The TimePass of India

I turned 40 last month. Yes, the big 4-O. They say 40 is the new 30 or whatever seems to be the age when people call you young. I “celebrated” my birthday in Berlin – I use inverted commas coz I don’t think I celebrated it as much as I just roamed around the streets, sat down in cafés I thought were too expensive when I was last there as a student. I did touristy things that I couldn’t afford like having dinner in the rotating TV tower restaurant with wife who 14 years ago was my girlfriend. I live in one of the most expensive cities in the world, but boy some touristy stuff in Berlin is expensive – like Dubai on steroids expensive!

As I grow older, and I look at my friends I realize how lucky I have gotten. I don’t particularly consider myself lucky. I think for the 75% of my very eventful life, things were very difficult, almost unfair. I know some people have it worse, I got everything I wanted but it took some effort – and by some, I mean a lot.

My favourite wife’s (also only wife) favourite saying is – Life can only be understood backwards. She’s had this as her email signature ever since she was 20 years old! I don’t know how I managed to impress her enough to marry me coz when I was 20, my email signature was – The more cheese is there, the more holes are there, the more holes are there the less cheese is there. So the more cheese is there the less cheese is there!

Ah romance king only I tell you!

But honestly, now I am just starting to get a gist of what that line means - the line about life backwards, not the cheese one.

I believe that in the future (within our lifetime) even if we aren’t able to time travel, we will be able to send information back into the past – it wont be details like what stock is going to 100x or what team to bet on in the IPL (any team but RCB), it will be things like sending indications about what businesses to get into, what people to stay away from and what woman to chase – maybe it already happens, coz sometimes something just feels right, no?

So this is my message in a bottle back to the 20 year old I was once. He has lived 50% of my life, the tough 50% - need to give him pointers. We are the heroes our younger self needed. And now we are here. So here goes. (I wrote something similar when I was 29 – read it here)

10 things that the 40 year old me, wants to tell the 20 year old me.

1. The future is good. I know currently it feels like everything is falling apart. It’s tough. We love movies about a fight back, ever wondered why? We are fighters – its in our blood. Watch this movie called Cinderella man – has it released yet in your time? And then watch this movie – Fandry – its been our favourite movie for 15 years now.

2. Exercise – I know its boring but we need to do it sometime and you better do it, coz I am lazy. Also eat more and pack some nuts and some juice and stuff. Spend more on your body. I promise you that I will also do a better job for the 60 year old me.

3.What is the purpose of life? I know this question bothers you. (Man, u are deep for a 20 year old!) 

The purpose of life is to have more like you – it’s an exercise in making world a better place – paying it forward. Living a good life is important, its also simple (note I said simple, not easy)

4.A good life is composed of good women, good weather, good bread, good beer and wine, and a new addition – good kids. 

What great women we have met! And the best one we married. You want a hint? Remember that day in the 9^th standard, just before Diwali vacations – you saw this girl and said to yourself – If I get this type of girl I will marry her! 

Apparently she’s the only 1 her type and we marry her. Well, technically I marry her, but you will be me soon.

5.And what kids we have! The middle one especially. 

Yes like every good story we have 3 acts (kids). 

The eldest one is carbon copy almost, the middle one we are figuring out what trail mix she is and the youngest one is a mixture of the first two. You know the saying the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree? Well I don’t think  we can predict what kind of fruit will fall from the tree – sometimes its apple, sometimes it bananas and other times Oranges. 

All different but all equally sweet.

6.The next 20 years will be great for cricket. 

What close encounters, what finishes – like the T20 World cup (yes that’s a thing now). 

You will see the first one – that last over in the 2007 T20 WC. Also in the next few years that catch by SKY on the boundary. SKY is a cricketer, you don’t know him – in your time he’s in the 5^th standard.

7.Career wise its been tough for you, I know. I wish I could tell you it gets better, but it doesn’t . At least not immediately. We keep fighting for a long, long time. And then slowly it gets better. And how!

8.You will get into really good schools – always like the second last seat or something. At the end of the graduation, you will end-up in the top - just out of sheer hard work. 

But you will still end up with the lowest salary in class. It would take us years, but we will reach the top. I know you don’t care much for money, this is where we have been wrong. Maybe this is why it took so long to come to us.

