Phenomenal Women

Saturday, the 8th of March, was observed as International Women’s Day. Team Culture Curry doffs its collective hat to all you phenomenal women at Blue Lotus. We know we’re a little late but we’d like to make amends. So we begin with a delightful poem by Maya Angelou that’s rather apt for the occasion. It’s titled—you guessed right—‘Phenomenal Woman’.

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.


Hope you enjoy reading this edition of Culture Curry. It’s quite a mix. There’s a contemplative piece by Piyush Jain, a gastronomic outburst from our resident foodie Shikha Johnson, both the winning entries in the recently-concluded blog writing contest (topic: Offsite) and much more. It would be nice if you could leave your comments after reading individual entries. Enjoy.

- Editor

A nine to six story

Piyush Jain writes on the upsides and downsides of the 'nine to six' way of life. Piyush heads team Blue Bytes.

It’s 9.27 a.m. and I have just stepped out of the bus which brings me from Victoria Terminus to the heart of Colaba. Office is still a couple of blocks away. I realise that if I walk quickly (without stopping to buy my daily dose of nicotine) I might just get to office on time. I break into a half-run, weaving, ducking, swaying to avoid the morning crowd and various other obstacles.

9.29 a.m.: I am inside the building breathing heavily from my exertions. I keep my finger pressed on the lift button, almost willing it to come down. I curse under my breath as the liftman seems to take forever to first open, then shut the lift door. Will I still be on time? The lift, a monumentally slow contraption, rattles its way upwards. It comes to a shaky halt at the fourth floor. I push hard at the lift door and rush out, the swipe card in my hand poised to make contact with the receptor. The contact happens at 9.30 a.m. sharp. I am home and dry.

2008 had begun with a dictum – strict adherence to official work timings (i.e. 9.30 a.m. – 6.30 p.m.) of Blue Lotus. Now dictum may be too harsh a word but we had it coming didn’t we? No organisation can survive without proper discipline. Maybe not an army-like rigidity (else I would have joined the army, wouldn’t I?), but some basic ground rules to keep the house in order.

So how does it help to be on time? There’s lot of gyaan doing the rounds regarding the merits of time management. For me being on time means a chance to start work early, and consequently, to leave office on time. I am reminded of Narayan Murthy (Infosys) who in fact condemns people who spend long hours in office.

Finally it is our value system and as M. Scott Peck puts it:
'Until you value yourself, you will not value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it.'

Tibet calling

Shikha Johnson composed this piece in her head, while gorging on a batch of succulent steamed momos at Café Seranya. She dashed off the first draft on a piece of tissue smeared with sauce stains.

Alright! So they finally realised how much I appreciate this thing called food. And that’s why I was asked to contribute to this column. (For those of you who can’t decide whether to trust my sermons on food can rest assured. What I eat shows on the outside. Really.)

My mum has mentioned it more often than she’d care to remember: one has to eat to live, not the other way round. My retort: as I must eat to live, I might as well enjoy every morsel of it. And guess what? My work requires that I come into close contact with cookery books by Master Chef Sanjeev Kapoor. Isha, Anupriya and Shefali strongly believe it’s a bonus for a confirmed foodie like me. Trust me, I know better.

So, delaying no more let me take you guys on a short culinary trip of Tibet. Yes I know, I know. Tibetan, Chinese, Thai… it’s all the same. Isn’t that what most of you are thinking? So did I, until the cute 20-something guy at Café Seranya handed me the menu card. But let me first tell you how I landed up there. My room-mate is quite an explorer when it comes to economy food, economy being the key word here. And so one day she happened to venture into this small, neat joint near the sprawling Infinity Mall at Lokhandwala. Afterwards she couldn’t stop talking about the place. So I decided to go check it out for myself. I did, only to be taken by surprise at how well the restaurant satisfied all parameters of a great food joint: yummy food, decent service, clean and affordable.

