The Shared Auto

Wondering what the title is all about? I mean, shared autos aren't all that uncommon, right? Well, make a trip to Gurgaon, and you'll find out why I'm writing about them. Better still, be forced to live (and work) here for two months. Then you'll really find out! Imagine the following scene: You live about 4 km from your work-place, with a ten-lane expressway in between. How long do you think you'll take to reach office? Five minutes? Ten? Fifteen? Well, if you're in this city, not less than 45 minutes, and that's on a good day. You see, the Einsteins who designed this little gem of suburbia forgot one tiny detail - the public transport. In Gurgaon, the word "public" and "transport" don't really mix. It's like Real Madrid and Barcelona fans. There isn't even a snowball's chance in hell of any sort of combination of the two. You've just got to deal with the fact - get a car, or else sit in three separate overcrowded, dusty and painfully slow autos to get to your workplace. It's that simple: Car or the Indian version of chaos-on-wheels. I'll try my best to upload pics of these vehicles, but like the Mumbai Locals and Bangalore traffic jams, you have to experience them to believe in them. Let me try my hand at a description - take a medium sized auto-rickshaw (about 50% larger than the Autos from Bangalore) and stuff FIFTEEN people into it. Bags, Sacks, Barrels, Small children... Everything fits, and how! Add loud dik-chik dik-chik music, painfully under-powered engines (obviously, the manufacturers wouldn't have had a passenger load of 15++ to contend with) and bingo, you have a typical "shared auto". A driver screaming random names and making interesting gestures at passers-by completes package. Wait a minute, I forgot to mention the best part. The "Shared" part of a shared auto comes from the fact that there needs to be more than one person in the auto, and they only ply on fixed routes (presumably, the random names the chaps keep shouting). Unfortunately, "more than one person" equates to a minimum of six. Hence, a half-empty auto behaves like a drunk lecher, angling its way near each pedestrian, (esp. women, and I've noticed this time and time again) almost intimidating them to get into the auto. No amount of pleading, coaxing or even cursing can get the driver to move a little faster. There is a single over-powering emotion: "must pick up passenger, stuff him/her in". Time constraints? Whatever is that? Abe India hai, boss! I sincerely miss those express buses of Mangalore :)

Hello World!

Hmmmm... Is it just me or are my titles getting stranger with each successive post. I read a few of the others, and ordinarily, I'd have put them down to the work of a stark-raving lunatic. Oh well, it takes all types to make this world. Anyway, as with all other esoteric titles, this has a vague semblance of an origin. (And here, some of my friends are going to roll their eyes over and snigger at the pretentiousness of it all. Well, quoting Clark Gable, frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn...) I was think about stuff in general the other day (here's where it all started to go downhill, right at the "think" part) and I realised something. I don't quite like the world I'm increasingly being exposed to at what is supposed to be a B-school. Don't get me wrong - the primary purpose of this place - i.e. providing a reasonable amount of knowledge - isn't being unfulfilled or anything. While some courses make you want to tear your hair out, and stuff it down someone's unfortunate throat, most provide a fair degree of learning. The part that depresses me about this place is the level of competition and politics.

Back at my previous institute, our student body was fragmented pretty much along regional lines. (For those afraid of another one my "election" related posts, don't worry. I was never really into that sort of thing...) It was sad to watch a bunch of guys, who were about as homogeneous and talented a group as is possible, given the size, squabble over issues that could have easily been solved in much better, more efficient ways. Here was one of the best institutes in the country, ending up as a sad reflection of all the ills that plague India. When push came to shove, we divided ourselves along simple language and region. Screw merit and all related concepts, we wanted our "state" to be among the winners. Some of us tried to change things, with a few notable effects, but all in all, what transpired was hardly the most optimal solution. For me, it was an indictment of all that was wrong with the system in India.

So, doing what Indians do best, I simply ignored it, forgot about it, and pretended that nothing had happened. In all fairness, nothing really had happened. I was just a little late to wake up, and smell the coffee, as it were :)

Anyway, moving on to where I am currently, I thought that this place would be different. I expected a far more mature response to issues like elections, considering the group of people here (after all, I'm one of the youngest in my class). Well, the previous few months have been pretty much the opposite of what I expected. I've realised yet another thing - this place, while mercifully not divided along regional lines (at least not apparently, anyway), is still very much divided. People can't seem to understand a simple fact - this stuff (committees, secys etc. etc.) really DOES NOT matter. Think about it - ten-plus years from now, are all these committees going to seem all that important? I sure hope not, for all our sakes :P. Not to say that I didn't have fun as part of a committee - I think that what we accomplished (esp. memorable - one hell of a simulation game) was quite brilliant - but I'd like to think that there are bigger things in life. That brings me to my point - at times, we tend to get a bit caught up in the here and now. We seem to be overly bothered about stuff that really doesn't matter, so much so that we neglect what we ought to be doing. Getting one more live project, with no real learning value, really isn't going to change much. Having said that, everyone's doing it, so what's the harm in doing it also? There lies a fundamental problem I really can't change - we're part of a rat-race, and I can't see a way out of it, yet...

It's Time For Change!

Well, if anyone still visits this blog (apart from me once every fortnight, surreptitiously checking if there's been any sort of activity) they'd have notice the change in the name. The obvious question that follows is "Why?". Well, to put it very simply, things have changed. My physical appearance has changed, if only by a bit. My world and the experiences in it have changed. My friends have changed. (at least some of them :P) But most importantly, I've changed. The way I look at things, the way I see people has definitely been altered. I've gone from contentment, to mini-desperation, and finally back to contentment again. In some things I've tried and failed. In others, I've been successful after a fair few attempts. In still others, I've succeeded at the outset itself. My expectations from people have been modified to account for the subtle deception that is invariably part of life. I've learned not to take things at face value, and not to assume anything.

All in all, I've done a reasonable bit of introspection, and realised that ultimately, thus far, the questions I've asked have mattered far more than the answers I've received. Hence the title - Questions, NOT Answers.