Ginger & Cardamom

Terra Incognita

It has been a month now since the news has been out and I have been told that I will be spending some next few years, months and days of my life with Infosys Technologies. Since then, something has changed. A lot of thoughts are flowing around in the empty space above my neck casually referred to as head. It’s going to be a new place, new people, new environment, new expectation everything new. All that’s going to be old is may be a quarter of century antique me. There are so many questions propping all over, that the world seems to be hazed out. It was so easy few days back, when all I wanted to do was to reach where I am. But now over a month, the world is unclear, which I thought was my goal is just an intermittent destination and I don’t know where I will be going henceforth. Till here the journey was so far so good the terrain was familiar, and the feet were held strong. But what about the land ahead, is it a swamp which will swallow me completely with nothing left of my antiquity, or will there be a strong wind that will blow me away. Will the sunshine in the east, will the moon still shine or the seasons would stop. It is like passing through a gate where you do not know what lies ahead, but you also know that once you enter there are no comebacks.

I have always been surprised by the ability of life to bring new and still new surprises for me. Sometimes pleasant while other times not so pleasant. There are a lot of questions which are standing straight in front of me. The only answer to them is to live them with the time. The only way I have ever won from being surprised by the life was giving her back surprises in a bigger and better way. All I can feel from my gut, there is going to be a competition between me and life and its going to be array of surprises and an era of unpredictability for the next few years. All I can say to life is let the best between two win……. Adieu till the next post.

Education & Courage

When I look forward to the issues and really think about it, education seems to be one of the biggest ironies of the life of my friend. Actually not only she but I am sure there would be hundred of other women who would be under going the same thing for lack of courage and independence in social structure and may be men too. One of the better students in the country, an engineer from a fairly good institute and an MBA from a renounced Institute in her profile. She after all this knows what is good for her and what she wants out of life. 24 years of life with 6 years of a technical and professional education has given her a lot of perspectives about life. With roots descending to an unknown village in Uttar Pradesh, she has seen a lot of life and is very competitive in all spheres of life.

I always believed education could bring changes in people that made them great as they were but I guess I was wrong when I see her plight. Despite knowing what is good for her, what she wants out of life. She will start making compromises in her life, for her orthodox family has never heard of a women who can have her own will in the family. So how can she be spared? Is it not the Males who spent most of life in that village know how she should spend her life, they already know what is good for her. If she doesn’t agrees may be she can be killed, or her mother for that matter. Does it makes a difference? Can education help u save from the bullet or a give you courage to stand against one. I think her mother did really a good job to make sure that she studies so hard and go high above all expectation, but she really forgot to teach her to stand for what she thought was right.

The interesting fact is that all her education has made her plight more unbearable, a girl who has probably never seen a school will never be able to sure what was right for her and what was not. But girls like these will always know that what is happening to them, what has happened to them is wrong and they will live with it all their life. They will do what the males of the family wanted them to do and at the end may be tell their daughters too that they should follow the same league. Was all that education able to brought a change? Wasn’t one of the finest minds in the country is going to be wasted, and deprived a right of choice? Does she actually have a say in her own life or family? There can not be a more waste of education than this for the lack of courage. I have no answers to these questions to help my friend. But I wish the only solution is a pinch of courage, to sit down and listen and then stand up and say that I am what I am and I know how to handle my life and I need to take charge, and my Time is NOW!!! There are scary thoughts when I think of this, but it is still better than a life suffering and living like hell for rest of her life agonizing every minute for the single minute when she had a choice to stand up.

Memoirs of 6 Weeks

There has been a trail of events that has put my life on a roller coaster ride, I have been too lazy all this while to post anything on this blog. The only justice I can do is to post a memoir and mentioning snippets of my life…

SOLD!!! Auction Closed-

Finally this sheep is sold to, Infosys Technologies. The experience was so good, Two years dreaming IT, and trying to living the dream. Finally I am part of the great organization. It has not long when I used to talk about the great Global Delivery Model, or the Zero Debt Company, or the Millionare Driver of the founder himself, or the splendid cash reserves all with such awe and now I am going to be part of this great legacy. I will have a chance to live what Thomas Friedman talks about as “The World is Flat”. I am afraid will I be lost in the crowd of the 55000 people who will be around me or will I be affecting the NASDAQ 100 Index. A lot of questions makes life exciting because I know equal number of answers would be coming by very soon.

Resolutions-

I plan to do following things in this New Year. When I say I plan, it is quite clearly understood that they might fail and they are there in the first place to provide me a metrics of how much I missed.

1- Read twice the number of books that I did last year. I know this would be a state of Ideal Utopia but this comes in the light of that after being place I do not intend to slog myself ass of for the MBA curriculum and also if I can predict odd with Infosys predictability, there would be a high probability that I might get to spend some time on bench, which I intend to utilize for constructive purposes not for forwarding mails ( but I am assured that these odds are not in my favour).

2- Keep touch with friends- Will keep touch with old friends, will call people write emails and letters.

3- Will not help people at my own cost and allow them to enjoy their lives at my expense

4- Save money for contributing generously for Help Prats Get Rich Quickly Fund.

5- I will try and respect other view points than the right view point (which is obviously mine)

6- Will drive in a more sane manner, and clean my bike ever weekend (I have already missed two in the time between I thought and I am writing this)

7- Will not give anyone advice on their love life, and will apologize people from my past who are into a relationship and are cursing me to make their relationship work (Yes some are looking forward to break my head for all obvious reasons)

9- Will exercise regularly at least one hour a day.

10- Follow all this to maximum time of the year possible.

Adieu!! Till the next post :-)