Marriage....

It has been a while since I wrote something in this forum and I decided to give it a go now. Life has been good and the talks about marriage have been blown across my ears. When I was growing up I always had this fascination for marriages. I always believed that getting married will bring in a sense of Joy and fulfillment along with a lot of other things. Slowly but surely I started maturing with time and started understanding things in life better and clearer. People from my part of India get married after getting a job and getting a feel of responsibility. And then there are the exceptions too.

I have been raised in a modest background with a not so flashy flamboyant lifestyle. Though my parents have raised me by giving an air of freedom, I was always told/taught various different facets of responsibility as a brother/son and a human. So I always wanted to get married after my sister ties the knot or rather gets it tied. I never really thought that to get someone married is this tough. When you feel that things will fall in place in time and you see a lot of proposals coming in, you feel that the process will take its own course and will eventually materialise. But then I must admit the sense of panic and insecurity that comes when you go search for a groom outdoors.

I registered my sister's profile in a matrimonial site and saw a whole of lot of good proposals flooding my inbox. But now that I have to act like a responsible brother and not a typical 22yr old go-gaga with life person, I zeroed in on a few profiles after seeing attibutes like job, salary, family background etc. I must admit that I rejected a few profiles looking at the profile pictures itself. Not to mean that the guys were not looking good but the photos when casual and sort of not so very matrimonial like did not feel right. After all it is a one time affair. So you can tread ever so slowly but should not slip once you have set your foot on the ice.

The character of the guy is one of the most important attributes and I do not believe in digesting what they have put in the site for their sons or brothers or themselves. This is how it works as per me. You see the profile, run through their information and shortlist a few. Then these prospects need to be checked for astrological stuff and if it suits then you shall run a back ground check on the guy. This back ground check phase is the most important phase in the entire process. Everybody who is 27-29 will have the brain cells smart enough to act good during the interaction time atleast. So you run the check with a few friends, acquaintances, relatives, family friends, neighbours and strangers too. This is very tricky. You sometimes will have to be so smart and extract just the right amount of data and leave.

From a guy's perspective this process is the most irritating process that you will be a part of unknowingly. No one in the world would  like to be frisked and enquired. I am no different too. But as a family member and a brother of a girl I can surely understand the gravity of this process as this is a very very crucial process. Marriage is no joke and it is better to take things so very seriously than casually.

I saw a tamil reality show of late and the topic revolved around this background verification for marriages. Lot of guys and girls were furious about it. According to me it is no wrong because it is very difficult to see your loved one treated not all that well after marriage. A few argued saying that this is very much alike an interview process which in a way it is but then this does not have a remuneration but a whole life.

I know this is a very dry area to write home about but then the context of why I wanted to write this article is that we live in a world which is not so very safe. You read all shameful things across the dailys. So it does not harm you if you are conventional and if you realise those who critisize you are not the ones who will share/take your sufferings. The bottomline is to have a harmonious and symbiotic life with your loved ones. Beware, even roses have thorns which prick.

My friends' story

It was one of those days when I was talking to a friend of mine who insisted me on resuming blogging.I simply asked him what can be written.He wanted me to write something about the professional life of his and how he is enduring the pains of it, day in and day out.Since then I wanted to write this,but now is the time to write, said my birdie.

I work in a Pvt. company in Bengaluru.It has been a great journey so far with my company for me because of the freedom I get in doing what I like to do and the likes.I always wanted to work in the same office as that of my best buddies but as the saying goes,'man proposes and God disposes'.Still I loved working with the people here in my office.Two of my friends had to join a sales job in a Pvt telecom company.

It all started early for them as they assumed office a month and a half before I did.I was very happy for them as both were deserving candidates not just for this job but for many of the jobs they missed before getting this.There was a small training module scheduled for them which they both underwent and were posted in various districts.Their role was to promote sales in their territories.Looks fancy,right?.Fancy it was untill they started working their backs off.The guys initially had the motivation and were happy about what they were doing except for the fact that it was physically taxing to roam around 100kms a day.But then these sort of jobs come with an attractive pay package.So they found some sort of satisfaction in doing what they did.They were expecting things to turn alright a few months later as they were so raw and new to the workplace.

