New Year Greetings!

To all my friends and family whom I’ve not contacted for ages, I wish you and your loved ones a very Happy New Year. May the year ahead be filled with joy, love and success. May you and your loved ones be blessed a thousand fold and be protected from harm and temptations. May good health follow you wherever you go. May there be peace and harmony in your household and work place. May God guide you to overcome the trials in your life, so that you will rise up again with new hope. May you forgive your brothers and sisters who have hurt or wronged you and may you be forgiven for the wrongs that you have done unto others. May all that is good come true for you. May God be with you wherever you go.

Happy New Year! Selamat Tahun Baru! Xin Nian Khuai Le! Naya Saal Mubarak ho! Manigong Bagong Taon! Kum Thar Chibai! (still my favourite hahaha).

With love, Gary

I just came back from a hectic break from work (I will not call it a holiday, it’s just too tiring to be called one) in Malaysia. I know I’ve been an asshole for not looking up any of my friends, (except one, Wai Yen, you’re the unlucky one, see?) I know this should not just be brushed off lightly, what sort of friend is this when he comes all the way back from overseas after a very long time and doesn’t even call up his friends, huh? Anyway, he has very valid reasons – such as parading his never-before-seen wife to his enthusiastic family plus plus, such as attending (and trying to assist, somewhat disastrously in) his good brother Jack’s wedding, such as shopping for and buying Christmas presents for everyone in the family plus plus (and that’s not all – you have to wrap the darn things up – and with my family, it felt like there’s a present-wrapping competition). We wrapped most of it up (creatively) in newspapers (it’s the heart that counts, no?), plus this is my first Christmas with the family at home after err… 6.. no 9 years (I think) don’t really remember the last time… and my first year buying presents, so understandlah huh? And then there are the 101 errands, my work visa, the bloody banking matters… And lastly, and most importantly, I have to show off to the wife the frequently boasted state-of-the-art attractions and the fabulously delicious food of my beloved home, Malaysia, right? Just say that she’s not too impressed (thanks mainly to the hectic schedule I put us through and family pressures hehehe).

Anyway, to those who sent me Christmas greetings, here’s a belated Merry Christmas to all of you. I miss you all and would have loved to meet as many as possible. Thanks for keeping in touch, may all your souls be blessed. Cheers, till we meet again, Gary.

Our Other Homes in Mumbai

OK, it's December. And I've just completed another sparring match on email with a %#$*! at the office, ...and this time I 'won', ahem. And I'm feeling just a little pleased with myself, so here's to giving myself a little time-off to bask in my 'victory' and post more pictures of our homes in Mumbai, since my brain is still stuck on combat mode...

Our other homes in Mumbai aren't too bad either. Our 2nd home, compliments of the Reliance Industries Group (flagship of the richest man in India, Mukesh Ambani, at last count worth about err …49 Billion USD) at Chuna Bhatti, Mumbai: -


Our bedroom at Reliance Towers


The playground where we used to have our evening walks, except when the breeze blows from the direction of the river, …and carries the stench of a million pollutants…

Our 4th home, Leighton’s Guesthouse in Kalina, Mumbai: -

The common living room


The view from the roof of the Kalina Guesthouse with a Gurdwara in view

Our 5th home: -

...Hahaha (kidding), ...Kim of the slums

Anyway, good times never last forever right? And that’s why we’re here now, in Bharatpur, staying with evil monkeys and #$%^*$^% ^#$*%$^ #%^%#$*!!

The Generosity of My Employer: Example 2

And here's more... Our 3rd home after rejoining Leighton.


The modernistic museum-like Grand Hyatt, Mumbai


Poolside, Grand Hyatt

Anu doesn't like this place because it has a hospital-like appearance, because of its ultra-cool atmosphere (or more like it's always bloody cold in the lobby), and the ultra exclusivity of its food (e.g. like having its mineral water priced at 10 times of the price outside). Not much complaints from me or especially from the rest of my colleagues though - nice Western food, and the Company's paying for it after all - hehehe.


