Ode to De living

My life is a lie...
DON'T TOUCH THAT KEY!
Behind that door
is the truth you see!

I am who I am
but I won't tell you
Who knows what you'd think
or indeed what you'd do.

The pain of knowing
just what I've become
may unravel those lies
till they're completely undone.

Where would that leave me?
At the beginning I guess.
So just let me be
in this wretched mess.

I'll wallow in misery
I'll live in doubt
I'll try what I want
but you'll never find out.

On my judgment day
you'll look at me
You'll likely be shocked
by what you will see.

My life is a lie
but you'll never know.
I'll keep it from you
till the day I go.

This one's dedicated to the one who knows.

Your life is yours
and yours alone
Let nothing sway you
(not even this "pome")

Stand tall, stand high
like a might oak.
spend those lies
till your conscience is broke.

Tough as it may be
people want to know YOU.
In this huge web of lies
this much is true.

No ill intent is meant by this pome. It's inspired by the hypocrisy of our culture symbolised by the most open societies, which went to war to hide the openness.

De-pression before in-De-pendence.

I started this article on the 15th August 2007 (our 60th anniversary of independence) and didn't have the energy to complete it.

Most people (for some reason) don't realise how much I love my country. India is a place filled with people with completely different outlooks, backgrounds, concepts, religious beleifs, sensitivities, intellectual abilities, blah... you're probably sitting there thinking "all countries would have this". There's diversity in geographic topology. There are so many different types of places with so many interesting things to see, but the thing that really builds this place is the people.

Heck if that's not enough of a sales pitch, how about this one:

India is home.

I have the option to live and work abroad (it'd be somewhat easier for me since I don't need a visa/work permit to get a job in the UK since I've got "Right to abode" there). India has spoiled me. I'm lazy. There's a maid who comes in the morning, cooks, cleans, washes the clothes, irons them, answers the phone when there's no one around, handles the house by the day so to speak. Then there's the odd job guy who washes the car, walks and feeds the dogs, takes care of the garden, repairs stuff around the house, cleans the outside area of the house.

Essentially, there's someone to do anything you don't want to and it's usually not too much of a problem to get the stuff done because labour is cheap here. Does this make me a hypocrite though? How independent could I be if all the stuff I've got to get done get done by other people? Am I dependent on them? I'll put it this way. I know the "how's" of getting most things done, but don't ever need to actually implement anything myself as long as they're around. When they go on leave, I don't exactly shrivel up and die, but I DO have a bit more to get done.

That having been said, let me ask this. How can I afford this luxury? Having two people spend quite an amount of time getting my work done for me should be an expensive deal right? The truth is that these people work on a monthly basis for a combined amount that I'd make in a few days. And no - I'm not earning a particularly large amount of money. These are the gaps.

This divide isn't terribly healthy. The people who work in junior positions in government jobs - the paper pushers or gate keepers (depending on what your work in that department is) get salaries that would allow them to buy a small TV in a month if they didn't spend anything on anything else. Add a wife and a couple of kids to that equation and you get a materialistically challenged family who look around and see all these rich kids in their designer clothes, driving flashy cars discussing how much they spent last night at that nightclub.

What do these guys do then? How about making life a little miserable for all these rich kids. If he comes here to get some work done, let me pull all stops to irritate him to even things out just a little bit. And what's the response? Rich kid pulls out a few notes and passes them to the guy to "smoothen" things out a little. (newly) Corrupt government man decides this isn't a bad way to make a little extra money, so winds up hassling anyone who comes through the door expecting money and when he doesn't get any starts demanding it.

