Chp 886. Y20 Brainstorming, Aizawl

Have you ever been in a situation where you're invited to an event, and then suddenly asked to speak in front of the audience, that too live-streamed on YouTube by an official Govt of India channel?

Embarrassingly for me, that's what happened last week. :D

So, my dear friend Fela who runs this absolutely fantastic incubator called TiLi (Tharthilthlentu) was hosting a Y20 brainstorming session, in association with G20 (Group of 20, which includes 19 countries and the European Union) to discuss the future of work for the youth of Mizoram in this digital age. 

He had invited me as a guest to the prestigious event!

As you all know, I live at my farm here in Neihbawih. Apart from being a farmer, I also work in the digital industry. It's quite a big deal for me to go all the way to Aizawl, not just because of the distance but also because of my busy work schedule.

But Fela is a good friend and we've had many constructive industry-related conversations. He had even visited me at my farm all the way from Aizawl, so it was only fair that I return the favour and accept his invitation.

Plus, I was really impressed with the list of keynote speakers he had lined up for the event. Mizos who had reached great heights in various sectors. They were:

Lalramsanga Sailo - An IRS officer, Lalramsanga is the Secretary of Labour, Employment, Skill Development, and Entrepreneurship Department (LESDE), Mizoram. He focuses on HRD, skill and entrepreneurship ecosystems, and labour welfare in both organized and unorganized sectors. He is also a research scholar on the Informal Sector Economy in Mizoram.

Dinkima Sailo - Based in Singapore, Dinkima is an international affairs and public policy advisor. He manages the Friedrich Ebert Foundation's geopolitics program, serves as an adjunct professor at the Singapore Institute of Technology, and is a board director at the Arthur Bastings Collective.

Rokimi Khawlhring - An equity analyst, Rokimi began her career at MFS Investment Management in Boston and later joined Sanford C. Bernstein in New York. She now owns a top bakery chain in Aizawl and ventures into various startups while expanding her portfolio as an angel investor.

Danny Hmar - An MBA from IIM Ahmedabad, Danny is currently WFH (working from home) as a Product Marketing Manager at Browserstack, a reputed SaaS company. He loves writing and sharing marketing content on social media and also runs his own marketing initiative cleverly coined "Hmarketing 101".

Jonathan Lalremruata was also one of the keynote speakers, but unfortunately, he had to bail at the last minute due to a family emergency.

Apart from these esteemed keynote speakers, Ali Syed, a Consultant RIS from the Ministry of External Affairs, GOI, gave an introduction about the event and shared his knowledge and experience on what the main intention of this brainstorming event was, as well as the past initiatives undertaken by the Government of India.

And then of course there was none other than the one and only LTL Fela, who moderated the entire event and added his valuable input to the ongoing discussion and presentation, while trying to create a conclusive and compelling deduction that would leave no room for doubt or confusion.

I really wanted to hear what these wonderful speakers had to say and imbibe all their thoughts and wisdom. And so I took a leave from work to attend the event and got ready to leave my farm here at Neihbawih.

Coming down to Aizawl, that was another drama. I had to feed my dogs first before my cab arrived because you know, dogs really don't understand what's going on.

I also had to leave very early because my cab driver told me Durtlang Leitan would be closed from 9AM because they had to clear the landslide debris, and so I had to leave my farm by 7 freaking AM!

Once I reached Aizawl, I had delicious home-cooked food (after such a long time!) and then left for the event, which was located at Mission Veng.

I was one of the early people to reach the venue. :D

It was a closed event, meaning, it was based on invitations only. The names of all the invitees and guests were labelled on their designated chairs. I searched for mine and it was there on the front row, right in front of the keynote speakers, lolz.

Soon, all the keynote speakers arrived and it was time to kickstart the event.

I was able to take really up-close photos of the keynote speakers from where I was sitting. :D

Christopher Lalbiaknia, the secretary of TiLi, gave a hearty welcome address.

After that, as mentioned earlier, Ali Syed from the Ministry of Internal Affairs introduced the event to the audience, covering a lot of interesting topics.

And then one by one, the four esteemed keynote speakers took the stage and left the audience in awe with well-articulated speeches and powerful presentations.

All four speakers spoke about different fields, captivating everybody on the floor. The topics ranged from entrepreneurship to government policies for a more startup-friendly ecosystem to different skills required in today's age of AI to venture capitalism, and so on.

I'm posting a video of the entire event further below. There are so many interesting and motivating takeaways from all their presentations, so I really hope you watch the video. 

A few favourite points of mine are how Dinsanga reinforced the fact that good ideas are not limited to metros and cities but are very much in abundance at distant remote places. Ramsanga interestingly mentioned how the state and central governments are already preparing the youth on AI courses with support from the Ministry of IT. Rinkimi talked about unicorns and how companies get to that stage by disrupting the industry which really inspired the audience. And Danny gave very good demonstrations of the power and capability of AI, and how we must utilise that as a tool rather than opposing it, or even fearing it. 

The audience was captivated. The invitees also consisted of one representative from each college in Aizawl, and it was good to see them gain so much from the speeches. And when they report their experience to their respective institutions, it is bound to pique even more curiosity.

The keynote event ended with an overwhelming ovation. It was truly a day worth spending. After the keynote speeches, it was time for the brainstorming session.

And it was then that Fela dropped a bomb! :D Suddenly he announced that all special guests must also give a short speech!

Initially, when he invited me, he told me that it would be a brainstorming session about different topics. And so I read the portfolio of all the keynote speakers and prepared a list of topics regarding each of their specializations. I was ready to bring those points up so that they could impart their wisdom about it to us and we could all further discuss it.

I mean, I thought that's what the event was going to be about. But nooo, he never said anything about us giving a speech!

So there were five special guests invited: Lalnunpuia - Director Zonet, Vanglaini family and founder of FamCart, Angela Zothanpuii - Director of LESDE, Nicky Puia - Stock trader and Hauva & Sons, Ruth Zothanpuii - Project Coordinator at KAAMT and former Secretary to Member of Planning Commission, and me - a farmer.

Though we were all hesitant to speak, there was nothing we could do when all eyes were on us. Angela didn't come due to last-minute office work, so she escaped. :D Mapuia, Ruth and Nicky eventually gave very inspirational speeches. They all talked about their respective line of work with so much passion and enthusiasm that it was contagious.  

