Travel Log - India!

Let me admit that I had never thought that I would go across almost India in a span of 3 months to end up writing travel log on my blog. Also, I had intended to write this as travel guide and place which are must visit in different Indian states, but I don’t think I would able to write it in that way, so will write a brief log!

Now like a fairy tale, it all began before the summer of 2010 when I was in the last semester of my MBA. That was a trip to Rajasthan via Gujarat, with 4 days in Gujarat and 7 in Rajasthan (IIM A’s 3 day program was the plan initially, however except using their dorm we hardly made any contribution there!, however luckly I got a chance again to visit IIM-A and complete a smashing leadership development program)

After going across Ahmedabad and its famous khau gallis we moved on to much awaited Rajasthan. The state is so humongous and different, that even after traveling like rodies during night and going through each of its major 6 cities (jaipur, jodhpur, jaisalmail, Udaipur, mount abu, etc) we were left with few cities to explore.

Till now things were anticipated, however post summer I was throw onto an exciting project by my employer where I was required to travel pan India for a marketing activity roll out. This particular project made me take more than 55 flights to visit in all 28 cities across India!! Starting from west zone, covering Pune, Nagpur, Aurangabad, Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara, Rajkot to north zone with Chandigarh, Delhi, Shimla, Dehradhu, Amritsar, Dharamshala, Jammu, Rohtak to east zone’s Kolkata, Raipur, et all!

It’s said to know a place you need to first know the people who reside there (However pix here are not of the people who live in India, they are travelers to that place ;-) And true to an extent it was the shortest way for me to understand their culture. Balvinder, a taxiwala from shimla gave me the entire Himachal download in our 4 hrs drive from Chandigarh to Shimla, while Gurjyot, my event manager from Punjab took me through each and every aspect of his state.

The sheer size and scope of our country had left me in AWE at the end of my travel, from the massive dessert in Jaisalmer to stunning snowfall in Dharamshala and from exceptional greenery in Ludhiana to the marvellous T3 terminal of Delhi, you have it all.

Few must visit places: Golden Temple and Wagah Border (Amritsar), Red Fort (Delhi), guru shikhar point (Mount abu), Lake palace (udaipur), Raj mandir theater (jaipur), IIM-A (Ahmadabad), lakkad bazar (shimla), Mcleod ganj (Dharamshala), vaishnodevi (jammu), vidharbha cricket stadium (Nagpur) and go into any dessert village in jaisalmer.... .. Incerdible India!

The ice-cream guide! (Mumbai)

Something which on day1 I thought was my wrong decision to work here, today when I unwind back (Today its past 2months) seems to be a pretty cool experience for me. I am talking about my summer internship at Amul’s ice-cream division. Don’t worry I won’t bore u away by writing my 2months internship biography here, this post should help you for the next time when you see that lip smacking frozen delicious delicacy. Yep, this is an ice-cream review with true to my heart details of each n every ice-cream that I consumed (over 30 I consumed and over 70 flavours I tasted for my study! And surprisingly I was on diet for this 2 month, but I did my math good and kept my calories under check by having many days by just what I call as “ice-cream lunch”!) Now considering the beauty of my blog and respecting your time spent on it shall state the best ice-creams to have at ice-cream parlours in Mumbai and the reason for same, but in reverse order

No.8: Havmore ( Swiss cake and Dry fruit flaours) it might sound a new name for few but soon you shall see it more around you. Last on my list, if you come across this parlour, you can have its dry fruit flavours which best among the all. But what i remember from this place is the swiss cake, an ice-cream cake!

No.7: Amul (Choco vanila & cheez strawberry) Ya, this is where i did my internship. I hope my guide does not see this, rank 7 (lol) The most economical ice-cream parlor you will find in Mumbai! Its higher end flavour (jst Rs.35), choco vanilla mix is cool as vanila is among the purest here and cheez strawberry is one which you should try if u are very fond of cheez.
No.6: Temptation (Blegium chocolate) this parlor will give you a massive range of 54 flavours, which includes 15 chocolate flavours. Highest to offer in Mumbai. But in this number rush do not miss to have Belgium chocolate of theirs. They import the contents for it from Belgium itself! Apart from that as i mention, a vast range of flavours to fill your tummy with snowballs.

No.5: Baskin Robbins (Gold Medal Ribbion & Rum Punch) Among the expensive ones, most of you mst have been here, howevr if missed, do taste rum punch, it does have a punch. Very franky i don’t remember gold medal ribbon flavour taste, but i have marked it among the best favour at Baskins.

