My early morning walks

This is about my commute to work during the 2 years when I worked as a production engineer at Widia, Bangalore. I worked earlier in the regular business hours and later moved to production department where I worked in weekly shifts of either 6AM-2PM(first shift) or 2PM-10PM(second shift). First shift commute was always a challenge because I lived 20 miles away and the nearest pickup point for my company bus was about 3 miles away.
I used to walk few days or my dad dropped me on his scooter. The last option or backup was traveling by my motor cycle. The bus would arrive at my pickup point around 4:55-5:00 and there was no waiting for any employee. If I missed the bus, the only option was to hitchhike a ride in another company's bus up to the point where I can get public transport or our own company bus in the different route.

On the days I walked to the stop, I would be up by 3:45 AM and leave home around 4:15 to start walking. The roads were empty, sparingly lit. The only company I had during those hours - milk supply guys distributing the milk in the local area and stray dogs! . Some of you might not know, stray dogs are rampant in Bangalore. Step in to any area, you will find scores of dogs on the roadside. Some how in the early hours, these dogs don't like people walking on the roads and bark or sometimes attack people. So while walking 3 miles, I had to be watchful in the 4-5 points where there was major concentration of dogs. May be the dogs are also scared of strangers at that hour. It all used to start with one alert dog blowing the whistle. Rest of the team would gradually join in the barking spirit and the enterprising ones would dare to get up and approach me. Even though we had 2 dogs at home, I am some how scared of stray dogs even to this day. So I would offer all the prayers, lift my 2 hands up and get ready for any onslaught. I knew I should not run to invite more trouble, I simply slowed down or stopped for a brief while and then proceed. But those tense moments would later result in self reflection and I used to think is this job that worth at all? I was not the one who quits for such things, I would dismiss these thoughts and go on with the life.
The other risk of walking at that hour was getting mugged or robbed. At that time Koramangala was a quiet and upcoming suburb and had a fewer population, so walking at early hours was considered risky. So while walking I had to keep an eye on any approaching vehicle(s). Fortunately nothing untoward incident happened except once when a car followed me briefly for about 10 mins.
I was lucky to have a coworker live near by. When our shifts matched, the bus would come very close to my place about less than a mile. That's because he belonged to a different department that worked round the clock and he had bargained long enough to get this transport deal.

Thanks to all those tough days, today I have no problem or no complaints in getting up early. One thing remains that stray dog issue in Bangalore is still not completley resolved. Bangalore dogs still rule the early hours and late nights. Some interim solutions were in force, however a majority of the suggestions are turned down in the name of animal cruelty.

Coming to America - Final Post

This is the concluding post of earlier "Coming to America" post. This post is all about how a typical Indian working in US ( read H1-B or L1) settles down after arriving in the US and how he/she moves on.
"Visibility" of the assignment drives all major purchases. Visibility I mean here is the most likely duration of the customer engagement, employer's location & policies and the individual's long term plans of staying in US. A person coming on a short term assignment would prefer to keep his investment to the minimum. Friends/Colleagues offer immense advice /help in setting up the home, help in moving furniture and complete all other legal / official formalities like getting SSN, updating some federal forms, setting up payroll information/opening bank account, etc. The first few weeks or months goes away in adjusting to the commute/work culture/work time/work pressures.
Some of the common initial milestones or challenges;

• Learning to drive & getting a driver's license, Finding a decent accommodation(preferably with some Indian community around), Get used to public transport modes if car is not feasible
• Initial home setup - As always, Walmart is the favorite
• Work Related - Initial days require lot of interactions with the customer teams. So meeting new people, remembering their names & designations. Lucheon meetings and dinner meetings with the customer teams are common. Vegeteraian Indians feel like fish out of water because it takes a while to understand the veggie options in the menu. Some people are shy to ask for what they want.

Once the individual spends few months, he / she gets used to the local environment and is now ready for travel around USA. Refer to my earlier post, theertayatra in America...so there is a list of must see destinations and friends /family to visit. Meanwhile, some people are blessed with children and most often the grand parents come over from India for offering moral support and help during the initial months. Some individuals pursue the green card option to continue staying in the US. Getting a green card is a major milestone for many people and this will lead to home /upgrading or buying a better car. People who are not in the green card race will eventually move back to India.
Bottom Line: Apart from technical expertise, goodies like communication, presentation, networking & other skills go a long way in making the stay more comfortable, challenging and successful.

