Untruth is stating the correct answer to the wrong question

Well, the dictionary definition of “untruth” may not be very easy to understand and hence, I am coming up with this one page document, which with the example quoted inside, should help one understand what the meaning of “untruth” is all about. 

Two days ago, I was headed to the Upanayanam of the son of a close friend of mine. I could have easily missed the function and he wouldn't have complained. But, there was no way I was going to miss a function arranged by him, because his aasthaana caterer is one phenomenal cook. 

I was also informed in advance that the first pandhi would be served at 9 AM, to help the office goers take an early brunch so that they can sleep easily in the office; assuming of course that they didn't sleep while driving to work and cause even bigger traffic snarls than usual. 

So my friend Raghu and I had decided to target that first batch, despite the lack of requirement of physically having to go to office. We could sleep at home right? Anyway, on the ordained day of eating, I was slightly delayed while starting. It looked like our aim of being part of the first pandhi may not really materialize. Also, the later it started getting, the traffic build-up would be higher and I was afraid that the caterer maama would run low on payasam. 

And like I guessed, the traffic on Adyar bridge was quite heavy, so much so that it was a standstill towards the north end; the very direction I was headed to. All along, I had been updating Raghu about my position, so that he we wouldn't waste time in waiting for him to reach the predefined pickup spot. The updates were being sent via Whatsapp messages. 

But I wasn't typing while driving, since I know that it is dangerous. So, I had started using the Google feature of giving it instructions, including the dictation of message to be sent via Whatsapp. I followed the same modus operandi on Friday and in hindsight, maybe sharing my Google location would have been a more effective input. 

Anyways, to give instructions to Google, one has to hold the phone on hand and as bad luck would have it, an “Uncle” spotted this. He pulled me over after I crossed the signal. If you know Andhra Mahila Sabha signal, you will also recollect what a busy junction it is and that most of State Govt ministers ply along that route. Now, I somehow understood that my phone usage was the issue and quickly let it off my hand and let it reside in one of the cubby holes of the car. 

The uncle didn't come to talk and I found that a senior uncle was asking him what was going on. And all these uncles were on walkie talkie, so presumably, some Minister was on the move and these folks were a little jittery. The junior one told his senior that I was talking on the phone. So my suspicion was correct and I was cursing myself for being so naive in using the phone such that someone could spot it! The senior uncle had by then come near my car and told the junior that it was someone else. The junior reiterated that it was me. The senior guy looked at me and asked if I was talking on the phone. 

Now we get to the place in the climax of the story line, where one reveals the title. I basically said an untruth by nodding my head in the negative to the senior cop and said “No”. The senior simply waved me away and I went off. 

So why was my statement not a lie but an untruth? It is because one has to understand what was asked. The question to me was if I was talking on the phone. The implication was that he was checking if I was on a phone call with someone. My answer was “No” and it was the right one because, I wasn't on a phone call. I was not “talking to someone on the phone” and was in fact, talking "to the phone”. 

If the cop had asked if I was using the phone, I would have confirmed it and would have been booked for “rash driving” as was the case sometime in 2015. But here, my answer was a perfectly correct statement for the question that was asked, though in wholistic terms it was not true. This, my dear audience, is what an Untruth is.

P.S.: The food was as amazing as ever.

Treefic Jam

Last Monday, the 12th of September 2011, I was out of the gates of my office by around 5:45 PM. As has been the case for the past couple of weeks, the skies had started to turn a bit cloudy and I hoped that I would reach home before a  thunder-squall came up. But my hopes were dashed.

I may not have road rage anymore

Last evening, I was returning back from the office, along with a couple of friends. After passing the Pallavaram bus stand on GST road, a maroon Wagon-R cut into my lane, quite sharply. He moved in from my left and literally bulldozed his way in front of me.

Those of you who have travelled with me, may have experienced my reaction in such situations. I blare my car horn like crazy or keep flashing the headlights for a few seconds. Depending on the intensity of anger, the few seconds can be up to 5 or 6. Five seconds may appear to be very less in the larger context of life, but try honking and flashing the headlights for 5 continuous seconds and you will realise that it is indeed a long time!

