Life Still Has Meaning

Another beautiful poem from pravsworld :-

If there is a future there is time for mending
Time to see your troubles coming to an ending.
Life is never hopeless however great your sorrow
If you're looking forward to a new tomorrow.
If there is time for wishing then there is time for hoping
When through doubt and darkness you are blindly groping.
Though the heart be heavy and hurt you may be feeling
If there is time for praying there is time for healing.
So if through your window there is a new day breaking
Thank God for the promise, though mind and soul be aching,
If with harvest over there is grain enough for gleaning
There is a new tomorrow and life still has meaning.

Summers of 2010 : Chennai Summers continues..

In this life ,one passes through many such periods when he does weird things: some of them out of compulsion artificially created in the disguise of priorities,some you never did coz you either hated them or always felt yourself too good to do such a thing,some just don’t comply to your typical nature and there are few others which though you did in the past but vowed never to do again in order to find yourself a solace by designing a facade of “learning” and "improvement” for yourself.

Well,Summers of 2010 at this company in Chennai is one such period for me.I am going to chalk out a few such things and share with you my notion that how sometimes one has to go against his own rules to succumb to something called "adaptation”

Cribbing - The worst thing which I have seemed to regained during this time.According to my fellow interns and some of my close friends,I have been untypically cribbing a lot these days which surprised them not too pleasantly.

Sleeping at the top of the water tank in the night to tackle the scarcity of power in this part of the world.

Room Sharing : The budget constraints forcing me to share a room with an unknown person reinforcing my notion that it’s not my cup of tea – something I hate to the core and which is certainly not the one way I should be testing my patience :( It’s one thing which teaches me to behave in the weirdest of ways more than anything else.Nothing against my roomie as he is a really nice person but just that probably I value my privacy too much.

The game is on again : Temporarily breaking my resolution of not playing cricket(a game with which I hold a relation quite different from what other Indians do) – and actually enjoying playing it after a number of years.Not only that,even managing to show to my fellow South Indians what balle balle means on a cricket field :)

Party and me ?? This period has seen someone like me,who may not even go to a neighbour hostel for party,planning to go(cancelling at the last moment though) to a city about 6 hours away and spending around a good sum of money in travel just to attend a party in another city.

Punctuality taking a back seat for the first time: This period has also seen me being routinely unpunctual to office - a more of a deliberate attempt though ;-)

A step towards angrezi : Watching quite a few English movies and actually preferring them over the Hindi ones : those who know me would get the revelation in this point.

Bruuuahhh !! Savouring few glasses of beer at the institute annual meet and doing some cheap but mesmerising dance steps in front of few hot ladies \m/

Embarrassing : An ugly quarrel with my landlord – something which I generally avoid to the best of my ability.

Still few days to go and I have still not started discussing my project at work. Like other things in my life,even the project carries a story :)

End Of The Day

A gem shared by pravsworld

Is anybody happier because you passed this way
Does anyone remember that you spoke to them today
The day is almost over, and its' toiling time is through.
Is there anyone to utter now a kindly word of you

Can you say tonight in parting with the day that's slipping fast,
That you helped a single person of the many that you passed
Is a single heart rejoicing over what you did or said
Does one whose hopes were fading now with courage look ahead

Did you waste the day or use it Was it well or sorely spent
Did you leave a trail of kindness, or a scar of discontent
As you close your eyes in slumber, do you think that God will say
You have earned one more tomorrow by what you did today.

Chennai Summers !!

Hey guys...Finally I’ve got access to my blog and a chance to post something.Let me just share my experiences of Chennai where I am doing my internship for last 3 weeks.

Some points regarding the goods and bads of this city:

Chennai’s Weather : I’ve found a lot of people cribbing about this a lot and I believe that a good majority of them would answer ”heat/hot” if asked for “Chennai” as the input in the Word association game.

My take on this: Yes, there is a lot of humidity in this area and it does play a spoilsport in your life many a times but for that matter ,summers in even a Delhi or a UP also doesn’t give you many favourable experiences - just compare the temperatures of these cities over the last week (which is hovering around 44-45 maximum) with that of Chennai (around 6-7 degrees lesser).I think while talking about Chennai’s heat, most of us tend to be biased towards the supposedly favourable weather conditions of the northern part of the country.

