Everything Heals!!!

A bad day at office, upset about the attitude of your Kaam-wali and sabziwala, angry at the bus driver, irritated with the corrupt politics, worried about the unpleasant situation with near-n-dear ones, going through mid-life crisis, looking for pupose in life, torn between duties and responsibilities, ..-there is a solution for everything!
Surprisingly the answers to all these questions lies within us and this is professed and substantiated with facts by eminent people from different walks of life. Managements gurus like Steephen Covey, Spiritual leaders like Sri Sri Ravi shankar, Writers like Dale Carnegie and Robin Sharma and even the Bhagavatgeetha-- all convey the same funda --only using different languages.
They all reinforce that answer to every question lies within you. You hold the power of immense achievement by ridding your selves of negative thoughts. All of them teach you techniques to do so. If one observes closely, even the techniques are common.

Honestly, it is a great relief to learn this- as this common thread puts one at ease. It not only helps one to relate to the teachings, but also makes it real and practical.

"All thats countable doesnot count and all that counts is not countable"-- Albert Eintien.

Saturday 22nd Oct - 7.45 am. Woke up to the melodious tone of the alarm. As usual I put it off and went back to sleep-- Awww Come on it was a Saturday!!! At 8.15 am the phone rang agian. It was Veena!.. Oh ya I was supposed to be at the office by 8.45 am for the RRP(Rural Reach Program) stuff.Veena made sure she kept talking till I was out of the bed and had my tooth brush in my hands!!

"This school looks pretty good for one in rural area."--I thought as I stepped out of the Infy wan. While, CCD got busy with setting up the computers, I decided to befriend the kids who would spend the rest of the day trying to make sense of the alien language we would be speaking. I stopped by one of the classes. It happened to be 7thB. All the girls circled around me and began bombarding me with questions in kannada.
"Teacher Teacher, will you be keeping the computers for us?"
"Teacher Teacher, will you allow us to play games?"
"Teacher, what is your name?"
"Teacher, teacher, is that your photo on your ID card? Do everybody in Infy wear it?"
"Teacher Teacher, How much have you studied?"
"Teacher Teacher, We want you only to teach us!!"

After chatting with them for a while, I gathered most of these children help their mothers with the household work, help their siblings with food and studies before they come to school and get back to the same after they go back! I asked them "when do you watch TV?".. to which most of them told "On sundays, when our neighbors watch the regional movie on doordarshan" It was 10.00am and they had to rush for the Morning Prayers. I smiled them a good bye. Each one seemed to want an exclusive good bye..and I truly loved waving ba..bye to each one of them...:) When they all began "bye bye Teacher" in chorus, I asked them to just call me by my first name-- To which none of them agreed... and they decided to call me "Aunty"!!!....I immediately regretted my decision. "Teacher" sounded so much better...!!!;)

I got back to help CCD set up the computers. The temperature was rising by the minute in the classrooms. It was getting too hot to tolerate. when I began looking around for a switch board, I realized there was NO FAN! It was then that I began paying closer attention to the infrastructure. During the rainy season, the rain must be lashing into the class rooms and during the other seasons, the class rooms were ovens.

These children were real heros!- They were mini-mothers at home, they put up with tough conditions at home and school and still managed to do well in studies!

During the classes, I found how meek these kids were--afraid to touch the mouse, overwhelmed at the TV-look alike on which you could play music and solve math problems. The meekness vanished the moment, they were told and allowed to play games!..:)

Personally I was pretty embarrased with the quality of my kannada. How I would jump for the more familiar english subconsciously and the realization would hit me only when i saw blank innocent faces staring up at me! I admire the kids to tolerated my attempts at speaking the language they understood!
The first batch of kids belonged to class 5- They were meek, innocent and almost scared. As the batches with children from higher classes began to come, I realized they were a fabulous mixture of bright-and-naughty and bright-and-very- very-naughty ones...:) Towards the end after a couple of hours in the oven, when it was batch 9's turn , though my kannada had substantially improved, my tolerance seemed to lower and I began seriously getting irritated! But one look at the innocent-but-naughty faces, and you get all the energy to push yourself a li'l longer!
By the time I was done, I had rashes because of the heat and sweat and I was filled with respect and admiration for these bright children!