A cousin is registering his company here. He'd given our house address as his correspondence address, so when his registration letter arrived by registered post (recorded delivery), the post man came home to deliver it. Registered post requires a signature, so it wasn't just dropped in the post box. The maid didn't know my cousins name or the name of his company, but offered to sign for it. The postman gave her a phone number and left with the letter. My mother called in the afternoon and offered to pick up the letter, but was told that my cousin would have to make a personal visit to the post office as it must be some paise ka mamla (money matter). My cousin was in town the next day for a few hours, so had planned on picking up the letter in the morning, running to interview someone and leaving. At 10 am when we called the post office, we were told gyarah baje tak aajao (come by 11 o'clock). It was 10 so Ma offered to reach there in 5 mintues and was told nahin gyarah tak aajao (no come by 11). I'm not sure why, but this went up and down a few times before Ma finally said "We'll be there at 11" and put the phone down. At 11 we went to the post office, expecting to pick up the letter, feel a little happy and leave. We were called into the office where one man took the letter, held onto it and sat down at a table telling us (I couldn't continue writing after this, so I took a short 9 month break) that he needed to see the letter of registration of the company before he could give us the letter (which incidentally was the tax registration letter a requirement for registration of the company).

An hour before my cousin had to catch a flight we were slightly pressed for time so my cousin pulled him to the side and asked him exactly why he was doing this, to which the blatant response was "300 rupees". There are two options at this point. Pay and get it done with or leave, let the process get delayed by another few weeks and pray that you have the contacts to squash this bug - who'll land up in another post office and do exactly the same thing there.

Look at it this way. You have a company to register where the registration process gets stopped at a few thousand different places where each person demands x amount of money - all the amounts are individually very small, but they sort of add up when there are so many people to "handle". What solutions have been devised to get around this?

Enter the tout! You can actually HIRE people to do the running around (read bribery) for you. They will give you a "99% assurance" that all your work will get done for an amount that would be a little higher than the amount you'd have to bribe people with. Why is it only a little higher? Because it's like a nexus. The tout would be running a "revenue-share" concept with the officials (and their office boys) he's dealing with.

So now you're sitting there with the concept of the services industry and corruption being tightly linked, the plot gets thicker...

It's possible here (and on many occasions necessary) to have someone NOT hassle you for a fee. There are a massive number of cabs operating between Delhi, NOIDA and Gurgaon.
A friend struck up a conversation with a cab owner and got the dope on why they drive as badly as they do (that's not exactly how the guy put it, but it's quite evidently the reason).

For each cab owned by the cab company plying on a regular route, the company has to pay the DELHI POLICE a particular amount per intersection to "look the other way" for all traffic offenses. Most cabs tend to jump red lights, stop in the middle of the road to pick up and drop passengers, jump lanes at will (is there a car in that lane? Too bad... he's going to have to move away), tamper with the speed governors (they're supposed to be limited to 50KMPH) and generally increase the chaos on the already chaotic roads. They've got amnesty. They'll do what they want, but when they start killing people I'm almost certain the price goes up... price? PRICE? There have been instances where actors/influential people/wealthy individuals and/or their children/relatives have been involved in well publicised manslaughter/homicide (driving, shooting, blah...). They've been all over the national papers (gossip rags). They've gone to court. They've come back out of court. They're resting at home happy to be free having (possibly by mistake, but never the less) killed someone.

Is this independence?

As long as people HAVE to pay someone to get basic work done we're not free.
As long as the government votes itself to power (by buying polling booths and peoples identities) we're not free.
As long as the people responsible for removal of corruption are the ones ASKING for bribes WE ARE NOT FREE!

De Cleanup Job

I live in Delhi. A place I've always thought of as home, but also a massive mess. There's the standard attitude of "I'll mess it up - the people paid to clean should do their jobs properly". I still remember a while ago (when the BJP came to power) seeing this strange man sweeping the road in front of our house. My mother asked him a few questions and found that this man had been responsible for sweeping the road outside our house for a few years now - only now he was actually doing his job. The city cleaned up quite a bit with all the people who'd been employed to do their jobs for years actually starting to do them.





At some point of time, the government got smart - there's only one way to make sure the job gets done properly (and continuously) without having someone sit on all the cleaners heads...





OUTSOURCE!





