Chandrakant Pandey has been asked to leave. He was found using the company resources, time and money for searching a better job on naukri.com. He has apologized but it is too late. Too late to restore our faith in anything and anyone. So while we are busy ensuring that the salaries get paid, the heaters work in the office and the meals are served in a clean and hygienic manner, our team is busy looking for better options. What can one say to this? Kya bol sakte hain? Best of luck Chandrakant. Let us see who turns out  to be a winner. The race is not yet over. And while you keep looking for better opportunities and jobs, you will miss what is right on front of you. All the best, nevertheless.

I think animals would be more loyal. Just that we cannot train them to do GIS. What a pity. Yes we are poor. Very poor. As a society, as a nation, as people, as a generation. We have no values, no integrity. And that is the worst form of poverty. The rest does not matter.

Altaf aaya tha. job chahiye. Mar raha hoon. Job de diya. And then what?He harmed us at the first opportunity. Chandan aaya tha. Kuch bhi nahin aata tha. Mauka diya seekhne ka. kaam karne ka. Kya kiya. Peeth piche waar kiya. Hit us behind our backs. Ritesh aaya. Jobless. Unemployed. Just a lot of gas in his ballon of ego. chance diya. Vishwas kiya. what did he do. He masterminded the hacking of our sites and e-mails to damage us and start his own company. Accha nahin kiya guys. You have just harmed the next team at GC, the next generation. In place of creating more freedom for them, you have ensured that the next team will get limited rights and limited opportunities in a limited space. You have killed the faith that we worked so hard at building and maintaining. Well done. Khush raho. Live with the history you have created. Job to mil hi jayega. Repeat your performance again. And blame GC, blame me. Thoda bojh kam ho jayega.

Focussing on building a new team. Again. And again. No idea what to look for. How to judge. Hariom is shortlisting a few candidates. He is the only team member left. Its me and him with the housekeeping staff and the guard to give us company. Good. So far so good.

Back to zero.

Zero, a good number. An auspicious number. Anything can be done with a ‘zero’. There are immense possibilities.

‘Zero’.

Ashok has apologized and is back in the team. I truly hope this team has what it takes to win a match, a battle. Let me correct that. Not ‘a match’ but a series of ‘matches’. Not ‘a battle’ but a series of battles. Every moment, every day, every month and every year.
Had a meeting in Dwarka yesterday with Mr. Dhunta. He has written many books and is a known authority on ‘GPS’. I am hoping he can help us with some much needed ‘gyan’ on the working of the instruments at the airports. The larger part of the day was spent in travelling for the meeting and hence the rations for the office were bought by the office boys. Good for me.

There is a sense of emptiness. A void inside. And it seems nothing can fill it. name,fame,money. wine,women,wealth. The void refuses to go. And yet we keep running. towards something, away from ourselves. Running fast provides us with a false illusion of doing something worthwhile. It does not matter what we are running for. The direction in which we are runing. All that matters is the running. Bacause stopping can be much more painful. To stop would mean that we would need to do a reality check on our lat-long. To accept where we are. And then to change that. And that would take herculean effort. It may also mean losing our illusions leading to pain. And so, to avoid pain and loss, we keep running.

Appu has hurt her toe in the dance performance and we may need to a visit to the doctor. OK. What needs to be done, needs to be done. There is water in the house. And atta. The plants are ok. And the rent for this month is paid. So far so good.

Get work. Do it. Get the money. pay the bills. and then pay the taxes. And somewhere in the middle of all this, convince ourselves that we are happy. That we are doing great. Urban chaos.

Searching for a larger motive to be. Search.

Still searching.

Appu is in Kashipur with her grandparents and I hope she is having a good time. She has experienced so much chaos with me recently. She was not well before leaving for Kashipur and I had to take her to a doctor in the night. (I mean we always visit the doctor in the night, well past midnight in fact). We also had to run to catch the train. She reached safely and I guess all is well that ends well. I rushed back to the office for the pooja.

