Category Archives: Rant

Managers from Hell

Over my 15 years of living a corporate life, I have had many managers. An employee’s satisfaction in their job depends a lot on the kind of manager they have. However, every once in a while comes along a manager from hell and for me it was no different. In my career, I have had 2 managers from hell.

Managers from Hell
Pointy Haired Boss, PC: Pinterest

Manager from Hell-1

I came across this manager in my second job. Let’s call him PS. He was young, energetic and came from a software company. He was one of those who tried to show themselves as cool in front of their employees, but in reality was far from it.

Immediately after taking over our team, he started to stir things up. We were working in shifts and everyone was happy with their shift. He started by suggesting we rotate shifts going forward. Everyone immediately broke into protest and shut his idea down, but it gave a hint about what to expect going forward.

He started to micromanage our team’s work. Out of the blue, he would come and sit behind us staring at our screen or listening to our calls. I remember once I asked him for 1 day leave to attend a friend’s wedding in Kolkata and he refused. I had to fly to Kolkata at the end of my shift, attend the wedding and return before my next shift, all with no sleep.

Needless to say, everyone hated him and wanted him gone. Eventually he ended up irking a senior employee & the employee went high up and got him fired. We all felt sorry for him, but were glad to see him gone.

Manager from Hell-2

I had the misfortune of working with him in my second job. Strangely, it was not while working with him that he caused me grief, but later.

Let’s call him GK. This guy was inept and somewhat stupid. He never interfered in my work, and I was left on auto-pilot for most of the time, which suited us both. The only drawback was that to make up for his ineptitude, he indulged in office activities and pushed others to, too. Things like office decoration, arrangement of parties, sucking up to his bosses & other such activities.

Once, during a an office party, he invited me to come to the dance floor and dance. I was happy drinking in the sidelines, so politely refused. He kept on insisting and I continued to refuse. Eventually he said “will you come dance if I get a pussy attached between my legs?”. From that day forward, I christened him with the nickname of Pussy. Eventually everyone, including other managers started calling him that. He never indicated that he knew or was bothered, but deep down, he hated me for it.

I eventually left the job none the wiser. Years later when I tried coming back to the same company, I was blocked by HR because as it turns out, Pussy had put in a bad review for me just after I left. Also, he blocked my re-hiring when he was asked for feedback. Eventually, I had the last laugh because people higher up than him overrode him and I was hired anyway.

Others

Apart from these 2, I have been lucky to have good managers overall. My current manager is awesome and I am happy with my job because of it.

I suggest everyone in a corporate job or anyone who has had a bad manager to read Dilbert comic strips; you will relate to it. You can setup a subscription here.

Bengali Pride Fact Check

Bengali pride is well known. Bengalis like to share facts about their proud heritage whenever we can. Not so recently, my shemale friend Putki shared the below image with Bengali facts with a photo of an unattractive female, in a group chat. So, I decided to check some of these facts (and more) myself.

Bengali Pride
Bullshit

Bengali Claims

ClaimTrue?Description
Bengalis are the 2nd in numbers in India.TrueAs per wikipedia, Bengali is the second most widely spoken language in India, after Hindi. Nothing to be proud of, though.
Bengalis are 5th in numbers in AsiaBullshitBut not by much; Bengali has the 6th highest number of speakers in Asia as per wikipedia.
Bengalis are 11th in numbers in the WorldTrueIn fact, as per wikipedia, it is the 5th most widely spoken language in the world, with 4% speakers. Nothing to be proud of, though.
Bengalis are the 4th most richest community in the worldBullshitI could find no evidence backing up this claim and Bengalis are not known to be rich anyways.
35% of NRIs are BengalisBullshitI could find no evidence backing up this claim. Specifically, NRI means “Non Resident Indians”, which excludes Bangladeshi Bengalis.
In 2018 Bengalis will be world No 1 community.BullshitThis one is so hilarious.
Bangla has been declared as the second language of LondonBullshitAlready been debunked
UNESCO has declared Bengali as the sweetest language in the worldBullshitAlready been debunked
Most Indian Nobel prize winners are Bengali/from KolkataBullshitAs per Wikipedia, there have been total 6 Nobel Prize winners with Indian citizenship till date, but out of these only 2 were Bengali.

