Patience,Wait and Increment

Some times life put us in dilemma, we don’t know what it want and where it is going to take us.

We always want things to fall apart in the way we like them to be but it did not happen always, life has different plan for us. From the past few months I have been involved in some things and if they turned in my favor then they will benefit me in a really good way but the dilemma is they are not turning either in my favor or on the other side which is really irritating. My friends says to go with the flow of life and have patience but day by day I am going impatient.

Every day I am waiting for some updates on those ventures and I want the outcome as soon as possible. I am not bothered about the positive or negative outcome, whatever it is let it be, at least I will be able to plan further as soon as the things get clear.

All those positive quotes like “Don’t get angry on your life when you do not get desired things, your life knows that you deserve more than your desires”,”Whatever is happening, is happening for your own good” and “Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet” are holding me up during this time.

Above quote are somewhat true, my awaited increment letter which was due from April 2012 was in my Inbox in the first week of this month. I was waiting for it from the day when I filled up my appraisal form (patience) and when I received it I really liked the increment in my salary (this fruit is really sweet) which is going to be credited with the salary of June. My wife is waiting for it more then me :)

I hope things to become clear, the sooner the best.

HO HO

Being in NCR region from year 2002 I never did Dilli Darshan, every year I thought to plan for it in winters but some how the plan for it didn't work out. When I and Palak got married in Dec 2011, I planned to Dilli Darshan this time as that was the right time (winter season and a companion to roam with) so we did it in the month of Feb 2012 by HO HO bus service.You must be wondering why I am writing about it now, well, some of my friends asked me about my experience with HO HO bus service so I thought to pen it down which would be easy to refer.

HO HO Bus service initiative is very good, you can choose this service as you don't have to worry about finding a parking place and then parking your vehicle. Also, those who are not very much familiar with roads in Delhi then they must opt this service for sight seeing.

HO HO service covers in total of 19 places and you should have 2 days time for it because out of 19 places we were able to see only 6 places in a single day. HO HO purple color bus is every 45 minutes from each sight seeing place which means you get 45 minutes to spend at each place. Some places are very time taking like Red fort, Malls in Saket,Hauz Khas village, Dilli Haat so it is not possible to cover these places in 45 minutes so you may have to skip your next bus.

*** If you are planning to purchase handicrafts and other state wise cultural things from Dilli Haat then I must  tell you that prices are skyrocketing there. You can purchase the same items at much reasonable rate from either Chandni chowk (near to Red fort) or from the shops inside the red fort.***

The Ho Ho service includes many museums so, if you are not interested then you can skip these places and continue in the same bus for next point. It's ticket is of Rs 300 per person which is valid for two days (you can book ticket online from HO HO website). I went through snap deal in which ticket was of Rs 249 for two persons for a single day (if you are going thru snap deal then you have to redeem your voucher from CP office). HO HO service is from 8 am to 8 pm and you can board from any of the stops and purchase the ticket in the bus itself. The ticket cost will remain rs 300 for each person and it did not differ if you have skipped 5 places from the place of you are boarding.

One important thing to keep in mind is that all the monumental places which are going to be covered by HO HO tour having their timings i.e. most of the monuments are closed by 5-5:30 pm so plan your trip accordingly. Below is the timing chart of all destinations which is obtained from HO HO website

Bus service and the guide on board are good and quite satisfactory. Main thing is that HO HO bus services are on time at their spots.

More details are available on www.hohodelhi.com

How I Met My Wife

Yes.. you are thinking it right, the title of this post is inspired from American television series How I Met your Mother but trust me, I am not going to tell you a never ending tale like HIMYM.

My process of arrange marriage was going on after meeting one, two and three which I have already told you, there were other meetings but they were not interesting as compared to those three meetings.Along with the newspaper advertisement and friends, relatives contacts I have also made my matrimonial profile as a free user on matrimonial website www.jeevansathi.com and trust me guys once you have made a login on it your mail box will start receiving lots of notifications about the profile who has viewed your profile, who has accepted/rejected your interest, who has shown interest in your profile and suitable matching profiles according to your profile.

My parents used to browse those profiles and then when they find a suitable profile they asked me to have a look and give my approval. Things were going on like this, one day my parents told me that one of their friend has told about a girl from Agra and her profile id on jeevansathi.com, It was Palak's profile and I liked it. I asked my parents to proceed further. When Palak came to know about such initiation from our side she become a bit worried and decided to talk to me first before proceeding.


