks. Took deep a deep breath and pulled back the window curtains to fall flat into the cozy bed.

But I did not sleep, opened my laptop instead.

I wrote 4 emails. Every time I was about to click the SEND button, I expanded my eyes as wide as I could, held back the wandering mind very tightly, double checked every line I was furiously typing.

While all others were business emails, one was without Subject.

The bitter Pinot Noir in dinner and two glasses of the clear-juice-like Lemon Drop, the Tequila shot, Yega Bomb in a tiny glass suspended in Red Bull. I gulped them all with commendable ease. The result was complete bliss, the bliss of first high!

Beautiful words

We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them - Kahlil Gibran

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy. When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight - Kahlil Gibran

But let there be spaces in your togetherness and let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls - Kahlil Gibran

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on - Robert Frost

Sometimes the promise of what lies beneath is more tantalizing than baring it all - Don’t know

We are what we repeatedly do - Don’t know


Mil jaye to MITTI hai...kho jaye to SONA hai - Don’t know

A Rainy Day in Delhi

It was pouring in Delhi and my cab was moving at a speed of 1 inch/hour. The words of cab driver changed from – ‘Three hours is a lot of time sir. We will easily reach airport by 4 PM’ to ‘I told you sir we should have taken the other route ’. 

But it had been an incredible day for me and I continued to beat life. The flooded roads and snarling traffic could not stop me from reaching airport back on time. Ambling on the walkalator I saw passengers lining up at gate number 45. The departure of IT 343 was being announced. I was tired but not as much as I was happy. Life was fast, furious and beautiful since the previous evening.

It was the fourth meeting of the day and I was struggling to stay awake. Manish’s email popped up and it stirred me enough. It was a reminder to check the status. It was Thursday, 8^th September and the last hope. I entered details online and to my delighted-confusion the text abruptly ended – ‘Passport received from French Embassy. Please collect on.’ I burped. 

‘What does this text mean?’ 

Any other normal thinking mind would have read it as – ‘Visa is ready, have a wonderful trip to Paris’. But it was mine which has a penchant for analyzing absolutely trivial things.

With a very determined intent to clarify all my doubts, I dialed the customer care number. Yes, I was right. It was clarified and ascertained that life mocks at me at will, a little more when the topic of discussion is foreign travel. It was 6 PM and the call centre was closed. Amidst all uncertainties, one thing was clear – With or without Visa, I had to collect my passport. So requested Manish to book the early morning Hyderabad-Delhi flight. 

It was raining very heavily in Delhi. I reached the Visa office at Nehru place a little ahead of scheduled time. At the collection point, I was given an envelope. I tore it with all my might and quickly opened my passport. I saw what I wanted – A glossy page with multi-entry Schengen Visa. I was happy, very happy. 

I have to mention this to all my readers. After the agonizing experience I had with US Visa, this was truly wonderful. I was scheduled to travel to Paris on Sunday the 11^th of September. The only way this could happen is to get Visa latest by Friday, 9^th September, the last working day. With every passing day, my hopes waned. But I was always telling myself, whether I fly or not, what was important for me is Visa. Because I sincerely hoped that countries worldwide will increasing believe that I am harmless and all my future Visa applications will be hassle free (fingers crossed). Never know what problem they will have with my name and religion. 

Whatever, for now, I was all set to visit the fashion capital of the world and importantly a new country this year.

I hurriedly entered into the cab while questioning the cab driver, ‘We will reach airport by 4 PM, right?’

The Joy of Handwriting

I wrote five pages on a trot. I don’t remember when I last used as much ink in my pen. It gave me indescribable satisfaction taking me into flashback (yes, those black whirling circles on white background)…..

She quickly walked into the class carrying a sober expression on her face. The usual cute smile on her round face was clearly missing. It was an easy guess for all 58 of us - a deceptive calm concealing the imminent storm.

Nagabushnam and Vinay followed her carrying a pile of note books each. Getting books, chalk and duster from staffroom, borrowing cane from neighboring class teacher, noting down the names of talkative students were the top job responsibilities of class leaders. There were three leaders to manage the three rows in my class. I was the third one. That evening I preferred staying back in class which allowed me to utter a silent prayer one extra time. Mary teacher was about to announce the names of students selected for the handwriting competition. The year was 1991 and I was in my 3^rd grade.

‘Abidaaali is the only one selected for the handwriting competition’, she said in an angry tone.

I was more embarrassed than amused on hearing this. All I prayed was to be one of the selected ones, not the only one.

‘Show your notebook to everyone bench by bench’, she ordered.