9.People are born with preconceived notions, habits, skillsets – in the debate about nature vs nurture, Nature reigns supreme. 

We get these from our DNA, past births, experiences of our great grandparents. It all filters through to make us. 

Something in us makes us incredibly frugal. I have always spent less money on myself than I deserved. Walked kms to save some change, ate the same falafel sandwich to save money (would buy 2+1 free and eat it for all 3 meals). Some of this poverty attitude took away from vacations, luxury items, nice things for the wife and kids. 

Now its much better. 

One of the happiest days in my life is when in an expensive restaurant my wife tells me that she doesn’t look at the right side of the menu since the last few years. 

10.Remember how we love all things German? We end up buying multiple German cars. 

I did something recently for the 10 year old us – I bought a Mercedes Convertible. Its a 2-seater just like we wanted to buy! 

Its like falling in love everyday. There are fewer things more satisfying than driving that car top down on a cool Winter afternoon!

So that's all I wanted to tell you - I am not sure if all this actually is of any help. But hope this backwards information about life makes you feel better and brings you some clarity. 

Love & best of luck, 

40 year old Arshat!

10 things I want to tell the 20 year old me

 Adapted from Satyajit Ray’s "Ratan Babu and that man"

I like Satyajit Ray as a writer, but his stories leave a lot to imagination and dont offer a closure that I crave in a good short story. So I took it up on myself to adapt one of his stories to see if I could give some closure to people who crave the same closure as I do. So here goes -

Darul Dutta, DD as he liked to be called, was as unambitious as they come. 

The year was 1951, India had just gained independence, and the British run institutions were being taken over by rich industrialists. One such institution the Indian Bengal Bank (erstwhile British Bengal Bank) was bought over by Abhinandan Agarwal, one of the first Marwari families that had made Calcutta their home. 

DD held a Commerce degree from the University of Calcutta, a degree that his father had forced him to study for. If it was up to DD he would have stopped studying by High school. The degree helped, banks were hungry for educated professionals and DD’s father, an influential mathematics professor got him the job. But DD’s lack of ambition ensured that he would not get promoted. 

DD’s personal life had also taken a beating. DD’s father got him married to an educated girl from a wealthy Bengali family. But that marriage didn’t last 4 months. According to the wife, DD was a boring person and barely had any interest. By DD’s own admission, all he needed was a movie on Sunday and eating fried fish as his favourite restaurant outside of Bada Bazaar. DD's mother died when he was in his teenage years and his father passed away a few months after the divorce. The only silver lining amongst this was the fact that DD’s parents left him a house in one of the posh areas of Calcutta, and enough money in the bank to last him a lifetime. Ideally DD didn’t have to work, but he would get bored at home anyway so he continued his 9 to 5 job. 

The part of his job he liked the most was the 11 day vacation he got every year from his office. The train ticket and the stay was paid for. While other employees chose Delhi, Bombay and Lucknow as the vacation spots, DD would choose the most obscure of locations. His criteria was simple – he would choose a place that had a train station with no more than 24 hours train ride, the location should be so remote that it wouldn’t have any post office or police station even. DD found such locations interesting. The bank allowed to pay for the employee and plus one. But no one wanted to go to such places. Not that DD had any friends he could travel with anyway.

This year he chose Bhimghat in Madhya Pradesh. He got down from his first class compartment. Instantly he could feel the lightness in the air compared to the industrialized city he was from. He got a horse ridden tanga to his hotel - New Mahamaya hotel, the only hotel of repute in Bhimghat. The hotel barely saw any visitors and was more than happy to have a city babu stay at their establishment. 

Room no. 45 read the key that the manager at the reception handed over. It totalled 9. DD liked the number 9 – this was another of his quirks. DD asked for the dinner to be sent to his room. He took a warm bath and then had his dinner – his favourite fried fish (albeit not as good as his city) and slept on the comfortable bed. 

In the morning, it was a bit chilly. He went to the small restaurant within the hotel to have some breakfast. The locals made delicious poha and chai, something he wanted to try. On the table on the far end there sat another gentleman. He had his back to DD, but DD could feel he knew the man. After every sip of chai he would look up to see if the man had finished his breakfast. Finally the man got up and walked past DD to the reception to make the payment for his breakfast. DD could see that the man had the exact same breakfast as him – poha and chai. The man bought the newspaper and began to walk out of the restaurant. DD felt a strange familiarity with him but couldn’t place him. He followed the man. 