Bad luck strikes and strikes with utmost ferocity as they say and the work nature didn't change any good in the near future.They were still sweating their pants off yet their bosses were pretty much unhappy with the outcome.This is a management philosophy of most of the telecom managers.Their mantra is simple yet effective.Attrition is a useless word to them.They believe in targets and numbers alone.

My friends, after working for close to half a year, felt the heat.This time the heat was unbearable that they wanted to go out of the company once for all.One of them fell sick because of mere pressure and the other was challenged emotionally and phsychologically.Every day became a bad day and one of them was feeling terrible as to go hit out at the manager directly.He felt unwanted in his place and that is the last thing you expect in your work environment.

Their stories gave me one big takeaway.Be least bothered about what you are going to work on,how much you are getting paid and what position you hold in the company,try and establish a connect with the work.If you don't feel that you should be doing what you are doing then pack your bags and leave before you are asked to leave.

And how I feel about the industry they worked-well it sucks and their managers suck bigtime.If you ought to extract work out of somebody as a manager,give him freedom and don't put him in a guillotine so as to save your back.The ones who work passionately are the ones who are contributing to your meal.If you feel that you should hang in there and let them face the chin music,well I have got just 2 words for you,suck it.

To those special humans

                   
            It has been 4years now but still his memories have never faded out.He gave me good company,made me laugh and was there in happy times around me.I felt happy when he was around.We killed time,travelled a lot together passing on a lot of facts about the classes to each other.Still i remember the last meeting we had.He came to my room,talked for half hour that day.We talked about bikes and how he loved it.I never knew that i would miss him so much.There was a dream a couple of days back when he was there in it.I was so elated to see him back.I truly will give up anything to have him back live playing his character persona but it is against the laws of life,i know.But dreams are things created by god to keep us happy.He was there in it and i asked him how is it possible for him to come back alive.He shrugged his shoulders,gave that typical smile of his and said "i came back just like that".I did not ask any further but was tracking back the times we had together.It was fantastic.We were on a get together sort of a function and he was right there in the middle enjoying himself and spreading fun to all the ones around...People were so happy to see him back live.I never knew it was a dream,i really believed that it was all happening and i was in complete joy,overwhelmed by it.The dream slowly faded away and i bid him goodbye.I woke up the next morning in rude shock and wanted to have him back.God thanks for the dream but you should have never taken him away from us.RIP my friend.
                             
                           

Graceful exits

It is always mandatory to have retirements in any sector so as to bring in a fresh leash of life in the form of vibrant youth.Experience is something that any organization should have in order to hold its act together but then there are times when you need fresh legs.In our country experience is a term that is often misinterpreted or wrongly portrayed.Experience as of our contextual understanding is the age factor more than anything.But we have to understand clearly the very difference between age and experience.I did my post graduate education in kerela-the god's own country as they may fondly call it.
The very place is the epicentre of communism and voices of rights in India.There isn't any state that is so very attached to hold on to its human rights and employees so dear as like this wonderful state.But then we always see the state under performing or performing badly compared to its potential interms of national growth.Why is this so?.Well I have my own reasons for it.The state proudly says that it has the largest number of trade unions in the country which is a fair reason as to say why the state is very habitual to most of its labor force.The people who cross an age aren't chucked out of the system even if they underperform .The brothers of the labor union tend to go fight for their brethren when there is a sacking around the corner.This is a double edged sword.Though they cling on to the rights of theirs,they tend to forget that there need to be someone who bells the cat.
The people once they cross an age should be retired and if they underperform they can be retired too.My point is simple.Give people chances to perform even if they fail a couple of times.Back them up,but not at the expense of your downfall.There is only a very acute difference between foolishness and gut when it comes to backing up underperformers.I may be a bit harsh but being a young lad and someone who is itching to go on and make history,people of my age expect the oldies to retire if the job is burdening them
If they can't do it leave way.We can come and turn the tables.We are good at doing it too.We are a generation expecting opportunities.If we have a look at the way the government offices work on e really feels that atleast a quarter of them needs to be laid off.But they hang on and make a lot of money too.Why can't we take tough decisions.Of course they have done wonderful things to the workplace during their prime,but now the point is,they are more of excess baggage in a sinking boat.We need fresh guys to row the rudders.Bring in the youth and retire the oldies.The oldies as i really mean are the ones who aint doing any work and are useless.Those who work their asses off are always young according to me.The situation will only change when there are graceful exits rather than pinkslips.