Cut to the cute guy with big, soulful eyes. The first thing about the menu card that struck me was its foreignness. I mean, I could barely pronounce the name of a single dish. So I opted for the safer route. I asked the sweet looking old man at the counter to recommend something interesting. He was more than happy to oblige. I had the Seranya Special soup and a serving of delicious steamed Momos for starters. Oh what bliss! Devoid of spices, yet so mouth-wateringly tasty. I felt uplifted. But the best was yet to come. My host had decided on a full course dinner for me on his own initiative. So while I thought he was giving general instructions to the cook, it was actually the order being placed… without my consent... in Tibetan.

Dinner was finally served. And what dishes: Lhasa Nyasa (a succulent lamb dish), Chicken Thukpa (Thukpa being Nepali noodles), special Tibetan sausages and a delightful prawns dish. There’s more for meat lovers here. After all, I am a proud carnivore. One has the option, however, to order dishes minus the meat without there being any significant changes in taste.

The flavour of the food continued to linger long after dinner was over. It’s perfect for people who can’t handle too much spice but still like a little zing in their food. A little nutmeg here, a whole anistar there… Oooh!

It was an extremely satisfying experience. And although the food was top class, the bill wasn’t astronomical. Café Seranya is sure to be in my list of favourites for quite some time to come. Highly, highly recommended.

The Day my Fear flew

This is the winning entry in the recently held blog writing contest. The theme was the December offsite, and the entries were judged by a team of journalists. Written by Anuja Shah of team Bluetterflies.

Since my first day at Blue Lotus I have being hearing of the so called ‘offsite’. For the most part, Isha who sits besides me would narrate what an experience it was to be in Lonavala amidst the mountains, drenched in water, rappelling the cliff and getting stuck on top with nowhere to go. At this time to me it all sounded too scary and risky….. But nevertheless she said it was worth all the fun.

But I still was skeptical. It was not only she but most of the office was looking forward for the next offsite speculating what is it going to be like this time. I really didn’t bother. Days passed, months passed and on one fine day of December I received a mail from Tapash (training manager) that we are soon heading for our next offsite which to my astonishment was compulsory for all the employees. I was thinking of ways and means to avoid it. But the HR team of Blue Lotus turned out to be smarter than I thought. The consequences for not attending the offsite were, WE WOULD BE MARKED ABSENT FOR THREE DAYS. And to add icing on the cake, we were unaware of the destination, staying facility and the activity for which this three day camp was arranged. I mean c’mon this was preposterous. My situation was uncanny but finally gave up fighting my twin self and began packing.

And finally arrived the ‘D-Day’, on December 13th Team Blue (employees of network offices) from different parts of the country started flanking the Mumbai office at different intervals during the day. I mean it felt like attending a marriage reception. That entire day no one worked but people greeted each other with great passion. Finally it was time to board the bus. With no clue where we were headed and what’s in stored for us, maximum apprehension at the back of our minds we set to make a long journey.

At around 11.30 pm, two and a half hours behind schedule (all thanks to our problematic bus that broke down twice) our bus began to slow down at a place known as Talegaon. It was pitch dark outside and to make matters worse it was freezing cold. At first we could only hear horses neigh nearby but shortly to our dismay we could see them all around us. In my mind I was excited but scared of what next is going to happen to us. I picked up my luggage and walked ahead to the source of light.

Too sleepy but sound I was trying to understand where had we landed ourselves. Soon I realized I was standing outside a stable with tens of horses making world’s weirdest and loudest noises. I tried to calm myself by holding Vandy (Vandana) tightly. Luckily Vandy and I were sharing the same dorm. Looking at the place I figured that we for sure are not staying in a three star hotel room. After school this was the first time in five years I was staying in a dormitory.

Within ten minutes we were supposed to report outside for a small briefing by Mouli sir (CEO of Blue Lotus) followed by Dinner. As we gathered outside on the ground we were introduced to Mr. Junaid Merchant and Mr. Rohan (trainers) whom we were told would take are of us for the next three days. Thinking it was not as bad as we thought Vandy and I peacefully went off to sleep. Little did I know the coming day I would be facing the worst horror of my life.

