Continuing with the series, the next entry in my list is Paytm, which sucks balls.
Paytm is an Indian payment giant. It first entered the market in 2010, when payment and wallet apps were not so popular. But it was in 2016 when the Indian government demonetised major currency notes, that it gained major popularity. No thanks to a front page newspaper advertisement endorsed by the Prime Minister himself. Over the years, Paytm became synonymous with digital payments and every small vendor started accepting it.
Over the years, the app has also turned into one of the finest examples of bloatware. Opening the app takes you to its front page, 80% of which is bloat with only a single bar dedicated to something useful.
Paytm sucks Balls
Scrolling down reveals a never-ending series of advertisements and offers.
What else do you expect from someone who not only looks repulsive, but also acts like this?
https://youtu.be/rbs7adwyd1s
“Impassioned” speech
Frankly speaking, I never understood the concept of keeping your money in a dedicated “wallet”. UPI rightfully took a dent out of this market by bringing the convenience of a wallet to any app while you get to keep your money in your bank account.
I am just glad I don’t have to use their services anymore.
Ever since I moved to Bangkok, I have avoided buying new plants, because I always assumed that this was a temporary arrangement. I bought 1 Palm but that’s it. As it has become more clear that I will be here for a while, I have started considering buying some plants here. Last weekend, I got a Calibrachoa Hybrid.
The Calibrachoa Hybrid, is an evergreen short-lived perennial. Here’s a good website with more information about this plant.
Calibrachoa Hybrid
This plant consists of a lot of dense flowers. My flowers have pink petals and orange centers.
I keep this plant in full sunlight all the time.
The Calibrachoa requires no maintenance at all.
I water it every other day.
I fertilise it every 2 months or when it shows signs of growth.
Here’re some good tools which will help you with your gardening.
Few days after walking out on The Matrix: Resurrections, I realised that the movie I had been waiting for so long deserves at least a full watch. So today, I decided to watch it again, this time all the way through. I also realised that the first time, I had some expectations of what I wanted to see; which I decided to leave behind this time.
The good news is, The Matrix: Resurrections is not as bad as the first 1 hour. The bad news is, it is still pretty average and forgettable.
Unlike the original trilogy, which was a philosophical/existential story with action thrown in, this one is primarily a love story with action thrown in. In the original trilogy, Neo and Smith were 2 sides of the same coin and were shown as a (not romantic) pair. Now it is Neo and Trinity who are an unseparable pair and one cannot function without the other. This is inconsistent with the original trilogy because Neo did just fine without trinity for decades, before being freed. The original trilogy had a serious tone, this one tries to be funny more than once.
Some More Points
Neo now has a new signature move where he can Jedi force-stop everything – bullets, blows, missiles.
The Merovingian is now deranged and suffers from overacting. Looks like he was added for pure nostalgia reasons.
The new Agent Smith is not at all menacing. He tries too hard to sound & act like the original one but comes across as silly. Also, no one knows why he is doing what he is doing. First he beats up Neo something fierce, but later on saves their group.
The new characters like Bugs lack true character, although the new Morpheus is good.
Niobe is a bigger bitch than she was before.
Too many flashbacks from the original trilogy in almost every scene.
The new Architect/Analyst sucks. The last Architect was a suave and calculating program. This one is sexist, gets beaten up by Smith and even gets bitch slapped by Trinity. While the original Architect prided himself on being a program and hence not a liar, this one is a lying, conniving crook.
Priyanka Chopra as Sati with her fake American accent is horrible. I hated seeing her. She cannot compare to the Oracle.
The final action sequence (swarm mode) feels like a zombie movie.
By the end, even Trinity has superpowers like Neo. It is not explained how.
The myth of “The One” has been debunked. Although the Architect confirmed it to be true in The Matrix: Reloaded.
The background score doesn’t really match the mood of the movie.
On a positive note, The Matrix: Resurrections answers quite a lot of questions pending from the original trilogy.
Some Questions Still Remaining
Why did Neo age only 20 years in the real world when 60 years have passed?
How did Neo have powers in the real world in Revolutions?
How is Smith still around, when he was purged at the end of Revolutions? Why didn’t the machines get rid of him, considering he was a problem for them?
