Kotak's jifi is here and so am I!

My Sundays are usually spent with family and dear friends or all by myself up in my ivory tower.
Last Sunday, I headed out to B-Bar at Select City Walk Mall, Saket to hang out with a family of a different kind at the Kotak #JifiIsHere Indiblogger Meet. My Indiblogger family, and what fun we had!!!!
The oriental themed luxurious bar welcomes guest into a different world. I got in line to register, said hi to a few fellow bloggers and then hit the bar to get myself an early drink. It had to be 8 pm somewhere in the world right? and it was Sunday, my day of rest :)

The cheerful servers kept the appetizers coming. There were exotic looking and tasting tidbits including chicken satay, chilli chicken, and assorted vegetable tempura. We made a meal of it. We is me, Rinzu and Paromita. It's been raining Indibloggers meets :) and I am loving it.

Eversince my first Indibloggers meet sometime last year, I have really made a lot of new friends from the bloggers I met at the meets :) I call them my new family and we are discovering the fun of dining and snacking at 5 star venues, winning tweetathons, blogging contests and exploring new products, ideas and avenues. Thank you Indiblogger for expanding my world.

Sunday was Kotak Mahindra Bank's jifi launch party and it was done in style with a tri city event spanning Delhi - we were the noisiest lot I think! - Bangalore and Mumbai. We watched the proceedings on the televised screen with Mr. Chetan Bhagat doing his thing while we ran our own party.

First off was the selfie competition which me and my friends did not win. We tried nonetheless. We soon caught up with the group tweet contest where our group of twenty calling ourselves the KPL 3, won vouchers from Flipkart for the maximum tweets about Jifi - the Social Banking experience with #jifiishere #KPL3. Yippee!!!!

So what is Jifi? In simple words, banking the social way using social media networking to up your rewards while making your bank transactions too. You can now make the most of you big circle on social media to help you earn kudos of the money kind! You earn by commenting and liking posts on the jifi facebook page! You can safely use your email/facebook id to log into your account and get your updates including bank balance via a DM or direct message on twitter.

Mr. Deepak from Kotak was more than happy to answer all our questions about jifi patiently.

The jifi account allows you to maintain a zero balance! How difficult is that!!!! Keeping count of the zeros is fun now! Only glitch is you have to apply for a brand new jifi account! but hey, to sweeten the deal, you get rewarded a cool 1000 social points when you invite yourself to jifi - this points can be used to shop on select partner merchant sites! Connect your twitter account and add 100 points. Refer your friends on facebook and you earn more and more points to add to your kitty! Make transactions with your jifi account and earn more points! Oh and if your bank balance hit 25k and above, you start earning interest on your moolah!!!!

Here's to a fun social banking experience with jifi. My own account is awaiting formalities to be completed and I can't wait to start earning and spending! Kotak has gone a step ahead to put the fun back in banking and this will go a long way in educating people about saving, earning and banking smartly with the times and the technology! Bravo!

Cheers! belated hic hic

Did I mention that lunch was a delicious affair and the Indiblogger Team - as usual, super RAD?
Oh and welcome the first timers to the Delhi Indiblogger family! Now, time for me to go and start banking with jifi!

Real good moments at Sunsilk Real FM Indibloggers Meet: A Movie review

There was a special email in my inbox on a friday morning. I had a raging fever and was racked with body pain but when I went through the mail from Indiblogger, I knew I had to get out of bed and get it on for a dose of girl power at the special tri-city screening.

Now this is the first official film review I am writing in spite of my great love affair with films of all kinds.
If I could do just one thing in life, I could spend it watching movies from all over the world. I finally reached the venue after stopping at the wrong Tivoli property on Chattarpur Mandir Road, to find the red carpet laid out, box office and popcorn all in place.

Signed in, got my ticket to the show and found a comfortable seat!
I also helped myself to some coffee and popcorn and made way to the photo-booth cum RJ console to put on my best smile! Let me tell you, I outdid myself and the picture taken by my sister Kuvelu won me a Shoppers Stop voucher worth Rs. 1000 as one of the best pics of the lot at the Indiblogger meet.

The winning pic!