It could not get clumsier than this for me. I had only one option, to oblige.  With a trust-me-I-am-hating-this look I mechanically moved from bench to bench displaying the page which had two ‘very goods’ and one ‘excellent’. ‘Did I over pray?’, ‘Is God punishing for not sharing water bottle with Humayun?’, the thoughts kept churning.

My handwriting is very much of old English style with all the bends and curves. Filling scores of cursive handwriting books played an important role. I was far ahead than my peers in primary school days. As time passed, all my classmates developed a great art of writing neat (like pearls, as they say). But I always took pleasure and pride in writing cursive.

Complete credit to my dad who took extraordinary interest during my formative years of schooling. He used to assign a one page home work daily during vacation before he left for work.  The inspection use to happen near to midnight when he returned back home. It used to be a dreadful experience. Bashing, tearing of pages and re-writing were common. But it immensely helped my sister and me in setting very high standards at that tender age.

The pen and paper experience has a special charm. Even during my graduation days I never imagined that their usage will be curtailed so drastically. I still try to write a bit wherever possible – to-do notes, a bit of dairy, while explaining any little thing and of course cheques. But it is all about mighty technology now and why not? How would it have been possible for my pages in dairy to reach friends across the world if it was not a laptop, MS Office, Blogspot, Facebook, Gtalk etc. etc.?

Life Aaj-Kal

Back resting on a pillow inclined at an angle of roughly -30 degrees to the bedhead, legs completely stretched and one over the other, a pillow on the lap over which a laptop is mounted. This is my usual posture whenever I read or write on a computer. The warmth of its base is so irritating that I often feel like thrashing it against the wall. Had it not been an office given one, I might have done it by now (I am lying).

Making notes in a word document using all the fancy tools to beautify, hurriedly swapping across facebooks, gtalks, opening outlook every time an office email pops up, emails from nakuris, monsters etc. etc. have all made the writing(?) experience so artificial. All these can be easily avoided but it requires discipline which will cost me a million dollars which I cannot afford. So instead, I used a pen and book.

I wrote five pages on a trot. I don’t remember when I last used as much ink in my pen. It gave me indescribable satisfaction taking me into flashback (yes, those black whirling circles on white background)…..

She quickly walked into the class carrying a sober expression on her face. The usual cute smile on her round face was clearly missing. It was an easy guess for all 58 of us; it was a deceptive calm concealing the imminent storm…..(to be continued)

With this I commence ‘Life Aaj-Kal’, an attempt to relive the best days of my life. I fervently hope that it doesn’t fizzle out soon.

Pervasive Innovation

---- Prelude: My article on company blog. First one on a serious note. I will aim to write such sedative articles more consistently as I am now more close to research and customer pulse. If not anything, I promise, these should drive you to deep sleep.

Cheers!

‘When the world starts to move from a primarily vertical (command and control) value-creation model to an increasingly horizontal (connect and collaborate) creation model, it doesn’t affect just how business gets done.  It affects everything’ –The World is Flat, Thomas L. Friedman.

Not very long ago firms were happy reaping profits by just focusing on local markets, competing with local players or enjoying the status of monopoly. Massive regulatory, geographical and technological barriers ensured longevity of such a regime. But recently, we have seen these barriers crumble, changing the rules of the game. As the world gets flatter and flatter with technological advancements, economies are increasingly embracing the collaborative mode of working. To summarize, there has been an unprecedented strategic shift.

Collaboration will inevitably lead to learning and unlearning. Multinational presence of firms is pushing this trend further. To improve the bottom line, subsidiary firms have no option but to emulate global practices. This forms the basis of my discussion – Pervasive Innovation. Firms from BRIC group (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and other emerging economies in APAC are looking for innovative solutions to gain a competitive edge. ERP has been one such innovation which companies are finding irresistible especially for tighter integration in the supply chain. For major ERP vendors, APAC-Japan have become the most sought after markets. One reason for this change could be that western markets have started to mature, but primarily it is because of increased trading and an emphasis on increasing efficiencies in new markets. This trend is not limited to developed and now developing economies. Within each of these, the major propellant has been the SME (small and medium enterprise) segment. Close to 55-60% of SAP’s worldwide revenues come from SME segment. The desire to innovate is just ubiquitous!

In any organization cost-benefit analysis is an indispensable tool to evaluate any solution. However, in the case of developing economies and the SME segment, it becomes extremely critical. In my next write up, I will discuss my experiences with firms from these regions and how ERP vendors, enterprise solutions like Winshuttle care to play a Samaritan’s role.