In addition to the visible displays of displeasure, I let lose

Client and Hyderabad Visit - Day 0 - 19/Oct/08

19th October was the date identified by the Tamil Nadu state government to inaugurate the fly-over (bridge in local parlance) in front of the airport at Chennai. The time was set as 5:30 PM. I had decided to fly out to Hyderabad that same Sunday evening. My boss also got her ticket in the same plane.

So, in order to avoid the traffic jam expected in front of the airport (after all it was the Chief Minister who was inaugurating it!), we decided to leave quite early from home. We reached well ahead of time and got our boarding pass issued by 4:45 PM.

That’s when my boss said “Why are they boarding us in at 6 PM?”. I too was equally bewildered. Domestic flights usually board some 15-20 minutes before the departure time and this looked like a lead time of almost 90 minutes. After flipping over the boarding pass a couple of more times, we then looked up our e-Ticket. And it was printed in a very clear font that the flight was scheduled to leave at 18:20 hours and reach Hyderabad at 19:20 hours.

You see, I’d originally been booked on another flight at 19:30 hours. But since it was an ATR flight, I asked my agent to book me on another flight leaving at around the same time. He got me this new one, but I happily assumed that the flight was only at 19:30.

If there was no inauguration function that day, I’d have started at least an hour later that day. And I’d have reached the airport just around the boarding time. I’d have had the ground staff of Air India (nearing their retirement date) come look for me!

Anyways, I called up my parents after the Security clearance was done and told them that I was all set to fly out and would call them after reaching Hyderabad. I then made a resolution not to tell my parents about this near goof-up and decided to call them around 20:30 hours when the flight (per my schedule) was presumed to land there.

But the minute we left the Hyderabad airport by cab, by force of my good nature and habit, I called up home and informed them that I’d reached Hyderabad and was in the cab headed towards my office. It was around 20:00 hours and so my mother was shocked. She wondered out loud as to how come I’d reached there so soon. At that point, the cat was clearly letting itself out of the bag and since I don’t lie (about such trivial things) I told her about my mistake.

I got my second reminder dose of the Hari incident in 2 months. I could only sheepish grins and rest the issue.

On a side note, the flight to Hyderabad was really empty. I would put the occupancy at only around 70%. Agreed this was Air India and was a bigger Airbus plane, but still it was quite surprising to see so many empty seats on this sector. Perhaps the business travelers mostly prefer flying out really early on Monday mornings and with the evident increase in prices of air tickets, those travelling on personal reasons had perhaps stayed away from the flight.

After dinner, I went back to our Guest House complex and before I hit the bed, I met the Program Manager for my project. I didn’t want to have any surprises and guesses to be done in front of the client as to who was who. After a quick chat, I returned to my room. The TV was not working in my room at that time and I didn’t want to connect my laptop to the internet anyway. Also factoring the long day ahead, I decided to sleep early and so I hit the sack by 11 PM.

My ESP is still off target

For one of my earlier posts, Raghu had sent me a list of psychiatrists, thereby indicating that I needed some help. But today, there was an article in the Times of India on practically the same topic.
And earlier this week, on Wednesday, I'd asked my friend Raji (who was leaving later than usual) if she would come by train. She agreed, but then I asked her to proceed by bus since something had come up. But I was able to finish the task on time and since her bus had not yet left, I asked her if she would still be interested in the train. She refused and went ahead by bus. However, there was a big traffic jam along her route and in effect she was late in reaching home. Normally, I wouldn't have asked her if she wanted to come by train and definitely not twice. Perhaps it meant that I had some kind of premonition that there would be some delay if she went by bus.
So, I think I am really having ESP at some level, as mentioned in another earlier post of mine. Just that, even after one year, it hasn't really improved!

Take diversion

Note: This post would be better understood by those who have travelled a lot in and around Chennai.

This week has witnessed me taking some great traffic diversions, partly due to traffic advisories from friends and partly due to my bulb nature.

On Thursday, my car pool was going to start around 6.45 PM. Luckily, we got word from a friend of ours that he was stuck along our route for more than an hour. So we decided to snack slightly more than usual for the delay. We effectively started around 7.15 PM. We checked with the poor soul stuck in the jam and he told us that he had probably moved some 100 metres since the last call!