When the program was over it was 4.30 pm and the girls that I had spoken in the morning came back to me to say good bye again( cho chweet..:)). I heard one of them tell her friend- "One day, I too will become like that aunty"!

RRP is one beautiful program- more than a wonderful oppurtunity to interact with school children. We give them bright dreams when we talk to them. We give them hope!.

What the society that we live in today needs really is not your MONEY, just some of your "TIME"! Today I understand and truly appreacite terms like "Social Service" and "Returning to the Society". It is much more deeper than contributing money by buying T-shirts!

A guide for 2 hrs...A tete-a-tete with Mrs Dare

I knew I was late by 7 minutes and 28 sec. But Li'l did I know, there'd be 3 Huge Men (per Indian standards) waiting to punish me for this..."Please rush to Dheeraj's Chamber" said one of them and the other two seemed to silently reinforce it.The first few questions that came to my mind were..."Who Dheeraj?""Who were these people-- how come none of them seemed to be a familiar face in teh office?"
Before I could even understand the situation, Dheeraj himself presented himself and mentioned with a smile-- "Hey Usha, are you free for a couple of hours. We need your help".
OKKK- Now I knew this Dheeraj. But, 2 hrs?-- Facilities and HR usually have their own way of conveying unpleasant news. What is it this time?Was any of my friend driving? Or had I written something in the blog?.. Oh MY Gawd!!!!

"As you know Mr. Ray Dare is here for audit. His wife is also here. She'd like to just go around the Mangalore City. She is English. Can you please spend a coupla of hours with her?"
THATS it?... Whoa...The relief musta shown on my face.

"You dont have to worry at all...Here is the list of places you might be visiting"
After the situation sunk in, Sunila Jaikumar was the first name that came to mind.Office ki gaadi, Foriegn guest- It was her first time in India. British are usually more restrained. What would I talk? How should I talk? Was there anything sensitive I wasnt supposed to discuss?...

I was pretty worried till I met her. She seemed an extremely nice lady-- well may be I master this knack of extracting people's nice side..;)
Thanks to her, had a chance to visit a few places in Mangalore that I had only known about-- never been to.We started with Milagers Church. She was pretty impressed with the number of churches in a city that is nearly 10 km in diameter.We then moved on to Falguni Cashew center-where she bought some Mangalore special cashews. She had plans of visiting the cashew factory the next day. We then went to the Saree palace to show her a flavor of Indian silk sarees. And here-- she asked me very meekly if we could just walk on the streets for a while-- :) We walked till the hampankatta circle - my guess is this was her favourite part of the trip! We also window shopped for Diamond and gold jwellery. We then proceeded to the Kudroli temple-where again she was pretty overwhelmed. I suprised myself by answering her questions on the reason and story behind the scultures on the walls of the temple...:)We then moved on to Saibeen complex-- I wonder why this place was in the list of places to be visited-- What did we want to project?.. that we too had a mini mall!!! I had saved the best for the last--- Sultan Battery!.. My fav. The place looked amazing -rustic but scenic shining in the afternoon sun.
It kinda felt good - it was an earnest effort to make a foreigner feel at home and admire my land!
I was back by lunch-time.

Can I have the cake and eat it too?

Another something that put my mind on the -thinking mode- --thanks to the lunches...

Most working girls nurture this idea that, once married, they would miraculously balance home and office without having to compromise much in both places. Is that practical or just a loud reminder that I have still not come out of the dream-world?
Looking at some married ladies around, it definitely does not seem easy. When you think one level deeper- it even gets scary. Are married working girls torn between dreams and duties?

