Marriage Proposals

There is a time in life when your parents start to ask you the most dangerous question which most of you dread to hear the whole life and those are:

1.       When are you planning to get married? 

2.       Do you have any bf/gf or should we look for a boy/girl for you?

3.       You know Mr. XX son/daughter got married. When will be your turn?

And these are the times when you want to just run away from home and look for solace. The worst lots are person who do not stay with their parents but visit them after every 3 - 6 months and your conversation are on mostly about when you are going to get married.

Now fast forward a bit...you buckle down to your parents regular questions and start to look for a girl/boy (this is for who do not have bf/gf during that time)

Step 1: Create a profile up on websites or your caste has a matrimony group. Your parents duly fill up the form. With all details and an amazing profile photo of yours *smiling*. Parents tell all relatives and friends that you are ready for marriage. 

Step 2: Ok for the lucky few, you get 1000 proposals and you have to select few where you can meet them. The order in which person (from now on guy and girl will be referred to as a person) is shortlisted are

1.       Looks: Fair gets most views, darker people lesser until the person selecting is dark they are not much of a chooser.

2.       If the person is shortlisted in looks then comes studies, it is similar to job market MBA's in finance gets higher priority then comes other big education CA, Doctor, Engineers, then BCom, MCom etc

3.       You then shortlist yourself into what does the family do well the parents are more interested in that. 

4.       Then next part where does that person work or is in a business, in real world person likes stability and first priority goes to the person with a job. 

And after the full short listing you come down to 10 or more.

Step 3: Your parents will start to get connected with the friends who know the family of the shortlisted person and try to find the history and geography of the selected person and family. Now the number comes down to very few.

Step 4: Now your profile goes to the person who you liked and selected. Now the waiting part starts, you are not guaranteed that person will approve of you. But let us talk the best scenario, that person approves to a meeting.

Step 5:  Parents decide to meet at a neutral location such as a restaurant and you reach there all ready decked up to impress. The person walks in and almost you get the first impression and in your mind you decide what to say, what not to say. This is mostly like a date where you come to know about a person but with interruptions from parents if they decide to join.

Step 6: Best case scenario, so the person likes you and you that person, you continue talking on phone and meet once or twice a week to know that person better. Now here where the family are getting happy that yes there is hope. And some in few weeks and some in few months decide to slide the ring in the finger.

Now here comes my point, it is all so amazing and interesting but then we are playing a roulette betting on a number and hoping that ball lands on that, some are very firm that they want that number only while some are ready to play between the colours making them have more options. 

But in the above process what we miss to see is that a BCom person is a much better than a MBA person but what is written on paper makes us go woo before even meeting the real one. And I am a believer of you know the person the best if you travel with them, take them to some resort with common friends different rooms everyone is happy but take them for some rough terrain trip and the real person is alive. This is where you know how that person will react in a real life scenario with you and friends. And 1 trip is not enough no....you will need more than one, like some are good judge people and some just take time (like me). 

I seriously hope my parents make me go through the above process.......

Agra - Tourist and Touts Delight

Image via Wikipedia

It was nice sunny Thursday afternoon when we confirmed on the plan of going to Agra from Gurgaon (this is where i have being staying for sometime now). Come saturday morning we wake up with our general laziness and pack our bags for the big trip to Agra and Fatehpur Sikri.

We reach Faridabad/Ballabhgarh Bus Depot which is on the Delhi Agra highway and we were on a budget trip we get a Madhya Pradesh Parivahan and we enter we see no place to sit. Never do that by mistake, never take a bus which is going to another state from your preferred location you will never get a seat. The ticket cost Rs. 120 till the outside gate of Taj Mahal after a smooth ride and good lunch at Baanke Bihari hotel which would not be my first choice to stop but note: this is where all the State Transport Bus Stops. We get down from the bus @ 5 pm after some time we realized we were a bit too late. Read below to know more.