There have been total 12 Nobel Prize winners with ties to India, but out of these only 4 have some ties to Kolkata.
Only a Bengali has ever won an Oscar from India.BullshitThis may have been true once, but as of 2021 there have been 5 Indians who have won Oscars and the Bengali Oscar was an honorary award.
Bengali “Facts”, debunked

So what?

Bengalis have many things to be proud of, but most of the above are not it. I hope people would stop sharing such bullshit facts on Social Media without checking facts because it is embarrassing for Bengalis, including me.

Bengalis should also realise that the days of Bengali Renaissance are long gone and instead of dwelling on achievements long past, we should focus on the present and future.

I have had it with Seat Swappers

As the title says, I have had it with seat swappers. After years of tolerating (and sometimes accommodating) them, I have no patience with such people anymore.

I wouldn’t be wrong to say that most Indians are seat swappers and almost all seat swappers are Indians. Seat swapping is an integral part of an Indian’s psyche.

Their mission goes something like this:

  1. Buy bus/train/plane tickets for yourself and your family members/friends, knowing full well you are not sitting together. Don’t rectify the situation by selecting your seat online.
  2. Show up on the date of the journey and board said vehicle, nonchalantly.
  3. Once on-board, look for an unsuspecting victim whose seat you like.
  4. Walk up to them and politely ask/demand that they swap their seats with you.
  5. If refused, give them a nasty look and find another victim.
  6. Repeat steps 3 to 5 till all members of your party are sitting together.

Ever since I was young, I have seen them in action. Whenever you board an Indian transport, you can see people frantically discussing this with each other. I can understand 30-20 years ago, maybe when booking train tickets, you were not allowed to choose seats. In some such cases, seat swapping was necessary. But at least for the last 15 years, Indian train ticketing allows you to ensure all members of your party are sitting together. For airplanes, you could always ask the check-in personnel to give you seats together. For last 15 years, you can select seats right at the time of booking. Same for busses, now. Most providers allow this for free or for a very small charge.

Whey then, do seat swappers exist? They exist because these bastards are too lazy to do even the bare minimum mentioned above and select seats. Sitting with the rest of their group is important for them, but not important enough to select seats in advance. Also, these people have no respect for people who did bother to follow the process.

When I travelled regularly for my job, I came across such bastards on almost every single flight out of/to India. In the beginning, mostly, I accommodated them. After that, I started accommodating them, only when the new seat was the same type as my original seat. Sometimes, I went through multiple rounds of seat swapping before being able to settle down.

Eventually, I grew so tired of all this that I started to pretend to sleep after boarding. Still, some shameless people would try to shake me “awake” to swap seats.

I remember one specific incident when I was travelling to Melbourne. I had paid ₹1200 out of my own pocket to reserve a window seat on the Air India flight. As expected, after I settled in, a woman came and started crying that she and her son got different seats and asked me to swap seats. I politely told her I had paid for my seat and I was not moving. She muttered something like “people have no compassion” and started walking away. Already on edge, I immediately lost it and insulted her in front of dozens of people. I told her that if sitting with her son was important for her, she would have paid some money and made sure they had seats together. I was fuming for hours afterwards at the nerve of the woman.

Interestingly, I have seen this behaviour only among Indians. Others either selects seats in advance or don’t care where they sit. In fact on one long-haul flight from Sao Paulo to Dubai, I saw a white woman sitting separately from her 2 daughters (both <10 years) and all of them were perfectly fine and behaved the entire time.

End of Rant.

Die Intel!

My first PC came with an Intel Celeron 400 processor. Back then, I had no idea what I was getting; I was not aware of various PC parts & technologies. All I knew was that a friend of mine had a Pentium III computer and it was better than mine.

Dominance/Monopoly of Intel

Slowly, as I started to explore the world of PCs (with help from Chip and Digit magazines), I became aware of various components inside PCs and different technologies & brands. The market leader for computer processors even back then was Intel. AMD, Via and Cyrix were alternative brands. Over time, I began to hate Intel. I started looking at Intel as a company which made technically good but overpriced processors & indulged in false/misleading advertising.

Intel is Evil
Evil Inside, PC: LogoDix

AMD processors always fascinated me. When the Athlon series launched, I read about its performance with awe. However, AMD, VIA or Cyrix processors were very rarely seen in the real world, outside reviews. Cyrix & Via soon died completely and AMD remained elusive, plagued by overheating issues and solely in the realm of gamers & enthusiasts. When I did my first major PC upgrade, I had to get a Pentium IV because no one would assemble an AMD for me.

