Team Sequence outing at GIP, Great India Palace, NOIDA

Sequence Design successfully organised the Twenty20 Sequence Cricket Tournament, for the second time. And, as Sequence was able to make it to semi-finals, so it was the time to celebrate the success of Sequence Cricket Tournament. After a poll, team decided to go for bowling and dinner at Great India Palace, NOIDA.

We started from office at 6:30(no work loss guysJ ). I took a lift from Awashesh as I did not want to go by my bike. As usual Prabhas was reached with us despite leaving 5 mins early J. GIP is a new mall in sector 18 market, known as Atta market. The fun centre was at top floor. We started with some snacks at McDonalds. In the meantime, Kamlesh and family joined us. His small daughter was very sweet. I tried a lot to win her confidence, but in vain L. She only needed papa J. Ajay and his wife also joined us.

 Now it was the time for bowling, in first group were, Dinesh, Shyamal, Awashesh and Prabhas. For first two three rounds we all were doing same except Awashesh, he started to lag behind from initial rounds. Dinesh was doing good consistently. Till sixth round, he was ahead from Prabhas by around 6 points. Shyamal was just behind Prabhas. In 7th 8^th and 9^th round Dinesh cleaned the deck in single shots and got two bonus shots. Finally Dinesh’s score reached to 142.... whoooh awesome!!! Prabhas was second with 98. Shyamal was just behind Prabhas and Awashesh was nowhere J. But he made a record for empty shots J

 Second group had Sunny, Indrajit, Kamlesh and Ajay. As usual, Ajay was fast and furious and found the court very slippery J J J. Sunny was trying to match Awashesh but did well later on. Kamlesh, he was interrupted by his daughter as she also wanted to play, not with ball, but with her papa :). He was replaced by Rahul. Rahul was trying to spin the ball with a bounce, but he could not L ID was awesome and he had 3 clean shots, just like Dinesh. Finally he won in his group.

 In third group were Munna, Subhashis, Arundhati, Ajay’s wife and Kamlesh’s wife. In this group Munna was trying to break Awashesh’s record of blank hits J Shubhasshis was doing good. Ajay’s wife won in this group. So the final winners were, Dinesh – 142, Indrajit  - 106 and Ajay’s wife – 104.

 Awashesh, Ajay and Dinesh went for some car racing too. It was good, Ajay won both rounds there. Then we went to Moti mahal, the restaurant. It was very difficult for me to find a place at the table as I was the only vegetarian in the gang of more than 10 people. So, I sat at the last corner L and ordered some dal and seeda saada khan for meJ. It was a fun to eat together with so many guyz. Finally we had some ice creams at some ice cream shop, had some chats, I played with Kamlesh’s daughter. Finally I was able to play some pakdam pakdai with her J. She is a ditto copy of Kamlesh J.

 Time to go back home. Thanks to Awashesh that he dropped Prabhas and me at our homes. He is a nice guy!!!

 Ah...ah....ah... while going toward our car, we met Rahul and he enlightened us by some ‘high level’ ‘gyan’ on his favourite topics J

T20 cricket match between Sequence design systems and Sirf technologies

It's a fine noon and a do or die match between Sequence Design Systems and Sirf technologies. As Sirf has already lost their other two matches so they are not going to make it to semi finals but as Sequence won their match against Interra systems so if they win this match, they will be straight into semi finals. Before the start of match, sequence boyz calculated that if Sirf make 100 runs and they score only 80 then also they can make it to semis.

Sequence wins the toss and decides to bowl first. I see a strange move and their time pass kind of bowler, Shyamal, comes to open the bowling. And, oh man!!!!, he starts a furry of wide bowls. Somehow his first over, including a four, comes to an end. Second bowler, Shubhashis, is also not looking into that great touch. Soon, he looses the control and starts to throw wides. Four overs go like this and wides are looking a certain candidate for man of the match :). As a bowling change comes Prabhas, people who do follow annual T20 Sequence cup do very well know for what Prabhas is known for, he is known for ....***^^^&&&& :) it's better if you ask him only, if you do not know his contact # then plaese contact me first. But strange, he is bowling good today. Good sign for Sequence.

