The Bucket List

On my flight home from US this time I saw the movie ' The Bucket List" starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. This is certainly one of my sentimental favorite which touches your emotions and has you hoping for finding a friendship in the end. Jack Nicholson is billionaire hospital CEO administrator Edward Cole who as a grumpy and aging four time divorced playboy finds he has terminal cancer. With Freeman a character that's much different a blue collar working class auto mechanic named Carter Chambers who's a loving family man with a wife and kids and on the side a beloved history buff and trivia enthusiast yet he discovers his fate of having terminal cancer. Upon meeting in the same hospital room they share at first it's a cold and tough bonding only later to grow into a friendship by journey and discovery. The concept is thought up by Chambers by making a list called "The Bucket List" of things to do before we die. Oddly opposites agree the journey starts. The adventures include the heart pumping sky diving, auto drag racing, and trips to exotic locations and foreign countries. The movie also has them visiting the Taj Mahal. Most important aside from the journey and discovery of friendship and caring by travel and adventure a special bond is formed. Each has learned before they meet the end they have made each a better person that cares. They both found what's important in life thru one another. "The Bucket List" isn't really a tear jerker, yet you are certainly touched by the way the characters emotions grow by friendship. You as the viewer feel your emotions have taken a good friendship journey. Finally this film is made even better by the performances of the two veteran legends Nicholson and Freeman.

I read somewhere a quote " If you leave each day as if it was your last, someday you will most certainly be right"Remembering that you are going to die is the best way to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. I have seen fear of death very closely with both my parents getting diagnosed with cancer. I was not prepared to lose them , nobody is. No body wants to die nor see there near and dear ones die.Every people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to go there. And yet death is the destination we all share. I now understand that time a man has is limited.I don't want to waste it living some one elses life, living with the results of other peoples thinking. The first thing in my bucket list is to be happy.I was discussing with my good friend Rajesh today and he mentioned about an article Vir Sanghi writes in Sunday Brunch. He mentioned that Bailey Irish Cream are the best and no where it is replicated. The basic reason the farmers mentioned is that they keep there cows happy. Vir further narrates having the same recipe and ingredients but two different hands cooking them makes taste different because of the happiness the person cooking it puts in there. Now I realise why my morning tea is the best tea of the day that my grand mom makes for me.
The future always comes in bits and pieces. You never know what lies in store for you. But I believe if I maintain a positive attitude the doors of chance remain open and I will be happier person.

Is Emotion reason for Indias problem

I was flicking through TV channels after coming from work today and one of the major news was about Japans Daiichi buying majority stake in Ranbaxy. As i understand this is the first major Indian MNC being sold. Over dinner I shared this news with my Grand Mom and she was a bit shocked. For her it was like selling countrys pride. How can one sell itself to a foreigner etc...
I just jocked to her that its difficult to run enterprises on emotions , may be if some day , some one pays me good for LNM I might sale it. But then this thought itself was a bit shivery though I mentioned this casually to her. I felt emotional about my ownership in the company and how I have worked hard to take it where it is today. Also I thought that My Grand mom knew nothing of both the companies or whats good or bad about this deal but her emotional reaction was some thing which she might have percieved out of her experiences or studies. I believe Emotions does not allow you to make a decision based on facts and logic.Emotions can be so intense that it becomes hard to think objectively about things. When one can't think objectively, then proper judgement can not be used. I have lot of fights with my teenager son over various issues. I believe reason for most of this is emotional as I love him very much and my emotions take away my logic. Emotion is about feelings.Emotions interfere with thinking. Anger, fear, hatred, love, all cause behavior that follow people's feelings rather than their thinking. We Indians are emotional about every thing. We forget the practical aspects and reasons in front of our emotions. In the newspapers we read every day about politicians making optimum use of our emotional quotient for there gains wether the present Gujjar agitation in Rajasthan or Gorkhaland issue in Darjeeling. I am still unable to understand how emotional we get into issues that causes us to kill people , destroy public and private properties.
I believe Life is a emotional rollercoaster. Typically the more emotional we are for something the more memorable it will be. A bad vacation does not mean holidays are bad. Our emotions becomes important when weighing the options and ultimately making a decision. The better we understand our emotions (and what that emotion stems from) the better decisions we will make. Our emotions are what drives us. It what causes us to take actions. Emotions effect relations. Very often we respond to other people's behaviors based on how we feel about ourselves. If we are insecure or uncertain about ourselves we are much more likely to have a negative emotional response to somebody's benign comments or actions. I think we should think before we act and not act before we think. We carry our emotions too far. We should have a good balance between being emotional and being rational.

Hey they have this site to locate "Pee Places"

Looks like some guys ready my blog and got this out. You can check out Pee places in 30 cities in US and also they are rated. Great - enjoy this video

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=3906861&cl=8102214&ch=4226721&src=news

Destiny - A must for survival and growth

Having had this accident and survived - both times I believe it was destined to happen this way.