So, we decided to take an alternate route, which was basically a circuitous one. Akin to touching the right nostril with your right index finger by supporting your right forearm on the back of your head. In a way, pretty much like the unnecessarily long sentence that preceded this one.

For those familiar with the topography of this region, the route we took was: Mahindra City->Chengelpet->Thirkazhu Kundram->Mahabalipuram->Chennai via ECR. We had to pay toll at two places - one for the GST road and the other for ECR.

The reason for the jam was that the bride at Tambaram (where the GST goes over the railway track), was having some trouble and traffic was being regulated on the bridge with the Police allowing only 1-2 vehicles at a time to cross that stretch.

The next morning, we took a detour again, since we were not sure if the problem was still there. We took the ECR->Kovalam->Kelambakkam->Vandalur->Mahindra City route. That evening, we were given few false alarms and so decided to take the same route as on Thursday evening.

The evening route was actually a total of almost 85 KMs and took around 2.5 hours. A normal return along the GST usually takes 2 hours these days. For 30 more minutes, we at least get to have the car in motion in the 4th or 5th gear and that obviously increases the fuel efficiency.

That completes the highway detour story. Now starts the city story.

On Saturday, I was hosting my birthday lunch treat at a restaurant at T.Nagar. This was on Thanikachalam Road and I was informed that it is closer to the Pondy Bazaar side of the road. So, when I started from home, I thought of entering Pondy Bazaar through Mount Road, then take the left into Thanikachalam Road. Or the other option was to go from Nandanam signal, along Venakatanarayana road and then turn right on Thanikachalam road.

Mui chose the former. At first, I thought of going thru Eldams Road and cut across Mount Road to enter the Pondy Bazar road. So, I entered TTK Road with that intent. Half-way thru, I suddenly decided that I would take the MKB Road and then make a right to enter Mount Road and then take the left to the Pondy Bazaar road. Reason - SIVET college on MKB road.:D

When I reached the MKB-Mount road junction, I saw the signal indicating a left turn. But the right turn light did not work. So I thought, perhaps it would come up next. I put up my right indicator and waited patiently. After a couple of minutes, the signal (which in the mean time had returned to red), once again gave the permission to turn left. Then a cop came into my line of vision and pointed me towards the same direction. I understood that there was no right turn at that signal. I still wonder how I missed all those boards that said that there was no right turn there.

After making that left turn, I went along Mount road hoping to see a U-Turn segment. But none came along. By then I reached Nandanam signal and at that point I had no option but to continue with the plan B that I ditched earlier.

Very good lessons learnt over the past 2-3 days, especially the alternate route from office to home. Actually, we are also planning to try another route to get to T'Kundram without having to touch C'pet. I also hope that the no right turn regulation that I experienced, stays put for some more months at least!

Road Trip to Vaitheeswaran Kovil - Part 1 ::: Start of trip

The day was 13th October 2007. The sun began its journey around the earth (lets ignore Galileo for the sake of a dramatic beginning) assuming that it was seeing the same usual sights.

Not so my dear friends. Adithya was in for a mild shock, since he would have seen the Pattamadais in Besant Nagar begin their first road trip in India.

Without any more beating around the bush, I'll get to the details.

We originally planned to leave the house by 6.45 AM. We did make an earnest attempt, but the car officially left the house only around 7.30 AM. Just before we locked up our main door, I asked my father to get a couple of rusks, just in case Jimmy showed up when we started. I am not bringing in this rusk just to prove a point that I feed the hero of my street. Its just a point to be noted for future reference in this travelogue.

I somehow managed to get a few bhakthi paattu CDs. But these were never used, since my parents believe strongly that listening to music distracts the driver totally.

I started off with nearly a quarter tank of petrol. Raghu had mentioned the previous night that the price of petrol in Pondicherry (which was en route) was quite less and so advised me to fill up my tank there.

Some 30 minutes after we started, we were motoring along the ECR at a fair speed. Of course, I had to be on my best behavior in terms of my driving, since its taken me around 5 years to convince my parents to come with me on a long drive. So, I never really crossed the 80 Kmph mark, didn't overtake a vehicle unless it was clear that not even a leaf was moving on the other side of the road for the next 500 metres, didn't honk too often, didn't mutter under my breath (swearing was obviously ruled out) etc.

