Nip in the air

For the first time this year as I stepped out from my bath, I felt a slight chill run up my body. Of course, this slight chill shall soon be bandied by the Mumbaikars and all local media as the arrival of winters to Mumbai or if some journalist is feeling lucky, even a cold wave. For me, at best it is disappointing and at worst, a reminder of what it could have been. Having spent almost all my life (except the four years in South India and 3 years here in Mumbai) in the north of Vindhyas, winter has had a special significance for me.

The arrival of winters, whether I was in Delhi for my schooling or job, or if I was in Patna/Buxar growing up, was marked by many distinct happenings. One of them, of course, was the grand revival of the quilts and the woolens. Dumped aside in some big box for the rest of the year, the woolens used to make their presence felt as Diwali came to pass. Starting with the half sleeved pullovers and the thin blankets and ending up at full bodied jackets and heavy duty quilts, the smell of mothballs combined with the heat trapped inside them after a day of being shown the sunlight form some of my happier childhood memories.

As I grew up, winters also became the opportunity to show off. Unlike girls who can actually heat things up in summers with their multi colored apparel extending up to multiple standards of length and size, guys hardly have options on what to wear. It is only in winters that the blazers and the jackets, the tweeds and the denim come out in full force. I started realizing this once I moved to Delhi from a sheltered Patna and became a part of the pack. The jacket that Mananmama bought me from the local Tibetan market in Patna was a prized possession then and continues to be with me, 15 years down the line. And then came the suits as well...starting with a dumb beige suit to the now-often-unused smart black suit, this sartorial journey has been a pleasant recollection for me as well.

Probably the most favorite recollection I have of winters has been the one associated with the Christmas cheer, the one I witnessed in Paris. Having heard about the terrific atmosphere pre-Christmas in the western world, I was not to be disappointed as my exchange program during MBA chanced to happen in a way as to be spread over the months of September to December. The best time to visit Europe, the winters were in full flow by the time we were starting to prepare for our journey back to India. From ice skating to my first ever experience with natural snowfall, I could see all of it and I loved every moment...cherishing every experience.

The Christmas spirit, the warmth of new year that I had seen so much in movies, read so much about in books, heard so much of...was all there. Shops were decorated as if all light and flower arrangements in the world would run out tomorrow and today was the only day left to use them. Cafes were doing brisk business, people were walking about with smiles on their faces, and even the normally stiff metro co-passengers appeared to have that sense of joviality reflected on their faces.

It was quite a contrast from the winters I had seen in Delhi, for example where it becomes a challenge and an ordeal at times instead of people actually enjoying the party. The living standards starkly different, it is understandable I guess, if those who can't afford one square meal a day hate the season that exposes them at their most vulnerable, chilling the very bones of their existence...at times to the very end. But then the other strata in Delhi enjoys the season as well as any of their counterparts elsewhere in the world. You can always find droves of people (including me and my friends) around stalls of anything hot and edible...chaat, rolls, momos... Even a simple cup of coffee with friends and family turns into a celebration of the season that winter is.

Now in Mumbai, where the different seasons simply don't seem to exist, life (just like the weather) seems to chug along in the boring monochrome. The ceiling fan operates in full gusto in my bedroom whereas cold is busy gripping the sunlight out of other cities I know of...the contrast is stark. Is there an option but to bow down to the will and designs of that eternal being who controls all this...makes all these stark differences possible, rules our lives and of all that around us with such absolute control?

Retail Therapy

Almost two and a half years ago, when I was persuaded by my sister to buy a flat for myself in Mumbai instead of paying increasingly exorbitant rents to increasingly greedy landlords (despite the recession), I never realized truly what I am getting into. Whether it was the EMI and the stretch that I would have to do to meet it, or it was the positives in terms of an integrated complex with a mall, a club house, a hotel, a school, a hospital, etc...I had not really visualized any of it.

Things kept changing and May 2009 till now, there have been many new experiences that I have had with my first home. Increased traffic, food chains refusing to deliver, having my own club house with a swimming pool, squash/tennis/badminton courts, gymnasium, etc, no cafes near my home where I could spend a lazy sunday morning (always a dream), the neighborhood's low brand appeal, the rapidly increasing rentals and property prices, the nearest multiplex although only four kilometres away taking anywhere between twenty minutes to an hour to reach, society formation and new rules that it brought along, comfort of being just three and a half kilometres from office...so many things for it and as many against it.

