Cactus Chords

Sorry guys, I was traveling and just got back to share with you all the last and final chapter of the story.

Max reaches his friend’s place and is surprised at how small an office he has and stops to wonder if he was doing something that wasn’t worthwhile. He scraps all the random thoughts running through his mind and steps in. Walks into his friend’s office and meets him. His friend welcomes him with a hug and asks him to take a seat. Without wasting anytime, his friend introduces Max to one of his subordinates and asks him to commence the process of familiarizing Max with the goings on of the distribution unit. From identfying production companies, negotiating, agreements, logistics, stock checking, distribution, further negotiationm basically from alpha to omega.

As time passed, Max started showing exemplary skills in every field. He also went the extra mile and became sort of the union leader of the employees. He got their concerns to the higher authorities; his friend. Within a short time span of 4 years, he had managed to increase the distribution units from 1 to 4 in 3 different cities. His friend was very proud of him and promised to make him his partner and let him handle 2 sectors all by himself. Max regularly sent money to his uncle’s house and wrote to them as he considered them his family. He had also saved enough money to invest in real estate, and 3 ambassadors. Don’t ask me why he bought 3 of them. Maybe he found some use of it. Within another year, business was going smooth but stagnant. No growth and they badly needed to expand. His friend put forward the idea of him joining his business and both of them investing more money into the business and opening up more distribution units in 2 other cities to increase their revenues. Max readily agreed as, in a way, he was thankful for the life he had and he wanted to grow. After their discussions, his friend agreed to invest quite a bit of money and to get Max to be an equal share holder, his friend asked him to invest the same amount. If Max invested that amount, he would be left with exactly INR 8,000/-.

In a way Max loved the challenge. He thought to himself, “If this is a wrong decision, then I stand to learn from this. So what, I have my friend and team with me. If something goes wrong, we can always work our way up.” He agreed and they started the procedures to open the new units. He handed over the money to his friend and told him to take care of the formalities as that was what was happening all these years. He handed over the money and decided to visit his only family to tell them the good news and go check on them after years. As soon as he said this, I sat back on my chair, widened my eyes and cupped my mouth. Max looked at me and made the loser sign on his forehead. I sat there motionless.  Max was in charge of all the operations whereas his friend was in charge of the management. He stops, looks at me and says, “You guessed right Mithun, he screwed me. I am not ashamed to admit it.” He adviced, “Whenever you get cheated or screwed in business, shout it to whomever you want. Do not keep it within. Only then will you have the drive to prove to those that you can come out of it and you are capable of it. If you are the only one who knows it along with a few others, you will keep a low profile and end up a loser.”

In a way, it is true. It does help in many ways. I openely accept my first failure but at the same time working ten times harder to prove myself and find myself at peace. I find a lot who agree with me in the wrong decisions I made, advice me, correct me, say the I-told-you-so phrase but most of all support me and offer me all kinds of help. And one thing I appreciate and realize is that, all those weren’t just words. Every single person who promised to help me has come to my aid, with absolutely no expectations. It is indeed a good feeling. Just for the sake of those people, I want to excel in life. I will ensure I do not make the same mistakes that I made and I saw others make. But I might make new ones. Take life as it comes and learn as you go.

Max then returns from his home to find out that his childhood mate and his work buddy for so many years has, no points for guessing, invested his money and moved on. All within a matter of 2 weeks. Apprently, the procedures had started well before the handing over of the money. Basically he was broke with just INR 4000/-, 3 ambassadors and a piece of land. What he did after that, I can not say, f@#k!!! He quit his job, spent a few months brooding over his mistake and without wasting anymore time went on to build a whole new business that flourished to not that state alone but 3 different states and lives a happy life with his family. Due course of this new venture he went through a lot of hardships as well which I am not allowed to speak about. Pretty much the same thing, backstabbing, cheating, lying, but by other people in new ways. This time, he had a back up plan for everything that happened. He ends by saying, “Once bitten, twice shy. I just followed my instincts and learnt to observe, read and decipher people.”