Anyways, we planned to have our breakfast somewhere along the route. While we were near Mahabalipuram, we started looking out for decent eateries. There were quite a few that had put up hoardings on the roads but none of them proclaimed themselves to be 100% vegetarian. So we continued to look for one such joint.

I did spot some signs for a motel that was 100% veg. When I mentioned that to my parents, somehow they started scanning the left side of the road and didn't find anything. The motel was on the right hand side and while crossing it, I told them "dho inga irukku". For what I thought was a vague reason, they continued to look for something on the left side of the road. When I told them that it was on the right hand side and that I had crossed it, I was asked to drive along and stop at the next joint that was on the left side of the road itself.

Kapish? The basic idea was that I was supposed to stick to the same side of the road and not make a turn cutting across traffic flowing in the opposite direction, never mind even if there was no traffic. Yes, that was the reason.

So, I had no choice but to motor along hoping to find the next decent place to eat. It will surprise you no end that it took me another 100 odd Kms to find such a place. More about that in Part 2.

Uncensored driving pleasure

The shutting down of our car pool looks very imminent, since one member has gone to Canada for a 2 month official trip and another has put in her papers. This has effectively left Raj and myself as the only assured travellers.

But this week, one other colleague of ours, Raghavan, has joined us. He had a nasty accident recently and returned to work this week, after around a month's leave.

Anyways, to cut a long story short, our car pool this week has been an all-men affair. And we could maintain our decency only for so long. Like just 2 days. Last evening, our conversation somehow veered itself into the swear words territory.

We were exchanging notes about how people from different parts of out state prefer to use one particular swear word over another. Turns out, the same body part is referred to with different names (k and p) and prefixes (m and p), based on where you grew up learning it.

I also told them about my great story about how I mis-pronounced a scooterette manufactured a long time back by Bajaj. Naturally, it had both Raj and Raghavan in splits. In fact, another friend of Raj, joined us in the car today and he too was given the update. Obviously, it impressed him quite a bit!

All in all, just to be able to travel in the car and use real swear words instead of the dignified "idiot" or "paithiyakaaran" or "porambokku" or even "naai", has given me more pleasure during the drive.

But like they say, all good things must end and as per the current projections for July, we are all going to return to the company bus.

Fantastic 4 - Fantastic nonsense

The fantastic four of us watched the "Fantastic Four - Rise of the Silver Surfer" at Sathyam yesterday.

The movie was seriously utter nonsense. The scientific jargon thrown at us were practically bordering on absurdity. And then the bloody Indian movie sentimental formula that was made to form the crux of the climax was ridiculous.

Imagine an entity in space coming from some galaxy far far away. The sole purpose of it is to consume matter and energy for its own existence. Such an entity sends out a Silver Surfer who on seeing Jessica Alba (who by the way has managed to look bad in the movie) starts getting a change of heart and when it finally sees her dead (killed by a harpoon none the less and that too while trying to save the surfer), restores life back to her and then goes back to its own planet and destroys it.

What the hell? How many bollywood movies did the "brains" behind the movie watch? Why is Hollywood starting to get all too senti with these sci-fin and superhero movies?

If this is the kind of $hit these guys are gonna roll out, I'd rather watch the emotional drama churned out in millions by the local movie industry. At least, there's no science to worry about in these.

On a related note, Nilu practically raped me throughout the evening. The fundamental theme being that I had no moral right to advise him about things like he not having a driver's license and yet driving a two-wheeler or he watching pirated movie cds or jumping signals etc. All because I bought tickets for Sivaji at a premium. Well, he did have a point I guess. But the continuous rubbing it in for like 2 or more hours, didn't obviously go well with me and I took it out on a two-wheeler idiot who crossed my lane when I was trying to go right. Since there was a mini traffic jam he stopped to my left. I lowered the side window and asked him the traditional Chennai question of whether he had informed his people at home about his "departure". I went further and equated him to a body part which is basically like the gate through which trash is taken out of a house. Actually, were it not for Madhu's presence in the car, I would have gone further to question his parentage with a prefix about the process that lead to his parentage being questioned.

