*Respect*

A conversation led to a question thrown at me about my internships and the bosses at each of those internships. And I realise that I had some of the best people to learn from through each one of those experiences. All five were organisations from different industries, of different sizes, and made up of fairly different people as well.

Thinking about them reminds me of the fabulous luck I have had. All of them are such brilliant minds, such amazing mentors! 

Their contribution to my professional life has been so significant that I cannot imagine where I would have been if I hadn't undertaken these internships. 

Piyush Bajpai and Laveesh Bhandari of Indicus Analytics,

Shadan Parveen, Amar Dutta and Angshuman Chakraborty of Pearson Education,

Bindiya Rawat and Aqueel Khan of ASK India,

Mitabh Saud and Sugato Hazra of Adfactors PR, and

Anshuman N. and Namita Asnani of ABB India...

...are the gods I am talking about. 

My first cheque, grammar lessons for a lifetime, the perfect perspective, insight into the world of lobbying, and an example of what leadership is all about, all this and a lot lot more has come from these people. 

Can never be thankful enough, I guess. 

*all the sounds that I made in the last one minute*

The world of presentations is so much better than that of shitty classes and books. And I know how badly I needed a feel-good factor in life. Had three presentations to make today (thanks to which I could not work on a contest that I reeeaaaallly wanted to work on)... all three being very different from each other, and each one interesting enough for me. But to be appreciated by a faculty you like and to hear the words 'best presentation in the college in a long long time' is a crazy boost! Of course, it does help to have somebody on your team who speaks VERY well, and does so even better when he is less prepared. :P
And then it was not meant to end there. The hard-to-please (academically) faculty decides to wholeheartedly applaud for you and your team (a different one this time). And that is a different kind of a kick you get because he is never happy.
A shameful thing to find out at EOD is the attendance figure going up when no weightage is given to the numbers except for qualifying for semester exams. I sooo want to get out of this city. But with such a lot of evaluation work going on, that just closes at a crazy thought. Hmph!

Reality is a little too hard to accept sometimes. That sometimes happens to happen very often to me. But things become so strange after a point that they completely stop making sense. And then you wonder how it started and how the fuck can the same thing in life keep chewing your brain at intervals and constantly working on creating a hollow somewhere inside.

Don't ask why...

It is all a little too inconsequential but is still a little overpowering. Because when the poetry mode starts taking over, it almost acts as an indicator. An indicator that doesn't initiate any action, but more thinking. Not that then it means that it is of any help, but whatever.
I sit and give gyaan for hours, get questioned on how then I can't take care of my own mind, I laugh it off, and then next morning find myself in the dumps. Yes, the things that I am worrying about might turn my life around if they really happen. But there is an IF there. I hope it remains at that.
I give more gyaan after the thinking, and then turn to someone else to give me some of it too. It sounds bad when I call it gyaan. If I say it is help in getting a perspective and wiping the emotional sheet off, sounds better in my head.

There are two reasons why summers could pass as being better than winters for me. One of them is that the fan makes sure that the unnerving silence never takes over. Ever. But as I write, it somehow has. The song that I am addicted to is playing in my ears for about 30 minutes now. And these words are staring back. It is a strange kind of a silence. The one that transports you to another world. A world which is made of half numbness and half of I don't know what.
Not feeling physically well is not helping either. The bloody mind always does this - it won't work on the things that it needs to work on. But such thoughts never cease to bother. And why is this laptop's comma key placed in such a way that I reach it everytime my fingers go looking for the period?!
It doesn't end here. Now I have started bothering about the fact that I bother too much about everything. I don't want to. I really don't. And now when I have SO MUCH TO DO, dumb issues are getting developed to add to 'things to do'. For absolutely no reason at all. So there I go again!

+++

Cigarette smoke suffocates me. And not just my lungs. It suffocates my mind in a way that I can never describe. It pushes me into the 'shell' that I don't like going into. It's the people who call it a shell. I know it is the same state of half-numbness. Sumit's presence in my life has kept that shit thing away. I sometimes feel sad that a single person affects me and my life so much, but it does. And I have no qualms about admitting it. If I have made the choice of giving that level of importance to someone other than default family, then why not. It is all about people anyway.

Out of context from the original maybe, but...
That's me in the corner
That's me in the spotlight,
Losing my religion
Trying to keep up with you
And I don't know if I can do it
Oh no, I've said too much
I haven't said enough...

No, there's no time to go on. It's slowing down. Need to get back to what actually needs time. I think it's just the new keypad that is making me type so much. I have even started a new diary. Not sure how long that will last, but for now it has an entry almost everyday. Anyway, thanks for listening. Later!

A couple of new things...

