A time to change

Today's topic would be to try to understand  the question of the traditional roles played by women in India mainly, and also the world.The way ,in general, social perception has been built , women are known to look after the family,bear children and that is where they should find salvation.Now in today's world when we have advanced a lot and we see a lot many working women it is time that we ask a question,whether this traditional perception of women, is ,at all valid.

Lets take a plunge into the past for this.Long back when cave man and woman decided that they should follow the steps of Adam and Eve, their only necessity was to eat, reproduce and sustain their family.In such a set up, the ability to sustain a family in a better way and the size of the family you can bring up, were the only measures by which your efficiency could be judged.So for a man, it was the number of women they had in their life and the number of children they had.For a woman too, it was by the number of children she could produce.There is a reason to this also.Our earth in the distant past was scarcely populated..yes it was..and people then must have understood that manpower was what it needed to be more powerful, successful.The definition of power and success , of course judged by number of wives and children you have, among other factors.This was a cycle..the more you reproduce the more powerful you are..the more powerful you are..the more you can reproduce.And why not..!!the kind of inputs that led to a good life and sustenance of life..involved heavy work..going to jungle,working with the woods,gathering food from the dense forests, breaking stones and so on.Life was very hectic and hard.So for obvious reasons,the physically weaker sex,women lacked much behind in all these.It was very difficult for a woman to emerge as the food provider of a family.She gradually emerged not as someone who could provide food like men, but as someone who could produce men.Healthy, strong men.Hence those women who could not do so..came to be known as unholy,unlucky,the bereaved.It is important to understand the position of an unmarried girl in a family in this respect.The only use of woman , as a producer, was not available unless she gets married.So until that time she was a burden on her father.In a social structure that has a scarcity of resources, love, duty and responsibility are not always the only things.So when it comes to bringing up a child,or spending some resources for him/her, in case there is a paucity of resources, the provider would always try to dispose of the unproductive things as early as possible.Hence came in the custom of early marriages.A girl, as soon as she reached her puberty was married of.And even in some cases before that...when the bridegroom is hedging the future risk of not getting a beautiful, healthy wife.Even the definition of being beautiful has been very close to what it means to have the ideal body statistics to bear more and more healthy children.Thus girls were married of as early as the age of 10-12.And then in the years to come the girl became extremely weak,giving birth to children year after year,with severe malnutrition, and other diseases.If you are giving birth to 10 or 15 children in a span of 20 years(which could have been your most "productive" years in other ways too), starting from an age of 14 or 15, it is obvious that you wont have any good health left out to do other things.
So for understandable reasons , it was the RIGHT social structure that women stay back at home, nurturing their offspring and bringing more of them to the world, while the provider, the man goes out for work.

Now , in everything we see, we know, the person , the group who "provides" has an undoubtable upper hand.Take for the example your employer.So unless the service is very rare and very important, it is the provider of money who is the boss.Because he provides exchangeable currency.I will write a separate post on this soon.Hence we can understand why the males in a family grew to be masters.He will demand care, attention, pampering,he will make rules and ensure that they are followed.In short, he will want a gratification of his power.And in such a scenario, if we consider the male and female as two distinct entities of a bigger social picture, who would not want to decrease the power of the other entity and grow themselves?So as time passed, it became a male dominated society.And came in such fundas as "daughter is a guest","kanyadan" etc.If a daughter stays with you only for 8 or 9 years before she is married,before she develops her own identity,personality,she is indeed a guest!She cant get anything from parents, she cant be an intrinsic part of her maternal/paternal clan.Yes,she imbibes everything from her inlaws.And gharjamais were looked down as expected.Certainly because they were "weak" they could not sustain their family themselves, and took help from another male..the wife's father/brother(the males will be in a state of continuous struggle for power among themselves).This continued for years over years, and now we have our present society.

