Smile & Wave
Ever since my product manager days, I am a big fan of technology and the role it can play in our lives. The steam mop from Eureka Forbes is my latest purchase. Why Eureka Forbes? That’s because they have an impeccable track record of providing some world class service.
Coming to the steam mop. I have pets at home, which means, dander, cat hair, paw prints from a few pots I own, it’s a busy house! Along with a child, I need to make sure the floor is always clean. Earlier I used antiseptics like Dettol, Phenylene but they are harsh considering one of my pets develop an allergy to the cleaning agent. This led me to explore further and my search narrowed down to the steam mop. A steam mop uses steam to clean the floor, its like we boil water to kill germs now there is steaming to kill germs on the floor. Plus, we don’t need to add any cleaning agent like Dettol, the steam does the job.
The steam mop is easy to maneuver, easy to operate and clean. The machine is lightweight however my better half will have a different POV, may be the company can look at this. The cleaning is bang on! It does what is says, the floor is clean, not watery like in case of hand mops. Even stains which have dried up can be removed using steam. For best results you will need to sweep the floor before using the mop.
Concept: Travelling tour guide
Platform: Mobile based
Application: Google Maps
Benefit to user: Make road journeys fun, informative and interesting
Benefit to Google: More people will use Google Maps for travelling, the existing ones will show higher brand loyalty
Explaining the concept in 150 words: My wife, Richa and I, enjoy visiting places of historical importance, this time we were enroute to UNESCO World Heritage sites of Ajanta and Ellora. They are Buddhist cave monuments dating back to 2nd and 1st century B.C. We started on a 427 KM road trip from Mumbai. As usual Google was very helpful except a few hiccups, turns…re-routing…From Mumbai to Ajanta we would have passed so many places, landmarks, monuments…which will come to life only if we knew about it. Else they are just structures.
Google Maps at any point of time know where the vehicle is. What if there is an option within Google Maps to switch on a tour guide (audio based). The tour guide will provide fun, interesting information about the places, landmarks as we pass by.
End result: A happy family with rich experience.
What do you think?
The feeling when every organ of your body is talking to your mind. Your knees are saying ‘You can hurt me really bad’. Neck is whispering ‘Are you serious, you old man! I’m constantly in pain due to your madness, please don’t try this’. Heart is talking so fast that I can barely understand anything. This is the feeling when you are about to do a water ride which is approx. 50 ft. in height with speeds that will give Usain Bolt a run for his speed and you have no idea what you’re jumping into.
Cut to the Loopy Woopy ride at Adlabs Imagica Water Park. While climbing up to the launch platform, each stair was asking if I really wanted to do this. At the launch pad, I was greeted by a cute little enthusiastic guy who looked so thrilled. May be he was thinking, ‘Here comes my victim’, but then he seemed too sweet for that.
“Aa jao, aa jao” (come on) he says with yellow teeth and big smile. There is a que ahead and people are listening to every word this little guy says. “Remove your T-shirt and wrap it around your hand”, everyone complies without the slightest protest, talk about discipline! Right ahead is a launch capsule with a trap door. The capsule has a transparent door, the people outside can see the anxiety on your face. One by one my turn comes closer. The mind is still trying to dissuade me from the ride. The little guy cracks a joke, everyone laughs and the visible tension disappears. I think that was good enough for boosting moral. There are only two people ahead of me. My mind is preparing the body for the impact, it is not sure what is going to happen, it has no reference check and it trying to make sense of how people are reacting. “Chalo aa gaya aapke number” says the little guy. The launch capsule opens, I step inside and wait for the countdown. THE WORLD FADES OUT.
Being inside the capsule is the ultimate level of meditation one can achieve. You are already committed to the ride and THERE IS NO BACKING OUT. The mind goes blank, blood is being pumped to only the essential organs, and there is ABSOLUTE CALMNESS. YOU ARE IN THE MOMENT. 3, 2, 1 announces the mechanical voice, the little guy shows a thumbs-up sign and by the time I try to smile the trap door opens. The mind is busy recording the data of the experience as the experience is absolutely fresh.
36 feet vertical drop is covered in less than 2 seconds, that’s really fast and then there is rest of the ride which goes through a loop with water splashing and the exhilarating ride finally comes to an end. The first thing the mind says is, “Yeah this is fun and not dangerous, let’s do it again!” Tell me about it!
EVERY PICTURE HAS A STORY TO TELL
What meets the obvious eye is a girl holding an umbrella for a guy as he barbecues the corn. However my dear readers I promised that every picture has a story to tell, so what’s the story for this one?
The picture was taken at Borivali National Park on 26th July, 15. I had gone out for bicycling. Borivali National Park is a proper forest reserve complete with Leopards and deer. What makes it special is the forest reserve is inside Mumbai city limits. How many cities in the world can boast of this?
Inside the forest reserve is centuries old Buddhist caves, Kanheri Caves. The caves date back to 1st century BC and are believed to be one of the oldest cave formations of the country.
Mumbaikars and visitors flock to this beautiful place during monsoon. One can come across nature lovers, photographers, families looking to picnic, young couples, and fitness junkies along with an abundance of monkeys. The air is fresh and the shadows fall behind you.
Coming back to the story, this Sunday I decided to spin the wheels of my new bicycle and go through the mountainous terrain in the Borivali National Park. At the end of 30kms I had already cranked out quite a lot from my recovering body so I stopped for some high carb treat. Though the sky was overcast it wasn’t raining.
Local food vendors are scattered all throughout the trail selling nuts, fruits and corn. I settled for some nuts and asked for a well done corn. All of a sudden it started to pour as if someone opened a tap somewhere. While couples seized the occasion and cozied up I looked embarrassingly at the bushes, trees, clouds, my own feet and then finally at the corn seller.
