CBS : Core banking Solutions or Core Bureaucratic Solution ??

Well, the title of the article would have given you a hint how frustrated I am with banks calling themselves with any time , any where banking. I had to withdraw cash from a SBI bank yesterday and went to the one on the Greams road , however was advised that they would not be able to give me the cash I wanted as it was not my parent bank and the rules does not permit them !!! However I must admit that the the staff ( on counter 4 and the Accounts manager ) were very helful and they worked around the system to meet my requirements. Thank you !!

• When we have a CBS why is it that we have a cash limitation of withdrawing cash from other branches over the counter ? Does it not defeat any where banking ?
• Why is that a customer from a particular branch treated differently though with in the same bank?
• Are the private banks the same as well ?
• what about people who travel long distance and hoping to pick up cash from the local branch ?

We are in stone-age still!!!

Fact or Story telling ??

My day typically starts with reading TOI and then go about doing my other work.I was reading a news article about a man killing his wife whom he married a week back !! I read the same article in 3 different news papers during my breaks from training on the same day and I was stunned and started hating the thought of reading news papers!!!

The news papers which I read were TOI, Bangalore Mirror and Deccan herald.

I don't recollect which story came in what , however the three different versions of the reasons are

1. They had a quarrel.
2. They had a fight about each others SMS and mails
3. They had a fight about Sex!!

Same news with three different story lines!! What do I believe is true ? I was lucky ( or Unlucky) to read the three different versions on the same day . What about the rest of the news (or stories) ? Many people start the day reading news papers @ Home , tea stalls, on the way to work , waiting for mode of transport and all are read to believe is the true incident based on the news papers that they read!!!! Are the news papers only interested in increasing their reader base with infected story lines ?

Page 3!!!! and not headlines!!

Dusting

Wondering why the town is so dusty ?? Well...just decided to dust the blog off the shelf and put it back on lime lite!!

Currency equivalent ?

I have been noticing for couple of years now....and have been a victim of the same as well on being thrown into the new world of currency!! I have seen this happen at railway stations , office cafeteria , tea stalls , Toll booths ( on Kannur tellicherry road)...and the list is endless. However when you give them back with the same equivalent they refuse to accept it. Absurd!! I had to make a lot of noise at one of the cafeteria to make them accept back what they gave me..

Wondering what the news equivalents are ??

Hail Eclairs , Halls and peanut chickies!!

BTW....how is the Dollar value calculated for these ?

Brush with a star......

Never a movie buff ! Not a regular to the movie theaters and not a die hard fan of any in cine field. Was at the Bangalore Aero show 2009 on the 12th of Feb and I thought I saw a familiar face and yes it was Ajith - Tamil movie star . However there was no crowd mobbing him down, guess it is because he was in a lesser known territory - Karnataka. Walked upto him and asked if he was Ajith and he said he was and requested him that I take a snap with him and he was kind to agree without any fuss. No fuss of a movie star..he asked what I do for a living...and some small talk . -My first brush with a movie star.

Do u own the street in front of your house ??

Well...I have almost the same answer for this question...irrespective of the age group...an irresistible answer , pride possession outside the boundary walls of ones habitat...all say...why are you parking your car/bike on the side of my boundary walls!!! Absurd! Give me a break.

Mid Jan, I had to drop in a parcel for the underprivileged children at the World Vision office (NGO) in Kodambakkam and could not find a parking space on the same street and had to park the car in one of the by-lanes close to their office. I ensured that my car was not blocking the enterance to the house who's boundary wall I was literally kissing when parked to ensure that the street was not blocked. On my return back to the car after the visit to the office , I was suprised to see a lady studying the car with lot of disgust!

Oh My!! Well I was laughing inside and knew what was coming my way...she gave me a stare that could burn me down and said , "Is this your car" , I was calm and composed unlike my usual self for this particular senseless stake of tax payers property as self! and said yes, it is...and then hell broke loose...." How can you park your car in front my house!!" ...err....was it blocking the enterance to your house? NO!! All this for parking my car adjacent to her house boundary wall...hmmm....her arjument was , where will they park their car ? Ok...did the govt right off the parking space in u r favour ? If some one has occupied the space...find a free space.

This was not my first experience! I had a similar kind of experience with one of my neighbours , once when I had to go to the bank @ Valasaravakkam and parked in one of the by-lanes and once when I had been to Subam Hospital in Virugambakkam and parked outside the hospital compound wall in the space "reserved" for the doctor's car! fully loaded with a make shift shade!!

In all the above instance, my answer was the same. My car has a number plate! If you feel that I have encroached on u r land and parked lodge a complaint with the cops and I would pick it up from there.

TATA SKY....