In first five/six overs Sirf scores more than 30 runs, thanks to wides and Shyamal. Then comes the strike bowler, Dinesh, and as usual Batsmen are unable to play him. And one classic off side rising bowl allows the keeper to take the catch. Big relief for sequence, they get the first wicket in 8th over. In next over Sunny bowls too good and gets one wicket. Somehow, Prabhas is good as a wicket keeper today. Ajay takes a good catch at boundry to get rid of a dangerous batsman. Going like this, in around 15-16 overs, somehow Sirf manages to score around 80 runs. Now Sunny and Dinesh has two overs each and Shyamal has left with one over. And as Shyamal did not bowl his third over that bad so he is given 17th over. Here begins the nightmare for sequence. Dinesh was fielding at long on boundry and 3 sixes among 4 flew above his head. Just for a change, Shyamal conceded 27 runs in 17th over. And more painful, they were hit by the same player who's catch was missed by Ajay and company. Sirf must be relieved now as they crossed 100 mark. (Shyamal reminded Prabhas). Oh guyz, the situation is very painful for Sequence boyz, they look tired now but somehow Dinesh was able to cheer them up and takes the bowl. He and Sunny wraps the remaining overs superbly, pressure is so much that Dinesh gets a six from a crap batsman, in the final over. Sirf gets a total of 121.

Soon, Sequence boyz come out of the shock and make their strategy to change the batting order. Prabhas and Sunny opens the batting. They go slowly but steadly. Prabhas was certainly trying to avoid his favourite(but dangerous) stance :). Sunny gets out cheaply. Pushpraj gets anxious and breaks the silence with a four, and gets out. Then comes Dinesh and gets trapped by a loly bowl. Next comes Shyamal. He must be having some veavy burdon over his shoulders. And, soon he gets that off by hitting four sixes!!!!! Finally he scores a qiuck 30+ and gets out. Now is the turn for Ajay to regain his (lost) pride. He does justice to his strength and alongwith Prabhas takes Sequence a comfortable victory. yohoo!!! Sequence is in semis now. Ajay remains not out, 21. Prabhas, 49*, gets the man of the match award.

Team Sequence, The Winners!!!

Happy and relieved team Sequence celebrates their win at some dhaba in Shoprix mall, NOIDA.

A trip to Andhra Bhawan canteen

Today was the last day of one of my colleagues. Ho ho ... party time. We decided to go Andhra Bhawan’s canteen. It is located in the heart of Delhi, around India Gate. It is famous for it’s tasty and finger licking south Indian food. We five stared at around 1PM by the departing colleague’s CNG fitted Hyundai Accent car. First topic, how will it take to reach from NOIDA to Andhra House, Delhi. One says, 15 minutes one 30 minutes, finally we settled for half an hour J. It’s been quite a long time since he bought the car, but whenever we go with him, we always praise his Accent for some or other aspect. This was the time for the seat covers to get some praise. He purchased them from car market located in Karol Bagh, Delhi for Rs6000. 

In mid-day, it was quit smooth to enter into Delhi. We took the Akshardhaam mandir(temple) flyover. We entered from the pragati maidaan cut. There was bit traffic as it was the first day of International Trade Fair, organised every year from 14^th November to 27-28 November. 14^th November is the birthday of first prime minister of independent India, Pandir Jahawar Lal Nehru, also famous as chacha nehru. He was supposed to be the person who initiated the industrialization in India. Going through India gate and Ashoka road, we reached Andhra bhawan in more than 30 minutes. 

The canteen is not very big but looks good. One person stands between the counter and the tables, collects the coupon’s from customer’s and creates a queue and asks about the number of people in one group. He keeps track of tables getting empty and asks the groups to sit accordingly. There was a wait time of around 5 Minutes. We watched the table getting cleaned by a cloth, I did want the table to be re-cleaned as I could see some remains on it and it was a bit sticky too. The waiter said, “saaf to hai” – it is already clean!!! I surrendered, as you wish. There were some salt, ghee(clarified butter) pickle etc on the table, Now comes the thalis. Thali is supposed to be the main platter/plate which contains other small ‘katories’. Or it can have some inbuilt shapes which can contain some dishes. It already had katori for sweet dish, some rice etc. Now comes the person with five different dishes, some daal, sabzi, etc. Then comes the poodi man. So, the main course starts with all this stuff. Food is really tasty except one ‘kankad’ encountered by the departed colleague J.

