After a long while I drove to Bournemouth yesterday, a visit that lasted few hours. In the last four years, after we moved out of Bournemouth, I have visited the place at least half a dozen times and boy I should say that the place is just getting better each time. The beach front at Boscombe has improved like anything. Apart from the new pier that was put up less than two years ago, they have tidied up the roundabout as well. There is a huge pile of sand near the Boscombe pier and that is where Europe’s first artificial surf reef is coming up. Locals are understandably excited about that and I heard from more than one person that the reef is the reason why the housing prices are holding on bucking the nationwide trend. I have no clue about how that will look like upon completion, but will get to see that sometime before the end of this year.

Visiting the beach at Bournemouth is akin to taking a trip down the memory lane. I spent three eventful years in the area nearer to the beach and even in days of solitude, that was my favourite place for hanging around. Wish I had more time so that I could have walked down the promenade all the way up to the other pier. Well, there is always a next time.

Couple of months ago, when I was checking out the websites of the three major political parties in UK, I thought of downloading Labour Party’s policy brochure. Like many marketing sites, they sought my contact details and promised to send it by post. Few days later, I got a letter from the party that went on like ‘Dear Chakra, Welcome to the Labour Party. We are proud to welcome our newest member.. yada yada yada…’. I promptly sent that letter to the bin and forgot about it.

Last night, I had a knock at my door and it was a Labour Party person from our neighbourhood. He is running for the County Council election and wanted my support. Apparently, he was thinking that I am one of the party members as he showed the list of Labour Party members in our area and my name was there in it. After explaining him that I am not one, I started discussing about an issue that I want to take up with the local authorities. He explained about the process and mentioned that if he gets elected, he will be the person expected to sort that out. When I enquired with him about his chances of winning the election he was contesting, as a matter of fact he said that he will not be winning this election, as Labour had very few supporters in the area. Moreover, Labour has been in power for more than 12 years now and things are not really looking in good shape. Asked why he was contesting then, he mentioned that there are people who will vote only for Labour, no matter what and we don’t want to disappoint them.

While talking about campaigning styles, he mentioned that Liberal Democrats (nationally, they are the third front of UK, but locally, they are the runners up here behind Conservatives) will be dropping pamphlets saying not to waste your vote by supporting Labour, as the real contest is between the Conservatives and Lib Dems. I was baffled when he said - ‘perhaps, they are right coz we are not going to win’. What do you call this? Is this pessimism or being brutally honest?

After meeting this guy, I am keen on getting into a party and see the way it works, their campaign style etc and compare it what we see back home. At the moment, I don’t have time and energy, but this one has got into my wish list.

Overheard conversation..

அயன் படம் பாத்தீங்களே, எப்படி இருக்கு?

ஐயோ.. தாங்கல. 4 தெலுங்கு மசாலா படம் சேர்த்து பார்த்த மாதிரி இருக்கு.

Could one get a shorter and effective feedback than this?

I, Chakkarapani Sampath, swear by Almighty God that on becoming a British Citizen, I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, her Heirs and Successors, according to law.

I will give my loyalty to the United Kingdom and respect its rights and freedoms. I will uphold its democratic values. I will observe its laws faithfully and fulfil my duties and obligations as a British Citizen.

More than a month back, I had a chance to be part of the audience in the Question Time programme telecast in BBC1. It was not a live show, but gets recorded in single take around 2 hours before the telecast. Wish I had got to speak during the show. It was nice to see the way the crew members worked as I have never been anywhere near such shows. More than that, I was pleasantly surprised to see about dozen odd people at work and at Anirud’s school saying that they spotted me on the telly. There goes my claim for the fifteen minutes of fame.

Life has been quite monotonous in the recent times. Work has been very routine, to say the least. In times like these, positive distractions like blogs and other interests should lift our spirits up. But for some reason, I find it very difficult to even open up this site and scribble few words, let alone make it more interesting. I will try my best to pull myself out of this rut.

Happy New Year and all that.

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A silly doubt related to New Year celebrations. If you observe the fireworks at Sydney, Hong Kong etc., there weren’t any smoke (If there was, it was very less) at all, where as the fireworks at Berlin and London emitted quite a lot of smoke. Is it because of the weather or is there any other funda?

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Almost forgot to come back to work after 11 days of holidays. Given the business climate these days, one has to be happy for having got a place to go to work every morning. I have never been at home continuously for these many days. Slept late, woke up late, watched movies, read books, spent time with Anirud and what not. Dubukkus visited us for a couple of days, as has been our custom to meet up during Xmas break every year (though we do meet up at every conceivable opportunity during the year). I should say that we re-lived our days of late 90s and early 2000s with out endless chat on all things non-sense. Those 2 days are easily the greatest two days in my recent memory.

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New Year began with a bang. My broadband conked out one fine morning. My telephone service provider (TSP) says that the line is good and clear for anyone to provide BB service, whereas my ISP says that there is something wrong with the line for them to resume the service. Apparently, both of them wouldn’t talk with one another and want me to do the talking. As if this is not enough, both my TSP and ISP don’t want to take any instructions from me and they would only listen to my employer, who actually pays the bills. By the end of the week, we learnt how to live without Internet. Looking at the positive side, we are discovering various titles we have on our book shelf, which would otherwise have gathered dust. Seems that it will take a week for the BB service to resume.