The Sukanta - An "Eat To Live" Restaurant

This is a Rajasthani artpiece at the Sukanta reception

I went to the Sukanta on J M Road yesterday. And honestly, I never knew about it till today! It is an awesome dining experience, right next to the Mula river, tucked cozily beneath all the old establishments and flooding with Punekars waiting in a queue to check out the much reputed food!

A shift at that restaurant starts with  pooja wherein all the staff, right from the waiter to the owner participate, to make sure that their business keeps running by the blessings of the Lord. (And I think that even if they don't do that, their business is going to do just fine with the type of food they serve!) And when I said "shift" I meant it! The restaurant is "OPEN" from morning 9:30 a.m to afternoon 3:30 a.m and then it again opens for the guests in the evening from 7:00 p.m to 10:30 p.m. And trust me, these guys follow this schedule religiously!

This is wall piece at The Sukanta

The entire interior of the restaurant is really warm and welcoming. However old the exteriors of that entire building maybe, the inside of the restaurant takes your breath away! Then you are left with nothing to say besides a frequent "WOW"! :-) Then you have the much reputed (I know I am using the word 'reputed' more than often but it is worth it) waiters scaling every inch of the floor, every couple of minutes. These guys are really efficient, don't spill food in your plate, come up to you every time you ask for them or not, don't make you wait and they really make you feel like a 'Maharaj' or a 'Maharani'! What with the superb interiors of the restaurant! Beautiful!

Look at the size of the dishes here and the ambiance of the restaurant

The food at Sukanta is awesome! On my plate I had aloo ki sabji, bhel puri, rabdi, roti, puran poli, kadi, veg papdi, bajri ki roti with ghee and gud, mattar ki sabji, sabja, water, paneer ki sabji, dhokla, methi ka paratha and a couple of more stuff which I can't remember because I didn't know their names there! And guess what? We can eat unlimited food till we are filled with no extra charges! And trust me, while eating this, you don't want to accept any challenges wherein you got to finish all the food with 3 to 5 servings - I did that and I came home crying! Accept the fact that the potato of aloo ki sabji was not boiled correctly, everything else was amazing - I took 2 more servings of Sukanta's rabdi and it was superb! After you've finished your food, they give you pan outside, which not really good, but fine!

But when one opens a great restaurant one should take care of the fact that guests just HATE waiting! That is because if you go during the "CLOSED" hours of the restaurant, mostly when you are a first - timer, you then have to wait for quiet some time till you get to your table. That's fine when you are out for fun time and not hungry. But then what about those foodies who are hungry? When you want fine dining, you just want it! There is no turning back! Also one should make sure that the vicinity of the restaurant should be at least an okay one, if not great one. Another thing is this that one needs to be updated about the quantity of ingredients they are using for the dishes - for Sukanta it was oil. Oil ruled the main sabjis! Other than these, guys, I couldn't encounter any other drawbacks with the restaurant.

The Judging Committee - (from left) Mahima, Nikita, Vijayata and Deepti

I'd say that if you want a nice, filling meal and want to have it at a reasonable price, with amazing dining experiences, you got to visit Sukanta at J M Road! I rated it 6 / 10. Nikita and Vijayata agreed. Mahima rated it 5.5 / 10 and Deepti put it at 8 / 10. So the overall review is that Sukanta is a good restaurant with good food at the rate of Rs. 170 per dish and unlimited servings with the additional 'happy food' that is pan!

Be An Influential Personality - Be An Indian

The following post is by Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam on his three visions for India, his Vision 2020 and various other subjects that he disputed on. This one's a really famous speech by him and I am posting it because it is the most inspirational speech of all times! If you don't think that you need any inspiration to become a good citizen of India or want to know how you want to go about doing the right things, then I request you to not read the following! Because only a progressive individual will understand the true essence of the speech, and not a stagnant and dumb-head person.

So, here goes, Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam's Speech :

"I have three visions for India. In 3000 years of our history people from all over the world have come and invaded us, captured our lands, conquered our minds. From Alexander onwards. The Greeks, the Turks, the Moguls, the Portuguese, the British, the French, the Dutch, all of them came and looted us, took over what was ours. Yet we have not done this to any other nation. We have not conquered anyone. We have not grabbed their land, their culture, their history and tried to enforce our way of life on them. Why? Because we respect the freedom of others. That is why my first vision is that of FREEDOM. I believe that India got its first vision of this in 1857, when we started the war of independence. It is this freedom that we must protect and nurture and build on. If we are not free, no one will respect us. 

