Review of “The Checklist Manifesto”

The Checklist Manifesto

The AVP of my team asked “what are you reading?”

I said “The Checklist Manifesto”

“What is it about?”

It’s about the importance of checklists and....

Before I finish the sentence, he told me with a lot of sarcasm “You need to read a book for that!” And that kind of sums up our abysmal attitude towards checklists. Checklists are just one of the trivialities, formalities who hinder us rather than help us. In fact for me it was not even a triviality or formality. It just didn’t exist. But this book opened me to a world that I was alienated from . It took me from intensive care units to the cockpit of a plane to the corporate dungeons of the financial world. And it showed me how a Simple, perfunctory checklist saved a lot of dollars from going down the drain and a lot of lives from dying in vain. It displayed how major mishaps were averted and irreversible mistakes were avoided. I think a checklist help us avoid the oversight that can breed due to familiarity and experience and help us avoid slight errors which are considered to be trivial that can cause consequences unforeseeable in magnitude and proportions due to our engagement with the vicissitudes of life or our profession. In fact it can be as simple as saving your file while working on it to avoid loss of data in case of a sporadic shutdown of our system. The author works hard to explain the psychological indifference to checklist. We always view our legends and heroes who circumnavigate the maze of complexity in their profession through improvisation, or who achieve supernatural feats through autonomous decisions taken on the go either by following their hunch or gut as we say or by breaking through the barriers of conventional wisdom and create moments of excellence. But we refuse to acknowledge that their success may not be attributable to action inspired by intuition or moments of excellence but by simply following a protocol and be disciplined in following that protocol even in the midst of complexity and adversity. I still remember my sport hero Rahul Dravid say while advising young sportsman that when you are going though a rough patch in your career just go back to your basics and get them right. When he says “Basics” they are nothing but a form of checklist that we often overlook or regard as frivolous as we advance in our career and the significance of which we highly underestimate or downplay in our progress due to the blurred view caused by the hazy mist of our arrogance or overwhelming success. He also shows how a checklist can even radically change the culture of an organization. For eg checklists already used in sectors of aviation and construction always have a checklist in hand where there are pause points when everyone assembles as a team and voice their concern. Also it states down the duties of every person involved from the head to the lowliest worker of the organization making everyone feel as a part of the same team .This does away with autocratic decision making still prevalent in many organization where finger wagging officials  just considers others in the team as mere pencil-pushers whose only job is to obey and follow and where communication is just one way street -from top to bottom. This brings in a culture of teamwork and inclusiveness. He also explains that often checklists are considered as a hindrance one needs to get away with in order to get straight to the task which requires a cobweb of intricate skills interwoven by in-depth technical knowledge but he points that the purpose of checklists is just the opposite that is to finish the task that are simple but highly necessary and significant that can be overlooked or brushed aside and intently focus on the complex task ahead. He also explains in details how to prepare a checklist which is a science in itself where you have to maintain the perfect balance of brevity and detail. Checklists are created for the very purpose to have attention to detail yet if very detailed and long it is unsustainable and remains unused as a yellow stained copy of an old book. Also checklist should be specific without any ambiguity and vagueness succinctly spelling out the responsibility and accountability of each person involved. Also why checklists are important because a checklists draws lessons from the experience of failures and also from mere experiences of veterans in a profession and incorporate them in easy manageable actions to refer to when such an event occurs where we are often found to be utterly inexperienced. As this a mere book review but in case of any doubt you can read this book which you should and read the mind-boggling statistics that are almost implausible to believe. Lastly he gives a brilliant example that professions are increasingly becoming like a car.

So what would happen if you join together the engine of a Ferrari, brakes of a Porsche, suspension of a BMW and body of a Volvo. What we would get is not a car but an expensive piece of shit. Checklists just help to avoid that shit from happening. 

The Why Hour

Guitar

I have been learning Guitar for a long time. But I have not made an apparently significant progress. In fact I don't even know on what parameters I need to evaluate my progress. I have no sense of direction because I have yet to decide the destination. My practice is sporadic, random , purposeless and directionless. I don't particularly enjoy guitar. But I never enjoyed reading at some point of time and now reading has become part of me, and now it is not merely a habit. I have realized that I have never really questioned why I want to learn the guitar. And now it's seemingly obvious that the root of the problem is the deliberate, yet unintentional evading of the important question: "Why". So let  me answer it today.

Why I want to learn guitar?

