Chinese Valentine's Day

It seems that according the Chinese calendar today is celebrated as Valentine's Day. Surrounding this myth there is a truely beautiful story of two lovers. The amazing thing was that it did actually pour heavily out here in Gurgaon today and I just couldn't let the coincidence slip by. Hope you enjoy the tale!

India as an integral part of China

Now I know how the Chinese feel. India has gone ahead and blocked access to sites such as blogspot, geocities etc where people like myself post their views. This under the excuse of the Mumbai blasts and that such sites were being used by anti-national elements. Well that just shows the amount of stupid morons we have in the IT department in our country.

And whats worse is that the blockage is done in a technology unsavvy manner. For eg. I can still post to my blog by logging into blogger but I just can't access it in my browser. So if any anti-national element needs to spread his/her message he/she still can and ofcourse the use of proxies and other hacks would still allow you access to any of the blocked sites.

And all this in a democracy and that too the largest one in the world. The word "largest" that is harped on so much. Well as long as this lasts let me welcome all my countrymen/women to being an integral part of China.

Technorati Tags: India, Blogs, Ban, China

Air Deccan Sucks

Air Deccan should be renamed Air Dick-an. I just decided that I would like to travel to Mumbai for the weekend and for saving around 500Rs I decided to fly Deccan. Now I got onto the site and selected my flights and when I hit the confirm button (before moving to the payment tab) there is this popup which shows up saying that RF######## is my reference number just in case I don't get the PNR number at the end of this. I should've bailed out just then but naive me went on to make the payment and lo-and-behold the site just went onto a blank page with Done showing up at the statusbar. Now I try the reference number to get my PNR but it says that the number is invalid. Great. Immdieatly checked my bank balance and ofcourse 5573Rs were already dedcuted. I call the customer care number and after giving the jerk wastes 30mins of my time typing my complaint down he says that they have registered a case and it would take 14 working days for me to get my money back. Whats worse is that I don't get the tickets either.

Now this is just ludicrous use of technology. Stupidity at its worse. By giving out a RF number before the payment is made just says that they already know that their system doesn't work and they are not willing to do anything about it other than show a useless popup with an equally useless RF number.

Chuck Air Deccan out of the window from my list of i-wanna-fly-em airlines. Jerks!

Technorati Tags: AirDeccan, CustomerCare, Complaint, BadExperience

Mumbai Blasts 7/11

Everyone has by now heard and read about the merciless act of terror committed by cowards in Mumbai on the 11th of July 2006. The series of 7 high intensity bomb blasts most of which were in the local trains in Mumbai killed nearly 200 people and left more than 700 Mumbaikars injured. As anyone who has visited Mumbai would know that the train network is the heartline of the city and literally millions of middle class people travel to and from work using this mode of transport.

These killings were a rude shock to many of the cosmopolitan Mumbaikars. This shock will leave an indelible mark with many of us. At the same time though these blast give us a stern reminder that India has been in a state of emergency right since 1979. The events of 7/11 in Mumbai are acts that happen on a routine basis in our state of Jammu and Kashmir. People in J&K have been held hostage to these terrorists for the past 2.5 decades while the rest of the country has continued on with its own agenda turning a blind eye to our citizens and soldiers in J&K. This callous attitude has strengthened the network of these terrorists not just within the state but throughout the country. They have probably managed to form an invisible thread within out country with strong support of the governments of Pakistan and Bangladesh which provide economic, moral and territorial support for their neferious training camps and madrassas.

I just read an article in the Hindustan Times by the renowned Barkha Dutt (NDTV). She as a journalist has been a strong supporter of the peace process and these blasts have shown her the grim reality of terror first hand. As it has for many of us. Things that have been only seen in snippets of Israeli telivision footage and gory pictures are now things that we can relate with having experienced it first hand. According to her article the shock was so strong for her that she doubts the success of the peace process and the need for us to waste our valuable resources trying this route while the other party is not ready to move a muscle in return. Well Barkha welcome to the real world. Just to put in in figures J&K has seen the loss of >50,000 Indians over the past 2 decades. That is 250 times the people that died in Mumbai!!! Now imagine the casualties in lives, injuries and their families.

It is time that India strikes back. India has to prove to the world and more importantly to her citizens that she is ready to defend herself and that she values the lives of her citizens. Unlike int the past, where Indian soldiers of the flag where tortured and their mutilated bodies were strung on bamboo sticks like some hunter's game by Bangladeshi troops and yet India did not strike back. That event still gets my blood boiling with anger. The largest democracy in the world needs to value the life of each and every of its citizens and just as the United States had the right and the determination to defend its country by waging wars overseas we too need to weed out these fundamentalists at their roots. If it is by crossing international borders then so be it... all things considered we are at war since 1979 its time we seize the fort and hoist the flag or else generations will keep paying the price for our cowardice.