Now take a look at present.One, the nature of work needed to sustain a family has drastically changed.You don't go to jungles or wage a war to sustain your family.A vast part of job profiles consists of cushy jobs and getting paid.Two, and thank god and the inventor,birth control has arrived.You don't have to give birth year after year and yet your carnal desires can be fulfilled.Three,today's world does not need a big family.Come on..its population EXPLOSION.We need less number of children unlike the past.Four,the maternal health has improved drastically over the years.Thanks to the laws and medical facilities.So we have more number of physically healthy women in the society.Five, on an average women are getting married at an age over 20.So for 20 years her closest relatives are only her parents and siblings.She cant be called a "guest" any more.Six,the definitions of power,success have , to some extent changed.We can no longer say that a women who gives birth to 10 sons is a worthy human being.We do not consider widows as totally useless unlike the past when they were rendered useless because of their incapability to give birth and satisfy a man in the legitimate way.We do not consider a man with 20 wives as a "MAN".Seven,information revolution has taken place.It is very difficult to keep someone uninformed.Hence everyone is mostly or can be aware of his/her position/role in the society.Eight,just like the past,everything is governed by the convenience and power.So it is more convenient to have a dual income family,gives more money,makes you more powerful.

Coming to a close, what I want to say is, the rules and social structures in any society are always constructed based on deep social, economic factors, are based on the convenience of people, over the struggle for power, over domination and revolution. Over the years these take shape into an extremely stringent rule based system, a closed dark box. You never become aware that those very reasons which led to the rules have changed and that you need to change also. New rules have to be made in a society where the dynamics of everything is fast changing. One cannot keep his/her eyes closed and be impervious to all these.The ideal society should be such which should give equal opportunity to all, that should not take decisions on behalf of others lives and that should have equal representation of all the parties. This is not something to happen in a day. And in fact, ideal is a word that suits in dictionaries only.But then haven't we learnt about differential calculus ?Limit tends to ideal?..at least we can strive for betterment.It’s time to take a call...

Fuzzy Logic and Me

From the days I studied this topic in college everything has been fuzzified.Neither did I understand it then , nor do I ,now, given that I encounter it at every phase of life. So everything is stuck between 0 and 1.And no one knows what, when , where, how!!I search for happiness, peace..everyone else does so..but when I tend to know what will make me happy , I get confused.Not that I have been this confused always.But the time from when I have learnt to undersatnd that consequences to the correct knowledge of the answer of this question can make a hell lot of difference in your life..I have started getting confused.
So what are the main problems? Take for example,leaving a well paid job for pursuing higher studies.Higher education is well and good.But what about life after that?Is it going to be some ease in your career or turn out even more nightmare?Next comes the bigger question..whom to marry, when to marry?Or marry at all?I dont want to be an outlier as such, but then the happiness of being single is too dear to sacrifice, unless...ofcourse you get an "YES" from your inner self!!And sometimes that yes comes packaged in a hazy pack..very difficuly to identify.Again things go FUZZY!! Apart from this, ceratin behavioural aspects too are there.I have realized this one thing..that you cannot be your true self even if you want to be.So you cannot be humble always, you cannot totally not be pretending, you cannot let go always, you cannot be conforming always.And there lies the challenge.Answers are more often fuzzy than being a specific yes or no.Tough times to come!!!

Memoirs of Geisha

Memoirs of Geisha...I was reading this book during the last week.And the first question that comes to mind is how does the sadness , unhappiness, the feelings of hollowness of people staying long away from us be so similar to our own.Memoirs of a Geisha has a completely different context, speaks of a life that I have never and will never come across.But still I could not help but empathize with them."Them" I say because this book is not only about the central character Sayuri but also about a host of other Geishas..the bad ones..the good ones..the weird ones.The one thing that is important is each of us can recognise with their dreams, aspirations, sadness, happiness, failures and success.
This book is extremely women centric.So whether you like it or not you will be taken to a world full of women..the way they think, speak behave, dress, eat,work, dream , expect.And yet there is no help you can get in understanding how to deal with woman's expectations, in case you are reading it with the intention to find such answers.
This book is like a flowing river, where every phase of life begins somewhere, carries somethings and emerges as something else.Only the name remains same.The book begins with extremely sad things happening ,but slowly some optimism also comes in.But at no point you will feel like happiness has triumphed.This book is not for people who want to experience the rosy picture of life.Rather, it is for them who can feel the deep melancholy hidden in this story.An excellent book, that emerges as a lifetime experience.The entire road to reading the book takes you to a picturesque world.Every nuance is subtly expresses, explained and carried forward.
Indeed a great deal of satisfaction to read this awesome book!!!