I started learning guitar in the first place because I figure it is something creative to do. And that time the goal of my life was to become creative. Little did I know that creativity begins from the way we think to the way we perform our actions by being true and honest to ourselves, by bringing forth our true, original selves and not just doing something the way we are subconsciously conditioned to do or the way society deems it to be appropriate. But, yes we do a lot of things on the basis of the wrong reasons but sometimes those actions may lead us to the right destination pushing the erroneous reasons into oblivion. So in short the basis or the foundation on which I wanted to build this skill was shaky and weak. So almost after 6 years of erratic and intermittent practice, and after experimenting with different teachers, let us start with the root of it all "Why".

1. It is something I have been doing for a long time and after concerted efforts I have reached to some level of expertise. So i thought if I won't start again all my earlier efforts will go in vain and my efforts would be wasted. But then nothing ever goes waste. And this will not keep me motivated for long. Also earlier I was practising just out of that chilling fear of being reprimanded by my teacher whom I was completely in awe with. So, the reason was a cocktail of fear and deference. But as it showed,  as it was based on a frivolous reason, it didn't hold for long. So, this goes out of the window.
( As I am writing this, I am very apprehensive as this approach towards life to ask the "Why" of our actions can expand to all my other important pursuits, all of them much more significant than learning guitar)
2. I did realise the fallacy in my objective of learning guitar after almost 6 years. When I joined again I was very determined to do, because I wanted to engage myself in some activity. I wanted something that I can immerse myself into which can give me the self-gratification that I have used my time effectively and not merely wasted it. So I actually I wanted something for timepass, lets be honest. But if this is acting as a cause of frustration and stress and then the whole objective of doing it is nullified. So, adios

Also I have realised that I can't tolerate mediocrity and I just can't let things be the way they are. I can't really accept the status quo. So if I am doing something I have to put adequate efforts in developing the skill and be really great in what I am doing. So, in this case I can happily come for classes and practise nothing at home but that would really hurt my conscience.

Also, I am trying to find a reason but then this whole process would be a sham. If I had a reason to do it, I would never had to find it. It would be something flowing in my veins, in my blood at the tip of my tongue. So, lets call it quits.

But we don't need to reflect on the question "Why" all the time sometimes the reasons are so obvious that we just have to do it.

Lost but not given up!!!

Yesterday I did one of the most abhorrent acts in my life. A human being will regret the existence of its own race after witnessing what I have done. It can put any rational human being to shame. I was vituperative. I abused my enemy with a lot of invectives and expletives. My language was opprobrious and derogatory. To top it all, it deranged my ego, ruffled me from inside and there was a soul annihilating chaos inside me which manifested in using my brawn and muscle power to conflict injury on my enemy. I was unduly persistent in causing harm to him. I also made racial slurs. I was barbaric, violent, boorish. I behaved like a complete lowbrow. In the end I was mercilessly beaten up with canes by his friends. In short. I behaved like a complete jerk. I behaved like a hooligan, a ruffian, a hoodlum. Like I was part of a gang. I conducted as if I was a part of a mob causing riotous and atrocious activities, creating disruption in the society. In short, I am feeling ashamed of what I did. But one thing is an irrevocable habit of mine that is to reflect upon an event or an incident to investigate what caused it, what fallacies of human nature and the ubiquitous ignorance is still prevalent in me. Also what the not so conspicuous positives I derived from it. I felt I behave like this because I felt completely unjust the way he was behaving with the coffee man. He was belittling , demeaning and humiliating him. I was not able to be a mere witness to the events particularly to the injustice meted out at that poor, hapless coffee man. It provoked me to confront him, to intimidate him. But one thing I experienced I was in state of "No Thought". My mind was not speculating the harm that would be caused to me for standing up for the coffee man who would be anyways oblivious to whatever I do for him. My mind was completely empty. I was not able to resist the temptation of antipathy to whatever was happening in front of my eyes. I provoked him by looking at him with angry, furious eyes. At that time I realised, love and concern for my own species is my very nature, I cannot doused the fire of love with reason or rationalism of the intellect. I have always felt incorrigibly guilty whenever I had become angry on someone or whenever I ogled some girl with lascivious eyes. I experienced sorrow and guilt because I was acting against my very nature which is incorrigible, impenetrable.

I wanted to brag about my power through the physical implementation as it really deranged my ego. I forgot that real power is when you empower people without either coercing or insinuating artfully in their minds your opinions, beliefs or prejudices. You are actually powerful when your power is equitably distributed. Muscular power is a physiological constituent that is short-lived. Power is something that exists perenially even after you die as your ideas, ideals, beliefs, your little anecdotes and your very life motivates, instigates people to achieve higher maybe even abstract things in life. A person who is powerful is one who doesn't feel the need to display his power as he doesn't require any external circumstances to conspicuously showcase his power, even if he may given the opportunity he will empower others instead of placing his power on a pedestal for others to see as such power is very transitory in nature.