Mapuia shared his vast experience on OTT platforms and monetisation, and how Industry 4.0 is disrupting that sector, as well as his first-hand personal experience on how the digital revolution is affecting his print business. And I must admit, until that day, I realised I have only thought about how my job can be replaced by technology, but I've never really put myself in the shoes of family business owners who have to make the painful decision of laying off people due to technology.

Ruth took the audience through a new and very refreshing topic of performing arts, and how the youth of Mizoram can utilise technology, giving a very good example of how Shakespeare had been integrated into Mizo plays that had really impressed the Planning Commission and National School of Drama.

Nicky immediately took us down memory lane by talking about what life was like in the early digital days, giving an example of how much we used to struggle with Dreamweaver to make a website, lolz, those HTML coding days :D And how today we can just use AI to make a website. He gave many examples of innovative technological ideas he was involved in, as well as new ideas possible in today's technological age which really inspired the young audience.

When it was my turn, I decided to talk about two topics - Remote working and AI. Danny had already covered most of the things I wanted to say, so I had to talk more about my personal experiences. 

However, I did make everyone do a small exercise on how we percept the same instructions, and yet the outcome is not the same in spite of that and then related that to how AI is only as efficient as the person operating it. It was good to see everybody taking part in the exercise.

I also tried to quell the fear of AI by demonstrating a few things AI would not replace, like human emotions and perceptions. I did a small interactive exercise on the decoy effect and how our human minds work in comparative marketing.

Overall, yes, I was unprepared, and I said "right" like a bazillion times! :D But it was good to see that the audience had something to gain from it.

You can see the part where I was speaking in the video below, the video is hosted at the Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports YouTube channel.

But I really do recommend you watch all the other speeches as well. There is a lot to gain from hearing all their insightful speeches, as they not only provided valuable knowledge and expertise in their areas but also instilled a sense of empowerment and motivation.

After this, it was the Q&A round. The energised audience asked all the keynote speakers very interesting and compelling questions.

And of course, the keynote speakers played their role to perfection, answering all questions with profound expertise and leaving the young audience thoroughly inspired and motivated.

Sadly though, all good things must come to an end. We didn't have enough, but it was necessary to call it a day. We had the Vote of thanks delivered by Martha Lalzarmawii and mementoes were presented to all the keynote speakers.

And with that, the memorable event was over.

The keynote speakers with Fela and Ali Syed.

And then with us unprepared special guests in the background. :D

And finally with the entire TiLi team who had made this event a grand success.

And oh, how could I forget about the snacks. There were tons of delicious food served after the event. To Aizawllers, this might be normal, but I hogged on every piece of scrumptious food like it was my last day on earth. :D

All in all, I was really glad so many of our young generations asked very interesting questions. To be frank, when I was their age, I was still playing with GI Joes. Mizoram really has a bright future, as the future of our state depends on the future of our youth.

After the event, there was apparently an after-party type of function, but much as I would love to spend more time with such brilliant people, I had to rush back to Neihbawih because I had to feed my five dogs their dinner.

Such is the life of a single-dad farmer, but that's life. We battle each day as it comes. Thank you so much TiLi and G20 for such an enlightening event filled with profound insights and inspirations. Wishing everybody a great success. Cheers.

Chp 885. Life of a single dad

Life is tough when you're a single dad in your mid 40's with 5 kids.

Five rumbustious kids, all males, running everywhere in the house and destroying anything in their path. Life is a whirlwind of chaos and turmoil, especially when there is no better-half around to help you manage the circus show.

The first thing I must remember when I wake up every morning is whether there is leftover food for them to eat or if I have to cook from scratch. If it's just warming up leftovers, then I can relax a bit, one of those rare breathers. If it's cooking, then I have to cook immediately before I even do my basics like brushing my teeth because the food has to cool down before breakfast time.

And they are such spoilt brats. Any food that is a little over 2 days old, they won't eat! My dad, rest in peace his soul, would have whooped my ass if I refused such food. But of course, I can't whack my kids because woke culture says it is wrong.

I really hate woke culture. How many times my kids woke me up in the middle of the night! So frustrating! Screw you, woke culture. Stop this culture of waking up your parents. Let me sleep, dammit!

Anyhoo, that cycle of cooking repeats in the evening again, after a day spent trying to spare at least 5-10 minutes every hour playing with them from my busy work schedule. After all, I definitely don't want any of them getting inspired by the song "Cats In The Cradle", if you know what I mean.

As dinner time approaches, I have to make sure I cook everything just the way they like it again, or else, tantrums.

But you know what?

Watching them munch away the food I toiled so hard with my bare hands and complained so much about, is all replaced by a sense of fulfilment and joy. For in the act of nourishing their bodies, I am nourished by the light in their eyes, the warmth of their smiles. The hours spent labouring in the kitchen, the weariness that clings to my bones, it is all but a fleeting price to pay for the immeasurable reward of their happiness.

All single dads out there will know how this feels.

Everything. Is. Worth. It.

In the midst of all this, I no longer have the energy to cook my own food. Sometimes I order from nearby Sihphir town, and sometimes I starve. That is the sacrifice we parents make for our beloved children because they mean the world to us.

And in the night, as I gently tuck them all to sleep, one by one, this is perhaps the only time they are obedient, lolz. As I sit in front of my PC trying to wrap up a few deadlines (deadlines I must meet so that I can continue feeding them), I glance at the peaceful embrace of their slumber, like wisps of moonlight, their breaths come soft and rhythmic, harmonizing with the silent cadence of the night.

I sometimes think, do they ever dream, "Daddy is still working" or "Daddy must make ends meet to give us a happier tomorrow"? Perhaps they do. Or at least they do that in my imagination.

As I switch off the lights to call it a night and make sure I have kept all leftovers in the fridge, I tuck in beside my eldest, because he's the only one who sleeps in the same bed with me. The rest have their own beds.

I know that tomorrow the whole cycle will repeat again. In addition to that, the number of times I have to clean their poop or give them a bath they hate will only make my daily routine harder. But as I said, it is worth it.

Being a single dad to five kids is tough, but the emotional benefits you get are truly rewarding. Cheers to all the single dads out there.

Ending this post with a photo of my five adorable kids sleeping peacefully.

Chp 884. Paying My Respects

Last month, I finally came down from my secluded farmhouse on the hilltop of Neihbawih to the hustle and bustle of Aizawl City, because I had to take a flight to Mumbai to attend the memorial service of Sidharth Rao held at his farmhouse.