Rating: 6/10

Language problem: YES!! this is a BIG problem and can be very frustrating at times too : For instance I went to buy an electric kettle from a nearby supermarket kind of retail store.First they didn’t understand what I asked for.When they did,first thing I was shown was a COT !! Well,I just couldn’t find out the relation between a kettle and a Cot and then if we add the word “Electric” to it ( which i m sure means the same in delhi or chennai), the situation becomes all the more laughable..okay..then i started explaining the functions of the kettle: It is used for making tea..ahh tea !! then came Tea Cups !! or were they electric tea cups?? Laugh was slowly giving way to frustration now..But still lets try once more : see kettle is used for heating water...seems now they finally get it: the keyword ‘water’ forces them to showcase this time...guess what ...A Water purifier and yeah this time an electric one too !! Now you don't need to make a guess about my further movement...next thing I did was just to find the first nearest exit gate and run away.

Rating: 2/10

Autowallahs : If you ever believed that Delhi autowallahs fleece you,then surely you haven't met their Chennai counterparts.Take this: I want to travel about 3 kms distance from place A to B by auto,so I try for one.Guess the asked charges for this luxurious travel : 170 bucks only !! For a 3 km travel !! Total paagalpan…And here comes the best part which defies all the marketing logic taught in a B-school which says "customer is the king". Come to South India and this notion gives way to "Let the customer go to hell..Here Status/Ego is the king" How?

Okay fine that someone asks you an outrageous sum of money as charges for an auto ride but in Delhi you would still find autowallahs coming down to a lesser sum on bargaining or on facing the prospects of losing a customer..But here in our Anna land,they wouldn't budge at all.They wouldn't mind returning home without earning even a single penny but they won’t reduce the price they initially asked for,to a considerable extent, even if that means losing the customer.

One of the most horrible things here is an auto travel and the corresponding communications and if you add the language barrier to it,the rating goes somewhat like this:

Rating: 0/10  ( sorry just couldn’t press even 1)

Importance of failure and Imagination

An awesome speech from JK Rowling at Harvard,sharing her life’s experiences and elaborating on the importance of failures and imagination.Do give it a read or a watch.

http://harvardmagazine.com/commencement/the-fringe-benefits-failure-the-importance-imagination

CHANGING TIMES

I have certain questions to ask

Which I think is quite a tough task

But still, I am going to commence

and will try, not to cross the fence

Somebody please explain me in depth,

the baffling relation between life and death

What it takes to reach to GOD

Prayer! Patience! or again, the Fraud!

What has happened to world at all?

Why the hearts have become so small?

Why is life running so fast?

Leaving everyone confused and aghast

Why is humanity finding hard to stand?

How can we become so utterly bland?

When did greed establish the upper hand?

Do here also we need some magic wand?

Colours of friendship have started to fade

Where have gone the stones of jade?

Losing himself by running so fast

Why is man afraid to promenade?

I always think standing at sea shore

Why is no one respected anymore?

Where is decency? Where are the manners?

Have they also got buried under the banners?

Why the people who were once filled with verve

Now finding it hard to hold their nerve?

Natural beauties are losing their charm

Let me know who has caused this harm

But still some people follow the tradition

Let me ask them the exact reason

Do they also feel like me?

Then how are they living in such misery?

To get the answers, I have started the hunt

Yes, I am ready to bear the brunt

So as to re-widen this space

And get my earth to the happy old days…..

Incredible India

Hey...As a part of my newly gained interest in photography,I came across 2 good links exhibiting fantastic sceneries.Would like to share it with you all so that you can also savour the truly Incredible India in the first link and a heavenly & breathtaking beauty of IIM Kozhikode campus in God's own country in the 2nd one.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/02/colorful_india.html
http://iimkbackwaters.com/downloads/videos/IIMK_view.swf

Hats off to the photographers !!

Kya ye manzil hai…??

ऐ मुसाफिर ..चलो मानलो कि आज मंजिल पे पहुँच गए हो ....

ज़रा बताओगे हमे भी ..अब क्या सोच रहे हो ..

लेके कामयाबी को झोली में …कह सकते हो आज कोई गम तो नहीं ?

मिल गयी जो अब खुशियाँ जहां की …कह पायोगे कि आँख नाम तो नहीं ?

सारी गहराई नापने के बाद कही नीचे ही तो नहीं रह गए ?

समंदर को और जानने की चाह में साथ ही तो नहीं बह गए ?

आज बे -इन्तहा खुश हू...क्या कह सकते हो ये दिल पे हाथ रखकर ?

नहीं कुछ गलत किया कभी भी ..बोल पाओगे सचाई को साथ रखकर ?