In the laptop space, AMD was even rarer. In fact, the first time I saw an AMD laptop was during my college days when Nihit (technically his girlfriend) bought a laptop with an AMD Turion processor.

I remember inheriting a Compaq laptop (which I still have today) from my father and it had an Intel Core 2 Duo processor. When Windows Vista came out, Intel released a beta WDDM driver for the GPU on this laptop, but later discontinued it. Consequently, the laptop couldn’t use Vista’s Aero Glass effect for themes even though the hardware was compatible. My hatred intensified and I swore never to use Intel again.

In 2000, Intel was forced to abandon its IA-64 platform for 64-bit computing and forced to license AMD’s AMD64 technology. They called it x86-64 and had to pay licensing fee to AMD for every processor sold.

My First AMD

In 2006, briefly, for the first time, Intel and AMD both had nearly equal market shares for Desktop CPU shipments. AMD would maintain the neck-neck competition till date, Intel was no more a monopoly. In fact, in 2021, AMD is arguably ahead of Intel.

When I moved to Gurgaon, I decided to assemble a new gaming PC myself, from scratch. I got the AMD FX 6300 and a Radeon GPU, shunning Intel completely. It cost me half of what an equivalent Intel platform would have cost and performed better. There were no heat issues to speak of.

Eventually I bought an Xbox and sold my gaming PC, never to buy a PC again.

Last Tryst with Intel – Surface Pro 3

I was re-introduced to the world of Intel, when my fiend gifted me a Surface Pro 3. To me, the Surface Pro 3 showcased the very worst of Intel. The external hardware, touch screen, keyboard and OS were all amazing. It was the Intel innards which sucked balls.

The Core i7 processor always ran hot, no matter how light the workload. Consequently the fan was always whirring loudly. It was so loud, you couldn’t sleep in the same room with the Surface if it was doing something. Still, the fan was not enough to efficiently cool the Surface and the CPU was throttled <50% most of the time. I had to install an external USB fan to keep it cool; which was ridiculous.

On top of that, it had issues with Sleep which remained unresolved even after many firmware updates over many years. You closed the Surface and put it in your bag expecting it to sleep. It, however kept on running at full throttle and when you got it out to use it later, you saw that the battery was dead. Microsoft blamed Intel drivers and they twiddled their thumbs, as usual.

Eventually, I sold it and got myself an iPad.

ARM and Apple M1

For those who haven’t been keeping track, Apple transitioned their MacBooks from Intel CPUs to in-house ARM based processors in 2020. We (technically, my wife) bought a MacBook with an M1 chip. After using sluggish/hot/battery sucking laptops over the years, the MacBook blew my mind away.

It is as snappy as an iPad, the battery lasts all day (My wife uses it 8-9 hours off the charger) and there’s no fan and no heat to speak of. On top of all this, existing apps made for x86 work flawlessly and with minimum performance penalty. On the other hand, my work laptop (Intel Core i5) doesn’t last more than 2 hours off the charger and any computational effort make its fans sound like a jet plane.

I would not be wrong to say that the M1 is a generational leap ahead in computing from the old/shitty X86 laptops.

The Future

All mobile phones already used ARM processors. Same for all embedded devices and IOT devices. Apple would probably transition their Macs to ARM completely within the next few years. Many custom-made servers operated by the likes of Facebook/Amazon/Google use ARM already, too. In fact, the current world’s most powerful supercomputer also runs on ARM.

Once Microsoft get their x86-64 on ARM emulation to work properly, we should see a significant chunk of Windows ultraportables and laptops move to ARM. I hope AMD embraces the ARM architecture soon, too.

That being said, x86-64 isn’t going away anytime soon. Gaming PCs, Enterprise workstations, legacy applications requiring native x86-64 and most servers would continue to be x86-64 based for the foreseeable future and Intel would probably continue to dominate this space. I just hope they are reduced to shells of their former selves soon and then eventually die.

McDonald’s Doesn’t Suck After All

I remember seeing McDonald’s in American movies and TV shows when I was young. I can recall the hype when their first outlet opened in India back in 1996. Still, it was years later when I first went to my McDonald’s in Mumbai. Although I was fascinated by the drive-through concept, I was much disappointed by the food being served.