What MBAs dont know

About one year post our MBA we have some time to look back and decide what we missed in our MBA.An MBA teaches you to expect the unexpected, to know things in a very short span of time and to get things done. But what it does not teach is your own involvement and the extent of involvement. If you are a workaholic you can dedicate your entire time, if you are not, you don’t have any other option. So there lies the crux that an MBA teaches you to be professional, to backstab even the dearest of your friends, to be indifferent of whatever the circumstances are around you in case it is against your own good. Basically we are mainly taught how to be the best in existing processes. We lose the insight to look into processes in an unbiased way; we lose the urge to create new processes. We go through each process, to perform the best, and as the pressure builds up some of us succeed, rest fall back. We do not have a contingency plan...we just have to be the best. But let’s not forget that not all people can become CEOs and CFOs.Not all people want to. And there can be other ways of making oneself happy other than great money and awesome appraisal. We are taught to be professional at all points of time still we never do forget our trivial and junk methods of personal attacks and stupid remarks. And in being such "professional" we lose the human touch. Let’s not forget that we are human beings and we as humans, as a social creature cannot be mutually exclusive with us, as the hardworking, intelligent worker. Professionalism does also include work-life balance and not making your work your life. If even after work hour you are constantly thinking of "how to do things" at your workplace, somehow you are prioritizing something’s over other. If it is by your choice, you may enjoy it, but if it is by compulsion, you are left with frustration. And your MBA doesn’t teach you to explore the other options. Once our Director Subbu told that the world is unfair and you have to get accustomed to it and accept it. You have to know methods to hack the code of life. But seldom does one speak of changing this unfairness. We look for ways of escaping, not facing it, not changing it. And their lies the utter failure of our so called acclaimed entrepreneurial skills. I don’t say that alignment to existing processes is wrong, because not all of them may be faulty. But what I say is we take things for granted. We do not question the validity of processes or the need of a process.

Break Free

Break Free!!Yes break free is the word. And I often feel this. I have never known the shackles; there aren’t any in the conventional sense. But sometimes I feel this immediate desire and that can be termed as only break free. Break free from work, from all possible outcomes of future, from all the memories of past and just sail through. If there can be life after death and if we can consciously experience that possibly I am urging for such a thing. I am trying to break free from things which I am so fondly in love with. The past memories, both good and bad, they provide me direction, a push to move forward, the future aspirations, they decide which road to take. And then all those responsibilities, so fondly earned credentials, without them I am just a blank bag of blood and bones!! The only exception can be my loved ones, even in this desperate urge to quit everything I don’t for a second feel like leaving them. But this extraordinarily power gush of emotions to leave everything and so immediately makes me wonder how mercurial I can be. Or is it that it happens with everybody. Our mind is the fastest thing to happen to us and when the mind perceives me as travelling to some far far corner of the country without the baggage of aspirations, emotions, memories, it really is tempting! Feel like a crane comes and just replaces me. Or just like a toggle happens…state 0 to 1! Or is it 1 to 0? No one knows. None will ever know. I automatically look to my holiday list. Search for that golden time when this can happen. I am sure by the time the actual time comes I will be back to myself (although I hardly know which is the “actual”” real” self) and will be taking decisions “judiciously”. And then that frantic “what to do” “where to go” look will disappear!!