My second vision for India is DEVELOPMENT. For fifty years we have been a developing nation. It is time we see ourselves as a developed nation. We are among top 5 nations of the world in terms of GDP. We have 10 percent growth rate in most areas. Our poverty levels are falling. Our achievements are being globally recognized today. Yet we lack the self-confidence to see ourselves as a developed nation, self-reliant and self-assured. Isn't this incorrect?

I have a THIRD vision. India must stand up to the world. Because I believe that unless India stands up to the world, no one will respect us. Only strength respects strength. We must be strong not only as a military power but also as an economic power. Both must go hand-in-hand. My good fortune was to have worked with three great minds. Dr. Vikram Sarabhai of the Dept. of space, Professor Satish Dhawan, who succeeded him and Dr. Brahm Prakash, father of nuclear material. I was lucky to have worked with all three of them closely and consider this the great opportunity of my life. 

I see four milestones in my career : 

ONE: Twenty years I spent in ISRO. I was given the opportunity to be the project director for India's first satellite launch vehicle, SLV3. The one that launched Rohini. These years played a very important role in my life of Scientist.

TWO: After my ISRO years, I joined DRDO and got a chance to be the part of India's missile program. It was my second bliss when Agni met its mission requirements in 1994. 

THREE: The Dept. of Atomic Energy and DRDO had this tremendous partnership in the recent nuclear tests, on May 11 and 13. This was the third bliss. The joy of participating with my team in these nuclear tests and proving to the world that India can make it, that we are no longer a developing nation but one of them. It made me feel very proud as an Indian. The fact that we have now developed for Agni a re-entry structure, for which we have developed this new material. A Very light material called carbon-carbon.

FOUR: One day an orthopedic surgeon from Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences visited my laboratory. He lifted the material and found it so light that he took me to his hospital and showed me his patients. There were these little girls and boys with heavy metallic calipers weighing over three kg. each, dragging their feet around. He said to me: Please remove the pain of my patients. In three weeks, we made these Floor reaction Orthosis 300 gram calipers and took them to the orthopedic centre. The children didn't believe their eyes. From dragging around a three kg. load on their legs, they could now move around! Their parents had tears in their eyes. That was my fourth bliss!

Why is the media here so negative? Why are we in India so embarrassed to recognize our own strengths, our achievements? We are such a great nation. We have so many amazing success stories but we refuse to acknowledge them. Why? We are the first in milk production. We are number one in Remote sensing satellites. We are the second largest producer of wheat. We are the second largest producer of rice. Look at Dr. Sudarshan, he has transferred the tribal village into a self-sustaining, self-driving unit. There are millions of such achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad news and failures and disasters.

I was in Tel Aviv once and I was reading the Israeli newspaper. It was the day after a lot of attacks and bombardments and deaths had taken place. The Hamas had struck. But the front page of the newspaper had the picture of a Jewish gentleman who in five years had transformed his desert land into an orchid and a granary. It was this inspiring picture that everyone woke up to. The gory details of killings, bombardments, deaths, were inside in the newspaper, buried among other news. In India we only read about death, sickness, terrorism, crime. Why are we so NEGATIVE? Another question: Why are we, as a nation so obsessed with foreign things? We want foreign TVs, we want foreign shirts. We want foreign technology. Why this obsession with everything imported. Do we not realize that self-respect comes with self-reliance?

I was in Hyderabad giving this lecture, when a 14 year old girl asked me for my autograph. I asked her what her goal in life is: She replied: I want to live in a developed India. For her, you and I will have to build this developed India. You must proclaim. India is not an under-developed nation; it is a highly developed nation.

Allow me to come back with vengeance. Got 10 minutes for your country?

YOU say that our government is inefficient. YOU say that our laws are too old. YOU say that the municipality does not pick up the garbage. YOU say that the phones don't work, the railways are a joke, the airline is the worst in the world, mails never reach their destination. YOU say that our country has been fed to the dogs and is the absolute pits. YOU say, say and say.