From my farmhouse to his farmhouse, a melancholic melody played across the moonlit skies, weaving a tapestry of unforgettable memories, hidden beneath a façade of smiles.

As I mentioned in my tribute to Sid, I owe him my entire career. He was not just my mentor or boss, he was my friend and flatmate. The least I could do was travel thousands of miles to pay him my last respects.

[Happier days at our Mumbai apartment with the occasional celebrity guest]

My mom and maid came to the farm to stay in my absence, and I bid a short goodbye to my dogs and left for the city. 

I wanted to give Shweta our mitthi puan. A mitthi puan is our Mizo traditional cloth that is given to the family of a deceased, and back in the day, it was considered honourable as the puan was used to drape the body of the deceased.

Semantically speaking, it is actually a gift for the deceased. Like when my dad passed away and we received a mitthi puan, we didn't say, "We received a mitthi puan", the correct way of saying it was, "My dad received a mitthi puan". Hence, this way, Sid could have a part of my culture with him one last time.

Unfortunately, by the time I reached Aizawl late in the night, every shop was already closed, and my mom who would have new puan with her, was at the farmhouse. Luckily for me, my eldest sister U Lapuii had new puan and she gave it to me, rolled in a newspaper just like how we do it here in Mizoram.

The next morning, I left for the airport.

My flight plan was crazy!

Shweta had already booked a bed for me at their farmhouse where only 20 people could stay. And we're talking about Sidharth Rao, the Godfather and Original Gangsta of Indian digital advertising - there were hundreds of people planning to come for the memorial service and I was indeed fortunate to be one of the 20 people to get a place to stay at their farmhouse.

I definitely didn't want to reach late!

Their farmhouse was 3 hours away from Mumbai, and so calculating backwards, I had to land in Mumbai by at least 6 or 7 PM.

Now that was a problem. If I took the 2 PM Aizawl - Kolkata flight, and then took the next 6 PM Kolkata - Mumbai flight, I would land in Mumbai around 10 PM and would only reach the farmhouse by around 2 AM, when everybody would already be asleep!

That was a definite no.

There was an earlier Kolkata - Mumbai flight, but I wouldn't be able to catch that if I took the 2 PM Aizawl - Kolkata flight. However, if I took the 10 AM Aizawl - Guwahati flight instead and then took the connecting Guwahati - Kolkata flight, I could make it for that flight!

And so, that's what I did.

Yeah, I went all the way up to Guwahati first and then took a connecting flight from there to Kolkata, and then took another flight to Mumbai. :D

Oh by the way, on that Guwahati flight, we nearly died! lolz. My friends LS Zadeng and John Opa JohnOp were also on that same flight so you know I ain't lying, they can vouch for it. We hit the motherload of all air pockets, we went freefalling for 5 seconds and everybody screamed for their lives. 5 seconds may not seem like much to you, but it freaking is when you're 10,000 feet above sea level!

Once we landed at Guwahati, everybody disembarked (and congratulated each other that they were still alive) except for 6 of us who were on the connecting flight to Kolkata. Here is a video I took while we waited inside the plane :D

That was the first time I personally saw the amount of quick "repair" the ground staff had to do in case of a severe air pocket incident. I saw them change at least 5 seats that were soiled with piss or shit or vomit. One of the flight attendants was also injured quite badly and had to be carried outside as she wasn't buckled up when that sudden dive happened, and a replacement attendant quickly arrived. The entire plane was cleansed and purified and then it was back to the usual.

The other passengers came in and my long flight continued. Changed planes at Kolkata and by nightfall, we were approaching Mumbai.

I truly miss this view below. Mumbai, the city of lights, the city that never sleeps.

It's been almost 10 years since I last landed in Mumbai because I never went back to Mumbai again after moving to Pune in 2015.

I landed at 7:30 PM and by the time I got my luggage, ate a quick dinner, took a short dump, and walked out of the terminal, it was almost 8:30 PM.

Shweta told me not to book a pre-paid cab from the airport to their farm as that would cost around 3K. Instead, she told me to book an Ola or Uber outstation cab as it was cheaper. I did just that. And turned out, it was indeed cheaper by almost 50%.

Oh Mumbai. So many memories! It was the place where Sidharth had made me become who I am today from literally a nobody. There are so many things I want to write about, but I'll refrain from that or else this post will be too long.

It was a long 3 hours ride to Kharjat from the airport.

I finally reached Sidharth and Shweta's farm - The Rising Sun Farm by 11:30 PM. 

It was sooooo good to see Shweta again and I gave her a long, big hug. Sid's parents had already gone to sleep by then, but Shweta's mom was still staying up, waiting for me to arrive. So sweet of her.

Our dear friend Karan Bareja was there too, making me take a rum shot before I even paid my cab driver, lolz. I was ushered into the cafeteria, which was apparently the first (and only) building on the farm when Sid had initially bought it. Slowly, he and Shweta took it as a side hobby while running multiple corporations and start-ups, and transformed the entire barren farm into this premium yet rustic weekend getaway for the rich and powerful.

Yup, their farm was NOTHING like my farm, lolz. Very secludedly located away from the maddening noise with so many antique furniture and amenities, it was the perfect place for venture capitalists to finalise their next big investment, or company heads and board members to discuss mergers and acquisitions. 

There were three different cooks running the cafeteria, with all sorts of delicacies served, after all, the culinary desire of their exclusive clientele must always be met. Here are a few photos of the farm cafeteria.

We had such a great time catching up on all our crazy old days and talking about Sidharth. Aunty (Shweta's mom) asked me about all the juicy secrets on how Sid and Shweta started dating, as I was the only one who knew about their initial romancing days, and so I spilled it all out that night. :D

Shweta laughed and cried so much. Tanya, Shweta's best friend, told me that that was the first time she was pouring out her feelings and emotions since Sid passed away, as she was just keeping everything bottled up till then. We were really happy to see her letting it all out. It's better to be a rollercoaster of emotions than an emotional train wreck.

As we continued talking about Sid, we also played only his favourite songs from the music system, and each song had a background story worth sharing.

By around 3 AM, I ate their delicious dinner which was mutton and chicken something.

After that, Karan took me to the cottage we were sharing, and everybody else too went to their respective cottages. Had a great sleep.

The next morning, I got to see more clearly how amazing our cottage was! Just check it out.

Their rain shower in each cottage was Heavenly too. I made two short 30-second videos that I quickly edited on Inshot. :D Looks so nice naw?

And the above videos were from just our one cottage, there's a similar setup on all the other cottages as well!