The man walked into a nearby garden, found a bench to sit on and started reading the newspaper. 

“Hello”, said DD.

“Hello”, replied the man. 

DD could now make sense of it. The man looked a lot like himself. In fact it was like he was looking in a mirror. They were the same height – wore the same Bengali style kurta and dhoti as DD. They had the same receding hairline and the same sharp nose. They even sported the same set of reading glasses with the thick black frames. The only difference was maybe that DD was clean shaved and this man had a pencil moustache. 

“I am Darul Dutta, I am here on vacation”, he said extending his hand for a handshake.

A smile appeared on the face of the man. He extended his hand and said – “Bhowmick Bannerjee. But you can call me BB.”

DD chuckled. “My friends call me DD.” Not that he had any.

“What made you visit this location? I mean this place is has no historical significance”

“I like to visit unknown places. I like the anonymity. Why are you here?”

“I work for the postal department. We are setting up a postal office here”, BB replied. 

DD and BB immediately hit it off. They were alike. Even the silk handkerchief DD used to clean his spectacles was similar to BB’s. BB was staying in the same hotel as DD. BB invited DD over for a round of Old Monk Rum. DD didn’t drink much but he couldn’t turn down an invitation by someone who was so similar to him. What else was similar? A thought passed DD’s mind – could they be… could they be twins?

“What year were you born in?” DD asked.

“1919.”

Same as him. 

“What, umm, what date?”

“29th January”

Same as him. 

“What did your parents do?” DD asked.

“You work for the Police?” BB let out a hearty laugh. “Let’s keep some discussion for drinks”

They came back to the hotel – it was only afternoon, but DD was on vacation, and how many times had someone invited him for drinks. 

Room no. 54. BB opened the door. Total 9. 

They had drinks and spoke heart to heart about many things that one does with close friends. DD’s heart felt light. 

This continued for the next 9 days. Every time DD broached the subject of BB’s parents, BB would change the subject.

On the last day of his stay BB called DD to his room. 

“I hear this is your last day in town”, BB said.

“Yes. My leave gets over tomorrow. This has been a refreshing break. Thanks to you.”

“Really? I am glad I could help.” BB said wiping his thick framed glasses with the silk handkerchief that he used to carry.

“We are similar you know.” DD said. “We look the same, have the same habits. Both of us are Bengali, we even the same height. Some people might say we are twins!”

BB let out a hearty laugh. 

“We aren’t similar apart from the fact that both of us wear thick framed glasses. I am at least 2 inches taller than you, you know.” BB chuckled. “And I am not even Bengali – have you heard a single Bengali word come from my mouth. Is this why you keep asking about my parents? You think we are twins?”

DD had a serious look on his face. 

“You can have a look at the picture of them. I always carry with me.” BB said pointing towards the drawer in his bedstand. 

DD pulled it open. There was a black and white photo of a couple dressed in traditional Maharashtrian attire. Next to it was a knife with a curved blade. 

BB walked to the cabinet with his back towards the bedstand. He poured himself a glass of old monk. 

DD picked up the knife with the curved blade and walked towards BB ever so quietly and with all his strength in his puny little body all of 5 feet 8 inches, he pushed the knife into BB’s back. BB let out a cry of distress. DD covered his mouth before stabbing him 7 times. 

He then walked out of room 54 and walked into his room. He washed his knife lovingly under the tap in his bathroom, humming an old Rabindranath Tagore song. Wiped it clean with the silk handkerchief he used to clean his glasses with and packed it carefully with his clothes. 

He picked up his suitcase and quietly walked out of the hotel. His train was just pulling into the station when he reached. He got into his first class compartment, laid out his bedding and went to sleep. 

When he joined office the next day his manager Jaspreet Singh, a tall Sardar from Lahore who moved to Calcutta during the partition, asked  - “How was your holidays, DD?”

“Refreshing”

“Really? What god forsaken place did you go to this time?”

“Bhimghat”, replied DD.

“Bhimghat?” Jaspreet said stroking his beard. “Why does that ring a bell?”

He thought about it for a second, then shook it off. There was work to be done. 

