BlogStep#5

After you have decided why, what, whom and how, it is important to plan out the goal. I had planned to cover about my perceptive about U.S culture along with my past perceptions and incidences. I am also one among many who never had any desire to step in U.S, at the same time I also longed to see how my birthday was celebrated in U.S. People like me who hesitate to travel to U.S, I would only recommend to visit U.S given a chance just to admire their culture and automated things. The contents in each of my post are 100% true except for four posts. I have covered all possible interesting areas that I adored the most in U.S. It is easy to plan and hard to execute but consistent planning and execution would definitely help to progress. That's exactly what I tried for the past one year. I could not complete my initial count of 365 (which later got down to 360) due to my India trip. As per my original plan I had to post my last write up on 6th August which could give me the correct count of 365. I thought I would compensate for the remaining posts by blogging two topics everyday. But due to hectic work and health conditions I could not even think of writing one everyday so planning to write two on a single day seemed bit impossible. In spite of many deviations and hiccups, I still consider my first step towards writing a big success. I am here with closing my personal blog from this day.

Log Home

Before I close my personal blog I thought of completing my week pending task of writing in detail about our two day stay in log home.

Our trip started on a Friday evening to this place. We are got split into two cars with four and five members in each car. I should also give some good qualities that I like in each of the members in car 1 and car 2.

Car#1 Gang:

If you have to blame me for hanging a camera with me always for any outing then he is the guy you should blame for. He knowingly or unknowingly did a big mistake of forcing me to buy a rechargeable battery due to which I never used my camera for the past one year. What I learnt from this person is the sheer determination, we have tried a lot to brain wash his mind to eat non-veg but he seems to be lot steady and strong to stick to his values and view point.

Building a relationship in a first meet and retaining the same after is not a easy task my friends and I love this person only for this sole reason she knows how to maintain relationship and one gets easily attracted my the way she speaks. kattabomman movie is associated with her for some reason not sure why :)

I have never seen this person lose his temper and not sure how he has trained himself to maintain his nerve to be calm even when things get miserable. If he doesn't find someone agree to his point, he stays silent and saves his energy wisely.

I would set this person as a role model who loves to maintain perfection in everything be it be dancing, singing or teasing or getting ready on time or taking the responsibility to arrange things at home.

Mite be new to our gang but she comfortably mingled with everyone and got close with each of us. Everyone in our gang calls her Mrs. Question mark that is because she poses tooooooo many questions. That is exactly what I like in her.

Car#2 Gang:

She has very good observation and a razor sharp mind. Even during night time she was able to guide our driver. Her presence of mind is something I really appreciate.

He likes to read a lot and if I recall correctly he loves winter season that the time he gets more time to read things online. Well I admire his reading habits.

Many could be talented and knowledgeable but few are modest. I came to know more about this person only after this trip. I respect his humbleness and hidden talent. I damn sure he will soon showcase his talent to everyone in near future.

Person known for energy and enthusiasm also traveled along with this gang in car2.

Day#1 Adventures

we thought we would reach our destination by 10 or so but we stepped our log home close to 12 as we looped around one point for sometime. We all lined up to arrange our things in the log home. Some were arranging kitchen things and some were pulling the luggages from the car. After a tiring drive we all took turns to prepare Dosai and Adai. After so called heavy dinner we all headed to have a night view of the lake. Our log home is almost in the middle of the forest which is lined with lake on one side. The lake was at walk able distance from our log home. We all walked in 4-5 rows with group of 2-3 people in each row. We carried our torch light as it was pitch dark outside. We reached the lake and admired the reflection of water, sound of frogs and grumble of our stomach. After few clicks in the dark we headed back to the log home. It was almost 2-2.30 when everyone went to bed.

Day#2 Adventures

Morning people attacked water melon, bread and kellogs to energize them to canoe for long time. I and one other friend got up at 11 am as we were pretty much unworried about canoeing. First thing that attracted me in the morning was the water bottle arranged with white Nymphaea stellata(Ambal flower). I guessed that our folks had plucked from the lake during their boating. People had gone for many rounds of canoeing and I landed late but ensured I carried my breakfast along even when people pulled me to row in the boat with six people of which five were gals. I had a very interesting ride that day as the canoe was only turning 360 degrees rotation and never navigated to any direction. Everyone in the boat had suggested individual direction that kept the boat turn turn and turn but never allowed it to move in any single direction. Finally we made up our mind and reached the shore.

Close to 1 pm we headed our way to hike in the forest with individual self survival kit of water bottle and snacks. Still I am not sure to what distance we walked as some say 3 and some say 6 miles either way we had a long walk. The weather was very favorable factor to us in the end as it neither poured rain nor appeared hot. There was one who throughout our hiking had a constant eye on the route number and map directions. We walked on sand, ran between tall grasses and jumped on soggy grasses.
Whenever we lost our energy we either sang loud or aimed for flower stem shots on bushy hairs or took snaps or did something really crazy. After 3 hours we reached our log home again. Prepared sumptuous Briyani and passed couple of hours playing phase 10 cards. The game was not interesting as before one could gather cards, someone or the other completed that phase easily if the cards were not shuffled properly. Still we continued to play for four phases. Our head started to ache and eyes wanted to catch a wink. In this state some compromised to stay at home and some were desperately waiting to take bath in the lake. Later we pulled everyone to visit the nearby lake. Oh my god can't express how much fun each of had in playing in the lake water.

After getting refreshed most of them got ready to set the camp fire at 9.30 pm, I was feeling bit weak by then and started to lay flat on the sofa. I went after the fire was high and corn was roasted. After seeing everyone's energy level my level got lot heightened. One side people were roasting sweet corn and on the other side people grilled chicken. After dancing, singing and eating we headed back home.

All of us had decided to sleep only at 3 am that day so we had to find some way to keep ourselves awake. We finally decided to play dumb-c only with Tamil movies. Guys and gals formed separate teams. It was fun confusing our opponent from guessing and giving the right answer. Of the entire movie names only 123 GO retained in our minds for ever as our friend really had a tough time in explaining about this movie to us. Back to bed after having mini breakfast (idli/Chapathi) along with ice cream.


Day#3 Adventures

At least today most of us decided to wake up late in the morning, those who got up early went for another round of canoeing. As we had to vacate the log home by 3P.M we had to complete our cooking, cleaning and packing in a very shot time. We managed everything easily as each of us took responsibility of some task or the other. Half heartedly we all left the place and headed to hear a 30 minutes lecture in wolf center. After the wolf center visit we took a short break in a park to fill in our stomach with Sundal and water melon. As we waited for our friends to gather in the parking lot we decided to play a game and I was the target for this game. My friends tied my eyes and asked me catch them. To spice this game one of my friend suggested me to call out Marko for which my friends would reply back polo just to indicate their positions and move. People clapped, scratched and shouted to hint about the existence of people close to me. It took long time and I was unable to catch hold of anyone at the end I found someone whom I grabbed strongly and there you go our game ended and each gang later pulled their respective cars to drive for a scenic view. After dinner break at pizza hut we all reached home before 3 a.m. That's the end of our sweet memories of our two day stay in log home.

I might have missed out few interesting points from our trip which I guess my friend might help me to recall. Anyway I have tried my best to at least jot down the highlights of our trip.

Life in Chennai

I always tried to keep myself busy with something or the other when I was in Chennai. After joining software industry I hardly found any time for my personal activities. That's when I decided to use my one hour to and fro bus time for personal daily routine. I only remember the days of running from home to the bus stop with a huge back pack on my shoulders, bread sandwich in my left hand and Hindu newspaper in my right hand. I would stand next to someone who usually boards the office bus from my stop, that way I needn't even look up for the bus number. While standing in the bus stop and while travelling to office I read the headlines and editorial section of Hindu Newspaper. After work while returning back home I used to sketch/replicate cartoon pictures from the same newspaper. During night time as I needed light to sketch my drawings I always ensured to occupy the seat right behind the driver. I continued this hectic routine of reading and drawing during my travel time. Too much of anything is good for nothing and that's exactly what I realized when I suffered from severe eye pain. Saturday and Sunday's were usually packed with tennis for 3-4 hours, washing and sleeping. Life probably will not be that busy at least for the next three weeks in my hometown.

My liking

From childhood I have a habit of collecting quotations from news paper, books and magazines. I like to paste spirit boosting quotes around my place. During my school days I had gathered and organized humongous list of quotes that I loved the most. Today When I went through one of the great quote mailed across by my friend I got reminded of my ever loving hobby.

Direct Heat

My sleep was completely disturbed in the morning when I heard this message "Ashwini" application hanged. Well not a big issue but hearing this message my pressure raised a lot as I have been getting back and forth issues and escalations with this application which has almost taken my breathe for the past 3-4 weeks. I was happy last Friday as the application worked as expected. I was under the impression that I will have a peaceful disperse for my India trip coming Saturday. But this application escalation really sucks and sometimes peaks my stress level. Onsite folks in general get the direct heat/tension when the team does not meet client’s deadline and quality deliverables even when things are dependent on clients. Hearing few comments from one of my clients made me feel very bad and pathetic when things really go out of our control. What worked yesterday hangs up today and causes a delay to business and ultimately you are blamed for something unusual that happens all of sudden makes you feel that your efforts are in vain. I felt much stressed out today and didn't even have the energy to do anything much.

Grave Day

Trip was just amazing, I ate for the whole day and slept for at least eight hours. I have promised my friends to write a detailed blog to capture our evergreen memories of our two day stay in the log home. I am damn tired today and will probably find sometime this week to elaborate about our short trip.