He may not even feel the need to have power as he would be in touch with the perennial, metaphysical power that will never diminish. A power that is ubiquitous within him, that had the potential to change peoples lives, that has the potential to make miracles a daily occurence. It requires a man to be animalistic impulsive to be violent, it requires a man to be powerful to fight against injustice but be invincibly non-violent. Violence doesn't even provide you victory but its self-defeating, it disturbs the equilibrium of your mind. It lays the incipient seeds of anger, lust, greed, etc whose tall trees restricts the sunshine of knowledge to your very soul as negativity always wants a hook to grow on.

My intentions were benevolent, but my mode of operation was not only unconvincing but diabolical.

I was not prudent and smart but I acted dumb. I should have first spoken to him softly because we all are victims of ignorance. Then if it didn't work, I should have called the police. But that happens if I am not impulsive and I am able to channelise my anger in the right way. That will happen through lots of running, gymnasium and meditation. That will alleviate my impulsive imprudent anger. I always feel disillusioned, discouraged that I will never become that perfected soul that I only have an obscure idea about. But everything happens for a reason. This gave me a lot of insight in human nature. I will turn this event into a lesson. As soon as I get well, I will start running and I will hit the gym with vigour and enthusiasm. My vengeance against the act that compelled me to perform such a fiendish act would be against the anger not against the victim of my anger. I would have to hit the gym, start running and meditate. Yes I want to just lie on the water and be carried away to my destination but that will happen only after embarrassingly flapping my arms helplessly for a distance to save myself from the apparent inevitable drowning.

So yes I have lost today one battle where I would have given impetus to the matured being lying dormant within me. 

Even after writing all this, there is an underlying, concealed doubt that what if everything is entirely wrong and that is what requires immutable power to do what you believe its right yet having the awareness and open-mindedness that you may be wrong. This way you go beyond right and wrong and you start listening to the obscure, quaint language of your heart.

The need to be right is the sign of a vulgar mind - Albert Camus.

The Chef

The Chef was a hilarious, feel good movie and to some extent for a thinker like me even though-provoking. The movie is inordinately stylish and it has imbibed and displayed American culture, as food is an important ingredient in the metaphorical food of culture, quite in its totality. The movie starts with a chef who is reasonably happy with his job, but then comes an all awaited night when a food critic is visiting the concerned restaurant. The chef has a heated altercation with his complacent, philistine supremo who wants the same menu to be prepared that has been dormantly existing since the last 10 years, however the chef has created a special menu to stun the food critic. There is a clear ideological difference arising out of this little anecdote between the adventurous chef and the opportunistic boss who seems to consider cooking as a mere employment or one of the important functions in a restaurant that needs to be performed. The main protagonist considers cooking not as a mere job that needs to be performed to make his ends meet. But he considers cooking as a singular, dignified and unparalleled art. He doesn't wants to cook food to have happy customers but he wants customers to concoct good food by mixing his multifarious, myriad ingredients. Somewhat I recollected what Steve Jobs said "The customers don't know what they want until we have shown them". However, the chef's obstinacy subsides and he succumbs to the pragmatic demands of his supremo. However the food critic appears to have learnt and graduated from the same school of thought and he detests the seemingly delectable food devoid of any innovativeness or inventiveness and consequently he lambasts the chef and his shadowy complacency on his blog which becomes viral on social media thus leading to ire from a chef who is completely oblivious to the complex web of the social world. This is the starting point of a magnificent ride.

The movie shows you how social media plays a magnanimous, prodigious role to reach the incipient customers. The Chef here is completely alien to the world of social media and is catapulted like a rocket in an estranged planet which becomes a source of constant chagrin and mortification for the bereaved chef who finally loses his job for standing to his beliefs. The story is one of a person reaching the stage of self-realisation, finally realising what he wants to do and experiencing unconditional bliss arising from the work itself and not from some related or peripheral benefits arising out of it. It's a story of a person finally reconnecting to his innocent son whose father, the main protagonist,is somewhat reckless in performing his parental duties that is partly attributed to his divorced marriage ,the oppressing pressures of his work and his own insatiable desire to achieve a perennial creative ingenuity in his work. It's story of a person who finally tightens the bolts and the nuts that is needed in the effective functioning of the machine of his family. One of the most ironical part of the movie is that he finally become self employed with the help of the ex-husband of his ex-wife. That also depicts the complexity of relationships in the developed world and the adroitness with which they deal with their complicated worlds. There is a lot of flamboyance, style and the American culture that coerces you to stand up and applaud. That is one of the most sparkling, scintillating features of American movie that they have succeeded to insinuate a sense of American culture in their films. Something our Bollywood needs to learn who are apathetic to their own cultures and have become obsequious to the Western culture.