My father called yesterday and asked me to visit them on the weekend, specially because it was festival time. I decided to spend a few hours with my parents this weekend, despite all that has happened. However, he called me up this morning to say that the doors of their house were closed to me as I had not attended the 25th marriage anniversary organized by them. Also that I needed to apologize to my brother for not being present. Immediately all thoughts of a family re-union evaporated from my head. If I have felt insulted all my life and decided not to participate in a meaningless show of pomp and glory to protect my self-respect, I do not think it is a cause for begging forgiveness. Such is the spiritual poverty in my family of origin. There is anger. There is a lot of emotional pain. Ok. back to the basics. Cannot get bread from a hardware store. Another harsh reminder.
Trying to soak in the reality of my life. Real is painful. But it feels good to have my feet planted firmly on the surface of the earth.

I was very exasperated with Om Prakash and Chandra Kant for not being able to understand the concepts fast. It is not their fault but I think I am getting impatient. I just need to take it easy. Let time take time. The pieces will fall in place. Let the universe do its job. I just need to get out of the way. And stay out.

There is nothing to say really.
More and more I do not understand how the world works, how the countries work, how the society works and how the family runs. I am a misfit.
What would be worth living for? Worth dying for? Except Appu of course.

Maybe its time for me to go. To take the exit route.

The same is with girls and women who are forced into postitution due to abandonment by the men in their lives (father,brother,husband). First they are abandoned and forced to earn a living the way they do (maybe they have no other skills) and then they are penalized for making money the only way they know how to. The cops harass them, use them and mistreat them for being the dregs of society. And what about the men buying their services. Are they not be blamed. If buying drugs is an offence then buying sex should also be an offence (since sex is a million times more powerful drug than any other). I for one, do not understand the laws of this country. In place of punishing the men who left them in the first place, in place of discouraging the men who buy their services, we punish the women who are already a punished lot. So the unsaid law is ‘jo mar raha hai usko aur maro’. The one who is dying should be killed. Punish the already punished. Because they have no strength to retaliate.

The bank. Of course ‘The Bank’. The papers for the renewal of the limit have been submitted. I think I have already mentioned that before. Initially they were convinced. they were happy that we were doing OK. Now suddenly they have developed cold feet since our balances have dwindled. The bank is very much like the society we live in. The moment the amount of money in our pocket or accounts goes down, everyone is jittery around us. The scale of our respectability goes down. We should have known it. ‘paise ki bhasha’. Show money to get money. Does not matter if you have not earned it. Does not matter if its deserved or not. Get the money somehow. Ajeeb chakkar hai. So we will see ( as always). We have not died. As yet. I mean its a necessary condition but definitely not sufficient. Meaning that we have not really lived in style but we have been alive.

Varun has left in two days. More and more we are becoming like the ‘Roadies’ reality show on TV. It is difficult for people to be with us for a long time (to jhelo us). It could be anything. Maybe they were flirting with the company in the first place, maybe they did not really need a job, maybe its male ego again, or the pressure to work independently, or the timings, or the food or me.Thats like a big ‘ME’. I am the biggest problem in GC.
So now we have Om Prakash who is handling the respnsibilities very well. Chandrakant who has taken up the challenge of understanding the MOCA guidelines. Balmiki who is filling in as an HR/Admin guy and Ashok who is working on the software development. I mean this is the smallest we could ever get but we are holding on. I am hoping that this will be the core team around which the other team members can be built.

The ‘atta’, ‘chawal’ for the office is still to be bought. Appu got the’diyas’for the office and the house She also finalized the T-shirts with the GC logo to be gifted on the occasion of Diwali. Some lighting has been done in the office. We might even do a small ‘havan’ in the office on the day of Diwali. Could not do any pooja while moving in as our time to vacate the last leased space had run out.

Work, projects still elude us. First things first. Maybe building the team is our first priority. Then the work will happen. My father called. To say that he could not visit me as he could not get a chance to slip away from mom. Old story. With a new title. each time.

It is Diwali time and everything is on sale. Things, people, relationships. The newspapers are full of advertisements. Every word is screeching out, ‘buy,buy,buy’. As if ‘buying’ is all there is to Diwali. Cleaning of the house is a must even if the hearts stay dirty. At least the minds and hearts cannot be seen. Ok I am a mad person. Nothing makes sense to me. maybe I am just rambling on.

To create some sanity from the chaos around.

‘A chaotic sanity’ , so to say.