Gone

No more offshore calls
No more staring at the monitor
No more bug fixes and requirement analysis
No more status updates
No more follow ups
No more shopping and roaming
No more sleeping for less time
No more tennis
No more blogging
No more eating in rush
No more willing to take deadline pressure

I am refraining all of the above activities just for the next two days. I am gone to live between the woods and lakes just to eat and invigorate.

Konsc

I am very impressed with this person though I know him from March of this year. In our first meet itself he frightened me. Every time I met him he scared me with some blunt comments. I really had a hard time getting along for project related activities. He has high standards, discipline and perfection even for the smallest task whereas I always cared about getting things done and quite often didn't bother how it is done.

He is very straight forward and snappily opens up frank opinions about individual expectations and nature. He is very detailed and elaborate about his findings for any issue. When I ran out of time, I ignore his mail otherwise I go through line by line. He is guy who has helped me to develop great attitude. I can't sometimes believe how people have a sharp memory even when they grow old and this guy is no exception. This guy also reminds me of few great characteristic of my mother.

He is a movie and astrology lover who keeps updating his DVD and space image list.

Today there was lot of lengthy conversation floating across for my next assignment after my vacation break. I am lot afraid to step into core technical side again but at the same time I don't want to miss this wonderful opportunity to work with this great personality.

If I work dedicatedly with this person for the next six months, I am sure to move up to the next level in my career path.

Sick

I fell very sick with few things in life.

Playful

"Please will you leave my hair for a while", is the usual statement that I usually hear from my elder sister whenever I mess with her long beautiful hair. I love to play with her lustrous hair. I completely become deaf whenever she yells at me for doing crazy things with her hair. I and my sister fight a lot for silly matters, and every fight had some concealed love and understanding.

Its been more than three months I am due to cut my hair this week .My roomies took this opportunity to try pony tail with my short hair before shedding out some hair in the saloon. I was not bothering about what they did with my hair as I was seriously focusing on my project issue. But such playful styles with my hair made me recall my wonderful moments with my siblings.

BlogStep#4

When I decided to blog I was very much doubtful about my commitment to blog everyday.
Sometimes I went late to bed due to long offshore calls sometimes I slept early morning at 4 a.m. But what was interesting in spite of my inconsistent bedtime was my determination to write everyday. I ensured I wrote at least one line about my daily activity irrespective of my brain saturation point.

I had tremendous amount of self discipline for the past one year. I feel satisfied for accomplishing my personal assignment.

Faking

My mother throughout my childhood strongly insisted one thing in life "Honesty is the best policy". And I have always followed that even for the simplest things in my life but there were couple of scenario's in the past were I avoided being genuine. Whenever I took a wrong path there was always someone other than my mother to pinpoint "Ashwini" you are deviating from being bona fide.

Such unknowingly/unintentionally committed mistakes always make me feel guilty for long and I really take time to recover from such acts. Today again I realized yet another mistake of mine i.e faking things. First this person sounded very angry on me but when I repented my mistake he smiled back and said anyone in your position would have done the same thing "Ashwini". But I advise you to be original than faking others work. This incident makes it very clear to me that no matter what the situation is, it is always best to be "fair and authentic" .

My lesson for today is be straight and still rather than being short and caught.

Restless

No wonder I will feel restless today after doing some shopping, roaming, playing ping pong and tennis.

Detour

We took a long route due to detour and in between called upon our friends to get some guidance to reach this spot for our mixed doubles tournament. I had a new experience to play tennis on turf today. The weather changed drastically during our match and we didn't play our usual shots this afternoon as we anticipated something whereas the ball turned in different directions because of wind, sand/grass patch and last minute dilemma. This is the first loss for me and my partner in the count of mixed doubles matches played so far. We both took the defeat in right spirit as winning and losing are part of any game.

Boozy D

I heard this word for the first time from my onsite coordinator when I was at offshore few years back. He was inquiring about the annual party from me and threw a blunt question did you booze in the party? The word booze sounded like sizzle to me and I replied back saying yes I did. His voice appeared as if he smirked and continued his questions what did you booze? This question now alerted me that booze has something to do with drinking but I didn't know what drink. I thought I gave him a safe answer by mentioning about water but I was wrong. He continued to shoot the next question which brand? That made me realize he was referring booze as "alcoholic beverage" whereas I interpreted booze as the verb "drink". From then on whenever people mention about booze I knew what they were referring to.

Now how would the situation be if a boozy driver pulls his heavy vehicle, smashes the objects on the road, tries to approach your car as close as possible without giving any indication and pretends as if nothing existed adjacent to his vehicle, bit scary isn't it?.

I had this strange experience today. I am generally afraid of people who booze but after staying at onsite and going for happy hours with clients I only thought most of the Americans enjoy boozing and they consider boozing as one of the socializing occasion. But today's incident makes me rethink about my thought on people who drink. I never ever even dreamt a construction worker who is completely drunk to drive late night that too in front of the cops. Now I get a complete understanding why transportation department insists to avoid driving when drunk.

Soo Good

I love certain qualities of mine such as giving equal chances, treating everyone alike, pulling people to interact and including everyone in all my group activities. I found this characteristic in very few people that I have worked with. Today late afternoon we had a meeting with our client lead, architect and few developers. I was the presenter for this meeting. Over period of time I have gained tremendous amount of confidence in me to do any kind of presentation in front of big leads. In this meeting too I was extremely surefooted that made me answer every question posed by my clients. Every now and then I kept asking my clients if they had any other queries. Out of seven people in the room five of us conversed but two remained silent. At the end we had to pull our manager to consult for his decision so that boils down to one person who did not speak a word during the meeting. My architect was so good that he knew how to pull that taciturn personality to this discussion. He smilingly asked that person to comment on the design from a developer perceptive. I felt very happy when he did that, at same time I also felt bit guilty for missing that initiation from my end. I kept admiring my architect’s attitude for the remaining part of the day. I feel soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good when I come across people who put me back to my original state of valuing individuals opinion.

2nd Time

Last night this time I was almost dead in bed. My stomach was empty and head was heavy. For a second I felt not to think about offshore calls, office work and my personal routine. This incident made me realize how careless I have been straining my body without giving it sufficient rest. It was bit unexpected that I held my head with both my hands and my face flinched while dining out to celebrate our last match for this season. Before reaching the restaurant I was complaining about severe neck pain to my captain and after we reached the spot I was completely speechless. My whole team stared at me as I was making weird expressions. My team members thought dehydration and neck pain probably could have caused me to suffer from headache, thereby everyone tried their trick on my pain. One suggested me to drink plenty of water, few rushed to get me bag of ice and few others cracked jokes to relax my mind. Nothing was having any effect on me. I only wanted to crash myself for an undisturbed sleep. I thought after having meal I would be fine. But I went blank for a while and couldn't realize what was happening around me.

Seeing my state my captain immediately fixed an appointment with chiropractor. My captain quickly paid the bill and pulled me in the car to reach the chiropractor's residence. We drove for long and all of sudden something really troubled me and wanted the car to be stopped. Even during this time my captain was passing some funny comments and the very next second I vomited in the car. After a break we continued our travel to the therapist house. The therapist checked my blood pressure and heart beat rate and then continued with his massage on my neck. Unfortunately nothing seemed to make me better. They arranged for a bucket next to my place to avoid me rushing to the rest room every time to vomit. I met this guy and his family for the first time but everyone in his house were compassionate even during their sleep time. He was another cool guy who was trying to relive by pain by mentioning "Ashwani" it is better you stop serving at 125 mph and start taking tennis bit easy. He sincerely advised me to stop straining myself for at least a week. I was lying on the bed for an hour or so, later without any alternative treatments I had to pull myself to travel back home. Reached home to pull a pillow and sleep immediately. Before I slept I ensured to communicate to my dependents not to disturb me till the next day afternoon.

Second time in my life I have gone through such a miserable state. Unlike last time I had many to help me out this time. Yesterday's incident made me perceive how quickly one should react when someone says "they are not feeling well".

Rush Shopping

I don't love to shop in rush but did one today without any choice.

Firework

My day kick starts with group of friends singing a memorable song for me over phone during their return trip from Niagara. I was feeling very very happy on hearing the song and their wish. I was also delighted to see mails and attend calls from my friends. I love giving and taking surprises as far as this matter is concern. There were only three occasions and three groups (parents, college friends and ELT friends) who were successful in giving me a surprise party.

And today someone has done it again for me. All of sudden unexpectedly someone buzzes the door bell and points my favorite chocolate cake in front of me. I didn't really expect that and was bit stunned but ensured I quickly reacted and got them seated. I was so excited after this incident that I gave all wrong answers to my friends simple questions.

Directions flow from New York to MN to arrange for my day with Friends in and around our apartment. We had an unplanned group potluck which at the end turned out to be a great feast. Finally I crossed my hands to feed cake to my friends and later everyone rushed to watch the American Independence Day firework. Managed to return back home before midnight besides heavy traffic. Day got tweaked in many unanticipated directions but finally things ended well.

2 in one

I got a chance to see a Northern style wedding in U.S. I had to leave with one of my Zimbabwe friend for our friend’s marriage. I was not surprised to see her dressed in American wedding suit but she was bit upset on seeing me covered from neck to toe. This being her first experience of attending an India marriage she had no clue how to deck out for the occasion. She was very concern about her dress and was thinking about crossing her front portion with shawl. We conversed about American, Zimbabwe and Indian wedding style during our 35 minutes drive to the marriage hall.