Recently, his old friend got in touch with him, apologized and asked him if he was interested in a new business venture and told him this time he would work for him. “What goes around, comes around.” He told me, “Mithun, you just do your part. The universe has a way of its own. It will reward you with everything you want if you want it with all your heart and work towards it.”

If you guys haven’t heard of or watched it, please get your hands on this documentary called “The Secret”. It is a life changing documentary. NOT THE MOVIE, THE DOCUMENTARY. At least for me. I hope you enjoyed this post. I just wish Max lets me write about his work someday. I would love to share the rest of his story. It is action packed.

Cheers!!!

Right out of college, he hadn’t the slightest clue what he wanted to do in life. As soon as he told this to me, I cut him short and asked him, “Then what did you do next?”. I asked him this because, I was pretty much in the same position when I passed out of college. I just did not want to work in a company. Not that I would have gotten placed with the marks I had Even if I had done the usual stunt of getting one of my relatives or even my dad to get me a job, I did not want it. Was I being stupidly stubborn? Was I being hard headed for no reason? Probably, but as I always believed, everything happens for the good. And that decision of mine made me embark on a journey that I, till date, do not regret. Anyway, getting back to his story, he replied, “At first, pretty much nothing. I tried looking for a job and got a few calls. You see Mithun, it wasn’t that hard for an engineer to get a job those days. But I did not want to work in a company, wake up in the morning, get back home and join the rat race.”

Reader, if you are an entrepreneur or an aspiring one, you will realize that the above emotion is a common one. The above sentence is like a perpetual chant in your head. It is a sentence you might have used and heard being used a million times. The not-wanting-to-work-for-anyone-but-yourself, is an innate emotion in all entrepreneurs. For the very same reason, I reacted with an ear to ear grin and told him, “I felt the very same way.” The moment those words left my lips, I realized I was gonna get slapped down. I wished I hadn’t said those words.  He looked at me, smirked and said, “Every aspiring entrepreneur thinks the same. It is nothing new.” I didn’t say anything else but, “That’s true”. What else could I say? Somehow getting slapped down by this man did not pinch my ego.

I heard a phone ring in the yonder, it stopped half way through. A little later his wife, a very sweet lady, appears on the first floor and taps on a wind chime that hung off the edge of the roof. Max swirled his head around the moment he heard the melodious chime. They exchanged glances, not one word spoken. He turned to me and excused himself and hopped to his house over the moist lawn. I sat there and took in the beauty of the place and wondered what I had done to meet such a person. Why would he sit and talk to me at such length and narrate his life story to me? My imaginative time piece started ticking. With every passing second I was thinking of a new scenario. Does he want to help me out with my business? Does he want to start something with me? Yeah right he will. Does he want to warn me of the hurdles that lie ahead? Is he telling me not to lose focus? Why is he free today? Doesn’t he have work? Is he shitting me or playing a prank on me? Why am I thinking all this? After we speak everything, is there anyway this person will be helpful in business to me? How can I use this contact? In other words, I was being plain desperate. Once you venture into business, you wonder how every second person you meet can help you out. It isn’t because you have become an opportunist but purely because you are desperate or looking for greener pastures. Once you have achieved what you want, this internal war of queries cease to occur. But I guess, that is normal. If you meet some big shot in your field tomorrow, by chance and he starts chatting with you about his life and asks you about your work and gives you tips, wouldn’t you also think somewhere on the same lines? Maybe not this desperate, but I am a little hyper as it is and also have balls to admit to all of this

