Just a complaint

I am the poorest rich man I know.

(NOTE: rest of this post is in poor taste, Caveat Lector)

I raced out of my house today, and went to the pump to fill my car’s tank. Halfway through the fill, I realised I didn’t have my credit card on me. I told them to stop filling, paid them 300 bucks, and left my drivers license and pan card with them. Went back home to pick up some more money, returned, and gave it to them.

That leaves me with 10 rupees in my wallet. No lunch today. Oh well. And my bank balance currently stands at -110 rupees. God I hope I get paid soon - (even after which - there are debts to be paid). Argh.

Like I said, the poorest rich person I know…..

Another ray of hope…

Can’t think of an Economist-style sub-heading…

In the battle of Delhi vs Bombay (of course, most Bombay-ites pretend there isn’t one. Whatever), Delhi wins on the airport front, because you don’t see the massive slums lining the side of the airport. What you will get to see these days is a broad 4-lane-on-either-side highway, with a few choke points (where the highway is still being built), and other points where the traffic flows at about 120 kilometres/hour (or 60 miles/hour for the cavemen out there).

Now what they also will see is a new airport.

I present this and this to you….

A Pat on the back.

Vindicated

To all the naysayers, I say HA! This blog’s title has for the most part been ridiculed as idealistic.

2.5-world? scoff scoff blah blah burp burp

Well to all of yooz, I say:

BAH!

and

HA!

A rant on slave labour

I can’t leave my job….

So this is a general ramble.

First off, I have now been rejected by Google twice, within one year. This, you have to admit is a remarkable achivement. It’s even more remarkable than applying to ISB three times, getting admission on the third try, and then foolishly rejecting it for the Melbourne Business School. But such is life.

On top of that, I have realised just how chained the Indian labour market is. We all know that the Indian Labour market is horribly over-regulated, and this is why there are no jobs here - although in this booming economy, that’s not quite so true. But let me put it like this - I joined my old company - HCL basically because I didn’t want to be unemployed while hunted for a more appropriate job. Right now, I am a Project Lead. This means I get yelled at by a few people, and yell at a few more. But I want to get an MBA job, which means I get yelled at by one person, and yell at a lot of people. So anyways, I found a job that will allow me to do that - I will be joining IBM as an associate consultant.

Ok, so far, nothing more than the regular self-absorbed post you can expect from me. Now what pisses me off here, is that even after having spent only 14 business days at HCL, I am chained to them - I HAVE to see off the entire 2 months of notice. This is fucking ridiculous. In (semi)civilized parts of the world, I would have been out in a week. But nope. This is the Communist Republic of India. Where you still have to take permission from the government to fire people. Which means you will think 1000 times before hiring someone. Which meansn once you have thought 1000 times and expended all that effort in getting someone, you will put them on probation for 1 year, in case they DO decide to run away. And it also means you will try and keep them in your company, so you’ll tack on a 2 month notice period. And if you break that 2 month notice period, the company can file a suit against you - or make you pay the 2 months salary that you would have got had you stayed those 2 months…!

And then they say Slavery has been abolished.

Yes, it is the small stuff, stupid

Mister Shit-for-brains is at it again

So apparently, there is no standardisation in India. This might be true for 99.9999% of things. Maybe. Or not.

Let’s take telephone numbers for example. Now Mr. Clueless is struggling with something as basic as the phone system. Well since Mr. Clueless here is unable to spot patterns, I shall do it for him.

All telephone numbers, barring the “special” numbers and the toll-free numbers in India are 10 digits long. Wha? You mean just like our Great American-do-no-wrong overlords? Yes. 10 Digits. All of them.

1) Fixed line Numbers:

All fixed line numbers, when taken together with their STD code, total up to 10 digits. Example:

11-4161-2345 (a New Delhi Fixed Line number - Airtel’s Customer Service line actually)

22-2364-1522(a Bombay number)

172-256-6499(a Chandigarh number)

Oh no, the end of the world is upon us. The Chandigarh number has a 3 digit STD code, and a 7 digit number, whereas the Delhi number has a 2 digit STD code and a 8 digit number. I am going to lose 0.0001 paise in opportunity cost attempting to figure out what to do. I could have spent that extra processing power figuring our how to molest my neighbour. Boohoo. And the really sharp people amongst you 1st-graders may have noticed that the deeper you go into a remote/not-so-populated area, the smaller the phone number gets, and the larger the STD code. But they are all 10 digits long taken together. Wow. It’s magic.

 And not that it’ll help you in anyway, but you can also identify the service provider of the landline by the first digit.

So for Delhi…: 

2XXX-XXXX - MTNL

3XXX-XXXX - Reliance

4XXX-XXXX - Airtel

6XXX-XXXX - Tata (used to 5 upon a time)

Gee, have I spent the last 200 years memorising phone numbers? Nope. I just happen to stay awake, and ensure that my head is not up my arsehole.

Emergency Numbers:

100 Police

101 Fire

102 Ambulance

I know this to be true of most cities. I don’t know what the rural situation is. Again, it just requires someone to pull their head out of their arsehole.

2) Mobile numbers:

All mobile phone numbers begin with 9, and are 10 digits long as well. Currently, Mobile phones have been assigned to the following series: 92 (Tata), 93 (Reliance), 94 (BSNL), 98, 99 (Airtel, Hutch, Idea, Others).

Wowwee, does that mean you can figure out if the person who is calling you is doing so from a landline or a mobile, just by looking at the number? As opposed to the USA? Oh my God, could there actually be some BENEFIT to this? Why yes, you can indentify your caller to a better extent. Are they at home? Are they on the move? Is this an invasion of privacy? Sure, but then so is caller ID. Get over it.

Question by an idiot: What happens when 7-digit Chandigarh starts to run out of numbers? Well well, Sunny Jim, Chandigarh will then simply latch on the ‘2′ in its STD code to the existing 7 digit numbers. So… 172-256-6401 would become 17-2256-6401. Now all of a sudden you have tons of space to create more 8 digit numbers, as and when you need them. They can be 1000-0000 all the way up to 9999-9999. Wow, aren’t numbers neat.

Addresses

Here are some sample New Delhi Addresses:

81, Jor Bagh, New Delhi, 110003, India

W-144, Greater Kailash-I, New Delhi, 110048, India

M-5, Saket, New Delhi, 1100-something, India

3, Udyog Vihar Phase-I, Gurgaon, Haryana, 122-something, India

Gee, they don’t seem so complicated. Could it be the fact that when Indians tack on the “Near Pappu Cinema” or “Opposite Dey Mental Hospital”, they use those landmarks to help their friends, and other various strangers, and NOT the Postal Serivce, (which usually is very aware of what is in its zip code)?

And…if you are having trouble finding your way around in an Indian city - I strongly recommend you buy one of these excellent products…