The view from our room




Some of the 'museum' displays in the ultra-'cool' lobby


The courtyard of the Grand Hyatt

No, ...we didn't stay there for too long, 'only' about 10 days, ...unlike our other long-term staying colleagues...

The Generosity of My Employer: Example 1

I can complain a lot about some of the things in the Company (the people, …especially the people). As an organization, I think we are one of the most self-centered group of employees found in a working culture, a far cry from the days working in RBM when the lack of resources perhaps, forced us staff to have a rapport to sort things out amongst ourselves, and to share things. (…Except when it had something to do with Chairman Mao hehehe – see previous entry Depression Mode).

This place, it’s all for yourself, very individualistic, no trying to understand others, no team spirit, etc. The organization could do with some initiative to inject a little more fun, team spirit and morale into the works. It could for example, put me in charge of the organization hahaha…

Anyway, when it comes to generosity, RBM cannot even smell the whiff of a fart of this place. See pictures below of my first home after joining Leighton –


The Marriot Lakeside Chalet, Powai, Mumbai - part of the Renaissance chain of hotels


The view from our living room, with Powai Lake in the background


Our bedroom


The adjoining Renaissance Hotel, Powai, Mumbai


Anu and the 'eternal guardian' of the Nawab Sharif Indian Restaurant, Renaissance Hotel


The interior of the Renaissance...

How much is the cost of this thing? You wouldn’t even want to imagine… And we stayed there for more than a month!

The Dry Spell continues...

The inspiration to blog continues to be blocked. The inspiration to complain however, works up every other day. Working here nowadays tends to generate that inspiration somehow. I have to thank the company (or more like my peers and colleagues) for cranking me up (more than a few notches), improving my oratory and writing (or more like bitching) skills and for giving me a new found love for being an a#*hole in general to my equally irritating %#$&*#&$% peers. I shall not bitch about them as then I would be an equal &^$&#*$&%^ to those %#^$&*&$%#&…

From all the intrigue that happens in the office, I have found a new respect for people who are forthright in their approach rather than those sneaky little weasels who smile and (try to) act friendly with you only to be an absolute $#%#^$*^%&*#&*%^*%&*^#*%*%&#%^ behind your *$&$ backs! %&$^*#&$*^*$* spineless $^&%&*$%!

Some examples of creative insults my beloved Construction Manager uses here: -
Numb Nuts
Penis-Breath
Pull your $#%^$%^$* finger out of your %$#^$% %^#$&$*^# and start doing something
Colonial Pricks
Queer A$#%*&les (for QA)
Mushrooms growing in their dark holes (because mushrooms are kept in their cosy little dark corners and fed %^#&&*$^ buffalo shit for them to grow)
Etc
Etc
Etc

Not many of the insults refer to yours truly, thankfully. And he’s not one of the people I’m pissed off with – imagine that.

Yet another update, yet another Fort City

Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh

I’ve been busy, at work, for a change, hehehe. I still have no inspiration to blog. But I think I’m no different than a lot of other bloggers. It comes a time when inspiration and ideas just don’t …happen! especially when you let the serious things of life (like work) interfere with your daydreaming. So, to honour my resolve of having at least 2 updates per month (and November seems to be zooming by pretty fast), here’s the easy way out – more pictures, more fort cities…

On the work front, I've discovered the secret of generating work in Quality Assurance – string up a line of Audits! And so I have, 16 audits down, 16 more to go, and audit reports for all of that. On the average I take 1 bloody day to do 1 bloody report, so it’ll take me up to some time the end of December to finish off that lot. Oh, …and I forgot, my last minute assignment. Shit!


Jain Sculptures on the way up to Gwalior Fort. Jainism is a religion in India which appeared about the same time as Buddhism (I think... don't quote me). The holy men of Jainism frequently go around stark naked. No, I'm not kidding, and yes, I've seen it a couple of times before. Never seen any holy women though...