The acting of all the actors is such that they are not playing any part, they have not taken any effort to play their roles. This is the biggest compliment I can give to an actor. An actor is performing superlatively when you actually feel that he is not acting, but just playing himself.

Anyways the movie is a must watch. If I go on I will add a lot of spoilers, so please go and watch.

4 stars from me.

Eclectic and Multifarious choices for my career

Oh it's frustrating!! An eclectic mind is a desultory mess!! And this is what I am going through!!! I have come this far but my inchoate mind acting to its true nature of eccentricity again has pushed me to untraceable, unfathomable sea of confusion. Let's list out the options:

• MA in English Literature + a job from 1 pm

This seems to be the most difficult option. Now here the idea is that I should be able to accommodate my expenses with the help of my moderate salary. At the same time, if my MA in English Literature doesn't work out as planned, I have a back up to fall upon on. 

But the problem is I would be jack of all and master of none. I won't be able to achieve superlative performance in my MA in English literature. I would only get weekends to study which would not be adequate for the good grades that I would strive for. I won't do justice to my job as I would be constantly worrying about my studies and would unscrupulously consider as a 9 hour job, abondoning the prime responsibility of contributing towards my company through my job and thereby failing to achieve a higher purpose than to mechanically work from 1pm to 10 pm

This is elation in the short time but irreversible misery in the long time.

• MA in English Literature

The cost of the course is just a mediocre Rs 7000. The only impediment is that I have to invest a long duration in the course. And I am not sure what are the myriad job opportunities after finishing my masters. The only encouraging factor is that it will be a perfect booster for my penchant of reading and writing. Atleast I would be doing something that I have a incorrigible  passion in. If I take the idealistic view that is I should study something in which I have a long quenching thirst for knowledge, a disquieting  curiosity and a heartfelt need to investigate and comprehend the vast store of material available, then MA in English Literature is the perfect choice. It would catapult me into the complete unexplored world of creativity. 

But yes if I take a pragmatic view, still it stands a bit vindicated that I would surely have some unconventional job opportunities that we will not fill my coffers to the brim but still provide me job opportunities in which the work will completely swallow me up though it would provide only a modicum income.

It may also happen that after my MA I would realise that this is what I don't want to do but the point is very flagrant I would atleast learn something as I am learning about something that I love doing. This road will atleast lead to some other adjoining road which will lead to my destination. I would also be able to apply for other courses during my 2 years course and explore the unexplored and obscurely evaluate my interest in it.

• No MA in English Literature but MBA

MBA is something I think you should do when you have an accurate understanding and an obscure foreknowledge of what you want to do or what you want to excel in. I don't want to do MBA just for larger pay package. As I would be somewhat prematurely happy at the onset but than there would be utter mortification and chagrin at having squandered my life in the pursuit of something inconsequential as money is just a means to an end not an end in itself. Moreover MBA can be done at any age in your life when you have a plan, a well-thought idea and you utilise MBA as a means to achieve it. No matter how much I try I can't get rid of a certain dogma that I have unconsciously inherited from my forefathers that a man ought to settle down by the age of 25 which is compelling me to take the conventional path, the path that people have already  marred with their obstinate footprints. But if I can't get rid off atleast I can observe and choose the alternate path less travelled. And now if I do MBA, I would do it for a complacent motive i.e to have a larger pay package. Though I don't have an iota of an idea as to where do I want to utilise my MBA skills, what sort of job I would be happy and satisfied doing, which companies I would be targeting. No doing MBA would not be a sound decision.

• No MA in English Literature just a job

I even entertained the idea of just working in a marketing company but then that would be just a continuation of the haphazard and fatuous way of finding the work that I really want to do. Now after jumping from one job to another, I need to try something different and MA in English Literature is the answer.

• MA in English Literature and a freelancing job

This seems to be the most plausible and viable alternative. Through freelancing, I will earn enough to take care of my expenses. At the same time, I would have sufficient amount of time to do my studies. At the same time, it would compliment to whatever knowledge I am imbibing in my MA in English Literature. I would find means to implement my knowledge which would I think is of paramount importance. It will augment my studies as well as the job that I am doing. I think it is a ridiculously obvious alternative or choice.

