Random images from my flickr stream...

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27/02/09

Doesn't make sense not to live for fun!

A retired man moves near a junior high school. He spends the first few weeks of retirement in peace and quiet. However, when a new school year begins, three young boys beat on every trash can they encounter every day on their way home from school.

Finally, the man decides to take action and walks out to meet the boys. He says, "You kids are a lot of fun. I'll give you each a dollar if you'll promise to come around every day and do your thing." The kids continue to do a bang-up job on the trashcans.


After a few days, the man tells the kids, "This recession's really putting a big dent in my income. From now on, I'll only be able to pay you 50 cents to beat on the cans." The noisemakers are displeased, but they accept his offer.


A few days later, the retiree approaches them again. "Look," he says, "I haven't received my Social Security check yet, so I'm not going to be able to pay more than 25 cents. Will that be OK?"
"A freakin' quarter?" the drum leader exclaims. "If you think we're going to waste our time beating these cans around for a quarter, you're nuts. We quit."


This was a joke that I got some days back on a RSS feed, but I did not laugh after reading this but it got me thinking instead...

The moment we take away fun from what we do and start doing things for returns, the entire perception changes... now the effort is usually defined by the returns we are getting out of it and not by how much we enjoy doing it !!!

When I put myself into this position, I see myself doing most of the things because I enjoy doing them and not because I want some returns to come from them... having said that I really like the returns too in forms of money or attention or praise, but the bottom line is that how much I enjoy doing it, does not change !



I hope to continue living this way !

Well the years start coming and they don't stop coming
Back to the rule and I hit the ground running

Didn't make sense not to live for fun
Your brain gets smart but your head gets dumb

So much to do so much to see

So what's wrong with taking the back streets

You'll never know if you don't go

You'll never shine if you don't glow

Smashmouth - All Star (One of my favorite tracks EVER)

25/02/09

Randomness in me !

Come to think about it, Chai Ki Dukaan is a random blog !!! Not many posts are in order of being connected to each other, however there is a certain order that got built in between all this randomness over the last few years !

I am wondering if there are enough random things that I can write about myself, but looks like there are... every month every week every day something new happens that might just seem random but is a part of a larger plan someone (I don't know who) is busy making for me !!! so thank you that someone :) !!

and here is a free flow of some randomness about myself...

1. I face Southwest in my office and at days when I reach early (like 7ish) and the day is sunny, there is sunlight on my desk... I love it

2. I like to give and get credit for things both at work and in personal life! If I am using something that someone else has worked on, I do try to ensure that the audience knows about that effort ! I absolutely hated it when a friend once used a picture that I clicked and put it on her page without a mention of me anywhere and without asking me... and all of this when she knew that the picture was very close to my heart... to top it all she comes back and tells me that she did justice to the picture by doing that !!! phew !

3. I don't work for money.. I love what I do at work, and that's why I work ! IT Services Consulting... love it! and money most of the time is the least of my worries... Surprisingly whenever it has been a cause of concern, it was taken care of... as if someone was ensuring it does not bother me! and at multiple times!

4. Mostly my life is driven by needs and not wants... if I want something too much then I try to figure out how it qualifies to be a need and then get it!

5. I want to get married next year... how to go about it is another story and will need a post a blog a diary an year to write about ! I am hoping I will find someone really nice who my parents would like too sometime!

6. I forget about drinking water and having food at times when I am too much into work!


7. I take my time (now) before I decide on what kind of a person someone is... earlier it used to be a quick(er) judgment !

8. There has been a phase in my life when I totally hated women and that went on for a year or so... no points for guessing that it was because of a relationship that ended at a very very bad note.. I have never cried that much in my life...

9. My behavior (mostly) is driven by how I would like to be treated in a similar situation... that has helped me a lot over the past few years !!!

10. I don't have an excuse for not working out regularly ! and thankfully for the past two days I am regular with exercise... ;) two needs to be 20 and 20 needs to be 200 !

11. I love tea and not all tea... tea is with tea leaves and not really anything and everything that you can dry and crush to a powder and put in a bag! Though I have to admit that I like some of them, but not many!

12. I am an extremely lucky person. There are times when I feel frustrated, but when I look back at things I realize that most of it did fall into place... and Uncle God has been around most of the time either in the form of my parents, or my friends or in forms that I did not realize then but I do now!

13. I can act strangely crazy, closed, stupid at times, and all of this while knowing that I should not be doing it... I guess I cannot lie to myself !

14. I think flowers good great in B/W photographs ! For that matter, I think most of the things look great in B/W... even life ! :)


15. I had a 3 gb collection of porn which I deleted last year! ok 3.4 GB!

16. I enjoy walking


17. Alone on the hills


18. and I feel the need of a company at times on the beaches

19. But I have sat down and looked at the sea for hours alone as well, and I loved all of those experiences !

20. I broke down the beach/hill/alone/company points above so that I finish 25 random points quicker !!

21. My interest in anything stops when learning from it stops!

22. But I also feel that I am growing up to be a more patient person than I have been all through these years ! So I tend to find ways to get some learning or make things interesting when they are too conveyor belt-ish.