Hey, if I give you assurance that irrespective of whether your job gets done or not, I'm not going to fire you/cut your pay/irritate you at all in any way and you're a slacker, you're not going to get your job done. On the other hand, if I call a contractor and tell them to clean the place up, then as soon as they screw up, I jump on them and tell em I'm not going to pay them - I become king... yay! Plus, I get to pay them less by putting out bids for the job of cleaning the place.





So there you have it. I drive to work every day - occasionally see a very hip looking cleaning truck trundling along the side of the road whipping up all the dust, dirt, plastic, excrement, blah into it's large belly. The roads? They're squeaky clean in Delhi now.





But back the truck up just a minute (pun intended). Where do these trucks empty their guts?

Well, it would seem to me that they dump the stuff quite a distance from where they pick it up - a few inches perhaps? This is a picture I took yesterday when I was heading back home from Nehru Place (a sprawling commercial complex in Delhi) just accross the road from the famous Kalka Mandir.

Hang on... lets get a little closer...

So THESE are the guys cleaning up the roads. Yesterday after I saw (and photographed) this, I thought of two things - going to the Kalkaji police station (about 100m away) and telling them (I actually went, but was in a bit of a rush to get home, so thought I'd just blog it and send it to the papers). The second was that I hadn't really looked at the sides of the roads for quite a while - they're dirtier than ever before - I guess now I know why. Maybe these contractors are planning on asking for a contract to clean the sides of the roads as well.

I drove up to the truck and motioned for the driver to push back his window - he motioned for me to drive round to the other side of the truck which I did. His "co-pilot" gave me a big grin while he pushed his window open. I asked one question "is this the rubbish dump?" to which his immediate reply was "yes".

I'm thinking I should send this around a bit more than just to the papers. Lets see what happens.

De forté of Airtel... customer service???

If you've ever wanted something done that you can't do yourself, what's the first thing you do?

Find someone who can get the job done right?

What happens when it's your job to do it? Picture a customer care person who's being asked a question on the phone. Now picture the question as being the metaphorical equivalent of the question of the meaning of life, the universe and everything.

You sit some poor kid who's fresh out of school following which they're given diction and voice training for a while and a crash course in how to read scripts from a screen at one end of the line and erm... a customer asking a few questions beyond the scope of the script at the other end. The result is either a very frustrated kid or customer.

I'd rather spare most of these guys from such ordeals... I've heard them squeak "we'll have to get back to you on that" before asking me if there'll be anything else I can maim them with. Airtel (conveniently) provides a mail address where you can write to them if you have any queries, so I thought since there's no real time exchange of information, no one has to be embarrassed by their knowledge (or lack of). Also, in case they don't know the answers they can either look them up or ask someone who might know.

I thought wrong.

This is my mail exchange with customer care in Bangalore (I've got a roaming number from there while I'm sitting in Delhi - Delhi customer care maintains that they can't give me any information since I'm a Bangalore customer and I need to contact them directly).

Me:

Hi,
My number is 9xxxxxxxxxx.
I'd found information on your page which says I can get EDGE services on my Airtel mobile for Rs. 299/month. The link to this page is at
http://www.airtel.in/Postpaid_otherservice.aspx?path=1/6/7/9&cid=4
I have the following queries:
1. What is the monthly download limit on this?
2. Are there any other charges?
3. Will I have to pay extra while roaming in Delhi on Airtel's network for EGDE access?
4. What sorts of speeds could I expect assuming I use an EDGE enabled device?
5. Are any IPs/domains or ports blocked?
Regards,
Sunil

Airtel:

