Waiting List -> Confirmation??

Usually, I never rush to book tickets (even if available) for holiday trips. So this time for coming Ugadi (March 16th), I have booked a train ticket well before for 3A . But no luck, waiting list.

The problem is there is only one suitable train goes from Bangalore to Vijayawada (Howrah- Yeswantpur), which takes around 12-13 hours night journey. It's a comfortable coach if you are lucky enough to get tickets.

Since my 3A ticket is in WL, I have booked TATKAL ticket for the same date. I always fail to book a confirm TATKAL ticket. Again Tatkal WL. So, from the past two days, for every one hour I am checking the chances of confirmation for both the tickets. Another interesting thing is my wife gave one confirm ticket of his colleague. But I am very much scared to go with this ticket.

The fact is like me many people might have booked several tickets for the same train. On top of that they will book bus tickets if the chances are very less for train ticket. Because, WL tickets including TATKAL tickets will be automatically cancelled (IRCTC e-ticket) and remitted to their account if not confirmed.

Last time, I have booked one train ticket (WL) and a bus ticket. Thinking that WL ticket will be automatically cancelled I decided to board the bus. Just before boarding the bus, I called my friend to confirm the status. Unfortunately, the ticket got confirmed. But I couldn't do much at that point. Because of so much uncertainty (may be because of bad-planning, demand) people book several tickets for the same journey. This causes very much inconvenience and trouble to a common passenger. Because of this travel services are making so much money. For a sleeper class ticket train fare is around 280/- and for the same VOLVO ticket costs more than 1200/- .

Anyway, my wait is going to be over by tomorrow.

/Srinivas

My early days of playing with 'Kites'

I think I was in 3rd standard when our family shifted to Vijayawada. In those days every evening I used to watch kites flying over the sky. It was very much amazing (of course even now) to my eyes whenever a kite appears in the sky. During that time my parents used to beat me whenever I ask money for buying a kite (at that time a small one costs 25 paise). Especially my mother treats as a rogue whoever plays with kite. So couldn't get chance for a long time until my cousin visited our house during summer holidays. My cousin is a crazy fellow and I admire him a lot on creative side.

At that time he also doesn't know how to make a kite to fly. So we had wasted almost a dozen kites for the first one to fly. So we used to request, not request, used to beg our 'street kite masters' to make our kite to fly. We call it as "sutram" (formula) for connecting thread (a stranded thread will be connected to the kite in an equilateral triangle) on to the kite.

There was a myth in our minds. If our formula doesn't work we used to run along the street for lifting the kite into the air. So whoever does this we tease them as "parigethe galipatam" and we say it will never fly as its own as the kite learned flying only by running.

It took almost 3-4 years for learning kite dynamics. There is lots and lots of fun in this. We used to fly kites for competitions and for making different and interesting trajectories in the sky. I used to climb tall buildings and making noise over the terrace and finally beaten up by mother.

And now I used to make and balance any kind of kite on my own. Here is a photograph of mine during Sankranthi, playing with kite at RK beach, Visakhapatnam. It was wonderful and fun after a long time.

scary insurance stories

Last Saturday I have asked ICICI prudential insurance agent for better plans and health cover. So, I have asked him to come down to my place to discuss further.

He is an associate financial manager. But he didn't know the simple math to explain the options. Only thing he could say is "This scheme covers for a long period and will give you better cover for you". For every question, he says " I will give you in written form (on a white paper) if some thing is not covered under the policy".

So finally I asked for two days to study the policy terms. Then he started telling one hypothetical scary story. He had issued one policy to one fellow some time back. The policy holder completed all the forms and only pending thing is the cheque collection. So, this insurance agent is about to collect the cheque on the next day. But the policy holder had got cardiac arrest.

Although this is a nonsense story but I could sense the aggressiveness of the insurance agent. His business unit might have targets but this kind of aggressiveness and creating some scary stories to meet his targets is totally nonsense.

The bad thing is I couldn't sleep well that night.

Pro'T' or Anti'T'

Finally, after a long time I went to my mother's work place (Ethipothala, near to Nagarjuna Sagar) and wife's home town, Visakhapatnam.

As usual (even after marriage) I haven't planned for the entire trip. I thought I could manage in Andhra Pradesh. But during this Sankranthi all the routes were very busy. 3 people for every sleeper class berth. I had a funny conversation with Train Ticket Collector while traveling in Visakha express. For berth request he was questioning several times that whether I am Pro-Telangana or Anti-Telangana. I was very much surprised at that moment as I was very much tired and sleepy (time is almost hitting 1 AM). I said "I belong to Vijayawada". He kept silent for a moment and asked the same. I haven't changed my answer. May be he got my opinion, immediately he allocated a berth for my wife.

Anyway, I had a safe and happy journey during this trip for almost 10 days.