And then something came up. Phoenix Mills (of the High Street Phoenix fame) took up old and defunct Mukund mills right next to my place (five minutes walking distance) and decided to convert into Phoenix Market City, India's largest mall and amusement complex. From the time they announced the project through the entire construction to the opening a week back, the expectations that I have had of the mall kept on increasing.

Yesterday, I had a chance to visit the newly opened mall and boy, was I pleasantly surprised! I did expect a good collection of brands, given the size of the mall but was definitely prepared for what I saw. Anything that one could ever need in terms of shopping/entertainment was already there or in the process of being there. In addition, there were a lot of stores which were not even branded and work was in progress. Nothing seemed to be missing and there was much more packed into it than what any other place I have seen has to offer.

This was just the inside of the mall, someone said, and there is an entire courtyard that is still to be laid down. I ventured out into the courtyard and realized that it was almost twice the size of the mall (which took me one and a half hours of walking across 4 levels to just cover). What shape the place would take 3-6 months down the line had my antennae of anticipations all propped up.

With the size of the mall being so large, it becomes very important for it to be properly laid out in terms of the ease of finding a particular brand/store in the entire "market city". Once again I was not disappointed when I saw that each floor of the mall was arranged in the form of 2-3 hub-and-spoke models with each spoke representing a lane of shops. Each such lane was invariably based on a theme (all footwear brands in one lane, all apparel brands in another, etc).

While walking through all these hubs and spokes, I made a note of the stores that were either already functional or whose branding was visible (and which were at most a month away from opening). There were a lot of brands that I was aware of, some that were more boutique in nature and the mix was just right, it appeared to me. The names below are just those that could recall having seen earlier (both large and small). Many others are relative unknowns or still on their way and I am really looking forward to discover more in addition to the ones listed below:


Cafes (always wanted one of these close to my house, am now spoilt for choice)
Cafe Coffee Day, Costa Coffee, Cafe pico, Di bella coffee, Kalmane coffee, Cafe bean garu, Cafe Royal

Entertainment
PVR (the largest in India for sure, some 14 screen megaplex is what I have heard), TimeZone, FunZone, Amoeba

Restaurants/Eating Out
Mcdonalds, Cream Centre, Subway, KFC, Pizza Hut, Rainforest, Rajdhani, Mainland China, Joss, Egg Sunday, Kailash Parbat, Maroosh, Mad over Donuts, Hokey Pokey, Gelato, Bowl House, Smokin Joes, Cookie Man, Golden Tips Tea

Wellness/Health/Cosmetics
Sukho Thai, Aroma Thai, Essence of China, VLCC, Health & Glow, The Body Shop, Lush, Nyassa, Color Bar

Fashion/Apparel
Zara, Debenhams, Diesel, Veromoda, UCB, French Connection, Promod, Espirit, Alcott, Calvin Klein, Guess, FCUK, Lee, Levis, Wrangler, Luxury Boulevard, Sisley, Celio, Van Heusen, Allen Solly, Arrow, Louis Phillippe, Blackberrys, Park Avenue, Belmonte, Raymond, Lords, La Senza, Madame, Rockport, Color Plus, Headquarter, Indian terrain, AND, 109F, Biba, Bebe, Wills Lifestyle, Ayesha, Globaldesi, Only, JacknJones

Kids Fashion
Mothercare, Mom & Me, Liliput, UCB Kids, Just for Kids,

Footwear & Bags
Charles n Keith, Bagzone, Hidesign, Nine West, Aldo, Aldo Accessories, Esbeda, VIP, Samsonite, Reliance Footprint, Timberland, Converse, Nike, Reebok, Adidas, Crocs, Planet Sports, Cheemo, Catwalk, Gossip Shoes, Bottomline Footwear, Metro, Clarks, Hush Puppies, Puma, Mochi, Bata

Departmental Stores
Lifestyle, Max, Pantaloons, Reliance Trends, Reliance Hyper

Jewellery and Watches
Swatch, Titan, Fastrack, Swarovski, Cygnus, Gilli, Carbon

Others
Canon, Archies, Hallmark

Update long due

It's been ages since I last wrote and this time, there are no excuses. I just did not feel like writing. Every time I came to see the blog, I felt like updating it but never managed to gather enough verve to actually sit and write something. Not that there was a dearth of things to write about...quite to the contrary, actually. Not only from a strict news point of you, but even from the emotions and sentiments ruling my life, there were so many things I should have recorded but I did not. Well, better late than never!