Taj Mahal is open till 7 almost but last ticket is at 6 pm and it gets dark and no point in going inside. Well let me move back a bit, we got down from the bus and there was a smiling rickshaw (auto for Delhi people) wala waiting for us.
Now comes the best salesman pitch you can ever hear.....(let me call him Bunty)
Bunty: Good evening sir, where do you want to go?We: Taj Mahal, how much?
Bunty: Sir, only Rs. 10
We: Cool, lets get in,
Bunty (after getting into the rickshaw): Sir i would like to say that no bags are allowed in Taj Mahal. Where are you staying?
We: A friend of us told us some place (saying the hotel names reading from the sms which I had received)
Bunty: Sir, those place are not good, I will show you a better place and then you can go to see Taj Mahal once you put the bags away.
We: How much will you charge?
Bunty: Sir only Rs. 30We drive in some bylanes, mini lanes of Agra and reach a place Baluganj where we find Lavania Vilas in our budget well over our budget but in our effort to reach Taj we made the deal, put our bags and then on our way to Taj Mahal.
Bunty: So sir, Agra is a very beautiful place and there are so many things to buy and see such as Saris made from Banana and Bamboos
We: ohhhh! (we were delighted because we have never heard of saris made from banana and bamboos)
Bunty: Sir, Agra is famous for Leather shoes, there is a small market for shoes also.
We: Ohhh! (shoes, that too leather all men like it)
Bunty: Then I will take you for dinner. What would you like to eat?
We: Well, what is famous in Agra?
Bunty: Sir, everything Indian, Mughlai, Chinese etc etc
We: mmmm we will think about it.
Bunty: Now sir we have reach Taj Mahal but as the line is too big outside, I shall take you to a person who will give you the tickets but you have to pay Rs. 5 extra.
We: Rs. 5 no big deal ok.

We did our Taj Mahal trip and awwed in wonder, stories from the guide (who give exams to get UP Guide License). Tool lots of photographs and then, sir you should buy mini Taj Mahal, we go in UP handloom shop just outside Taj Mahal and bought 1 mini Taj Mahal for Rs. 100 and after just 10 steps the same product was sold for Rs. 50 (note: do not buy anything in the first store check out other shops compare and then buy)

Bunty: Sir, how was the trip?
We: It was nice. Bunty: Now sir the famous sari store.
We: Bunty, how much is the whole trip going to cost us?
Bunty: Sir, only Rs. 250



Well if you read from the second line of Rs. 10 we paid Rs. 250 and if we had taken rickshaws stop by stop it would not have cost us Rs. 100. Agra is a small place, decide a place and get down there and say bye bye to your auto rickshaw wala. Because it is like a spider web, but the spider is a smiling rickshaw driver who with good talks will take you to places which he intends you should see. If you want to read we ended up buying Saris for our near and dear without us having any knowledge of it coming up in the next post.

So as my title says, Tourist and Touts delight, there are so many things to see in Agra which millions website have shown but there are only few who write the real thing and this is the real thing.

Once Upon A Time in Mumbai - Review

This is a story of a time when Peru (Guava) used to cost only 25 paise.

Sultan Mirza a person who had come from Chennai aka Madras that time to Mumbai made sure he made friends instead of enemies in his line of work which would make it easy for everyone to work. He was one of those guys who did not like bad things to Mumbai aka Bombay.

Then comes in Shoib Khan who with the attitude it is "My Way or the Highway" wants to reach the top and want to go there fast by hook or crook.

That is the background of the main character, now the movie well I was expecting some fundoo action or else some smart moves by main characters but what I got in the initial part was a Love Story of both characters which was totally baseless in the movie. What I think is director was short of story and wanted to add glam and bore the audience added Rihanna and Mumtaz. Well Rihanna aka Kangana does not know how to act (this is her first movie which I have seen) and Mumtaz aka Prachi Desai was really OK!

In second half, I thought more action would be on the way but no it was just same boring stuff and then the expected happened Shoib Khan goes to rival gang and does not like what Sultan does to him. To all fairness what Sultan did was slap Shoib, I thought now some gangwar will happen who will have the upper hand etc etc but no, Sultan wants to do a rally, I mean wtf yep he did give a good speech but no use sir.

For the background score Mr Pritam just ripped of Marlyn Manson Beautiful People song and songs were not required in this.

So all my hopes got dashed where I was expecting to see a good movie but it ended in a duh! and Bore! and and...the movie could have got over in one hour if the romance would not happen.

Visapur Trek - How to reach there?

Not going to dwell on the history of the place called Visapur which is a fort next to all famous Lohaghad and Bhaje Caves. But here, will be giving you the details on how to reach there and what to do.

Best Option: Take a car and drive down towards Lonavala, take the second exit of Lonavala and move towards Pune you will find a Junction on the right is Malavali Station, go towards the station and drive down to Bhaje Village where you get an option to Pay and park.

Good Option: Take a Intercity Train from Dadar at 7 am, make sure you do the booking and get a reserved seat because it is one big problem in General will not cost more that Rs. 60 from Dadar to Lonavala. If the train is on time you should reach Lonavala at 9 am. Get down at Lonavala station and from there you have 2 options
Expensive Option: Well this one is a faster option as well, take a rickshaw from the station and they drop you near Malavali station (which is 12Kms from Lonavala Station) at Rs. 150 for 3 seats or if you want to continue take the same rickshaw to Bhaje Village which is another 4 Kms and charges will be crazy.
Cheaper Option: This one takes time because you will have to wait for a local train which runs between Pune to Lonavala every hour. Take one at 10:05 am, tickets will not cost more than Rs. 6 and in 5 minutes you will reach Malawali Station

OK Option: Take an Asiad or ST from Dadar station and get down at the junction of Malawali, which god only knows how long will it take and then take Rickshaw till Bhaje Village from the Junction.