23. I want to go back to London and stay there for at least 6 months during spring and fall.


24. I like open windows and fresh air... Even when the temperature was in negatives outside, I would open the window an inch or so that fresh air can circulate inside my apartment...

25. I like heights... I could jump from a plane 14500 ft above ground (Sky diving, Chicago last year) but I find it difficult to jump from a 22ft cliff into the water (River Rafting, Rishikesh every year, well almost every year).

26... So I finished 25 but I think I can write a few more

27. I like to be in love... Its a very complete feeling... and I am not really talking about the relationship love, it can be the love for someone without being in a relationship as well, and the willingness to do things to make them happy... I do not like an overuse of the word "love"... its a precious word for me!


28. I don't understand football but I love Tennis (Pete Sampras and Steffi Graf are my favorites, but I don't know everything about them like most fans do; watching them play was a visual delight like nothing else; I liked watching Ivan Lendl and Boris Becker as well) and Basketball( Lakers happens to be my favorite team and Kobe Bryant the favorite player)... I cannot watch cricket alone...

29. This number and my age have a certain resemblance that is both comforting and challenging at the same time

30. I am going to be 30 soon.. I wanted to take a month long break travel throughout India when that happens, but looks like I would be spending it here in the US.. the month long break has been deferred and the three must go places for me are Ahmedabad, Kolkata and Mumbai


31. I have learned how to play a keyboard and a guitar and have spent most of my college life either on the stage or in greenrooms or writing/directing/doing street plays... I really miss those times ! Really!


32. This is a very very long post ! tell me if you did manage to read it !!! Chandan, you specially :)



24/02/09

Taking a step back !

I had mentioned it a few weeks back that I was seriously thinking of getting a film camera and after a few initial thoughts, I finally got myself a Canon AE1 Program along with a Canon f1.4 FD Lens...


No longer in production ( for obvious reasons) the Canon AE1-Program was introduced in 1981 and has been one of the more successful cameras Canon has in its kitty !


I have bought it to click some B/W film and do more street photography... Call me strange or crazy or whatever, I am pretty happy that I got it !

23/02/09

Sasural Genda Phool in Minneapolis

Here is another one of the many conversations from the Minneapolis trip !! Suman Vaddi , on my right is a flat mate with Pritam, Lakhan and Deepak... He was not too sure of the meaning of Sasural Genda Phool song and I decided to share the details with him... looks like it was more funny than it seemed to be at moment... I enjoyed looking at this video !!!




oh and I managed to watch the movie as well over this weekend. I was dissapointed to be honest... very weak transition of scenes, not sure if the title has much to do with the movie, strange inclusion of songs, and mostly below average use of the brilliant set of actors...
- Vijay Raaz (Inspector Chaudhary; very bad dialogues... someone really needs to know how the Delhi Police guys in Delhi talk, specially the ones from Haryana) and
- Divya Dutta (another useless attempt at trying to have an accent); there was an uncomfortable pause in her sentences...
- Another big dissapoint was the role given to Atul Kulkarni... he is such a brilliant actor and he given the character of "gober" !!! unbelievable !

For all I know, this movie could have been named Ghaziabad -8 or Lucknow 12 or Kanpur 21 or Bhopal 44 or Kala Bandar if not anything else !

But don't take my word for it... watch the movie... It would still show you a "few" glimpses of the beautiful walled city !

Oh, and apologies for a bad video quality of the embedded video.. it was the darker corner of the room where we guys were sitting and chatting... If the above video does not work for you, here is the link for YouTube.

19/02/09

Blogged by Chaibaaz Chandan (चायबाज़ चंदन)


Blogged, originally uploaded by Chandan Dubey.

Please welcome a new member to the Chaibaaz Family.. Chandan Dubey (चंदन दूबे )

She is from Banaras and currently based out of Hong Kong and has a blog called Girl About Home. Go to her blog and you would be able to effortless wander around all the text and photographs that she has there... Something to look at whenever you need to view some refreshing colors ! Needless to say, the same thing is true about her flickr stream too !!

Welcome to the Chaibaaz Family Chandan :) I kind of like your name like this :चंदन चायबाज़

And, finding members for the Chaibaaz family is something that I really like to do.. .Random thing number 1 :)

18/02/09

कविराज प्रशांत भारद्वाज

You've read what I write... here is a chance to hear it too :)



Apologies for a bad video quality... It was taken using a regular point and shoot camera and in the darker side of the living room !

17/02/09

(a)Roundtrip in two days !

I had aimed for a good weekend, and I hit the bull's eye if not anything else :)


So Friday night i took the bus to Minneapolis and reached around midnight...


Happy Valentine's day had started :)



On Saturday all we could do was hit on the dartboard instead of some hot girls around, because it was kind of snowing and very cold...


But the sky opened up, and it was bright outside... Pritam was excited about the shoot I had promised him of his new car !


No, not the one above... its the one below :) The one above was just parked where we were shooting...