The Temple of Doom (...hahaha kidding), a hybrid South / North Indian Hindu temple atop Gwalior Fort


A Gurdwara (Sikh Temple) atop Fortress Gwalior


The Gurdwara comes equipped with a swimming pool...

For the record, this is the fastest post I've ever done - come on guys, leave a comment, show me that you people still care about yours truly here, hehehe...

How not to waste time...

I still have no inspiration. The last two weeks have been a string of work in the office interrupted by spells of internet-surfing. These spells sometimes last a lot more than the 1 hour (maximum) I set for myself earlier in ‘My New Blogging Strategy’. I somehow have a natural talent for this. The really important things are not easy to start. I have to complete all the unimportant stuff before I switch to the really important stuff. Assignments that I have to handover for example, are important stuff, and as such will be left to the last minute, because I have to do the unimportant stuff first, …like tidying up my table, reading through piles of paper collecting dust in my in-tray for the last 3-4 months, putting a new entry into my blog…

And then I have to add some pictures to the blog entry. Somehow, I feel an update is never complete without pictures. Pictures sound like the easy thing to do, but they actually use up quite a lot of time. First you have to spend time choosing the nice ones, or the ones that will best capture the essence of a place or an entry, right? And if you are armed with a digital camera and have click-happy fingers like me, or Anu, you will have 34 pictures of one tiny restaurant, and 298 pictures of one tiny town (ok, I am exaggerating). And you have to choose 7 out from that.

And after that you have to check out the news. Because who knows what’s changed in the world, while you’ve been busy updating your blog, right? Is Lewis Hamilton still gonna be with the McLaren F1 team next season, have they uncovered anymore sex videos of famous people, is the naga jolokia still the spiciest chilli in the world, is Lindsay Lohan still alive…

I better get back to work. I shall now file all the dusty papers I have read so far from my slowly depleting in-box. I know I can still meet the deadline, I am super-efficient when it comes to last-minute-work. Years of training and practice made sure of that.

A Hidden Place

The Tombs of Kings of Orchha, by the river Betwa
What a name huh? Orchha… like some infestation of Orcs…

This is a peaceful little place tucked in northern Madhya Pradesh in the middle of India. Its name is Orchha (meaning Hidden Place), and it used to be the capital of one of the many independent kingdoms in India in the past. I like this place. It's cool (it was winter, ok?). I got to eat some ‘kimchi’ fried rice, some creation the local restaurants adopted from the Korean tourists I suppose (nice for a change, especially when you’re eating some sort of ‘dal’ or ‘roti’ every meal). It is fairly small, not crowded, not touristy and not too dirty. The one thing that attracted me most however, is the immense and almost-deserted Chaturbhuj Temple – that feels like something right out of the Prince of Persia. Give the Purple Scroll (50 rupees) to the Dark Acolytes (unofficial guardian-boys) of the Temple and they shall let you into the dark, steep and narrow staircases that lead you up to the scary upper chambers of the temple, with low and narrow pathways that open up to thin air, staircases formed by pieces of stone sticking out of the wall (and half of that broken), dark dank chambers, vertical drops straight down to the ground 100 feet below… and amazing views of the surrounding at the roof. If only I could climb the spires… where the Skeleton King of Orchha was said to reside…


Temple of the Skeleton King (kidding - Chaturbhuj Temple at night)


Gearing up to face the terrors within…


Castle Orchha


Palace of Emperor Jahangir (Jahangir Mahal)


The Dark Elves (construction ladies) of Jahangir


The Palace of Glass (Sheesh Mahal)

Sex at the Temples

Mahadev Temple, Khajuraho

These are pictures from Khajuraho in the state of Madhya Pradesh, a huge state somewhere in the middle of India. Khajuraho is a peaceful and rustic little village with not too many irritating guides. That is why this is one of my favourite places in India. Its main attraction(s) are a group of huge ancient temples which will put Playboy and Penthouse to shame. Don’t believe me, come visit yourself.