I went to the cafeteria for breakfast and Sid's sister Natasha and her family were already there and we gave each other a long hug. We continued talking about all the wild Mumbai days while eating delicious misal pav.

Natasha too lived in Bandra and she used to come over to our apartment regularly when she wasn't flying (she's a badass commercial pilot). Sometimes we would have dinner at her apartment too, and other times we would all go on a weekend getaway together, like that time we all went to Almitra Villa, where Sid first fell in love with the idea of having his own farm.

After breakfast, Natasha took me to the memorial garden where Sid's ashes were kept. I didn't take any photos as I felt it was inappropriate. 

It was located at the border of the farm, sealed in a concrete box, and a majestic tree cast its protective shadow over it. Natasha told me that the tree was auspicious. Rays of sunlight filtered through the leafy canopy and a small brook gently flowed right next to it, emitting an aura of serenity like a delicate lullaby, perhaps to signify that this was where Sid's weary soul had finally found eternal solace. 

We spent some more time next to Sid's ashes, sometimes in silence and other times laughing at all the crazy things we did together.

But soon, it was time to get ready for the memorial service. The event management company had arrived and was already starting to set up.

Those of us who stayed the previous night all helped Shweta in managing the upcoming event. Karan, Tanya and I along with the others welcomed all the guests who were starting to arrive one by one.

Most of them were giants of our industry (Indian digital space) and we showed them where to park their cars, where to have lunch, where the toilet is, which cottage to temporarily keep their luggage, where to change if they want to take a quick dip in the swimming pool, etc etc.

I met a lot of my former bosses and colleagues too. It was indeed nostalgic. Most of them had grown fatter, but then again, so did I, lolz. There were at least 10 to 20 co-founders or heads of successful startups and businesses, and all of them testified that Sid had played a crucial role in their endeavours.

I sneaked in for a quick lunch when the cafeteria was least crowded and quickly ate lunch.

After lunch, I had a bit of free time and so I went to look for my precious Saddam. The farmhands were taking him and the other dogs for a walk at the other end of the farm. When I saw Saddam, my heart just broke. He was so old now!

This was him in 2012 when Sid and I first got him, and the other photo below was taken in 2013 when he would just sleep peacefully in my arms, snoring softly like a mini thunderstorm. :D

Though Saddam slept in Sid's room, he slept with me whenever Sid was away on a business trip. I felt a bit sad that he no longer recognised me or my smell, but then again, 10 years is a pretty long time too.

Soon, it was 3 PM. We wanted to wait a bit as many guests were still yet to arrive, but many of those who were already there had a night flight to catch. After all, it was a congregation of some of the busiest people in this cutthroat industry.

And so, the memorial service started.

The particular photo above was taken at the very beginning of the service. It might look like only a few people were there, but like I said, most of the invitees arrived a bit later, and there was also a large number of people standing a bit further away under the tree shades because the seating area was directly under the sun, lolz.

It was already so humid, and on top of that, a direct sunbath meant it was scorching hell. You can see my face completely flustered below. I too joined the people standing under the shade after this photo was taken and never sat down again.

So while some of us were helping Shweta manage the event, the credit for this memorial service should go to Meghna, Tanvi and others who organised the entire thing. They were the ones who coordinated everything from inviting people, setting up the right date and venue, etc.

Meghna, or Meg as I fondly call her, was my copy boss at Webchutney. I learnt everything about copywriting from her. She was the one who saw my raw, unfettered creativity and moulded that into a powerful weapon of words. She not only taught me about copywriting but also guided me on how to understand different brand languages, how to conceptualise ideas properly, how to speak to a target audience more efficiently, and so on. That day, Meg was the MC.

After a very moving eulogy, Meg opened the floor to anybody who would like to share their story or testimonials.

One by one, people stood up and shared their experiences. They were all so interesting and moving, with stories ranging from what Sid was going through when he first started Webchutney in 1999, the conversations he had with others when starting a new division, or how this or that got funded, and so on. So many great stories, all narrated by very well-articulated leaders. And most of the speech ended with how Sid had played a vital role in their careers, just like me!

Meg came to me and asked if I too would like to share my testimonial with everybody. I mean I would, but most of the stuff I would want to share was all very personal, and I was happy to have done that with our close circle the previous night.

We took a short snack break.

By then, there was a very large crowd. I met a lot of people I had met back when I was living with Sid, and it was so nice to say hi to them again. And then suddenly I met Mandeep Singh, our landlord! He apparently flew in all the way from Kuwait just to make it for the memorial service.

He brought his daughter along, and he told me she got a very good internship all because of Sid's recommendation. Man, it wasn't just us digital marketing people, Sid's benevolence was affecting everybody.

I also met our two former office-boys Ram Singh and Vijay, who took the effort to come by train till Kharjat railway station and took a bus from there. Everywhere I looked, there were people who had nothing but appreciation for what Sid had done for them.

Around 7 PM, the on-ground open-mic session ended and the online session started. This was for those who couldn't make it to the venue. Meg and the other organisers had already created a Zoom link and hundreds of people were online. They too shared their tearful testimonials one by one in front of everybody.

The event was finally over by 9 PM. A couple of people who had to go to the airport directly took a shower in our cottage, while others who had an early morning flight could stay over for the night. As for me, I packed my bags as I was leaving with Amit and Sonal.

I found Shweta at the cafeteria and I could make out she was extremely exhausted and emotionally drained, but being her, she was still putting up a strong and brave face. I gave her a long hug goodbye and then presented her our mitthi puan, while explaining its significance in our Mizo culture.

I promised her that I would come back to visit again.

By the way, Shweta was personally gifting 2-3 boxes of mangoes to every person! She insisted that it was what Sidharth would have wanted, as the mangoes were all from their farm. All those trees you saw in the photos above were all mango trees, and with the region extremely humid, it had the perfect growing condition.

As I headed to Amit's car, I saw Saddam slowly stumbling and sniffing on plants, and so I spent a few more minutes with him. I tried my best not to cry, but to no avail. 

Considering his current physical condition (old age, blind in one eye, bone issues) and emotional condition (Sid had looked after him since he was a puppy), there's a chance that I might not see him again when I visit next. Reading my old blog updates now like Hello Saddam about when he first came into our lives makes me even sadder.

A big thanks once again to Meg, Tanvi and others for organising this heartrending memorial service. Tanvi reached out to everybody asking for photos of Sid, and those photos were played on a loop in the background during the open-mic session.