Also, the end credits have this version of Wake Up
I have been a huge fan of the original Matrix Trilogy. They were thought-provoking, philosophical movies. So, when The Matrix: Resurrections was announced, I was very excited. I followed its progress for over more than a year. When ticket bookings started, I booked tickets on Day 1 and went to see it on the release weekend.
I have only one thing to say: Lana Wachowski is mentally sick and needs medical help.
The Matrix: Resurrections feels like a fan-made YouTube video, but with real big-name actors and actresses, financed by a reputable studio. From the very first scene, it is evident that the movie was directed by someone with no artistic skills. There’s no story as such, just a collection of bizarre scenes with no connections to each other. I don’t joke when I say that creatively challenged me would have made a better sequel.
Neo is back as Thomas Anderson, who is now a world-famous game developer. He is the developer of the Matrix Trilogy of games, who is forced by his company to develop Part four against his will. He is also a suicide survivor. His favourite thing is repeating “This can’t be real” over and over again and making cringey faces. Also,
Morpheus is somehow Agent Smith
Thomas Anderson’s boss is also somehow Agent Smith
Trinity is “Tiffany”, who people openly call a “MILF”
In the scene where Thomas Anderson meets “Tiffany” for the first time, her son asks him “Are you going to bone my mom?”.
What the fuck did I just see?
I had to pinch myself a few times to check whether I was dreaming or if all this was real. I also kept waiting to see if this was all just a joke and the real movie would start soon. Eventually, I couldn’t take any more and left an hour in. I don’t remember watching a movie this bad that I left before the interval. Even the propaganda video everyone is forced to watch and stand for was more entertaining.
I thought Chronicles of Riddick was the worst sequel ever, but this takes the cake. This is not only the worst sequel ever, but possibly the worst big-budget movie ever made.
I wonder at what point the cast and crew of the movie realised how shitty this movie is going to be and but were too embarassed to back out.
Now please excuse myself while I cleanse my brain by consuming alcohol and pretend that this never happened.
I loved living in Chandigarh and still miss it terribly. There’s something about the well planned, laid back nature of the city that attracts me to it. But it was after I left that place that I began to notice that the boys of Chandigarh were somehow different from the boys in the rest of India. Especially the ones who have stayed there their entire lives and never moved out.
Consider themselves superior to the rest of Indians.
Don’t have much exposure to the world outside their tri-city area. For them everything beyond Delhi is “South India”.
Brag about their “kothis” and discuss their sizes in “marla” and “kanals“.
Plan whose farmhouse they will take girls to, on the weekend.
When going to Sector 17, park their cars in the parking lots at the outer peripheries of the market, where parking is ₹5 cheaper.
Drive scooters/motorcycles/cars starting at the age of 12.
Take the above vehicles on the Gedi Route in the evenings & weekends.
Call Discos and clubs as “disc”.
Those who cannot afford clubbing, drink with friends in the car (Also applicable to West Delhi boys).
Brag about which discos in South Delhi they have visited.
Even if you are from Mohali/Panchkula/Zirakpur, tell people you are from Chandigarh. I myself have been guilty of this.
If you stay in Chandigarh, look down on the people from Mohali/Panchkula/Zirakpur.
If you go to one of the Catholic Boys Schools (St. Johns, St. Anne’s), look down at kids from the other schools.
Casually throw around the name of Le Corbusier to visitors.
Make out with girls in your car, parked in the narrow unpaved road behind the lake.
Always know influential people via someone’s father or uncle. For events, ask these people for free passes, because Chandigarh Boys don’t pay for shit. Also pull favours when caught by police for traffic/underage drinking violations.
On Sundays go to pray at Nada Sahib or Mansa Devi to absolve yourselves of the sins of the week; organize “bhandaras” if sins are especially serious.
When asked where they are from, answer with “The City Beautiful” as if the entire country/world is familiar with this phrase.
Invasion is a Sci-Fi show on Apple TV+. I actually wanted to watch Foundation but it proved too complicated and big for me, so I settled for this. The show has great special effects, good production values & a huge budget. But eventually, it ends up disappointing because of flaws in the story and the annoying characters.
Entitled American Soldier annoyed with the eponymous Invasion, PC: Series TV Online
The story is about the invasion of earth by Aliens. It follows 4 characters around the world affected by the invasion. Like other similar shows and movies, you just know the paths of these characters will merge at some point in the show. I won’t go too much into the story, because it’s the characters who sink the show.
