A day out in the farm!!

Yesterday, i had a very good experience.. an experience filled with joy, pleasure and happiness...After a long hectic week, all i was longing for is a weekend... a weekend where i can take a break.. and sleep..But contrary to that, i got an opportunity to visit a village.. I was delighted to see the innocent people, pollution free blue sky, wide species of birds, the greenary.. and various small streams of water flowing here and there..!! what else do I need on that weekend to take a break from the mundane routine?

I had seen the cocoon culturing division..while i was still trying to recollect the school days where my science teacher taught about sericulture, fresh coconuts were given to us..I took the coconut and was waiting.. Sandip did not take a moment to think once he got his coconut.. he was so excited and tried to gulp it all directly into his mouth and eventually fed his shirt with good amount of coconut water! Kumar almost followed Sandy.. i was still holding the coconut in my hand while the others were ready for the second one.. i was waiting for a straw :P At once i realized where i was.. i was in a farm.. under a coconut tree and was expecting a straw.. For the first time ever, i tried lifting up the huge coconut and managed to drink it with almost negligible fuss and without making a fool out of myself :D

Kumar, Sandy and I shared the farm into sections and started harvesting the raagi.. Kumar underestimated our capacity and just got one gunny bag where we were dumping the raagi extract from the field. In the scorching sun we were on our task for the time time ever.. trying to learn from our own mistakes and sharing the best practices across..Sandip was emphasizing on the requirement of peer review.. While we were too engrossed with our task, we had two ox's not so tightly tied staring at us. Unsure of when they will break the rope apart and test the strength of their horns, we collectively managed to harvest one third of the 1.6 acre farm in a couple of hours time. I had taken a couple of snaps with the collected raagi like a proud farmer.. To dampen all my pride, Kumar told me the fact that after processing the extract into raagi, it will hardly make 1KG or 2!! Hard to accept, but he is infact right. A farmer works so hard all through the season fighting hard with the rain Gods.. at the mercy of nature.. and might sometimes end up not even being self-sufficient with his hard earned harvest..

After one round around the place.. with Kumar guiding us on the various varieties of birds (of which i honestly dont remember a single name while i compose this blog)...we were all set to drive back home at around 3:30.. But Govindanna's(a farmer around) wife insisted that we should have lunch there. Their lunch was so simple.. Rice(with almost no polish), butter milk and lemon pickle.. They were all eating it sooo happily.. All it takes to be happy is just the attitude towards life..We had lunch and came back homes.. But the day left me with loads of thoughts.. thoughts that are still running in my head..

Cricket match!!!!

After a very long time, i got this wonderful opportunity of posing on a cricket pitch!! There was a cricket match organized in our office by our team over the last saturday.. The rules of the game include the involvement of two women players in each team with the opening bats women being them for the 1st two overs.. where we had under arm bouling :D (btw.. i was a pseudo member of the organizing committee :) ) Ofcourse, needless to say that the highly enthued Sravani is in demand!! lol! I gave my consent to one of the teams out of four. The selection was kinda tough.. but i had to oblige after the captain promised me a treat!

There were three matches in total.. Abhik's team Vs Vikranth's team.. It was outrageously hilarious to watch the match with Abhishek and Adam taking up the charge of being the commentators and me trying to interrupt them in between.. with the people who are slightly weak in mathematics doing the manual scoring using the scoring sheets. Somehow, Abhik won the match! The second match was between Shridhar's team(the lucky team for having got me in it!) and Raimon's team. Adam seemed a bit too confident, walking like a lion on the pitch..

Shereen and I practised enough for 1 long hour to thrash the other team down. However, the bouler on the other side, Sushma, seemed to have practised even more ;). 5 balls is all it took for her to throw us out of the ground.. I faced the 1st ball.. while i was still wondering as to where the ball has gone, it is in the keeper's hand! I prepared myself for a shot in the next ball.. Apparently, before i could manage to relax after a big swing of my bat in the attempt of thrashing the ball, the ball comfortably hit the wickets behind me :( and i was thrown out of the ground..