I am sure lot of people will disagree with me on this and say its hard work that pays but I strongly believe without destiny hardwork alone does not move things. I have seen lot of examples in my life which I would like to share here. Destiny makes things to move and where as hard work helps in execution.

Till the year 2000 we were only making turned parts for our customers in mining industry. In 2000 we got an opportunity from our customer to supply conical bits. There was a new activity involved in there – forging. We at LNM till that time had not supplied or manufactured any forged part. We did a successful development of these parts and were doing 20000 to 25000 nos every month. This is the year when we shifted from LCL shipments to containers as the volume increased. LNM was doing good and growing and then in 2001 , September 11 happened. Business with US suddenly took a big dip. And all customers at that point of time were based in US. LNM had so much of inventory lined up and all orders were put on hold. This is when I thought I should look for some local industries for business with India. One day I saw an ad in newspaper about a mining exhibition in Calcutta. Just for a break I thought let me go to Calcutta and take a small holiday with friends there and visit the exhibition for couple of hours. Inside the exhibition I came across Widia India Ltd, a company based in Hyderabad and Bangalore and in their stall I saw products similar to what we were making for US market. At that time I had no idea that any one was using conicals in Indian market. I made my presentation to Widia and we did our first shipments to them in February 2002. Though the requirement was small but we were having a regular business.

As we started to understand more and more of the mining and construction market, I started exploring possible customers. I came across Kennametal Inc and Sandvik Ltd. – which were amongst the largest buyers of our type of products. I went to there websites, wrote mails but never received any reply back. May be they never reached the write people. And then sometime 2002 kennametal bought over Widia India Ltd, my customer. This made LNM a vendor to Kennametal and opened doors for future growth with Kennametal. In some other posting I will detail the business with Kennametal. In Jan 2004 kennametal sold of the Hyderabad plant to Sandvik. And now we manufacture products for Sandvik and Kennametal both which combined is almost 50% of LNM’s business.

As you notice from above I believe my casual trip to Calcutta, then Kennametal taking over Widia for a short period – good enough time for LNM to start business with them - and then Sandvik – all was destined to happen. Today LNM makes almost the maximum type of Bit Block these two companies use for there worldwide requirement.

Back Home - Its wonderful

I am back home and back to work. Its been eventful trip to US and unforgettable. Its hot and humid here. But still you dont mind it. My flight back was good and Virgin Atlantic though didnt upgrade me but they gave me seats with better legspace and infact gave me four seats in the London Delhi sector as there were vacant seats. I slept most of the flight. I did meet Keera on my flight from NewYork to London and exchanged Hellos. Its 4 Am in the morning and I am into Jet lag thing and am awake since last half an hour. While travelling in NY I had a great idea which Larry Page and his Google team can pick up and pay me royalty. We were on the streets and tube travelling here and there and I wanted to use the restroom. But it was difficult to locate one till we found a Starbuck. I think Google should come out with a "Pee Map" sort of thing which your mobile or GPS could locate for you.

I located a scanner which scans negative to make digital images. I had been to NY city to buy that on Saturday. I hooked up that yesterday night and at random scanned some pictures. Its great. The first picture is of 20th Dec 2006 - a day after Divyansh was born. The other one is of I believe Minoos first Diwali at Purulia after our marriage. I think over some weekends I should be able to upload lot of old memories which is now getting bad in albums.

The coming weeks are going to see lot of people coming in. Sangeet and Sumant are coming next week. Shrikant is coming from Nagpur. Rachana is already here.
Minoo and kids will be travelling to Bangalore in two weeks. Its going to be pretty hectic.

I had some great time with Pankaj in NY and this guy lost his car entertaining me. God has been great on us and In enjoyed my time with him. I am sure he would also be pleased to see family around there. His friend Stanley has also been great and thankfully his IPL team Chennai is into Semis otherwise he would have some tough moments from Pankaj.