I got up early in the morning at 7 am. The morning looked beautiful in Talegaon. As I stepped outside to feel the cool breeze on my face I was horrified to see one. two…four mid sized dogs and one huge dog (as tall as a man) walking around. Shocked as I was already to see that human sized dog, then there was Junaid who said that since we were around 80 of us we would be split into two groups and every group will train dogs and horses for one and a half day each. Training horses was fine as I have always fancied horse ridding but training DOGS sent shivers down my spine.

After the briefing I quietly approached Junaid and asked him if I could choose to only train horses and not dogs. I explained him how much I feared dogs and have actually had a dog running behind me when I was a kid. My parents disliked dogs as much as I did. Probably mom disliked more as one of her brothers died because a stray dog bit him when he was very young.

Understanding my problem Junaid just told me to give him two days where he would rid me my fear and assured me I would be unhurt, so much so I will start loving dogs by the time we leave for Mumbai. Seeing his confidence I accepted it as a challenge. We were the first group to deal with dogs and Shirin (his wife) handed a small brown and white coloured Cocker Spaniel called Maxxy to our team (Aaron, Sachin, Isha, Arnab myself).

For the first forty five minutes Shirin told us how dogs can help humans communicate, learn and understand better by showing us techniques how to train dogs to do simple things like walking it, making it sit, sleep and lastly jump. At first I did not want to touch Maxxy at all. I strongly refuted but she held my hand and put a biscuit on my palm and put my palm under Maxxy’s mouth. I thought she was out of her mind and my palm would nicely have small dog bit holes. But as I squinted to see, Maxxy just licked my palm without even touching his canines to my palm.

I was relieved. Then she told me to tap it’s head and rub it’s back. With little hesitation I touched Maxxy’s head and back, it felt so soft just like my beloved cushion. And just minutes later I was playing with Maxxy as though it was my pet. Junaid couldn’t believe his eyes. He felt he had over promised me by saying two days, whereas I got pally with Maxxy only within few hours. Moreover I could not believe my self playing with a dog, an animal I gravely disliked once upon a time. People watching me would not say that this is the same Anuja who would scream at the sight of a dog.

Later throughout the training session Maxxy liked my feet, sniffed my hands and I merrily played with me. He was a slow learner. But some how would listen to my commands. Initially he would see his female friends and get excited and would want to run behind them. But he slowly started obeying commands. We made Maxxy do various tricks which he did gracefully though slowly.

At the end of the activity I learnt two very important lessons in my life, one being patient. Golden rule of life, if you ever want to achieve something in life learn to be patient. A dog is like your new born baby who does not understand what you speak but only understands actions. It takes a good amount of effort to make a dog trust you and obey your commands. Second lesson was hard work. Never give up in life. You fail only when you stop trying. To make Maxxy do tricks was extremely difficult as he was a very restless dog and was missing his owner. We had a competition where the dog’s team that stood last would go back to Mumbai that very moment. We had very little hope from Maxxy. But we never stopped trying. With only one thing in mind, ‘So what if we loose at least we tried’ this kept us going. And to our amazement we stood second last. At least we did not loose.

I bring back with me from that wonderful session unforgettable memories, where a dog taught me how to make life at work more organized and productive. Today at work I follow these rules and aspire to achieve my goals……….. All thanks to Junaid today I am not scared of dogs anymore. At the same time I am very grateful to Blue Lotus for organizing this camp which has in a lot of ways changed my perceptions towards life. I feel proud to be a part of this wonderful initiative and am already agitated for the next ‘Offsite’.

- Anuja Shah

Why PR is not a buzz word for Journalists...

This is the runners-up entry in the blog writing contest. Written by Archana Sharda in her inimitable style.