We were the first ones to reach the spot; we saw an empty hall filled with chair and tables. Later we witnessed few of our friend’s relatives running around to complete the decoration and other arrangements. After few minutes everyone started to show up and my Zimbabwe friend appeared bit relaxed after seeing her college mates dressed in same fashion as hers. I got introduced to many Americans and Chinese people in today's wedding. More or less it appeared as if I was seated in a American wedding as majority were Americans. I heard one repeated sentence from my friend “I can't imagine that our friend is getting married". Hearing this I could only understand how much she was missing the bride.

We waited and waited and there was no sign of bride/bridegroom entering the hall.
Later bride's brother asked everyone to assemble at the entrance to receive the bridegroom. It was fabulous to watch bridegroom's relative’s dance in front of the bridegroom's car. When the bridegroom entered the crowd greeted with a big applause.
The priest chanted some mantra's to welcome the bridegroom and his family. Everyone whispered about the turban that the bridegroom and the relatives had worn. Besides all this talks I found an American camera woman coolly moving around to shoot the marriage pictures.

Now we waited for the arrival of the Bride, we were very eager to see our friend in traditional dress. Someone screamed there she comes under the red dupattah held by four of her brothers. Our friend appeared extremely beautiful in the ornate Indian dress. The bride and bridegroom got seated on floor and went through a long process of Indian pooja. The best part of today's wedding was rice grain neatly packed in a mess cloth wrapped with baby ribbon. Instructions were announced in the mike when the rice grain should be thrown on the couple to bless them. Every one followed the instructions till the end of the wedding.

During the ceremony we dispersed for lunch, took a group snap with our friend and finally waved a bye to everyone in the hall. I had a flavor of both Indian and American style in this marriage. Though the wedding was witnessed by many American friends the spirit of Northern Indian culture existed predominantly in today's marriage. I also liked the adaptability of American's to Indian style wedding.

Old Connection

I felt very happy for linking with my old friends today.

BlogStep#3

Here goes another break point to cover with whom I shared this blog. I circulated my blog to my friends and colleagues. I was very determined about blogging everyday irrespective of whether I got any comments from my friends or not. Believe me comments from my friends were definitely a support factor to boost my confidence.

Few of my friends mailed me personally, few others commented directly in the blog and some called me over phone. There were many of my friends who were against blogging about my personal activities and exposing the same to everyone. Say for example, when I wrote about the fights that I had with my parents for choosing my life partner. Well according to me all the situation that I am going through everyday for sure would have been faced by many. I only thought my blog would help people to correlate their incidences with mine.

Above is just a sample to state that I accepted few valid comments from my friends which I thought made more sense to me and few others I had to compromise with my intended plan and self-thought.

I hope I will get similar encouragement from all my friends for my next assignment in September of this year.

Starling

American women are bold and daring. I always felt they have the full freedom to do what they want to do unlike few restrictions that most of our Indian gals have. One will not find much difference between an American man and woman in aspects of drinking, smoking, eating habits, hair cut, fitness, tolerance level and work culture. In Minnesota people generally say women are more reckless while driving compared to men.
There is no limit set for American women to explore the riskiest job. That is the best part I love about American culture. Clarence Starling is one such character who is very audacious.

Hard Day

Life is getting hard these days just five hours sleep, 3-4 hours for personal task which includes getting ready, having meal and cooking food. I am lot burned out for the past two days with remaining hours with work. Have to figure out a way to get rid of being workaholic.

Pontiac

Had a ride in Pontiac Solace, it was just superb. I had an amazing experience.

Feel Good

I love this character "Archana" from Mozhi Tamil movie, a gal who lives a life filled with unexpectedness. As a normal human being it is very difficult to lead a life without any anticipation. Quite often I always crave for one thing from most of my friends that is a bond of true affection and care. I had many unreliable friends in the past that made me turn into an unthoughtful personality. But today I feel so good that I came across many who really bother about me. My honorable friends some pinged while some called me to inquire why I was not showing any interest to participate in this year’s tennis tournament. In the evening few of my friends were feeding me popcorn and couple others were inquiring about my health. Now in spite of being pooled with such cherubic people, I still have the nature of unexpectedness binding with me somewhere.

Idli

Idli, Dosa and Sambar is frequently eaten South-Indian dish that most of us do not find it that easily in U.S. One has to travel at least a distance of five miles to taste one in U.S. It's a pain to prepare cushy Idli's at home without Indian mixie/grinder. After several attempts we have now learnt the techniques to prepare soft Idli's in U.S, even during severe winter our methods work. Due to drastic climate, quite often it takes long time for Idli batter to puff up. In spite of all pullbacks we ate plenty of Idlis in today's dinner.

Heavy Rain

I had a horrible experience of missing the last bus, travelling in heavy rain and viewing the lightening brightness besides my super Keralite lunch.

Tango

Dance is something I love to watch people do and also at times do like dancing in private. Gone are my college days when I was a part of the group dance and at the end of the show my friends come back asking me to clarify whether our batch gals performed a group or a solo dance? Dance has its wonders in everyone’s soul. I experienced it whenever I was pulled in for a group dance practice. One has the greatest pleasure in life, when one knows to move freely to any kind of tune.

Classical or western dance is just amazing to watch/feel the free movements. I watched different types of couple dances such as Tango, Waltz, and Salsa etc from the movie "Take the Lead". I kept admiring every action of the dancers in this movie even though I pitched in at the later half of the movie

Punctuality

I have heard that Americans are very punctual and do not prefer wasting others time by being late. For this reason during my initial days at onsite I used to go five minutes before the scheduled time for each meeting. My first client was very cool and understandable and never bothered even if I pitched in late, those made me take things for granted. My client’s attitude made me stop worrying about being late for each meeting whenever I was held with some important task.

But there is one person who awfully yelled at me very recently for being late by 2-5 minutes for one appointment. That made me realize how Americans are very concern about being on time. I do not blame him for scolding me but understood the importance of being punctual. That incident switched me back to be on time for any appointments/meetings. It is advisable to go early but never late. Today we had our status meeting with our folks at 5p.m, last time I was the first person to reach the meeting room and after 10-15 minutes people showed up, so this time I decided to start bit late for the meeting. When I opened the meeting room door at 5.10 P.M, I only saw my manager in the big meeting room. After couple of minutes, people came in and the room became quite occupied.

The way Indians value time is completely different from the way Americans do and this is something each one of us have to learn from U.S people of being punctual no matter what and avoid giving excuses.

Busy Bee

Being busy is always good at least for me, as I hardly get time to think about my worries, happiness and sorrows. Day my day I only feel my energy level is increasing in some of my area of interests and completely dying out in the ones I hate the most. In order to retain a proper health conditions I like to lead a balanced life. I can not tolerate when few of my regular activities slip due to my busy schedule. I had to compromise on few things late night which I didn't prefer to do.

BlogStep#2

Penning down why I started to blog on my personal day to day activities. When I decided to blog I had to think for some topic that would trigger me to write everyday. If I were to write on something generic and informative it would be impossible to blog everyday. Thereby I finalized to record small/interesting/unforgettable things in my mundane life. This blog was not written to pass any useful information to others but was solely written only to satisfy my personal needs. I strongly believed and still believe that if one can not express about one-selves, one for sure can not verbalize about any damn thing to others, so started off to see how well and precisely I can utter about my interest to the public.

I had three solid reasons why I wanted to write about myself. I had a penchant to get into management side for which one required a skill set of strong communication both written and oral. This was the strong ground for me to start blogging. August 2009 was also the same month when my parents seriously started to look for my marriage proposals. I was willing to get married to someone who knows and understands my thought flow for at least a year but typical arranged marriages never allow people to interact for such a long tenure. That was the second reason why I decided to write about me for the duration of one year. Over course of time I figured out that I was taking long time to draft even the simplest mail to my friends, which clearly made me realize that I lacked writing skills. To work on my writing skills became the third cause to compose regularly. I hope this post answers the question why "Ashwini" is so disciplined to complete her write up daily.

My favorite GS

I love to watch Wimbledon when compared to other grand slams just for the serene white suits worn by the players. I can not forget last year’s finals between Andy and Roger as I did nothing after waking up in the morning. I didn't brush, I didn't eat, I didn't even move an inch I only focused on the match. It was nail-biting as till the last minute no one could guess who would win 2009 Wimbledon championship. My friends were cursing me as I made them wait for long before heading to team lunch. I kept saying to myself in five minutes I should get ready but every point played was so interesting that I didn't feel like moving. I was very shocked today when I saw the score for round one between Federer and Falla in Wimbledon 2010. Catching up with Wimbledon scroes from this day.

Source of Inspiration

All I did today was sleep, sleep and sleep. I just woke up to have my lunch and went back to slumber again. After a long time I again got into the mode of listening to inspirational speeches. The below link is one such talk that I heard late night today.

http://www.ted.com/talks/ananda_shankar_jayant_fights_cancer_with_a_dance.html

Thriller Tree

The climate was cloudy and water was shaky that’s exactly what we needed for canoeing today. We took four canoes and three kayaks for a seven mile row. As expected I did my photographic work of clicking people while wearing their life jacket, canoeing in the turbulent water and dashing each others small boat. The sail was set and things appeared smooth until one of our friends splashed water on us using the paddle. It was more enjoyable chasing adjacent boats and splashing water on co-rowers. Our aim was to get everyone drenched by swashing but somehow two of our friends escaped from this play. We stopped in between to have our lunch and after 30 minutes break we started to row again. A tree on our left with its branch floating in water grabbed our attention.

