Moments so Far ...

Aloo's village is on a plain table land on top of a hill belonging to western ghats. The mumbai local can take you to within 4-5 Kms from his residence. He was inducted into services when in Nineteen Seventees there was labor shortage and then scouts would be sent to nearby Adivasi villages asking if anyone was interested in job. His wife passed away sometimes back and now his complete salary goes for the welfare of his two sons. The eldest with his wife just came back from jungle after cutting wood for their fuel needs. The son only had a blue short and a muscular body drenced in sweat. The wife had skirt like saree and a blouse. That is the standard dress for a normal adivasi. Only thing that distinguished them from us was their instant happiness. They were glad and unihibited in interacting with us. The smile baring all teeth while talking was a glowing tribute that man can be happy in most isolated of places even if he was just returning from cutting wood. Most of elders go to ...

Government can bring out policy for promoting rural tourism and help it reach all deserving villages. Ensure that villages are not discriminated based on history,geography,demography,religion or natural location. Build a belief that every village has got the potential. Ensure that any village can be converted into a tourist destination without any administrative hassles. A single form/application from any social entrepreneur should take care of recognizing that village as a tourist destination, form necessary trusts for financial transactions. Ensure that most of the funds is managed by village self help group/cooperative/trusts. All revenue generated directly or indirectly through rural tourism should be tax free. Please add to the list. I am not good at policymaking.

Suppose you are developing the concept of rural tourism for a village. You start getting enquiries for weekdays trip or for bulk booking say 50+ people or for overnight stays. Now what will you do? You only thought that the village could be a weekend destination with 10-15 people per day but its not. I would recommend that you discuss the same with your local connect and lt him have a internal discussions with various stakeholders in village and come back with his commitment. Show him the stretch goals but do not enforce them. Its their village and they know best as to how much capacity they can build and how much timeoff they can take from their routine farming tasks. Its their business to decide how much they want to take/make? Its not easy for them to accept money in return for the hospitality they provide, they treat it as their duty and do it out of pure love. You may want to go beyond tourism development and will get an urge to develop village. Resist your urge and allo...

ASK -- Talk to people who may have links to nearby villages. People who touch your daily life like your security guard,drivers,housekeeping. They may be working in your residence, in your apartment complex, in your neighborhood, at your workplace. Tell them that you would like to spend a day in their village with them. VISIT -- Visit them based on their convenience and walk around their village. Enjoy local hospitality. If possible try to have your local connect arrange for breakfast/lunch. Take photographs and video of the place with their permissions. SPREAD -- Write about your experience in blogs and post photos and videos at web sites. Talk to your family friends and workplace colleagues and arrange another trip with a combination of them. EMPOWER -- Let your local connect start arranging the trips and taking care of everything from transport, to food and acting as local guide. He can make more and more people from village participate in succeeding trips and spreads the goodwill. ...

A trip was organized by team@ruralzing.com for Bangaloreans to visit HaleNijagal on Tumkur road on 25 th November 29, 2007.There were 14 individuals that turned up through either our network or website ( www.ruralzing.com ). Few were on complimentary passes. Everybody paid for the food/guide and transport cost.   There were from diverse backgrounds but all were urban dweller eking out a living in urban Bangalore. They were our guest for the day. The age group would start in twenties and go in early forties. Everybody had a fun-filled day and they left the day wanting to have it started a little earlier. The breakfast, lunch and snacks were prepared at host home. The guide and rural games were organized by the Host. It also included a eco walk through village and its fields and it temples. We met many interesting people enroute and there was lot told about village history, rituals and flora and fauna. The host hospitality was well appreciated and even at the end of tirin...

Vision Create a sustainable brand that can be easily trusted by both urban and rural fraternity. Leverage this brand to build rural centric sustainable business models. Mission a) Build the brand – initial vehicle is tourism the trust – extend team to be all inclusive sustainable business models – offshoot of growth and ideation by rural india b) Grow number of villages and participation within villagers number of urban tourists and participation amongst them network of educationists/NGO’s and government officials c) Develop and nurture Savings habit in rural india. Make them aware of their rights Enable them to highlight their problems and seek its solution through our network. What we are not Advisors Know-all experts What we will not tolerate Insensitivity to either urban or rural folks pride/dignity/culture.

