to start writing again !

I have always been a voracious reader and also a good story teller/writer when I was young. I would write many small stories inspired from the likes of Malgudi days.  I had many small black and blue books filled with ink pen written stories that had little cartons etc  , I need to dig them out from my garage some day.

I then stopped writing stories, not sure when that happened but I just stopped – my guess was that it was after I read Salman Rushdies’ Midnights Children.  Salman Rushdie is the most amazing writer I have come across, his ability to build stories and use words to take you a land far far away is the best in the industry.

So, after a lot of thought I have decided to start writing like my main man Salman. This is probably a 25-30 yr project to try to get as close as possible to be able to create fairytales and recreate completely different world like in Malgudi Days.  I have been thinking about this a lot because my storytelling skills through written words have started to hit rock bottom, it seems like its become easy to write about opinions and “give gyaan” – they seem like very low hanging fruit for me.

This is a journey I shall embark on and document it on this blog and like almost all my previous writing promises, it may end with this post itself 🙂

“Have a short memory and look ahead”

Today is Fathers day so I thought I should share something my father once told me ” Vineet – have a short memory and look ahead ” I really do not remember the context in which he told me this but something about its simplicity stuck with me.

Forgetting the past is not easy, you are for the most part of your life who you were born as. People judge you for who you were born as and to break through that barrier is very tough and can be emotionally draining. As hard as one tries someday your past catches up with you and for the most part its not pretty.

One’s past is a lot of things – friends, colleges, ex-girlfriends, siblings, relatives – these are the people who embody your past, they store those experiences in their memory creating a snapshot of who you were at that point of time. Every-time you bump into your past and you  have to fit that mental picture and suddenly your past is your present. This constant bumping into your past through people makes it hard to evolve and change and most people give up and accept the mental image that people expect from them. I have seen this happen to the most intelligent, outspoken, confident of people. I also learnt this from my coach who used to say something on the lines of  ” to be a good player you need to be talented, but to be a great player you need to have a short memory” , the moment you think about the shot you just missed you are probably going to miss the next one too.

I meet old friends all the time and I enjoy meeting them, I love talking about things that happened when I was a kid etc but I do not let that affect my thought process of who I am and who I am aiming to become. I accept my faults and failures with all happiness, people will always remind you of how much of a loser/stud you were but it does not matter what you were, what matters is what you want to become.

Thanks for all you have given me dad, wish you were alive today to enjoy life.

 

 

Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar

I wanted to write a blog post when Steve Jobs died but I didn’t  I wanted to write something when Dravid and Kumble retired but I could not get myself to write. But today I had to write something about Sachin Tendulkar .

I have never been a fan of cricket, I followed it because well I am Indian and thats what we Indians do. I never even liked Sachin Tendulkar as he represented the complete opposite of what I believed and respected ( thats another blogpost) .. I did not hate him but he was not my fav player – Sanath Jayasuriya was . Having said that I cannot escape the fact that Sachin Tendulkar was the God in a nation where Cricket is the biggest religion. I cannot count the number of times we stopped playing/eating/driving/showering/sleeping/studying just to watch this man hit a round piece of leather.

As I was not a great fan of cricket I was always stuck being bored and uninterested while the rest of the country was glued to Doordarshan in the 1990’s and StarSports/ESPN lately. This lack of interest in cricket made me respect and understand the power Sachin had on the entire Indian population better, no one actually noticed how passionate  they were about the sport and more importantly obsessed with every single stroke of the Little master as they were all hypnotized by that beautiful straight drive.

A billion people expected nothing less than a matching winning blazing century from Sachin dismantling the oppositions bowling attack to pieces.. anything less than that was unacceptable. The beauty was that Sachin delivered more often than not something which is obvious from the staggering stats he has, I can never fathom how the pressure of a billion people never got to him. I have read a lot of glorious things written about a lot of famous people but most of them are exaggerated glory testimonials thanks to selective memory.. but in the case of Sachin everything is true because he IS the exaggerated praise.

I never wanted him to retire not because I felt he was integral part of team but because he was such an integral part of my childhood. Everytime I saw the Sachin play it made me feel like a small kid again and forget that I am 3 years away from being a 30yr old man.

I want to end this post by thanking the Fab 4 of Dravid, Ganguly, Kumble and Sachin for playing when they did and it was a joy as a young kid to watch them play and root for them. Each one of them is a phenomenal role model in their own way.

Comfortable

Comfortable or in more common language “settle” . I have never understood why people wanted to be comfortable and settled down – it made no sense to me.

I do not mean this in a small way, but it a big way.. in every stage of life.. people are working towards settling down towards leading a comfortable life when the beauty of  life is in the most unsettling aspects of it.

Comfortable did not think of new ideas.. comfortable does not make bold moves and comfortable never had an exciting life.

I guess I am comfortable being uncomfortable.

 

 

Finally someone writes the truth without worrying about “geek” cred.