Wondering about what had happened in fractions of seconds, i sat there watching the rest of my team mates hitting boundaries after boundaries.. I was cheering them and wishing for our team to win the match so that I can again get a chance to play.. this time, to really play the game and not just pose on the ground.. Irrespective of Adam's futile attempts, the Indian pitch did not seem to be favourable to him.. the Sachin of our team, Mallik hit him with sixes on alternate balls!! Yes..if you really want something, the whole universe conspires for you to achieve it.. we won the match and secured a place in the finals to compete with Abhik's team. I must say Vikrant did a great job as a commentator for this match and constantly managed to get Adam on his nerves.

After lunch, we had the final match.. We won the toss and chose to bat first. Shereen and I are all set to make a mark this time, unlike the last match. We thought about nothing else.. as the ball arrived, we just bashed it towards any random direction and ran across for the run. I had to dive forward stretching my bat forwards to save my wicket at one point of time..and.. we managed to give a score of 9 to the team at the end of 2 overs.. with both of us not out. We were so proud of our performance. I was so proud of my dive.. my 1st ever dive on a cricket ground. Probably the rest of the people in my team were also so excited with our performance that they apparently forgot to perform to their best :P ;) and we lost the match :D Afterall, it was just a match! But it made our day.. We had so much fun..It was masthi unlimited..

Pollution Vs Diwali

Yes.. today is Diwali.. Firstly, I wish you all a very happy and safe diwali :) Oflate i have been thinking how powerful nature is! Floods.. droughts.. earth quakes.. what not!! These are the things which no one can do anything about! well.. is it really so? Is it all because of nature that all these things are happening without any involvement of us? I dont really think so.. well, there is a lot of pollution around. There are ten people going from a destination A to a destination B. And, they would want to go on ten different vehicles, all of them polluting the atmosphere in their own fashion.. and i really dunno if any of those ten people trying to pollute the air by ten different means atleast even think of planting some trees to compensate for the loss..well, they wont! why will they? how does it matter to them? they just want comfort..

I have personally seen a lot people in my office calling multiple lifts at the same time, as they cannot afford to wait for 2 mins till the lift called comes. So, they want to call all the available lifts.. which ever comes first, they will take it.. The rest of them just waste the electricity and come in vain.. Not just this, people are so relluctant to shut down the computers while leaving for the day. Especially in the software companies, it is utmost important that one does not waste so much of electricity knowingly.. It takes a lot to produce one unit of electricity.. but who cares? we wont!!

And especially on this day of Diwali, i feel like writing this.. because as i write this blog, i can hear a lot of noises around.. of the crackers and bombs that people have been indescriminately firing since 4 hours giving no break for the air to calm down.. so much of air and noise pollution!! Yes, Diwali is the festival of lights and we should have fun.. but, one should always draw a line.. you can fire a couple of crackers.. just to drive away the flies and insects around.. but you should not just go on and on with it to the extent that a person with sensitive ears goes deaf in that noise! And again, are we doing something to atleast reconcile for the loss being created to the natures balance? Definitely, not!! Then, none of us have any right to blame the Mother nature for getting wild.. we are the culprits for making it lose its balance and roar at us in regular intervals.

The shorter, the sweeter!!

Of late, i happened to have a chance to glance through a couple of blogs.. I start reading them with great interest to start with, but apparently, when it comes to nearly half way through the journey, i get exhausted.. the interest ceases to exist.. I dunno if the blogger is trying to express so much on something that he/she is just pouring out all of it in one single shot.. or is it that i restrict my blogs to only a couple of paragrahs that i am finding others blogs a bit too lenthy??

As far as i am concerned, the blogs should act like a refreshing tonic to read through and get the views of the other person. I realized that the shorter the blog is, the sweater it is.. unless the author is a too good at writing! Atleast I hate to read long blogs.. If someone has succeeded in making me read a real long blog from top to bottom with the same interest, either the person has really expressed it in a way that is too interesting, or the person has similar thoughts as that of mine.. or the topic in itself has the magnetic effect!! Having said all this, i will stop this blog here [;)]

Change!!

Change is inevitable.. If things dont change, it gets really boring.. and if they do, it will be challenging.. but if they do too much, it makes life hell! There is a line drawn for anything. For instance, a fish is happy inside the water body. Not that it doesn't have its challenges inside that vast water body. If we get it out of its comfort zone and throw it on the land, you cannot term that as an attempt to make the fish to be more competitive and challenging.. it is beyond argument, a cold blooded attempt of making its life a hell!!