28 and More

Contemplating on past, present, future...future's future all is a part of us.We spend countless hours for this.And all this investment comes only with the fact that we grow older!!..Yes...I am speaking of my age...very difficult for women to comment on that...and hence its 28 and more...there's a benchmarking done and there's no upper limit.What I am interested is...what has changed...The last 5 years have marked a spectacular change in everything..N (when n tends to infinity) number of malls coming up, reality shows ka tamasha and so on...But what has changed to me...Well now I am a little more wiser, or I think it to be so.One of the people I have known used to comment that people who are single still in earaly 30s or late 30s are like the left outs of food..Though I am strictly very against this funda and only because I feel anybody's value doesn’t run on depreciatiating manner. Rather it’s a constant depreciation and appreciation ,both at the same time. So perhaps now I feel it’s the peak of my lifetime in terms of being fit, energetic and thoughtful at the same time. Even my language skills have typically become great. I know gaalis in Hindi, English, Bengali, Mallu!!That’s a great achievement. Now I have started to look at the anti age cream advertisements and talk nonsense in a very serious tone. This actually worked! Recently I was given two blood reports in Apollo Clinic, for the same sample, same test and on same date. With my "nonsense speaking" skills I was successfully able to make them feel that I understand the "case management" process and should therefore get my money back. Otherwise, anyone wearing a long skirt and a simple T and having that crazy, half mad look will be considered as just a simple si ladki who is almost similar to the cow standing on Kolkata roads. And what else...Most importantly I have learnt that happiness is not something which comes when all your desires are fulfiled.Its either by stretching yourself or by accommodating yourself in the framework of what you have, you become happy. And still I hold almost all of my old favourites true.

20 Things!!!

Twenty things I dont like when I am in a bad mood:
1. To see faces which look slutty (however most of my reference point is based on Hindi movies and some stupid incomprehensible thing called inner thoughts!!?)
2. Accidental and unnecessary brushing of shoulders while walking (though the Kolkata crowd would certainly have some reasons ...like Kolkata is too crowded, they found my perfume too much addictive etc etc which are beyond the scope of my intellectually challeneged brains)
3. The lady behind me in the bus continually leaning over me for support without even giving a try to hold the bus handle to resist the laws of inertia.
4. My car going over bumps
5. Guys expressing "how much I love you" kind of dialogues
6. Completely brainless guys
7. Male Chauvinistic Guys
8. Over indulgent aunties who inflate their son's salaries and send marriage proposals
9. Stupid guys who feel salary is the only thing which can increase their ICC (Intellectual and Commonsense Counter)
10.Guys who share dirty or unreasonable sarcastic hurting jokes about every other girl but are terribly hurt, taken aback, disturbed, destroyed, ashamed,flabergasted , mourned to depression when the same is meant for their lady love who never even gives them a damn
11. People who behave as if nothing has happened and act innocent like teddy bear
12. Gals who keep on blabbering and on and on....
13. Staying in office when I have absolutely no work, no future chances of work, no hopes of staying in the same office again
14. Friends demanding to come over at midnight to have a blast when I have loads of work to do and loads of tiredness to refresh upon!!And then the inevitable blackmail, silence abuse starts...
15. Friends who pretend to be always extra terrestrially busy because of the excellent job profile they possess in an excellently dumb company
16.Friends who shoot amateur , unproductive, uninteresting , totally disgusting, unrelated ,disoriented, boring, trivial videos without any content of humour,drama,nature,character, emotion,passion,story ,adventure, thrill in it ,shot in their high resolution costly mobile phones and show those to me every time I meet them.
17.So called friends or roomies or hostel mates who by chance get hold of my hard earned completed assignment and pass it on to others saying its them who have done it , thus earning 1000000 wow points of great fellowship from others for free
18. Boy friends who show a contorted face with bow shaped eyebrows every time you mention you have something important with your parents/friends/personal.
19. Friends (who are girls) suddenly get hooked to a new found love and start complete ignorance of the presence of others in any common/uncommon place they are in
20. People who post comments in Facebook for every trivial reason, who are attention seekers and who never get that attention and who crave for it and start posting comments!!

P.S. Most of the times I am in such bad mood :)
Acknowledgement: Insprired by MangoMan..really admire his blogs!!!

This time,That year......