On reaching Bhaje Village which is 4 kms from Malavali station you have lots of option to eat and drink like tea, coffee, misal pav, vada pav, bhaji pav which are very decent. There are no big restaurants but small ones which will serve you the basic.

Right now the actual trek starts, there are two ways to reach Visapur one is via Patan Village which is short but more tiring and other is via Bhaje Caves, longer but faster.
Via Bhaje, till reach a point where the trail to Visapur and Lohaghad changes it is a very simple route just and zig zag incline walk for which you can take shortcuts which are small and bit tiring but you reach faster.
After the new trail starts it is a very simple walk where you see on your left the massive Visapur fort.
There will be a small left on the way to Visapur top where you have to pass through a jungle which is a 20 mins walk up and then reach a point where water is flowing. This is tricky part where one has to be very careful of not putting your feet on the loose stones and taking care of the moss. Reaching the top from the start of the waterfall is around half an hour in good weather (which means sun is not shining hard).

The fort itself is so huge that you will need atleast an hour to survey the surroundings. You can also just relax and have lunch on the fort itself.

Coming down is a tricky part again you have to come down by the same route and be sure of your footings and look out for moving rocks. Once you are down you can go towards Lohaghad and there are many many eateries outside local people house and they you awesome food.

Coming back: If you have a car then just go back the way you have come. Other options are go to Lonavala Bus Station and get anyone of the bus which goes to Mumbai. Or go to the station and get into a train which is coming from Pune like Intercity but they arrive very early around 5:30 pm something or hire a cab, if there is a group of 7 or 8 you will get a Sumo @Rs. 1500 till Sion.

Well this is it...Visapur

Two Songs you should wake up to

In this life we always want more and more, if we have a Mercedes we want a Ferrari and if we have a one bhk in the crowded Mumbai suburbs we want two bhk in upscale Bandra complex.

These two songs which i think everyone should wake up to, yes i know it is not the ideal world but the words are so simple and surely it can make you smile through the day.

Good Morning World by Dean Martin:


Don't Worry Be Happy by Bobby McFerrin

(could not embed) the video

Two of my all time favorites......which is a must on Monday Morning!!

Have a great time

INCEPTION - No Review

There are 1000 post and blogs flying around the internet praising the movie and the director, well most of them had to praise about it because at one point of time even the actress in the movie got confused on what the hell were they doing and whose dream were they getting into.

I really loved the movie in one sense which is something never tried before and this has got lot of people thinking and talking about kicks, dreams, sub consciousness, limbo etc etc. What is interesting is how the concept got flowing and how it had being created into one of the masterpiece of the year where lot of people will still talk about it.

What more interesting is you can dream in a dream which people do talk about but they have taken it to another level.

Indian movies have done this a very very long time back if you do not believe me check this video out



I hope you get it what I mean here....our own Hrishi Da the legendary film-maker has thought about this even before Nolan started to learn how to pee in the loo all by himself

Power The Hotel - Eat for Free

Article taken from BBC World website.

A Danish hotel is offering a free meal to any guest who is able to produce electricity for the hotel on an exercise bike attached to a generator.

36% of Copenhageners cycle to work each day

The Crowne Plaza Hotel in Copenhagen says the idea is to get people fit and reduce their carbon footprint.
Guests will have to produce at least 10 watt hours of electricity - roughly 15 minutes of cycling for someone of average fitness.
The hotel already produces renewable energy with solar panels on its facade.
Guests staying at Plaza Hotel will be given meal vouchers worth $36 (26 euros; £23) once they have produced 10 watt hours of electricity, hotel spokeswoman Frederikke Toemmergaard told the BBC News website.
"Many of our visitors are business people who enjoy going to the gym. There might be the odd person who will cycle just to get a free meal, but I don't think people will exploit the initiative overall," she added.
The bicycles will have iPhones attached to the handlebars measuring how much power is being generated for the hotel.
The plan, a world-first, will be launched on 19 April and run for a year, the hotel says. Only guests staying at the hotel will be able to take part.
Copenhagen has a long-standing cycling tradition and 36% of locals cycle to work each day, one of the highest percentages in the world, according to the website visitcopenhagen.dk
"Because Copenhagen is strongly associated with cycling, we felt the bicycle would work well as a symbol of the hotel's green profile," Ms Toemmergaard said.
US environmental website treehugger.com recently voted Copenhagen the world's best city for cyclists.
If successful, the electric bicycle meal programme will be extended to all Crowne Plaza hotels in the UK, the hotel said in statement.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8621038.stm