harjai's blog

A snapshot !!

2010-03-22T04:24:00.000-07:00

Usually Sundays are not meant to wake up early and my body knows it very well. You pull it out and just in minutes, it’s back to bed. But last Sunday was a bit different. After all it was a picnic day.

For a change, woke up at 7:15(Note: without alarm :P) and the first thought that went through my mind was, scrap it and sleep, but somehow I managed to get myself off the bed and got ready. Plan was to meet at 9:30am at Panvel station and we were right on time (IST standards), just 1.5 hrs late. Meanwhile, people had a great time sleeping at airy Panvel station. As soon as auto-waala told us that the picnic spot is around 25 Kms away and that too we have to cover by auto, I thought of boarding the next train and coming back home.

The trip was very different in the sense that I knew only 1 or 2 guys out of 12 and to be safe I introduced myself to most of them to ensure that no one will kill me for any of my stupidities. As we entered, a small lake full of dirty water for boating was waiting for us with lush green sceneries around. Felt like I was entering some jungle rather than a resort. Well there was no hope left to be shattered as the heat had already spoiled everything. Resort people told us there is only one slide out there and later we came to know that there were lot more but rest of them were not worth calling a slide. You better walk over to come down and jump in water to have splash.

Finally we made to the so claimed Asia’s .. oops Mumbai’s second largest wave pool !! And the waves were no less than any tsunami. Thank god most of us were renowned swimmers and we managed ourselves the whole day. What just followed was a friend of us lost her gold ring and suddenly everyone was underwater searching for it. Somehow she managed to keep a smile on her face and she was lucky enough to get it back by evening. The rain in rain dance was like its raining in a desert. It was more of a place to make your feet good as the whole floor was burning like a furnace. The tasteless gola we had after lunch could have better be used for cooling your feet !! By evening a Cosco tennis ball was like a best friend to all of us as it was something that added lot of fun to pool. How can you expect us not to click so many photogenic smiles among us. Pool side photographic session with sunset was simply awesome !! Suddenly we realized that most of us had to travel around 3 hours to reach back home. And going back home without a toast to lucky ring who found her owner back would have been a crime. What better can you get than having masala chach in beer bottle and food at Bhagat Tara Chand followed by a pan to call it a day.

After all this, I can easily call it a perfect outing coz of awesome group we had formed. A sheer example of how a trip can be fun with friends no matter if it is a resort or jungle.

M sure there is lot more to come guys!! Cheers !!

The common man

2010-03-01T08:11:00.001-08:00

A normal Sunday evening. A bit less crowded but still didn’t get seat to sit. Well.. in a city like Mumbai you have to learn how to be more comfortable standing than seated. And in last 2.5 years, this is also a part of learning that this city has given me.

So,I was just standing near back door of BEST(The Brihanmumbai Electric Supply & Transport Undertaking) bus and suddenly a passenger holding his kid in his arms slapped the bus conductor. And it was so loud that it brought everything to pin drop silence.

Now the issue was that the passenger wanted to get down at some stop but from back door of bus. But if you want to travel in Mumbai local bus you have to board it from back and get down from front. And driver doesn’t stop the bus at a stop where no one is standing at bus stop to board or on the front door to get down.

So the passenger missed his stop which led to a fight and a tight slap at the end. Thanks to the police nearby that it sorted out finally.

This very small incident made me think if this the way we treat a person who does his job nicely? A person who follow rules gets what.. a slap in front of 50 odd people?? And then we say the government is corrupt. Isn’t the common man more corrupt who tries to bend every single rule according to his comfort??

I think the day we would be able to understand this small thing. We will never have to raise fingers on anyone else.

All that glitters is gold !!

2010-02-25T14:22:00.001-08:00

Have u ever thought twice before changing ur DP?? Well... to most of us its not a big thing!!! We just make a small effort to keep it interesting.

One random day me and @sumagambs had a small discussion.
And the topic was "Is your presence on twitter coz of ur name or ur DP". Or let me put it this way...ppl on twitter recognize u by ur handle or ur DP? When we can have so many case studies about people based on their Dp's, a small discussion was surely a worth!!

Well the observations were based on fact that our mind stores images in a much better way than text or any other thing. And suddenly i realized that when i browse through my timeline, i read tweets corresponding some particular DP's not handles!!! May be the reason is catchy images get more attention than some alphabets!!!
So, if I change my DP too often!! does that mean that my presence will not be so firm??? Well, our discussion said..catchy DP comes with better visibility!! And frequent changes may effect temporarily !! But its not a vice-versa thing!!!

That’s our take on it !! What do you guys think abt it?? Or do u guys even think abt it or not??

Isn't TWITTER hyped up?

2009-11-24T03:14:00.000-08:00

Sometimes i really feel I am more of @sharadharjai than Sharad Harjai.

Do we actually need to update my status when something wrong or good happens to us? Is it necessary to tell everyone that after having lunch I am feeling sleepy in office?? Well, I don't think so. Because in any case updating doesn't make any difference.

For a person who want to spread his business,need to have world news instantly or any other thing, TWITTER can act like a GOD's hand picking him from the ground and dropping on the top of world skipping all the ladders. But whats in there for a person who updates his followers just because he has an account on TWITTER?We have people of just 12 13 years of age so much active here like they need to get everything by their next bdday!!!
Isn't playing in cricket grounds better thing for them than just updating status?

Where no of people following us matters... where every retweet makes us feel our presence and we feel concerned about every tweet about what the other person is doing!!! I would definitely like to ask if these things are taking us to the right direction??