I do understand that "priorities change" with time. Probably duty always takes the priority.
May-be:
Since marriage and children are something no girl likes to compramise, they top the priority list.Perhaps, the fact that she might have to discontinue working for a while is something she comes prepared for when entering the marriage. But the million dollar Q is when is the right time?
--to get ready to see your bank account NOT getting refueled every month?
--to get out of the routine of office, colleagues and meetings
--to get used to be ready to open the door with smiling face every evening when your husband returns after -din-bhar-ka-kaam?
--to get used to making cooking your all day project?
--to get used to having NO holidays.
...
--to have the chance to be there for your baby all day-- whenever he/she needs you....
OKKK-- But When:
This should be when you are needed the most?
Is it your Home, Hubby or your baby? --- How do you decide that?--- Each of it is important to you!
Probably Home and Hubby are easier to manage along with work-- and so dont picture as the deciding factor!
When does your baby need you the most?-- seems a wooden question!!
Keepings, emotions aside-- is it when the he sleeps for 18 /24 hrs a day? Or when he tries to understand the world outside-when he steps into the school.
As per one line of thought-- which am guessing is not very popularly since it is not extensively followed -- probably your parents can help you with the 18/24 hrs stage and you are needed at the time when you building your baby's foundation. May be the ideal break time for a married woman inorder to shape her baby better is when the baby is between 4 and 14.

Question then is can you return back to your dreams-- " your career" after a 10 yr break?
Probably you'll settle to a 9to 5 job(Eg. teaching profession)...at a time when your child needs to be independent and you have probably forgotten what your dreams were!

Or with time would your dreams also have changed?

Should media be regulated?

First things first- Let me define the scope of which media I am referring at the very outset!
Media is a very broad collection of all the mediums that have helped today's world get the -global village- status.

The media I am referring here is medium used by the common man to keep him self updated about the happenings around him/her--in his/her global village!. I am not reffering to the entertainment-media here. I am confining the scope to just the news media!-i.e through the news papers, magazines, news channels.

Having crossed the first step, now I further limit the scope by targetting only the collectors of news- the journalists!

Are the journalists of today making it imperative for the media to be regulated?
Yes and No.
Yes- because, as a common man, i would like to have access to fair and true information as opposed to the news that is skewed -thanks of greedy journalists.
No.. beacuse there is a huge chunk of good journalism that already exists which works ethically and is unputurbed by the politics- whose goal is to bring news to us in as-is form!

But since the world we live in is not the ideal one, and is a mixture of good and bad where perhaps bad wins(monitarily and perhaps momentarily) more often than not. -- coming back to the question at hand!- should media be regulated?

In order to discourage unfair journalism, may be it is a good idea to introduce "licence" for the journalists -in lines with licence for driving. The idea is to make jornalists more accountabile and more desciplined without compromising on their freedom of expression!
Any unfair/untrue reporting by the journalists would require the licence to be cancelled for a specified period and hence curbing the journalist's right to publish his/her news.

Only catch- This needs to be implemented more like driving licences in the US rather than in India! How many ages would it take to bring it into force--- Is this practical in the land that has produced people like chandra swami and laloo yadav?!!

Or is the process of natural evolution the best and probably the only practical solution?
How long will the common man trust the journalist who writes untrue stories. Some day, he would get eliminated! But-Is the common man indeed the best judge for unethical journalists?

Is the general public mature enough to identify and eliminate the corrupt?-- Only time will say!

But must agree- today the "ruling-party-friendly-DD News" is not even a feeble competitor to independant and bold NDTV!

post 10/19

I hesitate as I write this time. It used to be so easy... to pen my thoughts...when Words blossomed effortlessly and fingers danced on the keyboard. I loved this space. It used to be just mine!

And now, I am diffident.. and may be even cautious!
Nope... I wont stop blogging.. But I guess the post 10/19 blogging in this space will be "different"!

May be for the better!!!

Fire Fire Everywhere...

Sampath and Arun were literally on each other on the Lunch table over "Dress Code in Anna University"!!...:) And boy, This did seem a war among equals.

If sampath hoped his opponent to be like the one who usually gets easily subdued while supporting Mumbai roads ... then ha ha he was in for a HUGE surprise...