As me and my partner were thinking to row towards the tree we steered casually and were excited to experience the thrill of sudden jerk after dashing the tree. Almost close to the same time two of our friends reached the spot and dashed the tree branch which made them lose balance and topple.

As we were pretty close to the tree we tried to see how much we could help our friend who was clinging to the tree branch. We got our canoe close to the branch were our friend was hanging. Before starting our rescue operation we tried to balance our canoe by holding the other side of the branch firmly. We called upon other members of our group to support our canoe but even the slightest touch of other canoes to the tree branch was making us lose the balance. We tried our full strength to pull our hanging friend inside our boat but due to heavy water current and imbalance we could not pull our friend in. In sometime we saw two of our friends approach us in their kayak and we hoped things would get better. To our dismay things worsened as the people who came in kayak tumbled and were pulled away in water so that increases the count of people floating in water.

Now it is just two of us me and my partner who are completely responsible to pull our hanging friend. Even the slightest hit to the branch sometime made us lose balance. Our friend’s neck was between the branch and the canoe any pull or push in wrong direction would only make her choke. When she screamed "I am unable to breath" we had no clue how to handle this situation. I was little afraid when I heard this and was every concern about her neck. At the same time few American rowers surrounded our canoe and tried providing us support to pull our friend. After few minutes of chaos we managed to get our friend in the canoe. Challenge now was to get the canoe out of the branch, I had to duck in my head to pull out and reminded in the same position for a while even after people shouted we are good to go.

After securing people we now had to hunt for the lost kayak and canoe. We found one kayak in the power boat traced by the Taylor falls canoeing operations team. We tried to reach the power boat but kept moving away from it. At last they threw a rope and we pulled ourselves to the back of the power boat to tie the kayak to our canoe. Immediately we tried to row forward but our canoe didn't move even an inch in spite of giving full strength from front and back rowers. I lost my strength at this point and sat still for 2-3 minutes and after a while my friend from back tried hard to move it forward. I took a breath of relief and continued my rowing activity.

Overall the experience of balancing the canoe between the tree branches was very thrilling.

Kiwi

Now everyone in my apartment is falling in love with this fruit kiwi. For the first time me and my roommates tasted this fruit. We were little afraid about wasting the box of Kiwi but now box is almost about to get over. Initially we didn't know how to eat this fruit. We didn't like this fruit when it was ripe as it was sour and tasted like ripe strawberry. After few days this fruit gave a combined taste of banana, mango and peach and it actually tastes amazing. Inner part of the fruit has a great color combination of green and black. Take a look at the fruit.

Shivery Style

Don't be shocked to see people with green or pink or yellow or lavender color hair in U.S. It is common to find people do many crazy things with their hair. It is also odd to view people wear studs on their forehead, nose, lips, tongue, stomach etc. Each individual in U.S have their own dressing sense of which some are appealing and some are awkward. I have never seen such a bizarre eye shadow color until I met this lady on my way back home.

Attitude

Wait something is missing says Mr. Han to Dre. Hmm.. It is attitude. I felt this scene was acted very naturally by Jaden Smith. When I saw the scene from "Karate Kid 2010" movie where Dre's mother goes crazy on repeating the same thing to Dre (played by Jaden Smith) to place his jacket in the stand and not just drop the jacket on the floor. I got reminded of my mother. There were many occasions during my childhood were I took my mother's word for granted. I never bothered as I always liked to trouble my mom. From "Karate Kid" I can only understand how irritating it is for our parents when their kids repeat the same mistake over and over again. I believe it is the predefined attitude that most of us have during our childhood to disobey our parents instructions.

Pick the Rt One

I love all my team members in 3.5 leagues. All are Americans except for me. All know to drive confidently except for me. All are expressive except for me. All are extremely healthy except for me. All wear miniskirt except for me. In spite of many odds between me and my team members they treat me like a kid and always give me free advice. I talk very less but listen more to my seniors in my team. My team members are extremely sweet, friendly and kind. I always feel we have a very strong team spirit. We manage to help each other when required. Everyone in my team has many personal problems but they all pretend being happy.

For the past two weeks we gals from our team have been hanging out for dinner after our weekly matches. Every week someone takes turn to express their concern about being married to the wrong person. Some mentioned they dated for more than 10 years before jumping into marriage. I smiled and thought such things are unimaginative in India. Some betrayals, some fights and some mismatches have caused many in my group to hate married life. However everyone is only advising me to get married to the right person and I am still not sure how and when I will figure who is the right guy for me. They were giving me many tips to choose the right guy. They also conveyed to get married only when I felt I have found my perfect match otherwise they suggested me to stay alone. After hearing many stories today I am very confused about this matter.

Sometimes

There were few occasions that sometimes made me worried for not being married in this age but there are many occasions that give me a felicitous feeling. I personally feel one should explore U.S when one is a bachelor. Life is more thrilling and fun-filling to diagnose unknown adventures here in America. The best part I love being a bachelor in U.S is the "To go boxes" after each party. During festival celebration and birthday parties’ quiet often bachelors are given higher preferences for arranging things. Family people invite bachelors for dinner, or lunch. Today I enjoyed a delicious lunch for a particular event with our friend’s family.

BlogStep#1

It is now time for me to start my count down to end tracking of my daily personal activities. My last blog in this site would be on 23rd July 2010, I have close to 49 posts to reach my initial target count of 360. I will try covering my blogging inspiration in between these 49 posts. Today I would just cover how and who motivated me to blog.

English is the subject that I hated the most during my school and college days. I remember the days when my dad used to bang my head with Wren Martin grammar book at four in the morning. He trained me hard but nothing related to grammar seeped into my mind. I hate writing essays and stories for English exams. I would land up scoring less mark in this favorite subject of mine. As I grew up I gradually understood the importance of this powerful language.

Importance of communication without this language across countries is undoubtedly difficult. Now I regret a lot for not grasping what my dad taught me early morning each day. As I love reading compared to writing I kept reading online materials.

I have been thinking to work on my writing skills for quite sometime but never got the determination to do so. One day someone indirectly sparked my mind. Yearly once we have tennis tournament conducted in MN. And as a part of this event we blog everyday's match covering the full details of the players. Once it so happened that none of the organizers could post for one of the matches played on a particular day. We later had to recommend one of our friends who witnessed the match to write few lines about the match. I was inspired by this person who set a benchmark for my writing skills. He documented the details in just 30 minutes. I was impressed and highly motivated by his noble-minded writing talent.

This incident was the starting point for me to step into blogging area.

MT

Until I reached U.S, this one never slashed me. When I traveled to onsite I believe the exchange rate was 38 and was only hoping it would still diminish. But to my surprise the exchange rate crossed 50's during the recession period. In general many working Indian's prefer doing a money transfer (MT) to family members in India when the exchange rate is high. Some Indians do consider many options such as money2India, remit2India, wells Fargo, NRI account etc. to cut down additional charges involved in money transaction between U.S and India. Mostly when the exchange rate is high one would not have enough bank balance to transfer. I explored a new type of money transfer this afternoon.

Worst and Best

Listening to songs is now part of our special dinner. We are now in the habit of playing worst and best album songs after our heavy meal. Silahaisila is the most popular among our folks for its choreography and brilliant camera tricks :).
Below are few other songs that we enjoyed and teased tonight:

Song about love marriage and this was dedicated to one of my roommates:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TojTlYNNm9w

This song was dedicated to me:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyeJ2dhtvjQ

Ever time favorite:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOtW1IGoYqo

Our ever time worst hit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5MuXo-f3xY&feature=related

Mix of

My day started off with bad news from my dependent members. I was damn exhausted that I could not even sense anyone’s feelings when such news was conveyed to me. After sometime I heard extremely happy news about my new post. I never even dreamed to serve in this post in my lifetime so soon. This new post for sure will transform me a lot and make me more responsible and effective. I have umpteen plans to fulfill my small dreams through this new post. I am eagerly waiting for 1st July to take over my new post. Overall I had a mix of good and bad things today.

Fire Drill

When I was trying to hold my concentration to complete one of the critical tickets there was an announcement for a mock fire drill in our building. It was just not me who said "Oh no" there were couple others who echoed the same phrase along with me. I followed my infrastructure in-charge person to the exit door and moved causally to downstairs.

I was shivering a bit while walking in the windy weather. At last I met couple of friends who sat pretty close to my cube. We talked lot of things for a span of 10-15 minutes. We were bit surprised to see the number of people evacuating from our building as it was more than we had estimated. I don't find any major difference between the drills that I had in India and here.

Other Side

We landed up late by a minute for today's match. But my opponent team was kind enough to permit us play the match after negotiating for a penalty of two game points. I had no time for my warm ups I directly jumped to play the set with a starting score of 0-2. The match was tough and I gave my best to level my point with my opponent's score. I covered all corners of the court and for the first time I felt I was running like Serena Williams from one side to other to return the shots. After every point I had to take a break as our rallies ran for long minutes. I lost my first set with a difference of two points and in the second set; we had to abandon our match due to unavailability of court after 7.30. I felt very disappointed for stopping the match half way through. After all this I chit-chatted with my opponent and came to know that she was fifty years old and also conveyed she has a daughter of my age. I was bit shocked and a lot ashamed for not able to catch up with her running speed in my young age. I was thinking how agile I would be when I would turn fifty.