What do YOU do about it? Take a person on his way to Singapore. Give him a name - YOURS. Give him a face - YOURS. YOU walk out of the airport and you are at your International best. In Singapore you don't throw cigarette butts on the roads or eat in the stores. YOU are as proud of their Underground Links as they are. You pay $5 (approx. Rs. 60) to drive through Orchard Road (equivalent of Mahim Causeway or Pedder Road) between 5 PM and 8 PM.

YOU comeback to the parking lot to punch your parking ticket if you have over stayed in a restaurant or a shopping mall irrespective of your status identity. In Singapore you don't say anything, DO YOU? YOU wouldn't dare to eat in public during Ramadan, in Dubai. YOU would not dare to go out without your head covered in Jeddah. YOU would not dare to buy an employee of the telephone exchange in London at 10 pounds (Rs. 650) a month to, "see to it that my STD and ISD calls are billed to someone else." YOU would not dare to speed beyond 55 mph (88 kph) in Washington and then tell the traffic cop, "Jaanta hai sala main kaun hoon (Do you know who I am?). I am so and so's son. Take your two bucks and get lost." YOU wouldn't chuck an empty coconut shell anywhere other than the garbage pail on the beaches in Australia and New Zealand. Why don't YOU spit Paan on the streets of Tokyo? Why don't YOU use examination jockeys or buy fake certificates in Boston? We are still talking of the same YOU. YOU who can respect and conform to a foreign system in other countries but cannot in your own. You who will throw papers and cigarettes on the road the moment you touch Indian ground. If you can be an involved and appreciative citizen in an alien country why cannot you be the same here in India. Once in an interview, the famous Ex-municipal commissioner of Bombay Mr.Tinaikar had a point to make. "Rich people's dogs are walked on the streets to leave their affluent droppings all over the place," he said. "And then the same people turn around to criticize and blame the authorities for inefficiency and dirty pavements. What do they expect the officers to do? Go down with a broom every time their dog feels the pressure in his bowels? In America every dog owner has to clean up after his pet has done the job. Same in Japan. Will the Indian citizen do that here?" He's right. We go to the polls to choose a government and after that forfeit all responsibility. We sit back wanting to be pampered and expect the government to do everything for us whilst our contribution is totally negative. We expect the government to clean up but we are not going to stop chucking garbage all over the place nor are we going to stop to pick a up a stray piece of paper and throw it in the bin. We expect the railways to provide clean bathrooms but we are not going to learn the proper use of bathrooms. We want Indian Airlines and Air India to provide the best of food and toiletries but we are not going to stop pilfering at the least opportunity. This applies even to the staff who is known not to pass on the service to the public. When it comes to burning social issues like those related to women, dowry, girl child and others, we make loud drawing room protestations and continue to do the reverse at home. Our excuse? "It's the whole system which has to change, how will it matter if I alone forego my sons' rights to a dowry." So who's going to change the system? What does a system consist of? Very conveniently for us it consists of our neighbors, other households, other cities, other communities and the government. But definitely not me and YOU. When it comes to us actually making a positive contribution to the system we lock ourselves along with our families into a safe cocoon and look into the distance at countries far away and wait for a Mr. Clean to come along & work miracles for us with a majestic sweep of his hand. Or we leave the country and run away. Like lazy cowards hounded by our fears we run to America to bask in their glory and praise their system. When New York becomes insecure we run to England. When England experiences unemployment, we take the next flight out to the Gulf. When the Gulf is war struck, we demand to be rescued and brought home by the Indian government. Everybody is out to abuse and rape the country. Nobody thinks of feeding the system. Our conscience is mortgaged to money.

Dear Indians, The article is highly thought inductive, calls for a great deal of introspection and pricks one's conscience too....I am echoing J.F. Kennedy's words to his fellow Americans to relate to Indians.....

"ASK WHAT WE CAN DO FOR INDIA AND DO WHAT HAS TO BE DONE TO MAKE INDIA WHAT AMERICA AND OTHER WESTERN COUNTRIES ARE TODAY"!

Lets do what India needs from us."

I hope you are inspired and on fire right now. I got goosebumps when I first read this speech, and get goosebumps every time that I read it. It helps me to understand my responsibilities and priorities as an Indian. I need comments on this one! 

May God bless the nation of India!

Jai Hind!