I don't want to mean that something is wrong with this. But has anyone of us felt we are just connected to ourselves through internet? I know it is highly controversial thought and everyone has his/her own way to look at this social media giant.

Still, just a question in my mind and want to know what you people think about this.

The biggies on the menu!!!

2009-11-12T02:11:00.000-08:00

Yes the biggies here m referring to are the cricket players with their own restaurants chains. They are BIG NAMES!!! Famous BRANDS Ambassadors!!! They are the faces associated with some of most prestigious brands in world. From some basic consumer products to luxurious brands, they endorse everything, and their names do make a difference.

But when it comes to their own restaurant chains, the story is completely different.

Starting from our Little master to dada.. everyone have its own chain running.

Sachin Tendulkar --- Tendulkar's
Sorav Ganguly ----- Ganguly's
Harbajan Singh ----- Bhajji da dhaba
Zaheer Khan ----- ZK's
Virendra Sehwag ---- Sehwag's favorite

and many more.....

They all have something different to serve you in the plate. While tendulkar's is for sea food, bhajji da dhaba is for punjabi puttars. ZK's is known for its lounge designed by Zaheer Khan. Virendra sehwag has kept his favorite dishes on the menu with the price equal to the runs scored by him in a particular match(Multan Ke Sultan Ki Tikdi-- Rs309).

But the most common thing among all is that none of them is a big hit except ZK's which is doing well in pune. Even with such a huge fan following, their names are not crowd pullers.

Well, I don't have a reason why these big names doesn't take care of brand they are associated with. I think spending money should not be the concern for them. Then whats the reason that is keeping them away from maintaining their own brand value.

Can anyone make me understand this?

Continued.... Finally..!!!!

2009-10-03T02:41:00.000-07:00

April 20, 2009

It was some different same morning when I thought of entering into this blogging world. Started very enthusiastically. It was hard to fill thoughts in my empty mind bucket. But some how I started and it felt very good.

Then, it was time for the next entry.... Well for that i collected some stats and formatted my way to call it my 2nd post. Named it "The Bullish Run". Days passed on and on and on and on. I used to visit my blog to check some new activity. Every time the same thing.... A big black screen. Somehow, the no of visits crossed 100 mark(So called achievement).

It was that day and its today, with around 3-4 months in between, the bucket still seems to be empty. But we say, A meaningful change is the need of the hour. So lets start it again and make the move.

The Bullish Run!!!!

2009-05-02T16:06:00.000-07:00

SENSEX!!!!!!!

A recap!!!!!

1000, July 25, 1990
2000, January 15, 1992
3000, February 29, 1992
4000, March 30, 1992
5000, October 11, 1999
6000, February 11, 2000
7000, June 21, 2005

8000, September 8, 2005 : BENCH MARK
9000, December 09, 2005
10,000, February 7, 2006
11,000, March 27, 2006
12,000, April 20, 2006
13,000, October 30, 2006
13,000 from 12,000. It took 124 days to reach 13,000 from 12,500.
14,000, December 5, 2006
15,000, July 6, 2007 -- It took almost 7 month and 1 day to touch such a historic milestone.
16,000, September 19, 2007

17,000, September 26, 2007- Creating a record for the second fastest 1000 point gain in just 5 trading sessions.
18,000, October 9, 2007- The journey from 17k to 18k took just 8 trading sessions which was the third fastest 1000 point rise in the history of the sensex.
19,000, October 15, 2007- The Sensex crossed the 19k mark for the first time on October 15th 2007.It took just 4 days to reach from 18k to 19k. This is the fastest 1000 points rally ever.

20,000, October 29, 2007

The journey of the last 10,000 points was covered in just 869 sessions as against 7,297 sessions taken to touch the 10,000 mark from 1,000 levels.
In 2007 alone, there have been six 1,000-point rallies for the Sensex.

21,000, January 8, 2008

The journey so far was very nice and smooth. Everyone was happy and was enjoying the flow.The bullish rally raised expectations to many folds. In 2007, people predicted Indian economy as it would take India to the top of the world.Many big statements were made :-

"Sensex will cross 25000 mark"
"Sensex will continue to be bullish"

....and don't know what else.

Even I was hoping the same, not as some market analyst but as a common man.... and most of the people expected the same too. Due to a series of jumps in market in a very less spam of time, people had a kind of blind faith in it which led them to invest more and more. People have lost lakhs and crores of rupees in last 1 year. And there is nobody whom you can blame.

But was this blind faith correct?
................don't think so.

In-fact, Was it right for the market to be so bullish? Don't know.

I don't have an answer for this. Nobody has. Obviously everyone has his own way of judging a situation.But whatever is the answer to this question, one thing that we cant deny with is:
"If bullish nature made common man rich, it had made him poor too"

If bulls run, its good. But if they hit with the running speed, its hurts a lot.

The different same morning

2009-04-20T19:51:00.000-07:00

Don't know why, but it feels good to have a blog with your name written on it.

Its 7 in morning. God knows why am I awake this time and that too on a holiday.Its off coz I was working on weekends. Felt nice after a night of sound sleep. Infact smthing more than nice if it comes after 15 days of continuous night shift.

Anywayzz... after a movie(STRAIGHT), a small drive to get eggs and french toast in early morning breakfast, thought of finally giving shape to a old thought of writing a blog. People say you are full of ideas early morning. Just giving it a shot. But Is it true?

Even after scratching hard, I don't see any new entries to my thoughts bucket. Still feels its empty.

Well, when now started I will try to keep it going. I think its just till the day u give it a try.