Normally, my intention was to talk to the girl for some time before the face to face meeting but it was not always possible. We both felt that we need to first talk to each other on phone/chat to understand each other and we can not take a big decision of our life in those 10 minutes face to face meeting in a secluded room so we were talking.


Later on, we felt that we should meet each other before our parents meeting and exactly one year before I went to Agra to meet Palak. She told me that she will pick me from railway station but she didn't arrive when I have already reached there, actually it was raining that day and  she got stuck in traffic. I was waiting for her on the station and after some time I saw her coming on her Activa, she stopped and took off her helmet and came to me.On that moment dialogue of Aamir Khan from 3 Idiots were going through my mind.... 

"Tum apne scooter pe helmet pehen kar aati ho, aur phir apna helmet utar kar meri taraf aati ho and phir mujhe.... "

She was completely drenched due to the rain, so it was like "...Bheegi bheegi saari me yun thumke lagati tum..." we exchanged initial greetings and decided to go to some restaurant. Till this point when I saw her in real I was somewhat fallen for her, I asked her to park her Activa in station's parking and hire a auto rickshaw but she refused (I don't know why), she insisted me to hop on on her scooty. I did that, when she drove I was really singing in my mind


"...jaisa filmon main hota hai ho raha hai hoobahu
Zubi dubi zubi dubi pum pa ra zubi dubi para rum
zubi dubi zubi naache kyon paagal stupid mum..."


We went to a restaurant and talked there till the time of my return train, she dropped me back on railway station and I came to Noida. As the days were passing and as we were talking on phone after that meeting in Agra my so called infatuation was turning into a budding love but I didn't told her about this as still our parents have to meet and decide. We fixed the parents meeting and by this time we both were sure that if things goes fine between parents then we have made the right decision.

We went to Palak's relatives home for family meeting, she arrived after sometime,she was blushing and she was not uttering a word, I was continuously smiling to see talkative, charming,bubbly Palak to be silent and blushing. When we got our 10 minute cut in a different room then we laughed (matlab ek dum khul ke hass rahe the hum dono because our parents were not aware about our face to face meeting in Agra, before that family meeting they were only aware that we are talking on phone) and She said

Palak: ab kya baat karein hum log, hum to saari baatein pehle hi kar chuke hein.
Me: Haan wo to he but still hume ye 10-15 minute  baat to karni hi hogi.


Me: Waise Palak ji, aapko sharmana bhi aata he...ye to maine aaj hi dekha. Us din Agra me to tum badi bindaas thi. Aaj kya hua?


Palak: Arey itne saare log bethe hein to sharm to aayegi hi, ye ladkiyon ki baatein he tum nahin samjhoge.
Me: Chalo thik he koi baat nahin.


Palak: So, what do you think, what parents are gonna say?
Me: I don't know, I believe that if we are destined to spend our life each other then everything will go fine.
Palak: hmm.... I will not feel bad if it is a No, I will accept it as a decision of God.But, it was really nice  talking and interacting to you.
Me: hmm...same here
(Actually, we both have said those filmy dialogues but internally we both wanted it to be yes and we both have felt bad if it came to be No from either of parents. This we shared to each other later on )


Our meeting got over and we were asked to come out. After few private discussion between my parents and  my Chacha,chachi they said yes and then meri Parchi wahin kat gayi :)

So, this is how I met my wife. Below is my video wedding invitation which we shoot during our courtship period, if you are on my facebook friend list then you can also see this video here. I hopw you will like it.

See what Mansi and Shivani find in their life on Sony Entertainment Television, every Monday to Thursday at 8.30p.m. (IST)

I have submitted this post for a contest on Indiblogger. Read details here: http://www.indiblogger.in/topic.php?topic=59

Visit the Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/LoveYaArrange

Meeting During Arrange Marriage Process-3

Okay fellas, I am back to marriage thing.

I have already talked about the process of arrange marriage and my first and second meeting during arrange marriage process. Now comes the third one, as the marriage proposals were flowing in both directions it leads to another meeting with parents of a girl from Rohini, Delhi. _{I know, you must be thinking that why I am writing all this about families from Delhi and if you did not then this statement of mine made you think that. Seriously, I do not have any intention to project anything wrong/negative for families from Delhi, it was me only who wanted to have my life partner from NCR (why? Well, there are many reasons which may need a separate post, so, not this time). There were some good meetings as well, but, as I already said in my first post that these posts will contain my funny (or weird) meeting experience with family members of those potential prospective brides.}

Meeting with girl’s parents was fixed at my apartment, again, I thought maybe they want to see how this bachelor is keeping up his home or may be my living standard. Thankfully they were only two people to screen me, the mother (the Lady) and the father. I escorted them in to my  apartment and made them settle down. After exchanging usual pleasantries and serving them whatever I had arranged the lady opened the questionnaire:-

The Lady: So, Ankit, tell me about yourself.