McDonald's
Not an Indian McDonald’s, PC: Orange Smile

The burgers were pretty generic, portions small and taste average (at the best). The fries were excellent, but I got turned off from this chain for a long time. I did eat there now and then (especially at the daughter’s insistence), but only when I needed a snack and had no other options. My impression was that they served cheap, sub-standard food, not fit for a proper meal. Why would anyone have things like Aloo Tikki burgers McVeggie burgers for dinner? Why, still, would people boast to be VIP members of the place?

Consequently, even when I travelled to other countries, I never went to their outlets, considering them inferior. But during one of my trips to China, I was in a situation that I had nowhere else to eat, so reluctantly went to a McDonald’s.

When I saw the menu inside, it blew my mind. Unlike India, they had a full menu with proper meals. They had actual Cheeseburgers with proper meat, full rice meals, salads, pies & various other dishes. The portion sizes were huge. Most importantly, everything was really tasty. Unlike a typical Indian fast food outlet, this place was also a proper restaurant. I went back multiple times during that trip alone.

Since then, my impression of McDonald’s has changed considerably. We eat there quite frequently now and hope to continue to do so. Now if only they can stop the McFlurry machines from being out of order every time.

Shittiest Television ADs-2

After 15 years, I bring you the sequel to the shittiest television ADs. I stopped watching live TV many years ago, so have not seen Television ads in a long time. Recently I was watching live coverage of Durga Puja on TV. I came across many shitty ADs. Some of them are presented below for your viewing cringe.

Shitty Television AD-1

realme GT Master Edition

The one above is what inspired me to write this article in the first place. Realme, a shitty brand which caters to Rickshaw Pullers & toilet cleaners claims in this ad that they are “India’s 5G leader”. The only problem is that there’s no 5G in India. So all they have done is sell many cheap 5G handsets to rickshaw pullers and toilet cleaners, a demographic which couldn’t care less for 5G.

Shitty Television AD-2

ABP Ananda

This AD is about ABP Ananda, the premier new channel for Bengalis. The aim of this AD is to inform the viewer how serious they are about journalism. It features a series of journalists (Or TV presenters, I don’t know) in formal wear looking at the camera, making vague gestures. Some of them look angry, some constipated. But the last one, with his protruding sideburns and chubby face really takes the cake.

Shitty Television AD-3

Shitty Television Ad-3

Nothing special about this one except that it looks like someone has pushed a vibrator inside her at 00:09.

Shitty Television AD-4

Shitty Television Ad-4

This one is more elaborate. Akshay Kumar (making his second appearance in this series) is going through an airport. Security asks him if he is carrying anything. He says he is carrying “Dollar”. They all panic and take him to another room to search him for foreign currency. After the attractive security agent pats him down, focusing on the groin area and finds nothing, she asks him where the “Dollar” is. He respectfully asks for permission to pull down his pants. The broad says sure and he does, revealing that “Dollar” is his underwear brand. Instead of beating him to shit for sexual harassment, she loosens her hair and keys in her phone number on his phone. I actually found this AD very funny. Definitely inspired from Axe Ads.

Shitty Television AD-5

https://youtu.be/AlrnnzVvxz0
Shitty Television Ad-5

This above, is a shitty television Ad to beat the shittiest television ads. A (slightly chubby) woman is trying to exercise, but it looks like her watch is possessed and has taken over her left arm. It looks like the best selling smartwatch in the world is too heavy for her to even move properly, despite those chubby arms. On the other hand, the more attractive woman next to her is exercising seamlessly with no issues. And her arms aren’t chubby either, because she’s wearing an AmazFit wearable, which doesn’t weigh you down.

Durga Puja

Durga Puja (Worship of Durga) is the ultimate festival of the Bengali people. Although you cannot deny the religious nature of Durga Puja, it is as much a cultural and a social festival as it is a religious one; which explains my interest in it. Being an Atheist, it is the cultural part which draws me. It is my favourite festival of all time and is something I look forward to, all year, every year.

Durga Puja is celebrated in Autumn, on a date decided by the Hindu calendar, either in late September or early October. It coincides with the North Indian concept of Navratri, but unlike Navratri, we don’t punish ourselves by restricting our diets or eating vegetarian food. Unlike Navratri, Durga Puja is a time to meet people, feast like there’s no tomorrow & gorge on your favourite food, mostly meat.

