The Age Where Sharing is not Caring !!!

As we move into the age of demonetization and digitized banking systems the smell of ‘hard cash’ has become a reality of the past. The heftiest pay packages to the minimum labor salary being nothing but a pleasing sms on our phones, it’s a matter of time the wallets are heading to the antique shop. The increasing dependency on digitized banking systems and plastic money have also opened the world of cyber criminals prowling in the virtual space always on the constant look out and evolving their strategies and tactics of deceiving the vulnerable targets despite the fact that the banks and the whole online banking apparatus having a full proof secure systems and improving with every passing day. The awareness and knowhow of not falling into the well woven traps of the unknown fraudster has been made sure to reach even the most technologically challenged civilians by a simple principle please do not SHARE any kind of number given exclusively to you to help you access your account. The fancy CVV, OTP, PIN numbers have become the most guarded secrets not to be shared even with yourself loudly.
The primary modus operandi of coercing you share these numbers being a call COMING over to you and the caller talking you into a better bank deal, prize won or a lucrative plan which wins you a lot of money. However, with the banks relentlessly drilling into all our senses to stay away from fraud calls and not share any details with these money distributing impostors, the likelihood of us taking these baits are on the decreasing trend. The primary mantra of the banks now being we do not call our customers and ask any details, any incoming call asking our guarded secrets seems to be understood and well fended off by most of us. So how do they make us reveal those guarded numbers? So they evolve into Not calling the targets but make the Target call them. A number of techniques used being practiced , one of the newest methods being playing with the very psychology of the modern Google dependent civilians . Well how?? …here we go !!!!
It starts with on the basis of basically two conditions. First being you are facing a credit card/debit card issue which ONLY the Home branch i.e where your actual account exists can solve. And the second and the interesting one being the Home branch contact number ( which usually is a landline number ) does not work ( for reasons unknown ). The interesting part being the bank call centre having as that unserviceable contact number in their database. So the unsuspecting victim in order to solve his credit/debit card issues calls the customer care , which in return advices him to call the home branch as they are perpetually helpless. You get the number which is not working !!!!! so after calling again the customer care you get the same home branch number and all your protests of that number not working go unheard as the so called database has ONLY that unserviceable number. So what do we do ???? Viola !!!! Google …… to find is there any OTHER number the home branch might have which the helpless customer care did not have but our very own search engine king Google might. And there we come across another number …yay!!!!!!  We self pat our backs on finding out the alternate number and also get somebody answer it within the first two rings. The real fun starts now.
The person who claims to be from your home branch listens carefully to the issue you facing and calmly takes full responsibility for the inconvenience caused. He sounds usually cooperative ( unlike the experience of dealing with banks) and also owns up that it was HE who has caused you the trouble and it will be ONLY him that will be able to solve the issue. Case in point being if say your ATM card was blocked due to some reason unknown to you. You get adviced to call the home branch and resolve / unblock the card. However the home branch number does not work . so you google in order to find an alternative number. You ususually find a MOBILE number as the other number to the branch, apparently under the name of your home branch and surprisingly linked somehow to the official website of the bank ( this is actually strange ) but probably a cyber trick beyond our capability. Anyway since we are trouble and we want to resolve our problem say Unblock our ATM card we do nothing to verify the number and believe that it might be an alternate number to our bank. The person on the other end definitely tends to win your confidence as being the person who shall be helping you out. After the preliminary predictive questions , he leads you in believing in a fact that it was you who was fault in someway and that is the reason you are facing an issue. Reasons varying from generically , KYC not updated, old card, damaged card etc. he also claims to have sent you reminders in form of sms , e-mails etc for you to update your information . in a nutshell he convinces you that there was something lacking in you that you have landed up in an issue. Having taken this bait the rest of the journey becomes a cake walk for him as in order to rectify your issue he starts asking you questions leading upto revealing your card number , expiry date and finally the well guarded CVV number. But as good well aware customers as soon as hear CVV / OTP we become super alert and all senses warn us of something fishy, he comes up with his brahmastra , “it was you who had called sir, banks never call customers . You have to believe me “ “ give me your CVV number ill send you another pin , just confirm me that number and your card will start working!!!!!!”
Well!!!! We apply all our reasoning and come to the logical conclusion that indeed it was I who had called him , so he should be an authentic . Of cpurse he hadn’t call, it was ME who had call . And we reveal one of those things we never ought to share, our CVV number…. Ting!!!!! Within a flash we have 25000/- off our account through a complex banking internet FRAUD !!!!!!!
Welcome to the new technique of siphoning money. Make the customer call you !!!!!! who would have thought of that one now !!!a well read and researched cyber criminal today knows you and me better than anyone. He knows our instinct reactions to a situation when it comes to banking . he knows our fears , our insecurities. He capitalizes on the fact that we believe on Google search more than anything/ anyone in the world. he knows we blindly believe the fact that “ if its being shown as a result of an internet search it will be true”.
I know its not possible to not believe our instincts , but lets spread our experiences to one another and be more aware, because definitely we are living in an age where Sharing is definitely not Caring!!!!!