क्या भुला चुके यारो कि आज कोई याद तो नहीं है ?

आबाद होके भी कही ज़िन्दगी बर्बाद तो नहीं है ?

क्या रास्ते में छोड़े लोग दिल में आज भी कहीं जिंदा हैं ..

बहाए ना जो कमज़ोर दिखने के डर से ,क्या तेरे आंसू ज़रा भी शर्मिंदा हैं ?

इस उन्चाइयी पे कही तन्हाई भी ज्यादा तनहा तो नहीं हो गयी ?

दुनिया को दिखाने में कहीं खुद ही की पहचान तो नहीं खो गयी ?

इस इज्ज़त नाम कमाने में सोचो कितनो की बेईज्ज़ती की है ..

इक पल भी कभी एहसास हुआ कितनी तुने अपनों से ज्यादती की है ..

तुने अपने आज के लिए अपनों का कल कही तबाह तो नहीं कर दिया ..

तुझे जनम देने वालो को खुद ही , कबरो की राह तो नहीं कर दिया ..

ये मेज़ पे पड़ी दवाइयां कुछ गलतियों की सूरत तो नहीं लगती ..

क्या आज भी दिल से जीने की कोई ज़रूरत तो नहीं लगती ..

दा-उम्र दौड़ में दौड़ते रहने का कोई पछतावा तो नहीं ?

क्या ये तेरे सपनो की तस्वीर है ,कही कोई छलावा तो नहीं ?

इक वो थी भूली बिसरी कहानी जो तुझे कभी ना भूल पाई है

इक तू है बेगैरत जिसे , आई भी तो , उसकी याद कब आई है ?

बता ऐ इंसान ये मंजिल कैसी है ये दिन कैसा है ..

ये शौहरत ये नज़ारा यारो के बिन कैसे है ..

अगर कुछ और बचा नहीं पाने को ..तो अब क्या इरादा रखते हो ..

क्या इस अनजान शहर से लौट जाने का मादा रखते हो ...

क्या इतना करीब आके भी ..क्या ज़िन्दगी पूरी बिताके भी ,

अभी भी कहीं ज़िन्दगी को ही लोच रहे हो ..

चलो मानलो

की

आज मंजिल पे पहुँच गए हो ....

तो ज़रा बताओ हमे भी ..ऐ मुसाफ़िर..क्या अब सोच रहे हो ..

Mandeep Chawla

Simplicity Mystified..

You must be wondering that since my life is already so open,what more can I have to showcase..Well the answer to this is - Even I don't know..In fact,this is an endeavour along the same lines only...So let's begin the chase..and formally begin to fill this space :-)

The idea of this blog came from..

Over the years I've got suggestions and encouragement to start my own blog from lots of people,ranging from my friends & seniors at various places to profs at IIM K. Every time, I was against the idea thinking that it's not my cup of tea,as probably I won't have enough content to justify such an effort.But just a day back,while I was celebrating my newly gained independence - the first valentine day after 7 long years,when I could officially claim to be single ,the thought of giving it a try flashed off my head,especially considering that,of late,I have tried to shift myself from a mere watcher to a person who wants to see himself trying out new things,though not always for success but primarily to put myself in various situations and see my response.

Everyone has limits...but we never know our limits,unless our skills have been put to test...The human nature is such that we need to be pushed to find our true potential.So,trying to overcome the two most universal human characteristics -Fear and laziness - today I am writing my first blog post.

Through this space,I aim at..

1) We all are blessed with good friends in this world,but due to the uneven requirements of our lives,we tend to get out of touch.I want to use this blog as a platform to revive all my relationships,relive those good old days and keep them afresh and intact,by sharing my experiences in this journey and requesting others to do the same...asking for their advices,criticisms in various fields I am foraying into,every other day-be it professional career,poetry,MANDYisms :-),photography,video making etc or the life in general.

2) I want to test my writing skills and the quality of content I can generate.Not only my own content, but sharing anything I find interesting (with full credit to the owner) and thus using this space for new learning.

3) Now a more selfish motive...Over the last few years,wherever I went,made friends & acquaintances and managed to gain popularity (or at least people said so)..in different ways..and was considered for special places in many lives & hearts...Today,I would like to see if this is indeed the case or have I been living in world-conceived delusions all these years.I would request all those people to come and show me the real picture so that i can know if i have been successful in marketing myself well or not {so that I can really go ahead with an MBA in Marketing ;-)}

First informal post would be posted soon..Watch this space !!