What yummy tires his SUV has... Tires and the lights are the first thing that I like to notice in any vehicle and if they are not attractive, I am usually not going to give the car a second look... and Pritam's Nissan is a nice mean beast !!!


We went around driving for a sunset point and reached the Medicine Lake instead... Realized that this was our chance to drive on ICE and without much deliberation took the car on the lake as well... Now this was some crazy experience... driving on the frozen lake....

Waiting till sunset there and then headed back home.... The evening saw some lovely Indian music with an overdose of Delhi 6 numbers, specially Gainda Phool and ended with a lot of RD Burman music... not to mention the repeat of Umrao Jaan songs over and over again... so finally slept around 0300 hrs after finishing the conversation quote for the night...



The next morning... 0830 hrs and some hot ginger tea thanks to Deepak woke me and the rest of the gang up !!!!


Suman still did not want to get up and he just got up and went into a different room to catch up on his sleep :)

While the rest of the gang was getting ready, I took a few pictures of the customary roses to mark the Valentine's day celebrations :)



The day was sunny and nicely warm !

So we decided to go out for a short drive around Minneapolis...

Went to the Minnehaha Park...


and saw the frozen waterfall @ the Minnehaha park...


The stairs that would take you to the bottom of the fall were closed and that saved us some time... so me and Pritam decided to take Golu, Lakhan and Sapna to the Medicine Frozen lake....

This time around, there were more people on the lake, and ICE fishing was at its full swing...


Lakhan got adventurous and decided to take some rest on his makeshift ICE bed...


The rest of the people were more intelligent, and had small cabins which they we spending time in...


And then we tried another game... sit on the pillow push ! but this did not work well... either our subject (Pritam in this case) was too heavy for the pillow to slide on ice, or the ice was not that frictionless... anyway, before we came out of the lake, we decided to do some wheelies and Pritam did take some nice complete turns in the car... very very interesting... i am sure they would have looked more interesting from outside !!!

With not much time left, we then rushed to Perkins to have lunch... i love Perkins by the way... the Granny Omlette (without any meat) and the Pancakes with honey are the best combo !!! mmmmmmmmmmm....

With just about 30 minutes left for my bus, we rushed to the downtown stand...

Took the bus at 1530 hrs from Minneapolis and was back home around 2200 hrs....


And did I mention that during these two days, we managed to take some crazy interesting portraits too !!! enjoy :)


Like I had said in my earlier post... Had a very refreshing weekend... Frozen lake, Frozen Waterfall, Umrao Jaan, Ginger Tea, Crazy Face Making Photo Session, Hunt for a Pineapple Cake, were just some of the few things that happened, not to mention the non stop talking !!!

16/02/09

Refresh Complete !

Had a very refreshing weekend !!!

Hope you enjoyed too !!!

And sincere apologies for not being able to respond to any comments on the last few posts !! Have been crazy busy at work and was out for the weekend ! Will write soonest !

13/02/09

Tandem Random Tags ! (for the Old Love for Old Delhi)

Bindu tagged me sometime back and here are the rules :

1.pick the 6th picture from your 6th photo folder (I chose to pick it from the 6th Set on Flickr. Here are the rest of the sets)
2.tell the story around it. (sure... below)
3.pass it onto 6 other people. (umm... I would let the people chose if they want to do this)

so here is the photograph :



And here is the story:

The flower market in Fatehpuri, near Chandni Chawk, Old Delhi is a daily market where loose flowers are sold... The market starts around 0400 hrs and does brisk business by 0730 hrs... post that there are less buyers and the flower prices also start coming down... and, some of the flowers get spoilt as well after being there for a while... mostly these vendors have to sell everything the same day, because of the lack of storage, and the life of the flowers.. What you see in the picture, is one of the vendors throwing away the not so good ones so that his bunch still looks fresh and he can sell it at a decent price !

Chandni Chawk and the lanes and bylanes and the whole place has something that attracts me to it... I can't really put my finger on one reason, but it can be anything between the food that I get to eat there, or the old Delhi Character I see, or the warmth of the people that I meet while walking around on the streets, or the integrity of the place even though there is so much varied which happens all around... Not to forget the fact, that he has one of the largest Spices market, Trophies Market, Dry Fruits Market, Cotton Market, Wedding Cards and Paper market, Hardware and Sanitary Market all in the viscinity !!! In addition to this flower market offcourse !!!


And here are a few more photographs from the same place...







I have another tag to finish... Chandan has tagged me to write some random things about myself and I have a few more friends on facebook who would like me write 25 random things about myself !!!! So that is coming up sometime soon !!!

Oh, and this valentines, why don't you go out with your loved one and do something for the not so loved ones !!! I am sure spreading some love can have a completly new meaning if you can afford to spend your time and money for people who really need some love !!! I have nothing against the roses, and cards, and other natak's that happen on this day ( ok, I have something against them :P) but mostly I feel that this one day can be utilized much much better in many many more ways... unless Romance with each other is on the top of your list :)