The Characters
Sherrif Tyson is a typical old-school/small-town Sherrif who realises during his retirement party that his career has been too lacklustre. Tyson is played by Sam Neill, who is the only big-name actor in this show. All the trailers of this show focussed mostly on his characters and misled people into thinking that the show revolved around him. Instead, he appears only in one episode, climbs a few ladders, grunts a bit a then dies.
Maliks are an Islamic immigrant family living in New York. The wife is plain-looking and homely, so the husband fucks and impregnates an attractive American woman. As revenge, the wife abandons him twice to die. First time the aliens almost kill him, second time she abandons him to gun-toting vigilantes. The family pretends to be victims of Xenophobia, but the wife proves the entire point of it by stealing an American family’s SUV & abandoning injured patients. At one point another American family provides them shelter, but the Maliks leave them to die. The children only squeal and shriek.
More Characters
Trevante is a typical entitled American soldier posted in Afghanistan. Trevante displays his American values from the very first scene by insulting and abusing Afghans, even those who help him and save him from certain death. He frequently demands locals to help him, steals things from them, all the while abusing them. Trevante continues his entitled behaviour even when he lands in London, demanding Britishers to give him an entire plane to fly him to the US.
Mitsuki is arguably the most irritating character in this show. She is a low-ranking engineer at Japan’s space exploration agency. Being an Asian and a Lesbian at the same time, she satisfies demands for inclusivity and diversity in the show. At work & off, she has no qualms cutting corners and breaking rules to get what she needs. After being fired for indiscipline, she is caught hacking into some servers. She gives her boss a lecture about love & he promptly hands over his all-access card. Mitsuki goes on to hijack the biggest radio telescope of her country without any repercussions. She even develops an AI program to decode Alien language in hours. All the while shedding tears for her presumably perished lover.
Caspar is a British epileptic kid who discovers that the seizures he has been having all his life are actually mind-syncs with the Aliens. He always gets his way because his mixed-race girlfriend shows everyone some shitty sketches he made. They casually convince Trevante to escort them to a hospital to induce a seizure in Caspar. The hospital, full of patients in need of help drops everything to do just that. Eventually, when his eyes roll into his head one last time, you can’t help but hope that he’s dead.
Eventually, the Aliens are defeated in typical American fashion. The Americans fire a nuke at their mother space ship and the alien creatures just drop dead on earth. Even I, an inferior human knows not to create designs with single points of failure.
Eventually, I am glad the season is over and I hope they don’t renew it for a second season.
Food delivery guys suck balls. They have sucked balls on Day 1 and they continue to suck balls everyday since. I have experienced Food Delivery with multiple services and they almost always suck. In India it was Zomato & Uber, In Thailand it is Grab & FoodPanda. These “riders” make an otherwise enjoyable experience unpleasant.
What I Expect
I choose what I want to eat and from where, I make the payment and place the order.
The order magically appears on my doorstep after a reasonable amount of time.
I enjoy my meal in peace.
Those who fulfill the above get a juicy tip and a nice rating.
What I get
Calling me to ask if my order is confirmed. This is very common in Bangkok. You retard, if my order wasn’t confirmed, did I place it (and also paid for it) for shits and giggles? Even if I did, since I have paid for my order, your job is to bring it and not question my judgement.
Calling me to tell me he is bringing my order. This was very common in India. I don’t need you to tell me you are bringing my order. I can see the status on the app.
Calling me to ask my address. Asshole, my address is in my order. Secondly, I have also set my GPS co-ordinates to make things even easier for your retard self.
Calling me to ask for directions. Use the navigation app on your Realme/Redmi phone instead of expecting me to ask you where you are and then give you turn-by-turn directions. I see many delivery guys and cab drivers as well who seem allergic to using the maps app on their Realme/Redmi/Vivo phones.
Calling me from outside my door to tell me they have arrived. Never heard of a thing called a doorbell? If not, just keep the order in front of the door and get the fuck lost.
Riding like maniacs on their ear-splitting mopeds. This one I write as a pedestrian/fellow driver, not as a customer. I think this is partly their fault & partly a result of the unrealistic expectations placed on them by their companies.