Raghu at least stopped doing his 'ching-chak' to Nilu after that, though Nilu did stop after a few minutes.

And at the start of the article, I said the fantastic 4 of us. That was Nilu's theory. He equated Raghu to the elasto man since he has the capability to stretch his imagination and also he is like an all-rounder. Then Madhu is like invisible when compared to the rest of us in terms of weight. And it does help that the real life couple also match up to these characters who get married in this movie. Then I am supposed to be the guy who creates fire coz I am like the angry young man. And Nilu is of course the hulk-like guy.

We went to City Center for dinner. :)

Only an auto driver can do this!!!!

Saw this some 10 days back, near the Adyar depot signal. The time was around 06:50 AM.
Please zoom the picture, especially the space between the auto and the two-wheeler.
The auto driver just didn't give a rat's a$$ about hindrance to traffic.

I saw a lady rise up from the middle of the road

An incident happened last week or the week before. I was driving my car and was on my way home.

Near Tambaram Railway station, you can always see lots of people crossing the road at various points. The point to be noted that for a good stretch, the GST has pretty big road dividers - regular concrete medians that are like 3 feet tall.

However a small portion of the road does not have this type of median. The police have placed the standard metal dividers in that stretch.

Naturally, people have a tendency to use the gaps between two such barricades and cross the road. But what I saw that day was really scary.

I was near this stretch and around 25-30 feet in front of me, I saw this apparition in the middle of the road. Upon keener observation, I realised that it was a lady. The interesting thing was, it looked like she was emerging from the tar road. Just when I neared her, I found this big gap between two of these barricades. Since it was at a lower height, she had actually crawled thru this gap.

For someone watching this spectacle towards the end of the show, it looked as if she she was rising up from the earth. But alas, she was only a human being (theoretically that is).

And I took a picture of the gap more than a week after I witnessed the above mentioned theatrics. Its a pity that I couldn't capture the event itself on camera.

Car Pooling

3 of my friends at work and myself, have now started car pooling.

As most of you would have experienced, Mr.Aditya is doing "Over Time" in Chennai (and from news reports, in many other parts of the state as well). He has been at it from March/April itself. We have been suffering for quite some time in the bus.

One of my friends, Raj, was especially adamant about not travelling by the bus any more. He found an ally instantly in me. We then started hunting for other like minded people and got hold of Raji and Sudha. Luckily, Raj and I live close-by and Raji stays in Indira Nagar. Sudha stays in Velachery, but she was ok with boarding the car near Guindy. The only problem is that, only Raj and I can drive. The other 2 have cars, but the driving duty is taken care by their better-half.

Since this car pooling thingy involves financial implications on all of us, we had to first arrive at a proper estimate of the cost. Raj and I worked out the fuel efficiency of our cars and included a small maintenance fee.

I created a detailed trip sheet in Excel. I used this opportunity to upgrade my excel knowledge and came out with a whole lot of 'if-else' conditions. The excel sheet has received great feedback in my friends' circle at work. :D :D :D

Anyways, we have been Car Pooling from the start of May. The plan as of now is to continue till the end of June at the minimum. But in case I move to my new house, the plan would have to be revisited.

Going by car has given me a new lease of life. I feel fresh when entering office and even when I return home. In spite of the bad traffic sense that 99% of the road users possess, I still find so much peace in driving that I am ok with all that.

But I have a tough week ahead. Raj is on Bangalore the whole week, which means I have to drive on all 5 days. Yet, I actually look forward to it.

Capital Punishment can be replaced with this option

If you belong to the group of people who want to eliminate Capital Punishment (personally, I am in favour of it), I think you have a very good alternative on hand.

While you oppose CP claiming that by killing someone the system is no different from the offender, the system has no other option of educating the people about the pitfalls of committing heinous crimes.

So, to you, I offer a solution. Perhaps you can advertise this during all your protests and you might actually have some takers.