Getting on to the news front first, I bought a house in Mumbai...that's right, a dwelling place in one of the most densely populated and costliest cities in the world. That is the good part. The bad part is that the house and associated liabilities have resulted in a fixed monthly expense of about Rs. 80,000 and that is without taking into account the other, relatively variable expenditure that one will have to make towards regular expenses like maid, electricity, cooking gas, car fuel, groceries, etc...most of which is being covered by Priya today but that will only last for that much more time.

The office, incidentally, has also shifted to Kalina, which is only 3 odd kilometers from my new home. What this means is that I have now got additional two hours of my life per day, all to myself. I have started utilizing these two additional hours properly. While the one in the morning goes into exercise (I have actually started running and to my utter surprise, I have managed notwithstanding my leg), the one in the evening goes to reading (one good habit that I had put on the back burner for a long time).

Amongst other news, my car has become a wreck and the driver is threatening to leave (not related to each other but still...). Now Sunil, the driver in question, has been serving our family for the last six years and since he belongs to the native place, the trust factor is pretty strong. From my side, I have tried to treat him well but the promise of Mumbai does not fail in getting anyone. Having spent his driving career in Jaipur and Delhi, Sunil has realized, having come to Mumbai, what the possibilities are...how endless they seem once you are free to pursue them...and free is what he wants to be.

Okay, now that we are done with news in its strictest sense, time to do the transition from news to its impact. The transition, of course, starts with more news and this one happens to be that I did not get any special treatment from my firm this year (and this includes bonus and salary hikes which I did not expect, as well as promotions and role definitions which I did). That's it...I have said it and I don't care who reads it.

Obviously, all the news has resulted in a combination of some extreme sentiments. There is, of course, happiness, joy, pride, and a sense of achievement on the family owning a house in Mumbai (celebrated in part via two housewarming parties, one for the college junta and another for the office people). At the same time, there is sadness, disappointment, disillusionment, and a resignation to fate that has resulted from news at work.

I have become so befuddled with all this that I don't know whether to be happy or sad nowadays. The end result is that I have become such an explosive mixture that at times, I hardly know what to expect from myself. A friend tells me that I am dead and have lost my sense of humor, another tells me that I am into some sort of depression, my sister has stopped talking to me since I flare up at her at the slightest of things, and I get tired of any conversation that lasts for more than a minute or two.

Robbed!!!

It was something that you have heard about so many times, laughed at each time you heard it, and cracked the usual joke about the foolishness of people involved in every such case. The difference was that this time, the joke was on me and by the time it got over, I was feeling like a complete stupid ass.

It was while I was getting back from office on Saturday. As the watch showed five thirty and I sat on the passenger seat of my car, admiring the pleasant evening and for a change, letting the cool strong breeze blow in through the rolled down windows, there was no indication of what was to follow. As we waited at the Mahim signal, waiting to get on to Western Express Highway, I was pretty relaxed, listening to the music playing on the car radio and thinking of the people I would meet at the party this evening at Ravi's new house. The seat belt was on, legs stretched, fingers playing with the cuff links, phone lying on the dashboard...

As the signal turned green, Sunil, my driver released the clutch and the car jerked forward slightly. All of a sudden, there was this noise from the rear at the driver's side as if some car had hit us from behind. As both I and Sunil instinctively turned around to look at what was the source of this noise, we could just see a youngish guy cursing aloud as if the car had gone over his foot. Smiling benignly on the regular Bombay traffic, it would have taken me hardly a couple of seconds to turn back and start looking ahead but these couple of seconds were good enough for the partner of this youngish guy to flick the phone, which if you remember was lying on the dashboard...yes, stupid me!