This question sounded like an interview question which is generally asked to candidates to start interview and I answered in that manner only.

The Lady: Ok, good. So from where you did your schooling and graduation? From Gujarat or from U.P?

Me: I did my whole schooling from Gujarat and graduation from U.P.

Girl’s father was smiling and pushing his both knees with his both hands. May be he was feeling sleepy or he was stressed out of driving from Rohini to Noida

The Lady: Ok and what was your percentages in Xth, XIIth and B.Tech?

Smile from face of girl’s father got vanished and I literally said

Me: Excuse Me.

From here the conversation went in Hindi

The Lady: Marks aapke Xth, XIIth and B.Tech me. Beta agar aap comfortable nahin ho to mat batao. Main ye dekhna chah rahi thi ki how intelligent you are.

Me: I am totally confortable in it. Itne bure marks nahin he mere, wo kya he na ki aisa question aaj tak kisi ne aisi meeting me pucha nahin to I was little shocked.

I told them about my marks and I wanted to told her that a person cannot be always declared as intelligent by looking at academics but I didn’t . She started digging her purse and took out some papers and handed over to me.

The Lady: Ye humari beti ki MCA ki photo copy he and uski transcript bhi he. Main generally rakhti hoon agar koi dekhna chahe to. Beta aap dikha sakte ho apne degree and transcript?

“Shock laga laga shock laga…..” I thought ki ye aunty marriage silsele me aayi he ya she is some third party verification agent.

Me: Arey aunty!! Iski koi zaroorat nahin he. Aapne bataya to I totally believe you after all ye to vishwas karne waali baat he. Haan wo baat sahi he ki verify karna chahiye as aajkal dhoka dhadi bahut hoti he.

She didn’t say any word, she smiled a bit and then become somewhat serious.  I continued

Me: Waise aunty Preksha (imaginary name) ke Xth and XIIth ke certificates and marksheets nahi laye aap? Waise kitne marks the unke?

The Lady: Unke <something something> marks the aur baaki documents to he nahin mere pass. Aap k documents…..??

Me: Actually aunty, mere pass he nahin mere documents, ghar par he, soft copies he mere pass, if you want then I will send it you.

She has not expected such counter attack from my side. Girl’s father intervened and said

Father: Arey nahin, uski koi zaroorat nahin he, ye to bas aise hi pooch liya.

Me: Oh achha!!

On my such kind of reaction her facial expression was very serious as if she wanted to walkout from my apartment. She bent her head towards left, leaned forward and in a Sarkar Raj style she asked me

_{From her this kind of expression I sensed that she is going to ask another ajeeb question.}

The Lady: College me padhai k alawa kuch aur bhi kiya he ya nahin?

“Kuch aur bhi”…  there are various meanings of “Kuch aur bhi” in college life. Which one she wants to know so I asked her

Me: Sorry, aunty main kuch samjha nahin.

The Lady: mera matlab sirf padhai hi karte the ya kisi sports, extracurricular activities me bhi involved the?

Me: Sports me to nahin but haan extracurricular activities me involve tha.

The Lady: (with a small fake smile on her face) ok, kis type ki activities?

Me: mmm…. Like watching movies, playing network based computer games on desktop,  getting involved in long night discussions (B*kch**i), raat ko khoke pe jaa kar Anda parantha khana and chai peena aur college ke management ko galiyan dena. _{Actually, I didn’t say all this.} Well, I was involved in organizing various kind of technical fest in college and I was also the founder member of our College’s first computer society “CONATUS”.

 The discussion shifted from education to general life, she asked me various things about our style of living i.e. how we (me and my cousin) are managing our food, how do we commute, what we do once we get to home after office and one more interesting question

The Lady: aap log apne kapde kaise dhote ho? I mean maid he ya apne aap?

Me: Ji maid ko humne hta diya as she has spoiled some of our good shirts and Ts so apne app.

The Lady: (With her mouth open wide) Apne aap, kaise haathon se?