If a drastic change in itself is so dangerous, how pleasant a feeling it is to be amidst people who are not at all cooperative, deriving sadistic pleasure out of watching the fish struggle to reach back to its comfort zone?? The poor fish is happy in the aquarium.. some ppl watch it and enjoy by restricting its space.. narrowing down its zone of comfort.. while some others go to an even more higher level by taking it out of the aquarim and watching it struggle for its life on the land. Is it the mistake of the fish's fate to get into that aquarium in the 1st place?? Even if it is not happy inside and wants to just get away from there, back to its sweet home, does it really have an option??

Well, there cannot really be a solution for everything.. I once thought, if the problem is complicated, there will always be a smart solution for it. Afterall, if a brain can think and propose a problem, it can also think and get a solution for it.. But now, i need to think over it again.. before i confess that what i had thought once upon a time is not completely correct..!!

time..!

Time.. the most precious thing in this world! It is infact priceless.. Oflate it gives me a feeling that time is just flying by.. I cant believe it is exactly 2 years since i started my professional career. Yes.. August 30th 2007 it was when i stepped into ANZ. It doesn't really feel like it... its hard to think that it was 2 years back that i had a chat with my manager about my short term career goals.. It is only now, as the short-term is almost close to an end that i started realizing the pace at which time runs and drags us along with it..

yes.. it takes a moment for a minute to exhaust.. but, the memories collected are for sure indelible.. As i sit today and think about those pages of my professional diary, i can see the vivid picture of the journey that i went through.. it has tons of cherishable events, gloomy scenarios, strategies, a lot of good friends..

Am i too busy to realize that the time is making me run along with it? or is it really true that the earth started revolving faster of late? ;) Definitely, the latter is not possible.. yes! i am busy.. so busy that i dont even get time to blog.. to read others blogs.. to do complete justice to the various creative ideas in my head.. Thanks to the competitive corporate world.. i wish we soon start living each moment of the life fully, rather than just letting the moments pass by..

media!!

Media... is definitely the widely used mode to reach public. Especially the news channels are widely being used by today's busy world to keep themselves updated of the latest info. Undoubtedly, they are not just the dump pits of information.. Every bit of info that they provide makes a remarkable impression in many tendure hearts. It indeed has a great role to play in paving the way for a brighter India. If not just used as a commercial mode, it can make wonders.

But how far are they presenting the facts and figures? How much of the information that you see is free of exaggeration? Just give them a thread and they will knit a beautiful net out of it.. competing with each other as to whose net is more appealing..In their mad race to become more popular, they are distorting the total communication.. who will take the ownership of the damage that they create with their "commercialized form" of information? When will ppl get to hear the factual info and not the grape wine?? If the sponsorers for the ads cease to do so atleast during the time of the news, will the situation be any better?

Is democracy the right thing all the time???

We are a group of 11...set up for another trip to some place near bangalore.. we are a group who strongly believes in democracy.. this is what happened..

P1: How many day trip is it? are we ok for a 2/3 day trip?
P2/3: I prefer 1 day.. though i am open to 2/3 day trip too
P3/4/5/6/7/8: I am ok with 2/3 day trip
P9/10: Cannot make it for more than a day
P1: OK then, lets jort down what all we have around bangalore for one day fun..
P2/9: No water places.. water places in summers will really be very sad..
P3: Wonderla!!!!! Its not a natural water place.. there are a lot of rides.. we can have fun..
P10: i dont mind it though.. but do we have any other options?
P1: How about Film city?? It has go carting too.. there is maze.. and i a sure we can have lotsa fun there..
P9: hmm.. does not sound all that bad.. but can we think about Lepakshi?
P3: No......not in this scorching sun
P2: How about Guhantara?
P9: hmm.. i am not for artificial caves and stuff.. but considering that we are all going together, i think we can have fun..
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the conversation goes on..
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needless to say that we dint come to any conclusion.. definitely, we wont!! afterall, no two individuals think alike..and we are totally 11 brains thinking at the same time.. If a small decison goes into a loop with just 11 people, what will be the situation at a higher level?? How difficult is it to manage a whole lot of people in a "democratic" country like India???