When I was looking for photos of Sid to send to Tanvi, I found many of them, some of which cannot be put online of course, lolz. But here are two photos I really love and that's because they were taken at Toto's, Bandra, Sid's favourite watering hole. It's the one place where Sid was always the happiest. And you have no idea how many business deals were done or career-changing advice given here. 

That's why earlier this month on June 2nd, Sid's birthday, friends of Sid and regular patrons of Toto's had put up this plaque to permanently adorn the walls of Toto's and immortalise Sid! SID 2679. Cheers indeed.

I'll end this post with another photo I really like. I took this on June 2nd, 2013. An entire pub was booked for Sid's surprise birthday party, and in the pic is Anant Rangaswami, who was our regular guest at 4B Sea Hill apartment and Sid's very close friend. He passed away last year. Now I know the two of them are reunited once again and toasting together, having a jolly great time. 

All in all, it was a very memorable journey. A part of me was also satisfied that I participated or else I would have regretted not going for the rest of my life. I smiled as I headed back to my much less elegant farmhouse at Neihbawih, Mizoram.

Chp 883. Starting afresh... again

This had been the longest break I've ever taken from blogging since I started blogging 19 years ago.

There were many reasons why I just lost interest in blogging for the past one year, from personal reasons, to having to use this platform's unfriendly User Interface that seems to be stuck in 2010, to having a completely screwed-up AdSense integration, to the simple fact that people just don't read blogs anymore.

But being a blogger for 19 years, it has become a part of my identity now. It is who I am, whether I like it or not. So, here is me, an old fart blogger, cracking my knuckles one more time to give blogging one more shot.

I will be doing two things very differently this time though.

#1. No more MS Word. 

I always used to write my blog on a Microsoft Word document first. Back in 2004 when I first started blogging, internet was expensive. Gen-Z may never understand this, but I used to update my blog by going to a cyber cafe, google all the info I want to know about or require as references, copy them to a floppy drive, rush back to my hostel and then copy the files to my offline computer, read them, and then open an MS word file and start writing.

Once I was done writing, I would copy the Word doc back to the floppy, run back to the internet cafe, open my Word doc from the floppy drive, copy the content and then update my blog. Phew!

Yeah, life was something else back then.:D

And as the years passed by, technology improved. Pen drives replaced Floppies, and affordable home internet connections replaced Cyber cafes. Smartphones too entered the market and suddenly we had the internet right in our pockets! Who would have thunk?

However, my habit of writing a blog post on an MS Word file never ceased. I continued doing that but I started facing a lot of issues.

Let me try to explain this as simply as I can. 

Back in the early 2000s (when Google had just acquired this blogging platform), I could just copy-paste whatever I wrote on a Word doc to my blog and that was it. Everything was fine.

Then came the change in Blogger.com's CMS (Content Management System) and suddenly everything I copied also copied the hidden MS Word unicode characters and pasted them on my blog update! It was a shitstorm of texts and strange symbols everywhere. And so I would first copy-paste what I had written on a Word doc to a Text document to remove all the formatting, and THEN copy-paste that to my blog again.

That worked for a couple of years, until Blogger.com suddenly decided to follow what Wordpress was doing back then and became a WYSIWYG editor. That is "What You See Is What You Get", meaning, whatever you type on any text editor, it will appear exactly like that online.

And so, again I had to change the steps in which I would copy-paste. The good thing about that is that if I had put a paragraph or italics on my Word document and copy-pasted that to my blog, it would also put a paragraph or italic in my blog editor, and so on.

All was well for a couple of years, until Blogger.com suddenly changed their CMS again. Now it was no longer WYSIWYG. I mean, it's still WYSIWIG to an extent, but only if you were typing on the platform's editor. Anything pasted from outside to the platform's editor was no longer WYSIWG. For example, a paragraph or a quote or a line break was no longer recognised as that after copy-pasting it. My blog post became a clusterfuck of words and sentences all joined together after copy-pasting!

After a couple of weeks of frustration, I found out the only way to tackle that was either to use this platform's editor directly, or to manually put HTML commands in my Word doc itself while writing my blog post.

I told myself I wasn't going to succumb to Google's demand. I'm a rebel, hell yeah. And so for every blog post I was writing on a Word doc, I was also including different HTML commands like breaks and paragraphs, as well as div, span, font face, size, alignment, a href, img src, etc., right in the middle of my blog content!

Yeah, you really have no idea what was going on behind the scenes of my blog updates, lolz.

And that worked well when I copy-pasted from a Word doc to here, except for the fact that I had to spend so many extra minutes writing all the HTML commands.

The reason for all these restrictions is, I guess Google's marketing execs want bloggers to write directly on their platform itself, instead of using a third-party software. After all, more time spent on their platform means higher retention, longer session duration, more engagement time, higher CTR and conversion rate etc etc, which will give these execs a nice bonus on their next Quarterly meet. 

Now that I'm finally going to start blogging again, yeah, screw my defiance. I surrender to Google. I will be writing directly on this platform for any new updates from now on, including this post. I no longer have the time or energy to do those extra things. You win, Google. You happy? 

Kima - 0, Evil Corporation - 1. :P

#2. Image hosting sites. 

This is the second big change I'm making.

For years, the biggest headache I have when it comes to my blog update is where I'm hosting my images.

To a layman, let me explain. If you want to put an image on your blog post, you have to upload it somewhere and then embed that image on your blog post. The place where you upload it is called an image hosting site. Many people use the default Google Photos or Google Drive image gallery to upload their blog images now, but back then, there were no such things as Google Photos or Drive. We had to host our blog images elsewhere.

I selected Photobucket as it was the most popular image hosting site back then, and being a bit OCD about the way I arrange my image folders, I was able to do that neatly at Photobucket.

All went well for a couple of years, until I crossed the free limit. I could no longer upload any new images unless I pay, and I really don't blame them for that, after all, they also need to earn some money right?

I became a premium member.

I think that happened around 2008'ish because I was working and had a credit card by then. Since I already had hundreds of blog posts and images, I didn't want to change my hosting service provider and so I was paying $9.99 per month with by credit card for the additional storage space and bandwidth.

And that went well for a couple of years, until 2017, when Photobucket dropped a mega bomb. They removed all free accounts, including lower-tiered premium accounts like mine that were paying $9.99 per month, and suddenly charged an exorbitant $399.99 annual fee to continue using their service!