The squirrel was basking in the sunshine. My hands were tightly tied to the body. The chill was nail-biting. The time was 7 in the morning. I called all and gave a enthused GOOD MORNING. I was waiting. There were multiple points and the Tempo traveler (TT) was doing its round.  And it was a long wait because with one smart move I had to further wait till 8:40 to get into the car that was carrying a family for the visit. We went out using the NICE road that exited on Tumkur road. The TT was left behind. We had tea and nariyal-pani at roadside dhaba and coasted along NH4. After crossing Dabbaspeth we saw a tractor with trolley and our entourage romping up and down on it on seeing us. We reached the host house and had a unique form of rice item as breakfast. People were inter-mingling and getting to know each other. We began our eco-walk through village. There were curious onlookers and a nice group followed us too. We chatted with few on before reaching the place where caps...

A simple question. Few complex answers. It is easy to list the questions. It is difficult to explore answers. Therefore I will list only and allow you to explore. Why do I randomly browse Internet? Is it to kill time? Is it to learn? What do I want to achieve in the next 2 hours? Or can I simply attempt to do something with focus and attention and in order to meet an objective? Why does the mind scheme, calculate and nurse a hurt? What is the objective in getting back at someone with equal animosity and hurt-back? Why are hurt resident and creativity non-resident in mind? Why did I walk at 5 AM on a Saturday morning? Why do I give so much attention to my child and why is it only sometimes? Why do birds sings, winds blow in face and the nature is scenic spot? Why don’t I buy gold? Why should I give back to society? Why should I live? Why should I die? Why should I participate in this cycle of life? Guruji says "Angst is due to thoughts. Thoughts o...

A little sparrow sat on my window, the road was full of trees on the sides, and in the distant were green fields and clear blue skies and the snowy whites clouds shifted sides two naked kids were playing in the mud as lambs cows moved aside Will I cross horizon to be there or will I continue to visualize   It has been a while since I saw the sparrow fighting for his little space in my house, slipped into the paddy fields, snaked through the ragi farms, climbed and fell from neem tree, gathered dust and sat on top of buffalo. Was it in distant past or will it happen in near future?

Lets consider the alternative in a dramatic way. The team has been going to a crowded mall with multiplex, watching a movie in the dark on their separate seat and eating in a food court or nice restaurant with only the nearest four in conversation if at all and rest hidden in the din. The team has been going to a resort with swimming pool, a little playground with some wet patches, a closed TT/badminton room and a garden with few flowers. Everything well laid out and limited property, kind of a zoo where there are predetermined cages for inmates to choose from. The team has been going to a game alley, again a crowded haven these days with loud music and excess light, sometimes too bright, throwing balls, dancing to graphics and repeated computer noise or riding simulated bikes. Lets consider a rural setting for a while. An open green field, open skies, friendly people. A series of activities to choose from like hiking, walking, resting or listening and witnessing to another l...

It is dark and lives in a glass bowl of water, flapping its gills and tails as it waits for two granules of food twice a day. She is alone and restless and the only activity is vigorous movement. Some of her brethren live in wells, some in ponds, some in rivers and rest in seas and oceans. I am dark and live in a 1400 square foot apartment of concrete in a structure that’s 14 floors, facing another of 14 floor. My waking hours are mostly spent in commute and in office campus except for few in morning and evening which I either have for me or family/friends. I am restless as my limbs move, my mind and the muscles and the simulation it creates generates excitement during the passage of time. Some of my brethren live on street, on the ground and under the blue sky, some in villages and some in cities, divided by boundaries of nation and mind. Some skies are polluted and some are clear and star studded on a chilly wintry night.

It was a small hut where goats and their young ones stay. The door is small so you have to bent and go in. The place smells of cow dung and the cows have been out for a stroll. Cute little goats were jumping around with ropes tied to their neck. The older ones are killed for human consumption. There was a small mud wall dividing the hut into a dark alley where nothing was visible. A voice was heard and I wondered how darkness could talk. Something in kannada was spoken that meant who is that. Our eyes had not still adjusted to dark inside and we could only hear. I felt eerie as two white spots became clear to my sight that happened to be sockets of his eyes. An old man was sitting on the cot, he must have been lying but woke up with the chatter that we created. Is that what happens to humans once they lose sight as rest of us live in good fresh concrete and they have to share smelly muddy indoors with goats and cows? Meals would come to him thrice a day by a lady in the family an...