SLUTWALKers

The latest news that flooded the dailies all over India,if not the world,is slutwalks by women.The objective of these walks is to reduce the sexcrimes against women.The very objective is catchy and has to be appreciated.People all over the world do care only about themselves and their loved ones rather than staging up a fight against social issues.Iam no different too but i always had it in me to do something good when I grow up.Only time can tell when and how I can be of some use to the society.Well now these slutwalks are nothing but a rally by young and beautiful women who take up the streets to exercise their opinions on dressing up fashionably and exposively.Of course I have to agree on their point that men have got no rights to define how they have to dress up,we really don't.

The women are beautiful creatures made by God,so pleasing to the eye and their mere presence brings an element of joy.Of course Iam talking generally here.But this whole concept of Slutwalk is taking a different dimension because of the clothing factor.Women want their freedom of dressing,of course they do.But I cant comprehend why do they want to expose their skin.Westernisation is taking a toll on the Indians thanks to the growing industrial sectors and invasion of foreign outlets here in this part of the world.Women can dress as fashionably and attractively as they need,nobody infact has a buzz about it.But then, the slutwalkers hold placards saying “u need not look at what iam wearing”,”rapes will go on even if iam properly dressed”.Of course anyone who knows a fair bit of English can really understand what they mean but that doesn’t make what they say is right.

There are two ways to look at things,one the rebel way and one the conservative way.The women taking up this stance are quite rebellious in nature and I can only hope they raise their children atleast in an Indian way.Dressing up themselves is anyone’s liberty but not at the expense of others' getting provoked.I don’t seriously understand the girls who come up and display their t-shirts with very perversive comments like,”I ve got a beautiful face on top,see that too”,”touch me if u dare” “don’t look at me”,”unbutton me if u can”.If the women believe that moral policing is bad and if they seriously believe that wearing such captions and going in front pervert men ,waiting like hawks for a fish,and say “come on I have got my own sense of dressing,don’t you look at me…”.Now that is the aspect that I dislike .

Men aren’t perfect.But it doesn’t make sense to me that exposive dress ups shouldn’t even arouse a man.Men wouldn’t be men if they aren’t doing it.Iam not being machomasculine but I just want to say that girls should understand science before they talk.Sex crimes have to be dealt with severely.I would consider a sex crime like a rape/molestation/eve teasing as a social injustice towards women and the offenders should be stonepelted to death.But even men like me who take a fundamentalist stance would like to conserve women welfare,but in the positive way.Going in halfbaked clothing and provoking men would only deepen this ruggedhole and so women should understand what they are doing too.It is a 2edged sword, this slutwalking.Not only is it targeted at men but also it fights for women's clothing freedom.My sincere request to all those beautiful women,fight for a cause not for publicity& exposure

the tour that was all fun n frolic...

