Sheer Coincidence or Divine intervention?

Say you decide to take the Shatabdi Express from New Delhi station to Chandigarh, something that you've done at least a hundred times earlier.But this time, there's a real difference. For just after you've boarded the train and reach out for your wallet to pay the coolie, you realise that you've been pick pocketed.

Far more important than the money you've lost are your ID cards, particularly those related to Health and Insurance, which might take upto six months be re-made.

But then you console yourself and finally shrugging your shoulders, you tell yourself that it could have been far worse.And then you carry on with your way of life and living.Exactly two days later, your front door bell rings and standing there, are three young schoolboys. After having introduced themselves, they hand over your wallet...which is now much lighter, but still has all your  6 ID cards!

Looking at your open mouthed surprise, they decide to enlighten you. 

They were on a school trip to the New Delhi Zoo  and saw this wallet thrown in a bin just ahead of the monkey's cages.

So they did simply what they thought they absolutely must.

And brought it back to you.

Image courtesy- Flipkart

Now this would be a story that I would find hard to believe, but I did. For it was told to us by my own father in law, Major General Sampuran  Singh  Ahluwalia some years  back, who is amazed and delighted with this sheer coincidence.

Or I'm left wondering.

Should I re-phrase it as 'Divine intervention'?

The grey Lladro Vase

Crash… went the sound and my heart leapt into my mouth. 

The cleaner was at work and I knew what I’d always feared had happened. I also knew exactly what had been broken, for there was that particular sound that indicated the breaking of exquisitely delicate glass. 

I made my way to our passage, which was where the sound had emanated from, trying not to look as panic stricken as I felt inside and there was the sight and sounds of shards of glass being swept away. The man looked ashen faced and knew that he had done something that he would probably regret for a very long time thereafter. I looked at the remnants of our grey Lladro vase being swept away and along with the sudden dryness in my mouth that threatened to turn to nausea in the very next minute, a hundred thoughts flashed through my mind.

( Pic sourced from the net)

It was exactly nineteen years ago that we had picked up that vase at the Annual Sale of one of the leading stores here and it was easy to recall the pride and joy that we had felt while placing that vase at the exact spot and the even more exact angle that we had wanted. Everything had to be ‘just so’, for we had been eyeing that piece throughout the year, knowing that the best way to get it was when that store went on Sale. 

Time passed, we moved houses, added a whole lot of new things to our collection, some of which were way more expensive than the grey vase, but that vase continued to be one of my favourite things.

I would pass by many a time and glance at it as it stood silently, yet proudly in its place and felt a smile begin. That particular smile that came from the inside, not merely the kind that showed up on the face.

“Sorry Madam”, my thoughts were broken as I heard the sound of a man in great mental stress. He knew very well that there was nothing he could do about it and I realized that only too well myself. 

So I did the next best thing that I could manage at that particular moment in time. “It’s OK,” I told him, “I know that it was an accident, so just be careful while you clear it up, for we don’t want any glass pieces being left behind.” 

And then turned away before he could see the stubborn tears that had welled up and now threatened to spill right over. For that just wouldn’t do now, would it?

Swallowing and heading to the kitchen where I made myself a strong cup of tea, I reflected. 

It was finished, over, and nothing would bring it back to me. As I sipped the calming hot tea, from somewhere at the back of my mind I recalled what my mother had always taught us, albeit in another context, “There’s no looking back, only moving forward.” 

With each sip of the tea came the necessary strength and my resilient nature re-asserted itself and I resolved to do just that.

Stepping out with my head held high, I looked at the man cleaning another section of the house, and happened to catch his eye just as he looked at me. 

And then surprised myself more than I probably did him. 

“Theek Hai," I heard myself saying, “I suppose I could just as easily have broken it myself one day"….”

NB- This piece was originally written for my column My Take in Muscat Daily

Magnificent Prague, an unforgettable visit- my You Tube video

The iconic Charles Bridge, the stunning and legendary Prague Castle which thrives on the legend of Golem and so much more, our daily walks in the old town square, the midnight 

( and really scary) ghost tour, the trip to the Jewish quarter which brought a lump to my throat.

The food, the flowers, the smells, the glorious weather and most of all, the superb architecture of Prague made it an unforgettable trip.

I've tried to encapsulate all these in my You Tube video  and have succeeded to a point.

As to the rest, will leave it for another post on another day.

Would love to hear what you thought, so do tell folks!

The magic of Hauz Khaz fort, New Delhi

" Where journeys end, stories begin".