Architects are finally waking up to the reality that just CAD drawings are not sufficient. That it is important to link them to the surface of the earth for realistic outputs. So we may have them working with us as a team rather than against. Finally, we have a small (really tiny) project in Mumbai. Like an icebreaker. A they say, something is better than nothing.
At least some of the bills (the age old story) will get paid.

Many invitations for all kinds of conferences all over. Have no wish to attend. Fake it to make it all the time. Paste a smile, look and act successful and keep exchanging cards. Any robot could do that. There should be better ways to market one’s work and connect (if shaking hands and eating together can be called connecting).

Appu has been experiencing mood swings and is not going to college today. I wish I knew how to support her better emotionally. Life and living. Entirely different realms.
We are on an even keel now. The accounts are getting under control. PHBAAS and the online shop are in process. Hopefully, the payment gateway issue should be closed by next week.
I have to believe that what we are being able to do on a daily basis is sufficient. If it is the best we can do on a given day, it is alright. There is no need to push ourselves to do harder. We just need to keep doing what we can on an everyday basis. Easier said than done.

We have two boys for housekeeping in the evening shift. They have worked in the Air Force and whenever we pack up in the night, they always sign off by saying ‘Jai Hind’. It feels good. It is strange. There is always a sense of pride in saying and hearing this salutation.

‘Jai Hind’

PHBAAS, the thematic map showing maximum permissible height (according to AAI guidelines) for any given site in the city of Mumbai has been launched and we are hoping that it will generate a lot of interest in the real estate developers and architects. And hopefully we will be able to shift from being daily wage labourers to real engineers. Right now our life hangs between the start and end of a project.

The vendor who was supposed to integrate the payment gateway with our online shop has mis-behaved and hence the agreement with him stands cancelled. Kamakhya is searching for another vendor. The vendor who will provide us with the payment gateway has been finalized and freezed. So at least part of the work is done. The time it takes to convert an idea, a concept to a working reality is herculean. That is why it is so easy to give up at any stage. Cannot see the results or even hope for them for a long time.

There is ‘aloneness’ and there is ‘emptiness’. And I am not being able to connect to a Higher Power at all. There is a sense of agitation and meaninglessness. It is also dawning on me that my mother is a very ambitious woman and hence she moulded my brother on the basis of her own idea of a successful man. So he could never really be anyone or anything else. He has not been a brother at all, I wonder if he has been a father and son too.

After a very long time, we have an enquiry from a client. So that is good news. So far so good. Hopefully, we should be able to close it. A very small job but work is work. And revenue is revenue, all said and done.

Another day. Another hour. I have just suited up, booted up and showed up. My productivity levels are at an all time low. But after the trough, there should be a crest. That is how a wave is defined.

Surviving the trough.

I have behaved very badly with Appu this sunday and she is very sure that I need some counselling and/or psychiatric help to deal with my abandonment issues. Maybe she is right. I may be a borderline personality with no control over my reactions. I will need to think about this. Cannot, should not harm people around me, specially those who love me.

The interface for the online shop is ready and finally it is ready to be launched. Thank God for that. The mess is disappearing, piece by piece. Hopefully on the outside as well as the inside. The jingle to be played on FM has also been recorded and hopefully we should be able to air it on August 8 as planned. That would be a huge achievement. The only achievement in quite some time, I must say.

There has been no water supply in the house since yesterday. Ok, so the tanker has to be called. Its just more stress to deal with. All the bills for this months have been paid. That is quite a relief. Next month is still a week away. dekh lenge. As always. The big stuff has always been unmanageable. So we will tackle the small stuff. The daily routine. The part that is manageable. It is very tempting to compare our progress with that of other people who plan larger and more spectacular things in life but we need to remember that even maintaining the daily routine has been a challenge for us. To keep a roof over our heads, to have an office to work from, to ensure that the meals are prepared in the house and office, to ensure that there is enough money for the bills and that they get paid on time, has been huge for us. The rest will happen when it has to.

What is there to possess? what is there to say ‘mine’ and ‘thine’.
The best in the universe is available for all. The air we breathe, the sky, the earth we walk on, the water.

To God, with love.