BLISS

“I feel I’m on a vacation” I say when someone recently asked me how I was doing in my recent place of posting. And when I said it I definitely wanted to add “touchwood” (which apparently I have no clue why people say that) probably because it gets good luck and avoids the so called “nazar”. Well frankly I don’t give a damn to the nazar of insignificant and inconsequential beings. I guess its their nazar that have got me to this place of posting in the first place. And because I get to live this blissful life so surprising to me as well, I need to illustrate more about it ,for no other purpose but to probably read about it when I go back to being or rather acting busy and behaving as if the world rest on my shoulders in my next tenures. So the best part of this vacation cum work posting is that I get to do firstly something I really joined this job for “Fly” and do nothing else. The last phrase being a real surprise to my brothers located else where in the country probably getting to fly definitely more than me but also doing some real additional jobs no one had a clue would exhaust the fuck out of their minds and time building up not only layers of fat on their bellies but a unknown pressure a real freaking pressure in their heads asking them everyday ..every second moment … : what the fuck are you doing??? Is this what you signed up for?? 

So here I m doing this 7 to 1430 job as a factory pilot, flying exactly in my working hours, and for the first time in my life I don’t have any urge of spending even a second extra in my work place for no matter what the reason is . The job expects me to be fighting ready for war but that’s only if the war is happening.. as if now there isn’t so I rightly need to have my lunch on time. This simple fact seems to be some alien theory in most of the other places I have worked before. But then its not only about having fixed working hours and getting lunch on time. Its about realizing life s real priorities. Its about becoming a better person every passing day , which definitely does not mean getting good at my JOB but about having a better life to live for me and the people I choose to surround myself with. Something that we keep reading in all self help books…and keep seeing in all movies themed “go live ur life” …’spend more time with your family’ ...’spend more time on yourself’ …well…its just got true for me .. my son no longer gives me that stranger look of weather should I trust this person who I used to got to see once a day and used to disappear for every 15 days suddenly . I get to teach him the skills I dreamt of teaching him and be that first person whom he cries on for anything..just anything…

Words cannot describe the feeling when you conquer something you fear.. or were terrified about.. and it happened in my case when me a below average runner became a marathon runner and found a calling for running. Running those half marathons , with the first one being the most special, it wasn’t the results that mattered to me..they still don’t do… it’s the overcoming of that fear …makes you feel elated…and what we call as Nirvana…you no longer are scared..and that feeling is something no money in world can buy you . im no longer scared to experiment and push my body beyond my comfort limits. I rather never knew nor still don’t know how much my body can push itself… but those unreal aims just got real for me.

I have never out rightly excelled in any field but its time I realized its not about winning its about the spirit and the completion is only yourself and no one else. Because no one is actually interested in what to do or achieve , they can only cheer for you or simply be jealous. You need to be a better person and better runner than what you were previously. 

The place has been magical so far, taking out hidden aspects of my personality that I never thought I had. But then at then at the end of the day , does the place matter or was it just a reason for me to start living a new life , well whatever it is.. I no longer judge people/… I no longer have any hidden agendas on my mind.. I no longer procrastinate…. I no longer WISH I did this… and I no longer wait for the right time ..you just have to make the time right !!!!