I discovered the loss almost instantly but not quick enough in the rush of vehicles trying to make the best of the just converted signal (what timing the rascals had!). Going to the traffic cop was no use as all he helped me with was pointing out the border of jurisdictions of Bandra and Mahim police stations. There was, of course, no point in going to the police station because the miscreants were beyond reach by now and the phone was switched off and the SIM discarded.

More than the phone's loss, it was the way in which I was made a fool of, which has been tormenting me. Had I been able to catch hold of those guys, even if they did not give the phone back, I would have loved to sock them one in the eye for the stupid idiot they made out of me. That was not to be, however, and stupid idiot I remain, but one with yet another lesson that will probably make me less of an idiot than I have previously been.

My next phone is going to be one of the least expensive ones that the market has to offer and which can give me the basic functionalities that I need. No more fancy stuff for me!

Exploiting Market Imperfections and a visit to the scientist

I have been wanting to write on so many things over the past week or so but now that I finally sit to write, I can't recollect anything at all. Hopefully, now that I have started to roll, things will come back to me as I keep on writing and deliberating and moving ahead thus. So, before the first of these topics hit me, let me place it on record here on this blog that I am not that disappointed with Mumbai. In terms of roads, green cover and infrastructure, in general, the city obviously does not show even a light to the grandeur of say, a Delhi. However, in all other respects, it is not too bad. The work culture is professional enough (not to say that it is in any way much better than Delhi), people smile here, too and at times, also have time to exchange pleasantries. Taxi drivers are a pleasant lot and generally tend not to cheat you off your last penny (though the same can not be said of the auto rickshaw drivers at all). Traffic is bad but coming from the congested NH-24 in Delhi, that does not seem too much of a bother either. Trains, of course, are bloody efficient even though they are perenially crowded, smelly and sweaty.

Speaking of smelly and sweaty, it reminds me of last Saturday, at the end of which, I was in a pretty bad shape myself, thanks to some fair bit of travel across the city during the hot and humid afternoon in open taxis and autos. Starting off the day was the memorable trip to meet a SCIENTIST which happens to be one of the things that I have been wanting to write about. The trip was based on an interview on national television done with a certain scientist who has been credited with treating some supposedly incurable diseases through his herbal medicines. My Mama had seen this interview and wanted me to see this person for my nerve problem (a fallout of the accident I had last year). So it was that Priya and I reached this scientist's place in Versova on this hot Saturday afternoon. In the last few minutes of his sitting time, the scientist heard me out, barely trying to stifle his yawn while telling me at the same time that I should start the medicine and that the medicine will cure me totally. To top it all, this was done without even glancing at a single report of a single test conducted for this problem of mine. So much for the science part! All this was still ok till the time I was told that there was only one medicine that he provides for all ailments, whether it is cancer, high blood pressure, diabetes, paralysis, or a nerve disorder like mine. To assume that this one-stop-shop for treatment of ailments will turn out to be better than all the specialised treatments that I have considered and decided against because of their inefficacy, was a long call to take. But I did take this call alongwith Priya and my Mama, and for all my so called education, I can not but hope for a miracle from this exceedingly highly priced herbal medicine (15 doses for a freaking 15 grand).

The incident I described above does not conform to any of my thoughts about such things and yet, I acted in this non-conformist manner. To claim that I did this only to please my family members would be a lie to myself since at some corner of my brain, I wanted to believe in this treatment, however fantastic it seemed. Having all but lost hope from so many other 'scientific' quarters, and almost designated to lead a life with this disorder as a permanent part of my being, I reached out to this ray of hope, however bleak it may be. Doesn't it show somewhere that despite all the rational thinking that we are capable of, faith comes out the stronger in cases where logic and reason are not fast enough in their action?

On the work front, things are turning out to be quite a haze, what with me having to dip my hand in almost everything that presents itself for dipping hands into. I will try and write about all that I do in some other post but for now wish to share with my readers something of a management insight that I gleaned from one of the senior management meetings that I had the good fortune to be a part of. This meeting was called to discuss a new vertical that the company is going to launch and was aimed at kick starting the design of the operational and marketing framework for the new business. While discussing some operational aspect, a senior member remarked how and why we should not try to be perfect in all that we do. His logic was that there were imperfections in the market and the intelligent player is one who exploits these imperfections till he can and at the same time, is the first to find out when those imperfections are starting to get corrected. This is when the intelligent player makes the switch from playing to an imperfect market (and making his moolah while he does so) to initiating and setting up a perfect setup for a market that is fast on its way to removing its imperfections.