Well...has been thinking for a long to write something but always find myself either bored or lethargic or too busy!! But then the mail came...the mail for testimonials...and I could not help but open that excel sheet again. Yes…almost this time last year we were busy filling up those lines, juggling with our multi colored thoughts for our friends. Some of those friends who are still there in our lives, some others whose thoughts are imbibed. And life isn’t about gaining or loosing people around us, it’s about how we deal with that, what we become after all the experiences we gain. A very touchy issue it is indeed. Yet, today has made me a bit happier, when I read through those lines. May be some of those were written in lieu of the final parting which was to be there after an overwhelming 2 years of college life, but nevertheless they were to some extent true. They were feelings felt. Last year on the 13th of Feb I was supposed to go to German Bakery and yet went somewhere else…on that fateful day. Remember all the shopping I did with my friend .My life also could have changed. Last year this day I was in a train travelling back home...the urge for reaching home was getting more and deeper, stronger. Last year, today midnight I reached the smoky station of Jamshedpur …and then went to Ranchi. We visited Bodhgaya..An enlightening experience. We as a class,struggled with the Google docs link hanging again and again...the entire class struggled with it .Still we ensured that we write what we want to for our friends.I know somewhere down the line all those testimonials will be lost...infact the hard copy of the year book (costing a good Rs 300) has already been placed in some corner of my room which I don’t remember.But whenever we happen to come across those comments..Nostalgia pours in. A trail of memories burst open through a small, almost forgotten orifice. Trying to balance, balance hard…yet they come back...Ganapatipule ,Matheran, Mumbai, Sweet chariot, Idlisius, FC Road, Vaishali, E-Square, Campus,407,308,Placements…..and finally the goodbyes….

http://writer.zoho.com/public/bidishapaul/testimonials/noband

She

Her lot is all around .By “her lot” I mean people from her country. Kolkata’s strategic position makes them travel here, sometimes settle here forever. The other day when I was roaming around New Market, saw a bunch of them. Those peaceful faces, soft like butter faces, making their way carefully through Kolkata crowd. She also used to be like this...every step, rather every small step that she put forward was cautious..as if one small push from the crowd can melt her. Yet I have never seen someone who could be so strong, both mentally and physically. And she never had any inhibitions for doing anything hectic, unless, it was something that she would not like to do. Motivation had been a big factor for her, even in making efforts in understanding others. May be motivation, may be confusion. Those small rounded fingers and those weird colours on them, that “no matter what” calm and expressionless face, is it true that her countrymen are also like her or is it me who perceives them like her? Otherwise why should I find similarities even in the way of walking, speaking, and glancing!! Those sweet Hindi words infested with God knows what grammar, those generous mix-ups of “karta-karti”,”jaata-jaati” in Hindi...they are so much known to me. And I do remember her on many such simple occasions…

Like or Dislike?

How do you do marketing? Especially for services which are very relation-centric? Places where maintaining public relations is important or else relation with audience is important? One trend that I have been noticing off late is abuse. Yes abuse is in!! Believe it or not, we like to see, feel, experience, know others abuse each other, insult each other. Take for example the realty shows. Till a decade ago when the realty shows were introduced the prime point of the shows were dancing and singing. Shows like Boogie-Woogie or Sa-Re-Ga-Ma (which were one of the first really shows on TV) were seen to have judges judging the performances. By “judging” I mean expressing their view calmly and solely about the performance. Then came in Indian Idol, en-cashing on weak and ugly man’s desires to become hep and happening. So people with oiled heads and smelling shirts left Indian Idol with hair that stands straight, colored in purple or jackets that would cost a fortune. All in the name of confidence building and providing opportunity to underpriviledged.And lo!! Huge sum of money in the pocket of organisors.But take a break.Becasue the next few years change the trend. Here comes judges who are hired just for abusing others, accusations, altercations...all become hep.So judges fight among themselves, contestants question judges’ discretion and what not. Even the promos change. Earlier, normally the promos used to show glimpses of the extraordinary performances. Now they show all those caustic elements. And then comes the next genre of realty shows. Be it Sach ka samna or Big Boss. Entertainment means getting a glimpse of man’s darker side. That’s it. Be it facing the ugliest of truths of one’s life with his family or acrimonious dialogues with fellow people living in the same house. Unhealthiness, abuse, acrimony are in. The latest addition to this is Maa Exchange that deals with the disgust, boredom, distrust and most importantly power play that goes on around the leading lady in a family. And does this mean that by enjoying all these the audience actually can fantasize about their deepest unhealthy desires ,at least on screen? We all know that every human being has a good and a bad part!!So "live" spying on girl friend, or trying out obnoxious(I can hardly say it brave as eating snakes and cockroaches doesn’t converge to bravery) things can make you stick to your sofa and get glued to the television. So we love to see others getting fooled, getting abused. I was surprised to see the promos of a cine awards ceremony showing Shah Rukh Khan in a caustic banter with Akshay Kumar. And in a recent Karan Johar show Deepika was seen making fun of her ex-boyfriend. Fair enough...isn’t it. After all break-ups are spicier than tie-ups.And we have known such people even in our college days too. Who could abuse anyone and everyone without any prior thoughts? Those who thought themselves as witty!!Just unaware of their inability to deliver healthy and humorous entertainment. Surprisingly there is a group of people too who consider these people as wise and great dialogue deliverers and want to somehow copy them. Who knows the NextGen Facebook may look like this:

