Subtle Beauty!

On a lazy Saturday evening when I was sipping my rich flavored tea, reading one of the Michael Crichton’s my taste buds were searching for the dry ginger (sukku) I put in the tea. The ginger flavor was mild, relishing that I looked over to find the pretty little pink carnations just blooming on their green stalks on my dinner table. How simple!

The beauty of both hit me! It was like watching a polite girl in a meeting, almost invisible until she speaks that one word which would turn everything around. Most certainly comparable to that hidden king-rook pair which would be lurking unnoticeable in the chess board until the opponent makes a castling.. The very calm ocean… with nothing but the rushing waves to décor it, sometimes that very simpleness in a guy who hides in the crowd and acknowledges with not more than a smile when his name is announced for the success of the project. I am anything but subtle. But to me it feels soothing and natural when you see subtleness, in any and every form. Beautiful flowers, my mobile phone camera did not do enough justice to it though!

For the Love of the Flag!

Jan 26th 2010 – The 61st Republic Day of India. Indians celebrated it all over the globe, this grand day when our constitution was formed. This day made India. Infact there was even a function organized by our guys to celebrate it in the city where I work too. So with “Jai Hind!” I proceed…

How exactly do we celebrate it in India nowadays? When I was in school, there used to be a mandatory attendance required for flag hoisting and everyone of us were proud to stand there for the whole function and get candies in the end. Same was the case with Independence Day. But later in college what happened was “the mandatory” was removed! So many of them would not show up! Later when I joined the IT Company it’s even worse. There is no republic day celebration, no flag hoisting nothing! They enjoy the freedom though! Yes in our history classes we have read a big deal about this flag. What amazes me is as part of this field wherever we travel we do celebrate that country’s Independence Day with all fun and party. Atleast in the US we do.

This makes me think is it because of the fun and family involvement? Yes here Independence Day is all about barbeque (even in the office they do!), family union, drinks, beer and fun with the flag! Everyone is allowed to use the flag the way they want. In the car, in front of their house, cubicles, posters, t-shirts, hat, even tattoo… You name it… When they see it everywhere it becomes a brand, a logo of themselves. They celebrate it while we stand at a distance and revere it. While respect is good, it should not be at the expense of forgetting the whole point of the flag , the idea of being free, the notion of being a nation. Do you know that the flag code was changed in 2002 after a trial? Now every one of us can fly it with due respect on all days! May be seeing the flag everyday might impart some love for the country too. Also celebrating it with family just as any other festival might be fun too. Just crying out loud the deep struck thought, that’s all! mmm.. time to paint a picture of the flag and hang it in my Cube!

Did I wake up on the "right" side of the bed?

It’s not about how lucky or unlucky I am feeling today, but it’s about the weather. Two years now I got used to the 3 winters I have been in this place. It is not as bad as some of the mid-west states, but sometimes it gets brutal here. But otherwise it is the usual cold, dark winter that cripples you from doing anything outside the house (No wonder people love video games!). There have been a lot of weekends when I have felt like staying at home and relaxing. This weekend was like that too. After a small get together on Friday and a short shopping on Saturday, I pretty much stayed at home, catching up on some books, some cooking, some coding (personal learning... not work related hello!! ) etc.,

When I went to bed I had that "Charged Weekend Mood!" (Especially since I lived through the GM diet plan) where you would want to change everything from the next day. I wanted to wake up early, make it to work early (nowadays I often do this) and get to my personal things in the evening nice and happy. I so much wanted to battle the winter fever! In the morning when I got ready and stepped out of the house at 6:10 am...

Instead of the cold harsh air, I was in for the surprise of a pleasant breeze;
Instead of the jittering teeth, my mouth put on a broad happy smile;
Instead of my worry about the frozen car, I was wondering about removing my jacket;
Instead of the time wasted in scrapping the ice off, I was enjoying the miniscule rain droplets;

WOW!!! It was a whopping 55 F (12 C) degrees... Where did the winter go? Did we already step in to spring? My friend was suggesting about a weekend trip to New York City... Did the weather blur his thinking too? The sudden euphoria was short lived when I remembered it was only Jan and a lot more of winter is still left! Well, I can enjoy this day anyway :)

The Labored, Resolved on its Own!

Wondering what this means? Well for one thing- it is not an idiom. I was searching for one though for this post but did not find any, so created my own :). Without much ado lets move on to the actual subject.

Say you have been trying very hard to get something done, may be a problem that you are trying to solve or a big stain you wanted to remove. You have worked against the clock on it, you have tried various options. Somehow the issue is not getting fixed. Now, how would you feel if one fine morning suddenly the issue is no more? The stain has vanished because of your friend poured some solution on it unexpectedly. Likewise the problem got fixed because someone else was trying to fix something and fixed this accidentally. Something you never thought would fix it has fixed it with no effort from you. All the sweat and pain basically did nothing. Would you be happy that the issue is gone or would you be sad that all your energy became pointless?

