Wishlist / Bucket List

I was talking to a friend and I realized that I dont have one single wishlist. I have blogged about my todo's in past (here, here, here)

Here is my wishlist (aka the bucket list)
  1. Get a Royal Enfield Bullet Electra. (Got in Apr 2009)
  2. Get a Sony PSP. (Got it in Mar 2008)
  3. Buy an iPod. (Got it in Aug 2006 and donated it to my sis in Dec 2008)
  4. Publish at least one book. (Done. The Nidhi Kapoor Story in Oct / Nov 2014)
  5. Preferably a travel book.
  6. Teach. (Done. At EMDI. Two courses. On marketing and planning. Aug / Sep 2014)
  7. Bunjee Jump. (Jumped off Macau Tower in May 2010)
  8. Bike from Kanyakumari to Leh.
  9. And from Rann of Kutch to Arunachal Pradesh.
  10. Visit places in my Travel WishList. Visit 1000 cities across the world. 
  11. Win a WSOP bracelet. 
  12. Run a Marathon in less than 4 hours. 
Funny how I have want so many materialistic things in life!

Update. The initial list had 10 items. The first ten. Added more as I went along.

Last updated on 16 Sep 2016

Origami Crane

I have always been an Origami fan. As a kid I remember folding all kinds of paper into all kinds of shapes. Not that it excited me, it was one of those million things that you do as kids. And then when I stumbled upon Prison Break, I wanted to be able to make Cranes and all the other things that people make with one sheet of paper.

Somehow, yesterday, I started reading about it and decided to learn at least a few things. The Crane was an obvious place to start. Googled and used this image to learn how to fold a crane.
This is the final result. Not as beautiful as the ones Michael (Scofield) makes, but its still a crane. And it can still bring a smile to anyone.


I made two of them. The second one looked better. And while you are at it, you might want to check out this TED talk by Robert Lang where he marries the art and science of origami and creates wonderful objects (check out his website for his creations).

Any more origami aficionados?

And yes, I realized that I need gratification for my efforts. Even if its small. Even if it comes from myself only! I see things like juggling, origami, rubik's cube etc as those small little things that give me that instant gratification I look for.

Mindmaps and Website layouts

While working with Mindmaps it dawned upon me that why can't I do my website design like a huge inflatable mindmap? It would be easier for the visitor to find his way around on my website. It would be easier for me to create it. A quick and dirty website layout that I designed with MindMeister (one of those few free online mind mapping software).



And I realized that WK website is like a huge 3D Mindmap. Done very well. Time for inspiration!

Man About Town

Last night when I was wondering what to do, while channel surfing, I chanced upon Man About Town at Sony Pix. Although I dont watch a lot of English movies, something about this one appealed and I saw it.

Here's a tailor ...



I realized that Jack's life is very similar to mine (mine being lot less successful), he has the same insecurities that I have (although I dont have a wife to worry about), he is skeptic of same things I am of (apart from the fact that he is rich) and he is as confused as I am.

And its a wonderful movie. It enters my list of favorite movies. And I dint know that "Man About Town" meant these.

Autobiography of Ram Prasad 'Bismil'

Started reading this...

Autobiography of Ram Prasad 'Bismil' Autobiography of Ram Prasad 'Bismil' Satchidananda This is the original autobiography of Shri Ram Prasad Bismil (the great Indian revolutionary) which he finished just 3 days before going to the gallows. The autobiography is a must read for every Indian. It shows how great men are formed and how they think!!! In the end, it contains the poem 'Sarfaroshi ki Tammana' written by Shri Bismil which inspired millions to work for Bharat Ma's freedom...

A, B and C

One of the latest pieces of work that has really caught the fancy of the world has been Anurag Kashyap and Abhay Deol's Dev D. It is a story of this young lad, Dev, a rich dad's poor little boy, an obsessive lover, an escapist, disillusioned by the world and in search for something that he calls love.