DD left the office at 5 pm as usual. He reached home, changed his clothes into a more comfortable lungi and vest, made himself a cup of chai and sat down with the day’s newspaper. He directly opened the 4th page. Found a pair of scissors and cut a news article out. 

He pulled out a file from his cupboard and stuck it on the 4th page. 

The article read –

“A man in his late forties was found brutally murdered in a Bhimghat hotel on Thursday morning. His body was found when the hotel manager found his door unlocked in the wee hours of the morning. The body has been identified as Bhushan Bedekar, or BB as he was lovingly called, a postal employee from Pune. He was on special duty to establish a new postal office. The Police arrived late as they were summoned from the neighbouring district to investigate the matter. The postal office has offered their condolences to the parents of the deceased along with a compensation of one thousand rupees.

The investigating officer feels the job might be done by an insider or someone who knows Bhushan, as it would be difficult to overpower Bhushan who was a well built man almost 6 feet tall. 

The motive of the murder was unknown."

The first 3 pages of the file had old clippings about different murders from years 1948,49,50.

The last line for each read - Motive unknown.

---The End---

Motive unknown - (Adaptation of Satyajit Ray's short story)

Nights like these need to live on - there are stats and there are how this night made you feel. 

I wrote about our 2007 win years ago (Read it here) and I wrote the following the night before the 2011 world cup clash - one of my best write-ups (read it here) I thought when will I write about this feeling again. Maybe it wont be as intense as 2007 or 2011 - I am much older, more accomplished - there are so many things in life that have given me joy that maybe this wont matter much. 

I was wrong. 

The way my heart sank after that 20+ run over - I felt again we will end up 2nd. Again! Then I saw Rohit's face on the screen, the pain on that face. At that moment, so many of us Indian men, bogged down by EMIs, and kids fees, working in bad companies, under terrible bosses, would give up anything to see the men in blue win. 

Kohli's last T20, can we do it for him? 

Dravid - that warhorse from the 90s, will he never be able to hold a trophy? How unfair is life on some men - Dravid is the guy who did everything right - I dont know him personally but I am sure he never gets batshit drunk, cant imagine him being late for a meeting. In fact if my wealth manager told me that he is transferring all my fund to Rahul Dravid's account and he is my new wealth manager I would honestly think Dravid would do better than my current guy. 

Then Bhumrah takes the ball in his hand. The warmth I felt at almost 39 years of age can only be described by being lost in the park and suddenly you find your dad. I knew he knew what is to be done. If my eye surgeon tell me it is Bhumrah who is going to perform LASIK on me, I will allow it. He knows what he is doing. 

I am not an IPL fan, but I would tune in to see Ab de Villers in action. The only Indian guy who is that entertaining is Surya. Unfortunately barely lasts. But that catch. What a catch. I jumped up from my chair clapping and my daughters ran in from the other room to see what is wrong with their very mild mannered dad. 

We saw Rohit cry, Virat cry, Hardik cry and Rahul Dravid punch the air - Grown men cry when does that happen! At the end of 15th over most Indian men in their 30s and 40s, accomplished or otherwise would be willing to give up whatever they were chasing in their personal lives for one chance to win the world cup. 

That promotion you were working for since 1 year? Exchanged for an Indian win

Cure to the back pain thats lasted for 10 months? Exchanged for an Indian win

My last heartbreak was the ODI world cup. We did so well, probably our best world cup outing in the history of the game and then to lose the final like that. Just broke our hearts. And the worse part was who do we blame? I wanted to give Rohit a hug, give him some pointers on life, on chance, on destiny and fate. I am older than him have seen more life than him, less cricket but more life. 

In the 15th over yesterday, I dont think if we had lost, I would have any words of wisdom for him - coz how brutal can life be? Something had to happen. Some stroke of luck. Something had to go right. And it did, a lot did. 

Rohit and team, thank you for the memories.

T20 world cup 2024 - Remember the name!

My father worked for erstwhile Indian Airlines, which later got absorbed into Air India. Now that we have that out of the way, let me tell you about my love affair with the airline. 

In the 90s, when air travel was reserved for mostly businessmen & politicians, we would fly as a family. It gave a certain sparkle to our arrival to any family event. There was certain amount of jealousy, some awe, and some general amazement at the fact that we reach anywhere in the country within 3 hours. 