Just a Note; The subject of this post is so vast, I've picked only few points to end this post here!.

Beijing Olympic Games 2008!

The count down has already begun and the next Olympic Games are coming up in less than a year from now. Other day the local FM station featured an interview with a US journalist stationed at Beijing. Amongst other things, following caught my attention;

• Chinese federal and state authorities have begun urging people to follow queue system while making getting in to public transport systems, banks, post offices, etc. There will be few volunteers on the street helping people to "fall in line".
• Spitting - Chinese authorities have begun educating people not to spit in the public places and instead use plastic bags or spit in the trash cans
• Cab drivers in Beijing are being encouraged to learn at least 50-100 english phrases like "hi how are you?". A lot of cabbies are seen playing the lessons tapes when they are free.

Way to go Beijing...Check out the Olympic games related details in the following LINK.

Lost & Found

Do you misplace something at home and find it after few days? Well,that happens to me a lot of times. At first it's all funny, later on turning in to frustration & disappointment. It appears some items get misplaced in the hour of their need and to re establish their importance. In my own experience it is usually the small, inexpensive stuff that normally gets misplaced. The above thoughts came to me as I just discovered a misplaced treasure..Remote controls of the TV & the cable TV.
These days sometimes we've gone a day without watching TV. So a day went by with the normal search without yielding any results. Next day,the heat gradually caught on and we finished searching all the other obvious places and it wasn't there. Unfortunately,the cable TV unit was turned off which deprived us of watching at least one channel. Our patience levels reached its limits on the end of day 2..we simply could not figure out where to search for the remote control...we had finished looking in all the closets(just in case they were buried in some other stuff,behind the window blinds,my daughter's toy bag,kitchen, etc. One hope was it was within the house and not disposed off with the trash. On the morning of the day 3, I got this strange feeling that I did not check under the sofa. So some exercise in moving the sofa,bending and looking down did not yield any results. One last elimination point was under the sofa cushions...which again did not help. I decided one last try and literally ran my hand across the tiny space between the sofa seat and the back rest...My hand felt 2 familiar objects and I was way too happy. So there it was...the2 remote controls tucked away in the secret location.

Somehow this is the most hilarious and frustrating lost & found incident in the recent past.I am sure most of us experience similar incidents in our daily lives. It takes sometime to realize that an item is misplaced, some time is spent plainly scanning the normal places and postponing the search. It reaches its zenith when the frustration limits are reached and upon finding the item, there is that moment of relief & celebration!.

Toothbrush!

At my place, me & my wife get a new toothbrush at the same time.Because of this timing,similar model,location(placed in the same holder) it takes me a day or two to get to the correct one. Sometimes this leads to a sort of funny/semi-serious arguments.

Flash black 25-30 years ago, we(I mean my family only) were not changing our tooth brush as often as we do now.That was typical of many Indian middle income families those days. Why? reasons might be many;cost, availability, need, lack of awareness, etc.Those days toothbrush cost considerable amount, even though it was not very expensive. Also to create awareness and demand, there were not so many dentists or many manufacturers in the market. Add to this, there was no TV at our home.Many toothpaste manufacturers also produced or made available their own brand of toothbrush. Some of the toothpaste manufacturers offered free brush along with the toothpaste purchase.

My grand father's place used to be the common meeting point for all cousins during summer holidays. So there used to be a crowd of over 10-12 people during summer and some how we all had a way of identifying our respective tooth brush. One simple way was to put in the the same place every day and not disturbing the position of other brushes. As kids we curiously observed other brushes and each one had a story to tell.Some had their bristles bent left/right or in both directions, some were simply wearing away waiting for retirement.

Today's Toothbrush:Toothbrush industry is well established and offers numerous varieties of toothbrush for kids & adults. Electric tooth brush seems to be selling very well these days.Read the latest developments in the following LINK

My future dream: That day is not far where I just need to go to bathroom, put my chin on/in a device & press a switch. A computer guided toothbrush will go in do all the work. Wow...there could be a combo device which will do tooth brushing and shaving one after & another!