I was happy in a way when this happened to me today. In the middle of the night I get a call saying the issue is resolved. I was wondering if I was awake or was it a dream... I have not even dreamed of this before. After the call I could not go to sleep. I have labored with all love on that issue for 6 months now. Suddenly with no effort from me it is more or less resolved. I was happy because I don’t have to deal with it any more and the result was in my favor. I felt as if the Almighty, The Powerful One has suddenly chosen me to be amongst his lucky few. Have you faced this magic anytime?

Not so "Friendly" Friend

Hey Listen, Your "Friend" just called up.

Have you heard any of your really close friends or your husband or boy friend say this to you in a sarcastic tone? If you have then you know what I mean here. For others, let me put it in a few words. The "Friend" mentioned here is some person whom you do not get along with, or cannot stand or do not like to see. Now the person mentioning this is a person who will be pretty close to you and in good terms with you.

When or why did people start mentioning a non-friendly person to you as your friend? I started contemplating on this after my friend said a similar line to me "Yah she is your close "Friend" right!!"
to mean a girl who is not in good terms with me. Just the stress and sarcastic tone changes the whole meaning of this word. This is not the only word and most certainly it exists in almost all languages. The more I thought about this I came up with more reasons for this. May be the first time someone had to mention it, they were afraid what if that person they are talking about hears this? Or may be the repercussions of the corporate culture where people like to see the glass half full, all the positive thinking stuff... Or it could be because we ran out of negative words or the mind was not quick enough to get one.

However strange it may feel while analyzing this, when used in a normal situation it brings out a secret smile and may be in a while that "Friend" person might soon become a real friend.

Well Said by Us!

I am not going to talk about the current economic trends, why the market went down and all. This blog is all about appreciation. My intention though is not to do a free advertisement, but that could happen. Also No offense meant for any other Nation.

Are you one of those who like to read the morning newspaper (Hindu, Indian Express etc.,) with a nice cup of coffee to begin your day? Or may be the lazy Sunday News paper reader? Or infact a tech savvy person who likes to reduce paper wastage and gets his news from the web? Either ways you might have noticed the language depth and expanse of vocabulary in the articles. I have been reading the online versions of our Indian journals and the American ones like Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Time Magazine etc., I don’t get to read every word or sentence it says but I do read in detail about certain News and some articles as time permits.

Recently I happened to read about the Nexus One release by Google on almost every news site possible. I was trying to gather as much information as possible to consider a possible buy of the cell phone. While doing that I stumbled upon this news on Economic Times. Now, I am not sure if it is the same version that came in the printed copy, but the one on the website was by far the best one about "Nexus One". I felt the author had really given crisp points about the phone and the editor has done a wonderful job pulling it together . In some American counter parts I saw spelling errors, grammar errors and worse - even information errors. Same way I was reading this article today again on Economic Times. Normally this topic will be written more or less like a "Chicken Soup for Office Politics Hater's Soul", but the way this article was written I was simply amazed. If you are interested check it out :).

Reading this, thoughts poured in. We have mastered an international language and are producing works that would stump even the native speakers. Is that because of the fact that our country ranks on top for the most number of official languages (22) and in the 4th position for the most number of languages spoken (427)? Or we did that because we are always surrounded by languages and over years we got it in our nature to master them :). Just a possibility!

"Curb" Appeal of Maharashtra Government!

I was randomly browsing the News Headlines on Times of India. This caught my eyes. 3-idiots in ragging row My first thought is - What the heck is wrong with this government

First, why do even politicians bother commenting on a movie? Is it not just an entertainment industry? Do they do it for all entertainment fields? If so then how is it entertainment... doesn't it become a government controlled show? For any industry to grow it needs some freedom. That’s why some industries in India prosper and grow. Not because the government helps there, but on the contrary they keep themselves out of it, especially because they do not understand those fields. 3 idiots is one of the well taken movies in recent times. I have heard people even say that the movie is comparable to most Hollywood movies for the picturisation and all. With good movies becoming a rare occurrence nowadays why do our politicians always find it amusing to pick on crowd applauded movies mentioning words like ragging, violence etc especially where it is totally unrelated?
Second, when the government (rather politician) promotes violence themselves in different ways during elections, bandh, strikes, in the parliament when they hit each other with chairs, during internal border issues (like telengana and belgaum) etc., how can they even think about pointing fingers at the Movie Industry? Even morally what rights they have to do that?

Third, don’t they have better work to do? Maharashtra the second largest in population in India has umpteen issues that the government really needs to worry about. Every time it rains Bombay is flooded, traffic is slow, and can they spend this time taking steps for those things. To appeal the crowd, instead of curbing "Scenes" from movies, they should curb "some poverty and illiteracy" from their state. Please someone let me know, if there is a way to open their brains and put the right thoughts in.