The Back up

In this technology driven age where our brains have found their artificial replacements of storing information like our laptop/ PC hard disks , our super smart phones and the numerous virtual banks in the vast world of the internet, we are soon arriving at a point where our brains are turning empty and our hard discs are short on space. Specifically in our professional lives , in a large way have stopped relying on our own thoughts and  our basic instincts  and have started referring more on the huge cache of information available to us in the virtual world. To make it more appealing we keep storing tons of information , photos, articles, e books, ppts and every God damn format of data that is available to us just as a BACK UP for those imaginary times  at our jobs when probably we can refer to and feel extremely satisfied of the knowledge we display from our back up s . We keep feeling secure of the one or many sources of back up s we can refer to and make all the efforts to protect it and keep it from harms way , because we know we are not capable of possessing ALL the knowledge of the profession available but what we can do is surely BACK IT UP for future reference or FALL BACK upon when the chips are down . The back up seldom helps us recover from testing times and definitely in doing our HOMEWORK well  and helps us keep that pseudo intellectual alive in us. But we often forget that that the only intelligent thing we have done is just BACKED UP that information !!!! Despite Learning and storing the vast information in our virtual brains , and having the sky as the limit in finding solutions to the complex situations at work by utilizing all the backed up information , it is our  BASICS that determine the path we follow in processing that vast treasury of information . These BASICS are those foundation bricks  on which we build our vast empire of knowledge. Having all the information in the world backed up but lacking in the BASIC principles of gaining maximum benefit out of it makes all that BACKED up information just another data bank filling up our devices. Its the BASICS of our profession ingrained into us during the rookie days , the facts that makes us passionate about our jobs , the principles we swore to before plunging deep into the vast ocean of opportunities is what we need to protect and nurture throughout our lives. It s these BASICS that actually give us the sense of security and not the Backed up information, Because its only the BASICS that give a character to our to our professional lives.
In our relationships too , why is that we forget and take for granted the very BASIC people who give us the sense of security and who are our real BACK UP in our lives?? We keep getting far from the folks we need to keep close  , physically and mentally, we start taking for granted and question the very people who teach us the basic worldly ways and depend upon the countless others to understand our needs and thoughts. We make all the fuss in the world in choosing the so called RIGHT person , so as to be that one person we can call an extension of ourselves, but end up hurting her/him the most. The Life Partner  gets neither the life  nor the partnership from you. We keep living in self made insecurities despite making all attempts to secure our lives with meaningful relationships. Our BASIC relationships with our parents, our wives, our husbands our sons, our daughters , our brothers , our sisters are not cared for and we forget to nurture the basic relationships who define us as a person and who are our real BACK UP .
As the wise man has said, it s no point having an increment on the day of your divorce .lets s make our BASIC relationships strong enough because its because of them that we can stand our ground when the rest of world falls apart on you.

PARADIGM SHIFT

So someone asked me recently . What's the best gift you have ever got ? and I said "my healthy Body"!!! Well everyone's got  that one , that's not a gift .Oh !!really forget EVERYONE , have a closer look at your self in the mirror sometime, you will realize what i intend to say. Today as Human Beings we have acquired all the knowledge possible to ensure our supremacy over all beings existing on the planet , and ensured the longevity of the same , then why have most of us forgotten to honor what we naturally have been born with and the only thing we OWN from the day we are born .As we go about changing the natural order of things within and around us every day, we successfully have increased our average lifespan to about 70 yrs , but HAVE in a bigger way stopped respecting our own Body ( the only natural asset we born with) well early in our lives.  Conveniently, blaming it on the modern age lifestyles, urban environments, demanding deadlines and other cliche reasons we go about destroying the only thing we should be protecting and nurturing, for gains and accomplishments which only we invent for ourselves in deciding the parameters for living a Happy Life for ourselves and the people we intend to spend our lives with. But in this process why do we not give the deserving due to our own physical form ? , which primarily is responsible for ensuring the magnificent goals we keep aiming for ? why do we accept mediocrity when it involves maintaining a healthy body ? Why isn't working to know the limits of our body a parameter in ensuring a complete life? And why do we take the only natural thing we were born with and will die  "our Body" for granted throughout our lives? 