I was hoping to get my corn when I realized what an amazing human story this moment had to offer. A concerned sister hastily pulling out an umbrella to shield the coal stove from the rain. It’s not her brother she is concerned about, though he also enjoys the benefit (Collateral benefit). Her attention is focused to keep the coal stove going as it’s their means of livelihood. Her brother is confident that the fire in the stove will be protected from the rain. The same reflects in his nonchalant behaviour. Such an act was a routine thing in their everyday life. The duo was quite amused when I requested to take their picture.
It started as a time pass, no brainer game. But this one turned out to be different, way different. In a span of some 3 months I have been a part of so much learning and action. I wanted to share the same –
• Leader – In the first clan we had a leader named Rick, now Rick won’t communicate. Most of the time he was missing from discussion, aloof, not taking active part in running of the clan. Though people respected him but no one loved him. This resulted in other clan members taking active participation in running of the clan.
• Rewards – It does feel good when one gets rewarded and ones owns loyalty to the person rewarding them. As Rick was mostly absent Indrajit took care of rewarding people with promotion. It felt good. People were happy with him and man we had quite a few co-leaders and elders in the clan. Indrajit was the craze as he had the power and if you approach him he will promote you.
• Revolt – The growing popularity of Indrajit and Rick’s reluctance to discuss the transfer of leadership led to formation of a new clan, Phoenix Slayers. The popular leader Indrajit was in charge. There was an exodus of people from the old clan. We all were happy members of the new clan.
• Hard work – As expected in the new clan people had expectation from their new leader. Since almost everyone was promoted to the highest level there was nothing more which Indrajit could do. We needed people to run the clan and this meant hard work. This is where Deb comes in. She was active in the previous clan as well but in the new clan she will be in a totally different avatar.
• Persistence – Deb started working with and on the clan members, she will get up in the middle of the night to check on the clan members, schedule wars, advice green horns. She went on to make a blog to help people do better at clan wars. Deb was always involved giving shape to all major decisions in the clan. She was putting in hard work, was persistent and loved what she was doing.
• Getting noticed– If you love your work it will show and that’s what happened with Deb. The clan members started looking up to Deb for guidance. If you keep polishing copper it will start to shine and Deb’s hard work was shining. People loved her.
• Change – Deb started to bring a first a few and then some major changes in the clan which also includes demotions and kick outs. Indrajit, the leader, could not do much as the majority was with Deb. This meant a change was in the cards.
• Murmur starts– Members of the clan had started talking about change in leadership. These were the same people who were happy with Indrajit at one time but no longer supported him. They had realized that Indrajit had outlived his purpose and the clan needed a new leader if it has to grow.
• Graceful exit- Finally one evening Indrajit bid farewell to the clan as he handed over the leadership to Deb. He knew his time has come and made a graceful exit. I am sure I am going to miss him, especially his attitude of taking everything in his stride.
The COC journey will unfold many more chapters as we continue to grow. Do share if you have a story to tell.
“I wish money was able to buy happiness, at least one would have known who the happy ones are”
So it’s finally here. First of all a standing ovation to all the sponsors behind ISL. Hero, Reliance, Star India, Bollywood stars, Sachin (the living God) and all other sponsors you are doing a huge service to India by reviving football. 10 years from now, the youth of the country will owe their presence in the world football to you.
Yesterday the first match between Mumbai and Kolkata marked the beginning of all the great things to come. I agree that it was an amateurish start that the first yellow card came out 1:35 minutes of the game, that there were too many fouls, that if the world has to take our football seriously then the stature of the game has to go up. I am absolutely with you. Yes, some of us may have felt dejected by the quality of the game especially Ranbir’s body language sucked. But don’t criticize the game as yet.
Let me tell you a quick story and then we shall come back to ISL. Roger Bannister an Englishman was the first person to run a mile under 4 minutes. This was done in 1954. Imagine the number of times Roger would have tried to finally achieve one mile or 1.6 (approx.) Kms in under 4 minutes. Wikipedia says in the last 50 years this record has been lowered by almost 17 seconds. What happened in the last 50 years can be attributed to evolution. But Robert was the first guy who set the things in motion, who started something, who gave a benchmark for people to follow.
Similarly football in India will improve, but it will take time and money. What we can do is support the game with viewership numbers. Give the sponsor a reason to support the game, else sponsors like Adidas who associate themselves with football will be seen missing from action, though it was a delight to see the football sporting a Puma logo. For our future generation we as Indians need to help sustain this game. Criticizing is very easy, it doesn’t take any brains. Right now, at this very moment you can be angry about almost anything under the sun, bad roads, traffic jam, procedural delays, corrupt cops, bureaucracy, the list is endless. But criticizing doesn’t end in a solution. You have to be a part of the solution, big or small doesn’t matter.
So let’s give ISL a breather, let’s watch the game for at least first 3 years before making any judgement. Everything good takes time.
Now ISL guys, you have to be on top of the game to ensure fans keep coming back. Coming to the website http://www.indiansuperleague.com/, it is crying out for attention. The horizontal scroll is not working properly, the pictures need to be high resolution and please edit them. If you have to compete with the big boys then your work has to be top notch.
Look at this picture –
Who is the guy on the right hand side of the picture? This is lazy editing. My readers please do not get confused thinking Rishi is criticising, am not. I am pointing out the careless mistakes which should have been avoided.
See the same picture is edited, with color and brightness correction it looks much better. One has to be passionate about such things else qualifications doesn’t matter. At times, we are so busy being correct that we fail to understand that the strings need to tug your heart. The website needs attention; “enough gyan”.
Now am all set to catch today’s match between NorthEast United FC and Kerala Blasters FC; Let’s see another match full of Indian action, #LetsFootball.
Rishikar Krishna 