Okay. So the movie Real FM takes you through the trials and tribulations of Rhea who has to take extreme measures when her father suffers a heart attack leaving his beloved Radio Channel in jeopardy. Rhea shows how, with a loyal circle of friends, some fresh ideas and a never say never attitude, you can turn things around in one single day and even get ahead in life while at it.

Rhea's father's financial woes wears him out as his crew and staff stages a walk out demanding a raise bringing the broadcasting to a standstill on Independence day when a special broadcast is scheduled. Rhea has to take matters in her hand when her boyfriend, Sameer, who holds the confidence of her father also leaves them in the lurch.

She ropes in her dear friends Saloni and Natasha to help her run the radio station for a day and in the process, they all learn life's lessons as they come to terms with their own realities and find out what freedom and independence really mean. To keep the radio channel going, the girls use social media and the internet to the hilt with google coming to the rescue.

Rhea and co decides to do something different. They decide to bring different music from all of the country's 28 unique states to the studio in celebration of the country's Independence day. In the process, Rhea finds that she can trust herself to be strong in the face of pain and do the right thing. The Chartered Accountant turned standup comedian finds out that he can laugh at himself and be funny too when he learns to be himself.
Saloni, the hesitant nightingale finally finds her voice through music and learns to say Yes to living life on her terms and No to the unreasonable restrictions laid down by her father. Natasha and her sister Aakansha also learn to set aside their differences and find their sisterhood's happy groove again.

Some real moments and effortless acting allows for a pleasurable watch. The peppy songs gives the entire movie an uplifting feel and acts as a very exciting geography lesson on our Country's cultural wealth and varied demographic. Considering that my hindi is pretty weak, the acting was authentic enough for me to bypass having to watch it again to grab the finer nuances of the movie.

I felt warm when references were made to the lesser known parts of the country like the Northeastern states of Tripura and Nagaland and real voices of regional dialects were included. There were no occasions for flinches and many lines from the movies resonated with the audience as we all hooted with laughter and agreed firmly with sentiments expressed through out, including booing out the cop with doubtful intentions and the goons who turned quite brotherly and protective towards Rhea post a hit rendition of their song from Chattisgarh.

Anurag Basu has succeeded in uniting the country with a feel good movie with a strong base on music while celebrating the spirit of independence by highlighting the courage of three young women as they come of age. These women represent the youth, talent and realities of progressive women of India.

So, three + one girls with great silky hair save the day with some delightful ideas centred around music and even get a super duper deal for the radio channel. And maybe now, Sameer can redeem himself in front of Rhea for a sequel while the providential invisible brother gets revealed too.

As for me, I happily tucked into the delicious dinner at the Meet as I made more friends among the many bloggers who came for the meet and also took home a basket of goodies from the wonderful people at Sunsilk and a flipkart voucher for a tweet about the movie. Time to try out my own bottle of Sunsilk for some life changing inspiration. Thank you Indiblogger for enriching my otherwise unremarkable weekdays.

My evening with Vir Sanghvi at Delhi Duty Free 's Scents & Sensibility

Perfumes interest me almost as much as food and fashion so when I was invited by Blogmint to be a part of Delhi Duty Free’s Fragrance 101 Promo Event at Pullman’s Central Park, Gurgaon, I was ecstatic.

If anyone were to ask me what my favourite perfume is, I would find it hard to give a definite response. I am quite particular about the scents I use and at the same time, it is pretty much dependent on my state of mind.

My fondness for perfumes started early in life. I would watch with rapt attention as my lovely mother got dressed and dab a few drops of perfume to her wrists, neck and underarms before setting out to work or going to church. On Sundays, she would indulge me by rubbing her wrists on mine so that we could share her scent. How excited I used to be. I would feel all grown up and sophisticated, just like her.I distinctly remember my grandmother's scent - by the Vaseline hair oil which she used to wear. 
We grew up being bathed with pears bathing bar. The scent of pears soap still evoke nostalgic memories of wintry Saturday evenings in our Kohima home, sitting by the fire after a hot quick bath and sipping hot corn tea out of floral print enamel mugs.