Me: No, not at all, we have our own washing machine so we use it.

The Lady: Ok, so, shaadi ke baad kaun kapde dhoyega, aap ya aap apni wife se kahoge?

I was losing my temper on such stupid questions, I decided that I won’t be answering  this question diplomatically

Me: Aunty, ye to situation pe depend karega, agar meri wife is out for some work and kapde dhone ki zaroorat he to main hi dho dunga, isme koi male ego waali baat to he nahin. Abhi bhi main hi dhota hoon aur jaise time k according requirement hogi waise dono kar lenge. Aisa to he nahin ki I will always ask her to do the clothes, hum ek padhe likhe samajhdar log he and hum jaante he ki mil  baat kar kaam karne se time bhi save ho jaata he and enjoyment alag hota he. Wo to pehle ki baat thi jab har kaam ghar ki lady ko hi karna hota, mere khyaal se ab aisa nahin, jab dono husband and wife working he to dono ko mutual understanding se saare kaam karte hein.

Auntyji to thodi der k liye chup ho gayi. Girl’s father sensed that it is not going well and I am getting irritated with such questions so he broke the silence

Father: haan beta ye to sahi kha aapne.Aisa hi hona chahiye, dono me se agar koi naraaz bhi ho jaye to doosre partner ko musky maar kar use mana bhi lena chahiye.

He kept down his soft drink glass on table and asked his lady

Father: I think hume ab chalna chahiye.

She nodded in agreement and they left the apartment. I was sure that by seeing my khadoos attitude they are not going to proceed and I also wanted this.

Master of Social Engineering

***Disclaimer: This post is written with the experiences shared by my colleagues and friends in their own corporate life. The purpose of this post is not to hurt feelings of anyone.***

Masters of Science_…oops… Social Engineering is a qualification which can be given to a person who is master in social engineering. You must be thinking that it is like that only, isn’t it? Yes, you are right but I am not referring to actual degree of MSe which universities provides, I am referring to the degree which are given by friends and colleagues to a person who is good in social activities.

As any qualified person can use his/her degree either in good way or in bad way same is applicable to Masters of SE, some people use it for the help of others and society but some use it for the help of themselves. Such people can be found in your office, in your social life or at any other place which has involvement of many people.

Let’s talk about office, in office or in your team you can find an MSe easily, such people become your good office friend and they are involved with you in official work and in your office social life. They laugh with you, they go with you anywhere but, when the moment of doing some work comes they start wiping sweat from their head and silently ask fellow colleague “yaar, ye dekhna kya he, dekhna zara isme kya karna he”. On such request if a fellow colleague helps him/her then they start giving instructions as if they know whole thing. They want full credit of the work assigned to him/her but they do not want to do it as they try to accomplish it through their social engineering skills.

                It’s not bad to help your fellow colleague but always helping them in each and every tasks allotted to him/her is not correct and it clearly shows that this person is incompetent. Such behaviors and practices effects team spirit. Team members refrain themselves to complain as their emotions stop them.

The good part is that irrespective of the gags you do on them such people never get angry or irritated because they know they have to bear this if they want to be in the same team. They never take any panga with anyone and they are always ready to take out their wallet to make a payment.

We have always heard about team work and such people gets benefit of team work, they do not contribute anything but take contribution from others and its always a dilemma to either complain about such people or to keep helping them and save their job.

New Apartment

Haanji!! kya haal chaal? sab badiya, ek dum mast, tip taap?
I hope ki sab badiya ho at your end.
Well, I wanted to write this post before my post Show off but I was not able to stop myself to write it (why? read it and know it).

So, we have shifted to a new apartment in a different society in same area. I don’t know why but I kinda love this area (Indirapuram) and when we came to know that we need to look for a new rented apartment then moving out of this area was not on my list. I am living in this area from the past 5 years and that might be the reason for my love to this area and its proximity.

It was a month’s effort on property websites and interaction with property dealers to search a rented apartment which suits our requirements. I cracked this deal by the medium of an add posted on one of the property website (yes, no brokerage) and I felt good to see that still some land lord post their property’s advertisement on internet rather than including property dealers who let their apartment on a rent amount which actually do not deserve to be.

Process of finding a rented apartment includes various questions from property dealers and land lord which we (I and Palak) found sometimes funny and sometimes very weird, some of the Q&A were:-

• LL: “Aapko apne liye chahiye ya kisi aur k liye?”

Me: Apne liye chahiye.