My solution - The offender must be asked to drive a car in T.Nagar, specifically the area of Usman Road, Dhandapani Street and the connecting streets. Of course, the car given to the offender must be like the ones used in driving schools - with control pedals on the passenger side as well, just so that the offender doesn't indulge in any "Carmageddon" activities.

I had quite a tough time in that area this evening. I am 110% sure that I spent at least 2 litres of petrol this evening, while covering a distance of say 2-3 kms. I had to go around the streets and the main road due to lack of parking space. I had to encounter auto rickshaws coming menacingly towards me in a one-way street - and point to be noted, I was travelling in the correct direction. I withstood verbal attacks like "poyiginaay iru", "po po" and "varalaam vaa", not to mention the assortment of glares, stares and apologetic looks and the quintessential showing of palm while crossing the road.

So, it was quite an excruciating evening for me. And if the hole in the ozone has increased today, I am definitely accountable for a small portion of it!

Road Sign - what should I do now

When I was in Std X, I participated in an inter-school quiz/test on Road Safety and won the first prize. It was conducted by IRTA and the state Transport Ministry. So I got the prize from the then state transport minister and even got coverage in some local newspapers - with photo.

Anyways, the point is, when I topped that exam (beating out all the kids of Chennai), I clearly aced all the questions on road signs that were asked. But thank God, this one was not there in the exam.

This sign is near the Tambaram Railway Station. Saw this a week ago but was able to take a picture only yesterday.

But what is a road user supposed to do at that junction? Or not do for that matter.

Rain and traffic and a compensatory working day

This week's been quite hectic. Mainly coz of traffic.

Its the annual feature I guess. It rains. Roads get damaged. HUGE craters appear all of a sudden, making you wonder if any meteorite landed there. Naturally, with the next spell, all these craters and their smaller cousins - the potholes - get filled up and hamper traffic flow.

So a normal journey from office, that used to take an hour and 30 minutes, now takes a minimum of 45 minutes more.

The funny things is that, the choke point varies every day. One day it was Chrompet. Another day it was the Airport. Next time it was the Kathipara Junction. The area between the Airport and Kathipara was clogged once. Halda junction took the honors another day. Not to be left out, the stretch between Madhya Kailash and Anna University showed its power by stopping traffic on the surface road and also on the flyover.

Its quite bad to travel by bus in this mess. Thankfully, I now leave by the 6.30 services and so I dont have to share my seat with anyone. Otherwise, I will go mad during 'jam' times.

Only yesterday evening, I had the usual 1.5hr journey. I am guessing that was because the rain has stopped for a couple of days and also because it was a Saturday and so no routine peak-hour traffic.

Yes, my office was working yesterday to compensate for the public holiday we were given for the Tamil Nadu Municipal Elections. But again, the crowd was less in the office, coz some projects still had to come that day and few others made a strategic move to come in last Saturday itself. That was a good strategic move because, since its not an official working day, the bus services are limited and that means less time in the office. I however didnt opt for that option, though in all honesty, that strategy didnt strike me till 2 days back. By which time, I guess it was late.

So basically I have just this one day to recharge myself. The sun also seems to be out. So hopefully I can do some mall visit and also finish up the pending treat to Superthumby and Neeluking.

sunday traffic

oh boy. the traffic on besant avenue is really annoying me. the cops are doing their best to slow down the traffic. they've placed these huge metal barricades on either side of the road, but that seems to be applicable only for any vehicle that has more than 3 wheels.
the other option that the cops have in place, is the speed breaker (or rumblers as they are known in only this part of the city). but that slows down everything except the SUVs. that breed of drivers are probably beaten to the post only by the 3 wheel demon called auto.
i think the only way traffic can be regulated here is by having the ubiquitous median or having a cop stand every 50m with a lathi in hand. and i defintely prefer a cop who likes to use it.

I went to see this tamizh movie called Jerry yesterday evening with aatha and naina. the movie was just about tolerable. for a supposedly full length comedy movie, it had around 15 minutes of real good fun. but then watching it in Mayajal, effectively blew a 600 buck hole in the wallet. somehow intelligently, i got my pops to pay for the whole thing. small pleasures in life :)

god, its monday in an hour's time. better get some sleep and start fresh for the daily 50km travel (each way) to office.