The big news first - one of my pictures appeared in Flickr Explore. It's a feature on the site that shows the 500 most interesting pictures uploaded on a day. It's no big deal for some, is quite a deal for me who's forever hunting and hungry for appreciation. :-)

And some slightly technical things...

I'd been increasing the saturation level in a lot of pictures, I just desaturated one for the first time. That looked pretty funky.

Had been reading about textures here and there for a while but had never played with them earlier. Just did that too. It has quite an unbelievable effect.

I'm dying to lay my hands on PhotoShop (have just been lazy about it). Not that I'm too much of a fan of post processing - certainly never mean to completely change a picture - but it can make pretty things look prettier. Or some not so pretty things look pretty too. :-)
It can sometimes be a painful process too, especially when you're living on hit & trial. Sure it's fun to suddenly discover something new and fun, but when it takes you hours just to figure how to get a frikkin' shape right... it is worth it, but is very frustrating for the L5 (lower back :(. Btw, starting this week we'll be going back to physiotherapy again. Bleh.)

And oh, apart from having been told early on that it's always better to let that flash be, I've myself never liked using it. But a couple of weeks back I'd read some article online about a very neat use of it. Even in daylight. Still to try that, but I did use it for clicking a source of light. Didn't get a good response from people, but I personally really liked it.

Flickr.com happens to be a better site than what I first thought of it. Which of course was a few years ago when I never had anything to do with the P word. :D Except, the friends who are now being very encouraging. Yes yes... right on top of the list is none other than Mr Deepak Kumar. And somebody recently commented on a photo of mine saying that it's a very "Deepak style" picture. I wonder what he has to say about that. :P

Digressing a little - it was fun watching Bhajji's little stint with the bat today. :D Of course, fun also means sitting with a set of enthu people in the khandaan, some of whom are the typical cricket-crazy Indians.

And now I'm going off to sleep. See ya soon!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/richab/ :P

Rendition Time

June 1st, 2007. Another ordinary Friday for almost everybody. Significant day of my life - my first day at my first job.

A few calls from a few close people last evening kinda brought that Big Day Tomorrow feel with them. I was jittery, excited, nervous, tense, anxious and there was a slight feeling of the fact that life's gonna change the next day onwards.

The day started with my alarm, a late-night sms from Mithu that MG Road's seen violence the previous day so I should be careful, and there was also a message from Vidur wishing me luck one more time. Made me feel good.

While literally 'dressing up', I got a call from a 'colleague' that she's leaving early so she'll be early to pick me. Rush rush rush... got Bhai to drop me to my 'pick-up point', Ma came along for the thrill and I was on my way by 8:00 a.m.

The road had heavy traffic. It took almost an hour to reach office. We checked in at 8:57 a.m. and I was immediately shown my seat and my system. Right corner seat - but of the 'bay area', not the metro (:P). I'd been to the office once before so it wasn't all new but the feel still was. The China, Uruguay, US EST, India, UK times on perfect analog clocks on the wall looked beautiful. One of the people who had interviewed me was so sweet today that I couldn't believe that she actually managed to intimidate me earlier.

General administration stuff and admn induction/training were followed by a sequence of briefs and inductions by different project managers. All of them were in their positions because of their experience but with 4 different people, 4 different types were very evident. There was the definite leader, there was a passionate & intelligent personality, there was a dedicated & dilligent one and there was a plain, bored but still smart woman. [By the way, this is a women-dominated organisation. :)] It's funny how I could notice all this. I mean, I wasn't sitting there with the intention to judge any of them. It was simply evident.

And similarly, other new joinees were all verrry different from each other and I could easily gauge who's the type to stay away from. Much thankfully, that one is on a different project than me to begin with. Although, she did get the project that I think I might have enjoyed more. But I'm cool with that. I generally tend to do better when I don't get the best or the most interesting things too easily. Coming back, all this somehow makes that dawning of the realisation of growing-up clearer and perhaps more quantitatively visible. I know my 'vibe-system' has been in place for a long time now but this is different. This is what probably age brings. And that way, this first day was very different from the first day at college. I wasn't too eager to even start chatting up any random person. I wanted to take my time 'coz here you gotta know what you say to whom. And also, I'm in no search for friends here. It'll be great if I make some, and it'll definitely make life easier here but I'll let that take its own time. But I'm sure I still must not have come across as quiet by any standards. :)

Funny thing. Now my passion (IF we can call it that already) for photography is hardly a few days old but guess what happened. One of those managers had to wait to begin her presentation 'coz two analysts were missing. So in the meanwhile she started talking to me and one other new analyst. General stuff - college, family,etc,etc. So I mentioned photography as my new interest. :P Turned out that the woman bought a Canon 400D last year-end. We discussed how she started, what I'm planning to buy, and I am very sure that I heard the words shit and fuck from her too. She's cool! I'm gonna be taking my camera to office as soon as I get it... my senior wants to see it bhai! She's also from my college. ha! Oh, the funny thing... that other analyst was zonked out just like I used to be till not so long ago because of the Greek about lenses, etc that was being discussed. Funnn. :P

So, till about 4:45 p.m. we were more or less in the training room. I got some reading material after that and my brain was not registering a single word of what I was reading. I think I'll soon be on tea too. It's hard work. Anyway. Took a break, washed my face and read for an hour. And that was when we 'logged off'. :)

Did I say that traffic was heavy in the morning? I meant evening. CRAZY!!