In my last post i have mentioned about the lovely tour to munnar.I enjoyed it so much that i thought it would be justice served in a platter only if i can type something about it here in my very own world.the tour to munnar started very colorfully because of the fact that we were allowed to be in casuals for the 1st time in the otherwise wrecked college 1st year life.This in itself set the mood up and all of a sudden the talkatives,silent folks and the rest too slowly but surely stepped into the room of enjoyment.we had our lunch and we started the tour after a prayer.it was a ritual which is not my cup of tea but it has always been carried out whenever i have been on a tour.the bus buzzed up as we travelled around say a dozen kms.the gals started singing,the north indian friends,the hindi knowing mallu friends kickstarted the campaign by singing a few songs.we were(like usual)sitting in the last row of the bus and were simply warming up ourselves.the anthaksari mode turned on as everybody started singing some foottapping numbers in their own voices.All of a sudden SPBs and Shreya Ghosals were increasing in leaps and bounds as the fever spread epidemically.All of a sudden i was forcefully evacuated from my place and the leader of the trip took me alongwith him to the front and asked me to sing tamil songs.I went there all alone and i was say like threatened to sing and i had to.I was not allowed to be accompanied by my tamil speaking friends too.I felt very reluctant and shy but then i knew i should not disappoint the entirity there who were simply looking at me to start.So i started singing(or whatever u name it) a few gaana kinda songs.I was feeling happy with the kind of care and encouragement that were showered on me.it was a nice trip.the gals felt a bit less amused to speak with us,but ya we knew that they would be like that certainly for how we had been till then.We were introduced to a tent life for 3days.I just loved it as i knew it was something that caught me unawares and something that happens once in a lifetime.We had a wonderful team of neighbours to whom we spoke for the first time.The class started to loosen up in the first day itself with activities and games and the romantic climate set up a wonderful campfire mood ready to be occupied with fun.The guitarist of the class set the tone by his amazing skills and to set the party ablaze a few started singing a few peppy numbers.It was a nicetime but i loved my first campfire in coorg with my ug mates better because we were dancing to the compositions that were made by rajas and rahmans.nevertheless it was an effort that was really appreciable.The next morning sun welcomed us and a couple of naughty brat girls were beating up every guy who came a bit late for breakfast.I got my share too.Then we went onto play a few games,i even got my first time opportunity of leading a team.Nobody cared about the individual losses but everybody were very sportive and were complimenting each other well.we made our own boats and did a nice boating.This again was an one time opportunity for sure.I enjoyed it thoroughly.The campfire the second day was good again but numbers started reducing soon and so the think tank came up with an idea of asking pairs to comeup and dance/sing.I was paired with a girl with whom i was doing my horrible dancing too.The photograph taken after the dance was a classic.It's a favourite of mine.We did some trekking and some photoshoots too.The girls from Tamilnadu felt so reluctant to come and ask us for a joint photograph because of the treatment that they had meted out before from us.It wasnt a good experience for them speaking to us before that.Eventually they approached and we happily obliged too.We took photographs with most of the class and of course with the special ones too.Then we were returning back to the college.This time i was asked by a girl who was sitting before me, to sing a melody song.So we thought of lighting up the bus with some songs which was half asleep and tired.we knew that we guys who always roamed together dint do justice to the enjoyment of the class.So we four of guys agreed to sing and dance and we had company.A few girls and some real good friends came together and we started enjoying ourselves.People starting contributing a lot with a lot suggestions and songs that were to be sung.we had a real good time out there and then i was overwhelmed with ecstacy when a north indian friend of mine who dint understand a word of what i shouted as 'o podu,nalla podu' said he enjoyed the ooooos and the other rhythms that we sang.We made everybody happy and feel good.That was very satisfactory infact.the class began to gel up well after that.facebook and orkut got new acclaims that pgdm 19c is the best kinda msgs...We simply were the best set of friends around then and i enjoyed being part of such a good tour with such good friends...thanx all for some wondeful memories to trackback and cherish...

tamil machans

my pg life dint start as per expectations.the college was damn strict and rubbish at times that they treated us so badly and dint give us either freedom or respect.but i got acclimatised soon.its a common sight to see the birds of the same feathers flock together.it happened in my case.we the guys from tamilnadu,we were always roaming together.we had a similar frequency and of course the language was the 1st uniform thing that brought us together.we were all in different classes but we go together whenever we meet up.there was this lovely tour to munnar where 4of us started dancing and singing in the bus and i believe a good chunk of the class enjoyed it.people started tagging us 'tamil machans' and it stuck from there on.time fled by and we made friends with many guys from then on...the cross culture affiliation came up but still we never left the friendship that we had amongst us.godwilling we shall be together for many years to come too.