I have spent the biggest part of my sane life in Pune (Maharashtra, to be precise). If forced to define, I would say I am equally or more a Marathi (Maharashtrian) as I am a Gujarati. I have loved every moment (almost every) of my time being there and I any day love Pune and being in Pune more than any other places I’ve ever been to.

Little over two years ago, the fate had me relocate to Bangalore. Another beautiful city, but with less than limited love interest from my end. Rang Shankar, Radio Indigo and Cha Bar aside, there was barely anything to feel energetic about. And then suddenly, Bangalore was declared 3rd Best City To Be Visited In 2012 one fine morning. Not much later, a worldwide survey honoured Bengaluru as the best Indian city to live in. (My moving to Bangalore didn’t influence these developments in any way.)

Paradox and Hypocrite happen to be two of my favourite words in the English language. I’m assuming it’s because I can relate to these terms quite closely. While I tend to find, notice and remark irony out of most of the practical situations, I feel I’m strongly responsible for their very existence. Thanks to some distinct contradiction between my speech and action, I manage to produce interesting whirls in many affairs I’m directly involved in. Such behaviour – often unintentional – is usually amusing and beneficial; however, the only honest word to define is Hypocrisy.

Much as I try to introspect and implement stronger life-ethics, I’ve observed I often (unknowingly) take a path of pretence – something that
 conveniently works my way. Not that I’m proud of it, nor has it played any role in the little success I’ve achieved in my professional and personal life; I can only be honest that I haven’t always been the most neutral person one should ideally be. And so I thought of resorting to someone I know who’s always stuck to her/his stand in everything s/he had to say, someone, I can learn from – like my parents, teachers, close friends, relatives. Drifting as my thoughts could be, I was led to think – Most of us are Hypocrites – at one or the other level.

Director(s): Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra/ Acto(s): Abhishek Bachchan, Sonam Kapoor, Om Puri, Waheeda Rahman, Rishi Kapoor, Divya Dutta

I finally started living in my new (rented) apartment in Bangalore, with no great movie to look for on TV (not sure if I should blame TataSky for that). The only option was to re-explore my old DVD collection. No rewards for guessing, I picked Delhi 6 – one of my all-time favorite movies (as most of my closest people already know). I loved it so much the first time I watched it, I immediately bought its DVD and happen to have watched it more than once (being modest).

While I’m about to watch it (n+1) th time today, the only question running through my mind is – why would anyone not like Delhi 6? That’s a question for those to answer who can’t appreciate this phenomenal creation. I belong to the proud-others, who’re sane enough to understand and digest its perfection.

Author: Ken Blanchard, Margret McBride/ Publisher: William Morrow/ ISBN: 9780688169817

Dr Bharat Desai's review of "The One Minute Apology" by Ken Blanchard and Margret McBride:

• A powerful way to make things better.
• A manipulative technique for getting what you want.
• A power of forgiveness to improve or repair relationships, your business and even your home.

This is a rare book exploring a very important subject – poorly understood and hardly bothered. I will start with the most important issue that is,

1. “The toughest part of Apologizing is realizing and admitting that you were wrong.”
2. The power of the one-minute apology is deeper than just words.
3. The core of most problems is the truth you don’t want to face.
4. The longer you wait to apologize, the sooner your weakness is perceived as wickedness.
5. Without a change in your behaviour just saying “I am Sorry” is not enough.
6. Apologize not for the outcome, but because you know you were wrong and it is the right thing to do.
7. When you honestly express your feelings with someone you care about, you show respect for yourself and the relationship.
8. A one-minute apology can be an effective way to correct a mistake you have made and restore the trust needed for a good relationship.

Like in Nagesh Kukunoor’s ‘3 Deewarein’ three independent incidences took place with me in the recent past, which were meant to be linked by the end. That’s the only part in common with 3 Deewarein; the plot and the story in my case were completely different.

• I gifted one of my favourite books to a friend in the office because I knew she loved reading and I also knew she wrote equally great. I just attempted to encourage her to start writing book reviews because she read a lot of books and she could write much better than what I attempt here on this blog. (Not mentioning my selfish intentions; they’re out of the scope of this article.)

• My cousins and less-brother-in-law-more-a-friend happened to visit Pune for a weekend around the same time. One of the most fun-filled weekends, I didn’t know there were so many hours in a day and there was always so much we could do. Anyway. We had fun. I realized both of my cousins were too much into reading, and just-like-how-I-used-to-be, my brother-in-law found it tough reading more than a couple of pages of any book. I recommended him one of the most interesting books (Indian fiction) I had ever read, with a very strong endorsement to give it a try. The last I know, he had read much more than two pages in that book. No rush, but I really hope he completes the novel someday – it’s really interesting.

One of my closest friends once tagged me in a note on Facebook revealing some of the shocking secrets. The idea was to write some equal number of random things about myself, tag all the other people I wanted, to read these 25 things about me. And so it finally comes to a shape today! (In this Facebook-age, the better suited title would have been "25 Things On My Mind".)

Here’s my story (barely random and significantly long - I spent more than an hour to list them all):

1. I love reading. I read absolutely anything that comes handy. Of all, my favorite book is “Indian Muslims – Where Have They Gone Wrong?” by Dr Rafiq Zakaria. With that in place, I feel my vocabulary is limited to a very small set of words.
2. I have full faith in Indian government, their initiatives and efforts. I know the future is even brighter.
3. I some times feel people (/Indians) not living in India should not be allowed to crib about issues in India. (If you can’t see the brighter side, be equally blind to the darker one.)
4. I wish India and Pakistan were never separated. I would’ve loved supporting a cricket team with opening batsmen like Sachin Tendulkar and opening bowlers like Wasim Akram. (And Sania Mirza could marry Shoaib Malik with peace - without making any political news. Shashi Tharoor could also mind his own business.)

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilemma 
• http://www.howstuffworks.com/morality-located-in-brain1.htm
• That monophonic Dilemma – Nelly ringtone on Nokia 3310 mobile, back in early college days. 

The context in this article is slightly (or completely?) different. It’s the dilemma whether to stay back in Baroda or go back home.

This must be a great deal; it motivated me to ‘write’ after a long time – more than five months. I’m on my way to Baroda (Vadodara) Railway Station from Chintan-Bina’s residence. On one hand, it’ll let me spend one extra day with my parents before I conclude my three weeks long vacation. On the other, I’ll get to spend one more fun-filled Uttarayan celebration in Baroda.