He returned from the phone call and pardoned for being away. I just smiled to such statements. What could I possible say when he says sorry? “It’s okay Max, dont worry.” As if he gives a flying f#$k about what I feel? But he is a person who has such values and principles. He somehow seemed gleeful about narrating his own story. Maybe he knows its an award winning rags-to-riches story. He continued narrating, “As I was saying, once I passed out, I didn’t know what to do. Got a few job offers but turned them down that very moment.” I listened intently for the next part of the story as that was the part I was interested in. What a bum I am. He leaned back on the cane chair and stretched his arms and let out a sigh. I was still listening intently with the empty coffee cup in my hand. He asked me, “Care for some more Mithun?” and pointed to my cup. I looked down at my cup, the left over coffee had dried up and formed an ink devil sort of artwork that spanned from one end of the cup to the other. I placed the cup on the table, denied the offer cordially and went back to the “intently listening” position, you know the one when you sitting on a chair, with your elbows perched on your thighs and your chin resting on your palm or merely clamping your hands together. He got the hint and went on with his narration, “I then bumped into a friend of mine who I knew from my school days, by chance, on the road after almost a decade. It was really nice to catch up with him after a long break.” Apparently, that friend of Max’s was into pharmacy. He had a large distribution network and was quite successful. When Max expressed his interest in starting something of his own, his friend asked him what field he was interested in. Max hadn’t the slightest clue. Mind you he was 24 years old then. He told him that he wanted to join him in his business. Being a good friend, he did not say anything and told him to meet him the following week with whatever certificates he had on him. Max admits, “To be a successful entrepreneur, hard work alone will take you ages. You need an impressive combination of luck, timing, hard work, contacts and most importantly, how to utilize them.”

So Max set out the following week with all the documents he possessed from his school and college. He also gathered as much information about pharmacy and distribution. That day was his first interview for a job that he wanted with all his heart.

to be continued……..

Yeterday, I had the opportunity to meet one of the greatest personalities in my life by chance. We got talking and I felt dwarfed (an understatement) to his simplicity, knowledge, wealth and genorosity. Though he hasn’t been covered in the media as much, he is a human being who has been through the worst times in life and crawled his way back to success.

When I asked him if I could write about him in my blog, he replied “Mithun, you met me today morning and we have conversed for close to half a day and I have only let you in on a fraction of my life. Go ahead and write, but please keep my name and work anonymous. I believe you wouldn’t take undue advantage and divulge my credentials.” I, thus, apologise for not revealing his name as I am bound by a humble promise which I wish to abide by. I wish to cover this in chapters so I do not bore my few readers.

Chapter 1

Which human being would deny free media coverage? I laid this question in front of him with all due respect, to which his reply was “Mithun, first of all please call me (his name) and do not be so formal with me. Now coming to your question, media hype can work both ways. It works for someone who is low and needs to soar or for one who is up and needs to be brought down. I fall in neither. Then why would I need it? I know I have tackled my share of hurdles to success, so the former is out. Are you trying to bring me down?” I chuckled and appreciated the thought and we exchanged innocent smiles. Did he mean my blog is shit and I would make him look bad? Damn…

For my reader’s sake, let us name him Max, as he suggested. Max was born in a village in one of the western most states of India. His parents passed away at a very young age and he was raised by his aunt. Once he completed his 12th standard, they asked him to fend for himself. Before letting him go, his uncle found him a job at a very wealthy NRI’s mansion as a caretaker. Max does not blame his uncle for letting him go. He reminisces, “I was the 6th member in his family and they weren’t well off at all. His uncle had a small tailoring store and his aunt was a housewife. They had to raise 3 other children and I know and have seen what they went through. Post my 12th, I was old enough to differentiate right from wrong, had a basic qualification. How much more should he provide? In fact, if it wasn’t for him, I probably wouldn’t be where I am now.” I looked around his house. There was class written all over the freaking place. But his sheer humbleness and thoughtful nature drove you to respect him subconsciously. 

When the owner returned a year later, he was impressed by the boy’s work. He had maintained accounts for all the maintenance over the past one year, filed all the necessary documents immaculately, maintained the mansion in top notch shape and even managed to get the house touched up before the owner returned with the money that was left over from the expenses. The owner was astounded by this, 12th standard pass boy’s knowledge, responsibility  and maturity. The owner confessed to Max that ” Honestly beta (SON in Hindi), I thought you would have either taken off with the money or made a mess of the house. I gave you this job because your uncle is a very good friend of mine. Now I trust you blindly.” He looked straight into my eyes and said with a firm head bob, “That was my very first achievement. Earning someone’s trust with my hardwork.”  The owner promised to admit him to college and the honourable man kept his promise indeed.