I was a shy, generally under-confident kid who might have had a slight inferiority complex every 90s kid had in India, especially around English speaking cousins. I know, some of you now know the amazing me and wonder how is that possible, but let me tell you that is how 90s India was. So for that kid, ability to fly to places, and the resulting adulation gave an immense boost to self confidence. 

Indian Airlines was beautiful - everything from the logo to the seating, to the air hostesses, the flights, everything was very unlike an Indian Govt company. I would go on to say that it was probably the best Indian company at that time. And I saw it weaken overtime, I saw the quality of food go down, the quality of the crew, the general disdain amongst employees that is so characteristic of any Indian govt company slowly made its presence felt.

Then among much fanfare, it got inducted into Air India and overnight the quality went further down. Dont get me wrong, it was still better than the joke Air India has recently become. Indian taxpayers love to highlight that their hard earned money is being mismanaged - and when the say this, they are thinking Air India employees are at fault. They are like always, wrong -

When the skies opened up, so did the opportunity for the politicians to make money, India was flooded with low cost airlines, which is great for so many of us who now could reduce their travel time by 20 hours or so and at a cost that didnt burn a hole in the pocket. But what this did is, take away the class from flying. It is similar to the degradation that Indian TV programming has seen. The slums have TVs, and they like to watch Sasural Simar ka - so you are left with no programming - you have to watch whatever crap the masses are watching. Same with flying, suddenly the only aim of flying became to reach to point B at the cheapest price. 

Welcome Indigo. A Marwari bus in the sky. Now I have nothing against Indigo, I have flown Indigo so many times. And it never lets you down, it gives you exactly what you ask for, nothing more, nothing less - like a McDonalds of flights. 

I have flown numerous International Airlines from Emirates, to Lufthansa to British Airways and even at its worst, Air India is still amongst the best in my book (I might be biased). For guys who never got a chance to fly Indian Airlines (or the real Air India), let me elaborate what the difference is - 

Leg room - For a guy my height, this is important, very important - which is why for me Air India (like IA) comes so high up the ranks. They dont try to fit in a few extra seats (the local train equivalent of a 4th seat) 

Food - People dont like airline food, but trust me once upon a time AI food was amazing. Sure, we mostly travelled Business class, so there were menus exchanged and certain bells and whistles but even in economy, food was the highlight

Cabin crew: Those girls were great - ever smiling, girls who probably dreamed of becoming this when they were kids. As a guy who understands class, those girls were classy. Even their sarees were classy - what the hell happened to sarees on flights? 

Moving on...

Like I was saying, Air India was slowly but surely became a joke. I loved it, but like loving Mithun Chakravaty, you keep it to yourself. When have you ever heard anyone say their favourite actor was Mithun? I have had discussions with a close few highlighting why it was not the mistake of the employees and AI but the politicians who were making decisions that didnt favour the airline. Like all crappy companies that you might have worked at, they were crappy coz the owners, in this case - the politicians were crappy! None of my firang friends ever had anything good to say about the airline - I specifically flew firang airlines to see what the fuss was about, except the timeliness (something that was the main source of corruption AI) nothing else ever matched to the level of AI. 

When Tata won, I was glad for 2 reasons - one, it is not going to be made into another bus in the sky airline (which would have been the case had ambani or adani won), and two, it was finally out of the hands of the politicians. 

Now it seems I will be redeemed. I have in the past tried to book AI more, but always worried about delays (reason listed above) but now, I can confidently book AI.  I cant wait for India to have an airline that will (easily, if I may add) become the top 5 air lines in the world. I cant wait to ask my firang friends to take the airline and see what Indian hospitality really is! I cant wait to be a kid again. 

Air India, welcome back, my friend!

Air India, welcome back!

Hi baby, 

This is the first time I am calling a boy - baby. Seems kinda weird to be very honest. I wrote a letter to both your akkas - Pranaya (read here) & Aainee (read here) when they were born. And I knew I had to write one for you. 

I am writing this as your mom is getting ready to bring you in the world - this process, which I have been witness to 2 times already scares me, and makes me respect your amma even more - but scares me for the most part, like if she can take that amount of pain, she can kick my butt if shit ever went down. 