Durga Puja
Durga, PC: Indiatimes

The Origins (For me)

My memory of the festival from when I was young is that I had no interest in leaving my house to go and see it. In fact, when I lived in Panchkula, one of the Puja committees even awarded me a prize (Set of Sherlock Holmes books, which I treasure to this day) for academic performance. I refused to attend and someone later brought it home for me.

The first time I remember attending a Durga Puja in earnest was when Ritwik Mandal took me to one in Nagpur. I remember he insisted that we have the puja lunch (bhog). They didn’t have cutlery; you were expected to eat rice with your hand. I was struggling and an elderly couple sitting next to us started making fun of me in Bengali, not knowing I could understand them. I took the higher ground and didn’t abuse them.

Slowly, as I attended more and more Pujas, my interest went up. I remember going to the Maddox Square puja once with my cousins when I was in Kolkata. We reached the venue well past midnight; still the atmosphere was electric. There were thousands of people there, chatting with family and friends. The smell of food being prepared wafted through the air. I hung out there for a few hours and headed home. I had not seen anything like it before.

Regular Patron

Eventually, I became a regular patron of Durga Puja, when I moved to Gurgaon and my parents moved there, too. My father had no interest in it, so me and my mother explored the city in search for new Pandals. After marriage, I drew my wife into the mix, too. Slowly we developed our favourite Pandals, although we would go Pandal-hopping to all the major ones in Gurgaon as well as Delhi. When our daughter was born, we got her hooked, too and we developed a predictable schedule.

  1. Few weeks before the start of the Pujas, we would go to Slice of Bengal in CR Park to begin our shopping. My wife and daughter would both get Bengali sarees and other clothing.
  2. We would attend the pre-Pujo fest at the Chittaranjan Park Bangiya Samaj.
  3. On day 5, we would go to the Pandal at Kashmere Gate, see that it is not ready yet and return home disappointed. By next year we would forget this and do the same thing again.
  4. On day 6, we would cover some of the Gurgaon pandals.
  5. Day 7, we would go Pandal Hopping at CR Park in the morning (Including Navapalli, my daughter’s favourite), then go to Oh! Calcutta for lunch and then return home stuffed. In the evenings, we would go to some more pandals in Gurgaon, including my favourite at the DLF Phase 1 community center.
  6. More of the same on Day 8
  7. On the 9th day, we would go to all our favourite ones once again and then bid a tearful goodbye till next year.

I much prefer Delhi & Gurgaon Durga Pujas to Kolkata ones (which are complete carnage).

Disappointing 2021

Durga Puja in 2020 was a subdued affair because of COVID, but there was something, at least. This year’s Durga Puja was a big disappointment. Normally there’s one Bengali group organising it in Bangkok, but this year, there’s nothing. There are no Bengali restaurants in Bangkok either (There are Bangladeshi, but its not the same). So we are sitting at home, watching it on TV.

Hope I am able to enjoy my favourite festival next year, again.

Smells

Out of all the senses, the sense of smell is probably the one I am most sensitive to. Certain smells invoke a very strong emotional response from me. Below is a list of smells that influence me.

The Smells of

  • Old Spice reminds me of my childhood.
  • Cigarette smoke reminds me of my father.
  • Beer reminds me of Sood Sahab.
  • Whiskey reminds me of Sanjay Patel.
  • Weed reminds me of Goru.
  • Damp and mold reminds me of the basement of our house at Panchkula.
  • Diesel Exhaust reminds me of Delhi/Gurgaon.
  • Lemongrass reminds me of Hotel Bonsai at Connaught Place.
  • Lemon reminds me of Lemon Tree Hotels.
  • Nail Polish Remover reminds me of my mother.
  • Naphtha reminds me of my paternal grandparents’ house.
  • Urine reminds me of T-Point Hostel, NC Jindal Public school and my maternal grandparents’ house.
  • Garbage reminds me of Uttar Pradesh.
  • New electronics reminds me of my first computer.
  • Cow-dung reminds me of Mathura and Vrindavan.
  • Panchvati incense reminds of of the Maruti 800 car we had when we moved to Delhi.
  • Nivea deodorant reminds me of São Paulo.
  • Rose reminds me of one time I travelled on Rajdhani Express with my mother.
  • Night Blooming Jasmine reminds me of the festive season in India.

