
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Total recall: Generation 198x

Thursday, December 24, 2009
Anon
On a more personal front, the Hipp is now a little younger, 26 to be precise. He spent the day at work. Rather, he spent the day proofing and checking text on the screen and the page, take it as you will. At night, old and new friends congregated for cakes (yes, there was a cake) and cigarettes. Irony is, the Hipposaur missed out on the 'surprise', being brain fried and desperately in need of smokes. So there he was, late as usual, while his friends made a beeline for the door. "We waited for a long time for you to turn up. Here's your cake. Got work tomorrow. Goodnight."
Surprises, they're so nasty when plans fall apart. Paste that smile in place and grow up, dude. Happy birthday, and same to you.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Hipposaur approves

A friend once said, if you can come home from work, while still clinging on to your sanity and get a good night's sleep, you know you are doing a good job at life.
Another said, at the end of the day (literally) you don't really need much beyond a full belly and a nice place to sleep on for as long as you want.
The Hipposaur likes having such friends.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Put a lid on it
This happens to be one of those posts that have been bugging the Hipposaur (now grown into a fuzzy purple mass) for quite some time. Having lived in a city peppered with convenience stores since the last four years, life could not have been better for our fuzzy friend. That is one of those annoyingly urbane habits that the Hipp has developed of late: browsing through convenience stores; specifically, convenience stores that sell groceries. Nevertheless, the bugger's from Red Bengal ain't he, you might ask, dear reader, why would he do that to himself? Wouldn't he be better off touting a jhola and rushing off to the nearest local produce kirana for his weekly grocery fix?
Truth is, this being a blog would inevitably verge on the confessional, ergo, we ask for your patience.
Truth is, the Hipp is a visual creature, easily excited by bright lights and colourful shelves. The phoren-cutting grocery supermarket therefore becomes his weekly shot of quick-fix-capitalism that helps him trudge through the week in a relative state of functionality. Yes, a shame, but he admits it - the Hipp is a grocery whore, who cannot quite help himself, despite the menacing threat from hawk-eyed employees. And that's where the story gets interesting.
Truth is, clueless employees at any big store freak out the Hipp. Far removed from the neighbourhood kaku selling suspiciously neon-orange labenchus (that is candy for the uninitiated) in south Calcuttan suburbs; the new age convenience store employee is a wholly unexpected force to be reckoned with. Right from the young bunch of ladies caked with way too much foundation who insist on selling a rather hirsute male (the Hipp, that is) skin toners and vegetable protein shampoos, to the obligatory guy at the grocery aisle who will disappear in a cloud of smoke the moment you ask him anything, the Hipposaur has reasons to be afraid. Yet he still stalks the supermarket shelves with a needle and a spoon.
Truth is, supermarket employees are honest folks trying to make ends meet, who share seats while still clutching on to their sweat-stained Hyderabad Central emblazoned caps at the commute, who'll probably strike a decent conversation about current affairs if you make the effort. This is the face of the new urban have-nots, a sizeable pool of unskilled employees at the service sector. However, when they are in the aisle, the Hipposaur is afraid. Right from the eager clerk who would relentlessly spray perfume on strips of paper at the eponymous section, even if you simply want to see the bright bottles (colours are good), to the grinning young man who'll keep nodding to anything you ask him, the supermarket-slash-multi brand store is an esoteric and highly confusing social space. Befuddled? You should be.
Truth is, the Hipposaur does not quite know how to deal with the young lad who will rattle off basenotes and topnotes at the drop of a hat at the perfume section, all the while aware of the fact that the lad in question probably could never afford the decanter of Issey Miyake he's trying so hard to sell. Add to this the fact of the Hipposaur's fuzzy recollections of the abysmal working conditions of employees (damn the stint at the newspaper!), blend this with his general discomfort at uniformed individuals staring him down while making purchases and you have the perfect recipe for social awkwardness.
Truth is, the supermarket system works on the Big Brother ethic, with the clueless employee in the red cap automatically becoming the inevitable front-end punching bag for their well-heeled customers. They are trained to act the way they do, and hang around your neck only because the big man in the suit told them to do so, never mind if its carrots, or Cool Water by Davidoff.
Truth is, the clueless employee in question probably never grew up in a world governed by packaged vegetables and eau de toilette. As the Hipposaur makes his way to the express checkout, a niggling discomfort remains. But hey, someone’s gotta do the dirty job, right? With such capitalist-Zen-sedative explanations abound, troubled souls like the Hipposaur can be at peace, until the next mall visit, that is. After all, he cannot go cold turkey, not after bearing witness to the wonders of packaged carrots and Cool Water by Davidoff. One of these days, he might even burst out of the pro-cap-brahminical closet...
(The author confesses of never having actually used Cool Water by Davidoff. He has, however, pestered employees to give him a whiff of said product, and then deftly pocketed the tester strip thereafter.)
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
what's up with the Hipp?
Monday, January 19, 2009
Big Hunt
So one rather mundane Sunday morning (by morning we imply post 11:27 am) the Hipposaur boards a big blue bus down to Old City. Now the Old City in Hyderabad is one of those rare places that you will find a bi-weekly “chor-bazaar”, as its known here, a flea market, if you will. The market spans the area known as pathergatti till the approach to the Charminar and consists of hawkers setting up shop in makeshift plastic sheets.
What can you expect to find here? Well, ask and you shall be overwhelmed. From broken pieces of cassette tapes, wafer biscuits, telephone sets, bicycle wheels, heavy machinery to vintage collectibles, you’ll find it all here at the Sunday market. Need a charger for your cell phone for 20 bucks? Step right in. Have a fetish for collecting empty perfume bottles? This is the place to be. However, as the word goes, what you see is exactly what you get – no testing, no guarantees. Perchance you prefer the finer things in life, like shards of printed circuit boards, or keyboards without keys, the Sunday market fits the bill perfectly. But once in a while, with enough patience and a few hours at your disposal – you might just discover some authentic drool-worthy objects of desire. The Hipposaur, now having assumed the role of crazed fountain pen collector, at this point decides to jump in.
We spot him rummaging through what looks like bicycle bells and spectacle frames and lo and behold! A clean Parker 45 fountain pen – and the bloody thing works too! For 90 Rupees, he pockets the pen and strides on towards the swelling crowd. Towards Machli Kaman, the north gate of Charminar crossing, he encounters a bunch of shops under the building portico on the left. Yes, they stock pens. Yes the Hipposaur has no self restraint. Ergo, after rummaging around for some 50 minutes, he walks away with a Parker 21 with a broken filler and bent nib (Rs 100), a slightly brassed but smooth-as-hell Sheaffer Triumph Imperial (Rs 250) and (breathe in breathe out) a vintage Sailor pen with a cool 14 carat gold flexible nib (Rs 100…what?!).
And now, kids, for a bit of history. In 1911, a Japanese gentleman, by the name of Kyugoro Sakata was introduced to the fountain pen, as demonstrated by a British sailor who was passing by at that time. Now our man was so impressed by the design and function that he decided to start making such instruments in Japan, using local resources. Till date, the factory of the The Sailor Pen Company at Hiroshima still makes fine writing instruments that have acquired somewhat of a status overhaul in recent times. Now that you are wiser, relax and check out the picture of the Hipposaur’s “Sunday haul” (term courtesy Mr. Vinod Ekbote)
A pretty neat deal, eh? And come free with a moral lesson – patience not only pays, but unloads your rather impoverished wallet in no time.