Dear Mr. Sunil,
You have inquired regarding the EDGE services for your Airtel number 9xxxxxxxxx,
We would like inform you this will achieve the delivery of advanced mobile services such as the downloading of video and music clips, streaming, full multimedia messaging, high-speed Internet access and e-mail on the move, multiplayer games etc.
EDGE provides three times the data capacity of GPRS. Using EDGE, operators can handle three times more subscribers than GPRS; triple their data rate per subscriber, or add extra capacity to their voice communications. EDGE uses the same TDMA (Time Division Multiple Access) frame structure, logic channel and 200k Hz carrier bandwidth as today's GSM networks, which allows existing cell plans to remain intact.
It will be possible to view live TV streaming on an EDGE enabled phone ? the Nokia 6230. It will not be possible to view it on any other phone, as there is no other EDGE enabled phone that supports streaming today in India.
? The service can be subscribed and accessed from the Airtel Live portal, and can be seen under ?Live TV? on the wap portal
http://live.airtelworld.com/
? Service will be chargeable per channel per month.
? To begin with, CNBC News channel will be offered, subsequently Aaj Tak, Sports and other entertainment channel will be added as we continue to strike agreements with other TV channels.
? The CNBC channel will be offered free of cost for the time being
To access live TV, a user must have subscribed to Airtel Live portal. If not, then he needs to be provisioned for Airtel Live portal before he can access live streaming.
The settings will also be made available over the website. In a nutshell, the APN is??airtelfun.com, proxy is disabled, and the UDP port range is from 1024 ? 65535.
Currently Nokia 6230 is the only phone which supports video streaming on EDGE. Please note that by using this setting, you will not be able to access the Airtel live portal (to down load rich content like Games. Wall Papers ring tones etc) He needs to alternate between the settings as he normally does between Airtel Live (earlier called Airtel Masala) and Airtel Online.
Alternatively, you could also contact our 24 Hours customer care service by dialing 121(toll free) for same.
Regards,
Renuka Devi
Customer Support Service
Airtel

erm.... Okay Renuka... whatever you say. Not a terrible advertisement for the Nokia 6230, but you could have used a little targeting on that one.
Me:

Dear Renuka,
Thanks so much for the detailed response. I would however like responses to the questions I've asked which were:
1. What is the monthly download limit on this?
2. Are there any other charges?
3. Will I have to pay extra while roaming in Delhi on Airtel's network for EGDE access?
4. What sorts of speeds could I expect assuming I use an EDGE enabled device?
5. Are any IPs/domains or ports blocked?
Please assume I do not have a Nokia 6230, do not want to stream TV on my phone and do not want to download any content from Airtel's portal - I just want to surf the internet on my phones - one Nokia N91 and one O2 XDA Atom Life.
Thanks again,
Sunil

Airtel:

Dear Mr. Sunil,
You had inquires about the EDGE facility on your Airtel number 9xxxxxxxxx.
What kind of speeds will be available?
2 dedicated time slots will be available for EDGE. Depending on the air interface, the quality of coverage, other people in the cell area, speeds will vary between 40kbps-200 kbps. The bandwidth will get shared among as many users as present, who are using GPRS/ EDGE in that cell at that particular instant.
Live TV: (available on both Post and pre paid)
Live TV streaming is still a new concept in most countries (in the few networks where it has been deployed), the experience depends on the bandwidth available. Equally important is the RF tuning and optimization done at the BTS level, which can perceptibly change the user experience.
Typically, streaming is done at 5-10 frames per second (a TV shows 30 frames per second), so it is important to have the right expectation even before you start to view a live TV stream on a phone.
? It will be possible to view live TV streaming on an EDGE enabled phone ? the Nokia 6230. It will not be possible to view it on any other phone, as there is no other EDGE enabled phone that supports streaming today in India.
? The service can be subscribed and accessed from the Airtel Live portal, and can be seen under ?Live TV? on the wap portal
http://live.airtelworld.com/
? Service will be chargeable per channel per month.
? To begin with, CNBC News channel will be offered, subsequently Aaj Tak, Sports and other entertainment channel will be added as we continue to strike agreements with other TV channels.
? The CNBC channel will be offered free of cost for the time being
? The service will be available to both pre paid and post paid customers.
To access live TV, a user must have subscribed to Airtel Live portal. If not, then he needs to be provisioned for Airtel Live portal before he can access live streaming.
The settings will have to be given to the customer over a telephone call, and will also be made available over the website. In a nutshell, the APN is airtelfun.com, proxy is disabled, and the UDP port range is from 1024 ? 65535.
On a Nokia 6230, the detailed steps for providing the settings are as follows:
1. Click ?Menu?
2. Go to ?Media? and press ?Select?
3. Scroll down to Media Player and press ?Select?
4. Scroll down to ?Streaming Sett? and press ?Select?
5. Select ?Active Connection Settings? and press ?Activate?
6. Now Scroll down to ?Edit Active Connection Settings? and press ?Select?
7. Enter Connection Name as ?Streaming? and press Ok
8. Scroll down to ?UDP Port Range? and enter 01024 ? 65535. Click Ok
9. Scroll down to ?Connection Settings? and press ?Select?
10. Scroll down to ?Proxies? and press ?Select?
11. Scroll down to ?Disable? and press ?Select?
12. Scroll Down to ?Data Bearer? and set it to GPRS (default)
13. Scroll Down to Bearer Settings and press ?Select?
14. Select ?GPRS access point?, enter Airtelfun.com and press Ok
15. Set Authentication Type to Normal (default)
16. Set Login Type to Automatic (default)
17. Leave ?User Name? and ?Password? blank (default)
18. Go to Standby Screen, and access the Airtel Live portal now.
19. Click on Live TV link on portal, and select the channel you have subscribed to.
20. After this, you will receive a SMS with the link to view Live TV.
21. Save this link as a bookmark (by entering it manually in ?New Bookmark?)
22. Once this bookmark is saved, select it to connect to the TV streaming server.
Regards,
Yuvaraj B
Customer Support Service
Airtel