What ancient sculptors think about when they're at work... (not much difference from nowadays huh?)


Lakshmana Temple




Anu and the Vishwanath Temple, Khajuraho


Entertainment to suit the masses –
Bottom tiers (for the children) – procession of animals & everyday life;
Middle tiers (for young adults) – err…‘a pictorial guide to the kama sutra’;
Upper tiers (for senior citizens) – gods & deities


The Vamana Temple and I


Cycling in Khajuraho

India Update: My New Blogging Strategy

I have decided to change my strategy for updating my blog, by being assertive, and pro-active, instead of just waiting for inspiration to hit me. At this age, and being married, and beginning to start to be ‘serious’ about work, I don’t think inspiration is going to suddenly pop-up from nowhere anytime soon.

I have therefore resolved to –
Update my blog at least twice per month, through happy times or hard times, busy times or times where I can browse the net for 2 (or 3) hours in a row (the perks of being a Quality Assurance Manager, as opposed to a lousy Works Manager where I hardly have time to shit).
Use a maximum of one hour per day (of my official work time) to do this, and to browse the internet, check personal mails, and day-dream (compliments of my ‘generous employer’ but without their knowledge, not yet anyway).
Post pictures, if I have nothing to write about.

By the way, just a short update to keep my loved ones in the know, I am well and so is Anu. Bharatpur is slightly cooler. Our China-made cheapo air-conditioner works! (surprised?) Evil monkeys of Bharatpur destroyed our satellite dish yet again, exposing dishonest installation by crooked TV technicians (they gave us a Kancil for the comparative price of a Toyota!). The neighbourhood animals have pools to wade in now. The neighbourhood mosquitoes thrive and sting us to kingdom come. WE ARE NOT HAVING KIDS YET. Anu has a Passport now, and will be made available soon to family. Quality Assurance is great for lazy people, like me. I am currently still in lazy mode, but I don’t want to be lazy forever. Can I go from Quality Assurance Manager to Project Manager next? (Hey, I can spread self propaganda because this is MY BLOG). Bosses / potential bosses, if you’re reading this, please keep me in mind ok? I look lazy, feel lazy, sound lazy, am lazy sometimes, but I can actually do great things if given a chance, really. Don’t believe, just gimme a try, guarantee you’ll not regret it.


Photo of our living room in Bharatpur, with mascot of the season - nephew Kunal. That blue monstrosity at the back is a desert-cooler for those of you who wanna know.

Where people come to die...

On the river Ganges, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh


The Ganga Arti (prayers to the Ganges) in process at Dasaswamedh Ghat

This is just about the best place you can visit in India – Varanasi (also popularly called Benares), the holy city of the Hindus, the place where many Hindus would want to die in (…die at, …aww, what the heck, if any of you know the correct preposition to use, please tell willya?), since dying here is supposed to release one from the cycle of birth and death, or moksha. Great huh, you can finally die, …for good.

Besides dying, Varanasi is actually great for many other things. You can take a gulp of the water from the holy Ganges, wash away your sins, and in the process kill yourself and attain moksha (it’ll be a miracle if you survive anyway, don’t believe me take a look of the Ganges here yourself). You can take a dip in the holy Ganges and while away time watching the multitude of things that can float on water sail by, boats, garlands of flowers, lit offerings to the Gods, a stray bra or underwear, empty plastic bags and bottles, unidentifiable floating objects, crows having a good time dining on the carcass of a buffalo… You can have a swell time tracking across the 2km stretch of Ghats lining the revered Ganges river visiting hidden temples, learning about the different types and costs of wood used for burning up dead bodies, chatting with the holy men, and the not-so-holy, who’ll try to sell you stuff, show you stuff, or pry stuff (especially money) out of you. You can explore the narrow lanes and hidden alleys near the ghats and play hide-and-seek with the cattle (who’ll take up the entire width of some of the alleys), dogs, goats, monkeys and dangerous looking people, all the while holding a hankie to your nose, so that you won’t faint from the exotic smell of incense, dung, urine and garbage. You can shop till you drop at the streets and streets of shops (believe me, the bargain shoppers (aka women) will love this place, but luckily for us men, the smell of this place will hopefully limit the natural tendencies of our better half huh?). You can practice your oratory skills, in Hindi if not in sign language, with the uncountable rickshaw-walas who’ll try to ferry you to any place, except the place you wanna get to, all for the sake of showing you the sights of Varanasi, or more likely to waste your precious time, piss the shit out of you, and get extra money for ferrying you back to the same place you’ve started from so that you can get another rickshaw, who’ll try to play the same trick on you, and the cycle goes on…