...it is as a growing industry though! 'People come and people go'..does it not sound rhetoric and rhapsodical, very cliche, very mundane...but it remains a hard core fact and today the practice seems rampant across any kind of an industry big and small.

So this is no news to our industry as well, but what is imperative for a PR agency is to atleast try not to let their employees go..atleast not very easily...

So that is what the organisation I represent, or rather the brand name of the organisation that represents me and so many like me (yes you call them like minded people) thought of creating an ambience for 100 plus member team . An initiative to bring together a team 'BLUE' spread and scattered geographically to 9 locations.

At outskirts of Mumbai, 'Tale Gaon' - an apt setting for a movie like Jaanbaaz or a song like Jati hoon main....jaldi hai kya...a big farm house kind of a place - picturesque, countryside feel and look...rugged and adventerous setting... with lovely tall and elegant horses cantering on a green landscape like birds flying free on an unlimited blue horizon. Ok..a bad comparison but truly not a bad experience at all even if we had to stay in dormitories and sleep in bunker beds near the stinking stables. I was reminded of my hostel days as the washrooms were common with no doors and latches, just plastic drapes and mutual trust :)Japalouppe organised a coporate training with horses and dogs for the very first time in India and must say a decent job done.

What do we have to learn from animals esp. a PR agency like us who are treated as dogs or any other stray animal not allowed in media houses (cheers my media friends..no offense meant, bura na mano...new year hai). I would say there are analogies that can be made, the experiental learning as we call it (did I tell you I am in talks with a prospective hard on negotiation client in corporate training space). Horses and Dogs are social animals that can be tamed for domestic purposes, have so many other traits that resemble or have a bearing to human beings like they are sensitive and they reciprocate emotions.

There were many small little sessions and learning through games with the animals that the organisers had arranged, but what was really interesting (atleast to me) was watching the horses or should I say observing them with a analytical bent of mind. Rohan, a multifaceted personality, a 28 year old master trainer, told us all how life of horses change when they meet young horses (freshers), how a stallion boast about his masculanity and tries to woo the female horses, how the face of politics changes when the group of old horses are introduced to the young mares, how the male horses protect few female horses for themselves. It was a delight to see ' butterscotch' a young (was it a filly or a colt - don't seem to remember!) horse trying to make friends and get pally with his senior mates.

The dog training session was lot of fun as well, I liked playing a narrator to my 'all girls team' who spoofed 'Kajrare kajrare tere kaare kaare nayana.....playing mumbaiya taporees and guess who played Aishwarya...our 4 month old pup ' Cheese' who was dressed up like a female dog (bitches are only used for bad human females these days). The exercise was to get few dancing moves right...

I can go on an on...but what remains as an important question is why is this blog written - to tell you all that there's a lot new stuff happening in PR industry and thought I will keep you informed and updated

Cheers

Till we meet again - Au Revoir!

The Pune Story

Chitra Shripad looks at the month that was from a Pune perspective.

February began with Mouli coming down to Pune for a pitch. Days later, Prashant took the onus of cleaning the office, which included getting rid off all the Bytes newspapers, clearing the cupboard etc. He is also our inhouse technical man. When we are in despair with some bug in our systems he comes to our rescue. Cheers Prashant!

This month we also saw a member from Mumbai who visited the Pune branch for the first time. Blue Saints really enjoyed the company of our very own training manager, Tapash Pal. Normally on Thursdays, work is hampered because of load shedding. But this Thursday it was a pleasant change when Tapash joined us. We were all so engrossed in the training session that we didn’t realise that there was no electricity in the office for most of the time. Plus the training session has really helped us in understanding whole lot of techniques, in understanding body language, non verbal communication, Dos and Don'ts of communication, which would definitely help us enhance our communications skills. We all enjoyed the first session and really looking forward to more of such sessions in the future.

Our decade long search for an Office Assistant finally came to an end with Dutta Kamble joining us. Welcome to Blue Lotus Dutta!