The beauty. The corn was young, soft and sweet and the fibers were silk. The tank was always there on the sides but until you climbed the bund it was never in sight. The fields are green and wet as we gingerly walked between them trying hard not to slip. The areca nuts(betal nuts) were reddish brown, lying in open, soaking sunlight to turn brown and white before they stimulated a person's taste buds. The plate on which a type of rice was served was thick,creamy,soft and was stripped from a areca nut tree. The rice itself had raw mango flavor but the fruit responsible was a mix of lime and lemon.The water pump had under ground cold water gushing out and relaxed the tired body when touched. The cow dung was fresh and on the streets.The big tree simply wanted you to sit. The lunch had raagi balls and its a challenge to gulp it without turning your tummy. The hill with view do not allow you to blink the eye. You are left wanting to explore more,climb more,dive more and walk more. Peopl...

Everyday we travel by Hosur road and most of the days we hear stories about accidents but today a dumper met our bus from behind and crashed into the barricades in the side that are erected for construction of elevated highway. The front glasses of dumper truck had smashed. I don’t know what happened to the driver. It surely did scare the hell out of us. Life suddenly seems precious again and do we need to barter it on our daily commute to office.  

the beauty Mr KondandaRamu's father slit the ripe tender coconut with sharp knife made in 1943 and his son was on top of coconut tree felling the green coconuts. They refused money for they said when you have made the effort of coming from city then its no effort for them and even otherwise so the monkeys would have anyways taken them away. We drank without straw and some of the water spilled over most of us. Mr KondandaRamu's son Harsha showed the Raagi fields and Mulberry plantations and we played frisbee in open fields facing beautiful hills that are soon to be extinct by granite merchants. Some of us drank water from open borewell that were irrigating the fields. Evening was spent at meditation center of art of living ashram. The sun was going down horizon in the beautifully reddish orange lit skin. We ordered something else but ended up having idlies at the restaurant there. the beast We took a wrong turn after leaving electronics city and reached Anekal road instead of Go...

The beauty: Clouds appearing and flowing past you climbing the hills and blurring the vision one second and next clearing and giving a glimpse into mother nature’s beautiful creation. You are at such a height that human existence ceases to be visible. There seems to be no houses nor vehicles nor the associated noises until the sun sets and night becomes black do you realize the the golden glitter and diamond studs that humanity has created through its lighting system. The room with view was facing the sun set and the whole world was painted in small hills, some floating in clouds and some were little grey cones. You could jump into the valley and rolled down with greenery. The winds kept talking all through the night and chill forced the hands to tightly wrap around. The clouds simply walk into rooms as uninvited guests and some decide on condense on the wooden door and some simply give a cool bath. The flowers and leaves were in all colors and the nursery was well spaced out. Th...

Prasanna Jyothi is an orphanage run under Prasanna trust chaired by Swami Sukhabodhananda. Its focus is on women empowerment. The place is well maintained and children are treated as their own despite their backgrounds. All girls from LKG to 7 th standard go to an English medium school in Jayanagar 7 th phase and are back in home by 3:30 PM. Current funding is through Prasanna trust and through donations. About Rs 30K is spent per child per annum and the home maintenance goes upto Rs 2 lakhs. Key Areas of growth – self sustainability 1. Catering – Right now they cater to a company on airport road for about 100 plates. They need to reach out to more consistent order base and more exposure through dedicated counter during festival time. Also need to grow into tiffin(morning breakfast/evening dinner) space for bachelors in neighborhood. The caretakers help the grown up girls in cooking. 2. Real estate – They have a site of 30*40 which can be developed into either a...

On ganesh chaturthi day, an auspicious day in hindu calendar that happened to be a Saturday on which we decided to hit the road and explore rural beauty and innocence. We went about 25 kms on kanakapura road. It was a beautiful Saturday morning after the day when office-goers had spent 3-6 hours reaching their 10-20 kms away homes. It was a beautiful cold morning with good cloud cover and we set ourselves for the first random right turn after a beautiful lake. Luckily the village was nearby along side road and we parked the car in front of school with few trucks nearby. We started asking if someone knew hindi/english but people responded that they only knew kannada and telugu. We saw a guy sitting in front of a huge house on the sides of the gate and he happened to know hindi. We explained to him our mission and he asked how many people would be coming next weekend. He even suggested that we should keep a cook but we said it may not be needed as our focus was authentic rural experience...