Unindianising Too Indian

Micromax- one of the largest companies in India selling low priced cheap Chinese phones. This is the irrefutable answer you will receive maybe in a different language or dialect in the Indian sub-continent.

A name synonymous with "smart feature phone" rather than "smart phones."

And rightly so, they allege that they were never cheap, they were affordable and they were compellingly dragged under the thraldom of this inevitable positioning.

But the domestic brethren cannot be blamed for thrusting upon Micromax this thorny, prickly crown. Particularly when the company made inroads into a market dominated by multi-national sharks by offering a bewildering almost obnoxious offering of a Rs 2300 mobile with an advertised 30 day battery backup. At that time, it was regarded an old little pony, an aberration to be ignored. But then it emerged as a dark horse with their unparalleled follow up offerings like a dual sim phone, universal remote control phone, a women centric phone with a Swarovski crystal on it and many more. With such unprecedented product offerings they unseated the Moghuls of the mobile industry like LG, Apple, Nokia, etc and grabbed an indomitable 22% market share only second to Samsung.

But still it wasn't able to rub off the notoriety of being an Indian domestic company selling cheap Chinese phones. And the international revenues accounted for less than 10% revenues today.

Micromax thought an innovating unthinkable strategy to extricate itself from this conundrum. It signed Hugh Jackman for its high end product: the Canvas smartphones.

Now let us look into the rationale behind it:

Sorry Bollywood........

In Bollywood there are many occupying the zenith of superstardom and all of them,some raised to the pedestal of apotheosis, endorse innumerable brands which nobody have a proper count of. Also their beatific faces appears on a lot of spurious brands. They wanted a face that is exclusive to the brand particularly for the Indian consumer. For that, it is ludicrously obvious to look for that face in LA and not in Mumbai. 

Me first.....

Signing Hugh Jackman would turn out to be an unprecedented marketing campaign in Indian corporate world where an Indian company would sign a Hollywood stalwart (although there had been sporadic incidents where Indian companies have managed to sign English, Australian cricketers but for particular ads of negligible significance and hackneyed concept but not for a blitzkrieg marketing campaign), this would invariably comply to its tag line "Nothing like Anything". 

Made in India....Uuhh....Let me think about it.

Also Indian products are considered superior when it is catapulting from the factories of yoga and Ayurveda, but Made In India mobiles would be unquestionably considered inferior as compared to its Korean, U.S and Japanese counterparts but still superior to its Chinese counterparts. So Mr Micromax was aiming at a paradigm-shift from a lowly Indian company selling cheap phones to a global brand providing quality, state of the art products to reckon with. This requires a face who has a global outreach which they found in Hugh Jackman.

HUGE Jackman......

Now if you have seen the pervasive advertisement of Hugh Jackman, he is inspired by a juggler and he juggles many lives. And isn't a smartphone judged by its ability to multitask? If you take a Jackie Chan or Vin Diesel, these actors are familiar faces when it comes to pure, unadulterated action which gives 

the viewer an adrenaline rush. If you take Hugh Grant, the butterflies of romance flutters around you. Hugh Jackman is considered to be a versatile actor, a virtuoso who has donned every role with impeccable finesse. He can sing, dance, fight, in short can act, display or emote every conceivable emotion the soul and the mind of a human being can produce. Also the recent unfathomable successes of the X-Men series and his other films has made him a known face in India. Even the youths in Faridabad, Ghaziabad would be aware about Hugh Jackman though obscurely. And this goes without saying that Hugh Jackman has a monstrous fan following all over the world. So it is hitting two birds with one stone, a brand whose ambassador is an Hollywood veteran superstar is immediately prejudiced by the import-obsessive Indian consumer to be a valued brand and also at the same time it adds a global icing to the brand. 

In short, the primary aim is to mutate from a cheap-fuddy to a global phenomena with the ancillary aim of upping the ante in the Indian market