As a student of History in college followed by Mass Communications as a post graduate subject, I firmly  believe in this beautiful and intriguing phrase. And from the time I actually started writing fiction as a novelist, I've had a wonderful opportunity to have free reign over each of the characters, places and situations that I've first created in my head- then put on paper.

Have I tired of it? In two words, absolutely not.

So in this short piece where I focus on the oft neglected, yet popular with the college going crowd, the  Hauz Khaz fort, I'm going to use that same creative licence and hope you like it.

Emerald green waters, a mysterious walkway, boat rides for those who want to and a place to let your imagination run riot.

You never know who you might meet.

You see, some people claim that they have heard sounds of voices, tinkling of anklets and mysterious shadows in the deep of the night. And with that intriguing thought, its time to focus on the whys and hows of this fort.

Walking into the Hauz Khaz fort and marvelling at the magnificent trees

Established by Alauddin Khilji  in the year 1284, unfortunately, this fort hasn't been maintained or looked after with the respect it deserves. Sadly, the  walls are broken and many of the the engravings faded. 

Built in the ‘medieval history’ era, this fort marks the beginning of the rule of Delhi as the capital of the first Muslim rulers in India. The word 'Hauz' comes from the Urdu language and means a 'pond'.  The  King  of that  time, Alauddin, had commissioned a large pond in this area for the convenience of the inhabitants of Siri Fort, the second city of Delhi. Initially named 'Hauz-i-Khas',  later Firoz Shah Tughlaq got this tank rebuilt as the royal baths and renamed  it 'Hauz-Khas.'

Despite all the odds, and a degree of neglect, this fort still fascinates tourists and locals alike. Its wide lawns are great for kids to play on. With a host of alleys and secret passages, people absolutely love the feel and atmosphere of this fort. For photo enthusiasts, the fort is a great  subject, particularly during sunset and sunrise. The fort overlooks a wide pond which is home to many birds and flowers, adding to its overall charm. 

The beautiful pond

To get a real feel of the fort, please click on my You Tube video just below.

The stories these walls could tell- unending.

As I started by saying, "Where journeys end, stories begin."

Two days and a whole lot of learning at the India Affiliate Summit 2016

Its a great time to be in India and being an advertising, public relations and marketing professional with many years of experience in the Middle East, I'm enjoying the opportunity to be a part of the 'new India' which is surging ahead by leaps and bounds in every field. 

The India Affiliate Summit 2016 was  designed to revolutionize the Affiliate marketplace in India. Held at the Leela Gurgaon on the 1st and 2nd of September and with an opportunity for   networking and observing innovation in its best avatars,  the Summit was segregated to provide all participants the opportunity to hobnob with fellow affiliates and  brands alike, with the Affiliate Street being one of the main attractions.

An Overview- Day I at the India Affiliate Summit, Leela Gurgaon

Initiated by IAMAI to bring affiliates and the performance marketing industry together, it provided  educational sessions on the latest industry issues along with networking opportunities for affiliate marketers.

  

One of the panel discussions 

Starting off with the  interesting theme    'Demystifying New Age Marketing' with the Theme Address by Ms Parul Bhargava, Co Founder and CEO V Commission Media, followed by the Leadership address - 'Constructing a Good Affiliate' programme where the Speaker was Mr Anurag Gupta, Founder and MD, DGM India, the programme elicited a great deal of attention from the packed audience who then followed it up with related  questions and feedback. 

Interspersed with visits to the Affiliate Street, I thoroughly enjoyed the  first day and ensured that I attended each of the sessions.  

The Affiliate Street was a  section completely dedicated to Affiliate marketers and gave all the participants  a chance to immerse, converse and disperse insights on performance-based marketing. - wouldn't be too far fetched if I said that it was a great opportunity  to experience the future of marketing

With publishers, brands, ad networks, bloggers and agencies in attendance, the setup

At Affiliate Street and loving it!

sought to replicate a “marketplace” which  had ‘streets and vendors’ with the main aim of furthering  business’ opportunities through affiliate marketing.

This innovative setup was  intended to encourage healthy competition and bring together the 1500+ delegates and 100+ companies at the Summit.

Affiliate marketing is not a novel concept in India.  However, the proliferation  of the internet and digital mediums have given a new life to affiliate marketing by making it more effective and easy to adopt.

Definitions of affiliate marketing vary from 

'a broad performance based marketing in which one or more affiliates is  rewarded for each customer influenced by the affiliate's own marketing efforts' to a narrow one like ' affiliate marketing is the practice of an advertiser paying a third party to publish ads on their web page.

