If there is one thing in this world, I wish I could do better (alright there are tons of things), it would be writing and to go with it, speaking (I know, that is a lot of wishful thinking).

And since I am lazy enough to not even consider, joining a creative writing class, this is an uphill task. Made all the more difficult by the fact that I have never been studious and owe whatever little English I can speak, to the English channels on cable tv, which were a new thing in the late 90s in India, when I was growing up as a teenager.

While my English (or for that matter Hindi) workbooks used to be full of red underlines, the idiot box did manage to teach me English, which was worthy enough of employment in a leading call center. And while their accent trainers tried their best to make me understandable to Americans on the other side of the globe, I was just glad that I needn’t do much writing and no one was paying much attention to spellings!

Of course, things got worse when I decided to make a career as a blogger and entrepreneur; after all, blogging was and still is, mostly about writing!

While I struggled to form a proper flow, Microsoft Word became my trusted companion and editor. From emails to blog posts and even short replies in forums, there was never a line, which I didn’t first type in Word, checked for spelling mistakes and then double checked for good measure!

Of course the hardest thing was and still is, writing sentences which at least make some sense and do not appear merely as a collection of words, but as a well thought out plan, which manages to engage the reader and conveys my point.

While I was able to accomplish this to some extent, when I was writing about something I am passionate about; things came to a complete standstill, when I tried to force myself into writing something, which wasn’t as close to my heart.

Eventually, I learned to simply give up the urges to write about matters, which did not get my emotions flowing, after all, there is only so much effort, a lazy man like me can make.

However, when you rely on emotions to provide you with the thought flow, content and tone; things can often sound more sentimental and aggressive than one had hoped for. In fact in moments such as these, I often struggled to find an appropriate tone and fail miserably.

Due to this, not only do I sound overly aggressive in some of the online discussions I participate (ok that is an understatement); but also more sentimental than I originally intended!

So while I search within myself for an answer, you must be left wondering, what was the actual purpose, teaching and aim of this rather abstract blog post and I am happy to announce, there was none!

This is just another random meandering, I felt I needed to pen down (ok type in Word and double check for spelling mistakes) and share it with whoever was unfortunate enough to stumble across it.

Wibiya is a small floating toolbar, which remains at the bottom of the browser (only on the website, on which it is installed) and provides a customizable array of features (mostly social media related) to help engage website users in a not too intrusive manner.

I first thought of using this toolbar, after seeing it on NDTV.com and thought of implementing it on BCMTouring.

Signup process and creation of the toolbar was simple and straight forward, and though I wanted to start with pro package (branding free), I had a query and thus I sent an email to Wibiya support team and in the meanwhile, integrated the toolbar on BCMTouring (a simple matter of adding java script code in the footer).

At the same time, I decided to start a thread on BCMTouring to garner feedback from the members, since they are the ones, who would be using it.

While the views were mixed, the usage of the toolbar though ok, wasn’t all too great. However we did managed to increase the number of fans of BCMTouring’s Facebook Page by around 8% in a matter of 3 days and I did see a few more pages from BCMTouring, being shared by BCMTians on Facebook.

However, Wibiya toolbar did have a negative impact on the end user speed and responsiveness of the site and that along with the fact that one member was almost caught in office due to this toolbar, was reason enough to discontinue the usage of the toolbar, though I do think it is a nice idea and requires following changes, before I can think of implementing it again:

• Ability to integrate within applications like WordPress and vBulletin, which would ensure flexibility for the end user, on whether or not they want to keep using it or completely disable it.
• Ability to run the code from your own server, ensuring performance to match that of other local apps.
• Better customer service, since I haven’t yet received a reply to my email.

As for the last response, I guess it worked in my favor, as I might have signed up for the Pro plan and would have then had to go through the cancellation procedure.

Overall it was a nice experiment, even though things didn’t go exactly the way I wanted.

When I first added India with Sanjeev Bhaskar in my reading list at FriendsofBooks, I didn’t know that Sanjeev Bhaskar was actually the actor who was part of Goodness Gracious Me and The Kumars at No. 42. Both of which I had seen limited episodes of and had somewhat liked them.

While that might not have affected my decision to read this book in the first place, the fact that it is actually based on a documentary series and I could just have easily watched it, rather than having to read the book was something that would have certainly influenced my decision.

However after realizing this and knowing the character behind the book, I was hoping for a good account of travel in India with a somewhat Indian perspective with right dosage of humor thrown in and boy was I disappointed!

For starters, the author appears rather cynical and prudish and mostly concerned with showcasing his family history in India, while remaining oblivious to culture, history or religion, he is trying to showcase!

Hell I would have even settled for a foreigner’s view of India (which Sanjeev Bhaskar basically is), however this isn’t the case either and he appears confused with the identity and tone he is supposed to carry; should he come out looking as an English gentleman exploring an Ex-Colony or should he appear as a long lost son, returning to his homeland?

In the end, he manages to be neither and this fact isn’t helped a least bit by the fact that all his travels are rather hurriedly paced and showcase little if anything about the places he is traveling through and just appear as a vague consort of events, people and a few building; devoid of all important human touch, humility and a bit of romanticism, needed to keep an audience captivated!

To make matters even worse, his timeline is even more construed. For instance he arrives in Kolkata at time of Durga Puja, then witnesses Diwali (comes 20 days after the end of Durga Puja) and runs off to Darjeeling, only to reach Ponta Sahib 3-4 months later, to enjoy Holi. All the while adding nothing concrete for time wasted, offering no explanations and leaving you to conclude that he must have run back to UK and then returned to finish off the documentary, when he had spare time in hand!

The whole part about partition and going back to Pakistan (for less than 12 hours!) to trace back his father’s footsteps is rather loosely based and appears added just to win some brownie points to sell his book. In case this wasn’t the case, then I have to say, he doesn’t really knows how to pen down the emotions and his thoughts in an interesting manner!

Overall the only chapter I did like about the book was the last one, titled “Turn on, Tune in, Drop out”. Which carries quite a bit of emotion and is written quite beautifully and going by the rest of the book; likely by someone else!

Overall, I wouldn’t even term this book as a good read, though it does has a sadistic way of retracing footsteps of one’s forefathers and commenting on the enormity, which is India!