So much for Dev and his psychedelic life. Let me talk about me and a couple of my friends. Let me call these three people A, B and C. All three have a fairly enviable education background. All are beyond their prime now (28 types).

A works for India's most visionary entrepreneur's prodigal elder son's one of million companies. This company is one of few organized players in India's burgeoning retail market. A is one of the most extraordinary people that I have ever met. Although he doesnt put a lot of time and effort in coming up with insights and ideas but whenever he does so, he comes up with gem. His words are worth their weight in gold and diamonds and platinum. His thoughts are very clear and he knows what exactly he wants out of life and work. He is also one of the laziest people you would ever meet.

B works for a "conglomerate" with businesses ranging from chemicals to locks to rocket engines to foods to retail to real estate to medicine and to what not. If we legalized gambling and prostitution, they would have launched that too. Of course they would have put myriads of hierarchy and long designations for doing seemingly innocuous work. Anyways, B is an engineer by education, manager by designation and Shikari Shambhu by character. His sole aim in life is to make more money than anyone he knows, own the biggest house amongst his reference group and retire with enough in the pension fund. Nothing wrong about it. Just that its a different story that he is not doing anything about it.

C thinks that he hard to understand for most of the people that he knows. Including C himself. Actually that's what C thinks. He is often branded random, frivolous and fickle minded. He is trying to ride some 19 boats at the same time and needless to say, failing at staying on course. He work a 8:30 to 5:30 job and leaves his office strictly at 5:30, goes to his place and stares at the wall and TV for about 5 hours before he sleeps.

So, three of us, our life stream can put any number of Devs' to shame. A typical day for each of us is VERY predictable. We probably are the cheapest targets for detective agencies. Sitting here, in my office, I can tell, with 100% certainty what the other two are upto. For example B is trying to scroll through his gtalk chat list thinking who he can chat up with. A would be out of his office smoking umpteenth cigarette of the day. I can also say for sure if you asked the other two about all three, everyone but A would know what others are upto. A's secretary might have some answers.

Not that we dont try to break out of this monotony, its just that we are constrained by things that seem out of control and we dont even try to move out of the rat race. For A, its lethargy, for B, its security and for C, its, well he doesnt know.

Dev was better. He at least had an outlet in blur of alcohol. We dont.

P.S.: Title changed from "Putting Dev D to shame" to "A, B and C"

April 2009: Goals!

When April 2009 would end, I would have
  1. bought the bike.
  2. learnt how to juggle 4 balls.
  3. finished (or given up) on the twitter clone. This would mean I would know the basics of CSS. PHP and MySQL.
  4. restarted blogging on saurabhgarg.com.
Will add more things that I may think of before April begins.

Twitter Clone in a Month

Me and Kunal have gone back to our BIT days. We just bet with each other that both of us will come up with a Twitter clone in a month. So, by 25th April we would have two home grown twitter clones*.

Goodluck and Godspeed Kunal. And just in case, I am @Saurabh at twitter.

I plan to use this thread to put updates on my clone. I will call it #Twitter22. I know, not very creative, but still. And I have created a blog for the same twitter22.wordpress.com. Will update it with progress and lessons.

* Hopefully.

Work Better

I have realized that I work better when ...
  1. I am facing a wall. I this helps me keep distractions to the minimum.
  2. Listening to music I like. This helps in concentrating.
  3. The background noise is at bare minimum. For obvious reasons.
  4. There's a glassful of water next to me. And a loo within 10 seconds walking distance.
  5. My feet are free. Or read as, when I am not wearing any shoes. May be my brain is in my toes?
  6. I have a notepad and few pencils to scribble things on. I like taking notes!
  7. Lights are dimmed. Not too much of a brightness fan. Blame it on q3?
I am trying to build this list. Lets see how far this goes. Once I have everything in place, I would move!

What helps you work better? Any more tips?

The Nidhi Kapoor Story

Did you like this post? May be you want to read my first book - The Nidhi Kapoor Story.

Check it out on Amazon or Flipkart?