A paradigm shift in the way we look at ourselves and grade our achievements is definitely required. We keep exhausting ourselves daily to earn more, BUY happiness and have a imaginary idea of a Satisfied life !!. We have all the money , motivation and knowledge of buying that new car and know its engines more than anyone else and can never imagine missing the date of its regular periodic servicing , but we are always short on money for a membership to the nearest gym, have minimal knowledge of health benefits and the way our body works and absolutely no motivation to sculpt our body and give its shape as per our wishes. Lets  change the perception of our body , lets take it for granted in a lesser way and worship it more , nurture it and truly live a life style that defines Wellness!!. If we have no issues working that extra hour in office , we should also have no issues spending that hour in the gym , if we cant afford to miss our car s servicing date and ensure everything is smoothly running , we cant afford to have a complete body checkup once a year  ensuring all parameters within limits, if we cant stop ourselves from owning the latest upgraded phone regularly , we can afford to upgrade our physical limits regularly too. Its all about the way we conceive the idea of a FIT body, and its benefits in maintaining a healthy mind and soul. Lets stop wishing and start doing things and upgrade ourselves daily with the daily dose of working for our own body in ensuring a peaceful and sound mind !!!Lets start having goals in not only our professional lives but give more priority to our OWN body first and ensure it remains at its peak position till the last breath.

PARADOX !!!

The word "Paradox" always seemed to fascinate me in unexplained ways. It began with the way it sounded which attracted me to know its defined meaning. There are these certain words which probably we don't know the exact meaning but keep using them again and again just because they sound good. "Paradox" for me is one such word , though i hardly used it only because i wasn't sure what it really meant.Well the definition and the published meaning appears to be nothing confusing , maybe i wasn't relating to the examples or simply wasn't sure to which the situations in my life or maybe the folks around where a "paradox" seemed to be happening.

But then as they say the experience is the best teacher , provided you are ready to learn from it and grow each day rather than just exist in it. So what have I learnt to make a Paradox make sense to me? The decision to join the Air Force apart from the burning desire to Fly and a certain percentage to serve the Nation was also to get a sense of certainty in my life . With Certainty i mean stability of job, security of wealth ,career etc etc which makes the existence in this world Comfortable in a stereotypical way . And then achieving that goal and establishing a life with absolute stability for more than a decade, a strange sense of boredom of being a part of a rut and race has certainly crept up . Exploring the unknown and fulfilling my other desires, hobbies and other dreams have certainly taken a backseat . Though the CERTAINTY has brought stability in my life it has also has slowly and steadily has brought a kind of stagnation in my growth as a person and i  definitely have stopped dreaming , because to fulfill them i now need to step out of my STABLE world and accept UNCERTAINTY to venture out . I now need to break away , travel, write, read , run and play out by stepping into the world of UNCERTAINTY. I need to to surprise myself and stop living in a routine, and see the world with a different set of eyes everyday. BUT what gives me the freedom to think this way ? What tells me to take the basic necessities of life and the world for granted now? What makes me think that i need to Break away? Well , its nothing but my world of CERTAINTY filled with stability and security giving me the privilege today of Stepping out into the world of UNCERTAINTY where definitely id be surprised on the things i can accomplish but would have the sense of instability and insecurity attached to it . It will make grow as a person im urging to become and will show me horizons unknown to me , but i will have to step out of the world which is giving me all the very freedom to think so and the stability in the family and life responsible for encouraging me to live my dreams. And this what is the "Paradox" I m living with and will continue to live trying to strike a Balance and continue to live the STABLE life (trait of a CERTAIN life) but trying to GROW (Trait of the UNCERTAIN life) each day surprising my past self everyday.

The second Paradox most of us are living is that we want to live in a group or be a part of a group but still have our Individuality paramount . The best example being the over addition of showcasing our individual and personal life on the social media platform and eagerly waiting for the rest of the world to appreciate it by "liking" or commenting/ praising about it . All our attention is not to live our life but project it waiting for the pseudo sense of being appreciated in the virtual space. It leads to a situation where the same people start distancing themselves from your fab life cause they do not see themselves a s a part of it and in cases feel no reciprocation from the individual. The individual is now slowly stranded alone in the virtual space and now wants to be a part of a group to feel wanted or appreciated. Now being a part of a group still the he/she wants to keep the individuality intact and get into the same Paradoxical cycle.

Nothing before Time.. Nothing more than destiny!!!

