Bajaj Discover 135: A review

I had planned to write a review of my bike a few months back but then Bajaj launched the Bajaj XCD DTS-Si a 125cc bike at a much lower cost which led me to believe that the sale of my bike - Bajaj Discover 135 would be cannibalised automatically. But people still keep visiting my tiny article and keep asking me on its performance which has prompted this review.

Performance (8/10):

I get a mileage of 57 kms/litre from my bike. I drive it in the congested roads of Chennai, so it should be considered as "city riding". I track the mileage very meticulously on a spreadsheet and although I was a bit disappointed for not hitting the sweet 60, I was happy with a cost of 85 paise / km expenditure with the rising fuel costs. Ideal conditions for reaching that sweet number are not really possible in the city which has the largest population of 2-wheelers!
On lower gears the sound of the engine is almost inaudible - very smooth. But as the vehicle crosses 45 kmph, it finally feels like a motorbike which possesses power. It feels good to see other vehicles lagging behind you :). After it crosses 60 it is noisy. I would have loved to have a 5th gear on it even though it is very rare to reach such speeds! The maximum speed I could fearlessly reach was 70 and then I lost my courage.

Comfort: (9/10)

The fuel tank has a sort of dual pod under which the leg gels with ease. The seat is long so that 2 large people can sit along with some luggage in between. The Nitrox shock absorbers will ensure your back doesn't feel the small holes or bumps which dot Indian roads. Pillion riders have been particularly happy with this aspect. The electric start is a life-saver in heavy traffic! I must have kick-started the bike only 2-3 times until now. I chose to have disk brakes and it has avoided a few accidents, but the back has to bear the brunt!
Cruising on half-empty roads is real fun on this. Sometimes, when I drive alone I tilt the bike to take turns at slightly higher speeds and the thrill is unparalleled.

Looks: (9/10)

Like I said earlier, I bought the bike just for its looks. In terms of looks it certainly fits in the same class as TVS Apache, Hero Honda Hunk and Bajaj's Pulsar 150. It makes heads turn (Not if it isn't cleaned for a week after rains!). I didnt like the Blue colour when I saw it on Bajaj's website, but brand new Blue Discover 135s too look stunning. The alloy wheels add to the all-black graphics. The headlamp completes the muscular look of the bike.
I have a slight problem with the rear-view mirrors which always show part of my arms and vehicles which are close can't be seen. I tried adjusting it but it doesn't help. The gear chain is left uncovered which opens it up to collect dust. It has a plastic covering on one side, but on rainy days dirt gets collected over the chain. I would have liked a digital display too, knowing that the Bajaj XCD has a digital display.

Reliability: (10/10)
I have driven the bike on good roads, manageable roads and really horrible roads in rains and the bike seems to be totally agnostical to road conditions. I have the confidence that I can ride on it for really long rides.

Service: (8/10)
To get good service is a very important aspect of owning a bike. I've had very few problems with the bike, but the mechanics of Bajaj's authorised service centre are well-informed and give you good advice on handling the bike. Only problem I have had so far is with the 2nd gear being very tight after the engine has just started.
What I dont like about the Service is the hidden costs in it. For the 1st and 3rd "Free" service I had to shell out Rs. 450/- towards oil change and in the 4th service the service engineer talked me into applying a wax (teflon) coating on the exteriors to get back the shine of the bike. He didnt tell it would cost Rs. 300/- though!

Conclusion: (44/50)
In my honest opinion, the Bajaj Discover 135 is an excellent choice of a bike for a person who travels a lot within a city who would also like to have the thrill of a Sporty bike at times. If you are bored by seeing the thousands of Pulsars on the road, the Discover 135 is an eye candy. But then, I feel Pulsar is in a league of its own. To conclude I just put the latest Pulsar advertisement which blew my mind away. And no, I dont try such things on my bike!

Hatred Unleashed

"We hate in others what we despise most in ourselves"

I dont remember where I read that quote or who wrote it, but the more I think of it, the truer it seems to me. I come from the mindset that too much of hatred is not good for a person as it brings out the worst in you. I hate to keep myself attached to one mindset and so I change and unleash all hatred that is within me and is now I, myself.

The Eternal repeater
In a conversation, a person picks up a topic and gives a few insights into it. The other person throws some more light. Another one joins in with his theory. A link is caught, the conversation drifts, but every time something new is being said and everyone who is talking or just hearing, enjoy the way time flies by. To have endless conversations you need a huge gang. Or you need people who are well read or well-informed.
But there are those who have very little to add but their childish instincts wishes to grab attention. With nothing new to say they always end up saying the same thing, the same way. There is this Tamil friend of mine who loves the fact that the vocabulary of Tamil literature already covers so many new scientific terminologies. You say computer, he says "Kanini", you say comet, he says "Natchatiram", you say "Milky Way", he says "Paal kadal". Most of the time the translation is a drift from the main conversation, a drift towards known conversations. I hate him for that. For I know I've been culprit to the same very often. The realisation that I dont know so many things frightens me, but I have to have a say in a conversation or else people will take me to be a fool. I read things that disinterest me. Everything is information!