Technorati Tag: Mumbai, Bombay, Blasts, 7/11, Jammu, Kashmir, BarkhaDutt, India

Carriers in the Indian Skies - A Candid Comparison

Desi Fun(da)

Well over the past few months I have flown in many of the new carriers that have invaded the Indian skies. The list of airlines who have enjoyed my business, and in true desi fashion have not bothered to thank me at all, are as follows and ofcourse it is accompanied by my list of cribbs and kudos.

1. Indian (formerly Indian Airlines)

Kudos

good food
pleasant service
very frequent flights
superb connectivity
experienced engineers and hence safer planes
national domestic carrier
allows decent amount of baggage

Cribbs

the changed name and colors aren't enough
airhostesses are not hot enough
green seat covers and not appealing
online booking portal is not user-friendly
not much legroom

2. Jet Airways

Kudos

hot airhostesses
good connectivity
international flights
experienced crew
allows decent amount of baggage

Cribbs

jet-sahara deal devalued my stock by ~20k
too high fares
not much legroom

3. Kingfisher

Kudos

bought in strong competition to the big boys
superb food
friendly crew and staff
focussing on service
classy uniforms
introduced very easy online booking
slab fares
brand new A320s
allows decent amount of baggage

Cribbs

airhostesses couldve been hotter
slab fares again
not much legroom

4. GoAir

Kudos

classy online booking
choice of seat online while booking itself

Cribbs

seats get expensive as you book closer to the departure date
yucky flourescent uniforms under navy blue vests and pants
leased aircrafts
not much legroom
allows only 15kgs baggage - excess is at Rs70/kg

5. SpiceJet

Kudos

good service
friendly and smiling crew and staff
serving cookies and water onboard instead of whole meals - cost-effective and sensical for Indian flight durations
brand new Boeing 737-800s
good legroom
good looking airhostesses

Cribbs

those Boeings are hideous and make too much noise
allows only 10kgs baggage

6. Air Deccan

Kudos

very economical and made flying possible for a large section of Indians

(30-40% of its flyers are first time flyers)

very creative advertising techniques employed for additional captial generation
online booking is decent

Cribbs

leased aircrafts - most of them look as-if they were picked off a airline scrap yard
no service at all
heavy last-minute cancellations and rescheduling of flights
don't even serve water onflight - everything has to be purchased
sad and depressing airhostesses
not assigning seat numbers ie you can pick any seat as you board the flight
allows only 15kgs baggage - excess is at Rs70/kg

Well there is no guessing which one is my favourite and which ones I'd rather not entrust my life with. All in all I feel safety is of the paramount importance to me while I fly and there is nothing else that matters especially while flying within the subcontinent. The flight durations are around an hour to an hour and a half and food and other things don't matter much. If an airline promises me safety at a reasonable price and throws in some goodies and eye-candy with it I would definitely shell out the extra amount to have a thoughtless journey. On the other hand the various low cost carriers have definitely helped bring air travel to the common man and cost will always remain of paramount importance to many of us Indians. I wish all the carriers well and am sure that there are sufficient customers to feed all their fat bellies in our country.



Technorati Tags:
India,Airlines,Indian,JetAirways,Kingfisher,GoAir,SpiceJet,AirDeccan

GoAir experience

  
Desi Fun(da)
  
The online booking experience at the GoAir website is wonderful. The site is designed in the eye friendly colors of light blue and white and things seem to be arranged spot on. The best part of the ticketing experience is that there is a "Pick Seat" feature which gives you a layout of the airplane and lets you pick your seat. Now that is one thing that I have always wanted to see especially wrt international carriers. When someone is paying around 20k for a one-way international ticket they should at least have the opportunity to request a particular seat. Surprisingly no one of our other carriers have this feature available as yet. I guess they are just scared to show how many seats are actually full. And it helps that I may just get a free air ticket on this route....pretty cool.

And whatsup with those hideous uniforms. It looks like some design school dropout got the task of desinging their uniforms and man are they sad. The long sleaves and flourescent colors do not go along with the navy blue pants and tops that they wear and worse still they are really injurious to the eyes. Even if the attendants are good looking the uniforms would turn me away. The airhostesses were alright but still Jet rules. The served a bottle of water on the flight and there were other refreshments on sale. So it was pretty decent. The planes are definitely leased out and not brand new so it is a bit unnerving but they don't seem to be that old.

Well unfortunately I did not win the free ticket and whats worse is that my baggage turned out to be overweight so had to pay a hefty price of Rs70/kg to load it. I should have just carried it as hand baggage instead of checking it in like a dumb ass. But in general the checkin procedure was alright. There were no unnecessary delays or anything so that was a plus. The only crappy part of the GoAir website is that the booking feature works only on IE :( and doesn't move on Mozilla.

Technorati Tag:GoAir