He was narrating his college escapades to me. He was ragged heavily in college and almost drowned in a pool due course of one of the ragging sessions. Hospitalized for a short while for suffering from mental trauma and thus performed miserably in his exams. He was like, “I have seen my batch mates and class mates crying when they flunked in 2 or 3 papers. When I finished 4 years, I had 32 papers to clear. I cleared them within a year’s time”, in other words, in two sittings. He continued, “It wasn’t because I couldn’t clear them earlier, I just didn’t want to. I hated everything about my college, but loved everything about my life. I was somewhere I did not belong or at least felt so. But I knew if I had to get rid of that burden and to achieve that, I had to clear them.” I nearly choked on my saliva listening to all this. I would have taken all my life to clear those papers or even quit half way through. Max managed to scrape through his course in 5 years. He then moved on to sit idle for almost a year wondering what to do with his life. I feel really handicapped as I can not talk about his work. If I do, you all are sure to find out who he is, as he is one of the pioneers in his field. I am not here to talk about his work but the hardships in life he has been subjected to and how he crawled his way up. Truly inspiring.

We moved to his garden from the study for a cup of coffee. He takes his coffee strong, with one teaspoon of sugar. He took well spaced, short sips with tightly held lips, preventing his tongue from being burnt, he continued his story. “Mithun, I hope I am not boring you.” To which I gave him a look like, “Do I even remotely look bored and shook my head.” There was nothing I could get myself to say. Was a bit too intrigued by his story. Now you might wonder, a guy flunks in college, clears his papers in a year and he’s narrating it, what’s the big deal? The big deal, my friend, is that, that very same man is the owner one of the the biggest businesses in his field and has assets worth over 50 crores in a matter of 5 years since he started working.

to be continued…….

Cheers!!!

Not everyone is as lucky as me when it comes to finding the right person. And when I say that, please don’t start off with the soul mate crap…Spare me the music.

I mean two people who gel and dig each other so well that, there are absolutely no complaints whatsoever. Except the occasional fights that everybody has on small things. But they are not blown out of proportion. It is as good as a friendship, of course, with the benefits of a relationship…ahem ahem…This makes it the perfect relationship. There are a lot of lucky men out there with girlfriends that realize exactly how a male brain functions and gives us space. I drop myself in the same basket. But at the same time we musn’t take advantage of the space given either. Respect must be showered equally to the other party as well. Coz dude, we all know what percentage of women in the world actually understand the male brain and live accordingly.

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Recently, an old friend of mine from college in Bangalore happened to call me out of the blue. He had gone through quite an emotional turmoil in the past couple of years. The reason being, no prizes for guessing, his woman.

The guy was so hysterical when he called that it took me a second to realize that he was not happy on talking to me after long, he was happy that he got a new person to narrate his saga to. He had literally typed out a template with all his problems in his mail drafts and whenever he got a prey to molest, he would send this mail with the name changed to the respective recipient’s. Hilarious!!!
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I received the mail, clicked on it. It took slightly longer than usual, but once it opened, it seemed like Shakespeare was still writing in his grave and he had sent me all that he wrote since he stepped in. It was never ending.  I shut it and called him to ask what exactly was the situation.

Before I tell you what happened next, that very phone call lasted for 5 hours, due course of which he cried like a baby, laughed like a mad man, screamed like a girl, howled like a wolf, sang like a beggar who had his b@!!$ squashed and many other emotions which I never even knew existed. At one point of time he started whining and laughing at the same time. It spooked the very soul out of me. I felt like I was bearing witness to an exorcism on the phone.

There is one thing I have realized about women that when they say “Women Are Complicated”, it’s a bloody hoax. They are not. The basic cause for all the speculations is just one thing, CONSTANT HORMONAL CHANGES & MOOD SWINGS. Every action of a woman can be justified by their mood swings.

Q: Why do people say they are complicated?