A yogi by name Ram Ram left his body 7 years ago. He used to dwell in a cave and shooed away deadly snaakes with little stick in hand. We were searching for the ashram but could only see a patch of thick greenery introduced by three Shivalingas in the open. We neared the greenery and found a pathway that bifurcated and we chose one. After few careful steps we were looking at our reflection, then some construction but no sight of humans. We kept helloing for a while and a lady appeared from nowhere and asked what we wanted. Did we know what we wanted? We just mumbled ashram. She said Amma and led us to a terrace like structure which opened to the scenic beauty outside. A lady in white robe appeared in front of us and after a while a yogi made retreat as we were ushered in the room that had a pierced rock, a bed, two chairs,wall paintings and the guru patni, wife of Yogi Ram Ram. We decided to sit on the mat and the lady in white who latter mentioned herself as Uma too sat on bare floor....

blogger for for text,youtube for video,picasa for photos,google maps along with photos for location,revenue sharing with google adwords pick up a theme that appeals to masses like mumbai coast line and develop a story around it and do a daily update on any of social networking site explore the open platforms like facebook/amazon, think of ideas for applications and outsource using "craiglist" develop your personal strategy and execute a business plan conforming to it. The only tools in this age of collaborations are broadband and laptop and you have both of them. Determine who your partners will be, who your customers and how will you sustain your vision. simple words, requires steady clear mind with no constraints, offload your constraints to people who believe in your personality explore ideas , they hook, they hold and they will drive you to develop your professional identity. Your personal identity is intact and preserved and you will be always loved by your...

A gap exists in rural and urban culture. This gap is most felt now as cities outgrow and villages (rural folklore) disappear. It is imperative that responsibility and onus of understanding the rural behavior lies with the urban dweller. Not because he has better opportunities and is more sophisticated but he needs to be sensitized to the rural innocence and culture. The rural world needs to grow on its own.Rural innocence needs to be more widespread than before and we need to stem the rural youth exodus to urban dwellings. One of the way out is through reverse cash flow and creating an economic opportunity landscape around rural ambience. Thus the idea of homestay is proposed and extended to villages around you and you need to take care of them as your own and collaborate with rural folks for village room, village food, village itinerary and a village guide. You can also join group at orkut to further this idea at " rural homestay " or post videos at youtube group ruralhomes...

Some NGO's can become self-sustained over a period of time and then can grow and multiply. Volunteers can focus on cause and its corrective development. The NGO then becomes for profit venture but the funds are utilized for self-growth and sustenance. You can visit NGO around neighborhood and understand their current running/operations. If possible discuss their self-sustenance model and growth. Provide ideas from our shared learnings. If allowed to shoot video then you can interview the volunteers/owners there. You can also shoot the activities that they do there and post them at http://www.youtube.com/group/ngoneighbor. Also you could develop the ideas with like minded people in orkut under community " NGOs around you ". The same has been responded to in linkedin. There is a group in google that is developing similar ideas at http://groups.google.co.in/group/ socialentrepreneur.

I attended the second session/meeting after the inspiring lecture on social entrepreneurship by a lady speaker yesterday. The discussions were on the usual lines and the focus seems to be more on processes,evaluation criteria and what has to be updated to mentor etc., I shifted the focus by giving an example. The builders create the mock flat first to interest the audience before constructing the building. Only then they proceed with the construction. On the same lines we need to pick a few ideas and get people involvement on the same and then build the platform. The problem with the masses is that they need something to hold on to, something they can relate to and something from which they source their inspiration and in this case it should be the idea that all of us can cling on to and identify with. We are here participating to build a entrepreneur platform that has a social angle. Unless you have a cause that you personally feel strongly about you can not involve yourself much. The...