I complained about missing warm ups and scoring less points against an old lady to my captain. My captain drew many positive points from what happened. My captain mentioned warm ups before the match would have wasted some amount of your energy, skipping warm ups sometimes helps you to perform better. And for losing a set against an old lady is a great experience for you. Think it this way in this age you have competed with the most experienced person and when you grow old you will be damn experienced to play this sport. This consolation from my captain has now made me to look for positive aspects in each match.

GD

I got a broadcast message stating one of my colleague’s sons has a graduation day sometime this month. I ignored the message and kept doing my regular stuff in office. In the afternoon one of my friends bought be a graduate chocolate. Though I admired the design of the chocolate I could not finish eating it completely. People in U.S treat graduation day as one of the special occasion in their life. One can find graduation cards, candies and parties to honor this occasion which is not that popular in India. I feel such occasions would strongly encourage kids and adults to learn more. GD (GRADUATION DAY) also emphasis learning has to be filled with fun and frolic.

Cute and Tiny

I was closing my eyes now and then as I didn't sleep properly last night. I have been trying to concentrate on few things in the evening but couldn't absolutely do so. I have been trying hard to stay awake by talking a lot to my roommate this evening about the birthday party that I attended. After a while, I saw a very tiny being proceed from one direction to other. At first I thought it was due to sudden closing and opening of my eyes I had a weird feeling of movement under the conventional oven. But the feeling stayed for long, I was not sure what was happening around me. Later I saw a very cute creature standing on the kitchen mat. I whispered about this creature to my roommate and asked her to take a peep of the same. It kept moving in small gaps under our dishwasher and oven. We now have no clue how to get rid of this uninvited guest who might cause us some trouble at later point of time. For time being we are just keeping an eye on our living room.

Look who is staying in our house without our knowledge:

At last

As mentioned before I am very crazy about fancy watches. Any shop I enter I first look for watch section. I would quickly scan through to see if anything matches my taste. I have been hunting to get few good collections of watches and finally grabbed one today.

Dating

First time when I heard this word in college I was thinking people were mispronouncing the word "dated" as "dating". During college days, my knowledge was zero in any adult related matters. Now, one can understand how I would have interpreted the meaning of the word "Dating" without referring any dictionary. It was the titillating topic given to two of our friends for a management subject discussion. In the conversation both of my friends projected many plus and minus points about copying the culture of dating in India. All the guys of my class giggled, rolled, blushed and showed all sort of reaction when the talk was given on Dating in front of the whole class. Whereas all missies remained taciturn and motionless. As usual during presentations my mind started to wander and pulled me to think deep inside. I kept questioning myself is "Dating" important and how it would fit in our culture etc. The talk started on Dating and eventually landed in many other funny things related to the after math of implementing Dating in India. I still remember most of the points stated by two of my friends who were assigned with this topic.

After being in U.S for more than two years, now I know the full pledged meaning of dating. And my perception of dating is now completely different from what I had when I was in India. I was inquiring about someone very keenly from my clients during our lunch time. I didn't have any thought of what details I was trying to ask from them. My only intention was to know if it was the same person whom I quite often meet in my toastmasters meeting. After I was done with my questions, my client asked me are you planning to date with him or something? For a second I couldn't control my laughter as I got reminded of my college jokes on "Dating". I quickly chewed in what I had in my mouth and replied her back saying no, I was just interested to know if it was the same person whom I meet on a weekly basis every Tuesday.

Parenting

Parents play a significant role in their child's growth. Collective decision, love and attachment of both mother and father are needed during the upbringing of any child. Broken marriages, frequent fights within parents and detached feelings generally affect the kids in their tender age. Sometimes whenever I hear my clients say my husband’s kids are coming over this weekend, I feel pity for the kids who shuttle among father, mother and second mother. In U.S I have few American friends of my age who are living with divorced mothers married for the second time. Children in U.S have cool mentality when it comes to living with second or third father. I had a wretched feeling when I heard someone say my kids have gone to stay with my wife for six weeks. I have seen both extremes of parenting in U.S.

My Photos

I was feeling bit elated when people commented on the photos taken by me. Of course I am open to learn tips, tricks and to hear constructive feedbacks from my friends to improve my photographic skills. Today I heard couple of people give comforting comments about the photos taken by me during the long weekend. And few of my friends have added themselves as fans for my photo albums. I am stirred a lot to explore and polish my photographic interest from this day.

Adjustment

It is good to fix appointments\reservations well in advance in hospitals and restaurants but at the same time is also essential to make adjustments when needed. Last year, even though I started pretty early from office I landed up late for my eye check up as I was caught in very bad weather. I was not shown any mercy for being late but was only asked to either postpone or cancel the appointment. Such things are bit flexible in India were people try their level best to accommodate facilities when needed. In India one will not feel disappointed if they were late due to unavoidable reasons. Some kind of adjustments are always made to satisfy the customer in India, whereas in U.S no matter even if president Barack Obama shows up at the closing time of a restaurant the employees would only chuck you out by stating it is the closing time. This was the hot topic for today's discussion during dinner time.

Khadhi

I was recognized in college only by my dress. I was a unique creature in my college campus who always loved to wear one and only Khadhi kurtha's. I have some kind of attachment for Khadhi material. I always felt I would have been a freedom fighter in my previous birth. I love to be simple in what I wear. I had tried out Khadhi kurtha's in all possible colors. During my college days few of my friends commented that I looked like a reporter and few others said I resembled a saint. After I started to work lot of things have changed in my dressing style. But still I have a fondness for my Khadhi dresses. Wore one today after a long time.

Hair Straightening

It is fun curling, coloring and straightening hair and trying out completely different look by changing one's hair style. As we are bit away from home, there is no restriction to cut and play a bit with one's hair. Hair straightening is comparatively cheaper in U.S when compared to India. I had a deep sleep in the evening and my sleep was disturbed when I heard our apartment calling bell buzz. All gals from our building were surrounding one of my roommates and commented about her new look after straightening her hair. We took few snaps of her soft straightened hair. She was blushing a lot but still we continued teasing her. We are now brain washing couple other friends to try hair straightening.

Skin Texture

Majority of people in U.S have a clear skin, there could be many reasons such as weather, eating habits and gene etc. for such a good texture. It is difficult to distinguish who belongs to which class of the society. Rich, poor and middle class people all look healthy. I really envy their acne free skin. I had to praise someone's skin texture today morning.

Full Swing

I will continue to write two blogs till tomorrow just to compensate for my long weekend trip. Our preparation is in full swing for our trip, we completed our final round of shopping today. I am also bit excited to visit this place. We have prepared ourselves for all worst weather conditions. Things look pretty planned for the entire day starting from this Friday to Monday. Hopefully we will have a enjoyable journey.

Cope Up

Yesterday my captain kept advising me to wear shorts while playing tennis during summer. She said it is very hot here and as your parents are not around, I think you shouldn't have any issues wearing shorts in U.S. She was very concern that I would get heat stroke if I covered myself completely in this muggy climate. I was explaining how conservative people are from the southern part of the India. She was very insistent to adapt to American culture and climate when needed. And today one of my clients is willing to pull me to taste alcoholic drink. Sometime I really find it hard to cope up with such extreme culture difference in India and America. It is a big challenge for me to be firm and inviolable and stick to our rich Indian culture in U.S.

Recurring Problem

I was sitting next to the meeting room door. Door opened quite often due to wind or lose contact of the knob not sure which one. Every time the door opened I closed it patiently. At one point even I got bit bugged to close the door frequently during the meeting. The very next time when the door opened, my manager and one of my friends quickly rushed to the door. My manager banged the door with full strength while my friend placed a trash box next to the door to keep the door closed till the end of the meeting. Might be simple solutions from both of them to put an end to this door banging problem, but their responsiveness to fix a recurring problem is much praise worthy and is a lesson for me to generate ideas to find a fix for such simple recurring problems in life.

Tennis Glory

Tennis Glory
Today when my manager recognized me by saying I head your tennis glory. I was happy but at the same time I didn't want my name be tagged a lot with tennis when I am in office. Probably now is the time to share how I got pulled into tennis. I was a athlete during my school and college days and played every possible outdoor sport but never trained myself dedicately in a single sport. One of my close friend was very keen to learn tennis and desperately approached me to pair with her for a practice session. I was not too interested to learn this sport as tennis being a rich man's sport in India. I was sure my parents would not like spending money for court fee, racquet, balls etc. Accordning to them sports in general is something a gal can not continue forever. I had many fights at home with my parents on this topic. My friend was very determintant than I was to pull me to learn tennis. She kept shuttling between my home and hostel to meet my parents and convince them to allow me to learn Tennis.

Finally I got a nod from my parents on 12th May and that was the first time I touched a tennis racquet. As I respected my coach a lot, I was very sincere and dedicated during my learning period. I slowly got tremendous interest in tennis and was absolutely crazy playing for 4-5 hours on weekends. I never visited my relatives, attended family functions or hanged out, my only chant during weekdays and weekends was tennis and nothing else. Whenever my mother gave me something to cut in the kitchen, I would first toss the vegetable in air as if I was practicing my serve in the court and later would continue cutting them. I was hitting balls on the living room floor to strengthen my wrist. No matter where I stood, I was always kept moving to and fro to get a proper foot work. My parents were bit afraid on seeing me get mad on this sport. They tried putting me off saying Ashwini remember once you get married you have to get along with your husbands interest so better stop getting much involved in this sport. I ignored their words played played and kept playing.