AAA's : Ajanta-Ellora caves, Aurangabad and my Alter-Ego

I can confidently say I am the ludicrous caricature of my Alter-ego Prasad Pisharodi. We have a disinclination to put a degree of comparison to our friendship,as anything which is put under the scanner of comparison, is invariably demeaning it. As a wise man said " Imposing a nomenclature to a relationship restricts the rhythmic flow of love". Anyways so after a lot of intellectual pondering we settled for "Alter-ego" instead of "best friend" and "closest friend". So he commanded me,as it should be as Love commands and doesn't demand, to pack my effects and other paraphernalia for a trip to Ajanta. Ellora and Aurangabad. I gave monosyllabic answers to his curious questions, deceptively portraying an attitude of oblivion and indifference to the relatively naive. But I knew him, I knew he knows that I have as usual surrendered myself to him, and henceforth his wish would be an incorrigible command, as I said I am a ludicrous caricature of himself so I didn't want to fight with my better self. So our trips are never acutely planned which makes it hackneyedly predictable. We booked a room in a hotel for an incredulously ridiculous amount of ₹200 per person, too cheap that it made us suspicious about any malevolent, ignoble intentions of the hotelier. Anyways we always loved to sail on the tremulous boat of faith floating on the impetuous waters of doubt. Faith requires an awareness of being wrong, that is why the use of the phrase "A leap of Faith". So our skeptical minds did consider this possibility of us being in imminent danger of money being wheedled out of us through a cunning stratagem. But we took the leap of faith.

Next I checked online on our anomalously well-maintained railway website about the trains travelling to Jalgaon which was a mere 59 kilometres from Ajantha and our grandiose hotel. The best deal that I got was unreserved tickets to Jalgaon and we were at an ominous 94 and 95 on the waiting list. So I booked the tickets reluctantly as I am perennially averse to travelling unreserved, but I had already submitted myself to the wisdom of my Master Prasad Pisharodi, so there was no question of turning my back to the ticket counter. I booked the tickets, informed my alter-ego. I failed to add one more facetious or pertinent detail, the way you see it, I booked the tickets on 30th Jan and we were travelling on 31st Jan. So it was inevitable that I was going to be subjected to the insinuations, insults and the ridicule of my brethren who have taken the excruciating pain of planning their trip meticulously and book the tickets well on time, not literally on time, which we did but on time here means when the railways authorities were generous and condescending enough to provide tickets with a reservation. I reached the station an hour early, seriously an aberration to my infallibly undisciplined life. I stood standing there bemused waiting for the chart. And when the chart arrived, I saw that I have been assigned neither a seat nor a coach. I was an orphan in the train with no fatherly comfort of a coach and no motherly tender love of a seat. And my prophecy turned out to be true, the moment I sat on an empty seat, I was uprooted from it by a mere gesture of a hand by an elderly insolent man. His behaviour suggested as if he has bought the train and has already willed to bequeath it to his immediate heir who would only have a life-interest in it. I sat compacently at the next available empty seat but now I was just derisively directed to ease out of the seat. This was far more embarrassing  and shameful than the earlier incident. Here the guy didn't even take the pain to insult me with invectives but merely shooed me away as if I had metamorphosed into a dumb ape. But during these barbaric acts inflicted upon me, I maintained my calm stoicism.

The only sanguine consequence was that my hubris was vehemently obliterated. I was wearing upper middle class clothes: denims and a cool shirt that should have evoked respect and awe and should have extenuated any petulance arising in a person whose seat has been occupied by me. But I was mercilessly disillusioned. 

Anyways I finally got an empty seat. Then my friend Prasad boarded the train from Kalyan which sometimes is so unreasonably far from Sion as to exist in another planet altogether. Anyways he arrived with his blithe disposition, with no creases on his forehead marked by anxiety, but accepting the circumstances with an undeniable alacrity. He has this risible idiosyncrasy which impels everyone to undulatingly laugh and smile around him. He is this incredulous synthesis of intellect and innocence. Anyways praising him means I am invariably praising myself. So being pretentiously humble which actually ostentatiously boasts about my humility, invariably sowing a thorny seed of arrogance, I press forward. We were prattling about so called stuff in our lives avoiding any refined, intellectual talk, till our comfort was sentenced to death, and our hopes were mercilessly dashed. Another elderly man claimed his progenial right to his seat so now we were two behemoths confined to one seat, our abysmal circumstance assuaged by our jocular banter.

Then he implored us to vacant our seats that we have laid our siege upon as he was separated from his family owing to unconnected, disjointed seats due to the exigencies of booking the tickets well ahead of time to enjoy the insatiable luxury of reservation, thus casting aside any justifiable preferences for seats. So we were genuinely touched by his constant solicitation so we traded a seat, for which we had no claim whatsoever, for a seat that was guarded by the impregnable force of reservation. We were quite delighted at our ingenuity. 