So, wanna experience India at its best? Visit Benares.


A bored security guard at Munshi Ghat


What a local hotel boss does when he’s bored…


Somewhere near Manikarnika Ghat, Varanasi


The rickshaws of Varanasi, …Yes, it’s always this congested (…ok, maybe not at 3am in the morning, but who’s gonna be up to find out huh?)

…but come to think of it, on a less cynical tone, and to be fairer to the city, I actually kinda like Varanasi. Amid all the chaos and hustle and bustle, Varanasi has its subtle charm, like something surreal, some lifestyle of the ancient past which is still very much alive today. This is where you can catch the soul of Hinduism (…if you can somehow ignore the greedy, and the crooked), this is where you can experience the real India with all its colours, customs and culture, this is where a lot of foreigners come to seek spiritualism, jam music and just, chill out. I think there’s hardly another place with as much connection to its past and to its after-life than Varanasi, the city where people come to die…


An offering to the Ganga...

India Update: To Bake or to Steam

Greetings from Bharatpur! Bharatpur has been our new home since the 20th of May, and the house we’re now at, is our 7th home in line since our runaway marriage (and you thought marriages were predictable). Bharatpur is in the state of Rajasthan and is located along a highway connecting Agra (the site of the Taj Mahal, India’s most famous landmark) and Jaipur, The Pink City (another tourist attraction), and therefore lies within the so-called Golden Tourist Triangle (Delhi-Agra-Jaipur), where most tourists to India visit.

Bharatpur has been consistently hovering at about 47 degrees Celsius for the last few days (I’m not exaggerating). At home it is about 41 degrees (well, that’s what the digital read-out says on the air-cond in our living room anyway). Our brand new China-made Sensei-brand split unit air-cond is super-efficient at bringing down the temperature, …from 41 to a minimum of 39 degrees, after 2 hours (no, we didn’t leave it on for a longer time, …what if it overheats?) We’re in the process of getting the wireman who installed it to come back to have a look at it (still not much success – his mobile phone has miraculously stopped working, hopefully he’ll come before winter).

At the mean time we’ve got a desert-cooler to do the job of cooling down our bedroom. For those who don’t know what this is, it’s a big fan enclosed in a box with a water pump. You fill the bottom of the box up with water, switch on the pump, and walla you get water flowing down the inside walls of the box. The cooler only cools down the immediate space in front of the fan, so our bed is aligned conveniently in the middle of nowhere and partially obstructing the door, no, can’t move the cooler, it has to be just outside the darn window.

Our entire floor is white marble. White marble is fabulous, for retaining heat. The white marble in our house retains heat so well, it’ll still be warm at 5am in the morning, and then the sun rises, and God heats up the marble again, and the cycle goes on. We tried flooding the bedroom with iced water to cool it down, …it helps for about an hour before the water dries up (or leaks to the landlady’s room below, …well, let’s say, she complained).

Our walls aren’t marble, there’re brick walls (with very little mortar I presume, since that’s how Indians do brick walls anyway) plastered all up and painted with white-wash (meaning if you lean on the walls, you get free chalk on your clothes, body, or whatever comes into contact with the walls), and yes, like the white marble floors, their heat retaining qualities are simply superb.