Hmmm... are we getting a little better now? Yuvaraj could have left the info on speed and skipped the spiel (sic) on the 6230 and Live TV though.

Me:

Hi Yuvraj,
Again, I would like to ask for responses to my queries rather than hear the sales pitch on Live TV. I have received a response only to the 4th point.
The queries were and still are:
For Edge services @Rs.299 /month as mentioned at
http://www.airtel.in/Postpaid_otherservice.aspx?path=1/6/7/9&cid=4:
1. What is the monthly download limit on this?
2. Are there any other charges?
3. Will I have to pay extra while roaming in Delhi on Airtel's network for EGDE access?
4. What sorts of speeds could I expect assuming I use an EDGE enabled device?
5. Are any IPs/domains or ports blocked?
Regards,
Sunil

Airtel:

Dear Mr. Sunil,
Regarding your mobile number 9xxxxxxxxx
You had inquired about the EDGE phone for your Airtel mobile number 9xxxxxxxxx.
We would like to inform you that there is no limit for downloading in the EDGE phone and charges as per the downloading items.
The games will be chargeable on a per download basis, and will be priced at Rs. 99 per game. The game will expire after 6 months.
Further, we would like to inform you that 2 dedicated time slots will be available for EDGE. Depending on the air interface, the quality of coverage, other people in the cell area, speeds will vary between 40kbps-200 kbps. The bandwidth will get shared among as many users as present, who are using GPRS/ EDGE in that cell at that particular instant.
To access live TV, a user must have subscribed to Airtel Live portal. If not, then he needs to be provisioned for Airtel Live portal before he can access live streaming.
The settings will have to be given to the customer over a telephone call, and will also be made available over the website. In a nutshell, the APN is airtelfun.com, proxy is disabled, and the UDP port range is from 1024? 65535.
Further, any clarification you can contact our customer care center 121(toll free) for the same.
Regards,
Karthik
Customer Support Service
Airtel

Okay, I forgot to tell Karthik that I wanted to use this facility to connect to the internet - I was slightly bugged with this entire conversation by now though - the series of mail was going back and forth for quite a while by this time (yep - I made sure the entire series went back each time).