Also, I remember a few distinct smells which I have no names for

  • The distinctive smell of the video game parlour at Jwala Heri market. Might have been some incense that I have never come across anywhere else.
  • The smell of freshly dried clothes out of the dryer provides me a lot of comfort.
  • The earthly smell of cosmetics in and around a Forest Essentials store.
  • The smell of rubber and leather that is omnipresent in old-school shoe stores like Bata.
  • The distinct smell that was prevalent at Tosh Opticals, Paschim Vihar that I once again got a whiff of, at Central few days ago.
  • The smell that comes from desert coolers fitted with new wood fiber.
  • The typical smell of carpet, tablecloth and linen at old-school Indian restaurants & hotels.

American Peculiarities

Below is a list of American Peculiarities that I cannot seem to wrap my head around.

American Peculiarities
Team America, PC: Watch Movies Free Online
  • Not being able to pronounce/spell words properly, simplifying them instead and calling it a new language. Eg Aluminium->Aluminum, Colour->Color.
  • Suing each other for any and every small reason.
  • Calling a liquid “gas”
  • Obsession with cars.
  • Calling a national-level sport “World Series”
  • Meddling in the affairs of other countries for no reason other than to make American weapon manufacturers rich.
  • Using a retarded unit system.
  • Naming kids something, but then shortening their names to something else. Eg. Aaron->Ronnie, Leonard->Lennie. Also how is Bill short for William?
  • Prescription medicines openly advertised on TV and patients asking their doctors for specific brands of medicines.
  • Not being able to think of original names for cities and just copying European city names.
  • Cheerleading.
  • Not knowing where India is.
  • Huge portions of food everywhere. Tremendous quantities of sugar in foods.
  • Calling only “South-East Asians” as “Asians”
  • Calling aerated beverages “soda” or “pop”.
  • Obsessing over the flag and plastering it everywhere.
  • Restaurant staff relying on tips to make ends meet.
  • Have a strange idea of what “freedom” means .
  • Always running short of material when constructing toilet stall doors.
  • Insane medical expenses.
  • Calling a game which is mostly not played with the feet, football.

I will let James Brown explain the rest

James Brown – Living in America

My Worst Purchases-Dyson TP03 Air Purifier

Continuing with my series, the next entry in the list is Dyson TP03 Air purifier.

Dyson TP03
Dyson TP03

It was the day after Diwali 2019 in Gurgaon. Because we Indians cannot celebrate festivals without polluting at least 1 element of nature, the AQI was 1999. I already had air purifiers (Different makes) in all the bedrooms, but it was getting difficult to breathe so we decided to get one for the living room.

We had had a very good experience with the Xiaomi 2S, so we decided to get another one for the living room. Headed out to Ambience Mall (I miss you so much) and went straight to the Xiaomi store. We had already decided what to buy, so I asked the sales guy to bill one for us. Instead, he laughed at us and said “Stock hi nahi hai to kaha se du”. (We don’t have stock where do I give it from?). Angry at his rudeness, we decided to get the Dyson TP03 (Also known as Dyson Pure Cool Link) instead. Surely, compared to the Xiaomi (₹7999) the Dyson (₹29999) would surely be much better? How wrong we were.

Here’re my views after using it for >1 year

+ Is Stylish, looks nice in the living room
+ Setup is easy and app is very nice
+ App can show historical AQI data
– Can only show AQI on a scale from 1-10 (Both the tiny display & the app). No other details
– Is noisy
– Doesn’t really purify very well or fast. On most days, it couldn’t keep up with outside air leaking in
– Since it throws air straight at the user rather than up in the air, in winters it becomes uncomfortable

At the end of the day, I think the company’s Air Multiplier technology is not really suitable for air purifiers. Basically, if the fan draws “X” amount of air from the pedestal (and via the HEPA filter), it draws 15*X amount of air from the back of the air multiplier which doesn’t pass the filter at all. So at any point of time, only 6.66% of air thrown by the purifier is clean/has passed through the filter, compared to 100% for traditional purifiers.

All of this results in a lot of air flow in the (already very cold) room but very little purification. My impression of all this is that Dyson has over-engineered its purifiers for the simple purpose of purifying air. I feel terribly guilty for not buying 2 Xiaomi purifiers for the same price as this and still have cash left over.