That was such a dick move. By then I already had more than 650 blog posts with over 2000 images in my Photobucket account. My 650+ blog posts no longer displayed any images and all Photobucket accounts across the world were held at ransom. Yup, there was indeed a severe backlash. People started migrating to other service providers (we couldn't even access our accounts to download our old images).

A year later, they introduced a much lower fee but I'm sure there were hardly any takers. They had already broken our trust completely.

I shifted to AWS to host my blog images and set up my own server there.

That went well for a couple of years and I was paying around ₹ 100 a month on bandwidth usage, sometimes up to ₹ 500 if I had a series of "hit" blog posts.

Now a bandwidth usage is the amount I get charged every time people visit my blog and view the images on that post. Let me explain it this way. Suppose I write a new blog post, where I have put 10 new images. I upload those images to my AWS server. Now when you visit my new blog post, my HTML sends a message request to my AWS server to display the images embedded in that post. Every time AWS displays an image to a new user, it charges me. That is known as bandwidth usage.

And I was okay with paying ₹ 100 to ₹ 500 per month, you know, until CoVid happened and one of my blog posts went viral!

It was the Mizoram: Setting an example for India post, which had over a lakh views. Now, a lakh may not be much, but that post had more than 50 high-resolution images! My bandwidth usage charge was shooting up like crazy, in real-time! I was panicking (at the same time excited my post about Mizoram was going viral across India, with many renowned celebrities sharing it).

I watched my bill shooting up every minute! I couldn't disable the images because there were like 1000 unique visitors every hour. And so I quickly resized each image quality from 10MB to 2MB and replaced it with the same file name in my AWS folder.

That reduced my cost vastly, but it was still going up as the number of unique visitors kept increasing.

And so the next day, I created a free account at Imgur, another popular image hosting site, uploaded the same images there and then edited that viral blog post and linked the images to my new Imgur account instead.

The exponentially rising AWS cost finally stopped completely. Phew!

You know how much my AWS bill for that month came to? 

₹ 7000!!!!

Yeah, that was so sad.

I stopped using AWS after that, and continued using Imgur for all my blog image hosting.

But again, the problem with Imgur is that, even though I absolutely love it so far, who knows, one fine day, they just might go the Photobucket way and screw me all over again. After all, capitalism.

Instead, I might as well just host all my blog images here on Google Drive itself, especially since I am already paying extra for the additional 100 GB a year. Like, if Google decides to screw me one fine day, then it will be just Google screwing me and not 4-5 different companies screwing me together. The lesser of two evils, lolz.

You hear that Google? You win this round too.

The only problem is, like I said at the very beginning of this post, Blogger.com's UI is extremely outdated. Like, if I am inserting an image, whether I link the image to my Google Drive or Imgur, I only have the option of selecting which FIXED size I want the image to be displayed as here. Like seriously??? 

We're living in the age of "responsive design" where people can access blogs from all sorts of devices, from desktop computers to tablets to phones to VR headsets to even a freaking washing machine. Fixed widths cannot cater to all these different resolutions because this platform's template hasn't been designed to handle it. And so keeping a fixed-width image will display differently across different mediums.

Hence, for now, the only solution to prevent this is to add the <img width="100%"> command in the HTML section of each blog post image. Sad.

The other even sadder part is, Google Drive photos cannot be embedded directly on a blog. I mean I can see it on my browser after I embed it because I am logged in with my Google ID on my browser, but you won't be able to see it even if the image is set to public view.

So apparently, there is a different embedded link for each Google Drive image link (which begs the question, what is the point of having the privacy setting of public or private then?). I know, such a roundabout.

So, after a couple of trial and error and reading up different forums, I found the two best solutions to tackle this:

The first is this post by Temitope Ayodele who tells us to simply replace the Google Drive image link with a different link (mentioned in the link) and we just have to insert that image's ID in it. This works.

The second is an embedded link generator by Labnol who tells us to paste the Google Drive image link, click "Generate" and it generates a new link that you can paste in your <img src> link. This works too.

A big thanks to these two for helping me solve my problem. 

(Edit: One small difference I found out after publishing this post - In the first method listed above, Facebook will not fetch the image to display as a thumbnail when you post a link on FB, whereas in the second method, Facebook will display the image as a thumbnail.)

I still don't understand why there can't be an option to get the embedded link directly from our Google Drive image link itself??? Why Google why?

You know how much pain it's going to be if I write a new post with 20-30 images in it and I have to follow the above 3-4 steps procedure for every single image? :( 

By the way, Google Photos is considered to be more user-friendly and seamless than Google Drive for embedding blog images, but the problem is, you can't create sub-folders within Google Photos like you can in Google Drive (again Google, why?) As I mentioned before, I am very organised when it comes to storing my blog images. I keep all the images of a particular post in separate folders, each one numerically named and arranged alphabetically. 

That's the reason why I prefer Google Drive over Google Photos. I want a folder (for example, "BLOG") and within that, I want all the sub-folders of each blog post (for example, "001-xx post", "002-yy post" and so on). One solution is to make all these sub-folders in the primary level of Google Photos itself, but that would mean my primary level is going to be flooded with 800+ folders! If you have no qualms about where your photo goes, then by all means, use Google Photos.

Anyway let's see, maybe in the future, Google will make it easier to embed images from Google Drive or at least give us an option to create sub-folders in Google Photos. 

And I hope they also finally wake up and remember they have a blogging division, lolz. Their official Blogger.com blog is just so sad, where it's been 2 years since their last update, and before that, it was just one post a year. :D

We used to joke that maybe there is just one employee left in the whole of Google's blogging division who's overseeing everything, but I fear that is becoming more of a reality now.

So, whatever the future may hold, here is looking forward to many new blog posts in spite of all these hassles. Hope you all start visiting again. Also, yeah, I promise I won't be this technical in my next update. Cheers, everyone.

Fare thee well Sidharth Rao

Circa 2008, I had decided to apply for a job for the first time in my life, no longer depending on my parent's pocket money.

All my friends who knew me well advised me to get into advertising because of my passion for creativity. Problem was, I had never faced a job rejection before, which they told me I would surely face, especially since I was a college dropout and a fresher. And so in order to experience that, they told me to go for the best agency, face the rejection, and then start my career from a smaller agency. I did just that. 

The number 1 digital agency in India at that time was Webchutney (now Dentsu Webchutney). I googled the office address at Juhu Versova Link Road and then walked right in the office, asking for a job :D

The receptionist Rianna was shocked! Nobody had ever done that before. Rianna called up the HR Manisha, who then called up the Creative Director Nishi, who then called up the Mumbai Branch Head Poornima, who then called up the CEO in Delhi, Sidharth Rao.