As monetary compensation, various payment structures exist such as the percentage of sale and a fixed sum for conversion.

Based on the white paper released by the IAMAI at the conference,  currently affiliate marketing accounts for less than 10% of digital marketing spend against 15% in some matured markets. Growth of affiliate marketing spend would be driven by three key factors-

Increasing digital marketing spends

Adoption of affiliate marketing by new industries

Improved ecosystems for affiliate marketing on marketing platforms.

According to Ms Parul Bhargava, CEO V Commission Media Pvt. Ltd, 'Currently the technology in the mobile space is not able to effectively attribute sales to the affiliate which drove the last click. I strongly  believe  that with the power of the media, performance marketing on mobile platform will gain further prominence and the mobile ecosystem would evolve to mirror the internet based ecosystem for affiliate marketing"

All tweets came up on this large screen 

I'm detailing some of the sessions in no particular order of preference so that you can get an idea of the diversity and range a the India Affiliate Summit.

Cracking the Affiliate Marketing Code 

 Featuring Panelists like Ankur Singla, Founder and CEO HelpChat, Rajat Garg, Founder, Shimply, Neha Surekha,VP Marketing and Innovation, Airtel, Abhijit Banerjee, Head Affiliates, V Commission, Nadeesh Ramachandran, Vice President, Sales and Strategy, V Serv, and Saurabh Khemka, Business Head, Affiliate Marketing, NetCORE soltions, it was moderated by Sourabh Gupta, Engagement Manager, Technology and Digital, TATAStrategic Management group. 

Some key points of discussion-

From driving sales to building brands through affiliate marketing

How to identify the right affiliates and incentivise them for improving the brand

How can affiliates position themselves to become an attractive proposition for brands and networks.

Means or the end-Last Click vs Multi Click attribution

Moderated by Ms Parul Bhargava, and panelists like Gaurav Arora, Head, Acquisition Online marketing, Nearbuy, Sharat Krishnan, Vice President, Marketing, Blue Stone.com, Praveen Meloth, Head Marketing, Shop CJ, Ashish Bhatnagar, Head, Mobileand Affiliate Marketing, ShopClues,and Prasad Shejale, Co Founder and CEO, Logic Serve Group, the session covered a wide range of relevant topics, viz.

Is the current norm of last click wins unfair to affiliates?

How feasible is multi click attribution?

How can emerging technologies help in solving this puzzle?

Harsh Agarwal, Founder Shout Me Loud, Day 2
Definitely, one of, if not 'the' most popular speakers at the IAS 2016.

One of the more hard hitting sessions was Ordering its way to growth- Affiliate for E Commerce and Food Tech.

Moderated by Pankaj Gupta, Senior Practice Head-Consumer and retail,TATA Strategic Management Group, and with panelists like Meera Iyer, Head Marketing Big Basket, Shekhar Sharma, National Director, Group M Interaction, Sourav Shah, Head Digital Marketing and CRM,Jubilant Food works and Pramod Rao, Senior VP Marketing and Growth, Zomato, it was really useful!

Another session that I really must mention was the closing one.

Titled 'Into the Crystal Ball, New Age drivers for affiliate marketing' it started off with a packed audience and by the time it was half way through, there were more people standing in all the aisles and listening intently.

With panelists like Sumit Kumar, VP Digital, Oxygen Wallet,  Himanshu Periwal, Vice President , Ixigo, Rohan Bhargava , Co Founder, Cash Karo.com and moderated by Sourabh Gupta, Engagement Manager, Technology and Digital, TATA Strategic Management Group, it clearly showed all the path forward and closed on the very positive note that affiliate marketing is definitely set to be the  'next big thing' as a marketing tool in India.

Dealing with weight woes and the balancing act

As the old adage goes, 'You can never be too rich or too thin' and while I’m not going to debate the first part of that statement, it’s the second part I’m talking about today.

Imagine this scenario (and it's something that almost everybody will identify with almost instantaneously).

You’re at a party and enjoying yourself and a certain lady enters. Now, she’s someone who you haven’t seen for a while, so you can clearly see that she’s gained some weight. That’s when you hear someone  telling her how great she looks and that outfit of hers is 'to die for!' She smiles, says a polite ‘thank you’ and turnsaway to talk to someone else. And then you hear the first lady tell the group of people she’s standing with” Have you seen how much weight she’s gained?”Those words say it all, they define a mindset that people have- that a person must look a certain way and maintain a certain weight and heaven help them if he/she has added a few extra pounds!