A perfect example was ICICI Bank, India's largest private sector bank, which chose to play along with other credit card companies in charging annual and joining fees for credit cards till the game was there and available in the market. However, as soon as the bank realized that this was a temporary phenomenon that was about to go and that the customers were very soon going to be very demanding, they decided to act as destroyers in the market and pioneered the concept of Free-for-life credit cards. They had the last laugh since not only did they lap up the revenues till they were there for the taking, but once they realized things were changing, they were proactive enough to build a large market share by removing the market imperfections faster than the market itself would have been able to manage.

Needless to say, I was quite impressed by this line of thinking and though this does not reflect too well on the Indian markets and the players involved, it still is a very practical strategy. It still leaves the question, however, that if everyone tries to exploit the imperfections, doesn't it tantamount to the market and the customer always remaining imperfect, with no body breaking the shackles? In reality, however, this does not happen and the efficient market hypothesis takes over at some stage or the other and the trick is to be able to predict this point of inversion.

A new update from a new city

There has been a lot happening around me that I should have written about but I guess I have been just plain lazy. It is difficult to put pen to paper, or finger to key when you are engrossed with so much else that is going on in your life.

For starters, it has been nearly two weeks since I have permanently moved to Mumbai. As if that was not an event enough, I decided to follow it up with changing my role from that of a Relationship Manager for High Net Worth Clients, who I used to advise on their investments. Going forward, I shall not be doing anything of the sort. Instead, I am supposedly going to be working with the business head of he wealth management unit of my company.

The work that I need to do, however, is not really very well-defined. Even though I am supposedly going to be involved in the overall strategy of the firm, as per the job description doled out to me, I always believed that I will be required to work as a floater. Having come here and spent more than just a couple of late nights in office, I think I can say with fair bit of certainty that my job details are pretty uncertain.

Right from trying to improve productivity in a tough year, to working towards some new businesses that the firm is launching, to some very mundane stuff like preparing excel formats for various purposes, there is quite a bit of variety in life. The good thing about this variety is that it keeps me on my toes almost all the time and that I do not get those pangs of boredom that I was so susceptible to, in my previous role which offered me the luxury to relax and not do anything, every now and then.

The bad thing about this job, however, is that it takes me far away from much of human contact. Since this is more of a brains rather than mouth kind of a job, I do not get to interact too much with people, either internal or external, which is something I had not anticipated or factored in and therefore, terribly miss. The change of location has not helped, either, since it is now a new set of people at work with whom I can't even have cordial, meaningless, unrelated-to-work banter without some amount of effort.

Since it has always been difficult for me to put in that effort, I , more often than not, remain at my desk, at times doing something I am engrossed in and at others, just plainly gazing across the window towards the sea, whose view my seat so graciously provides.

It has been just a few days here, and there are so many things that one still needs to understand about the job and people here that it is quite unnerving at times. But herein lies the opportunity, and I am sure of it, to shape a career. It will be left, however, completely to my own resourcefulness and ingenuity to identify and capitalize on the opportunities before they get out of my grasp.

Amongst other stuff, I visited Singapore with my family (parents and sister) on my first offshore trip paid by my own money. The experience was very nice, and doubly so because I had the good fortune of being able to enjoy the company of my family on this vacation. Following it up was this felicitation in Goa organized by the company for some top performers in a certain category. I took Papa along but had not really anticipated how much he will like it and neither did I anticipate the positive feedback that I received from peers and colleagues who liked the novelty behind the idea of taking your parent along to a place like Goa. Novelty? Coming from a culture as rooted to the family concept as India's, that did come in as a surprise factor.

Well, I have finally moved in to a well built and well provided for place that I can call home for the time being. This place is in Santa Cruz, a 2 BHK, furnished house where I have moved in with Priya, my sister. It is still early days and even my stuff has not reached me from Delhi but first impressions seem quite favorable as the house is fast on its way to being called home.