No.4: Hocky Pocky (Alpen Buttersctch & Dutch chocolate dream) This New-zealand brand invented Butterscotch flavour! So best Butterscoth flavour you’ll find in Mumbai is at HOCKY POCKY. Also never did dutch chocolate tasted so awesum then at this place. Ambience is also great! Do go in during happy hours (bet 1pm to 5pm) to save money on this bit expensive ice-creams. But Thumbs up for this parlor in spite of throwing me out of their parlor during my research on them.

No.3: Dinshaw (Mello Jello and Hardrock) Surprrised! Yep i was too.. much above my expectation. This parsi run ice-cream chain, has very few parlors. But Mello jello is simple amazing for 1st timers. Its yellow and violet color makes is look funky too. Also there is a hradrock flavour range of 3, truly among the rare ones. Dont miss them if you come across a dinshaw parlour.

No.2: Naturals (Sitaphal & Thunder coconut) This preservatives free, natural content of fruit ice-cream brand knows how to maintain its brand name in Mumbai. Sitaphal is the most unique flavour of theirs. Another good one is coconut. However i personally do not enjoy them, but as per the consumer feedback goes, they all just love their seasonal fruit flavours and have forced it to keep at rank 2.

No.1: Gelato (Fer Rocher & Choco cocca almond fudge) Here comes the winner, this brand does comes out very strong, which is actually a desert but projected as ice-cream in india! Fer Rocher is their super successful flavour. The another one coco almond fudge is superb too. With 97% fat free, a rare quality to find and smooth feel, they come on top in my list. Also most flavour in their highest range (Rs.95) are worth having.

Thats all ice-cream lovers, hope you all now know which flavor to hit on at which place. Njoii...!!

The Power of Negotiation!

Well, many of us may buy the idea that, after reading a book you can save some money. Hey but dont worry, i am not selling this idea here. However what i am writting here is a true fun experience which happned to me when i actually bought this idea! I guess you lost again, ok this is about a book which i read recently called "You can negotiate anything" by author Herb Collins which actually teaches you to negotiate anything under the sky when you are willing to buy. This book's basis principle says that when you are buying someting, you are not buying it but you are selling your money to someone! Ok let me not get into its tricks and tips (howmuch ever interestings it may be) and give you a practically example of .

I had to buy two books for myself (did i said buy,hehe) and when you study at churchgate, there is no better place to find them (The prices of books/novels here at roadside stalls at Churchgate/CST range from 50 rs to anything depending on who the buyer is) But then i have to bend this price as i am supposed to be armoured with negotiation knowledge which incidently i had earlier accuire from this place itself! So here i go again and apply all the methods read in that book (like spending time with them, finding defects, showing money, etc) and after spending 45mins with the seller where normally people spend not more than 10mins, i finally manage to buy two books for 50 rs which he had initially quoted to me for 160 rs for both! During the last 5mins of deal , a girl (though beautiful she is not the one in pix :) got excited by the price i paid and started negotiating. I left for station where at ticket counter someone said hi to me, to my surprise she was the same girl, bookstall girl! i asked her, "Hi, so which books you bought?" she said "none as he asked 280 rs for her 3 books!" And as i expected she gave him price ultimatum in 5mins which never works as per my book's rule and she left empty from stall. I next asked her "did you approach me because i was around you here or you want me to negotiate and buy them for you" She candidly replied "I saw you here but to be honest i approached because back of my mind i wanted those 3books which are rare to find at good price" Well, then as there were no hidden motives we moved to the stall again but after knowing each others name, Maria is her name. Again i went there and applied those standards and tried other unused methods ones from the book, hey but this time the deal ended little early, around 30mins but results were more than good. An average price of 20 rs was achieved to sell my or rather her money to make it total of just 60 rs! Maria was more facinated by the entire process of negotiation then being happy by the deal. So by the end of total around 2hours of negotiation i could win a naturals ice-cream from the lady and her number in my friend list. Thats how the power of negotiation worked here, a few savings, ice-cream and a friend. (Hey Maria as you said i hope you really dont mind your name on my blog)

The A to Z of Disc Jockeying (DJ)

Very little i knew about this art in music and so much to my surprise i learnt about it. As i was always keen to explore this as my hobby, i took no time to take up a professional course of DJing when i found a reasonable short spell of ideal time. (By the way that pix is of worlds No.1 DJ Tiesto) I know for most, looking from a far end at a DJ who's playing music in a club or in a party/function may seem to be a cakewalk for easy money. Now for some true inside story about it, its not that easy as it looks, mark my words its not easy. Let me give you a gist of what actually a DJ does before he brings you that flawless continuous mixes of tracks.