Once I got into a tough project, I couldn't stick to my old routine of having a regular morning practice. This was the time tennis completely faded out of my life. I hardly found time to play during weekedns. I made up my mind saying probably I would never get another chance to touch my racquet. That was exactly the sametime corporate companies launched olympiad. There was mail a seeking participants for different sports competition. I learned tennis as one of my favorite hobby and never ever imagined to participate in tennis tournments. So I ignored the mail and almost till the last day of the registration. One of my friend knowing my strength spoke with me for hours and convinced me to participate.

For some reason I wanted to win the gold medal in this competion. Afer seeing the number of participant I also thought I could win the medal with ease except for one person i.e my opponent. Everyone who witnessed the practice sessions guranteed that my opponent would win the match, as she had a perfect stroke and powerful shots. I had a tough time to gain self-confidence when there was absolutely no sign of hope on me. I was bit shattered at the start of the match. I only said to myself every single point counts and played very hard from the start of the match. After a tough fight I won the match. This event was a big turning point for me. My name topped the list in the e-mails circulated in office. Few of my colleagues on seeing my name, teased me for saying you didn't have much competition that's why you won etc. I pretended deaf when I heard such things as I knew what I faced.

Only afer this incident my parents supported me to play tennis as much as I wanted. Might not appear as big record achieved by Sania Mirza, but given the circumstances and chances I think I have utilised my potential to a greater extent. That is the story behind my tennis glory.

Abbreviation

I went to meet someone this morning to say I missed to do one of my assigned task. I was very afraid to even mention this to him. I prayed God several times today before opening up this matter to him. He was cool and completely understood my situation and said never mind even I have done such things in the past. That was a sign of relief to me. We later continued to talk about abbreviations and he expressed his difficulty to understand the short forms such as 2mrw and mwc. I took a piece of paper and wrote down the full form of the shortened word. I still remember my first e-mail to one of my clients stating "PFA document". I kept mailing several times with the same abbreviation and assumed they knew the full form of PFA, after couple of months when we met for the team outing, she quietly asked "Ashwini" what does "PFA" stand for and said She came across that word quite often in my mails, that made me understand that not many people in U.S are accustomed to abbreviations.

Approachable

Not that everyone feels comfortable with everyone when it comes to brushing basics. It matters a lot how approachable a person is, to make one comfortable to shoot the silliest question. I was figuring out, whom I should approach to recall and reinvest my interest in project related technologies. I was only listing down the set of people with whom I express things naturally without bothering about what they think of me. Finally I fixed an appointment with the person who topped my list. I spent couple of hours with her today and I definitely had lots of take away from this person. She was very patient to answer my questions and guided me wherever I needed help. I know that she is pretty busy with her work and personal activities but at the same time I was very glad that she spent couple of hours mentoring me. Out of many learning’s today I truly believe she was very approachable in helping me out.

Kids

Whenever I saw American dolls in India, I always wondered how the dolls resembled a blonde and appeared chubby and cute. U.S kids are very attractive due to their healthy skin, fair complexion, pinky lips and colorful dress. My tennis partner was accompanied by his kids for today's morning practice. Both of my friend’s kids were cute and simple. Now after being in U.S for sometime I can correlate that the dolls are exact miniature of American Kids.

Good Habits

I was very excited to meet this person during the happy hour. We both had the same opinion as far as taking care of one's health was concern. She had more knowledge about calorie value, fat types and hormones. She follows a restrict diet compared to what I do. I was glad to know that there are people like me who are very cautious about what they eat. She had many good habits and planned tasks for each day which is exact replica of my nature. She is very particular about sleeping for at least 8 hours every day to maintain a healthy look. For the first time in my life I was hearing someone from IT industry say that they get time to sleep for more than 8 hours. Most of the people working for software companies completely spoil their health by sleeping for 3-6 hours a day. It is very important to focus on one’s health when one is young so that one can stay fit and independent as one grows old. My good habits routine has become even more stronger after talking to this person in the evening. While my colleagues had a great time enjoying their drink and I had my best time discussing about healthy habits on the same table.

Whatever is Meant

One of my friends had got flowers for her parents in India, as her luggage crossed the specified limit; she had to leave few things here. She purchased the artificial flowers with so much of love for her parents and that was one of the things her parents wanted her to carry for them. Without any choice she had to leave the flowers with me. Sometimes I always think whatever is meant for you in life will for sure reach you at the right time. I believe the flowers were meant for my new cube. Decorated my place with those lovely flowers.

Relationship

When we know for sure that we can just shut off the other person by passing on some rude comments when that person is trying to annoy you, it better to control our anger and temper. All that matters in life is relationship no matter who the person is. In corporate world it is important to have a broad smile whenever you want to say something polished. Fighting and arguing is absolutely not advisable as that would ruin our healthy relationship with our colleague. I don't like pretending being good always but when I have to think of maintaining bond with my co-workers I act like a best person in the world who controls all my free emotions. My feelings were kindled today but I just ignored it for this one word "Relationship".

Strange Exp

This morning I could only view the hair of the person standing outside our apartment through the lens. As I was rushing to leave for office, I never even bothered to inquire and quickly opened the door thinking it was one of my friends. To my dismay I saw a middle aged lady holding a crushed piece of paper. She politely asked if she could make a call from my phone. I was not willing to take even 0% risk of letting a stranger in our house; I made up some stories to get rid of her. I locked the door and left to office. On the way I was only thinking what if I lost my mobile in an outing and had to reach my friend, for sure I would have also begged a stranger to make a call. I felt little bad for not helping the woman who knocked our door today but at the same time I cannot risk my personal security in a foreign country. It was a very different and unusual experience for me with the lady.

Many thoughts

My mind is preoccupied with many thoughts today. I am bit disturbed and confused.

Disturbing Mixer

Sometimes I really feel sorry to operate mixer and vacuum cleaner after 8 P.M, but many times we are helpless. We quiet often disturb our neighbors either by making boisterous conversations or by operating noisy electric device. It is said Americans are early sleepers and arousers though there are many exceptional cases. As our apartment is completely constructed using heavy wood, one can hear A-Z of what is happening around in the close by apartments. The wooden walls only serve as a means of partition between rooms and do not absorb any sound generated. Today we operated two mixers at the same time after 8 P.M and ensuring our neighbors were completely troubled.

Genius CC

I prefer watching documentary movies compared to usual ones. After a long time I am staying at home for the whole day. I tried watching the following movie based on the life of Charlie Chaplin. Some are born genius and Charlie Chaplin is one among those. He has been so creative and comical in his profession. Few scenes in this movie are just stunning, to name a few when little Charlie performs at the age of five to rescue his mother from the hit, bread fork dance on the table during the lunch conversation and Charlie becoming short all of the sudden etc.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/101893/chaplin

This movie is worth watching only if you are interested to admire and know the megastar Charlie Chaplin.

Lovable Hug

First time when I saw my client hug my X onsite coordinator in one of the send of parties, I was thinking how come American's can be so affectionate. As far as Indians are concern hugging is something done only among close ones. Giving a hug to a colleague is definitely unimaginable in India. I did not initially like this culture of hugging people to indicate one's affection but later after closely observing the emotions of people, I felt there is nothing wrong to hug when one's mind and heart is free from lust. It is also scientifically proved that touch treatment in any form i.e. hug, kiss, holding hands etc. helps one to be healthy. My building infrastructure in-charge lady gave me a lovable hug late afternoon when I informed her that I would be moving to a new place from Monday.

Rain Rain

It rained again today. In the afternoon it appeared as if it rained heavily. But in the evening I found the parking ground to be dry indicating no sign of rainfall. At least in MN, the place where I am residing the water drainage system is very well constructed and well planned that no water stagnates even after dense rainfall.

Concern of Hair

Hair loss is a big concern for many Indians in U.S. Climatic conditions make our scalp dry which in turn helps in the growth of dandruff. This exfoliation causes tremendous hair fall. Sometimes Indians worry about becoming bald very soon due to excessive use of lead water and drastic change in weather. Someone was very concern about their hair and was keenly inquiring about hair treatment this evening.

Point Five

I can't imagine how people can be sooooo good when it comes to helping me out. I was reluctant to join 3.5 team for the only reason I had no car and was absolutely unwilling to depend on someone for my ride to the indoor courts. My captain insisted me to join the team and asked me to stop bothering about my transportation. As my captain was out of town for today's match, until yesterday I was only planning to book a cab to reach the court. One of my team members knowing my state dropped a mail yesterday night stating that she would give me a ride to and fro. I was shocked, stunned and happy to know there are people who are willing to keep my tennis spirit. I still remember the days of fight that I had with my parents when I started to play tennis, my friend’s encouragement and support made me get associated with this sport for few years now. Sometimes fear surmounts when I think, I might have to give up this sport if I get married to someone who has absolutely no interest in tennis or if my health gets spoilt.

In U.S it is easy to keep up once tennis hunger as one can find people through USTA, Medtronic etc. I was winning all the matches in 3.0 leagues and now I am losing all matches in 3.5. It is just a difference of point five in the rating but that speaks a lot about the players. In 3.0, one can score points by focusing on the opponents weak points, but in 3.5 your opponent is equally proficient in volley, lob, drop, serve and returns. One can experience long rallies and movements in 3.5 leagues. One has to be very fit to compete in 3.5. It is mix of stamina, stroke and slice in 3.5. I have been playing singles for the past two weeks and I found the matches to be very challenging. Today's match I ramped from a score of 0-4 to 7-5 and later lost my stamina and completely gave up the second set without scoring even a single game point. We winded up the match after playing a neck to neck tie break. I was not worrying much about losing today’s match but felt glad for knowing my areas of improvement through many amazing tennis players in 3.5 league.

