Celebrities

My experience has been that celebrities are ordinary folks. They are made larger than life by media and fans. Those who are in demand are living in palatial bunglows and move around in expensive cars. They hardly come in contact with general public.
But those celebrities who are not high in popularity chart afford such luxuries and they move out to co operative societies. I have had the opportunities to interact with such celebrities. Presently, I am staying in a very large complex consisting of 2 towers and 6 buildings of 7 floors each. This society is located in a posh area in western suburbs of Mumbai. There are many celebrities ( Not so popular type) who are staying in our complex. Some are music directors, Actors, T.V. Host, Models etc. It is a coincidence that one of them who happens to be an actress and who has worked in Hindi films in the past is staying in the flat just opposite mine. She is married to a guy who is an international pilot. She has been staying in the complex even before we moved into this complex 5 years ago. She is very tall, very fair and good looking. She soon became friendly with me wife and often used to come to our flat and chat with her. I had no objection to her coming to my flat so long as it did not invade my privacy. We, on our part helped her as and when required so as to maintain a good neighbourly relations. Gradually, I started noticing that her behaviour and mannerism was very insulting at times. She will ring the bell of our main door at odd hours sometimes at 12 midnight for silly things like asking for change. She did not even bother to apologige for her behaviour. Once, she entered our flat holding a glass of juice. I thought, she is going to offer this to us. But instead, she herself was drinking juice from the glass while chatting with my wife. She often used to criticise all other members residing in the building. We then started ignoring her and would give some excuse or the other whenever she required any help from us. Being in the glamour world, she had many bad habits. She used to hold parties at night with loud music creating noise and disturbing everybody. She was addicted to smoking. Whenever we opened the main door of our flat, we will find her smoking while sitting in the staircase. The stench of the cigarette smoke at times was so intense that it was difficult for me to stand even for one minute waiting for the lift. I was very upset with her behaviour. She had no right to smoke in common area and endanger the health of the other members residing in the neighbourly flats. I was the chairman of the society. I put up a notice on the noticeboard which read "Smoking is strictly prohibited in public place. The society will impose a fine of Rs 500 on any member found smoking in common area like staircase, garden, lobby etc". This lady defied the rules completely and continued to smoke. When the security guards came and told her not to smoke, she started shouting and blatantly told them she is not going to stop smoking. She will rather pay fines than stop smoking.

I have told you this story to impress upon the point that celebrities are spoilt brats. They think, they are above the common people. They think, they can get away with anything by sheer power of money. They have no civilised manners, not even basic courtsey which is expected of a normal human beings. They carry an inflated ego with themselves thanks to chamchas and media who make them larger than life. Some societies have rightly made it a point not to allow such people to buy flats in their premises.

The straight line that you draw will look big until you draw another line which is bigger than the one you have drawn previously. CSW scandal, the latest one in the series of scandals this country has witnessed over the last 10 years is perhaps the biggest one to date. All other scams including IPL, look peanuts compared to the scam of this magnitude. Public money has been laundered and looted to the tune of thousands of crores of rupees. The hard earned money of Indian people has gone into the pockets of few shameless corrupt officials. I ask you why the hell should the income tax be paid by the citizen of this country to the government which is not put to use for road infrastructure, public transport, Hospitals and other developmental activities but wasted in such manner. The officials who are involved in this crime may never be punished as usual but what perhaps the Indian Public can do is to boycott commonwealth games as a sign of protest. Ministers, beauracrats, Govt officials have become corrupt to such an extent that they keep denying their involvment despite all the documentary evidence. Why ministers, even the doctors cannot be trusted now a days whose profession is considered noble. It is difficult to pinpoint a single individual who is not corrupt. Corruption is the single biggest impediment in the growth of the country which has the larget pool of technical manpower in the world.

Traffic woes

It has been a long time since I have written blog. Reason being that I have been very busy now a days with a project. There is no other reason for not writing the blog for so long. I hope you understand what I mean. I find Mumbai's traffic very frustrating specially while driving down in the evening back home. I am covering a distance of roughly 20 Kilometers from my home to workplace and vice versa but it takes me 2 1/2 to 3 hours in driving everyday which develops lot of stress in my body. It is not just the traffic intensity that is causing stress but the gross indiscipline of motorists, Autodrivers and pedestrians in following traffic rules that is scary and dangerous. I have to pass through narrow lanes in between which is not wide enough to accommodate even 2 cars in the same row. There is always a risk of meeting with an accident. Even if I cross the traffic signal with green light showing , I still feel unsafe because vehicles can come from any direction and hit me. Almost everybody breaks the signals unmindful of the consequences of doing so. Scooters, autos, Cars can be seen being driven in haphazard manner posing serious threat to life. There is no sense of traffic rules whatsoever. Traffic police is nowhere to be seen. It is free for all. Do whatever you like kind of scenario. Everybody seems to be in a rush to go to grave. Everyday, I wonder whether I will be able to reach home safely. It is this anxiety that is causing stress