Came home and nicely pulled a muscle. So, lots of pain and crying-shrying too. But I'm better now assuming that a fucked-up neck/shoulder can't let you sit in front of the pc after such a long day.

This was a very long and extremely detailed post. Thanks for bearing if you're still here. This is one post that I contemplated writing about for a very long time. The part of me that's undergoing transition did not want it up here, but the opinion of the one that finally dominated doesn't sound too bad still.

It's a Friday night and that's why I'm still up till 1:00 a.m. Other nights I'm gonna be a good girl. :D

Good night, people!

'See you Monday' sounded so cool in my head. :P

The Wild Thing

After almost 2 years, I sat behind the wheel and boy was I scared or what! For about 5 seconds I went blank and I shall not accept that the sweat was because of any reason other than the sun. Anyway. Adjusted the mirrors, turned the key, pressed the clutch, put the car in gear, and I was ready. Not too bad a start...my car (or, for now and still, my brother's car) did not lose direction and neither did it cause any other trouble. I'd given just the right amount of acceleration! That was encouraging.
So there were tinu kids with tinu balls/marbles completely oblivious to everything else, cycles, an ass who wanted to STOP the TRAFFIC so that he could do his own thing, and I don't know what else! Yeah, crazy wild roads! My memories of flyovers and bigger roads are much better. There you stick to your lane and can relax a little. Or was that a farce? Most of Delhi doesn't have lanes, right? I'll know.
A (probably younger) guy on a bike zipped past me and I knew I have to be good enough soon. This is no rocket science. A little more scary, yes, but even so. All my female cousins know the art. There's no way I can not know. Yes, it's competition too. And anyway, right now it's a need for me. Even if it may not be cool to spend a royal part of my income on fuel, it is supercool just to think that I'd be getting that much more independence. I can SO imagine myself abusing already! :D :P
Wish me luck!

PS: World No Tobacco Day. Quit it, not too cool.

First Steps

The newness feels good.

New colours feel fresh.

The new display name sounds good in my head.

The dp is a first in two years. New experience.

Being away from the pressure to study is relaxing.

The new photoblog is keeping me happy.

Being back to my socializing self is goood.

Choko La served me something too sweet in the name of dark chocolate, but good company and good weather kept me cool.

Mithu's gonna be moving somewhere close to my house pretty soon. I'm happy.

So far so good.

Back To The Basics

The Oxford dictionary defines ‘religious’ as being devoted to a religion. And ‘spiritual’ as being religious among other things. Orkut gives you the option ‘spiritual, not religious’ in your profile.

Apparently, I have been thinking. I do not have enough knowledge of my religion to even think that I could be religious if it means that I should know about rituals, beliefs, etc. to be that. But then I know what God is. I know what God wants me to do. I know what He tries to tell the world. Maybe not word to word as is written in holy books but the gist, yes. So now does that make me spiritual? Or not even that?
I have sat through many havans so far and I know they remind me of the basics every time. I am sitting through one every day nowadays and I look forward to it. Quiet and peace – that’s what it gives me. I’m not 70 so it’s not as if I have nothing else to do in life. But to think that it’s just a matter of five more days that I’ll get to experience this makes me want to find some place where I can actually do it every day. So, am I becoming spiritual? Or religious, ‘coz I get to hear about the Vedas and understand mantras? Not that it matters, but I’d still like to know and be sure.

I also get to go back to Biology nowadays ‘coz of a therapy that I am going through. It sure tells me how every possible thing in my body is fucked up but I enjoy talking about intestines, liver, nerves, glands, etc, etc. :D
I wonder if it really was a great idea to give up Bio because I didn’t like Chemistry. Anyway! That’s part of history now. My current subjects have absolutely no connection with that. And my future subjects could be anything but Biology. :(

I guess since Hinduism tells something to the effect that you gain nirvana only when you have learned everything that there is to learn, I’m getting closer to it by doing the same. :D

Don't Stop

I just came across one of the most amazing ads ever. I may not be a big fan of the product but MY GOD....what an advertisement!