Me:

Okay... one LAST time before I post this hilarious conversation on my blog.
You DID respond to one question on the first mail and two on the second.
How about trying for the remaining two this time?
The queries were and still are:
For Edge services @Rs.299 /month as mentioned at
http://www.airtel.in/Postpaid_otherservice.aspx?path=1/6/7/9&cid=4:
1. What is the monthly download limit on this? (answered - no limit)
2. Are there any other charges? (answered - charges are only for downloading games etc from Airtels site)
3. Will I have to pay extra while roaming in Delhi on Airtel's network for EDGE access?
4. What sorts of speeds could I expect assuming I use an EDGE enabled device? (answered - low speed or high speed dependent on network availability and usage at the time)
5. Are there any IPs/domains or ports blocked?
Please note : I'm still NOT interested in hearing about Live TV.

Regards,
Sunil

Airtel didn't respond to this mail at all for 8 days, so I sent them this reminder.

Me:

Any update on this? It's been quite some time since I wrote to you asking for this information.
Regards,
Sunil

Lokesh (the person who finally responded the next day) didn't really feel like getting chatty like the other customer service people did, so sent this mail.

Airtel:

Dear Mr. Sunil,
You had expressed concern on Live TV for your Airtel number 9xxxxxxxxx.
We request you to kindly contact 7070 (toll free) from black berry hand sets for all the quiries about the Live Streaming.
Regards,
Lokesh
Customer Support Service
Airtel

There comes that Live TV thingy again, but a Blackberry???? What's the story on that one?

This guy really didn't want me to get any info, so pushes me off to the Blackberry and email tech support people at Airtel specifically telling me to call from "black berry hand sets". Damn... maybe he read the series and figured since I'd shelled out so much money on the two phones I've got that I wouldn't be able to get my hands on "black berry hand sets" and wouldn't call. Problem customer that I am, I tried anyway, and was instructed by the IVR to dial 121 - back to the old drawing board.

I fail to understand from all this why they would offer a service and not tell any of their customer support folks about it. I checked the link and the content of the page and it still says the same thing. One customer support person even assured me (on the phone) that there were no other charges for this service - at Rs. 299/month I would have high speed internet and would only have to pay for downloads from the Airtel portal. I'd feel a lot safer if I got this in writing in a mail or something since I've been burned in the past (and the only unlimited data card plan is 899/month for corporate customers).

Anyway, I'm sending a link to this entry to some folks at Airtel in hopes that I'll get some response (possibly even a comment) to my queries (if you'd care to check, my last reference number was 92083120782).

Later,
De.

Life is De sale

I haven't seen nearly enough of life yet... there's so much to see and so little time. The aim at the end is to maximise the amount of life you've truly lived. I've narrowed it down on occasion to dabbling in everything I've had a feeling I might like.
What is confusion? Is confusion a state where you're going for one thing, get halfway there and jump? That's not so much confusion as it is mess. Confusion is heading somewhere till you realise that there's something else - perhaps even better out there to head towards.
I've dabbled in lots of things -
music to metals,
cooking to wood,
As a bartender I'm told
I've been really good.

Building a car
out of Lego parts
won't take me far
even after it starts.

Creation's the pleasure
that makes it worthwhile.
I'd be obvious to you
by my permanent smile.

To get where you want
is a sale a De.
From this place to that
do whatever you say.

Communication begins
with a human out there.
Saying "thanks" in Japan
may get you a stare.

In Norway a fluke
may be amazing play.
You must have respect,
it's the people's way.

No dirt and no lies
is the only way to sell.
Praise it as perfume,
but get rid of the smell.

Computers are easy
to sell a concept to.
They understand only logic,
they haven't a clue.

Humans are beings,
they're hard to understand.
You need a good guide
to take you by the hand.

You learn one at a time
but learn you must.
And to you dear reader
this blog I entrust.

Ya ya! I know... It didn't finish with the general "pome" ending... realised that it's 3 in the am and aside from having to "wake up" and get out in another 4 hours or so, I've got some work to handle... love the work but it takes some time out of my life... good excuse for the delay in blogging n'est ce pas?

In the true spirito of "ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies" let me finish by saying:
I fully intend to finish this post in the next post, but may not get around to it given the fact that I'm dabbling in way too many things at the moment to commit any amount of time to any particular thing.

Damn... I just felt a tremour... Think maybe I'll get up early and finish the work.

3:10 now... good night all.