A: Because they switch personalities at times without the slightest warning. Some examples:

- They say things with absolutely no connection to the previous sentence.
- You are their prince charming at one time and their worst enemy the next moment.
- They are happy when you get them a gift, but angry that they didn’t get you something and that can ruin that night.
- They are happy you called them but sad why you didn’t call earlier.
- They are happy you have a lot of friends, but angry you spend more time with them, when you actually aren’t
- They are happy when you remember something you shared a while back, when they forget, its because they had so many other problems bothering them and then the famous line “Please, I remember more instances than you”.

And many more which you readers can add, as you read.

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Women have a lot of hormonal changes going on that result in mood swings. Once you keep room for the complete opposite reaction, your life is pretty much smooth sailing. Just like cops think like the way a crook would think to eventually catch them, we must subject our thoughts to those of a woman or at least try to create an inclination towards a woman’s thoughts. I am not in anyway looking down on women. Don’t shoot me.

Q: What is the solution?

A: If it was so easy, then I would be a Guru by now, a millionaire. There is no hard and fast rule buddy. You must be aware of the term Risk Analysis and Risk Management. Something similar to that is what you have to adopt when dealing with women. Adverse Reaction Analysis and Adverse Reaction Management.
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There are signs which women give, which differs from individual to individual, before they go into a frenzy for instance

- constant shifting of position
- vigorous eye movement
- quivering of the nose
- over-examining an object in the vicinity
- fidgety
- snappy
- the dangerous frown that says (what the hell did u just say?)
- the look of disbelief that says (how could you say that?)
- quivering chin, just before tears gush out
- brusque remarks (what?, who?, excuse me?, u crazy?, helloooo!!!)

The moment you hear any of these, it is wise to calm down and say sorry or just change the topic or give another gift or surprise or do something stupid and look cute. Otherwise, it will escalate into a fight unnecessarily and it will be blown out of proportion. If it is a girl who is stronger than you, then I pity you mate.

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Try and avoid these situations as much as possible. Women go through a lot and us guys have it easy throughout. The only thing we have to worry about is getting the food on the table. One way or the other we will do it. But we wont be able to withstand half the things women do, so cut them some slack.

But that doesn’t mean you let them sit on your head and take a dump. I hope you know the relevance of this post and the selective implementation of it.

But it is a complete different feeling to have someone care for you, love you, be there for you and vice versa. So the least we can do is return the favor by choosing the path of least resistance.

I am terribly sorry if you read this whole thing and got nothing out of it. That is why I have it under the necessary category. But thanks for reading anyway.

Cheers!!!

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image reference: http://4.bp.blogspot.com, http://masterworks.files.wordpress.com, http://www.citizenorange.com, http://www.filmcement.org, http://www.herospy.com, http://www.popartuk.com, http://intelligentwomenreadromance.files.wordpress.com, http://www.mikesjournal.com, http://www.clipartguide.com, http://pro.corbis.com, www.images.com

Eminem’s latest album Relapse which had a soft launch on the 15th of May 2009, later officially released on the 19th May 2009, is in many ways a typical Eminem album with a song about his mom, celebrity mockery, for his daughters Hailie and Elanor. The tracks, “Crack a Bottle”, “3 AM”, “Beautiful”, “We Made You”, “Old Time’s Sake” were all top 40 hits in the U.S. Relapse debuted #1 on the U.S. albums chart, selling over 608,000 domestic copies in its first week and over 1,000,000 worldwide.

When a lot of folks purely detest the white rapper from Detroit, there is an even bigger population that follows him religiously, like myself. Why do we love him so much, what is so great about the short, white rapper that bags about his mother and disses everyone at the drop of a hat?

Personally, I am  fan of his lyrics and rapping style. It isn’t just novelty rap that deals with disses. It is sheer poetry. To actually have the talent to implement thoughts in words, transfer emotion from heart to paper. Some of the greatest rappers like 2-pac & Notorious B.I.G were aces at doing this. Though they had all the talent, the art of rhyming two words that don’t even share the same spelling was only tackled by Eminem. And as far as RAP is concerned, if you could rhyme, then you had done more than half the job. But Eminem, not only could rhyme, he was also a modern day poet. All the ingredients for a legendary rapper. All you have to do is, search on the web for one of his song lyircs. Let me help you with a few songs “Cleaning Out My Closet”, “Mockingbird”, “When I’m Gone”, “Beautiful”, “Real Slim Shady”, “We Made You”, “The Way I Am”, “My Name Is”, “White America”.