Still Under

Weather plays a crucial role in determining the deadlines for any construction. I have been noticing orange tags and sign boards in most of the streets today. Unlike Indians, people here use many sophisticated machines to get their construction done easily, quickly and safely.

Surf Excel

I found many Indians in U.S, who still value anything given by their parents, so do I. I am very sentimental when it comes to any small thing given by my loved ones. My parents had packed minimal amount of food items and detergents for my trip to U.S. At any given point of time I didn't ever feel like trashing any of the items given by my parents. Today I threw the emptied surf excel pack which I carried along with me couple of years back. Bit satisfied for the fact I kept carrying surf excel pack for the past two years, even when I moved from one apartment to other.

Active Day

It started at 6 today morning running actively to visit wet tennis court and later marching to Temple. I cann't express how much I enjoyed cooking and serving food for people visiting the temple this afternoon. I now completely know how to handle and treat people after today's incident. Cricket, bean bag and reception party made me have a racy evening. Overall few clicks of group photos and interaction with different category of people has made me become more active and naughty.

G Friend

Few years back, I was shocked to see my client’s son with his gal friend in one of the photos placed at her desk. I was questioning your son is just sixteen years old but still has a girl friend, she grinned and conveyed teens in U.S mandatorily have a gal or boy friend. I can not ever imagine having a boy friend when I was sixteen. Probably most of Indian teens would have undergone the phase of having crush on someone during school and college days but for sure we would not have expressed such matters to our parents. In U.S, teens share their puppy love with their parents. In a way I strongly feel parents should help juveniles to come out of such temporary feelings when needed. Highlight of today's dinner was when I heard my little friend say he doesn't have a gal friend and that is a problem.

Initiative

It is always a question mark when it comes to keeping in touch with our old friends or extending our hand with a new friend.
I quite often think my friends are busy and never ever bothered to mail or talk to them.

I believe my friends do have similar thinking which restrained them to keep in touch. At least I take the responsibility to occasionally mail across people to know what is happening on their side. It is usually me who puts out the hand to introduce myself to new people or to converse; today someone else took a bold initiative to shake hands with me. I like such personalities who are proactive in maintaining and establishing quick relationship.

Red-hot

These days I am bit concern whenever I get a big pimple on my face as I have plans to visit my parents in couple of months. I don't want to hear saggy comments from my parents such as "why I was not taking care of myself", “I look weak/pale” etc. I am eating well and not worrying about gaining weight. Now I am only thinking of impressing my parents with all my learning’s from U.S life style. Not sure how many gallons of water I drank today to keep my body cool. Feeling very stressed out and heated up today.

Nite out

After a long time I am doing a night out today.

Making a Wait

I do not actually like people waiting for me but most of the time I land up making people wait for me. I would have said "yes" to my friends to leave home and the very next minute either someone would have called me or stopped by at my desk. I can not be rude to the person talking to me by saying "hey listen I got to pack home now, talk to you later". I have to spend couple of minutes chit-chatting and later convey the message you know what my friends are waiting for my arrival to disperse home. Today I disappointed two of my friends by making them wait for 20-30 minutes.

Veggie

It is sometimes difficult to explain how few vegetables such as avocado, celery, broccoli, artichoke, jalapeno and asparagus look like to our relatives in India. U.S has a mix of vegetables and fruits from all over the world, few of which we could have never heard, imagined or seen in India. Explained about broccoli to someone today.

Pets

Pets such as puppies, kitten, rat and mice etc. have a great and cherishing life in U.S. Americans really treat pets as one of their family members. Today most of us were either hiding or running to protect ourselves from the site of gigantic and different varieties of dogs on our expedition to pot hole in Taylors falls.

Still Hunting

Hunting for my flight tickets to India.

Getting Tough

Life is getting busy these days that I am hardly focusing on any of my pleasurable things.

Feeling Little

Missing home today for some reason. Everything seems very boring and monotonous to me. My energy and enthusiasm is at zero level. Feeling bit homesick and strongly need a long break.

Cushy Work

There was a time when I used to panic for every stressful scenario at work. I am bit experienced now to handle any pressurizing situations with ease. I keep my head cool even though tension reflects in my face. These days I think there is always a way out to get things done and there is never a dead end for any issues in life. My day started with highly intensified critical issue which made me feel numb for 15-20 minutes. I later found a solution unlike my past days in this industry were I would quite often go back saying there is no way out in this world to fix this defect.

Screwing Up

At the last minute I screwed up my friends plan, thinking that she too thought the same way as I did. I had to console her and later beg her to forgive me for such a big mess up. Sometimes it becomes essential to think in others angle and shouldn't always take matters for granted was my learning today.

Walk Around

I had a pleasurable evening by paying a visit to Minnehaha falls(http://www.minneapolisparks.org/default.asp?PageID=4&parkid=252) with my group. We walked along the flow of falls water. We crossed many danger sign posts and kept walking till we saw a bridge and some people. We crunched some snacks and cracked some jokes during our walk. As we stopped a lot in between to take many scenic snaps during our forward journey, it appeared as if we spent more time to reach our destination. While returning back it was bit dark and everyone sped up a bit, thereby reaching our parking area pretty soon. This break definitely made me feel very relaxed today.

Flash

In the morning it appeared someone flashed a strong beam of light on my face. Though my head was covered with the blanket, I could still sense the effect of light in my eyes. I only thought for a second how dare this person was to flash light on me to wake me up in the morning. I quickly pulled my blanket off my face to get hold of the flash light and I figured that it was the lightening that dashed me through the window. When I peeped out of my window I saw rain accompanied with thunderstorms and lightening. I slowly turned my head towards my room. My room was dark and I said to myself what a perfect weather to catch a wink and later pulled back my blanket for another dose of sleep.

Respect

Appearance is deceptive is what I concluded after meeting this lady. When I met her for the first time a month back I thought she was rude, stern and unkind. Today when she discussed about respecting elders and how disgusting it was to see people disrespect Barack Obama and presidency post in the media. I understood how diplomatic she was. She continued saying that her generation knew to respect people irrespective of anyone's age. She talked like a sweet mom who wants to raise her kid with all good habits. No matter whether you are in U.S or in India it is important to respect people and their positions. It is always better to give and take respect when it comes to people.

Vivid Reading

I have noticed Americans read books while having lunch, while travelling and while waiting. It is very interesting to see people buried in what they read. I always adored this habit in Americans and appreciated someone in my group for her multitasking talent to read her new book during her break times in spite of tough work routine.

Net Test

Slow internet connection is testing my patience today.

Change

Even small changes in life can open new ventures. Someone asked me to gear up for relocation soon. I am bit excited to see the new environment and people starting from May. I am pretty sure things are happening for my good and hope this change would make me a better personality.

Usual Comedy

I have myopia (short sightedness which means far off objects appear blurred). To me anyone standing at a distance of 50 meters appear completely unknown to me. I can only see the body, head appears pretty much obscure to me. I quiet often have the habit of waving or giving a broad smile to people as an acknowledgement of saying "hi" to them. I have got many nose cuts due to my poor vision. Quiet often people would have waved hand to someone coming behind me and I would have waved them back, only when I get closer I would have realized that the person whom I wished was a complete stranger to me. So these days I smile only when I know for sure of the person who is crossing me. Today late afternoon I was exiting from north wing and saw few people exiting from the south wing. One among them waved his hand as I was not sure whom it was, I didn’t react much and immediately took a turn. Later when I met him closer at the turn I realized it was one of my friends. I had to say sorry many times for my ill-manner though done unknowingly.

Interesting

It is very interesting to know that there is no accommodation for English to Sanskrit translation in Google Translate. Sanskrit is one of historical languages in India which forms the base for many other common languages. I was searching a bit to find few Sanskrit translations today. Anyway adding Sanskrit to Google translate is not worthy too as this language is no longer used in written and oral communication these days.

Perky

Following two songs are lingering a lot in my mind and making me feel cheerful:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8sKjhXldcE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb2si7fClqA&feature=related

Smiley

Sometimes I wonder how people can keep smiling even if their job sucks, pressure mounts and emotion pours. On seeing such people I feel little jealous for the fact that I am unable to keep up constant happiness and optimism level even if my mood changes drastically. I have recorded two people in mind who have taught me to keep twinkly no matter what happens as smile is a sign of spreading joy to others.

3 GEM

Quiet often we three hardly get time to chit-chat, as either of us would be completely drained out. Today all three were bit excited and brisk to discuss few fishy topics. We had so much of fun that I can't express how much we are enjoying our bachelor life. We are those three monkey models set by Mahatma Gandhi, hear no evil, speak no evil and see no evil. We three were only discussing, seeing and listening to all mirthful incidences this evening. This comic reminded me of my sister who calls me “GEM” when she wants something done from me and after the work is completed she would expand GEM for "Ginger eating monkey". All three of my mates behaved like a GEM but not sure in which angle.