Long story short, I was interviewed by HR, asked to come again and was interviewed by Nishi, and then asked to come again and was interviewed by Poornima, and then I got the job! What started as just an experience to get rejected, ended up in me getting my first-ever job.

It was many years later that I found out when Poornima had called up Sidharth to tell him about the bizarre incident of somebody just randomly walking into office and asking for a job, Sid looked at my CV and saw that I was a college dropout. He immediately told her to give me a shot at an interview instead of telling security to throw me out, as he himself was a dropout. He knew from his own experience that not all dropouts are failures.

It was that decision that changed my life forever.

I never knew Sid well for the first 2 years I was in Webchutney. He was the hotshot CEO and Co-Founder from Delhi who would occasionally visit our Mumbai office once every few months. I was just a junior copywriter then while he was in the upper echelon of management. But he would always greet me and everybody else with a "hi" and smile whenever he came down to Mumbai. And by everybody, I mean everybody, right from the top and middle management to the bottom feeders like me, all the way to the office boys, sweepers and security guards.

He was also always there at GoaFest, which is like the "Oscars" for advertising held at Goa annually, where all the top ad agencies of India would come together and prizes were awarded to the best campaigns and ideas. It was there that Sid and I first bonded well when my concept for Axe won Silver at GoaFest (Technically, we came first since there was no Gold awarded that year).

Also, the exact moment we bonded was hilarious. Sid had booked the entire beach shacks of Palolem for us to stay, and we were drinking and partying by the beach. It was quite late, maybe around 2 in the morning. I was just sitting alone at the edge of the dark beach, letting the waves gently hit me up to my chest and enjoying my high all alone, when Sid suddenly appeared out of nowhere near me and peed on the waves! I jumped out of the water like a freaking ninja on acid. He too was completely shocked to see me and apologised immediately while turning around. We still talked and laughed about that incident many years later.

As the years went by and we won more and more awards at GoaFest, Sid and I became closer. Eventually, I graduated from just brainstorming and conceptualizing ideas for clients to directly pitching those ideas to clients myself.

The one client meeting I will never forget was with Mahindra. Even though I was regularly meeting clients by then to pitch concepts and ideas, it wasn't out of the ordinary for one of my bosses like Nishi (Creative Director), Meghna (Copy Head), Saket (Tech Head) or Tarana (Client Servicing Head) to come along for the meeting, especially if it was a big or important client. But that day when Sukruta and I were about to go to Mahindra corporate office to pitch a campaign idea, Sidharth joined us!

He was visiting Mumbai right then, and decided to tag along. I was quite nervous that day when Sukruta and I were pitching to the head honchos of Mahindra because our CEO Sid was right there in the same room, silently sitting and probably judging us. We did win that pitch eventually, and years later, Sid told me he came along for that meeting because he personally wanted to see how I was interacting with clients.

As the number of accounts and pitches we won kept increasing, Sidharth too started spending more time in Mumbai than Delhi. In Mumbai office, I had the reputation for always being the first to reach the office and last to leave. But when Sid was in town, he gave me serious competition. And of course, he would show off and mock me if he reached before me :D Eventually, I became his regular drinking buddy, hitting the bottle together every night after a long day of intense work.

We found the perfect drinking partner in each other - somebody with high capacity who's still able to hold their drink. It was like a match made in Heaven. :D

As a drinking buddy, I will always keep the secrets he had shared with me locked in my heart, but there is one secret I will reveal now, which I know Shweta won't mind too because they got happily married three years ago. Back when Sid and Shweta first started dating, I was the only one who knew about it. :D Ah what a clandestine life I had to lead in office. My tiny matchbox apartment in Jogeshwari East became our regular after-drinks crash pad, where Sid and I would sleep in the bedroom and Shweta slept on the couch outside (both of them were still based out of Delhi back then).

There was this super hilarious moment when we all got back at my apartment in an auto and I collected our laptop bags from the back of the auto and when we reached my floor, we realised I had also taken the poor auto driver's spare tyre!!! In the darkness and drunken state, I didn't realise I had also grabbed his tyre. I ran downstairs but the auto was already gone. Sid took a photo of me with the tyre, and many years later on my birthday, he surprised me with a beautifully framed photo of that as a birthday gift!

Ah yes, he always made my birthdays feel special. This one time when he promoted me to head a new (but small) experimental business division in Delhi directly under the COO Rahul Nanda, I moved out of my Jogeshwari East apartment and was temporarily staying as a guest in his rented duplex apartment in Bandra before I was supposed to move to Delhi permanently. I had just returned to Mumbai from a long meeting in Delhi with Kavin Mittal regarding the new venture. That day was my birthday. As I stepped into Sid's duplex from the airport quite exhausted and ready to crash, he told me, "Fucker, it's your birthday, freshen up and wear something nice, I'm taking you out somewhere fancy".

And so he took me to AER, which was like the top-class lounge in Mumbai back then. It was the kind of place a person like me would never afford to go to. He even got Shenaz Treasurywala to join my birthday party and we had such a blast together! I will never forget that birthday.

Unfortunately, yesterday was another birthday I will never forget again either. As I was just about to sleep after celebrating my birthday with a few friends here at my home in Aizawl, Sumeet and Amit called me up to deliver the sad news that Sid had just passed away.

Fuck. Till now it feels so unreal. I was beyond remorse. I wish I could be there for his cremation which was held at his farm in Kharjar today. I wish I could be there to console dear Shweta. I wish I could be there to be with dear uncle and aunty, with sweet Nat. All the fun times we spent together, all the memories.

After the Delhi experimental business plan didn't work out, Sidharth quickly pivoted and helped me start our own games dev company, guiding me all the way. I switched my role completely from a copywriter to a game designer! A radical change like that was possible only through Sidharth's vision because he believed in me.

Since I had already moved out of my Jogeshwari apartment, I was about to look for a new place in Mumbai again, but instead of getting a new place of my own, Sid suggested we rent a place together! We went house hunting and finally moved into this posh 3BHK at Sea Hill Apartment, right opposite Olives on Khar West.

Of course I couldn't afford the bloody 3 lakhs per month rent, lolz, even if split halfway or four ways :D But Sid made me pay only a very small amount, like the newspaper and other service bills, and the salaries of our two maids and one domestic help. That was it. I will never forget his generosity.