A DJ understands a song and the music elements in it much more in detail than an ordinary person would, like he/she knows which is the baseline of the track, how the kicks are arranged and where would the tempo change. Let me give you a complex study into it, a DJ concentrates on the "Beats" of a song, 4 of which makes a "Bar", a Bar being a short and equal time frame in every song makes up 1 phrase when 4 bars taken together. That is when a DJ marks 2/4/8/16/32.. "Phrase" in a track and then this group of phrase is taken as a "Section" of that track which helps him in clean mixing of two tracks. And someone is called a DJ or rather a "good" DJ when he/she not only perfectly matches the basic beats but can matches bars, phrase and sections cleanly. Phew! sounds complicated right. yes it is. To be honest this is just a minuscule part of this art, there's loads of other tricky skills & things like scratching, beat matching, gain, equalizers, cueing.. the list is too long for this post and boring for someone who's not interested in this art.

The point i just want to put here is that when the next time you see a DJ wearing that big headphones and turning that disc on a turntable or playing on a pro-cd player remember that he is doing that easily because he/she has probably worked on that machine for few years and to be a good DJ he has cracked his head initially.

A DJ not only understands the psyche of the crowd but also controls their energy levels for creating a fireball on the dance floor. Today i understand this hobby of mine quite well and i respect the ones who has made it big or even for that matter made something out of this wonderful art. As our sir, DJ Bob used to say "Most of the people get into this field for wrong reasons" True to an extent but for whatever reason one has learnt DJing, be it for a profession or for a Hobby or to hook on the chicks who are looking the other side! Cheer for the work they have put in to give us countless foot tapping music. Well that's how this work works in an overview for you all and for me even while signing off this post I'm really enthused about getting back in there.

When girls chase guys..

Its common to see a guy or even guys trying to impress a girl. Nothing wrong, its obvious with sex ratio in India at all time low,[just kidding] but then would this equation be ever changed, not to mention that it does happens otherwise too but overall it’s the traditional way. So then just to give it a thought how things would be when girls chase guys. Let me imagine and explore this thought. When I asked few of my lady friends and also as I heard on radio fm meow, I found girls believe only 1 percent of guys are good. duh what an impression, thank you. Now in this imaginary world girls feels 99 percent of guys are good and only 1 percent are turn offs. These 99 percent guys don’t see other women’s as sex objects but see as friends or soulmates, moreover they are caring, considerate and compassionate with good sense of humor and sensibility towards their emotional and physical needs.
So then how would girls behave in such scenario? Well we will have girls hitting gym more frequently then guys [not to mention beauty clinics too] they become more humorous and flirty with finding loads of time to be spent on impressing men. We will see a girl proposing a guy much before then the guy would ever imagine. Sending them endless sweet messages all time and buying countless gifts and greetings from Archie’s shop to make them feel special. Also keeping them happy with strange sweet surprises and ya flowers in-between to keep things fresh.
Now that’s what I believe would be every mans dream which unfortunately would remain just a dream. Yes only a dream unless I think if we men apart from keeping our own good inherent traits start learning from women in detail the way to be towards others and give these wonderful species their share of love, respect and honor.

The beliefs I believe in, a piece of my mind..

I remember one of my friend studying back in America replied to my question how are you as ‘mat puch vaibhav, zindagi jeene me bada mazza aa raha hai’ [I am having a great time living life] ohh boy what an answer, rarely one hears that. Even I wondered after that call, why cant I be in smashing mood always. I think life is like a music and we simply play to it, we play to its different genres like the rock, the blues,etc. And who plays it. No wonder the almighty up there but then why cant we stay in rocking mode even in blues. Maybe we can, maybe we cannot, I don’t know but what I believe is that if try to live life in more likely way then we may ultimately liveout in rocking way. I believe all of us here have a purpose in life. Every soul has a mission and the mission is not physical but spiritual in nature. And for me spirituality is simplicity of thoughts and deeds. Sharing, caring and making the people around me feel special is what I like to do and follow everyday. I believe character is destiny because every action counts and every deed has a ripple effect. I believe one must do good things for its goodness and for ones own satisfaction.
I would like to ask god to always bless me and keep me closer to him. For me a person is a reflection of his soul. I believe god is in detail of all human existence and present everwhere [he watched me while writing and is watching you while reading] so that makes us son/daughter of god. And as his child not a single day of mine passes without praying and thanking him for whatever he has given me. Trying to make my parents proud of me keeps me ticking in right direction everyday. I believe life is a gift which gets glorious as we share and live it lively with other lives. So cheers to life.