I understood the relativity of time when we sealed our friendships with an invisible totem. Time somehow takes an incorrigible flight, it always seems to be scarce when I am spending my time with him. The best part about conversing with him is that I am unconsciously talking to myself, answering to potent questions that I was hardly aware about. It sometimes appears to be a monologue. He appears to vicariously live my life through the instrument of my maudlin or stoical talk. That is what is required from a friend, a friend who lends a ear unconditionally without interrupting without being obtrusive and without being judgemental or prejudiced. Anyways so I was invariably emptying my mind off all the flotsam, rubble and debris that had been collected and subsequently rotting during my time of hibernation from him and unconsciously surrendering all my innocuous worries to the omnipotent divine.

So we were deliberately and compulsively awake till we reached our destination as we were quite confident about the fact that the sounds of the alarm on our phone would be just trifling, infinitesimal ants that would be trampled upon by our elephantine, gargantuan sounds of our yawns.

We got down at the station or we can say, as one of my acquaintances sealed his embarrassment for a perennial time, by calling his friend and boisterously claiming ,with an icing of floridity ,to suggest his intractable hold on the English language, that he has "landed on the station."

We took a rick and got to the ST bus station. We took a rickety, ramshackled bus to Fardapur. We informed the conductor to wake us up when we reach the destination. We dived into such a deep, inveterate ocean of dormant sleep that when we were awaken we woke up with a caustic jolt as the protagonist in horror movies jumps up with a start when he is haunted by an apparition or ghost in his or her sleep.

We were stranded in this oblivious place of Jalgaon. The passers by, the chai-wallah were trying to scare us by deliberately, consciously exaggerating the distance to be covered to reach our venerable hotel. It may also be just an instinctive reaction due to the inveterate habit of Indians to exaggerate. Sorry I don't want to be judgemental. But one of the many predilections common to me and Prasad is the enjoy of walking. So we started walking unperturbed with bags on our shoulders and imperishable smiles on our mouths. On the way, a well wisher in a well-polished car asked us whether we are going to the hotel and after getting an obscure, vague nod of our heads, voluntarily granted us a lift. Our bitter experiences of strangers in a strange town again gave rise to creases on our forehead and obnoxious distortions of our faces characterised by suspicion. But we were relieved when we finally arrived at Hotel New KP Park and the well-wisher didn't ask for a penny, instead beseeched us with a bigger proposition of booking his well-furbished car for the time of our stay. But we denied to return his gratitude with such an expensive gesture. Anyways this is the hotel where the owner being incredulously scrupulous, suggested us not to make a payment of ₹1000 online instead to make a payment of ₹200 per person per night which arouse gnawing suspicions in our mind which were still rather inchoate. We were escorted to our room by a gregarious, vivacious Sandeep on whom the depravity and hypocrisy of human behaviour realised with the ambivalent growing of age and the staleness of time has still leaved the child-like innocence untouched. He escorted us to our rooms, handed us the keys and gave us the assurance that he will be there whenever we needed him. Our room mollified our suspicions as the rooms were dilapidated and it was not worthy of a ₹1000 as we were suspecting that he will ask for an exorbitant amount of money after suggesting that ₹200 was just a deposit. But still the room was comfy. Our bodies were exhaling a pungent, acrid smell. So we quickly bathed and got into our new robes, packed whatever paraphernalia was not needed for the nonce. 

The generosity of the hotel staff was overwhelming which was just exacerbating our suspicions even further. They dropped us at the foot of the hill where Ajantha caves were located. We bought the tickets. After an exhausting 20 minutes climb, we arrived at our desired destination. From the pinnacle of the hill, the layout of the caves resembled a prodigious, gigantic horseshoe. Anyways after our superficial, perfunctory frisking, we were freed to explore the unseen caves. We entered the first caves, it was enveloped in a benighted darkness with obscure innocuous little lights conspicuously failing to serve its purpose obtrusively imposed upon it. The minuscule lights were required to display the paintings, to guide the exploring traveller to showcase the intricacies, nitty-gritties of the painting, which actually intended to explain the Buddhist mythology in meticulous detail. But we were bewildered,nonplussed. We were in a conundrum, we wanted to have a very acute understanding of the depiction of the paintings but what we were able to observe was just a hotchpotch of myriad colours.We also wanted to comprehend the artistic, intrinsic value of the paintings. Anyways we implored, beseeched some fellow travellers to lend us a torch but they didn't heed to our constant solicitations. We hired a guide in utter frustration after exhausting whatever choices were available to us. What he did was an abhorrable, detestable thing to do. It was an outrageous, unforgivable mistake on our part. Years and eons of painstaking efforts and irrevocable commitment was demeaned by a superficial and hackneyed explanation that can be flagrantly observed by even an obtuse traveller. A guide should be ideally an aficionado, a virtuoso of art and should have considerable gnosis of the mythology depicted intricately by such kaleidoscopic paintings or by such flawless carvings. Anyways we learned a stinging, caustic lesson from this. We immediately went back and bought a guide approbated by the Archaeological Survey of India. And all this while I was hoping to find the pertinent torch to obliterate the darkness enveloping around us in the cave being oblivious to the obscure lights within it. But no one heeded to my constant solicitations. Anyways once we had the infallible weapon in the form of a guide book, we started our battle to understand how much our sensibility and our limited imagination allowed us. 