Jennifer Jones

Life is always full of surprises, its the good ones you cherish and the bad ones you hope to learn from. One of the best experiences I have had was with Jennifer Jones.

Jennifer Jones is a marketing expert and you can find all about her here . The way we met was random and shows one of the +ve’s about social networking, she once tweeted about our company and I followed her on twitter, sent her a couple of thank you’s to which she responded. We exchanged some tweets here and there. Almost a year back when Steve Jobs died she tweeted about working with Steve Jobs and getting water thrown all over her in a meeting by him in a fit of rage. This sparked a conversation between both of us and I am guessing this is when she registered who I was and recognized me, albeit from my Twitter handle.

Fastforward 6-7 months, I was in Palo Alto running around trying to close BD deals, raising funding and doing what it took to NOT die. Things were bleak and time was running out. I needed something good and I needed it fast, almost everyone I knew – all my contacts had been tapped out and I was losing faith. During that time Jennifer replied to one of my tweets which showed that I was in PA asking if I was in town. I said yes and I sent her an email, she obliged to meet me and setup a day to meet.

Being broke and without a car in Palo Alto meant that I had to maintain a very tight schedule with respect to bus and train. I obviously did not factor in holidays so when the day to meet reached I realized it was Martin Luthur King day and the bus I was supposed to take was not running. I sent Jennifer this email

“Jennifer,
I just realized that the Marguriette shuttle that I had planned to use today to come towards SLAC is closed due to Martin Luther King day (http://transportation.stanford.edu/marguerite/). I don’t have a car and there doesnt seem to be any public transportation that side. I am staying in the Stanford campus, is there a place that works for you somewhere closer/on the campus so that I can walk there.

I am sorry I should have noticed this earlier. ”

Jennifer obliged to reschedule this and we scheduled this for another day. As the day approached, AOL wanted to meet me on a short notice – we were in talks for a business deal and the timing was just right that I could make both the AOL meeting and the meet Jennifer but we had to move the location. I sent her an email to see if she was flexible

“Jennifer,
Hope all is well, I had an unexpected meeting scheduled for 4pm at the AOl office in Palo Alto tomorrow. I can still make the 5pm meeting that we setup but we may have to meet somewhere close to the AOL office because if I use the bus the earliest I can reach Sharon heights is 5:45pm.

Can we meet at Starbucks @Stanford and ElCamino ? .. or we could reschedule the meeting for 6pm at Sharon heights so that I can catch a bus and be there on time.

Let me know what works for you. Sorry for the last minute change.”

Jennifer again obliged when she could have just ignored all my requests let alone reschedule and then have to move the location less than 24 hours in advance. I felt like a fool but I was helpless as public transportation is not that great in the Valley and I had to usually walk miles to reach meetings and would enter a meeting sweating profusely.

As expected the AOL meeting ran late and I had to walk approx .7 miles which would have taken me 20 min. I did not have a cell phone (because I was broke!) so I could not even contact Jennifer that I would be late. I was already 5 min late so I decided to run that distance. The irony being that I was just discussing a multimillion$ deal with AOL and now I was running on the streets of Palo Alto just hoping no one from AOL or any investor would notice. I was 15 min late and completely exhausted – I took a couple of deep breaths and went in just hoping that she waited for that extra 15 min.

She did and I was glad she did – I exchanged hi and hello, I was dripping with sweat so I excused myself and went to the restroom to freshen up. I came out and Jennifer bought me a cup of coffee and we had a pleasant conversation. She told me about her experience with Steve Jobs ( which was really cool! ), her journey in marketing and I talked about what we did and where we were in our companies’ stage. It was good to finally talk with someone with no agenda or me begging them to see why our company was doing some cool stuff, she offered to help me with my presentation deck which I emailed to her and we left after an hour of conversation.

I went back and started working as usual on my night shift and I get an email from Jennifer telling me in the most polite words that my presentation was a piece of shit. She asked me if I wanted some help with it and she could put me in touch with someone who can help me with the making my presentation better but it would cost around 200$. I did not have the money for this and while the presentation needed work and it seemed like a pretty reasonable request I had to decline the offer.

After about 20 min I get this email from Jennifer:

“Hi I talked to my friend and he will help you redo this preso pro bono. Just remember us when you win! ”

I almost cried.

She then made the introduction.

“I wanted the two of you to meet on email. Vineet as I explained to you, XXX can help you enormously by making your presentation look better! The storyline is good, but the visuals deter from the presentation.

So let XXX help you, and XXX and I will work out the cost. It made us both impressed to hear you were taking buses around the Valley to work on your dream.

Here is his contact information: “

With all the shit that was going on, this email gave me the confidence to move forward. It is sometimes the smallest things that you derive your strength to move forward and I really needed something like this that day.

I worked with XXX and we got a much better presentation ready. Jennifer has been an awesome supporter since then and I had to share this story because it shows how unpredictable life can be and how sometimes the kindness of humans can provide you with a lot of support.

Thanks Jennifer.