Most of these retards actually think they are doing good service by going the extra mile and calling me repeatedly. I understand that these people are underpaid and unskilled but it doesn’t require skill to use the food delivery app and the navigation app (which hopefully they are trained in).
Can’t wait for Drones to take over this job in the future.
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.
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.
I love coffee. In fact I love it as much as I love beer. However, unlike beer, I need coffee. I need it desperately to start my day and function as a human.
Part 1: Cheapdisgusting Coffee
The earliest I can remember drinking coffee is during college, to stay up at night to pretend to study. Since we were poor, it was Nescafé Instant coffee that we had. It was disgusting, but it was stimulating enough to keep one awake. The cold coffee at Anna’s was slightly better, although he didn’t put enough of the powder in, unless you nagged him. Anna also used the same Nescafé instant shit, so there was a theoretical limit to how good it could be.
Now, I would rather have an injection of caffeine directly into my veins than drink this cheap shit.
For the real brewed version, we went to Café Coffee Day or Barista. My favourite drink at Café Coffee Day was Iced Eskimo, a kind of slushy which took a long time to melt and finish. At Barista, I almost always had a Vanilla Frappe. Needless to say, we couldn’t afford this regularly.
During the first few years of work, I alternated between Nescafé instant at home and the office coffee machine. Around this time I also went lactose intolerant so started having my coffee black (Americano).
Part 2: Switch to Brewed Coffee
Eventually, I bought my own cheap brewing machine. I used to buy beans from Barista and used a grinder to grind the beans. I remember once I got coffee beans from Brazil and they were amazing and strong. After I switched back to my regular beans, I had caffeine withdrawal for a week.
Soon, I started suffering from acidity from the strong black coffee.
I read about cold brewing and how it is easier on the stomach, so started doing that. The results were great, but the prep was too troublesome and messy.
I also stopped having coffee after noons, as it didn’t let me sleep at night. I also discovered that the Chinese don’t really drink much coffee and view it as an unhealthy drink; preferring tea instead.
Eventually, we almost stopped going to Cafe Coffee Day and almost always preferred Barista.
Part 3: Sleepy Owl Cold Brew
I came across an advertisement for Sleepy Owl cold brew on Facebook one day. I read that they supplied cold brew concentrate in boxes and immediately ordered some. Soon, I was hooked. It was everything I always wanted:
It was delicious.
No prep required, all one had to do was mix and drink.
It was easy on the stomach, while still packing a punch.
For the next few years, Sleepy Owl poured over ice was all I had at home. I remember during the COVID lockdowns, I was once almost out of it and had to ration till I could get another box delivered.
My Sleepy Owl recipe (after a lot of trial-and-error) was:
225ml water
2 cubes of sugar
75ml Sleepy Owl Cold Brew
I carried Sleepy Owl’s brew bags when I travelled, too.
During this time, I also developed a morning coffee ritual. I wouldn’t look at my phone after waking up. Instead, I would make myself some cold brew and then sit next to the window with my coffee, looking out. I would do nothing else during this time, except sip slowly on my cold brew and savour each sip. I would do this for up to an hour before I would check my phone and start my day. It was beautiful.
Alas, it was not to last forever.
Eventually I moved to Thailand, along with the last 2 boxes of my Sleepy Owl cold brew. They lasted over a month, but eventually I had to look for alternatives.
Part 4: Thailand andNespresso
I looked for Cold Brew in Thailand, but it was rare and not easy to get as concentrate. A fiend of mine suggested Nespresso; so I got a Nespresso machine. It combined the advantages of freshly ground coffee (pods are sealed) and convenience (just pop a pod in and press a button). To keep my acidity in control, I stick to pods with strength levels of 5 and below.
It is no sleepy owl, but at least it tastes good and I can have different flavours every day. My favourite pods are Tokyo Lungo and Shanghai Lungo. My recipe is:
320ml water
2 cubes of sugar
A shot of Nespresso Lungo
There’s no Cafe Coffee Day or Barista here, but I love Cafe Amazon, a Thai coffee chain. I love their Iced Espresso.
My morning coffee is still the best part of my day. I can’t wait to return to India once again and get myself some Sleepy Owl & Barista.
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.
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.