The First Sight of a New Life

The title to this post is kind of a confusion-creator, really! But again, when you are anxious about so many things and in the middle of making a greeting card for a really special person, your thoughts happen to take a bump every time you give a second thought to a greeting card idea! Happens more than often when it's a really special person! :-)

Well, let's get to the title. Today I went to see my new college, a new place I am going to call "HOME" away from home for the next 4 years. And I am making apologies before hand for not getting any photos with me from there. But next time I promise I will get them to you guys! :-) 

It so happens that I am allotted the SSMS's PVPIT College of Engineering in Bavdhan, Pune. It's a really nice campus, situated on a hill, lush green, amazing and virgin breezes always blowing there and the staff, the building and the crowd is almost 'okay'.  (To be honest I couldn't make much out of the crowd! I need the college to begin in order to determine what kinda crowd there is!) The only drawback is the really high fees - Rs.1,08,625/- per year only (!!!).

At first I actually got a mini heart attack when I read this college's name against my I-D number. Mom was so happy, she was literally sprinting from the kitchen to my room! Dad was happy too, if "happy" were defined as "being calm and yawning, with an occasional nod" (what when it was 6 am in the morning!). All morning I couldn't think of anything besides this particular college, how it was and what were the placements like. I made up all sorts of stories and theories in my head (was actually practicing being a good mechanical engineer!), but all this just so that all my pre-conceptions would be shattered to bits and pieces, about 2 hours from then! :-(

And when I reached PVPIT, I actually liked that place, besides the fact that my favourite Uncle teaches there first year mathematics! So, this was the first sight or more appropriately a sneak preview of a new life, roughly lasting for the coming four years. But I have made up my mind to totally enjoy this time in college, make loads of new friends, make even better projects and actually live these 4 years! :-)

So, PVPIT, here I come!!!

A Strategy Wise Enough to Last Long

I am 18 years old and am going on to pursuing Mechanical Engineering at a reputed college in Pune from the Pune University. I have a lot of aims that I got to achieve down the line, mainly professionally. And no great projects establish within a couple of years (with the exception of Facebook and then me, and then a few others)! But yes, when we have a long term goal and few short term aims leading towards the "big day", we need a basic strategy, roughly spanning a few years, even if our businesses establish much before that.

They say dreams come true. Similarly, thinking about your final goals will definitely make you accomplish it. Free time is the time when one should really concentrate on their goals, only if you are damn serious about achieving them! And when I said thinking, I also meant dreaming about your goals consciously and positively. Next, DO NOT LISTEN TO ANYONE except yourself. That is barely all that that matters. Be head on! And the most important thing is to stay updated no matter what comes! You want to "establish" a business. The latest trends your industry should be understood. There is nothing besides this that you can do! And amongst others there is one golden rule for any entrepreneur : Make friends anywhere and everywhere!

These are all basic stuff here. I am practicing these, and so putting it up on the blog! Hope it helps! :)

Photography From The Heart Into The Image

This is the photo that I snapped when I was still an amateur

When I was looking at the images that I shot when I first bought my camera, I was left in a shocked yet appreciative state. The images were extremely beautiful, and had all the details right. But they missed an even more important factor – the ‘"heart" factor! Besides the fact that I was an amateur photographer then (which, needless to say, I am even now) I didn’t know the exact art of photography. Photography, the way you see it, has to be shown into the world by you. When you are clicking a photo, you have to be satisfied with what you are watching through that lens. And whatever you see through that lens is the exact same thing that the world will see. For example, take Fritz Hoffmann, the great photographer who shot for the National Geographic Magazine’s China Edition. He was asked to go and do an assignment in China, telling a story about China with nothing but his images! He discovered the soulful fact that China’s entire story is associated to Kung Fu. He worked on it, putting every inch of his hard work

This is from Fritz Hoffmann's China's Edition

into the photos that he clicked right from the tips of the Himalayas to the temple of Master Shen Jeng (who decided to see Hoffmann after a long wait)! When I saw his photos of China, the sheer sight of those made me hold my breath! Those pictures were so lively, as if I was actually living there, through those photos! Every aspect of those photos – right from the struggle that the kids learning Kung Fu put in it to the calmness and serenity that surrounded the great Master Shen Jeng – all of it was completely mind-boggling! And I guess that’s the exact same time when the little girl in my head woke up from her sleep! And she knocked so hard on my skull that I had to open the protective coverings and let her through into my world! And that little girl taught me how to click

This is a photo of my cousins and my dad

photos – not by measurements and by making angles, but by the depths of my heart, by feeling good about the scene through that cheap lens first, then making it a beautiful picture in my mind and then showing it to others and the world – literally through my eyes! I am an amateur photographer even now, but I think now I am learning and I am on the right path to attaining perfection in my photography!