Day 1 I was reading in newspaper that a leopard had entered the civilized area and the photograph had him leaping for and in direction of few policemen who were on their heals and my daughter wondered who was scared of whom as she thought policeman were brave souls. Next day I read in paper that wild animals get killed crossing the national highway. A friend of mine mentioned that three wild elephants got killed while crossing the railway lines in jungles of assam in the dark of the night. Day 3 I had left for office and was settling down in the seat spreading out the newspaper and the bus slowed down in the recently paved new road where people sped their vehicles at will beside puttenahalli lake. It was quite uncharacteristic because these state bus drivers whizz past so early in morning. Suddenly I saw two buffaloes lying beside road and wondered whether they had gone in coma and fell down. As the bus crawled beside them I saw fresh red blood oozing out of them and spreading on the r...

Every moment we breath out we die and every moment we breath in we live. With death we lose past and then with every new breath we compose life. Your future life is composition of these events or karma and you simply add them on to get richer life experience. Therefore it is futile to hold on to dead past and crave for more in the dead future because what you have is this live miniscule moment. Use it to construct or destroy. Anyways destruction is automatic with each passing breath and you can double it up in the life breath too. So the positives like love, compassion, forgiveness, goodwill, innocence and hope can be nurtured as against anger, frustration, hopelessness and hatred.

There is a birthday party in the evening and its the weekend so we are all ready for it. The gift buying happens in afternoon with some additional shopping and then we go on to a restaurant to munch lunch. It was a very sweet lunch and just before the end daughter says "Wait", we wonder why and then she explains that "Mouth fresheners are yet to come!" सौंफ आना तो बाकी है! We go back home and sleep and manage to get back and are lazy to move and wish we could have stayed back at home. The wife is getting ready and the husband is already is keeping a close eye on the watch. We were supposed to be there at 6:30 but now its 7. It happens to be his birthday too but he is preoccupied with getting late and thus ignores the surprise gift that he gets from the wife as it happens to be his birthday too. His anger is supreme and thus reacted causes the wife angst and she too decides to dump the party after spending over a hour doing the make up. He locks himself in room. Ther...

your emotions are like water, they will flow and will always do so until they meet a turbine of action to propel water and show him its true potential. there is turtle that will swim thousands of miles just to lay two hundreds egg on shore of Orrisa but only one of them survives. Will the turtle give up hope saying I take so much pain and I have such a low success rate or will he think that I have the onus to continue my species. These were the thoughts of the founder of Enable India. She said we are all disabled in some sense and her mission is to enable physically challenged to get equal opportunity employment across industries. Every hurdle or the normal way of doing is a challenge, a hindrance, a barrier and therin lies opportunities for innovation. Examples included the hearing impaired petrol pump assistant where in the idea was to capture the customer requirement on a piece of paper with a few text marks. When a cause overrides you dont need slides/graphs/analytics to pursue it,...

  Different strokes.     Background -- a trip to resort from bangalore to mysore to bangalore and time is for lunch in the afternoon.   Arjun says lets have food at floating restaurant. It has lots of variety and is a fun place to take parents too. Devaki, Arjun’s Wife  says No lets go to food court and have separate stuffs. The restaurant serves non-veg and mother may not like it. Arjun drags all to floating restaurant. A Cuckoo is spotted and all laugh. The Devaki says lets sit here. Arjun says its in the way lets sit on the other side. He drags all to other side. The Devaki decides to protest and Arjun thinks that she does not want to go to non-veg counter in front of parents. The parents adjust and go ahead to fill their plates but the Devaki sits around and mother offer to get her plate full. The Arjun is ill and tells this is all exaggeration and dramatics. The Devaki cries. Mother cries. The child questions the mothe...

Brand me please For creative freedom you need a supervisor who empowers you but for your growth you need to market your achievements more strongly in different manners and on multiple occasions. Your supervisor could be weak because of his personality or lack of data points. You cannot control the personality but you can supply the data points. You need to create a plan to generate data points and publish it either daily or weekly as your accomplishments.     Designations and their fallacy Names like project manager and technical architect do not matter. You like to do something and sometimes that something is driven by technical pull or managerial pull say people/customer/technology management. Designations are to play with human need for putting a name that is associated with certain benefits like access to internet or that implies your number of years in job. Ultimately you do what you like to do. If you love people then you would devote most time to people ...