• LL:“Aap dealer he ya party?”

Me: Hum party and hum bahut party karte hein :)

LL:kya?

Me: I mean hum party he…hume hi ghar chahiye.

• LL:“Kitne log he aapki family me?”

Me: Hum do log he, kyun?

LL: Actually, jis family me bacche hote hein hum unhe ghar nahin dete rent pe kyunki bacche ghar kharab kar dete hein.

Me: Ohh, that means aapke bacche nahin he.

LL: Excuse me! aisa kyun lagta he aapko?

Me: aapko ghar se jyada pyaar he na isiliye, never mind.

• PD:“Aap kahan aur kya kaam karte hein?”

Me: Noida me, Software company me, kyun?
PD: Accha software me ho, phir to thik he, wo kya he na ki software waale jyada much much nahin karte.

• PD:“Aap kahan se belong karte hein?”
• LL:“Aapne padhai kahan se ki he?”

Me: Street light k neeche, sadak pe. Kyun aap ghar rent pe nahin doge kya?
LL: Nahin wo baat nahin he, I just want to check whether you are a professional or not. Kabhi kabhi kuch dada type k log aa jate hein.

Once a lady asked me (who was staying in a house as a tenant which we went to see)

• Lady: Aap kahan kaam karte hein?

Me: Ji, wo main aapke Land lord ko bta chuka hoon, aap ghar dikha dijiye.

Lady: Nahin phir bhi kahan aur kya kaam karte ho?

Me (frustrated): I am Ankit Garg and I like movies a lot, I use my motor cycle to go for Movie on every weekend and I like to whistle and throw coins on Movie screen when a good scene comes. I like to play cricket inside movie hall and regularly drink Pepsi because it changes the game. I also go to Noida for bike ride and for job. (Palak started smiling)

Lady: Accha, Motorcycle se Noida jaate ho job k liye, ok.

Me: haanji

In this area rent pe ghar dhoondhna wo bhi without broker is like aiming in the eye of a revolving fish with bow and arrow by looking at its mirror image. We went through this life learning lesson and realized that real estate sector is really booming and rates are touching sky these days. After all this jostling when we finalized our deal we took a breath of relief and tighten our back for shifting.

Two days before shifting to new apartment we started packing and then we actually saw how much things we have in this 2 BHK. Palak said “OMG! itna samaan aaya kahan se…..kitna samaan he yaar humare pass”. Whatever it was we had to pack and we had cartons, cartons and cartons every where.

Some how we got shifted to our battle won apartment with the help packers movers and got settled, but, still struggling to get broad band connection. Bechara humara laptop, from the day we came in to our new apartment it did not get the chance to connect itself to its peers in this electronic virtual word, it has not even come out of backpack.

Arey!! sabse important baat,Many thanks to the god that Maids in this society are not rowdy and raunchy like maids in old society otherwise we have to again go through hiring and tantrums of kaam waali bai as I told before. I told Palak that she is lucky this time with the maid and lets hope this new home brings us more good luck. Fingers are crossed.

Show Off

We have often heard that these days Marriages are a medium for show off. Things like kind of decorations, varieties of food, kind of Marriage hall or farm house etc one has opted shows status of that family. Show off starts right from the marriage invitation card i.e. Marriage invitation card itself indicates which kind of marriage one is going to have.
Show off from the type of Wedding invitation card can be understandable but show off from the content of wedding invitation card is some thing which can not be explained. One of my colleague who belongs to Tamilnadu  is getting married and when we (our team) received his invitation card we were not able to believe our eyes. However we were not able to understand his card as it was printed in Tamil but few words in that card grabbed our eyes which made me write this post.
Below are the edited scanned version of his card which we got on our email.
This one is quite normal

but the next one is not

I believe you are familiar with most of the qualifications which can be seen above but if you are not aware about TNEB then it is Tamil Nadu Electricity Board. Tradition of mentioning highest qualification with the name of bride and groom can also be seen in North India but for the first time I saw the designation and qualification of whole family mentioned in the wedding invitation card.
Next one is super cool :)
 
Groom’s name is printed with his qualification, designation, company name and location. RSVP list also has qualifications.
This may be the trend of marriages from Tamilnadu and I believe not only me but you have also not seen a wedding invitation card like this.
***Disclaimer:Intention of this post is not to make fun of any community or individual. Purpose of this post is to show the different things which people are doing these days.***

##Keep reading and stay blessed##