My Cabin

When I worked in Ion Exchange (India) Ltd in Mumbai, my office cabin overlooked the

Mahalaxmi Race course

When I worked for YK Almoayyed & Sons in Bahrain, my office cabin overlooked the

World Trade Centre

Now I work for Sofinter (Ansaldo Caldaie) in Milan Italy & my office cabin overlooks the

Monte Rosa, the 2nd highest point of Alps in Europe

Copenhagen
The price of gas is 60% higher in a poor country like India as compared to that of the USA. The Americans start their cars 15 to 30 minutes with their remote car keys before they enter the car to ensure comfortable temperature.
And in India, we put off the ignition at traffic lights to save gas where the average waiting time is 60 seconds!!
So the conclusion – COPE ’N HAGGLE

Milan mania 4

As the autumn is setting in, nature is showering extraordinary colours on the earth. The trees are changing colours – some are still green, whilst others are red, orange, yellow, purple, blue, etc. It’s like the rainbow has descended on earth with one big difference – the rainbow stays for a little while, whereas this feast of colours will remain for a month & a half.

Another spectacle which cannot be missed is the beautiful flowers. One cannot make out the difference between the artificial & real flowers. The real ones are like the artificial & the artificial like real. One needs to thank God for firstly creating the beautiful flowers & secondly for giving man the brain to copy him.

Milan mania 3

It’s now 6 months since we have been in Milan. When we arrived, the branches of the trees were struggling to carry the weight of the flowers & leaves. Now, it is autumn. It seems branches allowed the flowers & leaves to fall as they are delicate & would not be able to withstand the winter. Thereby in spring, they can come back with vigour.
One important happening in this period is that we bought a Jaguar. The credit goes to my sons who kept on advising me about which car to buy. The 2 criteria which Jaguar clearly passed were – the best brand & more important, that it is now a part of Tata brand which is Indian.

The Great Indian Poverty

During Diwali week 2009, Indians bought gold worth Rs. 90 billion!
It is necessary to repeat – ALL THESE PURCHASES ARE MADE IN ONE WEEK!!
JAI HO

Milan Mania 2

As we live in Milan, last Sunday we happened to visit a very beautiful town named Stresa around 40 kms away. Stresa is on the banks of a lake & around a few kms from Switzerland.
On reaching Stresa, we were pleasantly surprised to know that the First Italian Grand Prix for OFF SHORE Class I World Powerboat Championship was about to begin!
When an Indian hears about racing, the obvious name that comes to mind is that of Vijay Mallya!
AND WHAT A PLEASANT SHOCK WE HAD - WHEN THE RACE STARTED, ONE OF THE PARTICIPATING TEAM WAS FROM KINGFISHER!!
There were no other thoughts in mind other than saying - WE SALUTE YOU VIJAY MALLYA.

I took up a new job in Milan, Italy. Prior to this, I was working in Bahrain. My wife & I landed in Milan in April, 2009

As we got out of the Malpensa airport of Milan, we were greeted with bright sunny weather – the winter was ending. On our drive from airport to the residence, it was pleasant to see greenery around.

We soon realized that learning Italian would be necessary because with English we could barely manage conversation. It is inconvenient to communicate at slow pace. The Italians apologized for their English & would make all efforts to try and communicate including taking help of others to help us out. The first word that I learnt in Italy was ‘ciao’ – pronounced as ‘chow’. It is used for saying ‘hi’ & the same word is used for saying ‘bye’.

After coming to Italy, as per Italian rules, it is necessary to get a document called ‘invitation’ to work. The same has to be stamped by the Italian Embassy in Mumbai. Hence, I visited Mumbai in June. The visit to Mumbai was around the time the Bandra Worli sea link was inaugurated. But we missed the inauguration by whiskers. I was interested because not only it is a construction feat & beautiful structure, but because it is constructed by a company which I worked for – HCC.

At present, trees & flowers are blooming & the rivers flowing with clean water due to the melting snow from the Alps. We landed here in the right season. We visited the F1 showroom which is magnificent. We saw many places in Italy – balancing between the work schedules during Omkar’s (my son who was here for 3 weeks) stay.

We get a large variety of sweets which are very good – pastries & ice-creams. The pizza has thinner base as compared to what we are used to, but the taste is good.

We have not found many Indians here. As it is Indians are few. In addition, one of the factors restricting meeting people is the cost of travel. Petrol is € 1.2 per litre plus the toll tax takes its toll.

August is a month of vacation here. So, everyday is a Sunday (in Middle East context – a Friday)! The system is that though this holiday is part of one’s annual leave, it is availed by everybody at the same time. In India, it’s impractical since even when this practice is not followed; the bus, train & air tickets get booked 3 months or even earlier when the booking starts. But this raises a fundamental question – do Government, Corporate bodies, etc. need annual leave like humans keeping aside commercial considerations?

We received our cargo after almost 5 months. We attempted to calculate the difference between the cost of transportation & cost of goods transported – but could not come to any conclusion. One more important piece of statistics – the amount of freight + charges from Bahrain to Milan was considerably less as compared to the same from Milan airport/seaport to residence!

We located the ISKCON centre & visited it for Janmashtami. It is about 75 kms and 8 euros (toll) away! The place is beautiful – green, vast, clean, quiet & serene – carrying the hallmark of Italy.

We missed the Ganeshotsav festival. When we left Mumbai first time in 1993 (I was in Muscat), we started missing festivals. If I have to grade the festivities it would be Bombay – best, Muscat – better, Bahrain – Good. My apologies for grading the Muscat festivities better than Bahrain, but that is firstly because it was a five day festival & secondly there was a dedicated community hall.

Our Italian classes have started. A young, beautiful Italian lady teacher comes home & teaches Seema (my wife) & me. Fortunately, she did not go on August holiday. We soon plan to talk in Italian at home so that there are 2 advantages – we will hopefully learn the language faster & we would have lesser quarrels!

Talking about learning languages, I remember an instance where I attended Aditya’s (our son) parent-teacher meeting in Muscat. The Hindi teacher announced – ‘I request parents not to teach Hindi to their children’ (this was mainly because majority Indians in the Middle east are from South India).

The internet has been of immense use. To the extent that we are able to see Indian TV programs. Especially, I consider myself lucky not to have missed Pt. Hridaynath Mangeshkar’s SA RE GA MA (Marathi). In my opinion, he deserves Bharat Ratna for his contribution to Indian music.