I am not asking you to admire him or listen to his music or even stand him. Just spend sometime to go through his lyrics, read them, see if most of the words even rhyme, try and understand them, empathize with his emotion. Then listen to one of the above songs and the way he rhymes those weird words. It is out of the world.

For those of you who did not know what rap meant, it stands for Rhymes And Poems. It is not just obscenity, violence, anger, hatred. It can even be love, like Eminem has for his kids, anger for his mom for ruining his childhood, hatred for the world for putting him through misery. He does not even care for his fans, he has abused his fans themselves in so many songs like “The Way I Am” and still we love him. He has then thanked them later in another song “When I’m Gone”. He goes through a mixture of emotions as any human being. The only difference is that he pens it down and sings about it.

Why do we admire someone? Ever thought of that? We admire someone, when he/she has the talent or a mere capability to do something we can’t or much better than how we do it and rises to become the epitome of that. Even though a slim population listens to rap, when someone says RAP, who is it that comes to your mind, if you are not a rap lover? EMINEM. Why? It is because he is the epitome of rap. Chess – Vishwanathan Anand. It is not because Gary Kasperov is the worst, just because Anand is the best. Cricket – Sachin Tendulkar, Swimming – Michael Phelps and so on.

Like any celebrity he has had his fair share of trials and lawsuits. I can’t even count how many that man has had against him and filed against others. All said and done, when you are at the top, there are always people trying to pull you down. He has had his so called friends betray him a lot of times and embezzle money from him. To defend your position, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.

This is his era….Let him bask in its glory. He deserves every bit of it.

Cheers!!!

image reference: www.vivagoal.com, www.aftermathmusic.com

Has it ever happened to you that you are chilling out with your usual set of chums and they start chatting about something, you know you will be left a mere spectator to? Am sure each one of you must have gone through that at one point of time. It takes balls to admit, I know.

Anyone want to deny this?

If so, you must either have one set of dumb ass friends OR you are one of those losers that act as if you know what they are talking about OR read up on topics you have absolutely no interest in the previous night and make sure to pitch in while the talk is going on

If you fall under any of the above, then I am terribly sorry for you. I know and have witnessed people like this in one of the few friends circles I have been. It is indeed a shame when you have that inferiority complex overpowering your character till you end up becoming a complete different person on the whole.
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OR you are in the perfect set of friends that, though speak about things you don’t know about, you feel comfortable as they make you feel comfortable (you are very lucky indeed).

I, on the other hand, blatantly accept when I don’t know something. It makes things much easier. I look at the bright side of things. If they are your friends then they wouldn’t mind your lack of knowledge. You, at the same time, can learn a lot from them and flaunt it elsewhere That’s how the circle of knowledge goes, if you didn’t know. There is no shame in accepting it. That is what friends are for. There is always that one Mr.Know-It-All in most of the groups. If he is one who has his head under the clouds, then he can be a good teacher and an even better friend. But if he is one with his head up his @$$ then there is nothing more turning off in that group than when he opens his gob.

But if you fake it, then you stand to fall in a lot of trouble.
You can be asked a question which you are expected to know and end up looking stupid OR
Say something totally out of context because that is all that you read upon.

When you are in such a group of friends, if the lack of knowledge in certain areas eventually ends up in your being left out, then its a sign, look for new friends. Coz these ones, do not like you for who you are….Simple!!!

Every person has an area of interest. It could be current affairs for one, cars for another, music and movies for another etc. So repect your friends for who they are and what they know. Impart knowledge, don’t disrespect its value, for, one day its going to come around and bite you in the ass so hard, you wont even know what hit you.

Cheers!!!

image reference: www.anu.edu.au