Proposed IIT Fee Hike

IITs have recommended increasing their tuition fees from 50 k a year to 250 k a year. While I don’t deny the fact that IITs and IIMs are the finest institutes for engineering and MBA in the country, but the subsequent fee rise leads us to think certain issues.
The trend is potent. It gained momentum with the IIMs raising their fee from around 4-5 lacs to around 11 lacs .And then it followed to the other B-schools also...including my own,SCMHRD. And now IITs too vouch for the same. Premier Institutions have simply detected a growing market for their product (education that offers great career) and hence increased the exchange value. The question is what is our perception of education? Even though not the IIMs( because Management Institutes have always got that tag of capitalist, money crazy education), but IITs used to come with the perception of being the “right” place for the intelligent, who may be poor or rich. Graduation colleges are the first place where a student leaps into a world where he has got admission because of his mere self and not because of his family income, proximity to the locality or such causes. At least IITs were so. The main motivation of students to get through IITs used to be being extremely intelligent. The mere concept that “if” you are good enough, you can join an IIT, served as an energizing drink for aspirants. The solution that is being suggested by the IIT committees after the fee hike, in case of poor students is , the availability of “easy” loans. Given that India is a country with a huge chunk of its population staying in the suburbs, awareness about loans is a pain. Statistics from the RBI website suggest that only 0.6% of the loan amount allocated to education is being utilized in practice. Only 10% of the population in India has access to bank credit We should remember in this aspect that the prospective students to IITs are just Higher Secondary Pass outs; they may be brilliant but not aware about nitty-gritty of loan. And if they come from rural remote uneducated backgrounds, it is not expected for their guardians to know too.
So first question, will this fee rise not serve as a turn-off? Will it not de-motivate our young aspirants? Or else will this not motivate only a certain section of society, other left behind?
Secondly, tied to my first question, doesn’t, somewhere this has the smell of the age old problem…that we tend to add more to those who already are affluent? Increased fees of IITs, coupled with the near compulsory coaching classes in big cities, shifting the profiles of prospective students more and more towards being children of wealthy, aware parents…where does India stand in future?
Thirdly, can’t help drawing this analogy-earlier days parents used to get their unruly sons married early to “sunder, sushil bahu” who could keep them at home and tied to family. These days, educational institutes encourage students to take loans (managing yearly 2.5 lacs would be difficult for even middle class families) and tie them in the unending cycle of loans. An education loan at the age of 18, then a home loan at 25, car loan at 26 and here starts the inevitable EMIs…NO ESCAPE.
Fourthly, the primary reason premier institutes raise their fees is the want of autonomy. Accepting government grants is no longer desirable. Does this mean that premier institutes do not subscribe to the credibility of Government or it has some underlying problems that should be addressed?
Fifthly, how can we take steps collectively to increase awareness about bank loans in education and guarantee easy accessibility? There are bank managers who are reluctant or who simply not believe in the credit worthiness of students. How can we overcome such conservatives? May be Government can offer insurance schemes for students who would not be able to pay back.

