Travelling Times

     "In that direction," the Cat said, waving its right paw round, "lives a Hatter: and in that direction," waving the other paw, "lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they're both mad."       "But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked. "Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."      "How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice. "You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."     Three decades back, my uncle got married to my aunt. A couple of years down the line; they found my aunt’s cousin to be a nice, responsible young man and introduced him to my uncle’s youngest sister. They were married before long and they hardly knew each other. My mom was 18 and my dad close to 30.      Fast forward twenty eight years. My brother met my sister-in-law after everyone else in our family had met her. They ...

     " You can be obsessed by remorse all your life, not because you chose the wrong thing-- you can always repent, atone : but because you never had the chance to prove to yourself that you would have chosen the right thing. " - Umberto Eco, "Foucault's Pendulum"      A lot of people are pleasantly surprised (read shocked) when I inform them of my engineering degree. For those who don't know what I do, I smuggle drugs and weapons into Eastern African countries (meant to be a joke, please don't report me). I'm a recruitment consultant (like the sound of it). I used to recruit candidates in the US for big American companies, the likes of Microsoft, Accenture and IBM. And when people question my shift in loyalties from engineering to management, I have my answer ready, like instant payasam. Well not exactly like instant payasam . I wasn't good at what I did. So i moved to something that might be better.      I ...

     “If you're not making mistakes, you're not taking risks, and that means you're not going anywhere. The key is to make mistakes faster than the competition, so you have more changes to learn and win.” – John W Holt.           One of the reasons I was inspired by this year's Oscar for best movie was the concept. War veterans in the war plagued countries who swept out land mines. It got to a point when I could no longer resist the temptation of locating mines. I took the harder router, playing Windows' most distinguished game in majority of its operating systems. The first time I played Minesweeper, the game seemed so dumb (the fox and the grapes flashes past; Ahem, don’t draw comparisons). I would randomly click across the board, and it didn’t require Einstein’s hypothesis to register my losses. In due course, a friend trained me on the objectives of the game. To locate the mines, and to flag the (locate meant...

     There’s an old folklore that when Neil Armstrong landed on the moon he was shocked to see a Nair tea stall (check out the evidence). Mallus (a certain sect believe that they are the south Indian sardars) generally believe in pompous celebrations and gaiety. We’re earmarked for our drinking abilities (I’ve mentioned this before) and feast on meat like piranha.       To be knighted a mallu, there are certain precautionary measures to be taken care of; Rule #1: Should be born in Kerala to mallu parents. Our explanation of native location is pretty weird. Eg: Which part of Kerala are you from? Cochin. Oh nice. Actually not Cochin, about 200 kms from there (Objects in mirror appear closer than they actually are). Rule#2: Coconut oil is a part of your diet, skincare (for the ignorant, hair is part of skin too), rituals and lubrication (for cranky parts, don’t get me wrong). Rule#3: What’s in a name? A rose would smell as s...