Shikha is not being able to be a part of the team. She continues to think that she is different, that she is being unjustly treated and that no one recognizes her work. And her thoughts are creating her reality for her and affecting the environment in the office. Low self esteem is the deadliest and most silent killer. And there is no way to reach her as she has closed all the doors and windows of her heart and mind. Tough one. Maybe we are losing her. maybe we have already lost her. Maybe she has lost herself.

Chennai is moving. The site is smaller but the work is multiple times that of a larger site it just remind us that the ‘smallness’ of things can never define the ‘largeness of their being’. That size can be very deceptive whether it is that of ‘achievement,possessions,character or life’.
Paul is unavailable as of now so the online shop is in limbo. We are cartographing maps which need to be floated but the actual launch of the shop is stalled for the time being. Fingers crossed.
No more leakage in the pantry. The toilets are working. The UPS is working. And the punching machine is working. Unbelievable. We also have a metal detector now to scan bags for a pendrive and/or CD. So the guard is entertained (its just to keep him busy).

The lease of the house is over and I am hoping that it can be renewed, at a higher rent of course so that we do not have to move. Hopefully there will be more clarity by the end of next week else it is pack up time again. I think it would be best to live in a tent and move that to another location as and when required. I mean most of us slog through our lives to just buy land for a house or a house itself and that money could be used for travelling and other more meaningful pursuits in life. OK. That is wishful thinking. The lease and the house. get the focus back.

Need to do some homework for the college admissions for Appu. Maybe today. There is always a fear of the unknown. The ‘known’, even when uncomfortable is familar territory. It is very difficult to move from the realm of the ‘known’ to that of the ‘unknown’ whether it is work,relationships,career or life.

To stop moving. To just be. Wherever one is.
To get the bearings right. To check the direction of movement.

To pause and to reflect.

Yahaan se wahaan tak. Kahaan se kahaan tak. From here to there. From where to where. Kyun. kaise. And why. And how. Dreams versus reality. sky versus the earth. take your pick.make your choices. either way. if we become too real, people leave us alone. pretty much. people are happy in a dream world and wish to have no connect with what is real, what is obvious. Guess it would be too painful, emotionally.

There are too many ants in the kitchen. Noticed them while making tea. That is all I make, well mostly specially when appu is not here. The plants are still alive in the house. So something must be ok about this house. Sarees, pearls, looks, all belong to a long (mostly forgotten)distant past for me. Each dropped somewhere along the path chosen.

The lease of this house is getting over. Time to pack up I guess. Once again. Pack up time always comes. whether for shifting or quitting life. Dekhenge as always. Faith. There is a roof today and there will be a roof tommorrow. To surrender completely is so frightening. Even though controlling brings no outcomes, it provides a sense of power (useless though it is).

Pack up time can come. anytime.

Good to remember that.

Work is happening ( as in ‘happening’). There is ‘work’. So hopefully, the ‘money’ will follow. Getting ‘respect’ would be another story altogether. ‘Respect’ is fast becoming an ‘unknown word in our lexicon.

Everyone is eagerly waiting to shift to the new office (which has a larger space). Of course a lot of work is still pending (which also means that a lot of money is still required for the makeover). And we do not wish to stop work here as there are deadlines for the projects we have undertaken.

Too much time on this earth could be detrimental. It would be nice to just experience life, do what one has to do and leave it to the younger generation to create something better and more worthwhile.

I have been thinking ( that is what I do most of the time anyway) that most of us live in a dream most of the time (just like in ‘Inception’). We live in a dream created by us for years, maybe generations at the second or third level. And it is a comfortable world. We believe what we wish to believe. The ‘reality’ is too heartbreaking, too painful. So we prefer to stay in a makebelieve world where all is well and nothing changes, day after day. Until a crisis happens to break that comfort level. And we are forced to face reality. And the facade breaks.

So maybe it is important that the facade remains intact. Of a happy family, of a successful life, of a ‘happening’ political and democratic system, of power, of being in control. The other side would be too scary to show. Just like the slums of a country or the ‘poor’ of a family. Now the poverty could be ‘financial’ or ‘emotional’. It has to be hidden. Behind lies, drugs, clothes,cars.

The ‘show’ must go on.