One Day At A Time

Each day passes by,

So quickly, you don’t even realize;

And then, here we are in a new one,

Regretting, guessing and aiming for another tomorrow!

Wish I had been a little bit more careful;

Wish I could do something like that;

And hence, we keep wishing all the time,

Forgetting every time, to enjoy the moment of bliss!

Nah! One day at a time is something that’s in the books,

Nope, I ain’t talking about that;

I am running out of words to put this logically,

But why not a little more of “now” than “one day”?

Every morning we wake up,

Shrug the hangover off of us;

Get into the bathroom,

Get cleaned for another new day!

We struggle hard and sometimes laze,

Keeping in mind the better tomorrow;

But when tomorrow comes,

We commit, struggle and live for another better tomorrow!

Ever imagined how many “better” tomorrows we might have made to come to life?

Ever imagined how many “best todays” we have leaped on?

One can never go from the digit 1 to 100,

So how can we let go of today and determine what we will be 10 days later?

One step at a time makes a man walk,

A man will die if he hops from one end to another all the time!

How could we forget this?

Bring Me Back To The Passport Office

A little bit of sunshine and a little bit of rain. Took a bath at 7 am, which is just not like me. Watched "Castle" on Star World at 8 am and left for the passport office at 9:30 am. Picked up Amita on my way at The Barrista at 9:50 am. Reached the Passport Office exactly at 10 am. Tell me, now, isn't that a lot more than just "punctual"? That's "superhero"! That is like being at all the right places and doing all the right things. By the way, I have slept only for six hours out of the 28 hours until publishing this post! Whoo! That is being "super - super - hero"! Yay!

Apparently, I loved the premises of that office; what with all the humungous eucalyptus trees and the cool and serene shadows! All except the Rs.5 that they charge per hour for the parking! And they don't take a specific amount on the spot; they are clever and educated no lesser than an H.S.C! Being a lady, I can keep this issue aside, but seriously, don't these guys have any other "PRODUCTIVE" jobs to do? On the other hand, the exceptionally eloquent talks that I had with Amita were more than just verbal - the upshots started showing in reality! There's this verse that factually states,"The sincere desires of the heart are always fulfilled!" Keep this in mind as you read on!

At 10 am I was in the fifth circuit of the queue.  An hour and a half later, I was in the first circuit. A half an hour later, after the big-belly guard checked my papers and the super-hungry-cum-sleepy token-guy gave me my token, I went and stood in the C-3 queue. 

The office is an exceptionally good place, where the tall and thin guys sit, scrutinizing your passport application. ( I even described this counter guy as "tall, thin & 'smart'"! I mean, what got into me to call that guy "smart"?)

We waited then. Amita had left and I had made some cool, new friends there called Cheryl (a sweet girl who had my back there), a Pink Dress Lady (she was very sweet and understanding) and a BVB employee (she was nice to us too)! 

Oh, yeah! The lunch break!

Well, the lunch break was like a half hour break the employees out there get. So it was like 3 pm and I had had no breakfast in the morning and neither did the other girls. So, me and Cheryl went out and got Lays and KrackJack, ate a little outside and sneaked some food inside the "no eatables zone" for the other girls. And trust me, when your stomach is rumbling due to hunger, you definitely will do anything for your 'friend' - even if that means sneaking foodstuffs inside a government office and eating right under the nose of the guard!

 
And then exactly at 3:45 pm my turn with the "tall & thin" counter guy came! Finally! After waiting for 6 hours! 6 special hours wherein I could have done something worthy of doing! And I gave that guy my papers with a smile on my face denoting relief! I called him "bhaiyya"! He saw my documents and gave me a smile! I looked at the rest of the applicants with a smile! And so, only a smile could define that moment which came after a long haul!

And then that "tall & thin" guy said, with real light-weighed words,"YOUR DOCUMENTS ARE NOT SUFFICIENT!" 

And all I could say was, "BITE ME!"