The American English

"We (British) have everything in common with the Americans except our language" - Oscar Wilde

I watch American movies and I watch British movies. The first thing that strikes me is the repertoire of vocabulary that is used by the British to convey messages. They used the choicest of adjectives to describe a situation. The Americans on the other hand use "Cool", "Awesome", "Amazing", "F******" and the likes as the only adjectives. What I hate about them is that all their life they've had to learn just one Language... a single language to learn and they cannot possess mastery over it? How abysmally shameful!
I realise that I dont know my mother tongue - Tulu. I can't speak Gujarati. My command over English is questionable, I seem to have forgotten Hindi and people in Chennai feel I dont know Tamil. It is my dearth of vocabulary in a language and lack of mastery over any language that i truly despise and I hate the Americans for the same!

The lazy bum
There's this lazy friend of mine, a 100 Kilograms in all. You leave him on his own and he will sleep. You ask him to exercise and he will say he doesn't have time. You ask him to do a work and he will come up with numerous excuses for not doing it. I know what the guy thinks and how he will react in any situation - for I am exactly like him.

The finishing touch
I hate Arsenal - the football club. Throughout the season they played splendid football and blew the opposition away. But when the season comes to an end, they falter so badly that they are almost certain to lose titles for which they had no competition at all.
Some say that a job well begun is half done. I say, a job half done, is a job not done. There are so many hobbies that I've started and followed with earnestness. I start to dream of what can be done with the new found joy that the hobby brings and soon the hobby withers away. A job half-done.

The final question
I accept that I truly hate myself for all the wrong things I find in others. I atleast come to know my pitfalls. I work on them to change my own self so that I dont become a channel of hatred for others. Let me assume that I manage to change myself. I have changed so much that I dont recognise myself anymore. Obviously, now I dont hate the people i hated earlier. But will I ever be able to change my true inner self?

I think not. I am what I am. So the love-hate relationship shall continue.

The road to Perdition

Energy from within I can feel is bustling
Waiting to be expended, to be spent
How much can I really release at once?

This upsurge of vitality drives me insane,
I try to calm down, breathing slowly.
Is this rush of blood out of control?

I wish to scream, I wish to run,
To kick, to jump, to dance,
Why shouldn't I behave as a kid?

Instincts teach me to quell,
With restraint, the tide is held.
Can I really kill the surge?

Subsequent surges become weaker,
The resolve only gets stronger,
Who is winning this battle now?

Victory seems imminent,
It finally ceases,
What happened to all that Energy?

How is a kid different from an old man, I ask myself. The kid jumps, runs, screams all day and always wears a huge smile on his face. The old man walks frailly, talks scarcely and always frowns. How did the transition happen?

I get my answer in the equation E=mc². The equation suggests that Energy and Mass are different manifestations of the same thing. Which means they interchange their forms frequently.

As a kid grows older, he becomes a social animal and starts exercising control over his energy. He starts to store energy... as what? yes as mass. It is no wonder that people start to grow fat once they are out of their adolescence. All that stored energy is then wasted in fear, scheming and hatred. The smile slowly begins to wither away. The body no longer requires Energy, as it no longer needs it. The decadence so begins and ends the soul.

The quest for an Idea

"There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time has come." ~Victor Hugo

Transcendental thoughts
Ever felt an arousal? a determination from deep inside? You can feel it creeping through your skin straight into your head. It all starts collecting, the adrenaline rises and you cannot feel anything else but this accumulation. It boils you but still has a calming effect. The motivation, the inspiration, this feeling seems eternal. But yet it is ephemeral. Hmmm... seems like you just struck an Idea!

I've been trying to discern between few words and the concepts that they suggest. Data, Information, Knowledge and Idea. On the exterior they seem pretty much the same, but you try to divide them and you start figuring how they are dependent on each other and how they start fitting into some sort of a hierarchy.