One of my favorite quotes was …when you REALLY desire to achieve something the whole world CONSPIRES to make you get it !!!! well do I agree on it I used to !!!.. not because shahrukh khan also said it but because the world has being kind enough to conspire and bestow all the things I so badly craved for at different stages of my short life so far … from the times when I was lying in a military hospital in NDA with a broken thigh bone and had no hopes to pass out of the grueling regime of the academy to making me meet the love of my life..FLYING!!! The only thing that kept the fire alive was HOPE!!! Hope that I will survive these never ending days , hope that these ever discouraging counterparts or ‘seniors’ will change the way they look at me , hope that I will wear wings on my chest. But the world didn’t at seem to conspire for me to achieve these goals. A military hospital is one place where one thing is found in abundance..DESPAIR!!!!. Your counterparts think you are shaming it out with it being a part of a big conspiracy hatched by you to isolate from the training and take a break !!!! and time and again you are blamed, abused and made to realize your worthlessness in the whole setup .There is absolutely nothing but a sense of failure you smell in the air. I guess the only thing that works out is one s self determination and may be his own passion to survive out of this situation. And then I hear my mothers voice one day reacting calmly to my dejected tone of losing all hope to touch the sky… Nothing before Time and Nothing more than Destiny!!! The things you missing out lying on this bed were never meant to be yours son!! And remember one thing that which is yours you will get it no matter what, and you are born to fly .. and you will fly !!! Just give it time and you will see that everything will automatically align to fall in your lap.  And just as I thought of mom s words daily and started working upon the power of positivity through all my cells, in time along with my thigh bone, all things slowly and steadily aligned themselves and I grew strong in the heart and the soul . I knew what I exactly wanted, I no longer wanted to do anything for someone else’s honor , it was all for me , my life, my goals, my destiny!!!! . The person getting discharged from the hospital was no longer the same guy who had been admitted. He wasn’t the guy who was going to be bullied in by a bunch of jarheads, he wasn’t the one who would let someone else decide his limits and he wasn’t the one who was going to put anyone else’s except himself first and foremost. Yes it took time but I realized wearing the wings on my chest that what is meant to be yours will be yours , you just need to believe in it and only YOU can make it happen no one else. The world will be the same with or without you its how you see it. So if you believe in achieving something you think will make you a happier person, keep nurturing in it , because if it meant to be yours it will be one day !!! Just keep the faith!!!

THE LESSON

“So both of you are Ghati’s right?” asked the middle aged fair lady serving us water. Looking equally bewildered, i gave the blankest of the looks to my history teacher for bringing up a term i had never heard before. “Ghati, Maam?” I stammered looking still as expressionless as before. “arre you guys are Marathi na?” she put across with that expression of looking down at the common breed of human beings  found on the streets of the city which was  supposedly was meant to be their original breeding ground. “well yes maam, we both are , but what does Ghati mean ?”Answered Nikhil in a rebellious tone to the person who was responsible for teaching us the history and civics of India in an age where anything taught by the teachers meant the last word. “See Maharashtra is located in the Western Ghats, so the people staying here are called Ghati’s. My maid servant is also a Ghati. Actually she hasn’t come today so I have to do all the work here.” she answered in a sarcastic tone topping up with a smirk which evidently expressed looking down on two teenage boys not belonging to the same variety of humans she definitely did not want to be associated with and who probably were nowhere near the Race of people she belonged to.

As she went inside the kitchen, continuing to the pleasing host and doing the work to be done originally by a person belonging to the same breed as her guests, both of us looked at each other imbibing new lesson taught by our history teacher on the diversity of India. Picking up the cup of tea I asked “ Maam waise where do belong to ?” “Well originally from Punjab but have shifted to this city after marriage as my husband was working her, so basically we are Punjabis you know” she answered with pride in her tone on the mention of her original roots. “Oh so you Chose to be a Ghati, that is so great maam !!!?” said Nikhil with an animated excited expression. “Oh no no we are not, its just that we stay here, but not...!!” falling silent mid way and realising she had been taught a lesson by her student , whom she was accountable  to teach the basic tenets of egalitarianism and equality , giving us the friendly smile she said “Yes, I too am a Ghati and a proud one too!!”