What a rise it had been for me. From idolizing the man who had created the premier digital ad agency in India and somebody I thought I'll never get to hang out with, to being flatmates with him.

Sid had taught me so many things in the years that we were flatmates. He mentored and groomed me into what I am today. I started watching completely different types of shows and docus I had never watched before. I had a front-row seat into the world of VC funding and Capital raising. He had daily meetings with powerful people at Toto's and sometimes he would call me and I would just drop everything and go sit among them and listen to their powerful conversations.

He shaped my character too. This one time, we found out one of our maids had ripped us off. She had asked me for her salary and I gave it to her. The next day, she also asked Shweta for her salary again and she gave it to her as well, not knowing I had already paid her.

That night we found out about her deception, and it wasn't the first time either. Sid was infuriated. However, he told me, "Kima, you're such a nice guy and everybody loves you, but people take advantage of nice guys in this industry. You have to be tough and ruthless if you are running your own company. You must fire the maid immediately tomorrow, I'm not going to get involved in this shit".

That was the first time in my life I had ever fired anybody. Yes, it was hard for me to do so, especially with the maid crying and begging for forgiveness, but she had betrayed the trust we had in her. I did it and felt terrible about it, but Sid later patted me on the back and told me it was hard but necessary to do such things if I wanted to be successful.

Just recently, I had fired two of my chowkidars at my farm here in Mizoram. The reasons were justified of course, but I seriously don't think I could have done that had Sid never moulded me into what I am today.

Of course, being ruthless wasn't Sid's only trait, he was also gentle, funny, caring and understanding. After all, you can't run the top digital agency in India and various successful startups by being a stuck-up dictator. One of the ways in which I judge people is by drinking with them and watching them get drunk. A person's true colour comes out when under the influence. With Sid, the drunker he gets, the nicer he becomes. That's when you know a person is truly good inside.

Our nightly drinking sessions were very different too. Most people would talk about, you know, sex or politics or sports when they're inebriated. We on the other hand spoke only about our industry, new start-up ideas, new business opportunities, incubators, mergers and acquisitions etc. It was like, work never sleeps in Sidharth's environment. On the very few occasions we didn't talk shop, Sid would play Foster The People's "Pumped up kicks" on repeat. Sigh, those days.

And speaking of getting drunk, another lesson I've learnt from Sid is to never handle anything financial when drunk. Sid would never sign even a simple cheque, even if it was 100% legit and safe, when he was drinking. He would do so the next morning. I have followed that mantra till today and I believe I have avoided many costly mistakes because of it.

But no matter how wasted we got the previous night, when I woke up the next day (and believe me, I always wake up early every day, much to the irritation of my friends), Sid would already be up, reading yet another new book. The amount of books he used to order and consume was truly mindblowing.

In all the years that I had spent with Sid, there had been only one time he was angry with me. After Sumeet and I started our own mobile gaming startup, we were in Delhi with our team there, working on a few projects, when we suddenly received the mail that our application for the prestigious "Start-Up Chile incubator" had been approved!

We were ecstatic! Out of thousands of applications worldwide, only 100 were selected every year, and we were one of them! We were so happy that we partied immediately, getting drunk right there itself. It was much later that a very angry Sidharth called me up as he had just heard about the news from some other source. He was our main investor and company director, and we had completely forgotten to tell him about the news! :D Oh he was soooo angry with me, and at the same time extremely excited and happy too. :D 

I'll never forget all the random gadgets he used to purchase, like our own personal fancy bar stand, or tetris blocks with lighting system, or party hats with lights, or vintage posters and Tintin comics, etc etc. He sure loved his toys, and deep inside he was but a mere boy. We also adopted a couple of puppies and kittens, and when some of them passed away, he would cancel all his plans and meetings so that we could go to the crematorium. He would wear dark sunglasses to hide his pain and tears.

But he was always funny otherwise. He never stopped making fun of my tattoos (because we both have fucked up tattoos that we got when we were stupid). And he would never stop reminding me about the time I came home late at night from a business trip in Delhi and ate our dog's food from the fridge by mistake, and ended up with food poisoning the next day. How that never failed to make him laugh.

I have hundreds of photos and videos of Sid, and looking through them now breaks my heart again. All the great moments we spent together, both on and off work. But he was a fiercely private person, so even though he is gone now, I will respect his wishes and not put any of our photos here. However, he had always encouraged me to keep writing, especially about social issues. In fact, that incident about me and Mumbai police where I had invited them for tea (the one that went viral) was written because he encouraged me not to be afraid, in spite of the negative backlash it could have caused me.

There are two things I have achieved and feel proud of when it comes to Sidharth. 

One was when I had finally succeeded in convincing him to try Android (those were the days when most upper management were extremely loyal to iOS and Blackberry, and us Android fans were treated as outcasts, lolz). He even bought the OnePlus One phone when it first launched in the US, tried it out for a week, liked it, and then resold the phone to me with a huge discount. And so I was one of the few people in India to use the OnePlus One phone back then, because it wasn't available in India yet, all thanks to Sid.

The second was when I finally convinced him to try out our Mizo delicacy made from fermented soybeans and shrimp paste. I used to cook occasionally because he loved my special fried potatoes (Bareja too would come over immediately when I cooked that). One day, since I was alone at home, I decided to make fermented soybeans and shrimp paste chutney. Sidharth came home earlier than usual and suddenly started sniffing around everywhere, peeping out of each window. I asked from the kitchen, "Wassup", and he replied while still looking everywhere, "Hey man, something died out here, I think it's a pigeon, the smell is everywhere". God I was so embarrassed :D 

I told him that it was the dish I was making and we had a great laugh. That night I made him have it and he absolutely loved it. Believe me, I don't think there are that many people who initially thought it was the stench of decaying flesh to still try it out with no hesitation. He was never afraid to try out new things, be it food or business ventures.

The day our start-up was acquired by Jetsynthesis and our team had to move to Pune to our new office was probably the saddest moment for me in Mumbai. I bid a tearful goodbye to Sid and Shweta. Sid had groomed me so much, from a clueless copywriter trainee to a senior copywriter to a start-up founder to a game designer. I owe him my entire career. Words will never be enough to express how much he will be missed by his family and close friends, but writing this eulogy gives me a small amount of solace.

Goodbye my boss, my friend, my mentor, my sensei, my flatmate, my brother. Hope you have an endless jolly time with Anant Rangaswami across the rainbow.