However having raised this question, I would expect simple and intelligent solution to this problem such that the future remains secured…clichéd but true 

God,To me

Have you always not missed them when they are not around? At home, at work place, at schools and colleges? While they hail almost always from the “not so happening” group of people around us, nevertheless we need them and need them desperately!! Yes I am talking about agony aunts and blame takers!! At home , for the room being unclean ,for the food being bad, at office for the boring work you have to do, for the almost insignificant pay hike, in college for the “C”s and “D”s and for all those occasions when you were supposed to be the “game maker” and could not…just because of….yes..Because of that tolerant, calm and not so bothered face. The confident face that would easily take your blame and yet not be bolstered by it. Someone who could easily be “responsible” for your girl friend ditching you or your best friend getting an “A” for the assignment copied from yours. For ages, in families, women, typically have played this role. So while there is always a woman behind every successful man, there are a host of other women to pull him down  . In today’s age, mostly it would be people who are perceived as being weak. So is personification so inherent? Don’t we see that it is our inner weaknesses that are the main cause? Is it really needed that we tend to “blame” a “human”? But yes, of course, it is very difficult, almost impossible to redirect all our queries, regrets, and needs to our own selves. That is why it is very difficult to be an atheist.At least my brief stint as an atheist, (for about 2 years) leaves me with this. During that phase, what I realized is that, there is nobody to fall back to. There is no one who can make things uneven...We want ourselves to be the happiest, richest, most beautiful, most knowledgeable. We need God, whether he/she is there or not. We need someone to be there at least to be our greatest agony aunt and blame taker. And that is why I believe in God, this faith gives me the courage to face odd things, and in turn increases my inner strength. It gives me the desire to overcome my prejudices and weaknesses, to cleanse my thoughts. God is a name that initiates changes that are good. And it is because of this that to me, God and religious practices are not same. Religious practices to me are mostly fun, friends and family get together, coming back. So necessarily external processes. While God is very much inherent, internal, my own.

Exams over!!

Another mail from Examination Department!!!Now that I have passed out, and our convocations are also over my SCMHRD mail box welcomes this mail. These mails have been the most unwanted mails, eagerly awaited too!! Yes, because the sooner you get the bad or even the worst news the better it is because anyway Exam Department never fails to send mails!! Of course some credit we must owe to the great men or women who had managed to put chewing gum in the Exam Department's lock or those who could send mails “cancelling SAP exams".From struggling with 13 core subjects in a semester and more importantly with those non-core subjects we learnt our knowledge of statistical analysis .Since we had no clue about what exam out of those 13 is going to be given the next day morning, we indeed learnt to do some probability analysis and come out with mode values. Be it surprises like an exam on the 1st of Jan or Re-FCQs to all those privileged people, SCMHRD Exam Department rocks. I still remember the transition of perception from the time I joined SCMHRD to the time I passed out and finally to the present time. Bitterness if persisted for too long becomes a part of you and you start to like it too. May be somehow I too liked those whims of Exam Dept and now I "miss" all those. I can still visualize those print outs (sometimes "by order of Chief Learning Officer") on those notice boards. I can still visualize eager faces trying to discover something new and useful from those print outs!!And those "please allow us" sessions to ask for a Re-FCQ and then the surprised exasperation at the decision. After all who ever heard that you can "allow" for a Re-test based on your gym attendance!!They say that our MBA course had been designed to prepare us against the "uncertainty" of future, unpredictability of the world we step into after MBA, of the monotony of our professions, of the unpredictability of our boyfriends or girlfriends (who knows what makes a good choice for them!!), of the nature of what we think we know and don’t know, of each step that we take into tomorrow. And now that I have already stepped into it, I can hardly tell whether "this" helped or not. But still going back I miss Exam Department :)