Change agent Is there a fine difference between a change agent and a nagger? I want a behavior change. I want somebody to move from being talking about a goal to move into actionizing that goal. The emphasis is on action rather than on deliberation. Today morning the other person called and I drifted the discussion towards the "You should think more", "You should worry more" and "You should contemplate more." Is negative emphasis on a behavior help it to become more ingrained or will force a revulsion to the same and encourage a person to come out of it and adapt to newer way of living? How much of negative assertion would motivate a person and how much of it will force a person to detest you or the change? Will it help a person to participate in a transition or force a person to give it up totally? Fear I just tapped in the back and the person was shocked as hell and you could almost see blood draining away from her face. She was shatter...

A simple process to manage ideas and help them transform your team. You can use Sharepoint portal solution to manage all these steps. Idea management Friday, June 29, 2007 12:04 PM   Generate Collect from appraisals Brain Storm Prepare Wish Lists   Capture In a team discussion on sharepoint portal email chain Team meeting with note taking   Sort/Categorize Do they sound similar to other? Can you think of one word category or buckets? Prioritize Which address immediate need? What are the current pain points in the team? What would team like to improve in future? There would be three priority level like 1 for immediate,2 for within a month and 3 for this quarter. Action Plan The list of item for next week,fortnight,month and year Tasks Assigns person Create topic/task Give date/dateline   Events helps follow up Recurring weekly ta...

Recently a supermarket opened close to residence and named EverFine. She calls it neverFine. She drops water on floor and I keep on insisting that she will fall if she steps on it. She simply comes again and one hand on sides and other resting on sofa set, with a serious expression on face she says "come to dining table" with a nodding head. It is time for dinner. She wondered where she was when I was a kid. I say she was a bird. I narrate a incident when my parents took me to beach in Bombay and then I was left behind and probably the sea would have consumed me. She said that then a uncle saved you. I wondered how come she knew and she reminded me that she was a bird and was flying above. We have never discussed on cigarette and its ill effects at home but she went ahead and told a friend of her that her father was bad because he smoked.

The occasion was the thirteenth day of mourning and prayer after grandfather passed away. The tickets were booked by my brother using irctc online portal in tatkal quota that roughly translates into current quota. Tatkal used to be 24 hrs before departure of train and I remembered the last time when I traveled in Tatkal, I had to reach reservation center early in morning at about 2:30 AM and had to haggle for space with some touts and shared newspaper to lie for a while before the window opened. It was a huge discomfort. Now the rules are changed and you can do five days in advance. The train was karnataka express leaving Bangalore at 7:20PM and we were not sure about the time of its arrival in Jhansi. We refused to exchange seats with another family who were eight and distributed. The lady pleaded that we were gents and could adjust but he asserted that we had wanted side berth and insisted with out choice. Later we realized that we both were tall and side births were too stuffy and s...

A take on two roles employed and how they look at each other with regards to current and future work Appraisals may 2007 Friday, June 15, 2007 5:05 PM   Appraisals   Feedback For I, the role of manager Small comments make a lot of difference in the team's outlook. Like the one pointed out by a teammate "I was not like this but have become so." The topic was fear of hierarchy. Temper, I guess it can be used based on the need but you should realize that you are using it as a tool. SDLC stages, how to customize it for POC or prototyping kind of project? Mostly all get work based on interests and more than what role demands like in design. More motivational meeting that help set direction and provide focus. Jolly and friendly nature Random movement between tasks Ineffective estimation   For all roles that are for team No design phase. sharing amongst team...

One of the quickest and best discussion that I had during a assertiveness workshop that was followed by some reading and extracted inputs from few past experiences. where to from where are you? Tuesday, June 05, 2007 4:27 PM   "The other person does not listen and only persists with his point of view." Is he aware of this? If yes then there is problem and if not then it can be corrected. He could be because he has been in industry for so long. Did you put across your points? He had 4 points and I had put across 8 to contradict and defend my point of view, but even that does not alter his stand and he persists that this is how you should go about doing it? Are you concerned about RELATIONSHIP and or CONSEQUENCES? No I have a don’t care attitude now. Still think over and relate to these two points.   In the beginning it was yes about relationship because I was pleasing everybody as I was trying to comprehend the culture and I was wo...