Well we moved to a new house over the weekend, Courtesy the new house owner I get a room to myself! As per the wishes of the house owner , we get decided to get a TATA SKY connection.Off we set off (Me and Manish) to book a connection and we finally did take a connection at 17:30 PM on a saturday and was promised that the disk and the connection would be installed with in 4hrs.And indeed true to their words the connection was up and running in less than 3 hrs.The only issue being that their channel offerings are mostly in packages and one cannt choose individual channels.Not sure with regard to the other DTH service providers.

Got the connection 2 days ago so not realy sure how thier customer care service is if there is any issues.Having said that quite impressed with their turn around time for installation...just in time for me to watch the "Making of the Kingfisher calendar 2009"...no wild imagination...just enjoying the art of photography :D

Hope this helps ....http://www.kingfishercalendar.com/2009/

and the website of Tata sky is http://www.tatasky.com/

97!! and miles to go before I sleep

97!! and yes miles to go as well.......keep guessing!!

97

Medha Patkar.....Protest lady?

Medha Patkar....has been in the news for a very long time....Narmada Bachao was the first one that I started admiring her work for the people who are affected by the height of the dam.However was not very pleased with the other protest activities that she was involved with...the nandhigram episode..where in she was part of the protest for WB govt giving away farm lands for industrial developments. Now who is at loss? West Bengal Govt or the people of the state who lost a huge chunk of job ? Now from yesterday's newspaper I hear that she is now in chennai joining the protest against the govt of TN asking them to stop the airport expansion!!! Does she realise that airports are needed for a countries growth ? We speak about international airports...where as we expand existing shabby airports to accomodate the growth in passenger traffic and we have protestors for them as well ? Well, agreeded that this comes with cost of people losing land and houses and tons of sentiments with them....however I am sure that the govt would have compensated them. Protest should have some value and lot of thought needs to go behind it. Admired personalities need to think many a times before they join a protest and not just for the fame! Kerala is one example....anything and everything we have a protest and strike comes complementary , and this is one of the reason where we dont see much of economic growth in Kerala! And we talk about India being the economic super power!

6 couples and a Bachelor...trip to Mangalore

Though have been there couple of times I decided to join in a bunch of couples - here after referred as Oldies. for a trip to Mangalore on the 14th and 15th of November. Arrived at the hotel and after a long complementary B'fast - (A mistake that the hotel did to offer us complementary B'fast : Guess they realised that we have not seen food in ages ) ,we hit the roads. We stopped at a Summersand's resort (The beach here is horribly maintained with sewage mixing into the sea close by) en route to Bekal fort - Kasargode Kerala.Spend some time there and after a game of Volley ball and ring, we headed for the fort with a stop over for lunch in Kasargode - Mallu food.

The fort is one of my fav spot and any number of times would not make me bored. Wish it was the rainy season to relish the monsoon and the lush greenery of the vegetation in the fort. For the first time I tried a different angle of photography with my friends hovering over me. After lazing around in there till late evening we left for Mangalore with a stop over for tea and Pazampori ( Ripe plaintain coated with batter and deep fried). The day ended with a good dinner.

Sunday , we headed to St. Mary's Island. My first visit to this place as the last attempt with my parents , we were unable to make it as the boat was operated only when it is full - and there were just about 5 people including us for about an hour and had to cancel the plan. The island is big enough to be a private island and has some beautiful rock formations as if some one has chiseled it . Spend time lazing around and exploring the island and staging some shells for snaps. As we were waiting for the boat we were tempted to try out fresh fish fry and must admit I would have loved to have one more.

En route to Mangalore we stopped at Udupi for a gourmet lunch and a quick visit to the famous Krishna temple made the day. I thought Udupi to Mangalore was a memorable journey with a round of anthakshri , however I was wrong - the best part of the trip was many rounds of UNO that we played - Oh! I had never laughed so much in the last couple of months of hardship @ work. This trip was a definite stress buster. Hoping that we could make many more of these.

The only common cribbing that I heard from the couples was that the bed was separate with a table in between and not joined in each room :D

Bon South - for NRI southies

Had great expectations when advised by my friend Anu and Chells when I had met them late morning @ forum. En route from Times now music festival we dropped in for dinner . Liked the ambiance , however the restaurant did not live up beyond it. The menu had a page dedicated to each state - Tamil Nadu , Kerala , Karnataka and Andra Pradesh , however the choices were limited. There were just 2 choices for the veggies and multiple for the Non-Veggies . The food was good and nothing great to comment about. The dishes are expensive - 2 appams cost about 75 rupees .

Anu has jotted about her good experience on a visit there , however we were not the lucky ones I guess - No saplings :(

This place is good for bringing foreigners who wants to taste some Indian food and yes also if you are on a company lunch treat. They enquired immediately what was wrong when one of us had complained in the feed back form - which I have never seen in other places. I liked this gesture.