Data, Information, Knowledge and Idea
Everything you read, hear or see, voluntarily or involuntarily gets registered somewhere. The topic might not interest you, but still it gets registered. We can call this data. If you start looking for data about specific subjects, you are searching for Information. Voluntarily you take notes either in memory or in writing if you dont trust your memory. As you keep gathering information, you seem to start making some connections between varied data and you get an underlying understanding of how things work. That is Knowledge. The more information you gather, the more connections you make and your knowledge keeps increasing. Knowledge is Power.
After you have drowned yourself in knowledge, you start feeling an itch. The itch tells you that you still dont know something. It sits in some corner of your mind. And then in some weird place and time, an upsurge occurs. The things around you dont make sense, the neurons in your brain are working overtime, synapses are being created and the neural network of your brain keeps coagulating ... and then final strike... it hits you! You have an Idea.
Idea is something that is truly original, not clouded or biased by anyone, just by your knowledge! You hold on to your idea more than you ever did for anything else. You haven't even thought over the merits and de-merits of it. It just feels right.

"...Beneath this mask there is more than flesh and bones. Beneath this mask there is an idea, Mr. Creedy, and ideas are bulletproof!"
~ V for Vendetta

The whole of human civilisation has been built around one thing - an idea. First, there were problems. Problems gave trouble, troubles gave knowledge and then struck the Idea - the solution. Slowly, each problem was overcome and the civilisation moved towards what could be called as taking its Natural course. The word natural is intriguing now. When we wonder how our Ideas actually occur, we have no idea! (ironic, eh?). Deeper searching shows that they were not completely unbiased. The bias was the Laws of nature. For solutions, we look at how Nature overcomes its problems and we look for Patterns. Patterns somehow find parallels in a weird manner. They are the driving force that lead you to the crescendo and the eventual climax of the conception of an Idea. Eventually, it seems that you never got the idea, the Idea got to you!

Enigma
Now this leads to a conundrum - an enigma that can only be solved with deep questioning. If ideas come from Laws of Nature, what ideas formed these laws?

Silencing critics - The Arsenal way

Last season Arsenal Football club had a bad season, not having won a single championship and barely managing to finish in the 4th place. To make matters worse, at the beginning of the current season talismanic striker Thierry Henry announced that he was leaving the club to join Barcelona Football Club. Henry was the mainstay of the team and most of the game was built around him. From the moment Henry announced his departure everyone in the football fraternity wrote off Arsenal for the season. Some said they might get relegated, most said they wouldn't even manage to finish in the Top to play in Europe next season. But Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger was silently confident.
None of the players made any comment as the football fraternity sounded the death knell of the club. With majority of the players being under the age of 24, the lack of experience in the team was told to be the major setback of the team. Of all the betting companies not a single one was putting money on Arsenal winning the Premiership. These guys have billions at stake and can't make any decisions that will affect their profits.

So how does a team written off by every expert fare?
The best way to silence your critics is by proving them wrong in every statement they make. And that is exactly what the Arsenal team has done. 4 months into the season and take a look at where they stand.

• Unbeaten in 27 games


• First in the Barclays Premier League


• First in the group in the European Champions League


• 30 points from 12 games in Premier League with a game in hand


• Only team to have scored in every match they played


• An average of 2.25 goals per match!

More statistics of Premier League
From being written off, they are the team to beat now. Money is being put on the first team that might be capable of defeating Arsenal.

Francesc Fabregas
At the heart of this resurgence of the Arsenal team has been 21-year old Spanish kid Francesc Fabregas. He instantly filled up the void left by Patrick Vieira in the central midfield. No funny antics, no excessive dribbling, no publicity stunts... Fabregas has been a revelation to the team. He controls the midfield powerfully as the other Gunners charge forward. Last season, he was criticised for not scoring goals. A central midfielder doesn't need to score, but this season he has taken everyone by surprise by scoring 11 goals. He still has the highest number of assists. If his form would have to be doubted in big games, it would be noteworthy he scored equalisers against Liverpool and Manchester United and led the team to some splendid fight backs. Although, people do say he doesn't have any trophy behind him to prove that he is the best midfielder currently, he is certainly my favourite footballer.

Catching talent young
What has been the most important facet in this Arsenal squad? Talent sighted at an early stage. When every critic was writing off Arsenal, an extremely small no of experts pointed out the amazing eye for talent that Arsene Wenger possessed. They found parallels with the young squad that Sir Alex Ferguson sported in the early 90s for Manchester United. The "kids" back then were Ryan Giggs, Neville brothers, Paul Scholes and David Beckham. They turned out to become stars. Only 4 months into the season and football clubs are making a bee-line to steal away the likes of Cesc Fabregas, Van Persie, Rosicky and others.

Are all the critics silenced, though?
Most of the critics have already changed their opinion and some of them actually go overboard in their praise. But some still remain adamant as ever. They say Arsenal have nothing to show that they are a world class team. The current team has won no championship. The current unbeaten run is just a bubble which might burst anytime and the whole team shall be in tatters. To an extent they are right. Until we win any title, we have nothing to be proud about, nothing to boast and nothing silence the critics. But what we have is belief. Belief in the young team. Belief in the manager and belief in the club.
Go Gunners Go!