It was unfathomable at the first how our ancestors who conceived this overcame the irrevocable architectural conundrums. But we were were fully aware about our barren architectural understanding, so we didn't try to comprehenend but capitulated to our inexpressible wonder with our mouths gaped open. The carvings provided us a numinous, ethereal experience with Buddha serene and stoical from every niche in the monastery. The carvings were intricately set in stone with indefatigable perseverance to carve the ornamentation with a preternatural obstinate detail. The most conspicuous and alluring feature of the caves were the cells inside the monastery, those cells were used by ascetics who wanted to extricate themselves from their intertwining threads of daily lives, who want to silence the rambunctious voices reverberating within their minds exacerbated by the boisterous noises outside, who wanted to relieve themselves of all the innumerable identities and absolve themselves of all countless responsibilities and repose within their selves. It was a cell for those hermits who wants to listen to the obscure yearnings of the soul. This was just a testimony to the fact that meditation forms the core of every religious and spiritual endeavour. We are all aware about the pertinence of meditation in Buddhism and Hinduism and other religions. I am just reading a book "The First Muslim" and there was a citation of a very notable fact that the word for spirit or soul and the breath is the same "ruh" in Arabic. This also provide further evidence to the fact that meditation should be made a very incorrigible part of our lives. The carvings at the entrance boasts of lascivious, licentious couples snuggling to each other, caressing and fondling with certain unspeakable private parts that can embarrass even a Casanova or a coquette. There were also carvings portraying the internecine violence of man. The objective of these carvings seem to showcase the ignoble, vile human depravity as a whole and the purpose of it was to arouse every conceivable poignant negative emotion in the chaotic minds of the hermits in order to purge them in their solitary confinements. 

Next we visited the Ellora caves, we first entered a prodigious Hindu temple. We were again enveloped by a blinding fog of amazement and wonder. The entire Ramayana and Mahabharatha in exquisite detail was carved so meticulously in stone that for a moment you feel a part of those momentous epochs. The carvings talked about the myriad stories which provides an unprejudiced and broad-minded view of Hinduism characteristic of the age when India was an indomitable super-power, a common nemesis of empires around the world contrary to the dogmatic, patriarchal Hindutva which suppresses individualistic opinions, perceptions and beliefs that violate their own deep rooted beliefs watered by an impregnable obstinacy bordering on arrogance. This has caused an intellectual rape of various art forms by the riffraff obdurately influenced by the rabble-rousers and demagogues, who are an intractable force against the free-thinkers who are right now under the ominous danger of extinction. The proletariat, the rabble should visit these ancient temples where art has been displayed unyieldingly, where the amorous couples are shown in various sexual positions, where pantheon of deities are also not spared to portray the human life as a whole with its obvious lasciviousness, licentiousness, moral depravity. In some temples, there are flagrant carvings of homosexuals, gays, lesbians in various sexual positions sardonically mocking at the narrow-mindedness and chauvinism of the Hindutva brigade that fail to understand the old phrase that Hinduism is Sanathan Dharma that it is a way of life and not a religion to wage war for to prove its supremacy. 

The developed countries are just emulating the erstwhile India where art was given an unalterable freedom and where every opinion or belief was taken into consideration with an unprejudiced mind. The temples provide us a glimpse of ecstasy, a bliss only comparable to the samadhi achieved after long perennial meditation. There were carvings all around depicting the various deities quite obnoxious and grotesque in nature like there was an horrifying carving of a Goddess which was naked all the way down, stripped off all the skin harbouring the skeleton of the body, it looked like an apparition of a skeletal ghost which will surely send shivers down your spine if accidentally visited in the ubiquitous stillness and silence of the dark, starless night. We visited a lot of Buddhist caves, Hindu caves and now we are yet to visit the Jain caves for which we have to inevitably plan a second trip.

I can go on but now I have to stop because now I am on the verge of giving way to my emotions violating the factual, objective tone of this write-up. I hope after reading this you will surely visit these caves and visit the Real India.