It was a pleasant evening spent among Delhi's top fashion and lifestyle bloggers while we listened to the charming, very articulate and knowledgeable Vir Sanghvi share his thoughts on all things fragrant. 

He happened to recommend some of my personal favorites in perfumes and that made me very happy (because obviously, I am a big fan of the Man) as he is quiet an authority on the good stuff and looks like I know my stuff too. He mentioned that the current craze is an Indian origin flavor called 'Oudh' which is distinctly Arabian in smell.

I have always preferred men’s perfumes to women’s so it is easy for me to pick perfumes for my man and myself. I am the musky type for evenings and clean citrusy – fresh laundry scents for day. My list of must haves are Ralph Lauren’s Black, Bvlgari Aqua Pour Homme, Armani Aqua Di Gio and CK Euphoria. Davidoff, Chanel, Issey Miyake, Kenzo and Armani have some great scents for men and women too. All available at the DelhiDuty Free Store at Terminal 3 of Delhi's International airport.

I have done my research on perfumes and while I would not call myself an expert, I am pretty familiar with the perfume trends and the basic classification of notes or layers of perfumes – top, middle and base notes. I am also aware that a lot of times, people come away with liking the top note without really allowing the scent to settle and give out the middle and base notes and eventually find that they are not that happy with their perfume buys. I am patient when it comes to buying perfumes. Sorry pushy sales assistants!

Mr. Sanghvi did share some exciting insights. That, all the perfumes come from just 8-10 companies and what the brands do is pick and choose the ones they like. And sometimes, the scent that every other house rejects ends up being a best seller when launched by another brand. That, most men's perfumes use a detergent scent based formula. That, most people claim that they are not into perfumes but there is a lot of fragrance in the many beauty products and toiletries. If you look at the kind of fragrances you like in your beauty products, you can decode your perfume themes. Also, since the perfume you wear is enjoyed by people around you, it is a good idea to take inputs from your significant others. Oh right! Like I keep telling my sister not to wear her Ja'dore near me :P

Moi and Vir Sanghvi
Photo by Awungshi at DrPoisonIvy

Perfumes are a worthy investment as they can add that special element to your mood-uplifting you and giving you the extra confidence. While most people use perfumes to smell fresh, a lot more wear perfumes to make a statement. And that is a good thing. Finding a signature scent is good but having an array of scents for different times of the day and occasions is even better. I believe in this and practice this.

Perfumes are not about the longevity of the scent but about how it make you feel and requires to be refreshed once a day at least. Nothing is worse than the sweat infused stench of perfume at the end of the day or announcing your presence with powerful scent.

There is a trick to making perfume last on you and that is to layer scents. You can also achieve a unique personal scent by mixing different scents. Good pointer again.

As for the bottles, did you know that the high price of perfumes is mostly because of the pretty bottles?
There you go. Oh and you can actually buy refills for some perfumes. Thierry Muggler is one I know of.

IKandy lounge by the poolside.

Back to the meet. After the talk, we gathered around Vir Sanghvi for a few photographs at the poolside bar iKandy. We managed to exchange a few words and he mentioned that he has been to Kohima. A few pictures later, we bloggers proceeded inside for the beauty makeover by the specialists from Delhi Duty Free.

Heena from DDFS who did my make over. Thank you!

While I waited for my turn, I participated in the Perfume Quiz and won myself a lovely Burberry Fragrances toilet bag. 

With my prize!

Post my evening look makeover by the very talented Heena, we headed off to partake of the scrumptious dinner spread at La Riviera. 

Pork belly, quinoa-rocket salad, garlic butter scallops and salmon in tomato vinaigrette made it to my plate. I also got to interact with the bloggers over dinner and we all left pretty enlightened with new information, goodies from Delhi Duty Free, a delicious dinner, great hospitality and looking much forward to visiting the Delhi Duty Free Store for our next perfume refills!

Dinner time with the bloggers of the evening.

An evening to remember. Selfie time!

 Thanks to blogmint for allowing me to be a part of this wonderful evening. Cheers!

Ruminating on the Nokia Lumia Your Wish Is My App II Indiblogger Meet 2014!