Here’s another scenario, you walk into an event and someone tells you that you’ve lost weight. Makes you feel good, doesn’t it? That’s because you have probably made your weight a significant part of your sense of self esteem and because those words touch that part of your psyche, it makesyou feel happy. Each one to their own of course, and I’m no one to pass judgmentbut I’ve known of so many cases where weight gain has made some of my friendsand acquaintances so miserable that they have resorted to shelling out big bucks and going in for weight loss treatments - some of which do work, but an equal number of them don’t. Sadly, the fact of the matter is that weight loss becomes more difficult as a person ages, so for all those over 40 and trying to manage their weight, it would be great to keep that in perspective.

It's no secret that Oprah Winfrey has struggled with her weight for decades. Over the years, she's spoken candidly about bouncing from one diet to the next. In 1992, Oprah lost a considerable amount of weight and by her 50th birthday  in 2004, she seemed to have her health and weight under control. But that weight seems to come backt ime and again and she continues to be candid about it. Watching Aishwarya Rai walking the red carpet at Cannes a few years back was an eye opener. Here was 'the most beautiful woman in the world' with at least 20 extra pounds post motherhood,seemingly happy with the way she looks. In the interview that followed, she talked of coming back to films, but nowhere did I hear her mention her rush to lose that weight. Made me think, how very different her approach was from the Victoria Beckhams and the Beyonces after they had their babies.

On a less serious note, ‘The toughest part of a diet isn't watching what you eat. It's watching what other people eat!’ 

This was a line that I posted on my FB profile some time back and was amazed at the number of comments that it generated. To cut the long story short, most of them were incomplete agreement with the line and ruefully acknowledged that that it was 'oh so true'.

As someone who has been through the ‘Yo Yo’ syndrome myself,I consider myself as somewhat of an authority to talk about it. Diets are indeed a hard act to follow through and it is the easiest thing in the world to fall off the wagon. You gain some, then decide to lose it, which you do up to a point then get fed up, or just plain bored And that’s where the cycle starts all over again. So at this point in my life, this is where I'm at. I eat all that I want to for a few days, then do the balancing act for the next few. That way I'm able to successfully maintain at least the semblance of a ‘status quo’.

But for all that I do/don't do, what I definitely try and do is walk off some of it away. At least five evenings a week I set out and try and do about 30-45 minutes at as brisk a pace that I'm able to manage on that given day. It mostly works for me,  try it and I'm fairly sure that it will work for you as well.

NB- This piece was originally written for my column My Take in Muscat Daily

Monsoon Magic in Delhi-Some photographs

The monsoon is here and love it or hate it, you just can't ignore it.

So while many people will share their stories of waterlogged roads, stalled vehicles and long traffic jams, I thought of sharing some photographs  clicked over the course of the last few days.

Driving towards Rashtrapati Bhavan

Vijay Chowk-in the heart of Delhi

Old and very beautiful- Hauz Khaz

On a lovely afternoon

Looking down and loving it

Of Bygone Days

Another beautiful view

Green, clean Refreshing and 

Of Bygone Days

Mysterious and alluring

Could it possibly be more beautiful?

Would love to know what you thought- so please do let me know.Meantime, don't forget to carry your umbrella whenever you step out.

Wishing all of you a great monsoon !

Adventures of Arabia- A memorable visit Zafraniya in Muscat, Oman

Some time ago, close to sunset, we found ourselves in 'Zafraniya', or as is sometimes better known, Hillat Al Zadjali. It is one of the oldest neighbourhoods in Muscat and certainly one of the prettiest. 

A lovely old home

Unexpected delights

Walking through, we came upon an old graveyard, with some children playing nearby, sometimes even running across the unmarked graves. It all seemed so natural, the 
football, the cycling and the running around. Yet one thought did cross my mind, whose graves were they sometimes stepping on?

Moving on, we came across one of the prettiest houses that I've seen, and here are a couple of pics to show you some of it. It was just like  a picture book house, yet there was a clear difference. It was all so 'lived in' with some hens clucking and eating their grain in the courtyard, kids swinging on their 'jhoolas' and ladies having their tea.

But the 'adventure of Arabia', as I like to term it. wasn't yet over. Moving on, we reached an old Shiva temple where worshippers were just going in for their evening prayer. 

A very old Shiva Temple 

Just as I stepped in the temple bells began to toll, and simultaneously, I could hear the sound of the 'Muezzin' calling the faithful for their evening prayer.

Talk of harmony, it was really and truly in that air...