Smartphone – luxury or necessity?

Yesterday I read the above interesting statistics in one of the leading newspaper. It shows how smartphones have changed our life. Those days are gone where only game option was “snake” in Nokia phone. Now lots of things can be done and managed with the tip of your 2 fingers or thumbs in few cases 🙂

If one goes through the above research, then it is very interesting to know few facts about “We” Indians. And I personally feel that the statistics which are given are very much true and day by day as the new generation steps in and starts using smartphone the percentage will increase and touch the sky.

I analysed myself after reading the above and concluded that I fit into many categories of the stats, like mentioned below :-

• Yes I do check my phone over 100 times a day (although I have never counted it but am so much confidence because of the fact that I get minimum 700-800 messages on Whatsapp in a day).
• If I am checking my phone over 100 times a day then yes I must be spending 3 hours, 18 minutes in all including playing games, chat, social media and mails.
• I use many apps on my smartphone for example booking movie tickets, train tickets, etc. So very much possible that I am just not limited to social media and chat-apps.
• I don’t use any chat-apps for business purpose.
• I am not a person to watch videos on phone as I don’t enjoy watching on a smaller screen :). So I don’t fit into any category related to online video watching. I have seen and do see it daily in local trains that most of the people are watching movies on their smartphone with earphones plugged deep inside their ears.
• Yes I am willing to pay more for better service as the type of internet connectivity speed we get on our phone is pathetic and specially while commuting.

I feel the survey is half completed without adding few more parameters like playing games, listening online music and non-stop chatting. So here below are my additional findings and results :-

• I feel the percentage ratio of people playing games will not be less than people watching online videos which could be 23-25%
• 12-15% people especially house wives prefer to listen music online.
• Atleast 40% will be found chatting non-stop for hours and hours late night in bed. Online chatting has outpaced all types of face to face calling / meetings.

So which all and how many categories do you fit into? I will be happy to see your comments on this.

Cycling break – but I am not complaining

The past 2 weeks I have not been able to go cycling daily in the morning. This is due to the rains which have arrived in Mumbai, although late but much needed and most welcome for all of us.

After an acute dry spell in month of June with no rains at all and not to forget the scorching heat, Mumbai finally got blessed with rains since last week. Although it did not rain that heavy till now (as compare to July 26 some 8-9 years ago) but how much ever it rained till now is a blessing. Blessing in sense of getting some relief from heat wherein the temperature came down to almost 30 degrees from 38 degrees.

As usual, the first rains in Mumbai means disruption of rail and road traffic which is the trade mark from all these years and there has been no improvement on this till now. Water logging, traffic jams, delay in trains, un-maned open potholes is the common scenes one experiences in Mumbai.

If you are thinking that I am complaining about rains in Mumbai, then please you got it wrong. Rains are much needed not only in Mumbai but rest of India too. And my prayer to rain God that please pour down with open heart mainly at the catchment areas so that the lakes get full, where Mumbaikars get their full year water supply, as presently we already have started facing water cut of 15-20%.

Dormant contacts – do we need them?

“We both are friends but we will not be talking with each other” one of my colleague showed this message to me as he had got from “someone” whom I also don’t know. Now what the hell this means? I was asked by my colleague to answer this. So I read it one more time slowly interpreting it word by word. We are friends – true; but will not be talking with each other – huh? Contradicting statement, don’t you feel so? I told my colleague to reply “Ok”. So my colleague (more smarter than me) replied with 2 Oks; 1 ok for being friend and another ok for not talking :).

Later, I thought into this and I asked myself, how many contacts do I have who are friends of mine but not talking with me. So I checked my friends list on FB and my contacts in mobile. I first started browsing thru the list in mobile, all the contacts starting alphabetically from A and by the time I reached half way i.e. till alphabet H, I got tired counting the number of people who are in my contact list and are either friends, colleagues, ex-colleagues or family members whom I am not in regular in touch or rather not at all in touch with them for a long long time. I also gave a glance on the list of friends on FB and there too I found so many people whom I am not in touch with at all :(.

Social media, helps keeping in touch with many of them, but it rather seems that once you add the contact of the new person, then they are just lying inside your contact list for long long time. Actually most of us forget many of them after few days. We all have fix set of friends whom we prefer to stay in touch with each other.

So again back to my first sentence of this post. I said to myself, Hemang what if tomorrow one of my near and dear friend sends me such message. What shall I reply? I noticed that there is still lot of empty space in my mobile and in my FB account wherein people can stay in the list. I simply will not delete anyone. I already have so many dormant contacts, one more will be added to the dormant list. I am hoping some day these set of people will definitely come alive (I mean not from the grave yard but in sense of keeping in touch) and will start talking with me again. Hence as of now, I am keeping all the people-who-are-silent-in-my-life safely in my mobile as well as FB list :D.

What if someone says one such statement to you? What will be your response? How many such people do you have in your list?

Happiness & Joy of Giving (part 2)

The mission of helping someone in need continues. Last Sunday we (myself and other 2 friends) again visited the same orphanage in Malad (our second visit and mine many till now). Last time we visited was in month of March 2014. This time we distributed vada pav, books, pens and project papers to all the girls over there.