Bharatpur’s water is from the ground and is very rich with minerals, ...should be, since it’s bloody salty. The water in our bathroom, like the floors and walls, is perpetually warm. Doesn’t matter what time of day (or night) it is, the water is warm (or hot, in the afternoons), and so is the shampoo, soap, face wash, toothpaste, lotion, hair gel, etc. The best time to shit is early in the morning (like what your parents teach you). If you’re in need of losing some weight though, then shit at the other unrecommended times, and in the process, get yourself a fabulous free steam-bath.

Apart from getting cooked alive, Bharatpur is actually quite an interesting place (from what I hear, no, I’ve not gone around the place yet, not at this time, I’m not crazy). It has loads and loads of animals – monkeys to terrorize the shit outta you (yeah, they like to sneak into your house …real silently, and catch you unawares), dogs which wallow in the mud-pools together with the buffaloes and wild pigs (and I thought dogs hate water), but can’t blame ‘em, it’s either dirt or die by slow-cook. And the best of Bharatpur – a lovely tree-filled internationally known, bird sanctuary (really, no kidding) with wild peacocks, antelopes, cranes, etc etc etc but it’s just a mystery to me why any bird would wanna come to a hellhole like this???

Cute Gods & Laid-Back Beaches

Mooooo…. how wonderful, can someone give me a massage, …...pleeez?

This is Puri on the east coast of India, in the state of Orissa, the closest ‘decent’ beach to Calcutta, and therefore a ‘must-go’ for someone who’s never in her life seen the sea before (you know who I’m talking about). Anyway, there’re absolutely no regrets. Puri is surprisingly ‘tout-free’ (not totally, after all this is India mate, but reasonably …for India), and has attractions and places to cater for people of different interests.
There’s the Sun Temple in Konark for history buffs and Indiana Jones enthusiasts (like me).

The Sun Temple, Konark, Orissa

There’s the thriving and packed Jagannath Temple in the centre of Puri, one of the main pilgrimage destinations for Hindus for the spiritualists and cultural nuts (also like me, …I dunno why but I like temples and religious places, whatever religion they’d be).

The Temple of Lord Jagannath, Puri, Orissa

There’re tons and loads of wildlife for the wildlife enthusiasts (of course, this is India, remember?), cows (what’s new), dogs, chickens, monkeys, etc apart from the not so common grand entourage of birds, dolphins (yeah, some riverine dolphins, don’t ask me what species, coz I don’t remember, anyway you see them only for about err… less than a second per time, smooth grey bald round objects that bob up and down in the Chilika lake).

Our boat, Chilika Lake, Orissa

There’re stretches of quiet, tree-shaded roads (unlike India…) for a nice stroll, or hassle-free ride on a cycle (very unlike India).

The favourite pastime in Orissa, …zzzzzz (Ram Temple, somewhere between Puri and Konark)

There’re thronging markets packed with all sorts of stuff from cheap ethnic clothes to religious paraphernalia for the die-hard bargain hunters (like the women, really, I’ll never understand them…).

Life around the Jagannath Temple, Puri

There’re cheap (but reasonably bright and airy) budget hotels lining the quieter beach front towards the east (the west is packed full of Indian revelers, mainly Bengali tourists from Calcutta), where backpackers chill-out, jam music, and have an occasional dose of ‘grass’ I suppose (no, dunno where I can get them, didn’t try, but I’m sure it exists, hint).
There’re lots of cheap and fresh seafood to gorge on and beer to wash it all down, wonderful…
There’re peaceful and hassle-free beachfronts where you can roam undisturbed (most of the time) – nope I’d not want to swim here, when it comes to beaches, nothing beats good ol’ South-East-Asia after all.

Dusk at Chilika Lake

And there’s of course the super-cute main deity of Orissa, Lord Jagannath, with huge round saucer eyes on a black and red round smiley face, short body and stumps for hands, adorning every altar, wall and portrait in town. And what’s more, he’s usually with his brother and sister, both also similarly ‘cute’, (sis has no hands by the way). Dunno how they look like? Just watch one of those South Park cartoons.


The Sun Temple, Konark