GEB

My client asked me if I was aware of Gödel, Escher and Bach. I passively nodded my head conveying "no". He posed me couple of questions such as do natural numbers and even numbers have the same or different infinite values, how about real numbers and natural number etc. By fluke I gave the right answer. This topic came in today's meeting as he wanted to share few thoughts on his current reading of "I am a strange loop" book. My client loves to read technical books that associates mind with mathematical theories. I can not ever reckon reading one in my lifetime as I always considered such books to be very vague and boring. Such books would for sure make me sleepy. Following tidbit from Wikipedia would give some idea about GEB to those like me who do not have any knowledge about GEB.

Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (commonly GEB) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Douglas Hofstadter,[1] described by the author as "a metaphorical fugue on minds and machines in the spirit of Lewis Carroll".[2]

On its surface, GEB examines logician Kurt Gödel, artist M. C. Escher and composer Johann Sebastian Bach, discussing common themes in their work and lives. At a deeper level, the book is a detailed and subtle exposition of concepts fundamental to mathematics, symmetry, and intelligence.

Through illustration and analysis, the book discusses how self-reference and formal rules allow systems to acquire meaning despite being made of "meaningless" elements. It also discusses what it means to communicate, how knowledge can be represented and stored, the methods and limitations of symbolic representation, and even the fundamental notion of "meaning" itself.

Another Family

We all belong to different culture, country and custom but still we behave as we if we all belong to one community when it comes to speaking. The count for today’s meeting was less than the usual number. And this small crowd was the one which made the whole meeting more attached and friendly. Today's theme was "career change", there wasn't any in the group who really loved what they were currently doing. Due to economical circumstances and family status many had forced themselves to work in the sectors that fetched them more money. It was very interesting to hear people’s true ambitions in life. I heard one say he wanted to study Geo-physics, one preferred being an ice cream seller from childhood just because she loves ice cream and other friend mentioned about switching job as he finds his current one to be monotonous.

Great stories were shared by everyone today and our mind was only floating in the dream world for that one hour between 11.30 A.M to 12.30 P.M. People were surprised when I mentioned that I would have preferred to rope myself in drawing and painting profession. My members know that I am passionate about tennis but none knew that my childhood strength lies in arts and crafts. I thoroughly enjoyed sharing my opinions with my members open heartedly. I always get a feeling that I am with my own family members when it comes to expressing my feelings frankly.

Registration

It all started this afternoon when one of my friends mentioned about registering my new bike. I did not believe him at first but later I had to trust him for the fact he too has a bike for quiet some time. In the evening at the tennis court when one of my friends inquired about my cycle, I again touched upon bike registration concept to him. He started to laugh and kept saying that I was fooled and there is no such thing for bikes.

I am still not sure how far things are true with regard to bike registration. But for sure there is a concept of bike registration in U.S is what I understand from the following sites:

http://www.dot.state.mn.us/bike/
http://www.nationalbikeregistry.com/register.html

Anyway this bike registration topic has made me, my roomies and couple other friends giggle a lot the whole afternoon, evening and night.

Small World

Living a delightful life in my small world filled with adventures, thrills and frivolousness. Doing things which do not take me anywhere in life but things which makes my heart feel light, peaceful and happy. Took a ride in my new cycle (referred as bike in U.S) this evening. I am no longer thinking big, competing with others and chasing my dreams. I am not worried about where I would stand in life. I am not concerned about what would happen to me even for the next second. I am only trapped in this tiny world of mine filled with small small wishes in my life.

Lucky Lindsay

I was the last one to reach the hall to have my breakfast with my favorite women tennis player. I got seated and immediately someone called my name I wasn't even sure why they called me, without bothering much I quickly ran towards them. For a second I didn't even realize what was happening, they asked me to pronounce my name in the mike I just mentioned by first name and came back to my table.

After couple of minutes someone approached me and handed me a bag and mentioned that I won one of the lucky draw prizes. I can't express how happy I was for that second. I gave a broad smile and quickly grabbed my prize. As I was very eager to know what was inside, I opened the bag the very next minute. I found two wine bottles handed over to me in a black bag. I was not sure whether I should still consider myself lucky for having wine bottles which I thought was absolutely of no use to me. Just after this incident my star Lindsay Davenport arrived. Everyone commented on her height (6.2 inch), as she was the tallest among us.

Some big wig introduced Lindsay to us and then she talked few words about herself. Later the hall was open for questions from the audience. Lindsay answered all the questions energetically and jovially. Sports personalities in general are known to be very active, confident, alert and outgoing; Lindsay undoubtedly was not an exception to those characteristics. After the Q&A session we took a group photo with Lindsay Davenport. I met few known faces in today's event and I was in a very excited state for the remaining part of the day.

Dates

My teammate thanked me for placing the dates box at my desk. Looks like those dates helped people to regain some energy in the evening when they were completely enfeebled. I was very glad to hear that. Under normal circumstances none of my teammates would ever prefer to take pitted dates. People have stamped me as a person who is too health conscious, as quiet often I stock only salubrious goodies at my desk. Now I feel very happy to see my teammates adhere to healthy diet at least when they feel hungry.

Backup

When I was in college I had no plans in life so there was never a possibility to think about backup plans. But after stepping into software industry I have learnt the importance of making main/alternative/backup/contingency plans in project. I have even observed people follow similar strategies in every single task they do in their daily life. But I can't imagine having backup for backup for backup for backup plan. Someone today mentioned backing up codes in four different locations, it sounded as if he was extra cautious but on the other hand I also felt, there was nothing wrong in having multiple backups for something very precious.

Fire Day

I woke up this morning on the buzz of a phone call from some unknown caller. "Ashwini" someone freaked out over phone, you haven't logged in for the session at 8 A.M, I could not react anything immediately as my ear and nose was partially blocked. I pulled myself hard and logged in my inbox to trace out the bridge number details. By the time I logged in, people had already winded up the conference call. I only saw chain of escalation mails flowing in my inbox. On seeing the mails I only said to myself "Wow what a day". My mood became still worse on reaching office as I had to work on some compounded critical issues in my project. I was feeling very miserable today. I tried recalling all "great quotes" which people once taught me to use when I get pressurized at work.

Dosing Off

Somehow I was unable to open my eyes and see the monitor. I felt warm and sick to do anything today. I was only in search of Kleenex tissues during my meetings in the conference rooms. Few suggested me to pack home on seeing the number of tissues I used. Feeling sleepy and drained.

Bless you

My elder sister taught me to say "Excuse me" whenever I sneezed but today my client taught me to say "Bless you" for every single sneeze. I sneezed 4-5 times in the meeting and my client gave a smile and kept saying "Bless you". If I was in his position I would not have blessed the person more than once. Through my client I got many blessings from God today.

Gift Used

At last I got a chance to use the gift given by my Grandma two years back. Had several shots taken after wrapping the gift around me. Everyone in today's Easter dinner liked its color including me. Had a buzzing dinner with new set of extremely tall people.

Kani Lingam

Angadi Theru Tamil movie might not be entertaining to many but it is definitely worth watching to understand how grateful each one of us should be, for having a good life when compared to others living under the poverty line. The movie makes one to know the other side of the real world. The movie completely states the list of problems faced by any youngster when he/she takes the family burden due to misfortune.

I could not catch up with many dialogues, as the Tamil slang used in this movie is completely different from what I am generally used to. The feeling of job insecurity, family love and finance pressure is neatly portrayed through two main characters Kani (Heroine) and Lingam (Hero) in the movie. Both these characters have created a very strong impression in my heart to treat “people as people” irrespective of their positions in life.

Characters

Few characters just walk in and walk out in our life. I met a new strange, unexpected character this afternoon. This character actually made me feel better. Though I know for sure this character would walk out of my life very soon but still enjoyed its stay even for a short duration.

Moving Motorcycle

I and my friend saw a gal drive the motorcycle few feet ahead of us. We kept watching how she rode the motorbike on our way to office. Her turns were sharp and she drove the motorbike with a moderate speed. At last we all reached the same parking lot; we saw her move around the parking lot to find a suitable spot for her super cool motorcycle. The parking lot was congested with cars and one could hardly find two wheelers in the parking area. As motorbikes are expensive than cars and due to climatic conditions people here prefer to have cars than two wheelers which is just opposite to what exists in my country.

M to S

It is that part of the year were one has to start using sunscreen lotion and stop applying moisturizing cream. The temperature was above 70 F today and I enjoyed the moment of free walk without wearing those heavy winter jackets, leather gloves and ear mufflers.

No Bar

We are still living in the old Indian tradition when it comes to marriage. Generations have passed but we still continue the same trend of marrying people within our caste. I am not sure why our parents are so insistent to get married to someone from the same religion, caste and region. I am not even sure how many of our parents would accept us marrying to someone from a different family tree. Such meaningless restriction to inter caste marriages makes no sense to personalities like me who is a follower of great Tamil poet Subramanya Bharathi. Survival with anyone after marriage is possible if one follows the three rules of marriage that is true love, unshakeable trust and deep understanding. One can find specification for castes, religion in many matrimonial sites and new paper, eagerly waiting for the arrival of that day when one can see adds stating "No bar" for the bride/bridegroom. At least Americans don’t bother much about caste and religion in marriage matters. I had a discussion on this topic with few of my friends this evening.

Made it

My day started with the hum of "Give me some sunshine" song from 3-idiots movie.
I kept humming this song for the whole day. I thrummed so many times that even my biz partner started to hum along with me in the office. He is a kind of person who never even opens his mouth even to talk; I need to pat myself for making someone sing this song along with me. That was one of the greatest achievement I made today.