I am seriously technology challenged though I have always tried to be updated on what is the latest. Gadgets and Technology fascinate me but I am of the mind that what is supposed to make life easier should not be so hi-tech that you have to invest a lot of time to make it work for you when it comes to application.

Now here comes my exposure to phone apps. 8 years ago, I bought my first mobile.

I was slightly in awe of it and later on, felt frustrated by all the additional things it was supposed to do but well, pretty much never quite functioned. Then four years ago came my first smartphone.

I was pretty impressed. I could blog on my phone, make notes, read attached documents from my mail…and then apps came to my notice. My first app was the Farmville gaming app. And it was pretty cool except that my phone would hang in a bit and I gave up on playing from my phone. Then I got hooked to "angry birds". But that was it for a long time until I discovered a host of other apps which I found to be quite useful. Often, I also wondered if there were more things I could do with apps and once in a while, I would check if there are apps for specific purposes. 

There are so many apps out there to make it pretty mind-boggling. i have downloaded and deleted quite a few on finding them not to be not as useful as I thought it would be. The apps I often use are mostly for communicating and the more utility it provides, the higher points I give it. So when an opportunity to design or create an app at the indiblogger meet came up, I was terribly excited. My head was abuzz with ideas. The proceedings went smoothly if a little delayed. There was a 300 strong crowd to wave in the wonderful people from Nokia and the panel of Judges from the Your Wish Is My App Season II - Rajiv Makhni, Vikas Khanna and Vishal Gondal. They kept the session rocking with their witty banter and a presentation on the state of tech affairs from Nokia was enlightening! Not to mention the delicious and generous spread at the Oberoi Hotel's Ballroom.

My last blogger meet concluded successfully with a great run. our group choreography won the first prize at the Meet and later on, I won my first windows phone, a Nokia Lumia 620 for blogging about my causes. 

Second time round, it was wonderful to see and hear so many creative ideas from fellow bloggers about the apps they wanted to create. I also got a chance to share my app idea! and won a delightfully prize- a universal usb charger! Woohoo. Thank you Nokia and Indiblogger.

My understanding of apps is that they should simplify things for us, at a touch or click on our phones. How wonderful is that! 

And let me get to what made me think of my app.

I have always been dismayed by the way our country treats its women as second-class citizens. This is most apparent in the lack of civic amenities meant for women. Security is entirely another issue.

So here goes my app idea!

Men can go anywhere but not us, girls. They can stand right on the road too and shower the roads dreamily. But for girls and women, we have to suffer terrible indignity and security risks even to carry out our most basic biological need of relieving ourselves. 

First off! We need more public loos - clean and safe corners for women but in the meantime, we have to make life easier with an app which I will call the "loo locator". 

Does it need an explanation?
An app to find the nearest loo!

It will help both girls and boys who are inclined, to find the nearest loo wherever you are so that you can relieve yourself in comfort and with dignity. This will make my life almost anxiety free (and hopefully for more women too, across cities and towns). In the hills, you can always find a safe corner or even step into a local's loo but in the city, that is just not an option! Here's to better loo habits and happier city women.

Moving on to my next app idea, I would like to design an app that allows pre-medical students to gather information about all the medical institutes in the country or even abroad, application procedure and dates, apply for exams, upload their passport photos, pay application fees and keep a track of the exam schedules and exam centers. My sister and many other kids run around for almost two months figuring out which exams to sit for, especially sitting for the state exams and the centralized exams. Multiple applications, multiple challans, multiple passport photographs and negotiating exam centers and multiple cities. This will save a lot of time and effort for everyone involved!

I love Delhi and it is home for me but many times, commuting and negotiating with the Autowallahs can take the shine away!

I wish there was an app which could tell me the shortest, low traffic route to my destination and also calculate the exact fare for me. You would say use GPS and also that autos have meters. They do and GPS works too but our autos still happily run you off on long routes, complain about traffic jams and even charge you extra for it! :( An app to this effect will ease travel around the city because I would know exactly how to get to my destination and how much it would cost. Smart app eh?

I could go on and on but let me bring my musings to an end while I go take a loo break. Thankfully, I am home.

This post is written after my experience at the Nokia Lumia #YWMA Indiblogger Meet 2014.