No wonder we have so many people voice out their views against every single decision taken with their own philosophy to be against... its truely understandable... All that is required is a little time.. That acts like a fuel to burn the situation and policy in all possible angles.. Now its time for me to re think, does democracy do good in all respects at all times??? or should there be some exceptions for our own betterment??

Blogging Vs Regular Blogging

Blogging definitely is not all that difficult.. But blogging regularly is..!! Each time i let my fingers dance on this panel while letting my thoughts flow by, i decide to come back and do that more and more often..But, i hardly end up with a count of one blog a month!

It so happens that i get a huge flood of ideas when i am too busy swimming in an ocean of work trying to figure out for an island..or i get some very important work when i am in the middle of a blog.. and hence end up leaving it as a draft forever!! afterall, its not that easy to continue a left over piece of work for ages.. be it continuing someone else's or ur own work.. it doesn't matter..!!

well... ahh.. here it comes.. i gotta log off now.. but this time, i am not gonna leave this blog unpublished for ages down the line.. and finally discard it!! i will put an end to that trend.. i will publish it as it is..!!!!

Man proposes.. God disposes

I should have been in Hyderabad as i write this blog if things had happened the way i had planned... It was a very important day in the life of my dear friend Kamy.. and i really really wanted to be present on this most important day in her life, her wedding.. Generally it so happens that whenever i plan to go to Hyderabad, i plan the leave well in advance and somehow manage to goof up with the tickets and the plan gets toppled down due to unavailability of tickets. This time i had booked the tickets well in advance, applied for leave very well in advance.. but alas.. i am here in Bangalore writing this blog..

This is what i call destiny or fate.. Life is not a cake walk.. If everything happens the way you plan, may be life gets boring..may be we will miss this element of subtle battle with it..may be each of us would start feeling that there is nothing that can ever compete with us.. Hence there is always a remarkable difference between what you plan and what actually happens..!!

I fell in a situation where i cannot enfore that my leave should be granted 'coz the project is at a critical stage where i just cannot leave it in the middle or hand it over to someone else. My committment never allows me to do that. But my heart wants to witness the most memorable moment of my dear friend's life. Conflicting interests they are!!!! My best wishes are surely with her..though i am not able to make it to the wedding personally... I wish her a very happy married life..Dedicating this blog to her!! luv u Kamy :)

Whats in a Valentines day?

well.. today is feb 14th.. so what??? just another day in the calender of 365/366 days!!!

There is Children's day where the kids enjoy because they can go to school in colorful dresses.. and they get chocolates!!! There is Independence day where we all cherish the hard earned freedom and think about all that went through once upon a time for India to be what it is today.. what is it about valentines day and why is it so special?? I am saying this not because i dont have someone to walk hand in hand and celebrate this day.. not because i dont appreciate the bond of love.. but because i never understood this very concept! As far as i am concerned, everyday in this life's dictionary bears a significance.. if that were the case, then it is needless to say that every moment of ur lover's company should give you pleasure.. every thought of having him/her in your thoughts should bring in a pleasant smile on ur face..

True that in some cases people wait for this day to express their love.. but again, it leaves me really surprised as to what the whole logic is.. if you love someone, why dont you just go ahead and tell them?? why do you want to wait for a day which comes only once a year to express it?? Such madness(i really dont know what to call) was largely predominant in my college days where there was a committe who took the great initiative of distributing roses on people's behalf to their beloved ones and thus aid in cropping up their love.. Hey.. dont get me wrong here.. i definitely dont belong to any ram sena or something.. i am just trying to be too practical!!

At the end of the day, we have people asking.. so, how was the day? something special??? huhh... and my answer remains.."It was just another day in the diary of 2009.. just another day in the dictionary of my life"!!

New Year!!!

The new year has begun.. with the sun rising in the same old direction, setting in the same old direction.. pollution increasing at the same exponential rate with rapidly growing technology.. people setting up new resolution list and wish list for the year ahead..!! Yes the new year comes very promptly every year, with the same spirit!! And we receive it with great enthusiasm and positive spirit.. afterall we need an occasion to celebrate!!!