Day 6 - I am alive

I have always been a firm believer in destiny. Despite the best efforts things take place when they are destined to. On my flight of US airways from Canada there inflight shopping magazine had some very interesting products which for an electronic maddy like me was great.I tried to locate where in store i can find some of the things and there was a store in NY which had these things. So we changed our plan to go to the outlet mall today and went to the City. We parked the car in NewJersey near the Exchange Place station. Sangeet used to live here till some time back and its a great place to be. remembered her a lot at that time. It was great to roam in 5th avenue. NY is NY. Nothing beats it. And being a long weekend there was a huge crowd in the streets. Raman Uncle was also to come into the city and we decided to meet at 6 PM neat the exchange place station in Mew Jersey. We were just roaming around the city trying to pass the time when Raman Uncle called that he will be delayed so we fixed up to meet at Pankajs place. We headed home at around 3 PM - thought of going to Walmart to pick up some chocolates for the kids and a luggage. There was a huge traffic and cars were just bumper to bumper that too at 80 - 90 Kms speed. And then this happened.There was a series of accidents and we hit the car in front of us with a bang. A real hard crash at that speed with screaming breaks. Just thinking of that shivers runs down your spines.The airbags were out. Thank God we were alive and had no injury's. In five minutes there were siren screaming cops and ambulances. They just checked out if we were ok. There were couple of guys in front of us who looked badly hurt and the ambulances took them. The efficiency with which the police works here is worth seeing. In half an hour all 8 cars hit were removed. Pankajs car was the worst damaged more on the side I was sitting. Check the photo attached. Notice all airbags out. I had a slight bruise on my forehead because of hitting the airbag. We are alive today - No.1 because of the seat belt and No 2 - the airbags. I remember each frame of the accident.If I have to describe that fraction of a second with which it happened - The car in front braked suddenly. Pankaj applied brakes - the car screamed , tilted a bit and hit with a BANG - the airbags came out on the face and the windshield cracked. All in some milliseconds. There was lot of smoke coming out from the bonnet and lot of liquid/oil spilling on the road. Both of us looked at each other and were relieved that we were safe. God has been great. This was an experience to forget. Lesson learnt - never start your car without buckling in. We were saved today because of that. As I started the blog with Destiny - this accident was destined to happen. I had no plan to go to the city today. Secondly we were to stay in the city today till 6 pm but as Raman uncles program got delayed we started early at around 3 PM back.And this happened at 3.30 PM.

Thanks to all of you for your wishes because of which I am alive today.

Day 5 - Its not all that easy

Well reading my blog you must be thinking that what a wonderful job Sandeep has. Traveling all across the globe, seeing new places and meeting new people. It really looks like that but let me tell you its hard work. And its tough when traveling away from home for quiet so many days. And specially if you have to go through American airport security you are ripped – literally. I am sitting at the Buffalo International Airport for my flight to NY. It’s the first time I am flying into LaGaurdia Airport in NY. Its so funny that tickets from this place to other airports in NY like JFK or EWR is 250 dollars where as Lagaurdia is 100 dollars. So its better to save some money for my shopping which I am going to do tomorrow.
We stayed in a hotel near the Lake in Burlington Canada. The hotel is wonderfully located on the Lake and Duane being a runner he freaked out on the view running on the boardwalk by the lake and seeing sun rise. Last evenings drive into Canada was not much of a hassle as it was too late in the night and there were not many cars at 10 PM in the immigration area. I had a very good meeting with my prospective customers here. Then they took me out for Lunch – an Indian Lunch. Usually people think that I might be missing my home food so they take me to Indian restaurants but in actual terms I prefer eating the different cuisines , just they have to be completely veg. I recollect about traveling to Mysore via Bangalore in 1995 as a trainer in Rotaract. My inlaws had moved into Bangalore some years back and they were my host for the day at Bangalore before I went to Mysore. They wanted me to have a feel of South Indian food like Rice Curd. Though I hate rice I some how gulped it and then in my train to Mysore they served Rice Curd and then at the training summit for DRR’s they again served me Rice Curd. It was three meals of Rice curd in a day and all wanted to make it unique experience for me to taste south Indian meal. Same is the situation when I am traveling abroad with my customers. They take me to Indian Restaurants and I prefer otherway, Anyway after this meal we drove back to USA and as the memorial day weekend was to start it was a huge line at Immigration into US from Canada. I was not much bothered as my flight was at 8 PM so had enough time. But after answering all the questions that these guys have at immigration I was into USA. Duane dropped me at the Buffalo International Airport for his lonely drive home. He has been so nice to me over the years that his services has become like of expected. And you forget to be grateful for them. I was lucky enough to get an early flight into NY after paying 25 dollars as flight change charges. I went into security and bundled. I forgot to be completely off metal going into the security. I forgot to take my belt off. And once the security beeps are on , it’s a hard time. I know how George Fernandes must have felt when as Defense Minister of India he was ripped of for security at US airport. So I was taken aside for further screening. And though they try to make it comfortable but I know I might be loosing a day of my life every time I get into US security.

My trip has been very productive as far as business prospects is concerned. But on the personal front I like more about the travel into Europe. I saw more people and enjoyed meeting them more – may be because it was my first time into there small towns. But one thing is common with may be all buyers is that they want to buy from us for only cost considerations. Its not about your quality or delivery security etc. Its just the cost advantages. That remains the only criteria with which they look at Indian or maybe overseas suppliers. I hope I am able to take LNM to a stage some day where they just would like to buy LNM made product for the cost it comes from LNM. And pricing becomes secondary. Its a challenge and I am happy to take it.

Tomorrow is my big shopping day. I will be out to some outlet mall and get myself some clothes. Shopping in these malls does re energizes after this hectic schedule. Sunday, I will go into the city and may be meet Stefanie, my buyer from Germany who is here in NY for her holidays. It might be good fun not talking business with her. These last two days – I am feeling a stiff backache. May be because of long drives or the soft beds in the hotels. I am ageing . I hope I will be comfortable at Pankajs bachelor den and hope the Virgin guys give me an uplift to business class on my flight back.

Catch you later.