The dream

And its not time to wake up now

and its time to dream on

and its not time to give up now

and its time to live on

Woman

Inspired by a real story

Crouched under the willow tree
She sits there in the afternoon heat
The sweat trickles down her face
Upon the heavens she throws her gaze


Her arms around her knees, she feels helpless
Her brimming eyes, staring into an emptiness
She gets up, and walks away in a lonely stride
Deciding not, on what would be right

Twice before, but not again,
does she want to feel the pain
Of having to lose the one in her womb
Killed thereafter and sent to the tomb

But now the day has finally arrived
She is dispirited, her tears have dried
All she wants is to be able to love
The one, sent to her, from the up above

Seven hours past, her heart is finally filled with joy
For the doctors tell her, ‘it’s a boy!’
Now she can live and learn to love
Now she can get the respect of all she loves

But what world lives, where every girl is killed?
Way beyond her fate had willed?
What world lives where women don’t live?
What world will live, when the women don’t thrive?

On love and life

On Love and life

And he too deserves to be in love
For no power can deny him love
Let him not be mistaken for a sinner
He only deserved to be treated better
So be not judgmental ,for you have no right
To feel not, what’s not yours, to be tried

Beyond his steely gaze rests a fire most warm
With the serenity of a wave most calm
Read his eyes, they speak of truth, not lies
The truth you’ll find only in his eyes
For his eyes are the ones that loved
Though the world gave him only hate.

Love feels all, and is not jealous, nor alone
It reminds you constantly of the single one
That connects the connects the soul of the millions
With the same blood that’s shed in tears
For a love that’s lost
For a love that’s found.

for everyone must be given the chance to love
for everyone must be allowed to accept love
then why is it you manipulate love
why have you destroyed the essence of love
behold, don’t say it’s a crime to love
the purest passion in the world is love

let not love be infected with your vices
do not change the meaning for your crisis
for it is something only few can comprehend
do not change the meaning to gain your end
the simplest love exists in the eyes of the one you love
and love and only love will take you through.

Landscape

First of the landscapes I made digitally! Trees can be pretty tricky!

Consumer satisfaction????

Consumer Satisfaction reaches new heights in today’s world. (Yes, I’m being sarcastic)

The other day I went to a Pizza Hut, quite a reputed brand and well regarded for its customer care. I beg to disagree. To begin with, there were only two waiters for the whole diner (which has quite become the trend now for the brand). It felt a bit awkward, with an uneasy silence all over the place, customers wondering if they’ll ever make it till the pizza arrives.
Finally I have one waiter coming over to take the order. But his face reads sheer terror- there’s just so much to do. And if you take more than a minute with your order, you’ll notice his twitching and turning, and he will adorn the ‘oh-just-get-over-with-it’ look. Well so much for the customer service. All this, in spite of me being one of their loyal customers (forced-due-to-love-of-pizza-loyal).Oh, and I better not get started on their non-availability of items.
It’s true that the customer is getting more demanding in terms of service and satisfaction. At the same time he is not willing to pay a higher price for the same. And with millions of ‘me-too’ brands coming up all over the city, there is a sudden increase in the demand for qualified employable sales people. However, to cut cost, most of these are willing to do away with the ‘qualified employable’ part of the deal. Sometimes, even the floor manager can take you to whole new heights of stupidity that makes you wonder why you still come here.

Take BIG BAZAAR for an example. More like BIG fat lying bazaar. I was pretty interested (initially) in its concept of providing the best quality at the cheapest prices available. But what I see now, leaves me a little more than flabbergasted-to be modest with my words. I have never had such a terrible customer treatment anywhere. I go over to their garments section and the colors and design almost makes me puke. And the price remains similar to a Westside or a Shoppers’ Stop (except worse in quality and taste). Well getting back, I notice these three sales women ganging up and gossiping. I call on to one of them and they look at me as though they were making the new budget of India and I happened to disturb them. When I ask her, do you have this in a different color or size; she just waves her hand nonchalantly and goes back to making the budget or whatever.

So then I proceed for billing and as soon as I reach the counter, the salesman puts the board ‘counter closed’. I proceed to the next ‘counter open’ counter, however without a counter person. I ask a few salespeople around, and after a lot of inquiry I’m informed that he will be here shortly. After a long wait of five minutes, (which looked well over an hour to my short tempered mind clock), the counter person arrives all smiles. I ask him to bill it and he has the audacity to say that the counter is closed. If you know me, you’d well know what state that would put me in. I asked him, then why is the counter open sign put and why make me wait? He coolly inverts the sign and continues smiling.

I could go on and on about more such (and mind you more serious) anecdotes of BIGGGG Bazaar, but I need to check on my BP first. As long as companies want to expand their tentacles and bite into their competition, they would keep opening new showrooms, new franchises, and new outlets. And with this, would increase their search for employable staff. Non availability of such staff, lack of training the current staff and a major slack on the part of supervisors will continue to leave customer care puritans like me just high and dry!