I feel not just this government, it is true with even Tamil Nadu and a few other state governments. Lately they seem to think they can take up silly things and make it an issue and get some publicity by that means - Wake up Government! Your people are smarter than you think, it’s high time you get there! mmm will it be interesting if we can curb and criticize the government the same way they do to the movies or other silly issues.

New Year & Blue Moon @ the Crossroads of the World!

Last Saturday a lazy afternoon my friends were making plans for the New Year's Eve. In the TV they announced it is a blue moon day and that faintly hit my brains. I made a mental note to check on it when I have time. Then after an hour's vague discussion we finally decided the weather is not good so skiing would be a bad idea. The thought rested for 2 days. On Tuesday we gathered again to take a final poll on the New Year's Eve. Work was getting to us, its year end, we wont have holidays for another 5 months solid... so all these made us decide lets go to New York City. So what to do there? Then we came up with the Ball drop idea! How about going to the Ball Drop? Immediate thoughts were - the weather is bad, it will rain, we will not be able to stand 7-8 hrs, is it worth it, what if we feel cold, once we are in we cannot come out, how to manage nature calls, we came up with an answer for all questions as we were determined to make it (atleast one of us :)).

On Wednesday night we hit "Wal-Mart" and bought hand warmers, ponchos (not my idea), thermals, protein bars etc, read different websites and blogs for tips (were scary), and prepared for the grand day. I was not all that enthusiastic and went to bed. The Grand Day finally came - The end of the Year, I was all excited about the plan. We had to leave our home by 11:30am to make it to the ball drop, so I woke up early started cleaning my house (its just me), one of my friends went to work by 6:30am, the rest of us worked from home. By 10:30am my friend calls me and he was like "Can you check outside the window?” OMG! It was snowing so much. We had checked NYC weather but did not check our own place. We again huddled on the phone and since the determination level was high we decided to go with it.

As planned we left home by 11:30am waddled our way through the snow keeping the car on the road in a low speed drove to New Haven. When we reached it was about 1:30 pm. Our hearts were contemplating on if we will make it or not. We took a to-go lunch from "Subway" and hit the train @ 2:33pm - the earliest we could manage. It’s the slowest train journey of my life. First, I have never traveled in a train (not subway) in the US; Second I am used to trains in India (comparatively much faster). After a bumpy, hour and half drag it reached Grand Central, NYC. We jumped out, got ourselves dressed for the weather, bought final stuff and started walking to Time Square at 4:30pm. It was already crowded, the streets were busy, the Sun went down and we were worried if we will get anywhere close to the ball.

We had to walk down to the 52nd street after a few enquiries with the cops and I was already saying it’s alright, not so bad and all that - the general morale was somewhat low; crowd was everywhere trying to get to the square. Finally we entered - walking, running, screaming to the 47-48th st pen. We were glad to be atleast that close, overjoyed we looked at the clock and it was 5:30pm - 6.5hrs to go. The Ball was hoisted at 6. We barely heard the things going on in the stage, then saw the crowd around - there were a LOT of Germans, students, Indians, Chinese and people from around the globe. Initial chattering was there... 2 more count down happened and it was 8. We were all happy until - the ice rain. It starting slow and then to a down pour - our ponchos and rain proof jackets kept us safe to the envy of the crowd. Some of them even asked if we have one more of it. No bags allowed, so Sorry!

By 9:00 pm we were all exchanging chocolates, thoughts and interests, the crowd started getting familiar and we were moving forward with in the Pen. We then decided to go even further and jumped a Pen, and we loved it between 46 & 47, the stage sounds were much clearer and we got to talk to a different crowd. Slowly it was 10:30pm. The ice rain changed to snow, then normal showers and again ice rain. The weather got colder, my legs were freezing and lower back was aching. Another chocolate this time with a different group and some water kept the spirits up again. It was 11:00 pm :). The last hour of the year... in my mind I was replaying the important incidents of the year... my friends were all waiting for the last minute, Hey not so bad we are there and then it was 11:59... the last 1 min was so fast with the count down. I was screaming so loud every one was taking photos, there were proposals, shouting, hugging, kissing, a mad frenzy in the chaotic showers of confetti - the glorious moment lasted for about 10 mins, completely worth every minute of the wait. The other end of the road gleamed with fireworks, 2010 has BORN!!!! I could not believe I was there at the cross roads of the world (Time Square) on a Blue Moon New Year’s Day (even caught a glimpse of the moon hiding between clouds), once in a life time experience.

The thought filled me up until I got back home at 6:30 am and even now. Hope each one of you had a blasting New Year start, all geared up to face the 365 days of challenge ahead! Once again "Happy New Year!!!"