The feeling of seeing small girls age from 3 years onwards living in an orphanage could not be described here. All of them looking so cute and innocent. A visit to this place always leaves an impact on me. And it takes me sometime to recover from this heart wrenching experience.

There are in all 70 girls staying in that orphanage. They all goto school and they do all types of activities which our child does it in school. Except that they have no parents whom they can call mom or dad. Their parents are the Nuns (who take care of the orphanage) which they call them tai or sister.

The kids have their playing area and they all play together. No fighting or arguing with anyone. They just love each other. I would like to mention here that when we were distributing snacks there was no grabbing or asking or pushing. All the girls lined up in queue with their respective plates and they have their fix place to sit and eat. They eat, wash their plates and keep it at their fix place. Such discipline they have in them. Truly worth taking back such learning from them. We were greeted with thank you by most of the girls and even asked to visit again.

By God’s grace we have so much in our life and then also most of the times we crib for want for more. And here the girls have nothing, some might not be knowing her full name too but then all of them are so happy, joyful and thankful.

Our objective to be some help continues and we have planned for our next trip in the month of October (maybe another such place).

ABC of flying

“Ladies and Gentleman, it’s a request to please switch off your mobile phones, laptops and any other electronic gadgets”, the same also said in Hindi language. This is the announcement made inside the flight minutes before the take off.

As a responsible citizen I ensure to follow the code of conduct of flying and switch off all my gadgets. But I have noticed that many people just don’t want follow it. Either they have not understood the announcement which is made is Hindi and English language or they seem to prove themselves as the “Hero” of the nation.

Even after the request announcement many don’t switch off their phones or laptops or iPads. They seem to purposely don’t want to follow the basic ethics of safe flying. These so called “disobedient-lot-people” think that the captain who made the above announcement is a “fool”. And all the more even the manufacturer of the phone devices who now gives the option of “flight mode” are “illiterate” to provide such option in the handset.

I have seen many times that the cabin crew members have to plead people to please shut their devices. Mobile phone and any other electronic gadgets throw out signals which can become an issue to the captain in his cockpit.

All such precautions are for passenger’s safety. It’s our responsibility to obey the very basic rules of flight. One has to follow the safety measures inorder to have a safe and enjoyable journey.

Today I noticed both my neighbors not obeying the announcement and both were requested by the cabin crew to please shut down the devices (one was busy chatting on whatsapp and another doing something on his iPad). This is not my first experience. I have seen many times such thing happening.

It’s a request to all that please do ensure to follow the basic thumb rules of flying and help in avoiding any untoward accidents.

I am writing this post during my flight back to Mumbai and posting it on reaching home.

Unknown charming girl

I see her smile daily, I adore her daily, I say hi (within me) daily. Yes this one unknown girl whom I accidentally bump into her almost everyday. She is well dressed up, with exact make-up, matching dhupata as per her churidar, equally matching hair clips and hair band and not to forget her matched up chapals.

I see this unknown girl who must be in her mid twenties, daily on my way to office. I am sure she is also on her way to her office too. The type of handbag she carries shouts out loud that she is an office-going-girl.

I don’t know but it’s just a coincidence that mine and her office timings are almost at the same time J. Almost everyday I see her in the morning and most of the days in the evening too. Even my eyes are on the look out for her on the roads and I feel nice once my eye reaches her.

She is the one girl who stands out of all the ‘office goers’ crowd in the morning and evening too. Mainly her way of dressing, her perfect looking facial makeup, her hair style and her taste of matching things is one of its kinds which stands out from rest of the crowd. Most important, she always looks fresh and equally decked up in the evening too as she was in the morning. Her face is always smiling and eyes always glittering.

But alas the time frame which I have eye to eye contact is just few seconds. As we both cross our paths both times of the day. We both head in opposite direction for our offices and it is just few seconds in which we cross each other’s path and I get the privilege to admire her beauty.

Everyday I hope that today I will make one step progress and will try to exchange smile between us, but as soon as my eyes traces her I get too much involved in checking her clothes and accessories that I forget to give her a smile. And within wink of an eye she passes by.

I am sure she is not aware that she has one secret admirer of hers who always like to see her and feel happy on seeing her J and hoping some day we both will greet “hi” to each other and also will get know more about her. I think I have started liking her.

And the day actually came when I gathered courage and had decided firmly that today anyhow, no matter what, I will exchange smile and say hi to her. I can see her approaching towards me; I can feel my heart pounding heavily like I am just back from a Marathon. As I was about to say hi to her, trrrrrriiiiinnnnnnggggg…… my alarm rang at its highest volume, waking me up and making me realize that it was just a dream. I saw my wife standing beside me like a policewoman asking me to what was I murmuring in my sleep. I somehow got escaped from her question and was feeling sigh of relief.

Does early morning dream come true? If yes then should I start looking out for that unknown-charming-yet-to-find-dream-girl in the crowd everyday.