Suddenly phone rings and gives the news of a bomb blast in sector 22, NOIDA. The topic changes and we start discussing “what is this happening”. But, the food and surroundings are so good that very soon we come back to the light mood. The food was unlimited and the waiter kept coming to serve more good. There was only one ‘papad’ per plate, though J. Food is so tasty that everyone wanted to eat more and more J. Finally it was the limit and we decided a have paan. Paan is the traditional food item eaten after the meal. It does contain ‘paan ka patta’, supari, kattha, chuna etc. But it was not that good as it contained some unbalanced ratio of katta and chuna. No one could complete the full paan. It is supposed to be eaten full, by chewing slowly slowly. 

It’s time to start back, people start reminding their IIT days, school days, all kind of bachelorhood fun, fultu masti J.  Everyone was feeling sleepy but rushed back to office, “kaam kaun karega!!!”

My friend's financial stars are still playing bad with him

One more incident with the same colleague who is going through financial frauds. Because of the internet banking fraud, his automatic car monthly instalment(EMI) got bounced. He got a message from the insurance company to pay the EMI or bear some interest. Somehow he arranged some cash and went to the insurance company’s office, personally, to pay the EMI. Two days later he gets an SMS that Rs10000 has been deducted from his AXIS bank account. He enquired and found that the money has been used to clear his cheque for car EMI. What the hec is this, when did he give the cheque. He called the insurance company, they told that as the cash transaction was not getting reflected in their system, by then, so as regular process they sent the cheque to the AXIS bank, for realisation. 

He asked about how can he get the money back now. They said that as their system is reflecting the double payment now, so they send a cheque to his address. He asked, what if he did not notice about double payment. Then, the cheque would have sent to his address after the completion of loan term i.e. after ten years. Only got knows whether he will be residing at the same address after 10 years or not. This is the third ‘zor ka financial jhatka’ he has got this month L L

 Two other incidents:

Internet banking fraud

Credit card blues

 

In the name of survival

This is a small world, everyone comes to know what is happening in the surroundings. Probably that is why the news(good/bad, deserving/non-deserving) spreads at a faster rate. This is recession time. The world economy is going down. Companies are making all kind of efforts to remain profitable and not to run out of cash. Where this is not possible there layoffs turns out to be the way to save some cash for the companies. But this strategy sometimes leave behind some very bitter work experiences.

 

One of my colleague’s wife work in some other company. Few months ago they had a baby girl. So obviously her wife is on maternity leaves. This week 7 people were layed off from her company and she is one of them. I want to say that I know one more company who was in same kind of situation and had to lay of some employees but it waited for the employee on maternity leave to back from the leave and only then she was laid off. How bad is would be for that girl. For me this is just out of ethics. I mean, how can this be done to a mother!!! What would be going through her mind, she needs time to nurture the baby and the company has given her a lot to think about her new job.

 

Have we become so materialistic or our passions have taken over so much that we have even forgot the basics of life – mother has to be honoured. This is certainly debatable. But, where to debate, can she raise her voice somewhere? I do not know about any such thing, do you know?

Credit card blues

Lat week one of my friend suffered a loss of Rs 35000 because of internet banking fraud. Poor boy, his financial stars seems to be in wrong shape. This weekend he went to Chandigarh for a party. On sunday he got a call from the credit cards department of his bank, HSBC. The calling agent asked whether he has commited the last transaction of Rs17000 from his credit card, to purchase kingfisher Airline tickets. Whoops!!!! what is this, he replied a big NO. Last time he used his credit card in NOIDA only, few days ago. The calling agent informed that it seems to be a fraud transaction made by his credit card. The agent assured him that he will file a request to not consider this transaction into his HSBC credit card account. The thanked him put the phone down.

Now the question is, how did the bank figure out that, that particular transaction is made by someone else. One possible reason is that, after few consecutive transactions, the automated checking system send information to the HSBC bank people. Then, the HSBC bank people calls the credit card owner and asks about the validity of the transaction. Now, in this particular case, as the friend did not make the transaction, so being right, he denie about the transaction. What if someone wrongly denies about such transaction. How the bank will verify that the person is denying wrongly.

Actually, there could be some other hidden mechanism by which the bank people come to know that a particular credit card transaction is not valid. HOW, this is still dark to me. Antbody knows???

One more thing, the friend had to call the HSBC customer care to inform them about the full scenario. Let us wait and watch whether he gets the charges or not!!!

Black money in swiss banks - An international loot

As this is not my original work, so I have moved this post to:

http://wat-is-going-on.blogspot.com/2008/11/black-money-in-swiss-banks.html