We have been ready for a long time for you, son. When I was growing up, pretty early I knew I wanted a son - someone to share the life with, someone to teach all the guy things one a man learns over time - things about women, wine, beer, bread, work, purpose of life, did I mention women? I think all men start out wanting sons, I always thought daughters would be a lot of work (this part is not true) & you have to constantly look out for them (this part is true) - but the part that I didnt realize is how beautiful my life would get with two daughters.

A friend once asked what is the test of the fact that you are in love - I said if you happen to think about someone more than 17 times a day, you are in love! (Tune in to my daily gyaan sessions on youtube). I think about Pranaya & Aainee a lot more times than that every day. One day you will fall in love with a woman and feel love cant get deeper than that, wait till you have daughters - that love is something different. 

I am lucky to have such amazing women in my life - I am using the word "women" for Pranaya and Aainee coz thats what they are - you should see how they talk! Pranaya is a lot like me, it's like living my childhood again through her - in that sense, she is lucky too - to have a parent who completely understands how she's wired and understand the things that pain her or bring her joy. Aainee, we are still trying to figure out where her source code comes from! She is nothing like any of us, not like the parents, or grandparents or her sister - she is the spice in our very low sodium lives. 

Your sisters are flowers. There are times when I am looking at them paint, or make something with clay and they look at me, my heart skips a beat - it's different from how one falls in love with a woman, but still same same. Do you understand? See? How this letter has become about them?

The other day someone asked me what does it take to be a good father? <Start of gyaan sesh> I said two things  - Indulgence & sacrifice. Indulgence is getting to understand them, involve them in your world, get involved in theirs, be less grown up and more growing up - with them. Sacrifice is the easy bit, it is automatic and doesnt even feel like a sacrifice at the time. <End of gyaan sesh>

It is 6 am on a slightly chilly Dubai morning. You came into the world crying and punching arms to the background of "Eye of the Tiger" (in my head). 

I am writing this after you have arrived in our lives -  all pink (& for some reason angry, like an Irishman). I can't tell you how happy I am, son, that you are here - one very important reason is of course, now the attention of your amma & akkas will get diverted to your misdoings and I will be free to do as I like (or at least that's how it is in my head). Also, I didnt want one more girl come into my family and tell me how I do things wrong - the women lobby in the house is strong as it is (this is also why I call your akkas "women").

I was the first Chaudhary son in my generation and you are the first in yours. Men like us have a great responsibility. For years the Chaudhary name has stood for sacrifice, hard work, leadership & an inexplicable charm - all Chaudharys have it - both your akkas (esp the smaller one) have it. I have it (obviously), how else do you think I got your amma to marry me? You, my son, have a responsibility towards that name.

I am writing this now because when you are 14, I will be 50 & you might think I am not as cool as I used to be. Then you will turn 21 & realize I am cool again & it is amazing how I have changed in 7 years. Jokes apart, I am writing to tell you that I might not be always right about everything. My understanding of the world is mine, it is coloured by my experiences of the world. I might, in my good natured naivety, feel that something you want to do is wrong - be kind to me & remember that your father is also bound to errors.

The men from my father's generation were the last who got to be men. The men in my generation have had it slightly tougher (because no wet towels allowed on the bed), for your generation it might be even more. Some men have it easier than others, some are born into wealth others have influential parents, things that are not in your control and their is no sense feeling jealous about it or worrying about it. Kids born in the most expensive of hospitals, in temperature controlled delivery rooms cry when they are born & so do the ones who are born in poor neighbourhood in the heat & dust. The lives we are given always seem more difficult than they are. If you think something is not right, go ahead and make it right.

Then there will be times in life when it will seem that you made a choice, a bet that didnt pay off. In times like these you might doubt yourself - To that I tell you, forget what the world is telling you - what magazines tell you or what the newspaper tells you - these are just words on a paper - they dont mean anything till you give them meaning. Forget what your friends are telling you, they have seen only as much of life as you, they dont know more, or better.  

My advice to you son, for times like this is - Do whatever feels right to do. And do not what doesnt. 

This advice applies, not to everyone but a few - it is applicable to those men only who are made right by the creator, coder, if you like - and you are the very best he created. I know it, and if you ever doubt it, read this letter again - I hope it gives you confidence and helps you become an even better man.

I wish you all the happiness & joy. I wish for you a courageous heart & hope that you find love in this world. Love, courage, happiness & hope in your heart, my child, will lead you a long way. 

Lovingly, 

Daddy

A letter to my just born son...